Home-made bombs are being sent to physicists in Mexico. Colleagues around the world should ensure their own security, urges Gerardo Herrera Corral.
My elder brother, Armando Herrera Corral, was this month sent a tube of dynamite by terrorists who oppose his scientific research. The home-made bomb, which was in a shoe-box-sized package labelled as an award for his personal attention, exploded when he pulled at the adhesive tape wrapped around it.
My brother, director of the technology park at the Monterrey Institute of Technology in Mexico, was standing at the time, and suffered burns to his legs and a perforated eardrum. More severely injured by the blast was his friend and colleague Alejandro Aceves López, whom my brother had gone to see in his office to share a cup of coffee and open the award. Aceves López was sitting down when my brother opened the package; he took the brunt of the explosion in his chest, and shrapnel pierced one of his lungs.
Both scientists are now recovering from their injuries, but they were extremely fortunate to survive. The bomb failed to go off properly, and only a fraction of the 20-centimetre-long cylinder of dynamite ignited. The police estimate that the package contained enough explosive to take down part of the building, had it worked as intended.
As an academic scientist, why was my brother singled out in this way? He does not work in a field that is usually considered high-risk for terrorist activity, such as medical research on animals. He works on computer science, and Aceves López is an expert in robotics. I am a high-energy physicist and coordinate the Mexican contribution to research using the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, Europe's particle-physics laboratory; I have worked in the field for 15 years.
An extremist anarchist group known as Individuals Tending to Savagery (ITS) has claimed responsibility for the attack on my brother. This is confirmed by a partially burned note found by the authorities at the bomb site, signed by the ITS and with a message along the lines of: "If this does not get to the newspapers we will produce more explosions. Wounding or killing teachers and students does not matter to us."
In statements posted on the Internet, the ITS expresses particular hostility towards nanotechnology and computer scientists. It claims that nanotechnology will lead to the downfall of mankind, and predicts that the world will become dominated by self-aware artificial-intelligence technology. Scientists who work to advance such technology, it says, are seeking to advance control over people by 'the system'. The group praises Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber, whose anti-technology crusade in the United States in 197895 killed three people and injured many others.
The group's rhetoric is absurd, but I urge colleagues around the world to take the threat that it poses to researchers seriously. Information gathered by Mexican federal authorities and Interpol link it to actions in countries including Spain, France and Chile.
In April this year, the ITS sent a bomb similar to the one posted to my brother to the head of the Nanotechnology Engineering Division at the Polytechnic University of Mexico Valley in Tultitlan, although that device did not explode. In May, the university received a second parcel bomb, with a message reading: "This is not a joke: last month we targeted Oscar Camacho, today the institution, tomorrow who knows? Open fire on nanotechnology and those who support it!"
Posted by: Mike Ramsey ||
09/17/2011 07:26 ||
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The HAQQANIS are repor claiming they no longer have any sanctuaries in PAKISTAN, + feel safe in their AFGHAN ones, + also refuse to particpate in any formal peace talks unless the TALIBAN do.
Despite mounting US PRESSURE, the PAK ARMY is once again refusing to take any milaction = offensive agz the Haqqani Boyz unless they are proven to clearly interfere in PAK AFFAIRS.
Which may explain, as per NEWS KERALA, ....
THE US IS REITERATING THAT IT WILL CONTINUE TO FIGHT + HUNT DOWN AL-QAEDA, OTHER VIOLENT MILTERR GROUPS ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD, + PROVIDE HELP TO THOSE COUNTRIES THAT ARE UNABLE TO FIGHT OR RESIST THEM.
IMO Artic read > "...... SSSSSHHHHH ...CCCCCCCC AND BTW WE WILL SEND IN DRONES + SEALS, ETC. INTO PAKISTAN AGAIN AGZ THE HAQQANIS, WID OR WIDOUT PAKISTAN = ISLAMABAD'S PERMISSION"???
The U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution Friday to establish a support mission in Libya for an initial period of three months and to take other measures to help the country get back on its feet.
The mission's mandate includes restoring public security and order and promoting the rule of law, beginning efforts to write a constitution and set up elections, promoting and protecting human rights, and thawing the assets freeze that had been imposed on the government of ousted leader Moammar Gadhafi.
The resolution further asks U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to report on its implementation in two weeks and every month thereafter, or more often if he sees fit.
Resolution 2009 was passed shortly after the General Assembly approved the National Transitional Council to represent Libya at next week's meeting of the U.N. General Assembly.
The vote was 114 in favor, 17 against and 15 abstentions.
Such matters are usually adopted by acclamation, but a number of countries, including Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Angola and Gabon, denounced the recognition of the NTC as Libya's representative and forced the entire assembly to vote.
The Venezuelan ambassador called the NTC an "illegitimate transitory authority, imposed by foreign intervention."
[An Nahar] The Nigerien government said Friday it will not send fallen Libyan leader Moammar Qadaffy's ...whose instability has been an inspiration to dictators everywhere... son Saadi back home from Niger, where he decamped after the collapse of the regime in Tripoli.
Asked by journalists if Niger would turn Qadaffy's son over to Libya's new authorities, government front man Marou Amadou said, "No."
"With regard to (our) international obligations, we cannot send someone back there where he has no chance of receiving a fair trial and where he could face the death penalty," he said.
"On the other hand, if this gentleman or any other person is wanted by an independent court ... which has universal competence over the crimes for which he is pursued, Niger will do its duty," he added.
On a visit to Libya on Thursday with British Prime Minister David Cameron ... has stated that he is certainly a big Thatcher fan, but I don't know whether that makes me a Thatcherite, which means he's not. Since he is not deeply ideological he lacks core principles and is easily led. He has been described as certainly not a Pitt, Elder or Younger, but he does wear a nice suit so maybe he's Beau Brummel ... , French President Nicolas Sarkozy ...23rd and current President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra. Sarkozy is married to singer-songwriter Carla Bruni, who has a really nice birthday suit... said he was confident that Niger would cooperate in this regard.
"We have no reason to doubt the Nigerien leaders' commitment to international justice," Sarkozy said.
"We are a sovereign government and we shall consider requests or demands when they are received," said Amadou.
Saadi Qadaffy is on a list of people close to the Qadaffy regime targeted by U.N. Security Council travel sanctions.
The 38-year-old, the third of Qadaffy's seven sons, renounced a football career in Italia in 2004 to join the army, where he led an elite unit.
He arrived in Niger, one of the west African countries that benefited the most from Qadaffy's largesse, on Sunday in a convoy alongside other members of the toppled regime.
Niger has confirmed it has 32 Qadaffy loyalists on its soil, including three generals, saying it allowed them entry for "humanitarian reasons".
Niamey has officially recognized the National Transitional Council as Libya's interim leadership.
It has insisted that Qadaffy himself was not on its territory and declared that it will comply with international agreements should wanted Libyans cross into its borders.
"Niger will not hesitate to respect its engagements, as a democracy and lawful state," Amadou said.
The Qadaffy loyalists are "under our guard, our surveillance and our control" and the government "will be making sure that these people refrain from all political activity," he added.
The front man said an NTC delegation was expected in Niamey and in the meantime it was in regular contact with the transitional authority.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
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Check, hell. The bearer bonds were certified and authenticated. At least, that is what the smart dictators use nowadays: bank accounts can be frozen and drained but bearer bonds are effectively million of dollars per page of the document. With the right ones in it, a standard briefcase can literally be worth BILLIONS of dollars and only weigh a few pounds.
The key diplomatic relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States is in "good shape" despite "scratchy" disagreements over Arab Spring revolutions, a senior US official said Friday. President Barack Obama and Saudi King Abdullah also have a very good understanding, US National Security Adviser Tom Donilon said, days after new concern emerged over one of America's most vital Middle Eastern alliances.
"I would be less than honest if I didn't indicate there were disagreements about how the United States should go about handling" uprisings against longtime Arab leaders, Donilon said at an Economic Club lunch in Washington. "I think it is fair to say, and I have said this publicly before, that our conversations with the Saudis about this were scratchy.
"There were some disagreements about this."
Analysts say Saudi Arabia was angered at the Obama administration after it distanced itself from long-time Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak -- a linchpin of US security policy in the region, before he was deposed. But Donilon said that it had since become clear that the turmoil and revolt sweeping the Arab world was an indigenous uprising, and was not orchestrated by the United States or any other external forces.
"I have talked directly with the leadership of Saudi Arabia... and I think the relationship is in very good shape. Why? I think because it is based in shared strategic interests," he said. "We have had a relationship for 70 years based on a set of shared strategic interests."
Donilon expressed optimism that the key allies would get past earlier disagreements, pointing to the "very good relationship" between Obama and King Abdullah.
Speculation over the state of relations between Washington and Riyadh were stirred again this week when the former Saudi ambassador to Washington, Prince Turki al-Faisal, wrote a blistering New York Times opinion piece. He warned that if Washington carried out its threat to use its veto to halt the Palestinian drive for statehood recognition in the UN Security Council, it would put at risk Saudi-US cooperation in numerous areas.
"The 'special relationship' between Saudi Arabia and the United States would increasingly be seen as toxic by the vast majority of Arabs and Muslims, who demand justice for the Palestinian people," Prince Turki wrote. In the commentary headlined "Veto a State, Lose an Ally," he warned that Saudi cooperation with the United States in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen and the Gulf could also be at risk.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
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How about their funding of jihadis/Global Islam/religious parties in Pakistan?
Posted by: Paul D ||
09/17/2011 6:06 Comments ||
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Queen Elizabeth II signed Thursday an amendment to the United Kingdom's universal jurisdiction laws allowing harrassement of non-nationals through the threat of arrest warrants to be served when they reached British soil. "The change will ensure people cannot file for warrants when there is no real chance of prosecution," British Ambassador Matthew Gold said," and prevent abuse of the British legal system for political ends."
According to Gold, the chief prosecutor in the UK would have to approve requests for warrants under the universal jurisdiction statutes, thereby avoiding the issuance of politically motivated warrants in response to petitions that related to cases not expected to reach trial.
Last year Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman met with counterpart Willian Hague to discuss the rampant abuse of the universal jurisdiction statute by anti-Zionist groups who submitted petitions to the British courts as a means of harassing Israeli officials and military commanders.
The change was also advocated by British officials, including Attorney General Baroness Patricia Scotland, who had asked for the law to be amended giving her office the right to veto such warrants.
Anti-Israel activists have engaged in an extensive and cynical lawfare campaign against Israel and made extensive use of universal jurisdiction statutes, especially in Britannia, to target Israeli officials and military commanders for harassment.
Gold personally called opposition leader Tzipi Livni, who avoided visiting the UK as she had an arrest warrant issued against her in December 2009 due to her position as Foreign Minister during the Second Leb War and Operation Cast Lead, and told her the news.
In May, Gen. Yohanan Locker, military attaché to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was unable to accompany Netanyahu to London due to a British warrant for war crimes issued for him under the universal jurisdiction statute.
Other senior officers, such as former OC Southern Command, Doron Almog , who was to speak at a dinner benefiting institution for handicapped youth, and the head of military intelligence, Maj. Gen. Aviv Stars , have also been prevented from entering Britannia due to such warrants. Almog, who did not know about the warrant in advance, was warned not to get off the plane when he landed in Britannia.
The energy chiefs of South and North Korea have discussed with Russian energy giant Gazprom a pipeline to funnel Russian natural gas across the peninsula to South Korea.
Gazprom on Thursday said it signed a memorandum of understanding with North Korea's Ministry of Oil Industry and agreed to set up a working group on the project. Gazprom also said it signed a "roadmap" for future gas deliveries with South Korean gas pipeline operator KOGAS. There was no confirmation whether the energy chiefs of the two Koreas met as well.
The pipeline is expected to be over 1,100 km long, including 700 km across North Korea.
The Norks could earn some needed coin for the royalties on the pipeline, or they could be stupid and blow the deal. I'll bet on 'stupid'...
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
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That depends on how many generals and secret police commanders the ChiComs have in their pocket now: enough of those, and the deal will go through even if it has to wait for the elder Kim to die. And I would avoid medical treatments in China if I were him and he impedes the pipeline, lots of people die in hospitals from complications.
#2
I wouldn't get too dependent on that line if I were the SKs. Nice hostage for the NKs
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/17/2011 8:50 Comments ||
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I'll have to vote this is the result of his travels to China and Russia. Russia won, or china gets the construction contract. Bet the contract requires nork labor to do the install. Also bet it really falls behind and SK/US needs to kick in some incentive for completion.
Swedish public service broadcaster Sveriges Radio (SR) has been reported for hate speech after featuring a programme in which a Somali imam called for all converts from Islam to be killed.
The programme in question was a panel discussion and was broadcast live by SR International's Somali service.
The police report was filed by Erik Johansson, at the Swedish Evangelical Mission (Evangeliska Fosterlands-Stiftelsen - EFS), after friends told him of the imam's words underlining every Mohammedan's responsibility to kill anyone who leaves Islam.
"I received a call from my Somali friends who had heard the programme. I don't speak the language myself and when they explained to me, I concluded that this wasn't a message which should be on an SR channel," Erik Johansson told The Local on Thursday.
Johansson also contacted Sveriges Radio in order to register his dismay that the item was left available on their website for more than two weeks. Soon after his telephone call the programme was removed from the website.
In a comment to the Christian website Dagen on Tuesday, SR International head Ingemar Löfgren said that he decided to pull the transcript from SR's website pending receipt of an official translation, pointing out that he is responsible for several channels broadcast in languages which he does not speak.
"If a holy man calls for other Mohammedans to kill converts, then we have a journalistic responsibility... If he didn't get any follow up questions then we have failed in our journalistic responsibility," he said.
According to Erik Johansson, the journalist reminded the imam that they were in Sweden, to which he replied that the same rules apply there.
Praying in the streets of Gay Paree is against the law starting Friday, after the interior minister warned that police will use force if Mohammedans, and those of any other faith, disobey the new rule to keep the French capital's public spaces secular.
Claude Guéant said that ban could later be extended to the rest of La Belle France, in particular to the Mediterranean cities of Nice and Marseilles, where "the problem persists". He promised the new legislation would be followed to the letter as it "hurts the sensitivities of many of our fellow citizens".
"My vigilance will be unflinching for the law to be applied. Praying in the street is not dignified for religious practice and violates the principles of secularism, the minister told Le Figaro newspaper. "All Mohammedan leaders are in agreement," he insisted.
In other words, they did not immediately and openly disagree with him when he told them what they were to think.
In December when Marine Le Pen, then leader-in-waiting of the far-Right National Front, sparked outrage by likening the practice to the Nazi occupation of Gay Paree in the Second World War "without the tanks or soldiers". She said it was a "political act of fundamentalists".
Indeed.
More than half of right-wing sympathisers in La Belle France agreed with Marine Le Pen, at least one poll suggested. Nicolas Sarkozy ...23rd and current President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra. Sarkozy is married to singer-songwriter Carla Bruni, who has a really nice birthday suit... 's party denounced the comments, but the President called for a debate on Islam and secularism and went on to say that multiculturalism had failed in La Belle France.
Following the debate, Mr Guéant promised a countrywide ban "within months", saying the "street is for driving in, not praying".
In April, a ban on wearing the full Islamic veil came into force. Holland today became the third European country to ban the burka, after Belgium, despite the fact fewer than 100 Dutch women are thought to wear the face-covering Islamic dress.
Yesterday, Mr Guéant said the prayer problem was limited to two roads in the Goutte d'Or district of Gay Paree's eastern 19th arrondissement, where "more than a thousand" people blocked the street every Friday. However, you can observe a lot just by watching... a stroll through several districts in Gay Paree on a Friday suggests that Mohammedans spill into the streets outside many mosques.
Under an agreement signed this week, believers will be able to use the premises of a vast nearby fire station while awaiting the construction of a bigger mosque.
"We could go as far as using force if necessary (to impose the ban), but it's a scenario I don't believe will happen, as dialogue (with local religious leaders) has born fruit," he said. Sheikh Mohamed salah Hamza, in charge of one of the Gay Pareeian mosques which regularly overflows, said he would obey the new law, but complained: "We are not cattle" and that he was "not entirely satisfied" with the new location. He said he feared many believers would continue to prefer going to the smaller mosque.
"My congregants prefer to stick their bottoms in Frenchie faces on their streets," he added. "Such an amusing little soft jihad."
Public funding of places of religious worship is banned under a 1905 law separating church and state. Mr Guéant said that there were 2,000 mosques in La Belle France with half being built in the past ten years. La Belle France has Europe's largest Mohammedan population, with an estimated five million in total.
[Dawn] On the face of it, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani ... Pakistain's erstwhile current prime minister, whose occasional feats of mental gymnastics can be awe-inspiring ... cancelled his planned trip to the US on Friday because 'he personally wanted to supervise ongoing relief efforts in flood-hit areas of Sindh'. However, nothing needs reforming like other people's bad habits... there are indications that strained relations between the two countries have led to calling off his trip to America where he was to address a UN General Assembly session.
One reason for calling off the visit, sources told Dawn, was the American president's refusal to meet him on the sidelines of the General Assembly session scheduled for next week. They said the Pakistain embassy in Washington and consulate general in New York had tried hard to arrange a meeting between Prime Minister Gilani and President Barack B.O. Obama, but failed.
There are conjectures about chilly diplomatic ties between the two countries.
Earlier on Friday after attending a scholarship-award ceremony, Prime Minister Gilani said: "Now it's time that they (United States) should do more." He made the remark when his attention was drawn to Americans' lack of satisfaction with efforts from Pakistain in their fight against Taliban and their demand that his government should do more.
The prime minister said Pakistain had already contributed enormously to the fight against terrorism and extremism and stressed that the US should 'do more' instead.
The Pakistain-US relations hit a new low after the US officials again pointed fingers at Pakistain after the latest Taliban attack on its embassy in Kabul and adjacent NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all.... headquarters. Once again the Haqqani network is in the spotlight. The US claims the network has sanctuaries on the Pak side of the Afghan border and is behind Tuesday's attack which lasted nearly 20 hours. In recent weeks, frequency of Taliban attacks on Americans in Afghanistan has substantially increased. Since the Raymond Davis and the late Osama bin Laden ... who doesn't live anywhere anymore... episodes, there has been a serious level of trust-deficit between the two sides.
It was an eleventh hour cancellation because all arrangements related to the trip such as issuance of tickets to members of the delegation and their hotel bookings in New York had been finalised.
"Supervision of flood relief efforts is an excuse, because only this week prime minister had a couple of days' trip to Iran," remarked a journalist who was to accompany him to New York.
Referring to British Prime Minister David Cameron ... has stated that he is certainly a big Thatcher fan, but I don't know whether that makes me a Thatcherite, which means he's not. Since he is not deeply ideological he lacks core principles and is easily led. He has been described as certainly not a Pitt, Elder or Younger, but he does wear a nice suit so maybe he's Beau Brummel ... 's telephone call to Mr Gilani, he said the Britons had always intervened whenever serious issues beset Pakistain-US relations. Mr Cameron appreciated the prime minister's decision to call off his visit to New York in view of the devastation caused by massive rains in Sindh, a handout said.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Prime Minister Gilani said: "Now it's time that they (United States) should do more."
Happy to do more. Get out of the way, or stay there.
* DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > SAUDIS "EYE PAKISTANI NUKES" TO FACE IRAN.
NUKE-ARMED PAK is now the frontline SUNNI STATE in the KSA's on-going regional and geopol struggle agz SHIA IRAN, SAUDIS SEE PAKISTAN AS THE REPLACEMENT FOR SADDAM HUSSEIN + IRAQI NUCPROGS ALA PROVIDING "NUCLEAR COVER/SECURITY UMBRELLA" FOR THE KSA???
versus
* SAME > WIKILEAKS: MUSHARAF WARNED US ABOUT INDIA INTERVENTION IN BALOCHISTAN. Indjuh allegedly covertly funneling or providing $$$ + Arms, etc. to anti-Govt. Balochi Separatists.
MUSHEY = UNLESS INDIA STOPS, PAKISTAN WILL HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO "SEEK OTHER OPTIONS" TO PRTECT ITS NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY + INTEGRITY [read, including but not limited to WAGING WAR AGZ INDIA].
Remaining officials set to return next week after being evacuated when protests outside mission call for end of peace treaty with Israel.
Israeli ambassador to Jordan, Daniel Nevo, on Friday returned to Amman after being evacuated Wednesday and brought back to Israel as a protective precaution when mass protests were organized outside the mission in the Jordanian capital.
All diplomatic personnel at the embassy, with the exception of the No. 2 official there, left Amman on Wednesday. Generally, because of overall security concerns and the short distance between the countries, the staff -- whose families are not with them during the week -- return to Israel each Thursday for the weekend.
Palestinian Authority leaders say a future Palestinian state would be secular and open to all religions including Jews if they are willing to follow their laws as Palestinian citizens.
Mahmoud Habbash, the Palestinian Authority's minister of religious affairs, said, "The future Palestinian state will be open to all its citizens, regardless of their religion. We want a civil state, which in it live all the faiths, Muslim, Christian and Jews also if they agree, (and) accept to be Palestinian citizens."
"Can I get an amen?"
Habbash's comments come after the ambassador for the PLO to the United States, Maen Areikat, responded when asked Tuesday whether he could foresee a Jew being elected mayor of Ramallah: "I personally still believe that as a first step we need to be totally separated, and we can contemplate these issues in the future."
Areikat continued: "After the experience of the last 44 years of military occupation and all the conflict and friction, I think it would be in the best interest of the two people to be separated first."
This comment was widely reported, eliciting harsh reactions from Israeli members of parliament and members of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee.
Areikat later said that he never meant that Jews would not be allowed in a future state. He told the Huffington Post, "I never said that, and I never meant to say such a thing."
"Heavens no!"
Habbash said the state would protect any Jews still within the borders of a Palestinian state and accepted Palestinian citizenship, "equal with other citizens." But no one would be allowed to remain armed, as settlers are now, he said.
Pay a high tax in humiliation - have no legal standing in court - Muslims are *always* right no matter what. You are considered just below cattle - but a little higher than cattle dung. Oh and you must practice your religion in secret.
[An Nahar] Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan lashed out at Syrian President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators. Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor... on Friday, telling him the era of oppressive dictators is past.
Erdogan, who is in Tripoli on the final leg of his "Arab Spring" tour, hailed the advent of democracy in Libya and the "memory of deaders who sacrificed themselves for their country and their religion."
"You have proved in the eyes of the world that there is no regime that can go against the will of the people. This is what those who oppress the people of Syria should realize.
"This kind of leader should understand that his time is past because the era of repressive regimes has ended," Erdogan said.
Earlier Friday, the Turkish daily Hurriyet said Erdogan had warned Iran "not to spoil" the Syrian leadership, whose security forces have been cracking down on protesters since mid-March.
Erdogan said: "I cannot say there has been tension with Iran but we warned them (the Iranians) that 'the Assad administration is getting spoiled with your encouragement.'"
Turkey has expressed frustration with Assad and his iron-fisted regime for failing to listen to the people, whose almost daily demonstrations for democracy have been met with violent repression, at a cost of more than 2,600 lives according to the U.N.
"Unfortunately he did not do it," Erdogan said earlier this week, warning of the consequences of failing to meet popular aspirations for reform.
He said a solution would be for Assad to get rid of "those surrounding him who insist on the repression and the breaking of the Syrian people's will".
"If President Bashar does not take this step, he personally will pay the price," Erdogan said.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] The international Red Thingy on Friday condemned attacks on medical services in Syria, saying that relief workers and ambulances have come under fire on several occasions in the country.
"It is completely unacceptable that volunteers who are helping to save other people's lives end up losing their own," said Beatrice Megevand-Roggo, the International Committee of the Red Thingy' head of operations for the Near and Middle East.
A Syrian Arab Red Islamic Thingy volunteer died this week from injuries sustained while performing his duties, noted the relief agency.
Two other volunteers were maimed in the same incident, during which their ambulance was caught in heavy fire while transporting a maimed person to a hospital.
"This is not the first time Red Islamic Thingy personnel and vehicles have come under fire or been otherwise attacked since the onset of the recent violence in Syria," said the ICRC.
It urged all parties in the conflict to "respect and facilitate" Red Thingy efforts to help those in need.
Thousands of Syrians have demonstrated daily for the past six months against the regime of President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators. Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor... , whose security forces have responded with violence, leaving some 2,600 people dead according to the U.N.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Syria has filed a "strong formal protest memorandum" with the 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... over Wednesday's meeting between its Secretary General Nabil al-Arabi and "figures claiming to represent the Syrian opposition," Syria's official news agency SANA said Friday.
The opposition figures "handed al-Arabi a list of demands calling for all forms of flagrant foreign interference, including military intervention," SANA said.
In the memo, Syria's Permanent Representative to the vaporous Arab League Youssef Ahmed expressed "deep concern over this step as a serious precedent in terms of joint Arab action," the agency reported.
Ahmed slammed "such irresponsible act by the AL Secretary General who exceeded his powers and mission defined by the AL charter, in contrast to a firm fact that he is the secretary general of a regional organization representing Arab countries."
He added that al-Arabi's step violated the League Charter, accusing the secretariat general of seeking "exaggerated media coverage of the meeting."
"In this context, I cannot but express strong dissatisfaction over leaking information about your meeting with President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators. Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor... on September 10th, 2011 in such a delicate timing, which damaged the confidence that was supposed to exist between the Syrian government and the League's secretariat general," Ahmed said in the memo, addressing al-Arabi.
He noted that the alleged leaks would affect al-Arabi's mission in "communicating, cooperating and coordinating with the Syrian leadership to come out of the current crisis."
Posted by: Fred ||
09/17/2011 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.
David Cameron
Queen Elizabeth II signed Thursday an amendment to the United Kingdom's universal jurisdiction laws allowing harrassement of non-nationals through the threat of arrest warrants to be served when they reached British soil. "The change will ensure people cannot file for warrants when there is no real chance of prosecution," British Ambassador Matthew Gold said," and prevent abuse of the British legal system for political ends."
Praying in the streets of 
"We could go as far as using force if necessary (to impose the ban), but it's a scenario I don't believe will happen, as dialogue (with local religious leaders) has born fruit," he said. Sheikh Mohamed salah Hamza, in charge of one of the 
On the face of it, Prime Minister 
Palestinian Authority leaders say a future Palestinian state would be secular and open to all religions including Jews if they are willing to follow their laws as Palestinian citizens.
President-for-Life Bashir 
The international 
