PRISTINA, Serbia - Two officials of Kosovo's governing coalition have been arrested after police found a minibus packed with heavy weapons and ammunition. A police source said the haul included a 12.7 mm anti-aircraft gun and more than 100 rocket-propelled grenades.
Local media reports said the find, made late on Wednesday in the Drenica region of central Kosovo, was the largest in Kosovo since the 1998-99 war and the deployment of NATO peacekeepers.
Three men were arrested, including a senior adviser to the Kosovo labor minister and a member of the governing Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK), which emerged from the guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army.
Excerpted
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061221/wl_nm/serbia_kosovo_weapons_dc_1
Declaration of war threatens stability of Horn of Africa
December 22, 2006
The leader of Somalia’s Islamist militia said yesterday that his country was now at war with neighbouring Ethiopia, dashing hopes of an early resolution to the conflict that threatens to engulf the volatile Horn of Africa.
As fighting raged for the third day between the militias and forces loyal to an Ethiopian-backed rump government, Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys called on all Somalis to defend the country from external threats.
“All Somalis should take part in this struggle against Ethiopia,” he said in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, before embarking on the haj pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia.
Excerpted
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2514894,00.html
Description: MACDILL AFB, FLA. – United States and Special Operations Forces and conventional Marine units have provided training to the Yemeni Central Security Force Counter Terrorism Unit (CSF-CTU) as part of the persistent Foreign Internal Defense (FID) program.
FID is one of the primary tenets of special operations and enables partner nation’s military forces to gain knowledge and capabilities while receiving training and guidance from U.S. and coalition partners. The U.S. Coast Guard has also been involved in the training, building the Yemen Coast Guard and providing them the means to enhance their ability to secure its territorial waters.
Special Operations Command Central (SOCCENT) has provided a near continuous presence to ensure all resources had complimentary effects. Through the use of conventional force training and Joint Combined Exercise Training (JCET) events that focused on special operations, the Yemen forces have been able to make a significant impact to the Global War on Terror.
Most recently, the CSF-CTU executed two raids that resulted in either death or capture of significant operatives within the al-Qaeda organizations. They Yemen forces also seized weapons and weapon making materials during the raid.
The successful integration of US and conventional special operations forces serves as a model for capacity building in the CENTCOM AOR. The CSF-CTU’s transformation is the most successful example of capacity building outside of Iraq and Afghanistan.