(Reuters) - The Supreme Court of Afghanistan's ruling Taliban will resume on Saturday the trial of eight foreign aid workers detained on charges of converting Muslims to Christianity, their defense lawyer said. ``The supreme court will sit on Saturday,'' Pakistani lawyer Atif Ali Khan told Reuters. Khan returned to a capital under fire, saying it was his duty to defend his clients since they had no one else to help them. "It is my obligation because my clients do not have their families or their diplomats here,'' he said when asked what prompted him to go back to Kabul while it was under attack from U.S.-led forces hunting down bin Laden. "I am the only person who can plead their case before the court.''
The fate of the eight will rest with approximately 15 judges who will evaluate Khan's defense and the evidence, consisting of statements, books and videos. Khan said he had prepared his reply to the charges of proselytizing and must have this translated into one of the official languages of Afghanistan -- Pashto or Dari -- before submitting it to the court.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Times of London FROM VANORA BENNETT IN MOSCOW
RUSSIAN troops and technical experts, wearing camouflage but no identifying badges, have secretly entered Afghanistan and are waiting with the anti-Taleban Northern Alliance for orders to attack Kabul, according to a prominent Moscow military analyst. âTwo weeks ago . . . Russia effectively went to war on foreign territory without the parliamentary approval demanded by the Constitution,â Pavel Felgengauer wrote in the weekly Moscow News.
Mr Felgengauer, a usually authoritative commentator, said that the strength of the Russian 201st motor-rifle division stationed in Tajikistan, on the border with Afghanistan, had been increased from 7,500 to more than 8,000 men. Quoting informed military sources, he said anti-aircraft and artillery units from the division had penetrated Afghanistan. Mr Felgengauer also quoted Alexei Arbatov, of Russiaâs parliamentary defence committee, as saying that Russian technical experts were being sent into Afghanistan with the latest supplies of tanks for the Northern Alliance. He said Mr Arbatov was worried that US attacks on the Taleban might not last long, leaving those Russians âface-to-face with a new enemyâ. I'd put this one down as a "doubtful."
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10/11/2001 ||
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BBC
The World Food Programme (WFP) says its aid effort to Afghanistan has been hampered by Taleban officials demanding a road tax. The officials demanded $32 for every tonne of food carried by a convoy that had just crossed the Pakistan-Afghan border, the WPF says. The incident happened only hours after the WFP - a United Nations agency - began resuming food convoys into Afghanistan.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Frontier Post
After the US attacks and the planning of a broad based government headed by ex-king Zahir Shah through the United States, serious differences have developed between the Northern Alliance key leaders and field commanders. Former Jihadi commanders now aligned with the Northern Alliance who fought against Red Army are condemning the US attack and are not ready to accept the ex-king as head of the new broad based government in Afghanistan. Sources further revealed that some of these commanders had secretly contacted Taliban authorities to join Taliban ranks to wage Holy war against US. These commanders are belonging to Hizb-e-Islami Hekmatyar group, Jamiat-e-Islami Rabbani and Itehad-e-Islami Sayyaf.
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10/11/2001 ||
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BBC
Anti-aircraft fire has erupted again around the Afghan capital Kabul, signalling a fourth night of US-led air strikes in the biggest show of firepower yet, according to witnesses. Several loud explosions were heard near the airport on the outskirts of Kabul as planes roared over the city. A military academy east of Kabul was reportedly hit. Taleban gunners opened fire from at least three positions near the city centre.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Ananova
Reports say Osama bin Laden is offering $50,000 to anyone who catches an American soldier alive. An al-Qaida spokesman also says bin Laden is offering $3,000 for US uniforms and $1,500 for assault rifles. The spokesman told Pakistani newspaper The News that bin Laden will give "good news" to Muslims in the near future. The statement from bin Laden also warned: "Neither their air travel will be safe, nor will they find peace on earth, unless these infidels leave the holy land of Muslims."
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10/11/2001 ||
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AP
Meanwhile, the rebels fighting to topple the Taliban claimed Thursday they had taken a key central province after heavy fighting with Taliban forces during the night. Mohammed Abil, a spokesman for the northern alliance of opposition groups, said by telephone from Pakistan thatAfghanistan's Gur province, including the capital, Chaghcharan, fell to opposition fighters shortly after midnight Thursday. Heavy fighting continued into the morning in several provincial areas, Abil said.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Sky News
Some of the Taliban's top leaders were reportedly killed in the first wave of bombings on Afghanistan on Sunday night. The deaths of some of the regime's leaders was claimed in "highly credible" reports American intelligence received from the country, it is claimed. An anonymous senior official said those killed included two "adult male" relatives of Mullah Omar, the spiritual leader of the regime. American Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said earlier this week that one of Mullah Omar's compounds had been a target of the initial wave of strikes. Omar is himself related to Osama bin Laden, the al Qaida leader whose organisation is a target of the raids, as two of their children are married.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Afgha.com
Quite contrary to the view held by Pakistani military, the United Front is not an entirely non-Pashtun force of Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks and Turkmans, battling the latterâs domination of Afghanistan. There are several Pashtun leaders and field commanders who not only have never supported the Taliban but also have lent their active contribution in the war against them. The names of Haji Sher Alam , Haji Abdul Qadeer (the former governor of Jalal Abad), Hazrat Ali, Aref Khan Commander Almas and many others are too familiar but a few to mention in this regard. These personalities command wide respect among the Pashtun minority and have thousands of armed Pashtun soldiers fighting on the frontlines along side others, against the Taliban. Equally true is the fact that the Taliban is not a purely Pashtun force. There are well over 20000 foreigners coming from a myriad of several different nationalities including Arabs, Central Asians, Chinese Uigurs, Pakistanis (civilian and military) and South East Asians, who constitute approximately more than forty percent of the Talibanâs fighting force in Afghanistan.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Los Angeles Times By ROBYN DIXON
Gen. Fazel Udin Ayar, chief of police in the front-line town of Charikar, says that a delegation of would-be Taliban defectors from Gorband, west of Charikar, came to town Tuesday seeking a deal. Their fighters control a road in the Gorband area, about 35 miles northwest of Kabul. "They are secret talks, but the deal is not yet completed," the general said Wednesday. "We've been in touch with them for quite a while. Their morale is low, and they're coming to the conclusion that they should come onto our side. But they're hesitating."
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10/11/2001 ||
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BBC
The former president of Afghanistan who was ousted by the Taleban, Burhanuddin Rabbani, has said that the future of the country can only be determined after the Taleban has been destroyed and peace restored. Mr Rabbani was speaking in Dushanbe, where he met President Imomali Rakhmonov and other Tajik leaders. He said he was not considering the future leadership of Afghanistan at the moment.
Mr Rabbani said that all Afghans, except for those he described as terrorists with blood on their hands, could take part in determining the future of the country.
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10/11/2001 ||
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IRNA
A military official from Afghanistan's Islamic Movement confirmed the defection of forty Taliban commanders to the Unified Islamic Coalition (UIC). Head of the Islamic Movement office in Mashhad told IRNA that about a thousand of the Taliban forces under those commanders have defected the Taliban and joined the north coalition, under the command of General Dustom, with all their arms and ammunition. After primary inspections, the Islamic movement commanders have transferred these forces to the regions under their control, according to this Afghan official.
In related news, an informed Afghan source at Afghanistan's embassy in Tajikistan told IRNA Wednesday night that General Dustom's forces have succeeded to free Afghanistan's Zari city, which has been frequently transferred form Taliban's hegemony into the Islamic movement's rule and vice versa. The Islamic forces have now succeeded to fully settle their rulership in the city, according to this embassy official. Mohammad Mahdi added that the Taliban have forced the inhabitants of Afghanistan's Heybatan city to evacuate their homes and leave the city and the Taliban forces are the only inhabitants of that city now. "The city is in a part of Afghanistan that has remained intact from the U.S.-British air raids and missile attacks and that is the
reason for Taliban forces' settlement there," he added. Mahdi also claimed that the American planes use Uzbekistan's air bases for their take offs and landings during their air raids against Afghan targets.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Frontier Post
ISLAMABAD: The allied military action against the Taliban of Afghanistan is all set to enter a new phase on Thursday with land incursion of the Taliban controlled territories by United States and British ground troops, The Frontier Post has learnt. Sources privy to the operational plans told this scribe that an expeditionary force is likely to be launched into Afghanistan through Zhob, Balochistan. The US troops are likely to cross over into Afghanistan some time Thursday afternoon. The expeditionary force may comprise up to 20,000 American and British soldiers. Sources said that Wednesday night's attacks are likely to be the heaviest in the last few days and may continue till very late in the day on Thursday. The landing of troops will follow immediately after the missile and aircraft strikes conclude.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Los Angeles Times By ROBYN DIXON, TIMES STAFF WRITER
Kabul Radio, the Taliban's official station, broadcast recent comments by Osama bin Laden. The report claimed that not a single Taliban fighter had been hurt in the U.S. campaign. But most people weren't listening to Kabul Radio, glued instead to the BBC, Radio Tehran and Voice of America.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Susan B. Glasser Washington Post Foreign Service
TASHKENT, Uzbekistan Gen. Abdurrashid Dostum said his fighters are 28 miles from the key city of Mazar-e Sharif and struggling to capture the road that leads there. Cut off by land from supplies, Dostum's forces can be reinforced only by helicopters. And those haven't come, at least not yet. In an interview today by satellite phone from inside Afghanistan, Dostum -- one of the Northern Alliance's most celebrated commanders -- offered a portrait of an insurgency that hardly seems poised to topple the Taliban. Even with the new opening provided by U.S. bombardment of Mazar-e Sharif and this week's capture of strategic towns near the city, Dostum is further from his goal than his allies have reported. He has a long list of complaints: no tanks, few trucks, not enough food to eat or clothes to wear, old weapons and insufficient ammunition. With no gasoline to fuel the trucks he does have, he and his men travel by horseback through the mountains. "One thousand horses," he said, "are better than 5,000 Taliban."
"On the days we have enough weapons, we fight well," Dostum said. "On other days, there's nothing left to fight with." Even the casualty report he offered suggested a rag-tag guerrilla army waging a 19th-century battle. The dead in recent days, he said, number "20 fighters, five commanders and 60 horses."
Still, Dostum and other Northern Alliance commanders are reporting gains that would have been unthinkable only a month ago, including cutting the main Taliban supply line to Mazar-e Sharif. Poised to capitalize on the United States' entrance into a civil war that has been raging for more than two decades, the rebels have embraced a new strategy to oust the Taliban, relying on Dostum to recapture the north and link opposition forces for an attack on the Afghan capital, Kabul. And what the general lacks in supplies, he makes up for in bluster. "If I had more weapons," he said, "I would have seized the north long ago."
Dostum returned to Afghanistan from exile this March, agreeing to serve under the charismatic Northern Alliance general, Ahmed Shah Massoud, whom he had betrayed several times. Massoud was assassinated just before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, and Dostum is now the best known, if not the best equipped, of the Northern Alliance's remaining commanders.
Today's interview suggested that some fractures have begun to appear. Asked about promised military aid from Russia, Dostum replied, "It has all gone to General [Mohammed] Fahim," who succeeded Massoud as the rebels' commander in chief. "There has not been a single airlift to me." At the same time, he said, the Northern Alliance is "a good union. Even though there's a diversity of interests, it's a good union."
Dostum said he commanded between 15,000 and 18,000 fighters. But other Northern Alliance officials have said he has fewer than 8,000 troops. Numbers vary just as widely for the Taliban forces arrayed against him. Other opposition officials also described the ebb and flow in Dostum's battle. On Monday, Dostum's fighters reported gains of up to 12 miles in Samangan province, claiming they pushed the Taliban defenders out of the mountains and into the town of Samangan. But on Tuesday, according to the Northern Alliance ambassador in Uzbekistan, Dostum's fighters were the ones under attack. "There were many casualties," said the envoy, Mohammad Hasham Saad. Dostum's men "held on to their gains, but did not move ahead."
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10/11/2001 ||
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Times of India
ISLAMABAD: Afghan opposition forces have won control of the entire central province of Ghor after an overnight battle with their Taliban enemies, an opposition spokesman said on Thursday. "We have taken Ghor completely and people are very happy that we have freed them," Mohammad Ashraf Nadeem told AFP by satellite phone from northern Afghanistan. He said the forces of the opposition Northern Alliance under commander Fazul Karim Aimaq had clinched control of the province after a four-hour battle which finished around 8.00 am (0330 GMT). The spokesman said fighting had since moved south to the neighbouring province of Uruzgan. Ghor province is of limited strategic importance but its capture will be an important morale boost for the opposition forces, who claim that their victory was aided by civilians rising up against the Taliban.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Peter Baker, Molly Moore and Kamram Khan Washington Post
Rebel troops have made some advances in other parts of the country in the days since the U.S. assault began, even as the Kabul front lines remained unchanged. Perhaps the most significant was the defection of local fighters who control the main road used by the Taliban to supply its fighters in the north.
The commander who led the mass desertion said in an interview today that more would soon follow. Nuridin Ahmady said he brought about 35 commanders and 1,000 men with him from the Taliban side, believing that the government had sold out to foreigners such as Pakistan. Ahmady, 28, said he first contacted the Northern Alliance about switching two months ago, 21 days after the Taliban killed his brother.
Ahmady's decision in effect allows the Northern Alliance to cut the main Taliban supply route and help it link isolated forces that have been fighting in different parts of the country for years. In the next two or three days, Ahmady said, he would begin moving his troops in an effort to provide a bridge for separate alliance units in the center of the country.
He also predicted that 25 other commanders, along with 800 or 900 troops in nearby areas, would abandon the Taliban for the Northern Alliance in the next few days.
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10/11/2001 ||
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By Bob Woodward Washington Post Staff Writer
Osama bin Laden has provided an estimated $100 million in cash and military assistance to the ruling Taliban in Afghanistan over the last five years, making bin Laden the single greatest supporter of the Afghan regime, according to intelligence information presented recently to President Bush and his senior national security advisers. As a result of the new information, government sources said, the CIA has concluded that bin Laden "owns and operates" the Taliban, highlighting the pervasive influence that bin Laden and his al Qaeda forces exert within Afghanistan. Bin Laden's military units also provide the Taliban with some of its most committed and effective assault forces. Bought himself a little kingdom, did he? Got his own little Islamic paradise going.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Peter Baker, Molly Moore and Kamram Khan Washington Post
Northern Alliance leaders have acknowledged the concerns of the United States, and promised not to seize power only for themselves if the Taliban regime falls, but to try to create a broad interim coalition and then hold elections, perhaps in two years. The alliance sent a delegation to Rome to meet with former king Mohammed Zahir Shah, who was deposed in 1973 and lived in exile ever since, as well as other key leaders of the Afghan diaspora. The king's representatives will participate in the upcoming conference, called a supreme council, involving 120 delegates. The council might call a loya jirga, or grand assembly, to formally resolve the makeup of a future government.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Peter Baker, Molly Moore and Kamram Khan Washington Post
The U.S. government has been under intense pressure from Pakistani officials and U.N. authorities to prevent the Northern Alliance from capturing the Afghan capital and effectively claiming control of the country. To counter the influence of the Northern Alliance, the Pakistani government is cooperating with U.S. intelligence officials in attempting to identify moderate Taliban leaders and southern Afghan tribal leaders who might be willing to trade their Taliban loyalties for large sums of money and a role in a future government, according to Pakistani intelligence officials.
The interim government might grow out of a summit to be convened in the rebel-controlled Panjshir Valley. The meeting would be aimed at forging a new accord on how to govern Afghanistan, a process that will inevitably require difficult compromises among competing ethnic, political and military factions. The summit would include the often-fractious guerrillas of the Northern Alliance. "We want to, at first, create the core of a government," said Abdullah Rakhim, a regimental rebel commander eager to lead the way to Kabul. "After they've agreed between themselves, only at that point are we really in a proper position to attack. That way there will be order in Kabul when we seize the city."
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10/11/2001 ||
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NY POST
THE thrash-metal band Anthrax might change its name. "It's as though it's 1937 and I'm a bandleader named Freddie Hitler," lead singer Scott Ian, 37, told the Washington Post. "Maybe we should change the name now. A friend suggested Basket of Puppies." Ian, who came up with the name 20 years ago in high school biology class, said, "People keep coming up to me and saying, 'Hey, wouldn't it be funny if you got anthrax?' I'm like, 'Oh, that would be hilarious.' " He's stocked up on Cipro, the antidote for the germ. Ian told columnist Lloyd Grove: "I will not die an ironic death."
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10/11/2001 ||
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MICHAEL FECHTER and BIRUSK TUGAN The Tampa Tribune
TAMPA - A string of scares across the Bay area in which envelopes containing powders were sent to unsuspecting recipients were all hoaxes, apparently meant to take advantage of the still-unsolved anthrax mystery in South Florida, investigators said Wednesday. The FBI collected the envelopes, tested the contents and found no biological threats, said FBI spokeswoman Sarah Oates. Still, managers, security supervisors and the U.S. Postal Service encouraged office workers across the area to be careful handling unusual mail. The common caution: Be watchful. If you have doubts, call a higher-up for help. And if the worst happens, call 911.
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10/11/2001 ||
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BY LARRY LEBOWITZ, LISA ARTHUR AND DAVID GREEN MIAMI HERALD
Law enforcement and public health officials confirmed Wednesday night that a third employee of the American Media Inc. tabloid publishing firm has been exposed to the anthrax bacteria. U.S. Attorney Guy Lewis said the latest employee who tested positive for the presence of anthrax spores in her nose was a 35-year-old woman. Lewis declined to identify the woman. ``It is now a criminal investigation,'' Lewis said, speaking at an evening news conference with the FBI, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the state Health Department.
While emphasizing that the anthrax contamination appears to be limited to the 66,000-square-foot AMI office building in Boca Raton, criminal and public health investigators were unable to say how the employees were exposed or why. AMI publishes The National Enquirer, The Star, The Globe, The Sun and other supermarket newspapers.
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10/11/2001 ||
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(CNSNews.com)
The Socialist Party-USA does not believe that bin Laden is responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States. "I refuse to believe that Osama bin Laden...is behind all of these things he's been accused of," said Shaun Richman, the co-vice national chairman of the Socialist Party USA. In an October 7 statement on the bombing of Afghanistan, the Socialist Party-USA expresses "outrage" at the US-led attack, calling it "retribution'' and "aggression" that will lead to more violence. Well, that certainly comes as a surprise. They've always been so mainstream, so pro-American...
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10/11/2001 ||
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WSJ Best of the Web Today
Tony Falcone, one of the UC Berkeley students who sponsored a student-government resolution threatening to raise the rent of the Daily Californian student newspaper for publishing an antiterrorist cartoon, now says he was wrong. "You know, looking at the original bill, it did reek of fascism," Falcone tells the San Francisco Chronicle's Debra Saunders. "I think we screwed up big time."
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10/11/2001 ||
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Bill O'Reilly
Although the dissenters to military action are small in number, they are loud. Phil Donahue and his brethren passionately advocate a measured response to the attack on America and want the proper "authorities" to handle the matter. Mr. Donahue, for example, wants the people who ordered the mass murder to be tried in a "world" court. He also wants a "coalition" of nations to band together and decide what strategies should be employed in apprehending the Osama bin Ladens of the world.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Debra Saunders
GEORGE Orwell would have loved UC Berkeley student senate bill 67. Its first and second versions begin praising Berkeley as "a place of light where the rights of individuals with difference are appreciated and honest, probing inquiry is encouraged."
Also: "Berkeley remains one of the few places in the world where a thoughtful, critical exchange can occur from people across a spectrum of backgrounds and races, without fear of reprisal or hatred."
But, in an exercise of left-wing censorship, a version of the bill introduced last week recommended that a student board raise the $8,000-per- month rent of the Daily Californian in retaliation of the student newspaper refusing to be intimidated into running a front-page apology for a Darrin Bell political cartoon it ran Sept. 18.
The cartoon showed two turbaned terrorists ready to "meet Allah and be fed grapes," but finding themselves instead burning in hell. Bill co-author Sajid Khan believes the cartoon was "racist." (I disagree. The cartoon clearly lampoons a vicious fanatical mind-set that equates slaughtering innocents with martyrdom and eternal reward.)
The newspaper could avoid a rent increase, the bill explained, if it adopted "voluntary diversity training." (Doublespeak lives in the misuse of the words "voluntary" -- when the bill says submit or pay -- and "diversity" -- when only popular opinions will be tolerated.) Also, the paper could "rectify its complete insensitivity to the needs of its campus and its values" with "a printed apology, and a new record of dedication to truth in editorial and news content."
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10/11/2001 ||
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WSJ Best of the Web Today
A Spring Clarification
We heard from Berkeley city councilwoman Dona Spring, who offers the following clarification of a quote from the Daily Californian, which we noted yesterday:
I never denounced America!
I believe what I was trying to stay is that "to many of the Afghan people, the U.S. bombing of them is a terrorist act." Human life is precious. Whether it is the 6,000 people who cruelly lost their lives to the bombing attacks on Sept. 11 or the hundreds of thousands of people of the Middle East who have been killed through extensive U.S. bombing and intervention in the past two decades. Are not the lives of these people as precious as our own? One thing that history has proven again and again is that violence will only beget more violence. As our great American leader Cesar Chavez said, "nonviolence is our strength."
I also told the reporter that a preferable solution for the U.S. would be to continue creating coalitions with governments in the Middle East and with Afghan civilians to unite and bring down the murderous Taliban.
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10/11/2001 ||
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WSJ Best of the Web Today
At Brown University, some 120 students walked out of class Tuesday to protest America's efforts to defend itself against terrorism. The Brown Daily Herald reports that "Some professors, including John Tomasi, associate professor of political science, and William Keach, professor of English, let their classes out early so students could attend the protest. At one point, Keach took the microphone and said, 'What happened on Sept. 11 was terrorism, but what happened during the Gulf War was also terrorism.' " We'd like to think he's referring to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, but we somehow doubt it.
The Herald quotes one Peter Zedrin, "who said he is a freelance writer in Providence": "I was cheering when the Pentagon got hit because I know about the brutality of the military. The American flag is nothing but a symbol of hate and should be used for toilet paper for all I care."
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10/11/2001 ||
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BY JOHN LEO
The House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church has issued an unusually disgraceful statement on the terrorist attacks. After urging believers to "wage reconciliation" (i.e., not war), the bishops said: "The affluence of nations such as our own stands in stark contrast to other parts of the world wracked by the crushing poverty which causes the death of 6,000 children in the course of a morning." The number 6,000 and the reference to a single morning, of course, are meant to evoke September 11 in a spirit of moral equivalence. In plain English, the bishops seem to think Americans are in no position to complain about the Manhattan massacre since 6,000 poor children around the world can die in a single day. The good bishops are apparently willing to tolerate 6,000 murders because the West has failed to eliminate world poverty, and perhaps should be blamed for causing it. But the terrorist attack has nothing to do with hunger or disease. And the bishops' statement is a moral mess. How many murders can Episcopalians overlook because of the existence of crushing poverty? If 6,000, why not 60,000?
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10/11/2001 ||
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Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani said today that New York City would not accept a $10 million charitable donation from a wealthy prince from Saudi Arabia who criticized the American government's policies in the Middle East. Prince Alwaleed bin Talal bin Abdul Aziz Alsaud was one of many foreign visitors who have gone with the mayor to ground zero at the destroyed World Trade Center since the terrorist attacks last month. The prince, who is also the chairman of the Kingdom Holding Company, attended a memorial service at the site today, where he handed the mayor a check for $10 million for the Twin Towers Fund, one of various charity funds set up to benefit survivors of the attack.
Mr. Giuliani initially accepted the check, as he has several times from government and private industry leaders. Along with it was a letter from the prince, in which he expressed his condolences for "the loss of life that the City of New York has suffered." The letter added, "I would also like to condemn all forms of terrorism and in doing so I am reiterating Saudi Arabia's strong stance against these tragic and horrendous acts."
What the letter did not say was what a press release attached to a copy of the letter did: "However, at times like this one, we must address some of the issues that led to such a criminal attack. I believe the government of the United States of America should re-examine its policies in the Middle East and adopt a more balanced stance towards the Palestinian cause." The press release attributed the statement to the prince. "'Our Palestinian brethren continue to be slaughtered at the hands of Israelis while the world turns the other cheek,' Prince Alwaleed stressed," the release read.
The mayor, who had been told of the press release just moments before his daily briefing but after receiving the check, was visibly annoyed by it. "I entirely reject that statement," he said. "That's totally contrary to what I said at the United Nations," he added, referring to his address to the international body last Monday. "There is no moral equivalent for this act," the mayor said. "There is no justification for it. The people who did it lost any right to ask for justification for it when they slaughtered 4,000 or 5,000 innocent people. And to suggest that there's a justification for it only invites this happening in the future. It is highly irresponsible and very, very dangerous."
The mayor added that he might consult with the State Department before deciding what to do with the check; an hour later, his press office released a statement attributed to the mayor that the check would not be accepted. Rudy's got guts. Prince Alwaleed lacks tact.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Boston Herald Franci Richardson
Police are investigating what happened to $1,000 raised by Whitman-Hanson Middle School students for local families who lost loved ones in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. ``We're just devastated,'' said Thomas Benvie, middle school principal. ``We can't believe it. We were hoping there was a mistake, but there wasn't one.'' Nearly 450 students raised $2,700 from the proceeds of selling red, white and blue ribbons, holding a school dance, and forking over their daily snack money toward the fund.
On Friday, administrators realized that only $1 bills were left alongside some rolled coins, and that nearly one-third of the money had been stolen from the school's main office. ``We noticed the fives, tens and twenties were missing,'' Benvie said, referring to the larger bills. Benvie then called Hanson police, who yesterday said the theft was under investigation.
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10/11/2001 ||
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WSJ Best of the Web Today
Boston Globe columnist Derrick Z. Jackson, a finalist in the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for commentary for his "perceptive, versatile columns on such subjects as politics, education and race," offers these perceptive, versatile insights on the war (emphasis ours):
Until yesterday all was antiseptic in the temper tantrum against terrorism. . . . Americans were successfully fed the illusion that our tantrum would break only the glass and china of the Taliban and punch a hole in the wall protecting Osama bin Laden. . . . In human history, there are few cases of tantrums that take time to understand complexity. This one is no exception. . . . It does not matter how smart your bombs are if they are dropped in a tantrum.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Ralph Z. Hallow and Vaishali Honawar THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Many American Islamic leaders say they support the war on terrorism, but some younger Muslims here say they are not willing to fight that war against others of their faith. "We support President Bush in the war against terrorism," Islamic Institute President Khalid Saffuri says. "We support our troops and pray for their safe return."
But Altaf Husain, 31, a Howard University Ph.D. student, strikes a different note. "Most Muslim students hold widespread grievances about America's role in the Middle East conflict, its sanctions against Iraq and the stationing of troops in Saudi Arabia," he says. Mr. Husain insists that this does not mean such students feel any less patriotic about being Americans, but he concedes he would not be willing to fight against other Muslims. "Not under these circumstances and not for this war," says Mr. Hussain, the U.S.-born son of Egyptian parents and president of the National Muslim Students Association. "It doesn't sit well to say Afghan people should suffer when they have not done anything."
He regards Saudi-born fugitive Osama bin Laden as merely a suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks, a belief shared by Ashraf Ali, 19. "Everything is in question until the evidence comes," says Mr. Ali, a member of the University of Maryland's Muslim Students' Association. "It all comes down to justice. That is the foundation of Islam."
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/11/2001 ||
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BBC
The government in Pakistan has warned that it will deport any Afghan refugees found to be involved in pro-Taleban demonstrations. The call follows the deaths of several people in demonstrations which have turned violent. Mullah Mohammad Omar, has called for Muslims around the world to back them in their fight against the United States.
Three people were killed on Tuesday in protests in Pakistan against the US-led air strikes on Afghanistan. The deaths occurred when police opened fire on a crowd of several hundred people who had stormed a police station in the town of Kuchlak, near Quetta. The deaths in Quetta came as Pakistan arrested three prominent Islamic leaders allied to Afghanistan's Taleban movement.
There have been protests in many areas of Pakistan, including Lahore, Orangi Town and the city of Rawalpindi, near to the capital Islamabad. There was also a large demonstration in the southern city of Karachi where about 5,000 demonstrators took to the street. They chanted anti-US slogans, but there was no violence. Reports say about 1,500 students marched in Islamabad, and several hundred turned out in Peshawar near the border with Afghanistan.
The BBC's Daniel Lak says mainstream Pakistani opinion does not support the anti-US rioters, or the Taleban. But he says news of civilian casualties trickling out of Kabul will cause more widespread anger against the American and British raids.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/11/2001 ||
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(AFP)
61 university lecturers allegedly involved in anti-government activities have been sacked, transferred or issued with warnings, Malaysia's Education Minister Musa Mohamed told parliament Thursday. "The situation is under control and public universities are constantly carrying out investigations and monitoring the situation to ensure that this problem does not spread," he was quoted as saying by Bernama news agency. Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Monday announced a requirement for all civil servants along with teachers, university lecturers and students to sign a pledge of good conduct. Mahathir said the move was to check "poisoning of the minds" of students so they "stick to the original purpose of entering universities to gain knowledge and not to indulge in anti-government activities".
Students have played a prominent role in a series of "Reformasi" (reform) protests which followed the sacking and detention of ex-deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim in 1998.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/11/2001 ||
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(AP)
Osama bin Laden's chief deputy visited the United States at least twice in the last decade to raise money for terrorism, according to federal court records. Ayman al-Zawahiri made the trips in the early 1990s to help raise funds for the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Ali Mohamed said on Oct. 20, 2000, as he pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges stemming from the deadly bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa. "I helped him to do this,'' Mohamed told Judge Leonard B. Sand.
The sworn statement was highlighted in a San Francisco Chronicle story detailing how two members of a Silicon Valley terrorist cell had admitted bringing al-Zawahiri to the United States to raise money for terrorism. The newspaper said he traveled with a stolen passport supplied by the two men and used a fake name. It said he visited mosques in Santa Clara, Stockton and Sacramento during a nationwide fund-raising mission. The Chronicle said he may have raised as much as $500,000 in the United States, mostly donations from U.S. Muslims who were told the money would support refugees of the Afghanistan war with the Soviet Union in the 1980s.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/11/2001 ||
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Middle East Newsline
The United States has concluded that the Iranian-sponsored Hizbullah was behind the 1996 Islamic bombing of a U.S. military barracks in Saudi Arabia. A federal indictment unsealed in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va. listed Hizbullah as the organization that sponsor the bombing of the barracks in the Saudi city of Khobar. Nineteen servicemen were killed in the blast. Moreover, the indictment said the Khobar plot was discovered three months before the actual bombing when Saudi border guards seized about 40 kilograms of explosives.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Jerusalem Post
Imad Mugniyah, a suspect in the bombings of the Israeli Embassy and a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that left 119 dead in the early 1990s, was named one of the FBI's 22 most wanted terrorists. Before September 11, US officials considered Mugniyah - a founder of Hizbullah - responsible for the deaths of more Americans around the world than anyone else, CNN reported yesterday. Among other actions, the US blames him for the 1983 suicide bombing that killed 241 US Marines in Lebanon.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Arieh O'Sullivan
The deputy to one of the most wanted Hamas terrorists died in an explosion earlier today as he was trying to plant a roadside bomb intended for Jewish settlers and IDF troops in the West Bank. Security sources identified the man as Hani Rawajbeh, 22, a member of the military wing of Hamas and deputy to Mahmoud Abu Hanoud. His mangled body was found near the Nablus-area village of Kfar Zara which is frequently used by settlers and IDF patrols.
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10/11/2001 ||
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(CNSNews.com)
Beginning Friday, European pilots will help protect American skies for the first time ever. AWACS planes will be deployed from a NATO base in Germany to Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma. But, Texas Republican Congressman Ron Paul is upset at the action, believing it indicates a loss of American sovereignty. President Bush announced the action Wednesday during an appearance with NATO Secretary-General Lord Robertson. "In an unprecedented display of friendship, NATO air surveillance aircraft are on their way to the United States to help keep our country safe. This has never happened before, that NATO has come to help defend our country. But it happened in this time of need. And for that, we're grateful," Bush said.
Paul, a member of the House International Relations Committee, disagrees. "National security is the most basic sovereign duty of the federal government in our constitutional republic. Neither Congress nor the president can cede that duty to a foreign nation or body. We cannot allow the security of our own borders to become the responsibility of any coalition or international organization, whether it's NATO or the United Nations," said Paul on Capitol Hill.
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10/11/2001 ||
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NY POST LAURA ITALIANO
Egyptian anti-terrorist police have foiled a second wave of suicide hijacker attacks - this one against "various world capitals." The plot was thwarted through the arrest of 12 al Qaeda-linked suspects in Egypt, according to local press reports. The suspects were part of a terrorist cell that was conspiring to commit "simultaneous attacks in various world capitals," said the report, in the weekly journal Al Mussawar.
The second wave of terror would have been a repeat of the coordinated hijacking attacks last month in New York and Washington. Among those arrested were two pilots who trained at the same flying school as Mohamed Atta - believed to have been the ringleader of the 19 hijackers from Sept. 11. Egyptian officials declined to comment on the report.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Middle East Newsline
Saudi Arabia has launched a crackdown on Christian activists amid heightened Islamic unrest in the kingdom. Christian sources in the kingdom said at least 15 Christians from Africa have been arrested in Jedda over the last few months for conducting non-Islamic services in private homes. Three of them are said to have been tortured in prison. The Christians are nationals from Eritrea, Ethiopia and Nigeria. The sources did not report any arrest of Western Christians. About 50,000 Americans are said to be in Saudi Arabia, many of them from the military or defense industries.
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10/11/2001 ||
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Mariam Isa
RIYADH, Oct 11 (Reuters) - A man threw a Molotov cocktail at a German couple in Saudi Arabia in an incident believed to be related to heightened tensions following last month's attacks on the United States, diplomats said on Thursday. The man and woman escaped unhurt, the diplomats said, but the episode in Riyadh had prompted the German embassy to advise Germans in the kingdom to tighten their personal security. "We take it very seriously. It appears to be an attack directed at foreigners," one of the diplomats said.
"A man wearing Saudi national dress threw a bottle with a burning liquid towards the couple's car as they drove towards their compound just after sunset. The driver hit the brakes and the bottle hit the front of the car and broke on the other side of the street," one of the diplomats said. "He then accelerated very fast and when they looked around there was a big burning spot on the street. As they drove away the man, who had his headscarf wrapped around his face, picked up a rock and threw it after their car."
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10/11/2001 ||
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Reuters
One U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that since the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, authorities had foiled bombing plots aimed at four U.S. embassies. The official declined to identify the locations of the embassies or the plotters.
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10/11/2001 ||
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NY POST
Italian police arrested two suspects yesterday in that country's own crackdown on al Qaeda. Milan-based prosecutors say they are tracking a network spanning Italy, Germany, France, Spain and Belgium. Acting on Italian intelligence, police in Germany arrested in Munich a third suspect with links to bin Laden. The three had planned to supply bogus passports to terrorist recruits en route to training camps in Afghanistan, officials said. The German suspect had direct phone contact with bin Laden - including conversations earlier this year with references to an imminent "major" attack, and arms hidden in Afghan caves. Fourth and fifth suspects are being sought in France and elsewhere, said prosecutors in Milan. The suspect in France is believed to be linked to a chemical weapons lab there.
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10/11/2001 ||
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(AP)
A Palestinian man with a pilot's license entered an innocent plea today to federal charges of having a gun while living illegally in the United States and making false statements to gun dealers. Atallah Fuad Khoury, 28, of suburban Houston was arrested Sept. 18 after federal agents received a tip that he allegedly told a rental car clerk in mid-August he was two weeks away from getting a pilot's license and that she should "watch the news."
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/11/2001 ||
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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.
