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The Justice Department is pressing the State Department to designate Boko Haram, a Nigerian militant group alleged to be responsible for hundreds of deaths, as a "foreign terrorist organization," according to a document obtained by Reuters. Lisa Monaco, head of the Justice Department's national security division, sent a letter in January to State Department counter-terrorism chief Daniel Benjamin requesting that Boko Haram, also known as the "Nigerian Taliban," be put on the list. A Congressional source said that in the last few days, State Department representatives have lobbied Congress to try to stop legislation which would force the administration to...

If a jayvee team puts on Lakers uniforms, that doesn’t make them Kobe Bryant.President Obama That line sums up President Obama’s tendency to downplay foreign-policy crises with derisory humor. And today his arrogance bears its toll. This weekend, Abubakar Shekau — the half-Salafi/half-psychotic leader of Boko Haram — pledged fealty to the Islamic State (IS). Defined by extreme violence — burning students alive, slitting throats, destroying villages, etc. — Boko Haram is well matched to IS. As I recently explained, it threatens both regional and U.S. interests. Yet Shekau’s pledge to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi catalyzes the threat....

At least 19 civilians were killed in a weekend attack by Boko Haram Islamists on three remote islands in Niger with many victims burnt alive, a local lawmaker said. Sunday’s onslaught took place on three islands located on Lake Chad, said ElHadj Aboubacar, a deputy from the town of Bosso in southeastern Niger. “We have been informed that at least 19 people have died, most of whom were either burnt alive or drowned in the lake,” he told AFP. There has been no official confirmation of the death toll but a private radio station in Niger has reported that two...

A Syrian businessman described as the "middleman" for oil deals between ISIS and Bashar al-Assad's regime will be targeted for European Union sanctions on Saturday. The listing of George Haswani, the owner of HESCO engineering company, sheds more light on financial links between Syria's regime and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS or Isil or Islamic State or Daiesh).

Nigerian militant group Boko Haram has pledged allegiance to Islamic State (IS), according to an audio statement. The message, which could not immediately be verified, was posted on Boko Haram's Twitter account and appeared to be by the group's leader. Boko Haram began a military campaign to impose Islamic rule in northern Nigeria in 2009. The conflict has since spread to neighbouring states.

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White House officials have been holding private meetings this week aimed at soothing lawmakers’ concerns over the U.S. posture in Syria, the future of the American military presence in Afghanistan and defense spending. The meetings come as a frustrated White House seeks to push back at criticism of President Barack Obama’s foreign policy. But the White House outreach appeared to be having little effect on some lawmakers’ concerns. Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, described Tuesday night’s White House meeting with chief of staff Denis McDonough and national security adviser Susan Rice as...

A man was arrested in New York City's international airport with uranium destined for Iran hidden in the soles of his shoes, the US Justice Department said. Patrick Campbell, 33, who was arrested Wednesday as he arrived at the John F Kennedy airport from Paris, is accused of trying to act as an intermediary to sell Iran 1,000 tons of purified uranium, in violation of US law. The Sierra Leone-based Campbell had been under surveillance since May 2012, when he responded to an ad on the site Alibaba.com by someone looking to buy uranium 308, or yellow cake. The buyer...

President Idriss Deby of Chad said on Wednesday he knew the whereabouts of Abubakar Shekau, the leader of the Nigerian militant group Boko Haram, and called on him to surrender or risk being killed. Chad's army has waged a series of battles against Boko Haram as part of a cross-border military campaign and has re-taken territory the militant group held in northeastern Nigeria. ... The Chadian army is considered one of the best in the region, backed by a strong air force. It first deployed to help Cameroon fend off Boko Haram and is now pressing southwest into Nigerian territory...

Sen. John McCain is charging the Obama administration’s foreign policy is “delusional” and says Secretary of State John Kerry’s global diplomacy has “accomplished nothing except mileage.” In an appearance on MSNBC, the Arizona Republican also calls Russian President Vladimir Putin a “meglomaniac” and “pariah.”

(CNN) - For sheer cruelty, they are well matched. They also share an apocalyptic "end-of-days" vision. Now there are signs that Boko Haram -- the most feared group in West Africa -- may be edging toward a formal pledge of allegiance to the self-declared Caliph of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi. Observers of Boko Haram, which has inflicted years of terror on northern Nigeria, note that its actions in the last six months have frequently mimicked those of ISIS -- from punishments such as stoning and beheading of its victims to taking territory and an increasingly sophisticated use...

Below, we demonstrate that the U.S. keeps “losing” war after war. There are 3 potential reasons this might be happening: •Is this chaos an intentional way to implement regime change and grab resources? •Or is this a sign of the decline of the American empire … and we just can’t win a war anymore? •Or do those in charge just not really give a damn about winning … and are they just focusing on one short-term goal after another?

A man claiming to be the leader of Nigerian jihadist group Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau, appears in a new video threatening violence against the Nigerian government should they proceed with presidential elections, and warning that the terrorist group will “enslave” all those “supporters of Francois Hollande and Obama.” The video, which was initially distributed on Twitter and since has been distributed through the SITE Intelligence group, depicts the man claiming to be Shekau before a camera, warning that the Nigerian presidential elections– already postponed due to Boko Haram suicide bombings– will never happen. The elections are scheduled to occur on...

Hundreds of militants have been killed during the struggle to recapture the Nigerian garrison town of Monguno, according to officials. "Over 300 terrorists were killed while a few were also captured," said defence spokesman Major-General Chris Olukolade. The claims follow similar statements from Niger, Chad and Cameroon - who are also involved in fighting the terror group - but they have not been independently confirmed. The army has often claimed success against the group which has then been contradicted by witness reports. Civilian vigilantes in the town confirmed it had been retaken and said there had been heavy casualties, but...

VATICAN CITY — “African values are not on sale,” the new Chairman of Communications for the African bishops has said. But Bishop Emmanuel Badejo of Oyo, Nigeria, is convinced they are under threat from what Pope Francis has called an “ideological colonization” that is seeking to destroy the family. It's so bad, he says, that the United States has made clear it will not help Nigeria fight the Boko Haram terror group unless the country modify its laws regarding homosexuality, family planning and birth-control.

At about $50 a barrel, crude oil prices are down by more than half from their June 2014 peak of $107. They may fall more, perhaps even as low as $10 to $20. Here’s why.

http://www.portfolio.com/views/columns/economics/2007/12/17/Why-Oil-Prices-Will-Drop

Scarcely a day passes that media personalities aren’t sounding the alarm over the relentless march of “Islamism”—i.e. militant Islam. To hear them tell it, one could be forgiven for thinking that “Islamism”—exemplified by the likes of ISIS—is mere centimeters away from destroying both America and Israel. Of course, this is hysteria. Jihadists are dangerous individuals, for sure, but America and Israel have ample resources with which to protect their citizens. Such, however, cannot be said for the Christians of dozens of countries around the world who daily suffer unimaginable predations at the hands of the Muslim majorities of their homelands....

In a series of histograms (graphs showing the distribution of genome and population data), Hawks shows that Asian and European genomes have significantly more Neanderthal DNA than African genomes. The averages for Asian and European samples are around 3% higher than the average for African samples. Whatever gave Africans some degree of similarity to Neanderthals, non-Africans seem to have received around 3% more of it. Europeans average a bit more Neanderthal DNA than Asians, showing that Europeans probably mixed with Neanderthals as they moved into Europe, adding a secondary mix of Neanderthal DNA into their genome beyond the primary mix...

Boko Haram forces appear poised to attack Maiduguri, a city of 2 million in northeast Nigeria -- meaning that 200,000 Christians could be at risk of slaughter by the Islamist terror group, say U.S. intelligence officials and experts on Nigeria. "An attack on Madiguri is very likely," said J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Project at the Atlantic Council, echoing U.S. intelligence officials. Pham believes, as do other experts, that Boko Haram has already placed "sleeper cells" among the tide of refugees who have fled the group's murderous rampage through Africa's most populous nation. "They've done it everywhere else...