A reconnaissance group of the special task force of the Chief Intelligence Agency (GRU) has destroyed physically three militants in Chechnya, including a mercenary from Turkey, a representative of the information and public relations department of the Russian Defence Ministry told Itar-Tass on Friday.
âA reconnaissance group of the GRU special task force detected and destroyed physically three militants near the village of Selmentauzen, Vedeno District, Chechnya, on November 18. They had with them fire arms, ammunition and communication facilities,â the Defence Ministry official said. âOne of the militants had a Turkish passport on him (TRL series, No. 929660) to the name of Topli Sakhin, born on August 10, 1976. There are notes in the passport, which show that he legally crossed the Turkish-Georgian border on many occasions.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 11:10 ||
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Police arrested on Friday some 90 people in Brussels in a large scale operation against human smuggling. Almost a third of those arrested are accused of smuggling illegal immigrants into Belgium from Pakistan and India. The illegal immigrants were then transported onto Britain, Flemish broadcaster VRT reported. The suspects are accused of loading the illegal immigrants onto trucks along the E40 Brussels-Oostende motorway for the journey to Britain. The Dendermonde public prosecutor had kept the gang under surveillance for some time before the raids took place on Friday morning. Some 26 homes were raided in the greater Brussels area. Of the 90 people arrested, 66 were staying illegally in Belgium. The other 24 people were accused of membership of a criminal gang.
#2
HU - Try searching RealClearPolitics for such things in the future - they keep quite an archive.
The one you want is here, question 31 -- Note it's a PDF file. Typical screwy poll in several respects.
31. What do you want U.S. troops in Iraq to do -- do you want them to leave Iraq and come home now or do you want them to stay in Iraq and finish the
job?
Come home / Finish job / (Not sure)
8-9 Nov 05 36% / 55 / 9
30-31 Aug 05 33% / 58 / 9
They leave the best bit for last: Who did they poll, and that's assuming they were honest, which is crap, of course, when one is driven by an agenda...
POLITICAL IDENTIFICATION
When you think about politics, do you think of yourself as a Democrat or a Republican?
1. Democrat 38%
2. Republican 36
3. (Independent) 20
4. (Other) 2
5. (Refused/Donât know) 4
#1
Will say again that Dubya's DemoLefty critics are like the character PEG BUNDY in MARRIED WITH CHILDREN - when it coms to her own survival andor benefit, she will proudly proclaim to cook and clean and have sex with the winner(s), as long its understood that Peggy does NOT do the same for everyone or anyone, no matter whom wins.
EFL - HT to Captain Ed and Michelle Malkin
ANGERED by negative portrayals of the conflict in Iraq, Bruce Willis, the Hollywood star, is to make a pro-war film in which American soldiers will be depicted as brave fighters for freedom and democracy.
It will be based on the exploits of the heavily decorated members of Deuce Four, the 1st Battalion, 24th Infantry, which has spent the past year battling insurgents in the northern Iraqi town of Mosul.
Willis attended Deuce Fourâs homecoming ball this month in Seattle, Washington, where the soldiers are on leave, along with Stephen Eads, the producer of Armageddon and The Sixth Sense.
The 50-year-old actor said that he was in talks about a film of âthese guys who do what they are asked to for very little money to defend and fight for what they consider to be freedomâ.
Unlike many Hollywood stars Willis supports the war and recently offered a $1m (about £583,000) bounty for the capture of any of Al-Qaedaâs most wanted leaders such as Osama Bin Laden, Ayman Al-Zawahiri or Abu Musab al- Zarqawi, its commander in Iraq. Willis visited the war zone with his rock and blues band, the Accelerators, in 2003.
âI am baffled to understand why the things I saw happening in Iraq are not being reported,â he told MSNBC, the American news channel.
He is expected to base the film on the writings of the independent blogger Michael Yon, a former special forces green beret who was embedded with Deuce Four and sent regular dispatches about their heroics.
Yon was at the soldiersâ ball with Willis, who got to know him through his internet war reports on www.michaelyon.blogspot.com. âWhat he is doing is something the American media and maybe the world media isnât doing,â the actor said, âand thatâs telling the truth about whatâs happening in the war in Iraq.â
Willis is likely to take on the role of the unitâs commander, Lieutenant-Colonel Erik Kurilla, 39, a Bruce Willis lookalike with a chest full of medals, more hair than Willis and a glamorous blonde wife.
He was injured in August after being shot three times by insurgents âin front of my eyesâ, Yon recorded in his blog: âHe continued to direct his men until a medic gave him morphine and the men took him away.â
Kurilla now has a titanium plate in his leg. He met Willis at the ball and said that his men were âvery excited and appreciative that he was thereâ. â
Deuce Four has a chequered history. For decades it was a segregated black unit commanded by a white officer. It was disbanded in 1951 but veterans felt hurt that its past was considered to be a stain on the army and it was revived in the mid-1990s.
When the battalion arrived in Mosul in November last year the city was under threat from insurgents. âWe faced very heavy fighting for about three months,â Kurilla recalled. âEvery patrol was making contact with enemy forces. We would hit them where they slept, where they worked and where they ate.â
Today the picture was very different, he said. âI have watched a city that was in absolute chaos turn into one that has a viable Iraqi security force, which is taking the lead in fighting the terrorists.â
Yon, 41, went to Iraq after a friend from high school, Scott Helveston, a former navy Seal, was hanged from a bridge in Falluja in an incident that shocked the world. Yon had never blogged before but was the author of Danger Close, a book about his experience as a green beret when he killed a man in a bar-room brawl. He was charged with murder and acquitted on the grounds of self-defence.
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/27/2005 15:48 ||
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Iraqi police said they had smashed an Al-Qaeda cell plotting to kill the chief judge in charge of building the case against ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, whose trial resumes on Monday after a five-week recess.
"We arrested 12 members of a cell linked to the Iraqi branch of Al-Qaeda during a dawn raid on a house in eastern Kirkuk," in northern Iraq, police colonel Anwar Kader said on Saturday.
"They confessed during questioning to planning to kill (chief judge) Raed al-Juhi this week."
Juhi is the chief investigative judge on the Iraqi High Tribunal which is tasked with judging former regime officials, including Saddam, for crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide.
Kader said all the suspects were Iraqi Sunni Arabs from Kirkuk, from Saddam's hometown of Tikrit or from the restive western province of Al-Anbar. The 12 suspects also confessed to helping to carry out suicide attacks in the Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah in October in which 10 people were killed, he said.
Security will be a top priority when the trial of Saddam and seven former henchmen resumes Monday in Baghdad on charges of killing 148 men and youths from the Shiite town of Dujail, north of the capital, after the former leader escaped an assassination attempt there in 1982.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 10:55 ||
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TIKRIT, Iraq â Iraqi and U.S. forces continued the fight against terrorists operating throughout the north central region of Iraq Saturday.
Sixteen suspected terrorists, including one female, were captured in a series of unrelated events.
In an early morning cordon and search mission near Baqubah, Iraqi and U.S. Soldiers detained nine suspected terrorists and seized fuses used for detonating explosives along with several anti-aircraft artillery rounds.
Police in Samarra investigated an explosion that occurred at a gas station southeast of the city Nov. 26 at about 11:30 a.m. Four 155mm artillery shells, converted into IEDs, detonated before they could be moved out of the station, killing nine suspected terrorist and injuring four others. The four injured suspects were detained by the Samarra Police.
In the nearby city of Balad, U.S. Soldiers detained a suspect at a checkpoint after he attempted to avoid questioning. A search revealed that he was carrying more than $3,000 in U.S. currency.
To finish off the day, U.S. troops conducted a clearing operation in Baqubah the evening of Nov. 26. The Soldiers detained a man and a woman after discovering them with eight blocks of C-4 plastic explosive, an AK-47 with several hundred rounds, blasting caps and various other IED-making materials.
A close family member as well as Coalition sources claimed earlier this week that a gatekeeper and confidant of Abu Muâsab al-Zarqawi, Bilal Mahmud Awad Shebah, aka Abu Ubaydah, who reportedly met weekly with the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, is dead.
Abu Ubaydah was reportedly killed Oct. 14 when Coalition Forces raided several suspected terrorist hideouts in the Albu Ubayd neighborhood north of Ramadi. Although intelligence analysts assessed Abu Ubaydah was killed during the mid-October raids, they could not determine his death with certainty at that time.
In late November, Coalition Forces received information from knowledgeable sources and a close family member of Abu Ubaydah claiming independently that Zarqawiâs confidant and gatekeeper was killed as a result of the Oct. 14 raids.
Detained members of al-Qaeda claim Abu Ubaydah served as an âexecutive secretaryâ for Zarqawi; met with Zarqawi frequently; served as a messenger and gatekeeper for Zarqawi; screened all messages and requests for meetings with Zarqawi; was one of Zarqawiâs most trusted associates; provided Zarqawi with safe house locations; and used intimidation and death threats to gain the cooperation of the Iraqi people to support al Qaeda in Iraq terrorist activity.
During the course of the raids, several weapons caches, containing mortar rounds, small arms and ammunition, were found and destroyed. Mortar rounds were also emplaced along the road leading to the safe houses, serving as improvised explosive devices against incoming vehicle or foot traffic. The forces were engaged by small-arms fire upon their arrival to the suspected terrorist location and immediately returned fire. Combining the ground attack with the use of close-air support, the terroristsâ hideout locations were destroyed.
No Coalition forces were injured or killed during the raids.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 00:50 ||
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The Multi-National Forces in Iraq announced Saturday the start of Operation Panthers in Al-Ramadi, western Iraq, to track down terrorists. A Multi-National Forces statement issued today said that 550 Iraqi and American soldiers are to take part in the operation that aims to stop and obstruct the movement of terrorists and stabilize the city in preparation for the mid-December elections.
Operation Panthers follows Operation Lions that ended yesterday, where around 200 Iraqi Army Soldiers and 250 Soldiers from the 2nd Brigade Combat Team (2-BCT) concluded the operation in the Tamim area of Al-Ramadi. Operation Lions resulted in the arrest of 20 suspected terrorists and it is the third in a series of disruption operations that were aimed at capturing or killing Al-Qaeda terrorists in the area. Operations Panthers and Bruins were also aimed at crippling terrorists' ability to operate in northern Al-Ramadi and create a suitable environment for the upcoming elections.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/27/2005 00:35 ||
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Some Iraqi rebel groups say they are ready to engage in the political process, a top aide to President Jalal Talabani said Saturday, after the government warned of a renewed offensive against insurgents.
âWe have received calls from people who said they belonged to armed groups,â Talabaniâs national security advisor Lieutenant-General Wafeeq al-Sammarai told AFP, adding that the callers âsaid they were ready to join the political process.â
They included Islamists and Baathists from the now banned party of deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, said Sammarai, who was the head of Iraqi military intelligence in the 1991 Gulf War.
At a meeting of Iraqi political leaders in Cairo last weekend, Talabani said he was prepared to talk to rebels in a bid to end the deadly insurgency that has gripped the country since Saddamâs downfall in 2003.
âIf those who describe themselves as the Iraqi resistance want to get in touch with me, they are welcome to do so,â Talabani said.
The Cairo meeting was held to pave the ground for a reconciliation conference next year in Baghdad and to encourage minority Sunni Arabs, seen as backing the insurgency, to join the political process instead.
Sammarai gave no further details on which rebel groups might have been in touch, or how much of a following they might have within the insurgency which US forces described as multi-faceted.
The announcement comes amid a wave of suicide bombings and sectarian-related shootings that have left at least 180 over the past week in the run-up to the resumption of Saddamâs trial on Monday.
On Thursday, Interior Minister Bayan Baker Solagh told reporters that security forces were preparing to launch a comprehensive sweep involving 10,000 men throughout the country against rebels before the December 15 elections.
âWe are going to strike forcefully at the hotbeds of terrorism in different regions,â he said.
Government spokesman Leith Kubba has warned that âone should expect an increase in violence in the run-up to the December 15 elections,â saying those responsible were âcriminals and partisans of Saddam Husseinâ.
Sammarai said those who contacted him were all Iraqis and that he would have no dealings with foreign fighters such as Jordanian-born Al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose group is behind most of the bloodiest attacks.
Zarqawi condemned Talabaniâs initiative and is widely believed to be attempting to spark a sectarian war in Iraq between Sunnis and Shiites in effort to increase chaos and discredit the US-backed government.
In two attacks on Thursday, both south of Baghdad, a suicide car bombing against a hospital in Mahmudiyah killed 30 people and a car bomb in a shopping district of Hilla left three dead and 16 wounded.
Several Sunni Arab political and religious leaders have also been gunned down over the past weeks, including a tribal leader and four of his relatives early Wednesday by gunmen dressed as Iraqi soldiers. In Baghdad, security officials were preparing for the resumption of the trial of Saddam, who along with seven co-accused faces charges linked to the killing of 148 Shiite villagers.
The first witnesses for the prosecution are expected to be called. They could testify from behind screens or with faces masked to protect their anonymity, according to a US official close to the tribunal. Saddam and his co-accused could face execution if found guilty.
Meanwhile, Lithuanian Defense Minister Gediminas Kirkilas said his country would reduce the number of its soldiers serving in Iraq at the start of next year.
Some 100 Lithuanian troops are currently deployed in Iraq, around 50 under Polish command in central Iraq and 50 under Danish command in the British-controlled southern sector.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 00:36 ||
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Ahmed Hussein Khudeir, a taxi driver in the city of Samarra, lined up at 6:30 Saturday morning to wait for gasoline, part of life's maddening routine in oil-rich, gas-short Iraq.
Four hours later, he was still in line when a pickup truck barreled toward the gas station in the wrong lane. A young man in a black headdress rammed the pickup into a tanker truck at the station just as he exploded a suicide bomb, creating a fireball that killed three and reached Khudeir with its flames.
"They want to destroy the peace," said Khudeir's father, who stood distraught and helpless at a hospital bedside as his 22-year-old son, writhing in pain, recalled what happened. At least eight others were severely burned, according to Mustafa Hussein Bazi, a physician who confirmed the death toll.
The attack on the gas station in Samarra, about 65 miles north of Baghdad, was one of two bombings Saturday in Iraq; the other killed four people when explosives in a parked car detonated as two armored cars passed in downtown Baghdad. Such armored cars often carry foreigners, but the victims this time were Iraqi pedestrians, according to police.
In southern Iraq, police said they found the body of a Sunni Muslim cleric who had been abducted from his home in Basra Friday evening by gunmen. Sheik Nadir Karim was the second Sunni religious figure killed in Basra in the past seven days, increasing fears of sectarian warfare between Sunnis and Shiites as the country moves toward Dec. 15 elections.
Karim had been shot many times and dumped in an old British cemetery, according to Basra police Capt. Raji Hassan.
The Sunnis, who wielded power during Saddam Hussein's rule, and the majority Shiites, who control the government now, have traded deadly attacks. A group claiming to represent Sunnis claimed on a Web site Friday that it had carried out a car bombing in the southern Shiite city of Hilla that killed 11 people Thursday.
The group, calling itself Partisans of the Sunni, said in a statement that it had conducted the attack to retaliate for the slaying of Sunni cleric Khadim Sarhid Hemaiyem in Baghdad on Wednesday. Gunmen wearing Iraqi army uniforms broke into Hemaiyem's home, killing the cleric, his three sons and a son-in-law.
"We have warned the [Shiites] to stop assassinations and detentions and torture," the statement said. "You should know, your blood is no more dear than ours. You kill our men, we kill yours. You kill our sheiks, we kill yours. You started this war."
The U.S. military said in a statement Saturday that a raid on a home last month in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad, had killed a top aide to Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian Sunni radical who leads al Qaeda in Iraq.
The military said "a close family member" and other sources confirmed the death of Bilal Mahmud Awad Shebah, also known as Abu Ubaydah, in the raid. The statement described the man as the "executive secretary" for Zarqawi, saying he met Zarqawi often and served as his "gatekeeper and messenger." U.S. and Iraqi authorities have long and unsuccessfully pursued Zarqawi, who has asserted responsibility for numerous beheadings and other spectacular attacks on U.S. and Iraqi targets, including Shiite civilians.
U.S. military officials also confirmed Saturday that a U.S. Marine was killed Friday in a roadside bombing near Hit, nearly 100 miles west of Baghdad. The Marine's name was not released.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 00:33 ||
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The US military Saturday said that the American troops in Iraq killed Bilal Awad Sabah, described as a close associate of extremist leader Abu Musab Zarqawi in western Iraq. Sabah, also known as Abu Ubaydah, was reportedly killed on October 14 when US-led forces raided a number of suspected rebel hideouts in the Albuaide neighborhood north of Ramadi, in western Iraq, according to the US Army's statement.
Although intelligence analysts reported that Abu Ubaydah was killed during the mid-October raids, they could not determine his death with certainty at that time, when the hideouts were bombed by US forces. Sabah was said to have served as a messenger and gatekeeper for Zarqawi and to have been one of his most trusted assistants.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Car bombs killed 10 people Saturday in Baghdad and elsewhere in central Iraq, while gunmen opened fire on campaign workers putting up posters in the run-up to next month's parliamentary elections. The violence came two days before Saddam Hussein's trial resumes after a five-week break.
U.S. and Iraqi officials have warned of an upsurge in insurgent attacks ahead of the Dec. 15 elections, in which voters will choose the first fully constitutional parliament since Saddam Hussein's rule collapsed in April 2003. American authorities are hoping for a big Sunni Arab turnout, a move that could produce a government that would win the trust of the religious community that forms the backbone of the insurgency.
On Saturday, gunmen opened fire on four people as they plastered campaign posters for the biggest Shiite party on walls in western Baghdad, killing one person and wounding three, police said. In Mosul, gunmen fired on members of the Iraqi Islamic Party, the country's largest Sunni Arab political movement, while they were putting up campaign posters, wounding one person, police said.
A statement posted on an Islamist Web in the name of al-Qaida in Iraq also claimed responsibility for killing a Kurdish election volunteer in Mosul. The statement said Miqdad Ahmed Sito, 28, was seized in the city's Shifaa neighborhood.
Al-Qaida has often spoken out against elections, saying that devout Muslims should follow the Muslim holy book Quran as their only formula for governance. Al-Zarqawi repeatedly has threatened Iraqis who participate in elections, regardless of whether they are Muslims.
The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) on Saturday offered to broker a ceasefire between troops and Muslim rebel forces in the southern Philippine island of Jolo.
Fierce fighting the past two weeks have killed dozens of Moro National Liberation Front members and soldiers in Jolo's Indanan and Panamao towns.
The military accused the MNLF of aiding Abu Sayyaf terrorists, blamed for the series of attacks and bombings in Jolo, about 950 kms south of Manila.
"The MILF is willing to mediate and broker for a ceasefire to save lives and properties and to bring back peace in Jolo," an MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu said.
He said the MILF would appeal to the government to halt offensives on the island to allow peaceful negotiations.
"Peace is important and we should allow peace to return in Jolo. People should live peacefully and that is what we are trying to do, just like the MILF, when it signed a truce agreement with the government," he said.
Jolo military chief Brigadier General Alexander Aleo said troops security forces were still pursuing Abu Sayyaf terrorists, who splintered into smaller groups in Mount Tumatangis in Indanan town.
"The terrorists are holed out in the mountain and troops are tracking them. We will not stop our operations against the Abu Sayyaf and the groups that are supporting or aiding them," Aleo said on Saturday.
Aleo also denied reports that US soldiers were involved in the operation against the Abu Sayyaf. He said a small group of US troops are on the island because of humanitarian mission.
"The American soldiers are part of a humanitarian mission in Jolo under the joint RP-US Project Bayanihan. They are not directly involved in any operation against the terrorists in Jolo," he said.
The fighting in Jolo erupted after Abu Sayyaf militants raided a military post in Indanan town on November 11. But officials said the MNLF sided with the Abu Sayyaf and in many instances fought alongside with them.
MNLF leader Haber Malik denied the accusation and said security forces were attacking their positions on the island.
In February, some 25 soldiers and 120 MNLF and Abu Sayyaf members had been killed in weeks of fierce clashes following a rebel attack in Jolo.
Most of the attackers were loyal supporters of jailed MNLF leader Nur Misuari.
Misuari formerly headed the MNLF that accepted limited autonomy and signed a peace deal with the government in 1996. But violence flared again in November 2001 after some 200 former rebels, backed by the Abu Sayyaf, attacked a major army base in Jolo.
Another MNLF faction also held hostage some 100 people in Zamboanga City, but freed them after days of government negotiations.
Misuari later escaped to Malaysia where he was arrested and deported back to the Philippines, where he was imprisoned on charges of rebellion, which carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
But thousands of his followers and supporters still maintain strongholds in Jolo. Many Abu Sayyaf militants were former members of the MNLF.
Aid workers said the latest hostilities forced more than 2,500 people to flee their homes in Jolo for fear that they would be caught in the cross-fire or held hostage by rebels.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 11:09 ||
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Iran is secretly training Chechen rebels in sophisticated terror techniques to enable them to carry out more effective attacks against Russian forces, the Sunday Telegraph can reveal.
Teams of Chechen fighters are being trained at the Revolutionary Guards' Imam Ali training camp, located close to Tajrish Square in Teheran, according to Western intelligence reports.
In addition to receiving training in the latest terror techniques, the Chechen volunteers undergo ideological and political instruction by hardline Iranian mullahs at Qom.
The disclosure that Iran is training Chechen rebels will not go down well in Moscow, which regards itself as a close ally of the Iranian regime.
Russia has sided with Iran in the diplomatic stand-off over Teheran's controversial nuclear programme.
While the British and American governments have accused Iran of having a clandestine nuclear weapons programme, the Russians, who are building Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant, back Teheran's claim that their nuclear intentions are solely peaceful.
Moscow has offered a face-saving formula to prevent Iran from being reported to the United Nations Security Council for its failure to co-operate fully with UN nuclear inspection teams.
Under the terms of the deal, the Russians would oversee Iran's nuclear enrichment activities to ensure that only partially enriched uranium, which is not of weapons grade, is produced.
At this weekend's meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, America and Britain gave their qualified backing to the Russian proposal in the hope that it might resolve the crisis in the agency's dealings with Teheran.
But the Iranians are growing increasingly suspicious of Moscow's intentions, and it is for this reason that Western intelligence officials believe that Iran's hardline president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has sanctioned the training of Chechen fighters in Teheran.
"Just as they have orchestrated attacks against British troops in Basra to pressure Britain to drop its opposition to Iran's nuclear programme, so they are trying to put pressure on Moscow by backing Chechen fighters," said a senior intelligence official.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 00:48 ||
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As you've no doubt noticed, I totally hosed things while working under the hood. I went to drop a table and dropped the database. Inconvenient, but I thought I'd just restore the backup, which would cost us about a half day's post.
The backup was corrupt. I had to use the previous day's. After tearing my remaining hair out, I was able to restore Page 1 by hand. I still don't have the comments done, will probably do that tomorrow.
I usually have an editor page open set to "all records," but today I didn't have it on this machine. A family member -- he'll recover, though he'll never play the violin again -- shut down the page I had open upstairs.
My sincere apologies to everyone.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/27/2005 22:57 ||
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#1
Fred - You never need to apologize for things that go amiss. That something as complex as the 'burg works so well is a marvel. That it is so open, inviting every moron on the planet with a connection to try to screw it up, yet stays online is a testament to your generosity - and programming skills. Full stop. I am extremely grateful for the work you do and the unique creation that is the 'burg. I offer my sincerest no-shit thanks.
Maoist rebels in Nepal say they may reconsider their opposition to the monarchy if the king holds free elections for a constituent assembly.
Senior rebel leader Prachanda told the BBC that the verdict of free and fair elections would be acceptable even if it meant the retention of the monarchy. Elections, he said, had to be supervised by foreign monitors. The rebels and a coalition of seven opposition parties have recently agreed on a programme designed to end direct rule by King Gyanendra.
Talking to the BBC in his first ever radio interview, Mr Prachanda said the rebels would reconsider their opposition to the monarchy if King Gyanendra agreed to the election of a constituent assembly. "If [the] monarchy comes with that kind of position [acceptance of constituent assembly] we can think about the new situation. But right now we feel that this is not the case in our country," he said.
In theory, Maoist leaders continue to insist that their aim is to turn Nepal into a republic. "History has proved that in Nepalese conditions the monarchy is the main obstacle for the cause of democratic aspirations of the masses and for the cause of communist power peace. Therefore we want to abolish the monarchy and have a communist peoples' republican state," Mr Prachanda said.
But the world "republic" does not feature even once in a major 12-point agreement that the rebels have reached with Nepal's opposition political parties. Also, unlike in the past, Mr Prachanda has stopped using insulting language against the king.
Opposition political parties are also not demanding an end to the monarchy, but that its powers be limited once again.
The royal government has always opposed the idea of a constituent assembly. However, Mr Prachanda's statement may give the government an opportunity to rethink their own position as well. The monarchy in Nepal has lost much of its popularity after the king seized direct power this year. But many still believe that it is saving Nepal from a complete collapse.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 11:04 ||
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#1
Methinks it'll be more like AL SHARPTON and JESSE JACKSON, etal. vv KATRINA-GATE and criticize the Federalist = National level of Governance unto Marxist/Commie-style Universal Subsidation and cradle-to-grave Welfarism.
A statement distributed by the Global Islamic Media Front and formerly located on an radical Islamic American hosted Internet site, contained a death threat against a number of world leaders.
The site has now been suspended.
The statement (at www.alfirdaws.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&t=9116) threatens, according to the Society for Internet Research (www.internet-haganah.us/harchives/005294.html), Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, Australian Prime Minister John Howard, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and U.S. President George W. Bush.
Contacted by e-mail, the Internet Haganah's Aaron Weisburd said the posting promised kidnaping to be followed by decapitation. Weisburd said according to the statement the plan is in place, including the proposed location for Berlusconi's slaughter.
The Global Islamic Media Front (GIMF) is known as the voice of al Qaeda on the Internet.
According to the Society for Internet Research (SOFIR) the statement was published on the al-Firdaws forum by "ialam al-islami," who has in the past been a prolific contributor to GIMF forums and sites.
The ominous statement is attributed to "Rakan ben Willyamz," an apparently collective name for native European converts to Islam roaming the continent, preparing to strike.
While there have been questions about the credibility of the statement, including the poor quality of the Arabic, as opposed to the first statement from the imaginary Rakan ben Willyamz (www.sofir.org/sarchives/005248.php), SOFIR said the threat shouldn't be dismissed.
"Arguments in support of the statement (if not the threat) being credible, include the fact that it was distributed by the Global Islamic Media Front. That this âRakan' is a different and less-literate individual doesn't necessarily make the statement non-credible. Since when are terrorists great examples of human intelligence? Certainly there is no disputing that the countries in question are all in al-Qaida's sights ... Increasingly the global jihad is waged by ignorant thugs, and their statements are likely to reflect that."
The ben Willyamz name came to light earlier this year. The Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper (AAWSAT) reported (http://aawsat.com/english/news.asp?section=1&id=2577) in Aug. that ben Willyamz (or bin Williams), was being touted as someone who would "wreck havoc worldwide."
Al Qaeda's strategy "will depend on surprise such as when near simultaneous attacks were carried out in Morocco and Turkey. Al Qaeda's aim was to target the border between Europe and the Muslim world, east and west, so let this serve as a lesson to the entire west; we have arrived at your borders and no one will be able to stop us," AAWSAT reported that GIMF said on the Internet.
AAWSAT also reported that the British tabloid the Sun indicated al Qaeda was recruiting English men, and referred to six English-language web sites affiliated with al Qaeda that had published material encouraging Europeans to sign up for military training.
Earlier this year, AAWSAT reported al Qaeda warned on the al Firdaws forum, "Do not rejoice, Blair, as you will not be able to follow or halt the movements or stop al Qaeda's new soldiers Rakan bin Williams ... Al Qaeda's new soldiers were born in Europe of European and Christian parents. They studied in your schools. They prayed in your churches, and attended Sunday mass. They drank alcohol, ate pork and oppressed Muslims, but al Qaeda has embraced them, so they have converted to Islam in secret and absorbed the philosophy of al Qaeda and swore to take up arms after their brothers. They are currently roaming the streets of Europe and the United States, planning and observing in preparation for upcoming attacks."
At the time of writing, the Al-Firdaws forum was hosted by the Kentucky- based IX Webhosting. Informed of the contents of the forum reported in this story, a company employee acknowledged that the site was hosted by IX and promised an investigation. Within about an hour, this notice was on the (former) Al Firdaws forum, "Account for domain alfirdaws.org has been suspended."
The content of the Al Firdaws forum violated IX's terms of service (www.ixwebhosting.com/index.php/home.dspPage/page/info.dspTOS). A portion of the company's terms of service reads, "If inappropriate activity is detected, all accounts of the subscriber in question will be deactivated until our investigation is complete. Prior notification to the subscriber is not assured. In extreme cases, law enforcement will be contacted regarding the activity."
The Al Firdaws site was registered to Marwan Alansary of the Al Firdaws Company in Amman, Jordan.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/27/2005 10:58 ||
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Pak writer
Dr Farrukh Saleem
The combined annual GDP of 57 Muslim countries remains under $2 trillion. America, just by herself, produces goods and services worth $10.4 trillion; China $5.7 trillion, Japan $3.5 trillion and Germany $2.1 trillion. Even India's GDP is estimated at over $3 trillion (purchasing power parity basis). similar statistics continue but then here is the conclusion
What really went wrong? Muslims are poor, illiterate and weak. What went wrong? Arriving at the right diagnosis is extremely critical because the prescription depends on it. Consider this:
Diagnosis 1: Muslims are poor, illiterate and weak because they have 'abandoned the divine heritage of Islam'. Prescription: We must return to our real or imagined past.
Diagnosis 2: Muslims are poor, illiterate and weak because we have refused to change with time.
Keep pace with time -- al Quran note the writer doesn't allow for the hypothesis that Islam is the disease itself and his prescription is going to an "imagined past" perhaps because he knows the real past is actually worse than the present; finally he can't bring himself to admit that the quran can't change with the times so he finesses it with an ambiguity
When your whole moral focus happens to be 'my way or the hiway,' folks are not likely to want to do business with you. That could explain the poverty bit.
I'll be chasing an elusive database bug this morning. My apologies in advance for any stupidity-generated system crashes.
Followup: I've switched the categories table from MySQL to Postgres, and I'm about to drop the table from MySQL. I'll be checking for errors on any pages that use that table. If I miss any, let me know.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/27/2005 09:54 ||
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#1
We use 3-footed Zelms for this sort of thing. They're tireless and supel.
Posted by: Octo ||
11/27/2005 11:31 Comments ||
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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.
Police arrested on Friday some 90 people in Brussels in a large scale operation against human smuggling. Almost a third of those arrested are accused of smuggling illegal immigrants into Belgium from Pakistan and India. The illegal immigrants were then transported onto Britain, Flemish broadcaster VRT reported. The suspects are accused of loading the illegal immigrants onto trucks along the E40 Brussels-Oostende motorway for the journey to Britain. The Dendermonde public prosecutor had kept the gang under surveillance for some time before the raids took place on Friday morning. Some 26 homes were raided in the greater Brussels area. Of the 90 people arrested, 66 were staying illegally in Belgium. The other 24 people were accused of membership of a criminal gang.
A close family member as well as Coalition sources claimed earlier this week that a gatekeeper and confidant of Abu Muâsab al-Zarqawi, Bilal Mahmud Awad Shebah, aka Abu Ubaydah, who reportedly met weekly with the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, is dead.
The Multi-National Forces in Iraq announced Saturday the start of Operation Panthers in Al-Ramadi, western Iraq, to track down terrorists. A Multi-National Forces statement issued today said that 550 Iraqi and American soldiers are to take part in the operation that aims to stop and obstruct the movement of terrorists and stabilize the city in preparation for the mid-December elections.
The US military Saturday said that the American troops in Iraq killed 
Car bombs killed 10 people Saturday in Baghdad and elsewhere in central Iraq, while gunmen opened fire on campaign workers putting up posters in the run-up to next month's parliamentary elections. The violence came two days before Saddam Hussein's trial resumes after a five-week break.
Maoist rebels in Nepal say they may reconsider their opposition to the monarchy if the king holds free elections for a constituent assembly. 
