Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Birthday/Daily Gam Shot
June Haver aka 'Cri-Cri' Bruce in "Home in Indiana" aka Rozsika "Rosie" Dolly in "The Dolly Sisters" aka Katie in "I Wonder Who's Kissing Her Now" aka Rad McGill in "Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay!" aka Liza Martin in "I'll Get By" aka Connie Scott in "Love Nest" (Died in 2005 at age 79)
[Tolo News] Nine non-combatants were killed in a Taliban attack in eastern Nangarhar ...on the main road from Lovely Peshawar. The capital is Jalalabad. The population of 1,334,000 consists mostly of Pashtuns with a few Arabs and Pashais... on Wednesday, local officials said on Thursday.
The incident happened last night in Dowr Baba district of Nangarhar when Taliban attacked on a house in which a wedding ceremony was being held. Nine non-combatants were killed and five others were maimed, Ahmad Zia Abdulzai, a front man for governor of Nangarhar told TOLOnews.
Police have started investigation about incident, Mr Abdulzai said.
The Taliban have not yet commented about the attack.
Of course not. It makes them look bad to the locals, so they're going to pretend it didn't happen, and anyway they didn't do it. Possibly some five year olds somewhere are fooled by this.
Militants are active in some parts of Nangarhar province fighting against government forces.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Taliban
[Tolo News] Eleven Afghan security officers including two high-ranking military officers in Ministries of Defence and Interior Affairs were placed in long-term storage in connection with defence ministry raid around two months ago.
A source close to national security department confirmed the detentions, but declined to shed light on the identity of detainees.
A separate source said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of issue that two high-ranking officials were also among the detainees. One of the officials was serving as chief of staff to a leading official in defence ministry and the other was running a department in interior ministry.
Top officials in Defence Ministry have said that the raider was taken in by a contact inside the ministry.
"As I said before, defence ministry attacker is Atiqullah from south eastern Afghanistan and was living in London. He came to Afghanistan from London and then was taken to Northern Wazoo for training," Defence Ministry Spokesman Gen. Zaher Azimi said. "Then he was taken into the ministry by a driver of an official while the official was not aware of the process."
A roundabout path, to be sure.
Some experts claim that a high-ranking official in defence ministry has a hand in the incident and the jacket wallah was taken inside the ministry compound by his senior aide.
"In defence ministry attack, an army soldier named Habibullah, senior aide of the commander for deputy defence minister, cooperated with the attacker to get inside the ministry compound and to kill some of our personalities," Political Analyst Jawid Kohistani said.
On 18th April a suicide bomber, dressed in army uniform, attempting to blow himself up inside the main building of Afghan Defence Ministry was rubbed out.
The incident led to the death of two Afghan cops and seven others were maimed.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Pakistan
[Tolo News] Pak Taliban has warned to step up their attacks against US troops in Afghanistan seeking to avenge deaths in drone attacks targeting bad turban locations in Pakistain's tribal belts.
But Afghan Defence Ministry described the comments as enemy propaganda. Naah, Taliban doesn't do that...
A front man for a Taliban leader, Mullah Nazir who is supported by the Pak government, said his group would send more fighters to Afghanistan to target US troops.
Pakistain's military government considers Nazir and his group "good Taliban", because they are not after ruining the Pak state. ...if that's possible.
Nazir's group provides safe haven to senior al-Qaeda leaders and carry out attacks in Afghanistan.
"Because the United States is launching these strikes, we will send more fighters to Afghanistan and step up our operations against US forces," Maulawi Yonus, a senior Taliban capo and front man for Mullah Nazir, told Rooters. I, of course, will stay back here and...monitor the situation. He'll eat a goat in their honor...
So much easier for the drones to find, that single leader eating a goat all by his lonesome, while his boys are off doing what they fondly believe to be terribly fearsome fighting.
"We have no other option. We have no weapons which shoot them (drone
aircraft) down so we will fight the United States in Afghanistan." Our weapons are useless against them!
Qari Yosuf, a close one to Nazir, said the Taliban have a lot of fighters to send to Afghanistan and the drone attacks will help them recruit more.
"We have lots of mujahideen (holy warriors)," Yosuf told Rooters. "It is not a problem. If drone strikes continue, we believe many rustics will join us because they (drone strikes) are killing ordinary people.
Not quite right. We've seen the statistics, and most of those killed by the drones are precisely the people they were aimed at. Ordinary people only get hit when they are friends or human shields.
Our shura will decide on the appropriate time to send more fighters and how many will go."
Nazir openly supports the Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Blinky Omar and al-Qaeda leaders and is behind some of the deadliest attacks in Afghanistan.
"Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are one and the same," Nazir said. "At an operational level we might have different strategies, but at the policy level we are one and the same ... This is wrong that I am anti al-Qaeda. I am part of al Qaeda."
But a bigwig in Afghan Ministry of Defence said the comments cannot bring any big change.
"We call the comments propaganda and we keep ourselves prepared against any threat," Defence Ministry Spokesman Gen. Zaher Azimi said.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: TTP
#1
Call me weird but trying to attract new recruits, etc. by labeling them as "rustics" is hardly motivational.
That's Fred's little joke, JosephM. Click on the headline and read the original article to find out the original vocabulary. In this case, the word was "tribesmen" before Fred's automatic translator program took over.
#4
By now, I would hope that we had discreetly set up some ambush corridors for the ill informed Taliban and free agents. The US set up some really gnarly ones in Iraq, where a small handful of ambushers took out ten times their numbers.
[Ennahar] The number two Al Qaeda Ayman Zawahiri ... Second in command of al-Qaeda, occasionally described as the real brains of the outfit. Formerly the Mister Big of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Bumped off Abdullah Azzam with a car boom in the course of one of their little disputes. Is thought to have composed bin Laden's fatwa entitled World Islamic Front Against Jews and Crusaders. Currently residing in the North Wazoo area. That is not a horn growing from the middle of his forehead, but a prayer bump, attesting to how devout he is... , has renewed his allegiance to the Taliban supreme leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, in a video posted Wednesday by the American intelligence group SITE.
"We renew our allegiance to the emir of the believers, Mullah Omar, we pledge our commitment to continue the jihad and the establishment of sharia" in the Mohammedan world, said the new strong man of Al-Qaeda.
Zawahiri speaking in a eulogy of the founder of Al Qaeda, the late Osama bin Laden ... who used to be alive but now he's not... , killed by U.S. commandos on May 2 in Pakistain. Bin Laden had sworn allegiance to Mullah Omar.
This renewal of allegiance to Mullah Omar comes as the Afghan government has asked the Security Council of the UN, which must make a decision in mid-June to lift sanctions imposed on about fifty Taliban leaders.
The Committee's list of sanctions against Al Qaeda and the Taliban are currently 486 people, including 138 linked to the Taliban, who are banned travel and whose assets are frozen.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under: al-Qaeda
#1
Omar to Ayman: I'm not into old men.
Posted by: American Delight ||
06/10/2011 3:56 Comments ||
Top||
#2
They are parasites living off the Taliban bodies!
#5
AFAIK Mullah Omar has always been tight wid OSAMA, + I've seen little or nothing on the MSM-Net, etc. to indic or convince me otherwise.
POST-ABBOTTABAD/OSAMA various younger MilTerr Leaders are beginning to assert themselves + take control.
IFF I WERE THE FED, I WOULD ADVISE THE BAMMER + USDOD, STATE TO FIND OUT WHERE OSAMA'S "CROWN PRINCE" FLED TO IN AFPAK OR ASIA AFTER THE RAID.
The Regional, Global Jihad isn't over just because OBL, etal. is gone, nor will OBL's demise stop the expansion of same - the MilTerrs themselves have said andor inferred as much.
[Al Jazeera] Fighting in Sudan's volatile oil-producing border state of South Kordofan has left several people dead and maimed, the UN has said.
"We know that more people have been killed overnight this morning in the state capital, Kadugli. But we don't have casualty figures," Hua Jiang, a spokeswoman for the UN mission in Sudan (UNMIS), told the AFP news agency on Wednesday.
Jiang said the fighting, which started on Sunday between Sudanese armed forces and northern elements within the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), the former southern rebel group, was currently most fierce in Kadugli.
But the army had also been shelling SPLA positions in the mountains of South Kordofan, she added.
"The IDPs (internally displaced persons) are now our main concern," she said.
Ceasefire call
Tension has been escalating in South Kordofan, the north's only oil-producing state, which borders the south.
The state is home to many fighters who sided with the south against the north during decades of civil war and fear being isolated after the south officialy declares independence next month.
The fighters are still referred to as members of the SPLA, although south Sudan says they are no longer part of its army.
Khartoum has repeatedly ordered about 40,000 northern SPLA troops, which it says are illegal, to either disarm or redeploy south of the 1956 borders before southern independence.
The fighting started after northern forces attempted to disarm some of the gangs, Yasir Arman, who heads the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement's [SPLM] northern wing, the political wing of the SPLA, said.
"We call for an immediate ceasefire, and to start dialogue immediately," Arman told Rooters.
A front man for the northern forces was not immediately available to comment, though Khartoum has previously said the region was stable.
UN staff evacuated
Kouider Zerrouk, another UN spokesperson, said that between 6,000 and 7,000 civilians were in and around the UNMIS peacekeeping compound, near Kadugli's airport, seeking protection.
All UN agencies and international NGOs have suspended their operations in Kadugli since Monday and their staff evacuated to the UNMIS base.
On Tuesday, the UN reported at least six casualties from festivities in the state capital, four of whom where Sudanese coppers.
South Kordofan is awash with weapons and retains strong links to the south, especially among the indigenous Nuba peoples who fought on the side of the southern rebels even though their homeland, the Nuba Mountains, lies in the north.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Sudan
[Al Jazeera] Muammar Qadaffy's days as leader of Libya are numbered, Hillary Clinton ... sometimes described as the Smartest Woman in the World and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Frederick T. Frelinghuysen ... , the US secretary of state, has said at the International Contact Group [ICG] on Libya meeting in Abu Dhabi.
"Qadaffy's days are numbered. We are working with our international partners through the UN to plan for the inevitable: a post-Qadaffy Libya," Clinton said on Thursday.
Clinton also said talks were under way with people close to the Libyan leader and that there was "the potential" for a transition of power in Libya.
"There have been numerous and continuing discussions by people close to Qadaffy and we are aware that those discussions include, among other matters, the potential for a transition," she said.
She gave no further details on the talks, other than to say "there is not any clear way forward yet".
Financial pledge
Donors at the ICG meeting pledged more than $1.3bn to help support the National Transitional Council (NTC), the main body representing the Libyan rebels fighting against Qadaffy.
Italia and La Belle France offered a combined $1.02bn while Kuwait and Qatar promised a combined $280m to a fund set up to provide transparent assistance to the opposition.
Turkey has established a $100m fund to support the Libyan opposition government based in Benghazi, Ahmet Davutoglu, the Turkish foreign minister, said.
Clinton said "we are ready for the establishment of financial mechanism for the money to flow to the National Transitional Council".
The US secretary of state said while Washington would boost its humanitarian aid to all Libyans by $26.5m it was not offering any direct aid to the NTC.
This was despite Clinton acknowledging that the council "faces a serious budget shortfall'' and "needs our immediate financial assistance".
A US offical, speaking on condition of anonymity ... for fear of being murdered... , said: "We understand the NTC's frustration but again the international community isn't going to let the TNC go under."
Washington said on Wednesday that the first shipment of Libyan oil sold by the council had been delivered to a US refinery and Clinton encouraged other nations to make similar purchases to help the Libyan people.
The Benghazi-based leadership has said it hopes to restart production of up to 100,000 barrels a day soon, without specifying a timeframe.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#3
"weeks, not months" was ohhhh a couple months ago?
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/10/2011 8:56 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Didn't you get the "months, not years" memo?
Posted by: Matt ||
06/10/2011 9:07 Comments ||
Top||
#5
This was despite Clinton acknowledging that the council "faces a serious budget shortfall'' and "needs our immediate financial assistance". A US offical, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: "We understand the NTC's frustration but again the international community isn't going to let the TNC go under."
Apparently she doesn't get the American frustration with the Euroweenies. Gaddafi's days are numbered cuz the funding is--Bambi may only have until '12 to accomplish the US' complete implosion--hence the stepped up bombing using US assets:
Future U.S. political leaders - those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me - may not consider the return on America's investment in NATO worth the cost,"... Gates has made no secret of his frustration with NATO bureaucracy and the huge restrictions many European governments placed on their military participation in the Afghanistan war. He ruffled NATO feathers early in his tenure with a direct challenge to contribute more front-line troops that yielded few contributions. Even so, Gates' assessment Friday that NATO is falling down on its obligations and foisting too much of the hard work on the U.S. was unusually harsh and unvarnished. He said both of NATO's main military operations now -- Afghanistan and Libya -- point up weaknesses and failures within the alliance.
"The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress -- and in the American body politic writ large -- to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense," he said. Without naming names, he blasted allies who are "willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets."
#6
This was despite Clinton acknowledging that the council "faces a serious budget shortfall'' and "needs our immediate financial assistance".
This on the heels of an Inspector General's report that State says it can't take over operations in Iraq from the military because it "doesn't have the funds".
#10
Qaddafi, Gaddafi, Ghadafi, Gadhafi, Khadafy,
Khaddafi, Kadaffi, Qadafy, Kadafy, Qadaffi,...
All hundred and fifteen of their days are numbered.
Hillary wants to go to the World Bank? Our days are numbered. The World Bank is funded by its own borrowing and by 184 member countries in proportion to their wealth. We might be safe since much of our wealth has been looted internally already (sarc).
#11
Without naming names, he blasted allies who are "willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets."
It's not just Europe. Many of our security dependents have done the same thing, including Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. The heartening thing is that our allies in the Persian Gulf, one of the biggest flashpoints of all, continue to keep up their defenses.
[Arab News] Under the arches on Benghazi's rundown Omar Mukhtar Street, the news agents have not known anything like it for decades. They now have dozens of different newspapers to sell -- and people not only want to buy them but also read them.
Before the revolution, the press was tightly controlled. In its 2010 press freedom index, Reporters Without Borders put Libya at 160th position out of 178 states.
It was so controlled and so full of obsequious praise for Muammar Qadaffy that very few Libyans bothered to read it. "I only looked at it for the sports," says Abdul Hamid who now works for a humanitarian relief agency.
The revolution has changed everything. It brought into being a flood of magazines and newspapers -- papers like "Al-Jazirah Al-Libiyah", "Intifada Al-Ahrar", "Al-Kalima", "Libya Hurriya" (Free Libya), "Akhbar Al-Aan" and so many others. Libyans are suddenly spoiled for choice.
When she visited Benghazi three weeks ago, EU Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton expressed "astonishment" at the number of papers and magazines available. It grows with every week that passes. At the end of March there were around just half a dozen new titles. By the beginning of May that had grown to 28. By late May it was 65. Now it is over 80.
They represent an outpouring of four decades of pent-up frustration, disillusionment, rage and contempt for Qadaffy and his family and regime and all it stands for -- dictatorship, brutality, squandered wealth and preening vanity. But it is not all. There are plenty of positive articles, full of hope about what Libya could become -- democratic, stable, economically successful and well-liked and respected.
All are weeklies -- there are no dailies as yet -- and almost all are in Arabic, although some such as "Berenice Post" have a small English section. The "Libya Post" is the first all-English publication. Many are run by volunteers based at the Media Center across the street from the city's burned-out court house. Different publications have grabbed a desk here, an office there. Chaos seems to reign in the building but the papers manage to get out on time.
Quantity is one thing. Quality is another. With journalists ranging from professional to the enthusiastic amateur, it is a mixed bag. Sounds like the Times...
Arguably the best paper is "Al-Kalima." It is a 16-page broadsheet. Unlike many other new Libya titles, some of which are no more than a mouthpiece for their editors' views and contain nothing but opinion, it has a balance of news, features, investigative articles and opinion pieces. It looks and feels like a newspaper, as good as many papers anywhere else in the world.
It first hit the newsstands at the beginning of May. The man behind it, Mohamed Elmozogi, has been a journalist and writer all his working life, previously editing cultural, economic and local publications. He was originally involved in one of the first newspapers "Libya 17 February", named after the date of the anti-Qadaffy uprising, but then decided to set up his own paper. He admits it is tough going. He and a few others bear most of the costs -- and it is "very expensive," he says. There are only four other staff members. But by the end of May, "Al-Kalima" was selling 4,000 copies a week and circulating not just in Benghazi but as far as Tobruk. It even manages to sell in besieged Misrata.
Sitting in the lobby of the Uzu hotel, which has become the main journalists' hotel in Benghazi, partly because of its relatively reliable Internet connection but also because it is where officials from the TNC and so many others involved in the uprising are often to be found, Elmozogi attracts particular attention. A constant succession of people come up and greet him -- foreign journalists, other Libyan newspaper editors and writers, TNC officials and more. He is clearly very highly regarded.
His aim is to go daily, and to have an English-language paper as well. But it costs money -- a lot of money, and he does have it at present. But he is determined to get to that point and is looking around for investors.
Does he think all the other publications will survive? He does not speak much English. A colleague, Ibrahim, translates. "No. But for democracy to work we have to have a flourishing, independent press. Otherwise people cannot make informed choices."
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
But for democracy to work we have to have a flourishing, independent press.
Somebody ought to remind US media about that. Especially the 'independent' part.
[An Nahar] Gunmen killed a prison warden and a traditional chief in Nigeria's northern state of Bauchi where a radical Islamist sect is active, police said Wednesday.
A neighborhood leader who also works as a prison warden, Ibrahim Ali Figidi, was bumped off outside his house by two men who decamped on a cycle of violence in the typical hit-and-run style of the Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. Currently wearing a false nose and moustache and answering to Jama'atu Ahlus-Sunnah Lidda'Awati Wal Jihad, or Big Louie... sect.
"They knocked on his door and he came out to see who the visitor was. They shot him three times and decamped. We still don't know who the attackers are," Bauchi police front man Mohammed Barau told Agence La Belle France Presse.
Attacks blamed on Boko Haram have been concentrated in the northeastern city of Maiduguri, but the sect that launched a botched uprising in 2009 has also been active in Bauchi.
Bomb blasts rocked an outdoor bar and killed more than a dozen people hours after President Goodluck Jonathan ... 14th President of Nigeria. He was Governor of Bayelsa State from 9 December 2005 to 28 May 2007, and was sworn in as Vice President on 29 May 2007. Jonathan is a member of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP). He is a lover of nifty hats, which makes him easily recognizable unless someone else in the room is wearing a neat chapeau... was sworn in on May 29. Boko Haram, also known as the Nigerian Taliban, grabbed credit for that attack.
A day later, gunnies hurled a bomb and fired shots at a cop shoppe in Bulkacuwa, 180 kilometers north of the capital, killing one policeman.
In September last year, Boko Haram attacked a prison in Bauchi and freed more than 700 inmates.
Bauchi is one of the predominantly Mohammedan northern states hard hit by post-election riots that left 800 dead in April.
Boko Haram has been blamed for dozens of killings in the northeast of the country, where it targets security forces and community leaders.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
[Yemen Post] Government forces clashed with armed rustics in Qaeda district, Ibb province, 30 miles off Taiz province. According to the rustics, the goal of the tribes is to get rid of all government forces attacking the people. "Security forces are now using this lawless time in the country to loot and attack civilians. We will not allow our people to be attacked and will ensure that they are safe from any attacks from pro govt thugs," said a tribal fighter.
The government denied the accusations of the tribe, and said that they are funded by the opposition in Yemen. "These gunnies are occupying all government buildings in Taiz. They are now trying to expand to Ibb province," said Zaid Thari, the ruling party political advisor.
Government security forces said that three of members of the central security forces were killed by the gunnies.
Eyewitnesses said that tens of homes have been destroyed in Ibb over the last two hours.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
[Yemen Post] According to a security bigshot in Zinjibar, Abyan, nine Islamic fascistiand four soldiers were killed in festivities that started last night and continued until the early hours in the morning. "The government is still trying ot retake the governmental sites that were occupied by the Death Eaters."
Eyewitnesses said that the gunnies continue repeating pro Islamic chants.
Medical officials in Razi hospital said that more than 40 cases entered the hospital, all from gunshot or explosive wounds. "Dead bodies are still in the streets of Zinjibar, but residents have evacuated the city, leaving those injured with no one to take them to the hospital," a medic in Razi hospital said.
Will the drive for international jihad peter out as the participants turn their attention inward?
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
[Yemen Post] The ruling General People Congress party insists that no negotiations can take place in the absence of President-for-Life Saleh. ... exemplifying the Arab's propensity to combine brutality with incompetence... "The ruling party will wait until its leader, President Saleh, is back to Yemen. He will be back soon and it will not harm the opposition to wait a couple of days," said Abdu Ganadi, the deputy minister of information.
The youth organizing committee said that protesters will not sit and watch as both government and opposition stall the revolution and negotiate. "Our steps will be quick and vital. The revolution will succeed and anyone standing in front of the youth will be held accountable," said Ridwan Masood, a member of the committee.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
[Iran Press TV] A prominent Pak news hound has spoken publicly about being kidnapped, beaten and humiliated by assailants allegedly associated with Pakistain's intelligence agency.
Umar Cheema -- an investigative news hound for Pakistain's largest English language newspaper, The News -- has officially told the globally renowned and New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) that he was "sexually assaulted in an Islamabad suburb in September 2010," a report obtained by Press TV reveals.
Cheema says he was on his way home from dinner when men in black commando garb stopped his car, blindfolded him and drove him to a house on the outskirts of the Pak capital, Islamabad.
There, he adds, he was beaten and stripped naked. His head and eyebrows were shaved, and he was videotaped in humiliating positions by Pakistain's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agents. Six hours later, he was dumped on a road 160 kilometers (100 miles) from Islamabad.
"Ten minutes after I was free, I started thinking about what I should do," Cheema said.
"The decision was I had to speak up. Speaking out has made me stronger and made my enemies more coward. Their efforts to intimidate me backfired."
Cheema, 35, had written several articles for The News that were critical of the conduct and performance of the Pak Army and intelligence services and detailed accusations of corruption against President Asif Ali President Ten Percent Zardari. ... sticky-fingered husband of the late Benazir Bhutto ... His ordeal is not uncommon for a journalist or politician who are frequently tormented or even killed by the ISI.
In May, the body of 40-year-old journalist Saleem Shahzad was found in a canal in Mandi Baha Uddin in Pakistain's northern Gujarat ...where rioting seems to be a traditional passtime... district. The ISI emerged as the prime culprit in the incident.
Ali Dayan Hasan, a Human Rights Watch's ... dedicated to bitching about human rights violations around the world... South Asia researcher, says he had "credible information" that Shahzad was in the custody of Pak intelligence agency.
Shahzad had written an article about al-Qaeda infiltration in Pakistain's Navy prior to his death.
He reported that the bully boy group launched the deadly assault on the Mehran base in Bloody Karachi, the headquarters of the navy's air wing, on May 22 after talks failed over the release of several naval personnel placed in long-term storage on suspicion of links to al-Qaeda affiliates.
Saba Dashtiyar, a professor at the University of Baluchistan, is the latest in a long line of those killed by Pak military's death squad.
He was shot repeatedly by unidentified gunnies on June 1 in Quetta on his way home.
He was the author of several books on Baluch literature and culture and a scholar in Islamic studies.
He reportedly backed the call for an independent Baluchistan over the past few years.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
[Dawn] The authorities are pressurising elders of Zakhakhel tribe to support some of their co-rustics in the armed struggle against banned turban outfit Lashkar-i-Islam, sources say.
"The Zakhakhel elders have been engaged in consultations for the last four days to devise a mechanism to extend all out support to the gang, which has recently rebelled against the banned turban organisation," they added.
A prominent Zakhakhel elder, requesting anonymity, told Dawn that local political administration and new commandant of Khyber Rifles wanted them to assist their co-primitive in Bazaar-Zakhalhel area in their armed campaign against Lashkar-i-Islam (LI).
A group of powerful Zakhakhel commanders rebelled against their leader Mangal Bagh ...a former bus driver, now head of the Deobandi bandido group Lashkar-e-Islam and the Terror of Khyber Agency... after the later allegedly kidnapped and later killed a prominent holy man of the area in March last. Since then the two groups have been fighting against each other.
"The administration wants us to assist the volunteers of newly formed Zakhakhel lashkar monetarily against LI," the elder said. He added that they told commandant of Khyber Rifles and political administration to first ensure safety of all tribal elders against different gangs as only then they would be in a position to take a final decision regarding assisting the lashkar.
"The new lashkar is also consisted of LI rebels and can transform into a turban group if given free hand.
A final decision will be taken only when all the four prominent Zakhakhel elders -- Malik Darya Khan, Malik Abdul Haleem, Khan Malik and Malik Razaq -- meet in coming days," he said.
Another member of Zakhakhel jirga, privy to correspondence between officials and tribal elders, told Dawn that it was the same group, which facilitated LI to establish bases in Gogrina area of Bazaar-Zakhakhel after security forces expelled Mangal Bagh and a handful of his supporters from Nala area of Bara in 2004.
"How can we repose trust in such untrustworthy people," he asked.
The government, he said, wanted to blackmail us in the name of restoring peace and dislodging Mangal Bagh from Zakhakhel area.
"We do want peace but it is the responsibility of government to dislodge and defeat all turban groups," he said.
Another local elder said how they could even dream of peace when the government prevented them from carrying light arms for personal protection but on the hand it allowed heavily armed volunteers of Zakhakhel lashkar to roam freely in their streets and bazaars.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Lashkar-e-Islami
[Dawn] A bomb went off in a market in Beautiful Downtown Peshawar city's Matni area on Thursday, killing four people, DawnNews reported.
The blast hit a passenger vehicle, killing four people, including a woman and a child, said Peshawar police chief Liaquat Ali Khan. The target was not immediately clear, but on Sunday another blast in Matni killed six people.
Several anti-Taliban militias are based in the area.
SSP Operation said the explosive was planted in a roadside pile of garbage. Four kilograms of kaboom was used in the blast, he added.
Separately, in the Upper Dir district of Saber Killy, two people were killed and three were maimed in a roadside kabooming against a vehicle carrying food supplies for a paramilitary camp, said police officer Rehmat Khan.
Upper Dir saw several large-scale jihad boy attacks last week.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under: TTP
[Dawn] Around 150 cut-throats armed with rockets attacked a security checkpost in Pakistain's Wazoo on Thursday, killing eight soldiers, intelligence officials said, as tensions rise in the border region.
Twelve cut-throats were killed in retaliatory firing by security forces.
The attack came on the heels of stepped-up missile strikes by U.S. drone aircraft in the tribal region along the Afghan border regarded as a hub of cut-throats from around the world.
"The cut-throats were carrying rockets and heavy weapons and attacked the checkpost shortly after midnight," an intelligence official in the region told Rooters.
"Eight soldiers were killed and twelve were maimed," he added.
Security forces hit back at the bad turbans, killing at least 12 of them and wounding five, another official said.
The attack took place in Makeen, an area on the border between North and Waziristan, which was once a stronghold of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistain (TTP), the main alliance of Pakistain's homegrown bad turban groups involved in suicide and kabooms across the country.
Pakistain army launched a major offensive in South Waziristan in 2009, driving TTP fighters out of their bases in the restive region.
Many TTP leaders, including its chief Hakimullah Mehsud, were believed to have decamped into North Waziristan.
The United States has been urging the Pak military to launch a ground offensive in North Waziristan, which is also the main of the Haqqani network that leads the insurgency just over the border in eastern Afghanistan.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: TTP
A border defense volunteer was killed in a drive-by shooting in Yala province late Thursday night.
Mustafa Yamuding, 27, a border defense volunteer, and Rusdee Damusaw, 24, a village defense volunteer, were attacked at about 10:45 p.m. They were in a Toyota sedan heading to Yala's Muang district on a narrow lane, when four men on two motorcycles drove by. Two gunmen opened fire at the two victims and fled.
Mustafa was shot in the head and Rusdi slightly wounded. They were taken to Yala hospital but Mustafa died en route.
[Al Jazeera] Video footage has emerged showing the body of a Syrian boy reportedly tortured to death after his arrest in April following a government crackdown on pro-democracy protests in the country.
The video, provided to Al Jizz by sources inside Syria, shows the mutilated body of 15-year-old Thamer al-Sahri, who was placed in long-term storage for participating in an anti-government demonstration.
Hundreds of residents of the Syrian town of Jeeza filled the streets to mourn his death on Wednesday, the day his body was released from the mortuary and returned to his parents, six weeks after he went missing.
The amateur video shows al-Sahri's body riddled with bullets, missing an eye, several teeth, and according to Al Jizz's source, returned to his family with a broken neck and leg.
Al Jizz is unable to independently verify the footage due to restrictions on journalists in the country.
Al-Sahri was placed in long-term storage along with his friend, 13-year-old Hamza al-Khateeb - the teenager whose brutal death caused much of the world to pay closer attention to the events in Syria. Al-Khateeb's body was also mutilated.
The Syrian government has denied using torture against protesters, but the latest video could lead to renewed demonstrations in the country against alleged excesses by the Syrian security forces.
UN weighs resolution
The footage emerged as Russia rejected a possible UN Security Council resolution condemning the violence in Syria, saying that the situation in the country does not present a threat to international stability.
"Russia is against any UN Security Council resolution on Syria," Alexander Lukashevich, a foreign ministry front man, told journalists at a briefing in Moscow on Thursday.
"We do not believe the Syrian issue is a subject for consideration by the Security Council, let alone the adoption of some kind of resolution. [...] The situation in this country, in our view, does not present a threat to international peace and security."
On Wednesday, Britannia, La Belle France, Germany and Portugal floated a draft resolution condemning Syria at the Security Council as the US and its allies seek to raise the pressure on Syria to end its violent crackdown on anti-government protesters.
Mark Lyall Grant, the British UN envoy, said the resolution could be put to the vote in the coming days at the UN despite the threat of a Russian veto.
"We would like a vote as soon as possible, before the end of the week," Grant, said.
The proposal falls short of calling for military action or further UN sanctions against the Syrian government.
Russia and China, which both hold vetoes, have made clear they dislike the idea of council involvement, which they say could help to destabilise a strategic Middle Eastern country.
Moscow has long been an ally and arms supplier of Syria. Russia, citing NATO's ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Originally it was a mutual defense pact directed against an expansionist Soviet Union. In later years it evolved into a mechanism for picking the American pocket while criticizing the style of the American pants... inconclusive bombing of the Libyan capital, Tripoli, said it would veto intervention against Syria in the Security Council.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
[Arab News] More than 1,500 Syrians have decamped to Turkey to escape a feared army crackdown, officials said on Thursday, in another sign that President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad's One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators. Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor... struggle with protesters is disturbing Syria's neighbors.
With Western public opinion startled by the bloodshed that has met Syrians' efforts to emulate other Arabs in casting off autocratic rule, Britannia and La Belle France have asked the UN Security Council to condemn Assad -- though world powers have shown no appetite for any Libya-style military intervention.
Residents in the area said about 40 tanks and troop carriers had deployed about 7 km from Jisr Al-Shughour, a northwestern town of 50,000 where authorities say "armed gangs" killed more than 120 security personnel earlier this week.
Other accounts speak of a mutiny among troops who refused to fire on civilians after a pro-democracy rally in the town on Friday. Loyalist military units then attacked the mutineers.
Syria has barred most independent media from the country, making it difficult to verify accounts of the violence.
"Jisr Al-Shughour is practically empty. People were not going to sit and be slaughtered like lambs," said one refugee who had crossed into Turkey, who gave his name as Mohammad.
"Demonstrations in the villages are still going on. Women and children are carrying flowers and shouting 'people want the downfall of the regime'," he said.
A front man for the UN refugee agency said 1,577 Syrians had arrived in Turkey in the last 24 hours and were sheltering in a tent encampment just north of the border at Yayladagi.
Thousands more people from Jisr Al-Shughour have decamped to villages on the Syrian side of the border, residents say.
"Syria is causing concern for us," Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said on Turkish radio, putting the number of refugees at 1,200 since Wednesday. "We will always keep our doors open to our Syrian brothers and sisters."
Among the refugees in Turkey was a 23-year-old Syrian being treated for a bullet wound to the leg. He said he was attacked by militiamen, known as shabbiha.
"We were leaving the mosque after Friday prayers to start protesting and then the shabbiha ... attacked us," he said.
Turkish police kept journalists away from the refugee camp, nestled under mountains in a tree-shaded valley, but women could be seen hanging up washing, while children played between tents and older men wandered around.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/10/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
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.
Nine 
A source close to national security department confirmed the detentions, but declined to shed light on the identity of detainees.
[Tolo News] Pak Taliban has warned to step up their attacks against US troops in Afghanistan seeking to avenge deaths in drone attacks targeting
Zawahiri
Qadaffy's days as leader of Libya are numbered, 
[Arab News] Under the arches on Benghazi's rundown Omar Mukhtar Street, the news agents have not known anything like it for decades. They now have dozens of different newspapers to sell -- and people not only want to buy them but also read them.
Goodluck Jonathan
.
Asif Ali 
A bomb went off in a market in 
Wazoo
President-for-Life Bashir 
