Afghanistan's Islamic council has told President Hamid Karzai to stop foreign aid groups from converting locals to Christianity and also demanded the reintroduction of public executions.
"Yeah. Things just ain't been the same since they stopped the public executions."
The council, an influential group but without binding authority, is made up of Islamic clergy and ulema (scholars) from various parts of Afghanistan and made the warning in a statement during a meeting with Karzai on Friday
The ulema have always played a crucial role in Afghanistan and have been behind a series of revolts against past governments. But since the ousting of Taliban's radical Islamic administration by U.S.-led troops in 2001, Afghanistan has seen an unprecedented period of freedoms. "The council is concerned about the activities of some ... missionary and atheistic organs and considers such acts against Islamic sharia (law), the constitution, and political stability," said a copy of the statement obtained by Reuters. "If not prevented, God forbid, catastrophe will emerge, which will not only destabilize the country, but the region and the world."
"A specter is haunting Afghanistan, the spectre of... Methodism!"
Quoting what he said were reliable sources, Ahmad Ali Jebrayeli, a member of the council and also a member of parliament, said unnamed Christian missionaries had offices in Kabul and in the provinces to convert Afghans.
This article starring:
Ahmad Ali Jebrayeli
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
The Islamic Council could be used to test out the public execution equipment. Nothing personal...It's just business.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
01/06/2008 0:16 Comments ||
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#2
"Using a soccer pitch for soccer is unislamic! Turn it back into an abattoir, just like the good ol' days."
MUSLIM women are to be sent on leadership and assertiveness courses to help to prevent Islamic extremism.
Knives and pruning shears would work better ...
In an attempt to stop young Muslims being seduced by Al-Qaeda, women will be sent on training courses designed for FTSE 100 managers to give them the skills and confidence to confront fanatics.
How about skills and confidence to prevent honor killings?
Amid fears that extremists are becoming more sophisticated in their recruitment, Hazel Blears, the communities secretary, has concluded that a key way to stop extremist ideas further permeating Muslim communities is to give the silent majority a stronger voice. She is to publish a good practice guidance document which will say that resilient communities can only exist where women are playing a full and active part.
Great in theory but you're dealing with a group where women are regarded as breeding stock. Going to take more than 'communication strategies' to help out.
Blears will tell local authorities to use part of a £70m government fund set up to combat extremism to pay for the courses in confidence building, communication and mediation skills.
£70m would pay for a lot of knives ...
Muslim women will be offered work placements with business leaders and top athletes to imbue assertiveness and leadership and help them to advance their careers. Funding will be available to set up local Muslim womens groups to provide a safe space where they can discuss their concerns. The plan is likely to attract criticism from some Muslim men who will see it as a threat to cultural traditions about the role of women in society.
Blears believes that Muslim women have untapped potential to become a voice of moderation in communities targeted by fanatics. Half of all Muslim women have never worked and the government believes that improving their educational and job prospects will boost their influence.
A Whitehall source said: Muslim women can have a unique moral authority at the heart of families as sisters, mothers and friends and must be supported to play a greater role in tackling extremist ideology.
The plans have already provoked a mixed response among Muslims. The Muslim Council of Britain accused the government of trying to turn women into government spies. The government at first wanted our imams to act as spies on young British Muslims and now they seem to want Muslim women to do the same, said Inayat Bunglawala, the councils assistant secretary-general.
Shaista Gohir, chief executive of the Muslim Womens Network, said: Its not about Muslim women becoming investigators, its about giving them a greater role in Muslim public life.
It's about letting them say 'no' and mean it.
Professional motivational firms will run role-play courses in which Muslim women will learn how to confront fanatics. Some of the courses will be run by actors who are expected to pose as radicals espousing violent jihadist arguments, whom the women will be taught to challenge effectively. Mothers will also be offered confidence-building courses to help them speak out if they see their children being wooed by extremist preachers. The courses will help young women to have the confidence to challenge young radical men in debate.
The Home Office estimates between 10,000 and 15,000 British Muslims support Al-Qaeda or other terrorist groups. The document, to be published this month, will express concern that extremists are targeting young people aged between 16 and 35.
Extremists operation methods and use of technology are becoming ever more sophisticated. They are exploiting ungoverned spaces such as the internet, bookshops and cafes and using new media to put across slick and seductive messages, a draft of the paper says. This is about giving the silent majority a stronger voice in their communities and equipping people with the skills and strength to withstand the messages of extremists preaching division and hatred.
Muslims have three times the unemployment rate of the general population, with more than half economically inactive.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 08:20 ||
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#1
"Muslims have three times the unemployment rate"
How much of this is because they can't get jobs, how much because they can't get jobs they want, how much because they don't want jobs, and especially how much because they are 'employed' 'studying' jihad?
Islamic extremists have created "no-go" areas across Britain where it is too dangerous for non-Muslims to enter, one of the Church of England's most senior bishops warns today. The Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester and the Church's only Asian bishop, says that people of a different race or faith face physical attack if they live or work in communities dominated by a strict Muslim ideology.
Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, he compares the threat to the use of intimidation by the far-Right, and says that it is becoming increasingly difficult for Christianity to be the nation's public religion in a multifaith, multicultural society.
Noticed that finally, did you?
His comments come as a poll of the General Synod - the Church's parliament - shows that its senior leaders, including bishops, also believe that Britain is being damaged by large-scale immigration.
Okay, and so what's the solution?
Bishop Nazir-Ali, who was born in Pakistan, gives warning that attempts are being made to give Britain an increasingly Islamic character by introducing the call to prayer and wider use of sharia law, a legal system based on the Koran.
In an attack on the Government's response to immigration and the influx of "people of other faiths to these shores", he blames its "novel philosophy of multiculturalism" for allowing society to become deeply divided, and accuses ministers of lacking a "moral and spiritual vision". Echoing Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Commission for Equalities and Human Rights, who has said that the country is "sleepwalking into segregation", the bishop argues that multiculturalism has led to deep divisions.
David Davis, the shadow home secretary, has accused Muslims of promoting a kind of "voluntary apartheid" by shutting themselves in closed societies and demanding immunity from criticism.
In the Synod survey, to be published this week, bishops, senior clergy and influential churchgoers said that an increasingly multi-faith society threatens the country's Christian heritage and blamed the divisions on the Government's failure to integrate immigrants into their communities.
It was just pointed out that the Muslims were segregating themselves voluntarily. So how's it a 'falure to integrate' the immigrants? You need to face the fact that they don't want to integrate, they want you to submit.
It found that more than one in three believe that a mass influx of people of other faiths is diluting the Christian nature of Britain and only a quarter feel that they have been integrated into society.
The overwhelming majority - 80 per cent - said that the Government has not upheld the place of religion in public life and up to 63 per cent fear that the Church will be disestablished within a generation, breaking a bond that has existed between the Church and State since the Reformation.
A substantial part of the problem is that the venerable Church of England hasn't given people much reason lately to participate in said church. It's easier to keep the Church established if it offers something for people to believe in. The good Archbishop and his clerics have offered religion that is full of 'correct' thinking, social mores, and kindly words about diversity, but that is empty of .. religion.
Calls for disestablishment have grown following research showing that attendance at Mass has overtaken the number of worshippers at Church of England Sunday services.
Bishop Nazir-Ali, whose father converted from Islam to Catholicism, was criticised by Ibrahim Mogra, of the Muslim Council of Britain. He said: "It's irresponsible for a man of his position to make these comments. He should accept that Britain is a multicultural society in which we are free to follow our religion at the same time as being extremely proud to be British. We wouldn't allow 'no-go' areas to happen. I smell extreme intolerance when people criticise multiculturalism without proper evidence of what has gone wrong."
But the no-go areas are happening. So what will you do about it?
But the Bishop's concerns are shared by other members of the General Synod. The Rt Rev Nicholas Reade, the Bishop of Blackburn, which has a large Muslim community, said that it was increasingly difficult for Christians to share their faith in areas where there was a high proportion of immigrants of other faiths. He believes that increasing pressure will be put on the Government to begin the process of disestablishment and end the preferential status given to the Church of England. "The writing is on the wall," he said.
Gordon Brown relinquished Downing Street's involvement in appointing bishops in one of his first facts as Prime Minister - a move viewed by some as a significant step towards disestablishment. Last night, Mr Davis said: "Bishop Nazir-Ali has drawn attention to a deeply serious problem. The Government's confused and counter-productive approach risks creating a number of closed societies instead of one open, cohesive one. It generates the risk of encouraging radicalisation and creating home-grown terrorism."
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
Did you ever see a steam engine boiler dispatched in pieces in different directions? I've seen it, the release valve got stuck.
#3
Divide & conquer. Balkanization in Germany, Belgium, France, Britain, Dearborn and more coming to a place near you very soon. Keep going to movies and sticking yer heads where sun don't shine. Day by day it keeps creeping toward you, just like an infestation of mold. Once mold gets into your house, you'll probably be moving soon.
#4
Western governments (and elite) are afraid of the conflict between the West and Islam developing the way of Germany and the Jews. It is a worthy concern, though there are far more differences than similarities. This much is true though - the Jews were 'different' and could be blamed for the actions of a few (stereotypes do not develop out of nothing), and the Muslims are 'different' and can be blamed for the actions of a few (same deal on stereotypes.) That said, the choice had better not be between dhimmitude and a 'final solution'.
In Britain - and the US - there are 'no-go' zones for other-than-Muslim reasons too; you have your yobs, your black gangs turf, your Asian gangs turf, yor Latins gang turf, your non-ethnic drug gangs turfs, etc. Analagous dhimmitude is not the answer there either - strong law enforcement is. Outside of active war zones like Iraq and Afghanistan the Muslim problem is more like an ordinary gang problem but with (some) different motivations. Employ similar tactics - with no religious safe havens. RICO (or the British equivalent) them. Wiretap problem Imams. Confiscate problem mosques. Etc.
#5
I wondered how much impact removing private ownership of weapons from law abiding citizens has had. No-go zones has to be a reflection of this. Only the criminals have weapons.
In these Muslim enclaves, I wondered if they are well supplied with weapons in the event of what is percieved as a external threat eg.Threat to Islam, insult to Allah, Mohammed and others.
The pacifist's will reap what they sow and Britain will be lost. Winston Churchhill must be spinning in his grave and Neville Chamberlain must be watching with interest.
#6
Anybody click on The Telegraph's site to read the comments posted? A HUGE number of posters running ( I estimate ) 10 -1 in favor of the comments made by Bishop Nazir-Ali. The lefties want to call him a racist, but it's a hard sell since the good Bishop has dark skin and hails from Pakistan. The lefties can't answer the Bishop except to say he's not credible since he doesn't say exactly which parts of the country are no-go areas for Christians. The lefties are like...whatcha mean there might be places I might not be welcome? BS...prove it Bishop !
Posted by: Mark Z ||
01/06/2008 22:40 Comments ||
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#3
They are no difference than the democrats here. I am still reading "The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt" and have just read the part where in 18friggin94 he noted that the "democrats were very weak about foreign policy and [security] since they would probably not build up the Navy the way it should be built up.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
01/06/2008 9:35 Comments ||
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An Islamic group accused of trying to seize control of a Sydney mosque is understood to be part of a hardline religious movement that has been linked to the 2005 London bombings. The Australian has been told that some of the group's members follow the Tablighi Jamaat stream of Islam, which is under watch by Western intelligence agencies because of its suspected links to terrorism.
The battle for the Sefton mosque in Sydney's southwest has already resulted in legal action being taken over ownership of the property and the resident imam being kicked out of his home. Sheik Abdul Karim Quasimi has also been served with an apprehended violence order forcing him to stay away from the Helen Street mosque.
Sheik Abdul Karim, who is not a Tablighi follower, said the group had gone to extremes to remove him, including calling in police to evict him from his home in the middle of the night. "It was very scary, the police arrived very early in the morning," he said.
He said the group was attempting an ethnic and religious-based takeover, wanting the mosque exclusively for Bangladeshi Muslims, particularly those who follow Tablighi, to the exclusion of other ethnic groups including Arabic Muslims. "Some of the Tablighi in Australia are very dogmatic, bordering on extreme," he said.
The caretaker of the mosque, Mohammed Zantar, said trouble started last year when a number of new members, who are Tablighi, were elected to the 15-strong committee that runs the mosque. Islamic Friendship Association president Keysar Trad said the move against the imam was unprecedented. "It is a disgrace to seek out an AVO against an imam unless he's made a major breach of religious teachings or the law," he said.
The Tablighi are influenced by a fundamentalist branch of Saudi Arabian-based Islam known as Wahabism. The sect has been linked to two July 7 London bombers, and failed shoe bomber Richard Reid is also known to have attended Tablighi meetings. Tablighi supporters reject the idea that the group is linked to terrorism or recruiting members for jihad, instead saying they are bringing Muslims back to the mosque.
One of the founders of the mosque and committee member Abdul Bhuiyan said legal action was under way between the original trustees of the mosque, the House of Peace, and the Bangladeshi Islamic Centre which now runs the mosque. Mr Bhuiyan said when the mosque was established in 1995 it was for all Muslims, but the new members now wanted it to be exclusively for the Bangladeshi community.
Sefton mosque committee member Kabir Ahmed said Sheik Abdul Karim had been caught in the middle of the dispute and treated badly. But the press secretary of the Bangladeshi Islamic Centre and committee member Abdullah Yousef Shamim has denied the Tablighi were staging a takeover.
Mr Shamim, who refused to confirm or deny he was Tablighi, admitted some of the new members were followers but said he did not know how many. "It is not an issue," he said.
Mr Shamim said the dispute with Sheik Abdul Karim stemmed from dissatisfaction with the imam's work practices. He said the group wanted an imam who was more qualified and more experienced and gave more "attractive sermons" than Sheik Abdul Karim.
Posted by: ryuge ||
01/06/2008 09:12 ||
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FORMER terrorism suspect Mohamed Haneef is still waiting for the date of an inquiry into his case before deciding on his next move, his lawyer Peter Russo says.
Dr Haneef today spoke of the damage his arrest had caused his career and reputation, at a press conference in India following his return from the Muslim holy pilgrimage to Mecca.
Wonder who paid for his ticket?
Sky News said Dr Haneef had said at the press conference that he would seek compensation from the Australian government over his ordeal. "I'm hopeful of this because the damages that have been done to my career, my job, my aspirations, and my reputation is far too much," Dr Haneef told reporters.
Dr Haneef today spoke at a press conference in India following his return from the Muslim holy pilgrimage to Mecca.
Mr Russo said he had spoken yesterday to his client in Bangalore, and it was too early to decide on his next move.
A decision on a return to Australia by Dr Haneef would depend on the timing of an inquiry into his case. "It's all pretty difficult at the moment for us to do anything until they announce the date of the inquiry," Mr Russo told AAP from Sicily where he is on holidays. "What everybody seems to forget is that it's not this government that has caused all the grief and they have made all the right noises, if you put it that way.
"We don't want to be running off and saying things that would prejudice us in the future with any negotiations that we would have the opportunity to get into. They have indicated that there will be an inquiry and up until that point, we are a little bit stuck in relation to what we do.''
Mr Russo said he would speak again to Dr Haneef late tonight, Australian time.
Dr Haneef was arrested on July 2 last year and 12 days later charged with supporting a terrorism organisation after his SIM card was linked to the failed Glasgow airport bombings in 2007.
The charges were dropped a fortnight later but then-immigration minister Kevin Andrews had already cancelled Dr Haneef's work visa, forcing him to return to his home in Bangalore, India. The full bench of the Federal Court last month upheld a judge's earlier decision to reinstate his work visa, clearing the way for Dr Haneef to return to Australia.
On Friday, Mr Russo said Dr Haneef was re-registering his qualifications with the Medical Board of Queensland, and that Queensland Health has said it will consider any application from Dr Haneef for re-employment. But he must first obtain a work visa from the commonwealth.
AN inner-Sydney council will plead with Indonesia to spare the Bali bombers less than a month before their scheduled execution. The left-leaning Marrickville council will write to Indonesia's government this month asking it to commute death sentences imposed on three convicted Bali bombers, whose final appeals officially failed last week, leaving them just 30 days to seek last-minute presidential clemency.
These lefties are just plain idiots.
The council will also ask Indonesia to spare six Australian members of the Bali Nine, sentenced to death by firing squad for trying to smuggle 8.3 kg of heroin from Indonesia to Australia.
The move follows Amnesty International Australia's recent controversial bid to save the Bali bombers. To defend its position, the organisation cited its universal opposition to capital punishment.
In a motion passed at its last meeting, by four votes to three, with five Labor councillors abstaining, Marrickville Council resolved to urge Indonesia's participation in a UN moratorium on executions. Greens councillor Colin Hesse, who proposed the motion, said he did not do so out of sympathy for the Bali bombers, whose attack killed 202 people. "I'm against the death penalty and, in that sense, I'm in line with every mainstream political party in Australia," Mr Hesse said. "There's no doubt in my mind that we have to be consistent - if we don't urge them to commute the sentences of the Bali bombers then the Bali Nine will meet their deaths, as well."
Marrickville's stand aligns it with human-rights groups and the Catholic Church, which also called for an end to the death penalty last week, including terrorists such as the Bali bombers. However, it angered survivors of the 2002 attacks, who are hoping a definitive conclusion to the drawn-out legal process will finally bring peace to families of the dead. Coogee Dolphins Rugby League Club secretary Mal Ward, who lost six friends in the attack, said Marrickville councillors should stick to local government. "Obviously, these people haven't lost a brother or a child - obviously they haven't been affected by it because they wouldn't be doing it if they had."
Fellow Coogee Dolphin Erik de Haart said he accepted the council's right to express a view but questioned whether Indonesia's prison system would ever truly punish the bombers. "If they get life sentences instead, how long are they going to stay in jail? I think the only way we are going to get justice is if these guys get killed," he said.
Guess which side the left supports.
The Dutch were debating the limits of freedom of expression last week after an artist who photographed gay men wearing masks of the prophet Muhammad was forced into hiding and her work removed from a museum exhibit. Speaking on the telephone from an unspecified location in the Netherlands last week, the artist, an Iranian exile who goes by the pseudonym of Sooreh Hera, said she had been threatened with execution. She accused the director of the municipal museum in The Hague of cowardice for caving in to Muslim extremists.
Her story is a reminder of the tensions that have put the Netherlands and other European countries on the front line, sending dozens of people threatened by extremists into hiding since 2004, when a Dutch film-maker was murdered on the street and his collaborator driven into exile.
This leaves Hera, 34, in no doubt that she is in real danger. They said to me, Were going to burn you naked or put a bullet in your mouth, she said, referring to menacing e-mails. They say, Now you are locked in your home and you cannot go out any more.
She said that by photographing gay Iranian exiles in masks of Muhammad, the founder of Islam, and Ali, his son-in-law, she had wanted to expose a hypocritical attitude towards homosexuality in countries such as Iran, where men can be hanged for homosexual conduct. They condemn homosexuality but in countries like Iran or Saudi Arabia it is common for married men to maintain relations with other men, said Hera. Works of art can be provocative. It is not an artists job just to paint flowers. Art should shine a light on social issues.
The photographs were part of an extensive collection of images by Hera of mostly Dutch gay men. Another part of her exhibit was a video featuring hard rock music and images of Iranian clerics interspersed with pictures of naked men. Wim van Krimpen, director of the museum, initially praised Heras collection of photographs as exceptional. Last month, however, he announced that the masked men could not be included in the forthcoming exhibition because certain non-Christian people in our society might perceive it as offensive.
The museum director was very afraid, said Hera. He gave in to pressure from the Islamists. It is censorship. In protest, she withdrew the rest of her photographs from the exhibition and Ranti Tjan, director of a museum in Gouda, agreed to put them on show. He received threats from extremists and was under police protection last week. Hera declined to discuss her own security arrangements. She said she would like to attend the opening of the show in Gouda if it went ahead, but that it might be too dangerous. There are times when I am very afraid, she admitted, times when I feel like a prisoner.
She may not get much support from the politicians, who seem determined to avoid confrontation even if some might accuse them of turning a blind eye to the erosion of artistic freedom. When Hera wrote to Ronald Plasterk, the culture minister, asking for his support he agreed to meet her but would not help to reinstate her photographs in the exhibition.
Wouter Bos, the deputy prime minister, seemed to take a stand for freedom of speech, saying: In a democracy, we do not recognise the right not to be insulted. The left wing de Volkskrant newspaper, by contrast, praised the museum for its great professionalism in excising the images. For her part, Hera, who fled Iran seven years ago, says she has no regrets, particularly when she thinks about the young men and women being hanged there for offending the countrys code of sexuality. I do it for them, she said, for the boys and girls with no freedom in Iran.
Posted by: ryuge ||
01/06/2008 06:42 ||
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#1
"Iranian exile threatened in the Netherlands" would be a more accurate headline, now that I think about it.
#2
Appeasement - dhimmitude - is NOT the answer, Holland. Stand up against this before it is too late. (And I still don't believe this kind of stuff is Art.)
#3
No it's not Art, it's just the usual protest crap. Although it is nice to see that someone has the balls to stand up to the Islamists, even though it's not a Dutch but an Iranian. And of course, when it's offensive to the majority, it's freedom of expression, and when it's offensive to anyone else, it's racism.
Posted by: ryuge ||
01/06/2008 09:25 ||
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#1
This is their tactic and will be evident in US if this works. This and tying up our courts with frivolous lawsuits. All this can be stopped by throwing this shit onto the dung heap where it belongs. If courts don't stand for our protection, judges must be removed.
#2
There has to be someone out there with the resources to launch a slap suit on all muslim organizations trying this sort of lawfare. There is nothing which cannot be described as hate literature in any mosque on earth, starting with the koran.
#7
Agree Barb, resistance is to be preferred, but resistance in some places will be futile - Detroit or Phoenix for examples because of the weight of Muslims, or Washington DC or New York because of the strength of PC/Multiculti idiocy.
#8
"There has to be someone out there with the resources to launch a slap suit on all muslim organizations trying this sort of lawfare."
There is. Though he is not taking on ALL muzzie lawfare jihadist front groups. Just CAIR. His name is Michael Savage. The case is captioned Savage v. CAIR. You can read about it at the Savage website.
Those interested in reading Mark Steyn's comments wrt his on-going defense against the muzzie lawfare jihadists should read his website. Figuratively, with logic and wit, he kills his muzzie opponents. He takes 'em apart in such a manner you might even feel sympathy for the muzzie.
(just kiddin' about that last part!)
Posted by: Mark Z ||
01/06/2008 14:57 Comments ||
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#9
The Savage vs CAIR might set some precedents for others being sued by CAIR. God I hope so.
#10
From an interview with Dean Steacey; the principal "anti-hate" investigator of the HRC:
MS KULASZKA: Mr. Steacy, you were talking before about context and how important it is when you do your investigation. What value do you give freedom of speech when you investigate one of these complaints?
MR. STEACY: Freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don't give it any value.
MS KULASZKA: Okay. That was a clear answer.
MR. STEACY: It's not my job to give value to an American concept.
#11
MR. STEACY is an idiotic troglodyte, and likely a drop out.
Section Two of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is the section of the Constitution of Canada's Charter of Rights that lists what the Charter calls "fundamental freedoms" belonging to everyone in Canada, regardless of whether they are a Canadian citizen, or an individual or corporation. These freedoms can be held against actions of all levels of government and are enforceable by the courts. The fundamental freedoms are freedom of expression (e.g. speech), freedom of religion, freedom of thought, freedom of belief, freedom of peaceful assembly, and freedom of association. They are guaranteed but can also be limited by the section 1 of the Charter, and they can be temporarily invalidated by the notwithstanding clause of the Charter.
It won't do $hit against an RPG hidden in the weeds or under a tarp-covered foxhole at the end of a runway. I also saw something about how this technology will only work against old MANPADS technology. Heck, that dazzler laser might even act as a homing beacon to the newer stuff! I also heard that commercial engine exhaust heat cannot be used as effectively as military engine exhaust heat to guide a heat-seeking missile because it is more diffuse. I'm skeptical about that when I think about the B-52 bomber, which it seems should be included on a MANPADS list of favorite things to hit!
In first-ever tests for commercial airplanes carrying passengers, as many as three American Airlines jets will be equipped with a shoulder-fired missile defense system. The Department of Homeland Security signed a $29 million contract with BAE Systems on December 21. BAE said Thursday it is working with American Airlines to put laser systems on the planes, which will be flying between New York and California.
Since the contract calls for the planes to log about 7,000 flight hours, the tests will probably last from early spring, starting in March or April, until the end of the year, DHS spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said.
The systems have already been tested on cargo aircraft and out-of-service passenger planes. The new contract calls for the systems to be tested for the first time on aircraft carrying passengers. DHS, American Airlines and BAE Systems were all careful to assure there will be no test firing -- through simulators or otherwise. The tests primarily will check the systems' worthiness in air and their maintenance reliability.
The system works by detecting the heat-seeking missiles and then emitting a laser that diverts the missile.
Homeland Security officials say there is no specific threat of these weapons -- also known as MANPADS, for Man-Portable Air Defense Systems -- being fired at planes. Taliban forces, however, successfully used MANPADS against Soviet helicopters in Afghanistan. Terrorists tried, unsuccessfully, in 2002 to shoot down an Israeli passenger jet in Kenya with them. Insurgents hit a DHL cargo plane in Baghdad the following year, but the plane landed safely. Experts say about 500,000 to 700,000 MANPADS have been produced worldwide, and some have been purchased in Middle Eastern and Central Asian arms markets for as little as $5,000.
Since 2003, Congress has pressured DHS to adapt military anti-MANPADS technology to commercial aviation. Commercial airlines have opposed efforts to install defense systems, which are costly, add weight, and can weaken the plane's aerodynamics.
A chief goal of the testing program is to discover how to increase the systems' endurance. Military systems require frequent maintenance -- not practical for commercial airplanes that fly for extended periods between maintenance checks.
American Airlines on Thursday said it is participating in the program, but added it is "not in favor of installing counter-MANPADS on commercial aircraft." The airline believes protection is best accomplished by preventing terrorists from getting shoulder-fired missiles, or by using ground-based systems, spokesman John Hotard said. But the airline said it is willing to participate because it "wants to understand the development" of these technologies that might be available in the future.
Last year, American and BAE installed and test flew BAE's hardware on a Boeing 767 that was not in commercial service, Hotard said.
#2
Big risk allocation and insurance liability issues here.
There comes a point at which the amount of money being spent is far in excess of the benefit derived. Is there any evidence there is a credible threat from MNAPADS? And to be credible, you've got to explain why they haven't been used yet but they will be soon. Another DHS TSA boondoggle in my opinion.
They will find a way to hit us again if they can. We're just too vulnerable in too many ways. You can't prevent them all without turning the country into a police state. And we've already done that with air travel. I've got to admit that I'm surprised the American people have put up with the needless sacrifice of their liberties in airports for as long as they have.
Time to stop living in fear and respond to provocations effectively, not fears ineffectively. As long as we're willing to slaughter 20,000 people a year and do nothing to stop drunk drivers, I can see efforts to potentially save 200 people at the cost of billions as nothing but conspicuous consumption.
#3
Solution, don't fly. (I don't, ever) let the airlines go bankrupt if they don't/won't change.
When the government looks at footing the entire bill, this shit stops abruptly.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
01/06/2008 16:33 Comments ||
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#4
Is there any evidence there is a credible threat from MNAPADS?
They have been used in Africa by Islamicists against Israeli flights and at least one attempt in Kenya to use them against US flights has been disrupted that I know of.
We've seen several small cells in the NYC area attempt to purchase or smuggle them into the area.
#7
Besides, which, Nimble, afaict, you could get a distinct improvement on the standard infantry rifle for the infantrymen (say, a piston driven system shooting a 6.5mm bullet) for just about the same cost-per-unit as the M-4 they're purchasing now. A different bore barrel/chamber won't cost any more, the piston won't cost appreciably more, and all the optical doodads (which are what lets the rifle remain competitive in spite of its age) are going to all be the same. (And unless you use some custom setup like the xm-8, they're going to be interchangable/reusable, just take them off the old rifle and put them on the new one).
There may be reasons for sticking with the m-4, but as far as I can tell, cost isn't one of them.
A WHISTLEBLOWER has made a series of extraordinary claims about how corrupt government officials allowed Pakistan and other states to steal nuclear weapons secrets.
Sibel Edmonds, a 37-year-old former Turkish language translator for the FBI, listened into hundreds of sensitive intercepted conversations while based at the agencys Washington field office. She approached The Sunday Times last month after reading about an Al-Qaeda terrorist who had revealed his role in training some of the 9/11 hijackers while he was in Turkey. Edmonds described how foreign intelligence agents had enlisted the support of US officials to acquire a network of moles in sensitive military and nuclear institutions.
Among the hours of covert tape recordings, she says she heard evidence that one well-known senior official in the US State Department was being paid by Turkish agents in Washington who were selling the information on to black market buyers, including Pakistan. The name of the official who has held a series of top government posts is known to The Sunday Times. He strongly denies the claims.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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[8 views]
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#1
They were helped, she says, by the high-ranking State Department official who provided some of their moles mainly PhD students with security clearance to work in sensitive nuclear research facilities. These included the Los Alamos nuclear laboratory in New Mexico, which is responsible for the security of the US nuclear deterrent.
Lets see, Clinton administration used increased access to the National Labs to support its policy of engagement with China. Then we have small warhead technology, security clearances, Los Alamos, PhD students, 1997 Clinton trip to China (150 members of Congress recommended he not go), Wen-ho-Lee, Sandy Berger briefed on Las Alamos spy situation. White House sought to minimize the espionage issue. FBI did not aggressively pursue the crminal investigation of lab theft. Former Democratic fund-raiser Johnny Chung has told Justice investigators that he passed on to the Democratic Party more than $100,000 from Liu Chao Ying, an official of a Chinese aerospace company who is also an officer in the Chinese army and the daughter of a top official in the Beijing regime.
After the donation, Clinton approved a waiver that allowed Loral Space and Communications -- whose chief executive officer, Bernard Schwartz, is a leading Democratic Party donor -- to launch one of its satellites on top of a Chinese rocket.
Looks like a duck. Swims like a duck. Quacks like a duck.....
#2
If you are calling me to say somebody said that I took money, thats outrageous . . . I do not have anything to say about such stupid ridiculous things as this.
I agree, it would be a stupid ridiculous thing to admit to.
#3
Intelligence analysts say that members of the ISI were close to Al-Qaeda before and after 9/11. Indeed, Ahmad was accused of sanctioning a $100,000 wire payment to Mohammed Atta, one of the 9/11 hijackers, immediately before the attacks.
A candidate for a cage in Gitmo
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 5:53 Comments ||
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#4
These things may very well prove to be true. This woman's life isnt worth a damn dime.
I think a large injection of an excessive heart stimulant will be headed her way. $300,000 and a team should be right on it. Sibel is as good as dead.
The only thing that would keep her alive would be the secrets are already out ,but not acted upon, and that envelope can be opened if she is taken out.
There are going to be a lot of people who may not be able to move toward the door fast enough.
FBI and US Security are going to be extremely cautious of high US govt officials who can ruin a career with a phone call. If you were an FBI or US Security official with access to the material you would have to be extremely wary of your own seniors. Going through "channels" conventionally might not be a good idea.
That lethal injection might be a good idea for certain executive Pentagon and others in the US heirarchy. No trials. Just put a pistol next to the candidate and tell him you will wait outside and close the door for the sound of the shot.
The difficulty with having and using a Wetwork Team is that once you have them what do you do to retire them...you HAVE to keep them busy. The answer is that you have a second string to use on the first team. A single player who is part of the first string Team would be best.
The trouble today is that the George Tenets and the Porter Goss's wash after they leave the toilet they are so clean. We need a man who pisses and doesnt wash his hands. Its the little things that point down the hole.
#6
That lethal injection might be a good idea for certain executive Pentagon and others in the US heirarchy. No trials. Just put a pistol next to the candidate and tell him you will wait outside and close the door for the sound of the shot.
I have been thinking that same thing for some time now. We are so infected with traitors, it is past time to start.
#7
I hope someone credible follows up on this story. It's not that hard to believe and is disturbing on so many levels.
From what I've read in the blogs the last few days, the DoD managed to fire the ONLY qualified jihadist analyst on staff in the Pentagon.
Couldn't happen you think? Well, I wouldn't have thought it possible that six months to the day from 9-11 two of the muzzie terrs that flew planes into our cities would receieve their "student visas' in the mail from immigration & naturalization. But Atta and al-Shehhi did.
Posted by: Mark Z ||
01/06/2008 15:23 Comments ||
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#8
The DoD jihadist analyst I'm referring to is Stephen Coughlin who was fired in the last 72 hours. Sorry. I didn't make that clear.
Posted by: Mark Z ||
01/06/2008 15:25 Comments ||
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#9
I pretty much agree with Angleton but he left out certain key memes:
1: No mention of MOABS
2. No mention of wrapping in a pigskin shroud
3. No mention of baconfat
5. No mention of dropping out of an airplane.
Now to remedy this, Ima bring it all together for you....
My mullah was targeted by a MOAB,
he was strpped to and dropper off deh plane!
But the bacon fat and the pig shroud saved him ass from that nutty olde crowd
Posted by: Thomas Woof ||
01/06/2008 18:13 Comments ||
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#10
Oh, Great... Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordie England throws Coughlin under the bus to open up the Pentagon (Our Pentagon, of all places) to help get Anti-USA islaamist Jee-Haw-Dees into the DOD decision-making process. Will this effing madness ever stop?
#11
"Support of US Govt officials to acquire a network of moles in sensitive military and nuclear institutions" > PENN STATE AND PROF ZARQHAWI, ..........etal.???
AND THIS WEEK'S MURDER = "HONOR KILLING" OF TWO EGYPTIAN TEEN GIRLS BY THEIR FATHER, AS LINKED TO ANNA NICOLE AND THE DEATH OF HER SON, etal.???
In a controversial action, the highest Sikh temporal seat on Sunday declared the assassins of former prime minister Indira Gandhi as martyrs of the community.
At a special religious function, organised at the Akal Takht in Amritsar [Images] that was attended and headed by its Jathedar Gyani Joginder Singh Vedanti, Satwant Singh and Kehar Singh were hailed for targeting Indira for "sending the Indian Army to the Golden Temple for Operation Blue Star in 1984".
Satwant and Kehar were hanged to death.
One man's martyr is another man's goon.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 14:15 ||
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[7 views]
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#1
Yep... nothing like gunning down an unarmed old woman to prove your manly martyr qualities..
Real heroic action too.. killing her in her garden.
The terrorists who occupied the holiest Sikh shrine and turned it into an armed camp are of course blameless....
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 14:34 Comments ||
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#2
Simla treaty talks...
Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Indira Gandhi, Benazir Bhutto
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 14:41 Comments ||
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#3
"Martyr" them all, let Allah sort them out.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
01/06/2008 16:39 Comments ||
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#4
If they had tried this 2 decades earlier, when Rajiv Gandhi was PM, they might very well all be 'martyrs' now.
The Sikh Police Chief who crushed the insurgency, KPS Gill, notes that Sikh terrorism did not end because of any political negotiation. It ended because his men killed all the terrorists.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 17:26 Comments ||
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#5
Talking of KPS Gill, this is quote attributed to him from his Wikipedia entry;
"Democracy and liberalism are not a sufficient defence and this is a fact that the ideologues of freedom need, equally, to comprehend. There is a fatal flaw in the liberal mind. Having established, in structure and form [though seldom in substance], a system of governance that corresponds to its conception of democracy, it feels that nothing more needs to be done. The Truths of the liberal ideology are, as the American Declaration on the Rights of Man expresses it, Self Evident. They require no proof, no reiteration, and no defence - certainly no defence by force of arms. Once democracy [or even the ritual of quinquinneal elections] is established, according to liberal mythology, the mystical invisible hand keeps everything in place; the superior wisdom of the masses ensures order and justice...
This is just so much rubbish. As we should know after living with falsehoods for fifty years now. Truth does not triumph; unless it has champions to propound it, unless it has armies to defend it."
Lot of good sense there...
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
01/06/2008 19:01 Comments ||
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#6
Yeah, but a lot of confusion too. Declaration of Independence/Rights of Man; Where's the Constitution; Adam Smith's Invisible Hand kinda sorta relates; the Rule of Law is unmentioned but the use of force is emphasized.
KPS Gill was a better police/military commander than political philosopher. As someone said, good government leads to democracy but not vice-versa.
This photo bears a striking ( kinda creepy) resemblence to a pic of my date "w/ her parents on the couch" taken about 10 minutes before I arrived to escort her to the K of C Christmas dance, junior year, circa 1971.
You lads recall the "maxi coats" the ladies wore in 1971? (She might deny it, but TW does) My date wore one that night. Modesty and the lenth of skirts being what they were then. All I can recall is 3.2 beer, Sly and The Family Stone, and a very warm goodnight kiss. I deny everything else.
Posted by: Mark Z ||
01/06/2008 20:44 Comments ||
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#8
Ya know...it just dawned on me (after I hit submit query) that this thread is devoted to the assasination of a great political figure of the 20th century and not the memories of a middle aged man from high school. I really was taken back by the photo. You have no idea...
Anyhow...if I could I would withdraw my last post.
Posted by: Mark Z ||
01/06/2008 20:55 Comments ||
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Kolkata: Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen must apologise with folded hands for hurting the sentiments of Muslims in the country, said Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi on Sunday.
''We are a pluralistic nation and we respect all religions. I love literature and I have nothing against her writings. That does not mean she can use her pen to insult and hurt the religious beliefs of any community, he said in Malda, West Bengal.
Actually it does. Freedom of speech is the freedom to offend.
"The comments made by her in the book in question (Dwikhandito) were uncalled for. She should bow down before the people whose sentiments she has hurt and apologise with folded hands, and expunge those pages from her book," Dasmunsi said. "We did not allow Salman Rushdie's book ('The Satanic Verses') when it caused a flutter and raised controversy. She will not be an exception," said Dasmunsi. ''Bangladesh is a neighbouring country and neither the society nor the government can allow such controversial writing.
Nasreen has been confined to a 'safe house' somewhere in Delhi and shut out from the world except for phone calls and emails. The Central government has told her to leave the country or stay confined in a house away from Kolkata, where she had set up home for the past few years returning from exile in Europe after she was hounded out of Bangladesh for her writings.
Asked if Nasreen should be allowed to return to West Bengal, Dasmunsi said: ''When the state government had welcomed her to Kolkata, they were under the impression that they were about to bring a high tide of progress in the state. It is their headache now.'' But if Taslima has to stay in India or any other country, she has to honour and respect the philosophy and identity of that nation, he added.
At the beginning of 2008, the writer had described her condition as in a no man's land of fading hope, despair and crushing loneliness.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 09:24 ||
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#1
Looks like snap general elections are on the cards...
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 9:26 Comments ||
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#2
"She went of her own volition, ignoring the threat," he said. And then she decided to stand outside the protection of her SUV. "Who is to blame for her coming out of the vehicle and standing outside? Who is to blame? The law enforcement agencies?" Musharraf asked angrily.
Musharraf might indeed qualify as a "subject matter expert" with regard to assissination attempts. He has somehow survived somewhere in the neighborhood of nine I believe. Appears however he called Scotland Yard Anti-terror offices AFTER the event. No one is buying his "if you're gonna be stupid, ya gotta be tough" story.
#4
Right. And women who go outside without a burka have only themselves to blame if they are raped. And they should be whipped too. Is that really Time Magazine's attitude?
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
01/06/2008 20:26 Comments ||
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How do you track down a foe without a face? That is the challenge posed by Baitullah Mehsud, the man who could well be the newest Enemy No. 1 in the War on Terror. Since he first emerged as a young jihadist leader three years ago, the black-bearded and slow-talking tribal leader has transformed his Mehsud clan's mountainous badlands in the northwest corner of Pakistan into a safe haven for Al Qaeda, the Afghan Taliban and outlawed Pakistani jihadists. Though uneducated, and only in his mid-30s, Baitullah snookered Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf into a fake peace deal two years agoand even got him to hand over a few hundred thousand dollars. Just as important, Baitullah has learned the hard lessons of previous jihadists who grew too enamored of the spotlight for their own good. According to Afghan Taliban who know him, he travels in a convoy of pickups protected by two dozen heavily armed guards, he rarely sleeps in the same bed twice in a row, and his face has never been photographed. They say his role model is Mullah Mohammed Omar, the equally mysterious Taliban leader who disappeared from view in 2001.
U.S. officials have distanced themselves somewhat from the Pakistani government's swiftperhaps too swiftconclusion that Baitullah was behind the Dec. 27 assassination of Benazir Bhutto. The slain former prime minister's Pakistan Peoples Party also disputed that claim, pointing the finger instead at figures within the government. Even Musharraf toned down previous statements from his own officials definitively assigning blame to Baitullah, and late last week he invited Scotland Yard to help with the investigation.
Assuming the intercept that was published was true, it was Baitullah. It having been prepared and published, if it's not true that leads to the inescapable conclusion that the people who prepared and disseminated it -- to whit, the Pak gummint -- are the ones who dunnit.
Still, most U.S. experts agree that Baitullah is the most likely culprit. Musharraf told a press conference last Friday that the tribal leader was behind most if not all of the 19 suicide bombings in Pakistan, including the two aimed at Bhutto, in the past three months. "He is the only one who had the capacity," says one Afghan Taliban with close connections to Mehsud, Al Qaeda and Pakistani militants. (The source, who has proved reliable in the past, would speak only if his identity were protected.)
Last week the Pakistani government produced an intercept in which it claims Baitullah was heard telling a militant cleric after Bhutto's murder: "Fantastic job. Very brave boys, the ones who killed her." Pakistani and U.S. authorities now fear that Baitullah, encouraged by the chaos that followed Bhutto's assassination, will try to wreak more havoc before the rescheduled Feb. 18 national elections.
The Afghan Taliban source claims that Baitullah and his Qaeda allies had laid out remarkably intricate plans for killing Bhutto, who was a champion of secular democracy and a declared enemy of the jihadists.
This year she was. Way back when, she wasn't. Had she lived, there's nothing to say that next year she wouldn't be or would be.
He says Baitullah and Al Qaeda's No. 2, Ayman Al-Zawahirialong with Zawahiri's deputy, Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, Al Qaeda's new commander of military operations in Afghanistan and Pakistanhad dispatched suicide-bomber squads to five cities: Karachi, Peshawar, Lahore, Islamabad and Rawalpindi, where she was killed. Their orders were to follow Bhutto with the aim of assassinating her if an opportunity presented itself. (Two U.S. counterterrorism officials, who asked for anonymity when discussing the investigation, say there are growing indications of Baitullah's involvement in the assassination.)
Baitullah and his allies have even grander plans, the Afghan source says. Her assassination is only part of Zawahiri's long-nurtured plan to destabilize Pakistan and Musharraf's regime, wage war in Afghanistan, and then destroy democracy in other Islamic countries such as Turkey and Indonesia.
Baitullah's alleged emergence as the triggerman in this grand scheme illustrates the mutability of the jihadist enemy since 9/11. As recently as June 2004, Iraq was said to be Al Qaeda's main battleground, and Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi was the terror chieftain whom U.S. authorities worried about most. Baitullah was then a largely unknown subcommander in South Waziristan. But that same month, a U.S. Hellfire missile fired from a Predator drone killed Nek Mohammad, the young, dashing and publicity-hungry tribal leader in Waziristan. Al Qaeda and tribal militants promoted the young Baitullah to a command position. His equally young Mehsud clansman, Abdullah Mehsuda one-legged jihadist who had recently been released from two years of detention in Guantanamoalso seemed to be a rising star. But after the botched kidnapping of two Chinese engineers working on a dam in the tribal area, a local council backed by Al Qaeda removed Abdullah and replaced him with the little-known Baitullah, who was seen as being more levelheaded. (Abdullah was later killed in a shoot-out.)
Since then, Zarqawi has been killed by U.S. forces, Iraq has receded as a haven for Al Qaeda, and Baitullah has come into his own as a terrorist leader in newly unstable Pakistan. Last month a council of militant leaders from the tribal agencies and neighboring areas named Baitullah the head of the newly formed Taliban Movement in Pakistan, a loose alliance of jihadist organizations in the tribal agencies. Taliban sources who would speak only on condition of anonymity describe Baitullah as a key middleman in the jihadist network: his tribesmen provide security for Al Qaeda's rough-hewn training compounds in the tribal area as well as foot soldiers for Qaeda-designed attacks. With a long tradition as smugglers, the tribals (most of whom, like Baitullah, take Mehsud as their surname) run an extensive nationwide trucking and transport network that reaches from the borderlands into teeming cities like Karachi, allowing Baitullah to easily move men and weapons throughout Pakistan...
More detail in the article. Not a bad summary.
This article starring:
ABDULLAH MEHSUD
Taliban
ABU MUSAB AL ZARQAWI
al-Qaeda
BAITULLAH MEHSUD
Taliban
MUSTAFA ABU AL YAZID
a-Qaeda
NEK MOHAMAD
Taliban
Taliban Movement in Pakistan
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Taliban
#1
Though uneducated, and only in his mid-30s, Baitullah snookered Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf into a fake peace deal two years agoand even got him to hand over a few hundred thousand dollars
ROFL! This from the brilliant newsteam that is always ready and willing to be snookered by the most transparent "peace deals" of the Palestinians or any other Islamist groups who claim to want peace as they kill, murder and continue to wage global jihad.
Abdullah Mehsuda one-legged jihadist who had recently been released from two years of detention in Guantanamoalso seemed to be a rising star.
But, but, according to what I read in Newsweak, Guantanamo was only holding poor miscreants who deserved the best lawyers that American taxpayers could afford to assure that they were not unfarily treated! And now we find out that we were just so stupid to allow them to trick us from finding out that they were brilliant leaders.
Just too funny to see how the brilliant, wise ones at Newsweak only get a clue when they think they can make their own countrymen look bad by talking about how clever the "masterminds" of the Jihad movement are. So pathetic, these willing dhimmis.
#2
How do you track down a foe without a face? ...the black-bearded and slow-talking tribal leader has transformed his Mehsud clan
How could they possibly know his beard and mannerisms if they hadn't seen him in person? I shudder to think how bad the writing would be had Newsweek not a full staff of professional editors and fact checkers.
#3
How could they possibly know his beard and mannerisms if they hadn't seen him in person?
lol! Maybe someone should check their newsrooms and see if he's there. Maybe he's the one writing all the ridiculous puff that turns ruthless 7th century thugs into brilliant masterminds outsmarting the hapless civilized west.
A harder military approach towards militancy in the Tribal Areas seems a new agenda following the departure of Ali Jan Orakzai as the NWFP governor, who pleaded for a peaceful solution to the issue engulfing the countrys western borders, analysts said on Saturday.
That worked well.
With Orakzais departure, political solution to the militancy in the Tribal Areas will be a distant cry and strong military response will follow, the analysts told Daily Times. I think that emphasis on the political solution will be lesser and hard things have to come by, said Khalid Aziz, head of the Regional Institute of Policy Research and Training.
Meaning the new guy's not going to be on the turbans' side?
Since early days of his appointment as NWFP governor in May 2006, Orakzai, himself a tribesman and former corps commander of Peshawar, was giving every young tribesman a pen to change mindset of the tribal people from militancy. Orakzai was trying to balance governments acts in the Tribal Areas with an emphasis on a political solution. With his departure, this emphasis will vanish, Khalid, a former NWFP chief secretary, said.
The political solution approach works if both sides want one. If one side wants a political solution and the other side wants to cut some heads off, it doesn't work at all. And if the guy who's pushing the political solution is actually on the side of the head choppers, it works even less.
Within months of his appointment, Orakzai signed a peace deal with militants in North Waziristan in September 2006 and hoped that this would lead to a permanent solution. The Waziristan attempt was copied in the Helmand province of Afghanistan where the British forces left Musa Qala district after they reached a similar deal with the Taliban.
Another move of singular brilliance.
Although Orakzai kept himself at bay from the media, the Helmand deal prompted him to say that his deal with pro-Taliban militants in North Waziristan was a good starter, pleading that Afghanistan should follow me. Months later, anti-deal forces began voicing concern at the North Waziristan situation where they believed the deal was benefiting the militants.
Continued on Page 49
This article starring:
Ali Jan Orakzai
Khalid Aziz
Mehmood Shah
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Senator Babar Awan said on Saturday that the regime wanted a civil war in Sindh by talking about exhuming former premier Benazir Bhuttos body.
File under "Department of Can't Win for Losing."
He told reporters at a press conference here that the PPP would only accept those investigations into former premier Benazir Bhuttos murder, which would be carried out under a first information report (FIR) to be registered according to Benazirs email that she had written to her foreign friends before her death.
According to the senator, Benazirs email to CNNs Wolf Blitzer via her longtime friend, Mark Siegel, which stated that if anything happened to her, she would hold President Pervez Musharraf responsible, should be treated as her dying declaration. An FIR is registered by the aggrieved party and not by the government. The government investigates after an FIR is registered by the aggrieved party, he said.
This article starring:
Senator Babar Awan
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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[8 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader Begum Abida Husssain on Saturday told Daily Times that Intelligence Bureau (IB) and Punjab Home Department had warned her of an attack. She said she felt that this warning was a threat to her indeed.
Three days ago, the IB director for Faisalabad called me and today I have received a letter from Punjab Home Department. Both said that I should up my security and hire some security personnel to ensure protection, she said. Hussain is also part of the PPPs committee that has demanded international probe into Benazir Bhuttos assassination. She said the IB officer in question and the Punjab Home Department had mentioned that she was on the hit-list of some sectarian terrorists.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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[7 views]
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The Anti-Terrorism Court No 1 on Saturday adjourned hearing into the cases against former Lal Masjid chief cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz till January 28. Maulana Aziz was produced before the court but the judge, Habibur Rehman, postponed the hearing as defence and state lawyers failed to turn up due to the elections of the Rawalpindi District Bar Association.
Oh. Well. That's perfectly understandable then.
The cleric was held on July 3 last year during an operation against the Lal Masjid and adjacent Jamia Hafsa. Margalla and Aabpara police had booked him under sections 353, 365 and 7ATA. A total of 23 cases had been registered against him. Copies of three more cases against him were given to Maulana Aziz. The clerics wife and the daughter along with 80 students of Jamia Fareedia and Jamia Hafsa also appeared before the court. Hearing into their cases was postponed to January 28.
This article starring:
Habibur Rehman
MAULANA ABDUL AZIZ
Lal Masjid
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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[8 views]
Top|| File under: Takfir wal-Hijra
New Delhi: The Congress-led UPA government on Wednesday played the biggest Muslim card so far. In a clear indication that it needs a large share of the Muslim vote in case of a mid-term poll, the Government is now asking states to deploy more Muslim policemen, teachers and health workers in Muslim dominated areas. This is particularly in context where there is great deal of public hearing.
So, an election-bound coalition is perhaps preparing for the inevitable by putting Sachar Panel recommendations on a fast track.
The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has written a letter to all state governments and union territories that there should be more Muslim policemen, teachers and health workers.
This is not unprecedented. Even during Indira Gandhi's time such letters were written to chief ministers however its another thing that they were not followed, Member Secretary of the Sachar Commission, Abu Saleh Sharif said.
Thats not all, DoPT has also directed Union Home, Health and Human Resource Development ministries to frame guidelines for these postings in minority dominated areas.
Although Home, Health and Education appointments are a prerogative of state governments and the advisory is not binding but political overtones are quite evident. They are trying to nutralise the effect of the nuclear deal row with the Left, BJP Spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said.
The Government has so far accepted 72 out of the 76 recommendations by the Sachar Panel.
The Government has however, rejected recommendation to have a caste based census and the other contentious issue of Muslim reservations has been put on a backburner. But its also a clear enough indication that a strategy is being worked upon to counter Left allegations on the Congress of being pro-imperialist after a bitter stand-off over the Indo-US nuclear deal. The Opposition BJP for sure would see in this step another opportunity to lash out at the Government.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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[8 views]
Top|| File under: Global Jihad
#1
Is there a single country on earth that is not kowtowing to these cultists? Even the Chinese want to appease the muslims.
#2
Indian Government's Sachar Committee recommendations
1. It recommends the recognition of the degrees from madrassas for eligibility in competitive examinations such as the civil services, banks, defense services and other such examinations!
2. It recommends that Governments use public funds to encourage the formation of Muslim NGOs and their activities
3. It recommends that government provide financial and other support to occupations and areas which are Muslim dominated.
4. It recommends that Muslims be in selection committees, interview panels and boards for public services
5. It recommends that a higher proportion of Muslims be inducted in offices that deal with the public the teaching community, health workers, police personnel, bank employees etc
6. It recommends provision of equivalece to madrassa certificate/degrees for subsequent admission into institutions of higher education.
7. It recommends that government give special incentives to banks to open branches in Muslim dominated areas
8. It recommends that instead of reporting amount outstanding banks should report as sanctions or disbursements to minorities.
9. It recommends that financial institutions should set up separate funds for Muslim entrepreneurs
10 It requires banks to set up special micro credit schemes for Muslims
11 It recommends that all districts more than a quarter of whose population is Muslim be brought into the prime ministers 15 point program
12 It recommends that for each program of government, data be maintained separately about the extent to which Muslims are benefiting from it
13 It recommends that each department institute new schemes for the benefit of Muslims
14 It recommends special measures for the promotion of Urdu
15 It recommends that University grants be linked to the diversity of the student population
16 It recommends that eligibility criteria for IIT be scaled down and admission should be extended to madrassa educated children
17 It recommends that incentives to builders, private sector employees, educational institutions be linked to diversity
18 It recommends that where Muslims are elected or selected in numbers less that adequate, a carefully conceived nomination procedure be worked out to increase the participation of minorities at grass root level.
The Sachar committee goes on to add that It is imperative that if the minorities have certain perceptions of being aggrieved all efforts must be made by the state to find a mechanism by which these complaints could be attended to expeditiously. The mechanism should operate in a manner which gives full satisfaction to the minorities
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 8:27 Comments ||
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#3
The answer is skills and content based testing.
The US civil service tests, while not perfect, eliminated political job patronage at all but the senior, overtly political appointee levels.
Of course, that requires some group consensus re: required skills and knowledge. But there is precedent for that in e.g. college entrance exams, if there is a political will to go that route.
#4
The IAS (Indian Administrative Service) has similar tests.
The IITs (Indian Institute of Technology) are harder to get into than MIT or Harvard.
In 1947, India had a Muslim middle class of civil servants, doctors, lawyers etc. It was quite large.
Practically all of them left for Pakistan, to build their "land of the pure". Those left were mainly traditional peasant farmers and laborers.
India didn't go through the mass industrialization that would have produced a blue collar class with children and grandchildren in white collar occupations.
And traditional Muslim education doesn't produce employable people. Hence the calls for affirmative action.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 9:43 Comments ||
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#5
"traditional Muslim education doesn't produce employable people"
Yes it does. But we only need a few imams (so far), and we don't need ANY militant jihadis.
#6
"incentives to banks to open branches in Muslim dominated areas"
So the government should be paying all the loan interest, since Islam forbids the concept?
Actually, some variation on the financial recommendations is probably a good idea - too often the status quo leads to dependence on financing administered through the Islamic religious heirarchy with funds originating in the KSA and other Islamic oil states. It is worth making some effort and investment to weaken these dependencies.
New Delhi: A seemingly innocuous proposal from the Centre to offer incentives to madrassas so that they can celebrate National Holidays has the Muslim community up in arms.
Uh-oh, they're going to seethe again!
The Centre has proposed to offer additional grants to nearly all the 12,000 madrassas, which get Government funds, to celebrate national festivals namely Independence Day and Republic Day. The Government also wants to make it mandatory for all institutions including private schools to hoist the National Flag on these days.
In the National Development Council meeting last month the Government came under severe criticism from the BJP-ruled states for making special allocations for minority upliftment.
Now the criticism is coming from within the community for what is being called interference in madrassa education. This means you are trying to breed this thought and misgiving that people in madrassas are not patriotic. This certainly can not be supported, Spokesperson, All India Muslim Personal Board, S Q R Illayas said.
The Government has earlier faced stiff resistance in its bid to modernise madrassa education. A proposal to set up a central madrassa board was shelved under pressure from the clergy last year. Inadvertently or otherwise, policy makers seem to overlook the politics of education while drafting the 11th Five Year Plan.
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
Notice there is no response to the call to fly the Indian flag and celebrate the Indian Independence Day and Republic Day.
If they were so offended by filthy lucre, they could do so for free.
The money is not the problem, it is acknowledging the Indian state that bothers them...
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 7:26 Comments ||
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ISLAMABAD- A large-scale military operation is on cards in the restive tribal belt of Waziristan to stamp out the local Taliban led by Baitullah Mehsud, who is blamed by the government for most of the recently carried out suicide blasts including one that killed the former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
34-year old militant commander Baitullah Mehsud, as his name suggests, belongs to the Mehsud tribe in South Waziristan, a troubled region, which is now considered to be the safe haven for al-Qaeda and Taliban. Baitullah Mehsud, according to security officials here, has played a major role in the expansion of militants writ and control in Waziristan besides, extending support to the militants in other tribal areas as well as the district of Swat. Pakistans top security brass believes that Mehsud is the most important militant leader in the current scenario and in order to eradicate the scourge of terror, a full-fledged military operation against him and the militants being led by him is a must, said a senior official here on Saturday requesting anonymity.
He said that new military offensive could be launched any time soon to crush the militants in Waziristan and in this regard preparations were being carried out. He was of the view that the resignation of Governor NWFP, Lt Gen (Retd) Ali Mohammad Jan Aurakzai also showed that the government had made up its mind to flush out al-Qaeda and Taliban in the rugged mountainous region with full force. Aurakzai became the Governor of NWFP in May 2004. He is known to be the architect of September 5, 2006 agreement between the government and militants in North Waziristan
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: john frum ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilna'i expressed support for freeing jailed Fatah Tanzim leader Marwan Barghouti in exchange for Cpl. Gilad Schalit, in a weekend interview with Israel Radio. Barghouti was sentenced in 2004 to five life sentences for the murders of four Israelis and a Greek monk.
Vilna'i said he could not look people in the eye and say "we're giving up on Gilad Schalit." Freeing prisoners with "blood on their hands," he said, was not new to Israel, as this had already been done in past deals to bring about the release of captured Israeli soldiers.
An official in the Prime Minister's Office who preferred to remain anonymous said Vilna'i's was merely expressing his personal opinion. Other senior officials said Israel was not considering releasing Barghouti.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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Hamas has rejected a European offer for an indirect meeting with Israelis to discuss a possible truce, exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal said Friday, adding that the Palestinian people have no choice other than "resistance."
Speaking at a rally in Damascus marking Hamas's 20th anniversary, Mashaal also called on Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to hold unconditional talks with Hamas. Mashaal went on to claim that "some Europeans have offered us to meet indirectly with Israelis to discuss a truce and we told them no and one thousands nos." He did not say which European country made the offer.
On Monday, Abbas took a conciliatory tone toward his Hamas rivals in a major policy speech, calling for a "new page" in relations between the bitter enemies. Fatah and Hamas have been at odds since Hamas won parliamentary elections in January 2006. Those differences boiled over into open warfare that peaked with Hamas's driving Fatah out of Gaza in June.
Mashaal said that the PA had made reconciliation talks conditional on a number of concessions from Hamas including an apology. "We are ready for a dialogue without conditions. Our hands are extended and all matters should be put on the table including elections," Mashaal said.
He also made it clear that Cpl. Gilad Schalit, captured by Hamas-linked terrorists in a cross-border raid in June 2006, would not be freed without the release of Palestinians held in Israeli jails. "The prisoner issue bloodies our heart," Mashaal said, indicating that it was a painful topic, and added that "Gilad Schalit will not be released unless our prisoners are released."
Army Radio reported that Mashaal named jailed Fatah Tanzim leader Marwan Barghouti as one of the Palestinian leaders he was demanding that Israel release.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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Parents of captured soldier say gov't not being creative enough in efforts to secure troops' release.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
Dunno. If I were ever kidnapped by muzzies, my relatives are intructed to press for locating of the holding facility and consent to boming the shit out of it.
Israel is seeking US approval to retake the area of the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, Al-Quds Al-Arabi reported Saturday. According to the report in the London-based newspaper, the request was made following Egypt's decision last week to allow Hamas operatives to reenter the Strip with pilgrims from Mecca. Security officials suspect that the operatives smuggled weapons and money intended for Hamas into Gaza.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
Why the hell do they need our permission to retake a crossing between Egypt and Israel?!?
The American government is assisting the Palestinian Authority in reforming and strengthening its security forces, Army Radio quoted President George W. Bush as saying Saturday. Meanwhile, in his weekly radio address, Bush said he would encourage Israelis and Palestinians to make "tough decisions on complex questions" during his visit to the Middle East which begins next week. "I am optimistic about the prospects," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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Jubail's Maronite Bishop Bechara Rahi said that although the weapons of Hezbollah have not been used internally , they are a fear factor for other Lebanese . He asserted that "the solution to this question of disarmament requires calm and frank dialogue among the Lebanese."
In an interview on LBC TVs "Naharukum Saeed ( have a pleasant day ) show he said that "there is a large group that has no confidence in Hezbollah arms, and this could constitute a pretext for the other teams to own weapons, which is dangerous and unacceptable to Lebanon.
Rahi said MP Michel Aoun has failed in his mission to negotiate on behalf of the opposition and it is about time we find another way to have a successful dialogue . He wondered "Why doesnt Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah negotiate on behalf of opposition?."
Rahi said the government of Prime Minister has not taken any decisions that could provoke the opposition , knowing that according to the constitution the authority of the president was transformed to the prime minister as soon as Lahoud term ended.
Rahi said Bkirki is satisfied and happy with the performance of the prime minister and there is no sensitivity against him by the church unless he takes decisions that favor the Muslim community .
Rahi urged dialogue amongst leaders to solve the problems of the country instead of depending on foreign interference. He urged them to stop these back and forth accusations which are prolonging the crises and damaging the country .
In response to Aouns attacks against Bkirki he said although we are not elected , our power is derived from God .
Bishop Bechara Rahi is one of the most outspoken Maronite Christian leaders. He made the news about 2 weeks ago when he criticized General Michel Aoun by saying : "Aoun is being used as a tool by the (Hezbollah -led) opposition,
He also criticized Speaker Nabih Berri for closing the parliaments door. Everyone knows that Berri is not free in taking decisions, he said. This was in reference to Iran and Syria which back the Hezbollah-led opposition . The government loyalists have accused Syria and Iran of blocking the election of the president.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero paid a surprise visit on Saturday to Spanish peacekeeping troops serving in south Lebanon praising their role as the most important mission that Spain is contributing to in the world... Zapatero was accompanied by Defense Minister Jose Antonio Alonso on the visit to 1,100 Spanish troops who form part of the United Nations peacekeeping force UNIFIL in southern Lebanon.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/06/2008 00:00 ||
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#1
I notice this little ponce grows a pair when the enemy are the Jews. He knows Israel is too civilized to smash his little fascist convoy into the dust.
#2
He broke with tradition by not issuing a "Long live Spain" during the toasts. It was one of the presents who had to do it for him. Quite a symbol from man who has given more than a proof he hates his country and he would like it destroyed
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.
MUSLIM women are to be sent on leadership and assertiveness courses to help to prevent Islamic extremism.
FORMER terrorism suspect Mohamed Haneef is still waiting for the date of an inquiry into his case before deciding on his next move, his lawyer Peter Russo says.
A harder military approach towards militancy in the Tribal Areas seems a new agenda following the departure of 
Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) 
Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilna'i expressed support for freeing jailed Fatah Tanzim leader Marwan Barghouti in exchange for Cpl. Gilad Schalit, in a weekend interview with Israel Radio. Barghouti was sentenced in 2004 to five life sentences for the murders of four Israelis and a Greek monk. 
Hamas has rejected a European offer for an indirect meeting with Israelis to discuss a possible truce, exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal said Friday, adding that the Palestinian people have no choice other than "resistance." 
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero paid a surprise visit on Saturday to Spanish peacekeeping troops serving in south Lebanon praising their role as the most important mission that Spain is contributing to in the world... Zapatero was accompanied by Defense Minister Jose Antonio Alonso on the visit to 1,100 Spanish troops who form part of the United Nations peacekeeping force UNIFIL in southern Lebanon.
