In 1967, Temple ran unsuccessfully for Congress against retired Korean War veteran Pete McCloskey. She ran on a platform supporting America's involvement in the Vietnam War.
Temple went on to hold several diplomatic posts, serving as the U.S. delegate to many international conferences and summits. In 1969, She was appointed a delegate to the United Nations by President Richard M. Nixon. She was appointed United States Ambassador to Ghana (197476). In 1976, she became the first female Chief of Protocol of the United States which put in her charge of all State Department ceremonies, visits, gifts to foreign leaders and co-ordination of protocol issues with all U.S. embassies and consulates. She was United States Ambassador to Czechoslovakia (198992) and witnessed the Velvet Revolution. She commented, about her Ambassadorship, "That was the best job I ever had." In 1987 she was designated the first Honorary Foreign Service Officer in U.S. history by then U.S. Secretary of State, George Shultz.
My kinda girl!
Posted by: Mike ||
05/31/2008 8:46 Comments ||
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#4
Ah yes, the awesome Philadephia Thursday, since it's Saturday I guess.
Posted by: George Smiley ||
05/31/2008 12:04 Comments ||
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#5
As I recall, her IQ was supposed to be pretty upscale, too.
AFGHAN authorities said more than 100 Taliban-linked militants have been killed in an operation to retake a remote district from the rebels in south-western Afghanistan
The rebels were killed during two days of operations by Afghan security forces and their international allies in Bakwa, a remote district in the south-western province of Farah, the interior ministry said. "During two days of operations more than 100 enemies of peace and stability were killed,'' ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary said.
GHAZNI, Afghanistan - Afghan security forces along with U.S.-led coalition forces regained control of a district centre in the province of Ghazni after the Taliban had captured it overnight, provincial governor, Shir Khosti told Reuters.
"The word I have got a few minutes ago is that they (Taliban) have been pushed back," he said. Asked if Afghan and coalition forces were now in charge of the district centre, Khosti replied: "Yes".
Taliban insurgents had seized the remote Afghan town overnight, patrolling the streets for some hours before withdrawing ahead of a government operation to retake it on Friday, residents and officials said.
Ghazni province where the attack took place is only a two-hour drive south from the capital, Kabul, and while not as unstable as provinces such as Kandahar or Helmand, the villages around the historic city of Ghazni have seen an upsurge of Taliban activity in the past two years.
Ghulam Shah, district governor of the captured district of Rashidan, had links with the Taliban and had handed over the district buildings to the militants, provincial Police Chief Khan Mohammad Mujahid told Reuters. The district police chief, meanwhile, had been taken prisoner, he said. A spokesman for the Taliban, Zabihullah Mujahid, said the insurgents had taken the district by force and had killed nine policemen.
Governor Khosti denied the Taliban claim saying they had "no reports" of any casualties. He also said he could not yet confirm whether there were any casualties following the joint operation to regain control of the district centre.
The Taliban from time to time take over remote towns in a show of strength, then pull out before government forces are able to reach the area and drive them out. Khosti played down any significance of the latest incident. "I don't think they are getting stronger," he said. "These are just a bunch of criminals, a bunch of thugs."
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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The Islamic courts union fighters have captured parliament member Osman Hassan Ali known as Atto as he was traveling in Lower Shabelle region south of Somalia later Friday-spokesman said. One residents in Yaqbari weyne where the MP was seized told us that the islamists have taken the MP with vehicle into unknown locations. Its yet unknown whether Osman Atto who is former warlord and parliament member will be released by his captors.
This article starring:
Islamic courts union
Osman Hassan Ali
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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Once again the Algerian Customs services have been shaken by another scandal, as a car loaded with weapons has been seized at Algiers port, while its owner arrested. The striking thing in this case is that the car has been sold in auction, but new weapons have been discovered in it, to be driven back to the port.
The case facts reach back to last March, 2007, when a quantity of guns and rifles has been discovered on board of a car. The Customs services at the port have conducted minutes and arrested the car owner referring him to justice after being charged with arms trafficking. The legal procedures conducted by the Customs services were in accordance with the law into force, but the very amazing in such a case is that this car was sold in auction last April 16, so the new owner of the car a month later has discovered in it several arms that have not been unveiled by the Customs.
Moreover, such a case proves the neglect of the customs services which are failing in their duties, while checking superficially a car loaded with weapons, which should have been completely dismantled by the same services before selling it.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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(AKI) - At least eight people were killed in central Yemen on Friday after an armed man opened fire at a village mosque. Twenty others were wounded in the shooting - eight of them critically - in Amran province, located 60 kilometres north of the capital, Sanaa. Sources said the armed man walked into the mosque in the town of Kohal during Friday prayers and began firing indiscriminately on worshippers with an automatic rifle. After the shooting, the gunman was arrested and taken away for questioning, officials said.
Yemen has recently witnessed renewed fighting between government troops and Shia rebels in the north of the country.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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Eighteen men went on trial in the oil-rich Caucasus state of Azerbaijan on Friday for suspected links with Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network. Azeri security forces arrested most of the men in October and November in a sting operation during which they uncovered an arms cache that included machineguns, pistols, hand-grenades and explosives. The men are accused of possessing illegal weapons, creating an armed group, weapons trading, crossing borders illegally and resisting arrest.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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A bomb blast at a CD centre at Amandara in the suburbs of Malakand early Friday morning badly damaged four shops, officials of the Malakand Levies said. The blast occurred at 4am. No loss of life was reported. The Malakand Levies have registered the case and started investigations. In two other incidents, two persons were killed in the jurisdiction of Police Station Ghaligay in Swat District and Shomzai area. Niaz Zeb allegedly killed Ahmed Khan and dumped his body in the fields. The police have registered a case on the complaint of deceased's son Arif against the accused. In another incident some unknown persons killed a taxi driver Juma Khan, resident of Allah Dhan Dheri Malakand. The reason behind the murder could not be ascertained.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
Man, MP3 advocates get really up in arms over old technology, don't they?
Two United States helicopters intruded over the Pakistani area of Shawaal near the Pak-Afghan border on Friday. The helicopters hovered over the area, which is 70 kilometres west of Miranshah, for around 40 minutes before returning to the Afghan side without taking any action. According to residents, US drones have been violating into Pakistani airspace everyday.
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05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
UNCONFIRMED > WAFF Poster claims area media is reporting that one US APACHE HELO had been shot down???
Unidentified gunmen on Friday opened indiscriminate fire on youths playing cricket near the Balochistan Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) headquarters, leaving at least six boys dead and three injured, police said. The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility for the killings.
Three of the men died on the spot. Three others succumbed to their injuries at Quetta Civil Hospital later, police added. Friends and relatives of the dead and injured boys rushed to the hospital and shouted slogans against the attackers, the police and the administration. They also broke hospital windows and blocked the road. The majority of the murdered boys belonged to Quettas ethnic Hazara minority.
The BLA claimed that those killed were spying for the Military Intelligence and the Inter-Services Intelligence.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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MOSUL, Iraq The recent successes in quieting violence in Basra and Sadr City appear to be stretching to the long-rebellious Sunni Arab district here in Mosul, raising hopes that the Iraqi Army may soon have tenuous control over all three of Iraqs major cities.
In this city, never subdued by the increase of American troops in Iraq last year, weekly figures on attacks are down by half since May 10, when the Iraqi military began intensified operations here with the backing of the American military. Iraqi soldiers searching house to house, within American tank cordons, have arrested more than 1,000 people suspected of insurgent activity.
The Iraqi soldiers are heady from the Basra experience, Brig. Gen. Raymond A. Thomas III, the commander of American forces in Mosul, said in an interview. They have learned the right lessons.
The crucial lesson, in fact, over the past month appears to be that all sides the Iraqi military as well as various insurgent groups prefer, at the moment, not to fight. Rather, as in Basra and Sadr City, the huge Shiite enclave in Baghdad, the Iraqi military appears to have allowed many insurgents to slip out of Mosul, after scores of negotiations with militias and their leaders.
This approach could make any gains temporary: The insurgents, here as elsewhere, are alive to fight another day. And little progress has been made on political reconciliation among rival sects and ethnic groups that could help reduce violence in the long term.
But the negotiations have allowed the military to expand both its area of control and the governments zone of sovereignty, burnishing the once-poor reputations of the Iraqi military and Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki. While the American military was never far away it offered air support and additional firepower the operation here was largely led by Iraqis.
And that paid dividends here in Mosul. More than two dozen insurgent leaders who might not have surrendered to the Americans turned themselves in to the Iraqi generals.
Out in the dusty streets, for example, Gen. Nooraldeen Hussein, the commander of the Iraqi Eighth Brigade, hunted one insurgent leader until the day he sat down and had tea with the man. The insurgent, whom General Hussein identified as Muhammad Saffo, living in the Rashadia neighborhood, was suspected of killing five Iraqi soldiers with a roadside bomb.
At a meeting with his American advisers two weeks ago, the general said he arrested 14 members of Mr. Saffos tribe and killed three others, before Mr. Saffo came forward to negotiate along with six other tribal members.
I have all his numbers right here, General Hussein said, tapping his cellphone. He would call, he said, and negotiate the amnesty in the presence of a tribal sheik.
The American advisers glanced at one another, not quite sure what to make of this new twist to the American effort to tamp down the Sunni insurgents in the city.
If the Iraqis are comfortable, we are comfortable, too, General Thomas said of the negotiated surrenders of insurgent leaders sometimes described as members of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, the homegrown Sunni insurgent group that American officials say is led by foreigners.
As the decline in attacks in Mosul became clear in late May, Ryan C. Crocker, the American ambassador in Iraq, said, You are not going to hear me say that Al Qaeda is defeated, but theyve never been closer to defeat than they are now.
American and Iraqi officials have called Mosul the last urban bastion of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and other Sunni jihadist groups. The trash-strewn streets on Mosuls predominantly Sunni Arab western half, separated from the Kurdish and Christian neighborhoods by the Tigris River, had been in a state of more or less continuous uprising since 2004.
The recent operation was necessary after northern Iraq, an area about the size of Georgia, with seven provinces and bordering three countries, became what the American military called an economy of force region as troops were diverted to Baghdad during the surge. Conditions were dismal. By last fall, only 700 or so American soldiers were stationed in Mosul, the multiethnic fulcrum of the region. American commanders conceded that that was not enough.
The government in nearby Iraqi Kurdistan has sought to annex parts of Nineveh Province around Mosul. That tension has also driven some local Sunni Arabs to allow the insurgents to operate in the province. Insurgents in western Mosul, the Arab city across the Tigris River from the biblical town of Nineveh, took to hanging the bodies of their victims from a bridge to intimidate residents.
For the past several months, American and Iraqi forces have been slowly applying pressure on the city. The operation, named Lions Roar, began officially on May 10. In it, the Iraqis have relied on significant American military assistance, after similar and tentatively successful assaults in Basra and Sadr City.
American tanks have formed cordons while Iraqi soldiers have searched house to house. Forts built and operated by Americans in western Mosul also greatly helped to stem the car bombings that had plagued this city. The Iraqis, though, drew up the arrest lists and conducted the parleys. To soothe ethnic tensions, a Sunni Arab general oversaw the operation.
In all, 83 percent of the military actions had a majority of Iraqi troops participating.
American military statistics show that significant acts of violence, including roadside bombings, sniper shootings, and mortar and rocket grenade attacks, fell from 195 in the week before the operation to 93 in the week after it, according to Lt. Col. Eric R. Price, the chief American adviser to General Hussein.
While Iraqi and American politicians lump the Sunni insurgency under the Al Qaeda banner, the military operation here relied instead on accurately identifying the many fractured groups of Sunni insurgents, and in some cases opening talks with those considered reconcilable.
Owing to the splintered nature of the Sunni insurgency, rather than a single truce as in Basra and Sadr City, amnesties were negotiated with neighborhood insurgent bosses. By Monday, 27 insurgents had surrendered, according to the American military. Organizers of suicide bombings were not eligible for amnesty.
Maj. Adam Boyd, the intelligence officer for the Third Armored Cavalry Regiment, described the Sunni insurgency here as a dozen groups, including the Islamic State of Iraq, a radical Islamic group that insurgents have put forward as an umbrella group for jihadist fighters in northern Iraq, and Sunni nationalist organizations like the 1920 Revolution Brigades and a Baath Party revival group called Al Awda.
Mosul, and the area around it, is also believed to be a hideout for some top fugitive Baath Party officials, including Izat Ibrahim al-Duri, one of the kings in the original most-wanted deck of playing cards distributed to American troops.
Other Sunni insurgent groups active in the city are the Army of Islam, the Army of Muhammad and Ansar al-Islam, the group formerly based in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Still, it is unclear how many remain active in the city.
In the Abi Tamam neighborhood on a blistering midmorning in May, Lt. Rusty Morris parked his convoy of armored Humvees beside a reeking field of garbage to begin a mission to show the American presence and speak with residents. Some cows picked around the piles of refuse, while children ran up to the trucks. Two helicopters buzzed overhead.
Lieutenant Morris sidled up to one resident, who introduced himself as Muhammad Ahmed. The man was standing in an alley. Looking bewildered and nodding obsequiously to the American lieutenant, Mr. Ahmed said nervously that he knew of no insurgents still operating in the neighborhood. He explained that he had three wives and six children, and no time to watch for insurgents.
Lieutenant Morris thanked him and moved on, walking past a wall with blue graffiti praising a leader of the Islamic State of Iraq.
#3
NYT is having to twist logic, reality and credulity to defend thier obviously WRONG stance on the surge and the conduct of the war.
They are placing politics over reporting, spin over facts, and bias for objectivity.
And in doing so they are ACTIVELY *mal*informing the public -- planting false ideas, spin and bias instead of reporting the fact. Meaning they want to FOOL people into following their position, rather than inform them of the entire set of facts in an objective fashion and have the public make up its own mind.
The NYT is doing grave damage to our democracy by their irresponsibility, and are bordering on becoming a domestic enemy.
#4
Boy Howdy, that kind of logic would have gotten me THROWN out of class when I was taking Classic Philosophy and a F on a term paper.
However, twisted, folded, spindled and mutilated logic seems to work for newspapers these days.
I love it when they do backward sumersauts of logic up their own rectums and call it news.
Only the most deluded of liberals would buy this crap.
Of course, watch Barak and Billary roll this crap out in the next round of dead horse beating they do on their neverending campaign trail.
BAGHDAD Coalition forces struck a blow against a Special Groups criminal ring when they captured a key suspect Saturday in the Rusafa district of Baghdad. Intelligence sources led Coalition forces to the residence of the suspect who is believed to be a key assistant to a senior Iranian-trained Special Groups leader who recently fled Sadr City under pressure from Iraqi Security Forces. He should advise the Iraqi Intelligence people where his SG people were going; it would make his imprisonment more comfortable.
Intelligence shows that as Iraqi Security or Coalition forces come close to capturing senior Special Groups leaders, the criminals flee and hide until the situation calms. Wotta surprise!
Most of the senior Special Groups leadership have fled Sadr City and its surrounding area, leaving innocent Iraqis to pickup the pieces of the indiscriminate violence wrought by the Special Groups, said U.S. Army Capt. Charles Calio, MNF-I spokesperson.
The captured man is suspected of kidnapping, managing funds for Special Groups in Sadr City, and providing funds to various other elements within the Special Groups criminal organization.
As Coalition forces approached the suspects residence, he demonstrated hostile intent, and Coalition forces painfully wounded him in self-defense. The suspect was treated on-scene and transported to a medical facility for further treatment. Possibly including morphine for the pain and antibiotics for the infection - if he cooperates.
Coalition forces also recovered multiple weapons at the suspects residence. Iraqi Security and Coalition forces continue the important job of reclaiming Iraq from criminals and terrorists, and todays raid demonstrates the ongoing resolve to restore peace and prosperity to Iraq, Calio said.
(VOI)- At least two civilians were killed on Friday morning in two separate explosions in Diala province, central Iraq, a security source said. "An explosive charge detonated, this morning, in Buhruz district near Ba'aquba, killing a shepherd," the source, who asked to be unnamed, told Aswat al-Iraq- Voices of Iraq- (VOI). The same source added that another roadside bomb exploded near a civilian car in Hibhib district, 15 km north of Ba'aquba, killing a civilian.
Child killed, 3 wounded in 3rd IED blast in Diala
(VOI) A child was killed and three others wounded when an improvised explosive device went off near a football playground in central Baaquba, thus becoming the third IED attack in the province of Diala on Friday, a security source said. "An IED went off in a football playground in the central Baaquba area of al-Azzat, killing one child and injuring three others," the source, who declined to have his name mentioned, told Aswat al-Iraq Voices of Iraq (VOI).
Earlier in the day a joint Iraqi-U.S. force detained 20 persons on alleged involvement in a mortar attack against an Iraqi army base in Diala province. The force raided "Jaghat village near al-Saadiyah district, this morning, and arrested 20 persons suspected of launching a mortar attack Thursday on the Iraqi base located near the village," the source, who requested anonymity, told VOI. Al-Saadiyah is 150 km northeast of Ba'aquba.
Meanwhile, Jalwlaa Police Chief Ahmed al-Qassab told VOI that three women were killed and two more were seriously wounded when mortars fell on a house which is located next to the attacked Iraqi army base on Thursday.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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(VOI) A joint Iraqi-U.S. force captured five men wanted by security agencies for suspected belonging to al-Qaeda network in a security operation in central Baaquba on Friday, the Diala police chief said. "An Iraqi force, backed by U.S. troops, raided strongholds of al-Qaeda organization in the central Baaquba neighborhoods of al-Mafraq and al-Katoun," Maj. General Ghanim al-Qurayshi told Aswat al-Iraq Voices of Iraq (VOI).
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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(VOI)-Joint security forces arrested a number of wanted men and seized a weapons cache in raid operations conducted in Diwaniya, a security source said. Iraq army troops backed my Multi-National forces (MNF) conducted a raid operation in al-Nahdha district, south Diwaniya, capturing a number of wanted men, a Diwaniya security source said. The source added the forces also discovered a weapons cache containing quantities of light and medium weapons along with different types of ammunitions. Eyewitnesses from the district reported huge joint forces cordoned off al-Nahdha district on Friday along with helicopters hovering over the area.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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(VOI)- A colonel from the Babel police was killed on Friday in north of Basra by unknown gunmen, a police source said, noting that one of his assassinators was arrested one hour after the incident.
Unknown gunmen opened fire at Colonel Kazem Salman near his house in al-Dier region, north of Basra, killing him on the spot, the source told Aswat al-Iraq Voices of Iraq (VOI) on condition of anonymity. One hour after the attack, the police arrested one of the perpetrators, he added. The officer was working for the criminal investigation department in Babel police, the source noted.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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(VOI)- Iraqi security forces on Friday detained a 12-gunmen armed cell while attempting to infiltrate into the city of Karbala from a neighboring province and seized weapons and explosives found in their possession, the commander of the Karbala operations said. We got accurate intelligence information on a move by a wanted armed cell towards Karbala, General Raed Shawkat Jawdat told Aswat al-Iraq Voices of Iraq (VOI).
Security forces deployed in al-Husseiniya region, north of Karbala, where they arrested 12 gunmen infiltrated from al-Musayab city, Babel province, through gardens and agricultural roads, the general explained. The forces seized weapons and explosives, including six bombs, six Rocket Propelled Grenades (RPG), 30 hand grenades and 12 machine guns found in their possession, he added.
Karbala senior police officer detained on human rights violations
(VOI)- A senior office at Karbala police was detained on Friday along with three policemen on alleged violations of human rights, Karbala police chief said. "Several complains were received by police on human rights violations committed by a police brigadier and three policemen while conducting raid and search campaigns," Major General Raed Shawkat told Aswat al-Iraq- Voices of Iraq- (VOI). The police chief added that the detainees would be questioned and sent to court if charges against them were confirmed.
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05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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MOSUL, Iraq - Iraqi security forces shot dead at least 11 suspected Al-Qaeda operatives who were hiding in a sheep truck near the northern city of Tikrit on Friday, the defence ministry said. The men were killed in fighting at a checkpoint between ousted dictator Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit and Baiji, ministry spokesman Major General Mohammed al-Askari said.
"Members of the Iraqi special forces intercepted a truck transporting animals, but there were 11 Al-Qaeda fighters hiding in it," Askari told AFP, adding that one of the men was a foreigner from an unidentified Arab nation. Askari said the truck was believed to be fleeing the main northern Iraqi city of Mosul, where the Iraqi army has been conducting a large-scale crackdown on Al-Qaeda since May 14.
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/31/2008 00:00 ||
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HT to LGF
A Palestinian was killed and another 16 were wounded on Saturday in an early mysterious morning explosion at a house owned by a Hamas member in Gaza City, medics and witnesses said.
Dr. Muawiya Hassanein, the head of Gaza emergency services, confirmed the incident, adding that medics had not yet identified the person who died. Witnesses said the house belonged to Nadir Abu Shaaban, a member of the Islamist Hamas movement which has ruled Gaza for nearly a year. Mutual of Gaza will being paying out for this!
The cause of the explosion was not yet known, but several Gazans have been killed and wounded in recent years by accidental explosions while constructing or handling crude homemade rockets and other weapons in the war-torn territory.
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/31/2008 16:52 ||
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#1
3 gets you 5 it was a Jooooooo Jinnnnnn.
(Jew Jinns, they're out there now)
Please don't Google Jew Jinnss.
Seriously.
Nothing good can come from Jew Jinns.
Amazon sez Jew Jinns next big hit!
Posted by: George Smiley ||
05/31/2008 17:32 Comments ||
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#2
Backed up plumbing. Usually with rocket propellant.
Posted by: ed ||
05/31/2008 17:40 Comments ||
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#3
Lousy killed-to-injured ratio.
Is there anything the paleos can do right?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
05/31/2008 17:52 Comments ||
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#4
I think they're pretty good at building the same house over and over, Barbara dear. And they always meet local building codes.
Government troops have captured a Tamil Tiger rebel base in northern Sri Lanka after three days of fighting that killed seven rebels and one soldier, the military said yesterday. Army troops captured the stronghold known as Munnagam Base on Thursday, said military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara. He said the base, located four miles north of the front lines in Welioya region, had been used by the guerrillas as an operational centre. He said the three-day battle to seize the base had killed seven rebels and one soldier. Five other soldiers were wounded.
Other fighting Thursday in the Mannar and Vavuniya regions near the rebels' de facto state in the north killed four rebels and wounded eight soldiers, he said. Rebel spokesman Rasiah Ilanthirayan could not immediately be reached for comment. It was not possible to independently verify the military's claims because journalists are banned from the northern jungles where much of the fighting takes place. Each side commonly exaggerates its enemy's casualties while playing down its own.
Fighting has escalated in recent months along the war's front lines. The Tamil Tiger rebels have fought since 1983 to create an independent state for ethnic minority Tamils who have suffered marginalisation by successive governments controlled by ethnic Sinhalese. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the conflict.
Meanwhile, Sri Lanka called on Western powers Thursday to be wary of imposing sanctions for its alleged human rights violations, warning that the action could worsen the island's long-running ethnic conflict. The United States and the European Union have withheld various aid programmes and are debating whether to withdraw special trade benefits from Sri Lanka amid concerns the human rights situation has deteriorated since the government pulled out of a Norwegian-brokered truce with the Tamil Tigers in January. "It really is necessary to have sympathy for and understanding of the problems of a developing country that is grappling with terrorism," Sri Lanka's minister of international trade GL Peiris said in Washington. "And to cut off resources, to threaten to withdraw trade benefits, GSP (General System of Preference) and so on -- all of that is unhelpful because that will only mean the dissemination of poverty, deprivation and adversity," he told AFP.
Peiris said under such sanctions and other pressures on "a democratic government pitted against terrorism, you can't possibly prevail." Peiris was in Washington for talks with US officials and to woo US investors to set up shop in Sri Lanka's eastern province, where Tamil Tiger rebels were removed from enclaves after heavy fighting last year.
Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse vowed this week to press on with a military campaign to crush the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), who have been fighting for a homeland since 1972. Expressing concern over the rights violations and the raging civil war, the US State Department said Thursday that there was no military solution to the ethnic conflict, and emphasized the need for a political settlement.
Sri Lanka has been in existence for over 2500 years as a Buddhist nation, its inhabitants Sinhalese. For all of that time there has been trade, political relations and intermarriage with the subcontinent, particularly with the Tamils, who inhabit the southernmost part of India. They somehow managed for all that time, through thick and thin, to remain Sinhalese. Any Tamil petty principality is going to be evanescent, based on Ceylon's history, and will do nothing but enrich the princelings who run it. The government has tried the negotiation routine, which let the LTTE have time to buy more guns and ammunition, and now the government has come to the conclusion that it's not going to get them anywhere. Ceasefire violations, recall, were routine, as were kidnappings, the occasional kaboom, and a constant background noise of assassinations. The Lankan government's not angelic, by any means, but I have nothing but contempt for the pantywaists at the State Department and elsewhere who're lightning quick to use "human rights" as an excuse to sell millions of people down the river to a group of thugs.
Posted by: Fred ||
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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.
AFGHAN authorities said more than 100 Taliban-linked militants have been killed in an operation to retake a remote district from the rebels in south-western Afghanistan
The 
MOSUL, Iraq The recent successes in quieting violence in Basra and Sadr City appear to be stretching to the long-rebellious Sunni Arab district here in Mosul, raising hopes that the Iraqi Army may soon have tenuous control over all three of Iraqs major cities.
BAGHDAD Coalition forces struck a blow against a Special Groups criminal ring when they captured a key suspect Saturday in the Rusafa district of Baghdad. Intelligence sources led Coalition forces to the residence of the suspect who is believed to be a key assistant to a senior Iranian-trained Special Groups leader who recently fled Sadr City under pressure from Iraqi Security Forces. 
MOSUL, Iraq - Iraqi security forces shot dead at least 11 suspected Al-Qaeda operatives who were hiding in a sheep truck near the northern city of Tikrit on Friday, the defence ministry said. The men were killed in fighting at a checkpoint between ousted dictator Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit and Baiji, ministry spokesman Major General Mohammed al-Askari said.
