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Showing posts from September 21, 2014

Muslims gather in Paris to denounce ISIS

Paris - Hundreds of people gathered in Paris on Friday answering a call by Muslim leaders to denounce the "barbarism" of Islamic State militants, as flags across France flew at half mast after the beheading of a French national. Imams and ordinary Muslims have rallied to condemn the execution of 55-year-old mountaineer Herve Gourdel this week by militants in Algeria with ties to the ISIS jihadists, as the country mourns the brutal murder. "This gathering is the strong and vibrant expression of our desire for national unity and of our unwavering will to live together," Dalil Boubakeur, head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith - an official representative for the country's roughly five million Muslims - told the gathering outside Paris's main mosque. "Islam is a religion of peace", he said, adding it "orders respect for life". Leading Muslim figures also signed a message published in French newspapers Friday condemning "

Australians band together to show support for Muslim community

Two Muslim men who have experienced the rising tension in the community since the terrorism threat level was raised said it is affecting everyone, from their wives and children to the elderly. Steve and Adam from south-west Sydney said they "can feel the tension in the air when you take your kids to the park" and there is also a visibly increased presence of the authorities which was making people feel uneasy. In the past week, there have been a string of incidents involving Muslim women being verbally abused in the street, cars being vandalised and mosques and religious buildings sprayed with graffiti. Muslim community members have said they feel they are the ones being terrorised. A 21-year-old man has been arrested and charged with being armed with intent to commit an indictable offence after allegedly entering the Al-Faisal school in Minto armed with a knife and asking if it was a "Muslim School". Steve and Adam have said some of the community have re

OKLAHOMA BEHEADING LEADS TO FEARS OF DOMESTIC TERRORISM

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A man who allegedly stabbed and beheaded a front office worker at food processing firm where he had just been fired from had recently started trying to convert employees to Islam,  USA Today reports . Moore, Okla., Police said the FBI was asked for assistance in the case because of the "manner of death" of the victim. Alton Nolen, 30, had just been fired from Vaughan Foods on Thursday afternoon when he drove to the front of the building, hit another vehicle and walked inside, according to police. "Nolen encountered (fellow worker Colleen) Hufford with a knife," said Sgt. Jeremy Lewis with the Moore Police Department. "During the attack, Nolen severed the victim's head." Lewis said the knife may have been used by Nolen at the plant to cut lettuce or vegetables. Nolen had the words "as-salaamu alaikum," Arabic for "peace be with you," tattooed on his abdomen according to Corrections Department records, NewsOk.com reports. C

Islamic State gains traction in al-Qaeda’s old stomping grounds

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The Islamic State's practical focus may be on Syria and Iraq right now, but there's some clear signs that their ideas have appeal further afield. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's self-proclaimed caliphate has found pockets of support far and wide, from  inner-city Britain  to the  island paradise of the Maldives . Now, there are increasing signs that the group is gaining support in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban, an Islamist group with a local focus, and al-Qaeda, a global jihadist militia, currently hold sway. Many are now wondering whether the Islamic State, which skews younger and has attracted more foreign support than other extremist groups, could find a foothold in the region – and if so, what that would mean for the global jihadist movement. Radio Free Afghanistan  reported Friday  that they were recently sent a video that appears to show three masked militants in Afghanistan declaring themselves the Islamic Organization of Great Afghanistan and pledging al

Twenty-two countries back Sri Lanka against UN probe into war crimes

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Colombo:  Sri Lanka has won the backing of 22 nations in its battle against the UN's war crimes probe into the country's human rights record during its brutal civil war. A government statement said the countries in a joint statement had termed the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) resolution passed last March as an intrusive mandate and unwarranted in the context of Sri Lanka's own local investigation. A cut out of Mahinda Rajapaksa in Colombo. AFP. The like minded group chaired by Egypt included Algeria, Angola, Bangladesh, Belarus, Bolivia, China, Cuba, Ecuador, Indonesia, Iran, North Korea, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Pakistan,Russia, South Sudan, Sudan, Uganda, Venezuela and Zimbabwe. This support was in addition to the concerns raised by India as Sri Lanka's all important giant neighbour had questioned the methodology of the investigation. This is in view of Sri Lanka's decision not to cooperate with the investigation. India backed the US-sponsored 2012 and 2

Police clear Hong Kong democracy protesters who stormed govt HQ

HONG KONG: Police cleared dozens of protesters who had been holding out at government headquarters on Saturday after storming the complex overnight, as a week-long protest against Beijing's refusal to grant the city unfettered democracy turned angry.  Police escorted the remaining 50 demonstrators from the building's forecourt on Saturday afternoon, hauling some of them away after they refused to leave.  Up to a thousand other protesters remained camped outside the government complex, booing the police through the fence as they began rounding up the remaining demonstrators.  "Police should catch thieves, not students!" the crowds shouted. The early hours had seen the tensest scenes yet in a string of recent protests, with riot police using pepper spray to clear out more than 100 people who had pushed into the grounds of the complex, some of them scaling a high fence.  Police had dragged many away overnight and into the morning, making 13 arrests.  Student groups have

Germany supplies arms and ammunition to Kurdish forces in Iraq

BERLIN: Germany delivered arms and ammunition to the Kurdish Peshmerga forces in Iraq to boost their firepower against the Islamic State militants who have captured large swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq.  The first transport plane carrying 27 tonnes of weapons landed in the Kurdish provincial capital of Irbil.  Airlifted from Leipzig in eastern Germany, the cargo included "Milan" antitank missiles, machine guns, ammunition and other military goods.  More cargo flights will operate to Irbil in the coming weeks to ferry over 600 tonnes of weapons and ammunition intended to boost the firepower of the Kurdish Peshmerga forces, German defense ministry said.  Around 10,000 Kurdish soldiers will be equipped with the military supplies from Germany, which include "Unimog" trucks and offroad vehicles, the ministry said in a press statement.  Germany had also supplied night vision equipment, protective clothing, helmets and other military materials to the Kurdish force

Islamic State Lieutenant Emerges From Australian Red-Light District

Sydney:    In Kings Cross, this city's bawdy, alcohol-infused red-light district, Mohammad Ali Baryalei once patrolled the sidewalk outside the Love Machine club, his basso voice luring customers in, his muscle keeping the unwanted out. For a time, the police said, his was a world of prostitutes, drugs, gangs and gambling.  But a few years ago, Baryalei, the son of Afghan refugees who settled in the suburbs of Australia's most multicultural city, embraced radical Islam and traveled to Syria, where he resurfaced as a lieutenant of the extremist Islamic State. This month, the authorities here said, he was recorded on a phone call instructing a young Australian to carry out what the police described as a "demonstration killing" of a random person in Sydney.  Analysts and policymakers have debated whether the Islamic State has the ambition or the reach to carry out large-scale terrorist attacks in the West. Baryalei's phone call, from 9,000 miles and a world away from

Facing Islamic State With Few Supplies, Iraqi Soldiers Took to Phones

Baghdad:    The Iraqi unit, bunkered in a village in Anbar province, had held the militants at bay for four days. But running perilously low on ammunition, food and water, the soldiers finally took matters into their own hands.  They started making calls - to commanders, friends, members of Parliament, even a humanitarian aid organization.  "We told them we would be slaughtered if they did not provide us with ammunition," said Cpl. Hussein Thamir, 24, a soldier in the regiment.  Even so, the chain of command never got supplies to them, and the soldiers said they had finally been forced to abandon their base and run: another rout of the Iraqi military by fighters of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS.  On Friday, the soldiers' accounts of their battle this week again exposed some of the glaring weaknesses of the Iraqi army, which has been struggling to counter insurgents who have seized large stretches of western and northern Iraq this year.  Last weekend, Islamic State

Pakistan is building smaller nukes, but they just might be more dangerous

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Pakistan is likely working to create tactical nuclear weapons, which are smaller warheads built for use on battlefields rather than cities or infrastructure. These weapons are diminutive enough to be launched from warships or submarines, which makes them easier to use on short notice than traditional nuclear weapons.  Developing tactical nuclear weapons calls for miniaturization of current weaponry (the "Davy Crockett," developed by the US in the '50s, was designed to launch from a simple tripod). But as The Washington Post reports, analysts are divided on whether Pakistan will be able to make warheads tiny enough for sea-launching.  There's less uncertainty about the military advantage gained with such weapons. A warhead-toting navy would allow Pakistan to stay nuclear-capable regardless of what happens to its homeland, where its nuclear infrastructure is spread out.  READ ALSO:  Pakistan test-fires short range missile Hatf IX The trade-off there, for both Pakistan

How Lashkar, ISI tried to target Modi's swearing-in

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'Who in Pakistan was intending to carry out one of the most grievous acts of international terrorism just a few months ago?' Former CIA official Bruce Riedel reveals how the Lashkar-e-Tayiba and the ISI planned the attack on the Indian consulate in the Afghan city of Herat in May to take Indian diplomats hostage and disrupt Narendra Modi's swearing-in. Aziz Haniffa/ Rediff.com  reports from Washington, DC P rime Minister Narendra Modi is in the cross-hairs of terrorist groups like Lashkar-e-Tayiba and Al Qaeda, former Central Intelligence Agency official Bruce Riedel said in Washington, DC on Thursday, September 25. Riedel, who was with the CIA for over three decades, argued that the attack on the Indian consulate in the Afghan city of Herat in May was evidently to take Indian diplomats and other personnel hostage and disrupt Modi's swearing-in. Riedel, now a Senior Fellow and Director at the Brookings Institution's Intelligence Project, speaking at one