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Showing posts from October 14, 2012

Bowen to visit Lebanon despite bomb blast

IMMIGRATION Minister Chris Bowen is pushing ahead with his travel plans to Lebanon this weekend, despite a car bomb attack in Beirut that killed a top security official and seven other people. Friday's bomb blast in Ashrafiya, a business centre full of banks, shops, universities and cafes, also injured 78 people. Two of Lebanon's top anti-Syrian political leaders have accused Syrian President Bashar al-Assad of assassinating the Lebanese security official in the car bomb attack. Mr Bowen has announced that despite the security concerns he will still make his first visit to Lebanon. He is set to meet President General Michel Sleiman, Prime Minister Najib Mikati and other senior government officials and refugee organisations next week. He will also visit Syrian refugee shelters in northern Lebanon, with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. "This will help to inform discussions about Australia's humanitarian program and consideration of ways

Cycle bomb, attack kills 4 FC men

QUETTA - Three Frontier Corps (FC) men were killed and 10 others wounded in a bomb attack in Quetta, claimed by the banned Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), on the outskirts of Quetta on Friday. Another FC?soldier was killed in an attack in Dera Bugti. An FC spokesman said explosive material fitted to a bicycle parked along the roadside near Badini intersection was detonated when a patrol passed by, killing three security men and wounding 10 others. Six civilians, including a woman, were among the injured, rescuers said. Lawmen rushed to the site and cordoned off the area. The rescuers shifted the dead and injured to the Civil Hospital and CM Hospital. The deceased were identified as Nawab Khan, Sarmad and Wajid Khan, while two injured security personnel were named as Sajjad Ahmed and Feroz Ahmed. DIG (Investigation) Hamid Shakeel told the media that four security men and six civilians, including a woman, were among the wounded. “The FC convoy was the main target,” he added. Accor

Gunmen kill four, including three cops in Iraq

Baghdad:  Gunmen killed three policemen and a prison official in attacks on Saturday and overnight in Baghdad, Iraqi authorities said. The first attack took place early in the morning when gunmen opened fire on a police patrol in the Shiite Muslim neighbourhood of al-Shaab, killing two policemen and wounding another, police said. In downtown Karradah, gunmen on Friday night attacked the house of a police lieutenant colonel who worked with the State Identity Directorate, killing him, police said. Health officials at nearby hospitals confirmed the deaths. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media. Meanwhile, gunmen with pistols fitted with silencers killed Haider al-Sultani, an official at Taji prison, in a drive-by-shooting that seriously wounded another employee, said Haider al-Saadi, spokesman for the Iraqi Justice Ministry. The Taji prison lies in a town with the same name, 20 kilometers north of Baghdad. The attack took pla

Group wants Fort Hood attack deemed terrorism

Nearly three years after the Fort Hood shootings, a group of soldiers and their families are pressing the Department of Defense to make victims of the rampage eligible for Purple Hearts and other benefits. About 160 people affected by the Nov. 5, 2009, shootings released a video this week describing the attack on the sprawling Texas Army post. "The victims are being forgotten, and it's frustrating," Kimberly Munley, one of the first two officers who arrived at the shooting scene, told The Associated Press. Maj. Nidal Hasan, an American-born Muslim who officials believe was inspired by a radical Islamic cleric, faces the death penalty if convicted of 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder in the attack. While several government reports have described the rampage as an act of terrorism, soldiers and their relatives say the only way Fort Hood victims and their families will get the same benefits as troops killed or injured

Terrorist Stings Make the U.S. Less Safe

When Mario Buda blew up the  first car bomb , in 1920 in front of the U.S. Sub-Treasury on  Wall Street , he had something in common with Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, who is accused of trying to do more or less  the same thing  this week in front of the  New York  Federal Reserve building a few blocks away: Both wanted to harm the U.S. through a symbol of its financial center. There was also a big difference. Buda, who escaped to  Italy  and was never brought to justice, belonged to an extended ring of anarchists who planned and executed terrorist attacks including the spectacular seven-city midnight  attacks  in June 1919. Nafis, on the other hand, hoped to connect himself to al- Qaeda, yet was acting almost in isolation -- except for the  Federal Bureau of Investigation  and New York Police Department agents who had set him up, strung him along and given him his 1,000 pound fake bomb. In plain English, Nafis was a patsy. Should we care? Since 2004, the most impressiv

Edmonton terrorism suspect ordered extradited to N.Y. for Iraq bombing trial

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VIDEO Video: Edmonton man can be extradited to U.S. to face conspiracy charges, judge says An Edmonton judge has ruled there is enough evidence to extradite a Canadian citizen to the United States to face terrorism charges. Sayfildin Tahir Sharif is accused of conspiracy to kill Americans and supporting a terror group that took part in a 2009 suicide bombing in his native Iraq. A truck filled with explosives was detonated at a military checkpoint, killing five U.S. soldiers. The Crown argued that intercepted phone and Internet conversations show Mr. Sharif, who went by other names — including Faruq Muhammad’Isa — helped jihadists contact members of a terror network as they made their way from Tunisia to Iraq to make the attack. Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Adam Germain said the recorded phone calls and emails went far beyond religious enthusiasm. “The record of the case is logical and supported by Mr. Isa’s own words,” Germain ruled. The case will go to fede

Bangladesh seeks access to suspected terrorism plotter in New York

Dhaka is seeking consular access to a Bangladeshi citizen arrested by US federal agents on suspicion of plotting terrorism in New York earlier this week, officials said Saturday. The government also urged US authorities not to be hostile to members of the Bangladeshi community living in the United States because of a single individual's actions. "Bangladesh embassy officials in Washington have asked for consular access to  Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis at a meeting with State Department officials Friday," Foreign Secretary Mohamed Mijarul Quayes said. US authorities arrested Nafis Wednesday on charges of plotting to use what he believed was a 1 000-pound bomb against the Federal Reserve Bank in Manhattan's financial district. He was also charged with attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and attempting to provide material support to al-Qaeda, according to the US Justice Department. Born into a middle-class family, Nafis studied in private

Yemen: Security Forces Raiding Aden Hospitals

| Human Rights Watch (Aden) – Yemeni state security forces are threatening health care in Aden by forcibly removing wounded alleged militants from hospitals, exchanging fire with gunmen seeking to block the arrests, and beating medical staff. One hospital in that southern port city has suspended operations as a result. Aden security forces describe the patients they have sought to arrest as suspects in serious crimes, including attacks against state security forces or armed robbery. Sources link most if not all of the wounded patients to Herak (“Southern Movement”), a coalition of groups seeking greater autonomy or independence for former South Yemen. Gunmen supporting and protecting the alleged militants have fueled the violence by firing at state security forces on hospital grounds. “Gunfights in hospitals put patients and medical workers at grave risk and threaten to shut down health care in Aden,” said Letta Tayler, senior Yemen researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Both securi

Somali militants 'arms seized'

16:00 IST, Friday, 19 October 2012 Al-Shabab merged with al-Qaeda in February and the two groups have long worked together A large consignment of arms destined for suspected Islamist militants in north-eastern Somalia has been seized, a regional governor has told the BBC. Abdisamad Gallan said a boat said to have come from Yemen delivered sealed sacks full of land mines and artillery. Correspondents say this is one of the biggest seizures of al-Shabab weapons. The discovery was made after a tip-off from residents in Qandala, a coastal town in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland, Mr Gallan said. The al-Shabab group says it wants to strengthen its presence in Puntland. The al-Qaeda-aligned group once dominated all of central and southern Somalia, but has now lost all the major towns it once controlled, although it still occupies many rural areas. Somalia descended into a patchwork of territories controlled by rival warlords and clans after the overthrow of President Siad

New arrests over Dominican 'sect'

03:07 IST, Saturday, 20 October 2012 The house in Sousa had its own shooting range The Dominican Republic authorities have arrested two more German suspected doomsday cult members over a deadly shootout earlier this week. Daniel Brunck and Isabella Dietrich were ordered by a judge to stay in preventative detention while a police investigation continued. They joined Peter Brunck, Daniel's father, who had been held earlier. Peter Demetrick, also a German citizen, was killed in the shootout in the northern town of Sosua on Wednesday. Police later seized rifles, grenades and crossbows in the exclusive neighbourhood in the seaside town popular with German immigrants. 'Very dangerous' On Friday, the judge in Sosua ordered the arrest of Daniel Brunck and Isabella Dietrich, who is believed to have been Mr Demetrick's girlfriend. They could remain in police custody for up to a year while investigations proceed. Peter Brunck, the alleged leader of the Academy fo

UN to sanction Congo's M23 rebels

05:24 IST, Saturday, 20 October 2012 M23 rebels mutinied from the Congolese army in April in eastern DRC The UN Security Council says it intends to impose sanctions against leaders of the M23 rebel movement in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It said it would also target those who violate an arms embargo in DRC. This week a UN panel of experts said Rwanda and Uganda were supplying M23 with weapons and other support - allegations those countries deny. On Thursday, Rwanda was elected to a temporary seat on the Security Council. M23 rebels have been fighting the DRC government since April. The non-binding Security Council statement condemns the M23 militia for "all its attacks on the civilian population, United Nations peacekeepers and humanitarian actors, as well as its abuses of human rights, including summary executions, sexual and gender-based violence and large-scale recruitment and use of child soldiers". It also expresses "deep concern" at report

HSBC says websites hit by cyber-attack

Agence France-Presse | Updated: October 19, 2012 16:28 IST Banking giant HSBC said Friday some of its websites had been hit by a "large scale" cyber attack that disrupted online services, but it assured customers that their data were not compromised. The bank said in a statement that HSBC servers came under a "large scale denial of service attack" on Thursday. It said a number of sites were affected around the world but did not give an exact number or say where they were. "This denial of service attack did not affect any customer data, but did prevent customers using HSBC online services, including Internet banking," the bank said. "We are taking appropriate action, working hard to restore service," the bank added. It said some of the sites are back up and running. A denial of service attack typically involves sites being saturated with requests. The London-headquartered, Asia-focused lender said it is working with authorities to inv

Torture UK: why Britain has blood on its hands

US military personnel with detainees at Kandahar airport, Afghanistan. When the US and its allies went to war in Afghanistan in 2001, it was inevitable that a small number of those captured on the battlefield would be British. For more than a decade, MI5 had been aware that British Muslims had been travelling to Pakistan and Afghanistan in what it saw as a form of jihadi tourism that posed no threat to the UK. All that changed after 9/11. Among the Britons who were picked up in the wake of the attacks was a man called Jamal al-Harith. Born Ronald Fiddler in Manchester in 1966, Harith had converted to Islam in his 20s and travelled widely in the Muslim world before arriving in Afghanistan. After 9/11, he had been imprisoned by the Taliban, who suspected him of being a British spy. At one point he and several other prisoners were forced to share their large cell with a horse that had offended a local Taliban leader in some ill-defined way. A British journalist found Harith languishin

A look at some recent attacks against prominent Lebanese figures

A car bomb Friday killed the chief of Lebanon's police intelligence department, Brig. Gen. Wissam al-Hassan, in a Christian neighbourhood in east Beirut. Seven other people were killed in the blast and dozens wounded. Here's a look at the other recent attacks in Lebanon, most of them against opponents of Syria: — Feb. 14, 2005: Former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri is assassinated in a massive bombing in Beirut. Bassel Fleihan, who served as economy minister in Hariri's government, also died in the blast. Anti-Syrian groups, then in the opposition, blame the Syrian and Lebanese governments, charges both deny. — June 2, 2005: Anti-Syrian journalist and activist Samir Kassir is killed by a bomb placed under his car. — June 21, 2005: Anti-Syrian politician George Hawi, a former Communist Party leader, is killed by a bomb planted under his car. — July 12, 2005: Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Elias Murr survives a car bombing that targets his vehicle as he driv

Tackling extremism in Indonesia what others say

The Straits Times, Asia News Network October 20, 2012 1:00 am The 10th anniversary of the Bali bombings this month is an opportunity for introspection on how far Indonesia has come since then. The terrorist attack carried out by the al-Qaeda-linked group, Jemaah Islamiah (JI), was instrumental in turning Southeast Asia into the second front of the so-called war on terror, a year after the 9/11 attacks in the United States. The spotlight was very much on Indonesia as sporadic attacks on foreign targets took place since then - notably the Jakarta Marriott bombings of 2003 and 2009, and the Australian Embassy bombing of 2004. Luckily, terrorists have failed to pull off a repeat of the Bali blasts, which killed more than 200 people. Despite being held back by weak anti-terrorism laws, Indonesia has been able to put JI and its offshoots on the defensive, thanks to the work of the Detachment 88 anti-terrorism squad. Funded by the United States and Australia but bearing the imprint o