[ToloNews] China’s Defense Ministry on Thursday defended military cooperation with Tajikistan following a report of a sizable Chinese troop presence at a base in the Central Asian state.
Ministry front man Ren Guoqiang told news hounds at a monthly briefing that cooperation between the two was "in line with" international law and related resolutions passed by the United Nations ...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks... Security Council, the News Agency that Dare Not be Named said in a report.
"This cooperation benefits the two countries, their two militaries and regional peace and stability," Ren said.
However, there's more than one way to skin a cat... Ren said there was no Chinese presence in the adjacent Wakhan Corridor belonging to Afghanistan, in line with earlier denials of any plans to deploy troops to the war-torn nation with which it shares a narrow border.
Wakhan Corridor is a narrow strip of territory in northeastern Afghanistan that extends to China and separates Tajikistan from Pakistain and Gilgit-Baltistan.
Despite the denials of Chinese military activity in the area, unconfirmed reports have shown what appear to be Chinese military vehicles operating in the corridor, which lies in the shadow of the Hindu Kush mountains with Tajikistan to the north and Pakistain to the south.
According to the report, China had apparently sought to keep its Tajikistan base manned by members of the paramilitary People's Armed Police a secret.
However, there's more than one way to skin a cat... the Washington Post in February reported on the sizeable Chinese military complex first-hand, although it remains unclear what the troops' mission is and Ren provided no details. I can say no more! The area borders China’s restive Xinjiang region, where Beijing has deployed a massive security presence following violent attacks by Moslem separatists in past years.
[AlAhram] Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... has stripped citizenship from Hamza bin Laden, the son of slain al Qaeda leader the late Osama bin Laden ... who is now among the dear departed, though not among the dearest... , the interior ministry said in a statement published by the official gazette Umm Al Qura.
The U.S. State Department said on Thursday it was offering a reward of up to $1 million for information leading "to the identification or location in any country" of Hamza, calling him a key al Qaeda leader.
#1
Smoothing the way so it won't be a diplomatic incident when he gets whacked?
Since our intelligence community is otherwise occupied trying to overthrow America, perhaps we could contract this out to the Israelis. Or even the Russians. Ham-fisted is OK, as long as it gets done.
That certainly suggests a certain sincerity of effort...
[BREITBART] Austrian populist Interior Minister Herbert Kickl has announced that the country will be converting all asylum seeker reception centres to departure centres.
The Freedom Party (FPÖ) interior minister made the announcement Monday saying, "With effect from March 1st 2019 there will be no more reception centres in Austria, but only departure centres," Austrian newspaper Kronen Zeitung reports.
The new policy will see asylum seekers with low probabilities of getting an approved claim staying at the departure centres and would have several limitations imposed upon them.
The limitations will include restrictions on where the asylum seekers are allowed to go and a mandatory curfew from 10 pm to 6 am.
Mr Kickl emphasised that the terms would be voluntary but added, "the ones who do not sign it will find themselves in a place that is far from metropolitan areas, where there is little incentive to hang around at night."
Along with the new departure centres, Kickl is pushing for a constitutional change to allow the government to detain dangerous asylum seekers. "There is a gap in the legal system here, and this gap needs to be closed," Kickl said.
The push for the change comes after the murder of a government official in Dornbirn, allegedly by an asylum seeker, earlier this month.
The new policies are just the latest anti-mass migration moved from Mr Kickl who has previously introduced plans to tackle people traffickers and illegal migration by automatically rejecting the asylum claims of those involved in trafficking.
Last year, Kickl also invested efforts into boosting border security, creating a new border force named Puma to manage migration along the country’s borders. "We already have effective monitoring that works well. But what certainly cannot happen is a repetition of the year 2015," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2019 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Moslem Colonists
#1
I like the direction
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/02/2019 6:49 Comments ||
Top||
#2
The tide comes in. The tide goes out. Circle of Life, man.
IMAO, that jihadi hostage business back in 2014 at a Sydney chocolate shop was a wake-up call for the Ozzies. They have their own band of usual suspect boo-hooing the poor refugees, of course, but your basic Australian was pissed.
#5
Doh! How can anyone keep track of all these different countries with all the different names and places? And don't get me started on all the different languages! If English was good enough for Jesus and King James, it's good enough for me.
[Rudaw] DIYARBAKIR, The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the most dubious NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A cautionary tale of cost-benefit analysis.... ally.... ‐ Candidates campaigning for upcoming local elections in southeastern Turkey have a serious conundrum: the villages they want to run have been largely emptied by festivities between Kurdish rebels and Ottoman Turkish soldiers.
The violence, which resumed after the collapse of a fragile ceasefire in 2015, hit the historic walled town of Sur in the Kurdish-majority province of Diyarbakir especially hard.
Thousands had to abandon the region, with many houses demolished during intense festivities between the Ottoman Turkish military and outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) holy warriors.
Mehmet Kacan, who is running for village chief in the March 31 elections, finds himself chasing some 4,000 voters of his Fatihpasa neighbourhood who simply are not at home.
"The people are now scattered all around the province," Kacan told AFP.
"It is hard to afford a living there, people cannot even pay their electricity bills. They want to return to their old neighbourhoods," he said, vowing: "I will work to bring those people back."
Around 6,000 families were forced to leave six Sur neighbourhoods, and no one has returned, according to a February report by the Diyarbakir-based Dicle Social Studies Centre.
While construction of new homes has been continuing since 2017, police barriers and concrete blocks prevent any access to the town, a UNESCO World Heritage site with ancient fortified walls, historic mosques, churches and synagogues.
Although many people moved away, they remain registered as residents to avoid losing state benefits such as rent allowances and compensation for damaged homes.
‘NO NEIGHBOURHOOD LEFT’
Turkey stepped up the fight against Kurdish turbans following a 2016 failed coup against President Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey... ’s government, declaring a state of emergency under which tens of thousands of people were placed in durance vile Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please! or sacked from their jobs.
The PKK, originally set up to win Kurdish autonomy, took up arms in 1984 with the aim of creating an independent Kurdish state. The subsequent insurgency has claimed more than 40,000 lives.
Parts of Sur have endured 24-hour curfews lasting weeks at a time, preventing Kurdish civilians from fleeing combat zones.
Activists have accused Ottoman Turkish security forces of causing huge destruction to urban centers and killing Kurdish civilians.
Although the district ‐ a tourist attraction as one of the first places where humanity began settled life ‐ has been rebuilt, it has changed significantly.
Kacan, an electrician, is going street by street in search of an audience for his campaign platform.
At a local coffeehouse, he came across two former residents from Fatihpasa who lamented their loss.
"There is no neighbourhood left physically to talk about," said Selim Turgul. "When we left the neighbourhood we did not change our addresses... because we wanted to get back to our house there."
He said many former residents "are in a dire situation", adding: "We are hoping to return. We want our own house."
’YOU SEE THE SUFFERING’
Orhan Kacan, a former resident of Fatihpasa neighbourhood, also wants to return home.
"You see the suffering of people. They cannot pay their rents for four months," he said. "We want to live in peace. We want our neighbourhood to be like it was before, so that we can return."
Savas is another devastated neighbourhood where the number of voters has dropped to 1,800 from 3,000.
Metin Arslan, another candidate for village chief or muhtar, is also touring the coffeehouses, to little avail.
"Our residents live somewhere else because the neighbourhood is abandoned," he said. "It is not appropriate to make promises to an electorate in a neighbourhood that no longer exists."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
03/02/2019 00:00 ||
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Decision follows war of words between Beijing and Ankara over treatment of Muslim minority population in Xinjiang
China has shut down its consulate in Turkey’s second biggest city following repeated criticism by the Islamic country of Beijing’s treatment of Uygur and other Muslims in its far western Xinjiang region.
“China has decided to temporarily close the consulate in Izmir from February 28, 2019. All diplomatic and consular services of the Izmir consulate will be handled by the Chinese embassy [in Ankara],” according to a notice on the embassy’s WeChat social media account.
The notice went on to say that the decision related solely to internal working arrangements and work efficiency had been one of the factors taken into account.
The shutdown of the Izmir consulate comes days after Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told a United Nations rights forum in Geneva that reports of human rights violations in Xinjiang were a serious cause for concern.
[AlAhram] A group of Yazidi women and kiddies returned to Iraq from Syria on Friday after more than four years in Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... captivity.
The group includes three women and 18 children, witnesses told Rooters. They were greeted by residents of Sinuni, a Yazidi town north of Sinjar mountain.
The group's return was confirmed by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) office which helps return missing Yazidis. An official said his office had helped in efforts to bring the group back home.
The women and kiddies returned to Iraq more than four years after Islamic State Lions of Islam launched an assault on Sinjar, the Yazidi heartland, on Aug. 3, 2014.
The Lions of Islam shot, beheaded, burned alive or kidnapped more than 9,000 members of the minority religion, in what the United Nations ...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks... has called a genocidal campaign against them. According to community leaders, more than 3,000 Yazidis remain unaccounted for.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
03/02/2019 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
[IsraelTimes] Four members of Paleostinian terrorist group Hamas, the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®, held in Egypt since August 2015 arrived home in the Gazoo Strip Thursday where they were welcomed by Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh ...became Prime Minister after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank... The four arrived at the Rafah Border Crossing between Egypt and Gazoo where they were greeted by dozens of well wishers before being driven to Haniyeh’s office.
They had disappeared in August 2015 under mysterious circumstances as they traveled through the Sinai region on a bus from Hamas-ruled Gazoo to Cairo en route to The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... Other passengers said that the vehicle was stopped by unidentified button men who seized the Hamas men.
At the time, Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group jihadists were active in the lawless north Sinai region.
IS had threatened Hamas after it jugged Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! jihadist bully boyz suspected of targeting its armed wing with a series of bombings.
Haniyeh did not say Thursday who had been holding the four Gazooks but expressed his "deep gratitude to the Egyptian authorities for this decision."
Relations between Hamas and Egypt have deteriorated since the military overthrew Islamist president Mohammed Morsi in 2013.
Morsi, a leader of the Moslem Brüderbund, had been sympathetic to Hamas. His overthrow unleashed a deadly crackdown on Islamist protesters, and an insurgency based in Sinai.
[IsraelTimes] Gazoo terrorist group says it has a ’natural right and our duty’ to capture Israeli soldiers, claims rockets can reach Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
The Gazoo-based Islamic Jihad ...created after many members of the Egyptian Moslem Brotherhood decided the organization was becoming too moderate. Operations were conducted out of Egypt until 1981 when the group was exiled after the assassination of President Anwar Sadat. They worked out of Gaza until they were exiled to Lebanon in 1987, where they clove tightly to Hezbollah. In 1989 they moved to Damascus, where they remain a subsidiary of Hezbollah... terrorist group showcased its military capabilities on Iranian TV last week, displaying tunnels, rockets, mortars and other weapons.
A front man for the group’s al-Quds Brigades, Abu Hamza, speaking with his face covered and voice disguised, said in the report that the tunnels were meant to capture Israeli soldiers for use in prisoner exchanges.
"It is our natural right and our duty to capture Israeli soldiers," he said, according to a translation by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).
Iran has provided support to the group since it was established, Hamza said in the broadcast on al-Alam TV.
The clip featured members of the group storming a replica village in a training exercise with explosives, machine guns, sniper rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars.
The terrorist faction also showed off a "military industry" tent with stockpiles of rockets and showed hard boyz building the projectiles. The rockets can reach Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Netanya and farther, Hamza said. He went on to claim credit for a November rocket strike on Ashkelon.
Acknowledging Iran’s support, Hamza added that, "since the day of its establishment, the Islamic Theocratic Republic [of Iran] has been supporting the Paleostinian fighters financially, militarily, in raining, and in all aspects."
[Rudaw] The Russian military says the Syrian government is sending convoys to evacuate a refugee camp in southern Syria where tens of thousands suffer from lack of food and medical supplies.
Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev said the Syrian convoys are heading on Friday to the Rukban camp and urged the U.S. military in the area to secure its safe passage. Russia has blamed the U.S. for failing to provide normal conditions in the camp, which is home to about 40,000 people.
Mizintsev says the U.S. military would bear “full responsibility for the safe passage” of convoys through its zone of control.
The Russian military said it will work together with the Syrian army to escort the convoys as they head to temporary accommodation centers for refugees established in several Syrian provinces.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
03/02/2019 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
#1
Don't you just love the idea that we should take care of every little problem in every $hithole country in the world?
[Rudaw] The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the most dubious NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and structure.... ally.... and its Syrian proxies took over the Kurdish-majority canton of Afrin in northwest Syria in March 2018. Since then "arbitrary arrests, detention, and pillaging became pervasive" throughout Afrin, the UN Human Rights Council has learned.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife ||
03/02/2019 00:00 ||
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[AnNahar] The journey out of the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group's last holdout in eastern Syria begins with a steep climb eastwards, towards a position manned by U.S.-backed forces.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) has plucked thousands of people out of the enclave in five batches since February 20.
Here's a detailed look at the complex process, part anti-terrorist operation and part humanitarian evacuation:
- BAGHOUZ -
Holdout IS fighters and civilians, mostly relatives of jihadists, are trapped in less than half a square kilometer in the village of Baghouz near the Iraqi border. They are besieged and crammed in a makeshift riverside camp.
To the north and west of the settlement, jihadists and their relatives are surrounded by the SDF.
Iraqi forces are positioned across the border, to the east of the shrinking pocket.
Syrian government forces are based across the river, on the western banks of the Euphrates, in the towns of Mayadin and Albu Kamal.
- CIVILIAN COLLECTION POINT-
In the past week, jihadists have allowed men, women and kiddies, especially the maimed, to leave, several evacuees have told AFP.
Those wanting to escape walk up a steep incline towards a hilltop on the eastern outskirts of the village, where the SDF has opened a corridor for civilians.
At the civilian collection point, they are taken in double-trailer trucks to a screening outpost 20 kilometers north (12 miles).
- SCREENING POINT -
The SDF screening point is an open-air position located in a rocky and arid plain. Only a handful of tents are erected in the area.
Members of the U.S.-led international coalition backing the SDF stroll around the area, but it is not immediately clear what their role is in the screening process.
They are often seen displaying pictures of wanted foreigners to evacuees. An AFP correspondant also saw them using retina scans to identify potential jihadists.
SDF fighters start sorting new arrivals as soon as they disembark from evacuation trucks.
The men and women are shuffled into separate queues, where they wait to be searched by SDF fighters.
The Kurdish-led force scrupulously inspects baggages and belongings carried by all new arrivals, confiscating weapons, phones and other electronic devices.
The women who are usually veiled from head to toe are required to reveal their faces to female SDF fighters.
The men are all required to record their fingerprints with a small digital reader. The SDF also take their photo, and jot down their name and nationality. Suspected fighters among them are then singled out for further interrogation.
The SDF only takes pictures and fingerprints of foreign women, not Syrians and Iraqis.
Following initial search and registration procedures, the SDF then separate the foreigners from the rest of the arrivals.
- CAMPS AND DETENTION CENTERS -
After being vetted, women, children, and men not suspected of belonging to the Death Eater group are transported north to Kurdish-run camps for the displaced.
Most are trucked to the al-Hol camp in Syria's Hasakeh province, which hosts more than 50,000 displaced persons.
The overpopulated settlement contains a special section designated for foreigners, mainly wives of suspected jihadists and their children. Unlike the rest of the displaced population in the camp, these women are not allowed to exit the shelter.
A smaller number of civilians are trucked to the Roj camp, also in Hasakeh province, which hosts more than 1,500 people and the Ain Issa camp, which hosts more than 12,000.
Meanwhile, ...back at the abandoned silver mine, there was another kaboom... suspected combatants are sent to SDF detention centers, also located in northeastern Syria. Their exact locations are not all known.
The Kurds say their prisons are overflowing.
Beyond routine interrogation procedures, SDF fighters inspect suspects for a callus on a trigger finger or marks on the shoulder from carrying a cartridge pouch. They also cross-reference names and nationalities with a list of wanted jihadists.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
03/02/2019 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
#1
damn, talk about beating a dead horse with this shit.
Posted by: chris ||
03/02/2019 7:04 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Disappointing story. When I saw 'How' they were leaving I was hoping it was feet first.
#3
I’m happy. They’re taking weapons, phones, and other electronic devices, taking photos, fingerprints, and retinal scans. looking for trigger finger calluses, cross-referencing against lists — no doubt of names collected from captured ISIS application files and previous interviews... The data boys and girls must be in hog heaven at the moment, living on caffeine and flat food while they play with 50,000 files.
[Ynet] At least 84 people, two thirds of them children, have died since December on their way to al-Hol camp in northeastern Syria after fleeing Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... in the Deir al-Zor region, the United Nations ...the Oyster Bay money pit... said on Friday.
"There are reports of 175 children having been hospitalized due to medical symptoms from severe acute malnutrition," Jens Laerke, front man of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), also told a news briefing, citing reports from UN agencies and aid groups on the ground.
Some 13,000 people fled Deir al-Zor last week, many of them arriving at al-Hol, and the exodus continues on what is a "long and very tiring journey", he said.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
03/02/2019 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
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.
... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey...
[South China Morning Post] 
...became Prime Minister after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank...
