Threat Matrix: March 2007

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[Cindy]

Note: The following text is a quote:

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http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=3264

Coalition Forces Capture 38 Suspects During Raids in Iraq

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, March 5, 2007 – In operations around Iraq over the past three days, coalition forces captured 38 suspects.

During a raid near the Syrian border today, coalition forces targeted terrorists suspected of facilitating the movement of foreign fighters, weapons and vehicles into Iraq. Troops captured two suspected senior-level foreign fighter facilitators, and 20 other suspected terrorists.

Elsewhere in Iraq today, coalition forces in Tikrit netted four terrorists suspected of developing and emplacing improvised explosive devices in the Tikrit and Bayji areas.

Near Arab Jabour today, coalition forces detained five suspected terrorists during operations to destroy a vehicle-borne IED network. Troops also detained five suspected terrorists while targeting a foreign fighter cell south of Fallujah.

Iraqi security forces today, with coalition advisors, conducted operations in Karbala targeting rogue Jaysh Al Mahdi elements responsible for advanced IED attacks. One suspected militiaman was captured by Iraqi Forces, military officials said.

"Successful coalition operations continue to disrupt al Qaeda in Iraq operations, restrict the flow of foreign fighters and reduce the terrorist organization's manpower pool," said Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, Multinational Force Iraq spokesperson.

Earlier this week, Iraqi security forces, with coalition advisors, captured the suspected leader of an insurgent cell during operations March 3 in Karabilah.

The suspect is believed responsible for trafficking weapons and IEDs used in attacks against Iraqi civilians and security forces in the area. He is also implicated in a recent IED and car bombing attack on the Karabilah Iraqi Police Station, military officials said.

[Velveeta]

You're very welcome.

[Velveeta]

>>>The Salt Lake City murders, a Jihad?

Yes.

[Cindy]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=northkorea
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=nkorea

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NOTE: The following post is a quote:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1795851/posts


North Korean diplomats' children ordered to return from abroad: report
Kyodo News (Japan) (excerpt) ^ | March 5, 2007

Posted on 03/05/2007 7:29:45 PM PST by HAL9000

Excerpt -

(Kyodo) _ North Korea's ruling party has ordered children of North Korean diplomats and other representatives stationed overseas to return home, for reasons unknown, a South Korean daily reported Tuesday.
"The Workers' Party of Korea recently issued a directive to overseas missions that children of diplomats and representatives send their children home," the Joongang Ilbo newspaper quoted a source well-versed in North Korean affairs as saying in Seoul.

The reason remains unclear, but another Seoul-based expert on North Korea was quoted as saying it may be related to preventing defection of diplomats.

~ snip ~


(Excerpt) Read more at asia.news.yahoo.com ...

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NOTE: The following post is a quote:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1795332/posts


UN aid programme (UNDP) suspends operations in North Korea
AFP on Yahoo ^ | 3/4/07 | AFP

Posted on 03/04/2007 9:56:30 PM PST by NormsRevenge

SEOUL (AFP) - The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has suspended operations in North Korea following US claims that its funds were being diverted to prop up the communist regime.

In January the US delegate to the UN Mark Wallace charged that North Korea had, since 1998 and with the complicity of UNDP, "systematically perverted" the aid programme "for the benefit of the Kim Jong Il regime, rather than the people of North Korea."

The UNDP said in a statement seen Monday on its website: "As of March 1, 2007, UNDP has no choice but to suspend its operations in North Korea as the necessary conditions set out by the executive board on January 25 have not been met."

The agency's measures include ending all payments in hard currency to Pyongyang and discontinuing sub-contracting of local staff via government recruitment as of March 1, it said.

The agency said its position "could be reconsidered if these circumstances change."

Following the US claims, which were angrily denied by the North, UN chief Ban Ki-moon called for an audit of UN programmes and funding in countries such as North Korea.

The UNDP had earlier suspended 17.9 million dollars in its 2007-09 budget for its operations in North Korea pending the outcome of the inquiry and said it would stop paying workers in hard currency from March 1.

The US House of Representatives introduced a resolution on February 8 calling on the United States to suspend its contributions to UNDP.

In a background report on its website, the UN agency said that over the past decade, it has funded about three million dollars in development activities per year in North Korea.

"There has been no concerns raised that UNDP funds have been diverted to the North Korean nuclear arms programme or otherwise used for purposes other than those intended," it said.

North Korea in January described the US claims as part of a smear campaign by hardliners in Washington, designed to torpedo talks on shutting down its nuclear programme.

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http://www.defenselink.mil/news/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=3214

"Terror, Iran, North Korea Top List of Threats"

By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 28, 2007

[Oorang]

First it's al-Masri, then it's not. Yes/no/yes/no. It must be someone important for him to go to such painful extremes. Yikes.

[Oorang]

Man Awakes In Castroville Near Bag Of Bomb Parts (California)
March 5, 2007

Monterey County sheriff's deputies found a man unconscious in a Castroville alley near a bag that contained parts of a bomb, the sheriff's office reported Monday.

Robert Bayne, 44, was found at about 10:23 a.m. Saturday morning suffering from a gash to his head by Monterey County sheriff's deputies in the middle of an alley behind 11081 Merritt St. Near Bayne was a camouflage duffel bag containing several military surplus items, 14 inches of detonation cord, 12 inches of time fuse, two M-60 fuse igniters and 1 M228 time fuse, according to authorities.

Bayne, in a semiconscious state, was unable to tell deputies how he had been injured or where he was, the sheriff's office reported. Bayne was transported to Watsonville Community Hospital to receive treatment for the 1-inch gap over his eye. A search of Bayne's residence did not uncover any more explosive components, the sheriff's office reported.

Explosive Ordinance Disposal technicians who were called to the scene stated that Bayne had all the components to make a bomb. All the materials were later taken to a safe place and destroyed.

http://www.nbc11.com/news/11177818/detail.html

Two bombs found in city impound lot (Tennessee)
03-05-2007

“This was not a hoax,” Sweetwater Police Chief Eddie Byrum said Monday night after two active bombs were found in SPD’s impound lot behind the Teachers Center on South High Street several hours earlier. No one was injured and the Knox County Bomb Squad safely detonated the bombs using a robot.

Byrum said he and SPD Detective Marty Kile found the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) around 3 p.m. while they were inventorying seized cars that were to be sold. One of the explosive devices was found was under an old surplus police car and the other was near a car. About 18-20 cars were on the lot.

Excerpted

http://monroe.xtn.net/index.php?template=news.view.subscriber&table=news&newsid=138218

Afghanistan: Taliban Claims Control Of Another Helmand District

Karachi, 5 March 2007 - At least 19 Afghan civilians have been killed over the past 24 hours in strikes and gunfire incidents by coalition forces in Afghanistan in response to militant attacks on NATO targets. Although NATO has said it is trying to reduce civilian casualties, the attacks look set to continue as the "spring offensive" materialises. Taliban commander Abdul Khaliq told Adnkronos International (AKI) that they have taken control of Nawzad district in Helmand province and prior to the recent attacks the Taliban distributed leaflets warning people to keep away from NATO installations or convoys.

In an interview with AKI, Taliban commander Abdul Khaliq said that with their recent seizure of the Nawzad district in the restive southern Afghan province of Helmand, their spring offensive had begun.

Excerpted

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Terrorism&loid=8.0.391792506&par=0

[Cindy]

"This was not a hoax."
Tennessee seems to be an interesitng place lately.
Thanks for posting that Oorang.

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http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=tennessee

[Velveeta]

>>>Man Awakes In Castroville Near Bag Of Bomb Parts

Now there's a headline you don't see every day.

[Cindy]

Note: The following post is a quote:



http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1795872/posts


Quake hits Sumatra, tremor felt in Singapore
CNN ^ | 03/05/07 | Reuters

Posted on 03/05/2007 8:48:44 PM PST by JennysCool

JAKARTA, Indonesia (Reuters) -- An earthquake measuring 5.8 on the Richter scale shook Indonesia's Sumatra island on Tuesday, panicking residents in West Sumatra province and sending slight tremors to neighboring Singapore. The United States Geological Survey said the quake's magnitude was 6.3 and its epicentre was around 420 km (260 miles) from Singapore. The Indonesian national quake centre said the epicentre was 16 km (10 miles) west of the city of Batusangkar. There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.

(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...

[Cindy]

March 5, 2007

Note: The following text is a quote.
Some of the links have been adjusted to make clickable on this thread.

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Jeremy Reynalds
P O Box 27693
Albuquerque, New Mexico 87125
Tel: (505) 400-7145
www.joyjunction.org

The Cybersleuth and the Professor

An English cybersleuth and a university professor have unearthed hours of al-qaeda videos which they say shows a strong link between radical Islamic clerics Abu Hamza, Omar Bakri and their followers and the 2005 London terror bombings.

As a result of that terrorism, 52 people died and more than 770 were injured (http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2005/london.bombing ).

Glen Jenvey and the professor, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it took hours of viewing the videos and some good old-fashioned detective work to link the London bombers to the now jailed Hamza (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Hamza_al-Masri and http://www.answers.com/topic/abu-hamza-al-masri ) and the exiled Bakri (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4703541.stm and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Bakri_Mohammed ).

They did so, Glen told me by e-mail, through an Internet connection going back several years.

So you can see the result of the duo’s work for yourself, Glen has uploaded a number of video clips demonstrating some of the horrifying videos he and the professor discovered. They are available at http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=alimasharli

Glen told me by e-mail that in the United Kingdom al-Qaeda appears to run, or heavily influence, a number of organizations with different names. He said, "You could compare them to the England soccer team which draws its players from other soccer clubs when needed for a match."

According to Glen, al-Qaeda seems to operate by drawing members when needed from radical Islamic groups like the ASWJ ( http://muntadaa.aswj.net )or the banned "Saved Sect" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/5188136.stm ). Then, Glen said, when al-Qaeda calls for a terrorist (jihad) mission, these individuals "take up their role as an al-Qaeda player like the London bombers did."

Following the London bombings I wrote to Glen to see if he could give me a perspective from his side of the world as to just what was going on in England. He said that the bombings were in part the result of radicals like Bakri and Hamza not being taken seriously by the British government. Many in law enforcement, Glen said, regarded them as harmless "bigmouths." But Glen believed otherwise and although he had been hard at work before the London bombings documenting Islamic terrorism on the Internet, these terrible atrocities galvanized him to spend even more hours huddled in front of his computer.

Since that time Glen has been keeping me updated with some of his discoveries. As a result, I have ended up viewing some of the most hateful statements about British and American people that I have ever seen.

Since I first heard about the London terror bombings the victims and their families have always been in my prayers, and it is my hope that the information provided in these videos found by Glen and the professor might aid law enforcement in their work and bring some sort of sense of closure for the victims and their families.

In addition to his ongoing research (with some of which I have been privileged to collaborate), Glen told me his unique story for inclusion in my upcoming book "War of the Web," which will be released soon (http://www.joyjunction.org/bulletin and http://www.abuhamza.org.uk ) by World Ahead Publishing.

"War of the Web" also tells the story of how I also became involved in fighting online terror. Of course, some people may wonder what the director of a homeless shelter is doing trying to get radical Islamic Internet sites shut down.

That’s an easy question to answer. Above anything else, Joy Junction (the homeless shelter I direct) is a faith-based ministry which shows the love of Jesus Christ in spiritual and practical ways to the many homeless women and families who come to us looking for help. Unless we start taking the fundamentalist Islamic agenda seriously and realizing that its ultimate goal is to impose shariah (Islamic) law over the entire world, we’ll be in trouble. We won't be able to have faith- based ministries like Joy Junction; they’ll be illegal. People need to understand what’s going on here, and I think both Glen and this book will help them do so.

[Cindy]

Thanks to Nick Grace for pointing to this new GCW.

http://www.globalcrisiswatch.com



QUOTE:

Global Crisis Watch
March 5, 2007 | Episode #45
Washington negotiates with Axis of Evil, Clouds gathering over South Asia, Salafism in Indonesia

Global Crisis Watch calls to Chennai, India, Washington, DC, and Banten, Indonesia, to dissect Washington's moves to negotiate with North Korea, Syria and Iran, and the relationship between Washington and Islamabad with B. Raman, former head of India's external intelligence service and current director of the Institute For Topical Studies, and discusses Salafism and the push for Sharia law in Indonesia with Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, couterterrorism consultant and author of "My Year Inside Radical Islam," and Faridotulsalam, an Indonesian Salafi.

Link: http://www.GlobalCrisisWatch.com/gcw/gcw_070305.mp3
29:30 minutes | 13.5 Megs

[texpat72]

Glad to hear the good news about Ex-Soldier. I always look forward to his and AD's posts on TM.

[texpat72]

Yikes, this is literally in my neck of the woods!

[Cindy]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=russia
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=putin

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NOTE: The following post is a quote:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1795867/posts


Under Western Eyes
IBD Editorials ^ | 5 Mar 2007 | Staff

Posted on 03/05/2007 8:26:08 PM PST by Kitten Festival

Democracy: We don't know if last week's shooting of a U.S. analyst was a Russian hit job, but we know critics are being picked off as President Vladimir Putin cleans house ahead of a transition. He is going to go too far.

Thirteen journalists have been killed in mysterious circumstances since Putin took power, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. The shooting of U.S. analyst and TV commentator Paul Joyal, less than a week after he criticized the Kremlin on Dateline NBC, looks like a street crime, but as high-ranking retired KGB general Oleg Kalugin told the Financial Times, Russian government involvement should not be ruled out.

(Excerpt) Read more at ibdeditorials.com ...

[Cindy]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1795906/posts

"IAEA head says agency cannot guarantee Iran nuclear program is peaceful"
Pravda (Russia) ^ | March 5, 2007

Posted on 03/05/2007 11:20:50 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

[Cindy]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1795907/posts?page=5#5


http://www.currentargus.com/ci_5363325

"Search for missing pilot comes to Cavern City"
The Current-Argus
Article Launched: 03/05/2007 08:48:51 PM MST

Click photo to enlarge

By Martha Mauritson
Current-Argus Managing Editor

ARTICLE SNIPPET: "CARLSBAD The search for a California pilot and his experimental plane feared missing in the Guadalupe Mountains area south of here brought a flurry of activity to the Cavern City Air Terminal Monday.

The man, whose identity is being withheld by authorities, left southern California on Wednesday, bound for the coast of Virginia, said Civil Air Patrol spokesman Larry Zentner, who traveled from Albuquerque to Carlsbad to take part in the search.

When the pilot did not check in at his destination on Thursday, his family called California authorities. The man was the sole occupant of the single-seat plane."

[Cindy]

http://www.koin.com/Global/story.asp?S=6175910

"Police Look For Belmont Store Shooter"
Also on KOIN.com
Friends of Shooting Victim Speak Out

PORTLAND -

ARTICLE SNIPPET: "The suspect is described as a clean-shaven Asian or Hispanic male, 25 to 35 years old, about five feet eight inches tall, with a stocky build. He may be driving a burnt-orange 2002 or 2003 Chevrolet Corvette.

The Police Bureau and Crime Stoppers have set up a Web site with more information, and a variety of ways to contact them if you have any information about this crime. Crime Stoppers is offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to the capture of the homicidal robber. You can also call them at 503--823-HELP. Numerically, that's 503-823-4357."

3/5/2007

[Cindy]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=russia
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=putin

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Note: The following post is a quote:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1795909/posts


Russia To Receive Two Modernized Strategic Bombers In 2007
http://www.militaryglobal.com/reports/439 ^

Posted on 03/05/2007 11:22:41 PM PST by Srirangan

Moscow: Russia will commission two modernized Tu-160 bombers in 2007, the Strategic Air Force commander said Monday. Russia is currently carrying out an ambitious program to upgrade and modernize its strategic Air Force assets.

The upgraded fleet will include both new and modernized Tu-160 Blackjack, Tu-22 Blinder and Tu-95 Bear bombers. "We are modernizing the fleet of Tu-160 bombers...and are planning to receive two [modernized] aircraft by the end of this year," Lieutenant-General Igor Khvorov said.

He added that one of the previously commissioned bombers will conduct test bombing runs in spring 2007.

(Excerpt) Read more at militaryglobal.com ...

[Cindy]

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/03/20070305-1.html

For Immediate Release
Office of the Vice President
March 5, 2007

"Vice President's Remarks to the VFW National Legislative Conference"
Omni Shoreham Hotel
Washington, D.C.



10:56 A.M. EST

[Cindy]

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/03/20070305-5.html

For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
March 5, 2007

"Memorandum for the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of Commerce, the Director of National Intelligence"

White House News

March 5, 2007