A group of up to eight Islamist insurgents remained besieged by police in two flats in a residential building in the capital city of Russia's southern republic of Kabardino-Balkaria's on Wednesday afternoon. The republic's interior minister, Khachim Shogenov, told journalists on Tuesday that the leader of the local "Yarmuk" Wahhabi group, Muslim Ataev, was among the trapped gunmen. Shogenov said Ataev was a major suspect in the December attack on the republican branch of Russia's drug-control service, in which four officers were killed and more than 250 firearms stolen.
Ataev and his Yarmuk group have been also accused in an attack on police near the republic's capital, Nalchik, last August, in which two officers were killed. The militants reportedly have been living with their families in the two rented flats in the besieged five-storey building. Police surrounded it late on Tuesday, demanding that the militants surrender. Other tenants were evacuated from their apartments. Negotiations - conducted via telephone - continued through the night and Wednesday. The militants, with Ataev's wife and a child, demanded safe passage from the city. That demand has been refused. Interior Minister Shogenov told journalists on Wednesday that the militants were ready to surrender, but that Ataev had forbidden them to do so. A source in the republican Interior Ministry told Regnum news agency on Wednesday afternoon that a radio exchange had been intercepted, in which other Yarmuk members were bidding farewell to their comrades trapped in the building.
Later on Wednesday, Shogenov told reporters that plans to storm the building had been set in motion for later on Wednesday. According to Russian security officials, Yarmuk was created by Balkar Wahhabis, followers of the austere fundamentalist brand of Islam, who fought against Russian troops in Chechnya under the command of the Chechen warlord Shamil Basaev. Balkars, an ethnic minority in Kabardino-Balkaria, were deported en masse by Joseph Stalin to Kazakhstan and Siberia in 1944, just like the Chechen, Ingush, and Karachai peoples. Representatives of these four ethnic groups form the backbone of the anti-Russian, anti-government insurgency in the Northern Caucasus.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
9:58:22 AM ||
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An imprisoned Egyptian Islamic leader is staging a strike behind bars to protest authorities' refusal obey a court order to release him. Saudi daily al-Watan reported Wednesday Tarek al-Zumur, a leader of the Jihad organization and the cousin of the group's chief, said he would refuse to deal with wardens or receive visitors.
That'll teach them
Zumur has been held about two years beyond his prison sentence and a court ruling in December ordered his immediate release, but he remains jailed. Zumur's defense lawyer, Mamdouh Ismail said he is going to sue Interior Minister Brig. Habib al-Adli for breaching the law and resisting a court ruling. Ismail also threatened to lodge a complaint against Adli with the European Tribunal for Human Rights. Zumur was arrested in 1981 and convicted of complicity in the assassination of former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and of reviving an outlawed organization. He was sentenced to 22 years in prison, which he completed at the end of 2002.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
9:41:03 AM ||
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Okay. Lock him in the cell and leave him alone. Wouldn't want to violate his right to privacy and piss off Human Rights Watch. Just make sure to check on him every six months or so
As he begins his second term, President Bush has become a victim of his own success in combating al Qaeda. If shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, Bush had announced a policy of disemboweling captured terrorists, he would have been applauded from Boise to Boston. Heck, John Kerry probably would have volunteered to wield the sword.
More than three years later, the sense of panic has abated, and legions of critics are condemning one of the successful steps taken to prevent another 9-11: the aggressive interrogation of captured terrorists.
Human Rights Watch had the gall to begin its annual report by singling out for censure two "fundamental threats to human rights" that occurred last year: "the ethnic cleansing in Darfur and the torture of detainees at Abu Ghraib."
Are the abuses committed by a few renegade guards at one prison really worth mentioning in the same breath as the murder of 70,000 people in Darfur? Even Human Rights Watch has to concede that "no one would equate the two," and yet that's what the group is doing.
I hold no brief for the sickos at Abu Ghraib, who have begun to get the prison time they deserve. Their superiors also deserve to be harshly disciplined. But let's keep a little perspective, shall we?
According to the August 2004 report of an independent panel headed by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger, more than 50,000 individuals have been detained by U.S. forces in the global war on terrorism. Allegations of misconduct have been made in 300 cases -- that's 0.6 percent -- and not all of them have been substantiated. (Surprise! Some detainees lie!)
For all the sifting of the administration's legal memorandums, no evidence has emerged that abuses were the result of high-level decisions. "No approved procedure called for or allowed the ⊠abuses that in fact occurred," the Schlesinger report concluded.
The Bush administration is hardly blameless. It should have kept a tighter rein on its subordinates and been better prepared to handle large numbers of detainees. But the critics are barking up the wrong tree when they flay the president for refusing to apply the Geneva Conventions in Afghanistan. (They are being applied in Iraq -- for all the good that did at Abu Ghraib.)
The laws of war are a social contract: Combatants who follow the rules will be given protections if captured. Al Qaeda and its ilk do not abide by such niceties as not targeting civilians and not beheading captives. If they are given all the protections accorded to lawful prisoners of war, what incentive do they have to follow the rules?
We should be clear about what POW status entails. According to the 1949 Geneva Convention, a POW "is bound to give only his surname, first names and rank, date of birth, and army, regimental, personal or serial number." Any attempt to coax further information is forbidden: "Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened, insulted, or exposed to unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind."
Is this really the standard we should apply to al Qaeda detainees? Many of Bush's critics think so.
Although Human Rights Watch focuses its criticisms on torture, which everyone condemns, it also wants to ban "all forms of coercive interrogation." Many of these involve no physical coercion.
Interrogators employ psychological "stress techniques" such as the good cop/bad cop routine seen on countless TV shows. Other techniques that Human Rights Watch would like to outlaw involve keeping detainees up past their bedtime, making them stand for long periods and yelling at them -- no worse than the treatment meted out to recruits in boot camp.
Rougher methods have been employed on the worst of the worst. It is alleged, for instance, that 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was tied to a board and temporarily submerged in water to induce a feeling of drowning. "Waterboarding" may well meet the U.N. definition of torture: the infliction of "severe pain and suffering, mental or physical."
Should this be permitted? I'm not sure. It's hard to know exactly where to draw the line. But I am sure that I reject the absolutist grandstanding of so many of the president's critics, who would turn international law into a suicide pact. That such views are now espoused even by some supporters of the war on terrorism is a sign of how complacent we have become.
I hope it doesn't take another 9-11 to alert us to the mortal danger we still face.
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
9:37:32 AM ||
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I hope it doesnât take another 9-11 to alert us to the mortal danger we still face.
Of course it will. For some people, the loss of life is the only thing they understand. Unfortunately, it's usually people other than themselves that are the ones that end up paying the ultimate price.
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/26/2005 19:23
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It will take several more 9-11s to alert a large majority of US voters to the danger they face. For extremists like Noam Chomsky and Michael Moore, even their own death will fail to make them change their positions.
Outlaw lynched in Bagerhat
Jan 25: An underground terrorist was lynched by mob at Putiya in Fakirhat upazila early hours today. Police said the villagers held Russel (30), recovered home-made bombs and leaflets of Purbo Banglar Communist Party (ML-Nutun Bangla) and lynched him. He hailed from Rupsa of Khulna district. At least 60 underground terrors, extortionists and dacoits were killed in mob beating, crossfire or internal clashes in Bagerhat district during the last nine months.
Cab driver found dead
Shyampur Thana police recovered a body yesterday from Shyampur in the city.
The dead was identified as Russel (22), a CNG-run taxi cab driver, son of Bachchu Miah, a resident of 82/7 Rasulpur at Dania under Shyampur police station. He hailed from Alexjandra of Barisal. According to police, on receipt of information, a group of Shyampur Thana police recovered a floating body from a pond at Kuderbazar of Muradpur under Shyampur police station at around 3.30pm yesterday. The body was sent to the morgue of Mitford Hospital for autopsy.
Police suspected that he was a close associate of the snatchers who were killed in crossfire with Demra Thana police in the night of January 21.
Perhaps he ratted them out, or was thought to have.
Majibur Rahman, owner of the CNG-run black taxi cab, identified him as Russel who was a driver of his taxi cab.
"Yeah, dat's him. He's looked better."
Abul Kalam killed in crossfire
Munshiganj: Abul Kalam alias Kalam Master, 28, one of the listed top terrors in the district, was killed in crossfire between the police and terrors in the early hours of on Tuesday here.
Bangla night shift at work again
Police said acting on a tip-off, a team of Detective Branch (DB) of Police arrested Kalam from a slum in Binodpur area of the town on Monday.
"Stick em up, Kalam! Youse comin' wid us!"
Following his confession, a team of Munshiganj Police along with Kalam went to Hudpara area of the town to recover arms at about 2 am.
That's ALT - F7 on the Bangla police computers
As soon as the police reached the area, the associates of Kalam opened fire on the police. The police returned fire in self-defence.
Control - F8
At one stage of the shootout, Kalam received fatal injury while trying to escape the custody. He was declared dead on arrival at Munshiganj Sadar Hospital.
ALT - F10
During the shootout, three constables of the police-Nazmul Islam, Subed Das and Shawkat Ali received injuries. The police recovered one rifle and 15 bullets from the spot. Police said Kalam Master, son of Abdur Razzak of village Naluabagi under Galachipa Upazila of Patuakhali district, has been engaged in terrorist activities in Rampal and Brajrayagini union of the Sadar Upazila of the district for a longtime. He was a close associate of terrorist Kala Babul, killed in crossfire here last year.
It's so hard to keep track
He was an accused in seven criminal cases including two for murder. He was also the main accused of sensational Basir murder case. Locals said the death of Kalam Master in crossfire has brought a sigh of relief for the local people.
"Huzza! Kalam is dead, drinks all around!"
A case was registered with Munshiganj Sadar Police in this connection.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
9:18:15 AM ||
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At least 60 underground terrors, extortionists and dacoits were killed in mob beating, crossfire or internal clashes in Bagerhat district during the last nine months.
Sounds like the Bagerhats have bought into the WOT.
The alleged killer of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh ignored his victim's pleas for mercy and calmly shot him at close range before slitting his throat, prosecutors said at the first public hearing in the murder case Wednesday. In the most detailed account yet of the killing, prosecutors gave a play-by-play account of the morning of Nov. 2, when Van Gogh was shot while bicycling to work in a residential Amsterdam neighborhood. The suspect, Mohammed Bouyeri, 26, waived his right to attend the pretrial hearing and was represented by his attorney. "What's extraordinary is the calmness with which as he did this," said the prosecutor, identified only as F. van Straelen. "Several witnessed described how he coolly knelt next to Van Gogh's body and reloaded his gun."
Autopsy showed Van Gogh's throat had been cut nearly completely off with a kitchen knife, to the spinal cord. A note impaled in Van Gogh's chest threatened prominent politicians and vowed Islamic holy war or jihad, against nonbelievers. A bystander who witnessed the crime yelled at Van Gogh's killer "You can't do that!" to which the suspect replied: "Oh yes I can ... now you know what's coming for you."
Bouyeri allegedly then walked away, apparently in search of police officers, Van Straelen said. He opened fire at the first police car he found, injuring a police officer. In total, the gunman fired around 30 times in a shooting spree, Van Straelen said. Bouyeri faces charges of terrorism, murder, attempted murder, threatening politicians, possession of an illegal firearm and impeding democracy, and could be sentenced to a possible life sentence in prison if convicted. He is still recovering from a gunshot wound suffered during his arrest.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
9:15:32 AM ||
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impeding democracy
That's not a crime - that's, well, its like what Boxer stands for, isn't it?
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
01/26/2005 11:11
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FOX in the Morning - when talking about the attacks on Condi Rice - repeatedly reminded the viewer that in his youth Sen Byrd was a top Klansman. Stated: Why are Boxer and Kennedy defending a ex-clansman attacking a highly regarded black woman? Shouldn't have spent his whole life atoning for being in the clan?
Its getting really really nasty!
Posted by: 3dc ||
01/26/2005
9:12:51 AM ||
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Good. That bastard should've shut up and climbed into a box years ago.
#2
Kennedy is a drunk. Byrd is senile and doesn't know shit from Shinola. Boxer is a grandstanding left coast wacko. Does anyone really listen to these clowns?
Two Bangladeshis were missing Monday after a North Korean registered cargo boat capsized off the coast of Lebanon, officials said. Rescue teams were alerted at dawn when residents in Khalde, south of Beirut, saw the 25-metre (82-foot) Mary capsize in rough seas. A civil defence team managed to fish three Georgians out of the sea, including the captain and two crew members, but two Bangladeshi sailors have been reported missing, the sources said. The boat capsized after wires got entangled in its propeller and was left badly damaged, according to the initial findings of an investigation.
Just happened to "snag" some wires in the prop, huh?
The captain told police that the Mary left Port Said in Egypt for Latakia in Syria on Saturday.
Wonder what her cargo was?
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
9:10:30 AM ||
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Quite the little UN aboard the Mary, wasn't it? Nork flag, Georgian Captain, and Bangladeshi crew...
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/26/2005 19:33
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For those kinds of lines to be there, its a bit "unusual" - Gee, I wonder where the Israeli Navy is keeping its diesel electrc boats these days, and if some steel cable somehow disappeared from the docks the last time they sortied...
#8
For those kinds of lines to be there, its a bit "unusual" - Gee, I wonder where the Israeli Navy is keeping its diesel electrc boats these days, and if some steel cable somehow disappeared from the docks the last time they sortied...
#9
For those kinds of lines to be there, its a bit "unusual" - Gee, I wonder where the Israeli Navy is keeping its diesel electrc boats these days, and if some steel cable somehow disappeared from the docks the last time they sortied...
AUSTRALIAN Guantanamo Bay detainee Mamdouh Habib was tied to the ground while a prostitute menstruated on him after he failed to co-operate with interrogators, his lawyer said today. Interrogators also told the Sydney man they had killed his family and superimposed animals' heads on photos of his wife and children, Mr Habib's lawyer Steven Hopper said today.
The federal Government said it was aware of similar allegations of torture made by former British detainees at Guantanamo Bay but it was the first time the government had heard the claims involving Mr Habib.
Mr Habib is due back in Sydney within a fortnight after the US said it would release him without charge despite holding him for more than three years on suspicion he knew about the September 11 attacks and trained with al-Qaeda.
Mr Hopper today detailed for the first time the "atrocities" his client endured while in detention at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
"The Americans used prostitutes as tools in their interrogations," he said in Sydney.
"They'd say to detainees 'If you co-operate with us, we'll let you at this woman for the night'. And if they wouldn't agree they'd use them in other ways."
He said detainees held at the base with Mr Habib reported that a prostitute was told to stand over him and menstruate on him.
"(We believe) one of the prostitutes stood over him naked while he was strapped to the floor and menstruated on him," Mr Hopper said.
Officials at the base also defaced photos of Mr Habib's wife Maha and their four children, he said.
"The Americans in their wisdom have taken the heads off the pictures, enlarged them and superimposed them with the heads of animals and then strung them up all over the walls of the interrogation room.
"As they sat there talking to Mamdouh asking him about his terrorist activities, they held up a picture of Maha and said 'It's a shame we had to kill your family, it's a shame you will never see these people again'."
He said Mr Habib also said he was subjected to interrogation techniques at Guantanamo Bay like those used on prisoners at the infamous Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
"Make no doubt about it, Guantanamo Bay wasn't a prisoner-of-war camp," Mr Hopper said.
"It was a facility designed to interrogate people. It was nothing more than a vulgar concentration camp and it has marked a new high in the rise of American fascism."
Mr Habib was detained in Afghanistan in late 2001 and sent to Egypt before being flown to Guantanamo Bay in 2002.
Mr Hopper also detailed abuses against Mr Habib while in Egypt, saying he was strapped to the ceiling with only an electrified barrel to stand on.
"He would stand and get a shock or hang painfully by his arms until he'd collapse," he said.
He was blindfolded and locked in rooms which were flooded with water and charged with electricity, Mr Hopper said.
"On other occasions they used German shepherd guard dogs and (interrogators) told him they train dogs to sexually assault people," the lawyer said.
"Mamdouh has said he wasn't sexually assaulted by these dogs but really we don't know.
"Who would admit to it, particularly an Arab Muslim male?"
Mr Hopper detailed the alleged abuse at an Australia Day forum, focussing on Australia's political relationship with the US.
The federal Government said it was aware of similar allegations of torture made by former British detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
But a spokesman for Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said tonight it was the first time the Government had heard the claims involving Mr Habib.
"We haven't heard those sorts of allegations from Mr Habib but we're aware that allegations of that nature were made by other detainees released last year," Mr Ruddock's spokesman said.
"But if he's got any evidence to support those sorts of claims we'd pass them on."
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
8:56:37 AM ||
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It was nothing more than a vulgar concentration camp and it has marked a new high in the rise of American fascism."
I see he has a fine communist lawyer.
"We havenât heard those sorts of allegations from Mr Habib but weâre aware that allegations of that nature were made by other detainees released last year," They were total bullocks then and they are now. He should have added.
Note the one-upmanship going on. Jihadi #1 says he was forced to watch a prostitute masturbate. Jihadi #2 says he was forced to have sex with a prostitute. Jihadi #3 says ditto, plus the prostitute had her period!
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/26/2005 10:16
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"Make no doubt about it, Guantanamo Bay wasnât a prisoner-of-war camp," Mr Hopper said.
right, & it shouldn't be because you're not a prisoner of war assclown.
"It was a facility designed to interrogate people. It was nothing more than a vulgar concentration camp and it has marked a new high in the rise of American fascism."
-God, if only that were true, then I'd be truly proud.
#7
I loved the "superimposed animalsâ heads on photos of his wife and children" bit. Oh horror of horrors!
Posted by: Tom ||
01/26/2005 14:02
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Now THAT's some useful psyops. Nothing could have been more horrifying to this guy-how wonderful! I get a soundtrack of Margaret Hamilton running through my head when I try to visualize this:
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 14:04
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This story is one for the psychologists out there. Sounds like he is projecting his own subconcious fantasies.
One thing I found interesting: as far as telling him that his family was executed.... I don't think that is torture, per se. Mock executions of the prisoner, yes; but I don't see how what he is saying goes over whatever line you have drawn regarding torture. (Aren't we allowed to lie to them? The police do it all the time in interrogations in the US)
Posted by: Mark E. ||
01/26/2005 15:25
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#11
As he skips out the door, make the suggestion to Mr. Habib that he grow eyes in the back of his head.
#14
Three years inside, he had to have given up lots of people. Why else would they let you out, right, Mamdouh? Could you blame some of your "old friends" for thinking like that, Mamdouh?
MORE than 30 US marines were killed in a helicopter crash in western Iraq, CNN reported.
US military officials in Baghdad said they could not immediately confirm the toll but acknowledged there were casualties.
Elswhere, four US marines were killed in the western province of Al-Anbar today, the military said in a statement.
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
8:45:44 AM ||
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Freedom again claims it's price. Rest well Marines.
Eternal Father, grant , we pray,
To all Marines, both night and day,
The courage, honor, strength and skill
Their land to serve, Thy law fulfill;
Be Thou the Shield forevermore
From ev'ry peril to the Corps.
Amen.
Massively snipped; RTWT.
On December 22,Venezuela enacted a law granting Cuban judicial and security forces extensive police powers within Venezuela. Under the new code, Cuban officials are allowed to investigate, seize, detain, and interrogate Venezuelans and Cubans living in the Bolivarian Republic. Suspects taken into Cuban custody in Venezuela could be extradited to the island and tried there without any assurance that they would be returned to Venezuela. The Venezuelan "government" hardly seems to qualify as such.
Allowing officials in Mr. Castro's dictatorship authority to conduct police operations in Venezuela has raised concern that Venezuela is no longer safe for the 30,000 Cubans living there, especially members of the anti-Castro opposition. Ya think?
Some 27,000 Cuban doctors, teachers, sports trainers, intelligence and police officers, and other workers are currently in Venezuela, sent by Mr. Castro to help Mr. Chävez replicate in his own country many of the social and political structures of the Cuban regime. The workers receive about $15 to $20 a month from the Cuban government. Well, it's better than being in Cuba.
In exchange for the assistance Mr. Castro's regime has provided Mr. Chävez Cuba receives roughly 80,000 barrels of oil a day at significantly reduced prices and on very generous credit terms. In a setup very similar to one Castro enjoyed with the Soviet Union, a portion of the Venezuelan oil bypasses Cuba entirely and is resold immediately on the world market, with Mr. Castro pocketing the profits. Surprise, surprise.
#2
Oil for People; clever idea. But when does the UN get its cut?
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 20:40
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Cubans have been operating in Venezuela for a while now. We have Cuban "doctors", "PE trainers", "Tourism Instructors", etc. They are in every poor neighborhood indoctrinating people under the pretense of "helping" them. Ironically, Venezuelan employment rate is sky-high but apparently we need people from Cuba to perform those jobs.
With this new "edict", Chavez just makes legal a situation that has been going on for over 4 years now.
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 21:44
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#9
I'd have Noriega call Hugo weekly
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 21:45
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#10
Hello, State Department? Can we have a moratorium on issuing visas to Muslims and get a bunch out real quick to the Cubans who need out of Venezuela Real Quick?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/26/2005 22:23
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From the Wall Street Journal, appears on page A16 of the dead tree version. Submitted in full.
In our continuing quest to save readers' time, we suggest you skip all of those alarmist stories in today's newspapers about the latest federal budget deficit estimates. They will have you believing that the feds are starved for cash, which defies everything we've ever learned about the way government works.
All you really need to know about the latest Congressional Budget Office figures is contained in the nearby chart. Fred, could you fetch the chart from the web page? It didn't copy along with the text. And I'm the apocryphal end-user, so there's no point in me trying -- I'm more likely to crash the entire world wide web than to actually succeed. Thanks! The darker bars at the bottom measure the annual budget deficit as a share of the U.S. economy, showing that it will steadily decline throughout the rest of this decade. From 3.6% of GDP in the 2004 fiscal year, the deficit will fall steadily to an insignificant 0.5% of GDP in 2011, assuming continued economic growth.
We realize these CBO estimates don't include future spending on the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. But as CBO points out, revenues are expected to grow rapidly over the decade, especially in individual income taxes. The progressive nature of the U.S. tax code means that, as growth raises incomes, more and more people are pushed into higher tax brackets, even if President Bush's tax cuts are made permanent.
Budget estimates beyond the current year are always a guess, and CBO's is hardly more educated than others, but the larger point of these numbers is that with even a modicum of spending restraint the federal deficit will fall back to zero over the next few years.
The other thing to know is revealed in the lighter bars in the chart, which show debt held by the public as a share of GDP. This is the most telling measure of the federal debt burden because it indicates a country's ability to service that debt. And the chart shows the U.S. burden staying more or less constant through this decade despite the fact that annual deficits will add to the total amount of debt.
Even at 38.6% of GDP in 2006, debt held by the public would remain well below the 49.4% level hit in 1993, the most recent peak year. And it would also be well below the general government debt burden in Germany (51.9% of GDP), France (42.7%) and especially spendthrift Japan (79.3%), according to statistics from Bear, Stearns & Co. Compared with other industrial nations, in short, the U.S. is in strong fiscal shape.
Bear, Stearns economist David Malpass adds the cheeky point that, despite its high debt burden, Japanese interest rates are close to zero. This would tend to refute the claim -- made so often by politicians who want to raise taxes -- that deficits cause higher interest rates. Robert Rubin, call your press agent.
This bit is important: It is also true that these debt figures do not include the future liabilities for Medicare and Social Security that politicians have promised. But Congressman John Spratt (D., S.C.) and other self-described "deficit hawks" could raise taxes beyond their wildest dreams and never raise enough revenue to pay for those promises. The only way to reduce those liabilities is to reform those entitlement programs -- for example, with private Social Security accounts that will build wealth over time. Any politician who moans about the "deficit" or the "national debt" and opposes entitlement reform is really arguing for a tax increase.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
7:41:39 AM ||
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Thanks for the read, I have been trying to enlight people harping about the U.S. budget deficit that there is a reason that in the U.S. press we are always shown the Dollar-amount and not the actual percentage.
#4
The chart also doesn't reflect the future costs of the WOT (currently running what, about $80B a year?) and the revenue impact of making the last four rounds of tax cuts permanent (originally passed with 10 year sunsets which aren't likely to occur). Even with all that factored in, though, the percent of GDP news is pretty good.
#5
The chart also doesn't reflect the future costs of the WOT (currently running what, about $80B a year?) and the revenue impact of making the last four rounds of tax cuts permanent (originally passed with 10 year sunsets which aren't likely to occur). Even with all that factored in, though, the percent of GDP news is pretty good.
The chart isn't likely to show the impact of not vigerously fighting the WoT.
A picture of an exploding bomb would suffice.
The chart doesn't show the recent paydown of the deficit by virtue of increased revenues by stimulating the economy with massive tax cuts.
Posted by: Hillary Clinton ||
01/26/2005 19:05
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I'm not an economist, but from what I've read it's a bit misleading to cite the Federal Government's debt as a percentage of GDP. Only our government's revenues can be used to pay down the debt.
Also our country is suffering from twin deficits -we also have significant trade deficits and inspite of our devalued dollar which should have helped selling more of our goods and services abroad. A devalued dollar without trade benefits is bad. We are forced to sell more Treasury bonds to countries like China and Japan. If they start increasing the interest rates on the money they have loaned us, we could be screwed.
Look it's all well and good to call this occupation of Iraq as a WOT, but unless this Admin. cuts its spending, foreign investors could give two hoots whether or not Iraqis vote or Afghans have a soccer game with soccer balls instead of human heads. It's the bottom line that counts, and investors are looking at us as an increasingly bad risk for re-paying the debt we are accumulating with them.
Wall Street Journal. Given in full.
China's leaders may have convinced themselves that the country's relatively new, albeit unbalanced, material prosperity will be enough to keep an uneasy population from peering into some of the darker corners of the country's Communist history. And the popular reaction (or lack thereof) to purged former leader Zhao Ziyang's death last week appears to prove them right at first glance. The relative tranquility does make it appear as if young Chinese, intoxicated by the opportunities of China's dizzying economic growth, don't really understand -- or care -- about what really happened at Tiananmen Square in 1989, or why Zhao's sympathies with the student protesters led to his downfall.
But that is not exactly the case. Increased access to information through the Internet, which is just one of the many fruits of China's development, is producing a predicament for China's leadership. China's pragmatic leaders undoubtedly saw allowing widespread access to the Internet as necessary for growth, but hoped to rein in its power by using firewalls to block "unsavory" information. But the Internet has only endowed citizens with a heightened awareness of the amount of information that is being blocked.
When Zhao died last week, his passing was mostly observed in silence. State media played down the death, if it was reported at all, and relevant Web sites were often either sterilized or blocked entirely. But some Chinese, rather than quietly observe the systematic blockage of news, turned to the few tools at their disposal, and used the Internet to both obtain and spread information. The Internet, in fact, served as a forum for Chinese to congregate and express their mourning or, more often, frustration. While many Chinese went online to pay their respects to Zhao, the anger and sadness on these sites often had little to do with the man who died. Comments extracted and translated from discussions on mainland-accessible Chinese-language Web sites in the days following Zhao's death showcase a collective lament for the limits on freedom of information in China today.
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Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
7:30:12 AM ||
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Hip-hop radio station HOT 97 has sparked outrage across the city by airing a twisted song that shockingly mocks the 200,000 victims of the South Asian tsunami.
The radio station, WQHT, was forced to air an apology yesterday after the insulting song - whose lyrics include racial epithets aimed at Asians - was played for four days last week by morning deejay Miss Jones.
The nasty parody, sung to the tune of "We Are the World," makes light of how the killer tsunami "washed your whole country away."
Some of the other tasteless lyrics refer jokingly to orphaned children being sold into slavery.
Before one airing of the song, the station's news reader, Miss Info, who is of Asian descent, objected to the song, only to be attacked by Jones and her cohorts.
"That song is really offensive to me, and I opted not to involve myself," Miss Info said.
Jones replied, "I know you feel you're superior because you're Asian, but you're not." Later, co-host Todd Lyn, incensed at Miss Info's criticism, said, "I'm going to start shooting Asians."
Councilman John Liu (D-Queens) said it was outrageous that the station, owned by Emmis Communications Corp., aired the song for four days.
Four days? There's malice aforethought there.
Jones and program director John Dimick both read apologies on the air yesterday.
"HOT 97 regrets the airing of material that made light of a serious and tragic event," Dimick said. "We apologize to our listeners and anyone who was offended."
Songs like this will be created and spread over the Internet. While they will always exist, airing them on the public airwaves should be a hate crime. The station had the song up on its website for download.
Rank: No. 2 among listeners 12 and older for the past two ratings periods, ending Jan. 1, according to Arbitron.
Download a clip of the song being aired on Hot 97, it includes the hosts berating the Asian host, Miss Info. Choice quote: "If you feel that way, why are you even on the show?"
Posted by: gromky ||
01/26/2005
6:37:01 AM ||
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and it's great publicity for radio station. You should kill the link and ignore it. It's not a hate crime, but it's beyond tasteless and their license should at least feel threatened.
#3
With representatives like Miss Jones, NWA and Two Live Crew no wonder the rest of the World hates us. They lost of few of their brethren in East Africa as well but I guess as long as Asians were killed the price is worth it.
#4
If Janet Jackson's sagging tit rates a half million dollar fine from the FCC, this heinous example of open racism and callousness ought to get at least a couple of million. Shut the place down and make an example of them.
Future explorers on the Moon and Mars could be outfitted in lightweight, high-tech spacesuits that offer far more flexibility than the bulky suits that have been used for spacewalks in the 1960s.
Research is under way at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) on a Bio-Suit System that incorporates a suit designed to augment a person's biological skin by providing mechanical counter-pressure. The "epidermis" of such a second skin could be applied in spray-on fashion in the form of an organic, biodegradable layer.
This coating would protect an astronaut conducting a spacewalk in extremely dusty planetary environments. Incorporated into that second skin would be electrically actuated artificial muscle fibers to enhance human strength and stamina.
The Bio-Suit System could embody communications equipment, biosensors, computers, even climbing gear for spacewalks or what NASA calls an Extra Vehicular Activity (EVA).
"When we get back to the Moon and on Mars, we're not going there to stay in a habitat," said Dava Newman, professor in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics and Engineering Systems here at MIT. "EVA becomes ⊠a primary function," she said.
Newman is leading the Bio-Suit System work, assisted by researchers Kristen Bethke, Christopher Carr, Nicole Jordan, and Liang Sim in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics and Engineering Systems. The study is multi-pronged and is intended to better calibrate astronaut performance, explore improvements to current spacesuit designs and generate novel ideas for a new generation of space exploration suits.
The NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts, headquartered in Atlanta, is sponsoring the Bio-Suit System effort.
"We need to shrink-wrap the astronaut," Newman said. "It would be like wearing a second skin."
The Bio-Suit System, Newman said, would provide life support through mechanical counter pressure where pressure is applied to the entire body through a tight-fitting suit with a pressurized helmet for the head. Ongoing research is targeted at understanding, simulating, and predicting capabilities of suited astronauts in a variety of scenarios — be they performing simple motions or more complex movement, such as overhead or cross-body reach, stepping up, or trudging across an exotic landscape.
The scenario envisioned by Newman and her associates is an astronaut first donning his or her customized elastic Bio-Suit layer. Then a hard torso shell would be slipped on, sealed via couplings located at the hips. A portable life support system is then attached mechanically to the hard torso shell and provides gas counter pressure. Gas pressure would flow freely into the wearer's helmet and down tubes on the bio-suit layer to the gloves and boots...
from Debka DEBKAfile's intelligence sources expose a uniquely brutal Palestinian atrocity committed and videotaped last Friday, Jan 21, by Fatah-al Aqsa Brigades in the main square of the Balata camp south of Nablus. Mohammad Mansur, 23, accused of collaborating with Israel, was not shot dead as Palestinians claimed; he was slowly dismembered. Knives and axes were used to chop off his fingers and toes first, then his limbs. No ambulance permitted to collect his remains, which were thrown into a dumpster. Nablus governor and Fatah leaders issued dire warning against revelation of this horror
Posted by: Classer ||
01/26/2005
4:53:32 AM ||
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What they do not have enough fresh meat for the table in the Balata Camp?
#3
Not only do these folks imagine themselves legitimate and worthy partners for delivering a state to Palestine and peace to the Middle East through that move, their colleagues and supporters in the US and Europe also see nothing wrong with meeting and negotiating with them. Did that sink in-shaking hands and making bargains with people who chop off body parts?
On other strands, I've noticed a kind of sneering attitude on the part of a very few Rantburgers who think a refusal on the part of the US to negotiate with animals such as these is naive. So be it. In my book, people who chop off body parts are not people the US should be talking to in any capacity. Forget the talking. If this story is proven true, I hope Israel finds every last stinking Al-Aqsa member and eliminates him. And I pray that this administration will stand firm on what it has been doing right-refusing to meet with animals like this (as was the case with his refusal to work with Arafat).
#6
Illinois, but you would know what it meant if I had worked for you.. (- anting)
Course in the days I worked for a Jules I was known as the "burn" of "crash and burn".
French President Jacques Chirac called for an "experimental" international tax to help fund the war against AIDS, suggesting it could be raised via a levy on airline tickets, some fuels or financial transactions. After all its only the camel's nose we are letting into the tent.....
In a speech via video link to political and business leaders in the Swiss resort of Davos, he said at least 10 billion dollars (7.7 billion euros) a year was needed -- up from six billion annually now -- to stem the spread of the disease. They are having their meeting in a exclusive swiss RESORT while asking for more money? Does anyone else see anything fishy here?
Chirac, prevented from flying to the World Economic Forum here through poor weather, said that despite huge efforts so far, "we are failing in the face of this terrible pandemic." I mean how can we afford to have more forums at exclusive resorts if we dont have a tax?
He suggested options including: a "contribution" on international financial transactions, a tax on aviation and maritime fuel, a tax on capital movements in or out of countries which practised banking secrecy, or a "small levy" such as a dollar on the three billion airline tickets sold every year.
"What is striking about these examples," Chirac said, "is the disproportion between the modest efforts required and the benefits everyone would reap from them."
The president said developed countries should also create tax incentives to stimulate private donations to charity.
Chirac acknowledged that his proposal would be widely debated, an allusion to US opposition to any international tax, and said there was "no question" of treading on each country's right to set its own levies.
"But there is nothing to prevent states from cooperating and coming to an understanding on new resources and their allocation to a common cause," Chirac added.
He said a tax on international financial transactions would be implemented sparingly and at a very low rate and would not be an obstacle to normal market operations. It could raise 10 billion dollars a year, he went on. After all its only the Nose, not the whole camel....
A levy on capital movements would partially compensate for the consequences of tax evasion which damaged the poorest countries, and would be allocated to development.
The fuel tax would apply to air and sea transport and effectively end the current exemption regime. Any bets the UN would be exempt from this tax?
Meanwhile, a small levy on plane tickets would not compromise the economic balance of the aviation sector, the president said.
Two years ago Chirac also raised the possibility of an international tax to help the fight against AIDS, but gave few details, while he has several times extolled the idea to help combat the negative effects of globalisation
#4
I'll write him a check but he'll have to deposit it with a tennis raquet.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/26/2005 16:20
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If it's such a good idea, you would think that the French people would be more than willing to have a tax increase to raise the meagre amount of $15B that he wants. It's such a good cause and all. And besides, the world *obviously* doesn't want the US's money, because they are always trashing us at the world AIDS conferences. I mean, you don't attack somebody then seriously ask for them to give you money any other time, do you?
#10
Didn't we fight a war over taxation without representation?
Yeah, but that's only because the British neglected to couch their demands in moralistic terms. Had taxation of the colonists been justified on the basis of "feeding all the people in the world", we would have been a bunch of selfish, whiny poopyheads instead of freedom-fighters, wouldn't we?
#11
An international tax does two things. (1) It allows the UN to take credit for giving the money out (2) It hides the fact that one or two countries would be paying the bulk of such a tax.
Oh, and what good would it do when we know what caused infection and still can't get folks to use protection? Maybe we can keep the infected alive longer but I'm not sure we can do anything to stop the rate of infection without putting a few bullets into a few world leaders (and at least one Noble Prize winner) who spread rumors and nonesense about the origin of AIDs.
The UN transnationals could not get their claws on US taxpyer $ through Kyoto, so they're trying the "compassionate" angle and I hate to say it but we have a willing victim sitting in the Oval Office this very minute. The transies may get this to fly with GWB with enough pink ribbons and bows.
Anyways, let's face it AIDS is not a reult of poverty. It's caused by promiscuity, by self-directed, self-destructive behavior.
How much "education" or how much money does it take for a person either living in Bel Air or South Africa to realize that keeping zippers up and panties on are the best deterents to getting AIDS?
I'm compassioned out about AIDS "victims" these days. How much compassion do we show fat people or cigarette smokers with regards to their self-destructive behavior? Both these groups are virtual pariahs in our society, not pitied ad nauseam. We give these 2 groups a kick in the pants and tell them it's all about poor self-control. With regards to cigarette smoking, tough love appears to be working. With regards to obesity, people are becoming more self conscious about undisciplined eating habits and laziness and are are trying to change their life styles.
I don't understand why AIDS is such a cosmic everyman problem. It's a problem related to individual excesses and I think we need to re-think the whole pity them/it's not their fault goo goo head thinking because AIDS is increasing not decreasing with the compassionate approach. I think some tough love is in order.
Seems the Oil-for-Food (better known as Money-for-Saddam) was couched in goody-good humanitarian causes. Seems Frenchy had a bank called BP that collected funds. Seems Frenchy had a staff member prominently listed on the scandal sheet. Seems Chirac wants to pontificate a self aggrandizing program and have others pay the bill.
There isn't a moralistic bone is Chirac's pruney body.
No taxation without representation. Them's fighting words.
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/26/2005 18:32
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"Oh, and what good would it do when we know what caused infection and still can't get folks to use protection?"
-that's it in a nutshell. I agree w/2xs as well. Those who stupidly yet willingly engage in self destructive behavior don't get much sympathy from me either. I've no compassion for anyone in my generation who took up cigarette smoking. My friends and I were told ad nauseum about the evils of cigarettes as well as unprotected sex all through the 80s&90s. I'm a big believer in personal responsibility.
#15
where's Joe Mendiola with his OWG (One World Gov't)? This is indeed the proverbial camel's nose. Shoot it with a 2nd amendment protected firearm. F*&k off, Jacques and Kofi
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 19:01
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I always figured Jacques was a OWG Betty Crockercrat..
#17
The problem I have is that this would set a precedent which the U.N. would most likely follow with all sorts of 'compassion taxes' on all sorts of things. Taxes to allow bigger more exlusive luncheons end world hunger. A Tax for the UN 5-star catering service the Tsuimi(sp) disaster. A tax here... a tax there... Everywhere a Koffi tax....
Yes some people who have AIDS got it by transfusion or some other involunterary method but the vast-vast majority did so by their own actions. I used to be a smoker and didn't expect anyone else to pay for my smoking.
This is just another form of Oil-For-Palaces-and-Bribes..
#19
Chiraq has GREAT ideas for spending other people's money. Tell him to talk to Kofi and the UN ought to be able to cough up some Oil for Palaces money......if they have not spent it all yet. FOAD, Chiraq.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
01/26/2005 21:23
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SIMON TRINIDAD is the nom de guerre of Ricardo Palmera, a high-ranking terrorist of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC), the deadliest and largest terrorist organization in the world. Thanks to Colombia's president, Alvaro Uribe, Trinidad was extradited to the United States last month. He now awaits trial for a lengthy list of crimes involving the recent kidnapping and murder of American citizens in Colombia. Trinidad's capture was a victory in the fight against global terror (see Note, below), but it is unlikely that the FARC terrorists will be defeated as long as Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez continues to use his government to harbor, equip, and protect them.
Since assuming the presidency of Venezuela in 1999, Lieutenant Colonel Hugo Chavez has often sympathized with global terrorism. Not only has he proclaimed his "brotherhood" with Saddam Hussein and bestowed kind words on the Taliban, but he also maintains close economic and diplomatic ties with the leaders of Iran and Libya. Moreover, President Chavez is increasingly identified with the FARC terrorists. Although the full extent of Chavez's involvement with FARC is unknown, he has been accused of everything from sympathizing with the group to providing it with weapons and monetary support. The allegations against Chavez are numerous and it is likely that some of them are either exaggerated or untrue. Even so, President Chavez's activities reveal a consistent pattern of sympathy for terrorists.
The FARC terrorist group has been fighting the democratic government of Colombia for almost 40 years. Founded as the armed wing of the Colombian Communist party, this 16,000-strong terrorist force recruits children and funds its activities with billions of dollars collected as taxes on the cocaine trade. The group's explicit objective is to take Colombia by force. In pursuing its mission, FARC terrorists have kidnapped, extorted, and executed thousands of innocent civilians, bombed buildings, assassinated hundreds of political leaders, and, with two other local terrorist organizations, have turned Colombia into one of the most violent and dangerous countries in the world. All in all, FARC has caused the deaths of more than 100,000 people.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
2:36:24 AM ||
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We need to work on subverting and eliminating this utcase from power as well. Far to many good people and energy reserves to be ruled by this moonbat.
TAOS, New Mexico (AP) -- Lynn Anderson, who won a Grammy for "Rose Garden" in 1970, is accused of shoplifting a Harry Potter DVD from a supermarket and then punching a police officer as she was being put into a patrol car. Anderson, 57, was arrested Monday night at Smith's Food & Drug Center, said Police Chief Neil Curran. She was taken to police headquarters, where she refused the option of a written citation, he said. A Taos County magistrate released Anderson on her own recognizance. An arraignment was scheduled for later this week. Telephone calls to a listing for Anderson went unanswered Tuesday.
In December, Anderson was charged with drunken driving after police found her passed out in her car on the shoulder of a highway near Denton, Texas. Anderson, who lives in Taos, was the Country Music Association's female vocalist of the year in 1971. She released an album last year called "The Bluegrass Sessions."
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
2:36:07 PM ||
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Well, after all, she didn't promise you a rose garden.
A blistering letter written by former vice-presidential candidate Jack Kemp to congressional leaders, criticizing the 1998 U.S. bombing of Iraq, has raised new questions about whether he was promoting a secret agenda on behalf of Saddam Hussein's oil spy in the United States, The Post has learned.
Kemp's Dec. 18, 1998, letter to then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.), which called for congressional hearings into the Clinton administration's decision to bomb Iraq, has left investigators wondering whether he was pushing "talking points" drawn up by Virginia oil trader Samir Vincent, who pleaded guilty last week to charges that he received payments from Iraq to weaken U.N sanctions.
In the letter, Kemp — who has been questioned by the FBI about his contacts with Vincent — blasted U.S. policy and raised numerous Iraqi propaganda points.
Kemp asked, for example, if it was true "that around 4,500 children under the age of five are dying" in Iraq every month, and whether the U.S. government was refusing to have "direct contact with Iraq."
"The Iraqi government believes that nothing it can do will cause the United States to allow the economic sanctions to be lifted," Kemp said in the letter.
"Is it realistic to expect any regime to cooperate with U.N. inspectors if it believes the U.S. has declared de facto war on it and that nothing it can do will lead to a lifting of sanctions?" Kemp added.
Vincent was making eerily similar points to Kemp during their once-a-month meetings during the same period, Kemp's office admitted.
In a statement issued by Kemp's office, Empower America, over the weekend, the former upstate GOP congressman and Buffalo Bill football star said he believed Vincent was "motivated by the national security of the United States and thought the Iraqi government believed the sanctions could never be lifted, which he said he believed was leading them to obstruct inspectors from coming into the country."
One congressional official involved in the U.N. oil-for-food investigation said, "Knowing what we know now, the question is: Where did Jack Kemp get this stuff?
"It looks like Samir Vincent did a very good lobbying job."
Andrew Porter, spokesman for Empower America, said Vincent played no role in the drafting of Kemp's letter to Lott.
Vincent admitted in federal court last week that he was paid $3 million to $5 million by Saddam to lobby American officials against sanctions.
Kemp, Bob Dole's running mate in 1996, admitted he was questioned by the FBI about his relationship with Vincent last October.
He has said he and Vincent worked behind the scenes on a plan to persuade the Clinton and Bush administrations to consider phasing out sanctions in return for Iraq's agreement to "robust" U.N. weapons inspections.
Kemp denied there were any business or financial dealings with Vincent, who is Iraqi-born, saying they talked only about "policy."
Kemp's lawyer, Lanny Davis, said last week that he believes Kemp was duped by Vincent and did not know Vincent was on Saddam's payroll.
Kemp's letter and other speeches and media interviews opposing the Clinton administration's bombing of Iraq were controversial at the time and represented a break with many of his conservative political and intellectual supporters.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
2:05:00 AM ||
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Kempâs lawyer, Lanny Davis, said last week that he believes Kemp was duped by Vincent and did not know Vincent was on Saddamâs payroll.
Isn't Lanny Davis a former Clinton heavy? One very good outcome of Kemp's stupidity (if that's all it was) is that this aspect of Oil For Fraud will get the attention of the Republican-hating MSM and perhaps, finally give this story the legs it deserves-- without tarnishing the neocons or anyone else in the Bush admin. Well done, Jack.
Sixty years after the world learned that bored Germans flung Jewish babies into the air for target practice at the Auschwitz death camp, our oily pals at the United Nations have officially acknowledged the Holocaust.
Enjoy it quickly, because if yesterday was any indication, the anti-American, anti-Semitic rats infesting the banks of the East River — a species alternately known as the "French," "Germans" and "Libyans," among others — will forget the lessons of Auschwitz, or just insist the camp didn't exist.
Only one man spoke the truth about anti-Semitism.
But that man was not Israeli or American, but Italian. Who knew?
The U.N. yesterday took the unprecedented step of inviting concentration-camp survivors, liberators and the Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel for the purpose of shouting, "Never again."
Perhaps they should have whispered, "Maybe later."
Seats in the General Assembly were half-full. Jordan and Afghanistan were the only Arab governments whose reps spoke.
And then Marcello Pera, speaker of the Italian Senate, spoke up.
"We have an obligation to admit that anti-Semitism is still with us," Pera said. "Today, it also feeds on such subtle and insidious distinctions as are often made between Israel and the Jewish state, Israel and its governments, Zionism and Semitism. Or, it crops up when the struggle for life led by the Israelis is labeled 'state terrorism.' "
Even Europe's Constitutional Treaty cannot make reference to the continent's Judeo-Christian roots, he railed.
"If we believe that our core values are no better than others; if we start thinking that the cost of defending them is too high; if we give in to the blackmail or fear, then we have no more instruments to counter the anti-Jewish racism which continues to poison us than we have to counter the fundamentalist and terrorist racism which puts peaceful co-existence at risk."
Now political correctness prevents us from speaking the truth. How, then, will we prevent history from repeating itself?
Next year in Italy.
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
2:04:05 AM ||
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FORZA ITALIA!!
Posted by: SON OF TOLUI ||
01/26/2005 2:58
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Never realized I liked Italians so much . . . they'ra kinda wacky, but you can find a really good one here and there.
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 7:09
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The New York Post sure does hate the United Nations. No accusations are too outlandish. Everything, including the kitchen sink, gets thrown.
The UN still hasn't condemned frying babies in hot oil. That probably means that the UN supports it.
.
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
01/26/2005 8:37
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#4
What's your point, Mikey? Or are you just riding to the defense of your beloved dictators club?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/26/2005 9:57
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Muayed Al-Nasseri: "Colonel Muayed Yassin 'Aziz 'Abd Al-Razaq Al-Nasseri, commander of the Army of Muhammad, one of the resistance factions in Iraq. The Army of Muhammad was founded by Saddam Hussein after the fall of the regime, on April 9, 2003. At first, Yasser Al-Shab'awi was put in charge, until his capture in July 2003. Then Sa'd Hammad Hisham was in charge until December 2003. Then I was put in charge from January 2004 until now. The Army of Muhammad has some 800 armed fighters."
Interrogator: "What operations did you carry out? How many operations did you carry out?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "We carried out many armed operations against the coalition forces in all the districts. The operations included bombarding their military posts, their camps, and their bases, fighting these forces and planting explosive devices against their patrols and convoys."
Interrogator: "What was the nature of your organisation?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "The organisation was a military armed one, which operated according to a method of non-centralised command."
Interrogator: "How is the Army of Muhammad related to the Ba'th party?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "The Army of Muhammad is militarily independent. After Saddam Hussein's capture in December 2003, for a period [of] four months, the Army of Muhammad had no connections with the party, but after April 2003 there was a meeting with the party and we are currently coordinating with them.
In addition, Saddam Hussein distributed a communique via the party, back then, instructing all his supporters or whoever wants to fight the jihad for the sake of Allah, to join the Army of Muhammad because it is the army of the leadership."
Interrogator: "Who are the leaders of the Ba'th Party in Iraq?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "Today, the leader of the party is 'Izzat Ibrahim. He is the leader of the party in Iraq. Next in line is Fadhl Al-Mashhadani, who is responsible for the local organisations within Iraq. Then, there is Muhammad Yunis Al-Ahamd, who is responsible for the organisation outside Iraq. He is currently in Syria."
Interrogator: "Did you get support from the countries of the region?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "Yes, sir... Many factions of the resistance are receiving aid from the neighbouring countries. We in the Army of Muhammad - the fighting has been going on for almost two years now, and there must be aid, and this aid came from the neighbouring countries. We got aid primarily from Iran. The truth is that Iran has played a significant role in supporting the Army of Muhammad and many factions of the resistance. I have some units, especially in southern Iraq, which receive Iranian aid in the form of arms and equipment."
Interrogator: "You're referring to units of the Army of Muhammad?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "Yes. They received money and weapons."
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "As for other factions of the resistance, I have reliable information regarding the National Islamic resistance, which is one of the factions of resistance, led by Colonel 'Asi Al Hadithi. He sent a delegation to Iran from among the people of the faction, including General Halaf and General Khdayyer. They were sent to Iran in April or May and met with Iranian intelligence and with a number of Iranian leaders and even with Khamenei."
Interrogator: "You mean they personally met with Khamenei?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "According to my information, they met with him personally and they were given one million dollars and two cars full of weapons. They still have a very close relationship with Iran. They receive money, cars, weapons and many things. According to my information they even got car bombs."
Muayed Al-Nasseri "In addition, as I've told you, Syria [âŠ]. Cooperation with Syria began in October 2003, when a Syrian intelligence officer contacted me. S'ad Hamad Hisham and later Saddam Hussein himself authorised me to go to Syria. So I was sent to Syria. I crossed the border illegally. Then I went to Damascus and met with an intelligence officer, Lieutenant-Colonel ' Abu Naji ' through a mediator called ' Abu Saud '. I raised the issues that preoccupied Saddam Hussein and the leadership. There were four issues: First, the issue of the media; second, political support in international forums; [third], aid in the form of weapons and [fourth], material aid, whether it is considered a debt or is taken from the frozen Iraqi funds in Syria."
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "Through the [Syrian] Ba'th party - the [Iraqi] Arab Socialist Ba'th Party operates in Syria with complete freedom. It maintains its relations and organises the Ba'th members outside Iraq. The Syrian government is fully aware of this and the Syrian intelligence, as well as the [Syrian] Ba'th Party cooperates fully in Syria.
As for the Ba'th Party, after we contacted them, they organised a meeting for me with a man named Fawzi Al-Rawi, who is a member of the national leadership and an important figure in Syria. The Syrian government authorised him to meet with me. We met twice. In the first meeting, I explained to him what the Army of Muhammad is, what kind of operations we carry out, and many other things. In the second meeting he told me that Syrian government officials were very pleased with our first meeting. He informed me that the Army of Muhammad would receive material aid in the form of goods, given to us for free or for a very low price, for us to sell in Iraq in order to support the Army of Muhammad. This was done this way due to Syria's current circumstances, international pressure and accusations of supporting the terrorism and resistance in Iraq."
Interrogator: "During our investigation we found a picture of a Syrian man. What is this picture?"
Muayed Al-Nasseri: "This is the picture of an Islamic preacher called ' Abu Al-Qa'qa', whose [real] name is Mahmoud Al-Agassi. He lives in Aleppo, Syria. I have met with him twice. He supported me and gave me $3,000. He also sent a sum of money with me for someone in the resistance here in Iraq.
Also, I forgot to mention that Fawzi Al-Rawi told me he had close connections with many factions of the resistance. He mentioned his Hareth Al-Dhari [leader of Iraqi Sunni Clerics Association], Mahdi Al-Sumayda'i, and other factions."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:59:33 AM ||
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Venezuela's president, Hugo Chävez, has been accused of assisting Colombian guerrillas and funding opposition political parties in Bolivia.
James Hill, the recently retired head of the US army's southern command, which oversees military operations in Latin America, said the Venezuelan leader was allowing Farc, a leftwing Colombian guerrilla group, to establish training camps in his country.
He also said the Bolivian opposition leader, Evo Morales, is receiving funds from Mr Chävez as Bolivia faces a series of strikes and blockades that threaten its stability.
The accusation comes days after Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state designate, called Mr Chävez "deeply troubling" at her Senate confirmation hearing.
Ms Rice's comment followed a dispute between Venezuela and Colombia which broke out after it was revealed that Rodrigo Granda, a senior Farc leader, had been kidnapped from Caracas, the capital of Venezuela, by bounty hunters and taken to Bogota, the capital of Colombia.
But General Hill's comments about Venezuela's influence in Bolivia may prove just as damaging. He told the Miami Herald: "It is quite proven that he gave money to Evo Morales... and continues to do so."
Mr Morales is expected to win an election if the president, Carlos Mesa, were to go. Mr Mesa is facing political pressure because leaders in Santa Cruz, the country's second biggest city and economic centre, want to set up an autonomous government.
The city feels it is contributing a disproportionate amount of money to maintain the poorer parts of the country, and is demanding that recent rises in diesel and gas prices be revoked.
Although Mr Morales is not involved in the Santa Cruz crisis his party, Mas, is fuelling opposition to the president and calling for nationwide demonstrations against the government next Monday. Privately, there is an admission that more radical actions could follow in a couple of months when major legislation will be discussed in parliament.
According to a leading Bolivian opposition figure, Mr Morales radicalised his thinking as a result of the negative results of an opinion poll commissioned and paid for by the Venezuelans last year.
Mr Morales then met Mr Chävez in December, when it was suggested to him that he change his strategy and become more radical to control the constituent assembly that will be convened next August.
When asked by the Guardian about the Venezuelan poll, Mr Morales said: "I don't care about polls nor pollsters." He added: "Chävez definitely provides us with political support. He has taught us how to fight the American empire and how to turn the ruling elite into the opposition, and for that we admire him, but he doesn't support us economically."
He said: "Chävez isn't financing us. The only thing he has given is some money to pave a road in La Paz and some loans for education."
However, a senior Mas source said: "The Venezuelans planted doubts in us last December. They said we should ensure control over the constituent assembly before it convenes [next summer] so that the resulting constitution is the one we want, the same way Chävez did in Venezuela."
According to this source, "Evo definitely wants to gain power and import our version of Chävez's Bolivarian revolution to Bolivia."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:53:40 AM ||
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This Venz thing is really heating up. Chivez cozying up to Iran and China, offering up advantageous oil contracts while punishing US oil companies. Now his aiding and abetting Columbian guerrillas.
Posted by: Duke Nukem ||
01/26/2005 9:19
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Dont forget his selling Venz passports to Al-Q and other terrorists organizations.
An American kidnapped in November pleaded for his life in a video aired Tuesday, and at least a dozen Iraqis died in Baghdad as political violence continued to plague the country five days before Sunday's crucial elections for a new National Assembly.
On a day the U.S. military announced that six American soldiers died, Iraqi police engaged in fierce shootouts with insurgents, including gunmen who were handing out leaflets warning Iraqis not to vote or risk seeing their families' blood "wash the streets of Baghdad."
Early Wednesday, a U.S. Marine helicopter crashed near the town Rutbah in western Iraq (news - web sites) while conducting security operations, the U.S. military said. There was no immediate word on casualties.
A military statement said the aircraft was transporting personnel from the 1st Marine Division. A search and rescue team has reached the site and an investigation into what caused the crash is underway, the military said.
In the hostage video, a bearded Roy Hallums, 56, speaking with a rifle pointed at his head, said he had been taken by a "resistance group" because "I have worked with American forces." He appealed to Arab leaders, including Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, to save his life.
Hallums was seized by gunmen Nov. 1 along with Robert Tarongoy of the Philippines at their compound in Baghdad's Mansour district. The two worked for a Saudi company that does catering for the Iraqi army. The Filipino was not shown in the video and it was not known when the video was made.
"I am please asking for help because my life is in danger because it's been proved I worked for American forces," Hallums said.
In Westminster, Calif., his daughter, Carrie Cooper, 29, said she last saw him at a family reunion last June.
"My heart's broken to see my dad with a gun to his head. ... He's fearless and he wanted to help the people there and rebuild Iraq," she told KNBC-TV.
Hallums' former wife, Susan Hallums, urged President Bush (news - web sites) to help the captive and urged the kidnappers to let him go.
"Please release him. He's never hurt anybody in his life. He's only done good things. He's a wonderful father and grandfather, and he's kind and I know that you can see that he's kind," she said at her home in Corona, Calif.
The U.S. military announced that a Bradley armored vehicle rolled into a canal northeast of Baghdad during a combat patrol Monday night, killing five American soldiers and injuring two from the Army's 1st Infantry Division. The accident, which was under investigation, occurred near the town of Khan Bani Saad during a sandstorm, it said.
A sixth U.S. soldier died Monday of wounds from a roadside bomb that blasted an American patrol in Baghdad, the military said.
At least 1,378 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
There has been speculation that the new Iraqi government might ask the Americans to set a timetable for foreign troops to leave. But Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said Tuesday it was too soon to do that, saying Iraq must first build up its security forces to confront the insurgents.
U.S. commanders are devising a plan for as many as 10,000 soldiers and Marines to accompany Iraqi units as advisers and trainers, defense officials in Washington said. That would be a substantial increase from the few thousand now doing such work.
Tuesday was the last day for Iraqis living outside the country to register for the weekend vote, and international organizers said less than 25 percent of those eligible had done so. The biggest turnout was among Iraqis living in Iran — more than 53,000.
Iraqi authorities blamed the low turnout on several factors, including the long distances that many had to travel in countries like the United States and Australia.
But Majeed al-Gaood, a member of National Front of the Iraqi Intellectuals, a Sunni Arab opposition group, said many chose not to register because of the country's continuing instability and the presence of U.S. troops.
"How can we expect Iraqis to take part in the elections while their country is under the control of foreign forces?" he said.
Meanwhile, an Internet posting in the name of one insurgent group, the Islamic Army of Iraq, ordered followers to "escalate their operations to the maximum" to stop "the infidel elections."
Its origin could not be authenticated, but Islamic militants have used the site to claim responsibility for attacks and to condemn Iraq's interim government and U.S.-led forces in Iraq.
Late Tuesday, people in Fallujah reported hearing bursts of heavy automatic weapons fire. The city was an insurgent stronghold until a U.S. offensive in November, but the assault did not clear out all the gunmen and others are believed to have slipped back with residents in recent weeks.
Several firefights erupted earlier in Baghdad's eastern Rashad neighborhood. In one, police fired at insurgents handing out leaflets warning people not to vote.
The leaflets, which did not bear the name of any insurgent group, said rebels would attack voters and polling stations with bombs, mortar fire and rockets.
"We promise to wash the streets of Baghdad with the blood of voters," the papers warned.
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
1:51:49 AM ||
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His head and hands were wrapped in bandages and his uncovered face looked like bubbled tar.
The young Saudi man told investigators this month that he wants revenge against the Iraqi terrorist network that sent him on the deadly mission that he survived.
Ahmed Abdullah al-Shaya, 18, told Iraqi investigators during an interrogation early this month that he was recruited to drive a car rigged with explosives to Baghdad and blow it up.
He said the objective was "to kill the Americans, policemen, national guards and the American collaborators." But Shaya said he was injured even before he went on the mission when insurgents detonated a truck bomb he was supposed to leave at a target site.
Shaya's statements were captured on a videotape made by Interior Ministry officials who interrogated him. It is not clear whether the video captures all of the interrogation or part of it. USA TODAY obtained a copy of the tape from an Interior Ministry official.
Shaya's video statement describes the journey of a young man ready to die in his zeal to drive Americans from Arab lands. Shaya says he left Saudi Arabia for Syria in late October, right after the holy month of Ramadan, which began in late October. A smuggler he knew as Abu Mohammed took him over the border into Iraq and into the hands of other Islamic extremists who call themselves mujahedin, or holy warriors.
In Iraq, he traveled first to Qaim, then Rawa, and finally to the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, where he spent 1œ months with like-minded Muslims from Morocco, Jordan, Syria, Tunisia, Yemen and Macedonia. Most, however, were Iraqis, he says, gesturing with his gauze-wrapped arms.
While he was awaiting his mission, he says, he was told that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of a terrorist network responsible for numerous bombings and beheadings, had been captured by Iraqi police only to be let go after seven hours because they didn't recognize him. Iraqi officials have declined to comment on previous reports that Zarqawi had been captured and let go.
Shaya moved to Baghdad in December to prepare for his final mission, which he expected to be as the suicide pilot of a bomb-laden car. But on Dec. 24, he was given a preliminary job of driving a butane-gas delivery truck that was rigged with bombs. It wasn't supposed to be a suicide mission. "They asked me to take the truck near a concrete block barrier before turning to the right and leaving it there. There, somebody will pick up the truck from you," they told him. "But they blew me up in the truck," he says.
When the gas truck ignited into a fireball near the Jordanian Embassy, nine people were killed, including a family of seven whose house collapsed on them. The explosion burned Shaya on his face and hands but he was thrown from the cab and survived. Authorities at first didn't know who he was. But then a local Baghdad newspaper carried a report from Saudi Arabia about his family mourning his martyrdom. Shaya told the interrogators that he regretted his mission now. "I want the Iraqi people to live in peace," he says, and he can no longer support Osama bin Laden because "he is killing Muslims."
As for the Zarqawi network that sent him on the mission that left him permanently disfigured and in prison, he says, "I want revenge for what they have done to me."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:46:40 AM ||
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#1
"But Shaya said he was injured even before he went on the mission when insurgents detonated a truck bomb he was supposed to leave at a target site"
I guess this means he was still in the truck!
""They asked me to take the truck near a concrete block barrier before turning to the right and leaving it there. There, somebody will pick up the truck from you," they told him. "But they blew me up in the truck," he says."
Now gather around all you young boomers and boomerettes, I got some sagely advice for you. NEVER GIVE UP THE REMOTE CONTROL!!
MUSLIMS were warned by the Director of Public Prosecutions yesterday that new laws designed to combat religious hatred would not stop people from being rude about Islam.
Ken Macdonald told MPs that he wanted to play down Muslim expectations to avoid a backlash against police and politicians because very few cases were likely to reach the courts.
People will remain "perfectly free to be rude or offensive" about Islam or any other other religion because in most cases the right of free speech will still prevail, Mr Macdonald said.
He added: "It is very important people understand what the law will achieve. It will stop the grossest form of conduct but it will not stop people being rude about Islam."
Mr Macdonald was speaking at the Home Affairs Select Committee, where he also repeated his caution to ministers to keep the right to jury trial even for terrorist suspects. He told MPs of his concern that religious incitement laws, part of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill, were expected by some to stop all forms of criticism or abuse of Islam.
The proposals have also been criticised for threatening to stifle free speech. Mr Macdonald said that they would not have been possible in the United States because of the First Amendment. But in the light of existing laws on incitement to racial hatred, British courts would "set the bar very high" before convicting, he added.
Since 2001 there had been 86 referrals to the Crown Prosecution Service for racial hatred but only six prosecutions and two convictions, with one dropped and three ongoing.
Mr Macdonald added: "The main issue is managing expectations . . . Communities have said they believe it will protect them from people being rude or offensive about Islam — but you are perfectly free to be rude or offensive about any religion and the law protects you.
"The danger is that if people believe it is going to protect them from that, they will feel very let down by us."
He added: "The police will send us the files and we will see whether prosecution will meet the appropriate tests and if it does we will prosecute . . . But you will have to meet the very high level [of proof] required."
The Muslim Council of Britain said that it shared Mr Macdonald's concern to explain the law carefully.
Inayat Bunglawala, a council spokesman, said: "Not just Muslims fail to understand but also the likes of Rowan Atkinson, who has said it would prevent jokes and satire. So it has been misunderstood by those who want the legislation and those who oppose it."
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
1:46:21 AM ||
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#1
I'll be rude right now Islam ptttthhhhhttt!
Allan is the son of a dog bred with the evil one.
This law is just secularist presecution of the outspoken. The abuse of this law will begin almost from the start.
#2
Come come, now SPoD, surely there will not be more than one or two cases at most. The RoP would never imagine abusing a law so obviously skewed as one intended to protect the tender emotions of those who would commit to jihad for merely allowing women to show their faces [/sarcasm]
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 7:16
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A suicide bomber from Saudi Arabia, who survived a failed attempt to blow up the Jordanian mission Baghdad in December, alleges that Iraqi police may have captured, and then released, the most wanted terrorist in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, two months ago. Both U.S. and Iraqi officials could not confirm the claims made by the suicide bomber.
On a video disk provided by Iraq's interior ministry, the badly-burned man, identified as Ahmed Abdullah al-Shaiyah, tells Iraqi interrogators about his journey from Saudi Arabia to Baghdad between late October and December to volunteer for suicide missions.
He says he crossed into Iraq from Syria, where a smuggler met him at the border and eventually transported him to the town of Ramadi, in the restive Anbar province, to receive training from insurgents. Ramadi is close to Fallujah, which in late October and early November, was still a stronghold for the Jordanian-born terrorist, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and other militant Sunni Arab groups.
Mr. Shaiyah says he was in Ramadi during the November U.S.-led offensive in Fallujah. The ensuing two-week fire fight led to a decisive U.S. and Iraqi victory over the insurgents, but Zarqawi eluded capture.
When Iraqi interrogators ask Mr. Shaiyah if he knows anything about the fate of the terrorist, the Saudi man gives a startling answer.
"Do you know what has happened to Zarqawi and where he is?" an Iraqi investigator asked Mr. Shaiyah.
He answered, "I don't know, but I heard from some of my mujahadeen brothers that Iraqi police had captured Zarqawi in Fallujah." Mr. Shaiyah says he then heard that the police let the terrorist go because they had failed to recognize him.
A U.S. military official in Baghdad said he had no evidence to corroborate the allegations from the suicide bomber.
And, during a press conference Saturday, Iraq's interior minister, Falah al-Naqib declined to answer a reporter's question about the allegation and rumors that Zarqawi had been arrested.
REPORTER: "Can you just clarify a bit what you were just saying or not saying about Zarqawi?"
NAQIB: "I wouldn't like to comment for the time being. Let us see."
REPORTER: "Does that mean you have him in custody?"
NAQIB: "Pardon?"
REPORTER: "Does that mean he is in custody?"
NAQIB: "No comments."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:44:40 AM ||
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The FBI said Tuesday that the possible terrorist plot reported against Boston by a tipster last week was a false alarm. A law enforcement official in Mexico said that a suspected smuggler made the story up to get back at people who failed to pay him.
"There were in fact no terrorist plans or activity under way," an FBI statement said. "Because the criminal investigation is ongoing, no further details can be provided at this time."
Jose Ernesto Beltran Quinones was detained over the weekend in Mexicali, a Mexican border town near San Diego. His son, also named Jose, was detained Monday. According to a law enforcement official there, the two men were involved in smuggling Chinese immigrants across the border and told investigators that smugglers had squabbled over a deal, and that one had anonymously called in the false tip to U.S. authorities as revenge. The source, who asked not to be named, did not say which smuggler had made the call. snip
The two were later released; relatives at their houses told reporters Tuesday that they were not at home.
The FBI statement did not say whether Quinones and his son had provided the information that allowed the threat to be ruled out, but the bureau did thank Mexican law enforcement agencies for their help. snip
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
1:42:41 AM ||
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#1
Michelle Malkin's blog had some interesting followup:
1. Afzal Hameed and Taylor were married in 1980 (they were 23 (Hameed) and 45 (Taylor) respectively. Green card marriage?).
2. Hameed, is president of Alpha Tango Flying Services in San Antonio, which trains pilots and mechanics. Alpha Tango Flying Services--which, by the way, caters to Saudi Arabian flight students.
3. Among their clients were three Arab flight students investigated by the FBI, including Al Qaeda operative Abdul Hakim Murad , who was arrested in Manila in 1995 and later convicted in New York of plotting to blow up a dozen U.S. airliners over the Pacific, then crash a suicide plane into CIA headquarters. The FBI has been keeping tabs on Alpha Tango since Sept. 11.
Posted by: ed ||
01/26/2005 11:55
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Green card for him, love match (at long last!) for her.
#3
A Mexican man who reported Boston was targeted for a terrorist nuclear attack confessed he fabricated the story to take revenge on a man who stiffed him in a deal to smuggle illegal aliens, a source said. ``He's admitted it's all a hoax,'' said a law enforcement source familiar with the investigation of Jose Ernesto Beltran Quinones, who was taken into custody Monday along with his son in Mexicali by Mexican police and interviewed by the FBI. ``He admitted he was trying to get back at his employer, who is a human smuggler,'' said the source.
FBI officials in Washington, D.C., released a statement saying Beltran's telephone report last week that two Iraqis and four Chinese nationals planned to detonate a nuclear device in Boston ``had no credibility.'' The FBI had no comment on whether Beltran will face criminal charges. An official in Mexico told the Associated Press that Beltran and his son Jose were released because they had obtained a court injunction preventing their arrest. According to a statement released last night by the Mexican Attorney General's Office, Beltran denied being a smuggler but admitted making the bogus 911 call to the California Highway Patrol Jan. 17. He said he was drunk and under the influence of drugs at the time but the call ``was only a joke.''
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005 14:36
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The FBI has been keeping tabs on Alpha Tango since Sept. 11
Riiiggght. Keeping tabs sounds very tough.
the bureau did thank Mexican law enforcement agencies for their help
But of course. If this tip had not turned out to be bogus, no doubt Meuller and Ridge would have thanked the illegal alien smuggler for his help, perhaps even recommending that he get the medal of honor.
This open borders crap makes me crazy. It is a tragedy that is waiting to happen and when it does the finger of blame should point directly at GWB's policy with Mexico. GWB is worse than Clinton ever was. GWB pretty much put out a welcome mat to illegals when he pre-prematurely announced his "compassionate" guest worker plan last January. GWB should have asked Germany and France about how wonderbar their guest worker programs turned out to be before announcing this doomed policy for his own country.
There is no other country in the world that tolerates the level of contempt for its sovereignity that Mexico shows America 24/7.
How can GWB speak with a straight face about threats to America from without while at the same time condoning a porous border with a nation that can be used as an easy conduit for nationals from S. America, the ME, and Asia that are rabidly anti-USA? Mexico itself has a growing population of anti-American folks and couple that with its nation's well known levels of corruption, is a recipe for a disaster.
#1
Malkin is a bright young lady that has chronicled the problem of illegals for some time. The problems continue. We will end up getting bitten again if we (U.S.) don't do something to address this problem quickly.
The top U.N. drug official is heading to Afghanistan to check out reports that farmers are heeding government calls for a "holy war" on the rampant drug trade by slashing opium cultivation.
Foreign and Afghan officials are forecasting a drop of between 30 percent and 70 percent in this year's crop, as once verdant expanses of poppies are being sown with wheat instead. In eastern Nangarhar province and southern Helmand, poppy production could be down by more than three-quarters this year, the officials said, though reliable statistics are not yet available.
The reports suggest at least an initial response to President Hamid Karzai's U.S.-sponsored campaign against the illegal Afghan narcotics industry, which last year supplied an estimated 87 percent of the world's opium, the raw material for heroin. "I want to see it with my own eyes," said Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the Vienna, Austria-based U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, as he departed Tuesday on a five-day mission to Afghanistan.
The drop in poppy cultivation - seen in one traditional opium-producing region toured by The Associated Press last week - is increasing pressure on the international community to deliver hundreds of millions of dollars in aid for impoverished Afghans who have survived until now by growing opium poppies, but are cooperating with authorities in switching to other crops. "The first priority which we are supporting is self-restraint and self-eradication, and it is happening amazingly well," Rural Development Minister Haneef Atmar said. "The risks are now too high for (the farmers), and they hope the government will protect them and help them."
Skeptics say drought, disease and falling opium prices - not Karzai's eradication program - are responsible for the drop in cultivation.
Costa, who will meet with Karzai and other senior government ministers, cautioned this week that it could take a "generation or more" to solve the opium problem. Poppy production soared after the U.S. invasion in 2001 that ousted the Taliban militia, which had curtailed the flourishing drug trade. Except at the end, when they forced farmers to plant their fields once again with opium poppies, to support Taliban weapons purchases and suchlike expenses.
The United Nations said that although bad weather and plant disease significantly reduced the opium yield last year, the total output was about 4,200 tons. It valued the trade at $2.8 billion, or more than 60 percent of the country's 2003 gross domestic product, and warned that Afghanistan was turning into a "narco-state."
Under pressure from the United States and Europe, Karzai has called for "jihad," or holy war, against the drug industry, which is believed to benefit guerrillas, warlords and corrupt officials.
Foreign diplomats give some of the credit to Mohammed Daoud, a former militia commander and the government's top anti-narcotics cop. Daoud, a deputy interior minister, summoned provincial police chiefs to Kabul and told them they would be fired if they didn't halt poppy cultivation. Daoud said in an interview he expected cultivation to fall by 50 percent to 70 percent this year. A Western official involved in counternarcotics was more cautious, saying the decrease could be 30 percent or more.
Costa's representative in Afghanistan, Doris Buddenburg, said there seemed to be a reduction, but cautioned that production might also have shifted. Farmers in colder regions have yet to plant their fields at all, she added.
The U.S. government is paying thousands of people in Helmand and Nangarhar $3 a day to clean irrigation ditches and repair roads instead of planting poppy.
Atmar, the rural development minister, said he expected about $1 billion in aid this year from the United States and the European Union.
A drive last week around Nangarhar province found terraced fields planted with knee-high wheat or vegetables. Provincial officials said poppies were being grown only in remote valleys near the Pakistani border and insisted they would destroy the fields.
Farmers in two traditional growing areas of Nangarhar told an AP reporter they stopped planting poppies because they were told to by powerful local landowners and security officials. "It was good business, but they said we should stop, and wait and see," said Abdul Wahid, a bearded sharecropper resting under a stand of mulberry trees next to his fields.
"If we get help, maybe it's gone for good. If not, we'll plant again."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
1:38:06 AM ||
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Ok, which US congressmen of farm states have they been talking to?
Subsidies all around, boys!
If they can become the breadbasket of that region, more power to them, figuratively and literally.
Militants in Grozny killed two local women, who refused to give them the money of Wahhabite "Jamaat", a spokesman for the press center of the Regional Operational Headquarters for Controlling the Anti-Terrorist Operation in the North Caucasus told RIA Novosti. "The murder was committed by members of the group of militants, headed by Isa Khatuyev from the Rizvan Chitigov criminal gang. The militants tried to find and take the money belonging to the Wahhabite "Jamaat" which was earlier headed by "emir" Mussa Akhmatukayev," the spokesman said.
According to the spokesman, four armed militants in masks penetrated the house on Uchenicheskaya Street in the Chechen capital and killed 41-year-old Raisat Israilova and 21- year-old Birlant Israilova. The spokesman explained that, according to local inhabitants, some time ago suspicious people visited that house several times and each time noisy scandals occurred. The neighbors heard in one of the conversations with Raisat Israilova she said that the visitors were members of the Isa Khatuyev criminal gang. "In investigating the crime, law enforcement officers established that both women were relatives of 24-year-old Musa Akhmatukayev, a member of the criminal gang, who was killed in Grozny," the headquarters spokesman added.
Investigators are considering the possibility that the militant received a big sum of money from the leaders of the criminal gang to use it to commit terrorist acts. However, he did not have time to spend it because federal forces killed him. "At that time, after a special operation, the money was not found in the house, though the law enforcement officers possessed the information about the scheme and the channels through which the Akhmatukayev criminal gang was financed. Presumably, his relatives could know the place where the money was hidden but preferred to keep silent and, as a result, were killed by Chitigov bandits," concluded the headquarters spokesman.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:38:00 PM ||
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We got a Bobba Fett icon? Or maybe Judge Dread?
A rebel whose capture in Venezuela has touched off a diplomatic crisis with Colombia believed that he was going to be killed by his captors, his lawyer said Tuesday. Rodrigo Granda was snatched off the streets of Caracas by bounty hunters - purported to be moonlighting Venezuelan law enforcement officers - on Dec. 13 and driven, bound and stuffed in the trunk of a car, to the Colombian border. The Colombian government has acknowledged paying the bounty. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called the capture of Granda a kidnapping, accused Colombia of violating Venezuela's sovereignty, suspended commercial ties and demanded an apology. While in the darkened trunk of the car, Granda noticed that it turned off a main highway onto a secondary road, his attorney Miguel Gonzalez said in an interview with The Associated Press. "He thought he was going to be killed," Gonzalez said. "It was traumatic."
Did you wet your pants like a baby, Senor Big Shot Narcotraficante Hombre?
After a 16-hour trip, Granda was handed over at a Colombian border city to Colombian police, who arrested him. For many Colombians, the irony of a representative of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, being kidnapped is clear. The FARC kidnaps hundreds of people each year, either for ransom or to be traded for imprisoned rebels. But Gonzalez said the government should be held to a higher standard. "All human-rights pacts demand that he be treated according to the law," the lawyer said in the interview in his small office suite overlooking downtown Bogota.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:36:40 AM ||
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"He thought he was going to be killed," Gonzalez said. "It was traumatic." Good.
#2
Granada should be treated according to who's law?
Columbia's or Venezuela's law which allows him to be harbored? Kudos to Columbia - keep up the good work. Chavez, your days are numbered.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/26/2005
13:58 ||
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#1
What's so difficult about changing the names to protect your sources? The journo/editor dropped the ball on this one, and the club adviser didn't notice to pick it up. An article about teen homosexuals, outing individuals to the school population, is a set-up for real problems later.
#2
tw, I personally don't think this is the type of story for a High School paper but then I went to High School back in the '60s when being gay was dangerous. I blame the advisor for tis though, not the author of the article.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/26/2005 20:04
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The group of Iraq's most wanted man, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, threatened Americans and Iraqi forces, and warned Iraqis not to go near polling stations, according to an Internet statement posted Wednesday.
"Beware, beware, Iraqis, don't approach the (polling) centres of infidelity and vice. You are warned," said the statement from the Al-Qaeda Group in the Land of Two Rivers which was posted on an Islamist website.
The authenticity of the statement could not be verified.
"Enemies of Allah, prepare yourselves. Barricade yourselves as you want. We have men who love to kill as much as you love life," it added.
"Death will be the fate of the enemies of Islam... the Americans, who call for false elections and the soldiers of (Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad) Allawi."
On Monday, Zarqawi's fighters said snipers would take out any Iraqis who try to vote in Sunday's landmark elections.
"Trained snipers will be ready to kill the apostates who go to the electoral lairs," said a statement signed by Zarqawi's group and handed out in the Iraqi town of Al-Dur.
"The coming days will be the worst for those involved in the operation to establish the principles of apostates in the land of Islam," added the text.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
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"The coming days will be the worst for those involved in the operation to establish the principles of apostates in the land of Islam," added the text.
Russian police laid siege to suspected Islamic militants in the volatile Caucasus region on Wednesday, maintaining a tense stand-off after three similar sieges this month ended in gun battles. Local officials said up to five militants had barricaded themselves in an apartment block in Nalchik, capital of Kabardino-Balkaria region, along with some women, believed to be their wives or girlfriends.
Local Interior Minister Khochim Shogenov said the men were believed to be members of a militant Islamist group called "Yarmuk" which killed four people in an attack on an anti-drugs unit last month and also killed two policemen in September.
"We believe that it is those people, or even some of the leaders of the group we are looking for," Shogenov told state television.
Police evacuated residents after surrounding the building on Tuesday and began negotiating with the militants.
Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev has branded the entire region a "breeding ground for Wahhabism", as Islamic extremism is known in Russia, and officials link the militants to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda movement.
Police have already stormed three militant hide-outs in sieges elsewhere in the Caucasus this month. Despite using mortars and bazookas and a tank, they took more than 15 hours to subdue one gang, and at least four soldiers died in the sieges.
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01/26/2005
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A 12 year old boy was lashed 80 times in the street by a Saudi court hours after he was arrested at the annual Muslim pilgrimage (Hajj), Saudi newspaper Okaz. reported Monday. The paper said the boy who is from Bangladesh was arrested in Mena, three miles outside the holy city of Makkah, where two million Muslims gathered for the annual pilgrimage after he was allegedly caught pick pocketing pilgrims. The paper said an AdHoc court that operates during the annual pilgrimage sentenced the boy only hours after his arrest, and applied the punishment on the street outside the court. No lawyers or family members were present during the process, but the boy was later handed to his family. The field court is headed by Shaikh Abdullah AbdulRahman Al-Othaim, Shaikh AbdulRahman Al-Hussaini, and Shaikh Hamad Abdullah Al-Khudairy, judges who usually work at Jeddah courts but moved to Mena to set up the summery court during Hajj, the paper said.
Because... huh huh!... they like to watch...
Torture by lashing is a common punishment administrated by Saudi courts which operate according to Wahhabi Muslim traditions. Lashes can reach as high as 5000 lashes in some cases. In July a court in Najran sentenced two men to 750 lashes for writing on the internet about the government persecution of Ismaili Muslims who are a majority in Najran near the Yemeni border. Saudi courts are limited to Wahhabi Muslim judges. Other Muslims such as non-Wahhabi Sunni and Shia Muslims barred from judgeships.
#4
Someone with more knowledge, please correct me, but somewhere in the deep recesses of my brain, there is a bit of recall that says anything about 50 lashes results in terminal damage.
#5
Hummm, I've seen her before. Looks like the lab tech on NCIS.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005 11:20
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#6
I thought it was that chick from the
"Oh Mickey, your so fine, your so fine you blow my mind, hey Mickey"
video from way back when MTV played music...
U.S. and Iraqi forces have killed or captured 15,000 people over the past year in their fight against an insurgency ravaging Iraq, the commander of U.S. forces in the country said Wednesday.
In the past month alone, they had seized around 60 leaders of the various Islamist and Baathist groups trying to drive the Americans from the war-torn country, General George Casey said.
Speaking on the deadliest day for U.S. troops since the invasion in 2003, Casey said the insurgency was limited to just four of Iraq's 18 provinces.
But he conceded that the number of car and suicide bombs had increased and that Iraqi security forces were not capable of dealing with the violence themselves.
"If you look back over the last year we estimate we have killed or captured about 15,000 people as part of this counter-insurgency," Casey, the only four-star American general in Iraq, told reporters.
"Just in this month we have picked up around 60 key members of the Zarqawi network and key members of the former regime," he said, referring to the group led by al Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
"The level of violence in 14 of the 18 provinces in Iraq is four incidents or arrests a day," said Casey, who commands 150,000 U.S. troops. "It is primarily confined to four provinces. It has not spread to 80 percent of the population."
He said the level of violence had subsided since its peak in November last year -- the deadliest month for U.S. troops since the campaign to oust Saddam Hussein began.
Casey, whose father was the most senior U.S. general to die in the Vietnam War, said he expected further attacks Sunday, when Iraq goes to the polls in a historic election Zarqawi and his followers have vowed to disrupt.
"I would see most of the violence in the Sunni areas and a good part of it in the Baghdad area," Casey said. "I would expect low levels of violence in the Shi'ite areas."
He said that while Iraq had 130,000 trained and equipped soldiers and police officers, they were not ready to take over from the Americans.
"Are they (the Iraqis) capable of taking over the counter-insurgency campaign today? The answer is no," he said. "And if you ask the Iraqis, they understand that."
Casey described the insurgents as an assortment of Islamists, Saddam loyalists, common criminals and foreign fighters -- although he said the foreigners numbered less than 1,000.
He scotched rumors, fueled by the refusal of the interim government to confirm or deny them, that Zarqawi had been captured.
"I don't have him," Casey said.
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01/26/2005
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"I don't have him" at its broadest means "he's not in the custody of American forces". It could mean "he's still on the loose", "the Iraqis have him", "some other country has him", or even "he's gone to hell". It does not constitute "scotched".
#5
"I don't have him" could also mean, "My people don't have him." It doesn't speak to the CIA, or even a special interrogation unit offsite somewhere (Ghost Jet, anyone?).
Al-Qaeda and Baathist supporters of ousted president Saddam Hussein have formed a "marriage of convenience" to mount violent opposition to Sunday's Iraqi elections, a top US commander said.
Major General John Batiste, commander of US troops in the sector north of Baghdad that includes many insurgent hotspots, also warned that more suicide bombs and other attacks were likely during the landmark vote.
Batiste, head of the 1st Infantry Division, said more than 750 insurgents, including members of Al-Qaeda and foreign fighters, had been detained since January 1 in the four provinces in the sector -- Salaheddin, Diyala, Sulaimaniyah and Kirkuk's Tamim province.
During an interview late Tuesday with reporters at his office in a Tikrit palace formerly belonging to Saddam, Batiste named Al-Qaeda and its frontman in Iraq Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the biggest threats to the election.
He said Osama bin Laden's group and Zarqawi want "to destroy what is going on at all costs. They don't care what they do."
Former supporters of the fallen dictator, whose hometown was Tikrit, are also behind trouble in the sector, which includes insurgent troublespots Baquba, Baiji and Samarra.
"So there are marriages of convenience between those people and Al-Qaeda and Zarqawi."
The general said the Iraqi people should know that "a vote on the 30th is a vote for Iraq and a vote against the insurgency and people have just got to step out."
Many voters fear attacks however and Batiste admitted that he could not guarantee their safety.
"Absolutely not. I wouldn't even begin to say that. But the Iraqi security forces are doing a credible job of setting this thing up for success."
The election will be surrounded by massive security measures, with nearly all cars banned from the streets, a nightly curfew and other restrictions.
But the general said the threat from suicide bombers mingling with voters was a major concern for US and Iraqi forces.
"It is very possible that we will see some of that -- the suicide jackets and everything," he said.
On election day, Iraqi police will guard polling stations, with the Iraqi army forming an outer security cordon and US forces playing a support role.
"On election day we will be everywhere and US quick reaction forces, 25,000 strong, are committed to ensuring that we have a good, safe and secure election. We will do whatever we need to assist Iraqi security forces."
The general said that since the start of the month more than 80 weapons and ammunition caches had been seized. "We have killed and wounded a good number of insurgents," he added.
"So the idea is that we are piling on pressure (on the enemy), we are disrupting his activity so that come election day he is back on his heels."
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01/26/2005
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All 19 Russian parliament members who signed a letter asking the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation to open an investigation against all Jewish organizations throughout the country on suspicion of spreading incitement and provoking ethnic strife, on Tuesday withdrew their support for the letter, sources in Russia said.
The 19 members of the lower house, the State Duma, from the nationalist Rodina (homeland) party, Vladimir Zhirinovsky's Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), and the Russian Communist Party, came under attack on Tuesday for signing the letter. Around 450 Russian academics and public figures also signed the letter.
Russia's chief rabbi Berl Lazar said the letter had caused outrage among the country's 1 million Jews and raised questions over the lessons learned from the Holocaust.
"Today is a test. People are trying to test how society will react 60 years later," Rabbi Lazar told Reuters on Tuesday.
"More than half a century later, when such statements come out openly, this really shows that the famous line 'Never again' has to be taught constantly and fought for."
"The majority of anti-Semitic actions in the whole world are constantly carried out by Jews themselves with a goal of provocation," the letter said.
The General Prosecutor's office said on Tuesday that the deputies' move had been dropped at their request. No explanation was immediately forthcoming from the deputies. Earlier they denied the letter was anti-Semitic.
"There is nothing anti-Semitic in our address, we only ask the General Prosecutor to give a judicial evaluation of the facts we have presented," Alexander Krutov, a Rodina party deputy in the Duma, or lower house, told Izvestia newspaper.
The Kremlin had no immediate comment on the issue.
President Vladimir Putin will join other world leaders at Thursday's commemoration of the Jan. 27, 1945, liberation by Soviet troops of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp in Poland. He has in the past called anti-Semitism unacceptable. "It's in the hands of the government to bring a case against them [the deputies] and not allow them to serve in the Duma," Rabbi Lazar said. "Any kind of anti-Semitic propaganda by government officials should be outlawed and these people should be brought to justice."
He said: "Today they are trying to outlaw Jewish organizations, tomorrow they will try and do the same with any religion, any kind of national idea, and this is dangerous."
The Israeli embassy in Moscow said the document used the same arguments the Nazis had.
"It is a classic example of anti-Semitism," it said in a statement. "The theories in the appeal were used by the Nazi regime as a basis for the mass destruction of the Jews during World War Two."
Russia came under the spotlight on Sunday when an Israeli government report expressed alarm at what it said were sharp rises in violent anti-Semitism over the past year. The report ranked Russia third in the world overall for anti-Semitic violence after France and Britain.
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Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 21:06
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"There is nothing anti-Semitic in our address, we only ask the General Prosecutor to give a judicial evaluation of the facts we have presented," Alexander Krutov, a Rodina party deputy in the Duma, or lower house, told Izvestia newspaper
At first Talib al-Duleimi did not bother to register to vote in Iraq's elections. The longtime exile changed his mind after Iraq's most feared militant declared war on the balloting.
"This is our country," said al-Duleimi, 38, a businessman who left Iraq after deserting the army in the 1991 Gulf War. "We should not listen to threats coming from this or that person. Iraq comes first."
That's not an easy position to have in this Jordanian desert city, the hometown of Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi, al-Qaida's top operative in Iraq. Yet in interviews Monday with some of the 60,000 Iraqis living in Zarqa, many said they planned to vote in defiance of al-Zarqawi.
In the United States, al-Zarqawi rivals Osama bin Laden as public enemy No. 1. But many people here -- not the least al-Zarqawi's family and friends -- take pride in his uncompromising and violent interpretation of Islam. They refer to him as "son of our town" or "our townman."
Al-Zarqawi's nephew, Mohammed Fawzi, scoffed at Sunday's elections as an American ploy to bring Shiite Muslims to power. The Jordanian terror chief is a Sunni, the minority in Iraq that held sway under Saddam Hussein but who are likely to lose power to the Shiites in this weekend's vote.
Attacks on Shiite Muslims in Iraq have increased in recent weeks as Sunni Arab insurgents try scare Shiites away from polls, the first independent ballot in Iraq in nearly 50 years.
"Shiites are infidels and they should be burned in hell," said Fawzi, who like the many strictly observant Muslims here was bearded and wore a knee-length robe. "They are spies and stooges and their blood should be spilled."
His comments echoed the latest threat attributed to al-Zarqawi, issued via an audiotape that aired Sunday. In the recording, a speaker who identifies himself as al-Zarqawi called those running in the elections "demi-idols" and vowed to disrupt the vote. The speaker railed against democracy for trying to supplant the rule of God with that of man and accused the United States of engineering the vote.
Just how deep Fawzi's loyalty to his uncle lies is unclear. Fawzi, who was released last week after four months under arrest following his return from a trip to Iraq, refused to say whether he joined the insurgency while there. It was one of two trips he said he has made to Iraq since U.S.-led troops toppled Saddam in 2003.
Most of the Iraqis in Zarqa live in low-income areas of the city, Jordan's second-largest with 800,000 people, including many Palestinian refugees. It is 17 miles northeast of the Jordanian capital of Amman.
Nearly 180,000 Iraqis live in Jordan. While many came after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, others have been here for years. Al-Duleimi, for instance, is married to a Jordanian. Jordan has always been Iraq's main outlet to the world.
Abu Anas, who became friends with al-Zarqawi in 1986 while the two were serving in the Jordanian army, praised him as "a symbol of all Jordanians." He said al-Zarqawi had a keen interest in weapons and combat techniques even then. When the hell was Zarqawi in the Jordanian army? He dropped out of high school to fight in Afghanistan!
"You could realize right from the beginning that he was born to do that," said Abu Anas, who refused to give his full name.
Shiites make up the majority in Iraq and are expected to fare well in the elections, raising concerns in Jordan, as in Iraq's other largely Sunni neighbors, that candidates could align themselves with Iran's hard-line Shiite Muslim theocracy. Jordan's King Abdullah II has accused Shiite-dominated Iran of trying to influence the elections in Iraq. Iran denies that.
Al-Duleimi, himself Sunni, dismissed al-Zarqawi's attacks against Iraqi Shiites as bigotry.
"I am a Sunni, but I see this as really abhorrent," he said. "I am worried to see some people want to kill this experience (election) even before it is born."
Zuhair al-Samaraei, another Iraqi living in Zarqa, said many Iraqis have expressed similar defiance to al-Zarqawi's call for a boycott and have begun registering to vote. On Monday, several Iraqis registered their names in two balloting offices opened here by the International Organization of Migration, which handles Iraqis overseas balloting.
But al-Samaraei said that some Iraqis are being intimidated and that election billboards are being torn down.
Overall, turnout in registration for voting in Jordan and other countries neighboring Iraq has been low. Only about 16 percent of eligible Iraqi voters living outside their country had registered as of Saturday, the IOM said.
In Jordan, more than 14,000 or an estimated 8 percent of 180,000 expatriates have registered so far, according to the group.
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01/26/2005
12:59:42 AM ||
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The concept of democracy appears to have taken root in the dusty town of Karma, a predominantly Sunni community of 75,000 people about nine miles (15 kilometers) northeast of Falluja.
Karma sprawls for miles along the canals of the Euphrates River, with its little communities of sandy brick houses, each separated by the bright colors of laundry hanging out to dry. Patches of bright green grass dot the landscape. Herds of sheep and goats drink from the river while children run behind Humvees screaming "Mister! Mister!" as Marines on their daily patrols throw them candy.
Troops from the Regimental Combat Team 7 (RCT-7) of the 1st Marine Division meet with local leaders, sheiks and the people of Karma to try to gauge their sentiment about the upcoming elections. They distribute flyers that read: "Participate in the elections to build a strong Iraq" and "Vote! The future is in your hands."
But many villagers are not as interested in talking about the elections as they are about the lack of petrol, gas, electricity and work. They say they receive their information about the elections from TV and say no one has campaigned or even hung campaign posters in their community.
Although most say they don't know who the candidates are or where to go to vote, they say they will vote come January 30.
Shakir Jiyad Aswad, father of 10, said Karma residents want to elect a nationalist, someone to preserve religion and defend holy places. "We want one Iraq," he said. "I'll probably vote for [Iraq's interim President Ghazi] al-Yawar."
He took the opportunity to tell Col. Craig Tucker, commander of RCT-7, about the generator he said was bombed during the Falluja offensive in November. The colonel promised to send a civil affairs team to file a claim for him the next day.
Abd Al-rahman, a 24-year-old Iraq Force Protection Services employee says he'll vote for interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi. He says he has received a 200,000 Iraqi dinar bonus from him.
Ghanem Juhayir, 20, says he's been out of work for months. He says Allawi harmed the community by allowing the Falluja offensive. "The Iraqi forces are worse than the Americans, and Allawi controls them," he explains. He says he expects to learn about the candidates on TV. And if not, he will probably vote for al-Yawar.
Farther down the road, Iraqis are also preoccupied with what's lacking. They tell Col. Tucker they want to vote but don't know who to vote for.
"We get our information from the TV. But then the power goes out and we have no TV," one man says. Abd Al-Khadar Ali Khayab, a butcher and father of nine, says he'll vote for one of the sheiks of his tribe he has heard is running. But he doesn't know which list he's on or who any of the others on the list are.
His white dishdasha is splattered with blood, having just slaughtered seven sheep for the Eid holiday. "Financially our situation is zero," he says, knives still in hand. "But we hope that things will get better after the elections."
Some displaced Fallujans now live near a canal in abandoned buildings and tents.
Abd Al-Khader moved his family of 12 out of Falluja and in with relatives in the area. He says there are 11 families living in three rooms and two tents. He made the trip back and found his home in the Andalus neighborhood destroyed.
"Of course I am going to vote. We need something to change, we can't live like this," he says. But he does not know whom he'll vote for or who the candidates are. A man standing near him said "Allawi, al-Yawar, it doesn't matter. I am not going to vote."
"Do you know when the elections are?" Col. Tucker asked a group of five men. "Yes, it's the 29th," one answered.
Thalab Sarbat Ali, the traditional community leader called the "Mukhtar," said he is encouraging people to vote. "It's simple," he says. "You just tick on a box and that's it."
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01/26/2005
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Three women have been killed and five others wounded after a bomb exploded in a mausoleum near the Algerian capital, residents say. The device had been left in a bag in the mausoleum in the Ain Rumana cemetery near the town of Muzaia, 70km southwest of Algiers. It exploded on Friday afternoon as the cemetery was crowded with people praying for the dead during the Eid al-Adha (Day of Sacrifice) religious holidays, residents said. The funerals of the three women killed took place on Saturday.
According to an official toll and press reports, at least 34 people have been killed so far this year. Press reports said on Saturday three people were killed in separate incidents in Algeria involving various groups. In a separate incident a soldier had his throat slit when he was stopped at what was reported to be a fake roadblock at Adekar, 260km east of Algiers, and a young man was killed and two wounded when a group set on them with clubs at Kadiria, southeast of the capital, the report said.
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01/26/2005
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Algeria's top Islamic rebel group, which has ties to al Qaeda, is reeling from the arrests and killings of hundreds of members, but a deadly ambush on a military convoy shows it is far from eliminated.
The Jan. 3 attack by the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) killed 13 soldiers and five militiamen, according to diplomats, and may mark the emergence of a dangerous new leader.
A U.S. military source familiar with the region said it looked like the work of Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a GSPC desert chief newly returned from hiding in northern Mali and keen to show that he is a force to be reckoned with. "Among all the GSPC folks that we know about, he's certainly the most active, certainly the most dangerous. He's the one that needs to be wrapped up next," the source told Reuters.
The deaths last year of 321 rebels, most of them GSPC, will boost foreign investor confidence in the OPEC member's ability to crack down on Islamist militancy. In 2004, the army stepped up its military offensive and was helped with intelligence obtained from those who surrendered or were captured. "Security is improving gradually and obviously 2004 was quite a bad year for the GSPC, losing its leader and many followers," said Sarah Meyers, a Middle East and North Africa analyst for London-based risk consultant Control Risks Group. But it will be a long process to eradicate its cells."
The security risk remains high, according to diplomats and security analysts, because of 300 to 500 armed and well-funded and trained rebels still operational across Algeria. Foreign firms and many embassies have heavy security. Despite the Jan. 3 ambush, Interior Minister Noureddine Zerhouni was upbeat in comments last week.
He insisted the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), a forerunner of the GSPC, had been dismantled and that "only a few pockets of GSPC terrorists remained" and would soon be crushed. "The battle is won but it's not over," he said on Jan. 12. The U.S. military source said the GIA, whose leader was recently arrested, was "on its last legs".
But the GSPC, which is designated by the State Department as a terrorist group and pledged support to al Qaeda in 2003, would continue to pose a residual threat for some time, drawing on grievances from the past decade's violent conflict. He praised the "magnificent job" of the Algerian authorities against the group, which almost fell apart last year with the death of leader Nabil Sahraoui and the arrest of deputy Amar Saifi, known as "El Para", who was behind the kidnapping of 32 European tourists in the desert in 2003.
The U.S. source said Algerian pressure against the GSPC had partly had —group has been significantly weakened and it will hurt their ability to carry out major attack against oil installations in the south or large-scale targets in the north. "But it will be more difficult for authorities to root them out in more remote areas because they are very skilled at carrying out attacks and then retreating to the mountains."
President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's government hopes many of the rebels have tired of the war and want to surrender, but the GSPC's die-hard leadership has repeatedly warned their members against giving up. "No truce, no dialogue, no reconciliation and no peace with the enemies of God," GSPC spokesman Abou Yasser Siaf said in a statement on Jan. 6.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:49:41 AM ||
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The Interim Somali government, which is based in Nairobi, Kenya, has continued with its plans to relocate to Somalia in early February, despite the killing of a senior police officer in Mogadishu on Sunday, sources said.
"There is no question that government plans to relocate will continue," a source in the prime minister's office told IRIN on Tuesday. "As repugnant as the killing is, there is no change of plans".
The cabinet met on Monday to discuss security and has agreed to continue with the relocation plan, the source added. It had initially resolved to start preparations for a return to Somalia during its first formal meeting on 15 January.
Three teams composed of cabinet ministers were formed to start making the necessary arrangements, according to a statement issued on 18 January by the prime minister's office.
"Preparations are already underway to implement the decision of the cabinet," the director of communications in the prime minister's office, Hussein Jabiri, told IRIN at the time. The first team of ministers to leave for the Somali capital, Mogadishu, would "consist of 30 members and will be led by the prime minister", Jabiri added.
No one has so far claimed responsibility for the killing of Gen Yusuf Ahmad Sarinle, who was the acting police chief, a local journalist told IRIN. Sarinle served as deputy police chief under the former Transitional National Government (TNG) and had pledged to support the current government.
Sarinle was the fourth senior police or military officer to be shot dead since September last year, the journalist said.
"The attacks are related to fears by some on the possible deployment of peacekeepers in the country," the journalist added. "These are people who have no interest in the return of peace and stability in Somalia."
All the victims have, at one time or another, called for the deployment of peacekeepers to Somalia and all had served under the TNG, according to the journalist.
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01/26/2005
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The United States will back President Gloria Arroyo in the fight against breakaway Muslim militant groups threatening fragile peace talks in the southern Philippines, its envoy to Manila said on Monday.
US ambassador Francis Ricciardone said negotiations between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the government were being made difficult by many groups claiming to be legitimate separatist rebels. While the ongoing peace negotiations brokered by Malaysia to end the MILF's 28-year insurgency were welcome, Ricciardone said Washington would provide military support against those continuing to carry out attacks.
He said 70 US military personnel were training troops in the southern Philippines in intelligence gathering, leading to the arrest or killing of "25 identified, known, no-doubt-about it terrorist leaders" last year.
Development assistance would also continue in the mostly poverty-stricken southern Mindanao island and in Muslim areas, he said.
"Our concern is not merely to get a piece of paper ... a peace accord. What we want to see is a peace (agreement) that will be durable and that will permit development to go ahead," Ricciardone told foreign correspondents.
But if certain elements of the MILF were "going to hide bombers from Bali, or train bombers or hide kidnappers, or get involved in the drug trade, the law enforcement and security forces of the Philippines are going to go after them and we are going to help them," Ricciardone said."We are going to help, we are going to keep making inroads, and the kidnappers and bombers at the end of the day are going to lose," he said. Renegade MILF rebels two weeks ago attacked and burned to the ground an army detachment in Mindanao, where the guerrillas have been waging a war for independence since 1978.
War games: The United States will drastically scale down its participation in annual joint military exercises with the Philippines as it diverts resources to relief efforts after the Indian Ocean tsunami, US officials said on Monday. zThe Philippines, fighting protracted rebellions by communist rebels and Muslim separatists, has cemented its close security alliance with Washington with the annual "Balikatan" (shoulder-to-shoulder) exercises.
US military spokesman Captain Dennis Williams told Reuters only 300 US soldiers are expected to participate in the exercises, likely to start around Feb. 13, down from the usual number of about 2,600.
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01/26/2005
12:46:17 AM ||
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Gunmen shot dead a town vice mayor and his security aide in the province of Sulu, some 950 kilometers south of Manila, in an attack blamed by the military on family feud.
Pata Vice Mayor Adjili Abbas and his bodyguard were killed on Saturday morning outside the official's house.
Authorities only reported the incident on Tuesday, but officials said security forces were sent to the town to track down the attackers.
"There is an going operation now. Soldiers and policemen were in the town to hunt the assailants," military anti-terror task force commander Brig. Gen. Agustin Dema-ala said.
He said Abbas rushed outside his house after hearing burst of gunfire, but was also shot by unidentified assailants.
His unidentified bodyguard, who came to help, was also shot dead, Dema-ala said.
The motive of the attack was still unknown, but Dema-ala said they were looking at the possibility that a family feud or personal grudge may have sparked the shooting.
"There is an investigation, the police are handling that case," he said.
It was not immediately known if the Abu Sayyaf group, which is known to actively operate in Sulu, had something to do with the murder.
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01/26/2005
12:43:32 AM ||
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To demand that Russia should conduct "peaceful negotiations" with terrorists is to cultivate double standards in the fight against terrorism, Russia's ambassador to Belgium, Vadim Lukov, wrote in his article "Whom Does Chechnya Support?" published in the Belgian newspaper De Tijd on January 19.
"It turns out that with some terrorists, such as Osama bin Laden and Abu Zarkaui, negotiations are impossible, while with others [Maskhadov, for example] they are not only possible but even necessary! What is the difference between Aslan Maskhadov and Shamil Basayev, whom the U.S. State Department has included on the list of international terrorists?" Mr. Lukov wrote.
He noted that "the calls addressed to Moscow to start a political settlement in Chechnya are obviously too late," because "the main political steps towards peace in Chechnya have already been taken."
Mr. Lukov names the Constitution of the Republic, adopted at the referendum, the presidential elections and the preparations for the parliamentary elections as part of those steps.
"Those who ignore all these basic facts of a peaceful settlement in Chechnya expose themselves as supporters of only one variant of 'settlement': that of the repetition of terrorists' power on the Chechen land," he underscored.
According Mr. Lukov, the European public should clearly understand that support of the Chechen terrorists does not at all contribute to the stabilization of the situation in Chechnya but, on the contrary, "inspires and encourages those who, under the pretext of 'fighting for the independence of Chechnya,' would like to use common Chechens as 'cannon fodder' in combinations of international terrorism."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:42:20 AM ||
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n an article titled "Adolf Hitler on the Making of a Successful Lie," Abu Khawla (Muhammad Bechri), a human rights activist and former chair of the Tunisian section of Amnesty International, claims that Islamism is "a very successful lie," and not "a remarkable social and political force." In his view, "only Arab/Muslim secular forces can effectively undermine Islamism." The following are excerpts from the article: [1]
'The Mother of All Big Lies: Islamism'
"A contributor to a secular forum did well recently in reminding us about Hitler's dictum on how to lie and have a great impact on the masses⊠This raises a set of interesting questions. Why would a particular lie succeed while others fail? And why would a liar suddenly succeed in a particular period of time and not before that? To answer these questions, we need to understand what makes for a successful lie. I will elaborate on this point first, then I will go on to speculate on the effective way to counter the mother of all big lies: Islamism (or political Islam, since Islamism is nothing but politics in a religious garb).
"Adolf Hitler said: 'the broad mass of a nation will more easily fall victim to a big lie than to a small one.' Hitler also taught us that to succeed, the lie should be told loudly. In case you didn't notice, he would generally start his speeches in a relatively quite manner, [and] then as he starts shouting he gets more and more applause. The foolhardy German masses honestly believed that if their beloved Fuhrer is taking such a pain to talk loudly, he should be telling more truth.
"By these two accounts, Islamism is expected to be a very successful lie, indeed. Amir Taheri estimated the Islamist propaganda machine's bill to be about 100 billion dollars during the last two decades alone, which makes it the largest propaganda machine in history, even larger than the communist propaganda machine during the Soviet era. People wouldn't obviously spend that much unless they know they have to defend a huge lie.
"The mosque (especially the Friday prayer sermon) is particularly used by Islamists to spread their message. [Egyptian progressive] Saadeddine Ibrahim recently lamented how he would face a propaganda machine that uses a network of 150,000 mosques in Egypt. In many countries, Fatwas issued by the Mullahs could be binding on social and political matters, and the religious authorities are granted wide powers for censorship of whatever they consider to be blasphemous.
"In addition, an infiltration of culture and education spheres gives Islamists an upper hand, especially in the conception of school curricula and media programs. And since the early 1990s, a turn to the worst was inaugurated by the advent of satellite TV. In the Arab world, this important tool of communications is so far completely monopolized by fundamentalists."
'The Most Effective Way to Counter a Lie is Obviously to Undermine It'
"To view Islamism as a lie (not a remarkable social and political force, a mistaken belief largely shared in the West) could have many implications on the conception of an effective strategy to counter Islamist terror and win. The most effective way to counter a lie is obviously to undermine it. That is what Ronald Reagan did with communism. As soon as the peoples of the former Soviet Union and central Europe realized that they fell victims to a lie, the communist edifice fell suddenly like a house of cards, without having America to fire a single shot.
"The same is needed with Islamism today. But so far, what is happening is just the opposite. Arab/Islamic governments are rather colluding with the Islamists, hoping that anti-Western diatribes will help deflect the attention of the masses from their own failures. And some of them are even adopting the Islamists' agenda as a way of containment. Examples include denying women rights to vote in Kuwait, and postponing reforms of women codes and educational systems in countries like Algeria and Egypt. To quote the great Tunisian secular thinker Afif Al-Akdhar 'these governments are implementing Islamism without the Islamists.'"
'Freedom in the West Gave Islamist Terror Masters Ample Opportunities to Mount an Effective Propaganda Machine'
"Western countries have also been active in putting oil on [the] fire. Since the creation of the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt, Western democracies chose either to support the Islamists as a counterweight to communism or to adopt a neutral position. In all cases, freedom in the West gave Islamist terror masters ample opportunities to mount an effective propaganda machine.
"One would have hoped that 9/11 will change all that, but to no avail. The media dimension of the so-called 'global war on terror' consisted so far of an America counter-propaganda (Hi Magazine and Radio Sawa for Arab youth, Al-Hurra TVâŠ). Serious doubts, however, remain about the effectiveness of this approach. The declared objective is to disseminate 'American values.' But while this is a noble objective, it is not the effective way to counter political Islam. The reasons are: (1) Most - if not all - of these values are already known to Arabs; as a result, not much will be achieved by re-advertising them, and (2) Many of these values are considered to be decadent (thanks to the powerful impact of the Islamist propaganda). As a result, counter-arguments, especially when they come from American propagandists will almost certainly fall on deaf ears in the Arab/Islamic world."
'Only Arab/Muslim Secular Forces Can Effectively Undermine Islamism'
"To be sure, only Arab/Muslim secular forces can effectively undermine Islamism. As the recent Iranian example clearly shows, attempts to portray modernists as Western stooges will be futile. At the end of the day, truth will always prevail. But so far these forces are kept on the sidelines. In a recent op-ed article, U.S. defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld explained well the need to wage 'a war of ideas.' That may mean there is still hope in sanity. But until that happens, America and the West will be kidding themselves if they believe that the current military campaign alone will lead them anywhere close to their objective of uprooting Islamist terror."
[1] http://www.metransparent.com/texts/abu_khawla_adolf_hitler_on_the_making_successufl_lie.htm, January 2, 2005.
Posted by: tipper ||
01/26/2005
12:41:30 AM ||
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#2
Many of these values are considered to be decadent
The most sucessful lie is always rooted in truth. We do have a problem in the US with decadence. We are able to handle it here - but it is indeed a problem that was reflected in our last election.
That's the theory, anyway. I can't lie -- my ears turn red and I have nightmares until I give up and admit the truth (damned overdeveloped Jewish conscience!)
I am not jewish but the same thing happens to me when I try to lie. My poor son turns pale around the lips and he is known to wake up in the middle of the night to "confess".
Abkhazia's authorities have denied rumors that Chechen extremist leader Shamil Basayev or any other members of illegal armed groups are in Abkhazia. "Shamil Basayev is not in Abkhazia, and neither are any other representatives" of the Chechen extremists, Abkhaz Vice President Raul Khajimba told a press conference in Moscow. "If anyone would like to see for themselves, they are welcome," Khajimba added. Abkhaz President Sergei Bagapsh confirmed this statement. Stories about Basayev hiding in Abkhazia are "old rumors," he said. "We know who is spreading them and why," Bagapsh said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:41:04 AM ||
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Georgia's President Mikheil Saakashvili will use avisit to the Council of Europe today to unveil proposals to give broad autonomy to South Ossetia, in an effort to end a long-running conflict with the breakaway region.
Mr Saakashvili plans to offer a power-sharing arrangement that will give South Ossetia full responsibility for education and cultural policy and public order issues, as well as guarantees on its language. The central government in Tbilisi would be responsible for security and defence, foreign policy and fiscal policy.
The proposals are crucial to Mr Saakashvili's plans to restore Georgia's territorial integrity without antagon-ising Russia at a time of increasing tensions between the two former Soviet republics.
South Ossetia, on Georgia's northern border, has enjoyed de facto independence from Georgia, backed by Russia, since an earlier conflict in 1991-92. Violence flared again last year after Mr Saakashvili took power on a pledge to restore central authority to his fragmented country.
The Georgian president says today's proposals, involving a shift to a more federal structure for the country, represent a compromise on his original intentions.
"Of course it is a compromise," he said. "We want to do this peacefully, and there is a price to be paid for that."
But Eduard Kokoity, South Ossetia's president, yesterday gave the plan a chilly reception.
"Mr Saakashvili can't understand that the train left the station a long time ago," he said. "South Ossetia's status was decided by its people in a referendum in 1995."
Georgia accuses Russia of encouraging breakaway movements in South Ossetia and Abkhazia as part of its efforts to preserve Russian influence there.
Tensions between the two countries have escalated since Russia moved to abolish monitoring of the Russia-Georgia border by the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, designed to maintain peace in the volatile north Caucasus, from the beginning of this year.
The monitoring was also aimed at keeping rebels from neighbouring Chechnya from crossing into Georgia's Pankisi gorge, which Russia has accused them of using as a base.
Salome Zurabishvili, Georgia's foreign minister, said her country was deeply concerned about Russia's hawkish rhetoric towards Georgia. She said abolition of OSCE monitoring left the country more exposed to pressure from Russia.
She said Georgia was surprised by Russia's contradictory statements about the monitoring. Russia initially argued that the OSCE mission, which began in 2000, had achieved its objectives and was no longer needed, but later said it was ineffective and had failed to prevent the movement of rebels.
Russian foreign ministry officials accused Georgia of providing safe haven for Chechen terrorists, and said 250-300 rebels were hiding in the Pankisi gorge.
"We have repeatedly told the Russians that the Pankisi gorge is clear. We have asked Russia to provide us with specific information if they have it. We even offered to them to come and inspect it with us," Ms Zurabishvili said.
She said Georgia was looking for new partners - possibly the European Union - to monitor the border.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:39:46 AM ||
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Deputy chief of the Chechen branch of United Russia party Lecha Magomedov died on Tuesday during a pilgrimage to places of worship in Mecca. Preliminary reports said Magomedov died of a stroke he suffered in Mecca, a source from the Chechen Mufti's office told Tass on Tuesday. The United Russia headquarters has been negotiating the return of the body to Chechnya although traditionally, a pilgrim who dies in Mecca is buried there. Lecha Magomedov was around 70 years old. He was one of the organizers of the United Russia branch in Chechnya and until recently, he had been Deputy secretary of its political council.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:38:20 AM ||
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The FBI knows of "jihadists" who have trained in terrorist camps in Afghanistan and are now living in Oregon, the agency's Oregon chief said in an exclusive Tuesday interview with The Associated Press.
"We don't have an imminent threat that we're aware of. But I will say this: We have people here in Oregon that have trained in jihadist camps in bad areas. In the bad neighborhoods of the world," said FBI Special Agent in Charge Robert Jordan.
Asked what he meant by "bad neighborhoods," he said Afghanistan, as well as several other countries he would not specify.
During the session with The AP, which lasted nearly two hours, Jordan discussed a wide range of themes - from his agents' participation in the Bush administration's war on terror to the upcoming opening of a new laboratory in Portland to conduct forensic work on computers seized from suspects.
Jordan refused to say how many "jihadists" live in Oregon. He said the FBI knows "they've trained overseas, taken oaths to kill Americans and engage in jihad," but the challenge is "to prove those things."
Jordan contrasted the known "jihadists" living in Oregon with the so-called "Portland Seven," a group of seven Portland-area men accused of plotting to wage war against U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
One of the men was killed in combat, while the six others returned to Oregon, where they eventually pleaded guilty to all the charges against them.
Discussing his office's participation in the ongoing war on terror, Jordan said that last fall FBI agents in Oregon took part in an analysis of crop-dusting aircraft across the country, interviewing their current and past owners, examining bills of sale and other pertinent information.
U.S. officials had received intelligence that al-Qaida intended to use a crop duster to spray biological or chemical weapons on American targets, he said.
The crop duster interviews, he said, led to some questionable activities being disrupted. He declined to provide specifics.
Beth Anne Steele, spokeswoman for the FBI's Portland office, said it was the second time since the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 that FBI agents had interviewed owners and pilots of crop duster planes.
The purpose is not just to make an accounting of where the aircrafts are, she said, but also to encourage people who use the planes to contact the FBI if a suspicious person inquires about buying such an aircraft.
Jordan said demands on the FBI's agents in Oregon have increased since the Sept. 11 terror attacks and since the launching of the war on Iraq.
He said some of his agents have been assigned to the U.S. prison for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay.
Some have also been assigned to duties in Iraq. Jordan said that his chief bomb technician volunteered to go to Iraq, where he helped defuse improvised explosive devices - called IEDs - placed along roads.
Jordan also spoke of a new regional laboratory that's being set up in southeast Portland to analyzed seized computers. He said the lab will have a staff of at least 12, and will include officers from local law-enforcement agencies.
"Our goal is to be one-stop shopping for law enforcement in the Northwest, not just Oregon," Jordan said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:33:47 AM ||
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#1
I guess we're still confused about whether this is about law enforcement or war. In war you shoot your enemy on sight.
Posted by: Mr. Spock ||
01/26/2005 10:04
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He said the FBI knows "theyâve trained overseas, taken oaths to kill Americans and engage in jihad," but the challenge is "to prove those things."
-if we've reason to believe this, why can't we just keep them out of the country? Does the Pat Act not cover this situation?
#4
If they are citizens it would probably be difficult, but if they aren't, or if they lied about something on their application (like being a member of a terrorist organization, perhaps?), it shouldn't be difficult to start deportation proceedings -- even under the old rules. But it sounds to me that the FBI office there is severely understaffed for the current situation, so probably they are dealing with crises first.
The man who gave San Diego FBI agents a phony tip about a terrorist plot in Boston is behind bars Tuesday, 10News reported. Mexican police arrested Jose Beltran Quinones in Mexicali, Mexico, Monday. Beltrans claimed that he helped a group of Chinese nationals illegally cross into the United States from Mexico. According to his tip, they were intent on detonating a dirty bomb in Boston. Beltrans is now being questioned by U.S. and Mexican officials about his motives.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:23:30 AM ||
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A Latin American war could possibly break out in the next few years. Unlike what happened in the 20th century when all confrontations were caused by border disputes, this time the war could be a bloody, multinational conflict triggered by ideological reasons.
All symptoms indicate that behind that likely disaster will be the irresponsible behavior of Venezuelan President Hugo Chävez.... The recent episode with Rodrigo Granda is only a sample. Granda, a leader of Colombian communist narcoguerrillas called the FARC, was kidnapped in Caracas by Venezuelan military men [and] was one of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of subversive Colombians who have obtained refuge and aid in Venezuela.
An angry Chävez asked Uribe for explanations, but it would have been more reasonable if Chävez had given the explanations, instead of demanding them. What was this sinister character doing on Venezuelan territory, invited to a semiofficial event and carrying a Venezuelan passport in his pocket? Why are communist narcoguerrillas from Colombia camped on Venezuelan territory, and why do their leaders freely enter and leave the so-called Bolivarian Republic?
Venezuela has replaced Cuba as the headquarters of the violent left. A few weeks ago, a former Peruvian Army officer, Antauro Humala, after proclaiming himself a disciple of Hugo Chävez and accompanied by several dozen insurgents, seized a couple of military installations, murdered four policemen and attempted unsuccessfully to launch a nationwide revolution.
In October 2003, Bolivian President Gonzalo Sänchez de Losada was forced to resign after a series of mass uprisings organized by radical groups apparently financed by Venezuela. At the head of the protests marched Evo Morales, an indigenous and profoundly anti-West leader of the coca growers.
Simultaneously, Chävez uses the river of petrodollars that is pouring into the country, as a result of rising fuel prices, to strengthen his army's offensive capability. Pending is the purchase of 50 MiG-29 warplanes from Russia, along with a large number of tanks, helicopters and armored vehicles.
The purpose of so much materiel is easy to guess: an eventual confrontation with Colombia, intended not only to liquidate Uribe's ''oligarchic and pro-United States'' government but also to initiate the reconstruction of the Greater Colombia (including Ecuador), the grand homeland sought unsuccessfully by Simón BolÃvar in the first half of the 19th century.
But this dangerous imperial Bolivarian dream has another, even more-dangerous detour: a war against Chile, intended to destroy that bastion of ``neoliberalism.''
Whether governed by the Christian Democrats or the Social Democrats (as it is led today by Ricardo Lagos), Chile is seen as a threat by the left because of its defense of free markets, democracy and free international commerce.
The left does not forgive Chile for its Free Trade Agreement with the United States or similar accords it has signed with the European Union and Japan; or for the success of the liberal style of government that has led to a reduction in poverty, from 42 percent to 18 percent, in 14 years of democracy, while Chile moved to the head of Latin America.
#1
Don't know this journalist, but his thesis is quite plausible. The Andean states are basket cases, ripe for subversion, and Chavez has the cash, the will and the loyal cadres to foment it.
Everyone likes to talk about a big new role for Brazil in world affairs. Here's that nation's chance to show some responsibility and wisdom by reining in the idiotarian caudillo to the north.
#2
This thing will blow before Mt. Saint Helen's. US intervention by end of year, 2005.
Posted by: Hillary Clinton ||
01/26/2005 19:09
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Brazil will be an ally of Chavez, not an enemy.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 19:19
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I am glad to see the Administration and regular Americans are taken an interest on this very dangerous man. From the start of his presidency he has repeatly talked about reviving Simon Bolivar's dream: La Gran Colombia.
Omani security forces have reportedly rounded up hundreds of people suspected of planning bombings during the Muslim feast of Adha. The Saudi daily al-Hayat, which is monitored in Beirut, said Wednesday rumors have been going strong in the sultanate that a wave of arrests took place a week ago and arms and ammunition were seized from the suspects. The paper noted Oman's ruler, Sultan Qaboos, failed to show up at the Adha feast prayers in the province of Rustaq last week, and it quoted reports saying terrorists planned attacks in Muscat during the feast. Muslim extremists say the festival is immoral and contradicts Islamic norms.
"They're having fun! It's un-islamic!"
About 300 people, including prominent political and military figures, were arrested in the raids. The cache of weapons was found when a truck carrying them was involved in an accident.
Oh, don'tcha hate it when that happens?
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
12:32:07 PM ||
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#1
Qaboos - you da man! Oman is a fairly quiet place thanks to the hard work of your intel services. Anyone know if they have Sharia in Oman? If so perhaps they can cut off some trigger fingers.
#2
Muslim countries shouldn't have a problem penetrating home-grown terrorist groups. After Oklahoma City, the running joke was that there were more FBI agents than bona fide members at militia meetings. And the FBI operates under all kinds of restrictions that Muslim governments laugh at. The only question is whether they really want to stop these things.
Thirteen suspected Islamist militants arrested following separate clashes with security men in Kuwait have been referred to the public prosecution for questioning, a judicial source said Tuesday.
The source said the suspects, believed to be linked to the Al-Qaeda network, were referred late Monday and that a second group is expected to be transferred to judicial authorities on Tuesday.
The source did not state the charges levelled against the suspects by police but Al-Qabas newspaper said Tuesday that they are allegedly linked to militants in neighbouring Saudi Arabia and to the group of Iraq's most wanted man, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
The suspects were "plotting to attack US targets" and were "authorised to clash with Kuwaiti security forces if necessary", the daily said.
According to Kuwaiti law, suspects are referred to the judiciary by the police on the basis that they require questioning by a higher authority based on evidence supplied by the police.
The prosecution is at liberty to take a number of measures, including referring them to court or releasing them.
A January 15 gunbattle between militants and Kuwaiti security forces left one Saudi gunman killed in Umm al-Haiman, south of the capital near the border with Saudi Arabia.
The shootout near the largest US military base in Kuwait, came five days after another clash closer to the capital left two security officers dead.
The authorities have seized arms and explosives in subsequent raids around the tiny oil-rich emirate.
Two suspects, including the Saudi national, were killed in the two gunbattles, while at least 15 others, a number of them Saudi, were arrested, according to Interior Minister Sheikh Nawaf al-Ahmad al-Sabah.
Security forces are still hunting for an unspecified number of militants who fled after the clashes, which were strikingly similar to regular shootouts between Saudi police and presumed Al-Qaeda militants responsible for a spate of shootings and bombings in Saudi Arabia since May 2003.
The commander of Kuwait's National Guard, Sheikh Salem al-Ali al-Sabah, said the suspects were members of Al-Qaeda who had plotted to carry out terrorist bombings in the oil-rich emirate.
Kuwait has put its security forces on full alert, and security measures around oil facilities and vital installations have been raised to the maximum.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:31:57 AM ||
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Pakistani Fighters from Afghanistan's ousted Taliban militia killed two policemen and wounded a district police chief in an ambush in the south of the country, a local official said on Tuesday. Azim Jan, the police chief of Ghorak district in Kandahar province, was travelling with his bodyguards from the city of Kandahar to Ghorak on Monday evening when Taliban militants attacked his convoy, the district governor Easa Jan told Reuters. Two of the bodyguards were killed and the police chief was wounded in the ensuing firefight, Easa Jan said. "We have launched an operation to arrest the attackers and bring them to justice," he said.
Taliban spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi said the militia had killed seven police in the attack and had possibly killed their commander. Two Taliban fighters were also killed, he told Reuters by satellite telephone. Another district police chief and three others were killed in the neighbouring province of Uruzgan on Saturday.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:29:41 AM ||
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The Foreign Mujahideen "Martyrs" of Iraq: '03-'04
Courtesy of: Evan Kohlmann
During 2003-2004, hundreds--perhaps thousands--of foreign fighters from across the Middle East, Asia, and even Europe traveled to Iraq to join Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and other militants in a jihad against the U.S. and its coalition allies.
These men include both trained Al-Qaida veterans from conflicts like Afghanistan, and Chechnya, and also less-experienced but still quite zealous young recruits. A Globalterroralert.com dossier is now available for download profiling a group of foreign mujahideen killed in Iraq during 2003-2004--including top commanders, reputed suicide bombers, and even one of the masked executioners of U.S. hostage Eugene Armstrong.
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/26/2005
12:29:05 PM ||
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#1
The best line comes right off the top:
Date of Death.
In nightly sermons broadcast on the Internet, Sheik Omar al-Bakri, a 46-year-old Syrian-born cleric, has urged young Muslim men all over the world to support the Iraq insurgency on the front line of "the global jihad," investigators say. He struck a similarly defiant tone this month at a rally attended by 500 people at a central London meeting hall, where a giant screen behind him showed images of the World Trade Center falling.
"Allahu akbar!" - "God is great!" - some audience members shouted at the images.
After eavesdropping for months on his nightly praise of the Sept.-11 hijackers and of suicide bombings, Scotland Yard said last week that it was investigating Bakri, the leader of Al Muhajiroun, Britain's largest Muslim group, and officials are exploring whether they can deport him.
The more aggressive approach toward the sheik is part of stepped-up surveillance of militant mosques in several countries, including Germany and France. French officials deported an imam this month after officials said he was inspiring men to jihad.
One major concern, officials say, is that more heated religious rhetoric is encouraging young men to leave home to fight in Iraq. Although the dimensions of the recruitment effort from Europe to Iraq are not clear, there are indications that it is intensifying.
On Sunday, the German police arrested a man suspected of being a member of Al Qaeda and charged him with recruiting men to carry out suicide bombings in Iraq. These arrests were part of an ongoing investigation in cooperation with the United States of recruitment and other terrorist activities in Europe. A senior German official said he was certain there would be additional arrests of militants inside the country who have set up sophisticated recruitment and smuggling networks that lead to Iraq.
Italian investigators say several recruits from Italy carried out bombing attacks in Baghdad. Swiss officials say they are concerned that several militant clerics have openly urged men to become terrorists. And in Jordan, a gateway to Iraq for some foreign fighters, senior officials say they have arrested several dozen men in recent weeks who intended to cross the Iraqi border to serve as foreign fighters.
Bohre Eddine Benvahia, the 33-year-old imam recently deported by France to Algeria, had urged young men in a working-class neighborhood of L'Ariane, outside Nice, to join jihad, French intelligence officials said.
Bakri did not return repeated phone calls over the past several days. Last week, he denied in several interviews that he had urged people to become foreign fighters in Iraq, saying his comments had been taken out of context. "I believe Muslims are obliged to support their Muslim brothers abroad - verbally, financially, politically," Bakri said in an interview with The Associated Press. "I never said, 'Go abroad.' But if people want to go abroad, it's a very good thing to do. But we never recruit people to go abroad."
News of the central London rally, which was first reported by United Press International, and portions of the sheik's nightly Internet sermons, have alarmed senior British officials. In one sermon last week, Bakri called Al Qaeda "the victorious group" that he said Muslims were "obliged" to join.
Home Secretary Charles Clarke has asked officials to investigate relocating him to Syria or Lebanon. Like their counterparts in Britain, counterterrorism officials in Germany said they had seen indications of an increase in attempts by groups there to recruit fighters to travel to Iraq to fight. Some men in recent weeks have planned to go to Iraq to carry out suicide bombing missions, the officials said.
In the arrest on Sunday, prosecutors said a man they identified as Ibrahim Mohamed K. , a 29-year-old Iraqi from Mainz, Germany, had persuaded a 31-year-old man, named Yasser Abu S., to go to Iraq on a suicide bombing mission. Prosecutors said Yasser Abu S. intended to fake his death in a car accident in Egypt and use the life insurance proceeds to pay for Qaeda activities in Germany as well as his travel expenses to Iraq, where he planned to carry out a suicide bombing attack. The surnames of suspects in criminal cases are not disclosed in Germany. "Stopping recruitment for Iraq where they may do harm to U.S. troops is our highest priority, and the Germans and other European governments are cooperating," a senior U.S. counterterrorism official based in Europe said in an interview with The New York Times and the PBS program "Frontline." He said that a would-be suicide bomber intending to travel to Baghdad was arrested early last fall in Germany. German officials said they were worried that recruitment had intensified there in recent months.
Last October, the International Institute for Strategic Studies estimated that 1,000 "foreign fighters" had entered Iraq to join the insurgency, although U.S. military officials in Iraq have acknowledged that they are unsure of the numbers of outside fighters. In raids in several German cities on Jan. 12, the German police arrested 22 people suspected of being militant Muslims while recovering dozens of forged passports and boxes of militant propaganda. A senior German law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that many of the arrested men are members of Ansar al-Islam, who were recruiting young men to go to Iraq.
Counterterrorism officials view some militant European mosques as a link in the Iraq recruiting chain, just as they came to see the importance of Al Quds Mosque in Hamburg in the formation of the Qaeda cell led by Mohamed Atta, the leading hijacker in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States. Officials say that in some countries, their efforts to control activities at mosques are hampered by laws that protect religious expression and restrict what they can do to stop hateful speech. British officials say that if they want to deport an imam who they fear is inciting violence, the proceedings can often take months or even years to wind through the court system.
In Britain, where 1.8 million Muslims live, elected officials are demanding that the police move quickly. In the months after Sept. 11, pressure built for Britain to move against outspoken imams. But it was not until last May that British officials arrested the most high-profile militant cleric, Abu Hamza al-Masri of the Finsbury Park mosque in north London. He was charged with encouraging others to murder people who did not believe in the Islamic faith. Now leading the mosque is another militant Muslim, Abu Abdullah, who said in an interview, "People see us as extremists because we don't compromise the religion of Allah."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:28:04 AM ||
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#1
I saw these guys interviewed last night. They are rabid dogs that need to be put down asap.
Condoleezza Rice won easy confirmation Wednesday to be President Bush's new secretary of state, despite strong dissent from a small group of Democrats who said she shares blame for mistakes and war deaths in Iraq. The Senate voted 85 to 13 to confirm Rice, who succeeds Colin Powell as America's top diplomat and becomes the first black woman to hold the job. Plans were made for her to be sworn in at the White House Wednesday night, take her place in the State Department Thursday morning and have a more elaborate swearing-in by Bush at the agency on Friday. The Senate vote showed some of the partisanship that delayed Rice's confirmation vote by several days. Twelve Democrats and independent James Jeffords of Vermont voted against Rice. The Democrats included some of the Senate's best-known members such as Massachusetts Democratic Sens. Edward M. Kennedy and John Kerry, who was the party's presidential candidate in last year's election. Thirty Democrats voted for her.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
12:25:37 PM ||
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#1
I would look for a lot of votes to be around this count over the next couple of years. I was hoping that Boxer would break down in tears again and then stamp her feet. But I think Byrd and Teddy gave good performances.
#2
Over at DU, the moonbats are cursing any Dem who voted to confirm -- Barack Obama in particular -- as a sellout and a traitor and worse. One poster is touting Evan Bayh as Wesley Clark's (!) running mate for '08 because he was "courageous" enough to vote against Condi.
Condi in '08 -- Moonbatti delinda est!
Posted by: Mike ||
01/26/2005 12:50
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#3
"and John Kerry, who was the party's presidential candidate in last year's election"
He's getting closer to being a mere footnote with each passing week.
Posted by: Tom ||
01/26/2005 12:55
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#4
Good for Obama. The Senate's still no place to launch a presidential bid, but the young fella's showing a degree of intelligence that's rarely found among his elders in the Dem Party.
#5
Obama's a decent, honorable, rational member of the loyal opposition. Look for the moonbats to go after him with a vengeance -- with Robert Byrd (D-KKK) perhaps taking the lead.
Posted by: Mike ||
01/26/2005 13:21
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#6
Has Obama made any public statements about Condi? he should speak up, and start positioning himself as the rational alternative to Teddy/Kerry/Pelosi/Byrd
#7
Voted AGAINST:
Barbara Boxer, D-Calif.
Robert Byrd, D-W.Va.
Edward Kennedy, D-Mass.
John Kerry, D-Mass.
Carl Levin, D-Mich.
James Jeffords, I-Vt.
Jack Reed, D-R.I
Mark Dayton, D-Minn.
Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii
Evan Bayh, D-Ind.
Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J.
Tom Harkin, D-Iowa
Richard Durbin, D-Ill.
Posted by: Tom ||
01/26/2005 14:19
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#8
Any chance of a headline tomorrow that reads "MASS SENATORS OPPOSE FIRST BLACK, FEMALE SEC STATE"?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/26/2005 14:29
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#9
lex, Obama spoke rather well during her hearings.
Kleagle, Dayton and Bayh all need to be remembered for this.
#14
Obama, known to Ginrose Ted as Osama (heh!) sounds like an independent thinker. The democrats desparately need people like him to survive politically and not go the way of the Whigs, for instance. If they give Obama too much crap, they will drive him to become a true independent or even a republican.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
01/26/2005 15:39
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#15
What? Comrad Murray (D-Wa) isn't on the list? I'm shocked!
#16
So Hilary voted Yes. As did DiFi, of course. And Chuck Schumer. And Lieberman, of course. And even Babs Mikulski. Obama was hardly alone, by any means.
Only disappointment was Evan Bayh. Angling for the Dean vote in 2008?
#17
I hope so, AP, but Obama, Osama, come on pretty mama seems more like a typical mainstream Dem. Not a radical leftist like Boxer or Kerry, but not a centrist like Miller or (I hope) Salazar, either.
#21
DiFi is up for re-election in 2006. Unlike Babs 'Crybaby' Boxer she won't have Kerry's coattails to ride into office. Nothing against DiFi she is the smarter and more resonable of our two Commisars. I do hope the Republicans find somebody that can beat her, but i doubt it. The guy who ran against Boxer last year was on EVERY side of every issue and never took a stand. Kind of a Republican Kerry without the accent or money.
#22
Jim Jeffords true colors are coming through. Can't believe this guy used to call himself a Republican.
Posted by: Billy Hank ||
01/26/2005 19:07
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#23
Moonbat is then a default-masculine noun, Sobiesky? I would have assumed default-feminine, but its Trailing Daughter who is studying the language, not me. ;-)
#24
TW, since it is a species that split/devolved from Homo Sapiens, then default-masculine would be in order. Of course, many fembats are represented, I would venture a guess that it is about 50 % of their population.
#25
I would guess that a fair percentage of the male moonbatus share a lot of common sensibilities (fashion sense? hairstyles?) with the females
;-)~
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 20:35
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#26
Frank, usually also they indulge in all sorts of perforations with external implants, very often rings. Perhaps an expression of their yearning to be domesticated?
That would explain their leaning towards Islamofascists, as they may be perceived as ideal domesticators and excellent butchers.
#30
At the pleading of my mother, some clarification:
Moonbatus is a second declension noun that can be used as either masculine or feminine depending on the subject, similar to canis, canis, m./f. The adjective delendus would therefore match the the noun in gender, so that depending on the subject described it would either be delendus or delenda. If you were anal about getting all the possible information into one sentence, I believe you would have to put in the pronoun illa, meaning she, or illus, meaning he. However, when we're talking about the Moonbatus delendus species, it would by default be masculine. So Sobiesky is right.
I'm currently carrying a 94 percent in my Latin I class. Were it not for the fact that I lose my homework my teacher would have entreated me to move up to Latin II. But I digress.
Posted by: Trailing daughter of the trailing wife ||
01/26/2005 22:00
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#31
Sobiesky, when you talk about perforations, implants and rings, you mean like this guy?
Posted by: Dave D. ||
01/26/2005 22:16
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#32
Ladies and germs, you see what I am up against here at home. And she is only 14. And has a younger sister. God help their husbands.
To conclude, Mike's sentence then should read either Moonbatus delendus illus est.
or Moonbatus delenda illa est.
1. 'delendus' is a future gerundive participle, not an adjective.
The translation is roughly:
Moonbat must be erased.
Compare: Carthago delenda est.
(Cities/towns were female-default)
2. Since we are talking a species, default is masculine, as already agreed. There is not need to insert pronouns, they are used only when you point out something (with your index finger as it were, an emphasis, but then it will be in the first place in the sentence). It is often used when the noun has been mentioned in the previous sentence/paragraph and you don't want to repeat it as the context is clear.
So,
Moonbatus femina delenda est, in the case you want to make it clear that a single fembat is what you have on mind, or in plural: Moonbatus feminae delendae sunt.
#38
Hmmm, I just did a long article about why the Dummycritters are in a death spiral from 50k to zero with no intelligent control, and then they do something like this in the Senate and verify everything I said. I also fisked Ted Kennedy's speech to the National Press CurbClub a little farther down (Ted Kennedy Wrong about Everything - again). Either yesterday or today, old Jonah sKerry was caught carrying bourbon and water for Kennedy on his Medicare for Everyone fiasco. You can only look at the Dummycritters and weep - that it's taking too long for these idiots to die off! The Dinosaurs went quickly, why can't these morons?
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/26/2005 23:06
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#39
spite?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 23:07
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#40
read your post Mike. "The Democratic Party is still living in the 1960's. After 9/11, the 60's era politics have no relevance to the world we all have to live in"
true, but the primaries they have to win in - that's the activists, so you have a guy like Bayh, who's been fairly centrist and reasonable, shifting to his left to have a chance in the primaries in '08. That will undo him and others with the general electorate if the Reps offer a feasible acceptable alternative. They kill themselves until they realize their base SUCKS in the eyes of most Americans
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 23:12
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#41
Dave D., yup, although it is usually somewhat milder version. This one is screaming "domesticate me!" from the top of his lungs.
#42
Sobiesky, I'll pass that information on to trailing daughter. She assumed without checking that delendus derived from whatever Latin word means lunatic, lit. Crazy Moonbat and took it from there, basing her argument on the formation of the species name homo sapian. She really is bad about forgetting her homework -- we've been fighting it for years. Probably one reason she's so good at this stuff is that she has to quickly re-do it so very often. (And of course, its approximately the 7th foreign language she's been exposed to, the 3rd she's studied formally, which makes it easier.) But it is lots of fun, so that's ok.
As for Dave D's picture, I'm surprised all that weight of metal hasn't caused his face to literally fall of his skull. (Ick)
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
01/26/2005
12:24:55 PM ||
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#1
It would have helped if I posted the pic too!
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
01/26/2005 12:54
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#2
Awesome!
Posted by: The Doctor ||
01/26/2005 14:05
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#3
I would respectfully suggest one addition to those great photos: a nice aftermath backdrop of a suicide bombing behind the photos-giving clear context for why the figure on the left is who we strive to be.
Looks like Mokhtar Belmokhtar is trying to rally what's left of the group in an effort to prevent it from folding into irrelevance like the GIA has. Algerian Islamic militants, stepping up attacks in recent weeks, have killed two policemen and injured one civilian in the restive Berber region east of the Algerian capital, media reported on Tuesday. Rebels suspected of belonging to the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) attacked a foot patrol on Monday evening in Tizi Ghenif, a town some 100 km (60 miles) southeast of the capital Algiers, El Watan and other newspapers said.
The government has also proposed bringing in an amnesty for rebels if they surrender. However, analyst Mahmoud Belhimer said the fact that the attacks were continuing, showed the country was still unstable. "Attacks seem to have risen compared with recent months. This shows that the terrorist threat still exists and remains a factor of continued instability for Algeria," editor and university professor Belhimer told Reuters. "Unfortunately killing is part of these people's daily activities. It won't stop overnight," he said.
A soldier in civilian clothes was killed on Saturday evening when militants stopped a bus at a fake road block in the same region, known as a rebel hotbed. Suspected members of the GSPC, aligned to al Qaeda and listed by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organisation, dressed as soldiers then set the bus alight and robbed passengers. Police estimate that between 300 and 500 rebels remain active, but many are believed to want to surrender if authorities offer an amnesty. Several hundred were killed or surrendered last year.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:24:36 AM ||
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Dhaka yesterday dismissed a report published in the New York Times (NYT) Magazine headlined 'The Next Islamic Revolution?" as one-sided, baseless and politically motivated.
Bangladesh's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury has already sent a rejoinder to the NYT refuting the allegations in the story, saying it is 'baseless, partial and misleading'.
"We are saddened that the report is one-sided. It would not be unusual for the motive behind this report to be political," said Zahirul Haq, director general of the foreign ministry's external publicity wing.
"Nearly 1,400 foreign journalists visited Bangladesh in the last three years. Reports by only three or four of them have been regrettable," Haq said referring to a portion of the January 23 report that claims, "Foreign journalists in Bangladesh are followed by intelligence agents; people that reporters interview are questioned afterwards."
The report narrates, "It is possible to travel through Bangladesh and observe the increased political and religious repression in everyday life. The global war on terror is aimed at making the rise of regimes like that of the Taliban impossible, but in Bangladesh, the trend could be going the other way."
Referring to such statements Haq said, "The NYT reporter came a long way but failed to portray the real picture of Bangladesh," adding, "To suggest Bangladesh is becoming a Taliban country is humorous at best and is the result of ill-motives."
He termed the report's allusion to government collusion with Bangla Bhai and his organisation -- Jagrata Muslim Janata -- motivated and said, "The first secretary of US Embassy in Dhaka visited the area mentioned in the report and found no consolidated existence of Bangla Bhai following there."
"Bangla Bhai gained the support of the local police -- until the central government, worried that Bangla Bhai's band might be getting out of control, ordered his arrest in late May," reads the report.
The author, Eliza Griswold, a freelance writer, also says in her report, "The Bangladeshi government's arrest warrant doesn't seem to have made much difference, although for now Bangla Bhai refrains from public appearances."
On these points, Haq said the government is determined to tackle these issues and has already arrested 66 operatives of Bangla Bhai.
"The author of the report chose a single village, Bagmara, out of the 70,000 villages here. The situation there does not represent all of Bangladesh," he added.
The report says, "Last Spring, Bangla Bhai, whose followers probably number around 10,000, decided to try an Islamist revolution in several provinces of Bangladesh that border India."
But Haq questioned the very credibility of the report: "Since there is a question mark in the headline, it suggests the author herself is not clear and confident about the subject matter."
"It is not right to judge a country on the basis of one aberration," he added.
The report also says the ruling coalition partner Jamaat-e-Islami is "socially conservative and unafraid of violence," and referring to the coalition's incumbency it adds, "Since 2001, a politically aggressive form of Islam has found, for the first time since independence, a strong place at the top of Bangladeshi politics."
The report quotes coalition leader and Islamic Oikya Jote Chairman Mufti Fazlul Haque Amini as saying in an interview that he had not been appointed as a government minister as the West and Bangladesh would see him as an extremist.
The report also cites Indian intelligence documents to suggest that Amini is a member of the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (Huji) and says Huji is linked to Al-Qaeda and that there are rumours that Amini is a 'good friend' to the Afghan Talibans.
Refuting such claims Haq said, "This report has saddened us, but it will not be able to tarnish the international image and fame of Bangladesh."
The report also quotes Amnesty International's Bangladesh specialist Govind Acharya as saying Hindus, Ahmadiyyas and tribal peoples are leaving the country feeling less safe, a phenomenon problematic for the identity and the future of this country.
The author alleges that the permissiveness of certain sections of the government and the police allow Bangla Bhai and 'other groups' to continue repression of the minorities and communists.
But Haq rejected all these claims saying, "The people of Bangladesh are committed to democracy and Bangladesh has achieved great progress in social indicators highly appreciated in the international forum." He added that Bangladesh's active participation in that forum means its image would not be damaged so easily.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:22:16 AM ||
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#1
Somebody is telling the truth, I suppose. Oh, well... who wants some popcorn?
Twenty-three terrorism suspects tried to hang or strangle themselves during a weeklong protest orchestrated in 2003 to disrupt operations and unnerve new guards at the U.S. military camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the U.S. military said Monday. Officials hadn't previously reported the incidents, which the military called ``self-injurious behavior'' aimed at getting attention rather than serious suicide attempts. The coordinated attempts were among 350 ``self-harm'' incidents that year, including 120 so-called ``hanging gestures,'' at the secretive prison that opened after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to Lt. Col. Leon Sumpter, a spokesman for the detention mission.
In the Aug. 18-26, 2003, protest, nearly two dozen prisoners tried to hang or strangle themselves with clothing and other items in their cells, demonstrating ``self-injurious behavior,'' the U.S. Southern Command in Miami said in a statement. Ten detainees made a mass attempt on Aug. 22 alone. Last year, there were 110 self-harm incidents, Sumpter said. The 23 prisoners were in steel mesh cells and they can talk to neighbors. It would not have been possible to pass notes, and they are allowed to exercise only one at a time. Only two of the 23 were considered suicide attempts - incidents requiring hospitalization and psychiatric treatment. Officials said they differentiated between a suicide attempt in which a detainee could have died without intervention, and a ``gesture'' aimed at getting attention.
Sixteen of the 23 remain at Guantanamo; seven have been transferred to other countries. The military has reported 34 suicide attempts since the camp opened in January 2002, including one prisoner who went into a coma and sustained memory loss from brain damage. The 2003 protests came as the camp suffered a rash of suicide attempts after Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller took command. Miller had a mandate to get more information from prisoners accused of links to al-Qaeda or Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime, which had sheltered Osama bin Laden. Critics linked the two and criticized the delay in reporting the incidents. ``When you have suicide attempts or so-called self-harm incidents, it shows the type of impact indefinite detention can have,'' said Alistair Hodgett, a spokesman for Amnesty International in Washington, D.C. "But it also points to the extreme measures the Pentagon is taking to cover up things that have happened in Guantanamo. ``What we've seen is that it wasn't simply a rotation of forces (guards) but an attempt to toughen up the interrogation techniques and processes,'' he added.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:20:47 AM ||
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#1
they should be held until the mahdi comes,the twelfth iman reappears or until the twelfth of never--which ever comes first
Posted by: SON OF TOLUI ||
01/26/2005 1:58
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#2
Send 'em out here to Oregon...we have assisted suicide and if they are that unhappy to be alive I am pretty sure we can find some liberal Dr. here to help them out...
Posted by: dave ||
01/26/2005 2:15
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#3
"Some 558 prisoners are at Guantanamo Bay" Many have been permitted to remain alive more than three years after their capture as illegal combatants, a status which in earlier times would have resulted in their immediate execution at the places where they were captured.
#7
Someone should ask the Saudis how they make their prison fires look like accidents or get some Bangladeshi cops some part time gigs down there as guards.
EFL: MoveOn.org, the online liberal advocacy group, threw its weight into the race for the Democratic National Committee chairmanship by announcing a plan Tuesday for state-by-state endorsements from its nearly 3 million members. The move is expected to help chairman candidate Howard Dean, who finished first in a 2003 straw poll of MoveOn members during his unsuccessful bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Go, Howie, go!
The plan also reflects MoveOn's determination to institutionalize its influence over within the Democratic Party. Founded to protest President Clinton's impeachment in 1998, the group has become one of the party's most farout wacko influential liberal voices, and most effective fundraisers, on a wide range of issues. Dean is generally considered the front-runner in a DNC race that also includes former Reps. Martin Frost of Texas and Tim Roemer of Indiana, former Denver Mayor Wellington Webb, party operative Donnie Fowler, former Ohio party Chairman David Leland, and Simon Rosenberg, president of the centrist New Democrat Network. On Tuesday, the former Vermont governor won the support of several African American members of the DNC — Yvonne Atkinson Gates, who heads the committee's black caucus; Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. of Illinois; and Minyon Moore, a former Clinton White House aide.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
12:20:38 PM ||
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#1
"...Minyon Moore, a former Clinton White House aide."
#2
This DU Article shows how out of touch the Dems really have become. You'll notice that every time a law is passed against gay marriage a judge overturns the will of the people. These are presented as "progress" with voters. I am not sure if I would join a party that likes to overturn my vote at the ballot, it sounds too much like the National Socialist in 1939 and the Commies in 1917. They also swoon over the fact that the didn't lose any solidly Democratic seats to Republicans and that several Right leaning Dems got elected.
#8
I still love the answer given by the woman who, when asked who she was going to vote for, said, "I like that nice man, you know, the Dean of Howard College".
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/26/2005 15:39
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#9
I nominate Ted Turner for DNC Chairman. Howlin' Howie isn't crazy enough.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
01/26/2005 15:52
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#10
He ain't heavy, he's my brother.
Posted by: Hillary Clinton ||
01/26/2005 19:13
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Mir Jam Muhammad Yousaf, the Balochistan chief minister, has said he will not rule out the possibility that Iran or an extremist group is behind the recent disturbances in the province.
Talking to a private television, the chief minister said he suspected that either Iran, Al Qaeda or another foreign power or extremist groups opposed to the government's policies could have been involved in the recent attacks by tribesmen on gas installations in Sui.
A report in the Sunday Telegraph claimed Pakistani officials believed Iran was instigating an insurgency in Balochistan, but the Foreign Office has denied the report, saying it blames no foreign power for events in the province and has a very good relationship with Iran.
Yousaf said there was no military operation in progress in the province and the government had no plans to launch one either. He said security forces were only there to guard natural gas installations in Sui.
Tribal chiefs have said the attacks were sparked by public outrage at the alleged gang rape of a woman doctor by army personnel, but Yousaf said the incident had sparked no such public outrage. He said many women in other parts of the country had been subjected to such crimes, but never had there been such a reaction.
He said soon after getting wind of the crime, the provincial government was ready to take action against the alleged rapists, but Pakistan Petroleum Limited authorities denied police permission to question the victim.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:19:03 AM ||
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...Balochistan has become an important operational area for the dregs of Al Qaeda and the IIF in their attempts to hurt US economic interests in Pakistan in retaliation for the US war against the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and its campaign against the Saddam Hussein regime. They have been receiving assistance in their endeavours from the pro-Iraqi and anti-US segments of the Balochi tribals on both sides of the Pakistan-Iran border.
10. Since December last, there have been at least four attacks on the oil and gas infrastructure in Balochistan by unidentified elements. Available particulars of three of these incidents are given below:
Posted by: Pete Stanley ||
01/26/2005 1:05
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#2
khalid sheik mohammid [ne al baluchi] comes from baluchestan--his whole family ie his nephew ramzi yusef came from there--someone should start a forest fire, impute blame and start a tribal conflict--nothing like islamic red on red to warm the heart of a "great game" player--btw do they have forests?
Posted by: SON OF TOLUI ||
01/26/2005 1:48
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At least 11 Iraqi policemen were killed in fierce clashes on Tuesday in eastern Baghdad, a hospital official said, and gunmen assassinated a senior Iraqi judge in a series of slayings that highlight the grave security risks in the run-up to this weekend's elections.
Fighting erupted in Baghdad's eastern Rashad neighborhood as Iraqi police fired on insurgents who were handing out leaflets warning people not to vote in Sunday's national elections.
About the same time and in the same neighborhood, insurgents opened fire on police who were checking out a report of a possible car bomb. Altogether, 11 policemen were killed in the various clashes, according to an official at Kindi Hospital. On Monday, Iraqi authorities announced they had in custody an Al Qaeda lieutenant who confessed to masterminding most of the car bombings in Baghdad, including the bloody 2003 assault on the UN headquarters in the capital.
The slain judge was identified as Qais Hashim Shameri, secretary general of the judges council in the Justice Ministry. Assailants sprayed his car with bullets in an attack that also wounded the judge's driver.
Assailants also shot dead a man who worked for a district council in western Baghdad as he was on his way to work, police said.
In a third ambush, gunmen firing from a speeding car wounded three staffers from the Communications Ministry as they were going to work, police Lt Iyman Abdul-Hamid said. Attackers also shot dead the son of an Iraqi translator working with US troops, police said. A police colonel was also gunned down along with his 5-year-old daughter on Monday as he was driving in southern Baghdad, officials said on Tuesday.
Northeast of Baghdad, a US Bradley Fighting Vehicle rolled into a canal during a combat patrol, killing five American soldiers from the Army's 1st Infantry Division and wounding two others, the military said Tuesday. Another US soldier died of wounds from a roadside bomb that blasted an American patrol in Baghdad, the military said on Tuesday.
The Al Qaeda bombmaker in custody "confessed to building approximately 75 percent of the car bombs used in attacks in Baghdad" since the Iraq war began, according to the interim Iraqi prime minister's spokesman, Thaer al-Naqib. Sami Mohammed Ali Said al-Jaaf, also known as Abu Omar al-Kurdi, was captured on Jan 15, a government statement said on Monday.
It said Al-Jaaf was responsible for 32 car bombings, including the bombing of the United Nations headquarters that killed the top UN envoy in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello, and 21 other people.
US soldiers on Tuesday raided one of the biggest gas stations on Mosul's west side in search of the owner who they said they suspected of supplying fuel to insurgents in the restive northern Iraqi city.
Dozens of US soldiers from the 1st battalion 24th infantry regiment descended on Al-Nashima filling station in the Yarmuk neighbourhood, known as a haunt of insurgents, an AFP reporter witnessed.
A video distributed by insurgents showed an American citizen taken hostage by militants, putting the US administration under new pressure five days before Iraq's election. The videoshows a man identifying himself as US citizen Roy Hallams sitting crossed-legged on the floor against a black background and anxiously rubbing his hands together as he makes a desperate appeal to the camera.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:18:01 AM ||
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NEW YORK - HarperCollins Publishers Inc. Tuesday retracted allegations made in its book "The Terror Timeline" that accused a Saudi billionaire of helping fund al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, saying it now has no evidence of any such connection. The allegations were made against businessman Mohammed Hussein Al Amoudi, one of the world's richest men, in the book "The Terror Timeline" written by Paul Thompson and published by HarperCollins's ReganBooks imprint last September. They "were based on previously published reports that were subsequently retracted," the publisher said in a statement.
HarperCollins, owned by the Rupert Murdoch-controlled News Corp., declined to answer questions about its retraction. Neither the author or representatives for Al Amoudi were available for comment. The book had been released despite the fact that publishers elsewhere who had made similar allegations against Al Amoudi had retracted them after being sued.
"HarperCollins is aware of no evidence to suggest that Mr. Al Amoudi has ever supported, advocated, or financed Osama bin Laden, the al Qaeda terrorist network, terrorism or terrorist groups," the publisher added. HarperCollins said it would print an errata slip for copies in bookstores and said it would delete any reference to Al Amoudi in a revised printing of the book. The company's statement did not say whether it would pay damages.
Sounds like a first-class screw-up on vetting. Wonder if Mary Mapes was involved?
On Jan. 27, 2004, British publisher Pluto Press withdrew from circulation its book "Reaping the Whirlwind Afghanistan," which made almost identical allegations against Al Amoudi. In its retraction, Pluto said, its allegations constituted "an extremely serious defamation of Mr. Al Amoudi." The publisher said it had agreed to pay "substantial damages."
Several large American newspapers, including USA Today and the Boston Herald, have corrected articles about Al Amoudi's business connections or alleged links to funding terror.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/26/2005
12:17:27 AM ||
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#1
... or maybe he threatened to sue them in the UK, where the truth is not a defense.
#2
he definitely threatened to sue them for libel in england where he also lives-- he wears a "golden chain" bigger than mr. T--fred--will you accept service of process for me?
Posted by: SON OF TOLUI ||
01/26/2005 2:52
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#3
Well there might be something about smoke being where fire is buried someplace in this story but it is behind this story perhaps.
The Philippine government will deport a Saudi man arrested in the southern Philippines on suspicion of having terror links. He was tagged as a financier for the militant group Abu Sayyaf, blamed by authorities for a spate of bombings and kidnappings in the strife-torn region, officials said yesterday.
Airport police and immigration agents, backed by marine soldiers, arrested Mohammad Abdullah Sughayer at the Zamboanga City International Airport when he arrived from Manila on Jan. 17, after his name was included in the government's watch list.
Filipino Immigration chief Alipio Fernandez said the Saudi national was positively identified by a detained militant Muhammad Umug as one of the financiers of Abu Sayyaf chieftain Khadaffy Janjalani.
Authorities linked Umug to a series of bomb attacks in the southern Philippines.
"Sughayer has been positively identified by one neutralized member of the Abu Sayyaf Muhammad Umog as the one who is also giving financial support to Janjalani's family (in Basilan island)," Fernandez said at a news conference yesterday in Manila.
Television footage yesterday also showed the heavily bearded Sughayer, clad in a dark-colored shirt and pants, covering his face with a newspaper while avoiding dozens of reporters and photographers, who waited for him at the immigration office in Manila. Two security men were spotted escorting Sughayer.
Police intelligence chief Ismael Rafanan cleared the foreigner and said they had no evidence to link him to Al-Qaeda or terrorist groups in the southern Philippines. "He is not a member of the Al-Qaeda and he is not a terrorist," Rafanan told reporters in Manila. But Fernandez said he would still deport Sughayer. "We have reports from the intelligence community about Sughayer, we should be extra careful here and we will deport him back to Saudi Arabia," Fernandez told Arab News.
He said Sughayer remains in the immigration blacklist and had violated immigration laws. "Sughayer is also facing administrative charges and enough grounds to expel him," he said without elaborating.
Sughayer, who claimed to be a businessman, was initially interrogated in Zamboanga City, but flown back to Manila a day after his arrest where he was further investigated. He was in Indonesia before he entered the Philippines, authorities said. A local newspaper Sunstar Zamboanga on Monday ran a story about Sughayer and linked him to the Al-Qaeda network. It said the man, described as a wealthy businessman, traveled to Zambonga to link up or help finance the terror activities of the local militant group Abu Sayyaf, tagged by authorities as behind the series of bombings, killings and kidnappings in the southern Philippines.
It quoted unnamed security sources as saying that Sughayer was an Abu Sayyaf financier. Other reports said Sughayer is the finance officer of the Al-Qaeda cells in Southeast Asia. He allegedly put up several non-governmental organizations in the Philippines which authorities said are being used to channel funds to terrorists in the south.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:16:52 AM ||
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#1
"Beat it. Don't come back. Our next conversation will be extremely short, and one-sided."
TEAMS of suicide bombers are heading from Baghdad to pick off soft targets in the British-controlled south of Iraq in the run-up to the country's elections, British forces believe.
Militants are also known to be crossing into Iraq from Kuwait, and there are reports of Semtex plastic explosives and other even more sophisticated weapons being smuggled across the Iranian border.
British forces have been put on alert and warned to be aware of the risk posed by suicide bombers ahead of the country's first democratic elections on Sunday.
Troops involved in policing the 80-mile border with Kuwait have mounted operations to attempt to stop terrorists crossing into the country, but some are believed to have managed to breach the defensive ditches and electric fences.
Soldiers serving with UK forces in Basra say they are concerned about the threat of more suicide bombings, after nine soldiers were injured in an attack on the main British base at Shaibah, near Basra, last week.
Suicide attacks on British troops based at Camp Dogwood in central Iraq last year led to a change in tactics.
British officers say the Sunni terrorists behind the attacks are becoming more professional, and although they still operate predominantly in and around Baghdad, they are increasingly capable of moving further afield to mount operations.
One officer said yesterday there had been reports of more attempts to move suicide-bomb teams south towards Basra, and soldiers said they believed Basra was now seen as a softer target.
British forces have been heavily involved in securing Iraq's borders with Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iran, working with Iraq's Department of Border Enforcement to plug many of the gaps.
Major Alan Richmond, the second in command of the Queen's Dragoon Guards, said that despite the army's good work there was evidence that extremists and weapons materials were still getting through.
"We have done some operations against militants coming in from Kuwait," he said, though he declined to elaborate.
He said that, while Iraq was already awash with guns, it was clear that more sophisticated weapons, including Semtex, were still getting in across the Iranian border.
The more porous Saudi and Syrian borders also remain a cause for concern.
The question of security is expected to play a significant role in turn-out for Sunday's elections, with one of the terrorists of most concern to coalition forces, al-Qaeda-linked Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, already warning that anyone going to the polls to vote is putting their life on the line.
But at Shalamacheh yesterday, the only official border crossing into Iran, people planning to vote said they would not be put off by the threats. Osama Abdul Karim, 30, from Basra, said he intended to vote for Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani's coalition, despite the warnings.
"I am not scared about voting. We are going to vote anyway," he said. "Iraqis are not scared of these people coming in from outside. We need the election for the future. The election must succeed."
A SURVIVOR of a suicide bomb attack on British troops has spoken publicly for the first time about the moment the bomber struck.
Lieutenant Huw Longmore, 27, told how the bombers, who had travelled from Fallujah, planned to video the attack on a British checkpoint and how his squadron of light tanks headed them off, only for the bomber to detonate his device next to their vehicles.
He described how his driver, Trooper Lee Williams, was saved from taking the full force by luck, ducking down to pick up his rifle just as the bomb went off.
"His back was covered in flecks of suicide bomber," he said. "I felt the heat and the blast and there was black smoke everywhere."
Lt Longmore, from Cardiff, was a member of the 100-strong force of Queen's Dragoon Guards sent to Camp Dogwood near Baghdad.
The incident happened on 17 November.
Lt Longmore said he would like to know more about what had driven the bomber to carry out the attack.
"He was just a normal guy, about 20 to 30," he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:15:33 AM ||
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Security agents have detained seven people suspected of being part of a network funneling French Islamic militants to Iraq, police said Tuesday. Two of the seven were women, according to the television station LCI. The seven, whose names were not released, were arrested Monday in Paris, the police said. Under France's anti-terrorism law, they can be held for up to four days before being released or placed under investigation.
On September 22, judicial authorities opened an investigation to determine whether a network for sending Islamic combatants to Iraq exists in France. The investigation was opened after the bodies of several French were discovered in recent months in Iraq. Experts in France have said in the past that they do not believe there is a substantial France-based network to help Muslim extremists make their way to Iraq to fight U.S.-led multinational forces there. However, there have been numerous arrests of suspected al Qaeda-linked cells in France. Six people are on trial in Paris in connection with an alleged al Qaeda-inspired plot to bomb the U.S. Embassy there. In neighboring Germany, numerous arrests linked to Iraq have been made recently. On Sunday, German security forces arrested two alleged al Qaeda members, an Iraqi and a Palestinian, accused of plotting an attack in Iraq. Earlier this month, German police arrested 22 people to break up an alleged network of Muslim extremists suspected of falsifying passports and spreading militant Islamic propaganda.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:14:23 AM ||
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In an important victory for a Yemeni sheik charged with financing terrorism, a federal judge yesterday prevented prosecutors from introducing what they have described as vital evidence during their initial presentation to the jury. The judge in federal court in Brooklyn, Sterling Johnson Jr., ruled that the prosecutors cannot display three items they have said are their only corroboration for secretly recorded conversations in which they say the sheik and an aide plotted to take money for terrorist organizations. In arguing unsuccessfully to persuade the judge to change his mind, a prosecutor, Kelly Moore, said the items the judge barred yesterday were "a significant part of the government's evidence in this case."
The ruling was important because the items the judge banned were the prosecutors' only way of proving that the defendants' supposed plan to take money for Al Qaeda and Hamas was part of a long-running effort to provide financial support to terrorist organizations. The sheik, Mohammed Ali Hassan al-Moayad, 56, and his aide, Mohammed Mohsen Yahya Zayed, 31 are charged with conspiracy and providing financial support for Al Qaeda and Hamas. The ruling, which created palpable anxiety among the prosecutors, said the prosecutors cannot show jurors an application of a mujahedeen fighter for entry into an Al Qaeda training camp. The prosecutors said the application, found in Afghanistan in 2001, listed Sheik Moayad as the fighter's sponsor. The ruling also stopped prosecutors from introducing into evidence address books taken from two Muslim fighters in Bosnia in 1996. The prosecutors said the books included entries for Sheik Moayad. Judge Johnson said that "we don't know what the source" of the Al Qaeda application was and that the address books were from a time too remote from the alleged fund-raising by the sheik in 2003. Judge Johnson said they dated back to before Al Qaeda was listed as a terrorist organization by the United States government.
The third item he banned during the prosecution's initial presentation was a videotape of a wedding in Yemen that the prosecutors said included images of Sheik Moayad cheering about the death of Jews in a Hamas terrorist attack in Israel. Focusing on a central vulnerability for the prosecutors, Judge Johnson noted that the videotape was taken by the prosecution's main informer, Mohamed Alanssi. Mr. Alanssi drew attention to a history that included bad debts and legal troubles when he set himself on fire outside the White House in November. After that act, the prosecutors suggested they would not call Mr. Alanssi as a witness. Yesterday, Judge Johnson said the prosecutors could not show the wedding videotape unless Mr. Alanssi testified. "If the informant wants to come in and testify as to what he saw and observed, I'll allow it," Judge Johnson said from the bench. Pressed by Judge Johnson, Ms. Moore said more definitively than she has before that the prosecutors were "not planning" to call Mr. Alanssi as a witness.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:12:40 AM ||
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#1
Is that your traditional curved throat-cutting dagger, or are you just glad to see me?
The commander of U.S. forces in central and northern Iraq said Tuesday that he cannot guarantee the safety of Iraqis on election day, despite months of training Iraqi forces.
"I wouldn't begin to say that," said Maj. Gen. John Batiste, commander of the 1st Infantry Division, when asked whether voters would be able to cast ballots safely Sunday. "But Iraqi forces are setting them (elections) up well for success."
U.S. forces, about 22,000 soldiers in Batiste's area of responsibility, will be ready to help if violence mars election day.
Interim Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi conceded Tuesday that Iraqi forces will need U.S. assistance for the time being. Allawi said Iraq must build up its security forces to confront insurgents. "I will not set final dates" for the withdrawal of international forces "because setting final dates will be futile and dangerous," he said.
Allawi discussed preparations for the elections with President Bush, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.
In Tikrit, Batiste said he was particularly concerned about someone setting off a bomb as people walk to polling stations. "It's very possible there will be some of that, the suicide vests and everything," he said.
Batiste said he expected the biggest threat to come from al-Qaeda supporters, some of whom back Jordanian-born terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Batiste said those groups may launch large attacks early on election day or on Saturday to scare away voters.
There also are worries that some Iraqi security personnel guarding the polling places may be insurgents, Batiste said.
He said he expects trouble in particular in Samarra and Beiji, where Iraqi security services are weakest. Nine attacks Tuesday on U.S. and Iraqi forces in Samara were about double the usual number, he said.
Violence elsewhere claimed the lives of six U.S. soldiers and nine Iraqis. Among the incidents:
Northeast of Baghdad, a U.S. Bradley Fighting Vehicle rolled into a canal during a combat patrol near the town of Khan Bani Saad late Monday. Five soldiers from the Army's 1st Infantry Division were killed and two were wounded, the U.S. military said Tuesday. Another U.S. soldier died of wounds from a roadside bomb in Baghdad, the U.S. military said.
Three policemen were killed and nine injured in three incidents in Baghdad's eastern Rashad neighborhood. Police fired on insurgents who were handing out leaflets warning people not to vote. Insurgents fired on police who were checking on a possible car bomb. And gunmen fired on Iraqi and U.S. forces responding to a bombing at a secondary school.
Assailants fired on the car of Qais Hashim Shameri, secretary general of the judges council in the Justice Ministry. Shameri and his driver were killed. The Ansar al-Sunnah Army, an insurgent group, claimed responsibility.
Also Tuesday, an American hostage was shown pleading for his life in a videotape broadcast on Al-Jazeera television.
Roy Hallums, 56, said he had been arrested because "I have worked with American forces." Hallums was seized Nov. 1 with Filipino Robert Tarongoy from their compound in Baghdad. They worked for a Saudi company.
At least 10 Americans have been taken hostage. Only one has escaped.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:10:58 AM ||
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I think this is the site
THE US Defence Department has been asked to investigate a website being used by American soldiers to post grisly pictures of Iraqi war dead.
The site, which has been operating for more than a year, describes itself as "an online archive of soldiers' photos".
Dozens of pictures of decapitated and limbless bodies are featured on the site with tasteless captions, purportedly sent in by soldiers.
Captions include "plastic surgery needed", "road kill" and "I said dead".
Australian expat Iraqis, most of whom supported the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, have been angered by the website and called on the US government to ensure it was taken down.
US President George Bush in 2003 demanded the Iraqi military not release photographs of US war prisoners for publication and the Pentagon has banned publication of pictures of coffins containing US war dead being transported back to America.
Australian Iraqi Forum president Dr Riadh al-Mahaidi said: "It is abhorrent to see gruesome pictures of dead bodies in Iraq posted on this offending website.
"It is no less cruel and sickening than web postings by terrorist groups of decapitated bodies of kidnapped victims."
#4
I wish the website would give estimates on the total number of insurgents killed. I'm still looking for any knid of info or the sort. Maybe if we broadcast to the Muj recruiters just what the life expectancy of their volunteers would be their sales pitch would be a little watered down.
The MSM is hurting us by only showing Coalition fatalities by showing the enemy they can hurt us.
#5
There is a different website that routinely posts gruesome photos of American dead, as well as of Iraqis and anyone else who has fallen victim to violence.
Many of the pictures of dead Americans appear to have been taken by Americans, including a set that appears to show the preparation of dead bodies in a military morgue.
This is an egregious violation of military regulations, which absolutely forbids anything but authorized forensic images to be taken in these facilities.
I have reported this to the Quartermaster Corps and they are investigating. Unbelievably, some of the bodies are recognizable from the pictures. This may allow the exact source and the culprit to be identified, in which case he or she needs a long stay in Fort Leavenworth.
#6
Odd. I remember, as a kid, seeing pictures of WWII dead in a Life magazine "Best Of" book. I remember one that WOULD have been a recognizable Japanese soldier, had his tank not caught fire, reducing his head to a lump of charcoal frozen in a scream.
Excepting the captions, how is that different?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/26/2005 14:23
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Bob,
It's different because the left loves dead Americans more than living Americnas, especially America military
During the war you never saw pictures or footage of Allied soldiers dead. Some newsreel showed burned up tanks and injured soldiers, but there was strict censorship of the press during this time. Enemy soldiers were always a different matter.
The difference now is that we have the easy mobility of information. It is a virtual impossibility to censor either individuals or the media (who would scream like little girls at the mere mention).
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 14:45
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Jame, Life did publish photos of allied war dead during the conflict. The first being an American GI face down on a New Guinea beach, circa 1943. Showing faces or dismemberment may have been taboo tho.
#10
Actually you did. There is a famous Life magazine picture of a dead American marine lying face down in the sand Difference is you couldn't tell who it was.
Posted by: Weird Al ||
01/26/2005 15:19
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To reiterate my earlier point, Robert, it is against the law for American soldiers to take or distribute images of their dead comrades.
As a retired officer, I have mixed feelings about the images of enemy dead. On the one hand, it is an obvious affront to human dignity, especially when accompanied by humorous captions. When you're actually there, you are trying to deal with all kinds of emotional trauma, and some degree of levity is appropriate or at least excusable. In the public domain, accessible from the safety of a home computer, it is something else again and reflects very badly on those involved and on the service in general.
On the other hand, I think it is fair for people to see what actually happens and how ugly a business this really is. The pro-terror peace movement would obviously use this to support their demands for surrender and totalitarian rule, but if the real nature of war undermines support, then the support is probably not worth having.
I have seen the image you describe in Life (and worse in person).
Excuse me for getting clinically gruesome, but this is an important point: The "frozen scream" effect is probably the result of tissue contraction and not literally of a scream at the time of death. How do I know this? Because we see it on burned bodies that were obviously dismembered by impact.
It is interesting to me that the Iraqi group complaining about this contrasts it with US complaints about the official conduct of the Iraqi government, and not with the truly analogous situation, the many gruesome photos taken by jihadists and their sympathizers and plastered all ober the web.
#12
I believe it was after '68 that the U.S. Military banned taking pictures of dead Viet Cong. If any were found in your stuff while you were processing out they were confiscated. I never heard of fellow soldiers taking pictures of their dead comrades although I can't say it didn't happen.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/26/2005 15:46
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#13
I bet the MSM are envious. WaPo could run the pics for days.
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/26/2005 19:32
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I'm pretty sure that the WWII picture of the dead Marine in the sand was at Tarawa. The photos from that hellish battle were the first to show American dead sent back home and they did have an impact on the civilians from what I've read. I think the censorship was ratcheted back up after that.
#15
I believe this post has the famous photograph taken at the invasion at Buna Beach in 1942 by George Strock and published by Life in 1943. Not quite the same as the pornographic images of the dead to which we are now immune.
It is difficult for us to imagine what consternation this photograph caused to Americans on the home front. In two years, we were liberating Bergen Belsen. This war will last much longer. And I believe that we cannot now imagine how far we will descend before it is over any more than could the Americans looking at Life in 1943.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 20:17
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To quote the article from Mrs D:
In September 1943, the military released the first photographs of dead American soldiers. George Strock's images of corpses on Buna Beach, New Guinea, appeared in Life, the largest- circulation picture magazine. The powerful pictures shocked some readers, but a greater number approved of the policy. The Washington Post argued that the pictures "can help us to understand something of what has been sacrificed for the victories we have won." Images of dead soldiers appeared regularly after that. All were as anonymous as they could be made to be. Efforts were made to crop the photos or obscure the victims' faces, name tags and unit insignia. The caption to Strock's Buna Beach photoâ¹"Three dead Americans lie on the beach at Buna"â¹told Life's readers that they did not need to know the names of the dead in order to appreciate what they had done.
So they appeared after this point in time, but not before. Thanks, Mrs. D
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 23:02
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#17
hmmmm - did they clamor to find a GI funeral to show opposite FDR's inaugural? Soooooo close to Fifth column traitors
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 23:07
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Charles Clarke will attempt to resolve the crisis surrounding controversial anti-terrorist laws today when he sets out the fate of foreign terror suspects detained without trial.
The home secretary will tell the Commons how the government intends to deal with detainees, after the law lords ruled before Christmas that their incarceration was unlawful under the European convention on human rights. The final details of the plans were still being discussed by the cabinet last night but a statement to parliament was scheduled for lunchtime today.
There was speculation that the government would be forced to release at least some of the 11, most of whom are held in Belmarsh prison in London.
But civil rights groups warned the government against any attempt to place the suspects, in effect, under house arrest. There were fears ministers could introduce orders placing restrictions on the detainees' behaviour. This would mean keeping tight control over them while not actually confining them in prison.
There was even speculation the government might try to challenge its obligations under European law.
Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, the civil liberties group, said: "I'm delighted that the new home secretary is finally responding to the House of Lords' damning verdict on detention without trial. I hope, however, that he will honour the spirit as well as the letter of this judgment and fully comply with human rights values in any new anti-terror measures."
Mr Clarke has signalled that he wants to secure deals with north African countries to enable some of the suspects to be deported without the risk of being tortured or sentenced to death in their homelands. The development came as the last four British detainees to return from Guantänamo Bay were being questioned last night by detectives at a central London police station.
Moazzam Begg, Feroz Abbasi, Martin Mubanga and Richard Belmar were arrested as they arrived back in Britain yesterday after almost three years in custody at the US base in Cuba. The men are now expected to sue the US government for compensation.
Shortly after the RAF aircraft carrying them touched down, they were taken to Paddington Green for questioning. Their return prompted fresh calls for the government to rethink its anti-terror legislation. Edward Nally, president of the Law Society, said ministers ought now to "pause for thought".
The decision to arrest the men was taken in spite of protests from Muslim leaders and a plea from their lawyers not to detain them. The US suspects the four, who were captured three years ago during the war in Afghanistan, of links with the al-Qaeda terrorist organisation. Their lawyers say they did nothing wrong. The men's families are expecting to see them today.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:08:39 AM ||
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#1
I am sorry. The UK doesn't appear to get it. What I read leads me to believe that all to many of the folk in the UK think these clowns were on wild flower picking trips and that these detainees are just misunderstood good boys.
That anyone in authority in the UK government can't bitch slap these lawyer society commies is beyond me. The Law Lords need to have a sharp tug to remind them that people die from terrorism.
There are times to be civil and there are time to be uncivil. (The LLL have never been civil when it counts.) This is one of those times where being uncivil is in order. Lay down some smack on these stupid terrorist loving turds. Drive these bastards out to a military airport in secret. Put them on a plane for their home countries and be done with it. What is anyone going to do? Oh they will take you to court? BFD. If the detainees are gone what the heck can they do? Nothing thats what. Send them back to wherever they came from . IF they are UK citizens keep them off bail and in jail. See if the Law lords feel like going down and getting them out personally. I doubt they are that interested.
Sorry for the rant but this whole issue is based on loonie liberal stupidity.
#3
Face it the people and leaders of the EU are at war with us in every way on every day. Don't believe me go look at the forums at FT.COM or its spinoff
http://www.serioustopics.com.
These are "finance movers" in the EU and it's not pretty.
I await the day the Boeing Company has a private bombing run on a certain bus factory in the southern Euarabian state of France.
American neo-conservatives and followers of President George W. Bush pride themselves on taking no prisoners in their ideological quests. Now they seem to have set their sights on a new target: the stifling of academic freedom in the United States. Then why does Noam Chomsky still have a job, you liar?
Tenure.
One of the most prominent American intellectual institutions in the world, Columbia University, New York, is now under such an assault. Youssef Ibrahim's lips fell off.
The most hunted species on that campus consists of professors of Arab and Iranian origin, or anyone who dares to open a debate on Middle East policies that do not conform with the Bush neo-conservatives' thinking. That is a flat glaring lie as you know full well.
Since anyone can remember, Columbia University has been the headquarters of intellectual freedom and excellence.
Also the headquarters of a few dingbats.
But that venerable institution now finds itself in the middle of a major investigation a witch-hunt really to examine complaints by delusional Jewish students, professors and administrators zealots, who are claiming they are being "intimidated" by the professors of Middle Eastern origin. The fact is the professors are themselves a tiny, hounded minority.
The charges are manifestly fanciful. Dan Miron, a pro-Israel professor, told The New York Times in an article on January 18 that for five years "dozens of Jewish students" have told him of "rude" and "snotty" treatment by colleagues and professors of Arab and Iranian origin. "They're making that constant breathing noise and they know it drives us crazy."
"These students didn't look like disturbed people who would invent these things," Miron told the newspaper. Rude and snotty? Dear, oh dear! Being a graduate of Columbia myself, I can assure Miron that, as an Arab-American, I found myself from day one the target of serious intimidation by legions of Jewish professors, students and administrators at the university. I simply assumed this to be a part of academic and intellectual sparring, indeed freedom.
Wounded, tender soul that he is.
Now the game is more sinister as the objective is not only to fire those professors or stifle them, but to prevent the hiring of any non-conformists and spread that campaign across academia in America. We can call it "the silencing of the mind".
What are the allegations against the three professors being hunted? According to The New York Times, one involves a sidewalk encounter between Lindsay Shrier, who has since graduated, and her professor, George Saliba, an American of Palestinian origin, during which she says he told her that because she had green eyes she was not a Semite and could not claim ancestral ties to Israel. Saliba denies the charge.
"Lies! All lies! The brazen, green-eyed hussy!"
The second transpired at a small lecture off campus in which Tomy Schoenfeld, a student who had served in the Israeli Army, said that when he tried to question Professor Joseph Massad, a Jordanian-born Palestinian, Massad first asked him, "How many Palestinians have you killed?" Massad told The New York Times: "It is inconceivable that I would ever respond to a member of the audience in the manner and context that [the student] describes." (Out of curiosity, I wish to know what would be Schoenfeld's answer as well as his views on dual loyalties).
The third centres on Professor Hamid Dabashi, an American-Iranian academic who is accused of cancelling a class to answer his "moral duty" to attend a Palestinian rally but who seems targeted chiefly for his "published" political viewpoints, according to The New York Times story by reporter N.R. Kleinfield. Kleinfield reports that an assistant professor in the medical school sent an e-mail message to Massad, saying: "Go back to Arab land where Jew hating is condoned. Get the hell out of America. You are a disgrace and a pathetic typical Arab liar." What about Arab hating?
Hate-mongering is unacceptable no matter who is doing it, so it is particularly obscene for Columbia to condone it among its professors.
Professor Said seemed to get along with it pretty well.
Columbia University which should have fired that professor as per its own rules of ethics did absolutely nothing.
Indeed, Massad, said he, like the other two, has been swamped with hate mail, insulted as a "camel jockey" and "Islamic Fascist". He said students who are not registered in his course show up to attend his lectures in order to heckle him. The truth is that Massad is being targeted for other reasons. Jewish students have taken to refer to his courses as "Israel-Is-Racist". Well it so happens that Israel is indeed a racist state.
Yep, so racist that Arabs there enjoy more political freedom than in just about any Arab state. Shocking, just shocking.
Half the world believes that because of Israel defining itself as "an exclusively Jewish State" where everyone who is not a Jew is a second class citizen. At least this should be debated freely on campus.
Right along with why women in Arab states are treated as breeding stock fourth-class citizens.
"To me, these are dark ages," Dabashi said. "This is not the United States I moved into in 1976. I don't recognise it. I'm in a sort of moral shock," he told The New York Times.
This is the new age of neo-conservatives obliterating not only all views contrary to their policies, but purging all intellectuals who hold different views. The vile campaign is having some of its intended effects. Massad is already losing his academic purpose. He has chosen not to teach his most controversial course, "Palestinian and Israeli Politics and Societies", in the coming semester because it wouldn't pass academic muster of the emotional toll and because he worries it might jeopardise his tenure.
The winners may be zealots, but the American intellect pays the price of censorship.
"I've been teaching for 33 years and I've always thought we all knew what appropriate faculty deportment was," said Andrew J. Nathan, a political science professor who thinks the students' charges are dubious. "Now it is not clear to everyone that the classroom is where the faculty is in full control. I teach a course called Introduction to Human Rights. We had a whole week on the torture memos of the Bush administration.
"Now I'm starting to wonder whether there's somebody in my class of 143 students who might grieve against me ⊠that I indoctrinated them, that they went through emotional suffering by hearing about these things."
Oh horror! Quick, someone, his pills!
Posted by: Korora ||
01/26/2005
12:07:13 AM ||
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#1
Yep, Tenure. That's why the Administration and faculty of the Law College at the University of Michigan can rig quotas for the student body, but exempt themselves from achieving those same levels of representation within their own ranks. Four legs good, two legs better.
"Ghailani has been handed over to US custody because he wasn't wanted in any crime over here," the Pakistani official, who declined to be identified, told AFP. He did not give any further details. Most have been handed to the United States and are thought to be held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. "We have no information on Ghailani's whereabouts," a spokesman for the US embassy in Islamabad said.
At the bottom of the Marianas Trench will do, I'd think...
Pakistani investigators told AFP that they transferred Ghailani to American custody despite earlier promising him that they would not do so. "He said he wouldn't be satisfied unless the person who was interrogating him takes an oath on the holy book (the Koran) that he would not be handed to the US," said another official speaking on condition of anonymity. Security sources said Ghailani was part of a "sleeper cell" and had received personal messages on computer discs from Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden ordering him to carry out new attacks.
He'd already burned. He was wanted for his involvement in the embassy bombings. Nobody uses agents who've already been used as sleepers. Sleepers are supposed to become part of the national background noise, not have $5 million prices on their heads.
When he was arrested he was drawing up plans for a missile strike on an airliner at Nairobi airport in Kenya as well for attacks on London's Heathrow Airport and US financial institutions, the officials said.
GAZA CITY - Palestinian security forces in Gaza prevented a cell of militants from firing mortar shells into southern Israel late Tuesday, seizing their weapons, a Palestinian security source told AFP. "Members of the security forces in northern Gaza stopped militant group from firing three mortar shells into Israel," the source said. Following a heated argument with the militants, the forces confiscated the weapons and the cell left, he said.
Guess it was too much to ask the 'security forces' to detain the miscreants.
Five days ago, newly-installed Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas ordered the deployment of around around 2,500 Palestinian police and security forces in northern Gaza to stop militants from firing a barrage of rockets and mortar shells at Israeli targets. The deployment has been accompanied by a marked lull in violence in Gaza.
Earlier Tuesday, top Palestinian and Israeli officials agreed to extend the deployment of Palestinian security forces to several flashpoint areas in southern Gaza with the aim of also preventing attacks in the south. By Thursday, troops are expected to be operating in the areas of Khan Yunis and Rafah from where militant groups have frequently fired rockets at Israeli targets.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/26/2005
12:06:29 AM ||
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#1
the forces confiscated the weapons and the cell left
Must have had them surrounded.
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 9:56
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#5
I can imagine the heated argument..."Dammit Salim, there's no way you can hit the settlement from this far away! You need to move closer!" "Listen Muammar, I was firing mortars at the Jews back when you wore that diaper on your ass, not your head, so don't tell me I'm too far away." "So that's how you want to be? Well, I'm confiscating your mortar, and tomorrow my colleagues and I will set it up right on the border, so get lost."
#7
I agree with lh and rw. We need Abbas to stay alive and for Palestinian policemen to have the confidence that they can do their jobs without being attacked by crowds or their family members being terrorized. Arafat and his corrupt thugs have used poverty and hatred to set the Palestinians on such a wrong course for so many years, that this situation cannot be corrected overnight.
I think we need to look at this incident as a glass of water half-full not as a glass have empty.
#8
You gotta be frickin' kidding me. Do you know how long it takes to set up a mortar tube? Not long. And they only had 3 shells? How long to fire them, would you guess? A minute or two? In fact, what this shows is that the "police men" knew exactly what was going to happen and when. They show up, talk to the guys who were setting up the tube (probably "cops" themselves) and say that they can't be doing that during the honeymoon.
OTOH, maybe this means that the cops are really going to use the fact that they know who perpetrates these attacks to try and stop them.
Possible propoganda, or a possible first step. Given the track record, I'm not holding my breath.
Posted by: Mark E. ||
01/26/2005 15:38
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The US State Department said on Monday that "skill ful and aggressive" efforts by Pakistani and American intelligence agencies have minimized Al Qaeda's influence in the region even if its leader Osama bin Laden is still at large.
The department's deputy spokesman Adam Ereli made these remarks while commenting on an observation that US efforts to capture Al Qaeda leaders have not been very fruitful because Osama and his key lieutenants were still free.
"There have been a number of important captures, both through the Rewards for Justice Programme and also through the aggressive and skillful work of Pakistani, American and other counter-terrorist officials and counter-terrorist forces," said Mr Ereli.
Under this programme the United States offers financial rewards to those who could lead US authorities to the suspects they want to capture. The programme led to the arrest of several wanted men in Iraq but has not been very effective against Al Qaeda leaders hiding in Afghanistan or Pakistan's tribal belt.
So far almost all senior Al Qaeda leaders in US custody were captured by Pakistanis and handed over to the Americans. Mr Ereli acknowledged that "several very important" Al Qaeda leaders were still free but many were either dead of jail. So, "the trend line is clearly in our favour," he said, adding that those still free were on the run.
Mr Ereli said the "benchmark" for assessing the success of the US reward programme was not to see how many Al Qaeda suspects were still at large but to "think in terms of what kind of constraint, what kind of difficulties having this reward out for you and being so much in the public eye presents for those who would do us harm."
He said the US Embassy in Islamabad and the Rewards for Justice Programme have launched a new ad campaign in Pakistan. The first ad that appeared on Jan. 7 featured photos and reward amounts for 14 terrorists who may be in the region, including Osama bin Laden, Mullah Omar and others.
There will be additional advertisements running in other Pakistani newspapers and airing on Pakistani radio and television stations in the next couple of weeks.
Asked if the US was going to double the $25 million reward for Osama, Mr. Ereli said that a law signed in December authorized the secretary of state to raise the reward offers up to $50 million but no decision had yet been made to do so.
"Obviously, as is always the case in the Rewards for Justice Programme, the amount of the reward is something that we keep under regular and consistent review to assess whether it's appropriate, whether it needs adjusting or not, and this case is no different," he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:04:52 AM ||
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The United States on Tuesday accused a Syrian of bankrolling Al Qaeda and rebels in Iraq, a first step toward an international freeze on his bank transfers and travel. The US Treasury said Sulayman Khalid Darwish provides money and material to Al Qaeda and its group in Iraq, led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. "This terrorist financier is helping support Zarqawi, who has launched violent acts against our troops, coalition partners and the Iraqi people," Treasury Secretary John Snow said in a statement. "Identifying financial operatives and choking off the flow of blood money moves us closer to our ultimate goal of fracturing the financial backbone of the Iraqi insurgency and Al Qaeda," he said.
Darwish lives in Syria and is a member of Zarqawi's advisory council, the statement said. He was also trained in Afghanistan in weapons, topography, artillery, electronics and explosives, according to the Treasury, which also said he is an expert document forger. Darwish sent 10,000 to 12,000 dollars to Zarqawi in Iraq every 20-15 days, carried by suicide attack volunteers entering Iraq, the statement said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
12:03:31 AM ||
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WASHINGTON (AP) - Looking for new ways to bolster its thinning ranks, the Army National Guard is seeking legal authority to offer $15,000 bonuses to active-duty soldiers willing to join the Guard - up from $50 now. Lt. Gen. H Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau, told reporters Tuesday that the Guard is 15,000 soldiers below its normal strength of 350,000, and he expects further short-term declines despite recent gains from tripling re-enlistment bonuses for Guardsmen deployed abroad.
If the Guard fails to return to its normal troop level of 350,000 by the end of the budget year on Sept. 30, it will be the first time that has happened since 1989, the three-star general said. He added that he believes he has a formula for restoring the Guard's strength.
Heavily stressed by longer-than-anticpated combat and support duties in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, the Guard recently increased first-time enlistment bonuses and added 1,400 recruiters. In explaining his interest in getting congressional approval for $15,000 bonuses to entice active-duty military members to join the Guard, Blum said he believes he could get 8,000 new Guardsmen this way. He said the existing $50 bonus carries little weight in today's economy. ``That incentive may have been a big deal 50 years ago, but it doesn't buy much today,'' he said.
Blum offered two main reasons the Guard has found it harder to get active-duty soldiers to switch to the Guard. Many are prevented from leaving the active Army even after their contracts are up or their retirement dates have arrived because the Army invoked a special authority known as ``stop loss'' that freezes soldiers in place for months at a time. Also, those who can leave active duty are sometimes less interested in joining the Guard if they believe that their prospective Guard unit is in line for a deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan.
Blum also said that while he believes the National Guard will be asked to contribute a relatively smaller proportion of the combat force in Iraq starting in mid-2005, it will remain strapped. Currently, 44 percent of the Army combat forces in Iraq are Guard troops, he said, and he believes that will drop to the low 20s later this year. Offsetting that, however, is an expectation that the Guard will be required to contribute a larger proportion of the support troops.
According to a chart provided by Blum, 71 of the Guard's 75 infantry battalions have been committed for duty in Iraq, Afghanistan or elsewhere since President Bush authorized Guard and Reserve mobilizations for the war on terror on Sept. 14, 2001. A battalion is considered ``committed'' if at least 35 percent of its troops are mobilized for active-duty service. Similarly, 33 of the Guard's 36 armor battalions have been committed in that same time period.
Blum said the Guard has not run out of combat power but it needs a break. ``I've pretty well given at the office,'' he said, ``and it's time for the (active-duty Army) to pick it up.''
Among the Guard combat forces that have been put on active duty since September 2001 are 11 infantry battalions and six armor battalions that provided security at airports and other locations in the United States in the weeks following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Blum's chart showed. In hindsight, he said he wishes he had used non-combat troops for that work. ``I did not envision being in Iraq in 2005 with 44 percent of the (total Army) combat forces,'' he said. ``That was not in my wildest scenario on the crystal ball that I was looking at.''
Blum also said that he has kept his promise to state governors - who control National Guard units during peacetime - that he will not have more than 50 percent of their Guard troops mobilized at any given time. In most states the percent that are mobilized is well below 50. The only states currently at 50 percent are Washington and Hawaii, he said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/26/2005
12:01:52 AM ||
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Enezi tribe taking center stage at Rantburg this week...
A Kuwaiti man has reportedly confessed to killing his 14-year-old daughter because he believed she was having sex. Adnan Enezi - an employee in the Islamic Affairs ministry - had just returned from the pilgrimage to Mecca. He allegedly bound and blindfolded his daughter, Haifa, knelt her down in front of her two brothers and sister and then cut her throat. The suspect - who is also undergoing mental health tests - was separated from his wife, and has been imprisoned in Saudi Arabia for 18 months for his extremist activities, the al-Rai al-Am newspaper reported. The daily said that after cutting Haifa's throat the first time, he swapped the knife for one with a sharper blade as she bled and screamed in front of her siblings. Al-Qabas daily said the brothers and sister fled from the house after the murder, while their uncle took their sister to a hospital, but she had already died.
Somebody's gotta do something about this. Here's a deranged extremist slaughtering his own family. Can anyone in Kuwait or Saudiland find some cause to keep him locked up (and away from others) for the rest of his days?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005
1:20:13 PM ||
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#5
I bet in his mind it isn't considered "mistaken". The mere rumor of female sexual activity in that world sure seems to result in a plenty of dead female relatives.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan (news - web sites) was on Tuesday questioned for a third time by the commission investigating the scandal-tainted Iraq (news - web sites) oil-for-food program, a U.N. spokesman said.
Annan has appointed Paul Volcker, the former chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve (news - web sites), to lead a probe of the $67 billion program, set up in late 1996 to allow civilian goods into Iraq in an effort to ease the impact of U.N. sanctions.
"He has met more than once for an extended period of time with Mr. Volcker and his investigators," U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard said in answer to queries.
He originally said two interviews took place last year but later updated the information, saying the latest round was on Tuesday afternoon and lasted one hour and 35 minutes. Previous interviews were conducted on Nov. 9 for one hour and 45 minutes and on Dec. 3 for 25 minutes.
"Yes, the secretary-general is part of the investigation, is subject like anyone else involved in oil-for-food in the secretariat," Eckhard said. "He has been questioned and most likely will continued to be questioned as Mr Volcker's investigation continues."
The spokesman said the meetings took place in Annan's office at U.N. headquarters. Volcker is due to give a preliminary report at the end of the month or early in February.
Among the allegations is that Kojo Annan, the U.N. leader's son, was paid a total of $125,000 by Geneva-based firm Cotecna, which inspected goods coming to Iraq. U.N. officials have denied Annan was aware or involved in contract negotiations.
The payments were part of an agreement for the younger Annan, who worked in West Africa rather than Iraq, not to join a firm competing with Cotecna after he left the company, Eckhard said previously.
CIA (news - web sites) weapons inspector Charles Duelfer, in a report in October, said Saddam reaped some $1.7 billion by subverting the program. Iraq also sold $8 billion in oil outside of the program, to Jordan, Syria and Turkey, which the Security Council, including the United States, knew about.
Volcker said earlier this month his probe has not turned up a smoking gun.
"You know his son was employed by this company, you know he knew his son was employed by the company, you know a few other things, but suppose you have no evidence Kofi influenced the process," Volcker told the New York Times.
"You find an e-mail, or somebody who's squealing, then you have the proof, but without it you're left with the difficult task of trying to prove a negative," Volcker said.
More recently Samir Vincent, 64, a naturalized U.S. citizen, pleaded guilty in New York of taking millions of dollars from Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s government in exchange for lobbying U.S. and U.N. officials.
Vincent is the first known suspect who can shed light on how Saddam subverted and worked around the program and Volcker has asked to interview him.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:19:59 AM ||
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#1
Volcker said earlier this month his probe has not turned up a smoking gun.
Might wanna get used to hearing that one, folks...
US and Iraqi forces were searching for Al Qaeda-linked fugitive Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in the former rebel stronghold of Falluja on Monday after hearing that he had entered the city ahead of the Jan. 30 election.
"We have heard he entered Falluja in a six-car convoy. We hear lots of rumours but we are not dismissing this," Marine Captain Leonard Coleman told Reuters. "We are on the lookout for Zarqawi as we continue protecting the people of Falluja."
An Iraqi officer said he and a group of Marines had searched for Zarqawi on Monday morning after receiving tips that he was traveling in a convoy that included a Mercedes and a BMW.
"We have been searching houses with those types of cars in front of them. We have also been taking photographs of anyone driving BMWs and Mercedes for analysis and recording license plates," said the officer, who asked not to be named.
A US Marine officer told his men to take the reports seriously and be on alert for attacks.
Earlier this year he was believed to be hiding out in Falluja, a rebel stronghold to the west of Baghdad. Marines led an assault on the city in November to take it back from insurgents and in the hope of catching Zarqawi.
But Zarqawi wasn't found and remains elusive. On Sunday, an audio tape was posted on the Internet, purportedly from Zarqawi, declaring "all-out war" on Iraq's elections in a warning intended to scare away voters six days before the poll.
"If he is back in Falluja that means we can expect bombings on election day," said the Iraqi officer. "If he is back in Falluja that means the insurgents will be back. If he is back, he is here to destroy the elections."
US and Iraqi forces have boosted security around the city, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad, ahead of the vote, Iraq's first multi-party elections in half a century.
City officials will set up polling stations for Falluja residents who have returned to the city since the November offensive, but their location will remain secret until just before voting because of fears of attack.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:17:47 AM ||
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EFL
Passengers jumped in to help restrain an unruly traveler on a flight from Philadelphia to West Palm Beach before the plane landed, authorities said.
A flight attendant on Southwest flight 2161 asked passenger Christopher Egyed, (37, of Philadelphia)to quiet down because he was disturbing other passengers, said Palm Beach County Sheriff's spokesman Paul Miller. What kind of a name is Egyed, I wonder?
The man later made threats and headed toward the pilot's cabin, and after a flight attendant tried to stop him in the aisle, a group of passengers helped detain him, Miller said.
Sheriff's deputies took Egyed into custody after the plane landed at Palm Beach International Airport Tuesday night. The FBI later arrested him on a federal charge of interfering with the operation of a flight crew.
No one was hurt during the incident.
Posted by: Trailing daughter of the trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
11:17:22 PM ||
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What kind of a name is Egyed, I wonder?
TD, try Hungarian (Magyar).
EFL:
"I just started shooting," said Gloria Doster, 56. "I was trying to blow his brains out is what I was trying to do."
You go girl!
Shoats Grocery & Package near Crawford, 70 miles east of Atlanta, is a well-known spot where locals stop for breakfast biscuits or lunch. Gloria Doster said the two men who came there Monday had something else in mind. She was rearranging boxes of soda by the store's front door when a man wearing a wig walked inside, the fake hair draped in front of his face. "I asked him, 'Can you see to walk?"' Doster said. Then she noticed a second man behind him wearing a mask. He announced a holdup. One man grabbed Gloria Doster and pushed her toward the register. She said the other kept his gun on her 62-year-old husband, who also goes by the name Shoats. She said she tried to open the register, but one of the men told her she wasn't moving fast enough and tried to shoot her husband. He missed -- and his gun jammed.
Say goodbye, asshole...
At that point, Bobby Doster pulled out a .380-caliber handgun and shot one of the suspects. Gloria Doster then went for a 9 mm pistol she keeps near the register. "All hell broke loose," she said. "I was trying to shoot and dial 911 at the same time."
Shoot first, dial later
Both suspects took cover behind the store's meat counter as the Dosters opened fire. Gloria Doster said she doesn't know how many bullets were fired, or how many times the suspects were hit.
Enough, it seems
Police arrived about five minutes after receiving Gloria Doster's call; the suspects died a short time later at a hospital.
Scratch two goblins..
Posted by: Don ||
01/26/2005
11:17 ||
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#1
The armed suspect and his partner were killed. The Dosters won't be charged, according to local officials, because they were acting in self-defense.
#5
LOL BH. After this gets out I doubt the Dosters will ever have any other malcontents showing up at their store. Peace through superior firepower I always say. Oh and one more thing -f*ck all gun control pussies.
#6
careful JH - I'm a firm believer in gun control: "hit what you aimed at"
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 21:42
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your right Frank, I should've qualified with:
two hands on the weapon, clear sight picture, proper breathing control, slow trigger squeeze - now that's good gun control. Oh and one more thing - f*ck all anti-2nd Amendment pussies.
Kamran Akhtar, suspected of having ties to terrorism after a police officer spotted him videotaping Charlotte's skyscrapers in July, was sentenced Monday to six months in prison.
Chief Judge Graham Mullen of the U.S. District Court in Charlotte gave the 36-year-old Pakistan native credit for the time he's already served in jail. That means Akhtar will now be turned over to immigration officials for deportation.
Akhtar has not been charged with any terrorism-related offenses, but he pleaded guilty in October to failing to leave the United States, possessing false identification documents and making false statements to investigators.
Akhtar turned down an opportunity to speak during Monday's sentencing hearing.
"Mr. Akhtar, do you have anything you would like to say?" the judge asked.
"No, sir," Akhtar replied.
U.S. Attorney Gretchen Shappert praised Charlotte-Mecklenburg police Officer Danny Maglione for spotting Akhtar filming uptown office towers.
"We deeply appreciate the vigilance of Officer Maglione in this matter and the subsequent work of federal law enforcement," Shappert said. "We will continue to pursue such matters whenever appropriate."
Defense attorney George Miller told reporters that Akhtar's wife and three children, who have been living in New York, will be reunited with his client in Pakistan.
"He definitely misses his family," Miller said. "It's been six months since he's seen his daughters."
Miller said he doesn't know how long it will be before Akhtar is deported.
"Nobody knows how long it will be before he's returned to Pakistan. It won't happen tonight. Hopefully, it'll happen very soon."
When Akhtar was detained in July, authorities announced that they had found a videotape in Akhtar's camera that showed the 60-story Bank of America tower and the former Wachovia Center, which houses the FBI's offices in Charlotte.
Authorities said Akhtar also had tapes showing buildings in the downtown areas of Atlanta, New Orleans, Dallas, Houston and Austin, Texas.
Akhtar's brother, Irfan Akhtar, told the Observer that Kamran Akhtar has been wrongfully accused and portrayed in the media as a terrorist. He said his brother is not a terrorist.
Irfan Akhtar, 33, said his older brother likes to take pictures of tourists spots and buildings and had been traveling the country after losing his job at a New York photo store.
Kamran Akhtar was indicted a month after his capture in Charlotte and charged with violating immigration law by failing to leave the United States in 1998 after a New York court found he was in the country illegally.
The indictment accused Akhtar of making false statements to investigators that he was in the United States legally, had a green card and had never been ordered deported. He also was charged with possession of false documents -- a New York driver's license and a Social Security card.
Federal prosecutors have said the investigation into Akhtar's activities is continuing.
But after Monday's sentencing, Miller told reporters he's confident Akhtar isn't involved in terrorism and doesn't think his client will be charged with any terrorism-related offenses.
The government, the defense lawyer said, has had six months to investigate Akhtar.
"They've checked out everything they could check out," Miller said. "They would have discovered something if there was something to find."
Posted by: ed ||
01/26/2005
11:15:33 AM ||
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GLENDALE, Calif. (AP) - A suicidal man parked his SUV on the railroad tracks and set off a crash of two commuter trains Wednesday that hurled passengers down the aisles and turned rail cars into smoking, twisted heaps of steel, authorities said. At least 10 people were killed and more than 180 injured.
The SUV driver got out at the last moment and survived.
The collision took place just before daybreak on the outskirts of Los Angeles. Employees at a Costco store rushed to the scene and pulled riders from the tipped-over double-deck cars before the flames reached them. Dazed passengers staggered from the wreckage, some limping. One elderly man on the train was covered in blood and soot, his legs and arms apparently broken.snip
Dozens of the injured were in critical condition, and more than 120 people were sent to hospitals.
The wreck set in motion a huge rescue operation involving more than 300 firefighters, some of whom climbed ladders to reach the windows of the battered train cars. A triage center was set up in a parking lot, where the injured lay sprawled on color-colded mats - red for those with severe injuries, green for those less seriously hurt.
It was the nation's deadliest train accident in nearly six years.
Authorities said Juan Manuel Alvarez, 25, of Compton, parked his sport utility vehicle on the tracks and got out before a Metrolink train smashed into it. The train then derailed and collided with another train going in the opposite direction. That train also jumped the tracks.
Alvarez was arrested and will face homicide charges, Police Chief Randy Adams said. Alvarez had also slashed his wrists and stabbed himself, but the injuries were not believed to be life-threatening, authorities said. Adams said Alvarez had a criminal record that involved drugs.
snip. The nasty little pathetic life of Alvarez, the efforts of the rescuers, the ordeal of the passengers. Maybe I'm being paranoid, but this seems a simple method of terror attack.
#3
I am glad to see that Fred is keeping this news alive. It is so hard to get any information on it. Nobody is publishing any progress report on the investigation. Where does one go to find follow up information?
The American Coptic Union, and Egyptian Coptic Christians are shocked and disturbed by the latest Jersey City Police, and Hudson County Prosecutor Office report, âNo Proof of Religious Hatred in JC Family Slay â that was the report title by 1010 WINS.
The report denied the religion factor of the massacre, despite the fact that the Cross-Tattoo was cut, and slashed, on the late martyr Sylviaâs hand. In addition, Mr. Edward DeFazio, Hudson County Prosecutorâs report, never mentioned the facts that Egyptian Christians are facing a vicious terror campaign from the Arab-Islamic government of Egypt, and terrorists. In this case the massacre would be a perfect terror message to intimidate the Coptic Christian Community in Jersey City, and USA. To keep their mouth shut is a good prime motivation.
#11
In The Name Of Allah the Most Gracious The Most Merciful quit trying to bullshit us that Mooselems aren't behind this--their hands are all over this.
#12
I think a nice, reasoned response to this would be to nuke Aswan with a really, REALLY dirty 50Mt nuke, don't you? I'm sure a FEW Cairo residents will survive. Oh, and at the same time, drop one on Mecca, Medina, and Riyadh, where the sh$$ originates, at the same time. It won't kill it, but it'll slow down the spread of this vile disease known as islam.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/26/2005 22:57
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Who's in charge of Palestinian politics? Following his commanding performance in the January 11th Palestinian presidential elections, officials in Washington and Jerusalem are looking to Mahmoud Abbas, Yasser Arafat's successor as head of the Palestinian Authority (PA), as their new political counterpart — and potential peace partner. Yet alarming signs suggest that the biggest beneficiary of the political changes now taking place in the Palestinian Territories might just turn out to be the Islamic Republic of Iran.
An Iranian foothold in the West Bank and Gaza Strip is certainly not a new development. Both directly and through their terrorist intermediaries in Lebanon, Iran's ayatollahs have been meddling in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for years. But the death of Yasser Arafat, and the political vacuum that has emerged in the wake of the Palestinian strongman's passing, have laid the groundwork for even greater Iranian infiltration of Palestinian politics.
Signs of this expanding influence are already visible. Over the past two years, Iran's ayatollahs have provided substantial resources to their most potent terrorist proxy, Hezbollah, in order to increase the Lebanese militia's presence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The results have been dramatic; according to new assessments just issued by the Shin Bet, Israel's vaunted internal security service, the Lebanese terrorist powerhouse is rapidly expanding its control over Palestinian insurgent groups, co-opting existing terror cells and creating new ones. Hezbollah is now believed to direct over 50 separate (mostly secular-nationalist) Palestinian terror cells — a seven-fold increase since 2002. And Fatah, the PLO's main political faction — also the party of the Palestinian Authority's new president — is said to be the most deeply penetrated. In 2004 alone, 38 separate Fatah cells were identified by Israeli intelligence as having been co-opted by Hezbollah.
Iran is also increasing its leverage among the Palestinian Authority's Islamist factions. Over the past two years, Israel's successes against Hamas have led the group to seek an accommodation with Hezbollah, signing an unexpected strategic accord in March of 2004 to cement Hezbollah's—and Iran's—influence over the most prominent terrorist organization in the Palestinian territories. The other Islamist terror outfit in the Palestinian Authority, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, meanwhile, is already a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Islamic Republic — one whose resources have been dramatically increased by Tehran since mid-2002. It's no wonder that Israeli intelligence officials now say that Iran is "in control of terrorism in Israel." When he was in charge of Palestinian politics, Yasser Arafat found this sort of activity troubling enough to publicly oppose it. Back in October, for example, the PLO chairman himself took the unprecedented step of denouncing the Islamic Republic's meddling. "[Iranian Supreme Leader Ali] Khamenei is working against us," Mr. Arafat had told reporters visiting his Ramallah compound at the time. "He is giving money to all these fanatical groups. Khamenei is a troublemaker."
Now, however, the Palestinian Authority's various factions — jockeying for political position in the West Bank and Gaza Strip —have begun serious efforts to curry favor with the Islamic Republic. In December of 2004, in an ominous sign of things to come, Farouq Qaddoumi, the new head of Fatah, kicked off a three-day visit to the Islamic Republic. On Qaddoumi's agenda were meetings with Iranian President Mohammed Khatami and other top regime officials, with the goal of "consolidating relations between the Iranian and Palestinian nations." Moreover, as part of this new political bargain, Palestinian officials appear to have embraced the idea of a dramatic expansion of Iranian involvement in local politics. During his visit to Tehran, Qaddoumi publicly welcomed Iranian infiltration, dubbing it a positive sign of the Islamic Republic's "support [for] the Palestinian people and the Palestinian cause and the liberation of Palestine."
All this suggests that American and Israeli policymakers could be asking the wrong questions. In the wake of Mr. Abbas' electoral victory, both countries have begun to debate the new Palestinian leader's reformist credentials, as well as his ability to resume real peace negotiations with Israel. But, given the growing inroads Iran is making in the West Bank and Gaza, a more important issue might be the plans for the Palestinian Authority now being laid in Tehran.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:10:33 AM ||
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Russia on Tuesday agreed to write off a huge chunk of Soviet-era debt held by Syria, a country at the center of Moscow's attempts to revive its influence in the Middle East.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was on his first official visit to Russia, which has long defended the Arab state against U.S. and Israeli charges of ties to terrorism.
In a sign Moscow was ready to take its relations with Syria to a new level, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Russia had agreed to write off 73 percent - $9.8 billion - of Syria's net debts to Moscow.
It was unclear what Moscow, whose influence waned in the Middle East after the collapse of the Soviet Union, would get in return, but Assad called on Russia to boost its voice in global politics.
"I would like to support Russia's political course and at the same time express a protest against the political course of the United States," Assad told Moscow students.
"Russia's role is huge and Russia is well respected by third-world countries ... These countries are really hoping that Russia will try to revive its lost positions in the world."
Moscow cultivated ties with Syria in cold war times to counterbalance the influence of U.S.-backed Israel and supplied weaponry to the Arab state. But the Soviet collapse left Russia's key Soviet-era arms client out in the cold.
Russia's burgeoning relations with Syria have rung alarm bells in the U.S. and Israel. Days before Assad's visit, Israeli media reported Syria wanted to buy powerful missile systems from Russia, a move Israel said would strengthen militant groups in the region.
While denying any such plans, Assad said the very fact that Israel opposed expansion of Damascus' military might meant that it wanted to invade Syria. "Israel's position is illogical," he said. Moscow has denied it wanted to sell arms to Syria.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, speaking before talks with Assad, said: "Syria is a country with which the Soviet Union and today's Russia have always had particularly warm relations.
"We can base our relations today on a tradition of friendship and cooperation that is decades old."
Washington sees Syria as a sponsor of terrorism and has demanded that Damascus stop insurgents and money entering Iraq ahead of Sunday's elections. Syria denies the accusations.
Moscow, already at odds with Washington over nuclear ties with Iran, says the U.S. stance on Syria undermines the Middle East peace process.
"We are concerned with the recent situation around Syria," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, due to meet Assad on Wednesday, said in remarks issued on the ministry's Web site.
"The language of threats can make the situation only worse ... If any concerns (about Syria) remain, they should be backed by concrete evidence and removed through talks," Lavrov said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:07:59 AM ||
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A fine gesture, recognizing that they are never going to collect anyway. Probably a gratuity for hiding some of Saddam's weapons that had manuals written only in Russian.
Posted by: Tom ||
01/26/2005 10:33
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#2
Hold on a sec... everyone says everything Russia does is driven by their starvation for Cash. Now they're forgiving the debt of Syria, which they've sold stuff to on credit, and maybe selling stuff to on credit in the near future?
Wow. For guys who are so broke that they have to sell nukes to Iran, the Russians are being awfully "altruistic."
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
01/26/2005 10:46
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#3
It's not about money, it's about power. Moscow solidifies its alliance with the Damascus-Tehran sub-axis, the true Axis of Islamofascist Terror.
#10
Tom> Need is defacto control. If Russia's support of the Syrian and Iran regimes does prove both necessary and adequate to protect them from USA (or even seem that way), then these regimes become dependent on Russia.
It's one reason why Ukraine's Orange Revolution was a blow to Russian power -- because there Russia's support for Kuchma/Yanukovich proved *in*adequate to keep them in power.
trailing wife> They *are* still a player, even if largely reduced in strength.
Moscow's still keeping atleast half a dozen other nations to a mock-independence similar to the mock-independence that Warsaw Pact members enjoyed. And beyond that, Russia *is* playing worldwide, in the Middle-east, in the Balkans. Russia interfered even in Cyprus through a UN veto, in order to hurt the chances Cyprus had for reunification.
#11
"I would like to support Russiaâs political course and at the same time express a protest against the political course of the United States," Assad told Moscow students. "Russiaâs role is huge
Bullshit. You never had any intention of repaying Russia, precisely because Russia's influence is next to nil.
"...and Russia is well respected by third-world countries..."
Right. Like Afghanistan, which they were ejected from, or Egypt, which they were ejected from, or Iraq, whose people despise them for aiding Saddam, or China, which views Russia with contempt and whose traders so dominate the border regions that Russians are now being forced to learn Chinese instead of v-v in order merely to survive, or the other Asian tigers, who leaped past Russia twenty years ago, or Latin America, which is utterly oblivious to Russia....
#13
It's not about money, it's about power. Moscow solidifies its alliance with the Damascus-Tehran sub-axis, the true Axis of Islamofascist Terror.
Oh, spare us. There is no "alliance" between these kleptocracies, just a smorgasbord of arms deals. Putin's regime is the ultimate whore. The Russian security services are yet another mafiya-style group, one skilled in moving not only commodities but also antiquated Russian military hardware across Russia's porous borders. Deals with corrupt FSB officers and industrial bandits do not constitute anything like a coherent strategy for influence, let alone real influence. This Syrian maneuver by his FSB handlers Putin has about as much significance for interstate relations as Chavez's posturing.
#14
"This Syrian maneuver by his FSB handlers Putin has about as much significance for interstate relations as Chavez's posturing."
I find "Chavez's posturing" to have become the flagship of far-left fascism in the whole of South America, elements from Bolivia to Brazil to Peru -- so I don't think I shall be appeased by these words.
If there's no strategy in these deals, then why would Syria praise Russia's international role? This is a true alliance of powers, where consistently each tries to boost the other's.
http://arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/050119/2005011912.html
"Our duty is not only to go back to the previous level of bilateral cooperation, but we have to exceed and enhance it,"
In the meanwhile, Iran has shown interest to join the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) (http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/int/sco.htm), the regional "security" organization so far dominated by Russia and China.
There's an alliance between almost *all* those fascist states: Russia, China, Iran, Syria. It's consistent and steady, and none of these countries ever does anything to oppose the other.
But if you have elements of real disagreement between these countries, please mention them.
For example: Saddam Hussein supported the MEK that opposed the Iranian regime -- that proves that Iraq wasn't part of the Iran-Syria axis.
Do you have such examples that disprove any Iran-Syria-Russia consistent alliance?
#15
Aris: I think this, as well as the Russia/Iran deals, more-or-less constitute the same sort of alliance as the Molotov-Ribbentroff pact.
Regarding Saddam: he also had a quid-pro-quo and helped support Ansar-al-Islam, which was also supported by the Mullahs. (And still is, under the ironic "Ansar al Sunni" name. The irony slays me).
If Syria and Iraq were cooperating (and it seems to me they were, both before and after the invasion), and Syria is also cooperating with Iran...
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
01/26/2005 14:18
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#16
It's all about the Oil MOSCOW, Jan 26 (AFP) - Russia and Syria said Wednesday they planned to sign agreements on participation of Russian companies in various projects focusing on development of oil and gas resources in Syria, Russian news agencies reported. Russian Industry and Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko and Syrian Oil Minister Ibrahim Haddad discussed several projects including development of known resources and construction of several pipelines including the Syrian portion of the Pan-Arab pipeline project, Interfax said.
Another agreement in preparation centered on work by Russia's SoyuzNefteGaz and the Syrian Oil and Natural Resource Ministry on exploration and development of two oil and gas deposits in Syria over a 25-year period.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005 14:20
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#17
If Syria and Iraq were cooperating (and it seems to me they were, both before and after the invasion), and Syria is also cooperating with Iran...
I think that "cooperation" needs to be consistent in order for it to be considered an "alliance". Iraq's occasional cooperation with either Iran or Syria seems to have been on a case-by-case basis, cooperating in some places, opposing in others.
#18
Saddam was loyal only to himself.
As for Moscow/Tehran/Damascus, I don't see any real loyalty there, except on the part of Damascus. That's more the loyalty of a small dog to an alpha.
Any single dot is "trivial", until they turn themselves into a pattern.
Here's a dot: Russia criticized the US for accusing Syria of supporting terrorists.
Here's another dot: Russian missiles to Syria.
Here's a 3rd dot: Syria praises Russia's international role.
Here's a 4th dot: Russia and China both abstained from supporting the UN resolution (US- and France- supported) demanding Syria to withdraw from Lebanon.
5th dot: The oil deal.
What do they need to do in order for you to consider Russia and Syria consistent allies?
#21
The Sears/K-Mart is widely regarded as an essentially meaningless merger of has-beens. IIRC, Scrappleface had a piece on it, suggesting also their merger with France.
#22
key question is wiil putin really come to thier aid....talk is cheap unless it is backed up with deeds.. yes russia is trying to play on the world scene but they cannot not even take of thier chechen problem.
i think GW will call this sooner than later..if we are going after elements on the syrian/iraqi border or launch strikes agaisnt the irab what will putin/russia do?
Posted by: Dan ||
01/26/2005 18:33
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Aris, K-Mart is a discount department store in the states; it is kinda like Wal-Mart used to be, and it was like that before Wal-Mart.
It hasn't held up to the competition too well... and has made a lot of bad business decisions, like having product lines designed by Martha Stewart, among other things... anyway, between being squeezed by Wal Mart and Sam's on the low end, and Target on the upscale end, they've been in and out of Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Court (reorganization), and have been closing a lot of stores. There aren't any left in Lafayette, which used to have three. The only one in central Acadiana that I know of is in New Iberia. I think there's one in Jennings, and there are some over in Baton Rouge... (those are both ~ 1 hour drives, BTW).
Anyway, Sears has been having a whole lot of problems as well.
There have been rumors that Sears might wind up in Bankruptcy Court as well, but under Chapter 7 rather than Chapter 11. Anyway, late last year some executive at Sears had a revelation: the solution to all of their financial problems was to merge with K-Mart. Which they have done.
This all vaguely reminds me of an old joke in the oilfield service industry... "Yes, we lose money on every one of those we sell, but we'll make up for it in volume!"
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
01/26/2005 22:29
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The Iranian students storming the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979 became icons of worldwide Islamic revolution.
Twenty-five years later, Iran's youth is rebelling again. But as CBS News Correspondent Elizabeth Palmer reports, this time against the Islamic government itself.
Fully 60 percent of Iranians are under the age of 30, and they have had enough of strict Islamic rule. Everywhere there are signs that the religious authorities are losing control.
Especially for the young, personal behavior in public can be very political. You can easily see some of these small acts of rebellion in a place that would look familiar to any American teenager, like a shopping mall.
Women let their scarves slip back to show their hair. They show off their makeup, tight coats and high heels. Even five years ago, a couple holding hands in public could have been arrested and flogged. The mullahs hope that turning a blind eye to this minor defiance will relieve pressure for major change.
That pressure did explode in 1999. Students rioted and were brutally put down.
It was a grim lesson for Azadeh Shirzad who helps run her family's print shop. She remembers what happened to friends who got involved.
"Some of them were arrested and some of them were killed and you know? I am myself ... I am afraid of that," she says.
Islamic morality police tend to stay away from trendy places like fancy cappuccino bars. But even here, people would talk to CBS News only if they could hide their faces.
It adds up to a cash bonus for the police but a long-term cost for the government and growing contempt for the Islamic state.
That worries mullah Mohammed al Abtahi. Until September, he was one of Iran's vice presidents. He quit, disgusted by the corrupt and reactionary regime. He's traded in politics for computer blogging.
On his popular Web site, al Abtahi posts irreverent photos of establishment figures - like one of Iran's nuclear minister picking his nose - that he takes with his cell phone.
"Our young people are as well informed as young people in China or Britain or America. Anyone who tries to limit them is bound to fail," he says.
The hardliners can always launch another temporary crackdown. But in the end, the 1970s Islamic revolution seems certain to be undone by its own children.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:05:01 AM ||
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We need to continue to support these people. Not just through VOA but through other channels as well. My Iranian friends tell me it is a mistake to overtly attack Iran, not because of their military but because we would alienate a population that has some of the highest opinions of the US in the World. They tell me the number could be as high as a 75% approval rating. The polls of course would never be conducted or completely doctored for the opposite effect. Tyrannical Regimes are doomed to fail but in many cases require outside intervention. An attack on Iran could polarize these friendly forces against us and the end result would be disasterous. I originally agreed with military strikes on Isafan and the other facilities, but my opinion has changed after this dialogue. More covert action is required. I'm not sure if sanctions are the answer either because the only ones to suffer will be our allies in Iran not the Mullahs.
I'm open to opposing arguements. Comments welcome.
#2
"in the end, the 1970s Islamic revolution seems certain to be undone by its own children."
If this turns out to be true in the long run, this represents not only the failure of the Iranian revolution, it also represents the failure of a central idea of islam that religious law must be enforced by the state. Not only is such a practice doomed to be flouted by those who don't feel conscience bound to observe it, it actually results in an increase in the very behaviors it is meant to prohibit by driving it further underground out of fear of truly draconian punishments, by decreasing respect for the law in general and by increasing corruption as people look for ways around the law. It also increases despair and addiction.
The problem with islam is what happens when it succeeds in obtaining a majority which then institutes islamic law. I wonder how many times muslims will have to fail in their attempts to either institute or maintain sharia before they finally admit that the whole idea of mixing religion with "every aspect of life" as they say, including government, is a bad idea.
#3
Probably the best way to fight the regime is to:
1.increase the broadcasting power of Persian emigre radio
2. to get cell phones in the hands of the young Persians and have them call the radio station which would then broadcast their own voices
It would also help things if the Pavlevi family would renounce any interest in being head of a monarchy (they probably provide much of the funding of the emigre radio)
#4
what this represents is not so much the failure of any particular religion, but the universal human longing toward freedom, the resentment against the crushing boot of the tyrant, whether he wears a turban, an officers cap, or the hat of a "comrade".
#5
peggy, the Muslim's in power will ever admit thier failure, any more than our politicians do. But since I'm hearing from Bloggers that the people of Iraq don't want cleric's in the goverment, because they've heard from thier freinds in Iran, that it's not a good idea to have clerics in the goverment. This shows that at least the people (much like here) learn
I dont disagree that all humans want to be free. But islam is in contradiction of human freedom because of its totality which is an idea that lies at its very heart. Therefore in any muslim dominated country no matter how moderate or liberal, the distinction between mosque and state is always blurred and the government is always to some extent the enforcer of islam's religious code on all citizens in some way shape or form.
I do not deny that any tyrannical regime is undermined for the same reasons that tehran is being undermined today. But islam's central tenents, beleieved by all no matter whether moderate or conservative are a leading factor in this case. Yes, it does point to the failure of trying to fully implement islam. This is the case wherever muslims attempt to bring islamic tenents into all aspects of life.
I wonder if you have studied islam with muslims, LH, or do you just assume that its just like all other religions without any serious examination?
I have studied it from muslims, the totality of islam is a given among them no matter what their stripe and has been throughout all of islamic history with few exceptions. Anyone taking the faith seriously must accept islams intrusion in government and its applicability to all citizens even non-muslims for even non-muslims must live under some form of islamic law and cannot opt out. This idea is absolutely inseparable from islam and it cannot work in practice. Therefore it is a failure over and over of one of the religion's tenents.
#13
ive read several books and articles on Islam. I havent studied with muslims, nor have I studied Christianity with Christians.
Islam is a religion that impacts all of life, with detailed regulations. I follow a religion that does the same, its called Judaism.
Islams traditional texts make no allowance for the secular state. Nonetheless muslims in Turkey and Indonesia have built and supported secular states, and remained muslims. Tens of millions of Indian muslims accept life in a secular, predominanty Hindu state. I do not feel fit to tell those people that their form of Islam is inferior or inauthentic, and even if i spent some time "stuyding islam with muslims" i would not feel so fit.
I would also point out that theres a huge difference, one you skim over, between the application of muslim family law by the state, done in most muslim countries (but not Turkey)
and the application of sharia more broadly, as in Iran and KSA. Even Israel applies muslim family law to muslims (as it applies Jewish law - halacha - to Jews on such questions).
#15
exactly LH - who's the party of the current gov't, AK?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 13:57
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"who's the party of the current gov't, AK"?
In Germany, the main conservative party is still called "Christian Democratic Union" -- and yet nobody's thinking that it'll turn Germany into medieval-eras Christian prosecution of heretics.
In the same way, the fact that the governing party of Turkey used to have the word "Islam" in its title and that it contains religious conservatives, won't authomatically make me believe that secularism in Turkey is collapsing.
I don't believe that secularism is significantly threatened in the USA either, and from everything I gather politicians there tend to mention God much more often than Turkish politicians tend to mention Allah.
I've been looking for *actual* signs of Turkey regressing, and haven't been able to find many. Or indeed even one: if anything democracy has been strengthened the past years according to Freedom House reports. But as always, let me know if you have actual examples of the Turkish state becoming less secular.
You know little Turkish story. Mustapha Kemal despised Islam, said things about "being led by ignorant, filihy mullahs following the teachings of a mad Arab". And there are dozens of examples of state becoming less secular. Like the fact that until the end of the eighties making the pilgriamge meant political death. Today they have an Islamist prime minister who is slowly dragging Turkey under Arab yoke.
#18
And there are dozens of examples of state becoming less secular. Like the fact that until the end of the eighties making the pilgriamge meant political death
These seem to me as signs of Turkey becoming more *tolerant*, not less secular. Do you have any signs that indicate the state/mosque separation is being breached?
The black sedan made its way down Madaris Street, the young men inside tossing leaflets out the window.
"This is a final warning to all of those who plan to participate in the election," the leaflets said. "We vow to wash the streets of Baghdad with the voters' blood."
Thus was the war over Sunday's nationwide elections crystallized in a single incident on Tuesday in Mashtal, an ethnically mixed neighborhood on the eastern edge of Baghdad, where many Iraqis say they would like to vote, and where a small, determined group of people are doing everything they can to stop them.
The leaflets, like many turning up on sidewalks and doorsteps across the capital, were chilling in their detail: they warned Iraqis to stay at least 500 yards away from voting booths, for each would be the potential target of a rocket, mortar shell or car bomb. The leaflet suggested that Iraqis stay away from their windows, too, in case of blasts.
"To those of you who think you can vote and then run away," the leaflet warned, "we will shadow you and catch you, and we will cut off your heads and the heads of your children."
The effect of such intimidation across the country will not be known until Sunday. Estimates vary, but Iraqi officials say they will be pleased if the nationwide turnout reaches 50 percent of the 14 million eligible voters. In some areas, like the Sunni-dominant cities of Ramadi and Falluja, even a meager turnout would be welcomed.
In Madaris Street, the men in the black sedan got a hostile reception: Iraqi police officers spotted the car and opened fire, killing two of the men, residents said. The rest got away, after killing three officers.
Guerrilla groups have vowed to step up attacks to disrupt the voting.
On Tuesday, in Al Jededa, in southeast Baghdad, gunmen shot and killed Qais Hashem al-Shamari, a senior judge in the Justice Ministry, as he drove to work, and wounded one of the judge's guards. Ansar al-Sunna, one of the most active insurgent groups, took responsibility for the attack in an Internet posting, claiming that the murder of Judge Shamari "would make God and the Prophet very content."
"Our heroes ambushed one of the heads of infidelity and apostasy in the new Iraqi government," the statement said.
Among the operations Ansar al-Sunna has claimed responsibility for is the suicide bombing last month of a mess tent in Mosul that killed 21 people, including 18 Americans, and wounded 69 others.
American commanders and Iraqi officials say they are preparing for a surge in attacks leading up to election day. Some are predicting that the worst of the attacks could happen before Sunday, when streets around the country will be closed to almost all vehicular traffic and an 8 p.m. curfew will go into effect.
On Tuesday the Islamic Army of Iraq, another insurgent group, called on its followers to unleash attacks to disrupt the elections. "O brave mujahedeen! O lions! O people of zeal! Go and fight and God will be with you," the group said in an Internet posting.
In the fighting around Baghdad on Tuesday, a total of 11 Iraqi police officers were killed and 9 were wounded, hospital officials said. One battle unfolded on Madaris Street, less than three hours before the black sedan came, when a bomb exploded in a school that was designated one of the capital's 1,200 polling sites. Schools will serve as polling sites across the country. American soldiers also found and defused a bomb near a primary school in western Baghdad.
In other aspects of the insurgency, an American taken hostage in November appeared on a videotape and pleaded for his life, according to news agencies.
The American, Roy Hallums, who was kidnapped during an assault on his compound in the Monsour district, sat cross-legged in front of a dark background, according to The Associated Press and Reuters. As he spoke, the barrel of an assault rifle hovered inches from his head.
The tape is the first to have surfaced of Mr. Hallums since he and five colleagues at a Saudi Arabian food contractor were taken from their compound on Nov. 1. Four have been freed; Robert Tarongoy of the Philippines is still missing.
In the tape, Mr. Hallums appealed to Arab leaders, including Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya, to help save him. "I have been arrested by a resistance group in Iraq," Mr. Hallums said. "I am asking for help because my life is in danger, because it has been proved that I work for American forces."
On Madaris Street on Tuesday, the threatening anti-election leaflets had an uncertain effect. Residents said they did not support the guerrillas, but some said they were terrified at the violence that election day might bring.
"I want to vote," said Khalidayah Lazem, a 40-year-old Sunni, standing outside her home. "But as you can see, the situation is getting worse. We see these leaflets every day."
Most of the Iraqis interviewed expressed disapproval for the insurgents. They said the men in the black sedan, for instance, had come from outside the neighborhood. And while some, like Ms. Lazem, were clearly frightened, others said they planned to vote, whatever the price. "We are not afraid of these leaflets," said Mohammed Adel, 24. "I must go to the polling center to vote. I want security and stability for my country."
A spokesman for Iraq's Electoral Commission said Tuesday that results would probably be known about 10 days after election day.
In other military news, American officials said six soldiers had been killed Monday in separate incidents in and around Baghdad. Five soldiers with the Army's First Infantry Division were killed Monday night when a Bradley armored personnel carrier rolled into a canal during a sandstorm near Khan Bani Saad, northeast of the capital, the military said. Another soldier died from wounds from a roadside bomb.
Also Tuesday, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi refused to set a date or a timetable for the withdrawal of American forces from Iraq. Dr. Allawi is running for the national assembly and is a possible candidate for prime minister. Some candidates have suggested that if they were elected, they would set a timetable for the pullout of American forces.
"Others spoke about the immediate withdrawal or setting a timetable for the withdrawal of multinational forces," Dr. Allawi said. "I will not deal with the security matter under political pretexts and exaggerations that do not serve Iraq and its people."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
01/26/2005
1:03:34 AM ||
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Big thing on NPR this afternoon about the upcoming vote. Lots of interviews with Iraqis from across the country who essentially said, "I'm afraid of being killed, but this is so important that all the voting age adults in my family are going to do it." Oh, yes, and "We've been arguing around the dinner table every night over who to vote for. NPR didn't even try very hard to make the story about insurgent violence and Coalition troop casualties.
#2
Sorry -- forgot to close the quote. It should be, "We've been arguing around the dinner table every night over who to vote for." NPR... I think that will make a bit more sense.
A document examiner involved in the flawed "60 Minutes Wednesday" report on George W. Bush's National Guard service claims that he was defamed and his reputation damaged by the recent report from an independent review panel that investigated the show's reporting practices, E&P has learned. Marcel Matley, one of four document experts consulted by CBS News while reporting its Sept. 8, 2004, report on Bush, is demanding a slew of corrections in the report, which was issued earlier this month. In an interview with E&P, he referred to the report's treatment of him as "defamation."
I love the smell of lawsuits in the morning.....
The independent review panel, headed by former Attorney General Richard Thornburgh and former Associated Press CEO Louis Boccardi, found mistakes in the network's efforts to authenticate documents on which the report was based and determined that CBS had rushed the report to air too quickly. In an e-mail to Thornburgh's office on Jan. 13, obtained by E&P, Matley criticized the report as containing "certain incorrect statements affecting me and which are derogatory and/or damaging to me professionally." He also asks that the panel issue corrections for each of the errors he contends are in the report and distribute the corrections.
"It is professional defamation," Matley, a 20-year document expert, told E&P, from his home in San Francisco. "When you are in a court of law, it can make the difference between being considered credible or not." He said the report has already hurt his professional reputation, claiming it was mentioned last week during his appearance in a Modesto, Calif., courtroom on a probate case. "Someone brought it up that I was the one who made the mistake in the '60 Minutes' case," he said. "I've already had this thrown at me." Matley told E&P he had yet to hear back from CBS or Thornburgh about the e-mail. "They have not acknowledged my existence," he declared. "They have not even replied."
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
10:24:58 AM ||
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I love the lawsuit angle and I also like that this report (sic) is far from final. I want CBS, 60 minutes, Dan Rather, and Mapes brought up on Federal elections tampering charges. I know it won't happen but I would love to see Rathers final act come from a court bench where he has to admit he didn't know anything.
Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra says Thailand's most-wanted man, an alleged Muslim separatist, has been arrested in neighbouring Malaysia and the kingdom will seek to extradite him. Authorities have alleged that Doramae Kuteh, also known as Chae Kumae Kuteh, was the mastermind behind a January 4, 2004 arms depot raid that reignited unrest in Thailand's Muslim-majority south.
Is a guy named Dora Mae kinda like a Boy Named Sue?
The unrest has left at least 570 people dead. "Absolutely we want him extradited back here as he has been involved with many incidents," Mr Thaksin said. "He has been the real mastermind [behind the unrest] including last year's robbery of government-owned weapons." He did not elaborate on how and when the suspect was arrested but confirmed that he was captured alone and under Malaysia's Internal Security Act, which allows suspects to be detained without trial, for also posing a threat there. "We are coordinating with Malaysia to determine his nationality but initially we will take part in investigations and we are now checking for evidence as well as on his Thai nationality," he said.
Doramae Kuteh is wanted for premeditated murder and inciting a guerrilla movement, and had a bounty of five million baht ($A169,000) on his head. Mr Thaksin says another alleged separatist known as Sapae-ing had, meanwhile, made contact with authorities here. "Sapae-ing has contacted authorities to turn himself in, but on condition of being granted bail. After the elections I will go to the south to personally oversee the crackdown," he said. Both developments are likely to mean an improvement in the restive southern provinces bordering Malaysia ahead of February 6 elections. Security forces have struggled to quell the Islamic insurgency that erupted in the area after the January raid. The unrest has comprised almost daily attacks on police, troops, government officials and teachers at state schools. Buddhist monks and villagers have also been killed. It also led to tensions with Malaysia after Mr Thaksin claimed in December that Thai militants were training in the neighbouring country's jungles. Mr Thaksin later backed off from the comments, claiming they had been distorted by the media.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
10:17:43 AM ||
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excellllenntt
(/monty burns)
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 12:15
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January 26, 2005: It's the economy, stupid. Iraqis are less concerned about democracy, than in making a living. You can blame this one on Saddam. Iraq prospered in the 1970s, as oil prices soared and Iraq was one of the leading suppliers. Saddam's invasion of Iran in 1980 kept things going, as he borrowed billions to buy weapons and supplies to fight off the furious Iranian counterattack. When peace was finally achieved in 1987, Iraqis thought they were safe. But many of Iraqs lenders wanted repayment, and Saddam sought to solve that problem in 1990 by invading Kuwait (which had lots of oil, and was demanding repayment of the billions it had loaned Iraq.) Iraq was not only defeated in 1991, but forbidden to export oil until Saddam disarmed. Saddam refused to let the UN inspectors go where they wanted, and while he was doing this, the economy collapsed. In effect, most of the nation went on a meager welfare program to prevent mass starvation. Saddam now controlled what was left of the economy, as he had never done before. Saddam used this new power to punish areas where there was active resistance to his rule. Cutting off food supplies proved very effective in keeping rebels quiet.
When Saddam was thrown out of power in 2003, the economy began to revive. That process had begun in northern Iraq in 1993, as American and British airpower drove out Iraqi police and troops. This was mainly to prevent Saddam from continuing his persecution of the Kurds. Saddam put up with that situation, because the Kurdish region he had lost had no oil. But even without oil, the Kurds got their economy going. In a few years, it was obvious to anyone who visited Saddam's Iraq, and the Kurdish controlled north, that the Kurds were much better off.
But with Saddam gone, so were the people he had running his powerful welfare state. Part of that operation was the army, a sort of armed public works project. With jobs so scarce, a spot in the army was a prize awarded only to those who were loyal to Saddam. Knowing this, right after Baghdad fell, the army (which was only military effective against unarmed civilians) was disbanded, as was the bureaucracy that controlled food distribution. These two institutions were much hated by the majority of the population. However, most of the people who lost their jobs were Sunni Arabs, who lived in central Iraq, and especially Baghdad. When Western reporters went looking for Iraqi interview subjects, a disproportionate amount of the time, they found an articulate, English speaking Sunni Arab who used to work for Saddam's government (and sometimes admitted it to the reporter.) Thus began a long line of "man-on-the-street" interviews featuring an Iraqi put out of work by the American invasion. Most of the people put out of work by the invasion were those who administered Saddam's police state. The army was controlled by Sunni Arabs, whose first loyalty was to keeping Sunni Arabs in control of the country.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005
10:11:08 AM ||
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JPost - Reg Req'd - posting it all - Apparently some snuffies aren't exempt...
Israel Police special forces operating Wednesday in the West Bank city of Kalkilya killed Hamas fugitive Maher Abu-Sneineh and wounded two of his assistants. During the operation, security forces spotted Abu-Sneineh together with two others riding in a car in the center of the city. The troops identified Abu-Sneineh and one of the passengers as Fatah Tanzim fugitive Mohammed Hamis Yusef Amar. The forces chased the car in order to arrest them. When the car slowed down the fugitives ignored calls to surrender and attempted to flee. The officers then opened fire killing Abu-Sneineh and wounding Amar. A third passenger who was in the car with them, identified as Mohammed al Basha, was also wounded. nice shooting Avner!
The two, who sustained serious wounds, were taken to hospital in Israel. According to the army, Abu-Sneineh, in the past, planned to launch a suicide bomb attack in Israel but after his Hamas commander was killed, he took over the role and was involved in recruiting others to launch attacks.
In response to the incident, masked Palestinians in Gaza who said they represented the Al Aqsa Brigades threatened to renew attacks if Israel did not stop such operations within 24 hours.
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005
10:01:23 PM ||
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#4
The Chinese are now outdoing the French in currency manipulation. Bwahahahaha.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 18:42
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#5
I found the story to have alot of humor.
China will not float it's currency.
The truth is the Euro cant compete even with a weak dollar. Their goods are overpriced due to the nany state taxation they have to support. A weak dollar isn't all bad. The fact is the US buys and sells more than Europe can or will even in weak dollars. Central banks should be holding a mix of currencies not just dollars or euros.
#1
This addresses one of the biggest misconceptions about Islamofascism, the wails and whines about only impoverished muslims become terrorists -- bull shit!
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/26/2005 9:44
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#2
This addresses one of the biggest misconceptions about Islamofascism, the wails and whines about only impoverished muslims become terrorists..
Not that any of the wailing and whining would actually stop....
Veteran political strategist Bob Shrum, who most recently advised John Kerry during his failed bid for the presidency, will join the NYU Wagner School of Public Service as a senior fellow on Feb. 1. Shrum said his move to academia was not motivated by his candidate's loss to George W. Bush. "I would have been inclined to do it if Kerry had won, because I had no desire to go the White House," said Shrum, 61. "I would never lobby." Right.
"If nominated, I would not run. If elected...like hell I would!"
This spring Shrum will focus on doing research on modern politics and preparing his classes, which will include a graduate course for Wagner students and a freshman honors seminar. He will not start teaching until fall 2005. Lifelong friend and now boss NYU president John Sexton...call[ed] Shrum "a wonderful thinker, a truly gifted writer, and a good man," Sexton said he was "particularly struck by his eagerness -- insistence, really -- on teaching undergraduates each year."
"Especially the pretty ones."
Shrum should have ample material for his classes. At the age of 9, he volunteered for presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson's campaign. Although his primary tasks included general office work, he was not allowed to answer the phone because he sounded too young. obligatory tee hee Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
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#1
Is he going to teach "Introduction to Losing Elections" or is it more of a graduate-level seminar on losing elections?
#2
no --he's going to teach "networking with old friends to get jobs for losers"--based on his textbook "the idiot's guide to ineffective stridency based on stale ideas"
Posted by: SON OF TOLUI ||
01/26/2005 2:29
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#3
"...he plans to honor his commitment to advise Sen. John Corzine, D-N.J., who plans to run for governor this year."
#4
Running for Governer doesn't appear to be as hard as running for President. You only have to fool a majority of people in your State whereas running for President you have to fool a majority of the whole country.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/26/2005 12:22
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#5
What a dream for the Republicans, Dean for DNC chairman and Schrum as the go-to advisor for presidential candidates. I wish them both very long careers.
#6
true, Deacon, but Governors have to - voila!-govern. Create budgets, cut compromises, seek voters on the other side, etc...that's why Senators suck as candidates (except Hillary, of course, we know she doesn't suck....) - all they do is create track records of bills and votes...unless, like Kerry, they avoid both by not showing up....I guess....er... I was wrong?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 22:48
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Investigators probing allegations of impropriety in the United Nations' Iraqi oil-for-food program questioned Secretary-General Kofi Annan about his involvement twice last year and again Tuesday, a U.N. spokesman said. Annan met with former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker and his investigators Nov. 9 and again Dec. 3, spokesman Fred Eckhard said. A third meeting took place Tuesday afternoon, but Volcker, who spoke to reporters as he left the United Nations, would not give details. Volcker's panel had been expected to release a preliminary report in late January, but he said Tuesday it would come out in early February. "We're going to have a report shortly," he said. "All I can tell you is wait for the report to come out."
"The secretary-general is part of the investigation, is a subject like anyone else involved in oil-for-food at the secretariat," Eckhard said. And for Mike S.:
One element of the investigation is Annan's son Kojo, who worked in Africa for a Swiss company that had a contract under the oil-for-food program. Kojo Annan, who denies any involvement in wrongdoing, received payments for more than four years after his job ended. It was not immediately known if the U.N. chief discussed his son during his meetings with Volcker and other investigators. Eckhard said the November meeting lasted more than 1 1/2 hours and the second about 25 minutes. A report in October by top U.S. arms inspector Charles Duelfer said Saddam was able to "subvert" the $60 billion program to generate an estimated $1.7 billion in revenue outside U.N. control from 1997 to 2003. Saddam also raked in more than $8 billion from illicit oil deals with Jordan, Syria, Turkey and Egypt, according to U.S. congressional investigators... There are also at least five U.S. congressional probes into the scandal.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
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Germany is to consider suspending a European agreement abolishing internal border controls before and during the 2006 World Cup, Interior Minister Otto Schily has told Deutsche Presse-Agentur. Schily said the government might impose regular border security checks for a period to coincide with the tournament from 9 June to 9 July next year. Germany is party to the Schengen Treaty in which internal border checks have been abolished in all pre-enlargement European Union member states except for Britain and Ireland. The Schengen area also includes non-EU members Norway and Iceland. Schily said security authorities would be braced for all potential danger before and during the World Cup.
Schily has his priorities in order. Bet the editorial boards and Brussels don't agree with his thinking...
"We will be watching very closely who is coming to our country for the World Cup," he said. "Whether we again temporarily introduce regular border controls on the Schengen internal borders for the World Cup is something we will decide at the appropriate time based on the security situation. It is possible."
Posted by: Seafarious ||
01/26/2005
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Okay, then you think of a better title for this! Hat-tip Instapundit
The Anglosphere Challenge to the Political Left
"People who define themselves primarily as members of collective entities, whether families, religions, racial or ethnic groups, political movements, or even corporations, cannot be the basis of a civil society. Individuals must be free to dissociate themselves from such collectivities without prejudice and reaffiliate with others in a civil society. Societies that place individuals under the permanent discipline of inherited or assigned collectivities, and permanently bind them into such, remain bogged down in family favoritism, ethnic, racial, or religious factionalism, or systems such as the 'crony capitalism' which has marked in particular East Asia and Latin America."
-- James C. Bennett, The Anglosphere Challenge
The long first chapter of writer James C. Bennett's new book, "The Anglosphere Challenge," is a fascinating combination of cultural anthropology and technological prognostication. It led me to reflect on a number of issues.
1) Our Anglospheric culture, as Bennett calls it, enables people to form and break relationships easily. In economist's terms, the costs of entry and exit are low.
2) The ability to formulate and dissolve partnerships is very important in the real world of business, yet it receives relatively little attention in business school, much less in economics.
3) In the 1960's and 1970's, a book with the ambition, scope, and intellectual power of The Anglosphere Challenge would have been written by an academic.
4) Today's political Left is focused on group solidarity rather than on building a coalition.
What Causes Prosperity and Democracy?
In Learning Economics, I raise the question What Causes Prosperity?. Bennett answers that economic prosperity and political freedom/democracy both stem from what he calls "civil society." By this, he means the networks of associations that people form, reminiscent of de Tocqueville's observation and so forth
A long article, but very interesting. And another addition to my books I want list.
Books, bad. Rantburg, good. ;-)
Posted by: trailing wife ||
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#1
Unfortunately, his first point seems to be translating over real well into personal relationships especially in regards to marriage.
#2
The costs are psychic more than economic, Jarhead. The children of the divorce generation are well aware of this,having been the ones who paid the highest price, and considerably more careful about making and breaking commitments. My prediction (for what its worth): the divorce rate will drop precipitously over the next two decades.
#3
TW, You might want to read The Anglosphere Primer that Bennett wrote a few years ago. Den Beste also had at least one post on the topic that I recall, but I don't know how I would ever find it. Also, there is a small bibliography at the end of the Primer. EVERY one of the books he mentions is excellent.
Posted by: Mr. Spock ||
01/26/2005 14:30
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#4
I would have to disagree, TW.
These children have been taught, consistently, that personal relationships are secondary in their lives. It doesn't matter if your family life falls apart, just moveon.org to the next temporary relationship. The 'ME' generation taught their children to think of themselves first.
The divorce rate may drop . . . but only as a symptom of the lack of committed relationships. Not that people won't get married, but you will find a widening gap between marrieds and dedicated singles, with more dedicated single than ever before.
In the end, without people from our culture having more children, as few women or men actually choose to be single parents, other cultures and value systems than what we are used to will become predominant. 'They' will outbreed us (pick your 'they').
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 14:33
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#5
If you want to read more about James C. Bennett's views, he has posted a 3 part "primer" at the Angloshere Institute's website, of which he is President. He's also an adjunct fellow at the Hudson Institute:
http://anglosphereinstitute.org/
Bennett is a little "too head in the clouds" veering leftward for my taste. When I got to his chapter on "Sojourner Provisions: The Human Element of Trade and Cooperation"( ie. sojourner status = "a new model of transnational personal movement")I lost interest because Mr. Bennett's vision is the same old, same old no borders, no worries shtick.
Also, Bennett's views on national security titled "Security Organizations: Sailing With the Fast Convoy" is "interesting." Hold on to your hats folks - powers such as Britain and France, which had fallen to the middle rank of military capability, today have returned to the rank of top powers precisely because of their greater ability to master the cutting edge of today's information-based technologies
Mr. Bennett is a very smart guy, no doubt about it. He has a high profile in the field of nanotechnology and the commercial space field.
http://www.foresight.org/FI/Bennett.html
I'd agree that the book may be interesting but it's not entirely new thinking - kind of a mix of neo-conservativism with libertarianism with Neal Stephenson. Ranking freedom as the route to a new world order without properly addressing big barriers like some religions, that shall go un-named, that put loyalty to it above individual and familial needs is more pie in the sky.
It's not so easy for First World nations to lead Third World nations to world peace and prosperity just with slogans about democracy and liberty via the internet. I for one don't believe that it's every person's innate desire to be free. If you look at world history, there's been a heck of alot more years of servitude than equalitarianism and freedom. Even the system that pretended to believe in equalitarianism ( communism) actually had an elite oligarchy that governed the common masses and curtailed their freedoms considerably.
Also there is an issue about Third World nations, that have considerable devotion to Islamic faith, being in the driver's seat in the future just by virtue of their natural resources, which the First World nations desperately need. They do not need to embrace democracy or Western values to conduct business interactions with capitalist nations and be successful in the future.
#6
Thanks, Mr. Spock. Saved for later, when I'm not on chauffeur duty. When the family went on holiday over Christmas, between the four of us we took an entire suitcase full of books. I think that when the girls set up their own homes, I'll divide the library between them, as my mother-in-law has divided her Xmas decorations. (Okay, I admit it, she gave me some books, too). That should fulfill .com's dictum about simplifying life, nez pah?
#7
They do not need to embrace democracy or Western values to conduct business interactions with capitalist nations and be successful in the future.
Depends on your definition of successful.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 15:07
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#8
JH, Jame, TW-I don't fear underpopulation of the earth because people aren't having enough children. I do think about the demographics of the world population over time-what percentage is committed to individual freedom and rights? What percentage would fight to eliminate a psychopathic leader? It is crucial to the survival of the democratic way of life that these percentages remain majorities.
Over time, whether subconsciously or consciously, Westerners will examine our current ways of life and family and make adjustments to our expectations. Those adjustments will have to come from more than childbearers, however. Is our current way of raising children an attractive enough alternative for a larger number of talented and intelligent women to choose mothering and home-making over remunerating, rewarding and challenging careers?
Once children are brought into the world, I think it makes sense to have a parent at home for those children, and in most societies, that has been parent has been the mother. That is smart in terms of child-rearing, but that is a huge sacrifice for women who have talents and dreams of their own-talents and dreams that in the case of my mother would have taken her to concert pianist success has she lived in a different generation. Just as is the case for any human being entering an agreement, a free person will ask, is this a good bargain?
I wouldn't expect any huge shift in the numbers of women working outside the home without significant shifts in other arenas.
#9
TW, as a product of a broken home, trust me, I know the psychological aspect.
I think as it's easy for people to make and break contacts wrt business/professional life (as the author suggests) so goes their personal affairs.
50% of all marriages or so end in divorce, my belief is that's in part to the great "me" generation & I think the other part of it is that some people go into a marriage w/unrealistically high expectations and bail out as soon as things start to get dull.
As far as underpopultation, heck, I'd like to see a little underpopulation for a change. I think there's enough idiots on the planet already. I see so many parents today that have children they can neither afford economically or emotionally. BTW Jules, my wife is a stay at home mom. Sure we could be better off money wise if she worked but we both feel it's a far greater investment that she's home w/our son. I think her job is much harder and more noble then just about anything I can think of. We both laughed at Teresa H. Kerry for making the assumption that Laura Bush never had a job "if she was just home raising the kids."
Life is merely having the lead in a series of one-act plays.
And, as with all other aberrations of nature (read: ignoring the Darwinist reality; i.e. rational femalians must favor monogamy to protect their offspring), such a philosophy is a genetic box canyon. Here's to the day that rational behavior wins out over this social insanity. As with other clueless and self-defeating "strategies" (i.e. Ebola killing the host before spreading), this is yet another aspect of moonbattery that will eventually have suicide as its obvious end-point.
#11
Depends on your definition of successful
I used the word in terms of sustainability, power and I relate it to Bennett's philosophy for how the world can be transformed through the power of democracy. He claims liberty/democratic values can cause a former failing nation to become successful.
I disagree with Bennett. A nation does not need democracy to be powerful or successful. Look at China. It's motoring along quite well and getting stronger each day. Liberty has not made the Eastern Bloc nations prosperous. No matter how much democracy we promote in Africa, I doubt that continent will ever be successful, financially solvent, self-sufficient.
Bennett relates his political vision to economics, world politics, and power. He believes that universal values from the First World democracies like rule of law, individualism, "high-trust characteristics" ( per Fukuyama) can be used to get Third World countries up to speed and every one will float around through borderless networked commonwealths being happy happy with one another and prosperous and innovative to boot.
Nations that control fossil fuel resources do not need to change their values to be powerful in the future world. Islam does not allow for individual freedom - it requires individual loyality to faith so right off the bat the concept of liberty is a no-no, because that would call for freedom of association,freedom of religion, equality of man and women,blah, blah, blah. Islam is one of the oldest religions and its tenets have survived intact without its followers being "distracted" by values from neighboring democracies. European nations like the UK actually had ME nations as colonies yet the Magna Carta has never been embraced by ME'ers.
I think we need to use another paradigm to look at the future. Shared values except for exchange of money from fossil fuel poor nations to fossil rich nations is not going to happen. Perhaps civil business transactions is the best we can hope for. First World nationals better get used to the fact that our standard of living is going to take a tumble in the future. We have paid way below true market rates for fuel, especially in the USA.
I suggest that our nation should not put all its eggs in one basket ie. that democracy will make hostile nations like us and bring world peace. I think for every cent we invest in the military, we should invest the same amount in scientific research re: discovering a substitute for fossil fuels. I'm more a pragmatist than a dreamer.
#15
2x:
While you raise some excellent points, I believe that you are being overly pessimistic. In most instances people rise to the occasion when presented with economic opportunities, individual freedom, and the chance to govern themselves democratically. Certainly there is a rocky road to travel for many developing nations, but in the end the individual is always the basic building block of society. Individual, rather than collective, wants and needs rule human behavior. Mainland China will eventually reform and become democratic, given enough time combined with continued economic prosperity. It may take 50 years but it will come. Islamic nations will become more democratic, individualistic, and friendly toward women and minorities given time.... as well as the occasional military or economic "kick in the ass" by the United States.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 18:48
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#17
Exactly, #14. It was not liberty or democracy or those high minded ideals that beat the Third Reich. The Third Reich sowed its own defeat when it did not honor the peace truce Hitler signed with Stalin. Germany simply over-extended itself when it took on the Russian front. However, if Hitler had kept Stalin happy, I have no doubt Europe would have German as its official language today. We were lucky that Hitler turned on Stalin.
The Third Reich fell but communism became entrenched, yet another odious political system. Communism pursued its own genocidal programs and was every bit as evil as Fascism. Interestingly enough communism does not get as much "bad press" in the West. There's a statue of Lenin, believe it or not, in Fremont, Washington state.
http://www.seattleweekly.com/features/0503/050119_arts_toughlenin.php
It should make every American vomit at the thought of having Lenin's statue in a US city.
#18
as a product of a broken home, trust me, I know the psychological aspect. Better than I do, as I only know from observation. And you and your wife have chosen the "sacrifice" of child-centered life, at least until the children are grown, which was precisely my point. I, too am a housewife (the 'little' that I often append describes my almost 60"/152cm height), for the same reason, and my husband says that hardest/noble stuff too -- I think of it rather as both choosing the most personally suitable role. He would be as miserable at home as I would be trapped in the endless series of meetings he revels in. Several of my house-husband friends made the same choice for the same reason, liberated by classical (Jules -- by that I mean pre-lesbian/bra burning absurdities) feminism to make seek the highest happiness for the whole family.
I agree that at least part of the cause for the current divorce rate is unrealistically high romantic expectations of marriage. I understand that military folks tend to marry younger than civilians, which would exaggerate that aspect. And indeed, that same unrealistic expectation leads to the whole Sex in the City eternal bachelor/bachelorette thing, as they keep waiting for the perfect, nonexistent One (.com's genetic box canyon).
The whole birthrate thing is a bit of a blind ally, I think. On the whole, prosperity world wide is increasing these days, and with prosperity comes decreasing birth rates. The Western World is just furthest along the curve, is all. (Although I wouldn't argue with those who suggest Europe has gone too far. But that's related to why they prefer talking to doing. Another argument altogether.) Those who choose not to have children will simply be replaced in another generation by those whose parents chose to become parents. (Ha!)
As for the Nazi Germany, the seeds of their defeat were inherent in their situation. A nihilistic, murderous society naturally turns on its own citizens when all the putative outsiders have been eliminated. Had Hitler won the war, his society would have melted down within a generation, as first the Slavs, then the French and Southern Europeans been killed off, then all non-Germans, then all non-blond Germans, and finally all who were not Hitler himself, were there any still willing to do his killing for him. The successful invasion of the Allies merely hurried that process (saving my mother and her family, among others, along the way, for which I am duly grateful). Even a non-nihilistic, but expansionist, Continental society like Napoleonic France was doomed to failure, for reasons that others here can explain much, much better than I.
And that, I think, is quite enough from me on this thread.
#19
TW, I think the causality is that in industrial society, larger families lead to poverty, smaller families lead to prosperity. Sufficient prosperity leads to purchasing the ultimate luxury, a larger family and a wife at home full time to rear it. I anticipate women constituting a shrinking proportion of the workforce as more of them have larger families over the next several decades.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 20:36
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A good background piece on the the shape of Iraq's government, post-election.
Can't tell the players without a program.
By Brett H. McGurk, former legal adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority and the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, who helped establish the legal framework for elections in Iraq.
Iraq's upcoming elections will be an event with real potential to turn the tide both in Iraq and in the war on terrorism. As Afghanistan demonstrates, credible elections -- elections that are perceived as free and fair -- can sap the influence of violent extremists whose only claim to power is brute force and intimidation. That is why the claims of Sunni groups that advocate a boycott of elections must be vigorously rejected. These groups, such as the often-cited Association of Muslim Scholars, fail to disavow violence, yet they claim that the electoral process is somehow rigged against them.
Rarely are their claims scrutinized. Indeed, it is remarkable that in all the commentary and reporting on the Iraqi elections, little has been said about what exactly those elections are for -- and how powers will be shared after the elections even if violence keeps some away from the polls. But there lies the answer to Sunnis who threaten a boycott. Iraq's interim constitution sets the framework for a transition to an elected government under a permanent constitution by the end of this year. As in any democracy, the majority will govern, but it is untrue that minorities thereby lack influence during this period. Any elected majority must share power to govern post-Saddam Hussein Iraq. The country is simply too diverse and intermingled for one group to peacefully control more than a small fraction of territory.
The interim framework accounts for this by incorporating checks and balances and important limitations on the central government in Baghdad. Iraqis are to elect a 275-member National Assembly to serve as both a legislative and constitutional assembly. But the powers of this assembly are to be shared with an independent judiciary and an executive branch that incorporates the views of Iraq's three principal factions. The selection process for the executive branch is vital. The National Assembly will appoint a three-member presidency council -- with each member receiving at least two-thirds support (or 184 votes) within the assembly. The presidency council must then unanimously appoint a prime minister, who will be the most powerful figure in the Iraqi government, as well as approve cabinet selections and appoint judges to Iraq's highest court. Thus the center of power in post-election Iraq will enjoy support across the political spectrum. And unlike the transitional model in post-conflict Bosnia, the process in Iraq requires debate among elected representatives, rather than simply locking in ethnic division from the outset, which leaves democracy stillborn. The process for drafting a permanent constitution similarly requires extensive outreach to all Iraqis, regardless of ethnicity or creed.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
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Two men suspected of being al-Qaeda supporters have been remanded in custody by a German federal court in Karlsruhe, after they were arrested for allegedly plotting a suicide bombing in Iraq. Police say a 29-year-old Iraqi who had previously served as an al-Qaeda gunman in Afghanistan was believed to be recruiting for suicide attacks against US forces and the interim government in Iraq. A 31-year-old Palestinian medical student was believed to be the recruit who had agreed to "martyrdom" at the wheel of a car bomb.
He should really watch that VW Polo commercial before making a final decision...
German authorities say the Iraqi had attended al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan before the 11 September 2001 attacks on New York and Washington, and had spent a year in Afghanistan afterwards fighting US forces. Prosecutors said there was no indication the men were planning attacks in Germany, but they seemed to have used Europe as a safe haven in much the same way as the pilots who led the 9-11 suicide attacks on New York and Washington. In the western German city of Mainz where the Iraqi, identified as Ibrahim Mohamed K., was arrested Sunday, a police spokesman admitted to Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that K. had been vetted after the 2001 attacks, but police had missed warning signs. On SWR television, interior official Karl Peter Bruch said a tip- off from the public had led to months of surveillance of K. culminating in the arrest of the two men. Police discounted any connection with a visit to Mainz in four weeks by US President George W. Bush for talks with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.
Posted by: Seafarious ||
01/26/2005
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Important, shocking-to-me fact:
[E]arly sex is not usually "good sex" or even "safe sex." Of those teens who have sexual relations, a significant majority report dissatisfaction and disappointment with the experience. Especially for teen girls, "safer sex" is not often emotionally safe. In fact, when asked, the vast majority of sexually experienced girls say they wished they had waited. According to a 2000 poll by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, nearly two-thirds of teens who initiated sexual activity said they wished they had delayed their decision. Among girls, the results were striking: 72 percent of girls wished they had waited.
Another fact:
[I]n the recent CDC research, nearly 40 percent of teens said they avoided sex because of religious reasons.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
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#1
The most laughable aspect of teen sex is how uneven it is. First of all, across the board, relatively few teens are sexually active: however, they *think*, and are propagandized to believe, that *most* of their peers are active, and they are among the few who aren't. And that they are *abnormal* because they aren't. But among those that are sexually active, the vast majority are of several types (or a combination of these): financial poverty; parents who themselves had sex, drugs and alcohol at a young age; broken homes; latchkey kids; and victims of molestation. The irony of this is that the kids who are most responsive to all forms of warning about teen sex, are the *least* likely to being having teen sex anyway.
#11
No, Mrs. D, shocking because such a large number of sexually active kids are unhappy about the choice they made. Exercising one's sexuality should be such a joyous, as well as pleasurable, act, and somehow so many kids are managing to deprive themselves of that. Although, clearly, significantly fewer than before. For context, the editors cut the majority of the article, which was about the downward trend in the number of sexually active teens since the 1980s. The bits they kept were actually incidental to the thrust of the article.
But where on earth did you get the idea that I believe the MSM and watch TV news? At Rantburg, them's fighting words ;-)
#12
I got the idea from you being shocked that teen-age sexual activity was continuing its downward trend. Read Generations, the History of America's Future and you'll see that it was to be expected. The M$M kept peddling the story of teenage promiscuity long after it was history because it fit their world view and sex sells.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
01/26/2005 20:29
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That looks interesting, Mrs. D. Thanks, I've added it to my ever lengthening list. At this rate, Mr. Wife isn't going to be able to afford any of the expensive pretties he thinks he wants to gift me -- for quite a few years to come ;-) On the other hand, we can hope my conversation will be more interesting!
An interesting follow-up on the Rantburg discussion on biowarfare. From Nat'l Review Online, The Kerry Spot (scroll down)
A FEW MORE THOUGHTS ABOUT SMALLPOX AND EPIDEMICS⊠[01/24 10:46 PM]
Boy, David Frum is right, NRO readers collectively know everything about everything. So do Rantburgers, but I won't argue with a man on his own blog about the calibre of his readers ;-)
TKS reader Mike, who was a microbiology major during the glory years of KC and the Sunshine band (which he compares to Ebola), writes in:
At any rate, on one hand, it is remarkable simple to manufacture virulent strains of some really nasty stuff. But, the virulence comes at a price. VOLUME. You need a crap load of the stuff to really do the job. AND, it's pretty fragile too. Why do you think it takes a lab with all the fancy schmancy heaters/coolers, humidifiers, etc to make it? Once made, it needs that type of environment to survive. I'm not saying I'd go out and drink a margarita of cholera mind you, I'm just saying that delivery really gets to be a female dog if you get my meaning.
So, I live in Arizona, a few million people going about their day-to-day lives. Typical day in January-High Temps in the 60's (eat your heart out) lows in the 30's to 40's. Humidity around 18% or so. Winds light gusting to maybe 15mph. From what I understand, you'd have to almost saturate 100 sq miles and I mean SATURATE the ground, buildings, etc for any form of virus, bacteria, disco band to have any penetration. You'd need a crop-duster to do this flying almost at roof-top level. And remember, that for the most part people are wearing clothes. Time to infection is crucial. Most places just are not habitable for these things. ALL the conditions, not just some or even most, ALL, need to be there, temperature, humidity, wind patterns, susceptibility of people, virulence half-life, incubation period, response, etc.
Now, if someone did develop the super resistant, super virulent bugga-boo, what's to stop it? If you're the developer, you gotta test it right? How's that gonna go? How do you keep it a secret. Like the proverbial genie, once it's literally out of the bottle, there's no putting it back in. How do you keep it contained in these places? It's not like, your other reader pointed out, the ME emirs would stockpile any sort of vaccine or antidote would they? This type of research just cannot be done in the black. Well, maybe we could or are, but Iran? Syria? Indonesia? Please, just not likely to happen.
Echoing some of his thoughts, TKS reader Richard observes, "Before they used the Sarin gas, the Aum followers tried spraying botulism toxin and anthrax spores in Tokyo. They didn't make anyone ill with those, but that was due to their technical incompetence. If they'd had access to smallpox, I have no doubt they would have used it. And given the low level of general immunity in the human population now, it would have been horrific."
And TKS reader Michael Bellomo tips us off to the June 2005 release of his book, with co-author Dr. Alan Zelicoff, that discusses how to detect and minimize the effects of a bioterrorism event - called Microbe: Are we Ready for the Next Plague?. I look forward to reading it, next time I feel like I'm sleeping too soundly. Me, too. I've added it to my books I want list.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
01/26/2005
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Even given that a bioweapon would be seriously difficult to manufacture and deploy, it could still have a major psychological effect. I think that any bioweapon would function like a dirty nuke: not all that dangerous in and of itself, but possibly leading to lethal panic among the uninformed. Usage in a subway system or a heavily trafficked public building -- say, the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum during the summer months -- coupled with an announcement to the public about what was done could lead to stampedes and the like.
Posted by: Jonathan ||
01/26/2005 11:27
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More long term, you would have a divergance of opinion regarding ground zero issues. Was it an isolated "no big deal" event for those not impacted early or a more than subtle "I ain't shopping at that Walmart anymore"? Would business in the nebulous decontamination zone have to relocate by necessity, or just because all of their customers are going to other places. What about your housing value? If a little mold can screw up a house closing deal, what about the uncertainty over the longer term effects of having an event in your major metropolitan area? Money lenders do not like uncertainty, and there is plenty of it in this scenario. Pity the bastard that just closed on his dream home the week before.
#3
Frankly, the next terror attack seems far more likely to be small arms fire in a densely crowded open public space, maybe a dozen or two dozen fascists doing the firing. Probably at a mall or in a subway.
Mark sounds like he's a pretty bad boy. Mother must be so proud.
That idiot, Cliff BarnesMark Thatcher, 51, the son of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, could be barred from the United States, where he hopes to rejoin his American wife and children, after last week's felony plea bargain in which he admitted paying for a helicopter to be used in an African coup. Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, the president of Equatorial Guinea, was the target of the coup attempt last year. The former Spanish colony, which gained independence in 1968, likely will seek Thatcher's extradition from wherever he goes.
Teodoro would be worth getting rid of, but waiting a year or two would allow him to depart the scene naturally, since he's about 185 years old.
Thatcher's criminal record could prevent him from obtaining anything beyond a visitor's permit to the United States, the South African newspaper Rapport said. His plans to rejoin his American wife, Diane, and children in Texas have been delayed while his attorneys negotiate with U.S. authorities for a new visa, the Dallas Morning News reported. His old visa has expired and his criminal conviction could count against him, it said. The Dallas newspaper said Thatcher was waiting in Frankfurt, Germany, for word on the visa. An earlier report in the London Sunday Telegraph quoted a U.S. customs official as saying Thatcher would receive no special favors because of his family.
It doesn't sound like the U.S. authorities are particularly impressed with him, either...
Margaret Thatcher, who was a close friend of President Reagan's, paid her son's bail and has been staying with him in Cape Town. She did not accompany him to the courthouse. Thatcher's wife, the daughter of a wealthy Texas auto dealer, has been conspicuously absent. She made one fleeting trip to Cape Town since flying to Dallas with their two children shortly after her husband's arrest in August.
Maybe she doesn't like South Africa? Or is she spending time with J.R. now that Cliff Mark is preoccupied with other things?
#3
Sounds like a Brit problem to me. Sir Mark can go there, not to the U.S.
Posted by: Tom ||
01/26/2005 10:57
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Ima thinkr thisn good for a Victoria Principal nude shot?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 11:04
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I think she's in the shower with Bobby...
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005 11:09
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Oi.
Seriously, I'm suprised his wife went to SA to see him, and took the kids too. I would have figured they already had enough hostages.
Do y'all think he really did it, or is he just a high-profile suspect-du-jour to get the masses excited?
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
01/26/2005 11:44
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If the description's remotely accurate, he dunnit.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005 14:37
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Odds on, he got duped by Mann. He should have known better, but when told he would be getting big returns for a relatively small investment he probably decided that it was worth it to not notice any irregularities. The fleetness of mouth by the mercs in captivity says that Thatcher probably was set up as a fall guy from day 1.
If Teodoro had really wanted to make a 'splas' he should have had somebody at the airport with an anti-aircraft missile and made mercenary bits all over the runway.
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 14:56
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What Ronnie Reagan is to President Reagan Mark Thatcher is to the Iron Lady.
Blame it on delusion of genes.
Posted by: Captain America ||
01/26/2005 17:14
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A negotiating team led by tribal clerics to get former Guantanamo Bay inmate Abdullah Mehsud to surrender has not yet made any progress, Brig (r) Mehmood Shah, the security chief of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, told Daily Times on Tuesday. Abdullah, the one-legged militant, had been asked by the military to surrender by today (Wednesday) or face a "military onslaught" for kidnapping two Chinese engineers in October last year. Tribal clerics met Peshawar Corps Commander Lt Gen Safdar Hussain — who is also in charge of military operations in South Waziristan Agency — in Peshawar and asked him to give them 10 days more to negotiate Abdullah's surrender, the earlier deadline being January 15. Lt Gen Hussain agreed with the clerics and extended the deadline to January 26.
The sweet by and by will eventually come, I suppose...
Posted by: Fred ||
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Tomorrow's headline: Mehsud Deadline Extended 10 More Days.
February 5th's headline: Mehsud Deadline Extended 10 More Days.
February 15th's headline: Mehsud Deadline...
The United States has determined that the Iraqi embassy in Syria serves to facilitate the flow of insurgents to fight the coalition in Iraq. U.S. officials said the Iraqi embassy in Damascus has refused to submit to the authority of the interim government in Baghdad.
Then they're still on the other side, aren't they?
They said the embassy has provided passports at sharply reduced costs to Islamic volunteers who have joined the Sunni insurgency movement.
Probably time to change the passports, isn't it?
The Iraqi embassy in Damascus has been one of at least two embassies that have refused to come under the authority of the Foreign Ministry in Baghdad and remain aligned with Saddam Hussein loyalists. The other Iraqi embassy was that in Libya. Officials said the Iraqi embassy in Damascus has arranged to issue passports for a range of Arab nationals who seek to join the insurgency. They said that for $95, or 5,000 Syrian pounds, applicants can receive a passport within a day.
Sounds like a casus belli to me...
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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Probably time to change the passports Wait until February 1st.
#2
Time for the guys with the sleepy looks to make a visit to the ambassador and friends . . .
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 7:06
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The Iraqi government should just appoint a new embassy to Syria and withdraw the diplomatic credentials of everyone in the old one. Sure, it won't make Syria budge, but this ISN'T out of the control of the Iraqis.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/26/2005 10:19
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The UN Development Programme (UNDP) will lend its name to a controversial report on freedom and governance in the Arab world despite US objections to parts of the text. Egyptian sociologist Nadir Fargany said the Arab Human Development Report, the third in an annual series, would come out in March under the UNDP logo without substantive changes. The nature of the dispute centred on differences between the US view that the Arab world's problems are mainly internal and the Arab consensus that external factors such as US foreign policy and Israel's treatment of the Palestinians have contributed significantly to oppression and poor governance in the region.
No doubt that view makes sense in Arabic, since they keep repeating it. In English it's about the same thing as dribbling tea down the front of your shirt.
Fargany said last year that Washington had pressed the UNDP not to back the report because it did not like sections on the US occupation of Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He said the US had threatened to cut its contribution to the UN agency if it published the report, though this was denied by the UNDP.
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..and the Arab consensus that external factors such as US foreign policy and Israelâs treatment of the Palestinians have contributed significantly to oppression and poor governance in the region.
Denial is quite a difficult beast to kill, isn't it?
Railway officials on Tuesday banned all trains from running at night in Balochistan after a blast the night before tore apart a main line for the second time, while a rocket was fired at a military workshop but caused no casualties. Timetables have been changed and trains will only run in daytime to limit the damage from any further attacks by angry nationalist tribesmen in Balochistan demanding more political rights, jobs and royalties from the province's natural resources, AFP reported. Services between Quetta and Karachi resumed on Tuesday after engineers repaired tracks damaged by the bomb late on Monday. The same line was hit by another explosion on Saturday. "The timing has been changed due to security concerns and no train will operate at night," Railway Deputy Controller Ghulam Rasool told AFP. Mohammad Shoaib, another railway official, told Reuters the authorities had also changed train timings in other parts of the country.
Staff Report adds: Quetta Nazim Rahim Kakar said that the rocket fired on Tuesday landed near a workshop in the Alamo area behind a medical complex in Quetta, but did no damage. Rocket attacks in the Cantonment areas were routine in the past but had gone down, only to return after recent violence in Sui.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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Night Train to Balochistan? Was that Duke Ellington or Glen Miller?
The U.S. intelligence community has obtained plans for what was described as an Iranian project to develop a nuclear warhead.
Golly. I wonder where that leak came from? Why would anybody want to leak something like that?
Officials said the plans were obtained by the CIA in November from an unidentified source. They said the source relayed more than 1,000 pages of technical drawings and documents of an Iranian nuclear missile warhead design. In November, 2004, officials said, the CIA had sought to confirm the authenticity of the Iranian documents. The Iranian documents -- first reported by the Washington Post on Nov. 19 -- were said to outline a design for a nuclear warhead of the enhanced Shihab-3 intermediate-range ballistic missile. Officials said a warhead capable of containing a nuclear bomb appeared have been developed for the launch of the Shihab-3 in October 2004. Iran has acknowledged that information from its nuclear program has been leaked to opposition sources and Western intelligence agencies. Since last August, Teheran has reported arrests of unidentified scientists and technicians in Iran's nuclear program.
Barn door's open now...
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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1,000 pages of technical drawings and documents
Probably xeroxes of Bomb Plan #1 from Khan & Co., 100 Boomer St., Islamabad, Pakistan.
Posted by: Duke Nukem ||
01/26/2005 9:29
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how could this be? Jack Straw assures us his Iranian friends aren't developing weapons while negotiations continue. F*&kers. Cruise missile time!
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 9:53
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Score one for the Spooks.
Deduct twenty for letting the press know about it.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
01/26/2005 10:03
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Unless it's not true and the spooks leaked it to spook the Persians and see what they do. Never assume it's the truth when it comes from any Spook other than an Old one.
Posted by: Mr. Spock ||
01/26/2005 10:06
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I wonder how much espionage their Russian allies are engaged in while installing their radar? Give a little, get a lot?
#8
I've always thought it would be funny to "leak" that 20% of the officer corp of the Iranian (or North Korean) military was in contact with CIA agents. Imagine the Purge Scrambles that would result.
Brew up some huge investigation in the US to find the "leaker" to make them believe it. :)
Posted by: Laurence of the Rats ||
01/26/2005 11:30
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We know. They know we know. We know they know we know.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
01/26/2005 12:10
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A New Zealand defence force team will stay in Afghanistan for an extra year to help with security and reconstruction, Prime Minister Helen Clark said on Tuesday. The deployment of the 120-strong provincial reconstruction team in the central province of Bamiyan has been extended for a further 12 months until September 2006.
Parliamentary and provincial elections in Afghanistan scheduled for April 2005 meant it was important that the international community maintained its involvement, Clark said in a statement. "Failure to stabilise Afghanistan would have consequences for the campaign against terrorism," she said. "The Taliban and elements sympathetic to Al Qaeda continue to provide resistance to the Afghan authorities and to the multinational force mandated by the United Nations," she said. New Zealand, which has been working in Bamiyan since 2003, will also send two police officers to help rebuild the local police force.
I'm actually surprised...
Afghanistan is a touch-stone for the more reasonable left-liberals. They can condemn us for Iraq but by supporting (in a small way) the work in Afghanistan, they can lay claim to some of the heavy lifting being done in the WoT. Perhaps people like Clark also think that this will give them a chit for future use. Whatever, I'm pleased the Kiwis are helping.
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I'm sure it'll produce a more spectacular explosion than a bus...
Drat. And here I was working up a good bullet train pun...
Israel is weighing a proposal to link the Gaza Strip and West Bank by a train that would allow Palestinians to travel between the territories without posing a security threat, Israeli political sources said on Tuesday. They said Vice Premier Shimon Peres plans to ask the World Bank to help raise funding for the project if it is approved, seeing a train link as a way to counter charges that Israel will effectively maroon Gaza Palestinians when it quits the occupied strip later this year. Israeli and Palestinian officials were not immediately available to comment on the train proposal, which appeared to be a retread of the "safe passage" road between the West Bank and Gaza enshrined in 1993 interim Middle East peace accords. That road was closed off soon after negotiations stalled and a Palestinian uprising erupted in September 2000, with Israeli officials citing concern it could be used by suicide bombers.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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Make it electric, and bury it underground, with no stops in Israeli territory.
#2
Good idea, B-a-R, we all know just how much experience the Paleos have at tunneling ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/26/2005 0:35
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Same train of thought here, with one exception, there should be 2 spots close to each of the parts with installed gamma rays scanners, to check for a weapon contraband, like missiles and such. If found, there should be an area that the train can be stopped and the contraband safely disposed of.
What, the gamma rays are harmful? Make it some kind of zionist ray, then. :-)
Posted by: Fred ||
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Deadlocked? No. Roadblocked. Yes. This is what both want. The Iranians will keep building, and the EU will keep the Americans blocked as long as possible. We will have peace in our time! It's a feature, not a bug.
Dual citizenship will not be granted to persons of Indian origin (PIOs) in Pakistan and Bangladesh for the time being, said Jagdish Tytler, the minister for overseas affairs, the Hindustan Times newspaper reported on Tuesday. Inaugurating the International Congress of NRIs (non-resident Indians) in New Delhi, he said the grant of citizenship to PIOs required legislation and the process would be completed within three months by his ministry in coordination with Prime Minister's Office, the paper reported. Noting that the dual citizenship promise was made at the just-concluded Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (an NRI gathering), he said the next such event would be held only if the government fulfilled its promises, including grant of dual citizenship to all PIOs. "Such a status will not be granted to people in Pakistan and Bangladesh for the time being for obvious reasons," the paper quoted the minister as saying. He said that the security of the country was of prime importance.
The idea of dual citizenship doesn't make much sense to me. Even if it made sense, I'd still think it would apply only to countries that have very close relations. But I'm probably missing something...
Posted by: Fred ||
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Sudan's government and main rebel group said Tuesday that a peace accord clinched to end two decades of civil war should inspire an end to the bloody conflict in Darfur. "We hope this will also help us in resolving other conflicts in the country, especially that of Darfur," First Vice President Ali Osman Taha said after the signature of an accord with the EU to resume EU-Sudanese ties. Nhial Deng Nhi, commissioner for external relations of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), said elements of his group's peace deal with Khartoum "could be successfully be applied to resolving the problem in Darfur."
The legislative body of the SPLM on Monday unanimously ratified the Jan. 9 peace deal signed between the government and the southern rebel group to end 21 years of war. "The peace agreement has provided clearly for a number of concepts and principles governing the issue of power-sharing and wealth-sharing, not only between north and south but for the whole country," he said. "We are committed to using the same drive and our experience in resolving the conflict in south Sudan to bring a prompt and fair answer to the conflict in Darfur," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Indonesia's chief security minister will lead a top-level delegation to Finland to resume talks this week with rebels from tsunami-hit Aceh province, an official close to the negotiating team said on Tuesday. The tsunami disaster, which has killed more than 173,000 people in the north of Indonesia's Sumatra island, has prompted renewed efforts to resolve a sporadic rebellion that has killed 12,000 people since 1976. Former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari and his Crisis Management Initiative (CMI) group will mediate talks between Indonesia and the Free Aceh Movement, better known by its initials GAM. "The delegation will leave on Wednesday afternoon. They will be there for five days," the government official, who declined to be named, told Reuters, adding the delegation will be led by chief security minister and former military chief, Widodo Adi Sutjipto. The team includes Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda, Justice Minister Hamid Awaluddin and a former Aceh military commander.
Posted by: Fred ||
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A citizen has moved the Supreme Court of Pakistan asking the court to stop President General Pervez Musharraf from holding public meetings in uniform and to stop Pakistan Television from broadcasting programmes in support of the two offices. Engineer Jamil Ammad Malik, the Communist Party of Pakistan president, through a constitutional petition said that General Pervez Musharraf was in service of Pakistan and the 1973 Constitution barred him from taking part in politics.
I can see room for compromise on this. How about if he wears a uniform and a turban?
Or a turban with a whole bunch of medals on it?
Nah, the weight would cause him to tip over on his face. Not very dignified, that ...
Posted by: Fred ||
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He could put some of the medals on the back, as a counterbalance...or along the tail of fabric descending down his back, the way some of the Bugtis wear it -- and then he wouldn't need as many back there, according to the lever arm principle, y'know.
#2
A four-fer... He could suddenly become a Sihk to improve relations with India, get around the Commie wanker, make a bold fashion statement, and the dagger thingy might come in handy next time someone tries to assassinate him.
NATO has launched a drive to accelerate defense and military cooperation with Arab League states. NATO officials said the Western alliance wants to begin joint exercises and other programs by the end of 2005. They said the focus would be on cooperation with Algeria, Egypt, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia. Algeria was also deemed as the most likely North African partner of NATO in counter-insurgency operations, officials said. In 2004, Algeria's military was said to have significantly harmed the Salafist Brigade for Combat and Call, regarded as the leading subcontractor of Al Qaida. Officials said NATO wants to engage the seven-member Mediterranean Dialogue states in cooperation on counter-insurgency, training and naval patrols. They said the effort would require instruction to ensure NATO interoperability, common language and standards. The Mediterranean Dialogue states also include Israel and Jordan.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Indonesian and Malaysian memÂbers of the militant JeÂmaah Islamiah are posing as fishermen to enter into the Philippines, Malaysian intelligence said. In a report sent to the military, the Malaysian intelligence service said the militants were arrested aboard Philippine-registered fishing boats off the coast of Indonesia's Sumatra Island. The boat carried registration documents issued by the maritime office in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. "At least two had figured in the Bali incident and bomb attacks in Indonesia last year," a ranking military official told The Manila Times Tuesday. He said Malaysia has "advised" the Navy and the Coast Guard to inspect fishing boats and their crew to prevent foreign militants from slipping into the country. The Armed Forces disclosed an "unholy alliance" between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the Jemaah Islamiah—which seeks to establish an Islamic state in Indonesia, Malaysia and Mindanao—and the Abu Sayyaf. Jemaah Islamiah bomb experts have been training MILF fighters in using explosives; the MILF and the Abu Sayyaf provide security for the foreigners.
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Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has ordered the hardline parliament not to purge any more ministers in the embattled reformist government, pointing out that new elections are just months away anyway.
A message to deputies from Khamenei, also carried in Iranian media Tuesday, said that "now that the government is in the last months of its crucial mission, impeaching ministers is of no benefit for the country." The statement nevertheless told the parliament, or Majlis, it did have the right to use its "supervisory tools". In October the Majlis voted to sack transport minister Ahmad Khorram for corruption and mismanagement, failing to tackle mounting carnage on the nation's transport network and for awarding an airport operating contract to a foreign consortium.
The move was a major blow to the moderate government of President Mohammad Khatami, which has been left badly isolated after reformists were barred from contesting parliamentary elections 11 months ago. But conservative deputies have also set their sights on other moderate cabinet members, including Interior Minister Abdolvahed Moussavi-Lari and Education Minister Morteza Hadji. The education minister has been accused of favouring reformists in the education system, as well as bowing to striking teachers over wage demands.
Posted by: Fred ||
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I thought their "crucial mission" was the destructin of Israel..
#3
the moderate governmnt of Khatami....like Brezhnev was a moderate compared to Stalin?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 9:47
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They probably see the remaining "reformers" as useful fools, giving their stolen government some tiny degree of credibility as legitimate, and also giving a boost to the total election numbers, so it isn't bloody obvious that they are elected by a tiny minority.
"Hell, we don't know! Those guys are too inscrutable for us to figure!"
Posted by: Fred ||
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We may see China take out the North Korean nuclear program before this is over. China has too much to lose to allow a small nutcase neighbor wreck the relative stability of the entire region.
Can China really be happy with a nuclear Kimmie next door? Would China want to see Japan build up forces? Does China want half the U.S. fleet lingering in the area indefinitely?
Posted by: Tom ||
01/26/2005 10:48
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#2
I hope you're right, Tom. That would be wonderful. Soon would be even better, but then I'm known to be greedy.
The Iranian-sponsored Hizbullah, fearful of U.S. diplomatic and military pressure, has sought to launch an indirect dialogue with Washington. Lebanese opposition sources said Hizbullah has recruited senior Lebanese commanders and politicians to send messages to the U.S. intelligence community. The sources said the Lebanese interlocutors were asked to seek an understanding with Washington that would avoid U.S. diplomatic or military pressure on Hizbullah or its ally, Syria. Hizbullah was most concerned of a major Israeli military strike on either Lebanon or Syria, the sources said. They said Syria encouraged Hizbullah to send a reassuring message to Washington amid an assessment that President George Bush would wage a more assertive U.S. policy in the Middle East during his second term. The reported CIA-Hizbullah contacts have been regarded as part of a Syrian-sponsored effort to relieve Western pressure on the regime of President Bashar Assad. Over the last few months, Assad has repeatedly offered to renew negotiations with Israel.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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#1
What do you mean it's our turn to die??
That wasn't in the plan.
What do you mean you're paying attention to us?
We promise, you can take out the black turbans, but please leave us alone!
Prime Minister Iyad Allawi warned Tuesday it would be reckless to set a timeline for a final U.S.-troop pullout and said they would leave only once Iraqi forces are ready to defeat the insurgency on their own. A spate of slayings and fierce clashes between insurgents and Iraqi police left at least nine Iraqis dead in Baghdad on Tuesday, including a senior Iraqi judge, highlighting the grave security risks in the run-up to this weekend's elections.
Also Tuesday, a video emerged showing an American abducted last November by gunmen in Baghdad pleading for his life and appealing to Arab rulers, especially Libya's Muammar Gadhafi, to intercede to spare his life.
Amid the violence, Allawi rejected setting a timeline for U.S. troops to leave until Iraqi forces can defeat the insurgency alone. "Others spoke about the immediate withdrawal or setting a timetable for the withdrawal of multinational forces," Allawi told reporters. "I will not deal with the security matter under political pretexts and exaggerations that do not serve Iraq and its people. I will not set final dates" for the withdrawal of international forces "because setting final dates will be futile and dangerous."
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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Indonesia hopes to dispel concerns about official corruption in relief operations by announcing each month the amount of money it receives in foreign donations and wherethe funds are being spent, the government said on Tuesday. Indonesia is one of the world's most graft-ridden nations. Aid for disaster relief elsewhere in the country has regularly gone missing in the past, allegedly into the hands of corrupt local officials. "We will announce every month, on the 26th, the money we receive," said Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Alwi Shihab, who is in charge of the country's relief effort. "We will list down all contributions and where it is going to avoid anysuspicion (of graft)." Indonesia was the worst affected of 11 Indian Ocean nations that were hit by the Dec. 26 tsunami. More than 110,000 people were killed in the country and tens of thousands are still missing.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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My goodness...all that transparency could become a habit,or even an expectation, if they aren't careful.
Posted by: SON OF TOLUI ||
01/26/2005 3:04
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#3
Hey, ya know, I could go down and show them some neat tricks on how to make accounting errors in their favor. But they could probably teach me a few things in that regard. This is not transparency, but carfully crafted deceit. I can SAY anything about where the money goes, but where the checks are actually being delivered is another story. False front companies, anyone?
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 7:12
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true, Jame, but knowing how much came in does increase transparency. All donors will want to see their names and amounts given on the list. If they really intend to do that, it forces the thiefs to launder it with overcharges, false purchases etc., rather than just steal it, making it that much harder and leaving a better money trail for gross theft.
Rebels fighting for the independence of Aceh province are willing to engage in peace talks with Indonesia but say the country is not serious about negotiations, a senior guerrilla said from his rural hideout. "We remain ready to talk because so many Acehnese people are missing from the wars and tsunami," Darwis Djeunieb, a Free Aceh Movement (GAM) regional commander based just west of this coastal city, told AFP.
In an interview Monday, Djeunieb also said five of his guerrillas had recently been killed in a government ambush, despite the military's pledge to focus on relief efforts rather than fighting after the Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami which killed about 170,000 people in the Aceh region of Sumatra island. Djeunieb expressed support for the thousands of foreign aid workers in the province and mocked the Indonesian military's relief efforts. He was speaking after a Finnish NGO on Sunday said talks aimed at bringing together the two sides would be held in Finland at the end of the week. Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja later confirmed the meeting was to go ahead.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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More than 300 people have died after being crushed in a stampede involving thousands of Hindus fleeing fires during a pilgrimage to a temple in western India. Another 200 were injured in Tuesday's incident, which happened on a narrow staircase leading to the hilltop temple in the village of Wai, about 250km south of Bombay, according to police superintendent Chandrakant Kumbhar. Kumbhar said devotees set fire to shops in the crowded passageway after they heard rumours that some pilgrims had slipped on the temple floor and were trampled to death by others who were propelled forward by the mass of people behind them.
Oh, that was a reasonable reaction...
"When their relatives, who were still climbing the stairs, heard the news, they became angry and set fire to some shops," Kumbhar said. "About 200 pilgrims have been killed and an equal number of people have been injured." The dead were mostly women, he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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Like the graphic, Fred. I note that the BBC yesterday and al Jazeera today both like to think that Hindus stampede. I'll bet they think that white people and Arabs, respectively, only crush. Can you imagine an alJ header: "Hajj stampede kills 300"?
#3
I thought that Kali was more into blood sacrifice rather than random acts of violence? Cutting out hearts or somesuch. Or is that just Indiana Jones?
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
01/26/2005 7:17
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Kali: One of the manifestations and cult titles of the wife of Shiva and mother goddess Devi, especially in her malevolent role as a goddess of death and destruction, depicted as black, red-eyed, blood-stained, and wearing a necklace of skulls.
Israel has been quietly training foreign bodyguards for the Saudi royal family. The bodyguards have trained at a private security facility in Israel's Negev desert. The training included protecting convoys from attack, escaping ambushes and the protection of VIPs. Three bodyguards, said to have been German nationals, completed a weeklong training course at the Counter Terrorism Training Center near the southern city of Rahat. The course included 23 foreigners, including bodyguards for the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. The center invited journalists to a simulated training exercise in November 2004. The course was run by former Israeli security experts and commandos.
Well yeah, you want the best, right?
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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#2
They're not Israeli bodyguards, they just train them in Israel. I've read before the Saudi royals import foreign hard boyz for personel protection. As I recall from history, that's a old arabic tradition. They had vikings and other northern barbarians in the good old days. I'm sure a few of them have "contacts" in western security agencies.
Posted by: Steve ||
01/26/2005 8:52
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but..but...I thought joos are pigs. Ya, but their Saudi Royals' swine, right.
Posted by: Duke Nukem ||
01/26/2005 9:15
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Joooos training Germans to protect Saudis....I thought irony was dead?
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/26/2005 9:49
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Painfully obvious the arabs can't trust other arabs. Makes for good negotiations with these moops.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said he will discuss defence cooperation with Moscow as he prepares for talks with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. The Syrian leader defended his country's right to acquire Russian missiles to strengthen its air defences, but said that no concrete contracts would be on the agenda during his four-day state visit to Russia.
Israel protested earlier this month at the reported planned sale to Damascus of SA-18 surface-to-air missiles, also known as Igla, and next-generation Iskander-E missiles that could allow Syria to strike any target in Israel. "These are defensive weapons, air defence, to prevent aircraft from entering our airspace," al-Asad said when asked to comment on the reported contracts, now seen in doubt because of Israeli and US pressure.
Lord knows the equipment they have now doesn't stop anyone.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/26/2005
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defence cooperation?? Does he mean something like a mutual defence treaty?!? What's he trying to do, start World War I?
#2
When this story first came out the talk was the Russians where going to sell the SA-18 manportable missle and SA-10 (Patriot-like) missle system. I have not heard if the SA-10 sale is still a go. The manportable SA-18 is troubling; however, kind of localized for air defense. The SA-10 gives Syria a very credible and capable air defense network. Has anyone heard if that sale is still on? I had heard they where scaling it back to allow only non-networked vehicle borne variants of the SA-10 for sale.
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.
An imprisoned Egyptian Islamic leader is staging a strike behind bars to protest authorities' refusal obey a court order to release him. Saudi daily al-Watan reported Wednesday 
Cab driver found dead
The alleged killer of Dutch filmmaker 
DEBKAfile's intelligence sources expose a uniquely brutal Palestinian atrocity committed and videotaped last Friday, Jan 21, by Fatah-al Aqsa Brigades in the main square of the Balata camp south of Nablus. 
A 12 year old boy was lashed 80 times in the street by a Saudi court hours after he was arrested at the annual Muslim pilgrimage (Hajj), Saudi newspaper Okaz. reported Monday. The paper said the boy who is from Bangladesh was arrested in Mena, three miles outside the holy city of Makkah, where two million Muslims gathered for the annual pilgrimage after he was allegedly caught pick pocketing pilgrims. The paper said an AdHoc court that operates during the annual pilgrimage sentenced the boy only hours after his arrest, and applied the punishment on the street outside the court. No lawyers or family members were present during the process, but the boy was later handed to his family. The field court is headed by Shaikh 
Three women have been killed and five others wounded after a bomb exploded in a mausoleum near the Algerian capital, residents say. The device had been left in a bag in the mausoleum in the Ain Rumana cemetery near the town of Muzaia, 70km southwest of Algiers. It exploded on Friday afternoon as the cemetery was crowded with people praying for the dead during the Eid al-Adha (Day of Sacrifice) religious holidays, residents said. The funerals of the three women killed took place on Saturday.
Abkhazia's authorities have denied rumors that Chechen extremist leader 
Deputy chief of the Chechen branch of United Russia party Lecha Magomedov died on Tuesday during a pilgrimage to places of worship in Mecca. Preliminary reports said Magomedov died of a stroke he suffered in Mecca, a source from the Chechen Mufti's office told Tass on Tuesday. The United Russia headquarters has been negotiating the return of the body to Chechnya although traditionally, a pilgrim who dies in Mecca is buried there. Lecha Magomedov was around 70 years old. He was one of the organizers of the United Russia branch in Chechnya and until recently, he had been Deputy secretary of its political council.
The man who gave San Diego FBI agents a phony tip about a terrorist plot in Boston is behind bars Tuesday, 10News reported. Mexican police arrested Jose Beltran Quinones in Mexicali, Mexico, Monday. Beltrans claimed that he helped a group of Chinese nationals illegally cross into the United States from Mexico. According to his tip, they were intent on detonating a dirty bomb in Boston. Beltrans is now being questioned by U.S. and Mexican officials about his motives.
Omani security forces have reportedly rounded up hundreds of people suspected of planning bombings during the Muslim feast of Adha. The Saudi daily al-Hayat, which is monitored in Beirut, said Wednesday rumors have been going strong in the sultanate that a wave of arrests took place a week ago and arms and ammunition were seized from the suspects. The paper noted Oman's ruler, 
Condoleezza Rice won easy confirmation Wednesday to be President Bush's new secretary of state, despite strong dissent from a small group of Democrats who said she shares blame for mistakes and war deaths in Iraq. The Senate voted 85 to 13 to confirm Rice, who succeeds Colin Powell as America's top diplomat and becomes the first black woman to hold the job. Plans were made for her to be sworn in at the White House Wednesday night, take her place in the State Department Thursday morning and have a more elaborate swearing-in by Bush at the agency on Friday. The Senate vote showed some of the partisanship that delayed Rice's confirmation vote by several days. Twelve Democrats and independent 
Algerian Islamic militants, stepping up attacks in recent weeks, have killed two policemen and injured one civilian in the restive Berber region east of the Algerian capital, media reported on Tuesday. Rebels suspected of belonging to the 
Twenty-three terrorism suspects tried to hang or strangle themselves during a weeklong protest orchestrated in 2003 to disrupt operations and unnerve new guards at the U.S. military camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the U.S. military said Monday. Officials hadn't previously reported the incidents, which the military called ``self-injurious behavior'' aimed at getting attention rather than serious suicide attempts. The coordinated attempts were among 350 ``self-harm'' incidents that year, including 120 so-called ``hanging gestures,'' at the secretive prison that opened after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to Lt. Col. Leon Sumpter, a spokesman for the detention mission.
In an important victory for a Yemeni sheik charged with financing terrorism, a federal judge yesterday prevented prosecutors from introducing what they have described as vital evidence during their initial presentation to the jury. The judge in federal court in Brooklyn, Sterling Johnson Jr., ruled that the prosecutors cannot display three items they have said are their only corroboration for secretly recorded conversations in which they say the sheik and an aide plotted to take money for terrorist organizations. In arguing unsuccessfully to persuade the judge to change his mind, a prosecutor, Kelly Moore, said the items the judge barred yesterday were "a significant part of the government's evidence in this case."
"Ghailani has been handed over to US custody because he wasn't wanted in any crime over here," the Pakistani official, who declined to be identified, told AFP. He did not give any further details. Most have been handed to the United States and are thought to be held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. "We have no information on Ghailani's whereabouts," a spokesman for the US embassy in Islamabad said.
GAZA CITY - Palestinian security forces in Gaza prevented a cell of militants from firing mortar shells into southern Israel late Tuesday, seizing their weapons, a Palestinian security source told AFP. "Members of the security forces in northern Gaza stopped militant group from firing three mortar shells into Israel," the source said. Following a heated argument with the militants, the forces confiscated the weapons and the cell left, he said.
The United States on Tuesday accused a Syrian of bankrolling Al Qaeda and rebels in Iraq, a first step toward an international freeze on his bank transfers and travel. The US Treasury said 
A Kuwaiti man has reportedly confessed to killing his 14-year-old daughter because he believed she was having sex. Adnan Enezi - an employee in the Islamic Affairs ministry - had just returned from the pilgrimage to Mecca. He allegedly bound and blindfolded his daughter, Haifa, knelt her down in front of her two brothers and sister and then cut her throat. The suspect - who is also undergoing mental health tests - was separated from his wife, and has been imprisoned in Saudi Arabia for 18 months for his extremist activities, the al-Rai al-Am newspaper reported. The daily said that after cutting Haifa's throat the first time, he swapped the knife for one with a sharper blade as she bled and screamed in front of her siblings. Al-Qabas daily said the brothers and sister fled from the house after the murder, while their uncle took their sister to a hospital, but she had already died.
A document examiner involved in the flawed "60 Minutes Wednesday" report on George W. Bush's National Guard service claims that he was defamed and his reputation damaged by the recent report from an independent review panel that investigated the show's reporting practices, E&P has learned. 
Veteran political strategist Bob Shrum, who most recently advised John Kerry during his failed bid for the presidency, will join the NYU Wagner School of Public Service as a senior fellow on Feb. 1. Shrum said his move to academia was not motivated by his candidate's loss to George W. Bush. "I would have been inclined to do it if Kerry had won, because I had no desire to go the White House," said Shrum, 61. "I would never lobby." 
Investigators probing allegations of impropriety in the United Nations' Iraqi oil-for-food program questioned Secretary-General Kofi Annan about his involvement twice last year and again Tuesday, a U.N. spokesman said. Annan met with former Fed Chairman 
Germany is to consider suspending a European agreement abolishing internal border controls before and during the 2006 World Cup, Interior Minister 
Two men suspected of being al-Qaeda supporters have been remanded in custody by a German federal court in Karlsruhe, after they were arrested for allegedly plotting a suicide bombing in Iraq. Police say a 29-year-old Iraqi who had previously served as an al-Qaeda gunman in Afghanistan was believed to be recruiting for suicide attacks against US forces and the interim government in Iraq. A 31-year-old Palestinian medical student was believed to be the recruit who had agreed to "martyrdom" at the wheel of a car bomb. 
Thatcher's criminal record could prevent him from obtaining anything beyond a visitor's permit to the United States, the South African newspaper Rapport said. His plans to rejoin his American wife, Diane, and children in Texas have been delayed while his attorneys negotiate with U.S. authorities for a new visa, the Dallas Morning News reported. His old visa has expired and his criminal conviction could count against him, it said. The Dallas newspaper said Thatcher was waiting in Frankfurt, Germany, for word on the visa. An earlier report in the London Sunday Telegraph quoted a U.S. customs official as saying Thatcher would receive no special favors because of his family. 
A negotiating team led by tribal clerics to get former Guantanamo Bay inmate 
The United States has determined that the Iraqi embassy in Syria serves to facilitate the flow of insurgents to fight the coalition in Iraq. U.S. officials said the Iraqi embassy in Damascus has refused to submit to the authority of the interim government in Baghdad. 
The UN Development Programme (UNDP) will lend its name to a controversial report on freedom and governance in the Arab world despite US objections to parts of the text. Egyptian sociologist Nadir Fargany said the Arab Human Development Report, the third in an annual series, would come out in March under the UNDP logo without substantive changes. The nature of the dispute centred on differences between the US view that the Arab world's problems are mainly internal and the Arab consensus that external factors such as US foreign policy and Israel's treatment of the Palestinians have contributed significantly to oppression and poor governance in the region.
Railway officials on Tuesday banned all trains from running at night in Balochistan after a blast the night before tore apart a main line for the second time, while a rocket was fired at a military workshop but caused no casualties. Timetables have been changed and trains will only run in daytime to limit the damage from any further attacks by angry nationalist tribesmen in Balochistan demanding more political rights, jobs and royalties from the province's natural resources, AFP reported. Services between Quetta and Karachi resumed on Tuesday after engineers repaired tracks damaged by the bomb late on Monday. The same line was hit by another explosion on Saturday. "The timing has been changed due to security concerns and no train will operate at night," Railway Deputy Controller Ghulam Rasool told AFP. Mohammad Shoaib, another railway official, told Reuters the authorities had also changed train timings in other parts of the country.
The U.S. intelligence community has obtained plans for what was described as an Iranian project to develop a nuclear warhead. 
Sudan's government and main rebel group said Tuesday that a peace accord clinched to end two decades of civil war should inspire an end to the bloody conflict in Darfur. "We hope this will also help us in resolving other conflicts in the country, especially that of 
Indonesia's chief security minister will lead a top-level delegation to Finland to resume talks this week with rebels from tsunami-hit Aceh province, an official close to the negotiating team said on Tuesday. The tsunami disaster, which has killed more than 173,000 people in the north of Indonesia's Sumatra island, has prompted renewed efforts to resolve a sporadic rebellion that has killed 12,000 people since 1976. Former Finnish president 
A citizen has moved the Supreme Court of Pakistan asking the court to stop President General Pervez Musharraf from holding public meetings in uniform and to stop Pakistan Television from broadcasting programmes in support of the two offices. Engineer Jamil Ammad Malik, the Communist Party of Pakistan president, through a constitutional petition said that General Pervez Musharraf was in service of Pakistan and the 1973 Constitution barred him from taking part in politics.
Indonesian and Malaysian memÂbers of the militant JeÂmaah Islamiah are posing as fishermen to enter into the Philippines, Malaysian intelligence said. In a report sent to the military, the Malaysian intelligence service said the militants were arrested aboard Philippine-registered fishing boats off the coast of Indonesia's Sumatra Island. The boat carried registration documents issued by the maritime office in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. "At least two had figured in the Bali incident and bomb attacks in Indonesia last year," a ranking military official told The Manila Times Tuesday. He said Malaysia has "advised" the Navy and the Coast Guard to inspect fishing boats and their crew to prevent foreign militants from slipping into the country. The Armed Forces disclosed an "unholy alliance" between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the Jemaah Islamiah—which seeks to establish an Islamic state in Indonesia, Malaysia and Mindanao—and the Abu Sayyaf. Jemaah Islamiah bomb experts have been training MILF fighters in using explosives; the MILF and the Abu Sayyaf provide security for the foreigners.
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has ordered the hardline parliament not to purge any more ministers in the embattled reformist government, pointing out that new elections are just months away anyway.
The Iranian-sponsored 
Prime Minister 
Indonesia hopes to dispel concerns about official corruption in relief operations by announcing each month the amount of money it receives in foreign donations and wherethe funds are being spent, the government said on Tuesday. Indonesia is one of the world's most graft-ridden nations. Aid for disaster relief elsewhere in the country has regularly gone missing in the past, allegedly into the hands of corrupt local officials. "We will announce every month, on the 26th, the money we receive," said Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Alwi Shihab, who is in charge of the country's relief effort. "We will list down all contributions and where it is going to avoid anysuspicion (of graft)." Indonesia was the worst affected of 11 Indian Ocean nations that were hit by the Dec. 26 tsunami. More than 110,000 people were killed in the country and tens of thousands are still missing.
Rebels fighting for the independence of Aceh province are willing to engage in peace talks with Indonesia but say the country is not serious about negotiations, a senior guerrilla said from his rural hideout. "We remain ready to talk because so many Acehnese people are missing from the wars and tsunami," 
More than 300 people have died after being crushed in a stampede involving thousands of Hindus fleeing fires during a pilgrimage to a temple in western India. Another 200 were injured in Tuesday's incident, which happened on a narrow staircase leading to the hilltop temple in the village of Wai, about 250km south of Bombay, according to police superintendent Chandrakant Kumbhar. Kumbhar said devotees set fire to shops in the crowded passageway after they heard rumours that some pilgrims had slipped on the temple floor and were trampled to death by others who were propelled forward by the mass of people behind them. 
Israel has been quietly training foreign bodyguards for the Saudi royal family. The bodyguards have trained at a private security facility in Israel's Negev desert. The training included protecting convoys from attack, escaping ambushes and the protection of VIPs. Three bodyguards, said to have been German nationals, completed a weeklong training course at the Counter Terrorism Training Center near the southern city of Rahat. The course included 23 foreigners, including bodyguards for the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. The center invited journalists to a simulated training exercise in November 2004. The course was run by former Israeli security experts and commandos. 
Syrian President 
