Terrorism Watch

Source: IPS NEWS By Portia Crowe NEW YORK, May 24, 2011 (IPS) - While most of the world is closely watching the Middle East, monitoring the human rights situations in Bahrain, Syria, Libya and Israel, the International Crisis Group (ICG) is keeping its eye on neighbouring Central Asia. On Tuesday, the group released a report highlighting growing security threats in Tajikistan - the country it deems "by most measures, Central Asia's poorest state", and which is increasingly facing internal and external security threats. The report focuses primarily on insurgencies in the eastern region of Rasht. Military operations against the warlords and young insurgents there have been unsuccessful, and in 2010 resulted in a fragile peace deal between the government and those it had accused of terrorism. After a 2009 ambush and continued fighting throughout 2010 "demonstrated that someone in the Rasht area was capable of deploying trained deadly force,"

NEW DELHI: Dawood Ibrahim has evolved from a Mumbai bomber to a full-blown global terrorist. Intelligence agencies in New Delhi believe in the complete radicalization of the D-company boss, as he finds ways to further his terror network, aided by the ISI, and emerge truly as a global threat. Dawood's relations with ISI date back to 1993 when he executed the blasts in Mumbai but until a few years ago he was viewed as a logistics man for ISI by Indian agencies. LeT, the other arm of ISI, played the role of the main aggressor. The first Mumbai attack appeared to be one-off terrorist crime by a man focused on his smuggling and extortion operations. "In the past he was looked upon mainly as a mercenary. LeT was more ideology driven but Dawood and his gang now seem to have merged into LeT," said an official, adding that Dawood now presents as much a danger to India as to the US or any other target country of the jihadis. The transformation has happene

Kumaran Pathmanathan said Rajiv Gandhi's assassination was "well planned and done actually with Prabhakaran and (LTTE intelligence chief Pottu Amman). Everyone knows the truth". NEW DELHI: A top LTTE leader Kumaran Pathmanathan has apologised to India for V Prabhakaran's "mistake" of killing former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi . He said Rajiv's assassination was "well planned and done actually with Prabhakaran and (LTTE intelligence chief Pottu Amman). Everyone knows the truth". In an interview to CNN-IBN Firstpost, Pathmanathan, who was Treasurer of LTTE and its chief arms procurer, said "I want to say to the Indian people and especially to the Gandhi family...I want to apologise for Prabhakaran's mistake. Please forgive us. We beg you....Sorry for all this. We know the feelings of the son (Rahul) of Rajiv Gandhi....How father and daughter are attached (reference to Rajiv's daughter Priyanka)". He

Source: TOI NEW DELHI: Pakistan has lost almost half of its sophisticated long-range maritime snooping and strike capabilities in just one well-targeted jihadi attack on naval base PNS Mehran in Karachi that ended on Monday after a 15-hour gun-battle which left 10 security persons and four attackers dead. At least two of the five P-3C Orion long-range patrol aircraft, supplied to Pakistan Navy by the US, were destroyed in the attack. The irony is stark. Pakistan got the P-3C Orions , packed with radars and weapons like the E-2C Hawkeye 2000 airborne early-warning suites and anti-ship Harpoon missiles, from the US as part of the around $15 billion military aid in the name of the global war on terrorism over the last decade. India cried foul, holding that Orions as well as other weapons like F-16s were clearly meant for conventional warfare, not counter-terrorism. Al-Qaida or the Taliban, after all, did not have an air force or a navy. And now, in a role reversa

Source: TOI May has been a bloody month in terms of Maoist violence. Within 25 days, more than 50 lives have been lost in or around Chhattisgarh. RAIPUR: A burst of light machine gun fire rips apart the bodies of nine policemen; a vehicle carrying CRPF jawans is lifted in the air by a powerful explosion, seven jawans die; another landmine blast waylays a wedding baraat, killing six of the groom's family, including a four year old child. May has been a bloody month in terms of Maoist violence. Within 25 days, 50 lives have been lost in or around Chhattisgarh. Thirty-three of those killed were security personnel, with the rest being primarily civilians. If you account for casualties among Maoists, that cannot be confirmed in the absence of bodies, the toll crosses the 50 mark. Barring one episode, none of the deaths made it to the front pages of national newspapers. Scattered across disparate districts, and tucked away from the national limelight, the deat

Source: Daily bhaskar Raipur: Maoists trying to make a stronghold in Goriyabad have begun to include very young boys and girls in their gangs. At least ten girls have taken up arms in last five months. Bhaskar reporter came to know about this after a round in Datunuma village after the recent Maoist attack on police team that killed seven on Monday. The villagers said seven teenagers from Shobhaguna village one from Mainpur Block and one each from Kamar and Bhunjiya colonies have joined the Maoists in recent months. A well-trained women’s platoon brings educated girls in the gang and send them to Maoist training centres across the country for high tech training. The training in Udanti Dalum – a gang of Maoists – is held near Chipri plateau and nearby waterfalls. The gang also sends money to the families of girls who join them. Additional Director General (ADG) of Naxal Operations Ram Niwas said police intelligence is trying its best to gather information about the recru

Source: Telegraph nepal Kathmandu:  Politics is going from bad to worse. Experts’ claim that it is projected to sink further in the following days that may turn out to be frenzied ever recorded in Nepal. Bear with this imposed fate. Commotion, volatility and inter and intra fighting among the parties have become the trait of the country’s politics thanks the kind courtesy of Nepal’s “waste-bin” leaders who prefer to serve more to the alien preferences than what should have been the otherwise. The fight continued even May 25, 2011, at GOKARA RESORT. Free five Star lunch remains even at the last minute. Shame! Unfortunate mother Nepal. Nepalese leaders will not get better. Even if they want, they will not be allowed to advance for the better by the traditional neighbor-Nepal’s proven arm twister. A highly corrupt neighbor is hell bent on tormenting Nepal to the best it can. A completely damaged Nepal is in the interest of India and thus the Indian organization disma

Source: The jakarta post Jakarta | Thu, 05/26/2011 7:00 AM The G20 Conference in Bali earlier this month, which addressed international bribery and a number of bribery cases involving politicians that are handled by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), reminds me of an old tale about pirates that were arrested by Alexander the Great’s forces. The legend says that, in ancient times, Alexander the Great’s troops arrested a pirate captain. Alexander’s forces had long targeted groups of pirates because their activities were disturbing and harmful. In an interrogation, the king asked, “What kind of right do you have that you plunder the seas?” “I have the right to plunder the seas as Your Highness has the right to plunder the world. It’s just because I use a boat that I am called a pirate, while Your Highness has a large fleet, so you are called Maharaja (emperor),” the pirate captain said. Alexander gasped when he heard the pirate captain’s answer, which was strai

 Source: MSNBC Marco Ugarte  /  AP   A police officer escorts Julio de Jesus Radilla Hernandez, aka "El Negro" as he is presented to the press at the federal police headquarters in Mexico City,Wednesday, May 25, 2011. Mexico's federal police said Radilla Hernandez is allegedly responsible for ordering the March 27 murder of Juan Francisco Sicilia, son of Mexican poet Javier Sicilia and six other people. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte) MORELIA, Mexico — Gunmen apparently from two rival drug gangs fought a ferocious gunbattle on a highway in a western Mexico state that killed 28 men Wednesday, authorities said. The attorney general's office in the Pacific coast state of Nayarit said the gunfight started about 5 p.m. near the town of Ruiz, 500 miles (805 kilometers) northwest of Mexico City. Police initially responded to a citizen complaint of a kidnapping by a group of armed men in a nearby city who reportedly fled