After weeks of continued battles, hundreds of Lashkargah city residents are deeply concerned about the Taliban's deepening grip on Helmand's provincial capital.
Angered by what they call a never-ending war, hundreds of residents in Lashkargah on Thursday came together to urge government to step up its efforts to improve law and order in their region.
TOLOnews correspondent Sharif Amiri who is with Afghan security forces on the frontline in Nawa district of Helmand has reported that the militants are slipping into the capital – especially at night.
"Security has deteriorated over the past month, we gradually lost several districts and the security of Lashkargah is also getting worse. We want security," said Sardar Mohammad Hamdard, a civil society activist.
"There is no security if you travel 300 meters away from here, the Taliban attack during the night," said Mohammad Tamim, an Afghan soldier in Helmand.
"We are now fed up with the war, we want security, security is key for people to live in peace," said a resident of Nawa, Gul Mohammad.
While there appears to be no end in sight to the Taliban's insurgency in the war-weary region, the business community and residents still have not lost hope for a better tomorrow and restaurants and hotels in Lashkargah continue to do business well in to the night.
Helmand was once a key Taliban stronghold has been embroiled in an increasing battle this year - despite numerous promises by the Afghan security institutions to eliminate the militants in the war-hit province.
Concerns have been raised over the sharp increase in deaths of Afghan National Security Forces' members, with roadside mines being one of the key reasons for this spike.
The ministry of defense (MoD) said on Thursday that the Taliban's move to hit the Afghan Security Forces and the use of roadside mines was why soldiers were being lost every day.
However, former military officials have said that poor war management on the battlefields is also one of the reasons.
These days, security forces are busy fighting the Taliban and the scale of these clashes is resulting in a heavy death toll among security forces.
But the MoD said the number of insurgents killed by security forces far outweighs the number of soldiers killed by militants.
Muhammad Rad Manish, spokesperson for the ministry of defense said: "The enemy wants to take revenge and that started battles in every corner of the country which resulted in the increase in deaths among Afghan troops."
Currently Afghan security forces are embroiled in clashes with the Taliban in a number of provinces, but Helmand and Kunduz are the deadliest by far.
Meanwhile, the commander of Resolute Support in Afghanistan said recently that in July alone more than 900 Afghan soldiers were killed in battles.
"Afghan forces get killed because of poor management. Officials need to train the soldiers based on the warzone situation so as to decrease the number of soldiers being killed, but they do not consider this," said Mirza Mohammad Yarmand, former deputy for the ministry of interior.
Battles in Helmand and Kunduz have been ongoing for months now and the Taliban is still extremely active in the provinces.
These battles have also resulted in the Afghan forces losing some districts to the Taliban. Even the regions that have been taken back from Taliban are not completely secure, said analysts.
Atiqullah Amarkhil, a military analyst said: "Security forces do not have coordination with each other in the regions fighting the insurgents. They do not know how to manage the war; they even do not know how to defend the soldiers and the country."
Exact numbers of fallen soldiers in recent battles have not yet been released.
The US Department of State added the commander of the Islamic State’s nascent force in Somalia to its list of specailly designated global terrorists today. Abdulqadr Mumin, the leader of the small cadre of Islamic State fighters in the East African nation, defected from Shabaab late last year.
What took us so long?
State identified Mumin as “the head of a group of ISIL [Islamic State]-linked individuals in East Africa” and “a former al-Shabaab recruiter and spokesman.” Since he pledged to the Islamic State in October 2015, he has “expanded his cell of ISIL supporters by kidnapping young boys aged 10 to 15, indoctrinating them, and forcing them to take up militant activity.”
Before defecting from al Qaeda’s branch in in East Africa to the Islamic State, Mumin appeared in numerous Shabaab propaganda videos.
In April 2015, he appeared in a video where he incited fighters in the Golis Mountains in northern Somalia to wage jihad. Later that month, he gave a speech in a video that documented an attack on an African Union force in Lower Shabelle.
And in July 2015, he was featured in a propaganda tape that highlighted a Shabaab attack on a Burundi convoy near Leego. Burundi troops later withdrew from Leego after the attack.
When Mumin defected to the Islamic State in October 2015, it was reported that no more than 20 of the estimated 300 Shabaab fighters in the semi-autonomous Puntland region in Somalia, where he is based, joined him.
While Mumin has pledge allegiance to the Islamic State’s emir, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, the Islamic State has yet to reciprocate and named an official province in Somalia or East Africa. This may be due to the fact that Mumin has failed to rally a significant number of jihadist to the Islamic State’s banner.
Shabaab, which is waging a deadly insurgency in Somalia and even controls some towns and rural areas in the south, boasts thousands of fighters in its ranks, while Mumin has less than 100 fighters under his command.
Mumin has operated a makeshift training facility, known as the “Commander Sheikh Abu Numan Training Camp,” in Puntland. In April 2016, Mumin appeared in a video that depicted just over a dozen fighters training there.
The camp is named after Bashir Abu Numan, a former commander who was killed by Shabaab’s Amniyat – the rival group’s internal security and intelligence branch – after he defected to the Islamic State in late 2015. [See LWJ report, Islamic State highlights ‘first camp of the Caliphate in Somalia.’]
Since Mumin swore allegiance to Baghdadi in October 2015, his group has only claimed three small-scale attacks inside Somalia. On April 25, the Islamic State claimed its first attack, an IED blast against an African Union convoy in Mogadishu.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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The locals are tired of thievish Gazans (they have a reputation, apparently, deserved or not) waiting for months for the next border opening? Or is President Sisi trying to build goodwill among the Gazan common folk ahead of the next blow to Hamas?
[AlAhram] Egypt will re-open the Rafah border crossing with the Gazoo Strip in both directions on Saturday and Sunday for the upcoming Eid El-Adha holiday, after opening them for three days earlier this week, state news agency MENA reported on Thursday. Eid al-Adha falls in the second week of September and lasts for four days.
The crossing has been open since Tuesday to Paleostinian pilgrims leave Gazoo to go on Hajj.
The Islamic festival is significant because it marks the annual Hajj, or the Islamic pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... .
[ALMASDARNEWS] The Yemeni Army announced that they intend to expand their military operations beyond the Saudi border after weeks of fighting the Saudi-led Coalition in the Jizan, Asir, and Najran regions.
According to Yemen-based Khabar News Agency, the Yemeni Minister of Defense General Sharif Luqman promised to expand military operations in Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... because of the ruthless Arclight airstrikes conducted by the latter’s air force all over Yemen.
The Yemeni Army and Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews ... forces have already seized a large chunk of territory in southern Saudi Arabia, while also expelling the pr-regime loyalists from the Yemeni capital.
General Luqman did not indicate how far he is willing to send his forces in Saudi Arabia, but given their current status, they could push as far north as Abha.
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09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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[Dhaka Tribune] How they knew each other, how close they were and how they had walked together down this dark path, has not yet been found out. What is certain is that they all left home on the same day, February 3.
Shazad Rouf Arko, Nibras Islam and Tousif Hossain left their families at the same day from their residence at Basundhara Residential area, Uttara and Dhanmondi area accordingly.
Tousif completed his O Levels and A Levels from Maple Leaf School of Dhanmondi.
Then he went to study at the Kuala Lumpur campus of Australia’s prestigious Monash University around 2012 where one of Tousif’s friends was Nibras, according to the general diary filed by Tousif’s father Dr Ajmal Hossain with the Dhanmondi cop shoppe after he went missing. Ar Ajmal also said that they had contacted Nibras’ family and learned that he too had gone missing the same day.
However, there's no worse danger than telling a mother her baby is ugly... it could not be confirmed if any GD was filed after Nibras went missing.
Nannu Miah, caretaker of the building Tousif lived in, told the Dhaka Tribune that the boy usually came to Bangladesh in a regular interval and most often went outside in the afternoon carrying a bag. He had the bag also on the day he went missing.
Inspector (investigation) of Dhanmondi cop shoppe Helal Uddin said they had tried to find Tousif but could not find him. His last known location was in Dhanmondi.
Nibras completed his O Levels and A Levels from Turkish Hope School in Uttara near where he lived and then went to North South University. Then he quit halfway and left the country for Monash University in Malaysia in around 2013.
According to police Tousif and Nibras returned to Bangladesh in November 2015 on the same day.
When Nibras was studying at NSU he became friends with Arko. Both of them enjoyed playing football and were active in social media. One of the students of the time told the Dhaka Tribune that he knew both of them for their football skills but they hardly ever played in the campus.
In his LinkedIn profile, Arko mentioned that he had worked as an apprentice at Berger Paints since April 2015.
Arko’s father Touhid Rouf filed a GD with Vatara cop shoppe on February 6, saying he left his home in the early hours of February 3. His last cell phone location was near his residence, said SI Mizanur Rahman, IO of the missing complaints.
They were first found together when Shahbagh police jugged I ain't sayin' nuttin' widdout me mout'piece! three people near the Institute of Engineers in Ramna for their alleged plotting of subversive activities.
The arrestees were Raiyan Minhaj alias Raimu alias Armin, 24, Ahmed Sammur Raihan alias Chiller, 23, and Towhid Bin Ahmed alias Riyaj alias Kachhi. Later police filed a case against them under the anti-terrorism act. The three were now on bail.
According to the police six other young men expeditiously departed at a goodly pace that day. The arrestees however named Arko, Nibras and Tousif. But they did not confirm their real identities.
Nibras was killed in Operation Thunderbolt by the Army at Gulshan Holey Artisan Cafe on July 2, Arko was killed in a DMP SWAT drive ar Kallyanpur called Operation Storm 26 and on August 27, Tousif was killed in an operation by SWAT in Naraynganj’s Paikpara area with the criminal mastermind of Gulshan attack Tamim Ahmed Chowdhury.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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[Dhaka Tribune] This is the big news of the day ‐ Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the second most big shot of the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS) is dead. According to latest reports, al-Adnani was killed in a US air strike near the town of al-Bab in Northern Syria on Tuesday. As he was the the chief front man and propagandist of the group, he was often described as "the voice of ISIS." However, a poor excuse is better than no excuse at all... as Rukmini Callimachi of The New York Times ...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... (NYT) notes on Twitter, "[al-Adnani] was far more than the mouthpiece of IS. He was head of the Emni, the secret service of IS which plotted external terror attacks."
How important was al-Adnani (real name: Taha Subhi Falaha) for Bangladeshi ISIS jihadis? An indication of that can be found in an infamous ISIS video featuring three Bangladeshi jihadis in Raqqa, the ISIS capital. In that video, which was recorded at an intersection of a shopping street just two blocks away from the ISIS headquarters, Bangladeshi ISIS fighter Abu Issa al-Bengali (real name: Tahmid Rahman Shafi) refers to al-Adnani as "our Sheikh." According to him, the gruesome slaughter of foreign nationals and Bangladeshis at the Holey Artisan Bakery in Dhaka "was just a glimpse" of a global war envisioned by the Sheikh.
There are indications that al-Adnani was indeed the principal patron or sponsor of ISIS operations in Bangladesh. This was first revealed by Rukmini Callimachi as she interviewed Harry Sarfo, a former ISIS member now serving a prison sentence in Germany. During the interview, Sarfo told Callimachi that a regional division of the Emni ‐ ISIS secret service headed by al-Adnani ‐ was responsible for plotting and executing the "recent café attack in Dhaka, Bangladesh."
It is also highly likely that Tamim Ahmed Chowdhury ‐ the alleged criminal mastermind of the Gulshan attack ‐ was sent to Bangladesh by al-Adnani himself or one of his deputies overseeing the "Asian affairs division" of the Emni. Chowdhury left Canada sometime in 2012/2013 and received training in Syria before being deployed as an ISIS coordinator in Bangladesh. He was recently killed ‐ some believe executed ‐ by a special police unit in Narayanganj.
These deaths ‐ al-Adnani’s in al-Bab and Chowdhury’s in Narayanganj ‐ will certainly have a crippling effect on ISIS operations in Bangladesh. However, a poor excuse is better than no excuse at all... as the NYT journalist Callimachi points out on Twitter: "I would caution people not to see this as a blow ISIS can not recover from. [The organization] is built to survive deaths."
Posted by: Fred ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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[RFE/RL] The Chinese Embassy in Bishkek has suspended the issuance of visas to Kyrgyz citizens after a terrorist attack against the embassy compound. Kyrgyzstan's Foreign Ministry said that Kyrgyz citizens who applied for Chinese visas might receive their passports with or without Chinese visas back at the ministry's office.
Kyrgyz officials have said that a suicide car bomber rammed the gates of the Chinese Embassy compound in Bishkek on August 30 before detonating a bomb inside the car, killing himself and wounding three Kyrgyz employees of the embassy. Officials in both countries have called the incident a terrorist attack.
China's Foreign Ministry said that Beijing "will work with Kyrgyzstan to quickly obtain concrete information on the people and groups" behind the bombing.
[AlAhram] Germany's military launched a pilot project Thursday to help Syrian refugees learn civil reconstruction skills, in hopes that they will eventually be able to help rebuild their homeland. Over 12 weeks, military experts are teaching 120 refugees engineering, construction, sanitation and other skills in three four-week courses.
"The goal is for these young people to get good basic training," Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen told reporters in the Bavarian city of Ingolstadt, where one of the training centers has started giving classes.
Ahead of the event, von der Leyen said the idea is that the eventual rebuilding of Syria will need "more than just new stones, it will take people with confidence and diverse skills."
Even if the refugees decide not to return home, she said the program will help them acquire the skills they need to work in Germany.
[IsraelTimes] A Nice court finally suspended the burkini ban on Thursday after authorities in the French Riviera resort had defied a ruling by the country’s highest administrative court. Judges in Nice said the July 14 terror attack on the French Riviera city gave insufficient grounds to justify such a ban.
The decision Thursday follows last week’s ruling by France’s highest administrative court to suspend the bans introduced by around 30 towns, mainly in the sun-drenched southeast. Nice and several other towns had ignored the ruling and kept their bans in place in the midst of a raging debate over religious clothing in secular France.
Nice was one of the first French towns to ban the Islamic swimsuit this summer, with city authorities claiming there was a risk to public order from wearing the garment after a jihadist in a truck ploughed into crowds on the city’s waterfront, killing 86 people. But the city’s administrative court ruled Thursday: “In the absence of such risks, the emotions and the concerns resulting from terrorist attacks, and especially from the attack on July 14, are insufficient grounds to legally justify the contested ban.”
The court also found that burkinis posed no risk to “hygiene, decency or safety when swimming.”
At least 30 fines have been issued in Nice since the burkini ban was introduced.
"Nice continent ya got there. Be a shame if something happened to it."
[AlAhram] The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... will not apply a readmission agreement with the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... meant to stem the flow of illegal migrants colonists if it does not get the visa-free travel to Europe it has been promised, its EU affairs minister Omer Celik said on Thursday.
Speaking at a news conference in Ankara with visiting EU Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos, Celik also said Turkey was committed to its March agreement with Brussels on migration and that it was fulfilling its responsibilities.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
09/02/2016 09:28 ||
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A further 820 military personnel have been dismissed from the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK), the Defense Ministry has announced, while the U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen has ordered his followers to stay away from media outlets.
“The suspensions from the TSK are being carried out with meticulous efforts. The heroic soldiers, who are loyal to their nation and people, are performing their duties with success,” a tweet sent from the official Twitter account of the Defense Ministry read.
The personnel were dismissed over their links to the Fetullahist Terrorist Organization (FETÖ), believed to have masterminded the failed July 15 coup attempt.
“The Turkish Armed Forces will continue its service and will be further strengthened as it is cleansed from FETÖ member traitors,” the statement also read.
According to the ministry, a total of 648 of the dismissed military personnel are currently under arrest, while the total number of dismissed personnel since the failed coup attempt has reached 4,451.
The 820 dismissed military personnel from the land and naval forces do not include generals, but only officers and noncommissioned officers.
Some 3,631 soldiers, including generals and admirals, were previously dismissed from the army in light of the two state of emergency decrees issued after the failed seizure of government.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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Turkish military experts on Thursday cleared mines from the area of the Syrian town of Jarabulus captured from Takfiri insurgents last week, using controlled explosions that sent clouds of dust and smoke into the sky, an AFP photographer said.
Pro-Ankara Syrian militants, backed by Turkish aviation and tanks, took Jarabulus from ISIL terrorists in a lightning operation and now enjoy full control of the town.
The de-mining operation on the Syrian side of the border was easily visible from the Turkish border town of Karkamis, with the controlled explosions creating huge white-and-grey clouds of smoke and dust.
An AFP photographer on the border heard at least a dozen explosions and said that the de-mining work was continuing.
ISIL insurgents are believed to have left large quantities of mines and explosives around Jarabulus and operations to destroy them have been in progress since the capture of the town a week ago.
Artillery fire could also be heard on the other side of the border, AFP added.
Turkey says its offensive inside Syria, which began with the capture of Jarabulus, is aimed at ridding the border area not just of ISIL but also a Kurdish militia that Ankara regards as a terror group.
But Turkish strikes on the Kurdish People’s Protection Units militia (YPG) have worried the United States, which regards the group as an ally in the fight against ISIL.
Posted by: badanov ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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h/t Instapundit
"Bigots, anti-Semites, and terrorist advocates" are "spreading hatred and inciting violence" from within the halls of the United Nations with full backing of the international organization, according to a report that shines new light on the lack of proper administrative oversight at Turtle Bay.
Accredited advocacy groups permitted to operate at the U.N. have been using the international organization as a platform to legitimize anti-Semitism, hatred of the Jewish state, and support for terrorism, according a new report issued by Human Rights Voices, a group that monitors bias at the U.N. and the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust.
..."The UN cannot simply wash its hands of any responsibility, since its own selection and approval procedures belie any claims that UN officials are ignorant of NGOs’ purposes and content," the report said. "And none of these excuses addresses the fact that the buck stops with UN member states, who are the ones charged with the responsibility of awarding or continuing UN accreditation for NGOs in the first place." But, does the UN does so knowingly?
#3
That's what folks at R-burg have been saying for a long time. We (the U.S.) support people who hate us and do not have our best interests at heart. Time for UN-Exit?
There is a legend out thisaways about the region formally forming its own state, as they were not adequately represented in the respective states' governments.
In order to show solidarity they came up with a name which included Kansas, Colorado, and Texas.
Guess what they came up with, and why the movement began to sputter.
Kotex.
Dunno. Could be a joke from Oklahoma or New Mexico.
Thailand’s military government has announced peace talks can go ahead with Muslim separatists in the far south of the country but insisted they observe a ceasefire.
What's the over/under?
Separatists from the far south Muslim-majority provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat are suspected of involvement in a string of bombings last month in several tourist towns that killed four people and wounded dozens.
A decades-old insurgency in the deep south of predominately Buddhist Thailand flared in 2004 and more than 6,500 people have been killed since then, according to the independent monitoring group Deep South Watch.
Talks between the government and insurgents began in 2013 when Yingluck Shinawatra was prime minister of a civilian government but have stalled since the military threw her out of office in 2014.
The Thai defence minister, Prawit Wongsuwan, said negotiations would restart on Friday in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
General Aksara Kerdphol, the Thai government’s lead negotiator, said the rebels had to show good faith by ending violence.
“I have been instructed to tell the groups that there must be a peaceful situation on the ground before we are willing to sign any document,” he said.
Malaysia’s Bernama state news agency said Thai officials would meet representatives of the Mara Pattani “separatist umbrella group”.
Bangkok-based analyst Anthony Davis, at security consulting firm IHS-Jane’s, said a ceasefire was unlikely as the main group behind the violence, Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), had been left out of the talks.
Wonder why -- perhaps because they're the main group behind the violence?
“BRN has made it entirely clear that they reject the current process of peace talks between Bangkok and the group of small factions-in-exile in Malaysia called Mara Pattani,” he said.
The three ethnic-Malay majority provinces were part of a Malay sultanate before being annexed by Thailand more than a century ago.
You do have to wonder if the Thais would be smarter just to let the provinces go...
The 11-12 August bombings in several towns including Hua Hin, Surat Thai and on Phuket island spread alarm in a tourist industry that had been largely spared a spillover of violence from the insurgency.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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The Obama administration has denied claims by a Washington thinktank that Iran has secretly been granted exemptions to a multilateral nuclear agreement signed last July in Vienna.
But nobody believes them.
A report by the Institute for Science and International Security alleged that a joint commission set up to implement the Vienna deal had allowed Iran to keep more than the agreed maximum of 300 kg of low enriched uranium (LEU) by excluding waste material in Iran’s nuclear facilities. If enriched further, LEU could be used in a nuclear warhead.
The institute’s director and co-author of the report, David Albright, said that this and other exemptions were granted by the commission in secret.
“One of the biggest problems is we are being denied information in these cases,” Albright said. “If the joint commission has so many powers to change this deal, shouldn’t we know what they’re doing?”
The state department denied that the 300 kg LEU limit set down in the agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Programme of Action (JCPOA), had been breached.
“There’s been no loosening of the commitments and Iran has not and will not under the JCPOA be allowed to exceed the limits that are spelled out in the JCPOA,” spokesman John Kirby said. He added the only violation of the terms of the deal had been a temporary surplus in Iran’s export of heavy water (which can be used in nuclear reactors to produce plutonium), but that had been corrected. Kirby also said the secrecy of the work of the joint commission, which represents all parties to the deal, was stipulated in last year’s deal, signed by six world powers (the US, UK, France, Germany, Russia and China), the EU and Iran.
“This is in compliance with the JCPOA which says the commission’s work should be confidential unless all parties agree otherwise,” Kirby said.
So how about an audit and release of information? Nobody trusts you.
As well as noting the heavy-water surplus, Albright’s report said that “lab contaminant” containing 20% enriched uranium was being overlooked by the commission, and that Iran had been allowed to retain 19 “hot cells” larger than the specifications laid down in the JCPOA. Hot cells are special containers that allow technicians to handle radioactive matter with special gloves while being shielded. They can be used to separate plutonium from spent fuel on a small scale.
Kirby noted that the joint commission was given the authority to approve larger hot cells than envisaged in the agreement.
“We aren’t saying anything has been violated here,” Albright said. “But the number of these hot cells is surprising. We don’t know how many are being monitored by the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency], and again, why is this secret?”
James Walsh, an international security expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said that it was the norm for arms control agreements to have secret sections.
“Secret doesn’t mean evil. It’s just standard operating procedure, and as this report says itself, Obama notified Congress. Congress has known this from the beginning,” Walsh said. On the question of the “hot cells”, Walsh added: “The report admits these are being used for producing medical isotopes. There is no plutonium reactor in Iran. A reactor is years away, so allowing the existing hot cells is not a proliferation danger.”
James Acton, the co-director of the nuclear policy programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said: “The more complicated and comprehensive your arms control agreement, the more questions it throws up in implementation.
“Under the Chemical Weapons Convention, the US had to destroy its stockpile by 2012, but it wasn’t possible to meet that deadline. People didn’t see that as an attempt to undermine the convention, and a pragmatic solution was found,” Acton said. “There is the same principle at work here.”
Did he say that at the time?
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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#1
So we are all in agreement then that if that were secret exemptions then that would be a very very bad thing.
#3
“Under the Chemical Weapons Convention, the US had to destroy its stockpile by 2012, but it wasn’t possible to meet that deadline. People didn’t see that as an attempt to undermine the convention, and a pragmatic solution was found,” Acton said. “There is the same principle at work here.”
The word meaning has changed in 4 years although the semantic content remains the same.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The United States and its negotiating partners agreed "in secret" to allow Iran to evade some restrictions in last year’s landmark nuclear agreement in order to meet the deadline for it to start getting relief from economic sanctions, according to a think tank report published on Thursday.
The report, which was released by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, is based on information provided by several officials of governments involved in the negotiations. The group’s president David Albright, a former UN weapons inspector and co-author of the report, declined to identify the officials, and Rooters could not independently verify the report’s assertions.
"The exemptions or loopholes are happening in secret, and it appears that they favor Iran," Albright said.
The report ignited a chorus of Republican criticism, including from the campaign of presidential nominee Donald Trump. His campaign sought to link the findings to Trump’s Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton ... sometimes described as For a good time at 3 a.m. call Hillary and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Frederick T. Frelinghuysen ... , who was secretary of state when secret talks were held with Iran but had left office before formal negotiations began.
"The deeply flawed nuclear deal Hillary Clinton secretly spearheaded with Iran looks worse and worse by the day," said a statement issued by retired Army General Michael Flynn, a top Trump adviser. "It’s now clear President B.O. gave away the store to secure a weak agreement that is full of loopholes."
The Clinton campaign did not immediately comment on the report.
Among the exemptions were two that allowed Iran to exceed the deal’s limits on how much low-enriched uranium (LEU) it can keep in its nuclear facilities, the report said. LEU can be purified into highly enriched, weapons-grade uranium.
The exemptions, the report said, were approved by the joint commission the deal created to oversee implementation of the accord. The commission is comprised of the United States and its negotiating partners -- called the P5+1 -- and Iran.
One senior "knowledgeable" official was cited by the report as saying that if the joint commission had not acted to create these exemptions, some of Iran’s nuclear facilities would not have been in compliance with the deal by Jan. 16, the deadline for the beginning of the lifting of sanctions.
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09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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The United States and its negotiating partners agreed "in secret" to allow Iran to evade some restrictions in last year's landmark nuclear agreement in order to meet the deadline for it to start getting relief from economic sanctions, according to a report reviewed by Reuters.
I hear Darth Vader's voice in the background: "Pray I don't alter it any further."
The report is to be published on Thursday by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, said the think tank’s president David Albright, a former U.N. weapons inspector and co-author of the report. It is based on information provided by several officials of governments involved in the negotiations, who Albright declined to identify.
"The exemptions or loopholes are happening in secret, and it appears that they favor Iran," Albright said.
Among the exemptions were two that allowed Iran to exceed the deal's limits on how much low-enriched uranium (LEU) it can keep in its nuclear facilities, the report said. LEU can be purified into highly enriched, weapons-grade uranium.
The exemptions, the report said, were approved by the joint commission the deal created to oversee implementation of the accord. The commission is comprised of the United States and its negotiating partners -- called the P5+1 -- and Iran.
One senior "knowledgeable" official was cited by the report as saying that if the joint commission had not acted to create these exemptions, some of Iran’s nuclear facilities would not have been in compliance with the deal by Jan. 16, the deadline for the beginning of the lifting of sanctions.
And so...
The U.S. administration has said that the world powers that negotiated the accord -- the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany -- made no secret arrangements. A White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the joint commission and its role were "not secret." He did not address the report's assertions of exemptions.
Of course it wasn't a "secret" -- the P5+1 all knew. How could it be a secret? So okay, they didn't tell the little people...
The report's assertions are likely to anger critics of the nuclear deal. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has vowed to renegotiate the agreement if he's elected, while Democrat Hillary Clinton supports the accord.
Albright said the exceptions risked setting precedents that Iran could use to seek additional waivers.
Albright served as an inspector with the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) team that investigated former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons program. While Albright has neither endorsed nor denounced the overall agreement, he has expressed concern over what he considers potential flaws in the nuclear deal, including the expiration of key limitations on Iran's nuclear work in 10-15 years.
The administration of President Barack Obama informed Congress of the exemptions on Jan. 16, said the report. Albright said the exemptions, which have not been made public, were detailed in confidential documents sent to Capitol Hill that day -- after the exemptions had already been granted.
They weren't about to ask permission...
The White House official said the administration had briefed Congress "frequently and comprehensively" on the joint commission's work.
Democratic Senator Bob Menendez, a leading critic of the Iran deal and a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told Reuters in an email: "I was not aware nor did I receive any briefing (on the exemptions).”
As part of the concessions that allowed Iran to exceed uranium limits, the joint commission agreed to exempt unknown quantities of 3.5 percent LEU contained in liquid, solid and sludge wastes stored at Iranian nuclear facilities, according to the report. The agreement restricts Iran to stockpiling only 300 kg of 3.5 percent LEU.
The commission approved a second exemption for an unknown quantity of near 20 percent LEU in "lab contaminant" that was determined to be unrecoverable, the report said. The nuclear agreement requires Iran to fabricate all such LEU into research reactor fuel.
If the total amount of excess LEU Iran possesses is unknown, it is impossible to know how much weapons-grade uranium it could yield, experts said.
The draft report said the joint commission also agreed to allow Iran to keep operating 19 radiation containment chambers larger than the accord set. These so-called "hot cells" are used for handling radioactive material but can be "misused for secret, mostly small-scale plutonium separation efforts," said the report. Plutonium is another nuclear weapons fuel.
The deal allowed Iran to meet a 130-tonne limit on heavy water produced at its Arak facility by selling its excess stock on the open market. But with no buyer available, the joint commission helped Tehran meet the sanctions relief deadline by allowing it to send 50 tonnes of the material -- which can be used in nuclear weapons production -- to Oman, where it was stored under Iranian control, the report said.
The shipment to Oman of the heavy water that can be used in nuclear weapons production has already been reported. Albright's report made the new assertion that the joint committee had approved this concession.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/02/2016 00:00 ||
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#1
"Democrat Hillary Clinton supports the accord....."
Mai Oui, that goes without saying. Its a secret arrangement made by a democratic party and not to be questioned by the little people or peasants.
The very idea.
Okay Hemingway, lesson number two from me:
I know who you are. From my moderator's perch, I (and Pappy) see your IP. No matter what nym you pick or have picked for you, you're the same IP.
So stop changing names. I'm going to suggest one to you, you might like it -- "Hemingway1961". Regardless, pick ONE nym.
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trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Dhaka Tribune] How they knew each other, how close they were and how they had walked together down this dark path, has not yet been found out. What is certain is that they all left home on the same day, February 3.
[Dhaka Tribune] This is the big news of the day ‐ Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the second most 
Hillary Clinton
