U.S. to release Scud ship to Yemen

MSNBC | 12/11/02

[areafiftyone]

Sorry about that - Here is the link MSNBC.

[Mo1]

HUH??? ... What's going on

[NautiNurse]

Ari Fleischer discussing that the ship has been released right now.

[kinghorse]

Must have finished attaching the homing/tracking devices a little sooner than scheduled.

[areafiftyone]

This is the dumbest thing. They should have distroyed those weapons first.

[hchutch]

Hopefully, the Scuds turn out "defective".

We release the missiles.

The should have SUNK the damn ship.

[Blood of Tyrants]

A tech could render them inoperable garbage in 30 minutes.

[ppaul]

:

BOMB

SADDAM

:

[CougarGA7]

If Yemen's military wanted to buy missles then that's their perogative. But if they wanted to avoid all this commotion then they should have just done it above the board.

All this cloak and dagger stuff with hiding it under cement, and the missle not being on the ship's manefesto will do nothing but raise suspition.

[Smogger]

Sacks of powdered cement hide crates containing Scud missiles on board an unmarked North Korean ship seized in the Arabian Sea.

Dec. 11 — The United States has agreed to release a North Korean ship that carried Scud-type missiles destined to Yemen, a senior U.S. administration official said Wednesday. Yemen had protested the high-seas seizure by Spanish and U.S. forces and demanded the release of the cargo, which it said was intended for the country’s military.

EARLIER ON WEDNESDAY, Jim Miklaszweski reported U.S. military officials were frustrated at Yemen, which is ostensibly an ally in the U.S. war on terrorism.

They said Yemen had previously denied ownership of the cargo, but now that the government has claimed the arsenal, the United States has no choice under international law but to release the weapons.

On Wednesday, Yemen’s foreign minister, Abu Bakr al-Kerbi, summoned U.S. Ambassador Edmund J. Hull to protest the seizure. The U.S. Embassy had no comment.

“The minister informed the ambassador that the shipment was bound to Yemen and that the missiles were only to be used in defensive purposes,” a Yemeni official told The Associated Press.

A statement run by the state-owned Saba news agency said Yemen stressed the importance of the return of the shipment to the Yemeni government.

Yemen also sent a formal protest to Spain, whose warships intercepted the North Korean vessel.

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Excerpted from: Here

[Pearls Before Swine]

Clearly, these scuds were defensive in nature.

[AmericanInTokyo]

What?????!!! This is so stupid! What an outrage! What is Seoul or Tokyo or any of our allies to think?

THE UNITED STATES IS RIGHT NOW IN A WORLD REGION POISED FOR MASSIVE, BLOODY WAR IN THE NEXT FEW MONTHS, IT CONDEMNS PYONGYANG AS AN "EMPIRE OF EVIL" AND SPECIFICALLY HITS IT FOR EXPORTING MISSILES, AND YET THE US ADMINISTRATION ALLOWS SCUD MISSILE DELIVERIES, DISGUISED, FROM NORTH KOREA TO PASS THROUGH TO THE VERY REGION IT IS POISED FOR WAR.

State Department wins again. This is an outrage. The Scud B (probably B since I noted Russian cyrillic writing on the equipment) missiles should have been destroyed, our brought back to the US for complete analysis.

What, after all, is Yemen and Pyongyang going to do if we hold on to them?

This gives Pyongyang the green light to keep exporting missiles to the sensitive Middle East, but next time just hid them better.

[nocommies]

i like your sarcasm, but it also raises a point....

IF they were defensive, defensive from whom? and if not defensive, then offensive, and offensive for WHOM? who is yemen going to attack or defend itself from with SCUDS?

[Mo1]

Oh Ok .. works for me then

BTW .. what is with MSNBC and using a chalkboard to report the news?

[Station 51]

HUH??? ... What's going on

The SCUD Ship has entered the Twilight Zone and had traveled back the Clinton Administration where America let the North Koreans sell missiles to rogue states.

[Dog Gone]

Who is likely to ever attack Yemen? Somalia? Saudi Arabia?

[nocommies]

and if truly defensive, why the need to be so secretive and clandestine in attempts to hide and even at first, deny, the weapons from their "ally" in the war on terror, the USA?

[MatthewViti]

I agree with you, however the Bushbots may not.

[swarthyguy]

The USA is in a full tilt prostration to our arab and pakistani 'allies'. Nothing must be allowed to interfere with the Grand and Secret Plan that is underway.

Those who question or criticise are either too stupid to see the grand strategery or simply Anti Bush Liberals who know not of what they speak.

Double standards are us. And people wonder why there is so much costernation around the world about our policies.

It's getting very hard to understand this administration.