How does one make the argument that missile-defense systems are unproven? Dont allow it to get tested. Despite having plenty of lead time to the North Korean missile launch, the Obama administration refused to permit the US Navy to deploy its most sophisticated missile-tracking radar during the launch. The reason? It might have annoyed Kim Jong-Il...
The mayor of Duncanville, Texas had a member of the city council arrested last Tuesday for speaking out against the use of red light cameras during an official meeting. The incident took place during the discussion of whether the city should spend $59,000 to make street repairs. Mayor David Green recognized Councilman Paul Ford to speak on the contract item.
"Thank you," Ford said. "I want to let you know that earlier this evening during briefing, Mayor Green threatened me that if he told me to stop talking and I didn't, he'd have me arrested, and I want to let you know what I told Mayor Green."
Green became outraged and shouted, "Mr Ford, you are out of order. You are not recognized Mr Ford. You need to cease right now."
While Green yelled, Ford continued his brief statement without stopping.
"Unlike those thousands of people who are getting red light camera tickets, I will have the opportunity for a jury trial. It will be a jury of my peers and I will confidently put my fate in their hands. And now I'm going to discuss agenda item number three. I will vote against it, and here's why."
Before he had a chance to explain that the city could find the money for those necessary street repairs by cutting the city manager's salary from $179,000 to $160,000 and reducing payments to local chambers of commerce by $40,000, Police Chief Robert Brown grabbed Ford. Ford repeated several times the statement: "Chief Brown, I will not leave voluntarily, but if you believe I am violating the law by discussing this agenda item, I will submit to arrest."
Brown did not respond. Mayor Green had the audio of the city council video tape turned off as Brown dragged the councilman out of the chamber. Ford ended up hospitalized from injuries sustained during the arrest.
#1
Just twenty minutes from Fort Worth. (Is that Heimlich County?)
Interestingly, the city's website shows the April 21st COuncil Meeting as "*CANCELLED*". Wonder why?
The local news apparently got on their case about a local couple cited for Red Light cam violations. The city put the videos on their site in response to the news.
Must have been a bit of touchy subject.
Oh, the city's website has a phone number with an answering service, in case you're concerned about the whereabouts of Mr. Ford. Be cordial.
#2
We have these cameras in our city. It is an easy cash cow for the city. Some guy shot one of them out a year or so ago. The police frowned on this and he is now going to have to answer for this. I'm not sure how he was caught.
A Kenyan man bit a python which wrapped him in its coils and dragged him up a tree during a fierce three-hour struggle, police have told the BBC. The serpent seized farm worker Ben Nyaumbe in the Malindi area of Kenya's Indian Ocean coast at the weekend. Mr Nyaumbe bit the snake on the tip of the tail during the exhausting battle in the village of Sabaki.
Police rescued Mr Nyaumbe and captured the 13ft (4m) reptile, before taking it to a sanctuary, but it later escaped. The victim told police he managed to reach his mobile phone from his pocket to raise the alarm when the python momentarily eased its grip after hauling him up a tree on Saturday evening.
Mr Nyaumbe used his shirt to smother the snake's head and prevent it from swallowing him. His employer arrived with police and villagers, who tied the python with a rope and pulled them both down from the tree with a thud. Peter Katam, superintendent of police in Malindi district, told the BBC News website: "Two officers on patrol were called and they found this man was struggling with a snake on a tree.
"The snake had coiled his hands and was trying to swallow him but he struggled very hard. The officers and villagers managed to rescue him and he was freed.
"He himself was injured on the lower lip of the mouth - it was bleeding a little bit - as the tip of the snake's tail was sharp when he said he bit it."
Mr Nyaumbe told the Daily Nation newspaper how he resorted to desperate measures after the python, which had apparently been hunting livestock, encircled his upper body in its coils.
"I stepped on a spongy thing on the ground and suddenly my leg was entangled with the body of a huge python," he said. "I had to bite it."
Supt Katam told the BBC the officers had wanted to shoot the snake but could not do so for fearing of injuring Mr Nyaumbe. "If it wasn't for the villagers and officers who helped him, he would have been swallowed by the snake over the Easter holiday," said Supt Katam.
He added: "It's very mysterious, this ability to lift the man onto the tree. I've never heard of this before." The police officer said they took the snake to a sanctuary in Malindi town but it escaped overnight, probably from a gap under the door in the room where it was kept. "We are still seriously looking for the snake," said Supt Katam. "We want to arrest the snake because any one of us could fall a victim."
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
17:57 ||
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#1
ION WORLD MIL FORUM > CHINA AND NORTH KOREAN "AUTOMATIC INVOLVEMENT CLAUSE" [1961 Sino-NK Treaty of Friendship], ECONOMIC INTER DEPENDENCY [NK upon China] DETERS THE USA, WEST FROM ATTACKING NORTH KOREA OVER MISSLE LAUNCH; + CHINA ISSUES STRONG WARNING STATEMENT TO US AND JAPAN: STOP SUBVERSIONS AGZ NORTH KOREA. CHINA MUST NOT ALLOW NORTH KOREA TO HAVE NUCLEAR MISSLES, WMDS.
The President of Pakistan has warned that a "cancer" is eating away at his country, one which requires radical surgery. In fact, the patient needs three separate operations, each as risky as the next. The Islamist political parties, which have hardly ever been strong at the ballot box, sense victory through street-power and guns. The Pakistani Taliban and its Afghan and al‑Qaeda allies wish to destroy the state as part of their war against the infidel West. And the so-called Kashmir liberation groups are slowly widening their field of operations, as shown by recent attacks in Mumbai and on the Sri Lanka cricket team in Lahore.
Those of us who thought that it was possible to have a Pakistani national identity without ideological extremism have been disappointed again and again. It seems, in retrospect, that there was an inherent instability in pulling together the outer and more ungovernable regions of British India simply on the basis of religion.
Those of us who thought that it was possible to have a Pakistani national identity without ideological extremism have been disappointed again and again. It seems, in retrospect, that there was an inherent instability in pulling together the outer and more ungovernable regions of British India simply on the basis of religion. Throughout its history, Pakistan has been vulnerable to religious extremism. Unless co‑ordinated international action is taken as a matter of urgency, Pakistan may not survive.
So what needs to be done? First, it is absolutely vital that the international community assists in the rebuilding of confidence between India and Pakistan. This must include a guarantee from both sides, but particularly Pakistan, that all cross-border terrorism will cease and those planning it will be neutralised.
It is said that the previous President of Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf, was close to a deal with the Indians on Kashmir, but could not sell it to the army. The files must be dusted off in fact, it must be part of any agreement on military and economic aid that the army co-operates with its political masters in bringing peace and stability to Pakistan.
On the western and northern borders, as well, there must be assurance for any incoming regime in Afghanistan that Pakistan will not be host to any forces that seek to destabilise that country. This is also of huge interest to Nato forces operating inside Afghanistan. No solution to the conflict, however, can be morally acceptable if it protects Western interests from extremist attack but leaves women, children and minorities at the mercy of the Taliban's barbarity.
If Pakistan is to avoid playing host to a proxy war between Nato and the Taliban, it needs to take its security into its own hands. To do this, the role of the armed forces has to be re-oriented. Instead of structuring the military around Kashmir, and seeing India as the main enemy, counter-insurgency must have a much higher profile. It is good that a dedicated paramilitary force is being strengthened, with British assistance, in the North-Western Frontier Province, to resist Taliban advances and perhaps even pacify parts of the tribal areas. But the armed forces, as a whole, need to develop a security strategy that is coherent and national. Local terrorism, such as the recent raid on a police college, cannot be left to local forces alone.
This brings us to military intelligence. The Inter Services Intelligence agency was used by the West in the 1980s to channel large amounts of assistance to the mujahidin; as a result, elements within it have a significant relationship with Taliban leaders, and also Kashmiri militants whose organisations they helped to establish. But whatever the history, the ISI should be brought under control and the armed forces made accountable to the civilian government. Such reforms must be part of any agreement to enable Pakistan to deal with internal and external threats, not least in terms of safeguarding its nuclear facilities.
Yet it is not only military and diplomatic measures that are needed. One of the most significant failures of President Musharraf's time in office was the Council of Madrassas' refusal to co-operate with the government's programme of curriculum reform. This cannot be allowed to continue. An integrated education strategy is as important as a security one: generations of the poor cannot be allowed to become fodder for Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. A revision of textbooks is also needed to root out teachings of hate against Christianity, Judaism, India and the West.
And while some of the harsh Islamic laws that affect women and religious minorities have been modified, others are still on the statute book. The notorious "Blasphemy Law" prescribes a mandatory death penalty for insulting the Prophet of Islam. It has been used to terrorise religious minorities and to curb even modest freedoms of expression and of belief. Those who declare themselves friends of Pakistan must help to get this law repealed. Many decent and devout Pakistani Muslims are already ashamed of it.
A moment of threat can also be a time of opportunity. It is time for Pakistan and its friends to grasp the opportunity, and deal comprehensively with the threats to its security that have bedevilled much of the country's 62-year history. These threats to Pakistan are now also threats to world order. It is in all of our interests that they are dealt with quickly and comprehensively.
Michael Nazir-Ali is Bishop of Rochester, was born and raised in Pakistan and was Bishop of Raiwind there.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
15:45 ||
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#1
First, it is absolutely vital that the international community assists in the rebuilding of confidence between India and Pakistan. This must include a guarantee from both sides, but particularly Pakistan, that all cross-border terrorism will cease and those planning it will be neutralised.
so, step one is a non-starter. I stopped reading there
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/15/2009 20:45
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#1
I think the obvious solution to a problem like this is to hold his feet to the fire over it. When he hedges his bets and lies, pretending not to support murder, publish to the Muslim community that he "disavows the idea of harming apostates and asserts that Muslims are free to leave Islam at any time."
Then watch all the other Muslims threaten to kill him.
#2
Hard to get even a Mohammedan student at MIT or Harvard to go on record against this guy. Afraid? Of what? From a guy who thinks there is wisdom in killing apostates?
#1
It seems all American Idol is interested in from the little I have seen is finding the tone deaf. I wonder how with a voice like that she never got noticed.
There are several Pavarotti performances of the aria on youtube, for contrast. Some are unfortunately from the last years when he was quite ill, but you can see/hear him in his prime singing Nessun Dorma here and singing La Donna e Mobile from Rigoletto here.
I liked Potts but he's not nearly in the same league.
#5
Listen and learn, my children, cause you may hear....
Saw this on Sunday -- have been sending it -- but today, I sent it to a co-worker. Then, was emailing with a customer, sent him a link from our website to read about a feature. (You got to know, I never get to meet any of these folks)
He emailed back, he got the link but it took him to something like American Idol! I hadn't copied, just highlighted the link I thought I was sending.
Well -- I asked him if he had watched it? He emailed back, incredible, gorgeous voice... I emailed, well, I just did you a good deed for the day. He emailed back, he agreed ---
EL PASO, Texas (AP) - Former U.S. Attorney Alan Bersin is the new "border czar." Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano introduced Bersin Wednesday during a news conference at a bridge that links El Paso and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.
The former federal prosecutor will oversee Homeland Security's efforts to end drug cartel violence along the U.S.-Mexico border and reduce the flow of illegal immigrants sneaking across the border from Mexico into the United States.
Bersin is expected to work with international officials, along with his counterparts in the U.S. and border states.
Here we go folks. The Sikhs want the US Army to forgo Uniforms for US Army Sikhs. Do we allow Army Chaplains to wear different uniforms?
Here's an idea - DON'T JOIN THE MILITARY if you can't adhere to Military rules and regulations! A uniform is a set of standard clothing worn by members of an organization while participating in that organization's activity. Are you joining the US Military to become part of an outstanding organization or joining the US Military to try to push your organization?
Also, why are the Sikhs protesting by the US Marine Memorial, when they are supposedly Army?
Of course, they are just another "Community Organizing" group...
ARLINGTON, Va. -- Seeing "Integrate the U.S. Army" on a protest sign recalls the civil rights struggles of African-Americans in the mid-20th Century. But on Tuesday, under a cold wet spring sky, more than a dozen Americans of a different minority, the Sikh faith, stood in front of the iconic Iwo Jima memorial to World War II with one simple request: Let us serve.
The Pentagon has informed two Sikh personnel in the Army Reserves, a doctor and a dentist, that they must remove their turbans and cut their hair when they are called into their regular Army service later this year, according to a Sikh advocacy group.
Capt. Kamaljeet S. Kalsi said the Army recruiters who approached him during his first year of medical school in 2001 said they wanted him, and his beard, turban and long hair, to serve in the medical corps.
Seven years later, Kalsi expects to begin the Officers' Leadership Basic Course in July. But superiors in the Army's Health Professions Scholarship Program told him last year that he may have a problem with these "articles of faith" and an Army medical advisor to the U.S. Surgeon General informed him he may face resistance over his turban and beard.
Kalsi wrote to commanders at the Army Graduate Medical Education Office in December 2008 asking for exemption, but was denied.
On Tuesday, the Sikh Coalition filed a formal complaint with the inspectors general of the Army and the Department of Defense on behalf of Kalsi and 2nd Lt. Tejdeep Singh Rattan, a Reservist since 2006. The group was formed after two Sikhs were attacked in Queens, N.Y., on the night of 9/11 as reprisals for the attack.
For Kalsi, whose family came to the U.S. in 1978, the issue is frustrating and confusing. He is the fourth generation to serve in allied militaries. His father and grandfather were both Indian Air Force veterans. His great-grandfather served in the British army.
"I can't understand why my Army would keep me from serving," Kalsi said.
Kalsi joined in 2001 after talking extensively about his religious beliefs with a recruiter. The recruiter told him, "Yeah, we have Sikhs in the military, don't worry about it," he said.
Kalsi jumpstarted his career with rotations in military hospitals at West Point and Travis Air Force Base, Calif., serving as active duty, in uniform with his turban, beard and long hair intact.
Sikhs point to a long military tradition in India, the U.S. and other allied countries. They are known as "the protectors of India," Kalsi said, because they come from Punjab, a northern gateway border province of India and first line of defense against invaders. In World War II, 85,000 Sikhs died serving in Allied forces.
The Army banned turbans in the 1980s, but grandfathered those serving, and has made a few exceptions.
Today, there are a half-million Sikhs in the U.S., and the coalition's executive director said U.S. policy seems hypocritical given that Sikh's serve side-by-side with Americans abroad.
"The policy doesn't make any sense because we have Sikh troops serving in Afghanistan and Iraq as we speak with the militaries of Great Britain and, in Afghanistan's case, with Canada," said Coalition spokesman Amardeep Singh.
Turbans, long hair and beards are considered a mandatory religious uniform for all Sikhs. Keeping uncut hair is required according to the Rehat Maryada, the Sikh instruction for living. In the 18th century, Muslims forced Sikhs to convert by cutting their hair and removing their turbans, the group noted.
Of the four taboos listed for Sikhs, adultery is as forbidden as cutting one's hair.
"The fact that cutting one's hair is a moral transgression as serious as committing adultery speaks to the immense significance of uncut hair in Sikhism," lawyers for the Sikh Coalition wrote in a letter to the inspectors general.
"The Army places a high value on the rights of soldiers to observe their respective religious faiths; however, the Army does not accommodate the exceptions for personal grooming standards for religious reasons," said Army spokesman Lt. Col. Nathan Banks.
The restriction forces soldiers to meet "health, safety and mission requirements," Banks said, and facial hair prevents an airtight seal on gas masks.
But lawyers representing the soldiers say the policy poses a "burden on their exercise of religion" under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, and has been unevenly applied given some Sikhs in the U.S. Army were allowed exceptions and served for decades.
Col. Arjinderpal Singh Sekhon, a Sikh, retired in January, one day after his 60th birthday, due to Army age restrictions.
"My battalion right now, which I trained, is in Afghanistan as a combat support hospital," he said. "I ran the best 68-whiskey program," referring to combat medics.
"I did all this, and these two young people can do the same, maybe better than me," he added, because they sought out the Army and are eager to join.
The coalition's complaint added: "Shutting Sikhs and other devout citizens out of our armed forces not only reinforces the stereotype of these groups as the 'other' but also robs them of an opportunity to integrate into American society. In addition, it is important that our nation's armed forces reflect the diversity of its population."
Rattan, who emigrated to the U.S., called the Army's policy "deeply unfair" to ask him to choose between religion and country.
"I am willing to lay down my life for America. In return, I ask only that my country respect my faith," he said. "My turban and beard are not an option -- they are in intrinsic part of me."
#1
Ease up on them hammers, Tex. For many years, Sikhs served in the US military with honor and distinction. They wore OD turbans and had beards and were not inclined to leave before retirement as senior NCOs.
I might add that it was far more likely to see them branched combat arms than anything else. The Special Forces had a bunch of them, as did the Rangers.
The reason is that they are a militant, pro-military and nationalist religion. They dominate the Indian Army officer corps, and serve loyally in any army they are allowed to enlist. If they screw up, they are not just in trouble with their military leaders, but with their religious leaders as well.
They were only pushed out in the 1980s because they couldn't wear protective masks against chemical weapons. And there were a LOT of soldiers who were sad to see them go.
Hell, we "discovered" Sikhs in WWII, and the Japanese were scared half to death of them. There was one instance where on a Pacific island, four Sikhs so terrified a Japanese battalion that they surrendered without firing a shot or anybody getting hurt.
#2
Turbans, beards, and hair down to your a** walking around in the rear, or on a parade field might look interesting or distinctive to some, but it makes pulling on a protective mask, helmet, HALO or SCUBA gear a bit of a challenge. Last time I checked this was still the United States Army.
#4
Its a tough situation because in a combat medic, combat lifesaver situation, or forward operation lives are at stake for the lifesaver who has to run, walk, and carry victims off the battefield in a chemical environment.
I know I had trouble getting a seal on my mask in seconds at times as a female combatant with only a shoulder length head of hair back in a bun. True story, I ended up bobbing my hair shorter.
As for the regs here, it kind of dilatory of the Army to begin deliberations on these fellows cases now. They've already given a lot of service, perhaps a deal can be struck. But to be combat ready, a soldier has to be able to wear a mask, or else they'd be best off serving in strictly non-field situations. But its not like its a big deal, we had plenty of asthmatic soldiers who couldnt don a mask, who were put in job areas they could do. Its doable.
#5
If they want to have their own dress code and not be combat ready, I'm fine with that so long as their pay reflects reflects that fact and we have a qouta on how many non-combat ready personnel we have. Neither of those will happen as they are discriminatory. Therefore I have no choice but to be against allowing them a waiver on dress code.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
04/15/2009 18:05
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#6
True, being in the Army entails sacrifice. Why should they be treated any different? And yes, if you can fully do a combat job, rank and pay should be in full effect, if not, then take the dock in pay and quit bitching.
I'd wanted to wear a large cross dangling outside my uniform, have my long hair flowing in the breeze and have long fingernails, but all were prohibited, and were cut off or removed. I made my sacrifice to serve in the Army, so should anyone else. You change to be fit for the Army, the Army doesn't change to fit you.
#7
Ultimately this has nothing to do with the Sikhs, particularly, and everything to do with the Muslim demands to come. If they don't want to assimilate and do things the Army way, then they should be released to civilian life. That would be too bad, but less bad than what would follow.
#8
You change to be fit for the Army, the Army doesn't change to fit you.
Hooah GT! Lastly, try beards and long hair for a while in 115f-130f desert heat, blowing sand and dust. You'll be making tracks to the Haji barber, or initiating a do-it-yoself trim job pretty damn fast.
#9
GT: I'm a lung doctor. You mean asthmatics can serve? I had always been told that asthma was an automatic medical discharge.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/15/2009 19:29
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#10
Sometimes soldiers "develop" asthma or breathing disorders after theyre already in. I saw accomodations being made for folks with inhalers. I dont know if they were eventually med boarded or not. I think in many cases no, due to needing bodies.
#12
These "needs of the Army" arguments are silly. From 1943 or so until the 1980s, Sikhs were fighting with the best of us. They are hardcore warriors and were some damn fine soldiers. If things were harder on them because of their turban and beard, you wouldn't hear them bitch about it.
"The Sikh Regiment is one of the highest decorated regiment of the Indian Army, with 73 Battle Honours, 14 Victoria Crosses, 21 first class Indian Order of Merit (equivalent to the Victoria Cross), 15 Theatre Honours...and 1596 other gallantry awards."
Geez. Like dismissing the 82nd Airborne Division because their berets were the "wrong" color.
#13
" If things were harder on them because of their turban and beard, you wouldn't hear them bitch about it"
Im sure thats true they are fierce and wouldn't bitch about it.
Trivial as it seems, still, meeting boilerplate requirements is part of being a soldier. It is a shame such fine soldiers are dispensable due to wear of the uniform. Could their religion give them some slack in the hair and beard areas?
Back to my point, being in the Army regardless of Military Occupational Specialization boils down to meeting boiler plate requirements.
At present (im not the definitive judge if these are the guage of a good soldier or not) the first req. is knowing your Military Specialization. The second is qualifying on your assigned weapon a minimum of every six months. The third is passing your run, sit-ups, and push ups. And the fourth is not being Red (for no-go) for things like your gear, or pro-mask. Lastly, you have to be up to date on vaccinations... Not to mention you have to pay all your bills on time and abide by all regulations. Dont have one of those elements, your status is not fully combat ready.
When not fully combat ready, its not okay to be in a war-zone because you endanger your own life and the life of others. Its nothing personal or categorical against Sikhs, who no doubt sound very formidable.
#14
If they cannot don CW gear in a deployable unit I cannot see their use except as an "undeployable". You might note that most were formerly used in situations that did not require the ability to deal with Chem-Bio-Nuc Warfare. Times have changed and they have not or will not. That narrows their options but the Military should not relent in this case. The regs are there for a good reason. And I agree with #7, NS. Too bad, so sad. Deal with it.
#15
Yea, if they want to keep a beard and do their own wardrobe things, they'd have to go SF, but still that leaves the CF question. A little late for that, I suppose.
Where does SF even fit in with dentistry and/or physicians commisions, IDK? I give up, would these men just realize they joined the Army, man up, and shave or whatever.
The only living Indian 5 star general - Marshal of the Indian Air Force, Arjan Singh.
He strafed Pashtun tribals in the NWFP, flew against the Japanese in the Arakan, was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross in 1944, commanded the IAF during the 1965 and 1971 wars. Has flown over 60 different types of aircraft from Pre-WW-2 era Biplanes to Jet fighters.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 22:16
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#17
In the Indian Army, Sikhs wear ballistic patkas, which can accomodate the cloth patka which wraps the hair (normally worn over the Pagadi turban)
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 22:38
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#18
There is a condition sycosis barbae whereby man doesnt need to shave by doctors orders if the man gets sycosis barbae from shaving.
In these certain cases a soldier doesnt have to shave but must trim beard. As for the long hair and turban, I cant shed any light of ideas or solutions on that one, because of the need to wear Kevlar helmets.
May the United States Army solve its problems, and hope for the best for our best.
#19
trouble is - you start accomodating one, you accodate all. The military has succeeding by grinding down personal affectations in the interests of uniformity as an American soldier/sailor/marine/etc.
You become a member of a team, not an individual. Welcome Sikhs, conform or leave
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/15/2009 22:43
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#20
No problem in Canada...
Sikh soldier returns
By CARY CASTAGNA -- Edmonton Sun
Taliban fighters aren't the only ones clad in turbans in Afghanistan.
Maj. Harjit Sajjan, who finished a nine-month tour of duty in September and received his Canadian Forces service medal at Rexall Place yesterday, says he never doffed his turban in the Middle East.
"I can wear a helmet. I can wear a gas mask. There's nothing that my turban or my beard can prevent me from doing in the military at all," said the 36-year-old Sikh from Vancouver.
"To put a helmet on, you have to have an inner liner. My turban acts like an inner liner, so I just wear the kevlar shell over top."
Interestingly, these Sikh Soldiers have been wearing gas masks for a while
Sikh soldiers using gasmasks while defending Ieper, Belgium in April, 1915.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 22:45
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#21
accodate? or accomodate....long day...mea culpa
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/15/2009 22:45
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#22
That should be "under" rather than "over".
The cloth patka covers the hair. The big turban covers that and is normally removed.
Regulations state that beards must be trimmed or pulled back so as not to interfere with masks etc.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 22:53
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#23
Thanks John Frum, you just answered that last unanswered question about the hair and kevlar logistics. It is up to the Pentagon. I hope they do include Sikhs, but its not up to me.
The thing not covered much here is the intangibles of being a soldier. Part of the invisible inculcation process is being stripped of your bodily individuality and being one of the team, mentally as well as through the uniform.
Feeling you have control over your own body and the clothes on your own back is a privelege you HAD until you enter the U.S. Army.
Once youre in they tell you when to go to the bathroom, how to stand, eat, sit, shower, everything.
How well would Sikhs do at being controlled absolutely by the United States Army if they cannot let go of religious tangibles?
#24
The military has succeeding by grinding down personal affectations in the interests of uniformity
Indeed, it helps if you have a lot of them
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 22:59
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#25
Its a great sight, but it still doesnt tell me how they would take to being controlled absolutely and how would they be received by other soldiers in their unit who might be small minded or bigoted against them for their "otherness" Plus, Officers have the double problem of being regarded as impractical, pompous and uppity. Add to that a demand for accomodation, and now we're talking real differences.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 23:24
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#27
The Armed Forces desperately seems to need more manly men such as in these photos, not more homosexuals and women. I hope they do get some solution to allow Sikhs, a picture is worth a thousand words, and these seem like ultra capable Men.
TOKYO: Pakistan's foreign minister said on Wednesday his country can be a role model for the Muslim world, speaking ahead of a donors' meeting in Japan where Islamabad hopes to secure huge aid contributions. "Pakistan has transferred towards democracy," foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said. "And today I represent a democratically elected government of Pakistan." "We're collapsing into chaos and looking at rule by turbans, but we'll be a helluva role model!"
"Pakistan can be a role model of the Muslim world," he told reporters ahead of the meeting that aims to raise four to six billion dollars for the poverty-stricken country. He was shieking and cackling and biting himself in the small of the back as he said that, natch...
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari arrived in Tokyo Wednesday evening to attend the conference, which US envoy Richard Holbrooke and Iranian foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki are also due to join. Qureshi said Pakistan has "a functioning democracy" with an elected president, national and district parliaments and its first woman speaker in the national assembly. Every time they elect somebody they raid the treasury and are eventually replaced by the military, which is much better at oppressing the populace than they are at winning wars.
What Pakistan seeks from the Friday meeting is "an expression of political support of Pakistan's solidarity, Pakistan's role... as a frontline state fighting extremism and terrorism," he said. ... and lotsa money with no strings attached, which will end up in accounts in Switzerland and Lichtenstein.
Washington has put Pakistan at the heart of the fight against al-Qaida and US President Barack Obama has unveiled a sweeping new strategy to turn around the Afghan war and defeat Islamist militants on both sides of the border. Pakistain's pretty much necessary to get to Afghanistan, and the areas controlled by the turbans are those along the border.
Qureshi also said a majority of Pakistani people would like to see friendly ties with India as well as neighbouring countries Afghanistan and Iran. "Our movements towards normalization (of ties with India) was very good. Unfortunately the Mumbai incident did create a setback," he said, referring to the November 26-29 siege that killed 165 people and derailed a five-year peace process between the nuclear-armed south Asian rivals. "It couldn't be helped, of course. Those things happen when you live in day-to-day chaos, with people exploding all around you and beturbanned warlords rolling their eyes and taking control of large swathes of territory."
"But I must share with you that there is a large constituency of Pakistan that feels that it is Pakistan's interest to have a normal, good, neighbouring relationship with India," he said. "They're going to be killed, of course."
On Iran and Afghanistan, Qureshi said he had invited senior officials from both countries to come to Islamabad to discuss Afghan refugees and efforts to fight the narcotics trade and terrorism. "While they're there someone will try to kill them, but chances are they'll fail, at least on the first try. Probably the emissaries will get out alive. I have no idea how many people will be killed while they're there, but that's just our quaint local custom. Pay it no never-mind."
"Because when we talk about a regional approach to deal with terrorism and extremism, Iran is an important player in the region," he said. "And we sure like shooting at Shiites."
The Japanese government said that Prime Minister Taro Aso will meet Zardari and Iran's Mottaki separately on Thursday. "... but there's no way in hell he's going to Islamabad! Never!"
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
14:04 ||
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#1
And by role model, he means premier money laundering scheme.
#7
Pakistan's foreign minister said on Wednesday his country can be a role model for the Muslim world....he told reporters ahead of the meeting that aims to raise four to six billion dollars for the poverty-stricken country.
Well they know how to beg, so they're off to a good start...
Why the master of America's new First Mutt is no longer in good odour with President Sarkozy
France has been cooing along with everyone else over the arrival of Bo Obama at the White House, but the master of America's new First Dog is no longer in good odour with President Sarkozy.
Mr Sarkozy is pouring cold water on President Obama's efforts to recast American leadership on the world stage, depicting them as unoriginal, unsubstantial and overrated. Behind leaks and briefings from the Elysée Palace lies Mr Sarkozy's irritation at the rock-star welcome that Europe gave Mr Obama on his Europan tour earlier this month.
The American President's call "to free the world of the menace of a nuclear nightmare" was hot air, Mr Sarkozy's diplomatic staff told him in a report. "It was rhetoric not a speech on American security policy but an export model aimed at improving the image of the United States," they said. Most of Mr Obama's proposals had already been made by the Bush administration and Washington was dragging its feet on disarmament and treaties against nuclear proliferation, the leaked report said.
Personal pique and French politics are also behind the souring of Mr Sarkozy's self-promoted honeymoon with the United States. On the personal side, the French President is needled by the adulation for an unproven US leader whose stardom has eclipsed what he sees as his established record as a world troubleshooter. "The President is annoyed by what he sees as the naivety and the herd mentality of the media," said a journalist who is privy to Elysée thinking.
Mr Sarkozy has put out a version of the proceedings at the London G20 economic summit which casts him as hero, in the classic French role of intransigent defender of principle in the face of the American steamroller. This is to counter last week's reports of Mr Obama saving the day by persuading President Hu of China to accept Mr Sarkozy's demands for naming tax havens.
According to the leaks, Mr Sarkozy shamed Mr Obama into intervening: "You were elected to build a new world. Tax havens are the embodiment of the old world," he is quoted as saying. He also reprimanded Mr Obama for setting US goals for climate change that were inferior to Europe's, according to his staff.
Again, according to the Sarkozy version, at the Nato summit in Strasbourg, Mr Obama was meekly yielding to Turkey's refusal to endorse Anders Fogh Rasmussen as the alliance's new Secretary-General. It took pressure from Mr Sarkozy and Chancellor Merkel of Germany to stiffen him up and change his mind, say the French.
Mr Obama's favour for Ankara has irked but also helped Mr Sarkozy as his Union for a Popular Movement campaigns for European Parliament elections in June. Mr Sarkozy slapped down the US President on French TV after he publicly called for Turkish entry to the European Union.
Permanent refusal of Turkish membership is one of Mr Sarkozy's policy planks and one of his most popular with voters. Mr Obama's venture into EU affairs has enabled Mr Sarkozy to make political capital. He has shown that France can still stand up to the United States despite rejoining the Nato command last week.
It sounded like old Franco-American business as usual this morning when Bruno Le Maire, Mr Sarkozy's Europe Minister, accused Washington of backing the northern and eastern EU members by wanting to turn the union into a mere free-trade zone. France and Germany are sticking to their vision of the "political" Europe that others do not want, he said.
Behind the policy argument, it is easy to detect disappointment over Mr Obama's failure to respond to the Sarkozy charm offensive that began when he befriended the junior senator on a visit to Washington in 2006. Mr Obama showered compliments on France's "hyper-president" in Strasbourg, but the one that has stuck was double-edged: "He is courageous on so many fronts, it's sometimes hard to keep up with him."
A French warship has captured 11 pirates off the coast of Kenya, amid calls for the international community to deal with the problem of piracy. The pirates were captured by a warship from an EU piracy patrol, French officials said, hours after a failed attack on a US ship.
Other pirates released a Greek ship and its 24 crew held since mid-March.
That couldn't possibly be cause and effect, could it?
News of the incidents came as the UN special envoy for Somalia said the attacks threatened international peace.
The latest attack involved pirates firing rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons at a US-flagged cargo ship, the Liberty Sun, which was carrying food aid for Africa.
The French Defence Ministry said the warship Nivose captured the pirates about 550 miles (900km) east of the Kenyan port of Mombasa. It had detected a "mother ship", or command vessel, on Tuesday, and observed it overnight before launching an assault early on Wednesday, the ministry said.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
12:37 ||
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#1
Right on! In tribute, I will refrain from making surrender jokes for at least one week.
#3
AA5839: I'm pretty sure the UN Special Envoy means that the PIRATE attacks threaten the peace, not the attacks on the pirates. He even says that those bankrolling the pirates should be held accountable. Almost adult of him. LINK.
#1
It's pretty obvious that the left will not tolerate speech they do not approve of, so the response to that is to insure that violent acts are not permitted to accomplish their goal.
In a situation like this, I would get a dozen students discreetly armed with stun guns to stand behind the protesters. Then, for the particularly obnoxious ones, signal that they are to be given a shock, with other students without stun guns to say that they "fainted".
Other tricks involve using just a little bit of pepper spray spritzed on their cheek from behind, good old fashioned itching powder, half a dozen fire ants, superglue, etc.
The federal government is waking up to the growing nightmare of bedbugs.
The tiny reddish-brown insects, last seen in great numbers prior to World War II, are on the rebound. They have infested college dormitories, homeless shelters and swanky hotels from New York City to Chicago to Washington.
They live in the crevices of mattresses, sofas and sheets. Then, most often before dawn, they emerge to feed on human blood, leaving bites that can cause allergic reactions and infections.
The growing problem is the subject of a first-ever bedbug summit hosted by the Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday and Wednesday in Arlington, Va. Let me guess. This will require that the EPA regulate the entire hospitality industry.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/15/2009 11:56
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#3
While you are at it how about looking into the Chinese wallboard problem. Isn't this the problem of the hotels, universities, and homeless shelters. How about cleaning out the infestations of tax and spenders in Washington. Nothing like focusing on minutiae. Conjurs up the image of people frantically rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
#4
When I woke up this morning
And looked up on the wall
The cooties and the bedbugs
Were havin' a game of ball
The score was fourt to twenty
The bedbugs were ahead
The pitcher pitched a beanball
And knocked me out of bed
Posted by: Mike ||
04/15/2009 14:47
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#5
Hush now baby, baby, don't you cry
Momma's gonna make all of your nightmares come true
Momma's gonna put all of her fears into you
Momma's gonna keep you right here under her wing
She won't let you fly, but she might let you sink
Momma's will keep Baby cozy and warm
SANTA ANA, Calif. - He was the ultimate dark-horse politician, a school board member who murmured about conspiracies, refused to talk with colleagues, wore coal-black sunglasses during night meetings and survived a recall attempt.
But former Orange school trustee Steve Rocco may finally have met his match in a half-full bottle of ketchup. Rocco is being tried for stealing a 14-ounce Heinz bottle from a dining area outside the cafeteria at Chapman University, a charge he claims is bogus because -- in his calculations -- the ketchup was worthless.
If Rocco made for an awkward and often mute politician when he served a four-year term on the school board in Orange, he seemed light, gregarious and engaged as his petty-theft trial opened Tuesday, jotting things down in a spiral notebook, asking detailed questions and laughing with his public defender.
Told he would have to adhere to courtroom etiquette and go without his standard knit beanie cap and dark glasses, Rocco showed up in a plaid shirt with a black tie and flip-up sunglasses and had a white bandage the size of a slice of bread affixed to his head.
Superior Court Judge Jacki C. Brown's courtroom has become the latest stage for Rocco, a 58-year-old unemployed recluse known for espousing shadowy conspiracy theories about a powerful, secret cabal he calls the Partnership.
He made national headlines in 2004 when he won a school board seat in Orange, listing himself as a "teacher/writer" on the ballot.
Now a different panel will be asked to pass judgment on Rocco and decide whether he stole the plastic squirt bottle of Heinz from a table at a dining area in September and put it in a paper bag before speeding off on his bicycle. Or did he just take it, thinking it was trash and in need of recycling?
The case seems straightforward, if not a bit mundane and, well, cheap. According to prosecutors, the bottle had a value of $1.20 -- well below the $15 each juror is being paid a day for their civic service.
So while Deputy District Attorney Lynda Fernandez asked jurors to "focus on the conduct of the defendant rather than the value of the item," public defender Erica Gambale simply jingled two quarters and a dime in her palm.
"This is it, ladies and gentlemen, this is it: 60 cents," she told jurors. "At best, half that ketchup was left."
#4
this guy is truly deranged..how he got voted in republican orange county i do not know. this is what happens when people ignore their civic duty...and now we have bo at the highest level because people ignored thier civic duites -- change for the sake of change is not the answer
Posted by: Dan ||
04/15/2009 21:18
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Former naval aviator Don Boecker isn't too proud to say he was scared out of his wits on that July 1965 day in Laos when he dangled by one arm from a helicopter while enemy soldiers took aim below.
Boecker had spent the longest night of his life in the thick jungle, evading capture and certain execution while awaiting rescue. The Navy aviator had ejected after a bomb he intended to drop on the Ho Chi Minh trail exploded prematurely.
His rescuers that day, however, weren't from the American military, who couldn't be caught conducting a secret bombing campaign in Laos.
They were civilian employees of Air America, an ostensibly private airline essentially owned and operated by the CIA.
Boecker, now a 71-year-old retired rear admiral, plans to tell the story on Saturday at a symposium intended to give a fuller account of an important outfit that alumni say is still misunderstood by the American public.
The University of Texas at Dallas event coincides with the CIA's release of about 10,000 previously classified Air America records, which will become part of the school library's extensive aviation collection. The CIA declassified the documents following a Freedom of Information Act request by UT-Dallas.
"These Air America documents are essential to understanding a large untold history of America's involvement in Southeast Asia," said Paul Oelkrug, a coordinator at UT-Dallas' special collections department. He said they speak to "the covert side of the Cold War."
The records consist mainly of firsthand accounts of Air America missions and commendation letters from government officials, said Timothy N. Castle, a historian at the CIA's Center for the Study of Intelligence.
Included are accounts of the chaotic evacuation after the fall of Saigon in 1975, the investigation into a mysterious 1964 plane crash apparently caused by sabotage, and a letter from President Richard Nixon commending employees for their bravery in Laos.
More documents detail the rescue of the wounded from a mountainous Air Force radar station in Laos known as Lima Site 85, where a North Vietnamese raid in 1968 killed 11 Americans. It was the largest single loss of Air Force personnel on the ground during the Vietnam War, Castle said. The survivors were rescued by Air America.
Such operations were the norm for Air America pilots, and the inspiration for the title of the symposium: "Air America: Upholding the Airmen's Bond." Between 1964-65, Air America personnel rescued 21 downed American pilots. Detailed records weren't kept after that, but "we know there were scores and scores more (rescues) through the years," Castle said.
"That's the airman's bond. There is another airman who is down. Everything stops until you try to rescue them, because if it were you, you knew they would do it for you, too."
Air America's public face was that of a passenger and cargo airline that operated in sometimes dangerous places. It formed after World War II under the name Civil Air Transport, and did contract work for the Chinese Nationalists.
Control of Air America eventually shifted to the CIA, which set up shell companies to disguise its true ownership. Planes kept flying scheduled passenger flights out of Taiwan, but they also began flying covert missions in Laos and South Vietnam to supply anti-communist forces. Air America also had numerous government contracts, and was involved in humanitarian work though a deal with the State Department.
One of Air America's finest - and most iconic - moments was evacuating American and Vietnamese civilians after Saigon fell in 1975. A famous photograph shows an Air America helicopter atop an apartment building as a long line of people wait to board it.
Brian K. Johnson, a former Air America helicopter pilot and past president of the Air America Association, said flight crews would race to be the first to pick up downed military personnel. These untold stories of the Vietnam War, he said, could help change Air America's image.
Johnson laments that the perception of Air America is more about heroin than heroism, due largely to the 1990 movie "Air America," starring Mel Gibson and Robert Downey Jr. The film depicts the company as corrupt and its pilots as drug runners. It remains a sensitive topic among former employees.
"We have done everything we can to change that perception, and I think we are getting there," Johnson said. The liberal Air America talk radio network brought new confusion, he added.
UT-Dallas was chosen by the Air America alumni group as the site of a Vietnam Wall-style plaque listing the names of the roughly 240 fallen employees.
"Most people don't even know it occurred. It was a secret society," said Boecker. "They flew in all sorts of danger ... flying every day in terrible wartime conditions. They did a beautiful job."
By Ralph Peters Excerpt:
Can anyone in the Obama administration articulate what we intend to achieve in Afghanistan? The Bush folks couldn't. I doubt this bunch can either.
If our goal is to turn Afghanistan into a rule-of-law democracy, forget it. Iraq has an outside shot - it's a semi-modern society - although success is far from guaranteed. But a modernized Afghan state whose authority extends into every remote valley is an impossibility.
If, however, our goal is only to prevent Afghanistan from again becoming a massive terrorist mother-ship, we can do that - and at a lower cost. But we'd have to have the guts to choose sides among factions and stop pretending that we're honest brokers.
The impending troop surge faces the danger of LBJ-era accounting: the recurring conclusion that just one more rise in troop levels will tip the scales. You wind up with half a million troops deployed and a local population that wants you gone yesterday.
Inherently, this one's a special-operations war. A sounder long-term approach would be fewer troops on the ground - and far less reliance on vulnerable supply routes through Pakistan. Regular combat units have a role to play, but as punitive strike forces, not a vast neighborhood watch (this is not Iraq).
Ditch the claptrap that we can't kill our way out of this: Well-focused killing, for decades, is our only chance - and Afghanistan's. And dump the feel-good platitudes. In the real world off-campus, good marksmanship trumps good will.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009
10:04 ||
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#1
In a way its our first "Sci-Fi" war. It reminds me a little of Scalzi books and wars.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/15/2009 12:27
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#2
It was a terrible mistake to try to salvage *anything* from the old Afghan way of doing business, out of "cultural sensitivity". That is like refusing to vaccinate their children against polio out of "cultural sensitivity". Insanity.
Instead, we should have rounded up every intelligent and educated Afghan we could find, and put them to school to be trained how to run a modern government.
Then we should have written them a modern constitution and required that they follow it for 20 years before any modifications could be made.
Every unemployed adult, male or female, would be put to work doing *something* productive, with most of the men out in the countryside improving the national infrastructure. Their typical wage is so low, we could have done this for just $1B a year.
All children would be put in safe public schools near the provincial capitals and taught a secular, western education. The only bow to their culture would be that boys and girls would be taught separately until high school. Girls would wear ordinary clothes and headscarves.
#3
How do you deal with a roach infestation? Put on the lights and step on those scampering about?
Or dealing with their nesting places?
Failure to deal with the Pakistani military has its consequences.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 14:15
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#4
If peace and security were achieved in Afghanistan, the first thing that would happen would be manifestations of sectarianism. Karzai's Pashtun-supremacism alienates minorities. Let's not forget that Pashtuns provided the rearbase for the 9-11 terrorists. Why Bush promoted Karzai - a Pashtun - is bewildering.
#5
Another thing we should have done was tried to get every Afghan living in the west some incentive to move back to share their knowledge and experience of how rule of law works.
#6
TOPIX/RUSSIA TODAY > RUSSIA: AFGHANISTAN-BASED TERRORISM IS A DIRECT THREAT TO ITS SECURITY + MINIMAL DETERRENCE [destruction]: THE NEW GLOBAL ALTERNATIVE NUCLEAR DOCTRINE [versus former Cold War "MUTUAL DESTRUCTION"]???
Local governments across Arizona would be prohibited from enacting policies that prevent them from enforcing federal immigration law, under a proposal tentatively approved by state lawmakers Tuesday.
The measure, House Bill 2331, would bar cities, towns and counties from following so-called sanctuary policies, which discourage local authorities from contacting federal agents during routine encounters with undocumented immigrants. The bill was OK'd by House lawmakers on a voice vote and could receive final consideration as early as today before advancing to the Senate.
Following the 2007 murder of a Phoenix police officer by an undocumented immigrant, the city came under heavy criticism for a 2-decade-old policy that barred officers from contacting federal authorities regarding most encounters with individuals suspected of living in the country illegally, including during basic traffic stops and misdemeanor arrests. The city amended that policy last year. Now, everyone arrested in Phoenix is questioned about his or her citizenship.
The bill would not require local authorities to enforce federal immigration law; rather, it would prevent them from having policies that hinder enforcement of federal law.
Bill sponsor Rep. Tom Boone, R-Peoria, said the measure would "have a very credible impact" on reducing illegal immigration in Arizona, assuring that no communities are turning a blind eye to the problem. The proposal stipulates no penalties for communities in violation.
"I know that we have a serious illegal-immigration problem here in Arizona," said Rep. Ben Miranda, D-Phoenix, but he argued that the proposal leaves local authorities little leeway to write their own guidelines when it comes to prioritizing enforcement of immigration-related crimes.
"Given a choice between detaining a maid on her way to work or a drug dealer on the streets," Miranda continued, "it's clear where we should place our priority."
Boone countered that cities and towns shouldn't be able to pick and choose between which laws they want to enforce.
"There are a lot of laws that are federal laws, but they're enforced by the local law enforcement," he said. "Do we leave bank robbers to the feds? These are all federal laws."
Growing numbers of children of illegal immigrants are being born in this country, and they are nearly twice as likely to live in poverty than those with American-born parents, a report says.
The study released Tuesday by the Pew Hispanic Center highlights a growing dilemma in the immigration debate: Illegal immigrants' children born in the United States are American citizens, yet they struggle in poverty and uncertainty along with parents who fear deportation, toil largely in low-wage jobs and face layoffs in an ailing economy.
The analysis by Pew, a nonpartisan research organization, estimated that 11.9 million illegal immigrants lived in the U.S. Of those, 8.3 million were in the labor force as of March 2008, making up 5.4 percent of the U.S. work force, primarily in lower-paying farming, construction or janitorial work.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009
09:16 ||
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A group of some 1,000 Afghans swarmed a demonstration of 300 women protesting against a new conservative marriage law on Wednesday. The women were pelted with small stones as police struggled to keep the two groups apart.
The law, passed last month, says a husband can demand sex with his wife every four days unless she is ill or would be harmed by intercourse a clause that critics say legalizes marital rape. It also regulates when and for what reasons a wife may leave her home alone.
Women's rights activists scheduled a protest Wednesday attended by mostly young women. But the group was swamped by counter-protesters both men and women who shouted down the women's chants.
Some picked up gravel and stones and threw them at the women, while others shouted "Death to the slaves of the Christians!" Female police held hands around the group to create a protective barrier.
The government of President Hamid Karzai has said the Shiite family law is being reviewed by the Justice Department and will not be implemented in its current form. Governments and rights groups around the world have condemned the legislation, and President Barack Obama has labeled it "abhorrent."
Though the law would apply only to the country's Shiites 10 to 20 percent of Afghanistan's 30 million people it has sparked an uproar by activists who say it marks a return to Taliban-style oppression. The Taliban, who ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001, required women to wear all-covering burqas and banned them from leaving home without a male relative.
Shiite backers of the law say that foreigners are meddling in private Afghan affairs, and Wednesday's demonstrations brought some of the emotions surrounding the debate over the law to the surface.
"You are a dog! You are not a Shiite woman!" one man shouted to a young woman in a headscarf holding aloft a banner that said "We don't want Taliban law." The woman did not shout back at the man, but told him: "This is my land and my people."
Women protesting the law said many of their supporters had been blocked by men who refused to let them join the protest. Those who did make it shouted repeatedly that they were defending human rights by defending women's rights and that the law does not reflect the views of the Shiite community.
Fourteen-year-old Masuma Hasani said her whole family had come out to protest the law both her parents and her younger sister who she held by the arm. "I am concerned about my future with this law," she said. "We want our rights. We don't want women to just be used."
As the back-and-forth continued, another demonstration of Shiite women who said they support the law began. "We don't want foreigners interfering in our lives. They are the enemy of Afghanistan," said 24-year-old Mariam Sajadi.
Sajadi is engaged, and said she plans to ask her husband's permission to leave the house as put forth in the law. She said other controversial articles such as one giving the husband the right to demand sex from his wife every fourth day have been misinterpreted by Westerners who are anti-Islam.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009
09:10 ||
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#1
Can't wait for the traveling production of Vagina Monologues
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/15/2009 20:47
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They won't stop until every square-inch of Pakistan bows to Shariah law. And they have all available means to achieve it. The alarming intentions of the Taliban in Pakistan are no longer ambiguous. This is no longer about a chaotic Islamist outfit spilling over from Afghanistan and looking for cover. This is about taking over an entire nation.
In his first exclusive interview to an Indian television network, Tehreek-e-Taliban spokesman Muslim Khan spoke to Headlines Today in Pakistan's Swat. He opened by declaring in no uncertain terms that the Taliban intended to annex Pakistan in its entirety, and convert it into a "true Islamic state".
Referring to the hundreds of Pakistanis who have died in the area and the atrocities that continue, Khan said, "That is their fate. It is our duty to show the world what Islam really is. It is Allah's will that Pakistan be under Shariah in its true form. We have promised Allah that we will not rest until all of Pakistan is under Shariah."
When asked what the Tehreek-e-Taliban would do if it faced opposition from the Pakistani forces, he didn't lose a moment to declare that his outfit would use all means and all force available to overcome any opposition to their cause. He made it clear that the Taliban-controlled Swat, Malakand and more recently the Buner District of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, will be used as templates that the marauding Taliban will replicate in every piece of territory they take over. The recent authentication of the Swat peace deal through Pakistan's Parliament has reportedly emboldened the group into looking towards more territory - including South East into Pakistani Punjab.
With unconfirmed reports of Taliban infiltrations into the Valley still doing the rounds, the Taliban spokesman had a warning that speaks for itself: "What the Pakistan security forces could not achieve in Kashmir, the jihadis and the mujahideen will."
Khan went on to critise the "Hindu government" of J&K. "The Hindu government in Kashmir is committing atrocities on Muslims. Security forces have been incapable of doing anything on that front. It can be achieved only by the way of Jihad. The security forces have been unable to liberate Kashmir in the last 60 years because they don't fight on the basis on religion," he said.
Then, disturbingly, "Jihad does not stop in Pakistan. It does not stop for anything or anyone."
An article carried by The News ("An open letter to Gen Kayani"; April 14) by Harish Puri, a former Indian army colonel, raises a host of questions. (See here)
One question, up front, is obvious: would the free media of India have published similar advice to the Indian army chief by a Pakistani officer? The categorical answer is no.
Why?
There are several reasons. India has managed to develop, and credit is due her on that score, a sense of nationalism that not just binds its various institutions, civil and military, in the formation of the state but also draws its civil society into that nexus, at least those sections that matter in the initial evolution of such a consensus. This helps India in behaving as a unitary actor in formulating and pushing policies, especially those catalogued under the generic rubric of national security.
In theory, all states can do it. The issue of consensus has to do with the broader acceptance of those policies.
Please note that this consensus has a horrible flipside: it tends to develop internal structural constraints over time that can deny a state flexibility of response, but that is another topic; neither does this consensus in India involve, by any stretch, everyone who holds an Indian passport. But, to the extent of whether the state can express itself with one voice on most, if not all, issues, India has evolved such a consensus and is in the process of pulling in even those who currently remain on the periphery or are outside it.
To this end the state has used multiple means: relatively stable political institutions and processes; respect for the constitution; a sound higher judiciary; a professional military that accepts civilian supremacy; growing economic clout; an expanding middle class; and, lest anyone ignore the most important fact, ruthless coercion when necessary and against those groups that defy the Indian state.
That the Indian state has always been a hard-as-nails state compared to a much softer Pakistan is because it has been a democracy and has managed to develop a coercive majoritarian consensus for the exercise not just of its external sovereignty but, more importantly, its internal writ.
Therefore, if a Pakistani officer were to write an open letter to the Indian army chief on, say how that army should behave in Kashmir and inform him on how the Indian army should leave behind its memories of the 1962 debacle, it would be trashed by any Indian editor without a second thought.
The point is not to argue that we must emulate what an Indian editor would do but to raise some questions about why such an article should find place in a Pakistani newspaper.
First, is it important to debate the point and thrust of such an article, an exercise to determine whether printing it would serve any purpose -- and by purpose let us assume here that we mean changing the institutional direction of the Pakistan Army which, as the article states, is supposed to be perfidious both in relation to its neighbours and internally?
This is an important question because institutional perfidy of Pakistan Army is exactly what the underlying message of this article is. The argument is clever, combine as it does the concerns of civil society in Pakistan about the Army's role with India's concern over the role of the Pakistan Army vis-à-vis itself.
This message the Indian colonel conveys by highlighting the fact that the Pakistan Army has been an irresponsible outfit both internally and externally. While it was defeated by India, that defeat came in the face of its brutalities in the erstwhile East Pakistan. But even as it (Pakistan Army) ruthlessly operated against the Bengalis, it has cowed in the face of the ferocious Taliban. It is interesting how he throws in bits about the Pakistan Army's professionalism. This he does not to contradict his other negative assertions about the Pakistan Army but to strengthen the overall argument about the latter's perfidy.
Deconstruct this discourse to see how he appeals to the liberal minds in Pakistan. Are we, as editors, required to do this exercise of deconstruction? I think we are.
As editors we can always say that newspapers can print all sorts of viewpoints. Fair enough. But can, or should, this general acceptance of all viewpoints prevent us from establishing certain standards both in terms of judging the quality of an article as well as the broader implications of printing it.
Let me be a little more specific.
To argue that newspapers must print everything, and here I am assuming that the quality of what is being printed is not disputed, implies that in our professional capacity we are only faithful to our craft; that nothing matters beyond that. Do we always act in and through such purity of form, even assuming that we can?
The answer is no. When General Pervez Musharraf (retd) sacked the Chief Justice of Pakistan, the media took up that cause and many of us acted more as citizens of Pakistan than "pure" journalists. Indeed, we used the power we wield as journalists in the service of what we thought was in the interest of civil society with us being members of that over and above our professional calling as journalists.
Drawing the personal-professional line, as I have often stated, is difficult even in societies that are not disjointed. In such a one as ours, it is almost impossible.
But then it also proves my point that purity of form is difficult to maintain and as editors we cannot dismiss the context in which we print something and, more importantly, afford to ignore the implications of what we print. Not just that, we keep crossing the line between being citizens and professional journalists.
In this specific case, we have another problem too. Could this article also find place in Jang or its contents run on GEO? While there is nothing to prevent the editors of The News from acting independently of sister organisations within their group, the question becomes pertinent in relation to broader policy.
It is difficult to accept being subjected to two extremes from the same conglomerate. For instance, while the article by the Indian colonel castigates the Pakistan Army for standing by and allowing Swat to go under, the group's other media outlets have been congratulating the nation for the parliament having taken the correct decision on Swat.
Here we also get into another problem: how can we talk about democracy and civilian supremacy while goading the Army, even if indirectly, into violating the constitutional compact, given what the ANP has been insisting on and how the political actors have been behaving in relation to counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism efforts?
In fact, regardless of whether Charlie's aunt and I accept that, much of the media has actually created the conditions under which Pakistanis reject the idea of a threat perception from the extremists and have decided, through parliament, to take a political course of action on Swat -- surrender rather than fight it out.
The point is, none of these questions is being debated even as we, in the media, subject the nation to extremes. It is difficult to accept that our trade presupposes a free for all.
Ejaz Haider is Consulting Editor of The Friday Times and Op-Ed Editor of Daily Times
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
08:28 ||
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So Senator Kerry has come to do the usual doublespeak to the Pakistani people through its already confused leadership! Like the other US leaders before him, his understanding of Pakistan ran skin deep at best as he tried to justify the drones by declaring that terrorism existed in Pakistan before these attacks. Oh what a revelation Senator; but we all know qualitative difference between the pre- and post-9/11 status of terrorism in Pakistan. And, while some elitist part time residents and drawing room analysts (the very group that they seem to decry) of the capital may see drones as merely red herrings, the fact is that drones have killed almost 900 innocent Pakistanis between 2006 and 2009 and only 10 Al Qaeda targets. The growing instability in the country as well as the IDPs from the drone-hit areas are testimony to the fact that drones create space for future militants; as well as to the fact that the military option has not only failed to stabilise the area but also failed to deny space to the militants. And, no one buys the Pakistani state's whining to the US against the drones as authentic anymore since, if the leadership was truly opposed to these drone attacks, they would simply claim back Bandari air base. Remember also that perception is at least as critical as the reality.
Senator Kerry also talked about his cosponsored bill relating to aid to Pakistan that will be introduced or may have been introduced in the US Senate through its Foreign Relations Committee. He declared that there would be no conditionalities and he feigned because I refuse to believe that a seasoned Senator like Kerry would be so ill-informed on the issue especially when he knew he was travelling to Pakistan total ignorance about the Pakistan Enduring Assistance and Cooperation Enhancement Act of 2009 already introduced into the House of Representatives by Representative Howard Berman, Democrat from California. The bill, if passed as is, would be as humiliating for Pakistan as the US-bulldozed Platt Amendment of 1903 was for Cuba.
There have already been some comments of this Act in the Pakistani press and some of the clauses are so insulting that any self respecting Pakistani government would begin voicing its outright rejection of any aid tied to these conditions but there is a deafening silence from our leaders and their diplomatic reps in the US. As for the billions we spend on lobbyists, apparently Ambassador Haqqani has rendered them ineffective.
Coming back to the Berman bill's clauses, there is a truly absurd India-specific clause J which requires Pakistan "not to support any person or group that conducts violence, sabotage, or other activities meant to instil fear in India". This assumes that the Pakistan is indulging in such activities which in itself are unacceptable. Or is the US going to get a similar undertaking from India given the dangerous games RAW is playing within Pakistan? In any event, is Berman truly ignorant as many US legislators are about foreign affairs about the existence of a bilateral Pakistan-India anti-terror agreement or is he simply playing to the Indian lobby? Either way, for Pakistan the message is clear.
Clause K is equally humiliating, with a barely veiled effort to target Dr AQ Khan again. It seeks access for US investigators to "individuals suspected of engaging in worldwide proliferation of nuclear materials," and requires Pakistan to "restrict such individuals from travel or any other activity that could result in further proliferation". Berman would have been more useful to his country if he had sought to clarify the US role in proliferation to Israel or to seek more light on the nuclear agreements India signed with Iraq and Iran! In any event, the US has to get over its trauma of Dr A Q Khan and Pakistan's nuclear capability, just as it finally seems to be getting over its Iranian revolution trauma!
The hand of the Indian lobbyists is all over this Bill including in Clause H which requires Pakistan not to provide any support (could also include political and moral since it is open-ended), "direction, guidance to, or acquiescence in the activities of any person or group that engages in any degree in acts of violence or intimidation against civilians, civilian groups or governmental entities" target being the indigenous freedom struggle in Indian-Occupied Kashmir. Of course, given how the US is intimidating civilians in FATA with the drone attacks, shouldn't our government tell the US this may include them also! If only our leaders had such guts and gumption but all we see them do is fawn and fall all over the US regardless of the impact it has on the country.
Clause I focuses on the Taliban but again with the onus on the Pakistan government, with the underlying insinuation being that it is the Taliban's survival and nurturing is all at the hands of the Pakistani state this despite the fact that the Pakistani state has lost thousands of its personnel in fighting these forces. If Pakistan's detractors would study history they would realise that asymmetric conflicts for hearts and minds are never won through military means but who can talk sense to a super power that is still subject to irrational behaviour as a result of 9/11 so much so that it has also forgotten that the perpetrators of 9/11 were rich, westernised Arabs living in Europe and the US.
The Berman bill's title itself with the acronym PEACE is a cruel joke on the people of Pakistan and now Senator Kerry has been trying to tell us that his bill will have no conditionalities. That is nothing but a pack of lies; in any case it is irrelevant because now that an earlier bill relating to aid to Pakistan has been introduced in the House, Kerry's bill in the Senate, along with the Berman bill, will eventually go before a conference committee of Congress comprising equal members from the House and the Senate's relevant committees and one bill will be moulded from the two. Given the effective Indian lobbying and the animus that prevails in the US political circles against the nuclear Muslim state of Pakistan, the conditionalities of the Berman bill will not be removed certainly not all of them. Yet, from Pakistan's perspective, even one of the present conditionalities makes the aid bill humiliating and unacceptable to any nationalist, self-respecting leadership endowed with courage and a sense of history.
Does our leadership fit that bill? Certainly not so far but perhaps a greater reliance on parliament may give them some courage. After all, President Zardari also turned to the same parliament that he had been ignoring in the context of the issue of terrorism, to gain courage on Swat. But Parliament cannot be used selectively and one hopes it will now be more assertive of its powers.
Meanwhile, the US has begun to send drones into Swat to undermine an agreement that has parliament's sanction. The detractors of the peace agreement should realise that while the agreement was certainly signed from a position of weakness, once it is enforced action can be taken against the criminals violating women through acts of flogging and destroying education through burning of schools. After all, amongst the "secret" 14 conditions, are conditions that the Taliban will not prevent women from working or studying, will cooperate in the anti-polio drive, will desist from attacking barber and music shops, will denounce suicide attacks and so on. Given the paucity of the writ of the state, such an agreement, if enforced, can being peace to the local people especially with the army withdrawing and the Taliban agreeing not to display weapons in public and accepting a ban on raising militias. This is not the end of the problem but merely a beginning.
If the state wants to have a better negotiating position it needs to provide security and justice to the people while dialoguing and negotiating with all Pakistani stakeholders backed by, but not unleashed, coercive power of the state. This is the only way to isolate diehard militants. This is also a beginning to deny space for future militants, but that also requires the "adopt a madressah" approach mentioned last week, to go to the roots of the problem. The term Af-Pak has made us a "legitimate" war zone for the Americans with all that that implies. Unless we create space between ourselves and the US, we cannot move to reclaim the lost space of the moderate majority that is the Pakistani nation.
The writer is a defence analyst.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
07:43 ||
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... the fact is that drones have killed almost 900 innocent Pakistanis between 2006 and 2009 and only 10 Al Qaeda targets.
I LOL'd when I read that. I think Mr. Mazari pulled those numbers out of someplace dark and smelly ... now that I think of it, that description fits much of Pakistan.
She used to be in charge of a 'think tank' funded by the ISI. One of her 'researchers', the lovely Maria Kiyani, was involved in a honeypot operation against Brigadier Andrew Durcan, the British Defense Attache to Islamabad.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 9:33
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How many times will we be fooled by the US?
As many times as needed.
ON Saturday, March 11, a convoy of 10 double-cabin four-wheel drive pick-up trucks loaded with Taliban armed with every description of portable weapons Kalashnikovs, rocket launchers, heavy machine guns drove from Daggar the headquarters of Buner district to the villages of Sohawa and Dagai in Buner.
It entered Swabi district at Jhanda village, drove through the district headquarter (the town of Swabi), drove on to the motorway, exited at Mardan, drove through the cantonment of Mardan and, showing their weapons for all to see, went on towards Malakand.
In doing the above, the Taliban broke many laws of the state of Pakistan not least those that prohibit the possession of heavy weapons; showing weapons publicly and so on. They drove through a district HQ of a district they have not yet occupied (but are well on the way sooner rather than later, given the non-governance being exhibited by the ANP non-government of the Frontier); on the federally policed motorway; through an army cantonment as a matter of fact right past the Punjab Regimental Centres shopping plaza containing the usual bakery and pastry-shop run by serving soldiers and thence through the rest of the crowded city of Mardan which is also the home of the chief minister of the province.
Must have struck the fear of God into the populace of the villages/cities/ towns/cantonments they drove through, these ferocious men who so recently humbled the great Pakistan Army! So what am I going on about, talking of the laws of the state? What state? What laws? Much shame should adhere to the various actors, or shall we call them jokers, who are prancing about on the national stage striking nonsensical attitudes and mouthing pitiable platitudes.
Just as one example, the very same leaders of the ANP who just eight days ago admitted on TV that the flogging of poor Chand Bibi had actually happened but that it happened before they signed the (craven) deal with the Taliban, are now saying the flogging never happened! Look at Muslim Khan, the fiery spokesman of the Taliban in Swat who said, again on TV, that the woman was lucky to have got away with a beating that she should have been stoned to death. He now says there was no beating at all.
As another, the COAS, Gen Ashfaq Kayani says several weeks after the army handed Swat over to the Taliban that it was ready to face any threat, internal or external! Can you even believe any of this? What is happening to this country of ours; how long will we live in denial; when will we realise that if we dont act now it will all be over; that the Taliban will simply take over the state using the shock and awe that comes from killing wantonly and cruelly.
Lets go back to the most recent flag march the Taliban carried out from Buner to Mardan via Swabi and see its effects already furthering the Talibans agenda. Please go to http://buner.com and see what mayhem they are creating there, recruiting jobless youths by encouraging them to take-over their respective areas and neighbourhoods. What, pray, would the loquacious Mian Iftikhar, the Frontiers information minister, say about this latest in a series of coming conquests for the Taliban?
Does he know that Mansehra and Haripur are next on the hit list and that once in Mansehra the Taliban are but a few hours drive from the Karakoram Highway? Does someone in the federal non-government know that once they tie up with the Sunni Chilasis who hate the Shia Gilgitis with a passion, there will be havoc of a very special kind in our Northern Areas?
Is Islamabad the Beautiful cognisant of the fact that our great and good friend, China, is already up to here with the Taliban and others of their ilk, who have forever interfered in their restive province of Xinjiang. This interference goes back to the early 1980s when the highway opened to public traffic and I found myself in the company of two American friends at the Chinese customs post which was then located just below the Khunjerab Pass on the Chinese side.
We noticed that our Pakistani companions, most of them bearded young men, were being searched most closely and out came copies of the Quran from their baggage which the Chinese confiscated saying there were enough copies in China. It is too well known to repeat again the charge the Chinese have oft laid at our door that Chinese citizens are trained in guerrilla training camps in the Frontier.
So, has our FO, unaware that it usually is about matters that concern the country that it supposedly serves, taken stock of how the Chinese might react to the march of the Taliban? How will they do when they see that the Taliban are advancing, unchecked, to threaten the one land link China has with Pakistan, and through it with the rest of the world, not forgetting Gwadar? And that once there, given the fact that they face no real opposition from the great Pakistan Army, it is but a days drive to the Chinese border itself?
Have our Napoleons and Guderians and Rommels given any thought to any of the above? Where are they and our hopelessly inadequate government in Islamabad the Beautiful in all of this? Have they even begun to realise the gravity of the situation our country is faced with? That if they dont act fast the Taliban will pick up enough recruits to seriously threaten them and their ill-led and poorly motivated troops? Whilst they might well think that they are safe in their palatial villas guarded night and day by weapons-toting guards and barricades and tens of servants, all it will take is one beheaded body per cantonment every second day for their guards to throw in the towel.
On the bloody civilian side, Shah Mehmood Qureshi has been talking down to the Indians most recently in words that are a lot of hot air and bluster. On Swat: The whole of Swat is neither under Taliban control nor is being attacked by them! On the ISI: Without ISIs help you (India?!) could not have apprehended the 700 or so Al Qaeda operatives. As to his first statement the minister obviously needs to read the papers/see TV. For the second I can only say that he is mightily ignorant if he means the 700 as part of those that Musharraf sold to the Americans for $5000 each. Of whom at least 90 per cent have been proved to be innocent by none other than their jailors in Guantanamo. So have a heart, minister.
There is a great furore going on in our self-righteous media about how Pakistan will not accept aid under any conditionality. In the first place it will starve, which isnt a bad idea at all considering that our brass hats will come crashing down to reality; in the second, lets see if we have a country by then!
In the meantime, could the non-government of the ANP please resign for its acts of omission and commission re: Swat and Buner.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
07:39 ||
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This has all been planned by the military to once again overtake another weak Civilian govt!
Responses to Colonel Puri's open letter to Kayani (published in the Burg yesterday)
How the DG ISPR will respond to the Indian colonel, I don't know. However, being a true nationalist, I am going to give my own befitting reply to him. Let it suffice if I tell him (and our enemies) to stop hatching conspiracies against our nationhood (and our strategic weapons), as this time we have the Taliban on our side, against whom no known antidote exists. A country governed by the Taliban and armed with nuclear weapons has the potential of becoming the next real superpower of the 21st century. No wonder our opponents look terrified. And no wonder General Kayani is abiding by "national interest."
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 8:25
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John Frum,
The letter writer demonstrates that the Pak are bigger idiots then we give them credit. Do they really think that even BO (not Bo) would allow a Taliban controlled Pak to have Nukes? My God, that is some strong hemp these guys have.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/15/2009 11:37
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It represents their longing for the days of Muslim glory and conquest. The Pakistan army has failed at this so the Taliban become the standard bearers.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 12:43
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[Al Arabiya Latest] The Central Asian country of Turkmenistan has found an original way of coping with the global financial crisis: if your people are sad, build them a "Palace of Happiness." A bordello?
The reclusive ex-Soviet republic said Tuesday that it would build the palace as part of over $1billion (753 million) worth of construction projects to beautify the capital Ashgabat and make it more liveable. "President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov signed a series of documents under which several important community structures will be built in Ashgabat at a cost of over $1 billion," state newspaper Neutral Turkmenistan wrote.
" President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov signed a series of documents under which several important community structures will be built in Ashgabat at a cost of over $1 billion "
State newspaper
Neutral Turkmenistan The Palace of Happiness -- to be used as a wedding hall -- will cost over 100 million ($133 million), said the newspaper, a mouthpiece for the government of the energy-rich country.
Turkish construction firm Polimeks won over $200 million in contracts as part of the projects, which will also see an additional 2,000 hotel rooms built in Ashgabat.
The announcement comes one week after Turkmenistan unveiled plans to build a $1billion Olympic village, including a winter sports complex, despite the fact that the desert nation is not due to host any upcoming Winter Games.
Garish construction projects sprang up across Turkmenistan during the rule of dictator Saparmurat Niyazov, who died in 2006, even as much of the population remained mired in poverty.
His successor Berdymukhamedov has erased some of the more bizarre aspects of Niyazov's personality cult but has come under fire from critics who accuse him of simply replacing it with his own.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
00:00 ||
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The Happiest Place on Earth Ashgabat.
You will be happy or else, comrade.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009 1:00
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...In Turkmenistan, happiness finds you.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
04/15/2009 9:02
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Probably be cheaper to buy Gurbanguly a new name, wouldn't it? I can let you have "Sam" for a really good price.
Afghanistan on Tuesday warned that the peace deal with Swat Taliban for imposing Islamic law might have "dire consequences" for the region and could harm Pak-Afghan ties. The criticism came after President Asif Ali Zardari signed the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation to put Malakand under sharia law. The move is part of efforts to end the insurgency, despite fears that it could encourage extremism. "We do not interfere in Pakistan's internal affairs," President Hamid Karzai's spokesman said. However, there were concerns that "dealing with terrorists and handing over parts of one country to terrorists could have dire consequences in the long term", he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
Where's the Master of the Obvious pic?
Posted by: Snimble Dark Lord of the Platypi2795 ||
04/15/2009 16:00
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[Iran Press TV Latest] Iran has discovered a new offshore oil field in the Persian Gulf with reserves of 1 billion barrels of heavy crude, says a top oil official.
The head of the Iranian Offshore Oil Co (IOOC) Mahmoud Zirakchianzadeh said on Tuesday that the oil field was discovered by India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) in the Farsi block in the Persian Gulf, IRIB reported. He added that the amount of recoverable oil from the field, named Binaloud, would be announced later.
The National Iranian Oil Company announced last week that Iran has discovered seven new oil fields with 'considerable' reserves.
Iran, OPEC's second biggest oil producer, controls about 5 percent of global oil supply.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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[Geo News] The Government of Punjab has directed the law enforcement agencies to make foolproof security arrangements for educational institutes, government offices and foreigners in the province. According to a handout issued by Punjab Home Secretary today, law enforcement agencies have been advised that security of foreigners' particularly Chinese nationals should be ensured. Monitoring committees have also been set up for security of foreigners in Punjab, the statement said. The Home Department further said that one SP should be deputed in every district for the implementation of an emergency security plan.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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[Geo News] Federal Minister for Science and Technology Azam Swati, describing US and Nato a threat for Pakistan's nuclear weapons, said that they should leave this region. Addressing the businessmen here at the Federation of Chambers of Commerce, he said that US policies were not in the interest of Pakistan, advising the president and the prime minister not to implement them in the country. He said roadmap for development of science and technology would be prepared in consultation with business community.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
Its long past time to destroy Pakistan's nukes and their industry.
[ADN Kronos] Pakistan's top civilian security official has revealed that authorities have arrested a fifth suspect linked to last year's deadly siege in the Indian city of Mumbai.
'civilian security official': he was out of uniform that day?
Interior ministry chief Rehman Malik said on Monday that Shahid Jamil Riaz was arrested in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi. Riaz is alleged to have maintained financial accounts and helped to plan the November attack, which killed around 170 people in India's commercial capital.
Malik added that Pakistan needed more information from India to aid its investigation. Pakistan summoned India's deputy high commissioner to the interior ministry and asked for more information on the Mumbai attack, including a certified copy of the statement given by the lone surviving attacker Ajmal Kasab before a magistrate.
Malik said Pakistan had requested a copy of the charge sheet against Kasab, who is also known as Ajmal Iman. The de facto interior minister also asked for details of the mobile phone's SIM card and GPRS system used in the attacks. He also asked India for a copy of the statement Ajmal Kasab recently made before the court.
All this so that the ISI can figure out where they made mistakes in their Mumbai op ...
He said five of the nine suspects were in custody but did not disclose when Riaz was picked up.
India blamed the outlawed Kashmiri separatist group, Lashkar-e-Toiba, (LeT) for the November siege that claimed the lives of Indians and others in the siege at two luxury hotels.
Islamabad admitted in February for the first time that the Mumbai attacks were planned partly in Pakistan and filed a case against several suspects, saying that six of them were already in custody.
Kasab's trial is due to start in Mumbai on Wednesday.The 21-year-old faces the death penalty if convicted on a string of charges relating to the attack.
In January Pakistan bowed to international pressure and arrested 124 militants suspected of involvement in the deadly terrorist attacks. The government said it had closed five training camps and 20 offices belonging to banned charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa and LeT.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
I love this site why because I got a lot of information from this site
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/15/2009 11:50
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I suspect the Europe story was cover to allow the Pak Interior Ministry to send Riaz to India without causing problems with the Islamists or the Military.
Now that they've publicized the Karachi arrest, he can no longer be sent to India.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 12:04
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I agree with you, but the People Every where in the Country Must be Alert to escape from these type of attacks.
[Mail and Globe] The lobster had been grilled to perfection, the lights were low and the music tinkled softly in the background -- all that was missing were the 16 foreign leaders.
Instead, reporters, junior officials and even a few soldiers in camouflage tucked into a gourmet dinner intended for heads of state after protests forced the cancellation of a major Asian summit in the Thai beach town of Pattaya.
The intended guests of honour -- including Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso -- had been airlifted out of the hotel venue hours earlier after 1 000 anti-government protesters smashed their way in.
Waitresses in traditional outfits glided around the grand ballroom in the five-star Royal Cliff Beach Resort on Saturday night serving their new guests after the Thai government decided not to let the food go begging.
"The hotel arrangements had all been made and rather than letting everything which was prepared go to waste it was decided to invite people who were still at the venue," said Thai Foreign Ministry official Thani Thongpakdee.
On the menu were local delicacies including mango salad, fried catfish, Tom Yam Kai (a spicy chicken soup), Kai Pad (fried chicken with cashew nuts), beef red curry and, of course, the lobster, reporters said.
A live performance of traditional Thai music was cancelled, however, after the band that was due to perform fled the advancing red-shirted demonstrators earlier in the day, officials said.
The only other missing element was wine -- one bottle of red was available for a table of high-ranking officials but for everyone else it was soft drinks on tap.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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[Mail and Globe] At least four mortar shells pounded a northern working-class district of the Congo capital Brazzaville overnight causing heavy damage but no casualties, locals said on Tuesday.
The attack came just hours ahead of key talks between the ruling party, the opposition and civil society groups in the run-up to the July presidential elections, which President Denis Sassou Nguesso is expected to contest. "At least two mortar shells exploded. They destroyed the wall of a plot of land which was inhabited but without injuring or killing anyone," a pro-government source said. "For the present we are not worrying about where the shells were fired from and who fired them," the source added. "Nevertheless they took advantage of lighting on a night of heavy rain to carry out their task."
A human rights activist said the attacks were intended to pressure the politicians to move ahead with the "republican dialogue" announced during a visit to Brazzaville in March by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
The dialogue is due to review the institutional framework of the election, the electoral body and the financing of political parties. The holding of such a forum has long been demanded by the opposition, civil society and the clergy.
At the end of March the opposition expressed scepticism, saying the real aim of the dialogue was to legitimise the National Elections Organisation Committee, whose independence is questioned, before the presidential vote.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[Straits Times] POLICE issued arrest warrants on Tuesday for 14 leaders of an anti-government movement, including ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, as protesters abruptly ended violent demonstrations in Thailand's capital. A day after red-shirted protesters burned buses and seized intersections in clashes with police and soldiers that left two people dead and 123 injured, their leaders called it quits, urging a group of 2,000 die-hard demonstrators to go home.
SOME protesters threatened to regroup after the arrest warrants were issued. About 200 protesters took off their red shirts but gathered in a field near Government House late on Tuesday. They were closely monitored by soldiers patrolling the area but no clash was reported.
Jakrapob Penkair, a protest leader who had not turned himself in, said the movement 'will continue fighting'. He did not specify what action they would take next.
The swift and unexpected resolution headed off the possibility of a confrontation with heavily armed troops massing around the demonstrators' encampment near the seat of government. Dispirited protesters quietly boarded government buses watched over by soldiers.
But few expected it was the end of a rural-based movement that has shown the ability to mobilise 100,000 protesters and cause the cancellation of a regional summit in its campaign seeking to force out a government dominated by urban elements and hold new elections.
Charnvit Kasetsiri, one of Thailand's most prominent historians, said the 'political convulsion' may be over for now, but the underlying tensions between the rural poor and urban elite highlighted during the demonstrations remain.
The demonstrations were a mirror of mass protests by urban groups last year that snarled Bangkok until the courts removed a government led by Thaksin's allies who were elected on the strength of rural voters.
The appointment of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva further angered many rural people, who were already upset by a 2006 coup that ousted Thaksin, and their disenchantment blew up into their own protest movement.
Three of the 14 protest leaders were in police custody, metropolitan police spokesman Suporn Pansua said, and the Bangkok Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for 11 others, including Thaksin, who went into self-imposed exile last year before a court convicted him of violating a conflict of interest law.
The warrants accuse the protest leaders of creating a public disturbance and engaging in illegal assembly, which carry prison terms of up to seven and three years, respectively.
'This is not a victory or a loss of any particular group,' Mr Abhisit said in a televised address. 'If it is victory, it is victory of society that peace and order has returned.' But he warned that the threat from the red-clad protesters was not over.
'The operation under the state of emergency is not completed. There are still things to do,' he said. 'There are still protesters in some areas. The only difference is they aren't wearing red anymore.' The government announced it was adding two more days to the three-day Thai New Year holiday, which began Monday, to ensure safety and allow time for repairing damage from the violence.
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Authorities on Tuesday arrested a tribesman in Jamrud on suspicions of having links with terrorists, sources said. They said that the man, identified as Hanif, was arrested by security forces and had been moved to an undisclosed location.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[ADN Kronos] Israel and the United States are due to hold a "massive" joint missile defence drill later this year to counter Iran's nuclear ambitions, Israeli daily The Jerusalem Post claims. The allies will test three different ballistic missile defence systems, the Arrow-2, as well as America's THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defence) and the ship-based Aegis ballistic missile defence system.
"The Juniper Cobra exercise between EUCOM (US Military's European Command) and the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) will be the fifth and most complex exercise yet designed," Lt.-General Patrick J. O'Reilly told the US house appropriations committee's subcommittee on defence earlier this month.
Israeli defence officials cited by The Post said that the planned exercise would create conditions to enable "interoperability between Israeli and American ballistic missile defence in case the US government decided to deploy these systems here in the event of a conflict with Iran, like it did ahead of the Gulf War in Iraq in 1991."
News of the joint exercise - termed Juniper Cobra - was revealed less than a week after the US and Israel test-fired the Arrow-2 missile defence system capable of destroying a Syrian or an Iranian medium-range Shihab-3 missile.
The test launch last Tuesday was conducted jointly with the Israeli air force and the US missile defence agency which also funded the project. It took place near the Israeli port city of Ashdod.
Israel Aircraft Industries and Chicago-based Boeing developed the project at a cost of more than one billion dollars.
Israel has long accused Iran of training and financing anti-Israeli militant groups and with major western powers, accused Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons.
But Iran has consistently said its uranium enrichment programme is only for peaceful purposes and designed to generate nuclear power for civilian use.
Iranian hardline president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly engaged in anti-Israel rhetoric, which has drawn condemnation from the United Nations and western nations.
In 2005 he said that Israel should be "wiped off the map".
Israel, however, neither acknowledges nor denies having a nuclear weapons programme. However, it is believed the Jewish state possesses between 75 and 200 nuclear warheads.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
ISRAEL FORUM > HEATING UP: EGYPT VERSUS HEZBOLLAH/IRAN.
* OTOH, TOPIX > GOVERNOR RICK PERRY: STATE OF TEXAS COULD SECEDE FROM THE US.
Uh, uh, THAAD + BMD-GMD pointing the wrong way/direction???
If the Taliban refuse to disarm following the implementation of the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation, 2009, the government will take action after taking people into confidence, Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira said on Tuesday. He told reporters after attending a meeting at the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) that it was incumbent upon people of the area to come forward and play their role in ensuring peace. He said the government's decision to implement the Nizam-e-Adl had foiled the designs of people trying to destabilise Pakistan. Kaira said the situation in Buner was normal and would continue to improve with time. He said the government was evolving a comprehensive plan to provide training to journalists.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
[Al Arabiya Latest] The United States set out to donate 12 Raven unmanned aircrafts to the Lebanese army as part of its military assistance program, the U.S. embassy announced Tuesday. The aircrafts would be provided "in the coming months," an embassy statement said.
Lebanese army commander General Jean Kahwaji and Defence Minister Elias Murr agreed to the donation while visiting the United States earlier this year.
The U.S. Defense Department will also train Lebanese army pilots on the Raven as "part of the comprehensive, robust U.S. military assistance program to Lebanon," the statement said.
The Raven has electronic sensors providing immediate intelligence information and can perform remote reconnaissance and surveillance.
U.S. military assistance to Lebanon totaled more than 410 million dollars since 2006 and includes aircrafts, tanks, artillery and training.
The news comes right before Lebanon's parliamentary elections for the 128-seat legislature set to be held on June 7. Balloting is expected to be fiercely contested between Western-backed parties and a coalition led by the Hezbollah group.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
Will end up into the hands of Hiz-b-Allah
Posted by: Large Snerong7311 ||
04/15/2009 5:56
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And then will be able to critisize Israel when IAF have to knock them down.
Al Qaeda member Adam Gadahn called on Muslims to support jihad with "men and money", claiming militants had brought the West to the verge of collapse.
Gadahn, who is a US national, stated this during a one-and-a-half hour video produced by Al Qaeda's media wing, As Sahab, and released on the Internet on Monday. "The enemy under the leadership of the unbelieving West has begun to stagger and falter, and the results of its unabated bleeding has began to show on its economy, which is on the brink of failure," said Gadahn, in a report by CBS News.
Contradictions: Dismissing efforts by US President Barack Obama to improve relations with the Muslim world, he said former US president had all made similar claims but all have maintained the same policies and the same approach towards Muslims. "Obama's own statements contradict his claims," he said, referring to the US president's assurances to Israel that Jerusalem will remain its undivided capital, and his pledge to increase US forces in Afghanistan.
Gadahn also claimed that big US corporations and financial institutions dictated America's domestic and foreign policies, specifically mentioning the case of Bernard Madoff and books written by American author John Perkins. The video also included a documentary-style historical introduction at the beginning, which Gadahn described as examples of crimes perpetrated by US forces in the wars it fought during the 20th century. He referred to the killing of Germans during World War II, the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the use of Agent Orange in Vietnam. "Agent orange contains Dioxin, one of the most poisonous substances on earth," he noted, adding "just three ounces of it in the water supplies of New York, is enough to poison its entire population". The video also contained excerpts from statements released previously by other Al Qaeda leaders, such as Osama Bin Laden, Ayman Al Zawahri, Mustafa Abu Al Yazid and Abu Yahya Al Libi. The statements all stressed on jihad as the only way to rid Muslim countries from corrupt rulers and Western occupation.
It also included footage of operations carried out by Arab and Afghan fighters against NATO and Afghan forces in Afghanistan, including a succession of rocket attacks, IED attacks and suicide bombings. Gadahn pointed to a US army handbook, 'Route Clearance', that he said was seized during an attack on US forces. A copy of the handbook has been distributed along with the video.
The book explains the various tools and techniques used by the US army to minimise the damage caused by IED attacks. Gadahn said the procedures explained in the handbook were not being followed, suggesting the US preferred to save money on minesweepers rather than the lives of its own soldiers.
New technique: The video also revealed a new technique used by Al Qaeda for suicide operations, consisting of placing rocket launchers on top of vehicles, and firing those rockets before the suicide bomber detonates the car bomb.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
American Qaeda operative claims Western economy on brink of failure
...from his dank dusty cave somewhere in the desolate region of the Northwest Territories.
Sikh families living in Orakzai Agency have left the agency after the Taliban demanded Rs 50 million as jizia (tax) from them, official sources and locals said on Tuesday.
Residents of Ferozekhel area in Lower Orakzai Agency told Daily Times on Tuesday that around 10 Sikh families left the agency after the demand by the Taliban, who said they were a minority and liable to pay the tax for living in the area in accordance with sharia.
Locals said the Taliban had notified the Sikh families about the 'tax' around a week ago. They said of the 15 Sikh families in Ferozekhel, 10 had shifted while the remaining were preparing to do so.
The locals said the families were impoverished and had left the area to avoid any Taliban action.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
I wonder how those Sikhs who aligned themselves with the Pakis (ISI) and Afghanis (Hekmatyar/Rubbani) in their quest for Khalistan will like Sharia law?
[Mail and Globe] Republic expressed horror on Tuesday at weekend clashes over cattle poaching that left at least 22 people dead. With 52 people injured in the fighting and fears more bodies may have been buried and not taken to hospital, medical sources said the toll could well rise.
"Among the dead, we have seen two people who had their throats slashed. These are things that we have not seen in our country for a long time," said Antoine Mbao Bogo, president of the Central African Red Cross. "There are serious wounds, made by blades or with poisoned arrows. They used spears, machetes, to kill each other. This is very serious."
The fighting between cattle breeders and traders broke out on Sunday at the cattle market north of the capital Bangui. It was sparked by a dispute over 170 oxen stolen by bandits 10 days earlier but later retrieved. Traders wanted to sell the animals but the breeders sought to claim back at least some of them.
"This is a toll that could still rise," said one hospital worker, explaining that their figures of 22 dead and 52 injured dealt only with those who had been taken to hospital.
Some victims had been buried, according to Muslim tradition, without ever having been admitted, he said.
With the atmosphere still tense on Tuesday, police and paramilitary officers were out in force around the market working to disarm the rival breeders and traders.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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[Jerusalem Post Front Page] A federal appeals court has granted a stay of deportation to Germany for accused Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk.
The court made the ruling shortly after the frail 89-year-old Ukraine native was removed from his suburban Cleveland home by six immigration officers using a wheelchair. He was taken away in a waiting van as family members looked on.
His son, John Demjanjuk Jr., had filed motions earlier in the day asking the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals for a stay of deportation. The government objected.
It's unclear if Demjanjuk will be brought back home.
German prosecutors claim Demjanjuk, a native of Ukraine, was an accessory to some 29,000 deaths during World War II at the Sobibor camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. Once in Germany, he could be formally charged in court.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[Mail and Globe] Critics of President Barack Obama's handling of the economy are planning nationwide "tea parties" on Wednesday -- and not for the sake of polite conversation.
Coast-to-coast demonstrations against Obama's big-spending economic stimulus package are promised for the day that is also the deadline for filing federal income tax returns.
Whether Republicans -- in disarray since losing the presidential election last year -- can deliver is open to question. Pro-Republican organisers say they are plugging into widespread popular anger at Democrat-led Washington.
An even bigger claim is that the catchy "tea party" idea and heavy use of internet tools such as Facebook, YouTube and blogs signals a historic first attempt by Republicans to rival Obama's renowned e-network.
"Conservatives may be catching up with their liberal counterparts in building a web-driven, grassroots campaign to push their agenda," the conservative Fox News television network said on its website.
Skeptics point to Republican disunity in the wake of last year's electoral defeats and pan the protests as a skillful fake.
"The tea parties don't represent a spontaneous outpouring of public sentiment. They're AstroTurf [fake grass roots] events, manufactured by the usual suspects," liberal economist and Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman said on Monday.
The protests are named after the 1773 Boston Tea Party in which disgruntled Americans rebelled against British colonial taxes, an iconic moment in the path to US independence.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#4
Astroturm my ass Krugman. I've never been to a demonstration as a participant before (a number as law enforcement) and I'm going because I'm mad as hell and frightened for the future of my country.
#5
Got in from ours about an hour ago. 2500 to 3000 people turned out in the cold drizzle. Lots of honking and waving from cars going by, too. I like to froze my butt off (also toes and hands). Where the hell is the gerbil worming I was promised?
If I knew how, I'd post pictures.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/15/2009 21:37
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[Iran Press TV Latest] Archaeologists have found evidence suggesting that ancient Jews used human skulls in ceremonies, despite their religious beliefs.
Although there is a strict Halakhic prohibition on touching human remains, recently published findings suggest that ancient Jews might have ignored the rules.
Southampton University researchers said that human skulls were found in present-day Iraq (formerly Babylonia) that are believed to have been used during the Talmudic era.
According to researcher Dan Levene, some of the skulls bear Aramaic inscriptions and at least one of them seems to belong to a woman. "When I presented these findings in Israel, people told me, 'It is not possible that this is Jewish,'" said Levene. "But it is certainly Jewish."
Levene says many desperate people used talisman in the past and skulls were also used to ward off ghosts or demons, Haaretz reported. "The fact remains that belief in demons was widespread at this time among Jews as well as other peoples," writes Levene in a report published in Biblical Archaeological Review. "Incantation bowls are known not only from Jewish communities but from other communities as well."
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#3
Well, at least we have the noble Iranians to put this on the front page of their non-Jewish-controlled press organ. How else would we learn about the tainted and profane Jooooos?
If we don't watch out, the Jews might try to one-up the Sedlec Ossuary... with the skeletons of Palestinian children, no doubt.
From the comments: "Amazing! My orthodox friends complain I don`t keep Kosher - at least I gave up my Babylonian skull. "- HA!!
They used them to drink the fermented blood of Mesopotamian children.
Now that we've gotten the obligatory blood libel out of the way, it seems as if this is a real article. It's about Talmudic-era witchcraft ritual objects. If any of you have ever read the Old Testament, this is the crap that the Prophets were always thundering on about, the endless cycle of backsliding into idol-worship and witchcraft followed by repentance & remorseful piety.
In particular, the ritual objects in question were probably used to traffic with, enlist, or repel 'liliths', demons of childbed fevers and other calamities associated with pregnancy.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
04/15/2009 10:05
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#6
I use a human skull every day. I suspect most, if not all, Rantburgers do also. It's good for holding brains.
[ADN Kronos] A top Taliban leader has said that fugitive Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is alive and leading operations against foreign forces in Afghanistan. "Osama bin Laden is still alive and is directing the Jihad (holy war) against American and western forces in Afghanistan," said Taliban commander and Pashtun warlord Sirajuddin Haqqani, quoted by Saudi daily Al-Watan.
However, Haqqani, who leads Taliban militants in the Afghan provinces of Baktika and Khost, said he had not had any contact with bin Laden for a long time.
"It has been a long time since I lost contact with Al-Qaeda's leader, but I know he is still alive and leading Al-Qaeda combatants against foreign forces."
Haqqani, who is wanted by the United States and has a five-million dollar bounty on his head, did not rule out cooperating with Al-Qaeda in fighting foreign forces.
"The doors are open for all mujahadeen who fight to apply Allah's will, just like the government in Kabul has opened the doors to foreign troops. We are ready to receive all foreigners, including Arabs, who want to fight alongside us."
Sirajuddin is the son of Jalaluddin Haqqani a veteran of the 1978-1989 Afghanistan war against the former Soviet Union and one of the most respected tribal figures and mujahadeen in southeastern Afghanistan.
He has built up a well-organised group in Afghanistan, known as the Haqqani network which has its roots in Pakistan's tribal areas.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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Top|| File under: al-Qaeda
#1
Osama lives! He and Elvis have a new album scheduled for release in 2010.
Police have been told by the government not to interfere with the Taliban, as they are "guests" and should be allowed a free hand, a report in The Telegraph claimed on Tuesday.
A police official in Buner, neighbouring the restive Swat, was quoted by Telegraph as saying that they "have been instructed by the government to stay away from the Taliban as they are our guests and should be allowed to walk around the marketplace".
Buner is the latest district hit by violence after the Taliban stormed it from the neighbouring Swat valley, where the government on Monday agreed to the Taliban demand of imposing sharia. The policeman said he was told that any action against the Taliban would be a setback for the peace process.
Buner residents formed a lashkar to resist the Taliban, and clashes have so far killed eight Taliban, three policemen and two villagers. Authorities claim they were negotiating with the Taliban to convince them to withdraw, but the Taliban seem going nowhere and determined to take over the valley, police said.
"They are everywhere," a senior police official was quoted by Telegraph. "They are visiting mosques and bazaars and asking people to help them enforce sharia".
He said Buner was rapidly turning into Swat.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
Who gets the feeling the military/Govt want the taliban to be a major force in the country so we in the West start paying them their usual welfare cqs?
[Kyodo: Korea] China said Tuesday it is opposed to any new U.N. sanction against North Korea over its recent rocket launch, state media reported. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said China ŽŽdisapprovesŽŽ of the world body adopting any further resolution on the North, according to Xinhua News Agency.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#2
Let's everybody push that wimp the decadent american put in charge and we can get rid of them for good.
Posted by: Large Slusorong9431 ||
04/15/2009 16:03
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#3
ION CHINA, WORLD MILITARY FORUM > IIUC BANGLADESH MEDIA "NEW NATION": RUSSIA FEARS CHINA IS BECOMING TOO POWERFUL; + VIETNAM TO BUY "BRAHMOS" NUCLEAR-CAPABLE MISSLES FROM INDIA TO MAINTAIN NUCLEAR DETERRENCE AGZ CHINA, +INDIA TEST-FIRES SHORT-RANGE BALLISTIC MISSLE [Improved PRIVTHI-II SRBM/SRTM] CAPABLE OF CARRYING NUCLEAR WARHEADS.
The Taliban are teaming up with local militant groups to make inroads in the Punjab, a New York Times report has claimed.
Is there anywhere in Pakistain that doesn't have a local militant group?
The report quoted Pakistani experts as saying the Manawan siege, the Sri Lankan cricket team ambush, and the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad last year were only the most spectacular examples of the joint campaign. American officials said they viewed the developments with alarm.
"I don't think a lot of people understand the gravity of the issue," said a senior Punjab police official. "If you want to destabilise Pakistan, you have to destabilise the Punjab." An NYT reporter claimed seeing abundant signs of creeping militancy in towns and villages around Dera Ghazi Khan. Some villages, the report said, were so deeply infiltrated by militants that they were already considered no-go zones.
In at least five towns in southern Punjab, including Multan, barbershops, music stores and Internet cafes reported threats from Taliban. "It's going from bad to worse," said a senior police official in DG Khan. "They are now more active. These are the facts."
Tactical alliance: At least 20 Taliban killed in American strikes in the Tribal Areas since last summer were Punjabis, according to officials. One Pakistani security official estimated that five to 10 percent of the militants in FATA could be Punjabi. "These are tactical alliances," said a senior American official. The Pashtun Taliban and Arab militants, who are part of Al Qaeda, have money, sanctuary, training sites and suicide bombers. The Punjabi militants can provide logistic support in cities like Lahore.
The situation is still far from that in the Swat Valley but there are strong parallels. The Taliban here exploit many of the same weaknesses that allowed them to expand in other areas: an absent or intimidated police force; a lack of attention from national and provincial leaders; and a population steadily cowed by threats, or won over by hard-line mullahs. In Shadan Lund, just north of DG Khan, militants are openly demanding shariah.
Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif told the NYT reporter he was painfully aware of the need to restore people's faith in government. "Hearts and minds must be won," he said. "If this struggle fails, this country has no future."
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
Just one more piece of evidence that the very existance of a place called "Pakistan" needs to end. Take out the nukes first, then just start carpet bombing. The few survivors can be incorporated into either India or Afghanistan. If possible, capture some of the "leaders" of the ISI, and use whatever means necessary to find out ALL the skullduggery they've been involved with over the last couple of decades. It'll make some very interesting reading, I'm sure.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/15/2009 14:58
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[ADN Kronos] Rival Palestinian factions Fatah and the Islamist Hamas movement have reached an historic accord for the creation of a new "confederation" with two governments to rule in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, sources have told Adnkronos International (AKI).
Izzat the same thing as a "government of national unity"?
Top-level Palestinian sources told AKI that the two groups are waiting for the right moment to make an official announcement about the agreement.
"There's a couple-three 'accidents' that ain't happened yet."
Well-informed sources based in Damascus said the "confederation is based on two governments : one in the West Bank led by Fatah and the Palestinian National Authority and the other in the Gaza Strip led by Hamas".
And that's different from what they have...how? Oh, I think I know...the Hamas cut is now more-or-less "legal". Huzzah.
"It is a government for each of the two principal factions of the Palestinian conflict," the source said.
"One fer youse, two fer me. Three fer youse, four fer me..."
Under the accord, a co-ordinating commission would supervise the two executives in a type of politburo "central government", sources said.
With regular consultations with Damascus...
The commission would not have particularly broad or binding responsibilities, it will co-ordinate the two governments so that they act like a single body, sources said. "The two governments will restrict themselves to managing reconstruction and election preparations, without a clear political function," one source said.
"Leaving the bloodshed community organizing to the grassroots, as it were."
However, the accord is expected to attract strong opposition from other Palestinian groups including the Democratic Front and the Popular Front since the plan excludes their participation, sources said. A Damascus official from the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine has already said that his organisation is "totally cheesed opposed to this plan since it reinforces and perpetuates the divisions between the Palestinians, hampers the possibility of creating an independent Palestinian state and confirms the division of power between the two principal factions."
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
However, the accord is expected to attract strong opposition from other Palestinian groups including the Democratic Front and the Popular Front
And the Democratic Popular Front, the Democratic Popular Front, the Front for Popular Democratics, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Popularity, the Front for the Liberation of Democratic Palestine, the Front to End All Fronts...
#3
Looks to me like The Onion is making a bid for membership in the "Dead Fish Society". Those are the people targeted for revenge by Rahm Emanuel. this is a little too vicous for my tastes, but then, I'm such a delicate flower.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
04/15/2009 10:20
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#4
I can't remember the last time the press got lampooned this hard. They really don't get it. I was talking to a guy who is a sports reporter locally and he just doesn't understand why newspapers are folding and ad revenue is drying up and the paper is shrinking. I asked him if he thought the fact that news today is agenda driven and more opinion than fact had anything to do with it and he looked at me like I was speaking Mongolian. They do not get it and won't get it even standing in the unemployment line.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/15/2009 12:25
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urkey's Chief of General Staff Gen. Ilker Basbug said Tuesday he believes that the rebel Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) could be eradicated through effective security coordination between his country, Iraq and the United States.
Addressing the Turkish War Colleges Command, Basbug said the tripartite military measures enacted in north Iraq recently would bear fruit soon. He was apparently referring to the launching, three month ago, of a center for intelligence coordination in Irbil, north Iraq, where 3,500 of PKK separatists are believed to be based.
Basbug did not accuse Iraqi Kurds of harboring the PKK rebels and providing them with safe havens which signals a clear shift in the Turkish stance towards Iraqi Kurds. Thanks to the growing coordination among the three countries, north Iraq is no longer a safe haven for the PKK rebels, he affirmed.
The Turkish military was able to deal strong blows to the PKK bases in the region over the last one and half years using its air force and ground force, he pointed out. Due to these attacks the PPK lost its ability to act as a major militant group against Turkey, he said, noting that the attacks launched against Turkey from north Iraq have declined sharply, Gen. Basbug underscored.
The military leader affirmed determination to pursue the campaign against the PKK separatists deeming the victory in this conflict key to comprehensive development in southern Turkey.
Since October 24, 2007 units of the Turkish army crossed the Iraqi border in a special operation against PPK militants. Turkish military backed by helicopters chased the militants, while F-16 Falcon fighters and artillery dealt strikes at militant bases about 50 kilometers (30 miles) deep into Iraqi territory.
#1
WAFF > GLOBALRESEARCH.CA - WAR, OIL, AND GAS PIPELINES - TURKEY IS WASHINGTON'S GEOPOLITICAL PIVOT.
D *** NG IT, MORIARITY, its for the CHILDREN - you know, "GLOBALISM"; sub-you know, OWG-NWO, sub-sub you know, GLOBAL SOCIALIST ORDER, sub-sub-sub you know ...............@!?
MAKING IT ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY CATEGORICALLLY UNDENIABLY ........................@ FINGER-POINTING, ETC. CLEAR TO THE AMERIKAN PEOPLE!
Attacks and violence have decreased "significantly lower" during the past six months than they have been in a number of years, commander of US forces in the Mosul area Army Colonel Gary Volesky affirmed Tuesday.
In a video link from Iraq, Volesky told reporters at the Pentagon that the insurgencies still were able to conduct operations in Mosul due to three main reasons, the first was "that there was an ineffective provincial government that didn't represent the majority of the population in Nineveh. And they did nothing, really, of any measure to improve the people's quality of life." He added that "the ISF, all the Iraqi security forces, they were still developing, getting more and more capability, but they were unable really to handle the threat that (Al-Qaeda in Iraq) AQI and the other insurgents were able to do while attacking Mosul," and that "there were fewer coalition forces here in Mosul." "As we continue to clear more and more neighborhoods, what we've seen is the enemy has two choices: They can fight, or flee," he stressed.
The Commander indicated that an assessment is being conducted at the present time with the Iraqi counterparts to determine what the way ahead is for security in Mosul. He affirmed that based on that assessment, "a decision will be made what we will do on 30 June." Volesky noted that If the Iraqi government believes "we should stay in Mosul to continue the security progress, we'll support our Iraqi counterparts past 30 June and continue to build on the momentum that we've got here." "If we're -- if the decision's made that we leave, then we'll go into the Nineveh province at large and continue supporting Iraqi security forces," he added.
He stressed that according to this assessment the US combat soldiers will stay in Mosul after June 30th, saying "If the Iraqi government wants us to stay, we will stay ... it's the Iraqis' decision." A senior U.S. commander in Iraq, General Ray Odierno was quoted saying on Sunday that a decision on withdrawing American forces from Iraq's major cities by a June 30 deadline will be made by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki along with the advice of the American military.
Berlin -- A Somali suspected pirate filed a lawsuit against Germany Tuesday for what he called his inhumane treatment since being handed over to Kenyan authorities, court documents said.
The German navy patrolling the Gulf of Aden captured the plaintiff, identified as Ali Mohamed A.D., last month when he allegedly tried to seize a freighter, the MV Courier. He was transferred to Kenya along with eight other Somali suspects for prosecution in the port city of Mombasa under an EU agreement with the east African country.
The plaintiff's lawyer Oliver Wallasch said his client was seeking 10,000 euros (13,300 dollars) from the German government before the Berlin regional court for damages incurred after his "unlawful" transfer to Kenya.
The lawsuit, targeted at the interior, defence, justice and foreign ministries, contends that Berlin must have been aware that a suspect would likely have no access to medical treatment, sanitary facilities or privacy in a Kenyan jail. This "inhumane treatment" could expose him to "life-threatening illnesses" and possibly deprive him of a "proper legal defence", Wallasch wrote in the court documents provided to AFP.
Ali Mohamed A.D. denies involvement in piracy in the lawsuit.
Meanwhile a second suspect, Mohamud Mohamed H., has filed an injunction with the Berlin administrative court aiming to force the German foreign ministry to cover the costs of a public defender in Kenya. His lawyer Andreas Schulz said his trial was to begin in Mombasa on April 22 and he currently has no defence attorney there.
Wallasch said another three suspected pirates had hired German lawyers.
Kenya and the EU have signed an agreement to transfer to the country suspected Somali pirates who are detained as part of the bloc's Atalanta anti-piracy naval mission off the Somali coast.
#6
Just one more indication that the lawyers have screwed up EVERYTHING. From now on, if a pirate is captured, he gets one in the brain and dumped into the ocean. Don't even worry about identifying him, just make sure he's not able to pursue his "career" any longer.
The lawyer in this case needs to have some severe trauma involving the kneecaps.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/15/2009 14:40
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#7
I don't blame the lawyer, I blame the "Human Rights Activist" movement for convincing large numbers of touchy-feeley dickweeds that everyone who commits a crime must be coddled in the name of humanity.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
04/15/2009 17:52
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#8
So if the lawyer collects 10k EU, how much does the pirate get?
#9
OP, why waste a bullet? If you're 350 miles out to sea, just dump him overboard. Tie him to some heavy garbage so he sinks, if you don't want him washing up on some shore.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
04/15/2009 18:59
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#10
Personally, I'm for the.... one round of bullet method.
#13
Rambler, I believe that Somalia has some of the most shark infested waters on the planet. The garbage is unnecessary. Just toss in some tuna or leftover chum....that should do it.
An opinion poll on the 4-7 June European Parliament (EP) elections shows that only 34 percent of possible voters surveyed across the EU say they are already certain that they will go and vote in June, while 19 percent of respondents said they were already certain that they would not vote.
The poll, which was taken from mid-January to mid-February, and published Tuesday evening by the EP showed that 53 percent of the voters surveyed said they were disinterested in the elections. Sixty-two percent of the respondents said they did not know when next EP elections will be held in their countries.
On policy issues, respondents expressed greatest concern about the economy led by unemployment (57 percent). Other major concerns were inflation and purchasing power, and pension security.
The first non-economic subject on the list of respondents was crime (29 percent) followed by the security of energy supply (27 percent) and climate change (26 percent).
It is hoped that as the different parts of the campaign become visible from April in all EU countries, interest in and knowledge of the elections will rise, noted an EP statement.
LA PAZ, Bolivia, April 14 (UPI) -- Bolivian President Evo Morales has ended a five-day-long hunger strike after lawmakers agreed to allow him to run for a second term in December.
Mercopress reported Tuesday that the new law also gives Bolivia's indigenous communities rights to territory and their own systems of justice.
Morales went on a hunger strike after opposition politicians stalled the bill's passage, the news service reported.
Critics say the law would give 14 congressional seats to indigenous groups, which would essentially give them a political edge. Opposition lawmakers also wanted to replace Bolivia's manual voter registration system with a digitized biometric system using fingerprints, photographs and other personal data.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/15/2009
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#1
Barry should adopt this tactic in case the Dem controlled House and Senate doesn't give him everything he wants.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009 0:55
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#2
Bolivia's manual voter registration system with a digitized biometric system using fingerprints, photographs and other personal data.
Wait, so Bolivia, one of the most backwards places on the planet, can accomplish this but it's too large a task for the United States?
The Taliban are fast gaining on Pakistan's federal capital Islamabad. Reports on Tuesday said the Islamic militia is now marching towards Haripur, a district 50 km from Islamabad and the lone remaining buffer territory.
With Swat and the North West Frontier Province firmly in their grip, the Taliban has already overrun Buner district before their advance to Haripur. Besides the Taliban are gaining in newer areas.
Security analyst Muhammad Amir Rana said: "The Taliban are marching towards other areas, the settled areas at the same pace as they were marching from 2006. So there is no doubt that this is an emerging threat."
Even more worrying for India is that the Taliban are teaming up with local militant groups to make inroads into Punjab province.
Signs of Taliban terror abound in the villages near Dera Ghazi Khan in Punjab. Fearing the hardline mullahs of the militia, traditional ceremonies have been halted in some areas.
In at least five towns in southern and western Punjab, barber shops, music stores and Internet cafes have already received threats from the terrorists.
Senior police officials in Dera Ghazi Khan admitted: "It's going from bad to worse. They are now more active. This is a fact. I don't think a lot of people understand the gravity of the issue. If you want to destabilize Pakistan, you have to destabilise Punjab."
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
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#1
What does it mean when the Taliban control Pakistan? As a creation of the ISI does that mean ISI control or does that imply the monster controlling Dr. Frankenstein?
#2
Closer to Islamabad than Kabul. Shouldn't have conspired to attack the US on Sept 2001 you Pakistani asswipes. Now have a very interesting, but brief, life.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009 0:40
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Saint Petersburg — An Azeri immigrant in Russia's northern city of Saint Petersburg has been charged with hiring hit men to kill his 21-year-old daughter for wearing a mini-skirt, police said Monday.
The man's arrest follows the detention last week of two other citizens of Azerbaijan, a majority Muslim state in the Caucasus, who confessed to murdering the girl, a university medical student. "They admitted to being paid 100,000 rubles (about 3,000 dollars) by the girl's father. They said he wanted to punish his daughter for flouting national traditions and wearing a mini-skirt," a police source told AFP.
The girl was abducted on the street in Russia's second city on March 8, taken to the outskirts of Saint Petersburg and then shot twice in the head, the source said.
Russia has experienced a revival of conservative religious tradition since the fall of the Soviet Union both within its Russian Orthodox and large Muslim communities. The Saint Petersburg Mosque — the largest and northernmost in Europe when it was built in 1913 — now counts mostly migrants from ex-Soviet Azerbaijan among its worshipers.
A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that Rep. John Murtha cannot be sued for accusing U.S. Marines of murdering Iraqi civilians "in cold blood," remarks that sparked outrage among conservative commentators.
The appeals court in Washington dismissed a defamation lawsuit brought by a Marine who led the squad in the attack. The judges agreed with Murtha that he was immune from the lawsuit because he was acting in his official role as a lawmaker when he made the comments to reporters.
Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich of Meriden, Conn., claimed Murtha damaged his reputation by saying the squad he was leading engaged in "cold-blooded murder and war crimes" in Haditha, Iraq, on Nov. 19, 2005. On to Scotus
Murtha will win this if it goes to SCOTUS. Once the court decides that Murtha was acting within his official duties it has no choice but to dismiss the suit.
Suing Murtha isn't the best way to go. Finding a suitable opponent, funding that person and seeing Murtha lose in 2010, now that my friends would be revenge ...
#1
Some folks depend on technicalities to survive. Since when is making unfounded accusations against the armed forces a lawmaker's duty? Ponder the ramifications here.
#2
Wow - what this is basically saying is that a congressman is above the law. They can make any claim, any accusation, any slander at all anywhere and for any reason and have it part of their 'official role'.
Remember Sack-o-Shit was on a national television show - not on the senate floor. It was expressing Its opinion and not speaking for the Senate.
This sets a very bad prescient for future campaigns and give the incumbent an immense advantage.
As for finding a replacement. Good Luck. He can call them rednecks and they will still vote for him.
They have. It doesn't make any difference. The votes in his district want the income it brings in and doesn't give a crap about the quality of their representative. They have no shame. They're tribal. He'll die in office. Then the payback will begin as their rep won't have a day of seniority and all the business flees to the district of the next rep with the key seat in Congress.
"Official role" in on the floor of the House. Nothing more, nothing less. Just as lawyers get way with outlandish accusations within the confines of the court. Anything else violates the base concept of equality before the law. Four legs good, two legs better.
#5
Just more evidence that convinces me we're at the point of a "governmental singularity" - a point beyond which we, the people, can no longer constrain out government in any meaningful way.
#7
Murtha will not lose an election, because he is a master cheat. Because they have an open primary, in previous elections, he has had Democrats run on the Republican primary ticket, then told his followers to vote for them instead of the real Republican. The winning Democrat would then not campaign against Murtha.
He also believes in unlawful cheating as well.
A though he hates the military, he fully supports the defense contractors in his district as a quid pro quo for them supporting him. Any who refuse he puts out of business.
No, the only ways he will ever be put out of office is either if he is financially ruined, convicted of a felony, or they have to scrape his decaying carcass out of the chair.
#10
The rule is actually a good one, even if slime like Murtha get to hide behind it. Think of all the scurrilous lawsuits the left would have filed against Bush.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/15/2009 21:31
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#3
AOL/TOPIX NEWS > MASSIVE ASTEROID HEADED OUR WAY [2029-2036, space rock APOPHIS under watch + ASTROPHYSICIST SAYS APOPHIS ASTEROID CAN STRIKE EARTH [generate devastatng tidal waves/tsunamis].
* Lest we fergit, OLD DREAM/VISION > PACIFIC REGION - People on a FUTURE GUAM see massive horrifying explosions on the MOON; + "WEAKENING SOLAR MAGENTIC FIELDS" [MSM-Net News] = NORMAL ORBITS OF INNER PLANETS, ETC, SPACE ROCKS/OBJECTS WILL GENER WEAKEN + DESTABILIZE.
Also from TOPIX > SOLAR/SUN ACTVITY RESPONSIBLE FOR CLIMATE FLUCTUATIONS.
** DARTH VADER > "The Power to destroy a planet [Death Star = Techs] is insignificant to the Power of the Force"!
#4
Broadly, any desired future OWG-NWO = GLOBAL GUBBERMINT FRANKEN/-ZILLA PERTS + ALIGNED mad Mad MAD M-A-D MMMMMMMAAAAAAADDDDDDDDD, "MAD" spelled M-O-D-E = "MAD", SCIENTISTS have 20-30 Yarns to save the Earth + Moon, One andor Both, NOT COUNTING OF COURSE THE OTHER RUSSIAN-DISCOVERED SPACE ROCKS; SPACE PHENOMS, .....
.......@ETC.
The Obama Administration is reconsidering its decision to boycott the upcoming UN Human Rights Council anti-racism conference, dubbed "Durban II," according to a State Department announcement issued on Monday.
A few months ago Obama joined Israel, Canada and Italy in saying he would not take part in the event because a draft declaration scheduled to be adopted by the council singled out Israel, accusing the Jewish state of being a racist entity.
UN officials last month said they were revising the document, and in fact removed all direct references to Israel. However, Israeli officials noted that the document was also altered to reaffirm the conclusions of the first Durban conference held in 2001, which was an orgy of anti-Israel sentiment that both Israel and the US walked out of.
Israelis fear that Obama's participation in the conference will legitimize some of the most hostile and racist sentiments toward Israel.
#3
Compare POTUS BAMMER's new proposed "FIVE PILLARS", versus WORLD MIL FORUM > IIUC CHINA'S "FIVE TRICKS/VEILS":REGIONAL MILITARY ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS AGZ INDIA.
* Advanced MBTS to Pakland, other pro-China Nations.
* Dev and procurement of Advanced Indigenous Military-Combat Aviation.
* Support for Communist Party of Nepal [Nepal Maoists].
* PCorrect Overt, Covert supportfor ANTI-GOVT FORCES IN NORTHERN INDIA [Indian Maoists].
* Development + expansion of Chin MilBases in MYANMAR, SRI LANKA [Indian Ocean influence].
* Deployment of NUCLEAR-CAPABLE DF-11's, DF-15's, etc. SRBMS/SRTMS in TIBET.
Tehreek Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Muhammadi (TNSM) chief Sufi Muhammad asked the Swat Taliban on Tuesday to lay down arms after President Asif Zardari approved the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation, but Taliban spokesman Muslim Khan said in a tepid response his men would surrender arms only after they see sharia enforced in Malakand. "The Taliban should lay down weapons after the signing of the sharia regulation by the president," Sufi said while talking to reporters. Then his lips fell off.
"We will do that when the sharia is enforced and we see changes on the ground," Muslim Khan told Daily Times by telephone from Mingora. "When we are satisfied with the practical steps, we will lay down weapons," he said. "And how soon will that be?"
"Ten thousand years oughta do it!"
He asked the Taliban to avoid displaying weapons in public in major towns of the division. But Sufi said the Taliban should now "play their role in development of the people and the area. heir demand for the imposition of sharia has been met and carrying weapons has no logic now." Expression #89: "Look of wide-eyed innocence."
He welcomed the National Assembly's approval of the regulation. "See? They really did know what wuz good for them!"
Meanwhile, Qazi courts began functioning in Swat with full legal powers. The courts had started functioning on March 12 in six tehsils of Swat. However, the new qazi courts would not hear cases against the Taliban, The Associated Press quoted the TNSM chief as telling a private TV channel. "We intend to bury the past," he said. "Along with the rest of you bastards!"
This article starring:
MUSLIM KHAN
TTP
SUFI MUHAMAD
TNSM
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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60-day global covert operation by Indian intelligence agencies leads to Pak Lashkar operatives detention in Europe
A secret, determined global effort by India to track down those involved in the November 26 Mumbai attacks has borne fruit.
Riazs arrest will further strengthen the 26/11 case trial, which begins in a special court inside the high-security Arthur Road jail on Wednesday. Shahid Jamil Riaz, a key Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT) operative who handled financial transactions and was among the core group of 26/11 conspirators, has been detained in a European country, top officials in the Ministry of Home Affairs have told Hindustan Times.
Riaz is likely to be brought to India by the end of this week, where he will be officially charged and arrested.
The breakthrough, indicating the global reach of the conspirators, comes on a day Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said India had given enough evidence to Pakistan.
Riazs arrest will further strengthen the 26/11 case trial, which begins in a special court inside the high-security Arthur Road jail on Wednesday. The arrest will also validate Indias stand that Pakistani nationals were involved in the attack, which left 173 dead and more than 300 injured.
A retired teacher from a village near Bahawalpur in Pakistan, Riaz went to Spain to facilitate the procurement of the Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP), said sources in the Ministry of Home Affairs. It was later procured in the name of one Javed Iqbal, a Lashkar operative, said the official.
The virtual phone number used for VOIP was initially set up with the US-based service provider Callphonix by Riaz, who identified himself as Kharak Singh from India, added the official. All VOIP subscribers are entitled to multiple phone numbers that can be used from different locations, and Riaz requested Callphonix to assign five numbers.
The numbers were used to communicate with the 10 Mumbai attackers. The official said the Pakistani national was also instrumental in the procurement of the Yamaha motor fitted on the rubber dingy the terrorists used to land in Colaba, after leaving MV Kuber the fishing trawler used to travel from Pakistan up to the Mumbai coast two nautical miles off the Indian coast.
Top Lashkar commanders Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, Muzzamil alias Yusuf and Abu-Al-Qama used the VOIP service to keep in touch with eight of the 10 terrorists who laid siege on the three hotels for nearly 60 hours. Transcripts of these calls, prepared by the Mumbai crime branch, said the terrorists had made 284 calls and talked for nearly 20 hours to their handlers in Pakistan.
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009
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President Asif Ali Zardari's decision to bow to Taliban demands and impose the Nizam-e-Adl in Malakand division was marked by the Al Qaeda-allied militants taking over Buner, just 60 miles from Islamabad.
The takeover in Buner, with almost no resistance from security forces, marked a major advance for the Taliban, a report published in The St Petersburg Time stated. It said the government's endorsement of Islamic law further increased their political clout. In Washington, the Obama administration had no immediate comment.
Most serious: According to the report, Pakistan constitutes the most serious security threat the US administration faces in light of the Taliban's advance, the military's inability or unwillingness to combat them, the government's weakness and the country's economic crisis. The report notes that the decision to implement sharia came after parliament, under what amounted to a death threat from the Taliban, unanimously approved a resolution backing the move.
The takeover of Buner and the imposition of sharia in Swat are an outgrowth of the Taliban's violent conquest of Swat, completed in February. The provincial government in the NWFP had forged a deal with the Taliban, agreeing to the imposition of Islamic law in return for an end to the fighting, but the accord didn't enter into force because Zardari hesitated to give the necessary assent.
Position of defeat: The US has voiced concerns over the deal in Swat, as have members of Pakistan's small liberal elite. But politicians said they were left with few options after a band of Taliban defeated the army in Swat. "This (sharia) has been imposed from a position of defeat," said Iqbal Haider, a co-chairman of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP). "This is a formula for the Talibanisation of Pakistan."
The report predicts that Western-style schools, where English is the language of instruction, could be the Taliban's next target. Several schools in Islamabad closed on Monday, and others in Punjab, the country's most populous region, have beefed up their security.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
The takeover in Buner, with almost no resistance from security forces
As expected, Gov. Kathleen Sebelius on Monday vetoed legislation that would have allowed the construction of two 700-megawatt coal-burning power plants in southwest Kansas. She vetoed three similar bills last year. On Monday, in her newest veto message, Sebelius said of the legislation, "What was a bad idea last year, is an even worse idea today."
"President Barack Obama is moving toward regulating carbon dioxide emissions, and Kansas doesn't need the plants for its own energy needs," she said. And, she said, the Legislature's attempt to marry renewable initiatives to the bill was a failure because many of the so-called "green" provisions ended up watered down.
"Once again, as the rest of the country moves toward a renewable energy future, the Legislature is intent on darkening Kansas' energy future with new coal plants that will provide energy we don't yet need," she said.
The veto sets up a showdown with lawmakers when they return for the wrap-up session on April 29. A two-thirds majority is required to overturn a veto. Reading the comments from the Berkely-on-the-KawLawrence Journal World shows just how unpopular the veto is. Thought you all might like to know a little more about the potential HHS Secretary. Also, apparently she accepted an admitted donation of $17,000 from currently notorious abortion doctor (who IMO was unfairly tried as the procedures were legal at the time) but may be as much as 3x that amount "Which I (Sebelius) will look into". It is known that part of the job is accepting donations but this case has been all over the news. For her to not know that bit of information is telling. $17,000 is a lot of money out here folks; $51,000 is a decent chunk anywhere especially from an individual.
She began her professional public office career as the Insurance Commissioner and kicked out many companies, most of which rightfully so, but with the credible talk of federal insurance this is a good tidbit to keep in mind. She would make a great face IMO for such a move at the federal level kinda like Mom (from Futurama).
Also, I don't know if the rest of the world got to see the botoxed interview process (no problem there, seems to be in vogue, right Mr. Kerry?) but it was a hoot to watch the potential HHS Secretary handwipe her nose before shaking hands with the interview panal.
#2
Who cares? As Americans it should be our goal to allow every citizen the right and ability to cheaply light every square inch of their property like downtown Tokyo at midnight. Until we can offer that opportunity for a few cents per day we won't have reached a point where we can say to those willing to build new generating plants, "That's nice but we just don't need any more energy ...."
#5
Oh what wonderful Green world the future will be. The government will pay for every community to build farms of humongous wind turbines to re-charge the batteries of our electric cars. We will then all ride-share together down to the mass transit hub. (If your lucky I may even share some of my homemade Trail mix.) From there we can travel to our organic gardens or to the co-ops to barter for handcrafted goods. Golly along the way we may even see a unicorn or maybe even
#7
Everyone; Kansas could sell it to Colorado for starters. As I understand, electricity is a tradable commodity; adding power to the grid adds power to the entire grid as well as adjusting your S&D graph. Would help charge the golf carts and electric combines. Can't wait to see the battery powered cattle truck...it'l be HUGE!
#8
What was not mentioned is that she has been effectively excommunicated from the Catholic church, and it was done so in such a way that any Priest who offers her communion anywhere in the country will be in contention with his Bishop.
It was a major breakthrough in the Catholic church clamping down on pro-abortion politicians. To make things even more dramatic, the recent Notre Dame hubbub has galvanized bishops all over the US, and any arguments about powerful political allies have gone right out the window.
There are currently about 155 Catholic congressmen and senators right now. Many are of the opinion that there needs to be a LOT fewer of them calling themselves Catholic.
#9
I work for the company trying to bring in the two plants. We're a co-op and for those not acquainted with the process.....we are non-profit. We sell the power for what it costs us to generate it.
Weblink to the project: http://www.holcombstation.coop/
Our corporate website:
www.sunflower.net
Also checkout the link for the bioenergy center we plan also:
http://www.sunflowerbioenergy.com/
As much as I'd like to see her gone from Kansas, I still reel from the thought of her at the FEDERAL level.
[Jakarta Post] legislative candidate from West Javan town of Banjar was found dead allegedly after committing suicide by hanging Tuesday morning, kompas.com reported.
Sri Hayati, 23, of the National Awakening Party (PKB), was found dead at a hut in the middle of a rice field just seven kilometers away from her inlaws after she was reported missing for two days. Hayati, who was five months pregnant, was thought to have committed suicide after securing marginal votes during the legislative elections on April 9.
According to Lankaplancar police officer Adung, Hayati went missing Sunday evening.
Adung said Hayati's husband, Mastur Maulana Yusuf, went to look for her and filed a missing persons report at the police office Monday evening.
No signs of violance or injuries were found on the body when she was discovered by a tree sapper on Tuesday morning, leading the police to suggest that Hayati's death was connected to her failed candidacy for the regional council. Hayati was said to have secured a mere 10 votes within the Banjar I constituency, which included Banjar and Purwaharja.
PKB Banjar representative Zaenal Muttaqien, however, denies police allegation. "There was no pressure. Hayati was just a party supporter, she wasn't a party functionalist or member of the party's steering committee. She was only added to the party's list of candidates in order to fulfill the 30 percent quota for women," Muttaqien argued.
Meanwhile in Central Kalimantan's Palangka Raya, two legislative candidates and three political party supporters were admitted into the Kalawa Atei Assylum (BKJM) on Tuesday.
According to BKJM chief Wineini Marhaeni Rubay, one of the legislative candidate arrived on April 10 suffering severe mental distress and had received emergency treatment prior to being transferred to the Joint Adulam Ministry Foundation mental hospital. Two other legislative candidates displayed signs of similar stress and have been undergoing intensive treatment, she added.
"The legislative candidate who suffered severe mental distress was said to have acted strange after the election, he declined to shower, eat, and would keep laughing everytime he saw the vote tally of his party," Rubay said while declining to mention the name and political party he belonged to.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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[Geo News] The White House said Tuesday that an accord signed by PakistanŽŽs president putting Malakand Region under Islamic law in a bid to combat the Taliban went against human rights and democracy.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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Tearful soldiers carried the casket of Trooper Karine Blais onto a waiting plane at Kandahar Airfield in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday during a solemn ramp ceremony honouring a woman described as "full of energy" and "friendly to everyone."
Blais, 21, was killed Monday when the armoured vehicle she was in hit a roadside bomb north of the city of Kandahar.
At the ceremony on Tuesday, bagpipe music played as 2,400 soldiers some weeping openly lined the tarmac to salute Blais's casket, which is being flown back to Canada. "We will remember Karine as a woman who loved to smile, who was full of energy and who was very friendly to everyone around her," Padre Martine Bélanger, a Catholic lay chaplain, said during the ceremony.
Blais, who had only been in Afghanistan for two weeks, was the second female Canadian soldier to be killed in the war-torn country. Her death comes nearly three years after Capt. Nicola Goddard was killed in a grenade attack west of Kandahar.
Blais was from the 12th Armoured Regiment of Canada based at Canadian Forces Base Valcartier in Quebec, but she was serving with the 2nd Battalion, Royal 22nd Regiment Battle Group, also based in Valcartier. She grew up in the small town of Les Méchins on the Gaspé Peninsula in Quebec, where she spent her teen years babysitting and working at a convenience store and restaurant.
A statement released by her family on Tuesday said she often asked her mother if she was proud of her. "To answer your question, yes, we are always proud of you, despite the sadness that has enveloped us," the statement said. "In our eyes, you were a soldier who displayed dynamic leadership and who was dedicated to your regiment. You loved your job in the military and you were very proud of yourself You are our ray of sunshine and you will always be in our hearts. Your sense of humour and your vivacity will remain forever in our memories."
Blais leaves behind her mother, Josée, her grandmother, Laurette, and her brother, Billy. She also had a partner named Hugo who she lovingly called Kermit.
Before the ramp ceremony began, Brig.-Gen. Jonathan Vance said Blais believed in her role in Afghanistan and was dedicated to the mission. "She was an energetic soldier who gave 100 per cent to every challenge she faced," he said. "Frank and direct, she demonstrated the qualities of a future leader who was respected by all members of her squadron."
Her death brings the total of Canadian soldiers killed to 117 since Canada's combat mission in Afghanistan began shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. One Canadian diplomat and two Canadian aid workers have also been killed in Afghanistan.
Thank you, Trooper, rest in peace, and deep condolences to your mates and family.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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#1
If I was Canada I would pull my troops out of this miserable country.
#3
Bon voyage, Quebecois! May God be so good as to give your soul the peace and sanctuary it deserves.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/15/2009 11:33
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#4
Can we stop being "nice" now?
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/15/2009 14:43
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#5
French speakers have always opposed Canada's wars. Most opposed the Afghan mission, although thousands of French speakers would welcome participation.
Hint: They are not exactly rebels, any more. They wield true political as well as military power.
MINGORA, Pakistan -- Thousands of Islamist militants are pouring into Pakistan's Swat Valley and setting up training camps here, quickly making it one of the main bases for Taliban fighters and raising their threat to the government in the wake of a controversial peace deal.
President Asif Ali Zardari effectively ratified the government's deal with the Taliban Monday by signing a bill that imposes Islamic law in Swat, a key plank of the accord, hours after legislators overwhelmingly approved a resolution urging it. Pakistani officials have touted the deal, reached in February, as a way to restore peaceful order in the bloodied region -- which lies just a few hours' drive from the capital -- and halt the Taliban's advance.
Yet a visit to the Taliban-controlled valley here found mounting evidence that the deal already is strengthening the militants as a base for war. U.S. officials contend the pact has given the Taliban and its allies in al Qaeda and other Islamist groups an advantage in their long-running battle against Pakistan's military.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: john frum ||
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#1
Hint: They are not exactly rebels, any more.
They never were. They are a creation of the Pakistani power structure. One that threatens to fly out of control of Islamabad.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009 1:29
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#2
Has long since flown. Islamabad just doesn't realize it.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009 9:30
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[Kyodo: Korea] Stephen Bosworth, the U.S. special representative for North Korea policy, expressed willingness Tuesday to consider holding direct talks with North Korea when necessary, a Japanese lawmaker said. Bosworth signaled the stance during a meeting with Seiji Maehara, a vice president of JapanŽs main opposition Democratic Party of Japan, after North Korea ordered U.S. nuclear experts engaging in disablement of nuclear facilities in Yongbyon and U.N. nuclear agency staff monitoring the work to leave the country, Maehara told reporters.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Weak.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009 0:43
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#2
OK, I admit I haven't followed this as closely as I should, but are we responding to the latest clumsy provocation by the Norks with an immediate concession and show of weakness? That's what it sounds like.
Sheesh. Collapse on the Iran front, continuation/worsening of the Bush collapse on the Nork front. With these idiots in power in Washington, Hirohito would have easily have secured conditional surrender (keeping Manchukuo, the Marianas, and Indochina) after Iwo. Maybe after Saipan.
On this day in history: April 15th
1892 The General Electric Company is formed.
1923 Insulin becomes generally available for use by diabetics.
1943 An Allied bomber attack misses the Minerva automobile factory and hits the Belgian town of Mortsel instead, killing 936 civilians.
1945 The Bergen-Belsen concentration camp is liberated.
1947 Jackie Robinson debuts for the Brooklyn Dodgers, breaking baseball's color line.
1952 The maiden flight of the B-52 Stratofortress
1989 Upon Hu Yaobang's death, the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 begin in the People's Republic of China.
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/15/2009 8:40
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#5
Do you think we'll see the day when LCD monitors are replaced by holographic displays? Screens that literally appear out of thin air in full color?
What do you think? Holographic technology is still fairly new but there are scientists out there who believe we've only begun to tap into it.
There are also people working on holographic based cloaking devices for use in combat. In 10 years we could be looking back on the technology of today and laughing.
[Kyodo: Korea] Japan and the United States are planning to propose designating more than 10 North Korean business corporations and other organizations whose assets should be frozen under fresh sanctions to be imposed in connection with the countryŽs nuclear and missile development programs, U.N. diplomatic sources said Tuesday. The two countries are also planning to propose adding to a list of embargoed goods to North Korea a variety of items that could be used for nuclear or missile development, the sources said.
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" This significant breakthrough in our research program gives a means of preserving the valuable genetics of our elite racing and milk producing camels in the future "
Dr. Lulu Skidmore
[Al Arabiya Latest] The world's first cloned camel was born in Dubai paving the way for scientists to create elite-camels that can excel in racing or milk producing.
The female calf is named Injaz, Arabic for achievement, and was born on April 8 after five years of work by scientists at the Camel Reproduction Center and the Central Veterinary Research Laboratory in a project initiated by the ruler of Dubai.
The work started in 2003 when scientists developed a method to develop a so called "reconstructed embryo," an embryo which carries the DNA of a single donor camel using eggs harvested from a female and implanted into a surrogate.
Injaz was cloned from a randomly chosen camel -- slaughtered for food in 2005 -- and was the only calf born alive out of seven pregnancies. Scientists say in the future they will look into cloning camels specifically for racing and milk production.
"This significant breakthrough in our research program gives a means of preserving the valuable genetics of our elite racing and milk producing camels in the future," Dr. Lulu Skidmore, the center's scientific director, said in a statement. [Repeatedly bashes head into concrete wall at the thought of people who pedigree their racing livestock and marry their first cousins.]
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#1
By the way, there in your region...how are we coming there with the challenges of Gastro-enteritis, poliomyelitis, tuberculosis, brucellosis, hepatitus, Avian Influenza, Leishmania, Mumps, Salmonella, and Shigella?
The legs are long, the eyes are big, the bodies curvaceous.
Contestants in this Saudi-style beauty pageant have all the features you might expect anywhere else in the world, but with one crucial difference -- the competitors are camels.
This week, the Qahtani tribe of western Saudi Arabia has been welcoming entrants to its Mazayen al-Ibl competition, a parade of the "most beautiful camels" in the desolate desert region of Guwei'iyya, 120 km (75 miles) west of Riyadh.
"In Lebanon they have Miss Lebanon," jokes Walid, moderator of the competition's Web site. "Here we have Miss Camel."
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[Geo News] US Senator and Chairman US Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs John Kerry said that drone attacks on tribal areas in Pakistan was a complex issue. But added that a careful approach was being adopted in this connection. He expressed concerns over enforcement of Nizam-e-Adl Regulation in Malakand, saying he doesn't have much information about the regulation. "I firmly believe that US economic aid will be provided to Pakistan," he said. Senator Kerry hoped that President Asif Ali Zardari would continue to perform his responsibilities in a better way.
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#1
Isn't Kerry the guy who led a secret drone attack across the Durand Line in '8 with only his lucky CIA hat and Martin Sheen for support?
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04/15/2009 1:24
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You are thinking of Rudyard Kipling. Kerry was the guy who went looking for Marlon Brando up around the Cambodian border.
Abdelaziz Bouteflika was re-elected to a third term with 90.23% of the vote.
[Maghrebia] Algeria's Constitutional Council on Monday (April 13th) confirmed the official results from the April 9th presidential election, local and international press reported. Abdelaziz Bouteflika was re-elected to a third term with 90.23% of the vote. Louisa Hanoune of the Workers' Party finished second with 4.5%, while none of the other four candidates received more than 2.5% of the vote. Voter turnout was 74.56%.
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[Geo News] The Muttahida Qaumi Movement on Tuesday rejected the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation (NAR) and termed the regulation a conspiracy to sabotage sectarian harmony in the country. Addressing an emergency meeting of Raabita Committee at Khursheed Begam Memorial Hall here, MQM Quaid Altaf Hussain said implementation of the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation in Swat will set a precedent for the extremist and influential people in other parts of the country to impose their rule in their respective areas. Altaf said that the MQM was not against implementation of Shariah rather it opposed the Taliban Shariah in Malakand division. He said the extremist elements were actively engaged in sabotaging the peace and law and order in Swat and its adjoining areas and challenged the writ of the government. He said the MQM abstained from voting in the National Assembly, as they wanted detailed discussion on the matter in the House. Â"We have certain questions in our mind regarding the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation and we want their answers.Â" Talking to media after the Raabita Committee meeting, Dr. Farooq Sattar said the implementation of NAR was unconstitutional and negated people's mandate of February 18.
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#1
I can see the MQM being targeted by the ISI/Taliban!!!
[Al Arabiya Latest] Iran plans to send a bigger satellite into space on a rocket with a range of up to 1,500 km (930 miles), President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday, in comments that may spark further Western concern.
" A rocket with a range of 700-1,500 km is scheduled to take a bigger satellite (than Omid) into space "
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
Iran launched a domestically made satellite, called Omid, into orbit for the first time in February; a step that worried Western powers which fear the republic is seeking to build a nuclear bomb and missile delivery systems.
Iran, the world's fourth-largest oil producer, says its nuclear program is to generate electricity, and that the Feb. 3 launch of the Omid satellite was for peaceful telecommunications and research purposes.
The long-range ballistic technology used to put satellites into orbit could also be used to launch warheads, although Iran says it has no plans to do so.
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#1
Since when are satellite launchers stated to have a "range" on earth?
Posted by: john frum ||
04/15/2009 11:48
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Article read, NORTH KOREA plans to send rocket into somehwere again???
[Al Arabiya Latest] A bloc of Islamic states accused of undermining human rights standards set by the United Nations have taken matters into their own hands and set out to establish their own independent human rights commission Sunday.
The Organization of Islamic Conference, a 57-nation bloc of Muslim nations and the largest organization after the U.N., met yesterday at its headquarters in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia to establish an independent OIC human rights commission.
Eklemeddin Ýhsanoðlu, the OIC Secretary-General, stressed in a statement Monday that "human rights and man's dignity are an integral part of Islam and core components of Islamic culture and heritage."
Refining Cairo hr declaration
All human rights are subject to sharia, or Islamic law.
Member states also discussed "refining" the OIC's 1990 Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam (CDHRI), which gave an overview of the Islamic perspective on human rights and stated that all human rights are subject to sharia, or Islamic law.
The OIC has over the past decades sponsored the "defamation of religion" resolution at the U.N. General Assembly, the latest of which was a resolution condemning the Danish cartoons of the Prophet.
It will seek assistance from other international bodies such as the U.N.'s Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights and the Geneva Institute for Human Rights in setting up the new commission. Ýhsanoðlu said in his speech that such a commission would drive OIC member states to reform intellectually and politically. "An OIC human rights commission would promote tolerance, and fundamental freedoms, good governance, the rule of law, accountability, openness, dialogue with other religions and civilizations, the rejection of extremism and fanaticism, and the strengthening of the sense of pride in the Islamic identity," he said.
Sharia vs. human rights
Both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have accused Muslim countries including Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Egypt and Tunisia among many others of human rights violations against women and religious minorities despite many states being signatories to international human rights conventions.
Western human rights groups argue that some of the ways Islamic law is applied can lead to discrimination against women, religious minorities and converts to other faiths.
However, Islamic scholars and leaders have continued to refute western claims that sharia is incompatible with international norms of human rights and freedoms, arguing instead that the interpretation and application of Islamic law is what can lead to negative human rights outcomes.
Just as U.S. courts ruled that detainees in the "war on terror" could be held indefinitely without trial or permitted torture in contravention of internationa human rights norms, some sharia-based courts twist Islamic law to sanction cruel punishments.
Compatible with the west
In their defense of Islamic law experts refer to its protection of women's property rights and the rights of the socially marginalized like orphans or the elderly. Steven A. Cook, an expert on Islamic law and the west, said that interpretations of what Islamic law means are so variable that in some western societies it can be incorporated into non-Islamic political systems easily.
None of the 14 OIC states that are considered "electoral democracies" are Arab.
Ihsanoglu in his speech also suggested the compatibility of the Islamic notion of human rights and international norms, saying that refurbishing the Cairo human rights declaration will be "in keeping with the current global human rights discourse," though he did not specify how this would be done.
Several OIC member states follow sharia law, which has been compared to the Western tradition of common law, for personal status and criminal issues. None of the 14 OIC states that are considered "electoral democracies" are Arab.
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" If the line cuts off when the telephone is placed close to the needle ... that proves the existence of the substance "
Saudi Gazette
[Al Arabiya Latest] From ponzi schemes to sewing machines, it seems scams target everyone. Saudi police are investigating the origins of a hoax that had hundreds of people believing that old sewing machines may bring fortune because they contained an elusive, and probably mythical, substance known as red mercury.
Saudi newspapers on Tuesday published pictures of Saudis proudly posing next to old sewing machines awaiting prospective buyers at traditional markets. The English-language Saudi Gazette newspaper said some buyers were willing to pay up to 200,000 riyals ($50,000) for an old Singer sewing machine proven to contain red mercury.
Mobile phones are supposedly employed as instruments to prove the existence of the phony substance. Popular belief in the Middle East has it that it can help uncover hidden gold treasures, though there are other theories which say it can be used to create a nuclear bomb. "If the line cuts off when the telephone is placed close to the needle ... that proves the existence of the substance," Saudi Gazette said.
Al-Eqtisadiah newspaper said "poverty provided a fertile ground for the red mercury rumor to spread in Saudi society, especially the middle class."
"We have to find out who started this hoax. We cannot be 100 percent sure of getting in the short-term to the person or persons who started this," an interior ministry spokesman told Reuters. "People hope to make profit. This is no different to cases of citizens who put their money in untrustworthy schemes," he added.
Thousands of Saudi citizens have lost their life savings to financial scams consisting mainly of operations to raise money for real estate projects.
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poverty provided a fertile ground for the red mercury rumor to spread in Saudi society, especially the middle class
[Jakarta Post] Malaysia's ruling coalition was rocked by fresh political turmoil Tuesday amid suspicions that its legislators were trying to oust an unpopular leader in an oil-rich state.
The apparent revolt is the latest headache for new Prime Minister Najib Razak, who is trying to curb infighting in his bid to revive support for the coalition of the National Front.
But the effort suffered a setback amid intense speculation that some representatives were planning a no-confidence vote against Terengganu state Chief Minister Ahmad Said, who has become hugely unpopular after removing key officials he allegedly disliked.
In an apparent snub to Ahmad, 10 of the coalition's 24 lawmakers in the northeastern state did not attend a legislative meeting Tuesday, said Rahman Mokhtar, a National Front legislator who attended the meeting and opted out of the revolt.
Open revolts are rare in the ruling coalition and brings attention to factions that could undermine efforts to forge a more united, effective front against a resurgent opposition.
The rebellion is also a major distraction for the prime minister as he grapples with dissent among ethnic Indian and Chinese minority officials who have questioned decisions by Malay majority leaders.
At a news conference Tuesday, the 10 lawmakers said they avoided the meeting out of fears for their safety, the national news agency Bernama reported. Three of them alleged they received text messages with threats of violence and death.
Bernama quoted their chief representative, Rosol Wahid, as saying the group was not planning a no-confidence vote. However, several local media reports said such a vote was likely.
Ahmad has warned in recent days that any National Front lawmaker who introduces a vote against him would face disciplinary action, including expulsion from the coalition.
It is widely known that most of the 10 dissenting legislators have been unhappy with Ahmad's appointment. He took office amid controversy last March after the state's constitutional ruler rejected the National Front's initial choice for the chief ministerial post in the coastal state.
Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, who met with several Terengganu legislators prepared to discuss the conflict, said Tuesday it was "a matter of concern" because the problems in Terengganu would grow worse.
The rebellion is unlikely to affect the National Front's control of Terengganu, where it holds 24 of the 32 state legislature seats. Some political observers also believe Najib would prefer a new chief minister in Terengganu.
The National coalition has governed Malaysia for nearly 52 years and controls nine of Malaysia's 13 states. It retained power with its weakest parliamentary majority ever in March 2008 elections.
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Compare wid TOPIX/WORLD MIL FORUM > THAILAND'S GOVT. ORDERS CONTINGENCY PLANS FOR EVACUATION OF LEADERS, FALL OF GOVERNMENT.
[Jakarta Post] Singapore's economy plummeted nearly 20 percent in the first quarter, its biggest contraction ever, flagging a miserable start to the year for other export-dependent Asian nations grappling with the worst global slump in decades. Gross domestic product in this wealthy Southeast Asian city-state plunged an annualized, seasonally adjusted 19.7 percent in the first quarter from the previous quarter and fell 11.5 percent from a year earlier, both record drops, the Trade and Industry Ministry said Tuesday.
The government now expects the economy to shrink between 6 percent and 9 percent this year from a previous forecast of a drop between 2 percent and 5 percent, the ministry said in a statement. The 2009 growth forecast has now been cut three times.
Singapore announced in January a $14 billion stimulus package, and the government may boost spending again in June to help bolster the economy, said Tai Hui, head of Southeast Asia research for Standard Chartered in Singapore. "We believe we are facing a Great Recession, but we are not going into a Great Depression," Hui said. "We still expect to see some signs of stabilization at the end of 2009, although admittedly mild."
The island's economy has already contracted quarter-on-quarter over four consecutive quarters.
Singapore was the first country in Asia to report GDP figures for the January-March period, and its dismal showing suggests the region's most export-dependent economies - such as Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong - may face deeper and longer recessions than previously estimated. China announces preliminary first quarter GDP results on Thursday.
The city-state's central bank, known as the Monetary Authority of Singapore, said it lowered the center of its currency trading band, which was effectively a small, one-time devaluation of the Singapore dollar. But it said there was no reason for "any undue weakening" of the Singapore dollar.
Standard Chartered's Hui estimated the devaluation at 1.5 percent.
The central bank's inflation forecast for prices to fall as much as 1 percent this year was unchanged.
Non-oil exports, which accounted for about 60 percent of GDP last year, fell 26 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier. The ministry said it expected sales abroad to contract between 10 percent and 13 percent this year from a previous forecast of a drop of between 9 percent and 11 percent.
One bright spot was exports rose a seasonally adjusted 11 percent in March from the previous month, the ministry's trade promotion agency, International Enterprise Singapore, said in a statement. March exports fell 17 percent from a year earlier.
Manufacturing fell 29 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier while services fell 5.9 percent. Construction rose 26 percent.
Imports fell 28 percent last month from a year earlier and dropped a seasonally adjusted 4.7 percent from the previous month, the ministry said.
Singapore's first quarter GDP results are preliminary and based largely on economic activity in January and February. The government forecast economic growth of as much as 2 percent for this year in an initial forecast in November.
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Sign of the state of world trade and Global finance.
[ADN Kronos] Three top-level officials from a pro-Kurdish political party were among 46 people arrested on Tuesday in a nationwide police operation across Turkey. Raids were conducted in 12 Turkish provinces targeting alleged militants from the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
Turkish anti-terror police detained the 46 suspects and raided the offices of the Democratic Society Party (DSP), as well as the headquarters of local TV station GUN in the southeastern province of Diyarbakir, Turkey's Hurriyet said.
DTP leaders Bayram Altun and Kamuran Yuksek were among those detained by police.
Tuesday's operation, which had reportedly been planned for a year, aimed to expose those with links to the PKK within the DTP, said Hurriyet quoting an unnamed judicial source.
The PKK is committed to the creation of an independent Kurdish state in a geographical region comprising parts of Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran.
Blacklisted as a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States, the PKK began its campaign for self-rule in Turkey's southeast in 1984, triggering a conflict that has claimed an estimated 44,000 lives.
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Saudi Arabia plans to regulate the marriages of young girls, after a court refused to nullify the marriage of an 8-year-old girl with a 50-year-old man, Saudi Arabia's Justice Minister Mohamedal Issa was quoted as saying on Tuesday
The justice ministry was aiming "to put an end to arbitrariness by parents and guardians in marrying off minor girls", Issa told the al-Watan newspaper.
Abolished: The minister's comments suggested that the practice of marrying off minor girls would not be abolished. The regulations would seek to "preserve the rights, fending off blights to end the negative aspects of underage girls' marriage," he said. Last week, a court in the Saudi town of Onaiza upheld for the second time, the marriage of a Saudi girl to a 50-year-old man, on the condition that the man would not consummate the marriage until the girl reached puberty. The minister said any new regulations would be made under the provision that the requirements of universal laws were not binding to religious commandments. Officials at the ministry could not be reached for comment. Financial considerations could prompt some Saudi families to wed their underage daughters to older men. Many Saudi clerics, including the kingdom's chief cleric Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdelaziz al-Sheikh, endorse the practice.
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[Jerusalem Post Front Page] US President Barack Obama is working on a dramatic change in strategy with regard to the Iranian nuclear program, according to officials quoted by the New York Times on Tuesday.
The shift in policy, according to the report, centers on the US dropping its insistence that the Islamic republic immediately cease all activity in its nuclear program during the initial phases of talks. The US would instead encourage Teheran to allow inspectors to visit its nuclear facilities.
The aides quoted in the New York Times report said that Obama was still deciding exact details of the plan.
"We have all agreed that is simply not going to work - experience tells us the Iranians are not going to buy it," a senior European official involved in the talks with the US was quoted as saying of the West's recent attempts to bring about a stop to the Iranian nuclear program. "So we are going to start with some interim steps, to build a little trust."
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#1
oh... shift. Well that's too bad. I accidently misread that the first time through.
#2
Just give the ayatollahs the GPS coordinates of Rome, Paris, Berlin and London and say The One's work here is done.
Posted by: ed ||
04/15/2009 0:37
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"We have all agreed that is simply not going to work - experience tells us the Iranians are not going to buy it," a senior European official involved in the talks with the US was quoted as saying of the West's recent attempts to bring about a stop to the Iranian nuclear program. "So we are going to start with some interim steps, to build a little trust."
WTF?
Maybe it's just me. But essentially the idea is that a recalcitrant, defiant, mendacious regime is going to uh, build trust with us?
So allowing some inspectors will build confidence that the regime's nuke weapons program is not still proceeding?
So a concession in the opening round of a test of wills with a determined treacherous adversary with clear concrete objectives is supposed to .... lead where exactly?
This situation - like a few others - is exceedingly difficult, and there are no easy answers. Still - is this proposed shift as predictable, and farcical, as it sounds here?
#4
They aren't going to buy this step either. And why should they? Intransigence has proven to work for them. Eventually the West will say, "OK you can have a nuke, but only 1!" And the turbans will reply "But Mom, Ivan has thousands!"
#7
The US would instead encourage Teheran to allow inspectors to visit its nuclear facilities.
Encourage? And exactly how is this going to be done? Send ACORN? Community organizing? Conflict resolution techniques? I thought Iran recently kicked out nuke inspectors.
#8
Still - is this proposed shift as predictable, and farcical, as it sounds here?
The next question is does anybody anybody see anything other then a containment policy as the ultimate resolution to the O-Team plan. The Dennis Ross plan calls for direct talks without preconditions. The theory is that this will signal an end to Bushs cowboy diplomacy. And when the Mullahs still refuse to abandon their lust for nuclear weapons the Europeans will somehow grow a spine. Perhaps the real question is will the Israelis sit with an empty dance card during the 18 month Persian ballet.
#10
I recall Jimmy Carter was President when the Iranians seized our embassy. Carter was a weak President. Negotiations were not effective. And exactly why will they will be now???
The Taliban are covertly operating in Karachi and extorting millions of rupees in 'donations' from Mehsud and Wazir tribesmen living in the city, a private TV channel reported on Tuesday. The tribesmen told the channel that a few months ago a Taliban representative had collected more than Rs 2 million in just a few days. The channel said while some of the donors are said to be Taliban sympathisers, others pay them out of fear.
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[Mail and Globe] carmaker General Motors would likely not be swift or simple despite the best efforts of the United States Treasury Department, turnaround experts warn.
That's because court-supervised bankruptcy proceedings are essentially democratic,
Boggle
and all stakeholders -- which in GM's case would include its union, dealers, suppliers and creditors -- have the right to raise objections.
"They all have legal claims, and I don't see where the administration can 'force' them to abandon those claims," said Stephanie Brinley, an analyst with AutoPacific. "Why agree to something GM wants if you think the law is on your side and a bankruptcy judge might decide in your favour?"
The New York Times reported on Monday that the Treasury Department was directing GM to prepare for a bankruptcy court-supervised restructuring despite the company's public contention that it could still reorganise outside court.
$30 billion from the public purse into the pot, and now they decide to go to bankruptcy ...
The goal is to prepare for a fast "surgical" bankruptcy, the Times said, citing unnamed people familiar with the plans.
One option under discussion is to create a new company that would buy GM's "good" asset and leave the less desirable assets, factories and healthcare obligations to be gradually liquidated, the report said.
"Conceptually it makes sense. But there are some serious legal issues that have to be overcome," said Brad Coutler, an analyst with O'Keefe & Associates, which specialises in turning around distressed firms.
Objections from stakeholders have complicated the bankruptcy of GM's former parts supplier, Delphi, which has dragged on for nearly four years and is not close to being complete.
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[Geo News] Three people were killed and five others injured in an armed clash between two groups over a land dispute in Vehari on Tuesday. Following the incident, families of the deceased staged a protest by keeping the dead bodies in the middle of Maitla Chowk. According to reports, the unfortunate incident took place when people of Dangrah clan started to harvest the standing crops of Shah clan who resisted. On this, armed people of Dangrah clan opened fire on their rivals, killing three persons, identified as Nazar Hussain, Muhammad Javed and Shamshad Ahmed on the spot, while wounding five others. The injured were shifted to a nearby hospital. Following the incident, the affected family held a protest demonstration on Mailta Chowk against the killing. Acting DPO Vehari Hafiz Kashif and local people made a failed attempt to hold talks with the affected family as the protest continue. The victims' family vowed that the protest would continue unless accused were not arrested by the police. On the other hand, police officials suspended two junior police officers, Sub Inspector Ghulam Mustafa Qureshi and Sub Inspector Khalid Hussain after the incident.
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[Mail and Globe] Some of the Iraqi former insurgents recruited by United States forces to fight al-Qaeda are secretly plotting to launch terror attacks of their own, Iraqi Vice President Adel Abdel Mahdi warned on Tuesday.
Abdel Mahdi's comments came amid tension between Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's government and the Sahwa, or "Awakening Movement" of militias and former insurgents who switched sides to fight alongside the Americans.
The recruits are now paid by the Iraqi government, and many thousands have been integrated into the Iraqi security forces, but others recently clashed with government troops after a series of arrests of Sahwa leaders.
"It was a movement that allowed us to chase al-Qaeda out of Anbar Province, so it was supported by the government and the Iraqi people. Without the Sahwa it would have been very hard to get rid of al-Qaeda," Abdel Mahdi said.
"We agreed to integrate tens of thousands of Sahwa members in the armed forces, but certain groups took up the Sahwa banner, in Baghdad and elsewhere, even some terrorist groups," he told reporters during a visit to Paris.
"Sometimes we can't distinguish between the two -- the original Sahwa and the falsely created Sahwa. The pretend Sahwa is these groups who are waiting for the right moment to strike," he warned, speaking in French.
"That's why there have been arrests when we have discovered their links with other terrorist groups," he added, while insisting: "But the original Sahwa is a true movement that allowed us to restore order in the country."
Abdel Mahdi said the Sahwa groups established in Anbar Province in western Iraq and in some areas of Baghdad, such as that in the mainly Sunni downtown district of Adhamiyah, were legitimate and in touch with government.
US forces began paying and working with local armed groups in 2006 as some Iraqi tribal and insurgent groups began to turn against al-Qaeda in Iraq, the local franchise of Osama bin Laden's international extremist movement.
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#1
The parallel between this statement and and yesterday's DHS screed that "right wingers" are plotting attacks on the US gov't is too obvious to ignore.
BTW__ did you like the timing of DHS's fantasia? The day before the nationwide Tea Party?
Posted by: Ho Chi Throlugum3771 ||
04/15/2009 15:58
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#2
You mean the ...... "leaked" DHS report that contained the classification markings UNCLAS/FOUO (For OFFICIAL Use Only)?
#3
IIRC STARS-N-STRIPES > IRAQ:WHEN THE US MARINES FINALLY LERAVE WESTERN IRAQ, LOCAL LEADERS WORRY ABOUT WHOM WILL REPLACE THEM [or title to this effect]???
[Jerusalem Post Front Page] The International Atomic Energy Agency says North Korea is expelling its inspectors. The North has also told the UN nuclear watchdog that it is reactivating all of its nuclear facilities. An IAEA statement Tuesday said North Korea has told inspectors to remove seals and cameras from the Yongbyon nuclear site and leave the country as quickly as possible.
The Obama White House meanwhile called on the reclusive communist nation Tuesday to "cease its provocative threats" and respect the international community's will.
Presidential press secretary Robert Gibbs said Pyongyang's vow to restart its nuclear reactor and boycott international disarmament talks is "a serious step in the wrong direction." He said the international community won't accept North Korea "unless it verifiably abandons its pursuit of nuclear weapons."
"We call on North Korea to cease its provocative threats, to respect the will of the international community, and to honor its international commitments and obligations," President Barack Obama's chief spokesman said at his daily briefing with reporters.
North Korea vowed Tuesday to bolster its nuclear deterrent and boycott six-party talks aimed at its denuclearization in protest of a UN Security Council statement condemning the country's recent rocket launch.
North Korea's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it "resolutely condemns" the action by the United Nations, which it said "rampantly" infringes upon the country's sovereignty and "severely debases" the people's dignity. "We have no choice but to further strengthen our nuclear deterrent to cope with additional military threats by hostile forces," the statement said.
The statement also said that "six-party talks that we are taking part in are not necessary any more." Those negotiations, which also involve China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States, began in 2003 and have been aimed at achieving North Korea's denuclearization.
The North also said it will restore nuclear facilities it has been disabling in line with an international disarmament-for-aid deal negotiated under the six-party process and resume operating them.
The statement was the country's first reaction to the Security Council's unanimous condemnation Monday over the April 5 rocket launch, which Pyongyang says sent a satellite into space but critics say tested long-range missile technology.
The Security Council demanded an end to missile tests and said it will expand sanctions against the reclusive communist nation. The council's statement, agreed on by all 15 members and read at a formal meeting of the United Nations' most powerful body, said the launch violated a council resolution adopted after the North conducted a nuclear test explosion in 2006 that banned any missile tests by the country.
The statement was a weaker response than a UN resolution, which had been sought by Japan and the United States but was opposed by China and Russia. US Ambassador Susan Rice insisted the statement is legally binding, just like a resolution - a view backed by Russia - but other diplomats and officials disagreed.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/15/2009
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#1
Look, we all know Kimmie is a big movie guy who likes to make his own epics. Why not just send Jane Fonda, The Dixie Chicks and Barbara Streisand over to keep him cool for a while and give BO (not Bo) time to figure out his next move.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
04/15/2009 11:29
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#2
Surprise... GROUNDHOG DAY!
N. Korea is like a spoiled child throwing a fit over not getting enough attention. Let them cry for a bit....
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.
TOKYO: Pakistan's foreign minister said on Wednesday his country can be a role model for the Muslim world, speaking ahead of a donors' meeting in Japan where Islamabad hopes to secure huge aid contributions. "Pakistan has transferred towards democracy," foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said. "And today I represent a democratically elected government of Pakistan."
[Mail and Globe] At least four mortar shells pounded a northern working-class district of the Congo capital Brazzaville overnight causing heavy damage but no casualties, locals said on Tuesday. 
[ADN Kronos] A top Taliban leader has said that fugitive Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is alive and leading operations against foreign forces in Afghanistan. "Osama bin Laden is still alive and is directing the Jihad (holy war) against American and western forces in Afghanistan," said Taliban commander and Pashtun warlord Sirajuddin Haqqani, quoted by Saudi daily Al-Watan.
[ADN Kronos] Rival Palestinian factions Fatah and the Islamist Hamas movement have reached an historic accord for the creation of a new "confederation" with two governments to rule in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, sources have told Adnkronos International (AKI).
An opinion poll on the 4-7 June European Parliament (EP) elections shows that only 34 percent of possible voters surveyed across the EU say they are already certain that they will go and vote in June, while 19 percent of respondents said they were already certain that they would not vote. 
Tehreek Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Muhammadi (TNSM) chief 
Tearful soldiers carried the casket of Trooper Karine Blais onto a waiting plane at Kandahar Airfield in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday during a solemn ramp ceremony honouring a woman described as "full of energy" and "friendly to everyone."
[Geo News] US Senator and Chairman US Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs John Kerry said that drone attacks on tribal areas in Pakistan was a complex issue. But added that a careful approach was being adopted in this connection. He expressed concerns over enforcement of Nizam-e-Adl Regulation in Malakand, saying he doesn't have much information about the regulation. "I firmly believe that US economic aid will be provided to Pakistan," he said. Senator Kerry hoped that President Asif Ali Zardari would continue to perform his responsibilities in a better way.
[ADN Kronos] Three top-level officials from a pro-Kurdish political party were among 46 people arrested on Tuesday in a nationwide police operation across Turkey. Raids were conducted in 12 Turkish provinces targeting alleged militants from the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
[Mail and Globe] carmaker General Motors would likely not be swift or simple despite the best efforts of the United States Treasury Department, turnaround experts warn. 
[Jerusalem Post Front Page] The International Atomic Energy Agency says North Korea is expelling its inspectors. The North has also told the UN nuclear watchdog that it is reactivating all of its nuclear facilities. An IAEA statement Tuesday said North Korea has told inspectors to remove seals and cameras from the Yongbyon nuclear site and leave the country as quickly as possible. 
