INSURGENTS FOUND GUILTY OF POSSESSION OF ILLEGAL WEAPONS AND EMPLACING IMPROVISED EXPLOSIVE DEVICES
Release Date: 3/1/2006 (I cut out a lot of this.)
BAGHDAD, IraqThe Central Criminal Court of Iraq held 24 trials last week convicting 37 security detainees for various crimes including possession of illegal weapons, illegal border crossing and emplacing improvised explosive devices.
In the first case, Coalition Security Forces apprehended Ali Shaker Mahmoud, Luay Farhan Thiab and Ziad Ahmed Abdulla for burying an improvised explosive device Aug. 26, 2004. All three defendants were charged with emplacing an IED under Article 345 of the Iraqi Penal Code. The Trial Court found all three defendants guilty of emplacing an IED and sentenced them to 2 years confinement with credit given for time served.
In the fourth case, Coalition Security Forces apprehended the below defendants after observing them establishing an ambush position along a main supply route Sept. 18, 2005. The patrol established the observation point because Anti-Iraqi Forces had conducted ambushes of Coalition Convoys for several months from the same point along the supply route. The defendants were charged with violating Article 430 of the Iraqi Penal Code. The Trial Court found the defendants guilty and sentenced them as follows:
1) Jassim Mohammed Ibrahim 2 Years
2) Fhadil Rasheed Salih 2 Years
3) Faris Bizai Jawad 2 Years
4) Ahmed Mahmud Mizhir 2 Years
5) Abdul-Rehman Mohammed 2 Years
6) Khasim Mohammed Ali 2 Years (Half these guys are named Mohammed!)
In the fifth case, Coalition Security Forces apprehended Zahy Abdul Kareem after conducting a raid on his home May 18, 2005. Coalition Security Forces searched the house and found one pound of PE-four explosives, one assembled IED detonation device, one RPG Launcher, two RPG sights, one RPG hand grip, one RPG trigger mechanism, one SKS sniper rifle, three AK-47 assault rifles, two military radio telephone sets, one pound of gun powder, one hundred 9mm rounds of ammunition and two hundred PKC rounds of ammunition. The defendant was charged with violating Coalition Provisional Authority Order 3/2003, 6/2A, Possession of Illegal Weapons. The Trial Court found the defendant guilty and sentenced him to 1 year imprisonment. (Even by Boston standards this strikes me as a lenient sentence.)
In the sixteenth case, Coalition Security Forces apprehended Nayef Dalaf Omar for possession of four hand grenades and an explosive belt Nov. 7, 2003. The Trial Court found the defendant guilty of the charge and sentenced him to 1 year imprisonment and a fine of $1,000 U. S. Dollars.
In the eighteenth case, Coalition Security Forces apprehended Hassan Mohammed Abdullah, a Saudi national, for entering the country of Iraq illegally to assist the insurgency against the government of Iraq Nov. 28, 2004. The Trial Court found the defendant guilty of the charge and sentenced him to Life (20 years) imprisonment. (The big punishment must be for being foreign.)
In the nineteenth case, Coalition Security Forces apprehended Wafiak Mohammed Shihata (What a perfect name!) on suspicion that he allegedly had a weapons cache near his home, was suspected of kidnapping, and may have been involved with five IED explosions near his home July 5, 2005. The defendant was charged with violating Article 1246, Iraqi Passport Law. The Trial Court found the defendant guilty of the charge and sentenced him to 2 years imprisonment.
In the twenty-third case, Coalition Security Forces apprehended Thaer Mohammed Sulayman for illegal border crossing Jan. 4, 2005. The defendant was charged with violating Article 10/1/A of the Iraqi Passport Law, Illegal Border Crossing. The Trial Court found the defendant guilty of the charge and sentenced him to 6 years imprisonment.
To date, the CCCI has held 919 trials of insurgents suspected of anti-Iraqi and anti-Coalition activities threatening the security of Iraq and targeting MNF-I. These proceedings have resulted in 822 individual convictions with sentences ranging up to 30 years imprisonment.
#1
Interesting mix of sentences. Still, in the case where the gentlemen spent almost two years in Iraqi prisons before being tried, I can understand giving them credit for time served. The stories I've seen have not made me confident that Iraqi prisons were far removed from hell holes.
U.S. military operations in the province of Anbar, west of Baghdad, have resulted in the capture of 61 members of al Qaeda in Iraq, Major General Rick Lynch, a U.S. military spokesman, said on Thursday. Bomb making equipment, weapons and munitions were seized in the raids on the training and bomb making facility in an area 50 km (30 miles) northeast of Falluja, Lynch said. Some of al Qaeda in Iraq's "critical facilitators" were included in the 61 people captured, he said.
Iraqi border guards captured a Saudi who admitted he was involved in the suicide attack on the Abqaiq oil facility in Saudi Arabia, an Iraqi military spokesman said Thursday. Abdullah Salah al-Harbi was detained Tuesday by Iraq border guards in the desert along the border between the two countries, said Saadoun al-Jabiri, a spokesman for the Iraqi border guard force. He quoted al-Harbi as saying five other Saudis crossed the border with him but disappeared in the Iraqi desert. Iraqi forces were searching for them, the border guard spokesman said.
Al-Jabiri quoted the Saudi as telling interrogators that "the last operation I took part in was last week's attack on oil facility in Abqaiq." Al-Harbi also said he was wanted by Saudi authorities who had carried out raids around his home, al-Jabiri said. Al-Harbi told interrogators he was headed to the predominantly Sunni northern Iraqi city of Mosul, where he planned to meet cattle merchants who have links with al-Qaida, al-Jabiri said. "I came to Iraq to fight Americans, not Iraqis," the spokesman quoted al-Harbi as saying.
#1
The Saudi and Iraq oil targets (as with elsewhere) are an attempt to halt the flow of oil, methinks, prior to a huge strike to eliminate Israel.
Iran in on the mess, Sadr guiding things in iraq, AL Q moving into Syria and Palestine in large numbers... Seems that the timing for an attempt at something big on Israel would be called the minute pipelines and refineries in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere can be taken out enough to interrupt the flow of oil to the west. In their minds at least.
They figure US and coalition will be unable to defend or strike back. Iran drops whatever nukes they've scrounged up - dirty bombs or otherwise" on Israel - and it's mission accomplished.
They'll kill each other later over who gets to throne the new Khalifate. Mamhoud is sure he'll win, cause the Mahdi's on his side. And AlQ and assorted wahabbis affiliates will assume it's theirs, being the "pious" of all. Iran and Al Q may be in on this together to accomplish such a goal.
Strange enough and insane scenario that just might appeal to Mahmoud Armagheddon.
I gotta get a job at the UN. It sounds better then Massport...
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - An unpopular punctuality drive launched in the U.N. Security Council last month by U.S. Ambassador John Bolton came to an abrupt end on Thursday when Argentina took over the council's rotating presidency. And champagne glasses were raised all over the world...
Bolton had cracked the whip while presiding over the 15-nation U.N. body in February, starting meetings precisely on time, even with empty chairs in the room, as part of a plan to modernise council operations. He had also called in ambassadors almost every morning of the month for closed-door briefings by U.N. staff on overnight global political and peacekeeping developments. C'mon, John, dammit! You act as if this is a real job!
But Argentine Ambassador Cesar Mayoral made clear it would be a different story in March. If ambassadors wanted to come on time, it would be up to them, he told reporters. As for the morning briefings, "this is impossible," he said. "We aren't having a daily briefing each day." Why we haven't even put our hookers in cabs by that time of the morning...
If an ambassador asked for a briefing on a particular matter, he would try to accommodate the request. But absent that, the council work program was simply too heavy, he said. So many restaurants, so little time...
Some ambassadors had grumbled in February that they already had too many commitments to attend the daily sessions. Yeah...ummmmmmmmmm...commitments! That's it!
Bolton has described the U.S. campaign to reform the United Nations as an "irresistible force" pitted against an "immovable object." Bypassing the U.S. Senate, President George W. Bush sent Bolton to the United Nations last August with instructions to shake up the world body after findings of mismanagement and corruption in the $64 billion oil-for-food program for Iraq. Here's a suggetstion. Torch it for the insurance...
Posted by: Sen. Edward M. Kennedy ||
03/02/2006
16:29 ||
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UN - We waste more money than Paris Hilton before 9am!
Nice to see Bolton show these featherbedders up for the bunch of slackers they really are. I never thought bloodsucking could be raised to the level of high art until Koffi and his crew took the helm.
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) Better think twice beofre soothing those aching muscles in a whirlpool bath or hot tub. A new study shows that whirlpool bathtubs can be a breeding ground for a host of disease causing bacteria.
Dr. Rita B. Moyes a microbiologist at Texas A & M University tested 43 water samples from both private and public whirlpool bathtubs. "Every tub tested had some kind of microbial growth," she told Reuters Health.
"And I was just getting the few organisms I was testing for, so
it is probably just the tip of the iceberg as fas as what is really present. Also, I did no viral testing", Moyes Emphasized.
In 95 percent of the tubs, bacteria derived from feces were present, while 81 percent had fungi and 34 percent contained potentially deadly staphylococcus bacteria.
The bacteria found in whirlpool baths can lead to a number of diseases, including infections, skin infections and pneumonia.
Who is most at risk? The young and old and the immunocompromised should not be exposed. "A chemically maintained hot tub should not be a problem to a healthy person but having recurring infections, consider the tub as a potential source," Much reseach is published in an online journal called PM Engineer.
Posted by: ANdrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006
15:21 ||
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If it's cleaned well after each use it shouldn't be a problem. I've had my whirlpool bath for years.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/02/2006 16:03
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The interior pipes of the whirlpool baths that are not filtered or chemically treated and poorly maintained hot tubs, are prime areas for potentially infectious microbes to congregate and grow, Moyes noted. The organisms often form biofilm, a community of organisms that work together and are more resistant to cleaners.
When jets are switched on, the bacteria -packed water gets blown into the tub with the movement of the water, an aerosol is created that carries these organisms down your lungs or other orifices-something that does not happen in a regular tub". Moyes states. And YES, A chemically maintainted tub should not be a problem!.
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 16:12
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Deacon Blue: Don't clean your hot tub with the proper cleaner and you will have more than aching muscle's!##!!!
Andrea
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 16:17
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I always clean it with the proper cleaner. It's the people who are too lazy that get in to trouble.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/02/2006 16:21
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this psicose with germs...sooner or later we will die if we go out of home. Too much clean will kill us.
#6
Some bacteria is good and too much is dangerous.
Homeostasis is the KEY**
Andrea
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 16:26
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#7
In Tempe AZ they city fathers installed an obscentity called "the town lake", in utter defiance of reality.
To start with, they put it in a dry river bed, that floods periodically. The company that did it used inflatable rubber dams on either side to hold the water in.
To fill the damned thing, they used ONE BILLION GALLONS of fresh water, though the good people of the city have to drink recycled effluent in their city water. This is in a damn desert.
Upstream of the lake, rainwater turns into a mosquito-breeding swamp, which has now introduced two varieties of encephalitis and west nile fever to the area, and promises in the future to even host mosquitos carrying dengue fever.
In summer, despite costing huge amounts of money to replace water lost by evaporation in 115 degree heat and less than 5 percent humidity, the lake also is a perfect habitat for algae and duckweed.
The algae, in particular, gives off an immense cloud of spores for the whole area, so that unless swimming pools are kept so chlorinated as to be irritating to the skin, the water will turn some combination of dark green, dark brown and dark yellow.
To top it all off, the lake provides some form of recreation and/or entertainment to about 100 people a day, out of a city of 175,000. Many of these 100 people are visitors, not residents.
In all fairness, the city does plan to "improve" the riverbanks around the town lake by building highrises and condos on sand in the flood plain. This means that, once completed, the people of city of Tempe will get all of its entertainment value at once, watching them collapse into the river.
By then of course, the developers will be long gone, and no one will have been stupid enough to provide the owners with flood insurance.
#8
Very typical SWIM,EAT AND BREATH AT YOUR OWN RISK**
Andrea
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 16:41
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I remember year's ago an article in the Boston, MA paper that a couple had gone into the hot tub together to get "HOT" and the man was on top of the woman and he threw his back out and was yelling "Help I've fallen and I can't get it up".
Andrea
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 16:44
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You should consider going into the spawning tank business Andrea.
So, the PM of India asks Prez Bush if he would like New Delhi. Prez Bush says, Great, the WH deli is gettin' sorta stale.The U.N. nuclear watchdog welcomed a landmark civil nuclear deal between India and the United States on Thursday, saying it would end New Delhi's nuclear isolation and spur global non-proliferation efforts.
Under the deal, agreed as U.S. President George W. Bush visited New Delhi, Washington has offered India nuclear fuel and technology provided it separates its civil and military nuclear facilities and places the former under international inspections. Some U.S. lawmakers and nuclear experts have criticised the pact, saying it weakens international safeguards, especially the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which India has refused to sign calling it discriminatory.
But the support of Mohammed ElBaradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Authority, gives the deal an important seal of approval. ElBaradei said the deal would help satisfy India's growing energy needs. "It would also bring India closer as an important partner in the non-proliferation regime," he said in a statement. "It would be a milestone, timely for ongoing efforts to consolidate the non-proliferation regime, combat nuclear terrorism and strengthen nuclear safety."
The deal still needs to be approved by the U.S. Congress, where it is sure to come under close scrutiny. Tom Lantos, the ranking Democrat on the House International Relations Committee, gave it a cautious welcome. "A reliable and dependable strategic partnership is in the interest of both our great countries, and this agreement could herald an even closer relationship between the United States and India," he said in a statement emailed to Reuters.
"Given the unprecedented nature of this agreement, the Congress will have to carefully examine the details of the separation plan to assure ourselves and our international partners that this agreement will indeed support our shared political and security objectives."
China was less positive, urging India to sign the NPT and also dismantle its nuclear weapons.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/02/2006
14:09 ||
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Seeing that China gave nukes to Pakistan and North Korea, that last sentence is the rankest hypocrisy.
#2
Seeing that China gave nukes to Pakistan and North Korea...
And through them Iran, Libya, and God knows who else.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/02/2006 15:47
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This deal works in a bunch of different ways. First and foremost, it sets India up in a way similar to how Israel is set up. Israel has to defend itself from the Moslem world, India has to defend itself from China.
By allowing it to keep its weapons program off the table, this means that China won't know how many and how much nuclear nuclear weaponry India has, which would give China prickly heat if they were getting adventuresome in that direction.
Second, since their commercial production will be many times larger than their military production, this both forces it to be quality controlled to international standards and transparent with its production of weapons grade material and waste.
This is really good since nobody wants to see headlines about "The Indian Chernobyl".
Next, it is pretty obvious that the future for the major nations lies with large electrical grid nuclear power. If they do it on the table, it is always better than if they refuse to partner.
Finally, the US has an awful lot of nuclear fuel to sell. It was tremendously expensive to produce and we have immense stocks we would be glad to get rid of at a discount.
The UN is the proverbial cat chasing its tail over Iran nukes, but has the balls to "approve" what the US is doing (independently) with India.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/02/2006 17:25
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The IAEA has a long history working in India.
Several Indian power reactors are under IAEA safeguards.
One of the Indian plutonium reprocessing plants is under occasional safeguards. Whenenver spent fuel from a safeguarded reactor is being processed the inspectors come in.
They now get to extend their oversight...
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 17:51
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Will that "overslight" extend the practice employed in Iran and pre-invasion Iraq?
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/02/2006 18:15
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IAEA inspections will be to ensure that no safeguarded material is diverted.
They will be limited to those facilities only.
Some Indian facilities may have reactors that are off limits. The inspector may look at reactor 1 and reactor 3 but reactor 2 is being used for weapon grade plutonium production and is off limits.
A rather different case than Iran or Iraq, both of which signed the NPT and must not have any military program.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 20:29
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So it is a not a question about hide and seek (like in Iran or Iraq).
India has, and will continue to manufacture weapons. There is nothing for the IAEA to see with regard to this.
Anything not declared as civilian is military and these military sites cannot buy (a) fuel (b) safety equipment (c) componants. They will be off limits to inspections.
Most Indian R+D will be classified as military, not because it is but because they don't want IAEA folk around.
The truly sensitive stuff - the beryllium refining plant, the centrifuge cascades that make MEU fuel for the Indian Navy, the BARC complex that makes plutonium weapon pits, is and will continue to be off limits for obvious reasons.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 21:01
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Tag this additional deal on and everything gets more interesting U.S. to boost arms sales to India
: CNN
India will be able to buy more sophisticated fighter aircraft and other high-tech arms from the United States as part of a closer defense relationship between the two nations, the United States Department of Defense has said.
This would include state-of-the-art combat aircraft including the F-16 and F-18, the department said in a statement released Thursday.
"It is our goal to help meet India's needs in the defense realm, and to provide important capabilities and technologies that India seeks. We are on a path to accomplish this," the statement said.
If setting fire to embassies of countries that insult the Prophet aims to show that these countries no longer have any place in Islamic countries then this act is permissible. So says Ayatollah Dorri Najaf-Abadi, the Chief State Prosecutor of Iran, in ruling in favor of burning down the embassies of countries in which newspapers print the notorious Muhammad cartoons. It is not surprising that the regime that triggered the Iranian Hostage Crisis of 1979 would deny the sanctity of embassies, but the Ayatollahs words here fit into a larger pattern in Iran. According to the dissident Iranian publication Rooz, as reported by the Middle East Media Research Institute, Shiite clerics in the religious center of Qom have endorsed the use of nuclear weapons as well: Mohsen Gharavian, a disciple of [Ayatollah] Mesbah Yazdi [who is Iranian President Ahmadinejads spiritual mentor], has spoken for the first time of using nuclear weapons as a counter-measure. He stated that in terms of the sharia, it all depends on the goal.
...
In terms of the sharia, it all depends on the goal -- and that goal for the Iranian regime and the global jihad movement is to be ruthless to the unbelievers and to fight against non-Muslims until they pay the Jizya [the non-Muslim poll tax] with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued (Quran 9:29) under the hegemony of Islamic law. Anything that may advance that goal -- nuclear weapons, burning embassies -- is permitted. If Paradise is guaranteed to those who slay and are slain for Allah (Quran 9:111), there is no downside to a nuclear attack on Israel or even on American troops in Iraq, even if it draws a crushing retaliation. Rest at link.
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006
13:58 ||
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Anything that may advance that goal -- nuclear weapons, burning embassies -- is permitted. If Paradise is guaranteed to those who slay and are slain for Allah (Quran 9:111), there is no downside to a nuclear attack on Israel or even on American troops in Iraq, even if it draws a crushing retaliation.
In plain speech, Iran regards nuclear weapons as the world's biggest bomb vest. Someone please tell me again why Iran's signature on the NPT means sh!t to a tree.
#2
Uh oh. Somebody somewhere (here?) predicted that the Mullahs would gin up a fatwa to justify mass murder of the innocent as a precursor to actualy doing the deed.
arrant speculation alert:
I've wondered if part of the foot dragging on taking down the mullahs will result in us taking down a nuclear armed state without our using nuclear weapons in return...
The subsequent panic from all the other nuclear armed states as they realize that the "silver Bullet" dosent work on the US Boogeyman after all would be a sight to behold. I wonder if that panic would be noisy or silent? I wonder how many repeats of Lybia's performance would then ensue? Cold comfort for the radioactive, but satisfying nevertheless.
Posted by: N guard ||
03/02/2006 17:52
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By Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 1, 2006; A04
It was billed as a personal conversation about his own health and fitness battles, but when former president Bill Clinton stood before a group of governors yesterday, he just couldn't help getting wonky.
His forum was the National Governors Association, the organization he chaired when he was governor of Arkansas and was rising to national prominence, and one with which he still has a special bond. He was greeted as family, introduced generously by the current governor of Arkansas, Republican Mike Huckabee, who serves this year as the NGA chairman. And when it was over, it was hard to get him to leave the room.
Clinton, who underwent heart bypass surgery in 2004, and Huckabee, who lost more than 100 pounds after a health scare, have teamed up to combat childhood obesity -- even though, as Huckabee noted, Clinton has campaigned and raised money for every one of his opponents in Arkansas and that he had done the same when Clinton was in office.
When Clinton took the stage, he responded. "I was backstage listening to Mike's introduction . . .," he said. "I thought, the reason we're both here is that we were total failures in those efforts."
Then he was off, imploring governors to join the crusade to change the culture of food consumption to reverse the epidemic of obesity, which has led to a startling increase in diabetes among children and which consumes an increasing share of the nation's health care budget. More at the link
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/02/2006
13:34 ||
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Where's the BEEF?
Andrea Jackson
Posted by: ANdrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 15:18
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corn syrup in soda.
Nuff said...
bring back the real sugar
Rob Pike, Bell Labs
Feb 21, 2000 1 A Polemic
This talk is a polemic that distills the pessimistic side of my feelings about systems research these days. I wont talk much about the optimistic side, since lots of others can do that for me; everyones excited about the computer industry. I may therefore present a picture somewhat darker than reality. However, I think the situation is genuinely bad and requires action.
2 Thesis
Systems software research has become a sideline to the excitement in the computing industry. When did you last see an exciting noncommercial demo? Ironically, at a time when computing is almost the definition of innovation, research in both software and hardware at universities and much of industry is becoming insular, ossified, and irrelevant. There are many reasons, some avoidable, some endemic. There may be ways to improve the situation, but they will require a communitywide effort.
3 Definitions...
4 A Field in Decline
"Who needs new operating systems, anyway?" you ask. Maybe no one, but then that supports my thesis.
"But now there are lots of papers in file systems, performance, security, web caching, etc.," you say. Yes, but is anyone outside the research field paying attention?
This is the central part of his thesis: that there are really only two operating system choices in the world, *nix and Windows. But he's ignoring the Jurassic period of computing, when the "home" or business machine was young: CP/M, various menu-driven systems, the venerable TRS-80, Geos, the Amiga, the Atari ST... That was a pretty Darwinian period, where an OS could pop up on Monday and be gone by Tuesday afternoon, as I'll discuss below...
5 Systems Researchs Contribution to the Boom...
Hardware has changed dramatically; software is stagnant.
Unix/Linux
Windows
X Windows
Emacs + Others
TCP/IP
Opera
USB
Good progression, though there are a few things missing, like IPX/SPX...
6 Where is the Innovation?
Microsoft, mostly. Exercise: Compare 1990 Microsoft software with 2000.
That'd be Windows 3.0, or maybe even 2.0, compared to Windows 2000.
If you claim thats not innovation, but copying, I reply that Java is to C++ as Windows is to the Macintosh: an industrial response to an interesting but technically flawed piece of systems software.
Both are evolutions from base systems that won their particular competitions.
If systems research was relevant, wed see new operating systems and new languages making inroads into the industry, the way we did in the 70s and 80s. Instead, we see a thriving software industry that largely ignores research, and a research community that writes papers rather than software.
And here's the basic flaw in his reasoning: he's looking at the past and expecting the future to be a continuation of it. Looking at it from a different standpoint, the base form of Unix won its competition early on: a tiny kernel and the basic file system layout. Everything after that is elaboration. It was a thing of beauty, simple and intuitive. It's just like Bridge 1.0, invented by Og and Zug in 9276 B.C. Everything since has been refinement, and the competing approaches are best forgotten.
7 Linux
Innovation? New? No, its just another copy of the same old stuff. OLD stuff. Compare program development on Linux with Microsoft Visual Studio or one of the IBM Java/web toolkits.
In 2000, Linux was still in its infancy. The early efforts were geared much more toward the academics and the hacker community. In 2006 we're looking at products that are approaching full maturity, ready for prime time.
Linuxs success may indeed be the single strongest argument for my thesis: The excitement generated by a clone of a decadesold operating system demonstrates the void that the systems software research community has failed to fill. Besides, Linuxs cleverness is not in the software, but in the development model, hardly a triumph of academic CS (especially software engineering) by any measure.
If you regard the basic Unix approach as a building block, Linux is a good development, more than just "clever." I can remember using SCO Xenix and QNX on early PC boxes, and they were actually more mature (for the time) that Linux was the first time I looked at it. Both were proprietary, and both fell by the wayside because the Linux development model beat them out. MS DOS beat out its competition in a similar manner, running not just on IBM PCs, but also on 8086 clones. The Mac was pretty, in many ways more technologically sophisticated, but it didn't compete PCs were cheaper, the software was cheaper, and users weren't restricted to the Apple brand. Both the development and marketing models are tied to the system.
8 What is Systems Research these days?
Web caches, web servers, file systems, network packet delays, all that stuff. Performance, peripherals, and applications, but not kernels or even userlevel applications.
Once the Wright brothers figured out how to make airplanes, there wasn't a need for Boeing to reinvent them. The same applies to software. Despite the bells and whistles that are hung on new versions of "Office" products, they remain basically the same, with word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, and perhaps database components. The spreadsheet, the original "killer app," didn't exist before Visicalc, and hasn't changed a whole lot since Excel 3.0. "Killer apps" are pretty few and far between.
Mostly, though, its just a lot of measurement; a misinterpretation and misapplication of the scientific method. Too much phenomenology: invention has been replaced by observation. Today we see papers comparing interrupt latency on Linux vs. Windows. They may be interesting, they may even be relevant, but they arent research.
80 percent of Academe is like 80 percent of everything else, made up of hacks and place holders. Another 10 percent is actually destructive, which leaves 10 percent to do the actual thinking.
In a misguided attempt to seem scientific, theres too much measurement: performance minutiae and bad charts. By contrast, a new language or OS can make the machine feel different, give excitement, novelty. But today thats done by a cool web site or a higher CPU clock rate or some cute little device that should be a computer but isnt. The art is gone. But art is not science, and thats part of the point. Systems research cannot be just science; there must be engineering, design, and art.
9 What Happened?
A lot of things:...
10 PC
Hardware became cheap, and cheap hardware became good. Eventually, if it didnt run on a PC, it didnt matter because the average, mean, median, and mode computer was a PC. Even into the 1980s, much systems work revolved around new architectures (RISC, iAPX/432, Lisp Machines). No more. A major source of interesting problems and, perhaps, interesting solutions is gone.
They went prior to the development of the graphical browser, which would have allowed them to coexist, though in niche markets, kind of like where Solaris is now. The PC's advantage, like that of Linux, by the way, was its open architecture. All advantages bring with them disadvantages, but the architecture's been changing with new developments albeit at a fairly stately rate due to the necessity of having (most) everyone agree on standards.
Much systems work also revolved around making stuff work across architectures: portability. But when hardwares all the same, its a nonissue... And thats just the PC as hardware; as software, its the same sort of story.
11 Microsoft
Enough has been said about this topic. (Although people will continue to say lots more.) Microsoft is an easy target, but its a scapegoat, not the real source of difficulty. Details to follow.
Microsoft makes an easy target for many because it tries to take a lowest common denominator approach, while gouging as much cash from its adoring public as the traffic will bear. It beat out its competition by not being proprietary: recall using Samna Write/Ami Pro and Word Perfect on Windows 3.0/3.1, and Lotus 1-2-3, and Netscape, and any number of other products. Because of its corporate strategy, Microsoft either incorporated the best of the best into Windows (remember when Netscape used to cost money?) or tried to do a better job with its own product at the same price (Microsoft Office).
12 Web
The web happened in the early 1990s and it surprised the computer science community as much as the commercial one. It then came to dominate much of the discussion, but not to much effect. Business controls it. (The web came from physicists and prospered in industry.)
There's a Year 2000 statement. Six years later, with the development of dynamic web content, business is still on the web, with advertising and order entry systems and such, but so is everyone else, to include millions of bloggers using pretty easy-to-use but very sophisticated software.
Bruce Lindsay of IBM: HDLC C HTTP/HTML; 3270s have been replaced by web browsers. (Compare with Visicalc and PC.)
Heh heh. I haven't seen a 3270 emulator in years.
Research has contributed little, despite a huge flow of papers on caches, proxies, server architectures, etc.
But there are lots of refinements on the basic model. The refinements make the software more usable, reaching a bigger audience, which provides its own level of feedback to make the software still more usable... From the management standpoint, we've gone from the base development cycle to the cash cow period, and I'm pretty sure we're still at an early stage in that.
13 Standards
To be a viable computer system, one must honor a huge list of
large, and often changing, standards: TCP/IP, HTTP, HTML, XML, CORBA, Unicode, POSIX, NFS, SMB, MIME, POP, IMAP, X, ... A huge amount of work, but if you dont honor the standards youre marginalized. Estimate that 90-95% of the work in Plan X was directly or indirectly to honor externally imposed standards. At another level, instruction architectures, buses, etc. have the same influence. With so much externally imposed structure, theres little slop left for novelty.
All those standards are building blocks, and each and every one of them could be superceded by a better approach. If you can come up with a better approach, by all means do so; until you do, these work, and they've been refined to the point where they work very well.
Plus, commercial companies that own standards, e.g. Microsoft, Cisco, deliberately make standards hard to comply with, to frustrate competition. Academia is a casualty.
That's maybe a legitimate gripe, though my heart doesn't bleed for academia. There's a balance between standards and confinement. And note that six years after the presentation was written Cisco actually has competition in its arena, despite being guardian of the standards.
14 Orthodoxy
Todays graduating PhDs use Unix, X, Emacs, and Tex.
Users, I'd point out, don't...
Thats their world. Its often the only computing world theyve ever used for technical work.
This has slowly changed over the past six years, though I'm not sure academia realizes yet that it's behind the times compared to the world at large, a situation reversed from the way things were 20 years ago...
Twenty years ago, a student would have been exposed to a wide variety of operating systems, all with good and bad points. New employees in our lab now bring their world with them, or expect it to be there when they arrive. Thats reasonable, but there was a time when joining a new lab was a chance to explore new ways of working.
Now you're likely to find a slightly different set of building blocks. I read somewhere that systems that belong to suit-and-tie guys are almost always Windows/IIS, and systems that belong to the sweatshirt and jeans set are almost always Linux/Apache. But if you're going to be in the wonderful world of IT, you've got to get used to the idea of going with what the customer uses. Sometimes you can show him/her/it a better way, and sometimes you make a lot of money fixing mistakes made 10 years ago. That's actually the fun of it, for some of us.
Narrowness of experience leads to narrowness of imagination. The situation with languages is a little bettermany curricula include exposure to functional languages, etc. but there is also a language orthodoxy: C++ and Java.
They're pretty common in the want ads, too, so don't discount them, even though on the job you'll likely end up using Visual Basic or PHP or C.
In science, we reserve our highest honors for those who prove we were wrong. But in computer science...
15 Change of scale
With so many external constraints, and so many things already done, much of the interesting work requires effort on a large scale. Many person-years are required to write a modern, realistic system. That is beyond the scope of most university departments. Also, the time scale is long: from design to final version can be five years. Again, thats beyond the scope of most grad students. This means that industry tends to do the big, defining projectsoperating systems, infrastructure, etc. and small research groups must find smaller things to work on.
Three trends result:
1. Dont build, measure. (Phenomenology, not new
things.)
2. Dont go for breadth, go for depth. (Microspecialization, not systems work.)
3. Take an existing thing and tweak it.
I believe this is the main explanation of the SOSP curve.
16 Unix
New operating systems today tend to be just ways of reimplementing Unix. If they have a novel architectureand some dothe first thing to build is the Unix emulation layer. How can operating systems research be relevant when the resulting operating systems are all indistinguishable? There was a claim in the late 1970s and early 1980s that Unix had killed operating systems research because no one would try anything else. At the time, I didnt believe it. Today, I grudgingly accept that the claim may be true (Microsoft notwithstanding).
A victim of its own success: portability led to ubiquity. That meant architecture didnt matter, so now theres only one. Linux is the hot new thing... but its just another Unix.
I go back to my comments on competition. Unix was the best system at the time, and its base system probably still is, not due to its features but due to its simplicity. Likewise the C language displaced, for all practical purposes, Pascal and ALGOL and ADA and a host of other languages, not because of its "rich programming environment" but because of its simplicity. You can take a core C implementation, without any libraries (to include the very basics like stdio.h) and build an entire new implementation. Or you can use that core if you're a glutton for punishment to do the very same things you could do with the libraries, only with more typing.
17 Linuxthe Academic Microsoft Windows
The holy trinity: Linux, gcc, and Netscape. Of course, its just another orthodoxy.
In six years Netscape has dropped off the list, partially eaten by its competitors.
These have become icons not because of what they are, but because of what they are not: Microsoft. But technically, theyre not that hot.
See my previous comment about simplicity. They're icons because they're simple. If they get to elaborate, like Netscape did, they'll be displaced. Netscape is now mostly Mozilla, but it's still piggishly slow compared to Opera and compared to IE.
And Microsoft has been working hard, and I claim that on many (not all) dimensions, their corresponding products are superior technically. And they continue to improve. Linux may fall into the Macintosh trap: smug isolation leading to (near) obsolescence. Besides, systems research is doing little to advance the trinity.
In the early days, Linux tried that trap, with the "if it's not easy to write software, why should it be easy to use it?" syndrome. But I just set up a Linux partition on my laptop, and Ubuntu went on just as smoothly as Windows did.
18 Startups
Startups are the dominant competition for academia for ideas, funds, personnel, and students. (Others are Microsoft, big corporations, legions of free hackers, and the IETF.) In response, government-funded and especially corporate research is directed at very fast return on investment. This distorts the priorities: Research is bent towards what can make big money (IPO) in a year.
That paragraph was fizzling out even as he spoke.
Horizon is too short for longterm work. (There go infrastructure and the problems of scale.)
Funding sources (government, industry) perceive the same pressures, so there is a vicious circle.
The metric of merit is wrong.
Stanford now encourages students to go to startups because successful CEOs give money to the campus. The new president of Stanford is a successful computer entrepreneur.
I'm not familiar with who he's talking about. I wonder if he's still a successful computer entrepreneur?
19 Grandma
Grandmas on line. This means that the industry is designing systems and services for ordinary people.
That's actually a pretty brilliant idea, come to think of it...
The focus is on applications and devices, not on infrastructure and architecture, the domain of systems research. The cause is largely marketing, the result a proliferation of incompatible devices. You cant make money on software, only hardware, so design a niche gimmick, not a Big New Idea.
Programmabilityonce the Big Idea in computinghas fallen by the wayside. Again, systems research loses out.
Grandma brings other things to the table, though. We now have a huge user base, with most users no more familiar with the innards of their computers than they are with the innards of their toaster ovens. What we've done is build a tool, a completed product. The dangers now include falling into the Microsoft trap making the tool longer, lower, leaner, wider, with more road-hugging weight and 40 percent more cheese in the interests of of bringing out new models every two years; and of becoming elitists with overly complicated systems that let us sneer at the unenlightened who aren't bright like we are, so they can't make the systems work.
20 Things to Do
Startups are too focused on short time scale and practical results to try new things. Big corporations are too focused on existing priorities to try new things. Startups suck energy from research. But gold rushes leave ghost towns; be prepared to move in.
I think we've pretty much moved on from the dot Com "revolution."
Go back to thinking about and building systems. Narrowness is irrelevant; breadth is relevant: its the essence of system. Work on how systems behave and work, not just how they compare. Concentrate on interfaces and architecture, not just engineering. Be courageous. Try different things; experiment. Try to give a cool demo.
It's a tool. Concentrate on making the tool work better, in more environments.
Funding bodies: fund more courageously, particularly longterm projects. Universities, in turn, should explore ways to let students contribute to longterm projects.
Measure success by ideas, not just papers and money. Make the industry want your work.
21 Things to Build
There are lots of valid, useful, interesting things to do. I offer a small sample as evidence. If the field is moribund, its not from a lack of possibilities.
Only one GUI has ever been seriously tried, and its best ideas date from the 1970s. (In some ways, its been getting worse; today the screen is covered with confusing little pictures.) Surely there are other possibilities. (Linuxs interface isnt even as good as Windows!)
He said that six years ago, recall. My Gnome desktop is prettier and more usable in most respects than Window...
There has been much talk about component architectures but only one true success: Unix pipes. It should be possible to build interactive and distributed applications from piece parts.
2000 talking again. Since then, XML, RSS, WiFi, Bluetooth, thin clients, and about a dozen other neato things...
The future is distributed computation, but the language community has done very little to address that possibility. The Web has dominated how systems present and use information: the model is forced interaction; the user must go get it. Lets go back to having the data come to the user instead.
You mean like web services?
System administration remains a deeply difficult problem. Unglamorous, sure, but theres plenty of room to make a huge, even commercial, contribution.
That'd be more GUI, with the added benefit that most "GUI" functions can be delivered over a browser and the added disadvantage that when your GUI breaks you'd better have a command-line backup option, or you've just changed your machine into a doorstop...
22 Conclusions
The world has decided how it wants computers to be. The systems software research community influenced that decision somewhat, but very little, and now it is shut out of the discussion. It has reached the point where I doubt that a brilliant systems project would even be funded, and if funded, wouldnt find the bodies to do the work. The odds of success were always low; now theyre essentially zero.
The communityuniversities, students, industry, funding bodiesmust change its priorities.
The community must accept and explore unorthodox ideas.
The community must separate research from market capitalization.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
13:33 ||
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Most people expect devices that have processors to function like a toaster. They just have to work. .
As someone who starterd out with CPM on the "personal computer" and Using termials on mainframes we have come a heck of a long way.
He is wrong about Linux, it is not a clone. It has glue that lets it act like UNIX but it leaves UNIX in the dust. It's kernel is changing on a daily basis. UNIX is ossified.
Microsoft isn't a "problem". End user expectations are the problem. Mircosoft has a monopoly in peoples minds to some extent. My wife uses OS X at work and Mandriva 2006 Linux on her computer at home. It took almost zero time for her to adapt to not having a Microsoft operating system when her Windows computer died. All the Applications she used on her Windows computer are on her Linux computer. In some respects her computing experince has improved by the switch to a Linux computing system. But it really doesn't matter. It's just a tool. You use the system that works for you. If it wasn't working for her I would know it. I would go get a HP or Dell PC buy and load the apps she wanted and that would be that.
Microsoft is just to expensive for me to run. Free Software suits my needs better. I don't have thousands of dollars invested in applications. But if I need a Microsoft operating system and application I will buy it. It's been a long time since I needed one. The days of me having a dual booting system are just about over. I have an empty 300 gig drive here waiting for an LINUX OS upgrade when I get in the mood I will not be buy a copy of XP and making a MS file system partition on it. I just don't need a Microsoft OS any more.
My word for him, AT&T Labs are history, get over it.
Posted by: SPoD ||
03/02/2006 15:42
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#4
The issue is that the OS has become almost irrelevant and will be completely irrelevent in another generation or so. It is just not where the action is anymore because the OS has solved the problems that it was created for. Time to move on, until a major paradigm shift occurs. Paradigm shifts can not be predicted nor engineered, they just happen, Usually by accident. I don't think people are doing major research on how to make a better paper clip anymore either.
Posted by: Dave ||
03/02/2006 15:43
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#5
Fred's and my in-line comments stepped on each other, but here's my take in summary. My perspective? I'm a researcher in Artificial Intelligence now, but was a practitioner for 25 years before coming over to the academic side.
DOD paid for the development of TCP/IP and part of the MULTICS project from which UNIX spun off. For over a decade they remained mostly research environments, as academics played with them and DOD used them, learning how to exploit them well. When telecomms and chip technology were ready, they exploded and spawned 15 years of applications technologies including the Web.
Even when this was written, in 2000, there was lots of long-term research in progress on most of the areas Pike mentions.
Operating environments? Consider functional languages like Haskell, which Nokia has been using in its cell and smart phones for several years now. As we learn more about scalability, expect functional environments to replace standard operating systems in more and more places.
Component software? Pike missed the fact that those standards he bemoans have resulted in enterprise application integration. An insurance company client of mine in 1999-2000, the time of this talk, had already put their entire corporation on an integrated system in which whole application programs and databases were replaceable components. Not only the technologies, but even business processes have been changed out seamlessly since then.
GUIs? Check out the research in 2000 on adaptive user interfaces at this DOD project site. Here's another site, a bit heavy on the comp sci and decision theory and AI jargon, but the screen shots give you an idea of the kinds of things that are already working in research environments. He's right about Microsoft, tho, since they've been publishing about their work in adaptive interfaces since 1999, if not earlier.
Can't make money on software? Tell that to the guys in Richmond. Or talk to me - I've taken successful hardware and software products into niche markets quite profitably.
Bottom line: this talk reads like the lament of a guy who no longer gets to have plush 5 year budgets and who is out of touch with a technical and business environment in which his company no longer gets to set the technical terms of play. That's why Nokia is out there with Haskell-based devices and both Lucent and Bell Labs are struggling.
#7
Hardware has changed dramatically; software is stagnant.
What freakin' planet is he living on?
If you spend your life inside the theory of operating systems, OK, things probably look stagnant. Out here in the Real World, where we're solving Real Problems for Real People, new techniques and new ideas are coming faster than we can absorb them.
This'll probably sound odd, but the dotcom bust forced things to mature, and that opened up a hell of a lot of opportunities. What this guy's doing is the software equivalent of claiming architecture ended when the arch came along.
Besides, Linuxs cleverness is not in the software, but in the development model, hardly a triumph of academic CS (especially software engineering) by any measure.
The process of creating software is as critical as the design of the software. Maybe moreso. This sounds like a snob sniffing that that kind of work isn't done by proper gentlemen!
8 What is Systems Research these days?
Web caches, web servers, file systems, network packet delays, all that stuff. Performance, peripherals, and applications, but not kernels or even userlevel applications.
Ya know why? Because that's where the problems are today.
You have an intra-network serving 5,000+ locations. Each location needs access to applications that are run in central locations, and any downtime stops money coming into your company; a project that's coming soon will have servers at each store communicating with the other sites as well.
How do you make that work well? What's the best architecture for serving the applications? For the network?
What are the implications of allowing the public some limited access to resources on those networks?
This guy just doesn't like that his chosen specialization has reached a plateau. His name's familiar, though I can't remember where from.
(Oh, and he's wrong about big changes in hardware. The essential architecture is largely the same, what has changed is the process of manufacturing the hardware, which allowed for higher speeds. Heck, outside the CPU, bus speeds are still below 100MHz.)
To be a viable computer system, one must honor a huge list of
large, and often changing, standards: TCP/IP, HTTP, HTML, XML, CORBA, Unicode, POSIX, NFS, SMB, MIME, POP, IMAP, X, ... A huge amount of work, but if you dont honor the standards youre marginalized. Estimate that 90-95% of the work in Plan X was directly or indirectly to honor externally imposed standards.
Only two of those -- POSIX and TCP/IP -- are operating-system issues. The rest are applications. He's talking out of his ass, here.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/02/2006 16:08
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#8
(Linuxs interface isnt even as good as Windows!)
Pure BS. I'd rather use vi than 90% of the editors on Windows.
Heck, I often use vi on Windows.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/02/2006 16:10
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#9
Working in a mature technology isn't much fun. This guy should think about a career change. English? They're into deconstruction.
#10
Only two of those -- POSIX and TCP/IP -- are operating-system issues. The rest are applications. He's talking out of his ass, here.
I'd disagree a little on that point, RC. What he's bemoaning is that the infrastructure for large-scale systems consists of these technologies being glued together, rather than engineered-from-the-ground-up systems software.
Much as I'm critical of him in my comment above, he's not entirely wrong. DOD and others are having to invest huge sums of money and manpower to figure out how to secure this mess of stuff, what requirements to set for procuring new (secure) systems etc. Corporations are spending huge amounts of money on the data and apps side too. If there were breakthroughs in systems software designs, it conceivably could make a huge difference.
I just think he was out of touch with what WAS going on in the research at the very time he was speaking. They haven't gelled together like the technologies that really launched the Web yet, tho, so he doesn't see them.
#11
With the multi-cpu cores, cell processors single computers will be turned into clusters that are part of networked clusters and aspects of his orginal Plan-9 operating system will start migrating into the real world. Perhaps his research was ahead of the hardware?
BTW... the Plan 9 GUI is really sad.
#12
Even into the 1980s, much systems work revolved around new architectures (RISC, iAPX/432, Lisp Machines).
In the 1986-1988 timeframe DOD put together a panel of academics and industry people and asked them to recommend the level at which they should set standards for computing. Should they pick a CPU architecture? A language and CPU? or ???
DARPA was pushing the MIPS, Inc. RISC chip, which they had funded heavily, and envisioned virtual machines on top of the chip for various applications. Fairchild was pushing a CISC chip, but they had just got themselves sold to Japan.
The eventual recommendation was to standardize on the high level language (Ada) and let the rest all change underneath it, since so many advances were occuring in chip technologies. DARPA was pretty disappointed that a RISC chip with a virtual machine on top wasn't the choice, but those of us who were doing things in avionics, space based systems etc. breathed a sigh of relief....
And meanwhile, digital signal processors were making incredible strides and many systems now have both standard CPUs and DSPs as needed.
#13
This is a funny discussion. I've been in IT for 3 decades and have been around the barn a few times. This sounds like the typical bit-head that can't quite make the connection between real people doing real work, and all the pretty technical bells and whistles that float his boat. (how's that for mixing a metaphor?)
I've worked on PCs where it was 24k of memory and the big thing (literally) in floppies was 8" and 1 mb. I worked on a PC that could hot swap between the two competing OSs DOS and CP/M; and on and on.
You know what? Not one user gave a damn. They wanted a computer to be like a fork. You picked up it does its job....end of discussion.
Ivory tower types have their place, just not in public. ;^)
#15
I worked for LSI Logic (formerly Symbios, Symbios Logic, NCR Microelectronics) as a software test engineering technician, running a software test team. Our basic function was to test software compatibility between a dozen or so different software manufacturers and our own in-house SCSI (Small Computer Systems Interface) hardware and software. Basically, we tested our interface hardware and supporting software with Microsoft (Windows 3.X/95/98/2000/ME/NT), OS/2, Unix, SCO, Linux, and a half-dozen other minor operating systems, network software and hardware, peripheral devices, and applications software packages. We also used as wide a variety of hardware as possible - different processors, different chipsets, different manufacturer labels, etc. There are hundreds of ways to increase performance, both internally and externally, that the computer industry can make, if it's willing. One of the first things the entire industry needs to learn is that "one size fits all" doesn't satisfy anybody. I use three different spreadsheets because there are things I can do with one that the other two won't do - mostly things the spreadsheet designer never considered. I use two different word processors and FOUR internet browsers, all for the same reason.
The biggest problem "software researchers" have is their own narrow-mindedness. They never expect people to use their product except in the way they designed them to work, while the user-public wants things that make THEIR life easier. Business users want one thing, home users want something else, and professionals want still something different. Even in these rather loose divisions, there are layers - experienced users, semi-experienced, and total novices. Yet software is designed to meet a "general" user's needs. It doesn't work. Until the "software industry" learns that it needs to create products that address the different needs of each subset of its clients, it will continue to meet very few of the needs of anyone.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/02/2006 16:51
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#16
My 2c worth and in my time, I've worked on OSes, compilers and distributed systems.
The problem in a nutshell is 'system research' is an oxymoron. Or put another way, he is trying to apply the scientific method as practiced by academics to the development of complex systems and it doesn't apply.
The scientific method drives broad theoretical understanding through investigation and identification of facts (in the context of those theories). Whilst there are theoretical constructs that need to be elaborated concerning complex systems, they have no (or almost no) impact of the actual development of complex software systems, which is developed through an almost completely heuristic process.
It may sound counter-intuitive to some people, but as systems get more complex, they necessarily become more heuristic, becuase fewer and fewer people understand the system in its entireity. In fact, most modern software systems have already passed the point where any one person can understand them.
lotp is right in that engineered systems built on solid systems theories could exist (assuming the theories existed). However, in practice they don't exist.
#17
Phil_b & Lotp have it just about right...but there's one thing that is very hard for the academic community to grasp.
Software AND THE USE THEREOF have a large subjective / artistic / creative component.
When teaching RDB to students I like to start with a simple physical exercize. I break students into groups and then give each group a set of blocks. There are 3 large square blocks, one red, one blue and one green; then there are 3 medium sized square blocks and then 3 small; there are also round and triangle blocks the same way.
I ask the groups of students to sort the blocks into some rational order. The catch is that there is no correct answer and virtually every group comes up with different answers.
Then I ask them how the user wants them?
The point of the ramble is that there is no way to scientifially solve the "problem".
#18
Yesterday having done both taxes and FAFSA (kids student loan) is a perfect example of what can go wrong with software.
The FASFA site refuses to work with anything but IE or Netscape. (not even Mozilla) On top of that they don't do paper anymore so if the kid wants a student loan... ITS THEIR WAY OR THE HIGHWAY.
The IRS site is a tad better but will not allow you to efile for free unless your gross is < 50K. If its greater you have to pay to use TurboTax or the like. TurboTax implies windows - a M$S requirement to e-file.
So the Web experience on these government sites can make one curse the software. (rightly or wrongly the web presence becomes software in the users eyes.)
On another point... I have XEN 3.0 running on some old hardware downstairs. This recent operating enviroment with true virtualization solves DARPAs ADA vs MIPS complaint Ltop was complaining about... oh the currently running vitrual OSs on that basement junk box? Centos and Debian...
#19
Lots of expertise and experience here at the Burg!
A couple of points.
3dc, when I ran a group that produced language tools (compilers, link editors, symbolic debuggers with embedded chip simulators) for the military real-time world (avionics, flight control systems, space-based systems) along with a hard real-time OS for embedded systems there was no way on God's green earth those apps could execute successfully in a virtual, emulated environment.
We're talking microseconds for very complex calculations that do things like shoot down missiles or keep fly-by-wire fighters in the air. So unfortunately your box in the basement wouldn't have solved DOD's problem (then or now), although it suits nicely for some other application domains. Which makes the point that there is no such thing as a single solution ....
Alan, I put out a bunch of words, so you might not have noticed that I spent 25 years in the "real world" doing software and managing software engineering (and some hardware design) before I went academic.
I didn't miss the fact that "THE USE (of software has) a large subjective / artistic / creative component." And neither has the academic comp sci world. That's exactly what adaptive user interfaces are all about. When these move into general use, the users will focus on how they want to work and what they want the software to look like.
That said, a good portion of my practitioner career involved "hard" real-time applications, or at least softer real-time process control and/or communications systems. I've written or managed projects ranging from a couple hundred lines of elegant code to a system that had about 4 million lines of high level source code. In some of those systems, 'creativity' was not what we wanted, needed or could tolerate.
Elegant design? Absolutely. Tight code and innovative algorithms? You bet - if they were designed and written so as to make it possible to verify their behavior and validate that they met the requirement spec.
The pilots of planes whose avionics and flight control systems were built with our code were glad we weren't 'creative'. ;-)
#20
I ask the groups of students to sort the blocks into some rational order. The catch is that there is no correct answer and virtually every group comes up with different answers.
Then I ask them how the user wants them?
The point of the ramble is that there is no way to scientifially solve the "problem".
Sure - that's pretty obvious WRT user interfaces.
When you talk about the architecture underneath them, however, there ARE scientific ways to characterize better or poorer approaches. Mai-Hwa Chen's complexity metric for distributed enterprise systems is one.
#21
Never meant to denigrate your experience, lotp. While I never did anything military I have worked with some real time control software for things like cutters and slitters for roll goods. The last few years I've been doing a lot more managing like the current migration of 2 dozen systems with ~50 Tb of data from Solaris to AIX.
The point I was trying to make was that there is almost always more than one way to skin the software cat and the choices can rarely if ever be truly said to be scientific beyond a certain point. Elegant is a word more frequently used aesthetically than scientifically ( I had one boss who name me Elegant Alan for my propensity to turn out tight code ).
As far as those pilots of your go, I bet they were quite appreciative of your creativity whether you were or not. ;^)
But, again, the main point is that Mr. Pike doesn't seem to know that the $$$$ are with the users for whom there is such a thing as good enough.
ROME (Reuters) - Leaders of the former Soviet Union were behind the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II in 1981, an Italian parliamentary investigative commission said in a report.
A final draft of the report, which is due to be presented to parliament later this month, was made available to Reuters on Thursday by the commission president, Senator Paolo Guzzanti.
"This commission believes, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the leadership of the Soviet Union took the initiative to eliminate Pope John Paul," the report said.
"They relayed this decision to the military secret services for them to take on all necessary operations to commit a crime of unique gravity, without parallel in modern times," it said.
#4
Because it's only now that some documents have been made available that shed light on just how far communist tentacles reached into the Vatican. I don't think there's any doubt now that they had spies inside the Vatican, for example.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 14:08
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#5
Rafael, are you saying it (shooting JP2) was an inside job?
#6
It depends how far you want to go with "inside job", and who you want to believe:
VATICAN CITY, April 29: The Polish priest accused of spying on the late Pope John Paul II says he may have been an idiot or naive, but not a spy, and that the accusations were part of a slander campaign to discredit the late pontiff. I have never been a spy, insisted Father Konrad Hejmo in an interview published by Italys La Repubblica Friday. Call me an idiot, or naive, but not a spy.
Father Hejmo said the accusations, which he expects will soon hit other Polish priests, are an international operation aimed at smearing the memory of Pope Wojtyla, John Paul IIs original name.
Polands centre investigating crimes committed by Nazi Germany and the countrys former communist regime said on Wednesday that father Hejmo was an informer for the Polish intelligence agency during the 1980s, after John Paul II was elected pope.
The Dominican priest said he knew that his reports on the papacy, written for the Polish bishops conference, were being used by his countrys secret services.
I spoke about it to the Holy Father once, Hejmo told Corriere della Sera newspaper. We were having lunch with other priests and all of us said we had guardian angels, meaning controllers working for the Polish government.
Even the pope knew he was being spied on, said the 69-year-old priest, who was in charge of bringing Polish pilgrims to the popes audiences.
Hejmo said his detractors had waited for John Paul IIs death on April 2 to make their accusations, because the pope would have certainly defended him.
The Vatican has so far kept silent about the accusations. But Romes Il Messaggero daily reported Friday that it was planning a statement underlining that Hejmo was not an employee of the Holy See and therefore did not have access to any confidential information.
Vatican Secretary of State Angelo Sodano, however, has asked the Polish bishops to make the statement, hoping to keep the scandal at arms length, Messaggero reported.
Hejmo acknowledged to La Repubblica having received money from a Polish man living in Germany, whom he suspects of forwarding his reports to the Polish intelligence agency.
I came to Rome without money, explained the priest. There were good-hearted priests that gave me money.
This agent also gave me money, but through the priests, Hejmo was quoted as saying. AFP
Source. (the link wasn't working when I tried it just now)
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 15:27
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#7
This by itself might not be significant, if you take the priest at his word, except that there is a related story to this, about the Polish communists' attempt to infiltrate the Church in Poland. They knew very well that the Church was a threat, moreso after JP2's first visit to Poland.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 15:34
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#8
No link, facts or coherent thinking to back this, I'm only blowing hot air as I do best, but my impression is the commies did all they could to infiltrate and manipulate the Church from the 30's and counting, even sending thousands of sleepers into seminaries all over the world IIRC, including the USA.
Infiltration into the Church is not new (Free-masons did this a lot), in order to warp it to one's aims; for a conservative catholic, the Vatican II council or the liberation theology certainly could be indicative of the influence of liberalism and communism on its doctrine.
Pure communist spies, moles and influence agents certainly aren't too far-fetched.
#9
sending thousands of sleepers into seminaries all over the world IIRC, including the USA.
I have no facts behind my assertion, but I would say that they did a good job of destroying the church to the point where I have a tough time finding one outside of military chapels worth attending. The worst ones are in DC, since you need to bow before the worldly pc masters if you want to get the job. They've destroyed it in much the same way that the destroyed the liberals of old - by changing the focus to blame instead of rolling up your sleeves and providing support. For example, the Methodist Church over by the American University - the preacher was good - he understood spirituality and gave a good sermon - but the underlying message of it all was blame. For example, they didn't support the Boyscouts because of the gay issue. They prayed for the Iraqis killed by Americans but not the American soldiers.
What is the underlying message there? Blame the Boyscouts. Blame the soldiers. Blame George Bush for the war. Why, I wondered, if you think homosexuals should be allowed to be involved in youth groups, they why not start your own group and leave the boyscouts alone to do whatever good they do? It's sort of the same argument as the soup kitchens in France. If your goal is to feed the hungry and you are serving pork (a very inexpensive food) - at least you are feeding some of the hungry - no? It's a good deed. If you set up a soup kitchen for the sole purpose of NOT feeding the Muslims pork - then that's another story, but never the less, some get fed, so it is still a good deed. Nothing stops those who criticize those not providing halal meals from providing them themselves - but they don't want to do that - that requires work - they just want to blame those who do not. Blame, such an easy way to make yourself feel better and more self-righteous without actually having to DO anything or be inconvenienced in any way.
All you need to do to be self-righteous is to claim that you hold to a higher ideal than others because you criticize the good works of those who do not achieve your ideal goal.
Anyway, I could go on, but I won't. Someone said in another post the other day that children are not born to hate - they have to be taught. But that is only partly true. It his human nature to hate those who do you wrong. It requires a higher level of learning to learn the benefits of forgiveness. Forgiveness needs to be TAUGHT. The basis for our western society is built on many of the lessons of forgiveness, charity, doing unto others, etc. which were initially taught by the Christian churches. It is so ingrained in western society that we think we are born with these values, but we are not. Most western societies learned the benefits of these higher values and they incorporated to the point where they continue even in the absence of the churches. Look at Israel. But we are not born with this knowledge, it is learned and one must strive towards those goals.
Enough. I'm tired and off topic. But I think it is sad that the Christian churches, the fountain of so much good, have been denigrated to the point where they are believed to be bad. Perhaps it was the infiltraion of those who no longer teach the true values that this is the case, perhaps it is the ease of our lives today that we feel we no longer need it. Either way, it's a loss to us all.
Leaders of the former Soviet Union were behind the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II in 1981
Well, duh!
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
03/02/2006 20:05
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#11
CLINTONISM > Cops/Judges = Mafia-Bad Guys, so why not GOD/POPE = DEVIL, as honest injun as Bill Clinton wants to give Americans the straight arrow, D *** THE TORPEDOES, gist of things by being on any and all sides of the Port-Gate issue.
Solely and Severally = Jointly and Severally = Its your fault and only your fault for trusting/voting for him.
Libya released all 84 jailed members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood movement who had been held in the country since the late 1990s, official sources said. "All the 84 members of the Muslim Brotherhood were released today ... amid celebrations in front of the prison in Tripoli in the presence of their families," an official source said. "Fivty-five of them have returned home to Benghazi," Libya's second city in the east of the country, added the source, who asked not to be named.
Libya arrested at the end of the 1990s 152 members of the Muslim Brotherhood. In 2002 two were sentenced to death, 73 to life in prison and 66 were acquitted. The others were handed 10 year jail sentences. The condemned, mainly students and academics, were accused of supporting or belonging to Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya al-Libiya, an Islamist group created in 1979, whose beliefs reflect those of Egypt's banned but tolerated Muslim Brotherhood.
#1
I once saw an oil painting done by some Czech or Polish artist. It depicted Richard Nixon in a pseudo-Moses role, leading the people of eastern Europe out of slavery.
For several generations, eastern Europeans will remember who stood by them always in their dark times. We can hope that the people of the Middle East will eventually do the same.
President Bush is being tried for "crimes against civilian populations" and "inhumane treatment of prisoners" at Parsippany High School, with students arguing both sides before a five-teacher "international court of justice." The panel's verdict could come as soon as Friday... Based upon their rationalizations, I look forward to their holding a mock trial for Cindy Sheehan for Treason.
#4
Parsippany High School, home of the Fighting Parsnips.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/02/2006 12:35
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#5
They're stuck debating the punishment. While adamently against the death penalty, the judges are still debating whether to make this a "special" case.
#7
You guys are rough, Parsippany is a fair sized town that tends Republican and is home to Morris county's largest Indian population, if I'm not mistaken.
This type of "teacher" unfortunately isn't only an NJ problem.
#9
Kyle said he received several letters from parents who were "all complimentary" of the war crimes hearing. One thing that Kyle said he would like to keep private is the verdict. "That decision is going to be sealed," he said, explaining that students will be told the outcome but asked not to tell others.
How very open and KGB like. I wonder how President's Day was celebrated?
#10
JerseyMike: Happy to stand corrected, and my apologies to the good citizens of Parsippany.
Teachers like this are one reason why my kids don't go to public schools.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/02/2006 13:59
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#11
The "Defense" Lawyer was on Rush and He was well spoken. He also said they "tried" Slick Willy when he was in office. He explained that this is a Senior class project and the students understand that this is only acedemic. He was only confused when confronted with the fact that NO U.S. citizen is bound by the International Court and so attempting to try the President in that body was non-binding and at best "for show". I think they are supposed to have closing arguments on Friday and a verdict by next week. I am sure we will all know by next Friday if they "convicted" Bush.
#13
An affront to the prophet and utterly outragious. I will speak to the New Jersey Committee of Madras at once. May the nats of ten thousand goats eternally inhabit the sweltering camel toes of your clan teacher Kyle.
I remain,
Mulay Achmed Mohammed el-Raisuli the Magnificent
#14
I heard the kid on Rush. I think these seniors would learn a hell of a lot more if they would consentrate on how the MSM misleads and spins every news story to paint Bush as less than adequate. They could read about it daily. Then, perhaps they would realize that by the spin of the MSM and only that is how this anti-Bush movement has come about. That's learning something of value. Good luck Jersey kids.
#16
Kyle is no stranger to controversial topics. Starting on Tuesday, his sophomore class will put former President Andrew Jackson on trial for alleged abuses against Native Americans.
...and Kyle says not to worry. The Indian killing bastard will receive a fair trial.
Kyle insisted that he doesn't have a partisan agenda. While teaching at Montclair High School, he conducted an impeachment trial of President Clinton while he was in office.
#19
Based on their rationalizations I look forward for a real>/b> trial on Jane Fonda for complicity in the Vietenamese and Cambodian genocides. Complete with real hanging. Thinking it well some of those teachers could find themselves on trial too.
#20
Gene Simmons, lead singer of KISS, while on FNC's YOUR WORLD WITH CAVUTO said he prefers to have a ROTTWEILER with him in war, NOT A [Clinton-style]POODLE, even though said Rottweiler may on occasion lash out at him. Simmons > Dubya is a Rottweiler that America needs to win this war.
It was 15 years ago today that our 8-year-old son Ryan suffered a severe brain injury that left him unable to walk or talk or feed himself. He was in the hospital (in two hospitals, actually) for over six months, and ever since has lived with us at home. I thought I would share some of the lessons I've learned in these past 15 years . . .
Not about the WoT, or politics, or any of that . . . but something deeply moving that everyone really ought to read.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/02/2006
11:17 ||
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Low-skilled illegal immigrants are slowing the ascension of Latinos, as a group, into the U.S. middle class, the nation's most prestigious research group warned Wednesday...
(original opinion)
The article alludes to several characteristics about "Hispanic" immigration that are usually missing from most of the debate.
To start with, the very word "Hispanic" is a grotesque, politically correct term popularized by the US government first in the 1980 census. It really defines nothing, and is both irritating to the people thus labeled and confuses the issues surrounding legal and illegal immigration from a huge region of the planet.
Perhaps one of the most interesting definition of "Hispanics" is "people who do not interbreed with each other if they are from different countries, religions, ethnic groups, social or economic classes, education, or speak different languages." They are oddly unique in this way, that is, in not wanting to have anything to do with each other.
At least until they cross the US border, and at least as far as the US government is concerned. And no, they don't intermarry with each other up here, either, though they will intermarry under some circumstances with anybody else.
A minority of the "Hispanics" who are Mexican, which is to say mostly Indian, are a majority in the US only because their country of origin happens to be right next door. Not surprisingly, the next largest groups tend to be the Guatemalans, from "the next country down", and the Puerto Ricans, who technically at least are from the United States already. The next largest group would probably be the Cubans, from the theoretical 51st State, sooner or later, again to be part of the United States also. Maybe sometime, weather permitting. Though not the rest of the Caribbean. Especially Aruba.
I hope this clears things up a tad. No? Well, among the other countries labeled as "Hispanic", we have the mostly African negroes from Belize and the entirely white looking people, a lot of them at least, from South America, that speak both mostly Spanish, of some dialect or other, or Portuguese. Or some Indian language or frequently English.
Though it seems counterintuitive, it should be pointed out that neither the Spanish, from "Hispania", nor the Portuguese, also from "sort-of-Hispania", are not "Hispanic", and I probably shouldn't dream on speculating about the Catalans or the Basques, who get really snippy if you refer to them as "Spanish".
So, anyway, back to the Mexicans, who are most of our legal and illegal aliens these days. Pretty much like the other immigrants who came to the US uninvited, they integrate in about three generations. However, because we have learned that it's probably better that they integrate faster than do like Europe does with its immigrants, this integration is happening a lot faster than the norm. Which brings up the statement from the original quoted text:
Low-skilled illegal immigrants are slowing the ascension of Latinos, as a group, into the U.S. middle class, the nation's most prestigious research group warned Wednesday...
Since having a larger, younger, work-oriented middle class is a good thing, especially since we "non-Hispanics and others" are getting on in years and need somebody to pay for our retirements, and since "Latinos" (a subset of "Hispanics") do seem to integrate quickly and ascend to the middle class quickly, we should probably conclude two things:
1) Having a goodly degree of Mexican immigrants is a good thing, as long as it is not done to excess, and,
2) To help the Mexican immigrants who are already in our country ascend to the middle class as soon as possible is also a good thing.
Which basically means that we need to erect a wall mostly as a governor to limit the unrestricted flow of Mexicans into the United States; while, ironically, encouraging far more of them to legally immigrate to the US.
It also means that we should reconsider the label "Hispanic", and perhaps try to come up with some other labels when deciding what people we already have enough of for the time being, and what people we could add to the ol' melting pot without destabilizing the cosmic order.
For example, since he wouldn't dream of marrying a different "Hispanic", we might allow a female Peruvian Taoist who *also* speaks Japanese, has a masters degree in Botany, with an annual salary of $78,000; so at least that Peruvian "Hispanic" will have somebody to get married to. Otherwise he might have to marry someone who only has a bachelor's degree.
Since having a larger, younger, work-oriented middle class is a good thing, especially since we "non-Hispanics and others" are getting on in years and need somebody to pay for our retirements DON"T SPEAK FOR ME!
If we as a people aren't able to look further into the future to see how this will have a negative impact on our children and their children, we are very much in trouble here. Our own children need to know what hard work is and appreciate what it means. To have our children grow up expecting to have all the "labor" related jobs done by illegals instead of doing the work themselves puts more of a wedge between us as people.
The educational level of our communities are lowering significantly and fast. I don't see us coming up with the next brilliant idea with most not even graduating from high school. When we're gone and these young uneducated Mexicans are at our age, and no longer able to work who will support them? With our exporting all of our high end jobs to India and other countries OMG.
Also they are costing our country so much more in medical expenses and the like compared to the few taking advantage of cheap labor. They are scabs, lowering the wage and lowering the benefits offered by many private companies. Not having insurance means they get emergency medicaid and that comes out of my pocket for the business owner to get a "break".
Also what melting pot? Illegals have been bringing with them their own culture, most don't seem to be interested in our culture at all here. They are interested in all of the free care, schools, and get it. There are many neighborhood businesses here in Colorado that don't speak english for you to communicate. The expense of interpreters is outrageous.
If imigrants want to come here because they like our credo, and want to be like us yes by all means, but to not accept any of what we're about and demand to have their culture and rights upheld is an outrage. Especially when they are here illegally. Don't misunderstand me with this comment, as I do feel we need to respect all cultures, but our own should be the dominating one followed here.
We need to not get hung up on the labels, we need to just see clearly and act on the fact that illegals are breaking the law and deal with it.
We don't need more monies spent on another agency coming up with another term for hispanic. They have already changed the term citizen to resident to allow the illegals to access our libraries and other services here in Colorado.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 13:49
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#2
Personally I don't understand why Europe isn't doing there best to work out migrant worker programs with Latin America. The Latin Americans need the cash, Europe needs cheap labor. Latin Americans already speak a Europan language and are flush with Judeo-Christian beliefs which Europe could use some firming up on. The deal would also increase trade between the continents.
Yeah it would cost more to get them there but in the long run, compared to Islamic ghettos and riots, it would seem to be a far cheaper solution.
#3
#2: Personally I don't understand why Europe isn't doing there best to work out migrant worker programs with Latin America.
The Shipping costs are prohibitive. (Pun intended)
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/02/2006 14:04
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#4
"Latinos also identify themselves differently"
The "open borders" crowd like to paint the false impression that all Latinos share their viewpoint. Contrary to that myth history shows that many legal Latino immigrants oppose their illegal counterparts.
Mexican hero and former president of the United Farm Workers Union César Chávez always maintained that illegal immigrants drove down wages. He even called INS to report the presence of illegal immigrants in the fields and demand that the agency deport them. UFW officials were even known to picket INS offices to demand a crackdown on illegal immigrants.
Shhhh...don't tell the Unions or the "Immigrant Rights" groups. They might call you a racist bigot.
#5
Jan: your arguments are true for illegal immigrants, but only initially for legal immigrants.
The Irish, Italians, even Germans entering the US were in the first generation, ghettoized in the way Europe does today. Second generation they became troublesome because they were neither integrated nor old world. Only in the third generation did they really become permanently Americans.
Because of the efforts of the US, Mexicans are going through these three generations all at once. You stop being Mexican in a hurry and are on the fast track to being an American--a good American.
And, on the plus side, if we *do* close the border, all of a sudden those who are already over here become major assets--they rapidly move into the middle class--the most productive, educated and profitable part of our demographics.
It's just not feasible to throw 2-10 million people, many of whom are already Americanized, back across the border to a country they have either left behind or never knew.
And ghettoization these days is tiny, compared to the vast numbers that fully integrate. Even in Phoenix metro, you could probably count on two hands the streets that have dominant Spanish-sign businesses; out of a metro area of 260 square miles, with thousands of streets.
Within the past week, it was suggested that the moribund radical "Hispanic" organization MeCha be reactivated. However, to show how times have changed, the middle-class Mexicans who proposed this immediately stated: "...but without the protests, the radicalism and leftist politics, we want someplace where we can network..."
In other words, they want a business club, a Mexican-American version of Rotary Club.
I just cannot get concerned about the possibility that Mexican Rotarians will somehow hurt our economy.
#6
Anonymoose, my mother in law when she came here from Germany (she escaped since she was jewish, unlike other family members that didn't make it out) needed a sponsor, and had to have money to start out with to get here. She worked from the age of 14 in the garment district in New York. Likewise my grandparents needed sponsors. I feel a big difference to compare with the flood of illegals coming over the border every day.
You do bring up some good points, that I don't see any easy answers to regarding the illegals that are here already etc.. But we really need to address this problem and not just let it continue to get worse every day.
I would like to see an english only law get established, and really teach english in the schools. This is maybe a bit off topic here, but would like to see all of our high school graduates commit 2 years of service to our country not all need to be in a military capacity, but I feel our youngsters need to do community service. My kids did in scouts throughout the years, and I think they are better because of it.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 19:09
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#7
Jan: There is a huge demand for adult English as a second language and literacy classes, far more than can be handled through typical means. Something I've proposed in past was to use existing resources, in this case public libraries, as "open to close" English language and literacy centers.
That is, most public libraries have all the ingredients: meeting rooms, English language experts, written reading material, multilingual instructional material, graphic training aids and teaching resources. Library volunteers and librarians could have classes going on continually during business hours with all levels of instruction.
Not only do they learn English, but they have at their fingertips any number of practical books to actually *do* something with their skills, so they are improving other areas of their lives at the same time. Typically, after work, adults go to the library every night it is open and start reading something new, after they have learned enough English to start.
HOWEVER, that being said, as to your second point, about community service, I have to strongly disagree. Community service is HELL. It always begins with good intentions, but then the most despicable, swinish, nasty and useless people gravitate to the controls of the system, tormenting everybody who goes through it.
It could best be compared to a court mandated drug diversion program that you have to attend for six months because someone you carpooled with had a marijuana cigarette on him (guilt by association).
A drug diversion program ran by a control freak liberal who insists that you kiss his behind or he will keep you in the program forever. You must admit to drug use, even though you didn't, and you must show improvement, even if there are no drugs in your blood. If you don't do either, the diversion class can run for years. And best of all, you have to pay him for the privilege to abuse you.
Oh, it makes me shudder because I know the people locally who would run such a service program, and I would find it damn hard to get through such a program without gutting one or more of them with a grapefruit knife.
To recap, it always sounds good, but it never, never, never, ever, works.
#8
oh well, I did like my kids doing community service and giving back to society. But these programs are only as good as the people that run them.
Regarding learning the english language; in Denver, we had I think it was 7 libraries changed to spanish language to accomodate the neighborhoods they were located in. Instead of keeping them english and having folks learn english, they have no reason to learn english now that everything is offered in spanish.
It is an ugly problem, with no good or easy solutions.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 20:34
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A student panel discussion that included a display of the Prophet Muhammad cartoons descended into chaos, with one speaker calling Islam an "evil religion" and audience members nearly coming to blows.
Organizers of Tuesday night's forum at the University of California, Irvine said they showed the cartoons as part of a larger debate on Islamic extremism.
But several hundred protesters, including members of the Muslim Student Union, argued the event was the equivalent of hate speech disguised as freedom of expression.
Although there were numerous heated exchanges, no violence was reported.
The panel, which included one Muslim speaker, was sponsored by the College Republicans and the United American Committee, a group that says it promotes awareness of internal threats facing America.
During the discussion in a nearly packed 424-seat campus auditorium, six cartoons were displayed: three depicting Muhammad and three anti-Semitic cartoons.
The discussion got off to a contentious start with the Council on American-Islamic Relations - an invited guest - boycotting the event and calling the United American Committee a "fringe group."
Tensions quickly escalated when the Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, founder of the conservative Brotherhood Organization of a New Destiny, said that Islam was an "evil religion" and that all Muslims hate America.
People repeatedly interrupted the talk and, at one point, campus police removed two men, one of them a Muslim, after they nearly came to blows.
Later, panelists were cheered when they referred to Muslims as fascists and accused mainstream Muslim-American civil rights groups of being "cheerleaders for terror."
"I put out a call to Muslims in America: Put out a fatwa on (Osama) bin Laden, put out a fatwa on (Abu Musab) al-Zarqawi," said panelist Lee Kaplan, a UAC spokesman. "Support America in the war on terror."
Thousands of Muslims worldwide have protested, sometimes violently, after the cartoons were published in a Danish newspaper and in other European newspapers. Islam widely holds that representations of Muhammad are banned for fear they could lead to idolatry.
Osman Umarji, former president of the Muslim Student Union, equated the decision by the student panel to display the prophet drawings to the debasement of Jews in Germany before the Holocaust.
"The agenda is to spread Islamophobia and create hysteria against Muslims similar to what happened to the Jews in Nazi Germany," said Umarji, an electrical engineer who graduated from Irvine last spring. "Freedom of speech has its limits."
Brock Hill, vice president of the College Republicans, said his group had a First Amendment right to display the cartoons.
"We're not going against Islam whatsoever," he said. "This is about free speech and the free marketplace of ideas."
Mohamed Eldessouky, 20, a criminology student who attended the discussion, said he was disappointed because he felt the panel and the audience were biased against Islam.
"I entered it with an open mind, but I thought it was totally biased. I thought the panelists would be more balanced. I think it did more harm than good," he said.
Lauren Chramosta, 18, a freshman, said she didn't know much about Islam and attended hoping to learn more.
"It was helpful to listen to different views," she said. "But I think (the Muslim panelist) was shut down so many times that he didn't get a fair shake." It is a tremendous shock to some people that not all ideas are equally good; that moral relativism is not better than reasoned judgement; and that to a great extent, groups *can* be blamed for the actions of their individual members.
Los Angeles Cardinal Roger M. Mahony said Wednesday he would instruct his priests to defy a proposed federal requirement that churches check the legal status of parishioners before helping them.
The U.S. House of Representatives included the requirement in an immigration bill that the Senate Judiciary Committee is to begin debating this week. The legislation also would penalize social organizations that refuse to meet its requirements.
When asked if he would be willing to go to jail for the stance, Mahony said "yes" because "helping people in need were actions that are part of God's mercy."
Mahony, a longtime advocate of immigrant rights who oversees a racially diverse archdiocese of more than 4 million people, used Ash Wednesday and the beginning of the Lenten season to urge Catholics to "make room" for immigrants.
"Unless you are a Native American, everyone in here is the son or daughter of immigrants," said Mahony, speaking during Mass at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.
Mahony told those attending Mass he was not in favor of "unfettered immigration," but that the current system was inhumane and inefficient. He said stringent laws and government bureaucracy meant immigrants were often separated up to 15 years from family members trying to immigrate.
"We need reform that looks to family unification," he said. "What we have now is broken and invites violation."
U.S. Roman Catholic bishops support a guest-worker program, legalizing undocumented immigrants and more visas for migrants' families.
Mahony has long advocated for immigrant rights and opposed the 1994 state proposition that tried to deny public benefits to illegal immigrants. The proposition was approved by voters but struck down by federal courts as unconstitutional. It is not the business of churches to have to "check papers". It is also not the business of churches to facilitate additional lawbreaking. So it is acceptable for them to give to anyone who walks through their doors, but it is not acceptable for them to encourage the violation of US borders.
#1
"Unless you are a Native American, everyone in here is the son or daughter of immigrants," said Mahony, speaking during Mass at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.
Well actually they are too. It's just that their ancestors are so far back that one could never trace their family tree. I agree that it is not the business of churchs to have to check residency papers but neither should they encourage or facilitate breaking the law. With one proviso, laws that seek to deny the rights of citizens and can be fought with civil disobediance ala the civil rights fights of the past.
#2
"Unless you are a Native American,..."
Perhaps at odds with Merriam-Webster, a Cherokee friend of mine insisted that he was an "American Indian". He further pointed out that anyone born in America is a native, thus a Native American. As further proof to his argument, he said look at the sign as you approach Cherokee, North Carolina. It reads "Indian Reservation" not "Native American Reservation".
I'm wondering if the Cardinal cannot render assistance to the governmaent without compromising his religious duties. As Jesus pointed out, Give to worldly authorities the things that belong to them, and to God what belongs to God.
#3
The catch here may be that the priests are helping parishioners with federal funds. If they won't enforce federal laws (which they ought not) then they shouldn't take federal funds (which they ought not). This has always been the downside of the faith based initiatives. He who pays the piper calls the tune. It's the Feds favorite way of taking over, offer cash then pull the strings.
Lots of injuns prefer to be called American Indians. Some get downright nasty about it when you call them "native Americans", insisting their occupancy of the continent predates America.
#6
Its all PC in the name. NA came up because the Europeans had tagged the natives with a misapplied term thinking they [the Europeans] had made it to India. It had been used for hundreds of years, then the 60s and the victimization culture took hold and the PC police decided that it was an insult. Aboriginal-American wasn't classy enough I guess, but it does have that oh, so in ' - '.
#10
As a Catholic, I agree with OS - MAhoney's presided over the silencing and transferring of unknown numbers of pedophile priests to unsuspecting parishes, smashing the lives of untold children. He should be run out of the Church on a rail and sent to prison for conspiracy and abetting crimes. Mahoney should just STFU about legalities and morality.
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/02/2006 20:31
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#11
the church isn't a place for politics. If churches start/continue to push these views, they won't be non profit much longer.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 21:09
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#12
The Dioceses of Los Angeles and San Bernardino are at the forefront of this 'social justice' issue. The good Cardinal and the bishops may be right in saying they are "not in favor of 'unfettered immigration'", but they're not far off from that stance.
This is the key strategic question of our day.
...
A 'yes' answer offers a far different set of strategic imperatives than a 'no' answer.
To say yes to our question, one assumes that there are aspects of being Muslim and faithful to Islam, that can coexist peacefully with liberty, tolerance, and equality. The strategy that follows is one of identifying the groups and sects within Islam that adhere to these notions of their religion, and then encouraging them, favoring them, propagating them, and splitting them off from the elements of Islamic practice that are all too incompatible with the portions of modernity that invigorate men's souls: free inquiry, free association, free commerce, free worship, or even the freedom to be left alone.
To answer no, one states that Islam itself is fundamentally irreconcilable with freedom. This leads to a wholly different set of tactical moves to isolate free societies from Islam. They might include:
-detention of Muslims, or an abrogation of certain of their rights;
-forced deportation of Muslims from free societies;
-rather than transformative invasions, punitive expeditions and punitive strikes;
-extreme racial profiling;
-limits on the practice and study of Islam in its entirety
And even some extreme measures if free societies find the above moves to be failing:
-forced conversion from Islam, or renunciation;
-colonization;
-extermination of Muslims wherever they are found.
These last are especially ghastly measures. But a society that thought Islam incompatible with freedom might in the long term slip towards them.
Not news to us, but a good rendering; read the whole thing.
#1
The extreme measures are not imaginative enough. They are too straight laced, and black and white. They, also, show a lack of understanding of religion and how it goes away. The suggested actions might just make it stronger.
You destroy a religion by perverting it, seducing it members, making it irrelevant to life and embarassing to belong to. Silly works too.
So when ways are mentioned to accomplish this in a non-violent but invasive manner the religous supporters of this war blanch as they know many of the techniques are portable to their reality. Therefore, we must follow the blockhead courses..
#4
I agree 3dc: You destroy a religion by perverting it, seducing it members, making it irrelevant to life and embarassing to belong to. Silly works too.
That's exactly what Ali Sina said here in a long polemicinterview. It was posted on the 'burg here.
Here's a choice quote:
Muhammad was an idiot, a psychopath, a crackpot. He needs to be laughed at not disproved. What is there to disprove about splitting the moon, climbing the seventh heaven riding on the back of a horse with human face and meeting dead prophets who tell him to bargain with God to reduce the number of prayers from 50 to 5 times per day? Is God stupider than his prophets? The entire Quran is a big joke. If it was not so violent, it would be the biggest comic book ever written.
A suicide attacker rammed a car packed with explosives into a vehicle carrying an American diplomat in Pakistan's largest city. Initial investigations showed a suicide attacker deliberately rammed his car into a vehicle carrying the U.S. diplomat, blowing it into the air, across a concrete barrier and into the grounds of the hotel, a Pakistani counterterrorism official and senior investigator said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. The driver of the diplomat's car, a Pakistani working for the consulate, also died. The other fatalities were a paramilitary guard and an unidentified woman. The attacker was also presumed killed in the attack, the two security officials said. His body was not recovered. The blast ripped through the parking lot of the Marriott Hotel, about 20 yards from the consulate gate, shattering windows at the consulate and on all 10 floors of the hotel. Ten cars were destroyed, and charred wreckage was flung as far as 200 yards.
The counterterrorism official said the attacker used high-intensity explosives and it was the most powerful blast he'd seen in Karachi a hotbed of Islamic militancy. Police initially said two car bombs had gone off, but provincial police chief Jahangir Mirza said that a single bomb may have triggered a second smaller explosion in a burning car. The bombing left a crater 8 feet wide and more than 2 feet deep. It propelled cars into the air and damaged nearby buildings, including a naval hospital. The street was strewn with mangled car parts.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.
Mohammed Ali, who sells cigarettes nearby, said the first explosion occurred around 9 a.m., knocking him down and flattening his wooden stall. "Seconds later there was another explosion. We ran away to save our lives," said Ali. "The explosions set cars on fire and there was smoke all around ... I thought the explosions would burst my ear drums." Mohammed Jameel, a former army colonel who was getting a medical checkup at the naval hospital, said the first explosion was "very intense" and the second one was smaller. "I saw two burning car seats land in the hospital lawn," he said.
Officials said the bombing could be timed for Bush's visit to Pakistan.
"We have lost at least one U.S. citizen in the bombing, a foreign service officer, and I send our country's deepest condolences to that person's loved ones and family," Bush said at a news conference in neighboring India, without naming the diplomat. A Pakistani Foreign Ministry statement said the bombing was a "horrific terrorist attack" and it expressed "deep sadness" over the deaths of the American diplomat and his local driver. "This senseless act today further fortifies our resolve to fight terrorism," the statement said. "We all must work together to eliminate this terrible menace."
#1
I'm sure the ISI is all over this, and some of the usual suspects will be rounded up
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/02/2006 10:30
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#2
Such a massive blast, just two days before Bush's visit? Surely there has been unprecedented security beforehand, just as in India, especially when Pak's most wanted man, Rehman, is known to be an emerging leader and running loose. Maybe Musharraf will be shaken enough to really let loose on all the known camps and anyone thought to be associated with extremists.
#4
This only helps our cause in Bush's goal on persuading the Pakistani president to be more forceful in confronting terrorists, but still a real tragedy for the families of this innocent diplomat.
#1
I haven't posted anything in a while and as you can see, I like the picture feature. Nice work Fred. You can delete the helicoper if the mood strikes you.
#7
Agreed, HC. Methinks Steyn attended Ed's School of Reality (our ed) - he echoes many points that I've seen posted here - particularly ed.
The article is as much a vivisection as opinion. Splayed open, the UN is rot and corruption in (almost?) every aspect, in every action, in every organ.
#9
With some of it's guts spattered into Canada. We've had our horror story of ineffectual UN crap that led to well, the usual horrors.
I have such a loathing for the UN now, but as a starry-eyed child of the 60's, it seemed like a great idea.
Over time, we of the 60's have fallen complacently into the comforts of our small individual lives -- lost in the picayune market economy and less challenging philosophies. Otherwise, the current UN wouldn't exist.
Even more so today, we are the "children of the universe" and with all the hope and responsibility encompassed in the task of shifting paradigms, we must complete the journey.
The philosophies and ideals of that era (and the necessities of this) are NOT nostalgia. They are our legacy.
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Iran's nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani said on Thursday that the United States, by pressing for Iran to be reported to the U.N. Security Council over its nuclear programme, was threatening a Russian compromise proposal, Interfax news agency said.
"The insistence of the American side on sending the Iranian nuclear dossier to the U.N. security Council shows that the Russian proposal is being wrecked," Larijani was quoted as saying at a news conference.
He spoke after talks with Russian officials on Moscow's offer to Iran to enrich uranium on Russian soil to end the confrontation with the West, which suspects Tehran of seeking to build an atomic weapon.
Larijani added no new date had been set for a fresh round of talks on the proposal.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/02/2006 18:16
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#2
So Iran's Mullahocracy want their nuke fuels protected by infidel and future enemy the Russians, aka "Americans without Money" ala post fall of Saigon unified Vietnam/PRVN, in order for Iran to continue throwing tantrums about destroying Israel and ultimately the US-West?? DIDN'T KNOW RUSSIA WAS A "MAOIST" SOCIALIST NATION SUPPORTING RADICAL ISLAMISTS LIKE MAOISTS IN ASIA - has Russia pre-surrendered to China???
#3
Russia has massive demographic, economic and environmental problems. Right now IIRC ethnic Chinese make up or soon will make up the majority of people east of the Urals.
After the recent surge in terror attacks, acting prime minister Ehud Olmert has instructed Israel's defense forces to take all possible measures "with an iron fist and with no restrictions" in Israel's ongoing battle against terrorist organizations.
After emerging on Thursday from a breakfast meeting with President Moshe Katsav that went more than half an hour beyond schedule, Olmert reiterated several times to reporters that Israel will do everything in its power to prevent the penetration of international terrorist forces and to halt the activities of terrorist elements in the region.
"We are escalating our war against terrorism," he said. "There are no limits to the measures that our defense forces will take to prevent any outbreak of terrorism in any place. We will use all the means at our disposal to stop terrorists from harming the citizens of Israel. We will do everything that has to be done without hesitation."
There is not a day, said Olmert, in which the defense forces are not engaged in nipping terrorism in the bud. This includes preventing the activation of Kassam rockets.
Asked whether he thought that there would be an intensification of terrorist operations related to Israel's upcoming national elections, Olmert replied that there are terrorists who want to influence the outcome of the elections.
While Olmert expressed willingness to conduct talks with Palestinians who are genuinely seeking peace, he made it clear that Israel will not talk to a Hamas-led Palestinian government unless it meets three conditions: the cessation of terror and laying down of arms; Hamas amends its covenant and acknowledges Israel's right to exist; and all agreements between the Palestinian Authority and Israel are honored.
Olmert emphasized that there was no chance at this time of a meeting between him and Hamas prime minister designate Ismail Haniyeh.
"I will not meet with Ismail Haniyeh," he said, "but I will continue to fight any terror organization with which he is involved."
While observers from many countries commended the democratic manner in which the recent elections to the Palestinian Legislative Assembly were conducted, neither Katsav nor Olmert view these elections as democratic if the central force is a terrorist body.
Noting the link between Hamas and the Moslem Brotherhood, Katsav stated: "I'm sure that the Moslem Brotherhood does not advocate democracy, and this poses a danger to world stability."
Katsav who has met in recent days with Labor leader Amir Peretz, Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu, Shas leader Eli Yishai and former Shinui leader Tommy Lapid, said that there is consensus among all of Israel's political parties that there will be no talks with a Hamas-led government unless it modifies its covenant and recognizes Israel's right to exist.
#1
Well, if the flu does enter the pussy cat population as a whole, with cat-to-cat transmission, at least we can look forward to fewer "crazy old lady with 5 dozen cats in her house" stories for a while.
Authorities in Germany have today announced detection of H5N1 avian influenza in a domestic cat. The cat was found dead over the weekend on the northern island of Ruegen. Since mid-February, more than 100 wild birds have died on the island, and tests have confirmed H5N1 infection in several.
There is no present evidence that domestic cats play a role in the transmission cycle of H5N1 viruses. To date, no human case has been linked to exposure to a diseased cat. No outbreaks in domestic cats have been reported.
Unlike the case in domestic and wild birds, there is no evidence that domestic cats are a reservoir of the virus. All available evidence indicates that cat infections occur in association with H5N1 outbreaks in domestic or wild birds.
Notice to Pak TV, Chinese and NoKo weapons may be freely painted green and named after Afghan conquerors. American weapons should not be.Footage of the "Pakistan developed missile" from Pak TV
ISLAMABAD, Feb 28 (APP): Pakistan has attained another mark in the production of latest missile technology by producing Joint Standoff Weapon System, which would enable Pakistan Air Force and Navy to hit the targets with accuracy. The system is a joint venture of Pakistan Air Force and Navy. It has been developed by using Integrating Global Positioning System and Initial Management System, Navigation System. The programme is designed on modivator Joint Air Frame Guidance and Flight control systems. The maximum range of this missile is 70 km.
Under this programme, fighter jet fitted sensor provides the relevant details about the possible targets and guides the fighter plane to strike them with accuracy. This system is used to hit armoured vehicles and fixed targets, GEO TV reported. Dr Professor Hassan Askari , a renowned defence analyst while commenting said that Joint Standoff Weapon System is a form of Cruise missile. It is fired from a jet fighter and after piercing through air it can hit its target. The greater advantage of this system is that it can be fired from the fighter plane while remaining outside the range of Anti Air Craft and Defence system of the enemy.
It will add to the defensive punch of the country because it strengthens Air Defence system, Dr Hassan said and added that it can hit hard targets, air shelters, underground command posts and tanks as well. Moreover, the missile is less expensive and effective defence system
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has gained what it calls joint standoff weapons a capability through which an invisible target can be hit. The weapon, in which integrated Global Position System and Inertial (?) Management System Navigation are used, is a part of a joint programme of Navy and Air force in the U.S. Joint airframe, guidance system and flight control is used in this programme which is designed on the modular programme and thanks to this system the missile can hit a target at range of 70 kilometers. The missile can hit an enemy target without entering air limits of an enemy.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006
06:10 ||
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#1
Good. It's not a Joint Stand Off Weapon it's a country made long-range shuttle missile.
Boy, is the World Service making it difficult to Listen Again to the topic Is Islamism the new global threat? - broadcast yesterday on World Have Your Say at 18:00 GMT. Heres the torturous procedure:
Click on Listen Again - directly above the text World Have Your Say: Is Islamism a new 'global threat'?
That will get you to a burning issue, an interview with Liberias president.
Scratch your head for a while, then, in that window, click on World Have Your Say. That will take you to an introduction to a discussion on South Africas ANC.
At this point youll probably give up in disgust, unless you know that this is how the BBC chose to obscure the Islamism topic during the original broadcast.
Stay tuned for a minute and youll be in the middle of a fascinating discussion between Ibn Warwick, an academic ex-Muslim from New York State, and Ajmul Masrour of the Islamic society of Britain. (Forgive me if I've mangled the spelling of their names.)
Here are some highlights:
Ajmul: If someone can show me a verse in the Koran where there are instructions to kill
Ibn: Yes, I can. Sura 9, vs 5-6: Kill them wherever you find them ..Sura 8 vs 12: I will strike terror into the heart of the infidels
Ajmul: That was in the context of a war situation It's not a generic instruction to Muslims to kill...
Ibn: Thats your interpretation. The Koran is not time bound. It is the eternal word of God for Muslims. You cant relativise it.
Ajmul: Yes, the Koran is true for all time, but there are verses that have to be interpreted contextually:
If one is to take a knife and kill .it is as if he has killed the whole of humanity.
Ibn: Can I have the right of reply here? He quoted that whoever killed a human being it is as if he has killed the whole of mankind. Ajmul is the one taking it out of context: if you read the whole quote, in Sura 5, vs 32 onwards, youll find that this supposedly noble sentiment refers to Jews. Its a warning to Jews:behave or else.
Ajmul: [Complete, total and utter silence.]
So there it is. Next time a Muslim pompously and piously mentions that noble saying from the Koran, well know exactly what hes talking about.
Please put the link to the story in the "Source" box when posting articles. Thanks - the moderators
#1
It does not matter if you buy food or guns, sending 150K to the Chechens is supporting the enemy. Food for the families of the fighters is money saved for bullets. What is no big surprise is the ACLU is representing them. Who is paying for this? If they can send hundreds of thousands to terrorists one would think they couold afford legal services. I hope our tax dollars are not paying for the undermining of American law.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 6:10
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#2
good. Maybe with enough focus on this issue we can demand that our law be followed and that these traitors be hung.
In order to prevent the poor from being unable to bring suits against those who violate their civil rights, the law provides that if the plaintiff in civil rights litigation prevails they have thier legal fees paid by the defendant. That is why the government is the defendant in the creche on the twon square suits. Nobody minds if the city and its insurance company have to pay. These legal fees are a major source of funding for the ACLU and an invitation to invent suits where no real controversy exists.
#5
So now the ACLU is going to bat to cover for jihadi funding channels?
Can we just get on with it and admit the ACLU is on the enemy's side?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/02/2006 8:47
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#6
The ACLU was founded by people who might charitably be called fellow travellers. It has always been on the enemy's side. Only the enemy whose side it is on changes.
#8
NS, here I sit in Zamboanga wanting to strangle someone!! The ACLU, as you said, are there to protect the poor and those without representation. This is a disgusting distortion of what they were intended to do, it now is monster without controls. Thy are "The enemy within". God bless the United States of America, may each and every member of the ACLU rot in hell.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 9:56
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#1
poor mayor was not invited to the party, boo hoo. DC is not a state, and until someone decides to make it one he should know his place. He ran for the mayors office, next he will want to be king. What he needs to be doing is cleaning up the streets and raising the education levels in the poor areas.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 5:15
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#2
If AC/DC was made a state, then the sens and reps would be required to act within the laws of the nation. Never happen.
#5
In other news: Due to record Spring rainfall, The Potomac River is scheduled to crest 31 feet above flood stage this evening. D.C. Mayor Governor Anthony Williams blames the Bush Administration and has requested army field kitchens from Mexican President Fox, and inflatable, solar powered canoes from China.
#6
Do what they did on the Virginia side of the river. Keep all the federal land and revert the rest back to Maryland. They'll have their representatives and senators and Maryland taxes. Oh, and a drive up to Annapolis to bitch rather than take the subway.
Violence on the U.S.-Mexico border is at an all-time high because illegal aliens are more willing to attack U.S. authorities, and an increasing number also are convicted criminals, border sheriffs said yesterday.
Whereas 10 years ago they would flee back to Mexico if anyone challenged them, now aliens make it clear they will fight, the sheriffs told a Senate Judiciary Committee panel. "They make it known to the deputies: 'We're going through, you're not going to stop us,'?" said Sheriff A. D'Wayne Jernigan of Val Verde County in Texas.
And Sheriff Larry A. Dever of Cochise County in Arizona said when smugglers are involved, law enforcement now expects the worst. "We anticipate that we will be in a fight, a very violent confrontation, in every interdiction effort, with running gunbattles down public roadways," he said.
The sheriffs described a border in chaos and a federal government that hasn't put the resources into its own efforts, nor been as receptive as possible to local law-enforcement efforts to help out. They said the trend toward violent confrontations has happened in the past decade as the trade in drugs and people has become a big business for smugglers and with the increase in OTMs, or "other than Mexican" aliens, attempting to cross.
"It sounds like, if nothing else, there's at least an attitude of entitlement," said Sen. John Cornyn, Texas Republican.
Border violence has become a hot topic in recent months, with drug cartels brazenly killing police chiefs on the Mexican side, the discovery of a tunnel under the border ending in a warehouse in San Diego, attacks on U.S. authorities increasing, and a videotaped encounter with what Texas sheriffs said was Mexican military on the U.S. side of the border.
Senators said one reason for the rise in violence on the U.S. side is that many illegal aliens are convicted criminals or persons wanted for crimes. More than 42,000 illegal aliens caught at the U.S. border in the past five months fell into that category, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. "Because the goal of these criminals is to smuggle valuable drugs and humans across the border, the violence today has led to gunfire exchanges with our law-enforcement agents," said Sen. Jon Kyl, Arizona Republican. "These criminals also have no prejudice in their violence, as they also assault the very people they're smuggling illegally into our country."
Mr. Kyl said the Department of Homeland Security reported that 139,000 of the 1.1 million people apprehended along the border in 2005 were criminal aliens seeking to illegally re-enter the United States.
In addition to the sheriffs, federal immigration authorities also testified yesterday. Under questioning by Sen. Jeff Sessions, Marcy M. Forman, the director of the Office of Investigations for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said her office doesn't have the money or staff to respond to all calls from local law enforcement to come pick up illegal aliens. "Basically the rule in Alabama was it was 15 or more, we might come and pick them up. Otherwise basically don't bother to call. Isn't that the real fact?" said Mr. Sessions, Alabama Republican.
Miss Forman said not all calls about illegal aliens are a priority for ICE. "With 5,500 special agents we have to prioritize. Our prioritization entails national security and public safety," she said, which means dangerous felons and those thought to be security risks. She said "funding is an issue" for why they don't have the ability to respond. President Bush called for modest increases in ICE agents in this year's budget.
Sheriff Dever said that although his border county gets a good response from ICE, that's not true for his colleagues in the interior.
Also yesterday, Mr. Kyl and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, California Democrat, joined by a bipartisan group of House members, announced a bill to close a loophole in the law regarding tunnels that run under the border. Although it is illegal to smuggle drugs or people through tunnels, it is not illegal to build a tunnel or own the property that the tunnel exits onto. Forty tunnels have been discovered, 39 or them on the southern border. The border sheriffs are making the rounds of Capitol Hill in their search for more aid.
A House bill passed last year would allow border sheriffs to aid in enforcing immigration laws, and some states have signed agreements allowing ICE to train local law enforcement on how to detain and process illegal aliens.
Members of the Texas Border Sheriff's Coalition testified before a House Homeland Security Committee panel last month and some of their members, along with several Arizona sheriffs, will be before a House Judiciary Committee panel today.
#1
"Basically the rule in Alabama was it was 15 or more, we might come and pick them up
Sigh.....
Just come to Denver General Hospital, or to any of the Denver schools, you'll have thousands of illegals to "pick them up". They don't even try to hide anymore. They are first in line for services.
Don't get me going on free health care if you're an illegal verses no health care for the average joe american citizen. The term "citizen" is being replaced with the term "resident" here to include the illegals in Colorado.
And don't allow citizenship to those already here. They have been here illegally and need to be taken back. I'm very tired of this politically correct atmosphere that has been dominating our actions. Wanting to do the right thing has been tromped on and taken advantage of to the max. We need to reclaim our borders.
Put the fence up! put the fence up! put the fence up!
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 13:16
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#2
""
It's that way everywhere. Particularly in states bordering Mexico.
#3
"Just come to Denver General Hospital, or to any of the Denver schools, you'll have thousands of illegals to "pick them up". They don't even try to hide anymore. They are first in line for services."
It's that way everywhere. Particularly in states bordering Mexico.
Sorry for the double post, I forgot to close the tag.
#4
We need to protect our borders. This includes having 'heavy artillary' (as in gunships / helos / aircraft / and even troops if needed) on call to local law enforcement when needed. They shouldn't have to face this invasion alone.
Cut *all* federal funds to so-called 'sanctuary cities' and governments. No you don't get to pick and choose which laws you will enforce.
Require proof positive of legal residence / citizenship for public school registration, non-critical medical treatment, and other 'benefits'. Let them go back and fix where they came from.
Enforce the existing laws against hiring illegal aliens and hand out fines to pay for it. Change them to make it stick personally (as in pierce the coroprate veil) to the CFO and CIO's (and boards) of corporations who hire illegals.
If we need/want 'Guest workers' thats fine. As long as the apply *there* and get the approprate background checks / approvals / etc.... like any other Visa applicant. And make them return - they cannot adjust status but must return.
Automatic 10 year ban for entering the US illegally. Lifetime on the second offense.
No automatic citizenship for newborns born from a illegal parent (of either gender). Or of non-immigrant visa holders or 'Guest Workers'.
And stop calling them 'illegal immigrants' - they have not been granted immigrant status by the BCIS/INS they are ILLEGAL ALIENS (as in in-violation-of-federal-law).
Do not give amnisty to illegals who are already here. Make them return to their country of origin, then wait out their 10 year ban, then apply and wait like every other law-abiding applicant.
--
BTW: is that guy in the pic (on the left) showing us how (ahem!) big he is or what?
#5
Crazyfool, while I was a nursing student long ago, a guy came in through the ER from an accident from a bar brawl, and as they cut off his clothes, it was discovered that he had the perverbial banana taped to his leg. As a very young woman at the time, this was very shocking. This story traveled like wild fire throughout the hospital at the time. I don't think I would have believed it had I not seen it. So this photo means nothing to me, except maybe he's trying to catch the banana shifting haha.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 16:00
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#6
"It sounds like, if nothing else, there's at least an attitude of entitlement,"
#7
We need to create that National Militia as soon as possible, arm it to the teeth (capable of facing anything the Mexican military has), and put it on the border. As bad as my physical health is, I will gladly spend a month or six down there helping out, but only if I'm allowed to shoot back. NO MORE VIETNAMS, especially on our own border. At the same time, let's do the Canadian border, too. We won't have to face many Canadians of British descendance, but the odd arab or two should be greeted with a 7.62mm round between the eyes.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/02/2006 16:21
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#11
Old Patriot, I only wish more of our young people felt as you do. Hopefully we can make a difference in this arena by opening up people's eyes to the tragedies occuring down there.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 18:53
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#12
The Guard and local Police are concentrated in the SW border areas - meanwhile, the Spetzies are running around all over the place in Canada, aka "where American forces are not". Any 9-11(s) in Canada gives Putin the right to invoke the "Yeltsin, etal Doctrine" where Russia proclaims its right to use UNILATERAL mil force to "protect" Russian citizens anywhere in the world.
A fight to block alternative fuel development that could replace oil-burning power plants for communities along the Nantucket Sound has created an unusual alliance on Capitol Hill, with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy backing the fight against the green proposal.
Mr. Kennedy, a staunch environmentalist, opposes the Cape Wind project, which will place windmills in the sound's shallows to create electricity for customers in Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.
Critics say the Massachusetts Democrat doesn't want the Cape Wind project in his own back yard along with 130 windmills that might clutter the water view of the Kennedy clan's vacation home. Sen. John Kerry, Massachusetts' junior senator and another key green ally, called attempts to derail the project an "insult."
Opponents of the project say it should not go forward until federal guidelines are established and it has undergone a competitive bidding process. "Senator Kennedy has real environmental and economic concerns, and the federal government continues to lack a national policy and process to guide offshore alternative energy development," said Melissa Wagoner, Mr. Kennedy's spokeswoman. Mr. Kennedy, who has a 95 percent vote rating from the League of Conservation Voters, has recruited the help of Rep. Don Young of Alaska -- a conservative Republican and foe of environmentalists who received a zero ranking from the league last year.
Mr. Young, chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, is lobbying members of a House-Senate conference on the Coast Guard supplemental appropriations bill. He wants them to add his proposal to require windmills to be set back 1.5 nautical miles from any shipping or ferry lanes. Such a buffer requirement would make the Cape Wind project impossible in such a narrow sound. "Given the potential dangers of siting one of these wind farms in a busy shipping area, [Mr. Kennedy] thinks it is worth the conferees' consideration," Miss Wagoner said.
However, developers of the Cape Wind project say the legislation is specifically directed at them, would cripple the project economically and is a classic case of the "not in my back yard" (NIMBY) attitude toward developments that serve the common good. "The NIMBY opponents have spent more than $1 million lobbying in D.C.," says Mark Rodgers, Cape Wind project spokesman. "The Young amendment will kill Cape Wind in one fell swoop, which appears to be the intention.
"It would also impose on the U.S. the most stringent laws in the world on offshore wind energy development," said Mr. Rodgers, who noted that oil drilling rigs are only required to be 500 feet from shipping lanes.
Mr. Young's spokesman declined to comment on the legislation. However, in a letter to the conferees, Mr. Young specifically refers to the Cape Wind project, which he says encompasses 24 square miles with windmills reaching 417 feet, and is "located in water deep enough that ships can enter into the area and do so regularly. I know others oppose the project entirely on a wide variety of economic, environmental, and tourism standards," Mr. Young's letter stated. "I am not necessarily opposed to the project, but I am convinced we need a set of objective navigational safety standards that will assure that wind energy projects are properly sited with regard to navigational safety and national security," Mr. Young wrote.
Massachusetts declared Nantucket Sound an ocean sanctuary in the 1970s, thus banning disturbance of nearly the entire seabed as well as the view.
Mark Forest, chief of staff for Rep. Bill Delahunt, Massachusetts Democrat who represents the Nantucket area, called it "a very contentious battle." "We have a need for energy, but there is a right way to do it and a wrong way to do it -- this is the wrong way," Mr. Forest said.
Mr. Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee, has issued a statement opposing Mr. Young's legislative move. "The Young amendment is an insult to Americans who care about good government. I oppose this backdoor amendment to the Coast Guard Authorization bill, which -- if passed -- will derail offshore wind projects across the nation," he said.
Mr. Rodgers said the use of wind power would reduce air pollution from the oil-fired Canal Power plant and ease the demand for electricity throughout New England, which faces the threat of rolling blackouts during cold winter days. Asked about Mr. Kennedy's opposition to the plan, Mr. Rodgers said, "To say you favor wind power, but not here, where you live in a very windy place, calls into question your real commitment to wind power."
#1
So impose eminent domain and take his property, build the power site, and be done with that wind bag. Rodgers is correct, if Kennedy buries this in Congress it will cost millions to lobby the project out of DC.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 6:02
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#2
for a brief second, I thought the title of this article was Kennedy, tits and windmills. Maybe I should go to bed?
#3
I...ummmmmmmm...propose that this...ummmmmmm...money be...ummmmmmmm...instead be used to research...ummmmmmmmm...unsinkable cars, which is a...ummmmmm...huge...ummmmmmmm...issue in the Cape Cod...ummmmmm...area. Either that, or...ummmmmmmmm...research into low fat scotch.
Posted by: Sen. Edward M. Kennedy ||
03/02/2006 9:06
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#4
I never thought I would support Kerry on an issue...
Damm!
#5
Mary Jo Kopechne could not be reached for comment.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/02/2006 11:17
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#6
I think 49 Pan is onto something there. Take the Keenedy land for the betterment of the other citizens. If Ted (drunk-MA) was a true patriot and rpgoressive he would demand that they built it on his property. Hell the wind coming FROM the Kennedy compound could power the entire eastern seaboard! But I guess we can't disturb the imperial grounds.
#8
I wonder if there are things buried in the sound that Kennedy doesn't want uncovered during construction. He does have a history of leaving things in the water...
Posted by: Gir ||
03/02/2006 13:19
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#9
Stick him out in the water and let him blow hard.
I know he could do it! The wrong Kennedy landed in the water~~RIP JOHN JOHN.
Andrea
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 20:15
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Bill Clinton, former US president, advised top officials from Dubai two weeks ago on how to address growing US concerns over the acquisition of five US container terminals by DP World. It came even as his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, was leading efforts to derail the deal.
Mr Clinton, who this week called the United Arab Emirates a good ally to America, advised Dubais leaders to propose a 45-day delay to allow for an intensive investigation of the acquisition, according to his spokesman.
On Sunday, DP World agreed with the White House to undertake the lengthy review, a move which has assuaged some of the opposition from the US Congress.
However, Mrs Clinton remains a leading voice against the deal, and this week proposed legislation to block it, arguing that the US could not afford to surrender our port operations to foreign governments. Mr Clintons spokesman said: President Clinton is the former president of the US and as such receives many calls from world leaders and leading figures every week. About two weeks ago, the Dubai leaders called him and he suggested that they submit to the full and regular scrutiny process and that they should put maximum safeguards and security into any port proposal.
He added that Mr Clinton supported his wifes position on the deal and that ideally state-owned companies would not own US port operations. Mr Clintons contact with Dubai on the issue underscores the relationship he has developed with the United Arab Emirates since leaving office. In 2002, he was paid $300,000 (252,000) to address a summit in Dubai.
The backlash against Dubais takeover has seen some lawmakers in Washington highlight the UAEs alleged role in helping to finance September 11.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:35 ||
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#1
I am now very, very afraid. I just saw a vision of the world with Hildabeast as the U.S. President and Billy-Boy as head of the U.N. It was not a place worth living in.
#1
I have information that anti-open border citizens have virtually overrun the senate fax machines this week. Senators are probably hiding under desks. The organizers are pushing to continue the seige until realistic action is taken.
Once again, "Borders, Ports, Patriot Act"
India and the United States have sealed a controversial nuclear cooperation pact, the centerpiece of President George W. Bush's first visit to the world's largest democracy, Indian news channels said on Thursday.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:26 ||
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#1
This is very good news for the largest and the most powerful democracies in the world. I wonder why it took so long.
#2
Because it is not at all clear that this is a good idea. Why won't India sign the NPT, for example? It is in the same class as North Korea, a non-signatory nation developing nukes.
Because it cannot sign as a nuclear weapons state.
Signing the NPT would require it to sign as a non nuclear weapons state and give up its arsenal.
India will not do this while China has the bomb.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 11:03
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#5
You need to bear in mind that China attacked India in 1962 and still occupies Indian territory.
The Indian and Chinese forces are eyeball to eyeball on the LAC (the line of actual control) and the countries have come close to war on several occasions since.
China claims two of India's states as its own territory.
You're not goinf to get India to accept being defenceless against a Chinese strike.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 11:13
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#6
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 11:14
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#7
Because it cannot sign as a nuclear weapons state.
Why not? And even if there is some rational reason, why not say that they will abide with the NPT provisions with us?
#8
Uhh, but cooperating? What does that mean? I'll show you mine if you show me yours? Sounds like sharing. Does that mean we are in some way engaging in prolifiation ourselves?
Not really sure.
If so, then yes they could sign and say "yep, we be just like them "yanquee sahibs".
Like the toon, though.
Posted by: kelly ||
03/02/2006 12:04
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#9
I don't like the taste of this deal. I don't like negotiating with a country that allows leaders within it's borders to make claims such as to impose death threats to the cartoonist in recent months.
I feel we need to stop having money dictate our fate. I would like to think our leaders would put integrity and safety issues first.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 12:46
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#10
They didn't get to be 'our leaders' with the application of integrity.
If we had an honest, realistic way of electing representation, then we may have great leaders rather than womanizers, and other professional politicians.
The NPT only allows those states that tested weaons before January 1967 te be classified as Nuclear Weapon States.
India tested in 1974 and again in 1998.
It does not qualify as a Nuclear Weapon State under the NPT.
Hence it will not sign the treaty.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 13:57
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#14
Gosh, John - are you going to insist on confusing us with facts?
Posted by: too true ||
03/02/2006 14:02
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#15
It however has better non proliferation credentials than many other NPT members.
It has not shared its technology with other states.
And it has a lot of technology that other states would want.
It has full nuclear cycle technology. It mines its own ore, makes fuel assemblies, builds its own heavy water reactors, makes heavy water, reprocesses spent fuel rods to extract the plutonium, vitifies the waste for long term storage, makes MOX fuel, builds fast breeders to make more Pu and U233, has uranium enrichment centrifuge cascades etc.
It has various accelerator programs, its own inertial confinement and superconducting Tokamaks for fusion research.
And it has the bomb technology, both boosted fission and staged thermonuclear devices.
And the means to deliver them... it builds one of the largest solid fuel rocket boosters in the world. Its PSLV deploys multiple satellites in different orbits (implying MIRV tech).
The question is, to quote LBJ, do you want India "inside the tent pissing out or outside the tent pissing in" ?
Would you prefer it buy yellowcake from North Korea or from Canada?
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 14:09
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#16
What India wants from this deal is (a) large (1000 MW) light water reactors from the US for its civilian power grid.
The reactors and their enriched uranium fuel would be under IAEA safeguards. The spent fuel would be sent back to the country of origin for reprocessing.
(b) yellowcake to fuel the Indian heavy water reactors that use natural uranium fuel.
Most of these reactors would be placed on the civilian list.
India will keep some for militray use since the HWRs produce weapon grade plutonium when used in low burnup mode. India has develope a process of detritiating heavy water. It can produce Tritium (used to boost a fission primary) quie cheaply and needs enough reactors for this as well.
(c) plutonium for seeding the Indian fast breeders. India has the second largest reserves of Thorium. The Thorium breeders need plutonium (basically a source of neutrons) to produce Uranium 233 fuel.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 14:18
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#17
This Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty is as good as most UN sponsored treaties. After all, Iran and North Korea signed it.
Extracts from http://www.fas.org/nuke/control/npt/
In 1994, the United States and North Korea signed an "Agreed Framework" bringing North Korea into full compliance with its non-proliferation obligations under the NPT. North Korea affirmed its NPT member status and committed to allow implementation of its IAEA safeguards agreement.
The NPT is the most widely accepted arms control agreement. As of early 2000 a total of 187 states were Parties to the NPT. Cuba, Israel, India, and Pakistan were the only states that were not members of the NPT.
#18
We've had India outside the tent for almost 30 years so leaving it there doesn't frighten me. My concerns are less with India than with Brazil, Argentina, and other large mid level powers. They are seeing India, in effect, being rewarded for not signing or abiding by the NPT. What lesson do they draw from that? At the minimum we should be making India start abiding by the NPT provisions as though it had been a nuclear power when the treaty was drawn. We also have a hard time justifying to Pakistan why they don't get the same treatment India does. And I think it's a bad idea to sell Pakistan a clock with Radium hands.
#19
What are these NPT provisions that you feel India should abide by?
I have read the entire NPT text and there is nothing there that India is in violation of.
It just never signed the treaty.
It has not transferred nuclear weapon technology to any country.
Leaving India outside the tent is problematic.
The Indian northern power grid collapsed last year.
It badly needs power reactors, coal fired thermal plants etc. In the budget yesterday, there was money allocated for 5 massive coal burning power plants as well as 4 new heavy water reactors.
But India, while it has enormous reserves of coal (though low quality - high ash) it has limited supplies of Uranium.
What does it do when the Uranium runs out?
It can't buy from Canada or Australia.
Suppose it turned to North Korea or Iran for fuel?
Do you really want Indian engineers in Iran helping them increase Uranium output ?
Do you want them collaborating in any form with scientists from Iran? Or would you prefer they work with US and European scientists?
President Bush just cleared the way for India to join the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor. India will contribute 1/10th of the cost and build some of the instruments (India built some of the detectors for the Large Hadron Collider at CERN).
He clearly wants them inside the tent.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 17:01
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#20
I have read the entire NPT text and there is nothing there that India is in violation of.
Now.
Are they promising to abide by it in the future?
And what about the lesson this sends to all the other players? That whenever America doesn't like a treaty it just modifies it and everybody else has to go along? It seems to me it would have been better to get India added to the NPT as a Nuclear Power and have everybody ratify the amendment.
#21
Pakistan doesn't get the same treatment until the ISI cuts off support for Al Qaeda/Taliban/Kashmiri terrorists, and closes its borders to terror group excursions into India and Pakistan. President Musharref's bluster notwithstanding.
#22
India recently reinforced its nuclear technology trade laws to prevent any transfer of tech.
So it does intend to abide by the NPT
India cannot join the NPT as a nuclear power.
The NPT itself, which was extended in perpetuity, has no provision for this.
Amending the treat itself would not succeed.
China and other countries would block it.
This would also break the informal agreements made with countries like Japan when they signed the NPT.
This deal does not modify or violate the NPT.
Which is why the IAEA and El Baradei are so enthusiatic.
There is a lot of noise about this from people who have not read the actual treaty.
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 17:38
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#23
These countries are not in the same category as India.
Pakistan has nothing like the energy requirments of India.
Their technology level is also quite low.
Pakistan has yet to manufacture even a high speed lathe, or a tractor.
North Korea has yet to design even a bicycle
(they recently started a factory to make bicyles using Chinese technology).
India does Laser intertial confinement fusion research.
It operates Kamini - the only U233 fueled reactor in the world.
It is building advanced fast breeder reactors.
And size matters... India is 1/6 th of the planet's population.
You really want to compare 1/6th of the world, with their legitimate energy (power reactors) and security (nuke weapons) needs, and essentially rogue states like Pakistan?
Posted by: john ||
03/02/2006 17:46
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#24
I got up with a depressing thought today: Jesus said God would protect us from evil, but said nothing about stupidity...
Ibrahim al-Jaafaris nomination as prime minister of Iraq is facing stiff opposition, with non-Shia parties actively seeking to block him from forming a government.
According to senior politicians and western diplomats, efforts to prevent Mr Jaafari from establishing a new cabinet have intensified this week as Iraq grapples with an upsurge in sectarian bloodshed following last Wednesdays bombing of one of Shia Islams holiest sites.
Sunni Arab, Kurdish and secular parties are expected to ask the United Iraqi Alliance, the Shia coalition that emerged as the largest bloc in parliament after the December parliamentary elections, to withdraw Mr Jaafaris nomination. Its a real crisis, said a senior Iraqi official.
Mr Jaafari, leader of the Shia Islamist Dawa party, was nominated by the UIA. With the support of the movement led by radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, he narrowly won an internal UIA vote, defeating Adel Abdel-Mehdi, a vice-president and the candidate of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (Sciri), a rival Shia party.
The Jaafari nomination, however, has frustrated Iraqs other political factions, including Kurdish, Sunni Arab and secular forces. Many Iraqi officials criticise as ineffective and indecisive Mr Jaafaris performance as interim prime minister over the past year.
They fear his leadership of Iraqs first government with a four-year-term could aggravate an already perilous security crisis.
Meanwhile, the US and Britain, eager to see a stable government take over and facilitate the eventual exit of their troops from Iraq, have also been troubled by the prospects of a continued Jaafari administration. The Sadrist movements support for his nomination has added to the international unease.
Mr Jaafari has said he wants to form a government of national unity. But even Kurdish parties the allies that gave his cabinet the two-thirds parliamentary majority approval it needed last year are, at least for now, withholding their backing.
In a sign of the rising tensions between the Kurds and Mr Jaafari, Jalal Talabani, Iraqi president and leader of one of Iraqs two main Kurdish parties, on Tuesday criticised the prime minister for making a visit to Turkey without consulting other senior members of the government.
Talabanis criticism was a way of saying that a Jaafari government wont work, said a western diplomat.
Kurdish, Sunni Arab and secular parties are considering jointly issuing a national programme, a move that could lead to an alliance with more members in parliament than the UIA.
There are also attempts to encourage Sciri to break away from the UIA, and join the competing alliance. However, Shia religious authorities, led by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, are calling on political parties representing their community to remain united. Forming a government of national unity has become more important [after the recent violence] but also more difficult to achieve, said the senior official.
The political crisis comes amid continued violence, with at least 30 people killed yesterday in bombings and mortar attacks in Baghdad and neighbouring regions.
In the worst attack, 23 people were killed in a car bomb in a mostly Shia district of Baghdad. Gunmen last night ambushed a police convoy north of Baghdad killing at least two passengers and abducting 10, according to police reports.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:23 ||
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Russia plans to hit a golf ball into Earth orbit from the International Space Station. If NASA approves the plan, the ball would set records for the longest drive ever made but some experts warn that a mishap could cause "catastrophic" damage to the station.
The plan is part of a commercial deal between the Russian space agency and Element 21 Golf Company, based in Toronto, Canada. In the plan, the station's next crew members, due to launch to the station on 29 March, will try for the record-breaking swing during one of three planned spacewalks by September 2006.
A gold-plated, six-iron golf club will be used to hit the ball, which is made out of the same scandium alloy used to build the station. After being hit from a special platform alongside the station, the ball is expected to orbit Earth for about four years, beaming its location to Earth-bound computers using global positioning transmitters. Eventually, the ball will lose altitude through atmospheric drag and burn up in the atmosphere.
But that scenario depends on the ball being hit out of the station's orbital plane. If it somehow stayed in the same plane as the station, it might actually fall back onto the station or collide with it during a subsequent orbit. The damage caused by such a collision would depend on factors such as the impact angle, the speed of collision and the mass of the ball.
Fore!
In a worst-case scenario, the ball would remain at the same altitude long enough that its orbital plane shifted until it could hit the station side-on, says J C Liou, an orbital debris expert at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, US. "Then you could potentially have something similar to a head-on collision with an impact speed of about 9.4 kilometres per second," Liou told New Scientist.
The force of such a collision would be equivalent to that of a 6.5-tonne truck moving at nearly 100 kilometres per hour. "So the outcome of the worst-case scenario could be quite catastrophic," he says. But he adds that such a dire scenario is "highly unlikely" to occur.
Bill Ailor, director of the Center for Orbital and Reentry Debris Studies at The Aerospace Corporation in El Segundo, California, US, says that if the ball simply falls back onto the station without first going into orbit, it should not be moving so quickly, relatively speaking, and would pose little threat.
He estimates that, if the ball should strike the station in that manner, it would be at the same relative speed at which the astro-golfer initially hit it at most 30 metres per second. "I would doubt the astronaut will be able to hit it very hard at all," Ailor told New Scientist, as heavy spacesuits will hinder a zippy swing.
Atmospheric clean-up
Ailor says there are about 300 operational satellites now orbiting at low-Earth altitudes near the space station, which flies about 400 kilometres above Earth. The golf ball could potentially strike one of those satellites as it spirals towards Earth, he says. "But the chance of something like that happening is probably very low."
He points out that other objects such as SuitSat, a space suit fitted with a radio transmitter, have been thrown off the station without damaging orbiting satellites. "Low-Earth orbit has some nice features the atmosphere actually cleans things out of orbit after a relatively short time," he says.
"We're trying to minimise the amount of debris created," he says. "So not opening a space-borne golf course is probably a good idea. But once in a while, it won't affect the problem too much."
NASA is currently studying the safety implications of the proposal, which is just one of many commercial deals brokered by Russia, says NASA spokesman Allard Beutel. If the swing is approved, Element 21 plans to return the gold-plated golf club to Earth and contribute it to a charitable cause.
The shot would not be the first extra-terrestrial golf. On 6 February 1971, NASA astronaut Alan Shephard ended a Moon walk by hitting two balls for "miles and miles and miles".
#1
This "if" orbital planes stuff is silly. Fact is if you are in orbit and fire off a golf ball there are three things that can happen (a) it comes right back to where it started after orbiting. The station will most likely have moved on but there is a chance each orbit of a collision until the golf ball eventually deorbits from friction. (b) the ball gets enough friction from the first orbit to shift into ever increasing lower orbits until it burns up. This is probably the plan. (c) The ball doesn't achieve orbit and just sort of takes up a position somewhere in orbit becoming another piece of troublesome junk.
This is a stupid stunt with no scientific application. If we are going to jettison the science lets turn the damn thing into a gas station and use it for orbital vehicular assembly for going to the moon (where golfing is better).
#3
Seeing that they are the only ones who can get to it now - let them at it. I've always thought it was a money sink. All it seems they do up there are stupid experiments for elementary school kids on ants or bean sprouts.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
03/02/2006 11:41
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#4
And if anyone gets to hit a golf ball into space, it should be a Scot.
No! It should be Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Posted by: Me ||
03/02/2006 18:26
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#5
"It should be a Scot" - reminds me of that great BUGS BUNNY episode. Let the Russkis do it as long as Bugs will catch it.
Bombings in Baghdad killed 26 people, and four others died when mortar rounds slammed into their homes in a nearby town Wednesday, the second day of surging violence after authorities lifted a curfew that briefly calmed sectarian attacks.
A spokesman for the powerful Association of Muslim Scholars criticized the Shiite-led government for failing to protect Iraqis, and he urged Sunnis to defend their mosques. "All evidence has proven that the government and its security forces are incapable of taking any action," said Abdul-Salam al-Kubaisi, a spokesman for the Sunni clerical group.
Al-Kubaisi denied Sunnis were behind the latest attacks, saying Shiite politicians and religious leaders were trying to inflame sectarian hatred "to make use of these events and everything in this country to achieve one goal to serve their future interests."
Wednesday's most serious attack a car bomb near a traffic police office in a primarily Shiite neighborhood in southeast Baghdad killed at least 23 people and wounded 58, according to police Lt. Thaer Mahmoud. About an hour earlier, a bomb hidden under a car detonated as a police patrol passed near downtown Tahrir Square, said Interior Ministry Maj. Falah al-Mohammedawi. Three civilians died and 15 were wounded.
North of Baghdad, gunmen ambushed a police convoy carrying 50 officers, killing two passengers and abducting 10, police said. Four officers were seriously wounded. The convoy of five minibuses was returning from a training session in Sulaimaniyah when it was attacked about 45 miles northeast of Tikrit, police Capt. Hakim al-Azzawi said. The assailants drove off in one of the minibuses.
Mortar shells fell on three houses in the mixed Sunni-Shiite town of Mahmoudiya, 20 miles south of Baghdad, killing three civilians, police Capt. Rashid al-Samaraie said. A fifth mortar shell slammed into the mixed Qadisiyah neighborhood in west Baghdad, killing a woman and wounding a child, Mahmoud said.
The government said 379 people had been killed and 458 injured as of Tuesday afternoon in nearly a week of sectarian violence tied to the Askariya bombing. Another 30 died Wednesday.
The U.S. military apparently prevented Tuesday's death toll from climbing even higher when soldiers of the 4th Infantry Division discovered a bomb placed near a mosque in Baghdad's Saydiyah neighborhood. There was slight damage to the mosque after a controlled explosion, the military said, adding that civil affairs teams would help with repairs.
At least six of Tuesday's attacks hit religious targets. In addition to those known to have been killed Tuesday, police found nine more bullet-riddled bodies, including a Sunni Muslim tribal sheik, off a road southeast of Baghdad. It was unclear when they had died. Late Tuesday, police reported finding the body of Shiite cleric Hani Hadi handcuffed, blindfolded and shot in the head near a Sunni mosque in Baghdad's notorious Dora neighborhood.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:21 ||
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Self-styled as shaekh (spiritual leader), Abdur Rahman is the chief of Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), erstwhile Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB) that has been operating in the country secretly since 1998.
Born in Charshi Khalifapara village of Jamalpur Sadar upazila, Rahman, aged around 50, joined Islami Chhatra Shibir and later Jamaat-e-Islami when he was a student.
He studied at Madina Islami University in Saudi Arabia in the early 1980s and later worked at the Saudi Embassy in Dhaka for five years from 1985. He has travelled to many countries including India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Malaysia.
Rahman's father, late Moulana Abdullah Ibne Fazal, was a member of Jamiatul Ahle Hadith, lately led by arrested Rajshahi University teacher Asadullah Al Galib. Fazal was accused of collaborating with the Pakistani occupation forces during the Liberation War in 1971.
Rahman runs Al-Madina Islamic Cadet Madrasa and a mosque in Jamalpur. Saudi NGO Rabeta-e-Islam and Kuwait-based NGO Revival of Islamic Heritage Society provided him with the financial assistance to establish those institutions.
Rahman's existence as a militant lynchpin came to light when he came forward in 2004 in support of JMJB operations commander Siddiqul Islam alias Bangla Bhai as the latter's anti-Sarbahara operations in some northern districts gave rise to controversy due to media reporting.
Bangla Bhai, allegedly sheltered by several ruling BNP lawmakers, led a spate of killings in Rajshahi, Natore and Naogaon in early 2003 and 2004.
In an interview with The Daily Star last May, Rahman admitted that he has been secretly operating the JMJB since 1998. He also said the headquarters of the JMJB is in Dhaka.
He also said the JMJB has trained up some 10,000 full-time activists across the country and it spends up to Tk 7 lakh on them per month. Majlish-e-Shura is the highest decision making body of the organisation.
The members and supporters of JMJB were divided into three tiers: Ehsar--full-timers who act at the directive of the higher echelons, Gayeri Ehsar--part-timers, and a third one consisting of those who indirectly cooperate with the outfit.
The organisation divided the country into nine organisational divisions.
The JMJB was renamed Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh after a fight between Rahman's disciples and the police at a secret training camp in Joypurhat in August 2003.
Following the "encounter", the police arrested Rahman's brother Ataur Rahman alias Sunny and son-in-law Abdul Awal along with 17 other militants.
A few days later, however, they were released while the higher authorities transferred several police officials reportedly for making the arrests.
In a press note issued on February 23 last year, the home ministry announced the JMJB and JMB banned, accusing Abdur Rahman and Bangla Bhai of carrying out bomb attacks and killings in recent times to create anarchy in the country.
When newspapers started reporting on the activities of Bangla Bhai and JMJB in the northern region of the country about a year ago, the government said it was false. It even blamed the media for "creating" the "fictitious" character of Bangla Bhai.
"We do not know officially about the existence of the JMJB. Only some so-called newspapers are publishing reports on it. We do not have their constitution in our records," State Minister for Home Affairs Lutfozzaman Babar told the BBC radio on January 26, 2005.
Even Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, while exchanging views with editors in August last year, said there is no existence of Bangla Bhai.
Ruling coalition partner Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer and Industries Minister Matiur Rahman Nizami on July 22 last year said, "Bangla Bhai has been created by some newspapers."
Finance and Planning Minister M Saifur Rahman on February 23 last year dubbed the onset of Islamist militancy across the country as nothing but a "foul propaganda" by a section of the media.
On the same day, however, after the government banned the JMJB, Babar told the BBC, "We are embarrassed as it is not being possible to arrest Bangla Bhai...We have put extreme pressure on the police to hold him."
On May 15 last year, a cabinet committee meeting on law and order ordered the police to arrest Bangla Bhai and his followers. A week later, the JMJB operatives staged a showdown in Rajshahi and met the deputy commissioner, superintendent of police (SP) and deputy inspector general of police (DIG).
Masud Mia, the then Rajshahi SP who had been suspended a few days ago, welcomed the JMJB team, saying, "We [the police] hail you as you are helping us eliminate the Sarbaharas from Rajshahi. We will cooperate with you in the coming days so that people can rest without fear."
Rajshahi range DIG Noor Mohammad on June 23 said there is no existence of "so-called Bangla Bhai" in the region.
Zahirul Haque, director general of external publicity wing of the foreign ministry, on January 25 this year quoted US Embassy officials in Dhaka about the non-existence of Bangla Bhai. The US embassy, however, refuted his comment.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:20 ||
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Algeria will release more than 2,000 Islamist ex-fighters soon under an amnesty to promote reconciliation after years of conflict in the oil-exporting country, an official said on Wednesday.
The releases, the most numerous since civil strife erupted in 1992, will be a high-profile test of the government's push to stabilize a giant north African nation widely seen as crucial for the security of the Mediterranean region.
"There will be more than 2,000 people released under the charter for peace and national reconciliation," AbdelKader Sahraoui, an official of the Justice Ministry, said in an interview on state radio.
The state radio announcer said separately that this would happen "immediately."
The releases, which would be the first of former Islamist fighters for several years, had been widely expected since the government of the large north African oil-exporting country approved a raft of amnesty measures on February 21.
Another official source told Reuters that apart from the 2,000 people to be released, an estimated 10,000 people would take advantage of the reconciliation drive in one way or another.
These ranged from prisoners having their sentences cut to bereaved relatives being paid compensation.
The former combatants were convicted for their role in more than a decade of conflict that began when the authorities canceled the 1992 legislative elections which the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) was poised to win.
The amnesty also gives Islamic guerrillas still fighting the authorities six months to surrender and be pardoned provided they were not responsible for massacres, rapes and bombings of public places.
Word had circulated about a possible release after the amnesty was published in the government gazette on Tuesday, a measure that signals its entry into force.
Thousands of Islamic guerrillas have already given themselves up since early January 2000 after a partial amnesty. The last significant prisoner releases took place in 1999.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:19 ||
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#1
There may be an ulterior motive at work here. The ambiguously worded charter was most likely crafted in order to grant amnesty to members of state-armed militias and security forces convicted of abuses. Not only will this bar victims from seeking justice it will obviate Algerias obligations under international law to investigate and remedy such abuses. The legislation even goes further to that end and makes it a crime to debate such abuses. Article 46 of the charter states:
"Anyone who, by speech, writing, or any other act, uses or exploits the wounds of the National Tragedy to harm the institutions of the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, to weaken the state, or to undermine the good reputation of its agents who honorably served it, or to tarnish the image of Algeria internationally, shall be punished by three to five years in prison and a fine of 250,000 to 500,000 dianars."
#5
The fact is that the panarabist/islamist government and the islmaist rebels are ideologically quite close. The people now in governemnt were islamists even before the rebellion agsint the French, they created the most repressive regime against women in all Maghreb and they have agressively pursued a politic of islamisation and arabisation against the Berber populations. For instance they have amde use of Arab mandatory but not Algerian Arab, "classic" Arab ie Arab like talked in Arabia centuries ago.
I told abourt Algeria's berbers. For one part an incereasing number of them seem to be rejecting Islam as an instrument of foreign domination. For another part they are protesting because the Algerian government is replacing their suffi imams with wahabi ones.
As I said the governement and the islamist rebels share basically teh same ideology. The only differnce is about who will wear the golden turban and the fraction of the budget to be used for killing infidels.
Three British Islamists jailed for four years in Egypt over membership of a banned group have left for home after being questioned at Heathrow. Hizb ut-Tahrir members Ian Nisbet and Reza Pankhurst, from London, and Maajid Nawaz from Essex, were granted early release from their five-year sentences. Special Branch officers held them under terror laws for four hours after they landed at the London airport 1252 GMT. The men say they have been repeatedly tortured for their political beliefs.
"Clive, have you seen my vise grips?"
They were arrested in 2002 for attempting to revive the Islamic organisation Hizb ut-Tahrir - banned by the Egyptian Government in 1974 - and served their sentences in a Cairo jail. At Heathrow, their families and Hizb ut-Tahrir leaders welcomed them back with cheers and applause. Mr Nisbet said they were imprisoned by a "brutal and evil" regime in Egypt. "We were tortured and electrocuted and we and our families were threatened and we were forced to sign a confession we neither agreed with or sanctioned," he said. "We experienced and witnessed and met people who were tortured in the most grotesque and obscene ways for belonging to political opposition parties. Our thoughts and prayers are with the thousands of Egyptian political prisoners we have left behind."
Mr Nawaz's MP, there to greet the men, said he would be seeking a meeting with the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw to discuss the incident. Stephen Jakobi, director of Fair Trials Abroad and the men's legal representative, said they were victims of gross injustice. "They had been and remain devout Muslims committed to radical political change. They have never supported violence or terrorism in any shape or form," he said. "All three were beaten regularly and forcibly deprived of sleep. They were given filthy scraps of food and blindfolded and handcuffed behind their backs for many days."
Mr Jakobi said one of them was tortured using electric shocks because he was unable to reply to questions in Arabic. All three were held incommunicado for 11 days and denied legal access for 48 days officially. Hizb ut-Tahrir, which campaigns for all majority Muslim countries to become Islamic states, is outlawed in Egypt but remains legal in Britain. However, the group believes that it may be banned in Britain under new laws passed which make glorifying terrorism an offence. Hizb ut-Tahrir denies any association with terrorism.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
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So are you looking forward to the Academy Awards show Sunday night? Really? Can you name the five movies nominated for best picture? Have you seen any of them?
Most Americans haven't. The top-earning film among the best-picture nominees is "Brokeback Mountain," which has taken in about $75 million. That means that perhaps 10 million Americans have seen it. By contrast, the most recent "Harry Potter" movie and "The Chronicles of Narnia," each taking in four times as much money, were mostly ignored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
But, if the academy is overlooking popular films, it is paying close attention to progressive - even transgressive - films. As everyone knows, "Brokeback" is gay-friendly, but so is another film receiving nominations, "Transamerica." And let's not forget the preachily PC "North Country" and the overtly left-leaning "Syriana" and "Good Night, and Good Luck." And, oh yes, in Hollywood, there's usually special sympathy for a nonwhite-collar criminal, hence the Oscar-nominated song, "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp."
But a furor is starting to erupt around another movie, "Paradise Now," nominated as best foreign-language film. The film is obscure (director Hany Abu-Assad is not a name heard much around Hollywood), and it hasn't made much money (barely more than $1 million), but the topic is red hot: suicide bombing in Israel.
The tagline of the movie declares, "From the most unexpected place comes a bold new call for peace," and the film is nuanced and ambiguous. Still, it's hard to refute the argument that it humanizes Palestinian suicide bombers. A private group called The Israel Project has led the charge against "Paradise Now"; yesterday the project held a news conference in Jerusalem in which the Israeli father of a teenager killed by a suicide bomber referred to the film as "Hell Now." And the project is running an ad in Variety that asks, "Is it right to honor a film that puts a human face on deliberate murders of children?"
That's a great question, although Hollywood, of course, humanizes murderers all the time. "Capote," one of the films in contention for the best picture Oscar, puts human - and to Truman Capote, at least, sexually alluring - faces on the men who killed four people in Kansas, including two teenagers, back in 1959.
Still, "Paradise Now" might turn out to be too edgy for the Hollywood crowd. The Academy Awarders might not want to vote for the movie some say will encourage more suicide bombers in Israel - and maybe, too, in Iraq.
Instead, there's another film up for best foreign film that might actually cleanse some of the blood on Hollywood's hands. It's "Joyeux N"el," and it's about temporarily ending a war that never should have been fought, World War I. The French film is a fictionalized version of a true occurrence: the "Christmas Truce" that blossomed briefly along parts of the Western Front in France in 1914.
For a few hours the Brits and the Germans, inspired by the holy day, stopped killing each other. Indeed, the movie shows most soldiers joining in a Latin Christmas Mass - a lyrical reminder that the ancient language of the church once gave the continent a semblance of unity. Another unifying force in the film is Western music; men from the warring countries knew the same Christmas carols as well as the beauty of Bach.
Sadly, tragically, the truce ended and the fighting resumed; some 8.5 million soldiers died. Afterward, a ruined Europe stumbled into fascism, communism and Nazism, leading to the deaths of many millions more just a generation later.
Honoring "Joyeux N"el" with the Oscar for best foreign film won't change that painful history. But on Sunday Hollywood has a chance to remind us that audiences can be warmed and heartened by what unites us - not thrilled and chilled and bloodied by what divides us.
#1
I think it appropriate if the film glamorizing suicide bombers wins since this year, Hollywood is willingly and knowingly putting on its own suicide belt.
Nobody pays attention to them anymore so in an effort to get our attention, they become more and more outrageous every year. They glorify suicide bombers for the same reason all suicide bombers do, go make a call for attention that we can't ignore. Like with a suicide bomber, they will briefly get the attention they seek and then, five days later, only the people whose lives they destroyed will remember. But at least they got our atttention - right? Isn't that whats important to them? LOOK AT ME!!
#2
So are you looking forward to the Academy Awards show Sunday night? Really? Can you name the five movies nominated for best picture? Have you seen any of them?
Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, says the world's democratic nations must unite to defend against radical Islamic fundamentalism. The Italian leader addressed a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress.
Prime Minister Berlusconi delivered most of his address in Italian to a packed House chamber.
However, addressing lawmakers in English at the beginning of his speech, he expressed gratitude for the U.S. role in defeating Italian Fascism and German Nazism, as well as what he called the struggle against Communism.
Mr. Berlusconi drew prolonged applause when he turned to the war on terrorism.
"Today, I am still grateful to the United States for the high price in lives you continue to pay in the fight against terrorism to assure our common security and defend human rights around the world," he said. "As I will never tire of repeating, when I see your flag I do not merely see the flag of a great country. Above all, I see a symbol, a universal symbol of freedom and democracy."
The Italian leader said the September 11, 2001 al-Qaida terrorist attacks on the United States marked the start of a different type of war.
This new conflict, he said, is not a clash of states or civilizations, or an attack by Islam on the West which is allied with moderate Islam, but an attack by radical fundamentalists trying to use terrorism against democracies.
"I am firmly convinced that in addition to the generous effort by your great country, a grand alliance of all democracies is needed to defend this frontier," said Mr. Berlusconi. "It is only by joining the efforts of all the democracies on all continents that we will be able to free the world from the threat of international terrorism, from the fear of aggression by the forces of evil."
Only a grand alliance of all democracies, said Mr. Berlusconi, can defend what he called a frontier of liberty from international terrorism.
Italy has confirmed its intention to withdraw all of its troops from Iraq by the end of the year, a subject that came up in Mr. Berlusconi's talks Tuesday with President Bush at the White House on Tuesday.
In his speech to Congress, he noted that Italy has contributed troops to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, as well as commanding United Nations missions in Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Reverting to English again, the Italian leader offered U.S. lawmakers a memory of his father taking him to a cemetery containing the graves of U.S. soldiers killed in fighting during World War II.
"In showing him those crosses, that father made his son vow never to forget the ultimate sacrifice those young American soldiers had made for his freedom. That father made his son vow eternal gratitude to that country," said Mr. Berlusconi. "That father was my father, and that young man was me. I have never forgotten that sacrifice and that vow, and I never will."
Prime Minister Berlusconi's address came as U.S. lawmakers are preoccupied both with the situation in Iraq, and the controversy over the pending U.S. port management deal with Dubai Ports World, a company owned by the government of the United Arab Emirates.
He faces a tough battle for re-election in Italy next month.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:17 ||
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AT least four police officers were killed when gunmen attacked a police convoy in northern Iraq today, a senior police source said.
The attack occurred as about 50 officers were being driven in minibuses to Tikrit, north of Baghdad, after a training course in the Kurdish city of Sulaimaniya, police said. As well as the four killed, at least eight were wounded, police said.
Some 22 officers were seized by the gunmen but later released, police said. Another 16 officers fled at the time of the incident and made their own way to safety, police said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:16 ||
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#1
Some 22 officers were seized by the gunmen but later released, police said. Another 16 officers fled at the time of the incident and made their own way to safety, police said.
Don't these guys have guns of their own to shoot back with?
Why does this keep happening?
Posted by: SLO Jim ||
03/02/2006 12:11
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#2
It keeps happening because some of the police are spys for the insurgents and they pass travel info to the bastards for this very purpose. I would have everyone take a lie detector test, and God help he who fails it.
Pakistani officials told ABC News that they believe they have indications that a new terrorist attack against the United States is being planned there. They told ABC News that while their intelligence does not give any specific details as to a target or time, it does indicate that an emerging al Qaeda figure is making plans. Pakistani military officials say Matiur Rehman, 29, a Pakistani militant, is behind the new plans for an attack against the United States. Pakistan has posted a 10-million rupee (about $166,000) award for his capture. "He is probably Pakistan's most wanted right now," says Alexis Debat, a former adviser in the French defense ministry and now an ABC News consultant. "He is extremely dangerous because of his role as the crucial interface between the brains of al Qaeda and its muscle, which is mainly composed these days of Pakistani militants."
Pakistani officials said Rehman helped train thousands of fellow Pakistani militants at al Qaeda training camps during the late 1990s. As pressure from the United States and its allies against al Qaeda's leadership has intensified, there is increasing evidence that the terrorist network has relied on Pakistani-based militants to provide logistical support and execute operations. "Certain Pakistani groups have definitely been acting as if they were subcontractors for al Qaeda by virtue of carrying out certain terrorist attacks on behalf of al Qaeda, or in other cases, simply sustaining the terrorist network that al Qaeda built up," said Husain Haqqani, a Boston Univeristy professor and author of the book "Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military."
Last year the London bombings were carried out by a small group of Pakistanis, all of whom were British citizens. They became terrorists after visiting Pakistan. Pakistani military officials said they now fear that those training operations have set the model for other al Qaeda attacks in the West. "The Pakistani militant groups that provided [the London bombers] that training clearly did that with the understanding that these people would be acting not in Kashmir, not in Afghanistan but in London," said Haqqani. "And that could only mean that al Qaeda was taking the lead that these people were doing something that would, if not be at the behest of al Qaeda would definitely benefit al Qaeda's world view."
While Pakistani President Musharraf has moved against some al Qaeda locations where foreign fighters have been discovered, he has been criticized for failing to act strongly enough against Pakistanis connected to al Qaeda and other militant groups. "The government of Pakistan has been selective in its crackdown," said Haqqani. "In the process, there are many individuals and groups that have been acting on their own, and frankly, until all of them are treated as people who need to be eliminated, al Qaeda and al Qaeda linked groups will continue to survive."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:14 ||
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#1
Matiur Rehman. Has he taken up residence in Thugburg yet?
Thailand is ready to cooperate with agencies concerned to clarify the accusation that Thailand is part of the courier network system in funding terrorist groups in the Southeast Asian region, Finance Minister Thanong Bidaya said here Wednesday.
Col. Petrus Reinhard Golose of Indonesia's counterterrorism task force said the al-Qaeda terror network helped fund suicide bombings in Indonesia over the past four years through a courier system, and suggested that Thailand was linked to the network.
Col. Golose said that under the system, the money was carried from Thailand to Malaysia and finally to Indonesia.
Dr. Thanong said he wanted Indonesian authorities to provide details of such information to the Thai government and stated that the kingdom is ready to cooperate in checking the courier network system.
"The Department of Special Investigation (DSI) can be involved in the investigation," he said.
The Bank of Thailand can inspect money transfers on a case by case basis, he added.
Golose said the courier system was set up by former al-Qaeda No. 3 Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who was captured in 2003. He was one of the planners, "a mastermind" behind the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
Golose said the money was used to help the regional militant group Jemaah Islamiyah launch attacks in Indonesia including at the resort island of Bali from 2002-2005.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:09 ||
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Russia's space program suffered another embarrassing failure Wednesday, when a booster rocket failed to put an Arab commercial satellite to a designated orbit, officials said.
The Arabsat 4A telecommunications satellite owned by the Saudi ARABSAT company was launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. It was atop a rocket equipped with an additional booster stage, the Russian Federal Space Agency said in a statement.
The rocket successfully delivered the satellite to a preliminary orbit, but the booster failed to function properly and could not deliver the satellite to a designated orbit, the agency said.
An emergency panel of space officials was investigating the situation, it said. Federal Space Agency spokesman Vyacheslav Davidenko told The Associated Press that experts from the European Astrium company that had built the satellite were trying to save it by guiding it to a proper orbit using the vehicle own orientation engines.
"Chances for success are slim," Davidenko said.
Davidenko said the satellite separated from the booster earlier than required and remained in an orbit much lower than the designated one.
The bungled launch was the latest in a series of mishaps that have recently plagued Russia's space program, jeopardizing its hopes to earn more revenue from commercial launches of foreign satellites.
In October, a high-profile European satellite was lost because of a Russian booster failure. The loss of the $142 million CryoSat satellite dealt a major blow to the European Space Agency, which had hoped to conduct a three-year mapping of polar ice caps and provide more reliable data for the study of global warming.
Also that month, space experts failed to recover an experimental space vehicle after its return, engineers lost contact with an earlier launched Russian Earth-monitoring satellite and a new optical research satellite was lost due to a booster failure.
Following the failed launches, Russia's President Vladimir Putin fired the chief of the Khrunichev company that built the Rokot booster. The rocket that failed Wednesday was also built by Khrunichev.
#10
Close examination of the Soviet space program reveals a history of excellent designs discarded due to political or nepotistic preferences.
Sidebar: Poor Soviet vehicle reliability combined with low grade telemetry and video monitoring made it common practice to have all of the design crew and engineers present at liftoffs to observe post-launch behavior in case failure analysis proved necessary.
The crushing crowning moment happened in 1960. A massive military application solid-fuel booster had not ignited properly. Per SOP, all crews waited for nearly an hour in case the chemical engine suddenly sparked to life. (Much like a Roman candle that suddenly ignites due to a smouldering fuse.) With the waiting period over, primary designer Korolev and some 200 other design bureau members strode across the launch pad and approached the immobile rocket only to have it catastrophically detonate all at once.
Soviet Russia lost the cream of its aerospace engineering task force in a single incandescent second. This is probably why the Soviets were unable to detect subtle but critical parameters included as disinformation in the US space shuttle plans they stole during the early 1980s. All of this added up to a space program riddled by self-defeating special interests and interagency squabbling. It's hard to imagine that things have changed much today.
Two militants were killed in a special operation in the village of Elistanzhi, Vedeno district, and three personnel of the republic's Antiterrorist Center were also killed during the operation, the Chechen Interior Ministry told Itar-Tass on Thursday.
"Personnel of the Antiterrorist Center, 2nd road police regiment officers, OMON special task force police and Vedeno district police blocked and engaged a group of militants on Wednesday, who offered fierce resistance," the Interior Ministry said.
Judging by the blood-stained path of retreat, the gunmen suffered heavy losses and took the bodies of the killed and injured as they fled. Just two bodies were found in a gorge, police said.
And a big blood smear up the walls of the gorge. That works.
At present, law-enforcement bodies continue the search for the militants near the river Elistanzhi and in the local gorge.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:06 ||
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America's principal ground fighting force is stretched to breaking point. Both the active and reserve components of the U.S. Army have nearly reached their recruiting limits in strength, given attitudes in America. Fighting international terrorism simply does not have the same appeal for the post-Baby Boom generation as fighting fascism did for the generation of World War II.
Understanding that the draft was no longer viable in the post-Vietnam era, the army leadership developed the All Volunteer Army in the 1970s in order to meet the defense challenges of the late 20th century, which were mostly short- term conflicts.
This approach served well in Grenada, Panama and the first Gulf War. That same leadership also foresaw future situations involving protracted conflict, and determined that the army would only go into prolonged combat with the National Guard and army reserves fighting alongside the active component.
The army felt that this would not only assure that manpower would be available for land warfare contingencies, but also that civilian soldiers would share the sacrifices required, thus giving some pause to the White House prior to making the decision to commit forces to combat.
This arrangement has managed to delay the onset of manpower shortages in Iraq and Afghanistan, but it has not resolved the issue, and potential for conflict in Iran or Syria or elsewhere only exacerbates the problem. The United States does not have enough ground troops now, and the pace being set poses a grave risk to the army in terms of both morale and readiness.
Some propose that the United States resolve this problem by simply getting out of both Iraq and Afghanistan unconditionally. But most Americans with any logical strategic perspective of U.S. defense interests know that such a decision would be seen as a victory for international terrorism, bolstering our enemy's image and morale in a major way, enabling them to recruit more volunteers, and encouraging them to strike us again elsewhere. So we must remain committed until Iraq and Afghanistan can shoulder their own internal defense burdens. There can be no repeat of a Vietnam-type face-saving withdrawal in this conflict. The stakes are simply too high.
The good news is that there is a large untapped resource of potential manpower that has not ever been considered by the army: huge numbers of young foreign military age males who have green cards and are eagerly seeking U.S. citizenship, or are awaiting visas in their homelands.
In exchange for U.S. citizenship at end of enlistment, these young men could be vetted and recruited by the army on five-year terms at recruiting stations in the United States and around the world. Placed in their own infantry units, and led by seasoned U.S. citizen officers and noncommissioned officers, they could be trained in the latest techniques of light infantry tactics and counterinsurgent warfare, and appropriately equipped for that mission - forming, in essence, an American Foreign Legion.
Once ready, these Legion units could be folded into the deployment cycle of the all-U.S. units to Southwest Asia, thus easing the strain there. Eventually, this would permit a number of U.S. regular forces to be withdrawn from the deployment cycle and earmarked for other missions.
Equal pay and modified benefit issues would have to be worked out, and the overall expense might require some army hi-tech developments to be placed on hold, but that would be a small price to pay for relief of the current problem.
Most Americans would view such a project positively. It is certainly a more attractive and productive measure than the announced waiver policy on criminal records for army recruits.
All superpowers, from ancient times to the modern era, have seen their civilian populations grow more and more disinclined to serve in their national defense forces. Inevitably they have all turned to mercenaries to defend their interests, thereby extending their national integrity, their ways of life and their unchallenged supremacy. It is America's turn, and we need to get on with putting such a program in place - now.
Wayne E. Long, a retired colonel in the U.S. Army, lives in Nairobi.
#3
The problem with the idea is that this could become a good way for bad people to (a) get nice US training and experience (b) citizenship.
The Neonazi's sent members into the US military hoping to get military training. I'm not opposed to the idea but it would have to be carefully done.
I would suggest using such a unit primarily for peacekeeping and rebuilding duties. Probably working for the UN. That way the US military doesn't have the edge of its blade dulled by this nonsense. The US military cleans house and hands over the baton to these guys who are trained for peacekeeping and rebuilding.
We should also charge the UN for sending them anywhere as other nations do. Eventually these units, under UN control would naturally expand to take over most UN peacekeeping duties.
#5
Both the active and reserve components of the U.S. Army have nearly reached their recruiting limits in strength, given attitudes in America.
False on all accounts.
1 - Congress sets the limits of the forces. When the Army was downsized in the early 90s it went from 750,000 to 482,000 by LAW. In FY 2005 Congress finally got around to authorizing a modest increase of 20,000 to 502,000. In one year the Army raised 10,000 additional without a major shift of existing personal resources into the training base to accommodate greater numbers in a short period of time. It takes far more time to build up with skills and qualification, than it does to downsize the force. Body bags can be filled in 90 days.
2 - The Army operated for over a decade at the 750,000 mark prior to Desert Storm. In a smaller population base of the 80s, the Army was able to man the force. That's at a level of 50% great than today and without the draft.
#6
Many problems would be avoided in such a thing if the recruiting was limited to certain countries, not opened to all comers.
I'm thinking the Philippines. 95% Christian and highly pro-American, English-speaking to a substantial degree, a long-time US ally, and with a tradition of direct recruiting into the US armed forces (the US Navy did this until the 1970's). With a large community (2-3 million) in the US already, with a proven track record of rapid assimilation. The US could recruit a million Filipinos easily, and the subsequent citizenship/assimilation problems should be minimal.
#8
Thought the USMC was America's Foreign Legion - to paraphrase a Marine General from the 1980's?, its the Army's job "to win Wars", the Marines "to win Battles". I have never been attuned to when anytime America develops new warfighting technologies, it has to create a separate Uniformed Service. I remember analysts proposing as many as 9-10 separate Services.
Indonesia continues to grapple with indigenous offshoots of al-Qaida.
Senior police official Petrus Golose asserted at an international conference in Jakart on suicide bombings that al-Qaida has directly funded most major terrorist bombings in Indonesia.
Golose also told his audience that Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, arranged for a courier to deliver money to Indonesian Jemaah Islamiyah leaders. Golose said that the Jemaah Islamiyah funds were laundered through Thailand and Malaysia before arriving in Indonesia.
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported that Golose added that about $30,000 was sent to carry out the Bali bombings in October 2002 and tens of thousands of dollars more were sent to carry out the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta the following year, with surplus funds being used to attack the Australian embassy in 2004.
Golose cautioned his listeners that the capture of suspected Bali bombing mastermind Malaysian Jemaah Islamiyah militant Noordin Mohammad Top would not end terrorist attacks in Indonesia, saying, "People mention that if we catch Noordin, terrorism in Indonesia is finished -- no. It is still dangerous."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
04:00 ||
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The United States has been searching for ways to block Al Qaida recruitment and propaganda through the Internet.
Officials said the Defense Department has sought to lead an effort to draft methods to block Al Qaida access to the Internet. They said that despite its military superiority, the United States has failed to stop Al Qaida's growing exploitation of the Internet as the group's primary means of recruitment, information and financing.
"Its use of the Internet is interesting," said Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, deputy director for policy and plans at Central Command. "It uses the Internet to recruit, to train, to proselytize, in some methods to hand out orders and instructions. It uses it for financing. It uses it to show its latest videos to the world."
Kimmitt said in an appearance to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on Feb. 22 that the military would increasingly focus on understanding and foiling Al Qaida's use of the Internet. He said the effort was part of what he termed the "long war" of Central Command against Middle East-based Islamic insurgency groups.
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03/02/2006
03:58 ||
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Abu Dujana is the successor of Abu Rusdan,' said Mr Petrus Reinhard Golose, the deputy chief of Indonesia's counter-terrorism task force, at a seminar in Jakarta yesterday.
Rusdan had replaced Abu Bakar Bashir as the leader of JI after Bashir's arrest in 2002. Rusdan himself has since been arrested and jailed, reported the New Straits Times.
Dujana was a teacher at the Lukmanul Hakiem Islamic school set up by the JI leadership in Johor Baru. The Indonesian police is now looking for him.
He graduated from the Afghanistan Mujahidin Military Academy in 1991 and is one of the most-wanted members of the regional terrorist network, which is linked to Al-Qaeda.
At the academy, Dujana was given military training, including the use of firearms.
The appointment of Dujana, a veteran of the Afghan war and a known bomb expert, only highlights the continued threat of JI despite the death of its chief bomb-maker Dr Azahari Husin in November.
'He was my student,' former JI member Nasir Abas told the New Straits Times.
When he was asked whether Dujana was capable of assembling bombs, Nasir said: 'As a student of the academy, he would have been taught the basics of how to assemble a bomb.
'That means he knows how to make a bomb, but he would not be as skilled or sophisticated as Azahari.'
Dujana, who is believed to be from West Java and Nasir had fought alongside during the Afghan war.
'He has leadership qualities. He can inspire loyalty in his men,' said Nasir who was once a military trainer at the Afghanistan military academy.
'When I knew him, he was a good person. He was not hard or radical. I don't know what he is like now.
'He could still be the same or he could have changed. Dr Azahari and Noordin were both good when I knew them. But they both changed in 1999,' said Nasir.
JI, which was set up in 1993, is suspected of carrying out all the major bombings in Indonesia.
Yesterday, Indonesian police disclosed for the first time that Al-Qaeda directly funded the bombings through a courier system.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:56 ||
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#1
And he was also promoted to the top of our list of most wanted. Hope he enjoys his freedom, it will be short lived.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 5:21
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#2
Good hunting to your comrades in arms, 49 Pan. And to you and your people as well (I forgot to wish you that before), wherever it is that you are that I can't remember. ;-)
Iraqs main Sunni Muslim religious organisation, accusing the Shia-led government and US forces of involvement in attacks by Shia militiamen, called on Wednesday on the community to protect its mosques.
Our brothers in all areas must protect their mosques as the government has failed to do so, Abdul Salam al-Qubaisi, spokesman for the Muslim Clerics Association, told a news conference broadcast live on Al-Jazeera television.
Since a bomb blamed on Al Qaeda demolished the Golden Mosque in Samarra, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam, sectarian violence has killed more than 400 people by government reckoning, pitching Iraq toward civil war.
Qubaisi angrily listed alleged attacks on Sunnis across Iraq and accused Shia police of attacking the Baghdad home of the groups head, Harith al-Dari, on Saturday, wounding some of Daris nieces.
Qubaisi showed a group of children with bandages on their legs and arms and lying on beds. He said they had been wounded in the attack.
He said Shia police had showed up at Daris house to arrest him and that when the guards opposed them a shootout erupted.
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03/02/2006
03:55 ||
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There is a new twist in the Chicago connection to an al Qaeda terror plot. The scheme to attack American soldiers overseas involved a former member of the US military who was secretly working for the FBI.
Investigators close to this case say that the insider who helped federal agents crack the terror ring was a highly trained former member of the US Army's Special Forces. He is in protective custody and is expected to be the key witness in the case. In the indictment he is referred to only as the trainer, because he was hired to train insurgents on how to kill US soldiers. The trainer was recruited just after 9/11, authorities say, by the owner of a Chicago travel agency who is now charged as a terrorist.
Fresh from American Special Forces, the trainer was recruited in early 2002 by accused terrorist Marwan el-Hindi who lived in southwest suburban Hickory Hills. We have learned the trainer's name is Darren, but he was known in Muslim circles as "Bilal" and was hired to provide security and bodyguard training according to the indictment.
In 2004, the FBI says Bilal was assigned by el-Hindi to help train for a holy war against US military in Iraq. In 2005, with firearms and bomb training, lessons in how to smuggle weapons through airports and a plan to show Chicago terrorist trainees a video of how to build suicide bombs.
Through all of the meetings in Toledo with Marwan el-Hindi -- even in el-Hindi's own home -- after each shooting drill on this Toledo gun range, federal authorities say "the trainer" was providing the government with a running account of terrorist plans, plots and movements.
A year ago, authorities say the trainer was given a new supervisor, suspect Mohammad Amawi, who plotted to order chemical weapons. Last summer, the two men traveled to Jordan to deliver computers to insurgents. The computers held plans for a series of roadside bombings of US military convoys. It is unclear whether any of the attacks took place, or whether last week's indictment of three accused terrorists in Ohio short-circuited the entire plan.
What is certain: the trainer, Darren "Bilal" is not charged and he is not expected to be charged, having gone to authorities when he realized the plot involved attacks on soldiers he used to serve with.
The trainer has been moved out of his Toledo apartment and celebrated his 40th birthday Wednesday in federal witness protection. No one answers his home phone and his voicemail is full. We have learned his last name, but have chosen not to use it, as authorities believe that his family could be in danger because he turned on terrorists.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:53 ||
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Thank you for this second service to your country, Darren. Well done!
Bill Clinton, former US president, advised top officials from Dubai two weeks ago on how to address growing US concerns over the acquisition of five US container terminals by DP World.
It came even as his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, was leading efforts to derail the deal.
Mr Clinton, who this week called the United Arab Emirates a good ally to America, advised Dubais leaders to propose a 45-day delay to allow for an intensive investigation of the acquisition, according to his spokesman. ...more...
#1
This is unbelieveable. Next thing we will hear is Carter will be proposing to mediate the deal and Gore will do a high priced speaking tour spouting our bigotted terrorist intent. The EX Pres needs to back out of politics and stay comepletely out of policy. This is bad for America.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 4:08
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#2
Hey,
Before 9-11, most of the Americans polled said that their religion was more important than the nation. We all live here worrying about our own butt never thinking of the others. Politicians in India will sell India if any one wants to buy the headache. I never imagined US politicians will do the same. Unfortunately, too many out there want to buy US. God bless us.
#3
It's all about Hollywood. People performing the role begin to believe the role was created for them...both xprez and xpulpit imagine they are as big as the message the public asks them to deliver.
Its hard to leave that level of advocacy behind as they have become defined by the role they left.
#4
Your up way too early there skid to be thinking clearly.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 5:08
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#5
"Well, here's how I see it. You oppose this ports deal and make yourself look like you're all tough and security conscious. It'll make the Bushies look bad - I played golf with the old man today and didn't do too bad, but I played him even better -- he let slip Sonny doesn't even know about the deal so they'll be completely blind-sided by opposition and slow on the up-take. Oughta score big points with the sheeple before anyone figures it out - lol - they really eat that security shit up and love the conspiracy crap about Bush and anyone with oil to boot. Meanwhile, I'll advise 'em on it and grease my way into collecting a bunch more 6-figure speaking fees. It'll be a breeze... Gawd, this Ex-Pres gig is slicker 'n snot and twice the fun. Hell, purdy soon we'll both be milking 'em."
#6
Not same, but related. US panel objects to Israeli software takeover
The same Bush administration review panel that approved a ports deal involving the United Arab Emirates has notified a leading Israeli software company that it faces a rare, full-blown investigation over its plans to buy a smaller rival.
#9
I guess I just feel that we should own and manage our own ports. I know I'm speaking with less knowledge than most here, but this is my gut feeling.
I feel so uninformed to learn after the fact that the British owned our ports. I don't feel that was right either.
To allow ANY other countries to own and manage businesses shouldn't be allowed with the involvement of any kind when it comes to security, or border issues.
Money should never be our driving force to decisions made on this level.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 12:58
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#10
Thats just it. You're misinformed.
These guys run the companies that load and unload the ships. Thats it. And because of laws and politics, they have to use Longshoremen's union labor, and fall under lots of state and local administrative oversight as well. Its not like this is a blank check giving them free reign on what comes and goes.
Security of the ports is handled by the Coastguard, DHS, and FBI, as well as state and local authorities (Like the NY Port Authority Police in NY).
A Singapore Government Owned Company had been running the ports in the pacific coast of the US for about a decade.
There is little if any security concern. If you knew Dubai adn how closesly it is already intertwined with US military and security operations, you'd be astonished.
You're not getting all the facts, you're eating up the spin. From paleo-cons like Buchanan and Bush bashers, as well as grand-standing politicians of all stripes, this is just cheap publicity with little to no substance.
#11
Its not like this is a blank check giving them free reign on what comes and goes. Security of the ports is handled by the Coastguard, DHS, and FBI, as well as state and local authorities (Like the NY Port Authority Police in NY).
Except that most of the inspections are done on paper only, relying mostly on the cooperation of the company itself. The only added protection is that it is in the company's economic interest to cooperate and make sure that nothing is shipped that shouldn't be shipped. That's okay, if you trust UAE as much as the Brits and Singaporeans.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 13:39
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thanks oldspook, that's why i like this site. I'm trying to get better informed here. I still feel uncomfortable about it though. With the comment by Rafael reminding us of how inspections are done mostly on paper. I for one have seen this at my own work place. With many things going undetected.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 13:58
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Nope, Rafael. You miss a key part of the picture.
After 9/11 we started inspecting cargoes at many key ports overseas. Those inspected containers are then sealed in ways that make it obvious if they have been opened.
Those containers do not need to be re-inspected here, beyond checking the seals.
Nonetheless, the feds have deployed a variety of sensor-based scanners and sniffers at many of our ports - and are deploying more as fast as they can be built and installed. Even manually 'uninspected' containers have a good chance of being checked this way.
I understand the concern about safety. But this brouhaha has become a hysterical fit totally unanchored in any real facts.
Is the system at our ports totally impenetrable?
No - and neither are our borders, our airports, our trucks or our cities.
Is a lot being done?
Yes - and more each day.
Can't we make things foolproof safe?
Maybe - if we all live in hermetically sealed huts with our own nuclear power plants, food and water sources ... and if these are totally foolproof and never breakdown and ...
Cost - benefit, folks. You guard against the big things, then have defenses in depth commesurable with the threat.
And please - the UAE will not "own" the ports. That's a nonsense charge, a deliberate blurring of the facts to create a panicked response.
#14
Damn it, man, I'm a prostitute, not an ex-prez.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/02/2006 14:16
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After 9/11 we started inspecting cargoes at many key ports overseas. Those inspected containers are then sealed in ways that make it obvious if they have been opened.
Forgive me, but I have my doubts. I think for the most part those overseas inspections are done on paper, with the cooperation of the shipping company.
There's no panic on my part, just an uncomfortable feeling of distrust when it comes to Chinese, Arab, or Russian concerns getting their hands on anything that has economic significance. If you have that much trust in them, then okay, I guess.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 15:12
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thanks lotp. Don't we have to share alot of security information with them?
It's hard for me to feel so vulnerable with outside threats. It helps reading here more factual information. Even knowing the MSM is off base so often, it's hard not to listen sometimes to all of it.
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 15:48
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I think for the most part those overseas inspections are done on paper, with the cooperation of the shipping company.
I'm not sure if ALL of the inspections are done by our own agents, but I'm pretty sure most of them are.
Jan, we share limited security info with all sorts of people. But the important stuff is kept secret for us. And yeah, if we had only the MSM to go by, we'd all be learning which direction Mecca is for our 5 x daily tribute.
#19
The overseas inspections are donne by US Customs and Coast guard personnel. And FBI at major ports like Port of Dubai where there is a lot of trans-shipment using containers. Check around, this stuff is on the web.
This is just more election-year demagoguery in an attempt to smear Bush and split Republicans.
Even after the sale to Dubai Ports World, the British company that currently operates the six American ports will continue to hire the employees (U.S. dockworkers) and conduct operations. Moreover, the port operator is only responsible for loading and unloading the ships, not security. The United States Coast Guard is charged with ensuring that incoming vessels do not present a threat. The United States Customs and Border Protection determines which containers are to be inspected and conducts the inspections. The corporate board sitting in Dubai has zero effect on U.S. security efforts.
You want to know why Congress is making a big deal of this? Because it hides the fact that they have been underfunding and screwing up the security we really need.
The greater security threat to the United States exists in foreign ports where the cargo containers are packed and loaded. If an explosive or, worse, a nuclear or radiological weapon, makes it into a cargo container headed for a U.S. port, we are in trouble, because even the best efforts of our government security agencies are unlikely to identify it. For more than four years we have been urging foreign port operators, such as Dubai Ports World, and their host governments to cooperate with us to strengthen security at their ports, at some cost to them, for our benefit. Congressional action to block the Dubai deal is likely to undercut that cooperation and therefore reduce, not enhance, our security.
If Congress wants to enhance domestic security, it should take a close look at our underfunded port security programs. We give expedited inspection privileges to thousands of shippers around the world through our Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism, but many of them have not been audited to determine if they meet security standards. We allow containers to come into U.S. ports without proper security seals that would protect against tampering while in transit. The innovative Container Security Initiative is only funded sufficiently to support a half dozen or so U.S. inspectors at each key foreign ports (And the Port of Dubai is one of those). We currently do not have enough equipment that can effectively identify nuclear or radiological material inside a cargo container without shutting down commerce because of excessive false alarms.
There are many constructive actions that can be taken to improve our port security. Blocking the Dubai port deal is not one of them.
Anyone falling for this is falling for the demagoguery of the Democrats and PaleoconCon Isolationists like Pat Buchannan and closet Bush-hater columnists like George Will (who has written outright falsehoods lately).
#20
Well OldSpook, you have me convinced. This is another one of those times when my opinion has changed, based on people's comments here. Thank you :-)
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 17:30
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#21
You want to know why Congress is making a big deal of this?
Because the media showed them it was a way to get traction against Bush and appear to be more hawkish on terrorism, which they aren't.
The donks need to take a deep breath on this because they are heading down an isolationist road that will make Burton Wheeler seem like a one world government wacko.
#22
By the way if the Dubai company gets the job, part of the boilerplate legal terms will be that they obey the laws of the US and this includes not participating in the Israeli product boycott.
In a sense, this is a reason to support the transfer rather than oppose it.
#23
thanks oldspook for clarifying these points. You helped me to see this issue for what it is, and I thank you for that. It's damn hard wading through the trash on the news these days. It angers me that the MSM is given so much latitude in their reporting, and very scary to know that citizens base their decisions on issues from many of these false reports. I listen to talk radio alot on my way into work and that's just as bad sometimes.
Jan
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 18:48
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Forty people were killed and 30 others, including women and children, were wounded when helicopter gunships struck a suspected militants compound in a village in North Waziristan on Wednesday morning, officials and residents said. The attack triggered a strong reaction in Miramshah where hundreds of pious seminary students with automatic weapons besieged several checkposts of paramilitary forces. Pitched battles between locals and security forces continued for hours.
North Waziristan Agencys political agent Zaheerul Islam claimed that most of the people killed in the attack on the Dandy Saidgay village, about 15km from Miramshah, belonged to Central Asia.
A security official said that a Chechen commander was also hit from a helicopter, when he tried to escape in a red double-cabin pick-up. His (Chechens) name could not be ascertained, he added.
"Ford F-150 Club Cab don't fail me now!"
Two guards of the Chechen commander were killed on the spot, while he died a couple of hours later, said a military source in Peshawar.
Officials said one soldier was killed and 15 others were wounded in the assault carried out in the area along the Afghan border.
About 12 helicopters, including six gunships, and commandos from the armys Special Services Group took part in the operation that started at around 7am. Witnesses said that while residential compounds were hit by combat helicopters, ground troops moved in for conducting a search operation, prompting a gunbattle with tribesmen.
A wounded person, Shabir Khan, under treatment at a hospital in Miramshah, said he saw helicopters shelling houses in the area. Shabir, student of a local college, said he was travelling with a female relative across the rugged area when their vehicle was attacked by a helicopter. The woman died on the spot, while he and his driver suffered injuries, Shabir said.
Sources said that two children of Noor Payo Khan, the alleged protector of foreign militants, were among the dead. Thirteen civilians, including women, were wounded in the airstrike.
Official sources said that army troops backed by helicopters attacked the suspected compound owned by Noor Payo Khan, in the middle of a cluster of houses in Dandy Saidgay. Certainly, the compound was used as a hideout by foreign militants, but it was completely empty at the time of the attack. Nobody was there, said a resident.
"We knocked on the door, and the voice inside said no one was home."
Protesting against the attack, hundreds of madressah students, known as the local Taliban, thronged the town and besieged several paramilitary checkposts. Witnesses said the protesters, many of them armed, captured 12 soldiers and took away their arms. However, the soldiers were later freed.
Since they were all related.
The seminary students smashed government offices and attacked soldiers, prompting a heavy gunfight between the security forces and locals. Helicopter gunships were called in. People fired at helicopters when they started shelling houses.
The house of a tribesman, Janan Khan, and a clinic came under attack in the Dandy Derpakhel area. A witness said that the body of an unidentified man was found on the Sergardan Chowk.
Locals said that about 1,000 students of local seminaries later paraded the streets, chanting slogans against the US and calling for jihad. Local cleric Maulvi Abdul Haq led the march. Maulvi Haq called for jihad prompting people to take up positions on various buildings. A helicopter engaged the armed men on rooftops and fired several rounds. It attracted some fire from the protesters.
The locals said that the gunfire lasted three hours. Sources said that a large number of Taliban had gathered in a mosque to devise a future line of action.
Of course the Paks couldn't hit a mosque, nope, nope, couldn't be done.
Army spokesman Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan said the raid followed intelligence that there was a big gathering of foreign militants in the compound, housing eight residential quarters.
Mr Zaheerul Islam said the militants were targeted following information that they were carrying out attacks across the Afghan border. We have reports up to 40 militants, mainly foreigners, were killed in the raid on the compound where there was a big gathering of foreign militants, a security official told AFP.
A local official identified the suspected Chechen commander as Imam. It was an Al Qaeda camp and a training centre, an official said seeking anonymity.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:49 ||
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The locals said that the gunfire lasted three hours. Sources said that a large number of Taliban had gathered in a mosque to devise a future line of action.
My kingdom for a MOAB.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
03/02/2006 3:53
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North Waziristan Agencys political agent Zaheerul Islam claimed that most of the people killed in the attack on the Dandy Saidgay village, about 15km from Miramshah, belonged to Central Asia.
#4
I don't get this.
They attacked an area, and killed about 40. Then, others (? survivors of the attacked group) met to plan future action.
Why not continue to attack those folks ?
Coffee break get in the way ?
Colombian authorities have seized 29.7 pounds (13.5 kg) of uranium from two people trying to secretly sell the radioactive metal to the highest bidder, the army said on Wednesday.
Soldiers and police confiscated the uranium in the gritty Siete de Agosto neighborhood of the capital, Bogota, on February 24, Brig. Gen. Gustavo Matamoros said, speaking on radio and in a news release.
He gave no more details about the uranium and did not say whether it would be suitable for making weapons or indicate whether the attempted sale may have been linked to Colombia's Marxist rebels or far-right paramilitaries.
Western governments have long feared that militant groups might obtain materials for weapons of mass destruction on the black market.
A man and a woman were arrested in the raid, an army spokeswoman said. She was not sure if they were still in custody and local television reported they had been set free because possession of uranium is not specifically forbidden by any Colombian law.
"We are trying to establish where this material came from and where it was headed," Matamoros said in the news release.
Colombia, a close ally of the United States, is locked in a four-decade-old insurgent war in which Marxist rebels are trying to overthrow the state and thousands of people are killed every year. The conflict is complicated by illegal far-right paramilitaries who oppose the rebels. Both outlaw groups are heavily involved in the cocaine trade.
In January, Colombian officials arrested 19 members of a gang with links to Islamic militant groups Hamas and al Qaeda that forged passports for travel in the United States and Europe, according to the attorney general's office.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:48 ||
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#1
Um, er, is it against the law to own Uranium? Wow guess we gotta let them go! OK see ya, have a nice day. This is a future darwin award winning nation on a global scale! God I hope our boys are on this.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 3:55
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#2
Not too tough to pack it with a load of coke going to New York. I wonder if it hadn't been sold...
#3
If you haul around 29 pounds of Uranium, you're a dead man, perhaps the Cops know that it's a waste of time and effort to jail and prosecute dead men walking?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/02/2006 8:18
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#4
Is it depleted or active uranium? I suspect depleted uranium is easily -- if expensively -- obtainable.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/02/2006 8:40
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#5
It's only a matter of time before the commies in in Colombia mix it up with the porKoranimals. At least these dweebs got caught.
#7
Seems unlikely it was enriched as the shielding necessary for all involved not to die an extremely painful and horrible death would have been pretty conspicuous.
Still, it would be nice to have some samples so that its point of origin could be determined. A terse notification to the country where it was mined (and refined) might let them know just how dangerous it is to their future when it comes to releasing substantial quantities of rare earth elements onto the open market. The words, "glow-in-the-dark" and "parking lot" should figure prominently in such a missive.
#8
I'm not a phsyicist or anything... but 29 lbs sound in excess of a critical mass. So... unless it was well shielded or kept in separate masses, it wasn't significantly enriched.
#9
1. Uranium is a low-level emitter as is to be expected from an element with a long half-life. In the factories that make yellowcake, workers typically only need gloves and respirators to handle the material. Thus, U poses little radiological harm. It is far more dangerous as an ingested heavy metal toxin, similar to mercury or lead in its effects.
2. In all likelihood, they had natural uranium, which can be found in many places around the world. Of course, natural uranium only has 0.27% U-235 (if my memory hasn't failed me), which means that hunk of metal has 0.078 lbs of U-235. I doubt Osama was going to cut a check for that.
3. As to the comment about critical mass, there are two things to keep in mind. The first is the enrichment and the second is the geometry. The Little Boy bomb used at Hiroshima had about 140 pounds of U-235 (~80% overall enriched), which was in two different shapes that were then driven together by conventional explosives to form that critical mass. Also, historically, anyone who has been in the near vicinity of a criticality accident (like happened in Japan about 5 years ago) typically is dead in less than a day.
#10
Good info Dreadnaught. One minor clarification: U-235 is about 7% of natural Uranium. Depleted Uranium is about 0.3% U-235. Also the little mentioned U-234 is about .0054% of natural Uranium; that small percentage of U-234 is responsible for about half of all natural Uranium's radioactivity!
#11
Natural uranium has 0.72% U-235 and depleted uranium has 0.25-0.30% U-235. I think using depleted uranium weapons is short sighted since advanced reactor designs, such as the closed fuel cycle Integral Fast Reactor, envision fissioning 99% of the uranium.
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006 20:28
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#12
Not sure I follow that reasoning, ed. The depleted uranium is used because of its density. Unless there is a substitute, its usefulness means it will be produced in at least some places for this purpose.
#13
Tungsten alloys are just about as dense as uranium, though it does not have the pyrophoric (thus self sharpening) property of DU and not as quite good for armor penetration. But since most of the DU burns up while penetrating armor, that fraction can never be recovered and used for another purpose.
Proposed reactor designs can use 99.5% (vs. a small fraction of 1% currently) of all the isotopes of uranium by recycling both the plutonium and long life fission products to ultimate produce short half life products that decay to natural uranium levels in a few hundred years. So a 120mm DU penetrator is potentially worth millions in equivalent oil/gas/coal energy production.
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006 21:27
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#14
lotp, here is an article link for an advanced breeder reactor: Smarter Use of Nuclear Waste
And the design can also recycle used reactor fuel elements that are today in cooling ponds.
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006 21:37
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.72%! Thanks Ed! Knew the ol' memory wasn't dredging up the right number (or at least it was the right numbers in the wrong order)
#16
OK so now we know it might not be enough to make a good nuke. Would it be effectiveas a dirty bomb? Say pack it with C4 and detonate it in a city?
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 22:23
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dirty bomb
No. In Desert Storm a few hundred tons of DU was fired. A 120mm sabot has about 10 pounds of DU. Of that, 7 or 8 pounds will vaporize and oxidize (much finer than an explosive can distribute). While you may not want to camp in and around the thousands of destroyed armorded vehicles (both the heavy metal toxic effects and inhaling DU dust), it's not anything you can use as a radiation weapon (media weapon, yes). Cobalt-60 is another matter.
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006 22:42
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#3
"What about the young parents whose baby-sitter is trying to call them, or the brain surgeon who needs notification of emergency surgery? These calls need to get through."
Sheesh, its always the brain surgery emergency excuse.
#7
What a selling tool for the decorating industry!
Shermin Williams should make their first million in a week. Think of all the restaurnat's that would prefer you not talk while patrons are eating!
Andrea
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/02/2006 16:24
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"What about the young parents whose baby-sitter is trying to call them, or the brain surgeon who needs notification of emergency surgery? These calls need to get through."
A valid issue, if people were considerate and set their phones to vibrate only when in places like restaurants and concerts.
Thirty new terrorist organizations have emerged since the September 11, 2001, attacks, outpacing U.S. efforts to crush the threat, said Brig. Gen. Robert L. Caslen, the Pentagon's deputy director for the war on terrorism.
"We are not killing them faster than they are being created," Gen. Caslen told a gathering at the Woodrow Wilson Center yesterday, warning that the war could take decades to resolve.
Gen. Caslen said that two years ago the Department of Defense had not settled on a clear definition of the nature of the war. Moreover, because each government department had its own perspective, "we all had different strategies," he said.
The Defense Department now has defined the nature of the war, he said. The enemy, he said, is "a transnational movement of extremist organizations, networks and individuals that use violence and terrorism as a means to promote their end." It is not a global insurgency, the general said.
"We do not go as far as to say it is a global insurgency, because it lacks a centralized command and control," he said.
Groups such as al Qaeda, though, are constantly trying to increase their capabilities, and in some cases are outstripping the United States, Gen. Caslen said.
"We in the Pentagon are behind our adversaries in the use of communications -- either to recruit or train," he said. Compared with historical jihads, or enduring Muslim wars, this one "is accelerated because of its capability in communications."
The Pentagon official said Muslim thought ranges from secular and mainstream to extremist and intolerant.
The takfir (infidel) view of the world that falls under the Salafist teachings of the Sunni sect -- such as al Qaeda in Iraq -- is an example of the extremist view that condones violence to accomplish ideological ends, he said.
The general said the extremists' goal is to remove U.S. troops from Iraq and establish a radical state under Shariah, or Islamic law, remove what they consider the apostate governments of Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Egypt, and destroy Israel.
But the enemy has vulnerabilities.
"The ideology is not popular among most, even Muslims," he said. "We need to undermine support by amplifying the moderate forces and undermining the enemy's repressive and corrupt behavior."
Gen. Caslen said the government and military are working to integrate their strategies and plans, and that a national strategic presidential directive and homeland security presidential directive are being drafted to face the terrorist threat.
Leading the war on terrorism is Special Operations Command based in Tampa, Fla. The command is writing a military global campaign strategy with a specific plan to deal with each terrorist organization.
Gen. Caslen said a governmentwide plan to assign tasks and responsibilities to all U.S. government departments and the military also is being created.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:44 ||
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The tendency for existing terrorist organizations to don and shed various noms du guerre like so much used underwear make any assessment like this a little dubious. Regardless of factuality, all it really means is thirty new targets.
Pakistani soldiers and helicopter gunships attacked a suspected Al Qaeda camp yesterday near the Afghan border, killing more than 45 militants and angering residents who called for a holy war days before a visit by President Bush.
As news of the attack spread in the rugged northwestern region, tribesmen who sympathize with the militants came out of their homes and began firing in the air. A mosque loudspeaker urged people to ''wage jihad against the army."
The offensive was in North Waziristan, a region controlled by fiercely independent, well-armed tribes believed to be sheltering Al Qaeda fugitives and Taliban remnants. The militants often cross the porous Afghan-Pakistan border.
Three helicopter gunships attacked the militants' mountain hide-out near Saidgi, a village nine miles west of Miran Shah, army spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan said.
The assault ''knocked out a den of foreign militants" and killed more than 45 of them, an army statement said.
The slain men -- most from Central Asian and Arab countries -- included an Al Qaeda-linked Chechen commander, identified only by his code name, Imam, who died when a helicopter fired on a vehicle in which he was fleeing, an army official said.
The official said the commander was behind attacks on Pakistani security forces along the border. He said the Chechen was killed along with three bodyguards.
Another security official said one soldier was killed and about a dozen were wounded. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
One helicopter hit a bus with gunfire during the raid, killing a female passenger and injuring a 20-year-old student, according to the bus driver, Sabbir Khan. Khan was also injured and spoke from his hospital bed.
Pakistan, a key US ally in the war against terrorism, has been under pressure from the United States and Afghanistan to be more aggressive in flushing out militants and sealing off the border.
Last year, President General Pervez Musharraf suggested a security fence be built along the border. But Afghanistan rejected that idea.
Yesterday's operation came three days before a visit by Bush to Pakistan during which the fight against al Qaeda and loyalists of Afghanistan's former Taliban regime will be on the agenda.
Suspicion that Al Qaeda and Taliban militants may be using Pakistan as base for launching terror strikes in Afghanistan has become a source of tension. More than two dozen suicide attacks in recent months have fueled Afghan suspicions. Bush has said he will raise the issue of cross-border infiltrations with Musharraf.
Afghanistan has handed intelligence to Pakistan that it said indicated that Taliban leader Mullah Omar and key associates were hiding inside the country.
The operations against militants have angered some residents.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:42 ||
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Police declared a four-day revolt at Afghanistan's main jail over late on Wednesday after more than 1,350 inmates surrendered.
The riot erupted at Kabul's Pul-e-Charkhi jail late on Saturday, allegedly instigated by about 300 Taliban and Al Qaeda prisoners whom police said were trying to create chaos so that they could escape.
"The violence is over," police rapid reaction force commander General Mahboob Amiri said as the last of the prisoners were made to leave the riot-smashed cell block for more secure facilities.
"The prison is under full control of police," he said. Hundreds of extra police and soldiers deployed at the height of the standoff had left the complex on the outskirts of Kabul but 200 would remain, Amiri said.
He said that a fifth body had been found in the evacuated block - that of a man from the criminal wing who was killed on Tuesday with what police said was a club fashioned from a metal bar, perhaps from a bed frame.
Clashes broke out among the prisoners late on Tuesday after more than 1,000 inmates convicted of non-terrorist offenses had declared their intention to call off their resistance early the following day.
The political prisoners apparently opposed their surrender. It had been expected that they would resist being taken out from the block but they did not, deputy justice minister Mohammad Qasim Hashimzai said.
"There was no use of force. The criminal wing surrendered and later the political wing also started to come out and surrender one by one," he said.
Police said that two of the four inmates killed in the first wave of violence after the riot erupted on Saturday were Al Qaeda members - one from Pakistan and the other from Tajikistan.
Prisoners armed with makeshift weapons attacked guards, had set alight furniture and bedding and smashed windows and doors. Some chanted slogans against President Hamid Karzai and US President George W. Bush, witnesses said.
Guards opened fire to try to control the situation and the complex was surrounded by about 1,000 troops and police who occasionally fired into the building, witnesses said.
Five inmates were killed and around 30 wounded overall in four days of mayhem at the prison.
Among the inmates removed from the block on Wednesday was US citizen Edward Caraballo, one of three Americans convicted in September 2004 of torturing suspects in a so-called private war on terror.
Hashimzai said that authorities confiscated Caraballo's telephone and laptop because he had used them to "disseminate false information" about the riot. Caraballo said that he was being held hostage but this was rejected by authorities.
Besides the criminal and 300 political prisoners, the block also held about 60 women, some with children, who were moved out late on Tuesday.
Prison guards said that some of the women, who included a Nepali convicted of drug smuggling, had told them that they were raped. Several officials have dismissed the rape allegations but Amiri said that they would be investigated.
Most Al Qaeda suspects caught in Afghanistan after the US-led invasion that toppled the Taliban regime in late 2001 have been transferred to the US detention centre at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba or the US jail at Bagram Air Base near Kabul.
Some low-ranking Al Qaeda and rank-and-file Taliban are still housed in Pul-e-Charkhi, officials say.
Prisoner representatives handed a list of demands to negotiators on Monday. The negotiators said that some would be addressed, such as complaints over living conditions.
Others, including a review of all cases, were still being considered.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:34 ||
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Darn, I was hoping for a full scale revolt. Just giving them a reason to clean house!
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 3:43
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Women were reportedly raped, but no reports from the men. Hmmm...must just be part of the kulture.
Police arrested a Jordanian medicine graduate on Tuesday in Iasi for allegedly for being part of the "Muslim Brothers" organization, known as a terrorist network affiliated with al-Qaeda.
According to unofficial sources quoted by Mediafax news agency, the Jordanian was also a friend with seven Muslim medicine students detained and expelled last year for the same accusations.
However, a chief inspector with the Authority for Foreigners, Lucian Rusu, said yesterday the office did not know why the Jordanian was detained. "We carried out an order from the Iasi Prosecutor's Office which declared the man undesirable on Romanian territory," Rusu said.
The Jordanian, whose name was not made public, was picked up by Special Forces in front of the Medical School, from where he was taken to the Office for Foreigners in Bucharest.
The chief inspector denied reports published by several central newspapers, suggesting that a total of four Muslim citizens (a Palestinian, two Sudanese and a Moroccan) had been detained in Iasi on Tuesday as well. The reports suggest that the four were to be expelled from Romania because they were believed to have close ties to al-Qaeda.
Two national newspapers also reported that more arrests of Muslims are to follow in Iasi.
According to a report from the Foreign Intelligence Agency, the Muslim Brothers have dozens of members in Romania and operates under the cover of the Islamic and Cultural League in the country, the humanitarian foundation al-Taiba and other Islamic associations.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:32 ||
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Good. It removes some from temptation, and makes the rest feel insecure.
Yemeni security officials yesterday said that authorities thwarted two prison escape attempts by al-Qaida suspects in two different prisons.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, said the foiled escape attempts were stopped over the past two days and took place in cities outside the capital San`a.
They said 10 al-Qaida suspects were planning to escape from the first prison and another two, senior al-Qaida suspects, tried to escape from the second.
They did not identify the prisoners or provide further details, except to say that an investigation was launched into the attempts.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:31 ||
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Picks and shovels, miners helmets, flashlights, gloves, lumber, conveyor belts, United Mine Workers union dues receipts.....all found in the cells of prisoners. Effective link analysis finally pays off.
Ukraine's Security Service says 10 Uzbek asylum-seekers who were recently deported were members of an Al-Qaeda-linked terrorist group.
Maryna Ostapenko, a spokeswoman for the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU), said the men were members of the militant Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, allegedly linked to Al-Qaeda. The claim could not be independently confirmed nor does it particularly need to be, but appeared aimed at blunting international criticism over the refugees' forced return.
The 10 Uzbeks arrived in Ukraine last year, after the Uzbek government cracked down on protesters in Andijon in May. They were deported two weeks ago for alleged illegal migration. Human rights groups and international organizations have criticized the deportation.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:30 ||
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More removal from temptation. If one were religious, one might see the hand of God in all this.
Four security officials are being interrogated by a security committee over the jail break of 23 Al-Qaeda members and suspects from the Political Security Jail in Sanaa on February 3. The fugitives include men said to be among the most dangerous Al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen.
The jail officials are suspected of having aided the escape of the prisoners and taking bribes. Sources refused to reveal the results of interrogations, which are at this stage, preliminary.
The committee is still looking for more evidence against the jail officials. President Saleh told a London based Arabic newspaper earlier this week that three of the fugitives had handed themselves over to security forces. The rest are said to be still in Yemen, and in contact with authorities. Some reports claim they are willing to surrender themselves, though no evidence has been given for this.
President Saleh has blamed officials at the jail officials for laziness, and hinted at the existence of a conspiracy.
A conspiracy? In Yemen? Pshaw!
The President gave his personal assurances that the General Prosecutor and the Homeland Security Agency is working hard on the case. Security officials have already been accused of inadequately inspecting the inmates jail cells.
Investigators said the prisoners used cooking spoons and pot handles to dig the tunnel and two buckets for dirt removal. They also found four soccer balls which the prisoners used as breathing devices while they tunneled.
That was a size 7 cooking spoon?
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:29 ||
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"Investigators said the prisoners used cooking spoons and pot handles to dig the tunnel..."
Lets see here...a 400 meter underground tunnel with cutlery. Of course custom dictates that they eat with their hand...but busy little beavers aint they.
Prisoners loyal to Al Qaeda took a prison chief and six policemen hostage yesterday during riots at three Jordanian jails to stop the transfer of inmates convicted for killing a US diplomat, officials said.
Sources said the inmates released their hostages after receiving promises they would not be punished.
The head of Jweida prison, Colonel Saad Ajrami, was among those held hostage, deputy head of police Abdul Salam Al Jaafra told state television.
Security sources said the violence at the Swaqa, Jweida and Qafqafa prisons began after security forces went into one of the jails to transfer to another Jordanian jail two high-profile prisoners on death row for killing a US diplomat in Amman in 2002.
The inmates feared the two were going to be executed. Security sources said the two had not been transferred but it was not known if this was because of the rioting.
The prison clashes, which involved 150 inmates, were the most serious in Jordan in recent years.
It was the first coordinated rioting by prisoners in Jordan, which has been facing growing activism.
The three prisons are among eight jails holding more than 6,000 common criminals and political prisoners, many of whom belong to Al Qaeda and have been sentenced for attacks against Israeli, American and other Western targets.
Security experts said the clashes underscored the prisoners high-level of coordination. Security sources said the inmates used smuggled mobile phones to organise the rioting between the three jails.
The sources said anti-riot police units had already been on alert at the three jails after prisoners threatened to riot if the two inmates at Swaqa Libyan Salem bin Suweid and Jordanian Yasser Freihat were taken for execution.
As soon as the paramilitary units moved into Swaqa, clashes erupted. Similar violence broke out at the two other jails almost simultaneously, an activist said.
Hundreds of anti-riot police moved into the cells, using tear gas and plastic bullets to quell the unrest at the jails which hold some of Jordans most dangerous activists, including followers of Al Qaedas leader in Iraq, Abu Musab Al Zarqawi.
Among the prisoners in Jweida are Azmi Jayousi, a Jordanian aide to Zarqawi, who was sentenced to death last month over his leading role in plotting chemical attacks in 2004.
Police spokesman Major Raed Deajah said the hostages were seized when they went unarmed into a cell to negotiate with the prisoners. They were held for about eight hours.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:28 ||
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The world body's top envoy to Sudan said Tuesday that Al Qaeda has threatened him and any peacekeeping troops deployed there from outside Africa, following the Sudanese government's rejection of a proposed U.N. force meant to protect civilians in the nation's Darfur region.
U.N. special envoy Jan Pronk said the government in Khartoum deeply distrusts foreign intervention in its nation and fears that the presence of a United Nations or NATO force would be the beginning of a foreign occupation such as those that took place in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The U.N. is drawing up plans to transform a 7,000-strong African Union force into a U.N.-led operation as the regional troops run out of funding and logistical support. But Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir on Saturday denounced the U.N.'s plan to field a force of as many as 20,000 troops, some from outside Africa, to quell continuing violence in Darfur.
On Feb. 17, President Bush said the number of peacekeepers on the ground in Darfur should be doubled, perhaps with the support of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Bashir responded Saturday that such international troops would be at risk.
"We are strongly opposed to any foreign intervention in Sudan, and Darfur will be a graveyard for any foreign troops venturing to enter," he said in Khartoum. Bashir summoned Pronk on Monday to underline his government's insistence on African troops.
Pronk returned to the U.N. on Tuesday and told reporters that there is an "atmosphere of fear and conspiracy" in Khartoum. "They speak about re-colonization, invasion and they speak about Iraq and Afghanistan and they speak about a conspiracy against the Arab and Islamic world," he said.
The heated political climate in Khartoum has made negotiations over the next step difficult, Pronk said, describing intelligence that suggested that Al Qaeda terrorists were present in the Sudanese capital and had made death threats against him and any U.N. troops that might be deployed to the country.
Sudan's deputy ambassador to the United Nations, Omar Manis, reiterated his government's objections to the mission but questioned Pronk's reports of Al Qaeda threats.
"I don't know from where Mr. Pronk got this idea. Sudan is not Al Qaeda. We don't speak for Al Qaeda," he said.
Manis added that Khartoum prefers African troops to international soldiers, even if the existing force is absorbed by a U.N. mission.
"The Sudanese government has already said no," Manis said. "If there are problems with the African Union, let us solve those problems. If there are financial constraints, give them more money. If there are logistical constraints, help them. But nobody seems to be interested in going that path."
Pronk said the political stalemate must be broken because attacks against villagers in the Darfur region were again growing frequent. He described attacks in which thousands of Arab militiamen on camels and horses, followed by government army trucks, plundered Darfur. He also reported new attacks on refugee camps in Chad.
The militias, often backed by the government, have been razing villages in the region of western Sudan since rebel groups took up arms against the government in 2003. Hundreds of thousands of non-Arab villagers have been killed in the government-orchestrated campaign to oust the ethnic groups that supported the rebels, according to the U.N., and more than 2 million people have been displaced.
The attacks have continued despite a peace agreement in a separate Sudanese conflict reached last year, and the African Union forces are spread thin, Pronk said.
"We need a robust peace force in Darfur to prevent attacks on the civilians," he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:26 ||
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sounds a tad suicidal on the part of the Sudan govt.
Distrust of the United Nations and warnings of al-Qaeda involvement are growing in the Sudanese capital Khartoum, the UNs envoy to the troubled African nation has warned, saying that both are linked to the uncertainty surrounding peacekeeping operations in strife-torn Darfur. Describing the working environment for UN staff in the capital as "very difficult," Jan Pronk, the special representative, said that "politically we are a bit in a stalemate," referring in particular to the African Union (AU) peacekeeping force in Darfur and whether, and how, it would be replaced by a UN operation.
"The climate in Khartoum against the UN is heating up very strongly threats, there are warnings, there is talk about Al-Qaeda. And there is fear in Khartoum, that is being used, that the UN transition will be not a UN transition but a conspiracy which will bring Sudan into the same situation as Iraq a couple of years ago," Pronk said.
"Of course that is a feeling, which is being manipulated by leaders, at the same time its also a feeling which is true for many people in the streets of Khartoum, and in that very difficult situation we at the moment are working," added Pronk, who heads the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS).
UNMIS was deployed to support the Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed about a year ago in Nairobi between the government of Sudan and the southern Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A). It also has a mandate from the UN Security Council to provide some support to the AU mission in Darfur.
But despite the peace agreement, violence involving the rebels, the government and militias has continued in the Darfur region, prompting the Security Council yesterday to consider sanctioning individuals deemed a threat to the peace or to human rights in the area.
Since fighting flared a week ago in North Darfur, a large number of villages have been attacked and burned, markets have been looted and people displaced. UNMIS has also said that clashes between the Sudan Armed Forces and rebel Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) have continued.
Pronk also said that 300 people had been killed in one area of South Darfur since December by attackers riding horses and camels and backed up by military vehicles.
He also said that he was "very concerned about whats going on around the border in Darfur" with neighbouring Chad, where more than 200,000 Sudanese refugees have sought safety in the past three years from the killings in their homeland, adding that there was violence on both sides of the frontier.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Tuesday that they were now seeing "population movements in both directions along the troubled Chad-Sudan border, further evidence of the spreading insecurity that now straddles this increasingly insecure region."
"In addition to the more than 200,000 Sudanese refugees from Darfur who have sought refuge in eastern Chad in the past three years, we're now seeing indications that some Chadians are themselves fleeing in the opposite direction, to Darfur," said UNHCR spokesperson Jennifer Pagonis.
High commissioner António Guterres has repeatedly expressed deep concern over the potential for further destabilization in the region, she added, noting that the assistant high commissioner is currently on a one-week mission to Chad to visit its borders with Sudan and the Central African Republic (CAR).
UNHCR said today that it had reports of more CAR arrivals fleeing banditry as well as hostilities between rebel groups and government forces in the northern region of their country. If true, this would mean the total number of new arrivals this month in southern Chad from the CAR would be more than 5,000.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:23 ||
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Which is why we can't just leave Africa to stew in its own juices. Left alone, they will, willy nilly, provide Al Qaeda with a safe haven in which to plot further atrocities as they continue their war to establish their vile Caliphate.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has reportedly said there are signs of an al-Qaeda presence in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. "We have indications about a presence of al-Qaeda in Gaza and the (West) Bank. This is intelligence information. We have not yet reached the point of arrests," Abbas said. "The last security report I received was three days ago," he told the London-based al-Hayat newspaper.
"This is the first time that I've spoken about this subject. This is a very serious matter."
Israeli officials said they were worried that foreign militants and al-Qaeda agents entered Gaza from Egypt during a brief period of chaos on the border following the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza last year. The Palestinian Authority said that was untrue.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:22 ||
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A car bomb exploded Thursday outside the U.S. Consulate and a luxury hotel in Pakistan's biggest city, killing four people including an American diplomat just days ahead of a visit to Pakistan by President Bush, police said.
The blast ripped through the parking lot of the Marriott Hotel, about 20 yards from the consulate gate, shattering windows at the consulate and on all 10 floors of the hotel. Ten cars were destroyed, sending clouds of thick black smoke over the scene.
Speaking in neighboring India, Bush said a U.S. foreign service officer was killed.
"We have lost at least one U.S. citizen in the bombing, a foreign service officer, and I send our country's deepest condolences to that person's loved ones and family," Bush said, declining to provide further details.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/02/2006
03:21 ||
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At least two people died Thursday and at least 18 people were wounded in two bomb blasts near the U.S. consulate in Karachi, Pakistan.
Authorities said the blasts were also near a luxury hotel, not far from the gate to the consulate. A police official told the Associated Press that both explosions were the results of car bombs.
The blasts were said to have happened at around 9:00 a.m. local time in Karachi. Video images from the scene showed a large crater in the road. As well, windows at the hotel and the consulate were shattered. Pakistani security forces and emergency workers were on the scene trying to battle flames.
The blasts come just two days before U.S. President George W. Bush visits Pakistan.
#1
I think this will give our fair haired boys a green light to go after AQ in PAK. Happy hunting.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/02/2006 3:48
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Ain't life grand in Cockroachy Wackistan. WTF GWB is going there is beyond me. All Mu wants is money and weapons. His loyalty in the Wot is near zero. All he wants it to keep the WakiPaki military cabal in power and the region unstable. It's allen's will in his book.
Posted by: SPoD ||
03/02/2006 3:55
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I wonder if GwB won't be giving nuke technology to the Paks just like the Indians as a balance for Iran. Pushing the proliferation will either force the basin to come to grips with the issue, or cause a big boom. The US has an advantage either way.
#2
I found the article actually rather persuasive. Its thrust is that selfish people see children as a burden, and therefore exterminate themselves by refusing to reproduce. They are replaced by real people who actually care about others.
Patriarchy does not simply mean that men rule. Indeed, it is a particular value system that not only requires men to marry but to marry a woman of proper station. It competes with many other male visions of the good life, and for that reason alone is prone to come in cycles.
#4
This article fleshes out the Roe Effect and puts it in context.
A bit long-winded, but otherwise an excellent read.
Demographics truly is destiny. And all the platitudes in the world are trumped by DNA. We truly cannot legislate biology.
Some of the more extreme notions of modern feminism, even if well-intended, were doomed from the drawing board. All the wishing in the world won't change that.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
03/02/2006 6:55
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Long but not long winded in my opinion. I thought the point about the unintended consequences of the welfare state was particularly insightful. How long till the entire New Deal is proven counterproductive and rolled back?
#7
Interesting read; see also this, "Demographics and the Culture War By Stanley Kurtz", don't remember if I've posted here or not.
Two random thoughts :
- On a global level, the followers of a given "conservative" religion are outbreeding competition everywhere, regardless of ethnicity, even when their own natality numbers are falling. Guess which "conservative" religion? Oh, yaaas, a substantial part of the coming world's population will be "conservative", no doubt.
and
- Heard it on a conservative independent radio : France's demographical group with the highest natality is not black african wimmen (4,5, supposedly, as opposed to 1,2 for european french wimmen, theses are not official stats, since categorizing through ethnicit is forbidden), but would be traditionalist catholics (6,6 kiddies per woman)... theses are the most conservative part of french society, with lots of home schooling, latin mass, joining scouts, learnign musical instruments, reading books, studying in prestigious private schools (even if they mostly hails from middle-class), joining the army (80% of Saint Cyr military academy cadets supposedly follow traditional pre-Vatican II mass).
Why, I may be an evolutionary dead-end, and a bit of genetical deadwood, but this brings a lil' smile on my unlovely bloated face.
It's not a good idea to let the Fijians seethe -- those guys are as tough as the Samoans.
SUVA - The leader of the South Pacific nation of Fiji has called a general election for May, testing racial divisions, which have fuelled three coups and a military mutiny since 1987.
Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase announced the election on Wednesday, having previously vowed to stay in power until his five-year term ends in September. My party is ready for the general elections, Qarase told reporters in the capital, Suva. He said parliament would be dissolved on March 27 and elections held between May 6 and 13.
Voting in the South Pacific archipelago usually takes at least a week, given the logistical problems involved in collecting ballots from far-flung islands and villages. Fiji has 320 islands covering 18,376 sq km (7,100 sq miles) of ocean. Qarase was elected prime minister in 2001 after being initially installed as caretaker leader in 2000 when martial law was imposed following a nationalist-led coup.
Racial tensions have sparked three coups in Fiji since 1987, with indigenous Fijians resenting the economic, and at times political, strength of ethnic Indians whose ancestors were brought to Fiji to work on British sugar cane farms.
Qarases main challenge in the 2006 election is expected to come from Fiji Labour Party leader Mahendra Chaudhry, an ethnic Indian overthrown as prime minister in the 2000 coup. Chaudhry said his Indo-Fijian party was also ready for the early poll, but questioned the accuracy of new electoral rolls. We have been complaining about the registration of voters since last year, said Chaudhry. There are hundreds of voters assigned to wrong constituencies.
Fijis 71 electorates are race-based, with 23 seats allocated to indigenous Fijians, 19 seats to Indo-Fijians and 25 open seats, which often heavily favour indigenous Fijians. Four seats are reserved for minor ethnic groups.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/02/2006
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Another nation demanding to be invaded by Dubya - iff the West doesn't save Fiji the Chicoms will, as they want to be able to confront and defeat the USA in PACOA wid out having to say how their forces got there.
#3
At one time the Fijian Army consisted of 3 light Infantry battalions, two of which used to remain deployed on worldwide UN duty. Very good soldiers they are as I recall. Bula bula, more Kava please, I'm off to the Blue Lagoon to find Brooke!
Militant kingpin Abdur Rahman, pinned down by law enforcers at an East Shaplabagh hideout in Sylhet City since Tuesday night, refused to surrender as at 1:30am today.
Fox News just announced he's in custody...
While altercating with the blockading law enforcers led by Rapid Action Battalion at 4:00am yesterday, the Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh supremo said he would rather commit suicide than surrender.
Guess he changed his mind, huh?
Lashing out at the police operation, Rahman, called Shaekh or spiritual leader by his followers in reverence, said he would not talk with anyone except State Minister for Home Affairs Lutfozzaman Babar and asked the law enforcers to contact him.
"I wants me mout'piece, coppers!"
After that exchange of words at 4:00am, he made no further response to the law enforcers, who went on asking him to surrender again and again.
"Da jig's up, Abdur! Drop the artillery an' come out witcher hands up!"
However, his wife Nurjahan Begum Rupa, daughter Afifa Rahman, three sons and a grandson came out of the house with the poetic name Surya Dighal Bari yesterday noon and surrendered to the police.
"We're comin' out! He's crazy!"
The raiding party later persuaded Nurjahan into requesting her husband to surrender, but to no avail.
"Give up, Abdur! Think of the children!"
The JMB chief, who has a Tk 50 lakh bounty on his head, warned he has a large number of powerful explosives in his possession. Eight explosions were also heard from the house, but it could not be known whether there was any casualty. Rab intelligence chief Lt Col Gulzar Uddin Ahmed told The Daily Star last night they reckon two JMB operatives, identified later as Moijul and Hanif, were with Rahman in the house.
"Boss! Dey got us surrounded!"
Over a thousand-strong force drawn from Rab, Bangladesh Rifles and the police was besieging the house. The law enforcers also had been trying to flush out the Islamist militant linchpin and his accomplices by streaming water and lobbing teargas shells into the house through a hole drilled in the roof until 8:00pm.
"Hakk! Kaff! Gag!"
Rab sources said in the beam of a flashlight through that hole they saw a network of wires coming out of two bags placed behind two doors. They suspect the entire house is probably booby-trapped. They also saw something wrapped in a quilt on a bed but were not sure whether it was a man or an explosive device. At quarter to midnight, Rab Director General Abdul Aziz Sarker told The Daily Star over telephone that they would refrain from breaking into the house at night. They want to do it in daylight. Thousands of locals thronged the area and gathered around the sealed-off place to witness the imminent arrest of the mastermind behind all the bomb attacks in the country since the August 17 near-simultaneous bomb strikes across the country last year.
"Peanuts! Popcorn! Cracker Jacks! Get 'em right here!"
"Programs! Getcher programs!"
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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That is a great, action-packed article, Fred. Here is what needs to be done: Make a folder just for RAB stories like these. When you get 20 or so, we can edit through them and make some great action stories or comics. Dime novel type stuff. Anyway, thanks for the article and the usual high-quality comments. LOL!
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/02/2006 0:15
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Abner the miscreant dacoit throws in the sponge!
"Over a thousand-strong force drawn from Rab, Bangladesh Rifles and the police was besieging the house."
Reminds me of the Blues Bros scene at Richard J.Daley Plaza...
Security was restored yesterday at three major prisons, where inmates rioted and took 13 unarmed prison officials hostage at the Jweideh Correctional and Rehabilitation Centre for more than 12 hours. The first eight hostages were released after negotiations between police and inmates. The last five were released by mid-afternoon. Several security officers and prisoners were injured in the rioting.
Briefing the Lower House of Parliament on the disturbances, Interior Minister Eid Fayez said that the rioting that took place at the Jweideh, Swaqa and Gafgafa facilities was contained peacefully. Fayez said the rioting inmates were not imprisoned on political cases but were convicted criminals including some who have been sentenced to death. He said the officers who were held hostage at Jweideh were released unharmed. Among them was Jweideh's warden and head of the Public Security Department's (PSD) prisons, an official said. Prime Minister Marouf Bakhit decided to form a committee, to be headed by Minister of Justice Abed Shakhanbeh, to look into the reasons behind the rioting, Government Spokesperson Nasser Judeh said.
The disturbances began around 3:00am Wednesday when a group of inmates demanded that all prisoners convicted by the State Security Court be incarcerated in the same prison and that the would-be female suicide bomber being held in custody in connection with the November 9 bombings in Amman be released, officials said. Sajida Atrous Rishawi was arrested on November 13 and made a televised confession that she attempted to detonate an explosive belt strapped to her body at the Radisson SAS Hotel, but the device failed.
Fayez told Parliament that security forces could have ended the situation in minutes but the government preferred to negotiate with them [the inmates] to avoid bloodshed. PSD Spokesperson Major Basheer Al Daaja reported the situation at the prisons as stable. He said the inmates had also demanded new trials in civil courts for those convicted and sentenced by military tribunals. Daaja told reporters at a press conference yesterday that the PSD would carry out an investigation into the case, adding that a probe would reveal whether the riots were planned.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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US military authorities plan to transfer about a third of the detainees at the Guantanamo "war on terror" camp to their home countries after a review carried out over the past year, a US military officer said.
The Defense Department has concluded that 119 detainees did not need to be held at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and would be taken into custody by countries where they hold citizenship, Navy Captain Tom Quinn told reporters here on Tuesday. Another 14 detainees would be released outright because they no longer presented a threat to the United States and offered no "intelligence value," Quinn said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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#1
Somehow I dont think their home countries will provide the 'Club Med' facilities like they have now.
#2
Tag them, put a chip in them, track them. So when we find them on the next battlefield, we can lawfully off them. No need to waste some federal judge's time with briefs by the next agents of the enemy.
#3
1. Return to place of capture.
2. Give 'em a chance to run.
3. "Shot while attempting to escape."
Posted by: Jonathan ||
03/02/2006 11:52
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I bet the ACLU wants to stop them from going home and demands they be made U.S. Citizens, be given a place to live, Food, Clothing, and of course a Pony.
#7
cyber sarge, but of course not in their backyard
heh
I like the chip idea most definitely
Posted by: Jan ||
03/02/2006 20:54
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It's the Navy...send them all home in a leaky dhow!
Anyone notice the burg news: Iraq, Lybia, Algeria now Gitmo are all emptying prisons, today. GwB is on an alliance/capabilities tour. Paki has the JSOW, India can press forward (like they hadn't already) with their nuke program public news releases...and the Israeli's are quiet.
Tehran, Iran, Mar. 01 A government agency in Iran has launched a new book that sets out to prove the official position that the Holocaust was a myth and a historical lie that was concocted to justify the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. The Place of Holocaust in the Zionist Project Fact or Myth? is the name of the new book published by the Islamic Revolutions Documents Centre, a government agency headed by hard-line cleric Ruhollah Hosseinian. It is written by a little known author called Seyyed Mehdi Tarahi.
In its Wednesday edition, the hard-line daily Kayhan, which reflects the views of Irans Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, gave prominence to the new book, the latest in some 300 anti-Semitic books in Persian that adorn Tehrans bookshops.
Never mind his denial elsewhere in the 'Burg today.
The daily quoted several passages from the books introduction, including this one: When at the end of the Second World War, the world saw macabre scenes of prisoners of war camps with heaps of corpses of POWs who had died of typhoid, Zionist circles began to spread rumours that the Jews had been exterminated by Nazis using special weapons called gas chambers. Thus a new phenomenon called the Holocaust, or the massacre of the Jews, came into being.
The book, according to Kayhan, studies the myth of Holocaust and the role it has played in cementing the political and economic basis of Israel.
Irans state-run newspapers have given widespread coverage to allegations by Holocaust deniers who dispute the genocide of the Jews by Nazi Germany after hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed that the Holocaust was a myth and threatened that Israel must be wiped off the map. In addition to daily articles and commentaries in the government-owned press denying the Holocaust, the chairman of Irans cartoonists association, Masoud Shojai, set up a website, www.irancartoon.com, to put on display drawings and cartoons ridiculing the Holocaust.
Irans Foreign Ministry has announced plans to hold an anti-Holocaust conference in spring of this year to discuss unresolved questions about the Holocaust.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/02/2006
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#5
Holocaust Denial is the insult to the Injury of the Holocaust. Holocaust Denial functions as an attempt to make Murderous (Extremist) political parties elegible for Public Office: You judge a politcal party on the basis of its record: traditionally Conservative/Republicans tax the poor and pay the rich; while the Liberals/Labour tax the rich and pay the poor; while the Nazi's and the Facists murder who they don't like. With a political record of being killers and murderers it is obvious that the Nazi's and the Facists are unelectable unless they can deny the Holocaust.
#8
We'll have a book in ten years which will show the 'Iranian' Holocaust never happened. It was really an asteroid strike that left that massive glowing green sand in what used to be Persia.
#10
To respond to 2b, apologies for being off topic, Being a former member of the British Conservative Party, with its bloodline and ancestry in the English Aristocracy, in turn descended from the Norman Pillagers and Robbers who enscounced themselves and the Divine of Right Kings and Monarchs to rule over the Peasants. It's not nothing that the unofficial title of the British Conservative Party is "The Natural Ruling Party". Breeding counts, you see. The goal of the British Conservative Party, for most of its history, is to rule, so that 'others' cannot govern or change anything. Essentially a program for stasis. A book by Will Hutton "The State We're In" explains more clearly.
Essentially is not a lie to state from a British perspective that the British Conservative Party is the party of the rich. Merely a reasonable statement supported by history.
Anyway I was merely using the Conservative Party as an element in an 'Argument by Analogy' to illuminate why some not-very-nice-people have a program of Holocaust Denial in the FIRST PLACE.
#11
The far left in the U.S./Europe tends toward postmodern interpretations of history: there are no TRUTHS, only competing discourses. If one accepts this viewpoint, the Iranians will indeed have a willing readership not entirely composed of neo-nazi nut cases...
#12
The Islamist's preoccupation with denying the Holocaust, whilst simultaneously wanting to "finish the job Hitler began", is much like their arguments that "America flew passenger jetliners into their own skyscrapers to start a war on Islam, and they deserved it for meddling in the Middle East."
Islam cannot have it both ways. They continue to want it so and all it really indicates is that if another holocaust is in the books, it will be a Muslim holocaust. Yes, this concept seems to resonate with Hitler's own final solution, save for one vital and simple reason.
During WWII, the Jews did not seek the demise of any nation or people. They merely sought peaceful coexistence so that they could go on with their lives.
Quite to the contrary, todays Islamists seek, not just Semitic genocide, but the death of all who oppose global sharia law as their own "final solution." Confronted with this, at some point it will become less costly to exterminate all Muslims than to put up with their constant atrocities. In this more modern world, those who aggressively seek a "final solution" will more likely be incinerated for their pursuit of same. If there is a "final solution" it will be one that forever solves the problem of Muslim intransigence and intolerance for all other religions. By seeking to revise history for their own genocidal ends, Islam is signing its death warrant.
NICOSIA: You might have the best forgery skills in the world, but it is not much use if you cannot spell. A Cyprus court jailed Pakistani national Fazal Ur Rehman for eight months for forgery after police spotted spelling mistakes on stamps on an Afghan passport he was carrying, otherwise it was a near-perfect copy, the Cyprus Mail said. "Ministry" was spelt "Menistry" and the first "n" was missing from government, the newspaper said. "The passport looked perfect and professionally made almost deemed original by forensics," a police officer told a magistrate in Nicosia.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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Heh, tw. Dunno if it's a Urban Legend or not, but the story I heard was that a company in China was making knockoffs of Reebok shoes and a shipment was stopped by US Customs in Long Beach. They had never heard "Reebok" spoken correctly - and the Customs agent had never heard of Leebok, lol. The shipment was confiscated. Or so the story goes...
European aid to Palestine could not persuade the Palestinian group Hamas to change its policy positions, a leader of the radical Islamic movement due in Moscow for talks this week said in an interview published here on Wednesday. The Palestinian people cannot sell their legitimate claims, Khaled Meshaal said in an interview with Russias Vremya Novostei daily, responding to a question on the European Unions decision to unblock financial aid for the Palestinians. There can be no trading on that, with money on one side and on the other side our homeland and our rights... Humanitarian aid should not be given with conditions. Its inadmissible, he said.
On Monday, the European Union released 120 million euros (143.2 million dollars) to help the transitional Palestinian government fund its basic needs for about two months. Meshaal will lead a delegation to Moscow for talks on Friday and Saturday with Russian officials on an invitation from President Vladimir Putin after Hamas swept Palestinian elections last month. The visit is aimed at starting a dialogue, Meshaal said. Russia can put forward its proposals... We are ready to discuss all possible ideas. But the Hamas leader opposed recognising the state of Israel - a demand made by the Middle East Quartet, made up of the European Union, Russia, the United Nations, the United States.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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#1
We will not hesitate to bite down hard on the hand that feeds us!!
Dad, &*%$ homework, you can't tell me what to do! Now give me the car keys!
#2
lol! That's about right, MM. The poor perpetually pubescent Paleos are about to get a dose of the real world. Blaming mommy and daddy doesn't put food on the table when they've given you the boot.
#4
I just wish Meshaal would look over his shoulder and give prolonged thought to the outcome of his predecessors' policies. It would be a great joy to see him join those shown on the poster.
#5
Clearly he has a lot to learn. Step one is to announce that European aid might buy Hamas. Step two, when the aid is obviously not changing Hamas, is to announce that more aid might buy Hamas. Repeat indefinitely (the Euros never learn).
A leader of an underground outfit was killed during a shootout between his minions cohorts and members of the Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) at Gunari village in Dumuria upazila of the district early yesterday. He was identified as Ashabur Khan Tipu, 27, regional commander of Purba Banglar Communist Party (PBCP-Janajuddho).
Notice, not a Islamicist ...
Rab sources said Tipu was wanted in 12 systems cases filed with Khulna and Rupsha police stations. He was also involved in looting five rifles from Sundarbans Sea Food in 1997, the sources added.
Must be some vicious sea food...
1997? What's the statute of limitations for the RAB?
Rab-6 members arrested Tipu at Sonadanga in the city on Tuesday. On his painfully extracted confessional statement, they along with Tipu set out for Gunari village at about 2:30am yesterday to arrest his accomplices and seize the hidden firearms.
Only question is whether Tipu reached the secret lair alive or dead ...
When they reached there, Tipu's cohorts opened fire, forcing the members of the elite force to retaliate.
Alas, no one else was hit in the murderous fusillade of fire ...
Rab said Tipu was caught in the shootout and died instantly. A shutter gun and two bullets were recovered from the scene.
After which the shutter gun was carefully put back into its molded case and returned to the police lockup in Chittagong ...
The body was sent to Khulna Medical College and Hospital morgue for autopsy.
"Another one, Dr. Quincy!"
"Holy smokes, Sam! He looks like a red swiss cheese!"
"Think you can find the cause of death?"
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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#1
ex-sanguination from the 48 bullet wounds suffered from "warning shots"
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/02/2006 0:09
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Maybe Tipu's Mao T-shirt looked like a target...
#3
My question about theses Bangladeshi Cycles Of Violence would be : "do you think there are actually any moving pre or post mortem to the spot of death to make it look real, or is it just arranged in the rapport"?...
Maybe I'm too naive... or I could be too cynical, in fact?
Perhaps theses are *factual* reports of *actual* encounters, the way it *really* happened, each time? After all, Bangla is an exotic country, people act different, think different... Perhaps it's just one big string of coincidences from the start, and we're just slandering the good name of the RAB for nothing. Who knows?
Deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein on Wednesday accepted sole responsibility for destroying orchards in Dujail as a reprisal for a failed assassination bid in the town in 1982.
"I dunnit and I'm glad!"
In the last few minutes of the days proceedings in his trial, which has now been adjourned till March 12, Saddam said: I signed the order for destroying the orchards. I am Saddam Hussein. At the time I was in charge. It is not my habit to pass the buck on to others.
"I prefer to kill them."
Explaining the reason for ordering the destruction of the orchards Saddam said: Its the right of the Iraqi state to nationalise any land for the public interest by paying a symbolic compensation. I changed the law to substantial compensation. He also said that he escaped an assassination bid in the village. I came under machine gun fire from 50 metres away, he said, speaking of the ambush on his motorcade. Bullets passed in front of my eyes. Its Allah who wanted to save me, he added.
He was saving you for the hangman.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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#1
Sounds like something out of Kelo v. the New Dujail Development Company.
BILLINGS, Mont. - A newly discovered surface bulge in Yellowstone National Park may be responsible for some unexpected geothermal activity in recent years, according to a study by U.S. Geological Survey scientists.
The bulge, about 25 miles across, rose 5 inches from 1997 to 2003 and may have triggered some thermal unrest at Norris Geyser Basin, including a sudden rise in temperatures, new steam vents and the awakening of Steamboat geyser.
The findings are part of a paper set to be published Thursday in the journal Nature. Charles Wicks, one of the USGS scientists who worked on the study, said much of what happens beneath the park's surface remains a mystery, but more is being learned about the Yellowstone caldera, the huge bowl-shaped collapsed volcano in the middle of the park that last erupted 640,000 years ago.
Geologists discovered the dome on the northern rim of the caldera several years ago, and Wicks and others used satellite images and other tools to track its swelling. Scientists studying the shore of Yellowstone Lake found that the caldera has been rising and falling for at least 15,000 years, sometimes swinging more than 10 feet.
Henry Heasler, Yellowstone's lead geologist, said research about the heaving caldera could play a role in predicting volcanic activity and help ensure the public's safety. "We've known that the caldera breathes," Heasler said. "Now we're starting to get a much better idea of those respirations."
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/02/2006
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The eruption 640,000 years ago was huge - bigger than Krakatoa.
#6
This is obviously the work of Bush and Halliburton.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
03/02/2006 6:31
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Time to put major geothermal power systems under Yellowstone and exploit it. All that heat going to waste is just asking for an explosion. Take some out and purchase less oil.
#10
Is that a volcano in your pants or are you just happy to see me?
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006 8:42
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Tis a super-volcano - I saw the documentary 'n everything.
Last Saturday night on Sci-Fi channel, right?
Should I list the ways that movie sucked?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/02/2006 8:43
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A little Yellowstone trivia: it has erupted about every 6-700,000 years (630K, 1.3M, 2.0M). The last eruption 630,000 years ago was small, but still 500 times Mount St. Helens.
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006 8:51
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#13
Hmmmmmmm...we might be ready for human testing.
Notify the Email Spam Division.
Posted by: ed ||
03/02/2006 8:53
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Please, dear USA, do us all a favor and wipe the smile off Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Pakistan,...'s face before being blown to oblivion by the supervolcano. Time is the essence, faster please. Thanks in advance.
#18
I see a win-win situation. Bush: Suggest selling 100,000 acres of federal land around Yellowstone. All the moonbats in the nation: rush there to prevent the deal. Yellowstone: Blow your top.
Works for me. Of course, I wouldn't want to be in Grand Forks, Billings, or Jackson Hole when it happened...
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/02/2006 15:42
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The lagest eruption in modern times. 1815 Tambora
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/02/2006 16:18
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I saw the doco on the Science Channel. It was very well done, overall, but had the same breathiness we hear on the Near Earth Objects stories and the Asteroid of Doom. That we can't do diddley-squat at present about either one, though there's lots of grant money riding on the AoD thingy, sorta makes me yawn. Yeah, we're doomed, alrighty... one at a time, anyway.
Piracy is a growing problem along Somalia's long coastline, slowing efforts to feed as many as 2 million Somalis left hungry by severe drought, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said on Tuesday. Due to the threat of pirate raids on food shipped by boat, the World Food Programme (WFP) has had to move some aid overland to southern Somalia through Kenya for the first time in five years, Annan said in a report to the Security Council.
UN officials estimate that 1.5 million to 2 million people are in need of food in the northeast African nation, one of 11 countries in the region hit hard by prolonged drought. The situation is so dire there that some Somali children are drinking their own urine, international aid group Oxfam reported this month. Somalia's coastal waters have become the world's most dangerous in the 14 years the country has lacked a central government since warlords ousted military dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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#2
Let the UN deal with it. Our plate is full, especially with Iran coming up.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/02/2006 13:38
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Couple of FFGs assigned to escort duty ought to take care of it.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/02/2006 13:56
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We need a more serious solution. Have an aid ship lose speed and emit smoke while intentionally listing to port. Wait for the pirates to show up, open up with 50 caliber machine gun fire, shoulder launch missiles and fast response air support to mop up whatever moves out of range fast enough. Dead pirates are nowhere near the same problem as living ones.
#6
I'll take any sort of vessel, so long as it gets the job done, but that was certainly a tasty link, DMFD. Learn something new every day, especially at Rantburg.
London, Mar. 01 The deputy governor of the Iraqi province of Saladin, where the holy city of Samarra is situated, said preliminary investigation was pointing to Irans role in the bombing of the citys revered Shiite shrine last week. The investigations carried out so far about the explosion in the resting place of Imam al-Hadi and Imam Hassan al-Askari in Samarra point to the involvement of the Iranian regimes Intelligence Ministry, Abdullah Hossein Jabbara announced. He was referring to Irans secret police, the Ministry of Intelligence and Security, which is known to be actively operating in Iraq.
Jabbara said Iraqi security forces had obtained intelligence clearly showing that Iran was involved in carrying out terrorist attacks in the Sunni-dominated province and assisting terrorists to create insecurity in Iraq.
Think the world press is going to notice? Me neither.
Several prominent Sunni and independent Shiite figures have pointed out that Iran was the major party that stood to reap huge benefits from tensions between Sunnis and Shiites, at a time when U.S. diplomacy, spearheaded by Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, had succeeded in bringing together the various Iraqi factions to form a national unity government not under Irans influence.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/02/2006
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#1
any comment from Iranian puppet Lahoude Tater?
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/02/2006 0:03
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We still haven't heard anything about the apparent perps they caught. We may see them on TV in a few days saying how Iran paid them.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
03/02/2006 1:04
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I think you will find all those who carried this out are dead. That would even be a stronger indication that a foreign hand was in this. Taters beign out of the country was by design as well if Iran was involved. Most of the "retaliation was done by his "milita" in a further attempt to destablise the political system that is starting to form.
Posted by: SPoD ||
03/02/2006 1:53
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Seriously, they should take this to the UN for a Stevenson presentation if they have the evidence. This is a causis belli and we should be prepared to support our ally Iraq if they have been attacked by Iran. Otherwise, ignore it.
#7
Unfortunately, the Stevenson presentation was at a different time to a different audience.
And to what affect? The UNSC members are divided due to commercial (read oil) ties with Iran. Many in the UN see Iraq as a US puppet.
This has been, is, and will remain a regional conflict with Iran-Syria-So. Lebanon as the "problem".
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/02/2006 8:34
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To the same effect that the Powell presentation had before the invasion of Iraq, which, it seems to me, was as effective as the Stevenson presentation. The UN is really just a stage to influence public opinion and announce what we are going to do anyway. Instead we treat it like some world legislature, which it is not.
What made the Stevenson presentation so memorable was only the drama of Stevenson asking a question of Valerian Zorin and telling him he was prepared to wait for an answer untill Hell froze over. Great drama on the public political stage that had nothing to do with the diplomatic solution except for influencing public opinion. Bolton should do more of that. We haven't seen enough of the Darth Walrus pic lately.
#10
The fact that an Iraqi official makes this charge is of great importance. That means that now in Iraq, there is a movement against Iran and it's dung heap, the tater. Good on Iraq for figuring this out. Even if we can't parlay this into an attack on Iran, we can focus our Iraqi trainees on the bad neighborhood and stoke up the anger.
#13
Lol! The C&F cartoon now begs the question - where did the Bolton graphic used here - which I presume they've copied - come from? And how often do these killer editorial cartoonists visit the 'Burg?
The C&F site is deadly to the dickheads of the world, lol.
Authorities on Wednesday announced that they foiled a suicide attack by an Al Qaeda-linked group on a vital civilian installation and arrested three terror suspects. A security official said the General Intelligence Department (GID) seized four kilogrammes of heavy explosives, which were of the same type used in the November 9 triple hotel bombings in Amman that killed 60 people. Would-be suicide attacker Mohammad Saeed Hamad Gheith Darsi, a 25-year-old Libyan, was arrested along with Iraqi nationals Mohsen Mazloum Jassam Lousi, 34, and Abdul Karim Khudeir Ibrahim Abbas Jmeili, 48, both of whom provided logistical assistance in the plot.
The Libyan dude has Mohammed Atta eyes.
The three were referred to the State Security Court. The official said the GID was tracking down four other terror suspects who participated in plotting and supporting the criminal act and are currently in one of the neighbouring countries. The four were identified as Turki Nasser Abdullah, a 25-year-old Saudi citizen, and Iraqi nationals Saad Fawzi Hatem Muhyiddin Obeidi, 33, Yousef Abdul Rahman Obeidi and Saad Fakhri Younis Nueimi, 40. According to the official, the GID, with His Majesty King Abdullah's directives and support, foiled several terrorist plots in the Kingdom since the beginning of 2006 and seized automatic weapons, explosives, rocket propelled-grenades, which were brought into Jordan from neighbouring countries by terrorist groups.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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A 29-year-old Syrian accused of threatening terrorist acts in the Kingdom following the Nov. 9, 2005, triple bombings in Amman, pleaded not guilty to the charges at the State Security Court this week. Yousef R., a blacksmith, was charged with threatening the use of force to disrupt security and spread panic among people.
The defendant arrived in the Kingdom from Syria in September 2005 and was employed in a shop in Jerash, the charge sheet said. On Nov. 18, the defendant, who was visiting relatives in Zarqa, went to an Internet café and posted threatening text in the political forum of the Jordan Information Centre (JIC) website under the user name 911 and password blood, according to the charge sheet. The message read: If you think that you have ended us then you are mistaken. Watch out for new and mass explosions at a strategic place, which has many infidel people... I demand JD1 million in ransom and the release of my sister Sajida. Ha ha ha. Death has approached you infidels.
The suspect was referring to Sajida Rishawi, the would-be Iraqi female suicide bomber whose explosive belt failed to detonate when she and three fellow terrorists attacked three of the capital's hotels in November 2005, killing 60 people. Rishawi appeared on Jordan Television on Dec. 13 and explained how she tried to blow herself up alongside her husband Ali Hassan Shumari, on Nov. 9. The suspect was arrested shortly after posting the text and confessed to his actions, according to the charge sheet.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Kathmandu - At least 31 people, including 10 soldiers, were killed in two clashes between security forces and Maoist rebels in western Nepal, it was officially stated on Wednesday evening.
A Nepalese Defence Ministry statement said 18 Maoists and 11 security personnel, including 10 soldiers and a policemen, were killed on Tuesday in a day-long clash in Palpa district, about 200 kilometres west of the capital. The ministry said the bodies of 18 Maoists were recovered from the site during a search on Wednesday. A Maoists statement claimed they killed 20 soldiers while admitting that they lost eight. The site has been the scene of army-Maoist clashes for the past week. On Sunday, the army claimed to have killed at least 16 Maoists in the district.
In another clash early on Wednesday, two Maoists were killed in far western Nepal, security sources said. Army sources said the clash in Darchula district occurred when an army patrol encountered a group of Maoists laying landmines. Four soldiers were injured.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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A delegation from the Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI) would head to Najaf to meet with religious leaders, said AMSI's official spokesperson Abdulsalam Al-Kubaysi on Wednesday. Sources told KUNA that Najaf would witness a meeting between Shiite leaders Ali Al-Sistani and Muqtada "Spuds" Al-Tater for the first time in a year. Al-Kubaysi said in a press conference today that the delegation would discuss with the two influential figures means to put a halt on escalation of the sectarian conflict. He lauded Najaf's religious leaders who dealt with the recent sectarian dilemma with responsibility, noting that the supporters of Al-Sistani and Spuds have been holding talks to prevent any dangerous situation in Iraq. In Kerbala, Spuds called yesterday on the Iraqi government to establish one Waqf (Islamic endowment) ministry instead of having one for Shias and another for Sunnas.
"And I know just the man to head it up!"
"The occupation instates sectarianism in Iraq by creating the so-called Shiite endowments and Sunni endowments," said Spuds in a public speech, calling for meetings between Shiat and Sunni leaders to discuss forming one Iraqi Awqaf Ministry and jointly supervise religious sites in Iraq.
Is that the nose of an Iranian camel over there in the tent?
MANAMA - Six Iranian seamen who had been adrift in the waters of the Gulf for 10 days have been rescued by a US warship, the US 5th Fleet Command said in Bahrain on Wednesday. Tuesdays rescue was carried out by the guided missile destroyer USS Gonzalez during a security patrol in the central Gulf, the statement said.
The Iranians said their vessels engine and rudder failed on February 18. A Gonzalez boarding party gave the crew food and water as they had exhausted their supplies, the statement said. US Sailors determined that the dhows engine was beyond repair. Gonzalez then coordinated the seamens repatriation with other coalition forces in the area.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/02/2006
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#1
Awefully civil of them. I wouldn't expect the same treatment if I were adrift in Iranian waters.
There are now six more Iranians walking around thinking that those damned yanques may not be so bad after all.
Every little bit helps.
Posted by: kelly ||
03/02/2006 12:10
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I can't believe it took the Navy 10 days before anyone noticed they were afloat! I thought we had extra assets in the area, especially with the escalating nuclear saber rattling going on. This net has massive holes in it.
#4
I can't believe it took the Navy 10 days before anyone noticed they were afloat!
Lots of dhows in the Gulf. Lots of dhows in the Gulf doing nothing but drifting, especially during the daytime (nightime is another matter).
The only way to find out one is disabled is if the crew asks for help or indicates it's disabled. That's standard procedure with any vessel.
I thought we had extra assets in the area, especially with the escalating nuclear saber rattling going on. This net has massive holes in it.
Get real. One, there is no mandate to stop and check every frigging dhow in the Gulf. Two, it's a waste of assets unless there's a damn good reason. We knew the dhows shadowing us in the Gulf were monitoring us (the cammie trousers under the robes were a good indicator) but unless they are a threat, there's no valid reason to stop and board them. Third, stopping and checking every frigging dhow without a mandate is not only a waste of assets, but it tends to piss off governments that are otherwise relatively friendly.
#5
I thought we had extra assets in the area, especially with the escalating nuclear saber rattling going on. This net has massive holes in it.
What Pappy said.
Yes, it's a scary time out in the Gulf area. And yes, we have a powerful military. That doesn't mean that we can keep track of everything that happens or control every detail - quite the contrary. Contested theaters of conflict are chaotic and can change rapidly.
OTOH we have the most professional and best equipped and best trained military there is -- or has ever been. Trust these men and women to do their jobs well, okay?
The Heathen Chinee were pretty active yesterday. I banned four IPs trying to conduct dictionary attacks over ssh.
Many, many thanks to Badanov, JFM, and kbk for the tips on securing the server. I'm guessing the guys I banned were also the guys who were swarming the server when Apache overloaded. Eventually I'll (we'll) figure a way to stop that, too.
I also noticed that most of the spam I got came from Chinese or Korean servers dunno what the significance of that is. I haven't been tracking spam addresses close enough to know if it's abnormal.
Posted by: Fred ||
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It really does help to change the port number for sshd. Cut the attacks on my server to zero. You then change the port number on whatever ssh (or scp) client you're using to the new port number.
#2
I bet you get one heck of a lot of bad guy lurkers.
A tremendous irony that such governments and organizations don't even want their spies to see what is written here, for fear that they could be "corrupted" by uncontrolled information.
You might even publish an ISP by nation breakdown.
One humorist I know, a few years ago, published some rude humor about Islam and got a gazillion hits from Arabia--not an attack. Most had been searching for rude humor about Islam. He didn't get any email complaints, either. Hmmm.
#4
Servers from China and korea are not signifigant, IMO. I get these attacks all the time, tempered by some simple measures, as you know. It just fills up the logs. Reading them makes me want for a nap.
And the Somali MPs will get right on it, just as soon as they finish redecorating.
The Secretariat of Arab League (AL) called on Somali MPs Wednesday to responsibly work to solve their country's problems and enable Somali people to resume development. The AL Secretariat said today in a statement that it has been following with interest the Somalis parliament meetings, in which the AL Secretary General's envoy and the international community's representative have been participating. The AL called on all Somalis fractions to cooperate with the president of Somalia, pledging support for any proposal that would restore the country's institutions. The Somalis parliament meetings have come to implement Eden Agreement, signed on Jan 5, 2006 by the Somalia president and parliament's speaker.
Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) and police in a drive yesterday arrested 26 militants of the outlawed Islamist outfit Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh(JMB) at a village in Gaibandha. Tipped off, the law enforcers raided a house of Saidur Rahman at Uttar Dhanghara village where the cadres were holding a secret meeting, reports our correspondent in Gaibandha. They met there to finalise some major operations in and around Gaibandha, police sources said.
Meanwhile, our correspondent in Dinajpur reports that a fugitive JMB member wanted in connection with the August 17 blasts surrendered to a magistrate's court on Tuesday. The court sent Mohammad Tozammel Haque alias Toza, son of Md Jamil Hossain of Mohabbatpur village in the sadar upazila, to Dinajpur jail. Toza was an active operator of outlawed Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and was involved in last year's blasts in the district. His brother Moffazzal Hossain Dulal, chairman of Awaliapur Union Parishad and president of union unit BNP, surrendered a licensed pistol and 20 bullets to police yesterday morning.
Earlier on Friday night, Detective Branch police raided Charadangi Bazar in the sadar upazila and arrested JMB operator Nurul Islam, 22, of Saidpur village. The arrestee during primary interrogation by police confessed to his involvement in the blasts.
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COPENHAGEN: Cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (may his drip clear up peace be upon him) first published in Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten last year, have been reprinted in 143 newspapers in 56 countries, a study showed on Wednesday. One or several of the 12 controversial cartoons have appeared either in print editions or online, according to the study done by eJour, the online magazine of the Danish School of Journalism.
Most of the reproductions have appeared in Western countries, including 70 newspapers in Europe, 14 in the United States, three in Canada and New Zealand, two in Australia and one in Japan. But the drawings have also been printed in eight Muslim countries: Algeria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Malaysia, Morocco and Saudi Arabia. In the United States, no national newspaper has published the cartoons, but 14 regional and local publications have, according to the study conducted in February.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
And several thousand blogs. All hail the new media.
#1
But then...In seasonally adjusted terms, which economists consider to be a more important indicator of labour market trends, unemployment dropped by 5,000 this month to 4.695 million.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 1:23
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Wotta disingenuous comment, Raphael. The article is far from neutral or optimistic - it is a litany of worse than expected - and worsening - conditions. Sheesh. Foolish little parry there - did it make you puff up and feel good? -- if anyone bothers to read the thing you look like a pluperfect fool. Go figure, huh?
#5
In response to the high unemployment data Franz Muentefering said "there must be more jobs in Germany."
Whoaa..with insight like that they should make him Labour Minister or something...er nevermind.
#6
Wotta disingenuous comment, Raphael. The article is far from neutral or optimistic
I'm glad you commented because it shows perfectly just what a prick you really are.
I posted my comment to point out that the headline is not the entire story, and it's far from doom and gloom.
In fact, the whole point of the article was this and only this: The latest data means that unemployment has remained above the politically sensitive five million mark for two consecutive months.
That's seasonally unadjusted. This may or may not be meaningful, depending on what happens in the following months when the labour market is expected to stabilise. It says so in the article.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 13:24
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The Weimer Republic had it worse. Just hope they don't follow a similar prescription.
#8
Up or down, it's still 12 percent. It sucks. Bad.
Posted by: Mark E. ||
03/02/2006 16:24
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#9
But it's a bit unfair to include eastern Germany in this rate. Even the article admits the western unemployment rate is at about 10%, which is about 3% higher than the pre-unification rate circa 1990.
I'm not sure exactly what lotp's point was in posting this article. And I'm asking sincerely. Is it to show that Germany is paying the price for its stubborn socialism? Because there's more to it than that.
Manufacturing plays a more significant role in Germany's economy than perhaps any other advanced economy. Industrial output itself accounts for about 23% of GDP. This doesn't bode well for a country that now sits next to a cheaper source of labour and production. What we are seeing here is the repercussion of admitting eastern Europe to the European Union. Combined with socialist policies makes this especially painful for Germany, and they have to learn to adjust.
But before I would say the sky is falling, I'd watch those GDP figures, and as of this moment they are stable.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 17:16
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"I'm glad you commented because it shows perfectly just what a prick you really are."
ROFL! Other than making no sense, that's brilliant! Perhaps, you're the one's who's a prickly little dick.
Um, please don't cry, K?
If I want to comment on an article, I will do so you fucking asstard. What IS your major malfunction, other than being a Tranzi Europhile with full-blown Power / Relevance Envy?
The article is, indeed, pretty gloomy. Typical of such limp-symp reporting, it has all the brave (read: weasel) words up front and all the bad news at the end.
But this really isn't about Germany. [historical references follow] Or perfidious Turkey. Or moronic dual passports. Or unarmed Border Receptionists. Nah. Everybody knows those things aren't "it". It's about a very very bad, probably terminal, case of purest 100% Grade A Power Envy.
You're a variant of Aris' gig - you don't claim to know everything, no - your shtick is to be the Master Sensitive and Defender of The Tranzis. You're the nittiest pickiest nuanciest hair-splitter of all time. No hair is too small or thin for you to go Ginsu on. You're capable, cuz you're so very uber-sensitive (and seem to have a Gov't job, so plenty of time to blog), to spend hours and hours typing airy silliness which you believe proves that gray isn't really gray, it's some white mixed with some black and, somehow, only you know the right proportions. Wotta fucking nitwit.
Yesterday you said "The reasons for this are documented on Rantburg, going back to well before .com's days here." in this thread in Comment #11.
Oooh, Rafael the wizened Old Hand, eh? Wow! But, y'know what?, I found that curious. The post content is what matters, but since you brought it up and seemed to attach some self-inflating significance to it, I thought I'd have a look.
Guess what? My first post on RB is on 04/06/2003, as PD. I started lurking around RB from Saudi in early March - cuz of the war - but just reading soon wasn't enough... I was in damned good company, too - LOTS of new RBers came out of the closet in April, 2003. War will do that, I guess. So I thought I'd start there and stroll backward through the archives to see what wisdom and original thought you had revealed to the world via RB... and I found lots of interesting stuff and posters*, but...
But no Rafael or Raphael. Hmmm. Were you posting as Hugh Jorgan? Dreaming out loud, again? Lol. Naw, you're a little Qanuck weenie. So, lessee...
No posts by you in April. None in March. Zero in February. Zip, zilch, nada in January. A full third of 2003 and no posts from you. A very eventful time period, too. Wotta loss! No Rafael Expositions of The Major Truths! Holy smokes! Can it be? Yeah, it can...
I call BULLSHIT. On that idiotic little bit of self-inflation and, well, most everything else you post. Gosh, I don't wanna give you hives or make you cry or anything, but it kinda looks like you're a fucking liar.
Typical puffery and insecurity, or relevance envy, perhaps. Who cares?
Everything else rather pales.
*I see, in no particular order, Ptah and tu3031 and Tresho and Penguin and seafarious and Steve White and Frank G and Paul/Alaska Paul and Dave and Dave D and and Steve and mojo and Chuck Simmins and Raj and john and Just John and John Anderson and Robert Crawford and Dar and Barbara Skolaut and Tony and liberalhawk and Tom Roberts and Anonymous (amazingly prolific!) and VAMark and Angie Shultz and Meryl Yourish and Dreadnought and Patrick Phillips and Rex Mundi and Yank and Tripartite and Brian and Peter and Scooter McGruder and Atomic Conspiracy and Yosemite Sam and R McLeod and Hiryu and JAB and JDB and paj, and Dan and Hugh Jorgan (lol) and raptor and flash91 and Spot and eLaron and rg117 and Doug De Bono and mhw and Old Patriot and Pete Stanley and someone and TJ Jackson and Kathy K and OldSpook and Bulldog and Hermetic and Caton and Capsu78 and Matt and matt and Parabellum and Zhang Fei and B-A-R and BarCodeKing and phil_b (Phil B back then) and Ernest Brown and Anonon and Deviant Saint and Kalle and anon1 and Frank Martin and Wills and becky and Tibor and Tokyo Taro and El Id and True German Ally and Former Russian Major and Dixie Normus and Bent Pyramid and growler and Bodyguard and white-collar redneck and Dishman and Denny and George and Rw / RW (RWV?) and Mike N and Old Grouch and Poitiers and sonnie and Down Under and Rifle308 and mjh and Hodenon and Michael and MommaBear and jrosevear and Rawsnacks and FOTSGreg and Mark IV and defscribe and dorf and Ben and Joe and Tom and Christopher Johnson and Mike and Bobbing4Kittens and Someone who did NOT vote for William Proxmire and Tadderly and Nik Karanikos and Murat and me and some guy named Fred... and many others, of course - even Jabba the Tutt and Pink & Fluffy, lol - no offense intended if I left anyone out. I even found the comments are broken back on 01/13/03 and 01/15/03, lol, including comments from other dates, lol. It was a lot of fun looking back, in fact.
#11
I'm not sure exactly what lotp's point was in posting this article
I posted it because Merkel has to deal with the public response to this sustained, psychologically frightening (and structurally damaging) unemployment in Germany. She promised economic reforms but had to back off immediately after being elected due to public outcry.
Merkel is a great improvement over Schroeder. But if the German economy is perceived by Germans to be tanking, there is the potential for a backlash that might make Germany far less helpful and stable than it is at the moment.
We've already seen German companies and citizens accused of selling nuclear arms-related stuff to Iran. The last thing we need is for that to accelerate while Germany implodes economically.
In other words, I posted it because economic issues can have political - and geopolitical - consequences.
#13
I call BULLSHIT. On that idiotic little bit of self-inflation and, well, most everything else you post. Gosh, I don't wanna give you hives or make you cry or anything, but it kinda looks like you're a fucking liar.
If I remember, my very first post was using "RW". Those are my initials. Fred can verify that because he knows my real name (but please Fred don't disclose it). If I recall even further, you posted your first comment after me, but I may be wrong. I even remember why you changed from "PD" to ".com", at TGA's behest I think it was. Anyway, no matter, you win. (Hey look, I'm even on that list of yours!)
lotp, just as a note, Merkel is enjoying an 80% approval rating thus far. So far, so good. Time will tell.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 23:39
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Yup, it's all doom and gloom:
The surprising 2.7 per cent rise in Januarys retail sales is the latest evidence that the upswing in Europes largest economy is broadening beyond exports and investments.
The eurozones broadening economic recovery is expected to be cited by the ECB when it lifts its main interest rate this afternoon by a quarter percentage point to 2.5 per cent, following a similar rise in December.
Also underscoring Germanys economic recovery were figures from the VDMA engineering association showing orders in January were 25 per cent higher than the same month a year before. Inland orders were up 27 per cent another sign that the domestic economy is stirring.
LAHORE: Qazi Hussain Ahmed, ameer of the Jamaat-e-Islami and president of the MMA, on Wednesday said the entire Muslim world would go on strike on March 3 to protest the publication of caricatures of Prophet Muhammad.
Right after Friday prayers.
Addressing a press conference at JI Headquarters Mansoora, Qazi said that Muslim scholars and leaders of Islamic movements across the world had contacted him and assured their full support to the strike by staging demonstrations in their respective countries. Qazi added that people would mark March 4 as black day on the arrival of US President George W Bush in Pakistan.
Posted by: Fred ||
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...the entire Muslim world would go on strike on March 3
#2
..No doubt of course that killings, bombings, beheadings, and general seething will still be permitted during the strike.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
03/02/2006 12:40
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Beautiful ... The Islamic countries will experience economically crippling strikes costing them untold millions of dollars. More cartoons, more tramplings, more crippling strikes. Faster, please.
Two months ago, a man in his 30's introducing himself as stone trader Hridoy Chowdhury rented Surya Dighal Bari, the East Shaplabagh house in the city where Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh chief Abdur Rahman and two of his accomplices remained trapped until 12:30am today. Hridoy, who said he hails from Mymensingh, has been living in the house with his daughter and wife since January 2, said Mainul Haque, who looks after the house, as his brother Abdul Haque, the landlord, lives in the UK.
Hridoy also claimed to have lived in the adjacent Mirapara area previously, Mainul told The Daily Star. "When I came to the house to collect the monthly rent, Hridoy did not allow me to enter the house. But, I thought he did it to maintain Purdah." Recently some people used to frequent the house, Mainul said, adding Hridoy claimed they were his business partners. According to Mainul, he secured a photograph and other details of Hridoy as a precautionary measure before renting out the house to him. He also informed the local union parishad members about the rental. Rapid Action Battalion (Rab), which has been spearheading the blockade, arrested Mainul yesterday afternoon and taken Hridoy's photograph from him to ascertain the man's real identity.
Posted by: Fred ||
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To "maintain Purdah", huh. I'll have to try that one.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said Egypt had won over US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to its views on democracy in the Arab world and quoted her as saying it would take a generation for democracy to take hold. "She was very polite as she was listening to Egyptian opinions and points of view. She didn't bring up difficult issues or ask to change anything or to intervene in political reform, as some people say," he told newspaper editors.
Posted by: Fred ||
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So now he's saying Egypt isn't a democracy, and that the elections are rigged?
Posted by: Phil ||
03/02/2006 1:03
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I suspect that appointing Rice as SOS was a mistake from a Mid East point of view.
First Arabs are as racist as all get out and see Blacks as slaves.
Second (more important), to be seen treating a woman with deference is to bring one's manhood into question. From what the Arabic blogs are saying, domestic pressures require Arab rulers to publicly defy a woman even if they agree with her.
Al
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
03/02/2006 10:44
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Rice is small potatoes --- Arabs have been winning over common sense for 1400 years.
#4
Frozen Al, I don't think the Arabs or the Egyptians would treat any other emissary from America differently. They can't accede to Bush's demands for full democracy, rule of law, equality for other religions, and enfranchising women; to do so would be to give up the legs upon which their dictatorships stand. Hearing their unavoidable future from the lips of a black, infidel female (who is also one of the most powerful people on the planet) just rubs it in.
#5
just rubs it in. Indeed Trailing Wife. And so beautifully. The juxtaposition of Condi and the views of those with whom she meets, speaks volumes to observers (or should darn it). it's quite a hoot, really!
#6
Women are more likely to make Islam change than men. Them seeing Condi has to be one of the most powerful statemnts we can make about what they can do if they put their minds and bodies to it.
MULTAN: The Pakistan Minority Alliance (PMA) has condemned torching of a church in Sargodha and demanded arrest of perpetrators. Naveed Jeeva, a Provincial Assembly member, said some people wanted to create a row between Muslims and publication of caricatures of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) in European newspapers," he said. Some unidentified people had set a church alight at Noori Gate on Tuesday morning. Reports said assailants entered the church after scaling its wall at about 5:00am and set it on fire after throwing petrol on its doors, windows and furniture. Hundreds of Christians gathered at the church to express their anguish over the incident. Muslim clerics also reached the site and condemned the act.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Lets see if these same Mullahs will rebuild the church...
"Holy Prophet (PBUH)"
I am so sick of this. Call it right, Muhamhead, (piss be up him). Why do we dance around with kind printed words about a man who was a common thief a terrrorist a pedophile and terrorist?
Welcome to Dhimmitude.
Posted by: No More ||
03/02/2006 9:34
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TASHKENT: An Uzbek court sentenced Wednesday a leader of a banned opposition group that criticised the violent suppression of an uprising last year to 10 years in prison for economic crimes. Rights groups condemned the trial as politically motivated as the Sunshine Uzbekistan opposition coalition has been a vocal critic of the crackdown in the eastern city of Andijan in which non-governmental organisations say hundreds of people were killed.
"The court sentences Nodira Hidoyatova to 10 years in prison," said Tashkent court judge Zokirjon Isayev. Hidoyatova, coordinator for the coalition, was found guilty on seven charges, including tax evasion, money laundering and membership of an organised criminal group. "The court found that Hidoyatova, while being in an organised criminal group, has committed heavy and especially heavy crimes that have damaged the state," Isayev said. State prosecutors had demanded a 12-year prison sentence for Hidoyatova, who has been on trial since last month.
Posted by: Fred ||
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BAGHDAD - Iraqi prosecutors submitted to the court trying Saddam Hussein on Tuesday what they said was a signed execution order showing his guilt in the killing of 148 Shiite civilians in reprisal for a 1982 assassination bid. The document, dated June 16, 1984 and allegedly signed by the ousted president, confirmed death sentences passed by a tribunal two days earlier.
"I dunnit, just like the orchards!"
A second document purported to be letter dated March 23, 1985, stated that the executions had taken place, adding that a doctor had been on hand to confirm the deaths.
The prosecutors said the villagers had been sentenced after a show trial in which they had no rights to appear or be represented. These men were sentenced to death even though they were not able to take part in their trial or defend themselves, one of the prosecutors said. Neither Saddam, nor any of his seven co-defendant, questioned the validity of the documents.
Meanwhile, prosecutors also submitted a letter from Iraqs secret service, dated June 23, 1987, saying 46 of the 148 defendants had in fact died from torture rather than by hanging. Four of the victims were added to the list by mistake and executed, the letter also said. The head of the secret service was sentenced to three years in prison for this mistake, the court was told.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/02/2006
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Around 50,000 slogan-shouting Muslims staged a rally in the Indian capital yesterday against the visit of US President George W. Bush, who was due here by evening after a short trip to Afghanistan. The protestors gathered at the Ram Lila grounds near New Delhi's main commercial area for the protest organised by the Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, a Muslim religious organisation. Police put the number of protestors at around 50,000 but organisers claimed some 300,000 people had turned up. A smaller protest was held at the historic 17th century Jama Masjid mosque in Old Delhi, witnesses said. "We do not want Bush here as he is the world's biggest terrorist. He has no place in the land of (freedom hero Mahatma) Gandhi," said Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind spokesman Abdul Hameed Naumani. The protestors shouted "Bush murdabad" (Bush die) and "Bush vaapas jao" (Bush, go back), amid demands to ban the Danish newspaper which printed controversial cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed last year.
Addressing the rally, Communist Party of India general secretary A.B. Bardhan called the US president an "imperialist aggressor" for his invasion of Iraq and for "bullying" Iran over its nuclear programme. Left-wing parties and workers' organisations were preparing for similar protests on Thursday. Eight political parties, most of them communist, have formed a Committee Against Bush Visit, which will hold a "people's march" and put up cartoons and T-shirts poking fun at Bush on Thursday.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Once again proving why its only the Muslims that attacked America on 9-11, and only the Muslims that are attempting to destabilize South and Southeast Asia, and Le Affriqque, NOT Motherly Commies!?
#6
the indian communist party, unlike the Iraqi Communist party, hasnt had the privilege of living under and being persecuted by Islamofascism. This probably accounts for their ideological backwardness on this issue.
#7
the indian communist party, unlike the Iraqi Communist party, hasnt had the privilege of living under and being persecuted by Islamofascism. This probably accounts for their ideological backwardness on this issue.
Interesting theory. It works for the Democrats, too.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/02/2006 10:38
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So, if all these anti-Bush marchers are in the street, shouldn't somebody drop a few IEDs along their march ? Or rather pamphlets, somebody should drop pamphlets.
#10
Only 50-300k (give or take a commie) in a country of 1,000,000,000+? I noticed the press has overlooked the fact that 75% of Indian support and like the U.S. That would mean that around 750,000,000 don't support the action of 300,000. But I will leave the math to the "experts" in the MSM.
Convicted Turkish DHKP-C militant Fehriye Erdal has disappeared, just a day after being jailed for four years.
Ummm... Are we missing something here? Have you looked in her cell?
A DHKP-C spokesman, the Justice Ministry and the federal public prosecution office have confirmed her disappearance.
"Yep. We looked and she ain't there."
Police conducted house raids on Tuesday night but to no avail, the DHKP-C spokesman said, news agency Belga reported on Wednesday. "Searches were held at various addresses such as at my house and in the apartment of my mother on the floor below me despite the fact her place of hiding is not with me or my family," he said. "I have no idea where she now is."
"I looked around me and — thhhhhp! — she wuz gone!"
The Interior Ministry has refused to comment on the matter, referring questions to the Justice Ministry where a Francophone spokeswoman said: "Fehriye Erdal is missing and is being internationally sought." After sources first told Turkish media that the convicted militant was missing, the Belgian federal public prosecution office also confirmed reports that Erdal had not yet been arrested. Brugge Court sentenced Erdal to four years jail on Tuesday. Six other DHKP-C members were sentenced to jail terms ranging from four to six years. The DHKP-C is accused of trying to overthrow the Turkish government and is considered by the US and the EU as a terrorist organisation.
Tehran, Iran, Mar. 01 The Supreme Commander of Irans Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Major General Yahya Rahim Safavi appointed on Wednesday a senior commander in the Bassij as the new head of the IRGCs secretive Ansar-ol-Mahdi Protection Corps. The announcement was made by the state-run ISNA news agency.
The post was given to Abdol-Ali Najafi, a 45-year-old veteran IRGC Brigadier General and commander of the Bassij in Irans southern Fars province.
Ansar-ol-Mahdi Corps is primarily responsible for the protection of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other top officials of the regime. But as an elite, secretive force within the IRGC, its officers are entrusted with many other special assignments, including those in the area of weapons of mass of destruction and terrorist activities beyond Irans borders.
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Oooh! A secret military unit! How scarrrry! And sooo secret that they issue a press release! Wowsers!
Sheesh, wotta bunch. Y'know, I used to work with two Iranian programmers. They were intelligent. I guess the Iranian brain-drain was a total success.
#3
It matters who pays the Praetorian Guard. If these boys are under RG loyal to the Pres, and the top Mullahs and he get into contention, they could instantly become assassins.
I also gather that Khamenei is coming up for renewal of his "living god" status, and it is 50/50 whether he will be retained. Some mumblings suggest that the Pres would like to install his cult's guru to be the next living god, which would certainly clarify things.
Iraqs main Sunni Muslim religious organisation, accusing the Shia-led government and US forces of involvement in attacks by Shia militiamen, called on Wednesday on the community to protect its mosques. Our brothers in all areas must protect their mosques as the government has failed to do so, Abdul Salam al-Qubaisi, spokesman for the Muslim Clerics Association, told a news conference broadcast live on Al-Jazeera television.
Since a bomb blamed on Al Qaeda demolished the Golden Mosque in Samarra, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam, sectarian violence has killed more than 400 people by government reckoning, pitching Iraq toward civil war. Qubaisi angrily listed alleged attacks on Sunnis across Iraq and accused Shia police of attacking the Baghdad home of the groups head, Harith al-Dari, on Saturday, wounding some of Daris nieces. Qubaisi showed a group of children with bandages on their legs and arms and lying on beds. He said they had been wounded in the attack. He said Shia police had showed up at Daris house to arrest him and that when the guards opposed them a shootout erupted.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Two officers with Russia's state security service (FSB) were wounded on Wednesday when a stun grenade was triggered accidentally in their office, Interfax news agency quoted officials as saying. The blast occurred at the FSB's local headquarters in Nizhny Novgorod, north east of Moscow, reports said. The lives of those wounded were not in danger. The FSB, a successor organisation to the Soviet KGB, could not immediately be reached for comment.
Posted by: Fred ||
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SRINAGAR - Suspected Islamic terrorists rebels shot dead two members of a police counter-insurgency unit Wednesday in revolt-hit Indian Kashmir, police said. The two slain men were killed in a busy market in Sopore town, 50 kilometers (31 miles) north of Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Kashmir where Islamic terrorists militants have been fighting for 16 years against New Delhis rule. The area was immediately cordoned off and searches were launched to arrest the terrorists militants involved in the shooting, a police official said.
Authorities have stepped up security in in the Himalayan region, where tens of thousands have died in insurgency-related violence. Sopore is considered a hotbed of Hizbul Mujahedin, the regions most powerful militant group which is fighting to make Kashmir part of Pakistan.
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Faik Bakir, the director of the Baghdad morgue, has fled Iraq in fear of his life after reporting that more than 7,000 people have been killed by death squads in recent months, the outgoing head of the UN human rights office in Iraq has disclosed. "The vast majority of bodies showed signs of summary execution - many with their hands tied behind their back. Some showed evidence of torture, with arms and leg joints broken by electric drills," said John Pace, the Maltese UN official. The killings had been happening long before the bloodshed after last week's bombing of the Shia shrine in Samarra.
Mr Pace, whose contract in Iraq ended last month, said many killings were carried out by Shia militias linked to the industry ministry run by Bayan Jabr, a leading figure in the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (Sciri). Mr Pace said records, supported by photographs, came from Baghdad's forensic institute, which passed them to the UN. The Baghdad morgue has been receiving 700 or more bodies a month. The figures peaked at 1,100 last July - many showing signs of torture.
Reports of government-sponsored death squads have sparked fear among many prominent Iraqis, prompting a rise in the number leaving the country. Mr Pace said the morgue's director had received death threats after he reported the murders. "He's out of the country now," said Mr Pace, adding that the attribution of the killings to government-linked militias did not come from Dr Bakir. "There are other sources for that. Some militias are integrated with the police and wear police uniforms," he said. "The Badr brigade [Sciri's armed wing] are in the police and are mainly the ones doing the killing. They're the most notorious."
That's something we knew.
Some Iraqis accuse the Mahdi army militia, linked to the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, of seizing and killing people. But Mr Pace said: "I'm not as sure of the Mahdi army as I am of the others."
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/02/2006
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While all people earn for freedom, there are different interpretation of that freedom means.
Iran's former reformist president Mohammad Khatami has described the Holocaust as a "historical reality" - a stinging attack on his controversial and revisionist successor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. "We should speak out if even a single Jew is killed. Don't forget that one of the crimes of Hitler, Nazism and German national socialism was the massacre of innocent people, among them many Jews," the cleric said in comments carried in the Iranian press on Wednesday.
The Holocaust, he asserted, should be recognised "even if this historical reality has been misused and there is enormous pressure on the Palestinian people".
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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In unrelated news, Khatami's life insurance company cancelled his policy.
At least 33 people were killed on Wednesday, most of them in a Baghdad car bomb attack, a day after multiple bombings in Iraq left 64 dead and revived fears of civil war. Bombers struck again in Baghdad's southeastern neighbourhood of Jadid at about midday, killing 23 and wounding 58 by blowing up a car on the main road which also housed a market.
At least four police officers were killed when gunmen attacked a police convoy in northern Iraq on Wednesday, a police source said. The attack occurred as about 50 officers were being driven in minibuses to Tikrit, north of Baghdad, after a training course in the Kurdish city of Sulaimaniya. At least seven were wounded and many others feared seized, the source said. Three Iraqi policemen said that they had survived the ambush and told the source that around 10 of their colleagues had been abducted. The fate of the other policemen was unclear. Six others were killed in separate bombings and shootings across Iraq on Wednesday. At least 85 were wounded in all these attacks.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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QUETTA: Gunmen killed a pro-government politician in Balochistan on Wednesday, hours after suspected tribal militants blew up a gas pipeline in the region, officials said. Pakistan Workers Party Chairman Nasrullah Kakar was killed in Bostan, 30 kilometres north of Quetta, by unknown attackers. It is not yet clear whether the killing was politically motivated or the result of an old enmity. Balochistan government spokesman Raziq Bugti said that Kakar apparently opposed nationalist forces and was supporting President Pervez Musharrafs policies in Balochistan.
Meanwhile, at least four soldiers were injured when a paramilitary force vehicle struck a landmine in the Mand area, 700 kilometres southwest of Quetta on Wednesday. Dera Bugti District Coordination Officer Abdul Samad Lasi said that a paramilitary solider was injured in a landmine blast on Wednesday morning. Dera Bugti Nazim Kazim Bugti said that four people, including three paramilitary personnel, were killed in four different incidents of landmine explosion and firing on Tuesday. However, government officials could not confirm the incidents. Meanwhile, unidentified attackers blew up a pipeline in Tehsil Sui, District Dera Bugti at 3:30am on Wednesday. We have closed the pipeline to put out the fire so that repairs to the pipeline can begin, Multan SNGPL General Manager Ali Hussan Qureshi said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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Intelligence agencies and investigators believe the mystery behind the rise of militancy, spreading of its network and links both in and outside the country could be revealed only after JMB kingpin Abdur Rahman is arrested. So far, three of the seven-member Majlis-e-Shura (top decision making body) of the JMB -- Abdul Awal Sarker, Ataur Rahman Sunny and Hafez Mahmud -- have been arrested, but none of them could reveal a total picture of the banned militant group or their external and internal links.
Following the ban on Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB), the law enforcers primarily concentrated on arresting JMJB operations chief Siddiqul Islam alias Bangla Bhai. They did not focus on Shaekh Abdur Rahman until the August 17 countrywide bombings although he organised both the JMB and JMJB networks across the country quite openly. Following the August 17 attack, the investigators said the mystery would be revealed once they can arrest some of the seven members of Majlish-e-Shura, top decision making body of the JMB. However, after arresting three Shura members, the investigators claimed the three failed to provide the expected information saying they did not know much about the JMB network and its functioning. The arrested referred Rahman as controlling the network.
Two Shura members--Rahman's son-in-law Abdul Awal Sarker alias Ashiq alias Adil alias Arafat, and his younger brother Ataur Rahman alias Sunny alias Sajid--were arrested at the end of 2005. The law enforcers held the other--Rakib Hasan alias Hafez Mahmud--last Tuesday. Acting on intelligence information and Hafez's confession, the Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) on Tuesday night cordoned off the JMB chief's house at East Shaplabagh in Sylhet and has been trying to convince Rahman to surrender.
Nine family members of Rahman, including his wife Nurjahan Begum alias Rupa, daughter Afifa Rahman and sons Fuad and Ahmed, surrendered yesterday, but Rahman told the law enforcers that he would rather commit suicide than surrendering. Lieutenant Colonel Gulzar Uddin Ahmed, Rab intelligence wing chief leading the Sylhet operation, yesterday afternoon told The Daily Star over telephone that they were taking time before breaking into the house because they want to arrest Rahman alive. "We don't want him to get injured in any way since he has threatened to commit suicide," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2006
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It saddens me to reappear before you here today at a time when under the yoke of the clerical regime, my homeland is labeled as the greatest threat to international peace and security, and more importantly, from my vantage point, this threat comes at the cost of great pain and suffering for my fellow compatriots in Iran.
Fear of the first state-sponsor of terrorism acquiring nuclear weapons, with all of its implications for nuclear blackmail and terror, even unconventional delivery of a nuclear device to Europe or to these shores, has been widely discussed. But let me address how the strategic landscape is viewed by those in power in Iran:
Like all totalitarian systems, the Islamist regime in Tehran needs to expand in order to survive. Mr. Ahmadinejad has worked to become more popular on the Arab street than he is in Iranian homes. His instruments of oppression special units of the Revolutionary Guards and the Basijis feel intensely disliked and find their morale eroded while on patrol in major Iranian cities, but they walk ten feet tall in the souks from Mindanawa to Damascus; this is because they present themselves as champions of radical Islamism in front of the West.
As long as the Islamic Republic is in power, the project for democracy in the greater Middle East may actually pave the way for Irans expansionism. Witness the Islamic Republics ally Hamas victory in Palestinian elections. The coalition forces have removed Saddam and placed power in Iraqs elected parliament. But who is the king maker in that parliament today? It is the leader of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iran who for twenty years was nurtured and prepared for his present role by the leaders of the Islamic Republic. Nor is Iran limiting its bet to one option. Three weeks ago, the leader of the most radical Shiite faction in Iraq, went to Tehran to receive financial, intelligence and organizational support.
When Irans protégés have the money, information, and support from those who are masters of manipulation, intimidation and violence against their political opponents, they have a strong upper-hand against their rivals in a nascent democracy such as Iraq. In Lebanon, if Hezbollah can spend more money than the government building schools, mosques and hospitals thanks to generous Iranian contributions dont be surprised if they win elections.
A Bermuda Triangle from Iraq to Lebanon to Palestine is being taken over by Irans allies through the ballot box. It could pull in the Moslem Brotherhood in Egypt, and when it does the same to the Shiites of the oil-rich Eastern province of Saudi Arabia, the encirclement of the Persian Gulf will be complete. Islamists will have achieved what the Soviets could not, namely complete control of the Persian Gulf oil and the jugular of Western economies. They would then have a latter day Caliphate to lead all the forces that are against the post Cold War vision of the free world.
All the Islamic Republic needs in order to achieve this goal is to be able to use low intensity violence to supplement its financial, intelligence and organizational support for its allies. That, ladies and gentlemen, is why Iran needs the bomb: to neutralize the conventional military superiority of the West, and continue to use terrorism and low intensity violence without the fear of escalation to high intensity conventional warfare. For the free world, these are unacceptable outcomes. And yet, there isnt much time to find a solution. The resumption of enrichment by the Islamic Republic has drastically reduced the window of decision. The vast number of commentaries and reports on the subject seem to come down to this: comparing diplomatic options with punitive ones, including military strikes.
I am here to tell you that neither is an option:
The fruitless Euro-three diplomatic efforts have already given the theocrats three years. Another three years of cat-and-mouse games with the Russians under the IAEA buys enough time to make a bomb: that is the Islamic Republics plan and hope.
The problem with these negotiations all along was the false assumption that the other side wants a solution to avert a crisis. Quite the contrary: Increasingly unpopular, the Islamic Republic needs an atmosphere of crisis to justify its increased militarization and harsh security measures at home, and divert attention from increasing poverty and the misery index so long as this crisis does not result in a shooting war which they will lose. The fundamentalists assumption is that continuing on their present course will lead to a collision with the free world. Therefore, they believe they need a nuclear umbrella to force the other side off the road before the collision.
As for a military strike, it will rally nationalistic sentiments which will work to the regimes advantage, and consequently, give the theocracy a much longer lease on life. Make no mistake about it; the question is what comes first in Iran: Democracy or nuclear weapons? The race is on!
Let me repeat: a military strike may delay the bomb by two or three years, but it will delay democracy several times over. It is not a smart choice, and no way to win the race! If neither negotiations nor punitive measures are the answer, the inevitable question becomes: how is democracy achievable in Iran?
Let us recall that a hundred years ago, Irans Constitutional Revolution introduced the first genuine democracy into the East, with more than half the population of the world. Let me assure you that today, there are more than a thousand circles of dissent and opposition in Iran against the regime. Their cumulative weight is far greater than that of the clerical regime. However, the problem is that they are kept isolated from each other; and this is the regimes highest priority.
Local networks facilitating communications within these circles are beyond the regimes control. When it comes to connecting all of these circles at the national level, however, the regime comes down with an iron fist. The Reform Movement, the Student Movement, the printed press, web loggers, provide examples of attempts to create national networks.
The regimes response to the Reform Movement was to corrupt it from above by installing subservient leaders who later confessed their vow to defend the regime, not the people who elected them.
They fragmented the student movement through a combination of torture, imprisonment, building a fifth column, and even a vast drug ring. Can you imagine, a year prior to the vast student protests of 1999, you could seldom find drugs in dorms; a year later heroin was cheaper than tobacco! This does not happen in authoritarian states, unless underwritten by the state itself.
Living in the free world, you would expect that the natural means of communication with these circles would be a free press. Well, there are more journalists and web loggers in Iranian jails today than in any other country in the world.
While the roots of a national communications network has to be inside Iran, the conclusion from the observations above is that the hub of this network cannot be inside the country.
This is where the free world can help. I know of hundreds of young dissidents who have done organizational activity inside Iran, in effect connecting the aforementioned small local networks. Today they are sitting scared in places from Jordan to Turkey, or in refugee camps in European cities. With a little help from the free world, they can become the building blocks of a two-way communication network that aggregates the demands of the thousand circles of opposition into a national demand for democracy and against this theocracy.
I stand here before you, appealing on behalf of the many dissidents who simply ask for the support of the free world. And I hope that I am right to being optimistic that the free world is indeed committed to invest in democracy as the solution for Iran, rather than endless negotiations or military strikes.
Mr. Pahlavi, son of the former Shah, gave this speech at the National Press Club March 1, 2006.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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He predictably ignores the ethnic divisions, which will bring down the Iranian regime.
#2
I stand here before you, appealing on behalf of the many dissidents who simply ask for the support of the free world. And I hope that I am right to being optimistic that the free world is indeed committed to invest in democracy as the solution for Iran, rather than endless negotiations or military strikes.
ah yes, free the dissidents and magically Iran will become a democracy. It's all the west's fault that it is not, don't ya see. So don't bomb us, don't talk to us, don't santion us - just make your call to free the dissidents and all will be well. Please send, with your pleas, your credit card number and some cash to Reza Pahlavi. A woman did this last week and shortly after she did, she bought a lottery ticket and won the jackpot. Thank you.
#3
good thing that you support Bush so well Rif Raf.
I'm glad you see it that way.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 0:42
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#4
diplomacy maybe not, but military action will resolve it, how long are we going to wait before they build the nukes, what kind of precedent are we setting here for other countries
#5
ah yes, free the dissidents and magically Iran will become a democracy.
ah yes, another one who learns nothing from history.
This is where the free world can help. I know of hundreds of young dissidents who have done organizational activity inside Iran, in effect connecting the aforementioned small local networks. Today they are sitting scared in places from Jordan to Turkey, or in refugee camps in European cities. With a little help from the free world, they can become the building blocks of a two-way communication network that aggregates the demands of the thousand circles of opposition into a national demand for democracy and against this theocracy.
This was essentially one of the ways that communist propaganda was countered on the eastern side of the iron curtain. Information by itself, however, is not enough. There has to be a spark from within.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 1:12
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Lol, this strikes me as three things...
1) a cash cow - with all the proceeds being filtered through Pahlavi and, likely disappearing right there
2) an amateurish parlor game that would result in exposing and a consequent roll up of the real dissidents inside Iran for death and / or 20 years of prison beatings
3) yet another way to give the MM's another 2-3 years to complete their acquisition of a deliverable nuke... only with a payoff - see #1
Yes, there will be nationalistic feelings generated if the Persians aren't part of the regime change / nuke takeout... It doesn't matter what they think if they fail to get their shit together in time. The non-Persians are likely to be rather happy about it. Circulating petitions and listening to a self-serving character like Pahlavi will have precisely zero bearing. It will happen and neither they nor Raphael nor Russian and ChiCom whores will be able to stop it.
#7
It sucks even more to be behind the curve and dead.
Iran is running on borrowed time. We should start by rolling up their terrorist satelite groups anyway we can before cutting the head off the snake. Whats left of a Persian Iran can rot afterwards for all I care as long as it's another 100 years before they get their stuff together enough for anyone to have too pay attention to them again.
Posted by: SPoD ||
03/02/2006 3:47
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Violence never solves anything.
The City Fathers of Carthage (RAH)
#10
It will happen and neither they nor Raphael nor Russian and ChiCom whores will be able to stop it.
I wouldn't dream of it.
Posted by: Rafael ||
03/02/2006 12:55
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#11
If neither military action or negotiation will solve the problem but military action will delay acquisition of nuclear weapons, the choice is simple. Who gives a rip about how long democracy is delayed? Once Iran has nuclear weapons, they will gain an immunity that forever compromises any ability to act in the Middle East. Bomb the crap out of them immediately.
#12
Wholehearted agreement, Zenster - except for the "immediately" bit. We Want What We Want When We Want It (W8I). Bush lives in the real world, where that never happens on cue. I agree that sucks.
#13
More whine bitch moan. Iran, stand up for yourselves and get on with the damn overthrow.
A few well-placed bullets and you're on your way. Given the high horse of the "intellectuals" about how progressive iran and how different they are from all this Mahmoud crap, where's the action.
Sitting afraid and doing nothing will get you wiped out with Mahmoud. Help yourselves, like ya keep saying you want to. Gotta take risks youselves - the knight on the white charger is a little busy right now.
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.
U.S. military operations in the province of Anbar, west of Baghdad, have resulted in the capture of 61 members of al Qaeda in Iraq, Major General Rick Lynch, a U.S. military spokesman, said on Thursday. Bomb making equipment, weapons and munitions were seized in the raids on the training and bomb making facility in an area 50 km (30 miles) northeast of Falluja, Lynch said. Some of al Qaeda in Iraq's "critical facilitators" were included in the 61 people captured, he said.
Iraqi border guards captured a Saudi who admitted he was involved in the suicide attack on the Abqaiq oil facility in Saudi Arabia, an Iraqi military spokesman said Thursday. 
The U.N. nuclear watchdog welcomed a landmark civil nuclear deal between India and the United States on Thursday, saying it would end New Delhi's nuclear isolation and spur global non-proliferation efforts. 
Libya released all 84 jailed members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood movement who had been held in the country since the late 1990s, official sources said. "All the 84 members of the Muslim Brotherhood were released today ... amid celebrations in front of the prison in Tripoli in the presence of their families," an official source said. "Fivty-five of them have returned home to Benghazi," Libya's second city in the east of the country, added the source, who asked not to be named.
I wish I was one tenth as eloquent.
Violence on the U.S.-Mexico border is at an all-time high because illegal aliens are more willing to attack U.S. authorities, and an increasing number also are convicted criminals, border sheriffs said yesterday.
A fight to block alternative fuel development that could replace oil-burning power plants for communities along the Nantucket Sound has created an unusual alliance on Capitol Hill, with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy backing the fight against the green proposal. 
Russia plans to hit a golf ball into Earth orbit from the International Space Station. If NASA approves the plan, the ball would set records for the longest drive ever made but some experts warn that a mishap could cause "catastrophic" damage to the station.
Bombings in Baghdad killed 26 people, and four others died when mortar rounds slammed into their homes in a nearby town Wednesday, the second day of surging violence after authorities lifted a curfew that briefly calmed sectarian attacks.
Three British Islamists jailed for four years in Egypt over membership of a banned group have left for home after being questioned at Heathrow. 
So are you looking forward to the Academy Awards show Sunday night? Really? Can you name the five movies nominated for best picture? Have you seen any of them? 
AT least four police officers were killed when gunmen attacked a police convoy in northern Iraq today, a senior police source said.
Pakistani officials told ABC News that they believe they have indications that a new terrorist attack against the United States is being planned there. They told ABC News that while their intelligence does not give any specific details as to a target or time, it does indicate that an emerging al Qaeda figure is making plans. Pakistani military officials say 
Russia's space program suffered another embarrassing failure Wednesday, when a booster rocket failed to put an Arab commercial satellite to a designated orbit, officials said.
Two militants were killed in a special operation in the village of Elistanzhi, Vedeno district, and three personnel of the republic's Antiterrorist Center were also killed during the operation, the Chechen Interior Ministry told Itar-Tass on Thursday.
America's principal ground fighting force is stretched to breaking point. Both the active and reserve components of the U.S. Army have nearly reached their recruiting limits in strength, given attitudes in America. Fighting international terrorism simply does not have the same appeal for the post-Baby Boom generation as fighting fascism did for the generation of World War II.
Ukraine's Security Service says 10 Uzbek asylum-seekers who were recently deported were members of an Al-Qaeda-linked terrorist group.
Four security officials are being interrogated by a security committee over the jail break of 23 Al-Qaeda members and suspects from the Political Security Jail in Sanaa on February 3. The fugitives include men said to be among the most dangerous Al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has reportedly said there are signs of an al-Qaeda presence in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. "We have indications about a presence of al-Qaeda in Gaza and the (West) Bank. This is intelligence information. We have not yet reached the point of arrests," Abbas said. "The last security report I received was three days ago," he told the London-based al-Hayat newspaper.
SUVA - The leader of the South Pacific nation of Fiji has called a general election for May, testing racial divisions, which have fuelled three coups and a military mutiny since 1987.
Militant kingpin 
Security was restored yesterday at three major prisons, where inmates rioted and took 13 unarmed prison officials hostage at the Jweideh Correctional and Rehabilitation Centre for more than 12 hours. The first eight hostages were released after negotiations between police and inmates. The last five were released by mid-afternoon. Several security officers and prisoners were injured in the rioting. 
US military authorities plan to transfer about a third of the detainees at the Guantanamo "war on terror" camp to their home countries after a review carried out over the past year, a US military officer said.
Tehran, Iran, Mar. 01 A government agency in Iran has launched a new book that sets out to prove the official position that the Holocaust was a myth and a historical lie that was concocted to justify the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. The Place of Holocaust in the Zionist Project Fact or Myth? is the name of the new book published by the Islamic Revolutions Documents Centre, a government agency headed by hard-line cleric 
NICOSIA: You might have the best forgery skills in the world, but it is not much use if you cannot spell. A Cyprus court jailed Pakistani national Fazal Ur Rehman for eight months for forgery after police spotted spelling mistakes on stamps on an Afghan passport he was carrying, otherwise it was a near-perfect copy, the Cyprus Mail said. "Ministry" was spelt "Menistry" and the first "n" was missing from government, the newspaper said. "The passport looked perfect and professionally made almost deemed original by forensics," a police officer told a magistrate in Nicosia.
European aid to Palestine could not persuade the Palestinian group Hamas to change its policy positions, a leader of the radical Islamic movement due in Moscow for talks this week said in an interview published here on Wednesday. The Palestinian people cannot sell their legitimate claims, Khaled Meshaal said in an interview with Russias Vremya Novostei daily, responding to a question on the European Unions decision to unblock financial aid for the Palestinians. There can be no trading on that, with money on one side and on the other side our homeland and our rights... Humanitarian aid should not be given with conditions. Its inadmissible, he said.
A leader of an underground outfit was killed during a shootout between his 
Deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein on Wednesday accepted sole responsibility for destroying orchards in Dujail as a reprisal for a failed assassination bid in the town in 1982. 
BILLINGS, Mont. - A newly discovered surface bulge in Yellowstone National Park may be responsible for some unexpected geothermal activity in recent years, according to a study by U.S. Geological Survey scientists.
Piracy is a growing problem along Somalia's long coastline, slowing efforts to feed as many as 2 million Somalis left hungry by severe drought, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said on Tuesday. Due to the threat of pirate raids on food shipped by boat, the World Food Programme (WFP) has had to move some aid overland to southern Somalia through Kenya for the first time in five years, Annan said in a report to the Security Council. 
London, Mar. 01 The deputy governor of the Iraqi province of Saladin, where the holy city of Samarra is situated, said preliminary investigation was pointing to Irans role in the bombing of the citys revered Shiite shrine last week. The investigations carried out so far about the explosion in the resting place of Imam al-Hadi and Imam Hassan al-Askari in Samarra point to the involvement of the Iranian regimes Intelligence Ministry, 
Authorities on Wednesday announced that they foiled a suicide attack by an Al Qaeda-linked group on a vital civilian installation and arrested three terror suspects. A security official said the General Intelligence Department (GID) seized four kilogrammes of heavy explosives, which were of the same type used in the November 9 triple hotel bombings in Amman that killed 60 people. Would-be suicide attacker 
A 29-year-old Syrian accused of threatening terrorist acts in the Kingdom following the Nov. 9, 2005, triple bombings in Amman, pleaded not guilty to the charges at the State Security Court this week. Yousef R., a blacksmith, was charged with threatening the use of force to disrupt security and spread panic among people. 
Kathmandu - At least 31 people, including 10 soldiers, were killed in two clashes between security forces and Maoist rebels in western Nepal, it was officially stated on Wednesday evening.
A delegation from the Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMSI) would head to Najaf to meet with religious leaders, said AMSI's official spokesperson Abdulsalam Al-Kubaysi on Wednesday. Sources told KUNA that Najaf would witness a meeting between Shiite leaders Ali Al-Sistani and Muqtada "Spuds" Al-Tater for the first time in a year. Al-Kubaysi said in a press conference today that the delegation would discuss with the two influential figures means to put a halt on escalation of the sectarian conflict. He lauded Najaf's religious leaders who dealt with the recent sectarian dilemma with responsibility, noting that the supporters of Al-Sistani and Spuds have been holding talks to prevent any dangerous situation in Iraq. In Kerbala, Spuds called yesterday on the Iraqi government to establish one Waqf (Islamic endowment) ministry instead of having one for Shias and another for Sunnas.
COPENHAGEN: Cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (
LAHORE: Qazi Hussain Ahmed, ameer of the Jamaat-e-Islami and president of the MMA, on Wednesday said the entire Muslim world would go on strike on March 3 to protest the publication of caricatures of Prophet Muhammad. 
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said Egypt had won over US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to its views on democracy in the Arab world and quoted her as saying it would take a generation for democracy to take hold. "She was very polite as she was listening to Egyptian opinions and points of view. She didn't bring up difficult issues or ask to change anything or to intervene in political reform, as some people say," he told newspaper editors.
MULTAN: The Pakistan Minority Alliance (PMA) has condemned torching of a church in Sargodha and demanded arrest of perpetrators. Naveed Jeeva, a Provincial Assembly member, said some people wanted to create a row between Muslims and publication of caricatures of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) in European newspapers," he said. Some unidentified people had set a church alight at Noori Gate on Tuesday morning. Reports said assailants entered the church after scaling its wall at about 5:00am and set it on fire after throwing petrol on its doors, windows and furniture. Hundreds of Christians gathered at the church to express their anguish over the incident. Muslim clerics also reached the site and condemned the act.
TASHKENT: An Uzbek court sentenced Wednesday a leader of a banned opposition group that criticised the violent suppression of an uprising last year to 10 years in prison for economic crimes. Rights groups condemned the trial as politically motivated as the Sunshine Uzbekistan opposition coalition has been a vocal critic of the crackdown in the eastern city of Andijan in which non-governmental organisations say hundreds of people were killed. 
Around 50,000 slogan-shouting Muslims staged a rally in the Indian capital yesterday against the visit of US President George W. Bush, who was due here by evening after a short trip to Afghanistan. The protestors gathered at the Ram Lila grounds near New Delhi's main commercial area for the protest organised by the Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, a Muslim religious organisation. Police put the number of protestors at around 50,000 but organisers claimed some 300,000 people had turned up. A smaller protest was held at the historic 17th century Jama Masjid mosque in Old Delhi, witnesses said. "We do not want Bush here as he is the world's biggest terrorist. He has no place in the land of (freedom hero Mahatma) Gandhi," said Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind spokesman Abdul Hameed Naumani. The protestors shouted "Bush murdabad" (Bush die) and "Bush vaapas jao" (Bush, go back), amid demands to ban the Danish newspaper which printed controversial cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed last year. 
Convicted Turkish 
Iraqs main Sunni Muslim religious organisation, accusing the Shia-led government and US forces of involvement in attacks by Shia militiamen, called on Wednesday on the community to protect its mosques. Our brothers in all areas must protect their mosques as the government has failed to do so, Abdul Salam al-Qubaisi, spokesman for the Muslim Clerics Association, told a news conference broadcast live on Al-Jazeera television. 
Two officers with Russia's state security service (FSB) were wounded on Wednesday when a stun grenade was triggered accidentally in their office, Interfax news agency quoted officials as saying. The blast occurred at the FSB's local headquarters in Nizhny Novgorod, north east of Moscow, reports said. The lives of those wounded were not in danger. The FSB, a successor organisation to the Soviet KGB, could not immediately be reached for comment.
SRINAGAR - Suspected Islamic 
Iran's former reformist president Mohammad Khatami has described the Holocaust as a "historical reality" - a stinging attack on his controversial and revisionist successor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. "We should speak out if even a single Jew is killed. Don't forget that one of the crimes of Hitler, Nazism and German national socialism was the massacre of innocent people, among them many Jews," the cleric said in comments carried in the Iranian press on Wednesday.
At least 33 people were killed on Wednesday, most of them in a Baghdad car bomb attack, a day after multiple bombings in Iraq left 64 dead and revived fears of civil war. Bombers struck again in Baghdad's southeastern neighbourhood of Jadid at about midday, killing 23 and wounding 58 by blowing up a car on the main road which also housed a market.
QUETTA: Gunmen killed a pro-government politician in Balochistan on Wednesday, hours after suspected tribal militants blew up a gas pipeline in the region, officials said. Pakistan Workers Party Chairman Nasrullah Kakar was killed in Bostan, 30 kilometres north of Quetta, by unknown attackers. It is not yet clear whether the killing was politically motivated or the result of an old enmity. Balochistan government spokesman Raziq Bugti said that Kakar apparently opposed nationalist forces and was supporting President Pervez Musharrafs policies in Balochistan.
Intelligence agencies and investigators believe the mystery behind the rise of militancy, spreading of its network and links both in and outside the country could be revealed only after JMB kingpin 
