Threat Matrix: Daily Terror Threat - Thread 5

CNN ^ | March 12, 2004

[thecabal]

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- This week's deadly train bombings in Spain will not lead to a rise in the U.S. color-coded terror threat alert system, a Department of Homeland Security spokesman said Friday.

"Based on the current intelligence, we have no specific indicators that terrorist groups are considering such an attack in the U.S. in the near term," said department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse.

[WestCoastGal]

Please let us know when we should expect you back. Otherwise we shall have to send the FR Special Forces out to find you.

[MamaDearest]

Spain: 1,300 Honduras: 368 El Salvador: 361 Dominican Republic: 302 Nicaragua: 113

These countries no longer support us; suggest if you plan vacations, you take these countries off your list, add them to France and Germany (perhaps they can find the tourist dollars with countries that think the same as they do).

[Calpernia]

between you summaries and Cindy's links....you two should combine talents and write a book! Preferrably an ebook for download. Charge a few cents or dollars!

[liberallyconservative]

I agree with you 100 PERCENT. We are surrounded to the north and south by two of the most lilly-livered countries ever founded. Who would really come to our aid in time of crisis? God please help us that we never have to find out.

[liberallyconservative]

Aw shucks, Cal... you've got me blushing :)

[Calpernia]

Is there an audio of this out there anywhere?

[Calpernia]

I'm tired. I'm here though. Would rather be in Chat then on Terror watch :P

Miss the Finest threads! They were fun! I would really love to find normal again.

[MEG33]

I have been AWOL on the finest a lot as I get all embroiled in politics.

[Calpernia]

That is the concept. That is why Bush introduced the small business incentives. All good has it's bad though. Small business Outsourcing is wide open to scams because the checks and balances aren't as tightly controlled. But at the same time, stimulating small business growth induces employment and business economy wise.

America was founded on entrepreneurial principles. Unfortunately all in the business know how aren't the ones teaching the youth.

[Calpernia]

Then take note of my post here:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1096779/posts?page=1220#1220

I found some major scarey stuff that links these URLS to MoveOn.org.

And MoveOn.org is closely meshed with the presidential elections.

And MoveOn.org raises overseas funds.

[rickylc]

I'm not sure why the Iranian troops fired on us. Just to let us know they were there I think.

[TexKat]

A Turkish police display of vest with homemade pipe bombs attached, along with guns, firebombs and other explosive materials, all seized in raids in Istanbul, Turkey, on Tuesday, March 16, 2004. Police investigating the suicide bombing of a Masonic lodge last week have arrested 18 suspected Islamic militants, including three who were planning new suicide bombings, Istanbul Gov. Muammer Guler said. (Ap Photo/Osman Orsal)

Turkey Court Charges 3 in Suicide Bombing

Tue Mar 16, 2:14 PM ET

By ESRA AYGIN, Associated Press Writer

ISTANBUL, Turkey - A Turkish court charged three suspected Islamic militants Tuesday in the suicide bombing of a Masonic lodge, and Istanbul's governor said police had thwarted new suicide attacks.

Gov. Muammer Guler said police had detained 18 people over the past week, including three who were planning new suicide bombings.

"We have foiled new suicide attacks," Guler told a news conference.

Prosecutors questioned 10 of the suspects Tuesday. A state security court that deals with terrorism cases charged one with belonging to an illegal organization, while two others were charged with "aiding or abetting terrorists," a charge that can bring up to five years in prison, the semiofficial Anatolia news agency reported.

Authorities released the other seven who were questioned.

Guler said eight of those detained were still being interrogated.

Some of those detained "have confessed that they planned the attack on the Masonic lodge ... and that they prepared the bombs together," Guler said, without specifying if those suspects included the ones charged on Tuesday.

Anatolia said those charged Tuesday had ties to militants who carried out the suicide truck bombings in Istanbul last November that killed 62 people and that were blamed on al-Qaida.

Guler, however, earlier said Turkish authorities were still investigating whether al-Qaida was involved in the March 9 attack on the Masonic lodge. The blast killed two people, including one of the attackers, and injured six others, including the second attacker.

"We know they (the militants) received political and military training in camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan," he said. "But we don't know if they are al-Qaida camps, but the influence of al-Qaida in those camps is obvious."

Guler called the group responsible a "radical formation with religious motives."

The London-based Arabic newspaper Al-Quds al-Arabi said last week it had received a statement from an al-Qaida-linked group, Jund al-Quds, or Soldiers of Jerusalem, claiming responsibility for the bombing.

But authorities have said the March 9 attack bore little resemblance to the four carefully planned suicide truck bombings last November.

Guler showed reporters a vest with homemade pipe bombs attached, along with guns, firebombs and other explosive material he said was seized in the Istanbul raids.

The governor did not say what other targets the militants had been planning to strike, but private NTV television said without detail they had been planning an attack for Tuesday on a private TV channel.

Guler said one of the militants in custody had confessed to the 2003 killing of a Jewish dentist in Istanbul. A gun used at the attack on the Masonic lodge had also been used in the killing of the dentist, he said.

[Calpernia]

Night. bookmark.

[WestCoastGal]

March 15, 2004
Border Patrol seizes 579.8 pounds of cocaine, driver

Tucson Citizen



Border Patrol agents nabbed 579.8 pounds of cocaine after they responded to a call alerting them that three vehicles crossed into the United States illegally near Arivaca on Saturday evening, agency spokesman Rob Daniels said.
The 117 individually wrapped packages of cocaine, valued at $18.5 million, were taken into evidence and the driver, whose name was not provided, was taken into custody, he said.

Daniels said agents suspected there was a hidden compartment in the 1980 GMC pickup truck stopped on Arivaca Road.

He said a canine unit detected the drugs.

---

It could just as well have been 500 pounds of explosives.!!!


http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/breaking/031504cocaine.html

[WestCoastGal]

'Attack on London is inevitable'

· Tube, buses and pubs all potential targets, warns Stevens
· Public vigilance urged as huge security effort begins

Rosie Cowan, crime correspondent
Wednesday March 17, 2004
The Guardian

London's police chief warned yesterday of the ever-widening terrorist threat to the capital, stressing that bombers could strike not just on the rail or tube network but virtually anywhere - pubs, nightclubs, buses or roads.
Sir John Stevens, the Metropolitan police commissioner, described the huge security effort, with hundreds of officers working at full stretch to try to prevent an atrocity.

Sir John and the city's mayor, Ken Livingstone, pledged to do everything in their power to protect the public, but they urged Londoners to be on their guard, stressing that community vigilance was the best weapon against terrorism.

Sir John agreed with Mr Livingstone, who said: "It would be miraculous if, with all the terrorist resources arranged against us, terrorists did not get through, and given that some are prepared to give their own lives, it would be inconceivable that someone does not get through to London."

The threat has not worsened since the Madrid bombings - the UK has stepped up security since the September 11 attacks on the US in 2001 and has been on the second highest state of alert, severe general, since November.

The Met has increased its numbers of counter-terrorism officers by 680 in the past two years and intends to take on another 100 this year. Sir John said they were working "flat out".

The Spanish atrocity has brought everything into sharp focus. Plain clothes officers are patrolling the tube and other trains. But the commissioner said entertainment venues, buses and roads are all at risk, and people should report any suspicious objects.

"This is not just about the railways, the underground," he said. "It's about buses, roads, pubs, nightclubs and the like. Remember al-Qaida attacked a nightclub in Bali."

More........

http://www.guardian.co.uk/terrorism/story/0,12780,1170991,00.html

[WestCoastGal]

GAG ALERT...............................



French Going Wild For Senator Kerry In Election Fever

‘A CERTAIN ELEGANCE’ IS SEEN

By MICHAEL MANVILLE Special to the Sun



PARIS — It could be the flawless French he learned while at boarding school in Switzerland. Or that he summered in his youth at a picturesque village on the rocky shores of Brittany. Or his pledge to take America’s allies more seriously and pursue an inclusive foreign policy.

Or maybe it’s the simple fact that he’s not President Bush.

Whatever the reason, the French are going wild for John Kerry.


http://daily.nysun.com/Repository/getFiles.asp?Style=OliveXLib:ArticleToMail&Type=text/html&Path=NYS/2004/03/15&ID=Ar00104

[texasbluebell]

Sadly, this would not surprise me in the slightest...

[texasbluebell]

Wonderful news!

[WestCoastGal]

[rickylc]

mark