The United Nations has called on the Sudanese government to investigate recent attacks in Darfur that claimed at least 50 civilians, many of them children. A report released Friday by the office of Louise Arbour, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said the attacks, which began Oct. 29, affected at least eight villages and one internally displaced persons camp housing 3,500 people. "The investigation should aim to collect evidence to identify and prosecute those who planned, orchestrated and conducted the attacks," the report said.
Eight of the men killed were 70 years or older and 21 of the victims were under the age of 10, according to the United Nations. Witnesses told the world organization three of the attackers wore the insignia of the Sudanese Armed Forces.
Approximately 300 to 500 armed men in green camouflage uniforms participated in the attacks, which went on for two days and appeared to target young male children and elderly men, the report said. Eight of the men killed were 70 years or older and 21 of the victims were under the age of 10, according to the United Nations.
Witnesses told the world organization three of the attackers wore the insignia of the Sudanese Armed Forces. "At the very least, the attacks demonstrated the government of Sudan's continued failure to disarm militia in Darfur, and at worst its use of militia forces that target civilian populations," said the report.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
The United Nations has called on the Sudanese government to investigate recent attacks in Darfur that claimed at least 50 civilians, many of them children.
...
Witnesses told the world organization three of the attackers wore the insignia of the Sudanese Armed Forces.
via Drudge
The Spectre of a nuclear race in the Middle East was raised yesterday when six Arab states announced that they were embarking on programmes to master atomic technology. The move, which follows the failure by the West to curb Irans controversial nuclear programme, could see a rapid spread of nuclear reactors in one of the worlds most unstable regions, stretching from the Gulf to the Levant and into North Africa. The countries involved were named by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as Algeria, Egypt, Morocco and Saudi Arabia. Tunisia and the UAE have also shown interest.
All want to build civilian nuclear weapons energy programmes, as they are permitted to under international law. But the sudden rush to nuclear power has raised suspicions that the real intention is to acquire nuclear technology which could be used for the first Arab atomic bomb. Some Middle East states, including Egypt, Morocco, Algeria and Saudi Arabia, have shown initial interest [in using] nuclear power primarily for desalination purposes, Tomihiro Taniguch, the deputy director-general of the IAEA, told the business weekly Middle East Economic Digest. He said that they had held preliminary discussions with the governments and that the IAEAs technical advisory programme would be offered to them to help with studies into creating power plants.
#1
Let's see. The Pak bomb was financed by the Saudis and the bank of crooks and thieves as the Musilm bomb.
But, Muslim bomb was not specific enough so Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Iran, Iraq and maybe some others began building their variants of the Muslim Bomb
Then operations by various SpecOps of some different countries convinced some of these to give up the effort. Also, the US invading Iraq kind of end that effort and scared the shit of of Libya.
Now with Iraq being slow and Iran being abrasive they all want to restart the shit in a public way.
First I have to say they are really lucky that Israel is a vary tolerant society based on their experince with the Holocast. If they were not they could be pre-emptive with their nukes as most other nations in that sort of situation would be.
The US and the ROW is not playing hardball enough. We have gone into full multi-cultural confusion mode and the EU nations have reached a fully clueless state.
Meanwhile Puttie and China play a very dangerous game.
Where is the clock hand on the doomsday clock right now?
#3
How North Koreas nuclear test
affects the Doomsday Clock
North Korea's recent underground nuclear test is part of a worrisome trend of increased nuclear proliferation. Before making a decision about moving the hands of the Clock, however, the Board of Directors is also watching to see how the international community responds to North Korea's actions.
As outlined in its 2002 Clock statement the Board worries most about the large quantities of unsecured nuclear weapons material in Russia and elsewhere, along with Al Qaeda's stated intentions to acquire the necessary materials to produce a nuclear device.
Likewise, Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, about which the International Atomic Energy Agency and other experts know very little, causes great concern; the A. Q. Kahn network originated in Pakistan, and, despite Khan's arrest, the illicit trade in nuclear technologies and materials continues. North Korea already plays a role in this trade.
The Board also closely monitors disarmament efforts around the world, and there is not much progress to report. Almost two decades after the Cold War, Russia and the United States together possess a total of 26,000 nuclear weapons. Each side maintains nearly 1,000 weapons on high levels of launch readiness, ready to strike targets thousands of miles away in as little as 30 minutes.
While we continue to follow closely the actions surrounding North Korea's first nuclear test, we are mindful as well of the larger context of nuclear proliferation and disarmament. All these considerations continue to inform the Board's decisions about the state of global security.
Kennette Benedict
Executive Director
Bulletin ofthe Atomic Scientists
773-702-0077
kbenedict@thebulletin.org
This is what happens when a grand, visionary, history-shaping agenda replete with big ideas is handled by incremental, petty, and small actions.
President Bush had the correct vision, to an extent, in calling forth drastic changes in the Middle East. What has failed the grand agenda is that one cannot do it on the cheap nor with a nation that has an attention span of a flea. What was needed shortly after 9-11 was an all-out commitment to smashing, utterly smashing all sources of radical, Jihadi Islam, including both the Wahhabi-Sunni varient as well as the Shiite one.
Right now the only Americans called upon to make any sacrifice are the military and their families. Much of the rest of the country is uninvolved and or disinterested in victory because of a massive failure to state clearly what we're up against and what that entails.
The American people are not stupid, they're just a bit slow to "get it." What frightens me most is that we will have our great wake-up morning call only when, sadly, we turn on our TV sets and watch Fox, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, CBS broadcasting the horrible news of a major metropolitan area being vaporized in a mushroom cloud courtesy of our presumed "Arab" friends.
#7
"including both the Wahhabi-Sunni *variant* as well as the Shiite one."
I should add, the Pakistani-ISI supported Deobandi Islamist movement and its Taqfiri variant that's really big these days in the UK also need to destroyed... Now!
#8
I continue to doubt the American people will wake up to what's happening. Instead those who survive will be sleeping in late because their digital alarm clocks won't ring to wake them up, the TV won't be showing a local nuclear holocaust since EMP will have destroyed the electronics, and their cell & cordless phones won't work with the power off.
------- I found this comment from a blog useful.
While our incredibly foolish internal politics, increasingly driven by an increasingly unhinged left focuses [sic, probably "focusing" would work better] on sideshows and the carnival barkers touting the distractions fumble toward election day, the rest of the world watches and realizes we are in disarray...This is the payback for undermining, at every turn, the elected administration of this nation. This is what happens when bitter screeching partisanship and finger-pointing replaces citizenship and loyal opposition. This is what a partisan and irresponsible media transmits to the world and what convinces our Friends and enemies alike that we are weak and useless, both as a friend and as an enemy. This is the world we are left with.
#9
Excellent commentary! And the elected administration should have done a much better job at countering the BS from the Left early and often. Instead, it was too little, too late.
#10
To cut some slack on the Bush admnistration regarding the PR war, they've got the whole weight of the global mass media, or at least not far from that, against them. So, even if they had been less timid and passive, it's not even sure they could have changed much on that level.
Redacted by moderator. Comments may be redacted for trolling, violation of standards of good manners, or plain stupidity. Or for continually switching 'nyms. Please correct the condition that applies and try again. Contents may be viewed in the sinktrap. Further violations mayare increasingly likely to result in banning.
#12
Contrarian -- For once, just once, why don't you cut the fuzzy-wuzzy and spell out your Grand Plan.
The idiocy of triangulation, accommodation, and appeasement is so thoroughly discredited that it's a boggle anyone trots it out anymore. Sway-backed hag.
If only we'll give Kimmie and Ahmedinnerjacket some terrific Big Hugs and seek out those root causes and admit we asked for it then, somehow, all would be better. They would cease and desist - or something.
Cough up something other than a hairball, dimwit tool.
#14
I passed a few lawn signs today arranged like the old Burma Shave sequence. They spelled out various imagined current problems, then ended with HAD ENOUGH ? and finally, VOTE DEMOCRAT.
The stock market is booming
Unemployment rate is low
No terrorism since 911
Our pros fight terrorism in Iraq
Gas prices are down
What planet are you on ?
vote republican
#15
I've decided to stick with 'Contrarian', thanks. (I prefer Contrarian Babblemonkey but I don't think that would be allowed.)
.com, when you go to the movies, and the movie you're watching utterly sucks, is it your duty to show them how it's done by producing a film yourself? Neither do I think it is my duty to come up with a Grand Plan.
Instead, I made the following observation: Nuclear technology will become ubiquitous one of these days. What you do now will greatly affect how many people would want to use nukes on you later. It could be very many, it could be one or two, or it could be zero. Makes sense doesn't it?
National Geographic had an article on nuclear technology not so long ago. There's 20 countries in Africa lone considering nuclear power as a source of energy in the future.
#17
Ah, I see. You're not a contrarian, you're another useless little dog who yaps and pees. Puddles would be a better nym.
I worked at a very successful company (for about 8 years) and the #1 Rule was that you could not complain about a problem unless you coupled it with a workable solution.
But, on second thought, you would never have been hired there - interviews were conducted by 3 peers - and if you didn't pass muster with them you were politely sent on your way.
#21
And right there your "Grand Plan" falls apart.
Nuclear Power for Electricity, and Nuclear Power to blast cities is an entirely different thing.
We are NOT talking about the Electricity Generating type here.
I was thinking something along the lines of 100 years into the future or more, when bomb making technology will likely be of the plug-able kind; build the different pieces everywhere and assemble in one place. In other words, you won't have to start from scratch. Keeping track of all this for someone who is worried about it would be one heck of a pain.
#24
Other nyms for this IP: "Raphael", "NWFP Assembly", "facta non verba", "Nero", "Scumbag Defense Atty", "Papa Smurf", "Bob" and "GH". As well as a slew of auto-generated nyms.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
11/04/2006 18:09 Comments ||
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#25
Further communication is pointless, it just wants to moan and groan and be a-skeered. A Voice of Doom complex.
#28
Good call .com. His solution means the removal of Israel, women wearing Burkas, and Allahs laws. He's in a Toranto state of mind. Good thing there are others out there to protect him.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
11/04/2006 21:05 Comments ||
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#29
What frightens me most is that we will have our great wake-up morning call only when, sadly, we turn on our TV sets and watch Fox, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, CBS broadcasting the horrible news of a major metropolitan area being vaporized in a mushroom cloud courtesy of our presumed "Arab" friends.
How do you know this couldn't happen regardless? Or as a side-effect of the policies you are currently undertaking? I sense a self-fulfilling prophecy. Seems more like you are rushing toward this outcome more than anything. Nuke technology will become ubiquitous one day. How you act today will determine how many people will want to nuke you tomorrow. Alternatives do exist, you know.
A British Muslim on trial for inciting murder at a demonstration outside the Danish embassy in London had called for "another 9/11" across Europe, prosecutors said on Friday. Web designer Mizanur Rahman, 23, denies charges of inciting murder and racial hatred during demonstrations against the publication of political cartoons in a Danish newspaper that many Muslims considered insulting to Islam and Prophet Mohammad.
Muslims around the world demonstrated against the cartoons, but police say speeches at the London protests in February crossed the line to incitement to kill.
"I wish to make it clear that this case is not a trial of Muslims. Islam is not on trial," Prosecutor David Perry said during his opening remarks at the Old Bailey. "The defendant incited, solicited or encouraged killing," he said. "The prosecution say the meaning of those words is clear and unambiguous. Ordinary English words with the ordinary English meaning to kill."
"What he said was this: 'Oh Allah, we want to see another 9/11 in Iraq, another 9/11 in Denmark, another 9/11 in Spain, in France, all over Europe. Oh Allah, destroy all of them, Amen,'" Perry said, describing the remarks as a reference to the September 11 2001 attacks in the United States that killed 3,000 people.
"Bomb, bomb France. Bomb, bomb France. Nuke, nuke France. Nuke, nuke France,'" he quoted him as saying, adding that the reference to France may have been prompted by a French newspaper reprinting the Danish cartoons.
Rahman also called for "indiscriminate killing" of British troops in Iraq, Perry said. He quoted from Rahman's speech:
"'We don't want to see them in Baghdad or in Iraq any more. We want to see them coming home in body bags. We want to see their blood running in the streets of Baghdad and Fallujah.
"We want to see the Mujahideen shoot down their planes like the way they shoot down birds. We want to see their tanks burnt, just like we burn their flags.'"
The speech went on: "We want to see their freedoms destroyed. We want to see all of them removed from Muslim land. Oh, Allah don't leave any of them alive in Iraq, don't leave any of them alive in Afghanistan, don't leave any of them standing in France."
#5
"What he said was this: 'Oh Allah, we want to see another 9/11 in Iraq, another 9/11 in Denmark, another 9/11 in Spain, in France, all over Europe. Oh Allah, destroy all of them, Amen,'" Perry said, describing the remarks as a reference to the September 11 2001 attacks in the United States that killed 3,000 people.
"Bomb, bomb France. Bomb, bomb France. Nuke, nuke France. Nuke, nuke France,'" he quoted him as saying, adding that the reference to France may have been prompted by a French newspaper reprinting the Danish cartoons.
And yet the prosecuter feels obliged to say:
"I wish to make it clear that this case is not a trial of Muslims. Islam is not on trial," Prosecutor David Perry said
While this individual's official capacity forces him to say this, the rest of Britain had better wake up, and quick. This is what awaits further intrusion by Muslims into the European societies. Everywhere there is a concentration of Muslims, somehow this sort of extremism manifests.
Connect the dots or not, Britain, at your own peril. This maggot needs to die, quickly and mysteriously. All who exhort this sort of mass murder need to be offed in rapid succession. This must be seen as the cost of doing business inciting against the West.
#6
Zenster: Imagine just for a moment if the "West" had really been united on September 12,2006.
Had Western Civ. been united on 9-12-01 we'd be celebrating the successful quarantine of the cancer on 9-12-06 and looking forward to a sweep by Repubs on Nov. 7th. But that would be an alternate history.
Posted by: Mark Z ||
11/04/2006 14:03 Comments ||
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#7
Imagine just for a moment if the "West" had really been united on September 12,2006.
France especially, but Europe's flirtation with the Eurabia Code (or EAD - Euro Arab Dialogue) in general prevented such unity and makes me reluctant to have sympathy for them. Sadly, we will probably have to pull their stones out of the fire once again, but this time any assist by the USA must come at the price of abolishing socialism throughout Europe.
Britains Prince Charles returned home on Friday after his first ever visit to Pakistan where he called for harmony among different religions, officials said. Charles, who arrived in the capital Islamabad on October 29 along with his wife Camilla, toured different parts of the country, and recently travelled to Azad Kashmir to meet survivors of last years deadly earthquake. On Thursday, Charles addressed a gathering of Muslims, Sikhs and Christians at the sprawling residence of Punjabs governor. He said people of all faiths need greater understanding that will bring greater tolerance.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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Will Camilla's clit be accompanying them? I hope they had a fine time.
Mother Russia is also turning out to be the mother of all arms sellers.
The former Cold War superpower, where crusading journalists and anti-corruption bankers are regularly bumped off gangland style and the rule of law has become a joke, has just been designated the leading exporter of arms in 2005 to developing countries by a report issued by the Congressional Research Service, a branch of the US Congress. According to the report, China, India and Iran are Russias best customers for its booming arms industry which took in $1.6 billion more than 2004 to reach $7 billion in sales to developing nations. American arms sales occupied third spot behind second-place France. Surprise! Surprise! Gollie!
But it is Russias supplying of weapons to rogue countries like Iran and Venezuela that is causing friction with America. Sadly, Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose outward democratic façade hides the heart of the former Cold War KGB official that he once was, sees nothing wrong with arming nations that have made no secret of their intent to use them against their neighbors and to destabilize their regions. Russian arms have also been used against American forces and allies, making one wonder with friends like Russia, who needs enemies?
#1
Russkies are just as ruthless at capitalism as any American corporation. What I believe is really worrisome is that they have probably already sold functional nukes to these Arabs. They could demand any price they want, into billions. The camel drivers have the cash and would gladly pay up. I think this clamor over nuclear power is nothing but cover for Russkies(and another money maker, as Russkies sell the power plants). The fact that you have the ingredents doesn't mean you can make a functional bomb. If you have a Russian bomb, you have a winner. But Russians want their cover protected.
#2
Imagine the Russians succeed in arming Iran with nukes. Now imagine the Chechyens getting their hands on one from the Iranians. Sit back and enjoy the show.
#3
if the chechens did nuke russia they wouldn't give a sbhit unless someone big got it. What I mean is loom at some of the stuff the chechens have pulled off in the last few years and mother russia still can't save themself , and can't figure out that all the arms that the chechens use are usually mad ein russia or an ex soviet state
#4
One of the more common or routine interpretations of Saddam's infamous "MOTHER OF ALL BATTLES" quote on the Net was as "decisive battle" or "battle/war of annihilation" whereupon it was the USA-West whom would be destroyed. However, as myself and others had also warned, Saddam's comment could also be interpreted as the beginning or birth of war(s) or [decisive?]battles for the desired destabilization and hoped-for eventual destruction of the USA-West. GOOD DIALECTICISTS = POWER/MEDIA WHORES = WAFFLELISTS/CRATS > ONE = ANY = ALL = NONE, of the above. The burden is on the USA-West to save and justify both SECULAR SOCIALISM + RADICAL ISLAM, etal -isms, AFORE WE VOLUNTARILY = FORCIBLY ARE MADE = CHOOSE TO SURRENDER TO SAME.
This story lands in today's "very cool, yet very scary" category - South Korea develops a machine-gun equipped robotic sentry. The sentry robot is equipped with two cameras, one for day-time and one for infrared night vision, zooming capabilities, a speaker for notifying the intruder of inpending death, sophisticated pattern recognition to detect the difference between humans and trees, and a 5.56mm machine-gun.
The robots, co-developed between Samsung and Korea University, are expected to sell for $200,000 USD and will be available late in 2007. The South Korean government plans to deploy these friendly reminders on the border between South and North Korea, to further ease relations between the countries. Or, maybe it's the other way around.
You can also see more pictures and video of the robot on this roughly translated page. This line especially caught my attention: " ... the person the form recognition equipment to analyze the shedding of blood and a feature of the mobile object." Let's just hope that Google was especially bad at translating today.
I imagine that all of the World's Evil Leaders with secret Bad-Guy hideouts are licking their lips.
#10
Didn't I hear about this same idea proposed for our new "Border Fence" with Mexico?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
11/04/2006 18:18 Comments ||
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#11
Nothing so spectacular here. Some additions on the pattern recognition and the speaker, but that is about it. The US has already deployed several hundred remote weapon stations on vehicles (Styker, HMMWV's). The SWORDS system is a remote weapon platform mounted on the TALON robot, which is ready to go although the robotics boys in Hunstville are a bit concerned since it was developed at ARDEC and not JPO. Mapsands is the border system referenced. It too uses remote weapons if the customer so desires (something I strongly encourage of course!)
The Pentagon has stepped up planning for attacks against North Korea's nuclear program and is bolstering nuclear forces in Asia, said defense officials familiar with the highly secret process.
The officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the accelerated military planning includes detailed programs for striking a North Korean plutonium-reprocessing facility at Yongbyon with special operations commando raids or strikes with Tomahawk cruise missiles or other precision-guided weapons.
The effort, which had been under way for several months, was given new impetus by Pyongyang's underground nuclear test Oct. 9 and growing opposition to the nuclear program of Kim Jong-il's communist regime, especially by China and South Korea.
A Pentagon official said the Department of Defense is considering "various military options" to remove the program.
"Other than nuclear strikes, which are considered excessive, there are several options now in place. Planning has been accelerated," the official said.
A second, senior defense official privy to the effort said the Bush administration recently affirmed its commitment to both South Korea and Japan that it would use U.S. nuclear weapons to deter North Korea, now considered an unofficial nuclear weapon state.
"We will resort to whatever force levels we need to have, to defend the Republic of Korea. That nuclear deterrence is in place," said the senior official, who declined to reveal what nuclear forces are deployed in Asia.
Other officials said the forces include bombs and air-launched missiles stored at Guam, a U.S. island in the western Pacific, that could be delivered by B-52 or B-2 bombers. Nine U.S. nuclear-missile submarines regularly deploy to Asian waters from Washington state.
The officials said one military option calls for teams of Navy SEALs or other special operations commandos to conduct covert raids on Yongbyon's plutonium-reprocessing facility.
The commandos would blow up the facility to prevent further reprocessing of the spent fuel rods, which provides the material for developing nuclear weapons.
A second option calls for strikes by precision-guided Tomahawk missiles on the reprocessing plant from submarines or ships. The plan calls for simultaneous strikes from various sides to minimize any radioactive particles being carried away in the air.
Planners estimate that six Tomahawks could destroy the reprocessing plant and that it would take five to 10 years to rebuild.
Asked about the strike planning, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the U.S. government is seeking a "peaceful, diplomatic solution" to the threat posed by North Korea.
Regarding any military options, Mr. Whitman said, "The U.S. military is prepared and capable of carrying out all of its assigned missions."
The planning does not mean that the United States will attack, only that military forces are ready to do so if President Bush orders strikes. Concerned about threats from rogue states such as North Korea, Mr. Bush called for a ballistic missile defense system, parts of which are operational.
Defense officials said a key factor in the ramped-up planning effort is China's new attitude toward North Korea. Beijing's leaders, upset that North Korea conducted the test, supported a U.S.-led United Nations' resolution.
Chinese opposition to military action had limited defense planning, the officials said. In the past, U.S. military plans required warning Beijing, a move considered likely to compromise any planned action because of the close military ties between China and North Korea.
The Bush administration regards the new level of Chinese support as a "green light" for more aggressive military planning.
U.S. officials think North Korea will conduct another underground test soon because Pyongyang is demanding to be recognized as a declared nuclear power. Both China and the U.S. gauged the test as only partially successful.
The Yongbyon plant, 32 miles from the coast and a half-mile from a river, is considered a key target because U.S. intelligence agencies suspect that it is where the plutonium fuel used in the Oct. 9 test was produced.
Defense planners also said equipment destroyed at Yongbyon would be difficult to replace once newly approved U.N. sanctions are in place.
Another set of targets could be the nuclear test site near Kilchu, in northeastern North Korea. That site includes several research and testing-control facilities in the mountains -- and possibly one more tunnel where a nuclear device could be set off, the officials said.
Recent intelligence reports also provided new information about Pyongyang's uranium-enrichment program, which remains hidden in underground facilities in northern North Korea, the officials said.
The U.S. Special Operations Command has been planning raids against North Korean nuclear facilities for some time. It has conducted training for joint operations with South Korean special forces as well as unilateral U.S. operations.
U.S. Pacific Command spokesman Capt. Jeff Alderson declined to comment on military planning but said the command is continuing to shift forces to the Pacific and has four missile-defense ships deployed in Japan.
Mr. Bush said recently that any transfer of nuclear weapons by North Korea would be a "grave threat," phrasing viewed as diplomatic code for a military response. Defense officials said the military option will be used if North Korea is caught transferring nuclear arms to other states or terrorist groups.
#1
Oh dear! You mean to tell us the Pentagon has contingency plans and actually updates them when the situation changes? Next you'll be telling us the military is capable of killing people and blowing up stuff. It all sounds so mean.
#2
Now we see the rationale behind the US forwarding it's bases to further south of Seoul! That city will be blitzkrieged,missile assaulted and mortared like a 'bat outta hell'. Such an assault by the Norks could only be stopped by B52, and or B2 'Carpet Bombing', 100's of cruise missiles or a tactical nuclear buffer zone laid down like they did with Napalm in the Vietnam war!
#3
Sad that most, if not all, of the Chinese techs are no longer needed in the killzones. It would be fun to set the dragon's tail on fire at the same time. Oh well, we can always blind their new satellites for entertainment, I guess.
#4
WId assorted US Radicals calling for demonstrations + armed violence iff and when the GOP allegedly steals another US elex from the Dems, nothing is likely to happen until after Nov 7th when NETTERS > anticipating both IRAN = NORTH KOREA will formally announce their indigens/domestic nuke capabilities are more stronger and improved than thought. Don't forget about TAIWAN and the escalating GEORGIA crisis, etc. HOWIE DEAN has already said or inferred that Amer policies will not change = status quo even iff the Dems win one or both chambers of Congress, espec the House. IOW, THE DEMS ARE RANTING AGZ DUBYA-GOP IN ORDER TO MAKE LITTLE TO NO CHANGES TO DUBYA-GOP POLICIES.
#5
I'll repeat a former commitment that I've made here before. Should Bush find the courage to bomb North Korea's nuclear program out of existence, I'll cheerfully and enthusiastically defend his actions against all comers. I will protest in the streets against any attempts to impeach him and do my best to dissuade everyone I know from supporting such a misdeed. Ditto with Iran. If Bush can summon sufficient fortitude to nail both of these extreme enemies, he may quite possibly overcome any negative perceptions that history might otherwise hold against him. Such actions might even put him into a category of greatness not seen for many decades. Only later generations will ever have any proper comprehension of the incredible peril we currently face.
Iran's and North Korea's weapon programs collectively represent the most destabilizing activities in this world today. They are only remotely rivaled by Saudi Arabia's funding and Pakistan's indoctrination of terrorists.
SEOUL - North Korea on Saturday said Japan should not attend six-party nuclear disarmament talks after Japanese officials reportedly said Tokyo would not recognize the communist country as a nuclear-armed state.
"Hah! You call that a nuke little man? Betcha you can't do it again!"
It is the view of the DPRK (North Korea) that since the US attends the six-party talks, there is no need for Japan to participate in them as a local delegate, a spokesman of its foreign ministry said. Because it is no more than a state of the US and it is enough for Tokyo just to be informed of the results of the talks by Washington, he was quoted as saying by Pyongyangs official Korean Central News Agency.
Japanese leaders behaved impudently after Pyongyangs announcement, asserting that Japan cannot accept North Koreas return to the six-party talks as a nuclear-armed state, the spokesman said.
Guess they didn't like being laughed at over their fizzle.
The Japanese authorities have thus clearly proved themselves that they are political imbeciles incapable of judging the trend of the situation and their deplorable position.
"You're just imbeciles, imbeciles we say! Can't you see how manly we are? Imbeciles!"
The DPRK (North Korea) has never asked Japan to participate in the six-party talks. In fact, it was displeased with Japans participation in the six-party talks, but has properly treated it, taking the relations with other participating countries into consideration, the spokesman said.
"Especially the relations with China."
The new administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe must have a lot of work to do, he said. It had better, therefore, mind its own business instead of poking its nose into the work of the talks to its inconvenience.
"Bunch of nosy-parkers!"
It would be much better for Japan to refrain from participating in the six-party talks and less attendants would be not bad for making the talks fruitful, he added.
Wonder if the original spittle guy got released from a 'workers' camp?
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Chinese maps + schoolbooks say NORTH KOREA = KOREAS is part of China, thus Pyongyang wants Tokyo to believe Pyongyang is acting unilaterally + independent of the Chicoms.
#5
Kimmie is a dumb little runt, but probably now realizes he has royally pissed off the Rising Sun. He maybe thought he could back them off if he showed them how powerful he was with his nukes. Another backfire. And, if Japanese haven't assembled an inventory of their own yet,this act of stupidity by Kimbo may have pushed them to the starting point.
#6
Japanese officials reportedly said Tokyo would not recognize the communist country as a nuclear-armed state.
OK, you want to be recognized for your Nuclear skills, we'll get Japan to consider a Midget, Malformed Ambasador about one tenth normal size to negotiate.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
11/04/2006 18:45 Comments ||
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A MELBOURNE grandmother has accused Muslim cleric Sheik Taj el-Din el-Hilaly of inciting racial hatred and of sexual discrimination.
Elaine Davidson made her complaint against the "divisive" mufti to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission this week.
Mrs Davidson said she was deeply offended by el-Hilaly's reported comments in a service last month that claimed immodestly dressed women invited rape and were like "uncovered meat".
"I'm a white, Western woman of high morals and I was offended," she said, adding that she wants a personal apology and may take civil action against the mufti.
"I'm not doing this to be vindictive or anything else. As a woman I'm just sick of this man mouthing off.
"He's making sweeping generalisations. Anyone who's not a Muslim woman or of his ethnic origin is being hurled into this melting pot of meat thrown to the cats."
Mrs Davidson, 52, a recreational health lecturer from Melbourne's outer east who specialises in sexual health issues, said she had complained verbally to the commission. She would reinforce it with a letter this week.
"I am incensed, disgusted, offended and I feel internally brutally bashed by him," she said. "He has incited racial, religious and sexual hatred.
"It's a human rights issue. I need to be protected as an Australian woman."
The mufti's Sydney friend, Keysar Trad, said the cleric "did not address the comments to her (Mrs Davidson), did not make them about her".
#4
The mufti's Sydney friend, Keysar Trad, said the cleric "did not address the comments to her (Mrs Davidson), did not make them about her".
Still doesn't get it. Or doesn't want to. Or more likely wants non-muslims to just shut up and go away so he can go back to preaching his too-common brand of psychotic $hit. Hey, if such words do the trick it's a cheap win, so why not! Jihad at its finest.
I think it's telling when one culture starts trying to use excuses like this to justify their actions to another. Tells you a lot about the mentality the Mufti is used to dealing with, doesn't it?
And they wonder why they're getting such a hard time!
Hint: It's only going to get worse as the pattern continues and Westerners internalize what's going on!
#6
The mufti's Sydney friend, Keysar Sosa Trad, said the cleric "did not address the comments to her (Mrs Davidson), did not make them about her".
Actually, the Mufti was not addressing Ms. Davidson specifically. He was talking about all women, especially Western women.
More important is precisely who al-Hilali was addressing. His sermon was delivered in Arabic inside of the Lakemba mosque during Friday prayers. He was not addressing Australians and his speech was most definitely not for public consumption, elsewise he would have made it in public.
Al-Hilali's speech was for the ummah's consumption only and crafted for the explicit purpose of inciting rape and general hatred against non-Muslim Australians, women in particular. This is a common Islamic terrorist strategy of placing the most defenseless and vulnerable members of a host culture at risk.
This asshole is nothing but another damned terrorist and needs to be jailed for a prolonged period of time prior to being deported, preferrably in a coffin. Let his bones rot elsewhere.
Rape victim defends embattled sheik November 04, 2006 12:00
Brilliant PR strategy from the Lebanese Muslim Association. It just goes to show what we are up against. F*ing bastards these Islamofascist gits are. But they are masters of spin doctoring and it is in the media that the war is won and lost. They are flogging us.
I wonder where they dug this alleged rape victim from, if indeed she was ever raped. Disgusting. Especially in light of the fact a victim of the gang rapes carried out by muslim pakistanis and lebs from southwest sydney in the Lakemba Mosque catchment area came out and told off the Sheik and said he had effectively incited the crime committed on her body.
A WOMAN who described herself as a rape victim today defended the mufti of Australia, Sheik Taj al-Din al-Hilaly, saying his controversial comments did not mean he justified rape. In fact he said he would lock up rape victims in prison as they were partly responsible for thier own rape. He said it was their fault as if they were 'in their home, in their room, in their hijab' it would not have occurred. Useful idiotCindy Taylor walked with the sheik down the steps of Sydney's Lakemba Mosque after prayers today, before speaking to reporters. Sheik's PR machine leaps into action
The sheik has been at the centre of controversy since likening immodestly dressed women to uncovered meat and suggesting they invited sexual assault.
Ms Taylor said she understood what the sheik had tried to say, and called on Australians to be more open-minded. Open your mind to the idea that if you don't wear the hijab, 'you're asking for it'. Open your minds to the idea that women are not equals with the right to refuse sex.
"He was not being politically correct. But, he's not a politician, he's a philosophical leader," she said. Who leads 5000 muslims many of whom participated in gang rapes specifically targetting non-Muslim 'aussie sluts', the attitude they learned in the mosque.
"He's a wonderful man and his analogy certainly did not justify the act of rape. No, it did not justify it, it excused it and blamed the victim. Two different things.
"He believes that the act of rape is one of the worst capital crimes in Islam." for which he believes the victim must be punished
Ms Taylor said she had been raped twice, when she was 14 and 30, but no one was ever charged. got any evidence?
Four witnesses? No? Gather the stones.
She said was raised a Christian who had developed an interest in Islam. Islamic female to the rescue
Sheik al-Hilaly yesterday said he would resign if an impartial panel found him guilty of inciting rape. More islamic females on the jury? Direct incitement, no. Providing the cultural background and attitude behind it? Yes. Creating a culture of disrespect for non-Muslim women? yes. Blaming the victim for rape? yes.
#5
She believes the rapes (if any) were her fault adn the Imam is right.
Those who don't report rapes often feel (incorrectly) that they did something to provoke the attack. Years of self-hate, guilt and fear follow. Sounds like this miss is oneof them. She'll embrace Halily explanation as confirming her own fears.
#8
Pshaw, Angie. Self-deprecation is just another of the devastatingly appealing traits of the RB Amazons, lol. We RB myns (Trogs? heh) know you're all gorgeous, sweet, smart, deadly, and waay too modest. Ranger Up!
#9
sounds like the Ms. was never raped to me and found herself a platform for 15 minutes of fame. I think we need to give her 30 minutes instead.
As a woman, I do not think her comments should be left unchallenged. She needs to show some proof of prior rapes or be called on this PR stunt.
All women need to be concerned by what is transpiring. Gang rape is becoming a Muslim weapon of war in western societies. This woman is helping to excuse Hilaly and to minimize the horror of these crimes for the individuals who experience them.
If she wants to be a PR symbol, we women should allow her to become one, but not to excuse rape - but to expose the danger that Hilaly creates for all western women.
Australias top Muslim cleric vowed to retire from religion and tape his mouth for six months if an ethical court he proposed on Friday finds him guilty of inciting rape. The Mufti of Australia, Sheik Taj Aldin al-Hilali, made the unusual pledge as he came under intense pressure to resign over comments comparing scantily-clad women to uncovered meat inviting sexual attack. But he stopped short of stepping down from the post of mufti immediately, offering to go only if a better replacement can be found and invited the panel of imams that oversees the post to seek nominations for a new mufti.
The controversial cleric called for an ethical court to be assembled to decide whether he was guilty of denigrating women or inciting rape in a sermon that caused a divisive national religious row. If the court ruled against him, Hilali said in a statement he would withdraw from religious activity and place masking tape on his mouth in public for a period of six months to discipline the offending feature. The cleric said he would also carry out 600 hours of community service for a womens cause as punishment if he is found guilty. The court, that he stipulated must be made up of an impartial judge, two lawyers and two interpreters, should listen to the sermon he gave at Sydneys Lakemba mosque before making up their minds.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
I'll go along with it. As long as it's 3" wide duct tape at all times over his mouth. And nose.
#2
comments comparing scantily-clad women to uncovered meat inviting sexual attack.
That's not quite right. He didn't say scantily clad women. He was not referring to women dressed like hookers.
He referred to any woman not in her hijab. He was declaring all non Muslim women fair game for Muslim rapists. He was absolving Muslim men of responsibility for violent crime, blaming the victim and instilling the fear that Muslim imperialist have always found so useful in cowing or converting recalcitrant populations.
This is not a discreet argument over the law enforcement or proper dress. This is jihad- the spread of Islam through violence and the threat of violence against non-Muslims.
Posted by: Baba Tutu ||
11/04/2006 0:39 Comments ||
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#3
It's a lie
He'll never shut up
He'll object to Kaffir's or non-Muslim rape victims on the jury, Muslims will of course find him innocent then he's vindicated
Oh, love the touch of giving a bunch of flowers to the female police officer.
That's right, Sheik. Doesn't matter if you incite rape, women forgive everything with a bunch of flowers because we're *stupid* and *subhuman* like that.
F*wit.
And Baba Tutu: GOOD POINT. This sentence is annoying me in the media at the moment. He said rape was the fault of the woman, and that if she had been 'in her home, in her room, in her burqa' there would have been 'no problem'. And he specifically referenced the 65 year jail sentence Bilal Skaf got for the Muslim gang rapes of non-Muslim "aussie sluts".
#4
Pure unadulterated 100% gold plated crocodile tears. Y'all have already hit the high points. Thank you for doing the heavy lifting. The only cure for this asshole involves high velocity lead.
#6
This is a man who basically called for the rape of any woman not wearing a hijab. The Muslim's hope that the Australian government will take care of it for them. The world is noticing that they are incapable of taking care of it themselves.
#9
You're guilty. I would suggest taping your mouth, your eyes, bagging your head, then inserting a blasting cap up your ass. When it detonates, we won't have to hear from you again.
LONG before he was arrested in Yemen this week, Marek Samulski was suspected by intelligence services of keeping bad company. The 35-year-old Sydney web-designer of Polish extraction, commonly known as Abdul Malik, was boarding a plane at Sydney airport with his wife and children in August 2004 when ASIO officers swooped. "Malik's good looks and winning smile earned him an interview with the Anal Surveillance Investigation Officers," his angry wife Raygana later wrote. "They gave me mine and the children's passports and told me these were 'good' (but) they took Malik for questioning for about 30-45 minutes."
ASIO eventually let him board the flight, but it seems Samulski did not take the hint. Now he finds himself alone in a jail cell in Yemen - a captive of raids that have netted two other Australians and at least two senior al-Qa'ida figures alleged to have been plotting to import arms into Somalia. But the raids have also unearthed an extraordinary and disturbing network of "noodle-nation" links between senior terror figures in Australia and overseas.
Hutchison, a convert to hardline Islam, has had her passport revoked at ASIO's request after trips to Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, where she is suspected of rendezvous with extremists.
The two men arrested alongside Samulski in Yemen were none other than Mohammed and Abdullah Ayub -- the sons of the notorious Abdul Rahim Ayub, the former head of Jemaah Islamiah's Australian terror cell. It turns out that the mother of the two boys and former wife of Ayub is Rabiyah Hutchison, one of the most closely watched women in Australia. Hutchison, a convert to hardline Islam, has had her passport revoked at ASIO's request after trips to Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, where she is suspected of rendezvous with extremists. Hutchison is believed to have befriended Melbourne man "Jihad" Jack Thomas and his wife shortly before Thomas travelled on his ill-fated trip to South Asia in 2001 - a trip that led him to be charged with terrorism-related offences. "Hutchison got into the head of Jack Thomas and his wife when they were living in Sydney," one source told The Weekend Australian yesterday.
Among Hutchison's friends is another Australian convert, Melanie Brown, the wife of jailed French terror suspect Willie Brigitte.
The husband of Hutchison's eldest child Rahma is Khaled Cheikho, who is in a NSW prison awaiting a commital hearing on terrorism charges. Among Hutchison's friends is another Australian convert, Melanie Brown, the wife of jailed French terror suspect Willie Brigitte, and one of the key links between al-Qa'ida and several people in Sydney and Melbourne accused of terrorist offences.
Like Hutchison,
Samulski converted to Islam for love - so he could marry his South African Muslim girlfiend, Raygana Toefy, in 1992.
Samulski converted to Islam for love - so he could marry his South African Muslim girlfiend, Raygana Toefy, in 1992. But his converison to the radical brand of Islam came a while after Hutchison's. A long-time friend said yesterday that up until September 11, 2001, Samulski had not been particularly religious. "For many years, he wasn't a strict Muslim; I can't ever remember him going to the mosque," said the friend, who asked not to be named. "But I do remember that around the time of September 11, he and his wife started acting differently."
She began wearing a burka and he started attending the mosque regularly. Soon after she had their third child in 2004, they moved to Yemen. "We were surprised they left so quickly; they didn't even say goodbye," the friend said.
She was intent on moving the family to Yemen so that their children could be taught the way of Islam.
Mrs Samulski seemed to have a strong influence over her husband and her beliefs were more radical. "Marek was a nice guy, very friendly, but his wife was a bit unusual," the friend said. "She was intent on moving the family to Yemen so that their children could be taught the way of Islam."
So how did this network of extremists come to be exposed by events across the other side of the world? The answers lie inside a red-brick apartment building in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa, in a radical district just outside al-Islam University, which was home to the three Australians arrested this week. For six months, British and American spies had the building and two of its occupants under close watch. The furtive activities of a young British citizen and a firebrand Dane convinced them a terror plot was being hatched. Any new friends, or visitors, were scrutinised, such as the three young Australians who appeared on the scene some time in late September.
In the early hours of October 17, the operation was shattered by a Yemeni secret police raid that swept up all eight foreigners living in the building and at least 12 other men across Yemen. Yemeni authorities insist they dismantled an al-Qa'ida cell and disrupted a gun-running ring to neighbouring Somalia.
The trio -- the Ayub brothers and the Polish-born Samulski -- initially didn't fit the bill as terror suspects. The men the spies had been watching were strongly connected to ranking al-Qa'ida members. The newcomers didn't seem to be. But in the early hours of October 17, the British-led operation was shattered by an unexpected Yemeni secret police raid that swept up all eight foreigners living in the building and at least 12 other men across Yemen. Yemeni authorities insist they dismantled an al-Qa'ida cell and disrupted a gun-running ring to neighbouring Somalia.
The three weeks since have exposed much of the progress and many of the shortcomings in the Western efforts to collaborate with the Arab world in the war on terror. Yemen, a hotbed of radicalism in eastern Arabia and home to a steadily rising tide of militant Salafi Islamic beliefs, has long been a priority target for Western intelligence. But it has also been a surprisingly recalcitrant partner in getting the job done collectively.
Abu Atiq was allegedly an associate of two of the September 11 hijackers and a protege of the virulently anti-Western Salafi cleric and head of Islamic studies at al-Islam, Abdul al-Majid al-Zindani.
The US Central Intelligence Agency and Britain's MI6 are still fuming that their operation was blown. The man at the centre of the arrests is believed to be a senior Somali al-Qa'ida figure from the Horn of Africa states of Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia, who is known by the alias al-Ansar. As significant a figure as he is, the key to the raids appears to be a Yemeni known as Abu Atiq, who was arrested about six weeks before the October 17 swoop. Abu Atiq was allegedly an associate of two of the September 11 hijackers and a protege of the virulently anti-Western Salafi cleric and head of Islamic studies at al-Islam, Abdul al-Majid al-Zindani, who the US wants arrested on terror charges. But Atiq's biggest claim to notoriety is his alleged role in a foiled al-Qa'ida plot to bomb oil and gas facilities in Yemen.
All the men worshipped at a nearby Salafi mosque, in a dusty, downtrodden district with red-stone ramshackle houses, skittish, scruffy children and burka-clad women. When The Weekend Australian inquired about the Ayubs and Samulski, a man with a flowing ginger beard, selling perfume and soap, waved us down the road to the honey vendor. He passed us on to the skull-capped youths in the Islamic bookshop. The Salafis of Sanaa are a secret society within a culture that fears direct questioning from strangers or authority figures -- and with good reason. The secret police and Government Intelligence Service play a powerful role in Yemen, especially among groups like the Salafis, who are seen as a subversive threat to the regime. Many have ended up in the Central Security Prison in Sanaa.
It is here that the Australians are being held, in separate cells and without visitors. The Australian consul from the embassy in Riyadh is yet to be granted access to any of the men and British embassy staff in Sanaa were only allowed one fleeting visit before the Australian official arrived to take carriage. Mohammed Ayub celebrated his 19th birthday alone in his cell yesterday. Abdullah Ayub turned 21 in a nearby cell on October 21.
Locals in Sanaa insist, perhaps apocryphally, that the two stories of the complex above ground sit atop eight stories underground, where torture rooms and darkened cells are often used. Whether or not people are tortured here, Western officials and aid groups are adamant that torture is regularly used in Yemen on terror suspects, or political prisoners. With their infamous father and firebrand mother, the Ayub brothers are likely to be treated with caution by the Yemenis. And with scant consular access, the Australians may know little of their fate. The future may be more promising for Samulski, with Yemeni officials indicating he may be released soon, although Raygana has not been permitted to see him in prison.
In a blog in 2004, she speaks of her family's excitement about moving to Yemen, where they planned to learn Arabic and immerse themselves in Islam. "What I love about Yemen is the fact that everyone prays (and) there are many mosques within walking distance of our home," she writes.
Posted by: Fred ||
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ABDUL Rahman Ayub is a worried man, but he is adamant he has left his terrorist past behind. The Indonesian preacher, who along with twin brother Abdul Rahim Ayub headed the Australian chapter of regional terror network Jemaah Islamiah, says he has long renounced the radical teachings of former mentor Abu Bakar Bashir. The pair have also washed their hands of Abdul Rahim's sons, Mohammad and Abdullah Ayub, who were arrested in Yemen last month on terrorism charges.
They accuse Abdul Rahim's former wife, Australian woman Rabiyah Hutchison, of turning two "sweet, cute boys" into hardliners eager to create a Muslim caliphate by any means.
And they accuse Abdul Rahim's former wife, Australian woman Rabiyah Hutchison, of turning two "sweet, cute boys" into hardliners eager to create a Muslim caliphate by any means.
However, for the past four years, after long sojourns in Australia marshalling the faithful, they have kept their heads down in Jakarta, anxious to evade the scrutiny of authorities and, they claim, former religious compatriots who would like to see them come to a rough end. They even believe that Indonesia's National Intelligence Bureau, or BIN, could cause problems for them if they speak out.
Abdul Rahman, a genial, bearded character with a quick smile, arrived at a Jakarta Pizza Hut restaurant yesterday to explain why he and his identical twin had avoided the eye of Australian and Indonesian investigators keen to probe their involvement in terror atrocities such as the 2002 Bali bombing.
Abdul Rahman was deported from Australia months before the JI attack, after having his bid for refugee status rejected, and Abdul Rahim fled just days after it, attending a JI planning meeting in Indonesia at which the Bali planners were also present.
Abdul Rahman was deported from Australia months before the JI attack, after having his bid for refugee status rejected, and Abdul Rahim fled just days after it, attending a JI planning meeting in Indonesia at which the Bali planners were also present. The men had spent several years living and preaching in Sydney and Perth, and raising money from the local Muslim community to send to community leaders including Bashir. Abdul Rahman denied any knowledge of this fundraising activity yesterday, insisting that "any money I collected was only for the poor. For myself, I know of nothing else".
They have also been accused of being a link to al-Qa'ida after Abdul Rahman spent several years in Afghanistan in the 1990s fighting the Soviet occupation alongside Osama bin Laden -- then "a mere foot soldier" in the resistance movement. He was also friends with terror mastermind Hambali, alias Riduan Isamuddin. "But should we be responsible for people we once used to be friends with?" Abdul Rahman said.
Just because I knew Hambali means nothing. People think that all the veterans from Afghanistan are the same, but it's just not true. In Afghanistan I organised taking care of orphans and giving them food, but on my return I'm somehow a terrorist.
"Just because I knew Hambali means nothing. People think that all the veterans from Afghanistan are the same, but it's just not true. In Afghanistan I organised taking care of orphans and giving them food, but on my return I'm somehow a terrorist."
Abdul Rahman said his brother had a message for his ex-wife: please call. "He wants to know how his sons are," he said.
Abdul Rahim, who has survived by running a general store then by teaching English, has disowned his sons because of their hardline ways, but is sorry for the breakdown in communication and wants his former wife to make an effort to get in touch. Ms Hutchison has a daughter, Rahma, from her first marriage to a Balinese man, which foundered before she moved into the circle of JI founder Abdullah Sungkar in the early 1980s. Abdul Rahman says he and his brother met her when the study group she was part of went to hear him preach in Jakarta. He knew she was a "hardliner" even then, but thought that her radical views would mellow. That turned out to be a false hope, but not before the union between her and his brother had produced Mohammad and Abdullah and a daughter, Aminah.
After years of silence, Ms Hutchison called Abdul Rahim after their sons' arrests in Yemen, on October 17, but received a curt "I don't know, and I don't want to know" from the man who feels that his boys -- now 19 and 21 -- were kept from him after the marriage ended in 1996. It is a response he regrets, according to Abdul Rahman, who says providing for family -- both men have six children, Abdul Rahim with a second wife -- is more important than any effort they might have previously engaged in to spread Islam.
Abdul Rahman earns money preaching at mosques and small gatherings -- including for employees of state airline Garuda -- after previous low-paid stints selling donuts from the back of a motorbike and hawking his own paintings of flowers and wildlife. He denies he has been in The Philippines in recent months training terrorists allied with JI and the Abu Sayyaf organisation.
He also insists the men have been slandered by association with JI and al-Qa'ida, and fear their income will be diminished as students stay away because of the latest revelations. Abdul Rahman earns money preaching at mosques and small gatherings -- including for employees of state airline Garuda -- after previous low-paid stints selling donuts from the back of a motorbike and hawking his own paintings of flowers and wildlife. He denies he has been in The Philippines in recent months training terrorists allied with JI and the Abu Sayyaf organisation. "Our former friends in Australia don't contact us any more, because they're frightened given what they hear about us in the news," Abdul Rahman said. "All these accusations, there is no actual proof, only assumptions."
Abdul Rahman remains angry at claims by jailed Australian terrorist Jack Roche that the brothers were involved in a plot to bomb targets including the Israeli embassy in Canberra, saying: "If he comes here (to Jakarta), I will fight him over this."
"Australia should know that it was us who forbade him from carrying out terrorist actions," he declares. "We said that if you do this thing, we will destroy your house. This action would also have been in opposition to the preaching of Abu Bakar Bashir, who declared that violence was forbidden in Australia."
He says he abandoned Bashir's teachings because they were too extreme. Even so, he pleads for understanding: "You have to look at it case by case. Not everyone in JI is a terrorist. For now, we just have to find ways to live, to provide for our children."
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
This entire clan of lowlife scum needs to be erased.
and the comment sez, in the botched, SMS style, MTV-illiterate french our youths use after going through public education :"lol, even Tf1 (NB : rival, "conservative" channel) airs it, 'coz they know we're against the war".
#2
As a matter of fact, canal+ and its "investigative" show (which presses all the buttons of its intender viewers, the neocons takeover of foreign policy, Ahnold-the-nazi, the dreaded evangelists, the dangers of unregulated freemarkets, etc, etc...) "Lundi investigation" was to show a reportage about the attack of the french base in abidjian, with a french helicopter supposedly firing with its autocannon in the crowd of the attackers.
These in-your-face Rebels chickened out, under pressure from the gvt, and bravely didn't show it... which is a good thing, because the whole story was apparently quite biased against the french army (C+ is very much anti-police, anti-army, anti anything that looks like France).
So, if they had the stones to air the video you refer to, they would, it's not they wouldn't want to do it to protect France's image.
The far-Right leader is benefiting from ghetto violence in the race for the presidency
Aged 78 but bursting for a new fight, Jean-Marie Le Pen, the leader of the far Right in France, yesterday savoured news that shook the main parties in the race for the presidency next spring: he is enjoying a surge of popularity. A poll by the CSA institute showed that 17 per cent of voters supported the chief of the National Front. This is eight points higher than the same period before the 2002 election, in which M Le Pen shocked Europe by coming second to Jacques Chirac.
M Le Pen, campaigning for the fifth time since 1974, has been insisting that he is heading for a bigger breakthrough than in 2002, when he won nearly 17 per cent of the vote in the first round. He is, he says, benefiting from public anger over immigration, ghetto violence and disgust with politicians. I am convinced that I will be in the second round, he said yesterday. The economic, financial and social position of the country will be much more serious . . . so I will benefit from the rejection of the governing parties. With typical bluster, the one-time paratrooper and 1950s MP told the weekly magazine VSD that he is not just preparing for another run-off he lost heavily to M Chirac in 2002. I want to govern, in order to apply my ideas. Everyone reproached me for talking about immigration . . . now everyone can see that this is the chief cause of the worrying events in our country, he said.
A repeat of the 2002 first-round result is unlikely because of the domination of two reform-minded favourites in their early fifties Ségolène Royal, of the Socialists, and Nicolas Sarkozy, the leader of the centre-right Union for a Popular Movement. Each is trying to appear tough on law and order and immigration M Le Pen s recruiting ground. The shine is fading from both candidates in the face of opposition from party rivals and M Le Pen is predicting that Sargolène and Ségozy, as he mockingly calls the duo, will fall before the final round, which will take place next May.
As in 2002, the Socialist candidate may be weakened by a fragmented field from the far Left, but M Le Pens biggest hope is that M Sarkozy stumbles. The Interior Minister has made inroads into the Le Pen electorate with his harsh rhetoric on illegal immigration and violence. President Chirac is indirectly helping M Le Pen by waging an underground campaign to undermine M Sarkozy, whom he loathes. He is encouraging Dominique de Villepin, the Prime Minister, and Michèle Alliot-Marie, the Defence Minister, to run against M Sarkozy. Both have indicated that they plan to do so.
As usual, the pariah status of M Le Pen has kept him out of the media, while polls have shown his popularity rising. I am like Zorro, he said. Everyone knows that I am there but no one sees me.
Renewed violence on the immigrant estates has been playing into the hands of M Le Pen. The spectre of another electoral hijacking has woken up the media this week as opinion polls reported support rising from 12 per cent to the higher teens. Stéphane Rozès, director of CSA, which carried out yesterdays poll for the newspaper Le Figaro, said that only one third of those saying that they would vote for M Le Pen represented extreme-right supporters. The rest were hardline conservatives and disillusioned voters who would vote in protest against the mainstream.
#1
Sarkozy, who is an immigrant from East Europe, has been held back in attacking the terrorist underground, by Chirac. He will probably win, but the left-Islamofascist alliance will harden if he moves against the so called social "safety net" which is destroying France.
Chirac's sandbagging of civil police has been a disgrace. It is no exaggeration to say that where a flic exercises self-defense against a Muslim aggressor, he is accused of Islamophobia. Another weekend, another 500 torched cars and minimal arrests. What a sick country.
Every article from the MSM with the word suprise, just highlights how completely unrepresentative and out of touch the journalistic classes really are.
#3
just highlights how completely unrepresentative and out of touch the journalistic classes really are.
I was forced to listen to NPR yesterday. I haven't had to do that for awhile. It truly amazed me how dishonest and out of touch the program was. Like a make-believe Mr. Rogers for the aging left.
#5
I am less afraid of what Le Pen may do to France in the short term, as usually such individuals seldom win enough plurality to have a mandate for radicalism, and so must temper their extremism.
However, I hope he wins for the odd reason that he will be a harsh blow to the European government. A nightmare to their socialism that they cannot ignore or threaten, like the right wing Prime Minister of Austria some years ago.
But, like US democrats, since they cannot resist publicly sneering at Le Pen, and the French people in general for electing him, it will be a big eye opener to the French public about the EU.
And the EU will take a giant step to becoming the new version of the HRE.
More than 300 people braved a bitter wind and freezing cold in downtown Edmonton Friday for a rally in support of Canadian troops in Afghanistan. The rally at Churchill Square is the first of what organizers promise will be weekly demonstrations dubbed Red Fridays.
Rachel Lambert, who helped organize the event, says the soldiers in Afghanistan need to know Canadians care. "We have a lot of veteran military members who sign on the dotted line willing to do a job that many of us wouldn't do," she said. "We need to support them 100 per cent because, as I said, they're doing a job to protect our freedoms here at home, whether you want to believe that they can accomplish that somewhere else or not."
A choir of children dressed in red T-shirts opened the event with O Canada. A key speaker at the event was Master Cpl. Paul Franklin, who lost his legs in a suicide bomb attack. "When you are on a mission you don't have to think about how Canadians support us," he told the crowd. "We know that if we head out those gates, that no matter what, Canadians across this land support what we do."
Asked by the Mounties if he were part of al-Qaeda, Abdullah Khadr responded, "No, I only buy and sell weapons for al-Qaeda." Over the course of five interviews with the RCMP last year, the 25-year-old terrorism suspect admitted that he "knows everybody" in al-Qaeda and ran guns for the organization to the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
But he also insisted that if any terrorist "had anything planned for Canada, I'd be the first one to stop it."
But he also insisted that if any terrorist "had anything planned for Canada, I'd be the first one to stop it."
The Crown this week released two volumes of interviews Mr. Khadr gave to the RCMP between the time he was detained in Pakistan in 2005 and was released to Canada last year. Days after he landed in Toronto, the U.S. government had him arrested and launched an extradition case against him.
Mr. Khadr, a Canadian citizen who grew up in Afghanistan, seems to have been forthcoming during long questioning sessions with police. His lawyers suggest, however, all of the testimony could be tainted by torture he said he suffered in Pakistan.
Mr. Khadr's statements give new insights into al-Qaeda and figures who have long been of interest to investigators, primarily himself and his family. "We are one of the most famous families in Afghanistan," he proudly told his interviewers.
Abdullah Khadr: The young man told the RCMP how
His father enlisted him in an Afghan training camp when he was just 14. He learned how to fire weapons and explode bombs.
his father enlisted him in an Afghan training camp when he was just 14. He learned how to fire weapons and explode bombs. Mr. Khadr said he began procuring weapons for al-Qaeda after the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. He said he bought guns and missile launchers and had a role in using a global-positioning-system unit to map co-ordinates for fighters who were later arrested for trying to kill Pakistan's Prime Minister in a missile attack. But he said he was an arms supplier, not a fighter. "I never, like, entered a battlefield."
His late father, Ahmed Said Khadr: Abdullah Khadr said his father was a proud man who founded Canadian Muslim student unions, went to Afghanistan to help orphans and became a long-time intimate of Osama bin Laden.
Following the 2001 U.S. invasion, the al-Qaeda leadership put the family patriarch in charge of a group of Arab resistance fighters in Logar region of Afghanistan.
Following the 2001 U.S. invasion, the al-Qaeda leadership put the family patriarch in charge of a group of Arab resistance fighters in Logar region of Afghanistan, Abdullah Khadr said. The Pakistani army killed Ahmed Said Khadr in 2003. "My father knows everybody in the [al-Qaeda] Top 10," he said at one point. But he insisted no funds from his father's charity work ever made their way to al-Qaeda.
Abdullah said his brother was never supposed to have been a fighter. He just disappeared one day after his father sent him toward the front lines.
His younger brother Omar: The teenager has been held in Guantanamo Bay since U.S. forces shot him in a 2002 battle in Afghanistan, during which Omar lobbed a grenade that killed a soldier. Abdullah said his brother was never supposed to have been a fighter. He just disappeared one day after his father sent him toward the front lines. "My father said Omar is translating."
His sister Zaynab: The Mounties have suggested they recovered al-Qaeda propaganda videos from her computer hard drive, but Abdullah insisted his sister is no terrorist. She's "patriotic," he said. "But I doubt she can do anything other than talk."
Osama bin Laden: The al-Qaeda leader told the Khadr family to "be happy, something is coming" prior to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, Abdullah said.
Amer El-Maati: This Canadian citizen, sought by the FBI as a terrorist, worked as a carpet salesmen after al-Qaeda refused to give him a pension, according to Abdullah. He said he last saw the man fighting in Afghanistan-Pakistan border regions in 2001. "But he can't do much due to a brain injury," Abdullah Khadr said. "He was in a car accident in 1992. He cannot walk for long hours." Amer El-Maati's brother, Ahmed, a truck driver jailed in the Middle East after being followed by the RCMP, is suing Ottawa for being complicit in his overseas torture.
The Hindy family: The RCMP questioned Abdullah Khadr about Aly Hindy, a controversial Toronto imam and long-time Khadr family friend. Abdullah Khadr recalled a late-1990s visit that the imam's son Ibrahim made to Afghanistan. "He came, he stayed one month in the Musab al-Surri camp, maybe one week less than a month." He said the teenager learned about weapons, including firing Kalshnikovs.
Mahmoud Jaballah: Abdullah Khadr said he knew him as "Abu Ahmed," and as an "Arabic tutor in Peshawar for one week. But to my knowledge he never fought on the front line."
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Sheesh. Classic Muzzy family affair. This guy has the IQ of a rock... and thinks the Mounties are even dumber.
#2
His lawyers suggest, however, all of the testimony could be tainted by torture he said he suffered in Pakistan.
I thought six-year olds couldn't be lawyers. Oh well, I learn something new every day.
.com: This guy has the IQ of a rock... and thinks the Mounties are even dumber.
All kidding aside, it sounds like he thinks this is some kind of joyride. This guy is in for a rude awakening if they put him in with the general population. Or maybe that's how they got him to sing in the first place . . . . :-)
#3
ok am i the only one who noticed that al queda didn't give the man a pension. who woulda thunk they would renig on their retirement plans . Bet this puts some thoughts into the heads about all those virgins
#5
Gawd, the Canucks have a revolting cesspool up there. He is as dumb as stone, luckily. I hope they find out WHERE this dumb twit was buying weapons for the rabble. After that, dispose as required.
#6
Long drop, short rope, some assembly required.
He's too dumb to have any real info.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
11/04/2006 12:36 Comments ||
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#7
No RedNeck Jim.
I think he would make excelent shark or marlin bait when fishing in the waters off gitmo. Esp if he is still thrashing about... Excelent live bait.
#8
Good alternative, I don't fish so I forgot about that.
How about trolling for Aligators in the River?
Good equivalent? Or too far north for self-respecting Aligators?
What's big, vicious and lives In the Great Frozen?
Got it, Wolf Bait.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
11/04/2006 14:24 Comments ||
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#9
What's big, vicious and lives In the Great Frozen?
Bears. Maybe we could get this mook to do a reenactment of that naturalist fellow that was eaten by the grizzlies in the North West.
A West Point Cadet sends this along with this photo.
I'm a cadet at West Point, and tonight at our game against the Air Force Academy, a big sign emerged, and it was shown to the Corps of Cadets, who cheered wildly, and then shown to the Air Force cadets, who also cheered.
Wow, who'd have thought that - "John Kerry bringing the armed services together..."
And the game was televised, too. Heh. Military families are PISSED at Kerry. Again.
PESHAWAR: Members of the NWFP Assembly on Friday marched from the Assembly Hall to the main entrance amid slogans of Allah-o-Akbar and al-jihad, al-jihad to protest against the army airstrike on a madrassa in Bajaur Agency and for showing solidarity with the people of the area.
The protesting MPAs, including the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) ministers Asif Iqbal Daudzai, Shah Raz Khan, Hafiz Akhtar Ali and Malik Zafar Azam, pledged to continue the war against the imperialist United States, which they said, was responsible for the killing of innocent Muslims across the world. The NWFP legislators shouted pro-Islamic revolution and anti-Musharraf and Bush slogans during the march.
The MMAs Maulana Muhammad Idrees, Farid Khan and Amanat Shah denounced a statement by the White House spokesman lauding President Musharraf for taking action against the madrassa. Its like rubbing salt in somebodys wounds, said Idrees while criticising the government role in the war against terrorism. Traffic on Khyber Road where the assemblys main entrance is located remained blocked for sometime as the protesting lawmakers made speeches.
Earlier, the MMAs Nadir Shah demanded adjournment of the session for the day to express solidarity with the people of Bajaur Agency and the families of the 80 people killed in the air raid. Shahs demand was backed by members of the Awami National Party (ANP).
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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PTV has telecast a report showing people being trained to carry out terrorist attacks and suicide bombings, at the madrassa in Bajaur that was raided recently. According to the PTV report, the madrassa was actually an arms training camp where training sessions were held in the night and early morning.
Photographs taken from infrared cameras showed that highly skilled experts were training men, according to the PTV report. The camp was run by Maulvi Faqir Muhammad and Maulvi Liaquat, and the trainees considered Bin Laden their leader, it said. Around 15 to 20 people were being initially trained at the camp, and their number then rose to about 100, it added. It said that there was proof these people were getting financial assistance from Al Qaeda and the Taliban. The madrassas academic session had ended by Ramazan, but it remained open after Eid, which suggested that people were being trained there, it said.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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The Sweet Water Canal was rendered nearly useless from neglect by Saddam Hussein's former administration. Photo courtesy USAID.BAGHDAD The United States Agency for International Development, better known around the world as USAID, is making drastic improvements to the Iraqi infrastructure and improving the quality of life for millions.
The agency maintains a myriad of projects at any given time, and spends millions of dollars to see them through from start to finish. Whether its improving Iraqi canals, ensuring local populations have clean drinking water or restoring city markets, the USAID footprint is prominent and welcome here.
One such undertaking was a massive project resulting in 1.75 million Basrah citizens gaining access to fresh drinking water. The aim: upgrade the Sweet Water canal to modern times.
The Sweet Water Canal, constructed in 1996 to supply water to Iraqis, pumps water to twenty-three plants around BasrahCity which treat and distribute water into the city. Saddam Husseins old regime neglected the operation, and hadnt conducted maintenance since 1999. This resulted in the facility operating at less than half its capacity, leaving more than 80 percent of the treated water unfit to drink.
USAID renovated and improved the Sweet Water Canal, which now provides safe drinking water to nearly two million Iraqis. Photo courtesy USAID.At a cost of almost $38 million, the entire system is being rehabilitated by USAID to return essential services to Iraq. The 240-kilometer canal, its two pump stations, two reservoirs, and fourteen water treatment stations are all being repaired and rehabilitated.
Work has included dredging and cleaning the canal and reservoirs, refurbishing pump stations, providing backup power sources, repairing canal embankments, and replacing worn and broken parts.
Some of the canal's water treatment stations date to 1932 and upkeep was minimal. The canal and its reservoirs were filled in places with up to two meters of sediment, and vegetation was growing on the surface. A lack of dredging reduced the effectiveness of the reservoirs, and the high solids content of the water increased wear on the pumps.
By mid-spring 2004, residents of Al Basrah saw substantial improvements in their water supply, and by summer the quality and volume of fully treated water will surpassed pre-war conditions.
Restoring Markets
The al Korea Market before USAID renovations. Photo courtesy USAID.Another crucial project was restoring the al Korea market in Kirkuk, which had fallen into disrepair. Once the center of the communitys economic life, the market had degenerated and become unsanitary.
USAID responded by helping the community revitalize this important business center. Together, USAID and local residents paved the market road, installed new sidewalks, and dug a drainage canal. The local community contributed over $10,000 to this $60,000 project.
Today, people of all ethnicities and religions purchase fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, and even used clothing at the market. It is now an attractive local gathering spot that makes shopping safer, pleasant, and fun.
The al Korea Market after USAID renovations. Photo courtesy USAID.USAIDS program works with local leaders to determine a communitys needs. With nearly 4,000 projects implemented to date, these communities are learning to achieve their goals by utilizing democratic tools.
Bringing Safe Water, Promoting Hygiene
For many displaced Iraqis in the Diyala and Sulaymaniyah provinces northeast of Baghdad, access to safe drinking water used to be limited. Unable to return home, they had to make do with the resources available in temporary settlements. Lack of access to safe water caused both health and hygiene problems.
Contaminated water causes sickness and disease often spread quickly in densely populated areas like the settlements. Also, without access to safe drinking water, it is difficult to maintain good hygiene.
The organization and its partners helped provide fresh water to displaced families and educate them about good hygiene. Now that water is available to many displaced families, they are staying healthy and are able to perform basic hygiene routines.
USAID offered hygiene education in 40 settlements in the two provinces. USAID supported training sessions for community members, teachers, water station caretakers, and religious leaders that aim to promote hygiene practices and prevent disease and water contamination.
At the end of training, participants returned to their settlements with important hygiene tips and advice. They worked with hygiene specialists to design appropriate programs and facilitated similar hygiene education sessions in their home communities.
By supporting community education efforts on water management, disease, personal hygiene, water contamination, and simple water treatment practices, USAID and its partners are improving the quality of life for displaced families in Iraq
#1
And guys like Tater will be the beneficiaries. That we do the work, supply the tech and gear, and the $$$, big hairy foreign-land skimmed and pilfered $$$, will mean zip, zilch, nada, a month later. For not blowing it up, the militias and the asshats will be thanked and credited and supported.
Lol, if you think being appreciated for your good deeds is forgotten waay too fast 'round here (e.g. NOLA), well in ArabLand, it is nigh unto instantaneous.
IRAQ is bracing itself for another surge of violence tomorrow, when Saddam Hussein is expected to be sentenced to death for crimes against humanity. Iraqs national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, told The Times that the central provinces of Baghdad, Diyala and Salahaddin would be placed under curfew. There are more security measures under consideration, he added.
Saddam, his half-brother Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, Taha Yassin Ramadan, his Vice President, and Awad al-Bandhar, a judge, face possible death sentences for the execution of 148 Shia villagers from the town of Dujail after a failed 1982 assassination attempt on the then Iraqi leader. Four others face lighter sentences. Saddam is likely to win the right to appeal against any death sentence.
The trial, which started a year ago, aimed to heal Iraqs wounds after Saddam and his Baath partys 35-year regime. Instead, it has become a symbol of Iraqs divisions, between the long-oppressed Shia majority, who now rule the country, and Saddams Sunnis. Clashes between them tomorrow could push Iraq over the edge.
Further over the edge, they mean...
Iraqi officials worry that Sunni insurgents will attack Shia communities when the high tribunal announces Saddams fate. Once they see their dictator being sentenced, at that historic moment, Im afraid they will escalate their attacks and mobilise, said Bassam Ridha, an adviser to the Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki. Mr Ridha fears that Sunni insurgents will attack Dujail because of residents testimony against Saddam during his trial.
Mr al-Maliki is to meet Iraqi and US officials today to make a final decision on tomorrows security measures. Iraqs Defence Minister yesterday cancelled all leave for soldiers. Abdul-Qader al-Obeidi was heard issuing the order in videotaped footage of a meeting between Mr al- Maliki and military and security officials, in which the Prime Minister upbraided them for failing to stop the capitals unbridled violence.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
$5 sez the IZ will NOT execute him. Doing so would require a willingness to take responsibility that very few hajjis have.
Posted by: N guard ||
11/04/2006 11:34 Comments ||
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#2
They'll have to either execute him or let him go, to put him in prison will only delay his return to power for a few years.
My bet, that's exactly what they'll do, put him in prison and forget that's no solution, just a delaying tactic.
They don't seem very smart over there, and definately not at all exhibiting any desire to end this and start anew.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
11/04/2006 14:15 Comments ||
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#3
They'll ace him - it's a Shia govt and it's payback time.
#1
Jews and Israelis have a desire, the prime minister added sharply, "a real need for words of love from Arab leaders. We all have it; it's part of our genetic make-up.
Rival Palestinian factions agreed in principle to form a new government to replace the Hamas-led administration, Palestinian officials said on Thursday. Mustafa Barghouthi, an independent Palestinian lawmaker, said Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, a senior Hamas leader, were expected to finalise the details in the coming days.
We have agreed on forming a new national unity government made up of qualified people, a government that is capable of lifting the siege and preserving national unity, he said in Ramallah. A deal to form a unity government between Abbas Fatah faction and Hamas collapsed several weeks ago, deepening a power struggle and raising fears of civil war between the groups. Some Palestinian sources said an agreement could see the formation of a government of technocrats without direct affiliation to either faction.
Hamas would still be expected to select the prime minister, even if it meant that Haniyeh gave up his post. One Hamas official said he expected Haniyeh to stay on. Both Hamas and President Abbas have shown great flexibility and both were positive, a mechanism to choose PM and ministers was agreed.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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Leaders from a prominent American Muslim group have denounced reported comments by the Missouri Baptist Convention's executive director claiming that "Islam has a strategic plan" to take over the United States. Ibrahim Hooper, communications director for the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations, said Nov. 1 that David Clippard's assertions "are too bizarre to even comment on."
According to two Missouri newspapers, Clippard, in his address at the opening session of the convention's annual meeting Oct. 30 in Cape Girardeau, said Muslims are trying to infiltrate North American schools and take over U.S. cities in order to impose Islam and Islamic law on an unwilling populace. "They have a plan to take over," he said, according to Cape Girardeau's Southeast Missourian newspaper. "They are trying to establish a Muslim state inside America, and they are going to take the city of Detroit back to the 15th century and practice Shar'ia [Islamic religious] law there," the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Clippard saying.
In his message, Clippard claimed there are now 300,000 Muslims in Detroit, which would comprise a majority of that city. However, in a 2000 survey, the Association of Religion Data Archives estimated that 46,492 Muslims lived in Wayne County, Mich., which includes Detroit. The largest religious body in the city in 2000 was the Catholic Church, with 451,069 adherents. According to 2004 estimates by the American Religious Identity Survey, about 1.5 million adult Muslims live in the United States. Hooper noted that the Detroit metropolitan area has long been home to a large Arab-American community, but that many of those are Catholics and other Arab-American Christians.
Clippard, reached via e-mail Nov. 2, cited multiple sources for the assertions and figures he quoted, including several books and research institutions. A "primary source" for the material, he said, was Jim Slack, an official with the Southern Baptist Convention's International Mission Board in Richmond, Va. Clippard claimed that Slack "has a primary Muslim scholar's paper that documents the plans for Detroit," but said he had not read it. Slack did not respond to a telephone message requesting comment by press time for this story.
In his speech, Clippard also reportedly said the Saudi Arabian government has funded more than 100 Islamic study centers and mosques in North America -- including ones on or near the University of Missouri campuses in Columbia, Rolla and St. Louis. According to the Post-Dispatch, a spokesman at the St. Louis campus said the Saudi government does not subsidize the university's Muslim Student Association or the school itself.
In addition, Clippard said, the Saudi Arabian government paid for 15,000 Muslim college students to come to North America to study with the intention, he claimed, of taking the continent for Islam. "What they are after is your sons and daughters," Clippard said, according to the Post-Dispatch. "They are coming to this country in the guise of students, and the Saudi government is paying their expenses."
CAIR's Hooper said Clippard's claims about schools are also baseless. "If he has evidence of that, I'd like to see it -- but the Muslim Student Association has many chapters on college campuses around the country, just as other faith groups do," he said. "They're all just students trying to pass their courses like anybody else. Somehow to claim that they're [there to form an Islamic revolution], paid for by the Saudi government, is, again, too bizarre to even be commented on." Clippard said the Muslim Students Association of the United States and Canada is the conduit for Saudi funding of campus Islamic centers.
A telephone number listed Nov. 2 on the group's website was disconnected, and nobody from the group had responded to a message sent to the contact e-mail address listed on the site by press time for this story. But a statement on the site says: "We do not receive funding from overseas governments. We do not accept funding from any one source that might potentially seek control of MSA National's agenda or affairs."
Hadia Mubarak, a former president of the group who is currently a member of CAIR's board, echoed that statement. The MSA and its regional and campus affiliates "have absolutely no connection to Saudi Arabia or any foreign government, for that matter," she said in a Nov. 2 e-mail interview. "In fact, it is a policy of our organization to refuse any funding from foreign governments, as this is an indigenous organization created by American Muslims for American Muslims." She continued: "We set our own agenda and would never allow others to influence our agenda from abroad. The objective of MSA National is to foster respect and tolerance for religious diversity, a cornerstone of American democracy."
Mubarak said the assertion that MSA is tied to the Saudi Arabian government and its fundamentalist version of Sunni Islam has been primarily propagated by two authors: Joe Kaufman and Stephen Schwartz. Kaufman has articles on a conservative website called Discover the Networks (www.discoverthenetworks.org), which bills itself as "a guide to the political left." Schwartz has written for FrontPageMag.com, another conservative website whose most famous contributor is right-wing lightning rod Ann Coulter.
Mubarak said the two authors' "failure to provide any evidence for their claims leads me to conclude that their sole intention in propagating this myth about MSA National is to curb the growth and popularity of this organization. Their motives clearly stem from their deep hatred of Islam and nothing else."
Clippard, for his part, told the Post-Dispatch that his comments were not borne of hatred for Muslims. "I don't hate Islamic people," he said. "We need to love these folks, go after them and love them, one at a time."
#1
ok this is bullshit. why in the hell can't a baptist say something like this without outcry buta fuckin muslim can fuck goats rape women and behead ppl and no one but my fellow rantburgers seem to notice that no one gives a shit.
#2
The Baptist isn't well educated, but Muslims are Koran bound to work for conversion to the point where Muslims are in a majority position. Then they take over.
Muslim births in Spain, France, and Germany are double the rate of Caucasians. As more immigrate/infiltrate and breed, at some time they will dominate. The fact of terror-chill - which already infests Europe - further aids jihad advance. Once they take over one European country, then the bloody-borders phenomena takes over.
Yes. And the answer is plain. Islam has to go, regardless of how many Muslims have to be exterminated. A horrible thought, I know, but it is either that or surrender and conversion/dhimmitude.
#5
I believe that CAIR stated it quite plainly:
"CAIR founder Omar Ahmad was cited by a California newspaper in 1998 declaring the Quran should be America's highest authority.
He also was reported to have said Islam is not in America to be equal to any other religion but to be dominant." From WND, Oct. 13, 2006
Posted by: jim ||
11/04/2006 8:36 Comments ||
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#6
Remember they breed like rats compare to other communities.
The West fears their birth rates even Iran knows this!!!
Excellent timing on that quote. I forgot about it. The Baptists - Jerry Vines was first - are aware that Islam is not merely one of many religions. Muslims are supremacists.
#8
Keep talking there Rev Clippard. We need to get the info to the masses. Slight enhancements are perfectly accepatable. The Muzzie shitbags use the tactic daily. Isn't someone from FBI detailed to shadow this Hooper daily ? Can a small accident be arranged ?
#9
Muslims exclaim the ascendancy of Islam in America and then decry anyone else pointing out their aspirations. As usual, Muslims want it both ways.
We need to give it to them both ways, coming and going. We need to begin implementing Islam un-friendly legislation that makes their turbans heads spin. Banning the hijab and burqa should be the first step. Halting all immigration from known terrorist countries, even for asylum purporses (that taqqiya thingy, ya know), should be a priority. Immediate deportation of all Wahhabist clerics should follow as well. The list goes on.
Its bigger, easier to get out of and just a bit heavier but Corps officials say the new body armor vest will take care of Marines and make them more combat effective than theyve ever been.
Marine officials have released the first details of the new vest, known as the Modular Tactical Vest, after showing a prototype to Commandant Gen. Mike Hagee, who reportedly liked what he saw and gave it the final nod Oct. 19.
Officials say the MTV which Marines will start wearing in February is more comfortable, offers more areas of protection from bullets and shrapnel, and distributes the load better.
Theres just one catch: At least for now, the MTV is about one pound heavier than the Interceptor Outer Tactical Vest system Marines have been wearing in combat since the war in Afghanistan began in October 2001.
Officials say the extra pound is offset by an improved weight-distribution system. And when you consider that the MTV offers far more side protection than the old Interceptor system, the extra pound or so is worth it, said Capt. Jeff Landis, a spokesman for Marine Corps Systems Command at Quantico, Va.
#1
That's good. Anything to help the troops. Anyone noticed how many guys are being hit in the neck now ? Obviously, the snipers are using this unprotected zone as the aimpoint now. A neck shot is every bit as deadly as the headshot.
#2
It will be offered in the desert tan color only, with no woodland camouflage versions planned.
Hum, do tell, is this because the USMC planners believe most of the future actions/wars will be fought in places where there is a lot of sand, quite a few camels and not that many trees...? Gee, I wonder why?
The United States should get the message that it should stop conducting maneuvers in the Gulf, an Iranian admiral said Friday after his navy had tested three new missiles. Why don't you c'mon over and conduct some maneuvers in the Gulf of Mexico. Beyond your capabilities? Aw... your bad, lol.
Iranian state television broadcast footage of the Revolutionary Guards firing naval-warfare missiles with a range of about 170 kilometers (106 miles). It was the second day in a row that Iran had announced the development of missiles and their testing in its military maneuvers.
The tests and military exercises came only days after the US conducted naval maneuvers in the Gulf, and as the UN Security Council members wrangle over what steps to take against Iran for ignoring its call to cease uranium enrichment - an ingredient of nuclear bombs.
"Our enemies should keep their hostility out of the Persian Gulf," said Adm. Sardar Fadavi, the deputy chief of the Revolutionary Guards navy. That's our job!
"They should not initiate any move that would make the region tense," Fadavi said in a clear reference to the United States. The admiral was speaking to state radio about the US-led maneuvers, that finished Monday and which Teheran branded "adventurist." Lol - been talking to the Russkies.
Fadavi said the missiles tested Friday demonstrated Iran's naval capabilities, and had been "improved by our domestic technology" - implying they were based on missiles that Iran had acquired. Yep. We did it. It's all ours. Home grown. Yewbetcha.
Iran is widely believed to have bought missile technology from North Korean. Its ballistic missile, the Shahab-3 - one of dozens of rockets fired Thursday - is thought to be based on North Korea's Nodong missile. Lies!
The US military said Friday it had taken note of Iran's missile tests. Yeah. We saw 'em. *snicker*
"Countries throughout the region perform exercises on a regular basis, including Iran," said Capt. Gary Arasin at US Central Command in Florida. "It's something that we monitor."
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Thursday, when Iran began its 10-day maneuvers, that the Iranians were "trying to demonstrate that they are tough."
"They are trying to say to the world 'you are not going to keep us from getting a nuclear weapon'," Rice told a Cincinnati radio. "The world has to say to them, yes, we will."
Iranian expert Andrew Hess, a professor of diplomacy at the Fletcher School, Tufts University, Boston, said the missile tests were part of a campaign by Iran to "assert its political power in the Gulf region."
"It's a continuation of their view that the Gulf region is a sphere of Persian influence, and it ought to be the predominant power in that area," Hess said. Brilliant.
Hess said the Arab states of the Gulf were likely to be concerned about Iran's growing military power, but they would not take a strong stand against the maneuvers for fear of increasing tension. I don't think "tension" is the right word.
Iran routinely denies that its maneuvers are intended to intimidate neighboring states. The spokesman for the current war games, Gen. Ali Fazli, said Friday: "The maneuvers are not a threat to any neighboring country." No, no, of course not. Perish the Saudis and all the rest of the fucking Sunnis thought.
But the Gulf states have long been concerned about Iran, a Shiite Muslim country, stirring trouble in their own Shiite communities. In addition, the United Arab Emirates has a long running territorial dispute with Iran over some islands in the Gulf. We've cursed their mustaches for decades.
Iranian TV said the new naval missiles - named Noor, Kowsar, and Nasr - had a range 50 kilometers (30 miles) greater than its existing warship rockets.
Fadavi said the forces would also be testing some air-to-ground missiles during the maneuvers. Of course. Carry on.
#3
I suspect that slowly, the US is winning the war of nerves with the Iranian Command & General Staff, at least those who are serious military types and not politically appointed fanatics.
It doesn't take a "rocket surgeon" to figure out that if your enemy has really, really big ships, and one HELL of a lot more of them than you; AND that they are filled with much better aircraft, missiles, and personnel than you, that it would probably be a really, really bad idea to piss them off.
And the same rule applies to Generals who have received intel reports from trusted subordinates who have seen US ground and air elements in operation, and wrote up very concise communiques (with lots of exclamation marks) after scraping out the inside of their pants.
Of course, it really helps things to have it made clear that your civilian bosses are more than willing to sacrifice your lives because they believe that Tinkerbell will ascend from a well at the last minute and save your sorry asses.
We dont have anything like that, right?
We are so used to knowing secrets that we have come to conclude there arent any we arent privy to?
The best thefts are those that are in and out and none the wiser. Info is the ideal theft. You dont touch the thing itself except to put its content in your head and keep walking. The documents stay in the safe and you dont remove any originals.
The American tech can read a license plate from Outer Space. You can take a half mile of film in a sixtieth of a second. And its all in living color and Infrared. This isnt Francis Gary Powers anymore...and Eisenhower is no longer President.
#5
A9 - I guess I should have sarc tagged my comment.
When I was in college ('70's) high orbit, civilian satellite photos were being RELEASED that resolved bridges, buildings, etc. Height of the Cold War. Civilian image processing software is MUCH more advanced today - even if nothing else changed that same 197x image would now show the vehicles on the bridge. Extrapolate the hardware 30 years and both hardware and software to military and I suspect the limits today on intel imaging are having enough analysts to interpret them.
#8
Of course I am awaiting the first public flight of the Orion Space Ship that Kennedy canceled when he signed the testban treaty. I think Mecca would make a nice launch point for the first test flight.
Iran's mullahs will need a few "rocket surgeons" of their own once we fly some cruise missiles up their collective shorts. It is difficult in the extreme to imagine that all of this hardware has been assembled without any intention of it seeing use. Election day cannot come any sooner.
Which part of NO do you not understand, Ahma-dina-nutjob?
I'm sure President Bush would be glad to send the Air Force someone to explain it to you.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
11/04/2006 20:39 Comments ||
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#14
Why don't you c'mon over and conduct some maneuvers in the Gulf of Mexico. Beyond your capabilities? Aw... your bad, lol.
BWAAAAA!!!
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
11/04/2006 20:48 Comments ||
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#15
Re#3, 'Moose: IIRC this past week, Dinnerjacket replaced some of his top Air Force guys with those more inclined to think like him; in other words, 'yes men.' So as long as the 'king has new clothes,' they are in good shape (not).
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Its illogical for the Russians to recognize the long-tern or strategic geopol threat posed by nuclear/missle-armed Iran + "North Korea" to Russia or Russia-China per se, ergo the threat is America and American TMD-GMD.
Lame circular hair-splitting bullshit. Focus on the IAEA as the "forum" where the Iranian nuke problems must be solved. Noise, pure apologetic witless symptwit noise.
#3
Russia's supposed "double game" is the Siamese twins of modern foreign diplomacy. It cannot possibly be in two places at once and appears the same everywhere.
#4
Russkies aren't playing a double game. They are very singleminded about overcoming US hegemony. They were just poor for a few years. Their treasury is being rapidly replenished now. So the game is back on. They actually prefer operating thru client states. Makes their dirt a little harder to prove. AS for UN, it only serves to block US interests. Why have we not abandoned it long ago ? It is foolish to continue the facade.
A senior Hezbollah official has told the BBC that Iran is providing the group with money to help fund its reconstruction activities in Lebanon. Kassam Allaik said Iran also had its own groups in Lebanon, rebuilding bridges, roads and mosques. Lebanon's Finance Minister, Jihad Azour, also acknowledged that Iranian money is going directly to Hezbollah. Mr Azour said that he is trying to persuade Iran to finance the relief effort through the government.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
I clicked on this one only to see if it would have the "Master of the Obvious" graphic. But this one's good, too! :-)
TEHERAN - Iran test fired three new missiles on Friday, the second day of military exercises in the Gulf, state radio said. Different kinds of land-to sea and sea-to sea missiles were successfully test fired, including Kousar, Noor and Nasr missiles, a senior Revolutionary Guards commander, Brigadier-General Fadavi, told state radio.
The range of the missiles has been increased from 120 km (75 miles) to 170 km (106 miles). Definitely they cover the whole area of the Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, he said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#2
If they control the straits of hormuz with these missiles, Israel is f***d because they know they can hold the world to ransom with the oil that comes through there.
What is the threat to US warships who may keep the straights of Hormuz open? Are these missiles accurate? Are they a strategic threat?
Will the US be going after Iran after the midterms?
#3
The Iranians have many different types of missiles, all developed elsewhere and added to their arsenal by the Mad Mullahs. They then reverse-engineer them, build an ability to build one or two on their own, and claim they developed them from scratch. They can hit something like an oil tanker, but I doubt they understand the full ESM capabilities of the US or its warships. They won't be able to stop the B-1s and B-2s, but the B-52s will have to wait until the SAM suppression missions are complete. I'd bet my eye teeth (if I still had them) that we know where everything in Iran is, down to coordinates accurate to a few millimeters.
The Iranians can CLOSE the Straits of Hormuz, but I don't think they can KEEP them closed.
I'm not in any position to know, one way or another, about any post-election activity by the US military - sorry.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
11/04/2006 23:23 Comments ||
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Enjoy the self-absorption displayed by these lads....they seem to think that the military is some kind of democracy....
Since going to Canada to avoid honoring his oath another deployment to Iraq, Corey Glass has considered returning to the United States. But after hearing that a fellow former soldier who surrendered to the military and was ordered to return to his unit instead of being discharged, Glass may not return at all. "They're not going to win the hearts and minds like that," said Glass, 24, who signed on with the Indiana National Guard in 2002. Looks like they're settling for getting you by the balls, Corey.
Kyle Snyder, a one-time combat engineer who joined the military in 2003, disappeared Wednesday, a day after surrendering at Fort Knox and 18 months after fleeing to Vancouver instead of redeploying to Iraq. Snyder, 23, of Colorado Springs, Colo., said a deal had been reached for a discharge, but he found out he would be returned to his unit at Fort Leonard Wood, Mo.
His self-inflicted troubles are complicating efforts for those among the 220 American soldiers who fled to Canada and want to return to the United States, according to lawyers, soldiers and anti-war activists. "See, it's all the military's fault....if they just would let us out of our commitments without penalties, it would all be fine, really. They're just meanies!!"
"Nobody's going to come back from Canada anymore," said James Fennerty, a Chicago-based attorney who represents Snyder and other AWOL soldiers. Oh, dear. Wouldn't that be a tragedy....
Several soldiers who went to Canada have said they don't want to return to Iraq. Sgt. Patrick Hart, who deserted the Fort Campbell, Ky.-based 101st Airborne Division in August 2005, a month before his second deployment, said he felt misled about the reasons for the war. "How can I go over there if I don't believe in the cause? I still consider myself a soldier, but I can't do that," said Hart, a Buffalo, N.Y., native who served more than nine years in the military. Gee, next time we'll be sure to consult with you first before heading out, m'kay??
"The whole story behind it, it all feels like a big lie," Glass said. "I ain't fighting for no lie."
Fennerty said he reached a deal with the Army allowing Snyder, a private with the 94th Engineer Battalion, to receive an other-than-honorable discharge. It's a deal similar to one Darrell Anderson, a 24-year-old Iraq war veteran, received in October. After three days at Fort Knox, Anderson, who has denounced the war as "illegal" and "immoral," was released to his family in Lexington, then discharged. But Snyder ended up at a bus station in Louisville, with orders to go to St. Louis, then Fort Leonard Wood. Snyder, who said the brutality of what he saw happening to civilians in Iraq prompted him to desert, left with an anti-war activist instead of going back to the post.
Gini Sinclair, a Fort Knox spokeswoman, declined to address Snyder's case. But she said deserters who turn themselves in are automatically returned to their units if the unit is in the United States at the time of surrender. Once reunited with the unit, the commander there decides what becomes of the soldier, Sinclair said. When a soldier surrenders at Fort Knox and is sent to his unit, he is either put on a plane or a bus, sometimes alone, she said. "In some cases, they will be escorted," Sinclair said. "I don't know what decides if that happens."
That policy, and the question of whether an AWOL soldier can reach a deal that trumps it, is causing consternation among soldiers. "After what they did to him, I don't see anybody going back," said Glass, a Fairmount, Ind., native who is currently in Toronto. Bummer. And Fairmount was gonna throw you a "Welcome Home" party with clowns and balloons and everything....
Some are seeking refugee status in Canada. Hart, who was joined in Toronto by his wife and their 3-year-old son, served time in Bosnia in the early 1990s, became a reserve, then went to Iraq after returning to active duty. The idea of returning to the United States is appealing to Hart, because he would like to see family and friends. "I could see going back under some kind of amnesty program or something like that," Hart said. "But I don't trust them. My enemy isn't foreign now. It's domestic."
#1
...Can you say 'desertion', assclown? They never, EVER forget that one. If you're hiding out in the hope that a future administration will tell you all is forgiven, forget it. Not even Jimmah pardoned the deserters.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
11/04/2006 9:31 Comments ||
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#2
leave em there and revoke their citizenship. Declare them PNG and never allow them back. Ever
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/04/2006 9:33 Comments ||
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#3
Abandoning your country is no casual decision. And at least some of these guys seem to have enlisted post Iraq invasion, so they knew they were heading for war. 220 is no trivial number - and that's just the ones who say they want to return. Something significant seems to have happened to them & it would make sense for the US military authorities to try to understand just what it was. Some people just aren't psychologically capable of combat, or even of deployment - can we recognize them before investing in them? Perhaps others were subjected to some kind of conditions or experiences that pushed them over the edge - could they have been saved by different 'handling.? Perhaps even some were participants in/witnesses to legitimate atrocities - obviously that would need to be addressed.
The point is, there are valuable lessons to be learned from these men and we should try to learn them. (I am being purely pragmatic here, and make no moral or PC defense of the deserters.)
#7
Glenmore,
you've got a point - it is pounded into the troops' heads from day 1 that desertion is the ultimate disgrace and the authorities never forget - there was an article a few months back that mentioned the FBI is still (officially) looking for deserters from WWII and Korea. But I think we're looking at it from the wrong angle. Look at the people who these clowns are talking to - I truly believe that there is a concerted effort to subvert the US military out there, and it doesnt take much to learn how to play on someone's fears and feelings.
Some of these guys - a VERY small percentage - may have bailed because they didn't believe. The rest ...I think we need to look hard at who is talking to them.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
11/04/2006 10:13 Comments ||
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#8
The rest ...I think we need to look hard at who is talking to them.
And put them up for treason.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/04/2006 10:56 Comments ||
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#9
Don't let the screen door hit ya, boys. Enjoy the snow.
#10
Perhaps others were subjected to some kind of conditions or experiences that pushed them over the edge - could they have been saved by different 'handling.? Perhaps even some were participants in/witnesses to legitimate atrocities - obviously that would need to be addressed.
The point is, there are valuable lessons to be learned from these men and we should try to learn them. (I am being purely pragmatic here, and make no moral or PC defense of the deserters.)
Gee, Glenmore, if it wasn't for your disclaimer at the end I would have pegged you for a "Root Causes®" kind of guy.
#13
They will all come back. Things will be fine and after a few years they will have thought it's all forgotten. Then, one day, they will get pulled over for a traffic ticket and the police will run their info..... BAM! Turned back over to federal custody.
Actually, 220 is a small number when you consider how many rotations units have been on for OIF/OEF. Let Canada keep them.
the people helping the deserters should be tried and imprisoned for aiding and abetting the comission of a felony, and for conspiricy to commit a felony, the property used (safe houses, cars, etc) should be siezed under RICO.
#15
Youre sent back to your original unit [if it still exists - some Vietnam/Korea era deserters would find the unit disbanded]. It is SOP. Thats where the personnel paper work process starts. The papers have to be completed and signed off by the Courts Martial level authority, usually a Division level General Officer. The longer you screw around, the longer its going to take. They dont want you anymore than you want to be among them, but there is no Holding Company for the likes of you and generally another unit isnt tagged with keeping track of you and dealing with your behavior problems till the ink in dry. Of course there is the option of being assigned to the Inmate Control Unit at Fort Leavenworth, but that usually requires a minimum tour of duty of greater than 180 days.
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
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Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
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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.
The United Nations has called on the Sudanese government to investigate recent attacks in Darfur that claimed at least 50 civilians, many of them children. A report released Friday by the office of Louise Arbour, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said the attacks, which began Oct. 29, affected at least eight villages and one internally displaced persons camp housing 3,500 people. "The investigation should aim to collect evidence to identify and prosecute those who planned, orchestrated and conducted the attacks," the report said. 
Britains Prince Charles returned home on Friday after his first ever visit to Pakistan where he called for harmony among different religions, officials said. Charles, who arrived in the capital Islamabad on October 29 along with his wife Camilla, toured different parts of the country, and recently travelled to Azad Kashmir to meet survivors of last years deadly earthquake. On Thursday, Charles addressed a gathering of Muslims, Sikhs and Christians at the sprawling residence of Punjabs governor. He said people of all faiths need greater understanding that will bring greater tolerance.
Mother Russia is also turning out to be the mother of all arms sellers. 
SEOUL - North Korea on Saturday said Japan should not attend six-party nuclear disarmament talks after Japanese officials reportedly said Tokyo would not recognize the communist country as a nuclear-armed state.
Australias top Muslim cleric vowed to retire from religion and tape his mouth for six months if an ethical court he proposed on Friday finds him guilty of inciting rape. The Mufti of Australia, Sheik Taj Aldin al-Hilali, made the unusual pledge as he came under intense pressure to resign over comments comparing scantily-clad women to uncovered meat inviting sexual attack. But he stopped short of stepping down from the post of mufti immediately, offering to go only if a better replacement can be found and invited the panel of imams that oversees the post to seek nominations for a new mufti.
More than 300 people braved a bitter wind and freezing cold in downtown Edmonton Friday for a rally in support of Canadian troops in Afghanistan. The rally at Churchill Square is the first of what organizers promise will be weekly demonstrations dubbed Red Fridays.
PESHAWAR: Members of the NWFP Assembly on Friday marched from the Assembly Hall to the main entrance amid slogans of Allah-o-Akbar and al-jihad, al-jihad to protest against the army airstrike on a madrassa in Bajaur Agency and for showing solidarity with the people of the area. 
PTV has telecast a report showing people being trained to carry out terrorist attacks and suicide bombings, at the madrassa in Bajaur that was raided recently. According to the PTV report, the madrassa was actually an arms training camp where training sessions were held in the night and early morning. 
The Sweet Water Canal was rendered nearly useless from neglect by Saddam Hussein's former administration. Photo courtesy USAID.BAGHDAD The United States Agency for International Development, better known around the world as USAID, is making drastic improvements to the Iraqi infrastructure and improving the quality of life for millions.
IRAQ is bracing itself for another surge of violence tomorrow, when Saddam Hussein is expected to be sentenced to death for crimes against humanity. Iraqs national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, told The Times that the central provinces of Baghdad, Diyala and Salahaddin would be placed under curfew. There are more security measures under consideration, he added. 
Rival Palestinian factions agreed in principle to form a new government to replace the Hamas-led administration, Palestinian officials said on Thursday. Mustafa Barghouthi, an independent Palestinian lawmaker, said Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, a senior Hamas leader, were expected to finalise the details in the coming days. 
Its bigger, easier to get out of and just a bit heavier but Corps officials say the new body armor vest will take care of Marines and make them more combat effective than theyve ever been.
The United States should get the message that it should stop conducting maneuvers in the Gulf, an Iranian admiral said Friday after his navy had tested three new missiles. 
A senior Hezbollah official has told the BBC that Iran is providing the group with money to help fund its reconstruction activities in Lebanon. Kassam Allaik said Iran also had its own groups in Lebanon, rebuilding bridges, roads and mosques. Lebanon's Finance Minister, Jihad Azour, also acknowledged that Iranian money is going directly to Hezbollah. Mr Azour said that he is trying to persuade Iran to finance the relief effort through the government.
TEHERAN - Iran test fired three new missiles on Friday, the second day of military exercises in the Gulf, state radio said. Different kinds of land-to sea and sea-to sea missiles were successfully test fired, including Kousar, Noor and Nasr missiles, a senior Revolutionary Guards commander, Brigadier-General Fadavi, told state radio.
