#8
For Fernando,
Took Mrs. Ret. to a Valentine's weekend stay in British Columbia and while I don't want to make disparaging remarks regarding the size of some of the wimmens there, it sure looked to me like Camping World was missing a couple of Class A RV covers.
[Pak Daily Times] A former minister of the Afghan Taliban who was in favour of peace talks with the Kabul government was bumped off in Beautiful Downtown Peshawar ...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire. on Monday, Afghan Taliban sources said.
"Armed assailants riding on a cycle of violence shot Mullah Abdul Raqeeb, a former minister for refugees during the Taliban regime, killing him on the spot," a member of the Afghan Taliban in Pakistain told AFP. Speaking from Afghanistan, another Taliban member said Raqeeb was part of a group in Peshawar "which is in favour of making some connection with the Afghan government over possible peace talks". Raqeeb was coming out of a religious seminary where he had been teaching when he was attacked.
Senior Peshawar police officer Muhammad Faisal confirmed the murder. A Taliban office in Qatar that opened last June was meant to lead to peace talks, but instead it enraged Afghanistan's Caped PresidentHamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai ... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtun face on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use... after it was styled as an embassy for a government-in-exile. Public efforts at reconciliation have since been frozen. In a written statement, another former Afghan minister Aga Jan Motasim said leaders and jihadi commanders of the Afghan Taliban were being targeted in the Pak cities of Quetta and Peshawar.
"Mullah Abdul Raqeeb was working for a peaceful Afghanistan," said the statement. He praised Raqeeb, terming him a learned scholar, politician, social worker and "guardian of thousands of orphans". On Thursday, the Afghan government released scores of alleged Taliban fighters from Bagram prison, leading to criticism from the United States. Some analysts say the releases could help kickstart the moribund peace talks with the Taliban, who were ousted from power in 2001.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[Tolo News] Seventeen Taliban bully boyz were killed and 12 others were maimed in joint Afghan cops operations over the past 24 hours, the Afghan Ministry of Interior said in a statement on Monday.
Three others were maimed in the operations.
"In past 24 hours, Afghan National Police conducted several anti-terrorism joint operations with Afghan National Army and NDS to clean some areas of turbans and enemies of peace and stability of Afghanistan," the statement said.
The operations were conducted in Kunar, Nangarhar The unfortunate Afghan province located adjacent to Mohmand, Kurram, and Khyber Agencies. The capital is Jalalabad. The province was the fief of Younus Khalis after the Soviets departed and one of his sons is the current provincial Taliban commander. Nangarhar is Haqqani country.. , Kandahar, Zabul, Pashtun-infested Logar, Herat ...a venerable old Persian-speaking city in western Afghanistan, populated mostly by Tadjiks, which is why it's not as blood-soaked as areas controlled by Pashtuns... and Helmand ...an Afghan province populated mostly by Pashtuns, adjacent to Injun country in Pak Balochistan... provinces.
"Also, during these operations, Afghan National Police discovered and confiscated light and heavy rounds ammunition and IEDs," the statement said. It did not report any casualties amongst the Afghan forces or civilians.
The Taliban has not yet commented on the casualties.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[BBC.CO.UK] The co-pilot of an Æthiopian Airlines plane flying from Addis Ababa to Rome has been tossed in the clink I ain't sayin' nuttin' widdout me mout'piece! after hijacking the aircraft and flying it to Switzerland ...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell... .
The hijacker, identified by officials as Hailemedehin Abera Tagegn, waited for the pilot to go to the toilet before locking himself in the cockpit.
He was unarmed and, after landing at Geneva airport, said he was requesting asylum in Switzerland.
The airline said all 202 passengers and crew were safe.
Geneva airport was closed for a time but has since reopened.
Flight 702 was scheduled to leave the Æthiopian capital, Addis Ababa, at 00:30 local time (21:30 GMT) and arrive in Rome at 04:40 local time.
But at some point during the flight, the co-pilot locked his colleague out of the cockpit and took over the plane.
He radioed Geneva to request permission for an emergency refuelling, before setting off an alarm indicating that the plane had been hijacked.
Passengers have said he threatened to crash the plane.
Two Italian fighter jets and then French jets were scrambled to escort the plane as it crossed Europe.
The Boeing 767-300 eventually made its unscheduled landing at 06:00 local time.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] A British detective gave evidence Monday in Kenya at the trial of suspected British hard boy Jermaine Grant, accused of ties to Somalia's al-Qaeda-linked Shabaab and plotting attacks.
Grant was tossed in the slammer Youse'll never take me alive coppers!... [BANG!]... Ow!... I quit! in December 2011 in Mombasa with various chemicals, batteries and switches, which prosecutors say he planned to use to make explosives. He denies the charges.
In Monday's hearing, the counter-terrorism officer, Detective Inspector Stephen Ball, told the court that Jihadist documents and other materials "clearly dedicated to the making of explosives and weaponry" were found on a flash storage drive allegedly in Grant's possession.
The detective said other document detailed chemicals that could be used to make explosives, and various ways of making booby-traps to target government officials, police or bomb disposal teams.
"These files speak for themselves and show the person's interest in the construction of an improvised bomb, and with the chemicals files show intent to obtain the materials to make such a device," the court was told.
Prosecutors have accused Grant, a 30-year-old Mohammedan convert, of working with fellow Briton Samantha Lewthwaite -- the runaway widow of British jacket wallah Germaine Lindsay, who went kaboom! on a London Underground train on July 7, 2005, killing 26 people.
Lewthwaite, a mother-of-three and daughter of a British soldier, is wanted by Kenyan police and there was some speculation that she was involved in last year's Westgate mall siege in Nairobi.
Grant is believed to have become radicalized as a teenager in the same British prison where "shoe bomber" Richard Reid first turned to Islam.
Reid, who claimed he was an al-Qaeda recruit, is serving a life sentence in the United States for trying to blow up a flight from Gay Paree to Miami in December 2001.
In December 2011 Grant pleaded guilty to charges of being in the country illegally and lying about his nationality, for which he was sentenced to two jail terms of two years, to run concurrently.
However, there's more than one way to stuff a chicken... he was acquitted of robbery charges in a separate trial in Nairobi last year.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Sudanese police allegedly opened fire Monday on demonstrators from a camp for displaced people in the troubled Darfur region, wounding an unconfirmed number, peacekeepers said.
"The initial unconfirmed report that UNAMID got was that two were maimed. However, a woman is only as old as she admits... we are still verifying the report," a public information officer with the African Union ...a union consisting of 53 African states, most run by dictators of one flavor or another. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established in 2002, the AU is the successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which was even less successful... -United Nations ...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks... Mission in Darfur told Agence La Belle France Presse.
She said the incident, involving residents of the Hamadiya displaced camp, happened on the edge of Zalingei, the capital of Central Darfur state.
They are among almost two million people who the United Nations says are displaced in Darfur, from an 11-year-old war between the government and rebels, as well as from inter-Arab communal fighting which worsened last year.
The protesters objected to a conference organized by the Darfur Regional Authority (DRA) that brought together various groups in an effort to end tribal conflicts and promote peace in the region.
The DRA is a Darfur-wide government body set up to implement a limited peace deal in the region.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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MOGADISHU -- At least 50 Soldiers who were recently fired from Somali military ranks have reportedly joined in the Al Qaeda-linked Al shabab insurgents, Keydmedia Online reports.
Confirming the incident, Lieutenant Colonel Gelle Farah, who is among the fired officers, said that fifty of the dismissed Soldiers with their weapons have joined the al-Qaeda affiliated group, al-Shabab.
What idiot neglected to have them stack arms as they were marched out of the cantonment?
"Those joined in the insurgent-terrorist group al-Shabab, include dozens of women service members," he added. "Some of the fired army officers went to their home towns instead merging with the rebels."
He said Somalia government took a hasty decision to fire such number of military personnel (700 men & women) soldiers from various ranks including commanders, deputy commanders and captains amid the country in war against Al shabaab militants.
Two weeks ago, Somali National Army (SNA) Chief, Gen. Dahir Khalif Elmi (Indho Qarshe) has announced the sacking of 700 soldiers from various ranks in the military over incompetence amid anti-Al Shabaab offensives in the southern part of the country.
"Khat traders, private hotels guards and some soldiers who turned deaf ear to our calls of duty were among those who were sacked from the army," he added.
Mogadishu residents voiced concern over the removal of 700 soldiers from the army saying the decision will negatively impact them if they aren't positioned in specified bases.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
excellent job by the embedded Government spies in those 50 "fired" soldiers. Your assignment was to infiltrate, spy on, identify for ambush and extermination. We expect great things. Carry on!
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/18/2014 14:46 Comments ||
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The spokesperson of Benadir Regional Administration says that a vehicle owned by a official from the administration was attached with a bomb.
Mohamed Yusuf, Spokesperson of the Benadir Regional Administration, explained that Ismaail, from the Finance Department of the Administration, was targeted after his car was tied with an explosive and it was intended to detonate in Regional Administrations headquarters, but not before Ismaail caught sight of the bomb, with the spokesperson describing him as "aware".
Subsequent to that, the spokesperson alleged they informed the mine detectors, Main Action and Somali Police Officials, who were triumphant in their endeavour to posses the bomb from the vehicle and set it off safely elsewhere.
On the other hand, according to eye-witnesses, a car driven by a man believed to be from the "diaspora" exploded in Benadir's region Abdi Aziz district; but no casualties were reported.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[Jerusalem Post] CAIRO - The Islamist militant group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis said on Tuesday the bombing of a tourist bus in Egypt's Sinai that killed two South Koreans and the Egyptian driver on Sunday was a suicide attack carried out by one of its fighters, and threatened more strikes against economic targets.
The attack on the bus, which was traveling to Israel from St. Catherine's Monastery, a popular tourist destination in the south Sinai, was the first assault on tourists since President Mohamed Morsi's ouster spurred an Islamist insurgency. More on Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis
[An Nahar] More than a thousand protesters gathered on Monday in the Tunisian town of Jendouba to condemn the weekend killings of four people by suspected Islamist bully boys.
"Tunisia is free, terrorism out," and "Faithful to our deaders," were among the slogans chanted by the protesters outside the governor's office in the town in northwestern Tunisia, before marching down the main street, Agence La Belle France Presse reported.
Tunisia has been rocked by sporadic attacks blamed on bully boy jihadists since the 2011 revolution that toppled a decades-old dictatorship and touched off Arab Spring uprisings across the region.
The protesters expressed their support for the security forces, stopping before two police posts, chanting the national anthem and shouting "we are with you."
On Saturday, a group of gunnies who had set up a roadblock in the Jendouba area, some 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the Algerian border, rubbed out a civilian and a prison warden as their car approached, the interior ministry said.
When a National Guard patrol was sent to investigate, the snuffies again opened fire, killing two coppers and wounding another two.
The gang consisted of three Tunisians and two Algerians, according to the police.
Much of the deadly violence witnessed in Tunisia since the January 2011 uprising has been blamed on Ansar al-Sharia ...a Salafist militia which claims it is not part of al-Qaeda, even though it works about the same and for the same ends. There are groups of the same name in Libya, Tunisia and Yemen, with the Libyan and Tunisian versions currently most active... , a hardline Salafist movement accused of having links to al-Qaeda.
The government has said Ansar al-Sharia was behind the separate liquidations last year of two secular politicians, killings that plunged Tunisia into political turmoil, but the group never grabbed credit for those or any other attacks.
For more than a year, the security forces have been battling Islamist snuffies hiding out in the remote border regions of western Tunisia, notably in the Chaambi
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[TELEGRAPH.CO.UK] Suspected Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... Islamists killed more than 100 people in an attack on a village in Nigeria, a local senator said on Sunday.
The attackers stormed the village in Nigeria's restive northeastern Borno state on Saturday, slaughtering scores of civilians and sending many others fleeing.
"A hundred and six people, including an old woman, have been killed by the attackers, suspected to be Boko Haram gunnies," Senator Ali Ndume said.
"Sixty of the dead have been buried while the rest are awaiting burial," he added, saying the attacks in the area were becoming "deadlier and more frequent by the day."
The raid took place on Saturday in the mostly Christian village of Izghe in Borno, which has been under emergency rule since May last year in a bid to stop an Islamist rebellion that has claimed thousands of lives since 2009.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[NIGERIANBULLETIN] According to top Nigerian military sources, some of the 20 women kidnapped by Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... bully boyz during the invasion of Konduga in Borno state have been rescued.
The bully boyz had kidnapped about 20 girls from the Government Girls Senior Science Secondary School and Ashigar School of Business and Administrative Studies.
Meanwhile, ...back at the laboratory, Igor and Oleg were discussing what the quickest way might be to deal with the monster... military sources have also fingered some mercenaries of ex-Libyan leader Muammar Ghadaffi as part of those who invaded Konduga, killing residents and burning homes.
The source said, "These mercenaries relocated from Libya to Mali in the heat of the Libyan crisis, which led to the ouster of the late Ghadaffi. And with the intervention of French troops and African Mission, the mercenaries eventually lost their bases in Mali.
"These mercenaries, with stinking funds at their disposal, have not even given up in Libya. On January 18, some of them were said to have overrun an Air Force Base outside the City of Sabha in Southern Libya. They do have an ally in Boko Haram There is the suspicion that the Libyan mercenaries are backing the Boko Haram sect in retaliation of the position on the Libyan crisis.
Military sources have also squashed claims that Boko Haram is fighting a Jihad in Nigeria. A source said, "If you look at recent pattern of attacks, the bully boyz cannot be said to be waging a Jihad or pursuing any agenda to Islamise Nigeria because they have been destroying churches, mosques and killing Christians and Moslems. It looks more of a war against the illusory sovereignty of Nigeria than any religious colouration. This is why the military authorities have directed troops to go full blast on land and in the air.
Utterly absurd. The attacks on Christians are necessarily jihad; but the attacks against Muslims are actions of taqfir, and therefore also jihad. The source displays the classic "No true Muslim" logical fallacy to perfection. Take note, dear Reader, for future reference.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
Who is funding the mercenaries now Ghadaffi dead?
Posted by: Paul D ||
02/18/2014 5:55 Comments ||
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#2
Yes, their chopping and eating each other again. And of course, blaming outside agitators. Besides that, N-S-T-R (Nothing Significant To Report).
#3
Who is funding the mercenaries now Ghadaffi dead?
Ooh, speaking modern Eton now, are we?
Answer: A combination of Nigerian politicians (both on the national and regional stages) who are also funding Boko Haram, Boko Haram itself, various and sundry smuggling operations, and AQIM. I've no doubt that the mercenaries also finance themselves via sales of Ghadaffi-era weapons stocks and drug-running.
[SABANEWS.NET] The specialized Penal Court in the capital Sana'a held on Monday the third hearing of 17defendants accused of plotting to blow up the presidency mosque.
At the hearing, headed by Judge Mohammed Al Bargshi, the defendants refused to respond, demanding a copy from the case file.
For their part, the victims and their lawyers walked out of the hearing because the judge refused to step down ...Hell no! The money's too good!... from the case.
The court decided to continuo the trial proceedings, including the review of the proof list, and called on security bodies to bring five defendants others held in jail into the court next hearing.
The state security prosecution has accused 57 defendants, including five remanded, 22 granted conditional release and 30 defendants would be tried in absentia, of plotting to blow up the presidency mosque in 2011.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[Dhaka Tribune] The High Court yesterday granted bail to Mufti Muhammad Wakkas, a Hefazat-e Islam Nayeb-e-Ameer, for six months in five cases, including three related to the killing of coppers and violence in Motijheel and Paltan areas on May 5 last year.
The government will appeal against the bail, Deputy Attorney General Khandaker Diliruzzaman said.
The bench of Justice Naima Haider and Justice Zafar Ahmed rejected his bail petition in another case, while the file of that other case has gone missing. BNP Chairperson's Adviser Khandker Mahbub Hossain represented Mufti Wakkas.
The Detective Branch of Police incarcerated Please don't kill me! the Hefazat leader at the capital's Malibagh on September 2 last year.
He is also the secretary general of Jamaatul Ulema-e-Islam, a member of the BNP-led 19-party alliance. He was a state minister during the rule of military ruler HM Ershad.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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Last week's ambush and the deaths of three Chihuahua state police agents were a reaction by criminal groups to new measures taken by Chihuahua state's Fiscalia General del Estado (FGE), or attorney general according to Mexican news reports.
A published report which appeared in the online edition of La Polaka news daily quoted an anonymous source within the FGE office, saying that Chihuahua state FGE Jorge Gonzalez Nicolas had been tasked with "dismantling the connections" between local criminal groups on the western sierras of Chihuahua state and the ministerial police agents who had been posted there by the previous Fiscalia, Carlos Manuel Salas.
According to the report, as a solution Gonzalez Nicolas began to rotate state security officials among several offices in Chihuahua state municipalities, including the southern municipalities of Cuauhtemoc and Creel.
The report goes on to note that the latest state police counternarcotics operation, which took the lives of six people in Bocoyna municipality, was part of a change in tactics in which police agents aggressively entered into areas known to be ruled by local criminal gangs, as happened in Bocoyna.
A previous report posted on the online edition of La Parada Digital news daily said FGE Gonzalez Nicolas told a Chihuahua state Chamber of Deputies budgeting committee last December, the Junta de Coordinacion Parlamentaria, that his plans for the year 2014 included building a new regional police headquarters, presumably in southern Chihuahua, as well an intensifying police operations in the Mexican sierras with newly expanded Policia Preventativa elements.
Gonzalez Nicolas was a regional attorney general for the northern district of Chihuahua state before he was appointed to his new post last October.
In 2011 Gonzalez Nicolas had undergone withering criticism from grieving relatives of the Reyes Salazar family which lost several of its members to separate violent incidents including a triple murder in February of 2011. The claim at the time was that the three family members killed in 2011, Elias Reyes Salazar, Malena Reyes Salazar and Luis Ornelas Soto, were kidnapped by a "paramilitary group", which is a buzzword for unofficial state sanctioned killing. Since that time little evidence has surfaced that the 2011 deaths had a nexus with Gonzalez Nicolas or the Chihuahua state attorney general's office.
Meanwhile in southern Chihuahua state, three individuals were killed or were found dead in ongoing drug and gang related violence.
Sunday two brothers were shot to death in Parral. The victims were identified as Jesus Carrete Pereira, 28 and Eduardo Yañez Varela. They were found inside their Datsun pickup truck on Calle 10th de Mayao in Morelos colony at around 1530 hrs when nearby residents heard shots fired.
Saturday night, also in Parral, a man in his 30s was shot to death. Felix Barraza Barraza, 31, was shot by armed suspects traveling aboard a Volkswagen Jetta sedan and a Jeep Cherokee SUV near the intersection of calles Raúl Soto Reyes y Francisco Morales in PRI colony. The victim was known by the alias El Foco.
Police have been conducting counternarcotics operations in municipalities of southern Chihuahua.
In Parral last Wednesday night a joint local, state and federal counternarcotics operation seized a number of weapons and stolen cars. The raid took place on Calle Galeana in Centro colony. The raid netted eight vehicles including five luxury sedans, and three pickup trucks including a Ford F-150. Among weapons and armaments seized were one AK-47 rifle, five weapons magazines, a small quantity of ammunition and one fragmentary hand grenade.
Last February 11th, Chihuahua state police agents seized 200 kilograms of marijuana in Moreolos municipality. Police agents happened upon a Dodge Ram pickup truck at a location called Cienega Prieta where the drugs were found wrapped in 17 nylon bags. The news report says the suspects traveling aboard the truck abandoned it when they observed the state police units nearby.
Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com and BorderlandBeat.com He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com
[Pak Daily Times] Thirteen children were among 15 people maimed on Monday in an kaboom outside a private school in Dhab area of Karak district. Police said the kaboom was placed outside the private school's gate in Dhab. "It went off with a big bang; subsequently 15 people were maimed, including the school's principal," local news hounds quoted police as saying. The injured were shifted to District Headquarters Hospital in Karak city. Meanwhile, ...back at the laboratory, Igor and Oleg were discussing what the quickest way might be to deal with the monster... an kaboom in a three-star hotel in Namak Mandi area left its guard injured, the hotel manager said. The blast occurred on the first floor of hotel near the lobby. "The hotel's security guard, Allah Bakhsh, has sustained injuries," the hotel management told police.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
as Mohammed once said, "let's do it for the children..." and so they did.
And skip the Polio vaccinations too. Allah just hates that.
[NY Times] Three bombs that targeted public markets and a fourth bomb placed outside a Shiite mosque went kaboom! Monday night in Storied Baghdad ...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate... , killing 25 people and wounding dozens, the police reported.
The quadruple bombings appeared to be the latest in a wave of Sunni radical mayhem that has proliferated in Iraq and is playing an increased role in the war in neighboring Syria.
The first was a boom-mobile in the Ur neighborhood of northeastern Storied Baghdad, a heavily populated Shiite area, that killed 10 civilians and maimed 26 near a public market. Another boom-mobile killed nine civilians and maimed 30 in a famous public market in the Karrada district. A third bomb went kaboom! in a market in western Storied Baghdad's Ghazaliya neighborhood, the police said, killing four civilians and wounding 15. A fourth bomb detonated near a Shiite mosque in the al-Amil neighborhood of southwestern Storied Baghdad, killing two civilians and wounding nine.
In Diyala Province northeast of Storied Baghdad, a roadside kaboom aimed at an army patrol killed two soldiers and maimed two others, police sources reported.
In western Iraq's Anbar Province, an incubator of Sunni radicalism, the police said a jacket wallah killed a police officer and maimed eight others at a checkpoint near the house of an important tribal leader who has allied with the Shiite-led government in Storied Baghdad to fight Al Qaeda hard boyz in Anbar.
The rise in Sunni radical militance has been tied in part to a series of daring but little noticed breakouts from Iraqi prisons that has freed hundreds of hardened jihadists who are now among the leaders and foot soldiers of the Sunni groups operating in neighboring Syria and in Iraq itself.
The prison breakouts partly reflect the breakdown of authority in Iraq since the United States military departed in 2011.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[LA Times] GAZA CITY Like many Palestinians, Marwan Hissi has closely followed reports of peace negotiations between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
An unemployed father of five living in a refugee community in the Gaza Strip, Hissi says he has a question for American negotiators leading the talks: "Where's Hamas?"
The Islamic militant movement, which seized control of Gaza in 2007, has been excluded from the process as U.S. officials work out a preliminary agreement on key issues in the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel, the United States and the European Union refuse to engage with Hamas, which does not recognize Israel's right to exist and which they consider a terrorist group.
While all eyes are trained on Netanyahu and Abbas as U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry prepares to present a deal, the issue of Hamas, which could make or break the implementation of any agreement, looms uncomfortably in the background.
Hamas has denounced the negotiations, saying Abbas, whose Fatah party controls the West Bank, does not have authority to bargain on behalf of all Palestinians. Sorry Marwan Hissi, after several millennia, we still have no solution.
#1
as an unemployed father of five, why aren't you asking Hamas why there's no work? Why aren't you questioning the fact you brought five mouths in the world with nothing to feed them?
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/18/2014 15:32 Comments ||
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A bombing suspect was killed in a gun battle Monday when he fought with police commandos who were trying to arrest him in Maguindanao province.
Police special forces, backed by agents of the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission, were serving a warrant to Moro militant Yusop Kusain for his alleged involvement in a deadly 2007 bombing.
Senior Superintendent Reuben Sindac said Kusain hurled a grenade and opened fire on authorities, injuring two police officers, before he was killed in Datu Paglas town.
Besides the 2007 bombing, which killed at least four people in General Santos City, Kusain was also linked to a number of other bombings blamed on Moro rebels in the past.
[Jihad Watch] An increasing number of British women
...whom I suspect are not named 'Anne', 'Elizabeth' and 'Catherine'...
are travelling to war-torn Syria to marry jihadists from the UK, with some seeing them as leading a 'perfect life'.
Romantics. In the traditional sense of preferring gauzy feelings and imagination to seeing brutal reality. Or perhaps you would prefer to refer to them, dear Reader, as voluntary victims.
Many are thought to be marrying jihadists on the internets, as strict Islamic code forbids unmarried women to travel alone, according to researchers at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation at King's College, London. I'm sure the Krayon provides certain exceptions. We really do need to keep an open mind.
Exact numbers are difficult to pinpoint, but the research centre believes that dozens of British women have married English-speaking jihadists -- or are trying to -- according to chatter that it monitors on forums.
It knows of two women from Portsmouth, one from London and one from Surrey who definitely have married English-speaking men fighting for opposition forces. It said that one is a convert and that two were married prior to departure, with the other two marrying on arrival in Syria.
Women from other countries have also gone to Syria to be with jihadists -- two from France, who both married jihadists before they left for the war, one from Sweden, one from Serbia, one from the Philippines and one from Germany. What gives away the women's intentions are the questions they pose to the fighters.... Obviously the fact they are mooslim has no bearing at all.
One woman asked British jihadist Abu Abdullah al-Britani: 'How can a sister ask you for marriage? What are your standards? Are you interested after asking Allah, of course.' Standards? You hate Jooos and westerners? Excellent, Allan be praised. You meet the standard.
Charles Lister, from the Brookings Institute, said that many women view jihadists in Syria as living the 'perfect life'. The revelation follows the court appearance in January of Nawal Msaad, 26, a student accused of trying to smuggle £16,000 in her underwear to terrorists fighting in Syria. Money saved from her Gov't provided Personal Independence Payment (PIP) allowance no doubt.
Nawal Msaad, 26, and her alleged co-conspirator Amal Elwahabi, 27, are the first British women charged with terror offences over the conflict. But hopefully not the last.
Msaad, an undergraduate from Holloway, North London, was arrested at Heathrow as she prepared to board a flight to Istanbul with 20,000 euros wrapped in cling film in her knickers. Clinging nickers? I'd better check mine for euros.
Hours later, police swooped on Elwahabi, who stands jointly accused of being part of an arrangement in which money was made available for the purposes of terrorism. The court heard that the two Britons attempted to send the bundle of rolled-up notes to a suspected British jihadist fighting in Syria's civil war. Anyone consider the possibility that matrimony plays no role at all, and these people could actually be mules used to funnel terrorist funding? No? I figured not.
The head of the Counter Terrorism Command, Richard Walton, said several teenagers had been enticed to join jihadists fighting in the war-torn country, as he warned that the conflict posed a growing threat to national security. What he intended to say was.... "their RETURN to the UK posed a threat to national security."
Earlier in January, two 17-year-old girls from London and West Yorkshire were held at Heathrow as they were boarding a flight to Istanbul. Officers spent five days quizzing the girls before releasing them without charge. But Mr Walton said that other 'boys and girls' were being lured to join rebel forces fighting in Syria. He [Walton] said the numbers of Syria-related terror arrests had soared, with 14 in the first three weeks of this year -- more than half the total for the whole of 2013. He said: 'We've had a number of teenagers both from London and nationally who've been attempting to go to Syria. That's boys and girls, unfortunately.
'It's not just the odd one. They're damn well bloodly all odd.
It's shocking that they are such young people.' Old people find running oftentimes difficult, and they can also have difficulty with the charging handles on DShK machine guns.
[Al Arabiya - Aypee] Tehrans interior minister has warned Pakistan that Iranian forces may enter Pakistani and Afghan territory to release border guards seized by a rebel group, the Associated Press reported.
Abdolreza Rahmani Fazlis remarks on state TV come a week after the little-known Jaish-ul Adl posted photos on Twitter of five men it claims are Iranian border guards it seized near Pakistan.
The official asked Pakistan to treat the case strongly and seriously or allow Iran to secure the remote region deep on Afghanistan and Pakistan soil.
Otherwise we do consider it our own right to intervene and create a new security sphere for our safety, he said.
Home to a large Sunni minority and ethnic Baluch in a predominantly Shiite country, Sistan-Baluchestan province has been the scene of unrest in recent years, Agence France-Presse reported.
Jaish-ul Adl said in November it assassinated a local prosecutor, and in October it ambushed Iranian border guards, killing 14. In response, Iranian authorities executed 16 rebels - eight Sunni insurgents and eight drug traffickers, according to AFP. How will ISAF react to an Iranian ground incursion in AFG? Interesting developments to say the least.
#6
How will ISAF react to an Iranian ground incursion in AFG?
I don't think ISAF is operating that close to the Afghan-Iran border. I suspect the Iranians have a pretty good idea where ISAF assets are located.
Iran might also make a "courtesy notification" to the ISAF once its forces are in Afghanistan; whether or not the ISAF will notify the Afghan government is open for conjecture.
#8
whether or not the ISAF will notify the Afghan government is open for conjecture.
That's one way to put it. How much would pay like to make that call?
#9
Well, ISAF had better notify Afghanistan. After all, if there were an incident and Iranians got hurt, Obama would be upset that his new BFFs were attacked.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
02/18/2014 16:55 Comments ||
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#10
The latest ...
* DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > PAKISTAN URGES IRAN TO RESPECT ITS BORDER - EXPRESS TRIBUNE.
IMO it looks like Nuke-armed Pakistan may be anticipating wilful, retaliatory cross-border limited incursions by Not-Nuke-armed Iran IRGC andor Quds Force in armed search of the Bad Boyz, to include by Tac Air + Drone???
The US-World are likely to remain more concerned about post-2014 Taliban-Militant control of Pak's Govt-Army + Nukes than agz Iranian ambitions.
[An Nahar] Military Examining Magistrate Fadi Sawan interrogated on Monday three suspects on charges of belonging to a terrorist Qaeda-Linked organization and of planning to carry out terrorist attacks in Leb.
Sawan also issued an arrest warrant against the three suspects and one in absentia against Omar al-Satem, who is still in Syria.
The three allegedly belong to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant ... the current version of al-Qaeda in Iraq, just as blood-thirsty and well-beloved as the original... .
They were identified as Abdul Majid Hmeidan, Mohammed Ali and Alaa al-Mohammed.
The al-Qaeda-affiliated ISIL claimed credit in January for the deadly bombing in the Beirut southern suburb of Haret Hreik.
Four people died and another 77 were maimed by a suicide boom-mobile in Haret Hreik.
Wadi Khaled resident Qutaiba Mohammed al-Satem has been confirmed to be the jacket wallah who went kaboom! in Haret Hreik, according to DNA testing, state-run National News Agency reported.
Earlier, reports said the identity paper of a 20-year-old Lebanese University student named Qutaiba al-Satem was found near the bombing site in Haret Hreik district.
According to the state-run National News Agency, the three detainees have recently headed to Yabrud -- Rima Farms and then to Dankuk in Syria where they met with the Emir of the ISIL, who is known as Abou al-Kheir.
The three have reportedly been taught about takfir ...an adherent of takfir wal hijra, an offshoot of Salafism that regards everybody who doesn't agree with them as apostates who most be killed... is, suicide kabooms and reasons to consider Shiites, Druze, Christians, Alawites, the Lebanese army, al-Nusra Front and the Free Syrian army as takfiris.
"They were tossed in the calaboose Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! by the army at the Bekaa's al-Labweh checkpoint," NNA added.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Syria's army and rebels agreed a truce in the capital's southern suburb of Babbila Monday, the latest in a series of local ceasefires in Damascus flashpoints, Agence La Belle France Presse reported.
The truces come more than a year into fierce daily battles in and around several areas of the city that have led to rebels and Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Despoiler of Deraa... 's forces deciding to compromise, with neither side able to claim victory.
In addition to Babbila, deals have been struck for local ceasefires in Qudsaya, Moadamiyet al-Sham, Barzeh, Beit Sahem, Yalda and Yarmuk Paleostinian refugee camp.
The accords are negotiated by public personalities from disputed areas, including businessmen and former ministers.
They involve a ceasefire, a siege being lifted and food allowed to enter rebel-held areas, with opposition fighters handing over heavy weapons and the regime raising its red, white, black and green flag there.
A new agreement is reported to be in the offing for Harasta, a rebel bastion northeast of Damascus, and talks over Daraya southwest of the capital are also taking place.
An AFP journalist visiting Babbila accompanied by official regime escorts on Monday saw dozens of cheering residents chant: "One, one, one! The Syrian people are one!"
Journalists saw streets completely destroyed by bombardment and fire. On Babbila's main street, every single building had been either destroyed or damaged.
On Monday, regime troops raised the Syrian flag over the municipality of the southern suburb, which had been used as a rebel rear base until several months ago when the army laid siege to it.
Armed rebels were still present in the area, as the terms of the agreement also included an amnesty, a security source said.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, rebels and regime loyalists have even set up joint checkpoints in some areas such as Qudsaya.
Syria's nearly three-year war is estimated to have killed more than 140,000 people and forced millions more to flee their homes.
An activist from Damascus said the local ceasefires are strongly backed by people who lost their homes and are paying exorbitant prices for basic daily needs, amid skyrocketing inflation and corruption.
Just two key rebel bastions in the Damascus area remain in open conflict with the regime: Douma to the northeast and Daraya to the southwest.
Both are besieged and being shelled daily.
Activists say the wave of truces comes after the army turned to siege tactics after being unable to take and neutralize pockets of resistance near the capital, and as rebels failed to achieve their goal of breaking into Damascus proper.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] The Syrian army recaptured on Monday an Alawite village in central Hama province where rebels "massacred" civilians earlier this month, state news agency SANA said.
The Britannia-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has said that at least 25 members of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs... 's Alawite sect were killed by Islamist fighters in the village of Maan on February 9.
U.N. chief the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon ... of whom it can be said to his credit that he is not Kofi Annan... later expressed "great shock" at the killings and demanded that "perpetrators of this massacre" be brought to justice.
SANA, quoting a military source, said "army units have established total control over Maan, after crushing the snuffies who had infiltrated (the village) and committed a massacre against its civilian residents, killing dozens of them, including women."
State television also reported the army's recapture of Maan but gave a higher corpse count, saying 42 civilians had been killed by "terrorists," the regime's term for rebels.
The Observatory -- which had reported 14 women among the dead -- said Maan was retaken "after shelling and fighting."
The monitoring group, which relies on a network of activists and medics on the ground, meanwhile reported renewed regime air strikes on the central city of Homs Monday for the second day running.
The United Nations ...an idea whose time has gone... and Syria's Red Islamic Thingy evacuated last week some 1,400 who had been trapped inside rebel-held areas besieged by the army for more than 18 months.
The operation was made possible by a deal that included a ceasefire.
But it was suspended after festivities and shelling erupted on Sunday, with the rebels and the regime blaming each other undermining the humanitarian operation.
The Observatory also reported that a jihadist of German origins was killed alongside other fighters in a kaboom in the rebel-held town of Minjeb in the northern Aleppo province.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2014 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
The spokesperson of Benadir Regional Administration says that a vehicle owned by a official from the administration was attached with a bomb.
[TELEGRAPH.CO.UK] Suspected 
[NY Times] Three bombs that targeted public markets and a fourth bomb placed outside a Shiite mosque 
A bombing suspect was killed in a gun battle Monday when he fought with police commandos who were trying to arrest him in Maguindanao province.
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon
