h/t Gates of Vienna
Slovak prime minister Robert Fico told local press agency TASR that "islam has no place in Slovakia". He feared a Muslim community would change the country's traditions. Last December, Slovakia sued the European Commission over its proposal to redistribute refugees in the European Union. I feel the same way about my country
h/t Gates of Vienna
At a press conference at the G-7 summit in Japan on May 26, President Barack Obama declared that world leaders are "rattled" by Donald Trump, "and for good reason. Because a lot of the proposals that he’s made display either ignorance of world affairs or a cavalier attitude or an interest in getting tweets and headlines instead of actually thinking through what is required to keep America safe."
This statement is remarkable not only for its eccentric syntax and convoluted logic. Obama assumes that 226 million Americans eligible to vote this year should take note of the fact that his G-7 colleagues--Messrs. Hollande, Trudeau, Abe et al--are unnerved, shocked, or put off by the Republican candidate, and that this should influence their decision next November. It should not: the election is an American affair, and it is offensive to suggest otherwise. Lyndon Johnson in 1964 and Jimmy Carter in 1980 could have made the same argument, yet for all their faults they sensed how impertinent it would have been to do so . . . but those were different times.
#1
...Pity most of his audience is too young - or simply does not care to - remember that the same words were spoken of Ronald Reagan.
"Cowboy."
"Dangerous."
"Simplistic"
"Fascistic."
Of course, Reagan won The War in spite of our allies, but they dare not speak that. I am however starting to get the impression that our allies fear Donald Trump will end the next war, once and for all.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
05/28/2016 9:48
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#4
You fear what you cant control. Obama was a bought man, "their" Manchurian candidate. They knew he would do what was in their best interest, not in the best interest of the USA. Things are changing and in the words of a little girl named Wednesday, "Be afraid, be very afraid"!
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
05/28/2016 13:33
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[National Review] Hot on the heels of revelations that he fathered a love child with his mistress, the Reverend Jesse Jackson has tumbled further from the moral high ground. Jackson has added former Chicago Democratic congressman Mel Reynolds to the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition's payroll. Reynolds was among the 176 criminals excused in President Clinton's last-minute forgiveness spree.
Reynolds received a commutation of his six-and-a-half-year federal sentence for 15 convictions of wire fraud, bank fraud, and lies to the Federal Election Commission. He is more notorious, however, for concurrently serving five years for sleeping with an underage campaign volunteer. This is a first in American politics. An ex-congressman who had sex with a subordinate won clemency from a president who had sex with a subordinate, then was hired by a clergyman who had sex with a subordinate.
Posted by: Bobby ||
05/28/2016 14:28
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#2
The talk: "It's a bitch to be black, sons.
We're ruled by these cruel Anglo-Saxons
Who'll force folks to shoot you,
Take checks to be cuckoo,
And swoon for Obamas and Jacksons."
Judge rules video of Clinton aide deposition will remain secret
Washington Examiner-14 hours ago
Mills is set to answer questions under oath Friday from Judicial Watch, ... Judicial Watch will ask Mills about the reasoning behind Clinton's private server.
h/t Instapundit
...Donald Trump and Milo Yiannopoulos are provocateurs, no question. But they are proving something important about the militant left: that it is often racist against whites, and has no intention of allowing any opinions other than its own to be voiced in the public square. And whether in the streets or in a university lecture hall, it will use violence to impose its will.
...The center is not holding. The militant left is going to drive a lot of people towards the militant right. In the fall campaign, Trump is going to go full "Amnesty, Acid, and Abortion" -- and the emotional reaction that seeing video of violent Black Lives Matter activists and other Social Justice Warrior militants in action (which we will see, all throughout the fall, because they cannot help themselves, and not even media spin will be able to hide it) will frighten a lot of law-and-order people into voting for Trump.
#2
Bad news: It's hard to see how we're going to get past the two conventions and the election without some fairly serious street violence (above the ordinary, that it.)
Worse news: This could be the last presidential election conducted while the Second Amendment is more or less intact.
Posted by: Matt ||
05/28/2016 11:25
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#3
Let them riot. Let them wave their Mexican flags. We had violence in the 1960s and the loonies lost. The Great Silent Majority saw the rioters and responded by electing Richard Nixon. Ah, those were the days...
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
05/28/2016 11:52
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#4
Trump should wave an American flag at his next campaign event.
#5
"We Donks do not truck with no mixin'
With Trunks on the stump! Git yer kicks in!
Run wild like a jackass!
We'll crack heads, and backsass...
And lose, like our grands did to Nixon."
[AnNahar] The United States said Wednesday that the make-up of Israel's new right-wing coalition raises "legitimate questions" about the government's commitment to a two-state solution in its conflict with the Paleostinians.
Yes, they did go there.
I think Israel's stance on a "two state solution" has been perfectly clear for a long time...
In a rare comment on the internal politics of a U.S. ally,
It used to be rare under previous presidents. Under the current one, it's as often as they can find an excuse.
State Department front man Mark Toner said Washington had "seen reports from Israel describing it as the most right-wing coalition in Israel's history."
"And we also know that many of its ministers have said they oppose a two-state solution. This raises legitimate questions about the direction it may be headed in and what kind of policies it may adopt."
The front man also restated the United States' support for a negotiated end to the conflict between Israel and the Paleostinians based on two states living side by side within agreed borders.
Earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had named hardline nationalist Avigdor Lieberman as defense minister and welcomed politicians from his Yisrael Beitenu party to the ranks of his coalition.
Netanyahu has continued to insist that he wants to negotiate peace with the Paleostinians, but Lieberman's arrival in the cabinet has raised concerns inside and outside of Israel that it will toughen its stance.
"Ultimately we're going to judge this government based on its actions," Toner said.
That's certainly how we judge Champ and his administration...
"We are going to work with this government as we have worked with every Israeli government that preceded it with the goal of strengthening cooperation. And we remain steadfast in our commitment to the security of Israel and to the two-state solution."
#1
Yeah... it does raise legitimate questions like, "Will the Paleos actually work with a Jewish government that isn't willing to kill its own people for pretend peace?"
[Al Ahram] 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.... fighters captured territory from Syrian rebels near the Turkish border on Friday and inched closer to a town on a supply route for foreign-backed holy warriors fighting the jihadists, a monitoring group said.
The ultra-hardline group has been fighting against rebels in the area for several months. The rebels, who are supplied via The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... , last month staged a major push against IS, but the group counter-attacked and beat them back.
The United States has identified the area north of Syria's former commercial hub Aleppo as a priority in the fight against the IS group (IS).
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Friday's advance was the biggest by IS in Aleppo province for two years. It brought the jihadists to within 5 km (3 miles) of Azaz, a town near the border with Turkey through which holy warriors have been supplied.
IS said in an online statement it had captured several villages near Azaz.
International medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said it evacuated patients and staff from a hospital in the area as the fighting got closer, and that tens of thousands of people were trapped between the front lines and Turkish border.
A Syrian NGO operating in the area said the latest assault by IS had displaced 20,000 more people towards Turkey.
The advance also cut rebel supply lines from Azaz to the town of Marea farther southeast, isolating the latter from other rebel-held areas, the Observatory said.
In April, IS murderous Moslems seized another strategic town near the Turkish border from rebel factions fighting under the banner of the Free Syrian Army ... the more palatable version of the Syrian insurgency, heavily influenced by the Moslem Brüderbund... The IS advances on Friday encroach on a corridor of rebel-held territory that leads from the Turkish border towards Aleppo city, which is divided between turban and government control.
ALEPPO BATTLEGROUND
Aleppo's northern countryside is the theatre of several separate battles between multiple warring sides in the five-year Syrian conflict, which has drawn in military involvement of regional and world powers that back different groups.
Rebels supplied through Turkey have been fighting IS and separately battling Kurdish forces in other areas.
Ankara is concerned by Kurdish advances along its border, where the Kurdish YPG militia already controls an uninterrupted 400 km (250 mile) stretch.
The United States supports the YPG and allied fighters in its battle against IS farther east, including in Hasaka and Raqqa provinces.
IS has declared a cross-border Islamic caliphate in Syria and neighbouring Iraq.
Separately, al Qaeda's Syrian affiliate Nusra Front and other holy warriors late on Thursday seized control of a town south of Damascus from government forces.
Nusra Front said in a statement it had captured Deir Khabiyeh, which is near an area where government forces and allies have sought to tighten control of a road leading south.
Last week, government forces and Lebanese Hezbollah captured territory in Damascus's eastern suburbs from turbans.
Nusra Front and IS are rivals in the Syrian conflict and have been fighting each other, including near Damascus, in separate battles from those between holy warriors and government forces.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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[ALLAFRICA] The Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai, said on Thursday in Abeokuta that violent herdsmen ravaging some parts of the country may have links with the Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... Mr. Buratai, who spoke during a courtesy call on Gov. Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun, said the Nigerian Army was investigating the activities of the violent herdsmen.
Mr. Buratai identified timely information on the nefarious activities of the herdsmen as one of the best ways to tackle them, saying Nigerians must be security conscious at all times.
"We want to call on all Nigerians to be security conscious and to report any suspicious persons or group of people that are roaming about in their communities.
"One may not be too far from the fact that some of these herdsmen that are attacking communities across the country may have some affiliation with the Boko Haram terrorists.
"This we are further investigating and also pursuing them so that we can address the situation, so let's be security conscious. Let's report quickly movement of suspicious persons carrying arms.
"If you suspect any individual within your community, we should be able to report immediately.
"Timely information is very important. We have our troops deployed in certain areas and I believe the Police are working with them to be able to tackle any challenge that comes, "he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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#1
The Fulani herdsmen have been moving south and are attacking primarily Christian farmers.
#2
Thank you for pointing that out, Eohippus Snore8229. On reflection, I'd confused the situation with Sudan, where Arab Muslims raid black Muslims as readily as black Christians and animists.
(IraqiNews.com) al-Anbar – A source in the Rapid Intervention Division announced on Friday destroying the ISIS communications headquarters in the area of al-Sajar north of Fallujah.
The source said in a statement obtained by IraqiNews.com, “The Rapid Intervention Division destructed the ISIS communications center in the area of al-Sajar north of Fallujah,” adding also that, “The division’s [forces] had managed to kill four suicide bombers and detonate two booby-trapped vehicles.”
Posted by: badanov ||
05/28/2016
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[Al Ahram] Five more people were incarcerated Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw! on Thursday in relation to a sectarian mob attack on the homes of Christians in Minya governorate last week, according to an interior ministry statement.
Six people had previously been arrested in connection with the attack last Friday, which the church said involved the public stripping of Christian woman.
"A group of 300 people carrying various types of weapons went at 8pm on 20 May to attack seven houses owned by Christians, burgling some of them and torching others,"a statement by the Coptic Orthodox Church read. The events were precipitated by rumours of a love affair between a Christian man and a Muslim woman; the mob stripped naked the man's mother, an elderly woman, according to the statement.
Security forces are intensifying their efforts to capture other perpetrators, the interior ministry's statement added.
Also on Thursday, President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi called for the arrest of those involved in the mob attack and urged the government to take "necessary measures to preserve public order, protect [citizens] and property within the rule of law."
He alsoissued directives to the provincial governor to restore all damaged buildings in coordination with the armed forces within one month and at the government's expense.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Including 2 Top Turbans and four of their closest friends
(IraqiNews.com) Baghdad – The Joint Operations Command announced on Friday the killing of tens of ISIS elements during an aerial bombing that targeted ISIS positions in the city of Mosul, while pointed out that the air strike resulted in the death of the ISIS bombers officer as well as the financial officer in the so-called Wilayat Nineveh.
Joint Operations said in a statement followed by IraqiNews.com, “The Iraqi [Army] Aviation, based on intelligence information, conducted an aerial strike that targeted ISIS gatherings in the beloved Mosul, resulting in the death of tens of terrorists including notable leaders.”
The statement added, “The [ISIS] financial officer of Wilayat Nineveh as well as the suicide bombers officer and four of his adies
...either that's a typo for aides or my vocabulary needs expanding...
were among the dead.” Things you'll never hear a suicide bomber's officer say: Do I have to do everything myself?
Posted by: badanov ||
05/28/2016
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[Al Arabiya] Al Arabiya news channel’s correspondent said Saudi Arabia's army thwarted an attack on positions in Jazan.
He added that skirmishes has erupted, and that Saudi forces repelled the attack by Houthi militias on Al Khubah and Tawal in Jazan.
Days ago, the Saudi Interior Ministry said that one Saudi soldier was killed and three others were wounded when a landmine exploded on the border with Yemen.
The blast hit a border patrol in the southwestern province of Jazan, the ministry said in a statement. Video report at the link
[Hurriyet] Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu has strongly reacted to photos of U.S. special operations forces wearing Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Unit (YPG) insignia on their shoulders during an assault on Syria’s Raqqa, saying it is “unacceptable.”
“It is unacceptable that an ally country is using the YPG insignia. We reacted to it. It is impossible to accept it. This is a double standard and hypocrisy,” said Çavuşoğlu on May 27.
On the same day during a visit to the State Department, Turkish Ambassador to Washington Serdar Kılıç expressed Turkey’s irritation at the news that U.S. troops sporting YPG emblems were fighting against ISIL north of Raqqa.
As U.S. Ambassador to Ankara John Bass was not in town, Turkey’s reaction was passed on to Kılıç through a telephone conversation.
In both conversations, Turkey reiterated that it was unacceptable for the U.S. to cooperate with the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its armed wing, the YPG, despite the fact that Ankara emphasized to Washington the link between the PYD and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
Commenting on the photos, the Pentagon acknowledged that special operations forces do what they can “to blend in with the community.”
“Special operations forces, when they operate in certain areas, do what they can to blend in with the community to enhance their own protection, their own security,” said Pentagon spokesperson Peter Cook during a May 26 press briefing, adding that he would not comment on specific photos.
And to irritate those who deserve to be irritated...
Agence France-Presse released photos showing armed men in uniform identified by Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) as U.S. special operations in the northern Syrian province of Raqqa on May 25. Some of the men seen in the photos wore an YPG insignia on their shoulders.
“Special operations forces in the past have worked with partners, and in the past have conducted themselves in such a way that they might operate in an atmosphere in which they are supportive of that local force in their advice and assist role,” Cook said.
“And they might be, again, for visual purposes, blending in with the local community,” he added.
The U.S.-backed SDF, which consists of the YPG, Syrian Arabs and Syriacs, launched an offensive against ISIL stronghold Raqqa on May 24.
The YPG is the armed wing of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), which Turkey says is a Syrian offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), thus making both the YPG and PYD terrorist organizations.
Though designating the PKK as a terrorist organization, the U.S. does not perceive the PYD and the YPG in the same way and says they are “reliable” partners in its fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). This designation difference has caused a rift between the two NATO allies, Turkey and the U.S.
Meanwhile, the U.S. May 26 denied it has provided arms to the YPG in Syria, despite the insistence of the group to the contrary.
“We are playing an advise and assist role,” U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner said. “But assisting is not specifically providing arms.”
Toner said, however, that there is a lot of “liberated” equipment being used on the battlefield and that it was impossible to say where from where they come.
“We just don’t have the clarity on that,” he said.
American special operations troops were not authorized to wear the patches of Kurdish forces while advising them in Syria and have been told to remove them, the U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad said Friday, after Turkish leaders protested.
Army Col. Steve Warren said that while U.S. special operations forces have historically and routinely worn the insignia of foreign troops they are working with, this case was not appropriate due largely to political sensitivities.
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/28/2016
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#1
Normally I disapprove of Pres'dent Obama/Sotero's deliberately pissing all over long term allies for short term tactical advantage, but I will concede the Sublime Porte has earned the golden shower this time.
[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The Human Rights Watch ... During the fiscal year ended June 30, 2011, HRW received a pledge from the Foundation to Promote Open Society, of which George Soros is Chairman, for general support totaling $100,000,000. The grant is being paid in installments of $10,000,000 over ten years.Through June 30, 2013, HRW had received $30,000,000 towards the fulfillment of the pledge.... has urged the Afghan government to urgently act to end wrongful imprisonment and humiliating, scientifically invalid "virginity exams" of women and girls.
Accordin to the rights organization, the Afghan police and prosecutors continue to engage in the abusive practice, despite a pledge from President Ashraf Ghani ...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. .. in a February 2016 letter to Human Rights Watch to "prevent the imprisonment of women accused of running away from their family."
Heather Barr, senior women’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch, said "President Ghani’s promise to end the practice of arresting women and girls for ’running away’ is an important step forward for women’s rights in Afghanistan."
"But to make a real difference, the president needs to issue a clear and binding order that immediately changes how every police officer and prosecutor handles complaints against women and girls. For too long, women and girls fleeing violence have been treated as criminals while their abusers go free," Barr added.
This assumes that the president's orders are obeyed in the valleys and mountains far beyond Kabul.
HRW added that the government should take concrete steps to implement the promised reform and ensure that women and girls who have been the victims of violence are protected by the legal system.
"In Afghanistan today, hundreds of women and girls are imprisoned on charges of "moral crimes," Human Rights Watch said, adding that "These so-called crimes include "running away" from home, and committing or attempting to commit zina, or having sex outside of marriage."
According to HRW estimate, in 2013 that half of all women in prison and about 95 percent of girls in juvenile detention in Afghanistan have been enjugged Don't shoot, coppers! I'm comin' out! on "moral crimes" charges.
Citing a research report, HRW said in most cases, the women and girls accused of these "crimes" were fleeing forced child marriage or domestic violence. In some cases, women and girls who have been raped were charged with zina, alongside their rapist.
HRW said the so-called "virginity tests" have no scientific validity in reality, insisting that their use is based on the mistaken belief that "virginity" can be determined by examining a woman or girl’s hymen to determine whether it has been broken during sexual intercourse.
"In fact, some girls are born without a hymen, hymens often break during daily non-sexual activities, and some hymens remain intact after sexual intercourse. These factors make "virginity examinations" so unreliable that the World Health Organization has said that they have no scientific validity and health workers should never conduct them," HRW added.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Five people were injured on May 27 when rockets fired from ISIL-controlled territory in northern Syria hit Turkey’s border province of Kilis, 20 days after the last such attack by the jihadist group targeting the province.
Three Katyusha rockets fired from the Bab region of Syria hit the Hürriyet neighborhood in the Elbeyli district of Kilis. The projectile hit the wall of a house and exploded, injuring five locals.
Turkish artillery units and multiple rocket launchers on the border retailated to the attack.
Rocket attacks from the ISIL-controlled Bab region have claimed the lives of 21 people, including eight Syrians, in Kilis since January.
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/28/2016
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[DAWN] Jamaat-ud-Dawa ...the front organization of Lashkar-e-Taiba... (JuD), a self-proclaimed charity working across Pakistain, on Friday held funeral prayers in absentia for the dear departed Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Akhtar Mansour in the thriving provincial capital.
JuD provincial spokesperson Ghazi Inamullah told DawnNews that the funeral prayers in absentia were offered at Jamia Masjid Khyber Markaz in Beautiful Downtown Peshawar ...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire. and attended by hundreds of JuD activists and general public.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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[Inquirer] Philippine security forces arrested Thursday morning in Maguindanao a suspect in the 2008 Digos City bus bombing that killed six people and injured 30 others. Also arrested during the dawn raid was the village chair of Penfarm, Datu Paglas, Maguindanao.
Senior Inspector Allan Uy identified the bombing suspect as Kamad Makauyag, a member of the Al-Khobar extortion group. Also arrested was Mahal Matalam, chair of Barangay Penfarm, Datu Paglas, Maguindanao, where Makauyag had been hiding since the bus bombing. Uy said, "Matalam was arrested for possession of unlicensed firearms."
The Al-Khobar group, composed of former Moro militants turned bandits, was blamed for a series of bus bombings in North Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, South Cotabato and Davao del Sur after the transport company ignored the group's extortion demands.
The April 2008 bombing killed six passengers and wounded 30 others after the suspects set off a powerful improvised explosive device with cut nails used as shrapnel.
Makauyag was the third suspect arrested in connection with the bombing. In 2011, police nabbeded Nor Muhammid at his home in Barangay Nuangan. A certain Tahir Sindai was arrested by a police special unit in May 2014 also for his alleged involvement in the Digos bombing.
[AnNahar] Prosecutors said Friday they have opened an investigation into a massive brawl in the "Jungle" migrant camp in the northern French town of Calais that left 40 people injured.
A young female aid worker was among those seriously hurt after the fight broke out between some 200 Afghans and Sudanese on Thursday.
Three of the victims were seriously injured, including one person who was stabbed, local official Fabienne Buccio told news hounds.
She denied an early report from a police source that someone had been shot.
The brawl started as food was being distributed at the Jules-Ferry aid center in the heart of the camp, but the cause has not yet been determined.
The victims included two riot police and five members of a local aid group, La Vie Active, which runs the aid center.
A total of 260 coppers were sent to the camp along with 70 firefighters and 11 ambulances.
Between 4,000 and 5,000 migrants colonists are living in the Jungle in the hope of smuggling themselves aboard lorries that are crossing the Channel to Britannia.
Fights have previously broken out in the tense and desperate atmosphere of the camp, which is roughly divided between different nationalities from the Middle East and Africa.
A fight between Afghans and Sudanese in March left 19 people injured.
[AlAhram] Egypt's cabinet approved on Thursday a deal with Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil profits run out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... regarding peaceful cooperation on nuclear power, according to a cabinet blurb.
The deal was initially signed on 8 April during a visit by Saudi's King Salman ...either the largest species of Pacific salmon or the current Sheikh of the Burnin' Sands, Cutodian of the Two Holy Mosquesand Lord of Most of the Arabians.... Abdel Aziz to Cairo.
The agreement aims to establish cooperation in peaceful uses of nuclear power and on nuclear security, according to the release.
Egypt's government is moving ahead with plans to build the country's first nuclear power plant, expected to be completed in 2022 and operational by 2024.
Couple inshallah construction and maintenance with Master Religionist attitudes and Saudi talk about seeking nuclear weapons to offset Iran's, and the view is terrifying.
The plant, located in Dabaa in the coastal governorate of Marsa Matrouh, will eventually generate a total of 4,800 megawatts through four reactors.
Last week, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi approved a $25 billion loan from Russia to fund the building and operation of the plant.
Chernobyl on the Nile...
Egypt and Saudi Arabia are already working on connecting their power grids through a $1.6 billion deal, approved by Egypt's cabinet in January 2015, where they would share 3,000 megawatts of electricity by 2017.
During King Salman's visit, Egypt and Saudi Arabia also signed final loan agreements worth over $24 billion.
#1
I like it.
Another 10 year project that will stretch to 15 thru regime changes then not come to closure or activation AND will cost Russia $25B with issues of repayment. Not really on the Nile though.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] A British Muslim mother who was planning to move with her three children to ISIS-held territories in Syria has lost parental custody after her arrest last week, a UK newspaper reported.
The children - whose ages were not reported - are expected to live with relatives pending a decision by authorities over their long-term future, according to The Guardian.
Their Northern Ireland-born 34-year-old mother, Lorna Moore, was sentenced with a two and-a-half year jail term earlier this week for her planned attempts to take her children with her to an area of Syria controlled by ISIS back in August 2014.
Lawyers representing social services who are responsible for the children’s welfare said that the children would live with family members in the short term and that the mother would be able to stay in touch with them.
A decision is later expected to decide where they will live in the long term after social workers have assessed options.
Moore was found guilty of failing to tell authorities that her husband Sajid Aslam, 34, was about to leave for Syria to join ISIS.
However, alcohol has never solved anybody's problems. But then, neither has milk... she had told the court that by the time her husband left, they "were only together for the sake of the children" and that Aslam had even subscribed to a Muslim dating site, the Daily Mail reported in February.
Moore - who had converted to Islam before marrying Aslam - said that she had thrown her husband out of the house years earlier, but was forced to take him back when a Muslim holy man told her she would not get to paradise if she got a divorce.
The judge who imposed the jail term said she "knew perfectly well of [her] husband’s dedication to terrorism" and that she had told "lie after lie."
Posted by: Fred ||
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Russia said Friday it was taking unprecedented measures to upgrade its military presence on the far-eastern Kuril islands claimed by Japan, including plans to set up a new base on an uninhabited island.
Colonel-General Sergei Surovikin, commander of the eastern military district, announced the launch of "unprecedented measures to develop military infrastructure in the area", the defence ministry said in a statement.
He said Russia was taking the steps to "exclude the emergence of even the smallest risks."
Russia has military bases on the Kuril Pacific archipelago, while Japan claims four of the islands in a dispute that has simmered since World War II, preventing the countries ever signing a peace treaty.
Soviet troops seized the four at the end of World War II just after Japan surrendered.
Surovikin listed the measures being taken as "a planned rearmament of the formations and units and boosting the level of social protection for all categories of serving soldiers and their family members."
Russia earlier this month sent six ships from its Pacific Ocean naval fleet on an expedition to an uninhabited island in the archipelago called Matua.
Surovikin said Friday "the main aim of the expedition is to study the possibility of future basing of Pacific Fleet forces there".
"The eastern outpost of Russia, particularly Sakhalin Island and the Kuril islands provide unconditional guarantees of security and the territorial integrity of our country," he said.
Matua is not one of the four islands in the chain claimed by Japan and is closer to Russia.
Russian television showed army tents set up on the island as well as a fat merchantman landing military vehicles.
Troops have set up a field camp and organised water and electricity supplies and communications, Surovikin said.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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#1
Again, IMO Russia fears or knows a war for PLA-centric strategic access is likely to occur in the near future, moreso given China's response vee the PLA agz the Bammer's moves in the South China Sea, e.g. the new basing or forward deployment of Chinese PLAN nuclear submarines in waters claimed by US Allies + China's new demand that Taiwan assert or accede to a deadline for formal reunificaion wid the mainland. Russia in particular fears a Sino-Nippon battle for control of Sakhalin.
The Bammer + OWG Globalist agenda of taking no action = so-called "Minimalism" in any US direct action ala Foreign Policy is more likely than not to carry over into the Post-Bammer successor POTUS Admin NO MATTER WHOM WINS THE 2016 POTUS NOMINATION + ELECTION.
POTUS HILLARY'S "STATUS QUO", OR POTUS TRUMP'S "US ALLIES MUST PAY FOR US SECURITY/DEFENSE", MAMA RUSSIA KOWS CINA WANTS ITS STRATEGIC ACCESS FOR THE PLA IN THE EAST CHINA SEA = NE ASIA.
[Al Ahram] More than 2,000 migrants colonists were rescued from boats in the Mediterranean on Friday, Italia's coastguard said, as numbers soared for the third year running in the build up to summer.
Around 14,000 people were taken off often flimsy vessels over the whole week, the United Nations ...where theory meets practice and practice loses... and the coastguard said, and hundreds may have drowned, survivors and boat crews added, though there no official estimates of casualties.
Italian Navy ship Vega plucked about 130 people off a "half-submerged" large rubber boat - one of 17 operations coordinated by the coastguard on Friday. There were no details on how many were on board before it deflated.
The coastguard said the warmer weather and calmer seas had caused a surge in the number of people trying to cross from Libya, where people smugglers operate with relative impunity. Numbers managing to reach Italia were comparable to the same period last year and the year before.
The migrants colonists - many of whom do not know how to swim and do not have life jackets - pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to make the crossing.
They are piled onto flimsy rubber boats or old fishing vessels, and as dramatic images from the crew of the Italian Navy ship Bettica showed on Wednesday, they can be tossed into the water in a matter of seconds.
The images show the moment a blue fishing boat capsized, sending hundreds of migrants colonists tumbling into the sea. About 240 women and kiddies had already been rescued, but an unknown number were trapped in the hull. Only five bodies were recovered and 562 were saved.
Testimony from survivors suggests there were still many people below deck who were not able to escape, according to the U.N. refugee agency, while the Bettica captain estimated that "some 100" may have been lost.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] A Minnesota man on trial for plotting to go to Syria to join the ISIS testified Thursday that he thought about leaving the United States because he could feel the government closing in, but said he had no real plan and believed a scheme to get fake passports for the journey was a bad idea.
Guled Ali Omar, 21, is one of three men on trial in U.S. District Court in Minnesota on multiple counts. The most serious is conspiracy to commit murder outside the United States, which carries the possibility of life in prison. He is the only defendant to testify.
Prosecutors have said the men were part of a larger group of friends in Minnesota's Somali community who recruited and inspired each other to go to Syria. Six other men who were part of the alleged plot have pleaded guilty to "conspiracy to support a foreign terrorist organization."
A 10th man is at-large, believed to be in Syria.
During the trial, which is in its third week, prosecutors played secretly recorded conversations in which the men discussed travel plans, including the possibility of obtaining fake passports to go to Syria via Mexico.
Omar testified that he and his friends held regular study groups to discuss the Qur'an. He said that after one man left for Syria, the group began discussing the political situation there, but the group was not like the government portrayed it and he knew of no legitimate plans for anyone to travel.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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[Daily Excelsior] Telling Pakistain that the path to peace is a "two-way street", Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Islamabad needs to remove the "self-imposed" obstacle of terrorism which is coming in the way of Indo-Pak friendship.
Modi also asked Pakistain to play its part by putting a complete stop to any kind of support to terrorism ‐ "whether state or non-state".
"In my view, our ties can truly scale great heights once Pakistain removes the self-imposed obstacle of terrorism in the path of our relationship.
"We are ready to take the first step, but the path to peace is a two-way street," Modi told The Wall Street Journal, in comments posted on its website today.
He said he has always maintained that instead of fighting with each other, India and Pakistain should together fight against poverty.
"Naturally we expect Pakistain to play its part," he said.
"But, there can be no compromise on terrorism. It can only be stopped if all support to terrorism, whether state or non-state, is completely stopped.
"Pakistain’s failure to take effective action in punishing the perpetrators of terror attacks limits the forward progress in our ties," said the Prime Minister.
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[The News (Pak)] The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... Assembly on Friday adopted a resolution against a US drone strike in 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... that hit a car last week.
The resolution was tabled by a Pakistain People’s Party (PPP) politician Fakhr Alam Wazir and unanimously passed by the house.
The resolution termed the US drone strike an attack on Pakistain’s integrity and called on President Barrack Obama to tender an apology.
It also asked the federal government to lodge strong protest at diplomatic level. A US drone attack killed Mullah Mansour, chief of Afghan Taliban in the border region of Pakistain and Afghanistan last Saturday.
Islamabad has lodged a protest with the United States and termed the drone strike an attack on country's illusory sovereignty.
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[DAWN] Pishin’s Deputy Commissioner Hafiz Mohammad Tahir and Tehsildar Rafiq Tareen have been shifted to Islamabad from Quetta in connection with an investigation into verification of Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour’s applications for Pak national identity card and passport.
Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan had issued directives for the shifting of the two officials. They were brought to Islamabad on the PIA’s flight PK-352 on Thursday night by an FIA team.
Hafiz Tahir had verified the applications of Mullah Mansour using the name of Wali Mohammad while he was serving in Chaman as deputy commissioner.
An interior ministry spokesperson told Dawn that Hafiz Tahir had been summoned to Islamabad, but Rafiq Tareen had been jugged I ain't sayin' nuttin' widdout me mout'piece! by the FIA team for investigation into the matter.
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[RUDAW.NET] Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) liberated a large area in northern Raqqa, Syria.
Raqqa 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.... ’s main stronghold in Syria.
Commander of the SDF, Fayath Alghanim, said the morale of Syrian fighters is high in spite of the difficulties they face because of the mines planted by ISIS.
SDF received US ground support, the first of its kind, and they got new weapons as well.
US special forces soldiers are advising the Kurdish-led Syrian alliance fighting ISIS on the ground.
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(IraqiNews.com) Baghdad – A source within the police force in Baghdad province said on Friday, that a civilian had been injured in a car bomb blast north of the capital Baghdad.
The source, said in a statement received by IraqiNews.com, “This morning, an explosive device that was emplaced on the road side in the area of al-Rashdiya, north of Baghdad, has exploded against a civilian vehicle, resulting in the injury of its driver,” adding that, “A security force imposed a security cordon around the area of the incident, while transferred the injured to a nearby hospital for medical treatment.”
(IraqiNews.com) Baghdad – A source in the Iraqi Ministry of Defense announced on Friday, that ten people had been either killed or injured in a bomb blast south of Baghdad.
The source said in a statement obtained by IraqiNews.com, “This evening, an explosive device went off near a popular cafe in the area of al-Wardiya in the district of al-Mada’an, resulting in the death of two persons and wounding eight others,” adding that, “A security force rushed to the area of the incident and transferred the injured to a nearby hospital for medical treatment and the two dead bodies to the forensic medicine authority.”
[ARA News] HASAKAH – Militants of the Islamic State (ISIS) launched three suicide attacks in northeastern Syria, targeting security checkpoints for the Kurdish forces of the People’s Protection Units (YPG) near Hasakah, military sources reported on Friday.
Three ISIS jihadis detonated their explosive belts near Kurdish security checkpoints in Shaddadi district south of Hasakah, killing at least four Kurdish YPG forces and injuring more than a dozen.
“The attacks targeted our checkpoints in the villages of Azzawi, al-Ziyanat and Kashkash in southern Shaddadi. The terrorists carried out the attacks after infiltrating into the area coming from the direction of Deir ez-Zor province,” a spokesman for the YPG told ARA News in Hasakah.
“The terror attacks led to the death of four YPG fighters and the injury of 18 others,” the source reported.
This comes after hundreds of Arab civilians who escaped the ISIS-held province of Deir ez-Zor arrived in Hasakah province.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) –including the YPG– liberated Shaddadi in southern Hasakah from ISIS militants last February. “More than 275 ISIS militants were killed and 33 ISIS vehicles were destroyed at the hands of the SDF fighters in the battle for Shaddadi,” the SDF spokesman Talal Silo had told ARA News at the time. However, since then ISIS has been trying to infiltrate into the area, launching several car bomb attacks.
Posted by: badanov ||
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[DAWN] Law Minister Rana Sanaullah says the Punjab 1.) Little Orphan Annie's bodyguard
2.) A province of Pakistain ruled by one of the Sharif brothers
3.) A province of India. It is majority (60 percent) Sikh and Hindoo (37 percent), which means it has relatively few Moslem riots.... Assembly is not legally bound to implement the recommendations of the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) on any subject.
"The Council of Islamic Ideology has not sent any recommendations on the Women Protection Act and even if such recommendations are received, the Punjab Assembly may consider the same and amend the act only if appropriate as the house is not legally bound to implement the CII suggestions," he told the media at the provincial assembly here on Thursday.
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That makes our (including how many allies?) average of 19 or so over Syria and Iraq look a little silly...
[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The Afghan Air Force (AAF) participate in 50 to 180 missions a day to support the Afghan National Security and Defense (ANSDF) forces.
A front man for the Ministry of Defense, Dawlat Waziri, said the Afghan Air Force utilizes the available resources, including combat and airlift equipment to support the Afghan ground forces.
He said the Afghan Air Force provide close-air support as well as logistics support to the Afghan forces in their fight against terrorism.
The Afghan defense officials said last month that the Afghan Air Force carried out the most missions in mid-April by flying 83 missions over a period of 24 hours.
The Afghan Air Force has started the new fighting season with the increased capabilities as several combat planes have been added to the inventory during the past several months.
The Afghan Air Force officials have said they have so far received 9 A-29 Super Tucano fixed wing light attack aircraft from the United States as well as surveillance unmanned aerial vehicle which are expected to further boost the capabilities of the Afghan forces.
Afghanistan also received 3 Mi-25 gunship helicopters from India last which are in service with the Afghan Air Force.
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[RUDAW.NET] The United States has once again turned down a Russian suggestion to coordinate counter-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) operations. Washington declined to coordinate with Moscow before, too, due to its indiscriminate bombing across Syria, which has killed hundreds of civilians, as well as its continued support for the Syrian regime of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs... As part of Russia’s latest proposal for military cooperation the country’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov suggested that American and Russian air power synchronize their support of the Syrian Kurdish-majority Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which is currently mounting an offensive against the ISIS-occupied province of Raqqa.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
The United States has once again turned down a Russian suggestion to coordinate counter-Islamic State
Which would indicate we now have U.S. advisors embedded in Russian targeting teams, probably also provided Search & Rescue.
Long piece in Shabelle of all places. The Kenyans appear to be serious. Just the first two paragraphs here:
The Kenyan government says that it plans to close Dadaab, the world’s largest refugee camp. It had also threatened to close the country’s other major refugee camp, Kakuma, but has subsequently said it won’t. Speaking at the World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul, Deputy President William Ruto declared that Dadaab will be closed by the end of the year.
This move has gained much-needed attention. Kenya continues to host one of the largest refugee populations at a time when international attention has overwhelmingly turned to Europe and the movement of people out of Syria. Despite hosting more than half a million people, the camps’ remote locations and longevity have made them easy to ignore.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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BAGHDAD: Only 800 people have been able to flee Fallujah since Iraqi forces launched a major offensive to retake the city, the United Nations said in a statement released Thursday.
Lise Grande, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for Iraq, said that those who managed to leave the city occupied by the Daesh group reported dire living conditions inside.
“We are receiving distressing reports of civilians trapped inside Fallujah who are desperate to escape to safety, but can’t,” the statement quoted her as saying.
The UN said that only 800 people had been able to flee Fallujah since May 22, “mostly from outlying areas.”
“Some families report having to walk for hours under harrowing conditions to reach safety. People trapped in the city center are thought to be most at risk ,” the UN said.
Grande said that those who managed to flee told of a dire situation inside the city, which lies only 50 km west of the capital Baghdad.
“Food supplies are limited and tightly controlled. Medicines are exhausted and many families have no choice but to rely on dirty and unsafe water sources,” she said.
The UN and other humanitarian agencies have been unable to deliver much of the available assistance due to the lack of access since the operation was launched on May 22-23.
Humanitarian corridors discussed with the Iraqi authorities have largely failed to materialize so far.
Radical fighters holed up in the Fallujah city center have been imposing a curfew and forbidding residents to leave their homes, apparently using them as human cover.
Residents contacted inside Fallujah have also said that the amount of bombs and booby traps laid by Daesh in and around the city would make any flight very perilous. The UN also said on the first day of the operation that supply routes were effectively cut off by the tens of thousands of Iraqi forces surrounding the city, thus also preventing civilians from leaving.
Posted by: badanov ||
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[DAWN] Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif ... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Moslem League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf... , who is currently in London for medical check-up, will undergo open-heart surgery on Tuesday, Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said on Friday.
Asif said that doctors have advised the prime minister to undergo an open-heart surgery, following which Nawaz will be staying in the hospital for a week.
"The prime minister will travel after one week, on doctor’s permission," he added.
The daughter of prime minister, Maryam Nawaz Sharif, also confirmed through twitter that her father will undergo an open-heart surgery on Tuesday. She appealed to the citizens to pray for the health and recovery of Nawaz Sharif.
Posted by: Fred ||
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(IraqiNews.com) Dohuk – Witnesses in Dohuk province said on Friday, that Turkish warplanes attacked border areas in Dohuk Province, stressing that the attack resulted in the burning of large tracts of forest.
One of the witnesses reported for IraqiNews.com, “Turkish warplanes attacked areas in the border area of Kani Masi in the province of Dohuk,” pointing out that, “The attack caused no casualties.”
The statement added, “The areas that came under attack are free from the PKK militants,” noting that, “The attack caused the outbreak of fires in the forests of the region.”
[RFE/RL] A court in Chechnya has sentenced two Ukrainian citizens to long prison terms after they were found guilty of fighting alongside Chechen separatists in the 1990s.
Chechnya's Supreme Court on May 26 sentenced Mykola Karpyuk to 22 years and Stanislav Klykh to 20 years in prison. On May 19, a jury found both men guilty of participating in militant activities, including murder and attempted murder.
Investigators said they were members of the group known as the Ukrainian National Assembly-Ukrainian National Self-Defense (UNA-UNSO) and arrived in Chechnya in 1994 to fight along with Chechen insurgents against Russian security forces, leading to the killing of dozens of Russian troops.
[BLOOMBERG] Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... gunnies killed 11 people in a raid on five villages near Maiduguri in Nigeria’s northeastern Borno state, according to a pro-government militia member.
The bandidos Lion of Islams razed the villages in an attack that lasted for two hours in the evening of May 24, Hassan Ibrahim, a member of a youth vigilante group that fights alongside the Nigerian army, said by phone.
Boko Haram has killed thousands of people and displaced more than 2 million Nigerians in a seven-year campaign to establish its version of Islamic law in Africa’s biggest economy and top oil producer. The group was beaten back from territories it held early last year but continues to carry out suicide kabooms and hit-and-run attacks on soft targets such as markets and bus terminals.
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05/28/2016
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[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The former Afghanistan's Caped PresidentHamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai ... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtun face on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use... has urged the Afghan government to halt further execution of the prisoners charged with the terror offences.
In an online statement issued following the death of Taliban supreme leader Mullah Akhtar Mansoor, Karzai has said ’brotherhood’ and ’unity’ are the only way to achieve peace in the country.
The statement by Karzai further added that war and violence have been imposed on the Afghan people from abroad, insisting that the Taliban statement proves that the group’s leader Mullah Akhtar Mansoor was killed on the side of Durand Line in control of Pakistain.
He called on the new leader of the Taliban group Mawlavi Haibatullah Akhundzada ...Deputy to Taliban supremo Mullah Akhtar Mansour... to join grinding of the peace processor and return to Afghanistan.
Taliban on Wednesday announced the appointment of Mawlavi Akhundzada as the successor of Muallah Akhtar Mansoor who was killed in an Arclight airstrike in 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... province of Pakistain late on Saturday afternoon.
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#1
Don't you understand, it cuts down on bribes and money laundering.
[The News (Pak)] Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan ...Currently the Interior Minister of Pakistain. He is the senior leader of the Pak Moslem League (N) and a close aide to Nawaz Uncle Fester Sharif. He is noted for his vocal anti-American railing in the National Assembly. However (comma) Khan told the U.S. ambassador that he was in fact pro-American but he and the PML-N would have to be critical of US actions in order to remain publicly credible. Khan cited his wife and children's US citizenship as proof, which means he's lying to one side or the other and probably both. He wears a wig, but you probably guessed that. since hair doesn't grow naturally in that shape or texture... on Friday said re-verification of Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC) of all Pak citizens would be carried out within the next six months, warning fake ID card holders with punishment up to seven years.
Speaking to media at the NADRA headquarters, the minister said 25 million families would be targeted in the exercise to make the verification process easier. He said heads of families would help NADRA expunge names of imposters.
He issued a 2-month deadline to fake ID card holders to surrender their cards as they may have to face seven year jail term for the crime once the deadline lapsed.
Nisar said the government officials involved in issuing the fake ID cards would be sent to jail for 14 years if they didn’t identify the people who obtained the fake IDs.
"I will personally monitor the exercise...nobody will be spared," he said. "I was told that it is an impossible task and would cost a lot of money, he said. He said the issue was related to Pakistain’s security and he would make it possible like verification of millions of mobile phone SIMS.
He said a helpline would be set up for citizens to help authorities identify foreigners with fake Pak identity.
The interior minister said rewards would also be given to the citizens for providing information on foreigners.
Nisar said passport of Mullah Mansour was issued in 2001 and would have been caught if it had been brought for verification.
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[DAWN] Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) of police claimed on Thursday to have foiled a terror attack on a shrine in Bahawalnagar district and tossed in the calaboose Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw! three alleged turbans of banned outfits Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistain (TTP) and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi ... a 'more violent' offshoot of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain. LeJ's purpose in life is to murder anyone who's not of utmost religious purity, starting with Shiites but including Brelvis, Ahmadis, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Rosicrucians, and just about anyone else you can think of. They are currently a wholly-owned subsidiary of al-Qaeda ... (LeJ).
A CTD front man said after receiving information about the presence of suspected terrorists, a team raided a house near the shrine and arrested three people. He said the suspects were identified as Muhammad Asif of Khushab, Muhammad Jamil of Lahore and Muhammad Sadiq of Toba Tek Singh.
He said the police team also recovered three IEDs, arms and ammunition and the shrine was saved from destruction with the help of bomb disposal squad.
He said initial investigations revealed that the turbans were planning to attack the shrine.
In another raid, an alleged terrorist of banned Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain ...a Sunni Deobandi organization, a formerly registered Pak political party, established in the early 1980s in Jhang by Maulana Haq Nawaz Jhangvi. Its stated goal is to oppose Shia influence in Pakistain. They're not too big on Brelvis, either. Or Christians. Or anybody else who's not them. The organization was banned in 2002 as a terrorist organization, but somehow it keeps ticking along, piling up the corpse counts... (SSP) was arrested from Faisalabad ...formerly known as Lyallpur, the third largest metropolis in Pakistain, the second largest in Punjab after Lahore. It is named after some Arab because the Paks didn't have anybody notable of their own to name it after... , said the front man. He said after receiving information, a CTD team raided PSO pump near Roshanwali Jhal at Sumundari Road and arrested suspect Shakeel Ahmad Khan.
He said police team also recovered 575 grams explosives, 9 feet 6 inches prima cord and 8 electric circuit, detonators from him.
Meanwhile, ...back at the Senate, Odius Sepulcher called for war against the Visigoths... a CTD team arrested two members of a banned outfit in Alipur tehsil.
During a search operation at Azmatpur area, the CTD personnel arrested the suspected snuffies and found Jehadi literature from their custody.
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The Baltic Exchange’s main sea freight index, tracking rates for ships carrying dry bulk commodities, rose on Friday buoyed by higher demand for capesize vessels.
The overall index, which factors in rates for capesize, panamax, supramax and handysize shipping vessels, was up five points, or 0.83 percent, at 606 points.
The capesize index gained 37 points, or 4.67 percent, at 830 points.
Average daily earnings for capesizes, which typically transport 150,000-tonne cargoes such as iron ore and coal, were up $171 to $6,346.
The panamax index was down four points, or 0.68 percent, at 582 points.
Average daily earnings for panamaxes, which usually carry coal or grain cargoes of about 60,000 to 70,000 tonnes, decreased $33 to $4,650.
Among smaller vessels, the supramax index rose four points to 579 points, while the handysize index was flat at 347 points.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Harshith Aranya in Bengaluru)
Freight rates for large capesize dry cargo ships on key Asian routes are likely to rise next week on an increase in coal cargoes and higher fuel prices, ship brokers said.
That comes as Brent crude futures breached the psychologically important level of $50 a barrel on Thursday for the first time in nearly seven months.
“I’m kind of positive on how the fuel price will drive the capesize and dry bulk markets,” said a Shanghai-based capesize broker.
“I think rates from Western Australia to China will hold above $4 per tonne and increase to around $4.50,” the broker added.
“If coal prices provide support and there are more cargoes, and with the same amount of iron ore cargoes, then the market can be driven up.”
That would follow capesize rates from Western Australia to China falling from last week’s six-month high after a drop in the number of charters to around 23 fixtures in the week to Wednesday, data on the Reuters Eikon terminal showed.
“Overall sentiment is depressed but there is a hope we are at the bottom and there will be more demand,” Norwegian ship broker Fearnley said in a note on Wednesday.
Ship fuel prices, which are this week pushing close to the highest level since Nov. 11, are set to climb following the increase in oil prices. That will help support freight rates, brokers said.
Shipowners with vessels on the spot market pay for their own fuel and add a bunker premium to freight rates if fuel prices move higher, brokers said.
Longer term there is more optimism the dry bulk market will improve next year on increased cargo demand and cancelled new ship deliveries.
“If demand picks up in 2017 and half the slipped tonnage of 2016 gets cancelled, the market should be better in 2017,” Aristides Pittas, chief executive of New York-listed shipper Euroseas, said in an earnings call.
Freight rates for the Brazil-China route fell to $7.84 per tonne on Wednesday, down from $8.46 last week.
Capesize charter rates for the Western Australia-China route slipped to $4.05 per tonne on Wednesday, from $4.36 on the same day last week.
Charter rates for smaller panamax vessels for a north Pacific round-trip voyage trended lower at $4,700 per day on Wednesday, against $4,829 a week earlier, on lower cargo volumes.
Freight rates in the Far East for smaller supramax vessels were again largely unchanged, Fearnley added.
The Baltic Exchange’s main sea freight index fell to 605 on Wednesday, down from 642 last week.
Flagging asset prices and limited financing in the dry bulk shipping market have resulted in a spike in the secondhand sale of Supramax and Handysize vessels, a shipbroking and research house said Thursday.
The number of resales of Supramax and Handysize dry bulk vessels has more than doubled year on year during the first five months of 2016, data from Athens-based Intermodal Research and Valuations showed.
A total of 82 vessels in these categories have changed hands to date this year compared with 39 in the same period last year.
Handysize vessels range in size from 20,000 dwt to 40,000 dwt and Supramax size vessels from 50,000 dwt to 60,000 dwt.
Dwindling asset prices are fueling interest in older tonnage among shipowners, Intermodal said.
While there has been a lot of interest in Supramax and Kamsarmax size ships built during the last decade, buyers were also looking with increased interest at vessels built around the end 1990s/early 2000s, which was not the case in the recent past, said Intermodal sales and purchase broker George Iliopoulos.
“To put things in perspective, a 2000 built Handymax with [special survey and dry docking] was sold at around $2.9 million at the beginning of March and a similar ship today could easily fetch $3.5 million or more, which translates to a 21% increase,” he said.
Intermodal researcher Eva Tzima said the limited financing available to shipowners currently was also fueling the interest in older and consequently cheaper vessels. Shipowners still benefit from rising values for older vessels even though returns were greater for younger vessels, she added. “The vastness of the dry bulk trade in terms of the number of ports and commodities cannot be just serviced by modern tonnage when you look at commodities other than iron ore and steel,” Tzima said.
Supramaxes and Handymaxes have proven extremely resilient in terms of finding employment — their cranes and smaller size enable them to dock at less developed ports.
They also service commodities like grains, for which seaborne trade has not been negative, and the parcel sizes they can accommodate are still preferred by a lot of charterers, Tzima added.
Around 70% of the current Handymax fleet and 27% of the Supramax fleet was built prior to 2007.
Very few older Supramaxes and Handymaxes have been scrapped, indicating owners were still able to find value, said Tzima, adding the two segments have not seen a decline in fixing activity.
#1
You really are amazing, badanov. Such a variety of subjects over the years, each with breadth, depth, and perspective
... and sparks of humour and underlying passion. You help make Rantburg the special place it is.
#3
Impressive Mr. B.
Conversions to natural gas on the Supramax and Kamsarmax was supposed to be occurring. Much more efficient I understand. Too big for canals so they go round about to ports that can handle these massive ships. The push has been on for some time now. Upgrade or lose to more cost efficient vessels.
#4
Dale: Right now dry bulk shipping is the cheapest it has ever been. Not even lower fuel prices can counter the effects of a sick global economy struggling against the jackboot of governments worldwide on its neck, and that can be seen in the BDI.
Michael Totten
[WorldAffairsJournal] Venezuela and Colombia have swapped places.
When the Cold War ended, Colombia was a crime-infested war zone while Venezuela, its neighbor to the east, was an island of sanity and stability. Colombia is now one of the world's hottest new tourist destinations while Venezuela is on the brink of collapse.
For more than a half-century, Colombia suffered a bewildering multisided conflict that killed more than 200,000 people - the vast majority of them civilians - and displaced roughly five million. It was a no-go zone fractured by a communist insurgency that kidnapped and murdered tens of thousands, right-wing death squads that butchered people with chainsaws, and murderous drug cartels that often wielded more power than the government.
Meanwhile, during most of that period, Venezuela held democratic elections and experienced considerable, if uneven, economic growth. Throughout Latin America, Soviet-backed insurgencies battled it out with military regimes sponsored by the United States, but Cuba's attempt to foment communist revolution in Venezuela fizzled.
After the Berlin Wall fell, pro-Soviet forces all but evaporated everywhere except in Colombia where the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) swapped Moscow's largesse with drug money.
If one had to choose where to invest at the time, the smart money would have been on Venezuela. It had a small middle class and a great deal of poverty, but that was hardly unique in South and Central America. What set it apart was its vast oil reserves‐more than any other country on earth‐and its relative political stability.
The current United Socialist Party government led by Nicolas Maduro, and formerly Hugo Chavez, could have done amazing things for the country with that vast oil wealth. Instead, the party has done its damndest to import Fidel Castro's Cuban model of socialism‐ Chavez called Castro his mentor‐and turn Venezuela into a totalitarian anthill.
They never quite pulled it off, never quite managed to create a state powerful enough to smother every human being under its weight. Rather than molding Venezuelan society into a Stalinist Borg-hive, both‐but Maduro especially‐presided over a near-total collapse into anarchy, squalor and crime.
Last week the Washington Post called Venezuela a failed state. "The government has tried to control the economy to the point of killing it ‐ all, of course, in the name of 'socialism'...Venezuela has gotten something worse than death. It has gotten hell. Its stores are empty, its hospitals don't have essential medicines, and it can't afford to keep the lights on."
The inflation rate is almost 500 percent this year and is expected to exceed 1,500 percent next year. A hamburger costs 170 dollars. Everything is in short supply. "Venezuela reaches the final stages of socialism," David Boaz writes. "No toilet paper." Even hotels are asking guests to bring their own, which is almost impossible unless they're coming in from abroad.
Violent crime has spread throughout the country, even to rural areas. Police officers don't even attempt to suppress or solve crime, partly because they're too busy protecting the crooked and oppressive government from its furious subjects, but also because crime is as ubiquitous in Venezuela right now as the heat and humidity. Last week, a fed up mob doused a man with gasoline and burned him alive for mugging another man and stealing the equivalent of five dollars.
Hellish Colombia, meanwhile, has improved so dramatically over the same period of time that it's hardly even recognizable anymore.
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Commies
#1
Colombia is now one of the world's hottest new tourist destinations while Venezuela is on the brink of collapse.
The search for the EgyptAir plane which crashed last week killing all 66 people on board has narrowed to a 5-kilometer-wide area in the Mediterranean Sea, based on signals from the craft's emergency beacon, Egypt's chief investigator said. The chief investigator, Ayman al-Moqadem, said late Thursday that Airbus had given Egyptian authorities information on the Emergency Locator Transmitter, or ELT, from the doomed aircraft.
An official from the Egyptian investigation team on Friday clarified that the beacon information was from the day of the crash, May 19, and that no new signal had been found. An Airbus official said he was unaware of any ELT received or given to the Egyptians.
The ELT's signal is too weak to transmit information from underwater, unlike the locator pings emitted by the flight data and cockpit voice recorders, known as the black box. Al-Moqadem stressed that the black boxes have not been found, which he said requires highly sophisticated technology. But he said the search was now being conducted in a 5-kilometer (3-miles) area. He did not clarify how long the search has been narrowed to that area.
A French naval oceanographic research ship, Laplace, carrying a long-range acoustic system able to detect signals from the black box is headed to the crash site, France's air accident investigation agency, the BEA, said in a statement. The ship left Corsica on Thursday and was due to reach the crash area on Monday or Sunday, it said.
Eight days after the plane crashed off Egypt's northern coast on a Paris to Cairo flight, the cause of the tragedy still has not been determined. Ships and planes from Egypt, Greece, France, the United States and other nations have been searching the Mediterranean north of the Egyptian port of Alexandria for the jet's voice and flight data recorders, as well as more bodies and parts of the aircraft.
Small pieces of the wreckage and human remains have been recovered while the bulk of the plane and the bodies of the passengers are believed to be deep under the sea. A Cairo forensic team has received the human remains and is carrying DNA tests to identify the victims.
Egypt's civil aviation minister Sherif Fathi has said he believes terrorism is a more likely explanation than equipment failure or some other catastrophic event. But no hard evidence has emerged on the cause, and no militant group has claimed to have downed the jet. Earlier, leaked flight data indicated a sensor detected smoke in a lavatory and a fault in two of the plane's cockpit windows in the final moments of the flight.
The French vessel, Laplace, is carrying three detectors made by the Alseamar company designed to detect and localize signals from the flight recorders, believed about 3,000 meters (3,280 yards) underwater. The torpedo-shaped detectors can be lowered about 1 kilometer (half mile) into the water to listen for signals up to 4 kilometers away.
France may also send an unmanned submarine and deep-sea retrieval equipment, the statement said. The BEA is involved in the search because the crashed plane was an Airbus, manufactured in France.
Because of the difficulties in finding the black boxes, Egypt has contracted two foreign companies, Alseamar and Deep Ocean Research, to help locate the flight data recorders of the plane.
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/28/2016
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[EN.ZAMANALWSL.NET] Three people were killed Friday in northern Idlib city when an explosives-laden car detonated near a mosque, local media center said.
In the nearby Kafr Rouma town, a child was killed an two people wounded in regi,e air strike, al-Marra media center said.
On Thursday, 4 people killed in air strike hit the sheep market of Saraqeb town.
In Aleppo province, At least 10 people, including children, have been killed Friday in regime air strike on a bakery in Hreitan town, activists said.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] A Paleostinian not seen publicly since his 2002 capture by the CIA launched a brutal interrogation program may soon make his first appearance in a U.S. courtroom.
Abu Zubaydah, who CIA agents once sought to be kept incommunicado for the rest of his life, has been called as a witness by Ramzi Binalshibh, one of the defendants in the Sept. 11 war crimes case, to back up allegations of mistreatment inside a high-security unit at Guantanamo Bay.
Abu Zubaydah could testify, along with a prisoner from Somalia who has also never been seen in a public forum, as early as next week in a pretrial hearing at the U.S. base in Cuba.
James Harrington, a lawyer for Binalshibh, said that Abu Zubaydah is expected to support his client's allegations that prisoners inside the unit known as Camp 7 are subjected to noises and vibrations inside their cells intended to keep them awake and disoriented, similar to the sleep deprivation they were subjected to as part of the interrogation program they endured in a network of overseas CIA prisons. The military denies the allegations.
"He's experienced the same kind of thing that Ramzi has with the noises and vibration," Harrington said in an interview Wednesday.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: al-Qaeda
#1
He's a Palestinian. He's not accustomed to ocean waves.
[The News (Pak)] What followed was the ’OBL’ exhibit found on Pak soil and displayed to the entire world leaving us guessing if it was something to be embarrassed about. It pains one particularly because wherever the public diplomacy circuit has taken us we have vehemently contrived rationales to explain such deviations, hoping that some rationality may also somehow seep through the official brain trust ‐ forget the abiding pain that such cavalier approach to national security has caused to the nation itself. Seemingly, all has been in vain.
Because, what followed OBL was Mullah Mansour, taken out in 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... ‐ not in any god-forsaken corner of the contiguous Fata belt where the writ of the state is only sporadic. That would have at least given us face-saving argument. No, here he was in Balochistan, blazing the holy trail to the ’Quetta Shura ...Mullah Omar's command center, located in Quetta, that the Pak govt hasn't been able to find since its establishment in November, 2001. Honest... ’. There is another story doing the rounds that he was actually travelling from Iran into Afghanistan and was betrayed by the Iranian intelligence. This story goes that the Iranians did that as a favour because of the Modi visit, appeasing Indian sensitivities on the Kalbhushan Yadav episode. Whatever may be the case, he was found in broad daylight on Pak soil and became an exhibit.
I don’t even want to recount the car rental company of Quetta who somehow knew he was crossing Taftan and were ready to motor him into Afghanistan. What facilitation ‐ despite there being an equally accessible border between Iran and Afghanistan. Or is Iran far better at controlling its borders?
Just a while back our ’old man’ at national security revealed that the Quetta Shura was indeed our baby and that was how we exercised control and influence over them. The Mansour episode just proved that contention except that the element of influence was a thing of the past. This was a typical case of one becoming a victim of his rhetoric. Influence exercised through familial extensions is at best fluid and unworthy of strategic consideration. That is why the peace talks have failed; because Mansour always had his own agenda. As will the next man. And that will complete the cycle beyond which the broadly termed entity, the Taliban, will fragment further.
This will fail everyone lost on the road to discovering peace, including the US. The more the Taliban fragment, the more will others ‐ including the IS ‐ gain. The more Al-Qaeda and the IS gain, the more will the US lose. Forget the region; it is in a perpetual mess and will remain so for a long time to come. Back at home, Pakistain is a mess ‐ a royal mess; gains by Operation Zarb-e-Azb ..the Pak offensive against Qaeda in Pakistain and the Pak Taliban in North Wazoo. The name refers to the sword of the Prophet (PTUI!)... brought to naught.
The esteemed foreign secretary, a man of great motivation, recently desired that Afghanistan rather than Pakistain would do better to do something about their Taliban problem. It must be said that the FS got what he desired. A few more and Afghanistan may well be on the road to doing something about it.
Wait a while, we will soon have Messrs Haqqani and Zwahiri too paraded dead or alive on the Pak soil. What bloody embarrassment.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
I hadn't read much about it, but from what I have read, Couric apparently thought she could get away with pressing an agenda by twisting the presented facts, and no one would notice.
The Internet has changed things in the last 10 years. Dumb stunts like Couric's not only are noticed, but also the word of such malfeasance will be spread far and wide.
The proprietor of the Western Rifle Shooters Association (WRSA) has sage advice for dealing with the press: Don't talk to them. But I think that if you also record the interview yourself, you could safely talk to them as long as you have an outlet for releasing the raw footage.
WRSA has a point, though. No matter how clearly something gets stated on television, those with an agenda, on both sides, will find a way to twist your words.
Continuing the discussion from last week about ARs vs. AKs, the pro Russian military news website Southfront.org had an article camparing the two. Knowledgeably written, but written for a crowd that wouldn't know a fire control group from a box of matches.
Prices for pistol ammunition were steady across the board. Prices for rifle ammunition were mostly lower.
Prices for both used pistols were mixed on the low side, while prices for used rifles were higher across the board.
The nationwide average price of used AKs spiked to an all time high average of $637, with prices in California and Virginia spiking to all time highs.
New Lows:
None
Pistol Ammunition
.45 Caliber, 230 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (10 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Cased, .24 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Ammo Mart, Store Brand, RN, Brass Cased, Reloads, .22 per round (From Last week: -.02 Each)
.40 Caliber Smith & Wesson, 180 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Cased, .21 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Ammo Mart, Store Brand, RSFP, Brass Casing, Reloads, .19 per round (From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (4 Weeks))
9mm Parabellum, 115 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Bud's Gun Shop, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .16 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .16 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (1Q, 2016))
.357 Magnum, 158 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .22 per round
Cheapest Bulk: 1,000 rounds: Ammunition to Go, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel cased, .24 per round (From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (4Q, 2015))
Rifle Ammunition
.223 Caliber/5.56mm 55 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (9 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .21 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, steel casing, .21 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (6 Weeks))
.308 NATO 150 Grain, From Last Week: -.02 Each After Unchanged (4 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .35 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: J&G Sales, Tulammo, steel casing, FMJ, .34 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (10 Weeks))
7.62x39 AK 123 Grain, From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Ammunition Depot, Wolf WPA, Steel Case, FMJ, .24 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: TrueCaliber.com, Wolf WPA, Steel Case, FMJ, .22 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (6 weeks))
.22 LR 40 Grain, From Last Week: -.01 Each
Cheapest, 50 rounds (10 Box Limit): Ammomen, Aguila, RNL, .07 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds (2 Cases Max): Cabela's, Remington, RNL, .07 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (7 Weeks))
Helpful information, however...'concealed' carries different connotations in different states.
If you become LEO approached because a UA civilian caught a glimpse and felt threatened the situation can quite easily move to yourself and weapon being controlled until such time as higher powers can sort it out.
You may walk but you also may lose your weapon and certainly some time.
Situational awareness, be vigilant, have a good holiday.
[ARA News] RAQQA – Radical group of the Islamic State (ISIS) is using civilians as human shields in Syria’s northeastern Raqqa province, in a bid to impede the ongoing progress by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), activists reported on Thursday.
Backed by the US-led coalition’s air cover, the SDF has been advancing against ISIS militants in the northern countryside of Raqqa province over the past few days.
“ISIS has forced hundreds of civilians to stay inside buildings in central Raqqa that used to be security centres for the radical group. Many people are locked inside those locations,” local sources told ARA News in Raqqa, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Several buildings of al-Hisba police and Sharia institutions have been filled with civilians in Raqqa city, according to media activist Salman al-Hamwi.
“The main goal is that the SDF-led shelling and US-led airstrikes kill as much civilians as possible. ISIS is trying to increase the civilian casualties to claim that the western-backed SDF are targeting peaceful people,” al-Hamwi told ARA News.
Also, in the villages of Tal Shahin, al-Adriya and Mlehan north of Raqqa civilians were prevented from escaping their houses.
“Hundreds of villagers in Mlehan, Tal Shahin and al-Adriya are held hostage by ISIS militants, who are engaged in clashes with SDF forces in the vicinity of those villages,” SDF officer Habun Osman told ARA News on the phone.
“We are aware of such barbaric tactics by ISIS terrorists. We’re trying to avoid using heavy weapons at such fronts to prevent civilian casualties,” he added.
On Wednesday, the Kurdish-led SDF alliance recaptured four villages and towns in northern Raqqa–the de facto capital of the Islamic State. Subsequent to clashes with ISIS militant fighters, the SDF alliance liberated the villages of Qartaja, al-Fastah, Indebin and Matmasraja.
“The battle for northern Raqqa has started, and our advance will continue until we cleanse the entire province from ISIS,” Osman said.
The western-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Tuesday afternoon launched an operation to capture the countryside of Raqqa from the Islamic State (ISIS) group.
“Cleansing these territories from ISIS starts now from the north of Raqqa,” Kurdish Defence Minister of the Rojava Auto-Administration told ARA News in Kobane.
[ARA News] DUHOK – The radical group of Islamic State (ISIS) has executed five of its own militant fighters for escaping the battlefront in Fallujah, where clashes are ongoing between ISIS and the Iraqi army, local activists reported on Friday.
“They have left their post at the battlefront in the northeastern suburb of Fallujah without permission from their leadership, which ISIS deems as a treason,” media activist Salwan Rashidi told ARA News in Fallujah.
The five fighters were arrested inside the city of Fallujah, and the Sharia Court decided to execute them publicly on charges of “high treason”.
“They were shot dead in central Fallujah after an ISIS officer read a statement, vowing that any fighter who would desert his fighting position will face the same punishment,” the source reported.
This comes just one day after the Iraqi army forces recaptured the strategic town of Karma near Fallujah from the Islamic State (ISIS) group.
“Subsequent to fierce clashes, our forces liberated Karma town from ISIS terrorists on Thursday afternoon,” Iraqi army officer Karrar al-Saadi told ARA News. The official added that at least twenty ISIS militant fighters were killed in the clashes in Karma–about 16km northeastern Fallujah. “By liberating Karma, the entire eastern Fallujah area is now under the control of the government forces,” he said.
Posted by: badanov ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
[IsraelTimes] Islamic State fighters cradle cats, eat Nutella and hand out sweets in ad campaign for potential supporters
[Your adjective here] photos at the link.
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.... fighters are a bunch of softies who love to cuddle with kittens and eat chocolate spread, a new jihadist media campaign suggests.
Recent images on the internet depict fighters with a feline in one hand and an AK47 in the other, holding jars of Nutella spread, or handing out sweets to children.
The pictures -- the cat images were tweeted under the heading Islamic State of Cat, and have since been removed -- came to light during a visit to London by John Carlin, a top US counter-terrorism official, who said IS understood that "kittens sell," the UK’s Daily Telegraph reported Wednesday.
Carlin, assistant attorney general for national security, was in the UK to discuss how to counter the terror group’s efforts to persuade young people to leave home to join the organization or to perpetrate attacks where they live.
"We have an obligation to stop our citizens from going to commit those atrocities. And we need to figure out a way to stop these people getting radicalized, (the notion of ) no passport no travel required, this call to kill where you live," he said.
Carlin revealed that directors from Hollywood, advertising executives from Madison Avenue and tech gurus from Silicon Valley are being recruited to help fight the terror group’s propaganda.
According to the Guardian newspaper, Carlin also said that America’s success in integrating Muslims had helped intelligence experts to deal with the domestic terror threat.
He refused to be drawn into commenting about US presidential hopeful Donald Trump’s bid to temporarily ban Muslims from entering the United States.
In other remarks, Carlin called for the threat of terror in America to be kept in proportion, saying there were probably "only hundreds" who were attracted to Islamic State.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
[Daily Excelsior] Two Hizbul Mujahideen gunnies were killed in Tangmarg area of North Kashmire’s Baramulla district today while a murderous Moslem and an Army jawan were killed in an ongoing operation in Nowgam sector of Kupwara district.
Police said that on a specific information about the presence of gunnies in village Khonchipora Tangmarg, Baramulla Police, 2-RR and 176-battalion of CRPF cordoned off the area and launched the search operation. "The hiding gunnies were asked to surrender which they refused and instead fired upon the joint search party, ensuing an encounter", Police said.
The Police front man said that during the encounter two Hizbul Mujahideen gunnies identified as Mehraj Ahmad Bhat resident of Andargam Pattan and Aadil Ahmad resident of Brath Sopore were killed. "They were wanted in many subversive activities. Two AK series rifles and other arms and ammunition were recovered at the encounter site", he said.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Hizbul Mujaheddin
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Security forces fired tear gas as thousands of protesters gathered in central Baghdad on Friday and attempted to head to the Green Zone, a fortified area they have breached twice.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi called on the demonstrators, most of them supporters of holy manMoqtada Tater al-Sadr ... the Iranian catspaw holy man who was 22 years old in 2003 and was nearing 40 in 2010. He spends most of his time in Iran, safely out of the line of fire, where he's learning to be an ayatollah... , to stay home and security forces deployed to block their way to the Green Zone, but the protesters were undeterred.
Demonstrators pushed past security forces at Tahrir Square, breached a barbed wire barrier and attempted to pull down slabs of heavy concrete blast wall blocking Jumhuriyah Bridge, which leads toward the Gree Zone, where Iraq's main government institutions are located.
Some protesters, who are calling for a new government, gave olive branches and flowers to security personnel at Tahrir, but events quickly escalated, and the forces fired tear gas in an attempt to disperse the demonstration.
"Those with masks, go this way to pick up the injured," one protester instructed those who had brought gas masks.
Demonstrators forced a gate to the Green Zone and stormed the premier’s office last Friday before being driven away by security forces.
They used tear gas, water cannons, sound bombs and a barrage of bullets largely had gun sex to disperse the protesters and harry them away from the Green Zone and back across the Tigris River, killing at least two people and injuring dozens.
Abadi had sought to head off a repeat this week, calling on Thursday for protesters to postpone their demonstration, as security forces are busy fighting to retake the city of Fallujah from ISIS.
Demonstrators faced little resistance when they entered the Green Zone and overran parliament in late April, but the period of tolerance of such actions has ended.
Protests have been held almost every Friday for weeks by people demanding the current government be replaced with technocrats.
Abadi proposed that measure in February, but has faced opposition from powerful parties that rely on control of ministries for patronage and funds.
Sadr, a Najaf-based holy man who led an insurgency against US-led forces, has also demanded a technocratic government, encouraging his supporters to call for the change.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Govt of Iraq
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] US-led coalition air and artillery strikes have killed 70 ISIS fighters in Fallujah, ... the City of Mosques, which might have somthing to do with why it's not called Center of Prosperity or a really nice place to raise your kids... including the murderous Moslems’ leader in the Iraqi city, a military front man said Friday.
Baghdad-based Colonel Steve Warren said that over the last four days, 20 strikes in the besieged city had destroyed ISIS fighting positions and gun emplacements.
"We’ve killed more than 70 enemy fighters, including Maher Al-Bilawi, who is the commander of ISIS forces in Fallujah," Warren said, using an acronym for the ISIS group.
"This, of course, won’t completely cause the enemy to stop fighting, but it’s a blow. And it creates confusion and it causes the second-in-command to have to move up. It causes other leadership to have to move around," he added.
Iraqi forces launched an operation to recapture Fallujah, an ISIS stronghold located just 30 miles (50 kilometers) west of Baghdad, at the start of this week.
Between 500 and 1,000 ISIS fighters hold Fallujah, and about 50,000 civilians are trapped inside the city, with the jihadists trying to kill those who attempt to flee.
US planes have dropped leaflets telling locals to avoid ISIS areas, Warren said.
"Those leaflets directed those who cannot leave to put white sheets on their roofs to mark their locations. The Iraqi Army is working hard to establish evacuation routes. And the local Anbar government has set up camps for displaced civilians."
Meanwhile, ...back at the bunker, his Excellency called a hurried meeting of his closest advisors. It was to be his last. They discussed the officers's efficiency rating system... the spiritual leader of Iraq’s Shiites on Friday has called on Iraqi forces battling to retake the city of Fallujah from ISIS bandidosbully boyz to protect civilians trapped there.
"Saving innocent people from harm’s way is the most important thing, even more so than targeting the enemy," the News Agency that Dare Not be Named quoted Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani as saying.
His comments were delivered at Friday prayers by his representative Ahmed al-Safi in the holy city of Karbala.
Rights groups have expressed concern ...meaning the brow was mildly wrinkled, the eyebrows drawn slightly together, and a thoughtful expression assumed, not that anything was actually done or indeed that any thought was actually expended... s for the tens of thousands of civilians estimated to still be in the city, which has been in ISIS hands for more than two years.
Head of Iraq’s federal police said 720 civilians have been evacuated from northern Fallujah so far, the independent Al-Sumaria News reported on Friday.
"The families [evacuated] were mostly women, children and they have been transferred to a secure location after aid was channeled to them," Lieutenant Shakir Jawodat said.
The United Nations ...an organization originally established to war on dictatorships which was promptly infiltrated by dictatorships and is now held in thrall to dictatorships... said in a statement released Thursday that only 800 people have been able to flee Fallujah since Iraqi forces launched a major offensive to retake the city.
Residents contacted inside Fallujah by the UN have said that the amount of bombs and booby traps laid by ISIS in and around the city would make any flight very perilous.
Meanwhile, ...back at the bunker, his Excellency called a hurried meeting of his closest advisors. It was to be his last. They discussed the officers's efficiency rating system... Iraq’s emergency task force said on Friday that ISIS communication center in northern Fallujah was destroyed and four would-be jacket wallahs were killed.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/28/2016
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
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.
[National Review] Hot on the heels of revelations that he fathered a love child with his mistress, the Reverend Jesse Jackson has tumbled further from the moral high ground. Jackson has added former Chicago Democratic congressman Mel Reynolds to the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition's payroll. Reynolds was among the 176 criminals excused in President Clinton's last-minute forgiveness spree. 
(IraqiNews.com) al-Anbar – A source in the Rapid Intervention Division announced on Friday destroying the ISIS communications headquarters in the area of al-Sajar north of Fallujah.
[Hurriyet] Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu has strongly reacted to photos of U.S. special operations forces wearing Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Unit (YPG) insignia on their shoulders during an assault on Syria’s Raqqa, saying it is “unacceptable.” 
[Inquirer] Philippine security forces arrested Thursday morning in Maguindanao a suspect in the 2008 Digos City bus bombing that killed six people and injured 30 others. Also arrested during the dawn raid was the village chair of Penfarm, Datu Paglas, Maguindanao.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
Currently the Interior Minister of Pakistain. He is the senior leader of the Pak Moslem League (N) and a close aide to Nawaz 
Moqtada 
