[Washington Post] Libya's political crisis deepened Monday as militias mobilized for a potential showdown with the rival forces of a former Libyan general who had seized control of the national parliament a day earlier.
Hassan Shaaka, the deputy commander of a group of militias in the coastal city of Misrata, told the Libyan television channel al-Nabaa on Monday that his forces had received orders to move on the capital and that they would mobilize Tuesday morning. Other militias lined up to support each of the opposing sides.
The developments raised the possibility of a bloody clash between the rival camps -- and possibly even civil war.
The offensive by Khalifa Haftar, the former general, has sparked the most serious violence nationwide since a bloody uprising ended the rule of dictator Muammar Qadaffy ...who single-handedly turned a moderately prosperous kingdom into a dictator's fantasyland and was then murdered by his indignant subjects 42 years later... in 2011.
The confrontation began last week, when forces loyal to Haftar launched strikes against Islamist militias in the eastern city of Benghazi, killing 70 people.
On Sunday, two other militias allied with Haftar attacked the General National Congress in the nation's capital and then declared the institution formally dissolved. Fighting on Tripoli ...a confusing city, one end of which is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn... 's outskirts left at least two dead and dozens maimed Sunday night, the News Agency that Dare Not be Named reported.
On Monday, other fighters threw their weight behind Haftar, including those at an air force base in the far-eastern city of Tobruk and members of a Benghazi militia. The capital was jittery Monday, with residents bracing for more violence.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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[REUTERS] The United States warned on Monday that northern Mali risked sliding back into war and called for the government and Tuareg separatists to return to talks after deadly weekend festivities in a traditional rebel stronghold.
The Malian army was preparing to launch an assault on the northern town of Kidal where separatist fighters killed at least eight soldiers and took around 30 civil servants hostage in an attack on the regional governor's office on Saturday.
Eight civilians including six government officials were killed, according to the United Nations ...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks... , during Saturday's assault which took place while the prime minister was visiting Kidal.
"We have convinced the head of state that it is highly desirable...that Kidal be totally under the control of the Malian state," Prime Minister Moussa Mara said in a televised address late on Sunday.
President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita was due to address the nation on Monday evening.
"The rebels and the army are reinforcing their positions," said an elected official in Kidal, who asked not to be named due to fear of reprisals. "I'm closed up in my house. The next hours will be decisive."
Posted by: Fred ||
05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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[Dhaka Tribune] The prosecution of the trial of alleged razakar commander Mobarak Hossain alias Mobarak Ali ended their part of the closing arguments yesterday, seeking death for the accused for the crimes against humanity he committed in Brahmanbaria during the 1971 Liberation War.
At the end of argument session, prosecutor Md Shahidur Rahman said: "We think we have been able to prove all the five charges brought against the accused beyond reasonable doubt and we are pleading for maximum punishment for him."
He made arguments for documentary evidence and for legal arguments. The International Crimes Tribunal 1 appreciated the way he placed the new charge of genocide for the first time against Mobarak.
He said charges number two and five might fulfil the gravity of genocide "if we can prove that the accused committed the crime against a particular group." The prosecution mentioned the group should be "pro-liberation."
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05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
The Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971? The prosecution took its time.
[Dhaka Tribune] Division within the prosecution team of the International Crimes Tribunal has now aggravated further regarding the trial of Jamaat-e-Islami ...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It maintains close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores... as a political party for committing war crimes.
At a meeting on May 11, the seven-member team -- dealing with the case to press formal charges against the party --was asked to hand over all documents and advance reports of the case to acting chief prosecutor Syed Haider Ali for scrutiny.
Yesterday, prosecutor Tureen Afroz, coordinator of the team dealing with the case, wrote to the chief prosecutor, not the acting chief prosecutor, and replied that the team could not hand over the materials.
In the letter, Tureen said they would wait for a decision and instructions on the matter.
All these documents are kept at the office of the Chief Prosecutor, Golam Arif Tipoo, who is now out of office. He joined office on April 30 but has not attended it since.
Some members of the team are confused over the meeting's resolution. They think the decision was made to shift the case to other prosecutors. Some prosecutors have also questioned the legitimacy of such a resolution.
The confusion arose as a quarter of the prosecution team had been opposing the commencement of the trial, after considering its necessity and the political situation of the country. They also doubted whether it would be possible to punish Jamaat under the existing laws.
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05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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[Dhaka Tribune] China has said Monday it had started an international manhunt for the alleged criminal mastermind behind an attack at a train station last month blamed on Death Eaters from the Mohammedan Turkic Uighur ethnic group.
The official China Daily newspaper and other state media said a request had been submitted to Interpol for the arrest of Ismail Yusup and an unspecified number of associates, reported AP.
The report said that Yusup was a member of the East Turkistan Islamic Movement and organised the April 30 attack in the capital of the northwestern Xinjiang region that killed three people and injured 79 others.
Beijing says an organised militancy with elements based overseas is behind a rising number of terrorist attacks in the country. However, there's more than one way to stuff a chicken... little evidence has been provided to back up the claim and many analysts doubt such an organization exists in a form that would enable it to organise attacks.
China had previously said the attack, in which explosives and knives were used, was carried out by two religious Death Eaters who were killed in the blast.
East Turkistan is the name used for Xinjiang by some members of the region's native Uighur (pronounced WEE'-gur) ethnic group, Death Eaters among which have been fighting for years a low-intensity insurgency against Chinese rule.
The US initially placed the East Turkistan Islamic Movement, known as ETIM, on a terrorist watch list following the September 11, 2001, attacks, but later quietly removed it amid doubts that it existed in any organised manner. It is still listed as a terrorist group by the United Nations ...aka the Oyster Bay Chowder and Marching Society... , over which China has considerable sway as one of five permanent veto-holding members of the Security Council.
China Daily and other state media outlets said Yusup ordered 10 "partners" in Xinjiang to prepare for the attack in the city of Urumqi about a week before it happened. The 10 set off explosives and slashed people with knives at the station exit on the evening of April 30, the reports said. Two of the members were killed in the kaboom and the remaining eight were captured by police, it said.
The Xinjiang Daily newspaper said Yusup formed an hard boy group in 2005 and began conspiring with members of ETIM in 2012. It said he formally joined the group last year when he fled China after a warrant was issued for his arrest.
The reports didn't say where Yusup was hiding or give other details about his identity. However, if you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible warning... a number of Uighur Death Eaters are believed to be living in Pakistain's northwest alongside Islamic Death Eaters linked to the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] The Sindh High Court on Monday was informed that an accused in the murder of Wall Street Journal news hound Daniel Pearl who was incarcerated Youse'll never take me alive coppers!... [BANG!]... Ow!... I quit! over eight years ago has fallen ill due to an inordinate delay in the trial.
A single bench of the SHC headed by Chief Justice Maqbool Baqar was seized with an application of defendant Mohammad Hashim for the transfer of his trial from an anti-terrorism court in Hyderabad to Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... The court directed the assistant prosecutor general to file comments on the matter by May 26, the next date of hearing.
The 38-year-old US national and South Asia Bureau Chief of the WSJ, who was researching a story on religious murderous Moslems, was kidnapped on Jan 23, 2002 in Karachi and later beheaded by his captors.
The main accused criminal mastermind, Ahmed Omer Sheikh, was condemned to death on charges of kidnapping and killing the US journalist, while his three accomplices -- Fahad Naseem, Syed Salman Saqib and Sheikh Mohammad Adil -- were given life term and fine of Rs50,000 each by an ATC in Hyderabad on July 15, 2002.
The court had also directed the convicts to pay Rs2 million to the victim's widow, Mariane Pearl.
Accused Hashim, arrested on Sept 6, 2005, was among the seven others who were declared absconders in the case.
On Monday, the counsel for Hashim informed the court that his trial had come to a halt following the transfer of the presiding judge of the ATC Hyderabad, Javed Alam. He said the newly posted judge, Abdul Ghafoor Memon, had already declined to proceed with the case when he had been the presiding judge of the ATC-II in Karachi.
The counsel said the delay in his trial was a gross violation of the anti-terrorism laws that required speedy trial of the accused persons. He said that the inordinate delay had added to the suffering of the applicant who had fallen ill.
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05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
The counsel said the delay in his trial was a gross violation of the anti-terrorism laws that required speedy trial of the accused persons. He said that the inordinate delay had added to the suffering of the applicant who had fallen ill.
Maybe he'd be more OK with the delay if he knew that the punishment if he were found guilty would be to have his head sawed off with a bamboo saw.
[DAWN] The case against FBI agent, Joel Cox, who was tossed in the clink Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! from Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... 's Jinnah International Airport for allegedly carrying ammunition and three knives onto an airplane, was formally dismissed on Monday after a request by the city's police was submitted before a judge in a Karachi court, DawnNews reported.
Earlier during the day, police had submitted its final chargesheet in the case according to which Cox was issued a written authority letter by the US consulate to carry a weapon for his personal protection.
The authority letter was verified by the Federal Interior Ministry following which police requested the court to drop the case.
Observing that all circumstances were in favour of Joel Cox, the court decide to dismiss the case against the FBI agent.
The US citizen was arrested on May 5, at the Jinnah International Airport after security personnel found a bullet-filled magazine and a knife in his possession.
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05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
Luckily, SA Cox was not a USMC reservist making a wrong turn into Tijuana.
#2
Do you suppose there was one of those famous "What in hell were you doing?" conversations between the Pak prosecutor and the Pak policeman/border "official" that started this dust up?
Posted by: Bill Clinton ||
05/20/2014 13:36 Comments ||
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[DAWN] The Islamabad High Court on Monday during the hearing over a blasphemy petition filed by the Shuhada Foundation issued notices to all those party to the case, DawnNews reported.
The court while adjourning the hearing over the petition to an unspecified date, issued notices to Federal Information Secretary, chief executive of ARY, anchors Mubashir Lucman, Nida Yasir and Shaisata Lodhi, Amjad Sabri Qawwal, poet Aqeel Mohsin Naqvi, chairman of Pakistain Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) and Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) and Chairman Cable Operators Association of Pakistain.
In his petition, advocate Tariq Asad, said that the issue of alleged blasphemy in a Geo morning show was being highlighted only to target the Geo group, and what occurred in the morning show had been carried out by other media houses but no action was taken against them.
He requested the court to take action against other channels who had engaged in the same activity as Geo.
Advocate Asad said that he was not specifically in favour of Geo and had also filed petitions against the group in the past, adding that he only sought to curb any wrongdoing.
He further said that anchor Mubashir Lucman was engaged in a character liquidation campaign against former chief justice of Pakistain Justice (r) Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry.
The petition also put the onus on Qawwal Amjad Sabri and poet Aqeel Mohsin Naqvi for the blasphemy row while seeking to ban the Qawaali that caused the issue.
An FIR had been registered by the police on Saturday against Geo TV channel owner Mir Shakeelur Rehman, its morning programme host Shaista Lodhi, actress Veena Malik and her husband Asad Bashir Khattak.
The case was registered under PPC's sections 295-A [deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs], 295-C [use of derogatory remarks, etc., in respect of the Prophet (PTUI!) ] and 298-A [use of derogatory remarks, etc., in respect of holy personages]. The suspects were also booked under Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act [punishment for terrorist act].
The already deeply worrying events in the media landscape have taken a frightening turn with the reaction in several quarters to the Geo morning entertainment show debacle.
The Geo programme, Utho Jago Pakistain, made a critical error of judgement by trying to fuse sensitive religious material with crass entertainment.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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[Xinhua] Paramilitary troops recovered huge cache of arms and ammunition in Pakistain's southwest Chaman district on Monday morning, local media reported.
Quoting unnamed sources from Paramilitary troops Frontier Corps (FC), local Urdu TV channel Samaa said that the forces seized a truck carrying kabooms on an intelligence tip off in Chaman area, a district in the country's southwest Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... province.
The explosives were being brought into the province from some unknown place, said the report.
The troops recovered 170 bags of kabooms, 200 remote controlled detonators and over 100 primacords from the custody of the myrmidons.
Another 45 bombs, 100 guns and 135 pistols were also recovered during the operation by FC, said the report.
The sources from FC were quoted as saying that the forces of Evil were planning to take the lives of innocent and vulnerable people but the intelligence apparatus timely foiled their plans.
The truck driver was nabbed You have the right to remain silent... and shifted to some unknown place for investigations.
Balochistan has been under the grip of violence for more than a decade. Militants including Taliban and separatist groups usually smuggle weapons from Afghanistan and use them in attacking people and blowing up gas pipelines, power pylons and railway tracks in the province.
[AnNahar] Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ... Prime Minister of Iraq and the secretary-general of the Islamic Dawa Party.... won the most seats in Iraq's elections but fell short of a majority Monday, leaving him in the driver's seat to retain his post despite vocal opposition.
The results from the election commission showed Maliki's State of Law alliance garnered 92 out of 328 parliamentary seats, with the incumbent himself winning more than 721,000 personal votes.
Both were by far the highest such figures from the April 30 election.
But he still fell short of a majority, meaning he will have to win the support of rivals from across the communal spectrum, some of whom have sharply criticized Maliki and refused to countenance his bid for a third term in office.
State of Law won 30 seats in Storied Baghdad alone, and came first in 10 provinces overall, all of them in the bloc's traditional heartland in the Shiite-majority south of the country.
Maliki's main rivals all finished with between 19 and 29 seats overall, according to an AFP tally of election commission results.
Iraq's political parties have for weeks been meeting and maneuvering as they seek to build post-election alliances, but the formation of a new government is still expected to take several months.
As in previous elections, the main blocs are expected to agree on an encompassing package that ensures the prime minister, president and parliament speaker are all selected together.
Under a de facto agreement established in recent years, Iraq's prime minister is a Shiite Arab, the president is a Kurd and the speaker of parliament is a Sunni Arab.
Maliki's critics accuse him of consolidating power, particularly within the security forces, and blame him for a year-long deterioration in security, rampant corruption and what they say is an insufficient improvement in basic services.
The election and its aftermath came amid a surge in violence that has killed more than 3,500 people this year, fueling fears that Iraq could be slipping back into the all-out conflict that cost tens of thousands of lives in 2006 and 2007.
In particular, the 63-year-old faces strong and vocal opposition in the Sunni-dominated west and the Kurdish north, with rivals there insisting they will not agree to a third term.
Maliki blames external factors such as the war in neighboring Syria for the surge in unrest, and says his so-called partners in government snipe at him in public and block his legislative efforts in parliament.
The run-up to the election, Iraq's first since U.S. troops withdrew at the end of 2011, was plagued by attacks on candidates and campaign rallies, and allegations of malpractice that contributed to lower turnout in areas populated by disgruntled minority Sunnis.
But the election has nevertheless been hailed largely as a success by the international community, with the United States and United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... praising voters for standing up to militancy.
[AnNahar] Nuri al-Maliki, Iraq's tough-talking but uncharismatic rebel-turned-leader, looked set to remain prime minister after results on Monday from April's general election put his party in the lead.
Maliki's State of Law alliance won 92 out of 328 seats in parliament, with other blocs tallying between 19 and 29 seats, meaning he will need his rivals' support in order to keep the top job.
The news highlights the latest change in the script for the 63-year-old Shiite Arab, who was regarded as a weak compromise candidate when he emerged from the shadows in 2006 to become premier.
He has since undergone several transformations, from a nationalist who battled militias within his own Shiite community and brought violence under control to being accused of amassing power and sidelining partners.
Throughout, he has been seen as a rarity agreeable to both the United States, Iraq's former occupier, and Iran, its powerful Shiite-majority neighbor.
Former U.S. president George W. Bush has called Maliki "a good man with a difficult job", and Maliki himself has said he is "a friend of the United States, but... not America's man in Iraq".
Maliki's past eight years were markedly different from his life before the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
Born Nuri Kamal al-Maliki in a predominantly Shiite town south of Storied Baghdad, he joined the Islamic Dawa party -- the oldest Iraqi movement opposed to Saddam Hussein -- while at university.
He fled in 1979 after the dictator banned the party, and Dawa says he was later sentenced to death in absentia.
From 1980, he lived in Iran and then Syria, where he edited Dawa's newspaper. In exile he adopted the nom de guerre Jawad and coordinated cross-border raids from Iran into Iraq.
He returned after Saddam's ouster in 2003, and became a member of the de-Baathification commission that barred Saddam supporters from public office.
In 2006, the dour bespectacled politician was named premier after his predecessor Ibrahim al-Jaafari, also a Shiite, was regarded as too sectarian by Sunnis and Kurds.
Thrust to power at the height of Iraq's brutal sectarian war that killed thousands of people each month, Maliki was seen then as politically weak.
But he stayed in office and in 2008, with U.S. army backing, faced down accusations of sectarianism and pursued an offensive against the militia of powerful Shiite holy manMoqtada Tater al-Sadr ... the Iranian catspaw holy man who was 22 years old in 2003 and was nearing 40 in 2010. He spends most of his time in Iran, safely out of the line of fire, where he's learning to be an ayatollah... The successful assault won him plaudits across the communal spectrum, and he staked his reputation as a nationalist leader who had brought Iraq's raging violence under some semblance of control.
Under Maliki, American forces withdrew in late 2011 and oil production has steadily increased.
Since being re-elected premier in 2010 at the head of a national unity government, however, Maliki has faced near-constant political crisis and narrowly survived an attempted vote of no confidence.
His critics accuse him of consolidating power, particularly within the security forces, and blame him for a year-long deterioration in security, rampant corruption and poor basic services.
He faces strong opposition in the Sunni-dominated west and Kurdish north, with rivals there insisting they will not countenance a third term.
Maliki blames external factors such as the civil war in Syria for the surge in unrest -- Iraq's worst since his 2008 offensive on Sadr -- and says his so-called partners in government snipe at him publicly and block his legislative efforts.
But he still has the firm backing of his Shiite-majority heartland in southern Iraq, and with a hefty number of parliamentary seats, will be hard to dislodge.
[AnNahar] An Israeli court on Monday fined firebrand ...firebrands are noted more for audio volume and the quantity of spittle generated than for any actual logic in their arguments... Islamic holy man Sheikh Raed Salah $2,600 for obstructing the work of police when they quizzed his wife three years ago, legal documents showed.
Last month, Jerusalem Magistrate's Court ruled that Salah, an Arab citizen of Israel, had "interrupted" coppers as they questioned his wife at the Allenby border crossing between the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Jordan in April 2011.
On Monday, the court slapped him with a fine of 9,000 shekels ($2,600, 1,826 euros), the decision read.
The judge said the fine was relatively high for such an offence, partly due to Salah's refusal to express contrition for his actions.
The incident occurred after Salah himself was questioned on his way back from Jordan.
But when a female officer wanted to search his wife, he began yelling and had to be restrained by police, although he broke free and tried to force his way into the room where his wife was.
Salah, leader of the radical northern wing of the Islamic Movement in Israel, is no stranger to run-ins with the authorities.
In March, he was sentenced to eight months prison for incitement to violence over Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa mosque.
In 2010, he spent five months behind bars for spitting at an Israeli policeman.
The Islamic Movement is tolerated in Israel but is under constant surveillance because of its perceived links with the myrmidonHamas, always the voice of sweet reason, movement that controls the Gazoo Strip, as well as with other Mohammedan groups worldwide.
In other words, the Muslim Brotherhood in Israel. Got it.
[Ynet] Labor and Likud members join bid to push controversial legislation to open up Temple Mount compound for Jewish prayer, currently permitted for only for Mohammedans.
Labor and Likud MKs have joined forces on a new bill that proposes to allow Jews to pray at the Temple Mount compound - for the first time since the destruction of the Second Temple, as Jews are currently barred from praying at the site.
MK Miri Regev (Likud) and MK Hilik Bar (Labor) are expected to introduce the bill for discussion in the Knesset. It aims to extend freedom of worship on the Temple Mount to the level allowed in Hebron's Cave of the Patriarchs, where Jews and Mohammedans share the holy site.
Last April, dozens of Arab youths, some masked, rioted on the Temple Mount, throwing stones and fire crackers at security forces deployed to the scene. The festivities led to the compound being closed to visitors and the arrests of dozens suspected of violent acts. Such scenes constantly reoccur in the compound.
Given that any development related to the flashpoint location could result in wide-spread Paleostinian unrest, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will likely try to torpedo the proposal.
If that were to happen, Regev, who heads an Knesset's Internal Affairs committee, will turn to the High Court of Justice for resolution of the sensitive issue.
Initially, Deputy Minister of Religious Affairs Rabbi Eli Ben-Dahan attempted to change worshipping rights on the Mount through regulations, but delay in their implementation led Regev to seek a quicker resolution.
"There is no reason that Jews should not be allowed to pray in the holiest site in the world," she said on Saturday.
Regev said she would not desist until that was achieved. "I firmly believe that each event of Mohammedan unrest on the Mount should lead to its closure to Arabs. The prime minister is not the only decider on the issue, and if the proposal does not pass I'll turn to the High Court for Justice in a public petition until Jews are allowed to pray with tallit and tefillin on the Temple Mount."
The Likud MK emphasized that the bill's aim was not unrealistic: "When we enforced Israeli law on the Golan Heights they said it would cause riots. But just like the sky doesn't come tumbling down when Jews pray in the Cave of the Patriarchs, they sky will not fall now."
The bill's Labor supporter, Bar, said Saturday he was proud to introduce the legislation specifically as a representative of the left: "I believe full equality on the Temple Mount will lead to Jews and Arabs living side by side. I insisted the Waqf's authority would not be harmed, but the Mohammedans need to understand that we also have a right to pray there."
Bar stressed that supporting the bill was an extension of his nationalism. "As a Zionist and a nationalist, I see in these holy sites the cradle of our existence, and if someone on the left has complaints against Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount -- they will have a hard time claiming that other ethnicities suffer discrimination."
In an attempt to reduce tensions on the Mount, the bill stipulates that "no demonstration of protest or incitement that disturbs the peace will be tolerated" and that if a person or authority prevents a worshipper from exercising his right they will face a fine of up to NIS 50,000.
About tens of thousands of Jews make the ascent to the Temple Mount compound a year, but they are barred from praying.
The number of American snuffies who have flocked to Syria is higher than previously understood, American intelligence sources say. And some of the fighters are coming home.
Western intelligence services have been warning that European and American jihadists have been flocking to Syria to fight. But they've been reluctant to say how many Americans have joined the murderous Moslem forces there--until now. The latest U.S. intelligence estimates say that more than 100 Americans have joined the jihad in Syria to fight alongside Sunni Death Eaters there.
Senior American intelligence officials tell The Daily Beast that they believe between six and 12 Americans who have gone to Syria to fight Assad have now returned to America. "We know where some are," one senior U.S. intelligence official told The Daily Beast. "The concern is the scale of the problem we are dealing with."
The scale of that problem by all accounts has gotten worse. Last fall, the official U.S. estimate on Americans specifically who have joined the jihad in Syria was in the low double digits. In January, the New York Times ...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... reported that at least 70 Americans have either traveled or attempted to travel to Syria. Earlier this month FBI Director James Comey told news hounds that he believed "dozens" of Americans were suspected to be imported muscle in Syria, but declined to give a more precise number.
[AnNahar] The historic Christian town of Maalula stands a shadow of its former self, abandoned and war-scarred, a month after Syrian government forces expelled Salafist tough guys.
In the main square, with its posters of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Light of the Alawites... and slogans daubed on walls singing his praises, a handful of soldiers lounge in the spring sunshine.
Maalula's residents, many of whom still speak Aramaic, believed to be the language of Jesus Christ, are nowhere to be seen.
Silence fills the mountain town, broken only by the squeaks of swallows as they swoop near ancient caves with their tales from the early years of Christianity.
"People come here for an hour to see their homes, and then they leave," a soldier told AFP on a state-authorized visit to the town, 50 kilometers (30 miles) northeast of Damascus.
The damage is nowhere near as heavy as in places like Homs, where entire neighborhoods have been flattened in Syria's three-year war.
But the battle for Maalula has left its scars.
It lasted seven months, with the army finally expelling opposition forces, including Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front, in mid-April.
Homes have been left burnt out, with windows broken, doors smashed in and balconies collapsed.
The picturesque town was a strategic prize because of its location in the Qalamun mountains, on the road between Damascus and Leb.
It was recaptured with the support of fighters from Leb's Hizbullah ...Party of God, a Leb militia inspired, founded, funded and directed by Iran. Hizbullah refers to itself as The Resistance and purports to defend Leb against Israel, with whom it has started and lost one disastrous war to date, though it did claim victory... , and Assad paid a triumphant visit on April 20 to mark Easter.
It was also a symbolic victory for Assad's regime, which casts itself as the protector of Syria's minorities, a claim which the opposition mocks as propaganda.
So far, there are no signs of reconstruction in the town, whose 5,000 residents are largely Greek Catholic, with a Mohammedan minority.
"We need aid, because people here have lost everything," Fassih, the sole resident sighted, said near the famed Orthodox monastery of Mar Takla.
He had come to inspect his alcohol store, built around a cave, and found it burned to the ground, with the fridge smashed against a wall.
"The stock alone cost more then $66,000," Fassih sighed.
"My house was also burnt and looted, and all the furniture has been stolen," he said. "How can you expect people to come back to this?"
The army has closed Mar Takla, which jihadists ransacked and used as a military post.
Inside, Christian inscriptions lie scattered on the floor, and religious figures in paintings and icons have all had their eyes gouged.
The rooms of 12 nuns kidnapped by Al-Nusra in December and released three months later have been torched, their books destroyed and china smashed.
The abandoned orphanage in the complex is also a sorry sight: stuffed animals, scruffy clothes and children's drawings trail in the dust.
On the road to Mar Sarkis monastery, sandbags piled up by rebels stand outside caves overlooking the town that were used as military positions.
The Safir Hotel on the cliff above has been completely destroyed by bombing.
Nearby is the monastery of Sergius and Bacchus, founded in the fifth century and one of the oldest in the Middle East.
Named after two Roman officers martyred for their faith, today it stands damaged by shelling, its chapel filled with rubble.
Rare icons have been stolen, and in the souvenir shop, Gospels penned in Aramaic lie strewn on the floor.
Amid the desolation, a taxi-driver asked: "Who will return to this place? Probably no one. People will wait until the war is over."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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[Ynet] The minister of defense for Syria's opposition government has resigned following disagreements with the body's head, opposition sources said on Monday, highlighting divisions among Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Scourge of Qusayr... 's opponents.
Saudi-backed dissident Asaad Mustafa was appointed to his post in November as part of a plan by the opposition National Coalition to administer rebel-held areas of the war-torn country.
But the government-in-exile has been unable to control disparate rebel groups, which include foreign al-Qaeda krazed killers, and has received only marginal support from its Western backers.
[Ynet] UN front man Stephane Dujarric said Monday that over a million Syrian refugees are registered in Leb, and 50,000 new refugees continue to sign up with UN agencies each month.
In Geneva earlier, the UN's humanitarian chief in Leb, Ross Mountain, told news hounds that at this rate, Leb will be home to 1.5 million refugees by year's end. That's one third of Leb's population of 4.5 million.
[IranPressTV] Officers from Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... , Qatar and Turkey have been among turbans leaving the Syrian city of Homs, a report says.
According to the report by a news agency close to the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah, as many as six Saudi officers, four Qatari officers and a number of Turkish officers have left the Old City of Homs following a deal between the government and the turbans on May 4.
The report further said that the bodies of some Saudi and Qatari intelligence and security agents, who had been killed in battles in Homs, were delivered to Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
The deal between the Syrian government and the turbans was brokered by Iran, Russia and the United Nations ...aka the Oyster Bay Chowder and Marching Society... The deal also required the turbans to allow aid into two northwestern towns of Kafr Nabl and al-Zahraa. The turbans agreed to release dozens of soldiers and civilians held hostage.
The pull-out from the center of Homs, located 162 kilometers (100 miles) north of the capital Damascus, leaves the turbans confined to a single district on the outskirts of the city.
The country has been the scene of a deadly crisis since March 2011. The Western powers and their regional allies -- especially Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey -- are said to be supporting the turbans operating inside Syria.
Over 150,000 people have reportedly been killed and millions displaced due to the violence fueled by the foreign-backed myrmidons.
[IranPressTV] They are known as one of the deadliest legacies of the 20th century; today the use of landmines in wars has brought irreparable human and environmental damage to people and governments across the world. Experts in this gathering in Tehran come from three countries with some of the highest landmine contamination rates in the world namely Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. Their mission is more humanitarian rather than military aimed at sharing experiences and helping to diminish the lasting effects of landmines in the world.
In all of the three countries a number of ordinary people and mine clearance experts are still maimed or killed every year. President of the Geneva Intl. Center for Humanitarian Demining or GICHD who has also attended the workshop says that her organization is looking forward to working more closely with the three countries in facilitating mine action. When wars and conflicts pass, the effects remain long after the last gun is fired and the last bomb is dropped. For Iran landmines are Saddam Hussein's legacy,
...Anyone remember why he felt he had to plant them after Iran started it?
in Afghanistan they are the result of the soviet invasion followed by the civil war and in Tajikistan the result of the country's internal conflicts during the 90s. Figures show around 120 to 140 million mines currently planted throughout the world. The unfortunate fact is that for every mine, removed, six land-mines are planted again.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/20/2014 00:00 ||
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And how many were ones that they had planted themselves?
Posted by: ed in texas ||
05/20/2014 16:43 Comments ||
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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.
[Washington Post] Libya's political crisis deepened Monday as militias mobilized for a potential showdown with the rival forces of a former Libyan general who had seized control of the national parliament a day earlier.
Nouri al-Maliki
Moqtada 
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
