Although police officers have investigated all the recent threats, none of the searches for bombs have found any devices. Nevertheless, security forces in Sao Paulo's metropolitan area are treating every threat as credible, as bombs detonated inside the subway system on 23 and 25 December 2006. One person died due to injuries sustained in the last explosion. So far, authorities have been unable to determine the perpetrators of the attacks or the motives behind them.
Philippines
Media reports issued on 8 January 2007 indicate that government officials are concerned that foreign terrorists may have entered the Philippines in December 2006 in an effort to attack the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit in Cebu. The media reportedly gained the information from a series of government documents seeking to verify the entry of several al Qaeda-linked militants into the country. No additional information on the documents or the alleged terrorists is available. The summit was initially scheduled to take place in December but was postponed, allegedly due to a typhoon. The summit is currently scheduled to occur on 11-14 January.
Although security officials claim that there is no specific information regarding a possible terrorist attack during the summit, they acknowledge that an attack remains a possibility. Approximately 10,000 police officers and military personnel have been deployed to secure Cebu. In addition, government officials announced a 20 mi/32 km no-fly zone around Mactan Cebu International Airport (RPVM/NOP), the Shangri-La resort and several more of the summit's venues for the duration of the conference. Road checkpoints have already been erected.
Abu Musab Abdul Wadud, the Emir of the Salafist Group for Call and Combat [GSPC], a terrorist group in Algeria which allied with al-Qaeda, is featured in a 22:36 minute video issued by the GSPC today, Monday, January 8, 2007, including an Arabic-language transcript.
The speech, “We are Coming,” spoken by Wadud and dated January 3, 2007, contains three messages: one directed to the Emir of al-Qaeda, Usama bin Laden, another to Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, and the third to Muslim Algerian people.
Predominant across the message is a palpable anger towards not only Bouteflika, but America and France for encroaching upon Algeria culturally, militarily, and politically. Wadud also focuses in each address to what he terms as “theft” by foreign companies of Algerian natural gas and oil, placing this within the broader charge of the enemy subjugating Muslims, forcing them into poverty, and attacking their religion. He also requests of bin Laden instructions for the “next stage”.
Excerpted - link within link below.
“The Fire of the Magi in the Arabian Peninsula” by Abu Yahya al-Libi
By SITE Institute
January 8, 2007
A message attributed to Abu Yahya al-Libi, a Mujahid commander featured in as-Sahab media releases and an escapee from Bagram prison in Afghanistan in July 2005, was recently distributed to jihadist forums by al-Fajr Information Center, and titled: “The Fire of the Magi in the Arabian Peninsula.” In the text, Libi argues that the Shi’ites seek to establish a “Greater Persia” through political and social means, rather than failed military pursuits such as between Iran and Iraq in the 1980’s.