A Saudi man and a woman were beheaded Monday for murdering a Saudi man and stealing his money and car. Al-Tarqi bin Atallah al-Salbi and Noura Hamad were found guilty of killing Falah al-Dawish and stealing. The couple lured al-Dawish to a deserted area, stabbed him, and beat him with an iron tool before burning his corpse and stealing his money and car. It Both convicts were beheaded Monday in the Qariet al-Alyya province, about 200 miles east of the capital, Riyadh. The executions raised to at least 42 the number of people beheaded this year in the Gulf kingdom. At least 81 were beheaded last year. One thing you've got to say for the death penalty, the recidivism rate's not very high. And I guess it gives the rubes something to watch. Putting them down like dogs, like we do, it pretty boring. Merciful, but boring...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 12:45 pm ||
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I wonder how many years (or should I say hours) they sit on death row, exhausting their legal appeals, giving interviews to the local hand-wringers and having Susan Saradon, Sean Penn and Ed Asner publicize their plight?
Posted by: Jack ||
10/22/2002 6:29 Comments ||
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There's a long article in Lahore's The Friday Times by Khalid Hasan on The Saudi Way that's worth reading. I went to put it in Core Dump%, but Blogspot seems to be busted â as usual. I've put it on WOT Week, instead, even though it's still buggy, and will probably do so with subsequent long pieces.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 08:27 pm ||
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France's U.N. ambassador put a damper on prospects for a new U.N. resolution on Iraq, saying Monday he didn't think the five permanent Security Council members were close to an agreement on the next moves toward Saddam Hussein's government. Nor will there be, I'd guess. Chirac was meeting with the Francophones over the weekend and said the whole world felt just like France does. He meant the whole Francophone world, of course...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 12:28 pm ||
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North Korea said Monday that it was willing to negotiate over its nuclear weapons program if the United States withdraws its "hostile policy" toward the communist country. The comments by Kim Yong Nam, the North's ceremonial head of state, were unlikely to mollify the United States, which has said North Korea's nuclear program is a nonnegotiable issue and must be dismantled immediately. "What part about 'piss off' don't you understand?"
Kim made the remarks in a meeting with South Korean delegates in Pyongyang, the North's capital. The comments were the North's first official response to a U.S. announcement last week that the communist country had admitted to having a nuclear weapons program in violation of international agreements. "We consider the recent situation seriously," pool reports quoted Kim as telling the chief South Korean delegate, Jeong Se-hyun. "If the United States is willing to withdraw its hostile policy toward the North, the North also is ready to resolve security concerns through dialogue." Seems they've validated that "hostile policy," so what reason could there be for withdrawing it? Maybe the onus should be on the North Koreans to please us, not on us to please them. But I repeat myself...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 12:38 pm ||
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Uh, why the hell do you negotiate with someone who's already demonstrated that they don't negotiate in good faith?
Posted by: Patrick Phillips ||
10/21/2002 12:43 Comments ||
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Part of North Korea's efforts to produce enriched uranium, as well as tests on its long-range missile engines, are being conducted in Iran, in exchange for Pyongyang aid to Tehran in these two areas, as well as the concealment of such efforts from the United States' and North Korea's neighbors. The deal will certainly advance Iran's nuclear ambitions. The Axis of Evil is starting to look a lot more literal than it did...
Apparently, Pyongyang entered the deal with the intention of hiding its activity from the spying eyes of the United States' and North Korea's neighbors. American intelligence, and the intelligence services of Japan and South Korea, have long been watching Pyongyang's nuclear and missile technology. And coverage of North Korean and Iran crosses an internal organizatinal line...
The Iranians are getting know-how from North Korea on building centrifuges for producing enriched uranium as well as know-how on developing engines for long-range missiles. Foreign sources say the North Korean centrifuges in Iran have reached the operational stage for production, but they do not know when the stage was reached and how much of the processed uranium Iran will get from North Korea's centrifuges. We'll know when the Iranians go into production, when Tel Aviv gets it. Maybe we should do something before then?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 02:11 pm ||
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Authorities searching for the sniper terrorizing Virginia and Maryland took a man into custody Monday after surrounding a gray and white van parked next to an outdoor phone. At least one other person also was taken into custody, the White House said. It wasn't clear how the people in custody were connected to the case. I hope the guy wasn't just some schmuck who stopped to call Mom. The coppers had the place surrounded at least 15 minutes before he got there, and they were armed and dangerous...
Witnesses saw one man taken out of the van and into custody in the Richmond area. In Washington, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said only that more than one person had been arrested in the sniper case. He would not elaborate. Police investigators also declined to comment. WTOP said that a second person in the area had been nabbed while the guy in the van was being arrested — the lookout, who might have gotten a little too close to the action?
The developments came as the head of the sniper task force issued a second cryptic statement that authorities trying to communicate with the sharpshooter had received a message and were preparing a response. On Sunday, they had issued a public plea to the person who left a message at the scene of the latest shooting, in Ashland, a town north of Richmond. Just as his statement of last night, Moose's statement this morning, immediately after these guys were arrested, didn't seem to make any sense:
"The message that needs to be delivered is that we are going to respond to a message that we have received," Moose said. "We are preparing our response at this time." Since last night's statement was obtuse and it resulted in two guys netted this morning, and this one was even more obtuse, maybe we'll get three or four tomorrow...
A swarm of police officers in bulletproof vests converged on the van at an Exxon station along a main thoroughfare as the man sat inside, witnesses said. An officer at the scene in the Richmond suburbs said the van was a Plymouth Voyager with temporary Virginia tags. Saw that on CNN, sitting in a doctor's waiting room. Everybody in the room, with the exception of an ill-behaved 2-year-old, was rivetted — and all of us but the brat were expressing identical sentiments...
The nature of the message that investigators say was left at the Ashland shooting scene was unclear. The message contained significant text and was found in woods behind the restaurant, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported Monday, quoting unidentified law enforcement sources. The report also said police have found more than one tarot card during the investigation. Tarot cards would seem to suggest it wasn't Islamists. Multiple participants in the shootings would point to some sort of nutbag organization. The guy working next door to the Exxon station, at a car dealership, said the fellow in the van was maybe Hispanic in appearance. So I'm still in the dark. Maybe Chief Moose will be explaining it all to us in a day or two. I hope so.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 12:26 pm ||
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They were probably waiting for a phone call, maybe to tell them where they were working that day. A lot of them are drywall artists or rough carpenters. They share apartments to live cheap, and often don't have phones.
I feel for them. Most of them are honest and very hard-working.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/22/2002 8:04 Comments ||
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Sounds like a couple of small-time opportunists (unconnected with the shooter(s)) saw a little blackmail opportunity, no? Moose's cryptic comment this morning could be meant to give the losers the idea that their loot was being assembled.
Posted by: John Rosevear ||
10/21/2002 14:49 Comments ||
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The radio sez it was an illegal Mexican and Guatamalan, probably just in the wrong place at the wrong time. They're being turned over to INS and Chief Moose sez for the real Bad Guy to call back.
That poor man must be dying from frustration...
Posted by: Fred ||
10/21/2002 17:25 Comments ||
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That's a real honkin' extreme case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time... and in the wrong car, too. Still, odds are you're right.
Posted by: John Rosevear ||
10/21/2002 19:22 Comments ||
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I figured a Mexican connection from the video shot of the rear window where there was a Mexican flag sticker. Even so, how come that phone was being staked out? Was it the number Moose was asking the perp to call? What kind of credibility does the Chief have know? "Gee, sorry, didn't know where those guys in black came from, must've been that honkie Sherrif down in Henrico County".
Posted by: Jack ||
10/22/2002 6:40 Comments ||
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Pakistan People's Party (PPP) chairperson Benazir Bhutto has given go ahead to Makhdoom Amin Fahim, president of the Pakistan People's Party Parliamentarians (PPP-P), in continuing with efforts to form a coalition government in Islamabad. Ms Bhutto has directed Mr Fahim to win the support of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), party insiders told Daily Times on Sunday night. Insiders say Ms Bhutto, in the last Dubai meeting on Sunday, asked Mr Fahim to demand the future government give representation to the MQM in the Centre, withdraw cases against all PPP leaders and arrange for her safe return to the country. That's the important part. Get those cases withdrawn so Benazir can come back and... and... Well, they don't actually stand for anything, so just being there should be enough.
She said the PPP-P could not afford to sideline the MQM in the Centre as it was trying to form a government in Sindh with help of the MQM. "Before finalizing any deal with the Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid-e-Azam) or the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), Fahim should get assurance of the fulfilment of these condition from the movers and shakers of politics," a PPP-P leader quoted Ms Bhutto as saying. So whether Perv's party or the fundos come through with the fix is irrelevant. What's important is that one or the other does it. I think I'll go take a shower...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 01:03 pm ||
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Source: Daily Islam, Translated by Jihad Unspun
An important member of Al-Qaida has been arrested in a tribal area near Afghan border. According to sources, Pakistani military personnel with the help of local administration raided three houses and arrested Mosa Khan from one house. Authorities also seized important documents. Apart from these documents, others in the Uzbek language were also discovered. Later, the arrested Mosa Khan was handed over to a joint Pak-American team. There'll probably be riots over this guy, too. Might as well get 'em while they can. Once the MMA takes over, they'll try to stop this sort of thing.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 01:12 pm ||
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A car pulled up next to a bus and exploded in northern Israel during the Monday afternoon rush hour, killing at least six people and wounding more than 30 as the entire bus was set aflame. The blast took place several miles inland from the coastal town of Hadera, at Karkur Junction. The intense flames sent plumes of smoke into the sky and prevented police and rescue workers from approaching the vehicle immediately. That's a new technique. I guess they've reached the point where they're loading these bastards down with so much dynamite they can't walk, so they have to be driven...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 12:32 pm ||
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My guess would be they'll ignore Gaza and go into South Lebanon, then Syria, to approximately the Iraqi border. Without Syria as the conduit for Iranian control, Gaza dies on the vine.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/22/2002 22:42 Comments ||
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Well, our Mr. Burns is in the region, and every time he visits - something explodes.... I just wish it was the remaining outhouse building in Arafat's rubble compound
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/21/2002 12:41 Comments ||
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The militant Palestinian Islamist group Islamic Jihad said on Monday it was behind a car bombing which killed at least seven people in northern Israel, Hizbollah's al-Manar television station said. "The Jerusalem Brigades, the military wing of Islamic Jihad, has claimed responsibility in a call to al-Manar for the Hadera martyrdom operation," the station said in a message scrolling across its normal programming. It gave no further details.
Posted by: Steve ||
10/21/2002 14:50 Comments ||
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The death toll is up to 16 at last count. I'd say that equals about another 16 years before Israel will be ready to even consider letting the Paleos set up their little "independant" terror state. Way to go Islamic Jihad, you stupid bastards!!!
#5
I would assume that Israel is well aware that as soom as the Iraq hits the fan that the Paleos will stage attacks and Hezbollah will let go of some of those thousands of Katyushas...should be interesting....wonder if the world's attention diverted to Iraq will allow a real cleaning out of Gaza, the West Bank, and South Lebanon?
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/21/2002 18:08 Comments ||
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Source: Palestine Information Center
Thousands of supporters of the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, yesterday walked in the funeral procession of martyr Karam Mohammed Abu Obeid, 18, who was one of the members of the Qassam Brigades, military wing of Hamas. Abu Obeid martyred in a clash with Israel's occupation soldiers near the Doget settlement in northern Gaza Strip early Friday while two soldiers were wounded. "Hey! Lookit me! I'm shootin' up Zionists!... Ow!... Ow!... Hey, stop that!"
The terrorist Zionist forces detained body of the hero for ten hours before carrying it to an unknown destination then they delivered the body to the Palestinian Authority. A medical source in the Shifaa hospital in Gaza city said that the martyr was shot in the head, chest and stomach with some of the bullets being the internationally banned dumdum and splinter bullets. The source also said that the body was bruised. Horrors! His poor little body was bruised! And just perforated every which way. (Tap! Tap!) My sympathy meter still seems to be busted. Maybe I should call a repairman? 'Course, it seems to work for people who don't devote their lives to shooting up other people...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 01:10 pm ||
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Jakarta Post
Indonesia's House of Representatives Speaker Akbar Tandjung maintained Monday that the arrest of chairman of the radical Indonesian Mujahidin Council (MMI), Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, should be based on solid proof rather than on pressure from a third party. If there's solid proof presented by a third party, they will probably pressure the Indons to act on it...
"In addition, the humanitarian aspects and the principle of presumption of innocence should always be upheld," he told journalists at the legislative assembly building as quoted by Antara. The presumption of innocence is only a presumption. People aren't innocent by virtue of their position in civilized countries... Except for O.J. and Bill, of course.
Akbar, who himself was recently convicted on corruption charges but is free pending appeal, said the plan to arrest Ba'asyir should also consider all evidence being divulged in examinations, including those culled from the man himself against testimonies by another party. "As such, there is an urgent need to check-and-recheck the testimonies of Omar al-Faruq, as well as those by Ba'asyir himself," he said. In this check-and-recheck arrangement, Akbar explained, testimonies by al-Faruq should be compared to any made by Ba'asyir, and those by the latter be checked with the former. However, Akbar admitted that he did not know whether al-Faruq could be brought back to Indonesia and killed for that purpose. "Yasss... If we talk about it long enough, one or the other will die of old age and then we'll avoid having to actually do someting, because that would be unpleasant..."
Speaking also in regard to humanitarian concerns, Akbar suggested that the police postpone Ba'asyir's arrest until he recovers from his apparent illness. "When'll that be?"
"Oh, in about 12 years..."
The House speaker also reminded the police that Ba'asyir's arrest could not be based on the newly sanctioned government regulation in lieu of a House-approved law (Perpu) against terrorism. Akbar pointed out that the regulation was sanctioned to handle future terrorism cases and the Oct. 12 bombing in Kuta, Bali province. "The retroactive nature of the regulation can only cover the Bali bombing, but not earlier ones," he stated. "Bombing a few churches and plotting to kill Madame President? Nothing! All the witnesses are dead. There's no evidence at all! Our boy's pure as the driven snow!"
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 12:58 pm ||
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Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the largest Muslim organization in Indonesia, will not interfere in the legal process against Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, a NU executive said. "We will leave the settlement of Ba'asyir's case to the legal process. I am not a legal expert, and I cannot argue on (legal) articles," NU Deputy Chairman Solahuddin Wahid said here Monday as quoted by Antara. Solahuddin, who had just visited Ba'asyir in Muhamadiyah Hospital, added that Ba'asyir's case should be handled by the government but the process should not be against the law. Looks like Mr Deputy Chairman can see Abu and his boys going up the river, and he doesn't want to go with them. But I'd still guess that Abu will go kicking and screaming — if he goes at all. I saw FoxNews Field Marshal Geraldo Rivera on the terriblevision last night, reporting as he walked among the ranks of the black-clad "students" from Abu's madrassah, who were out front of the hospital as a show of force to stop the coppers from taking their lord and master away.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 01:25 pm ||
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Can someone please whisper in Ba'asyir's ear that Geraldo is a Zionist spy?
Posted by: Steve ||
10/21/2002 14:56 Comments ||
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is it just me, or does having all the hard boys in one spot spell "opportunity"?
Not yet I suppose...
#3
Hey, maybe we can talk the aussies into taking over the whole nasty archipelago. "Regime change" talk would probably encourage the current dictat^Y^Y^Y^^Y^YYpresident to start whackin' them moles, anyhow.
Vice President Hamzah Haz said on Monday that there was no government intervention in the arrest of Indonesian Mujahidin Council (MMI) chairman Abu Bakar Ba'asyir for his alleged role in bombing cases. "This is just the police's affair to uphold order and security," Hamzah was quoted by Antara as saying after launching the Anti-drugs Youth Safari program which was held at his palace. "Nope. Nope. Wudn't us. It was the coppers. Y'can't blame us, y'know, 'cuz we dint do it... It was them. So you should riot agains them. So there."
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 01:29 pm ||
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Former chairman of the Central Sulawesi branch of the "Ahlussunah wal Jamaah" Communication Forum, which oversees the Laskar Jihad Muslim militia group, Zabir, disclosed here on Monday that all members of the militia would leave the Poso conflict area by the end of next month. On Saturday Oct. 12, the militia's commander Jafar Umar Thalib dissolved Laskar Jihad, saying that the militia was no longer needed as a legion. "Yes, men, and a job well-done it is! The economy of Sulawesi is in ruins, the inhabitants no longer think of themselves as Indonesians, but as Muslims or (spit!) Christians, and each erupts into paroxysms of hatred at the mention of the other. So now, since the Feds seem like they're really cheesed this time, away like the wind!"
He said the organization would alternate its activities to serve in social and religious missions in the fields of education, health care and subversion Islamic propagation. Following the dissolution, some 780 members left the Ambon conflict area in Maluku province for their respective hometowns in Java. Meanwhile, Zabir pointed out that some 70 members had left Poso, while the rest would be sent back to Java gradually. "It is likely that I will be the last to go," he said. He said the militia members have been instructed by forum leaders in its headquarters in Saudi Arabia to leave the conflict areas. Mighty nice of the Indons to roll over and let their ethnic strife be controlled from Saudi Arabia, isn't it?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 01:52 pm ||
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The European Union is sending a trio of top officials to Indonesia to help in the fight against terrorism following the Bali nightclub bombing. God help us all...
The EU would dispatch a "high-level troika to Jakarta in the near future", Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller said today, after an EU meeting. Lessee, that'd be Chris Patten, Terje Roed-Larsen, and Mary Robinson?
Past EU troikas have comprised foreign ministers of the previous, present and future EU president countries. Denmark is currently in the chair. "The European Union will strengthen political dialogue with Jakarta in order to help Indonesian authorities step up their fight against terrorism," Moeller said. "Yasss... Time we had a nice, long chat, isn't it?"
Following the October 12 car-bomb attack outside a nightspot on Bali, which killed more than 180 people, the EU pledged to help Jakarta in the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
10/21/2002 04:31 pm ||
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I hope it is the 3 Messkiteers since it will be a predictable outcome. The only one missing will be Carter but he's too damn busy licking the boots of the guy kicking Bush in the leg.
Posted by: Jack ||
10/22/2002 6:47 Comments ||
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I'll sleep so much better knowing they're on the case...
Didn't Patten have ballz when he was in charge of Hong Kong, or am I way off base? He seems to have become emasculated.
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.
