Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Afghanistan may demand war compensation from Russia
negotiated compensation directly between both parties would be one thing.
Compensation adjudicated thru the UN or the Haig...forgetaboutit. imo
Posted by: Red Dog ||
12/28/2005 3:37 Comments ||
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When you are asking an ant to "negotiate directly" with an elephant (especially a rabid elephant like Russia), what you are asking it to do is be stepped upon.
The Afghan government on Tuesday vowed to chock and control the financial resources of foreign spies bedsides punishing them. "Spying for foreigners is a treason to the country and a conspiracy against the government, against the people and against the establishment," Presidential spokesman Mohammmad Karim Rahimi said at a press briefing. However, he did not name any official or country involved in the practice.
I didn't expect he would...
"Receiving financial support by some individuals and groups secretly and illegally from abroad is a threat against the establishment and the government would not allow it," the spokesman said without elaboration. His remarks came after sacking two officials by President Hamid Karzai a few days ago.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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Chad, which accuses Sudan of backing rebel attacks on its eastern border, fears Khartoum may be preparing a fresh assault which could also destabilise other neighbouring states, President Idriss Deby said. Deby briefed the president of Central African Republic, Francois Bozize, late on Monday about Chad's charges that the Sudanese government organized and directed two attacks by Chadian rebels against the border town of Adre on Dec. 18. "One can't rule out Khartoum making another repeat attack against Chad," Deby told reporters in N'Djamena after meeting Bozize. He said the Sudanese government was preparing for such a move at el-Geneina in Sudan's western Darfur region.
On Friday, Chad said a "state of belligerence" existed between itself and Sudan. The Sudanese government expressed surprise and said it would not allow its territory to be used for attacks on neighbouring states. But Deby, who accuses Khartoum of supporting Chadian rebels of the Rally for Democracy and Liberty (RDL) who are seeking to topple him, said Sudan's government had sent a 50-vehicle motorised military column towards the southern Sudanese border. Without offering more details, he suggested this might risk destabilising Central African Republic, which lies southwest of Sudan. "This is a worry not just for Chad but for all of Sudan's neighbours ... if Chad is targeted, I don't see how Central African Republic won't be affected," Deby said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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Another geopol crisis breaks out along the major trade/oil routes from the Pacific thru the Malaccas-Indian Subcontinent, thru now the eastern African flanks along the Red Sea and Mediterranean - can Dubya & Co. count on "The Colonel" of Libya to help save the North and NorthEast l'Affriqque, from Egypt to Ethiopia and Nigeria???
#2
Chad did alright the last time they had to go at it with someone; realistically, what they will need is logistical support. And Khaddafy seems to be trying to mellow his image in the West, so he might just be willing to rat out the Sudanese and their supporters.
#3
Also, remember that Uganda has smacked the Sudan on occassion for not being more helpful with the LRA psychos operating from inside the Sudan. Not sure Khartoum wants a 3-way split with Chad, CAR, and Uganda.
Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud received here Tuesday US ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad and the accompanying delegation.
According to the Saudi Press Agency the ambassador conveyed during the meeting to the king greetings of US president George W. Bush. In turn, the king sent his greetings to the president. Also during the audience, developments in Iraq were reviewed. The audience was attended by Princes and officials.
Bangladesh has invited another Interpol team to assist the country's intelligence agencies in investigating the grenade attack on an Awami League rally in Dhaka on Aug. 21, 2004. The bomb attack had killed 22 people including Awami League leader Ivy Rahman. The bomb went off soon after the speech of Awami League chief Hasina Wajed.
The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) is probing the grenade attack. A few Interpol teams were involved in the investigation at the request of Dhaka. The last Interpol team visited Bangladesh in June. CID chief Ruhul Amin told newsmen yesterday the probe made much headway with the arrest of George Miah, Hashem and Shafi. All of them confessed to their involvement in the attack.
"We dunnit! Stop hitting us there!"
George Miah, Hashem and Shafi told a court, top terrorists Mukul and Joy were the masterminds of the grenade attack. Both Mukul and Joy are now in the Indian state of West Bengal running a business there, the CID source said.
"Mike sez to say hello, Fabrizzio Mukul!"
Following information gleaned from Hashem and Shafi, the CID recovered a revolver belonging to Joy from a hide-out used by Shafi. The revolver license was issued to Joy in 1997. Joy was carrying the revolver during the attack. Shafi told investigators he had recently visited India and met Joy and Mukul. Although there has been substantial progress in the probe nobody has been charged with carrying out the attack.
Ruhul Amin said charges can be framed against people in the light of statements by Hashem and Shafi but the police were waiting to arrest a few more people involved in the attack. So far, 20 people have been arrested in the case. The investigation team has complained about non-cooperation from the Awami League leaders.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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The MI5, Scotland Yard and other intelligence and anti-terror units have identified the July 7 suicide bombers as forerunners of the next al-Qaeda generation. An expert said the UK-born and raised suicide bombers of 7/7 foreshadow the next mujahideen generation who will operate below the radar of local security services.
The police feel that if the suicide bombers who killed 52 people in three tube trains and a double-decker bus had no one running them at all, " we really are in a mess". There is now way of knowing who of the young Muslims is being groomed to blow himself up and kill dozens in the process.
The security agencies have learnt that most mosques, which until now were breeding and recruiting grounds for jihadis are now under the control of moderates. Extremist preachers are sending out talent scouts to find young Muslims who might be willing to become jihadis. The search concentrates on gymnasiums, study circles, universities and prisons, where the inmates are often persuaded to convert first.
The radical preachers are identifiable but their scouts are mostly unknown. Mohammad Sidique Khan, the oldest of the four 7/7 suicide bombers had used youth centres and gyms to recruit the three others and then held bonding sessions on whitewater rafting trips.
But how Khan was radicalised is as yet not known to the Intelligence, except that he went to Pakistan and almost certainly spent time al-Qaeda run camps. But who was or were the mentors is not known and that worries the MI5 and others.
The agencies have now drawn up a new topology of what makes a young British Muslim want to become a martyr for jihad. They hope it will help them hunt down the radicalised. But they are unsure if there are already groups of sleepers.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
12/28/2005 12:46 ||
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December 28, 2005: The island republic of Trinidad and Tobago has about a million inhabitants. About six percent of them are Moslems, including a few Islamic radicals. The countryâs principal Moslem organization, the Anjuman Sunnat-ul-Jamaat Association (ASJA), is very much in the tradition of tolerance that prevails among the âTrini.â When asked about âcultural conflict,â given the countryâs rich mix of several brands of Christians, Hindus, Moslems, and others, ASJA leader Yacoob Ali, replied âWe have to coexist. To each his own," and then added that according to the Koran, "Moslems believe there must be no antagonism, no anti-religious sentiment towards another person's faith and belief."
Speaking last year, when the Hindu festival of Divali coincided with the Moslem Eid and the Christian Christmas, Noble Khan, himself a Moslem and President of the Inter-Religious Organisation, observed that "The three festivals are closely linked with happiness,â adding "It's a confluence of spiritual forces coming together. If your whole community is totally taken up with positive activities, then it is going to reduce the amount of negative activity."
There are some more extreme views. Inshan Ishmael, head of the âIslamic Relief Centre,â has taken a harder line, frequently protesting âharassment of Moslem.â For example, he attributed delays in establishing a Moslem-oriented cable television channel to an âanti-Islamic sentiment,â though several other applicants for channels experienced similar delays, which the cable provider attributed to technical problems. Ishmael has also brought suit in the countryâs supreme court against the fact that itâs highest decoration is the âTrinity Crossâ (He has not, apparently, protested the name of the country itself, âTrinityâ in Spanish, or not yet, anyway). But Ishmael, who now has his cable channel, is a relative moderate when compared with local radical cleric Yasin Abu Bakr of the Jamaat Al Muslimeen. In July of 1990, Bakr led an abortive coup against the government, in an attempt to establish an Islamic regime. The coup resulted in 24 deaths. Freed in a general amnesty, Bakr and his organization are believed to be active in organized crime, drug dealing, kidnapping, and gang-related killings.
On November 4th, on the conclusion of the festival of Eid-ul-Fitr, Bakr delivered a sermon in which, along with demands for the overthrow of the United States, he warned ârich Moslemsâ to provide alms the poor, as required by the Koran. In the process, Bakr not only named his own organization as the only legitimate receiver of such alms, but also several prominent Trini Moslems and Moslem-owned businesses from which the tithes would be demanded, threatening âbloodshed and war"â if the money was not forthcoming. Bakrâs sermon prompted a major âsummitâ of the leading Moslem organizations in the country. Of the sermon, Ishmael said, âBakr is totally out of place and should know where to get off. He has crossed the line,â adding that it was an open threat to Muslims, and âa warning that the Muslim community should not take lightly.â
Meanwhile, on November 7th, Bakr was arrested on charges relating to several criminal investigations. And on the 22nd he was charged with âterrorismâ and promoting âthe commission of a terrorist act likely to cause the loss of life or serious bodily harm,"
Posted by: Steve ||
12/28/2005 10:34 ||
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#1
Missionaries from Saudi Arabia have been arabicizing the muslim communities in the caribbean with their toxic wahabism..
They are very well funded and this opens doors in a minority population. More and more women are adopting the hijab.
Abu Bakr and his group are not from the traditional East Indian muslim community. They are all of "African" descent and are converts from Christianity.
Several of Bakr's men have attended training camps in Libya and Afghanistan.
In recent times, contacts with Pakistan have increased with more locals going there for "islamic studies".
The US has an opportunity to crack some islamic heads in its own backyard. Bakr's group has been involved in gunrunning and drug traficking between the US and the Caribbean. Some members have been extradited to the US for trial. Bakr should join them.
He may be able to threaten the Trinidad authorities but the US is quite another matter...
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 13:27 Comments ||
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Notorious terrorists Shamil Basayev and Aslan Maskhadov masterminded the September 2004 siege of a school in Beslan, the head of the federal parliamentary investigation commission said Wednesday. "Separatists Shamil Basayev, Aslan Maskhadov, Magomet Khashiyev and their associates, notorious for cruelty, masterminded the terrorist attack," Alexander Torshin said. "Foreign mercenaries, including notorious [Arab] terrorist Abu Dzeit, also played an active role in the attack."
The parliamentary commission has concluded that the Beslan attack was designed to destabilize the situation in the entire North Caucasus, Torshin said. The commission head said preparations for the attack had begun back in August 2004, when a group of 34 terrorists was formed in the Malgobeksky district of Ingushetia, a republic in the North Caucasus. "The militants' well-coordinated actions point to a planned operation," Torshin said. But the Ingush branches of the Federal Security Service and the Interior Ministry failed to take sufficient measures to track down and arrest the terrorists, he said. The school siege lasted 3 days, leaving 331 people dead and 783 wounded.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
12/28/2005 12:56 ||
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The Beslan school massacre which left hundreds dead, including 186 children, could have been averted if government warnings had been heeded, Russian politicians were told today.
Alexander Torshin, head of a Russian parliamentary commission investigating last yearâs Beslan school tragedy, in which 331 people died, said that if orders had been followed, the deaths could have been prevented.
The crisis erupted on September 1, 2004 when Chechen rebels seized a primary school in the southern Russian city of Beslan, taking more than 1,000 people including hundreds of students and their parents arriving for the first day of school hostage.
A tense stand-off ended three days later after an explosion in the school triggered a fierce firefight between security forces and dozens of hostage-takers, causing huge numbers of casualties. Thirty-one hostage takers also died in the violence.
Responsibility for the attack on the school was claimed by Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev, but families of the victims have said that authorities at all levels of government and law enforcement bear a large share of blame for the tragedy due to incompetence.
Telegrams were sent from the Russian Interior ministry less than two weeks before the militantsâ raid instructing the police department in North Ossetia, where Beslan is located, to beef up security on the first day of school.
But Mr Torshin, deputy speaker of the Federation Council, told lawmakers, as he outlined preliminary conclusions from a parliamentary inquiry set up in September 2004, that only a single policewoman was posted outside the school and was eventually taken hostage.
Mr Torshin also said: "The counter-terrorist operation was plagued by shortcomings. Many law enforcement officers did not know how to act in an emergency situation."
He accused police and security officials in North Ossetia and the neighbouring region of Ingushetia, from where the militants had launched their raid, of "negligence and carelessness."
But the families of the dead were left angry with these early conclusions.
Savkuz Dzhusov, who witnessed the storming of the school from his nearby apartment building in Beslan, said that he would pay no attention to Mr Torshinâs report.
Mr Dzhusov said: "It is all fiction. They will lie again and nobody will be held accountable for the dead children."
Meanwhile, Susanna Dudiyeva, head of the Beslan Mothersâ Committee, said that "the most painful questions are left unanswered by Torshinâs report".
The rebels, who were demanding that Russian troops withdraw from nearby Chechnya after a decade of separatist fighting there, had crossed heavily-policed territory to reach Beslan, and victimsâ relatives are convinced that they received help from corrupt officials.
Families of the hostages have strongly criticised the rescue operation, saying hostages died needlessly because special forces soldiers used flame-throwers, grenade launchers and tanks against the militants.
Mr Torshin countered this by insisting their use saved law enforcement officersâ lives, and he said that there were no longer any hostages in the building when the heavy weaponry was used.
Jeremy Page, Mocsow Correspondent of The Times, said: "Locally, this issue is highly politicised.
"Relatives of victims blame both local and federal authorities for allowing hostage takers to get across the borders and take the school as well as for messing up the rescue operation and covering up afterwards.
"But nationally, it is not so much of an issue any more."
Page attributed this to the Kremlinâs influence over the national media.
He added: "No significant federal official has been held responsible for any of this ⊠the security lapses or the rescue operation."
Page said that human rights groups and relatives of victims still felt there were federal officials who should be held to account.
Discussing the security action taken by Russian since Beslan, he added: "Perhaps on a smaller scale, there is better security (at schools). But it is not enough to prevent this happening again. Schools are still vulnerable targets."
He described how there had been there parallel investigations into the tragedy, with only one so far, by the North Ossestian parliament, laying part of the blame on the Russian authorities' doorsteps.
Asked about the possibility of the issue rearing its head on the national political landscape, he said: "For that to happen, you need to give opposition politicians and NGOs (non-governmental organisations) the freedom the national media outlets to criticise the Government."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
12/28/2005 12:43 ||
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Telegrams were sent from the Russian Interior ministry less than two weeks before the militantsâ raid instructing the police department in North Ossetia, where Beslan is located, to beef up security on the first day of school.
Yeah right.. a few policemen on watch are going to deter an attack by dozens of heavily armed terrorists. Are they supposed to seal off every school with a platoon of troops?
Blame Russia for this again...
These are not terrorists, they are "hostage takers". The children died when the "planted mines exploded" Exploded ? How ? The media cannot state the obvious, that the terrorists detonated the mines. That they are killers...
The Russian anti-terror troops use of heavy weapons was incompetant but this constant harping on the Russians is shameful.
The Moscow theatre siege was similar. Report after report motivated by sheer spite that the Russians had not conceeded to the terrorist demands. Again, these were "hostage takers"
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 13:40 Comments ||
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#2
There were rumors in the aftermath that this was an inside job and that most of the weapons/explosives were already stashed at the school at the time of the attack. Also that 'officials' were bribed/told to look the other way...
#3
The entire Russian campaign in Chechenya has been incompetent .. a lesson in how NOT to fight a guerilla war.
But this media cheerleading for the terrorists is sickening...
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 14:26 Comments ||
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#4
Grown men, trained in using weapons and in hand to hand fighting, armed to the teeth with guns and explosives, clad in body armor..
And their target is a bunch of preteen schoolgirls?
That's where the media rage should be directed .. at these excuses-for-men, the Lions of Islam
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 14:31 Comments ||
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#5
These are not terrorists, they are "hostage takers". The children died when the "planted mines exploded" Exploded ? How ? The media cannot state the obvious, that the terrorists detonated the mines. That they are killers...
Don't be so harsh John, men of good will can agree that mistakes were made and changes must be made - in good time.
Posted by: Leon Clavin ||
12/28/2005 20:08 Comments ||
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Prosecutors investigating the Beslan school hostage siege have uncovered no mistakes in the authorities' handling of the crisis, the head of the investigation said.
A reconstruction of the September 2004 raid had established that police involved in the rescue operation did not bear any blame for the ensuing tragedy, Nikolai Shepel said. Victims' relatives say official incompetence contributed to the deaths of more than 330 people.
"The prosecutors are sticking to their version of events and ignoring victims' testimony," said Susanna Dudiyeva of the Beslan Mothers' Committee.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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A Japanese diplomat who committed suicide in May 2004 was being blackmailed to provide key intelligence to China, Japanese media reports say. The unnamed engineer, in charge of communications for Japan's Shanghai consulate, left suicide notes saying he had been threatened by a Chinese man. The threats concerned his relationship with a karaoke hostess, reports said.
A sultry wench with an impressive set of.......cameras in her bedroom.
Japan has asked China to clarify the incident, while China described the latest allegations as "groundless". A spokesman for the Japanese Foreign Ministry, Yoshinori Katori, was quoted by the AFP agency as saying Japan had complained about the matter. "We believe that, behind the death, there were regrettable acts by Chinese intelligence," he said. The case could stoke China and Japan's troubled relations, amid rows over natural resources and Japan's attitudes towards its past.
The Weekly Bunshun magazine reported that the man was being pressed to reveal the names of officials in the Shanghai consulate and the flight numbers of airlines that carried confidential documents from Shanghai to Japan. According to the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper, the diplomat did not provide any information to China, and wrote in his suicide note "I can't sell out my country".
Would that our State Department types had half this guys sense of honor
Posted by: Steve ||
12/28/2005 08:27 ||
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"The Karaoke Hostess Who Loved Me", coming soon to a IMAX theater near you.
A former German government minister, his wife and three children were kidnapped in Yemen on Wednesday, local officials said, and one of their captors said their lives would be at risk if Yemen used force to free them.
Germany's Foreign Ministry said former junior Foreign Minister Juergen Chrobog and four family members were missing in Yemen. A Yemeni official said the group were seized during a trip to the eastern Shabwa province from the port city of Aden.
"They are safe. But if force is used to free them, the hostages' lives would be put in danger," one of the kidnappers from the al-Abdullah tribe told Reuters by telephone.
His words contrasted with an earlier statement in which he said that the Germans' lives were not in danger and that they were his tribe's "guests". He gave no reason for the change in his position.
He said he hoped the kidnapping -- the third involving Westerners this year -- would put pressure on the government of Yemen to free five of his fellow tribesmen who are in jail on criminal charges including murder.
"We were forced to do this to focus the government's attention to our cause," he said.
Armed tribal groups in Yemen, a poor country at the tip of the Arabian peninsula where central government control is often weak, seize tourists frequently. They are usually freed unharmed after negotiations. The al-Abdullah tribe is not known to have been involved in previous kidnappings.
Last week, Yemeni tribesmen seized two Austrians. A month ago, another group of tribesmen captured two Swiss tourists. Both kidnappings were aimed at pressuring the government to free jailed relatives and all tourists were released unharmed.
Chrobog, 65, was Germany's ambassador to the United States from 1995 to 2001. In 2003, he was the top diplomat dealing with Europeans abducted in the Sahara desert and was able to secure the release of 14 hostages, including nine Germans. How ironic. A ransom was paid, of course.
Posted by: ST ||
12/28/2005 19:39 ||
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WASHINGTON, Dec. 27 - Defense lawyers in some of the country's biggest terrorism cases say they plan to bring legal challenges to determine whether the National Security Agency used illegal wiretaps against several dozen Muslim men tied to Al Qaeda. And Lawyers wonder why we hate them??
No, actually they don't wonder at all.
The lawyers said in interviews that they wanted to learn whether the men were monitored by the agency and, if so, whether the government withheld critical information or misled judges and defense lawyers about how and why the men were singled out. Inquireing minds want to know especially AQ
The expected legal challenges, in cases from Florida, Ohio, Oregon and Virginia, add another dimension to the growing controversy over the agency's domestic surveillance program and could jeopardize some of the Bush administration's most important courtroom victories in terror cases, legal analysts say.
The question of whether the N.S.A. program was used in criminal prosecutions and whether it improperly influenced them raises "fascinating and difficult questions," said Carl W. Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond who has studied terrorism prosecutions. no the facinating thing is how Sedition is just another day at the office
Of course it's fascinating -- he's a law professor! It's not like he's a prosecutor, judge or national security analyst with his heinie on the line.
"It seems to me that it would be relevant to a person's case," Professor Tobias said. "I would expect the government to say that it is highly sensitive material, but we have legal mechanisms to balance the national security needs with the rights of defendants. I think judges are very conscientious about trying to sort out these issues and balance civil liberties and national security." this is the problem they think these guys are our neighborhood common criminal not a enemy who's goal is maximum American civilian casualties
Once again, kids and law professors: the monitoring was done for national security purposes, not to build a case for law enforcement.
But Mr. Duffy said: "This is a limited program. This is not about monitoring phone calls designed to arrange Little League practice or what to bring to a potluck dinner. These are designed to monitor calls from very bad people to very bad people who have a history of blowing up commuter trains, weddings and churches." The sad thing is this has to actually be said and then proven to the LLL's and the Mainstream Media
When is the gov going to prosecute these leaks this leaking crap has gotten way out of control and the reporters should be rounded up and imprisoned until their sources are revealed this is National Security at stake, examples should be made quick, but then this is no were near as detrimental to our national security as "the Plame Affair" sarcism errrrr
#1
Its enough for the Failed/Angry Left that the terms "impeachment", "indictment" and
"investigation", etc. are used in the MSM's AM News-for-Dad/Mom, NOT whether anyone actually gets convicted or not.
#2
These guys are trying to build a Miranda equivalent covering electronic surveillance, such that terrorist suspects will be released if warrantless electronic surveillance was carried out.
#3
This is a second order effect, or third or fourth, of allowing terrorists to be tried as criminal in our courts. None of this bullshit would be happening if DOJ had not wanted to be a spotlight ranger and try to get the glory of covicting terrorists. These terrorists are enemy combatants and should be tried in military courts!
Posted by: 49 pan ||
12/28/2005 8:07 Comments ||
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#4
Rove's to-do list.
1. Get the Terrorists Rights Attorneys to organize.
2. Make sure the TRA gets a place in the Democratic Convention.
#6
This is part of a systematic effort by the Left to destroy the President, and the hell with national security if they achieve their goal. And this is only the beginning. We have 2 -1/2 years until the presidental election and a little less than a year unitl the congressional mid terms. The Republicans better grow a spine.
The attacks will become more numerous and more vicious. When national security leaks are not dealt with immediately, then more people will leak. This country will not survive attacks by the fifth column unless the 5th column is shut down.
This is analagous to the body being attacked by a cancer or virus. The cancer or virus is always around, but when the body's immune system is weak, the cancer will attack and destroy the body, and itself eventually.
It is very difficult to be standing by and watching this crap going on, day after day.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
12/28/2005 9:15 Comments ||
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#7
George F. Will, Conservative pundit, says Bush was wrong.
Here is a quote from his recent article titled:
"Why Didnt He Ask Congress"?
"Because of what Alexander Hamilton praised as "energy in the executive," which often drives the growth of government, for years many conservatives were advocates of congressional supremacy. There were, they said, reasons why the Founders, having waged a revolutionary war against overbearing executive power, gave the legislative branch pride of place in Article I of the Constitution.
One reason was that Congress's cumbersomeness, which is a function of its fractiousness, is a virtue because it makes the government slow and difficult to move. But conservatives' wholesome wariness of presidential power has been a casualty of conservative presidents winning seven of the past 10 elections.
On the assumption that Congress or a court would have been cooperative in September 2001, and that the cooperation could have kept necessary actions clearly lawful without conferring any benefit on the nation's enemies, the president's decision to authorize the NSA's surveillance without the complicity of a court or Congress was a mistake. Perhaps one caused by this administration's almost metabolic urge to keep Congress unnecessarily distant and hence disgruntled."
#8
Gee, Cassini, it has nothing to do with the fact that Rockefeller's office was caught saying that they intended to play partisan politics with national security issues.
Go grovel down before your mass-murdering totalitarian masters, and lick the hand that would kill you.
In your case, it would be justifiable homicide.
Posted by: Ernest Brown ||
12/28/2005 12:54 Comments ||
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#9
Cassini-
Will's argument is one of appearances, not legality. It is settled law that the President of the US has the legal ability and perhaps even the duty to do the actions he did.
Will is wrong for the following reason; this accentuates the gap in public perception regarding which party is tough(er) on the US's enemies. That issue is a winner for the Republicans right now, and this isn't going to help. Whether this outweighs the uncertainty people feel regaring potential violations of rights in the long run remains to be seen, but so far it has been an overall winner for them.
Posted by: Mark E. ||
12/28/2005 12:56 Comments ||
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#10
Ernest Brown:
So only democrats play partisan politics with
national security issues?
Heres a quote from a article that you may be
familiar with.
"Mr. Rove is the man who told Republicans they should use the war on terrorism for partisan advantage. This is what Rove actually said to the Republican National Committee in January 2002:
"We can go to the country on this issue, because they trust the Republican Party to do a better job of protecting and strengthening America's military might and thereby protecting America."
#11
Cassini - so Rove should deny facts? Deny Americans want security, not a nanny state from losing defeatists? Garbage is still garbage. If Republicans are better on defense they should downplay that? Idiot
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/28/2005 14:09 Comments ||
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#12
Frank G.
Republicans being "stronger on national defense" is not a fact, it is a opinion and a myth.
Furthermore the discussion with E.B. was about exploiting National Security issues for partisan
political advantage, which he accuses democrats of doing. As Karl Rove proved thru his statement, he and the republicans are hypocrites on this issue.
December 28, 2005--Sixty-four percent (64%) of Americans believe the National Security Agency (NSA) should be allowed to intercept telephone conversations between terrorism suspects in other countries and people living in the United States. A Rasmussen Reports survey found that just 23% disagree.
Sixty-eight percent (68%) of Americans say they are following the NSA story somewhat or very closely.
Just 26% believe President Bush is the first to authorize a program like the one currently in the news. Forty-eight percent (48%) say he is not while 26% are not sure.
Eighty-one percent (81%) of Republicans believe the NSA should be allowed to listen in on conversations between terror suspects and people living in the United States. That view is shared by 51% of Democrats and 57% of those not affiliated with either major political party.
Cassini, you might like to argue that they are wrong, but that isn't the issue. The issue is that one party's leadership and candidates are out of step with the opinions of the general population. You might wish that isn't true, but you are just deluding yourself. You might call it "playing politics", but that is what we have elections for. If your propounded beliefs are different than likely voters' beliefs, it makes it much more difficult to win an election.
Posted by: Mark E. ||
12/28/2005 14:23 Comments ||
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#14
Cassini
What is the specific hypocrisy?
Did Rove say something he didn't believe?
Did Rove do something he told other people not to do?
If so, could you please state exactly what belief was out of line with what Rove said or what act was out of line with what Rove told other people not to do.
Or maybe, I misunderstand and the hypocrisy charge has to do with someone other than Rove.
Congressional Democratic critics of the Iraq War and President Bush's National Security policies were routinely pillored by Republicans for supposedly using their opposition to these issues for partisan politican gain.
Karl Rove went out at midterms and told Congressional republicans up for election to exploit the issue for partisan political gain at the same time repubs were denouncing the democrats for the same thing. Is this not hypocrisy?
#17
Yes, because Rockefeller was determined to use his knowledge of classified defense issues against the Republicans, a little fact that Cassinifascist sweeps under the rug.
Posted by: Ernest Brown ||
12/28/2005 14:51 Comments ||
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#18
guessed as much, Sea. Cowards who troll via various names are easier to spot these days.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/28/2005 14:58 Comments ||
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#19
Don't pick on Cassani cause of what he believes - he has a right to believe what he wants. If you believed those things, you might go by Anonymous too.
Probe Sought on NSA Surveillance
Members of Congress Question Legality of Bush's Authorization
By Hope Yen
Associated Press
Monday, December 19, 2005; Page A05
Democrats and Republicans called separately yesterday for congressional investigations into President Bush's decision after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to allow domestic eavesdropping without court approval.
"The president has, I think, made up a law that we never passed," said Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said he intends to hold hearings. "They talk about constitutional authority," Specter said. "There are limits as to what the president can do."
Senate Democratic leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) also called for an investigation, and House Democratic leaders asked Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) to create a bipartisan panel to do the same.
Bush acknowledged Saturday that since October 2001 he has authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on international phone calls and e-mails of people within the United States without seeking warrants from courts.
The New York Times disclosed the existence of the program last week. Bush and other administration officials initially refused to discuss the surveillance or their legal authority, citing security concerns.
"It's been briefed to the Congress over a dozen times, and, in fact, it is a program that is, by every effort we've been able to make, consistent with the statutes and with the law," Vice President Cheney said yesterday in an interview with ABC News "Nightline" to be broadcast tonight. "It's the kind of capability if we'd had before 9/11 might have led us to be able to prevent 9/11."
Bush and other administration officials have said congressional leaders have been briefed regularly on the program. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said there were no objections raised by lawmakers told about it.
"That's a legitimate part of the equation," McCain said on ABC's "This Week." But he said Bush still needs to explain why he chose to ignore the law that requires approval of a special court for domestic wiretaps.
Reid acknowledged he had been briefed on the four-year-old domestic spy program "a couple months ago" but insisted the administration bears full responsibility. Reid became Democratic leader in January.
"The president can't pass the buck on this one. This is his program," Reid said on "Fox News Sunday." "He's commander in chief. But commander in chief does not trump the Bill of Rights."
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a statement Saturday that she had been told on several occasions about unspecified activities by the NSA. Pelosi said she expressed strong concerns at the time.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on "Fox News Sunday" that Bush "has gone to great lengths to make certain that he is both living under his obligations to protect Americans from another attack but also to protect their civil liberties."
Several lawmakers were not so sure. They pointed to a 1978 federal law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which provides for domestic surveillance under extreme situations, but only with court approval.
Specter said he wants Bush's advisers to cite their legal authority for bypassing the courts. Bush said the attorney general and White House counsel's office had affirmed the legality of his actions.
Appearing with Specter on CNN's "Late Edition," Feingold said Bush is accountable for the program, regardless of whether congressional leaders were notified. "It doesn't matter if you tell everybody in the whole country if it's against the law," said Feingold, a member of the Judiciary Committee.
Bush said the program was narrowly designed and used in a manner "consistent with U.S. law and the Constitution." He said it targets only international communications of people inside the United States with "a clear link" to al Qaeda or related terrorist organizations.
Government officials have refused to define the standards they are using to establish such a link or to say how many people are being monitored.
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) called that troubling. If Bush is allowed to decide unilaterally who the potential terrorists are, in essence he becomes the court, Graham said on CBS's "Face the Nation."
"We are at war, and I applaud the president for being aggressive," said Graham, who also called for a congressional review. "But we cannot set aside the rule of law in a time of war."
#23
mjslack
You are right. Cassini is wrong and treason is wrong. But that don't make it right to call poor Cassini names. Let him be wrong with dignity.
Probe Sought on NSA Surveillance
Members of Congress Question Legality of Bush's Authorization"
HAHAHAHAHAHA! Perhaps your bottom line differs from mine. Mine is election returns. Your's are probes and committees and convictions in a court of law and impeachments. I'm talking about which party people prefer on a particular issue. To say that people don't think Republicans are stronger on national defense is delusionary. To say that a violation of the law occurred here is delusionary. To say that most voters think that the President shouldn't spy on foreign individuals when they call the US is delusionary. If the Democrats want to have delusions that they have a constituency for these positions sufficient to win nationwide elections, so be it. But as a registered Democrat in Chicago, I despair for the party.
The real bottom line is/are elections.
Actually, the real bottom line is victory, and as Patton said, "Americans love a winner, and will not tolerate a looser." If someone wants to align themselves with defeat, with weakness, then I forsee a tough election cycle.
Posted by: Mark E. ||
12/28/2005 16:10 Comments ||
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#26
"Let him be wrong with dignity."
Then let him be wrong in silence.
His dignity is his responsibility, not ours; but the drooling mucoid apparently doesn't value that dignity, or he'd stop displaying his idiocy for all to see.
We're not babysitters.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
12/28/2005 16:38 Comments ||
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#27
LOL, DD! Drooling mucoid?
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/28/2005 16:59 Comments ||
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#28
Cassini
here is one of your premises for the charge of hypocrisy (the other premise I agree with)
"Congressional Democratic critics of the Iraq War and President Bush's National Security policies were routinely pillored by Republicans for supposedly using their opposition to these issues for partisan politican gain."
First, unless Rove made this claim, Rove can't be guilty of hypocrisy. Second, I don't agree with this premise. It is certainly true that Republicans routinely pillored (interesting word that but that's another thing) Democratic critics but this criticism almost never was 'You are criticising the war for political gain'. It was frequently, "you are hurting the country by mistating facts" or "you are hurting the country by implying our troops are savages" or "you are hurting the country by implying Americans are bad". No doubt somebody, somewhere criticized Dems for 'just trying to criticise the war for political gain' but such cases must have been few and far between because I can't remember a single one.
No - Cassini has the right to be publicly wrong. Freedom of speech does not require one to be right - that's so the left can talk too. Even when they made these rules, they let the British sympathizers talk. The public airing of wrong ideas usually leads to someone pointing out how it is wrong, and this allows the open minded folks to learn. See, the post by mhw is an example of this - he is showing Cassini the error of his ways.
#30
I fail to see where calling a %&^%* like Cassini=Left Angle=Anonymous=whatever violating his free speech, Hank. He has been spouting nonsensical troll drivel quite freely here on RB. Calling people names is quite effective actually as it quickly sums up the situation in a Low Bandwidth kinda way. LOL.
#33
TomAnon> Calling people names is quite effective actually as it quickly sums up the situation in a Low Bandwidth kinda way. LOL
But ofcourse it also has the consequence that that all *polite* opposition disappears quite soon from Rantburg, while I (who have no problem matching insult for insult) stick around.
#34
Defense lawyers in some of the country's biggest terrorism cases say they plan to bring legal challenges to determine whether the National Security Agency used illegal wiretaps against several dozen Muslim men tied to Al Qaeda.
If these slime buckets get off, something is definitely wrong in our justice system. I thought that those who weren't citizens were under different rules, that had connections. The terror lawyers have access to very deep, very motivated pockets... Seafarious, I agree with you on this, pretty scary. Money can get most out of awful jams.
Posted by: Jan ||
12/28/2005 19:53 Comments ||
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#35
"while I (who have no problem matching insult for insult) stick around"
That's one thing about drooling mucoid -- it sticks around no matter how hard you try to clean it up.
#36
Hey, I at least would like to think we're all on the same side here. Also that we would all value a clear and decisive ruling on not allowing these terrorists to go free on some supposed technicality. They should be judged in a different setting of courts. Military possibly? The wire tapping and such I thought was very clear how it differed from home front VS non citizen types with ties to possible terrorists.
The big issue here being the leaks. This is the big crime the way I see it.
Posted by: Jan ||
12/28/2005 21:49 Comments ||
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#37
Correct, Jan. The crime is the leak. Where's Mr. A. Gonzales?
#38
"while I (who have no problem matching insult for insult) stick around"
"In my most personal superb excellence - it's all about meeeeee"
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/28/2005 22:22 Comments ||
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#39
Frank, even if *my* posts are indeed all about me, why are *your* posts all about me, too?
Anyway, told y'all the reason why you mostly have to make do with me rather than find some more civil opposition -- you tend to drive away with namecalling and rabid insulting all the people who are less obnoxious than yourselves. How you deal with that knowledge is up to you.
#40
nobody says y'all...idjit. Just like you have no concept of the electoral college, you learned everything you know about America poorly, and it reflects in your insipid use of incorrect colloquialisms. I'm just irked by the fact your hyper-sense of personal self esteem isn't matched by anything coming from you except your boasting hubris, you are and always will be a punk. Keep trying to impress - nothing succeeds like continued failure, the odds are with you.... nite
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/28/2005 23:28 Comments ||
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Everyone at the conference was hanging on the words of Ryan Henry, and it was not difficult to figure out why. Mr. Henry, a top Pentagon planning official, was giving an early glimpse of the Defense Department's priorities over the next four years to an industry gathering in New York of executives of Lockheed Martin, Boeing, General Dynamics and other leading military contractors.
Mr. Henry, whose official title is principal deputy under secretary of defense for policy, said the Pentagon's spending binge of the last several years - its budget has increased 41 percent since 9/11 - cannot be sustained. "We can't do everything we want to do."
It was a message that the industry has been bracing for. The Pentagon budget, James F. Albaugh, chief executive of Boeing's $30 billion military division, said at the conference, has "been a great ride for the last five years." But, he added: "We will see a flattening of the defense budget. We all know it is coming."
The issue, however, goes beyond tightening budgets. Mr. Henry told the contractors that the Pentagon was redefining the strategic threats facing the United States. No longer are rival nations the primary threat - a type of warfare that calls for naval destroyers and fighter jets. Today the country is facing international networks of terrorists, and the weapons needed are often more technologically advanced, flexible and innovative.
In the years ahead, Mr. Henry said, the Pentagon would like to move "away from massive force." This would mean, for instance, that fewer fighter jets would be needed because the upcoming Joint Strike Fighter F-35 has more capabilities than the existing F-16's.
He noted that special operations forces played a big role in the early days of the Iraq war - once controlling up to two-thirds of the country - and are expected to be used in greater numbers in the future. This would mean the Pentagon would want to buy more of the highly agile and high-technology weapons that they need. Specialized skills like language, intelligence and communication are also becoming top priorities.
As for aerospace, he said the Pentagon would be looking for aircraft with longer ranges, and, therefore, did not need ships or nearby bases for them to land. Increasingly, the Pentagon will be depending on unmanned aerial vehicles, which can work longer hours than piloted craft and do not put Air Force lives at risk. In the future, he said, unmanned craft will be used not only for surveillance, as they are in Iraq, but for combat as well.
To illustrate what the Pentagon envisions as the future, Mr. Henry showed the group a copy of the photograph that is one of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's favorites. It shows American troops on horseback in Afghanistan, calling in air strikes and armed with global positioning devices.
"In terms of our strategic environment," Mr. Henry said, "we are at an inflection point." He argued that the world was vastly different from the world that existed the last time the Pentagon was required to conduct a top-to-bottom review of the military and national security strategy - what is known as the Quadrennial Defense Review - in early 2001.
He outlined these top strategic priorities that will be at the core of the review: defeating global terrorism, defending the nation against terrorist attacks on American soil, preventing other nations from acquiring weapons of mass destruction and influencing countries that Mr. Henry described as at a "strategic crossroads."
The quadrennial review is scheduled to be released in February, the same day as the Pentagon's 2007 budget request, and Mr. Henry said that many of the review's new priorities would be reflected in that budget plan.
There is now greater attention in Washington, both in Congress and at the Pentagon, on out-of-control spending on some weapons. The Pentagon currently has $1.3 trillion of weapons program in its portfolio - with $800 billion of the bills for them still to be paid. The Pentagon has commissioned a major study to make recommendations on curbing these runaway costs.
But given the difficulty the Pentagon has had in getting Congress to kill politically popular weapons systems, many analysts raised questions about whether the Pentagon's efforts will succeed. "There is a big chasm between rhetoric and the budget process," said Winslow T. Wheeler, a military analyst at the Center for Defense Information in Washington, the analytical and research arm of the World Security Institute, which describes itself as an "authoritative and impartial monitor of security issues." Mr. Wheeler criticized the Pentagon's decision to continue financing many weapons systems that some say are ripe for cuts. Among them are the next generation destroyer, the DD(X), which is projected to cost more than $1 billion each; the costly F-22A, which has a total program acquisition cost of $361 million each; and the V-22 Osprey, a Marine aircraft that has had numerous problems in test flights.
The future, Mr. Albaugh of Boeing said, "will be less about innovation and more about cost control. We will see a competition for resources, and cost control will be more of an issue." Boeing has already taken some hits. The Air Force has said it does not want any more of Boeing's C-17 Globemaster cargo planes once it receives those already on order, although the program is so popular in Congress, it may be difficult to kill.
"We're not going to have the flush years of past Pentagon budgets," said Daniel J. Murphy Jr., a former admiral and chief executive of Alliant Techsystems. "We are going to be cutting costs, even on cost-plus contracts. We will produce at cost-plus, but at a lower cost.""
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/28/2005 00:08 ||
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#1
I'm not a disinerested observer (program cuts == My job lost), but I sure hope they balance this right. Back in the 60s, the Army lost out an entire upgrade cycle because all the defense money was spent for operations in Viet Nam. Then, when the war wound down, the money did not go into rebuilding the lost equipment. It became the years the locusts ate. I'm concerned about China and its military upgrades.
Posted by: Jackal (from Moms house, like people on DU) ||
12/28/2005 8:06 Comments ||
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#2
The China problem came to my mind as well, Jackal.
#4
Been in the defense business in one form or another since I raised my right hand in 1966 and am, hence, not a disinterested observer. There are too many weapons systems in the pipeline that no longer have missions. The F-22 Raptor is the poster child for changed realities. There really is no threat to justify the squadrons of Raptors yet to be purchased. If allowed to operate without political restrictions, the existing fleet of F-16s and F-15s can dominate the skies in most of the world. The recent stories about the "success" of the Indian Air Force against the USAF in dogfight exercises neglected to mention that the ROE required closing to visual range instead of hosing the enemy at 80 - 120 miles. The F-22s we have are sufficient to be "silver bullets" if needed. Similarly, the DDX is a Navy wet dream. It is grossly expensive and unsuited for the wars we face. Its primary mission is to keep the naval shipyards warm. If we really needed capability, there are better suited ships slowly rusting at anchor off Bremerton. Best stop before the full rant mode starts.
JKLF Senior Vice President Mumtaz Ahmed Rathore told reporters on Wednesday that Yasin Malik was ousted from the position following his failure to run party affairs. He said that during a London conference four years ago, JKLF leaders had asked Yasin Malik to hold party elections, but he could not. He said Yasin Malik had âundemocratically occupiedâ the JKLF chairman slot for nine years like Amanullah, who was the JKLF chief for 20 years. He also welcomed the party leadershipâs decision to nominate Farooq Siddique as acting chairman and Javed Ahmed Mir convener of Srinagar
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 20:34 ||
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Nazir Ahmed appears calm and unrepentant as he recounts how he slit the throats of his three young daughters and their 25-year old stepsister to salvage his family's "honor" â a crime that shocked Pakistan. The 40-year old laborer, speaking to The Associated Press in police detention as he was being shifted to prison, confessed to just one regret â that he didn't murder the stepsister's alleged lover too.
Hundreds of girls and women are murdered by male relatives each year in this conservative Islamic nation, and rights groups said Wednesday such "honor killings" will only stop when authorities get serious about punishing perpetrators. The independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said that in more than half of such cases that make it to court, most end with cash settlements paid by relatives to the victims' families, although under a law passed last year, the minimum penalty is 10 years, the maximum death by hanging.
Ahmed's killing spree â witnessed by his wife Rehmat Bibi as she cradled their 3 month-old baby son â happened Friday night at their home in the cotton-growing village of Gago Mandi in eastern Punjab province.
It is the latest of more than 260 such honor killings documented by the rights commission, mostly from media reports, during the first 11 months of 2005.
Bibi recounted how she was woken by a shriek as Ahmed put his hand to the mouth of his stepdaughter Muqadas and cut her throat with a machete. Bibi looked helplessly on from the corner of the room as he then killed the three girls â Bano, 8, Sumaira, 7, and Humaira, 4 â pausing between the slayings to brandish the bloodstained knife at his wife, warning her not to intervene or raise alarm. "I was shivering with fear. I did not know how to save my daughters," Bibi, sobbing, told AP by phone from the village. "I begged my husband to spare my daughters but he said, 'If you make a noise, I will kill you.'"
"The whole night the bodies of my daughters lay in front of me," she said.
The next morning, Ahmed was arrested. Speaking to AP in the back of police pickup truck late Tuesday as he was shifted to a prison in the city of Multan, Ahmed showed no contrition. Appearing disheveled but composed, he said he killed Muqadas because she had committed adultery, and his daughters because he didn't want them to do the same when they grew up. He said he bought a butcher's knife and a machete after midday prayers on Friday and hid them in the house where he carried out the killings. "I thought the younger girls would do what their eldest sister had done, so they should be eliminated," he said, his hands cuffed, his face unshaven. "We are poor people and we have nothing else to protect but our honor."
Despite Ahmed's contention that Muqadas had committed adultery â a claim made by her husband â the rights commission reported that according to local people, Muqadas had fled her husband because he had abused her and forced her to work in a brick-making factory. Police have said they do not know the identity or whereabouts of Muqadas' alleged lover. Muqadas was Bibi's daughter by her first marriage to Ahmed's brother, who died 14 years ago. Ahmed married his brother's widow, as is customary under Islamic tradition.
"Women are treated as property and those committing crimes against them do not get punished," said the rights commission's director, Kamla Hyat. "The steps taken by our government have made no real difference." Activists accuse President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, a self-styled moderate Muslim, of reluctance to reform outdated Islamized laws that make it difficult to secure convictions in rape, acid attacks and other cases of violence against women. They say police are often reluctant to prosecute, regarding such crimes as family disputes.
Statistics on honor killings are confused and imprecise, but figures from the rights commission's Web site and its officials show a marked reduction in cases this year: 267 in the first 11 months of 2005, compared with 579 during all of 2004. The Ministry of Women's Development said it had no reliable figures. Ijaz Elahi, the ministry's joint secretary, said the violence was decreasing and that increasing numbers of victims were reporting incidents to police or the media. Laws, including one passed last year to beef up penalties for honor killings, had been toughened, she said. Police in Multan said they would complete their investigation into Ahmed's case in the next two weeks and that he faces the death sentence if he is convicted for the killings and terrorizing his neighborhood.
Ahmed, who did not resist arrest, was unrepentant.
"I told the police that I am an honorable father and I slaughtered my dishonored daughter and the three other girls," he said. "I wish that I get a chance to eliminate the boy she ran away with and set his home on fire."
#1
This was not about "Honor" but about control. He found he couldn't control what his daughter did so he murdered her. He didn't want to possibly go through the same things again with his other daughters so he murdered them to. An ounce of prevention, dontcha know.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
12/28/2005 15:52 Comments ||
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#2
The Friday prayers thing was what caught my eye. The imam must've been holy rollering for all he was worth...an' mebbe the son-in-law's brick factory was a bit too successful, mebbe cut into some of the holy man's other ventures. Just maybe.
#3
The pakistani "honor and dignity" is intimately tied up with control and power relationships...
The entire country exists because a muslim minority could not live in peace with other people.
They needed to dominate.
The current wave of islamist stems from this.. the defeats inflicted by the British against the Mughal and Ottoman empires.. this created the Deoband madrassa and the muslim brotherhood...
The elites lost their feudal rights. The muslim bureacrats lost their reserved jobs and priviledges...
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 16:09 Comments ||
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#4
A Father's got to do what a Father's got to do.
Posted by: Jim Anderson ||
12/28/2005 16:10 Comments ||
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#5
"...faces the death sentence if he is convicted for the killings and terrorizing his neighborhood..."
Those Waki Pakis! Terrorizing a neighborhood is a crime, but terrorizing another country is fair enough.
#7
Also, is it too much to hope that down the road, since the Pak govt is cowardly about this, soemone will take the manner into their own hands, and this guy will become instant worm food...
Available in PAL, SECAM & NTSC. Discounts for Senior al Qaeda, Wahhabi Imams, budding muttawa, and other True Believersâ¢. Don't forget to visit our Cutlery and Acid Depts! At Abu Musab Bros, expect nothing but the finest in Shari'a.
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 16:46 Comments ||
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#13
A practical solution to "honor" killings is simply to make the punishment as "dishonorable" as possible.
Hear me out. In cultures that are obsessive about "honor", just hanging the bad boy won't dissuade others from doing the same. However, they *do* respond if they are terribly shamed after the fact.
As an comparative example, in Japan there was an epidemic of people committing suicide by throwing themselves from subway platforms in front of speeding trains. The Japanese government stopped it, overnight, by installing mirrors to face the platform. The suicides had to look at themselves first, and this was intolerable in their culture. They just couldn't do it that way anymore.
So, what should be done about this man is to have *women* publicly humiliate, scorn and control him.
Literally, have him stripped down to his breech cloth, shave his beard off, then have women laugh, shout, curse at him, and intermittently flog him as they yell about how inferior he is as a man, how weak he is, what a wimp he is and unfit to be a husband or father. AT LENGTH. On national television. Hopefully, he would curl up in a ball and start crying and hiding his face in shame.
Believe me, it wouldn't be hard to find women to volunteer to do this job.
But do this a few times and not only would every woman killer in the country have a collective case of the hershey-squirts in fear, but it would be the most popular DVD for women in the country.
#14
So, what should be done about this man is to have *women* publicly humiliate, scorn and control him.
That would be unislamic.
It suggests that women are equal.
In islam a woman's testimony is only worth half that of a man.
Men don't wear hijab...
etc
Honor killings reinforce the social structure in Pakiland.
They're only a problem now because we kafirs get to read about it thanks to the TV and Internet.
It makes the Pak elite uncomfortable.
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 17:49 Comments ||
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#15
Send Lynndie England and her leash over there maybe?
It would do the job. No matter how much I may disagree with you over the odd point now and then, I would not wish Pervy's job on you to pull this off. Now if you could be the power behind Pervy's throne, from afar, to make something like this happen, and you were very well compensated for it, well now, then we'd be talking, lol.
A most excellent post! Putting Abu Musab Bros. & Shari'a out of business is Job 1 in civilization's death match with Islam. Certainly we can argue about what color the wheel should be, but only after we invent it.
#17
"Send Lynndie England and her leash over there maybe?"
A great idea!!! I'm thinking pay-per-view!!!
Posted by: Mark E. ||
12/28/2005 17:56 Comments ||
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#18
Just eradicate them all. Harsh? Hell yes. But can we tolerate a nation state that tolerates and winks and nods at this in our modern world? It appears that at least half of us if not more are females on this planet. Females whom deserve justice and human rights like the rest of us in the modern world. Cultures, sects and religions that don't program don't get to survive. Welcome to the 21st century.
Insert catchy phrase about taking off and nuking them from space here.
#19
he said he killed Muqadas because she had committed adultery, and his daughters because he didn't want them to do the same when they grew up
what a wickedly stupid foul decaying piece of rancid BS. The flies swarming over the BS have more morals than this low life. Honor?! BS.
The mind set here is just unbelievable.
Posted by: Jan ||
12/28/2005 20:38 Comments ||
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#20
Islam truely is nothing more than a death cult. This is also why muslims can't be allowed to become more than a small percentage of any country's population.
Via ThreatsWatch
India's defence and interior ministries were investigating how 100 tonnes of explosives went missing from a merchant navy ship bound for Iran, officials said Wednesday. The six missing containers of explosives were intended for road construction in Afghanistan where India's Border Road Organisation was constructing a highway.
"About 100 tonnes of explosives meant for the Border Road Organisation in Afghanistan were reported missing on the 26th (of December)," said a government official who did not wish to be named. "We are treating this as a serious security matter," the official said.
The captain and six crew of the Iran-bound ship were detained for questioning.
The ship set sail from the western city of Mumbai city Thursday for the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas where the consignment was to be offloaded to be taken to the project site in Afghanistan.
The containers were discovered to be missing just 10 to 15 nautical miles off Mumbai. The official said the captain's claim that the cargo was lost as the sea was choppy was being investigated. He said officials from customs, police, Indian navy, coast guard and other security agencies were enquiring into the incident.
Posted by: ed ||
12/28/2005 11:23 ||
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he Director of the shipping company Unimarine Ltd Samsu Sheroff said about six hours after the ship had sailed, the vessel encountered a very choppy sea and the master of the ship reported that one of the containers in the deck been loosened and might fall in the sea...
When the ship was asked on December 24 to return to Indian territory, the master turned around to come to Mumbai and "in the bargain other five containers on board were lost....
BS.
This has Bombay Mafia written all over it... and these folk supply the jihadi groups..
Gawd... one hundred tons of explosives...
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 16:25 Comments ||
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India shipping explosives to the mouth of the Persian Gulf and then through Iran. 100 tonnes missing aside, is this a good idea? Does Afghanistan need level highways bad enough to justify this?
Islamabad, 28 Dec. (AKI/DAWN) - The Pakistani government has tightened up its classification of nuclear goods, technologies and equipments that will be subject to strict export controls. The spokesperson for the Pakistani foreign office Tasnim Aslam said that effective and robust export controls should also facilitate international cooperation in the area of civilian nuclear technology. She said that the goods were listed according to international standards. When asked if the goods were being classified because of international pressure, Aslam said that it had been done keeping in view national requirements.
An official statement issued by the foreign office said all of Pakistanâs existing nuclear power-generating plants are under the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards. The control lists have been classified under the Export Control Act, which was adopted by parliament in September 2004. The statement said that the classification system was based on the European Unionâs integrated list, which constitutes the latest international standards in this regard.
The list also further highlights Pakistanâs policy to implement its national and international non-proliferation commitments as a responsible nuclear weapon state, according to the foreign office statement. The lists are being provided to all concerned, including the manufacturers of such goods and technologies as well as to the enforcement agencies, for effective control at the borders.
In view of growing energy needs for development and the scarcity of natural fossil fuel reserves, Pakistan plans to generate 8,800 megawatts of nuclear power by the year 2025 through the setting up of additional nuclear power plants under IAEA safeguards.
There has been international concern about Pakistan's nuclear programme after Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb, admitted in February 2004 that he had trafficked nuclear secrets and parts to other countries, including Iran, Libya and North Korea. However the nuclear scientist has not been allowed any visitors and international investigators into global nuclear proliferation have not been allowed to question him.
Posted by: Steve ||
12/28/2005 10:26 ||
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Shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted?
AQ Khan has already sold or traded nuclear weapon designs to North Korea, Iran, Libya, Saudi
And given the reliance of Pak nuke weapons program on imported parts, some form of the black market network must still exist....
Still, a bit better than the days when AQ Khan published color brochures offering nuke tech
From 2004 article... Pakistan faced embarrassment yesterday with the publication of a sales brochure from its top-secret nuclear facility, apparently hawking technology and components to would-be nuclear powers.
The brochure from the AQ Khan Research Laboratories, the centre of Pakistan's nuclear weapons programme, has an official-looking seal on the cover saying "Government of Pakistan".
Its publication in The New York Times yesterday undercuts Islamabad's claims that any transfer of its nuclear technology to rogue states has been the work of individuals.
Posted by: john ||
12/28/2005 12:54 Comments ||
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The Awami National Party will support Baloch nationalists in all democratic forums, Asfandyar Wali, the president of the ANP, has said. Talking to reporters, the ANP president said that provincial autonomy would solve all problems in the country.
"Yup. Solve that little problem and we're all gonna have ponies and ice cream three times a day!"
He said that military rulers had pushed the moderate leadership to the wall and ânow the question was when extremists will take their positionâ. He said that if extremists take over then General Pervez Musharraf and not Nawab Khair Bakhsh Marri or Nawab Akbar Bugti will be responsible for the mess.
Isn't that an admission they're responsible for the current mess? Or am I missing something?
He said if firing of rockets was the major reason behind the military operation in Kohlu, then why was military operation not initiated when General Musharraf was attacked in Rawalpindi and Karachi and the prime minister in Chakwal. He said the government and General Musharraf did not know what they were doing,
"Liars and thieves and incompetents, the lot of 'em!"
adding that conflicting statements were being issued on the Kalabagh Dam. He said the rally against the dam in Karachi was an âeye-openerâ and another rally will be held on December 29 in Jahangira. He said a protest demonstration will also be held in front of the Parliament House in Islamabad on December 30. Asfandyar said that Kalabagh was not a feasible project as it would be equal to âmurdering NWFP and Sindhâ.
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12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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At the United Nations, as a year of many scandals draws to a close, Secretary-General Kofi Annan has been trying to stuff some big unanswered questions down the memory hole--with mixed results. No, I'm not talking only about the files Mr. Annan's former chief of staff shredded during the Oil for Food investigation, or the discounted duty-free Mercedes allegedly shipped to Ghana in late 1998 by the secretary-general's son, Kojo Annan, under false use of his father's name and diplomatic perquisites. Hanging over all this is another mystery that despite the magnitude of the question seems of strangely small concern to the secretary-general: What has become of the former head of the U.N. Oil for Food program, Benon Sevan?
Mr. Sevan has not been called to account under any regime of law. Having been retained in New York by Mr. Annan after Oil for Food ended as a $1-a-year "special adviser" to assist in the inquiry into the program, Mr. Sevan skipped town in mid-2005, shortly before Mr. Volcker weighed in with his allegations on Aug. 8 of this year. Since then the U.N. has said that Mr. Sevan, despite the allegations against him, is entitled to collect his U.N. pension--which a spokesman for Mr. Annan confirmed to me again this week is "untouchable." The U.N. will not give out any information on Mr. Sevan's current location.
But to such sketchy accounts, investigators for Rep. Henry Hyde's International Relations Committee are now prepared to add some illuminating details--starting with their encounter with Mr. Sevan himself, less than three months ago, in Cyprus. As it happens, they were not expecting to find Mr. Sevan in person. They went to Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus, trying to track down details of the case, including the fate of Mr. Sevan's deceased aunt, Bertouji Zeytountsian. By Mr. Sevan's account to Mr. Volcker, this aunt, while living in Nicosia as a retired government worker on a pension, had sent him funds totaling some $160,000 during the last four years in which he was running Oil for Food, 1999-2003. The day after the U.N. investigation into Oil for Food was announced, in March, 2004, Zeytountsian fell down an elevator shaft in her Cyprus apartment building. A few months later, she died.
Mr. Hyde's investigators decided while in Nicosia to have a look at the elevator shaft. On Oct. 14, a Cypriot police official showed them the way to the building. There, printed plainly on a mailbox at the entrance to the apartment block, was the name not of Mr. Sevan's aunt, but of Benon Sevan himself. After shooting the picture shown nearby, the investigators went up to the eighth-floor apartment where the aunt had lived. They knocked, and the door opened.
There stood Benon Sevan. As one of the investigators describes it, Mr. Sevan came to the door "in shorts, no shirt, and sandals, smoking a cigar." Apparently everyone was surprised to come thus face-to-face. Mr. Sevan was polite but did not invite them in. They chatted across the threshold. He told the congressional investigators to address all questions to his lawyers, saying, "My conscience is clear."
The investigators turned to go, and, as one of them recounts, as they headed for the stairs, Mr. Sevan told them, "You can take the elevator. It's fixed now."
The U.N., however, remains broken.
The Manhattan District Attorney's Office opened an investigation into Mr. Sevan earlier this spring, and confirmed to me Tuesday that the investigation is continuing, but the New York prosecutor has no jurisdiction in Cyprus and cannot in any event bring charges against Mr. Sevan unless Mr. Annan lifts his diplomatic immunity--which it seems Mr. Annan has not done. A spokeswoman for the Cypriot mission to the U.N. says that "the issue" of Mr. Sevan is "on the desk of the attorney general in Cyprus, who is studying the case."
That leaves Henry Hyde's investigators, one of whom tells me the attorney general of Cyprus, Petros Clerides, assured them during a meeting in Nicosia, in October, just before they came face-to-face with Mr. Sevan, that if given the evidence, Cyprus "would prosecute." But since then, says this investigator, Cypriot authorities have been "uncooperative." It seems that Mr. Volcker's committee will deliver the evidence only if asked, and there is no sign yet that Cyprus is asking. Mr. Hyde's investigators say they are "going to follow up" and "will be in touch with the Cypriot ambassador."
Perhaps when Mr. Annan gets done tracking down that missing Mercedes, he could lend them a hand.
#1
The investigators turned to go, and, as one of them recounts, as they headed for the stairs, Mr. Sevan told them, "You can take the elevator. It's fixed now."
Does this mean that Benny went ahead and through ol' Aunt Bertie down the elevator shaft so she couldn't testify agaisnt him? Or was there no Aunt Bertie at all?
You know this is going to taint the moral authority of the UN to no end, right?
Leaders of the Shiite and Kurdish blocs that emerged triumphant in this month's Iraqi election agreed on Tuesday to push ahead with efforts to bring Sunni and other parties into a grand coalition government. The visit of Abdul Aziz Al Hakim of the Shiite Islamist Alliance to the Kurdish capital Erbil opened a series of planned meetings among rival factions intended to ease friction over election results which Sunni and secular parties say have been rigged and to begin building a consensus administration. âWe agreed on the principle of forming a government involving all the parties with a wide popular base,â Kurdish regional leader Masoud Barzani told a joint news conference after talks with Hakim, the dominant force in the alliance. Hakim, whose bloc has run the interim government for the past year in coalition with the Kurds, was due to meet the other main Kurdish leader, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, on Wednesday, launching a series of bilateral meetings that will include Sunni Arab and secular leaders disappointed in the vote.
In Baghdad, several thousand supporters of secular former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi marched in the latest street protest against the results of the December 15 ballot. They want a rerun of a vote that handed close to a majority to the alliance, whose armed supporters they accuse of forming Islamist death squads. Privately, however, many disappointed leaders acknowledge the results will stand and say they will negotiate a coalition. After meeting Hakim, Talabani will see, among others, Allawi, a secular Shiite, and Sunnis Adnan Al Dulaimi and Tariq Al Hashemi of the Accordance Front, Planning Minister Barham Saleh, a senior official in Talabani's party, said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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The Arabic language has a word for 'calm'? Who knew?
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - The Islamic Jihad militant group rejected a call from Mahmoud Abbas to halt rocket attacks on Israeli towns - dealing a new blow to the Palestinian leader and prompting a new round of Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip.
Abbas traveled to Gaza on Tuesday for talks with the militant groups, in part to halt growing violence along Israelâs border with Gaza. Israel has put heavy pressure on Abbas to stop militants from firing rockets.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat, a participant in the meeting, said Abbas urged all Palestinian groups to honor a cease-fire reached with Israel in February. âWe demand everyone be committed to the truce,â Erekat said. âWe consider the truce a matter of high national interest.â
And then his lips fell off.
But Islamic Jihad, which has been responsible for most of the rocket fire, rejected the appeal. Spokesman Khaled Batch accused Israel of violating the cease-fire, and said attacks were the only proper response. âI think the continuation of resistance is whatâs better for the Palestinian people,â he said.
"We shall have Dire Revengeâ¢!"
Since Israelâs withdrawal in September from the Gaza Strip, militants have continued to fire homemade rockets into southern Israel. Although the rockets are notoriously inaccurate, more Israeli towns, including the city of Ashkelon, are in rocket range now that Israel is out of Gaza.
Late Tuesday, the Israeli air force dropped leaflets into northern Gaza, warning residents to stay out of areas used by militants to fire rockets. âTerror organizations continue to launch projectile rockets at Israeli territory from your neighborhoods,â the leaflet said. âPresence in areas used for projectile rocket launching puts your life in danger.â
"And we're more accurate!"
US State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said Israel had responded to attacks on its own territory. âWhat we would like to see is effective measures against such acts so that the measures Israel is taking are not necessary,â Ereli said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat, a participant in the meeting, said Abbas urged all Palestinian groups to honor a cease-fire reached with Israel in February. âWe demand everyone be committed to the truce,â Erekat said. âWe consider the truce a matter of high national interest.â
But Islamic Jihad, which has been responsible for most of the rocket fire, rejected the appeal.
No more pussyfooting around. Invade Gaza, root out and kill as many terrorists as possible, and locate and destroy as many weapons caches as can be found. If terrorists want to keep fighting, then bring the Big Club to the match and keep bashing them over the head with it until it's no longer possible for them to continue fighting.
#2
No invasion. Airpower and artillery should be sufficient to accomplish what is necessary without unnecessarily risking Israeli lives. Give them the Serbian treatment.
#3
"Honestly, I am grateful for the peaceful tolerant friendship you have shown me, yes it is price as marked."
You assignment is to translate into Arabic.
Posted by: Leon Clavin ||
12/28/2005 11:00 Comments ||
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#4
Airpower and artillery should be sufficient to accomplish what is necessary without unnecessarily risking Israeli lives.
Airpower and artillery won't locate and destroy those who are well-concealed or behind well-fortified defenses, nor will they destroy hidden arms and ammo caches unless the plan is to totally lay waste to every inch of Gaza to a depth of several feet. That might be somewhat problematic though...
Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad on Tuesday praised the Turkish diplomacy towards international issues. In an interview with the Turkish Skyturk news channel, he praised the diplomacy of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Syrian-Turkish relations. He touched on the recent visit by Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul to Damascus, where Gul recommended interrogating the five Syrian officials in Turkey. ( ! ) He added that Syria immediately approved the Turkish recommendation, but were turned down by the international investigation team and the United Nations. On the Turkish role in establishing peace between Syria and Israel, Al-Assad said that the Israelis are not interested in peace with Syria, expressing appreciation for the Turkish efforts in this regard.
The Syrian media continued its attack against Lebanese politicians on Monday, accusing MP Saad Hariri of "manufacturing false witnesses" in the assassination of his father and describing organizers of the March 14 independence demonstrations as "liars and mercenaries."
Winning friends and influencing people right and left, aren't they?
Fayez Sader, the director-general of radio and television in Syria, in a statement criticized "Hariri Junior" as the agent of France.
"I, myself, have many times seen him Apache dancing!"
"Hariri Junior creates nicknames for witnesses he manufactures and masks to undermine Syria (..) and for every witness and mask more than $200,000 in cash is delivered directly or through mediators who collect commission," he said.
Yo! Over here! I'm a witness! I seen it!
Sader added that former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri had succeeded in building up Lebanon's politics and economy, "but failed to build men." In an interview with Arab satellite network Al-Arabiyya on Thursday, Hariri had lashed out against Syria, accusing it of being a "terrorist regime" seeking to "change the democratic regime in Lebanon."
The Baath newspaper published a letter written by Salah Mansour to the "lying and hireling March 14 chorus." Mansour described Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt as "the socialist feudalist with moods changing like the four seasons, who received Syrian protection the day it rained bullets above his head in Mukhtara." Telecoms Minister Marwan Hamade, whose car was hit by a bomb on October 1, 2004, was dubbed "a rancorous man whose car tires were worn out coming back and forth to Damascus with poems of praise to the Syrian regime." And his scathing description of Nayla Mouawad, MP and widow of the slain President Rene, was said to be an "old lady acting like a young girl who knocked on every Syrian door in search of a ministry and a parliamentary seat here and there."
The paper also criticized MPs Akram Chehayeb, Ahmad Fatfat, Walid Eido, Atef Majdalani and other "minor liars" for stealing public funds and damaging the Syrian presence in Lebanon with ingratitude on orders from the U.S. Embassy.
He also condemned by name all the residents of Sidon, the Mormon Tabernacle Chorale, and Ohio State University — "liars and thieves, the lot of them!"
In response, a PSP statement said such campaigns were no longer effective and reminded the Syrian regime "Lebanon provided the stage for its quarrel with Israel, not the Golan." It called on Syrian papers to focus on Syria's "achievements in democracy, freedom, the building of a state, prisons and cellars." The PSP also asked them to end the "ridiculous sequence" produced and directed at Damascus' intelligence offices.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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"Y'see, when we're having a cabinet crisis, we can't spare any time to throw Emile out on his ear..."
Despite mounting pressures on President oud">Emile Lahoud to resign his office, "the issue of the presidency is not the priority at the moment," said MP Farid Khazen. Khazen, a member of the opposition's March 14 movement formed after the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri, told The Daily Star on Monday that now is not the time to table discussions on the presidency "simply because we are facing a Cabinet crisis."
I strongly suspect that if there wasn't any pressure on Emile to depart Hezbollah wouldn't have precipitated a cabinet crisis...
The MP was referring to the Cabinet's latest setback, in which its five Shiite ministers continue to refuse to take part in governmental sessions.
"Nope. Nope. Ain't gonna do it. And you can't make us, so there!"
The row continues to see numerous meetings being held between the country's major political blocs in efforts to find a solution. "I don't think that there will be any change in the presidency issue at the moment. We have a situation where if we don't reach a solution the Cabinet might fall, so I think that the presidency issue is not a priority at the moment," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 00:00 ||
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Lebanese Speaker Nabih Berri called for greater Arab cooperation to resolve the general state of instability in the region on Monday, putting particular focus on Lebanon's crumbling relations with Syria. Berri also called for a separation of executive and legislative powers within the Arab Parliament, as he urged Arab leaders to help the newly formed pan-Arab body develop its own authoritative entity. "We need to give the Arab Parliament a chance to monitor and give consultations in the hopes that it develops into a serious power entity that will help complete the Arab authority system," Berri, the leader of the Lebanese Shiite Amal Movement, told al-Ahram Newspaper during his visit to Cairo as the head of the new Arab Parliament.
The newly formed Arab Parliament is set to convene for the first time in Cairo on Tuesday, in the latest effort by the Arab League to revitalize its position in the region. According to the League, its main goal is to "discuss issues related to the strengthening of common Arab action and offer recommendations for that purpose."
"It is about time that we as Arabs coordinate between each other as there is great instability throughout the whole Middle East, including Lebanon," Berri said, referring to the latest assassinations and bombings that shook Lebanon and rekindled tensions between Lebanon and Syria, which is being accused of being behind the assassinations. "Syria can't rule Lebanon from Syria and Lebanon can't make judgments against Syria; it is for the benefit of them both to have a balanced dialogue between each other," said Berri, stressing peaceful relations between Lebanon and Syria will become crucial given the permanent Arab Parliament will eventually be based in Damascus.
The international body's creation, approved by the Arab Summit in Algiers last March, is part of an effort to modernize the institutions and improve the image of the largely toothless Arab League, and will become a fully fledged elected legislature modelled on Europe's Strasbourg-based assembly.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/28/2005 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 Afghan government on Tuesday vowed to chock and control the financial resources of foreign spies bedsides punishing them. "Spying for foreigners is a treason to the country and a conspiracy against the government, against the people and against the establishment," Presidential spokesman Mohammmad Karim Rahimi said at a press briefing. However, he did not name any official or country involved in the practice. 
Chad, which accuses Sudan of backing rebel attacks on its eastern border, fears Khartoum may be preparing a fresh assault which could also destabilise other neighbouring states, President 
Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud received here Tuesday US ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad and the accompanying delegation.
Bangladesh has invited another Interpol team to assist the country's intelligence agencies in investigating the grenade attack on an 
Notorious terrorists 
Prosecutors investigating the Beslan school hostage siege have uncovered no mistakes in the authorities' handling of the crisis, the head of the investigation said.
A Japanese diplomat who committed suicide in May 2004 was being blackmailed to provide key intelligence to China, Japanese media reports say. The unnamed engineer, in charge of communications for Japan's Shanghai consulate, left suicide notes saying he had been threatened by a Chinese man. The threats concerned his relationship with a karaoke hostess, reports said. 
KOTLI: The central leadership of the 
At the United Nations, as a year of many scandals draws to a close, Secretary-General Kofi Annan has been trying to stuff some big unanswered questions down the memory hole--with mixed results. No, I'm not talking only about the files Mr. Annan's former chief of staff shredded during the Oil for Food investigation, or the discounted duty-free Mercedes allegedly shipped to Ghana in late 1998 by the secretary-general's son, Kojo Annan, under false use of his father's name and diplomatic perquisites. Hanging over all this is another mystery that despite the magnitude of the question seems of strangely small concern to the secretary-general: What has become of the former head of the U.N. Oil for Food program, Benon Sevan?
Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad on Tuesday praised the Turkish diplomacy towards international issues. In an interview with the Turkish Skyturk news channel, he praised the diplomacy of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Syrian-Turkish relations. He touched on the recent visit by Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul to Damascus, where Gul recommended interrogating the five Syrian officials in Turkey. 
The Syrian media continued its attack against Lebanese politicians on Monday, accusing MP 
Lebanese Speaker 
