As the United States and its allies try to negotiate a peace settlement with the Taliban before all combat troops leave Afghanistan in 2014, a new obstacle has arisen: Insurgent splinter groups opposed to the deal are emerging, complicating U.S. hopes of leaving behind a stable country. Who could have possibly seen that one coming?
These splinter groups have demonstrated their strength recently, with two brazen shootings one of a high-ranking Taliban leader and the other of a senior member of the Afghan governments High Peace Council.
That new violence has added to the difficulty of striking a deal with the Taliban as the clock continues to wind down with only 2 1/2 years to go before the planned withdrawal. Failure to figure out all these new players in Afghanistans varied ethnic and political groups threatens to plunge the country into more civil strife. Failure? It was preordained the instant Obozo announced our premature withdrawl.
I am very pessimistic, said Moeed Yusuf of the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington.
He warns that Afghanistan seems poised to repeat the devastation of the early 1990s after the Soviet withdrawal. At that time, rival rebel factions previously united against the Soviets turned their guns on each other, killing tens of thousands of civilians and paving the way for the Taliban takeover.
As more decision-makers emerge on the scene, it is becoming more difficult to secure a peace deal that can withstand the test of time, Yusuf said.
Whatever peace you come up with, I believe it is not sustainable, and I believe we are probably going to see a repeat of the 1990s, where you go for a few years and then it all starts to fall apart, he said.
The U.S. began the clandestine talks with the Taliban last year, aided by Germany and secretly held in Qatar. A senior U.S. diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said the goal for Marc Grossman, Washingtons special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, was straightforward: Get an Afghan peace deal.
That goal has run into a series of problems.
The Taliban broke off talks earlier this year, saying the U.S. reneged on a promise to release Afghan prisoners from Guantanamo Bay. To get the Taliban back to the table, the U.S. last weekend said it was mulling a proposal to transfer some Guantanamo Bay inmates to a prison in Afghanistan. But Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahed told The Associated Press that the group wants the prisoners freed unconditionally before resuming talks.
In the last six months, the Taliban has had increasingly violent clashes with a militant Islamist group called Hezb-e-Islami, led by warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. That fighting escalated to all-out war in some parts of Afghanistan.
Hekmatyar is a former American ally who is now on Washingtons wanted list. The Taliban worry that Hekmatyars group, which is close to the government of President Hamid Karzai and has held parallel talks with the Americans, will make its own peace deal.
The fissures in the Taliban movement have been further widened by the emergence of the splinter groups opposed to the peace talks.
President Barack Obama officially designated Afghanistan a "major non-NATO ally" on Friday, putting the country on par with some of the United States' closest international partners.
Wonder if Karzai got ten percent of that...
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made a formal announcement during an unannounced visit to Afghanistan on Saturday. Clinton said the new status was a powerful symbol of our commitment to Afghanistans future, according to reports of her address.
We are not even imagining abandoning Afghanistan, she said.
Some of us have more imagination...
The agreement to put Afghanistan on the list of major non-NATO allies was part of the postwar deal struck between the White House and Kabul in May. The presidential determination sent to the State Department on Friday merely formalized the mandates agreed to in the U.S-Afghanistan deal struck three months earlier.
Other major non-NATO allies to the United States include Australia, Bahrain, Israel, Japan, New Zealand, the Philippines, Thailand, and Republic of Korea. Pakistan was the most recent country to be granted the non-NATO ally status in 2004, when then-President George W. Bush added the country to that key list of American allies.
Afghanistan is the first country President Obama has added to the non-NATO ally list since taking the White House in 2008.
Aside from increased military cooperation with the United States, Afghanistan will now have priority to receive surplus American military hardware under its major non-NATO ally status. Afghanistan will also be able to stockpile American military surplus weapons and equipment outside the United States, without having to adhere to federal mandates governing foreign military sales.
The designation does not guarantee future U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan after the American withdrawal is complete in 2014, a senior administration official explained back in May, shortly before the U.S.-Afghan postwar deal was signed.
"It does, however, commit the United States to seek funding from Congress on an annual basis to support the training, equipping, advising and sustaining the Afghan National Security Forces, as well as for social and economic assistance," the official told reporters during a briefing aboard Air Force One.
The Obama administration has 30 days to officially notify Congress on Afghanistan's new status, according to federal law. However, congressional approval is not required before Kabul can assume its role as a major non-NATO ally.
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07/07/2012 10:41 ||
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The Obama administration has 30 days to officially notify Congress on Afghanistan's new status, according to federal law. However, congressional approval is not required before Kabul can assume its role as a major non-NATO ally.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has arrived in Afghanistan on an unannounced visit. Clinton is to meet President Karzai, one day ahead of a major conference of Afghanistan's foreign donors in Japan.
The meeting in Tokyo is expected to discuss how to support Kabul after most of the 130,000 NATO-led troops leave Afghanistan at the end of 2014.
A group of Coptic activists in Egypt announced the establishment of the Christian Brotherhood to counter the growing influence of the Muslim Brotherhood especially after their candidate Mohammed Mursi won the presidential elections.
The idea was first initiated in 2005 by lawyer Mamdouh Nakhla, head of al-Kalema Center for Human Rights, and political analyst Michel Fahmi. It was then adopted by Amir Ayad, member of the Maspero Youths Union for Free Copts, the group established after clashes with military forces in front of the TV building in the Cairo district of Maspero left more than 20 Copts dead. The Christian Brotherhood has branches in 16 governorates in Egypt as well as four branches outside Egypt, three in Europe and one in Australia.
Fahmi explained that it was the victory of Muslim Brotherhood candidate presidential elections that necessitated taking steps towards creating the new Brotherhood. The new group, Fahmi pointed out, is not meant to compete with Muslims but with the rise of political Islam and its members are not after power.
According to Amir Ayad, members of the group decided to put their ideas into action when they felt that the hope of having a civilian state was gone.
"With Mohammed Mursi's victory, we felt that Egypt is about to turn into a religious state so we decided to create the group as a means of peaceful resistance against Islamist powers," Ayad was quoted as saying by the Egyptian newspaper al-Youm al-Sabea. "We will then use all available legal channels to make sure the perpetrators of these actions do not get away with them." This resistance, which Ayad likens to that adopted by Mahatma Gandhi, will be basically through chronicling all sorts of violations and discriminatory acts committed against Copts across Egypt.
In the first response to be issued by an Islamist body, the Salafi Front welcomed the establishment of the Christian Brotherhood as the counterpart of the Muslim Brotherhood.
"As long as the Christian Brotherhood will abide by the law and will work towards the welfare of Egypt, then there is no problem," said Khaled Said, the front's official spokesperson.
Depends on whether 'welfare' means 'Islamicist rule'.
[An Nahar] The United Nations ...an idea whose time has gone... Children's Fund said Friday that gangs occupying northern Mali were recruiting children, while others had been raped and killed by bombs.
UNICEF said in a statement that evidence collected since the end of March, when Islamists and other gangs seized the northern half of Mali, showed at least 175 boys aged between 12 and 18 had been recruited into gangs.
The agency also noted that at least eight girls were raped or sexually abused. Two boys were killed by bombs and another 18 children maimed.
Theophane Nikyema, UNICEF's representative in Mali, said that in addition to this, some 300,000 children had been affected by the closure of schools and were at higher risk of recruitment, violence and exploitation.
"These numbers are reason for alarm especially because they represent only a partial picture of the child protection context in the north - an area where access for humanitarian workers is limited," he said.
Children in the desert region are further facing a severe nutritional crisis which has put some 560,000 young children in Mali at risk of acute malnutrition this year, the statement said.
"More than 330,000 people, a fifth of them children, have fled their homes, with 150,000 internally displaced inside Mali, and over 180,000 seeking refuge in neighboring countries."
UNICEF said it was in critical need of additional funding, with only 21 percent of its appeal for $58 million (47 million euro) for 2012 met.
Once one of west Africa's most stable democracies, Mali has been plunged into chaos since soldiers ousted the government on March 22 over its inability to clamp down on a deadly rebellion by Tuareg separatists in the north.
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07/07/2012 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Libya's election on Saturday could well bring Islamists to power, but liberals under the leadership of the architects of the revolt that ousted Muammar Qadaffy ...a reminder that a single man with an idea can change an entire nation, usually for the worse... say they too are confident of a win.
With more than 100 parties running in the upcoming polls of Libya, a nation with no recent history of democracy and no polling technology, it is impossible to predict the make-up of the General National Congress.
But three parties are seen as key contenders, including the liberal Alliance of National Forces, led by war-time prime minister Mahmoud Jibril, which faces stiff competition from Islamist parties Justice and Construction and Al-Wattan.
"We don't have surveys, so really we have no idea how powerful or how weak we are," said Ali Tarhuni, leader of a centrist party within the coalition, who served as the rebels' oil and finance minister during the 2011 conflict.
The winds of the Arab Spring that ushered Islamists into power in neighboring Tunisia and Egypt may well bring the same result on Saturday in the first national election since Qadaffy was toppled.
Mohammed Sawan, head of the Justice and Construction which was launched by Libya's Moslem Brüderbund, said his party enjoys a broad base of support in the conservative country unlike liberal "technocrats."
"We believe that the National Congress should have a solid bloc that has popular backing across the country," he said.
Sawan added that his party aims to dominate the incoming congress by linking up with similar parties, such as Al-Wattan, which draws on the popularity of members such as former jihadist Abdelhakim Belhaj, and the National Front.
Eighty out of 200 seats in the assembly have been allocated to party representatives. The party with the top votes will de facto need to reach out to 120 independents and smaller parties to dominate the legislature.
Proponents of political Islam believe that by banding together they can dominate the legislature, which was abruptly stripped of its constitution-making powers on Thursday.
But the Alliance of National Forces, which includes personalities such as Jibril and Tarhuni who proved themselves during the "crisis-period," or the early stages of last year's war against Qadaffy, also stand a good chance.
"Our goal is to get the majority, we will see later whether we need alliances or not," said its secretary general Faisal al-Krekshi
He rejects the "naive" notion that Libya's political scene is split between moderates and Islamists noting that "all Libyans are Moslem and all parties recognize Islam as the main source of legislation."
The dichotomy he prefers to draw is that of experience and inexperience.
"For the reconstruction of Libya, we need technocrats with experience, not newcomers testing the waters," he said, pointing out the weak grip on security of the ruling National Transitional Council now dominated by Islamists.
"The current authorities have clearly failed to manage the crisis."
"This is no time for ideologies, we need to foster unity," he stressed.
There are no major policy difference between the nascent parties, with all of them advertising themselves as nationalists, democrats, and Islamists in the same breath, while promising to tackle security, health and the economy.
All the parties agree that Islamic law, or sharia, should be a reference of legislation in the Moslem nation. Differences tend to center on what system of governance Libya should have -- presidential, parliamentary or a mix.
That is now a decision to be made by a constituent authority of 60 experts which is to be elected by the people rather than appointed by the incoming General National Congress.
The fate of Libya's parties rides on the tribal and personal networks they can tap into in the run-up to the elections, what alliances are likely to be developed in the congress, and the impact of their advertising.
"They're all in a position to do well," said Carlo Binda, director of the National Democratic Institute's branch in Libya, noting none have run in elections before.
Parties were banned as an act of treason during the 42 years of Qadaffy's iron-grip on power. There are 142 parties fielding 1,206 candidates in the election.
The result is a lot of white noise.
"A lot of people haven't been able to really grasp how party (or independent) candidates differ from one another but they are willing to go out to vote and it will be very interesting to see what the result is," Binda said.
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THE HAGUE: A war crimes lawyer who was detained in Libya for three weeks on spying allegations said on Friday her experience showed it was impossible for the son of slain dictator Muammar Qaddafi to get a fair trial in his home country.
And who would know more about fair and speedy trials than the ICC?
I guess it all depends on your definition of "fairness," doesn't it?
Melinda Taylor, who was assigned to assist Seif Al-Islam Qaddafi defend himself before the International Criminal Court (ICC), was imprisoned in Zintan along with three colleagues last month after being accused of smuggling documents to her client which her captors said threatened national security.
Her ordeal came as The Hague-based court was preparing to rule whether Libya is capable of offering Seif Al-Islam a fair trial for war crimes he allegedly committed during the NATO-backed revolt that toppled his father last year. He denies the charges.
Libya has so far refused to extradite him, saying it would prefer to try him in its own courts and has challenged the ICC's jurisdiction.
Possession is at least 9/10's, remember, particularly once you've hanged him...
But Taylor, an Australian, said her experience showed Seif Al-Islam had no chance of receiving a fair trial in Libya.
'Fair' is in the eyes of the beholder...
"These recent events have completely underscored that it will be impossible for Mr. Qaddafi to be tried in an independent and impartial manner in Libyan courts," she told reporters in The Hague. "The rights of my client were irrevocably prejudiced during my visit to Zintan."
Taylor spent three weeks in a prison in the western mountain city of Zintan after meeting Seif Al-Islam, who is being held at a secret location by Zintanis, on June 7.
Authorities in Zintan, which is only loosely under the control of the interim government in the capital Tripoli, had made it impossible for her to defend Seif Al-Islam effectively, she added, confiscating privileged documents and listening in on conversations meant to be confidential.
But they weren't planning to turn Seif over to you so it's not a big deal...
Libya is not a member of the court, but the ICC was granted jurisdiction by the UN Security Council last November.
Taylor and her colleagues, from Lebanon, Russia and Spain, were only released after 26 days when the ICC issued a carefully-worded apology to Libyan authorities.
Libyan authorities accused Taylor of smuggling documents that endangered national security, charges she denied. On Friday, Taylor said all the documents were legitimate and relevant to Seif Al-Islam's case however, and that Libya had violated his right to privileged contact with a lawyer.
An internal inquiry at the court - which was founded a decade ago to try war crimes around the globe - is looking into her imprisonment.
Gee, wonder what they'll decide?
She works for the ICC's office for the defense, which represents suspects in the initial stages of their trial and was visiting Qaddafi to advise him on his choice of defense lawyer.
Johnnie Cochran wasn't available?
The ICC employees were held in a prison surrounded by tanks for almost three weeks and were allowed one five-minute telephone conversation with their families, Taylor said.
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[An Nahar] Renegade soldiers of the Democratic Republic of Congo on Friday took a Ugandan border post at the town of Bunagana, after fighting regular Congolese armed forces, police and the mutineers said.
"We took Bunagana around 6:00 am (0400 GMT)," lieutenant colonel Vianney Kazarama, front man for the mutinous armed force known as M23, told AFP.
"The mutineers took control of the entire town. The entire population and the (Congolese) troops are in Uganda," a police source in the area told AFP separately.
A Bunagana resident said, "It's over, the place has been occupied by the rebels. We're all crammed in on the Ugandan side."
DR Congo's government forces on Thursday launched an offensive to rout the mutineers but the M23 said loyalist forces had been repulsed.
Bunagana is about 10 kilometers (six miles) from the positions of mutineers who have gathered in the hills in the southeast of Virunga national park since May.
The park, home to mountain gorilla, borders Uganda and Rwanda about 50 kilometers (30 miles| north of Nord-Kivu's main town of Goma.
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Some 600 Congolese soldiers have fled into Uganda, following clashes with rebels who have seized a border town. The Ugandan military said the fleeing troops had been disarmed. Ugandan army spokesman Capt Peter Mugisa says the 600 Congolese soldiers are in the custody of the Ugandan military. He told the News Agency that Dare Not be Named they fear being massacred by the rebels if they return.
M23 rebels loyal to Bosco Ntaganda, who is wanted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court, took up arms in April. They defected from the army after pressure increased on the government to arrest Gen Ntaganda, when one of his former colleagues was convicted of recruiting child soldiers by the ICC. As the rebels took control of the Democratic Republic of Congo side of the town of Bunagana, an Indian peacekeeper was killed, the UN says.
A recent UN report has accused Rwanda of backing the rebels - Gen Ntaganda is an ethnic Tutsi, like the majority of Rwanda's leadership. But Rwanda has vehemently denied the accusations. Rwanda has twice invaded its much larger neighbour, saying it was trying to take action against Hutu rebels based in DR Congo. Uganda also sent troops into DR Congo during the 1997-2003 conflict.
Sheikh Abdul Majeed al-Zindani has strongly denied No, no! Certainly not! US accusations of supporting terrorism, stressing that the US allegations are baseless.
In an interview with Al-Rai Newspaper, Al-Zindani, who is head of Al-Iman University, had expressed his readiness to stand before a Yemeni court if the administration has any evidence about his ties to terrorism.
Yemeni media outlets has recently spoken about an alleged deal between Zindani and the White House which would have seen the removal of his name from Americas terror list, but Al-Zindani denied such deal.
In a statement, Al-Zindani's bureau in Sana'a said that it repeatedly demanded the US administration to present any evidence that could substantiate its claims about Al-Zindani, asserting that the administration is unable to do that and that Al-Zindani has no any ties with terrorism.
It further said that the former Yemeni regime conspire to enlist Al-Zindai name in the terrorism list, pointing out that correspondences between Yemen's ambassador to the United Nations ...Parkinson's Law on an international scale... and Foreign Affairs Minister affirm that.
US Ambassador to Yemen Gerald Feierstein has recently said his country has not changed its position towards Al-Zindani, stressing the White House still considered Zindani a dangerous threat.
The Islah Party has expressed sorrow about the remarks of the US ambassador to Yemen Gerald M. Feierestein regarding Sheikh Abdul-Majeed Al-Zandani, emphasizing that the case of Al-Zindani was made up by the former regime of President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... with the aim of political blackmailing.
Al-Zindani is the founder and had of Al-Iman University in Sana'a that was founded in 1995 with Yemeni government support. He also a senior member of one of the main political Yemeni parties, the Islah Party.
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07/07/2012 01:18 ||
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WoT related, as it allows the Japanese the flexibility to build nuclear weapons quickly if the need *cough* North Korea *cough* should arise...
The Japanese government on Tuesday authorized the construction of additional facilities to reprocess spent nuclear fuel. The product is known as mixed oxide fuel, which contains plutonium blended with natural uranium, reprocessed uranium, or depleted uranium.
Construction of the MOX processing plant was halted following the nuclear accident in Fukushima last year. Some critics worry that the authorization was rushed through to give Japan a plutonium production facility that can be transformed for military use.
Last week, the Japanese Diet revised the Atomic Energy Basic Act to include a controversial clause that nudges open the door to defensive use of nuclear arms.
Japan's Asahi Shimbun reported Wednesday that the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency gave the green light to continue construction of the nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture.
The approval apparently means that Tokyo intends to maintain the troubled Monju prototype fast-breeder reactor in Fukui Prefecture, according to experts, despite growing public doubts over nuclear energy. The Monju reactor has been plagued with safety problems amid soaring costs and is not expected to become operational until 2050.
2050?? Or as the Obama administration would say, 'shovel ready'...
The Mainichi Shimbun reported that the revision of the act provided the legal basis to continue constructing the plutonium reprocessing facility in Rokkasho, which could be used for military purposes.
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07/07/2012 00:00 ||
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Japan is considering deploying Aegis destroyers near the West Sea (East China Sea) to deal with the long-range missile threat from North Korea. The warships have state-of-the-art electronics equipment and missile systems and radar that can track an aircraft flying 1,000 km away.
Japan's Defense Ministry in a recent report said it is mulling plans to deploy the ships when there is a warning that North Korea will fire a long-range missile to "waters surrounding the launch site," the Asahi Shimbun reported Wednesday. That can only mean the high seas near the West Sea. Although it is possible under international laws for military vessels to patrol the high seas, no Japanese Aegis destroyer has ever approached areas near the West Sea.
The South Korean government's official position is that Japan has the right to deploy Aegis destroyers on the high seas and the matter does not require consultation with Seoul. But there are concerns within the government that the move may be an excuse to expand the operating sphere of Japan's Self-Defense Forces.
"There are suspicions that Japan is trying to expand the operating area of its Aegis destroyers to the West Sea using North Korea's missile threat as an excuse," said one diplomatic source here. Aegis destroyers are capable of monitoring objects 1,000 km away and therefore do not need to approach so close for such surveillance activities.
Some expect the issue to be brought up during the Asia Security Summit or Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore on Friday, where the defense chiefs of South Korea, China and Japan meet. China may also object. Beijing strongly protested against a major South Korea-U.S. naval drill in the West Sea in 2010 involving American aircraft carriers.
Might well be a subtle power move by the Japanese, a reminder that a radar that sees 1,000 km can see further if it's deployed closer to the opponent.
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07/07/2012 00:00 ||
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a reminder that a radar that sees 1,000km can itself be seen at twice that distance.
[Dawn] Awami National Party's acting president Senator Haji Mohammad Adeel has said that the decision concerning disqualification of Yousuf Raza Gilani ... Pakistain's former prime minister, whose occasional feats of mental gymnastics could be awe-inspiring ... as prime minister was a conspiracy of non-democratic elements to create tussle among state institutions and political instability in the country.
He was speaking at 'Meet the Press' programme of Beautiful Downtown Peshawar Press Club on Thursday. He said that democracy had not fully flourished due to constant confrontation between military dictators and other institutions in the country. He said that Mr Gilani had come into power with the support of millions of people, but he was disqualified.
Mr Adeel said that the government had always obeyed judgments of superior judiciary though it was very difficult to accept the decision of disqualification of an elected prime minister. He said that there was need to abstain from such decisions to avoid confrontation among state institutions.
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07/07/2012 00:00 ||
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[Dawn] Adviser to the Prime Minister Rehman 'Nigel' Malik Pak politician, Interior Minister under the Gilani government. Malik is a former Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) intelligence officer who rose to head the FIA during Benazir Bhutto's second tenure. Malik was tossed from his FIA job in 1998 after documenting the breath-taking corruption of the Sharif family. By unhappy coincidence Nawaz Sharif became PM at just that moment and Malik moved to London one step ahead of the button men. He had to give up the interior ministry job because he held dual Brit citizenship. on Friday said that security for NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all.... containers travelling through Pakistain would be provided by Pakistain Rangers and other law enforcement agencies, DawnNews reported.
He said all the inspector generals have been directed to provide security cover to the containers in their respective jurisdiction.
Rangers, local Police would provide security cover to containers in Sindh while Police and Frontier Constabulary will escort containers in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... The first containers carrying supplies crossed into Afghanistan on Thursday following a seven-month-long blockade.
Speaking to media representatives outside the Parliament House, Malik said that the Difa-e-Pakistain Council (DPC) should not take the law into its hands in protesting against NATO supply resumption. He said he would not publicly announce the plan of action for the upcoming DPC long march.
Earlier, the DPC had announced that it would hold a long march on July 8.
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07/07/2012 00:00 ||
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So they'll be guarding dirt and rocks? That seems safe enough.
[Dawn] The UN's top human rights One man's rights are another man's existential threat. body has appointed three independent experts to conduct a fact-finding mission on how Israel's West Bank settlements affect Paleostinians.
The president of the UN Human Rights Council, Uruguay Ambassador Laura Dupuy Lasserre, on Friday named three women to the panel: Christine Chanet of La Belle France, Unity Dow of Botswana and Asma Jahangir of Pakistain.
Dupuy Lasserre said their mission will be to look how the Israeli settlements impact "the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of the Paleostinian people."
The Geneva-based 47-nation council passed a resolution in March to establish such a probe.
The UN already considers Israeli settlements illegal under international law. Some 500,000 Israelis live in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war, along with Gazoo.
Said Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor, "The fact finding mission will find no cooperation in Israel and its members will not be allowed to enter Israel and the territories. Its existence embodies the inherent distortion that typifies the UNHRC treatment of Israel and the hijacking of the important human rights agenda by non democratic countries," he said.
"Go back to your fancy hotels and fancier restaurants in Switzerland," he added. "We're too busy to deal with your nonsense just now."
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After trading insults with activist, parliamentarian first throws a shoe and then points a gun at adversary. Host tries to break up brawl. No shots fired
[An Nahar] A world meeting on Syria urged the U.N. Friday to use the threat of sanctions to force change in Syria as Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Supressor of the Damascenes... was rocked by the defection of one of his most senior generals.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ... sometimes described as The Woman to Call at 3 a.m. and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Jeremiah S. Black ... also rounded on Russia and China, telling delegates from over 100 countries gathered in Gay Paree that the two veto-wielding U.N. Security Council members were blocking progress towards peace.
The "Friends of Syria" meeting insisted that Assad would have to quit and sought a resolution under the U.N. charter's Chapter 7, which provides for possible sanctions and military action.
But it stressed that the immediate action under Article 41 provided only for non-military intervention.
German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle backed the call for non-military action for the time being, saying force should only be discussed "when the implementation of the sanctions has not really made the progress they should have".
French President Francois Hollande ...the impending Socialist president of La Belle France... also pushed for the Security Council to get tough with Damascus ...The place where Pencilneck hangs his brass hat... , while the Syrian opposition called for humanitarian corridors and a no-fly zone.
A peace plan drawn up by former U.N. chief Kofi Annan ...Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh and so far the worst Secretary-General of the UN. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize for something or other that probably sounded good at the time. In December 2004, reports surfaced that Kofi's son Kojo received payments from the Swiss company Cotecna, which had won a lucrative contract under the UN Oil-for-Food Program. Kofi Annan called for an investigation to look into the allegations, which stirred up the expected cesspool but couldn't seem to come up with enough evidence to indict Kofi himself, or even Kojo... , which insists on a cessation of violence by all sides, has made little headway and activists say an estimated 16,500 people have now died in the 16-month uprising.
A meeting last weekend of world powers in Geneva agreed to a transition plan that the Syria opposition, the West and Russia have interpreted differently, but Clinton insisted the plan amounted to a call for Assad to go.
"It is imperative to go back to the Security Council and demand implementation of Kofi Annan's plan including the Geneva communiqué that Russia and China have already agreed to," Clinton said.
"We should go back and ask for a resolution in the Security Council that imposes real and immediate consequences for non-compliance, including sanctions," ranging from economic measures to military force, she added.
The West insists Assad should not be part of any new unity government and the Syrian opposition rejected the Geneva talks as making concessions to Damascus under pressure from Russia.
Taking a tough tone, Clinton said she thought Russia and China did "not believe they are paying any price at all for standing up on behalf of the regime".
"The only way that will change is if every nation represented here directly and urgently makes it clear, that Russia and China will pay a price. They are holding up progress, blockading it. That is no longer tolerable," Clinton said.
Russia reacted immediately with Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov "categorically" rejecting "the formulation that Russia supports Bashir al-Assad's regime in the situation that has developed in Syria".
Hollande said the uprising is now a threat to international security, echoing U.S. calls for a tough U.N. resolution.
"To those who maintain also that Bashir al-Assad's regime, as dislikeable as it is, can avoid chaos, I tell them that they will have both the most dislikeable regime and chaos. And this chaos will threaten their interests," Hollande said.
Although Moscow did not attend the meeting, a diplomatic source insisted that "Russian political and security circles are changing their position".
"They agree that the situation is deteriorating... even if they continue to defend Moscow's policies," the diplomat said on condition of anonymity.
China did not attend either the Geneva or Gay Paree talks in which the United States, La Belle France, Britannia, Germany as well as 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 runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in their national face... and Qatar led a group of more than 60 members, including most EU states and many Arab League ...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... nations.
Assad's regime was dealt another blow when it emerged Friday that General Munaf Tlass, the son of a former defense minister who was a close friend of Assad's late father and predecessor, Hafez, had defected.
Tlass, a member of the inner circle of power in Syria, and a childhood friend of Assad, is the highest-ranking military officer to have abandoned the Syrian regime.
A source in Damascus told Agence La Belle France Presse that Tlass' relations with the authorities became irreconcilable after the regime's fierce assault on the Homs district of Baba Amr in February.
Tlass reportedly refused to lead the unit tasked with reclaiming Baba Amr, and Assad subsequently told him to stay at home.
Sources close to Tlass say his family is now in Dubai while others said he would soon head to Gay Paree. The defection of a senior unnamed military figure was confirmed by French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius.
In Geneva, the U.N. Rights Council issued a new resolution condemning the violence in Syria and the "widespread, systematic and gross violations" of human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... , including the "indiscriminate targeting" of civilians by the Syrian authorities.
The head of the main opposition group, the Syrian National Council, said at the Gay Paree meeting that humanitarian corridors and a no-fly zone should be implemented.
"All steps have to be taken to establish humanitarian corridors and a no-fly zone," Abdel Basset Sayda said, claiming that Assad's regime "is about to fall".
Morocco will host the next Friends of Syria meeting but no date has been set.
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[An Nahar] Israel is preparing to launch a devastating attack against Leb as the developments in Syria are one of the factors that could upset the calm, Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on Friday.
"This means carrying out a very strong attack against Leb, and the damage will be enormous," said a senior officer in the Northern Command of the 91st Division, which is responsible for the front with Leb.
The report said that the collapse of the Syrian regime will "increase the Jihadi or Hizbullah operatives, who will try to carry out attacks in the area."
The Israeli Northern Command intelligence described certain areas along the Lebanese-Syrian border as a "lawless zones," that are used to transfer advanced weapons into the region.
The senior officer told Haaretz that the third Israeli war against Leb will include ground maneuvers in Hizbullah bastions.
"The next war will be different, and therefore we should stop it as quickly as possible, in order to make things easier for the home front," he pointed out.
According to the senior officer "there is no choice but to fight against the enemy where it is, and that is in the heart of a populated area."
The Israeli Defense Forces previously said that Hizbullah owns 60,000 missiles, ten times more than the quantity it had during the first war.
Hizbullah, according to IDF, has the capability to launch a large quantity of rockets in a short period time, and this could cause significant damage to the Israeli front.
On Thursday, Brigadier-General Hertzi Halevy said that there are several factors that can ignite a war with Leb.
"The IDF is preparing seriously and professionally for another Leb war. The response will need to be sharper, harder, and in some ways very violent. The next war will witness very heavy exchanges of fire on both sides, and so both need to make every effort to stop this from happening," he told news hounds.
In June, the Jerusalem Post voiced Israeli fears that Hizbullah will try to move sophisticated weaponry, including Scud missiles, from Syria to Leb to protect them in the event of Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Supressor of the Damascenes... 's downfall.
Israeli officials believed that the missiles would only be transferred to Leb in the event of a war with Israel but now that Syria is in the midst of an uprising, there is concern that the Lebanese party might try to move them to prevent rebels or other rogue elements from putting their hands on them.
Syrian Scud Ds have a range of about 700 km. and can carry non-conventional warheads, it warned.
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07/07/2012 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] The March 14 forces on Thursday called on the government to "resign immediately" and called for referring the liquidation attempts against Lebanese Forces A Christian political party founded by Bashir Gemayel, who was then bumped off when he was elected president of Leb... leader Samir Geagea ... Geagea was imprisoned by the Syrians and their puppets for 11 years in a dungeon in the third basement level of the Lebanese Ministry of Defense. He was released after the Cedar Revolution in 2005 ... and MP Boutros Harb to the U.N.-backed Special Tribunal for Leb.
In a statement issued after an emergency meeting at Harb's residence in the wake of a failed attempt Curses! Foiled again! on his life, the March 14 forces also called on the government to immediately hand over telecom data linked to recent liquidations bids to the relevant security agencies.
"We hold the government in general and the Free Patriotic Movement Despite its name a Christian party allied with Hizbullah, neither free nor particularly patriotic... and Hizbullah in particular responsible for failing to hand over this data," the March 14 forces added in their statement.
Telecom Minister Nicolas Sehnaoui is an FPM member.
"These acts can be linked to the government's collusion in failing to hand over the accused in the Hariri murder and in providing cover for illegal arms," said March 14's statement.
Earlier on Thursday, security forces found an bomb in the elevator of a building in Beirut where MP Harb has an office after witnesses wrangled with a suspect who was whisked away by a suspicious vehicle.
Police found the device in the elevator shaft of the building that lies in Badaro district's Sami Solh street a few hours after the suspect carrying a knife was subdued but managed to escape along with two accomplices.
"The attempt comes following several reports about plots to assassinate March 14 leaders which were confirmed by the interior minister more than once," the March 14 forces noted in their statement.
"We realized from the very beginning that some sides are trying to drag us into changing the rules of political engagement," they added.
The March 14 forces also demanded "immediate military protection around the house of MP Harb and around the houses of all March 14 leaders."
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[An Nahar] Syria's Manaf Tlass, a top general with close ties to Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs... , has been transformed from a "golden boy" of the Damascus ...Capital of the last overtly fascist regime in the world... regime into a member of a growing dissident movement with his defection.
The change comes after the regime brutally repressed dissent in his hometown of Rastan in Homs province of central Syria.
An attractive man of 48, Tlass is married to a woman from the Damascus upper middle class. An enthusiast of fancy cars, he smokes cigars and is a regular at fashionable cafes in Damascus. His favorite holiday spot is the French Riviera.
Born into Syria's inner circle of power, Tlass' father Mustafa was a close friend of Assad's late father and predecessor, Hafez, who ruled the country for 30 years until his death.
Manaf became a close friend of Bassel, the strongman's eldest son and heir apparent before he died in a 1994 car accident.
The two men embarked on a military career, just like their fathers had in the 1950s, after meeting at a military academy in Homs. The two joined the elite Republican Guard, the country's top military force.
"Mustafa Tlass made a wise decision: he raised his eldest son Manaf to be an army man, and his second-eldest Firas to join the business sector," Syria expert Fabrice Balanche told Agence La Belle France Presse.
Firas went on to "take charge of the company MAS, which supplies the Syrian army with food, clothing and medicine. It was a monopoly handed to the Tlass family by Hafez al-Assad because Mustafa was one of the regime's Sunni guarantors," he said.
Both members of the ruling Baath party, Hafez al-Assad and Mustafa Tlass were posted in Cairo from 1958 to 1961 for the duration of the United Arab Republic of Syria and Egypt, whose existence they both opposed.
When Assad took power in 1970, Tlass became defense minister.
The only difference between them was that Assad was an Alawite -- an offshoot of Shiite Islam, accounting for 10 percent of the population. Tlass, on the other hand, is a Sunni Mohammedan, a member of Syria's largest community.
Manaf was the eldest of a family of four children. A general in the Republican Guard, he was sidelined more than a year ago because he was deemed unreliable, according to a source close to the regime.
Tlass undertook several unsuccessful reconciliation missions between regime loyalists and rebels in Rastan and the southern province of Daraa.
Months later he gave up his military uniform and opted for civilian clothing. He set up residence in Damascus, where he let his beard and hair grow long.
Another source in Damascus told AFP that Tlass' ties with the authorities became irreconcilable after the regime's fierce assault on the Homs district of Baba Amr in February that cost hundreds of lives.
Tlass reportedly refused to lead the unit tasked with reclaiming the former rebel stronghold, and Assad subsequently told him to stay at home.
The source said Tlass was furious when Assad refused to promote him from brigadier general to divisional general or commander, when the yearly promotion list was published on July 1.
Sources close to Tlass say his family is now in Dubai, including his brother Firas. After the uprising against Bashir al-Assad broke out in March 2011, the businessman wrote a blog post supporting the uprising.
Tlass's cousin Abdel Razzak defected from the military several months ago, and heads the rebel Free Syrian Army's Farouk Battalion in Homs.
"The Tlasses were pampered by the regime because they were the guarantors of Sunni loyalty in central Syria," Balanche said.
"But when they were no longer able to fulfill this role, there was no longer any cause to hold on to them, especially given that their predatory attitude was contributing to the explosive situation in Rastan."
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#1
Months later he gave up his military uniform and opted for civilian clothing. He set up residence in Damascus, where he let his beard and hair grow long.
...
"The Tlasses were pampered by the regime because they were the guarantors of Sunni loyalty in central Syria," Balanche said.
"But when they were no longer able to fulfill this role, there was no longer any cause to hold on to them, especially given that their predatory attitude was contributing to the explosive situation in Rastan."
Neo-cons believe that inside every Muslim is an American waiting to jump out. Unfortunately, reality has taught us differently, that inside every moderate (TM) Sunni Muslim is an Islamist mass murderer waiting to jump out. There are moderate Muslims in the world. The problem is that most of them are non-Sunnis. It's no coincidence that the vast majority of the freelance terrorist groups in the world, operating without government sponsorship, are Sunnis, funded by the kind of small donors who gave Islamists a 75% parliamentary majority in Egypt, and a near-majority in Tunisia.
[An Nahar] Russia said Friday it "categorically" rejected the idea it was siding with Bashir al-Assad's regime in the Syria conflict, after Moscow's position was slammed at the Friends of Syria meeting in Gay Paree.
"I categorically reject the formulation that Russia supports (President) Bashir al-Assad's regime in the situation that has developed in Syria," said Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov.
Earlier U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ... sometimes described as the Smartest Woman in the World and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Walter Q. Gresham ... and other top Western diplomats strongly criticized Moscow's stance at the Gay Paree meeting, which was attended neither by Russia nor its chief diplomatic ally China.
Ryabkov countered: "What the Russian Federation is engaged in is not supporting specific politicians or political figures in Syria, but in work that we hope will help create the important dialogue between the authorities and the opposition."
"The issue is not supporting specific political figures or leaders, but putting the process of regulating the crisis on a normal political basis," he said in a statement quoted by Russian news agencies.
Clinton blasted both Russia and China at the meeting for "standing up for the regime," saying they are "holding up progress" in the regulation of the conflict and urged countries to press Moscow and Beijing on the issue.
She added that assistance from Russia was one of the few things keeping the regime afloat. "That is no longer tolerable," she said.
But Ryabkov accused the West of being stuck in a Cold War mindset.
"Unfortunately, we cannot press our partners, including Western ones, to understand several basic things. The West is still operating with the notions of 'ours-theirs', 'who is whose client,' and so forth."
"We had the impression that such terminology should be left in the past. If it is still employed by these politicians, that means they are behind in their thinking," he said.
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[An Nahar] The head of the main opposition Syrian National Council on Friday called for humanitarian corridors and a no-fly zone as over 100 nations met in Gay Paree to discuss an end to the 16-month bloody crisis.
"All steps have to be taken to establish a humanitarian corridor and a no-fly zone," Abdel Basset Sayda said, claiming that the regime of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Leveler of Latakia... "is about to fall."
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If we do not stop the Islamization, we will lose everything: our identity, our culture, our democratic constitutional state, our freedom, and our civilization, Wilders told an audience of roughly 1,000 gathered in the main ballroom at the downtown Hyatt Regency Denver on Saturday. The annual summit, in its third year, is sponsored by the Lakewood-based Colorado Christian Universitys Centennial Institute and had an estimated 1,300 attendees over three days.
While the reaction to Wilders was mixed he received repeated standing ovations during his 45-minute talk, but perhaps a third of the audience members remained planted in their seats throughout one Colorado lawmaker said Americans should take the Islamic threat seriously and consider prohibiting the construction of mosques in the 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.
As the United States and its allies try to negotiate a peace settlement with the Taliban before all combat troops leave Afghanistan in 2014, a new obstacle has arisen: Insurgent splinter groups opposed to the deal are emerging, complicating U.S. hopes of leaving behind a stable country.
The 
THE HAGUE: A war crimes lawyer who was detained in Libya for three weeks on spying allegations said on Friday her experience showed it was impossible for the son of slain dictator Muammar Qaddafi to get a fair trial in his home country.
Renegade soldiers of the Democratic Republic of Congo on Friday took a Ugandan border post at the town of Bunagana, after fighting regular Congolese armed forces, police and the mutineers said.
Sheikh Abdul Majeed al-Zindani has 
Awami National Party's acting president Senator Haji Mohammad Adeel has said that the decision concerning disqualification of 
[Dawn] Adviser to the Prime Minister 
A world meeting on Syria urged the U.N. Friday to use the threat of sanctions to force change in Syria as 
...Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh and so far the worst Secretary-General of the UN. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize for something or other that probably sounded good at the time. In December 2004, reports surfaced that Kofi's son Kojo received payments from the Swiss company Cotecna, which had won a lucrative contract under the UN Oil-for-Food Program. Kofi Annan called for an investigation to look into the allegations, which stirred up the expected cesspool but couldn't seem to come up with enough evidence to indict Kofi himself, or even Kojo...
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
Samir Geagea
Syria's Manaf Tlass, a top general with close ties to 
Hillary Clinton
The head of the main opposition Syrian National Council on Friday called for humanitarian corridors and a no-fly zone as over 100 nations met in 
If we do not stop the Islamization, we will lose everything: our identity, our culture, our democratic constitutional state, our freedom, and our civilization, Wilders told an audience of roughly 1,000 gathered in the main ballroom at the downtown Hyatt Regency Denver on Saturday. The annual summit, in its third year, is sponsored by the Lakewood-based Colorado Christian Universitys Centennial Institute and had an estimated 1,300 attendees over three days.
