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Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Pakistan blast hits Shia procession - 28 Dec 09

A suicide bomber has blown himself up in Karachi. The attack happened during a procession of Shia Muslims on their holiest day. Mobs unleashed their anger after the blast, setting ablaze buildings, shops and cars, and attacked local police. Paramilitary forces have since taken control of central Karachi, and officials are appealing for calm, but already 40 people are dead, and more than 100 others injured.

Bomber hits Karachi procession



At least 30 people have been killed after a suicide bomber struck a procession of Shia Muslims in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi, according to police sources. The explosion struck on Monday as Shia worshippers marked Ashoura, the holiest event on the Shia Muslim calendar. Police sources told  that at least 80 people were injured in the blast, with many of those in a critical condition. The attack sparked riots in Karachi with angry mourners throwing stones at ambulances, torching cars and shops and firing bullets into the air. "A deliberate attempt seems to be afoot by the extremists to turn the fight against militants into a sectarian clash and make the people fight against one another," Asif Ali Zardari, Pakistan's president, said in a statement. The Pakistan Rangers, a paramilitary force, took control of several restive areas of Karachi after the blast, officials said. "People have been saying that the government has been apathetic to the listening to the warnings of potential attacks and people's fears," Talat Hussain, the director of news at the local  TV. "Any number of groups come to mind who may have carried out the attack ... The game clearly is to disrupt Pakistan." Rehman Malik, the interior minister, called for people to show restraint and asked that Shia processions over the next two days be cancelled following the attack. Bomber tackled Major Aurangzeb Khan, a spokesman for the paramilitary troops who were protecting the procession, said the death toll would have been much higher if one of the soldiers had not spotted the suicide bomber and tackled him. "He just took him down, and the bomber detonated himself," he said. Authorities found the intact head and torso of the suicide bomber on the third floor of a nearby office building, where it had broken through a window, Munir Sheikh, a bomb disposal squad official, said. About 16kg of high explosive were used in the bombing, he said. Pakistan had tightened security to protect mass processions ahead of Ashoura, deploying tens of thousands of police and paramilitary forces. The attack in Karachi was the third on the commemorations in Pakistan this year. A suicide attack at a Shiite mosque in Pakistani-administered Kashmir on Sunday killed seven people, while wxplosives wounded 17 people in Karachi on the same day.

Monday, December 28, 2009

Karachi burns on Ashura











Set ablaze by people reacting to the attack



More than a dozen vehicles and a four-storey building were also set ablaze by people reacting to the attack. Fazal Qureshi, chief editor of the Pakistan Press International news agency, told "These processions cover long distances, they were marching through the central road when suddenly the bomber blew himself up. "It is impossible to stop someone who is prepared to die. There is an atmosphere of fear throughout the city." "The Shia community would certainly have been the specific target of this attack, but there have been no claims of responsibility so far." "The Shia are in the minority but make up a significant number of Pakistanis. "They are woven into the fabric of Pakistan. However, they are under attack for their beliefs." Rehman Malik, the interior minister, has called for people to show restraint and asked that Shia processions over the next two days be cancelled following the attack. Talat Hussain, the director of news at the local TV, told  "Any number of groups come to mind who may have carried out the attack ... The game clearly is to disrupt Pakistan." Concerning the violent reaction to the strike, Hussain said: "People have been saying that the government has been apathetic to the listening to the warnings of potential attacks and people's fears." Pakistan had tightened security to protect mass processions ahead of Ashoura, deploying tens of thousands of police and paramilitary forces.

Suicide attack on Ashura procession kills 33 in Karachi



At least 33 people have been killed after a bomb blast struck a procession of Shia Muslims in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi, according to police sources. The explosion struck on Monday as Shia worshippers marked Ashoura, the holiest event on the Shia Muslim calendar. Police sources told  that at least 50 people were injured in the blast, with many of those in a critical condition. The cause of the blast was not immediately clear. "We are trying to ascertain whether it was a time bomb or a suicide attack, but it is a terrorist attack," Abdul Wahid Khan, a senior police official, was quoted by the Reuters news agency as saying. The Pakistan Rangers, a paramilitary force, has taken over responsibility for restive areas of Karachi, officials said. Television footage showed crowds around the blast area, smoke rising over the scene and ambulances going back and forth. Some people in the crowd, apparently angered at the attack, fired shots into the air, witnesses said.

Taliban have expanded influence across Afghanistan: NATO



The Afghan Taliban have expanded their influence across Afghanistan and are now running a 'full-fledged insurgency’ with their own 'governors’ in all but one of the country’s provinces, a senior North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) intelligence official said. "Time is running out. We’ve got about a year to prove that our strategy can actually work. The Taliban has shadow governors in 33 out of the 34 provinces," the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told a small group of reporters. "So he (the Taliban) has got a government-in-waiting. He has got ministers," he added. Violence in Afghanistan has reached some of its highest levels in the eight-year war and the United States President Barack Obama is sending in 30,000 extra troops as part of his new war strategy, to try to turn the tide. Other NATO countries are sending some 7,000 more. But Washington’s plan also calls for US troop levels to be scaled down from 2011 and the White House has said the United States will not be in Afghanistan in eight or nine years’ time. The Taliban are willing to wait. "The insurgency is confident and are looking towards a post-ISAF Afghanistan," he said, referring to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force. "If we are going to be successful, this has to be perceived as an international effort, almost a struggle, and it is a struggle, to stop or deter this notion of Islamic extremism." There are already around 110,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan but despite the numbers, they are locked in a stalemate with the Taliban, unable to stem the rising tide of suicide and roadside bomb attacks. With the improvised explosive device (IED) or roadside bomb, the Taliban have found their weapon of choice against the foreign troops, the official said, adding 'kinetic’ events had risen by 300 percent since 2007. The official said in 2003, foreign forces dealt with 81 IEDs, that figure rose to over 7,200 for 2009. This figure includes IEDs that had exploded and those that were found and cleared. "This is not meant to be a joke, but whoever is their logistics chief, you know, we ought to be taking lessons from them. Because that’s pretty good for an enemy insurgent force to generate that kind of capability," the official said. Foreign troop casualties are at their highest since the war began and public support is waning. More than 1,500 soldiers have died in Afghanistan since the war started in late 2001 and twice as many Americans have died so far this year compared to 2008.

Pakistan Is Rocked by a Spate of Attacks


A handful of deadly attacks ravaged parts of Pakistan this weekend and highlighted the multiple security challenges confronting the embattled Islamabad government, from violent vendettas by Taliban militants to sectarian violence against minority Shiites. The bloodiest attack happened Sunday in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani-controlled Kashmir in the north of the country, where a suicide bomber killed at least 10 people and wounded more than 80 during a Shiite religious procession. The attack could have been worse, the local authorities said: the bomber had been trying to enter a prayer hall but blew himself up when guards blocked him. Pakistani troops were rushed in to restore order. More than a dozen people were wounded in Karachi the day before by a small bomb. Both attacks appeared directed at Shiites observing Ashura, which commemorates the death of Imam Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, in A.D. 680. The identities of the attackers were not clear, but the country’s Shiites, one-fifth of the population, continue to be the targets of Sunni extremists. Past Shiite holidays have been singled out by sectarian militants, leading Pakistani security forces to deploy tens of thousands to protect Ashura marchers this year. The Kashmir attack followed the assassination on Sunday of a mid-level political administrator named Sarfaraz Khan and his family in the Kurram tribal area near the Afghan border. Taliban militants detonated a bomb at Mr. Khan’s home, killing him, his wife and four of his children, the local authorities said. The attack appeared to be retribution for the Pakistani military’s bombing and helicopter strafing of Taliban hide-outs in Kurram and the neighboring tribal area, Orakzai, a stronghold of Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud, whose fighters seized control of Orakzai last year and instituted strict Islamic laws. One of his wives is also from Orakzai. Taliban fighters took positions in Kurram and Orakzai after fleeing a Pakistani offensive in the South Waziristan tribal area this fall, Pakistani intelligence and military officials say. Skirmishes are now routine. In a telephone interview, a Pakistani security official said that Pakistani jets killed six Orakzai militants during a bombing run on Sunday while Taliban guerrillas battled state-sponsored Lashkar tribal militiamen in southern Orakzai. Nine Taliban militants and eight militiamen have died so far in that battle, which was still happening late Sunday, he said. The South Waziristan offensive prompted Taliban commanders to intensify attacks in large cities and in the country’s interior. The military says it is throwing resources into killing militants who attack population centers. But Pakistani officials have refused American demands to drive out militants in North Waziristan, including networks controlled by Sirajuddin Haqqani, who are battling American troops across the border in Afghanistan. Such action is seen as crucial to President Obama’s recent order to send 30,000 additional American troops into Afghanistan. American forces are using drones and powerful missiles to attack those militants. The death toll for the latest drone strike, which occurred Saturday evening, has soared to 13, the Pakistani security official and a Pakistani intelligence officer said in interviews on Sunday. That attack, in Saidgai village in North Waziristan, killed seven foreign militants and six local fighters, the Pakistani security official said. Two missiles struck the compound of a man known as Asmatullah, he said. The intelligence official confirmed the number of dead at 13 but said he did not know their identities.

Following Path of Least Resistance, Terrorists Turn Yemen Into Poor Man's Afghanistan


With a stepped up presence of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, intelligence and security officials are now looking at other would-be hosts to Al Qaeda and its offshoot terrorist elements. Near the top of that list is Yemen. If terrorism follows the path of least resistance, then Yemen may be the poor man's Afghanistan. With a stepped up presence of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, intelligence and security officials are now looking at other would-be hosts to Al Qaeda and its offshoot terrorist elements. Near the top of that list is Yemen. "Iraq was yesterday's war. Afghanistan is today's war. If we don't act preemptively, Yemen will be tomorrow's war. That's the danger we face," said independent Sen. Joe Lieberman, head of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee. "Yemen is a hot spot. We need to do everything we can to work with that government," added Rep. Peter Hoekstra, the top Republican on the House intelligence committee, who appeared with Lieberman on "Fox News Sunday." The arrest of a Nigerian man accused of trying to blow up a transatlantic flight to the United States on Christmas Day has now led back to Yemen.  Sources told Fox News on Sunday that suspect Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab, the son of a wealthy retired Nigerian banker and government minister, had spent time in Yemen in the past year. A government report sent to law enforcement agencies on Sunday also referred to Abdul Mutallab's "extremist ties and possible involvement with Yemen-based extremists." However, federal officials have not determined that Mutallab obtained any explosives in Yemen. Yemen has been a trouble spot for a long time. In 2000, the USS Cole was attacked in the Yemeni port of Aden. Seventeen U.S. sailors were killed. All the defendants connected to the Cole bombing were released by Yemeni authorities or broke out of Yemeni jails by May 2008.  While Yemen's President Ali Abdallah Saleh has been increasing counter-terrorism cooperation, tribes in rural areas have given refuge to Islamic extremists. More than 90,000 Somali refugees also are located in Yemen, which sits across from the Horn of Africa. Nearly half of Yemen's population is under age 15, and fewer than half the people are literate. Yemen was reunified in 1990 after being divided in two since the end of World War II. The southern portion was overrun by Marxists after the British abandoned its protectorate in 1967. The north was run by an Islamic theocracy until 1962. Now, political parties are divided into Islamic reformist groups, socialists and a Ba'athist Party similar to Saddam Hussein's in Iraq, among others. The Muslim Brotherhood, a pan-Arab, Sunni group that wants to spread Islamic law to secular governments, is an influential pressure group.  "The Yemeni government now is facing three confrontations -- one with the south, one with Al Qaeda and one in the north" that is supported by the Iranians as part of its proxy war with the West and U.S. ally Saudi Arabia, said terrorism expert Walid Phares.

China author set to sue Google over web book scan



Chinese author Mian Mian, who shot to fame with lurid tales of sex, drugs and alcohol in the underworld, will sue Internet giant Google this week for copyright infringement, her lawyer said Monday. Sun Jingwei told AFP that the case -- the first civil lawsuit against Google in China over the scanning of books into its controversial web library -- would open at a Beijing court on Tuesday. "Tomorrow afternoon at the Haidian court, representatives from both sides will hand over evidence," Sun said. "After that I will be preparing our case and I figure that the actual trial will take place next year." The 39-year-old Mian Mian -- who won fame in 2000 with her novel "Candy," a story about prostitutes, gangsters and artists in the southern boomtown of Shenzhen -- is seeking 61,000 yuan (8,900 dollars) in damages. She alleges that Google illegally scanned her third novel "Acid Lovers" into its digital library, Sun said.

'Mousavi nephew' among Iran dead



The nephew of Mir Hossein Mousavi, the Iranian opposition leader, has reportedly been killed in violence surrounding street protests in Tehran during the Shia Muslim festival of Ashoura. Seyyed Ali Mousavi is thought to be among at least five people killed during the protests, which comments on social networking websites suggested would continue into Monday. The Parlemannews website said Mousavi's 35-year-old nephew was shot near his heart during clashes at Enghelab square "and was martyred after he was taken to Ebnesina hospital". State television reported that "unknown assailants" had killed Mousavi's nephew, naming him as Ali Habibi Mousavi Khamene. Opposition websites reported police had fired into crowds of demonstrators in central Tehran during Sunday's protests and witnesses said dozens of protesters were wounded in the police crackdowns. The reports could not be independently verified because foreign media are banned from covering protests.

Sunday, December 27, 2009

Karachi, Muzaffarabad blasts: Several injured


Several people have been injured in blasts in Karachi and Muzaffarabad on Sunday. In Karachi, the blast was occurred in Qasba coloney just before the passing of Muharram prosessions from the area. At least 20 people including Rangers and Police officials have been injured. Relief activities have been started. The injured have been shifted to nearby hospitals where emergency was declared after the blast. Police and Rangers have reached the spot and cordonned off the area. According to police sources, the blast was done with a remote control device. In Muzaffarabad, 6 people have been injured in a blast at CMH road while firing

World's fastest train introduced in China


China on Saturday unveiled what it billed as the fastest rail link in the world -- a train connecting at an average speed of 350 kilometers an hour. The super-high-speed train reduces the 1,069 kilometer journey to a three hour ride and cuts the previous journey time by more than seven and a half hours, the official said. Work on the project began in 2005 as part of plans to expand a high-speed network aimed at eventually linking Guangzhou, a business hub in southern China near Hong Kong, with the capital Beijing. "The train can go 394.2 kilometers per hour, it's the fastest train in operation in the world," said officials.

Elite U.S. Force Expanding Hunt in Afghanistan


Secretive branches of the military’s Special Operations forces have increased counterterrorism missions against some of the most lethal groups in Afghanistan and, because of their success, plan an even bigger expansion next year, according to American commanders. The commandos, from the Army’s Delta Force and the Navy's  classified Seals units, have had success weakening the network of Sirajuddin Haqqani  the strongest Taliban warrior in eastern Afghanistan, the officers said. Mr. Haqqani’s group has used its bases in neighboring Pakistan to carry out deadly strikes in and around Kabul, the Afghan capital. Guided by intercepted cellphone communications, the American commandos have also killed some important Taliban operatives in Marja, the most fearsome Taliban stronghold in Helmand Province in the south, the officers said. Marine commanders say they believe that there are some 1,000 fighters holed up in the town.
Although Obama and his top aides have not publicly discussed these highly classified missions as part of the administration’s revamped strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, the counterterrorism operations are expected to increase, along with the deployment of 30,000 more American forces in the next year. The increased counterterrorism operations over the past three or four months reflect growth in every part of the Afghanistan campaign, including conventional forces securing the population, other troops training and partnering with Afghan security forces, and more civilians to complement and capitalize on security gains. American commanders in Afghanistan rely on the commando units to carry out some of the most complicated operations against militant leaders, and the missions are never publicly acknowledged. The commandos are the same elite forces that have been pursuing Osama Bin laden, captured Saddam Hussein in Iraq in 2003 and led the hunt that ended in 2006 in the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader in Iraq of the insurgent group Al-Qaeda in MesopotamiaIn recent interviews here, commanders explained that the special-mission units from the Joint Special Operations Command were playing a pivotal role in hurting some of the toughest militant groups, and buying some time before American reinforcements arrived and more Afghan security forces could be trained. “They are extremely effective in the areas where we are focused,” said one American general in Afghanistan about the commandos, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the classified status of the missions. Gen. David H. Petraeus, who is in charge of the military’s Central Command, mentioned the increased focus on counterterrorism operations in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Dec. 9. But he spoke more obliquely about the teams actually conducting attacks against hard-core Taliban extremists, particularly those in rural areas outside the reach of population centers that conventional forces will focus on. “We actually will be increasing our counterterrorist component of the overall strategy,” General Petraeus told lawmakers. “There’s no question you’ve got to kill or capture those bad guys that are not reconcilable. And we are intending to do that, and we will have additional national mission force elements to do that when the spring rolls around.” Senior military officials say it is not surprising that the commandos are playing such an important role in the fight, particularly because Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the senior American and NATO officer in Afghanistan, led the Joint Special Operations Command for five years. In addition to the classified American commando missions, military officials say that other NATO special operations forces have teamed up with Afghan counterparts to attack Taliban bomb-making networks and other militant cells. About six weeks ago, allied and Afghan special operations forces killed about 150 Taliban fighters in several villages near Kunduz, in northern Afghanistan, a senior NATO military official said. Some missions have killed Taliban fighters while searching for Pfc. Bowe R. Bergdahl, who was reported missing on June 30 in eastern Afghanistan. The Taliban in July posted a video on jihadist Web sites in which the soldier identified himself and said that he had been captured when he lagged behind on a patrol. A second video was released on Friday. “We’ve been hitting them hard, but I want to be careful not to overstate our progress,” said the NATO official, speaking on the condition of anonymity in order to describe the operations in detail. “It has not yet been decisive.” In Helmand, more than 10,000 Marines, as well as Afghan and British forces, are gearing up for a major confrontation in Marja early next year. Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson, the senior Marine commander in the south, said in a recent interview, “The overt message we’re putting out is, Marja is next.” General Nicholson said there were both “kinetic and nonkinetic shaping operations” under way. In military parlance that means covert operations, including stealthy commando raids against specific targets, as well as an overt propaganda campaign intended to persuade some Taliban fighters to defect. Military officials say the commandos are mindful of General McChrystal’s directive earlier this year to take additional steps to prevent civilian casualties. In February, before General McChrystal was named to his current position, the head of the Joint Special Operations Command, Vice Adm. William H. McRaven, ordered a halt to most commando missions in Afghanistan, reflecting a growing concern that civilian deaths caused by American firepower were jeopardizing broader goals there. The halt, which lasted about two weeks, came after a series of nighttime raids by Special Operations troops killed women and children, and after months of mounting outrage in Afghanistan about civilians killed in air and ground attacks. The order covered all commando missions except those against the top leaders of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, military officials said. Across the border in Pakistan, where American commandos are not permitted to operate, the CIA has stepped up its missile strikes by Predator and Reaper drones on groups like the Haqqani network. But an official with Pakistan’s main spy agency, the ISI directorate, or I.S.I., said there had also been more than 60 joint operations involving the I.S.I. and the C.I.A. in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and Baluchistan in the past year. The official said the missions included “snatch and grabs” — the abduction of important militants — as well as efforts to kill leaders. These operations were based on intelligence provided by either the United States or Pakistan to be used against the Taliban and Al Qaeda, the official said. “We can expect to see more U.S. action against Haqqani,” a senior American diplomat in Pakistan said in a recent interview. The increasing tempo of commando operations in Afghanistan has caused some strains with other American commanders. Many of the top Special Operations forces, as well as intelligence analysts and surveillance aircraft, are being moved to Afghanistan from Iraq, as the Iraq war begins to wind down. “It’s caused some tensions over resources,” said Lt. Gen. Charles H. Jacoby Jr., the second-ranking commander in Iraq.

Afghan war museum displays past's horror



Afghan human rights activists have opened the country's first war crimes museum on the site of a mass grave, taking a first step towards national reconciliation for victims of atrocities. At the foot of the snow-capped Hindu Kush mountains stands a tall, white marble monument and, nearby, the single-storey museum which leading rights advocate Nader Nadery said represents the Afghan public's demand for justice. The museum aims to commemorate the deaths of tens of thousands of people in the past four decades of war and revolution that have blighted Afghanistan. Inside the museum, glass cases display a vast and heartbreaking array of objects found in the mass grave outside Faizabad, capital of remote northeastern Badakhshan province. Torn pieces of cloth, mangled shoes, rusty handcuffs and small personal belongings such as prayer beads and false teeth bear testimony to lives violently snuffed out and bodies tossed like garbage into a hole in the ground. Hundreds of photographs, mostly black and white, of teenage boys and elderly men with beards and turbans -- and every age in between -- adorn the walls. “The demand from the public for justice led us to establish this human rights victims war museum,” Nadery, a senior commissioner with the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), told AFP at its opening. “The objective is to make sure the victims are remembered and that war crimes never happen again,” he said, adding: “It's like the Holocaust museum.” Dozens of activists, officials and relatives of the victims gathered for the opening ceremony last Tuesday. Sima Samar, head of the AIHRC and a nominee for this year's Nobel peace prize won by US President Barack Obama, told them the monument could remind “passers-by (to) say a prayer for the victims and curse those responsible.” Mass killings The decision to build the monument followed the discovery here in 2006 of a mass grave containing the remains of more than 300 people. The victims were murdered in a “systematic mass killing” of people believed to have been opponents of Afghanistan's communist regime, which took power in 1978, sparking a nationwide armed resistance which lasted 10 years and cost millions of lives, Samar said. AIHRC has registered more than 100 mass graves, some of them containing up to 1,200 bodies, under a programme launched in 2007, Nadery said. The atrocities continued in the post-communist era when resistance fighters turned on each other in a bloody power struggle after defeating the Russians, who had invaded the country to protect the pro-Moscow regime in Kabul. Once again tens of thousands of civilians lost their lives, in fighting and mass killings similar to that in Faizabad, in the 1992-1996 civil war which was concentrated in Kabul, a city that still bears the scars. The United Nations estimates that more than 80,000 Afghan civilians died in that war. Despite the presence in the country of international troops following the 2001 overthrow of the Taliban -- another brutal regime which took over amid the chaos of the 1990s civil war -- the crimes did not end, Nadery said. With the country now in the grip of an Islamic insurgency -- and the 113,000 foreign troops fighting under US and NATO command to be boosted in the coming year by another 37,000 -- Afghan civilians are still victims of both sides, dying in insurgent attacks and counter-insurgent operations alike. Thousands of civilians have died in crossfire between militants and security forces since the 2001 invasion. Scores of others have been captured and reportedly tortured by Afghan and foreign forces. Nearly 1,100 civilians have died in violence in the past six months, according to the latest UN figures, showing a 24 per cent increase compared to the same period last year. 'We want justice' The litany of atrocities has prompted rights activists to call for justice. At the end of 2006 President Hamid Karzai signed a “Peace, Reconciliation and Justice Action Plan” that seeks to establish accountability and could lead to the trial of those responsible for war crimes. But the South African-style plan for what is called “transitional justice” remains unfulfilled as rights groups accuse the government of “unwillingness” to take action. “The main reason the government lacks the political willingness to deal with this issue stems from the fact that there are some people within the government who feel threatened by the prospect of having to be accountable for their actions and deal with the past,” Nadery said. The main targets of his concern are the strongmen and former militia commanders accused of war crimes now sharing government with Karzai. Ignoring warnings from his Western backers, the US, NATO and the UN, Karzai appointed Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim, a notorious warlord, as his vice president before the August presidential election which he won.

Nigerian charged with attempt to blow US airline



Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab of Nigeria has been charged with an attempt to bomb a US airline. However, neither Al-Qaeda nor any other such group has been charged in this regard. Meanwhile, UK police raided the house of Umar, mastermind of the US airline bomb plan, in London.

Iran police deny protester deaths



Iranian authorities have denied claims by opposition websites that at least four people have been killed in clashes between protesters and police in central Tehran. The websites on Sunday said the victims were killed as police used live ammunition and tear gas to disperse them.But Azizollah Rajabzadeh, the Tehran police chief, insisted that no protester had been killed. "So far there have been no reports of killings and no one has been killed up to now,"  Rajabzadeh was quoted by the Iran Students News Agency as saying. However, pictures linked on the Twitter microblogging site appeared to show a man with a wound to his head being carried away by opposition protesters.The clashes in Tehran came as the country's Shia Muslims marked Ashoura, a religious event commemorating the 7th century death of Prophet Muhammad's grandson. Amateur video footage posted on the internet, said to be from the protest, showed protesters running away from riot police or Basij militias on motorbikes.

PPP ready to give sacrifices for democracy: Zardari



President Asif Ali Zardari has said that Pakistan People’s Party is ready to give any sacrifice to uphold democracy in the country, saying that “We are the people who tread the path of martyrs”.  Zardari stated this while addressing a gathering consisting PPP members at Naudero, Garhi Khuda Bux after paying respects to Benazir Bhutto on her 2nd death anniversary on Sunday, Dunya News reported. Zardari posed a question whether he was criticized for giving political approval to the war on terror, for protecting the rights of Balochistan or for giving a unanimous NFC award to the nation? Zardai said that it was the incumbent government that first take up the Balochistan issue and got a unanimous NFC award after 19 years. He added that his government has resolved all the issues unanimously. He said he raised the slogan of ‘Pakistan Khappay’ for country’s stability. He noted that his government did not want clash between the institutions. He warned the political actors against luring the masses and vowed not to let anyone derail democracy in the country, saying that PPP nourished it with its own blood. Is Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto blamed for uniting the broken Pakistan, for making it an atomic power, for giving the poor their rights or for making the first constitution of country?, Zardari questioned. Zardari pledged to continue the mission of ZA Bhutto and added that PPP believes in the politics of reconciliation. He hailed the party workers and vowed to strengthen democracy in the country.

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Congress approves $636 billion in military spending


The US Congress on Saturday sent US President Barack Obama a massive annual military spending bill that funds current operations in Afghanistan and pays for the troop withdrawal from Iraq. In a rare weekend vote, the Senate approved the 636.3-billion-dollar package, which cleared the House of Representatives 395-34 on Wednesday, by an 88-10 margin. Obama is expected to send Congress an emergency spending measure of at least 30 billion dollars early next year to pay for his recently announced decision to send 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan. The bill includes 101.1 billion dollars for operations and maintenance and military personnel requirements in Iraq and Afghanistan and to carry out the planned withdrawal of all US combat forces from Iraq by August 2010. The package also funds the purchase of 6,600 new Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) armored vehicles configured to better resist improvised explosive devices -- roadside bombs used to deadly effect by insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. The bill includes 80 million dollars to acquire more unmanned "Predator" drones, a key tool in the US air war in Afghanistan and Pakistan. That campaign deploys unmanned Predator and larger Reaper drones equipped with infrared cameras and armed with precision-guided bombs and Hellfire missiles. With little public debate in the United States, the pace of the drone bombing raids has steadily increased, starting last year during ex-president George W. Bush's final months in office and now under Obama's tenure. The spending bill upholds Obama's ban on torture of detainees in US custody, continues a general provision forbidding the establishment of permanent bases in Iraq or Afghanistan, and provides no funds to close the prison for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on Saturday praised the bill's passage. "In addition to giving our troops a pay raise and funding more than 100 million dollars for operation of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, this bill extends unemployment and makes health insurance more affordable for unemployed Americans," Reid said. "We're keeping our country safe with critical investments in our defense and giving an important boost to our economy." Reid took a swipe at rival Republicans, accusing them of "political maneuvering" to slow down passage of the bill in order to delay debating health care reform, the next measure the Senate will be handling.

Nato chief calls for enhanced ties with Islamabad




Nato Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said that the military alliance’s new strategy to uproot terrorism from the Pak-Afghan region is based on increased cooperation with Islamabad.  Rasmussen said the U.S-led coalition must emerge victorious in its battle with the Taliban in Afghanistan, otherwise the militant outfit would destabilise not only Afghanistan, but Pakistan as well. The Nato chief added that Afghanistan cannot be allowed to become a safe haven for extremists, otherwise the country would be used to launch terror attacks into several Central Asian states. Rasmussen also warned that Islamabad cannot afford to drop its guard, as there are Al-Qaeda elements in Afghanistan that want to take over Pakistan, which is a nuclear-armed Pakistan.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

The War in Pashtunistan


The plan President Obama unveiled last week for Years 9 and 10 of the war in Afghanistan left a basic question begging for an answer: If Al Qaeda is the threat, and Al Qaeda is in Pakistan, why send another 30,000 troops to Afghanistan? In his address Tuesday night, the president mentioned Pakistan and the Pakistanis some 25 times, and called Pakistan and Afghanistan collectively “the epicenter of the violent extremism practiced by Al Qaeda.” But he might have had an easier time explaining what he was really proposing had he set the national boundaries aside and told Americans that the additional soldiers and marines were being sent to another land altogether: Pashtunistan. That land is not on any map, but it’s where leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taliban both hide. It straddles 1,000 miles of the 1,600-mile Afghan-Pakistani border. It is inhabited by the ethnic Pashtuns, a fiercely independent people that number 12 million on the Afghan side and 27 million on the Pakistani side. They have a language (Pashto), an elaborate traditional code of legal and moral conduct (Pashtunwali), a habit of crossing the largely unmarked border at will, and a centuries-long history of foreign interventions that ended badly for the foreigners. Whether Mr. Obama will have better luck there than President Bush, the Soviet Politburo and British prime ministers back to the early 19th century remains to be seen. But it is there that the war will be fought, because it is there that the Taliban were spawned and where they now regroup, attack and find shelter, for themselves and their Qaeda guests. Today, the enemies of the United States are nearly all in Pashtunistan, an aspirational name coined long ago by advocates of an independent Pashtun homeland. From bases in the Pakistani part of it — the Federally Administered Tribal Areas toward the north and Baluchistan province in the south — Afghan Taliban leaders, who are Pashtuns, have plotted attacks against Afghanistan. It is also from the Pakistani side of Pashtunistan that Qaeda militants have plotted terrorism against the West. And the essential strategic problem for the Americans has been this: their enemy, so far, has been able to draw advantage from the border between the two nation-states by ignoring it, and the Americans have so far been hindered because they must respect it. That is because Pakistan and Afghanistan care deeply about their sovereign rights on either side of the line, but the Pashtuns themselves have never paid the boundary much regard since it was drawn by a British diplomat, Mortimer Durand, in 1893. “They don’t recognize the border,” said Shuja Nawaz, director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council, a Washington policy group. “They never have. They never will.” And that has enormously complicated the war against the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The Taliban can plan an attack from Pakistan and execute it in Afghanistan. Their fighters — or Al Qaeda’s leaders — can slip across the border to flee, or to rejoin the battle. At the same time, the Americans can fight openly only in Afghanistan, not in Pakistan, and the Taliban know it. An American military officer who served at the border in 2003 and 2004 recalled Taliban fighters waving their rifles from the Pakistani side to taunt the Americans. “Our rules said we couldn’t follow them and we couldn’t shoot at them unless they shot at us,” the officer said. “But when we saw them over the border, we knew we should expect an attack that night. The only ones who recognized the border were us, with our G.P.S.” That has been changing all year, however, and it is about to change even more, as the Americans gear up for an intensified war on both sides of the line simultaneously. The dispatch of 30,000 additional Americans to the Afghan side of the border will occur simultaneously with more intensive missile strikes from drone aircraft and Pakistani army offensives on the other side. Ever since Osama escaped American forces in December 2001, crossing the mountains of Tora Bora from Afghanistan into Pakistan, American strategists have spoken of a “hammer and anvil” strategy to crush the militants. Until now, the border has proven so porous, and Pakistani governments so squeamish about a fight, that the American hammer in Afghanistan was pounding Taliban fighters there against a Pakistani pillow, not an anvil. Now, Mr. Obama’s added troops are likely to be concentrated in the Taliban stronghold in Helmand and Kandahar in southern Afghanistan, and near Khost in the east. At the same time, the president has approved a major intensification of drone strikes in Pakistan, even as the Pakistani army continues a campaign against the militants launched this fall in South Waziristan, following on a counterattack that swept militants last spring from the Swat Valley.

Khamenei says US, Britain will fail to isolate Iran



Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei lashed out Sunday at the US and Britain, labelling them Tehran's main "enemies" and warning they will fail to isolate Iran over its nuclear issue. "Americans are at the head of the list of enemies and the British are the most awful of them," state television reported Khamenei as saying in an address to thousands of people to mark a major Shiite ceremony. "The Iranian nation wants to achieve it so that it does not have to beg to Westerners 20 or 30 years later. But the Westerners through the false campaign are preventing us from getting it." He also said that when the "oppressive powers fail to achieve their goal against a country through threats of military action or sanctions, then they start saying that there is a division inside that country.

Death Toll in Russia Nightclub Fire Reaches 112



Shocked residents of the Urals city of Perm laid carnations Sunday at the snowy scene of a cordoned-off nightclub where officials say at least 112 people died in a fire. The blaze, in the early hours of Saturday, was thought to be sparked by fireworks that shot into the decorative twig ceiling of the Lame Horse nightclub during a pyrotechnics show. Nearly 100 were killed on the spot, and some 130 were hospitalized, many in critical condition. Many victims were trapped in a panicked crush for the exit as they attempted to escape the flames and thick black smoke. Emergency Ministry spokeswoman Darya Kochneva said Sunday the latest victim was a man who died of severe burns in a Moscow hospital where he was flown for treatment after the fire. Mourning residents are indignant over what they call negligence on the part of the club's management, which President Dmitry Medvedev also criticized in a nationally televised videoconference on Saturday. Officials said club managers had ignored repeated demands from authorities to change the interior to comply with fire safety standards. Authorities quickly arrested two registered co-owners of the club, its managing director and two other suspects. One other suspect was injured in the fire and remains in critical condition.

U.S. Officials Place bin Laden in No-Man's Land Between Pakistan, Afghanistan


U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates says the U.S. hasn't had intelligence on Usama bin Laden in years, but National Security Adviser Jim Jones speculates he is in North Waziristan and freely crossing the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. National Security Adviser James Jones said Sunday that Al Qaeda leader Usama bin Laden still spends some time inside Afghanistan. Most recent U.S. estimates have placed bin Laden inside Pakistan. But Jones, a retired general, said the best estimate is that bin Laden "is somewhere in North Waziristan, sometimes on the Pakistani side of the border, sometimes on the Afghan side of the border." Jones described it as "very, very rough, mountainous area. Generally ungoverned and we're going to have to get after that to make sure that this very, very important symbol of what Al Qaeda stands for is either, once again, on the run or captured or killed." Earlier, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the U.S. hasn't had any good intelligence for years on bin Laden's whereabouts. He said he couldn't confirm reports that bin Laden had been seen recently in Afghanistan. "If, as we suspect, he is in North Waziristan, it is an area that the Pakistani government has not had a presence in, in quite some time," Gates said. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said it was important to kill or capture bin Laden and other Al Qaeda leaders, "but certainly you can make enormous progress absent that." Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said people in the region have told him bin Laden "moves back and forth." He said the hunt for bin Laden has prevented him from establishing bases for training and equipping terrorists, adding, "Don't think Al Qaeda could not flourish without him if we give them a safe haven." Jones appeared on CNN's "State of the Union," Gates and Clinton were on ABC's "This Week," NBC's "Meet the Press" and CBs' "Face the Nation." McCain was on NBC.

US soldier deaths in Afghanistan top 300 this year



A bomb killed another US soldier in Afghanistan, bringing to more than 300 the number of American troops killed in the war this year as NATO-led troops pressed deadly raids. The latest death pushed to 301 the number of American soldiers killed in Afghanistan so far this year. The number is nearly twice the 155 American soldiers killed in 2008 when total foreign troop deaths numbered 295 for the entire year. US President Barack Obama has ordered 30,000 extra US troops to Afghanistan in a bid to bring a quick end to the eight-year war against the Taliban and Al-Qaeda that is increasingly unpopular at home. NATO allies have pledged at least another 7,000 troops to back the new US-led drive, which will boost foreign troop numbers to more than 150,000.

Pakistan’s nukes are safe: Indian minister



Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor said that Pakistan’s nuclear assets are safe and India has no suspicion about their security. In an interview with an Indian news channel, there is no possibility of falling Pakistani nukes into the hands of terrorists. Shashi Tharoor said that India has no information about Pakistani nuclear arsenal and those countries, who are very close to the coutry, are also satisfied with the security of nukes.

Violence erupts during Athens march




Police and protesters have clashed in Athens as the city marked the first anniversary of the fatal shooting of a 15-year-old boy which led to Greece's worst unrest in decades. Riot police, hoping to avoid the lengthy riots of last year, fired tear gas at thousands of demonstrators as they marched through the capital and other Greek cities on Sunday. Greece's government had deployed more than 6,000 police officers onto the streets of Athens to avert a repeat of the severe rioting that hit the capital and major cities last year which caused millions of dollars of damage.

US in back-channel talks with Afghan Taliban



After fighting a bloody war in Afghanistan for more than eight years, the United States appears to have undertaken a re-think of its policy and has started engaging the Taliban in negotiations through Saudi and Pakistani intelligence agencies, highly-placed sources told here on Monday. ‘We have started ‘engagement’ with the Afghan Taliban and are hopeful that our efforts will bear fruit,’ a source involved in secret negotiations told this correspondent. He said that four ‘major neutral players’ were engaged with the Afghan Taliban on behalf of the Saudi leadership and the General Intelligence Directorate (GID) of Saudi Arabia and the Pakistani leadership and Inter Services Intelligence (ISI). The GID and ISI have been doing the job on behalf of the US government and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The source said that one of the main objectives of the recent visit to Pakistan by CIA chief Leon Panetta was to assess progress in the back-channel negotiations. The source said that four leaders were playing the role of mediators on behalf of the Saudis and the Afghan Taliban. Among them is Abdullah Anas, a son-in-law of Osama bin Laden’s mentor Abdullah Azzam who was killed in Peshawar in 1989 along with his two sons. Anas lives in the UK, but maintains close links with the Afghan Taliban and even Al Qaida. Saudi national Abul Hassan Madni, once a prominent leader of Rabta-i-Alam-i-Islami, has also been in the picture. He lives in Madina. Abu Jud Mehmood Samrai, an Iraqi who is married to a Pakistani woman, has also been contacted. He was given Pakistani nationality by former president Ziaul Haq for his role in the Afghan war. Maulana Fazlur Rehman Khalil, a Pakistani militant leader, is also in the loop. Khalil, who co-founded the Harkatul Ansar, currently heads Hizbul Mujahideen. He had signed the famous decree issued by Osama bin Laden and Ayman Al Zawahiri in 1998 calling for killing the Americans. Khalil commands respect among both Pakistani and Afghani Taliban and is said to have played a secret mediatory role with Pakistani authorities for peace in the country. Reliable sources also told that Mullah Umar, the chief of Afghan Taliban, has nominated his shadow foreign minister, Agha Motasam, to negotiate with the Americans. They said that talks held so far were of a preliminary nature, but may resume on a serious note after Eid.

Saturday, December 5, 2009

My blog



Usually TTP (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan) say that they never carry out attacks on mosques and women. But then they are hardcore criminals so can we trust their claims. Never. I believe somewhere Al-Qaeda, TTP, and even Punjabi Tehrik Taliban along with other militant outfits have been linked. Their sole aim (apparently) is that Pakistan should withdraw US support. That seems a dream now so this means we’d be seeing many more such attacks in future (unfortunately). The involvement of foreign hand claim sounds cliche but then people in tribal areas have been hired (by foreign elements) to fire rockets on Peshawar etc. (That is just a small example). I always believe such outfits can never act without financial support from foreign elements as well as without help from inside. Today was one tragic day for Pakistan indeed!

Taliban Detainee Claims Bin Laden Seen in Afghanistan



A Taliban detainee in Pakistan claims Al Qaeda leader Usama bin Laden was seen in Afghanistan in January or February of this year, the BBC reports. The inmate, who said he met bin Laden numerous times before the Sept. 11 attacks, said he met with a contact who had seen the Al Qaeda leader days before in Afghanistan. "In 2009, in January or February I met this friend of mine. He said he had come from meeting Sheikh Osama, and he could arrange for me to meet him," he said. The detainee reportedly said the contact is a Mehsud tribesman. "He helps Al Qaeda people coming from other countries to get to the sheikh, so he can advise them on whatever they are planning for Europe or other places,” he told the BBC. His claims couldn’t be verified, but a former CIA analyst told the BBC they should be probed. "If it's true—a big if—this is an extraordinary and important story," the analyst told the BBC. "The entire Western intelligence community, CIA and M16, have been looking for Osama Bin Laden for the last seven years and haven't come upon a source of information like this," he said.

US forces launch fresh Afghan push



More than 1,000 US and Afghan troops have launched a fresh offensive against the Taliban in southern Afghanistan, in the first major operation since Barack Obama, the US president, announced his new Afghan strategy. US Marines, Afghan soldiers, and other Nato forces gathered behind Taliban lines in the northern end of the Now Zad Valley of Helmand province on Friday, Nato and US military officials said. Officials said another, larger force was pushing north from the town of Now Zad as part of the operation that the military has termed "Cobra's Anger".  "It has been taken, won and lost again and again by both sides," "Up until now, for the past three or four years the people of Now Zad have been unable to return to the city because of the fighting."

NATO will send 7,000 troops to Afghanistan



NATO's top official says that at least 25 countries will send a total of about 7,000 additional forces to Afghanistan next year and there are "more to come."  Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen says that "with the right resources, we can succeed." He spoke after a meeting with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, NATO foreign ministers and representatives of non-NATO countries that have forces in Afghanistan. Clinton is seeking reinforcements for President Barack Obama's new influx of troops to Afghanistan.

Hunt underway for Pakistan gunmen



Pakistani authorities have launched a massive manhunt across the garrison city of Rawalpindi for gunmen involved in a deadly attack on a mosque near the country's army headquarters. At least 37 people, including  17 children, were killed in the attack when several gunmen stormed the mosque, opening fire shortly after Friday prayers. Police and witnesses said seven or eight gunmen were armed with assault rifles and hand grenades when they entered the mosque. "They threw three grenades inside the mosque, one was thrown on the ladies' side, and two grenades were thrown inside the [men's section of the] mosque," one witness told  "I could only hear the shouting of the people."

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Reports Claim Woods Crash Followed Argument With Wife



The mystery over Tiger Woods' car crash intensified Saturday when his agent called state troopers on their way to Woods' house and asked them to wait another day before speaking to him. It was the second straight day Woods was unavailable to talk. His wife, Elin, told troopers on Friday afternoon, after the world's No. 1 golfer had been treated and released from a hospital, that he was sleeping and asked that they return Saturday. The postponements came as reports claimed the bizarre overnight car crash outside his Florida home Friday may have occurred following an argument with his wife. Celebrity Web site TMZ claimed Woods was confronted by Elin with the report that he had been seeing New York night club hostess Rachel Uchitel. The argument grew heated, and according to TMZ’s source, she scratched his face up. He then beat a hasty retreat to his SUV, with her following behind with a golf club. She reportedly used the club on the golfer's vehicle. Woods, then, reportedly became distracted, causing the car crash.

Pakistan President Under Increasing Pressure to Resign



Pakistan's unpopular president is coming under increasing pressure from the powerful army and political opponents to resign or relinquish most of his powers, fueling political turmoil just as the West wants the country to focus on the threat posed by Al Qaeda and the Taliban. An amnesty protecting President Asif Ali Zardari and several of his key allies from graft prosecution expired Saturday, raising the possibility of legal challenges to his rule and triggering calls from the major opposition party for him to step down. Hours earlier, he relinquished command of the country's nuclear arsenal to the prime minister. He has said he will also give up some other powers inherited from his predecessor, former military leader and President Pervez Musharraf. The upheaval comes as the Obama administration is expected to announce this week a new strategy for defeating the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan and on Pakistan's western border. Any new approach will need political stability in Pakistan to have any hope of succeeding. A military coup to oust Zardari appears unlikely, as does impeachment, since he heads the largest party in Parliament. The opposition has not called anti-government street rallies, perhaps wary of pushing the country into chaos and paving the way for another stint of military rule. Zardari, 54, is languishing in opinion polls just 15 months after taking office. He has long been haunted by corruption allegations dating back to governments led by his late wife, Benazir Bhutto. He denies accusations that he took kickbacks that saddled him with the nickname, "Mr. 10 Percent." He also has found himself locked in a power struggle with the powerful military, which has objected to his overtures toward nuclear-armed rival India and his acceptance of a multibillion dollar U.S. aid bill that came with conditions some fear impose controls over the army. Zardari's office said the decision to transfer control of the National Command Authority to Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was a step toward ceding sweeping presidential powers that had been adopted by Musharraf. The authority comprises a group of top military and political leaders who would make any decision to deploy nuclear weapons. In an interview Friday with a local television station, Zardari said he was also likely to relinquish the authority he inherited from Musharraf to dissolve Parliament and appoint services chiefs by the end of this year — as the opposition and civic activists have long demanded. That would reduce his job to a more ceremonial role, but would lesson some of the pressures on him to step down. Speculation over Zardari's future has escalated after he was forced to abandon an effort to get Parliament to approve the amnesty passed by Musharraf that granted more than 8,000 bureaucrats and politicians — including the president and many others from his Pakistan People's Party — immunity from a host of corruption and criminal charges. The amnesty list was part of a U.S.-backed deal to allow Prime Minister Bhutto to return from exile in 2007 and run for office safe in the knowledge she would not be dogged by corruption allegations. The U.S. and other Western nations supported the bid by Bhutto, who was seen as a secular and pro-Western politician. But Bhutto, who was forced from her post twice in the 1990s because of alleged misrule and corruption, was killed by a homicide bomber shortly after she returned to Pakistan. Zardari took over as co-chairman of her party and was elected president in September 2008 by federal and regional lawmakers.

Obama to announce increase in troops to Afghanistan


Barack Obama is set to make the boldest strategic move of his presidency on Tuesday and order a surge of tens of thousands more US troops into an increasingly unpopular war in Afghanistan. Addressinbg the cadets at the prestigious West Point military academy, Obama is expected to announce between 30,000 and 35,000 reinforcements as part of a new Afghan strategy intended in his own words to "finish the job" there. More than eight years after a US-led invasion ousted the Taliban regime after it refused to hand over Osama bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda leaders accused of plotting the September 11 attacks in 2001, the president is also under pressure to lay out an exit strategy in address to the American nation. There were 35,000 American soldiers fighting the Taliban-led insurgency when Obama became president. After an initial boost in February there are now about 68,000. Tuesday's announcement could see troop levels triple under his tenure. Obama will therefore insist the renewed US engagement is neither unlimited nor unconditional and that the cause is clear: to prevent the region from serving as a base for attacks against the United States -- far from the grandiose notion of installing democracy espoused by the Bush administration. He will make the training of Afghan forces imperative and impress upon corruption tainted Afghan President Hamid Karzai, re-elected to a second term after disputed elections in August, the need to improve his governance.