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Today: 66 articles and 231 comments as of 14:26.
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Area: WoT Background    Non-WoT    Opinion        Politix   
Saudis conduct 18 airstrikes on northern Yemen
Today's Headlines
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Good morning
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Lena Copeland Baskette aka Lina Basquette



What have you been up to?

Daily Gam Shot

Tutu Much


Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC || 01/24/2010 4:50 Comments || Top||


Afghanistan
Taliban Kidnap District Police Chief
[Quqnoos] Taliban militants attacked a police patrol in Kunar province Saturday, capturing a district police chief and two other officers. The patrol, which included Jamtullah Khan, the police chief of Shaigal district in Kunar province, was attacked after midnight, provincial Police Chief Khalilullah Ziayee told AFP.

"Taliban abducted the district police chief along with two other policemen," he said.

It is the first abduction of a police chief by militants, said Zemarai Bashary, a spokesman for the Afghan Interior Ministry.

Hundreds of Afghan businessmen, foreign journalists, politicians, aid and construction workers have been kidnapped in the past by militant groups or criminal gangs. Most of the abductions have criminal motives or are carried out in a bid to secure release of fellow fighters from Afghan jails.
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: Taliban


Hekmatyar Outlines Afghan Peace Plan
[Quqnoos] Afghan militant leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar says he would reconcile with Kabul government and supports the presence of neutral international peacekeeping forces in Afghanistan.
No further detail on this as yet, as it's the lead to a Pashto video.
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: Hizb-i-Islami-Hekmatyar

#1  Yah, Hek is really in a position of strength.
Posted by: Thilet Poodle4597 || 01/24/2010 7:53 Comments || Top||

#2  Strange that he's still alive, though.
Posted by: Odysseus || 01/24/2010 10:10 Comments || Top||

#3  The Pakistanis make sure that he stays that way.
Posted by: Pappy || 01/24/2010 10:56 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Saudis conduct 18 airstrikes on northern Yemen
[Iran Press TV Latest] Houthi fighters say the Saudi army has conducted 18 airstrikes in the latest attacks along the border of northern Yemen.

The Shia Houthis said late on Saturday that hundreds of Saudi rockets and mortar shells were fired into villages in Sa'ada province overnight.

On Friday, the Houthis said a number of advances by government forces had been repelled and several tanks had been destroyed.

Their leader, Abdel Malik al-Houthi, posted video footage on the group's website dismissing Yemeni government allegations of his death. The video showed al-Houthi to be in good health, contrary to reports suggesting he had been seriously injured.

The Houthis say they are fighting to defend civilians being targeted in coordinated operations by Yemen and Saudi Arabia. Both countries deny the accusation.

Yemen launched an offensive against the Houthis in Sa'ada back in August -- three months before Riyadh joined in the attacks.

In early November, Saudi troops undertook their largest mobilization since the 1990-1991 Persian Gulf War and began overtly attacking the Houthi fighters from the ground and the air.

The Houthis, who until recently controlled a large swathe of mountain territory in Yemen's northwestern province of Sa'ada, have been under a sustained military assault by Yemen ground and air forces since August.

Meanwhile, Saudi Deputy Defense Minister Prince Khaled bin Sultan said on Saturday that the Saudi military had recovered the bodies of 20 of the 26 Saudi soldiers listed as missing in the fighting since November. On January 12, he had put the death toll for Saudi troops at 82.

Earlier this week, the southern region commander, General Ali Zaid al-Khawaji, said that 113 soldiers had died and that several more had most likely been captured by the Houthis, Saudi Arabia's official news agency SPA reported.
This article starring:
Abdel Malik al-Houthi
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  This all sounds a bit more invasive than the Saudis policing their own border or defending their own villages nearby the border. The Saudi action is significant & coordinated with the government of Yemen to eliminate the "separatist" Iran-backed rebellion, I suppose...
Posted by: American Delight || 01/24/2010 7:18 Comments || Top||

#2  Whatever....
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 01/24/2010 10:30 Comments || Top||

#3  Rose on red ...
Posted by: Steve White || 01/24/2010 11:03 Comments || Top||

#4  Houthi fighters say ...

propaganda right from the begining.

c'mon people
Posted by: Mike Hunt || 01/24/2010 12:28 Comments || Top||

#5  [Iran Press TV Latest] Houthi fighters say

Propaganda for Iran's Houthi tools is a given, Mike. But what diamonds are to be found within the propaganda dross, eh?
Posted by: trailing wife || 01/24/2010 23:14 Comments || Top||


Britain
UK students recruited for Somali jihad
Students from some of Britain's top universities are travelling to Somalia to fight with a terrorist group linked to Al-Qaeda. Almost a dozen young British Muslims, including a female medical researcher, are said recently to have joined Al-Shabaab, an extremist rebel organisation blamed for hundreds of deaths in the east African state.
Darwin awards all around.
Somali community leaders in the UK say students from the London School of Economics (LSE), Imperial College and King's College London are among those who have been recruited within the past year. The youngest recruit is believed to be 18.
Any chance the heads of these schools are investigating what they're doing to encourage such behaviour? I didn't think so, either.
One LSE graduate who grew up in Britain is said to have called his pregnant wife from Mogadishu, the Somali capital, telling her: "I am here defending my country and my rights. Look after my daughter. I don't think I will see you again."
Garnishee his parents' wages to pay support for the child until she is eighteen. There has to be a cost for abandoning children like that.
An investigation by The Sunday Times into the terrorist "pipeline" to Somalia substantiates claims that Britain has become a fertile breeding ground for Al-Qaeda. It follows the case of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the London engineering graduate accused of trying to blow up almost 300 passengers on a transatlantic flight on Christmas Day.
Clearly his education led him to what appeared to be a satisfying career choice. However, one suspects he will not now be a generous donor to alumni appeals.
The security services believe that Britons travelling overseas to train and fight in lawless countries such as Somalia and Yemen pose a serious risk on their return to the UK. They have previously suggested that at least two dozen Britons have gone out to Somalia to take up arms and even become suicide bombers, but community leaders believe the figure could be more than 100.
Community leaders are more likely to know about their constituents.
[Al-Shabaab] has been proscribed by most western countries, including America and Australia, but has escaped a ban in Britain.
Someone in the Home Office said, "Little brown people must be allowed their outlets." Someone in the Home Office is an idiot.
Sheikh Mohamed Ahmed, a moderate religious leader from north London, warned this weekend that Al-Shabaab is exploiting the loophole to recruit youths in the capital. Although many of them were born in Somalia, they have grown up in the UK and are British citizens. "It's unbelievable," said Ahmed. "The group's supporters and recruiters are free to do what they want."

Ahmed said some families had received anonymous phone calls from Al-Shabaab recruiters urging them to send their children abroad in the name of Islam. "The police said they cannot take action until they [the recruits] do something," he said.
Surely the recruiters are breaking some law or other -- it's Britain, where they have laws about everything. How about tracking down the phone callers?
Some of those who have left London for Mogadishu claim to be nationalists opposed to western influence in Somalia. However, one man from north London in his mid-twenties cited injustices against Muslims elsewhere before joining Al-Shabaab last year.
Because any excuse will do when taqfiri idiots decide to kill Muslims in the name of Islam.
The LSE graduate who abandoned his family in south London early last year initially told his pregnant wife and parents that he was travelling to Dubai to work as a journalist at the Khaleej Times newspaper. He never showed up. Instead, the 25-year-old Arsenal fan, who originally came to Britain from Somalia in 1994 and grew up in Leeds, had travelled to Mogadishu. Friends say he was not particularly religious and even had a western-style wedding.
He just wanted to swash and buckle and commit a bit of murder. It will enhance his resume in these competitive times, dontchaknow.
Perhaps more worrying is the case of two students from west London who are believed to have travelled to Somalia about nine months ago. The men, described by an informed source as a 23-year-old law graduate from King's College and a 25-year-old completing a medical degree at Imperial College, had both worked as volunteer anti-drugs campaigners around Ealing and were considered influential among Somali youths.
Around the time of their departure, a 24-year-old woman, studying biomedicine at the University of East London, also left Britain, telling friends she was joining Al-Shabaab's "medical team".
Someone should do a study, sometime, about how many patients they kill due to incomplete educations. Still, I'm glad they won't be treating innocent Brits.
Mohamed Abdullahi, director of the UK Somali Community Initiative, said his organisation is separately investigating the case of five men and an 18-year-old from London, thought to be fighting for the terrorist group. He said he treads a fine line between helping concerned families and identifying threats to the UK authorities.

LSE, Imperial and King's College said they had no record of the students. However, members of Britain's Somali community use a variety of names.
Posted by: ryuge || 01/24/2010 00:42 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  It seems like the totalitarian horrors of Islam are not well understood in these somewhat bright students from England (nor, for example, in Minneapolis/Dearborn). The marketing of the Islamic/hatred system is pervasive around the world, and the only solution is the internet.

That being said, please don't allow these Islamics to return to civilization.

Posted by: Ralphs son Johnnie || 01/24/2010 3:38 Comments || Top||

#2  ROTFLMAO
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 01/24/2010 5:14 Comments || Top||

#3  If these Muslims want to leave the UK to fight a Jihad let them. I hope more join them, and never come back.
Posted by: Dave UK || 01/24/2010 12:07 Comments || Top||

#4  The trick is to get the other 99% to follow.
Posted by: ed || 01/24/2010 12:08 Comments || Top||


Britain raises terror threat level to severe
[Al Arabiya Latest] Britain raised its terrorism threat level to 'severe', the second highest level, on Friday, days before London hosts major international meetings on how to deal with militancy in Afghanistan and Yemen.

"The UK is raising their measures to effectively where we are with the airport security measures that we have taken and announced over the last few weeks," said DHS spokesman Matthew Chandler.

" The UK is raising their measures to effectively where we are with the airport security measures that we have taken and announced over the last few weeks "
DHS spokesman Matthew Chandler
"We have enhanced our security measures and communicated specific information to industry, law enforcement and the American people," he said.

The decision to raise the level from 'substantial' means security services now consider an attack in Britain, a key U.S. ally, to be "highly likely" but the government said it had no information to suggest an attack was imminent.

Britain gave no reason for the move by its Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC) which comes as Britain and other countries step up precautions in the wake of the failed Christmas Day attack on an airliner in Detroit.
Raising the threat level is expected to lead to tighter security at airports and public buildings.

"JTAC keeps the threat level under constant review and makes its judgments based on a broad range of factors, including the intent and capabilities of international terrorist groups in the UK and overseas," Home Secretary (interior minister) Alan Johnson said in a statement.

"The fact that we've moved to another threat level means we put more resources in, we heighten the state of vigilance. It shouldn't be thought to be linked to Detroit or anywhere else for that matter," he told the BBC.

Security expert Anthony Glees said his guess was that the decision to raise the threat level was linked to the Afghanistan conference and to intelligence from the United States.

"I think it's very probable that people, either members of al-Qaeda or associated to al-Qaeda, will be figuring that it would be a huge trophy attack in some way to damage the holding of the Afghanistan conference," he told the BBC.

The threat level was last changed on July 20, 2009 when it was lowered to substantial from severe. It had been lowered to severe on July 4, 2007 from critical, the highest level, which had been declared a few days earlier following attempted car bombings in London and Glasgow.

Suicide bombings in July 2005 killed 52 people on London's transport networks and a number of plots have been thwarted since then.

Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda

#1  Apparently British authorities are unable to make the connection between the threat of Islamicist violence there and this action on their part
Posted by: lotp || 01/24/2010 7:05 Comments || Top||


Europe
Sweden rattled by Somali militants in its midst
Ten subway stops from downtown Stockholm is "little Mogadishu," a drab suburb of the Swedish capital where radical Islamists are said to be recruiting the sons of Somali immigrants for jihad in the Horn of Africa. Police and residents say about 20 have joined al-Shabab, an al-Qaida-linked group waging a bloody insurgency against Somalia's government, and many of them came from the suburb of Rinkeby - the heart of Sweden's Somali community. According to SAPO, the Swedish state security police, five of them have been killed and 10 are still at large in Somalia.

The issue has gained notice at a time of worsening fears of Islamic radicalism in the Scandinavian countries, home to more than 40,000 Somalis who have fled their war-ravaged homeland. These fears sharpened with the Jan. 1 attack by a Somali immigrant in Denmark on a cartoonist who caricatured the Prophet Muhammad. "It's a small group but they have power," said Abadirh Abdi Hussein, a 25-year-old hip-hop artist and "110-percent Muslim" who has become the best known Somali in Rinkeby because of his campaign to counter al-Shabab's influence. "People don't speak up against them. They don't dare."

In Sweden, police say they can do little to stop them leaving for Somalia unless they can prove that they are conspiring to commit terrorism. Unlike the U.S., Sweden has not put al-Shabab on any terrorism list. "Legally you can't prosecute anyone, neither the youth nor those who urged them to go," said Johnny Lindh, police superintendent in the precinct that includes Rinkeby. Lindh said police have been in touch with several devastated parents who said their sons secretly joined al-Shabab and traveled to Somalia without telling their families.

A 24-year-old Rinkeby resident, who came to Sweden with his family in 1991, and who spoke to The Associated Press by telephone, said his uncle was with a group that left Rinkeby in mid-2008. According to the man, who spoke on condition of anonymity, fearing for his family's safety, the uncle said that he was traveling within Sweden and would only be gone a few weeks. Speaking in Swedish, the man said that he, too, was approached repeatedly by an al-Shabab recruiting agent, but turned him down. "He used to ask, like, 'have you ever thought about the way things are in Somalia? Do you want to help?' You knew what he was getting at: jihad," he said.

The recruitment was linked to a youth center in Rinkeby that was financed with subsidies from the city, local authorities and residents said. Per Johansson, of the Stockholm Sports Administration, which gave the center half a million kronor ($70,000) over four years, said the funding was stopped in 2008 when city inspectors sensed there were radical undertones. They segregated the sexes and "They didn't let the girls be part of the activities in the same way as boys," Johansson said, adding that at the time there was no suspicion of any recruitment attempts.

Hussein, the hip-hop artist, said youth who were approached by al-Shabab told him they were shown videos of al-Qaida suicide bombings and urged to become jihadists in their ancestral homeland. As his worries worsened, he started going public to Swedish media on the issue last year. Since then, resistance to the extremists has grown and last month dozens showed up for a rally against al-Shabab in Rinkeby.

The singer's campaign has also prompted Swedish politicians to talk about the spread of extremism in immigrant suburbs, something that in the past might have drawn charges of being hostile to Muslims. "He is a real hero," said Nalin Pekgul, a leading politician for the opposition Social Democrats said of Hussein. Pekgul, a Kurdish immigrant, is an outspoken critic of the radicals. But Hussein has paid a price. In September he was attacked on the street by a masked man who slashed his forehead with a sharp object - he has an inch-long scar - and warned him in Somali to "leave us alone or we'll kill you." Police haven't found a suspect.
Posted by: ryuge || 01/24/2010 10:55 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Isn't there a category called "old news' for Islamic aggression in Scandinavia?
Posted by: no mo uro || 01/24/2010 14:02 Comments || Top||

#2  The interesting thing is the article is about Somalis who want to leave Sweden and go back to Somalia and do bad things and yet the Swedish are unwilling to let them leave but have no legal way to stop them. Most other countries would be willing to pay plane fair. Just tell them to renounce their Swedish citizenship/refugee status and we'll charter a plane and drop you off in Kenya. You can make your way from there. Good bye and have a blast.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 01/24/2010 18:10 Comments || Top||

#3 
Good bye and have a blast.
Posted by rjschwarz


LOL!!!
Posted by: Karl the Fat || 01/24/2010 19:46 Comments || Top||

#4  Sounds like Minneapolis.
Posted by: KBK || 01/24/2010 21:10 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Spy Chief Rips Handling Of Terror Case
From Thursday but running it today because Rantburg needs to absorb the key message:

that High-Value Interrogation Group?

It doesn't exist. Read to the end. They don't exist yet.

This isn't just incompetence, this is the Bambi world-view. The HIG doesn't exist because there are no high value terrorists to interrogate anymore. They're all just criminals so they all get the protection of the US Constitution. This is precisely what Scott Brown talked about on the campaign trail: the Bambi administration is going to 'Mirandize' terrorists, give them a lawyer and allow them to remain silent.

Even if the Bambi administration doesn't agree with the approach of the Bush administration regarding a "War on Terror", they have to be serious enough to acknowledge that certain groups of people mean America serious harm. The Undie-Boomer was carrying out a low-rent operation designed to test us, and we almost failed. He's clearly a 'high-value' target because he can tell us many things -- he can help us connect the dots.

But he certainly won't tell us if we don't ask him, and he likely won't tell us if we ask nicely. So we may have to be stern with him -- not torture him, but be stern. He may need a session or two in a cold room with "Muskrat Love" playing over and again in the background.

George Bush was repeatedly slammed about 9/11 for 'failing to connect the dots'. We now have an administration that doesn't even want to look at the dots and would prefer that the whole concept of dots disappears. That is simply dangerous for our country.
The nation's intelligence chief said the man accused of trying to blow up an airliner on Christmas Day should have been questioned by a special interrogation team instead of being handled as an ordinary criminal suspect. Dennis Blair, the director of national intelligence, told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Wednesday that officials botched the handling of terror suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who is accused of working with a Yemen-based offshoot of al Qaeda to try to bring down the Detroit-bound jet carrying 290 passengers and crew.

A new panel charged with designating so-called high-value terrorism suspects for special interrogations should have been used in the case and the suspect should have been questioned by an elite group of interrogators, said Mr. Blair, who used the expression "duh" to emphasize his point.

Later in the day, Mr. Blair issued a statement saying his comments were "misconstrued." "The FBI interrogated Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab when they took him into custody," his statement said. "They received important intelligence at that time, drawing on the FBI's expertise in interrogation that will be available in the HIG once it is fully operational," he said, referring to the High-Value Interrogation Group.
The HIG doesn't exist. It hasn't been constituted. There was no one to turn the Undie-Boomer over to because the unit doesn't exist.
An administration official said a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent didn't read Mr. Abdulmutallab his rights as a criminal defendant until after he stopped cooperating.

Wednesday's series of four hearings related to the Christmas attack prompted a new round of finger-pointing among government officials. Mr. Blair has been under fire since it became clear the government failed to piece together myriad clues that might have foiled the attempted attack.

Mr. Blair's testimony was quickly disputed by other administration officials, but seemed to bolster the contention by some Republicans and other critics that officials squandered an opportunity to gain more intelligence from Mr. Abdulmutallab.

In his testimony Wednesday, Mr. Blair said the HIG "was created exactly for this purpose--to make a decision on whether a certain person who's detained should be treated as a case for federal prosecution or for some of the other means."

He added: "We did not invoke the HIG in this case; we should have."

Mr. Blair, who was vice chairman of the task force that created the elite interrogation teams, offered implicit criticism of the Justice Department and the FBI, which decided how to handle Mr. Abdulmutallab. "I was not consulted," he said. "The decision was made on the scene, [and] seemed logical to the people there, but it should have been taken using this HIG format, at a higher level."

Mr. Blair's comments came as FBI Director Robert Mueller was defending his agency's handling of the case before the Senate Judiciary Committee. He said FBI agents acted "appropriately, I believe, very appropriately" in treating Mr. Abdulmutallab as a criminal suspect.
But that's the problem; he's not a criminal suspect, he's a foreign national who is a terrorist and an agent for a terrorist organization.
Under questioning from Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the top Republican on the judiciary panel, about why special interrogators weren't used, Mr. Mueller said: "There was no time to get a follow-up group in there. If one had had the opportunity over a period of time, we may well have had a specialized group do the interrogation."
You had all the time in the world. All you needed to say was, "he's not a criminal suspect, he's a terrorist, and we'll treat him as such."
Queerly enough, according to this AP article the FBI did bring in a second interrogation team the next day, after the pantybomber's injuries had been treated and he'd slept for five hours. It was the second FBI team that Mirandized the pantibomber.
An administration official said Mr. Blair was mistaken in his testimony about the HIG. A task force last summer laid out plans for the new interrogation teams, but none yet exist, administration officials said. The FBI is trying to create the teams with assistance from the Pentagon and intelligence agencies, officials said Wednesday.
There you go: the HIG doesn't exist.
Posted by: Steve White || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The AP article also says:
He would not be questioned again for more than five hours. By that point, officials said, FBI bosses in Washington had decided a new interrogation team was needed. They made that move in case the lack of a Miranda warning or the suspect's medical condition at the time of the earlier conversations posed legal problems later on for prosecutors.
Those FBI bosses in DC need names. In public. FOIA.

The trunks were too busy celebrating Brown's win to make this a loud public deal. This together with Holder's stonewalling, should be made campaign issues for November if the trunks ever want to get back in control. Barry is weaker on this than health care. Especially if the next pantybomber succeeds.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 01/24/2010 8:08 Comments || Top||

#2  You have to wonder which grave has higher rpm, Teddy or J. Edgar.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 01/24/2010 8:10 Comments || Top||

#3  Even the Wapo agrees:
It is now clear that the administration did not give serious thought to anything but Door No. 1. This was myopic, irresponsible and potentially dangerous.

Whether to charge terrorism suspects or hold and interrogate them is a judgment call. We originally supported the administration's decision in the Abdulmutallab case, assuming that it had been made after due consideration. But the decision to try Mr. Abdulmutallab turns out to have resulted not from a deliberative process but as a knee-jerk default to a crime-and-punishment model.

According to sources with knowledge of the discussions, no one questioned the approach or raised the possibility of taking more time to question the suspect. This makes the administration's approach even more worrisome than it would have been had intelligence personnel been cut out of the process altogether.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 01/24/2010 8:23 Comments || Top||

#4  There are even PC knee jerks in the WaPo that I'm sure they never even think about.

".. question the suspect." He wasn't a suspect, this was not an allegation. It was a fact!

Dullmullah was no more a suspect than Peyton Manning is "suspected" of playing QB for the Colts.

Our whole society is so saturated in PC legalisms that it is impossible to call scum scum. Everything is "alleged this" and "suspected of that".

If a court hasn't pronounced than nothing is a fact anymore! Saints preserve us.
Posted by: AlanC || 01/24/2010 9:06 Comments || Top||

#5  I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.
-Barack Hussein Obama



That's all you need to know, right there.
Posted by: Lionel Sninesing3981 || 01/24/2010 12:30 Comments || Top||

#6  Everything is "alleged this" and "suspected of that". The so-called "Barack Hussein Obama" is alleged to be the President of the United States.
Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 01/24/2010 20:10 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Two army men die in Khuzdar attack
Two army men were killed and two others injured in an ambush in the main market of Khuzdar town on Saturday. The proscribed Baloch Liberation Army claimed responsibility for the attack.

DPO Khuzdar Nazir Kurd said that the injured personnel were shifted to the Combined Military Hospital in Quetta because of their serious condition. The troops killed were identified as Mohammad Sharif and Asad Rasool and the injured as Samandar Khan and Shahid Mehmood.

The firing by attackers on a motorbike spread panic in the market, forcing shopkeepers to close their businesses.

"We are investigating the case," Mr Kurd said, adding that a case had been registered against unidentified attackers.

A man claiming to be the spokesman for the BLA and identifying himself as Merak Baloch told journalists in a call that the banned organisation was behind the attack. He said three security personnel died in the attack.

Security was beefed up in and around Khuzdar town and a house-to-house search was carried out in various localities for the arrest of attackers.
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Security forces gun down 12 militants, nab 25 in Kurram
[Dawn] The leader of a militant group among 11 others was killed security forces in central Kurram on Saturday. Meanwhile, 25 other militants were arrested and two of their hideouts were destroyed. With the death of these militant, claim officials, the area has been 'cleared' up to thirteen kilometers.

Speaking to the media in Parachinar, commanding officer militia force Colonel Tauseef Akhtar said that the security forces conducted a fresh operation against militants in Gadar and Zangai areas of central Kurram during which huge cache of arms and ammunition was also seized.

Security forces also destroyed a strategic position of militants in Janaat Rais, which was being used to fire rockets on the FC camp and Sada city.

Colonel Akhtar said that all the entry and exit routes for the militants have been sealed and oil supply to central Kurram has also been suspended in order to limit the mobility of the militants.

'The security forces will soon clear the whole of Kurram Agency of militants,' he added optimistically.

In another operation in the Khoedad Khel area of Upper Orakzai Agency, at least ten militants and two security personnel were killed.

According to officials, the militants had attacked the army check post Khoedad Khel with rockets which left two FC personnel dead and two injured.

Security forces also captured 22 militants from the area, who were later shifted to an unknown location.
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: TTP


Top Kashmir militant killed in Kashmir gunfight
Indian troops shot dead a top-ranking militant in Indian-held Kashmir (IHK) as security forces battled militants ahead of India's Republic Day national holiday next week, police said on Saturday.

Militant violence routinely increases in the revolt-hit Muslim-majority state ahead of the annual public holiday.

But tensions in India have been heightened by warnings by Western intelligence agencies that flights of the state-run Air India and other private carriers could be targeted by militant groups.

Police in the IHK capital of Srinagar said that Tariq Lone -- a leading rebel belonging to the militant outfit Hizbul Mujahideen -- was killed late on Friday in a gun-battle with troops in the southern Kishtwar district.

"Lone, alias Azhar, was a wanted militant," a police spokesman said, adding that security forces were engaged in two other gun-battles on Saturday against militants in the south.

The fighting came as Indian Defence Minister AK Antony warned of the likelihood of more militant attacks and infiltration bids along the Line of Control (LoC), the de facto border which divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan.
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: Hizbul Mujaheddin


Suicide attack on Tank police station kills four
[Dawn] A suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden vehicle into a police station in Tank district on Saturday, killing at least four people and wounding two others.

Officials confirmed the death of a constable, Syed Raza, and three passers-by -- two children and a woman.

According to sources, the bomber rammed the vehicle into the main gate of the Gomal Bazar police station, near Tank city. The officials said that one person was spotted in the vehicle.

Police said that a portion of the building collapsed, injuring two accused in the police station's lock-up. They were taken to the Tank district headquarters hospital. This is the second suicide attack in Tank over the last one month.

AFP adds: "The bomber struck ... outside the police station," district police chief Ejaz Abid told AFP.

He said 11 people, including five policemen, three passers-by and three prisoners in the police lock-up, were injured.

"This was a car bomb attack, which is a reaction to the ongoing operation in South Waziristan region," Mr Abid added.

Another senior police official Ghazanfar Hussain also confirmed the incident and casualties.

"I was busy in routine desk work inside the police station when a large blast rocked the entire building," Mr Hussain said.

He added that one of the outer walls of the police station collapsed from the impact of the blast while big cracks appeared in other rooms of the building.
Posted by: Fred || 01/24/2010 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: TTP


Iraq
US Marines pulled out of Anbar Province today victorious
Posted by: Chusoling Scourge of the Geats5019 || 01/24/2010 09:22 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Thank You USMC - Best Wishes for a relaxful R&R.
Posted by: Vespasian Snath6241 || 01/24/2010 17:34 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Roadside bomb injures six Thai soldiers
Six soldiers were injured when terrrorists insurgents detonated a roadside homemade bomb to ambush them Sunday morning.

Police said the six soldiers from the Narathiwat Taskforce 38 were patrolling the road in a pick-up truck when terrrorists insurgents used wired remote to detonate the bomb. The blast damaged the truck and slightly injured the soldiers.
Posted by: ryuge || 01/24/2010 00:28 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
'Sarkozy: Israel may act against Iran'
Posted by: Uncle Phester || 01/24/2010 10:07 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  'Sarkozy: Israel may act against Iran' and EUropeans will condemn it.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 01/24/2010 11:23 Comments || Top||

#2  "Sarkozy: Israel may act against Iran (we secretly hope)"

Fixed.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 01/24/2010 11:29 Comments || Top||

#3  Lets hope that it kicks off soon.
Posted by: Dave UK || 01/24/2010 12:01 Comments || Top||

#4  Is that permission or fear speaking?
Posted by: Old Patriot || 01/24/2010 14:37 Comments || Top||

#5  I haven't found the original text so I don't know if Sarkozy said "pourrait" ie could, has the possibility, there is a danger of, or "a le droit", has the right to defend itself.
Posted by: JFM || 01/24/2010 15:40 Comments || Top||



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Two weeks of WOT
Sun 2010-01-24
  Saudis conduct 18 airstrikes on northern Yemen
Sat 2010-01-23
  Militants report 15 dead in missile strike
Fri 2010-01-22
  Hamas accepts Israel's right to exist. No it doesn't.
Thu 2010-01-21
  Suicide car bomb wounds 33 in northern Iraq
Wed 2010-01-20
  Christian-Muslim Mayhem in Nigeria Kills Dozens
Tue 2010-01-19
  Three titzup in N. Wazoo dronezap
Mon 2010-01-18
  Taliban militants attack Afghan capital Kabul
Sun 2010-01-17
  Dronezap waxes another dozen in South Wazoo
Sat 2010-01-16
  Abu Nidal organization hijacker from 1986 dronezapped in Wazoo
Fri 2010-01-15
  Pak Taliban says Hakimullah Mehsud injured in attack
Thu 2010-01-14
  Hakimullah Mehsud drone zapped?
Wed 2010-01-13
  Jordanian al-Q bad boy among N.Wazoo drone deaders
Tue 2010-01-12
  Drone Strikes Kill 16 in Afghanistan
Mon 2010-01-11
  Iraq integrates over 40,000 Sahwa militiamen
Sun 2010-01-10
  Five killed in NWA drone attack

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