BERLIN -- Chancellor Angela Merkel vowed on Wednesday to stick to her open-door refugee policy, defying criticism at home and abroad which has intensified due to growing fears about a potential security risk after the Islamist attacks in Paris. In a 40-minute speech to the Bundestag lower house of parliament, Merkel said the security threat level in Germany was high but insisted that people must carry on with normal life.
"The strongest response to terrorists is to carry on living our lives and our values as we have until now -- self-confident and free, considerate and engaged," she said to loud applause.
"We Europeans will show our free life is stronger than any terror," Merkel added, battling with a croaky voice.
Merkel stressed her commitment to her disputed refugee policy, saying Germany, Europe's economic powerhouse, has a duty to protect those fleeing war and conflict in the Middle East, Africa and Asia.
In a nod to critics in her conservative party, especially in Bavaria, where most of the migrants enter Germany, she said that migrants who do not need protection must be sent home.
Being orderly persons like the Germans they wished to become, they will of course accept that judgement and go quietly, right?
"But simply sealing ourselves off will not solve the problem," she said. Merkel repeated her "we will cope" mantra and reiterated her argument that Europe must tackle the causes of the crisis by working for peace in Syria
...an interesting concept...
and engaging Turkey as a partner in the refugee crisis.
...an even more interesting one.
She countered politicians in some countries who have warned that the refugee crisis has exposed problems in Europe's Schengen passport-free area, saying that states must develop it further by agreeing on migrant quotas.
"A distribution of refugees according to economic strength and other conditions ... and the readiness for a permanent distribution mechanism ... will determine whether the Schengen area will hold in the long term," she said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/25/2015
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#1
New Years is probably going to be interesting... if she survives until then.
On average, 8000 refugees cross the German border each day.
That's 3 million per year. Umm no, sorry, this won't go on in 2016.
Posted by: European Conservative ||
11/25/2015 17:08
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#2
I meant her New Year's Speech
Posted by: European Conservative ||
11/25/2015 17:09
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Local reporters are doing what the national reporters won't. It may be that the one source is right: you can't win them all. Given that it only takes a few refugees with malice and weapons to stage an attack, we should be more careful. I'm not saying that shouldn't take in refugees, but the current administration doesn't seem to acknowledge the risks.
ATLANTA -- A Channel 2 Action News investigation uncovered refugees deported from the United States at a skyrocketing rate for violent crimes. That includes refugees deported from Georgia.
The terrorist attacks in Paris put a big spotlight on refugees around the country. To get into the U.S., each went through a vetting process that took two years. But experts and elected leaders called Investigative Reporter Aaron Diamant's research a game changer.
Diamant dug into a decade's worth of data on a massive federal immigration database. The numbers revealed that from 2003 through 2013, federal authorities deported 1,033 refugees, including 89 from Georgia. In those overall numbers, 713 refugees got kicked out of the United States for committing aggravated felonies, including dozens of assaults, sex crimes, drug crimes and homicides.
Those numbers concern Jessica Vaughn with the Center for Immigration Studies, a nonprofit research organization.
"I do think that the public and policymakers should be concerned about these findings," Vaughn said. "Refugees face more screening that any other immigrant group, but this demonstrates that even in the refugee category, we are not able to screen out all the individuals who pose a threat to our communities."
Diamant looked even deeper into the statistics and found the numbers of refugees deported from the United States has soared from only nine in 2003 to 185 in 2013.
"It may mean that the screening procedures have been relaxed somewhat in recent years," Vaughn speculated.
After French investigators confirmed ISIS operatives involved in the terrorist attacks in Paris slipped in among waves of refugees from Syria, leaders in Georgia and more than 30 other states pushed back and took steps to refuse any of the 10,000 Syrian refugees the U.S. is poised to accept over the next year.
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal defended his decision by saying, "We think that it's appropriate for us to take care of our people here in Georgia, and we think this is the appropriate step."
Diamant also looked into where the refugees deported for serious crimes came from. They represented 73 countries. The most, 247, came from Bosnia. Ukraine was next at 77, followed by Haiti, Cambodia and Sudan. Only two came from Syria.
Gainesville Rep. Doug Collins is on the House Judiciary Committee. He's one of many members pushing for a top to bottom review of the federal refugee screening process.
"I think what you're going to see in the House over the next month or longer is dealing with this total issue as a whole, taking into account some of the numbers (Diamant) has brought up," Collins said. "The numbers give us cause to believe there may be something else we could be doing."
Still, Georgia State University counterterrorism and criminology expert Robert Friedmann said there is no solution to root out every potential bad person.
"Anybody who tells you that that can be insured is either deluding themselves or deluding you," Friedmann told Diamant. "I don't think that that's possible."
Vaughn is more optimistic and believes federal authorities will find critical clues to reduce the risk.
"They should be examining each and every one of these cases to find out what went wrong."
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[NBC] ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistan's air force has suffered its first-ever female pilot fatality after a fighter jet crashed during a training mission Tuesday, officials said.
Flying Officer Mariam Mukhtiar was killed after the Chinese-built F7-PG aircraft she was flying suffered a "serious in-flight emergency," according to a statement from the Pakistan Air Force.
Both 23-year-old Mukhtiar and Squadron Leader Saqib Abbasi -- who was also aboard the aircraft but survived -- were praised by the air force for their "professionalism and courage" after they "tried to save the ill-fated aircraft until the very last minute."
Poor Future Sultan Recep Tayyip I must be livid. But according to Hurriyet, his ministers are speaking gently of the friendship between Turkey and Russia.
[AnNahar] Russian warplanes carried out heavy raids in Syria's northern Latakia province a day after The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... downed one of Moscow's jets in the area, a monitoring group said on Wednesday.
"Russian warplanes have since last night been carrying out heavy air strikes on the Jabal Akrad and Jabal Turkman regions" in the north of the province, Syrian Observatory for Human Rights chief Rami Abdel Rahman said.
He said Russian planes had carried out at least 12 strikes in the area since the morning, but had no information on any casualties.
A media activist on the ground confirmed the heavy strikes, which he said centered around the Jabal Nuba area where rebels on Tuesday destroyed a Russian helicopter that was forced to make an emergency landing by opposition fire.
One member of the crew was killed but the rest were rescued.
State television reported that Syrian warplanes were also carrying out strikes in the north of Latakia, a coastal province that is largely controlled by the regime.
In recent days, regime forces have been waging fierce battles against rebels in the northern part of the province, making some advances in Jabal Akrad and Jabal Turkman.
On Tuesday, Turkey shot down a Russian aircraft over the province, and rebels killed one of the pilots as he parachuted down after ejecting from the plane.
A second pilot was rescued by Russian and Syrian special forces.
#4
Waiting for the Turks to take the bait?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru
They've already 'taken the bait.' Vlad has unmasked Erdogan for what he is, a pro-ISIS sympathizer. A pro-muslin Turkey as a NATO member was a cock-up from the onset.
Yeah. What I don't get is why Erdogan thought this was a good move. Nominally allies. Strong economic ties. A military hot-line set up between the two countries that went unused. I could see it if the Sukhois were making a beeline for the Presidential Palace, but from the Turk's own radar track, this 'incursion' was more like stepping out of bounds.
I understand the immediate goal was to get the Russians to leave Turkmen forces alone, but it seems like a blustery, ineffective way to get there. Especially since the Russians are currently bombing the crap out of said Turkmen.
To put it in game theory terms, I don't understand the Turkish evaluation function.
#8
I used to play Risk with a fellow who would openly state I am going to Greenland - North America and whoever attacks me first, I go after until I am gone.
He always lost. If you set up shop (in the line of march) in Iceland and him in Great Britain, you didn't win.
Depending upon who was playing, how long he lasted.
[Irish Times] “We cannot receive more refugees in Europe, ” French prime minister Manuel Valls has told foreign correspondents in a group interview focused on the November 13th attacks that killed 130 people in Paris.
Mr Valls said he will repeat that message when he addresses the SPD congress in Germany on December 12th. “I told [vice chancellor and chairman of the SPD] Sigmar [Gabriel] we cannot receive any more,” he said.
“This doesn’t mean I’m criticising Germany. Germany made a choice which is to her honour, but she has to assume her responsibilities. Do you think Belgium or France will receive more refugees today? No. No. No. For me, things are very clear. The solutions are over there [in the region].”
[Hurriyet] One of two pilots aboard a Russian warplane shot down by The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... on Nov. 24 was killed by gunfire while parachuting from the burning plane. Meanwhile, ...back at the palazzo, Count Guido had been cornered by the banditti... the other pilot was picked up by the Syrian Army and returned to Russia's airbase in Syria, both Russian military and Russia's ambassador to La Belle France have confirmed.
Military front man General Sergei Rudskoi said a Russian soldier had also been killed in a failed bid to rescue the pilots, whose Su-24 plane crashed in Syrian territory.
Rudskoi said Russia would cease all military contact with Turkey, as international concerns grow that the incident could snowball into a major conflict.
The general said the Su-24 "fell in Syrian territory, four kilometres (2.5 miles) from the border".
"The crew ejected," the general said. "According to preliminary information, one of the pilots died after being fired upon from the ground."
Although the fate of the second pilot was not immediately known, Russian ambassador to La Belle France has said the second pilot was picked up by the Syrian Army.
Loyal to those who are loyal to them...
Russian defense minister later said the second pilot was safely returned to Russia's airbase in Syria, Rooters has reported.
Good.
In a statement published on the defence ministry's website, Rudskoi said a Russian soldier had been killed when his Mi-8 helicopter was "damaged by gunfire and had to land" during a search-and-rescue operation to retrieve the pair.
Two helicopters were used in the operation.
The rest of the crew onboard the stricken Mi-8 were evacuated to the Hmeimim air base in Syria's northern Latakia province, Rudskoi said, adding that the helicopter was hit by mortar fire coming from territory under rebel control.
The Turkish army said earlier the fighter was shot down by two of its F-16s after it violated Turkish airspace 10 times within a five-minute period.
Rudskoi insisted the Su-24 had not strayed within Turkish airspace, and denied that the Turkish army had tried to make either radio or visual contact with its pilots before shooting it down.
He said the plane was shot down within Syrian airspace and condemned it as a "flagrant violation of international law" that would have "the gravest consequences".
He said that Russia's Moskva guided missile cruiser would be stationed near Latakia.
"All targets representing a potential threat to us will be destroyed," he warned.
Russian bombers, which launched strikes on Syria in defence of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Despoiler of Deraa... on September 30, will now be escorted by fighters, Rudskoi announced, adding that operations to retrieve the two pilots were continuing.
[IsraelTimes] One moderately maimed, three others lightly in Tapuah Junction terror attack; Paleostinian driver, 21, shot and maimed by Border Police forces
Three IDF soldiers and a Border Police officer were hurt in a car ramming attack shortly after 8 a.m. Tuesday morning at the Tapuah Junction in the northern West Bank, army officials said.
One was moderately maimed, with injuries to the abdomen and head. The other three were lightly injured, with wounds to the arms and legs. All four were evacuated to Beilinson Hospital in Petah Tikva, according to the Magen David Adom ambulance service.
One of the soldiers injured held the rank of colonel while another was a lieutenant colonel. The border guard also held an officer's rank, an army spokeswoman said.
The other injured soldier was an enlisted man, the spokeswoman added.
A group of Border Police officers on the scene saw the events unfold and fired at the driver, wounding him. He received medical care on the scene and will be questioned once his condition improves, a police spokesperson said.
[IsraelTimes] Car flees site of attempted attack; Israeli vehicles hit by gunfire, stones in separate West Bank attacks, one lightly hurt
A car was driven at a group of Israeli security personnel in the West Bank on Tuesday night, in an apparent ramming attack at the Hizme checkpoint, north of Jerusalem. No one was injured in the incident, a police spokesperson said. Shots were fired at the retreating vehicle as the attacker drove away in the direction of the Paleostinian town of Anata in the West Bank.
Earlier Tuesday, two bullet holes were found in a car driven by an Israeli woman near the West Bank settlement of Ofra. Security forces began a search of the area of the shooting in the northern West Bank, the Hebrew-language Ynet website reported. The woman was uninjured in the attack.
Several Israeli vehicles were also damaged Tuesday after they were hit by rocks on Route 443 near to the Benzion Junction, north west of Jerusalem, and just inside the West Bank.
The United States believes that the Russian jet shot down by Turkey on Tuesday was hit inside Syrian airspace after a brief incursion into Turkish airspace, a US official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity. Which means what, for USA?
#1
may have fired missile when jet was in Turkish airspace but it hit the jet in Syrian air space
Posted by: lord garth ||
11/25/2015 1:01
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From The Aviationist: here’s the radar picture showing both the Su-24 and the F-16 tracks. The violation was quite short (17 seconds). According to the Turkish authorities the Russian plane was issued 10 warnings in 5 minutes before being shot down.
17 second incursion? Five mins of warnings? My SWAG is the Russians were bombing anti-Assad Turkmen in Syria near the border and Turkey decided to stop it.
Future Russian air ops will take place under fighter cover which will increase opportunities for misunderstandings, hurt feelings and maybe a little payback.
#6
Turkey has been the de facto air force for ISIS for months.
When Turkey announced their air campaign against ISIS they proceeded to bomb nothing but Kurdish positions in Iraq and Syria, positions that were having profound success against ISIS. Saying they were PKK positions is BS.
The cat is out of the bag and Turkey has both poked the Russian bear and cheesed off Putin. If I were Erdogan, I would start sleeping in a different house every night and hire a taster for all of my food, snacks and drinks.
[AnNahar] Iran-backed rebels in Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of. Except for a tiny handfull of Jews everthing there is very Islamic... have blown up several bridges in the mountainous southwestern Taez province to hamper the advance of pro-government forces, military sources said Tuesday.
Government forces backed by air and ground support from a Saudi-led coalition launched an all-out offensive last week to push the rebels out of Taez and break the siege of loyalists in its scenic provincial capital.
Taez is seen as crucial for the recapture of other central provinces and for opening the way to the rebel-controlled capital Sanaa farther north.
It is also important for securing the south, where loyalists have retaken five provinces since July, including Aden, seat of the provisional government of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi.
The Shiite Houthis on Monday "blew up several bridges leading to Rahida to prevent the advance" of loyalist forces, said one of the sources in a reference to the province's second-largest city.
Military officials said this week that landmines planted by the rebels have already been hampering the progress of government forces and had caused casualties.
Loyalist forces are now stationed 12 kilometers (seven miles) away from Rahida after they regained several positions in festivities that lasted until early Tuesday and left five rebels and two pro-government fighters dead, according to the military sources.
In the neighboring restive Lahj ... a Yemeni governate located in the southwestern corner of the Arabian Peninsula. It is the stomping grounds on the southern secessionist al-Harak movement province, farther south, Hadi visited al-Anad airbase, where Yemeni and coalition commanders are deployed to supervise the Taez offensive, a presidency source said.
"The visit is to oversee the military preparations to liberate Taez," the source told AFP.
[IsraelTimes] According to unconfirmed reports, eight fighters, five Syrian soldiers die in four IAF raids Monday; 'dozens' said injured
Unconfirmed Syrian media reports said Tuesday that Israel carried out some four Arclight airstrikes on Syrian regime and Hezbollah positions in the area of Syria's Qalamoun mountains on Monday night.
A report by Al-Souria Net, a pro-opposition outlet, said eight Hezbollah fighters and five Syrian soldiers were killed in the raids, which hit the border region between Leb and Syria.
"After several hours of reconnaissance flights above the area, Israeli planes suddenly launched two raids on a joint Assad forces and Hezbollah position," Al-Souria Net reported. "This was immediately followed by a third raid.. The Israeli planes resumed their attack with a fourth air raid after several minutes, targeting a Hezbollah position in western Qalamoun."
The report said there were "dozens" injured in the Arclight airstrikes, four of them critically. The maimed were transferred to local hospitals for treatment.
Israel is reported to have been behind a series of air raids on Syrian soil since the Syrian civil war began in March 2011, apparently aimed at preventing advanced weapons shipments from Iran from reaching arch-enemy Hezbollah via Syria.
Jerusalem has not openly admitted to being behind such operations. It has, however, warned that it will not permit the Leb-based terror group to obtain what it calls "game-changing" advanced weaponry.
[AnNahar] The army announced Tuesday the arrest of a fugitive belonging to the extremist Islamic State group who had plotted to stage suicide attacks on military posts in the northern city of Tripoli.
“The Intelligence Directorate has arrested the fugitive Mazen Ahmed al-Hajj Hussein, aka Abou Ahmed and Saeed, on charges of belonging to the terrorist IS group and plotting acts of sabotage,” the army said in a statement.
The detainee participated in the deadly 2014 clashes in Tripoli between the army and Islamist militants, the statement added.
He fought “alongside the group led by now detained militant Mohammed Asaad al-Ayyoubi and later alongside the group led by now detained militant Ahmed Salim Miqati,” the army said.
“After calm returned to Tripoli, the detainee started receiving his orders from the fugitive Mohammed Omar al-Iaali, who asked him to recruit new militants and promised him that the IS group would provide all the requirements for creating cells in Tripoli,” the army added.
Iaali also asked him to prepare to target army posts with “suicide bombers.”
After that, al-Hajj Hussein managed to recruit a number of would-be suicide bombers and he waited to receive “money and arms” from the IS, the army added.
“When the army tightened the noose on his group and after Ziad al-Rifai was arrested, al-Hajj Hussein decided to travel to (IS' 'capital' in Syria's) Raqa,” the army said.
The military's statement did not say where the man was arrested or if he had ties to the IS cell that was recently busted in connection with the Bourj al-Barajneh twin suicide blasts.
The bombings, among the worst in years, killed 43 people and wounded 239 others.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
11/25/2015
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[IsraelTimes] Amid escalating attacks, security services step up measures against Paleostinian stabbing, car-ramming
New measures are being introduced in the West Bank to tackle the wave of Paleostinian terror attacks that has swept Israel over the past two months.
A wave of stabbings, shootings and vehicular rammings have killed at least 22 victims since the beginning of October, including seven in the last week alone. Over 80 percent of the perpetrators have come from the West Bank.
Overnight Monday, IDF soldiers set up checkpoints surrounding Hebron, Hawara and Nablus, as well as around villages adjacent to the Etzion settlement bloc, according to Channel 10 news.
Security forces were reportedly checking all Paleostinian vehicles leaving the Hebron area, with hundreds of troops added to the IDF forces deployed to the area to secure the new checkpoints.
Security officials said 16 West Bank terror suspects were jugged Please don't kill me! overnight Monday, including 12 Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, activists. A joint force of IDF soldiers, Border Police and the Shin Bet security agency carried out the arrests.
On Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced tighter controls on Paleostinian vehicles and an increase in the number of so-called "bypass roads" that create separate routes for Paleostinians and Israelis.
Visiting the Etzion Junction in the West Bank Monday, Netanyahu said the army was stepping up its operations in the West Bank and has been given free rein in the area to preempt terror attacks. He urged Israelis to be resilient in the fight against terror.
"On the offensive side," Netanyahu said, "we're going anywhere [we need to]. We're entering [Paleostinian] villages, we're entering towns, we're entering homes, and conducting widespread arrests. There are no restrictions on the activities of the IDF and the security forces. On the contrary -- there's full support, and this is vital."
Netanyahu said that security forces are taking preventative action in the West Bank "day in and day out" to put an end to the current situation in which "hundreds of Israelis are killed every year by jacket wallahs and other attackers."
[AnNahar] La Belle France will install security gates at stations in Gay Paree and Lille for the Thalys cross-Europe rail services by December 20 in one of a raft of measures introduced after the Gay Paree attacks, minister Segolene Royal said Tuesday.
A Thalys train from Amsterdam to Gay Paree was attacked by a heavily armed man in August, but he was overpowered by passengers.
The French government has decided "to install gates for the Thalys in Lille and Gay Paree before December 20," Royal, who is ecology minister but has responsibility for transport, said.
The high-speed Thalys service links Gay Paree with Lille in northern La Belle France, the Belgian capital, Brussels, Amsterdam in the Netherlands and the western German city of Cologne.
Passengers boarding those trains do not currently have to pass through security checks, unlike for the cross-Channel Eurostar train services to Britannia which have airport-style security.
Royal indicated that Belgian, German and Dutch authorities would also install security gates, although those countries have not yet confirmed that.
She said La Belle France was also considering bringing in a system of named tickets for Thalys passengers.
La Belle France has tightened security at its borders and within the country following the jihadist attacks of November 13 on the French capital in which 130 people were killed.
It's amazing what one finds when one finally looks under the cushions of the couch...
[AlAhram] Hungarian anti-terrorist police have detained six people who were in possession of automatic weapons or suspected of producing bombs suitable for terrorist attacks, the head of the unit said on Tuesday.
Police detained four people found to be heading towards the capital Budapest with explosives in their car, Janos Hajdu, Director General of the Counter Terrorism Centre, told the state television channel M1.
In a subsequent house search, police found a bomb-making laboratory with "explosives and devices that were suitable for killing people to the utmost extent", Hajdu said.
He gave no details of the suspects' identities or motives, except to say that the case had "international threads".
He also said police had found two other people with submachine guns, ammunition and silencers in their car, but again provided no further details. Counter Terrorism Centre officials were not immediately available for further comment.
M1 said two of the suspects had been formally placed under arrest, and a court would decide on the others on Wednesday.
Knowledge, wishful thinking, or trying to defer the inevitable when the truth comes out?
[Hurriyet] Two pilots who auto-ejected themselves after a Russian jet was shot down by Turkish F-16's on Nov. 24 near the Syrian border are alive and well and are in the hands of rebel groups in the area, according to security sources in Ankara.
The Turkish National Intelligence Organization (MIT) is in contact with the rebel groups to hand over the pilots alive to The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... , the sources said.
Earlier reports had suggested that Turkmen rebels' claimed they rubbed out the Russian pilots after they auto-ejected from their jet with parachutes.
Speaking to the Dogan News Agency, Turkmen Deputy Commander to the 2nd Coast Division Alpaslan Celik had claimed that both pilots were killed.
"We shot the pilots while they were landing with parachutes. Their bodies are here," Celik said.
"Our friends are carrying the bodies from the other side of the mountains. Their IDs will probably be found on them," he added.
#3
Are they outclassed by that much? They're local, they have better logistics, their Air Force is fairly modern, and their pilots are likely decent. How outclassed are they?
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/25/2015 8:20
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#4
Dr. Steve, according to Hurriyet, Russia is now taking security vis a vis Turkey seriously:
Russian General Staff has deployed one of its largest air defense ships at the foot of Turkish territorial waters in the Mediterranean, in a move to revise security measures after a Russian SU-24 was downed by Turkish aircrafts.
According to Russian RIA Novosti agency, Russian General Staff boosted security measures after the recent incident.
In this perspective, Russian bomber aircrafts will be supported by chasers and any kinds of threats will be responded instantly, military spokesman General Sergei Rudskoi said.
Accordingly, “the Moscow,” one of the Russian Navy’s two largest warships and the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, will be deployed where Turkey-Syria territorial waters connect.
The warship is known to have an air defense system similar to S-300s, allowing the ship to immediately respond to any perceived threat.
Russian General Staff also decided to cut off all military communication with Turkey.
Moreover, Russia Russia is sending its most hi-tech air defence system to its airbase in Syria, the defence minister said Nov. 25, as Moscow ratchets up its firepower over the war-torn country after the downing of its fighter jet by Turkey.
"The S-400 anti-aircraft missile system will be deployed to the Hmeimim airbase," Sergei Shoigu was quoted as saying by Agence France-Presse.
#8
How outclassed Turkey is depends upon how much heat Putin wants to apply. I'm pretty sure Russia could destroy the Turkish Navy rather quickly and turn every coastal Turkish city to rubble if they wanted.
Battling over the skies of turkey is a different story with anti-aircraft and defensive fighters but the Russians wouldn't really need to go there to prostrate Turkey.
#9
How outclassed Turkey is depends upon how much heat Putin wants to apply.
The issue is the Bosporus. The Russians have the means (and the will!) to provide protection for their air ops. At the first sign of access problems in the straits, the Russians will go full Ivan. Remember that business in Crimea? It wasn't about territory. It was about access to the Med.
I doubt Turkey feels assured of NATO support at this point.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Tuesday accused the US of trying to divide Iraq along sectarian and ethnic lines and urged Iraqis to withstand any such plans. It was not clear if Khamenei was referring to a specific incident, but Iran has protested about US policy in Iraq several times this year.
“The Americans must not be allowed to consider Iraq as their personal property ... and dare to openly talk about disintegration of Iraq,” Khamenei said according to his website.
“The Iraqi people, Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds and Arabs have been living together peacefully but some regional countries and some foreigners are trying to amplify differences among them,” he added.
In August, outgoing US Army chief of staff General Ray Odierno drew condemnation from Baghdad and Tehran when he said reconciliation between Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq was becoming harder and that partitioning the country “might be the only solution.”
In the instability resulting from the rise of Daesh , Iraq’s Kurds have expanded the reach of their autonomous regional government to include Kirkuk, which sits on substantial oil deposits.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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#2
Divide Iraq? Half the Iraqis already hate the other half and that half hates the previous half plus some other people besides. Which is pretty much the Middle East in nutshell.
#9
Tour boats sail the trinitite surface:
"Folks, all this was glazed with a purpose --
Oh, look, there's a camel
Performing a Hamill! --
This place is where Allah met Curtis."
Following that shoot-down as Russian rescue helicopters searched for the pilots of that airplane, at least one of the helicopters was destroyed by U.S.-backed Syrian rebels using a CIA-provided TOW anti-tank missile.
The rebel group posted video of the destruction of the Russian helicopter...As part of the CIA program, Syrian rebel groups receiving U.S. TOW missiles are required to video each use and return each spent container.
The potential repercussions of these two incidents today could be unprecedented. The first is that the U.S. may get drawn into an armed confrontation with Russia if Turkey should invoke Article 5 of the NATO Treaty. In a speech following the plane shoot-down, Vladimir Putin said that measures will be taken against Turkey for their actions.
The second is that solid evidence of U.S. weapons being used against the Russians operating in Syria could be the pretext for direct confrontation between the U.S. and Russia.
And as I've reported here at PJ Media previously, the TOW missiles provided to "vetted moderate" Syrian rebel groups have repeatedly found their way into the hands of terrorists.
In case anyone wondered how the second round of Egypt's election was going.
Boy howdy, that one slipped right past me. Real earth-shattering news here...
[AlAhram] Preliminary reports from the second stage of Egypt's parliamentary elections suggest a second landslide victory for the pro-Sisi 'For the Love of Egypt' coalition
Initial figures from the second stage of Egypt's parliamentary elections suggest that the For the Love of Egypt coalition, widely believed to be loyal to President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, is likely to emerge victorious, trouncing two rival secular coalitions -- the Republican Alliance of Social Forces and the National Movement and Independence Current Alliance -- and one Islamist force, the ultraconservative Salafist Nour Party.
Observers and media news hounds attending the vote-count on Monday night confirmed that For the Love of Egypt has won the two constituencies reserved for party-based candidates in the second stage: Cairo and the Nile South and Middle Delta with 45 seats, and the Nile East Delta with 15 seats.
The above results mean that the coalition has won all 120 seats reserved for party lists in the two-stage poll. These form around 23 percent of seats in Egypt's new parliament.
Sameh Seif El-Yazal, the For the Love of Egypt coordinator, told news hounds Tuesday that the coalition's victory in the second stage was even larger than in the previous stage.
"We won 67 percent of the vote in Cairo and the Nile South and Middle Delta and 72 percent in the Nile East Delta," said El-Yazal, referring to the fact that his coalition's gain in the first stage did not exceed 60 per cent of the vote.
El-Yazal said that the For the Love of Egypt coalition, together with its allied political parties, has now become well placed to be the dominant bloc in Egypt's new parliament.
As in the first stage, the three secular political forces forming part of the For the Love of Egypt coalition -- the Wafd, the Free Egyptians Party and the Future of Homeland -- have shown strong performance in the second stage. Initial reports show that out of 326 candidates fielded by these parties as independents, 145 were able to qualify for the run-off stage, scheduled for next Tuesday and Wednesday.
In the first stage, held between 17 and 28 October, independent candidates affiliated with the three above-mentioned forces were able to win around 70 seats. If added to the 120 party-based seats the For the Love of Egypt coalition has won, they would make a total of 190 seats, or more than 30 percent.
Al-Yazal said last September that the coalition "aims to act as a back-up force for El-Sisi in the coming parliament".
The newly elected Liberal government in Canada will resettle 10,000 Syrian refugees by the end of the year and 15,000 by the end of February. The government had previously promised to bring 25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada by the year's end. The Liberals committed to bringing the refugees in during the recent election campaign.
CBC News had reported that the federal government will limit the resettlement to women, children and families only. As confirmed on Tuesday, those who will be considered refugees include families, women at risk, gays and lesbians and single men who are part of the LGBT community or accompanied by parents.
"We want them to have a roof over their head, and the right support," said Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Minister John McCallum. "It takes a bit of time to put that all in place."
"We're happy to take a little more time that originally planned to bring our new friends into the country."
The refugees will be both privately sponsored and government assisted, either registered with the UN Refugee Agency or with the government of Turkey.
Government officials promised "robust" health and security screenings, to be done overseas, and said military and private aircraft will assist with transportation of refugees to Canada.
Is that "Obama-style" robust screenings or true robust screenings?
Refugees will go to 36 "destination" cities, 12 in Quebec and in the rest of Canada.
Seems like 25,000 refugees could be settled in a fairly concentrated area so that resources could be focused. Also makes it easier to help the refugees return to the homeland when the shooting there stops.
Mr McCallum said the attacks in Paris did not affect the government's decision to slow down the transport of Syrian refugees, citing the logistical struggles with completing the pledge.
Never let facts interfere with ideology...
Newly elected Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made Canada's acceptance of Syrian refugees central to his campaign. After the Paris attacks, he reiterated his commitment to ending Canadian air strikes in Syria and Iraq.
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Iran expects July's landmark nuclear deal with major powers to enter into force in early January, when Tehran will have implemented its commitments, Iran's deputy foreign minister said Tuesday.
Champ is already letting the bank sanctions slip...
"We expect it will be in early January," Abbas Araghchi told reporters in Vienna after meeting the head of the UN atomic watchdog, which is tasked with verifying the accord.
Under the July 14 deal that ended a potentially dangerous decade-long standoff, Iran undertook to dramatically scale back its nuclear program. This includes reducing by two thirds the number of centrifuges, machines which purify or "enrich" uranium, making it suitable for nuclear power generation but also for a nuclear bomb.
In addition Iran agreed to to reduce its stockpile of uranium and alter a new reactor it is building at Arak. In exchange, the six world powers - the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany - will lift painful sanctions.
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#1
Yesterday, a State Department memo sent to Congress admitted that Obama's nuclear agreement was never signed by either party and thus is neither a treaty nor a legal accord. "Sham" it was, and sham it is.
DAMASCUS – Major General Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard’s elite Quds Unit, was seriously injured in the province of Aleppo during battles with the armed opposition forces north Syria, officials reported on Tuesday.
Iranian state agency AsrarIran reported that Soleimani along with two escorts were “seriously injured” 12 days ago in Aleppo’s battles after being hit with a TOW anti-tank rocket by Syrian opposition fighters.
The top Iranian official had received first aid in Syria before being transferred to Tehran to continue treatment in the hospital, the source added.
Activists reported Two weeks ago that the opposition fighters were able to target several Iranian officials in the northern fighting front of Aleppo province, killing and injuring a number of them.
In the meantime, Amir Mousavi, Director of the Center for Strategic Studies and International Relations in Tehran, confirmed Soleimani’s injury in a press statement.
Another high-ranking Iranian official has taken over the command of Iranian forces in Syria following Soleimani’s transportation to Tehran, the official added.
An Israeli official has claimed that the Iranian major general has been killed in Aleppo in northern Syria, according to the Iranian state agency of FNA.
“A well-placed source in the IRGC has strongly rejected rumors by terrorist groups about killing IRGC Quds Force Commander Major General Qassem Soleimani,” FNA reported on Tuesday. “General Soleimani is alive and safe.”
Soleimani, 58, has been in Syria for months, running military operations to bolster forces loyal to the embattled Syria President Bashar al-Assad against his opponents.
“IRGC’s leadership in Tehran is trying to hide the news of Soleimani’s health because disclosing it may negatively affect the morale of their troops in Syria,” a Syrian opposition activist argued.
Reporting by: Resho Issa
Source: ARA News
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#1
Man thatn a tough cookie, getting hit by a TOW is usually kinda fatal.
That said, these damn Farsi bastards see to lead from the front.
URFA – Militants of the al-Nusra Front (Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda) pounded Tuesday the Kurdish neighborhood of Sheikh Maqsoud in Aleppo city, northern Syria, and imposed a blockade on the area, military sources reported.
Speaking to ARA News, an informed source said that al-Nusra Front militants tried to advance towards the neighborhood of Sheikh Maqsoud Tuesday evening, shelling the neighborhood with dozens of mortars and ‘hell cannon’.
“The operation led to the death of at least nine civilians of civilians, including women and children, beside causing material damage to the residential buildings,” the source said on the condition of anonymity.
“Al-Nusra imposed a blockade on the neighborhood, cutting off the roads of Shukef and Kastillo,” the source added.
The Kurdish forces of the People’s Protection Units (YPG) are trying to stop al-Nusra advances in the region, activists reported without further details.
In the meantime, the Rebels Army (Jaish al-Thuwar) captured al-Faisal station on the road of Azaz–Aleppo subsequent to heavy clashes with al-Nusra fighters and Ahrar al-Sham Movement.
Also on Tuesday, al-Nusra Front launched an assault on the Basoufan village in Afrin suburbs, where Kurds constitute a majority, in Aleppo province, activists reported.
Speaking to ARA News in Afrin, media activist Omer Hassan said that al-Nusra fighters are locked in fierce clashes with the Kurdish forces in the vicinity of the village of Basoufan ــwhich is linked administratively to the Shirawa sub-district in the western countryside of Afrin.
“Al-Nusra Front attacked the area with a large number of insurgents and heavy weapons,” Hassan added, pointing out “at least five Nusra militants were killed in clashes with the Kurdish YPG forces”.
“The Kurdish fighters were able to destroy a Dushka machine gun during the clashes that continued until Tuesday midnight,” the source concluded.
[AnNahar] Italia has expelled four Moroccans who were found with a video inciting people to "fight the enemies of Islam," judicial sources said Tuesday, in the first such move following the Gay Paree terror attacks.
This year, Italia has already expelled some 60 Islamist radicals, including four imams, but these are the first expulsions since the November 13 strikes in the French capital.
Interior Minister Angelino Alfano signed the expulsion warrants for the four men, who were known to intelligence services. The video was found at their home.
Italia has ratcheted up its security alert to the highest level possible in the absence of a direct attack on the country after the Gay Paree carnage.
European countries have also tightened security and Brussels is in lockdown as police hunt a suspect amid fears of an imminent terror strike.
Since Monday, some 2,000 police have been deployed across Rome ahead of the Vatican's Holy Jubilee Year of Mercy which kicks off on December 8 and is expected to attract millions of visitors.
[AlAhram] French warplanes hit an Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... Lion of Islam group command center near its key western Iraqi stronghold of djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... , an official said Tuesday.
The target was reached" in the nearby city of Tal Afar, the French official said, adding that the Rafale fighter aircraft took off from the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier in the eastern Mediterranean.
In Gay Paree, the military said the strike was led with the US Air Force.
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#1
During this seemingly quiet moment the BEF is being moved under close convoy to the fron.t
We are staggering into some sort of stupid damn war, it makes no damn sense, we'll likely be on the wrong damn side.
We need to be on the same side as the Frogs and Russers, I dunno how to get there.
#2
We need to be on the same side as the Frogs and Russers, I dunno how to get there.
Indeed. Go Frogs! Go Rus! Beat Barbarians!
At this point, the best we can hope is our brave decisive POTUS standing on the sidelines issuing grave condemnations and soggy platitudes. I just hope he has smoke alarms what with all those strawmen.
[Rudaw] A Rudaw team has found a tunnel in Shingal, fitted with lights and electricity, that was under construction to protect bigwigs of the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group (ISIS).
The Rudaw team, guided by two fighters of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), is the first media team to film inside the tunnel, which is 1,000 meters long.
"They dug this tunnel to protect themselves, they have constructed this tunnel differently," said one of the PKK fighters.
Video about five minutes long with English subtitles can be seen at the link.
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#1
Very probably the Rudaw reporter then sold a much longer article to the Associated Press, which was picked up by The Times of Israel. In that article he reports that in Shingal ISIS people have dug over 30 such tunnels. Link. I imagine that, like the Gazans, the natural activity of ISIS men is tunneling through the earth.
[AlAhram] Two DHL parcels containing kabooms were seized at Cairo International Airport before making their way to the US through London, an official told Aswat Masriya on Tuesday.
The source at the airport said that the parcels, weighting about 10kg, were going through security procedures when the explosive substances were detected by the X-Ray scans.
The two parcels underwent further examinations which confirmed the existence of explosives.
The official said that the parcels have been put under heavy security until authorities can identify their owners.
Following the crash of the Russian airliner on 31October in Sinai which killed all 224 passengers on board, security measures were tightened at Egyptian airports.
New X-Ray baggage security scanners have been installed in the departure hall of Cairo International Airport.
The United States has asked Egypt not to ship parcels, cargo or mail on passenger aircraft destined for the United States starting this week.
Update at 11:45 a.m. ET from Al Ahram summarized as "Never mind, false alarm." I s'pose we should be glad their inspectors are on their toes after recent events.
DUHOK – Austrian teenage girl Samra Kesinovic has been beaten to death by militants of the Islamic State (ISIS) for trying to escape the group’s de facto capital of Raqqa, local sources reported on Tuesday.
Kesinovic, 17, left Austria with her friend in April 2014 to join the ranks of ISIS in Syria.
“The girl was caught by ISIS female jihadists while trying to escape Raqqa. She was then handed over to the group’s leadership and was subsequently beaten to death,” an informed local source told ARA News in Raqqa.
Kesinovic’s friend Sabina Selimovic, who was 15 when she left Austria, was reported dead earlier this year in war-torn Syria.
The parents of both victims are Bosnian refugees based in Austria for nearly two decades, according to reports.
When Kesinovic and Selimovic decided to join ISIS, they had left behind a letter to their parents saying: “Don’t look for us. We will serve Allah… and we will die for him”.
More than 120 people have left Austria to join the ranks of the ISIS extremist group.
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#4
Ralph Peters said this morning that "the last thing ISIS wants is disaffected recruits returning to Europe or elsewhere and telling ISIS horror stories." (paraphrased slightly)
#10
“Stupidity cannot be cured. Stupidity is the only universal capital crime; the sentence is death. There is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity.”
Now that Russia and the U.S. have been destroying oil trucks in serious numbers, other income sources will need to be more extensively exploited. And ransoms are a serious potential income source.
[ARA News] TEL TEMIR – The radical group of Islamic State (ISIS) released Tuesday a new batch of Assyrian hostages after months of abduction in Tel Temir town in Hasakah province, northeastern Syria, Assyrian Network for Human Rights (ANHR) in Syria reported.
The ANHR released a statement, of which ARA News received a copy, saying: “Islamic State group has freed ten Assyrian hostages, including five women on Tuesday evening.”
“The network’s monitors in Hasakah were informed that the released Assyrians arrived in the mostly-Assyrian town of Tel Temir at 17:00 on Tuesday,” the statement read.
“The resealed Assyrians, who are residents of the towns of Tel Shamiram, Tel Jazeera, Qabr Shamiya and Tel Fayda, are in good health conditions.”
“The total number of the released since the start of the negotiations has reached 98, mostly sick and elderly,” the network added.
This batch of the freed hostages comes as a result of the ongoing negotiations headed by the Bishop St. Ephrem Otnaial with the help of local mediations. The negotiations have been taking place for nearly eight months.
As for the release of the remaining Assyrian abductees, Osama Edward, director of the ANHR told ARA News: “We cannot disclose details on the negotiation process due to the gravity and sensitivity of the situation.”
“There have been indirect negotiations with ISIS in order to release the rest of the hostages,” he said.
“The conflict in Syria has been inciting the various ethnic and religious groups to expand at the expense of each other. ISIS has been attacking Assyrian Christians on this basis,” he added.
“The declared Kurdish Auto-Administration in Hasakah (led by the Democratic Union Party “PYD”) has also worked roughly against Assyrians through suspicious political and administrative procedures which seek to evacuate the area of its inherent Assyrian component,” Edward told ARA News.
In February, ISIS radicals launched a major offensive on Assyrian villages in the vicinity of Tel Temir town in Hasakah province, during which they took hundreds of civilians as hostages.
In October, the hardline group executed three Assyrian captives who were abducted earlier during attacks on Christian villages near Tel Temir town, according to a footage published by the group at the time.
Last August, ISIS freed 22 Assyrian hostages after six months of abduction in Tel Temir town in Hasakah province. The office of the Assyrian Archbishop in Hasakah said that the released hostages included 14 women and eight men.
The ANHR concluded that ISIS extremists kidnapped 235 Assyrians from Tel Tmir surroundings on February 23 subsequent to intense fighting with the Kurdish armed forces.
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Daesh's Egyptian branch claimed responsibility for a bombing that killed five people in a hotel in North Sinai on Tuesday where judges overseeing a parliamentary election were staying.
A terrorist militant tried to drive a car bomb into the hotel in the provincial capital Al Arish before security forces opened fire, causing the car to explode, the military and a witness said.
A splodydope suicide bomber broke into the hotel restaurant and blew himself up and a terrorist gunman entered the guest rooms area and killed a judge, they said. Seventeen people were wounded, the Health Ministry said.
The group has carried out similar attacks in the region as part of its bid to topple the Cairo government. It said two of its terrorists members carried out the attack on Tuesday, as did the Interior Ministry. But the military and a witness said there were three terrorists militants. It was not immediately possible to clarify the contradiction.
Two judges and three policemen were killed, the military said, and three terrorists militants were killed.
The blasts followed Monday’s second round of voting in Egypt’s parliamentary election. Egyptian elections are monitored by the judiciary with judges running polling stations, observing the voting and counting ballots.
“This brutal incident is a failed attempt to hinder the state from building its institution but we assure all that it will increase the drive and insistence of the armed forces and the Interior Ministry to weed out the roots of terrorism in North Sinai,” a military statement read.
The attack happened early in the morning and started with the car bomb, Swiss Inn manager Mohamed Mahana told Reuters.
“The security forces shot the splodydope suicide bomber and his car and his tyres blew up but he kept driving until he got to the hotel entrance then the explosion happened. It was huge.”
A second splodydope suicide bomber came in through the beach and into the hotel restaurant, breaking its window, before blowing himself up, said Mahana. The restaurant was empty.
“A third terrorist attacker sneaked into the hotel through the side where the guest rooms are and shot passers by, killing one judge, before a security official shot him.”
Judge, prosecutor, four security personnel and one civilian die in attacks launched in North Sinai by ISIS-affiliated bully boy group Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis
Seven people -- including judicial officials and security personnel -- were killed on Tuesday and eight were maimed in North Sinai's restive city of Al-Arish in attacks on a hotel where judges supervising the parliamentary polls were residing.
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(IraqiNews.com) A source in al-Hashed al-Turkmeni militia in Kirkuk province said on Tuesday, that 12 ISIS elements have been killed in an artillery attack that targeted an ISIS gathering south of the province.
The source reported for IraqiNews.com, “A force from the 16th brigade belonging to al-Hashed al-Turkmeni spotted, this evening, the movements of the ISIS elements, and bombed their positions by rockets in Qasaba Bashir in the district of Taza Khumatu (25 km south of Kirkuk), resulting in the death of 12 elements of them.”
The source, who requested anonymity, added, “The ISIS has transferred the bodies to the district of al-Rashad where there is a small hospital belonging to the terrorist organization southwest of Kirkuk.”
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Yemen’s national army and resistance fighters have seized many rebel positions in a week-long offensive in Taiz but the total liberation of the Southwestern city has been delayed by landmines planted by the coup insurgents, a Yemeni army general has said.
Brigadier Sadeq Sarhan, head of the military council in Taiz governorate, said the army and the resistance have occupied many areas and were advancing on other fronts, including Houban, Dhabab and Rahida, adding that they are advancing under heavy Arab coalition air cover and missile shelling of rebel targets.
“We have advanced in many areas but the liberation of the city has been delayed by landlines planted by the rebels,” he told the Saudi daily ‘Okaz’.
He said many Houthis and other rebels have been killed in heavy clashes over the past few days and that the insurgents have retaliated by shelling civilian areas.
Sarhan said air strikes launched by the Saudi-led coalition have largely supported the national army and resistance in their battles against the coup insurgents.
“These strikes have demoralized the enemy, boost the morale of the people in Taiz and other areas, and restored hope to the Yemeni people who are looking forward for an end to this nightmare,” he said.
He told the paper that the Houthi leaders and ousted Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh must pay for their crimes against the people.
A Turkmen commander tells reporters of how a Russian warplane was shot down after it entered Turkish airspace.
Alpaslan Celik, the second-in-command of the Turkmen Coastal Division, said the Russian warplane dropped a bomb on a Turkmen region of Syria after his forces re-captured the a mountain region from Syrian forces.
Celik also said the rebels shot and killed both Russian pilots who parachuted from the plane after it was shot down. It has not been verified that either of the pilots are dead.
A group of fighters could be seen in the background shouting "Allahu Akbar" and firing into the air with machine guns as Celik made the announcement.
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Officials said Tuesday that they are doing all they can to secure the release of the 10 bus passengers kidnapped on Saturday while traveling through Zabul province.
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, National Directorate of Security (NDS) chief Rahmatullah Nabil said the hostages are being held in Sharjoy district in Zabul and local elders are in discussions with the kidnappers to secure their release.
However, reports have emerged that a local Taliban commander, Taqwa, who is reportedly behind this kidnapping, has demanded the return of more than 400 sheep in exchange for the hostages. The sheep were allegedly stolen from them recently by residents of Behsud district in central Wardak province.
Zabul police commander, Mirwais Norzai, who confirmed the number of hostages was 10 and not 20 nor 17 as earlier reported, said: "They were 10 passengers .... They were on their way when they were taken out of the car."
Local officials have however emphasized efforts are underway for the release of the hostages.
Deputy head of Zabul provincial council Mohammad Omar Omari said: "As we have done in the past, we asked Zabul elders to help us. They have already met with the kidnappers."
Police chief of Zabul Ghulam Jailani Farahi said: "Talks are being held with them and I assure you we will soon have good news."
Meanwhile Kabul officials have also spoken of their efforts to secure the release of the hostages.
Nabil said: "The hostages are in Shah Joy city in Zabul now. Struggles are on and tribal elders are cooperating in this regard."
The Ministry of Interior also said Tuesday that efforts are underway to secure the country's highways.
MoI Minister Nooralhuq Olomi said: "We are trying to take proper measures for highways security and we will fill all the gaps in this aspect. We need people's cooperation."
The bus passengers were kidnapped early Saturday morning while traveling along the Zabul-Kabul highway.
The hostages, from Zabul province, where reportedly taken off buses at a single point along the highway, said local officials.
This latest incident took place a mere 24 km away from the point where Daesh militants kidnapped 31 bus passengers in February. Following the release of most hostages, the last five were freed about two weeks ago.
However, this comes close on the heels of the Zabul Seven incident, which saw the beheading of seven other hostages early this month after being kidnapped by Daesh almost two months ago. Video report at the link
[Rudaw] The Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS) is planning to infiltrate and destabilize Iran but has been unsuccessful in its attempts, said the commander of Iran's revolutionary guards, adding that the group's secret cells are under surveillance.
Not so secret then. Bummer.
Mohammad Ali Jafari, commander in chief of Iran's armed forces told the media that great amounts of explosives were recently seized in different cities across the country.
"Groups like ISIS have many support networks and not long ago we confronted one of them and all other groups are under complete surveillance and in time we will face them," Jafari was quoted by Nasim news agency as saying.
The news agency also reported that on Sunday the cells of "two terrorist groups" were unveiled and captured in Sistan and Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... and Azerbaijan provinces by the security forces.
"One of the groups was supported by regional countries and had tried to destroy the communication system of Rasik-Iranshehir by detonating 150 kg of explosives," an Iranian interior ministry official told Nasim on condition of anonymity.
Also on Saturday Iran's state minister told his country's Chanel 1 that a number of people had entered Iran to carry out "terrorist acts" during the Ashura ceremony.
These recent comments by Iranian security officials follow a statement by the intelligence minister Mamoud Alavi earlier this month who said that more than 10 cells of gangs had been broken up across Iran.
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Over 20 Saudi-led mercenaries were killed and 70 others were injured as the Yemeni army and popular committees frustrated their attempt to advance towards al-Omari military camp in Taiz province, according to battlefield sources.
The Yemeni forces also bombarded a Saudi warship on Mocha coast in Taiz.
A bomb blast on a bus transporting Tunisia's presidential guard in central Tunis on Tuesday killed at least 12 people and wounded 16, the interior ministry said. A security source at the site of the attack said "most of the agents who were on the bus are dead."
The presidency had said the blast on the bus killed at least 14 people, but this was revised down, with the interior ministry giving the latest toll as least 12 dead.
The explosion, described as an "attack" by presidential spokesman Moez Sinaoui, struck on the capital's Mohamed V Avenue, a ministry official told AFP. An AFP journalist reported seeing the partly burnt-out shell of the bus, with police, ambulances and fire trucks at the scene.
Many people were in tears. A bank employee working nearby reported hearing a large explosion and seeing the bus on fire.
While there was no immediate claim of responsibility, Tunisia has been plagued by violence since the 2011 overthrow of longtime dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
[AlAhram] Tunisia's President Beji Caid Essebsi declared a nationwide state of emergency and curfew in Tunis after a deadly kaboom Tuesday on a presidential guard bus in the capital.
"As a result of this painful event, this great tragedy... I proclaim a state of emergency for 30 days under the terms of law, and a curfew in greater Tunis from 9:00 pm (2000 GMT) until 5:00 am (0400 GMT) tomorrow," he said in a televised address.
The Islamic State group on Wednesday claimed the suicide bombing of a busload of presidential guards in Tunisia's capital, the latest attack in a country plagued by Islamist violence.
IS said a Tunisian, named as Abou Abdallah al-Tounissi, had boarded the bus wearing an explosives belt only a few hundred meters (yards) from the interior ministry as it picked up guards on their way to work.
Twelve of them were killed and 20 other people wounded, including four civilians, according to the health ministry.
IS said in a statement shared on jihadist social media that 20 people had died. It published a photo of the attacker dressed in white and wearing an explosives vest, his head and face covered with a scarf.
The interior ministry said 10 kilos of Semtex explosives were used.
It added that a 13th body "is believed to be that of the terrorist who caused the explosion", and that DNA tests were being conducted to identify the person.
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ALEPPO – Subsequent to intense air and missile bombardments on rebel positions, Syrian regime’s army forces regained Tuesday several towns and villages from the armed opposition groups in the northern outskirts of Lattakia and Jabal al-Turkman (Mount Turkmen), prompting opposition fighters to withdraw to their positions in the mountains, military sources reported.
Speaking to ARA News, Mohammed al-Naser, a spokesman for the rebel alliance Army of Conquest, said that pro-Assad army forces, backed by a Russian air cover, were able to take control of several key locations held by rebels in northern Lattakia after pummeling the Turkmen-populated villages with long-range missiles and dozens of airstrikes.
“Rebels were forced to withdraw towards Jabal al-Turkman under intense bombings from Russian warplanes,” he added.
Hundreds of civilians, mostly Turkmen, have been subsequently displaced from the Jabal al-Turkman in the wake of Russian airstrikes and the regime’s army bombardment on the area, civil rights activists told ARA News, pointing out “many of them are still stranded in the region due to the ongoing unrest”.
“The regime’s army forces were able then to take over the Rashwan Hill and the villages of Katf al-Ghader, Ain Samoukh, Jib al-Ahmar and Ruwysat al-Mallouha,” he said, adding “clashes are still ongoing in the vicinity of these villages in an attempt by rebels to regain them.”
Fighters of the Army of Conquest were able to repel advances by government forces towards the Jabal al-Turkmanin in Latakia countryside, according to al-Naser.
“Our fighters were able to destroy a 14.5 gun and a troop carrier for the regime’s army after hitting them with anti-tank missiles,” al-Naser told ARA News, pointing out “pro-regime forces tried to infiltrate into our headquarters from the village of Kabaneh, the towns of Ghumam and Mount Ziwik north of Latakia.
In the meantime, Turkish General Staff said Tuesday the Turkish air force shot down a Russian Sukhoi fighter jet over Jabal al-Turkuman, arguing “it penetrated Turkish airspace and had been warned five times without moving away from the Turkish area.”
In return, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the plane had been hit when it was 1 km (0.62 mile) inside Syria, warning of “serious consequences” for what he termed “a stab in the back administered” by “the accomplices of terrorists”.
“We will never tolerate such crimes like the one committed today,” Putin said.
Jabal al-Turkman, is a Syrian mountain range that runs along the eastern length of Latakia Governorate, and it is inhabited mostly by Turkmens.
Reporting by: Taim Khalil
Source: ARA News
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A Pakistani man extradited from the UK to the US has been sentenced to 40 years in jail for plotting attacks in several countries. Abid Naseer, 29, was sentenced by a federal judge in New York.
US authorities said he had been part of a plot to attack Manchester, New York City and Copenhagen.
In March, a jury found him guilty of providing material support to al-Qaeda and conspiracy to use a destructive device.
FBI assistant director-in-charge Diego Rodriguez said that Naseer, who moved to the UK to study, failed to use the British education visa system to make the best of his life. Instead, he exploited it "to take away the lives of many others in large numbers", said Mr Rodriguez.
Naseer was first arrested in the UK in 2009, along with 11 other men, suspected of planning a bomb attack on the Arndale shopping centre in Manchester over the Easter weekend. No explosives were found but the men were ordered to leave the country. Mr Naseer avoided deportation after a judge ruled it was likely he would not be safe if he returned to Pakistan.
Abid Naseer says he's not guilty. He defended himself throughout the trial, but his legal advisers say they'll appeal - and not just against the sentence which they believe is overly harsh. They say this was not a fair trial and Naseer should have appeared in court in the UK, not in front of a jury in a post 9/11 New York.
But US prosecutors say the 29-year-old was capable of mass murder. They say he remains a threat and they're delighted by the sentence. They hope it sends a message to terrorists that they will be caught and they will be put behind bars for life.
Naseer appealed to the judge that he was not - nor had he ever been - a "career criminal". But Judge Raymond Dearie had a response.
"I know you're not," he replied. "You're a terrorist."
UK officials arrested him again in 2010 at the request of US prosecutors. In 2013 he was extradited to the US, where prosecutors argued Naseer was part of a broader al-Qaeda conspiracy to attack various Western locations, including the New York subway system and a newspaper office in Copenhagen, Denmark.
The US Department of Justice said the plots were "directed by and co-ordinated with senior al-Qaeda leaders in Pakistan".
Evidence at Naseer's trial included a document found in the raid of the Bin Laden compound and MI5 officers testifying in wigs. His defence was largely based on his own testimony and cross-examining prosecution witnesses.
Prosecutors brought in MI5 agents who had previously tracked Naseer in 2009 at a shopping centre in the UK. They also relied on the testimony of two co-conspirators who pleaded guilty to the subway plot - Najibullah Zazi and Zarein Ahmedzay. Prosecutors say coded emails show all three men were under the direction of the same al-Qaeda handler.
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[Hurriyet] Ankara and Moscow must ease tensions, said U.S. President Barack Obama We're gonna punish our enemies and we're gonna reward our friends who stand with us on issues that are important to us... , while commenting on the downing of a Russian fighter jet by The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... , as he higlighted that Turkey has a right to protect its borders.
"Turkey, like any other country, has a right to defend its territory and its air space," Obama said during a joint presser with French President Francois Hollande ...the Socialist president of La Belle France, an economic bad joke for la Belle France but seemingly a foreign policy realist... "It's very important right now for us to make sure that both the Russians and the Turks are talking to each other to find out exactly what happened and take measures to discourage any kind of escalation," Obama said.
He said downing of the Russian plane points to an "ongoing problem with Russian operations near the Turkish border."
It sounds like our beloved president doesn't like Russia anymore.
The U.S. president said he expected to be in communication with the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him... in the next several days.
Not a priority to the White House, then?
Obama also said that Russian strikes against moderate opposition there only serve to bolster Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Leveler of Latakia... 's government.
He also said the United States and La Belle France will stand united to fight the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) hard boyz following the Nov. 13 attacks in Gay Paree, pledging to step up efforts to combat terrorism alongside its European partners.
"As Americans, we stand by our friends in good times and in bad, no matter what," Obama said.
[Hurriyet] NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and organization.... Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has said Turkish information over downed Russian jet's air space violation was correct contrary to the Russian claims.
"The allied assessments that we have are consistent with the information we have from The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... ," the NATO chief said after an emergency meeting in Brussels on Nov. 24.
"We stand in solidarity with The Sick Man of Europe Turkey, support its territorial integrity," Stoltenberg said.
Russian officials had said earlier in the day that the jet did not violate the Turkish space and the jet was hit on the Syrian side of the border.
There has been no direct contact between Russia and NATO so far, he said, adding that Ankara and Moscow have already contacted.
He called for more contact.
The situation is serious and tensions should be eased, he said, adding that measures should be taken to prevent any repetition of such an incident.
"The common enemy is ISIL," he said, referring to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, adding that Russia should be guided by that.
#2
Yeah, I'm sure that everyone in the Middle East is hanging on every word that Obama says - sort of like these Arab journalists: https://youtu.be/UXodRLLkth4
#7
This SOB is yet going to get a lot of us killed for the wrong damn reason.
Posted by Shipman
But he's what the Pro-Choice, LGBT, 'me generation' and 'basement dwellers' wanted. Their demise at the hands of their anointed worshipful master would certainly follow the historical pattern of tyrants and despots. We should not be surprised at such an outcome.
[Rudaw] The situation following the downing of a Russian jet by The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... is very serious, NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... Secretary General told Rudaw Tuesday, urging all sides to remain prudent and prevent further escalation.
"I think I've expressed very clearly that we are calling for calm and de-escalation," NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told Rudaw at a presser. "This is a serious situation. This is a situation which calls on that we all are prudent and that we all contribute to de-escalating the situation."
Turkish jets shot down a Russian warplane on the Syrian border after it violated the Turkish airspace, said Ankara.
Turkish officials said the Russian jet was warned about the violation.
Stoltenberg said that his organization urges Ankara and Moscow to talk over the incident and make sure similar situation won't happen again.
"There has been contacts and we would welcome even more contacts," he explained. "To partly to solve this concrete incident, but also to continue to work on the development and also the strengthening of mechanisms to avoid these kinds of situation in the future."
In response to a Rudaw question about NATO's position, Stoltenberg said, "Actually, inside the Alliance we are discussing how we can develop better and improved measures for transparency, for predictability, and for risk reduction."
He added: "Because we have to avoid this kind of incidents. We have to avoid that situations, incidents, accidents spiral out of control."
Russian President Vladimir Putin ...Second and fourth President and sixth of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead... described the shooting down of the jet as 'a stab in the back' by Turkey as he warned there would be 'serious consequences' in Moscow-Ankara relations.
Shortly after the incident Turkey called an emergency meeting of the NATO where Stoltenberg told news hounds, "I have previously expressed my concerns about the implications of the military actions of the Russian Federation close to NATO's borders," he said.
"As we have repeatedly made clear, we stand in solidarity with Turkey and support the territorial integrity of our NATO Ally, Turkey," he added.
At the presser the NATO secretary general told the Wall Street Journal that all sides including Russia should focus on the main enemy that is the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS).
"The common enemy should be ISIL," he said. "And I would welcome all efforts to fight ISIL. And it is important that all of us, also Russia, is guided by the overarching goal of defeating ISIL."
#1
In response to a Rudaw question about NATO's position, Stoltenberg said, "Actually, inside the Alliance we are discussing how we can develop better and improved measures for transparency, for predictability, and for risk reduction."
Just like the UN only smaller and a boat load more expensive.
Two men have been charged by a military court in Thailand in connection with the bombing of a shrine in the capital Bangkok. Twenty people were killed in the attack on the Erawan Shrine in August.
Authorities say Bilal Mohammed, also known as Adem Karadag, and Yusuf Mieraili have both confessed to their roles in the blast. The two suspects have been indicted on 10 charges, including murder, but not terrorism.
A lawyer for one of the men told the Reuters news agency that the charges included premeditated murder, illegal possession of weapons, and murder.
"The court has accepted the 10 charges that prosecutors formally brought against the two men," said lawyer Schoochart Kanpai.
The two have been in custody for nearly three months.
Documents sent by prosecutors to the court said both men were Chinese nationals from the Muslim Uighur minority. China has long faced criticism for the perceived harsh restrictions it places on religion and culture in Xinjiang, where the majority of Uighurs live.
Here's two examples of why China does have a point...
Thailand recently found itself in the spotlight following its forced repatriation of more than 100 Uighurs to China.
Here's two examples of why Thailand does have a point...
Police have released warrants for a total of 17 people over charges stemming from the attack. They believe many have fled the country.
The motive for the bombing remains unclear.
It's manifestly clear: a bunch of Islamicists blew up a shrine belonging to another religion.
The Erawan shrine - with its four-faced golden statue of the Hindu god Brahma - is considered sacred by Thai Buddhists, and attracts many foreign visitors.
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#1
Also looks like the Turkish Gray Wolves might've had a part in it. But the Turks are far away, and they don't bring foreign-aid gifts.
Somalia’s Shebab fighters have warned they will “cut the throat” of members who shift allegiance from Al-Qaeda to Islamic State, amid reports some factions have already been punished for doing so.
The trading deadline is past, and you have to clear waivers with the Muslim Brotherhood...
“If anyone says he belongs to another Islamic movement, kill him on the spot,” top Shebab official Abu Abdalla, said in a radio broadcast Monday. “We will cut the throat of any one… if they undermine unity.”
The Shebab, East Africa’s long-time Al-Qaeda branch, is fighting to overthrow the internationally-backed government in Mogadishu, which is protected by 22,000 African Union troops. The Islamists have lost much ground in recent years but remain a threat in both Somalia and neighbouring Kenya, where they have carried out a series of attacks.
The reported divisions come at a time when Islamic State in Iraq and Syria has become the jihadist franchise of choice, attracting fighters from abroad and the allegiance of other militant groups such as Boko Haram in Nigeria.
But Al-Qaeda has also recently expanded its territory in Yemen, just across the Gulf of Aden from Somalia.
A handful of Shebab factions have switched allegiance to IS but the shift has failed to gain momentum. Pro-IS groups have been attacked and their leaders assassinated as Shebab emir and Al-Qaeda loyalist Ahmed Diriye seeks to shore up his control.
Last month President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud said “the now-public dispute” within Shebab showed the group had “lost its way”.
But Abdalla said Shebab remained united. “The world wanted us to be divided,” he said.
“This is a collective decision, and anybody who wants to join another Islamic group must leave the country to meet them where they are.” he said. “I swear by the name of God we will not tolerate the acts of saboteurs.”
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#1
Him could be sent to the Awami League with no penalty (except salary)
[AlAhram] A hostage situation in the northern French town of Roubaix was apparently not linked to the Gay Paree attacks earlier this month and was drawing to a close with the hostages now safe, officials said on Tuesday.
Local authorities said the hostages were now in a "secure place" while a police source told Rooters that the operation would soon be over and that several suspects had been tossed in the clink ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... .
La Belle France remains on high alert after the Nov. 13 attacks in and around Gay Paree in which 130 people were killed, and as a result of this, situations such as the one in Roubaix have taken on a greater significance than usual.
However, today is that tomorrow you were thinking about yesterday... police sources said the Roubaix incident most likely concerned a planned armed robbery.
"This is apparently not a terrorist attack, it's apparently a robbery," one police source said.
#1
Roubaxix? Don't even think of it! MaryAnne will arise and rip your ballz off, Eddie the Cannibal will have you with cashews and my olde friend Lucky will paint you into a corner, so don't try it!
[Rudaw] The head of the Nineveh provincial council says the newly liberated city of Shingal "desperately needs" $100 million to provide basic services such as electricity and healthcare before the possible return of some 400,000 refugees--both Yezidis and Muslims--from the area.
Bashar Kiki told Rudaw he had visited the city after it was recaptured from ISIS snuffies and saw "a devastated town" which "makes it impossible to secure a safe return for the refugees."
"We have already asked all parties, including international aid agencies, to give us donations or help us reconstruct the town," said Kiki, who headed a provincial delegation to Shingal immediately after Peshmarga forces declared the area was under their control last week.
Shingal, which is a predominantly Yezidi town, still has a sizable Muslim community which includes both Muslim Kurds and Arabs.
The region where the city is located is part of the so-called disputed areas under the Iraqi constitution and is claimed by both Kurds and Arabs. A referendum in 2007, which was indefinitely postponed, should have decided the fate of the town along with the rest of the disputed areas in Iraq defined by article 140 of Iraq's constitution.
Though historically and politically under Kurdish influence, Shingal is outside the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and is part of Nineveh province, where djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... is the capital.
Some 400,000 refugees fled the area after the ISIS takeover in 2014. Authorities hope to gradually return the refugees to their areas now under Kurdish control.
Kurdish and foreign experts have already begun demining the city after ISIS turned Shingal into a mine field in order to halt Kurdish offensives into the city.
Authorities also fear that ethnic tensions between Yezidis and Muslim Arabs in the area could deteriorate into sectarian unrest, as many Yezidi families in the past year have accused their Arab neighbors of collaborating with ISIS in attacks on Yezidis in the city and villages.
This is partly why various Kurdish political parties justify their armed presence in Shingal where no central authority exists yet.
"Not all of Shingal is liberated, let's free all areas and the people there, normalize the situation, reconstruct the city and return self confidence to the people, then there is no need for us to be here," Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) spokesperson Demhat Jvian told Rudaw.
But Kiki from the provincial council said the presence of armed forces in Shingal has complicated things, as many buildings are "occupied" by various Kurdish forces.
"We have asked them to evacuate the city buildings, and if they don't, we will bring the case to the court of law because our civil servants need these offices to work," Kiki said.
He added most Kurdish political parties, including the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the PKK have occupied public buildings, which he said had impacted the work of city officials.
KDP official Qasim Rasho told Rudaw they have done so to protect the town and "whenever police forces arrive, KDP forces will withdraw."
More than 12,000 Peshmarga supported by US-led Arclight airstrikes effectively pushed back ISIS from Shingal and retook control of the city on November 12.
#1
Some 400,000 refugees fled the area after the ISIS takeover in 2014. More than 12,000 Peshmarga retook control of the city on November 12.
Maybe they didn't just run away, the nomadic culture could be resurfacing. If it hadn't been so easy to leave maybe it wouldn't be so expensive to return.
[AnNahar] The suspected ringleader of the deadly Gay Paree attacks and an accomplice planned to carry out a suicide kaboom on the city's La Defense business district the following week, the chief prosecutor said Tuesday.
Revealing the latest findings of the vast investigation into the attacks, Gay Paree prosecutor Francois Molins said Abdelhamid Abaaoud had aimed to target the area in the west of the capital where many major French companies have their headquarters.
Belgian national Abaaoud was killed with his female cousin and another man in a ferocious shootout with police at an apartment in northern Gay Paree five days after the series of shootings and suicide kabooms on November 13 in which 130 people were killed.
"The two terrorists, Abaaoud and the man found next to him, were planning an attack which involved blowing themselves up on Wednesday 18 November or Thursday 19 November, at La Defense," Molins said.
The man killed in the apartment siege who has not yet been identified "is perhaps" the third assailant spotted by witnesses, who sprayed cafe terraces and restaurants with gunfire on November 13, killing dozens, the prosecutor said.
Abaaoud's female cousin, Hasna Aitboulahcen, had helped to organize the hideout in Saint-Denis which was attacked in the ferocious shootout with police, the prosecutor said.
"She was absolutely aware of her cousin's implication in the November 13 attacks," he said.
- Key Belgian suspect -
She was first believed to have blown herself up, but the prosecutor said it is now thought she was asphyxiated when another man -- the unidentified individual -- detonated his explosive vest as police closed in.
Investigators have fingerprints and DNA samples from the man, "but they do not match any records in La Belle France," Molins said. They have been matched to those on a Kalashnikov rifle found in a car thought to have been used in the attacks.
Meanwhile in Belgium, prosecutors issued an international arrest warrant for a "dangerous" man seen driving a car with key Gay Paree attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam two days before the atrocities.
Mohammed Abrini, 30, was filmed along with Abdeslam at a motorway petrol station in Ressons, north of Gay Paree, in a Renault Clio later used in the attacks, Belgium's federal prosecutor said in a statement.
Abdeslam remains on the lam, 11 days after the carnage in Gay Paree.
In the French capital, prosecutor Molins revealed that an explosives vest found Monday in a bag of rubbish in the suburb of Montrouge was "exactly the same construction as the others" used by the jacket wallahs in the attacks.
Returning to Abaaoud, thought to be an Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... operative who had planned other attacks in Europe, the prosecutor said telephone analysis showed he had returned to the scene of the Gay Paree atrocities while the bloody siege at the Bataclan concert venue was still under way.
The Bataclan was the scene of the worst violence -- 90 people were killed by three assailants as they attended a rock concert.
The analysis "leads us to believe that Abaaoud returned to the scene of the crimes after the attack carried out on the people sitting at tables at restaurants and while the BRI (elite police) was intervening at the Bataclan", the prosecutor said.
Abaaoud had also been in contact by phone with Bilal Hadfi, one of the suicide bombers who detonated his explosives outside the Stade de La Belle France stadium, the prosecutor said.
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[AnNahar] Belgium on Tuesday issued an international arrest warrant for a "dangerous" man who was seen driving a car with key Gay Paree attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam two days before the atrocities.
Mohammed Abrini, 30, was filmed along with Abdeslam at a petrol station in Ressons, La Belle France on the motorway to Gay Paree, in a Renault Clio which was later used in the attacks, Belgium's federal prosecutor said in a statement.
"Two days before the Gay Paree attacks, on 11 November around 19.00 pm, Salah Abdeslam was filmed in a gas station in Ressons... together with a person who has been identified as Mohammed Abrini, born 27 December 1984," the prosecutor's statement said.
"The latter was driving the Renault Clio used two days later for committing the attacks.
"The Investigating Judge has issued an European and International arrest warrant against Mohammed Abrini. He is actively tracked down by Belgian and French police services," said the communique, which was issued in English.
A police wanted notice said Abrini was "dangerous and probably armed." It had a mugshot of the suspect, who is dark-haired with a cropped beard, along with a series of pictures of him apparently in the petrol station.
Belgium was home to a number of the suspects in the November 13 Gay Paree gun and suicide kabooms on a concert venue and a string of bars and restaurants killed 130 people.
The Renault Clio was one of three Belgian-licensed vehicles used in the attacks that were hired by Salah Abdeslam's brother Brahim Abdeslam, who went kaboom! outside a cafe in the attacks.
Belgian authorities also charged a fifth person in connection with the attacks, following the arrest of a number of people in Brussels and the eastern city of Liege.
- Fifth person charged -
The Investigating Judge, specialized in terrorism cases, has placed one person under arrest warrant for participation in the activities of a terrorist group and terrorist murders," a statement from Belgium's federal prosecutor said.
Four others placed in durance vile Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! Monday were released.
The first two people to be charged in Belgium over the Gay Paree attacks were Mohammed Amri, 27, and Hamza Attou, 20, who were accused last Monday on suspicion of helping Salah Abdeslam escape to Brussels after the carnage.
The last known sighting of Abdeslam was at a police check in Cambrai, La Belle France, in a Volkswagen Golf along with two people believed to be Amri and Attou, but he was not stopped.
A third person charged last Friday was identified by the prosecutor on Monday as Lazez A., a 39-year-old Moroccan from the Molenbeek district of Brussels, an area which has been linked to several of the suspects.
Lazez A. was charged with "participation in the activities of a terrorist group and terrorist murders", while two guns and traces of blood were found in his car, the prosecutor's statement said.
Meanwhile a fourth suspect arrested in a raid on Sunday was identified as Ali O., whom prosecutors said was arrested on suspicion of driving Salah Abdeslam after he was dropped off in Brussels, it said.
The capital Brussels was locked down Tuesday for a fourth day under a state of maximum alert.
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#1
My cousin Chuck, an AF brat a great athlete and an honest man came of age outside NATO HQ. On returning to Florida we were at the beach and I was counting coup on many a house-fly with my patented right-hand claw move. Chuck had no luck, although he was a far better quick mover. His excuse? In Belgium the flys are slower and unaware of air-pressure differentials.
The so-called Islamic State (IS) group is weak and Australia has no plans to send combat troops to fight it, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull says. His remarks contrasted with former prime minister Tony Abbott's description of IS as a "death cult".
Mr Abbott, now serving as a backbench MP, called for Australia to commit combat troops to the Middle East after the Paris attacks.
Mr Turnbull told Australia's House of Representatives that IS relied on its propaganda network and "we must not be fooled by its hype". Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has rejected calls to send combat troops to the Middle East. But the group must be defeated militarily in Iraq and Syria, where it has overrun vast swathes of territory, he said.
"Let someone else do it."
"Its ideology is archaic, but its use of the internet is very modern. ISIL has many more smartphones than guns, more Twitter accounts than fighters.
"It does not command broad-based legitimacy even in those areas under its direct control. It is encircled by hostile forces. It is under military pressure."
Mr Turnbull made the comments as part of national security statement to Australia's parliament.
Tony Abbott never backed away from his description of the so-called Islamic State (IS) as a "death cult".
When terrorism experts said IS would be delighted that his colourful description promoted the group's propaganda aims, Mr Abbott was dismissive. "I think we should call things what they are," he said in June this year.
Fast-forward five months and Australia's political landscape is very different. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, who deposed Mr Abbott in September, wants to undercut IS's effective propaganda. Rather than boots on the ground, Mr Turnbull is focusing on a war of ideas.
Mr Turnbull said the government of Iraq believed the presence of large numbers of Western troops in that country would be "counter-productive". He also said the consensus of world leaders was that there was no appetite for a large-scale invasion of Syria.
The deployment of Australian combat troops to either Iraq or Syria would be neither "feasible" nor "practical", Mr Turnbull said.
Former defence minister Kevin Andrews and Liberal MP Michael Sukkar had backed Mr Abbott's call for "boots on the ground" following the Paris attacks.
Currently there are around 90 Australian special forces soldiers advising counter-terror agencies in Iraq, as well as around 300 soldiers training members of the Iraqi national army. Australia also has six aircraft bombing IS positions in both Iraq and Syria as part of the US-led coalition.
Mr Turnbull said Australia's commitment to the Middle East conflict was already large given the country's size and geographic location. "Larger for example than any European nation, larger than Canada or any of the neighbouring Arab states," he said.
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#1
Send blankets and juice packs, that should cover your soul well enough.
#2
Australia imported a HUGE number of Sunni Islamist migrants in the 1990s
Now we are reaping the whirlwind. They have used Saudi money to establish a hugely well-organised movement
They are in control of vocal lobby groups. The Sunni Islamist faction is in control of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils which has branch councils in every state
They are funding think tanks on university campuses and are pumping their members through the academic mill so they are the next generation of commentators
they are commanding media coverage - every time media turns for comment from muslims the only muslim groups and leaders to step forward are the Sunni Islamists. They also work to tear down the lone secular voices like Dr Jamal Rifi
Secularism is the only solution to Islamism eg Banning sharia
but australia has a huge problem now because Islamists are firmly in control particularly in the multicultural lobby
they have also been logging and documenting Islamophobia to use as a weapon
Years of propaganda of *islam is the religion of peace, dont blame islam* means ordinary people are just blaming all islam and have no idea of the secular - theocrat split.
This is feeding the Islamophobia mill as they predictably lash out
Turnbull will not be able to govern the nation if he goes to fight in the middle east because the Islamists will turn their cultural power against him as they did on Tony Abbott
they forced Abbott out they would do the same to Turnbull and he knows it
#3
Sorry Ship, they may not know it but the AU is struggling to maintain their own national WASP identity. Their only reason to participate in the SE Asia festivities is to polish strategy, practice tactics and create data feeds for export back home. The north coastal states are as overrun with Indonesian migration as the southern US states bordering Mexico.
#4
Australia should create a foreign legion to go fight. Let radicals sneak their way in. Then when they get to the area make it easy for them to go MIA. Then cancel their passport. I'm fairly confident you'll get no true want to help my new nation volunteers but if you do that works even better.
Five people were killed and seven injured, one of them critically, when a truck bomb exploded at a checkpoint on the coastal road near Khoms.
At around ten this morning, a small lorry full of gas cylinders exploded at a security gate at the junction with the road to Emsalata and Tarhouna.
It appears that not of all the dead were military, since among the injured were occupants in passing vehicles. Among the seven wounded are two women, one of whom is in intensive care.
The dead have been named as:
Taher Mohamed Salkhin, 32,
Mohamed Imshehat, 25,
Abdul Mutalib Abusneinam 24,
Ahmed Mohamed Igzeit, 24,
Ali Mohaned Abu Ghifa, 22.
It is not clear who carried out the attack. Last month fighting between Khoms and Misrata led to the coast road being blocked for around 24 hours.
In Tripoli last week, Libya Dawn officials claimed that Emsalata had become a growing centre of IS activity.
Al shabaab said its fighters killed at least eight KDF soldiers when a roadside bomb hit their army convoy near Somali-Kenyan border on Monday.
Sheikh Abdulaziz Abu Musab, the spokesman of Al shabaab’s military operations said the 8 soldiers lost their lives in a land-mine blast destroyed a police vehicle at Hulugho area while on security patrol. Hulugho lies 5Kms away from Garissa town in North eastern Kenya.
Meanwhile, Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) spokesman Col David Obonyo, told Reuters that five soldiers were injured. One was critical, but (they) were evacuated for medical attention. He said their APC stepped on the landmine planted on the road injuring the five.
Couldn't the APC tippy-toe around it?
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[AnNahar] French police have carried out more than 1,200 searches, tossed in the calaboose Don't shoot, coppers! I'm comin' out! 165 people and seized 230 weapons in the security crackdown since the attacks in Gay Paree, Interior Minister Bernard Cazenueve said Tuesday.
He said the arms included "weapons of war" and the number collected "showed the effectiveness of the searches which were carried out to prevent the weapons from harming anyone," Cazenueve said.
A list of the group's demands, which has been posted to its Facebook page, also included a zero tolerance policy for Islamophobic rhetoric and actions on campus; mandatory bystander training for faculty, staff and students; more coursework on Islam in an effort to alleviate misconceptions toward Muslim students; and for administrators to "address, alleviate and eliminate systems of oppression that disproportionately target people of color, women and all marginalized students on campus."
More at the link including video.
So all you Rantburgers, can your Islamophobic rhetoric when you visit SDSU, don't gimme any crap about your First Amendment rights and don't ask who gets to define exactly what constitutes Islamophobic rhetoric. Yeah, and no bitching about your tax dollars being spent on Muslim propaganda being taught in our universities. Just shut up and drink your KoolAid.
You forgot the /sarcasm, Abu Uluque.
The demands read the same, virtually, as the demands at Mizzou, Duke, Yale, etc. Now maybe it's because of the internet. But these demands are about stuff that the snowflakes ordinarily wouldn't consider, like 'bystander training' and the like. So it makes me wonder who amongst the administrators, particularly the student affairs drones who majored in grievance studies, are in on this. And who the national coordinators are.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
11/25/2015
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#1
Who ever suspected the Fascist takeover of USA to come from the campuses?
#4
People will believe anything that benefits them personally. USA "fellow travelers" has been rewarded with the best white collar jobs for two generations now.
#7
foreign powers including Islamists have long targeted university campuses to recruit and spread ideology
saudi money funds many things including the think tanks, lobby groups and organisations that collect and document instances of islamophobia which are so very useful
they also fund imams to go visit the prisons and find converts among the criminal classes
and the street dawah movement is big as well
all of this is used to turn democracy against itself, using the very freedoms you thought might protect minorities
Infiltrating and funding activity at universities is where the ideological war is fought and won.
This is where the next generation of policymakers, media professionals and leaders come from.
when Islamists control the university campuses then the thought leaders that graduate instil a culture that silences criticism of Islam.
news stories become biased for fear of inciting islamophobia. The truth is no longer reported.
criticism of islam is not allowed through self-censorship
this cripples the war effort
Think about it
how many news stories do you see that talk about the Caliphate as the enemy? none.
They all talk about Islamic State, the group
that is because all Islamists support the Caliphate no matter what acronym. But Islamic State is just one of those groups
So why does the media support islamist aims? it has been controlled by Islamist lobby groups and that includes thought leaders from the very university campuses where this crap is setting the agenda
#12
Zero tolerance for Islamophobia (Noun: Any discussion of Islam which does not acknowledge it's supremacy).
Yet discrimination against anything Jewish or Christian is fully encouraged.
And who the national coordinators are.
I think a comparison between the 'student' leaders (why do I doubt they are actual students?) and the leaders of the Democratic Party organized and supported 'Occupy Movement' might be interesting.
#14
I'm sure if we taught everyone about the robbing murderous mentally-ill desert dwelling paedophile who wrote the terrorist manual, we'd be accused of islamaphobia even if we only quoted from the koran.
#15
BP - I think that's already been done - hasn't someone (Wilders?) been convicted of a 'hate crime' and banned from visiting England because he produced a video which basically quoted the Crayon?
After reading the article it should be noted that the 'student group' is a Muslim Association group urged on by CAIR. Money Quote:
Sarah Al-Khaled agreed. “Because of our names, we're Muslim so everyone targets us as terrorists and that is wrong because Islam is all about peace!"
Sorry lady but reality is, once again, calling you a liar.
#16
CrazyFool, I think the kind of peace she's talking about is when all other religions have been eradicated and everyone on the planet bows to Mecca five times a day. Problem is, if and when that day ever comes, they will find a reason to kill each other.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
11/25/2015 11:03
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#17
As a SDSU alumni they can kiss my white privileged Christian ass
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/25/2015 11:05
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#18
If at some level, they do not understand that they look like Sigfried and Roy trying to dress themselves in football gear for an eight yard post route from the slot, we have real problems.
Say what you will, at least meth heads and crack dealers are sure of themselves.
#22
It's time to go back and reevaluate the very idea of hate speech and hate crime -- by which I mean abolish these concepts altogether as inconsistent with the 1st Amendment and a healthy, functioning democracy.
#24
My guess is the only witnesses will be fellow Muslims. I think this is another hoax.
They had some kind of hoax there last year and almost shut down the fraternities. It's like they have an administration looking for excuses and some jerks trying to hoax up that excuse, with a passive student body easily riled up at each false alarm.
(IraqiNews.com) Baghdad – The Anti-Terrorism Forces announced on Tuesday the liberation of 22 neighborhoods out of 39 in Ramadi , stressing that the security forces have been blockading the city of Ramadi.
Media adviser of Anti-Terrorism Forces, Samir Shuwaili, said in an interview for IraqiNews.com, “22 neighborhood in the city of Ramadi have been liberated,” noting that, “the number of the districts in Ramadi is 39.”
Shuwaili added, “The security forces have blockaded the city of Ramadi “, indicating that, “50-100 terrorists have been killed in the 5th Kilometer area.”
A Russian marine has been killed on a helicopter mission to rescue the crew of a jet downed by Turkey near the Syrian border on Tuesday. He died when his helicopter came under fire from rebels in northern Syria, where the plane crashed.
Rebel fire from the ground killed one of the jet's two crew members after they ejected.
Russian defence official Lt-Gen Sergey Rudskoy said the rest of the rescue team, which were using two Mi-8 helicopters, had been safely evacuated from the area to Russia's Humaymim air base near Latakia in Syria.
"During the operation, one of the helicopters came under small-arms fire, was damaged and made an emergency landing on neutral territory," he said. "One naval infantryman serving under contract was killed."
One of the helicopters was destroyed on the ground by "mortar fire" after making an emergency landing, the Russian general said.
Syrian rebels say they blew up the helicopter shortly after it landed with an anti-tank missile, releasing footage of the attack.
The fate of the Russian jet's other crew member remains unknown.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/25/2015
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#1
Looks like the Russians are on the steep end of the learning curve for SAR OPS. OTOH, at least they appear to have a SAR SOP now.
#3
Why 8s and not 24s? or does the result answer that question?
(sets salt shaker next to mouse)
I see reports that one pilot was rescued; if one was captured and the other rescued, and one chopper (eat it modern man) was downed and only (not for the family) killed, would that not be called successful?
And the footage of blowing the wreckage with a TOW (looks at salt shaker) be a shot across the bow of sorts?
#4
Also, (rattles the shaker a bit) that video was Free Syria Army, what I have been calling Team Not-Assad as opposed to ISJV, both of which play against Team Assad, the FSA the ones who Team WTF arms and trains?
Wait a second, gonna go buy a program.
Also have a splinter in the mind (puts salt away, starts squeezing lemon wedges close to eyes) - say, Russia destroys number of oil trucks, incursions had been happening but now air zone is enforced, whose oil trucks did Team WTF (usa et al) as to not offend Turkey?
#6
Why 8s and not 24s? or does the result answer that question?
8s are issued to Russian Naval Infantry. MI-24s are not.
And as I said in earlier comments, it's all about Russian naval doctrine. Those guys are there for a fleet mission, so I suspect the SAR was an ad hoc mission, one transport bird, and one gunship.
At least eight children were killed and two others wounded in an explosion in Se Bangi area of Kabul.
Police chief of PD13 in Kabul said the children died while playing at a construction site in Se Bangi.
The families of the children say they were killed in a rocket attack but police reject these claims and say the children found an old explosive device possibly left over from a previous war.
Mohammad Ali Behsudi head of Kabul PD13 police headquarters said: "As you see the place is (also) in ruins and the children found an old explosive device from under rubble but it was not a rocket. We visited the scene and it is clear it was not a rocket,"
Eyewitnesses say the blast occurred when the children were busy playing in the rubble.
Ahmad Fahim one witness said: " I was at home when I heard the blast. It sounded like the blast of a gas cylinder. When I arrived at the scene and saw all these children laying there. About two or three were wounded. The rest were dead."
Sayed Farid another witness said: "I heard the blast and just one minute after I arrived in the area I saw five were wounded. We took them to hospital,"
The children aged between nine and 14 years old mostly come from one family.
Rahmatullah, a relative of some of the deceased said: "It was a rocket and the 13th police district officers found a piece of rocket remaining inside my house."
Another relative, Mohammad Ali said: "Before the blast there was a huge sound of firing coming from the 5th police district and 10 minutes later a blast took place and I reached the area and I saw that eight to nine children were dead."
Meanwhile, three civilians were killed in another blast in Kabul's PD5 on Tuesday evening. The explosives were placed inside a pressure cooker.
QUETTA: Frontier Corps, Balochistan, has recovered huge quantity of explosive material, IEDs and bombs during a search operation in Dera Bugti area of Balochistan on Tuesday.
Security forces conducted a search operation in Sonari Mat area of Dera Bugti and recovered 10 kilograms of remote control bombs near FC check post which were immediately defused. These materials were to be used for blowing up of gas pipelines, added spokesperson for FC.
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.
BERLIN -- Chancellor Angela Merkel vowed on Wednesday to stick to her open-door refugee policy, defying criticism at home and abroad which has intensified due to growing fears about a potential security risk after the Islamist attacks in Paris. In a 40-minute speech to the Bundestag lower house of parliament, Merkel said the security threat level in Germany was high but insisted that people must carry on with normal life.
[NBC] ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistan's air force has suffered its first-ever female pilot fatality after a fighter jet crashed during a training mission Tuesday, officials said.
[Irish Times] “We cannot receive more refugees in Europe, ” French prime minister Manuel Valls has told foreign correspondents in a group interview focused on the November 13th attacks that killed 130 people in Paris.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
[AnNahar] Iran-backed rebels in 
Daesh's Egyptian branch claimed responsibility for a bombing that killed five people in a hotel in North Sinai on Tuesday where judges overseeing a parliamentary election were staying.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
...Second and fourth President and sixth of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead...
