[ToloNews] The Ministry of Interior (MoI) has started a new initiative to reduce number of checkpoints in Kabul and replace it with patrolling in order to prevent crimes and ensure law and order in the city.
[AlAhram] Terror attacks in Egypt have fallen in 2018 to reach just eight, the lowest number since 2013, the country's State Information Service (SIS) said on Monday.
In an official report titled "2018: Terrorism is dying in Egypt", the SIS said 2018 saw a reduction in terror activities and number of attacks from a high point of 222 attacks in 2014.
There were 50 attacks in 2017 and 199 in 2016, the state body responsible for publishing information about Egypt said.
The SIS said the attacks in 2018 were primitive IED attacks, with some of them failing to achieve their aims.
It attributed the fall to a major counterterrorism operation, Operation Sinai 2018, launched in February, which it said has led to multiple strikes against terrorist elements in north and central Sinai, as well as in areas in the Nile Delta and desert areas west of the Nile Valley.
[AlAhram] Throughout 2018 the Egyptian Armed Forces have been following through in five strategic courses of action: the fight against terrorism, epitomised this year by the launch of Comprehensive Operation Sinai (COS) 2018; modernisation of the Armed Forces; building capacity to respond to evolving threats; participating in national developmental efforts in the framework of a civilian-army partnership and strengthening regional and international military relations.
COUNTER-TERRORISM EFFORTS
Egypt continued the battle against terrorism on various levels, including COS 2018. Launched in February this year, COS 2018 set two strategic goals: to eradicate terrorism from Sinai and stabilise the peninsula in readiness for wide-ranging development.
[DW] A bushwhack in a northern province on the border to Mali has prompted Burkina Faso's president to declare a state of emergency. Burkina Faso is battling increased attacks by Islamist gunnies in the Sahel region.
Officials in Burkina Faso ...The country in west Africa that they put where Upper Volta used to be. Its capital is Oogadooga, or something like that. Its president is currently Blaise Compaoré, who took office in 1987 and will leave office feet first, one way or the other... announced Monday that President Roch Marc Christian Kabore is declaring a state of emergency in northern provinces following intensified attacks from Islamist groups in the area.
"The president has decided to declare a state of emergency in certain provinces of Burkina Faso," Communications Minister Remis Fulgance Dandjinou said after a special cabinet meeting. "He has also given instructions for specific security measures across the country."
Names of the provinces where the state of emergency will go into effect will be named in a forthcoming presidential decree. The measure gives security forces extra powers to search homes and restrict freedom of movement.
INTENSIFIED ISLAMIST ATTACKS IN SAHEL STATES
Since 2015, the West African country has seen an increase in jihadi attacks on its northern border to Mali. Most recently, ten gendarmes were killed last week in a gunfire ambush in the Sourou province while responding to a school blaze. The al-Qaeda linked umbrella murderous Moslem group known as Nusrat al-Islam wal Moslemeen (JNIM) grabbed credit for the attack.
JNIM grabbed credit for four other attacks that took place in 2018, including one in the capital Ouagadougou in March that killed 8 security officials and maimed scores more. JNIM and Ansarul Islam, another jihadi group, are believed to be responsible for more than 255 deaths over the past three years.
An kaboom in Ouagadougou in March targeted the French Embassy
"The diffuse, cross-border nature of the terrorist threat" poses a security threat to authorities in Burkina Faso, Dandjinou added.
Jihadi groups are attempting to increase their influence across the semi-arid Sahel region ... North Africa's answer to the Pak tribal areas... just south of the Sahara desert. The attacks and the reprisals by Burkinabe security forces have caused thousands to flee their homes, Human Rights Watch reported in May.
In 2013, La Belle France intervened militarily in Mali, Burkina Faso's neighbor, in an attempt to push back Islamists who had seized territory in the former French colony.
Last week Burkina Faso's security minister, Clement Sawadogo, had urged people to be cautious during New Year's Eve celebrations on December 31.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/01/2019 02:36 ||
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[Yahoo] Britannia announced Monday it will deploy two border patrol ships in the Channel in response to a surge in migrants colonists crossing from La Belle France in dinghies.
Home Secretary Sajid Javid, the interior minister, said the Border Force ships would balance protecting human life with protecting Britannia's borders.
In December, around 230 people tried to make the 21-mile (33-kilometre) journey from La Belle France to Britannia, Javid said.
The attempts, chiefly by Iranian nationals, to cross one of the world's busiest shipping lanes have been made in dinghies and other small craft.
Javid -- the bookmakers' favourite to become the next leader of the governing Conservative Party -- cut short his Christmas family holiday in South Africa to take personal control of the situation.
He said he was redeploying two Border Force cutters from the Mediterranean to the Channel, to join one cutter already on the scene and two other coastal patrol vessels.
"It's both about protecting human life but also about protecting our borders," Javid said after meeting bigwigs from the Border Force and the National Crime Agency.
"I want to make sure that we are doing all we can to protect people.
"This is one of the most treacherous stretches of water that there is, 21 miles with people taking grave risk, really putting their lives into their own hands."
- TRAFFICKING GANGS TARGETED -
Javid said about 230 migrants colonists had sought to cross the Channel in December but "just under half have actually been disrupted by the French" and did not reach British waters.
He said efforts were being stepped up to tackle people smugglers and to return migrants colonists to La Belle France.
Britannia and La Belle France agreed Sunday to boost bilateral cooperation over the spike.
In the coming weeks, the two countries will increase surveillance patrols, efforts to dismantle trafficking gangs and awareness about the dangers of crossing the Channel.
In a message to would-be migrants colonists, Javid said: "We will do everything we can to make sure it is not a success, in the sense that I don't want people to think that if they leave a safe country like La Belle France they can get to Britannia and then just get to stay.
"That's why I am working out ways with the French to increase the number of returns."
Arrivals on southeast England's Kent coast spiked over the Christmas period, with British authorities finding 43 people on December 25 and 26.
On Thursday, British border officials found 23 Iranians in three locations in Kent, hours after French maritime authorities intercepted 11 migrants colonists in a small boat.
And on Sunday, authorities intercepted six Iranians near the Kent coast.
A group of 12 migrants colonists -- nine men, two women and a 10-year-old child -- were detained after landing on a Kent beach in a dinghy on Monday, the Home Office said. They presented themselves as Iranian.
"They all received a medical assessment and have now been transferred to immigration officials for interview," a Home Office front man said.
British interior minister Sajid Javid said two Border Force ships deployed in the Channel would balance protecting human life with protecting Britannia's borders.
[PRESSTV] Intelligence sources have revealed that Britannia’s most wanted female terrorist is plotting a major attack in the capital London.
Security sources told the Daily Mirror newspaper that Samantha Lewthwaite, better known as the White Widow, is now plotting an attack in London from her base in the war-torn Yemen.
Lewthwaite, a 35-year-old mother of four, is the widow of Germaine Lindsay, the British-Jamaican terrorist who carried out one of the deadly kabooms in London on July 7, 2005.
British intelligence services believe Lewthwaite, who fled Britannia to join murderous Moslems in the Horn of Africa region, has had plastic surgery and has put on weight to dodge and international police hunt.
Sources have revealed that she was recently in Dubai to prepare a string of new attacks, including one in London.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/01/2019 00:00 ||
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#1
For some reason, this story made me think of Billy Idols song "White Wedding."
No White Wedding for the White Widow and definitely no return home.
[IsraelTimes] UN cultural agency’s efforts to convince Washington and Jerusalem fail; ’we aren’t going to be a member of an organization that deliberately acts against us,’ Israeli envoy says.
In October 2017, mere days after the US administration announced its withdrawal from UNESCO due to, among other things, its alleged obsession with Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that he was following the US lead.
The withdrawal went into effect at midnight Gay Paree time (1 a.m. in Israel).
#1
The U.S. left UNESCO in 1984 and for some reason rejoined again in 2003. We withdrew again on 12-31-2018. Thank you Pres. Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump. Kudos to P.M. Netanyahu as well. Why help your enemies dig your graves?
[Rudaw] Many Shiite residents of Shingal displaced during the ISIS invasion of four years ago have now returned home and rebuilt some of their religious shrines.
"We have been living side by side with Yezidis and Sunnis in Shingal for 800 years and never had a problem with them," Saeed Mahmood Raza, a prominent Shiite holy man in Shingal, told Rudaw. "Religious and ethnic co-existence in Shingal was destroyed after the ISIS attack on the city in August 2014."
Mahmood says so far 500 Shiite residents have returned to Shingal and started rebuilding their shrines.
"We have been rebuilding our shrines on our own. The first shrine we started to repair was the Sayda Zainab Shrine. It is a sacred place where our ceremonies are held at. In addition to that, we are renovating two more shrines," he explained.
When they took control of djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... in the summer of 2014 ISIS holy warriors killed many Shiite muslims and demolished their shrines.
ISIS brutally took over Shingal, it kidnapped 6,000 Yezidi women, girls and children and killed a large number of their men. The group also destroyed 27 Yezidi and eight Shiites shrines.
Since October 16, 2017 Shingal has been under Iraqi control.
Yezidis make up 70 percent of the Shingal population.
Shingal Mayor Mahma Khalil, a Yezidi Kurd, says "It is true that the majority of Shingal residents are Yezidis, but the city is a multi-colored city where Moslems, Arabs, Christians also live for hundreds of years."
About the return of Shiites to the war ravaged city, Khalil said, "Whoever is indigenous to the city and not involved with ISIS, has every right to return. It does not matter from what ethnicity or religion they are."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/01/2019 02:40 ||
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#1
Rebuild the important stuff first. Shrines would not be at the top of my list personally.
Posted by: Chris ||
01/01/2019 13:26 Comments ||
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[AlAhram] Iraq sentenced more than 600 foreigners including many women and dozens of minors in 2018 for belonging to the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (IS) bad boy group, the judiciary said on Monday.
Iraq declared "victory" over IS at the end of 2017 after a three-year war against the jihadists, who once controlled nearly a third of the country as well as swathes of neighbouring Syria.
Around 20,000 people suspected of links to IS have been tossed in the clink You have the right to remain silent... since 2014.
Judicial front man Abdel Sattar Bayraqdar said Monday that "616 men and women accused of belonging to IS have been put on trial" in 2018 and sentenced under Iraq's anti-terrorism law.
They comprised 466 women, 42 men and 108 minors, he said.
Bayraqdar did not, however specify the punishments.
Under Iraq's anti-terrorism law courts can issue verdicts, including death sentences, against anyone found guilty of belonging to the jihadist group, including non-combatants.
In April, judicial sources said that more than 300 suspects linked to IS had received death sentences and more than 300 others were sentenced to life, which in Iraq is equivalent to 20 years.
Most of the women sentenced for IS links were from The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the decaying remnant of the Ottoman Empire.... and republics of the former Soviet Union.
Three French citizens -- two women and a man -- have been sentenced to life imprisonment while a German woman, a Belgian man and a Russian man have been sentenced to death.
Many women had travelled to Iraq with their children to join their husbands who fought in the ranks of IS.
Some are still waiting to be repatriated to their home countries.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/01/2019 02:14 ||
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[Rudaw] Elections in the Kurdistan Region, The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...just another cheapjack Moslem dictatorship, brought to you by the Moslem Brüderbund.... , and Iraq grabbed international headlines for 2018. It was a time for reestablishing relations for the Kurdistan Regional Government with capitals following the internationally opposed independence referendum, Kirkuk events, and international flight ban in late-2017.
With political tensions high, protests rocked sweltering Basra through the summer. It was also a time for Kurdish mathematician Caucher Birkar to be awarded the Fields Medal and Yezidi activist Nadia Murad to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Continued on Page 49
[Rudaw] The Iraqi government constantly tells IDPs to go home. The authorities threaten to close down the camps and sack teachers who do not report to work in their cities.
The IDPs too wish to go home and start a new life, they say, but their cities still lie in ruins, their homes bombed, and there is no water, electricity or health centers.
Hamad Ali waited to hear from relatives who had gone home. He was advised not to return.
"If the situation and services are good we will return. Lots of people have returned, but they regretted it. They want to return to the camps because there is no water, no electricity, and no health care. The government says they want to take us back, but nothing is clear." Ali told Rudaw.
Lack of health services is the biggest problem here. The Iraqi government closes camp health centers to force refugees to go home. There were plans to close all the camps by the end of 2018.
2.5 million people are internally displaced in Iraq. 47% of these IDPs live in 48 camps in Kurdistan Region.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/01/2019 00:00 ||
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[PJ] A Palestinian Authority (PA) court in Ramallah has sentenced a U.S. citizen to life in prison with hard labor today for the crime of selling property to Jews, a capital offense in the PA.
Issam Akel, 53, a U.S. citizen and a holder of an Israeli national identity card, was abducted by PA intelligence on October 11 in Ramallah. According to Reuters, the PA court's media office said Akel was convicted of "attempting to sever parts of Palestinian land and annex it to a foreign state," namely Israel.
"In light of the conviction, the court handed down a life sentence with hard labor," the court ruled.
The Jerusalem Post reported that Akel is accused of receiving a $25,000 commission for the sale of a Palestinian widow's home to Ateret Cohanim, an Israeli group that has been purchasing properties in East Jerusalem and the Old City. Akel, who lives in Jerusalem, had previously worked for the PA.
U.S Ambassador David M. Friedman called for Akel's release last month:
[IsraelTimes] A senior military official warns that increasing Iranian influence in Iraq means the country could be used as a base from which Tehran could launch attacks on Israel.
"Iraq is under growing influence of the Quds Force and Iran," Maj. Gen. Tamir Hyman, military intelligence chief, tells a conference in Tel Aviv, according to the Rooters news agency.
Iran could "see Iraq as a convenient theater for entrenchment, similar to what they did in Syria, and to use it as a platform for a force build-up that could also threaten the State of Israel," Hyman says.
[IsraelTimes] The bigwig adds that the IDF’s tunnel-destroying operation currently being carried out on the Leb border "prevented a war with Hezbollah that could have began in the coming months."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/01/2019 00:00 ||
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It is my understanding — g(r)omgoru, please correct me if I’m wrong — that many of the so-called settlers are immigrants from America, which may somewhat explain why they are willing to go tit for tat with their Arab neighbours.
[IsraelTimes] The United Nations ...the Oyster Bay money pit... Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs releases new statistics ahead of the new year that show a 69% increase in settler attacks on Paleostinians in 2018 compared to 2017.
OCHA records 265 incidents where Israeli residents of the West Bank targeted Paleostinians or their property. The UN agency includes in its count the murder of Aisha Rabi, a Paleostinian woman who was struck in the head with a large stone while sitting in the passenger seat of a vehicle that her husband was driving in the northern West Bank in October. The investigation into the matter is still ongoing, though a defense official told The Times of Israel in November that the growing assumption was that the crime was perpetrated by Israelis.
Ocha says 115 Paleostinians were maimed, 7,900 trees were destroyed and 540 vehicles were vandalized in 2018.
In comparison, OCHA documents 181 incidents where Paleostinians injured or killed settlers, a 28% decrease from 2017. However, women are made to be loved, not understood... the total number of Israelis killed in such attacks increased from four to seven in 2018.
[PRESSTV] The commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC)’s Navy says new speedboats operated by the IRGC will be radar-evading and equipped with new missiles.
Rear admiral Alireza Tangsiri made the remarks in an interview with IRNA on Monday, noting that the IRGC’s Navy attaches great importance to high speed and maneuverability in its missions.
"We are planning to equip the IRGC’s speedboats with radar-evading stealth technology while increasing their speed in order to conduct their missions," the Iranian commander said, adding that "new missiles moving at very high speed are being installed on the IRGC’s naval vessels."
Tangsiri noted that the IRGC has currently the fastest speedboats in the world, saying, "We are working on speedboats with the speed of 80 knots [per hour] and more than that, and we will start to build speedboats with the speed of over 80 knots [per hour] in the near future."
Over the past years, Iran has made major breakthroughs in its defense sector and attained self-sufficiency in producing military equipment and hardware despite sanctions and economic pressures on the country.
The Islamic Theocratic Republic maintains that its military power poses no threat to other countries and is merely attentive to its military doctrine of deterrence.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/01/2019 00:58 ||
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#1
"and they can fly!"
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/01/2019 5:41 Comments ||
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#2
As a kid, I always thought the "Flying sub" on Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea was as cool as it got.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
01/01/2019 6:25 Comments ||
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#5
#1 "and they can fly!"
Posted by: Frank G 2019-01-01 05:41
"...And they're driven by my wife, Morgan Fairchild, yeah, that's the ticket!"
All kidding aside, I wonder if they have ever given so much as a moment's thought to what would happen about thirty seconds after they should somehow lay a finger on one of our warships.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
01/01/2019 11:30 Comments ||
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#6
I read every Tom Swift book but that was a long time ago. Great stuff for a boy to grow up on.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
01/01/2019 11:31 Comments ||
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#7
speedboats with radar-evading stealth technology gotta lead 'em a little more
#12
One of my favorite reports from the first gulf war was a report of 2 Iraqi Zodiac patrol craft were bombed by A-6 Intruders. Sunk of course but I wonder, what bombs do you use on rubber boats?
[IsraelTimes] New York Times
...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... report on new timetable comes after Israeli official says Netanyahu asked Trump to slowly taper the withdrawal
And thus we see President Trump’s process in action: he starts with a shockingly maximalist opening bid that immediately reshapes expectations, then allows himself to be persuaded to soften that position, possibly in exchange for favours now or to be defined later. Everyone feels like they’ve beaten him, but the outcome is a good deal closer to his original statement than it is to the status quo ante. In this case, everyone now accepts that American troops will soon be officially gone from Syria.
[PRESSTV] US President Donald Trump has defended his decision to withdraw American troops from Syria, saying he is "just doing what I said I was going to do" during his 2016 election campaign.
Trump made the comments on Monday, one day after Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a close ally of the US leader, told reporters at the White House that Trump will reevaluate the withdrawal plan for Syria.
Graham has been a harsh critic of the withdrawal decision, which he initially called a "disaster."
"... I campaigned on getting out of Syria and other places. Now when I start getting out the Fake News Media, or some failed Generals who were unable to do the job before I arrived, like to complain about me & my tactics, which are working," Trump wrote on Twitter.
"Just doing what I said I was going to do!"
Posted by: Fred ||
01/01/2019 00:47 ||
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Ah, but which particular group of Taliban are they talking to, and what are the odds that this group cannot speak for any other?
[KhaamaPress] The politicians of the Taliban ...mindless ferocity in a turban... group met with the Iranian officials in Tehran on Sunday in what appears to be the second meeting between Taliban and Tehran over the past recent weeks.
A front man of the foreign ministry of Iran, Bahram Qasemi confirmed that the the talks were held with the knowledge of Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani ...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. .. and were intended to set parameters for negotiations between the Taliban and the Afghan government.
"A Taliban delegation was in Tehran yesterday. They had comprehensive negotiations with the Iranian deputy foreign minister," Bahram Qasemi was quoted as saying in a report by Rooters.
This comes as Ali Shamkhani, the Secretary of the National Security Council of Iran on Wednesday informed his Afghan counterpart that Tehran has been holding talks with the Taliban with the knowledge of the Afghan government.
The talks were held "to help curb the security problems in Afghanistan," Shamkhani told Hamdullah Mohib, the Afghan president’s national security advisor.
"All contacts and talks with the Taliban group have been with the knowledge of Afghanistan’s government and this process will continue," the top Iranian security official was quoted as saying by Tehran Times.
Shamkhani arrived to Kabul leading a delegation of high-ranking Iranian security, military and political officials.
[PRESSTV] Kuwait says it expects more Arab countries to reopen diplomatic missions in Damascus in "coming days" amid promising signs that the incumbent Damascus government led by Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Supressor of the Damascenes... is being admitted back into the Arab world.
Kuwait’s official news agency KUNA broke the news on Monday, but added that the move would need a green light from the 22-member Arab League ...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... .
Posted by: Fred ||
01/01/2019 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. ..
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
