[AnNahar] Britannia withdrew its last military forces from southern Afghanistan on Monday after 13 years of fighting that has cost hundreds of British lives in some of the most violent regions of the country.
A ceremony at Kandahar airfield marked the departure of remaining Royal Air Force personnel after the final British base was handed over to Afghan forces in October.
Since 2001, Britannia has suffered 453 military deaths during operations in Afghanistan.
"Britannia's armed forces can take great pride in the completion of their deployment to southern Afghanistan," Defense Secretary Michael Fallon said in a statement.
"Thanks to their courage and dedication, the country has the best possible chance of a stable future. Our departure from Kandahar airfield therefore is an historic milestone."
Much of the British fighting took place in neighboring Helmand ...an Afghan province populated mostly by Pashtuns, adjacent to Injun country in Pak Balochistan... province, which remains a Taliban hard boy stronghold and a center of opium poppy cultivation.
The U.S.-led NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A cautionary tale of cost-benefit analysis.... combat mission will finish at the end of this year, with about 12,500 troops staying on into 2015 to train and support the Afghan army and police.
The British contribution next year will be the supervision of an officers' training academy outside Kabul.
The security challenges facing Afghanistan were underlined on Sunday when a suicide kaboom killed 57 people watching a volleyball game.
Two NATO soldiers were also killed in an attack in eastern Afghanistan on Monday. NATO did not release their nationalities, in line with coalition policy.
[Ynet] The role of US troops in Afghanistan will shift in 2015 to training Afghan cops and counter-terrorism activities, White House front man Josh Earnest said on Monday.
Earnest said the new role doesn't represent an expansion and that there would be 10,000 boots on the ground if Afghanistan by the end of this year and the military would be back into an embassy protection role by the end of 2016.
Cairo -- An Egyptian appeals court on Sunday confirmed jail terms for at least 85 students convicted of illegal demonstrations and vandalism in protests backing ousted president Mohammed Mursi, officials said.
Hundreds of students have been tried in civilian courts after violence on campuses, bastions of pro-Islamist activists following the army's overthrow of Mursi in July 2013.
His student supporters have clashed regularly with security forces on university campuses since a nationwide government crackdown left hundreds of people dead and thousands jailed. More than 200 Mursi supporters have also been sentenced to death after speedy mass trials, which the United Nations criticised as "unprecedented" in recent history.
A Cairo appeals court upheld verdicts sentencing at least 85 students in separate cases to jail terms of up to five years after finding them guilty of illegal protests, illegal assembly, vandalism and joining a terrorist group, judicial sources and a lawyer said.
Defence lawyer Mukhtar Mounir, who represented nine defendants, confirmed the outcome to AFP. "A Cairo misdemeanour court of appeals confirmed the verdict against 85 students, including five female students... for violent clashes in Al Azhar University," said Mounir, who attended Sunday's session.
The verdict can still be appealed at the Court of Cassation.
At least 14 students were killed in clashes with security forces during pro-Mursi rallies at universities across the country during the academic year that ended in April.
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[NYDailyNews] An employee at the embassy may have given out more than 50 sham visas to people who falsely claimed they needed to enter the U.S. to attend an oil industry conference in Texas, according to unsealed papers in Brooklyn Federal Court. The feds learned the Yemeni citizens never went to the conference. It was not clear if the fraudulent visas were connected to terrorism.
DHAKA: Bangladesh opposition leader Khaleda Zia on Monday lost her latest attempt to halt trials on graft charges which could see her jailed for life if found guilty, her lawyer said.
A Bangladeshi pol charged for graft? How could that be?
The Supreme Court dismissed appeals by the former two-time premier, who claimed charges against her of embezzling $650,000 in two corruption cases were filed illegally, lawyer Rafiqul Islam Mia said.
"In a short ruling the chief justice said the appeals were dismissed," Mia told AFP.
The appeals to the country's highest court were the latest in a series of attempts to suspend the trials, which both started in September after years of delay.
Mia said his team of lawyers would continue their efforts, branding the charges "fabricated and concocted".
"Lies! All lies!"
Prosecutors have accused Zia's lawyers of time-wasting, saying pre-trial hearings alone had been delayed more than 36 times.
Zia, 69, has called the charges politically motivated, aimed at destroying her Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which has vowed to topple the government of arch-rival Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
Zia and three of her aides are accused of syphoning off 31.5 million taka (about $400,000) from a charitable trust named after her late husband Ziaur Rahman, a former president who was assassinated in 1981. She is also accused of leading a group of five people, including her eldest son and her heir apparent, in embezzling 21.5 million taka ($277,000) - funds which were meant to go to an orphanage set up in memory of her late husband.
In recent months, BNP and its allies have staged a series of large rallies across the country, and forecast fresh protests for the winter in an effort to force Hasina to call fresh elections.
Zia was charged just weeks after Hasina was re-elected in a January 5 poll which the centre-right BNP and its 18 opposition allies boycotted and denounced as a farce. The charges date back to Zia's last term as premier from 2001 to 2006 and can carry a life sentence, prosecutors have said.
Zia, who first became premier in 1991, has a notoriously poisonous relationship with Hasina - an enmity which dates back three decades.
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[AnNahar] British police on Monday urged the public to be alert to potential terrorist activity as they said the threat of myrmidon attacks would last for several years.
Launching Counter-Terrorism Awareness Week, police said that even if the violence in Iraq and Syria subsided, the risk of attacks in Britannia would continue.
The week of events, which will include talks with university students, businesses, theater group performances in schools and social media interaction.
It comes amid heightened concerns over the numbers of British jihadis joining forces with Death Eaters in Iraq and Syria -- and potentially returning home with terror "tradecraft".
"The danger posed by violent Death Eaters has evolved," said Mark Rowley, Britannia's chief counter-terror police officer.
"They are no longer a problem solely stemming from countries like Iraq and Afghanistan, far away in the minds of the public.
"Now, they are homegrown, in our communities."
He said several attack plots had been disrupted in 2014 and more than 270 arrests had been made this year following counter-terror investigations.
Interior minister Theresa May said on Monday that since the government came to power in 2010, a total of 138 people have been put behind bars for terror-related offenses.
She also said she had revoked British citizenship for 27 dual nationality holders in the same period, as well as refusing or canceling 29 passports to prevent people traveling to fight in Syria and Iraq.
However, it was a brave man who first ate an oyster... "the eyes and ears of law enforcement and other agencies alone cannot combat the threat", Rowley warned.
"We don't want to scare people but we do want them to understand the threat and be vigilant to things that are out of place or suspicious and report it to the police."
He said gunnies target busy, well-populated places for maximum impact, so urged businesses to check their security measures and train staff to spot potential threats, as they are often the first to notice when things are amiss.
The official terror threat level in Britannia was raised to "severe" in August, the second-highest of five levels, meaning that an attack is considered "highly likely".
Across Britannia, officers will be briefing more than 6,000 people at 80 venues during Counter-Terrorism Awareness Week.
Events will be held in schools, airports, shopping centers, cinemas and farms in a bid to engage people in helping to prevent attacks.
#4
The pols, press, and plods have addressed them
And asked about terror to test them:
"Improper suspicion
Of one faith tradition
Gives probable cause to arrest them!"
[Ynet] London seeking to ensure arms are not used in Gazoo in a way that would not breach international law.
All nations except that Jewish one are expected to enforce peaceful behaviour by the residents, and to defend their borders against attack. This is not, of course, antisemitism.
Britannia is undertaking a second review of arms export licenses to Israel to ensure equipment could not be used in a way that would breach international law, the government said on Monday.
The government has already conducted one such review, in August, in response to the Jewish state's conflict with Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, in Gazoo after which it said it would suspend 12 licenses to export military items to Israel if hostilities resumed.
It said on Monday it was conducting another review a day after Israeli forces rubbed out a Paleostinian in the Gazoo Strip near the border with Israel, the first such fatality since a 50-day war ended in August.
"To ensure that new information is taken into account, and in light of the fact that a ceasefire has been in place for more than two months, ministers decided earlier this month to carry out a further review," a government spokeswoman said in a statement.
The earlier August review had found that the "vast majority" of exports licensed for Israel were not for items that could be used by Israeli forces in Gazoo, she added.
A report by a British parliamentary committee in July found outstanding government-approved contracts for export of dual use or military goods to Israel worth more than 7.8 billion pounds (12.3 billion US dollar). These included contracts to supply body armor, drone components, and missile parts.
The lobby group the Campaign Against Arms Trade published an analysis of government data on Monday which showed Britannia had approved military licences to Israel worth 7 million pounds in the six months leading up to the war in Gazoo.
[Ynet] Britannia is facing the biggest terrorism threat in its history and has foiled around 40 major plots since jacket wallahs attacked London in 2005, Home Secretary Theresa May said on Monday.
The government would on Wednesday set out new laws to take on the krazed killers, May added, including legislation making it easier for security services to track attackers online, and check if radicalised fighters were flying into Britannia.
"When the security and intelligence agencies tell us that the threat we face is now more dangerous than at any time before or since 9/11 we should take notice," the home secretary (interior minister) said in a speech.
Insurance companies would be barred from providing cover for ransom payments under the new legislation and airlines would be banned if they failed to provide information on passengers flying to Britannia, she added.
North Korea on Sunday threatened Cheong Wa Dae with nuclear destruction after the UN human rights committee last week passed a resolution condemning the North's human rights violations.
Where?
The North's National Defense Commission in a statement said, "We ask this question of Park Geun-hye and her gang, who seem to be celebrating and making merry over the UN resolution. Do you think Cheong Wa Dae is safe if a nuclear war breaks out?"
It said the North Korean regime and people "totally reject the UN resolution on human rights drafted by the U.S. and their puppets abusing the UN platform" and threatened a "hardline response."
North Korea has been blustering about its nuclear program nearly every day since the UN committee passed the resolution on Nov. 18 which calls for the referral of top North Korean officials to the International Criminal Court.
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#1
'The Blue House'.
ROK version of the white house.
The Presidential Home
#2
Information for all those posting their own images: please make sure width=500 is included. If the thing is too wide it breaks the 'Burg until a moderator comes along to fix it.
[IsraelTimes] A Turkish regional governor was accused Monday of inciting hatred towards the country's Jewish community after suggesting a synagogue be turned into a museum as a reprisal for Israel's policies over the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem.
Dursun Ali Sahin, governor of the northwestern province of Edirne, sparked an outcry when he said Friday that the ancient Buyuk Sinagog (the Great Synagogue) built in 1907 under Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid should only be used as a museum.
"While those bandidos blow the winds of war and massacre people inside Al-Aqsa mosque, we are restoring their synagogues," Sahin said.
Continued on Page 49
[IsraelTimes] In a refutation of comments attributed to him earlier in the day, Paleostinian Foreign Minister Riyad Al-Maliki denied Monday that the Paleostinian leadership had suspended its UN bid for statehood until the completion of nuclear talks with Iran, insisting that negotiations with Security Council members and 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... have been underway and would end within 10 days.
On Monday morning, the Ma'an news agency quoted Maliki as saying that the Paleostinian leadership had decided to postpone its efforts to pass a Security Council resolution setting a timetable for an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank. The UN was too preoccupied with Iran to deal with the Paleostinian issue, Maliki reportedly told the Bethlehem-based news agency, adding that Paleostinian diplomats had not yet been able to obtain the nine Security Council votes necessary to either pass the decision or force the US to exercise its veto power.
But later, Maliki denied in a press statement that the Paleostinians had ever linked their UN bid to the Iranian issue, or to the prospects of success in a vote.
"The statements of [PA] President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... are clear regarding the continuation of our efforts to bring the draft resolution to a vote in the Security Council," said Maliki, referring to a pledge made by Abbas to members of his Fatah party Sunday to bring the issue to the Security Council before November's end.
Paleostinians are still negotiating the bid with La Belle France as the representative of the European bloc, and awaiting the return of Security Council diplomats from Vienna, where negotiations on Iran's nuclear program have been held. On Saturday, Abbas will discuss the bid in Cairo with the vaporous Arab League's Follow-up Committee for the Arab Peace Initiative, and then complete the procedural measures needed to bring the decision to a vote, Maliki said.
"In other words, there is no postponement, and preparations are ongoing. Once they're completed, the vote will take place on the draft resolution regardless of the outcome of negotiations with Council members. This is expected to take place within the coming ten days," Maliki concluded.
UN Secretary of State John F. I was in Vietnam, you know Kerry Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a lucky hat, conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State... has been trying to convince the Paleostinian leadership to forgo its UN bid in favor of renewed negotiations with Israel. The Paleostinians have presented a number of preconditions for talks to resume, including a three-month settlement freeze while the borders of the future state are negotiated and an Israeli recognition of the pre-1967 lines as the basis of a Paleostinian state.
[IsraelTimes] Israel on Monday welcomed the extension of nuclear talks between Iran and the West. No deal is better than a bad deal, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview with the BBC. The deal that Iran was pushing for was terrible. The deal would have left Iran with the ability to enrich uranium for an atom bomb while removing the sanctions.
Netanyahu made the comments after diplomats close to negotiations in Vienna said that the P5+1 nations the US, Britannia, La Belle France, China, Russia, plus Germany had decided to extend talks with Iran until July 2015 after they apparently failed to come to terms hours ahead of a midnight deadline.
The right deal that is needed is to dismantle Iran s capacity to make atomic bombs and only then dismantle the sanctions, the prime minister continued. Since that s not in the offing, this result is better. A lot better. I think Iran should not have any capacity to enrich. There is no right to enrich. What do you need to enrich uranium for if you are not developing an atomic bomb?
Continued on Page 49
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[Ynet] Jordanian authorities have deported "vulnerable Syrian refugees," including maimed men and unaccompanied children, an international human rights ...which are often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless... group said Monday, adding that a Jordanian government front man denied the claim.
Human Rights Watch ... During the fiscal year ended June 30, 2011, HRW received a pledge from the Foundation to Promote Open Society, of which George Soros is Chairman, for general support totaling $100,000,000. The grant is being paid in installments of $10,000,000 over ten years.Through June 30, 2013, HRW had received $30,000,000 towards the fulfillment of the pledge.... said that those deported include a group of 12 Syrians who had been receiving treatment at a rehabilitation center and four refugees, three of them children, whom Jordanian border police stopped near the Syrian border.
Human Rights Watch quoted the government front man as denying the refugees had been deported, saying they were taken to other unnamed hospitals. It did not name the front man. Another Jordanian official in Amman contacted by the News Agency that Dare Not be Named refused to comment on the report.
"Jordan is carrying a heavy refugee burden, but it should not be in the business of sending any refugees back to a conflict zone where their lives are threatened, much less children and maimed men who can't even walk," said Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. "Such deportations create an environment of fear that affects all refugees."
[AnNahar] Negotiations over the release of Lebanese soldiers and policemen abducted by jihadists, who briefly overran the northeastern border town of Arsal in August, reached a breakthrough, al-Liwaa newspaper reported on Monday.
According to the daily, the mediation carried out by the Qatari-appointed negotiator, Syrian Ahmed al-Khatib, succeeded in easing several complications.
Sources told the daily that the Lebanese authorities received further guarantees that jihadists affiliated to the Islamic State and the al-Qaida-linked al-Nusra Front will not execute any servicemen.
However, al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Monday that negotiations still have a long way to go.
The newspaper said that al-Khatib will end his mediation, without citing the reason.
However, General Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim denied the report after a meeting with Prime Minister Tammam Salam at the Grand Serail on Monday.
“Negotiations are ongoing and the Qatari-appointed mediator didn't withdraw," he added.
Sources had previously denied in comments to al-Akhbar that negotiations reached a dead-end despite a cut in communication with jihadists for the past 17 days.
The Nusra has said that the three-month hostage crisis would end if 10 inmates held at Lebanese prisons would be freed for each hostage or seven Lebanese inmates and 30 female prisoners held in Syria would be released for each abducted soldier and policeman or if five Lebanese and 50 women inmates would be freed.
The group added that the swap with the prisoners held at Syrian prisons should take place in Turkey or Qatar, while the exchange with the Lebanese authorities should take place on the outskirts of the northeastern border town of Arsal.
The cabinet had previously totally rejected any swap deal with the jihadists.
For its part, the IS group has announced its readiness to release the Lebanese soldiers and policemen in its captivity, if the Lebanese state sets free five Islamist inmates in return for each captive.
[Ynet] British Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond says target to reach a "headline agreement" within next three months, notes that during extension period, Tehran able to continue to access around $700 million per month in sanctions relief.
Iran and six powers failed for a second time this year on Monday to resolve their 12-year dispute over Tehran's nuclear ambitions and gave themselves seven more months to overcome the deadlock that has prevented them from clinching an historic deal.
Western officials said they were aiming to secure an agreement on the substance of a final accord by March but that more time would be needed to reach a consensus on the all-important technical details.
Continued on Page 49
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#1
More time to vilify Iran and vindicate any subsequent Israeli actions. Or peace will break out.
#2
Ah the endless stream of letters and memos while the centrifuges whirl...
At least during Disraeli's time and even Kissinger, the best diplomat could recognize when a negotiation was a stalling tactic and persuasion was required...leading to the Von Clausewitz definition of war as diplomacy by other means.
[FREEBEACON] Iran's foreign minister and lead negotiator in nuclear talks is known to frequently scream and shout at Western diplomats, including Secretary of State John F. I was in Vietnam, you know Kerry Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a lucky hat, conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State... , a practice that has caused alarm among bodyguards stationed outside the negotiating room, according to a member of the Iranian diplomatic team who spoke to the Farsi-language press.
Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif--who is scheduled to hold one-on-one talks with Kerry this evening in Vienna--"frequently shouts at Western diplomats" in such a forceful manner that bodyguards have hurriedly entered the negotiation room on occasion worried that an incident might occur, according to one Iranian diplomat involved in negotiations who spoke anonymously with the Iranian press earlier this week.
On one occasion, Zarif's shouts were so loud that a member of the Iranian delegation entered the negotiation room to check on the players, according to the report, which was independently translated for the Free Beacon.
Upon entering, the Iranian official was informed by European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton, a chief western negotiator, that Zarif was just shouting and she had gotten used to it, according to an independent translation of the report.
The report of Zarif's aggressive behavior is consistent with previous reports claiming that Iranian negotiators tend to treat their Western counterparts--particularly the Americans--with scorn.
Iranian diplomat Abbas Araghchi, another member of the negotiating team, is reported to have said in an interview that during past negotiations in Geneva, Zarif "shouted" at Kerry and spoke to him in a way that was likely "unprecedented" in the history of U.S. diplomacy.
Araghchi went on to claim that he and Zarif play the roles of "good cop, bad cop," according to the report, also in Farsi. The two often exchange these roles in a bid to "baffle the Western diplomats" and keep them uneasy, the report claims.
Araghchi further claimed that Kerry said very little after being shouted at by Zarif, except for "one or two very respectful sentences."
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#1
frequently scream and shout at Western diplomats
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.
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