[Daily Nation (Kenya)] Detectives investigating Friday's attacks on coppers are scheduled to hand in their forensic report to the Commissioner of Police on Monday.
The report, compiled by detectives from the Bomb Disposal and Anti-Terrorism Police units, reveals the attackers used grenades whose source is still under investigation.
"Grenades were used in both attacks but police want to know their source," a senior officer, who sought anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the matter, said.
"A preliminary report is scheduled to be handed over to the Commissioner of Police but a final one will be compiled later after the joint Kenya police and FBI investigation," the officer told the Nation.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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The Doha-based broadcasters coverage is crafted to exert or relieve pressure on other countries in order to suit Qatars diplomatic agenda, the dispatches suggest.
Joseph LeBaron. the US ambassador to Qatar, reported to Washington in November last year that the channel could be used as a bargaining tool to repair relationships with other countries, particularly those soured by al-Jazeera's broadcasts, including the United States".
In another cable that July, he claimed that the channel "has proved itself a useful tool for the station's political masters.
[Emirates 24/7] Abu Dhabi Police have foiled an attempt by two Arab forgerers to circulate fake $14 million and jugged them in a well-planned trap by the police sleuths.
Colonel Saeed Al Nuaimi, Deputy Director of Criminal Investigations Department, said the operation codenamed 'Storm of Black Dollars' which was criminal masterminded by two Arab men - a 49-year-old oil accountant and a 40-year-old businessman - was considered one of the most dangerous crimes of forgery busted recently.
"The criminal laboratory has confirmed the dollar notes were not original and they were nothing more than a package of dollar-sized white and black blank papers," he noted.
The two suspects could face jail terms ranging between 15 years and life imprisonment in addition to finacial fines.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
The FED does this, except that they have top of the line paper money printers, and they do not get jugged for counterfeiting.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/06/2010 2:56 Comments ||
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#2
Yes, Alaska Paul, and $14M is just pocket change.
[Yemen Post] Parliament approved on Sunday to summon Deputy Prime Minister for Defense and Security Affairs, Minister for Local Administration, Dr Rashad Al-Alimi after WikiLeaks said he lied to Parliament about Arclight airstrikes in Yemen.
In its latest revelations, the WikiLeaks Organization said Al-Alimi lied to Parliament when he said the U.S. Arclight airstrikes against suspected AQAP hideouts and positions, some of which killed innocents in the south, were carried out by the Yemeni forces.
The organization said Saleh covered up the U.S. military role in his country quoting him as saying: " We'll continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours [the U.S.].
It said Saleh's comment prompted Al-Alimi "to joke that he had just 'lied' by telling Parliament" that the U.S.-made bombs were used in attacks by Yemeni forces.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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The economy, and the fact that they're running out of water...
[Iran Press TV] Yemen's Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Kurbi says the main challenge facing his country is the economic development, and not the al-Qaeda terrorist group.
"Stability is linked to development. Stability cannot be achieved without development," Kurbi said on the sidelines of a security conference in Manama, Bahrain, on Sunday.
The Yemeni top diplomat's comments come as the United States has raised concerns over what it calls the presence of al-Qaeda members in southern Yemen, claiming that the group is trying to use Yemen as a launch pad for terrorist attacks in America.
Kurbi also noted that 30 percent of 23 million population of the country are jobless while the population is constantly on the rise.
Meanwhile, ...back at the ranch... the country's oil exports have declined by 50 percent over the past four years, which has drastically affected the government.
The poverty-stricken non-OPEC member produces about 300,000 barrels of oil per day, which accounts for 70 percent of state revenues.
Kurbi said his country is in dire need of economic aid and was counting heavily on the international support group Friends of Yemen meeting, scheduled for late February or early March in Riyadh, Soddy Arabia.
Earlier in September, the foreign minister had said that only 15 percent of about $5.7 billion of aid pledged at the 2006 London conference has been disbursed.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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Soddy Arabia is the world's largest source of funds for terrorist groups such as the Afghan Taliban and Lashkar-e-Taiba -- but the Saudi government is reluctant to stem the flow of money, according to a report by The Guardian quoting Hillary Clinton. ... sometimes described as the Smartest Woman in the World and at other times as Mrs. Bill...
"More needs to be done since Soddy Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al Qaeda, the Taliban, LeT and other terrorist groups," says a secret December 2009 paper signed by the US secretary of state. Her memo urged US diplomats to redouble their efforts to stop Gulf money reaching Islamic fascistiin Pakistain and Afghanistan.
"Donors in Soddy Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide," she said. Three other Arab countries are listed as sources of terrorist money -- Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.
The other major headache for the US in the Gulf region is the UAE. The Afghan Taliban and their partners, the Haqqani network, earn "significant funds" through UAE-based businesses, according to one report. The Taliban extort money from the large Pakhtun community in the UAE.
Kuwait is also described as a "source of funds and a key transit point" for al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. While the government has acted against attacks on its own soil, it is "less inclined to take action against Kuwait-based financiers and controllers plotting attacks outside of Kuwait".
There is little information about hard boy fundraising in the fourth Gulf country singled out, Qatar, other than to say its "overall level of counter-terrorism cooperation with the US is considered the worst in the region".
Resistance: But foreign leaders have resisted US pressure for more aggressive crackdowns on suspected supporters of terrorism, according to The New York Times. In private meetings, they have accused US officials of pursuing Arab charities and individuals in a heavy-handed manner and on thin evidence.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
If only we didnt need their oil the gloves would be off by now!
Google Translate
Early in his presidency, Felipe Calderon attempted to negotiate with top drug cartels in Mexico in an attempt to get them to tamp down on the violence, according to a published report by the Mexican weekly Proceso.
Between 2008 and 2009, disgraced Mexican general Mario Arturo Acosta Chaparro met with the heads of La Familia, Los Zetas, Beltran-Leyva, the Juarez and the Sinaloa cartels to try to ask them to reduce violence.
The report says that US intelligence services were aware of the meetings, and even had a video of one meeting between Acotsa Chaparro and Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano, alias El Lazca, head of Los Zetas, held in Matamoros, Tamaulipas.
Inasmuch as Acosta Chaparro was an intelligence expert, Caldeon's choice of an emmissary was an astonishing one in view of Acosta Chaparro's past.
The General prosecuted Mexico's Dirty war in the 1960s and 1970s, and until he was selected by Calderon, was facing charges of crimes relating to the war and drug smuggling charges. All of the charges against the general were dropped in exchange for his help in negotiating with the cartels.
A book recently published by Mexican journalist Anabel Hernandez, The Drug Lords, identified one character in the account as "General X". It is now confirmed that Acosta Chaparro was "General X".
#2
Felipe Calderon attempted to negotiate with top drug cartels..
One corrupt caste negotiates with one corrupt cartel. Madero, Diaz, Villa. The names of the actors have changed but its the same story in Mexico as it was a hundred years ago.
I just wanted to post a pointer to the previous post of this link back on Friday Afternoon here.
A confidential State Department cable made public this week highlights China's role in the U.S.-led war on terrorism.
The U.S. ambassador in far-off Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, confronted China's ambassador about a covert attempt by Beijing to bribe the government there to shut down the strategic U.S. military transit base at Manas in exchange for $3 billion in cash. So he went and confronted the ambassador, therefore burning the source for apparently no concrete benefit.
Also, you pretty much told the Chinese the important parts. Why didn't you tell us too?
The Feb. 13, 2009, cable signed by Ambassador Tatiana C. Gfoeller revealed that Chinese Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan Zhang Yannian "did not deny categorically" the covert cash offer to close the base, which is a major transit and refueling point for U.S. troops and supplies heading into northern Afghanistan.
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain ||
12/06/2010 00:33 ||
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[Iran Press TV] North Korean media has warned the South against holding more joint military exercises with the United States near their disputed sea border.
"The political situation on the Korean peninsula is reaching an uncontrollable extreme level by the frantic provocations of the puppet group. No one can predict what this situation will turn into," said a news reader on the state television.
South Korea plans to stage a naval firing drill, possibly as soon as Monday.
That is going to be the latest in a flurry of exercises by Seoul after Pyongyang's attack on a South Korean island last month. The maneuvers included joint exercises with the United States.
The North has warned that the situation is reaching an uncontrollably extreme level. It says a war between the two Koreas will seriously affect peace and security not only on the Korean Peninsula but in the entire region.
"We are now maintaining maximum self-possession and self-control. If a full-scale war breaks out between the North and South, it will seriously affect peace and security not only on the Korean Peninsula but in the rest of the region," a statement released by the official KCNA added.
The joint military exercise came after an artillery exchange between the South and the North resulted in the deaths of four South Koreans.
North Korea has warned that the war games could bring the Koreas closer to the brink of war.
Pyongyang accuses US President Barack B.O. Obama of plotting with regional allies to topple the country's government, insisting that its nuclear program is a deterrent against US forces in the region.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
ION TOPIX > {Gulf Times] SEOUL VOWS TO BATTER NORTH INTO SUBMISSION.
ARTIC = NEW ROK DefMin vows that, iff attacked again by DPRK, THE ROK WILL NOT STOP/CEASE ITS MIL RETALIATION = MILSTRIKES AGZ NORTH UNTIL PYONGYANG SURRENDERS = BOMBED INTO KIMCHEE- WEENIES.
and
* PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > FORMER USFK COMMANDER: IFF CHINA GOES TO WAR [agz US = US-Allies oer North Korea] WE WILL MAKE IT GO BACK 100 YEARS, espec as per Chin's economy.
#2
PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > RUSSIA + CHINA IN BIG TROUBLE | US BUILDS ASIAN MILITARY ALLIANCE AGZ CHINA + RUSSIA.
and
* SAME > WIKILEAKS CABLE REVEALS [former Aussie PM] KEVIN RUDD'S PLAN FOR "PARANOID" CHINA + PAKISTAN; + PEOPLES DAILY FORUM > AUSTRALIA WARNED US TO BE PREPARED TO USE MILITARY FORCE AGZ CHINA, espec iff anything went seriously wrong in US campaign agz MilTerrs in AFPAK.
ARTIC > IIUC, EX-AUS PM RUDD > IMO may believe that CHINA + ITS NUC ARSENAL will be next on the MILTERR jihad = hit list once the US-NATO are effec defeated in AFPAK. THE CCCC = now PCS + PLA WILL "HARDEN" THEMSELVES + BECOM MIL BELLIGERENT IN ORDER TO STOP THE MILTERR EXPANSION INTO NUC CHINA, ESPEC IFF THE MILTERRS POSSESS ASYMETRIC NUCMILTECHS.
IOW, POST-AFPAK + US FAILURE = NUC CHINA MAY NEED HELP FROM NUC US-ALLIES/NATO TO STOP NUC TERROR-JIHAD FROM CONQUERING EAST ASIA.
#3
I'm getting very tired of NORK's blabbering, It reminds me of a tree full of monkeys all screaming at the top of their lungs, and just as important.
All it really is is a child screaming for attention.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
12/06/2010 10:54 Comments ||
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#4
China is in a very thorny situation. The really don;t care what happens to North Korea, but they can't tell the south to outright attack them. Anyone taking bets that we have seen the last Kim succession? If we see a couple high level Rats defect then we will know the time has come.
#5
Bomb their harbors and mine the approaches. See how fast they collapse with no commerce but what comes from Russia and China. Bomb the rail lines coming from those two countries, and NKor will curl up and die.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
12/06/2010 20:41 Comments ||
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#6
North Korea has warned that the war games could bring the Koreas closer to the brink of war.
#7
ION YONHAP > LEE ORDERS GRADUAL [military]FORTIFICATION OF FIVE WESTERN BORDER ISLANDS, including Yeongpyeong Island.
and
* DAILY TIMES>PK > HU TELLS OBAMA KOREA TENSIONS CAN ESCALATE.
More "2012" - mainstream Amer should expect MORE-N-WORSE MIL INCIDENTS like these to occur throughout the Bammer's term(s) as POTUS, + even after unto 2020-2025.
OOOOOOO, you just knew "HU-WEE-NOT-AND-THE NEWS"
was in there somewhere.
US INTELLIGENCE agencies have blacklisted 23 Australians in Yemen suspected of terrorist links, as Barack Obama's counterterrorism chief warns that the world must confront al-Qaeda fighters in Yemen.
A diplomatic cable from the US embassy in Sanaa, leaked to WikiLeaks, lists the names and birth dates of 23 Australians thought to have connections to the group ''al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula''.
Some names have been added to a US list banning them from commercial flights. The rest are to be closely monitored by US spy agencies.
The cable, sent last January, has not been made public but the contents, excluding the personal details - have been reported by The New York Times, one of several news outlets granted access to the cables.
The NYT, doing their best to catch up to Wikileaks ...
Another cable blames Saudi Arabia as the world's largest source of funds for Islamist extremists.
The top White House counterterrorism adviser Daniel Benjamin yesterday said Yemen was a big recruiting ground for al-Qaeda, especially for people holding Western passports.
''There are individuals from many countries around the world who have made their way to Yemen,'' he said. ''Many of them did so fairly innocently - to acquire for example Arabic language training or other schooling - who have been radicalised.''
Mr Benjamin said concern about Yemen had increased in March last year and was confirmed by recent plots emanating from the country, including one to destroy a passenger jet over Detroit on Christmas Day and bombs posted to the US.
He said Yemen had significant problems, including an exploding population growth, the exhaustion of natural resources and a depleted water table. Local al-Qaeda affiliates were the most aggressive beyond the terrorist leaders in the border region of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Australia has sharpened its focus on Yemen and recently declared al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula a proscribed organisation. Many of the Australians listed in the cable were women, The New York Times said, with al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen seeking ''to identify a female for a future attack''.
#2
Really, it's time to be FAIR and just put evenly the names of Christian on the list since to do so would be discriminatory.
Posted by: jack salami ||
12/06/2010 9:21 Comments ||
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#3
'There are individuals from many countries around the world who have made their way to Yemen,'' he said. ''Many of them did so fairly innocently - to acquire for example Arabic language training or other schooling - who have been radicalised.''
Hmm when I took Italian classes in Florence the most radical thing I developed was a taste for good food.
Must be the water in Yemen.
Posted by: European Conservative ||
12/06/2010 12:39 Comments ||
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European Union president Herman Van Rompuy told a US ambassador that Europe no longer believed in Afghanistan and that 2010 may be the last chance for success, according to a leaked US diplomatic cable.
Van Rompuy told ambassador to Belgium Howard Gutman over coffee on December 23, 2009, that Europeans were only staying in Afghanistan out of "deference" to the United States, according to the confidential memo released by WikiLeaks.
"Europe is doing it and will go along out of deference to the United States but not out of deference to Afghanistan," Van Rompuy was quoted as saying in the cable.
"No one believes in Afghanistan any more," he said in a meeting that took place three weeks after he took office as the head of the 27-nation European Council.
"But we will give it 2010 to see results. If it doesn't work, that will be it, because it is the last chance," he said.
Underscoring Europe's waning appetite for combat, the former Belgian prime minister warned: "If a Belgian gets killed, it would be over for Belgium right then".
Barbers, put your shears away!
European countries account for around 30,000 of some 150,000 NATO-led troops in Afghanistan, while the United States makes up the bulk of the force.
NATO leaders agreed at a November 20 summit to start handing security responsibility to Afghan security forces next year with the aim of withdrawing from the battlefield by 2014.
#2
If the usual suspects keep talking about the aboriginal north americans as a singular 'nation' and people, then its just the same as treating a tribal confederation that actually has had a 'king' and some form of long term shared social community identification as a nation as well.
The Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) has completed training for 2,200 Transportation Safety Officers (TSOs) at the Los Angeles International Airport according to a press release found on the MPAC website.
The MPAC release notes that the two-month training course informed officers of "the diversity of Muslims around the world from cultural dress to language to tenets. The four trainers taught the TSOs how to properly handle a Quran and discussed the different ways Muslim women and men choose to cover or dress. For example, the TSOs learned if a woman wears hijab and needs a secondary screening she should be screened in a private area by a female TSO officer."
In 1986, MPAC was formed as a political action arm of one of the largest Wahhabi mosques in America, the Islamic Center for Southern California.
As the Center for Security Policy's Team B II report entitled "Sharia: The Threat to America" notes, "The founders of the Islamic Center for Southern California are Hassan Hathout and his brother Maher Hathout. The late Hassan Hathout was a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood Movement. The two brothers Maher spent time in an Egyptian prison during the early days of the Muslim Brotherhoods activities there, led by the Brotherhoods founder Hassan Al Banna. MPACs own publication, The Minaret, has proudly called Hassan a 'companion of' and Maher 'a close disciple of' Brotherhood founder Hassan al Banna."
Hathout was also on the board of directors and a member of the American Muslim Council (AMC) from 1993 to 1997. AMC was founded by the al Qaeda financier and Hamas operative Abdurahman Alamoudi who is currently serving 23 years in prison for funding terrorist groups including al Qaeda. Maher Hathout served on the AMC Board of Directors at the same time Alamoudi was serving as its Executive Director.
One of the early members and co-founders of the tight-knit, secretive WikiLeaks operation charged today that the website and its co-founder, Julian Assange, sold intelligence information the site had obtained.
John Young, whose name was listed as the public face of WikiLeaks in the site's original domain registration, also alleged that the website is a lucrative business.
Young said he left the site in 2007 due to concerns over its finances and that WikiLeaks was engaged in the selling of documents. There's a link to a radio interview at the site.
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
Oh, I forgot to mention: Hat Tip to Uncle Phester; I'd followed the link and forgotten it came from him. Sorry!
WIKILEAKS has released a secret list of key infrastructure sites around the world whose loss or attack by terrorists, according to the State Department, could "critically impact'' US security.
New Zealand's Southern Cross undersea cable landings at two Auckland beaches were on the list.
The leaked February 2009 memo from the US State Department requested overseas US missions to list infrastructure and key resources around the globe "whose loss could critically impact the public health, economic security and/or national and homeland security of the United States''.
It lists undersea cables, key communications, ports, mineral resources and firms of strategic importance.
On its website, the Southern Cross Cable Network says it provides fast and secure international bandwidth from Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii to the USA.
#2
So, it would be hard (not that it would stop them) for anyone (read lefties of the world) to claim defense of these things was "not in America's interests..."
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
12/06/2010 10:19 Comments ||
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[Daily Nation (Kenya)] The Swiss Post Office said on Sunday that it was carrying out checks on Wikileaks founder Julian Assange's account with its banking arm, after doubts emerged over the Swiss address he gave.
Wikileaks has advertised the PostFinance account details online to "donate directly to the Julian Assange and other WikiLeaks Staff Defence Fund," giving an account name of "Assange Julian Paul, Geneve."
"We have to find out if Julian Assange really does live in Geneva. In the process of checking we did not find his name in Geneva," PostFinance front man Marc Andrey told AFP, confirming a report in the NZZ am Sonntag newspaper.
Mr Andrey said checks were likely to take several weeks and would involve correspondence with Mr Assange, an Australian citizen who is currently in hiding.
He explained that bank accounts were normally granted to Swiss residents or foreigners from areas nearby.
But for people from more distant countries such as Australia or the United States, they must have some kind of relationship with Switzerland, such as business ties or a house.
Mr Andrey declined to give further details on the account, which is covered by Swiss banking secrecy laws, including when it was opened.
"We can confirm to you that he has an account because he published it on his website," Mr Andrey noted. Under money laundering laws and due diligence requirements for banks, Mr Assange must give his real domicile.
US-based online payment service PayPal said on Friday that it had decided to block financial transfers to WikiLeaks after governments around the world initiated legal action against the whistleblower website.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
Swiss media report that Postfinance has closed his account.
Posted by: European Conservative ||
12/06/2010 11:16 Comments ||
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#2
The amount frozen is 31.000 Euros (approx. US$41.000.
Posted by: European Conservative ||
12/06/2010 13:24 Comments ||
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[Pak Daily Times] He sez that like it's a bad thing. While politix occasionally smells awful and looks worse, it has a legitimate place in daily life, to include in international relations...
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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[Iran Press TV] Thousands of angry Pak demonstrators have taken to the streets of Islamabad to protests their government's alliance with the United States.
Protesters gathered near the parliament house amid heavy police presence on Sunday. They demanded Islamabad cut all ties with Washington.
The Pak Jamaat-e-Islami activists shouted anti-US slogans during a rally in the capital city.
They also demanded the release of Pak scientist Aafia Siddiqui. A US federal court has sentenced Siddiqui to 86 years in prison for allegedly shooting at her American interrogators in Afghanistan.
Siddiqui vanished in Bloody Karachi, Pakistain with her three children on March 30, 2003. The following day, local newspapers reported that she had been taken into US custody on terrorism charges.
Human rights groups say that Siddiqui had secretly been transferred to the US base in Bagram, north of Kabul, and tortured for five years prior to the alleged 2008 incident.
Siddiqui's relatives and political activists have strongly criticized the US justice system for its handling of the case.
Meanwhile, ...back at the ranch... some protesters were there to warn the government against a military operation in the North Wazoo tribal region. They said such a move would trigger a new wave of unrest.
The US has been asking Pakistain to launch a major ground offensive into the northern tribal region to crush militancy.
The Mighty Pak Army has launched several operations in the restive northwest in order to flush the snuffies out of tribal areas.
Hundreds of Paks have bit the dust since the former military ruler Pervez Perv Musharraf ... former dictator of Pakistain, who was less dictatorial and corrupt than any Pak civilian government to date ... joined the US-led so-called war on terror following the 9/11 attacks.
Militant attacks, unsanctioned drone strikes and political unrest have claimed the lives of over 4,000 people throughout Pakistain since 2007.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
Its about time we let India sort out this excuse of a country once and for all!
#4
Anonymoose, I seriously doubt they have to pay the rent-a-crowds in Pakistan. They probably just spread a rumor that Americans flush Korans and they'd have a ton of folks show up.
[Pak Daily Times] Intelligence officials say imported muscle have been slipping back into Iraq in larger numbers recently and may have been behind some of the most devastating attacks this year, reviving a threat the US military believed had been almost entirely eradicated.
Does this mean we ought not leave just yet?
It is impossible to verify the actual numbers of foreign forces of Evil entering the country. But a Middle Eastern intelligence official
What on earth is a "Middle Eastern intelligence official?"
estimated recently that 250 came in October alone. US officials say the figure is far lower, but have acknowledged an increase since August.
At the same time, Iraqi officials say there has been a surge in financial aid to al Qaeda's front group in Iraq as the US military prepares to leave by the end of 2011. They said it reflects fears by Arab states over the growing influence of Iran's Shia-led government over Iraq and its Shia-dominated government.
Wouldn't it be more effective for the Arab states then to make donations to the Iraqi government? That way they would increase Sunni influence over the government, surely.
On Sunday, security official Major General Qassim al-Moussawi said Iraqi forces are searching for six imported muscle who are among Iraq's most wanted terrorists. The six are suspected of involvement in the October 31 siege of a Christian church that left 68 people dead and drew international outrage, al-Moussawi said. They are also suspected in two summertime attacks on an Iraqi army headquarters in central Storied Baghdad that killed a total of 73 people. "All who committed these attacks are (non-Iraqi) Arabs," he said.
That leaves out the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, then.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Syria's alleged interference in Leb and its increasingly sophisticated weapons shipments to Hizbullah have alarmed U.S. officials and prompted Israel's military to consider a strike against a Syrian arms depot, U.S. and Israeli officials told The Washington Post.
But Israel has so far hesitated to take military action out of concern that such a strike could touch off a conflict even bloodier than the 2006 war, said an Israeli military official.
The B.O. regime's efforts at dialogue with Syria have done little to stop the flow of weapons, end Damascus' practice of sheltering Paleostinian leaders of turban groups, or counter Syria's interference in Leb, which has undermined the U.S. effort to promote Lebanese independence from external actors, according to the daily.
It said that while the U.S. maintains sanctions against Syria, American allies such as India and Turkey have inked trade deals with Damascus in recent months that undercut the American effort.
And Syria's alliance with Iran remains strong, to the dismay of U.S. officials who, as the WikiLeaks cables show, had hoped to drive a wedge between Syria and Iran, in part to stop the flow of weapons to Hizbullah.
Asked about the likelihood of Israel striking at a border area where transfer of weapons is taking place or one of the camps inside Syria, the Israeli military official told the newspaper: "This is definitely one of the options Israel has. Of course any attack like this could lead to an escalation."
"Persuading Syria to break its alliance with Hizbullah's chief patron, Iran, would be a key step toward ending the shipments. But it is in Leb that Syria's regional resurgence has been felt most profoundly," The Washington Post said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
What's to "mull"? Either you do it or you don't. Either you make it look like an accident or you don't. Either you implicate someone else in doing it or you don't.
And, in any case, you prepare to counter any reaction to your action, and even inaction, if that is the case.
But it's utterly worthless to blab about it to the press.
[An Nahar] Phalange Party The Kataeb (Phalange) party was founded by Pierre Gemayel in 1936, who modeled the party after Spanish and Italian Fascist parties he had observed as an Olympic athlete during the 1936 Summer Olympics held in Berlin, then Nazi Germany. The movement's uniforms originally included brown shirts and members used the Nazi salute. Despite the party's uniform, its strong sense of nationalism and dedication to a single charismatic leader, the Lebanese Kataeb was not and never became a fascist party nor did it espouse a totalitarian ideology. leader Amin Gemayel on Sunday stressed that "Hizbullah's approach has become well-known -- an approach of dictation and intimidation."
Hizbullah "wants all initiatives to be in service of its interests," Gemayel told Voice of Leb Radio.
"Let them remember our martyrs before they try to threaten us," the former Lebanese president added, noting that "Hizbullah's approach aims to torpedo the (Special) Tribunal (for Leb), without suggesting any alternatives."
However, The infamous However... Gemayel stressed that the anticipated indictment the STL is expected to issue in the near future was "not the end of the road," noting that it will be thoroughly scrutinized.
"It is important that the indictment be issued, and if the Lebanese State was not able to implement the ruling and arrest the accused, an international verdict will be issued, and it will be a sword hanging over their heads and they will be prisoners even without a prison," Gemayel warned.
He reiterated his belief that Hizbullah and its allies were staging a "coup."
"The coup is being put into practice everyday through crippling measures, such as the campaign against the president and the premier in addition to the issue of false witnesses. Everything happening is an attempt at changing the face of Leb," Gemayel claimed.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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Israel's plan to pull its troops out of northern Ghajar, a disputed village on the flashpoint border with Lebanon, is likely to prove more of a headache than a political victory for Beirut, experts say.
"The people of Ghajar do not want to be part of Lebanon," said Timur Goksel, former senior adviser of the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), of the village's 2,200 residents -- none of whom is Lebanese.
"They say they have nothing to do with Lebanon, historically, politically, socially," Goksel told Agence France Presse. "If they become Lebanese they are going to lose all their privileges as Israeli citizens."
Ghajar embodies the conundrum of Middle Eastern politics: originally Syrian territory, it was seized by Israel along with the adjacent Golan Heights during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
The tiny village was then cut in half in 2000, when Israel ended its 22-year occupation of southern Lebanon and withdrew south of the Blue Line, a U.N.-demarcated border which runs straight through Ghajar.
The Blue Line placed the southern sector of Ghajar under Israeli control and the north in the hands of Lebanon.
But in 2006, Israel sent its troops back into northern Ghajar during its summer war with Hizbullah, and access to the town from Lebanon has since been blocked.
After years of political wrangling, Israel's cabinet on November 17 approved a U.N. proposal to withdraw its troops from the divided village -- a move that residents strongly oppose.
Israeli officials have said responsibility for the sector will be transferred to UNIFIL, whose troops will redeploy around Ghajar's northern perimeter but not inside the village itself.
"The plan is basically to return to the pre-2006 status quo," said Andrew Tabler, a Syria and Lebanon expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
"Israel will only patrol south of the Blue Line and Israel's main security fence will run along the village's southern border," Tabler, who was recently in Ghajar, told AFP.
Most Ghajar residents are Syrian Alawites, an offshoot of Shiite Islam, who have acquired Israeli citizenship.
They reject the partitioning of their village, which would put 1,700 people in Lebanon and 500 in Israel and possibly leave family members unable to visit each other.
While Hizbullah is demanding that Israel hand over the northern part of Ghajar to the Lebanese army, with UNIFIL backing, experts say the Lebanese military is unlikely to be granted access.
"The (Israeli) security fence running along the northern edge of the village will remain," Tabler said. "The question being worked out now is who will patrol the northern neighborhood."
The Lebanese government has yet to react officially to Israel's proposed withdrawal, but Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, arguably the most powerful figure in the country, has rejected the plan.
"The Lebanese part of Ghajar must be returned to Lebanon and the Syrian part, with its residents, must be given to Lebanon until the Syrian-Lebanese border is demarcated," Nasrallah has said.
A UNIFIL spokesman contacted by AFP refused to disclose the content of talks with Israeli officials, but said the international force aimed to eventually ensure the return of Lebanese troops to northern Ghajar.
"We have been pushing for withdrawal of Israeli forces from northern Ghajar right since 2006," spokesman Neeraj Singh told AFP.
"It is an obligation that Israel must deliver on, in accordance with Resolution 1701" which ended the 2006 war and expanded UNIFIL's mandate, he added.
Experts say, however, that Israel's commitment to withdraw from northern Ghajar is unlikely to take place soon.
"It is not going to happen until there is a peace treaty between Syria and Israel, and then Lebanon and Israel, so everyone will cross that bridge when they come to it," Tabler said.
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12/06/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
They're Druze. Michael Totten had an excellent (as usual) piece on them recently.
[Iran Press TV] Iran's deputy foreign minister has decried the production, stockpiling and use of chemical arms, saying Tehran has been a victim of such weapons.
"We are very sensitive about chemical arsenals," said Mohammad Mahdi Akhoundzadeh, Iran's deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs, in an interview with the Dutch newspaper NRC.
The Iranian diplomat is in the Netherlands to attend an annual conference of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
He said Iranian people, who have been victimized by chemical weapons, do not like others to be victimized by the weapons.
In October, the 62nd Session of the OPCW Executive Council issued a landmark declaration condemning Iraq's chemical attacks on Iran's northwestern city of Sardasht in 1987, during the eight year war that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had imposed on the Islamic Theocratic Republic in 1980s.
The initiative for an international support network -- proposed by Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki -- was first tabled at OPCW conference in 2007 as the "Chemical Weapons Victim's International Funding and Assistance Network."
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Iran said for the first time that it had domestically produced a batch of uranium yellowcake -- the raw material for atomic weapons.
Yesterday's yellowcake announcement removes a key restraint on Tehran, which was previously reliant on 600 tonnes of yellowcake acquired from South Africa in the 1970s, prior to the Islamic revolution. Ali Akbar Salehi, head of Iran's atomic programme, struck a triumphalist tone in revealing the development. "The West had counted on the possibility of us being in trouble over raw material," he said. "Iran has become self-sufficient in the entire fuel cycle, starting from [uranium] exploration, mining and then turning it into yellowcake and converting it."
#1
See also TOPIX [related] > IRAN CLAIMS IT IS CAPABLE OF GOING NUCLEAR, + IRAN BOASTS OF ITS NUCLEAR ABILITIES BEFORE TALKS.
ARTICS = IRAN proclaims it is now de facto NUCWEAPS-CAPABLE, NOT JUST AS PER NUCENERGY, IFF IT SO CHOOSES thanks to newfound nuclear self- sufficiency = nuc independence.
#2
PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > [Missle Defense Agency]US MDA: NO CONFIRMATION OF IRAN MISSLE THREAT, vee alleged receipt of 19 BM-25 IRBMS from NORTH KOREA.
versus
* SAME > WIKILEAKS: WAR AGZ PAKISTAN MILITANTS TO TAKE [as long as] 15 YEARS.
ARTIC = circa 10-15 Years, as per the US Embassy in Islamabad???
A radical US-based Islamic website shut down last month after allegedly helping to inspire the stabbing of a Labour MP has resurfaced with a new name.
Younus Abdullah Muhammad, a founder of both sites, told The Daily Telegraph that IslamPolicy.com was the direct successor to RevolutionMuslim.com which was closed amid the furore over its role in the attack on Stephen Timms, MP for East Ham.
"IslamPolicy will continue with the work of RevolutionMuslim," Mr Muhammad, a white American convert to Islam, said during an interview in which he called the Sept 11 terror attacks "justified violence".
American counter-terrorism officials say that at least a third of the more than 50 domestic terror suspects arrested in America in the last year had ties to RevolutionMuslim, an English-language site aimed at Muslims in the West.
They trace its roots to a network of sites run by the now banned al-Muhajiroun group in Britain. "It is playing an important role in the export to the US of the British disease of home-grown terror by radicalised young Muslims," a US official said.
Aaron Zelin, a US academic who follows pro-jihadi websites, says that the US-based RevolutionMuslim was being increasingly used by British extremists to skirt hate speech and incitement laws in the UK and promote groups with al-Muhajiroun links.
The site, which was hosted on an American Google server, was closed down last month after intense pressure from British and American security officials. But Mr Muhammad has now established IslamPolicy on a blogging site also operated by Google, calling it the new home for the closed site.
He has said that IslamPolicy will focus on ideology and education, but British and American counterterror experts are monitoring it closely for the sort of radical content that was a fixture of its predecessor.
And no doubt also carefully monitoring posters and lurkers at the site. Happy hunting, guys!
Peter Barron, European communications director for Google, said: "We are looking at the new site and will remove content which breaks our guidelines on hate speech and dangerous or illegal content. What we can't do, and which few people would want a private company to do, is check what people want to post online before they do so."
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
One of the early members and co-founders of the tight-knit, secretive WikiLeaks operation charged today that the website and its co-founder, Julian Assange, sold intelligence information the site had obtained.
Israel's plan to pull its troops out of northern Ghajar, a disputed village on the flashpoint border with Lebanon, is likely to prove more of a headache than a political victory for Beirut, experts say.
Iran's deputy foreign minister has decried the production, stockpiling and use of chemical arms, saying Tehran has been a victim of such weapons.
