Several months ago, Ghulam Rasol packed his bag and quietly slipped out of his village in northwest Pakistan. He did not tell his parents, his brother or sister what he was doing or where he was going. They still don't know what happened to him.
Rasol decided to leave after being told by mullahs, who had come to his village outside Peshawar, that Afghanistan had been occupied by foreign troops. It was his duty as a good Muslim to kill those infidels, he was told. The 20-year-old had never been out of Pakistan. He knows little about Afghanistan. Yet he decided it was his responsibility to his religion that he should wage jihad by becoming a suicide bomber.
Rasol acknowledges he has never met a foreigner. He can't tell the difference between a Canadian, U.S. or British soldier. Nor does it matter to him. "I cannot distinguish between foreigners and we don't care from which country they are from," he explained through an interpreter. "Whoever is not Muslim are infidels for us."
Today Rasol sits in an Afghan jail in Kabul. He was captured in early February by Afghan security officers before he could carry out his assignment to attack foreign military forces in the northern province of Faryab. Norwegian troops are in that province, although Afghan intelligence officers suggest his main target could have been Hungarian troops also operating in the north. The Pakistani man's plan was to wear an explosive vest and detonate it as he approached a military compound.
Rasol's journey from his village and into Afghanistan to wage jihad is a rare glimpse of the enemy that Canadian and international troops are fighting.
Rasol cannot read or write. He had a job as an assistant to a man who operated a truck. Rasol said he is not a member of the Taliban nor of any of the other groups fighting international forces. "I'm nothing," he explained. "I'm not of the Talib or the mujahedeen."
He decided to devote his life to jihad because the mullahs had told him it was his responsibility to do so. After that Rasol was taken to a nearby madrassa, or religious school, where he received his "education." "They told us that in Afghanistan jihad is allowed, it is legal and they said: 'Go to Afghanistan and start jihad,' " he said. "They told us that we are Muslim and that in Afghanistan there are infidels, so it's our responsibility to go to Afghanistan and do jihad."
Rasol received three weeks' training using an AK-47 assault rifle as well as some basic Dari language skills so he could bluff his way through Afghan police checkpoints if needed. He informed the mullahs at the madrassa he didn't want to kill fellow Muslims but he was willing to fight international troops. "I was ready to blow up myself among Westerns," he said.
Rasol was given the equivalent of $1,200 U.S. to cover the expenses for himself and three other men who slipped into Afghanistan to conduct attacks. The others were not with him when members of the Afghan intelligence agency, the National Directorate of Security (NDS), arrested him in the northern part of the country. NDS officials declined to give specific details about the arrest or how they tracked Rasol, but they say the three other men are still at large somewhere in Afghanistan.
Rasol said the mullahs, who trained him, promised him nothing; for instance, there would be no money for his family after his death. The only time he showed any emotion in an interview was when he was asked about his family back in Pakistan. Rasol began to cry, explaining they did not know he had left for Afghanistan. "When I went to the madrassa I took my suitcase, that's all," he said. "My family will look around for me and they will cry and they will go to the Pakistani government and ask about where I am."
Rasol said if he is released by Afghan authorities he would return to Pakistan to live a peaceful life. "I will go back to my family and I will respect my mother and father and I will obey them," he said. "I was in the wrong direction when I came to Afghanistan. Afghan people are Muslim."
An Afghan court will now decide what sentence he will face, although it's unclear when that might be.
#1
I saw that there were two versions of this image to choose from but, for some reason, my preview function stopped working, so I didn't know which to choose. Interestingly, the preview function did work for me on comments yesterday, but it hasn't worked for posting articles for a week or so. At least not for me.
#4
When I use Preview, it throws up a small star where I put the cursor, means "Danger, Blocked", But if you hold down the CTRL button and click at the same time it goes on through.
Just a hint for all having trouble with "Preview".
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/20/2010 13:13 Comments ||
Top||
#5
Wasn't this the same dude who went to Malta in 1565 for the same reason? Seems to me that he died there in his thousands and failed. Now he's trying the same tactics for the same cause.
#6
Sounds like a guy who's not very bright or ambitious getting told by his 'betters' that he's been given his "mission in life".
Substitute a farm in "northwest Alabama" or "the Gaspe penninsula" or a factory town in "Massachusetts" or "the Midlands", and "Yankees" or "Rebs" or "the Hun" for "Westerns".
Wasn't this the same dude who went to Malta in 1565 for the same reason?
#8
P. S. I'm using windows 7 and don't like it a bit, NO older programs and NO older games will play
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/20/2010 16:15 Comments ||
Top||
#9
Damn, that didn't seem to work either. I don't know what happened to make it stop working for me. I just get the little exclamation point in the triangle that says 'Error on page' next to it with or without using the Ctrl button, but no other activity. I have Windows Vista, if that makes any difference. I may have to live with making sloppier posts for a while, I guess, unless I can figure it out. Hmmm.
#10
"I have Windows Vista, if that makes any difference."
It probably does, ryuge.
When I bought my new computer several years ago, I refused to have Vista because of all the problems I'd heard about it.
Off topic, but last fall I foolishly accepted a Windows offer to "upgrade" (free) to Explorer 8. Major suckage! It searched differently, and was the cause of my getting a terrible virus, which I had to pay to have removed. The poor people at Geeks-R-Us no doubt lost money on me, since their virus-removal service was a fixed price. It took them 3 days and 4 tries to get it completely gone. :-(
I'm working again on the premise of if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Best of luck with your problem.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
03/20/2010 17:49 Comments ||
Top||
#11
Well thanks everyone for your help. I was hoping that maybe there was some easy fix that I had overlooked. But, oh well, it's a rather minor inconvenience, I suppose.
A basic piracy operation requires a minimum eight to twelve militia prepared to stay at sea for extended periods of time, in the hopes of hijacking a passing vessel. Each team requires a minimum of two attack skiffs, weapons, equipment, provisions, fuel and preferably a supply boat. The costs of the operation are usually borne by investors, some of whom may also be pirates.
To be eligible for employment as a pirate, a volunteer should already possess a firearm for use in the operation. For this 'contribution', he receives a 'class A' share of any profit. Pirates who provide a skiff or a heavier firearm, like an RPG or a general purpose machine gun, may be entitled to an additional A-share. The first pirate to board a vessel may also be entitled to an extra A-share.
At least 12 other volunteers are recruited as militiamen to provide protection on land of a ship is hijacked, In addition, each member of the pirate team may bring a partner or relative to be part of this land-based force. Militiamen must possess their own weapon, and receive a 'class B' share usually a fixed amount equivalent to approximately US$15,000.
If a ship is successfully hijacked and brought to anchor, the pirates and the militiamen require food, drink, qaad, fresh clothes, cell phones, air time, etc. The captured crew must also be cared for. In most cases, these services are provided by one or more suppliers, who advance the costs in anticipation of reimbursement, with a significant margin of profit, when ransom is eventually paid.
When ransom is received, fixed costs are the first to be paid out. These are typically:
Reimbursement of supplier(s)
Financier(s) and/or investor(s): 30% of the ransom
Local elders: 5 to 10 %of the ransom (anchoring rights)
Class B shares (approx. $15,000 each): militiamen, interpreters etc.
The remaining sum the profit is divided between class-A shareholders.
A senior official of Somali insurgent group al Shabaab was shot dead on Friday in a rare assassination in the southern port of Kismayu, which is tightly controlled by the al Qaeda-linked rebels.
Sheikh Daud Ali Hasan, a commander who has been leading fighting against rival insurgents in the town of Dhobley close to Kenya, was killed near al Shabaab's military base in Kismayu as he returned home on Friday night. "We are after running the killers. We have already arrested several suspects and we should bring them to the justice soon," Sheikh Abukar Ali Adan, al Shabaab's chairman in the area, told a news conference in Kismayu on Saturday.
While al Shabaab and rebel group Hizbul Islam have fought together in the capital against the Western-backed government, the two insurgent movements have been at loggerheads for months in the south of the Horn of Africa nation. They have battled for control of Kismayu, the lucrative main port for rebel-held areas of southern Somalia, as well as the town of Dhobley on the main road linking the port to neighboring Kenya.
Hizbul Islam denied having a hand in the killing, but said it would step up attacks on Dhobley after a raid on Friday night in which it said it killed a number of al Shabaab militants.
[Maghrebia] An Algerian army brigade on Tuesday killed a known terrorist emir and three of his followers in Tébessa province, El Khabar reported on Thursday (March 18th). According to AFP, three armed fighters were killed by ANP troops in the town of Negrine, near the border with Tunisia.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in North Africa
[Iran Press TV Latest] Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh says the war with Houthi fighters in the north of the country is over.
Saleh said a ceasefire with Houthi fighters had begun yesterday. "The war is over..." he told the Arabic al-Arabiya TV station on Friday.
The announcement comes two days after Houthi fighters released 178 captured soldiers.
Yemen's government and the Houthis reached a peace agreement in February which ended fighting that has raged on and off since mid-2004 and has seen more than 250-thousand people displaced into refugee camps in the country.
It is believed that part of the deal to end the conflict will include landmines and roadblocks being removed by Houthi fighters." These are considered positive indications to prove good intention not to return to a new war," Saleh said.
The end of hostilities with the Houthis closes one of three fronts on which Yemeni government forces have been battling. The government still faces pressure from western countries and neighbouring Arab nations to deal with al-Qaeda militants who have taken advantage of instability to establish militant training camps.
It is still also involved in fighting separatists in the south, who have staged demonstrations calling for independence amid reports of escalating violence in the region.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[9 views]
Top|| File under:
#3
Indian people i know believe he was a CIA agent?
That sounds like Pakistani conspiracy thinking, Kofi Thinese2517. Even President Obama isn't stupid enough to order such a thing, and the Mumbai attack took place on his predecessor's watch. It was President Bush who believes America's future is tied to India's, so he would never have ordered such a thing... and I can't imagine the CIA being connected to such a terror attack.
Posted by: trailing wife on the other computer ||
03/20/2010 13:08 Comments ||
Top||
David Headley was convicted on heroin smuggling charges in 1998, and the available evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the following year he did undercover surveillance work in Pakistan for the DEA in exchange for a reduced sentence. During his time in Pakistan in 1999, his surveillance target was reportedly a drug gang based in Afghanistan/Pakistan. This has given rise to speculation among Indian officials that Headley's work for the US government may have gone beyond the DEA. The speculation holds that DEA may have passed Headley on to the CIA, given his experience in Pakistan, and the CIA in turn used Hadley to infiltrate Lashkar-e-Taiba. These rumors do not contend that the Mumbai attacks were thus a CIA operation; rather, they suggest that Headley had "gone rogue" by 2006 and thrown his lot in with LeT completely. Gerald Posner has a piece in the Daily Beast that does a good job of showing the factual backdrop that fueled this speculation.
I should say at the outset that the rumors are by no means completely outlandish, but I do not think they're correct. I spoke with a senior US intelligence official today who works on Afghanistan/Pakistan, and told me unequivocally that Headley was never a CIA asset.
Posted by: john frum ||
03/20/2010 13:41 Comments ||
Top||
[Dawn] Suspected member of Tehreek-e-Taliban, Ismail Mehsud has been arrested from Sohrab Goth area of Karachi.
Security forces told DawnNews that Ismail Mehsud has been nabbed by intelligence agency after a report that he had been preparing to carry out terror attacks within the city.
Security Agency claim to have recovered arms and ammunitions in his possession.
This article starring:
ISMAIL MEHSUD
TTP
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: TTP
#1
It's now three: He said the arrested men were planning "big terror attacks" in Karachi, adding that police recovered a huge quantity of explosives, detonators and other equipment from the laboratory.
Local intelligence officials confirmed the arrests and said Subhan Ghani, one of the three men, was leader of the trio.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2010 10:06 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Subhan Ghani, one of the three men, was leader of the trio.
appareently the vocalist, on the number seven truncheon
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2010 10:15 Comments ||
Top||
[Dawn] Two government schools were blown up in different parts of Bajaur Agency on Friday, increasing the number of schools attacked in the restive tribal agency to at least 70.
Official sources confirmed that the militants planted explosives in a government primary school in Mandal and blew it up.
Similarly, militants also planted explosives at another government primary school in Ghundai in Nawagai Tehsil.
No casualties were reported but the buildings have been seriously damaged.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: TTP
[Iran Press TV Latest] At least 200 people have been arrested as protests continued for a second day in Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, with protesters burning tires, damaging public property and disrupting the traffic.
Hundreds of people, unhappy with a 20 percent hike in the price of public transport, spilled out into the streets on Thursday, blocking a key road in Islamabad's Bara Kahu area.
Police fired tear gas and baton charged the demonstrators, injuring at least 15 protestors. More than a dozen students were arrested. One student was hit by a bullet, but according to doctors treating him, he is now in stable condition.
Although the government withdrew the fare increase late Thursday to contain the violence, protests continued on Friday with students demanding the release of those arrested.
Television footage showed police using tear gas and batons, and firing shots into the air to disperse the crowd and restore order. Meanwhile, the protesters retaliated by pelting the police with stones, DawnNews reported.
The angry mob also attacked a UN official's vehicle as the member of the UN team tasked with probing the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto was on his way to Islamabad from the airport.
The protesters also targeted public vehicles, ambulances and media personnel.
As the protest reached its peak, the capital police made desperate calls for reinforcement. The Punjab police and Rangers, however, stood by as silent spectators, the daily said.
At least two hundred protesters were arrested on Friday evening, bringing an end to the day-long pitched battles between the angry crowds and the Pakistani police.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[8 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
Pakistan [pak-uh-stan] -noun
A lawless public anarchy masquerading as a nation. A street riot with a UN representative.
[Dawn] A roadside bomb blast and a gun attack killed four people and wounded seven others in Baghdad, Iraqi officials said.
The officials said the roadside bomb went off Friday morning near a market in Baghdad's teeming Shia district of Sadr City. The explosion killed three people and wounded seven.
The officials said the bomb was hidden under a heap of trash and detonated as shoppers started arriving.
In the second attack, gunmen shot dead an Iraqi soldier in southern Baghdad after breaking into his house.
The police and hospital officials spoke on condition of anonymity.
The attacks come as Iraq is still counting the ballots from the March 7 parliamentary elections.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Islamic State of Iraq
[Al Arabiya Latest] Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Israel must comply with the Middle East Quartet's call on Friday to halt settlement activity as a means to clear the way for peace negotiations, whereas Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said that the Quartet's call harms the chances of peace.
"The statement by the Quartet in which it urges Israel to freeze settlement activity, including natural growth, is very important but what is more important is that Israel should comply so that the peace process can restart," Abbas said in a statement.
"The settlement issue is the essence of the problem," he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Thank you, President Obama.
Posted by: trailing wife on the other computer ||
03/20/2010 13:10 Comments ||
Top||
[Iran Press TV Latest] Fourteen Palestinians have been wounded after an Israeli warplane struck a disused airport in southern Gaza Strip, Palestinian medics say. They were waiting for a disused flight out...
Medical sources and eyewitnesses said the aircraft hit the airport on Friday night, AFP reported. For no reason, mind you. Except for a dead guy. But the rocketeers weren't at the airport.
The injured were all in the vicinity of the airport, near the town of Rafah. According to the report, the rescue forces were having trouble evacuating injured people due to Israeli forces activity in the area. Kinda like the guys who were working on the farm who were having trouble due to Hamas-allied bad boyz shooting rockets at them.
An Israeli military statement confirmed the attack, claiming the target has been "a terror site."
Earlier on Thursday, Israeli warplanes bombed six other targets in Gaza, leaving two people injured.
Tensions are high between Israel and the Palestinians over the regime's settlement activities on occupied Palestinian lands. And they swell up even higher when the bad boyz shoot off their rockets toward conveniently-located civilian targets.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Hamas
#1
All flights cancelled. The Rafah airport reconstruction programme hits yet another snag.
Three men were arrested yesterday for allegedly staging last week's fatal attack on a group of policemen, including Sompien Eksomya, superintendent of Bannang Sata police station in Yala. Sompien, who was posthumously promoted to the rank of police general, and one of his subordinates died from injuries sustained in the attack. Two other policemen survived.
Throughout his decades long career, Sompien worked very hard to improve the safety of people living within areas under his command, winning the hearts and minds of the locals. He was based in the deep South for four decades.
[Al Arabiya Latest] Iranian opposition activist Amir Jahanchachi unveiled a new project on Friday to provide financial and logistical support to movements opposing the Islamic republic's hardline regime.
The scheme, dubbed the "Green Wave," aimed to create organized "cells of resistance" to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Jahanchachi told AFP in London, where he lives.
"At the present time, the (opposition) green movement on the streets... is not structured, does not have a clear direction, and above all has no leadership to clinch victory," said the businessman and writer, 49.
"What I want to do and what we are going to do, is transform cells of discontent... into cells of resistance," he added.
Opposition groups "will contact us and if they need something for concrete projects, we will help them," he said, adding he had resources for those seeking to topple the Iranian regime.
Specific plans included organizing long strikes in sectors such as transport to "bring this regime to its knees," said Jahanchachi, whose father was the country's last finance minister under the shah.
The opposition activist stressed his new project was "not another movement, not a new party" and was aimed at supporting existing groups which oppose Ahmadinejad.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2010 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[12 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
Indian investigators will be able to question a Chicago man who pleaded guilty to scouting targets for the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai, a senior U.S. official said Saturday. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake said investigators probing the 2008 Mumbai terror attack would gain access to Daood Gilani, aka David Coleman Headley to learn more about his involvement, although he would not be extradited to India.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2010 10:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
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.
Several months ago, Ghulam Rasol packed his bag and quietly slipped out of his village in northwest Pakistan. He did not tell his parents, his brother or sister what he was doing or where he was going. They still don't know what happened to him.
A senior official of Somali insurgent group al Shabaab was shot dead on Friday in a rare assassination in the southern port of Kismayu, which is tightly controlled by the al Qaeda-linked rebels.
[Iran Press TV Latest] At least 200 people have been arrested as protests continued for a second day in Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, with protesters burning tires, damaging public property and disrupting the traffic. 
Three men were arrested yesterday for allegedly staging last week's fatal attack on a group of policemen, including Sompien Eksomya, superintendent of Bannang Sata police station in Yala. Sompien, who was posthumously promoted to the rank of police general, and one of his subordinates died from injuries sustained in the attack. Two other policemen survived.
