SACHA Baron Cohen's latest alter ego, Admiral General Shabazz Aladeen, responded to being banned from the Academy Awards by threatening the West with "unimaginable consequences" unless the sanction was lifted.
Cohen called US chat show Today in character as tyrannical despot Aladeen to express his "outrage" over the decision by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
"I had to delay 30 executions to do this," he said of his press interview, threatening "oil prices might be raised" if the event organisers did not change their minds.
#1
An individual identified as a "white supremicist" (Chicago Nazi) sent a bomb to a black city employee in Scottsdale, of all places. His identical twin brother was acquitted.
He is scheduled to be sentenced on May 22 on counts of conspiracy to damage buildings and property by means of explosives; of malicious damage of a building by means of explosives; and distribution of information related to explosives.
When sentenced, he faces up to 100 years in jail and fines of up to $500,000, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
The government used a confidential informant to make its case, the defense calling the woman "a trailer park Mata Hari".
#3
This pisses me off every time it comes up. You need to separate Y2K into Y2K: The Technical Problem and Y2K: The Media Hysteria.
The technical problem was real. A lot of people worked very hard to make sure it was not a problem. One example: General Motors checked every one of their microprocessors, industrial controllers, and manufacturing systems and took steps to make sure nothing would go wrong. Final result: no problemo
The media, on the other hand, ginned up a lot of overheated, frothy hysteria about the end of civilization. Final result: a lot of snarky nonsense about how there never was a problem. Bah, and bah again!
Don't get me started on the bad science behind global warming. The only thing global warming and Y2K have in common is the media hysteria.
#5
I'll say it again - all things equal, the greatest single threat from GWCC + OWG-NWO stems from the Universal Govts, Perts Consensus in that there is NO Consensus.
E.g. US-World Govts, Perts, + MSM-Net have all reported or pre-warned that COMET APOPHIS is coming 2029/30-2036 - YET, PEOPLE ON GUAM + US-WORLD MAY SEE APOPHIS-CAUSED LUNAR EXPLOSIONS BECAUSE OF THE POLITICAL + SCIENTIFIC WRANGLING + NOT-BELGIUM WAFFLINS', ETC. THAT OCCURS WIDIN OUR OWG-NWO THAT NO AMERICAN = AMERIKAN HAS YET VOTED FOR, NOR BEEN ASKED TO, NOR WILL BE ASKED FOR A LONG TIME TO COME, BETWEEN NOW + 2029-2036 THAT HAVE EFFECT ON RELIABLE SPACE ANALYSIS + DEFENSE.
We've already had a couple of NEO = Space Rocks pass by where NASA was repor uncertain about its own impact analysis + basically was crossing its fingers that nothing would happen.
#6
That's why the con-artists have change the name to 'climate change'. The problem with that spin is that climate change has been on going since the planet was able to even have a climate and will continue to change regardless of man. Humans so far have been successful to 'adapt' to several major changes and now occupy about every conceivable surface environment on this planet.
Teenager told court she was forced to have sex with 21 different men
She said the men made her feel 'scared and awful'
11 men on trial accused of a variety of sex offences against children including rape, trafficking and sex assault
#1
Note that the court received a bomb threat, forcing it to shut down for a while. "Don't you dare prosecute these jihadists for conducting their jihad!"
The latest report by United Nations experts disclosed a 42 per cent rise in the number of operational centrifuges enriching uranium inside the Natanz facility in the last four months.
Work inside a second, previously secret enrichment plant has also been stepped up, with 698 centrifuges operating inside the Fordow installation near Qom, a 69 per cent increase on the number recorded during the last inspection in October.
Meanwhile, the IAEA said that Iran had declined to offer full co-operation to its inspectors when they visited the country earlier this month. In particular, they were prevented from visiting a military location at Parchin, where experiments that would only be relevant to mastering the detonation system of nuclear weapons are understood to have been conducted. It bemoaned "major differences" with Iran after two fruitless visits.
Guido Westerwelle, the German foreign minister, said that he was very concerned about the latest report from the IAEA, adding: We think Iran should understand the key to ending sanctions is in their own hands: they have a duty to co-operate with the international community.
The latest report by the IAEA is likely to deepen Israels fears about Irans intentions, particularly the build-up of centrifuges in the Fordow facility, which is dug into a mountainside and could be immune from military attack.
#1
Why do they stick with Uranium instead of just refining Pu from reactor fuel? Is it the difference in complexity from a U-gun bomb and an implosion Pu device with it's critical timing?
Posted by: Water Modem ||
02/24/2012 18:22
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Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Friday accused the West of seeking "regime change" in Iran and warned Washington that Russia intended to keep its nuclear weapons to keep US power in check.
"Under the guise of trying to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction... they are attempting something else entirely and setting different goals -- regime change," news agencies quoted Putin as saying.
"We have such suspicions," said Putin. "And we are trying to take a stand that differs from the one they are trying to force on us... concerning the ways that the Iranian nuclear problem might develop."
Russia has longstanding commercial and military ties with Iran and has condemned unilateral sanctions imposed by the United States and the European Union over its suspected pursuit of nuclear weapons.
Putin's tough talk came as he toured a nuclear research centre in the once-secret city of Sarov ahead of a March 4 presidential election in which he is widely expected to secure a return to the Kremlin.
Footage showed the former KGB spy inspect research stands and then chair a security meeting in which he lashed out at US plans to deploy a missile defence shield in Europe that Russia fears might make its nuclear forces ineffective.
The February 2 decapitation of a 70-year-old baker in Landi Kotal, Khyber Agency, by the Taliban has terrorised the local population and aroused universal condemnation from tribal society and rights activists. But they won't actually DO anything - it's too dangerous. Will speak out against Crayon burning instead.
The Taliban accused the man of being a spy in an attempt to justify his murder.
"Waris Khan had always lived a clean life and confined himself to a limited number of friends," Qadeer Jan, a close friend of the murdered baker, told Central Asia Online, while refusing to comment on militant behaviour on grounds of personal safety.
Taliban terror is the main reason local residents will not comment on such matters, said local elder Hasam ud Din. So it is working exactly as intended. What will they demand next with terror as their tool of persuasion? Terror indeed works. Few people have the internal fortitude and courage to stand up to terrorists when confronted with a bloody sword just inches from their own neck. That's not a criticism, it's just human nature. Terrorists are astute students of human nature, and they do what works.
"We are simply terrorised and are extremely worried about our own safety," he said, adding he and other tribal elders have limited their contact with officials and security personnel for fear of being called spies.
Most such killings are groundless, he said. "By and large, they (the Taliban) intimidate tribesmen not to speak against them and keep them under terror," he added.
"It's a simple murder without a fair trial," he said. "Taliban courts have no legal justification, and it's completely illegal and inhuman." They may have no legal justification, but they seem to have support in the highest levels of Pakistan's government, and Karzai "talks with them every day."
The Taliban's assertion to enforce Islam is based on lies that no practicing Muslim can trust, Allama Noor ul Haq Qadri told Central Asia Online. Hope Allama has good security.
"They kill innocent people on the basis of a mere doubt, which is not acceptable in Islam," he argued. "They are criminal in the eyes of our religion ... .all their acts are un-Islamic and have no religious or moral justification." It would be nice to be able to believe that, but the track record suggests the Taliban are the ruling voice of Islam.
Such killings are meant to terrorise rather than to enforce justice, since mostly tribesmen of unblemished character have been killed, said Abdur Rahim, the FATA leader of the Awami National Party.
"Whatever the motives for such gruesome acts by militants, they leave marks of terror on the minds of ordinary tribesmen," he said, adding some of his terrified pupils had asked him about the baker's beheading. I suspect 'Stockholm Syndrome' may be affecting pupils at this point.
#1
the Taliban are the ruling voice of Islam until your average Muslim in Taliban areas gets the idea that a calm demeanor, bloody-mindedness, anonymity and a concealable weapon will given him/her a voice in what Islam consists of. Just saying.
Air Zimbabwe remains grounded following promises to be back in the air this week, with flights suspended indefinitely as staff refuse to work until outstanding salaries are paid.
Last week the struggling airline said it resume flights between the capital Harare and the second city Bulawayo and Victoria Falls on Monday, but staff remain on strike due to the non-payment of salaries and allowances.
Air Zimbabwe suspended all domestic flights in mid-January following a strike by employees who were demanding their salaries and allowances that have been outstanding since 2009.
Ok. I'm not very good about time, but that seems a bit long.
Air Zimbabwe acting chief executive officer Innocent Mavhunga told NewZiana that, "The company is addressing the issue as a matter of urgency. It's true that we failed to resumes flights as expected. We failed to reach a compromise on salary issues with workers on time." I can only imagine what these 'negotiations' consisted of. "Back to work, peasants!" "No."
"We are still locked up on negotiations and its difficult to issue a new time frame for resumption of flights, but Air Zimbabwe would be back on air soon," he said on Tuesday. And then his lips fell off.
Air Zimbabwe suspended all flights to South Africa and the United Kingdom in early January to avoid its planes from being impounded by increasingly frustrated creditors owed about US$149 million by the airline. A socialist success story!
On December 12, 2011, an Air Zimbabwe Boeing 767-200 was impounded at Gatwick Airport after American General Suppliers received a court order for US$1.2 million the airline owed for spare parts. The aircraft was only released on December 20 once the debt had been settled, but due to technical problems and a lack of spares the Boeing only left for Zimbabwe on December 24, arriving the following morning.
On December 2, Bid Air Services seized air Zimbabwe's Boeing 737-500 over US$500 000 of unpaid debt. The aircraft was impounded shortly after landing at Johannesburg's OR Tambo International Airport, as Bid Air parked a vehicle behind the aircraft to ensure it could not leave. Bid Air later allowed the aircraft to return to Zimbabwe. Got them behind the 8-ball, so to speak.
Other airlines are taking advantage of Air Zimbabwe's collapse. Emirates at the beginning of this month began flying between Harare, Lusaka and Dubai several times a week while Air Namibia, which stopped flying to Zimbabwe 13 years ago, will resume services to the country in May. Gosh, imagine that, capitalism. Rank incompetence being trounced by superior competitors. Gosh, it's like it's some sort of natural law or something.
Air Zimbabwe is facing the prospect of liquidation after being placed under judicial management following its rising debt level. Last month Zimbabwe's High Court appointed a judicial manager for the struggling airline and barred the Air Zimbabwe board from any involvement with the company. The move came after unpaid employees sought an intervention from the courts. Another shining success.
A lawyer representing the Air Zimbabwe workers, Caleb Mucheche, said the airline had failed to pay workers since January 2009 and had accumulated arrears of up to US$35 million by the end of December. You know, the amazing thing is that they continued to work so long. Socialist countries have a numbing effect on the mind. I would have been out of there and looking for a new job the second I didn't get paid.
A bill that would allow property owners to use deadly force to resist police is facing increasing resistance of its own. The proposed legislation would provide property owners the right to use deadly force to stop an illegal entry by law enforcement officers.
Which happens more frequently than the police would like to admit.
Current Indiana law gives homeowners the right to use whatever force they deem necessary to defend themselves and their property against unlawful entry. However, Senate Bill No. 1 is aimed directly at the police and would give property owners the same authority to use deadly force against officers perceived to have made unlawful entry.
Perception being the key. If you hear someone breaking into your home late at night and you use a weapon to defend the wife and kids, and it turns out that the entry artist was a local druggie, then you're a hero. But if it turns out that the people breaking and entering were police, you're charged with murder, even though your actions were exactly the same. Explain how that's right.
The Marion County Prosecutor's Office opposes that bill.
"I think carving out a specific law and putting it in our statutes saying that an individual can do that against a police officer is a recipe for disaster and danger," Chief Counsel Laurel Judkins said.
Forgive me for noting this, sir, but the police officer is at risk for disaster and danger when he kicks in a door in the middle of the night on a 'no-knock' raid. Whether there is a law or not to cover me, if I were a gun owner and someone kicked in my door without announcing who they were, they just might have trouble. That's not a threat, but it is a reality for some homes and some neighborhoods.
And please don't get me started on the ways police invoke the blue wall of silence on these raids, particularly when something goes tragically wrong, such that you can't afterwards figure out the truth and have proper redress.
President of the Fraternal Order of Police Sgt. Bill Owensby said metro police serve thousands of search and arrest warrants each year, and in many cases officers make forced entries to arrest suspected drug dealers or violent-crime suspects.
And occasionally break into the wrong home. Or arrest and terrorize innocent people. Who then have little, if any, recurse under the law, and who face police and prosecutors who shrug the whole incident off as just part of doing business.
Now one could suggest that instead of a 'right to resist', we should have a 'right to redress', so that when the police get it wrong the homeowner is promptly made whole and the responsible police officers are terminated from employment. Then perhaps we wouldn't need a 'right to resist'.
"And if one of these (suspects) gets wind that they may have a defense saying, 'I didn't know it was a police officer,' and can kill him, we don't have any ramifications there. We have a dead cop we're burying," Owensby said.
So you make sure, up front and with your best loudspeaker, that the people inside the home know that there are cops outside. Perhaps video shot on a camera where the tape can't be conveniently deleted later would help.
The right to resist legislation has also drawn the attention of domestic violence advocates who fear the proposal could endanger victims and have a chilling effect on police.
"I think if there's hesitancy on the behalf of police to go in that home and protect that victim, then that could really impact that victim's safety. It also sends a message to victims not to call the police because their hands are tied," Coburn Place Executive Director Julia Kathary said.
That is a red herring excuse. The hands of the police are never tied when it comes to rescuing a victim from danger. That isn't the issue here.
The right to resist legislation may face amendments. But opponents call the bill in any form unacceptable.
The proposal now moves to the House for more discussion.
Law and order starts with the police obeying the law. There have been over the years just enough examples of police abusing their powers in these midnight raids to generate legislation like this. Good police departments and police chiefs might want to re-think what they're doing and why.
#1
This seems to be the first push-back against the new post 9-11 police powers. The combination of warrant-less searches, no knock invasions, SWAT terrorizing of households, and absolutely no apologies for even grievous mistakes, trauma and destruction has, in the mind of many people, become intolerable.
There were very good reasons for the 4th Amendment and all the other restraints on law enforcement behavior, created even *before* there were police, as such. And nothing, even the War on Terror and other wars, has changed these fundamental rights.
Police did quite well back when they needed a warrant issued by a judge to search or invade the property or communications of a citizen. And they were not unconscionably constricted by needing probable cause.
And if there was no armed violence, not just the theoretical potential for armed violence, taking place, there was no need for SWAT. If this meant they only worked for a few hours each year, then the question arises were they needed in the first place?
#2
Obviously, they don't understand that this is supposed to make the police CHECK TWICE before busting in to someone's house and terrorizing their family. "Whoops, wrong address" ain't gonna cut it. Gosh, maybe we shouldn't have so many drug warrants in the first place. Change the thinking, people.
#3
Who then have little, if any, recurse under the law, and who face police and prosecutors who shrug the whole incident off as just part of doing business.
You left JURIES out of this equation. Police & prosecutors will do everything they can to leave juries out of this equation. Juries can and will sometimes nullify legal procedures that violate a sense of decency.
#4
Perhaps video shot on a camera where the tape can't be conveniently deleted later would help.
Good luck on that one. Deletion of such records by police & legal officials seems to be a routine nowadays.
#5
the responsible police officers are terminated from employment
Contracts with police unions render that difficult or impossible. Disputes about employment are usually turned over to arbitrators, who frequently overturn such terminations. The most reliable way to 'fire' a police officer is to convict him of a felony, not an easy task.
All the more reason to ban police unions outright.
A 54-year-old imam was found shot in the head in Strömsund in northwestern Sweden on Wednesday in what police have classified as attempted murder. Police received a call around 1:30pm on Wednesday afternoon that the man, identified by Sveriges Television (SVT) as Obydkhon Sobitkhony, had been found bullet shot with gun shot wounds.
"He was shot at least once in the head, but there may have been more shots. He was improving for awhile last night but during the day on Thursday certain complications came up which have made his condition worse," Östersund police detective Ted Persson told the local Östersunds Posten (ÖP) newspaper on Thursday.
Sobitkhony, who is known by the surname Nazarov, serves as a holy man in Strömsund, where he has lived since coming to Sweden in 2006 as a political refugee from Uzbekistan.
He is being treated at hospital in Umeå for what have been described as life threatening injuries.
According to SVT, a gun believed to be used in Wednesday's shooting was found near where Sobitkhony lay and around 30 officers participated in the preliminary investigation by combing the scene for clues and knocking on doors in the vicinity.
"The door knocking as yielded positive results thus far," Persson told the newspaper.
However, some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them...
local police have made an appeal to the public for more information about the shooting.
Sobitkhony is a known critic of the regime in Uzbekistan and came to Sweden along with scores of other political refugees after a 2005 crackdown by Uzbek government troops in Andijan in which hundreds of protesters were killed, although the exact number of casualties remains in dispute.
At the time of the incident, known as the Andijan massacre, the Uzbek government claimed the demonstrations were organized by Islamic radicals.
In the wake of the influx of Uzbek refugees, Strömsund, a town of just over 4,000 residents, has seen a rise in hate crimes ranging from racist graffiti to the burning down of a mosque in the city in 2008.
According to SVT, there were threats against Sobitkhony but, police were unwilling to confirm or deny the existence of threats directed against the imam.
"However, some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them...
there are threats against other Uzbeks who are currently in Strömsund," said Persson.
While local police are running the investigation, both Interpol and Swedish security service Säpo have been informed of the incident.
"For the moment, we don't have any suspects, but we do have some forensic evidence," Persson told ÖP.
#2
Besoeker, like the Jesuits, the Quakers will teach anyone, and it's an elite private school. These kids will go on to ivy league colleges, and from there some of them will end up running the country -- the same path taken by our current president. This matters.
?We understand that the future of Jewish life depends on the careful preparation of dedicated and impassioned individuals who are called to leadership.:
#5
The Friends school is popular for the wealthy and political elte to wearhouse their children. Al the Gore did as Obama did for a time. Parents drop them off and may see them on a holiday but few visits. These kids live in a different world.
They are to marry money. The are handed the keys to power. They always build upon what they are given. Some do that better than others.
CANBERRA (Reuters) - Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai said his government talks to the Taliban every day through intermediaries, according to an interview by Australia's SBS television for broadcast on Tuesday.
"We talk to the Taliban every day. We were talking to them just a few days ago somewhere around this region," Karzai said in an interview taped a week ago in Kabul with SBS, adding his contact with the group's one-eyed leader Mullah Omar was through indirect means.
"(But) not personally," Karzai said when asked if he had spoken with Omar. "I mean not directly, person to person. But through intermediaries, yes."
Karzai and many Western analysts say the reclusive leader is based in the Pakistani city of Quetta.
Which is why we have drones orbiting there...
Karzai also stressed that peace talks with the Taliban, who were originally backed by Islamabad, are key to regional stability and bringing peace as well to Pakistan, a player seen as crucial to efforts to end the war in Afghanistan.
"It's no longer Afghanistan that's the subject of conversation, or the issue. It's Pakistan as well. It's peace in Pakistan as well. It's stability in Pakistan as well," he said.
The interview was recorded before Karzai's visit to Islamabad last week, where he upset Pakistan by asking for access to Afghan Taliban leaders belonging to the so-called Quetta Shura, or leadership council, named after the Pakistani city where it is said to be based.
Afghans have always been suspicious of Pakistani intentions because of historical ties between Pakistani intelligence and insurgent groups like the Afghan Taliban. Pakistan has consistently denied the existence of the Quetta Shura. Karzai said despite the history, he is also keen to work together with Islamabad to help advance peace talks with the Taliban.
"We as the Afghan people and government are willing to help Pakistan work for peace in Afghanistan and work for peace in Pakistan, together," Karzai said in fluent English.
Karzai added that Afghanistan was making progress on security in the eleventh year of a costly war, local and foreign support for which is souring.
Which would be easier if we didn't have to worry about your people gunning down our soldiers...
The Afghan leader also said the Taliban would not return to power in a total capacity.
"I don't think the Taliban will ever come back to take Afghanistan, no," he said. "Two years ago I would have been uncertain and unwilling to give you an answer as firm as I do today. The Afghan people will not go back to the nothing of 10 years ago."
Federal agents are investigating Florida House Rep. Richard L. Steinberg, D-Miami Beach, for sending a series of suggestive and harassing text messages to a married Miami female prosecutor over the course of three years, according to court records.
"I acknowledge and take full responsibility for sending inappropriate and unsolicited messages to Mrs. Marlene Fernandez-Karvetsos, whom I have known for more than 15 years. I deeply regret and wholeheartedly apologize for the disrespect that I have shown her, her husband and my constituents.
"Most importantly, words cannot express how sorry I am to my wife, for the disrespect I have shown her, and my entire family," he said through a spokesman. "I am incredibly sorry for being caught." What a brave man. Did the spokesman have a tear in his eye on behalf of his boss?
Steinberg was an attorney specializing in commercial litigation and transactions at Steinberg & Associates, P.A. His wife, Micky, who moved with her family to the area at the age of 6, is a Realtor with Palm Properties of South Florida.
#2
Isn't that kind of behaviour illegal as well as rude? If so, an apology doesn't even begin to address it. Separately, by did she wait three years to do something about it?
#6
I AM tired of the "both sides" argument. There is one party corrupt to it's soul and entire being. With no virtue and morals. That one party is DEMOCRAT.
Four of the terrorists released in the bargain for kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit have gone back to terrorist activity.
Say it isn't so!
The four were recently arrested, and may return to prison. Military prosecutors are asking to send the four back to finish their original sentences. But their lawyers are asking for a new trial and sentencing based only on their latest crimes.
Either way a life sentence solves the problem. A death sentence solves it more quickly...
The four have been identified as Hana al-Shalabi, 25, of Islamic Jihad, Iman Sharwana, 36, of Hamas, Iman abu-Daoud, 34, of Hamas, and Majdi al-Ajouli of Islamic Jihad.
Security sources quoted by the Hebrew-language daily Yediot Aharonot warned that those four Shalit deal terrorists are not alone in having returned to terrorism. Many of those released in the deal would like to free those terrorists remaining in Israel's prisons by arranging another release deal. To that end, they are seeking to kidnap Israeli soldiers or civilians.
1,027 terrorists were freed in exchange for Shalit. Before their release the terrorists were asked to sign forms promising not to engage in terrorism in the future.
#5
there is a decent chance that the 4 were caught because of intel provided by one of the other releasees- that has happened in the past
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
02/24/2012 16:05
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#6
1,027 terrorists were freed in exchange for Shalit. Before their release the terrorists were asked to sign forms promising not to engage in terrorism in the future.
Signed forms (hand writing recognition). Read the form aloud in your native tongue...just to make certain you understand the conditions prior to signing (voice recognition recorded). Photos, mail forwarding addresses, proper haircut (DNA samples). A lift to your old neighborhood. Free cellie. That about wraps it up Mo, please keep in touch.
#8
I wish, just once, they'd actually do that. Drop them from 15,000 ft and say they returned a terrorist. They condemnation would be huge, but not anymore than usual. They'd probably get more pats on the back, behind the scene, than anything else. And it would give the terrorists something to think of. You don't die and get captured, you get X amount of time to pray till you go SPLAT.
Posted by: Charles ||
02/24/2012 21:28
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#9
Nah, next time just give back their heads, wrapped in premium fish wrap, NYT.
Posted by: Silentbrick - Halliburton Lost Drill Bit Division ||
02/24/2012 23:15
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Pakistan on Friday urged leaders of the Afghan Taliban to enter direct peace negotiations with the government of Afghanistan, a sign that Islamabad may be stepping up support for reconciliation in Afghanistan.
Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani in a statement said that Pakistan was "prepared to do whatever it takes" to support the reconciliation process. He called on Hizb-i-Islami and other terrorist militant groups to negotiate peace.
Rahimullah Yusufzai, an expert on regional affairs, said Gilani's comments indicate a shift in Pakistani policy. He said, "It's important because I am hearing this for the first time, that the Pakistani prime minister or somebody that important is urging the Taliban ... to talk directly to the Afghan government."
Tuesday Kandahar peace council head Ata Mohammad Ahmadi said that Afghan officials had been meeting for "some time" with mid-level Taliban commanders in Quetta, where their leadership is based.
It is not likely that such meetings could take place in Quetta without the knowledge of Pakistani intelligence agencies. Pakistan may have increased its cooperation with the Afghan government by allowing the meetings in Quetta.
At least six people were killed when gunmen opened fire in southern Philippines in an apparant retaliation attack over the arrest of a suspected Muslim terrorist militant.
Ten gunmen swooped down late Thursday on the village of Tininghalang in Zamboanga del Sur province and opened fire on the victims, said Lieutenant Colonel Randolph Cabangbang. He said, "Six were killed and an undetermined number were wounded."
Cabangbang said that the victims were relatives of a government militiaman who helped police arrest a suspected Muslim terrorist rebel this month. He said the gunmen were led by the brother of the arrested suspect.
Not Predators, helicopters. Probably black and making that whomp-whomp-whomp sound. They got two vehicles, three imported jihadis -- one of whom may have been a Number Three from Kenya, the others appearing to be from other continents -- and a local al Shabaaber. The rest of the convoy got away. Also a nice map of the disposition of forces, for those who crave such things.
Former UN chief Kofi Annan has played diplomatic poker with dictators ranging from Saddam Hussein to Omar al-Bashir,
...and was fleeced every time...
but the odds are stacked against him in taking on Syria's ruthless president.
Two terms as UN secretary general, during which he won the Nobel Peace Prize but was himself accused of corruption, taught the 73-year-old Ghanaian how to look after himself in international negotiations.
Eloquent and inept self-effacing, Annan left office at the end of 2006 as one of the most popular UN leaders ever.
Popular to whom? Dictators?
"A real pro," was how Human Rights Watch's director Kenneth Roth described Annan after the announcement Thursday that the former UN leader would be the United Nations and Arab League's special envoy on the Syria crisis.
Apart from a few years when he was Ghana's director of tourism, Annan devoted his working life to the United Nations and other international agencies.
Having been in charge of UN human resources, its budget and then peacekeeping, the UN Security Council recommended Annan as secretary general in 1996. Mission impossibles soon came his way.
In 1998, Annan had to go to Baghdad to negotiate with Saddam after the Iraqi strongman threw out UN inspectors looking for signs of nuclear and chemical weapons. He secured a deal to get inspectors back in, but it soon collapsed and US and British planes were bombing Iraq within months.
#7
I forgot about that. See, this makes Kofi the perfect choice: he's an expert on ignoring genocide, an expert I tells ya!
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/24/2012 14:11
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#8
As I remember, AFP always did like to give my boy Kofi Ye Olde Tongue Bath back in the good old days. Looks like some things never change.
One damn fine piece of revisionist history AFP...
#9
Ahh,Kofi...You were always so sophisticated at the UN until the World Bank sucked you up. And, how could they not?
What? With that sparse metro-sexual soul-patch and those soulful eyes of yours? Why who could possibly resist? we are at your mercy, Kind Sir. We beg you to return to NYC to boost in any way that you can, Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Lord of Lords,King of Kings and Son of our creator; our one true God. Please come soon, Lord Jesus to redeem your flock, whom You know.
The LA Times reported Friday that US intelligence agencies do not believe Iran is actively trying to build an atomic bomb.
I was wondering where those CIA analysts went after their retirements...
A highly classified US intelligence assessment circulated to policymakers early last year largely affirms that view, originally made in 2007. Both reports, known as national intelligence estimates, conclude that Tehran halted efforts to develop and build a nuclear warhead in 2003.
To put it in blunt Anglo-Saxon, bullshit. Either the US intelligence agencies are uniformly incompetent or they are for some reason lying... Or the LA Times is being sparing with the facts; this has been known to happen, though at the moment no example springs to mind.
#1
How about Iraq? US intelligence agencies are cowed enough to tell their bosses what their bosses want to hear, even if they take a PR hit for being very wrong.
This is because if they don't tell their bosses what they want to hear, they will be fired, and somebody else hired who will.
Thus defeating the entire purpose of intelligence.
#4
How about Iraq? US intelligence agencies are cowed enough to tell their bosses what their bosses want to hear, even if they take a PR hit for being very wrong.
What part Moose, something about this thingy that the MSM keeps buried.
#7
But-t-t, FOX NEWS AM = claims to have recieved a copy of confidential UNIAEA Report which says Iran is making [selective] improvements to its NucProg "specific" towards the eventual development of NucWeapons.
NOT NEEDED FOR DEDICAT CIVILIAN ENERGY PURPOSES BUT IS REQUIRED IFF ONE WANTS DA BOMB.
"DUAL-USE", ala the WE-WANT-TO/CAN-BUT-WON'T-RIGHT-NOW "JAPAN/EGYPT" MODEL, ESPEC "JAPAN".
No "official" or "third-party[s]" confirmation of Iran NucWeaps means US-Allies + UNCOM will get the blame for starting any de facto war agz Iran AS WELL AS BLAME FOR ANY NEW MAJOR OR CATASTROPHIC PROXY TERROR ATTACKS LAUNCHED AGZ CONUS, I.E. ATTACKS AGZ WHITE HOUSE + CONGRESS, NCA, US CITIES, ETC.
versus
* DEFENCE FORUM INDIA > WSJ: US BULKS UP ON IRAN DEFENSES, i.e. its "other" anti-Iran Air, Land mil capabilities in the Gulf in support of the US Fifth Fleet + Allies in case Iran does try to close the Straits of Hormuz.
* SAME > POSSIBLE IRAN ATTACK TESTS US-ISRAEL RELATIONS AS ELECTIONS APPROACH: ANALYSIS.
#8
OOOOPPPSIES, forgot DEFENCE FORUM INDIA > [Trilateral Summit] IRAN COMES TO SOUTH ASIA.
Tehran desires to end its isolationism by making econ openings wid PAKISTAN, INDIA, + even CHINA; + use the Energy Trade to TRANSFORM, MODERNIZE, + INFLUENCE ENERGY-STARVED SOUTH ASIA.
* SAME > "SOUTH ASIAN SPRING" IN RETREAT.
Many Govts-States in South Asia moving backward from [Western-style] liberal democracy toward hard-line authoritarianism.
IOW, RADICAL ISLAM = MILTERRS WILL HAVE THE ADVANTAGE.
#3
Malware to steal iranian credit card numbers?
Illegal internet gambling software the became self aware?
The pushiest penis pill ad ever, stuck in a loop?
Google's new beta version with enhanced privacy intrusion?
The possibilities are endless.
#4
Basically stuxnet was coded by someone with working knowledge of the Iranian nuclear set up. And it was written to deceive not to destroy the process. Very interesting clip I recommend it.
#5
Actually it's an hour video, and the good stuff comes around the 40 - 45 minute mark.
Bottom line:
1) The really destructive code was only 2 lines. The rest of the code was making sure the attacks occurred randomly.
2) He concludes that the team(s) that wrote this built a mirror copy of the Iranian uranium enrichment facility to make sure the attack would work as designed.
Al
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
02/24/2012 13:55
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#6
The capper is the virus that comes after STUXNET. It collected all the data and sent it back to the original programmers so they could see the effects of what they had done. Bottom line, it killed 1,000 centerfuge and even the brag video on Iran TV proved it.
BEIJING, Feb. 23 -- Envoys from North Korea and the United States held "substantive and serious" talks on Thursday over the North's nuclear weapons program, U.S. chief negotiator Glyn Davies said, announcing an agreement to extend the rare bilateral dialogue by one day.
The Beijing talks, the first since the December death of the North's former leader Kim Jong-il, are widely seen as a chance to gauge whether Pyongyang's new young leader, Kim Jong-un, is open to negotiations to get the communist regime to give up its nuclear ambitions.
Davies told reporters he and his North Korean counterpart Kim Kye-gwan discussed "quite a number of the issues" and plan to hold more talks in the Chinese capital on Friday.
The North's chief envoy Kim also described the Thursday meeting as "positive," saying both sides took part in the talks with a "serious attitude."
Davies said he would hold a dinner meeting with the North Korean delegation.
That clearly got the Norks' attention...
Before the start of the talks, Davies told reporters, "Today is, as we say, 'Game Day.'" Also on Wednesday, Davies said he saw a "positive sign," but the possibility of resuming six-party talks over the North's nuclear program is up to Pyongyang, reiterating a diplomatic sound bite often used by South Korean and U.S. diplomats commenting on prospects for the multilateral forum.
In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner described the Beijing meeting as "exploratory talks." Toner said the issue of resuming U.S. food aid to North Korea would be discussed during the Beijing talks.
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Many in the Islamic regime believe that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who became the Iranian supreme leader after Khomeini's death, is the chosen one to pass the flag of Islam to Imam Mahdi. In fact, statements made by close associates of Khamenei indicate that the supreme leader himself is convinced that he is the one who will trigger the coming.
Mahdi, in Shiite belief, will reappear at the time of Armageddon.
The holy mans in Iran have set up a center in the city of Qom specifically to track signs for the coming as they rely on centuries of hadiths from Muhammad and his descendants that have predicted signs in which the end of times will come and the last Islamic Messiah will reappear, killing all infidels and those who won't convert to Islam and raising the flag of Islam across the globe.
The coming of Mahdi only awaits these last signs, as all of the signs that the hadiths herald have already taken place: Chaos, famine and havoc will engulf the Earth; major wars with dark clouds (atomic wars) will burn the Earth; one-third of the Earth's population will be killed, and the rest will suffer hunger and lawlessness.
As revealed last year, an Iranian secret documentary, "The Coming Is Upon Us," clearly indicates that the bully boyz ruling Iran believe that worldwide war and the destruction of Israel will trigger the coming of the last Islamic Messiah.
Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym for a former CIA operative in Iran's Revolutionary Guards and the author of the award-winning book, A Time to Betray. He is a senior fellow with EMPact America and teaches at the U.S. Department of Defense's Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy (JCITA).
#7
I fear it may be a little more than a "streak" of Nazi. I believe I detect a pattern:
Islam Under the Swastika
The Grand Mufti and the Nazi Protectorate of Bosnia-Hercegovina, 1941-1945
by Carl Savich
The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem: Haj Amin el Husseini
Haj Amin el Husseini arrived in Europe in 1941 following the unsuccessful pro-Nazi coup which he organized in Iraq. He met German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and was officially received by Adolf Hitler on November 28,1941 in Berlin. Nazi Germany established for der Grossmufti von Jerusalem a Bureau from which he organized the following: 1) radio propaganda on behalf of Nazi Germany; 2) espionage and fifth column activities in Muslim regions of Europe and the Middle East; 3) the formation of Muslim Waffen SS and Wehrmacht units in Bosnia-Hercegovina, Kosovo-Metohija, Western Macedonia, North Africa, and Nazi-occupied areas of the Soviet Union; and, 4) the formation of schools and training centers for Muslim imams and mullahs who would accompany the Muslim SS and Wehrmacht units. As soon as he arrived in Europe, the Mufti established close contacts with Bosnian Muslim and Albanian Muslim leaders. He would spend the remainder of the war organizing and rallying Muslims in support of Nazi Germany.
#8
What Besoeker said. As I recall, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf have rivalled each other for Very Best Seller status across the Muslim world for decades.
Also, as I recall, Haj Amin el Husseini was an uncle or close cousin (and probably the same thing, genetically speaking) of that hero of antisemites, Yasser Arafat of the PLO.
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#1
Happy Birthday/Daily Gam Shot
Kristin Davis aka Charlotte York in "Sex and the City (TV Series 19982004)" aka Liz in "Journey 2: The Mysterious Island (2012)" aka Lucy in "Couples Retreat (2009)" aka Kelly Finch in "Deck the Halls (2006)" aka Rebecca Douglas in "The Shaggy Dog (2006)" (age 47)
#4
Heh. Angie's been busy with that no-account football stud she married.
Seriously, if you'll recall a while back we made an agreement that the Bloid and Daily Gam Shots would 'tone it down' a little. Fred's been good about where the line on the Bloid is, of course, but as he once pointed out, I was a little more 'modern'.
(I take that as a compliment, of course)
So I could run a pic of Angie but I'd have to find a tame one. It would take a while.
This week I've had a theme.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/24/2012 8:38
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#9
Steve, I'd have posted the announcement of her Gracie Award Wednesday, but figured that was your turf.
Feb 22, 2012 · The 2012 Gracie Awards winners were announced today, and Angie Harmon was named Outstanding Female Actor in a Leading Role in a Drama Series or Special
#14
Beavis, I don't think it was Jeri who gave us Obama - but "somebody" who managed to convince the judge to release the custody records. Both she and her ex-husband Jack Ryan begged the judge not to release them on the grounds that it would hurt their child. Once the revelations about sex clubs, etc. came out, Jack Ryan withdrew from the Senate campaign, and Obama won by default.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
02/24/2012 18:08
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#15
Both she and her ex-husband Jack Ryan begged the judge not to release them on the grounds that it would hurt their child.
STOCKHOLM A Swedish artist who angered Muslims by depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a dog was pelted with eggs during a university lecture when he presented another drawing of Islams revered prophet, police and the artist said Wednesday.
Lars Vilks told The Associated Press that he was not harmed in Tuesdays attack at Karlstad University in central Sweden and that he continued his lecture on the limits of free speech after police evicted the protesters from the building.
Vilks, who has received numerous death threats from radical Islamists, said about a dozen people started yelling and hurling eggs at him when he presented a sketch showing Muhammad and 19th-century Danish writer Hans Christian Andersen at a beer factory.
They were just waiting for the right moment to go to attack, he told AP.
The 65-year-old artist said he made the drawing in 2006, inspired by the debate that year over 12 Danish newspaper cartoons of Muhammad, which sparked furious protests in Muslim countries.
Karlstad police spokesman Per Strom said the attackers had been identified and the incident was being investigated, but no arrests have been made.
So the attackers are identified and there is video of their attack, but no arrests. I'm guessing no prosecutions. I'm guessing the police want Vilks dead.
Though there was a police presence at the lecture, the audience had not been searched because such measures must be announced in advance, Strom said.
So announce it...
Vilks has faced a string of threats and violence over his more well-known drawing of Muhammad as a dog in 2007. In 2010, he was forced to abandon a lecture at another Swedish university when protesters rushed toward the stage and scuffled with police.
Last year, a woman from Pennsylvania pleaded guilty in a plot to try to kill Vilks, and a year earlier two brothers were jailed for trying to burn down his house in southern Sweden.
A woman from Pennsylvania. Must have been Amish. And the brothers must have been Lutherans...
Vilks said he wont be deterred from making public appearances.
Ive experienced this so much now. It is what it is. You have to expect these things, he said. I have good protection and it works the way it should.
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We add the cartoon to remember what kind of stupidity the idiots are getting nasty about.
Controversial Swedish artist Lars Vilks was forced to dodge eggs thrown by angry audience members while giving a lecture about his Mohammad cartoons and free expression at the University of Karlstad on Tuesday.
o Vilks murder plot suspects acquitted (20 Jan 12)
o Three charged for plot to murder Lars Vilks (6 Dec 11)
o 'Jihad Jane' ally admits to Vilks murder plot (9 Mar 11)
"They were also shouting some slogans. We removed them as well as two people who had started shouting back at the 15 (egg throwers). At the time it was a bit tumultuous but the commotion only lasted for about a minute," said Tommy Lindh of the local police to news agency TT.
Vilks was lecturing on freedom of speech at the university on Tuesday evening at the invitation of the university's association of international affairs (Utrikespolitiska föreningen).
The local Islamic Culture Association (Islamiska kulturföreningen) and Karlstad Young Moslems (Unga muslimer i Karlstad) had called for a boycott of the lecture earlier in the day, writing in a statement that Vilks "abuses the freedom of speech that we all enjoy and uses it in such a way as to create tension sin society"
Vilks began his lecture bringing up examples of artists who have challenged the boundaries of freedom of speech in different ways, several of whom have been reported to the police and convicted.
Among these was an exhibition on pornographic images of children, Malmö street artist Dan Park's poster of a black man in chains with the text "Our Negro slave has run away", Vilks's own caricature of the prophet Muhammed as a dog and Jesus as a paedophile, according to a university statement.
A short while into the lecture, fifteen people suddenly rose and began throwing eggs at Vilks. Two other members of the audience reacted against the attack and started shouting at the egg-throwers.
However, Caliphornia hasn't yet slid into the ocean, no matter how hard it's tried... coppers present at the speech were quickly able to remove the disturbing elements from the auditorium and the lecture could continue.
According to the police, no one has been locked away as of yet, nor was Vilks hit by any of the eggs thrown by the irate members of the audience as he was rushed off stage.
"We have yet to decide whether or not a criminal act has been committed. Vilks might also report the incident himself," said Lindh to Sveriges Television (SVT).
So the attackers are identified and there is video of their attack, but no arrests. I'm guessing no prosecutions. I'm guessing the police want Vilks dead.
I'm sure they don't want any such thing. But it certainly would make things calmer if he weren't about.
"Will no one rid us of this meddlesome cartoonist?"
The university association for international affairs were pleased with the visit, despite the attack.
"It is important that we are able to discuss questions about freedom of speech and democracy at the university. We regret that this occurred but we are happy that we could carry on," said Mazlom Dogan of the association in a statement.
Police couldn't elaborate on what the egg throwers had been chanting as they staged their attack.
Allah Ackbar maybe?
But according to Lindh the officers who were present are likely to have heard what was being shouted.
Vilks told local paper Nya Wermlands Tidningen (NWT) that while no one should accept these kind of attacks, they are hard to avoid if one wants to be able to make everyone welcome to a public event.
Perhaps such people should not be made welcome, then.
Also, it isn't the first time he has encountered threatening behaviour.
Ah. A serial surrender monkey.
"I have been around the block before," Vilks said to NWT.
So he's proud of it?
At the end of the lecture many in the audience wanted to know what reactions Vilks wanted to get from his art and whose responsibility these reactions were.
"Insults are part of democratic society. If we begin censoring ourselves it will mean undermining freedom of speech in the long run. I don't think that the problem is that artists are too provocative but that we are not provocative enough," said Vilks in answer to their questions.
According to NWT, police have identified several of the attackers and have reported the incident as assault and disturbing a public assembly.
#1
There is a scene in the movie Apocalypse Now! that dramatizes the dangers inherent in ignoring small provocations.
As the boat travels a narrows, it is suddenly deluged by blunt arrows. At first frightened, the crew soon realizes that the arrows are blunt, and drop their guard. Then their chief is impaled by a spear thrown by one of the attackers.
This is the "lone gunman in a nonviolent mob" approach. The mob likely does not know that someone is using them as a distraction to kill, but they provide good concealment for a real attack to be made.
Wake up? Maybe. But we could say 'not completely comatose'...
LONDON: International powers called Thursday for urgent action on Somalia, warning that the world will "pay the price" for failing to help the country tackle political unrest, militants and pirates.
We've been helping. What do they think all those soldiers and Predators are all about, anyway?
Senior representatives from over 40 countries and organizations attended the Lancaster House conference that discussed what should follow the transitional institutions in Mogadishu in August 2012 and the establishment of a joint financial management board.
Addressing the conference, Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal said : "The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is still contacting all Somali forces who genuinely wish to see an end to the burning issue."
Not to mention all the ones who don't, but that's not to be talked about publicly.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon, British Prime Minister David Cameron and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were among those attending the talks in London, along with the Somali president.
"These problems in Somalia don't just affect Somalia. They affect us all. If the rest of us just sit back and look on, we will pay a price for doing so," Cameron said. "It's a country where there is so little hope, where there is chaos and violence and terrorism, pirates are disrupting vital trade routes and kidnapping tourists."
Clinton said the US would push for sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, for those "standing in the way" of progress by the fragile transitional government, the mandate for which expires in August. She also pledged an extra $64 million in humanitarian assistance to the region to help improve the lives of ordinary Somalis, blighted by famine and civil war for the past 21 years.
Ban urged the world to build on recent progress after the UN agreed to boost the African Union peacekeeping force in the country to 17,000, and after Al-Shabab rebels were driven from a key town.
While commending the efforts of the British Premier David Cameron to bring peace in Somalia, Prince Saud said Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah initiated the signing of a national conciliation agreement by Somali factions in Jeddah in 2009. He said Saudi Arabia believed that all Somali factions without the exception of any personality or group should be involved in making a just and comprehensive solution acceptable to all parties.
The prince also pointed out that Saudi Arabia has been striving all along to reduce the poverty in Somalia. "The last Saudi aid given to help the famine stricken Somalia people was $70 million besides a contribution of more than $53 million by the Saudi people between 2009 and 2011. This was apart from the thousands of tons of dates, other food materials, medical supplies and shelter materials supplied to the suffering people," the prince said, adding that the Kingdom has also been giving additional aid as part of the decision of the Arab summits on the issue.
How much went to the Widows Ammunition Fund, your Corpulenceness?
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#1
It's all our fault. all ways and ever more. pantywaist.
TEHRAN: Iran said on Wednesday it is ready to help identify those behind a series of kabooms in Thailand this month in which several Iranians have been implicated. "Iran stands ready to identify those responsible for the kabooms and to present them to the international community in a sign of our good faith," the foreign ministry front man said, quoted by official IRNA news agency. Ramin Mehmanparast added that Israeli accusations of Tehran being behind the February 14 kabooms in Bangkok were "bereft of all truth," and that such allegations were "a scenario put out by US and Israeli officials." Thai authorities this week issued an arrest warrant for a fifth Iranian suspected of involvement in the blasts, which were described as an alleged plot to kill Israeli diplomats.
Truly, the generous spirit of the Muslim Republic of Iran (or whatever their formal name is) is unparalleled.
I suspect the bad boyz will be found to be members of MKO, out to give the theocrats a bad name.
What is your thinking, Fred -- that while the Mullahs may talk big, they aren't actually brave enough to take on Israel so directly?
I think they'll try for a back alley war and probably another war in Leb. If Pencilneck's on the ropes there may be a flare-up in the Golan Heights, with Hamas singing sweet harmony...
PESHAWAR: Thirteen people, including two children, fell victim to Thursdays devastating car bombing at a city bus terminal packed with southern districts-bound passengers in the morning rush hour, officials said.
Around 25 passenger vans were destroyed in the bombing, Peshawar District Coordination Officer (DCO) Siraj Ahmed told the media after the remote-controlled car-bomb exploded. The DCO said that passengers from Darra Adamkhel, Kohat, Hangu, Karak and Bannu used the bus terminal.
Chaos followed the blast, as people from nearby localities rushed to the site help in relief and rescue efforts, witnesses said. It was a huge blast, heard far off, said Dilawar, a shopkeeper.
High-grade explosives were used in the attack, said Shafqat Malik, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa additional inspector general of the Bomb Disposal Squad (BDS). He said the bomb was apparently remote-controlled, as no body parts were found to indicate a suicide bomber carried out the attack.
The explosion comes just days after a federal intelligence agency warning that vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (IDE) attack was likely in the city. However, the target was not specified in the report, a senior police official told Daily Times.
It is not clear whether it was a targeted attack, or just a random activity to create chaos in order to put pressure on the government to stop action against terrorist organisations in neighbouring Khyber and Orakzai regions.
It seems that todays bombing was a reaction to the action being taken against terrorists, Peshawar Capital City Police Officer Imtiaz Altaf said, adding that it was one of the worst attacks the city had witnessed over the past year.
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ISLAMABAD: Interior Minister Rehman Malik on Thursday announced withdrawal of cases against the Baloch leaders currently residing abroad.
Remember Benazir, boys...
Following the governments reconciliation policy, I announce that Baloch leaders, including Barahamdagh Bugti and Hyrbiyar Marri, return to Pakistan to take part in the political and development process and I would personally receive them, he told reporters after chairing a high-level meeting held to review the implementation process of Aghaz-e-Haqooq-e-Balochistan package.
He said Balochistan needed a political solution to its problems and the coalition government of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) was determined to addressing the issue through political means. He dispelled the impression created by certain elements regarding the situation in the province, saying, We want to bring development in order to ensure stability and prosperity.
Malik also urged all Baloch and national leaders to participate in the All-Parties Conference being convened by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on the unrest in Balochistan.
I do not say the situation in the province is normal, but the way it has been propagated and portrayed is not right, he said while responding to another question.
He told the reporters that another decision taken during the meeting was FC Balochistan would not move in any district of the province without permission of the deputy commissioner. He further added that no FC checkpost would be established without permission of the Balochistan chief minister and that the FC and Coast Guards would exercise powers under the Customs Act, strictly in accordance with the law, and keep their deployment restricted to 10 kilometres of the international border.
So it's safe for the Taliban to move about in Balochistan now...
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#1
PAK GOVT-ALLEGED BLATANT + MALICIOUS US INTERVENTION IN BALOCHISTAN ...
* SAME > US CONGRESSMAN [Rohrabacher] CALLS FOR PAKISTAN'S LARGEST PROVINCE TO SECEDE, SPARKING LATEST CONFLICT. US-Pak diplomatic row.
* FYI DEFENCE FORUM INDIA > TIBETAN OFFICIALS ORDERED BY CHINA TO "PREPARE FOR SECCESSIONIST WAR"; + TIBET IN LOCKDOWN.
versus
* DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > [old = 11/2008] ALASKA + HAWAII HAVE STRONG SECESSIONIST MOVEMENTS TO BECOME INDEPENDENT + SEPARATE NATIONS.
* SAME > ALASKAN SEPARATISM HITS THE [American] MAINSTREAM.
Back to the Future of late 2008, via Pak Mil Forums.
Not unlike wid the US-vs-China, e.g. Himalayas-vs-Hawaii, pro-PAK MILBLOGGERS/POSTERS are arguing that iff the US desires to interfere in sovereign Pakistan affairs + induce the separation of Balochistan from Pakistan, THEN ISLAMABAD + ALLIES SHOULD RESPOND BY SUPPORTING VARIOUS INDIGENOUS SEPARATIST MOVEMENTS WIDIN THE US PROPER.
ARMING THEM, iff necessary.
Looks like the mighty North Korean invasion of CONUS ala "RED DAWN II" [remake] may yet still occur.
Irans economy is struggling because of crippling new restrictions on the countrys financial system, but no amount of sanctions will keep the mullahs from their headlong pursuit of nuclear weapons, which they hope will help usher in Islamic dominance of the world. The religious leaders believe it is their responsibility, as foreshadowed by the Quran, to bring about nuclear war to facilitate the coming of the last Islamic Messiah.
Two Iranian grand ayatollahs are now saying that the Earth will soon be under the feet of Muslims, as promised by the Quran.
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, indicated to his close associates that he saw a mandate for the final glorification of Allah to overthrow the Shah, establish an Islamic state and then pass the flag of Islam to the last Islamic Messiah. When asked if he would be the one to pass the flag, he responded that the one after me will be the one who will create the circumstances for the reappearance of Imam Mahdi, the Shiites 12th Imam.
Many in the Islamic regime believe that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who became the Iranian supreme leader after Khomeinis death, is the chosen one to pass the flag of Islam to Imam Mahdi. In fact, statements made by close associates of Khamenei indicate that the supreme leader himself is convinced that he is the one who will trigger the coming.
The clerics in Iran have set up a center in the city of Qom specifically to track signs for the coming as they rely on centuries of hadiths from Muhammad and his descendants that have predicted signs in which the end of times will come and the last Islamic Messiah will reappear, killing all infidels and those who wont convert to Islam and raising the flag of Islam across the globe.
The coming of Mahdi only awaits these last signs, as all of the signs that the hadiths herald have already taken place: Chaos, famine and havoc will engulf the Earth; major wars with dark clouds (atomic wars) will burn the Earth; one-third of the Earths population will be killed, and the rest will suffer hunger and lawlessness.
As revealed last year, an Iranian secret documentary, The Coming Is Upon Us, clearly indicates that the radicals ruling Iran believe that worldwide war and the destruction of Israel will trigger the coming of the last Islamic Messiah.
Stressed, though not the way you'd read that the first time.
JEDDAH: A national dialogue forum on Saudi media in Hail has called for increasing press freedom, separation of culture from the Ministry of Culture and Information and privatization of Saudi Television and Radio.
The forum, organized by King Abdul Aziz National Dialogue Center and attended by a large number of media persons and intellectuals, stressed the need for a national vision for Saudi media.
The 7-point proposal also called for a charter of honor for the media prepared by experts including forum participants and government representatives.
"The team will identify the principles to be included in the charter that would strengthen national unity, ensure intellectual security of society and contribute to preserving social peace, national building and protecting the country's achievements," the SPA said quoting the forum's final communiqué.
The participants said the relationship between the media and government departments should be based on confidence and credibility.
"Government organizations should provide the media with correct and complete information," they added.
They also called for revising the current Publication Law keeping in view of the speedy developments in the media sector. The media should fight tribal, regional and ideological bigotry and discrimination.
The participants were of the view that the media should possess the qualities of credibility, fair criticism, respect for readers and viewers, professionalism and knowing the limits of freedom.
In other words, the press will need to report what they're told to report by the government: that will be 'credible' and 'fair', and thus demonstrate 'respect'. The press then will be paid like the 'professionals' they are! having stayed within the 'limits'.
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#1
And if they don't kowtow, the Saudis will sic Interpol upon them.
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
02/24/2012 21:39
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Good question, Sarah, and one that I wish more Americans would ask.
Oh and by the way, the Korans were being handled because the prisoners were using them to hide messages. Next, I'll learn that Islamicist miscreants hide in burqas.
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#1
PALIN-BOLTON in 2012!
Psst-We have lots of great conservatives out there--We can tweak the mix to our advantage! Anything to pry Pharaoh and his godless minions/czars/Civil Service political burrowers and demons OUT! Santorum is correct. There are evil spiritual entities that are thousands of years old, poised to pounce on, and ravage our throats!
Turn the entire lot over to the Taliban, blow everything in-place. Kill anything thats gets in our way. Load up and fly outta there as quickly as possible. Leave the primitive, hopeless bastards to their goat buggering and dancing boys.
#4
I blame a political class unable to think outside of the Vietnam paradigm.
Afghanistan, the Afghans are not allies to be protected, they are enemies to be defeated.
AFTER defeating the enemy (and meting out measured punishment) you can be magnanimous, help the miserable rebuild their countries (in the image of Western civilization not barbarism.)
For historical reference here's a quote related to a successful project of liberation:
"b. Germany will not be occupied for the purpose of liberation but as a defeated enemy nation. Your aim is not oppression but to occupy Germany for the purpose of realizing certain important Allied objectives. In the conduct of your occupation and administration you should be just but firm and aloof. You will strongly discourage fraternization with the German officials and population."
A self confident, assertive occupation was able to bring positive change to Germany and Japan. It might have brought a measure of such change to Afghanistan and Iraq.
What happened was the application of theoretically overwhelming force combined with an incoherent but mostly weak and submissive political framework which never had a chance to succeed.
#5
Gratitude is an attribute of a society where cooperation is based on reciprocity. In Arab, and to the lesser extent all other Islamic "societies", cooperation is based on kin-selection.
#6
I must agree with you g(r)om, but I am sure you will agree, Islam does not have the market cornered on this type of...let me call it faith-based behavior.
Add to this the notion of 'nation-building', an unfortunate amalgam of 19th century imperialism and 20th century do-gooder progressism, in which we decided we could turn a group of Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazaras, Turkmen and crazy Pashtuns into a nation-state. I think that's exactly the moment we went down the wrong path.
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02/24/2012 8:49
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#9
It woulda worked better if we didn't decide a Pashtun had to be in charge, and a lot better if we didn't decide upon a particular caped Pashtun.
#10
IMO, you confuse cause & effect Besoeker. The "faith-based behavior" is due to inability to cooperate effectively. Well, never mind theories. Do you agree with me that it's much more profitable to teach calculus to dogs than democracy to Muslims?
#11
The Afghan people are murderous savages who spread worldwide misery with their opium and exist on an imprinted culture of crime, slavery, oppression, illiteracy, and pederasty.
#13
I've always thought that when we launched Enduring Freedom, we should have said the hell with winning hearts and minds--win the war. If that meant destroying everything in Afghanistan, so be it (Although I'm not sure anyone could tell the difference between Afghanistan undestroyed from Afghanistan destroyed). Not doing it is what brings on this candyassed $hit that is going on now. Moreover, we spread the notion of weakness to rest of the muslim world and invite more "kick me" behavior.
#14
The Afghan people are murderous savages who spread worldwide misery with their opium and exist on an imprinted culture of crime, slavery, oppression, illiteracy, and pederasty.
I understand that the rest of the Afghans think so of the Pashtuns, Penguin.
NAIROBI, Kenya: The commander of African Union troops in Somalia says that close to 300 members of the militant group Al-Shabab fledran away streamed out of Somalia in the direction of Yemen in recent days, a sign the militant group is under increasing pressure.
"Curly toed flippers don't fail me now!"
Maj. Gen. Fred Mugisha said Thursday that the recent announcement that Al-Shabab has formally merged with Al-Qaeda was an attempt to give a boost of confidence to an insurgent force that is losing power. He said the 300 militants -- mostly foreign fighters -- fled Somalia only days after the announced merger.
Perhaps we could chum the water...
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are they walking or driving?
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/24/2012 8:06
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Swimming...
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/24/2012 8:49
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BENGHAZI: A Libyan military court ruled on Wednesday that 50 people accused of fighting for Muammar Qaddafi and helping a mass jail break by alleged supporters of the deposed leader should be freed and tried instead in a civilian court.
Defense lawyers welcomed the ruling, saying most of the accused were civilians and that the military court on a base in the eastern city of Benghazi was struggling to try the case.
We feel this court is under pressure and... does not have the necessary judicial independence, said Saleh Omran, who represents 17 of the accused, denying that his clients were Qaddafi supporters. They helped the prisoners escape from jail because some of those held were their relatives and they were protecting them. It has nothing to do with Qaddafis men."
A transitional government has been keen to try Qaddafis family members and loyalists at home, but human rights activists worry that a weak central government and a lack of rule of law could rob them of the right to a fair trial.
The defendants are facing charges of using force against the revolutionary forces, terrorizing civilians and helping prisoners escape, as well as inciting people to commit crimes. Omran said some of those charges carry the death penalty.
The defendants are part of a militia that helped what officials from the transitional council said at the time were about 300 Qaddafi loyalists escape from custody in July.
Fifteen witnesses called to give evidence on Wednesday did not show up and hearings have been postponed twice since the trial began on Feb. 5, for security reasons and pending a request by some of the lawyers to review the evidence.
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ISLAMABAD: Speakers at and advocacy session "Are Registered Afghans Living in Pakistan 'Refugees in the real sense?'"
As much as the Palestinians*, to be sure.
organised by Community Appraisal and Motivation Programme (CAMP) on Thursday said the term "refugee" did not reflect the actual legal status of the Afghans living in Pakistan.
CAMP recently launched a baseline research report titled "Legal Status in Pakistan for Registered Afghans", which deals with the legal status of the registered Afghans in Pakistan. Some of the issues addressed in this study include evolution of their legal status over time; the international human rights and domestic legal and institutional framework governing them as non citizens in the absence of refugee law; their experiences in the Pakistani legal system, the types of remedies they have pursued for their problems and their sources of information on the law.
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#1
"If we've got some rice to sell, they ought to pay a premium for it just because this is the country that freed them."
That sounds like democratic values and ideas. We invaded you to make you a free democracy of sorts (probably a failed experiment), but forget capitalism and the free market.
I think maybe the rice business is not such a good idea when your competition is, well, all of Asia. Might be time to diversify a little.
#2
Rice is a commodity that is restricted just about everywhere in the world. Production quotas, tariffs, bans, price fixing, etc. In such a rigid market, any change will strongly rock the boat.
#3
Rice is a fungible commodity, it will sell just fine on the open market. There is not a glut of unused food in this world, rice is easy enough to sell on the open market. Still, it is a pain to lose a steady customer and have to hock your goods on the world wide marketplace.
ISLAMABAD: Reacting to Interior Minister Rahman Maliks statement regarding withdrawal of cases again Baloch leaders, BNP-Awami leader and Federal Minister for Food Security Israrullah Zehri has said, How can Rehman Malik abolish cases against Baloch leaders when he cannot even evacuate a single checkpost in Balochistan?
Talking to the media on Thursday, Zehri said he did not trust the interior minister, adding that the BNP would not participate in the APC on Balochistan until the killers of Bakhtiar Domkis family were arrested.
He said holding an APC with taking practical steps to resolve the issue was a waste of time.
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#1
ION DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > [Self-exiled Baloch Republican Party Chief] BARAHMDAGH BUGTI: WILL SUPPORT US, NATO, INDIA [any Foreign]INTERVENTION IN BALOCHISTAN, iff it means relieving on-going persecutions + genocidal? murders agz the Balochi People.
* SAME > [Self] EXILED BALOCH LEADER [Bugti] SEEKS INDIA BACKING | INDIA HAS ETHICAL OBLIGATION TO SPEAK OUT ON [Balochi] HUMAN RIGHTS CRISIS.
* SAME > {Video News] IMRAN KHAN GIVES SOLUTION TO BALOCHISTAN CRISIS.
#2
Is there *anyone* in Pakistani society who is trusted? Either people or institutions. And I ask that without any trace of snarkasm.
From the outside, the Paks seem to be running their own little Hobsonian war of all against all, with constantly shifting alliances and battle lines. Bin Laden showing up in a populated area is just an example.
said on Thursday the Syrian National Council (SNC) was a "credible representative" of the country's opposition, ahead of a meeting in Tunisia of the "Friends of Syria" group, Al Arabiya reported.
"The consensus opinion by the Arab League and all the others who are working and planning this conference is that the SNC is a credible representative and therefore they will be present" at a meeting in Tunis on Friday, she said.
Clinton said that the Syrian opposition will become increasing capable and find the means to launch attacks.
"There will be increasingly capable opposition forces. They will from somewhere, somehow find the means to defend themselves as well as begin offensive measures," she told reporters after taking part in a London conference on Somalia, according to Reuters.
"It is clear to me there will be a breaking point. I wish it would be sooner, so that more lives would be saved, than later, but I have absolutely no doubt there will be such a breaking point," she said.
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#1
See also LUCIANNE > {RealCLearPolitics] US NEEDS 75,000 TROOPS TO SECURE SYRIAN CHEMICAL PLANTS, besides also other non-Nuke WMD PLexes.
* ALso from SAME > US DOES NOT BELIEVE IRAN IS TRYING TO BUILD NUCLEAR BOMB.
Wel-l-l, it is the "Japan/Egypt Model" after all - IRAN WANTS TO BUILD ONE + COULD BUILD ONE BUT JUST DOESN'T WANT TO FOR THE TIME BEING.
IOW, IRAN = MICHELLE OBAMA = rly Rly Really R-E-A-L-L-Y RRREEEEAAALLLYYYY WANTS TO CARRY A PROTEST SIGN + EGGS, FIREBOMBS + AK47? RPG? BUT AS FLOTUS HAS TO SETTLE FOR PROMOTING ANTI-OBESITY KIDDIE DIETS. Perhaps in a Bammer 2nd Term???
#2
"It is clear to me there will be a breaking point. I wish it would be sooner, so that more lives would be saved, than later, but I have absolutely no doubt there will be such a breaking point," she said.
Her breadth of knowledge and vast understanding of geo-politics and the middle east is quite amazing. Like Obama, it must have surely been her Chicago experience.
GENEVA: Syrian forces have shot dead unarmed women and children, shelled residential areas and tortured wounded protesters in hospital under orders from the highest level of army and government officials, the United Nations said on Thursday.
Independent UN investigators called for perpetrators of such crimes against humanity to face prosecution and said they had drawn up a confidential list of names of commanding officers and officials alleged to be responsible.
The commission received credible and consistent evidence identifying high- and mid-ranking members of the armed forces who ordered their subordinates to shoot at unarmed protesters, kill soldiers who refused to obey such orders, arrest persons without cause, mistreat detained persons and attack civilian neighborhoods with indiscriminate tanks and machine gun fire, investigators said in a report to the UN Human Rights Council.
The commission of inquiry, headed by Brazilian Paulo Pinheiro, found that rebel forces led by the Free Syrian Army had also committed abuses including killings and abductions, although not comparable in scale.
Syrian authorities could not be immediately reached for comment on the commissions latest findings. But a Jan. 23 letter from its diplomatic mission in Geneva, printed in the reports annex, rejected as totally false allegations contained in the UNs previous report in November that Syrian forces were committing crimes against humanity. The Syrian letter accuses armed terrorist groups of such crimes.
Syria is on the brink of civil war and deep divisions among world powers complicate the prospects for ending nearly a year of violence sparked by protests against the regime, the three-member UN panel said in their latest 72-page report.
The continuation of the crisis carries the risk of radicalizing the population, deepening inter-communal tensions and eroding the fabric of society, it warned.
The UN team was not allowed into Syria but said it had interviewed 369 victims and witnesses. They included people still in Syria whom it contacted by telephone and those who have fled to neighboring countries which it declined to identify.
Satellite imagery of areas where military and security forces were deployed and related reported violations occurred, corroborated a number of witness accounts, it said.
Thousands of people, mainly civilians but also soldiers and defectors, have been killed during the nearly year-long crackdown, it said. Army snipers and Shabbiha gunmen posted at strategic points terrorized the population, targeting and killing small children, women and other unarmed civilians. Fragmentation mortar bombs were also fired into densely populated neighborhoods.
Some 6,399 civilians and 1,680 army defectors were killed in the violence through Feb. 15, according to figures provided by the Violations Documentation Center, a network of activists in Syria and abroad quoted in the UN report.
The level of fighting has increased since November, especially in Homs, Hama and Idlib provinces, with many areas besieged by state forces, according to the report.
On several occasions in January and February 2012, entire families children and adults were brutally murdered in Homs. On both sides, there is a pattern of abducting people not directly involved in the clashes for the purposes of revenge, ransom or as hostages, the UN panel said.
More than 18,000 people were in detention as of Feb. 15, it said, again citing the Violations Documentation Center.
Security agencies continued to systematically arrest wounded patients in state hospitals and to interrogate them, often using torture, about their supposed participation in opposition demonstrations or armed activities.
The panel, the report said, had documented evidence that sections of Homs Military Hospital and Al Ladikah State Hospital had been transformed into torture centers.
The inquiry, set up by the UN Human Rights Council last August, published a preliminary report in November accusing Syrian forces of crimes against humanity including murder, rape and torture. The 47-member forum is to examine the crisis in Syria at a four-week session starting on Monday.
Its other members are Karen Koning AbuZayd of the United States, a former head of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) helping Palestinian refugees, and Yakin Erturk, a professor from Turkey who has served as UN investigator on violence against women.
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PESHAWAR: At least 15 terrorists were killed and several injured when Pakistan Air Force (PAF) jets bombed suspected terrorist hideouts in Upper Orakzai Agency on Thursday.
Official sources said the jets targeted suspected hideouts in the Bermela, Khadizai, Mamozai and Samarbazar areas, and destroyed four compounds in the rugged terrain near the Afghan border.
Two warplanes were sent to the area early this morning after reports from local intelligence sources that terrorists from the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) were hiding in the mountainous region, a senior military officer told AFP. Sources said that death toll might rise, as several terrorists were reportedly trapped under the rubble.
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The United States and Israel are fully coordinated on the need to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, and have not ruled out any options in this regard, US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro reaffirmed Thursday, dpa reported.
The Jerusalem Post daily quoted him as telling US Jewish leaders meeting in Jerusalem that while diplomatic and economic sanctions were the preferred strategy to counter Iran's nuclear weapon drive, "all other options are on the table."
"More than that, the necessary planning is being done to ensure that those options are actually available if at any time they become necessary," he warned.
He rejected reports of a rift between Israel and the US over Iran's alleged nuclear programme, telling his audience that "whatever one reads in the paper, I cannot think of any issue on which we are better coordinated than on the issue of Iran."
Pay no attention to the current occupant of the White House...
"It is often the case that those who talk don't know and those who know don't talk. Much of what is written on this topic is pure speculation and much of it is wrong," he added.
Israeli President Shimon Peres, reinforced Shapiro's comments.
"The state of Israel is an independent, sovereign state, and has the right to defend itself. When we say all options are on the table, we really mean it," he said.
The president also denied a report, which appeared in the Ha'aretz daily Thursday, that he planned to tell President Barack Obama that he opposed a possible Israeli attack on Iran. The Ha'aretz report was attributed to "political and diplomatic officials" who were familiar with Peres' positions and were helping prepare for the Obama meeting.
Do they also not know what's going on?
Peres, however, was quoted as saying Thursday evening that "as far as I'm concerned, I've never told anybody in my life before a meeting with such a leader what I am going to tell him."
Media reports have speculated that Israel intends to attack Iran's nuclear facilities, but Israeli leaders have never publicly threatened to do so.
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Two individuals claiming to be representatives of the 45 victims of the 1997 Acteal, Chiapas massacre, told the Suprema Corte de Justicia de la Nacion (SCJN) in a letter that former president Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon should be judged criminally and not civilly, according to a report by the Mexican leftist weekly Proceso.
The letter was presumably authored by Porfirio Arias Hernandez and Enrique Perez Santi, whom Proceso says are leaders of the pacifist religious sect Las Abeas, the target of the December 1997 massacre.
The letter is in response to the SCJN decision February 1st to not only release six of the original 34 defendants in the case, but also to specifically declare them innocent of the crime, a rare move in Mexican jurisprudence. To read the Rantburg report on the SCJN decision to release the seven defendants, click here.
President at the time of the massacre, Zedillo is currently being sued in US District Court in Connecticut for his role in the massacre. The original suit claims that Zedillo, as commander in chief of the armed forces in Mexico, is responsible for the planning and execution of the massacre, though many of the defendants detained at the time were local and state police agents. To read the Rantburg report on the Zedillo lawsuit, click here and here.
The lawsuit could be decided this month on claims by Zedillo that as a former head of state he enjoys immunity from civil and criminal prosecutions, a concept that has a longstanding list of decisions and law supporting it, dating back more than 150 years.
The lawsuit itself is a curious one in that the Miami, Florida law firm pursuing it, Rafferty Kobert Tenenholtz, has zero experience in public interest or human rights law, although it does have some international business law trial experience.
Attempts by this writer two months ago to contact the law firm via a web form on their website acteal97.com have been ignored.
Receipt of the letter has yet to be acknowledged by the SCJN on its website or in any web search. It is unknown if the letter has actually reached the SCJN or how the reporters at Proceso came into possession of it.
According to the Proceso article, the authors stated that it was Zedillo's counterinsurgency policy which led to the murders, and that Zedillo himself betrayed the San Andreas Accords.
The counterinsurgency plan in Chiapas implemented by the Mexican Army under Zedillo was actually conceived under Zedillo's predecessor, Carlos Salinas de Gortari, after the Chiapas Conflict went hot in December of 1994, before a ceasefire was negotiated a few days later.
The San Andreas Accords were signed in 1996, putatively ending the conflict. The accords allowed municipalities to acquire autonomy subject to Chiapas Chamber of Deputies approval.
In the run up to the massacre, despite the peace agreement in place, the Marxist Ejercito Zapatista Liberacion Nacional, a group formed with the help of Guatemalan rebels who were using Mexico as a safe haven against Guatemalan Army attacks, had apparently organized protests and in some cases armed attacks against citizens who opposed the EZLN. According to a a government report released following the massacre, some groups of Mexican citizens responded in kind to EZLN's depredations throughout 1997.
Of the original 34 dependants in the case, only seven remain imprisoned for their role in the murders.
#1
The lawsuit itself is a curious one in that the Miami, Florida law firm pursuing it, Rafferty Kobert Tenenholtz, has zero experience in public interest or human rights law, although it does have some international business law trial experience
Rafferty, Kobert, Tenenholtz, Bounds & Hess, P.A. Statement of Practice Summary: Corporate Law; Mergers And Acquisitions; International Transactions; Real Estate; Venture Capital; Business Law; Commercial Law; Financial Transactions; Banking Law; Bankruptcy; Labor And Employment; Domestic Relations; International
Representative Clients: Alfa Parf; B.I.P., Inc.; Boca Martime, Inc.; Clear Channel Outdoor; Current Events, Inc.; For Eyes; Hoerbiger Corporation of America; International Alliance Resources; The Miami Heat; Sargeant Marine, Inc.; International Oil Trading Company, LLC; Trigeant; Alterna Capital; Cypress Creek Capital; Falcon Trust Air; Structured Asset Funding; Floridian Community Bank; Gallagher Bassett; Latin America Investments; Landsowne Mortgage; Esmeralda Farms; Wackenhut Security; First National Bank of South Florida; First National Bank of South Miami; Colonial Bank; Boston Investors Group.
BAGHDAD: A rapid series of attacks spread over a wide swath of Iraqi territory killed at least 50 people on Thursday, targeting mostly security forces in what appeared to be another strike by Al-Qaeda militants bent on destabilizing the country.
The apparently coordinated bombings and shootings unfolded over two-and-a-half hours in the capital Baghdad where most of the deaths were and 11 other cities. They struck government offices, restaurants and one in the town of Musayyib hit close to a primary school. More than 200 people were injured.
What is happening today are not simple security violations it is a huge security failure and disaster, said Ahmed Al-Tamimi, who was working at an Education Ministry office a block away from a restaurant that was bombed in the Shiite neighborhood of Kazimiyah in northern Baghdad. He described a hellish scene of human flesh and pools of blood at the scene.
We want to know: What were the thousands of policemen and soldiers in Baghdad doing today while the terrorists were roaming the city and spreading violence? Al-Tamimi said.
Good question. But this is the problem of playing defense: it's never perfect, and the bad guys will at some point find a way to hurt you. You have to go on offense and kill the hard core thugs, and you have to get the semi-hard boyz to decide to drop the heat and take up auto mechanics for a living.
While no group immediately claimed responsibility for the latest attacks, targeting security officials is a hallmark of Al-Qaeda in Iraq. In December, a wave of bombs tore through mostly Shiite neighborhoods of Baghdad, killing 69 people in a similar onslaught of violence that Sunni-dominated Al-Qaeda claimed.
Nationwide, security forces appeared to be targeted in at least 14 separate attacks, including a drive-by shooting in Baghdad that killed six policemen at a checkpoint before dawn. Police patrols in the capital and beyond also were besieged by roadside bombs and, in once case, a suicide bomber who blew up his car outside a police station in the city of Baqouba, 35 miles (60 kilometers) northeast of Baghdad.
Iraqs police are generally considered to be the weakest element of the countrys security forces, and 20 were killed earlier this week by a suicide bomber outside the Baghdad police academy that angry residents blamed on political feuding that is roiling Iraq.
But the latest violence spilled onto commuters, restaurant patrons, passers-by and school children as well.
In the single deadliest strike, a car bomb in Baghdads downtown shopping district of Karradah killed nine people and wounded 26. The blast effects could be felt blocks away, shaking buildings and windows. Associated Press TV footage of the scene showed people walking away from the scene, covered in blood.
In Musayyib, a car bomb parked on the street between a restaurant and an elementary school killed one person and wounded 62. Most of the injured were school children, said police and health officials.
The casualties were tallied by local security and hospital officials in the cities where the attacks occurred. Nearly all spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information.
Late Wednesday, Iraqs Interior Ministry announced the capture of Waleed Khalid Ali, accused as a top leader of the Ansar Al-Sunna insurgent group linked to Al-Qaeda. The government said Ali was caught trying to enter Iraq from Syria, where Al-Qaeda groups recently have been surging to assist opposition forces seeking the overthrow of President Bashar Assad.
But the coordinated nature of Thursdays attacks show the likely were planned long before the arrest. A Western diplomatic security official said recent intelligence indicated that an unspecified attack was in the works.
Widespread violence has decreased since just a few years ago when Iraq teetered on the brink of civil war. But bombings and deadly shootings still happen almost daily.
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* Speaker says radicalisation result of intellectual stagnation of society
* Static notion being taught at madrassas same as in public education system
ISLAMABAD: Speakers of a seminar have stressed the need for reinterpreting religious dogma in the dynamic and modernist spirit of Islam, which Sir Syed Ahmed Khan and Allama Iqbal had exhorted for the advancement of the Moslems of the Subcontinent.
The seminar titled 'Deradicalisation of the Vulnerable Segments of Society' was organised by the Islamabad Policy Research Institute (IPRI) on Wednesday.
Dr Khalid Masud, director general of the Islamic Research Institute of the International Islamic University, spoke on the role of religion in deradicalisation and said the process of change and evolution of thought was being blocked by the religious clergy to whom every new development was being referred to for endorsement by the ruling elite.
Radicalisation was the result of intellectual stagnation of society, which was being promoted by decision makers in tandem with the religious orthodoxy, he said. "Unless this mindset is changed, superficial efforts at deradicalisation are not going to bear fruit."
He said that the intellectual climate of the country was better in the 50s when scholars like Fazlur Rahman were doing their important work on the reconstruction of Islamic thought. "Today, nobody can dare differ with the holy mans who are actually quite ignorant, and together with the ruling elite constituted the dominant class of our religious illiterates."
Dr Masud criticised the present tendency to seek the cover of Sufism to fight orthodoxy, and said Sufis were no revolutionaries either, and their approach too had no dynamism. "Their approach was just more humane," he said.
He said that it was wrong to focus on madrassas when the same static notion of religion was being taught in the public education system.
Speaking on the socio-economic perspectives of deradicalisation, Professor Usman Mustafa of the Pakistain Institute of Development Economics (PIDE) said the vast economic disparity between the poor majority and the rich minority was behind radicalisation.
It was not religious indoctrination alone that was driving the poor to take up arms, but the desperation of their circumstances, he said.
"While the rich seek protection of their possessions, the poor have nothing to lose but their lives. Unless this disparity is reduced and the poor are given something to hold on to, the problem of radicalisation will persist and grow."
He also criticised the Western countries, which preached equality and equity to the world, but used their exclusive veto power at the United Nations ...an organization whose definition of human rights is interesting, to say the least... to secure their advantage. "The disparity between nations of the West and the East is as glaring as one sees between segments of society in Pakistain," he said.
Earlier, Pakistain Institute for Peace Studies Director Amir Rana explained the various models and approaches to deradicalisation that countries like Soddy Arabia, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Egypt Australia and the United Kingdom had used and applied to address the problem.
He, however, said that Pakistain could not borrow those models because of the "entirely different nature of the problem here". There were constrains, both financial and ideological, that would come in the way, he said. In a country where "as many as 104 organised bodies are promoting radicalism and where people are fighting extremism on a war footing", only a tailor-made prescription suited to the peculiar conditions could address the problem, he said.
In his opening remarks, IPRI Acting President Dr Maqsudul Hassan Nuri said the sense of deprivation had grown in Moslem societies due to poor governance and the ever-widening gap between expectations of the people and the performance of the rulers.
Radicalisation was not only a result of thug philosophies promoted by non-state actors but also a result of ideologies pursued by the states, he said.
China has already sent back several of the North Korean defectors who were recently arrested there, despite pleas from Seoul and international human rights groups, sources said Thursday.
The source said nine defectors who had crossed the Duman (or Tumen) River into China in early February were repatriated last weekend and have since been under investigation by security forces in Onsong, North Hamgyong Province. They were reportedly while traveling to Changchun from Yanji headed for South Korea.
It is unclear how many defectors are facing repatriation as there is wide discrepancy between sources. According to defectors' group North Korea Intellectuals Solidarity, three defectors were arrested on a train bound for Changchun last Friday and repatriated on Monday.
"Security forces and senior party officials are intimidating and threatening their families. Rumors are spreading that they will be executed to set an example," the group added.
According to sources in China, about 200 defectors were caught by Chinese police and face repatriation.
Chinese police have arrested far more North Korean defectors than was previously known, Liberty Forward Party lawmaker Park Sun-young claimed Tuesday. Park has been vocal in recent days warning that China will repatriate the defectors.
In a telephone interview with the Chosun Ilbo, Park said a total of 34 North Korean defectors were arrested in six groups since early February, and some of them face being sent back to the repressive country.
She said the 19 were arrested on Feb. 8, five on Feb. 12, three on Feb. 13, four on Feb. 17, and three on Feb. 18. Intelligence reports say there are others, Park claimed, but she decided to delay disclosure because she had not confirmed the facts.
Asked where her information came from, Park cited "a reliable source who has access to Chinese police." She added, "Based on this information, I was able to confirm their arrests by checking with family members who are already in South Korea."
"I verified personal data of at least one member of each group of defectors who were arrested recently," she said. "I'm also trying to verify another piece of information I got on Monday that North Korean security forces raided the North Korean homes of the arrested defectors."
Park said it is clearly possible for a single lawmaker to obtain information about arrested defectors and their personal data through various channels, "but the Foreign Ministry only says, 'We haven't grasped the situation yet' whenever defectors are arrested in China." She called on the government to do more to find out the real situation of North Korean defectors in China by using intelligence networks, rather than merely watching the reaction of the Chinese government.
Park the same day started a hunger strike in front of the Chinese Embassy in Seoul in protest against China's attempt to repatriate the defectors.
The government has decided to raise the issue of North Korean defectors who face repatriation from China with the UN Human Rights Council when it meets at the end of this month.
A government official said on Monday, "Since we have decided to take firm steps to prevent Beijing from repatriating North Korean defectors under UN treaties on the treatment of refugees and the prohibition of torture, we will raise the issue before the UN Human Rights Council." A Foreign Ministry official said, "According to new guidelines announced on Sunday, we are discussing at what level to bring up the matter at the UNHCR."
The government will dispatch Choi Soo-young, the director of human rights and social affairs at the Foreign Ministry, to the UNHRC in Geneva this week.
The government plans to seek measures to ensure the safety of North Korean defectors should they be sent back to the North. Also to be discussed is the inclusion of a clause in the North Korean Human Rights Resolution, adopted by the UNHCR every year, that would prohibit China from repatriating defectors from the North.
A high-ranking government official said, "If no solution can be found through the UNHCR, then we will consider filing a complaint against China at the UN to raise international awareness of the issue."
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#1
China Already Repatriated N.Korean Defectors
Well, that says it all, Don't it. Very unfriendly people.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
02/24/2012 0:40
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#2
ION DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > CHINA EXPELS [2] JAPANESE SURVEY BOATS, from East China Sea.
Read, TAIWAN.
* SAME > US CAN SURRENDER EAST ASIA TO CHINA | GWYNNE DYER: CHINA SUPREMACY NEED NOT MEAN WAR WID US.
* SAME > [ChinaNews.cn] CHINA COULD LEASE HAINAN TO PAKISTAN FOR 50 YEARS IN RETURN FOR GILGIT.
NOT-INDECENT Bilateral Proposal.
THE TALIBAN ARE COMING, THE TALIBAN ARE COMING? i.e. Pak-sponsored Taliban + Al-Qaeda + Haqqannis, etal. in South China Sea/SE Asia = PHILIPPINES, SOPAC, GUAM-WESTPAC???
D *** NG IT, I THOUGHT IT WAS THE CHINESE WHOM WERE COMING!
#3
It's important to remember stuff like this when doing business with China.
The US and Britain did some things like this, in the 19th Century, when non-western lives were considered trivial compared to American lives.
Now the Chinese are at that point. This is important to us if we are buying their stuff, because like we were at that point, "pure food and drugs", "safety" and such things are not real considerations compared to profits.
If they sell us something that could poison thousands of Americans and we don't catch it before it does, their only concern will be the loss of business, not the death of Americans, to which they will be utterly indifferent.
Semi-official Iranian news agency interviews widow of Mostafa Roshan -- leaving no doubt as to nuclear program's goal.
The wife of Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, an Iranian nuclear scientist who was assassinated in Tehran in January, said Tuesday that her husband "sought the annihilation of the Zionist regime wholeheartedly," according to Iran's semi-official Fars news agency.
"Mostafa's ultimate goal was the annihilation of Israel," the agency quoted Fatemeh Bolouri Kashani as saying Tuesday.
Bolouri Kashani also underlined that her spouse "loved any resistance figure in his life who was willing to fight the Zionist regime and supported the rights of the oppressed Paleostinian nation."
The report belies attempts by Iran to claim that its nuclear program is not military in nature.
Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan is described as "a chemistry professor and a deputy director of commerce at Natanz uranium enrichment facility."
Fars says he was killed by Mossad agents, who used a method of attack similar to that used against Iranian nuclear scientist Massoud Ali Mohammadi in January 2010, as well as scientists Fereidoun Abbassi Davani and Majid Shahriari. Abbasi Davani survived the attack, but Shahriari died. Yet another Iranian scientist, Dariush Rezaeinejad, was assassinated by the same method in July of 2011.
KARACHI: Paleostine Liberation Foundation-Pakistain (PLF-P) has formed a five-member committee for registration of participants of the global march to Jerusalem. Central front man Sabir Karbalai in a statement said that former MNA Muzaffar Hashmi heads the committee. Online registration will be made at the official website. The global march will start from four countries on March 30.
It seems to me they will find a bit of difficulty marching along the bottom of the ocean in between, but my knowledge of geography has always been regrettably scanty...
#1
And in Somalia the al Shabaabers (thanks, Besoeker -- now it's stuck in my brain) are fleeing to Yemen. They're going to need traffic lines on the bottom of the sea to prevent accidents.
UN atomic agency chief Yukiya Amano is expected to outline in a report Friday why its team investigating Iran's suspected nuclear weapons drive returned empty handed this week, diplomats said, AFP reported.
What's to explain?
IAEA chief inspector Herman Nackaerts and his team returned from Tehran on Wednesday with no progress in their search for answers from Iran on its alleged bid to develop nuclear weapons, leading Washington to brand the trip a "failure."
Diplomats in Vienna said they have begun discussing what action the 35-member IAEA board will take when it holds its next regular meeting on March 5. In theory
...in theory there's no difference between theory and practice, but in practice there is...
it could pass a resolution condemning Iran and reporting the Islamic republic to the UN Security Council, which has already passed four rounds of sanctions.
And, as I recall, a sternly worded letter...
This though depends on Russia and China, which have hitherto been more lenient on Iran that their Western counterparts in the UN Security Council.
Which is to say that it will all go nowhere.
Diplomats also say that the International Atomic Energy Agency report will give an update on Iran's progress in fitting out its new facility at Fordo, near Qom, enriching uranium to 20-percent purity. The facility, under a mountain and kept secret by Iran until late 2009, would slash the time needed to convert Iran's stockpile of low-enriched uranium to the 90-percent purity needed for a nuclear bomb if it decided to do so, experts say.
How quickly Iran could enrich would also depend on what kind of centrifuges are installed at Fordo. Indications so far are that Iran is installing "IR-1" older-generation devices, diplomats said, which could be converted to enrich to 90 percent, but which would do the work more slowly than more state-of-the-art models.
One Western diplomat said he expected the IAEA to say that Iran had installed "high hundreds" of centrifuges at Fordo -- but not the "thousands" that have been speculated -- and of the older kind.
"The newer-generation centrifuges that they have been working on have all been at Natanz," Iran's main enrichment site, another diplomat told AFP. "They are fewer in number, have been problematic, and we haven't heard from the IAEA that they have moved anything to Fordo."
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/24/2012
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#1
"They kept throwing streamers and glitter up into the air and promising us ponies and stuff. We were soooo distracted."
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
02/24/2012 10:53
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#2
"so long and thanks for all the fish"
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/24/2012 20:48
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#3
The IAEA has come a long way since the days of Hans Blix. I give them major props for actually finding something; in this case, Iran.
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.
A 54-year-old imam was found shot in the head in Strömsund in northwestern Sweden on Wednesday in what police have classified as attempted murder. Police received a call around 1:30pm on Wednesday afternoon that the man, identified by Sveriges Television (SVT) as 
Four of the terrorists released in the bargain for kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit have gone back to terrorist activity. 
STOCKHOLM A Swedish artist who angered Muslims by depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a dog was pelted with eggs during a university lecture when he presented another drawing of Islams revered prophet, police and the artist said Wednesday.
PESHAWAR: Thirteen people, including two children, fell victim to Thursdays devastating car bombing at a city bus terminal packed with southern districts-bound passengers in the morning rush hour, officials said.
GENEVA: Syrian forces have shot dead unarmed women and children, shelled residential areas and tortured wounded protesters in hospital under orders from the highest level of army and government officials, the United Nations said on Thursday.
PESHAWAR: At least 15 terrorists were killed and several injured when Pakistan Air Force (PAF) jets bombed suspected terrorist hideouts in Upper Orakzai Agency on Thursday.
UN atomic agency chief Yukiya Amano is expected to outline in a report Friday why its team investigating Iran's suspected nuclear weapons drive returned empty handed this week, diplomats said, AFP reported.
