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Showing posts from November 19, 2017

American mercenaries are torturing Saudi princes: British media

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The exact age of Mohammed, who sports a full dark beard, is uncertain. PHOTO: REUTERS  Saudi princes and billionaire businessmen arrested in a power grab earlier this month are being strung up by their feet and beaten by American private security contractors. The group of the country’s most powerful figures were arrested in a crackdown ordered by Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman three weeks ago as he ordered the detention of at least 11 fellow princes and hundreds of businessmen and government officials over claims of corruption, reports  Dailymail.com . How Saudi Arabia has overreached on Iran, Lebanon The British media agency disclosed that the arrests have been followed by ‘interrogations’ which a source said were being carried out by ‘American mercenaries’ brought in to work for the 32-year-old crown prince, who is now the kingdom’s most powerful figure. ‘They are beating them, torturing them, slapping them, insulting them. They want to break them down,’ the source

Autocracies breed terrorism in Middle East: Qatari foreign minister

In an effort to present his country as a more reliable ally of the West in the war on terror, Qatar’s Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al Thani has said the main reason for terrorism in the Middle East is the presence of authoritarian rulers in the region. Speaking at a Qatar-sponsored anti-terror conference held in London, in front of ministers of the British government, the minster affirmed his country’s firm resolve to use political, economic and security measures to attack terrorism’s “breeding ground of injustice and authoritarianism”. Qatari Emir  Tamim bin Hamad al Thani announced earlier this month that the country would hold elections for a 45-member ‘consultative shura council’ in 2019 amid criticism that the country was being run by a royal family which did not allow Doha-based popular broadcaster  Al Jazeera  to criticise developments inside the country, as opposed to the networks’s critical coverage of political and security issues in the region at large.

26/11 Mumbai terror attacks: Conspirators, their role and what has happened so far

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November 26, 2008, the day when 10 armed Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists attacked the city of Mumbai taking the lives of 160 innocent people and wounding several others. Ajmal Kasab, the only terrorist who was captured alive was hanged to death by the Mumbai Police. While the nine other terrorists – Ajmal Amir, Abu Ismail Dera Ismail Khan, Hafiz Arshad, Babar Imran, Javed, Shoaib, Nazir Ahmed, Nasir, Abdul Rahman and Fahadullah – were shot dead during the attacks. Though these 10 terrorists were killed, the alleged masterminds of the attacks continue to live a normal life. Here’s a look at the alleged conspirators, their role and what has happened so far. Hafiz Muhammad Saeed The co-founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba and the chief Jamaat-Ud-Dawa,   Hafiz Muhammad Saeed is said to be the mastermind of the heinous attacks. Saeed claimed Jamaat-Ud-Dawa a charitable organisation but it has been declared as a terrorist organisation by the United Nations. It is said that Saeed planned, executed and s

Saudi Arabia brings down ballistic missile fired from Yemen near Riyadh airport

Saudi Arabia’s defence forces on Saturday intercepted a ballistic missile, fired from Yemen, and brought it down over the capital city Riyadh,  Reuters  reported, quoting state news agencies. Fragments of the missile landed near the airport, but there were no casualties.  A loud explosion was heard around 8.20 pm local time when the missile was brought down. However, air traffic was not affected, according to Saudi Arabia’s General Civil Aviation Authority. The missile was fired at 8.07 pm local time, the spokesperson of a Saudi-led military coalition said, adding that Saudi forces used a surface-to-air missile to destroy it. It landed in an uninhabited area east of the airport. The Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen told  Al Jazeera  that they had launched the missile. “The capital cities of countries that continually shell us, targeting innocent civilians, will not be spared from our missiles,” said a spokesperson. The Houthis control a large part of Yemen. They have be

US to stop arming Syrian Kurds: Donald Trump tells Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan

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In a phone call with Erdogan, Trump said he’d “given clear instructions” that the Kurds will receive no more weapons — “and that this nonsense should have ended a long time ago,” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. File pic - US to stop arming Syrian Kurds: Donald Trump tells Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan  The United States will cut off its supply of arms to Kurdish fighters in Syria, President Donald Trump told the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday, in a move sure to please Turkey but further alienate Syrian Kurds who bore much of the fight against the Islamic State group. In a phone call with Erdogan, Trump said he’d “given clear instructions” that the Kurds will receive no more weapons — “and that this nonsense should have ended a long time ago,” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. The White House confirmed the move in a cryptic statement about the phone call that said Trump had informed the Turk of “pending adjustments to

A look at the deadliest militant attacks in Egypt

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Egypt has been battling an insurgency in the Sinai led by an affiliate of the Islamic State group that intensified after the military's 2013 ouster of the Muslim Brotherhood from power. Hundreds have been killed in what has become a grinding stalemate in Sinai. By:  AP  | Cairo | Updated: November 25, 2017 1:37 pm Injured people are evacuated from the scene of a militant attack on a mosque in Bir al-Abd in the northern Sinai Peninsula of Egypt on Friday. (AP Photo) Egypt was hit by its deadliest-ever militant attack when gunmen opened fire and set off explosives at a mosque in the northern Sinai Peninsula,  killing more than 200 people. Egypt has been battling an insurgency in the Sinai led by an affiliate of the Islamic State group that intensified after the military’s 2013 ouster of the Muslim Brotherhood from power. Hundreds have been killed in what has become a grinding stalemate in Sinai. The militants have expanded their attacks to other parts of Egypt, carrying o

Fundamentalists Sit-in : Policeman martyred, over 190 injured in Islamabad clashes

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ISLAMABAD: A policeman was martyred and over 190 people including police officers were injured as forces on Saturday moved to disperse a sit-in that has virtually paralysed the country´s capital for weeks. Smoke and tear gas filled the air as the roughly 8,500 elite police and paramilitary troops in riot gear were also seen throwing rocks and using slingshots in the ongoing bid to clear 2,000 or so hardline demonstrators which began soon after dawn. AFP reporters at the site said more protesters were arriving, though it was difficult to tell how many. Trees had been cut down to block roads, and protesters were burning tyres. Pakistan´s media regulator barred local TV channels from broadcasting live images from the scene as violence intensified. At least 110 injured people have been taken to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences in Islamabad, a spokesman from the hospital told AFP, adding that 66 of them were members of the security forces.  An Islamabad police spokesma

Film on ‘Pakistan’s toughest woman’ Nazo Dharejo is in Oscar race

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Nazo Dharejo says she is “very happy” with the final film (My Pure Land), adding that the triumphant story belongs to Sindh and Pakistan”. Qazi Ahmed, Pakistan, Agence France-Presse As 200 armed men surrounded their house on a hot August night in 2005, Nazo Dharejo and her sisters grabbed their Kalashnikov and puny stock of ammunition and climbed to the roof. The gunfight which followed earned her the moniker “Pakistan’s toughest woman”, and became the subject of a film which has been entered in next year’s Academy Awards, vying for glory alongside heavy-hitters such as Angelina Jolie’s First They Killed My Father and Joachim Trier’s Thelma. A still from the film, My Pure Land. A world away from Hollywood’s red carpet, at the ancestral home Dharejo fought for in Pakistan’s rural Sindh province, she described the night which could lead to Oscar glory. “I will kill them or die here but never retreat,” Dharejo, now in her late 40s, recalled saying as assailants attacked

Saudi Arabia’s Arab Spring, at last

RIYADH ,  Saudi Arabia  — I never thought I’d live long enough to write this sentence: The most significant reform process underway anywhere in the  Middle East  today is in Saudi Arabia. Yes, you read that right. Though I came here at the start of Saudi winter, I found the country going through its own  Arab Spring , Saudi style.   Unlike the other Arab Springs — all of which emerged bottom up and failed miserably, except in Tunisia — this one is led from the top down by the country’s 32-year-old crown prince,  Mohammed bin Salman , and, if it succeeds, it will not only change the character of Saudi Arabia but the tone and tenor of Islam across the globe. Only a fool would predict its success — but only a fool would not root for it.   To better understand it I flew to Riyadh to interview the crown prince, known as “MBS,” who had not spoken about the extraordinary events here of early November, when his government arrested scores of Saudi princes and businessmen on charges of corrupti