Posted on 12/17/2006 4:03:30 PM PST by DAVEY CROCKETT
VEVAK learned its methodology from the Soviet KGB and many of the Islamist revolutionaries who supported Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini actually studied at Moscow's Patrice Lumumba Friendship University, the Oxford of terrorism. Documented Iranian alumni include the current Supreme Leader (the faqih) Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, under whose Velayat-e Faqih (Rule of the Islamic Jurisprudent) apparatus it has traditionally operated. Its current head is Cabinet Minister Hojatoleslam Gholam-Hussein Mohseni-Ezhei, a graduate of Qom's Haqqani School, noted for its extremist position advocating violence against enemies and strict clerical control of society and government. The Ministry is very well funded and its charge, like that of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (the Pasdaran) is to guard the revolutionary Islamic Iranian regime at all costs and under all contingencies.
From the KGB playbook, VEVAK learned the art of disinformation. It's not so difficult to learn: tell the truth 80% of the time and lie 20%. Depending on how well a VEVAK agent wants to cover his/her tracks, the ratio may go up to 90/10, but it never drops below the 80/20 mark as such would risk suspicion and possible detection. The regime in Teheran has gone to great lengths to place its agents in locations around the world. Many of these operatives have been educated in the West, including the U.K. and the United States. Iranian government agencies such as embassies, consulates, Islamic cultural centers, and airline offices regularly provide cover for the work of VEVAK agents who dress well and are clean shaven, and move comfortably within our society. In this country, because of the severance of diplomatic relations, the principal site of VEVAK activities begins at the offices of Iran's Permanent Mission to the UN in New York.
Teheran has worked diligently to place its operatives in important think tanks and government agencies in the West. Some of its personnel have been recruited while in prison through torture or more often through bribery, or a combination of both. Others are Islamist revolutionaries that have been set up to look like dissidents - often having been arrested and imprisoned, but released for “medical reasons”. The clue to detecting the fake “dissident” is to read carefully what he/she writes, and to ask why this vocal “dissident” was released from prison when other real dissidents have not been released, indeed have been grievously tortured and executed. Other agents have been placed in this country for over twenty-five years to slowly go through the system and rise to positions of academic prominence due to their knowledge of Farsi and Shia Islam or Islamist fundamentalism.
One of the usual tactics of VEVAK is to co-opt academia to its purposes. Using various forms of bribery, academics are bought to defend the Islamic Republic or slander its enemies. Another method is to assign bright students to train for academic posts as specialists in Iranian or Middle East affairs. Once established, such individuals are often consulted by our government as it tries to get a better idea of how it should deal with Iran. These academics then are in a position to skew the information, suggesting the utility of extended dialogue and negotiation, or the danger and futility of confronting a strong Iran or its proxies such as Hizballah (Hezbollah). These academics serve to shield the regime from an aggressive American or Western policy, and thereby buy more time for the regime to attain its goals, especially in regards to its nuclear weaponry and missile programs.
MOIS likes to use the media, especially electronic media, to its advantage. One of VEVAK's favorite tricks is setting up web sites that look like they are opposition sites but which are actually controlled by the regime. These sites often will be multilingual, including Farsi, German, Arabic French, and English. Some are crafted carefully and are very subtle in how they skew their information (e.g., Iran-Interlink, set up and run by Massoud Khodabandeh and his wife Ann Singleton from Leeds, England); others are less subtle, simply providing the regime's point of view on facts and events in the news (e.g., www.mujahedeen.com or www.mojahedin.ws). This latter group is aimed at the more gullible in our open society and unfortunately such a market exists. However, if one begins to do one's homework, asking careful questions, the material on these fake sites generally does not add up.
Let's examine a few examples of VEVAK's work in the United States. In late October, 2005, VEVAK sent three of its agents to Washington to stage a press event in which the principal Iranian resistance movement, the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MeK), was to be slandered. Veteran VEVAK agent Karim Haqi flew from Amsterdam to Canada where he was joined by VEVAK's Ottawa agents Amir-Hossein Kord Rostami and Mahin (Parvin-Mahrokh) Haji, and the three flew from Toronto to Washington. Fortunately the resistance had been tracking these three, informed the FBI of their presence in Washington, and when the three tried to hold a press conference, the resistance had people assigned to ask pointed questions of them so that they ended the interview prematurely and fled back to Canada.
Abolghasem Bayyenet is a member of the Iranian government. He serves as a trade expert for the Ministry of Commerce. But his background of study and service in the Foreign Ministry indicates that Bayyenet is more than just an economist or a suave and savvy businessman. In an article published in Global Politician on April 23, 2006, entitled “Is Regime Change Possible in Iran?”, Bayyenet leads his audience to think that he is a neutral observer, concerned lest the United States make an error in its assessment of Iran similar to the errors of intelligence and judgment that led to our 2003 invasion of Iraq, with its less than successful outcome. However, his carefully crafted bottom line is that the people of Iran are not going to support regime change and that hardliner President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad actually has achieved greater popularity than his predecessors because of his concern for the problems of the poor and his fight for economic and social justice. To the naive, Bayyenet makes Ahmadinejad sound positively saintly. Conveniently overlooked is the occurrence of over four thousand acts of protest, strikes, anti-regime rallies, riots, and even political assassinations by the people of Iran against the government in the year since Ahmadinejad assumed office. So too, the following facts are ignored: the sizeable flight of capital, the increase in unemployment, and the rising two-figure rate of inflation, all within this last year. Bayyenet is a regime apologist, and when one is familiar with the facts, his arguments ring very hollow. However, his English skills are excellent, and so the naОve might be beguiled by his commentary.
Mohsen Sazegara is VEVAK's “reformed revolutionary”. A student supporter of Khomeini before the 1979 revolution, Sazegara joined the “imam” on his return from exile and served in the government for a decade before supposedly growing disillusioned.
He formed several reformist newspapers but ran afoul of the hardliners in 2003 and was arrested and imprisoned by VEVAK. Following “hunger strikes”, Sazegara was released for health reasons and permitted to seek treatment abroad. Although critical of the government and particularly of Ahmadinejad and KhameneМ, Sazegara is yet more critical of opposition groups, leaving the impression that he favors internal regime change but sees no one to lead such a movement for the foreseeable future. His bottom line: no one is capable of doing what needs to be done, so we must bide our time. Very slick, but his shadow shows his likely remaining ties to the MOIS.
http://www.ocnus.net/artman/publish/article_27144.shtml
Censorship's new clothes
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/02/04/opinion/edlalami.php
Censorship's new clothes
Moroccan taboos
Laila Lalami
Published: February 4, 2007
CASABLANCA, Morocco: When I went to visit my cousin in the capital,
Rabat, in December, he was preparing for his pilgrimage to Mecca. He
showed me the pamphlets he was reading to learn about the rituals and talked
about how much he would miss his family while he was away.
As the afternoon wore on, the mood grew lighter, and he began to tell
me jokes. "Did you hear the one about the Islamist whose wife has just
delivered a daughter? He picks up his baby and says, 'Come here, my
little bomb.'" My cousin chuckled as he said this — and so did I. It was an
otherwise unremarkable afternoon, during which we shared funny stories
satirizing our society.
Yet two weeks ago, Driss Ksikes, the editor in chief of the weekly
magazine Nichane, and Sanaa Al Aji, a journalist, were sentenced to three
years' probation and a fine of more than $9,300 each, while Nichane was
banned from publishing for two months — all for printing this joke,
along with several others, in a cover article titled "Jokes: How Moroccans
Make Fun of Religion, Sex and Politics."
The article, written by Al Aji, examined the role that jokes play in
society and, quoting sociologists, comedians and intellectuals, concluded
that "comedy is the most beautiful form of expression, inaccessible to
censorship." Several insets included jokes about God, the Prophet
Muhammad and the king, Mohammed VI. The magazine remained on newsstands for
a week without incident.
Some religious conservatives started a small campaign online and on
satellite news channels, calling for Nichane to be punished, while others
passionately defended the magazine and signed petitions of support. A
few days later, Nichane was shut down and its journalists taken to court
for printing material that was deemed "offensive to the Islamic
religion." As outrageous as the verdict was, it was light compared with what
the state prosecutor was seeking: five years' prison time and a ban from
practicing journalism for 10 years.
While the Nichane case was unfolding, another news magazine found
itself in trouble. On three occasions, court bailiffs visited the offices of
Le Journal Hebdomadaire to demand payment of a fine of more than
$350,000. A Casablanca court had called for the magazine to pay this sum to
Claude Moniquet, the director of a small institute called the European
Strategic Intelligence and Security Center. At issue was an article
calling into question Moniquet's impartiality in a report he conducted
about Western Sahara. The report was favorable to Morocco's position that
this territory is part of its southern provinces.
In the United States, Morocco is often seen as a liberal country and a
bulwark against Islamic extremism. Certainly, the reforms that have
taken place over the last few years are steps in the right direction.
But while the court cases against independent news magazines like
Nichane, Le Journal Hebdomadaire and several others are within the bounds of
Moroccan law, they appear to single out the independent press, to the
exclusion of more partisan publications. These cases highlight a
particularly troubling pattern, in which the regime represses the progressive
voices it claims to champion.
Meanwhile, newspapers like Attajdid, the mouthpiece for an Islamic
party, go unmolested, probably because they are careful to confine their
criticism to social issues and generally avoid two of the three infamous
"red lines" — the king and Western Sahara — that limit press freedom in
Morocco. When it comes to the third taboo, Islam, such publications
often set the tone for public debate, as they did during the Danish
cartoons controversy.
The government then tries to prove that it, too, can defend Islamic
values; hence the case against Nichane for printing jokes deemed offensive
to the religion. It is a high-stakes game between the religious right
and the government, and it is unclear which will come out the winner.
In a sign of the times, Nichane has retreated. The magazine has already
announced that it will not appeal the court's decision, and it is
likely that it will respect the "red lines" from now on. In contrast,
Aboubakr Jamao, Le Journal Hebdomadaire's besieged editor, resigned from his
post in order to save his magazine. Since any salary he makes in
Morocco can legally be seized to pay his colossal fine, he argued, he has to
leave the country and work elsewhere. Morocco cannot afford to lose his
voice.
The Bush administration has time and again referred to Morocco as a
moderate Arab state that deserves to receive millions of dollars of
taxpayers' money to encourage democratic reforms. U.S. officials point to
recent elections, changes in family law and a good growth rate as
indicators of Morocco's success. But they turn a blind eye to problems of press
freedom. A democracy cannot be established unless independent
journalists, whatever their political beliefs, are allowed to work freely.
Without freedom of expression, Morocco's reforms are merely a varnish.
Underneath it lies the same old country.
Laila Lalami is the author of "Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits," a
novel.
You will find most of my posts today addressed to 'all'.
I tried to pick up several background posts, that were lost in my email box, can't deal with new links, as my server is low today, which I am assuming, is related to the internet attack yesterday and even to the warning that came from Australia earlier this week.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1780800/posts
Police Investigate Wave Of Seven Letter Bombs (UK)
The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 2-7-2007 | John Steele
Posted on 02/07/2007 10:45:05 AM PST by blam
Police investigate wave of seven letter bombs
By John Steele, Crime Correspondent
Last Updated: 3:51pm GMT 07/02/2007
Police chiefs today issued a nationwide warning to companies, organisations and the public after seven "viable explosive devices" were sent through the post, injuring at least seven people, over the last three weeks.
continues and good map of bombs.....................
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070208/ts_nm/nuclear_terrorism_dc
Nuclear terrorism risk seen growing
By Mark Trevelyan, Security Correspondent 1 hour, 22 minutes ago
LONDON (Reuters) - Western governments must take seriously the possibility of terrorists exploding a nuclear bomb as the necessary materials and know-how become easier to acquire, security analysts argue in two new reports.
ADVERTISEMENT
"The threat of terrorists acquiring nuclear weapons is real ... moreover, the likelihood of terrorists acquiring such weapons is growing as more states aggressively pursue their own nuclear ambitions," the EastWest Institute said in a study.
It said the first nuclear terrorist may turn out to be an American or European, reflecting a likely evolution in security threats over the next 10-15 years and a possible shift away from al Qaeda-style Islamist militancy toward eco-terrorism.
In a separate report, London's influential Chatham House think-tank said it was feasible that terrorists could acquire an atomic bomb, build one themselves, create an "improvised nuclear device" or blow up a nuclear power station.
Another risk was the collapse of government control over civil and military nuclear facilities and materials in countries like Pakistan or
North Korea.
The design, materials and engineering for a bomb "have all become commodities, more or less available to those determined enough to acquire them," said Paul Cornish, head of the international security program at Chatham House.
He said the science and engineering challenges were very difficult but not insurmountable.
IMPROVISED BOMB
Rather than aiming to build a military-grade atomic weapon, terrorists might settle for a cruder improvised device that would require more uranium but a lesser degree of enrichment, thereby reducing one of the key technical barriers.
continued........................
Freeper mail.
http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=421&&issue_id=3992
CHECHNYA WEEKLY
Volume 8 , Issue 5 (February 01, 2007)
RIGHTS ACTIVISTS SAY SITUATION IN CHECHNYA IS “MONSTROUS”
On January 29, Demos, the Moscow-based human rights think-tank, and the Memorial human rights group issued a joint report on the “counter-terrorist operation” in Chechnya and the North Caucasus more generally. Despite the Kremlin’s efforts to portray the region as returning to normal, “nothing has really been normalized,” the Associated Press quoted Demos head Tatyana Lokshina as saying. “Yes, we can and we should be happy for the new freshly painted buildings and the clean streets and the fountains built in Grozny…but despite all that, the human rights situation there remains monstrous,” Lokshina said. The news agency quoted Dmitry Kozak, President Vladimir Putin’s envoy to the Southern District, as acknowledging that the North Caucasus remains volatile. “The main factor destabilizing the situation in southern Russia today and containing economic growth is corruption,” Kozak said at a meeting with scholars in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don. “Nobody is concerned any longer about terrorist activity and crime levels – everybody is afraid of extortion by the authorities, their prejudice, their bias.”
Gazeta, on January 30, provided details of the Demos-Memorial report. According to the newspaper, the report notes that the current situation differs from the previous years in that violence between Chechens has spilled over into other parts of Russia. It noted the attempted armed takeover of the Samson-K meat-processing plant in St. Petersburg by gunmen reportedly led by the commander of the pro-Moscow Vostok battalion, Sulim Yamadaev (Chechnya Weekly, October 5 and September 21, 2006), and the assassination of Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov’s main Chechen opponent, Movladi Baisarov in Moscow last November (Chechnya Weekly, November 22, 2006).
A co-author of the report, Tatyana Lapshina of Memorial, told Gazeta that the situation in Chechnya is not stabilizing at all, despite the fact that the number of abductions has declined. According to the report, 186 people were kidnapped in Chechnya in 2006, of whom 63 disappeared without a trace and 11 were found dead. This was a notable improvement over previous years: in 2002, 539 people disappeared; in 2003, 497; in 2004, 448; in 2005, 320. Still, as Gazeta noted, last year’s figure was “gigantic” compared to other Russian regions and for a republic supposedly re-establishing peace.
The report also notes another trend, which Gazeta described as “omerta, Chechen-style”: the number of people appealing to the authorities about relatives who have disappeared has dropped drastically. “But this does not indicate stabilization,” Gazeta wrote. “The reason is far more terrible: people have become more fearful.” The newspaper quoted the report as stating: “We find out about abductions third hand. But even when we come [to the victims’ relatives], they try not to tell us anything.” Memorial’s Lapshina told the newspaper that this state of affairs developed after control over security was transferred from the federal to the local siloviki. “Local residents can talk without fear only about the unlawful actions of the federal forces, but they are silent about the analogous actions by the kadyrovtsy,” Gazeta wrote. It quoted Lapshina as saying: “The farther the process of Chechenization goes, the stronger the curtain of silence. There is a lot going on that we are not finding out about.” She noted that the situation is exacerbated by the fact that the judicial authorities practically never prosecute the siloviki for rights violations, citing the example of the disappearance of 11 people from the village of Borozdinovskaya in 2005.
Gazeta also cited the case of Malika Soltaeva, the 23-year-old resident of the town of Argun who was abducted in February 2006 and whose abductors forced her to confess to alleged marital infidelity, beat her, shaved her head and painted it green – painting a green cross on her forehead – while videotaping the entire incident (Chechnya Weekly, January 25; May 25, 2006). Gazeta noted that Soltaeva and her father tried to file a criminal complaint with the authorities but that they had refused to accept it, and that the case only gained momentum after it was covered by Western media, including the New York Times. As Gazeta noted, it is not simply fear that keeps relatives of those who have disappeared from talking. According to the Demos-Memorial report, police often urge relatives to withdraw their formal complaints, telling them: “Why deprive yourselves of your last chance to free your relative? A go-between will appear, and you will come to an understanding with him. But if you raise a clamor, there won’t be such an opportunity.”
According to Gazeta, the authors of the Demos-Memorial report “tried very hard to tone down the criticism of the authorities.” The report says that in order to protect the rights and freedoms of its citizens, the state not only has the right, but also the obligation to carry out a tough fight against terrorism. “However, the actions taken by the Russian authorities in Chechnya and the North Caucasus since the fall of 1999 under the flag of the fight against terrorism does not fall under the definition of a counter-terrorist operation (KTO),” the report states. It adds that the way in which force was employed “turned the KTO into a criminal action leading to mass victims and gross violations of human rights.” One such violation is forced confessions. “They abduct young people, put them in illegal prisons, apply torture and get confessions,” Tatyana Lapshina of Memorial told Gazeta. “Later, they (the abductees) are transferred to official institutions and registered as [rebel] fighters.”
According to the report, there are many illegal prisons in Chechnya, but the most notorious are those located in Tsentoroi (the Kadyrov family’s hometown), Khankala and the Gudermes district settlement of Dzhalka. Elina Ersenoeva, the young Chechen journalist who was reportedly forced to marry Chechen rebel warlord Shamil Basaev and was subsequently abducted at gunpoint after receiving threats from kadyrovtsy may have ended up in one of those prisons (Chechnya Weekly, September 15, 2006). Ersenoeva’s mother was also subsequently kidnapped (Chechnya Weekly, October 12, 2006). “In the opinion of the Memorial staffers, both women were murdered a long time ago,” Gazeta wrote.
Novaya gazeta, in conjunction with Memorial, detailed several recent incidents of human rights abuses in Chechnya and the neighboring republics in its January 29 edition. One incident took place in the town of Argun on January 9, when a 76-year-old resident, Sumaya Abzueva, was beaten up as she was walking to a local market. According to Memorial, the possible reason for the attack was that Abzueva had been seeking an investigation into the abduction and murder of her son in November 2005, reportedly by members of the Argun branch of the Anti-Terrorist Center (ATC), the armed formation that operated under the control of Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov until it was dissolved last year. The Anti-Terrorist Center was restructured into two units of the Chechen Interior Ministry’s Internal Troops – the Sever and Yug battalions.
Prior to the attack, Abzueva had been threatened by her son’s alleged abductors, who were also her neighbors. On September 26, 2006, her neighbor Sultan Buluev tried to get her into his car; the next day, two other neighbors, Arbi Mamaev and Anzor Bataev, drove a car threateningly around her until passers-by “shamed” them away. Abzueva alleges that the three men had kidnapped and murdered her son while they were members of the Argun ATC.
The Chechen prosecutor’s office, however, did not detain the three suspects because they joined the ranks of the republic’s security forces after the ATC was dissolved. Bataev and Buluev were transferred to the Yug battalion while Mamaev joined the Chechen Interior Ministry’s patrol-sentry regiment (PPSM-2). “It did not seem possible to the civilian prosecutor’s office to detain Bataev and Mamaev, given that they were now servicemen,” Novaya gazeta wrote. “And to transfer the case to the military prosecutor’s office would not be possible as long as it was unproven that military men had committed the crime. Under that pretext, the three were left at liberty, and Abzueva wound up practically under house arrest, afraid to go outside and not even feeling safe at home – not without grounds, as [the incident on] January 9 showed.” Novaya gazeta added: “The paradox is that in order to become a soldier in the ‘Yug’ or ‘Sever’ battalions, it was sufficient to simply fill out an application. They were not subjected to vetting, at least by the prosecutor’s office.”
The other incident detailed by Novaya gazeta and Memorial involved the abduction of a resident of the village of Kartsa in North Ossetia on the evening of January 10. According to their account, Sultan Barakhoev was driving home with a friend, Vakha Keligov, when a car pulled up beside them. A policeman, Soslan Tsoraev, and an unidentified man – both dressed in civilian clothes – were in the second car. After asking Barakhoev who Keligov was – Barakhoev replied that his friend was a player with Ingushetia’s “Angusht” soccer team – two others cars pulled up, from which eight uniformed men jumped out and tried to detain both Barakhoev and Keligov. Keligov managed to escape and make it home, and shortly afterward, he and his relatives went to the village police department to file a report about Barakhoev’s abduction. The police refused to take a report of the incident, but an officer there was able to determine that Barakhoev had been taken to district police headquarters in Vladikavkaz. When Barakhoev’s relatives arrived at the headquarters, however, police would not allow them in or answer their questions. On January 11, Barakhoev’s uncle was told by a police investigator that a grenade had been found on Barakhoev, after which Vakha Keligov appealed to the office of the Memorial human rights group in Nazran, Ingushetia, and Barakhoev’s relatives hired a lawyer. That evening, Barakhoev was released after signing a pledge not to leave the area.
On January 13, Barakhoev provided Memorial with details about the incident. He told the human rights group that after he was taken to the police headquarters in Vladikavkaz, a plastic bag was placed over his head, preventing him from breathing, and that he was struck with a heavy object on his heels, legs and torso until he lost consciousness. Barakhoev said that when he regained consciousness, one of the policemen reached into the left pocket of his (Barakhoev’s) jacket and pulled out the fuse from a grenade. Barakhoev complained to investigators that the grenade had been planted on him. Before releasing him, however, the investigators tried to force him to waive his right to a lawyer and to sign a written statement saying that he did not know how the grenade and fuse ended up in his jacket pocket.
http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=421&issue_id=3992&article_id=2371870
CHECHNYA WEEKLY
Volume 8 , Issue 5 (February 01, 2007)
ACHIMEZ GOCHIYAYEV: RUSSIA’S TERRORIST ENIGMA RETURNS
By Andrew McGregor
In the wake of the London poisoning of former FSB Colonel Alexander Litvinenko came unexpected reports that the alleged “terrorist mastermind” and organizer of the September 1999 apartment block bombings in Moscow and Vologodonsk that sparked the current Russian/Chechen war was still active in the North Caucasus republic of Karachaevo-Cherkessia (KCR). Though the two stories appeared to be unconnected, there may indeed be some relation between them.
Russian security services allege that Achimez Gochiyayev (a member of the Turkic Muslim Karachai ethnic group) directed the September bombings as retaliation for Russian attacks on “Wahhabi” villages in Dagestan in August 1999. Yet, it seems unlikely that such a carefully planned operation could have been put together in such a short period. Indeed, nearly every aspect of the bombings suggested months of planning by professional saboteurs familiar with the methods used to bring down large buildings. Gochiyayev, a small-time Moscow-based trader (by some accounts), seemed an unlikely leader for such an operation.
Russia’s FSB (the successor organization to the KGB) charges that Gochiyayev was the leader of a gang of Karachai “Wahhabis” and terrorists known as “Muslim Society no. 3” (also known as the Karachaev Jamaat) based in Karachaevsk, Uchkeken and Ust-Dzhigut. In the biography advanced by Russian security services, Gochiyayev led the movement into terrorism, organized the 1999 bombings, became involved in a failed Islamist coup in the KCR later that year and eventually, emerged as a powerful rebel and terrorist leader in the first half of the present decade.
In a handwritten disposition dated April 24, 2002 and obtained by Litvinenko and historian Yuri Felshtinsky, Gochiyayev painted a very different picture of his life, beginning with his move to Moscow as a sixteen-year-old in 1986. He eventually married in Moscow, received official residency and opened a food distribution business. According to Gochiyayev, a childhood friend from the KCR capital of Cherkessk posing as a potential business partner (but in reality an agent of the FSB) persuaded him in June 1999 to unknowingly rent basement units for the storage of the explosives. After the second bombing, however, Gochiyayev realized that he was an unwilling accomplice in the attacks and called the police with details of the two other basements that he had rented. Police raids on these premises found timers and explosives, thus preventing two further blasts. Gochiyayev claims he was warned by his policeman brother that security services were intent on liquidating him and thus went into hiding, where he has remained ever since. The FSB declared that Gochiyayev’s account “could not be taken seriously,” coming from “a man who has besmirched the calling of an officer of the special services (Litvinenko)” (Interfax, July 25, 2002). A Chechen group claiming to be investigating the 1999 bombings later claimed that the Gochiyayev account had been obtained by them before copies were stolen from them by an “unscrupulous American journalist” and delivered to Litvinenko (Kavkaz Center, July 26, 2002).
The allegations of FSB’s involvement in the 1999 bombings were taken up by exiled Russian businessman Boris Berezovsky, who funded Litvinenko and Felshtinsky’s investigation and the publication of their book, Blowing Up Russia: Terror From Within. The former oligarch’s personal feud with Putin and mysterious dealings with Caucasus-based kidnapping gangs has made it easier for Moscow to discredit his efforts (and those funded by him) to expose an FSB role in the apartment bombings.
While still on the loose, two other Karachai suspects in the 1999 attacks, Yusuf Krymshamkhalov and Timur Batchiev (both alleged senior members of the “Gochiyayev gang”), confessed in a letter to the commission investigating the bombings that they had participated as “middlemen” in transporting explosives to Moscow. The two claimed that those who recruited them (FSB men under agents German Ugryumov and Max Lazovsky, both killed shortly after) told them the explosives were for use on administrative and military installations, not apartment buildings. The suspects added that reports that the Karachais had trained together in camps run by the Saudi commander of foreign mujahideen in Chechnya, Amir al-Khattab (the alleged financier of the bombings) were false: “We declare, that neither Khattab nor [late warlord Shamil] Basaev nor someone from the Chechen field commanders and their political leaders, nor any Chechen had any relation to the September terrorist acts of 1999. They did not order, they did not finance and did not organize those terrorist acts. As for Khattab and some other field commanders, we met for the first time only after we escaped to Chechnya…” (“Open Letter to the Commission for the Investigation of the Explosions of Apartment Houses in Moscow and Volgodonsk,” July 28, 2002, published by Novaya gazeta, December 9, 2002). Aside from Gochiyayev, all other alleged members of the bombing conspiracy are presently either dead or in Russian prisons. Though the bombings are typically described in the international press as the work of “Chechen rebels,” none of the accused were Chechen.
From time to time, Gochiyayev’s name has resurfaced in Russian media and federal security reports. The September 2003 allegations that Gochiyayev had been arrested with several Chechen mujahideen in Azerbaijan were denied by Azeri security services (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, August 27, 2003; PRIMA, September 1, 2003). In June 2004, a Karachai “member of Gochiyayev’s gang” named Khakim Abaev was killed in Ingushetia. Two months later, Nikolai Kipkeyev, another Karachai member of “Muslim Society no.3” was killed in Moscow during the course of a subway bombing. Kipkeyev was also alleged to be Gochiyayev’s associate (Interfax, May 12, 2005). In September 2004, Russian media reported that security services suspected Gochiyayev of financing the terrorist operation in Beslan (Moskovsky Komsomolets, September 11, 2004). In May 2005, a group of “Wahhabi terrorists” was killed in a police raid in Cherkessk. The six dead men and women were said to have been “under the command of Achimez Gochiyayev” (Pravda, May 19, 2005; MosNews, May 15, 2005. lenta.ru, May 15, 2005).
In the December 25, 2006 shootout at a Cherkessk block of flats that claimed the life of one alleged rebel, Russian media were quick to note that the cornered gunmen were from “Achimez Gochiyayev’s group” (Regnum, December 25, 2006). While the other fighters escaped the siege, the deceased was identified as Ruslan Tokov, allegedly an aide to Gochiyayev in a campaign led by the latter to murder FSB agents and policemen from the KCR’s Ministry of the Interior (ITAR-Tass, December 25, 2006). Russian TV later added that a second rebel named Saltagarov had been killed, while Gochiyayev himself had left the building only moments before the assault (Channel One TV, December 26, 2006).
The FSB charged that Amir al-Khattab paid Gochiyayev $500,000 in cash to carry out the 1999 bombings. Yet, Gochiyayev has always claimed that he had nothing to do with al-Khattab, and that the photos on the FSB website showing the two of them together were either fabricated or of another man Litvinenko engaged British forensics expert Geoffrey Oxlee to examine the digitized photos. While Litvinenko insisted (in Oxlee’s absence) that the forensics expert had declared the photos a fake, Oxlee later held short of making such a declaration in an interview with a Russian newspaper, venturing only that the images were “of poor quality” and had been “exposed to digital processing.” In short, the photographic evidence was “inconclusive” (Kommersant, July 27, 2002).
Gochiyayev is often said to be hiding in the Pankisi Gorge, but was not found there during the October 2002 Georgian security sweep of the area. Georgia promised to extradite the fugitive if found (as they did with several other Karachai suspects). FSB Lieutenant General Ivan Mironov stated that captured Chechens revealed during interrogation that they had seen Gochiyayev with Krymshamkhalov at the Pankisi base of late Chechen warlord Ruslan Gelayev (lenta.ru, December 10, 2002).
Conclusion
For over seven years, Gochiyayev’s menacing shadow has loomed over the North Caucasus. He is everywhere but nowhere; always planning new terrorist outrages but staying one-step ahead of the security services. In reality, since his (unwitting or deliberate) role in the 1999 bombings, Gochiyayev cannot be decisively tied to any rebel military operation or terrorist attack in the Caucasus. To the contrary, Gochiyayev denies having any role in the Chechen resistance or the bitter war being waged between the Karachai Islamists and security forces in the KCR.
It is entirely possible that Gochiyayev is already dead. He has not been heard from for four years and there appears to have been no takers for the $3 million reward for his capture offered by the FSB. While the leaders of KCR jamaats and other militant groups make public statements and give interviews (none of which mention Gochiyayev), there is only silence from the fugitive. The banner of Chechen resistance, the Kavkaz Center website, depicts current leaders of rebel leaders across the Caucasus, a pantheon from which Gochiyayev is conspicuously absent. Kavkaz and other resistance websites never mention Gochiyayev as an active insurgent.
Much of Bombing Russia relies on the testimony of Gochiyayev, so it is perhaps not surprising that Russian security forces might resurrect his name as a current terrorist leader just as the Litvinenko poisoning investigation intensified in December. If Gochiyayev were indeed an active resistance leader, this would discredit his account of himself as an innocent patsy of the FSB who has gone underground, fearing for his life. Reviving Russia’s reluctant “terrorist mastermind” as an ongoing threat deals a strong blow to Litvinenko’s version of the events of 1999 just as Bombing Russia is released in a new edition.
http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=421&issue_id=3987&article_id=2371848
CHECHNYA WEEKLY
Volume 8 , Issue 4 (January 25, 2007)
CPJ: CHECHEN POLICE TARGETED IN POLITKOVSKAYA MURDER PROBE
Members of a delegation from the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) who were in Moscow this week to push for more aggressive investigations into the murder of Russian journalists, and particularly Anna Politkovskaya, raised eyebrows when they claimed they were told by Foreign Ministry officials that Chechen policemen were being investigated for the crime. “Russia’s prosecutor general has opened a criminal investigation into several police officials in Chechnya who may have killed reporter Anna Politkovskaya because she was about to publish an article alleging their involvement in torture,” CPJ stated in a press release posted on the group’s website (CPJ.org) on January 23. “The information was disclosed to a delegation from the Committee to Protect Journalists in a meeting on Monday with Foreign Ministry spokesman Boris Malakhov.”
The Moscow Times reported on January 24 that the CPJ officials said during a press conference in the Russian capital the previous day that Malakhov, who is the Foreign Ministry’s deputy spokesman, had told them about the probe of the Chechen police during a meeting on January 22. The English-language newspaper quoted Nina Ognianova, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, as saying that the meeting with Malakhov was in English and that the ministry’s statement was put in such unambiguous terms that clarification was not required. “We reported to you what we heard: that the Prosecutor General’s Office has launched a criminal investigation into several Chechen police officers,” Ognianova said, adding that Malakhov said he had obtained the information directly from the Prosecutor General’s Office. “We were just pleased to hear the investigation was making progress,” she said. Paul Steiger, managing editor of the Wall Street Journal and CPJ board chairman, said he had asked the Foreign Ministry officials to confirm their statement, which they did. CPJ executive director Joel Simon said the ministry officials had stressed that Chechen police involvement was just one of several theories being pursued by investigators.
Foreign Ministry deputy spokesman Boris Malakhov subsequently denied that he had told the CPJ representatives about a possible Chechen police role in Politkovskaya’s killing. “Absolutely nothing like that was said at the meeting,” the Moscow Times quoted him as saying in a telephone interview on January 23. “I don’t know where they got that information from.” Instead, he said he had told the CPJ delegation that prosecutors in Chechnya were investigating a link between Politkovskaya’s last article, about torture in the region and her death.
Interfax, meanwhile, quoted the Chechen Interior Ministry as saying on January 23 that it had no information that any of its officers were in any way involved in Politkovskaya’s murder. Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov, for his part, called reports about the possible involvement of Chechen Interior Ministry personnel in Politkovskaya’s murder “a carefully planned provocation.” Interfax quoted him as saying reports that a criminal case had been opened against two Chechen Interior Ministry employees on suspicion of involvement in Politkovskaya’s murder were also untrue. “Anna Politkovskaya was a journalist - a person of a peaceful profession - and Chechen policemen do not wage war against peaceful people; their task is to fight terrorists, members of illegal armed formations [and] Wahhabis, and they cope with that task successfully,” Kadyrov said. Still, as Kommersant noted on January 24, Kadyrov also ordered the Chechen Interior Ministry’s leadership to “liven up” its battle against so-called “werewolves in epaulettes” – the term coined in 2003 by then Interior Minister Boris Gryzlov for corrupt and criminal law-enforcement officers. According to Kommersant, Kadyrov ordered the ministry officials to report to him on their efforts in this area no later than February 18.
http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=421&issue_id=3992&article_id=2371862
CHECHNYA WEEKLY
Volume 8 , Issue 5 (February 01, 2007)
RIGHTS ACTIVISTS SAY SITUATION IN CHECHNYA IS “MONSTROUS”
On January 29, Demos, the Moscow-based human rights think-tank, and the Memorial human rights group issued a joint report on the “counter-terrorist operation” in Chechnya and the North Caucasus more generally. Despite the Kremlin’s efforts to portray the region as returning to normal, “nothing has really been normalized,” the Associated Press quoted Demos head Tatyana Lokshina as saying. “Yes, we can and we should be happy for the new freshly painted buildings and the clean streets and the fountains built in Grozny…but despite all that, the human rights situation there remains monstrous,” Lokshina said. The news agency quoted Dmitry Kozak, President Vladimir Putin’s envoy to the Southern District, as acknowledging that the North Caucasus remains volatile. “The main factor destabilizing the situation in southern Russia today and containing economic growth is corruption,” Kozak said at a meeting with scholars in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don. “Nobody is concerned any longer about terrorist activity and crime levels – everybody is afraid of extortion by the authorities, their prejudice, their bias.”
Gazeta, on January 30, provided details of the Demos-Memorial report. According to the newspaper, the report notes that the current situation differs from the previous years in that violence between Chechens has spilled over into other parts of Russia. It noted the attempted armed takeover of the Samson-K meat-processing plant in St. Petersburg by gunmen reportedly led by the commander of the pro-Moscow Vostok battalion, Sulim Yamadaev (Chechnya Weekly, October 5 and September 21, 2006), and the assassination of Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov’s main Chechen opponent, Movladi Baisarov in Moscow last November (Chechnya Weekly, November 22, 2006).
A co-author of the report, Tatyana Lapshina of Memorial, told Gazeta that the situation in Chechnya is not stabilizing at all, despite the fact that the number of abductions has declined. According to the report, 186 people were kidnapped in Chechnya in 2006, of whom 63 disappeared without a trace and 11 were found dead. This was a notable improvement over previous years: in 2002, 539 people disappeared; in 2003, 497; in 2004, 448; in 2005, 320. Still, as Gazeta noted, last year’s figure was “gigantic” compared to other Russian regions and for a republic supposedly re-establishing peace.
The report also notes another trend, which Gazeta described as “omerta, Chechen-style”: the number of people appealing to the authorities about relatives who have disappeared has dropped drastically. “But this does not indicate stabilization,” Gazeta wrote. “The reason is far more terrible: people have become more fearful.” The newspaper quoted the report as stating: “We find out about abductions third hand. But even when we come [to the victims’ relatives], they try not to tell us anything.” Memorial’s Lapshina told the newspaper that this state of affairs developed after control over security was transferred from the federal to the local siloviki. “Local residents can talk without fear only about the unlawful actions of the federal forces, but they are silent about the analogous actions by the kadyrovtsy,” Gazeta wrote. It quoted Lapshina as saying: “The farther the process of Chechenization goes, the stronger the curtain of silence. There is a lot going on that we are not finding out about.” She noted that the situation is exacerbated by the fact that the judicial authorities practically never prosecute the siloviki for rights violations, citing the example of the disappearance of 11 people from the village of Borozdinovskaya in 2005.
Gazeta also cited the case of Malika Soltaeva, the 23-year-old resident of the town of Argun who was abducted in February 2006 and whose abductors forced her to confess to alleged marital infidelity, beat her, shaved her head and painted it green – painting a green cross on her forehead – while videotaping the entire incident (Chechnya Weekly, January 25; May 25, 2006). Gazeta noted that Soltaeva and her father tried to file a criminal complaint with the authorities but that they had refused to accept it, and that the case only gained momentum after it was covered by Western media, including the New York Times. As Gazeta noted, it is not simply fear that keeps relatives of those who have disappeared from talking. According to the Demos-Memorial report, police often urge relatives to withdraw their formal complaints, telling them: “Why deprive yourselves of your last chance to free your relative? A go-between will appear, and you will come to an understanding with him. But if you raise a clamor, there won’t be such an opportunity.”
According to Gazeta, the authors of the Demos-Memorial report “tried very hard to tone down the criticism of the authorities.” The report says that in order to protect the rights and freedoms of its citizens, the state not only has the right, but also the obligation to carry out a tough fight against terrorism. “However, the actions taken by the Russian authorities in Chechnya and the North Caucasus since the fall of 1999 under the flag of the fight against terrorism does not fall under the definition of a counter-terrorist operation (KTO),” the report states. It adds that the way in which force was employed “turned the KTO into a criminal action leading to mass victims and gross violations of human rights.” One such violation is forced confessions. “They abduct young people, put them in illegal prisons, apply torture and get confessions,” Tatyana Lapshina of Memorial told Gazeta. “Later, they (the abductees) are transferred to official institutions and registered as [rebel] fighters.”
According to the report, there are many illegal prisons in Chechnya, but the most notorious are those located in Tsentoroi (the Kadyrov family’s hometown), Khankala and the Gudermes district settlement of Dzhalka. Elina Ersenoeva, the young Chechen journalist who was reportedly forced to marry Chechen rebel warlord Shamil Basaev and was subsequently abducted at gunpoint after receiving threats from kadyrovtsy may have ended up in one of those prisons (Chechnya Weekly, September 15, 2006). Ersenoeva’s mother was also subsequently kidnapped (Chechnya Weekly, October 12, 2006). “In the opinion of the Memorial staffers, both women were murdered a long time ago,” Gazeta wrote.
Novaya gazeta, in conjunction with Memorial, detailed several recent incidents of human rights abuses in Chechnya and the neighboring republics in its January 29 edition. One incident took place in the town of Argun on January 9, when a 76-year-old resident, Sumaya Abzueva, was beaten up as she was walking to a local market. According to Memorial, the possible reason for the attack was that Abzueva had been seeking an investigation into the abduction and murder of her son in November 2005, reportedly by members of the Argun branch of the Anti-Terrorist Center (ATC), the armed formation that operated under the control of Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov until it was dissolved last year. The Anti-Terrorist Center was restructured into two units of the Chechen Interior Ministry’s Internal Troops – the Sever and Yug battalions.
Prior to the attack, Abzueva had been threatened by her son’s alleged abductors, who were also her neighbors. On September 26, 2006, her neighbor Sultan Buluev tried to get her into his car; the next day, two other neighbors, Arbi Mamaev and Anzor Bataev, drove a car threateningly around her until passers-by “shamed” them away. Abzueva alleges that the three men had kidnapped and murdered her son while they were members of the Argun ATC.
The Chechen prosecutor’s office, however, did not detain the three suspects because they joined the ranks of the republic’s security forces after the ATC was dissolved. Bataev and Buluev were transferred to the Yug battalion while Mamaev joined the Chechen Interior Ministry’s patrol-sentry regiment (PPSM-2). “It did not seem possible to the civilian prosecutor’s office to detain Bataev and Mamaev, given that they were now servicemen,” Novaya gazeta wrote. “And to transfer the case to the military prosecutor’s office would not be possible as long as it was unproven that military men had committed the crime. Under that pretext, the three were left at liberty, and Abzueva wound up practically under house arrest, afraid to go outside and not even feeling safe at home – not without grounds, as [the incident on] January 9 showed.” Novaya gazeta added: “The paradox is that in order to become a soldier in the ‘Yug’ or ‘Sever’ battalions, it was sufficient to simply fill out an application. They were not subjected to vetting, at least by the prosecutor’s office.”
The other incident detailed by Novaya gazeta and Memorial involved the abduction of a resident of the village of Kartsa in North Ossetia on the evening of January 10. According to their account, Sultan Barakhoev was driving home with a friend, Vakha Keligov, when a car pulled up beside them. A policeman, Soslan Tsoraev, and an unidentified man – both dressed in civilian clothes – were in the second car. After asking Barakhoev who Keligov was – Barakhoev replied that his friend was a player with Ingushetia’s “Angusht” soccer team – two others cars pulled up, from which eight uniformed men jumped out and tried to detain both Barakhoev and Keligov. Keligov managed to escape and make it home, and shortly afterward, he and his relatives went to the village police department to file a report about Barakhoev’s abduction. The police refused to take a report of the incident, but an officer there was able to determine that Barakhoev had been taken to district police headquarters in Vladikavkaz. When Barakhoev’s relatives arrived at the headquarters, however, police would not allow them in or answer their questions. On January 11, Barakhoev’s uncle was told by a police investigator that a grenade had been found on Barakhoev, after which Vakha Keligov appealed to the office of the Memorial human rights group in Nazran, Ingushetia, and Barakhoev’s relatives hired a lawyer. That evening, Barakhoev was released after signing a pledge not to leave the area.
On January 13, Barakhoev provided Memorial with details about the incident. He told the human rights group that after he was taken to the police headquarters in Vladikavkaz, a plastic bag was placed over his head, preventing him from breathing, and that he was struck with a heavy object on his heels, legs and torso until he lost consciousness. Barakhoev said that when he regained consciousness, one of the policemen reached into the left pocket of his (Barakhoev’s) jacket and pulled out the fuse from a grenade. Barakhoev complained to investigators that the grenade had been planted on him. Before releasing him, however, the investigators tried to force him to waive his right to a lawyer and to sign a written statement saying that he did not know how the grenade and fuse ended up in his jacket pocket.
http://www.jamestown.org/news_details.php?news_id=218
Beijing’s Great Leap Outward: Power Projection with Chinese Characteristics
02/07/2007 - By Willy Lam (from China Brief, February 7) - The forceful projection of China’s hard and soft power in recent months marks a stunning departure from the foreign policy axioms of late patriarch Deng Xiaoping. Deng, who anointed President Hu Jintao as the “core” of the Fourth Generation leadership, noted shortly after the Tiananmen Square massacre that China must “keep a low profile and never take the lead” in global affairs. Particularly in reference to the United States, Deng pointed out that China should “seek [opportunities for] cooperation and avoid confrontation.” This advice was largely followed by Third-Generation leaders, such as ex-president Jiang Zemin and ex-premier Zhou Rongji, both of whom were accused of being “pro-American” by nationalistic intellectuals. This shift in Chinese foreign and military policy had begun well before a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) missile destroyed an obsolete Chinese weather satellite on January 11. Last winter, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and PLA propaganda machinery surprised observers with the dramatic publicity of the launch of the Chinese-made Jian-10 fourth generation jet fighter, which is said to be the equivalent of the U.S. F-16 and the Russian SU-30. For example, state-owned CCTV showed tell-tale footage of the supersonic jet executing difficult maneuvers as well as refueling drills in mid-air (Xinhua, December 29, 2006). Until recently, it was rare for the official media to disclose information about newly developed hardware. A few months earlier, Western PLA watchers were also astounded to find military specialists discussing on-going plans to build the nation’s first aircraft carrier in the Chinese media. Blueprints of possible models even showed up on the websites of a few official news agencies (People’s Daily, November 17, 2006; November 21, 2006).
Sources close to the defense establishment said the PLA may unveil additional new weapons or technologies throughout the current year so as to demonstrate the fruits of military modernization under Hu, who serves as the chairman of the Central Military Commission. Examples may include test-flights of the even more advanced Jian-11 fighter; the unveiling of Chinese-made submarines; inauguration of indigenously designed laser weapons and even another demonstration of the Second Artillery Corps’ ability to hit targets in outer space.
On the diplomatic front, Hu set the tone for the rest of his term, which will run into 2013, by embarking on a grueling 12-day trip to Africa last week. This is the president’s second trip to the continent in less than a year. This “celebration” of Sino-African camaraderie follows on the heels of November’s Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), when Hu made history by hosting 40 African heads of state in Beijing.
Western reports of Hu’s on-going eight-nation African tour have focused on China’s anxiety to secure a long-term, reliable supply of oil and other strategic commodities; African crude already accounts for nearly a third of China’s total oil imports. The Chinese leadership has inked new deals on oil and other minerals with several countries, including Cameroon, Sudan, Zambia and South Africa. Equally important, however, has been Beijing’s eagerness to demonstrate the impressive sway of Chinese economic and diplomatic prowess. During the FOCAC as well as the current trip, Beijing has written off hundreds of millions of dollars of debt owed by 33 African nations. China’s direct investment in 49 African countries is close to $7 billion. While meeting Zambian leaders earlier this week, Hu vigorously defended his country’s assertive strategy toward Africa against charges of “Chinese-style neo-colonialism.” “China is eagerly expanding imports from Africa,” the president said, adding that tariffs for African products had been drastically curtailed. Hu declared that Chinese aid and investment in areas ranging from infrastructure and mining to hospitals and schools would be increased. The Africans and the Chinese, Hu said, would always remain “good friends, good partners and good brothers” (Xinhua, February 3).
It is true that an increasing number of African politicians—particularly those in the opposition—have protested against China’s “exploitation” of Africa’s resources and the ill-treatment of local laborers by the Chinese owners of African-based firms. Hu and his foreign policy advisers, however, are convinced that as far as the “mainstream elite”—particularly the authoritarian rulers and businessmen in several countries—are concerned, China has already displaced the United States as Africa’s big brother. Indeed, one of the main purposes of Hu’s trip is to demonstrate that China’s African policy is on par with Western norms. Thus in Liberia, the president inspected Chinese peacekeeping forces billeted there under the auspices of the United Nations. In Sudan, where China has been accused of supplying arms to government forces committing atrocities in Darfur, Hu urged President Omar al-Bashir to do more to permit a UN-sponsored initiative aimed at halting the genocide in Darfur (Xinhua, February 3). Western diplomatic sources in Beijing noted that a key reason behind Beijing’s newfound eagerness to participate in UN-organized peacekeeping missions is to demonstrate China’s rising clout, particularly when juxtaposed against the declining influence of the United States in Africa and the Middle East.
Apart from Africa, Beijing is focusing its diplomatic initiative on regions where China believes that it has an opportunity to displace the influence of the United States, which remains preoccupied with Iraq and Afghanistan. Due largely to its bulging foreign reserves, which are expected to hit $1.1 trillion this year, Beijing possesses the ability to utilize aid and trade to further consolidate China’s position in Latin America and especially Southeast Asia. During a meeting last December with the heads of state of the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Premier Wen Jiabao succeeded in expanding several initiatives under the umbrella of a China-ASEAN free trade zone. Voluminous arms sales to countries including Myanmar, Thailand and Indonesia are also in the pipeline.
Yet, a number of Chinese and Western observers have begun to question the sustainability of Hu’s aggressive foreign and military policy. Given that the Chinese Foreign Ministry was not consulted prior to the January 11 anti-satellite missile test, quite a few Chinese officials have privately expressed misgivings over the timing of, if not the rationale behind, the blatant demonstration of raw power. More liberal Chinese officials have expressed their concerns that Hu’s strategies, whether in Africa, Southeast Asia or space, may precipitate a confrontation with the United States. As evidence of this possibility, members of the U.S. Congress have already called for an investigation of whether the recent developments in Chinese weaponry could pose a threat to U.S. security, and NASA has shelved space-cooperation plans with Beijing (Washington Times, February 2).
Prominent Chinese scholars and analysts, however, have defended Hu Jintao’s security and foreign policy. People’s University international affairs expert Shi Yinhong, a known advisor to the Chinese leadership, indicated that Beijing’s enhanced peacekeeping role in Sudan and other African countries was evidence of China’s willingness to be a “respectable stakeholder” in the global community. He explained to the Western media that such demonstrations of responsible diplomacy “would boost China’s image in the West and would be welcome in Africa too” (New York Times, February 2). Likewise, Peng Guangxian, a well-known PLA strategist, noted that the recent upgrading of the Chinese arsenal was “entirely for our country’s self-defense, and aimed at boosting China’s national security only.” “Only Taiwan separatists and those people who have ulterior motives regarding China would feel uncomfortable about China’s advanced weapons,” he added (Huanqiu Shibao, February 2).
Seasoned analysts have pointed out, however, that the current leadership had decided late last year to make a clean break with Deng’s cautious axioms and instead, embark on a path of high-profile force projection. The analysts noted that Beijing was convinced it had little to lose. For instance, even under the best circumstances, it was doubtful how much advanced technology the PLA would have been able to obtain from their U.S. counterparts even if space and military cooperation between the two countries were to take place. Even without the recent demonstrations of PLA capabilities, the defense alliance between the United States and Japan will likely intensify further through such means as an accelerated development of a theater missile defense system aimed at both North Korea and China.
A new generation of generals and strategists within the PLA apparently believes that Beijing has more to gain by attaining a “balance of terror” between China and the United States. As senior strategist Peng noted, “We are developing sophisticated equipment so as to realize the principle of ‘we’ve got whatever you’ve got.’” This balance of terror would deter the United States from engaging in activities that encroached upon Beijing’s “core national interests.” In the case of Taiwan, Beijing is convinced that the embattled ruling party in Taiwan, the Democratic Progressive Party, is likely to make a further push on independence so as to rally its base—native Taiwanese primarily residing in southern Taiwan. Beijing believes that if the White House realizes that the PLA is well-equipped to disable U.S. spy satellites and target U.S. aircraft-carrier battle groups, Washington would be hesitant to come to Taiwan’s aid.
There are also benefits, both tangible and intangible, that may accrue with China’s achievement of quasi-superpower status. Given the United States’ difficulties in Iraq and the perceived shrinkage of America’s moral high ground in international affairs, countries in regions such as Africa, Southeast Asia and Latin America may have pragmatic reasons to tilt toward a seemingly benign, foreign-aid dispensing China. This goodwill may translate into more favorable terms when Chinese state firms negotiate for oil contracts in Africa and Latin America. Moreover, thanks to the backing from large numbers of Third World countries, Beijing may be able to vote down motions at the UN and other world bodies that are deemed detrimental to the interests of Beijing and close allies, such as Burma and Iran.
There may also be overwhelming domestic calculations behind Hu’s policies. With Chinese society becoming more fragmented due to the growing disparities between the haves and the have-nots, Beijing increasingly relies upon overarching ideals, such as patriotism and nationalism, to bind the disparate nation together. Spectacular demonstrations of the country’s own military capabilities and diplomatic triumphs in Africa and Latin America make it easier for Hu and his PLA colleagues to justify even greater increases in the army’s budget. And in the months leading up to the 17th Party Congress, Hu needs the support of the PLA generals in order to fully consolidate his stature in the CCP political hierarchy and legacy. All of these factors seem to impel the Fourth Generation leadership toward a much bolder—if not riskier—approach to the Middle Kingdom’s centuries-old quest for fuguo qiangbing or “wealthy country, strong army.”
Dr. Willy Wo-Lap Lam is a Senior Fellow at The Jamestown Foundation. He has worked in senior editorial positions in international media including Asiaweek newsmagazine, South China Morning Post, and the Asia-Pacific Headquarters of CNN. He is the author of five books on China, including the recently published “Chinese Politics in the Hu Jintao Era: New Leaders, New Challenges.”
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Al-Suri's Doctrines for Decentralized Jihadi Training - Part 1-2
02/01/2007 - By Brynjar Lia (from Terrorism Monitor, February 2) - The evolution toward smaller, more autonomous and decentralized organizational structures has been identified as a key trend in jihadi terrorism during the past few years [1]. Confronting amorphous structures and networks, which lack clearly identifiable organizational linkages and command structures and in which self-radicalization and self-recruitment are key elements, is a formidable challenge for security services [2]. The jihadi decentralization trend is clearly a result of counter-terrorism successes. These "defeats" have been scrutinized and digested in the writings of key jihadi theoreticians during the past few years. New roadmaps and operational concepts are being explored as the jihadis search for effective ways to operate in the much less permissive security environment of the post-9/11 era. Among the new literature on future jihadi strategies, the writings of the Syrian-born, al-Qaeda veteran Mustafa bin Abd al-Qadir Setmariam Nasar have received considerable attention, both in jihadi circles and in Western media and scholarship. Using his most common pen names—Abu Mus'ab al-Suri and Umar Abd al-Hakim—he has written a 1,600 page treatise, The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, which is among the most frequently mentioned jihadi strategy books. It has been featured on numerous jihadi websites since its release in January 2005. The core ideas of this voluminous work are presented in chapter eight, in particular the section on "military theories" and the subsequent two sections on "organizational theories" and training doctrines. This two-part article outlines and discusses al-Suri's training doctrine and briefly assesses its potential importance for the new generation of jihadis. Hopefully, it will be a contribution to improving understanding of how jihadi groups are adapting their training doctrines in the face of a harsher and less permissive operative environment.
How to train and prepare recruits for armed jihad is a topic that has preoccupied al-Suri throughout his entire jihadi career until his capture in late 2005. During his participation in the Islamist uprising against the Syrian regime in the early 1980s, Abu Mus'ab al-Suri received significant military and security training. He quickly rose to become a military instructor in the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood's camps in Iraq and at the organization's safe houses in Jordan. Combining his newly acquired military skills with his previous training in mechanical engineering at the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Aleppo, he co-authored a handbook in explosive engineering, which was then his specialty. Al-Suri claims that this handbook, which became known as "The Syrian Memorandum," was later used in the Arab-Afghan camps in Afghanistan. In July 1987, al-Suri met with Abdullah Azzam, the godfather of the Arab volunteers in Afghanistan, and was quickly enlisted as a military instructor. His intellectual ambitions, however, were greater than teaching explosive engineering and basic guerrilla warfare principles. Following the publication of his 900 page treatise The Islamic Jihadi Revolution in Syria, published in Peshawar in May 1991, he gradually emerged as a jihadi writer and theoretician of some stature. In his treatise, he debated the lessons learned from the failed Islamist uprising against Hafez al-Asad's regime [3]. The book was a frontal attack on the Muslim Brotherhood and was in many ways a Syrian parallel to Ayman al-Zawahiri's The Muslim Brothers' Bitter Harvest in Sixty Years, which appeared at the same time. Both works were part of the intellectual foundation for the radical jihadi trend that emerged as a considerable force inside the Arab-Afghan movement after Azzam's death in November 1989.
The Demise of the Revolutionary Tanzims
As opposed to many other jihadi writers, al-Suri always strived to maintain a practical and "operative" perspective, emphasizing the need to learn from past mistakes and devise new practical "operative theories" (nazariyat al-'amal) for future jihadi campaigns [4]. In his most important works, he focused on explaining how jihadi groups should operate in order to survive in the new post-Cold War context characterized by enhanced international anti-terrorism cooperation and the progressive elimination of terrorist sanctuaries and safe havens. Even though he himself had been a member of a typical tanzim (organization), the Syrian "Combatant Vanguard Organization," and continued to maintain very close contact with other tanzims, especially the Egyptian Islamic Jihad and the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, all of al-Suri's operative theories are built on the premise that the tanzim model—the centralized hierarchical and regional secret jihadi organization—has outlived its role. Their Achilles' heel was their hierarchical structure, which meant that if one member was caught, the whole organization would be at peril.
Another factor which has made the revolutionary tanzims less relevant in al-Suri's eyes is the progressive Western "occupation and usurpation of Muslim land" (Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc.). This transition from "indirect" to "direct occupation," which began in earnest around 1990 (Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm), obligates a reorientation: the current war must be aimed at "repelling the invading intruders and assailants" from Muslim lands. The traditional goal of attaining an Islamic revolution in one country or one geographical area has to be postponed. Al-Suri, therefore, recommends that future jihadi warfare should be concentrated around other forms, namely the "jihad of individual terrorism," practiced by self-contained autonomous cells in combination with jihadi participation on "Open Fronts," wherever such fronts are possible. In al-Suri's parlance, this term refers to conflict areas with an overt presence of mujahideen, permanent bases, open battle lines, or guerrilla war from those fixed positions [5]. Given the difficulty of opening such fronts, al-Suri concludes that "the jihad of individual terrorism" becomes, in reality, the only option for most jihadis.
Hence, the practice of "individual terrorism" is a core theme in al-Suri's most recent writings, and it is rooted in his most famous slogan: nizam, la tanzim (System, not Organization) [6]. In other words, there should be "an operative system" or template available anywhere for anybody wishing to participate in the global jihad either on one's own or with a small group of trusted associates, and there should not exist any "organization for operations." Hence, the global jihadi movement should discourage any direct organizational bonds between the leadership and the operative units. Leadership should only be exercised through "general guidance," and operative leaders should exist only at the level of small cells. The glue in this highly decentralized movement is nothing else than "a common aim, a common doctrinal program and a comprehensive (self-) educational program" [7].
The same goal of decentralization is applied in al-Suri's training doctrines; training should be moved to "every house, every quarter and every village of the Muslim countries" [8]. Al-Suri caricatures the jihadi training doctrine of the past as not much more than an invitation to Afghanistan: "calling the Islamic nation to the camps." His answer is to do the opposite; one should strive to "plant training camps across the Islamic nation, in all her houses and quarters" [9]. For al-Suri, the issue is not only that of decentralization, but also of transforming the jihadi cause into a mass phenomenon. One of al-Suri's oft repeated slogans is that "the resistance is the Islamic nation's struggle and not a struggle by the elite" [10]. This is an ambition many revolutionary theoreticians of all ideological stripes have nurtured without much success.
Determination to Fight
The decisive factor for successful jihadi training is the moral motivation and the desire to fight, not knowledge in the use of arms, al-Suri asserts. If the ideological program is not fully digested and the mental preparation is absent, weapons training is of no use. In an audiotaped interview in the late 1990s, al-Suri recalled how he had second doubts about the training that many Arab volunteers received in Peshawar and in Afghanistan, especially those hailing from the Gulf countries, since they more often than not failed to share his radical ideological platform:
"I am not prepared to train [people] in shooting practices because I think they will fire back at us justifying this by the fatwas of the Muslim Brothers and the Azhar clerics…People come to us with empty heads and leave us with empty heads…They have done nothing for Islam. This is because they have not received any ideological or doctrinal training" [11].
Partly based on this experience, al-Suri therefore came to insist that purely military disciplines should never form the dominant part of jihadi training.
Al-Suri finds the religious foundation for jihadi training in two Quranic verses, namely verse 60 of Surat al-Anfal and verse 46 of Surat al-Tawbah. The former is perhaps the most frequently cited Quranic verse among jihadis. It contains an injunction to prepare for "striking terror in the hearts of the enemies" [12]. It has therefore been a point of departure for a considerable number of jihadi writings on the legitimacy of "terrorism" in Islam [13]. Verse 46 of Surat al-Tawbah, "And if they had wished to go forth they would assuredly have made ready some equipment, but Allah was averse to their being sent forth and held them back and it was said (unto them): Sit ye with the sedentary," demonstrates, according to al-Suri, God's disgrace over the hypocrites who fail to prepare for war [14]. He concludes from reading these two verses that there are three stages in the performance of jihad: "will...preparation...launch." In other words, preparation cannot come without sincere will and firm determination, and an armed campaign cannot be launched without thorough preparation.
As opposed to many Salafi writers, al-Suri is not averse to comparisons with and citations of Western and non-Islamic sources to support his conclusions: "All military schools agree that a will to fight and moral strength of the fighter is the basis for victory and good performance" [15]. While this determination to fight is important in regular armies, it is "the fundament for the guerrilla fighter in general and the jihadi resistance fighter in particular" [16]. Al-Suri's writings are also characterized by a willingness to practice self-criticism, sometimes in a relatively sharp and satirical language. When writing about the moral and ideological prerequisites for proper jihadi training, al-Suri ponders the fact that many of those tens of thousands who trained for an armed jihad in Afghanistan under the first Arab-Afghan phase in 1986-1992, as well as during the second "round" under the Taliban regime in 1996-2001, returned to their homes without any intention to fight. They obviously "had the will to prepare [for armed jihad], but at the same time they intended to avoid jihad. They wanted to willfully and premeditatedly desist from jihad!" [17]. In al-Suri's eyes, jihad should be practiced not only in Afghanistan, but also in the wider global arena against the "Western Crusaders" and their "Arab collaborationist regimes." If this ideological platform is not fully embraced by the jihadi recruits, military training could easily become a double-edged sword.
Part Two
Training jihadi recruits in the post-9/11 world is increasingly about finding a safe place where training is possible rather than discussing curricula, facilities, selection of recruits, instructors and related tasks. In his voluminous treatise The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, published on the internet in January 2005, the Syrian-born al-Qaeda veteran Mustafa bin Abd al-Qadir Setmariam Nasar, better known as Abu Mus'ab al-Suri and Umar Abd al-Hakim, examines five different methods for jihadi training based on past jihadi practices [18]:
1. Secret training in safe houses.
2. Training in small secret camps in the area of operations.
3. Overt training under the auspices of states providing safe havens.
4. Overt training in the camps of the Open Fronts [19].
5. Semi-overt training in areas of chaos and no [governmental] control.
Secret training in safe houses has been extremely important in terrorist training in all jihadi experiences, according to al-Suri. He considers this method "the very foundation" in preparing jihadi cadres, even though it only allows for live training in the use of light weapons and some lessons in the use of explosives [20]. Al-Suri himself had hands-on experience with this type of training in Jordan from the early 1980s, and he emphasized, in particular, successes in educating cadres "in doctrinal and ideological courses" using this method [21].
Training in small, secret mobile camps has also been frequently used by jihadi groups during the past decades. This type of training may take place in remote regions such as in mountains, forests and distant rural areas, and the number of persons involved should be in the range of 5-12. Slightly more advanced training, such as setting up ambushes and organizing assassinations, is possible in such camps. Al-Suri suggests that live training in the use of explosives can be practiced inside caves or near places where the sound of explosions would not attract attention, such as in the proximity of stone quarries, fishing areas and related locations.
Although al-Suri acknowledges that jihadi organizations in the past have derived great short-term benefits from establishing overt training camps in states providing safe havens, he finds that the results have ultimately been mostly disastrous: "Experience has proven that this is strategically a mortal trap" [22]. Safe haven states tend to constrain, exploit and may eventually sacrifice the jihadi organizations to further their own interests [23]. Moreover, after 9/11 "it is no longer possible for countries to open safe havens or camps for the Islamists and the jihadis" [24].
Al-Suri is more positive about overt training in the camps of the "Open Fronts," based mainly on the Afghan and Bosnian experiences. The comprehensiveness of the training opportunities on these fronts, and the absence of "political and ideological constraints," makes this a better option [25]. He nevertheless cautions that training on the "Open Fronts" is not always effective, partly because of the presence of many competing jihadi and Islamist groups. The conditions do not allow for the kind of tight ideological indoctrination that is possible in safe houses. Furthermore, the economic costs involved in dispatching volunteers to camps in distant countries are very high. More importantly, crossing several national borders to reach the areas of the "Open Fronts" involves too many security risks [26].
As for semi-overt training in areas of chaos and where there is no governmental control, al-Suri points out its benefits in the past: in locations such as the tribal areas in Yemen, Somalia, the Horn of Africa, the tribal areas in the border regions of Pakistan and the great Saharan countries in Africa, both local and non-local jihadi groups have been able to set up semi-overt camps. The low cost of weapons, ammunition and space in these regions is an advantage [27]. He finds, however, that the prospect for exploiting these black holes is rapidly declining as a result of the U.S.-led war on terrorism and the new geopolitical situation:
"The areas of chaos are on the verge of coming under American control and being closed…the only [training] methods which remain possible for us now, in the world of American aggression and international coordination to combat terrorism, are the methods of secret training in houses and mobile training camps" [28].
In other words, only the first two models are viable options in the post-9/11 era. Al-Suri clearly believes that the formation of large-scale overt camps similar to the al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan must be postponed until some point in the distant future [29].
Devising Jihadi Training in a Harsh Security Environment
Al-Suri's training doctrine is heavily informed by his acute awareness of the military weakness of the jihadi movement. The current situation in which the enemy "is dominating air, ground and sea" imposes very strict security precautions on jihadi training opportunities [30]. From this point of departure, al-Suri offers five building blocks for jihadi training: 1. mental and ideological preparation and developing the desire to fight and moral strength; 2. jihadi guerrilla warfare theory; 3. spreading the ideological, theoretical and military training programs across the Islamic Nation by various means; 4. secret training in houses and in limited, mobile training camps; 5. developing fighting competence through jihadi action and through participation in battle [31].
Not surprisingly, ideological indoctrination comes first, but no less important is the emphasis on studying guerrilla warfare theory adapted to the jihadi struggle. This has been a topic of intense study by al-Suri. In fact, three of al-Suri's most well-known audiotaped lecture series deal specifically with this topic. One of them was held in Khost in 1998 and consists of 32 audiotapes in which he reads and comments on War of the Oppressed, an American book on guerrilla warfare that has been translated into Arabic. Al-Suri strived to modify and adapt leftist guerrilla warfare literature to the Islamic context and planned to turn these lectures into a book entitled The Basis for Jihadi Guerrilla Warfare in Light of the Contemporary American Campaigns [32]. Finding very few works in the Arab library on jihadi guerrilla warfare, al-Suri called upon his followers to transcribe his lectures in order to make them available to the broadest possible audience; in September 2006, his request was apparently heeded, as several of these lectures appeared on jihadi websites in Arabic PDF-formatted transcripts [33].
The widest possible distribution of jihadi training materials is clearly a cornerstone of al-Suri's training doctrine. One needs the "spread of culture of preparation and training…by all methods, especially the internet" [34]. This recommendation has been followed up by jihadis in recent years. Not only have numerous, comprehensive training manuals and encyclopedias, such as the 700 MB size Encyclopedia of Preparation for Jihad (mawsu'at al-i'dad), been made available online in text and picture formats, but also sleek, professional, video-formatted, instructional materials detailing various explosive manufacturing recipes have begun to circulate widely during the past two years, and at least 22 separate audio-visual jihadi manuals are now in circulation on the web. Furthermore, 29 WMV-formatted files of al-Suri's videotaped lectures, recorded in August 2000 at his own training camp, called mu'askar al-ghuraba (The Strangers' Camp), in Karghah near Kabul, have been available to download from multiple sites since January 2005.
The last building block in al-Suri's training doctrine, namely training through action and fighting, is derived directly from his experience in the Syrian Islamist uprising in 1980-82. Al-Suri did not intend to allow untrained recruits to undertake complicated operations, which would contradict his principle of sequence: "will...preparation...launch." Rather, he described how a gradual introduction of untrained recruits into an operative role can take place to allow "expertise [to] develop through battle" [35]. Recruits should first participate in action only as bystanders or witnesses. Later, they will serve in a minor auxiliary function without directly intervening. Finally, when deemed qualified, they will operate directly in main operations under the command of senior members [36].
Although al-Suri does not go deeply into the details of jihadi training, he presents what he terms "a light program which can be implemented by the simplest cells…operating under the most difficult circumstances of security and secrecy" [37]. The program is characterized by training activities that do not involve serious security risks, but are still relevant to a jihadi. The elements of the program range from physical exercise and studies of explosive manuals to practicing explosive manufacturing using dummies, shooting practice with compressed air guns, practicing procedures for secure communication and studies of all kinds of relevant military- and weapons-related handbooks. Only when the time is right should the group proceed to find a proper secret location to undertake live practice shooting and use of explosives.
Conclusion
The danger of al-Suri's training doctrine lies in its very realistic assumptions about the jihadis' military weakness. His doctrine seems to be cleanly and pragmatically tailored to the security situation in the Western world of the post-9/11 era. It emphasizes training and fighting at home or in the country of residence (which for many al-Qaeda sympathizers means the Western world), not overseas, using whatever means are available and always maintaining security precautions as the number one priority. This hard-hitting realism differs greatly from the main body of jihadi literature. Although al-Suri stands out as one of the sharpest theoreticians in the jihadi movement, he is rarely quoted in the wider and more religiously oriented Salafi-Jihadi literature [38]. Lacking the stature of a religious scholar, his writings probably have a limited, but important audience among the more intellectually oriented jihadis. Al-Suri is emblematic of the rise of a new generation of jihadi strategic study writers, who are still a tiny minority, but whose writings are informed by pragmatism, presented in a rational-secular style and emphasize a willingness to put political effectiveness before religious dogmas [39].
Dr. Brynjar Lia is a research professor at the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment (FFI) and the author of a forthcoming biography on Abu Mus'ab al-Suri entitled Architect of Global Jihad: The Life of Al-Qaeda Strategist Abu Mus'ab Al-Suri (London: Hurst & Co Publisher, 2007). See http://www.hurstpub.co.uk/hurst/bookdetails.asp?book=192. Among his previous books are Globalisation and the Future of Terrorism: Patterns and Predictions (London: Routledge, 2005) and The Society of the Muslim Brothers in Egypt, 1928-1942 (Reading: Ithaca Press, 1998).
Notes
1. The author would like to thank his colleagues Petter Nesser, Thomas Hegghammer and Anne Stenersen at the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment (FFI) for valuable comments and feedback on this article.
2. See, for example, "The Changing Face of Terror: A Post 9/11 Assessment," Testimony Before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations by Ambassador Henry A. Crumpton, Coordinator for Counter-terrorism, Washington, DC, June 13, 2006, http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/rm2/68608.htm.
3. The full title of the two volume book was Umar Abd al-Hakim, The Islamic Jihadi Revolution in Syria, Part I. The Experience and Lessons (Hopes and Pains) and The Islamic Jihadi Revolution in Syria: Part II. Ideology and Program (Research and Foundation in the Way of Armed Revolutionary Jihad) (in Arabic), Peshawar, May 1991.
4. Umar Abd al-Hakim, The Islamic Jihadi Revolution in Syria, Part I, p. 9.
5. As examples of such "Open Fronts," al-Suri refers to: "The First Afghani Jihad, Bosnia, Chechnya, and The Second Afghani Jihad in the Era of Taleban." Cited in The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, p. 1361 (pdf-version).
6. The term is introduced by al-Suri in Chapter 8.4 and 8.5 in his The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, p. 1379, 1395 and 1405 (pdf-file version).
7. The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, pp. 1407 (pdf-version). For more on this, see Brynjar Lia, "Abu Mus'ab al-Suri: Profile of a Jihadist Leader," Paper and ppt-presentation given at the King's College Conference The Changing Faces of Jihadism, London, April 28, 2006.
8. The "training theory" is presented in chapter 8.6 in The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, pp. 1414-1428 (pdf-version).
9. The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, pp. 1425 (pdf-version).
10. Ibid., pp. 1425 (pdf-version).
11. Brynjar Lia, Architect of Global Jihad, chapter 4.
12. Translation from Pickthal, via Search Truth: Search in the Quran and Hadith website, http://www.searchtruth.com.
13. See, for example, a booklet by the now deceased Sheikh Hamud bin 'Uqla al-Shu'aybi, perhaps the most prominent Saudi Salafi-Jihadi ideologue, in which he argues that there is a kind of terrorism which "is legitimate, sanctioned and ordered by God, which is to prepare strength and be mobilized for resisting the enemies of God and his prophets." Cited in "The Meaning and Truth of Terrorism" (in Arabic), Minbar al-Tawhid wa'l-Jihad website, dated 5/9/1422h or November 20, 2001.
14. Translation from Pickthal, via Search Truth: Search in the Quran and Hadith website, http://www.searchtruth.com.
15. The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, p. 1420 (pdf-version).
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid., p. 1421 (pdf-version).
18. When al-Suri discusses the training options, especially the last three models, he appears slightly ambiguous and self-contradictory, although his conclusion is clear. This probably reflects the fact that The Call to Global Islamic Resistance was written over a long period of time. After the U.S. announced the $5 million bounty on his head, the book was hastily released before he had time to double-check and finalize the manuscript. See introduction in The Call to Global Islamic Resistance.
19. For an explanation of the term "Open Fronts," see Part One of this study.
20. The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, p. 1414 (pdf-version).
21. Ibid., p. 1417 (pdf-version).
22. Ibid., p. 1417 (pdf-version).
23. Ibid., p. 1416 (pdf-version).
24. Ibid., p. 1419 (pdf-version).
25. Ibid., p. 1416 (pdf-version).
26. Ibid., p. 1418 (pdf-version).
27. Ibid., p. 1416 (pdf-version).
28. Ibid., p. 1419 (pdf-version).
29. Ibid., p. 1424 (pdf-version).
30. Ibid., p. 1423 (pdf-version).
31. Cited in Ibid., p. 1423 (pdf-version).
32. Ibid., p. 1424 (pdf-version).
33. These lectures were "The Management and Organisation of Guerrilla Warfare," Khost, 1998; "Explanation of the Book 'War of the Oppressed,'" Khost, 1998; and "Lessons in Guerrilla Warfare Theories," Jalalabad, 1999. See posting on muntadayat al-firdaws al-jihadiyyah, September 21, 2006, at http://www.alfirdaws.org, accessed October 2006.
34. The Call to Global Islamic Resistance, p. 1424 (pdf-version).
35. Ibid., p. 1426 (pdf-version).
36. Ibid., p. 1424 (pdf-version).
37. Ibid., p. 1427 (pdf-version).
38. See William McCants (ed.), The Militant Ideology Atlas (Combating Terrorism Center, West Point, 2006), http://www.ctc.usma.edu.
39. For one such strategic study, see Brynjar Lia and Thomas Hegghammer, "Jihadi Strategic Studies: The Alleged Al Qaida Policy Study Preceding the Madrid Bombings," Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 27 (5) (September-October 2004), pp.355-375.
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ABC acknowledges errors (or bias?) in covering ME conflict
Hat tip:
http://anivlam.blogspot.com/
http://www.icjs-online.org/index.php?eid=2470&ICJS=139&article=1186
ABC acknowledges errors in coverage of mid-east conflict
by Senator Michael Ronaldson
Monday January 29, 2007
from Media Release
Senator Michael Ronaldson, Liberal Senator for Victoria, today welcomed the ABC’s acknowledgement that its coverage of the Israel-Lebanon conflict in 2006 was riven with errors.
In answers to questions placed on notice by Senator Ronaldson at the Senate Supplementary Estimates Hearings in October 2006 the ABC has acknowledged that the news coverage was misleading.
The ABC specifically acknowledged that it had:
- repeatedly incorrectly described the location where Israeli soldiers were kidnapped by Palestinian terrorists;
- used language that portrayed a bias against Israel;
- made references in stories that were inconsistent with its own policies, and
- misled viewers over the history of conflict in the area.
"I welcome the ABC’s admission that its reporting of the lamentable conflict in the middle-east last year did not accurately reflect the truth" Senator Ronaldson said.
At the Supplementary Estimates Hearings on 30 October 2006 Mark Scott, ABC Managing Director described the purpose of the ABC’s new editorial policies as being "really about good journalism – journalism that is fair, accurate, balanced and objective; journalism that lets the facts speak."
"If these recent admissions by the ABC are the first step towards the more fair, balanced, accurate and objective reporting that Mr Scott describes then it is a welcome step forward" Senator Ronaldson said.
"The ABC must learn from its mistakes and prevent such breaches of its own standards in the future"
"I will continue to keep a close watch on the ABC in the hope that its new editorial policy and new Director will ensure that the community does not see a repeat of such errors"
"The Australian community deserves public broadcasting that is balanced and objective. The ABC’s admissions make it appear that this has unfortunately not been the case in 2006"
Windshield Failure Results In Dramatic King Air B200 Emergency
King Air Suffers Severe Damage After Depressurization Accident
The partial failure of a windshield and the rapid decompression of the
cabin
nearly resulted in the total loss of a King Air and its crew over the
weekend. While details are coming mostly from general media reports for
the
moment, video of the aircraft and its emergency landing have provided
significant evidence that an inflight failure of the aircraft resulted
in a
rapid, and possibly uncontrolled descent that nearly caused the
aircraft, a
Raytheon King Air B200, to break apart.
According to media reports, the aircraft experienced a partial failure
of
the windshield at an altitude well in excess of 20,000 feet, creating a
spider web type of failure ont he windshield and the decompression of
the
cabin. Media reports also suggest that the flight crew lost
consciousness
of, and/or control of the aircraft, resulting in some mode of control
recovery below 10,000 feet (reported as 7000 feet by at least one media
outlet). The aircraft subsequently executed an emergency landing at
Cape
Girardeau Regional Airport in Missouri.
Examination of the video (seen in the attached screen captures), shot
by
KFVS, which also caught the fairly uneventful emergency landing,
reveals the
loss of most of the horizontal stabilizer and elevator assemblies,
wrinkled
and bent main wings and a windshield that was nearly useless, visually,
due
to pervasive spiderweb-style cracking throughout its surface.
Statements
attributed to the pilots (who left the area by rental car, shortly
after
landing), indicated that they regained control of the aircraft below
10,000
feet where the aircraft was involved in a steep vertical descent and
(then)
not under positive control. The subsequent recovery created severe
stresses
on the aircraft and the wrinkling and bending evident in pictures of
the
wing suggests that aircraft was stressed in a manner not too far form
the
ultimate structural yield point.
Cape Girardeau Airport Manager, Bruce Loy, told local media outlets
that
this was, "The most amazing situation I've ever seen..." and expressed
surprise that an aircraft with this amount of damage could still be
flown.
The flight crew was identified as Pilot Sheldon Stone and co-pilot Adam
Moore who indicated that emergency oxygen equipment failed when they
attempted to use it. Despite that, they regained functional
consciousness
after descending some 20,000 feet. Pilot Stone told local media that
"We
were both getting drunk really fast. I remember thinking, really
slowly,
'Hey, I'm not getting any oxygen, what's wrong here?' But I was so
loony
already at that point I couldn't even solve the problem if it could be
solved. I just sort of thought to myself, 'I've got to hurry,' but
everything was fading."
While no one can deny that the flight crew was both skilled AND lucky,
one
media report suggests that a higher power may have had a hand in this
incident. It seems that the prior owner of the aircraft was an Assembly
of
God Christian association. Indeed, the N number, N777AG, had "biblical
significance" that combined a 'holy number' and the initials for the
Assembly of God.
The aircraft, N777AJ, is registered to Horizon Timber Services Inc, Of
Arkadelphia, Arkansas. More info to follow...
FMI: www.kfvs12.com, www.raytheonaircraft.com
aero-news.net
Fire Prompts L.A.-Bound Jet To Return To Sydney
(AP) SYDNEY, Australia A Los Angeles-bound Qantas Airways jumbo jet
returned
to Australia after flames streamed from the engine.
An airline spokesman says the engine was immediately shut down.
None of the 274 passengers and crew on board had been in danger.
The problem happened 10 minutes after take-off as the plane was flying
over
Sydney's northern beach suburbs. Media reports said residents were
startled
to see flames streaming from an engine.
The jet returned to the Sydney airport on three engines more than an
hour
later after dumping fuel as a safety precaution.
Passengers have been offered seats on board other flights and a
replacement
plane was scheduled to depart late Saturday.
unknown url, from group email...............
Alaska Airlines flight circles Sea-Tac after gear light flashes
SEATTLE (AP) -- An Alaska Airlines flight circled Seattle-Tacoma
International Airport for a short time Sunday morning after an
indicator
light showed a problem with the plane's landing gear.
Flight 397 safely touched down just before 9:30 a.m., with no injuries
reported, Alaska Airlines spokeswoman Caroline Boren said Sunday. The
plane
was carrying 39 passengers, two pilots and three flight attendants.
The flight was scheduled to arrive at 9:04 a.m.
The plane had been making a daily flight from Ontario, Calif., to
Seattle
when the pilot noticed a gear warning indicator light prior to landing,
Boren said.
The plane flew over a flight tower as a precaution for a visual check
of the
landing gear to make sure it had lowered.
"It was and it landed just before 9:30," Boren said.
Boren said the plane was taken out of service and crews were "checking
it
thoroughly."
"Our maintenance people will be checking it very carefully," she said.
[unknown url]
Cause of Plane's Emergency Landing in Roseland
We now know why a small plane had to make an emergency landing on the
main
drag in Roseland two years ago.
The plane landed on a busy State Road 933 during lunch hour in
December,
2004.
According to the NTSB Website, the fuel control unit on the Pilatus
Turboprop failed, causing the plane to lose power.
And because of that incident, the fuel control unit for that model
plane has
been redesigned.
The pilot and four passengers were unhurt when the plane clipped a
utility
pole during the emergency landing.
http://www.wndu.com/news/headlines/5541921.html
Al-Qaeda site posts Israeli book
Jihad website refers to book written by Haifa University professor discussing role net plays in terrorism
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3361031,00.html
Eitan Glickman Published: 02.05.07, 09:51
A book written by an Israeli professor has been posted on an al-Qaeda affiliated website.
Professor Gabriel Weimann of Haifa University's Communications Department was surprised to find a picture of the cover of his book, 'Terror on the Internet: The New Arena, the New Challenges,' and links to its summaries, on a global Jihad organization's website.
"At first it seemed quite strange to me that they would publish my book," Weimann said Sunday, "but then when I read the text in Arabic I understood their motivation."
The caption read, "The West's astonishment at our terrorist brothers' use of the internet has led them to write a book."
"The paradox is that this organization that goes against the progress of the West is using its most advanced tool as a weapon," added Weimann.
FEATURE-Iraqi police selling weapons on black market
05 Feb 2007 10:35:55 GMT
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/COL344383.htm
Source: Reuters
By Ahmed Rasheed and Ross Colvin
BAGHDAD, Feb 5 (Reuters) - Like many of his colleagues, Abu Zaid was issued an Austrian-made Glock pistol when he joined the new U.S.-trained and equipped Iraqi police force.
But after narrowly escaping death twice, including being shot at near a polling station in Baghdad during national elections in December 2005, he decided to quit, he said.
"I sold my Glock pistol and my bullet-proof vest for $1,500 so that I can feed my family until I find a safer job. They were mine to sell, after all I had risked my life and faced death," he told Reuters.
Anecdotal evidence, including interviews with arms dealers, suggests that Abu Zaid is just one of many policemen selling the highly prized pistol on the black market, already a shopper's delight for buyers with enough cash.
Everything from the ubiquitous AK-47 assault rifle, the biggest-selling item, to rocket-propelled grenade launchers, sniper rifles and belt-fed medium machine guns are available, many looted from huge arms dumps immediately after the 2003 war.
continued................
The Independent
Oksana Chelysheva: The slow, painful death of journalism in Russia
For a while, we are not going to be acting as a clearing house for
news about Chechnya
Published: 05 February 2007
Did you read about the death of press freedom in Russia the other
day? Well, probably not. Independent journalism doesn't expire in a
single, dramatic moment. It's more like a series of small blows,
leading not to out-and-out demise but suffocation and a life-sucking
loss of morale.
Another significant punch was landed last month. Russia's Supreme
Court in Moscow closed the Russian Chechen Friendship Society (RCFS)
on 23 January. This non-governmental organisation, which I helped
run in Nizhny Novgorod, was the home for independent journalism on
Chechnya. So, they closed us down and - for a while at least - we're
not going to be acting as a clearing-house for journalism about
Chechnya.
Consider the events of the past few months. When the wasted figure
of former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko died from polonium 210
poisoning in London in November, a murder mystery began. Two months
later, it is far from clear what lay behind this bizarre, John le
Carre-style affair, but one thing is certain: a trenchant critic of
the Russian government has fallen silent.
Likewise, just a few weeks prior to Mr Litvinenko's death, the
similarly outspoken journalist and commentator Anna Politkovskaya
was also killed. A woman of about my own age, coming back from the
supermarket with grocery bags under her arms, she was gunned down in
the lift of her own apartment block in Moscow.
Two unrelated killings? So it would seem. But, recalling that
Alexander Litvinenko appears to have been poisoned by tea laced with
polonium 210, it's chilling to remember that Anna Politkovskaya had
also been the target of poisoned tea during a plane journey in 2002.
Mr Litvinenko had publicly blamed the Kremlin for the massive
apartment block bombings that triggered the second Russian offensive
in Chechnya in 1999. Similarly, Ms Politkovskaya had repeatedly
lambasted Russia's armed forces in Chechnya for their "war crimes",
denouncing President Vladimir Putin himself for "crushing liberty".
Both wrote books expanding on their views.
I am not saying that the Russian president ordered these killings,
nor that he was even involved. I am, though, registering shock and
dismay at the lack of interest Mr Putin's government has in
safeguarding independent journalism and freedom of speech. Last
October, a few days after Politkovskaya's death, a regional Russian
court ruled that our RCFS organisation was illegal because it was
led by a man convicted of 'extremist' activities. Indeed the RCFS's
executive director - my friend and colleague, Stanislav Dmitrievski -
was convicted last February on "race hate" charges.
This is ironic. Classic, ugly, skinheaded racial violence is
certainly virulent in Russia, but Stanislav's "crime" had been to
publish pro-peace articles by Chechen separatist leaders. One of
them had been by Ahmed Zakayev, the Chechen envoy and former culture
minister who has been granted political asylum in Britain.
Whatever he is, Stanislav is no extremist, simply a journalist
reporting views on Chechnya deeply uncomfortable to the Russian
authorities. His two-year suspended sentence meant that, under a
controversial new NGO law, the authorities could close us all down
because we were run by a "criminal".
The skirmishes have their farcical side. When we arrived for our
Moscow court hearing last month, the high turnout from international
observers seemed to rattle the authorities temporarily. With
representatives from the European Commission, officials from the
embassies of countries such as Germany, the US and Sweden, and
monitors from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch all in
attendance, the normally punctual court felt it necessary to
postpone the hearing for three hours.
When they returned, the courtroom had become too small to
accommodate all the spectators. Some of the mystifyingly large group
of newcomers were asked by our camp why they were at the court that
day. It transpired that they were law school students who had been
ordered to attend simply to fill up the courtroom so that
international observers would be squeezed out.
When it is not something worse, this sort of treatment appears to be
the fate of awkward-squad journalists in Putin's Russia. The likes
of Stanislav and I, already the recipients of anonymous leaflets
proclaiming our status as "pro-Chechen vermin", are cast as ready-
made criminals in show trials for the edification of law students.
It's all part of the slow death of independent journalism in Russia.
Oksana Chelysheva and Stanislav Dmitrievski were awarded the Amnesty
International UK media award for "human rights journalism under
threat" in 2006
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/chechnya-sl/
[You will want to take a good look at this article, has charts and many ideas...granny]
Macroeconomic Implications of War with Iran
http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2007/01/macroeconomic_i_1.html
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