Posts

Showing posts from March 4, 2018

'How I joined the jihadis by mistake'

Image
More than 300 people from Kosovo went to join Islamists fighting "holy war" in Syria and Iraq - per capita the highest number in Europe. But not all of them match the popular image of a jihadi, as Helen Nianias discovered when she met a hipsterish young man for coffee in the Kosovan capital, Pristina. A man with a short beard, a dark pea coat and a bemused expression weaves towards me between the tables of this smart cafe. Sitting down, he looks slightly embarrassed as a tall glass of coffee topped with a huge quiff of whipped cream is put in front of him.  This is Albert Berisha. He's 31 years old and five years ago he went to Syria to fight.  "I know it's hard to believe, but it happened," Albert says about his nine days with different extremist groups. Articulate and focused, he says his primary reason for going to Syria was to oppose the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad.  To misquote the film Withnail and I, Albert went to fight "by mista

Veterans home in US under lockdown following shootout

California [USA], Mar. 10 (ANI):  The Veterans Home of California  in Yountville has been placed under lockdown after an armed man has taken three hostages during a shooting situation, which is still unfolding. According to local media reports,  FBI  officials and a  SWAT  team have reached the spot to resolve the situation. "Law enforcement is at the Yountville Veteran's Home right now following reports of gunfire. The safety of our residents, workers and the community is our top priority," the veterans home said in a statement on Facebook. "We have activated our emergency response protocol and are cooperating with law enforcement. Further official information will be provided by law enforcement when it is confirmed." A number of ambulances, firetrucks and an armoured police vehicle have also been seen at the property. Source  https://www.aninews.in/news/world/us/veterans-home-in-us-under-lockdown-following-shootout201803100507140001/

Erdogan's Rising Islamist Militarism

With enemies at home and abroad, the Turkish president is doing all he can to cultivate nationalism and loyalty.   By  Eric Edelman  and   Merve Tahiroglu The 6-year-old child who cried in front of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has become a  global sensation . Erdogan spotted the weeping girl wearing a military uniform during an address at his party’s congress last week, brought her onto the stage, and told her that if she died as a martyr, her coffin would be covered with the Turkish flag she held in her pocket. “You are ready for anything, aren’t you?” the Islamist strongman asked. The terrified child managed to utter “yes,” though it was hard to hear it through her sobs. Nationalism is running high in Turkey. Ankara is at war with Kurdish insurgents in the country’s southeast, and across the border in Syria since January. Moreover, Turkey has been under a  state of emergency  since mid-2016, when a rogue group within the military attempted a coup against Erdog

Malala Talks to David Letterman About Girls' Education, Fighting Extremism

Image
Nobel Prize winner's episode of 'My Next Guest Needs No Introduction' will begin streaming on Netflix this Friday 18 hours ago Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai will appear on the next episode of  My Next Guest Needs No Introduction With David Letterman . In honor of International Women's Day, a preview clip shows the 20-year-old activist discussing gender equality with the late-night talk show legend. The clip opens with Letterman asking Yousafzai about what would have happened if she had not survived the Taliban's assassination attempt against her in retaliation to her activism in her home country, Pakistan.  "I would hope that many people would have stood up and stood up against extremists, against not just the extremists, not just the people, but against the ideology," she answers frankly. "Because that's what we have to fight against: the ideology that exists there that does not accept women as equal to men [and] that

Jaspal Atwal expresses remorse for crimes and says he denounces Sikh extremism, "any form of terrorism"

We’re hearing today from the man who helped create quite the storm of controversy during the Prime Minister’s recent trip to India. Trudeau was forced to apologize when convicted criminal Jaspal Atwal showed up at a reception hosted by the Canadian government. Nadia Stewart is here now with Atwal’s side of the story

New Wave of Families Flees Post-Islamic State Iraq

Image
“They kicked us out of our home and stole our furniture and valuables,” said Rugya Saleem, a mother of six, plucking at the carpet of the tent in a desert refugee camp. She said her husband was forced to join Islamic State militants, and then was later killed by victims of the group. “They said our things belonged to IS. But they didn’t. It was all we had.” Going home again, she added, is not an option. Like many other people across northern Iraq, she fled her home recently, months after Iraq’s battle with IS militants was declared victorious. And while people are returning to their homes in droves, in many camps, the population is growing. FILE - Wives of killed or captured IS fighters often continue to cover themselves in black veils in the Haj Ali camp in Northern Iraq, Dec. 27, 2017. It's not just the families of captured or killed IS militants being forced to flee their homes. The majority of the newly displaced are fleeing extreme poverty and desolate, destroyed

Aid convoy reaches militant-held Eastern Ghouta: ICRC

Image
Trucks belonging to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) are seen parked on March 8, 2018, at the al-Wafideen checkpoint on the outskirts of Damascus neighboring the militant-held Eastern Ghouta region. (Photo by AFP) The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) says a humanitarian aid convoy has entered Syria’s Eastern Ghouta as government troops secured a humanitarian corridor for trapped civilians to leave the militant-held area near Damascus. The ICRC said Friday that the aid convoy comprising 13 trucks passed through front lines and was heading to the enclave’s biggest town, Douma. No further details were immediately available. The convoy was supposed to deliver its relief supplies on Monday, but it could not enter the area due to heavy fighting. The ICRC is preparing additional supplies, including medical material, to be sent in a bigger convoy next week. Bilal Abu Salah, a resident of Douma said, “The situation is relatively good today,” but add

Iran says it supports intra-Afghan peace talks

Image
Iranian Ambassador to the UN Gholamali Khoshrou, front, listens to a speech at a Security Council meeting, January 5, 2018. (Photo by AP) Iran says it supports all forms of peace talks among various Afghan groups, urging regional and international assistance towards the resolution of the Central Asian country’s security and economic woes. Addressing a Security Council debate on Afghanistan on Thursday, Iran’s UN envoy Gholam-Ali Khoshrou said the Islamic Republic “backs all kinds of reconciliatory Afghan-Afghan talks towards achieving peace. In this context, we welcomed participation in the Kabul Process and similar procedures towards achieving peace and security in Afghanistan.”  The Kabul Process  held its first session in June 2017, and the second one on February 28. Dozens of international delegates, including representative from Iran, partook in both editions. The second conference saw Afghan President Ashraf Ghani offering the Taliban militant group to join direct talks

Britain's Massive Charity Scam

Image
In a secularized West, charitable organizations are the modern-day saints granting us our expiatory rites. Many humanitarian NGOs even seem to cater to Western consciences filled with guilt. Since these NGOs say they work on behalf of "humanity" and for a "better world", while possibly assuming that states and governments act only for the sake of social efficiency or their own self-preserving interests. Yet, often these NGOs risk becoming bureaucracies as much as states do, sometimes even with similar sexual and financial scandals. At times these NGOs also can look like just a " mammoth machinery " with more employees than services; a steep, often unaccountable budget, and an ideology promoting the worst " Western stereotyping ". The weekly magazine  The Spectator  called them " the bad charity ". Lately, not a single week has passed without a negative story in the press about British NGOs. Now Oxfam, one of the wealthiest and

Hashd al-Sha’abi formally inducted into Iraq security system

Image
Members of the Imam Ali Division, one of the groups fighting within the Popular Mobilization Units (Hashd al-Sha’abi), celebrate after Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared victory in the war against Daesh, in a location about 80 kilometers (about 50 miles) along the Iraqi-Syrian border west of the border town of al-Qa’im on December 9, 2017. (Photo by AFP) Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has issued a decree, ordering the formal inclusion of pro-government fighters from the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) in the Arab country's security forces. According to the decree announced on Thursday, the volunteer forces, better known by the Arabic name Hashd al-Sha’abi, will be granted many of the same rights as members of the military. The decree added that Hashd al-Sha’abi fighters will be given equivalent salaries to those members of the military under the Ministry of Defense's control. They will also be subject to the laws of military service, and will gain acc

UN rights chief raps ‘serial denials’ of abuse by Myanmar

Image
United Nations (UN) High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein (photo by AFP) The United Nations human rights chief says Myanmar is making “serial denials” of the state-sponsored abuses carried out against Rohingya Muslims, shortly after a Myanmarese official demanded evidence of alleged genocide. Speaking in a news conference in Geneva on Friday, Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein urged the UN General Assembly to refer the case of the atrocities committed against the Muslim Rohingya minority in Buddhist-majority Myanmar to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for prosecution. Earlier, the UN official had said he had  strong suspicion  that acts of genocide had taken place against the Rohingya. Myanmar has consistently denied that any violence has taken place against the Rohingya Muslims despite the widespread and well-documented accounts of horrific violence and sabotage, including  satellite imagery . Myanmar’s National Security Adviser Thaung Tun on Thursday brazenly d

Afghanistan: Suicide bomber strikes Shiite area in Kabul, at least seven people killed in attack

Image
Kabul:  A suicide bomber on foot blew himself up in Kabul's Shiite area on Friday, killing at least seven people, officials said, in the latest attack in the Afghan capital. "In the explosion, seven were martyred and seven were wounded," interior ministry spokesman Najib Danish wrote on Facebook. One policeman was among those killed in the blast, which happened near a gathering to mark the 23rd anniversary of the death of Abdul Ali Mazari — a prominent former leader of the mainly Shiite Hazara ethnic community who was killed by the Taliban. Representational image. AP Kabul police chief Mohammad Daud Amin told  Tolo News  that the bomber detonated his explosive device at a checkpoint "after being identified by police". "The bomber failed to get inside to target the gathering," Amin said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack but it comes amid growing pressure on the Taliban to take up an offer by the Afghan gove

Alleged Ultra-nationalist anti-Rohingya monk released from Myanmar prison

Image
An Alleged ultra-nationalist Myanmar monk was released from prison on Friday after serving time for inciting unrest in an anti-Rohingya protest in 2016, a rare punishment handed to one of the country's hardline Buddhist clergymen. Parmaukkha, who was handed a three-month jail term, has helped peddle a fiery brand of Buddhist nationalism and Islamophobia in Myanmar, a country accused of waging an ethnic cleansing campaign against Rohingya Muslims. The monk was arrested in November over a rally he held outside the US Embassy in Yangon in April 2016 to protest against America's use of the word "Rohingya". The Buddhist-majority nation refuses to recognise the Rohingya as citizens, referring pejoratively to the community as "Bengalis" and insisting they are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Today several dozen supporters cheered and scattered petals in front of Parmaukkha as he walked out of Yangon's notorious Insein prison at dawn before hea