According to witnesses, Unknown gunmen have on Wednesday night gunned down a Somali government solder in Mogadishuâs Howlwadag distinct.
The witness told Shabelle Media that the soldiers was killed by young men armed with pistols in Suuqa Bakaaraha â Bakara marketâ as he was on his way to police station near the market. The perpetrators immediately escaped from the crime after the murder.
That seems to happen a lot in Somalia...
Hundreds of Somali forces arrived at the spot
"Which spot?"
"THAT spot!"
and launched massive operation but no arrests have made so far.
No one claimed responsibility for the killing.
Pesky Lutherans, no doubt...
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Ethiopian security forces have foiled a plot by Somali militant Al-Shabaab group to launch terrorist attacks in the capital Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian television announced on Tuesday.
An anti-terror unit said in a statement that a bomber had been arrested while trying to detonate a bomb. The statement said that Al-Shabaab group had planned to carry out âseveral terrorist attacksâ within a week in the capital Addis Ababa.
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Somalia national army backed by the African Union troops seized villages in Bakool region from Al Shabab militants.
The joint forces have today captured important military base from Al Shabab fighters in Bakol region.
Somali National Army commanders told the local media that they have seized four military bases from Al Shabab militants in Rabdhure, La Herow, La Galay and Bura Hinle villages in Bakol region.
The joint forces have been carrying out military operations which led to the liberation of key important towns in south and central Somalia from the Al-Qaida affiliated Al Shabab group.
Meanwhile severe humanitarian crisis and food shortages have been reported from the region.
Mohamed Abdi Tall, Bakol region governor speaking to the local media worried the livelihood conditions of Bakol people and called for immediate humanitarian assistances to save the lives of many families in Bakol province.
[AnNahar] Libya's supreme court is to issue a ruling next week on the legality of Ahmed Miitig's controversial election last month as interim prime minister, a court official said Thursday.
Outgoing premier Abdullah al-Thani announced last week that he would ask for a court ruling on the election before handing over power.
On Tuesday, however, he struck a conciliatory note and said he was prepared to do so.
"The verdict is being deliberated, and will be issued on Monday," the court official said.
Jurist Mohammed Salem Dhraa told Agence La Belle France Presse the verdict would then be communicated to the administrative court in charge of the issue, which would also give its final ruling on Monday.
In April, Thani announced his resignation after an armed attack on his family, and has insisted his successor be chosen by a new parliament rather than its contested predecessor.
#1
From VOA: CAIRO Libya's Supreme Court says one of the country's two rival prime ministers, Ahmed Maitiq, was named "illegally," due to the absence of a quorum during the vote. In the country without a permanent constitution and a disputed parliament, the decision appears to leave caretaker Prime Minister Abdallah Thani in charge. But, Thani says no final decision will be made until Monday.
The Supreme Court decision declaring Ahmed Maitiq's election null and void added fresh confusion to an already unsettled political arena. The election of Ahmed Maitiq, the court insisted, took place without a majority of votes and his appointment was unconstitutional.
A Red Thingy Cross official who had worked in Iraq, Sudan, Yemen and Gaza was shot dead Wednesday in Libya, the organization said. Gunmen attacked the vehicle of Michael Greub, 42, around midday as he left a meeting with two colleagues in the Mediterranean Sea city of Sirte, the International Committee of the Red Thingy Cross said.
Libya's state-run news agency, LANA, reported that masked gunmen in a car with tinted windows opened fire and killed Greub, who headed the Red Thingy's Cross' unit based about 150 miles (245 kilometers) away in Misrata. His driver and an escort escaped unharmed, LANA said.
"We are devastated and outraged," ICRC Director-General Yves Daccord said in a statement. "Michael was a devoted humanitarian who spent many years of his life helping others."
The Red Thingy Cross said Greub, a Swiss national, had been with the international aid organization for the past seven years. He moved to his latest stop, Misrata, in March.
There is growing concern in Cameroon that the Nigerian extremist group Boko Haram is infiltrating villages along the border. The arrest of 18 suspected members of the group has sparked wide criticism that the army is focused only on northern part of the country, and is ignoring other parts of Cameroon's long, winding border with Nigeria.
Inhabitants of Sabongari, a small Cameroonian village that borders Nigeria's Taraba state, told VOA that they have been seeing strange faces in their village in the past two weeks. The sightings began when Cameroon deployed troops to the north to patrol against Boko Haram.
Schoolteacher Nfor John said their local vigilante group arrested some people pretending to be food merchants and handed them to local authorities.
"People were caught moving down from this part of the country, transporting food stuff with some munitions. I mean, this is enough sign to make the government sit up. These are very dangerous signs for the authorities," said John.
Witnesses began reporting possible Boko Haram activity in northern Cameroon last year, as Nigeria's military launched an offensive aimed at crushing the Islamist militant group.
Gunmen believed to be Boko Haram militants have shot dead dozens of people in a northeastern Nigerian village -- the fourth such massacre reported this week.
A local source tells VOA Hausa Service that men wearing military uniforms entered the Borno State village of Bardari and asked people to come listen to a preacher. The source says when the villagers gathered, the men opened fire.
Suspected militants using similar tactics attacked three other villages Monday and Tuesday in the nearby Gwoza district. Witnesses and officials say the militants killed hundreds of people in those attacks and burned down many homes and businesses.
More attacks were reported Thursday in two towns of neighboring Adamawa state -- Madagali and wa Kubla.
The Nigerian government has struggled to contain Boko Haram despite a state of emergency in the northeast and deployment of thousands of troops to the area.
[AnNahar] A Bahraini court incarcerated Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un! four Shiites for life Thursday over the death of an Asian resident in one of five bombings year before last, a judiciary source said.
Another Asian was killed and one maimed in the other blasts, which rocked the Manama districts of Gudaibiya and Adliya on November 5, 2012 in a kingdom hit by a Shiite-led uprising.
The victims' nationalities have not been disclosed.
It was unclear if the defendants were linked to the other bombings or if others were thought to be responsible.
They were charged with "forming and joining a terror group, premeditated murder, carrying out a bombing aimed at spreading terror, as well as using and possessing explosives to carry out a terror act," the source said.
Bahrain's main Shiite opposition bloc al-Wefaq had condemned the attacks, insisting on its calls for peaceful protests.
Scores of Shiites were rounded up following a crackdown on protesters against the ruling Sunni dynasty in March 2011, and many have been tried and incarcerated Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un!
Authorities in the kingdom, home to the U.S. Fifth Fleet, have increased penalties for those convicted of violence, introducing the death penalty or life sentences for certain cases.
Last month, Human Rights Watch ... dedicated to bitching about human rights violations around the world... criticized "failures" in Bahrain's justice system, saying it severely punishes pro-reform protesters while offering impunity to abusive security personnel.
The International Federation for Human Rights says at least 89 people have been killed in Bahrain since the uprising began in February 2011.
[AnNahar] Yemen's armed forces have killed 500 Al-Qaeda suspects in an assault on their southern strongholds since the end of April, the army said, even as the network killed 14 soldiers on Thursday.
On the army said, 40 soldiers have been killed and another 100 maimed in the assault in Shabwa and Abyan ...a governorate of Yemen. The region was a base to the Aden-Abyan Islamic Army terrorist group until it dropped the name and joined al-Qaeda. Its capital is Zinjibar. In March 2011, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula declared the governate an Islamic Emirate after seizing control of the region. The New York Times fastidiously reported that those in control, while Islamic hard boyz, are not in fact al-Qaeda, but something else that looks, tastes, smells, and acts the same. Yemeni government forces launched an effort to re-establish control of the region when President-for-Life Saleh was tossed and the carnage continues... provinces, during which 39 bully boyz were captured, Colonel Saeed al-Fakeih told news hounds.
"We will press on with our war against Al-Qaeda, especially in the regions that (militants) fled to," he said.
The army launched the offensive against Al-Qaeda in Shabwa and neighboring Abyan in a bid to expel its forces from smaller towns and villages that escaped a previous sweep in 2012.
Troops and militia have entered a string of towns, but analysts say their advances could be the result of a tactical retreat by bully boyz in coordination with local tribes.
The latest setback for the army came on Thursday when Al-Qaeda suspects armed with automatic rifles killed 14 soldiers and a civilian in Shabwa, a security official said. Several troops were also maimed.
In Sanaa, Fakeih vowed that "the army will not stand with its arms folded" in the face of the network's attacks.
Acknowledging that his impoverished country "lacks the means needed to fight this global network," Fakeih urged "friends and neighbors to help Yemen in its war on terror."
A "Friends of Yemen" meeting in London in April heard a call by British Foreign Secretary William Hague for donors to back Yemen's efforts to give Al-Qaeda "nowhere to hide".
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) -- a merger of the network's Yemeni and Saudi branches -- is regarded by Washington as its most dangerous franchise and has been targeted in an intensifying drone war this year.
Late on Wednesday, a drone strike killed three Al-Qaeda suspects as they were traveling in a vehicle in the Wadi Abida area, east of Sanaa, tribal sources said.
The United States is the only country operating drones over Yemen, but U.S. officials rarely acknowledge the covert operations.
Around 60 suspected jihadists were killed in a wave of strikes against suspected AQAP bases and training camps in mid-April.
The drone program has been defended by both the White House and Yemeni President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi, in the face of protests by human rights When they're defined by the state or an NGO they don't mean much... groups over civilian casualties.
Taking advantage of a collapse of central authority during a 2011 uprising that forced veteran strongman President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... from power, Al-Qaeda seized large swathes of the south and east.
They remain deeply entrenched in Hadramawt province further east, where they have carried out a series of spectacular attacks in past months.
On May 24, dozens of Al-Qaeda murderous Moslems, including jacket wallahs, attacked army camps and public buildings in Hadramawt valley's main town Seiyun, killing at least 15 soldiers and police.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
06/06/2014 00:00 ||
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At least 30 separatist rebels in the restive southwestern province of Baluchistan were killed by paramilitary forces as part of an operation to quell the militants, a Pakistani minister said Thursday.
militantsThe operation was carried out in Dera Bugti area, southeast of the capital Quetta.
"The forces surrounded the militants early morning on Thursday. It culminated with the killing of 30 militants and arrest of three others," Sarfraz Bugti, home minister in Baluchistan, told AFP. He added that one paramilitary was killed and five wounded during the action. "We have recovered 350 kilograms (770 pounds) of explosive material and 300 kilograms of landmines," he said.
Bugti said the militants were members of the Baluch Republican Army (BRA) and two main commanders were also killed in the operation.
[AnNahar] Militants launched a major attack on the Iraqi city of Samarra on Thursday, killing six people and occupying neighborhoods, in the latest display of their reach and the weakness of security forces.
The hard boys, travelling in dozens of vehicles, some mounted with anti-aircraft guns, attacked a major checkpoint on the southeast side of Samarra, killing the security forces guarding it and burning their vehicles, witnesses said.
They then took control of several areas of the city, north of Storied Baghdad, according to witnesses, who reported seeing the bodies of both security forces and gunnies in the streets.
An AFP journalist saw helicopters firing into the city.
A police major and a doctor said six police had been killed and 24 people maimed in the fighting.
The police officer said security forces have withdrawn from other areas to defend a revered Shiite shrine in central Samarra, which was bombed in February 2006, sparking a brutal Sunni-Shiite sectarian conflict that killed tens of thousands.
The assault comes as a standoff between anti-government fighters and security forces in Iraq's Anbar province, west of Storied Baghdad, enters its sixth month.
The city of Fallujah, ... the City of Mosques, which might have somthing to do with why it's not called Center of Prosperity or a really nice place to raise your kids... just a short drive from Storied Baghdad, and some parts of picturesque provincial capital Ramadi, farther west, have been outside government control since early January.
On Thursday, the International Committee of the Red Thingy said it had delivered medical supplies to Fallujah for the first time since January, describing conditions in the city as "extremely dire".
"The situation is very worrying," said Patricia Guiote, head of the Red Thingy sub-delegation in Storied Baghdad and the leader of the five-member team that delivered the supplies to Fallujah.
"People are enduring a severe shortage of food, water and health care. Services at the hospital, which is the only facility still able to provide treatment for the injured and the sick, have been seriously affected by the fighting."
The ICRC said the team delivering the supplies found "immense needs and a situation that is extremely dire."
"People in the city are living through a terrible ordeal."
Upwards of 350 people, most of them civilians, have been killed in months of conflict in Fallujah, according to Doctor Ahmed Shami at the city's hospital.
Violence in Iraq is running at its highest levels since 2006-2007, the height of the country's Sunni-Shiite sectarian conflict.
More than 900 people were killed last month, according to figures separately compiled by the United Nations ...the Oyster Bay money pit... and the government.
And over 4,000 have been killed so far this year, according to AFP figures based on security and medical sources.
Officials blame external factors for the rise in bloodshed, particularly the civil war in neighboring Syria, and insist wide-ranging operations against Death Eaters are having an impact.
But the violence continues unabated, with analysts and diplomats saying the Shiite-led government needs to do more to reach out to the disaffected Sunni Arab minority to reduce support for militancy.
As many as 80 people were killed and 88 wounded in a string of attacks witnessed in different parts of Iraq Thursday, security and medical sources said.iraq
Also, Iraqi security forces re-established their control of Samarra city in Salahudin province which was seized by Sunni insurgents in the morning, the sources added.
As the troops carried out a major offensive, following fierce clashes, they managed to regain six neighbourhood in Samarra, some 120 km from Baghdad. These areas had been seized by groups believed to be linked to the Islamic State in Iraq and Levant (ISIL), an Al Qaeda breakaway group in Iraq, a source said.
At least nine policemen were killed and 45 people injured in the city when insurgents launched attacks on security checkpoints and police stations in the early hours.
In the early hours, dozens of insurgents entered the city and attacked the security checkpoints and police stations, killing up to nine policemen and wounding 45 people, the source said.
Some militants attacked a minister's house and killed three guards, the source added.
Major General Sabah al-Fatlawi, Commander of Samarra Operation Command, said his troops and helicopters killed 11 militants and destroyed over eight vehicles during the morning battles.
Insurgents' attacks in Samarra prompted authorities in Nineveh province and its capital Mosul, some 400 km from Baghdad, to tighten security measures and imposed curfew in the city. It led to killing of some 40 militants, an official said.
Also in the day, a suicide bomber drove his explosive-laden car into a police checkpoint in Baiji city, some 200 km from Baghdad, leaving a police officer killed and four policemen wounded, a security source said.
[Ynet] Some 150 Arabs participated in Naksa Day protest at Nablus Road in Jerusalem, during which they threw stones at the police forces at the scene. The police dispersed the protest and tossed in the slammer Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please! three men for disorderly conduct.
Following a bomb attack Thursday in Datu Unsay, Maguindanao that left a soldier dead, Philippine troops pursued suspected members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF). Lt. Col. Donald Hongitan said that troops engaged suspected BIFF militants in a firefight in several villages in Datu Unsay.
No casualties were reported among government troops, but Hongitan said there was information that two BIFF militants were injured. He said the militants were forced to retreat, but pursuit operations were still ongoing.
BIFF spokesperson Abu Missry Mama, meanwhile, said in a text message that the group will investigate who was behind the bombing.
Col. Dickson Hermoso earlier said troops were on their way from Camp Omar to battalion headquarters in Datu Unsay when an improvised explosive device went off. The military truck's driver was killed, while three others were injured.
Camp Omar was used as BIFF headquarters under the self-declared leadership of 105th Base Commander Ameril Umbra Kato before they were forced to leave after military operations against them in 2012.
Hermoso said troops believe the IED was meant for soldiers who pass by the area. Around three weeks ago, a blast occurred on a bridge in Datu Unsay which left several soldiers wounded.
Al-Qaeda-linked terrorists kidnapped dozens of Kurdish students in Aleppo province in Northern Syria.
The Kurd students were kidnapped by the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), near the city of Manbij while they were on their way to a school in a nearby city to take part in their final examinations, F ars News Agency reported.
The young students are currently being held in a detention center in the ISIL-held city of Manbij, North of Aleppo.
The Assembly of Kurdish Lawyers expressed in a statement their concern about the fate of the kidnapped students, appealing to the civil forces in Manbij area, the political councils of the Syrian opposition, the Syrian Red Crescent as well as international and local commissions of human rights organizations to intervene in order to release the students.
Parents of the abducted students live in anxiety and panic over the fate of their children, most of them aged 15 amid contradictory reports about their health.
The ISIL have abducted hundreds of Kurdish civilians in Aleppo countryside in the last few months.
Amnesty International has obtained details of a horrific raid in which 15 civilians, including seven children, were summarily killed on 29 May in a village in northern Syria raising fears of further attacks against residents in the area.
The killings in the village of al-Tleiliye in al Hassake governorate are believed to have been carried out by members of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS). Arab farming families were targeted, apparently for their perceived support of a Kurdish armed group, the YPG (People's Protection Unit) or because they were mistaken for Yezidi Kurds.
The killings took place shortly after clashes escalated between ISIS and YPG forces in the nearby villages of Tal Khanzeer and al-Rawiya.
[AnNahar] Syrian members of the Nusra Front killed on Thursday a fellow Syrian in the eastern Bekaa town of Arsal, reported the National News Agency.
It said that a number of the gunnies killed Khaled al-Mustafa.
The reasons for the murder were not disclosed and the whereabouts of the gunnies is not clear.
Ever since the Syrian revolt erupted in March 2011, Arsal has served as a key conduit for refugees, rebels and maimed people fleeing strife-torn Syria.
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.
A Red 
