Southern Sudanese officials on Saturday dismissed Khartoum's proposal for a joint north-south administration in oil-rich Abyei as a publicity stunt that would not resolve tension in the flashpoint town.
Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said on Friday his government had suggested shared control over Abyei, where fighting erupted between northern and southern forces in mid-May and prompted fears of a return to civil war.
"It is just a public relations statement that doesn't address the actual situation in Abyei," Yasir Arman, deputy secretary general of the former southern rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), said. "There is no agreement on borders until now to base the administration on," he told Reuters.
Abyei has been a main point of contention for Khartoum and the SPLM since the former foes signed a 2005 peace deal that ended two decades of civil war fought along ethnic, religious and ideological lines and complicated by oil. Three years after the peace accord the sides have still not agreed on borders or put in place a local government for Abyei, which will choose to join the north or south in 2011, when the entire south will vote on secession.
The uncertainty and a heavy military presence on both sides has raised tensions in the region which have flared up into violence with civilians caught in the crossfire. Tens of thousands of people fled Abyei during the recent violence, some of the worst since the peace agreement.
U.S. special envoy to Sudan Richard Williamson toured the area on Friday, where more than 20 northern soldiers and an unknown number of southerners were killed, and described it as a scene of "scorched earth" devastation.
State news agency SUNA said Southern President Salva Kiir and Sudan's Vice President Ali Osman Taha were discussing the idea of a shared administration. But SUNA gave no more details about the government plan for the disputed central town, which is close to oilfields that produce up to half of Sudan's 500,000-barrel daily output.
Anne Itto, the head of the SPLM southern sector, said there were more pressing humanitarian and security issues than the administration of the town that needed to be solved, and help was needed for thousands of displaced who were without food and shelter after their houses were burned. "We need to see the Brigade 31 redeployed out," she said, referring to a northern army brigade. "The numbers of the U.N. (peacekeepers) are not enough. They do not have enough equipment to deal with the situation."
"The administration issue is nothing new," she added.
Williamson said he wanted to hear more about the Bashir government's proposal for the administration of Abyei. But he also stressed that what was needed now for Abyei was for stability to take hold. He said he thought an "interpositional" force was needed to prevent more violence, and that he would bring that up in talks with Khartoum.
Thousands of United Nations peacekeepers are already in south Sudan, and have a compound at Abyei.
South Sudan's Minister for Presidential Affairs Luka Biong said an Abyei administration containing both SPLM and Bashir's ruling National Congress Party had already been decided on in crisis talks last year. "We already agreed the chief administrator would be SPLM and the deputy NCP," Biong said.
Posted by: anonymous5089 ||
06/01/2008 07:08 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Sudan
A police community support officer ordered two Christian preachers to stop handing out gospel leaflets in a predominantly Muslim area of Birmingham.
The evangelists say they were threatened with arrest for committing a "hate crime" and were told they risked being beaten up if they returned. The incident will fuel fears that "no-go areas" for Christians are emerging in British towns and cities, as the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester, claimed in The Sunday Telegraph this year.
Arthur Cunningham, 48, and Joseph Abraham, 65, both full-time evangelical ministers, have launched legal action against West Midlands Police, claiming the officer infringed their right to profess their religion.
Wonder if the officer would have arrested an iman who was preaching on the street ...
Mr Abraham said: "I couldn't believe this was happening in Britain. The Bishop of Rochester was criticised by the Church of England recently when he said there were no-go areas in Britain but he was right; there are certainly no-go areas for Christians who want to share the gospel."
Last night, Christian campaigners described the officer's behaviour as "deeply alarming".
The preachers, both ministers in Birmingham, were handing out leaflets on Alum Rock Road in February when they started talking to four Asian youths. A police community support officer (PCSO) interrupted the conversation and began questioning the ministers about their beliefs. They said when the officer realised they were American, although both have lived in Britain for many years, he launched a tirade against President Bush and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Mr Cunningham said: "I told him that this had nothing to do with the gospel we were preaching but he became very aggressive.
"He said we were in a Muslim area and were not allowed to spread our Christian message. He said we were committing a hate crime by telling the youths to leave Islam and said that he was going to take us to the police station."
The preacher refused to give the PCSO his address because he felt the officer's manner was "threatening and intimidating". The ministers claim he also advised them not to return to the area. As he walked away, the PCSO said: "You have been warned. If you come back here and get beaten up, well you have been warned".
West Midlands Police, who refused to apologise, said the incident had been "fully investigated" and the officer would be given training in understanding hate crime and communication.
Prince William is heading to the azure waters of the Caribbean as part of a two-month deployment in the Royal Navy despite his request to be as close as possible to conflict. And whoever blabs this time will get keelhauled because they will for certain be under British command!
The assignment beginning Monday will see the second in line to the throne spending much of his time trolling the West Indies aboard the HMS Iron Duke, a frigate on hurricane relief duty and counter-narcotics patrol.
Rear Admiral Robert Cooling, assistant chief of Naval Staff, said William "commendably wanted to be as close to the front line as possible." But officers decided he could learn more in a short time by serving on the Iron Duke than by being sent to the Persian Gulf, where the Royal Navy is engaged in a number of operations.
There was also concern that placing William, 25, in the Persian Gulf might draw unwanted attention from Britain's enemies.
"We clearly wouldn't have put the prince in the way of a particular threat, and we wouldn't want his presence in a warship in a particular region to have drawn attention from those who might not wish him well," Cooling said.
Deployment of William's brother, Prince Harry, to the front lines in Afghanistan had to be cut short this spring after a news embargo was broken and it was revealed he was serving there.
Senior officers stressed in a pre-deployment briefing that William will not receive special treatment during his Navy assignment, which will include shoreside training followed by a five-weeks at sea.
"The rules that will apply to Prince William will be exactly the same as the rules applied to any junior officer," Cooling said.
However, he said, the prince probably would not take part in boarding parties if the men are likely to come under fire while attempting to intercept drug shipments.
William is an officer in the Army, but he has been spending time in other branches of the service to round out his military experience.
He made headlines during his stint with the Royal Air Force, landing a Chinook helicopter on his girlfriend Kate Middleton's lawn and using the military chopper for other questionable trips, including picking up Harry and flying to a stag party on the Isle of Wight.
On the Iron Duke, William is scheduled to spend time in every department, including weapons engineering, logistics, operations, and the ship's helicopter flights. There will be no special accommodations for the prince, who is expected to bunk with other junior officers, and there will not be special security while he is at sea, Cooling said.
Commander Simon Huntington said the prince would in essence receive an abbreviated version of the normal two-year training most young officers receive.
Richard Kemp, former commander of the British Armed Forces in Afghanistan, said the training with all branches made sense for William in light of his future role as head of the armed forces.
"It's very good that at this stage he has a chance to experience all of this and get to know some of the people who will be leading the military and see some of the difficulties that they face," Kemp said.
The brothers are continuing a family tradition of Armed Forces service. Their grandfather, Prince Philip, had a long Navy career, as did their father, Prince Charles, and their uncle, Prince Andrew, who flew a Sea King helicopter during the Falklands War.
Cooling said all William's Navy flights would be "purely business." He noted that in many cases William will be flying as a passenger because he is not yet qualified for a variety of helicopters.
The Navy also plans to give William firsthand experience on a mine hunter during sea training operations, and he will be submerged in a nuclear attack submarine while it seeks to attack and evade ships and helicopters during training operations, officers said.
On the Iron Duke, William will be expected to cope with the confined spaces that define naval life and will also be required to serve on the 24-hour watches required at sea.
"These warships are not like cruise liners," said Cooling. "It's going to be a lumpy ride. He doesn't know if he's susceptible to seasickness, but if he is, there are pills that can help. It's nothing to be shy about. It happens to the best of us. Nelson got seasick."
Seasick or not, no one is suggesting that the future king will have to do kitchen duty.
Someone else will have to wash the dishes and peel the potatoes.
#1
Any thoughts as to whether the Caribbean branches of the Various Bad Guys (TM) will develop a special interest in monitoring the movements of the Iron Duke?
Muslim leaders must be more outspoken about violence in the name of religion, a senior Vatican official urged yesterday. How about if they just say something? Anything would be nice. The current silence is deafening
Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, the Pope's principal adviser on Islam, said that while the majority of Muslim clerics condemned acts of terrorism, they needed to be more vocal about jihad, especially because of its frequent appearances in the Qur'an.
The cardinal made the remarks after a lecture, given in London to an audience of students, Catholic clerics and figures from other religions. It was one of several public appearances during a rare visit to the UK.
He said: "In the Qur'an you have several interpretations of jihad - violent and holy. Most Muslims are condemning war made in the name of religion. The problem is that in the Qur'an you have good and bad jihad, so you choose.
"There is no worldwide authority who can interpret the Qur'an, so it depends on the person you have in front of you. Sometimes you should like religious authorities to be more outspoken about violence in the name of religion. But Muslims believe the Qur'an is the divine word of God, so it is a problem."
He said it would be "easier" if there were a single Islamic authority to negotiate with. "It's a great difficulty there are many voices of living Islam." Smack!
The cardinal is president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, and has been tasked with improving relations between the Vatican and Islam.
Tauran, the former Vatican foreign minister, has not shied away from difficult issues since his 2007 appointment. He has criticised countries, notably Saudi Arabia, which do not allow freedom of religion.
He expressed hope, however, that a summit of Islamic scholars and Catholic officials, to be held in November, would yield positive results.
The meeting, organised following an appeal from hundreds of Muslim scholars for closer ties with Christianity, will not be attended by representatives from Saudi Arabia or Iran, two regimes that place severe restrictions on religious freedom. "Of course we would like to see someone from Saudi Arabia. But we will meet them in another context. We talk to the interlocutors who come, we do not choose them."
His remarks came as the Bishop of Rochester, Michael Nazir-Ali, said that radical Islam threatened to fill a "moral vacuum" in Britain arisen as a result of a decline of Christian values. Writing in the newly launched political and cultural magazine Standpoint, the bishop claims that the church dissolved its influence over the country's morals during the social and sexual revolution of the 1960s.
Posted by: gorb ||
06/01/2008 01:25 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under: Global Jihad
#1
Saudi and Iran are at the core of religious intolerance!!!!
Posted by: Paul ||
06/01/2008 8:52 Comments ||
Top||
#2
So, Paul. Can you tell us what types of muslims are in Saudi? In Iran? What other types of muslims are there? What strain of Islam is in Saudi?
What's the significance of the Muslim Brotherhood of Eyypt? What's a principal flaw of Islam?
I mean, saying "Saudi and Iran are at the core of religious intolerance!!!!" is accurate, but that's something any Rantburger who spends at least one day a week here knows.
#5
For smartarse Pappy Saudis are sunni and Iran are shiites both fighting it out to be the leaders of the Islamic world.I feel the wahabbis from Saudi are as dangerous if not mose so that the mad mullahs of Iran.
At least in Iran we have a western loving population on the whole can the same be said about Saudi and Pakistan????
Posted by: Paul ||
06/01/2008 16:45 Comments ||
Top||
#6
There are Shia in the Saudi kingdom.
There are Arab Sunni in Iran, and Kurds.
All are minorities in those countries, all are a potential source of destabilization of the governments there.
#7
For smartarse Pappy Saudis are sunni and Iran are shiites both fighting it out to be the leaders of the Islamic world.I feel the wahabbis from Saudi are as dangerous if not mose so that the mad mullahs of Iran.
Ah, so you can contribute more than a sound-bite and a handful of exclamation points.
At least in Iran we have a western loving population on the whole can the same be said about Saudi and Pakistan????
Two different histories, anthropologies, cultures, and situations, Paul. Let's try this answer: It depends on how much effort and time is put into it, at least in Saudi. As for Pakistan, I'd almost write that off.
Of course they do. The NYT is as gullible as ever, spinning this as an intel 'failure' ...
WASHINGTON An 18,000-page declaration submitted by North Korea to the United States is stirring debate about whether American intelligence agencies previously overstated how much plutonium the Pyongyang government might have produced for its nuclear weapons program.
Bush administration officials have declined to comment on the declaration, which State Department officials say will take weeks to study, but they have indicated that North Korea is acknowledging it produced 37 kilograms of plutonium, or about 81 pounds.
That total would be more than the 30 kilograms that North Korea has acknowledged previously but somewhat less than the 40 to 50 kilograms that American intelligence agencies had calculated in the past. Estimates on how many nuclear bombs North Korea could wring from its plutonium program have ranged from 6 to 10.
Now read those two paragraphs again: the Norks say they have 37 kg, and we estimated that they had 40 to 50 kg, of plutonium. Right now I'd be calling the analyst team in for congrats and a beer, since they got one right. If this is the best the NYT can do ...
No one in the administration is prepared to accept the documents at face value, a Bush administration official said, and some intelligence analysts are particularly wary of the numbers they have seen so far.
Were coming to an important juncture in this process, Christopher R. Hill, the chief North Korea nuclear negotiator, told reporters in Moscow on Friday after meeting with his Russian counterpart and after meetings this week in Beijing with North Korean officials. Mr. Hill said that the North Koreans were working very hard on the overall plutonium declaration.
State Department officials have assembled a team of reactor experts and translators to go through the seven boxes of plutonium documents in hand. The documents go back to 1987 and contain information about North Koreas three major campaigns to reprocess plutonium for weapons in 1990, 2003 and 2005, administration officials said.
The documents do not include any information about North Koreas uranium program or proliferation activities. The declaration is part of what officials call a six-party nuclear agreement still a work in progress among North Korea, the United States, Russia, China, Japan and South Korea for the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
The declaration and the agreement are facing skepticism from Congress and from more hard-line North Korea experts who say that the North cannot be trusted.
That's a fair assessment, of course ...
A former diplomat who recently met with North Korean officials said Thursday at a forum on North Korea that the North was not planning to give up all of its nuclear weapons or material.
That's also a fair assessment ...
The former diplomat, Charles L. Pritchard, who is now head of the Korea Economic Institute and was a North Korea policy coordinator under Presidents Clinton and Bush, said the North Korean officials told him they would destroy their nuclear facilities but not necessarily destroy the weapons and material already manufactured. Mr. Pritchard said the North Koreans also told him they expected to be provided with light-water reactors for dismantling their nuclear installations.
Tom Casey, the deputy spokesman for the State Department, said: With all due respect to Mr. Pritchard, hes a former government official. Im not sure who hes talking to. But I think the secretary, the president and Chris Hill have all made clear that we expect the North Koreans to provide us a declaration that meets the requirements of the six parties.
Which we'll read. Then we'll decide what to do. Meanwhile the Norks continue to swirl the drain. It's not in our interest to rush our review.
The question of uranium could also eventually confront American intelligence agencies with an even bigger challenge, if the North Koreans ever get around to completing a declaration about any nuclear activities involving uranium. The United States has long asserted that North Koreas weapons efforts included the enrichment of uranium, but the North has denied having an uranium program.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
Benedict XVI has cancelled meetings with seven world leaders to avoid an encounter with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran.
Mr Ahmadinejad is one of 40 heads of state arriving in Rome on Tuesday for a vital United Nations summit on the worlds food crisis.
Mr Ahmadinejad was keen to meet Benedict XVI, after writing to him two years ago on the subject of spirituality and the need for dialogue between Islam and Christianity. Relations between Iran and the Holy See are warming, and Mr Ahmadinejad said the Vatican was a positive force for justice and peace in April after meeting with the new nuncio to Iran, Archbishop Jean-Paul Gobel. Benedict is also thought to have the support of several leading Shia clerics, including Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in Iraq.
A delegation of eight Iranians from the Islamic Culture and Relations Organisation, including Mahdi Mostafavi, one of Mr Ahmadinejads inner circle, came to Rome for a two-day meeting at the end of April and agreed religion should be a force for peace. However, the Pope was keen to avoid the glare of publicity that would have been triggered by a one-to-one meeting with Mr Ahmadinejad.
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, President Cristina Kirchner of Argentina, President Evo Morales of Bolivia and several African leaders also asked for a papal meeting.
The Vatican briefly considered a single audience for all the heads of state. However, it eventually decided to refuse all the requests in order to avoid any potential embarrassment. It did not comment further on the decision.
Gholam-Hossein Elham, the Iranian spokesman, confirmed that the Vatican had refused all meetings and added that Iran had never formally requested a meeting. He said Mr Ahmadinejad would not meet Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, but would meet with several Italian business leaders. No doubt.
Italy has taken a strong stance against Iran, and repeated over the weekend that it would not have bilateral talks with anyone who says that Israel should be wiped off the face of the earth. However, trade between the two countries added up to Eu5.7 billion last year, making Italy the largest European trade partner for Iran.
Money, mouth ...
The Vatican has not shied away from meeting controversial dictators in the past. In April 2005, Robert Mugabe took part in the funeral for John Paul II, and shook Prince Charles hand. In 1987, John Paul II met Augusto Pinochet in Santiago, while Fidel Castro saw the pope in 1996 at a previous FAO food summit. The Italian Foreign Ministry and the Embassy of Zimbabwe both refused to comment yesterday on whether Mr Mugabe would repeat his 2005 trip to Rome.
The centre of Rome has been locked down for the duration of the summit. Several main thoroughfares will be closed, bomb squads have swept the sewers and extra security has been called in.
President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, Yasuo Fukuda of Japan and Jose Luis Zapatero, the Spanish prime minister, are also expected at the summit. Gordon Brown has said he is unable to attend, however.
This one has been under our radar, but perhaps it shouldn't be ...
DOBOJ, Bosnia - For years, Saudi Arabia flatly denied it had provided money and logistical support for Islamist militant groups that attacked Western targets. But that assertion is disputed by a former al-Qaeda commander who testified in a United Nations war-crimes trial that his unit was funded by the Saudi High Commission for Relief of Bosnia and Herzegovina, a government charity.
Ali Ahmed Ali Hamad, the former al-Qaeda fighter, gave the same account to The Inquirer in an interview in this struggling city in the central Balkans. "Because it was the biggest charity, [the commission] helped the mujaheddin the most," Hamad said, adding that it had provided "everything a person needed to exist."
Hamad, 37, is expected to be called as a witness in a lawsuit filed by Cozen O'Connor alleging that Saudi Arabia and affiliated charities financed al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups as they geared up for the 9/11 attacks.
As a convicted terrorist, Hamad is an imperfect witness. During the Balkans war, from 1992 to 1995, jihadists from North Africa and the Middle East were accused of atrocities against indigenous Serbs and Croatians. Hamad admits having done "bad things" as an al-Qaeda fighter, and he is serving a 10-year sentence in a Bosnian jail for his role in a 1997 Mostar bombing.
Yet Hamad's account of his time in the Balkans went largely uncontroverted during the U.N. trial, where he was a prosecution witness. He contends that the Saudi High Commission, an agency of the Saudi government, and other Islamic charities supported al-Qaeda-led units that committed atrocities. Mujaheddin units, he said, recruited fighters, prepared for battle, and financed their operations in the Balkans. He said the Saudi High Commission had poured tens of millions of dollars into mujaheddin units led by al-Qaeda operatives who fought with Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan. Money intended for humanitarian relief bought weapons and other military supplies.
The Widows Ammunition Fund is not a joke ...
The charities also provided false identification, employment papers, diplomatic plates and vehicles that permitted Islamic fighters to enter the country and pass easily through military checkpoints, Hamad said. Several charity offices, including those of the Saudi High Commission, were led by former mujaheddin or al-Qaeda members, at least one of whom trained with Hamad in an al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan, he said. Like other al-Qaeda fighters, Hamad said, he was an employee of the Saudi High Commission for a time and traveled through the war zone in commission vehicles with diplomatic plates.
This article starring:
ALI AHMED ALI HAMAD
al-Qaeda
Cozen O'Connor
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Sure, Muslims are well supported in Europe. Yet nobody supports Christians who live in Muslim majority states. Makes sense to a moron.
#4
Saudi created AlQ to spread their version of Islam!!!
Posted by: Paul ||
06/01/2008 8:38 Comments ||
Top||
#5
Knock me over with a wet noodle. What a revelation! To see our Prez cowtow to the thugs is what is so outrageous. If we need the oil, take it. Quit playing one eye winking with the towel heads.
The Pakistan nuclear and missile programmes have ensured peace and balance of power in South Asia, said former foreign secretary, Shamshad Ahmad Khan. In his keynote address on the occasion of two days international conference on Nuclear Power of Pakistan in Peshawar University, he said, we now have credible deterrence, therefore, we should focus on the strengthening of democracy, economy, good governance and rule of law.
Mr Shamshad said that solid measures are needed to make the country a modern welfare state by diverting more resources to education, health and infrastructure development.
Former Chief of Army Staff General Mirza Aslam Beg in his lecture termed that Pakistans nuclear programme as vital for peace in South Asia. He said the propaganda against Pakistans nuclear assets of falling into wrong hands is baseless and unfounded.
Dr. Qadir Baksh Baloch, editor the Dialogue, Qurtaba University Peshawar in his presentation said that after Pakistan nuclear tests and introduction of missiles, the countrys defence has become impregnable and invincible.
Zafar Nawaz Jaspal of Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad said that nuclear capability is not for war rather to avert war.
Former Secretary Security FATA Brigadier Mehmood Shah said, we as sovereign nation have to solve our problems by ourselves,. He called for unity and harmony among people of various walks of life.
Former Director General Institute of Strategic Study Islamic Ross Masaud Hussain in his paper said that after nuclear test, Pakistan has become more safe and secure and now there is no threat to it. Pakistan nuclear assets are very safe and there is no chance of proliferation, he added.
The conference comprises five working session. Each session was followed by question-answer in which a large number of teachers, students and participant showed keen interest.
Director VC Secretariat Peshawar University Dr. Ajmal Khan hailed the role of International Relations Department for organizing the conference on the issue of national importance. Former Dean Faculty of Arts Dr. Guhlam Taqi Bangush and the senior most teacher of Peshawar University pleaded for unity of the Islamic countries for its security and prosperity and to face challenges in the competitive world.
Maria Sultan Director South Asian Strategic Study London in Islamabad, Former Chief of Army Staff Mirza Aslam Beg former secretary of defense Lieutenant General Retd. Talat Masood, Dr. Nazar Hussain of Quaid-e-Azam University and Analyst Saad Amin Khan, Director Strategic plan
Air Commodore Khalid Binori, and Professor Zhou Rong Chief of South Asia Bureau Gunag Ming Islamabad Prof. Dr. Naeem ur Rehman and Dean Faculty of Social Sciences University of Peshawar presented their papers.
The conference was arranged by Department of International Relations University of Peshawar in collaboration of Hanns Seidal Foundation Germany.
Posted by: john frum ||
06/01/2008 09:19 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Posted by: john frum ||
06/01/2008 9:26 Comments ||
Top||
#2
John,
A Q Khan a different bloke than Shamshad Ahmad Khan, correct?
A Q KHAN is still under House Arrest isn't he?
I do recall stories that A Q KHAN may be cut loose after the election.
The current Pakistan Gubmint is a pariah on civilization and non-proliferation.
Maoist chairman Prachanda, expected to lead the next government in Nepal, has warned the media against criticising his party, saying that "we will no longer tolerate criticism as we have already been elected by the people".
Just another step on the way to a totalitarian, Marxist state. Wonder when the Dhimmicrats will accuse Bush of 'losing' Nepal ...
Addressing a rally to celebrate the declaration of republic in Kathmandu Prachanda said his CPN-Maoist will not tolerate further criticism by the media and warned of serious consequences if it continued to criticise the party. Targeting the Kantipur publication that brings out the largest circulated dailies Kantipur and The Kathmandu Post, the former rebel leader said, "You journalists did well to continuously criticise the Maoists before the constituent assembly polls, otherwise the election would not have taken place at all."
"Now we will no longer tolerate criticism as we have already been elected by the people," he said, adding that the other newspapers criticising the Maoist will also meet the same fate.
The Federation of Nepalese Journalists (FNJ) has flayed Prachanda's statement describing it as remarks directed against the freedom of the press. "This has raised suspicion in the Maoists' commitment towards a free press," FNJ president Dharmendra [Images] Jha said in a statement.
No, reeeeeaallly?
FNJ also asked the Maoists to demonstrate their commitment to a free press in the country by making their party's policy towards press freedom public.
Posted by: john frum ||
06/01/2008 08:24 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Since when has "Maoist" and "free speech" ever belonged in the same sentence?
Key militant leaders remain in Piochar, a small remote village surrounded by mountains in Swat valley, notwithstanding the May 21 peace deal between the NWFP government and militants, sources told Daily Times on Saturday.
The sources said that Tehreek-e-Taliban leader in Bajaur Agency Maulvi Faqir Muhammad recently visited Piochar to meet with the leaders and their followers to discuss organisational matters.
Taliban release: A high-level meeting will be held in a few days to discuss the issue regarding the release of Taliban militants, arrested during the operations the valley, another source told Daily Times. It will be the first high-level meeting since the signing of the May 21 peace deal. Taliban representatives told Daily Times that the government has committed to releasing all the militants within two weeks of the deal. The government demanded local Taliban leaders to provide a list of Taliban prisoners so that officials could review their status before the meeting, the source said.
It added that 1,375 people had been taken into government custody since the launch of military operation in Swat and the security officials had released 1,113 so far.
This article starring:
HUSEIN ALI ALIAS TOR MULLA
Jaish-e-Muhammad
IBNE AMIN SON OF BAHADUR
Jaish-e-Muhammad
LAL DIN ALIAS BARAI MIAN
Jaish-e-Muhammad
MAULVI FAQIR MUHAMAD
Tehreek-e-Taliban
MULLA FAZLULLAH
TNSM
OMAR REHMAN ALIAS DAWUD
Jaish-e-Muhammad
Posted by: Fred ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: Jaish-e-Mohammad
Pakistans embattled president, Pervez Musharraf, came under mounting pressure to quit this weekend amid speculation he was already in talks over a deal for his resignation. A spokesman for the Pakistan Peoples party (PPP), which leads the ruling coalition in parliament, warned that the former dictator would face impeachment if he did not go.
The ultimatum was issued after suggestions that Musharraf was negotiating terms under which, if he agreed to go quietly, he would be granted immunity from prosecution for overthrowing the government of Nawaz Sharif in 1999.
He denied the claims that he was close to departure, calling them a malicious campaign.
Which is close to succeeding ...
Parliamentary support for Musharraf, who was elected to another five-year term last November, collapsed after Februarys general election in which the parties that backed him were virtually wiped out. Last week he held late-night meetings with the new president his successor as chief of the army staff, General Ashfaq Kayani.
In a further development, a Musharraf loyalist was removed from the command of the armys Triple One Brigade, known as the coup brigade, for its role in several of the countrys military takeovers. The move was widely seen as a ploy to prevent Musharraf from dismissing the government.
Pressure has mounted on Musharraf since Asif Zardari, widower of the PPPs assassinated leader Benazir Bhutto and the partys co-chairman, denounced him as a relic of the past, standing between the people and democracy. He [Musharraf] has taken off his uniform . . . but that doesnt make him into a democrat or a civilian president, he said.
Tension mounted when Sharif, the PPPs junior coalition partner, denounced the president as a traitor and said he should be charged with high treason. He said that he had told Zardari that Musharraf should be sacked without a safe passage deal, and that the PPP leader had agreed.
In a televised speech last week, Zardari declined to offer Musharraf any support but said he was committed to dialogue, patience and dignity.
The favourite candidate to succeed Musharraf is Makhdoom Amin Fahim, a long-standing PPP loyalist.
Last night Lieutenant-General Talat Masood, an influential retired coup-maker general, said a move against Musharraf appeared imminent. Things have to change, and its only a matter of time, he said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
Again, NO US-IRAN WAR as desired by OSAMA, etc = IRAN + RADICAL ISLAM WILL USE THE INTERIM 2008-2012/13 TO REORG, REARM, and GO NUCLEAR AMAP ASAP. The "Full Monty".
NET [paraph] > ISLAMIST WEBSITE MESSAGE > NUCLEAR JIHAD/TERROR AGZ USA > stated that the NUCLEAR WEAPONS OF THE USSR-SOVIET UNION + OTHER HAS BEEN READILY AVAILABLE [black markets] SINCE THE FALL OF SAME [1989 or 1991].
As long as the US-Allies stays put in Iraq + Afghanistan, or becomes diverted to regions outside of the ME + CENTRAL ASIA, RADICAL ISLAM BELIEVES THEIR JIHAD CAN ENDURE, REVITALIZE + NUCLEARIZE.
Again, STATE OF FLUX + PAN-ISLAMIC/ISLAMIST NUCLEARIZATION > "Tis a good time for ANY ISLAMIST HIDDEN IMAM, MAHDI, or MESSIAHS, etc. TO MAKE THEIR APPEARANCE, IN BATTLE AGZ THE US = US-ISRAEL, etc.
by Roggio, posting at Weekly Std
Last week, Muqtada al Sadr, the leader of the Mahdi Army and the Sadrist political movement, called for massive demonstrations against the negotiations between the US.. and the Iraqi government over the basing of U.S. troops in the country beyond 2008. This Friday, the Sadrist movement carried out its first nationwide protest. The turnout was a flop.
The Associated Press put the best face on the turnout, saying tens of thousands of Shiites joined in. But the AP does not provide a breakdown on the protests.
AFP, Multinational Forces Iraq, and Voices of Iraq, an Iraqi news service, put the number in the thousands. Multinational Forces Iraq said more than 5,000 protesters were in Sadr Cit, and another 200-300 attended the protest in the Kadhamiyah district of Baghdad. AFP said hundreds of Sadrists staged similar demonstrations and said demonstrations were held in Basra, but no numbers were given.
There was a time when Sadrs calls for protests put hundreds of thousands of Shia into the streets. Yet Sadr couldnt get more than 6,000 to 7,000 join in on a protest on the day when most people attend mosque.
To put the current numbers into perspective, and estimated 2,000,000 Shia are estimated to live in Sadr City alone, and the Baghdad district is considered the bulwark of Sadrs support. Yet Sadr couldnt muster more than one quarter of one percent of the district's residents.
Sadr called for weekly protests, to be held every Friday after prayers. He may want to cancel the protests and blame the poor turnout on heavy handed tactics of the security forces, just as he has done in the recent past
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/01/2008 16:51 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#2
This dog has been neutered. In a way it's better than killing him. This way he becomes an object of scorn, ridicule and pity instead of a martyr. Works for me.
Australian troops have ended combat operations in Iraq, a Defense Department official said Saturday. The Australian flag was lowered in a ceremony Sunday with the 550 troops at a base in the southern Iraq city of Talil. The move fulfills a campaign promise of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who was elected last November, to bring the troops home by the middle of this year.
#3
the Diggers themselves, and the country that provided them, should be thanked profusely. PM Rudd? Not so much
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/01/2008 20:02 Comments ||
Top||
#4
And I'm not sure that their combat ops in Iraq are nearly as important as those in Afghanistan. Can't really stick up for Rudd beyond observing he did what he said he would.
Nineteen U.S. soldiers were killed in Iraq in May, the U.S. military said on Sunday, the lowest monthly death toll since U.S. forces invaded to topple Saddam Hussein in 2003.
The number of Iraqi civilians killed in the same month plunged to 505 after reaching a seven-month high of 968 in April, figures obtained by Reuters from Iraq's interior, defense and health ministries showed.
The U.S. military says violence in Iraq is at a four-year low following crackdowns by U.S. and Iraqi forces on Shi'ite militias in southern Basra and Baghdad and on al Qaeda in the northern city of Mosul, its last major urban stronghold.
But a suicide bombing in the town of Hit in western Anbar province on Saturday that killed the local police chief underscored the fragility of Iraq's security.
Police said a suicide bomber blew himself up at a checkpoint, killing police chief Lieutenant-Colonel Khalil Ibrahim al-Jazzaa, nine other policemen and three civilians.
"The man, who was wearing a suicide vest, asked to meet the police chief to talk about a problem. When the policemen stopped him to check him, the bomber blew himself up," said Major Uday al-Dulaimi, a police officer in Hit.
In Iraq's more stable south, Australia, one of the United States' staunchest allies, began pulling out 500 combat troops from Dhi Qar province, fulfilling a pledge by Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to withdraw all troops this year.
The website icasualties.org, which tracks U.S. fatalities in Iraq, said 19 U.S. soldiers died in May. U.S. troop deaths reached a seven-month high in April when 52 were killed.
A U.S. military spokesman confirmed the figure, which may still rise as it sometimes takes the U.S. Department of Defense a few days to confirm reported deaths. The previous lowest casualty toll was in February 2004, when 21 soldiers died.
AUSTRALIANS PULL OUT
The May toll starkly illustrates how the security situation has improved in the past 12 months. In May 2007, 126 U.S. soldiers were killed amid a spasm of sectarian violence that threatened to push Iraq into the abyss of all-out civil war.
U.S. officials credit the turnaround in security to President George W. Bush's decision to send 30,000 extra troops to Iraq, a rebellion by Sunni tribal leaders against al Qaeda, and a ceasefire by anti-American Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
But U.S. commander General David Petraeus has repeatedly stressed that the security gains are fragile and reversible. "Quagmire!!!"
That was shown in March, when an Iraqi government offensive against Sadr's supporters in Basra unleashed a wave of violence. A TIDAL wave of Violence.
Under truces agreed with Sadr's supporters, Iraqi government troops have now occupied the cleric's main strongholds in Basra and in the capital. The government says al Qaeda is on the run after being forced out of Mosul.
The five-year-old Iraq war, which polls show is unpopular among most Americans, is a major issue in the U.S. presidential election in November. I thought it wasn't.
Republican candidate John McCain has promised to keep troops in Iraq until the war is won, while Barack Obama, who has nearly won the Democratic nomination over rival Hillary Clinton, says he will pull out the troops within 16 months of taking office.
Australian Prime Minister Rudd made a similar promise when he was campaigning for election last year, and on Sunday, Iraqi and British military officials said Australian troops were pulling out from their base in the Iraqi city of Nassiriya.
The Australian troops, whose main role has been to train and support Iraqi forces in the province, will be replaced by U.S. forces, a spokesman for the provincial governor said.
Australia's military chief said in February that Australia would leave behind two maritime surveillance aircraft and a warship helping patrol Iraq's oil platforms in the Gulf, as well as a small force of security and headquarters liaison troops.
The withdrawal of the Australians leaves the United States with only two other major coalition partners in Iraq -- Britain, which has about 4,000 British soldiers in Basra and Georgia which has about 2,000 deployed in other provinces. "Quagmire!!!!"
#1
This week's State Department report shows 25 counties totally over 9,900 folks are still in the coalition. 31 countries including NATO still support Iraq stability operations link
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/01/2008 8:43 Comments ||
Top||
Sunday WaPo, Front page
This was anything but an ordinary day inside Basra University's College of Fine Arts. Under the harsh constraints imposed by extremist Shiite Muslim clerics and militias that until recently controlled this city, men with Western hairstyles were threatened and beaten. Women without head scarves were sometimes raped and killed. Love was a secret ritual. Just like the Puritans in the Colonies. See below.
Two months after the Iraqi government ordered its fledgling military to root out the religious militias here in Iraq's third-largest city, Basra is beginning to awaken from a four-year dormancy. A recent week-long visit that included several dozen interviews revealed that many of the city's nearly 3 million residents are resuming lives that had been interrupted by an austere interpretation of Islam not to mention the terror-filled enforcement thereof.
Quagmire Alert!
But their new freedom in this historically cosmopolitan city near the head of the Persian Gulf comes with boundaries drawn by fear of the future. The root cause of their previous grievances -- well-armed militias fighting for power and economic resources -- continue to exert influence over day-to-day life.
Conservative Shiite religious parties, backed by these militias, still control government ministries. Security is brittle, ushered in by a temporary deployment of 30,000 Iraqi soldiers and expedient political cease-fire agreements.
Corruption as well as a lack of basic public services, jobs and investment are deepening frustrations. And in today's Iraq, even moderate Shiite clergy view themselves as protectors of the nation's Islamic identity, ensuring that Basra might never fully regain its freewheeling, secular past. Conclude Quagmire Alert.
For now, though, a collective sense of relief is washing over this sprawling port city, which sits at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
More Confidence In Maliki's Rule
Once Iraq's most vibrant city, Basra attracted traders and seamen from across the Arab world, Asia and Africa. It was dubbed the Venice of the Middle East because of its network of canals. Now most of those carry sewage.
The city was shelled repeatedly during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. The following decade, President Saddam Hussein brutally crushed two Shiite rebellions here. His government then purposely neglected the city, allowing it to collapse into a state of desert decay. In 2003, some of the heaviest fighting of the U.S.-led invasion unfolded on the city's outskirts. The British soldiers who then took control were greeted by thousands of Basrans, many of them with flowers.
But religious hard-liners flourished despite the British administration, infiltrating every nook of society, including mosques and universities. Shiite militias with such names as Vengeance of God and Soldiers of Heaven mingled with the larger and better-known Mahdi Army of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. Assassinations and kidnappings gripped the city.
"People called them the Taliban," said Abdul Sattar Thabid al-Beythani, dean of the College of Fine Arts, referring to Afghanistan's puritanical former rulers. Puritanical? Did the Puritans lop heads? Torture? Murder? As a Christian, I am offended by the comparison, yet I will neither seek retribution nor demand the death of the author. Or editor.
Other politically connected militias smuggled oil and controlled the ports. Three months after the British handed over control of Basra in December, Iraqi forces, backed by U.S. and British airpower, launched their crackdown. It was intended to return Basra, the chokepoint of Iraq's oil, to the central government's authority. The fighting stopped after Sadr ordered his fighters to stand down before they were completely eliminated. The editor overlooked this tiny little detail.
Today an Iraqi army battalion occupies the Sadrist headquarters at the Ministry of Youth and Sports, pocked with bullet holes like a giant slab of Swiss cheese. The office and mosque of the Iranian-backed Vengeance of God militia has been reduced to rubble.
Weddings in Basra had become silent affairs. Kidnappers often targeted them, and gunmen sometimes tossed grenades into the wedding processions of rivals. The sounds of drums and dancing now fill the streets every Thursday, when most weddings take place. Cars and buses are decked in flowers and play loud music as revelers head to local hotels for ceremonies. "It's like a gift from God," exclaimed Abdul Emir Majid, 52, whose nephew was getting married on a recent day.
In the weeks after the crackdown, local vendors sold alcohol, a capital crime in the eyes of the Islamist militias. Now the concerns are different. The new police chief recently ordered the vendors to stop alcohol sales. His reason? Once the ban was lifted, too many men were getting drunk in public.
A Militia of Tribesmen, Waiting for Mahdi Army Scary headline, bad savages waiting for the all-powerful Mahdi Army (of Allan)to return.
Militants send Ayad al-Kanaan, the tribal leader, death threats nearly every day. He heads the largest tribe in Tannouma, a neighborhood where the Mahdi Army ruled. "The Mahdi Army will be back. And you will be under their feet," read one recent text message he received on his cellphone. "Maliki cannot help you."
Two weeks ago, Kanaan's men found bombs planted along a route he drives frequently. He keeps a well-oiled AK-47 behind his living room couch. "They are waiting to rise up again, but their wings are broken," said Kanaan, a polite man with a white goatee who prefers a shirt and slacks to tribal robes. The Iraqi army has pulled out of his area to focus on other parts of Basra. So Kanaan has launched his own government-sanctioned paramilitary force, drawn mostly from his tribesmen.
His 760 men patrol an area along the border with Iran. But the Iraqi government has yet to pay his men their $260 monthly salaries. They have only 10 vehicles. Most of his men purchased their own weapons and uniforms. "We are afraid that if they are not paid, the militias will lure them away," he said.
A Sense Of Impending Doom
For the violinists of the Fine Arts College, the new freedoms are a mixed blessing. The death threats have stopped. They no longer have to hide their instruments in bags when they leave the university.
But they have few places to play. Iraq's security is still too fragile for concerts to be held in most public areas. "We don't have a lot of musical events or festivals," lamented Qais Oda, 35, the school's violin teacher. Nearby, the graduating class of the Translation Department held a festive party, with singing and dancing. But their joy was bittersweet: Jobs for graduates are scarce.
"The British did nothing to protect us," Zaki said. "If the Iraqi army leaves, perhaps we will be targeted more than before. They might take revenge on us because we are so free."
The dangers remain on campus as well. That morning, a Mahdi Army member stopped them in the hallway for walking too close together. He demanded to see Zaki's identification card and was never confronted by the school's administration. "They are afraid he will regain power again," said Zaki, the brand name "American Classics" emblazoned across his T-shirt.
He paused.
"I know this is temporary," he said. "I want to enjoy this time."
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/01/2008 06:38 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under: Mahdi Army
#1
If the Iraqi army leaves, perhaps we will be targeted more than before
They aint' going anywhere, maybe replaced by Shia units.
And 3rd largestm city? Mosul 2nd or Kirkuk?
Posted by: George Smiley ||
06/01/2008 11:58 Comments ||
Top||
(VOI) Former Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said on Saturday that he would form a new party under his leadership to "renounce the sectarian quota system and fight the militias," terming as "humiliating" the long-term Iraq-U.S. agreement. "An Islah (Reform) Party under my leadership was announced today. The new party will see the participation of a number of figures from all blocs and political parties with the aim of renouncing sectarianism and fighting the militias," Jaafari said on Saturday in a press conference attended by Aswat al-Iraq Voices of Iraq (VOI).
Jaafari criticized the long-term Iraq-U.S. agreement, noting "I renounce the humiliating agreement between Iraq and the United States." A declaration of principles was signed between U.S. President George W. Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in December 2007. The declaration was planned to be ratified on July 31, 2008 to be effective as of January 1, 2009. The agreement governs the U.S. forces' presence in Iraq after the year 2008. This presence currently relies on a mandate by the UN, renewed annually upon the request of the Iraqi government. Jaafari is a member of the Islamic Dawa Party, to which incumbent Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Jaafari? Wasn't he tied to Iran by US Intel? As for his party name, "Dawa" means: propagation of Islam. That would be the Shiite version.
(VOI) - Deputy commander of NATO Training Mission in Iraq, Major General Alessandro Pompegnani, on Saturday ruled out any intention for NATO to establish permanent bases in Iraq, stressing our role is to train and upgrade the capabilities of the Iraqi forces.
The mission has overseen the training of 67 officers from the War (Arkan) Academy, 10 from the Civil Defense, and 100 trainees on the English language, Pompegnani told a joint news conference held in Baghdad with Major General Hussein Jassim Dohi, deputy to the Iraqi army chief of staff. The NATO Training Mission began working in Iraq on 14 August, 2004, at request of the then Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, and were scheduled to continue training Iraqi forces from both army and police until the end of 2009.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Iraqi Insurgency
#1
NATO has no such plans because basing of that nature is inconsistent with the group Charter. But Iraq Shiites have set up SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement) as a means to end the wall between them and the Sunnis. If US troops leave there will be a bloodbath; if US troops stay there will be an Iranian backed bloodbath (as early as August).
Secularism arose in context of the Catholic-Protestant wars. In context of the 1400 Sunni-Shiite conflict, we allowed a pseudo democracy to polarize Iraq on religious lines, while Secularism was all but abolished. Iraq warring parties are prisoners of a rhetoric of perma-war, concluding only at the end-of-days; we are prisoners of pseudo democratic rhetoric that somehow values political islam in its inherent perversity. Muslims can go to hell.
#4
Based on first hand reports. I would expect a rather strong showing of hands from our folks in uniform if asked to volunteer for futy there; unlike the State Department stiped pants crowd...
different mind set. Selflessness vs. selfishness.
#7
The real "Reformation" in Christian Europe was secularization and freedom of religion, which ended religious warfare there & promoted the forms of government by consent of the governed. The Islamic countries have institutionalized dictatorship & religious warfare for centuries, their way out of their mess may be the same route as Europe took, although it will look different to the ignorant.
#8
AH: yah, Muslims can't secularize. Sunna - emulation of the self appointed "prophet" - is an inalterable foundation of Islam. Beards are worn to exact lengths, because that is what Muhammad did. Some slaves of allah even dye their beards with a red tinge, to look like the "prophet." Since the French intervention in Egypt, in 1798, there is a record of Muslims adopting Western ways only to return to strict sharia. Wherever Muslims have the numbers, they launch jihad terror. That is why we have to render them powerless, even if that means re-colonialization of their backward, mullah ridden cess pools.
BAGHDAD - French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner arrived in Iraq on Saturday on an unannounced visit to underline the "renewed political committment of France" to the war-ravaged nation, diplomats said. Kouchner arrived in Nasiriyah in southern Iraq at the start of a two-day trip during which he was due to meet Vice-president Adel Abdel Mahdi, said a diplomatic source who asked not to be named. Mahdi, a Shiite Francophone who lived in exile in France, is one of the leaders of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC), a key member of the governing coalition.
Kouchner was one of the most vociferous French critics of our 2003 decision to remove Saddam. Now he's in Iraq sniffing for crumbs.
Kouchner attended a conference of investors at Nasiriyah university and also visited the archaeological site of the ancient Sumerian civilization of Ur, 18 kilometres (11 miles) southwest of the city. His full programme has not been disclosed for security reasons, although he is also expected in Baghdad later on Saturday.
He is in Iraq at the invitation of President Jalal Talabani, the diplomatic source said. "This visit reflects the renewed political commitment of France with regard to Iraq and the Iraqi people," the foreign ministry said in a statement issued in Paris.
During his stay, Kouchner will have talks with President Talabani, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and his Iraqi counterpart Hoshyar Zebari. The French minister was also expected to travel to Arbil, capital of the autonomous Kurdish region 350 kilometres (215 miles) north of Baghdad, on Sunday to open a French representative office.
France has an embassy in Baghdad, but had announced it would also open two more diplomatic offices in Iraq -- one in Arbil and the other in the oil-rich port of Basra, 550 kilometres (340 miles) south of the capital. The visit will be "an opportunity to express the availability of France to work to promote national reconciliation in Iraq," the French foreign ministry said.
And to get in on the oil exploration ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#2
Kouchner was one of the most vociferous French critics
Nope, nope, nope.
Kouchner was actually one of the FEW french pols/public figures favorable to the removal of saddam, though he didn't call openly for an armed intervention, as that would have been simply "too much" in the hysterical 2003 context.
He's a socialist, but he's been advocating "pre-emptive wars" to rescue foreign populations from dictatorship since at least the 1999 serbia bombing campaign (humanitarian intrusal), and he's been derided enough by both the pro-"arab-dictators-with-mustachios" wingnuts & the usual suspects from the left (his party included) as an "atlantist" or "atlanto-zionist" (he's a joooooooooo) that calling him "one of the most vociferous french critics (of the OIF) simply is disingenous.
The only way I could think why you'd call him that is that he's been critical of how the post-war iraq was handled, but AFAIK, he's been pretty fair about the liberation of iraq, in the french context.
#3
To be more precise, he didn't support the war itself, again, this would have been unthinkable in 2003 France, and he took the usual position he was "opposed to war, which is always the solution of last ressort, etc, etc...", but he supported the removal of saddam and the baasist, through an "international community" intervention & pressure. This probably was not realistical, but, again, he was not a rabid Us opponent, and having him as a foreign affairs minister by sarko is one of the few actual relevant changes made from the yacoub ibn shiraq days (on almost all other matters, sarko is an immobilist and a phony reformer), as this is a shift from a gaullist strategy built on third-worldism & anti-americanism to a more (realistical IMHO) US-neutral (or even possibly US friendly, we'll see) stance.
So, instead of meeting this with snub and derision, I think this should be acknowledged as a positive step, again given the french context.
#4
A5089, to hijack this thread, I just watched the BBC documentary on Enoch Powell. Powell was certainly prescient and his ideas would probably be even more popular now that people have seen that what he predicted has come to pass.
What most struck me, however, was the absolute arrogance of the old-time Labourites. They were truly bien-pensant bastards. Did you catch the line about "we didn't think we should be discussing these things in front of the children--you know, the voters." And there was the real kicker, from Roy Jenkins: "We didn't know that in inviting these people in we would be taking a chance on losing our secular state."
These sons of whores had no compunction whatsoever about subjecting their country to a social experiment that the vast majority of their voters would have vehemently rejected and whose bitter consequences they could not begin to imagine. However, since they "knew" that people like Powell were just hateful racists, they had to be opposed no matter what. Leftists have been the bane of the 20th Century; the problems caused by the Right have been small beer by comparison.
Thanks for posting that series. It's a very good indicator for the current state of affairs. If such a lefty PC bunch as the Beebsters are even hinting that Powell might have been less than absolutely and completely wrong, you know things have got to be pretty damned bad in Britain.
Posted by: Thaimble Scourge of the Pixies4707 ||
06/01/2008 9:15 Comments ||
Top||
#5
Thanks, I found it worth posting, I've discovered it through a french translation. Nope, I didn't catch that particular phrase, but the smugness couldn't escape me, though.
#6
Kouchner was one of the most vociferous French critics of our 2003 decision to remove Saddam
Nope. He coauthored a book about Sadam's crimes and why he was better out of office. You are missing him with teh former Foreing Minister: Dominique Galouzeau aka de Villepin.
#9
truth be told, the Rafele, in an export version, might be just the thing for the Iraqis. It is, by all accounts, a solid multirole aircraft, and it gives the veneer of not being a US "colony" to make that deal (unlike an F-16/F-18 buy).
Plus they'd outclass every AF in the region excepting the Israelis, and maybe the Saudis.
And it ties the French *firmly* into sustaining an open and democratic Iraqi government, and at least a training presence in Iraq.
The frontrunner to become Israels next prime minister, Tzipi Livni, was a Paris agent for Mossad, Israels overseas intelligence agency, in the early 1980s when it ran a series of missions to kill Palestinian terrorists in European capitals, according to former colleagues.
They say Livni, now foreign minister, was on active service when Mamoun Meraish, a senior official in the Palestine Liberation Organisation, was shot dead by a Mossad hit squad in Athens on August 21, 1983. She was not directly involved in the killing, in which two young men on a motorcycle drew alongside Meraishs car and opened fire, but her role in Mossad remains secret.
Shortly afterwards Livni resigned and returned to Israel to complete her law studies, citing the pressures of the job. A quarter of a century later, Livni, 49, is poised to become prime minister amid accusations that Ehud Olmert, who has led Israel for the past 2œ years, accepted bribes from an American businessman. An opinion poll on Friday showed that Livni had more than twice as much support inside the ruling Kadima party as Shaul Mofaz, a former defence minister who is her chief rival.
Political commentators believe that Olmert will resign soon.
Political commentators believe that Olmert will resign soon.
Livni joined Mossad after leaving the army with the rank of lieutenant and completing a year at law school. From her base in Paris she travelled throughout Europe in pursuit of Arab terrorists. Tzipi was not an office girl, said an acquaintance. She was a clever woman with an IQ of 150. She blended in well in European capitals, working with male agents, most of them ex-commandos, taking out Arab terrorists.
Livni has never talked about her years with Mossad, but a glimpse of the nature of the work was given by her closest female partner on European assignments. The risks were tangible, said Mira Gal, who became head of her ministerial office. If I made a mistake the result would be arrest and catastrophic political implications for Israel.
Livni, a married mother of two, has enjoyed a meteoric rise in Israeli politics since she became an MP in 1999. Her career was forged in the violent creation of Israel. Both her parents were arrested for terrorist crimes in the 1940s. Her mother Sarah, who died recently aged 85, was a leader of Irgun, the militant Zionist group that operated in Palestine at the time of the British mandate and whose exploits included train robbery. I was disguised as a pregnant woman and robbed a train carrying £35,000, she said in an interview shortly before she died. Then we blew up another train en route from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv.
Livnis father, Eitan, was sentenced to 15 years in jail for attacking a British military base. He escaped.
Livni, who unlike her parents supports a Palestinian state, would be no soft touch as prime minister. While Tzipi is willing to give up the West Bank to the Palestinians, she is a hawk when it comes to Syria and Iran, said a leading political commentator. She is against withdrawal from the Golan [Heights], and once prime minister she will want to bomb Irans nuclear facilities.
#4
Tzipi was not an office girl, said an acquaintance. She was a clever woman with an IQ of 150. She blended in well in European capitals, working with male agents, most of them ex-commandos, taking out Arab terrorists.
Livni has never talked about her years with Mossad, but a glimpse of the nature of the work was given by her closest female partner on European assignments. The risks were tangible, said Mira Gal, who became head of her ministerial office. If I made a mistake the result would be arrest and catastrophic political implications for Israel.
Livni, a married mother of two, has enjoyed a meteoric rise in Israeli politics since she became an MP in 1999.
Her career was forged in the violent creation of Israel. Both her parents were arrested for terrorist crimes in the 1940s. Her mother Sarah, who died recently aged 85, was a leader of Irgun, the militant Zionist group that operated in Palestine at the time of the British mandate and whose exploits included train robbery.
>:) "My Mom robbed a Train"!
God Gawd, No easy road for Tzipi Livni. She served her Nation on hard assignments!
Someone with more than just 'talking-head-syndrome'. If only all our Presidential Candidates had such bona-fides.
#9
proof that light travels faster than sound: some people appear bright until you hear them speak
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/01/2008 16:00 Comments ||
Top||
#10
Frank G, it's called the Bozone. Some people are encapsulated by an invisible field that doesn't let intelligent thought enter or exit. It is populated by particles known as Bozons and Morons. These particles are sometimes able to escape the "Bozosphere" and the individuals are then able to be identified as Morons or Bozos. They are different in that Bozos exhibit a clownish nature and Morons are just plain Stupid.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
06/01/2008 16:30 Comments ||
Top||
Ma'an A member of Fatah's Al-Aqsa who has been held in jail for five months has appealed to Palestinian officials to secure his release.
35 year-old Fatah leader Jaafar As-Samhan called on the Coordinating Committee factions in Nablus and all Palestinian officials to intervene to find a solution to the problem Palestinian prisoners who Israel describe as 'wanted'. As-Samhan told Ma'an's Nablus correspondent that he entered the Al-Junied prison under an agreement between the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli side. He was supposed to serve three months but five months later he still has not been released. He says he has met all the conditions that were imposed by both the Palestinian and Israeli sides but still he remains in prison.
25 members of the Al-Aqsa Brigades men are being held in Al-Juneid prison, west of Nablus, awaiting a decision from Israel as to whether they have been pardoned and removed from Israel's 'wanted' list.
This article starring:
JAAFAR AS SAMHAN
al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades
Posted by: Fred ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: al-Aqsa Martyrs
(Xinhua) -- President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement said Saturday that the Palestinian leader "opens his arms" to settle differences with Hamas. "President Abbas opens his arms to end the Palestinian division and start dialogue," Azzam al-Ahmad, chief of Fatah parliamentary bloc, told the press. "Doors are open for Hamas to return to the Palestinian legitimacy under the leadership of President Abbas," said al-Ahmad.
He, however, stressed that any dialogue with Hamas should be based on previous deals between the two movements and tackles all outstanding issues which prevent the formation of a unity government.
This article starring:
AZZAM AL AHMED
Fatah
Posted by: Fred ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Fatah
A close associate of Syrian President Bashar Assad on Saturday said the media reports of progress in peace talks between Israel and Syria are inaccurate and detrimental to any real effort at negotiations.
In a statement quoted in the Kuwaiti newspaper Al anbaa Dr. Samir Taki, a member of Assad's negotiating team, said the contentious issues of water, security, borders and normalization of relations have been discussed. However, Tarki added, discussions were still in their preliminary stages and have yet to produce any long-term agreements.
This statement contradicts Friday's report in the London-based Al-Sharq al-Awsat, which quotes a Syrian official close to the negotiations saying that Israel and Syria were in their latest round of indirect talks.
The official added that direct negotiations could begin in the near future, due to will exhibited by both sides.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
#2
nice array of marginal assets which would be lost in the first hour of conflict with the US
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/01/2008 14:55 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Throughout the ME they are in denial about the US military. Even the Iranians, whose cities have been rattled by the vibrations from B-52 strikes across the border in Iraq, just don't get it.
In retrospect, I wonder if for years now, we shouldn't have been broadcasting what they would call propaganda, but is just the truth. We could show them, the typical Iranian and the expert, how pitiful their forces are compared to ours.
We could compare and contrast, US, Russia, China, even the EU, with Iran. We could show them game films from Gulf War I and II.
#4
Just an extension of primitive warfare. Puffing oneself up, posturing, to cow an opponent. Unfortunately for the practitioners, it's fatal when dealing with someone who operates in modern warfare, which is approached pretty much on the lines of a cold practical engineering exercise. There's no doubt that the word has gotten across the border, just by the examination of behaviors of the players already in the game, that to take the Americans head on is certain death. That the Americans are badass, made all the so by un-Geneva Convention behavior of all its opponents.
#5
What Prokopius2k said. Definitely a Middle Eastern cultural thingy. The Arabs carry on like that before attacking Israel, too, and then to their bewilderment lose, because they believed every word they invented. Honestly, Anonymoose, I don't think broadcasting real information can help them discern reality, because it's only real to them when they've been conquered. Sending in more squirrel spies might help, though. ;-)
#8
tw: I think that the Iranians as a group have a heck of a lot more brains than the Arabs. Their problem is a lot more ignorance than stupidity. The typical educated Iranian-on-the-street just doesn't grasp that nukes are anything more than a big bomb.
This is why such a broadcast channel as I suggested should have also been heavy with nuclear nightmare films of all varieties.
The irony is that we do have a satellite channel being broadcast to Iran, but it is mostly dissidents and arguers, which is not terribly persuasive.
#10
What they do have, is an abundance of patience. To win, all they have to do is wait through 4 years of an Obama administration, and we won't have any army or nukes, or bombs, probably not any guns. His policy is to decimate the greatest fighting force on this planet.
On a recent afternoon, while riding a rickety bus down Vali Asr Avenue, Tehran's main thoroughfare, I overheard two women discussing the grim state of Iranian politics. One of them had reached a rather desperate conclusion. "Let the Americans come," she said loudly. "Let them sort things out for us once and for all." Everyone in the women's section of the bus absorbed this casually, and her friend nodded in assent.
Although their leaders still call America the "Great Satan," ordinary Iranians' affection for the United States seems to be thriving these days, at least in the bustling capital. This rekindled regard is evident in people's conversations, their insatiable demand for U.S. products and culture, and their fascination with the U.S. presidential campaign. One can't do reliable polling about Iranians' views under their theocratic government, of course, but these shifts were still striking to me as a longtime visitor -- not least because liking the United States is also a way for Iranians to register their frustration with their own firebrand president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
It might startle some Americans to realize that Iran has one of the most pro-American populations in the Middle East. Iranians have adored America for nearly three decades, a sentiment rooted in nostalgia for Iran's golden days, before the worst of the shah's repression and the 1979 Islamic revolution. But today's affection is new, in a sense, or at least different.
Starting in about 2005, Iranians' historic esteem for the United States gave way to a deep ambivalence that is only now ending. President Bush's post-9/11 wars of liberation on both of Iran's borders -- in Iraq to the west and Afghanistan to the east -- rattled ordinary Iranians, and Washington's opposition to Iran's nuclear program -- a major source of national pride -- added to their resentment. In early 2006, when I lived in Iran as a journalist, I had only to step outdoors to hear the complaints. Standing in line for pastry, I heard indignant matrons suggesting a boycott of U.S. products. The pious bazaar merchant who lived across the street grumbled that America was trying to "boss Iran around." On the ski slopes outside Tehran, I heard liberal college kids in designer parkas lionize Ahmadinejad for "standing up to the U.S. like a man."
It was a time when Iranians of all ages and backgrounds united in their pique against the United States, turning their backs on its traditions and culture. A movement emerged to replace Valentine's Day (long celebrated here in satin-hearted American style) with Armaiti Day, a love festival in honor of an ancient Persian deity. DJs began playing homegrown Iranian rap at parties, instead of OutKast and Tupac Shakur. For the first time in years, millions sat at home in the evenings watching a domestic Iranian comedy, "Barareh Nights," rather than bootleg DVDs of American films.
But on a recent two-week trip to Iran, I found the shift in sentiment palpable. This year, restaurants were booked solid for Valentine's Day months in advance. Heart-shaped chocolates and flower arrangements sold briskly enough to annoy the authorities, who reportedly began confiscating them on the street. American-style fast-food chains such as Super Star, seemingly modeled after the West Coast burger franchise Carl's Jr., are drawing crowds again. Walking through my old neighborhood, I discovered people lining up at a grill joint called Chili's, bearing the same jalapeño logo as the U.S. chain. (The Iranian government shuns international trademark laws).
I used to hear similarly pro-American sentiments frequently back in 2001, when Iranians' romance with the United States was at its most ardent. A poll conducted that same year found that 74 percent of Iranians supported restoring ties with the United States (whereupon the pollster was tossed into prison). You couldn't attend a dinner party without hearing someone, envious of the recently liberated Afghans, ask, "When will the Americans come save us?"
The most interesting aspect of the revival of such warm feelings today is that the United States has done so little to earn them. Instead, Iranians' renewed pro-American sentiments reflect the depth of their alienation from their own rulers. As a family friend put it: "It's a matter of being drawn to the opposite of what you can't stand."
I lived in Iran until last summer and experienced all the reasons why Ahmadinejad has replaced the United States as Iranians' top object of vexation. Under his leadership, inflation has spiked at least 20 percent, according to nongovernment analysts -- thanks to Ahmadinejad's expansionary fiscal policies, which inject vast amounts of cash into the economy. My old babysitter, for example, says she can no longer afford to feed her family red meat once a week. When I recently picked up some groceries -- a sack of potatoes, some green plums, two cantaloupes and a few tomatoes -- the bill came to the equivalent of $40.
Inflation has hit the real estate market particularly hard. Housing prices have surged by nearly 150 percent, according to real estate agents. For most Iranians, previously manageable rents have become tremendous burdens. On one of my first evenings back in Iran, I watched Ahmadinejad on television as he addressed Iranians from the holy city of Qom. He blamed everyone -- the hostile West, a domestic "cigarette mafia" -- for the economic downturn, just as he had previously claimed that a "housing mafia" was driving up real estate prices. Many Iranians who initially believed this kind of conspiracy talk now admit that the president's policies and obstinacy are actually at fault. In a sign that even the regime is growing impatient, one of Ahmadinejad's chief rivals -- former top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani -- was elected speaker of Iran's parliament last week by an overwhelming majority.
Another trend turning people against Ahmadinejad is the conspicuous affluence of wealthy Iranians. Instead of bringing the country's oil wealth to ordinary people's dinner tables, as promised, Ahmadinejad is presiding over an unprecedented rise in status display. New-model Mercedes-Benzes and BMW SUVs now whiz past the local clunker, the Iranian-produced Peykan, thanks to eased controls on car imports. Posh restaurants with menu items such as "risotto sushi shooters" are packed, while cartoons in newspapers bemoan the shrinking size of bread loaves. (The government controls bread prices but not loaf sizes, allowing for a de facto cost increase.)
This newly stark class polarization, together with the economic downturn of the past three years, is reinvigorating young Iranians' vision of America as a land of opportunity. "You can compete in the United States because it has a much fairer legal system than most countries," Ali Ghassemi, a struggling 34-year-old graphic designer, told me. He spoke proudly of the financial success of a cousin who emigrated to Orange County, Calif., while complaining that Iran reserved prosperity for the heirs of ayatollahs.
To add to Iranians' weariness, there are the interminable lines that have accompanied the government's new gas-rationing scheme. During the busy early evening, it takes an hour to fill up on gas, and policemen are required to direct the snarled traffic. Ahmadinejad has insinuated that the unpopular plan was a precaution against possible Western sanctions, but most people I spoke with considered it another instance of his administration's mismanagement.
Beyond the new penury, Ahmadinejad has also resurrected unpopular invasions into Iranians' private lives. On the second day of my trip, newspapers announced that police would begin raiding office buildings and businesses to ensure that women were wearing proper Islamic dress. One of my girlfriends, an executive secretary, told me that as a precaution, her office had set up a coded warning message to be broadcast over the intercom. On the third day, police swept our street to confiscate illegal satellite dishes. I climbed to the roof to remove the coding device from my parents-in-law's dish. Such gadgets are costly to replace, unlike the dish itself, and the raids of recent months have made Iranians expert in such matters. "I'm going to miss 'American Idol,' " a neighbor sighed, fiddling with her satellite dish.
Yet another issue helping restore Iranians' regard for the United States is the withering relevance of Iran's suspected nuclear program. At the height of his popularity, Ahmadinejad successfully rallied public support around the program with catchy slogans (at least in Farsi) such as, "Nuclear energy is our absolute right." But that defiance failed to win Iran much more than the disagreeable whiff of global-pariah status, moving many Iranians to reconsider the costs of nuclear enrichment. Today, a scrawl of graffiti on my old street mocks the slogan: "Danish pastry is our absolute right." (Authorities ordered the city's Danish pastry shops to rebrand themselves after a Danish newspaper ran cartoons of the prophet Muhammad in 2005 that were deemed offensive.)
Of course, a minority of Iranians -- perhaps the 10 percent of society that sociologists estimate is hard-line -- still hate the Great Satan. But the strain of anti-Americanism in Iran is more mellow than the rage found elsewhere in the Arab and Muslim world. The Palestinian cause is less deeply felt here, making it easier for even Washington's critics to view relations pragmatically. Most Iranians belong to generations with compelling reasons to admire the United States. Those old enough to remember the shah's era are nostalgic for the prosperity and international standing Iran once enjoyed; those born after the revolution see no future for themselves in today's Iran and adopt their parents' gilded memories as their own. These longings have young and old Iranians alike following the U.S. election. Most seem to favor Sen. Barack Obama, who they believe will patch up relations with Iran.
Strolling down Revolution Street, a wide avenue in the polluted heart of Tehran dominated by murals of war martyrs in outmoded glasses, I stopped to chat with a young man selling bootleg DVDs of American films and TV series such as "Lost." "Before the revolution, we had relations" with the United States, he noted. "Was that bad for us? We were at the top of the region, the world."
Many Iranians make this point. But the mullahs in power still can't figure out how to stop being U.S.-hating revolutionaries. Until they do, most people here will consider the "Great Satan" just great.
Azadeh Moaveni covers Iran for Time magazine. She is the author of "Lipstick Jihad" and a new memoir, "Honeymoon in Tehran," which will be published next February.
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/01/2008 07:33 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
The most interesting aspect of the revival of such warm feelings today is that the United States has done so little to earn them.
Except the thousands dead and billions spent liberating Iran's neighbors to the west and the east.
Though arguably the greater sacrifice has been on the part of patriots forced to read seditious bullshit by self-satisfied, posturing "lipstick jihadis".
#2
The Iranians may have found out the worst of the Shah's repression wasn't all that bad, comparatively, and that it wasn't utterly without justification. They've lived with the consequences of throwing it off for the last 30 years and are starting to get a bad case of buyers remorse. They look at Iraq and realize they've been lying to themselves. Let them fix the problem themselves. Or at least without regular forces. They're up to it and they'll appreciate it more.
#3
The Iranians just like the people on the dark side of the Iron Curtain are getting the news regardless of the efforts of Izvestia state controlled media and Pravda Western MSM to lie tell a different story. While Iranian agents and munition make it across the border in one direction, the truth is getting back across the other direction. Add in the natural human desire to project one's own hope for positive change, I'm sure our success in Iraq and the benefits to the Iraqi people are being amplified behind closed doors and in the off streets of Tehran.
#4
It's gotta be hard to reconcile decades of Saddam is a monster with the US removed Saddam.
I think the Iranians better manage to clean up their own house and not expect the US to do it for them with an invasion because I just don't see it happening and I'm tried of every nation expecting us to do their revolution for them.
#5
Quite a few Iranians were educated here or have relatives living in the US and manage to keep in contact. The students prior to the '79 Revolution had a real taste for the discos and partying. I find Iranian women have a real sense of style and dress very well if possible.
Posted by: George Smiley ||
06/01/2008 12:08 Comments ||
Top||
#7
This is all very nice, but the popular attitudes of common Iranians are completely irrelevant. They have no power or influence on the regime, even less than the Soviet-block populations did on theirs, because the regime does not depend on their aquiescence or productivity at all. Iran has no industry to speak of and no longer depends on huge conscript armies for its power.
The Iranian regime lives on its oil revenues and the 10% that unconditionally supports its religious insanity. Thats all they need. The rest of Iran and its people might as well not exist.
#8
Rang the ol BS meter with that line "the United States has done so little to earn them"
Actions speak louder than words.
Our troops ACTIONS and humanity are becoming known throughout the middle east, especially next-door in Iran.
Our building of schools, our helping kids and civilian,s our kiling of suicide bombers, our promotion, even demanding, that the PEOPLE elect the government ....
They all add up.
And Iranians are hearing and seeing it first-hand, next door, where their fellow Shia are revving up an exconomy and ALL the peopel are sharing in the success, not just the upper echelon and mullah-ocracy.
#10
The problem is: islam. And for at least 200,000 Iranian immigrants to the US, abandonment of islam is the solution. Islam has never been anything but an instrument of Arab supremacism and aggression.
We should be playing these cards, against the Arab terror cult, instead of making deals with people who behead disbelievers: Persian, Egyptian, Kurd, Turk, Berber, Indonesian, Malaysian, Syrian, etc. Islam is an elite tool that offers nothing to anyone except Arab tyrants. We need to end our indulgence of those savages.
#12
The Iranian regime lives on its oil revenues and the 10% that unconditionally supports its religious insanity. Thats all they need. The rest of Iran and its people might as well not exist. That is also true of many other places on earth.
#13
The most interesting aspect of the revival of such warm feelings today is that the United States has done so little to earn them.
Last timle they had a mjor earthquake aid flowed from America ands Israel. he leter was refused by the ayatollhas I don't know about the former, but the common man was not pleased at all.
Anyway I remember that after 9/11, in sharp contrast with what happened in Arab countries, Iranins lit candles for the victims.
#15
We have, through our actions in Iraq, a vehicle to influence the opinions of average Iranians that is unappreciated in the minds of many. Iraq is a destination of religious pilgrimage for thousands of Iranians every year. We don't have to say a word to them. We have an opportunity for what I call "existential diplomacy". People coming from Iran can see, hear and otherwise experience things with their own senses.
When Iraq's economy begins to boom and it is more fun to spend an evening in Baghdad than it is to spend an evening in Tehran, people will form their own conclusions.
Seriously, as things get better in Iraq, we don't need to hammer them with any propaganda or finance opposition groups. We simply give them an opportunity to experience daily life in an alternative system.
Thousands of Iranians every year will get to experience the changes in Iraq and how life improves. Words mean a lot less than reality. My gut tells me that more and more Iranians will be experience more and more freedom as they travel to Iraq and it will make an important impression on them.
#17
No doubt many Iranians will pick up Iraqi television broadcasts on their hidden satellite dishes, too. Even those that don't understand Arabic will be able to decipher the images. At least as powerful as what is seen and heard on pilgrimage.
Another free thinker is to be executed in Iran in the coming days
It is with great regret that I inform all freedom loving people of the world that the Mullahs terrorist regime is about to execute one of Irans finest thinkers, a true patriot, scholar and historian.
Dr. Foroud Fouladvand is a dedicated monarchist, a Ferdousi expert as well as expert on the history of Iran and Islam.
A confirmed report sent to the office of Dr. Fouladvand in London from inside Iran suggests that Dr. Fouladvand and two of his compatriots are going to be executed on Saturday, May 31, 2008 or possibly even sooner.
The two men to be executed alongside Dr. Fouladvand are Mr. Nazem Schmidtt, an Iranian/American citizen, aka Simorgh, and Mr. AlexanderValizadeh, an Iranian/ German citizen, aka Koroush Lor.
Dr. Fouladvand, a British citizen, was known throughout the Iranian community for his open criticism of Islam and the Mullahs tyranny.
Dr. Fouladvand, who is an expert on Islam, openly challenged the Quran in his daily television broadcasts for listeners both inside and outsideIran. His Television discussions were offensive to the Mullahs. On March 10, 2006, in a preplanned action, about 65 of his supporters refused to leave a Lufthansa plane in protest of the European Unions policy of appeasement of the Mullahs regime.
Dr. Fouladvand was led to believe by an agent of the Mullahs regime posing as a monarchist activist from within Iran that there were many Iranian patriots inside Iran who believed in him, and that a meeting with them would be fruitful in organizing and uniting people inside Iran to oppose the Mullahs. On October 13, 2006, Dr. Fouladvand and a number of his friends, including the above-named men, left London for the Turkish/Iranian border. The last news of Dr. Fouladvands whereabouts was on January
17, 2007, when he was expected to meet the supposedly Iranian activists in the Kurdish province of Hakkary in Iraq, which is close to the Iranian border.
In January 2007, the agents of the Mullahs secret police arrested and smuggled these three men into Iran, where they were imprisoned and were subjected to torture.
Please contact anyone you can. Alert government officials, the press, the Amnesty International and the human rights organizations in your country of residence.
Posted by: tipper ||
06/01/2008 06:45 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#2
Thank allah this isn't Guantanamo where the prisoners are obese and the guards touching a koran is not allowed but throwing urine and feces at them is.
Posted by: ed ||
06/01/2008 7:48 Comments ||
Top||
#3
So where is the internal Iranian Pro-Western hubbub the previous article discusses?
And why have the Brits not said anything about this publicly?
BEIRUT: Rebuilding the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp will cost around $400 million and will take two to three years, Ambassador Khalil Makkawi, head of the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee, told The Daily Star Friday. The Lebanese government and Palestinian representatives will ask the international community to pay the reconstruction bill at a donor conference on June 23 in Vienna, and Makkawi said he believed donors would embrace the project.
"We have a very strong case, and there is great sympathy and support for Lebanon and the Palestinians," he said. "I'm confident that the international community will come forward."
Paging Uncle Sugar, Uncle Sugar to the white courtesy phone ...
The camp - officially home to more than 31,000 Palestinians - was largely destroyed in the three-month battle last summer between Fatah al-Islam Islamists and the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF). Estimates released at a donor conference last September 10 put the bill for rebuilding the camp, as well as for repairing six surrounding Lebanese communities and providing interim relief aid, at about $382 million. Makkawi said the final costs would be "in the neighborhood of $400 million."
Don't we have a UN something for this ...
"The timetable that has been put [to complete the reconstruction] is between two to three years, maximum," he added.
The Lebanese government will formally call the Vienna conference, and Makkawi said the ongoing formation of a new cabinet would not affect the conference or the rebuilding plans. "Any government which comes will follow the path of the previous one," Makkawi said. "Since Siniora is back - business as usual," Makkawi added, referring to Prime Minister Fouad Siniora being nominated Wednesday to cobble together the national unity government.
The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which provides services to Palestinian refugees throughout the region, will be responsible for the renovation of the old camp, a ring-shaped area bordered by the Mediterranean Sea and the site of the original refugee camp, which had long outgrown its UN-mandated borders. The old camp, with dense construction and narrow roads, was the hardest-hit area of the camp in the 15 weeks of fighting.
Mainly because the Paleo 'fighters' hid amongst the wimmins and children ...
The battle displaced all the camp's inhabitants, about half of whom took shelter in schools in the neighboring Beddawi refugee camp and the village of Beddawi. About half of the residents of the new camp - the area closest to the coastal highway which was damaged in the conflict - have returned to reside there, although some are not living in their original homes, Makkawi said.
Send them to Gaza, they'll realize how stoopid they were to fight the Lebs ...
UNRWA is providing rent subsidies of $200 per month to more than 3,000 families of the camp's official count of 5,449 resident families, UNRWA has said. In the new camp, UNRWA has also thrown up about 570 prefabricated, six-meter-by-three-meter metal housing units without air conditioning. UNRWA has been taking measures to reduce the temperature in the metal housing units, such as installing bathroom tiles and putting up concrete to reduce the structures' exposure to the sun, said UNRWA public information officer Hoda Samra Souaiby.
The condition of the displaced is "much, much better than what it was previously," Makkawi said. "All of them are - one way or another - housed. These people will not be happy until they really go back to the camp," he added.
How about building it in Mauritania ...
UNRWA has also erected three prefabricated schools for students from families who resided in Nahr al-Bared, although some students are still attending schools in two shifts - one group has classes in the morning and early afternoon, while a different group attends class in the afternoon and early evening, Samra Souaiby added.
Some of those who have returned to Nahr al-Bared are suffering from eye problems because of the dust emanating from the rubble left after the battle, said a Palestinian resident of the camp who requested anonymity. The hot weather combined with the living conditions has caused skin rashes among some of those inhabiting the battered camp, she added. Two cases of typhoid have also been reported, she said.
Warts, hangnails, bunions, all sorts of maladies ...
The "biggest problem" facing the returnees are regular disputes with the LAF members controlling access to the camp, she said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: Fatah al-Islam
#1
REBUILD IT? The Lebs should be saying all the rest of the Paleo camps are going to get the same treatment unless the Pals get gone pronto. They should also take anyone they can catch from UNRWA and summarily execute them on the spot, as those bastards are the ones immediately responsible for the destruction of Lebanon.
Posted by: Thaimble Scourge of the Pixies4707 ||
06/01/2008 3:11 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Just what we need another UN subsidized military base, posing as a refugee camp. Until Iran-Syrian intervention, Shiite Iraq was mostly located in the Bekaa Valley, in north Lebanon. Frankly, Druze and Christian interests must be paramount in south Lebanon. The ethnic cleansing has to stop.
BEIRUT: Prime Minister Fouad Siniora began on Friday consultations with the various parliamentary blocs in a bid to form a new national unity government. Sources close to Speaker Nabih Berri told The Daily Star on Friday that a late afternoon meeting between Berri and parliamentary majority leader MP Saad Hariri was "very positive." The sources added that Berri sees no obstacles facing the formation of the new government.
Siniora kicked off the consultations by meeting Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, deputy Speaker Farid Makkari, Independent MPs Michel Murr and Hussein al-Husseini.
After talks with Siniora, Makkari said that he told the prime minister that the new government must take Lebanon from political confrontation to political dialogue. Makari added that the cabinet must adopt the inaugural speech of President Michel Suleiman and start preparing for next year's parliamentary elections.
Meanwhile, Hizbullah MP Mohammad Raad told reporters after meeting Siniora that the Loyalty to the Resistance bloc has forwarded its requests regarding the number of ministers and the portfolios it wants in the next government. Raad said the bloc has requested that the opposition get a Sunni minister and a Druze minister at the expense of Hizbullah's Shiite representation in the government. The Hizbullah bloc also discussed with Siniora the prospects of the next ministerial platform. "There were no differences between our vision and Siniora's vision on the issue of the resistance," Raad said.
Hezbollah military threats are working like a charm ...
Media reports on Friday said that the opposition wanted to trade two Shiite ministers for a Sunni and a Druze minister and two draft picks next year. Under such formula, Hizbullah, the Amal Movement, and the Free Patriotic Movement would give their Sunni and Druze allies the chance to take part in the government.
Loyal votes, bought and paid ...
Meanwhile, Berri's Liberation and Development bloc insisted after talks with Siniora that the Interior Ministry portfolio in the new government should go to a neutral figure.
Assuming they can find one in all of Lebanon ...
The next interior minister is likely to be appointed by the president as he is required to remain neutral while conducting next year's legislative elections.
Meanwhile, Murr lashed out at the opponents of his son, Defense Minister Elias Murr, saying that "Elias Murr is our candidate for the government and this is the case for a big portion of the people of Metn." "I want to tell some lawmakers who are against appointing Elias Murr in the new government that they would not have made it to Parliament had it not been for the votes of the supporters of Elias Murr's father," he said, in an indirect criticism of members of MP Michel Aoun's Reform and Change bloc. "It is up to Siniora and to the president to appoint Elias Murr in the ministry that best suits him," Murr added.
Aoun told reporters after meeting Siniora on Friday that his bloc wanted five ministers in the next cabinet, adding that the posts would be distributed among different Christian sects.
Meanwhile, MP Hagop Parkradounian of the Armenian bloc, which is allied with Aoun, told reporters after talks with Siniora that it wants two ministers in the next government. Pakradounian said that former minister Alain Tabourian was one of the bloc's nominees for the next government.
Meanwhile, the different blocs representing the March 14 Forces maintained a low profile regarding their demands in the next government. Hariri only told reporters that the general atmosphere was positive, while Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblatt said he preferred not to make any comment. MP George Adwan, representing the Lebanese Forces bloc, also declined to reveal the number of ministers requested by his bloc. However, the Tripoli bloc, headed by MP Mohammad Safadi, requested that Safadi remain in his post as public works and transportation minister.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/01/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
Muslim extremist women are challenging al-Qaida's refusal to include or at least acknowledge women in its ranks, in an emotional debate that gives rare insight into the gender conflicts lurking beneath one of the strictest strains of Islam.
In response to a female questioner, al-Qaida No. 2 leader Ayman Al-Zawahri said in April that the terrorist group does not have women. A woman's role, he said on the Internet audio recording, is limited to caring for the homes and children of al-Qaida fighters. Careful there, Zawahri, or you'll wake up one morning with a rolling pin embedded in your skull.
His remarks have since prompted an outcry from fundamentalist women, who are fighting or pleading for the right to be terrorists. The statements have also created some confusion, because in fact suicide bombings by women seem to be on the rise, at least within the Iraq branch of al-Qaida.
A'eeda Dahsheh is a Palestinian mother of four in Lebanon who said she supports al-Zawahri and has chosen to raise children at home as her form of jihad. However, she said, she also supports any woman who chooses instead to take part in terror attacks.
Another woman signed a more than 2,000-word essay of protest online as Rabeebat al-Silah, Arabic for "Companion of Weapons."
"How many times have I wished I were a man ... When Sheikh Ayman al-Zawahri said there are no women in al-Qaida, he saddened and hurt me," wrote "Companion of Weapons," who said she listened to the speech 10 times. "I felt that my heart was about to explode in my chest...I am powerless."
Such postings have appeared anonymously on discussion forums of Web sites that host videos from top al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. While the most popular site requires names and passwords, many people use only nicknames, making their identities and locations impossible to verify.
However, groups that monitor such sites say the postings appear credible because of the knowledge and passion they betray. Many appear to represent computer-literate women arguing in the most modern of venues the Internet for rights within a feudal version of Islam.
"Women were very disappointed because what al-Zawahri said is not what's happening today in the Middle East, especially in Iraq or in Palestinian groups," said Rita Katz, director of the SITE Intelligence Group, an organization that monitors militant Web sites. "Suicide operations are being carried out by women, who play an important role in jihad."
It's not clear how far women play a role in al-Qaida because of the group's amorphous nature. Like a burkha is amorphous?
Terrorism experts believe there are no women in the core leadership ranks around bin Laden and al-Zawahri. But beyond that core, al-Qaida is really a movement with loosely linked offshoots in various countries and sympathizers who may not play a direct role. Women are clearly among these sympathizers, and some are part of the offshoot groups.
In the Iraq branch, for example, women have carried out or attempted at least 20 suicide bombings since 2003. Al-Qaida members suspected of training women to use suicide belts were captured in Iraq at least three times last year, the U.S. military has said.
Hamas, another militant group, is open about using women fighters and disagrees with al-Qaida's stated stance. At least 11 Palestinian women have launched suicide attacks in recent years. Yeah, they explode and die about the same and take out about the same number of Jooos. And what is great about them is that you don't have to risk a brave Jihadi Lion!
"A lot of the girls I speak to ... want to carry weapons. They live with this great frustration and oppression," said Huda Naim, a prominent women's leader, Hamas member and Palestinian lawmaker in Gaza. "We don't have a special militant wing for women ... but that doesn't mean that we strip women of the right to go to jihad." Besides, the men still wear the dishdash in the family.
Al-Zawahri's remarks show the fine line al-Qaida walks in terms of public relations. In a modern Arab world where women work even in some conservative countries, al-Qaida's attitude could hurt its efforts to win over the public at large. On the other hand, noted SITE director Katz, al-Zawahri has to consider that many al-Qaida supporters, such as the Taliban, do not believe women should play a military role in jihad.
Al-Zawahri's comments came in a two-hour audio recording posted on an Islamic militant Web site, where he answered hundreds of questions sent in by al-Qaida sympathizers. He praised the wives of mujahedeen, or holy warriors. He also said a Muslim woman should "be ready for any service the mujahedeen need from her," but advised against traveling to a war front like Afghanistan without a male guardian.
Al-Zawahri's stance might stem from personal history, as well as religious beliefs. His first wife and at least two of their six children were killed in a U.S. airstrike in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar in 2001. He later accused the U.S. of intentionally targeting women and children in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"I say to you ... (I have) tasted the bitterness of American brutality: my favorite wife's chest was crushed by a concrete ceiling," he wrote in a 2005 letter. Well, at least you still have your goat.
Al-Zawahri's question-and-answer campaign is one sign of al-Qaida's sophistication in using the Web to keep in touch with its popular base, even while its leaders remain in hiding. However, the Internet has also given those disenfranchised by al-Qaida in this case, women a voice they never had before.
The Internet is the only "breathing space" for women who are often shrouded in black veils and confined to their homes, "Ossama2001" wrote. She said al-Zawahri's words "opened old wounds" and pleaded with God to liberate women so they can participate in holy war.
Another woman, Umm Farouq, or mother of Farouq, wrote: "I use my pen and words, my honest emotions ... Jihad is not exclusive to men."
Such women are al-Qaida sympathizers who would not feel comfortable expressing themselves with men or others outside their circles, said Dia'a Rashwan, an expert on terrorism and Islamic movements at the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo.
"The Internet gives them the ideal place to write their ideas, while they're hidden far from the world," he said.
Men have also responded to al-Zawahri's remarks. One male Internet poster named Hassan al-Saif asked: "Does our sheik mean that there is no need to use women in our current jihad? Why can we not use them?" I've got a wife I'm just dying to send off on jihad!
He was in the minority. Dozens of postings were signed by men who agreed with al-Zawahri that women should stick to supporting men and raising children according to militant Islam.
Women bent on becoming militants have at least one place to turn to. A niche magazine called "al-Khansaa" named for a female poet in pre-Islamic Arabia who wrote lamentations for two brothers killed in battle has popped up online. The magazine is published by a group that calls itself the "women's information office in the Arab peninsula," and its contents include articles on women's terrorist training camps, according to SITE.
Its first issue, with a hot pink cover and gold embossed lettering, appeared in August 2004 with the lead article "Biography of the Female Mujahedeen."
The article read:
"We will stand, covered by our veils and wrapped in our robes, weapons in hand, our children in our laps, with the Quran and the Sunna (sayings) of the Prophet of Allah directing and guiding us." Well, I'm impressed. I don't think even the Terminator could have pulled that one off, and he can shoot a shotgun and ride a motorcycle through an obstacle course at the same time.
_______
Associated Press writer Pakinam Amer contributed to this report from Cairo; AP writer Diaa Hadid contributed from the Gaza Strip; and AP writer Zeina Karam contributed from Beirut, Lebanon.
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.
Pakistans embattled president, Pervez Musharraf, came under mounting pressure to quit this weekend amid speculation he was already in talks over a deal for his resignation. A spokesman for the Pakistan Peoples party (PPP), which leads the ruling coalition in parliament, warned that the former dictator would face impeachment if he did not go.
Nineteen U.S. soldiers were killed in Iraq in May, the U.S. military said on Sunday, the lowest monthly death toll since U.S. forces invaded to topple Saddam Hussein in 2003.
The frontrunner to become Israels next prime minister, 
(Xinhua) -- President Mahmoud Abbas's 
BEIRUT: Rebuilding the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp will cost around $400 million and will take two to three years, Ambassador Khalil Makkawi, head of the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee, told The Daily Star Friday. The Lebanese government and Palestinian representatives will ask the international community to pay the reconstruction bill at a donor conference on June 23 in Vienna, and Makkawi said he believed donors would embrace the project.
BEIRUT: Prime Minister Fouad Siniora began on Friday consultations with the various parliamentary blocs in a bid to form a new national unity government. Sources close to Speaker Nabih Berri told The Daily Star on Friday that a late afternoon meeting between Berri and parliamentary majority leader MP Saad Hariri was "very positive." The sources added that Berri sees no obstacles facing the formation of the new government.
