[An Nahar] Afghanistan's Taliban faceless myrmidons have denied involvement in the recent public execution of a woman captured in a horrific video that caused international outrage. "Nope. Nope. Wudn't us."
Afghan authorities blamed the Taliban Islamists for killing the 22-year-old woman for adultery, as was common during their rule of the country between 1996 and 2001. "When've we ever done somethin' like that before?"
She was rubbed out as dozens of men cheered in a village about 100 kilometers north of the capital Kabul. "Yay! Hurrah! Admiral Akbar!"
But the Taliban said in a statement on their website Thursday that they had investigated the incident and found the woman was "killed by the decision of the local residents". "It wuz them! We had nuttin' to do widdit!"
"The involvement of the... mujahideen as alleged by some officials of the Kabul government is absolutely untrue and baseless," the statement said. "We wuz takin' a leak when it happened..."
President Hamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai ... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtun face on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use... condemned the execution as un-Islamic and unforgivable and security forces have launched a manhunt for those responsible. But not for the guys hollering 'Adminral Akbar.'
The U.S. commander of NATO's ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... 130,000 troops in Afghanistan, General John Allen, offered to help local security forces track down and capture the men involved in what he called "an atrocity of unspeakable cruelty".
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Taliban rules
1 Deny
2. Claim someone else did it
3. Claim "It's Allah;s " Law
4 claim "it's not us"
5 repeat the above
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
07/13/2012 0:13 Comments ||
Top||
#2
The Taliban, along with dozens of its ubiquitous supporters.
#3
After all, the Taliban are a product of Afghan culture. So if it wasn't them it was people in that country who are at least sympathetic with Taliban goals and methods. Kinda makes nation building in Afghanistan look like a dubious proposition unless you're willing to spend a hundred or so years there ruthlessly stamping out that superstition of theirs.
#4
Kinda makes nation building in Afghanistan look like a dubious proposition unless you're willing to spend a hundred or so years there ruthlessly stamping out that superstition of theirs.
Muhammad's armies did it chop chop (no pun intended). However, his methods aren't available to us.
[Al Ahram] Afghanistan's Caped PresidentHamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai ... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtun face on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use... called Thursday on Taliban supreme leader Mullah Omar ... a minor Pashtun commander in the war against the Soviets who made good as leader of the Taliban. As ruler of Afghanistan, he took the title Leader of the Faithful. The imposition of Pashtunkhwa on the nation institutionalized ignorance and brutality in a country already notable for its own fair share of ignorance and brutality... to give up fighting his US-backed government in return for the chance to run for president of the war-torn nation.
Mullah Omar, the one-eyed Taliban leader who has been on run since the United States toppled his regime in late 2001, is one of the world's most desperados and is leading a Taliban insurgency aimed at ousting Karzai. Karzai has repeatedly called on Omar and other faceless myrmidons fighting against his administration to renounce violence and accept peaceful reintegration.
"I repeat my call on all Afghans, those who aren't the puppets of others and have (only) issues with us at home -- they're welcome for any talks," he told a news conference. "Mullah Mohammad Omar can come inside Afghanistan anywhere he wants to. He can open political office for himself but he should leave the gun.
"He along with his friends can come and create his political party, do politics, become a candidate himself for the elections. If people voted for him, good for him, he can take the leadership in his hand," Karzai said. The Taliban have repeatedly turned down Karzai's peace offers and earlier this year withdrew from exploratory talks with the United States in Qatar.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Force will probably have to be used to dislodge Islamists from northern Mali, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Thursday, although interim leaders must first take control of the south.
"Once the rule of law is re-established in the south, one must look at the north, meaning that at some point it's probable there will be use of force," Fabius told journalists in Gay Paree.
"Mali is a very serious case because it's the first time that beturbanned goons have taken over major cities and are perhaps in a position to take control of a state," Fabius said.
Tuareg rebels launched a rebellion in the north of the country in January, quickly overwhelming a demoralized and poorly equipped Malian army.
A Bamako coup only worsened the situation as the unmanned north became easy prey and fell to rebel groups in a matter of days.
Islamist fighters from Ansar Dine (Defenders of Faith) backed by MUJAO, an offshoot of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), appeared fighting on the flanks of the Tuareg rebels whom they have now routed.
Interim authorities who took over from the junta in the south have proved powerless to deal with the occupation, and West African mediators have given them until July 31 to create a "unity government" with a clear timeline to exit the crisis.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
I thought the French were getting ready to set the Legion loose among the illegal gold miners in French Guyana near the EU's rocket port?
Posted by: Water Modem ||
07/13/2012 0:47 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Follow a Frenchman no futher than to a cafe.
anon
[An Nahar] U.S. President Barack Obama This is a teachable moment... authorized the use of $10 million in emergency funds on Thursday for people displaced by the conflict in northern Mali, the White House adding it was "deeply concerned".
The funds will support efforts of the United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... High Commissioner for Refugees, White House National Security Council front man Tommy Vietor said.
Already, almost 230,000 Malian refugees have fled to Algeria, Burkina Faso ...The country in west Africa that they put where Upper Volta used to be. Its capital is Oogadooga, or something like that. Its president is currently Blaise Compaoré, who took office in 1987 and may be in the process of being chased out now... , Mauritania and Niger, while an additional 155,000 Malians are internally displaced, he said in the statement.
Leaders in Mali, formerly one of West Africa's most stable democracies, are discussing the formation of a unity government to deal with a crisis which has seen the country split in two.
The north of Mali is in the hands of Islamist fighters and a Tuareg separatist faction, and has seen the destruction of ancient World Heritage treasures in Timbuktu by hardliners.
"The United States is deeply concerned about the situation of the Malian people," Vietor said. "We call on all parties to support the restoration of democratically elected civilian governance in Mali as soon as possible."
Vietor also called on rebels in northern Mali to renounce any connection with terrorist groups and enter into legitimate political negotiations.
"In addition, we urge all parties to ensure neutral, impartial, and unhindered humanitarian access to all populations in northern Mali," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Ansar Dine
#1
From where?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
07/13/2012 0:14 Comments ||
Top||
#2
No mention made of cause and effect:
The rebel faction, which calls itself the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (NMLA), is a Tuareg movement seeking to create an autonomous region in Malis far north. The group has attacked several towns in the area.
NMLA has gotten a considerable boost in recent months as a large number of Tuareg fighters who had been hired as mercenaries for the recent civil war in Libya have returned home and brought their weapons with them.
China is building a massive highway and rail network in Liaoning and Jilin provinces near the border with North Korea. Beijing is expected to spend more than US$10 billion on the project by 2015. Experts believe the aim is not only to tap into North Korea's mineral resources but to secure easy access for Chinese troops in case of an emergency in the North.
According to Jilin Province officials, a 41.68 km railway is to link the city of Helong with the border town of Nanping, which is just a stone's throw from North Korea's Musan, where the North's largest iron ore deposits are. The railway will apparently be used to carry iron ore from Musan to the steel town of Anshan in Liaoning Province.
The Changbai region in Jilin, on the western side of Mt. Baekdu and just across the border from North Korea's Hyesan, is rapidly becoming a regional traffic hub. A 100.58 km highway and 126.4 km railway linking Songjianghe with Changbai will be completed in 2015. Hyesan is home to North Korea's biggest copper mine.
Another highway is also being built connecting Shenyang, Liaoning Province, home of the regional government office that has jurisdiction over the border area, with the border town of Ji'an in Jilin Province.
"A four-lane highway is being built into the remote region and many people think it is for military purposes," said one source in Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in Jilin.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Hmmm, China trying to "Take Over"?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
07/13/2012 0:16 Comments ||
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PARIS: Yasser Arafat's widow is to file a lawsuit in France following allegations the Palestinian leader died at a Paris hospital in 2004 after being radioactively poisoned, her lawyers said on Tuesday.
"Mrs Suha Arafat, widow of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, has asked a Parisian legal practice to file suit against an unnamed person under French jurisdiction," lawyer Pierre-Olivier Sur's practice said in a statement. "Mrs Arafat hopes that the authorities will be able to establish the exact circumstances of her husband's death and find out the truth so that justice can be done," it said.
And once the truth comes out the Paleos will move heaven and earth to suppress it...
The move comes after an investigation commissioned by Al-Jazeera news channel found elevated levels of the radioactive substance polonium on some of Arafat's belongings, suggesting the leader could have been poisoned.
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has said he will ask the Swiss experts who probed Arafat's death to take samples from his body in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah for further tests.
Half-life of Po-210 is about 138 days, and Po-209 has a half-life of 103 years, so they could get lucky...
Polonium, which is highly toxic, was used to kill Russian former spy turned Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko, who died in 2006 after drinking tea laced with the substance at a London restaurant.
The Al-Jazeera investigation, broadcast last week, centerd around the testing of some of Arafat's belongings, which the Percy military hospital gave to Suha Arafat after his death.
Suha Arafat gave Al-Jazeera permission to take possession of the items, which included clothing Arafat wore in the days before he died aged 75, and hand them over for specialist testing.
Suha Arafat has said she would seek an exhumation to allow specialists to take additional samples for testing, and the Palestinian leadership has said it would be willing to allow exhumation if Arafat's family agreed.
Many Palestinians believe Arafat was poisoned by Israel, which has denied the allegations,
...since if they had wanted Yasser dead he would have been dead long ago...
accusing Suha Arafat and Palestinian officials of covering up the real reasons for the former leader's death.
Polonium poisoning doesn't exactly point to Israel. But it does point in a certain direction...
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under:
#1
YEA WHEE a lawyers fight. (No winners)
SIC'EM.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
07/13/2012 0:18 Comments ||
Top||
#2
"Mrs Arafat hopes that the authorities will be able to establish the exact circumstances of her husband's death and find out the truth so that justice can be done"
Somebody is looking for a payday. Burn thru the ill-gotten gains already, Suha?
#4
"Mrs Arafat hopes that the authorities will be able to establish the exact circumstances of her husband's death and find out the truth so that justice can be done"
My gut says slow painful death by polonium was justice done--it sends a strong message, probably related to illicit proliferation... And it could just as well be the brainchild of former KGB as Israel.
The Turkish military on Friday tried to damp down speculation about the loss of one of its warplanes last month, repeating its assertion the jet was shot down by Syria and by something other than anti-aircraft fire.
Speculation in Turkey has been mounting since the armed forces released a written statement on Wednesday that appeared to contradict previous official accounts of the June 22 incident and suggested the military may be revising its initial stance.
In that statement, the General Staff referred to the aircraft which "Syrian official authorities subsequently claimed to have shot down". The use of the word 'claimed', absent from previous accounts, aroused confusion over an incident which many Turks had initially feared could lead to a war.
Further adding to uncertainty over the plane's fate, the armed forces statement declared no traces of "petroleum-based, combustible or fire accelerant substances, organic and inorganic explosive substance residues, or any kind of ammunition" were found on debris from the wreckage floating on the sea's surface.
The lack of any further explanation in the statement prompted a flurry of speculation in the Turkish media over what had caused the F-4 reconnaissance jet to crash off the coast of Syria and whether it had even been shot down at all.
However, in another written statement on Friday, the military reasserted its position the jet had been brought down by Syria and said it had tried to make this clear to the public in all its previous statements.
It said the findings from examinations of the flotsam referred to in Wednesday's statement meant the possibility of the plane being shot down by anti-aircraft fire "as Syria claims" had "disappeared".
RAISED TENSIONS
The loss of the plane raised tensions between Syria and Turkey, which has been harbouring Syrian rebel forces and refugees on its territory and has called for the departure of President Bashar al-Assad. Turkey dispatched its own air defence systems to its long frontier with Syria days after the incident.
While Syria said hours after it crashed into the Mediterranean that it had shot down the F-4 jet, official accounts from Ankara and Damascus differ over where and with what the jet was brought down.
Syria says it shot the F-4 jet in self-defence and without knowing that it was a Turkish aircraft. It says it shot the plane at close range with anti-aircraft fire after it flew into its air space at high speed and low altitude.
Turkey has said it violated Syrian air space accidentally for a few minutes but maintains its plane was shot down by a missile without warning, 13 nautical miles off the Syrian coast in international air space. It says all its identification systems were open.
According to international law, a country's sovereign airspace extends 12 nautical miles from a nation's coastline. Anti-aircraft fire is only effective up to a maximum 2.5 miles.
Effective range
Against low-flying aircraft (HE round),
L70: 914 m (1,000 yd)
L85: 1,500 m (1,600 yd)
Maximum range HE round at 45°,
L70: 4,389 m (4,800 yd)
L85: 6,800 m (7,400 yd)
[Dawn] Pakistain Tehrik-e-Insaf ...a political party in Pakistan. PTI was founded by former Pakistani cricket captain and philanthropist Imran Khan. The party's slogan is Justice, Humanity and Self Esteem, each of which is open to widely divergent interpretations.... chairman Imran Khan ... aka Taliban Khan, who is the lightweight's lightweight... has said that had there been protests against the army operation and atrocities in what was then East Pakistain, the country could have been spared the tragedy that befell it in 1971.
He claimed that he was on the last flight out of Dhaka before the Pakistain Army launched the operation and he overheard someone saying 'Kill Bengalis: we will teach them a lesson.'
"While our own people left us, we are repeating similar mistakes in the tribal areas and Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... now," said Mr Khan while speaking at the launch of a book 'Escape from Oblivion: The Story of a Pak Prisoner of War in India' authored by an ex-army officer and defence analyst, Ikram Sehgal, at a hotel on Wednesday evening.
The book is based on the notes of Mr Sehgal's one-month-long debriefing on his return to the country after successfully fleeing the Panagarh war camp in India.
Other speakers at the programme, which started almost an hour behind the schedule and event organisers had to rearrange the agenda by requesting the guests to proceed for a tea break first, were Mr Sehgal himself, retired brigadier A.R. Siddiqui, retired brigadier Mohammad Taj, retired lieutenant general Ali Kuli Khan and former federal minister Javed Jabbar.
The PTI chief said that in 1971 when he was returning from Dhaka after playing an under-19 cricket match he decided that he would never back a military operation against the country's civilians.
Then in the 1990s when his team of young first class cricketers beat the Indian team in a Dhaka stadium, it reverberated with the slogan 'Pakistain Zindabad' that lent strength to his views that Bengalis turned against West Pakistain due to our own mistakes, he added.
He told the gathering that drones attacks or use of gunship helicopters against beturbanned goons in the tribal areas or Balochistan was creating extremism in the country as innocent lives, too, were being lost in the strikes. A delegation from Fata told him that in a recent drone attack in a tribal area, five people were killed and as villagers gathered to see the casualties they were hit by another strike. The government withheld this information and the security agencies did not allow locals to share these facts with journalists, he said.
Mr Khan said he was against military actions in civilian areas because they dehumanised the general public and turned locals into barbarians.
About the book, he said it reminded him of his eight days in jail where it was sheer boredom that he had to fight with, but the 99 days that the author spent in captivity must have been quite challenging. He said: "The book is absorbing and a real life thriller."
On a lighter note, he wished the author best of luck for the business empire he had built over the years and asked him to make as much money as he could in the shortest possible time, because the PTI would fix the police department first when voted to power.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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[Dawn] Chief Justice of Pakistain Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry late on Thursday said that only law and constitution will prevail in the country and the judiciary will not accept any unconstitutional step being taken by the executive, DawnNews reported.
Addressing a gathering at a dinner reception hosted in his honour by the Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... High Court in Quetta, the chief justice said that the issues, which should have been dealt by the executive, are being resolved by the judiciary.
He said that the judiciary was fully aware of its responsibilities and all institutions of the country are bound to act under their constitutional ambit.
Justice Chaudhry regretted over noncompliance of the constitution in the country and vowed to resist any unconstitutional act taken against the judiciary, the parliament or the masses.
The CJ said that he has taken oath under the constitution and will defend it at any cost. "It is the judiciary's responsibility to make justice available for everyone. Tradition of respecting law is vanishing fast in the country," he added.
Expressing concern on overall law and order situation, the chief justice said the country was presently facing the worst kind of lawlessness, bloodshed, kidnapping for ransom and disregard for the supremacy of the constitution.
He also emphasised on implementation of the constitution in Balochistan as elsewhere in the country.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Seems that constitutions are under assault in many places.
The Muslim Brotherhood has said its political party, the Islamic Action Front, will boycott Jordan's parliamentary elections due by the end of the year. They said recent changes to the election law weren't enough, and warned of further public protests. But they said they might reverse the decision if there were serious reforms.
A boycott could thwart King Abdullah, who has promised reform in hopes of avoiding anti-government unrest in the wake of the Arab Spring.
The Brotherhood's deputy leader, Zaki Bani Rusheid, said, "The regime has failed to meet reform demands by Jordanians, including the Islamist movement."
Reform #1 demanded: Sharia law.
Reform #2 demanded: None. Once #1 is implemented there is no #2.
[Al Ahram] Syria's ambassador to Iraq Nawaf Fares, who announced his defection to the opposition, has been "discharged," the foreign ministry said in a statement on Thursday. "The Ministry of Foreign Affairs announces that Nawaf Fares has been discharged and has no relation with our embassy in Storied Baghdad ...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate... , or with the foreign ministry," the statement said.
So much for the automatic deposit of his paychecks...
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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Britain's foreign intelligence chief believes his agents prevented Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons but that the pariah state will become armed within two years, the Daily Telegraph reported on Friday.
So they didn't 'foil' the Mad Mullahs but merely delayed them...
In a rare public speech, MI6 boss John Sawers told a meeting of about 100 senior civil servants in London that British agents had foiled Iran's attempts to produce a nuclear weapon as long as four years ago, according to the Telegraph.
"You'd have Iran as a nuclear weapons state in 2008 rather than still being two years away in 2012," the report quoted Sawers as saying last week.
When Iran does finally acquire nuclear status, the intelligence chief warned that Israel and the United States "would face huge dangers".
"I think it will be very tough for any prime minister of Israel or president of the United States to accept a nuclear-armed Iran," he suggested.
[An Nahar] Israeli aid groups are working with Western organizations to provide humanitarian aid to Syrian refugees in Turkey and Jordan, MP Ayoob Kara told Agence La Belle France Presse on Thursday.
"We have found a way, with voluntary organizations from Israel that are now on the borders of Jordan and Turkey with Syria, to provide humanitarian help to the Syrians who are there," Kara said.
"My advisors are also in Jordan to try to find a way to help the refugees in Jordan," he added, saying that Israeli volunteer groups had been working in Turkey and Jordan for the past two months.
Kara stressed that the aid was humanitarian, with Israeli groups providing "food, medicine, a lot of help."
And he said the organizations involved were non-governmental groups working under the auspices of European institutions to assist Syrian refugees in the border areas.
"This is not the government, it's volunteers," he said, declining to identify the groups involved.
"They are Israelis but they don't work there as Israelis, they work with the European groups there."
Kara said the Israeli government was wary of being seen to aid the opposition groups fighting to overthrow the regime of Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor... , whose country is a sworn enemy of Israel.
"If we are part of the conflict, it's a danger for all the region, all the world," he said.
But Kara said he was eager to see the Jewish state provide humanitarian assistance, where possible.
"It is important for us that when there are big problems in our neighbor states, we are helping," he said.
Kara, a member of Israel's Druze minority who belongs to the rightwing Likud party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said the governments of Jordan and Turkey "know about the work of the Israeli organizations."
And the deputy said he was working with Jordan and the Israeli government on the possibility of bringing maimed Syrian refugees to the Jewish state for treatment.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
#1
Any runners from Syria welcome, try anything and you're dead, otherwise welcome.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
07/13/2012 0:11 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Personally, I believe that returning good for ill is just as morally wrong as the vice verse. But, mine, seems to be a minority opinion in this brave new world.
#6
Where can I send a couple of pallets Spam? Just trying to do my part.
Posted by: Secret Asian Man ||
07/13/2012 21:17 Comments ||
Top||
#7
This isn't so much the Israeli government doing something as independent people or groups helping out a bunch of displaced victims of war because, well, that's the right thing to do. You don't do these sorts of things because you expect to get something out of it other than personal satisfaction.
[VOA News] Russia says it will not vote for sanctions on Syria to try to end the violence there, as Western powers are demanding.
At the U.N. Security Council, Britannia, La Belle France, Germany and the United States said Thursday that sanctions must be invoked against Damascus ...The City of Jasmin is the oldest continuously-inhabited city in the world. It has not always been inhabited by the same set of fascisti... within 10 days unless the Syrian military stops using heavy weapons against opposition forces.
Security Council members are preparing for a vote on the resolution.
Russia says the Council should pass an alternate resolution that would simply extend the mandate of the U.N. observer mission in Syria for another three months.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
"We will bury you" .... in Kalashnikovs!
The Foreign Military Sales territories and WMD depots of the Motherland shall not be violated!
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.
[Al Ahram] 
[An Nahar] Force will probably have to be used to dislodge Islamists from northern Mali, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Thursday, although interim leaders must first take control of the south.
Chief Justice of Pakistain Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry late on Thursday said that only law and constitution will prevail in the country and the judiciary will not accept any unconstitutional step being taken by the executive, DawnNews reported.
Syria's ambassador to Iraq Nawaf Fares, who announced his defection to the opposition, has been "discharged," the foreign ministry said in a statement on Thursday. "The Ministry of Foreign Affairs announces that Nawaf Fares has been discharged and has no relation with our embassy in Storied 
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
[VOA News] Russia says it will not vote for sanctions on Syria to try to end the violence there, as Western powers are demanding. 
