(SomaliNet) The United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Somalia Mr. Eric Loraj warned of what he called the humanitarian crisis in Mogadishu' Thursday after a brief visit to Somalia capital meeting with the interim government officials.
Wherever you find a crisis, you'll find the U.N.
Soon after arriving in Mogadishu today, Mr. Loraj had an urgent meeting with members of the cabinet and the citys authority in UNDPs compound near the Aden Adde airport over the humanitarian problems in the country. In a news conference held after the discussion, Mr Loraj said the situation in Mogadishu is unpredictable and the United Nations would work on securing stability.
Thanks for that brilliant insight. Work on securing stability? Why didn't anyone else think of that?
During his visit in Mogadishu, the UN official met with the minister of planning Ali Abdulahi Osoble and the mayor of Mogadishu Mohamed Omar Habeb Mohamed Dhere. In that meeting he said they had reached out that the governments department on relief and the ministry of planning should have monthly session as the UN will hold two day workshop on the continuation of the tasks. He said the displaced people now living in the government buildings should be relocated with the help of the UN.
So that it can be cleaned out and used as quarter for the Euro apparatchiks who will be arriving. And their Toyota Land Cruisers.
While he was talking about the free media, he said he believes that the freedom of expression is important to the human facts. The free media should be kept guard in promoting to its duties, he said. The UN is fully supporting any efforts to bring the interim government and its rebellion together and reach agreement, Loraj said. Eric Loraj and his delegate went back to Nairobi, Kenya.
'cause who wants to stay in Mog?
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A leader of the militant group behind attacks on Nigeria's oil industry was released from prison Thursday, a gesture seen as a peace offering by a new government that has vowed to make the crisis a priority.
Mujahid Dokubo-Asari's release was a key demand of the main militant group in the Niger Delta region, where attacks on oil installations and kidnappings of foreigners have cut Nigeria's oil production and helped raise global crude prices.
Dokubo-Asari, freed on bail, told cheering supporters who greeted him after a year and a half behind bars that he would continue to agitate for greater autonomy and oil riches for his impoverished region.
"I will continue to stand by the struggle that I have dedicated my life to," he said.
A spokesman for the militant group called Dokubo-Asari's release a "positive sign" from the government of President Umaru Yar'Adua that could hasten a negotiated peace.
The militants demand more government oil funds for their region, which is desperately poor despite its natural wealth. Attacks claimed by the group have cut oil production by about a quarter in Nigeria, Africa's top producer and a leading exporter to the United States.
After Yar'Adua's May 29 inauguration, militants said they would cease attacks for one month.
A judge granted Dokubo-Asari bail on health grounds. He was prohibited from holding or attending political rallies and required to inform the state security service of his movements.
As leader of the Niger Delta People's Volunteer Force, Dokubo-Asari led a campaign for local control of oil wealth and fought battles with government troops around the oil industry hub of Port Harcourt.
He was arrested in November 2005 after saying in a newspaper interview he would work for the breakup of Nigeria.
Seven serving and former officers of the Zimbabwe army have been charged with planning a coup d'etat against President Robert Mugabe. The men were arrested in stages, beginning on May 29, and appeared twice in closed hearings at Harare magistrates' court earlier this month.
Journalists and family members have been barred from the hearings and the case has now been referred to the Harare high court, where the accused are expected to apply for bail today. A police record of the arrests said that the officers were accused of "treason" over a plot in which they aimed to overthrow Mr Mugabe and install Emmerson Mnangagwa, the rural housing minister, in his place.
The police statement accuses Albert Mugove Matapo, 40, of recruiting six others "who conspired to plot a coup to overthrow the Zimbabwe government". Mr Matapo wanted to "recruit as many soldiers as possible to take over the government and all camps and be in control of the nation after which he will announce to the nation that he was in control of government and would invite Minister Mnangagwa and service chiefs to form a government", the police record said.Another former army officer, Albert Rugowe, is accused of conspiring with his co-accused and recruiting members of the army, the air force and the police "to whom he gave some tasks in preparation of a coup". Others named are serving officers, among them Capt Shepherd Maromo and Olivine Morale, whose rank and age have not yet been established.
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Awami League (AL) President Sheikh Hasina yesterday described the government restriction on her travelling to Chittagong to visit the landslide victims as "unconstitutional, undemocratic and contrary to individual freedom." "I am shocked and saddened that I have been prevented from standing beside the affected people and extending help to them," Hasina, also former prime minister, said in a press statement adding that conspiratorial cases have also been lodged against her.
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Pro-reform leaders of the BNP are now finalising a set of proposals for reforms in the party, if necessary, excluding party Chairperson Khaleda. Party sources said the proposals include expulsion of corrupt persons including her son Tarique Rahman from the party and ensuring intra-party democracy and transparency in its functioning.
Initially, the reformist leaders will ask Khaleda to expel Tarique Rahman and other corrupt ones after the ban on indoor politics is withdrawn. If she does not do so, they will then give her a deadline to meet this demand. The leaders however believe the BNP chief will refuse to expel her detained son, Senior Joint Secretary General of the party Tarique, party insiders said. In such a situation, Khaleda might face a challenge to her leadership as the reformist BNP leaders are planning to run the party without her, the insiders said. "Senior reformist leaders have reached a consensus on reforms in the party and reorganising it, leaving out Khaleda Zia, if she fails to accept their reform proposals," one of the leaders said seeking anonymity.
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A court in Bangladesh has barred former prime minister Sheikh Hasina from leaving the country, police said on Thursday, just two months after she was briefly banned from returning home. The court ordered the Dhaka Airports immigration authority not to allow Hasina, who has been charged with extortion, to leave for the United States via London on Friday night.
Hasinas aides said she was planning to visit her son and daughter and their families in the US. The court order came after police had sought legal intervention to prevent Hasina from flying out, because her presence in the country was essential for investigation of a series of extortion charges against her, said a court registrar. In April, the Bangladeshs army-backed interim government had barred Hasina from returning from the US.
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Kyrgyz Prime Minister Almazbek Atambayev has been hospitalised at an elite military hospital here after he was poisoned by an unknown substance last month, Turkish and Kyrgyz officials said Thursday. He has to undergo medical check-ups after his being poisoned in his office in May, Roza Daudova, a spokeswoman for the Kyrgyz government, told AFP. He feels well, she said. He will be back at work at the beginning of next week.
Wouldn't be saying that about iocaine powder.
Atambayev was admitted to the GATA military medical academy hospital on Monday for check-ups and general treatment, a Kyrgyz embassy official in Ankara told AFP. He also said the prime minister was in quite good health.
An aide to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said: I believe he has some stomach problems, but he is well. GATA declined to comment. Erdogan visited Atambayev in hospital late Wednesday. An official Kyrgyz medical report said last month that Atambayev was poisoned with toxins of unknown origin on May 11. Atambayev said he was poisoned in his workplace. Somebody gave me a glass of water which I drank. I was unconscious for two days. Theres no doubt it was an attempt at poisoning, he said.
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HT: Drudge
China is striving to overtake the United States as the dominant power in cyberspace, according to a senior American general, in what is emerging as a new theatre of conflict between nation states and a growing priority for the Pentagon.
The Chinese foreign ministry rejected the Pentagon's report as "brutal interference" in internal affairs and insisted that Beijing's military preparations were purely defensive.
Lt Gen Robert Elder, commander of the 8th Air Force, said that all of America's foes, including Iran, were looking at ways of hacking into US networks to glean trade and defence secrets. But efforts by China set it apart. "They're the only nation that has been quite that blatant about saying 'we're looking to do that'," said Gen Elder in Washington.
Gen Elder is to head a new cyber command centre being set up at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, already home to about 25,000 military personnel involved in everything from electronic warfare to network defence. The command's focus is to control the "cyber domain", which the Pentagon now sees as critical to everything from communications to surveillance to infrastructure security, and just as important as "kinetic war".
His remarks follow last month's annual report by the Pentagon on China's military power which said China regarded computer network operations as critical to achieving "electromagnetic dominance" early in a conflict.
China's People's Liberation Army had established units to develop viruses to attack enemy computer systems and networks, the Pentagon said. China also was investing in electronic countermeasures and defences against electronic attack, including infrared decoys and false-target generators.
The US military now defines cyberspace as much broader than merely defending or attacking computer networks. Michael Wynne, the air force secretary, recently described the dangers as including remotely detonated roadside bombs in Iraq as well as interference with global positioning satellites and financial transactions over the internet. He said America's nerve centre "resides in cyberspace. Our military command and control, and precision strike capability all rely on ensured access to the electronic spectrum."
Caitlin Harrington, an aviation specialist at Jane's Defence Weekly, said: "The US military is taking this very seriously. It is similar to the once-emerging question of dominance of outer space."
Gen Elder said a cyber war would probably involve precision targeting of enemy military networks, command centres or air defence systems.
The clearest example so far of cyber conflict came earlier this year when Estonia claimed that state-sponsored Russian hackers had attacked official websites in retaliation for the removal of a Soviet-era monument in its capital, Tallinn. Government email and private online banking had to be shut down temporarily, while telecommunications companies and news organisations were also affected. Nato allies and European specialists found that some of the attacks originated from IP (internet protocol) addresses that appeared to belong to the administration of Russian president Vladimir Putin.
#4
I wonder what the Chinese have to do, short of nuclear attack on major US cities, to convince our government that we should NOT be doing business with them.
#6
Q.) I wonder what the Chinese have to do, short of nuclear attack on major US cities, to convince our government that we should NOT be doing business with them.
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor has admitted that her dream of reviving the dormant EU constitution at next week's summit in Brussels is all but dead.
The O Club chili was spicier than usual tonight, my gut's killing me...
It is a bitter blow to the first woman chancellor of Germany at the end of a year in which Berlin has been the president of the EU. Until recently she harboured high hopes of persuading sceptical members to sign up to a treaty. But yesterday she told the German parliament: "A deal is still not in sight."
All she could offer was the phrase usually applied to the Middle East; a roadmap to a deal in a distant future. "We want to agree upon a roadmap next week," Mrs Merkel told the German parliament. "If this doesn't succeed, it will not yet be the downfall of Europe, but it will have ... extremely serious consequences."
Mrs Merkel spoke before a round of weekend consultations in Germany with remaining sceptics, including the leaders of the Netherlands, Poland and the Czech Republic, and as the French president Nicolas Sarkozy, in Warsaw, urged Poland to drop objections. Poland is a major stumbling block. It is threatening to veto a deal by refusing to accept changes to the voting system envisaged under the draft treaty.
A report by Germany to other member capitals listed key issues that it recommended still need discussion. Voting rights was not among them. Listed were: the question of EU symbols and the primacy of EU law, possible terminological changes, treatment of the fundamental rights charter, clarifying a joint foreign policy, clarifying boundaries between the EU and member states and the role of national parliaments in the bloc. New rules on majority votes are designed to make it easier for the 27-member EU to make decisions by reducing individual countries' bargaining power. They call for a double majority where at least 55 per cent of the EU member states and at least 65 per cent of the EU population would agree in order for a law to pass.
Poland, with about 38 million citizens, maintains the new rules favour the bigger countries. Warsaw joined the EU under the Nice agreement, which gave it almost as many votes as Germany with its 82 million residents - and it does not want to relinquish that power.
Poland - the Delaware of Europe.
Mr Sarkozy flew to Poland on Thursday to try to persuade Warsaw to drop its veto threat. "Poland cannot block the European Union," Mr Sarkozy was quoted as saying in the leading daily newspaper in Poland Gazeta Wyborcza. "If every one of us shows total intransigence ... the question arises: what are we doing together?"
Look at your watch, Sarko. It's almost shrimp cocktail time.
Asked the right question but didn't stick around to hear the right answer.
Although he is on the way out, Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, gave a strong hint on Wednesday he will resist efforts to resurrect elements of the failed constitution.
The 21-22 June summit marks the end of Germany's presidency of the bloc, and Mrs Merkel has been pushing leaders to agree on which parts of the draft can be salvaged and which need to be amended or dropped. The hope is to adopt a revised charter in 2009.
Part of the draft constitution that chafed Dutch and French voters was the enshrinement of "symbols" of the European Union into the charter - including the EU flag, Beethoven's Ode to Joy as the EU anthem and the euro as the official currency.
COMPROMISE must be the goal of both Labour and Conservative politicians in dealing with the EU, a Conservative former cabinet minister warned in the Lords yesterday.
Lord Howe of Aberavon, speaking against a referendum on the constitution during a debate on the European Union, said no political party should allow itself to be bound by such a poll. If the UK wanted to be a strong player in Europe, not at the margins "compromise will be essential if we are to achieve the final result.
"That would be as true for a Conservative government as it will be now for a Labour government. And if it is to be considered by a Conservative opposition that intends to be in government, then they need to recognise the case for compromise is just as strong."
#3
EU Refernedum has a revealing story the nature of the EU: Valéry Giscard dEstaing, former French President and author of the failed EU constitution, has written in Le Monde that by making "cosmetic" changes to the constitution "public opinion will be led to adopt, without knowing it, the proposals that we dare not present to them directly".
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06/15/2007 11:48 Comments ||
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Last night, during a Q&A following remarks by Gen. Peter Pace at The Joint Forces Staff College in Norfolk, Virginia, the general was asked the following question:
My question is about what many folks at the reception tonight viewed as the very disappointing news about your replacement as chairman. I wonder why you believe that is happening, and what are your thoughts about the process by which we choose the nations top military uniformed officer?
General Pace responds:
I will tell you the truth as I know it, and that is around the middle of May, within a day or two of the Secretary learning from certain members of Congress that there may be a problem to renominate me, he brought me in the office and sat me down and said Pete, this is whats happening. I want to renominate you. I want you to know that this is what Im beginning to hear, this is what Im going to go do, this is how Im going to go do it."
He went out and did exactly what he said on television, and exactly what hes been saying in his interviews, which is he went out and pulsed various members of Congress and he heard back from them the things that he said that he heard.
He and I sat down, and I said Im a Marine If you want me to go forward with the confirmation process, Im all for it.
I also told him that what he needed to do, in my opinion, was what was best for the institution, and whatever he and the president decided was going to be best for the institution was what Pete Pace was going to do. Oh and by the way, I can read the Constitution, which says the president gets to nominate and the Senate gets to confirm, or not, and neither one of those two things is going to happen, therefore Im not staying.
One thing that was discussed was whether or not I should just voluntarily retire and take the issue off the table. I said I could not do that for one very fundamental reason and that is that PFC Pace in Baghdad should not think ever that his chairman, whoever that person is, could have stayed in the battle and voluntarily walked off the battlefield. That is unacceptable as a leadership thing in my mind.
So I elected not to submit my request for retirement until after it was publicly known that I was no longer going to be renominated.
That is very important to me. The other part that is important to me is personal. The first piece holds true for anybody in this position anybody.
The other piece for me personally was that some 40 years ago I left some guys on the battlefield in Vietnam who lost their lives following 2nd Lt. Pace. And I promised myself then that I will serve this country until I was no longer needed that its not my decision. I need to be told that Im done.
Ive been told Im done.
I will run through the finish line on 1 October, and when I run through the finish line I will have met the mission I set for myself.
Hey, where are the WaPo culture of corruption stories?
Former President Clinton made more than $10 million in paid speeches last year, according to new filings that show he and his presidential-candidate wife have at least $10 million in the bank, and may have closer to $50 million.
According to financial disclosure forms made public Thursday, Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton hold two accounts, each valued at somewhere between $5 and $25 million. One is an old-fashioned bank account; the other is a blind trust.
The former president upped his speechmaking money from the previous year, garnering some $10.2 million in payments, compared with about $7.5 million the year before.
The Clintons had a much more pedestrian income when he ran for president in 1992. If Sen. Clinton's 2008 presidential bid is successful, they will enter the White House a very rich couple. And owing a lot of favors
Six years out of power, Bill Clinton can still raise huge sums with a personal appearance. He made a staggering $450,000 for a single September speech in London, at a Fortune Forum event, as well as $200,000 for an April appearance in the Bahamas to speak to IBM, and another $200,000 for a New York speech to General Motors.
The former president's earnings must be reported as the spouse of a senator. Disclosure rules do not require him to reveal everything. He received an advance from Random House for an unpublished manuscript, but is only required to say that it was greater than $1,000.
He also did not have to say how much he earns as a partner with Yucaipa Global Opportunities Fund, a Los Angeles-based investment firm.
The senator's own book profits are declining, years after her "Living History" became a best-seller. She reported royalties of $350,000 for the book last year. Next book: Money For Nothing and the Chicks For Free
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06/15/2007 12:07 ||
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#1
"Honey, I'll play my saxophone, while you play my flute."
Posted by: William Jefferson C. ||
06/15/2007 13:26 Comments ||
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LONDON (AP) - A British oil trader was arrested Thursday on U.S. charges of paying bribes to Saddam Hussein as part of the discredited U.N. oil-for-food program for Iraq. Metropolitan Police said John Irving, 52, was detained in central London on a U.S. extradition warrant. He appeared at the city's Westminster Magistrates Court and was released on bail until his next hearing on July 20.
Irving was one of three men charged in New York in 2005 with cheating the United Nations of at least $100 million that should have gone to humanitarian aid for Iraqis. The other two - Texas oil executive David Chalmers and Bulgarian oil trader Ludmil Dionissiev - have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The extradition warrant accuses Irving of colluding with Chalmers and others to defraud the U.N. and pay ``illegal and secret commissions and surcharges to officials of the government of Iraq'' between January 2000 and March 2003.
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#1
A word of advice, John - watch those elevator shafts...
Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and visiting Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe want African leaders to agree next month to unite Africa under one government to help it solve its own problems, state media said on Thursday.
The two men, both among the worlds longest serving leaders, agreed in talks in Tripoli on Wednesday that the 53-nation African Union (AU) should be turned into an embryonic federal government at an AU heads of state summit in Ghana on July 1-2.
They consulted on the upcoming African Union summit due to be held in Ghana, and in relation to this they emphasised the establishment of the African Union government, Libyas official Jana news agency said.
This plan embodies the hopes and ambitions of the continents people, and the only means for the continents independence, political and economic freedom and progress and development, it added.
Gaddafi has long favoured the establishment of a United States of Africa as a means of ridding the continent of 800 million people of what he calls Western colonialism. The project attracts emotional support from some in Africa since the idea of a federal United States of Africa was first promoted by Kwame Nkrumah, Ghanas first president and pioneer of Pan-Africanism, but many doubt its practicality.
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#1
That's just peachy. Like the EU, we can have the 'Frican Union, aka the FU.
Posted by: Gary and the Samoyeds ||
06/15/2007 0:44 Comments ||
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#2
And they will be president and VP, of course. The continent has still some room to go... to be fucked up totally.
Muslim nations should aim for self-reliance in producing halal life-saving vaccines to eradicate preventable diseases, Malaysian PM Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said on Thursday. PM Abdullah, also chairman of the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), said children in Muslim countries faced the highest risk of catching infectious diseases.
Many of these children suffer diseases such as measles, malaria and respiratory infections, diseases that can largely be averted and prevented, Abdullah told the OICs inaugural health conference. In western countries, killer diseases like polio are considered to have long been eradicated. In contrast, the polio virus continues to threaten many Muslim countries, he said.
He said Muslim nations should band together to develop and produce vaccines, which were halal or permissible under Islam. We believe that the development of halal vaccines would break new ground for promoting public health in Muslim countries, he said, adding that it would also alleviate fears among Muslim communities about contamination. Although the OIC has widely approved child vaccines as halal and safe, hard-line Islamic activists have argued that western-made vaccines may contain alcohol or be contaminated by non-halal sources. Pork and its by-products, alcohol and animals not slaughtered according to the Islamic procedures are all haram, or forbidden.
According to World Health Organisation (WHO) officials at the conference, doubts about the safety of polio vaccine in Nigeria in 2003, led to the re-infection of 27 countries that had become polio free, including Afghanistan and Pakistan. Nineteen of those 27 countries were OIC member states, said Hamid Jafari, the WHOs regional adviser on polio. Nineteen of those 27 countries were OIC member states, said Hamid Jafari, the WHOs regional adviser on polio.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/15/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
I believe Ricin would be halal.
Posted by: Gary and the Samoyeds ||
06/15/2007 0:45 Comments ||
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#2
7th century -to- 21st century is too far to jump. I recommend bloodletting, leeches, and exorcisms
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/15/2007 1:07 Comments ||
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#3
I'm pretty sure my black humour and my bile are out of balance this week.
#10
Because pig biology is closer to human than most animals we end up using pig-derived medical products quite often. Unfortunately, Muslims seem to be too different from pigs and humans to be able to use those products, and so far no one has developed sea-urchin based insulin, for instance.
Tenuous understanding between Iraqi tribes, U.S. could spell success or disaster
FALLUJAH, Iraq - Marine Sgt. Tony Storey doesn't like to think about what-ifs as he watches the young Iraqis he's helping to train take target practice. He recalls one man who was a natural with his AK-47.
''Where'd you learn to shoot like that?'' Storey asked.
''Insurgent,'' the man said with a smile.
''Was he joking?'' Storey asked, surveying the 50 men from the Albu Issa tribe lying in the dirt firing their weapons - bang, bang, bang - at a distant target. ''I don't know.''
For the men of Regimental Combat Team 6 who are training members of Anbar province's tribes to fight al-Qaida, Storey's questioning of his charge's shooting skills isn't simple curiosity. Less than a year ago, the tribes viewed al-Qaida in Iraq as an ally in their effort to push the Americans out of Anbar.
Now, the tribes see al-Qaida as a threat to their society and their businesses - many of them dependent on illegal smuggling - and they've turned for help to the U.S. military, which has been only too happy to help after years of frustrating fighting in Anbar.
But will the tribes, so recently allied with al-Qaida, be dependable long-term allies?
''In 2003 when we came in here we didn't get it right with the tribes and ran into a lot of problems,'' U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker said during a recent trip to Anbar. ''But al-Qaida got it even more wrong. Now there is an opportunity.''
Getting it right has become a minor obsession among American officers, who acknowledge that their new allies have some unsavory aspects.
''Nothing goes in Anbar without tribal support,'' said Marine Maj. Gen. Walter Gaskin, the commander of U.S. forces in Anbar. ''Everybody belongs to a tribe.''
American officials are rethinking everything. After years of plugging the good-news stories of soldiers handing out soccer balls, they realize it did more harm than good.
''When you walk into a town and hand out soccer balls you might feel good about yourself but you shame all those bo s' fathers,'' said Marine Brig. Gen. John Allen, the deputy commander of U.S. forces in Anbar. ''This society is not driven by winning hearts and minds. It's driven by shame and honor.''
The walls of Gaskin's office are covered with color-coded maps of Anbar. Each color signifies a tribe. The legend shows pictures of tribal leaders next to their corresponding colors.
Gaskin jokes about the tribes' role in Anbar as smugglers and recalls visiting one sheik who introduced his three sons.
'''This one I'm most proud of. He is a smuggler,''' Gaskin recalled him saying.
Army Gen. David Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, compared Anbar's tribes to the mafia.
''Every tribe is like some organizations in Northeast America,'' Petraeus said. ''It's an import/export business.''
Tribal anger at al-Qaida in Fallujah is rooted in the 2005 killing of Sheik Hamza al Issawi, Anbar's mufti, or top religious figure. The tribes vowed revenge. Now, next to the posters in Fallujah that say ''long live the Islamic State,'' referring to the al-Qaida-dominated Sunni Muslim insurgent group the Islamic State of Iraq, are posters that say, ''We will take revenge on al-Qaida,'' signed by the Anbar Revolutionists, a new anti-al-Qaida group.
The Sunni Muslim tribes have little allegiance to Iraq's Shiite Muslim-led central government. Residents say that the Anbar Revolutionists have vowed to move their fight to Baghdad to battle Shiite militias cnd death squads once they've defeated al-Qaida.
Still, American officers have worked hard to curry favor with the tribes, whose influence is much stronger outside Fallujah than it is inside Anbar's largest city. Allen has flown to Amman, Jordan, numerous times to ask tribal leaders who've fled there to return. U.S. military planners hope to build a ''human wall'' with the tribes in the restive villages around Fallujah.
''The message is always the same for us,'' Allen said. ''The coalition asks you to please consider coming home.''
Allen said he tracked Anbar's 43 or so tribes in green and red on a map. Green represents tribes who aren't fighting the American-led coalition and are against al-Qaida. Red signifies those who are still opposed to U.S. forces. He declined to show the map to a reporter.
Allen studied the tribal makeup of the region before he came to Iraq at the beginning of the year, and he has a tribal expert working for him. ''What we can do is create consensus among the tribes on expelling al-Qaida in Iraq,'' he said. ''They (tribes) don't equate expelling al-Qaida in Iraq with shouldering up with the coalition forces.''
At Camp Bahariya - ''navy'' in Arabic - a few miles from Allen's office, the men Storey is helping to train are part of the plan to rid Anbar of al-Qaida, but they're also a risky bet.
The group in green coveralls and bulletproof vests is being trained by the Police Transition Team. Two Iraqi drill instructors, former members of Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard, march with them, chanting: ''Where can those who are wanted by us go?/ We will smash the heads of those who don't submit to us.''
The trainees are from the Albu Issa tribe, which is prominent in the Amariyah Farris area south of Fallujah. The town has been plagued by chlorine bombs, car bombs and gruesome executions by al-Qaida in Iraq. Last year, the Islamic State of Iraq declared a state here. Most of the Albu Issa tribe rejected the Islamic State and became al-Qaida targets. The tribal sheik asked members to volunteer to fight, and now 50 of them will be a Provincial Security Force in their village.
''It's a tenuous situation right now,'' said Storey, who in civilian life is a liquor-enforcement officer from Ohio. ''Where does their loyalty lie? Are we training the counterinsurgency force or are we training its enforcers? I think it's probably both.''
Lt. Col. John Reeve, the No. 2 officer in Regimental Combat Team 6, from Camp Lejeune, N.C., acknowledged that he and his troops have had their doubts.''We didn't trust them and we still don't trust them, but they've killed al-Qaida,'' he said of the tribesmen the group has trained.''They've always tried to link themselves with the rising star,'' he said. ''We're the rising star, and that's pretty apparent to everybody.''
But flipping loyalties means that these convenient allies could switch again.
''It's possible. You can't control them, but this is transition and we need something to transition to,'' Reeve said.
Officials from the government in Baghdad think that the U.S. effort to train security forces along tribal lines is risky. ''It's very dangerous,'' said Hoshyar Zebari, a Kurd who is Iraq's foreign minister.
Police Chief Col. Faisal al Zobaee was honest about his former hatred for the American military presence as he handed diplomas to the Albu Issa training graduates. Zobaee is a former member of the 1920 Revolution Brigade, an insurgent group, U.S. military officials said. His brother was brutally slain by al-Qaida and he vowed revenge.
''I hated the Americans because they occupied our country,'' he said. ''But all of us are for fighting the terrorists now. The Americans are better than terrorists, better than the militias,'' he said. Of the threats to his tribesmen, he said, Americans now are only No. 3.
#1
But will the tribes, so recently allied with al-Qaida, be dependable long-term allies?
With the likes of Reid and Pelosi, can the Americans be dependable long-term allies? Just ask a couple hundred thousand Vietnamese boat people or about a million and a half Cambodians who died in the third Holocaust of the 20th Century.
#2
Allen said he tracked Anbar's 43 or so tribes in green and red on a map. He declined to show the map to a reporter.
Apparently, they're not all as incompetent as General Peter Pace. I ought to know.
Posted by: Harry Reid ||
06/15/2007 9:13 Comments ||
Top||
#3
''When you walk into a town and hand out soccer balls you might feel good about yourself but you shame all those boys' fathers,'' said Marine Brig. Gen. John Allen, the deputy commander of U.S. forces in Anbar. ''This society is not driven by winning hearts and minds. It's driven by shame and honor.''
...compared Anbar's tribes to the mafia. ''Every tribe is like some organizations in Northeast America,'' Petraeus said. ''It's an import/export business.''
''We didn't trust them and we still don't trust them...They've always tried to link themselves with the rising star,'' he said. ''We're the rising star, and that's pretty apparent to everybody.''
They figured out the key bits for that part of the country.
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(SomaliNet) The United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Somalia Mr. Eric Loraj warned of what he called the humanitarian crisis in Mogadishu' Thursday after a brief visit to Somalia capital meeting with the interim government officials. 
A leader of the militant group behind attacks on Nigeria's oil industry was released from prison Thursday, a gesture seen as a peace offering by a new government that has vowed to make the crisis a priority.
Seven serving and former officers of the Zimbabwe army have been charged with planning a coup d'etat against President Robert Mugabe. The men were arrested in stages, beginning on May 29, and appeared twice in closed hearings at Harare magistrates' court earlier this month.
Pro-reform leaders of the BNP are now finalising a set of proposals for reforms in the party, if necessary, excluding party Chairperson Khaleda. Party sources said the proposals include expulsion of corrupt persons including her son Tarique Rahman from the party and ensuring intra-party democracy and transparency in its functioning. 
A court in Bangladesh has barred former prime minister Sheikh Hasina from leaving the country, police said on Thursday, just two months after she was briefly banned from returning home. The court ordered the Dhaka Airports immigration authority not to allow Hasina, who has been charged with extortion, to leave for the United States via London on Friday night. 
Kyrgyz Prime Minister Almazbek Atambayev has been hospitalised at an elite military hospital here after he was poisoned by an unknown substance last month, Turkish and Kyrgyz officials said Thursday. He has to undergo medical check-ups after his being poisoned in his office in May, Roza Daudova, a spokeswoman for the Kyrgyz government, told AFP. He feels well, she said. He will be back at work at the beginning of next week. 
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor has admitted that her dream of reviving the dormant EU constitution at next week's summit in Brussels is all but dead. 
LONDON (AP) - A British oil trader was arrested Thursday on U.S. charges of paying bribes to Saddam Hussein as part of the discredited U.N. oil-for-food program for Iraq. Metropolitan Police said John Irving, 52, was detained in central London on a U.S. extradition warrant. He appeared at the city's Westminster Magistrates Court and was released on bail until his next hearing on July 20.
Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and visiting Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe want African leaders to agree next month to unite Africa under one government to help it solve its own problems, state media said on Thursday. 
Muslim nations should aim for self-reliance in producing halal life-saving vaccines to eradicate preventable diseases, Malaysian PM Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said on Thursday. PM Abdullah, also chairman of the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), said children in Muslim countries faced the highest risk of catching infectious diseases. 
''In 2003 when we came in here we didn't get it right with the tribes and ran into a lot of problems,'' U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker said during a recent trip to Anbar. ''But al-Qaida got it even more wrong. Now there is an opportunity.''
Police Chief Col. Faisal al Zobaee was honest about his former hatred for the American military presence as he handed diplomas to the Albu Issa training graduates. Zobaee is a former member of the 1920 Revolution Brigade, an insurgent group, U.S. military officials said. His brother was brutally slain by al-Qaida and he vowed revenge.
