U.S. officials in Afghanistan have spent thousands of hours over the past few years charting what they call "Malign Actor Networks"webs of connections between members of President Hamid Karzai's family, businessmen, corrupt officials, drug traffickers and Taliban commanders.
Using intelligence drawn in part from informants and a powerful wiretapping system, these officials say they have found an economic and political orderunderwritten by billions of dollars in aid, reconstruction and logistics funds from the Westthat is undermining the Afghan government from within and aiding a Taliban insurgency that is trying to topple it from without.
The officials and their Afghan allies have had less success, however, breaking these bonds.
The futile attempts so far at prosecuting one individuala banker named Haji Muhammad Rafi Azimiillustrate the depth the problem.
Mr. Azimi has bribed senior officials, moved money for drug traffickers and kept the Taliban flush with cash, say several current and former Afghan and U.S. officials who described what they say are hours of wiretaps, information provided by informers and financial documents connected with the bank where Mr. Azimi works.
#7
Like I said before, if you really wanna win hearts and minds in Afghanistan, shoot Karzai and install an American general as governor. Stop pretending that these people are capable of managing their own affairs.
Posted by: Abu Uluque (new computer) ||
12/29/2010 14:18 Comments ||
Top||
The recent arrest of a Taliban fighter suspected of trafficking weapons from Iran to Afghanistan comes at the end of a year in which Iran greatly increased its efforts to disrupt the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan, military and intelligence officials say.
Over the past year, military officials have uncovered evidence of Iran training Afghan insurgents to make less detectable bombs out of plastic and supplying them with automatic rifles and other small arms. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard has also tutored Taliban sympathizers in guerrilla warfare tactics.
The Afghan man captured last week in Nimroz province was seen crossing from Iran into Afghanistan by a joint security team that had targeted him for capture.
So much unsaid in that simple sentence...
He was found to be working closely with the Quds force, a special unit within the Revolutionary Guard tasked with exporting Tehran's Islamic revolution throughout the Middle East and Southwestern Asia. And he had connections to high-level Taliban leaders, coalition officials told The Washington Examiner.
Cell phones are wonderful, wonderful things.
Iranian trainers are suspected of working in insurgent camps in the provinces of Herat, Farah, Helmand and Nimroz, and evidence suggests that trainers are also in areas of northern Afghanistan, according to numerous Afghan and U.S. officials.
A Western intelligence official, who works in South Asia, said that "generally, weapons that are provided by Iran are the older stuff -- or stuff that is difficult to trace back to [Iran]," adding "Iranians fear that the Afghans could use the weapons against them in the future."
#1
If only we could get Pakistan and Iran into a war we would kill two birds with one stone.
Posted by: Paul D ||
12/29/2010 7:24 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Over the past year, military officials have uncovered evidence of Iran training Afghan insurgents to make less detectable bombs out of plastic
Imagine if you will, a people who for the most part can neither read or write, or use toilet paper have an understanding of complex electronics circuitry as well as chemistry? Outside assistance? Bold assumption that.
#3
Imagine if you will, a people who for the most part can neither read or write, or use toilet paper have an understanding of complex electronics circuitry as well as chemistry?
#4
Imagine if you will, a people who for the most part can neither read or write, or use toilet paper have an understanding of complex electronics circuitry as well as chemistry?
Plenty of illiterate, uneducated women bake delicious bread without even being able to read a recipe, let alone having a clue why the dough rises. Whereas I have a pretty good understanding of what yeast is and how it works, and an array of recipes to follow, but my bread could be used as building material.
#5
Yes of course, "confused." I very intentionally stay "confused" in order to avoid becoming so. My point with #2 is quite simply, Iran has undertaken military advisory roles in their proxy war against the United States in Afghanistan as well as their continuing efforts to destabilize Iraq. Nothing new or startling here. Iran must eventually be dealt with and the sooner the better.
[Daily Nation (Kenya)] Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir pledged today to help build a secure, stable and brotherly state in the south if it votes for independence in a referendum less than two weeks away.
"We will not deny our southern brothers their decision, and we will help them to build their state, because we want a secure and stable state... if there are troubles, these troubles will come to us," Mr Bashir said in a speech broadcast live on state television.
Speaking before thousands of supporters in Gezira state, Sudan's breadbasket southeast of Khartoum, Presdent Bashir said he would be "the first to recognise the south" if it chooses secession in a free and fair vote on January 9.
"The ball is in your court and the decision is yours. If you say unity, welcome. And if you say secession, also welcome, and welcome to a new brotherly state."
"We are going to cooperate and integrate in all areas because what is between us is more than what is between any other countries."
Some 3.5 million southerners are registered to vote in the plebiscite, according to referendum commission front man George Makuer Benjamin.
Mr Bashir, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and genocide in Darfur, said earlier this month that the north would reinforce sharia, or Islamic law, after the referendum which is widely expected to grant the south independence.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Sudan
from the Sudan tribune
December 25, 2010 (KHARTOUM) -- A group of radical Muslim clerics on Friday overtly faulted the Sudanese government for accepting south Sudan's referendum on independence, and demanded imposition of Islamic Shar'iah law in the entire country whether citizens of the mainly Christian region of south Sudan like it or not...The group's leaders declared south Sudan's referendum on independence as "null and void" and part of a "Zionist-Western" plot to divide Sudan into five frail states, implying that the government was already aware that signing the CPA would pave the way for the south to secede.
"Those who say that the agreement [CPA] was consented by all sides and that they are surprised that the people of the south [will] choose secession have deceived the nation because the agreement works in favor of secession," Abdel-Karim was quoted by the daily newspaper Al-Sahafah.
Posted by: lord garth ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
ION TOPIX > {AllAfrica] SUDAN: SOUTH SUDANESE CALLED "SLAVES" BY CAIRO [Egypt] AIRPORT STAFF.
versies
* SAME > UGANDA: EGYPT RULES OUT ATTACK ON NATIONAL SOIL | EGYPT DENIES WAR PLAN AGZ UGANDA OVER NILE.
#2
Mark my words that this will not end soon. Integral to Islam is taking new lands, preserving "Muslim lands" at a minimum, but most especially, to never, ever cede "Muslim lands" to infidels.
This referendum 'Muslim-internationalizes' Sudan, which means beating the drums to demand the North somehow conquer the South. This would be centered, of course, in Saudi Arabia.
It is seen right now in international Muslim support for Paleos against Israel. No other Muslim gives a poop about Paleos, but they are adamant that Israel is "Muslim lands", so that it absolutely must be taken back by Muslims.
[Arab News] In his third appearance on Saudi TV on Monday, Jaber Al-Fifi, who was No. 20 on the Kingdom's list of 85 most-wanted bad turbans, expressed regret at turning his back on the Saudi government's generosity.
"The Saudi government assisted me in getting married, paid for my rent and furnished my apartment. It also paid for my father's medication. I then turned my back on them and went out to fight," said Al-Fifi on the Saudi Channel 1 program, Homomna (Our Concerns).
In the most recent episode of his interview, the 36-year-old spoke about his time in the mountains of Tora Bora, Guantanamo Bay and Yemen where he joined Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
"Terrorism was born without any knowledge of the true Islamic religion. Takfir (declaring another out of the fold of Islam) was done without any evidence or profit behind prison walls by politicized Arabs and Afghans," he said.
He added that Saeed Al-Shihri, a wanted bad turban and leader of Al-Qaeda in Yemen, encouraged gun-hung tough guys who had repented after their release from Guantanamo to rejoin Al-Qaeda and that non-Saudi gun-hung tough guys pressed him and others to fight the Kingdom.
"The Saudi gunnies absented themselves from religious sermons while in prison and focused on remaining patient until they were released and able to go back and fight their own country," he said.
Al-Fifi said he was caught in Pakistain where he was handed over to US soldiers and flown to a prison in Kandahar. "I stayed there for 14 days after which I was transported to Guantanamo; there were many Arabs and Afghans there," he said.
Speaking about the US detention camp, he said conditions were very bad and that inmates were tortured and mistreated. "We were kicked, beaten and thrown into prison like sacks. We were not allowed to extend our hands out of our blankets, make the Adhan or talk to our neighbors," he said.
Al-Fifi recalled that he spent five years in five different prisons before finally being released. "I could not believe myself when I arrived in the Kingdom. I looked for signs to show that I was in my country but could find none. I realized that I was in the Kingdom when I spoke to a man who answered me in a Saudi dialect," he said.
Al-Fifi said he relapsed back into terrorism and decamped to Yemen after going through a rehabilitation program at Prince Muhammad bin Naif Center for Counseling and Care. "I was looking for martyrdom and was deeply affected by the war in Gazoo and the atrocities in Iraq. I went to Yemen because it was easy to enter," he said.
Further episodes of Al-Fifi's interview are to be broadcast over the next few weeks.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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(KUNA) -- The International Committee of the Red Thingy (ICRC) announced on Tuesday that families in Yemen can for the first time comunicate with their relatives nabbed at the US facility in Guantanamo Bay, via video-teleconference, using a new service made available by (ICRC).
"The first video-teleconference calls were made 10 days ago in Sana'a. The latest round of calls, which took place in Aden, in the south of the country, has just been completed," said the ICRC in a blurb.
"This is the first opportunity families in Yemen and their nabbed relatives in Guantanamo Bay have had to use video-teleconferencing," explained Nourane Houas of the ICRC's Sana'a delegation.
"So far, four families have done so." The video calls, which can last up to one hour, give the detainees and their families the opportunity not only to speak but also to see each other, in some cases for the first time in almost a decade.
"Nothing - not even live video - can replace a face-to-face visit, but a video call is considerably more satisfying than a phone call or written message," added Houas.
A total of 90 Yemeni nationals are currently nabbed in Guantanamo Bay. Many have until now kept in touch with their families in Yemen through Red Thingy messages (brief family messages forwarded by the ICRC) and telephone calls.
The ICRC has been working in Yemen since 1962. In cooperation with the Yemen Red Islamic Thingy Society, it endeavours to meet the most urgent needs of victims of armed violence in the country, to provide humanitarian assistance on an impartial basis, and to visit people deprived of their freedom.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: al-Qaeda
[Bangla Daily Star] The instruction manual recovered by crime busters from a JMB den compiles a set of guidelines for underground gunnies reorganising the terror outfit.
Police raiding a hideout of Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh in Alipur Hospital Gate Area of the district's Hathazari upazila found the document along with some jihadi books.
Meanwhile, ...back at the ranch... a Chittagong court yesterday placed JMB bully boy Shamim Hossain, jugged during the raid, on a three-day remand.
Shamim disguised as a rickshaw puller was living in Alipur along with others bully boys.
Law enforcers on Monday busted another JMB hideout in nearby Patika area.
The Daily Star has obtained a copy of the handbook containing 29 instructions on different topics for members and leaders of the banned outfit.
The topics include selection of members and maintaining their profiles, hideouts, safety measures, and also some guidelines for Eshar members -- full time activists -- working underground.
It has a separate topic titled "Management and Monitoring" meant for the higher-tier members like commanders.
The manual reads six instructions on hiding.
The gunnies have been directed to select rooms on ground floors so that they could easily flee or put up good defence in a fight.
Places close to cop shoppes and Rab or other intelligence offices, slums where people are close to each other, and already raided areas have been strictly prohibited to be chosen.
Areas where most people are unknown to each other are suggested as better options.
While renting a house, members have to use a false identity. In Alipur and Patika, gunnies were posing as rickshaw pullers and day labourers.
The manual instructs them to get ready for frequent arrival of the gunnies from outside for training.
If some outsider gunnies frequently visit a den for training, the manual puts as an example, the shelter could be made known as a coaching centre.
The underground gunnies are instructed to gather furniture that synchronises with their identity and avoid Islamic appearance in the room so that no suspicion falls on them.
There are ten instructions on "Security Rules". In one of the directives, gunnies have been asked to maintain a little relation with locals.
The manual has three guidelines on arrest or sudden drives by law enforcers.
If any bully boy is jugged he should try to misguide police with wrong information about the whereabouts of his associates.
A separate sub-head meant for leaders has two instructions that include keeping statistics of hiding members and managing a network so that they can take steps to evacuate from the nearby hideouts in case of sudden raids.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh
File under "Let a single flower bloom."
Renowned islamologist Roman Silantyev cited statistics according to which about fifty Islamic spiritual leaders were killed in the North Caucuses for fighting against Wahhabism.
"Almost 50 people were killed. These people could have formed a big muftiat," he said in the The Faith and the World program on the Voice of Russia radio.
According to the islamologist, there are few such people left in Russia: "they are killed almost every month, losses is some muslim boards are irreplaceable, the greater number of people who were able to actively fight against Wahhabism have been killed."
"Others are demoralized and stopped opposing or just deserted to the enemy. The situation is critical," Silantyev believes.
He is satisfied that Russian authorities ordered to give security guards to Mohammedan spiritual leaders in the North Caucasus, "or we can just stay without allies."
[Chosun Ilbo] North Korea on Thursday accused the South of trying to drum up public support for war, taking issue with the revival of the term "main enemy" when referring to the North.
"The South Korean conservative regime's attempt to include in its defense white paper the concept of the North being the main enemy is designed to put a war against our republic in writing," the Minju Choson, the organ of the North Korean Cabinet, said Thursday. "This is an intolerable act of treason, arousing the indignation of our armed forces and people."
It warned if the South "provokes a war, it will taste the power of the war deterrent that our military and people have been strengthening. It will have no time for regret. This is not empty talk."
The official North Korean Web site Uriminzokkiri on Wednesday called moves to restore the term "main enemy" in the defense white paper, which was struck during the Roh Moo-hyun administration, "the most wicked theory of confrontation and war," and added, "If the conservative faction takes the path of all-out confrontation and war, it will not escape ignoble destruction."
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Commies
#1
I thought SOKOR changed its references from NOKOR being the South's "MAIN ENEMY" to being its "MILITARY ENEMY"???
IMO "MILITARY ENEMY" = the one Seoul + ROK Armed Forces have to physically fight or wage major combat against, but widout necessarily being SOKOR'S "MAIN ENEMY" [read, CHINA?]
[Chosun Ilbo] The Defense Ministry on Monday said it will describe the North Korean regime and military as an "enemy," instead of the old expression "main enemy," in its white paper 2010 due out on Thursday.
This is the first time the defense white paper has described the North Korean regime as opposed to the country as an enemy.
The white papers from 1995 to 2000 took North Korea as the "main enemy." Since 2004, they described the North as a "serious threat" or a "direct and serious threat."
In the introductory part stating the "defense goals," the new white paper states, "The North poses a serious threat to security by developing and augmenting massive conventional military capabilities and weapons of mass destruction such as nuclear weapons and missiles, and through constant armed provocations like the torpedo attack on the Navy corvette Cheonan, and the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island. As long as the threat continues, the North Korean regime and military, the perpetrators of all such provocations, are an enemy."
A senior military officer said, "We limited the concept of enemy to the North Korean regime and military to separate the North Korean people. We didn't specifically use the expression 'main enemy' due to our relations with neighboring countries, because it implies that there also may be other enemies."
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
WORLDNEWS > SOUTH KOREAN THINK-TANK WARNS OF NORTH KOREAN INVASION OF [Yellow Sea] ISLANDS.
and
* SAME > NORTH KOREAN PROVOCATIONS TO INCREASE IN 2011 AS PART OF POWER TRANSFER: SOUTH KOREAN THINK TANK SAYS.
versies
* SAME > JAPAN GAVE TACIT OK FOR US TO USE BASES , i.e. OKINAWA Milbases in support of Aerial Strikes, Troop Movements during VIETNAM WAR + TAIWAN, KOREA CONTIGENCIES. US Nuclear Weapons on Okinawa.
#2
PEOPLES DAILY FORUM > CHINA, RUSSIA TO DISCUSS KOREAN SITUATION.
* SAME > NORTH KOREA SAYS ITS NUCLEAR PROGRAM IS PEACEFUL.
* SAME > NORTH KOREA CAN PRODUCE ONE NUCLEAR BOMB A YEAR: US OFFICIAL, iff Pyongyang so choses to allocate the proper level of resources + support.
* SAME > FIVE REASONS WHY THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER IS OBSOLETE.
* SAME > RESERACHERS: US RAN TESTS BEFORE WWII ATOMIC BOMBINGS. National Diet Library docs indic that the US MAY HAD CONDUCTED 50 "DUMMY/TEST" A-BOMB TESTS OER JAPAN PRIOR TO THE HIROSHIMA + NAGASAKI ATOMIC STRIKES, e.g. ONE-TON SIMUL A-BOMBS EMPLOYING CONVENTIONAL VHE???
Which also may, or may not, had flown from GUAM + CNMI B-29 BASES???
[Pak Daily Times] THERE'S no French James Bond. But a new push may set the stage for one. La Belle France's secretive international spy agency, the DGSE, is recruiting hundreds of people and getting a budget boost, despite frugal times, to better fend off threats like terrorism and nuclear proliferation. La Belle France's answer to the CIA is buffing its image as well, with its first-ever front man and a new website.
The move follows hostage-takings abroad, bomb scares at the Eiffel Tower and fallout from WikiLeaks' publication of secret US diplomatic cables. La Belle France is also set to ban face-covering veils, which has angered Mohammedans around the world and drawn threats from al Qaeda. The DGSE changes have been long in coming, part of La Belle France's efforts to beef up its network of intelligence operatives as called for in a top-to-bottom security review completed in 2008.
President Nicolas Sarkozy's conservative government is sticking to the review's blueprint even as US and British intelligence agencies are facing cutbacks, and despite the economic crisis that has pinched state pockets across Europe. La Belle France's draft 2011 budget would give the DGSE a 13-percent funding hike -- just a year after La Belle France hit a record-high 7.7 percent budget deficit. The agency is adding 500 staff jobs over the next five years, and the prime minister recently inaugurated a new national Intelligence Academy.
It's a big boost for an agency that's little known, despite having agents in hot spots around the world. "These days, remaining in the shadows means not existing. But we do exist, we do have a purpose," the new front man at the DGSE, Nicolas Wuest-Famose, said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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Across the globe today, you'll find almost three dozen raging conflicts, from the valleys of Afghanistan to the jungles of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the streets of Kashmir. But what are the next crises that might erupt in 2011? Here are a few worrisome spots that make our list.
#4
Hopefully the United States can eventually extricate itself from the current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq and sit a few of these future wars out. I would especially not like to see any involvement in African and sub-Saharan conflicts or "Peace Keeping" efforts.
#7
I doubt it g(r)om. Revisionist history continues to construct a wall of denial regarding the African colonial period. What good could possibly come from learning to read and write, Christianity, agriculture, or mining and industry? Clearly, these are all western methods of exploitation.
#10
Unless modern medicine comes with modern agriculture, it's the biggest killer of them all, Besoeker. Most conflicts have their roots in overpopulation.
#12
Reg: All right, but apart from the sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?
#14
Hardly an original thought on my part g(r)om. Someone sent me this old article today. It's pretty easy to find on-line:
The following is a copy of an article written by Spanish writer Sebastian Vilar Rodrigez and published in a Spanish newspaper on Jan. 15 2008. It doesn't take much imagination to extrapolate the message to the rest of Europe - and possibly to the rest of the world.
REMEMBER AS YOU READ -- IT WAS IN A SPANISH PAPER
ALL EUROPEAN LIFE DIED IN AUSCHWITZ
By Sebastian Vilar Rodrigez
I walked down the street in Barcelona , and suddenly discovered a terrible truth - Europe died in Auschwitz ... We killed six million Jews and replaced them with 20 million Muslims. In Auschwitz we burned a culture, thought, creativity, talent. We destroyed the chosen people, truly chosen, because they produced great and wonderful people who changed the world.
The contribution of this people is felt in all areas of life: science, art, international trade, and above all, as the conscience of the world. These are the people we burned.
And under the pretense of tolerance, and because we wanted to prove to ourselves that we were cured of the disease of racism, we opened our gates to 20 million Muslims, who brought us stupidity and ignorance, religious extremism and lack of tolerance, crime and poverty, due to an unwillingness to work and support their families with pride.
They have blown up our trains and turned our beautiful Spanish cities into the third world, drowning in filth and crime.
Shut up in the apartments they receive free from the government, they plan the murder and destruction of their naive hosts.
And thus, in our misery, we have exchanged culture for fanatical hatred, creative skill for destructive skill, intelligence for backwardness and superstition.
We have exchanged the pursuit of peace of the Jews of Europe and their talent for a better future for their children, their determined clinging to life because life is holy, for those who pursue death, for people consumed by the desire for death for themselves and others, for our children and theirs.
What a terrible mistake was made by miserable Europe ..
#15
Besoeker, your old article has been circulating for even longer than that. It was originally published here in 2004, apparently under a pseudonym. The blogger Planck's Constant did a nice write-up on the piece in 2006 here. As he points out, others have thought similarly.
[Pak Daily Times] A police head constable petitioned in the Beautiful Downtown Peshawar High Court against the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... Police Department for reclaiming Rs 0.5 million from the department, which he paid to Taliban as ransom for his safe release.
Head Constable Pir Jamal, a resident of Hangu District, filed a writ petition through Fazal Mohmand advocate in the high court. He stated in the writ petition that on November 6, 2009, a group of Taliban attacked Doaba Police Post, Hangu with heavy weapons.
The petitioner, who was in-charge of the police post, stated that three police constables were killed and two injured in the attack. The Taliban, after the attack, jugged him and two other police constables Tariq and Akhlaq Ahmed and took them to Qazi's guesthouse an undisclosed location.
He said that they remained in Taliban's custody for three months, but no effort was made by the police department for their safe release. The petitioner said that after three months, his family started negotiations with Taliban for his safe release and finally they agreed to release him on payment of Rs 0.5 million ransom.
The head constable said that he belonged to a poor family and his family borrowed the money from other people. He was on duty and was kidnapped while fighting with Taliban. "To get him released from Taliban's custody was the government's responsibility," the petitioner said. But, after his family members got him released by paying ransom, now it was the government's responsibility to pay the said amount to his family, he said.
The petitioner said that he had time and again requested the police department to pay him the amount, but to no avail and moved the court after getting no response from the police department.
The petitioner made Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government through chief secretary, provincial police officer, Hangu district police officer and others as respondents in the writ petition.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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[Pak Daily Times] The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) on Tuesday demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, compounding pressure on the coalition government.
JUI-F chief Fazlur Rehman made the call just hours after the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) announced that it was quitting the federal cabinet, although it would not join the opposition. "The prime minister should resign and the PPP should appoint a new one," Fazl told news hounds. "He (Gilani) has sabotaged the process of reconciliation among coalition partners and his actions have caused political instability in the country," he said, "The government is under pressure and the president will have to take this step."
The JUI-F chief demanded an in-house change in parliament to protect the democratic system. He said due to the current political situation, coalition partners were leaving the government. He said in the prevailing situation, it was necessary for the government of the Pakistain People's Party (PPP) to announce the name of new premier for continuation of democracy in the country. The JUI chief appealed to President Asif Ali President Ten Percent Zardari ... husband of the late Benazir Bhutto, who showed remarkably little curiosity about who actually done her in ... to take action against those who undermined his policy of reconciliation. He expressed concern that there were threats to democracy and demanded the government take steps in the right direction.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Jamaat-e-Ulema Islami
(KUNA) -- The Central Committee of the Paleostinian movement Fatah has decided to suspend membership of Mohammad Dahlan as a result of disagreements with President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas, according to sources.
Committee insiders told Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) on Tuesday that the commission decided to suspend Dahlan's membership and unseat him as the chairman of the culture and information sub-committee, following disagreements with the president.
Dahlan's membership was suspended pending conclusion of investigations by a special panel after he addressed criticisms to the president over the latter's policies, the sources told KUNA.
Abbas has chaired a recent meeting of the committee and briefed the members about latest contacts and consultations at various levels, within the framework of the peace efforts.
The Paleostinian president has officially expressed staunch opposition to re-launch of "the armed struggle" at full scale, vis a vis Israel's intransigence to soften its stance on the settlement issue, and has frequently stressed that diplomacy remained the best and most fruitful option for the Paleostinians to resort to.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Syria's hereditary President Bashar Pencilneck Assad ... who used to be referred to in the Egyptian press as the boy president ... has reportedly informed Soddy Arabia that if it wanted Leb to remain strong, it should reject the indictment that will be issued by the international tribunal in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri's liquidation case.
"If you want Leb to remain strong, the indictment should be rejected and we should work together to stop its release," informed sources quoted Assad as telling Riyadh during the "strenuous negotiations."
Assad reportedly said that the Saudi-Syrian initiative had reached semi-final results but the delay in the announcement came as a result of King of the Arabians Abdullah's illness and his travel to New York.
The sources told As Safir newspaper that the Syrian president also said that confronting the "politicized indictment" would be an achievement as important as the collapse of the May 17 Agreement of 1983, which was a failed U.S.-backed attempt to create peace between Leb and Israel.
Assad also reportedly had conditioned his visit to Beirut along with King of the Arabians Abdullah on an agreement to postpone the release of the indictment, the daily said.
During his phone conversations with Abdullah to inquire about his health following his back surgery in New York, Assad was avoiding to discuss the settlement of the Lebanese crisis over fears of U.S. wiretapping, As Safir reported.
Assad was addressing the king with codes whenever he wanted to propose a political solution, the newspaper added.
As Safir said that the two leaders held a long telephone conversation on Sunday. Premier Saad Hariri's visit to New York came after the phone call, it said.
According to the newspaper, Abdullah will inform Hariri about the stage that dialogue with Damascus has reached. Well-informed sources also told As Safir that the Lebanese prime minister's trip to New York hints that improvement was made in the Saudi-Syrian initiative.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
You Should Oppose the Indictment if you Want Lebanon to RemainStrong be Shiite controlled.
[An Nahar] Iranian Deputy Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council Ali Bagheri has said that Hizbullah alone decides how it will confront the indictment that will be released by the international tribunal.
"Leb's enemies are targeting the stability of Leb. As for Hizbullah, it alone will decide what decision and stance to take," Bagheri told a news conference at the Iranian embassy in Damascus following talks with Syria's hereditary President Bashar Pencilneck Assad. ... who used to be referred to in the Egyptian press as the boy president ...
"The party said its word to the court and its decision," he said.
He said "stability in Leb depends on consolidating national unity and the Resistance." That'd be the Hezbullies, natch...
"Any attempt or act to harm this national unity or the Resistance is an advantage to the enemies," he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/29/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Hezbollah
[An Nahar] Initial investigation into the murder of Jund al-Sham leader Ghandy Sahmarani at Ein el-HellholePaleostinian refugee camp revealed that the thug was killed over a personal dispute, well-informed Lebanese security sources said.
They told As Safir daily in remarks published Tuesday that other thug groups in the camp could have killed Sahmarani for personal reasons because there was no tension after the discovery of his body in a garage inside the camp.
Lebanese security forces have previously questioned the thug and discovered that he had no major information about several terrorist activities, the newspaper said.
The security situation in Ein el-Hellhole remained calm following the murder and the Lebanese army took standard measures at the camp's entrances, As Safir added.
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Lebanon Daily Star...
Meanwhile, an official in an Islamist Palestinian faction who requested anonymity, told The Daily Star that Sahmarani was killed for moral reasons.
The official said that Sahmarani was arrested by fundamental Islamists for raping a married woman and videotaping her naked in the Tawaree neighborhood, which is adjacent to Ain al-Hilweh and falls under the control of the Osbat al-Ansar Islamist group.
The group considered such an act to be a severe violation of morals it wants to be respected in the neighborhood, the source said. Sahmarani was investigated for 48 hours after which he was released, the source said, and a few hours later was found killed.
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.
[Chosun Ilbo] North Korea on Thursday accused the South of trying to drum up public support for war, taking issue with the revival of the term "main enemy" when referring to the North. 
[Chosun Ilbo] The Defense Ministry on Monday said it will describe the North Korean regime and military as an "enemy," instead of the old expression "main enemy," in its white paper 2010 due out on Thursday. 
The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) on Tuesday demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, compounding pressure on the coalition government.
(KUNA) -- The Central Committee of the 
[An Nahar] Initial investigation into the murder of Jund al-Sham leader Ghandy Sahmarani at 
