#6
[^[ {[gÌÊ^ªÆÄàD«Å·BÍ¢AñíÉAñíÉD« (I very much like the motor boat pictures. Yes very, very much like) jbv^bNÌOÆñɵ½¢Æv¢Ü· (Would like to nip on neck with lips )
Officials said a roadside bomb has killed seven Afghan soldiers in the west of the country.
The spokesman for Afghanistans defence ministry, Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, said the powerful blast hit the soldiers vehicle on Sunday in the Dilaram district of Farah province. Azimi said no other soldiers were seriously wounded, but declined to provide further details on the explosion.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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MANDERA, Kenya --- Kenya's police on Saturday arrested three Al-Shabaab suspects and recovered three rifles and 259 rounds of ammunition in the northern town of Mandera. The trio, who were arrested at Koromei area, 10 km from Mandera town, had sneaked in the country from Somalia. In a little cafe just the other side of the border...
Mandera County Police Commander Noah Mwivanda said the three upon interrogation said that they had come to pick their "boss."
They couldn't do that on-line?
"When our officers interrogated these Al-Shabaab suspects, they said that they had come to pick their boss. We have since established that this is not true. We believe that these militiamen were on a mission to carry out an attack in Mandera town," Mwivanda said. Come a little bit closer...
The three Al-Shabaab suspects who were driving in a white Toyota Land Cruiser vehicle
...borrowed/stolen from the UN...
with no registration number were intercepted by the police who were on a routine night patrol.
No plates? That'll get you pulled over just about anywhere in the world...
The police commander said that a video camera caught in their possession was to be used to take pictures of security installations and other strategic places with a view of attacking them later.
"We have every reason to believe that these militia men were up to no good. They were fully armed to commit a major attack in our town. But thank God our hawked eyed officers arrested them before they could carry out their evil acts," said Mwivanda.
The three were briefly detained at the Mandera police station before being flown to Nairobi for further interrogation.
Mandera town that has enjoyed relative calm in the last few months is always under threat from the Al-Qaida linked group due to its proximity to Somalia. The local police chief said security had been stepped up and he appealed to residents to be extra vigilant and take security measures seriously, regardless of their status in society.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[Libya Herald] Downtown Benghazi was rocked by two kabooms in the early hours of the morning, destroying a restaurant and eight vehicles.
The front man for Benghazi Joint Security Room, Ibrahim Al-Sharaa, told the Libya Herald that the two kabooms, one on the Corniche and the other on nearby Gzeer Street, occurred ten minutes apart .
He said that the huge kabooms were caused by gelatina devices and had obliterated the Rous Al-Bahr restaurant on the Corniche and eight parked cars on Gzeer Street.
While reports have surfaced of some light injuries, Sharaa said that the security room had received no news of hospital admittances as a result of the bombings.
He also denied that the nearby home of Congressman Saleh Gaouda had been bombed in a similar attack but explained that a number of houses surrounding the blast area had suffered superficial damage.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[Egypt Independent] Security forces in Sharqiya announced on Sunday the arrest of 13 Moslem Brüderbund members and turbans in a crackdown following the killing of six coppers in one week.
Sources at the Sharqiya Security Directorate said the crackdown targeted active members of the group, as well as Death Eaters, in Hahya, Abu Kabir and Fakous.
Six coppers have been killed by the same methods in one week in Zagazig, Abu Kabir, Hahya and Kafr Saqr in Sharqiya. The killers have not been identified yet, according to the sources.
The security forces intensified their presence and set 20 checkpoints in different areas in Sharqiya following the incidents.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[Egypt Independent] The South Qalyoubiya prosecution referred 38 Moslem Brüderbund supporters to the Criminal Court for attempting to bomb the Shubra al-Kheima and al-Zera'a metro stations during celebrations of the 6 October victory. The Brotherhood supporters are being charged with smashing the entrance gates, shooting police and residents and possessing 49 explosives and Molotov cocktails.
Prosecution accused them of joining a terrorist group that practices violence, damaging public property, intimidating citizens, hampering public transportation and possessing weapons, ammunition and bombs.
Investigations showed that some of the suspects were not from Qalyoubiya and that most of them were from Daqahliya, Sharqiya, Beni Suef, Giza, Cairo and South Sinai. They were allegedly ordered by Brotherhood leaders to carry out several operations in Shubra al-Kheima to immobilize the second line of the metro running from Shubra al-Kheima to Moneeb by staging sit-ins at Shubra al-Kheima, al-Zera'a and al-Mezallat metro stations during the 2013 celebrations of the 6 October victory.
The Brotherhood supporters allegedly planned to bomb the al-Zera'a and Shubra al-Kheima metro stations. A march of around 2,000 persons started from 15 May Street to Ahmed Oraby Street. Security did not stop them until they attacked the metro station. Thirty eight supporters were incarcerated Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! and referred to prosecution.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] A Yemeni court specializing in terrorism cases began the trial on Sunday of six al-Qaeda suspects accused of murdering a Saudi diplomat and kidnapping a Swiss woman.
The defendants, two of them being tried in absentia, are charged with forming part -- between 2011 and 2013 -- of "an gang linked to al-Qaeda," the official Saba news agency reported.
The group are accused of murdering a Saudi diplomat in November 2012.
Sergeant Khaled Shobeikan al-Anzi, an official at the Saudi embassy's military section in Yemen, was killed along with his bodyguard in Sanaa when gunniesshot up his car.
They are also charged with carrying out the kidnapping of language teacher Sylvia Eberhardt from Switzerland ...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell... in March 2012, who spent nearly a year in captivity before her release, according to Saba.
The next hearing was set for February 23.
Yemen is the ancestral home of al-Qaeda founder the late Osama bin Laden ... who was laid out deader than a mackerel, right next to the mackerel... and home base of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the network's deadliest franchise according to the United States.
AQAP was formed in January 2009 as a merger of the Yemeni and Saudi branches of al-Qaeda.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[Yemen Post] Although it has been rumoured in the media that President Abdo Rabbo Mansour Hadi warned Abdel-Malek al-Houthi, he would personally oversee a large scale military intervention against his rustics should the Zaidi group overstepped once more over al-Ahmar's territories, reports have confirmed that Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is "God is Great, Death to America", Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews" ... gunnies managed on Wednesday to seize control of Raydah, a town located 60 Km north of the capital, Sana'a.
Reporters on the ground have confirmed that the Houthis have coordinated attacks against Arhab, further south from their Raydah stronghold.
From a pure military standpoint, the Houthis appear to have been working to clear an opening onto the capital. With Arhab sitting directly north of Sana'a, should the city fall to the Houthis, the Yemeni capital would stand a sitting duck at its northern regional borders.
Several tribal officials and politicians having warned over the past weeks that the Houthis would attempt to breach the capital. It is important to note that ever since 2011 uprising thousands of Houthi gunnies travelled from Sa'ada to Sana'a to maintain a presence within the capital. With men de facto within and without Sana'a the Houthis could in theory, attempt a coup d'état. That being said, assuming that their desire to diminish al-Ahmar and by extension, al-Islah's pull in Yemen, will translate into a political takeover remains to be seen.
It is likely the Houthis aim only to assert themselves as a potent tribal and political force as to assert their position as Yemen is about to make the move from a presidential system to federalism.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[Bangla Daily Star] The "founder of the Razakar force", AKM Yusuf, died yesterday with the war crimes case against him at the final stage.
The 88-year-old 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... nayeb-e-ameer died around 11:30am at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University. He was taken there after he reportedly suffered a stroke and collapsed in Kashimpur Jail-1 earlier in the day.
Sources in the morgue said they believed Yusuf died of a hemorrhagic stroke but they would be able to confirm the cause of death after the results of the viscera tests were in. The body was handed over to the family yesterday evening after an autopsy.
Yusuf had been facing 13 war crimes charges and the closing argument of his case was scheduled to start on Wednesday.
AKM Nasiruddin Mahmud, registrar and front man for the international crimes tribunal, told The Daily Star last night that as per the Code of Criminal Procedure, an accused gets discharged after his or her death.
He said there was neither any specific provision in the International Crimes (Tribunal) Act nor in the rules of the tribunals about continuing or discontinuing proceedings against a deceased accused.
"Now the tribunal will decide," he said.
CONTROVERSY OVER DEATH
Abdul Wahab, Yusuf's son-in-law, said the jail authority called him around 8:30am notifying him about Yusuf fainting. Yusuf had regained consciousness after some time, said Wahab.
Jamil Ahmed Chowdhury, superintendent of Kashimpur Jail-1, told The Daily Star that after checking his health, the jail doctor referred Yusuf to BSMMU.
Wahab claimed that around 10:15am the jail authorities took Yusuf to the emergency section of the cardiac department at BSMMU where doctors suggested him to the Intensive Care Unit.
As there was no vacant bed at the ICU, the authorities suggested that he be moved to Dhaka Medical College Hospital, said Wahab, adding that Yusuf died around 11:15am just after he was put inside an ambulance.
However, the way to a man's heart remains through his stomach... BSMMU Director (Hospital) Brig Gen (retd) Abdul Majid Bhuiyan told news hounds that Yusuf was rushed to the hospital around 11:00am in a critical condition and doctors had tried their best to save his life.
He denied that any doctor of BSMMU had referred Yusuf to be taken to DMCH. Majid said Yusuf died on his way to the Coronary Care Unit of the hospital and it was not true that there were no empty beds there.
Tajul Islam, counsel for Yusuf, and Wahab alleged that Yusuf was not given proper treatment at BSMMU. "Getting treatment is a basic right but the hospital deprived him of that," alleged Tajul.
After his death, Yusuf's counsel went to Tribunal-2 with a petition to allow Yusuf's family have his body without an autopsy done. But, the tribunal denied and said it needed to know the cause of his death.
After the autopsy at Dhaka Medical College, his body was taken to his Dhanmondi home. Yusuf's family were yet to decide when and where he would be laid to rest as of filing this report at 10:00pm.
Tajul Islam, counsel for Yusuf, said his client went through four heart surgeries and had colon cancer. They had sought bail for Yusuf several times but the tribunal denied them all.
In last October, the International Crimes Tribunal-2 denied Yusuf bail for the third time following a report from Kashimpur jail that his health was "stable".
BACKGROUND
Yusuf in 1971 was deputy chief of Jamaat, a party which vehemently tried to prevent the birth of Bangladesh.
He had against him seven charges of genocide which left several hundred people dead in Khulna and Bagerhat during the Liberation War. The remaining six charges were related to killing, arson, looting, and forced conversion of Hindus to Moslems.
According to the brief profile read out by the tribunal in its indictment order on August 1, 2013, Yusuf, son of late Azim Uddin Howlader of Rajoir in Sharankhola of Bagerhat, joined Jamaat in 1952.
He became the chief of Khulna division Jamaat in 1957. In 1962, Yusuf was elected a member of the National Assembly. He was nominated provincial joint secretary of Jamaat in 1969.
In 1971, he was made the deputy ameer of the then East Pakistain Jamaat and he was one of the two provincial ministers from Jamaat.
According to prosecution documents, Yusuf established the Razakar force, an auxiliary force of the Mighty Pak Army, on May 5, 1971, at an Ansar camp on Khan Jahan Ali Road in Khulna with 96 Jamaat activists. He also named the force.
Yusuf landed in jail on May 12 last year, hours after Tribunal-1 took the charges against him into cognisance. Later, his case was transferred to Tribunal-2.
A total 27 prosecution witnesses, including the investigation officer testified against Yusuf while his son Mahbubur Rahman testified as the lone defence witness.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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Australian officials on Sunday blamed a "fairly major breakdown" in border security for the reported escape of a convicted terrorist through Sydney Airport to join the conflict in Syria.
He's a big boy from the photo; he'll certainly give his ration to Fatima stuck in the refugee camp...
New South Wales Premier Barry O'Farrell expressed concern after media reports that Khaled Sharrouf, who served almost four years in prison after pleading guilty over a 2005 conspiracy to attack Sydney, had fled the country.
According to News Corp Australia, Sharrouf boarded a flight to Malaysia at Sydney Airport last month using his brother's passport and was now believed to be in Syria.
"I have to say I think that immigration and the federal police and customs have been doing a magnificent job," O'Farrell told reporters when asked about the case. "But I look to see what caused what appears to have been a fairly major breakdown."
On the bright side, Sharrouf is likely to die in Syria, in which case the Aussies will breathe a sigh of relief and exclaim "good riddance". Then they'll pop open another Fosters and check the shrimp on the barbie...
Police and customs have refused to comment on the case.
Sharrouf, 31, had his passport confiscated and has been on international watchlists since his release from prison in 2009. He pleaded guilty to committing acts in preparation for a terrorist act by possessing clocks and batteries to be used in a bomb blast as part of the so-called "Terror Nine" conspiracy, which resulted in Australia's largest-ever terrorism trial and the conviction of nine men.
Sharrouf served three years and 11 months in jail for his part in the plot.
Australia's government expressed concern last month at the growing numbers of its citizens travelling to Syria to fight alongside rebel groups, with several reported deaths.
Really? Bruce, Ian and William, all of them? Again, good riddance as long as they go to Syria and die there...
Attorney-General George Brandis said he was concerned about Australians returning radicalised and with new skills to commit extremist acts after fighting in Syria, where a three-year civil war has left more than 130,000 dead.
So make sure they don't return...
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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Nine so-called Australians known killed in Syria so far, passports cancelled for terrorist activities up from 7 in 2011 to 18 last year.
[DAWN] An official in Balochistan says gunmen have attacked the house of a pro-government tribal elder, killing him and eight members of his family.
Provincial Home Minister Sarfaraz Bugti says the attackers killed Gazeen Khan Bugti early Sunday morning along with three women, three children and two adult males in Dera Bugti district. Bugti is a common clan name in the area.
The minister says members of the ''peace committee,'' a pro-government militia in the area, retaliated and killed two of the attackers and wounded three others.
Baluchistan is home to a low-level insurgency by ethnic Baluch separatists. Al-Qaida-linked militants also operate in the region.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] Gunmen on cycle of violences Sunday rubbed out eight people including an eight-year-old girl at a faith healer's house in the port city of 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 and doctors said.
At least 16 others were also maimed in the shooting at Baldia Town, a low-income Karachi neighbourhood, as dozens of people waited for their turn to see the faith healer.
"Six gunnies on three cycle of violences stormed into the house and started indiscriminate firing," senior police official Irfan Baloch told AFP.
He added that the dead included an eight-year-old girl and her father.
The assailants fired 9mm pistols, a weapon used in a spate of assassinations in the restive city, he added.
No group has yet grabbed credit for the attack.
Faith healer Pir Meharban Shah, who provides spiritual healing services, received a bullet wound to his abdomen and said he had not received any threats prior to the attack.
There was a power outage in the area when the attackers entered the house shortly after dark and started firing, he added.
Doctor Aftab Chanarh at Karachi's state-run Civil Hospital confirmed the casualties.
Karachi, Pakistain's largest city with 18 million people, has been plagued by sectarian, ethnic and political violence for years.
Rangers are currently taking part in a joint operation with police in Karachi aimed at cleansing the city of bully boyz and other hardcore criminals, including hired killers, gun runners and drug peddlers.
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02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] Unknown persons attacked a 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... container-carrying truck, setting it alight, while killing two persons including the driver of the vehicle in Sibi area of Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... , DawnNews reported.
The cycle of violence-riding gunnies opened fire on a truck, which was travelling from 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... to Chaman, killing two persons including the driver.
The firing also caused the truck to catch fire which partially damaged the container.
The attackers managed to escape from the scene.
The fire brigade was called in to control the blaze whereas the victims were shifted to Civil Hospital Sibi.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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BAGHDAD -- A group of Sunni militants attending a suicide bombing training class at a camp north of Baghdad were killed on Monday when their commander unwittingly conducted a demonstration with a belt that was packed with explosives, army and police officials said. Talk about realistic traing!
The militants belonged to a group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, which is fighting the Shiite-dominated army of the Iraqi government, mostly in Anbar Province. But they are also linked to bomb attacks elsewhere and other fighting that has thrown Iraq deeper into sectarian violence.
Twenty-two ISIS members were killed, and 15 were wounded, in the explosion at the camp, which is in a farming area in the northeastern province of Samara, according to the police and army officials. Stores of other explosive devices and heavy weapons were also kept there, the officials said. Did somebody switch belts on him? Hey, Mamoud. Lets play a joke on the instructor!
Eight militants were arrested when they tried to escape, the officials said. Curly-toed slippers don't fail me now!
The militant who was conducting the training was not identified by name, but he was described by an Iraqi Army officer as a prolific recruiter who was "able to kill the bad guys for once." We don't yet know which parts are his. It's good to start the day off with a heart-warming story.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
02/10/2014 12:04 ||
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#1
Ladies and Gentlemen---Let the snark begin!
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/10/2014 16:48 Comments ||
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#2
Don't know who the Instructor was but I hear his class was a real blast!
BAGHDAD -- At least 19 people were killed and 19 others wounded in violent attacks across Iraq, police said on Sunday.
Two people were killed and seven wounded when a car bomb went off at a marketplace in the Shiite district of Sadr City in the eastern part of the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, a police source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
Meanwhile, another car bomb struck an army patrol in the town of Mahmoudiyah, some 30 km south of Baghdad, leaving a soldier killed and three wounded, the source said.
Three passers-by were also wounded by the blast which damaged several nearby shops and buildings, the source added.
In Iraq's eastern province of Diyala, three civilians were killed, including a child, and five others wounded when three roadside bombs exploded in the early hours of the day in al-Gatoon district in the southwestern part of the provincial capital city of Baquba, some 65 km northeast of Baghdad, a provincial police source anonymously told Xinhua.
Separately, the police found two bodies of civilians shot dead in their heads and dumped near a river in the eastern part of Baquba, the source said.
Also in the province, gunmen opened fire on a car carrying a leading figure of a Shiite militia named Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq and his aide near Baquba, leaving him critically wounded and killing his aide, the source added.
The Shiite militia is a militant group that previously splintered from Mahdi Army militia, loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. The group is widely believed to be backed by the neighboring Shiite state of Iran. They are allegedly funded, trained and armed by Iran's Quds Force.
Earlier in the day, a police source from Salahudin province told Xinhua that six policemen and four anti-Qaida militiamen were killed by gunmen in two incidents.
In one of the attacks, gunmen stormed a police checkpoint before dawn and shot dead six policemen outside a village near the city of Tuz-Khurmato, some 90 km east of the provincial capital city of Tikrit, a source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
Late on Saturday night, police found the bodies of a leader of government-backed Sahwa paramilitary group, his two sons and nephew, who were kidnapped by gunmen three days ago from their home near Tikrit, some 170 km north of the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, the source said.
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02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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BAGHDAD/ Aswat al-Iraq: Security sources said here today that a Sadrist election's candidate was assassinated west of the capital on Friday. The source told Aswat al-Iraq that unknown gunmen attacked candidate Hamza al-Shammari and shot him to death in Ghazaliya area.
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02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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BAGHDAD - Nine people were found dead in two brutal incidents in Iraq Sunday -- one where militants forced Shiite policemen to pray before killing them, and another where decapitated heads were left in a market.
The violence is among the most shocking in Iraq's worst prolonged period of unrest since it emerged in 2008 from a Sunni-Shiite sectarian war, and comes with security forces also battling anti-government fighters in western Anbar province.
Analysts and diplomats have urged the Shiite-led authorities to pursue reforms and address the grievances of the disaffected Sunni community, but with elections due on April 30, political leaders have been loath to compromise.
Also loathe to compromise with those who would behead police officers...
The two incidents both took place in Salaheddin province, north of Baghdad, leaving nine dead in all, security and medical officials said.
In Tuz Khurmatu, an ethnically-mixed town that has been hit by regular attacks, militants surrounded a police encampment protecting a stadium construction site and gathered the six policemen as a group and shot them all dead, two security officials and a doctor at the local hospital said.
One of the six, however, only died at hospital, and according to a local Tuz official, said that the insurgents had attempted to find out if the policemen were Sunni or Shiite before killing them. The militants asked them which sect they belonged to and the policemen, who were Shiite Turkmen, initially said they were Sunni in an effort to save themselves, the town official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
But because prayer rituals of Sunnis and Shiites differ in certain key aspects, the victims were forced to pray as a group and their efforts to mask their confessional background were undone.
In a separate incident in Baiji, the decapitated heads of three men were found in a town market Sunday morning, two police officers in the town said. The men -- an anti-Qaeda militia chief, his son and his cousin -- were kidnapped late on Thursday near provincial capital Tikrit.
The militiamen, known as the Sahwa, joined forces with the US military against their co-religionists in Al-Qaeda from late-2006 onwards, helping turn the tide of Iraq's violent insurgency. But, as a result, they are regarded as traitors by Sunni militants and often targeted in attacks.
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02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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[Ynet] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet with Champ next month at the White House during a multi-faceted trip to the United States, the prime minister confirmed Monday, speaking to reporters at the end of a meeting of his Likud party's Knesset faction in Jerusalem.
Netanyahu said that the trip "has four objectives first and foremost Iran." He said he and Champ would discuss the Iranian nuclear program. "Iran continues to object to any dismantling of its (uranium) enrichment capability - not even a single centrifuge," Netanyahu said in public remarks to legislators from his party.
Iran denies Western allegations it has been seeking the means to make atomic weapons, saying such claims are baseless and fabricated by foes such as Israel, which is widely believed to be the Middle East's only nuclear-armed power.
Iran, he said, "has not changed a single aspect of its policy; it violates human rights; assists with and organizes massacres for the Assad regime; arms terrorist organizations; conspires against a great many nations. It's greatest provocation has been to send warships (into the Atlantic)."
The prime minister also said that he and the president would discuss the ongoing peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, adding that he would reinforce Israel's stance on the issue.
"We stand by our demands (Palestinian) renunciation of the right of return, security arrangements, (Palestinian) recognition of the Jewish state," he said.
The third purpose of the visit, Netanyahu said, was to promote Israel's economy, primarily in the technology sector. For that reason, his visit would include a trip to Silicon Valley in San Francisco, where he was to meet with Israeli business leaders. Finally, in Los Angeles, he would attend a viewing of a film promoting tourism in Israel.
The date of the meeting with Champ has not yet been finalized, reports said, but the prime minister is to deliver a speech at the annual AIPAC policy conference in Washington DC, which takes place on March 2-4.
Relations between the US and Israeli leadership has been tense in recent weeks, after Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon and Economy Minister Naftali Bennett both criticized Secretary of State Jawn Kerry for his plan for a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians.
[Ynet] Over the past several days, rocket fire from Gaza Strip towards Israel persisted. On Saturday, a rocket landed in Sha'ar HaNegev Regional Council, but no injuries or damage were reported. Another rocket was launched Thursday evening, and landed in an open field south of Ashkelon. During the previous weekend, the IAF struck several Gaza targets, including two Hamas outposts in Gaza and Rafah, and another target in northern Gaza. Four people were injured in those strikes. The Gazookian bazookians persist. Perhaps it is time for another tank and D9 sweep through Gaza..
[Haaretz] The attempt to assassinate jihadi terrorist Abdallah Kharti in Gaza on Sunday morning indicates that the Israeli policy of targeted killings is being quietly revived. If missileers cannot achieve perfection as the standard, larger missiles may be required.
Members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) bombed a transmission tower on Saturday in Maguindanao as the group continued terrorist activities in Central Mindanao. The explosions, however, failed to topple the tower.
Col. Dickson Hermoso, spokesman of the Army's 6th Infantry Division, said, "The bombing did not bring a brownout, but they attempted to bring down the tower. Three of the IEDs exploded, but the tower has four steel feet, so it was not cut or toppled down. We still have electricity."
The latest attack came as the Philippine government ordered security forces to continue law enforcement operations against BIFF members wanted for the beheading of two civilians and an attack on a village in North Cotabato in September last year.
The bombing was the fourth in less than a week, and it comes in the aftermath of military operations in Maguindanao and North Cotabato less than two weeks ago wherein soldiers captured four BIFF camps and a bomb-making facility.
Military spokesman Hernando Iriberri said the attack was in retaliation by the BIFF over the loss of its four camps and over the dozens of casualties that it sustained during the operations.
A village defense volunteer was killed by a bomb at his rubber plantation in Pattani province yesterday. Bomb disposal police who examined the scene found the victim's badly mutilated body in the plantation. Police said the victim tended his gardens after work, and the explosion occurred while he was cultivating watermelon plants there.
[An Nahar] The Lebanese Army on Sunday tossed in the calaboose Book 'im, Mahmoud! a defected Syrian officer in the Bekaa border town of Arsal.
"the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... , a Syrian defected colonel and member of the Syrian Revolution Military Council, was arrested in Arsal's Wadi Hmayyed," state-run National News Agency reported. It said the man was arrested at a Lebanese Army checkpoint in Wadi Hmayyed.
But the army later announced arresting Syrian nationals Omar Mahmoud Othman and Radwan Mahmoud Ayyoush in Wadi Hmayyed.
"As part of the mission of controlling the land borders, army forces in the Arsal area of Wadi Hmayyed arrested Syrian nationals Omar Mahmoud Othman and Radwan Mahmoud Ayyoush for attempting to enter Leb illegally," the Army Command said in a statement.
"The detainees are being interrogated under the supervision of the relevant judicial authorities," the statement added.
OTV had earlier reported that one of the men was a defected colonel and the commander of the jihadist al-Nusra Front in the Syrian region of Qusayr near Leb's border.
Amid the Syrian refugee influx Arsal has witnessed since the eruption of the Syrian crisis in 2011, the Lebanese Army has several times seized cars loaded with arms and ammunition in the town and its outskirts.
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[An Nahar] A total of 420 people were evacuated Sunday from army-besieged districts of the Syrian city of Homs, the province's governor said, as television footage showed exhausted men, women and kiddies.
"Four hundred and twenty besieged people came out today from the Old City districts of Homs, and the operation is still under way," Barazi said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed that "more than 500 civilians" were evacuated Sunday, in compliance with a U.N.-brokered deal over the besieged districts, where some 3,000 people had been trapped.
Television footage showed women, children and elderly men getting off the buses that brought them out of the besieged areas, after suffering a more than 600-day siege.
They appeared visibly exhausted and frail-looking, in video broadcast by Beirut-based channel Al-Mayadeen. Children, carried by their parents, looked pale.
The civilians were assisted by U.N. staff wearing helmets and blue vests, and Syrian Red Islamic Thingy volunteers. There was also a strong Syrian army presence at the evacuation site.
"We had nothing. All the children were sick, we even had nothing to drink," said one exhausted woman, her three children standing around her.
A U.N. staffer gave her a bottle of water.
"It's been two years and four months!" a man told a journalist who asked him how long it had been since he had left the rebel-held districts.
A handful of neighborhoods in central Homs have been under choking army siege since June 2012, but even before then they had been under frequent fire and suffered from shortages.
Earlier on Sunday, state media accused rebels of firing on the convoys.
State television said the operation took place under fire from "armed terrorist groups," using the regime's term for rebels.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and activists said fire hit the rebel-held, besieged district of Qarabis in Homs, where dozens of civilians were gathered for evacuation by the U.N.
Activists said a gathering point for civilians was hit by mortar rounds launched from pro-regime districts bordering the besieged neighborhood where civilians have been trapped for more than 600 days.
Sunday's evacuation was the second in three days, since a U.N.-brokered truce for army-besieged districts of Homs was to have come into effect on Friday.
But on Saturday, shelling and gunfire hit a Syrian Red Islamic Thingy aid convoy, killing five residents of the rebel-held neighborhoods and wounding 20 others.
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02/10/2014 00:00 ||
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An aid convoy came under fire in a besieged rebel district of Homs on Saturday, threatening a United Nations-led operation to bring food and medicine to 2,500 people and evacuate civilians trapped by months of fighting in the Syrian city, Reuters reported.
The Syrian Arab Red Moon-Shaped Thingy Crescent (SARC) said mortar fire landed close to its convoy and shots were fired at its trucks, wounding one of its drivers. At least nine Red Moon-Shaped Thingy Crescent and U.N. vehicles were holed up in the city for several hours after dark when the explosions struck, but the team managed to pull out shortly before 10 pm (2000 GMT), leaving two damaged trucks, the Red Crescent said.
"Although the team was shelled and fired upon we managed to deliver 250 food parcels (and) 190 hygiene kits and chronic disease medicines," it said.
Syrian authorities blamed the attacks on rebels but opposition activists accused President Bashar al-Assad's forces of carrying them out, as well as earlier mortar fire which delayed the start of the operation on Saturday morning.
The violence threatens to unravel a humanitarian deal for Homs which was the first concrete result of talks launched two weeks ago in Geneva to try to end the country's civil war. But even the humanitarian talks have taken time and delivered only modest achievements, the first of which was the evacuation on Friday of 83 women, children and elderly men from the Old City. Aid workers said many showed signs of malnutrition.
Sunday is due to be the final day of a three-day ceasefire which Russia, a close supporter of Assad, said had been agreed to allow the aid to be brought in and civilians moved out.
Video footage of Saturday's incident published by activists showed eight white cars with U.N. markings and a truck stopped at a narrow street corner, already strewn with rubble. A man with a blood on his face was led into a nearby building, before a blast struck on the far side of the truck. It was not clear how much damage was caused by the explosion.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/10/2014 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.
[Egypt Independent] The South Qalyoubiya prosecution referred 38 
[Bangla Daily Star] The "founder of the Razakar force", AKM Yusuf, died yesterday with the war crimes case against him at the final stage.
Australian officials on Sunday blamed a "fairly major breakdown" in border security for the reported escape of a convicted terrorist through Sydney Airport to join the conflict in Syria.
[DAWN] Gunmen on 
BAGHDAD -- A group of Sunni militants attending a suicide bombing training class at a camp north of Baghdad were killed on Monday when their commander unwittingly conducted a demonstration with a belt that was packed with explosives, army and police officials said.
Members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) bombed a transmission tower on Saturday in Maguindanao as the group continued terrorist activities in Central Mindanao. The explosions, however, failed to topple the tower.
[An Nahar] A total of 420 people were evacuated Sunday from army-besieged districts of the Syrian city of Homs, the province's governor said, as television footage showed exhausted men, 
