News obtained from Somalias Gedo region of Somalia confirms that Alshabab troops have sent several civilians who are said to have turned rebellious against them.
Residents of the region who have requested to stay anonymous because of security reasons confirmed to Shabelle radio station in Mogadishu that dozens of civilians were arrested in Burdubo district after defying laws laid down by the Alshabab authorities.
The laws defied by the residents are said to be the Zakat (Charity) values paid by all residents which are currently being collected in the district by the Shabab administration.
All earmarked for the Widows Ammunition Fund...
The laws have been laid down by the Alshabab authorities in all regions falling under their rule.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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BELEDWEYNE, Somalia -- At least ten people were reportedly killed and 15 others were wounded in heavy clan fighting that occurred in Kabhan-ley vicinity which lies about 40 km north of Hiraan regional capital of Beledweyne as Al Shabaab militants poured into Baidoa according to residents, Garowe Online reports.
The fighting raged between two fraternal clans and witnesses reported that armed militias from the opposing sides set houses on fire on Thursday when the clashes started with machine guns.
Ahmed Mohamed Khalif, director of Beledweyne General Hospital said that they have received 9 people who are sustaining both major and minor injuries to their bodies.
"Two persons are heavy and they are now getting surgical treatment but the other people are sustaining fractures to their necks, hands and legs," added Khalif.
Agricultural lands in Kabhan-ley and Deefow areas of central Somalia are said to have sparked the deadly conflicts and ceasefire arrangements which were reached by the two clans remain foiled.
Meanwhile in Baidoa, the provincial capital of Bay region in southern Somalia residents said suspected Al Shabaab militants attacked buildings housing Somali Federal Government officials.
Baidoa resident, Ali Madey told Garowe Online that men chanting religious sermons' poured into his neighborhood by firing live ammunition at pre-planned targets.
"The town witnesses heavy fighting, I heard gunfire and the attackers were chanting religious sermons," he said via telephone from Baidoa.
Local reports confirm that the militants attacked a hotel housing former TFG parliament speaker and Federal Member of parliament Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan and Baidoa mayor residence.
Baidoa is hosting a convention aimed to push the locals into autonomy under Provision Federal Constitution (PFC) of Somalia.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] A civilian employee of Libya's interior ministry was bumped off on Friday in the increasingly lawless eastern city of Benghazi, security and medical sources said.
"Unknown assailants in a car shot up an engineer" working for the ministry, Mohammed al-Majabri, a security official told AFP.
Al-Jala hospital spokeswoman Fadia al-Barghathi said that his corpse had several bullet wounds to the back.
Majabri, an IT engineer, 34, was working on a project to provide Libyans with identity cards.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
Methinks Arab mind confuses freedom with licence.
#2
I think the critics of The Arab Mind are probably of the same school as those of The Bell Curve. There seems to be a blatant denial of genetic propensity.
[An Nahar] Two young men were killed in festivities Friday between supporters and opponents of Egypt's toppled Islamist president as police used tear gas to disperse protests, officials said.
Protesters across the country defied the icy weather brought by a rare winter storm to vent anger over the military's July 3 overthrow of Mohammed Morsi ...the former president of Egypt. A proponent of the One Man, One Vote, One Time principle, Morsi won election after the deposal of Hosni Mubarak and jumped to the conclusion it was his turn to be dictator... , the country's first democratically elected president.
A 23-year-old was hit by gunfire in Suez when festivities broke out between supporters and opponents of Morsi, and three coppers were maimed, local officials and medics in the canal city said.
Protesters in Suez also torched a police car, security officials said, adding that a similar incident took place in Qena in southern Egypt.
In Fayyum, south of the capital, a 19-year-old man was rubbed out in festivities and two coppers were maimed by buckshot, local health department officials said.
Tear gas grenades were used against Islamists in several Cairo districts after protesters erupted into the streets for weekly pro-Morsi demonstrations.
Protesters lobbed petrol bombs at police in the capital, the security officials said.
The interior ministry said 54 protesters were placed in durance vile Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please! nationwide.
Such demonstrations are regarded as illegal, since they do not conform to a new law requiring organizers to give three days' notice to police.
Police also intervened in the Nile Delta city of Mahalla to break up festivities between pro- and anti-Morsi supporters.
The Islamist Anti-Coup Alliance organizes regular protests demanding Morsi's reinstatement that often set off festivities with security forces and opponents of the deposed president.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] Twenty-seven Muslims were killed Thursday in an attack by militias in a village in the west of the Central African Republic, the UN's human rights agency said Friday. "According to information we have received, 27 Muslims were killed by self-defence militias, known as anti-Balaka, in the village of Bohong ... on Thursday," agency spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva, decrying "a vicious cycle of attacks and reprisals" in the country.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
Horrible. Simply horrible. Especially, as you can't blame it on white heterosexual males!
Chaos and sectarian killings have steadily spread throughout the Central African Republic since predominantly Muslim SelekaAlliancerebels ousted the Christian president, Francois Bozize, in March.
(The Muslim current ruler and former) Rebel leader Michel Djotodia (claims to have) lost control of his forces, which have carried out atrocities against Christians across the resource-rich, but unstable former French colony. Over time, Christian militias retaliated. Last week shootings, stabbings and lynchings spiraled across the country.
#3
Muslims are 15% of the population. Funny how no one has decried the ascension to power by a tiny minority of the population via armed revolution. I guess that's because the rulers are Sunni Muslims (rather than Alawites) and the oppressed are animists and Christians (rather than Sunni Muslims). Once again, the French have put their full support behind the minority Sunni Muslims just as they did in the Ivory Coast.
[Pak Daily Times] Bangladesh was rocked by a new wave of deadly violence on Friday as Islamist supporters went on the rampage to vent their fury at the execution of one of their leaders for war crimes. Comes as a surprise, dunnit?
Abdul Quader Molla became the first person to be hanged for his role in the country's bloody 1971 war of independence when he was sent to the gallows at a prison on Thursday. I was floored, myself. Never expected such a thing.
The hanging took place at 10:01 pm (1601 GMT) after the Supreme Court dismissed an appeal for a final review of the death sentence handed down to Molla, who was a senior figure in the Jamaat-e-Islami ...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It maintains close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores... party.
Molla had been found guilty in February by a much-criticised domestic tribunal of having been a leader of a pro-Pakistain militia that fought against the country's independence and killed some of Bangladesh's top professors, doctors, writers and journalists.
He was convicted of rape, murder and mass murder, including the killing of more than 350 unarmed civilians. Prosecutors called him the "Butcher of Mirpur", a Dhaka suburb where he committed most of the atrocities.
Fears that the execution could spark further unrest, in a country where political violence is intensifying in the build-up to deeply divisive ...politicians call things divisive when when the other side sez something they don't like. Their own statements are never divisive, they're principled... elections, were soon realised as the Islamists rioted in street battles in towns and cities.
Two protesters were killed and two activists from the ruling Awami League were hacked to death Friday. Jamaat activists Molotov cocktailed train stations, set fire to businesses and blockaded key highways, police officials said.
Violence also erupted near the country's largest mosque in Dhaka after Friday prayers as Jamaat activists detonated crude bombs and torched at least a dozen cars and vehicles, AFP correspondents at the scene said.
Police fired rubber bullets to disperse the crowds, critically injuring a child, footage aired by private station Channel 24 showed.
Activists also tried to burn down the coastal village home of one of the war crimes trial judges, local police chief Anisur Rahman told AFP.
"They tried to torch the house with kerosene. We fired rubber bullets to disperse them. No one was injured," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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One police officer was killed and another injured in a shootout Thursday night with militants in the Russian republic of Dagestan.
A local law enforcement source said that one militant was injured but managed to escape from the clash, which took place in the village of Tlibisho. It is not clear how many suspected militants were involved in the incident.
A lockdown imposed during counter-terrorist operations was put in place at midnight on Thursday in the district where the incident took place, though it was not immediately clear whether it was implemented before or after the shootout.
[An Nahar] U.S. authorities tossed in the calaboose You have the right to remain silent... an aviation worker Friday in an apparent sting operation after he tried to explode what he thought was a boom-mobile at an airport in the state of Kansas.
Terry Lee Loewen, 58, was apprehended as part of an undercover investigation when he arrived at Wichita airport.
The avionics technician had been under investigation for several months by a terrorism task force in Wichita.
"Those explosives were inert and it was not a bomb that would ever explode," U.S. attorney for Kansas Barry Grissom told news hounds.
Grissom did not reveal where Loewen had obtained the inert bomb. In previous similar cases undercover officers have supplied suspects with bomb-making materials.
He was charged with trying to use a weapon of mass destruction, trying to damage property with explosives and trying to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization.
"At no time was the airport perimeter breached, and ... at no time was any citizen or a member of the traveling public in any type of danger," Grissom said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under:
The headlines:
He's a self proclaimed jihadist.
He wants to be a martyr.
He's sent money to jihadist organizations.
He's been planning this for 5 months.
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
12/14/2013 11:58 Comments ||
Top||
#4
So what's the matter with this dumb bastid? He doesn't look (or act) like the brightest bulb in the box.
"At no time was the airport perimeter breached, and ... at no time was any citizen or a member of the traveling public in any type of danger," Grissom said.
#6
Since it was the agents who supplied him with the material for the bomb, his lawyer will just scream "entrapment", and he might walk.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
12/14/2013 16:16 Comments ||
Top||
#7
Interestingly, this case and 'sting operation' was reported to have taken years to build.
Somewhat ironic, even with the assistance of Russian intelligence, the same law enforcement effort was evidently not available for the Boston bombing and Tsarnaev bros.
#8
One of these days, a group is going to 'accept' all this assistance from these LEO forces, replace the inert explosives with real ones and then wait to be arrested and as they're huddled around, go kaboom. Honestly, I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet
[Pak Daily Times] Gunmen rubbed out a polio ...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set... worker and two coppers on duty to protect a polio vaccination team in two separate attacks in Swabi District in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... and Khyber tribal region.
In Swabi District, motorcyclists rubbed out two coppers who were on their way to escort a polio team, according to the police front man. "The two coppers were on their way to perform security duties when unidentified gunnies opened fire on them on Topi Road. Subsequently, one police official was killed on the spot while the other succumbed to his wounds at the hospital," the front man added. Hours later, a gunman killed a polio worker on his way home after vaccinating children in Jamrud District of Khyber Agency, Daily Times learnt.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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[Pak Daily Times] At least 80 alleged criminals were placed in durance vile Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un! during raids in the city on Friday, claimed law enforcers. The Special Investigation Unit (SIU) claimed to catch three alleged Lyari ...one of the eighteen constituent towns of the city of Karachi. It is the smallest town by area in the city but also the most densely populated. Lyari has few schools, substandard hospitals, a poor water system, limited infrastructure, and broken roads. It is a stronghold of ruling Pakistan Peoples Party. Ubiquitous gang activity and a thriving narcotics industry make Lyari one of the most disturbed places in Karachi, which is really saying a lot.... gangsters from Shershah. The arrested were identified as, Zohaib, Arshad and Saad Noor. According to SIU officials, the arrested were involved in numerous crime cases, including looting goods from trucks on Maripur Road. SIU chief Farooq Awan said the accused confessed that he killed Dr Abdul Wahab. Separately, Pirabad police arrested Akbar Khan in an encounter at Orangi Town. According to the police, the accused was a drug peddler. Meanwhile, ...back at the fist fight, Jake ducked another roundhouse, then parried with his left, then with his right, finally with his chin... Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... police claimed to nab 67 suspects in 64 raids. Rangers' spokesperson also said that 14 hardened criminals including Lyari gang war elements and criminals affiliated with political groups were arrested.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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[Pak Daily Times] Jamaat-e-Islami ...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It maintains close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores... (JI) on Friday staged a protest against the execution of JI leader in Bangladesh, Mullah Abdul Qadir. Several protestors blocked University Road against the killing and demanded Pakistain to expel the Bangladeshi ambassador to his country. Addressing the protestors outside the Bait-ul-Mukarram Mosque in Gulshan-e-Iqbal after Friday prayers, JI Sindh chief Dr Merajul Huda Siddiqui said the so-called war crimes tribunal of Bangladeshi government awarded death penalty to Mullah over fake testimonials.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
These guys look up to Pakistan to save them.Says it all which country is the problem country in the region aka Mordor.
Twenty-two Iraqi suspects facing terrorism charges escaped Friday from a prison in northern Baghdad after killing a security guard, but most were rearrested later in the day, officials said.
So a really stupid prison break now with added murder charges...
The stunning jailbreak from Al Adela prison triggered a police manhunt backed by helicopters that ended with one of the escaped prisoners dead and 13 rearrested. Eight remain at large.
The prisoners had lured a guard into their cell while his comrades were sleeping, claiming an inmate there was critically ill. They then stabbed him to death, two senior security officials said. Several guards were later detained and questioned over suspicions they had aided the escape, a prison official said.
Jailbreaks are frequent in Iraq and, as with other security breaches, they have cast doubts on the ability of the authorities to secure the country, mired in sectarian tensions.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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The Iraqi government established a fact finding committee on Friday night following the martyrdom of at least 16 Iranian gas engineers and workers on Naftshahr-Baghdad gas pipeline project earlier in the night by masked gunmen.
By Geoffrey that'll get down to the heart of the matter, a committee...
Hassan Dana'iefar, Iran's ambassador to Iraq, told IRNA in early hours of Saturday morning that the fact finding committee was established based on an order issued by the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and it is comprised of Iraqi Army commanders and intelligence officers.
Paging Carla del Ponte to the red courtesy phone...
A group of Iranian staffers of the Naftshahr-Baghdad gas pipeline were on Friday evening and at the end of their working hours been attacked by terrorist gunmen while returning for rest to their residence in Alandi district in the south of Khanaqin city in Iraq's Diyala province (75 Km to the north of Baghdad).
"So far the dead bodies of 16 Iranian martyrs of this terrorist attack have been transferred to the Khanaqin cold house, while also four Iraqi workers in the project, too, were martyred," said the Iranian ambassador.
Diyala province in the east of Iraq is among the most insecure parts of the country where the terrorist groups, particularly Al Qaeda, have a noticeable presence.
Dana'iefar said that the attack was aimed at disrupting the efforts aimed at rendering services to the Iraqi nation, and the continuation of effective infrastructure work in Iraq, on time completion of which would lead to greater competence of the Iraqi government.
He said the Friday terrorist act is not considered a move against Iran, arguing, "The group of Iranian engineers and construction workers were working at the service of the oppressed Iraqi people and it is definitely the Iraqi nation that will be benefitted from this project, and therefore, the recent terrorist operation has targeted the Iraqi people."
According to the Iranian envoy, the Naftshahr-Baghdad gas pipeline would resolve many of the problems with which the Iraqi citizens are entangled, including provision of the required energy for the electrical power stations and pumping gas to the Iraqi city networks for homes heating and cooking usages.
Dana'iefar said that intensification of the terrorist operations at the threshold of the Iraqi spring time parliamentary elections is quite likely, calling on the Iraqi political circles to comprehensively and alertly confront the phenomenon.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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#1
A guy I used to work with had a plaque on his desk that said "God so loved the World, He didn't send a committee." Words to live by...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
12/14/2013 18:41 Comments ||
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[REUTERS] Masked gunmen shot dead 18 oil and gas workers, most of them Iranians, outside the northeastern Iraqi town of Muqdadiya on Friday, witnesses and officials said.
No worries, we got a committee that'll get down to figuring this out...
One worker wounded in the assault told Reuters the attackers sped up in three cars as he and his colleagues were digging a trench to extend a pipeline.
"Three of them got out of a car and started firing on the workers inside and outside the trench," said Ibrahem Aziz by phone from hospital.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the assault, but officials said it bore the hallmarks of the Iraqi affiliate of al Qaeda which has carried out a string of attacks amid the country's worst spate of violence in five years.
Fifteen Iranians and three Iraqis were killed and a total of eight other workers wounded, medical and local officials said.
Iran signed a deal in July to build a pipeline and import gas into Iraq to fuel power plants in Baghdad and Diyala province, where the attack took place.
In a separate incident, at least five people were killed and 14 wounded when a car bomb exploded in southern Baghdad's outskirts of Nahrawan, police said.
A further six people were killed in a car bomb explosion in the town of Madaen, south of Baghdad, police said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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Philippine security forces have seized what officials described as a major bomb factory of the New Peoples Army in Agusan del Sur and hauled away more than 160 landmines.
Military spokesman Capt. Alberto Caber said in a telephone interview that the soldiers also found other bomb components in the facility, which was located in a remote area of the municipality of Loreto town on Wednesday.
Caber called the seizure one of the militarys biggest accomplishments against communist militants this year. He said the bomb haul was large enough to kill or harm thousands of people or raze a city if detonated at once.
He said, We believe these improvised bombs were being distributed to NPA units in Mindanao and used in committing atrocities against government troops and civilians. So far, this confiscation is the largest, maybe even in the entire country.
Lt. Gen. Ricardo Rainier Cruz III, Eastmincom commander, said, This is the biggest NPA landmine factory discovered so far."
A villager and his 2-year-old son were shot and seriously injured in Pattani province on Wednesday night. Manusi Samae was riding his motorcycle home at around 8 p.m. on Wednesday night after picking up his kids from school when he was shot by two men on another motorcycle. He was hit in the neck, shoulder and right leg. His 2-year-old son Musa was shot in the stomach, while his 6-year-old daughter was scratched up after falling off the motorcycle.
In the same province, a bomb went off yesterday morning inside a school, injuring a volunteer ranger and a village defense volunteer. The two injured men were part of a six-man patrol protecting the school.
In Songkhla province, a police car was damaged by a bomb yesterday morning and one officer was slightly injured. Following an earlier report of a suspicious object found in front of a school, four policemen in the vehicle were setting up a checkpoint nearby when the bomb went off. Police blamed the ongoing insurgency in the far South.
[An Nahar] Syrian troops loyal to Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs... launched a broad offensive on Friday aimed at expelling rebels from the town of Adra, northeast of Damascus, state news agency SANA said.
The army warned in a televised statement that "the operation will continue until the forces of Evil are crushed completely."
The industrial town, the scene of fierce fighting for three days, is strategically located on a main road into the capital.
The fighting follows a string of army victories against opposition fighters, particularly in Damascus province, where rebel positions have been under siege for more than a year.
"Our armed forces started this morning to stage a broad offensive on Adra, to assault the terrorists' positions after encircling the area," said a military source, quoted by SANA.
Assad's regime has branded all rebels and dissidents as "terrorists" ever since the uprising began as a series of peaceful protests in March 2011.
Friday's fighting comes two days after Salafist tough guys attacked security and army positions, as well as pro-regime militiamen, in Adra.
At least 18 pro-regime fighters were killed in the ensuing festivities.
Between Wednesday and Thursday, at least 15 civilians -- mostly Alawites, members of the same religious sect as Assad -- were also killed in the rebel attack on the town.
Adra is home to Sunnis, Alawites, Druze and Christians.
Residents told AFP that 10 of the civilians killed had been targeted because of their cooperation with the regime.
On Friday, the Observatory said a Shiite man and his family were killed when he threw a bomb at rebels trying to break into his home in Adra.
"He, along with his wife, brother and child died, as did two rebels," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
Most of the country's Alawites -- whose religion is an offshoot of Shiite Islam -- support Assad.
The army, backed by Leb's Hizbullah and Iraqi Shiite fighters, has made a series of advances on several fronts in recent weeks, strengthening its hand ahead of U.N.-brokered peace talks planned for next month.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Syrian authorities have freed for "humanitarian reasons" 366 detainees from Aleppo prison in the north of the country which is under rebel siege, state news agency SANA reported Friday.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a first group of 10 prisoners were freed Thursday and that more would follow, adding that most of the prisoners were convicted criminals.
Al-Qaeda-affiliated Al-Nusra Front and other Islamist rebel groups fighting to topple Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor. If he'd stuck with it he'd have had a good practice by now... have laid siege to the prison for the past eight months.
"The authorities have released 366 detainees from Aleppo's central prison... for humanitarian reasons due to the siege imposed by terrorists," SANA said, referring to the rebels.
Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP by telephone from Britannia that conditions inside the prison are "horrific" and prisoners are being freed due to outbreaks of disease, including tuberculosis.
"The evacuation of prisoners began yesterday and the Red Islamic Thingy has successfully brought out 10 people. Others will gradually be set free," he said.
The Observatory said the Red Islamic Thingy was also taking in food rations, medicine and clothes into the prison on the outskirts of Aleppo, Syria's second city and former commercial hub.
More than 3,000 prisoners are held in the jail, including Islamists, activists and minors.
Rebels have tried to storm the prison on several occasions but loyalist troops have repelled them, although fighting continues to be reported in the vicinity of the jail.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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The Turkish General Staff has announced that 869 people who tried to illegally cross from Syria into Turkey were captured in the period between Dec. 6 and 12 Hurriyet Daily News reported. The announcement posted on the official website of the General Staff on Dec. 13 noted that all the people had been intercepted by the Land Forces Command. The General Staff, however, did not provide any additional information as to why the people were particularly labeled as illegal migrants, rather than as people seeking refuge in Turkey like hundreds of thousands of other Syrians.
The list of items seized along with the people, however, indicated that they were smugglers. The list included more than 4,000 Kalashnikov-type rifles and 58 kilograms of drugs, in addition to pack animals, tobacco, electronic devices and alcoholic beverages.
So they were migrant. Illegal migrants. Heavily-armed, illegal migrants...
According to figures provided by the Turkish Foreign Ministry; as of Nov. 13, the number of Syrians residing in 21 temporary sheltering centers across 10 provinces was 202,445.
Some 400,000 Syrians have entered the country thanks to a visa-free regime and have been living in Turkey, outside of the camps, the ministry also said last month.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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The Obama administration is willing to consider supporting an expanded Syrian rebel coalition that would include Islamist groups, provided the groups are not allied with al-Qaeda and agree to support upcoming peace talks in Geneva, a senior U.S. official said Thursday.
"You guys promise that you're not part of al-Qaeda?"
"We promise, infidel!"
In addition, the official said, the Americans would like the Islamic Front groups to return U.S. vehicles, communications gear and other non-lethal equipment they seized last weekend from warehouses at the Syria-Turkey border.
Pretty please?
The seized material, which had been provided to the U.S.-backed Supreme Military Council (SMC) of Syrian opposition fighters, led the administration this week to suspend aid shipments through Turkey.
The emergence last month of the Islamic Front has presented the administration with a dilemma as it seeks to maintain military pressure on the Syrian government before an opposition-government peace conference next month that it hopes will lead to the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad and the installation of a transitional government.
The SMC, whose Free Syrian Army is the only opposition armed force the United States backs in Syria, has lost both strength and influence to anti-Assad Islamic groups. Among them is the al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and the al-Nusra Front, both of which have been labeled terrorist groups by Washington.
Because the al-Qaeda guys are a little more blood thirsty and have fewer qualms about killing the people who disagree with them...
But the increasingly powerful Islamic Front, while it includes many Salafists seeking an Islamic state in Syria, is not affiliated with al-Qaeda.
No, no, certainly not!
Talks between U.S. envoy Robert Ford and Islamic Front figures held in Turkey last month were inconclusive, said the senior U.S. official.
The Front has been pressing for inclusion in the SMC, and wants to be represented at the Geneva talks, according to rebel commanders.
The better to monkey wrench the proceedings when necessary...
Front leaders are reportedly in discussions this week with the SMC commander, Gen. Salim Idriss.
We dont have a problem with the Islamic Front, the senior official said, but any movement toward including them in the U.S.-backed coalition remains a work in progress.
Champ may have to bow to them a couple times...
In addition to the absence of any al-Qaeda ties, the administration is seeking assurances from the Front that it will support the Syrian Opposition Coalitions leadership in the Geneva conference, scheduled for Jan. 22.
But whatever happens with the reorganization of the armed opposition, the official said, we want our stuff back. The equipment, including vehicles and communications and medical equipment, was part of a program, administered by the State Department, to send U.S. non-
lethal supplies to the SMC. A separate program, run by the CIA, distributes small arms and ammunition to the rebels.
The cluster of warehouses in the Syrian border town of Atmeh was controlled by the SMC, and it is unclear how it ended up in Islamic Front hands.
Other than the gunshots, grenades, and mad dash with the loot, that is...
By one account, the Islamic Front offered to help SMC fighters defend the site from an anticipated attack by a group linked to al-Qaeda, and then ejected the SMC rebels at gunpoint.
Suckers...
Were not in a position yet to give a definitive account of what happened, State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said Thursday. Clarifying earlier reports that Idriss was present at the warehouses and ran away fled from Islamic Front forces, Harf said that he is currently in Turkey, and was in that country at the time of the weekend incident.
Harf emphasized that the flow of non-lethal military aid continued to flow into Syria through other countries. Other than Turkey on Syrias northern border, where much of the heaviest fighting is now underway the primary route is through Jordan, in the south.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/14/2013 00:00 ||
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#2
My one prayer this year is that the world survives another year of the Obamanation without a nuclear war.
Between Pak v. India and China/Nork v. Japan/ROK and Israel v. Iran the odds on the big one seem to be getting shorter by the day because of this buffoon's inability to see beyond the end of his next poll result or graft pay-off. 8^(
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.
[Pak Daily Times] At least 80 alleged criminals were 
[Pak Daily Times] 
Philippine security forces have seized what officials described as a major bomb factory of the New Peoples Army in Agusan del Sur and hauled away more than 160 landmines. 
[An Nahar] Syrian troops loyal to 
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
