Posts

Showing posts from December 28, 2008

Nepal: Small Blast Hits Kathmandu Shopping Area

Image
Source: Times of India 2009-01-01 18:32 Nepalese police officers investigate the site of a bomb blast in Kathmandu. Photo courtesy: AFP. 1 Jan 2009, 1722 hrs IST, IANS KATHMANDU: A 16-year-old Indian teenager was hurt as a bomb went off in a busy area of the capital Thursday, the third blast to disrupt life in the city since last week. Bimal Gupta, who came from Barganiya village in India's Bihar district to eke out his livelihood in the Nepali capital, was the only person injured by the bomb that went off near the post office at the Sundhara area of the capital, a busy commercial place teeming with shops, vehicles and people. Gupta, a garments pedlar, was selling his ware on the pavement before the post office when the bomb, kept in a white plastic bag nearby, went off around 1 p.m., injuring him in the leg. The Indian teenager was rushed to the nearby Bir Hospital where he was declared out of danger. The police said three

Fighting terror the Krav Maga way

An Israeli hand-to-hand combat technique is finding more takers in the wake of the Mumbai attacks Source: Livemint New Delhi: There were many in Mumbai on those three nights it was hostage to ten terrorists who would probably have prayed for knowledge of some sort of self-defence. The Israeli technique of Krav Maga or Hebrew for Contact Combat, teaches how to fight off an armed kidnapping or defeat a potential rapist and even counter terrorists. It’s a technique that sharpens reflexes and reduces reaction time. The practical approach to a potentially violent situation, has suddenly seen more takers for Krav Maga. Says Vicky Kapoor, director of Krav Maga India, “urban warfare is totally different, thinking is different, fight is different. You are not fighting regular soldiers, you are fighting only a surprise. So you have to prepared for everything.” Learner Nitin Bhasin says, “it mentally prepares you to be aggressive in situations that demand you to be aggressive.” However, be warned

Bloodstained 2008 India’s decades old bloody tryst with terrorism can probably be compressed into 70 hours when death danced on Mumbai’s streets

Mehak Kasbekar and Nidhi Bhardwaj Source: livemint Mumbai: 2008 was when terror reigned supreme. About 60 bombs rocked eight key cities in 2008. It started with bombs exploding in Jaipur in May claiming 68 lives. In June blasts claimed 58 lives in Bangalore and Ahmedabad. On September 13th Delhi was under fire. And in October 45 people died in Assam’s serial blasts. But India’s decades old bloody tryst with terrorism can probably be compressed into 70 hours when death danced on Mumbai’s streets, its iconic railway station and its landmark hotels. This time there were no bombs kept secretly to explode in packed trains and bustling neighborhoods. A combat-like situation was seen for the first time in a key metro city when terrorists took hundreds hostage in three separate buildings in south Mumbai- The Taj, The Oberoi Trident and Nariman House – a Jewish outreach center. The multiple strikes, which left almost 200 people dead, finally got the government machinery into action. 23 days lat

Serial blasts in Guwahati, several injured

1 Jan 2009, 1755 hrs IST, AGENCIES Source: ECONOMIC TIMES GUWAHATI: Three blasts have rocked Guwahati hours before home minister P. Chidambaram is supposed to land in the city. The serial blasts at Bhootnath, Birubari and Bhangagarh have left a trail of devastation over a wide area. Several people are suspected to be injured according to current count. At least 12 people were injured when a suspected cycle bomb exploded at Bhootnath locality, which falls on the route Chidambaram was to take, shortly before his arrival here on a visit. Three persons were injured in a blast outside a Big Bazar retail chain outlet at Bhangagarh, an upmarket commercial area near Guwahati Medical College. One of the blasts that took place in the Birubari area injured three persons. Official sources said the Improvised Explosive Devise (IED) kept in a Gauhati Municipal Corporation dustbin went off at around 3.30 pm. The injured were admitted to the hospital and were identified as Altaf Ali, F

THE TERRORIST - Weaponary

Image
Source: India today AK-47 and variants The terrorist operation in Mumbai was a confluence of time-tested tactics, ruthless ingenuity and accessories The weapon,patented by Mikhail Kalashnikov in the year of India’s independence is available for as little as Rs 5,000, or the cost of a midlevel mobile phone, in Peshawar. The AK-47 and its variants—the largest produced weapon in history—are the weapons of choice for terrorists. It is rugged, compact and effective and boasts of a very high rate of fire. Can fire after being dragged through mud or soaked in water. The Chinese clone, the Type-56 which in an Indianism is called the AK-56, varies only slightly from the Russian original. This is one of the most proliferated weapons. It takes months of training and thousand of rounds of practice to be able to wield this weapon with ease. A seasoned terrorist, for a speedy reload, always tapes a spare magazine to his AK-47. Rucksack From the four fidayeen who attacked Parliament to Kasab and his

THE TERRORIST

Image
Source: India today At first glance, there is nothing that makes him distinctive in the bustling anonymity of a metropolitan street. Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the bin-Ladenesque chief of LeT and its charitable front, the Jamaat-ud-Dawa Nothing except that gun of disproportionate size—an AK-47—he carries in his right hand. Everything else—grey cargos, faux Versace, overstuffed rucksack and floppy hair— adds to the generic drabness of a backpacker, though his movement is not dictated by a well-travelled Lonely Planet but the Book of Higher Directions. He is not a grainy image confined to the front pages or the small screens any longer; he has migrated to the consciousness of a nation savaged. Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi, operations commander of LeT, directly coordinated the Mumbai attack He is the lone survivor of the gang of 10 that, in the span of 60 hours that may have seemed longer than eternity to those who are condemned to mourn, turned the emblematic city of corporate aspiration and cosmopol

Prophets of doom, Sandeep Unnithan, December 26, 2008

Image
Source: India today LASHKAR-e-TOIBA (LeT) Founded in 1986 Chief: Hafiz M.Saeed Attacks: Mumbai 26/11 and Akshardham in September 2002 Hafiz M.Saeed The biggest and best organised of the anti-India terror groups and with a manifesto professing disintegration of the country, the LeT was founded to fight the Soviet army in Afghanistan. From the early 1990s, it began infiltrating hundreds of Pakistani fighters to shore up a flagging militant movement and post-Kargil it pioneered the concept of ‘fidayeen’ or suicide gunmen, engaging the security forces in firefights to draw media and world attention. Closely allied with the Pakistani military and functioning under the guise of a now-banned social organisation Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the LeT is the sword arm of the ISI’s operations in the Indian hinterland. The LeT draws its cadre from Pakistan’s Punjab province and trains them in camps near Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan occupied Kashmir, before infiltrating them across the Line of Control

Pakistan-Bangladesh plan a Mughalistan to split India

Image
Source: Bengalgenocide Mughalistan (or Mughalstan) is the name of an independent homeland proposed for the Muslims of India. This Mughal-Muslim state in the Indian subcontinent will include all of North India and Eastern India, and will be formed by merging Pakistan and Bangladesh through a large corridor of land running across the Indo-Gangetic plain, the heartland of India. This Mughalistan corridor will comprise Muslim-majority areas of Northern India and eastern India that will be partitioned for the second time in history. The comprehensive plan for a second partition of India was first developed by the Mughalstan Research Institute (MRI) of Jahangir Nagar University (Bangladesh) under the patronage of the two intelligence agencies, Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) and Bangladesh’s Director General of Forces Intelligence, DGFI. The “Mughalistan Reaserch Institute of Bangladesh” has released a map where a Muslim corridor named “Mugh

Hate literature fed from childhood: Pakistan

Image
Primers Of Hate History or biology, Pakistani students get anti-India lessons in all their textbooks AMIR MIR Source: outlookindia When Mohammad Qasim stepped out to participate in the declamation contest held to celebrate Pakistan's Independence Day, the topic he was to speak on was: 'Why Islam and Pakistan are integral to each other'. Instead, this Class XI student of Lahore's Government Central Model School lashed out against the Hindus, giving vent to inexplicable anger and hatred. This was particularly shocking because the Hindu community, constituting an infinitesimal percentage of Pakistan's population, hasn't been an aspect of Qasim's life. Asked to explain his outpouring in the contest, the 14-year-old boy said, "We hate Hindus because they are Hindustanis and the number one enemies of both Islam and Pakistan. We know it all through our history and Pakistan Studie