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Tons of Explosives Seized from Militants Planning Attack in Kabul
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
15:27 3 22:51 gorb []
14:55 1 23:04 crosspatch [1]
14:01 19 22:42 OldSpook [] 
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13:18 1 23:14 Steven [2]
13:02 1 18:38 Black Bart McGurque8512 [1]
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09:53 4 17:21 JohnQC [1]
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07:43 6 18:29 Solomon Huperert5909 [] 
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Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Egypt cancels natural gas deal with Israel
Apparently Egypt doesn't need the shekels... cut off all aid
Egypt's national gas company EGAS announced Sunday that it will be cancelling its natural gas supply deal with Israel.

Ampal-American Israel Corporation, a partner in the East Mediterranean Gas Company (EMG), which operates the pipeline, said the Egyptian companies involved had notified EMG they were "terminating the gas and purchase agreement".

The company said in a statement that the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation and Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company had notified them of the decision, adding that "EMG considers the termination attempt unlawful and in bad faith, and consequently demanded its withdrawal".

It said EMG, Ampal, and EMG's other international shareholders were "considering their options and legal remedies as well as approaching the various governments."

Sources close to EMG said in response, "Egypt does not understand what it is doing. This move will bring back the country - politically and economically -- by 30 years. This is a breach of the peace agreement with Israel."
yep. Don't subsidize fanatical stupidity
Wonder if this means Jordan will still get its share of the gas that Egypt promised to provide. As I recall the pipeline goes through Israel.
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 15:27 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  What OTAN countries will be following Spain into South America does anyone know?
Posted by: Bigfoot Lumumba6858 || 04/22/2012 18:39 Comments || Top||

#2  The Jerusalem Post adds:

Before the sabotage, Egypt supplied about 40 percent of Israel's natural gas, which is the country's main energy source.

Israeli officials have said the country was at risk of facing summer power outages due to energy shortages.

Companies invested in the Israeli-Egyptian venture have taken a hit from numerous explosions of the cross-border pipeline and are seeking compensation from the Egyptian government of billions of dollars.

Ampal and two other companies have sought $8 billion in damages from Egypt for not safeguarding their investment.

In response, Israel must make an extra effort to overcome any obstacles to getting Israel's own gas fields flowing this year as opposed to its scheduled operational start in 2013, a statement added.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 19:05 Comments || Top||

#3  In response, Israel must make an extra effort to overcome any obstacles to getting Israel's own gas fields flowing this year

Enviroweenie troubles?
Posted by: gorb || 04/22/2012 22:51 Comments || Top||


Europe
Hollande wins first round with 27.5 per cent
voting for Socialism won't make the debt crisis go away. Jeebus
Francois Hollande has secured 27.5 per cent of the votes cast in the first round of the presidential elections, with about 33 per cent of the ballots counted. Nicholas Sarkozy is trailing his Socialist rival with 26.6 per cent of the vote.
not so far apart...now the second round
­Far-right candidate Marine le Pen has secured third place with 19.9 per cent of the vote, according to figures released by the Interior Ministry.

Left-wing hopeful Jean-Luc Melenchon has got some 11 per cent of the ballots.
80% turnout is what they're saying...
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 14:55 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Considering that le Pen's votes will go to Sarkozy, he will win the runoff.
Posted by: crosspatch || 04/22/2012 23:04 Comments || Top||


--Tech & Moderator Notes
Bug fixes and suggestions...
This is the place. Let's get the bugs out of the system so we can concentrate on the news...
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 14:01 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Only problem is with the display characteristics of the Category, Views/comments columns. The font sizes are very small and thin and the information runs together. I like to be able to clearly see which posts are getting the comments and it's very hard to pick out with this layout.
Posted by: AlanC || 04/22/2012 14:55 Comments || Top||

#2  I liked when articles were listed in chronological posting order - I could easily see if there were any new posts
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 15:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Page 49 is screwed up.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 15:33 Comments || Top||

#4  I DO like the the "view all of Sunday..." and "View all of Saturday..." tabs!
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 15:34 Comments || Top||

#5  There's a Posting Order link along the top that'll give you the current page in posting order, most recent first. Or you can use WoT Research to see everything in posting order.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 16:31 Comments || Top||

#6  Perfect. Works :-)
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 16:50 Comments || Top||

#7  errr. I just recently put up that Pg 2 Egypt/gas deal post and it shows it way down in the listing for that page, even under "posting order" tabbing?
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 16:53 Comments || Top||

#8  The problem is those two buttons are presented in context with the rest of the buttons, which are for Page 1, Page 2, etc. They miss the eye. Moreover, it is not at all intuitive what a button called "WoT Research" is supposed to do. I certainly didn't expect it to "list all articles in posting order".
Posted by: gromky || 04/22/2012 17:07 Comments || Top||

#9  For me it shows as the first article on Page 2, top of the page. Or were you referring to the headlines?
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 18:39 Comments || Top||

#10  I don't care what Fred makes it look like, as long as it's still here tomorrow and tomorrow, etc.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 04/22/2012 18:55 Comments || Top||

#11  FF 11.0. Looks like I'm sorting pages alphabetically by "Category" in the page Index
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 20:11 Comments || Top||

#12  "Hi there, Bright Pebbles!" is in the HTML above the DOCTYPE declaration and this isn't good as DOCTYPE should be the first line. move it into the < HEAD > in a < ! -- comment
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 21:11 Comments || Top||

#13  < link type=image/x-icon"

should be a " after type=
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 21:14 Comments || Top||

#14  < STYLE TYPE="text/css"> should be lowercase"
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 21:15 Comments || Top||

#15  < td style='border:1px solid silver;background:#efefef;font-weight:bold;font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,Helvetica,Monaco,sans-serif'>tag not closed.
use class not style.
style attribute using single rather than double quotes.< / td>
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 21:16 Comments || Top||

#16  < td style='border:1px solid silver;background:#efefef;font-weight:bold;font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,Helvetica,Monaco,sans-serif'

tag not closed.
use class not style.
style attribute using single rather than double quotes.
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 21:18 Comments || Top||

#17  < a href="?HC=6&D=04/22/2012&SO=">


& in a href attribute should be &
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 21:19 Comments || Top||

#18  http://www.rantburg.com/editArticle.php?E=undefined

Error in query: SELECT * from tbltwar where ID=undefined. Unknown column 'undefined' in 'where clause'

Link from Edit article "pen" icon

Also looks like injectable SQL, v bad.
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 21:21 Comments || Top||

#19  A style suggestion: On the front page, boldface the number of comments to make them stand out against the number of views. Color doesn't provide much "contrast" given such a lightly stroked small font.
Posted by: OldSpook || 04/22/2012 22:42 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Saudi Hacker who Hit Israel Dies at 28
A top Saudi hacker who targeted Israel and Jews has died at age 28, Saudi media reported Sunday. The man, who was not named, died of an asthma attack brought on by summer sandstorms.

The hacker, who called himself “Cyber Terrorist,” was known for hacking well-protected sites including Microsoft. He targeted Jewish and Israeli sites in particular, as well as a site belonging to Danish cartoonists who drew cartoons of Mohammed.

A fellow Saudi hacker calling himself “hell cyber” told the media that “Cyber Terrorist” had put “defending Islam and the Prophet” as his top priority.

“One company had shown interest in working with him for a large sum of money, but he rejected the offer because it came from a Jewish company,” he related.

Israeli experts have warned that cyber warfare, already an active part of the Israeli-Arab conflict, will become more important with time. While Arab hackers have so far created financial problems, in the future enemies could crack Israeli military or healthcare systems, they say.
Posted by: tipper || 04/22/2012 13:27 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Sure...Asthma..the Haliburton Airborne Micro Particle Enemy Removal (HAMPER) program is a success.
Posted by: Warthog || 04/22/2012 13:43 Comments || Top||

#2  Asthma attack? I thought maybe it was a work-related accident.
Posted by: JohnQC || 04/22/2012 14:36 Comments || Top||

#3  9mm sinus inflammation?
Posted by: AlmostAnonymous5839 || 04/22/2012 14:48 Comments || Top||

#4  Jooooo Rhinovirus
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 14:51 Comments || Top||

#5  What about the dumb ass ones that wasted Israels time and shined everyone on instead of getting down to it when the world was in a better way? Bombs or a keyboard what works better?
Posted by: Harry Dark Lord of the Boskonians8849 || 04/22/2012 18:36 Comments || Top||

#6  What I would like to know is how the Israelis arranged for the sandstorm.
Posted by: gorb || 04/22/2012 19:15 Comments || Top||

#7  troll sighting confirmed
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 20:07 Comments || Top||

#8  "What I would like to know is how the Israelis arranged for the sandstorm."

I'm pretty sure they got some help from the Halliburton Sandstorm-On-Demand Division, gorb.
Posted by: Barbara || 04/22/2012 21:54 Comments || Top||


Science & Technology
Sonic Screwdriver invented
Image from The War Games, Patrick Troughton's final story.
You know technology is advancing fast when tools from science fiction shows start to become a reality. Scientists at the University of Dundee decided that Doctor Who shouldn’t be the only one enjoying a Sonic Screwdriver, so they took equipment designed for MRI-guided focused ultrasound surgery and developed their own.
It's unlikely to be able to detect antimatter, ignite swamp gas, detonate land mines, etc., though.
When the scriptwriters for Doctor Who imagined a futuristic device, they came up with the Sonic Screwdriver. Now a team of physicists at the University of Dundee have taken equipment designed for MRI-guided focused ultrasound surgery and demonstrated a real Sonic Screwdriver – lifting and spinning a free-floating 10 cm diameter rubber disk with an ultrasound beam.

The Dundee researchers used energy from an ultrasound array to form a beam that can both carry momentum to push away an object in its path and, by using a beam shaped like a helix or vortex, cause the object to rotate.

“This experiment not only confirms a fundamental physics theory but also demonstrates a new level of control over ultrasound beams which can also be applied to non-invasive ultrasound surgery, targeted drug delivery and ultrasonic manipulation of cells,” said Dr Mike MacDonald, of the Institute for Medical Science and Technology (IMSAT) at Dundee.

The results of the ‘sonic screwdriver’ experiment are published in the American Physical Society’s journal Physical Review Letters.
It also gained the Daleks' attention. Hopefully, the non-stair-mastering Classic Series Renegades.
The theory the Dundee researchers were testing is valid for both sound and light and is one that is used in topics from quantum communications to biophotonics but which had not previously been proved in a single experiment. The theory states that the ratio of angular momentum to energy in a vortex beam is equal to the ratio of the number of intertwined helices to the frequency of the beam.

“For the first time, our experimental results confirm directly the validity of this fundamental theory,” said Dr Christine Demore, from IMSAT. “Previously this ratio could only be assumed from theory as the angular momentum and power in a beam had only ever been measured independently.”

The ultrasound beam generated by the Dundee team resembles the ‘double-helix’ structure of DNA but with many more twisted strands, or helices. This vortex beam generates a rotating, angular component of momentum that can exert torque on an object. In the recent publication they showed how they could generate vortex beams with many intertwined helices, using a 1000-element ultrasound transducer array as an acoustic hologram. These beams are powerful enough to levitate and spin the 90g disk made of ultrasonic absorber in water.

The research forms part of a UK-wide Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) project known as ‘Sonotweezers’, which involves the Universities of Bristol, Dundee, Glasgow and Southampton as well as seven industry partners. SonotweezersTM aim to bring dexterity and flexibility to ultrasonic manipulation, allowing applications in a wide range of topics including regenerative medicine, tissue engineering, developmental biology and physics.

“The ‘sonic screwdriver’ device is also part of the EU-funded Nanoporation project where we are already starting to push the boundaries of what ultrasound can do in terms of targeted drug delivery and targeted cellular surgery,” said Dr MacDonald. “It is an area that has great potential for developing new surgical techniques, among other applications, something which Dundee is very much at the forefront of.

“Like Dr Who’s own device, our sonic screwdriver is capable of much more than just spinning things around.”
Don't let the WOTAN machine fool you; he's "the Doctor", not "Doctor Who".
Posted by: Korora || 04/22/2012 13:18 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Oh yeah, will be down at my local Wally World in the morning before the line gets too long.
Posted by: Steven || 04/22/2012 23:14 Comments || Top||


Afghanistan
US, Afghanistan finalize strategic pact
Afghan and U.S. officials finalized a long-awaited strategic partnership deal Sunday that is meant to set forth guidelines for U.S. involvement in Afghanistan as forces draw down, the two governments said.

Afghan and U.S. officials had said that they expected to sign the deal before a NATO summit in May but a series of disagreements had threatened to derail the partnership in recent months. Some of the most contentious issues were removed from the broader pact into separate memorandums of understanding.

"The document finalized today provides a strong foundation for the security of Afghanistan, the region and the world and is a document for the development of the region," Afghan National Security Adviser Rangin Dadfar Spanta was quoted as saying.

U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and Spanta initialed the document at a ceremony in the capital, a statement from President Hamid Karzai's office said. U.S. embassy spokesman Gavin Sundwall confirmed the same information.

"The agreement is now ready for signature by both the presidents," Karzai's office said.

At the signing, Spanta said the agreement had taken more than a year and a half of work, according to the Afghan statement.
Posted by: tipper || 04/22/2012 13:02 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  What a freaking joke pathetic!
Posted by: Black Bart McGurque8512 || 04/22/2012 18:38 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Iraqi premier starting talks in Iran
Iraq's prime minister is in Tehran for top level talks, underlining the close ties between governments of the two countries.

Nouri al-Maliki is expected to meet Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during his two-day official visit. Al-Maliki's Shiite-dominated government has received support from Iran, a regional Shiite powerhouse.

Among topics for discussion will be Iran's nuclear program. Iraq will host the next round of nuclear talks between Iran and the six world powers in Baghdad May 23.

Al-Maliki was given a red carpet welcome by First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi at Saadabad Palace in north Tehran, state TV reported Sunday.
Posted by: tipper || 04/22/2012 12:48 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Europe
Britain and Gaddafi ran al-Qaeda trap in Europe
MI6 and Muammar Gaddafi's Libyan intelligence service set up a radical mosque in a western European city to lure al-Qaeda terrorists, London's Sunday Telegraph has revealed.

The operation, which had the potential to backfire if a terrorist cell launched an attack from the location, was run behind the backs of Western allies in the chosen city.

The joint operation, undertaken as Britain attempted to secure a deal with Colonel Gaddafi to reopen diplomatic relations, shows how closely Britain's Secret Intelligence Service was prepared to work with his regime's spies, despite allegations of human rights abuses.

At the time, Britain was encouraging Colonel Gaddafi to give up plans for weapons of mass destruction. Four months later, the dictator and Tony Blair, then British prime minister, struck the 2004 ''deal in the desert'', which ended Libya's pariah status.

The co-operation extended to recruiting an agent to infiltrate an al-Qaeda cell in the European city, which cannot be named for security reasons.

The double agent, code-named Joseph, was closely connected to a senior al-Qaeda commander in Iraq and had been identified as a possible spy by the ESO, Libya's external intelligence service.

MI6 began recruiting the agent without telling its allies in the European country where he lived. The agency agreed on a narrative with the agent and the ESO to fool their allies about his recruitment. Documents seen by The Sunday Telegraph outline the subterfuge. The papers were left in Tripoli as Colonel Gaddafi's regime crumbled.
Posted by: tipper || 04/22/2012 12:43 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  That was a web of intrigue. Daffy's still dead.
Posted by: JohnQC || 04/22/2012 16:48 Comments || Top||

#2  Now they are their Heroes John Mc Cain after the capture of sas by farmers in Libya.
Posted by: Unaise Angusose9035 || 04/22/2012 17:28 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
Obama told of British ex-pat's murder before foreign secretary
For once, Obama has nothing to do with the sleazy aspects of the story.
Posted by: ryuge || 04/22/2012 10:58 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Who made the decision that telling the head of the hyper-power was a higher priority than telling the head of the murdered man's government? And why, when it appears to me, in my ignorance, that China's policies and practices won't change immediately as a result, and therefore no immediate planning or response on the part of America will be needed.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 13:53 Comments || Top||

#2  If I am following the article:
(1) Man dies; (2) Chinese tell US diplomats; (3) US President gets briefing really, really quickly; (4) someone finally picks up a phone to pass the information to the British; and therefore:

"It's a Conspiracy! Deep, dark and most-foul conspiracy sez' I!"

Weak tea... Agreeing with TW, the interesting bit is why the Chinese felt a need to drop the dime in the first place, hmmm? To assure the US that there was no Stalin-style Purge in the offing? Or that there would be no interruption in Sino-American *cough* campaign cash bundling?
Posted by: magpie || 04/22/2012 16:57 Comments || Top||

#3  "Or that there would be no interruption in Sino-American *cough* campaign cash bundling?"

Ding-ding-ding-ding! I think we have a winnah, magpie.
Posted by: Barbara || 04/22/2012 17:45 Comments || Top||

#4  Or that there would be no interruption in Sino-American *cough* campaign cash bundling?

Bingo.
Posted by: JohnQC || 04/22/2012 17:47 Comments || Top||

#5  I must have been typing while you were posting Barbara.
Posted by: JohnQC || 04/22/2012 17:48 Comments || Top||

#6  Great minds, etc., John. ;-p
Posted by: Barbara || 04/22/2012 18:33 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
End game for negotiations with Iran
Posted by: ryuge || 04/22/2012 09:53 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Bambi is stalling. The world can go down the tube's as long as it doesn't affect his re-election.
Posted by: Vespasian Dark Lord of the Swedes6537 || 04/22/2012 12:31 Comments || Top||

#2  President Obama is stalling, and so are the Iranians.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 13:59 Comments || Top||

#3  Iran must understand one thing, he'll have much more flixibility after his re-election.
Posted by: Besoeker || 04/22/2012 16:07 Comments || Top||

#4  Bambi has been running for re-election since his election.
Posted by: JohnQC || 04/22/2012 17:21 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
China's challenge to America in the battle for the skies
Posted by: ryuge || 04/22/2012 09:51 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Correct me iff I'm wrong, but didn't a US Navy-DOD Officio time back say something to the effect that the last Human Pilot of the US Armed Forces was already born, i.e. THAT THE US = USDOD HAD BEGUN ITS TRANSITION FROM MANNED TO UNMANNED/ROBOTIC AIRCRAFT + OTHER THINGYS???

As for Chinese Drones + the PLA in general, there are some hard lessons that only War per se can teach.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 04/22/2012 23:11 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Iran claims to have recovered data from captured spy drone
Iran has declared it has "cracked the codes" of the intelligence gathering system of a U.S. spy drone it seized last year for violating its airspace.

Tehran boasted about capturing the unmanned aircraft with stealth technology in December and displayed it on national television. Now, months later, an Iranian senior military official said armed forces have extracted data from it to prove a point to the Pentagon, which they said doubted Tehran would be able to decode it.

Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh was quoted as saying, "This plane is seen as a national capital for us and our words should not disclose all the information that we have very easily. Yet, I provide four cues in here to let the Americans know how deep we could penetrate into the intelligence systems and devices of this drone."

Hajizadeh said that some data from the drone's memory device showed it had flown over bin Laden's Pakistani hideout two weeks before his death. He added, "Had we not accessed the plane's softwares and hard discs, we wouldn't have been able to achieve these facts."

Hajizadeh said Iran has also decoded information such as protocols, repairs and flight sorties. He said that the drone was in California in October 2010 for repairs and was moved to Afghanistan the following month, where it had problems that American experts could not solve.
Posted by: ryuge || 04/22/2012 08:39 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "d-r-i-n-k m-o-r-e O-v-a-l-t-i-n-e."
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 10:32 Comments || Top||

#2  Frank's last is my nomination for snark of the day
Posted by: badanov || 04/22/2012 11:54 Comments || Top||

#3  Top 10 data left on the Iranian captured spy drone:

10: d-r-i-n-k m-o-r-e O-v-a-l-t-i-n-e
9: Lady Gaga's latest music video
8: A hyperlink for donations's to Barky's re-election campaign.
7: The telephone number for General Atomics call center.
6: A post-it note left taped on the drone's hard drive with telephone numbers to the local Taco Bell in San Diego.
5: Instructions on how to attach a PS3 controller
4: A hyperlink to Private Manning's Facebook page
3: Plans for Shelley's next four vacations
2: "Where all de wimmin at?" Secret Service
and the number one data left on the Iranian captured drone

A UPS label for shipping the drone back to California.
Posted by: badanov || 04/22/2012 12:07 Comments || Top||

#4  Plus the Obama donation forms and absentee ballots with postage paid by DNC.
Posted by: Cromert || 04/22/2012 15:54 Comments || Top||

#5  "This plane is seen as a national capital for us and our words should not disclose all the information that we have very easily.

Yes, we know where it is. Please keep it plugged into your electricity.
Posted by: Besoeker || 04/22/2012 16:09 Comments || Top||

#6  And a verse from Richland Woman Blues in RAM:

red rooster say
Cock-a-doodle-doodley-doo
Richland Woman she say
Any dude will do.......
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/22/2012 18:36 Comments || Top||

#7  LOL badanov. You added 9 good ones to Frank's. Impressive!
Posted by: ryuge || 04/22/2012 20:57 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Muslim mob burns down Catholic church in Khartoum
A Muslim mob has set on fire a Catholic church associated with the Southern Sudanese in the capital Khartoum. The church was built on a disputed plot of land but this incident appeared to be part of the fallout from the ongoing dispute between Sudan and South Sudan over control of an oil town on their poorly-defined border.

Witnesses said a mob of hundreds shouting insults torched the church. Fire engines could not put out the fire.

A newspaper, Al-Sahafah, said the church grounds included a school and dormitories. Ethiopian refugees living in Khartoum also used the church.
Posted by: ryuge || 04/22/2012 07:43 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  No seething mobs of rioters in Rome demanding retribution. No solemn denunciation from World leaders seeking answers. Not even any mild outrage from social justice groups. Nope, none of that, just a matter of fact news feed with a collective shoulder-shrug. Sigh…it’s just those pesky African Muslims again. What ya gonna do?
Let’s just hope no one dares draw an insulting cartoon.
Posted by: DepotGuy || 04/22/2012 9:27 Comments || Top||

#2  Yeah, I can't remember the last time a Catholic mob burned down a mosque!
Posted by: JohnQC || 04/22/2012 14:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Rolling in their graves: "Chinese" Gordon and Lord Kitchener. Laughing in his grave: The Mahdi. O Tempora! O mores!
Posted by: borgboy || 04/22/2012 15:14 Comments || Top||

#4  A-laugh-a while you can, monkey muzzie boy... With apologies to Dr. Emilio Lizardo.
Posted by: M. Murcek || 04/22/2012 16:47 Comments || Top||

#5  Ahhh, the religion of peace...
Posted by: Hellfish || 04/22/2012 17:32 Comments || Top||

#6  Butt their our allies just ask central command in Qatar home of the Democratic movement and money behind Al Qaeda!
Posted by: Solomon Huperert5909 || 04/22/2012 18:29 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
'Iran begins to construct copy of US drone'
Three Iran officials say that Iran's construction of new drone, based on data decoded, extracted from downed US spy plane.

Iran has started to construct a duplicate of the US-manufactured unmanned aerial vehicle Tehran claims it downed last year when it was spotted flying over Iranian territory, Iranian news agency Mehr reported Sunday according to a Revolutionary Guards commander.

Iran's construction of the new drone, announced by Revolutionary Guards Commander Brigadier Hajih Zadeh to commemorate the founding of the Revolutionary Guards, is based on data extracted from the downed spy plane, which the Iranian military claims it was able to ground without causing substantial damage to the aircraft.

Iran Navy Commander General Ali Fadavi and General Amirali Hajizadeh, IRGC Aerospace Commander also discussed Iran's successful decoding of the memory of the US's R.Q. 170 Stealth drone, according to an Iranian News Agency (IRNA) report on Sunday. The two commanders added that Iran repaired any minor damage that had been caused to the drone.
Posted by: tipper || 04/22/2012 05:22 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I heard that Bambi blocked the US Military's request to bomb the downed drone right after it crashed. Way to go big O.
Posted by: Vespasian Dark Lord of the Swedes6537 || 04/22/2012 12:26 Comments || Top||

#2  LOL. They're gonna copy it? Good luck with that.
Posted by: Hellfish || 04/22/2012 12:42 Comments || Top||

#3  DO you seriously think they can copy the technology. A simple variant will emerge with aspects of the drone and a huge leap forward for Iranian drone capabilities. Thats the good news.
That they sold every aspect of it to Russia and China, and that they willl not only replicate our sate-of-the-art in their drones, but they will exploit the identified vulnerabilities in what we operate now in collections ops against their interests. (Anybody else note the Seychelles connections of PLA basing and drone crashes?)
Posted by: NoMoreBS || 04/22/2012 13:03 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Wanted Thai terrorist killed in gun battle
A member of the RKK terrorist separatist group was killed and one policeman injured in a firefight with government forces early Sunday morning at a village in Narathiwat province.

The dead terrorist militant was identified as Tuwaedunan Nima, an RKK member wanted under an arrest warrant dated June 30, 2009 on charges of attempted murder, resisting arrest and violating the emergency decree.

The firefight took place at about 5:30 a.m. after Pol Maj-Gen Suchart Thirasawat, deputy police inspector-general, and Lt-Col Thanit Saengchan, deputy commander of the 46th Rangers Regiment, led a combined police-military unit to lay siege to a house on a tip-off that Tuwaedunan was hiding there.

Upon being told to surrender, the suspect climbed up on the roof of the house and began shooting. An exchange of gunfire followed. During the gun battle, Tuwaedunan threw an M67 hand grenade at the authorities. Pol Cpl Surasak Chandaeng was injured in the grenade explosion.

Tuwaedunan was during the firefight. His body was found on the roof of the house with a .38 pistol in his hand. A cloth bag containing a number of .38's and M16 ammunition was also recovered near the body.
Posted by: ryuge || 04/22/2012 01:31 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


India-Pakistan
Acid thrower awarded capital punishment
[Dawn] Additional Sessions Judge of Rawalpindi Mohammad Naveed Iqbal on Friday announced death sentence for an acid thrower who took the life of her ex-girlfriend in 2009 by burning her face and sensitive body parts with it.
He'll be dead soon. Look how quickly they executed Omar Saeed Sheikh...
The court also imposed a fine of Rs500,000 on the convict Mohammad Asif. However,
if you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible warning...
the co-accused in the case -- Abrar Ahmed and Abdul Waheed -- were acquitted for want of evidence.

According to the prosecution, Asif, a friend of deceased Gulnaz Bibi 27, was annoyed at her as she got married with another man Riaz Shah. In order to satisfy his anger and to take
Dire Revenge™ he threw acid on her burning her body parts.

An FIR of the case registered in R. A. Bazaar cop shoppe by Nasreen Bibi, a sister in law of the dear departed, said Gulnaz told her on telephone on June 5, 2009 that she was visiting a shrine of Baba Gohar Ali Shah along with her friend Asif.

Nasreen said Asif got angry with Gulnaz over a minor dispute and left her in the cab saying he had to buy something from a nearby shop. Then Asif brought acid and threw it on Gulnaz. Nasreen claimed to have heard cries of Gulnaz on telephone.

The prosecution told the court that police found the victim injured. Gulnaz was shifted to District Headquarters (DHQ) hospital where doctors declared that acid had burnt her body at four points severely.

According to medical report, the victim's face including eyes, back, sensitive body parts and arms were burnt in the attack. Gulnaz kept hospitalised for 26 days and on July 1, 2009 she finally succumbed to her injuries.

The acid thrower Asif after the incident beat feet from the scene, he remained an absconder for two years but surrendered himself to the police on July 8, 2011.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan


Troops' pullout from Siachen: Nawaz idea draws Qazi's ire
[Dawn] Former Jamaat-i-Islam chief Qazi Hussain Ahmad
... third president (1987--2009) of the Pak Jamaat-e-Islami. Qazi was also head of the Muttahidah Majlis-e-Amal until his ego became bigger than the organization. Qazi is what is known as a fiery preacher, which means he has lots of volume, a good delivery, and not a lot of reverence for coherence. He was the patron of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Rasool Sayyaf and Osama bin Laden during the war against the Soviets. He used to recommend drining camel's urine to maintain good health before his kidneys started to go...
on Friday opposed the proposal of unilateral withdrawal of troops from Siachen and said if it happened, it would tantamount to accepting India occupation of the glacier.

Talking to journalists after addressing party workers in Khairabad area of Nowshera, Mr Qazi criticised Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz chief Nawaz Sharif
... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Moslem League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf...
for suggesting Pakistani troops' unilateral pullout from Siachen and said the suggestion was irresponsible.

He said India should take initiative and take its troops on Siachen glacier to the 1984 position and once that happened, Pakistain should withdraw forces from there.

"India committed aggression and sent its troops to Siachen. Unilateral troop pullout by Pakistain will tantamount to recognition of Indian occupation of the glacier," he said.

The JI chief also opposed resumption of goods' supply to Afghanistan-based NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and organization....
forces through Pakistain and said the government and the army should avoid providing 'oxygen' to the Indian occupation forces.

He blamed NATO forces for the killing of hundreds of thousands of Paks and Afghans over the years and said his party was opposed to the reopening of NATO supply and would let it happen.

JI general secretary Liaquat Baloch, who was also in attendance, said people would block NATO supply route if the government decided to let goods for Afghanistan-based forces pass through the country. He said the US and its allies had suffered defeat in Afghanistan and were looking for safe exit.

Mr Baloch demanded immediate end to military operations in Fata and Balochistan
...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it...
and said the operations had worsened the situation in the two regions instead of restoring peace.

In Charsadda, JI provincial chief Professor Mohammad Ibrahim told a 'Youth Assembly' in the day that his party would bring about Islamic revolution in the country by organising Pak youth and give them proper direction to meet future challenges.

The assembly, which was organised by Shabaab-e-Mili, the JI youth wing, had JI provincial vice chief Mushtaq Ahmad Khan, Shabaab-e-Mili central president Attiqur Rehman,
provincial president Abrar Akbar, district chief Mohammad Riaz Khan, Shabaab-e-Mili district president Shabbir Ahmad, former MPA Arshad Khan and former nazim
...small time big shot, the chief elected official of a local government in Pakistan, such as a district, tehsil, union council, or village council...
Naseer Mohammad Khan in attendance.

Professor Ibrahim said enforcement of Islamic system was the only solution to the country's current socioeconomic and security crises. He said corrupt rulers had been imposed on the country and they had given the people prolonged power outages, high inflation, growing lawlessness and massive unemployment.

He said if elected to power, JI would give people jobs, peace and goods at affordable prices. The JI leader later awarded shields to Faiz Mohammad, Hamdullah Jan, Dr Zahoor Ahmed, Ghafirullah, Farhad Ali Rabbani, Shah Zed, Shaukat Ali, Hafeez Suhail Ahmad and Arshad Shahkar for highlighting people's problems and trying to resolve them.

Meanwhile,
...back at the game, the Babe was wondering why the baseball kept getting bigger and bigger. Finally it hit him...
around 50 noted scholars of Charsadda on Friday issued a fatwa (decree) that administration of polio
...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set...
vaccines to children under the age of five was not un-Islamic.

The fatwa was issued at Ulema Convention organised by National Research and Development Foundation (NRDF) to seek Learned Elders of Islam cooperation in convincing parents about vaccination of their children.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Jamaat-e-Islami

#1  He said India should take initiative and take its troops on Siachen glacier to the 1984 position and once that happened, Pakistain should withdraw forces from there.

"You can trust us"
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 10:38 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
1 dead, buses torched ahead of Bangladesh strike
DHAKA: Police and media reports in Bangladesh say at least one man has died after unidentified people set fire to at least five buses in the capital ahead of an opposition-sponsored general strike.
And remember, Dear Reader, the former East Pakistan is universally acknowledged to be considerably more sane and functional than the former West Pakistan, Land of the Pure.
An 18-party opposition alliance will enforce the strike on Sunday to urge the government to find a regional opposition leader who went missing on Tuesday from a Dhaka street.

Police official Sirajul Islam says a bus was set on fire on Saturday in Dhaka's Khilgaon area, killing the 40-year-old driver. The United News of Bangladesh agency and several television stations say four other buses were set on fire in parts of Dhaka.

The opposition has blamed security agencies for Elias Ali's disappearance but the government has denied this.
Posted by: Steve White || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Syria's Homs 'calm' amid UN monitors visit
[Al Jazeera] Syrian authorities have allowed a team of UN ceasefire monitors to enter the battered city of Homs after resident opposition activists said shelling and gunfire stopped for the first time in weeks.

A UN front man said on Saturday that a team of monitors toured the city and met with its governor.

"They are now visiting districts of the city," Khaled al-Masri said. Syria's state news agency SANA confirmed the statement.

Activists in Homs said that the shelling of the city only ceased to make it look as if the government was abiding by a truce, mediated by international the UN and Arab League
...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing...
peace envoy Kofi Annan.
...Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh and so far the worst Secretary-General of the UN. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize for something or other that probably sounded good at the time. In December 2004, reports surfaced that Kofi's son Kojo received payments from the Swiss company Cotecna, which had won a lucrative contract under the UN Oil-for-Food Program. Kofi Annan called for an investigation to look into the allegations, which stirred up the expected cesspool but couldn't seem to come up with enough evidence to indict Kofi himself, or even Kojo...
They said that shelling would resume as soon after the monitors left.

"It is very clear that the Syrian government can stop the violence whenever it wants at anytime in the country," Walid
al-Fares of the Homs Revolution Council said.

"There is no shelling whatsoever," Fares told Al Jizz, a day after activists had reported the deaths of at least 12 people there amid continued shelling by government forces on several neighbourhoods.

"We believe that the calmness has to do with the arrival of the observers. We wish they could live with us so that this peace can remain."
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
$680m US fund for Israel’s Iron Dome
WASHINGTON: A House panel is boosting money for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system by $680 million amid an election-year fight over whether President Barack Obama is doing enough for the longtime Mideast ally.
The issue isn't how much they spend, it's how much is needed, and how much can be spent properly and usefully. This is typical "we spend more because we care" Washington mentality.
The Republican-controlled Armed Services Committee, which begins crafting a fiscal 2013 defense budget next week, plans millions more for the system designed to intercept short-range rockets and mortars, according to a congressional aide.

The money would be in addition to the $205 million that the Obama administration and Congress agreed to in a special request in the 2011 budget and would cover several years, through fiscal 2015.

An increase in money for the program was expected as the Pentagon said last month that it would work with Congress to steer more funds to a system that has proven effective in intercepting rockets and mortars fired by Palestinian fighters from Gaza.

“Supporting the security of the state of Israel is a top priority of President Obama and Secretary (Leon) Panetta,” the Pentagon said last month. “The Department of Defense has been in conversations with the government of Israel about US support for the acquisition of additional Iron Dome systems and intends to request an appropriate level of funding from Congress to support such acquisitions based on Israeli requirements and production capacity.”
Posted by: Steve White || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  the $680 is for three years of R,D and production

rumor is that both Israel and the US are working to reduce the size and cost of the intercept vehicle;

the current model is about 200 pounds but the thought is that a 80 pound vehicle would work almost as well and be much less expensive
Posted by: lord garth || 04/22/2012 0:17 Comments || Top||

#2  And can be carried by one person.

They're going to need a bazillion of them.
Posted by: gorb || 04/22/2012 1:16 Comments || Top||

#3  I can't help thinking a railgun is the answer. You could even included a parachute, so projectiles that miss could float back to earth and be re-used.
Posted by: phil_b || 04/22/2012 4:28 Comments || Top||

#4  With a railgun the projectile would be a simple aluminum rod. If it misses so what.
Posted by: Steve White || 04/22/2012 11:18 Comments || Top||

#5  as long as we are doing blue sky concept, I have thought that drones might be used to launch small (5 to 10 pound) interceptors. That way, the missile might actually be hit before it even gets to home territory. Having the remnants of their own missiles fall on them would be quite a morale depressant for the Paleos.

If the missile is missed by the drone interceptors and the missile is projected to hit populated area, the Iron Dome interceptors could be used.
Posted by: Lord Garth || 04/22/2012 12:44 Comments || Top||

#6 
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 04/22/2012 13:41 Comments || Top||

#7  Why give the Muslim Brother Hood 1.2 billion and Israel only 680 million didn't they vote for Obama?
Posted by: Spusomble B. Hayes7430 || 04/22/2012 18:14 Comments || Top||

#8  didn't they vote for Obama?

No they didn't, actually. There are quite a few dual citizens over there, and they overwhelmingly voted against him.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 19:28 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Tensions prevail in Afmadow, south Somalia
(Sh.M.Network)- Tense of fighting and military exercises are reportedly rose on Saturday in parts of Somalia's Lower Jubba region as both Somali and Kenya army make more advances againts bad turban strongholds.

Locals in Afmadow town, 620 Km south of Mogadishu said that heavily armed Somali soldiers together with Kenyan military have moved this morning to rebel-held areas near Afmadow where is now under Al shabab control.

The situation is tense as Al shabab agents begun intensifying their defensive drills around Afmadow town in a bid to protect the coalition forces from capturing their base.

Kenyan has sent last year troops and tanks into the neighboring war-tornSomaliato pursue Al shabab, whom Nairobi blames for the growing insecurity in its soil.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: al-Shabaab


Arabia
Minister calls for counter-terrorism strategy
[Yemen Post] The former Minister of Endowment and Guidance and the head of a dialogue committee tasked with conducting dialogue with Al-Qaeda hard boyz has called for an inclusive national strategy to combat terrorism in Yemen.
Seems a bit late in the game for that, since al-Q has taken over a considerable portion of the country. But I guess any start is a good start.
Just what Yemen needs, another committee...
Committees do keep people who weren't going to do anything anyway from having to do anything more...
In an interview with the state-run Al-Jomhoria Newsapaper, Hamouid Al-Hitar who persuaded Al-Qaeda hard boyz to give up violence in the period from 2002 to 2005 affirmed that Al-Qaeda in Yemen is merely 10 percent of what was painted by medial outlets.

He attributed the expansion of Al-Qaeda power to the lack to a serious political approach to combat the terrorism, insecurity Yemen has lately witnessed, some governorates are not under the control of the state since three years, and the lack to education that immunize youth against fundamental ideologies.

He further said that Al-Qaeda was propped up with the aim of distorting the image of the peaceful struggle in the South and the peaceful uprising that broke out in 2011, hinting that some official of the former regime headed by President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh
... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it...
want to turn Yemen to another Somalia.

Al-Hitar who resigned in protest at crimes committed against peafowl protests in 2011 accused some military and security leaders of cooperating with Al-Qaeda, stressing that they provided the organization with weapons and ordnance in Rada of Baida and Zinjibar and Jaar of Abyan.

He said that Ansar Al-Shariah (supporters of the Islamic Law) is a mixture comprised of Al-Qaeda turbans, elements of the armed Southern Movement and supporters of Saleh.

He stressed that there are dissimilarities between Al-Qaeda and Ansar Al-Shariah, pointing out that the former only target non-Moslem persons and Western interests and that they do not attack Moslems or looting their properties, and that the latter target both.

He cited that there was cooperation between the former regime and Al-Qaeda, reiterating that some relatives of Saleh personally contacted with Al-Qaeda operatives and hampered the completion of investigation on the case of USS Cole.

Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


Iraq
Blasts kill three in Iraq
[Bangla Daily Star] Bombs went kaboom! in two minibuses in Storied Baghdad
...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate...
yesterday, killing three people and wounding at least 12, while a kaboom on a governor's convoy maimed two guards, security officials said.

An interior ministry official said the bombs in the minibuses went kaboom! about 8:30am near a Shia place of worship in the Chikouk area in north Storied Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 12.

Meanwhile,
...back at the Council of Boskone, Helmuth had turned a paler shade of blue. Star-A-Star had struck again...
a roadside kaboom targeted the convoy of Hisham al-Hiyali, the governor of Diyala province, north of the lovely provincial capital Baquba, police Captain Hazem al-Juburi said.

The officer said that two guards were maimed in the attack, but that the governor was unharmed.

Violence in Iraq has fallen sharply from its peak in 2006 and 2007, but attacks still continue across the country. In March, 112 Iraqis were killed, government figures showed.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Iraq


Arabia
Bahrain Opens Probe into Death in Protest Area
[An Nahar] Bahraini opposition groups claimed Saturday that a man was killed during festivities with security forces, threatening to sharply escalate the Gulf nation's unrest as officials struggle under the world spotlight as hosts of the Formula One Grand Prix. Authorities opened an investigation in a bid to defuse tensions.

At least 50 people have died in the unrest since February 2011 in the longest-running street battles of the Arab Spring. Bahrain's Shiite majority seeks to break the near monopoly on power by the ruling Sunni dynasty, which has close ties to the West.

Persistent protests have left the country's rulers struggling to keep attention on the buildup to Sunday's Formula One race -- Bahrain's premier international event. It was called off last year amid security fears and Bahrain's leaders lobbied hard to hold this year's event in efforts to portray stability and mend the country's international image.

A statement by Bahrain's Interior Ministry said a probe was under way, but gave no other immediate details. The death, however, was likely to intensify a wave of expected protests to coincide with the F1.

The body was found in an area west of the capital Manama, where festivities broke out after a massive protest march Friday. Opposition factions said riot police and demonstrators were engaged in running skirmishes around the village of Shakhura, about five miles (eight kilometers) west of the capital Manama and known for its burial mounds dating back more than 5,000 years.

The area is 12 miles (20 kilometers) from the Grand Prix circuit, which is surrounded by desert and under round-the-clock security watch.

The Interior Ministry said the man who died was identified as Salah Abbas Habib Musa, 36, and the case was "being treated as a homicide." The ministry statement did not give a cause of death but said Sherlocks found "a wound" on the left side of his body.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


Yemen Air Raids Kill 8 Qaida Militants
[An Nahar] Yemen's air force raided al-Qaeda hideouts in the south, killing eight cut-thoats, the defense ministry said Saturday, raising to 40 the number of jihadists reportedly killed in two days.

"The Yemeni air force carried out two air strikes that targeted al-Qaeda positions on Friday... killing eight faceless myrmidons and wounding dozens," said the ministry's news website26sep.net.

The raids were conducted in Abyan province, where 26sep.net reported that 32 faceless myrmidons and two soldiers had been killed in festivities late Thursday.

Al-Qaeda has exploited a decline in Yemeni central government control that accompanied Arab Spring-inspired protests since last year and eventually forced veteran president President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh
... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it...
to resign.

The army, backed by armed civilians, has been battling the turban group's Yemeni branch, known as the Partisans of Sharia (Islamic law), over the control of Abyan province, most of which has fallen under the command of the Islamist krazed killers.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Arabia

#1  Wouldn't it just be easier to blow up the money people in Yemen Qatar and Saudi Arabia instead?
Posted by: Omutch Squank8542 || 04/22/2012 18:23 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Seven more die amid relentless firing incidents in Karachi
[Dawn] KARACHI: Law enforcement agencies remained mere spectator as seven more people on Saturday became victim of relentless firing incidents in Bloody Karachi
...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It may be the largest city in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous...
, DawnNews reported.

In the latest development, a man was killed and three were maimed amid firing from faceless myrmidons in Korangi, Landhi and P.I.B Colony.

Earlier, two men were rubbed out by person or persons unknown at Lasi Goth in New Bloody Karachi. The dear departed were identified as Nisar Ali and Abu-Qasim.

According to police, both were sitting at a roadside tee shop, when unidentified cycle of violence riders opened fire on them.

Duty officer Hussain Bux said Nisar Bux, a supervisor at Ghazi Security, was the apparent target of the attackers and the dear departed came incidentally under fire.

A young man was rubbed out by unidentified gunnies at Mominabad in Orangi Town, while, another was rubbed out in Manghopir area.

Moreover, a man was killed and three others were maimed in different firing incidents in Malir, Landhi, Babar Market and Jut Line.

Meanwhile,
...back at the fist fight, Jake ducked another roundhouse, then parried with his left, then with his right, finally with his chin...
Sindh home ministry has imposed a ban on letting houses to the foreigners by issuing a notification for registering property dealers.

According to the notification, land-lords must verify from National Database Registration Authority (NADRA) before letting out their properties.

SHO of the concerned cop shoppe would consequently be responsible if houses are lent without verification, it added.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
11 Killed in Syria Violence
[An Nahar] Two civilians were among at least 11 people killed in Syria on Saturday as U.N. observers monitoring a shaky ceasefire toured the restive city of Homs, a monitoring group reported.

The report by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights came as the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to dispatch 300 observers to Syria for a 90-day period to help bolster an April 12 truce.

A sniper rubbed out a woman in the town of Qusayr near the Lebanese border in Homs province, the Britannia-based Observatory said.

Another civilian was killed in unclear circumstances in the southern province of Daraa, as regime forces carried out raids in the area, cradle of the uprising against Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad's
Light of the Alawites...
regime, it said.

Nine army deserters were killed in an ambush by government forces in the northern province of Aleppo,
...For centuries, Aleppo was Greater Syria's largest city and the Ottoman Empire's third, after Constantinople and Cairo. Although relatively close to Damascus in distance, Aleppans regard Damascenes as country cousins...
the Observatory added.

Meanwhile "a loud kaboom was heard Saturday at Mazzeh military airport in Damascus,"
...Capital of the last remaining Baathist regime in the world...
the Observatory reported, as activists told Agence La Belle France Presse the army blocked a road leading to the base and snipers were deployed on rooftops.

In other violence, an "armed terrorist group" on Saturday blew up a section of an oil pipeline in the Deir al-Zour region of northeast Syria, SANA said.

Monitors say more than 200 people have been killed in Syria since the shaky ceasefire to which the government and rebels committed themselves went into effect, including 46 on Friday.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria

#1  Send more paramedics.(U.N. People) Guess which movie?
Posted by: Injun Gloluth9901 || 04/22/2012 18:22 Comments || Top||


-Lurid Crime Tales-
Kenya Rangers Gun Down 5 Suspected Elephant Poachers
[An Nahar] Kenyan rangers rubbed out five suspected elephant poachers in a night-time firefight in the north of the country, the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) said on Saturday.

"Five suspected poachers were last night bumped off and one beat feet during a fierce exchange of fire with Kenya Wildlife Service rangers at Chepareria in West Pokot County," it said.

Two rangers were maimed in the firefight which went on for more than 40 minutes, the KWS said, adding that it had recovered 50 kilograms of elephant tusks and three assault rifles at the scene.

This article starring:
Kenya Wildlife Service
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ...and two rounds of bullet, a shutter gun, and some PCPB pamphlets.
Posted by: gromky || 04/22/2012 5:26 Comments || Top||

#2  How'd they fit 'em in those gunny sacks?
Posted by: AlmostAnonymous5839 || 04/22/2012 10:06 Comments || Top||

#3  Good riddance. Death to poachers.
Posted by: DarthVader || 04/22/2012 10:31 Comments || Top||

#4  Even the Kenyans prefer republicans over democrats!
Posted by: Gravirong Grundy6599 || 04/22/2012 18:20 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Syrian Rebels Hail U.N. Vote, Say Committed to Ceasefire
[An Nahar] The rebel Free Syrian Army hailed the United Nations
...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks...
Security Council vote on Saturday to send 300 observers to monitor a ceasefire in Syria and said it was committed to the truce.

"We salute the dispatch of new observers," FSA front man Colonel Kassem Saadeddine told Agencce La Belle France Presse through a Skype call from Homs province.

The rebel army remains "committed to the ceasefire" that went into effect on April 12 as part of a plan designed by U.N.-Arab League
...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing...
envoy Kofi Annan
...Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh and so far the worst Secretary-General of the UN. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize for something or other that probably sounded good at the time. In December 2004, reports surfaced that Kofi's son Kojo received payments from the Swiss company Cotecna, which had won a lucrative contract under the UN Oil-for-Food Program. Kofi Annan called for an investigation to look into the allegations, which stirred up the expected cesspool but couldn't seem to come up with enough evidence to indict Kofi himself, or even Kojo...
to halt more than a year of deadly violence in Syria that has killed thousands of people.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria


India-Pakistan
Militants target girls school in Jamrud
[Dawn] Unidentified myrmidons blew up a government girls' school in Jamrud tehsil of Khyber Agency on the night between Thursday and Friday.

Local officials said that a group of gunnies entered the Said Ahmad Jan Kali girls school building at midnight and planted explosives alongside its boundary wall.

The explosives went off with a big bang causing damage to some classrooms and a portion of the boundary wall. Windowpanes of a number of classrooms and offices were also smashed.

Officials said that they took into custody seven local residents, the school watchman among them, and started investigations. They said that the school was closed after the kaboom and would be reopened after devising security arrangements for the students.

A local bad turban group Abdullah Ezzam Brigade took responsibility for the incident.

Officials of the education department said that with the recent incident, the number of destroyed government schools in Khyber Agency had reached 69.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: TTP


Africa Horn
Hot lead flies in Mogadishu jail break
(Sh.M.Network)- Prison officials say at least 1 person was confirmed dead and 10 others injured on Friday jail break followed a deadly gunfire at Mogadishu central detention center.

According to witnesses who spoke with Shabelle Media station said the festivities erupted after some soldiers tried to release two other soldiers who were held in the prison by Somali government.

The soldiers also used grenades in their attack and gunfire that lasted for several minutes ensued between the two sides, killing a prisoner and wounding ten other inmates who have been taken to local hospitals in the capital.

Officials from Al-Shabaab
... Somalia's version of the Taliban, functioning as an arm of al-Qaeda...
told a rebel-run radio station that a group of their armed forces have on Friday afternoon stormed into Mogadishu central prison and handled to release dozen inmates who were incarcerated illegally, as he put it.

On the other hand, Abdi Mohammed Ismail, TFG Police Custodial Corps rebuffed the claims of Al shabab, saying the festivities were engaged between inmates and the guards of the prison.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: al-Shabaab


Afghanistan
Tons of Explosives Seized from Militants Planning Attack in Kabul
[An Nahar] Afghan cops have set to sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock, in a pestilential prison with a life-long lock five bully boyz with 10 metric tons (11 tons) of explosives that they planned to use to carry out a massive attack in Kabul, a security official said Saturday.

Shafiqullah Tahiry, who is a front man for the National Director for Security, told a news conference that three of the men were Paks and two were Afghans.

He did not say when the arrests took place, nor what their intended target was.

Tahiry said the explosives were brought from Pakistain to Kabul and that three of the men were members of the Pak Taliban, while the other two belonged to the Afghan Taliban. He said they were taking orders from two Pak Taliban capos who he claimed have ties to that country's intelligence agency.

"Imagine if 10,000 kilograms of explosives, which was already inside Kabul" had went kaboom!, "what a disaster could have happened," Tahiry said.

Militants reportedly from a Pakistain-based group launched coordinated assaults last week in the Afghan capital and other eastern cities.

Afghan and U.S. officials have blamed those attacks on the Haqqani network, an orc group that is allied with the Taliban and al-Qaeda and has been described by American officials as the most dangerous orc force in the Afghan war.

Last Sunday's coordinated assaults included near-simultaneous attacks in the three parts of the capital and three other eastern cities. Eight coppers and three non-combatants were killed in 18 hours of fighting, along with 36 orcs, according to Afghan officials.

Tahiry said the captured explosives were in 400 bags and hidden under potatoes loaded in a truck with Pak license plates.

According to Tahiry, the men confessed that they "had planned to carry out a terrorist attack in a key point in Kabul city."

This article starring:
Shafiqullah Tahiry
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Pakistan

#1  Crap pathetic attempt at prolonging the farce of working together and that they know what they are doing!
Posted by: Otto Thavish1139 || 04/22/2012 17:22 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Puntland forces detain 15 clerics in Galka'yo, central Somalia
(Sh. M. Network)- The security forces under Somalia's semi autonomous state of Puntland
...a region in northeastern Somalia, centered on Garowe in the Nugaal province. Its leaders declared the territory an autonomous state in 1998. Puntland and the equally autonomous Somaliland seem to have avoided the clan rivalries and warlordism that have typified the rest of Somalia, which puts both places high on the list for Islamic subversion...
have on Saturday jugged more than 15 holy men allegedly connected with Takfir bloc, officials said.

Reports said these people were locked away in an operation conducted by the forces at a compound in Israac village, northern part of the divided fragile Galka'yo town, the picturesque provincial capital of Mudug region in central Somalia.

Puntland security officials accuse the holy men of being part of the insecurity acts in the region. Some reports say the arrests followed after the local residents in Israac village informed to the police forces that the holy mans teach young children at Madrasas subjects against Islamic religion.

They are now being questioned in a jail in Galka'yo town for their connection with allegations.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Shabaab

#1  Just nab everyone with a beard. Separate them into 10 different prisons, publicize the list of inmates in each, see which ones the "islamists" attempt to break prisoners out of. There's your highest value target.

Posted by: crosspatch || 04/22/2012 20:40 Comments || Top||

#2  The upgraded version of "let God sort them out," crosspatch?
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 22:45 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Two killed in Quetta firing
[Dawn] Two people were killed in a firing incident on Quetta's Barori road, DawnNews reported on Saturday.

According to police, faceless myrmidons on a cycle of violence opened fire on two pedestrians.

One pedestrian was struck down in his prime, whereas, the other was severely maimed and departed this vale of tears while being shifted to a hospital, police said.

Moreover, two bodies were discovered from Quetta's area of Kuchlak.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Good morning
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Happy Birthday/Daily Gam Shot

Anna Falchi (Finland) aka She in "Dellamorte Dellamore (Cemetery Man)(1994)" aka Princess Desideria "Desideria e l'anello del drago (The Dragon Ring)(1994)" Maria Michi in "Celluloide (Celluloid)(1995)" aka Valeria Giordano in "L'uomo nero(The Black Man)(2009)" aka Jessie Collins in "Nessun messaggio in segreteria (Sorry, You Can't Get Through!)(2005)" (age 40)



A Christine Keeler Moment
Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC || 04/22/2012 1:50 Comments || Top||

#2  Happy Birthday/Daily Gam Shot 04/21

Andie MacDowell aka Ann Bishop Mullany in "Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989)" aka Ann Finnigan in "Short Cuts (1993)" aka Carrie in "Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994)" aka Rita in "Groundhog Day (1993)" aka Enid Goldberg in "Daydream Nation (2010)" (age 54)


Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC || 04/22/2012 1:53 Comments || Top||

#3  GB, re the "Christine Keeler moment": Ms Falchi is clothed; Ms Keeler wasn't.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 04/22/2012 2:18 Comments || Top||

#4  Ms Falchi is clothed

Part of her is. ;-)
Posted by: gorb || 04/22/2012 5:06 Comments || Top||

#5  She was actually only a little over 33 feet tall.

Get me a ladder.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 04/22/2012 14:39 Comments || Top||


Africa North
Libya builds case against Seif
TRIPOLI: Libya says it is building its case against Muammar Qaddafi's detained son, gathering witnesses and documents, according to The Hague-based war crimes prosecutor, as it seeks to persuade the International Criminal Court to allow for a local trial.
'Persuade'? They have him jugged. It's the ICC that has to do the persuading if they want the trial at the Hague.
The ICC issued an arrest warrant for Seif Al-Islam last year after prosecutors accused him and others of involvement in the killing of protesters during the revolt that eventually toppled his father, who ruled with an iron fist for 42 years. It has called on Libya to hand Seif Al-Islam over but Tripoli has insisted he will be tried in his home country after his capture in the southern desert in November.

ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo traveled to Libya this week as part of ICC investigations into crimes committed during Libya's war, meeting the head of the ruling National Transitional Council and chief prosecutor.

"I understand he has more than 30 witnesses, he's got documents, he has interceptions, so I understand he has a strong case but I don't know the details," Moreno-Ocampo told a news conference yesterday, adding he had not seen the information as it remains confidential at this stage of the investigation."Libya has to present the argument to the judges."
No they don't...
Tripoli is to outline its case to the ICC on April 30 as to why it should put Seif-Al Islam on trial.

Libya has the right to try him on its soil following his arrest there. The ICC will only act if a country is deemed unable or unwilling to investigate or prosecute, for instance when its legal system has collapsed.

Moreno-Ocampo said it seemed unlikely any trial would transpire before Libya's first free elections in June.

"There is no deadline for the judges. I suppose two, three months but in the meantime I don't see a trial in Libya before that because the process requires first an accusation."

Several human rights groups have questioned whether the Libyan justice system can meet the standards of international law as the interim national government struggles to impose its authority on a myriad of armed groups. The Libyan government has yet to convince the former Zintan rebel fighters who captured Seif Al-Islam to turn him over to its custody.

Moreno-Ocampo said he was told that Qaddafi's son had not been mistreated. "(Saif's location) is a matter for the national authorities. Respecting Saif's well-being is also matter for the national authorities," he said.

Moreno-Ocampo added that it was critical for Libyans who fought against the injustices of the Qaddafi regime to now show they could "respect justice for a person like Saif."

The ICC is also investigating rapes committed during Libya's conflict. Moreno-Ocampo, who traveled to Misrata -- scene of some of the bloodiest fighting last year, said his mission was considering how to tackle the taboo subject, looking at gathering evidence against top officials of the old regime, some of whom are outside Libya.

While there have been allegations of rape used as a weapon during the fighting, it remains unclear how widespread violence against women was. Rape is a highly sensitive issue in the Muslim country and is rarely discussed in public.

"Libya has to give recognition to these people, because if not, it will be double punishment -- they were raped and now they are marginalized," Moreno-Ocampo said.
This article starring:
Luis Moreno-Ocampo
Seif Al-Islam
Posted by: Steve White || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ...Would I be correct in imagining - for just a moment - that the real reason the ICC wants Seif so badly is so that he doesn't say anything...ummm...embarrassing on the stand in an effort to save his worthless butt?

(Embarrassing, that is, to the Eurotrash who kept doing business with his Dad all those years.)

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 04/22/2012 9:29 Comments || Top||

#2  I'm guessing that's reason #1. Keeping him locked up in a hotel suite prison at the Hague while awaiting a 20 year trial run by Carla del Ponte certainly solves that problem.
Posted by: Steve White || 04/22/2012 11:14 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
China military warns of confrontation over seas
BEIJING: China’s military warned the United States on Saturday that US-Philippine military exercises have raised risks of armed confrontation over the disputed South China Sea in the toughest high-level warning yet after weeks of tensions.

China’s official Liberation Army Daily warned that recent jostling with the Philippines over disputed seas where both countries have sent ships could boil over into outright conflict, and laid much of the blame at Washington’s door.
What's theirs is theirs, and they'll then talk about what's yours...
This week American and Filipino troops launched a fortnight of annual naval drills amid the stand-off between Beijing and Manila, who have accused each other of encroaching on sovereign seas near the Scarborough Shoal, west of a former US navy base at Subic Bay.

The joint exercises are held in different seas around the Philippines; the leg that takes place in the South China Sea area starts on Monday.

“Anyone with clear eyes saw long ago that behind these drills is reflected a mentality that will lead the South China Sea issue down a fork in the road toward military confrontation and resolution through armed force,” said the commentary in the Chinese paper, which is the chief mouthpiece of the People’s Liberation Army.

“Through this kind of meddling and intervention, the United States will only stir up the entire South China Sea situation toward increasing chaos, and this will inevitably have a massive impact on regional peace and stability.”

Up to now, China has chided the Philippines over the dispute about the uninhabited shoal known in the Philippines as the Panatag Shoal and which China calls Huangyan, about 124 nautical miles off the main Philippine island of Luzon.

China has territorial disputes with the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan across the South China Sea, which could be rich in oil and gas and is spanned by busy shipping lanes.

Major General Luo Yuan, a retired PLA researcher well-known for his hawkish views, amplified the warnings from Beijing issued through state media.

“China has already shown enough restraint and patience over this incident,” Luo said of the friction with Manila, according to an interview published on Chinese state television’s website.

If the Philippines “takes irrational actions, then the current confrontation could intensify, and the Chinese navy will certainly not stand idly by,” he added.

Beijing has sought to resolve the disputes one-on-one with the countries involved but there is worry among its neighbors over what some see as growing Chinese assertiveness in staking claims over the seas and various islands, reefs and shoals. In past patches of tension over disputed seas, hawkish Chinese military voices have also risen, only to be later reined in by the government. The same could be true this time.

Since late 2010, China has sought to cool tensions with the United States. Especially with the ruling Chinese Party preoccupied with a leadership succession late in 2012, Beijing has stressed hopes for steady relations throughout this year. Nonetheless, experts have said that China remains wary of US military intentions across the Asia-Pacific, especially in the wake of the Obama administration’s vows to “pivot” to the region, reinvigorating diplomatic and security ties with allies.

The Liberation Army Daily commentary echoed that wariness.

“The United States’ intention of trying to draw more countries into stirring up the situation in the South China Sea is being brandished to the full,” said the newspaper.
Posted by: Steve White || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Aren't they having joint training with the Russians at the moment. STFU China!
Posted by: Zebulon Prince of the Ostrogoths4887 || 04/22/2012 0:44 Comments || Top||

#2  China's view is that we need these resources so they belong to us. I don't really see how it can be resolved amicably. Our only hope (God help us) is the Communist Party mandarins in Beijing. If things ever turn sour in China, they'll turn to this conflict as a method to unite the people.
Posted by: gromky || 04/22/2012 5:32 Comments || Top||

#3  When do we start destroying all the damn Chinks infrastructure in Africa can't they see it from their U.S. Military bases is it out of range of our drones or what? That's right they don't have permission!
Posted by: Wheng Gurly-Brown7899 || 04/22/2012 17:30 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Security forces avert major terror attack in W. Bank
Traffic police, Border Guard identify 2 suspicious 17-year-olds near Tapuah Junction; discover knives, gun, powerful explosives which may have been intended for terrorist attack at crowded hitchhikers post.
It's a busy week for failed attempts throughout the Ummah. The attentive soul might get the idea that Allah no longer favours such behaviour...
Border Police officers averted a major terror attack in the West Bank on Saturday after stopping two Paleostinian men acting suspiciously, and discovering powerful explosives in their possession, as well as knives and a gun.

The incident occurred near Tapuah Junction in the northern West Bank, near a hitchhikers post used by many Israelis on Saturday night.

Security forces suspect that the post was the intended target of the attack.

"Our fighters noticed two men in their 20s acting strangely," a Border Police front man said. "They looked under pressure in the presence of security personnel," he added.

The suspicious conduct by the Paleostinians prompted Border Police to initiate a search of them and their bags. The officers uncovered a small arsenal of powerful explosives.

Four pipe bombs, two knives, and a home-made gun were seized in the search.

A Judea and Samaria Traffic Police patrol car then joined the scene, and placed the suspects under arrest.

During initial questioning, each suspect blamed the other. Both men are from the Balata region of Nablus. The suspects were taken away for questioning, and are refusing to cooperate.

Border Police then dispatched a bomb squad unit, which defused pipe bombs.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Yemen: Ten Saudis Killed in AQAP Clashes
[Yemen Post] Ten Saudis were killed in the southern Abyan province while fighting alongside al-Qaeda since Friday, two security bigshots said.
It's the easy way for the Saudis to clear out the worst results of their inbreeding program.
The officials said three Somalis were also killed as government intensifies its assault on al-Qaeda hideouts.
Ditto the Somalis. One wonders how many such Lions of Islam have lost to Darwin since 9/11...
The Defense Ministry announced that troops have taken over four key military positions in the province, while more than a dozen air strikes hit areas controlled by the myrmidon groups.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Arabia

#1  Butt the Saudi people are allies just like Qatar and Pakistan and Afghanistan. Hope it ends soon looking in to kabob franchise across the crescent!
Posted by: Chainter Angainter5043 || 04/22/2012 17:24 Comments || Top||


Caribbean-Latin America
The Legacy of Mexican General Acosta Chaparro

For a map, click here

By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com

Retired general Mario Arturo Acosta Chaparro was attacked Friday afternoon in the Mexico City suburb of Polanco in Anahuac colony near the intersection of calles Lago Como and Lago Trasimeno. He was hit three times in the head by gunfire. He was rushed to receive medical attention,but died at about 1820 hrs local time.

Mexicans these days recognize the general as a disgraced commander who was accused of receiving money from the founder of the Juarez Cartel, Amado Carrillo Fuentes AKA Señor de los Cielos or Lord of the Heavens, part of the charges for which Acosta Chaparro was arrested on August 30th, two months short of his retirement. He was later sentenced for crimes against health. Those charges actually related to his time as a counterinsurgency commander in Guerrero state in the 1970s. General Acosta Chaparro spent almost seven years in Campo Militar No.1 military prison in Mexico City.

In the summer of 2007, an appellate court, Quinto Tribunal Colegiado, ordered the Supremo Tribunal de Justicia Militar to impose a new sentence on Acosta Chaparro, saying sufficient evidence had been found of the general's ties to drug trafficking. The new sentence was for a charge he had already been acquitted of, so n June 2007 he was released.

General Acosta Chaparro was one of several military commanders who made their bones in the 1970s and 1990s fighting Marxist guerilla movements in Mexico, a list which includes General Mario Renan Castillo Fernandez, Military Zone commander during the latter phases of the Chiapas Conflict of 1994 to 1998, General Leopoldo Diaz Perez, who was Castillo Fernandez's intelligence chief during the Chiapas Conflict, and General Juan Alfredo Oropeza Garnica, commander of the 27th Military Zone in Acapulco, who effectively ended Ejercito Popular Revolucionario (EPR) combat activities in Guerrero in the late 1990s.

Acosta Chaparro was born January 19,1942 in Mexico City and entered military school in 1959. He graduated from Frances Hidalgo college in 1962, receiving his officer's commission as a 2nd lieutenant.

Between then and 1970 he spent time in a number of military police and rifle units before going to Fort Bragg, North Carolina for paratrooper training. He served briefly as an aide to Mexican Secretaria de Defensa Nacional (SEDENA) General Marcelino Garcia Barragan before being assigned as a staff officer in Brigada de Fusileros Paracaidistas, an airborne infantry unit.

In December, 1974 he was promoted by President Luis Echeverria to major and at some point was assigned to the 27 Military Zone in Acapulco. His service record shows these assignments under the heading War Campaigns and Actions. He worked with Guerrero governor Ruben Figueroa Figueroa during that time, in coordination with the Procuraduria General de la Republica (PGR) in the campaign against Marxist guerillas operating in Guerrero state. Chief among those was a group headed by Lucio Cabanas, Partido de los Pobres.

While in the 27th Military Zone, it is alleged that then-major of infantry Acosta Chaparro ran the Brigada Blanca, which was allegedly responsible for the forced disappearances of 143 individuals, and which operated the "death flights" which disposed of many more executed in Acapulco.

The Mexican leftist weekly, Proceso, published an article back in the 2000s which described in chilling detail how ordinary citizens had been swept off the streets of Acapulco, interrogated, then executed without trial. The bodies were transported to a local military airfield at night, then flown offshore some kilometers, where the bodies would be dumped.

The article understandably has been redacted, but it can be found here.

How much of that story is true is uncertain, but what is certain is that General Acosta Chaparro was implicated in that grisly activity and faced an investigation under the presidency of Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon. An assistant attorney general of Distrito Federal Samual de Villar attempted to charge Acosta Chaparro with the murder of several individuals during Acosta Chaparro's time as head of Guerrero state's Polica Judicial del Estado, but the complaint was unable to be moved forward.

Almost as an aside, it was with the help of Acosta Chaparro that the armed leftist insurgency in Guerrero was exterminated, not to be revived until after the Chiapas Conflict went hot in 1994.

When Chiapas went hot in 1994, after literally years of SEDENA and then-President Carlos Salinias de Gortari ignoring the warnings of a growing and hostile armed movement in Chiapas, current General Acosta Chaparro came up with a document based on files he had accumulated while fighting Marxist guerillas in 1970 that provided SEDENA with an insight into what Mexico was fighting with the Ejercito Zapatista de Liberacion Nacional (EZLN).

The document can't be found online, but from various descriptions available, it appears the general excoriated the intelligence services for their failures in recognizing the threat from EZLN. His files were later published in 1995 in a book entitled Movimiento Subversivo en Mexico.

Following his posting in Guerrero, which ended in 1977, Acosta Chaparro held a number of military police and rifle unit commands until his arrest in 2000. Despite his record as a warfighter during the 1970s, he was never assigned a military zone.

Just after the general was released from prison, President Felipe Calderon brought him out of retirement for one last mission in 2008, a year after the start of Calderon's term.

According to data supplied by Proceso writer Jorge Carrasco Araizaga, who gathered information provided by a book written by Anabel Hernandez entitled The Drug Lords, Hernandez identified a Mexican General called "General X", a military commander that Carrasco Araizaga identified as General Acosta Chaparro.

President Calderon's mission was for General Acosta Chaparro to contact the leaders for the top five drug cartels, and to negotiate with them to get them to tamp down the violence.

In turn, Acosta Chaparro met with:
  • Jesus Mendez Vargas AKA El Chango and Nazario Moreno AKA El Pastor, top leaders of La Familia de Michoacana.

  • Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano AKA La Lanzca and Miguel Angel Trevino Morales, AKA Z40, top leaders of Los Zetas, then the enforcement wing for the Gulf Cartel.

  • A second meeting took place in February, 2009 when General Acosta Chaparro asked Lazcano Lazcano why General Mauro Enrique Tello Quinones, commander of 21st Military Zone had been killed just days before. The reply was that he failed to comply.

  • Lazcano Lazcano helped the general contact Arturo Beltran Leyva, AKA El Barbas, head of the Beltran Leyva cartel. That meeting was held at a location between Cuernavaca and Acapulco, and was attended by Edgar Valdez Villarreal AKA La Barbie, Mario Pineda Villa AKA El Borrado and Jesus Nava Romero AKA El Rojo. Less than nine months later Arturo Beltran Leyva and Nava Romero would be killed in a military operation. Valdez Villarreal allegedly dropped a dime on Beltran Leyva and escaped the kill zone. Valdez Villarreal would himself be detained in Mexico City in 2010.

  • Next, the general met with leaders of the Juarez Cartel, probably Vicente Carillo Fuentes, the organization with which prosecutors alleged Acosta Chaparro had links.

  • The last meeting held was with Joaquin Loera Guzman AKA El Chapo, head of the Sinaloa cartel.

Ultimately, Acosto Chaparro's mission failed. He managed to get meetings with all the biggest cartel chiefs, but the goal Calderon set of getting the cartels to reduce the violence went unrealized.

Following his release, Acosta Chaparro was discharged from the military, a move against which he sued SEDENA in the courts and won. The suit allowed him to recover back pay and assets lost when he went to prison His name was eventually added to list of Mexican Army heroes by concurrent SEDENA General Guillermo Galvan Galvan for his efforts in extinguishing the armed Marxist movements in the 1970s.

Although he did spend almost seven years in prison and was acquitted, it was his efforts and experience in killing Marxist guerillas in Guerrero in the 1970s that won him a politically motivated charge of a nexus with organized crime, of which he was eventually cleared.

Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com
Posted by: badanov || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


India-Pakistan
The 'missile woman' behind India's new ICBM
Posted by: john frum || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [4 views] Top|| File under:

#1  she has had immense support from her husband and son, Tejas, an engineering student who shares his name with India's indigenously developed light combat aircraft, also made by the DRDO.
Posted by: phil_b || 04/22/2012 4:24 Comments || Top||

#2  HYDERABAD: Tessy Thomas, project director for Agni IV and a senior scientist behind the launch of Agni V, is already back at work preparing for the Multiple Independent Re-Entry Vehicles (MIRV) of Agni V that will make a second strike possible.

The missile woman, who is now referred to as 'Agni putri', has been a part of every Agni programme from the time developmental flights were being carried out 25 years ago. She designed the guidance schemes for long range missile system meant for Agni missiles.

While missiles are what Tessy always had in her mind, strange as it may sound, her parents had named her after Mother Teresa. Interestingly, Tessy hardly finds any difference in what Mother Teresa, whom she adores, did and her own work. "She did something for the society and my job also relates to doing something for the benefit of the society," she said.
Posted by: john frum || 04/22/2012 15:57 Comments || Top||

#3  Meanwhile...

RISAT-1 all set for launch at Sriharikota

Things are getting set for the launch of India's Radar Imaging Satellite (RISAT-1) from the spaceport at Sriharikota at 5.45 a.m. on Thursday. The four stages of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-XL) have been stacked up at the first launch-pad built on the beachside on the Sriharikota island and the satellite is married up with the vehicle. The 71-hour countdown for the lift-off will begin at 6.45 a.m. on Monday. The RISAT-1 is essentially a remote-sensing satellite.
Posted by: john frum || 04/22/2012 18:09 Comments || Top||

#4 
Posted by: john frum || 04/22/2012 18:21 Comments || Top||

#5  That photo reminds me of theTaj Mahal -- the beautiful thing facing across its reflection. Silly, I know, but both are tied to death and love, one of a wife, the other of a country.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 19:22 Comments || Top||

#6  Congratulations, John Frum
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 19:34 Comments || Top||


Africa North
Egypt Court 'Cannot Rule on Poll Ban for ex-Regime Leaders'
[An Nahar] Egypt's constitutional court refused on Saturday to rule on a parliamentary draft bill barring former regime figures from standing in next month's presidential election, judicial sources said.

The court, asked by the ruling military to decide on the bill's legality, said it could only consider a law after it comes into effect, the sources said.

The military, in charge since an uprising ousted president Hosni Mubarak
...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011...
last year, must first sign off on laws.

The Islamist-majority parliament hurriedly approved the bill on April 12 after Mubarak's vice president and spy chief Omar Suleiman
... Now former Vice president of Egypt. From 1993 until his appointment to that office in 2011 he was Minister without Portfolio and Director of the Egyptian General Intelligence Directorate (EGID)...
said he would run in the election.

Suleiman has since been disqualified, for not gathering enough endorsements from all the country's provinces, along with the Moslem Brüderbund's Khairat El-Shater, barred because of a previous military court conviction.

The provision, an amendment to the political activity law, excluded any president, vice president or leader of Mubarak's now dissolved ruling party from candidacy in the May 23 and May 24 election.

If ratified by the military it may disqualify Mubarak's last Prime Minister, Ahmed Shafiq, who is also a former air force chief.

But it would not exclude Jerry Lewis doppelgänger Amr Moussa
... who was head of the Arab League for approximately two normal lifespans, accomplishing nothing that was obvious to the casual observer ...
, a front runner who served as Mubarak's foreign minister until 2001 before heading the Arab League
...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing...
. He faces the head of the Moslem Brüderbund's political arm, Mohammed Moursi.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


Arabia
Iran accuses Saudi of recruiting Somalis to fight Houthis
[Yemen Post] Iran accused Soddy Arabia of recruiting Sunni Somalis in order to fight the Houthis, who follow the Shiite sect of Islam, in northern Yemen, where the Houthis hold complete control, taking an advantage of the unrest which roiled Yemen for over a year.

The Iranian official news agency Fars said on Saturday that Riyadh has started implementing a plan of recruiting Somalis who live in Yemen as refugees with the aim of sending them to Saddah and Hajjah provinces and take part in festivities with the Houthis, who are reportedly backed and trained by Iran.
Perhaps it's not as much fun to be a jihadi in Somali as before?
Remember that in Somalia, Yemen is 'paradise'...
Fars said, "that about 1300 Somali refugees who were initially living in Yemen have been moved to areas along the Yemeni-Saudi borders. The Somalis are trained in Saudi military sites and brigades and would be sent back to Yemen in order to fight the Houthis."

According to the Iranian news agency the US intelligence is part with Riyadh in its plan intended to confront "the Islamic youth in Yemen."

The Houthis support Iran and hold apposing stance against Soddy Arabia policies in general, especially in Yemen, accusing it of being behind every crisis in the poor Gulf state.

The kingdom feel threatened by the Houthis' expansion in the country in areas along its borders, and called on the government repeatedly to assume its role and reestablish its control in the far north of Yemen.

Many Somalis were killed during the past couple of months in festivities in the southern Yemeni province of Abyan as they fought with al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).

Hundreds of Shabaab al-Islam, a group affiliate to al-Qaeda in the Horn of Africa country, have reportedly infiltrated into Yemen to fight with Ansar al-Sharia
...a Yemeni Islamist militia which claims it is not part of al-Qaeda, even though it works about the same and for the same ends...
, the Yemeni wing of al-Qaeda.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Houthis

#1  Was John Mc Cain in charge of operations or was it Billary.
Posted by: Lemuel Croluger6744 || 04/22/2012 18:12 Comments || Top||

#2  It's John Mac Daddy now new secret service name found it on the internet.
Posted by: Phenter the Rash6158 || 04/22/2012 18:13 Comments || Top||


Lawsuit filed against dismissed commander
[Yemen Post] Officers and soldiers of the Air Forces have filed a memo of charges to the Attorney General Ali Al-Awash in which they demanded to arrest the dismissed commander of the Air Forces and prosecute him on charges of refusing presidential decrees and looting stocks of the Air Forces.

Sources of the Air Forces revealed that the memo included detailed information about looting weapons from Al-Dailami Air Base by gunnies affiliated to the dismissed commander, Mohammad Saleh Al-Ahmar, who is a half-brother of the former president President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh.
... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it...
The memo that Yemen Post received a copy of it emphasized that Al-Ahmar committed other crimes, asking to ban him of travel and freeze his assets.

The sources said that Al-Ahmar is still existed in the headquarters of the Air Forces in Sana'a, pointing out that the disobedience of the decree aimed to blow up the situation and drag the state into violence and chaos.

They cited the ultimatum given to Al-Ahamar to hand over power to the newly-appointed commander Rashid Al-Janad ended and that the officers and soldiers of the Air Forces wait bolder decisions to be taken by President Abdu Rabo Mansour Hadi
...the second and possibly the last president of Yemen, successor to former President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh...
against Al-Ahmar.

Meanwhile,
...back at the pie fight, Bella opened her mouth at precisely the wrong moment...
media sources said that a military unit of the 2nd Infantry Bridge affiliated to the Republican Guard was sent on Friday the headquarters of the Air Forces, reaffirming that the Republican Guard headed by the elderly son of the former President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh seeks to create new two positions inside the Air Forces.

Media sources said Hadi threatened Al-Ahmar last Sunday with stripping him from military rank and bring him to a military court in case if he continued his rebellion against his decree.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


Africa North
3 Killed in South Libya Clashes
[An Nahar] Fresh fighting flared in the Libyan Desert town of Kufra overnight leaving three people dead and 17 others maimed, local sources told Agence La Belle France Presse on Saturday.

"The situation is very bad," Toubu tribe leader Issa Abdelmajid Mansour told AFP in reference to fresh fighting in Kufra, where tribal festivities claimed more than 100 lives in February.

He said that Toubu living in the southeastern town were attacked on Friday by what was meant to be a peacekeeping brigade, Shield Libya, under defense ministry command.

Mansur said cries for help to the national army had fallen on deaf ears.

"No one has come yet and we are still under fire," he said.

Residents in a Toubu neighborhood said there was intermittent fighting since the morning.

"They've been firing since 6 am," a resident told AFP by telephone, adding that it was unclear what brought on the fighting.

A nurse in a Toubu residential area said the festivities were continuing.

"We have three people dead and at least 17 people maimed," until now, a nurse in a clinic in a Toubu residential area told AFP, adding that the majority of the maimed were at death's door.

He expected that number to rise because "festivities are ongoing and the clinic can only provide primary care."

Gunfire could be heard in the background of both testimonies.

On Friday, Wissam Ben Hamid, head of the Shield Libya brigade, said that fighting erupted after Zwai primitive rubbed out a Toubu man.

"The Toubu reacted by firing on every car passing near their neighborhood," Hamid told AFP, adding three of his men were maimed.

"We asked them to pull back in vain," he said.

On Saturday, Colonel Fradj Bushaala, a local representative of the defense ministry, told AFP that fighting had stopped and "negotiations were underway between tribal leaders to settle the problem once and for all."

In February, the festivities pitting Toubu against Zwai rustics in Kufra that cost more than 100 lives also displaced half the population, according to UN figures.

Libya's nascent army intervened by sending a brigade of former rebel fighters to uphold a hard-won ceasefire between the two camps.

Kufra, a town of about 40,000, is located in a triangle where the borders of Egypt, Chad and Sudan meet.

The Toubu, who are dark-skinned and present in southeast Libya as well as in Chad, Sudan and Niger, faced discrimination under toppled Libyan leader Muammar Qadaffy's
...a proud Arab institution for 42 years, now among the dear departed, though not the dearest...
regime.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


Africa Horn
Rights group: Kenya police executed terror suspect
(Sh.M.Network) -- Armed men pulled two passengers off a bus on the Kenyan coast earlier this month. The body of one man was found two days later with his eyes gorged out, nose chopped off and genitals missing, and a human rights
...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty...
group says Kenyan police executed the man -- a terror suspect.

Al-Amin Kimathi of the Mohammedan Human Rights Forum says the killing of Samir Hashim Khan and the disappearance of Mohammed Kassim-Bekhit, who is blind, is a common strategy employed by Kenyan police when they cannot build a case against suspects.

Police front man Eric Kiraithe dismissed the allegation that police potted Khan as "nonsense." He said police are investigating and those behind the killing will face justice, even if they are found to be coppers.

"Whoever has information should give it ... but not sit there and point fingers making outrageous allegations," Kiraithe said Friday.

Kimathi pointed to the 2007 killings and forced disappearances of at least 500 youth associated with a gang called the Mungiki. The gang, which ran extortion rackets out ofNairobislums, was known for beheading its victims. Several local and international human rights groups including a government-funded human rights group blamed the killings and abductions on the police.

The police denied responsibility and claimed a leadership struggle in the Mungiki gang led to the deaths. None of those murders has ever been solved.
The police denied responsibility and claimed a leadership struggle in the Mungiki gang led to the deaths. None of those murders has ever been solved.

Kimathi said the bus Khan and Kassim-Bekhit were traveling in was boxed in by cars near a supermarket chain in the coastal town of Mombasaon March 10. Heavily gunnies exited the cars and dragged the two men from the bus, according to Kimathi.

Kimathi said police denied holding the two when relatives and friends inquired if they had tossed in the clink them. Truck drivers later found Khan's mutilated body dumped in a national park near a highway.

The Kenya-basedMohammedanYouth Center-- which has pledged allegiance to the powerful al-Qaeda-linked Somali turban group al-Shabaab
... successor to the Islamic Courts...
-- said in an Internet posting on Thursday that Kenyan Mohammedans should rise up in response to the death.

It said the death signaled thatKenyahas embraced counter-terrorism techniques that would "take its terror war to the doorstep of every Mohammedan" inKenya, according to the SITE Intelligence Group.

Al-Shabaab forces of Evil have vowed to carry out a large scale attack inNairobiin retaliation forKenyasending troops intoSomalia. The Kenyan government blames al-Shabaab forces of Evil for several kidnappings on Kenyan soil, including those of four Europeans. The attacks greatly harmed the coastal tourism industry.

Al-Shabaab forces of Evil bombed crowds watching the World Cup final in Uganda in 2010, killing 76 people.

Kenyapolice are under pressure to prevent an al-Shabaab attack. Already several grenade attacks that police blamed on al-Shabaab have been carried out insideKenya.

Kenya's police force, however, is constrained from carrying out its work because of poor pay, which has led to corruption, and because of a lack of facilities. Few police here have cars, for instance, and those who do are given little fuel.

Britanniaearlier this month donated six cars to the anti-terror police unit. The German government donated nearly a dozen vehicles to the unit last month.

Khan and Kassim-Bekhit had been earlier tossed in the clink by police, said Kimathi.

Khan was tossed in the clink and charged in aMombasacourt in May 2010 for possession of a firearm without a license. Last year he was charged with being a member of al-Shabaab, Kimathi says.

Kassim-Bekhit was tossed in the clink earlier this month as he left the main mosque in the city by people suspected to be police who told him to stop his advocacy initiatives, according to Kimathi.

"His abductors said they were members of the Mungiki gang but from the way they were talking he could tell that they were coppers. The problem is that he cannot identify them, where he was taken, or the car he was being driven in," Kimathi said.

Kimathi said the government's counterterrorism campaign was failing because of human rights abuses and the profiling of Mohammedan youth. He said incidents like Khan's murder will likely remain unresolved and will stir up negative feelings among the Mohammedan community and draw moderate youth to extremism.

Kimathi, who was jugged inUgandafor one year for alleged involvement in the 2010Kampalabombings, said he believes Kassim-Bekhit could be alive.

Kimathi was tossed in the clink inUgandawhere he had gone to attend the case of seven Kenyans who had been illegally deported toUgandato face terrorism charges for the bombing. Ugandan authorities placed in long-term storage Kimathi and charged him with terrorism, murder and attempted murder. A Ugandan judge later dropped charges.

International rights groups said Kimathi, who had in 2007 exposed the extraordinary rendition of terror suspects to secret jails inEthiopiawhere they were being interrogated by Western security agents including the CIA, was jugged because he was exposing human rights abuses by the Kenyan and Ugandan governments.
This article starring:
MOHAMED KASIM BEKHITal-Shabaab
SAMIR HASHIM KHANal-Shabaab
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Shabaab

#1  Whatever works.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 04/22/2012 1:49 Comments || Top||

#2  If it was police who did it, it probably wasn't because they were police; more likely they were avenging an AQ atrocity on a family member or colleague.
Posted by: Glenmore || 04/22/2012 8:28 Comments || Top||

#3  Kimathi pointed to the 2007 killings and forced disappearances of at least 500 youth associated with a gang called the Mungiki. The gang, which ran extortion rackets out of Nairobi slums, was known for beheading its victims. Several local and international human rights groups including a government-funded human rights group blamed the killings and abductions on the police

not seeing a problem here
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 10:28 Comments || Top||

#4  What Frank said.
Posted by: Barbara || 04/22/2012 10:49 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Officer arrested for supplying weapons to al-Qaeda
[Yemen Post] The state-run al-Jamhoria newspaper reported on Saturday citing familiar sources, that the commander of the Southern Military Region, Salem Qatan, has ordered that an officer suspected with cooperating with al-Qaeda be tossed in the clink and referred to Aden for further interpretation.

The newspaper said the tossed in the clink officer has smuggled hundreds of artillery shells from the Southern Military Region armories and is believed to have given them to Al-Qaeda, which is fighting with army troops in the southern province of Abyan.

The cut-throats have launched surprise attacks on military outposts in the southern part of Yemen, killing hundreds, capturing dozens and seizing large quantity of heavy weapons such as rocket launchers, tanks and artillery.

The southern region soldiers accused their former commander Mahdi Maquala of supplying the terror network with different kinds of weapons in order to make people think that he was the one restoring security in the region.

The sources told the paper that the military leadership is still looking for some military equipment, and heavy weapons which have been missing since the command of the Southern Military Region changed hands to the new commander Salem Qahtan. He alluded that they think Maquala has transferred the weapons to secret stores in nearby areas.

Furthermore, a security official told the same paper that the police managed to arrest two suspected al-Qaeda spies who dropped out of their military services. The soldiers are suspected of supplying al-Qaeda with various kinds of missiles.

According to the official, the suspects confessed that they worked as spies for al-Qaeda.

The security official confirmed that the security apparatus is currently monitoring the movement of some suspects who entered Aden under the pretext of being refugees.

Al-Qaeda has taken control of vast swathes of land in the south, taking an advantage of the distracted, exhausted government.


This article starring:
Mahdi Maquala
Salem Qahtan
Salem Qatan
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Arabia

#1  What about the MONEY PEOPLE ?
Posted by: Whavish Gonque1646 || 04/22/2012 18:25 Comments || Top||

#2  How is that democracy coming in Qatar anyways? When will us Americans be able to start pig farming and open up Bar-B-Q joints anyway the MAN wants to know!
Posted by: Kofi Big Foot3103 || 04/22/2012 18:26 Comments || Top||

#3  Hmmmmmm
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 20:06 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
US says may not allow renewal of UN mission in Syria
[Dawn] The United States warned Saturday it may not allow the renewal of the UN ceasefire monitoring mission in Syria after the first three months, and called for greater international pressure on the government of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad.
Despoiler of Deraa...
Susan Rice, the US ambassador to the United Nations
...an international organization whose stated aims of facilitating interational security involves making sure that nobody with live ammo is offended unless it's a civilized country...
, told AFP that UN Secretary General the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon
... of whom it can be said to his credit that he is not Kofi Annan...
must now make a "careful judgment" about conditions in Syria before sending 300 unarmed monitors there.

"Our patience is exhausted. No one should assume that the United States will agree to renew this mission after 90 days," Rice told the Security Council after it authorized the full ceasefire observer mission.

Under UN resolution 2043, the unarmed military observers will be deployed for an initial period of 90 days if UN leader Ban Ki-moon decides it is safe for them to go.

"If there is not a sustained cessation of violence, full freedom of movement for UN personnel, and rapid, meaningful progress on all other aspects of the six point plan, then we must all conclude that this mission has run its course," Rice said.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria

#1  They can just send the side they are training to Afghanistan and the United States can fight them there instead kabob dude won't care!
Posted by: Kojo Lumplump5352 || 04/22/2012 17:27 Comments || Top||


Caribbean-Latin America
Mayhem in Monterrey: 13 die

For a map, click here. For a map of Nuevo Leon state, click here. For a map for Monterrey, click here.

By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com

Six unidentified individuals were shot to death in three separate shootings in Santa Catarina, Nuevo Leon Saturday, according to Mexican news accounts.

Armed suspects travelling aboard several vehicles burst into a residence near the intersection of calle Cuarta Oriente and Luis Donaldo Colosio in San Gilberto colony in Santa Catarina, a suburb of Monterrey.

Two men and a woman were killed at the scene, while a fourth victim was found a short distance away also shot to death.

Reports say two other people were shot, presumably by the same armed group, one near the intersection of calles San Juan del Rio and San German, and another on Calle San Juan.

Sales of drugs are suspected in the shootings.

Seven other individuals were murdered or found dead in and around Monterrey, Nuevo Leon.
  • Two unidentified men were shot to death in Juarez, Nuevo Leon late Friday night. The victims were attacked near the intersection of calles San Angel and Natalia in La Trinidad colony. Several spent shell casings for AR-15 assault rifles were found at the scene.

  • Three city workers for Cadereyta Jimenez municipality were shot to death Friday morning as they were working on water pipes. The shooting took place at around 1100 hrs near the intersection of Cadereyta-Allende highway at the seven kilometer marker near the village of El Castillo.

  • Two unidentified men in their 20s were found shot to death on the Santiago-San Mateo Road at the 15 kilometer marker, outside the Dos Hermanos ranch. They had been beaten before being shot.

  • An unidentified man was detained following a shooting and a pursuit in Monterrey Friday evening. A Fuerza Civil patrol attempted to stop the suspect who was driving a Jeep Patriot SUV near the intersection of avenidas Ocampo and Pino Suarez. The subsequent pursuit damaged seven vehicles, mostly by gunfire, before the pursuit ended.

Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com
Posted by: badanov || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
1st Armored Division Withdraws Troops From Inside Yemen Capital
[Yemen Post] Units from the first armored division started to withdraw from inside the Yemeni capital Sanaa and its suburbs on Saturday, in a move which comes within the government's efforts to put an end to the presence of forces inside main cities.

The 135th Infantry Brigade has withdrawn to new positions determined by the military committee, which was formed under a power transfer deal sponsored by the GCC countries and the West, according to the 26sep.net website.

Pro- and anti-revolution troops deployed to the streets of main cities including Sanaa when the anti-regime protests escalated last year including those from the 1st armored division, which defected to the popular uprising.

The Defense Ministry reported on its website the withdrawal of units from the 1st armored division, whose commander is Ali Muhsen al-Ahmer, comes within the program of the military committee to restore stability and return all forces to their original positions.

President Abdurabu Mansour Hadi
...the second and possibly the last president of Yemen, successor to former President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh...
has ordered to evacuate the capital from armed forces to help ease all tensions and restore stability, the website quoted Defense Minister, Muhammad Nasser, as saying.

The brigade now has new responsibilities including those to deepen the national unity and back other armed forces to serve the country, the minister continued.

He urged all forces to stay on high alert and work with other units and troops as a team and brothers during the current period.

The military committee has recently started its responsibilities to restore stability and return the situation to normal removing all barricades and checkpoints in cities that were set up during the uprising in 2011.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


Africa Subsaharan
Two officials vow not to challenge ailing Mugabe for top post
[Daily Nation (Kenya)] Two bigwigs from President Bob Muggsy Mugabe's
Octogenarian President-for-Life of Zim-bob-we who turned the former Breadbasket of Africa into the African Basket Case...
Zanu PF widely reported to harbour presidential ambitions say they will not challenge the veteran ruler as long as he is still in power.

Vice-President Joice Mujuru described the 88-year-old President Mugabe, who is reportedly battling against ill-health, as a "gift to the nation".

Defence minister Emmerson Mnangagwa also dismissed reports by Britannia's Telegraph newspaper that he had reached a secret pact with the long-serving ruler to take over the reins when he steps down due to ill-health.

The two reportedly lead two Zanu PF factions angling to take over from President Mugabe when he decides to retire or in the event of his death.

Ms Mujuru, whose late husband General (rtd) Solomon Mujuru was considered a powerful power broker in Zanu PF, is seen as one of the leading contenders for the job.

She has been in President Mugabe's cabinet since independence in 1980. "I have known him for 37 years," she told a function on Friday that was also attended by the Zanu PF leader.

"Our problem as Zim-bob-weans is that we do not understand our president. Had we understood him well, we were not going to have any challenges."
"Our problem as Zim-bob-weans is that we do not understand our president.

"Had we understood him well, we were not going to have any challenges. I will never challenge him as long as he is still in power," she said.

Mr Mnangagwa told students at a university in the city of Gweru that he was surprised to see reports linking him to the presidency.

"I was as surprised as you to learn there was a pact between the president and myself to take over office," he said. "I also read about it in the Press.

"This is a strategy by our enemies but we are too mature and intelligent as a nation to fall for that.

"We do not read much into that." Senior Zanu PF officials have admitted that the party is riddled with factionalism fuelled by campaigns to succeed the ageing leader.

In interviews to mark in his 88 birthday in February, President Mugabe said he was not ready to retire because he feared his departure will worsen the infighting.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


India-Pakistan
Nuggets From The Urdu Press
Pasha 'double game' expert
General Pasha of the ISI was very much in the news this week, for some reason..
Writing in Jang Hamid Mir stated that outgoing ISI chief General Ahmad Shuja Pasha was an expert at playing double game at whatever he did. He named 'national interest' every time he did something while promising to do something else. He adopted fair or foul means to achieve his ends but he failed in the end. Because the very constitution under which he had pledged his honour was betrayed by him. He considered the Constitution the biggest wall in the way of his objectives. He told journalists that presidential system instead of parliamentary system was good for Pakistain. He praised General Ayub and his governance and told journalists that they were condemned under the present to live as slaves the children of Zardari and children of Nawaz Sharif
... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Moslem League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf...
. But he approached Zardari repeatedly for extensions in his job. He was the master of the Double Game.
 
Pasha and his extensions
Daily Jang had Hamid Mir writing that General Pasha as head of the ISI got items published implying that the PPP government would extend his tenure yet again, because General Kayani
... four star general, current Chief of Army Staff of the Mighty Pak Army. Kayani is the former Director General of ISI...
and the Americans liked him. He had met CIA chief General David Petraeus in Thailand and Britannia assuring him that NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and organization....
supplies would resumed but at the same time he was giving the impression in Pakistain that he was opposed to the US because America was Pakistain's biggest enemy.
 
General Pasha and terrorists
According to Hamid Mir column in Jang ISI chief General Pasha stated in November 2008, right after the Mumbai attack, that Fazlullah and Baitullah Mehsud were the assets of Pakistain but in March 2009 the same bully boyz attacked the Sri Lankan team in Lahore, giving the lie to Pasha. Once he told Hamid Mir that relations with India would mend soon but after attack on the GHQ in 2009 he said that attack had come from India.
 
Pasha the jinxed ISI chief
Columnist Hamid Mir wrote in Jang that ISI chief General Pasha's era in power was a nightmare for Pakistain: May 2011, Osama was killed by the US in Abbottabad
... A pleasant city located only 30 convenient miles from Islamabad. The city is noted for its nice weather and good schools. It is the site of Pakistain's military academy, which was within comfortable walking distance of the residence of the late Osama bin Laden....
; May 2011 Mehran naval base was attacked in Bloody Karachi
...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It may be the largest city in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous...
; after attack at Salala, drone attacks were resumed on his watch. In the four years under him the Baloch were made to disappear and largest number of journalists were killed in the conflict zones of Pakistain.
 
Pasha can't write
Award-winning columnist Haroon Rasheed wrote in Jang that when he met General Pasha of the ISI he asked him to write a book about himself to defend against the untrue comment being written in the press. Pasha replied that that he had no experience of writing and therefore could not write a book. He said that he was good at speaking: if you invite me to a two hour lecture I can prepare it in ten minutes.
 
General Zaheerul Islam will be the next Army Chief
Daily Jinnah reported that General Zaheerul Islam newly selected as ISI chief was bound to become the next Army Chief after General Kayani. The other reason was that General Zaheer was very close to Kayani. In the past Kayani first ran ISI then became Army Chief.
 
Zaid Zaman and murder of Maulana Jalalpuri
Banned magazine of Sipah Sahaba monthly Paigham Khatme Nubawwat wrote that Zaid Zaman was the continuation of the mission of False Prophet Yusuf who hid after the death of Yusuf then appeared on TV talking in such a way that people took him to be a proxy of ISI and Army, When Bloody Karachi's Maulana Saeed Jalalpuri became critical of him as the follower of Yusuf the False Prophet he was killed. An FIR was registered against Zaid but little was done to get hold of him. But ISPR and ISI have declared that they were not supporting him.
 
Fatwa against Zaid Hamid
Banned monthly Paigham Khatme Nabuwwat reported that Jamia Banuria had published a fatwa against Zaid Hamid saying that Yusuf the False Prophet had nominated Zaid as next in line. Zaid Zaman was made responsible for making the False Prophet leave Pakistain safely. False Prophet Yusuf nominated Zaid Hamid (then Zaman) of Brinks Company as his khalifa.
 
Roedad Khan will not appeal
Quoted in Express ex-civil servant stated that if the Supreme Court convicted him in Asghar Case known as Mehrangate he will not appeal the sentence. The case has him working together with President Ghulam Ishaq in a cell put in charge of planning the defeat in elections of the PPP.
 
Tehrik Insaf and its 'seasonal birds'
Daily Jinnah stated that Insaf Party of Imran Khan
... aka Taliban Khan, who ain't the sharpest bulb on the national tree...
was already a failing party because the opportunists (mausami pancchi) had either decamped or were fighting among themselves. This resulted in the party not being able to frame its constitution. People came late to the meeting in Islamabad and deputy chief Shah Mehmood Wormtongue Qureshi was absent.
 
Osama was buried in America!
Daily Jinnah reported that the dead body of the late Osama bin Laden
... who is now among the dear departed, though not among the dearest...
after his murder in Abbottabad was not thrown in the Indian Ocean but was transported secretly to the state of Maryland in the US to a military hospital and the body was taken in a special plane of the CIA.
 
Contest of apologies in Moslem League
Quoted in Jinnah PMLN leaders invited each other to apologise for wrongdoing. Nawaz Sharif asked Chaudhry Shujaat to apologise to the people for siding with General Musharraf. Chaudhry Shujaat asked Nawaz Sharif to apologise for being supported by General Zia.
 
Mubahila: discussion unto death
Reported in Nawa-e-Waqt a mubahila was arranged in Lahore against the Ahmadis for which the latter did not turn up, thus yielding victory to the truthful Sunni opponents. Mubahila is a discussion which some describe as a competition of curses in the name of God in which the false party dies of its own accord. Ex-president Rafeeq Tarar also attended. The speakers said that Mansoor Ijaz can't get away by reciting the kalima. The challenge is a call to prove the truth or falsehood of the Qadiani religion.
 
Regal Chowk should be Akbar Bugti Chowk
Writing in Jang that Punjab University held a discussion on Balochistan
...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it...
in which the speakers were Oria Maqbool Jan and Suhail Warraich among others. Warraich said that media in 1971 was not alive therefore East Pakistain was lost but now it was alive therefore Balochistan would not be lost.
Truly impeccable logic. If only djinns were included, it could never be answered.
Hamid Mir suggested that Regal Chowk in Lahore should be renamed Akbar Bugti Chowk.
 
Mumtaz Bhutto to join PMLN
Reported in Nawa-e-Waqt Sindhi leader Mumtaz Bhutto stated that Tehrik-e-Insaf
...a political party in Pakistan. PTI was founded by former Pakistani cricket captain and philanthropist Imran Khan. The party's slogan is Justice, Humanity and Self Esteem, each of which is open to widely divergent interpretations....
had approached him but he had already decided to join the PMLN. He said that Imran Khan himself had made the approach and invited him to join his party but he excused himself because of prior commitment.
 
Raza Rabbani talks about his political creed
Quoted in Jinnah PPP leader Raza Rabbani stated that he found that Socialism was the only way of life for the states of the world. Socialism was the true revolution which the rightwing politicians wanted to destroy. He said third party employment (through contractors) was the worst form of employment and was exploitative. He said PPP would do its best to end this system.
Thank goodness the PPP's very best is never good enough.

Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  but at the same time he was giving the impression in Pakistain that he was opposed to the US because America was Pakistain's biggest enemy.
Is the problem in Pakistan the Pak military or the Pak public?
Posted by: Gruth McGurque5303 || 04/22/2012 7:44 Comments || Top||

#2  yes
Posted by: Frank G || 04/22/2012 10:44 Comments || Top||

#3  I get it now, so very clear.
Posted by: Steven || 04/22/2012 23:20 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Obama calls for talks to end row on border between rival Sudans
[Daily Nation (Kenya)] US President Barack Obama
This is a teachable moment...
on Saturday called for an end to fighting between Sudan and South Sudan and negotiations between the leaders of the two countries to settle their conflict.
Because history demonstrates that when Muslims are bent on jihad, and the kufrs in the vicinity object, negotiations always fix the problem amicably.
"We know what needs to happen -- the government of Sudan must stop its military actions, including aerial bombardments," Obama said in a videotaped message to the people of the two countries.

"Likewise, the government of South Sudan must end its support for gangs inside Sudan and it must cease its military actions across the border," the president added in the address released by the State Department.

"The presidents of Sudan and South Sudan must have the courage to return to the table and negotiate and resolve these issues peacefully," Obama pointed out.
There he is, folks: The Smartest Man in the Room. And he's running for reelection, so you know what you must do,
The appeal came after Sudan said on Saturday its forces had chased South Sudanese troops out of its main oilfield as the South ordered an end to its 10-day occupation, a move which had sparked fears of a wider war.
Posted by: Fred || 04/22/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Sudan

#1  According to the Beeb: satellite photos show significant parts of the Heglig oilfield are "no longer operating". Heglig provides most of of Sudan's oil production and crucial to its economy.

Other parts of the oil production and transport system have also been destroyed.

Posted by: Pappy || 04/22/2012 13:46 Comments || Top||



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Two weeks of WOT
Sun 2012-04-22
  Tons of Explosives Seized from Militants Planning Attack in Kabul
Sat 2012-04-21
  Sudan Rebels Kill 79 Troops, Militia in Blue Nile
Fri 2012-04-20
  8 die in Michoacan state as conflict goes hot
Thu 2012-04-19
  Qaeda leader suicide bombs himself and family in Iraq
Wed 2012-04-18
  Hadi Refuses to receive Former Yemen President
Tue 2012-04-17
  UN Camp in South Sudan Targeted by Sudanese Warplanes
Mon 2012-04-16
  US drone strike kills senior al-Qaeda Militant in Yemen
Sun 2012-04-15
  Afghan capital hit by blasts, gun attack
Sat 2012-04-14
  U.S. drone strike kills 7 al-Qaeda members in Yemen
Fri 2012-04-13
  23 Reportedly Dead as Syria Regime, Opposition Trade Charges of Breaking Ceasefire
Thu 2012-04-12
  Nork rocket launched, then 'breaks up'
Wed 2012-04-11
  Syria denounced for not adhereing to agreed peace plan
Tue 2012-04-10
  Syrian Rebel Army Ready to Respect Truce
Mon 2012-04-09
  84 Dead, 200 Arrested as Violence Rages across Syria
Sun 2012-04-08
  Hugo off to Brazil for Emergent Care

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