Posted on 06/07/2005 6:20:16 PM PDT by TexKat
US destroys rebels bunkers
By Christopher Drew and Tresha Mabile The New York Times
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 8, 2005
A chain of evidence that investigators believe will help convict Saddam Hussein begins at a wind-swept grave in the desert near Hatra, in northern Iraq.
The burial site - a series of deep trenches that held about 2,500 bodies, many of them women and children - is one of many mass graves that dot the country. But it was the first one excavated by an American investigative team working with a special Iraqi tribunal to build legal cases against Saddam and others in his government.
A senior Iraqi court official has said the tribunal is planning to start the first trial of Saddam by late summer or early fall in a case that focuses on the killings of nearly 160 men from Dujail, a Shiite village north of Baghdad, after the former dictator survived an assassination attempt there.
But American legal advisers say the Hatra grave holds a key to what is likely to be one of the broadest charges against Saddam - that he is responsible for the killing of as many as 100,000 Iraqi Kurds in the late 1980s, some in chemical weapons attacks. They say those charges could be filed later this year, and Iraqi officials said last weekend that there would be 12 separate cases against Saddam and others. Each would require a separate trial, and multiple convictions could mean multiple death sentences for any defendant.
According to Gregory Kehoe, the American who set up the investigative team, what was found at Hatra shows how the Hussein leadership made a "business of killing people" - the scrape marks from the blade of a bulldozer that shoved victims into the trench, the point-blank shots to the backs of even the babies' heads, the withered body of a 3- or 4-year-old boy, still clutching a red and white ball.
Much rests on the prosecutions of Saddam and his lieutenants - for Iraqis seeking a reckoning and for the Bush administration, which hopes the trials and the Iraqi-American partnership will help vindicate its involvement in Iraq and serve as a model of justice and democracy in the Arab world.
Yet in the 18 months since Saddam's capture, questions have been raised from several quarters about whether the process can produce a fair trial. Not only has Saddam challenged the tribunal's legitimacy, mocking an Iraqi judge for "applying the invaders' laws to try me," but also the United Nations and most European countries have refused to help, partly out of opposition to the death penalty. Human-rights advocates have questioned whether the tribunal's standards for finding guilt will be high enough to link Saddam justly to the killings.
In their first extensive interviews, with The New York Times and the Discovery Times Channel in the United States, Kehoe, the top American adviser to the tribunal from March 2004 until this spring, and other investigators provided a detailed look at how the cases were being built.
Tue Jun 7, 2005 9:12 PM ET
By JoAnne Allen
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul on Tuesday urged Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to do more to stop Kurdish militants he said were crossing the border with Iraq to carry out attacks in Turkey.
Gul raised the issue in a meeting with Rice one day before Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan meets President Bush.
Speaking to Turkish reporters after his meeting with Rice, Gul said terrorism in Turkey was a matter that needed to be urgently addressed.
"There is leakage from Iraq, and a noticeable increase in attacks on our troops by PKK terrorists utilizing remote controlled bombs and mines. We cannot ignore this, and I expressed that the U.S. needs to be more decisive in this struggle," said Gul.
The Turkish military said last month that guerrillas of the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) were stepping up attacks in Turkey after a large number of them were detected smuggling in explosives from northern Iraq, where the PKK is based.
More than 30,000 people, mainly Kurds, have been killed since 1984 when the PKK launched its armed campaign for an independent homeland in southeastern Turkey.
Erdogan was expected to repeat Turkish calls to Bush for U.S. forces to crack down on Turkish Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq and to try to improve battered relations with the United States. Ankara angered Washington by refusing to back its war in neighboring Iraq.
© Reuters 2005
From correspondents in Dubai
07jun05
IRAQ militants have threatened to kill a Turkish hostage unless Turkey agrees to end cooperation with the US military within four days.
In a statement to Dubai television accompanied by video footage of the businessman they said they were holding, the militants warned they would kill him and two companions "unless the Turkish authorities cease all forms of logistical support to the US military as well as cooperation with US firms doing business in Iraq".
Seated on the ground in front of a banner bearing the name of the group - the Ali bin Abi Taleb Brigades - and flanked by two gunmen, the hostage held up a passport which Dubai television said bore the name Ali Abdullah.
On May 24, Turkey's Anatolia news agency said a Turkish national named Ali Musluoglu, 48, had been seized by militants demanding that his building materials firm cease its Iraq operations.
Turks have frequently fallen victim to the persistent violence in Iraq. Around 90 have been killed in recent months, most of them truck drivers caught in ambushes.
Wednesday June 8, 2005
Islamist insurgents have turned the aftermath of the war in Iraq into a seemingly endless holy war, and are still pouring into the country to fight the 'American devil'. En route, many of them pass through Syria. Ghaith Abdul-Ahad visits the ancient city of Aleppo and hears one jihadi's story
Aleppo, Syria. Ten brothers were sitting in the courtyard of their house in one of Aleppo's myriad lanes, with a plastic bag full of small pieces of paper, from which they drew lots. Five of them would stay in Syria and look after all 10 families. The others, the winning five, would enjoy the ultimate prize: a jihadi trip to Baghdad. It was March 2003, the Americans had just started bombing Baghdad and, like the 10 brothers, hundreds of young men were eagerly making their way in cramped buses towards the Iraqi border. Most of them were Syrians, but there were many, too, from other Arab and Muslim nations, all driven by a religious fervour fuelled by the cries of jihad from Muslim scholars.
"Each neighbourhood [of Aleppo] started sending buses loaded with mujahideen into Iraq," says Abu Ibrahim, the second eldest of the 10 brothers, describing those early days of the war. "If someone was unable to go, he would support the jihad by giving his money."
The call to jihad was openly encouraged by the Syrian government, says Abu Ibrahim (a nom de guerre); it also arranged for buses to ferry fighters, speeded up the issuing of documentation and even gave prospective jihadis a discount on passport fees. Meanwhile, the Syrian media were banging the drum for jihad. (The US has repeatedly accused Syria of involvement in terrorism in Iraq; the Syrian government vehemently denies this.) Eyewitnesses recall Syrian border police waving to the jihadi buses as they crossed into Iraq. From the Grand Mufti of Syria, a man known for his religious tolerance for more than 50 years but who issued a fatwa legitimising suicide bombing just before the outbreak of the Iraq war, to a 16-year-old Christian boy from Damascus whom Abu Ibrahim remembers volunteering to fight alongside radical Muslims in Iraq, much of Syria was galvanised to resist the American invasion next door.
Abu Ibrahim, the most radical of his family, was not one of the lucky five of his brothers and had to stay in Syria, which did not go down well with his Bedouin wife. "My wife accused me of being a coward. She accused me of being happy that I didn't have to go."
But a few months later, he and a group of Syrian and Saudi jihadis crossed the border just as the Iraqi insurgency was getting into full swing. Fifty fighters went in total, Abu Ibrahim says now, but after a few months he returned to Syria with three others - the only surviving members of the group.
***
Two years after Syria first encouraged resistance to American troops in Iraq, the country claims to have cracked down on Islamic networks and cross-border activity. But many of these claims have fallen short of expectations, a fact that regional analysts attribute to two different factors. The first is that Syria is dominated by many and sometimes competing security apparatuses, which often behave quasi-independently, according to the leadership and specific agenda of each. The second is that while the Syrians, publicly at least, have considerably reduced the amount of support given to the insurgents and have put hundreds in jail, they are happy to keep the jihadi networks alive for a day when they might be useful again.
Abu Ibrahim was born in 1973 in a village north of Aleppo, close to the Turkish border. His father was a Sufi, a member of a mystical Islamic sect that is reviled by some ultra-conservative Muslims, but Abu Ibrahim never shared his father's tolerant views. "I was born to be a Salafi!" he says, referring to the fundamentalist Sunni school of Islam also called Wahhabism. "Even when I was a child of 10, I would refuse to shake the hands of the Sufi sheikhs who visited my father."
Abu Ibrahim's face is lined from time spent in Syrian and Saudi prisons. He looks older than his years, and has a short, scrubby beard, his larger beard having been shaved off by Syrian security officers during one of his detentions. (My conversations with Abu Ibrahim were conducted under extremely close monitoring by the Syrian security services.) He is small and slight, but says he can fight five men alone. He keeps repeating that pride and honour are the most important things in life.
Abu Ibrahim is furious at American imperialism, outraged by Palestine, repelled by the secular Syrian regime. He is angry, as many Arab young men are, and like many of his generation, has grown to see the holy war of jihad championed by Osama bin Laden as the only way to salvation.
Abu Ibrahim's goal is to re-establish the Islamic caliphate, and he sees the rule of the Taliban in Afghanistan as one of the few true Islamic governments since the time of the Prophet. He thinks the Qur'an is "a constitution, a law to govern the world". His views are severe, narrowly defined and impractical. But it is important to understand his anger and his contradictions, because Abu Ibrahim is as close to al-Qaida as it is possible to get.
***
At the age of 22, Abu Ibrahim's rebellious ideas against his father's Sufism were nurtured by a group of radical Salafis who flourished in the villages around Aleppo, in Syria's Sunni heartland. "I met a group of young men through my wife's family who spoke to me the true words of Islam; they told me Sufism was forbidden and that the Shia are infidels."
A year later, he decided to go to Saudi Arabia, taking some of Aleppo's famous textiles from his family's workshop and trading them in Riyadh. His seven years in Riyadh were prosperous ones; at times he was sending home $12,000 a month. But while he was there, he also met other young men with whom he started learning the Qur'an. "God provided for us," he says. "We were banned from preaching publicly. We read the mother of all books and then we started to know the truth. Everything was done in people's homes."
Young Saudis, he felt, were educated and worldly and they had what he considered a better understanding of the truth. But he also saw that they had the money and resources to put into practice what they were talking about. "When they went to fight in Afghanistan, they got a government salary, and they also had the resources to fight in Chechnya, the Balkans and now in Iraq."
In 1999 Abu Qaqaa, a charismatic Syrian religious sheikh, was preaching a radical version of Islam in Aleppo. In Saudi Arabia, Abu Ibrahim heard about the sheikh, who wore a salwar kameez, a relic of his time spent with Arab mujahideen in Afghanistan, and was impressed. "We were Wahhabis. Abu Qaqaa was preaching what we believed in. There he was saying these things: people with beards, come together. I was so impressed."
Returning to Aleppo, he became Abu Qaqaa's right-hand man. While in Saudi Arabia, Abu Ibrahim had been given training in video montage and digital photography at a private Saudi production company that specialised in the dissemination of radical Islamic propaganda. Now he helped to tape and copy Abu Qaqaa's sermons and to distribute CDs. They would travel to Damascus and to Saudi Arabia together. By 2001, Abu Qaqaa had attracted about 1,000 young men to his cause, though everything at this stage was underground and secret. "No one knew about us. But September 11 gave us the media coverage. It was a great day. America was defeated. We knew they would target either Syria or Iraq and we took a vow that if something happened to either countries, we would fight."
Two weeks after September 11 they decided to have a celebration. They called it "the Festival of America the Wounded Wolf". They made a video of martial arts fighting, including hand-to-hand combat and training exercises in which they jumped off 8m-high walls. During this time, Abu Qaqaa was arrested by the Syrian authorities, but was released within hours. "We thought, 'Oh, how strong our sheikh is that they do not touch us,' " Abu Ibrahim remembers. "How stupid we were."
By 2002 they were organising anti-American "festivals" twice a week. Food and CDs of sermons were distributed freely and the group, now calling itself "the Strangers of Cham [the Levant]", grew more popular. One festival was called "the people of Cham will now defeat the Jews and kill them all".
"Officials used to come to these festivals, security chiefs, advisers to the Syrian president. We had Palestinian flags and scarves saying, 'Down America'. It was very well organised - we tried to inspire young men and encourage them. We even had a website." The group grew bigger and stronger, its reputation and CDs reached other Arab countries, and young men from Ramadi, Salahuddin and Mosul provinces in Iraq came to seek them out. Meanwhile, money started pouring in from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.
Abu Ibrahim and his friends were tough, and created a phalanx cadre around Abu Qaqaa. They would raid houses and throw people out of their beds if they heard that they had said bad things about him. "We were exactly like the Amen [the state security services]," he says. "Everyone knew us. We all had big beards. We became thugs."
But slowly they began to suspect that their charismatic leader was a stooge for the state security and had long been an agent for them. "In the 80s, thousands of Muslim men died in Syria for much less than we were saying. We asked the sheikh why we weren't being arrested. He would tell us it was because we weren't saying anything against the government, that we were focusing on the common enemy, America and Israel."
Their suspicions hardened when they discovered that Abu Qaqaa had provided the state security with a list of all the Wahhabis in Syria. They had begun to split from him and were thinking of taking their revenge when the Americans invaded Iraq.
With the beginning of the Iraq war came the jihad frenzy, and the busloads of mujahideen. Saddam's government considered them manna from heaven; as the Americans rapidly advanced, they branded them Arab Saddam Fedayeen, and gave them weapons and basic training. But when Baghdad fell, the stories the Syrians brought home were bad. Often the Iraqis shot at them or handed them over to the Americans.
Abu Ibrahim, who had his own group of jihadis and was actively ferrying people across the border during this time, said that his Iraqi contacts "asked us to stop sending people, they said, 'There are Shia everywhere, Americans,' and they couldn't do anything." According to Abu Ibrahim and other sources in the insurgency, the quick American invasion of Baghdad and the collapse of the Iraqi army shocked the religious leaders and a debate started as to whether they should start a jihad against the Americans or whether this would only bring Saddam back to power, an option that was as bad for the Islamists as the US occupation.
But the Syrian authorities didn't want cross-border traffic in fighters to stop. The security services pressured them to keep sending people. "Why were they so keen for us to go and fight in Iraq?" asks Abu Ibrahim. "So we would die there?"
***
In the summer of 2003, the insurgency in Iraq began to organise itself and there was a further call for men. Places to stay and a network of routes, weapons and safe houses had been established. "We had specific meeting places for Iraqi smugglers. They wouldn't do the trip if we had less than 15 fighters. We would drive across the border and then into villages on the Iraqi side; and from there the Iraqi contacts would take the mujahideen to training camps." Syrian recruits could usually skip the training given to others, as every young Syrian man has to do two years of military service."It is mostly the Saudis who need the training," says Abu Ibrahim.
The main bulk of the insurgency at that time was led and organised by Iraqis who functioned in cells, often with no coordination. They focused mainly on ambushes and IED (improvised explosive device) attacks. "Our brothers in Iraq worked in small groups. In each area men would come together organised by religious leaders or tribal sheikhs and would attack the Americans. It was often us who brought them all together, when we met them in Syria or in Iraq. We would tell them, 'But there is another brother who is doing the same thing - why don't you coordinate together?' Syria became the hub.
"Young men are fighting with zeal and passion, there are Saudi officers, Syrians, Iraqis, but not those who fought for Saddam. The man who is leading it for the most part", says Abu Ibrahim, "is Zarqawi."
The emergence of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was the big breakthrough for the insurgency, especially after he was endorsed by Bin Laden late last year. Zarqawi, a Jordanian-born radical Islamist, then changed the name of his disparate group of insurgents to al-Qaida of Jihad in Mesopotamia, and funds started pouring in from Saudi Arabia. In Iraq, many different factions of the insurgency placed themselves under Zarqawi's banner and a joint treasury of jihad, called Bayt al-Mal, was founded.
"Until six months ago, Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden were different: Osama did not legitimise the killing of Shia. Zarqawi did that. Six months ago, Zarqawi gave the beyaa [allegiance] to Bin Laden. Anyone, Christian Jew, Sunni, Shia, who cooperates with the Americans, can be killed. It's a holy war." (Our conversation took place before Zarqawi was supposedly injured near Ramadi last month.)
By January 2004, Syria was coming under increasing pressure from the US to halt the jihadi traffic into Iraq. Jihadi cell leaders in Syria were summoned to Amen [internal security] headquarters and told that it could not continue. Passports were confiscated; some were detained for a few days.
It may not be terribly significant in halting the violence, however. According to Abu Ibrahim, insurgents in Iraq are not presently in need of fighters, but funds - which usually come from wealthy Saudi young men.
"Our brothers in Iraq are asking for Saudis. The Saudis go with enough money to support themselves and their Iraqi brothers. A week ago we sent a Saudi to the jihad; he went with 100,000 Saudi riyals [$27,000]. There was a celebration among his brothers there!"
Four weeks ago, US troops in Iraq launched an operation just inside the border with Syria, aimed at disrupting the route of foreign fighters; the US army claimed that 100 fighters were killed. Abu Ibrahim is unmoved to learn of the assault. "They think jihad will stop if they kill hundreds of us in Iraq. They don't know what they are facing. Every day, more and more young men from around the Muslim world are awaking and coming to the jihad. Now the Americans are facing thousands, but one day soon they will have to face whole nations."
Iraq said it would bring only 12 charges of crimes against humanity against Saddam Hussein (pictured) although there were more than 500 possible cases against the ousted dictator. [AFP/file]
No date set for Saddam trial; Bombs kill 19
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-06-08 09:25
BAGHDAD - Iraq's government backed away on Tuesday from suggestions that Saddam Hussein would be tried within weeks, admitting it was up to an independent special tribunal to decide when he appears in court.
Suicide bombers struck across Iraq, with blasts near the northern city of Kirkuk killing at least 19 people and wounding dozens, the latest in a series of suicide attacks that have killed hundreds since late April. A mortar attack west of Baghdad killed three more Iraqis, the U.S. military said.
Iraq's president and the prime minister's spokesman had said in the last week that Saddam could go on trial within two months, popular announcements apparently designed to show Iraqis that progress was being made in bringing him to justice.
But the Special Tribunal, set up in late 2003 to try senior members of the former regime, issued a statement saying no date had been set, and the prime minister's spokesman conceded on Tuesday that any decision was up to the tribunal.
"A fixed date has not been presented," Laith Kubba, spokesman for Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari, told reporters.
"(The Special Tribunal) assured me that they have a media official and they wish that information is given by them directly. I refer you to the spokesman for the tribunal."
A tribunal spokesman also denied a decision had been made to focus on just a dozen of the crimes of which Saddam is accused, as Kubba said on Monday, to bring him to trial more quickly.
Since Saddam was taken into custody in December 2003, Iraqi authorities have been under growing pressure to bring him and his senior lieutenants to justice.
An Iraqi National guard soldier leads arrested suspects during Operation Lightning in Baghdad June 7, 2005. Car bombers struck in Baghdad and northern Iraq on Tuesday, killing at least 19 people and wounding more than 40, the latest attacks in a surge of suicide bombings that have killed hundreds since late April. [Reuters]
The government hopes any conviction -- including the possibility of the death penalty -- will dent the insurgency by convincing former regime loyalists that Saddam's days are over, so it is pushing for the earliest possible trial.
A high-profile conviction could also help build popular support for the government before a mid-December election.
"Many people lost fathers and sons and want to know where the justice is," Kubba said on Tuesday. "There's popular pressure on us."
In the past, tribunal officials have indicated that Saddam's deputies will be brought to trial first and Saddam himself may not appear in court until 2006.
DEADLY BOMBINGS
At least five car bombs exploded across Iraq on Tuesday.
Four attacks were in or near the northern town of Hawija, close to the strategic oil city of Kirkuk. One suicide bomber blew up his car near a U.S. base, another beside an Iraqi army checkpoint and a third close to a market, police said.
A fourth car bomb struck a checkpoint in the town of Abasi, near Hawija. In total, 19 people were killed and 38 wounded in the four attacks, Major-General Anwar Mohammed Amin, the Iraqi army commander in Kirkuk, told Reuters.
In Baghdad, a car bomb detonated beside a police patrol, wounding 28 people, including two policemen, police said.
Near Falluja, west of Baghdad, police found the body of a man shot in the head. A message scrawled on his clothing said that he had been killed for working with the Americans.
Insurgents also hit a U.S. base between Baghdad and Falluja with mortars, killing three Iraqi contractors and wounding 13, the U.S. military said in a statement.
Since April 28, when Iraq's new Shi'ite-led cabinet was announced, insurgents have sharply escalated attacks, killing more than 800 Iraqis and 88 U.S. troops. May was the deadliest month for U.S. forces since January.
The violence has worsened sectarian tension in Iraq. A series of assassinations of clerics, and mass killings of Iraqis whose bodies were then dumped, has led some Sunni groups to accuse a militia linked to one of the main Shi'ite parties of involvement in the kidnap and killing of Sunni Arabs.
The militia, the Badr organization, has denied involvement and political leaders have called on Iraqis to avoid being drawn into sectarian strife.
In the latest killing of a cleric, Salam Abdul-Karim, a Sunni, was found dead in the mainly Shi'ite city of Basra on Monday, relatives said. They said he had been abducted the previous day by men in Iraqi police uniforms.
Police denied any involvement in the killing. The death followed that of a Shi'ite cleric in Basra last week.
In an effort to defuse sectarian tension and undermine the Sunni Arab-dominated insurgency, the Shi'ite and Kurdish blocs that emerged strongest from Jan. 30 polls are trying to involve more Sunni Arabs in the writing of a new constitution, the next key step in Iraq's path toward full democracy.
You are not alone Asclepius.
This undated photo provided West Point United States Military Academy shows Col. Ted S. Westhusing, 45, who was killed in Iraq, Sunday, June 5, 2005, family members said Monday. They did not release specifics on how he was killed. (AP Photo/West Point)
Army IDs Highest-Ranking Officer Casualty
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
WASHINGTON - The Army on Tuesday announced the identity of the highest-ranking officer to die in the Iraq war, Col. Theodore S. Westhusing, 44, of Dallas, who died Sunday in Baghdad.
No details about the circumstances of his death were disclosed.
The Army said he died from "non-combat related injuries." That is a category that includes death by accident, illness, act of God or suicide.
Westhusing was serving as a staff officer with the Multinational Security Transition Command, which is in charge of training Iraqi security forces. He was assigned to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y.
Family members in Oklahoma had said after being notified of Westhusing's death late Sunday that he had graduated from West Point in 1983 and had doctorate degrees in Russian, philosophy and military strategy. They said he deployed to Iraq late last year. He was due to return to West Point this summer.
The Army did not publicly announce his identify until Tuesday, after a range of his relatives were notified.
Several lieutenant colonels have died in Iraq since the war began in March 2003, but no generals or colonels until Westhusing. The vast majority of the 1,673 members of the U.S. military who have died in the war have been enlisted soldiers and Marines, reflecting their more prominent role in direct combat against the insurgents.
The Army also announced Tuesday that a female soldier died in Iraq on Sunday, Spc. Carrie L. French, 19, of Caldwell, Idaho. She was a member of the 145th Support Battalion with the Idaho National Guard in Boise.
She was the 36th female soldier to die in the Iraq war and the sixth from the Army National Guard. All but one of the 36 have died since President Bush declared the end of major combat operations in May 2003.
Two Department of the Army female civilians also have died.
___
On the Net:
Defense Department: http://www.defense.gov
Published: Tuesday, 7 June, 2005, 08:56 AM Doha Time
JAKARTA: One of Southeast Asia’s most wanted Islamic militants may be hiding on the outskirts of the Indonesian capital, police said yesterday as they stepped up security at luxury hotels and embassies after a US warning.
Jakarta police spokesman Tjiptono said that although police in the capital were already on high alert, they had yet to see signs an attack was imminent.
“We think Azahari and his people are just outside Jakarta,” Tjiptono said, referring to the Malaysian fugitive accused by Indonesian police of being the chief bomb-maker for the regional Al Qaeda-linked Jemaah Islamiyah militant network.
“We are increasing security as a precaution. We can’t tell what they are planning to do, but we’re on guard.” Jakarta Police Chief Firman Gani said security had been reinforced at 11 embassies, including France, Canada, Germany and the United States. Five luxury hotels, namely the JW Marriott, Shangri-La, Ritz Carlton, Four Seasons and the Hilton, had also had police security strengthened, he said.
Gani said other hotels had been asked to take their own measures to increase security.
Police have said Azahari is among the masterminds behind a spate of bombings in Indonesia, including the 2002 Bali blasts that killed 202 people, the 2003 JW Marriott hotel bombing in Jakarta that claimed 12 lives, and last year’s blast outside the Australian embassy that killed 10 people. The US embassy on Friday warned Americans of a threat to bomb the lobbies of hotels frequented by Westerners in Jakarta.
Tensions have also been raised by the May 28 blasts that tore through a market in the predominantly Christian city of Tentena on eastern Sulawesi island. That attack killed 22 people, making it the bloodiest since the Bali nightclub blasts.
Police have identified two suspects in that bombing, but said while it bore the hallmarks of Jemaah Islamiah they had yet to determine a motive. Despite heightened security at hotels, there appeared to be little impact on occupancy. “In fact, last weekend our occupancy rate went up,” Yos Rizal, director of sales of the five-star Aryadutta hotel, told Reuters. “But we are tightening security, and we have asked for additional police to safeguard the compound,” he said.
The Jakarta Hilton also reported no drop off in guests. “Our occupancy is still stable, and we haven’t seen any guests cutting their stays,” said Emeraldo Parengkuan, public relations director. The US embassy and others have issued a number of warnings to their citizens about security in Indonesia in recent years. Among other things, the warnings have advised people to avoid hotels, shopping centres, nightclubs and housing areas popular with Westerners.-Reuters
Tue Jun 7, 2005 03:56 AM ET
KARACHI (Reuters) - Pakistani police have arrested two Islamic militants suspected of involvement in a suicide attack on a Shi'ite Muslim mosque that killed five people in the southern city of Karachi last month, police said on Tuesday.
The pair, arrested in an overnight raid in Karachi, told investigators up to 20 suicide bombers were still at large in the city, Pakistani's commercial hub, the police said.
Fayyaz Khan, a deputy superintendent of police, said the men were members of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, an underground militant group with ties with Afghanistan's former Taliban regime and al Qaeda, and had been arrested with explosives and firearms.
One, Mufti Altaf alias Mufti Shahid, was supposed to carry out the suicide bombing on the minority Shi'ite Madinatul Ilm mosque on May 30 but was replaced at the last moment.
Khan named the other man as Bilal Farooqi and added that police were trying to establish the identity of the suicide bomber.
Two assailants were killed in the attack, including one who blew himself up, while a third was critically wounded.
The attack came three days after a suicide bombing at a Muslim festival in the capital Islamabad that killed at least 19 people, mostly Shi'ite Muslims.
Investigators suspect Lashkar-e-Jhangvi in both attacks and some Pakistan intelligence agents believe there could be a link between the incidents and a suicide bombing of a mosque in the Afghan city of Kandahar last Wednesday that killed 20 people.
Khan said investigators were trying to trace up to 20 suicide bombers the arrested men said were at large in Karachi, which has been the scene of frequent militant attacks since Pakistan joined the U.S.-led war on terrorism in late 2001.
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi is one of Pakistan's most feared militant groups and has been implicated in attacks on Western targets in Karachi, including the murder of U.S. reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002, and in two attempts to kill President Pervez Musharraf.
In an interview published on Monday, Musharraf said recent violence was purely sectarian and there had been no attacks in Pakistan linked to al Qaeda or the Taliban in more than a year.
The suicide attacks followed the capture of senior al Qaeda operative Abu Faraj Farj al Liby in Pakistan last month.
Musharraf said al Liby, who U.S. counter-terrorism agents say became al Qaeda's third most important figure two years ago and is wanted for two attempts on the Pakistani president's life in 2003, had been handed over to the United States.
US Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, flanked by his Norwegian counterpart Kristin Krohn Devold, right, and Major Trudi Skjelde whilst on the bridge of Royal Marine Vessel KNM Harstad, in Stavanger Tuesday, June 7, 2005. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld arrived here Tuesday to meet with Norwegian Defense Minister Kristin Krohn Devold and tour a NATO base. Rumsfeld and Devold are scheduled to sign the new equipment agreement on Wednesday. (AP Photo/Alf Ove Hansen / SCANPIX )
Rumsfeld to sign new defence deal with Norway
08 Jun 2005 01:07:34 GMT
Source: Reuters By Carol Giacomo
STAVANGER, Norway, June 8 (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld will sign a new agreement with Norway on Wednesday for the United States to carry on siting weapons and other equipment in the country, officials said.
Washington first kept equipment in Norway during the Cold War in case of attack by the Soviet Union, but Norwegian officials say it can now be used to deal with any terrorist attack as well as for peace and humanitarian operations.
On Tuesday, Norwegian Defence Minister Kristin Krohn Devold hosted a dinner party for Rumsfeld on a naval ship.
About 400 people demonstrated in the Norwegian capital Oslo against the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and some 800 protested in Stavanger.
The demonstrators held banners calling Rumsfeld a "war criminal" and demanding he leave the country, Norway's NRK television reported.
"(Rumsfeld is) a modern imperialist," Audun Lysbakken, an opposition Socialist member of parliament, told a group of protesters.
Rumsfeld arrived at his hotel in Stavanger under tight guard.
June 08, 2005, 04:30
Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, will sign a new agreement with Norway today for the United States to carry on siting weapons and other equipment in the country, officials said. Washington first kept equipment in Norway during the Cold War in case of attack by the Soviet Union, but Norwegian officials say it can now be used to deal with any terrorist attack as well as for peace and humanitarian operations.
Yesterday, Kristin Krohn Devold, the Norwegian defence minister, hosted a dinner party for Rumsfeld on a naval ship. About 400 people demonstrated in the Norwegian capital Oslo against the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and some 800 protested in Stavanger.
The demonstrators held banners calling Rumsfeld a "war criminal" and demanding he leave the country, Norway's NRK television reported. "(Rumsfeld is) a modern imperialist," Audun Lysbakken, an opposition Socialist member of parliament, told a group of protesters.
Rumsfeld arrived at his hotel in Stavanger under tight guard. - Reuters
08 Jun 2005 01:04:08 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Seif Fouad
BAGHDAD, June 8 (Reuters) - Palestinian refugee Thaier Noureddine never wanted to leave Iraq, even if he could return to the land his family fled after the 1948 Middle East war.
But he's been desperate for a way out since Iraqi security forces arrested his brother Ghazwaan and three other Palestinians in a crackdown on foreign fighters from Arab countries and Iraqi guerrillas suspected of "terrorist" attacks.
"He did nothing wrong. Is being a Palestinian a crime?" Noureddine asked.
Iraq -- with its history of dictatorship and war -- has been the only home some Palestinian refugees have known since their families settled here after the violent birth of Israel in 1948.
They have blended in over the years, as doctors, coffee shop owners and labourers in the major oil-producing country, but are now finding themselves under scrutiny from the police, state officials, the government and even their neighbours.
"Let them move us to Palestine or any country. I am ready to live in Sudan, in Darfur. It has problems. But if they take us we will go," said Noureddine, referring to the devastated western province of Sudan.
Some Iraqis believe that Palestinians in Iraq enjoyed privileges like free education and low-cost housing under Saddam Hussein, who portrayed himself as a champion of the Palestinian cause and delivered fiery anti-Israel speeches.
Now some of the 20,000 Palestinians in Iraq say they have been unfairly targeted by a government clampdown on guerrillas and subjected to abuse by Iraqis who believe they were cosseted by Saddam or are involved in guerrilla attacks.
"Twenty-five Palestinians were arrested in May," said acting Palestinian ambassador Dalil Qoussus. "They are innocent."
The Noureddine family's troubles began when Iraqi security forces showed up at Ghazwaan's apartment after a bombing killed 14 people at a crowded market in eastern Baghdad in May. His relatives said he was beaten and then taken away.
"They fired bullets at the door of his apartment. Some landed in the bedroom," Thaier said.
Ghazwaan and three other Palestinians soon appeared on "Terrorists in the Grip of Justice", a television show in which suspects confess to crimes including bombings and rape.
It was not possible to determine if the confessions were genuine. Some of the suspects on the show had bruised faces, including one of the four Palestinians. Detainees have often complained of being beaten by Iraqi security forces and police.
The arrests have led Palestinians to keep a low profile.
In Baghdad's Baladiyat slum that is home to many of Iraq's Palestinian refugees, shops have been shuttered and alleyways are quiet, with a few bicycles leaning on tin shacks. One child holding a toy gun just stared out a window.
"We can't show our identification cards because they will see we are Palestinians. They think Arabs and Palestinians are terrorists," said Ghazwaan's sister Hala.
"When we go to the market they call us terrorists. We can't even take a taxi because they call us terrorists."
UNCERTAIN FUTURE
Palestinian refugees, many born in Iraq, never had much of a say in their future, and they still don't. Their lack of proper documents makes it difficult to travel outside Iraq.
Palestinians fear being swept up in security offensives against Arab guerrillas who have carried out suicide bombings that have killed thousands of people.
Brosh Shaways, secretary general of Iraq's Defence Ministry, said security forces had not singled out Palestinians for arrest, but were detaining any suspicious Arabs without proper papers.
"Unfortunately there are foreigners and Arabs who take part in terrorist acts and explosions and making car bombs," he told Reuters.
"It is the right of the Iraqi government and security forces to take action against them because the lives of innocent people are in danger."
Palestinians can only hope escalating violence that threatens to push Iraq towards civil war will ease and take the pressure off their community.
But guerrillas have stepped up attacks since the new government was announced in late April, killing more than 800 people, including civilians and security forces.
Thaier and others are not taking any chances.
The welder decided to close up his workshop because people started calling him "the brother of the terrorist" after the confession show tied Ghazwaan to the Baghdad bombing.
The Nourreddine family say Ghazwaan was just a coffee shop owner, not someone who would carry out a bombing that left crushed limbs and bodies under burning cars.
"We have no hostility towards Iraqis. We are not related to any terrorists," said Hala, sitting beside Ghazwaan's children and holding up his picture. "Who is going to take care of his children?"
Isolated in the grim concrete buildings of Baladiyat, the Noureddines no longer see a future in Iraq. But they, like others, may have no choice.
"When we hear any sound like an ambulance siren our hearts beat in fear. I am afraid they will kill me because I am the brother of the Palestinian," Thaier said.
10:00 AEST Wed Jun 8 2005 AAP
AP - A man's leg and partial torso fell from a South African jetliner onto a suburban New York home as the aircraft prepared to land at John F Kennedy Airport, authorities and the airline say.
Police said a Long Island resident living about nine kilometres from the airport called to report that a leg with a sneaker on the foot had hit the roof of a garage and bounced into the back yard, where it was lying in the grass.
More remains were found inside the wheel well of the South African Airways aircraft when it landed at JFK, arriving from Johannesburg via Dakar, Senegal.
Spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration, Jim Peters, said a customs agent meeting the plane discovered another leg hanging from the left wheel well section.
South African Airways issued a statement saying it had "a stowaway situation where remains of a human body were discovered in the wheel-well of an SAA aircraft bound for New York out of Dakar, Senegal".
The severed leg with a part of the man's torso fell onto the home of Pam Hearne, who said she heard "a loud crash" and thought at first that her neighbour was loading a van.
She discovered the leg a few hours later.
"But I am very glad that I live where I do," she said, "so I don't have to run for my life like this man probably was doing."
There have been cases of stowaways being crushed by the mechanism in aircraft wheel wells and perishing from the extreme cold at high altitude.
The airliner said it was "working with the airport authorities in both the United States and Senegal to investigate this tragic event" and offered assurances that "there was no danger to the passengers of aircraft at any stage".
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