Several outlawed parties and gangs in the country's south-western region have started regrouping and resuming their activities under the command of over 50 kingpins.
Sources said the leaders, who had been evading arrest for the last few years, returned to their areas and are leading the regrouping mission. They are also recruiting fresh cadres to increase their strength, they added. Many of them are also maintaining close relations with political figures.
The outlaws are working openly in some areas of Kushtia, Meherpur, Chuadanga, Jhenidah, Jessore, Khulna and Bagerhat districts.
In Kushtia, at least 12 listed outlawed-party leaders and gang leaders had tried to escape arrest after some of their accomplices were killed in "crossfire" between them and law enforcers in the last four years. A few of them were also in Kushtia jail.
Sources said the criminals have started to return. At least three kingpins were released from Kushtia jail during the last few days on High Court bail. They have started re-establishing their old chain of command.
According to sources, Gono Bahini chief Azibor Rahman alias Azibor Chairman and his two key accomplices, Anwar Hossain Anu and Mandar, Gono Mukti Fouz chiefs Shaheen and Mukul and their regional commanders Swapan Chakraborty, Abu Taleb and Bakhtiar have started their activities in Kushtia, Chuadanga and Jhenidah.
Three regional leaders of Purba Banglar Communist Party (PBCP) Janajuddha faction Badiur Rahman, Anwarul Islam and Atiar have allegedly started criminal activities in some areas of Meherpur district. Dukhu, leader of Dukhu Bahini, is working in the border areas of Mujibnagar in Meherpur, sources said.
Twelve outlawed-party leaders of Chuadanga are now making arrangements to resume their activities. They are PBCP Janajuddha leader Robi, Oltu, Azad, Moka, Sahidul, Khorsed, Tosel and Kismat and PBCP-ML faction leaders Jamal Uddin, Somser, Kalu and Communist Juddha boss Amirul.
All of them had gone into hiding after Chuadanga police on October 23, 2005, announced bounties between Tk 20,000 and Tk 5 lakh on 20 outlaws. Six out of the 20, including Janajuddha founder Abdur Rashid Malitha Tapan, Janajuddha military commander Abir Hasan, were killed in "crossfires".
Khulna police are looking for 10 listed criminals who have resumed their criminal activities. They are Iqbal Hasan Swadhin, Mohammad Hossain Mukta, Ripon, Hasan, Harun-ur-Rashid, Golam Kader Bappi of PBCP-Janajuddha, Harun Sheikh and Kamal Sheikh of PBCP-ML faction and Sailendranath Biswas and Shamim Akhter of New Biplabi Communist Party.
Jessore police recently listed 183 criminals. A number of outlawed political party leaders top the list. Sarbahara leader Mintu, Janajuddha leader Abbas are active in Jessore Sadar while other Janajuddha figures Liton, Shimul Prashanta, Tima alias Shamim, Mostafa, Datal Babu are active in different areas of the district.
Dablu, Riaz, Uzzal and a few other listed outlawed-party bosses have also started their operations in Bagerhat.
In Jhenidah, at least 10 out of 18 top-listed criminals have resumed their criminal activities. Anwar Hossain Debu of outlawed Biplabi Communist Party (BCP), Bidhan Chandra and Ruhul Alam of Gono Mukti Fouz are among the 10.
Sources claim that police and even Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) have become silent after this government took over. They claimed a number of political party leaders are giving shelter to the criminals. Some leaders are seen accompanied by notorious criminals. The leaders tell others that they are partymen.
Talking to The Daily Star, a number of high officials of Khulna police said they have information about criminals resuming their activities in some pockets. They, requesting anonymity, said a few leaders of major political parties are involved in various criminal gangs and outlawed parties. These political figures use criminals to establish supremacy in their areas.
"It is impossible to root outlaws out overnight since they have been active for about 40 years," a high-ranking police official said.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2009 00:00 ||
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Japan's exports plunged more than 45% in January compared to a year ago to hit the lowest figure ever recorded, official figures showed. The trade deficit was worth 952.6 bn yen ($9.9bn; £6.8bn) and was the lowest figure since records began in 1979.
The demand for Japanese cars in particular dropped by 69%. Demand for electronics and other goods has also slumped as global economies and consumer spending contract, pushing Japan deeper into recession. Japanese exports to the US, which is at the centre of the slide, fell nearly 53% in January while shipments to the European Union retracted by 47%, Japan's finance ministry said.
Japan's export-led economy had previously been thought to be immune to the worst effects of the global recession, the AFP news agency reported.
The government said last week that Japan's economy was in its most serious crisis since World War II, after it contracted annualised rate of 12.7% in the last quarter of 2008. This was its worst performance in almost 35 years, officials said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/25/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
Astonishing numbers. They point to things getting a lot worse.
A Munich court on Wednesday sentenced Horst Mahler, a prominent right-wing extremist and former member of the leftist terrorist group the RAF, to six years in prison for incitement of hate crimes.
In November 2007, Mahler admitted to distributing an outlawed book by Holocaust-denier Germar Rudolf, called “Lectures on the Holocaust.” Mahler, 70, also distributed discs of himself giving a speech that called the Holocaust the “most momentous lie in world history.”
His defence attorney plans to take the case to the countryÂ’s high court to question the definition of incitement of hatred (Volksverhetzung) in the German penal code.
Before he started supporting the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD) in 2000, Mahler was a member of the left-wing Red Army Faction terrorist group in the 1970s. He also defended several of the RAF's members during criminal trials.
He was sentenced to 14 years in prison for his criminal activities as part of the group in 1970. He was released four years early in 1980 with help from lawyer Gerhard Schröder, who later became German chancellor in 1998.
#2
Before he started supporting the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD) in 2000, Mahler was a member of the left-wing Red Army Faction terrorist group in the 1970s.
US President Barack Obama vowed on Monday to crack down on costly military programmes, citing a project to build a new presidential helicopter fleet as an example of the procurement process "gone amok."
Lockheed Martin Corp's helicopter programme is now more expensive than Air Force One, the high-tech Boeing 747 that ferries the president, former Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain told a summit convened to look at ways of curbing the United States' $1.3 trillion deficit. Lockheed shares closed down nearly 5 percent on Monday, a day when Wall Street shares hit 13-year lows.
McCain and Democratic Senator Carl Levin, head of the Senate Armed Services Committee, will introduce a bill this week to rein in military weapons programmes which now routinely run billions of dollars over budget, Levin said. "This is going to be one of our highest priorities," Obama assured McCain when the senator told him at the summit that the government had to act to curb the "excesses of procurement." With the United States facing the worst economic crisis in decades, Obama has pledged to review major defense programmes.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2009 00:00 ||
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#2
...Well, clearly the man ain't stupid - he's picked a program that was going to run ELEVEN BILLION DOLLARS to deliver just six helicopters. People will see that and figure whatever comes next was just as bad.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
02/25/2009 5:24 Comments ||
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#3
And yet President Obama promised to up-size the Armed Forces during his term in office.
#4
Ridiculously costly weapons programs are at least as effective a stimulus for the economy as virtually anything in the so-called stimulus bill, and in the end usually have at least some redeeming value.
#5
..And yet President Obama promised to up-size the Armed Forces during his term in office.
Draft. Slaves are cheaper than freemen.
or [Don't count on it]
Like the Swiss, issue each able bodied member of the unorganized militia, without a criminal record, a standard M16/4 and two hundred rounds of ammo, then count them towards the increase.
#7
#5 ..And yet President Obama promised to up-size the Armed Forces during his term in office.
Everyone is a member of the Obama Corps and our numbers will grow! A "People's Army" of unpaid volunteers, liberted political victims, convicts, illegals like auntie Zeituni, tax cheats, and ........ "veterans."
#8
“…candidate Senator John McCain told a summit convened to look at ways of curbing the United States…”
What pathetic display of political Vaudeville that exchange was. [Que up the laugh track] Johnny Mac played Bambi’s straight man like fucking Abbot and Costesello routine. [Que up the talking heads and bold headlines with that end with a question mark] The media stooges then (predictably) furrowed their collective brow and wondered aloud if McCain was simply a sore loser taking a childish potshot. [Que up the Breaking News headline] With a stern look and his trademark glasses at the end of his nose, Levin declares this will be a “Top Priority”.
Tune in next week folks for the Juggling Act from The Amazing Geitner and Summers followed by Hillary the Dancing She-Bear.
#10
To be fair it is 28 Presidential helicopters for $11.2 billion or only $400 million each. Blame it on Bush scratching Tony Blair's back.
The Marines already fly VIP Blackhawks. Is it really necessary for the White House to stuff more than a dozen staffers in with the president?
Posted by: ed ||
02/25/2009 12:35 Comments ||
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#11
BTW, the Army is buying the latest and greatest Blackhawks for $12 million each. Hopefully the VIP mods can be kept under $388 million for each helicopter.
Posted by: ed ||
02/25/2009 12:39 Comments ||
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#12
There is a whole lot that can be done to improve the procurement process. This helicopter example is a very good one. My guess is that there was an incredible amount of requirment creep during the process. My guess is also that a lot of the requirements were just friggin nuts...too far reaching/all encompassing to be effectively achievable. This can and should be improved.
#14
Yeah, everyone wants to cut defense spending...until it hits in their back yard. See traditional attempts at base closings and the current let's-buy-some-of-each tanker debacle for examples.
New Delhi: Just as India grudgingly prepared itself to re-negotiate with Russia on its demand to more than double the original cost for aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov, Moscow has conveyed another shocker to New Delhi that the deal will cost another $700 million.
This makes the deal worth $2.9 billion, which is almost thrice the original amount agreed upon when the agreement was first reached on January 29, 2004 by the NDA Government for $974 million. While India did expect cost-escalation to the tune of $350-400 million in the course of refurbishing the old ship, Russia stunned India by proposing a $1.2 billion hike in November 2007 that pushed up the cost to $2.2 billion.
It took several rounds of official-level talks and then the visit by Defence Minister A K Antony to Moscow for the UPA government to consider Russia's request. Finally, the Cabinet Committee on Security gave its approval in December, around the time Russian President Dmitry Medvedev was visiting India, to renegotiate the Gorshkov deal in view of the cost escalation
However, India has now been informed that on February 10, Medvedev signed on a final deal amount of $2.9 billion after "thorough analysis" of the refurbishing and trial costs. This was conveyed by a Russian team that's here for talks on the deal. It's headed by Deputy Minister in-charge of Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation Alexander Fomin and includes Nikolai Kalistratov, Director General of Sevmarsh Shipyard where the Gorshkov is being refurbished.
The revised offer has surprised the Indian delegation stunned as it was expecting to find some "middle ground" to the earlier proposal made by Moscow. India has already paid $500 million as per terms of the initial contract. The Russian delegation has said that regardless of the outcome of this round of negotiations, Sevmarsh wants an immediate payment of $190 million for the work that's underway.
While this wavering by Russia could set off a diplomatic row, Moscow is firm that it will meet the delivery deadline of 2012. You have their word on it...
The first of the series of trials, the Russian team has said, would start next year. However, the trials alone have been estimated at $500 million which could increase depending on prevalent Oil costs. Yeah. I doubt they'll decrease...
Sources said Russia wants to ensure it bears absolute no cost in the entire deal. Admiral Gorshkov, which has not sailed much while in active service after it caught fire, needs to be completely refurbished. While India is building its own indigenous aircraft carrier, the progress has been slow and the date of completion has now been pushed to 2014-15. Sell them the Kitty Hawk: one dollar plus the costs of refurbrishing. They could get it in a year and it would be good for 10 to 15 years.
#3
ION RUSSIA, RUMORMILLNEWS > seems some websites are alleging that the Chinese-owned Sri Lanka-registered merchant ship sunk recently by Russia's Coast Guard was covertly carrying a MISSING RUSS TOPOL-M NUKE WARHEAD(S)? INTENDED FOR A NUCLEAR TERROR STRIKE(S)? AGZ THE USA???
United Kingdom's Consular Affairs Minister Gillian Merron arrived in Pakistan on Tuesday. The minister is likely to discuss various issues including 'forced marriages' with the local authorities. "The visit is intended to see the work the British High Commission (BHC) is doing in partnership with communities, police and the Pakistan government to tackle forced marriages," a BHC statement said. "We can only help victims here because of the excellent cooperation we get from the local authorities in Pakistan including police, local community leaders and the government," the minister said.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
Discuss? How about "stop"?
Posted by: Ho Chi Glusoque7625 ||
02/25/2009 11:54 Comments ||
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#2
Mark Steyn (no link, sorry) gave this startling statistic: 75% of the men in Yorkshire are married to their first cousins.
#3
For or against? Sometimes I'm not sure about the UK ruling class. Besides, now that Binyam Mohamed is in the UK, surely he deserves a fine British lass. And Keira Knightley isn't getting any younger.
Posted by: ed ||
02/25/2009 12:47 Comments ||
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#4
75% of the men Pakistani colonizers in Yorkshire
Posted by: ed ||
02/25/2009 12:48 Comments ||
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Aswat al-Iraq: The Kurdistan Alliance agreed with the Iraqi Accord Front (IAF) to share the leading posts in Diala, the head of the KA in Diala said on Tuesday. "We have agreed to form a local government in Diala after the announcement of the provincial elections results," Haimen Mansour told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2009 00:00 ||
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NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks fell on Wednesday as investors were hit by a report showing yet more deterioration in the housing market, while uncertainty about Washington's plans to shore up the banking system persisted. President Barack Obama's first address to Congress offered few new insights on government plans to stabilize the economy and shore up banks.
He offered no insight; instead he promised to be the bull in the china shop ...
Investors sold off shares of financial services companies and big manufacturers including Boeing, down 4 percent, and United Technologies, off 3.1 percent.
Perhaps because investors heard Bambi slam defense spending ...
Sales of previously owned U.S. homes plunged an unexpectedly high 5.3 percent in January, an industry group reported.
Who's going to buy a house right now? Why buy when sellers can wait and see if the gummint bails out their mortgage payments?
I still think the bank nationalization stuff is on everybody's mind," said Kevin Kruszenski, head of listed trading at KeyBanc Capital Markets in Cleveland. "If you have banks get nationalized in Europe, does that put pressure on the U.S. to do something?"
Financial shares staged a brief rebound after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said in a second day of congressional testimony regulators were not planning to nationalize Citigroup.
And then tanked again when investors realized Bernanke doesn't have the power to prevent it.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/25/2009 15:59 ||
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I have tried to explain how the "risk management" models on Wall St. failed so completely. This article explains it (in English) better than I could.
The damage was foreseeable and, in fact, foreseen. In 1998, before Li had even invented his copula function, Paul Wilmott wrote that "the correlations between financial quantities are notoriously unstable." Wilmott, a quantitative-finance consultant and lecturer, argued that no theory should be built on such unpredictable parameters. And he wasn't alone. During the boom years, everybody could reel off reasons why the Gaussian copula function wasn't perfect. Li's approach made no allowance for unpredictability: It assumed that correlation was a constant rather than something mercurial. Investment banks would regularly phone Stanford's Duffie and ask him to come in and talk to them about exactly what Li's copula was. Every time, he would warn them that it was not suitable for use in risk management or valuation.
People used the Gaussian copula model to convince themselves they didn't have any risk at all, when in fact they just didn't have any risk 99 percent of the time. The other 1 percent of the time they blew up
Bankers securitizing mortgages knew that their models were highly sensitive to house-price appreciation. If it ever turned negative on a national scale, a lot of bonds that had been rated triple-A, or risk-free, by copula-powered computer models would blow up. But no one was willing to stop the creation of CDOs, and the big investment banks happily kept on building more, drawing their correlation data from a period when real estate only went up.
Bankers should have noted that very small changes in their underlying assumptions could result in very large changes in the correlation number. They didn't notice. One reason was that the outputs came from "black box" computer models and were hard to subject to a commonsense smell test.
Another was that the quants, who should have been more aware of the copula's weaknesses, weren't the ones making the big asset-allocation decisions. Their managers, who made the actual calls, lacked the math skills to understand what the models were doing or how they worked. They could, however, understand something as simple as a single correlation number. That was the problem. "The relationship between two assets can never be captured by a single scalar quantity," Wilmott says.
In the world of finance, too many quants see only the numbers before them and forget about the concrete reality the figures are supposed to represent.
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
02/25/2009 12:08 ||
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#1
Most views of the world--in particular the views of Democrats--rely upon a static analysis of that world. Then they only look at one variable at a time. It's easy, then, to predict how changes in law will effect the economy.
But money is a slippery devil. It never seems to go where "it should." Failure to understand the math seems to be the biggest deficit in Washington. Dynamic models are hard, but they are better. (Most of the time.)
#2
Let's see. Any profit from borrowed and leveraged money you keep. When it goes south, the nation's taxpayers pick up the mess. What's not to like, including the view from the Manhattan penthouse?
Posted by: ed ||
02/25/2009 13:14 Comments ||
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#3
Greed masks risks. Greed is good. It stimulates productivity. But if it's not tempered by fear, the greedy eventually destroy themselves. Fear is good. It pulls people back from the edge. But unchecked it destroys productivity. It's time for a nap, now. Naps are good...
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
02/25/2009 13:23 Comments ||
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#4
When that bank blew up in the late '90's (BCI or some such...the mind is a terrible thing) that should have been the signal that this crap was too dangerous to play with. Clinton has now said that he should have increased regulation on derivatives at this point and he is right. Bush should have done so when he came into office. Neither party did squat to limit this stuff. As I've said before, it is one thing to make a crappy mortgage loan, but it is another to securitize that loan and creat 50+ obligations based upon it. That was what the geniuses on Wall Street, at the hedge funds and at the big insurance companies did. Too smart for their own good by far.
The Hearst Corp. said Tuesday that unless the San Francisco Chronicle can undertake "critical" cost cutting measures including job cuts within weeks, the company will be forced to sell or close the newspaper, MarketWatch reports.
Hearst said the Chronicle lost more than $50 million last year and added that, "this year's losses to date are worse." The Chronicle has had major losses each year since 2001, Hearst said. The closely-held media company said cost reductions including an unspecified reduction in union and non-union employees are needed to restore the Chronicle to health, MarketWatch reports.
Several other struggling newspapers around the country are also on the sales block, have filed for bankruptcy or are facing a possible shutdown. Meanwhile, bankruptcy lawyers say three Philadelphia newspaper executives will roll back their 2008 raises while the company tries to shed debt and stay afloat.
Chief Executive Brian Tierney's 38 percent pay hike in December has boosted his salary to $850,000. It has raised eyebrows when it was disclosed in this week's filing by owners of The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News to seek bankruptcy protection. The raises have come as two newspapers shed staff amid declining circulation and revenues.
Lawyers in court Tuesday say Tierney and two other executives will roll back their recent raises as the case proceeds in Philadelphia.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2009 00:00 ||
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#2
But gromky, I fear that the business woes will do nothing to change the truly astonishing stranglehold that the major-media mentality has over the public square in the US, and the catastrophic damage that does to the country - both things dramatically demonstrated just this past November.
I'm starting to marvel a bit at the ability of so many (sadly a minority) to reason effectively about their world, despite the distortion and delusion that suffuses the "press," popular culture, academia, etc. It's sort of the way I felt about the remarkably sensible and independent views of the US I found in recently-former Soviet citizens throughout the former Union back in the early 90s. How sad is it that America today and dreary, propagandized, long-totalitarian former Soviet republics 15 years ago have such striking parallels?
#3
Well, with papers going out of business, it's a start. The market for local advertising is there, it just needs to be served by something other than a newsroom so biased that it doesn't even recognize when it's doing it.
#5
This is good news. Period. It opens the market back up for alternatives, including more balanced papers, radio and internet sources.
The most insidious thing about these papers -- the NYT particular -- is that they provide a great deal of useful information: book reviews, travel stores, news about new electronic gadgets, etc. Reading the NYT every day gives you a VERY strong sense that you are well informed -- and all the wile everything of real importance is omitted or an outright lie.
#6
The S. F. Chronicle may be closing. It's good. It's bad. Whatever. It's reality. ADJUST!
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
02/25/2009 13:27 Comments ||
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#7
I find it somewhat unsettling to think of that bastion of intellectual ideas and reasoned thought no longer having a hometown newspaper to express their thoughts and feelings. What will they do with themselves?
#10
EU6305, especially in today's economy. I mean, the economy is worse today than it has ever been. Even before the Great Depression. Unemployment is at an all-time high - there are food riots everywhere. No one has ever seen an economy as bad as today's -- ever.
Or so you would believe if you listen to the mainstream media. Actually, unemployment as a percentage of the working force is no where near even levels seen during the Clinton administration.
Of course, if you're a journalist for a liberal newspaper, and all you can see is other journalists getting laid off, I suppose it does look like the end of the world.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
02/25/2009 20:33 Comments ||
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Oil prices extended losses for a second day Tuesday in Asia, falling below $38 a barrel, as a loss of investor confidence that the global economy will recover soon swept across stock and crude markets.
Benchmark crude for April delivery fell 59 cents to $37.85 a barrel by midday in Singapore on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract overnight fell $1.59 to $38.44.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/25/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
Oil doesn't "follow" the stock market. It "follows" the dollar. Both oil and gold are down a bit on a stronger dollar.
This is funny today from market watch.
At 9:19am ... Metals Stocks: Gold falls as rising stocks reduce safety buying
At 12:02pm ... Metals Stocks: Gold rises as falling stocks fuel safe haven buying
They can't seem to make up their mind.
But for commodities such as oil and gold and other metals and stuff, watch the dollar.
on Jan 1 the Euro bought $1.38, and today a Euro will buy you $1.28. Look at a chart since the first of the year and the drop in the Euro against the dollar is pretty steady.
The dollar might suck, but the other currencies suck more and the strength of the dollar on world markets is a relative thing.
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.
But mostly due to Bambi's speech.
