[Dawn] Two aircraft of NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Originally it was a mutual defense pact directed against an expansionist Soviet Union. In later years it evolved into a mechanism for picking the American pocket while criticizing the cut of the American pants... forces in Afghanistan on Wednesday evening violated airspace of neighbouring Pakistain by infiltrating into its boundaries by several kilometers.
Intelligence sources told Dawn.com that the aircraft penetrated into the Pak airspace through Pak-Afghan Torkham border.
The aircraft returned back to Afghanistan after flying for several minutes within Pak boundaries without causing damage or getting involved in any other violation of rules.
This is however not the first occasion when NATO aircraft violated Pak airspace. Similar incidents have been witnessed in North Wazoo, Kurram, Mohmand and Khyber tribal agencies in the past.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
This is however not the first occasion when Nato aircraft violated Pakistani airspace.
The most noteworthy of these being the 1-2 May 2011 multi-lift flights in and out of Abbottabad (also known as Operation Neptune Spear).....somehow never detected by PAK radar.
This time, I think, can be attributed to the gain on the political outrage output circuit being set a little too high. Must be either getting close to foreign aid calibration-time or the domestic politics circuit is being tweaked.
[Al Ahram] Fighting between government forces, rebels and rival tribes has cut off 100,000 people from urgently needed food and medical aid in South Sudan's east, U.N. and aid officials said on Wednesday.
South Sudan's army is facing a rebellion from local politician David Yau Yau in the vast Jonglei state, and new festivities have broken out between the rival Lou Nuer and Murle tribes.
Western powers are worried the violence will escalate into full civil war, undermining stability in the young African country, where weapons are plentiful after decades of conflict with Khartoum that led to its secession from Sudan in 2011.
U.N. humanitarian aid chief Valerie Amos said the new fighting made it impossible to supply some 100,000 people in Pibor county in Jonglei State with "life-saving assistance".
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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Mogadishu ---Mortar shells hit Mogadishus Digfer Hospital as mortars were fired from nearby built up area on Tuesday night, Garowe Online reports. No one was killed or injured by the mortar attack but independent sources in Mogadishu confirmed Garowe Online that mortar shells fell on the hospital left some parts of the hospital walls wrecked.
Digfer General Hospital, a public facility and funded by Turkish government has been under construction for the last four months and looks forward to become operational in the coming two months. it was one of the biggest public hospitals in Mogadishu but it has not been used for more than a decade and once housed internationally displaced families.
On 14 July, Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, Turkey ambassador to Somalia and Somali Federal government officials visited the construction site of the hospital for assessment.
This is the third shelling to take place in Mogadishu in three months, in May and June two mortar attacks were targeted the presidential palace but caused civilian casualties as they missed their target and hit neighboring built up areas.
Al Qaeda linked Al Shabaab group claimed the responsibility of the latest deadly bombings and attacks, making Mogadishu security situation extremely volatile and poor. On the other hand security analysts say the government could handle the worsening security situation in Mogadishu if it would draw its attention from Kismayo issues and outside trips.
Despite ousted from Mogadishu, Al Shabaab is still vying the Somali Federal Government for control and the government insists that it will take tougher security measures.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] An Egyptian soldier was rubbed out on Wednesday night by unknown forces of Evil infront of Al-Thaleth cop shoppe in Al-Arish in north Sinai.
The slain soldier, 32-years old Mahmoud Hanafi, was shot in the neck and was sent to the hospital where he departed this vale of tears.
The attackers immediately escaped in their car after the assault.
Egypt has witnessed a sharp rise in hard boy attacks in the Sinai Peninsula since former president Mohamed Morsi was removed by the army on 3 July amid mass protests against his rule.
At least 10 coppers died in hard boy attacks since Morsi's ouster.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] Egypt's general prosecution has incarcerated Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! 406 supporters of deposed president Mohamed Morsi pending investigation following violence that erupted during pro-Morsi rallies on Monday night.
Three hundred and thirty-six protesters were also detained pending investigation following festivities that erupted during a pro-Morsi protest in the Cairo district of Bab El-Shareya and downtown Cairo's Ramses Square.
Detainees face charges of rioting and vandalising private property.
Seventy protesters were held for 15 days pending investigation on charges of targeting coppers at El-Azbakeya cop shoppe in central Cairo during demonstrations also on Monday night.
Police forces clashed with pro-Morsi demonstrators in Ramses Square on Monday firing teargas and birdshot to clear the square for traffic.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] At least two people were maimed in festivities between supporters and opponents of deposed president Mohamed Morsi late Tuesday in the Nile Delta city of Mit Ghamr in Daqahliya governorate.
The local headquarters of the Moslem Brüderbund's Freedom and Justice Party was torched after a march by Morsi's supporters.
Tarek El-Gizawi, a member of the grassroots anti-Morsi Rebel campaign in Mit Ghamr who was an eyewitness to the festivities, told Ahram Arabic news website that supporters of Morsi were chanting against both the police and army in their march. Scuffles erupted with locals as a result.
El-Gizawi accused a "leading Moslem Brüderbund member" who he did not name of attacking a young man named Mohamed Refaat with a bladed weapon during the festivities.
Security forces fired teargas to disperse the protests and reportedly placed in durance vile I ain't sayin' nuttin' widdout me mout'piece! the Brotherhood leader accused of assaulting Refaat.
Pro-Morsi protesters have also been staging sit-ins and demonstrations around Cairo over the past week calling for the reinstatement of the Brotherhood figure.
On Monday, seven people were killed and 261 injured in overnight festivities between the police and pro-Morsi demonstrators in downtown Cairo and Giza.
The violence broke out late on Monday after police forces fired teargas at Morsi supporters who had blocked the 6 October Bridge and Ramsis Street in downtown Cairo.
On Tuesday, the Moslem Brüderbund issued a statement in response to the festivities, accusing the police of returning to its brutal practices prior to the January 25 revolution. The statement further warned of a possible return to the "dictatorship police state" after a "bloody coup d'état."
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] Mobile phone services returned in Nigeria's northeastern Yobe state on Wednesday, residents said, ending two months of signal blackout after a state of emergency was declared in areas struck by Islamist bad turbans.
President Goodluck Jonathan ... 14th President of Nigeria. He was Governor of Bayelsa State from 9 December 2005 to 28 May 2007, and was sworn in as Vice President on 29 May 2007. Jonathan is a member of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP). He is a lover of nifty hats, which makes him easily recognizable unless someone else in the room is wearing a neat chapeau... declared a state of emergency in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states on May 14, ordering extra troops in to try to crush Islamist sect Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... , whose insurgency has killed thousands of people in the past three years.
Authorities cut the mobile network to the three states in the same week to disrupt Boko Haram's operations. Service returned to Adamawa last week but there is still no signal in Borno, the state worst affected by Boko Haram's violence. Satellite phones have also been banned by the military in Borno.
Mobile phone companies such as South Africa's MTN, Gulf operator Etisalat and India's Bharti Airtel have been losing out on business from millions who live in the three affected states.
The lifting of radio silence raised optimism that the security situation has improved, although the military did not respond to requests for comment.
"They took away the network because of the security situation, now that we have it back means Yobe is gradually moving away from the bad times into good," said Inua Sani, a taxi driver in Yobe's main town, Damaturu.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
"Yobe is gradually moving away from the bad times into good less bad"
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) on Wednesday confirmed that its second-in-command, Saeed al-Shehri, had been killed in a US airstrike in Yemen, dpa reported.
Ibrahim al-Rubaish, a senior AQAP leader, said in a video posted on a jihadist website that al-Shehri had been killed in an attack by a US drone in Yemen. He did not say when the attack occurred. The Yemeni government said in January that al-Shehri, also known as Abu Sufyan, had been killed in an air raid.
"He (al-Shehri) has left behind a generation of jihadists to liberate the Arabian Peninsula from the sacrilege of America and its agents," said al-Rubaish.
Al-Shehri, born in Saudi Arabia, had fought in Afghanistan. He is believed to have been behind a series of abductions of foreigners, including a Saudi diplomat, in Yemen.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[Spiegel] German prosecutors have been investigating six neo-Nazis suspected of forming a terrorist group, SPIEGEL has learned. Police searched homes, offices and prison cells in Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland ...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell... in raids on Wednesday.
Police and anti-terrorism units raided 11 homes, offices and prison cells in Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland on Wednesday in a joint operation targeting a suspected international neo-Nazi cell.
According to information obtained by SPIEGEL, the raid is part of a secret investigation launched months ago by Germany's Federal Prosecutor's Office on suspicion that several individuals were planning to form a terrorist group.
Six neo-Nazis, together with an unkown number of accomplices, are suspected of planning kabooms to overthrow the German politicial system, Sherlocks believe.
The plot was named "Werwolf," in memory of the Nazi "Werwolf" plan for a commando force to launch attacks behind enemy lines in the final stages of World War II.
Prosecutors suspect two Swiss right-wing Death Eaters, named only as Robert S., 54, and Sebastien N., 25 of leading the group. Sebastien N., who is in prison in Switzerland, has Nazi symbols tattooed on much of his body.
He is alleged to have shot a young man in Zurich in May 2012, and was jugged You have the right to remain silent... in Hamburg 48 hours later before being extradited to Switzerland. His prison cell was searched on Wednesday along with the cell of another neo-Nazi, Roberto K.
Data Encryption Complicating Investigation
In Germany, police searched the homes of Denny R., 29, and Heiko W., 32, in the northern states of Lower Saxony and Mecklenburg Western-Pomerania respectively.
No arrests are believed to have been made. The investigation so far is based on witness testimony and is proving difficult because the suspects have been using an encryption system they developed for their electronic communications. The police have also been unable to gain evidence of any concrete plans for attacks.
Police confiscated computers and other data storage devices in the raids.
Awareness of the threat of neo-Nazi terrorism has grown since the chance discovery in November 2011 of the National Socialist Underground. The group is believed to have committed at least 10 murders between 2000 and 2007, killing eight immigrants of Turkish descent, one Greek man and a German policewoman, as well as orchestrating a nail kaboom in Cologne in which 22 people, most of them Turkish immigrants, were maimed.
The trial of the last surviving member of the three-person cell, Beate Zschäpe, and four alleged accomplices started in May.
[Dawn] An kaboom took place in a bus in Paharipura area of Beautiful Downtown Peshawar ...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire. near the Motorway exchange on Wednesday.
The blast occurred inside an inter-city bus travelling between Abbottabad ... A pleasant city located only 30 convenient miles from Islamabad. The city is noted for its nice weather and good schools. It is the site of Pakistain's military academy, which was within comfortable walking distance of the residence of the late Osama bin Laden.... and Peshawar.
The driver of the privately-owned bus service noticed a suspicious attachment on the back of the bus, prompting him to alarm the passengers. The Bomb Disposal Squad was sought but the explosives went off before the BDS could arrive.
The kaboom was magentically planted in the air-conditioner compartment of the bus, police officials confirmed.
The police sources added that there was no loss of life in the blast.
Another blast had occured earlier outside a house near Scheme chowk on Peshawar's Kohat road.
Police sources told Dawn.com that a home-made bomb was used in the blast and that there no human casualties in the incident.
A portion of the boundary wall of the house was damaged as a result of the kaboom.
In another unrelated incident, police recovered a huge quantity of explosives and related material and also jugged Youse'll never take me alive coppers!... [BANG!]... Ow!... I quit! one suspected terrorist during a raid conducted in Federal H colony of Peshawar's Hassan Gari area.
Police sources told Dawn.com that four boom jackets, 50 hand grenades, 20 prima-cords, 20 receivers and 90 detonators were recovered during the raid.
One suspected forces of Evil was also taken into custody while two of his associates managed to escape. A search was underway to apprehend the remaining suspects.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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The Sindh Home Department believes that Ayla Musharraf, daughter of former army chief currently on-trial, Pervez Musharraf, is facing threats to her life. The department issued a notification on Wednesday stating that Ayla Musharraf is on the hit list of the outlawed militant groups.
The provincial home department was informed by intelligence agencies that banned terrorist organisations have chalked out a plan to target the former dictators daughter who is currently residing in Karachi. The department has asked the Rangers and police to provide security for Ayla Musharraf. Her father Pervez Musharraf also faces threats to his life ever since his return to Pakistan from self-exile.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] A bombing killed three children at a popular swimming area in Iraq on Wednesday after a similar attack two days before, while seven people died in other violence, officials said.
The bomb was planted near Al-Shakha river in the Muqdadiyah area northeast of Storied Baghdad ...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate...
The kaboom came after mortar rounds struck a swimming area on the Tigris river north of the capital on Monday, killing four people, including a child.
In another attack in the Muqdadiyah area on Wednesday, gunnies opened fire on a car carrying tribal leader Sheikh Majid Ali Jumaili, killing his wife and wounding him, his son and his cousin.
And a roadside kaboom killed a policeman and maimed another person to the south of Muqdadiyah.
Areas to the north of Diyala province's capital Baquba, especially Muqdadiyah, have been hit by several attacks in recent days, including a bomb targeting worshippers leaving a Sunni mosque on Tuesday that killed four people and maimed 15.
Parliament speaker Osama al-Nujaifi called for an emergency session of parliament because of the situation in Diyala, especially Muqdadiyah, a statement from his office said.
Armed men also attacked an army checkpoint north of Ramadi, in Anbar province, killing two soldiers, the defence ministry said in a statement.
Three attackers were also killed.
And two bombings in the northern city of Kirkuk maimed two members of the Kurdish peshmerga security forces, a senior officer and a doctor said.
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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Sinai Salafis in all-out war on Egyptian forces, blocking roads to MFO base and Israeli border
The security situation in Sinai and along the Egypt-Israel frontier is rapidly going from bad to worse. The Islamist coalition's war on Egyptian police and military positions has gone far beyond the isolated strikes here and there reported by official spokesmen.
Hundreds of Salafist Bedouin, Muslim Brotherhood adherents and Palestinian Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters from the Gaza Strip have joined forces to block northern Sinai's key road arteries. They have stopped traffic to the Egyptian-Israeli border terminal at Nitzana, to the US-led multinational national observer base at Al Gora near El Arish, and to the big cement factory built by the Egyptian military in El Arish which is the region's main source of employment.
By blocking those roads, the Islamist fighters have choked off the movement of goods between Egypt and Israel and placed 1,000 MFO troops, including some American officers, under siege. Any vehicle driving in or out of Al Gora comes under anti-tank rocket fire. Flyers have been distributed forbidding locals to take jobs with Egyptian security forces or MFO.
The Islamists are now attacking Egyptian military and security targets at the rate of 30 strikes a day, traveling at speed between targets in minivans on which rocket launchers and heavy machine guns are mounted, or using motorbikes for raiders brandishing rocket-propelled grenades.
Early Thursday July 18, one of these squads shot up a police station near El Arish with anti-tank rockets, killing an Egyptian officer and injuring five soldiers.
The Egyptian army is sending a steady flow of reinforcements to the area, with Israel's consent. An armored force of 13 tanks reached northern Sinai Wednesday July 17, to bolster the Egyptian Second Army force, headed by Gen. Ahmed Wafasi.
However, not only has the Egyptian army abstained so far from directly engaging its Islamist adversaries, it has been pulling back from one isolated observation post and position after another, retreating into clusters of fortified buildings and leaving the militants in full control.
Egyptian officials, asked when their counter-terror offensive in Sinai would start, answer that it will go ahead only after intelligence-gathering and preparations are complete. Meanwhile, all the Egyptian army appears to be doing is sending Apache gun ships out on surveillance missions from El Arish airport which has been converted into an air base.
The images the Egyptian military has released showing bulldozers destroying the smuggling tunnels linking Sinai to the Gaza Strip are also misleading. They are not destroyed, only blocked. Egyptian officers are showing up in the private homes where the tunnels exit and warning their owners they would come to harm if the tunnels were reactivated. Those threats have had the desired effect and the surreptitious tunnel traffic has come to a halt.
Because the Egyptians have so far kept to a war of passive defense against the Islamists rampant in Sinai, expect those terrorist groups to soon start moving out toward the Suez Canal and the main cities of Egypt. Also predicted are attempts to infiltrate Israel for launching a major attack on a civilian or military target.
#1
I'll take the large shaker of salt please, but boy howdy I'd be pleased as punch if the Egypto military decided to gob-smack all the Salafists in the Sinai.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/18/2013 15:57 Comments ||
Top||
#2
There,s a town named Al Gora? He is worshipped everywhere.
[Al Ahram] Kurdish fighters have expelled jihadists from the Syrian flashpoint frontier town of Ras al-Ain and the nearby border crossing with Turkey, a watchdog said on Wednesday.
Elsewhere, a car kaboom killed at least seven people, among them a child, southwest of Damascus, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Kurdish fighters took total control of Ras al-Ain "after 24 hours of fighting. The (jihadist) groups were expelled from the whole of Ras al-Ain, including the border post" with Turkey, said Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman.
Earlier, the Britannia-based group had reported festivities between Kurds and Al-Nusra Front, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and other groups.
Ras al-Ain has a majority Kurdish population and is of strategic importance because of its location close to Turkey.
Kurdish fighters are trying to ensure that neither the regime of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs... nor the opposition takes control of the area.
The festivities between Kurdish fighters and jihadists erupted after Al-Nusra Front attacked a convoy of Kurdish women fighters, Abdel Rahman said.
Nine jihadists and two Kurdish fighters have been killed since the fighting broke out, the Observatory said.
Activists in Ras al-Ain said members of the jihadist groups had taken advantage of the Mohammedan fasting month of Ramadan, which began last week, to try to impose their extreme version of Islam.
In the early days of the Syria conflict, when opponents of Assad's regime were desperate for help from any quarter, jihadist fighters were welcomed but a spate of abuses has fuelled a major backlash.
Charles Lister, an analyst at IHS Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Centre, pointed out that tensions between Kurdish fighters and Salafist tough guys go back months, and have persisted despite a series of ceasefires.
Other fighters perceive the Kurds as "interested only with Kurdish interests, rather than those of Syria or of Islam," he said.
Additionally, "the predominance of more liberal values -- in terms of lifestyle, appearance, and culture -- make Kurds a typical target of Islamist derision".
He said the Ras al-Ain festivities "emphasise the potential for damaging distractions to emerge for Syria's anti-government opposition".
Elsewhere in Syria, a child and six men were killed when a car kaboom hit Kanaker in Damascus province, said the Observatory.
In the north of the capital, troops renewed their shelling campaign of rebel areas in Barzeh, while festivities also raged there, the group added.
It said a child was killed and five other people maimed by mortar fire of the Mazzeh district in southwest Damascus. Three children were among the maimed, the group said.
Rebels have been unable to seize areas of central Damascus, but have regularly targeted neighbourhoods of the capital from rear bases, where the army has been battling to dislodge them.
And in the central city of Homs, an army onslaught aimed at taking back rebel districts was in its 18th day, activists said.
Troops began a new attempt to break into the rebel area of Bab Hud, which like other districts of Homs has been under tight army siege for more than a year, Homs-based activist Yazan told AFP via the Internet.
Meanwhile, ...back at the alley, Slats Chumbaloni was staring into a hole that was just .45 inch in diameter and was less than three feet from his face ... "the humanitarian situation continues to tank day after day because of the suffocating siege", he said.
The lack of medical equipment in flashpoint areas means "there is a growing need to evacuate dozens of maimed, who urgently need operations that cannot be performed here", Yazan added.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
The Kurds clearly aren't playing fair by arming women.
#2
Shot by a girl - talk about adding insult to injury! Ya know, if we are going to arm any faction in this mess, the Kurds would be obvious candidates on the grounds of being least insane.
A Syrian official was assassinated by armed men outside his home in south Lebanon on Wednesday, a Lebanese security official said, in the first such killing in the country. The victim was Mohammad Darrar Jamo, a pro-regime Syrian political commentator who often appeared on Lebanese television to defend Syria's President Bashar al-Assad.
The heart (urp) bleeds...
Jamo had lived in Lebanon for 25 years, and headed the political and international relations division of the International Organisation for Arab Immigrants.
The Lebanese security official said Jamo was killed in the early hours of Wednesday.
"Jamo was shot dead by armed men at about two in the morning as he was about to enter his home in Sarafand where he lives with his Lebanese wife," the official said. "They shot him with 20 bullets in different parts of his body."
Witnesses said the 44-year-old official was shot as he arrived at his home at around 2:15 am (1115 GMT).
Mohammed, a relative of Jamo, told AFP he saw three gunmen enter the official's building.
"A car was waiting just metres (yards) away from the building for Jamo to return home," Mohammed said.
The neighbours were getting ready to go help, but within minutes they heard the sound of heavy gunfire, he added.
Jamo "parked his car in front of the house, and started to move bags of shopping inside... Moments later I heard the rapid-fire gunshots", his wife, Siham Younis, told reporters in her house.
"I went into the room, and I saw him lying on the ground, covered in blood," Younis added. She said his "friends in the (ruling) Baath party in Syria had warned him yesterday by phone that he needed to be careful".
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07/18/2013 00:00 ||
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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.
Goodluck Jonathan
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) on Wednesday confirmed that its second-in-command, Saeed al-Shehri, had been killed in a US airstrike in Yemen, dpa reported.
Sinai Salafis in all-out war on Egyptian forces, blocking roads to MFO base and Israeli border
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
A Syrian official was assassinated by armed men outside his home in south Lebanon on Wednesday, a Lebanese security official said, in the first such killing in the country. The victim was Mohammad Darrar Jamo, a pro-regime Syrian political commentator who often appeared on Lebanese television to defend Syria's President Bashar al-Assad.
