Dubai, 27 June (AKI) - An influential Saudi al-Qaeda leader, Abdullah Muhammad Rashid Al-Rushud, reported killed recently in Iraq, travelled there after a serious split within the al-Qaeda leadership, a recent statement posted on Internet Islamist forums suggests. It provides a detailed argument regarding the divisions within the leadership of the terror network which, it argues, were behind al-Rushud's decision to go to Iraq. Last week, a message signed by the Jordanian militant, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, announced the death of al-Rushud, one of Saudi Arabia's 26 most wanted suspects, at al-Qaim.
"Important truths about Sheikh Abdullah al-Rushud on the Arab peninsula with the mujahadeen" is the title of a message appearing on Islamist internet forums, signed by Ahmad al-Khilaila. Al-Rushud was famous for his January 2004 declaration challenging the legitimacy of the Saudi government in terms of Islamic law and was featured on the 26 most wanted list issued by the security authorities. When he disappeared from Saudi Arabia last summer, there was intense speculation about his whereabouts and what that meant. "Sheikh Saud al-Oteibi split from the leader Salih al-Oufi because of differences over how to carry out military operations because Sheikh Saud al-Oteibi wanted to follow the path of Abdelaziz al-Muqrin, who wanted to strike the crusaders and fight them," the message explains, talking about other leading Saudi militants on the most wanted list.
The first part of the statement outlines the clear division within the Saudi cell over tactics and refers to one of the last audio messages of the late local al-Qaeda leader, Abdelaziz al-Muqrin, killed in a gun battle with police in Riyadh on 18 June 2004. Al-Muqrin had called on his followers not to go to Iraq, but to concentrate on fighting the presence of American soldiers and diplomats in their own country. After al-Muqrin's death, the statement continues, "the differences began to emerge within the mujahadeen and the division into two groups. The first called itself 'the organisation of al-Qaeda in the Arab peninsula, and was led by sheikh Saud Al-Oteibi." The document says this first formation also included leading figures who fought in the battle at al-Ris at the start of April. The second group "The base of the Jihad in the land of the two holy places" [which resembles the name al-Zarqawi has given his formation in Iraq] was led by Salih al-Oufi, along with Abdullah al-Rushud and various other fighters who had been involved in the Falluja missing [sic - probably mission][a reference to the attack against the US consulate in Jeddah on 7 December, 2004] winning an important victory.
On the basis of Monday's statement, whose authenticity has not been fully ascertained, this internal split was the reason behind the decision by terrorist al-Rushud to leave Saudi Arabia and join al-Zarqawi's insurgents in Iraq. These elements also show how the strong personality of the Jordanian leader and the string of attacks that his followers are carrying out in Iraq have given him an important leadership role within the worldwide al-Qaeda network. His leadership appears to have influenced some of the Saudi cells who came to consider him a more important reference point than the local leader Saud Al-Oteibi, who was killed at Al-Ris.
After outlining the situation of the Saudi cells, the internet message goes on to piece together al-Rushud's final days. "The sheikh knew how to move freely on the peninsula and travelled in his BMW car. He took part in the battle of al-Fayha [in Iraq] and was wounded in the thigh. After being treated in May he wanted to take part in the battle of al-Qaim and had begun travelling overland in that direction. His brothers managed to get him there along with his bodyguards. Then I received the news that he and his bodyguards had died in a bombing raid at al-Qaim."
The announcement of al-Rushud's passing, posted on the Internet on 23 June by al-Zarqawi, also said he had died in al-Qaim. However, the Saudi Arabian authorities have not yet confirmed the reports of al-Rushud's death. Rumours had been circulating for some time prior to the announcement. A source close to the Islamist movements in Saudi Arabia told the satellite TV network al-Arabiya last March that Rushud had been killed during an internal showdown within the terrorist organisation in Saudi Arabia. The Dubai-based broadcaster added that the lack of concrete news about al-Rushud or statements by him for several months was proof of his death. According to their source, al-Rushud could have been eliminated by the late leader of Al-Qaeda, al-Muqrin, shortly before he himself was killed, for daring to criticise al-Muqrin's management of the local cells. This criticism revolved around the legitimacy, according to Sharia law, of terror attacks carried out during that period. Al-Rushud reportedly argued that terrorist activity must be concentrated on foreign and not Saudi targets because Islamic law did not allow the slaying of fellow Muslims. According to leading al-Qaeda experts, it is highly likely that al-Rushud died at al-Qaim, and various sources confirm that profound divisions emerged over the past year at the heart of Saudi Arabia's al-Qaeda leadership.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/27/2005 16:11 ||
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Goood article
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
06/27/2005 20:08 Comments ||
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2004 witnessed a lengthy battle between Shabab al-Mu'minoon (Believing Youth), a Shiâa religious organization, and the Yemeni government. Believing Youthâs leader and inspirational figure, Hussein Badr ad-Deen al-Houthi, was killed in early September and his death marked the end of that conflict. The fighting, however, staged a short-lived comeback in March-May of this year.
Tensions between Believing Youth and the government renewed when Houthiâs father, who shares the name of his son, returned to Sa'ada from Sana'a in mid-March. He cited the president's refusal to meet with him over the release of prisoners as the reason for his return. [1] In a March 9 interview, Houthi made a public appeal for the president to "make good on his promises," chief among them the release of Houthi followers from prison. [2] Later, on March 19, Houthi claimed that after the first war, the president invited him to Sana'a promising that if he came, he would release all prisoners and cease military and legal action against all of his followers. Houthi first arrived in Sanaâa in January of this year.
The fighting broke out on March 20 between Believing Youth and the Yemeni government at Souk at-Talh, 14 kilometers outside of Saâada. The fighting quickly escalated, spreading to Wadi Nashoor, Razamat and Al Shafaâa, all of which are rural areas surrounding the city of Saâada. The government brought in heavy equipment, including tanks and artillery. The fighting largely culminated from March 29 to April 3, where the dead numbered well over 100, and a major firefight occurred within the actual city of Saâada. [3] By April 7, Yemeni forces had the second in command surrounded. He died five days later. [4]
A week after the government announced the end of hostilities on April 14, Houthi supporters continued sniper attacks in scattered areas around Saâada province. The rebels managed to disperse their attacks, moving into the tribal area of Khowlan and within the capital city of Sanaâa. There they conducted a series of drive-by grenade attacks and assassination attempts, the last of which was on May 13.
The end of the attacks in mid May fully coincides with the Political Security Organization's successful penetration of Houthi supporters in Sana'a. Left without any further resources, Houthi sent a letter asking for pardon. President Salih agreed in principle on May 14. [5] Houthi has yet to surrender, though negotiations continue.
Houthi, despite his emphatic denials, seems to desire the establishment of an imamate in Yemen. He and his son are Hashimites, the family of the prophet Muhammad. While denying that the purpose of Believing Youth is to establish an imamate, al-Houthi the father clearly states his beliefs when responding to questions about democracy. According to him, there are two forms of legitimate government: an imamate ruled by Hashimites or rule by any pious Muslim. He made his views clearer when directly confronted, stating that an imamate is the most preferred form of government. Houthi takes pains to distance himself from the idea of democracy, saying "We are for justice. We do not know this democracy you speak of.â [6]
Whether Believing Youth has a coherent political program, however, remains unclear. Aside from holding the imamate as the ideal form of government, it seems to encompass a general feeling of disenfranchisement against numerous causes. Hussein al-Houthi the son distributed a great amount of literature denouncing the role of America in the world and specifically the Yemeni government's newfound cooperation with it. Houthi the father claims in his interview with al-Wasat that the entire purpose of the first rebellion was a defense of Islam against America. When directly prompted about the government's attitude to the Hashimite family, and by inference its Shiâa members, Houthi responds that the authorities hate the Shi'a. A multifaceted dislike of the government is perhaps the best explanation for the Houthi rebellions.
Concerns over Iran are related to Houthi the sonâs 1993 meeting with the Iranian president. Houthi the father visited Iran in 2003 and is accused of fleeing to Iran during the first Houthi rebellion in 2004.
It is likely that there is some sort of a relationship between Believing Youth and Iran. It appears from Houthi's interview that he frames the conflict in terms of Shi'a versus other. He clearly feels an affinity toward the Islamic Republic, as evidenced by his familyâs numerous visits. Knowing that he sees America as an enemy of Islam, he likely identifies Iran as a Shi'a pillar of strength actively combating their mutual enemy.
He knows, however, that actively and openly acknowledging Iranian support brings with it a host of difficulties. There is a traditional Arab-Persian antagonism. The idea of using Iranian support to bring down any Arab government would not play well among any Arab populace, especially in Sunni dominated Yemen. Open support would also entangle the Iranians, who are currently in a tense diplomatic situation with the U.S. and Europe over their nuclear program.
It is likely that Iran gives limited forms of support to Believing Youth in spite of the lack of clear benefits to the country. Iran has a lengthy history of supporting conflicts motivated by ideology, most notably Hizbullah in Lebanon. The power benefits in that conflict are clearer. By weakening Israel, Iran gains credibility among all Muslims and more influence in a contentious region of the world. In Yemen, however, supporting the Houthi rebellion brings a number of diplomatic risks with only minimal return. No oil exists in the Shi'ite areas of Yemen and the region has a long history of being irrelevant to world politics. The only clear benefit to Iranian support is proving its ideological commitment to itself and other Shiâa.
The settlement appears to have only fractured the Houthi leadership without fully eliminating or uncovering its supporters. An ash-Sharq al-Awsat article dated May 15 notes that the security services have not fully uncovered all the cells of the Believing Youth. The security services claim the organization was formed in 1984. If true, the twenty year duration of the organization would serve to discourage its members from simply abandoning its ideas, especially with the heavy casualties that have been inflicted on it recently.
On the surface the conflict is religious, but such a broad statement ignores the complex relationships that determine social and political life in northern Yemen. It is better understood as a balance of tribal affiliation with religious leadership. While the number of fighters supporting Houthi appears significant â at least in the hundreds judging from the number of dead â these military operations could never happen without the strong support of tribal leaders in the area. Ideology does play a limited role in their support, though their primary motivation stems from the opportunity to further diminish the governmentâs limited influence in the region.
The current resolution merely removes a tribal means for active rebellion. The leadership and infrastructure for rebellion, the Believing Youth, has received a severe blow. What remains, however, is a strong willingness among the populace to fight whenever the opportunity presents itself. Whenever a new charismatic figure emerges, one can assuredly expect renewed conflict in the remote regions of northern Yemen.
As applicable to al-Qaeda, the continuing rebellions weaken and embarrass the government. This is the third consecutive year where the government was forced to confront Islamic conflicts (an al-Qaeda related revolt in Abyan in 2003, along with the 2004 and 2005 Houthi conflicts). All met with failure, but they amply demonstrate how easy it is to foment armed conflict against the government.
The greatest threat facing the government would be a Sunni rebellion led by an entity like al-Qaeda, pitting thousands of tribesmen against the government in the Jawf and Marib provinces, where hatred of the government is near universal. The key ingredients are money, an opportunity to fight the government and organization. A multimillion dollar organization like al-Qaeda certainly has the financing and contacts necessary to implement such a rebellion. What offers the greatest challenge is organization. A rebellion with intra-organization communications could never happen due to innumerable rivalries between the tribes. What could happen, however, is a distribution of funds and an agreed upon start date between the tribes, leaving to their own judgment what to attack and how frequently. A revolt of the style mentioned above would only be limited by financing and its ability to keep the tribes focused on the government and not each other. A revolt on such a massive scale is not likely, but it is a threat that the government must consider.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 11:15 ||
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OK, I'm confused again. I thought the Houthis were Zayadi - Fivers, not Twelvers. Is this another one of these things where the Iranians support anything that even looks like Shia, if you cross your eyes hard enough? Like their thing with the Syrian Alawites?
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
06/27/2005 15:50 Comments ||
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Written from the perspective of a Russian analyst, pretty interesting stuff.
Later this month, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will take part in a session of foreign ministers of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC).
In the past few years, Moscow has intensified contacts with the OIC in response to the growing needs of its 20-million-strong Muslim community.
Muslims have lived in Russia for centuries, while Islam itself is even older than Orthodox Christianity. Russia therefore has good reason to see itself as part of the Islamic world and be actively involved in discussions of its problems. Many pressing problems for Muslims throughout the world - from extremism to Islamophobia - are also relevant to Russians. Thus, OIC-sponsored discussion of the problems facing the Muslim world will also be useful to Russia.
The first problem facing Russia's Islamic community is a lack of unity. Sunni Islam has traditionally been dominant in Russia in interpreting the Hanafite and Shafiite theological schools of law (mazkhabs). Followers of the Shafiite mazkhab live mainly in Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan, while residents of the North-West Caucasus, Tatarstan, Bashkiria and other regions adhere to the Hanafite mazkhab. A considerable number of Azerbaijanis are Shiites. However, recently the situation has changed, as migration from the North Caucasus to other regions and a considerable inflow of Muslim migrants from CIS countries have created tensions inside the Islamic community between various ethnic and cultural groups.
However, these are not the only causes of friction. Many regions are increasingly experiencing a generation gap, and younger Muslims have created parallel structures that their opponents immediately label Wahhabite. In addition, supreme mufti Talgat Tadzhutdin, chairman of the Muslim Board for Russia, and sheikh Ravil Gainutdin, chairman of the Muslim Board for European Russia, have been vying for the leadership of the country's Islamic community for several years. In 1999, muftis from the North Caucasus created the Coordination Center of Muslims of the North Caucasus mainly in order to oppose attempts by Tadzhutdin and Gainutdin to win them over to their side. The Russian Council of Muftis is also split.
This is all accompanied by a systemic crisis among Muslim boards generally. Created under Catherine the Great in the 18th century to facilitate control of the Muslim subjects of the Russian Empire, the boards remained just bureaucratic structures, and unfortunately have practically no control over the real situation in the provinces.
There is no permanent dialog between the state and the country's political forces on the one hand and Muslim leaders and organizations on the other. These contacts are supposed to take into account the diversity of the forces represented in Russia's Islamic community. However, so far everything boils down to contacts between the authorities and the Muslim boards.
Yet another problem is the spread of radical and extremist views among the believers. Many things are needed in order to combat this, such as training of mullahs. A system of Islamic education to train mullahs and imams capable of opposing radical and extremist propaganda has yet to form, and steps in this direction are often unsystematic and illogical. For example, in Karachai-Circassia there is an Islamic University, but practically all mektebs (primary schools attached to mosques) and medresehs (secondary schools) are closed.
The situation is being aggravated by uneven development of religious life in Islamic areas. For example, while over 1,700 mosques have been built in Dagestan, with a dozen Islamic higher schools and hundreds of mektebs and medresehs functioning there, in Adygeya there are less than a hundred mosques and no Islamic educational establishments.
This is only a short list of problems facing Russia's Islamic community, including natural problems of the process of restoring the religious life of Muslim believers. Much has been done over the past 15 years of a rapid Islamic revival in Russia, but we are only at the beginning of the road. Cooperation with Islamic communities in other countries and Muslim organizations such as the OIC are a must.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 10:05 ||
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live mainly in Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan, while residents of the North-West Caucasus, Tatarstan, Bashkiria
#2
Muslims have lived in Russia for centuries, while Islam itself is even older than Orthodox Christianity
A-hem, While the above statement could be argued from the techincal point that the Great Schisim occured in ~1054, I seem to recall that when the Pagan rulers of the russians went shopping for religions, they opted for christianity, ca. 800-1100 AD. The mongols that over-ran russia came later, and even then the mongols were more pagan thatn muslim at the time.
The majority of the muslim presence in what is now Russia started in the 1600s, when expansion eastwards/russian imperialism began.
Posted by: N guard ||
06/27/2005 13:12 Comments ||
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The Mongols famously adopted Islam over Christianity because the Islamic delegates arrrived on time, while the Christians from Byzantium [???] arrived a day late - thanx to CLOCK-/TAXI-GATE, vast areas of Mongol-conquered Eurasia became officially Muslim overnight, whether they knew it or not, wanted it or not.
#4
St. Cyril converted the Khazars of the Dnieper-Volga region from Judaism to Orthodox Christianity ~860 A.D., along with providing them a written alphabet and a Slavonic liturgy.
Russia is prepared to use warplanes to destroy terrorist bases abroad, Reuters reported Saturday citing Air Force commander Vladimir Mikhailov. He also said the Cold War was not over on the U.S. part, Russian news agencies add. âAs for terrorists and our fighter jets, if we have high-precision weapons and know the whereabouts of a terrorist gang, why not smash it, even if itâs outside Russia?â Interfax news agency quoted him as saying.
âThe Cold War is not over. We (Russia) no longer take part in the Cold War, we are in a very peaceful disposition. As for the Americans, considering what they are manufacturing, planning, arming themselves with etc, this Cold War has not been seized on their behalf,â General Mikhailov was quoted by RIA Novosti as saying.
Russia, which strongly opposed U.S.-led attacks on Iraq in 2003, has battled rebels in the Muslim province of Chechnya for over a decade. Moscow says Chechen rebels receive support and funding from international extremist organizations, Reuters reports.
Mikhailov, on a visit to the Volga region town of Engels, said Russiaâs need to strike terrorist bases abroad was linked to aspects of U.S. foreign policy, but did not go into details. Russia threatened pre-emptive strikes on rebel bases anywhere in the world after Chechen separatists took a school hostage in the town of Beslan in September 2004. More than 300 people, half of them children, died in the siege. Moscow has not specified where it thought these bases were, but has repeatedly accused Georgia of allowing Chechen rebels to operate from the Pankisi Gorge which borders Chechnya.
Critics are skeptical about Russiaâs threats, pointing to its crumbling armed forces, which have not recovered from a post-Soviet slump due to what analysts say are ineffective fund allocation systems and endemic embezzlement. Mikhailov himself said in January that Russian fighter pilots got paid so little that it pained him to talk to them, Reuters added.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 10:04 ||
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Ok, I've heard you saying this for almost a year now Mikhailov. Go hit them already. Quit talking about it, mount some wings, and go ... hit ... targets. What? Your planes don't have the range or in-flight fuel capability. Gee, that sucks. STFU.
Oh, and BTW, we do think the cold war is over. We just don't trust you. Don't take it personally, we don't trust anyone anymore.
#3
Gotta walk before you can run. First try hitting the terrorist bases in Russia.
Posted by: ed ||
06/27/2005 11:45 Comments ||
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Destroying terrorist bases abroad, eh? Isn't that a little, ummm, pre-emptive and unilateral? Not that there's anything necessarily wrong with that.
Not the next war, the last one:
Pyongyang, June 25 (KCNA) -- The U.S. imperialists are the sworn enemy of the Korean people as they provoked the war of aggression against the DPRK in the 1950s, inflicting unspeakable misfortune and disasters upon the Koreans, says Rodong Sinmun Saturday in a signed article. It continues:
The U.S. imperialists acted the fool in a bid to mislead the world public opinion by giving impression that the DPRK was to blame for the outbreak of the war. The last Korean war was a war of aggression carefully prepared by them.
Wow, they completely fooled me. Here I thought the Norks had launched a surprise attack on the South..
They instigated the south Korean forces to conduct armed provocations in areas north of the 38th parallel since 1947 in order to examine their war posture and bolster their capacity to fight an actual war. The U.S. dispatched presidential special envoy Dulles, Defence Secretary Johnson and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Bradley and others to south Korea and Tokyo under the signboard of discussing issues related to "peace treaty" with a view to examining the war preparations on the spot and taking necessary measures. The U.S. set June 25 as the day to start the war from the calculation that, it being Sunday, no one would believe the U.S. and south Korea would launch the war on Sunday because Christians in both countries did not work on the Sabbath. This was aimed to cover up their true colors as a provoker of the war.
Hummm, Pearl Harbor was on Sunday as well. Ya don't suppose....?
Based on the detailed operation plan worked out in advance and meticulous military preparations for the war, the U.S. imperialists started attacks against the DPRK on the whole front all of a sudden at the dawn of June 25, 1950. At the same time, the U.S. ordered its air force to carry out large-scale air raids on the front and all areas of the northern half of Korea. The Korean war was a war of barbarous genocide aimed to exterminate the Korean nation and wreck peace.
I must admit, falling back all the way to Pusan Pocket was a brilliant move to lure the Norks into a trap
The U.S. crimes against peace and humanity will be cursed and censured by history and human conscience generation after generation.
Of course, unless you've got a secret memo from Truman, no one's gonna take you seriously.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/27/2005 10:25 ||
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Sounds like they need more food aid. Everybody gets cranky when they are hungry.
#2
Wow, is right. It took 'em 55 years to figure this out?
Why didn't they cry about it at the time?
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/27/2005 12:15 Comments ||
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The "carefully" bears some scrutiny. Too bad our military neglected to get any of the units in place before the suprise attack cleverly planned for a sunday. It's almost like nobody told them it was going to happen. You have to admit it was quite clever for us to have armed the SK's to the teeth with hundreds of modern aircraft, artillery, and armor in preparation for the attack. It's stunning the way they were concealed so as to make the SK's military look like a large glorified police force in training with a little bit of vintage WWII equipment. Maybe the plan was for Task Force Smith to route all the Norks armor with only a few companies of infantry. They just got off to a slow start a few days later than the actual start of the attack. Guess we just forgot to use the nukes in furtherance of the genocide thing. Did you know lil Kim personally repelled the whole dastardly imperialist agression force by ripping hundreds of afv's apart with his own two hands while dodging bullets from hoards of US lackeys? You just can't make this stuff up. Does Juche translate to extreme power of delusion?
#8
IOW, Commie Airborne, Sapper Commandos, and Fifth Columnists, time to "mistakenly" attack NORAM/CANUSA so that Der SitzKrieg StalinFrau Hillary can be POTUS and "save Amerika SSR and the world"; OR, was it the "USR", ala OIL STORM!?
Russia = Russia, China = China, but only the USA is now "the USR" - you know, the threat from Radical Islam and Global Islamic State!?
SEOUL - South Korea will send more fertiliser to North Korea to help the impoverished communist state battle chronic food shortages caused by its weak farm sector, a South Korean government official said on Monday. South Korean officials have said they hope bilateral humanitarian assistance will help to coax the North back to stalled talks on its nuclear weapons programmes.
More wishful thinking.
Seoul will send an additional 150,000 tonnes of fertiliser to the North starting from Monday. The aid is on top of 200,000 tonnes the South completed shipping earlier this month, a spokesman for the Southâs Unification Ministry said by telephone. Last week, the South Korean Red Thingy Cross said it received the request from the North for the additional fertiliser and asked Seoul to grant the request on humanitarian grounds. At bilateral ministerial-level meetings last week in Seoul, North Korea requested 500,000 tonnes of separate food aid, which the South agreed in principle to deliver. But the South left the actual amount open for future discussions. Several newspapers in the South have criticised Seoulâs decision on food aid last week, arguing it should be more clearly linked to a resumption of talks on its nuclear ambitions.
For example.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Fertilser, you say, are they gonna send the detonators too?
The radical Islamic preacher who Italian prosecutors say was abducted by CIA agents in February 2003 had been involved in preparing false passports and travel documents for radical Islamic fighters traveling to northern Iraq, according to an Italian law enforcement official involved in the case.
The official said Italian investigators believe that the preacher, identified by prosecutors as Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, was involved with Ansar al-Islam, a Kurdish Islamic group in northern Iraq that the United States said had ties with Saddam Hussein's regime, the Taliban, and Al Qaeda.
The alleged Iraq link offers a possible explanation for why the CIA would covertly abduct a terrorism suspect in Italy, a US ally that had been cooperating closely on terrorism operations and on Nasr's case.
According to court documents, 13 CIA operatives snatched Nasr, also known as Abu Omar, off the streets of Milan on Feb. 17, 2003, a month before the United States invaded Iraq.
The alleged abduction, without the consent of Italian agents, has outraged Italian law enforcement officials, who had been monitoring Nasr as part of their own counterterrorism operation. Italian prosecutors are seeking the arrest of the operatives in a case that could damage US-Italian relations.
A court document filed in Milan and obtained by the Globe names the 13 suspected CIA operatives, and lists dates and places of birth, credit card numbers, and American addresses. It is not clear whether the identities are real. The document also lists the names of six other Americans who had been in Italy and are accused of assisting in the operation but have not been charged. Separately, the document alleges that Lieutenant Colonel Joseph L. Romano III, then a US commander at the Aviano Air Base in Italy, allowed the base to be used for Nasr's transfer. Romano also has not been charged.
Italian officials say the Egyptian-born Nasr had been suspected of terrorist activity since he received political asylum in Italy in 2001.
''He was involved in an organization that sent people to training camps in Kurdistan," said the Italian law enforcement official, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case. ''He was involved in preparing false documents and passports for sending people in Iraq, [perhaps] to train for bomb attacks."
The official said Italian investigators have seen no evidence to indicate that Nasr was involved with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq who has claimed responsibility for some of the deadliest terrorist acts there. Reporters, human rights groups, and State Department officials once associated Zarqawi with Ansar al-Islam.
Since 2001, Italy's special counterterrorism police, DIGOS, had bugged Nasr's home and mosque and had been listening in on his conversations with suspected militants in an attempt to understand his network.
Their investigation ended when he abruptly disappeared in 2003. Italian police, who had suspected CIA involvement in Nasr's disappearance, only discovered what had really happened to him a year later, when he called his wife in Milan from Cairo to say that he had been kidnapped, sent to Egypt, and tortured so badly there during questioning that he had become deaf in one ear, according to a statement released by prosecutors Friday and to the law enforcement official.
''The logical question is, why didn't the CIA coordinate with the Italians and let them know what was going on?" said Andrew Krepinevich, executive director at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a Washington-based defense think-tank. Krepinevich said the bulk of the CIA's efforts in the run-up to the Iraq war focused on pinpointing the location of Saddam Hussein and the location of weapons of mass destruction, and not capturing mullahs who had been providing false travel documents to jihad fighters.
''It seems like awfully small potatoes to go after this guy at the risk of alienating what has turned out to be one of our closest allies in the Iraq war," he said.
From their previous surveillance of Nasr, Italian investigators had been reaping a wealth of information about recruitment of jihadi fighters across Europe.
According to excerpts from the transcript published last year in The Observer newspaper in London, Nasr and a visitor were overheard discussing the need for ''intelligent and highly educated people" for a jihad operation.
The two talked in great detail about support for jihad in Saudi Arabia, Poland, Bulgaria, Austria, and Britain, and referred to London as ''the nerve center" of their network, according to the newspaper. ''The thread begins in Saudi Arabia," the visitor is quoted as saying during that meeting in Nasr's Via Quaranta mosque on June 15, 2002. ''Don't ever worry about money, because Saudi Arabia's money is your money."
The visitor also told Nasr that Eastern Europe is a good place for operations because ''there aren't too many eyes," according to the transcript quoted in the Observer.
The visitor also praised a man named Sheik Abd al-Aziz in Poland, saying, ''His organization is stunning."
The Italian law enforcement official did not detail what evidence links Nasr to Ansar al-Islam, a group of Muslim fundamentalists that came together in northern Iraq in September 2001. According to Human Rights Watch, the group imposed a Taliban-style ban on music and Western dress in the areas that had come under its control.
The State Department classifies the group as a terrorist organization. During the Iraq war, US airstrikes destroyed its base and its fighters fled to Iran to regroup, the State Department said.
But yesterday, in Milan's Islamic Cultural Center, housed in a modest building in the city's bustling immigrant district, Nasr's former associates denied that his fiery speeches against the United States represented anything other than his political beliefs.
''He was a kind, normal person and in no way dangerous," said Imam Abu Imad, the center's spiritual leader. ''Maybe he spoke about Muslims having to resist injustice, but this was his opinion."
Imad said that he first met Nasr in Milan in 1993 and that Nasr had been engaged in charity work among the Muslim communities in Albania.
He said Nasr was born in Egypt, where he studied law, and moved to live in a run-down apartment building in Milan's Via Conte Verde in 2001, after being granted political asylum.
Nasr has two children -- a son and daughter -- and a wife, Nabila, who have since left Milan for Egypt, Imad said.
Nasr's wife had contacted a lawyer associated with the mosque to help find her husband.
''A few years ago a woman came to me and said her husband was missing," said Antonio Nebuloni, lawyer to the Milan Islamic Cultural Center. ''And then we found that he disappeared."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 09:54 ||
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good for the CIA. If we've learned anything it is that simply watching and gathering info as these mobsters build their empires stronger and stronger, is counterproductive.
I can't comment as to whether or not the CIA handled it badly - but I'm glad to see we aren't allowing another trade center bombing to occur because they allowed the key players to continue in the game.
#2
Yes, good for the CIA, though I wish they hadn't been so clumsy and left bread crumbs all over the place. The CIA is supposed to be the Phantom, The Ghost Who Walksâ¢, when it does stuff like this. Nasr was supposed to go "poof" and disappear. Our people then were supposed to be able to say, with a straight face, "Nasr? Never heard of him."
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 11:03 Comments ||
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#4
From their previous surveillance of Nasr, Italian investigators had been reaping a wealth of information about recruitment of jihadi fighters across Europe.
I don't know. If they're stupid, have big mouths, and are wired for sound you might want to leave them out there.
#5
Dear Mr Nasr,
We are pleased to inform you that you have WON a vacation all expenses paid at an exclusive caribbean resort. So get those bags packed so our prize patrol can wisk you away on the trip of a LIFETIME!
Posted by: bruce ||
06/27/2005 19:06 Comments ||
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Turkey's prime minister said the country will not not agree to any new conditions for European Union membership, adding that Turkey expects "honest politics" as it begins negotiations to join the bloc.
Honesty from a politician? What next, charity from a banker?
Do you think they've caught onto the fact that the pea's not under any of the the shells yet?
The EU has already imposed tough conditions on Turkish membership. Turkey must recognize Cyprus before the talks open in October, show progress on Kurdish rights, improve the economy and limit the military's influence in politics. Ankara is also expected to treat ethnic and religious minorities equally and implement penal code reforms. Still many European voters are balking at letting in the poor, predominantly Muslim country of 70 million people, a decision that would extend the EU's borders to Syria and Iran.
Much as I sympathize with the Turks, being fed a line as they have been, and jerked from pillar to post, I can also sympathize with the Euros. I lived in Berlin in the mid-70s, before the cultural problems achieved their present dimensions, and it wasn't pretty then...
EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said this week that the bloc should have an open debate about Turkey's candidacy. The country is scheduled to start membership negotiations with the EU on Oct. 3. "Turkey is not ... renegotiating anything," Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters late Saturday. "If you impose new things on countries from one day to the next, especially at a time when negotiations are about to start, that would not be right, " he added. "We are used to honest politics, that's what we expect and want."
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Turkey saw that even France, which set such high standards, couldn't agree to this EU constitution. This is just an attempt to find quickest route out of a sinking ship.
Posted by: Charles ||
06/27/2005 0:29 Comments ||
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#4
Erdogan - what a trip. First he wants to tag along with the budding caliphate - but once the caliphate's not looking so well, he tries to tag along with the EU and now that it's no longer in vogue, I wonder who he'll be trailing after next. Tip to doggy boy, don't climb on our leg, we'll kick you across the room. Now go bother someone else.
You'd think the Turks, in a country with so much potential, would want someone who leads rather than someone like Erdoggyboy, whose willing to wag his tail and follow whoever throws a few meager scraps his way. Sad.
#5
"Turkey is not ... renegotiating anything," Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters late Saturday. "If you impose new things on countries from one day to the next, especially at a time when negotiations are about to start, that would not be right, " he added. "We are used to honest politics, that's what we expect and want."
Much like the unwanted little snot-nosed kid that keeps trying to tag along despite enduring merciless hazing, the Turks are failing to get the hints being thrown their way.
#6
It is painfully obvious that the solution to Turkey's problem lies South, not North. If Turkey could form an economic partnership with Iraq, maybe even with the suggestion of an eventual military alignment, the two nations alone would easily dominate the Middle East, Central Asia, and northern Africa. And this, in turn, would form an almost irresistable nucleus to a Middle East Common Market.
#7
Why would Iraqis want to form a partnership with the Turks? They quite remember their last merger under the Ottomans.
Posted by: ed ||
06/27/2005 12:00 Comments ||
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#8
Is this article Murat bait?
Turkey backstabbed us, now they are whinging because the French backstabbed them and nobody will speak up for them. Shoe's on the other foot now.
Had they let the 4th ID in, and act as a REAL ally, we'd not have nearly the problems in Iraq because those Sunni areas would have been rolled up coming out of Turkey. And we might have the time to turn from Iraq to help Turkey out.
But the Turks backstabbed us, so they should stop expecting sympathy and help. I'm willing to let Turkey rot until the military there stages a coup, which they eventually will. Screw the Turks.
Irakis are, mostly, Arabs ie they see themselves as naturally superior to the Turks since Allh elected an Arab.
And Turks, are emparented with Mongols not with Arabs, remember how they conquered the Arabs, how they, not the Arabs saved Islam when it was on the verge of crumbling (after the fall of Spain to Christian hands and in addition Turks did most of the fight during the Crusades), how tehy were backstabbed by them and that their national hero strongly rejected Arab "cultural" domination and adopted latin alphabet, occidental law and forced occidental clothing.
#10
I see Mr. Erdogan is being amply rewarded for siding with the Axis of Weasels two years ago.
Posted by: Mike ||
06/27/2005 12:44 Comments ||
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And this, in turn, would form an almost irresistable nucleus to a Middle East Common Market.
Hummmm...... very unlikely. It'll never be like the Euro zone, more likely the Bazzar Zone. The good news is that the BZ would have 12,000 pages of rules that would be absolutely ignored.
#15
Don't know what list you mean, Ship, but I don't do IVs.
I am willing, however, to shoot certain "special" people if they ever cross my path. (Realizing that I'm in a long line behind AP, OS, etc. ;-p)
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/27/2005 16:25 Comments ||
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#16
Shipman has these obscure moments, Barbara. Last week he asked me what I used to sharpen my claws.... at least that's what I think he was asking. Shipman, darling, you need to speak more plainly for us simple females, ok? ;-)
Much as I sympathize with the Turks, being fed a line as they have been, and jerked from pillar to post, I can also sympathize with the Euros. I lived in Berlin in the mid-70s, before the cultural problems achieved their present dimensions, and it wasn't pretty then...
Well, I could sympathize with the Euros more, except they seem to have stumbled upon the winning formula for taking immigrants from relatively secularized countries like Turkey and Morocco and turning them into radicalized religious extremists, and furthermore, the article states:
The EU has already imposed tough conditions on Turkish membership. Turkey must recognize Cyprus before the talks open in October, show progress on Kurdish rights, improve the economy and limit the military's influence in politics. Ankara is also expected to treat ethnic and religious minorities equally and implement penal code reforms.
Traditionally Turkey's military has been a relatively liberal, secularizing force in the country. So not only do they radicalize their own immigrants, they want to impose measures to help limit the institution that limits the radicalization of Turkey itself.
So I'm definately not impressed with them.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
06/27/2005 22:52 Comments ||
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PARIS - French Muslims re-elected Dalil Boubakeur, the moderate rector of the Grand Mosque of Paris, as leader of their national council on Sunday, confirming the ascendancy of traditional Islamic groups in recent elections. Boubakeur, a medical doctor born in Algeria, won easy re-election as president of the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM) representing Franceâs 5 million seething Muslims, the largest Islamic minority in Europe.
Jacques Chiracâs office said the French president had personally called Boubakeur to congratulate him, and hailed the CFCM election for uniting Islamâs different strands âin a spirit of dialogue and more effective actionâ.
Boubakeur noted the CFCM had often been criticised as inactive in its first two years but said his new executive bureau stood for âcontinuity, balance and a desire for efficiency.â
Ah, bringing new ideas to France, eh?
He said the CFCM had succeeded in rallying groups representing French Muslims -- whose origins lie in 62 countries, mainly Morocco, Algeria and Turkey -- to work together for the first time for the good of their fellow believers.
The activist Union of French Islamic Organisations (UOIF), which slipped badly in the CFCMâs national election last Sunday, threatened to boycott the voting for the executive bureau but finally attended and accepted the post of second vice president. The National Federation of French Muslims (FNMF) backed by Morocco swept the CFCMâs vote last Sunday, taking 19 of 43 seats on the administrative council. It took the post of first vice president on the executive bureau headed by Boubakeur.
The French are allowing foreign countries to "back" candidates?
Boubakeurâs Algerian-backed GMP group increased its seats to 10 from six in the CFCMâs first election two years ago. That made it equal with the UOIF which won 13 seats two years ago.
Boubakeurâs expected re-election was almost overshadowed by the UOIFâs threat to boycott the vote in protest against what it said was overt interference by Morocco and Algeria to have French Muslims with roots in those countries vote for their candidates. The UOIF, which is close to the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and stresses the fact it has no links to any Islamic countries, agreed to attend only after Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy met its leaders on Saturday.
Comments by Sarkozy before the vote to the effect that it was natural for French Muslims to keep some ties to their countries of origin sparked another protest by the UOIF. âThe UOIF pledges to the Muslim community that it will do its best to free the CFCM from outside guardianship or interference and to defend the interests of Islam in France,â it said in a communique issued overnight.
"There's no need for outside guardianship in a caliph!"
Franck Fregosi, an Islam expert at Robert Schuman University in Strasbourg, said the CFCM elections showed the continuity of outside influence on French Muslims. âFrench Islam is having a hard time freeing itself from this logic of subjection to ethnic or national interests,â he told the daily Le Monde. âFrench Muslims are still a long way off from taking their destiny into their own hands and creating an Islam free of outside guardianship.â
Once they've created Frankistan, however ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Depends on what the meaning of "moderate" is...
#4
He said the CFCM had succeeded in rallying groups representing French Muslims -- whose origins lie in 62 countries, mainly Morocco, Algeria and Turkey -- to work together for the first time for the good of their fellow believers.
Who, at present, are cruelly oppressed by not being able to treat infidels as prescribed by Sharia.
University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill suggested to a forum on conscientious objection they might be more effective in opposing war if they supported the "fragging" or killing of line officers. In a Portland meeting on resistance to military recruiting, Churchill, famous for comparing Sept. 11, 2001, victims in the World Trade Center to "little Eichmanns," twice suggested anti-war activists should support those who kill their officers.
"For those of you who do, as a matter of principle, oppose war in any form, the idea of supporting a conscientious objector who's already been inducted [and] in his combat service in Iraq might have a certain appeal," he said. "But let me ask you this: Would you render the same support to someone who hadn't conscientiously objected, but rather instead rolled a grenade under their line officer in order to neutralize the combat capacity of their unit?"
Later, in a question-and-answer period, Churchill was asked whether the trauma "fragging" inflicts on that officer's family back home should be considered, he responded: "How do you feel about Adolf Eichmann's family?" By illegally calling for the killing of U.S. military officers, Ward Churchill has finally merited Page 1, and clearly identified himself as an enemy facilitator.
#1
Hey, Great Chief Sitting Bullshit !
What about fragging US subversives and commies ?
The fact is, this piece of human BS isn't worth a grenade. A spit maybe, that's what tobacco is for...
#4
What are you trying to do? Why would Ward ever want to think about the implications of his special thoughts! Are you suggesting we give Ward a headache by forcing him to think? By his own inspired logic he, his family, followers and anyone else could be whacked for what Ward says or does, or doesn't say and do. Sounds like he's trying to build a little business trademark for himself through whacky rhetoric. Somebody needs to ask him if it would be OK to frag him and his family when one differs in thought and opinion. Put it to him, apply his logic, and demand an answer (or at least that he squirm with it for a little while). Finally, ask him what he was smoking in the "piece pipe" when he thought up his dribble.
#6
This is very liberating. If we conscientiously object to anything, we can resort to violence! I object to Ward Churchill's idiotic verbal spewings, and 'til now I thought I should just ignore them, but now he's given me a solution!
Posted by: Dar ||
06/27/2005 11:31 Comments ||
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#7
Stake him out to the top of Pawnee Buttes for a week or two in the summer, or to the top of Pikes Peak in the winter - majority choice. Oh, in the buff, like the REAL native Americans did it. If he lives, he's exonerated. If he doesn't, well, we already KNEW he was full of Bulls$$$.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
06/27/2005 11:33 Comments ||
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...the idea of supporting a conscientious objector who's already been inducted
Um, Ward, baby? Ours is a voluntary armed forces, but why let facts get in the way of treasonous statements?
#9
Ward is just going for the shock value statements to incite people and to keep himself in the slimelight limelight. However, his speech is seditious and IMHO could be prosecuted if the govt had the stones and a federal judge could be found that is not bought out by the extreme left.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/27/2005 11:49 Comments ||
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#10
Think globally. Act locally. I suggest fragging traitorous college professors with sham racial identification and academic credentials. I wonder how much I could get per pound if I sold Ward's worthless ass to the likes of Zman?
Posted by: ed ||
06/27/2005 11:53 Comments ||
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#11
I agree AP. What Ward Traitor doesn't want is the limelight to be focused somewhere else and he won't be have a stage to play the 'victim' on when Colorado finally get the balls to fire his lying fraudulant ass.
#14
Notice that he phrases it as a question. He would incite murder (including against our Commander In Chief), but he it smart enough not to do it directly. I'd like to see the Secret Service show up at his door and ask him some questions anyway.
Posted by: Tom ||
06/27/2005 12:09 Comments ||
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#21
Living in the slimelight, the universal dream
For those who wish to seem
AP, mind if I use it on our next tour? It works!
Posted by: Geddy Lee ||
06/27/2005 14:29 Comments ||
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#22
Slimelight is my contribution to the Rantburg venacular. Use it freely, but use it wiley, er wisely.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/27/2005 14:51 Comments ||
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#23
Hey and for this wonderful professor up at CU Boulder, (my daughter had Churchill a few years back) the tuition is going up 28%!
ARGHHHHH!
Drives me F***ing nuts.
One more year of college, I'll try to hold on....
Posted by: Jan ||
06/27/2005 14:53 Comments ||
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#24
any chance we can talk him into lecturing in Singapore and make sure he is carrying one of his "peace pipes?"
#26
"For those of you who do, as a matter of principle, oppose war in any form, the idea of supporting a conscientious objector who's already been inducted [and] in his combat service in Iraq might have a certain appeal," he said. "But let me ask you this: Would you render the same support to someone who hadn't conscientiously objected, but rather instead rolled a grenade under their line officer in order to neutralize the combat capacity of their unit?"
Why is it these assholes are never really anti-war like they claim just anti-war when it comes to the West defending itself against 7th Century barabians. If people like this were truely anti-war and acted as activsts against all confict then maybe they would be worth listening to. But when they call for this type of behavior shoot the MFs
#29
C'mon Ranters... there's more that just ranting you can do, and it feels good, too.
CU Chancellor Phil DiStaphano let Chief Yakking Ward off the hook by stating that his vile spew is protected free speech (3/24/05). Well, I exercise MY free speech when I mock and ridicule Churchill (and his minions)right on the CU campus, or at his pathetic speaking engagements.
Go ahead and make yourself feel better by mocking a leftist today! Sure it's like shooting stoopid fish in a barrel, but it's fun!
It's only our country and way of life they are trying to destroy...
#30
Lol! Back when I was a "troubleshooter" I used to pass through Atlanta, now and then. "Slimelight" was the local name for the Limelight Club there. A rather injudicious choice of name for their bar, lol!
#31
Oh, my, he just keeps excelling! Ward Churchill, the gift that keeps on giving. I posted a couple a months ago, that the UC administration should keep his ass around, just so the blogosphere could work him over like a cheap piniata, whenever things got dull. It is supposed to be an axiom that warriors are always fighting the last war... it looks like the anti-war boys are always fighting the last anti-war... or the one before that.
I suppose it is a cheap shot to point out what the initials "WC" stand for, internationally.
#33
I think he just broke a conspiracy law or three. The state of Oregon will not have the balls to do squat but he Crossed as state line to do it. Do the feds have the balls?
Hassan Almrei, one of five Muslim men jailed in Canada for alleged connections to terrorism, will have a bail hearing in Toronto Monday. Almrei has been held for more than 3œ years on a security certificate, under which a detainee can be held indefinitely without a trial. The government is also allowed to keep the evidence a secret.
Almrei and his lawyers have not been allowed to see much of the evidence used by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service to have him arrested nor has he been charged or given a trial.
CSIS alleges that Almrei is connected to al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and is a threat to Canadian security. Almrei, who denies the allegations, has admitted to working for a Saudi honey company accused of funnelling money to the terrorist network. He also admits he entered Canada on a false passport and knows an alleged al-Qaeda operative now being held in the U.S. in connection with the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
I know we're just rubes and fools south of the border, but in the US that kind of evidence gets you a conviction in Federal court. Even today.
The certificate used to arrest Almrei was supposed be a device that could have him quickly deported back to Syria, his country of origin. But Almrei's lawyers successfully argued before a judge that Syria is a country where the police use torture as an interrogation technique. As a matter of policy, Canada doesn't deport people to countries where they might be tortured.
Matthew Barrens, a political activist who has kept in close contact with Almrei during his time in prison, said Almrei is in legal limbo. "One choice is to be sent back to torture. The other is indefinite detention here in Canada," he said.
A third choice is to squeal like a pig cow.
Barrens said the government should either let Almrei go or give him a trial. Since no formal charge has ever been laid against him, Barrens said at the very least he should be granted bail.
John Thompson, a security analyst who advocates tough measures to combat terrorism, said even he agrees you can't hold someone forever. "If you can't build a case against someone in four or five years then maybe you shouldn't be holding them," he said.
Even I agree, you can't hold him indefinitely without a trial. Convict him. Then you can hold him indefinitely.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 09:42 ||
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Today, on our facing page, we are running the first of three excerpts from Kenneth R. Timmerman's new book, "Countdown To Crisis, The Coming Nuclear Showdown With Iran" (Crown Publishing Group, $25.95). Relying on intelligence sources he has developed during the past two decades as an investigative journalist, Mr. Timmerman spent many hours debriefing defectors from Iran's intelligence services. These sources have provided Mr. Timmerman with eyewitness accounts of meetings between top al Qaeda leaders and senior officials in the Iranian government.
It has been clear since September 11, 2001 that U.S. intelligence had failed the American people, resulting in the deaths of nearly 3,000 of our countrymen. A growing body of evidence has accumulated suggesting that Iran may have had a role in the September 11 attacks, and that the Central Intelligence Agency has sought to play down evidence of this.
Mr. Timmerman marshals an impressive amount of evidence suggesting Iran may have known about the attacks and has given sanctuary to senior al Qaeda officials who were involved in planning them. Perhaps most disturbing of all is the information he presents suggesting that the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies have systematically tried to whitewash credible evidence from Iranian defectors linking Tehran and al Qaeda before and after September 11.
"Several times, the CIA tried to steer me away from information these defectors provided. Rather than do me a good turn, the CIA was, I believe, trying to lead me away from their own errors in judgment -- errors that I believe cost thousands of American lives," Mr. Timmerman writes. "Because of the arrogance and willful blindness of our nation's top intelligence officers, America's leaders were misled about the threat from Iran until it was too late."
Nearly 400 pages in length, "Countdown to Crisis" provides an extraordinary wealth of information, much of it new, about how the threat from Iranian weapons of mass destruction and Iranian-backed terrorism grew during the late 1980s and 1990s, and how the Clinton administration refused to confront this reality; instead, the administration sought to create the illusion of getting tough with Iran to score public-relations victories. Mr. Timmerman shows how in the late 1990s, as the behavior of the Iranian government grew more menacing, Mr. Clinton pursued a more conciliatory policy towards the regime.
The Clinton administration was hardly the sole party to delude itself about Iran and its intention to develop nuclear weapons. Mr. Timmerman demonstrates how, in 1989, as Iran was rebuilding from an eight-year war with Iraq, Tehran successfully manipulated International Atomic Energy Agency Secretary-General Hans Blix into becoming the champion of its supposedly "peaceful" nuclear program.
There is also new, detailed material showing how Iran worked on nuclear weapons together with Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan's proliferation network. And Mr. Timmerman also sheds new light on how U.N. Ambassador-designee John Bolton made powerful enemies for himself within the IAEA and the State Department bureaucracy and its political allies on Capitol Hill: by working tirelessly as undersecretary of state for arms control to force Iran and other rogue states to get out of the nuclear-weapons business.
But the most disturbing parts of Mr. Timmerman's book, some of which which we excerpt here, deal with the evidence suggesting Iran may have had a hand in September 11.
This includes how an Iranian defector gave the CIA two months warning of a "massive attack on America," scheduled for September 11, 2001, but how the agency brushed him off even after the events of that day; how Rep. Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Republican, become so disturbed by the CIA's refusal to act on information that Osama bin Laden was in Iran that he contacted a bounty hunter in an effort to capture the terrorist; and how Iran continues to finance Abu Musab Zarqawi and Iraq's terrorist insurgency.
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill would do well to examine Mr.Timmerman's account of how George Tenet and CIA analysts dismissed evidence the agency obtained summarizing ties between Iran and al Qaeda. The evidence included a description of how Imad Mugniyeh, a senior Hezbollah operative whose terrorist credits include the 1983 bombing of U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut which killed 241 U.S. servicemen, coordinated the travel of between eight and 10 of the September 11 "muscle hijackers."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 09:44 ||
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The war on terror is not over and is no were near over either. Look at a map and you will see the plan coming together. The US after the Clinton cuts just doenst have enough troops to invade and occupy the entire Arab world at once. So we are raging this war one nation at a time. Afghanistan first then Iraq. Does anyone realy beleive that if we had invaded Iran a much larger nation and a whole lot more dedicated that Iraq wouldnt be a huge problem and we would probably have to invade them aswell at the same time. At which point a draft would have been nessecary and Syria and who knows maybe even N. Korea China would be spurred into a bad dicision by our temporary weakness. The plan is working Afghanistan was the terrorist training camp had to go then Iraq the weak link was next also surounding Iran and splitting a Iran / Syria alliance. Once Iraq is pacified and the Iraqi army comes on line I expect a small US froce to defelect any Syrian ideas and then a RR and into Iran for the bulk of our forces. They are now expeirenced and have cut thier teeth on the weaker and now would be ready for the stronger with tried and true tatics. Not to mention the terrrorist will reinforcements will have a hard time getting into Iran now Afghanistan on the East Ocean on the South Iraq on the West and Turkey on the North with our new freinds the old soviet republics. Surrounded but it will be a sereous hard insurgent war in Iran a lot of rough terrain good for small infantry. But this senerio is a lot better than a huge border with a hostile Iraq green occupation troops and strong supported leadership with a dedicated suicide group. Not to mention the serious risk of a reginal war all at once the LLL's just think we are stretched thin now
WASHINGTON (AP) - A new independent investigation of abuse allegations at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, ``doesn't make sense,'' Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Sunday.
Some Democratic lawmakers are pushing for an independent commission to look into conditions at the detention center at the U.S. Navy base in Cuba. Last week, the White House rejected the idea of an independent commission, citing 10 major investigations by the Pentagon. ``I think that to go back into all of the things that's already been reviewed by everybody else doesn't make sense,'' Rumsfeld said on NBC's ``Meet the Press'' on NBC. ``But that's not a decision for me. That's a decision for the president,'' he said.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has said an independent commission could explore the atmosphere that permitted abuses, how troops were trained, and the length of detentions. House members of both parties toured the facility on Saturday and noted progress in improving conditions and protecting the rights of detainees. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, acknowledged improvements but still supported an investigation by an independent commission.
Some detainees have been incarcerated for more than three years without being charged. Rumsfeld defended the detentions by citing the prisoners' alleged deeds. ``These are bad people,'' Rumsfeld said on ``Fox News Sunday.'' ``These are suicide bombers, these are murderers. This is the 20th hijacker from 9/11 down there. These are people who are out to kill people,'' he said.
But that's not as important as Nancy Pelosi scoring points on the issues.
Rumsfeld said U.S. policy calls for humane treatment of the detainees. Any U.S. personnel who have committed wrongdoing there have been punished, he said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Rumsfeld Rejects Outside Panel on Gitmo
Outside Panel - A collaboration of leftist totalitarian-minded anti-Amercan skunks, who never saw a dictatorial thug they didn't like.
#2
I read where one of the inspectors ate the same food that the prisoners were served that it was that good.
Isn't jail supposed to be a bad experience? Have I missed something here.
We need to just allow the guys to do their job, and get out of their face.
Don't pee on my back and tell me it's raining.
Posted by: Jan ||
06/27/2005 0:24 Comments ||
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#5
I'd like to see Shelia Jackson Lee head the independent commission with Michael Moore as her special advisor. Perhaps John Conyers could be co-commissioner. Is it possible for detainees to serve on the independent commission?
Posted by: Captain America ||
06/27/2005 8:53 Comments ||
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#6
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has said an independent commission could explore the atmosphere that permitted abuses, how troops were trained, and the length of detentions.
Yeah, let's waste more of the U.S. taxpayer's money.
It is visiting hour at Jakarta's Cipinang Prison and its most famous inmate, the Muslim preacher Abubakar Baasyir, sits on a wooden bench surrounded by a dozen acolytes, assistants and lawyers. Several prisoners attend to him, including a confessed terrorist who has become the cleric's servant and coordinates a team of six to wash his clothes and cook his meals without pay. Prison officials allow Baasyir to teach a class on Islam to fellow inmates four times a week; about 100 prisoners attend each session.
June 27, 2005: Piracy, or the threat of it, in the Malacca and Singapore Straits, has caused Malaysia and Singapore to threaten the summary arrest of any unauthorized armed boats found in these crowded waters. In addition, both nations are allowing private security companies to provide armed escorts for ships moving through the straits. At least six companies now provide these security guards, who are largely former or retired military or police. These men have their own boats, which are clearly marked, and recognized by the local navies, police and coast guard. The idea here is that the more security ships out there the better. Singapore has also recruited and trained a special force of armed sailors who are put aboard some merchant ships, to provide extra protection.
About 130 merchant ships a day pass through the Malacca Straits, most of them very large, very valuable ships. With the âarrest on sightâ order, sailors on merchant ships have an incentive to report any boats, especially speedboats, that are carrying armed men. Itâs believed that if thereâs enough pressure on the pirates, they will go back to robbing local fishermen. However, the pirates can get hundreds of times more loot off robbing on cargo ship or tanker, than from a fishing boat. So the temptation is always there. But what worries the local security authorities most is terrorists taking over a large ship and trying to do some major mischief with it. The increased security is directed at making terrorist operations much more difficult.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/27/2005 08:52 ||
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Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Is what the Commies said during the Cold War - don't need America, don't need the West, don't need Anyone, and espec don't need trade or Western freedoms to prove the inherent and self-obvious superiority and inevitability of Socialism, Marxism-Leninism and Communism - you know, Clintonian ANTI-FASCIST, COMMIE-CONTROLLED, "FASCISM", the One that is FASCISM or HITLERISM, etc. but weirdly and mysteriously is NEITHER!?
The exasperation of CIA Director Porter Goss with Pakistan's role in the hunt for Osama bin Laden and other remnants of al-Qaida, is evident from his remarks on the terror network's chief during an interview with Time magazine this week. The interview comes after the arrest of Hamid Hayat, a U.S. citizen of Pakistani origin, his father and some others by the FBI earlier this month. They belonged to a 2,500-strong Pakistani community living in Lodi, Calif., near Sacramento. Hamid, along with his father, was charged with covering up the fact he attended a six-month jihadi training camp near Rawalpindi during a visit to Pakistan in 2003-04.
Hamid was reported to have told the FBI the camp was being run by al-Qaida, but indications are it was actually being run by the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (the group now calls itself the Jamiat-ul-Ansar), a virulently anti-U.S. Pakistani jihadi group, which is a member of bin Laden's International Islamic Front for Jihad Against Crusaders and Jews, formed in 1998. Its then chief, Maulana Fazlur Rahman Khalil, who was released by Pakistani authorities after having been detained for some months last year without being prosecuted, was a cosignatory of bin Laden's first fatwa of 1998 against the United States. Pakistani authorities have tried to ridicule the FBI's charge, noting it was inconceivable a jihadi training camp attended by hundreds of trainees, as claimed by him, could be located in or near Rawalpindi, where the Pakistan army's General Headquarters are located.
"I dun' thin' that word means what you think it means!"
Coincidentally, Yasin Malik, the head of the Jammu & Kashmir Liberation Front, a militant organization in Indian Kashmir, during a recent visit to Pakistan, revealed hundreds of members of his group were trained in the late 1980s in a camp at the same place, which was being run by Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, a Kashmiri, who was a member of the government of Nawaz Sharif and is now minister for Information in the Cabinet headed by Shaukat Aziz. He is considered close to President Pervez Musharraf and has had a long history of association with the HUM and Khalil and obtained for HUM a large plot of land near Rawalpindi for it to start a jihadi training camp. Embarrassed by Malik's disclosure, Rashid strongly denied running any such camp and maintained he was only running a humanitarian camp for the refugees from Indian Kashmir.
At which point his lips fell off...
Malik also subsequently retracted from his statement and accused the media of misreporting him.
That was in immediate anticipation of those guys putting the pointy objects down and agreeing to let him out of the locked room at the Hospital for the Politically Unreliable™...
He asserted what he had said was Rashid was looking after the refugees. He denied having said anything about jihadi training organized by Rashid.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/27/2005 16:06 ||
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Pakistani authorities have tried to ridicule the FBI's charge, noting it was inconceivable a jihadi training camp attended by hundreds of trainees, as claimed by him, could be located in or near Rawalpindi, where the Pakistan army's General Headquarters are located.
Well maybe if we bomb it into oblivion, they won't notice that either?
Suuurprise suuurprise surprise!
Seventeen former prisoners at Guantanamo Bay who were detained on their return home to Pakistan were freed, with many alleging they had witnessed the desecration of the Koran at the US jail. I may go out and buy one just so I can wipe my ass with it.
The men came back to Pakistan around nine months ago after being cleared by US authorities. They were finally released from a Pakistani jail after promising not to take part in militant activities. ...and if you can't trust a terrorist, who can you trust?
"American soldiers have been committing desecration of the holy Koran at Guantanamo," Haifz Ehsan Saeed, 27, told AFP as he emerged from the central jail in the city of Lahore."There were various incidents. Once I saw them throw the Koran in a bucket full of urine and faeces," he said. Just once?
Saeed said he was arrested four years ago in Afghanistan on charges of having links with the Al-Qaeda terror network. He was kept in a jail run by brutal Afghan warlord Abdul Rashid Dostam and then shifted to Guantanamo."The Americans declared me innocent but yet I have been in prison for about nine months in Rawalpindi and Lahore after being released from Guantanamo Bay," he said. "I am not ashamed because I have not done any wrong act," Saeed added. Just checking out the school system in Afghanistan. Or was I a holy man? I forget.
Another freed prisoner, 25-year-old Muhammad Hanif, said he was tortured and his beard was forcibly shaved by the US troops at the military jail in Cuba."The Americans removed our beards and have been spitting over the holy book," Hanif told AFP. Look sharp, feel sharp.
The inmates at Guantanamo Bay protested at the abuse of the Islamic holy book and went on hunger strikes, he said. A real hunger strike or one of those 20 minute Palestinian ones?
A Pakistani official said the men had been released on the orders of Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. Thanks, Perv.
"We have released 17 prisoners after their parents and guardians furnished guarantees that they would not indulge in terrorist activities," said Tahir Ashrafi, the provincial government's advisor on religious affairs. Mom and dad vouched for them, so go and sin no more.
Musharraf earlier this month condemned the desecration of the Koran as an "unpardonable" act and backed calls for the punishment of those found guilty. Frequent protest rallies were held in Pakistan after a report in Newsweek magazine in early May said Guantanamo Bay interrogators threw a Koran in a toilet to rattle Muslim inmates. Newsweek later retracted the story. And Newsweek would never lie. Except for when they retracted the story.
The US Defense Department, announcing the result of an investigation this month, said that overall US soldiers at the camp handled the Islamic holy book with respect. But it said military personnel at Guantanamo Bay once kicked the Koran and a copy was sprayed with urine in another incident. Let's play "Kick the Koran"!
#6
Uh oh.... Ima repeating myself again. Was it the same article? Noooooooooooo! Im tooo young.
Letz do it right.
In my day we used to crush Bat Roaches on sight instead of molly coddlying their overly shellacked bodies.
/old and nutz right down the road
The endorsement opens up a number of issues relating to the coherence of the jihadist groups in the region. Last December an Algerian group announced on the al-Ma'sada jihadist forum how it was transferring its allegiance to Osama bin Laden, calling itself "TheOrganization of al-Qaeda in the Land of the Berbers" [www.alm2sda.net]. More recently, on May 8, the Qa'idat al-Jihad fi al-Jaza'ir (al-Qaeda [base] of the Jihad in Algeria) announced its appearance on the jihadist Kalimat al-Haqq site [www.rightword.net], citing the demoralization of the jihadist groups in Algeria, their bad name through association with massacres of civilians, and the questionable motivation and loyalty of the leaders to the cause. The statement encouraged the irredentist remnants to join âa new cause.'
The present endorsement may be a positive response to attempts by GSPC remnants to restore credibility. Indeed the attack on the Mauritanian outpost may be partly seen in this light. The Mauritanian attack came after pressure from the government at Nouakchott against camps training mujahideen for the Iraqi theatre. In Algeria the number of foreign Islamist militants arrested has increased in recent months, an unusual development which has worried the authorities. On the same day of the endorsement by al-Qaeda, six Yemeni students were arrested in eastern Algeria, suspected of belonging to an unnamed network linked to al-Qaeda.
This incident, and the message from al-Qaeda in Iraq, suggest that a greater degree of co-ordination is being attempted, either in the form of direct links between the groups, or at least as an attempt to re-package the activities as part of one âglobal jihad' movement. Whatever the exact explanation, the Algerian jihadi theatre, as proclaimed by the GSPC statement on the Mauritanian attack, looks set to expand. Attacks in Algeria, despite a net decline, have peaked recently, and there have been renewed clashes on June 12-13 between GSPC militants and the Mauritanian military in the desert area near the border with Mali. Soldiers are now to be deployed in greater strength along the border areas with Mali and Algeria [www.mapeci.com].
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 11:25 ||
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Looks like they're trying to line up on an "axis", so to speak.
let 'em all band together and see if they can agree on how to kill all the infidels! More "red on red" fighting, I hope!
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/27/2005 12:07 Comments ||
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Bangladesh is increasingly recognized as the locus of a significant and expanding threat emanating from radicalized Islamist extremist mobilization and its systematic transformation into political and terrorist violence. Notwithstanding vociferous official denials, it has, for some time now, been an established staging post for terrorism within the region, and is seen as a potential center of Islamist consolidation for the âglobal jihadâ as well. It is already a major supply route and transit point for illicit weapons smuggling, and a safe haven for some of the militant groups active in Indiaâs northeast as well.
Worse, these processes are rooted in an entrenched political dynamic that has progressively diminished the space for secular or moderate politics in the country. Given the polarization and extreme hostility between the two dominant political parties in Bangladesh, and the near complete split down the middle in voting patterns, the Islamist parties have become central to the processes of government formation in the country, and have gradually expanded their political presence as well. These trends have been compounded further by the combination of religious mobilization, intimidation and extremist violence that these radical parties and their armed allies engage in, as well as their very wide and expanding presence in the social sector, particularly education. Given these broad trends, the scope for any reversal of the Islamist extremist consolidation in Bangladesh has shrunk progressively.
It is necessary to understand the dynamics of these processes, as well as to make an objective assessment of their real and potential threat, both in terms of internal stability and external security. Firstly, what are the real dimensions and magnitude of the threat of Islamist extremist mobilization in Bangladesh? The coastal area stretching from the port city of Chittagong south through Cox's Bazaar to the Myanmar border, notorious for piracy, smuggling and arms-running, is the principal area of activity of the Harkat-ul-Jehadi-e-Islami Bangladesh (Movement of Islamic Holy War, HuJI-BD), which is a signatory to Osama bin Laden's International Islamic Front and a designated terrorist outfit in many countries, including the United States. [1] Further, the Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB or Awakened Muslim Masses), a vigilante Islamist group, is reported to have created strong bases mostly in northwest Bangladesh, in the districts of Rajshahi, Satkhira, Naogaon, Bagerhat, Jessore, Chittagong, Joypurhat, Natore, Rangpur, Bogra, Chittagong, and Khulna. [2] Elsewhere, the Jama'atul Mujahideen (Party of the Mujahideen) is training small groups of youths for jihad in the northern districts of Natore and Bogra, one in the southwestern district of Chuadanga and another in the mid-eastern border district of Chandpur. It also has a network in the Shaghata, Sundarganj and Sadullapur areas of Gaibandha district as also in Rajshahi district and parts of Khulna city. [3] While both of them espouse the ideal of a âTalibanisedâ Bangladesh, JMJB leaders have openly proclaimed links to the Taliban and al-Qaeda. There have also been reports that JMJB's training of recruits includes recorded speeches of bin Laden and video footage of warfare training at al-Qaeda's (now defunct) Farooque camp in Afghanistan. Professor Abu Sayeed, in his two books, Aghoshito Juddher Blueprint (Blueprint of an Undeclared War) and Brutal Crime Documents, claims that around 50,000 militants belonging to more than 40 groups are now controlling a vast area of the country, with the assistance of ruling coalition partner Jamaat-e-Islami and a section of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). [4] Sayeed also says over 50 camps are now in operation across Bangladesh, where Islamists are getting military training and that militant groups have their recruits in all sections of society, including mosques, seminaries, educational institutions, the judiciary, mass media and even the armed forces.
The prevailing socio-political dynamics lend themselves to the consolidation of Islamist extremism in the country. For instance, the JMJB is believed to have exploited the countrysideâs abhorrence towards left-wing extremism to spread radical Wahhabism among the rural populace and in the process also emerged as a significant force to be reckoned with. The groupâs rapid spread has been primarily achieved through an assumption of the role of âprotectorâ in areas of widespread mal-governance, support of local administration and perceived linkages and claims of contact with the al-Qaeda-Taliban combine. Taking recourse to a policy of appeasement, the Khaleda Zia regime has remained largely indifferent to the growing power and clout of such radical Islamist groups.
Political violence, including assassination of political opponents, has increased exponentially under the current dispensation and furthermore, most investigations have been inconclusive. Approximately 1,096 persons, including leaders and activists of different political parties, were killed in 997 incidents of organized violence of political parties between October 2001 and February 2005, according to the Bangladesh Institute of Human rights. [5] The opposition Awami League (AL) in a 74-page report titled Growing Fanaticism and Extremism in Bangladesh: Shades of the Taliban (released on February 13, 2005) has documented the rise of jihadi groups as well as the politics of vendetta. [6] In what is probably the first detailed documentation of Islamist extremism by an internal source in Bangladesh, the AL report mentions at least 34 bomb blasts between 1999 and February 2005, in which 164 persons died and 1,735 people sustained injuries.
A deeper scrutiny of these blasts reveal that, while there were only 13 bomb blasts between 1999 and 2003, 2004 alone saw 13 such attacks, and there have been eight blasts in the first two months of the current year. Eight of the 34 bomb attacks documented by the report have targeted the AL; nine were detonated during cultural functions; and five occurred at religious shrines, including the one in the shrine of Hazrat Shahjalal in Sylhet on May 21, 2004, in which the British High Commissioner was wounded. The report notes, "The selective and deliberate targeting of AL and the like-minded secular and progressive forces, cultural organizations, religious minority groups and entertainment places such as movie halls or local fairs is indicative of a consistent pattern that clearly unmasks the identity of the perpetrators of such crimes and their ideology."
A sharp polarization of the countryâs polity has led to a situation in which the government seeks to maintain an electoral balance, while the Islamic extremists seek to broaden their political and social base. This is crucial and is expected to continue, considering the past trajectory. In the October 2001 Parliamentary elections, the ruling BNP secured 40.97% of the votes, with its coalition right-wing parties, Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh securing 4.28%, and the Islami Oikyo Jote (Islamic Unity Council, an alliance of seven radical Islamist groups) wining 0.68%. At the other end, the opposition AL received 40.13% of the vote. This extremely close competition between the two main parties has given the Islamists disproportionate leverage, considering their tiny electoral base. [7] It is this battle for electoral balance among the BNP and AL that is being exploited by the Islamic extremists.
While it is true that Bangladeshi Islamic extremists, with some exceptions, have not been linked to major international terrorist incidents, it would be perilous to consider the Islamist ensemble as purely internal developments. These movements are, to a certain extent, local variants of an international Islamist enterprise and a significant number of these groups and individuals maintain links with the âglobal jihadâ. To that end, it would be hazardous to focus only on the transient geographical location of Islamist terror. The identification of the locus of terrorism, according to Delhi-based analyst Ajai Sahni, with the transient geographical location where it finds the largest number of victims, or from where it mounts the most significant of its recent outrages, is a grave error of judgment.
What real â immediate, imminent or potential â threat does the Islamist extremist mobilization in Bangladesh constitute to security and stability within Bangladesh; the immediate neighborhood; and to Western interests? Challenges in Bangladesh, on current projections, emerge from two quarters â a bitter power struggle between the BNP and AL and secondly, terrorism orchestrated by Islamic extremists, more often than not, in tandem with their over-ground supporters, some of whom are in the ruling coalition. A weakening of the democratic process in Bangladesh leading to a failed state scenario in the long run are bound to have repercussions in the immediate neighborhood and to the growing Western interests in the region. To this end, international donors at the recent aid meeting expressed serious concern over the deteriorating law and order situation. Many in Bangladesh believe that the government proscription of two Islamist groups on February 23, 2005, was a fallout of global pressure and not otherwise. Without impartial and effective government action against Islamist extremism, global skepticism regarding Bangladesh is bound to escalate. When asked about the future of democracy in Bangladesh, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia, Christina Rocca, said on May 12, 2005, "I wish a good future but I have no crystal ball."[8]
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 11:13 ||
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Moroccan militants have carried out a number of daring and devastating attacks in the last 24 months: from the train bombings in Madrid, to the murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh and the executions of more than 166 Moroccan civilians regarded as "bad Muslims". [1] The involvement of Moroccans in these terrorist attacks has shattered the kingdomâs image of moderation and tolerance. How this has happened is a question that was asked in shock and horror as Moroccans and non-Moroccans alike struggled to comprehend the circumstances and trends that have led to a shocking upsurge in Moroccan jihadism.
The kingdomâs domestic troubles are largely of its own making. It was the stateâs inadvertent support for the ideological and motivational sources of Islamic radicalism that laid the groundwork for the surge of modern Moroccan terrorism. During the 1980s, the state encouraged the importation of Wahhabism, a retrograde but status quo prone ideology, to counter the growing menace of political Islam. [2] To preserve its enormous privileges and perpetuate its hold on power, the monarchy had every reason to look favorably on this Salafi current, which albeit being puritanical, contemptuous of modernity, and scornful of Moroccan forms of Islam, was distinguished by its political quietism and deference to Muslim rulers.
This form of Salafism is known as Salafiyya âilmiyya (scholarly or scientific Salafism). It conceptualizes orthodoxy as a static set of beliefs and shariah as fixed divine construct. It condemns political Islam as a perversion of religion and authorizes the use of violence against individuals engaged in immoral conducts. The most prominent figure of this Salafi trend was the late Fqih Zamzami (d. 1989) of Tangiers, a great orator, whose diatribes against immorality, injustice and corruption in the 1970s and 1980s had a huge impact and gained him a considerable following among the discontented. Although widely hailed as a fearless critic of decadence, Zamzami was careful not to stray too far from the limits of freedom of speech set by the monarchy or to challenge the existing order. But this does not mean that Zamzamiâs edicts and pronouncements had no political objectives. [3] It is clear that his sermons were issued in pursuit of cultivating a social ethos of "moral" leadership capable of influencing the power-holders to temper their authoritarian, corrupt and immoral proclivities.
This new form of imported Salafiyya differed significantly from that of the 1925-1954 where Moroccan Salafi activism, personified by Allal al-Fassi, the religio-nationalist leader of the Istiqlal party, sought to defend Moroccoâs Arab-Islamic identity against the onslaught of European colonialism and the âheresyâ of Sufism and maraboutism, by promoting scriptural orthodoxy. This mainly revolved around the famous Islamic injunction of ('amr bi 'l-ma'ruf wa nahi ani 'l-munkar) "commanding what is proper and forbidding what is reprehensible". This obsession with the good conduct of individuals resonated well with broad sectors of the population who lived in crowded and poor neighborhoods and shantytowns. The latter are largely unrecognized by the state and receive little or no basic public services such as electricity, water, telephone lines, educational or health facilities.
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, this apolitical, puritanical, and backward-looking wave of new fundamentalism benefited greatly from globalization and the widespread alienation generated by the painful IMF/World Bank policies of economic and financial structural adjustment programs. [4] The Wahhabi salafists proved adept at manipulating slogans, generating themes and appropriating them for their own purposes. Through networks of storefront or makeshift mosques, they consolidated their ability to disseminate their ideas and operate in the shantytowns of the major cities in the kingdom. [5]
But contrary to popular images, the ideological underpinnings of modern Moroccan jihadism derive from a much more complicated set of intellectual, political and ideological trends than what is referred to as the fatalistic Wahhabi Salafism. The phenomenon of al-Salafiyya al-jihadiyya can be traced back to a deadly mixture of the Saudi tradition of aggressive Wahhabi militancy and the revolutionary political trend of Egyptian scholar, Sayyid Qutb (d. 1966). The fusion of Wahhabism and Qutb-style jihadism started with the war against the Soviets and created a "mentality of jihad" that had a profound impact on the small contingent of Moroccan mujahideen in Afghanistan. Unlike their Egyptian and Syrian counterparts who had their religious or political awakening grafted from inside their countries and way before they landed in Afghanistan, most Moroccan veterans had their formative years in Afghanistan where their political, social and religious views were molded. These acquired views stood in sharp contrast to the ones promoted by the retrograde but non-political Wahhabi religious school.
This marriage between Qutbist ideology and Wahhabi doctrine, better known as Salafist, entered a new stage with the 1990-1991 Gulf war, which brought American troops to stand guard over Islam's holiest sites. [6] This development was, indeed, a catalyst for radical Islamic anger and politicization. It also ensured new Moroccan recruits to the jihadi trend. The new converts to the jihadistsâ ideology openly embraced Osama Bin Laden. Some went to Afghanistan, the Balkans, Central Asia and Chechnya to join a jihadi contingent recruited by al-Qaeda-aligned operatives in Jordan, Syria, Egypt, and other countries in the Middle East and beyond. In these theatres of conflict, Moroccan veterans of the Afghan war perfected the skills they had developed at the expense of the Soviets, while new recruits underwent training courses in jihad and were indoctrinated for martyrdom. The March 2004 terrorist attacks in Spain were a demonstration of the dedication, efficiency, power and prowess of Moroccan international jihadists.
Other Moroccan jihadists sympathetic to al-Qaeda remained at home, devising their own set of goals that linked with the supreme military and political goal of the wider multinational network of jihadists. This group is primarily motivated by local issues and certainly more cautious in its choice of tactics and targets, including the wisdom of broadening the war against the âcrusadersâ to Morocco. This skepticism arose from the fear that turning the kingdom into a battlefield risked alienating the very people that sustain autonomous jihadist cells and would, moreover, provoke a dangerous and unnecessary confrontation with Moroccan security forces.
The terrorist attacks of 9/11 marked a turning point for the local Salafi-jihadist movements, which saw in the attacks and their aftermath a response to the perceived injustices and aggression of the West and an unprecedented demonstration of the international jihadistsâ power. The detection and subsequent disruption of a suspected al-Qaeda cell in Morocco, which planed to attack U.S. and British naval ships in the Straits of Gibraltar, pointed to a new strategy of the jihadist groups in the kingdom. [7] In its effort to confront the rising extremist threat, the Moroccan secret services and police have been carrying out raids against suspected Islamic extremist groups like those of Zakaria El Miloudi, Abou Hafs and Youssef Fikri. In retaliation against the kingdomâs aggressive antiterrorism operations and its staunch support of the U.S in its war against the jihadists, some of the militants decided to broaden the war against the âcrusadersâ to include the Moroccan regime and its collaborators.
This domestic based terror network is less cohesive in membership, consisting of cells, and operating with subtle, decentralized links to groups that provide funding, publicity, shelter and recruitment facilities. Unlike the Algerian Takfirist groups, GIA (armed Islamist group) and GSPC (Salafist preaching and combat group), during the civil war of the 1990s the movementsâ loose structure means that it does not have a central command authority, let alone a coherent and consistent methodology. Bin Laden is perceived as a symbol of defiance, ideological inspiration and policy guidance, inspiring attacks rather than plotting them. His self-proclaimed emirs in Morocco are believed to be the actors who outline objectives and major strategy issues.
At present, the Salafist jihadist groups in Morocco lack the popularity and organizational cohesion to destabilize the country. The Moroccan authorities seem to be aware at last of the dangers of identifying apolitical forms of zealous religiosity with radical political activism. This is important because the conceptualization of Moroccan political Islamists as a monolithic group of zealous ideologues fails to recognize the variability and non-violent essence of their doctrinal outlook. The major source of the terrorism problem in the kingdom stems from tendencies that disregard the concept of the nation-state and dismiss politics as a perversion of religion. Intransigence, militancy and violence are deeply rooted in the outlook of this brand of supranational Salafi activism.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 11:08 ||
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Declaring India's democracy to be a model for Islamic countries, External Affairs Minister K. Natwar Singh Monday said the biggest measure of its success was that no Indian was a member of terrorist group Al Qaeda.
"We have the second largest Muslim and second largest Shia population in the world," Singh, departing from his prepared speech, told a gathering at the Royal Institute for International Affairs here.
"Yet, not a single Indian out of our 150 million Muslims has joined the Al Qaeda. This is a fact that is not often recognised," Singh said during his keynote address to a two-day conference on "India - the next decade".
Singh's wide-ranging speech dwelt on the entire gamut of India's foreign policy in the coming decade and presented a picture of an India determined to play a larger role in world affairs.
"The existing world needs to take into cognisance the aspirations and hopes of the Islamic world," he said.
"India is a good example of how this can be done through democratic and consensual means, thereby strengthening the forces of coherence and integration within societies."
Singh's speech signalled the renewal of an outward-looking foreign policy for India - one that embraced what he called the "new realities" such as economic globalisation, Islamic aspirations, global poverty, challenge of terrorism and nuclear non-proliferation.
"It seems to me, from what respectable forecasting institutions have projected, that India - together with China - is more the flavour of the century than the decade," he said.
"In the next decade we could see India position itself for greater accomplishments as the century progresses. There are no precedents for managing a democracy of 1.2 billion people," said Singh as British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, who shared the stage with him, nodded vigorously.
"For ourselves, we seek, first and foremost, security and economic prosperity. These objectives must motivate India's interaction with the world in all matters, whether political, economic, strategic or cultural."
Revealing some aspects of Indian calculations for the future, Singh pointed out that a decade from now the world population would reach 7.2 billion people, 1.4 billion of whom would be Chinese and 1.2 billion Indian.
"Of the Indian population, some 68 percent, or more than 820 million people, will be in the active working age group of 21 to 51. By 2015, the technological, demographic and social changes of Asia will influence every aspect of global and local existence."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 09:30 ||
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The al-Qaeda linked extremist group Ansar al-Sunna on Sunday denied that any of its members had met US representatives over the violence in Iraq and vowed to pursue its jihad or holy war, according to an Internet statement.
"Lies! All lies!"
US secretary of defence Donald Rumsfeld said on US television on Sunday that Pentagon officials had taken part in negotiations with Iraqi insurgents. In answer to a question on Fox News television about a London Sunday Times report that US officials met with insurgents in a bid of split off the homegrown insurgents from foreign fighters, Rumsfeld said: "Sure, my goodness, yeah.
The Sunday Times reported that a US team, including senior military and intelligence officers, had held face-to-face talks with insurgent leaders, including representatives of the al-Qaeda-linked Ansar al-Sunna group. A civilian staffer from congress and a representative of the US embassy in Baghdad also attended the two meetings on June 3 and 13, the paper reported, citing Iraqi sources.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/27/2005 09:29 ||
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#1
Nope, not us! Must be some other weak-kneed crusader group!
Question: What group would admidt to talking with the infidels, when Al Zarkie has promised retribution to any who would defy his blah, blah, blah....
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/27/2005 10:33 Comments ||
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Divisions over tactics and vision split Libyan opposition groups in exile, but participants at a two-day conference agreed Sunday to unite under a "national accord" aimed at ousting Moammar Gadhafi.
If we're involved in this, which we probably are, I hope we're being very circumspect and not involving CIA or State Department publicity hounds to work on it...
In a final declaration, the groups addressed the United Nations, saying the global body was responsible for restoring Libya's constitution. The charter was drafted in 1951 as part of a U.N. resolution — but Gadhafi froze it after assuming power in a military coup and replaced it with martial law. "Bringing back constitutional legitimacy to Libya is a major factor towards building a stable political life," the declaration read.
Right. The UN's going to do that. Maybe this isn't really a movement to get rid of Muammar — if so, it'll probably be successful about the time he dies of old age. But as a method of tweaking the UN's nose, it's pretty slick. It draws attention to yet another failure on the part of the Best Hope for Mankind™...
Pro-Libyan demonstrators entered the hotel where opposition members were meeting to try to disrupt proceedings.
But natch. We expected no less...
Carrying the green Libyan flag and chanting pro-Gadhafi slogans, the protesters â mainly students â were asked by police and hotel security to leave the hotel. Some 200 people also rallied Sunday outside the embassy, waving Libyan flags and holding placards bearing Gadhafi's photo. They shouted "Look for peace together" and "Work for democracy together" in Arabic.
In the context of 40 years of martial law?
One demonstrator, Mostafa Ywali, said opposition groups were holding a meeting in London "to make trouble in Libya." Some 600 Libyan students are expected to hold a pro-Gadhafi demonstration in front of the Libyan embassy on Monday to voice support for the regime. Conference participants said the students were threatened with the loss of their scholarships if they did not join the demonstration.
We expected that, too...
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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#7
Thank you Mr. G.
Remember it's pronounced Said... like in he said, she said. It's is never to be pronounced in the Egyptian manner of Said as in Port Said. Altho that's how abu Gramps pronounces it.
Posted by: Boris Said ||
06/27/2005 13:07 Comments ||
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#8
I know - you're from Carlsbad....a neighbor....remember? :-)
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/27/2005 14:40 Comments ||
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#9
I musta forgot Mr. G. I was busy heeling and toeing, heeling and toeing all over thisa world.
Posted by: Boris Said ||
06/27/2005 17:19 Comments ||
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#10
Are you both well-heeled and well-toed, then? How about well met?
Riot police in front of Egypt's state security building on Sunday encircled a group of protesters demanding the trial of security officers accused of torture, beating demonstrators who tried to break through. About 100 protesters, among them members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood, pro-reform activists and representatives of local human rights organizations, shouted: "Freedom, Freedom," and held banners calling for Interior Minister Habib el-Adly to resign. They also carried posters of prisoners allegedly killed from being tortured.
Two protesters were injured during the protest and taken to a hospital, but their condition was not immediately known. International and local human rights groups have accused Egyptian security authorities of illegally detaining and torturing people, saying it is systematic, a charge the government denies. Susan Nadim from a victims of torture group said her center reported 32 cases of people dying as a result of torture in Egyptian prisons during the last month alone. Human rights activist and protest organizer Aida Seif el-Dawla said all the cases of torture were reported to the prosecutor-general. "We even held sit-ins at the prosecutor-general's office when they dismissed cases," she said.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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It seems even fallen dictators have trouble getting their novels published. Jordan has barred publication of Saddam Hussein's fourth novel, titled "Get Out, Damned One," due to political concerns, a senior Jordanian official said Sunday. "I just assessed whether this would be in Jordan's national interest and I thought it was not because the whole issue bears political ramifications which do not serve Jordan at all," Ahmad Qudah, head of the Press and Publications Department, told The Associated Press. "I have declined to ordain the printing and circulation of the novel said to be written by Saddam because we in Jordan will not sacrifice our ties with Iraq for anything."
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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"Get Out, Damned One"
Saddam shouldn't worry... It's only a matter of time before Oliver Stone secures the movie rights...
After those images of the old phart in his drawers, Stone probably wants to follow up the Blockbuster, "Alexander the Great", with the thrilling modern day epic, "A Day in the Life of a Misunderstood Tyrant"
#2
Before I took the time to read the article I was under the impression the book was a deply introspective autobiography of Saddam himself!!! The title would reflect the hatred most of his countrymen feel for him.
AMMAN - Jordanian Prime Minister Adanan Badran is planning a cabinet reshuffle in days in a bid to win a parliamentary vote of confidence denied him since he formed his government in April, officials said on Sunday. Badranâs cabinet has vowed to step up the pace of reform, but it came under attack from a group of 49 MPs in the 110-member parliament who threatened a no-confidence vote unless the economic team was changed.
Finance minister Bassem Awadallah, who was the target of criticism in parliament over the dismal state of Jordanâs economy, resigned earlier this month, paving the way for the reshuffle. The new line-up will see veteran diplomat Marwan Moasher -- currently a royal court minister -- return as deputy prime minister, a job he held in the former government of Faisal al-Fayez.
Sounds like the Italian government ...
The main duty of Moasher, who has been heading a national committee for reform for several months -- will be to help accelerate the pace of reform, officials told AFP. Five ministers, in addition to Awadallah, are also expected to be replaced.
Badran has been busy holding consultations with MPs ahead of the reshuffle and King Abdullah II has also held several meetings with political parties representatives over the past few weeks.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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A paramilitary soldier shot dead two people including a former militant on Saturday to avenge the death of his brother in a military operation against Al Qaeda-linked suspects last year, officials said on Sunday. Nur Janan, a Frontier Constabulary (FC) jawan, opened fire late on Saturday when a group of tribesmen was returning after playing a cricket match with a team of paramilitary soldiers at the Zalai Fort in Wana, the main town in South Waziristan Agency near the Afghan border. The firing left Noor Hasan and a 19-year-old boy dead, a local administration official said. Another boy was injured in the incident.
He said Hasan, had surrendered after a former Taliban commander, Nek Muhammad, was killed in June last year after leading bloody resistance to the armyâs largest-ever offensive to drive out Al Qaeda-linked militants in South Waziristan. Janan claimed that Hassan was close to the slain Taliban commander. âI killed him to take revenge for my brotherâs death,â he said. He has been arrested. Jananâs brother was a paramilitary soldier who died in that operation.
"It was just business, Mike!"
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Now that's putting the "ex-" in ex-militant.
Posted by: Carl in N.H. ||
06/27/2005 11:44 Comments ||
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JERUSALEM - Prime Minister Ariel Sharonâs cabinet approved plans on Sunday for the relocation of thousands of settlers from the Gaza Strip to form their own new municipality in a coastal area of southern Israel. The plan, which was passed by 14 votes to two, means that the Nitzanim area will become an independent local council as long as more than 5,000 settlers move there after this summerâs pullout from Gaza.
The government has already begun setting up scores of mobile homes in the Nitzanim area, which lies close to sand dunes that are classified as an area of natural beauty. However less than 5,000 of the 8,000 Gaza settlers have so far agreed to move, many still reluctant to be seen negotiating with the government and thus legitimising the pullout plan.
The relocation plan also fixes a cost for the land which the settlers receive. In turn, the cost will be deducted from the compensation payments they are to receive from the state for leaving Gaza.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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let them stay if they want to be pillaged. Jeesh. Give them a good offer, if they reject it, then tell them to STHU and then later, when they get what we all know is coming to them, say, we're like so totally sorry about your wife and kids. But the important thing was sticking to your principals. You can be proud. Soo..do you want us to move their graves out of gaza so they won't be disturbed?
Israeli President Moshe Katsav said in an interview on Sunday that Syria was sending ambiguous messages on peace talks with Israel. âI think we should reinitiate dialogue. But that depends on their president (Bashar al-Assad),â Katsav was quoted as saying in the interview with El Pais newspaper ahead of a visit to Spain this week. âHe transmits a double message, full of ambiguities; on the one hand he is capable of saying publicly that he wants peace with Israel, but at the same time they cooperate indirectly with Hizbollah. We canât have such contradictory messages,â Katzav said.
"Contradictory messages make us nervous. You won't like it when we're nervous."
Katsav added that in any case Syria was not as dangerous an enemy as Iran though just as nutty. âItâs true that Syria is still our enemy, but it does not have nuclear capacity; in the last decade it has stopped calling for the destruction of Israel and although it still cooperates with Hamas, Jihad and Hizbollah, it is very different from Iran,â Katsav said. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Syriaâs Assad may come together for the first time in a Euro-Mediterranean conference in Barcelona in November, which could help to re-establish peace talks between Arabs and Israelis.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian prime minister Ahmed Qorei will travel to the Gaza Strip on Monday to hold talks with the Islamic Jihad movement over its commitment to a troubled truce, sources said.
Qoreiâs office said on Sunday that the prime minister would host Tuesdayâs weekly cabinet meeting in Gaza and hold talks with security commanders about the law and order crisis which saw him threaten to suspend his government earlier this month. Official and militant sources in Gaza also said that Qorei would meet with Jihad whose commitment to a truce, or what radical factions call a âcooldown periodâ, has been called into question after a number of deadly attacks. âThey will discuss the cooldown, and the escalations, especially by the Israelis and Jihad,â one Palestinian official said.
I think they're trying to play the Israelis, but the Israelis are smarter than that.
Local leaders also held talks with interior minister Nasr Yussef over the weekend about the truce, saying that they remained committed to the agreement but reserving the right to respond to what they regard as Israeli violations. âWe have not changed our position regarding the truce. We support the truce as long as Israel does not violate it and initiate aggressions,â said senior Jihad official Nafez Azzam.
Israel had called off its arrest operations in the wake of the truce, which while less than watertight had led to a major drop in violence. Scores of Jihad activists were arrested last week, with the Israeli army saying it had âtaken the gloves offâ.
Yup, pretty smart.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Qoreiâs office said on Sunday that the prime minister would host Tuesdayâs weekly cabinet meeting in Gaza and hold talks with security commanders about the law and order crisis which saw him threaten to suspend his government earlier this month.
Erm, there was actually "law and order" in that place previously? Sure fooled me.
KABUL - Afghanistanâs US-backed government rejected on Sunday charges by Russia that Moscowâs Central Asian allies are being targeted by militants trained in Afghanistan.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday that âterrorist basesâ run by the Taleban movement, which ruled Afghanistan before a US-led invasion in 2001, and unspecified âforeign spy servicesâ, were still operational. Speaking after talks with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, Lavrov said radicals from ex-Soviet Uzbekistan and Russia were involved in training guerrillas at bases located in Afghanistan and border areas of Pakistan.
In a statement, Afghanistanâs Foreign Ministry said it had noted Lavrovâs remarks with âdeep regretâ. âThe Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan strongly rejects claims regarding the presence of terrorist training camps in Afghanistan and considers such allegations as totally baseless,â it said. âThe Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, a victim of terrorism itself, is on the frontline of the war against terrorism and is committed to continue the fight to remove this international menace.
âAfghanistan expects countries of the region to sincerely join in the efforts to eliminate terrorist elements,â it added.
Lavrov said last week Moscow had information that militants were periodically delivered from Afghanistan to the Ferghana Valley, a restive region shared by Uzbekistan, ex-Soviet Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
Hard to imagine this could happen without our knowing about it; hard to imagine we'd know about it and not put a violent stop to it.
Russia has long said that the Taleban financed the separatist movement in its southern region of Chechnya and helped to train Chechen guerrillas. Moscow backed the US-led invasion in Afghanistan in 2001 partly because it wanted to put an end to what it believed was a safe haven for radicals fomenting unrest in its predominantly Muslim regions.
On Thursday, Putin complained that the effectiveness of the US force in Afghanistan was âextremely lowâ, according to reports from Russian news agencies.
The Russian tradition in Afghanistan being what it is.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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The Russian tradition in Afghanistan being what it is.
You don't think Putin is thinking about a rematch in Afghanistan do you?
Posted by: Charles ||
06/27/2005 0:32 Comments ||
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Well, our supply lines to Afghanistan pass through former Soviet states for something like 1000-2000 miles. Maybe longer? So he'd have a massive advantage to start with. We'd have to fly stuff through Pakistan (assuming we still had permission).
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
06/27/2005 0:48 Comments ||
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"Foreign spy services": read, Dubya and the US of A, aka the Left-alleged "world's greatest terror state", sub-read "Will someone, anyone, please attack the USA and cause massive casualties so Hillary can be POTUS, and America under OWG and SWO'!?
#6
Maybe they'd be good enough to give us the location of one of these camps? Surely, they could pull out a few fingernails, or wave around some bacon, to get some information....
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/27/2005 10:31 Comments ||
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Oooh... Gee... Golly... Gosh... The answer's right on the tip of my tongue...
WHO were the dozen or so men who beat up a Punjab University student last week? The PU authorities have been unable to resolve this question. It was reported in the press that activists of the Islami Jamiat Talaba, the student wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami, beat up the student for speaking against the organisation.
They mean a roving band of fascisti grabbed the kid and beat him to within an inch of his life for not keeping his mouth shut...
The incident occurred when the first semester exams of the Institute of Administrative Sciences and Human Resource Development were being held. According to PU students, the student reportedly asked if it was true that the PU had banned co-ed student trips because of pressure from the IJT, and condemned the decision. Later, IJT activists called him outside the classroom, dragged him to a spot near the canteen and beat him up. Some of the alleged attackers were not even students of that department.
Sometimes you have to call in a specialist...
The director of the institute, Professor Dr Zafar Iqbal Jadoon, said a âdisciplinary committeeâ of the department had met thrice last week, but with no results. âNobody knows who were the people that beat up our departmentâs student.â
There are two L's in "pusillanimous," right?... Just checking the spelling...
He said the victim would identify the culprits if they were in front of him.
... but that they won't be...
However, he added, nobody had any proof that those assaulters were from a âspecific organisationâ, he said.
Doesn't want to have a close encounter with a tire iron, I guess...
He was almost sure that the attackers were from outside and vowed the university would tighten security to maintain studentsâ freedom.
"Yeah! That's it! It was probably hobos!"
He said the PUâs main disciplinary committee could also take up the issue. A report to the chancellor (Punjab governor) and the vice chancellor of the university is to be submitted in a day.
In triplicate, no doubt...
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Well, at least they're not digital brown shirts...
Posted by: Al Gore ||
06/27/2005 0:57 Comments ||
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Qazi Hussain Ahmed, president of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) said on Sunday that differences among leaders of the MMA would be resolved by consultation and everything "would be fine".
I love it when they say things like that. It means things are about to blow up in their faces...
Talking to the reporters on the occasion of the All Parties Hurmat-e-Quran Conference (APHQC) arranged by Jamaat-ud-Dawa, Qazi said such differences in an alliance were normal. He said he had no differences with Maulana Fazlur Rehman and they both were together in the evening of June 23, when asked that if there were no differences between him and Maulana Fazlur Rehman, secretary general of the alliance, why had the MMA postponed the supreme council meeting scheduled for June 23? He said the MMA supreme council would meet on June 28 to take the decision on the implementation of the Hasba Bill in the NWFP but the participation of the leader of the opposition and the NWFP chief minister were not on the agenda.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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The United States has seen no evidence which could spread the responsibility for the marketing of nuclear equipment beyond Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan; however it does not have all the answers, according to a State Department official. This was stated in answer to a question asked of Stephen C Engelken, director at the Departmentâs South Asia bureau, at a roundtable on the concluding day of the annual conference of the Pakistani-American Congress.
Another member of the panel, Marvin Weinbaum of the Middle East Institute, pointed out that nobody had been held accountable in Pakistan for the sale of nuclear equipment to other countries. He added that while this matter is not important to the present administration, elected officials in Congress and experts working at think tanks would like to get the answers. He said that in order to determine if it was the act of a single individual or whether the operation involved others, a thorough investigation is needed, though it may be âembarrassingâ to some.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/27/2005 00:00 ||
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Not what Dan D. said a while back. (Although he didn't mention "evidence") AQ-Khan was the Uranimum bomb market... There is a Pak Pu bomb market too. Different players.
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.
Dubai, 27 June (AKI) - An influential Saudi al-Qaeda leader, 
SEOUL - South Korea will send more fertiliser to North Korea to help the impoverished communist state battle chronic food shortages caused by its weak farm sector, a South Korean government official said on Monday. South Korean officials have said they hope bilateral humanitarian assistance will help to coax the North back to stalled talks on its nuclear weapons programmes.
Turkey's prime minister said the country will not not agree to any new conditions for European Union membership, adding that Turkey expects "honest politics" as it begins negotiations to join the bloc. 
Divisions over tactics and vision split Libyan opposition groups in exile, but participants at a two-day conference agreed Sunday to unite under a "national accord" aimed at ousting Moammar Gadhafi. 
Riot police in front of Egypt's state security building on Sunday encircled a group of protesters demanding the trial of security officers accused of torture, beating demonstrators who tried to break through. About 100 protesters, among them members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood, pro-reform activists and representatives of local human rights organizations, shouted: "Freedom, Freedom," and held banners calling for Interior Minister Habib el-Adly to resign. They also carried posters of prisoners allegedly killed from being tortured.
It seems even fallen dictators have trouble getting their novels published. Jordan has barred publication of Saddam Hussein's fourth novel, titled "Get Out, Damned One," due to political concerns, a senior Jordanian official said Sunday. "I just assessed whether this would be in Jordan's national interest and I thought it was not because the whole issue bears political ramifications which do not serve Jordan at all," Ahmad Qudah, head of the Press and Publications Department, told The Associated Press. "I have declined to ordain the printing and circulation of the novel said to be written by Saddam because we in Jordan will not sacrifice our ties with Iraq for anything."
A paramilitary soldier shot dead two people including a former militant on Saturday to avenge the death of his brother in a military operation against Al Qaeda-linked suspects last year, officials said on Sunday. Nur Janan, a Frontier Constabulary (FC) jawan, opened fire late on Saturday when a group of tribesmen was returning after playing a cricket match with a team of paramilitary soldiers at the Zalai Fort in Wana, the main town in South Waziristan Agency near the Afghan border. The firing left Noor Hasan and a 19-year-old boy dead, a local administration official said. Another boy was injured in the incident.
Israeli President Moshe Katsav said in an interview on Sunday that Syria was sending ambiguous messages on peace talks with Israel. âI think we should reinitiate dialogue. But that depends on their president (Bashar al-Assad),â Katsav was quoted as saying in the interview with El Pais newspaper ahead of a visit to Spain this week. âHe transmits a double message, full of ambiguities; on the one hand he is capable of saying publicly that he wants peace with Israel, but at the same time they cooperate indirectly with Hizbollah. We canât have such contradictory messages,â Katzav said.
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian prime minister Ahmed Qorei will travel to the Gaza Strip on Monday to hold talks with the Islamic Jihad movement over its commitment to a troubled truce, sources said.
WHO were the dozen or so men who beat up a Punjab University student last week? The PU authorities have been unable to resolve this question. It was reported in the press that activists of the Islami Jamiat Talaba, the student wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami, beat up the student for speaking against the organisation. 
Qazi Hussain Ahmed, president of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) said on Sunday that differences among leaders of the MMA would be resolved by consultation and everything "would be fine". 
