Daily Terrorist Round-Up 6/6/05

6/6/05

[Straight Vermonter]

Hunt for insurgents hits fields, farms
Operation is ‘baptism by fire’ for Iraqis.

LATIFIYAH, Iraq (AP) - Hundreds of Iraqi and U.S. troops searched fields and farms yesterday for insurgents and their hideouts in an area south of Baghdad known for attacks, and the Marines said they discovered 50 weapons and ammunition caches and a huge underground bunker west of the capital fitted out with air conditioning, a kitchen and showers.

The joint U.S.-Iraqi force operating in Latifiyah to the south was backed by American air power and said it had rounded up at least 108 Iraqis, mainly Sunnis, suspected of involvement in the brutal insurgent campaign to topple the Shiite-led government.

To the west of the capital, the 2nd Marine division said its forces had discovered 50 weapons and ammunitions caches over the past four days in restive Anbar province. The military said the find included a recently used "insurgent lair" in a massive underground bunker complex that included air-conditioned living quarters and high-tech military equipment including night vision goggles.

That bunker was found cut from a rock quarry in Karmah, 50 miles west of Baghdad. The Marines said the facility was 170 yards wide and 275 yards long.

In its rooms were "four fully furnished living spaces, a kitchen with fresh food, two shower facilities and a working air conditioner. Other rooms within the complex were filled with weapons and ammunition," the announcement said.

The weapons included "numerous types of machine guns, ordnance including mortars, rockets and artillery rounds, black uniforms, ski masks, compasses, log books, night vision goggles, and fully charged cell phones."

In Latifiyah, 20 miles south of Baghdad, Iraqi and U.S. forces launched a raid as part of Operation Lightning, a week-old assault aimed at rooting out insurgents conducting raids on the capital and sapping militant strength nationwide.

While Iraqi forces were in the forefront of yesterday’s sweep though the semi-rural region, it was clear the U.S. military was still the driving force.

About two hours into the operation, for example, U.S. forces voiced concern that an area covered in tall grass had not been searched.

An Iraqi commander said he was reluctant to send his troops into the field out of fear of an insurgent attack.

"This is a dangerous area. We need helicopters and the American army," Iraqi Brig. Gen. Najim al-Ekabi said.

The U.S. soldiers, who had spent months training Iraqi soldiers, tried to persuade al-Ekabi to send his troops, saying it was likely that weapons were hidden in the fields and alongside an irrigation canal.

Army Capt. Jason Blindauer of the 2nd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division told al-Ekabi the force had orders to search the area.

"No one is going to do it better than your group," Blindauer said.

Al-Ekabi asked for a private meeting with the Americans and departed shortly afterward in a large convoy, ostensibly to conduct the search.

Maj. Ronny Echelberger later went into the area with U.S. forces and searched a few homes, saying he was not been sure the Iraqi search had been sufficiently thorough.

The Iraqi army’s reliance on U.S. troops was evident in other ways. Echelberger had to show an Iraqi brigade commander his location on a map shortly before Iraqi troops launched the operation, and a few minutes later Iraqi soldiers fired hundreds of rounds when they mistakenly thought they saw an insurgent.

"These guys are doing baptism by fire. It takes time," Blindauer said.

Operation Lightning is being watched closely as a bellwether of when Iraqis can take control of their own security, a key to the U.S. exit strategy more than two years after Saddam Hussein’s ouster.

Interior Minister Bayan Jabr has said at least 700 suspected insurgents have been rounded up in the sweep, which has also killed at least 28 militants.

U.S. Lt. Col. Michael Infanti said at least 221 people had been detained since last Wednesday by forces carrying out a sweep of Baghdad’s southern districts.

It was unclear whether that number was in addition to the 700 given by Jabr. 

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24 Die As Mauritanians Fight Insurgents
By AHMED MOHAMED

NOUAKCHOTT, Mauritania (AP) - Algerian insurgents attacked an army base in this vast country's northern desert, setting off a gunbattle that left at least 24 people dead, the defense minister said Sunday.

President Maaoya Sid'Ahmed Taya, who has survived several coup attempts during his 20-year reign, called an emergency meeting of his top military commanders late Sunday.

Those killed in the overnight assault in Mgheiti, near the nation's borders with Algeria and Mali, included 15 Mauritanian soldiers and nine attackers, Defense Minister Baba Ould Sidi told reporters in the capital.

At least 17 other soldiers were wounded and two others were reported missing - including the unit's chief, Sidi said, adding that 150 assailants took part in the attack.

Other army officials said military reinforcements were sent to the north, but no other details were available.

In recent months, Taya's government has jailed scores of opponents, accusing them of organizing coup plots and setting up clandestine insurgent networks whose supporters have trained with the violent Salafist Group for Call and Combat insurgency in Algeria, which Western authorities link to the al-Qaida terror network.

The country's opposition says ruling-party officials unfairly brand them terrorists to undermine their efforts to organize. 

(SV-Mauritania, like Uzbekistan, is one of the places where the need to democratize and the need to win the WOT may come in direct conflict with each other)

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Al-Qaeda 'behind' Mauritania raid (More info)

Mauritania has accused Islamic insurgents from Algeria of attacking a Mauritanian army base in the Sahara desert killing at least 15 soldiers.

Defence Minister Baba Ould Sidi said the gunmen were from the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) - suspected of links to al-Qaeda.

He said 17 other soldiers were injured in an attack on Saturday, in the remote north-east near Algeria and Mali.

The United States warns the area is a training ground for Islamist recruits.

At least five attackers were killed in the attack, the minister said, adding that they took six military vehicles and burnt two others.

"They killed in cold blood the soldiers they had taken prisoner before fleeing," he told a news conference in the capital, Nouakchott.

Islamists angered

Following the attack, the army was placed on full alert and reinforcements and reconnaissance aircraft were sent to the region.

In recent months the Mauritanian government has arrested about 50 people accused of links with al-Qaeda.

Critics accuse the government of using the US-led war on terror to crackdown on Islamic opponents.

Mauritania's President Maaouiya Ould Sid Ahmed Taya has angered Islamists by establishing links with Israel.

There have been three coup attempts since June 2003. 

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More than 1,300 TNT blocks discovered in Chechnya

GROZNY, June 5 (RIA Novosti) - More than 1,300 TNT blocks with the combined weight of 500 kilograms were discovered in Chechnya, a representative of the regional operative headquarters (ROH) in the North Caucasus told RIA Novosti.

"The operatives discovered the explosives yesterday after a search operation in a forest to confirm information provided by local residents. They found a weapons cache with 1,342 TNT blocks weighing 468.4 kilograms in total," the ROH operative reported.

Sources in the Chechen interior ministry told RIA Novosti, "yesterday, an explosive device in a Zhiguli car parked at the side of the road was set off when an UAZ car was passing by. The explosion occurred 150 meters from a police checkpoint in Grozny. The power of the explosion was equivalent to 10 kilograms of TNT.

"Four Russian soldiers in UAZ and at the checkpoint, and two police officers from the organized crime unit of the Stavropol region's police department (the Stavropol region borders on Chechnya), who drove nearby in a Niva car, were injured and hospitalized, the source confirmed.

A police officer and a local resident, who stood nearby, received light wounds, he added.

In addition, the source in the Chechen interior ministry reported yesterday a bandit was killed in Grozny.

"The bandit offered armed resistance when the police attempted to apprehend him," the source said. He was killed by return fire, he said.

Police officers found and seized three Kalashnikov assault rifles, a Makarov pistol, two self-made hand grenades, an RGO grenade and 54 rounds of ammunition.

Five local residents were detained in Chechnya on suspicion of participation in illegal armed groups, sources in the Chechen interior ministry told RIA Novosti. Grenade-launchers, an assault rifle, grenades and other types of ammunition were seized during the detention.

According to ROH data, two of the detainees were previously "involved in terrorist acts against local population and representatives of republican authorities and in common criminal activity - robberies and armed assaults."

The detainees are currently kept in a pre-trial detention center. Investigation is underway.

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Ultra v ultra in Kashmir (Niiiice!)

JAMMU, June 4. — Mohammed Shafi, a guide of the Lashkar-e-Toiba, was shot dead a few days ago at Tilar near Navapachi in Doda district by the Hizbul Mujaheeden in yet another grim reminder of the intra-insurgency schisms in Kashmir, adding a new dimension to the terrorism in the valley.

Though Kashmir’s local terrorists are represented predominantly by the Hizbul Mujahideen and the foreign ones, by the LET and the Jaish-e-Mohammed, there are fringe elements like the Harkat-ul-Jehad-e-Islami and Al-Badr who act independently or collaborate with the main groups as the situation demands. The foreign terrorists are mostly Islamic fundamentalist mercenaries, drifters from the Taliban era.

The Indian Establishment attributes the conflicts to the hiatus between the indoctrination and the experience of the foreign militants. 

“They see normality, development and commercial activities that give the lie to the stories they have been told of atrocities upon Muslims. Struck dumb by the lack of public support, it does not take them long to realise that they are now marked men, trapped between the fence and the bullet of the security forces,” said a senior official, who added that this realization generated a tremendous sense of insecurity that progressively escalated with the depletion of funds and ammunition.
“Foreign terrorists then resort to extortion, killing, rape and molestation, which the local terrorists can’t accept,” he said. The locals complain to leaders across the border, usually in vain.

Flare-ups follow inevitably, as Doda, Kishtwar, Marwah, Poonch and Rajouri would testify. 

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Five guerrillas killed in Kashmir:-

Jammu, June 5 : At least five guerrillas were killed in a gun battle with Indian security forces in Jammu and Kashmir Sunday, officials here said. A soldier was also wounded in the skirmish at the hilly village of Jamola-Kha in Rajouri district, 170 km north of here.

The gun battle erupted Sunday morning, when Indian Army troops and state policemen acting on specific information raided a guerrilla hideout in the village located about 10 km from the district headquarter of Rajouri. A senior police official said: "Five terrorists have been killed. We believe that there are three more terrorists (in the area). The gun fight is on and the final picture will emerge when it ends."

The bodies of five guerrillas had been recovered so far. Though it was not known to which group they belonged, the area is dominated by the Lashker-e-Taiba and Hizbul Mujahadeen.

[Straight Vermonter]

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[Coop]

Five terrorists have been killed.

Very nice. Very nice.

[BayouCoyote]

BUMP!