[ToloNews] The Times of India reported that the treaty will enable India to extradite bully boyz of Pak origin who operate on Afghan soil.
The acting minister of foreign affairs, Idrees Zaman, and the Indian ambassador in Kabul, Vinay Kumar, on Monday signed an extradition treaty between Afghanistan and India.
The document was already approved and ratified by the relevant authorities of both governments, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement in New Delhi, India on September 14, 2016.
Under this agreement, the two countries will be able to deliver a person accused of, or convicted of, committing a crime to the other country’s law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement process that requires formal arrangements.
India’s Embassy in Kabul in a tweet said that Ambassador Vinay Kumar and Acting Foreign Minister Idrees Zaman "took a step closer to cement bilateral relations" by ratifying the India-Afghanistan Extradition Treaty.
The Times of India said that once the treaty is fully in effect, it will enable India to extradite bully boyz of Pak origin who operate on Afghan soil.
[LI] Killed in the Battle of Qala-i-Jangi (11-25-2001). John Walker Lindh, the American Taliban interrogated by Spann just before Spann was killed, was released from prison last May.
For many years, on November 25 and also Memorial Day, we have remembered Johnny Micheal Spann, a CIA Operations Officer who was the first American killed in Afghanistan after 9/11.
We have told Spann’s story many times, but it never gets old. Our 15th Anniversary post summed up much of what we had learned, 15th Anniversary: Johnny "Mike" Spann, first American killed in Afghanistan.
A small group of special operations officers, often riding on horseback, helped organize the Northern Alliance forces and overthrow the Taliban.
[ToloNews] SIGAR also reported an increase of women among the ranks of Afghan forces.
30 insider attacks occurred within Afghan forces between June and August of 2019, according to a report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), which is "nearly double the number" reported last quarter.
That brings this year’s total to 49 attacks, which resulted in 167 casualties, according to the report. While there have been three fewer attacks this year compared to the same period last year, there were 56 more ANDSF casualties.
"There have been five more attacks and 30 more casualties than roughly the same period in 2017," it said.
SIGAR’s report also reported an increase in the number of females in the Afghan cops.
The women in the Afghan cops this quarter, according to the RS Gender Advisor Office, numbered 6,395 female personnel, which is an increase of 933 women since last quarter and about 1,900 women compared to roughly the same period in 2018.
The increase since last quarter includes" 721 women in the ANP and 212 in the ANA," it said.
The vast majority of ANDSF female personnel (4,371) are in the ANP, including 165 women in the General Command of Police Special Units (GCPSU), the report said.
"There are 2,024 female personnel in the ANA, including 110 in the AAF and 20 in the ASSF," it said.
[ToloNews] The Ministry of Interior says 2,331 joint military operations were conducted over the past eight months.
With the arrival of the cold season and typically reduced Death Eater activity, the Ministry of Defense, or MoD, said on Sunday that Afghan cops operations against Death Eaters have risen over the past two months.
The Ministry of Interior said the number of joint operations in the past eight months was higher than the total number of operations last year.
But the Afghan security agencies said the Taliban ...mindless ferocity in a turban... has not reduced the level of violence, even with the arrival of the cold season.
"The operations by National Defense and Security Forces are underway and they have inflicted high casualties on the enemy," MoD front man Rohullah Ahmadzai said.
A recent report by the US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan (SIGAR), indicates that Afghan forces’ casualties have increased by five percent amid a rise in violence in the first quarter of 2019.
"They cannot defeat the government. The conflict and calamity will continue, but nothing will come of it. But, ultimately, peace will come," military affairs analyst Atiqullah Amarkhil said.
According to the Ministry of Interior, 2,331 joint military operations were conducted in the past eight months while last year it was less than 2,000 operations.
"The security and defense forces operations have increased this year. This year, the enemy has been suppressed and weakened more than any year," Interior Ministry front man Nusrat Rahimi said.
The SIGAR report, citing TAAC-Air, says the Afghan Air Forces’ average monthly flight hours this quarter (July 1 through September 30, 2019) increased by about 19 percent compared to the last reporting period (April 1 through June 30, 2019).
"The National Defense and Security Forces in Kunduz decided to launch a large-scale operation in Kunduz to suppress the enemy," said Nabiullah Mirzaee, Commander of 207 Pamir Corps.
Others await clearing operations: "Helmand ...an Afghan province populated mostly by Pashtuns, adjacent to Injun country in Pak Balochistan... requires a widespread operation to help displaced families to go back to their homes," said Attaullah Afghan, the head of Helmand Provincial Council.
[ToloNews] The Refugee Ministry reports that 390,000 Afghans have been deported or returned willingly to Afghanistan from Iran ...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan, the abbreviation IRGC is a cognate form of Stürmabteilung (or SA), the term Supreme Guide is a cognate form of either Shah or Führer or maybe both, and they hate JewsZionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol... this year.
The International Organization for Migration, or IOM, says the repatriation of Afghans from Iran has increased dramatically over recent weeks, stating that over 12,000 undocumented Afghans have returned--willingly or by deportation‐just over the past week.
The organization cited the US’s sanctioning of Iran as a main reason for the increase of Afghans returning back across the border.
Figures by the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation, or MRR, show that 440,000 undocumented Afghans returned to the country from Iran, The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire... , and Pakistain over the past 11 months.
According to the ministry, 220,000 of the undocumented Afghans were deported from Iran while 170,000 others returned voluntarily from Iran in the same time period.
But, according to IOM, the total number for 2019 is less than 2018, when one million undocumented Afghans returned to Afghanistan from Iran and Pakistain.
Goodness. Somebody tell the governments of Europe.
"When Afghans leave their country without any papers and go to Iran and other countries, they are deported because they do not have any documents and any act by them is a violation in the host country," said MRR spokesperson Abdul Basit Ansari.
"At least 450,000 people have returned from Iran and Pakistain between the beginning of the year and late November--and most of them have returned from Iran," MOI front man Haris Pardis said.
There is only one migration information center in Kabul, and it provides online help as well as face-to-face consultation.
Officials at the center said those who contact them are mostly asking about illegal rather than legal migration.
"We have received calls from people who have asked us ’How much will you charge us for going to Turkey?’ But we have advised them that it is not a good option, ’You can apply for a visa,’" said Shir Husain Hunaryar, a coordinator of Improving Migration Management.
According to the figures, the return of Afghans from Pakistain is many times less than the returnees from Iran, but both countries host millions of undocumented Afghans.
MRR figures show that so far this year, 22,000 Afghan refugees voluntarily returned or have been deported from Pakistain and 27,000 Afghan refugees have been forcibly returned from Turkey during this period.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Hundreds of Sudanese women Monday marched in Khartoum to mark International Day for Eliminating Violence against Women, in the first such rally held in the northeast African country in decades.
Chanting “Freedom, peace, justice,” the catch cry of the protest movement that led to autocrat Omar al-Bashir’s ouster in April, the demonstrators took to the streets in the Burri district, a site of regular anti-Bashir protests earlier this year.
Many women, dressed in orange, carried banners that read: “Women’s revolution continues” and “We are the revolution, we are the change.”
Many also carried banners such as “Stop rape of Darfuri Women,” as they called for justice for female victims of the war in the western Sudan region.
“There is an atmosphere of freedom now,” said 21-year-old university student Fatima, as others behind her whistled, clapped, and ululated, an AFP correspondent reported.
“There is less violence now, but we still need to change the laws that are against us,” she added.
Bashir seized power in an Islamist-backed coup in 1989 and since then the role of women had been severely restricted in Sudan.
During his 30-year-old rule, authorities implemented a strict moral code that activists said primarily targeted women, using harsh interpretations of Islamic sharia law.
Thousands of women were flogged and handed hefty fines under a controversial public order law for “indecent dressing” or consuming alcohol, which is banned in the country.
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11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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[ALMASDARNEWS] The US and La Belle France are planning to undertake steps in order to prevent future attacks on 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... ’s oil refineries by improving the country’s radar network so it can detect incoming threats in a timely manner.
The commander of the US forces deployed in the Middle East, General Kenneth McKenzie, stated that the Pentagon is continuing to study the data from the September 2019 attack on Saudi Aramco facilities. Once it understands where the gap in the defences was, the US will start working on fixing it.
"We continue to refine information on the attack against [Saudi state oil firm] Aramco [...] We are working with the Saudis to increase the networking of their systems. That will make them better able to defend against this type of threats", McKenzie said.
French Defence Minister Florence Parly, in turn, said that Gay Paree will be sending advanced radars to Saudi Arabia to help it detect low-altitude flying weaponry, which was reportedly used in the attack on the refineries.
"It will be in Saudi Arabia in the coming days so it will be operational very, very rapidly. But there is an analysis to be done in order to better identify how to fill the gap", the minister explained.
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11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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#1
Waste of equipment, unless you provide operators as well.
Bahrain is the “first trench” in the region facing Iran, National Security Adviser Maj. Gen. Sheikh Nasser bin Hamad Al Khalifa tells Al Arabiya English, following a US official’s remarks that Bahrain is “an island of stability.”https://t.co/HBjx2t5O19pic.twitter.com/caLQ2lP3I0
[GeoTV] LONDON: A record number of British-Pakistanis could become a part of the Parliament after the general elections on December 13.
Serves them right, actually. They're the ones planted the seed for the idea of Pakistain in the 40s. The creation of Pakistan was integral to Britain's grand strategy.'
'If they were to ever leave India, Britain's military planners had made it clear that they needed to retain a foothold in the NWFP and Baluchistan. Another sad, unheeded example for playing around with muslimeen.
For the first time Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats have given tickets to more than 70 candidates of British Pakistani origin for the elections ‐ the highest number of candidates. Many are also contesting the election as independent candidates.
Most British-Pakistani candidates are from the Conservative Party but candidates on the Labour ticket have a greater chance of winning.
The Conservative Party has fielded 20 candidates of Pakistani origin. The list includes current chancellor Sajid Javid who has been part of the Parliament since 2010 from Bromsgrove in Warwickshire. Other notable candidates include Nusrat Ghani, Rehman Chishti and Saqib Bhatti.
Ghani has served as the Minister for Transport and was elected first in 2015 from Wealde in Southeast. She was the first female of Pakistani origin to represent Conservatives in the House of Commons.
Chishti, who is prime minister's special envoy for religious freedom, was first elected from Gillingham and Rainham in 2010. The most interesting candidate in the list is Bhatti who is from Birmingham but has been awarded ticket in these elections from one of the safest Conservative seats ‐ Meriden in Warwickshire. An accountant by profession, Bhatti is also the current president of Greater Birmingham Chamber of Commerce. He is the first Muslim and youngest Pakistani to hold this position.
Others contesting from Conservative Party’s platform are Iftikhar Ahmed (Barnsley Central), Mohammad Afzal (Bradford West), Ex MEP Amjad Bashir (Leeds North-East), Kashif Ali (Halifax), Imran Ahmad-Khan (Wakefield).
From Greater London region Tamkeen Sheikh (Barking), Noshaba Khilji (Leyton & Wanstead) and Ali Azeem (Ilford South) will be taking on their Labour rivals. From Greater Manchester region Atiffa Shah (Rochdale), Attika Chaudhary (Salford & Eccles), Tayyab Amjad (Stalybridge & Hyde) and Mussadak Mirza (Stretford & Urmston) are standing on Tory tickets.
Also in the Conservative list are Wass (Wasim) Mughal (Sefton Central, Lancashire), Ahmed Ejaz (Wolverhampton South East), Pervaiz Akhtar (Luton South) and Haroun Malik (Inverclyde, Scotland). Gawd ! Why don't they just shift the HoC to Bloody Karachi ? For more Abdul names and faces, go to the proud Pak GeoTV link
#3
Majority are from Mirpur, Jammu province, though they like to call themselves Kashmiri. Ethnic Punjabi, Urdu speaking, and brought to the UK after the World Bank financed Mangla High Dam flooded their villages as the reservoir filled.
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11/26/2019 7:25 Comments ||
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[BREITBART] Mexico’s president announced Monday that he will reject any designation of cartels as terrorist organizations by the U.S. government.
During his morning presser, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) said he would not accept the U.S.’s potential designation of cartels as foreign terrorist organizations‐which could enable direct actions in Mexico.
"We will never accept that, we are not ’vendepatrias’ (nation sellers)," Lopez Obrador said.
The president’s statements come after the relatives of nine U.S. women and kiddies who died in a cartel ambush in Sonora revealed they would be meeting with President Donald Trump ...dictatorial for repealing some (but not all) of the diktats of his predecessor, misogynistic because he likes pretty girls, homophobic because he doesn't think gender bending should be mandatory, truly a man for all seasons...... . The family is expected to ask for some cartels to be labeled as terrorist organizations.
Last week, Tamaulipas Governor Francisco Cabeza de Vaca used the term "narco-terrorism" to refer to the brazen attacks on citizens of Nuevo Laredo by a faction of Los Zetas Cartel called Cartel Del Noreste. Cabeza de Vaca publicly called out Mexico City for past inaction in confronting Los Zetas.
#3
He doesn't think the US can keep him safe. He's the head of a failed state.
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11/26/2019 6:46 Comments ||
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#4
Of course he does because as terrorists the US can ignore the border like they ignore the border in 'hot pursuit'. See - incursions into Mexico chasing the Apache in the late 19th Century.
#12
Okay, so we'll just declare mexico to be a terrorist state raze it to the bedrock. Sounds good to me. Take Cartel money, get a hellfire through the window.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Swedish prosecutors said Monday they were investigating an Iraqi government minister for "crimes against humanity," as media reports suggested he was related to the shooting dead of hundreds of protesters.
Swedish media identified the subject of their inquiry as Defense Minister Najah al-Shammari,
...he’s the one with dual Swedish and Iraqi citizenship, as I recall..
but the statement from the Swedish Prosecution Authority did not name anyone.
The prosecutors’ body said in a statement that it had received complaints about "an Iraqi minister suspected of crimes against humanity". The investigation was "in a very early stage," it added.
Several Swedish media outlets, including the country’s main dailies, identified him as al-Shammari, reporting that he was also a Swedish citizen, though he goes by a different name in Sweden.
An unnamed Swedish-Iraqi lawyer told Svenska Dagbladet newspaper that he had reported al-Shammari to police in October for his role in the shooting of hundreds of protesters during weeks of unrest.
Since October 1, Iraq’s capital and majority-Shia south have been swept by mass rallies protesting corruption, a lack of jobs and poor services. Those demonstrations have escalated into calls for a complete overhaul of the ruling elite.
An estimated 350 protesters have been killed and thousands maimed in festivities with the security forces, according to a tally compiled by AFP. The authorities in Iraq no longer update their figures.
The defense minister is also under investigation for benefits fraud for claiming housing and child benefits from Sweden despite living in Iraq, according to online news site Nyheter Idag and Swedish newspaper Expressen.
Swedish social insurance agency Forsakringskassan told AFP that they were unable to confirm whether they were investigating al-Shammari as all their cases are classified.
Al-Shammari arrived in Sweden in 2009 and was granted a permanent residency in 2011 before getting his citizenship in 2015, according to Expressen.
There it is. But it’s so recent that it will be easy to strip him of both citizenship and residency, so that’s ok.
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11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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#1
...And the Swedes think this will deter others? There's two words for this, and they rhyme with 'full pit'.
In that culture in that part of the world, those in power kill to keep that power and enforce their authority. They're gonna have to do a whole lot better than that, and they won't.
Mike
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11/26/2019 5:09 Comments ||
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#2
Importing islam is a crime against the people of Sweden.
[Rediff] Social media posts in Pakistan indicate Brigadier Raja Rizwan was hanged on Sunday, November 24, 2019 after his mercy plea was rejected for spying against the country. He had been charged for espionage and leakage of sensitive information to foreign agencies prejudicial to the national security.
Cases involving two senior Pakistan army officers, Lieutenant General Javed Iqbal and Brigadier Raja came to light in October 2018 after Ali Rizwan, Brigadier Raja's son, filed a habeas corpus petition in the Islamabad high court reporting that his father had gone missing on October 10, 2018 evening, near a busy shopping centre in the city. Justice Aamer Farooq heard the petition and sought a report from the authorities.
In the last week of February 2019, Major General Asif Ghafoor, director general Inter-Services Public Relations, admitted while addressing a news conference that two senior officers were in military custody on charges of espionage.
Pakistan army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa had ordered their field general court martial. General Ghafoor also disclosed that the retired army officers were arrested in individual cases and there was no link between them. There were three separate cases. One other, involved a civilian working in a sensitive nuclear installation, Dr Wasim Akram.
Brigadier Rizwan hailed from Khanpur, Rahimyar Khan district, Punjab. His father was a junior commissioned officer (JCO, Engineers). He had his early education at the Hassan Abdal cadet college, a popular nursery for army recruits. He joined the 68th PMA course at Kakul and was commissioned in the 10th Frontier Force Regiment.
While in the army, he commanded a brigade in the tribal areas and thereafter, held a prestigious appointment as Pakistan's military attaché In Germany for three years, from 2009 to 2012. He retired from service in 2014.
Peers within the Pakistan military speculate he may have been honey-trapped as he had the reputation of having a glad eye. A video created by a Pakistani Pashtun Web site circulated on YouTube some time ago alleged India's Research & Analysis Wing (R&AW) may have initiated the honey-trap.
This seems unlikely. It is more probable he may have been snared and recruited by the Americans during his tenure in Germany. There was a sideshow involved, apparently relating to alleged army assistance to selected sectarian groups, which was being fed to the CIA possibly through US Defence Intelligence Agency officials in their embassies in Berlin and Islamabad.
Investigation by the ISI's counter-intelligence wing found traces to foreign bank accounts and vast properties disproportionate to known sources of income of the arrested brigadier.
Some social media tweets in Pakistan today alleged that Brigadier Raja's death sentence was expedited only because he was a Shia, while the other officer convicted of spying, General Javed Iqbal is still languishing in jail on a 14-year conviction. He was not hanged only because he is a Sunni.
Questions have also been asked why the nature of punishment meted out is different for sons of JCOs and civilians while generals were given more lenient punishment, though crimes damaging national security may be similar.
Brigadier Raja's fast-track hanging at this juncture seeks to wrest mileage by stressing across-the-board accountability in the armed forces in Pakistan, which has been an exception rather than the norm. The army's sanctimonious stance is unlikely to convince cynics in civil society there.
[DAWN] The high treason case against former military ruler Pervez Perv Musharraf ... former dictator of Pakistain, who was less dictatorial and corrupt than any Pak civilian government to date ... took a new turn on Monday as the interior ministry filed a petition in the Islamabad High Court (IHC), requesting it to set aside a special court's decision to reserve its judgement in the case.
The special court had on November 19 concluded the trial proceedings in the high treason case against Musharraf for declaring a state of emergency on November 3, 2007, and had ruled that a verdict would be announced on November 28 (Thursday) on the basis of the available record.
In the petition filed through its secretary today, the interior ministry has stated that the special court's decision to reserve its verdict in the case is in violation of the Constitution because it was issued without giving the ministry the opportunity to notify a new prosecution team in the case and because the judgement is set to be passed without hearing the prosecution during the trial.
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11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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[DailyExcelsior] SRINAGAR, Nov 24: The weekly flea market in Srinagar witnessed a huge rush of customers today, four days after threatening posters had enforced a shutdown in most parts of Kashmir, officials said.
Shops opened today morning at some places in the Kashmir valley, including here in civil lines areas of the city and mini buses plied, the officials said.
They said few shops were also open in areas around the commercial hub of Lal Chowk.
However, officials said, most of the shops and other business establishments were shut in downtown – the old city areas of the city here.
While there was a semblance of normalcy in the Kashmir valley over the past few weeks after about three months of protest shutdown over the abrogation of Article 370, the fresh shutdown started on Wednesday as threatening posters warning shopkeepers and public transport operators appeared at some places in the city here and elsewhere.
The police have taken note of these incidents and several such modules have been busted by arresting several persons.
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11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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#1
Some trouble yesterday at Jehangir Chowk - a popular commercial area, it was dealt with swiftly. Some ruffians tried to throw a brick at a uniform for not letting them open someone else's shop without his permission. They were taken in, slapped around and let off.
[Rudaw] The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the occupiers of Greek Asia Minor... ’s President His Enormity, Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First ...Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey. In Anatolia did Recep Bey a stately Presidential Palace decree, that has 1100 rooms. That's 968 more than in the White House, 400 more than in Versailles, and 325 more than Buckingham Palace, so you know who's really more important... claimed Friday evening that Ottoman Turkish troops have found thousands of weapons given to the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in northern Syria and are seizing them.
"They [YPG] run and we chase them. We have entered all of their hideouts. They wanted to establish a terror state in northern Syria. Did they make it? Between 32 and 33 thousand truckloads of weapons were given to them from somewhere. We have found the whereabouts of their depots and we are now collecting them," Erdogan said at an event in Izmir province, reported state-owned Anadolu Agency.
The United States supplied the YPG-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) with light arms, combat training, and air support during the fight against the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS) in Syria, beginning in 2014. The SDF declared the terror group territorially defeated in Syria in March this year.
Washington’s alliance with the YPG angered Turkey, which considers the Kurdish forces a terror organization with ties to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Erdogan repeatedly demanded the US stop arming the Kurds, expressing concern that after ISIS was defeated, the guns would be turned on Turkey.
The US tried to placate Turkey by promising to collect the weapons after the jihadists were ousted from northern Syria and sharing information on the weapons with Ankara.
On October 9, Turkey launched Operation Peace Spring against the YPG, vowing to push the Kurdish forces away from the border and establish a 32-kilometre deep "safe zone." A day later, a YPG source told Rooters that they do not have American weapons to match Turkey’s air force or tanks.
"The heaviest weapons we got from the U.S. are some mortar shells, nothing heavier. No missiles, no anti-aircraft weapons, no anti-tank," said the anonymous source.
Washington and Moscow separately brokered deals with Turkey to end the northern Syrian incursion, though festivities have continued.
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11/26/2019 03:16 ||
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[ALMASDARNEWS] The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire... is fully abiding by the agreements it reached with Russia and the United States regarding northeast Syria and is not resuming its military offensive, a security source said on Monday.
Ankara reached separate agreements with Moscow and Washington last month to remove the Kurdish YPG militia from a swathe of land in northeast Syria bordering Turkey, which in return stopped its military offensive against the militia.
But Ankara has previously said neither Russia nor the United States had kept up their side of the deal, and threatened to launch a new operation. The security source said on Monday that Turkey was responding to attacks by the YPG in the region within the scope of self defense.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Four months before a swarm of drones and missiles crippled the world’s biggest oil processing facility in 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... , Iranian security officials gathered at a heavily fortified compound in Tehran.
The group included the top echelons of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, an elite branch of the Iranian military whose portfolio includes missile development and covert operations.
Continued on Page 49
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11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] A major Lebanese business group called on Monday for a three-day general strike to press divided politicians to form a government and end a crisis that has brought the economy to a standstill.
Leb has faced five weeks of protests, fueled by anger at corruption among sectarian politicians who have governed for decades. Demonstrators want to see the entire ruling class gone from power.
Despite the unprecedented protests, which led to the resignation of Prime Minister Saad Hariri ...Second son of Rafik Hariri, the Leb PM who was assassinated in 2005. He has was prime minister in his own right from 2009 through early 2011. He was born in Riyadh to an Iraqi mother and graduated from Georgetown University. He managed his father's business interests in Riyadh until his father's assassination. When his father died he inherited a fortune of some $4.1 billion, which won't do him much good if Hizbullah has him bumped off, too.... on October 29 and exacerbated the economic crisis, deeply divided politicians have yet to agree on a new government.
The Lebanese Economic Bodies group, which includes industrialists and bankers, called for the closure of private institutions from Thursday to Saturday to push major parties to form a new government and avert further economic damage.Leb business group urges general strike to push for end to crisis
"The political forces have not assumed their national responsibilities and have not shown the seriousness necessary to produce solutions to the current crisis," it said.
Banks reopened last week after mostly being shut since unrest began on October 17. Fearing capital flight and amid a hard currency shortage, commercial banks have placed tight restrictions on withdrawals and transfers abroad.
It was not clear if any banks would heed the strike call.
The hard currency shortage has spawned a black market where the price for dollars has surged since the start of unrest, reaching over 2,000 pounds to the dollar on Monday, about a third higher than the pegged rate of 1,507.5.
In its statement, the Economic Bodies group said its "escalation" would continue until a new government was formed, with further steps to be announced.
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11/26/2019 00:00 ||
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The head of the global chemical weapons organization on Monday defended the agency’s conclusion that poison was used in a high profile attack in Syria last year after leaked documents suggested two former employees doubted some of its findings.
More than 40 people were killed in the April 7 attack in Douma, a town on the outskirts of Damascus that was then held by the opposition.
The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons' chief, Fernandon Arias, said the body stands by the findings it published in March this year.
“While some of these diverging views continue to circulate in certain public discussion forums, I would like to reiterate that I stand by the independent, professional conclusions” of the report, he told delegates on Monday.
“The secretariat has, as it always does, considered and taken into account all information submitted,” he said.
The United States, Britain, and France retaliated a week later by firing missiles at Syrian government targets, the biggest Western military action against the Damascus authorities of the eight-year war.
Inspectors from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons concluded in a report released on March 1 that a toxic chemical containing chlorine was used in an attack. The team was not mandated to assign blame for who used the toxic chemical.
However, the Syrian government and its Russian allies have rejected the findings, saying they believe the incident was staged by the opposition and no attack had taken place.
On Saturday, anti-secrecy group Wikileaks published an internal email to the former chief of staff at the OPCW in which an unidentified inspector described a report as having been edited to appear more conclusive than the inspectors’ findings.
“I am requesting that the fact-finding report be released in its entirety as I fear this redacted version no longer reflects the work of the team,” the inspector wrote. An OPCW source told Reuters the June 22, 2018 email was genuine.
Douma is expected to be a major theme at the annual conference of the OPCW being held in The Hague this week.
It is clear the Iranian regime bears “enormous responsibility” for the September 14 attacks on Saudi Aramco facilities, says US Senator Chris Murphy, a member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, who has received classified briefings about the attacks. pic.twitter.com/gyERsqrvX0
[Combating Terrorism Center] Abstract: Now is an opportune time to revisit the question of succession to the leadership of al-Qa`ida, for a number of reasons: the organization’s current emir, Ayman al-Zawahiri, is 68 years old and reported to have a potentially serious heart complaint; bin Ladin’s heir apparent, his son Hamza, is reported by the United States to have been killed in the Afghanistan/Pakistan region; and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of al-Qa`ida’s principal rival, the Islamic State, is also dead. An analysis of al-Qa`ida’s history and current decision-making structure points to one man in particular: the longtime jihadi commander known as Abu Muhammad al-Masri. Abu Muhammad has long played a critical role in al-Qa`ida, both as an operational commander and as a member of the governing shura council. Yet despite his importance to the organization, Abu Muhammad remains a shadowy figure. Little is known about his early life or his current activities. Unlike most al-Qa`ida Central figures, he is based not in northern Pakistan but in Iran, where he was previously imprisoned and now resides under a murky arrangement by which he is apparently allowed a great deal of freedom while still being barred from leaving the country.
The fall of 1998 marked a high point in Abu Muhammad al-Masri’s career. He had just returned to Afghanistan from East Africa, where he had masterminded al-Qa`ida’s deadliest attack on the United States yet‐the twin truck bombings of U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.1 He had positioned himself as one of Usama bin Ladin’s key confidants, to be consulted on the planning of all major attacks. And he had risen to the leadership of al-Qa`ida’s network of training camps.
Around this time, reports came to Abu Muhammad that a certain recruit, a Palestinian-Jordanian named Abu Moutassem, was behaving strangely.2 Despite claiming a history in the jihad stretching back over a decade, he struggled to control his rifle. He had a suspiciously large amount of cash, as well as a valid visa for Afghanistan in his passport‐a formality with which most self-respecting jihadis would not bother. And he was overheard talking on the phone apparently speaking in code.3 Abu Jandal, bin Ladin’s bodyguard, had a concise take on the matter: "If that chap is a jihadi," he said to al-Qa`ida’s military chief, Abdel Hadi al-Iraqi, "you can cut my arms off!"
Abu Muhammad had Abu Moutassem arrested and proceeded to interrogate him personally. It was not long before Abu Moutassem confessed that he was working for Jordanian intelligence. "I’m ready to tell you everything," the terrified spy told Abu Muhammad, "so long as you guarantee me a fair trial."
Evidently Abu Muhammad calculated that the prospect of a fair hearing was worth the potentially valuable intelligence Abu Moutassem might provide. Instead of shooting the man on the spot as many other jihadis might have done, he bundled the Jordanian into a car and drove him to Logar, south of Kabul, to meet face-to-face with bin Ladin. Saif al-`Adl, the hot-headed Egyptian former paratrooper then serving as al-Qa`ida’s security chief, was less eager to show mercy to the unmasked spy. Al-`Adl quickly pulled together a lynch mob of fellow jihadis and followed Abu Muhammad’s vehicle.
In late 2015 or early 2016, Abu al-Khair, having been named as “general deputy” to al-Zawahiri, was sent to Syria to serve as al-Zawahiri’s personal representative to al-Qa`ida-aligned jihadi groups fighting in that conflict. Abu al-Khair was killed in Idlib province in February 2017 when a missile from a U.S. drone struck his car.12 According to what is known about al-Qa`ida’s succession, that leaves Abu Muhammad al-Masri first in line to inherit the leadership.
The death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the so-called “caliph” of the Islamic State, further raises the stakes for the next emir of al-Qa`ida. The Islamic State began life as an al-Qa`ida franchise, and only split from the parent organization in 2014. Since then, scholars and analysts have speculated on whether and how the two groups might merge once more. Ayman al-Zawahiri is unlikely to be capable of leading such a reconciliation, given the perception of him as an interloper who spent most of his career with a different organization, Egyptian Islamic Jihad. But Abu Muhammad, as will be outlined, has been with al-Qa`ida from the very beginning and would therefore face no such impediment. Moreover, al-Baghdadi’s death bequeaths the Islamic State its own succession challenge: with so many of its senior leaders dead or captured, the group has resorted to promoting virtual unknowns. Its new leader, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashemi al-Quraishi, had no name recognition among global jihadis when the group announced he had become ‘caliph’ and has not yet been seen nor heard from.13 a Moreover, much of the animosity between the Islamic State and al-Qa`ida has built up around a war of words between al-Zawahiri and al-Baghdadi personally; with both of them gone, reconciliation could become markedly easier. Abu Muhammad, should he succeed al-Zawahiri relatively soon, will therefore potentially enjoy an unprecedented opportunity to bring former Islamic State members into the al-Qa`ida fold.
Abu Muhammad was born Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah in June 1963 in Gharbia, a governorate of Lower Egypt in the central Nile Delta. As a young man, he played soccer professionally for a club in the Egyptian premier league.
...of the founding — Afghan war — generation of Al Qaeda.
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.
[LI] Killed in the Battle of Qala-i-Jangi (11-25-2001). John Walker Lindh, the American Taliban interrogated by Spann just before Spann was killed, was released from prison last May.
...mindless ferocity in a turban...
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for 
...dictatorial for repealing some (but not all) of the diktats of his predecessor, misogynistic because he likes pretty girls, homophobic because he doesn't think gender bending should be mandatory, truly a man for all seasons......
Pervez 
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling 
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire...
...Second son of Rafik Hariri, the Leb PM who was assassinated in 2005. He has was prime minister in his own right from 2009 through early 2011. He was born in Riyadh to an Iraqi mother and graduated from Georgetown University. He managed his father's business interests in Riyadh until his father's assassination. When his father died he inherited a fortune of some $4.1 billion, which won't do him much good if Hizbullah has him bumped off, too....
[Combating Terrorism Center] Abstract: Now is an opportune time to revisit the question of succession to the leadership of al-Qa`ida, for a number of reasons: the organization’s current emir, Ayman al-Zawahiri, is 68 years old and reported to have a potentially serious heart complaint; bin Ladin’s heir apparent, his son Hamza, is reported by the United States to have been killed in the Afghanistan/Pakistan region; and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of al-Qa`ida’s principal rival, the Islamic State, is also dead. An analysis of al-Qa`ida’s history and current decision-making structure points to one man in particular: the longtime jihadi commander known as Abu Muhammad al-Masri. Abu Muhammad has long played a critical role in al-Qa`ida, both as an operational commander and as a member of the governing shura council. Yet despite his importance to the organization, Abu Muhammad remains a shadowy figure. Little is known about his early life or his current activities. Unlike most al-Qa`ida Central figures, he is based not in northern Pakistan but in Iran, where he was previously imprisoned and now resides under a murky arrangement by which he is apparently allowed a great deal of freedom while still being barred from leaving the country.
