[KhaamaPress] The Attorney General’s Office has announced that at least 15 prosecutors have been assassinated in targeted Taliban ...Arabic for students... attacks in various parts of the country over the past year.
Jamshid Rasouli, front man for the Attorney General’s Office told the media on Sunday, that the assassinated individuals were serving in the central AGO office and in provinces such as Paktia, Helmand ...an Afghan province populated mostly by Pashtuns, adjacent to Injun country in Pak Balochistan... , Kandahar, Kabul, Maidan Wardak, and Parwan, and in the western zone.
Rasouli added that these prosecutors were assassinated by unknown button men in different provinces of the country.
Meanwhile, ...back at the mall, Clarissa suddenly spied Mr. Bartlett at the checkout counter. He was buying Grecian Formula!... a prosecutor was killed by unidentified button men in Paktia province on Saturday night
Mohammad Lal Amiri, a front man for the provincial police HQ told the media that the prosecutor was assassinated on his way home from his office.
AGO’s front man Rasouli also added that since the year 2006 141 prosecutors were murdered in unidentified button men attacks.
Although the Taliban and other bully boy groups have not grabbed credit for many of these incidents.
But the Afghan government continuously blamed Talibs for carrying such attacks.
The al-Shabab militant group has called for attacks on interests of the United States and France in Djibouti, almost two weeks ahead of the presidential election in the East African country.https://t.co/WVEmL1bAN4
[Al Ahram] Sudan's government signed an agreement with a rebel faction on Sunday to guide future peace negotiations as the country's transitional leaders move to put an end to myriad internal conflicts.
The "declaration of principles" signed with the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) faction lays out priorities including the unification of armed forces and the establishment of a democratic, secular state with freedom of religion.
It was signed by Sudanese head of state General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Abdelaziz al-Hilu, head of the SPLM-N wing.
The group is based in the states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile in the country's south. The signing took place in South Sudanese capital Juba.
'The next thing is the two parties will resume talks three weeks from now,' mediation team official Ramadan Goch told AFP.
'They are now going to organise their teams and prepare to resume the peace talks.'
The transitional government in Khartoum, which includes soldiers and civilians installed after the 2019 overthrow of Omar al-Bashir ...Former President-for-Life of Sudan He came to power in 1989 when he, as a brigadier in the Sudanese army, led a group of officers in a bloodless military coup that ousted the government of Prime Minister Sadiq al-Mahdi and eventually appointed himself head cheese. He fell out with his Islamic mentor, Hasan al-Turabi, tried to impose shariah on the Christian and animist south, resulting in its secessesion, and attempted to Arabize Darfur by unleashing the barbaric Janjaweed on it. Sudan's potential prosperity has been pissed away in warfare that has left as many as 400,000 people dead and 2.5 million displaced. Hee was overthrown by popular consent in 2019. Omar has been indicted for genocide by the International Criminal Court but nothing is expected to come of it... 's 30-year dictatorship, have made peace with the country's rebel groups a priority.
A historic agreement was signed in October with the Sudan Revolutionary Front, an alliance of rebel groups from the Darfur, Blue Nile and Southern Kordofan regions.
A branch of the Sudan Liberation Movement led by Abdelwahid Nour in Darfur refused to sign.
Al-Hilu's SPLM-North signed a separate ceasefire, allowing its fighters to keep their weapons for "self-protection" until the Sudanese constitution is amended to guarantee separation of state and religion.
South Kordofan and to a lesser extent Blue Nile state have significant Christian populations who have fought for decades to end the imposition of Islamic law by Khartoum.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 00:00 ||
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#1
Finally, the one million ethnic Nuba of the Nuba Hills area of South Kordofan appear poised to live in peace after more than a half century of persecution.
[Al Ahram] A Cairo Criminal upheld a 10-year-prison-sentence in absentia against Mubarak-era Finance Minister Youssef Boutrous Ghali in the case dubbed in the media as the ’German licence plates deal case’.
In absentia means they’re just playing with themselves, unless there’s an extradition treaty.
Ghali was found guilty of squandering public funds.
The criminal court sentenced Ghali to ten years in prison in absentia in 2010 along with former Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, who got a suspended one year in prison-sentence, and former Interior Minister Habib El-Adly.
Nazif was accused of granting a German company a contract worth EGP 92 million to manufacture car licence plates for the Ministry of Interior through a direct order rather than a public auction as stipulated by law.
El-Adly and Ghali were accused of complicity in the deal.
Ghali served as finance minister under former president Hosni Mubarak ...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011... from 2004 to 2011. He fled Egypt in February 2011 to Beirut and then moved to the UK, where he lives currently.
There is no extradition deal between Egypt and the UK.
Definitely playing alone. Still, if they feel better, who are we to judge?
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 00:00 ||
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[Dhaka Tribune] At least two cops were maimed in a clash involving Chhatra Dal, police, and Chhatra League ... the student wing of the Bangla Awami League ... activists in Bogra during the nationwide hartal ... a peculiarly Bangla combination of a general strike and a riot, used by both major political groups in lieu of actual governance ... enforced by Hefajat-e-Islam ...a madrassa-based false nose and mustache of the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, formed in 2010 to protest against secular education. In 2011 demonstrated violentyly against women's rights and in 2013 held large rallies demanding capital punishment of Shahbag Square protesters and banning women working outside the home... .Police arrested two Chhatra Dal leaders — Nandigram upazila’s Jewel Hossain, 26, and Rabiul Islam, 27 — following the incident that took place at the district’s Majgram area on Sunday afternoon.
Confirming the matter to Dhaka Tribune, Nandigram cop shoppe Officer-in-Charge (OC) Kamrul Islam, said: "A case will be filed soon over the attack on law enforcers."
According to police and witnesses, local leaders, activists of Jubo Dal, Swechchashebak Dal, and Chhatra Dal, brought out a procession in support of the hartal in Nandigram at around 4pm on Sunday.
They then gathered in front of the Majgram BNP party office and continued to demonstrate.
A clash erupted when Chhatra League men brought out a procession against the Hefezat hartal and chased those who were supporting it.
Nandigram police, after being informed, rushed to the spot, charged batons and dispersed the two sides, and brought the situation under control.
Nandigram cop shoppe OC Kamrul said: "Leaders and activists of Jubo Dal, Swachchasebak Dal, and Chhatra Dal wanted to continue demonstrating in support of the hartal after the Chhatra League men left the spot.
"They then attacked us when we refused to allow them to bring out a rally."
"Sub-Inspector (SI) Reza and Constable Faruq were maimed in the attack. They were taken to the local health complex for treatment," the police OC added.
Nandigram upazila Jubo Dal Convener Shafiul Alam Sumon, claimed: "Chhatra League leaders and activists attacked us during our rally. The police also did the same.
"We did not attack anyone."
Meanwhile, ...back at the barn, a little lightbulb figuratively appeared over Bossy's head... upazila Chhatra League President Tuhin Ahmed claimed that it was the Jubo Dal leaders and activists who had attacked them first.
"We did not attack their [Chhatra dal] rally. It is them who attacked us," he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 00:00 ||
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[Al Ahram] PM Nikol Pashinyan announced he will resign next month but stay in office until parliamentary elections due on June 20, in an effort to curb the political crisis gripping Armenia
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 00:00 ||
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[MIDDLEEASTEYE.NET] Even some of the most ardent supporters of Ottoman Turkish President His Enormity, Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First ...Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey. In Anatolia did Recep Bey a stately Presidential Palace decree, that has 1100 rooms. That's 968 more than in the White House, 400 more than in Versailles, and 325 more than Buckingham Palace, so you know who's really more important... were truly shocked and angered last week by his decision to sack Naci Agbal, the central bank governor, less than five months after his appointment.
Ottoman Turkish officials, technocrats, academics and others who have supported Erdogan in his ups and downs over the years this time couldn’t find any logical reason to fire Agbal, whose initial ascension to the job last November increased confidence in markets, stopped soaring US dollar exchange rates and led to more than $15bn inflows into the country.
"This was a very sad day. No one could reasonably explain why he did it so suddenly," a Ottoman Turkish official told Middle East Eye, speaking on condition of anonymity ... for fear of being murdered... . "Why did you appoint him in the first place just months ago if you were going to fire him?"
When Erdogan appointed Agbal as central bank governor, the markets perceived it as a pragmatic move to stop the lira's free-fall and restore order and confidence into the Ottoman Turkish economy with an orthodox monetary policy.
His sudden firing depreciated the lira by around 10 percent versus the dollar, moved the country risk premiums to the highest points ever, and evaporated the profits made this year on the Istanbul Stock Exchange.
However, we can't all be heroes. Somebody has to sit on the curb and applaud when they go by... for those who are close to Erdogan, the firing wasn't really a surprise. "Erdogan's relationship with Agbal had been steadily deteriorating," said one Ottoman Turkish official close to the president. "Their communication wasn't good at all."
Officials and sources close to the presidency say Erdogan was truly astonished by Agbal's interest rate increases. "Publicly and privately, Erdogan repeatedly told Agbal what he thinks of interest rate hikes. And Agbal seemed to have understood what the president wants," the official close to the president added.
INCREASING RATES
Erdogan is famous for his ideological stance against high interest rates. Islam forbids it, but he also believes that high interest rates lead to high inflation, a controversial and heterodox theory that has roots in his ideological upbringing during the Islamist Welfare Party years.
When Erdogan appointed Agbal, who was previously his former budget director at the presidency, he also fell out with his son-in-law Berat Albayrak, who resigned as economy minister after the president discovered that the central bank's forex reserves were in tatters.
Erdogan named respected politician Lutfi Elvan as Albayrak's replacement, and started to talk about a "bitter pill" that the government needed to swallow.
"When Erdogan talked about the bitter pill, he meant officially moving the interest rates to the unofficial market rate," a source close to the Ottoman Turkish presidency said. "Agbal's first 475 points increase was approved by Erdogan."
Agbal's predecessor, Murat Uysal, used backdoor methods to increase rates while officially holding the main policy interest rate much lower.
[ENGLISH.AAWSAT] Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi accused political parties of obstructing government efforts in restoring state prestige and combating corruption.
Kahdimi indicated that some parties are trying to disrupt the anti-corruption committee which is accused of abuse against officials arrested on corruption charges.
During a televised interview with a number of Arab channels, Kadhimi said that restoring the state means some parties will be affected and harmed, and they will try to resist until the last moment.
The PM asserted that the government took a number of measures to restore confidence in the security services, noting that all parties must work within the framework of the state.
Asked about the military parade of "Rubu Allah" faction in Baghdad last Thursday, Kadhimi asserted that it won't be repeated.
Some parties want the government to fail and are trying to impede its work, according to Kadhimi, noting that the cabinet took bold decisions and presented a number of reforms including the white paper on economic and administrative reform.
Kadhimi earlier adopted the "New Mashreq" concept, which was rejected by a number of parties, especially those affiliated with Iran.
He explained that the New Mashreq can be established with Iraq, Jordan, and Egypt at its core, in conjunction with the preparations for a tripartite summit, which was postponed.
"When economic interests are the main element in the strategy of cooperation, problems are reduced."
Iraq does not need foreign forces on its territories, asserted Kadhimi, adding that the country needs international support, and the help of the coalition air forces to direct Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... s against ISIS hideouts.
Kadhimi stressed that the relationship between Washington and Baghdad must be transformed into a US-Iraqi interest in the fields of economy, security, culture, and health.
Kadhimi’s advisor Hussein Allawi, told Asharq al-Awsat that the government has worked with the US on the strategic dialogue.
This includes redeploying 2500 out of the 5000 advisors who previously worked with the international coalition against ISIS.
Iraq is looking towards expanding its relations with the US to include various fields such as economy, development, and investment.
Allawi asserted that the "New Mashreq" is an important economic, political, and security project that aims to strengthen various fields and provide public services, which will enhance Iraq’s foreign policy.
Iraq will have a competitive advantage, especially for its oil and gas resources, in addition to improving its capacity in joint projects with other countries, namely Jordan and Egypt, according to the advisor.
On Saturday, Kadhimi announced the postponement of the "New Mashreq" tripartite summit with Egypt and Jordan, in wake of Friday’s deadly train collision in Egypt.
The PM also discussed in a phone call with Jordan’s King Abdullah II bilateral ties, regional issues, and means to boost cooperation.
For his part, King Abdullah stressed the need to build on the trilateral cooperation mechanism between Jordan, Iraq, and Egypt, in service of their peoples' interests, adding that he looks forward to the next trilateral summit, according to a Royal Court statement.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 00:00 ||
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[ENGLISH.AAWSAT] The death of Dhafer Eliyahu hit Iraq hard, not only because the doctor treated the neediest for free, but because with his passing, only four Jews now remain in the country.
The day of Eliyahu's burial, "it was me who prayed over his grave", the doctor's sister told AFP.
"There were friends" of other faiths who prayed too, each in their own way, she added, refusing to give her name.
To hear Jewish prayer out in the open is rare now in Baghdad, where there is but one synagogue that only opens occasionally and no rabbis.
But Jewish roots in Iraq go back some 2,600 years.
According to biblical tradition, they arrived in 586 BC as prisoners of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II after he destroyed Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem.
In Iraq, they wrote the Babylonian Talmud on the very land where the patriarch Abraham was born and where the Garden of Eden is considered by some to have been located, in the heart of the Mesopotamian marshlands.
More than 2,500 years later, in Ottoman-ruled Baghdad, Jews were the second largest community in the city, making up 40 percent of its inhabitants.
Some were very prominent members of society like Sassoon Eskell, Iraq's first ever finance minister in 1920, who made a big impression on British adventurer and writer Gertrude Bell.
At the start of the last century, the day of rest and prayer was Saturday, as per the Jewish tradition, not Islam's Friday, as it is today.
Today, "one prays at home", said a Baghdad resident knowledgeable of the city's Jewish community, who also chose to remain anonymous.
And when people with a Jewish name deal with the administration "they will not be well received", he added.
According to Edwin Shuker, a Jew born in Iraq in 1955 and exiled in Britannia since he was 16, "there are only four Jews with Iraqi nationality who are descendant of Jewish parents" left in the country, not including the autonomous Kurdish region.
A turning point for Jewish history in Iraq came with the first pogroms in the mid-20th century. In June 1941, the Farhud pogrom in Baghdad left more than 100 Jews dead, properties looted and homes destroyed.
Seven years before Israeli independence, so the only trigger was pure hatefulness.
In 1948, Israel was created amid a war with an Arab military coalition that included Iraq.
Almost all of Iraq's 150,000 Jews went into exile in the ensuing years.
Their identity cards were taken away and replaced by documents that made them targets wherever they showed them.
The majority preferred to sign documents saying they would "voluntarily" leave and renounce their nationality and property.
Still today, Shuker said, Iraqi law forbids the restoration of their citizenship.
By 1951, 96 percent of the community had left.
Almost all the rest follow after the public hangings of "Israeli spies" in 1969 by the Baath party, which had just come to power off the back of a coup.
"Promotion of Zionism" was punishable by death and that legislation has remained unchanged.
Decades of conflict and instability -- with the 1980s Iran-Iraq war, the invasion of Kuwait, an international embargo, the 2003 American invasion and the ensuing violence -- completed the erosion of the Jewish community.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 00:00 ||
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#1
That does it. Time to move the pinochle game. Miami?
[ENGLISH.AAWSAT] "A stain on Iraq’s illusory sovereignty." That is how an Iraqi army officer describes the billboard glorifying Qassem Soleimani , an Iranian commander who was killed in an American Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... on Iraqi soil in January 2020.
[ENGLISH.AAWSAT] Paleostinian President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ...aka Abu Mazen, a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial. While no Yasser Arafat, he has his own brand of evil, just a little more lowercase.... announced his readiness to revive the Paleostinian-Israeli negotiations, based on a two-state solution, calling for holding an international peace conference as soon as possible.
During a meeting of Fatah’s Central Committee in Ramallah, Abbas underlined the importance of benefiting from the international support which upholds an international peace conference to resolve the Paleostinian issue, based on the resolutions of international legitimacy and the Arab Peace Initiative.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 00:00 ||
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#1
"Give us money"
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/29/2021 7:03 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Given that by your actions, you've never been interested in 'peace', why bother.
[ENGLISH.AAWSAT] The Syrian regime canceled the founding conference of the opposition National Democratic Front after security services stormed into the venue, banning anyone from entering.
Preparatory committee sources said that security agents contacted the Secretary-General of the Arab Democratic Socialist Union Party, Ahmed al-Asrawi, on Friday and informed him that the founding conference is canceled, unless they obtained the necessary green light from the competent authorities, after submitting a request to the Minister of Interior.
The General Coordinator of the National Coordination Committee, Hassan Abdulazim, announced the conference was postponed because the authorities also sent the state security agents and police forces to the site and banned the media from covering the developments.
The media office of the conference’s preparatory committee announced that the Syrian regime canceled the founding conference, which was set to be held on Saturday morning in Damascus.
In its statement, the committee asserted it will continue to hold meetings to take the appropriate decision regarding the formation of the National Democratic Front.
The committee also considered the regime’s ban of its peaceful civil action a "repressive criminal act" in violation of human rights ...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty... and international law.
It held the regime, the states supporting it, and influential parties responsible for the security and safety of the comrades and colleagues, calling for "diplomatic, international, and UN intervention" to ensure their security.
The statement explained that security agents contacted the participants on Friday night, and warned them that the security authorities will stop the conference from taking place under the pretext that it does not have a license from the so-called "party affairs committee."
The preparatory committee also called on all Syrians to boycott the presidential elections in June, describing them as illegal.
Earlier, Abdulazim called for boycotting the presidential election, scheduled for the summer, saying it was "illegal" and a "farce."
Asharq al-Awsat published a draft statement of the conference, which called for the "restructuring of the security agencies and building of a national army" and the "withdrawal of all non-Syrian armies and militias".
The document presented a set of proposals including a radical regime change and removal of all foreign forces and militias from Syria.
It also called for a political solution based on the international legitimacy - Geneva 1 and UN Resolution 2254 - to form a transitional governing body with full executive powers that allows for the establishment of a new constitution and holds fair elections under UN supervision, which results in a civil state.
The National Coordination body that called for the conference, includes the National Democratic Rally, most notably the Democratic Arab Socialist Union.
It had announced, through foreign media, its intention to hold a founding conference, the first of its kind in Damascus in nine years, to launch a new political alliance called the National Democratic Front.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/29/2021 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.
...Arabic for 
...Former President-for-Life of Sudan He came to power in 1989 when he, as a brigadier in the Sudanese army, led a group of officers in a bloodless military coup that ousted the government of Prime Minister Sadiq al-Mahdi and eventually appointed himself head cheese. He fell out with his Islamic mentor, Hasan al-Turabi, tried to impose shariah on the Christian and animist south, resulting in its secessesion, and attempted to 
...Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey. In Anatolia did Recep Bey a stately Presidential Palace decree, that has 1100 rooms. That's 968 more than in the White House, 400 more than in Versailles, and 325 more than Buckingham Palace, so you know who's really more important...
...
