United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-moon says the United States' decision to provide arms to rebel fighters in Syria would not be helpful.
The Obama administration said yesterday it had reviewed intelligence reports and concluded that forces loyal to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad had used banned weapons, including sarin, in attacks that killed up to 150 people.
But Mr Ban says he has been "consistently clear that providing arms to either side would not address this current situation. There is no such military solution."
"Only political solutions can address this situation sustainably."
#1
See also TOPIX > OBAMA TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE IN SYRIA?
As PCorrectly-Deniably inferred by Senator John Mccain, at this stage of the game POTUS Bammer likely needs to send in US combat forces, espec ground forces, to accomplish his goal of removing Baby Assad from power.
and
* SAME > BELATED ACTION IN SYRIA WON'T DETER IRAN.
Yuuupp.
HEZBOLLAH says THEY'RE GONNA STAY IN SYRIA + CONTINUE SUPPORTING, FIGHTING FOR ASSAD. Prolly safe to say ditto for Iran's IRGC Qud/Qods Force + related.
Rising Iran = Rising China in East Asia = desire for unchallenged or unobstructed "strategic access" into the Med.
* SAME > RIVAL MUSLIM IDEOLOGIES [Sunni-Shia] COMPETE IN SYRIA TO BECOME WORLD'S FIRST ISLAMIC SUPERPOWER.
#1
Wonder what will happen when the "Creditors" demand cash?
No tickee, no washee.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
06/14/2013 21:14
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#2
Oh, we have been sharing in the sacrifice that is Detroit for decades.
When I was a schoolboy, at the end of the year we would take a field trip to the zoo or the art museum. And it was great.
A decade later the Mayor declared success against vandalism, because less than 1,000 buildings were burned on the night before Halloween. And it was sad.
A decade later I was accosted by a prostitute on my way from the parking lot to a Tigers baseball game. And it was disgusting.
A decade later my Brother-in-law had his skull fractured in an altercation on 8-Mile. And it was scary. I moved to Ohio.
A decade later people from Europe traveled to Detroit to take ruin-p0rn pictures for their newspaper, and were mugged and beaten. And it was horrid. I moved to St. Louis.
What will be the story in the next decade? Probably worse.
DO NOT LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOUR CITY.
In summary:
* Enforce the Law.
* Punish evil and corruption.
* Encourage honesty and the people who work.
* Support those who support others.
The Turkish village complex will be built on 60 thousand acres area in Maryland province of the US with an aim to abolish Islamophobia following September 11 attacks.
Dr. Yasar Colak, Washington Embassy Religious Affairs Counselor and President of Turkish American Community Center, expressed they made a dream come true of Muslims in America.
Land for the Turkish village was bought in 2003, the construction began in 2012 and it is planned to conclude within 1.5 years, Colak said adding the new building would be designed in accordance with 16th century Ottoman architecture and there would be a museum for displaying Turkish-Islamic work of art.
We will show our friends in the US who we actually are and the main principle of our civilization. We will present our peaceful culture. We will try to erase the bad reputation of Muslims and Islam created following September 11 attacks, Colak said.
Turkish village will have sports facilities for the young and a garage complementary of the mosque. There is also a cultural center with exhibition halls, conference halls and library, Colak noted.
Colak added that the funding for the project was supported through donations by Muslims, alongside the support of the Turkish Religious Affairs.
Posted by: lord garth ||
06/14/2013 17:24
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#2
Sounds like a threat. 16th century Ottoman architecture? You mean like pyramids of skulls on Cyprus?
Step 1: have a massive church built. Step 2: kill the people who built the church. Step 3: invade Virginia and bring back slaves. Step 4: Make the slaves who did not convert re-fit the church into a mosque. Step 5: Blame the Pennsylvania Amish.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted Friday to restrict transfer of detainees to Yemen, a move designed to stall the closing of the prison at Guantanamo Bay.
In a vote of 236-188, the House voted to pass an amendment to the 2014 Defense Authorization Bill from Rep. Jackie Walorski, R-Ind., prohibiting use of federal funds to transfer detainees to Yemen, significant because 56 of the 86 detainees cleared for release are from Yemen, the Washington newspaper The Hill reported Friday.
President Barack Obama said last month he would lift a restriction on transferring detainees to Yemen to jump start the transfer of cleared detainees, but Walorski warned Yemen has been a hotbed of terrorist activity and home to al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula.
"We cannot warehouse these people forever," said Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., in opposition to the measure. "We need to give the president options, not restrict him."
The defense bill includes restrictions on moving detainees to U.S. soil, making it all but impossible for the president to close the prison in Cuba, although he does have the power to transfer a detainee with a country to which to return, the newspaper noted.
#1
"We cannot warehouse these people forever," said Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash.
And why is that, exactly? There are two reasons to throw people in prison. One is to punish them for being naughty. The other is to keep them away from everyone else.
Unless you are playing catch-and-release, a strategy more appropriate to fishing than war fighting, I'd say we are looking at reason #2 here. Would you want these guys living in *your* neighborhood?
#3
Website of jihawg.com gives address of a town just North of Coeur dAlene, Idaho. Reloads. misc common calibers such as 5.56, 7.62, 9mm luger, 40, 45 ACP. Must be oil based (ie pig fat) paint.
h/t Gates of Vienna
In a new report presented to members of the European Parliament, NGO Monitor details the damaging impact of highly secretive European Union funding for radical political advocacy Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs).
According to the Jerusalem-based NGO Monitor, EU funds are going to organizations involved in anti-Israel boycotts and violent demonstrations, which undermine the EU's efforts to secure peace in the Middle East.
The report, Lack of Due Diligence and Transparency in European Union Funding for Radical NGOs, shows how EU-funded NGOs lead the campaigns to demonize Israel through the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) - actions that entirely contradict the EU's proclaimed objectives of supporting peace and democratic development. Some European traditions have not been abandoned.
Europeans need to follow the example of the Jewish people and re-establish their nation-state to counter the growing Islamization of their countries, Dutch politician Geert Wilders said Sunday in Los Angeles.
Kathleen Sebelius, Obama's head of the Department of Health and Human Services refused to assist the child, so the parents went the Constitutional route by involving the Judicial Branch.
A 10-year-old Pennsylvania girl who battled for an organ donation successfully underwent a double lung transplant Wednesday and her family said doctors were "pleased" at her progress and prognosis.
Sarah's health was deteriorating when a judge intervened in her case last week, giving her a chance at the much larger list of organs from adult donors. U.S. District Judge Michael Baylson ruled June 5 that Sarah and 11-year-old Javier Acosta, of New York City, should be eligible for adult lungs.
#1
I've said Sebelius is a vile, shameless party machine who is horrible off the cuff. If a person wanted to really add to the credibility damage I would put her on TV every single day, and twice on Sunday.
#3
This looks line line jumping and special pleading.
Yep. Gonna be seeing a lot more of this as health care gets rationed. If you're not young and cute, better have a good answer when they ask "Who sent you?".
#6
Was not line jumping. A little background. The child was at the end of her tiny rope. The only hope per the doctors was an adult set of lungs that she had greater chance of recieving from the adult pool than lungs from another child which were far more scarce than the adult pool. But law forbid anyone under 12 access to the adult pool unless the head of the DHHS entered an exception. Her response was 'no, people live, people die'. The courts were the 19 year old's only alternative.
#8
Of course all that is true, Winky Sproing5899. But something similar -- except for youth -- could be said about everyone on the transplant list... and someone undoubtedly died who would have otherwise lived because this child was given preference.
This is a living example of the death panels Sarah Palin was mocked for. And it's only going to get worse as Obamacare rules ever more tightly restrict -- whether actively by regulation or passively as suppliers go Galt -- availability and access to doctors, medicines, equipment, and new inventions, al the things that previously differentiated health care in America from elsewhere in the world.
#1
In the unlikely event of a "national emergency" you will be told to turn your radio dial to it may become necessary to limit or terminate some types of communications. Our government has now established a monitoring and enforcement mechanism.
Other enforcement mechanisms may, but are not limited to, an expanded role for the IRS, Department of Agriculture, and Homeland Security. Tactical weapons training for these personnel is essential.
Champ and FLOTUS are planning a trip to sub-Saharan Africa later in the month, but the White House has scotched a plan to include a Tanzanian safari on the agenda after a reporter revealed that a team of IRS snipers with high-powered military assault rifles would accompany him in the wild.
The Washington Post reported Thursday afternoon that the itinerary's dangers 'would have required the president's special counterassault team to carry sniper rifles with high-caliber rounds that could neutralize republicans, cheetahs, lions or other animals if they became a threat.' No way we could trust a veteran park ranger armed with an old .303 Enfield.
The newspaper based its report on a confidential planning document leaked from someone in the administration. I suspect someone on the Tanzanian government may have had something to say about all of this, and it may not have been about wild game.
President Barack Obama's decision to authorize lethal aid to Syrian rebels marks a deepening of U.S. involvement in the two-year civil war. But U.S. officials are still grappling with what type and how much weaponry to send the opposition forces and how to ensure it stays out of the hands of extremists battling for control of Syria.
U.S. officials confirmed Obama's authorization Thursday after the White House announced it had conclusive evidence that Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime used chemical weapons against opposition forces. Obama has said the use of chemical weapons would cross a "red line," suggesting greater American intervention.
While a small percentage of the 93,000 people reportedly killed in Syria are said to have died from chemical weapons -- U.S. intelligence puts the number at 100 to 150 -- the White House views the deployment of the deadly agents as a flouting of international norms. Ben Rhodes, Obama's deputy national security adviser, said the multiple chemical weapons attacks gave greater urgency to the situation.
"Suffice it to say this is going to be different in both scope and scale in terms of what we are providing," Rhodes said of the ramped-up U.S. response. But he added the U.S. would make specific determinations "on our own timeline."
The Obama administration could give the rebels a range of weapons, including small arms, assault rifles, shoulder-fired remote-propelled grenades and other anti-tank missiles. The opposition forces could operate most of that equipment without significant training.
BEIRUT A Syrian rebel group's pledge of allegiance to al-Qaeda's replacement for Osama bin Laden suggests that the terrorist group's influence is not waning and that it may take a greater role in the Western-backed fight to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad.
The pledge of allegiance by Syrian Jabhat al Nusra Front chief Abou Mohamad al-Joulani to al-Qaeda leader Sheik Ayman al-Zawahri was coupled with an announcement by the al-Qaeda affiliate in Iraq, the Islamic State of Iraq, that it would work with al Nusra as well.
Lebanese Sheik Omar Bakri, a Salafist who says states must be governed by Muslim religious law, says al-Qaeda has assisted al Nusra for some time.
"They provided them early on with technical, military and financial support , especially when it came to setting up networks of foreign jihadis who were brought into Syria," Bakri says. "There will certainly be greater coordination between the two groups."
#4
And now, at last, the true hypocrisy is exposed for all to see.
"Bush lied about WMD!"
"Bush lied, people died!"
Pffft.
The Lightbringer, the agent of "hope and change", the secular messiah who supposedly embodied all faux-righteous outrage that the people shouting and believing those ridiculous slogans felt themselves, has gone to war with the reasoning that Iraqui WMDs moved to the Bekka Valley on the eve of the war have been used by the Assad government.
You know, the WMDs that never, ever existed.
Why hasn't every center/right pundit, blogger, and newsperson been hammering this from the moment the story about Syrian rebel assistance came out?
Well if they won't, I will.
Listen up, all you NPR-listening self-righteous phonies and pseudointellectuals . . .the WMDs WERE there, and your messiah-hero president, by giving assistance to the rebels, has admitted as much.
Will the lefty phony ever admit that she and her fellow travellers were wrong? I doubt it. But she and the rest of her friends need to have it repeated to them over and over and over. Your wonder boy hero has just done something which proves the WMD objection to the war in Iraq was incorrect.
Resolve that cognitive dissonance, if you have the brains, logic skills, honor, and maturity to do so. Recent history suggests that you do not.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
06/14/2013 6:23
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#5
The first rung up the ladder of escalation. Half measure after half measure. LBJ II.
#7
Damascus will fall to evil, maybe not in this particular fight between rabid dogs, but some day it will fall. And when it does, the Hussein supported brotherhood will have encircled Israel and will begin its assault from all direction. Israel will turn Damascus into a sheet of glass with a Nuke.
there will be a temptation to establish no fly zones fairly soon but of course what happens if armed groups go into the zones and gun down people without air support?
we all hope the US has weapons that have 'remote shut off' that can be 'loaned' to non Jihadi (or maybe 'less jihadi' groups but I've never been able to confirm we have such
Posted by: lord garth ||
06/14/2013 9:50
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#11
C'mon, you guys. The rebels have been on the ropes lately. We need to restore some balance to keep this war going and keep these people killing each other.
I recommend Rick Perry hold a press conference, hand a check to the US Treasury for the FEMA dollars already sent, and tell them to stick it up their arss.
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/14/2013 14:36
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#20
Of course this will include a massive supply shipment of 7.62, 5.56, .45, .40, 9, and .22LR as well as all in-stock and off the line AR platform rifles. Good citizens will turn in their AR rifles plus any other donations will be accepted. Your file will be noted with good remarks.
Don't like that? Then we will also send 15% of our grain storage via Egypt as well as tank and aviation fuel, trucks, baby formula, and kitten food.
#22
We should send these rebels the stuff they need to win. It is important to set in stone that any wanky dictator who does what the President of the the United States says he shouldn't will not succeed and probably not survive.
To that end, what do they need?
* Ability to deny the Syrian Government the use of the airspace.
* Ability to kill or disable Syrian Army soldiers and systems.
* Ability to feed and care for the rebel forces and civilians who support them.
How to do these things?
* Provide radars and communications devices to the rebels that allow them to communicate with U.S. and Turkish aircraft, which are empowered to shoot down any detected regime aircraft.
* Provide the rebels with AT-4s or Carl Gustov type weapons, as well as massive amounts of ak's and ammo.
* Provide via neighboring countries or airdrops massive amounts of MREs, medical supplies, and cell phone mobile towers.
None of these would endanger our allies. All of them would support the forces resisting the WMD using regime.
[AFP] Iran is working round the clock to enlarge its nuclear infrastructure with the eventual aim of developing an industry capable of building up to 30 bombs a year, an Israeli minister charged on Monday.
Speaking to news hounds in Jerusalem, Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz said Tehran was "very close" to crossing the red line laid out by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last year.
But he said it was biding its time and building uranium-enrichment facilities before making the final push for weapons-grade material.
"The Iranians are getting very close now to the red line... They have close to 200 kilos -- 190 kilos (418 pounds) -- of 20 percent enriched uranium," Steinitz said.
"Once they have 250 kilos, this is enough to make the final rush to 90 percent," the level of enrichment required for a nuclear warhead, he said in a presentation to the Foreign Press Association.
"It is a matter of weeks or maybe two months to jump from 20 percent to 90 percent with so many centrifuges," he said.
"What they are doing now -- instead of crossing the red line, they are widening and enlarging their capacity by putting in more centrifuges, faster centrifuges."
Iran's aim, he charged, was to build a nuclear arsenal, not just a single bomb.
"Many people are saying it's a question of the Iranian bomb - whether they will have it or not. No. We are speaking about an Iranian arsenal."
Tehran's big fear was that a Western military strike could wipe out their nuclear facilities "within a few hours," he said.
"The Iranians feel very vulnerable, especially from American air operations. This is their main concern -- that if the West, if NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... , if America decide to attack them, a few hours of accurate air raids might destroy their nuclear facilities."
Israel and many Western governments suspect Iran is using its civilian nuclear programme as cover for developing a weapons capability, a charge denied by Tehran.
But the Jewish state, the Middle East's sole, if undeclared, nuclear power, has refused to rule out a pre-emptive military strike to prevent it.
Steinitz also ruled out any change in policy that might result from the Iranian presidential elections which are to take place on Friday, saying the result was already known.
"Nothing is going to change. There will be, unfortunately, no significant changes because of these so-called elections because (supreme leader Ayatollah Ali) Khamenei has already won," he said.
"He is the leader and he makes the decisions and he already made his decision to spend many billions of dollars on building this nuclear industry with only one aim," he charged.
"The decision was already made to get nuclear weapons -- you don't spent so much money and you don't suffer $70 billion of losses (due to international sanctions) in one year only to show that you can spin some centrifuges," he concluded.
#2
OOOOOOOOOPPPPP, forgot FREEREPUBLIC > [Daily Telegraph.UK] BRITISH ARMY CHIEF: WE WON'T WIN WARS IFF WE ARE CUT AGAIN.
It may be the Brits, NOT the Debt/Deficit-ridden USA, but the Sequester is the same???
Iff the Bammer "wusses" out vee Syria + other, whose to sat he won't do same when China demands Guam + Hawaii + 1/2 of CONUS-NORAM in lieu of debt payment(s)???
#3
Well that seems about right. I mean we are decommissioning more than that every year. It would be less expensive to simply detonate 30 a year on Iran. Think of it as a way to meet our sequester cost goals.
[Pak Daily Times] North Korea on Thursday accused South Korea of deliberately sabotaging planned high-level talks with "arrogant obstructions" and warned that prospects for any future dialogue had been severely damaged.
The two Koreas had initially agreed to hold their first high-level talks in six years in Seoul on Wednesday and Thursday this week, but they were called off at the last minute following a dispute over protocol.
The talks initiative had been seen as a step forward after months of soaring military tensions, but its collapse has instead resulted in a sizeable backwards stride.
Even the one positive development -- the restoration of an inter-government hotline -- seemed in doubt, with the North refusing to answer calls from the South since Wednesday morning.
"The South side had no intent to hold dialogue from the beginning," said a front man for the North's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea (CPRK) -- the state body that handles inter-Korean issues. "It only sought to create an obstacle to the talks, delay and then torpedo them," he said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency, accusing the South of "arrogant obstructions and deliberate disturbance".
Posted by: Fred ||
06/14/2013
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#1
Why "Talk" At all, just spew profanity in their direction, as they do?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
06/14/2013 8:49
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#2
And so the dance of appeasement begins again. Has anybody sale seen this picture before..... Perhaps over the past 60 years over and over and over and over and over ad nauseum......
#3
FYI TOPIX > [Outside the Beltway] CHINESE TO PRESS CLAIMS TO OKINAWA?
* RELATED SAME > [Honolulu Advertiser] CALLS GROW IN CHINA TO PRESS OKINAWA CLAIMS?
Intehwesting how China repor affirms Japan's sovereignty oer Okinawa while simultaneously maintaining its claims to both the East China SEa + South China Sea, all but effectively nulling its support of Japan's sovereignty oer Oki. CHINA IS SAYING THAT JAPAN HAS SOVERIEGNTY OVER THE PHYSICAL ISLAND THAT IS OKINAWA, BUT CHINA HAS SOVEREIGNTY OVER THE CHINA SEAS = OCEAN WATERS, SEAFLOOR/UNDERWATER CONTINENTAL SHELF THAT BOTH THE ISLAND + JAPAN'S SOVEREIGNTY, ETC. RESTS UPON, ERGO CHINA SSSSHHHHHHHH ACTUALLY CONTROLS ALL???
[Libya Herald] A court in Tripoli has once again adjourned the trial of Qaddafi's last prime minister, Al-Baghdadi Al-Mahmoudi, and those charged with him -- Al-Mabrouk Zamhoul and Amer Tirfas -- this time to 7 August.
The court agreed to the delay following a request from Tirfas' defence laywer who had recently been appointed and needed of time to review the case.
The three are facing charges of having taken actions leading to the murder of Libyan citizens and of embezzlement, in particular transferring 15 million to private accounts in Tunisia to pay for logistic support for the former regime, along with other accusations of financial and administrative irregularities.
Mahmoudi, who was wearing blue prison clothes in court, faces separate charges including association with criminal groups and incitement to rape. They are not being examined in the present case.
Zahmoul and Tirfas are said to have been senior officials in an investment company run by Seif Al-Islam.
Speaking after the adjournment, prosecution spokesman Sadiq Al-Sur was quoted as saying that "three to four billion Libyan dinars were used by the accused during the insurrection to corrupt politicians, both at home and abroad, in order to gain their support for the regime".
Posted by: Fred ||
06/14/2013
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[Nigerian Tribune] PRESIDENT Goodluck Jonathan ... 14th President of Nigeria. He was Governor of Bayelsa State from 9 December 2005 to 28 May 2007, and was sworn in as Vice President on 29 May 2007. Jonathan is a member of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP). He is a lover of nifty hats, which makes him easily recognizable unless someone else in the room is wearing a neat chapeau... has said that most brass hats of the Police and para military agencies are incompetent which is why most Nigerians do not have confidence in them.
Speaking on Wednesday at the swearing in ceremony of the chairman and members of the Police Service Commission (PSC) at the State House, Abuja, said he believed they are incompetent because the yardstick being used for their promotion is not based on merit, competence and performance.
"I believe that the story of Immigration is the same with most of our services. I believe that is why the performance of some of our military and para-military officers is abysmal. Because the yardstick being used for promotion is not based on competence, merit and performance," he said.
Jonathan, who revealed the advice he received to sack all officers from the rank of Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) and above at the Police Headquarters, Abuja following the June 2011 attack by members of the Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... sect, noted that Nigerians have no confidence in the police.
He said following the bombing of the Police Headquarters, he was advised to sack all the senior officers as people wondered how a local terrorist group could successfully carry out such attack.
Jonathan said: "Even now that we have challenges, you will see that, especially when the Police Headquarters was bombed, some people came to me and said, Mr. President, sack all coppers working in that place from Assistant Commissioner of Police and above.
"I did not sack any because of that incident but that was the advice I got, that if you do that, subsequent people that would be posted there will sit up. How could the police allow their headquarters to be bombed by the local group called Boko Haram?'"
Jonathan observed that the problem with the services has to do with indiscipline and subjugation of merit in issues of promotions which throw up mediocre officers.
According to the President, "You will agree with me that Nigerians don't have so much confidence in the Nigerian police but Nigerian police is good. The Nigerian Police that work outside under United Nations ...boodling on the grand scale... are highly honoured, highly commended and Okiro (Mike) will agree with me. But once we come back home, that is not reflected in what we do."
Posted by: Fred ||
06/14/2013
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Top|| File under: Boko Haram
[Pak Daily Times] Former military ruler Pervez Perv Musharraf ... former dictator of Pakistain, who was less dictatorial and corrupt than any Pak civilian government to date ... was formally locked away Don't shoot, coppers! I'm comin' out! by a police team from 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 the Akbar Bugti murder case on Thursday. Subsequently, an anti-terrorist court ordered a two-week judicial remand of the former military ruler. Musharraf is to remain at his farmhouse for the duration of the remand. The farmhouse at Chak Shahzad had earlier been declared a sub-jail for the former president. Bugti was killed on August 26, 2006 during a military crackdown.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/14/2013
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#2
Has anyone ever pointed out that there are very few "gams" in these "gam shots"? Meanwhile, the editors of the DS-TP have correctly identified a gam for the edification of all.
[Bangla Daily Star] Indian authorities have decided to discontinue its telegram services from July 15 STOP
The age of smart phones, emails and SMS seems to have pushed the humble telegram service to a quiet corner of museum with the state-owned BSNL deciding to shut down the service that had functioned for 160 yearsd STOP
Once the main source of quick and urgent communication, good or bad, the service found itself struggling with the advent of technology and newer means of communication STOP
As per a circular issued by Shameem Akhtar, senior general manager (Telegraph Services) of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), the telegraph service is to be discontinued with effect from July 15, 2013 STOP
Faced with declining revenues, the government had in May 2011, revised the telegram charges after a gap of 60 years, in a last-ditch attempt to make the legacy commercially viable. But the increase could not keep the service afloat STOP
END OF MESSAGE
Posted by: Fred ||
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[Pak Daily Times] At least ten people including political and religious workers were killed in separate incidents of violence in different parts of the city on Thursday.
An activist of Muttahida Qaumi Movement ...English: United National Movement, generally known as MQM, is the 3rd largest political party and the largest secular political party in Pakistain with particular strength in Sindh. From 1992 to 1999, the MQM was the target of the Pak Army's Operation Cleanup leaving thousands of urdu speaking civilians dead... (MQM) was found dead from the bushes near a link road in the remits of Steel Town cop shoppe.
Police officials said that deceased, Muhammad Asif Majeed was kidnapped by unidentified culprits, who tortured and killed him before dumping his body. After getting information, police rushed to the spot and shifted the body to Jinnah postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) for an appointment with Dr. Quincy.
As per details, unknown culprits picked up the dear departed, a joint sector in charge of Landhi, when he was on his way to Faisalabad ...formerly known as Lyallpur, the third largest metropolis in Pakistain, the second largest in Punjab after Lahore. It is named after some Arab because the Paks didn't have anybody notable of their own to name it after... by train. Majeed was among nine other MQM activists picked up by security agencies, for which the party filed a petition in the high court. The victim used to work as a textile exporter.
A policeman and his friend were rubbed out at Chakra Goth.
Zaman Town cop shoppe officials said that policeman Rizwan Hayder Jagirani and his friend Najam Ali Qazi were sitting outside a house when at least a dozen gunnies shot them multiple times. Both the victims was struck down in his prime. The area suffers ethnic tensions and police suspect it to be a hate crime.
In another incident, a cop was rubbed out at superhighway within the remits of Sachal cop shoppe.
Officials said that victim, Enayat Solangi posted in Samnabad cop shoppe was on his way to Ayub Goth on a cycle of violence, when unidentified riders targeted him. The victim was rushed to the hospital where doctors pronounced him dead He's dead, Jim! . Motive behind the incident is unknown.
Separately, an activist of defunct Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain ...a Sunni Deobandi organization, a formerly registered Pak political party, established in the early 1980s in Jhang by Maulana Haq Nawaz Jhangvi. Its stated goal is to oppose Shia influence in Pakistain. They're not too big on Brelvis, either. Or Christians. Or anybody else who's not them. The organization was banned in 2002 as a terrorist organization, but somehow it keeps ticking along, piling up the corpse counts... killed and his friend was maimed near Disilva Town.
Shahrah-e-Noorjahan police said that Shafiq aka Baba and Saeedur Rehman were going somewhere when armed pillion riders shot them. Both victims sustained bullet injures and were rushed to the hospital, where Shafiq succumbed to his injures, and Rehman admitted with critical bullet wounds.
Meanwhile, ...back at the palazzo, Count Guido stepped from behind the suit of armor, rapier in hand. Ciccolini snarled and reached for his own weapon... a man belonging to Shia sect was rubbed out in Aleemabad.
Malir City police officials said that victim Ali Abbas was standing at a Pan Shop when unidentified armed riders shot him. He was taken to the hospital, where doctors pronounced him dead He's dead, Jim! . Police suspect it to be a sectarian killing.
Another man was rubbed out in Haroonabad within the limits of Pak Colony cop shoppe.
Officials said that Noorul Haq, 34, was returning after Zohar prayers, when an unknown armed rider killed him. The body was taken to the hospital for post mortem. Police suspect personal enmity as the reason behind the killing.
An unidentified man was rubbed out in Taiser Town within the remits Surjani Town cop shoppe. Officials said that unidentified culprits on cycle of violences shot him and later fled. Police transported the body to the hospital where doctors pronounced him dead He's dead, Jim! Similarly, Mirza Gull was rubbed out at Qasba colony within the jurisdiction of Pirabad cop shoppe. Officials said the victim was on way his home when armed riders shot him twice on his chest and managed to flee from the scene.
Bodies found: Two friends were found dead near Northern Bypass within the remits of Gulshan-e-Maymar cop shoppe.
SHO Mali Nawaz said that deceased were identified as Kamran, son of Waris Khan and Abdullah, son of Karam Shah. SHO Nawaz said that victims went missing two months ago when they were returning from Mansehra ...a city and an eponymous district in eastern Khyber-Pakthunwa, nestled snug up against Pak Kashmir, with Kohistan and Diamir to the north and Abbottabad to the south... to Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... . The motive behind the incident is yet to be ascertained, he said.
In another incident, a perforated carcass of an unidentified man was found from a Church at Bheempora within the jurisdiction of Risala cop shoppe. As per details, the victim was kidnapped and later shot in the head before being thrown at the said place.
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[CNSNEWS] While testifying before the House Judiciary Committee today, FBI Director Robert Mueller could not name the lead investigator in the IRS case involving the targeting of conservative groups. It is now one month into the investigation.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/14/2013
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#5
Total BS. No reason he could not have looked at his notes or turned to council. No... "I'll have to get back to you on that" either. If he offered up a name or names, those people might be subpoenaed to testify before congress. Once gain, it is patently obvious administration "paid liars" are backstopping the wrong doing.
Notice by the way, like David Petreaus, John Brennan, Susan Rice, Thomas Donnelly, and a host of IRS people.... Robert Mueller is on his way out the door. I suspect useful idiot Jim Clapper will be retiring soon as well. These people all have cooties and must be moved, or promoted out of the scandal information stream.
[An Nahar] Syrian rebels seized on Thursday a key army position in the central province of Hama, which lies on the road linking Damascus to Aleppo in the north, a monitoring group said Thursday.
The military responded by deploying en mass to try to take back the position at Morek and began shelling it, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights added.
"Rebel fighters took control of an army position situated at the northern edges of Morek village in the north of Hama province, capturing ammunition and weapons from the military after fierce festivities," said the Britannia-based Observatory.
The group said six soldiers were killed.
Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said the position is strategically important because it lies on the main road linking the capital to Aleppo, large swathes of which are under rebel control.
The road is the military's main supply route to Aleppo and to Khan Sheykhoun in the northwestern province of Idlib. It also leads to Maaret al-Noman, which the army has been trying to take back from rebel hands since its capture in October.
The capture of the Morek position comes days after pro-regime media announced an upcoming campaign to take back Aleppo from rebel hands.
Meanwhile, ...back at the game, the Babe was wondering why the baseball kept getting bigger and bigger. Finally it hit him... the Observatory reported shelling on the Qaboun suburb northeast of Damascus at dawn, as well as fierce festivities on the edges of Barzeh in the north of the capital.
Battles have raged for weeks in Barzeh, most of which is under rebel control.
At least 90 people were killed across Syria on Wednesday.
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[Bangla Daily Star] The BNP-Jamaat-led 18-party opposition wants Qawmi madrasa-based Hefajat-e Islam as an ally at the next general elections in order to exploit religion and win as many votes as possible capitalising on the people's Islamic sentiment.
The alliance has minimised distances with the Hefajat in the course of the last four months' programmes against Shahbagh youths, labelling them anti-Islamic and atheists.
"Now we want to make further progress based on recent understandings," said a source in the alliance. "We want to wipe out all differences with the Hefajat to make them our ally in the upcoming elections."
The opposition's goal of allying itself with the Hefajat is to bag the votes of its followers across the country and get them in its polls campaigns, bringing to the fore the "anti-Islam atheist" issue, the source added.
Harun Izhar Chowdhury, research and training secretary of Hefajat, told The Daily Star Wednesday, "Our movement is against anti-Islam atheists.
"If our movement influences the upcoming national elections, we have nothing to do."
He added if the present government doesn't meet the Hefajat's 13-point demand, definitely the "atheist" issue will remain a subject for discussion at polls time.
"We have no specific plan yet for the elections. We will not ask voters to vote for the BNP or the 18-party alliance or any other party. But, of course, we will continue to ask the people not to vote for atheists and the supporters of atheists," Harun said.
"We are even asking people to boycott our enemies socially," the Hefajat leader said, adding, "Anti-Islamic atheists are our enemies."
Harun said, "It is not our concern as to who will be benefited and who will be the loser in the elections because of our campaign. We will just continue our movement for Islam."
Another leader of the Hefajat, wishing anonymity, said a decision on its next course of action was pending because of Qawmi madrasa exams scheduled to end by the Ramadan.
Meantime, the 18-party alliance source said an informal effort was going on to ensure Hefajat's support at the next parliament elections for the BNP-led alliance.
The source observed that many of the Hefajat followers did not turn up to cast their ballots in the last elections as they do not believe in elections or democracy and many did not vote for the BNP and Jamaat.
So the BNP-Jamaat alliance wants to capture this vote bank at the next parliamentary elections, likely to be held at the end of this year or the beginning of 2014.
Contacted yesterday, Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain, member of the BNP standing committee, said his party supported some of the demands of the Hefajat. "We in principle supported Hefajat in its movement."
So, he added, it is quite natural that Hefajat will lend its moral support to the 18-party alliance in the next parliamentary elections.
Hefajat, launched on January 10, 2010 to oppose the education policy and amendments which were in the spirit of the original 1972 constitution, was not on the scene when the Shahbagh movement started on February 5.
The Islamist group then took centre stage in recent days as an opposite force to the Shahbagh Gonojagoron Mancha pressing for the maximum punishment for war criminals.
Its presence was felt with the February 15 killing of Rajib, a blogger who was branded an atheist.
Hefajat was known as anti-Jamaat-e-Islami ...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It maintains close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores... , a key component of the 18-party alliance. Still, it has enjoyed open support from the opposition in making its anti-Shahbagh programmes a success.
The top-brass of the Jamaat, historically known as an anti-liberation force and patron of communal politics, is behind bars on war crimes charges. The Shahbagh activists, including online activists and bloggers, all along have demanded banning the Jamaat.
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[An Nahar] Iran on Thursday expressed that Hizbullah's involvement in the Syrian war is a defense against "the enemies' plans," stressing that the party does not interfere in "sectarian conflicts."
"All the Islamic world respects and values Hizbullah for its fight against the enemies of Islam, particularly against the Zionists," Iranian foreign ministry's spokesperson Abbas Araqji said, explaining that the party's "procedures in defending Syria aim at facing the enemies' plans."
"Hizbullah is a symbol of resistance against the Zionist entity," he remarked,
Araqji said the party "has proved that it does not interfere in sectarian and internal conflicts."
Commenting on Influential Mohammedanholy man Youssef al-Qaradawi ...crackpot Egyptian Islamist theologian. He is best known for his program Shariah and Life on Al Jazeera, with an estimated audience of 60 million kindred souls worldwide. He is also well-known for IslamOnline, which occasionally advocates things like slavery and thumping the old lady with a rod no thicker than an inch, and has published more than 120 books, including Islam: The Future Civilization. Joe has long had a prominent role within the intellectual leadership of the Moslem Brüderbund. Some of his views have been controversial in the West, though less so among the rubes of the Mysterious East, and he was refused entry to the United Kingdom in 2008. In 2004, 2,500 Muslim academics from Saudi Arabia, Iraq and from the Palestinian territories condemned Qaradawi, and accused him of giving Islam a bad name.... 's criticism of Hizbullah, Araqji stated: "He (al-Qaradawi) might have gotten confused between God and Satan."
"What is expected from al-Qaradawi, who's the godfather of Takfiri ...an adherent of takfir wal hijra, an offshoot of Salafism that regards everybody who doesn't agree with them as apostates who most be killed... groups, is to work towards uniting Mohammedans."
Al-Qaradawi lashed out at Hizbullah's involvement in Syria earlier in June, calling it the "party of Satan."
He also called on Sunni Mohammedans to join the rebels fighting the Syrian regime.
Qaradawi, a controversial figure in the West but who has millions of supporters, mostly from the Moslem Brüderbund, also hit out at Iran for backing the Syrian regime of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor. If he'd stuck with it he'd have had a good practice by now... "Every Mohammedan trained to fight and capable of doing that (must) make himself available" to support the Syrian rebels, the holy man said at a rally in Doha late Friday.
"Iran is pushing forward arms and men (to back the Syrian regime), so why do we stand idle?" he said, branding Hizbullah, which means the party of God in Arabic, as the "party of Satan."
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[BREITBART] While attempting to attack an amendment to the "Gang of Eight" immigration bill that would require a fence be built along Mexico's border with the U.S. before legalization, Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) made a significant geographical gaffe.
Landrieu, who represents Louisiana in the U.S. Senate, was trying to undermine the amendment Sen. John Thune (R-SD) offered. In doing so, she tried to argue Sen. John Maverick McCain ... the Senator-for-Life from Arizona, former presidential candidate and even more former foot soldier in the Reagan Revolution... (R-AZ) was more qualified to talk about border issues than Thune because McCain represents Arizona.
"A smart fence, which is what Senator McCain and I want to build--since he's from Arizona, I think he knows more about this than the Senator from South Dakota who only has a border with Canada and that is quite different," Landrieu said.
Landrieu went on to argue that the 700-mile border double-fence that Congress passed into law a few years ago is a "dumb fence." She said she would be "voting against" Thune's amendment requiring the implementation of current law because of she thinks the fence is "dumb."
"We need to build a smart fence and a fence is not just a physical structure which could be built out of a variety of different materials with or without barbed wire on the top." The Smart Fence® is kind of like the invisible fence you can buy for dogs, only it doesn't work for dogs. As long as a human being is wearing a receiver, though, it works on them just dandy. The immaterial Smart Fence® is composed of equal parts Words of Power and Phlogiston. Check with your dealer for availability today!
Posted by: Fred ||
06/14/2013
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Mary Landrieu is expected to draw a strong opponent next time around. I wonder why?
Posted by: Black Charlie Panda3387 ||
06/14/2013 4:28
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Mary Landrieu is expected to draw a strong opponent next time around
And the 'Pubs will find a way to bollox that selection process up, too.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
06/14/2013 7:58
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M-O-O-N. That spells "Dad"
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/14/2013 8:38
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I'm sure tethered balloons holding robotic 50cal snipers rifles would work instead of a wall.
#5
Only nation in the world that would even have this debate. Absolutely amazing. The nice thing is you can spot the scoundrals because they are the ones who conflate immigrants and illegal immigrants to cause confusion.
#8
China builds great walls, some even become tourist attractions thousands of years later. We should contract them to build it so we know it will last.
[Al Jazeera] Authorities in Bahrain say they have identified and tossed in the clink Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please! leading members of the Shia opposition February 14 Revolution Youth Coalition, an influential cyber-group accused of working against the government and having links to Iran.
In making the arrests, the country's interior ministry accused the opposition on Thursday of taking part "in criminal acts" and "terrorist" activities.
The February 14 Coalition has been the main force behind a Shia-led uprising that began in 2011 to demand more rights from the country's ruling Sunni leaders.
The ministry identified the group's spiritual leader as Hadi al-Mudaressi, a leading Shia holy man living in the Iraqi holy city of Karbala.
The ministry said he "provided divisive ...politicians call things divisive when when the other side sez something they don't like. Their own statements are never divisive, they're principled... sectarian support to the organization".
It named 11 of those arrested, saying they had played prominent roles in the coalition inside Bahrain, and said other members were still being sought.
Sentenced in absentia
The ministry also named 13 people that it said were leading the coalition from abroad, some of whom are based in London.
Among those, it said, is Saeed Abdulnabi al-Shahabi "who is responsible for coordination with Iranian leaders".
Shahabi is an opposition leader who has been sentenced to life in prison in absentia for his role in the 2011 uprising.
"They frequently travel between Iran, Iraq and Leb to obtain financial and moral support as well as weapons training," the ministry statement said.
These members contact leaders in Iran "to receive direct financial support and field instructions".
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[MAGHAREBIA] Last week-end's bloody attack on anti-militia protesters in Benghazi stirred a large debate about the role of the military in a country that has been suffering from security turmoil since the fall of the Qadaffy regime.
Militias will have to either lay down their arms or join the army by the end of the year, Tripoli ...a confusing city, one end of which is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn... Post quoted Libya's new chief of staff, Col. Salem al-Gnaidy, as saying on Wednesday (June 12th).
Al-Gnaidy's demand was issued after last Saturday's deadly fighting in Benghazi between protesters and the Libya Shield militia that left 31 dead and at least 70 injured.
Fighting erupted after some 200 demonstrators tried to dislodge the "Libya Shield" First Brigade (Deraa 1) from its barracks in the Budazirah neighbourhood of Benghazi. They encircled the headquarters and called on regular security forces to step in.
It is unclear what prompted the confrontation. According to Libya Herald, Shield 1 "has a reputation of being pro-Islamist, unlike Shield 2, which is considered more sympathetic to the federalists".
On Tuesday, al-Gnaidy warned armed battalions of the consequences of continued security problems caused by armed militias.
"Patience is beginning to run out," he said at a news conference.
Al-Gnaidy gave the armed battalions the choice between joining the army and working under his command or facing the law.
"We'll set a date for handing in weapons in coordination with the government and General National Congress (GNC)," he added. "We welcome all factions that want to join the army, and we're ready to pay bonuses or rewards to each brigade that hands in their weapons and sends its members to join the army."
The Saturday attack caused considerable anger among Libyans, who demanded the establishment of a national army and the dissolving of armed militias.
"The government announced an investigation on the festivities without revealing its purpose," Libyan media figure Khaled Mhir said. "We are still waiting for the report of the government's investigation to understand, who fired first?"
"Suspension alone is not enough: anarchic weapons must be eliminated too, in a way that ensures employment for young jobseekers in various sectors, according to the possibilities of each and every one of them," wrote lawyer and human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... activist Abdullah Mesmari on his blog.
Party of Change official Mohamed Ghenim wondered if it was better to activate the army or to build a new national one in Libya "from patriotic and sincere elements".
Journalist Thouraya Khalil pointed to the fact that Qadaffy dissolved the military. "It was replaced with brigades and militias under the leadership of the chief of staff and subject to the control of Qadaffy's sons," she said.
Tobruk resident Salem Bayoudh witnessed the Saturday festivities: "I saw young people gathered at the gates of the battalion and asking for the removal of the emperor ruling it. After that we saw shooting and anti-aircraft missiles on unarmed people. I saw it with my own eyes."
The head of the joint security chamber, Brig. Gen. Mohammed al-Sharif talked about the difficulties ahead in defusing tensions in Benghazi. Not only are there shortages of equipment, vehicles, shields and communication assets, which he said "are very important for our work", but only half of the allocated budget is available for use.
"We want security and safety under the army and police," Benghazi public sector employee Youssef al-Zawi said.
"We want state institutions; we are fed up with militias and their acts," he added. "They observe no laws."
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#1
Militias to Libya: molon labe.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
06/14/2013 15:16
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Since 21 May, when the guardian council announced the eight approved presidential candidates excluding two prominent figures, the former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, a close ally of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the campaign had appeared to rouse little public interest.
According to a journalist in Tehran, that has changed in the capital. "You will not believe the election buzz in Tehran today. Everyone is talking about elections and who to vote for and everyone is advocating for [Hassan] Rouhani and trying to convince people to vote for him."
The campaign of the relatively moderate Rouhani, who served as chief nuclear negotiator under the reformist former president Mohammad Khatami, received a boost on Tuesday when Mohammad Reza Aref, Khatami's senior vice-president, bowed out of the race. Later in the day Rouhani received explicit endorsements from both Khatami and Rafsanjani.
Of the popular mood swing that followed, the Tehran journalist said, "I never saw this coming. Everyone was so without hope and talking about not ever voting again, and this morning things have changed 180 degrees. It's like someone put something in the water last night and this morning people are just different."
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[An Nahar] Georgian security agencies said Thursday they had foiled an attack after two foreign nationals were locked away ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... in Tbilisi along with a large cache of explosives and weapons.
"An attempted terrorist act has been foiled by Georgia's Ministry of Internal Affairs at a preparatory stage," the interior ministry said in a statement.
"Foreign" citizens Mikail Kadiev and Rizvan Omarov were arrested during a dawn raid by police in which a stash of explosives, firearms and fake identity documents were discovered, the statement said without specifying the men's countries of origin.
The statement said that Kadiev is wanted by Interpol for involvement in an unspecified crime in a Western European country.
"Intensive investigations are being carried out to establish and neutralize criminal connections between the persons exposed preparing a terrorist act and their accomplices and patrons -- both within the country and within the framework of international anti-terrorist cooperation," the statement said.
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Snopes True: The State of Georgia has a very effective voter identification program.
[Straits Times] Iran's presidential election has been neither free nor fair as Tehran has silenced journalists and opposition leaders in the run up to Friday's vote, a United Nations ...boodling on the grand scale... (UN) human rights ...which often include carefully measured allowances of freedom at the convenience of the state... investigator said in Spain.
Mr Ahmed Shaheed, UN special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Iran, warned in March that he was concerned that the outcome of the election would lack legitimacy because dozens of Iranian journalists were behind bars and hundreds of political prisoners remained in jug.
"I absolutely think the fears were warranted as has been bourne out by events," he told Agence La Belle France-Presse on the sidelines of the World Congress against the Death Penalty.
"The mass disqualification of candidates, especially for reasons that were not transparent and that appear to be quite unreasonable, for one violates the right to political participation.
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[Pak Daily Times] Five people, including three doctors, went missing while travelling from Balochistan's Loralai district towards the Zhob region. "Honey, I think little Mahmoud might have the measles. Kidnap a doctor, would you?"
Sources in Levies Force told a private news channel that Dr Muhammad Anwar, Dr Ayaz, Dr Nasrullah, their clerk Muhammad Farooq and driver Muhammad Anwar went missing on Wednesday. Family members of the missing doctors have approached the Levies authorities in Loralai and Zhob and lodged a first information report. Levies sources said the family members of the kidnapped men submitted a written application that they had lost contact with all five of them on Wednesday. "We do not know about the whereabouts of our relatives since yesterday," a Levies official quoting the missing men's family members told the channel. He said the three doctors, along with a clerk of Civil Hospital Loralai and a driver, were travelling to Zhob to attend the funeral of a senior surgeon when they went missing. Levies and police authorities have started efforts to ensure the safe recovery of the missing men.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Where do you often find doctors? Around sick people, right? So it stands to Muslim reason that doctors make people sick and should be excluded from the community.
[Pak Daily Times] Foreign Office spokesperson Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry has said Pakistain had emphatically conveyed to the United States its concerns over drone strikes. The FO said there was across-the-board political consensus in Pakistain that drone attacks in its tribal areas should be stopped. Addressing a weekly news briefing, Chaudhry said the prime minister had clearly called for an end to drone strikes. He said on the prime minister's instructions, the Special Assistant to the prime minister had summoned the US charge D'affairs to convey a strong message that the drone strikes violate Pakistain's illusory sovereignty, international law, UN Charter and the norms of inter-state relations. Protesting at the high level shows the importance the government attaches to this matter, he added. He said there was a growing international debate ... an expenditure of personal wind at the national level that leads to face-making and other histrionics but can't be shown to have ever solved an issue ... over humanitarian and legal implications of drone strikes.
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[An Nahar] King of the Arabians, Sheikh of the Burning Sands Abdullah ... Fifth out of 37 sons of King Abdulaziz to ascend to the throne. He is, after his half-brothers Bandar and Musa'id, the third eldest of the living sons of Abdul Aziz ibn Saud. Abdullah's mother is from the Rashid clan, longtime rivals of the Saud. He has 6 sons and 15 daughters and about $20 billion. His youngest son is just seven years old... bin Abdul Aziz cut short his vacation in Morocco and decided to return to the kingdom on Thursday evening.
The monarch and his entourage have already left Morocco, according to information obtained by Naharnet.
The information come amid media reports that the Saudi military command has ordered measures that resemble a state of alert.
According to the reports, the army has suspended the vacations of soldiers amid unusual military moves in the bases that are close to the border with Jordan, especially the Tabuk military base.
Observers linked the king's sudden return and the military measures to the developments of the military situation in Syria.
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[An Nahar] Turkish protesters said Thursday they would remain in Istanbul's Gezi Park despite a "last warning" by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to evacuate the green patch at the center of deadly anti-government unrest.
"We will stay in Gezi Park with all our demands and sleeping bags," Taksim Solidarity, the core group behind the campaign to save the park, said in a statement, rejecting the government's proposal to hold a referendum on the site's controversial redevelopment.
Earlier on Thursday, Erdogan issued a "last warning" for thousands of protesters to evacuate the park.
"I'm making my last warning: mothers, fathers please withdraw your kids from there," Erdogan said in a live television broadcast. "We cannot wait any longer because Gezi Park does not belong to occupying forces. It belongs to everybody."
The premier urged environmental protesters to withdraw so that police could clear the site of "illegal organizations."
"Don't sadden us anymore, let us clean Gezi park and return it to its rightful owners... the people of Istanbul."
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#1
the best aerial view I've found of Gezi park is here
Posted by: lord garth ||
06/14/2013 0:16
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IIRC, a Turkish Babe on FOX was remarking that the protesters want a democratic Turkey, NOT a hardline, pro-Sharia Islamic totalitarian or despotic State.
Many of the Babes in the protests could pass for any modern or post-modern contemporary Femme in the US-Euro-West - Baseball-Sports Caps, hair in long or ponytails, summer tops + shorty shorts or jeans, side bags everywhere,...@etc - DIDN'T SEE OR NOTICE ANY BABE(S0 IN A TRADITIONAL HEAD-TO-TOE BURQUA.
Not to argue there weren't any, but I didn't see any in the news footages.
ALSO, MANY LEFTIST-COMMUNISTS APPAREN SUPPORT THE PROTESTS. Prolly safe to say that the protests are more than just "anti-Sharia/
Islamism".
[Straits Times] Malaysian prosecutors filed murder charges on Thursday against a Pak security guard jugged You have the right to remain silent... after an American pastor was found dead.
Police have said that Reverend David Ginter died of asphyxiation in his home in a suburb near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia's main city, on May 4. A neighbour found his body bound with cloth after his wife failed to contact him while she was visiting her home country of Australia.
Authorities initially locked away Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! seven suspects but filed charges on Thursday only against 25-year-old Pak national Shahbaz, who uses just one name.
Prosecutors did not provide details of the murder charge, but police recently said robbery appeared to be the motive. The pastor's car had been reported missing from his house.
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[Pak Daily Times] The PML-N government appears to be in extra hurry to put the economy on 'right track' as it implemented the 1% increase in GST just a day after the announcement of federal budget for 2013-14, even without waiting for the parliament to pass the budgetary proposals to give it a legal status.
Prices of petroleum products and the Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) increased on Thursday after implementation of the new GST tariff, sparking a wave of immediate surge in the prices of edibles and daily-use items across the country.
The petrol price was hiked by 86 paisas per litre; light diesel oil by 77 paisas and high speed diesel by 90 paisas per following an increase in the GST.
The new rates are effective from midnight Thursday.
After the increase, new price of petrol has been set at Rs100.63; that of diesel at Rs105.50, light diesel oil at Rs 89.90 and of kerosene oil at Rs 94.59. The government has also increased the prices of compressed natural gas (CNG) by 45 paisas per kilogramme. The new prices of CNG are applicable to Region 1 and Region 2.
Transporters in several cities instantly announced an in crease in inter-city fares.
The newly elected heavy-mandate government's first budget has been branded as 'business-friendly' by most the business community and industrialists while the common man has termed it from 'cruel' to 'anti-poor'.
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[WHPTV] For people living in a York County [PA] condominium complex, they'll soon have to get their dogs swabbed for DNA because of what officials are calling a growing problem.
Chestnut Pointe Condo Association Board members said they will soon implement a program using "Poo-Prints", after some people have not been able to clean up after their dogs. You're not allowed to fling dog turds at politicians in Pennsylvania, so the droppings have no practical use.
According to a message posted on the Dallastown condo's mailbox area and sent individually to the owners or renters of the 12 units, there have been complaints that messes are left on the grasses. One resident told CBS 21 News that because of the feces on the ground, some people have stepped in it and brought it inside the home, staining the carpets. Ummm... A dozen units? Approximately 24 adults, assuming each is inhabited by married or cohabiting couples? How many of the households are represented on the condo association?
"We have talked to a lot of experts in the field and this is the best solution we could have come up with," said Lee March, a resident and the board's president. He should have talked to someone with a bit of common sense, rather than relying on experts in the field of dog poop.
"Parents don't want their children playing in the grass because there's dog poop everywhere, " she said. One method of coping with the problem would be for anyone else present to holler "Hey! Pick up your dog poop!" Eventually everyone in the community will know who doesn't pick up his dog poop and they can start bagging it for them and leaving it on their doorstep. Or not bag it.
Last week, the Board posted the notice where they have to have their dogs swabbed for the DNA. The association will pay for the costs, according to the statement, but after June 21st, residents who missed out on it or buy a new pet, will have to pay for the DNA tests and lab work which could add up $90.
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#1
"We have talked to a lot of experts in the field and this is the best solution we could have come up with," said Lee March, a resident and the board's president.
#4
Had to go check out the story before commenting.
First, its not a news article, its an news-style advertisement. Second, that is a nice neighborhood, so its not gangsta-g with his pack of wardogs flashing steel at people who look his way. This is rich people problems. Third, even the rep says its not the condo people who are doing it, its other dogs - dogs which would not be registered by this program and the fines would not be enforcable.
I think its time we ban high-capacity dogs. Poopers, your poopers please.
(Thanks for the link BP)
Now, this story irritates me for some reason and I'm going to try to get the bug out. Foremost, people are letting other people via dog crap all over their property and thereby their family. That's your life's work, those are your kids, stand up dammit! I ambushed a veteran alley cat with a tomahawk. Yeah, you read that right, missed by only a couple inches. See, it was peeing on my porch and I don't want my little ones playing in cat pee. Also, I cannot predict or count on that cat being in a good mood. Nor the loose dogs I chased off in my bare feet and berserker barking. Take some control, there are things which can be done: its the 21st century, take a picture of the owner with a dumb face and the dog in duty, print it and post it in the yard for next time. Dog is loose, water balloon with bear urine, don't even have to hit the target just miss upwind, or dribble a bit along the perimeter - however messy you want to get.
And the animal rights people can go kiss it, because in this case the animal abuse is the owner not taking responsibility for their animal which could cause real harm to a child who gets this in their mouth, as well as property damage. Right Mr. Gifford?
#6
I, at one time, posted a sign on my property "Doggies, please ask your pigs to pick up your poop." Mrs. Phester didn't like it much and it only lasted a few days....
#8
Besides, they probably already lifted DNA and fingerprints from payments mailed to the IRS, and know what you look like by doing a search engine of the security camera footage matched against your purchase of $11.49 on your credit card on 4/18/13 at 14:38:16.
And considering these health records, are you sure that a large coffee and eclair was a good good choice citizen? Considering you think wearing brown in the Springtime is a good idea we would like to politely suggest visiting our website and viewing our quick 15 minute video. Your webcam will confirm your identity and your undivided attention.
#9
*Bing!*
Attention: if you are a mooslimb or consider yourself a follower of moholland, please say the convert phrase three times. You will then be asked to repeat confirmation lines - you will receive suggestion on ununciation.
Your record of this violation will be expunged and this event will be erased from the database. Malignant salami.
[Bangla Daily Star] The UN is in exploratory talks with Sweden about its participation in a beefed-up peacekeeping force between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, Swedish and Israeli officials said yesterday. "Ya, sure! We bane next in th' barrel!"
The UN has asked Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt whether the Scandinavian country would consider sending troops to the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) after Austrian troops have begun withdrawing as a result of attacks and abductions of peacekeepers.
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[NY Times] American and European intelligence analysts now believe that Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators... 's troops have used chemical weapons against rebel forces in the civil war in Syria, an assessment that will put added pressure on a deeply divided B.O. regime to develop a response to a provocation that the president himself has declared a "red line."
According to an internal memorandum circulating inside the government on Thursday, the "intelligence community assesses that the Assad regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale against the opposition multiple times in the last year." President B.O. said in April that the United States had physiological evidence that the nerve gas sarin had been used in Syria, but lacked proof of who used it and under what circumstances. He now believes that the proof is definitive, according to American officials.
But a flurry of high-level meetings in Washington this week only underscored the splits within the B.O. regime about what actions to take to quell the fighting, which has claimed more than 90,000 people. The meetings were hastily arranged after Mr. Assad's troops -- joined by fighters from the bad turban group Hezbollah -- claimed the strategic city of Qusayr and raised fears in Washington thon the lam parts of the rebellion could be on the verge of collapse.
Senior State Department officials have been pushing for an aggressive military response, including Arclight airstrikes to hit the primary landing strips in Syria that the government uses to launch the chemical weapons attacks, ferry troops around the country, and receive shipments of matériel from Iran. But White House officials remain wary, and one American official said that a meeting on Wednesday of the president's senior advisers yielded no firm decisions about how to proceed.
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#1
The Obama administration has concluded that Syrian President Bashar Assad's government used chemical weapons against the rebels seeking to overthrow him and, in a major policy shift, President Obama has decided to supply military support to the rebels, the White House announced Thursday.
Then, the Bammer = USA still stood a good chance - Now, wid Assad in control of up to 85% of the countyr + prepping to launch his seming "final offensive" agz the Rebs + aligned, ITS A BIT OF TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE.
Fergit the NFZ - at this stage, what the Rebs really need is intensive US-NATO airstrikes + combat troops on the ground.
The only altern is that the Rebs become like the Paleos, i.e. a Govt-widout-a-Country, wid the Bammer having to sponsor + engage in 1980's style Contra insurgent operations vee the FSA, etal. in neighboring countries agz the Assad regime.
[UN.ORG] Afghanistan: Ban condemns deadly attack near Kabul's Supreme Court building
Secretary-General the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon ... of whom it can be said to his credit that he is not Kofi Annan... today urged an immediate halt to attacks targeting civilians in Afghanistan following a suicide kaboom near the Supreme Court building in the capital city.
In a statement from his spokesperson, Secretary-General Ban condemned the 11 June attack on civilian Government workers which he said was "timed and located to maximize civilian casualties."
"Targeted attacks against civilians are unacceptable and a serious breach of international humanitarian law," Mr. Ban's spokesperson said.
Mr. Ban "calls upon those responsible to immediately halt such attacks, which only add further to the suffering of the Afghan people."
The attack, for which the Taliban grabbed credit, killed at least 17 civilians, wounding some 40 more.
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[An Nahar] Rebels fired two mortar rounds at Damascus international airport on Thursday, delaying two landings and one take-off, Syrian state television ... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
cited Transport Minister Mahmoud Said as saying.
"One mortar round hit at the airport's edges, near the runway, causing two flights coming from Latakia (in northwestern Syria) and Kuwait to delay their landing. The take-off of a flight to Storied Baghdad ...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate... was also delayed," said the minister.
No passengers were hurt, but a second round hit an airport warehouse and one worker was maimed, Said added.
The rounds were fired by "terrorists," the regime's term for rebels, he added.
The statement comes after the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported a homemade rocket attack at the airport, the regime's main gateway to the world.
"Rebels hit Damascus airport with three homemade rockets," said Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman, who described the attack as "rare."
The airport lies southeast of Damascus, near several flashpoint areas and near the heated Eastern Ghouta region, large swathes of which are in rebel hands.
For several months, rebels have been trying to cut off the regime's access to the airport.
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[Pak Daily Times] Saudi security forces tossed in the slammer Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un! dozens of people this week during protests by families seeking freedom for relatives placed in durance vile Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw! on security charges, activists and witnesses said.
That worked out well. Or not, as the case may be...
Families of security detainees have regularly staged small protests in Riyadh and some other cities over the past two years in defiance of a government ban on demonstrations. They accuse the government of holding their relatives without trial or failing to release them after they were found innocent or had completed their sentence.
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[NOLA] Frank "Connor" Snellings, 21, the son of U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., was jugged
... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not...
Thursday morning on charges of driving while intoxicated, hit-and-run driving, and driving the wrong way on a one-way street in the French Quarter, according to the Orleans Gay Pareeh Sheriff's Office.
The car Snellings was driving hit a pedestrian, who was not seriously injured, according to the sheriff's report. Snellings and a passenger in his car were not hurt.
"We love our son wholeheartedly, but we are extremely disappointed by his irresponsible actions last night," Sen. Landrieu said Thursday in a phone interview. "These actions have serious consequences both at home and in our legal system."
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So even tho this story involves a Democratic Senator, booze an auto accident and leaving the scene, it doesn't count because the passenger survived and no bridges or Oldsmobiles were harmed in the making of this incident. (USN,Ret. using a travelnym)
[ONLINE.WSJ] A U.S. military proposal for arming Syrian rebels also calls for a limited no-fly zone inside Syria that would be enforced from Jordanian territory to protect Syrian refugees and rebels who would train there, according to U.S. officials.
Asked by the White House to develop options for Syria, military planners have said that creating an area to train and equip rebel forces would require keeping Syrian aircraft well away from the Jordanian border.
To do that, the military envisages creating a no-fly zone stretching up to 25 miles into Syria which would be enforced using aircraft flown from Jordanian bases and flying inside the kingdom, according to U.S. officials.
The White House is currently considering proposals to arm the rebels in Jordan, according to U.S. officials. White House National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden declined to comment on the details of those deliberations.
The limited no-fly zone wouldn't require the destruction of Syrian antiaircraft batteries, U.S. officials said.
Officials said the White House could decide to authorize the U.S. to arm and train rebels in Jordan without authorizing the no-fly zone recommended by military planners. A White House announcement could come soon, officials said.
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#1
When was it ever a good idea to give arms and ammunition to allies of Al Qaeda? Making announcements of future half-hearted military plans is a good way to get into an war unintentionally, though.
#2
None of what is going on in Syria is a threat to the national security of the United States. This is a "wag the dog" [grab the nightly news] initiative which has the potential go to very badly for our military.
Backing either side is backing the wrong party, something historically, we appear to excel at.
#4
Desperate to divert attention to so many failures. Obama is not the right stuff. Count on him to muck it up. All the domestic surveillance programs except for Muslims, Mosques. Heaven forbid profiling for them. This shows is is really in control. Not Obama. Everyone is doing their own thing. Data mining for control of future elections and money period.
#8
As per RENSE, Artic says it will cost US$50.0Milyuhn per day for the Bammer's NFZ.
Despite their rhetoric to the contrary, the US + NATO-EU = Russia = China = Israel = Saudi Arabia are ironically on the SAME SIDE when it comes to denying control or domination of Syria to Radical Islam includ but not limited to Iran.
IMO the above are all quietly giving out a deep sigh of relief that Baby Assad is winning in Syria, until such time the Rebs are willing to accept anti-Radicalist, moderate or liberal, pro-secular + pro-democratic Islamic rule.
[Al Jazeera] Morgan Tsvangirai, the prime minister of Zim-bob-we, has rejected a plan by President Bob Muggsy Mugabe Octogenarian President-for-Life of Zim-bob-we who turned the former Breadbasket of Africa into the African Basket Case... to hold an election on July 31, accusing the country's leader of violating the constitution.
Tsvangirai said that Mugabe was creating a political crisis in the southern African country, and that an election could be held no earlier than August 25.
Addresing a news conference on Thursday, the PM said that Mugabe had violated a power-sharing agreement, set up after bloody and disputed polls five years ago, under which he has been a partner in a factious unity government.
"Mugabe is deliberately precipitating a constitutional crisis," Tsvangirai told a news conference. "As prime minister I cannot and will not accept this."He reiterated his view that the state media and security forces needed to be reformed before any poll to ensure it was fair.
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"Mugabe is deliberately precipitating a constitutional crisis,"
Dictators are quite good at that. We feel your pain Morgan old boy.
[Bangla Daily Star] Suspected Maoist rebels killed at least three people in an attack on a passenger train in the northern Indian state of Bihar on Thursday.
A police guard and two passengers died in the attack on the Dhanbad-Patna express train, railway police official Amitabh Das told the BBC News.
Guards on the train fired at the rebels who then fled to the nearby forests.
Police said additional troops had been sent to the area. The train driver is among those injured.
Police officer SK Bhardwaj told reporters in the state capital, Patna, that the motive of the attack appeared to be to loot the guards' weapons.
He said the rebels had taken away some guns. The train, which was carrying 1,500 unarmed defenceless people, later resumed its journey.
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[An Nahar] Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri Second son of Rafik Hariri, the Leb PM who was assassinated in 2005. He has was prime minister in his own right from 2009 through early 2011. He was born in Riyadh to an Iraqi mother and graduated from Georgetown University. He managed his father's business interests in Riyadh until his father's assassination. When his father died he inherited a fortune of some $4.1 billion, which won't do him much good if Hizbullah has him bumped off, too. lamented on Thursday Hizbullah's fighting in Syria, which has ruined "the fraternal ties among the Lebanese people, especially between Sunnis and Shiites."
He said in an address to the Lebanese people: "Leb needs, now more than ever, the word of truth against the oppressive arms."
"The word of truth will halt the Iranian wars against the Lebanese people and their land," he declared.
"The word of truth will help liberate Leb from the illegitimate weapons and the hegemony of gangs," he added.
"No matter how many rockets these groups possess, they will never, at the end of the day, be able to create strife and break the unity of the state and the dignity of the people," Hariri stressed.
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[Pak Daily Times] Malaysia said Thursday it would work with Myanmar to repatriate thousands of their nationals following festivities in the community that left at least four dead and led to a security sweep.
The two Southeast Asian nations insisted that violence -- beginning late May at a wholesale market in Kuala Lumpur -- linked to strife between majority Buddhists and minority Mohammedans in Myanmar was under control.
Malaysian authorities have suggested Buddhists came under attack from Mohammedan countrymen seeking vengeance over deadly sectarian strife back in Myanmar. "It is a clash of Myanmars among themselves... The quarrel they have back home is brought to our country," Malaysian Deputy Home Minister Wan Junaidi Jaafar told news hounds after meeting a delegation from Myanmar.
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[An Nahar] A Tunisian rapper was handed a two-year jail sentence on Thursday for insulting the police in a song, an Agence La Belle France Presse journalist reported, with the court ruling sparking festivities between his supporters and police.
Ala Yaacoub, better known by his rap name "Weld El 15", was being retried at the same court in a Tunis suburb that had convicted him in absentia in March, after he handed himself him in to face justice.
As the judge read out the verdict, shouts of protest erupted in the court room from his supporters who were swiftly expelled by police, with some of them beaten outside the building.
There was evidence of tear gas outside the court house, but it was not clear who had fired it. The police blamed friends of the singer.
"The sentence is very tough for an artist who decided of his own accord to face justice," said Yaacoub's lawyer Ghazi Mrabet.
"It is particularly unfair that no text exists for suppressing a work of art."
Yaacoub, who was in hiding, was given a two-year jail sentence in March after posting a rap video called "The Police are Dogs" on the Internet.
He later turned himself in.
The lawyer said he was charged with conspiracy to commit violence against public officials, and insulting the police, offences punishable by up to seven years in prison.
Before the trial opened on Thursday, Yaacoub had said he was afraid and criticized the authorities for not respecting freedom of speech.
"I am afraid because in a country like Tunisia the law is not applied; you can expect anything," he told AFP.
"In the song, I used the same terms that the police used to speak about the youth. The police have to respect citizens if they want to be respected," Yaacoub added.
In the video the singer is heard saying: "Police, magistrates, I'm here to tell you one thing, you dogs; I'll kill police instead of sheep; Give me a gun I'll shoot them."
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Very sad. Here, he would have been invited to the WH for a performance and given a new cellie.
[MAGHAREBIA] Algerian gendarmes dismantled an arms trafficking network in Tebessa, El Watan reported on Wednesday (June 12th). They placed in durance vile You have the right to remain silent... four suspects and seized weapons, ammunition and money.
Security forces also uncovered a weapons fabrication workshop inside the home of one of the suspects.
The arms smugglers were operating between Algeria and Tunisia.
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[Libya Herald] Qatar Airways has suspended flights between Benghazi and Doha following an incident yesterday at Benghazi's Benina Airport when protestors prevented non-Libyan passengers arriving from Doha from going through passport control. Said to be mostly Bangladeshis, they were forced to fly back to Qatar. Libyan passengers heading to Doha were also reported prevented from flying.
According to a member of Benghazi Local Council who did not want to be named, the protestors were members of the Ezzedine Al-Waqwaq brigade. He said they accused Qatar of interfering in Libya's internal affairs and threatened to shoot at Qatar Airways aircraft if they flew in again. The Libya Herald has also been told that the pilot of the plane was personally told not to fly in again.
Al-Waqwaq is prominent federalist linked to Cyrenaica Military Council. He lives near the airport.
Speaking on TV, another councillor, Garah Al-Khafifa, called for rapid intervention from the army and police to ensure the airport's safety.
The head of the airport, Jamal Al Aqali, has said that the protestors were unarmed. He was also quoted in some of the local media as saying that his administration did not know who the protestors were but that the suspension would continue until security in the airport was assured.
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[An Nahar] Æthiopia's parliament ratified a controversial treaty Thursday ensuring its access to Nile water resources, amid bitter arguments with Egypt triggered by an Æthiopian dam project.
The deal replaces a colonial-era agreement that granted Egypt and Sudan the majority of water rights and allows upstream countries to implement irrigation and hydropower projects without first seeking Egypt's approval.
"Parliament approved and passed a law that incorporates the treaty into domestic law," government front man Shimeles Kemal told Agence La Belle France Presse.
Egypt and Sudan have not signed the Cooperative Framework Agreement (CFA) led by the Nile Basin Initiative, but six upstream nations have.
In addition to Æthiopia, Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda have all signed, while Democratic Republic of the Congo ...formerly the Congo Free State, Belgian Congo, Zaire, and who knows what else, not to be confused with the Brazzaville Congo aka Republic of Congo, which is much smaller and much more (for Africa) stable. DRC gave the world Patrice Lumumba and Joseph Mobutu, followed by years of tedious civil war. Its principle industry seems to be the production of corpses. With a population of about 74 million it has lots of raw material... and newly independent South Sudan have said they also intend to join.
For decades, Egypt held veto rights over all upstream projects, following powers granted by a 1929 colonial-era treaty with Britannia.
Egypt's subsequent 1959 deal with Sudan gave the two downstream countries more than 90 percent control of Nile waters.
Æthiopia inked the deal in May 2010, and its ratification by parliament comes amid rising tensions between Addis Ababa and Cairo over Æthiopia's construction of the Grand Renaissance Dam on the Blue Nile.
Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi has warned that "all options are open" over the construction of the dam, but Æthiopia insists it will not go to war with its neighbor, dismissing Morsi's words as "empty and violent rhetoric."
Æthiopia began diverting the Nile river last month, paving the way for the construction of the $4.2 billion (3.2 billion euro) Grand Renaissance Dam, set to become Africa's biggest hydroelectric dam when completed.
The Horn of Africa country has pledged to press ahead with the dam, despite Egypt's fury.
Shimeles said the deal replaces the "unjust" agreements of 1929 and 1959 that awarded Sudan and Egypt control of the lion's share of the river, and says the agreement ensures equitable access to Nile waters.
"Æthiopia has never considered the 1959 (and) 1929 agreements binding, as it has never been a party to it," Shimeles.
"The CFA is a response to the unjust colonial imposition on the part of the riparian states, preventing them from exploiting equitably the Nile resources," he added.
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#1
In related news, SCOTUS ruled 9-0 that TX could not take Red River waters from within the borders of OK. This will not sit well w/ CA who wants to do similiar w/Columbia River in Wa/OR. Maybe they will dry up and blow away.
[An Nahar] Marada Movement the personal militia of Suleiman Franjieh, president of Lebanon at the outbreak of the civil war, currently Syrian toadies, but you never know when that could change... leader MP Suleiman Franjieh on Thursday accused President Michel Suleiman ...before assuming office as President, he held the position of commander of the Leb Armed Forces. That was after the previous commander, the loathesome Emile Lahoud, took office as president in November of 1998. Likely the next president of Leb will be whoever's commander of the armed forces, too... of "making promises to the West," stressing that Hizbullah "has the right to intervene in Syria" militarily.
"The president turned against the March 8 forces ... the opposition to the Mar. 14th movement, consisting of Hizbullah and its allies, so-called in commemoration of their Mar. 8th, 2006 demonstration of strength in Beirut ... and when we reached a juncture, he made his choices, and here we raise a question: why did all these countries cling to him? Is he the 'Bismarck of Leb' or did he make promises to the West and endorsed their policies?" Franjieh said during an interview with LBCI television.
"The president wants to turn himself into a hero over the (Syrian) shelling (of Lebanese territory). When Syria makes a violation, he directly condemns it, but when Israel makes a violation, Baabda remains silent," Franjieh added.
The northern leader rejected any attack on any region in Leb, saying "we're against these violations, especially those committed by the Free Syrian Army."
Criticizing the Suleiman-sponsored Baabda Declaration -- which calls for Leb to disassociate itself from regional crises, most notably the one in Syria -- Franjieh said the declaration "was one of the tools that are aimed at bringing down Hizbullah after bringing down the Syrian regime."
"They wanted Hizbullah to hand over its weapons and as the regime did not fall, a new round of pressure started, and it can be war or other means," he added.
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#1
Meanwhile, not to be outdone by the Hezzies Huzzies Hassies Hissies ....
* TOPIX > EGYPT SAYS IT CITIZENS FREE TO JOIN FIGHT IN SYRIA.
* SAME > SUNNI CLERICS CALL ON SUNNIS TO FIGHT AGZ ASSAD, AL-QAEDA IN SYRIA.
versus
* DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > [AllAfrica] HEZOLLAH EMERGES IN LIBYA, + very likely also in Egypt + Tunisia given how long pro-Al-Qaeda afiliates have been operating in the North African regions.
RELATED TOPIX > NIGERIA ARRESTS THREE FOR HEZBOLLAH CELL.
[Yemen Post] Officials confirmed that a soldier died in Sarwah, a region situated between the restive province of Marib and the capital, Sana'a in clashing opposing the government forces and local tribes.
Following countless acts of sabotage against Yemen power lines and oil pipeline in Marib, all of which have been claimed by local tribes, President Abdo Rabbo Mansour Hadi ordered the defense ministry to sent troops on the ground to regain control of the province and prevent further attacks.
On Wednesday the military moved in, shelling rebel tribal position in Marib. While a truce was requested on Wednesday, mediations failed within hours.
Acts of sabotage against power lines since 2011 have meant thon the lam areas around the capital, Sana'a have had to endure lengthy power outage; a nuisance on civilian life and a drain on the economy.
Yemen oil industry has also been greatly affected by kabooms on Marib pipeline, forcing the ministry to halt all activities, thus leading to millions of dollars in lost revenues and repairs.
Military sources told news hounds this Thursday that the victim, "was in a convoy escorting a technical team to the site of the attack in the Sarwah region, between Sanaa and Marib in the country's east." He added, ""Clashes broke out between the security forces escorting the technical team and armed rustics in the area, killing the soldier."
Tribal sources told the AFP that armed rustics attacked Marib pipeline at dawn on Thursday.
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[Yemen Post] This Thursday Human Rights Watch ... dedicated to bitching about human rights violations around the world... , a prominent rights organization, called on the Yemeni government to launch an investigation into last Sunday's events, when 13 Zaidi gunnies were bumped off by the authorities in the capital,
Sana'a after they tried to take by storm the Intelligence Agency headquarters.
The Houthis, a former Zaidi rebel group based in the northern province of Sa'ada now going by the name of Ansar Allah (the Party of God) marched on Sunday in Sana'a, demanding the immediate release of several of their men, all currently sitting in jail.
HRW said the group had hoped that the release of 17 political prisoners earlier this month following much public pressure would prompt the government to show lenience in their case as well.
Faced with a resounding no from the presidential palace, demonstrators turned violent. Eye witnesses recalled that far from being spontaneous, the attack against Yemen Intelligence Agency seemed to have been carefully planned and rehearse, with men being clearly aware of what they were doing, how, when and where.
Regardless, HRW slammed the coalition government for its lack of restraint.
"The Yemeni security forces' brutal response to the pro-Huthi demonstration suggests that President Hadi's security reforms have had little impact," said Sarah Leah Whitson, HRW Middle East and North Africa director . "It is now up to the government to show that it can conduct a serious inquiry into this deadly episode and prosecute all those responsible for unlawful deaths and injuries," she added.
Protesters already complained to HRW they suffered unjust and cruel treatment by the hands of the authorities, recalling the arrival of armored vehicles to break up their march. The security services used water cannons and tear gas under the crowd, technics men said are reminiscent of 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... 's repressive crowd control tactics.
"We yelled out our basic human rights ...which are often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless... of free speech and the right to gather, and then said that we would not leave until the 10 prisoners were released," a protester told HRW. He added, "I saw them, some in uniform and some in plain clothes, shooting protesters in the head and chest."
Video footage shot by a protester and posted on YouTube shows some protesters reacting to the shooting and water cannons, by throwing rocks and lighting fires with kerosene and gasoline in the square in front of the NSB headquarters.
Contradictory statements are already emerging on the events of the day with state officials claiming that security forces opened fire after protesters attacked the building with automatic weapons and grenades in an attempt to storm it, while protesters allege they were shoot at while trying to help the injured. Others recalled soldiers chasing protesters out of the square and down various alleyways, following some into a neighborhood graveyard and then firing at them with handguns.
With dozens of Houthis gunnies now in prison since Sunday, security experts have warned against yet another show down between the Houthis' militia and the government forces, an escalation of violence which could jeopardize political negotiations.
A Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is "God is Great, Death to America", Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews" ... spokesperson said Sunday evening that 24 protesters were in jug, but the current number could not be confirmed. "Yemeni authorities should ensure that any protesters still in detention are treated humanely and released if not promptly charged, "Human Rights Watch said, reminding Yemen officials of the UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officers state that law enforcement officials "shall, as far as possible, apply non-violent means before resorting to the use of force and firearms... In the dispersal of assemblies that are unlawful but non-violent, law enforcement officials shall avoid the use of force or, where that is not practicable, shall restrict such force to the minimum extent necessary." Law enforcement officials should not use firearms against persons "except in self-defense or defense of others against the imminent threat of death or serious injury."
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[Bangla Daily Star] The Supreme Court unanimously ruled Thursday that human genes cannot be patented, reports CNN.
But in something of a compromise decision, all nine justices said while the naturally occurring isolated biological material itself is not patentable, a synthetic version of the gene material may be patented.
The case involves Utah-based company Myriad Genetics, which was sued over its claim of patents relating to two types of biological material that it identified -- BCRA-1 and BCRA-2, whose mutations are linked to increased hereditary risk for breast and ovarian cancer.
Since Myriad owns the patent on breast cancer genes, it is the only company that can perform tests for potential abnormalities.
Investors in Myriad appear pleased with the ruling; the stock is up 6%, and has been up as much as 9%.
At issue is whether "products of nature" can be treated the same as "human-made" inventions, allowing them to be held as the exclusive intellectual property of individuals and companies.
On one side, scientists and companies argue patents encourage medical innovation and investment that saves lives. On the other, patient rights groups and civil libertarians counter the patent holders are "holding hostage" the diagnostic care and access of information available to high-risk patients.
The high court has long allowed patent protection for the creation of a new process or use for natural products. Whether "isolating" or "extracting" genes themselves qualifies for such protection became the issue.
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[REUTERS] Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan met members of a group opposed to the redevelopment of an Istanbul park on Thursday in what appeared to be a final bid to end two weeks of anti-government protests through negotiation.
Erdogan met the delegation, mostly made up of actors and artists but also including two members of the umbrella protest group Taksim Solidarity, hours after saying his patience had run out and warning those occupying Gezi Park to leave.
"Our patience is at an end. I am making my warning for the last time. I say to the mothers and fathers please take your children in hand and bring them out ... Gezi Park does not belong to occupying forces but to the people," he said.
It was unclear what triggered the apparent change of heart.
A heavy-handed police crackdown on the park nearly two weeks ago triggered an unprecedented wave of protest against Erdogan and his AK Party - an association of centrists and conservative religious elements - drawing in secularists, nationalists, professionals, unionists and students.
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[An Nahar] Damascus on Thursday called on the Lebanese army to "control the border to preserve security and stability," in the wake of Wednesday's Syrian air raid on the Bekaa border town of Arsal.
Caretaker Foreign Minister Adnan Mansour said he received a memo from Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem about the situation on the border between the two countries.
Muallem cited the security agreements signed between Leb and Syria and underlined Damascus' "keenness on Leb's security," Mansour said.
The Syrian minister "stressed the importance that the Lebanese army control the border to preserve security and stability," urging Lebanese authorities to "take the necessary measures that strengthen the joint efforts between the two brotherly countries and peoples, in the framework of mutual keenness on respecting the illusory sovereignty and territorial integrity of the two states."
The Syrian memo comes after a Syrian helicopter gunship bombed Arsal on Wednesday morning, prompting the Lebanese army to issue an unprecedented statement in which it warned that it will immediately retaliate to any future attacks, as President Michel Suleiman ...before assuming office as President, he held the position of commander of the Leb Armed Forces. That was after the previous commander, the loathesome Emile Lahoud, took office as president in November of 1998. Likely the next president of Leb will be whoever's commander of the armed forces, too... threatened to file complaints with 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... and the U.N. Security Council.
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
North Korea
Goodluck Jonathan
Pervez 
[Pak Daily Times] At least ten people including political and religious workers were killed in separate incidents of violence in different parts of the city on Thursday.
a city and an eponymous district in eastern Khyber-Pakthunwa, nestled snug up against Pak Kashmir, with Kohistan and Diamir to the north and Abbottabad to the south...
[Bangla Daily Star] The BNP-Jamaat-led 18-party opposition wants Qawmi madrasa-based Hefajat-e Islam as an ally at the next general elections in order to exploit religion and win as many votes as possible capitalising on the people's Islamic sentiment.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
John 
[Straits Times] Iran's presidential election has been neither free nor fair as Tehran has silenced journalists and opposition leaders in the run up to Friday's vote, a 
King of the Arabians, Sheikh of the Burning Sands Abdullah
[Pak Daily Times] The PML-N government appears to be in extra hurry to put the economy on 'right track' as it implemented the 1% increase in GST just a day after the announcement of federal budget for 2013-14, even without waiting for the parliament to pass the budgetary proposals to give it a legal status.
[WHPTV] For people living in a York County [PA] condominium complex, they'll soon have to get their dogs swabbed for DNA because of what officials are calling a growing problem.
[Bangla Daily Star] The UN is in exploratory talks with Sweden about its participation in a beefed-up peacekeeping force between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, Swedish and Israeli officials said yesterday.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon
[An Nahar] Rebels fired two mortar rounds at Damascus international airport on Thursday, delaying two landings and one take-off, Syrian state television
