Come gather round people wherever you roam
And admit that the waters around you have grown
And accept it that soon youâll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you is worth saving
Then youâd better start swimming or youâll sink like a stone
For the times, they are a changing
Come writers and critics who prophesize with your pens
And keep your eyes open, the chance wonât come again
And donât speak too soon, the wheelâs still in spin
And thereâs no telling who that itâs naming
Oh the loser will be later to win
For the times, they are a changing
Come senators, congressmen, please head the call
Donât stand in the doorway, donât block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be her that has stalled
The battle outside ragging will soon shake your windows
And rattle your hall
For the times, they are a changing
Come mothers and fathers all over this land
And donât criticize what you canât understand
Your sons and your daughter are beyond your command
Your old role is rapidly aging
Please get out of the new one if you canât lend a hand
For the times they are a changing
The line, it is drawn, the curse, it is cast
The slow one will later be fast
And the present now will soon be the past
The order is rapidly fading
The first one now will later be last
For the times, they are a changing
#4
Ok, all you current/former military types: take out your calculators. Question: how many [units of your choice -- I only know platoons, brigades and divisions] is our new Sect'y of State, Dr. Condoleeza Rice, worth? How much more when she wears a black coat and spike-heeled boots? ;-)
#7
It's an relationship derived from heel length and ground pressure. But generally a 3 inch heel with a 3 sq. inch landing area is equavalent to a Mechanized Brigade.
#11
However, the recent elections in Iraq and Saudi Arabia did not reveal much support for Western liberty and democracy. Arabs love to wallow in the muck of chaos and mayhem.
#12
Agreed about the Magic Kingdom, Couth, but if you read the Iraqi bloggers and the blogs of those over there (one version is called "Milblogs," I think) you'll discover that the Iraqis have been mad for participative democracy at all levels from running the local village to electing representatives to the National government. Not uncouth at all, I'm happy to say.
Kuwait's Ambassador in Washington Sheikh Salem Al-Abdullah Al-Jaber Al-Sabah hosted a reception for families and relatives of American soldiers who died in the war that liberated Kuwait from a seven-month occupation of Iraq in 1990. The reception was held one day before the "No greater love" 14th annual ceremony to honor the war casualties, which will be held in Arlington national cemetery later tonight. At a speech to more than 200 families and relatives coming from all over the states representing soldiers who died in the war, the Kuwaiti ambassador said Kuwait will always remember the sacrifices of the soldiers who brought back the freedom to Kuwait.
"This occasion gives us the honor and we will always remember them, and we will be standing steadfast with you," Sheikh Salem told the families of the fallen soldiers. Sheikh Salem added that not only on the people level, Kuwait's government will always stand steadfast with the United States in protecting freedom all over the world and in fighting terror. Members of families of the fallen soldiers also spoke at the reception, saying that despite the difficulties of loosing loved ones, they were proud to see Kuwait now liberated and freedom protected. They added that they will, in their part, always remember the victims of the occupation.
They expressed profound appreciation to Kuwait for continuing to remember the American soldiers who sacrificed their lives for the freedom of Kuwait by hosting such gathering to express to them Kuwait's continued appreciation for the role the United States, specially the soldiers, in ending the seven months of occupation. Sheikh Salem was also awarded by the sons and daughters of the soldiers who died in the war with a crystal colored eagle-shaped shield, which reflects the shape of the American flag, in appreciation for Kuwait and its role in standing besides the United States in its efforts to provide freedom all over the world.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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France and Yemen have signed a military and security cooperation agreement providing for joint exercises, exchange of intelligence and the supply of French military equipment to Sanaa, French Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie said here Sunday. The pact, inked with Yemeni counterpart General Abdullah Ali Eleiwah, stipulates equipping six gunboats France had earlier supplied to the Yemeni coastguard, Alliot-Marie told reporters. The minister, who also held talks with Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh during her visit, said that under the accord, joint exercises would take place between the two countries' naval forces and special forces. The agreement also provides for setting up radars and other military equipment on the island of Meon in the Bab el-Mandeb strait in the Red Sea that would enable Yemeni forces and French forces based in nearby Djibouti to cooperate in fighting drug and arms smuggling and terrorism.
Posted by: Seafarious ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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#1
--...that would enable Yemeni forces and French forces based in nearby Djibouti to cooperate in fighting drug and arms smuggling and terrorism.---
SEVERAL hundred people are planning terrorist attacks on the UK, Tony Blair said yesterday, as a British-born man admitted plotting a suicide attack to blow up a packed passenger jet with a shoe bomb.
The prime minister spoke out only hours before the government's majority was slashed to just 14 as a cross-party attempt to ensure judges, rather than the home secretary, impose control orders on suspected terrorists was narrowly rejected by the House of Commons.
The Labour revolt came despite these fresh concessions by Mr Clarke. Bowing to pressure from cabinet colleagues as well as MPs, Mr Clarke said judges would be the first to decide whether "control orders" amounting to house arrest could be imposed on a suspect, instead of just reviewing them within seven days.
However, he said he would be seeking to grant police "a new and specific power" to arrest and detain a suspect while the application to the judge was being decided.
Defending the terror bill, Mr Blair said the security services and police were adamant they needed increased powers to combat the terrorist threat.
On BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour, he said: "What they say is you have got to give us powers in between mere surveillance of these people.
"There are several hundred of them in this country who, we believe, are engaged in plotting or trying to commit terrorist acts . . . and being able, being sure enough of the proof, to prosecute them beyond reasonable doubt.
"And these will be restrictions on their liberty that we will use only in the most limited circumstances. But we genuinely believe that they are necessary in order to protect the country."
Before the concessions were made, Mr Clarke and the prime minister had insisted that only the home secretary should have the power to execute the most extreme house arrest control orders, which would involve the government applying for an exemption, known as a derogation, from the European Convention on Human Rights.
At the Old Bailey, 25-year-old Saajid Badat admitted plotting to blow up a jet with a shoe bomb, the first successful major prosecution for terrorism in Britain since the 9/11 attacks. He had an identical device to the one used by Richard Reid, a fellow Briton, when he attempted to bring down a flight from Paris to Miami.
Badat had intended to use the bomb to destroy a plane heading from Europe to the US, but changed his mind and dismantled his device. Police said he had been prepared to kill hundreds.
Peter Clarke, Metropolitan Police deputy assistant commissioner, said: "Today's conviction demonstrates the reality of the threat we are facing."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 1:36:00 AM ||
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#1
Sooner or later. Then the tide will reverse course... with a vengeance, if it hits close to home for most.
Terrorists from al-Qaeda have been making chemical and biological weapons in Georgia's Pankisi Gorge, French Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin said on Tuesday.
Speaking at a world conference on bio-terrorism in Lyons that was organized by Interpol, he said that "several al-Qaeda cells have been trained in Afghanistan where they have learned to use biological agents including anthrax, ricin and botulism toxins. Later, after the fall of the Taliban regime, those groups continued their experiments in the Pankisi Gorge, on the territory of Georgia, bordering Chechnya," Interfax news agency reported.
The minister added that al-Qaeda terrorists "were able to use the religious aspect of the war" in Chechnya.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 3:17:50 PM ||
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#1
Bah, where's the proof? This is just another example of Bushitler trying to scare people so that he can invade.....what's that....this isn't Bush, it's the French? Well, it must be true then.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/01/2005 16:31 Comments ||
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#3
The big question that bugs me: does this mean that France is jumping onto the big Russian "something must be done about Georgia" bandwagon?
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
03/01/2005 23:33 Comments ||
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#4
I know this is about to age off the page... I'll be checking the O Club on and off though.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
03/01/2005 23:34 Comments ||
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#5
Oh, and Dan: thanks.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
03/01/2005 23:37 Comments ||
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#6
France is trying to use any means it can to create a group of nations to "counter weight" the US and it's interests. Yes it will sell out anyone to do this.
Reports from Turkmenistan say President Niyazov has ordered the closure of all the hospitals in the country except those in the capital, Ashgabat. The order, announced by a government spokesman, is part of the president's radical health care policies.
Well, that's one way to cut the budget
Thousands of medical workers have already been sacked under the plan. Civil rights activists have accused the president of sacrificing public services in favour of vast projects that glorify his regime.
President Niyazov apparently took the decision to close the hospitals at a meeting with local officials on Monday. "Why do we need such hospitals?" he said. "If people are ill, they can come to Ashgabat."
For the Turkmens, it means the end of a nationwide health service already on its knees. There are few able doctors and little medicine in rural Turkmen hospitals, and last year President Niyazov sacked 15,000 medical workers, replacing them with army conscripts. However the local hospital was the only place for sick people to go - especially those without the funds to travel to Ashgabat for treatment. The foreign community will be horrified by the decision.
But not suprised
President Niyazov is well known for his idiosyncratic orders, but it is extraordinary for a head of state to take such a step. At the same time, the president has also ordered the closure of rural libraries, saying they are pointless because village Turkmens do not read.
Criticism of the president is not allowed in Turkmenistan, but civil rights activists abroad say he has destroyed social services while spending millions of dollars of public money on grand projects, such as gold statues of the leader and a vast marble and gold mosque, one of the biggest in Asia.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/01/2005 8:26:44 AM ||
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As an aside -
The US Embassy's Address in Ashkabat is -
Street Address:
American Embassy
#9 1984 Street (formerly Pushkin Street)
Ashgabat, Turkmenistan
744000
TOKYO - A new law took effect on Tuesday that bars most North Korean ships from Japanese ports, with officials watching to see whether it squeezes a major lifeline to the impoverished communist country. Japan will require all foreign ships over 100 tons to be insured against oil spills, losses and other damages in order to enter under the new law.
With few North Korean ships believed to meet that requirement, the measure effectively bars them from trade and has been referred to by some as economic sanctions in disguise. Ruling party lawmaker Ichita Yamamoto, who heads a group of legislators studying possible sanctions, said that the new shipping restrictions are not enough to pinch North Korea because many of its goods are shipped on Chinese ships. "Even after (this measure) takes effect, it will not have much effect," he said, calling for more direct sanctions targeting Pyongyang.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said that the government would be watching to see how the new law affects North Korea.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/01/2005 12:24:30 AM ||
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#1
Oh no!! The NorKs will surely see this as an act of WAR!!!!
#2
HAHAHAHA!!! I love it. You are too dirty to enter our ports. Go home and get clean. What? You can't afford soap? Not my problem. Go away.
Talk about a diplomatic stab. Nice one Japan.
SEOUL: The United States and its allies could grant North Korea its wish for direct talks with the United States but only within six-way negotiations aimed at ending its nuclear ambitions, a South Korean negotiator said yesterday.
South Korean, US and Japanese negotiators agreed at the weekend to broaden the scope of the talks in the hope of enticing the North back. South Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Song Min-soon said participants could be more flexible. "We indicated that the wide-ranging forum of discussions can incorporate the positions of both sides, combine them," Song said on KBS radio, referring to what he called "differences on methodology".
That may mean the North would be offered more chances to meet directly with US negotiators on the sidelines of the talks, analysts said. But Song denied there would be direct negotiations between the North and the United States outside the six-party process, as North Korea has long demanded.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/01/2005 11:48:11 PM ||
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#1
But Song denied there would be direct negotiations between the North and the United States outside the six-party process,
The Dutch have rejected liberalism in response to Islamic immigration. Some say they are now too hardline. So what can the rest of Europe learn from their crisis?
That's they're not really that hardline?
Not long ago, Holland prided itself as being the most tolerant and welcoming country in Europe for immigrants and asylum seekers. It had the credentials to prove it. So many have settled there, ethnic "minorities" are often in a majority. In the great Dutch cities of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and the Hague, the newcomers already outnumber the native Dutch among under-20-year-olds. They will soon be an absolute majority.
Thereby demonstrating that cultures are more fragile than we think they are.
Although the slump that followed the 1973 oil shock removed the urgent need to recruit labour, the Dutch accepted that the "guest workers" in the country could remain. The policy was to create a multicultural society in which cultural and ethnic differences were accepted and appreciated. Some immigrants came from former Dutch colonies. The two largest groups, however, Turkish and Moroccan, had no historic links with the Netherlands.
Another blow to the culture...
The Dutch nonetheless accepted the reunification of families, and the practice of marrying partners from the country of origin, even though these can have an eight- or tenfold multiplier effect on overall numbers. Asylum seekers then arrived, in numbers that escalated from 3,500 in 1985 to over 43,000 in 2000. The figures were pro rata among the highest in the EU. Illegals came, too, mainly after 1990, with estimates running from 100,000 to 200,000. The Dutch supplied funding for mosques, religious schools, language courses and housing. They passed special legislation so Moroccans could have dual nationality, as Moroccan nationality is inalienable under Moroccan law. Political correctness, of the sort that produced Harry Enfield's famously relaxed Amsterdam policemen, reigned. Issues felt at street level — immigration, crime, culture, national identity — were seldom discussed by the political elite.
We're always reluctant to discuss the things that might make us feel bad. It's ever so much more pleasant to think nice thoughts and have a good lunch. So often when you discuss things that are unpleasant the doctor tells you the lump has to come out.
No longer. A sea change has taken place. It was evident after the death last month of a young Dutch Moroccan, identified only as Ali El B. Several hundred Moroccans congregated on the street where a driver had run him over, reversing into him after he had stolen her bag. They had made a shrine on the pavement, with flowers and candles, and there was talk of racism and murder. The crowd set off on a march to pay their respects at a mosque not far away. The boys were in a long gaggle at the front. The girls, neater, were in disciplined ranks at the rear. Some had Moroccan flags draped over their shoulders. They chanted in Arabic for a while, and passers-by looked and scurried on. The mosque was on the ground floor in a row of old gabled houses, some converted into offices, that looked out over a broad waterway. A racing skiff, a pair, was splashing through the wavelets thrown up by a blustery gale. Television cameramen darted round the crowd as it milled outside the mosque. An elderly Dutchman looked down from his flat at the sea of hoods and scarves and red-and-green flags, with an utterly forlorn expression.
Poor lad! And all he was doing was robbing the lady!
Nobody doubts that Ali El B would once have become a martyred innocent. Now, attempts to portray him like that were sat on fast and hard. The fiercest comment came from Geert Wilders. The hard line this right-wing MP takes on immigrants and terrorists has made him the fastest-rising star in the political firmament.
Even though he says the lump has to come out.
It has also brought threats of beheading from the lump radical Islamists, so he is now shackled to six bodyguards and has secure lodgings on army bases. "All Moroccan troublemakers should be expelled," Wilders says. "The government wants to expel terrorists. The same process should be used for street terrorists like Ali El B. Detain them, de-naturalise them and deport them."
Sounds pretty logical to me. If you can't live by the rules, maybe you should be someplace where the rules are more to your liking. Though I doubt if they're gentle with thieves in Morocco, either.
Wilders is a firebrand. Rita Verdonk is the minister for immigration and integration, and a mainstream Conservative. She, too, is implacable. "If the boy hadn't stolen the bag," she says, "he'd be riding around on his scooter today."
Statements of the obvious are sometimes disputed, of course...
But the real pointer to how far Holland has shifted comes from Job Cohen, the mayor of Amsterdam. Cohen is Labour, from the party that personified political correctness and the more-the-merrier, they-can-do-no-wrong approach to immigrants. "We have to admit," the mayor says, "that this was not a sweet and blameless youth, to put it mildly."
And if you're deeply into PC, that's the only way you put things...
The consensus has shifted across the board. In a country that can still seem a parody of itself — a magistrate ruled recently that an armed robber was entitled to a tax rebate on the cost of his gun as a tool of his trade — even the leader of the Green party has called for it to be illegal for Muslims to import spouses through arranged marriages. Integrated teams, drawn from the police, social welfare and housing offices, are used to locate and arrest illegals. Social welfare knows who is drawing benefit, housing offices have addresses, and police check for criminal records. The number of asylum seekers has been slashed from 43,000 to 10,000 a year, nine-tenths of whom have their applications rejected. Multiculturalism is damned. A recent poll found 80% in favour of stronger measures to get immigrants to integrate — and 40% said they "hoped" Muslims "no longer feel at home here".
How did this happen? The first open shift came in 2001, with 9/11. Frits Bolkestein, the leader of the VVD Conservative Liberals, had struck a chord in the 1990s with his insistence that immigrants conform to western culture, but immigration issues were largely the preserve of "racists" and "crypto-Nazis" on the political margins. Then came reports that the atrocities in New York and Washington had been greeted with cheers in parts of Rotterdam. Forum, the Dutch institute for multicultural development, commissioned an opinion poll of Dutch Muslims. It showed that 48% had "complete understanding" and 27% "some understanding" of the attacks. Overall, only 62% disapproved. Wim Kok, the then prime minister, expressed his shock. The poll was said to be "unbalanced".
#1
Interesting. Like the CDC science error. If you don't like the answer, the poll must be unbalanced. So...ask a different question! "How much did the Americans deserve 9/11? A lot/more than a little/not at all?" Maybe that WAS the question?
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/01/2005 11:30 Comments ||
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#2
The West has a tough time understanding the Islamic movement, because it is foreign to the base value system of the West, and is in fact, OPPOSED to the base value system of the West. Religion, and subsequent societal values stemming from an historical experience of religion, necessarily inform and dictate present behavior in a general sense--even if the religion under discussion is not adhered to or practiced any longer.
Holland's values are based in Christianity (though that has most likely been forgotten in the "post modern" age), and the immigrants' values generally come from Islam, as well as their countries of origin. It's not even important to the argument whether or not either group remembers where they got their values from and why they believe what they believe--at this point it's an established fact of life for both groups.
So, the Dutch want to pursue freedom, tolerance and multicultural perspectives as values (values based on 1000 years of the influence of Christianity)--even going so far as to supply "funding for mosques, religious schools, language courses and housing." The immigrants, however, want the polar opposite--freedom, tolerance and multiculturalism simply are NOT their values.
It was terribly silly, in the first place, to believe that the immigrants coming into Holland (or into England, or into the US, or into Switzerland) were ever coming there to pursue the values and societal dreams of Dutch society. While a minority of Moslems may indeed have wanted to escape the oppressive environments of their native lands, and were willing and happy to accept the norms of Western civilization, the rest don't. And at this point, it really must be bad there for 40% to say they "hoped" Muslims "no longer feel at home" in Holland. In other words, the Dutch opened their doors, thinking the Moslems would like to come there and be "Dutch." Then they found out that "this was not a sweet and blameless (Moslem) youth, to put it mildly," and they ignored important questions of crime, culture, and national identity, which should have been asked in the first place. But true to liberalism, even asking such questions would have labled such inquiry the venue of "racists" and "crypto-Nazis". (Hmm. Guess it goes without saying, that before you open the doors, it might be a good idea to find our exactly what's waiting on the other side.) Now "the newcomers already outnumber the native Dutch among under-20-year-olds." It's only a matter of time then, until native Dutch are in the minority. When that happens, the majority will be the ones deciding which values reign.
The same is true here in the US regarding the Moslem tactic of immigration and the setting up of Islamic enclaves--it's clearly all part of a larger strategy of jihad when they do it that way. Americans might think "Well, we believe in freedom of religion, so we must support them (or we will be in opposition to our own cherished value system)." True, but then, "the Moslems ain't doin'what they sez theys doin'--and that changes everything.
What's really a shame is that the Moslems who DO want to start a life based on what our values afford, and are willing to live by our value of freedom of religion, etc., can all to easily be lumped in with the rest--which leads to racism. The higher plane is to be able to decipher who's doing what, and support the good guys while ferreting out the bad apples.
BTW--I was once again appalled by the Moslem sense of entitlement and lack of personal responsibility and accountability. The lady backed into the guy that stole her bag. Instead of saying, "Well, he kinda got what he deserved," the Moslems make the thief into a martyr JUST BECAUSE HE'S MOSLEM. This kind of mindset is very receptive to facist/toltalitarian/socialist politcal models that characterize Moslem world. Hopefully, we'll see more of what we're seeing in Iraq and Lebanon--in some cases, even the Moslems have had enough.
Something that's funny to me (well, not funny, really) is that without understanding the entire context of the origin of of the value system one is operating within, it happens that the vague application of the values without context, leads to a fog of lunacy--like thinking everything will be peachy if we're just "nice" to others. This Pollyanish view is not supported in the greater and specific contexts of the actual belief and value system it purportedly came from.
#3
Then came reports that the atrocities in New York and Washington had been greeted with cheers in parts of Rotterdam. Forum, the Dutch institute for multicultural development, commissioned an opinion poll of Dutch Muslims. It showed that 48% had "complete understanding" and 27% "some understanding" of the attacks. Overall, only 62% disapproved. Wim Kok, the then prime minister, expressed his shock. The poll was said to be "unbalanced".
Wimmy was the only thing unbalanced there because he was blind to the truth about the way the Islamonuts think...
Yup. I think that old Pym Fortuyn was ahead of his time. On Laura Ingraham this AM they were discussing this very subject. How many native Dutch are leaving Europe to come to the US, go to Australia, etc.
With the expulsion of some magic mullahs from Holland last week, it looks as though Holland my explode, and sooner rather than later.
#4
Perhaps instead of welcoming the Dutch and others who want to escape the colonization of their homeland, we should turn them away. Make them go back home and fight for their country instead of cowering behind us cowboys and our military.
Posted by: Laurence of the Rats ||
03/01/2005 13:32 Comments ||
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The European Commission has appealed for the Lebanese parliamentary elections to go ahead as scheduled, following the resignation of Prime Minister Umar Karami's government. "I hope that the situation in Lebanon remains calm and the channels of dialogue between the different political groups open," EU external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said in a statement. She encouraged political continuity among the various parties following the resignation of the entire government.
Karami himself resigned on Monday in the face of mass protests taking place in Lebanon, bringing to a head a political crisis sparked by the murder two weeks ago of his predecessor Rafiq al-Hariri. The announcement was greeted with loud applause in the national assembly in Beirut, where the opposition had been seeking a vote of no confidence in Karami's four-month-old government. "In this difficult period Lebanon is facing after the tragic events of 14 February it is important for parliamentary elections to take place as planned in May," Ferrero-Waldner said. "These forthcoming elections should be held in accordance with a free and fair electoral process, without any foreign interference or influence, and under the sovereign control of the Lebanese authorities," she said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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...The closeness of the war, coupled with the state's penchant for taking on social causes, helps explain why a group of activists has gotten enough signatures here and in some 50 other Vermont communities to place resolutions about Iraq on the agendas of their Town Meetings, a New England ritual as local as tapped maple trees and as old as the American Revolution. On Tuesday, one-fifth of Vermont towns will consider what role the Vermont National Guard should play in the war, and whether American troops should be withdrawn. Foes call the resolution so much "poppycock," and complain activists have hijacked an annual event they say is better suited to debate on snowplows and school roof repairs. But to supporters, the war in Iraq is the essence of town business: It's about the men and women who live, work, and raise families in the community...
Posted by: Anonymoose ||
03/01/2005 11:45:03 AM ||
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#1
itâs about the men and women who live, work, and raise families in the community... Really? I thought it was about the men and women who are actually serving.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
03/01/2005 12:27 Comments ||
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#2
But to supporters, the war in Iraq is the essence of town business
No, it's the essence of national security. And these people have the nerve to call us stupid and ignorant?
#3
heh! These are the kind of people I live around. I think they got them to pass one of those resolutions around here. Maybe it didn't pass - but I remember reading in the Sun that it was presented.
The ripple effect created when Canada said 'no' to signing on to U.S. missile defence seems to have penetrated deeper south of the border than first believed.
CTV News has learned that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was so displeased by Canada's decision to opt out of the program that she's postponed a planned visit to Ottawa in mid-April.
This contradicts Ottawa's official line that U.S.-Canada relations are proceeding smoothly after Prime Minister Paul Martin announced last week that Canada won't be a part of the controversial ballistic missile defence (BMD) program.
A senior U.S. State Department official, who was on board a London-bound flight with Rice, confirmed to CTV News that the cancellation of the Canadian visit was a direct consequence of Martin's decision.
Washington State Department spokesman Adam Ereli took a softer line, saying there's still discussion going on about the timing of the meeting, and that "it'll happen when the stars are all aligned in the right way."
That could take a very long time, reports Clark. He adds that it wasn't just that Martin opted out of the American plan but the way in which he did it.
Martin has sent signals in the past that he was in favour of Washington's missile defence program.
"I think our sovereignty depends on our being at the table when discussions are taking place about the defence of North America," he said about a year-and-a-half ago.
And last fall, Defence Minister Bill Graham made statements indicating it would be a serious mistake for the government not to be at the table with the Americans on the issue of missile defence.
But on Thursday, Martin announced: "BMD is not where we will concentrate our efforts. Instead, we will act both alone and with our neighbours on defence priorities outlined in (the) budget."
Chris Sands of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies says that the result of Martin's backtracking on the issue could have negative consequences for Canada-U.S. relations.
"The one thing with Bush, the one thing you don't do with him is double-talk him. You tell him what you think," he tells CTV News.
Paul Cellucci, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, says American anger and astonishment at Canada's decision runs deep.
"As I said last week, I don't understand why Canada would give up its seat at the table, given our history of working together in the defence of North America, particularly at NORAD. But that was a decision for Canada," he tells CTV News.
Rice is currently in London at a conference of Palestinian reforms, as is Canada's Foreign Minister, Pierre Pettigrew.
An official in Pettigrew's office told CTV News that the minister will try to have a private word with Rice and perhaps even extend another invitation to Ottawa.
The secretary of state's planned visit to Canada's capital was supposed to actually be a follow-up trip to another meeting.
The White House has confirmed with CTV News that there will be a summit between Martin, Bush and Mexican President Vincente Fox in Mexico City on March 23.
But with no follow-up, says Clark, "it begs the question: how seriously are Canada's concerns going to be taken at that summit?
"Bush is very frustrated with Canada and the way Canadians are making their decisions, about everything from Iraq to missile defence," says Clark, adding that consequences of Martin's decision could impact trade areas such as softwood lumber.
One analyst in Washington says Canada's rejection of missile defence is a historic shift in its relationship with the U.S. and could have deep, unforeseen results.
Dwight Mason, former chairman of the American section of the Canada-U.S. Permanent Joint Board on Defense, said one impact will come next year when the Norad agreement comes up for renewal.
"The decision to opt out of missile defence is an abandonment of some Canadian sovereignty," he writes.
This wasn't the first time that Canada has angered the U.S. in recent years.
Two years ago, then prime minister Jean Chretien decided Canada would not join the American-led coalition to invade Iraq.
Bush promptly reacted by cancelling a visit to Ottawa, saying he was too busy with the war in Iraq to address a planned joint session of parliament in May, 2003.
Posted by: tipper ||
03/01/2005 1:20:54 AM ||
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#1
some Canadians get off on flipping off America - but the end result means that our airspace will be protected and theirs will not. Cutting off your nose to spite your face, as my mom used to say.
#2
"itâll happen when the stars are all aligned in the right way."
The next planetary alignment is in 500 years. Call me when it happens.
Posted by: Adam Ereli ||
03/01/2005 7:53 Comments ||
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#3
There is no longer any compelling reason to source military (e.g. Strykers) equipment from Canada. Move the production back to the US. Future contracts should give as much consideration to Canadian firms as is given France or Argentina.
Posted by: ed ||
03/01/2005 7:58 Comments ||
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#4
The whole deal on Canadians ranting the anti-american thing is so boring. Most of them are really nice people but they do have a cadre of ejits (including alot of politicians) who love the general and generally inarticulate rants about their southern neighbors. I'd say, make it known who the ejits are and then give them appropriate and persistent verbal SH_T should they or their families dare to come here! One female MP comes to mind for her thoughtfull dribble about Americans. You can google the topic, generally and find that mental midget pretty easily. Send her and email inviting her to your neighborhood for a "town meeting" and an opportunity to learn about the people she regularly defames. My chumpies could give her a quick and concise tutorial in heartfelt indignation and the best ways to express it. She could learn something. PS I didn't even vote for Bush!
#5
They are more than useful idiots. The country is controlled by Quebecois politicians and it is becoming an ally of the frogs. It is becoming a department of frogistan.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
03/01/2005 9:44 Comments ||
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#6
Of course, Rice isn't calling for "regime change" in Canada; but I don't suppose the US would be terribly upset by a "regime change", there.
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/01/2005 11:00 Comments ||
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#8
I'm 1/2 tempted to email their embassy and tell them I respect PM Martin's wish for sovereignty and I and my family will respect it. We will not violate Canada's airspace or landmass which is disappointing, because we were thinking about the Vancouver Olympics, but....that's their right.
#9
Let's tone down the Canada bashing please. My inner cannuck is becoming upset. Quebec bashing can continue apace. My inner quebecois can take it and has some choice words for you all in joual.
I'd like to see some informed speculation as to why the backtracking occurred. The Liberals have got a good handle on what will fly and won't within the base. Doesn't make a lot of sense for the Liberal party leadership to line up (more or less) behind participating in missile defense, then stand us up at the alter. Is the rejection political expediency? Or has the Liberal leadership convinced itself this is a point of principal, and if so, what's the principal?
If NORAD survives, don't expect to see a Canadian ever again in operational control.
#11
Norad is safe and should remain so. It is Canada's real contribution to BMD. As far as I can see the whole thing is primarily for domestic consumption to deflect attention from a real increase in defence spending from non-existent to pathetic. Nonetheless, there should be Canuck bashing and Quebecois bashing. The sooner the Canucks get fed up with the Quebecois, the sooner the problem gets fixed, either in an Anglosphere Canada or a dissolved Canada. I could care less which. Tell the frogs to take a flying...
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
03/01/2005 11:25 Comments ||
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#12
CL - no offense meant to the normal folks of Canada - and we have enough loonies on our own side of the border that we understand your plight. When you hear us bashing "Canadians" just think of it as if we were bashing our own homegrown moonbats.
#13
The ripple effect created when Canada said ânoâ to signing on to U.S. missile defence seems to have penetrated deeper south of the border than first believed.
CTV News has learned that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was so displeased by Canadaâs decision to opt out of the program that sheâs postponed a planned visit to Ottawa in mid-April.
There's a new woman in town, folks, and things are looking up for us. That they may be looking down for the Canadian Government is an additional benefit...
#14
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was so displeased by Canadaâs decision to opt out of the program that sheâs postponed a planned visit to Ottawa in mid-April.
#15
... U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was so displeased by Canadaâs decision to opt out of the program that sheâs postponed a planned visit to Ottawa in mid-April.
Canada, this is Egypt. You two have something in common....
The annual report on human rights released by the State Department on Monday said that Iraqi government topped the list for human rights abuses last year that included torture, rape and illegal detentions after interim administration took charge in June. The twats are still p. o. ed that DOD got to run CAP instead of State. Condi: clean up the mess at Foggy Bottom!
It cited reports of arbitrary deprivation of life, torture, impunity, poor prison conditions and arbitrary arrest and detention. And Kimmy doesn't do any of that "Maddie told me so." The report, however, said the Iraqis respected human rights, but serious problems remained as the government and US-led forces fought a violent insurgency. Did anyone tell State it is a war zone?
The State Department also criticized countries like North Korea, Syria and Iran, and US allies, including Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan for poor showings on human rights issues.
Among the worst abuses cited in the report were torture in Syria, serious abuses in China and the crisis in Sudan, where a government-backed militia is killing civilians. North Korea was criticized as one of the world's most brutal regimes, while Egypt and Iran were also condemned for their record on human rights. "But they all pale in comparison to the barbarity in Iraq," said J. Smedley Smegma, State Department spokeseunuch.
''What it shows is that we don't look the other way,'' a State Department official said with a Eddie Haskell "Aren't I clever?" smirk on his puss. ''There are countries we support and that are friends, and when they have practices that don't meet international standards, we don't hesitate to call a spade a spade racist.,'' he said.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
03/01/2005 6:39:43 PM ||
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Header: Iraq tops list for 2004 human rights abuses
This header is a lie. Iraq is mentioned, but does not top the list.
Severely EFL The ATM card of slain Jersey City Heights resident Hossam Armanious was used several times in the week after his death to withdraw thousands of dollars from his bank account, Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio said yesterday. The withdrawals, made on several occasions from banks in the Jersey City Heights and in mid-town Manhattan, continued for up to a week after the bodies of Armanious, his wife, Amal Garas, and their daughters, Sylvia and Monica, were found inside their Oakland Avenue apartment on Jan. 14.
The discovery of the ATM withdrawals "certainly corroborates" the theory that the slayings took place during a robbery, DeFazio said. "That would be the inference based on the circumstances," he said. Many ATMs are equipped with video cameras, but DeFazio declined to say whether investigators had obtained photos or video of the person, or people, who used Armanious' card. He also would not say when investigators first discovered the ATM card had been used.
#4
Why not release any photo's? I'm sure the newspaper must have them?
Andrea Jackson
Posted by: Andrea Jackson ||
03/01/2005 21:08 Comments ||
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#5
If they have pictures then they have suspects. If there are suspects then they can be interrogated for their connections to terror. Once we establish the connections to terror and possibly burn a cell or two (maybe co-opt) then we hang them out to dry.
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
03/01/2005 21:44 Comments ||
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#6
Jame - I'm cynical, humor me, but if the perp sturn out to be Arab muslims or CAIR understudies, we'll get the watered-down version. We might get up in arms or sumpthin'!
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/01/2005 21:48 Comments ||
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#7
Frank- I would dearly love to have my first mission as a newly commissioned occifer (looking at 2006) to be to go and clean out some of the suburbs of NJ. But there are times we must simply sincerely hope that people like the FBI (who should be the CONUS agency concerned) are doing good things quietly.
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
03/01/2005 22:05 Comments ||
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#8
Count on this to remain buried. The MSM has every interest in keep what ever the facts of this case are hidden away. The Democratic controled state of New Jersey will go to any lenght to hide any information that this may have been an act carried out by followers of allan.
#9
SPOD, right on. Look how the MSM covered for their allies after that Russian school invasion. They simply refused to admit that it was done by Islamic terrorists (and not simple 'hostage-takers') and never mention the bayonetted babies or gang-raped schoolgirls.
It's not even spring yet, but a long-frozen political order seems to be cracking all over the Middle East. Cautious hopes for something new and better are stirring along the Tigris and the Nile, the elegant boulevards of Beirut, and the impoverished towns of the Gaza Strip. It is far too soon for any certainties about ultimate outcomes. In Iraq, a brutal insurgency still competes for headlines with post-election democratic maneuvering. Yesterday a suicide bomber plowed into a crowd of Iraqi police and Army recruits, killing at least 122 people - the largest death toll in a single such bombing since the American invasion nearly two years ago. And the Palestinian terrorists who blew up a Tel Aviv nightclub last Friday underscored the continuing fragility of what has now been almost two months of steady political and diplomatic progress between Israelis and Palestinians.
Still, this has so far been a year of heartening surprises - each one remarkable in itself, and taken together truly astonishing. The Bush administration is entitled to claim a healthy share of the credit for many of these advances. It boldly proclaimed the cause of Middle East democracy at a time when few in the West thought it had any realistic chance. And for all the negative consequences that flowed from the American invasion of Iraq, there could have been no democratic elections there this January if Saddam Hussein had still been in power. Washington's challenge now lies in finding ways to nurture and encourage these still fragile trends without smothering them in a triumphalist embrace.
Lebanon's political reawakening took a significant new turn yesterday when popular protests brought down the pro-Syrian government of Prime Minister Omar Karami. Syria's occupation of Lebanon, nearly three decades long, started tottering after the Feb. 14 assassination of the country's leading independent politician, the former prime minister Rafik Hariri. If Damascus had a hand in this murder, as many Lebanese suspect, it had a boomerang effect on Lebanon's politics. Instead of intimidating critics of Syria's dominant role, it inflamed them. To stem the growing backlash over the Hariri murder, last week Syria announced its intentions to pull back its occupation forces to a region near the border - although without offering any firm timetable. Yesterday, with protests continuing, the pro-Syrian cabinet resigned. Washington, in an unusual alliance with France, continues to press for full compliance with the Security Council's demand for an early and complete Syrian withdrawal. That needs to happen promptly. Once Syria is gone, Hezbollah, which has engaged in international terrorism under Syrian protection, must either confine itself to peaceful political activity or be shut down.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Matt ||
03/01/2005 11:41 ||
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The closing statement is ironic. "The wonder is less that a new political restlessness is finally visible, but that it took so long to break through the ice." And just HOW did YOU contribute to the thaw, NYT?
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/01/2005 12:30 Comments ||
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#2
The wonder is less that a new political restlessness is finally visible, but that it took so long to break through the ice.
Your anti-American editorials notwithstanding, of course...
#3
Looks like Exec Editor Bill Keller is starting to throw his weight around. Will lefty OpEd page Editor Gail Collins still have her job a year from now?
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/01/2005 13:43 Comments ||
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#6
"And for all the negative consequences that flowed from the American invasion of Iraq, there could have been no democratic elections there this January if Saddam Hussein had still been in power."
As someone on Rantburg has said before, "I'll take Blinding Glimpses of the Obvious for $500."
[sarcasm = 1]Masterful use of understatement.[sarcasm = 0]
It was 12:18 p.m. on Feb. 26, 1993, lunchtime, when the van exploded. The massive bomb rattled the World Trade Center, leaving a giant crater in the underground garage. Six people were killed, and more than 1,000 were wounded. At the time, it was the worst act of terrorism ever committed on American soil. Three Islamic extremists were among those convicted, each sentenced to more than 100 years in prison. Former prosecutor Andy McCarthy convicted others involved in the attack. "It's difficult to imagine people who are more evil or inclined to do more mass homicide," says McCarthy.
So the men were sent to America's most secure federal prisons, eventually ending up at Supermax in Colorado, supposedly unable to do further harm. Or so we thought. Letters and articles obtained by NBC News show that while behind bars, the 1993 bombers continued their terrorist activities. They wrote letters to other suspected terrorists and brazenly praised Osama bin Laden in Arabic newspapers.
According to confidential Spanish court documents obtained by NBC, at least 14 letters went back and forth between the World Trade Center bombers and a Spanish terror cell. In February 2003, bomber Mohammed Salameh writes: "Oh God! Make us live with happiness, make us die as martyrs, may we be united on the Day of Judgment." The recipient, Mohamed Achraf, later allegedly led a plot to blow up the National Justice Building in Madrid and is awaiting trial.
In July 2002, a letter Salameh sent from prison is published in the Al-Quds newspaper, proclaiming "Osama Bin Laden is my hero of this generation."
"He was exhorting acts of terrorism and helping recruit would-be terrorists for the jihad," says McCarthy, "from inside an American prison."
The letters to the bombers spoke of the need to "terminate the infidels" and said, "The Muslims don't have any option other than jihad."
Among those corresponding is a man charged with recruiting suicide operatives in Spain. Spanish officials accuse him of using letters to and from the U.S. bombers as a recruiting tool. All this while the Bureau of Prisons reassured the public that terrorists were under control. "We have been managing inmates with ties to terrorism for over a decade by confining them in secure conditions and monitoring their communications closely," said Harley Lappin, the Bureau of Prisons director, in October 2003.
Today, federal prison officials refuse to comment directly on what other law enforcement officials call a horrible lapse, saying only that inmates' letters are "monitored" and "inspected." So how did this happen? Federal officials tell NBC that the Justice Department failed to restrict communications to and from the three bombers because key officials didn't consider them all that dangerous.
Michael Macko lost his father, Bill, in the trade center bombing and attended the 12th anniversary memorial on Feb. 26. "If they are encouraging acts of terrorism internationally, how do we know they're not encouraging acts of terrorism right here on U.S. soil?" asks Macko.
That's just one of the many questions now being scrutinized by the Justice Department.
This article starring:
Former prosecutor Andy McCarthy
Harley Lappin, the Bureau of Prisons director
MOHAMED ACHRAF
al-Qaeda
MOHAMED SALAMEH
al-Qaeda
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 2:12:56 AM ||
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#1
I was wondering if they didn't have translators or if the translators were corrupt.
because key officials didnât consider them all that dangerous. That's stupid enough to be a firing offense.
MEXICO CITY - Mexico will pursue legal action against plans by a US citizens' group to patrol the US-Mexican border in search of illegal immigrants, the country's foreign minister said on Monday. Luis Ernesto Derbez said he asked lawyers in Los Angeles to draw up a legal strategy to fight the Arizona-based initiative called "the MinuteMan Project" that has signed up hundreds of volunteers for border patrols. "We are going to attack by all legal means," Derbez told a news conference. "We are presenting the reasons why we consider this action to be incorrect and illegal from the point of view not only of our government but also under US law."
Our citizens have a right to peaceful assembly, even if it's forty miles out in the middle of an Arizona desert. We also have the right -- and obligation -- to assist law enforcement.
Derbez said he would discuss the issue with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice when she visits Mexico on March 10. Volunteers from at least 29 states plan to camp out in April on ranches and public land to spot and report illegal immigrants to the US Border Patrol.
The weak link is the Border Patrol -- overworked, undermanned, underfunded and too hide-bound in its ways.
Migration is a prickly issue for Mexico, where the government is growing skeptical US President George W. Bush will be able to deliver on his promise of a new migration accord to enable legal, safe and orderly migration.
A lawsuit won't make it any easier.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/01/2005 12:19:35 AM ||
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That's it Luis, go cry to choco-beaurocrats in Brussels, the UN, whoever. I couldn't give a rat's @$$ about what you think of our laws.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
03/01/2005 1:04 Comments ||
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#4
Just goes to show how preposterous this situation has become, a foreign government taking legal action against American citizens trying to keep Illegal immigrants out of our country⦠and the foreign government will have their day in court.
WHY??
Posted by: Big Sarge ||
03/01/2005 5:48 Comments ||
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#5
yawn. They might get lucky with the 9th Circus Ct. but unless they plan to go to war with us this is only going to backfire on them by getting a ruling that will clarify the Minutemen's rights.
#6
Just a bunch of folks"out for a stroll and enjoying the beauty of the Sonoran Desert"nothing to get excited about(pay no mind to those NVG's)Saw a report last night that some goofballs are trying to ban the sell of Stunguns to civilians.How stupid is that?I can by a 10mm Glock,but they do not want me to be able to own a stungun,sheesh,bunch wankers.
#7
It's pretty obvious that the Mexicans think they have sovereignity on both sides of the border.
The US has been too nice and tolerant with Mexicans for so long that they now have contempt for the US. The only way relations can work is for the US to slap the Mexicans down hard if they even think of violating US sovereignity. Can you imagine the furor in Mexico if the US tried such a move.
Build the Friendship Fence, mine it, and shoot to kill anyone who tries to cross it.
Posted by: ed ||
03/01/2005 8:17 Comments ||
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#8
Unfortunately, we have some useful idiots on our side of the border who are quite willing to help us lose.
#9
Annex Mexico - send the federals south to hang these corrupt politicians and their drug lord sponsors. Every set of feet crossing our southern border is another vote to Annex!! The Commonwealth of Mexico, soon!
#11
Migration is a prickly issue for Mexico, where the government is growing skeptical US President George W. Bush will be able to deliver on his promise of a new migration accord to enable legal, safe and orderly migration
This is wishful thinking. There is no compelling reason for the US to allow "migration." These people don't want to become US citizens. They just want to reverse the results of the 1848 war. They are like the Palestinians that want the land back after someone else has made it into a garden. Drop leaflets saying that anyone illegally crossing the border will be shot and killed and then put armed Predators along the border. Tell Mexico that we are just doing what they do to anyone trying to cross THEIR southern border illegally.
#12
Lol ... does "It's our country, fair and square" a viable slogan?
I totally agree with everyone here and with the Minutemen. I figure though that Newman is either deluded or simply pimping himself for brownie points ...
#13
who do these whiney Mexicans think they are, do they think they can dictate US policy within it's own sovergn boundaries with legal action. This would be laughable if lawyers these days didnt have so much clout to warp the rule of law to their own agendas.
#20
(1) Seal the border solid. Let the Marines and Army train on interdicting illegals in the desert as practice for deployment in Iraq. Retask the DEA and ATF into border patrol duties.
(2) Pay the State Government for border protection services and pass a law that withholds Highway Funds from states that don't take the illegal issue seriously.
(3) Task the IRS with tracking down companies that hire illegals. If they even think you hire illegals they audity you.
(4) Reframe the arguement as pro-Mexican people. The US has acted as a safety valve for decades. The illegals have brought money back to Mexico and allowed the Mexican government to avoid needed reform. Because of our well meaning intentioned policy millions of millions of hardworking Mexicans living in a nation wealthy with minerals and oil have been living in abject poverty. This cannot stand. By doing this any complaints from the left and the Mexican government can be deflected as greedy, corrupt, or racist.
With the safety valve shut off Mexico will have to reform or face revolution. Either way it's got to be better than it is now.
#21
RJS: Speaking of your #3, I saw somewhere today that there's a bill routing through the House that allows any EMPLOYEE of a company to sue the company for hiring illegals. Think of it as reverse (anti) affirmative action for illegals. I think it could have feet...especially the SW States' Reps. I think border security is priority #1 for Dept. of Homeland Sec.
Posted by: BA ||
03/01/2005 13:22 Comments ||
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#22
wow! That would have a huge impact. One disgruntled employee and thousands of dollars of fines.
#23
There is only one reason that illegal immigration is allowed to continue and that is the flow of low cost labor. Putting pressure on the employer was tried in the late 80's and it failed miserabley. Choking off the demand is the only way to stop the situation. I am hugely sceptical that is going to happen.
#24
Another way to frame the arguement is that previously many of the jobs taken up by illegals were handled by African Americans (Janitorial, farm, etc). By promoting illegal immigration the paychecks for those jobs have plummetted to the point that they are not really respectable jobs anymore. Higher unemployment rates in the African American community are the result.
Realistically we won't see any change until (a) another attack (b) 2008 elections when Bush is gone and the Republican candidate position is fought over.
#27
Reframe the argument as pro-Mexican people
Illegal immigration hurts honest, legal immigrant workmen harder than anyone. These folks need to be put front and center to make our case.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
03/01/2005 14:37 Comments ||
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#29
deliver on his promise of a new migration accord to enable legal, safe and orderly migration.
There IS a legal, safe, and orderly immigration policy -- it is written into the current immigration laws. Thousands of people use it every day - hundreds of thousands (if not millions) are waiting for their 'turn' to use it even as we speak.
Giving mexicans a 'special' category (as Bush is trying to do) is truely racist.
#31
I know Pancho Tequila. He's a midget who works in a bar in Guadalajara (I think. It's kind of foggy in my brain). He wears cartridge belts crossed over his chest that hold shot glasses and he pours you a shot glass full of tequila for a fee. My head still hurts.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/01/2005 15:24 Comments ||
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#32
CF-I'm with you. We don't need a separate category of immigration for Mexicans or anyone else; we are supposed to have the same laws for everybody. (That's the one way you know you've emigrated to America.)
#33
(b) but the Democrats might own the issue by then.
As long as it creates debate. Right now both parties have their heads in the sand as they hope for Latino votes. If the Democrats came out on the right side of this issue, and they found someone strong on foreign policy they might earn my vote.
I'm not sure they've got anyone like that though, nor will they until they hit rock bottom in 2006 or later.
#37
fellow San Diegan - I sympathize. The Mexican cops don't have the budget for those Suburbans, SUV's Jeeps etc. - where do you think they come from? - I could search the SD paper's archives and come up with a dozen incidents where Mex cops were driving vehicles stolen in the US
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/01/2005 18:14 Comments ||
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#38
This from the Minutemens SOP:
If challenged, you will physically remove yourself from the situation. At this point 'tis better to retreat and preserve the ability to return and fight another day. The idea is for your sidearm to remain holstered for the duration of your visit. There will be absolutely no need to ever remove your firearm from its holster - not for cleaning, not for show-and-tell, not for any reason. By never removing the firearm from the holster, never keeping it chambered and always keeping the safety on and keeping your hands away from it, there can be no accidents. End of discussion. Remove the firearm from the holster for any reason, and your group members will likely send you on your way back home.
Stun guns, mace, pepper spray are alternatives for personal safety, but remember you have agreed to abide by a no contact, no engagement policy, so your safety will never be an issue. Right?
Heh.
WASHINGTON - Airline passengers can no longer bring cigarette lighters onto planes or in any secure areas, the Homeland Security Department announced. Lighters were added to the prohibited items list because of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act, which President George W. Bush signed on Dec. 17.
The Transportation Security Administration, the agency charged with prohibiting dangerous items on aircraft, said Monday that lighters will be banned from planes and areas beyond security checkpoints at airports. "By creating policy to add lighters to the Prohibited Items List we are closing a potential vulnerability in air travel security," said Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security Rear Adm. David M. Stone.
The TSA said butane, absorbed-fuel (Zippo-type), electric/battery-powered and matches concealed in shoes novelty lighters were included in the ban. The rule will be enforced beginning April 14.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/01/2005 12:17:42 AM ||
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#1
That is a tad too far. I am a smoker. If I do transfers on my trip, how I am going to lit a smoke? Can I still carry matches?
#2
You can make a crude but potentially damaging incendary out of a butane lighter. Curiously about a year ago I was forced to take matches out of my checked luggage (on an Emirates flight)and put them in my hand luggage. I have no idea why.
#4
When I smoked many years ago, I use to occasionally bring along a small polished parabolic mirror novelty item (don't remember what kind of metal it was made of) that had a small flip-up doodad in the middle that could hold a cigarette. Stick the cigarette in, point the mirror at the sun, and the smoke would be lit in under ten seconds.
#5
Bomb-a-rama, that's truly remarkable. The only glitch is that there are airports that do not have readily accessible opening for sunrays to pass through. I should also skip potentially cloudy days in my travel plans, eh? ;-)
#8
come one now, this is hardly a major inconvenience to close a loophole in security. Suck it up and grab a pack of matches from the closest airport bar.
#9
Years ago,a wielder at one of the local copper mines was useing a cutting torch,a piece of slag landed on a butane lighter in his pants pocket.Damn near blew his leg off.
#11
I prefer the use of a butane lighter to an oxy-acetylene torch to light my cigarettes . The extra baggage with a oxy-acetylene torch just infuriates airport security and knackers me out carrying the damn thing :P but hey its a cool fashion accessory guarenteed to impress the ladies in the perfume shop.
#12
2b - you won't find matches in an airport bar at JFK or LaGuardia. They've banned smoking.
This pisses me off, since I'm a smoker. But I heard somewhere that they will still allow you to carry matches. Just put your lighter in your checked bag.
It's all arbitrary anyways. I once saw some guy getting on a plane with a knife. Granted, it was "only" a serrated butter knife, which he told the HSA person he needed to cut the cheese he had in his bag (which he showed her). She let him take the knife onto the plane.
#13
That's reassuring. Was he wearing a turban, or was she?
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
03/01/2005 11:27 Comments ||
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they better not come for my redmans, i hate asking for a spit cup tho. if ima ever on a hijack plane first thing ima do is go for the eyes of the leader
UNITED NATIONS — With U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan next up for review by Paul Volcker's inquiry into the Oil-for-Food scandal, a crucial question is whether Volcker will expand upon information tying the scandal directly to the U.N. chief's office — by way of Annan's second-in command, Louise Frechette.
Four years into the seven-year Oil-for-Food program, with graft and mismanagement by then rampant, Frechette intervened directly by telephone to stop United Nations auditors from forwarding their investigations to the U.N. Security Council. This detail was buried on page 186 of the 219-page interim report Volcker's Independent Inquiry Committee released Feb. 3.
This decision from within Annan's office left only the Secretariat privy to the specifics of the waste, bungling and contractual breaches detailed by U.N. internal auditors in dozens of damning reports. The extent of what Annan's office knew was not available either to the Security Council or the public until Congress finally forced the issue and the United Nations produced the reports in conjunction with a Volcker "briefing paper" in January.
Continued on Page 49
#1
Hmmm.... Canadian. With a French name. And Chretien and Chiraq are related by marriage. As are many, many of the French Canadians, often many times over.
#2
I don't see any comments from Mike Sylwester. This seems on the surface to be very damning. I lost any confidence in the UN when the "Peacekeepers" were withdrawn from the Sinai back in 1973 and I believe it has gone downhill from there.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/01/2005 21:57 Comments ||
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#3
Once again our "friends" to the north have been helpful. One wonders how many Iraqi people might be alive today if not for Ms. Frechette's phone call. With helpful persons like this one needs no enemies.
The "important US citizens" that met with Kofi in New York early this year to council bear a close inspection as well.
#4
Among other things, that audit found that Sevan had failed to hold any management meetings of his Oil-for-Food team for the previous two years. It remains to be explained how that fact had escaped the attention of Sevanâs direct supervisor, Deputy Secretary-General Louise Frechette, or that of Kofi Annan himself.
I'm sure a suitable excuse will be found and put forth. And it'll likely be one that puts the lion's share (if not all) of the blame on someone else besides Goo-fi.
Does it not mean when income triples that some kind of fraud could be taking place, and therefore warrent an investigation by the FBI? We are now privvy to information that fraud could have taken place on US soil and to ignore such fraud is abdicating responsibilities mandated to US Attornies?
I know the author of this piece. He works for Dr. Gunaratna and he's a pretty smart guy.
The recent car bombing in Thailand that killed five people and wounded more than 44 has once again highlighted the threat of terrorism in Southeast Asia. Though much has been written about the dangers posed by terrorist groups in Southeast Asia, there is hardly any analysis of the US counter-terrorism strategy in the region, which has been dubbed by the George W Bush administration as the "second front on the war on terror".
Is America winning the second front on the "war on terror"? The answer appears to be mixed. It is true that with American's assistance and support, Southeast Asian countries have been successful in eliminating terrorist networks in the region; nevertheless, American's unilateral actions, such as the war in Iraq, have alienated Muslim populations within Southeast Asia, thereby generating the "political oxygen" that militant radicals exploit to reinforce their ideology. Thus, though America is succeeding in the military dimension of the "war on terror", it appears to be losing the ideological one. However, before we continue it would be prudent to know what the terrorism threat is in Southeast Asia.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 2:01:40 AM ||
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#1
I don't give a damn about winning the "hearts and minds" of Muslim communities in that region or anyplace else. Those raghead bastards need to learn that THEY need to be worried about "shock and awe" sending them and their ilk back to Allan early if they start some crap.
Posted by: mac ||
03/01/2005 6:34 Comments ||
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he's a smart guy. I don't know Dan, seems to me like he's infected with the PC brain rot to me.
"For example, the US should spearhead international efforts to assist poorer Southeast Asian countries in providing programs aimed in alleviating poverty and unemployment. Implementing such polices would no doubt reduce discontent among disgruntled communities and undercut the appeal of the terroristâs ideology.
There is absolutely no evidence to show that this is what fuels terrorism. Funding the madrassas to spew hate, yes. Combating poverty - no.
#3
Agreed 2b most cell leaders and in some cases homicide bombers are well educated and from the societies elite. There is a fundamental issue with Islam - ie apparently the religon does not come out explicitly in denouncing murder and suicide like say ... Christianity.
#4
I used to fall for the old argument of it's because they're not educated or well off financially. But after 9/11, I've seen the opposite. The jihadis who go to their death and actually carry out binny's/Paleo's wishes are of two types: (1) well educated (especially in their religion) and well off (see the 19 9/11 hijackers), or (2) ordinary people who've been shamed into committing suicide (see the women who've been caught in adultry blowing up Joooos. Recently, a third type's been added...the mentally retarded (see the autistic boy the jihadis sent to kill those in line to vote in Iraq on Jan. 30). NONE of these have to do with their financial situation (and in the case of #1, is actually counter to the "poor/opressed" argument). I'd also say that while some exceptions to the educated argument might exist, I'd say the one thing they're all educated in is their DEATH CULT.
Posted by: BA ||
03/01/2005 11:56 Comments ||
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"Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute."
TIME: Can you tell me when you will you be out of Lebanon?
ASSAD: Out completely?
TIME: Yes.
ASSAD: Actually, our discussion should be with Terji Roed-Larsen, United Nations envoy, who is coming back in March. It [withdrawal] should be very soon and maybe in the next few months. Not after that. I can't give you a technical answer. The point is the next few months.
TIME: Could you give me a timetable?
ASSAD: It's a technical issue, not political. I could not say we could do it in two months because I have not had the meeting with the army people. They may say it will take six months. You need to prepare when you bring your army back to your country. You need to prepare where you will put the troops.
There are two factors. The first is security in Lebanon. The security in Lebanon is much better than before. They have an army, they have a state, they have institutions. The second thing, which is related to Syria, is that after withdrawing we have to protect our border. We need to talk about our borders, because when Israel invaded in 1982, they reached that point. It was very close to Damascus. So we will need [fortifications for the troops] along the border with Lebanon.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
03/01/2005 5:20:47 PM ||
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Unless, of course, the pseudo-SPETZNATZ Mad Mullahs and the Norkies fail this year to entice Dubya to militarily accomodate their 'I demand to be attacked/destroyed", WOT/Cuba = Dubya/JFK Assassination mentality of desperation and PC, aka "We love Hillary"!
Frontpage Interview's guests today are Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi and her husband Elio Bonazzi. Both are writers, activists and Middle East pundits.
Excerpt:
FP: In what ways do you think that the West fails to understand Iran?
BZB & EB: ...
In many occasions, Westerners assume that everybody in the world shares their standard behavior; basically they project their mentality onto all counterparts. And here is where, in the case of Iran, they dramatically fail. The Islamist establishment that unfortunately today governs that country is not interested in making the best possible deal with the West. Its only interest is the destruction of the infidels and their corrupt world.
While in the West the act of engagement is absolutely neutral, and doesn't imply giving in, but simply to sit down and negotiate, in the mentality of the mullahs to engage basically means that the counterpart proposing engagement feels weak, and tries to beg for a deal from an inferior position. Key for the EU3 to learn this.
...
Another sad example is the recent book by Ken Pollack titled "The Persian Puzzle." Mr. Pollack shows an encyclopedic knowledge of Iran and its history, definitely he knows more than even many of the well-educated Iranians. Yet, in spite of all his knowledge, he fails to grasp the basic concept that the only way to deal with the Islamist threat is to actively pursue regime change in Tehran; anything short of that is simply postponing the inevitable showdown, which will occur sooner or later. The sooner the better for the West, which would confront a regime that doesn't have yet a nuclear arsenal at his disposal.
Rest at link.
Posted by: ed ||
03/01/2005 10:12:02 AM ||
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Former President of Lebanon Amin Gemayel has no illusions about the reach of Syria's Baath Party regime. The veteran Christian leader blames Damascus for assassinating his brother in 1982, shortly after Bashir Gemayel's election as president of Lebanon. Amin took his brother's place, signed a U.S.-brokered peace deal with Israel and formally asked Syrian troops to exit Lebanon. Instead, the Syrian government supported Lebanese militia groups that drove U.S. peace-keeping troops out of Lebanon, and forced Gemayel to cancel his Israel agreement. Seventeen years after leaving office, Gemayel now believes that a Syrian withdrawal from his country is inevitable, as he explained to TIME Cairo Bureau Chief Scott MacLeod.
Interview follows
Posted by: ed ||
03/01/2005 9:57:10 AM ||
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British lawmaker and leading anti-war loonie campaigner George Galloway Monday expressed apprehension that US president George Bush (Junior) is not mindful about ''establishing democracies'' in the Middle East and Arab countries but is planning ''fresh attacks against Syria.,'' reports BSS. "The capitalistic imperialist forces led by the USA never took any action against the dictators in the Arab world but launched offensives against those dictators who did not obey their formula," the visiting UK lawmaker observed at a seminar at Dhaka Sheraton hotel.
The Centre for Democratic Practice (CDP) organized the seminar titled "Crisis in current politics." CDP convenor Mahbubur Rob Sadi moderated the session. Professor Muzaffar Ahmed, BNP leader Shamsul Alam Chowdhury, Awami league lawmaker Suranjit Sengupta, left leader Haider Akbar Khan Rono, CPB leader Mujahidul Islam Selim, convenor of the committee for protection of oil and gas from foreign exploiters Engineer Mohammad Shahidullah, organizer of Friends of Bangladesh Dr Mohammad Motahar, peace activist Ms Nazma Shikha and cultural activist Pijush Bandapaddya, among others, took part in the discussion.
George Galloway said the unipolar character of the new international world order has emerged as a real disaster. He noted that equilibrium of the international political system has been destabilized following the collapse of the Soviet system. The new international capitalistic order is intensifying the process of exploitation in the post-Soviet era.
George longs for the good old days when Socialists like him were relevent. Perhaps we should borrow the Doctor's Tardis and send him back.
The Scottish leader expressed the hope that Bangladesh would follow the path of democracy amid all odds and turbulence in the international arena. He also observed that Bangladesh can develop the power to withstand all natural calamities if it can enjoy a vibrant economic state. He urged Bangladesh political leaders to engage their best efforts to bolster country''s economy and its positive image abroad.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/01/2005 9:25:18 AM ||
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#1
It's a bummer being a Stalanist (when you have lost).
#3
"capitalist imperialists" ... hmmm ... northern ireland ... hmmm ... etc. etc. ... George, haven't you got alot more pressing matters closer to home? ... self agrandizement is all fine and wonderful but really, is there any place for your "old school" shrill and idiotic dribble? It adds little to anyone's understanding of the world and god knows, Bangladesh deseerves better than that. ... Why bother going there if you have nothing usefull to offer George? ... I'd say George is "exploiting" his position, the Scots and the Bangladeshis to further his supersized and morbidly obese sense of self-importance. ... just my opinion.
#4
Geeze, at least Ted Kennedy (our fav socialists) had enough sense to keep his mouth shut. BTW I don't think it will be necessary to "attack" Syria becuase it is imploding all on its own. After Lebenon break away, Baby Assads days will be numbered in double digits.
#8
"The capitalistic imperialist forces led by the USA never took any action against the dictators in the Arab world but launched offensives against those dictators who did not obey their formula, and, besides, somebody stole my strawberries!
#9
British lawmaker and leading anti-war loonie campaigner George Galloway Monday expressed apprehension that US president George Bush (Junior) is not mindful about ''establishing democracies'' in the Middle East and Arab countries but is planning ''fresh attacks against Syria.,''
So 1) he admits Bush IS establishing democracies in the middle east, and 2) despite the facts, is worried that the US will take out yet ANOTHER dictatorship.
I imagine it's the "dick" in "Dictatorship" that turns him on.
#10
haha the rat speaks his mind . Galloway , favourite of the Hussein's , Castro's and various other nefarious regimes of the world .
Seeing as Treason failed , cant we just expel the little shit to some cold dark place where we will never see his slime trail again . pwetty pwease !
Syrian Kurds seized Saddam Hussein's half-brother in northeast Syria and handed him to Iraqi Kurds before he was taken into custody by Iraq's security forces, government sources in Baghdad say.
Sabawi Ibrahim, a former spy chief and senior adviser to Saddam, was captured in the Syrian town of Hasakah, about 50 km (30 miles) from the Iraqi border, the sources said on Monday.
Iraq's government announced his capture on Sunday but did not say when, where or how he was caught.
It is unlikely that Syrian Kurds, who are closely watched by the Syrian authorities, would dare get involved in any such operation without at least a green light from Damascus.
"He (Ibrahim) was in Hasakah. The Kurds there captured him and handed him to Iraq's Kurds in the north," a senior source in an Iraqi ministry told Reuters.
"Then Iraqi security forces, working with multinational forces, went to the Kurdish area and took him into custody."
Kurdish officials were not immediately available to comment. Iraq's Kurds enjoy extensive autonomy in Iraq and have their own security forces. They have links to Kurdish populations living in neighbouring Syria, Turkey and Iran.
Ibrahim, who was born to the same mother as Saddam, was number 36 on the U.S. military's list of 55 most-wanted people in Iraq. A $1 million (520,000 pound) bounty was offered for his arrest.
A former head of Iraq's feared Mukhabarat domestic security service, he was repeatedly accused by Iraqi officials in recent months of financing and directing Iraq's insurgency from Syria. Damascus denied the accusations.
On Sunday, Iraqi government sources said Syrian authorities, under pressure from the United States, were involved in handing over Ibrahim, but would not specify the role they had played.
"The Syrian authorities, because of the tremendous pressure on them, did something about Ibrahim," a senior Baghdad government official said on condition of anonymity.
"Having so many problems on their plate at the moment, the Syrians were willing partners in this, but the Americans and we were also involved," the official said.
Syrian authorities in Damascus had no comment on Monday on the affair. The U.S. military also would not comment.
More information on Ibrahim's capture had been expected at a news conference in Baghdad on Monday, but Iraq's minister of state for national security, Kassim Daoud, proved circumspect.
"He was arrested under special circumstances," Daoud told reporters. "We decline to give any details at this time ... for security reasons and to finish our job," he said, indicating that accomplices of Ibrahim's were being sought.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 2:10:18 AM ||
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#1
It is unlikely that Syrian Kurds, who are closely watched by the Syrian authorities, would dare get involved in any such operation without at least a green light from Damascus. Alternatively the Syrian government's writ does extend beyond the large towns and Kurds control the countryside and picked him up at a check point.
#3
What about the other 28? Did they fall off a truck or something? Or were they lounging in Latakia when the Syrians felt the need to bag and tag 'em?
The Bush administration is planning to expand its Persian-language satellite-television broadcasts to Iran (news - web sites) as part of an initiative to press for democratic reforms in the Islamic Republic, officials say.
As President Bush (news - web sites) ponders incentives to encourage Tehran to abandon its nuclear ambitions, Voice of America plans to go from a 30-minute to a four-hour daily news and information broadcast to Iran within the next few months.
"Iran is an information-deprived society, much like the former Soviet Union," said Kenneth Tomlinson, chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the federal agency that oversees international civilian broadcasts including VOA.
"A large percentage (of Iranians) appear to be thirsting for information," he added. "What we propose to do is exactly what Radio Free Europe, Voice of America and Radio Liberty did in the Cold War, and that is provide a window on the world."
The new initiative comes as the Bush administration reviews options for dealing with Iran's nuclear program that range from economic incentives to military action.
Washington accuses Tehran of seeking to develop nuclear arms under the guise of civilian energy, a charge Iran denies.
Officials say the Bush administration also plans to begin Arab-language satellite-television broadcasts to Europe later this year in a new escalation of its information war against Islamic extremism.
But VOA broadcasts are unlikely to have much effect in Iran any time soon, independent analysts say.
"Expanding Voice of America might have some marginal impact. But I don't think it's going to create the climate for a popular uprising," said Shireen Hunter, an Iran expert at the Washington-based Center for Strategic & International Studies.
Analysts also warned that expanded broadcasts could stir nationalist distrust of the United States and inadvertently strengthen the current government.
"People could see it as a sign that an invasion is coming. It's the sort of thing that happens before nations build up their war effort," said Nancy Snow, a propaganda expert at California State University, Fullerton.
U.S. officials believe VOA TV broadcasts could chip away at Iran's unpopular religious leadership over time by emphasizing issues of economic and political opportunity.
"We're trying get people to say ... what do we want opportunity to be in Iran? Do we want a government controlled by mullahs? Do we want a government of the people?" said Tomlinson, who expects the expanded TV format to include close coverage of Iran's presidential election in June.
VOA already has a 24-hour Persian-language radio service called Radio Farda, which offers a pop-music format geared toward Iran's large youth population.
The administration is seeking money for the expanded telecast in Bush's $81 billion supplemental budget request for military operations in Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites) as well as other U.S. efforts abroad.
The supplemental is expected to win congressional approval over the next several weeks.
Officials hope to receive $1.5 million to expand Voice of America's "News and Views" current affairs service into a one-hour program that would be rebroadcast three times a day with hourly news updates.
A further $5.5 million would be spent on studio construction and other investments that could pave the way for further Persian-language programing expansions.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 2:08:41 AM ||
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#3
What they need to do is expand braodcasting to target the young men, those that commit Jihad. Programs like "Sex in the City" and "Baywatch" will either turn them to our side or torture their religiously 'pure' minds.
Posted by: Charles ||
03/01/2005 7:22 Comments ||
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Officials say the Bush administration also plans to begin Arab-language satellite-television broadcasts to Europe later this year in a new escalation of its information war against Islamic extremism.
Anticipating the new dominant European language? If only the VOA would begin broadcasting to the information starved natives.
Posted by: ed ||
03/01/2005 7:40 Comments ||
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"Analysts also warned that expanded broadcasts could stir nationalist distrust of the United States and inadvertently strengthen the current government.
"Oh, dear, we mustn't do anything that might cause instability in the region! It might make the mullahs angry with us!"
#6
See "29 Baathist Leaders Turned Over to Iraq", posted today. The old "stability" was Arafat and Saddam, the new "instability" features elections in Iraq and Afganistan, new candidates in Cairo, and Lebenese governments resigning. Who said instability was bad?
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/01/2005 10:43 Comments ||
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Article: Analysts also warned that expanded broadcasts could stir nationalist distrust of the United States and inadvertently strengthen the current government.
"People could see it as a sign that an invasion is coming. Itâs the sort of thing that happens before nations build up their war effort," said Nancy Snow, a propaganda expert at California State University, Fullerton.
This was what they said about Voice of America broadcasts into the Soviet Union and Communist China during the Cold War. Nancy Snow is a left-wing propagandist who implies that the US doesn't have a free press because anti-American perspectives don't win out 100% of the time.
#8
Programs like "Sex in the City" and "Baywatch" will either turn them to our side or torture their religiously 'pure' minds.
I need the royalties Great idea!
Posted by: David Hasselhof ||
03/01/2005 12:28 Comments ||
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When "Sex in the City" and "Baywatch" become the flagships of American policy, I'll resign my citizenship. A grand promotion of ditz . . . Anyway, Moslem young men already don't have any trouble seeing women as dehumanized sex objects. Infantile male fantasy is just that. For cryin' out loud, people.
Assad puts a bucket on his head in the cause of Peace in the Middle East.
Jordan and Syria yesterday signed 21 accords for boosting bilateral cooperation, including agreements for combating terrorism and border demarcation. The agreements were signed at the end of two days of meetings by the Joint Higher Commission, co-chaired by the Jordanian Prime Minister Faisal Fayez and his Syrian counterpart Mohammad Naji Al-Otari. The anti-terror accord provided for the extradition of suspects who may cross the common border or the frontiers with Iraq, officials said.
The border demarcation accord, which ends a 50-year dispute, provides for the return of 125 square kilometers of land to Jordan, while Syria recovers 2.5 square kilometers from Jordan. Under the accord agreed after several top-level security meetings over the last six months, Syria will remove fences and posts on land it had gained in decades of creeping incursions into Jordan. Syrian Prime Minister Naji Al-Otari said the deal reconfirmed an internationally recognized border drawn in 1931. "This demarcation of borders is a step forward to the cooperation we started several years back," Otari said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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return of 125 square kilometers of land to Jordan, while Syria recovers 2.5 square kilometers from Jordan
That is a pretty good trade. Now, there is a wide strip on the Syrian north that stretches from Iraq border to Mediterranean. I believe it belong to someone else, too.
A number of the agents of the Iranian Intelligence Services of the Revolutionary Guards were arrested on charges of forgery, Iran's Student News Agency, ISNA reported. According to Iran's Judiciary Spokesman, the band was involved in the forgery of identity cards, university certificates and other official documents. "So far 30 of the band members have been arrested, but some of them have been released on bail." Jamal Karimirad said.
Posted by: Seafarious ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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Wht they just did not stick with the state sponsored thuggery? Got greedy, eh?
The head of the UN nuclear watchdog said yesterday Iran must be more forthcoming with inspectors probing its nuclear program, which the United States says is a front for developing an atomic bomb. Mohamed El-Baradei was speaking as the board of governors of his International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) met one day after Iran's nuclear planners scored a major victory with a key uranium fuel supply deal with Russia. "In view of the past undeclared nature of significant aspects of Iran's nuclear program, a confidence deficit has been created and it is therefore essential that Iran works closely with the agency in a proactive manner," El-Baradei said in a speech to the IAEA board. "In some cases, the receipt of information is still pending, which in turn delays our work," he said.
El-Baradei told reporters he welcomed an Iranian decision to show the IAEA a 1987 offer from aides to Pakistan's top nuclear scientist and atomic black marketeer, Abdul Qadeer Khan, to supply nuclear equipment. He said the written offer was for centrifuges used to produce enriched-uranium fuel - a revelation that several Western board members said deepened their suspicions about Iran's program. "They indicated that they did not take these people up on the entirety of the offer," El-Baradei said. El-Baradei said the agency had been able to verify Tehran's suspension of activities connected with uranium enrichment, a process of purifying uranium for use as fuel for nuclear power plants or, when very highly enriched, in weapons.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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... I can feel the MM's running scared... "El-Baradei is on our tail!"
That was a snipped of a fable from a parallel reality.
Lebanon commander of Fatah Sultan Abul-Aynayn denied claims that Syria had provided the movement with weapons, saying that the Palestinians were neither part of the Lebanese equation nor part of the parties' conflicts.
"Yeah! Leave us out of it! We're just innocent bystanders!... Well, bystanders, anyway."
Abul-Aynayn held a news conference Saturday in Rashidieh refugee camp in Tyre, in which he said the Palestinians were separate from Lebanon's political conflicts, which occurred in the wake of UN Security Council Resolution 1559. "The Lebanese factions are trying to include the Palestinians in the political conflicts between the government and the opposition," he said."The Palestinians have nothing to do with any of that,nor with Ahmed Abu Adas who held himself responsible for killing former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri." According to the Abul-Aynayn, the movement's position regarding the interior conflicts should be neutral, and the Palestinians should only be concerned with their own social, economic and living problems. Concerning Resolution 1559, Abul-Aynayn said it was an American- Israeli resolution aimed at "disarming the country from the Syrian and Palestinian weapons and making it available to the Israelis."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 ||
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I like this. If the Fatah chief is trying to disassociate himself with Syria - it gives us some idea of just how weak Syria is.
Chouf MP and Progressive Socialist Party President Walid Jumblatt congratulated the Lebanese people on their victory Monday in what he described as the "battle for independence," and called for promoting friendship with Syria. However, in the resulting melee following Prime Minister Omar Karami's resignation, one man was reported killed near opposition MP Ahmed Fatfat's residence in Tripoli. Karami supporter Fadi Ahmed, 22, was shot by an unidentified assailant from the rooftop of a building overlooking the residence. Physicians from the Islamic Hospital said that the victim received a bullet to the heart.
Following the shooting, Ahmed's friends smashed Fatfat's car. Assailants also attacked the home of Tripoli MP Samir Jisr and tried to break into Tripoli MP Mosbah Ahdab's home. Meanwhile, as soon as news of the resignation spread to the Chouf Monday, hundreds of residents gathered near Jumblatt's stronghold in Mukhtara to express their joy and exchange congratulations. Jumblatt said: "Beware of being drifted by racial feelings against Syria." Recalling the sacrifices of the Syrian Army on several occasions, including the 1982 Israeli invasion, he added: "We do not want hostility against Syria, but Syria's friendship."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 9:44:46 PM ||
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Anti-Americanism in the Turkish Media
Turks are 'The Gold Medalists in Anti-Americanism'
'America's Hitler'
'The Pervert Enemies of Islam'
"The Black 'Occupier' Woman"
'The Biggest Danger: USA'
Posted by: ed ||
03/01/2005 2:38:54 PM ||
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For seven days after a burial a Palestinian family receives mourners, normally a big social event involving colourful banners and patriotic music. But yesterday seven members of the family of Abdullah Badran, the 21-year-old who blew himself up at the entrance to a Tel Aviv nightclub on Friday, killing five Israelis, occupied the otherwise empty chairs and when asked if Abdullah's death had achieved anything they all shook their heads, and one said no in English.
Abdullah's brother Ibrahim said they were mystified and angered by his death. "I really do not know what was on his mind. ... He wanted to be a teacher, to get married and get a home. He seemed optimistic in spite of everything. It never occurred to any of us that he would blow himself up."
Deir al Ghusun is a hill town of 8,000 inhabitants. The flags of Islamic Jihad, Hamas and the leftwing Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine fly from many buildings, but there are none near the house of mourning. Islamic Jihad, which has claimed responsibility for the bombing, was keeping a low profile.
Sami Qadan said the whole town was shocked and angered by the bombing and in protest no one was paying respects to the family.
"Things were getting better and then no sooner do we have money coming in again then it is stopped by this suicide bombing. This intifada has killed us and the wall has destroyed us. We cannot even leave our homes and we want it to stop," he said. Six of his sons were working as builders in Israel but when they tried to cross the checkpoint on Sunday they were told: "No one from Deir al Ghusun is coming into Israel."
Abdullah, a student of Arabic literature at a branch of the al-Quds (Jerusalem) University in Tulkarem, was last seen at breakfast on Friday. "We didn't ask where he was going because it wasn't our normal practice. There was nothing in him to suggest that he had no plans to return," his brother said. The family realised that something was wrong only when Israeli soldiers arrived at 5am on Saturday morning and told them. ...
The family had not suffered any particular grievance at the hands of the Israelis, Ibrahim said, although he was detained in 1989 and held for 18 months without trial....
Ibrahim said that the family was extremely angry with the people who had chosen and prepared Abdullah for his suicide mission. "I don't know who they are but we want them to stop this and reach out their hands for peace. That is the only way the situation will improve."
#2
perhaps, blondie, but al-guardian still can't help but include the occasional anti-Israel digs
"checkpoints . . ."
"held for 28 months without trial . . ."
plus, in reference to: "For seven days after a burial a Palestinian family receives mourners, normally a big social event involving colourful banners and patriotic music." they forgot to mention that such events are reserved for terrorists.
#7
Finally, the Paleos are understanding Cause and Effect. ....more dominoes.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
03/01/2005 18:14 Comments ||
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Has Abbas followed through with his promise to clean up Palestinian TV? If the Palestinian media's being more responsible nowadays that could explain much of the apparent change in attitude. It never pays to underestimate the power of propaganda, and unemployed people watch a lot of TV...
The developments to the North are probably having an effect as well.
World powers on Tuesday demanded immediate Palestinian action to catch those behind a Tel Aviv suicide bombing that broke a fragile ceasefire with Israel. hmmm. this is a substantive change in their positions from the past. are "world powers" finally getting it - that you can't deal with terror through "negotiation?"
Palestinians responded angrily to the statement by the Middle East quartet comprising the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States, while Israel complained that Palestinians were failing to confront militant groups. standard paleo response. it used to be that "strong condemnation" was enough to get the quartet off their backs. well, in english, that is. guess they're angry that tactic isn't enough anymore. it's about time.
The quartet met on the sidelines of a London meeting on Palestinian reform hosted by British Prime Minister Tony Blair and clouded by Friday's suicide bombing of a Tel Aviv nightclub, in which five people were killed. The group called for "immediate action by the Palestinian Authority to apprehend and bring to justice the perpetrators" and demanded "further and sustained action" against terrorism. isn't "immediate action to apprehend and bring to justice terrorists" part of the roadmap, anyway???
"We are very upset at the quartet statement," said a Palestinian official who asked not to be identified. "it means we have to do something constructive. this is unacceptable!"
"And we ain't gonna do it! They'll have to come up with something else!"
He said the Palestinians had condemned the bombing, but Israeli travel restrictions were hampering efforts by Palestinian security services to find those behind it. that was yasser's line. he wore it out.
"They (quartet members) are putting security as the first approach as if they want the occupied Palestinians to give security to their Israeli occupiers," the official said. Israel has ceded much so far. now it's the paleo's turn. after all:
The bombing had undermined the truce declared by new Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon at a summit three weeks ago. Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, whose country was not represented at the London meeting, attacked Abbas for trying to win the cooperation of Palestinian militant, not crush them. "I am very sorry the Palestinian leadership is still hesitating over its need to fight terror," Shalom said. "It has to be clear that as long as they don't take the strategic decision to dismantle terrorist infrastructure, we cannot truly advance toward peace," he told Israeli army radio. at LEAST the quartet now sees that you must fight terrorism. this is a paradigm shift. well, they say it's important to fight terrorism, at least.
My guess is that it's not a paradign shift, just a temporary wobble, brought on by the fact that Yasser's in stable condition, Iraq's voted, and the Lebanese are making faces at the Syrians. As soon as it's safe, half the quartette will go back to doing nothing much.
The verbal fireworks threatened to overshadow the London meeting's efforts to underpin efforts by Abbas to implement reforms, halt violence and resume peacemaking with Israel after the death last year of veteran Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. isn't this part of the "halt violence" effort?
Participants, who included Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan as well as Arab and European foreign ministers, told Israelis and Palestinians to meet their obligations under a peace "road map." The final statement offered Palestinians support for security forces trying to stop attacks on Israelis, for parliamentary polls and for efforts to ensure order when Israel removes Jewish settlers from the occupied Gaza Strip. all makes sense.
In return the Palestinians vowed to pursue security reforms, hold elections on schedule in July and fight corruption. that too, makes sense.
A draft of the London statement said the path to peace required direct talks leading to "a safe and secure Israel and a sovereign, independent, viable, democratic and territorially contiguous Palestine, living side by side in peace and security." don't tell us, tell IJ, hamas, hezbollah, al aqsa.
Rice said her pointman on Palestinian security reform, Lieutenant-General William Ward, would move to the region, where he will coordinate security contacts between the two sides. A Palestinian official said Ward was welcome. "We need him to be a witness to the actions of both sides," Mejdi al-Khaldi, an aide to Foreign Minister Nasser al-Kidwa, told Reuters. Abbas told the meeting that reforms must be backed by peace negotiations with Israel, saying security efforts could collapse unless supported by a "serious political track." just stop the terror and you'll get your negotiations, Abby.
He urged new efforts to implement the nearly two-year-old road map, stalled by violence and upstaged by Sharon's unilateral Gaza withdrawal plan. Palestinians want governments to press Israel to ensure that any Gaza pullout is part of the road map, not a one-off move to perpetuate Israeli control of West Bank settlements. didn't Israel already say they'd do that? UNLESS there is no halt to terror?
Gaza is home to 1.3 million Palestinians and the West Bank to 2.3 million. Nearly 240,000 Jews live in settlements in the territories, which Israel occupied in the 1967 Middle East war.
RICE MESSAGE TO ISRAEL
Rice said it was vital to stop violence by militants, but Israel must also do its part. "Israel must take no actions that prejudice a final settlement, and must help ensure that a new Palestinian state is truly viable. A state of scattered territories will not work," she said in remarks that echoed the quartet statement. Representatives of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund were also attending. British officials expect some countries to pledge cash to plug short-term gaps, setting the stage for a donor conference by the end of June. donor conference? as things go, they'll need spleens and kidneys, mainly.
#1
"Israel must take no actions that prejudice a final settlement, and must help ensure that a new Palestinian state is truly viable. A state of scattered territories will not work,"
Please define "viable". As far as I know, it's the West Bank and Gaza and that's it. Where are all these other "scattered territories"?
World powers on Tuesday demanded immediate Palestinian action to catch those behind a Tel Aviv suicide bombing that broke a fragile ceasefire with Israel.
This is Scrappleface, right?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
03/01/2005 15:26 Comments ||
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The Israelis have chopped-up the West Bank Judea and Samaria into many little islands of Paleos separated by settlements Jewish villages and roads so it is a hodge-podge of little 'islands'. Condi is saying the USA doesn't want those to be used as the basis for a Paleo state as it would be a mess.
Now, when the fence is completed, THAT will be the de facto border and will encompass the largest Isreali towns in Judea and Samaria and form a wider Israeli belt around the Jerusalem area, the eternal home of Jews. Let the Paleos have the rest and see if they can make a go of it. If not, I suspect they will all be resident of the East Bank when the Israelis kick their asses out.
So what do all of you make of this? Euros responding to Sharons pragmatism, and Israeli restraint? Euros just happy Bush is focusing the Pal situation again? Euros reconciled by Condi? Euros crying uncle after the Iraq election?
#6
Here's what I make of it: resounding Bush victory + Iraqi elections + rising political vulnerability at home = conciliation, compromise, respect from the Euros.
Germany: massive unemployment on a scale not seen since Weimar-- and rising. Joschka "the Pimp" Fischer undone by scandals. Schroeder's government losing regional elections and on the ropes.
France: Economy stagnant, popular mood is sullen and self-hating. Chirac has run out of gas; Sarkozy looking to take over.
UK: Blair in deep trouble politically; Labor backbenchers no longer docile.
Holland, Scandinavia: civil war brewing. Restive populations no longer willing to tolerate jihadists in their midst while political elites remain clueless and detached.
Across Europe now you see disgust with slow growth and corrupt political classes. Europeans are looking for good news, for hope. Condi and Bush did exactly the right thing by presenting a warm and fuzzy image while refusing to budge from core positions on Iraq, Iran, and China.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/01/2005 9:05:41 AM ||
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One of the most profound issues that will have to be addressed in the new constitution is whether, as advocated by al-Da'wa Party, Islam should be the only source of legislation or whether it should be one of the sources of legislation as has been established by the Transitional Administrative Law (TAL)which serves as Iraq's interim constitution.
I have a serious question...
I don't think that the mundane aspects of 21st century society is not covered in the Koran. What shall be the speed limit on the highways? (to make an odd example) I don't think the prophet ever envisioned cars going 100km/h. So how, if Islam is the only source of law, do they deal with that?
U.S. officials say they have recently uncovered communications from Osama bin Laden to the man behind many of the attacks in Iraq — Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
In the communiques, a counterterrorism official said, bin Laden "suggests" Zarqawi might be able to help al Qaeda by attacking inside the United States.
Two other sources said the information was actually delivered to Zarqawi by Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's deputy, but that the message was clearly from bin Laden.
The communications did not mention any specific targets. And, the official cautioned: "Let's face it. Zarqawi has his hands full in Iraq right now." Indeed, just last week one of his top lieutenants was captured.
But senior officials say it is a significant discovery — and a clear message for Zarqawi to attack inside the United States.
Officials at the Department of Homeland Security were concerned enough about the message last week to alert state homeland security advisers around the country. The department's bulletin said in general terms that al Qaeda wanted to be "expanding operations outside of Iraq." It advised law-enforcement officials to remain vigilant.
Senior U.S. officials say there are no plans to raise the nation's threat level.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 1:38:30 AM ||
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Senior U.S. officials say there are no plans to raise the nationâs threat level
That's an awfully insulting assessment of Zarqawi's ability to execute.
U.S. intelligence and security officials yesterday said new information indicates that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has asked Iraq-based terrorists to focus future attacks on targets inside the United States.
Recent intelligence reports showed that bin Laden contacted Abu Musab Zarqawi, al Qaeda's senior operative in Iraq, and urged Islamists there to shift from attacking U.S. targets in that country to targets in the United States, said officials familiar with the reports.
A U.S. official said there was no specific time or place mentioned in bin Laden's message to Zarqawi. There are no plans to raise the color-coded threat level from "elevated," or yellow, to "high," or orange, officials said.
"This credible but nonspecific information restates al Qaeda's desire to potentially target the homeland," said Brian Roehrkasse, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security.
The department last weekend sent out a classified bulletin to state and local security officials regarding recent information on the threat. The bulletin was based on a communique between al Qaeda leaders about expanding "operations outside of Iraq with an inference that the United States would be the primary target."
The disclosure about the shift in targets, first reported by Fox News Channel, reveals that the U.S. government has been able to track al Qaeda communications. The group is thought to communicate through couriers and the Internet.
It also shows that a major attack on the United States aimed at rivaling the September 11 strikes is still a danger.
CIA Director Porter J. Goss told a Senate hearing last month that al Qaeda is planning to target U.S. territory and that Islamic extremists are using the Iraq war to recruit anti-U.S. "jihadists," or holy warriors.
"These jihadists who survive will leave Iraq experienced in and focused on acts of urban terrorism," Mr. Goss said. "They represent a potential pool of contacts to build transnational terrorist cells, groups and networks in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and other countries."
Mr. Goss said Zarqawi is intent on bringing "the final victory of Islam over the West, and he hopes to establish a safe haven in Iraq from which his group could operate against 'infidel' Western nations and 'apostate' Muslim governments."
Meanwhile, the U.S.-backed coalition has nabbed more than a dozen senior leaders of Iraq's deadly insurgency in recent weeks, but the enemy has a deep bench of planners and jihadists who seem able to keep up a pace of 40 or more attacks daily, according to U.S. officials and outside analysts.
The string of arrests was highlighted Sunday. The Iraqi interim government announced the capture of its biggest target since the U.S. Army apprehended former dictator Saddam Hussein in December 2003. Sabawi Ibrahim al-Hassan, Saddam's half brother, was among scores of Ba'ath Party loyalists jailed in Iraq after being arrested in Syria, where they had been directing and financing terror attacks.
But U.S. officials said the number of Saddam loyalists willing to kill Iraqis and coalition troops is still sufficient to carry out attacks for months, if not years. When Baghdad fell to the U.S. invasion in April 2003, intelligence agencies estimated that there were 20,000 senior Ba'ath Party members. That number, coupled with 40,000 criminals freed by Saddam and thousands of ex-Iraq army troops still loyal to Saddam, creates a huge pool from which to draw insurgents and terrorists.
"They don't know. One surprise after another," said a defense source in Washington about intelligence estimates of the insurgency and terrorists.
The source said there are scores of other Iraqi Ba'athists operating in Syria.
The terrorists' ability to operate in most areas of Iraq was demonstrated yesterday in the Shi'ite town of Hillah. A suicide car bomb killed more than 115 Iraqis applying for government jobs, in the worst attack since Saddam was ousted.
"The insurgency in Iraq, as insurgencies are classically defined and assessed for accomplishing their goals, has been far more successful than most imagined it would, or could be," said Dan Gallington, a former aide to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and now an analyst at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies.
"What the insurgents fear is a series of Fallujah-type operations," he said. "Why we are not obliging them is not clear. But I would suspect that our joint-combined Iraqi-U.S. strike units are riddled with spies and informants and that such operations are impossible to conduct with even the slightest degree of operational security."
The militants in Iraq essentially come in two groups: Sunni Muslim Ba'athist insurgents such as al-Hassan and their paid attackers, and foreign jihadists and suicide bombers led by Zarqawi. A Zarqawi car bomber likely pulled off the Hillah attack yesterday.
Before the historic Jan. 30 elections, the Iraqi government announced the capture of a handful of Zarqawi's top people, including Salah Suleiman al-Loheibi, who ran the terror group's Baghdad cell.
"I think the arrests have had an effect on them," said Robert Maginnis, a retired Army officer and military analyst. "You're taking experience off the streets, and that's going to hurt them."
Such arrests also result in a flood of new intelligence information on Zarqawi's group, al Qaeda in Iraq. Iraqi authorities say they have come within hours of catching Zarqawi as he moves from town to town.
"I am encouraged by recent arrests of insurgents, especially if the arrests are based on information brought forward by real citizens and not competing insurgents who want us to help them eliminate rivals," Mr. Gallington said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/01/2005 1:27:02 AM ||
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especially if the arrests are based on information brought forward ... not (by) competing insurgents who want us to help them eliminate rivals So the 'insurgents' are ratting each other out. I never realized terrorism was such a cut-throat business.
ISLAMABAD — Pakistan said yesterday a rise in India's defence budget was not helpful for the peace process between the nuclear rivals. "We must work towards an equilibrium and there should not be an atmosphere of arms race or competition which can be avoided," Foreign Office spokesman Masood Khan told a regular news briefing. Asked to comment on India's announcement that its military budget would rise 7.8 per cent to Rs830 billion rupees ($19 billion) in the coming year, he said the "spike in defence spending is not a helpful trend." "What we need is nuclear restraint in the region, we need conventional balance, we need restraint all around," Khan added.
"So you hated Hindoos need to quit trying to defend yerselves!"
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/01/2005 12:08:15 AM ||
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âspike in defence spending is not a helpful trend.â
Actually, standing on Paki side of border, it may look like it. Standing on Indian side of border, boy, I bet it'd look entirely helpful to me!
Israel's defense minister warned yesterday that he would send large forces into Palestinian neighborhoods if Israeli troops and settlers come under fire during the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip this summer. The military faces twin threats during the pullout — from extremist settlers and Palestinian militants. Settlers want to stop the evacuation of all 21 settlements from Gaza and four from the West Bank, while militants want to show that they are driving the Israelis out by force.
Also yesterday, Israeli officials said they might leave houses in Gaza settlements intact, reversing an earlier tendency to tear them down to spare the settlers the vision of Palestinians taking them over. Palestinian attacks during the Gaza withdrawal "would require us to go into Palestinian Authority territory with very, very large forces to those places which overlook the areas to be evacuated," Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 ||
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#1
destroying the houses to spare them the vision of Palestinians taking them over seems silly to me.
#3
true...but it's one of those "time to move on in life and get over it" kind of things. Demolishing the houses would risk additional lives and cost money. Give the money to the displaced settlers instead.
#4
Besides, I can't believe that all the settlers would be in agreement over this. If it were my family home, I'd rather that it stood. While the Paleo's are a messed up lot - they aren't all bad people and times change. Were it my family home, I'd prefer that it stood in the hope that someday, good people would move in. Why would you just want all of your memories demolished - forever?
JERUSALEM — Israel looked set to execute a U-turn over plans to demolish the homes of Gaza Strip settlers to be evacuated this year, as the official in charge of the pullout yesterday advocated they be handed over intact. "I heartily recommend not destroying these houses and coming up with an arrangement by which they are handed over to officials,"Â national security council chief General Giora Eiland told Israeli public radio.
"If we have to destroy them, it would prolong the disengagement operation from the Gaza Strip while on the contrary, we want to limit our presence in the region to a minimum," he added.
As of July 20, the Israeli government is set to uproot the 8,000 Jewish settlers living in the occupied Gaza Strip and several hundred living in four isolated enclaves in the northern West Bank.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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The usual line of bull. If you say something that makes no sense at all, but use polysyllables, somebody's going to believe it.
The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has warned that a fragile ceasefire with Israel could collapse if Israel continued to ignore Palestinian concerns, including the illegality of building a gigantic separation wall inside the West Bank.
The fragile ceasefire with Israel could collapse if Paleostinians continue their efforts to explode around Israelis.
"Israel must realize that this is not an open-ended truce. If Israel continues to grab our land by this evil wall and refuses to free our prisoners, then the ceasefire will die a natural death," said Hasan Yusuf, Hamas's chief spokesman in the West Bank, during a speech at the Polytechnic College in Hebron on Monday. Hamas rejected Friday's bombing in Tel Aviv, which killed five Israelis and injured many others, calling it, a "wrong move."
"Yeah. Not nearly enough casualties."
Yusuf said Hamas was still committed to the ceasefire and not looking for pretexts to breach it. He added however, that "we can't pretend things are fine when 9000 political detainees and resistance activists are still languishing in Israeli prisons and detention camps."
This article starring:
HASAN YUSUF
Hamas
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 ||
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The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has warned that a fragile ceasefire with Israel could collapse if Israel continued to ignore Palestinian concerns, including the illegality of building a gigantic separation wall inside the West Bank.
BAGHDAD - Shiite mosques, politicians and civilians willing to work for the government have been the target of repeated attacks by the Sunni-based insurgents. So far, at least, the Shiite parties have not sent their gunmen to retaliate.
"Basically those who are behind these attacks are trying to pull the Shiites into civil war. This is the aim of these operations. Consequently, responding to these attacks will be a victory for these forces," said Haidar Musawi, a spokesman for Ahmad Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress.
There are no official figures available, but an Associated Press count found that 234 people were killed and 429 people were injured in at least 55 attacks from Jan. 1 until election day on Jan. 30. The death toll increased in February, which saw at least 38 incidents resulting in at least 311 deaths and 433 injuries.
But the Shiites have so far refused to be baited, biding their time until they can deal with the insurgency in a more institutional way when they lead the government. "Shiite leaders have made it clear and have repeatedly and categorically refused retaliation," Musawi said.
They have more than enough firepower to fight back, with disbanded militias capable of fielding thousands of men - enough to deal the insurgency a serious blow. Alliance leader Abdel Aziz al-Hakim recently hinted that the Shiites were waiting to take power before dealing with the insurgency. He indicated that a first step would be to identify and purge the security services of any insurgency sympathizers.
Yep, that'd be a good first step. Now wouldn't be too early.
"We must depend on the sons of the Iraqi people who believe in the new Iraq, and not on those bad elements that infiltrated the security circles and turned into a problem," al-Hakim told The Associated Press on Sunday. "We can't solve the security issue unless we reconsider the internal structure, to spot those bad elements."
It is those Iraqi security forces - already thought to be dominated by Shiites -that have become another favored target of the insurgency, so much so that attacks against their traditional foe - the US military - seem to have dropped off.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/01/2005 11:51:32 PM ||
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Long-term planning and postponement of immediate gratification - looks like a promising sign to me.
#3
Agree, if they can keep the moral high ground that it will beneift all in the long run.
But realistically, revenge is a dish best served cold. Is it just me or does it seem stupid to be blowing up the friends of people who will soon be policing your neighborhoods - without any of the restraints that cops would have in America to extract revenge.
Algerian women's groups have accused President Abd al-Aziz Boutaflika of caving in to religious groups by watering down reforms for women's rights in the country. The Algerian president ruled against abolishing a regulation that women require permission from a family member or guardian to marry. "It is a grave discrimination against women, who will remain minors for life," Miriam Bilaala, president of the rights group SOS Women in Distress, said. "The long-awaited family code reform will now mean little to Algerian women." Analysts say Boutaflika's decision not to drop the guardian clause from an amendment to the 1984 family code he approved on Tuesday showed religious groups still carried weight after a long-running uprising against a military coup that has claimed the lives of 150,000 people.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 ||
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Does anybody have any batteries? I think this thing is busted.
Sudan's government and the militia it supports persist in committing atrocities in the Darfur region despite repeated promises to end brutal abuses and killings, the U.S. State Department said on Monday. Tens of thousands of people have been killed over the past two years, many as a result of disease and hunger, and more than 1.8 million displaced from Darfur in fighting which the United States has called genocide. "Despite the government's repeated commitments to refrain from further violence in Darfur, the atrocities continued," said the State Department's annual report of human rights abuses worldwide. "In Darfur, government and government-supported militia (Janjaweed) committed serious abuses during the year, including razing hundreds of villages of African tribes," said the report.
The Janjaweed, often in concert with regular government forces, typically conducted attacks under cover of military aerial support, it said. Last year, then Secretary of State Colin Powell concluded genocide was being committed against the people of Darfur and that Sudan's government and the Janjaweed militia bore responsibility. The United States wants the United Nations Security Council to impose sanctions against Sudan but China and Russia have opposed such penalties, particularly on oil. The report said government forces in Darfur "routinely killed, injured, and displaced civilians, and destroyed clinics and dwellings intentionally during offensive operations."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/01/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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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.
France and Yemen have signed a military and security cooperation agreement providing for joint exercises, exchange of intelligence and the supply of French military equipment to Sanaa, French Defence Minister 
SEOUL: The United States and its allies could grant North Korea its wish for direct talks with the United States but only within six-way negotiations aimed at ending its nuclear ambitions, a South Korean negotiator said yesterday.
The European Commission has appealed for the Lebanese parliamentary elections to go ahead as scheduled, following the resignation of Prime Minister Umar Karami's government. "I hope that the situation in Lebanon remains calm and the channels of dialogue between the different political groups open," EU external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said in a statement. She encouraged political continuity among the various parties following the resignation of the entire government.
The ATM card of slain Jersey City Heights resident Hossam Armanious was used several times in the week after his death to withdraw thousands of dollars from his bank account, Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio said yesterday. The withdrawals, made on several occasions from banks in the Jersey City Heights and in mid-town Manhattan, continued for up to a week after the bodies of Armanious, his wife, Amal Garas, and their daughters, Sylvia and Monica, were found inside their Oakland Avenue apartment on Jan. 14. 
A number of the agents of the Iranian Intelligence Services of the Revolutionary Guards were arrested on charges of forgery, Iran's Student News Agency, ISNA reported. According to Iran's Judiciary Spokesman, the band was involved in the forgery of identity cards, university certificates and other official documents. "So far 30 of the band members have been arrested, but some of them have been released on bail." Jamal Karimirad said.
The head of the UN nuclear watchdog said yesterday Iran must be more forthcoming with inspectors probing its nuclear program, which the United States says is a front for developing an atomic bomb. 
Lebanon commander of Fatah 
Chouf MP and Progressive Socialist Party President 
World powers on Tuesday demanded immediate Palestinian action to catch those behind a Tel Aviv suicide bombing that broke a fragile ceasefire with Israel. 
The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has warned that a fragile ceasefire with Israel could collapse if Israel continued to ignore Palestinian concerns, including the illegality of building a gigantic separation wall inside the West Bank.
Algerian women's groups have accused President Abd al-Aziz Boutaflika of caving in to religious groups by watering down reforms for women's rights in the country. The Algerian president ruled against abolishing a regulation that women require permission from a family member or guardian to marry. "It is a grave discrimination against women, who will remain minors for life," Miriam Bilaala, president of the rights group SOS Women in Distress, said. "The long-awaited family code reform will now mean little to Algerian women." Analysts say Boutaflika's decision not to drop the guardian clause from an amendment to the 1984 family code he approved on Tuesday showed religious groups still carried weight after a long-running uprising against a military coup that has claimed the lives of 150,000 people.
