Free Republic

Munir Akram was the target of the fictional plot The former imam of a mosque in the US state of New York has been jailed for 15 years after being caught in a sting operation involving a fake plot.Yassin Aref was convicted in October along with Mohammed Hossain, who is still awaiting sentence. The two men had agreed to take part in the plot, which appeared to target Pakistan's ambassador to the UN. They were convicted among other things of supporting terrorism, lying to FBI agents and money laundering. In a speech before the sentencing, Aref claimed he was...

Servicemembers donate blood used in life-saving surgery at the base hospital By Combined Joint Task Force - 76 Combined Press Information Center BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, March 1, 2007 — As the life of an Afghan National Army soldier hung in the balance Feb. 25, U.S. soldiers, sailors and Marines serving at Forward Operating Base Asadabad responded to his injury with an outpouring of blood. A total of 11 American servicemembers, including military policemen, embedded trainers, Asadabad Provincial Reconstruction Team members and artillerymen from 4th Battalion, 25th Field Artillery Regiment, each donated a pint of blood used in life-saving surgery at...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 7, 2007 – Pakistan has proven to be a dedicated ally of the United States since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in an interview. “Pakistan was right there after United States and coalition forces began major combat operations in Afghanistan with substantial assistance to the United States,” Navy Adm. Edmund P. Giambastiani said Feb. 5 aboard an Air Force C-17 traveling back to Washington after an eight-day overseas trip that included stops in Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan. “They have been a good and strong partner...

US Vice-President Dick Cheney will travel to Australia next month to thank the nation and Australian troops for their efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. A statement issued by the White House said Mr Cheney would travel to Australia and Japan during the week starting February 19. "He will meet with [Japanese] Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and [Australian] Prime Minister John Howard to discuss issues of mutual interest including Asian security and the global war on terror," it said. US President George Bush had asked his Vice-President to visit the two allied nations to thank them for their efforts in Iraq...

OGADISHU, Somalia - Ethiopia sent fighter jets into Somalia and bombed several towns Sunday in a dramatic attack on Somalia's powerful Islamic movement, and Ethiopia's prime minister said his country had been "forced to enter a war." It was the first time Ethiopia acknowledged its troops were fighting in support of Somalia's U.N.-backed interim government even though witnesses had been reporting their presence for weeks in an escalating battle that threatens to engulf the Horn of Africa region. Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi went on television to announce that his country was at war with the Islamic movement . ....

Rome, 16 Oct. (AKI) - Should Iran continue to refuse incentives offered by six world powers in exchange for a freeze on sensitive nuclear work, punitive measures against it will be inevitable, Italian foreign minister Massimo D'Alema told a conference on 'Security of the Mediterranean' in Rome on Monday. "It is inevitable that the international community will issue measures" against Iran, said D'Alema, recalling how the country had ignored a UN 31 August deadline threatening it with sanctions if it did not stop uranium enrichment work that world powers fear is aimed at building nuclear weapons. The foreign minister also...

The question of whether Israel is or is not an asset to the United States is one we rarely bother to ask ourselves. Time and again, we see prominent Americans -- presidents of the United States at the forefront -- emphasizing their special relationship with Israel. In polls of American public opinion, Israel scores very high marks, while sympathy for the Palestinians, never very high, continues to drop. Why should we even ask ourselves whether Israel is an asset or a liability to the United States? Isn’t the answer obvious? Most supporters of Israel, when pressed to go a bit...

PODGORICA, Montenegro, Sept. 26, 2006 – Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld arrived here today for meetings with Montenegrin leaders. This is Rumsfeld’s first visit to the country, and he’s the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit Montenegro since it achieved its independence earlier this year. On the 10-hour flight here from Washington, Pentagon Press Secretary Eric Ruff said the secretary will discuss with Montenegrin leaders the role they envision for their country in fighting terrorism. “The Montenegrins have indicated that they would like to be part of the effort to fight the global war on terror,” Ruff said. “They have indicated...

PAKISTAN'S President Pervez Musharraf is supposedly a key U.S. ally in the "war on terror." But is he, in fact, more of a liability than an asset in combating Al Qaeda and the increasingly menacing Taliban forces in Afghanistan? Since 9/11, the Bush administration has been propping up Musharraf's military regime with $3.6 billion in economic aid from the U.S. and a U.S.-sponsored consortium, not to mention $900 million in military aid and the postponement of overdue debt repayments totaling $13.5 billion. But now the administration is debating whether Musharraf has become too dependent on Islamic extremist political parties in...

NEUVE-CHAPELLE, Pas-de-Calais (AFP) - Indian Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee paid homage to the thousands of Indians killed in Europe in the First World War. Mukherjee on Sunday laid a wreath at a memorial at Neuve-Chapelle in northern France to Indian soldiers killed in the 1914-1918 conflict. Hamlaoui Mekachera, India's minister for veterans, was also present. The memorial bears the names of around 5,000 Indian soldiers killed in a 1915 Allied offensive against the Germans at Neuve-Chapelle. Around 90,000 soldiers from India, at the time a British colony, fought in World War I, with around 8,150 killed in 1914-1915 in France...

Many pundits in Washington, among them supporters of Israel, anticipated better results from the month-long war against Hizbullah. They were hoping for Israel to put Iran and Syria on the defensive by using IDF military might to eradicate Hizbullah much faster. Some have already concluded that this was an opportunity squandered. The truth is that the last month has not been "a walk in the park" for Israel. We have been fighting a ruthless, well-armed and well-trained, albeit small, army that has spent the last six years preparing for this war while we have been busy on many other fronts....

LONDON (Reuters) - A British soldier killed in an operation against Taliban guerrillas in southern Afghanistan was named on Monday as Private Andrew Barrie Cutts. He was killed on Sunday during a pre-planned operation against insurgents in Musa Qualeh in Helmand province, the Ministry of Defence said. The latest death brings the number of NATO soldiers killed since it took over the south from the United States to eight. Seventeen British forces personnel have been killed in Afghanistan since November, 2001, five not in combat. Defence Secretary Des Browne paid tribute to Cutts, from the Royal Logistic Corp based in...

In a startling report revealing a tale of transatlantic espionage not witnessed since the glory days of 007, the London-based Financial Times recently detailed how Britain, supposedly America’s closest European ally, has been leading a multi-year European undercover ('back-door') effort within the United States to undermine U.S. climate change policy. While this is not surprising, it does smack of interference with another nation's policies. It also happens to confirm prior ITSSD research, readily accessible on its website.

Tony Blair will quit Downing Street in "a year and a bit" according to a remark attributed to Alastair Campbell, the Prime Minister's former press supremo. This suggests that Mr Blair will stay put until the Labour Party conference next year. He has already told his G8 colleagues, before leaving them at St Petersburg last week: "See you next year." The report will anger many Labour MPs - and probably frustrate his expected successor Chancellor Gordon Brown - who presumably would like to see him retire much earlier than that. Some Labour MPs now believe he is a liability to...

Excerpt - Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi announced a plan on Tuesday to withdraw Japanese ground troops from the southern Iraq city of Samawah, ending their aid and reconstruction mission that started with the dispatch order issued in January 2004. At a meeting of executives of his ruling Liberal Democratic Party before making the announcement, Koizumi said of the Iraq mission, ''A chapter has been finished. I will announce the withdrawal today.'' Koizumi held a news conference on the withdrawal of the Ground Self-Defense Force troops after meeting with leader of the LDP's ruling coalition partner, New Komeito, as well as...

The final breakthrough in the long pursuit of the most blood-stained terrorist of them all, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, came from Jordan. The source was Ziyad Halaf al Karbouli, also known as Abu Hufeiza, one of the lowlifes Zarqawi employed to attack and rob the convoys plying Baghdad’s main supply route across the Jordanian border and murdering their Iraqi or Jordanian drivers. Foreigners riding along were taken hostage. DEBKA-Net-Weekly reveals that he was picked up – not by chance, but in consequence of a well-laid Jordanian sting operation set up and executed by King Abdullah’s old unit, The Riders of Justice...

Colombians granted their Right-wing president a second four years in office yesterday, backing his assaults on the booming drugs trade. Alvaro Uribe, Washington's staunchest ally in Latin America, changed the constitution last year to allow himself to seek re-election and becomes the first Colombian president to win a second term for more than a century. His victory, with 62 per cent of the vote, halts a trend in the continent that has seen Left-wing leaders elected in Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile and Uruguay. The Oxford-educated president campaigned on his uncompromising security policy, under which murder rates have fallen by a...

BOGOTA, Colombia - Law-and-order President Alvaro Uribe was re-elected in a landslide Sunday in Colombia's most peaceful elections in more than a decade, strengthening the U.S. ally's mandate to crack down on armed groups and drug traffickers. The Harvard-educated Uribe's win marks the first time in more than a century that an incumbent Colombian leader has been elected to a second term and bucks a trend of leftist leaders taking office across South America in recent years. With 85 percent of ballots counted, the conservative Uribe scored a stronger than expected 62 percent of the vote, easily surpassing the 50...

Speaking to the California Legislature, Mexican President Vicente Fox on Thursday applauded passage of a sweeping immigration reform bill by the U.S. Senate and said his country is willing to share in border control. "Mexico wants to be part of the solution, not part of the problem," Fox said in a 20-minute speech to a joint session of the state Senate and Assembly, marking his first official visit to California's Capitol in five years. "We are your partners in security against terrorism," Fox said. "We are your allies in the war on drugs and crime. We are your partners in...

OTTAWA -- Canada won't ignore threats from Iran and the Hamas-led Palestinian government against Israel, warns Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Harper made the pledge Tuesday as he spoke at a Parliament Hill ceremony in remembrance of victims of the Holocaust. The prime minister said the world should never again stand by and ignore signs of trouble when they appear. "We will not ignore them when they are done by Hamas. We will not ignore them when they are from the government of Iran," Harper told several hundred people beneath the Peace Tower. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has made repeated threats...