Posted on 06/19/2007 4:43:36 PM PDT by DAVEY CROCKETT
Saudi King Says Middle East Crisis Will Affect The World
DUBAI, June 19 (Bernama) -- The Saudi king has warned of an impending "explosion" in the Middle East, saying that it will not only affect the region but will spread all over the world, the English daily Gulf News reports.
"The Middle East region suffers from the longest conflict in our contemporary history which is the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and Israel's occupation of Arab lands," King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz, said in an interview with the Spanish El Pas newspaper which was published simultaneously in Al Riyadh newspaper yesterday.
"At this point in time we are exerting efforts to solve this conflict, but we are witnessing an expansion of the crisis to include other countries like Iraq and Lebanon," he said.
"This makes the region replete with troubles that pose grave concerns for us. My fears are the fears of all reasonable men that the explosive situation will not be confined to the region but will extend to the whole world," he added.
The Saudi monarch yesterday began a five-nation trip that will take him to Spain, France, Poland, Egypt and Jordan.
King Abdullah also underlined the importance of solving the problem of Iran's nuclear programme peacefully in a way that guarantees all countries in the region to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes in accordance with the standards of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v3/news_lite.php?id=268361
(Excerpt) Read more at bernama.com ...
[Go to the last paragraph, it explains the whole game...granny]
http://www.serbianna.com/columns/joksimovich/008.shtml
LECTURES
Has Cold War II commenced?
By Vojin Joksimovich
July 9, 2007
Vojin Joksimovich has served as the first Vice President of the San Diego North County Chapter of the World Affairs Council in charge of the program for the last three years. The Council meets weekly on Thursdays throughout the year (about 50 sessions per year) and covers a spectrum of foreign affairs subjects. The speakers are either distinguished guests or members. On June 28, 2007 (the Vidovdan day) a San Diego State University professor was supposed to address the Council on the subject of Central Asia. He cancelled and Vojin proposed instead, reflecting the outcome of the G-8 meeting in Germany, a debate on the subject has Cold War II commenced? The Council accepted and the debate was initiated by a three member panel of speakers addressing the following subjects: (a) Missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic or Euro-ABM program; (b) Kosovo independence issue; and (c) Other U.S./Russia hot issues as authored in an essay by the former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko published in the May/June 2007 issue of Foreign Affairs. The members participated in the second part of the program. Vojin Joksimovich notes on the subject of Kosovo independence are reproduced below.
Vijin Joksimovic, center blue shirt, at the San Diego North County Chapter of the World Affairs Council.
· Today marks the 618 anniversary of the Kosovo battle between the Serbs and the Ottoman Empire; battle between Christianity and Islam which led to the loss of Serbian sovereignty in 1463 and enabled the Turks to march on to Budapest and Vienna. In 2007 we are experiencing another Kosovo battle. This time the battle has been a diplomatic one thus far. A battle between the U.S. and Serbia. The battle between adherences to foundations of international law vs. force.
· The Ottoman records of 1445 show that Kosovo & Metohija population consisted almost exclusively of Serbs (~99%) as the Serbs started populating Kosovo in the 6th century and created there the Serbian kingdom and the Serbian holy land with some 1300 churches and monasteries.
· Over 5 centuries of Serb ethnic cleansing followed first by the Ottomans, then Austro-Hungarian Empire, then Hitler-Mussolini Axis, then communist dictator Tito and now U.S./NATO using Albanians as their proxies.
· Serb-Albanian conflict, which is almost 130 yrs old was reignited in 1990s as the Islamist and U.S./NATO interests merged leading to a jihad against the Serb-Orthodox Christians
· In 1994 Osama bin Laden established a base in Albania after his phenomenal success in Bosnia and started to arm and infiltrate the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which was then classified by the State Department as terrorist organization. Subsequently the Western intelligence agencies (CIA, MI6, and BND) joined in support of the KLA. After the KLA insurrection from Albania was defeated by the Serbian police, Clinton/Blair decided to go to war against Serbia and in the process hijacked holocaust to wrest Kosovo from Serbia.
· UN Resolution 1244 ended the war, created UN/NATO protectorate but reaffirmed the commitment of member states to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Serbia.
· After 8 years the UN/NATO protectorate has dismally failed (as discussed in Peace at any Price: How the World Failed Kosovo by Iain King and Whit Mason) and in the process grossly violated the UN 1244. Having created a royal mess so called international community started looking for the way out. A centerpiece of the program: human rights eight point package ahead of status approach was jettisoned. In 2003, a UN police spokesman said that Kosovo “is not a society affected by organized crime, but a society founded on organized crime.”
· Former Finnish President, Marti Ahtisaari was appointed in 2005 as the special UN envoy to “mediate” the interethnic conflict. He has been the wrong man for the job from day one as illustrated with his statement that Serbia must give in because it is guilty as a nation—nobody must be allowed to pin a feeling of national guilt on any group of people only individuals proclaimed by many including the ICTY. Recently BND sent the documentation to the UN Secretary General accusing Ahtisaari that he took the bribe from the Albanian mafia.
· On March 26, 2007 Ahtisaari submitted a report to the UN Security Council recommending Kosovo independence supervised by the EU with continued presence of the NATO troops on the ground. In my humble opinion, the Ahtisaari approach has been designed to shift the intractable situation to somebody else and if it provokes either the Serbs or Albanians, or both, so be it. Then they would be blamed for the impending disaster. Turning water into wine is nothing compared to transforming the republic of heroin, black hole of Europe, into a model democratic multi-ethnic state. But that is the miracle Ahtisaari has come up with.
· The U.S./GB/France/Germany jumped on Ahtisaari recommendation and drafted a UN resolution which would annul the UN 1244 and thus would detach Kosovo from Serbia.
· Serbia with help from resurgent Russia and some other countries has opposed the Ahtisaari plan as well as the three drafts of the Western sponsored UN resolution. In the second draft only a few words were changed. The third draft filed on June 20 sponsored by the U.S./UK/France proposed the postponement of supervised independence for 120 days, this time would be given to the Serbian and Albanian negotiators to reach an agreement with automatic imposition of the Ahtisaari plan if the parties cannot agree. In Moscow and Belgrade the third draft was dead on arrival. Russia opposes artificial deadlines and automatism and Serbia is not interested in the negotiations when the final outcome is predetermined and amounts to violation of the UN charter and the Serbian constitution. Serbia is looking for a sustainable solution. Imposed solution is not sustainable as it would plant the seed for the next conflict.
· Russia and Serbia, as well as a number of UN Security Council members such as China, Indonesia and South Africa, believe that the rule of law should be the keystone of the international order using WWII experiences as an example. Kosovo independence established on the 15% of the Republic of Serbia territory would violate the UN Charter, Helsinki Accords, Badinter Commission and the UN 1244 as well as the previous UN Kosovo resolutions. Kosovo independence would be the first time in post WWII history that the boundaries of a nation state had been drawn against its will. Why would the UN violate own Charter to create the second Albanian state in Europe?
· Russia and Serbia, as well as some neighboring countries, point out that Kosovo independence would destabilize the region. Hence they are looking for a sustainable solution which would preserve Serbia’s territorial integrity and sovereignty with everything else being negotiable and subject to agreement between Belgrade and Pristina. A Serbian plan is now in Putin’s hand that supposedly he will put on the table when he meets with President Bush on July 1&2 at Kennebunkport.
· In addition Kosovo independence would establish a far-reaching precedent for many separatists round the world. Why does Kosovo deserve independence while South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Transniestria and Nagorno-Karabakh and others do not? The UN Resolution sponsors make the case that Kosovo is a sui generis case using the argument that Serbia has lost the right to rule the Kosovo because Milosevic’s regime opposed NATO and committed acts of ethnic cleansing. The ethnic cleansing arguments stated are, by and large, based on half truth and outright falsehoods. Besides the logic is that the history both before Milosevic (millennium old) and after Milosevic does not count.
· Indonesia, a Muslim country and a UN Security Council member, is not sold on the Ahtisaari plan and the sui generis Kosovo case and proposed that the Kosovo issue be deferred to the EU at the time when the EU is ready to accept both Serbia and Kosovo as members.
· For radical Islamists Kosovo represents a jihad. Why the US on one hand is fighting jihadists in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere but is in the business of creating the Islamist states in the Balkans is paradoxical. Part of the “strategic concept” for dismemberment of former Yugoslavia has been the appeasement of the Islamist world, which started under president Bush 41 and then was embraced by the Clinton administration and now by Bush 43. As early as 1992, the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) demanded independence for Bosnia and Kosovo and division of Macedonia. The U.S./NATO has essentially complied with these wishes. Bush announced yesterday, at the rededication ceremony of the Islamic Center of Washington DC, that he will appoint a special U.S. envoy to the OIC. This speaker considers the OIC to be Islaminterna analogous to what cominterna was.
· Since announcement of the Ahtisaari plan I must have read over 100 columns and editorials on the subject. Here are some headlines: “Russia still opposed, Russia digs in heels, and Russia refuses to budge.” After exercises in bullying these articles ad nauseam reiterated that Russia was supporting its co-religionist and Slavic historic ally. There was hardly any appreciation that Yeltsin’s Russia is history and resurgent Putin’s Russia is the reality. Kosovo was one of the reasons why Yeltsin had to go. Here is what Putin said in Zagreb and Istanbul this weekend at the Balkans Energy Summit and the Black Sea Economic Cooperation Organization meetings: “The Balkans and the Black Sea have always been a sphere of our special interests and it is natural a resurgent Russia is returning here.” If Putin gave in on Kosovo his efforts to re-establish Russia as a great power would be severely undermined.
· Last week in Washington we witnessed a heated exchange on Kosovo issue between members of the Russian Duma Foreign Relations committee and their U.S. colleagues. Natalia Narochnitskaya, a Russian lawmaker, made a strong case against independence while Congressmen Lantos and Engel, long-time advocates of Kosovo independence and major recipients of contributions from the Albanian lobby, threatened that the UN might be bypassed in case of a Russian veto, and that Kosovo could unilaterally declare independence. They went as far as claiming that the U.S. would recognize Kosovo next day after declaration of independence and even to be followed by the EU members. However, the EU ministers have reiterated again this week their support for a UN resolution but will not back unilateral declaration as it would divide the EU like the Iraq war did.
· Some expect much in the way of compromise from the Bush/Putin meeting this coming weekend. I am personally skeptical especially after reading the statement from the American ambassador to Serbia: “We believe that a compromise has already been achieved.”
· I will conclude with an analogy between Kosovo and the U.S. Southwest where we live. If Bush were to deliver 15% of the Serbian territory to Kosovo Albanians, who had never owned Kosovo, he would then establish a precedent for the return of the U.S. Southwest to Mexico. There are numerous organizations which are attempting to annex California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas plus Southern Colorado to create “Republica Del Norte.”
http://www.serbianna.com/columns/jatras/006.shtml
When Is A Diplomat Not a Diplomat?...When you’re Richard Holbrooke
By Stella Jatras
May 29, 2007
http://www.serbianna.com/columns/mb/060.shtml
Of Bribes and Allegations
By M. Bozinovich
July 1, 2007
Recent allegations that Martti Ahtisaari was a recipient of Albanian money in order to recommend independence for Kosovo has been refuted as “rubbish” by the Ahtisaari’s spokesman, Remi Dourlot.
With that dismissal being swell and good, the other unexamined part in this entire allegations fiasco is one of the personalities that allegedly paid the money to Ahtisaari.
According to the allegations made against Ahtisaari, a briefcase stuffed with money was delivered to his office and the money allegedly came from Kosovo’s Muslim Albanian billionaire Behgjet Pacolli.
It could turn out that the charismatic Pacolli does know few things, here and there, about stuffed briefcases.
Back in 1995, Russian prosecutors alleged that Pacolli “delivered a briefcase stuffed with U.S. currency, a Cartier watch and a diamond-studded brooch to Pavel Borodin, President Boris Yeltsin’s chief of administrative affairs.”
Pacolli denied the allegations.
In 2004, a BBC cameraman Peter Jouvenal said that he was Pacolli’s ransom money delivery boy to the Afghan jihadists that kidnapped 3 UN workers, one among them being Shqipe Hebibi, Kosovo’s Muslim Albanian.
Pacolli denied Jouvenal’s allegation as well but admitted on Afghani TV that Kosovo Muslim Albanians are much more brotherly with the Afghanis, who are overwhelmingly pro-Taliban, then with the Americans whom Teliban is killing.
“Shqipe Hebibi went to Afghanistan to help our brother people here,” Pacolli said on a private Afghan television channel to which, once released, Habibi added:
“I know the culture, I know the religion, and that’s why I thought I can help... We are not related to America.”
Syed Akhbar Agha, the chief of Jaish-al-Muslimeen, a criminal arm for the Teliban that kidnapped Hebibi, said that “Ms Habibi was released after a personal plea by Mr Pacolli,” and Jouvenal confirmed that he is “positive that Mr Pacolli was entirely responsible for their release.”
According to the Swiss ISN Security Watch the “Kosovar Albanian woman, a Muslim, was released because of an appeal by Pacolli, who is also a Muslim.”
What the Jihadist Syed Akhbar Agha could have discovered after hearing of Pacolli is that Behgjet sits on the Board of the Bosnian Institute in Zurich along with a fellow Jihadist Mohamed Mansour.
The Executive Order by President Bush as of September 24, 2001, names Mohamed Mansour along with 27 others to be an individual that supports terrorism.
The Bosnian Institute has its other offshoot in London where Noel Malcolmm chairs the “institute” and uses services of Paul Williams who advises Kosovo Albanians on status negotiations.
In the wee days of NATOs attack on Serbia over Kosovo in 1999, Bosnian London network was used, temporarily, to recruit European Jihadists to fight in Kosovo on behalf of Muslim Albanians amid Jihadist fervor whipped up relentlessly by London-based Imams.
It turns out that Behgjet’s alleged friend, Mohamed Mansour, was also on the Board of Nada Management located in Italy but near Lugano, Switzerland, where Pacolli has his home.
The proximity of the residence may not be as significant as the fact that Nada Management is on the list of terrorist groups that funnel money to Osama bin Laden and is part of the world-wide Islamic financial network, al-Taqwa, that funds violent Islamic causes including the ones in Kosovo.
“Al Taqwa is an association of offshore banks and financial management firms that have helped al Qaeda shift money around the world,” President Bush said.
A prominent member of Nada Management Board is a 74-year-old Swiss convert to Islam, Ahmed Huber, who glorifies Hitler, Ayatollah Khomeini, Haj Amin al- Husseini and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem that organized Albanian Nazi divisions in Kosovo during WWII. However, it has not been alleged that Nada Management had any money funneled to Kosovo’s Muslims through Pacolli’s Lugano-based Fund for Reconstruction of Kosovo, an organization that allegedly funded Kosovo’s Muslim Albanian terrorists, the KLA, and is known to fund a Kosovo-based Albanian separatist newspaper Bota Sot.
In what is another peculiar coincidence, Lugano-based Banca del Gottardo seems to be the bank of choice for both Pacolli and Nada Management. Banca del Gottardo President Claudio Generali is also a leader of the Swiss Radical Democratic Party known for its long time rule over Switzerland and support for Kosovo’s independence.
In 1993, Banca del Gottardo was handling the contract between Lugano-based, Pacolli-owned Interplastica and a Soviet-era biological weapons producer Biopreparat. Two former Biopreparat defecties to the West, one in 1989 and 1992, said that the firm never ceased to produce biological weapons.
A September 1994 coded fax to Banca del Gottardo says that “for our friends of Torola, ‘Biopreparat’ deposited through ‘Interplastica¥’ two cont. of 20 kg of material in the security box of the bank. P. Mamaladze advised — ready for transaction [of] ‘bonds.’”
Mamaladze is/was owner of Falkon Group for which a Russian reporter from Novaja Gazeta, Oleg Lurje, alleges that it is a subsidiary of the BinLaden Group.
Pacolli eventually split Interplastica with his partner and formed his own Mabatex whose sister company, Mercata, became the centerpiece of a series of long corruption investigations known as KremlinGate linking former Russian President Boris Yeltsin, his staff and family to Pacolli’s money.
According to a report by the European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control, Organized Crime, Trafficing, Drugs, Behgjet Pacolli transferred $1 million to a Budapest bank held by Yeltsin, then paid off Yeltsin’s daughter’s large credit card bill. Pacolli said that the money was for advertising while a Pacolli associate said, no!, the money was for Yeltsin’s political campaign.
Carla del Ponte investigated KremlinGate and concluded that she could not prosecute because Swiss laws allow bribing of officials.
The allegation against Ahtisaari is that Pacolli’s money was deposited in a Swiss account.
Pacolli funds a US-based lobby group Alliance for a New Kosovo.
Check :
OBL owns:
Must check:
There are many more, but have too much open to work them.
[live links at url:]
http://www.bosnia.org.uk/news/news_list.cfm
Below is the latest news and analysis about Bosnia in English or Bosnian (articles in Bosnian also have a synopsis in English).
Items 1 to 10 of 1318
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SFOR fears Karadžic’s bodyguards
Author: Monitor (Podgorica)
Uploaded: Monday, 09 July, 2007
Commenting on the recent arrest of Vlastimir Ðordevic wanted by The Hague, the independent Montenegrin weekly Monitor points out that the same police force on a number of occasions held in its grasp also Radovan Karadžic and Rako Mladic, but let them go.
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On Kosovo, the EU is united - by a sickening lack of will
Author: Jonathan Steele, Berlin
Uploaded: Monday, 09 July, 2007
The senior foreign correspondent of The Guardian argues that, despite the modest successes of the reform treaty, the first post-summit crisis in fact laid bare Europe’s failures
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Hag kao interes pravde
Author: Beta, Hag
Uploaded: Monday, 09 July, 2007
The defence team of former chief of the general staff of the Army of B-H Rasim Delic explains why it opposes the sudden decision of the Hague tribunal’s chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte to ask the court to transfer the case to the B-H justice system
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Uništeni tragovi nekadašnjeg života u Banjoj Luci
Author: Gordana Katana
Uploaded: Monday, 02 July, 2007
Article in Oslobodenje (Sarajevo) records the systematic and continuing replacement of historic names for streets and neighbourhoods in Banja Luka with names having an exclusively Serb (or Serbian) resonance
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Scars and stripes
Author: Ed Vulliamy
Uploaded: Sunday, 01 July, 2007
On 12 February, an 18-year-old Bosnian walked into a shopping mall in Utah carrying a pistol, a shotgun and more than 100 bullets. He killed five shoppers, before finally being shot by police. But what triggered his homicidal rampage? Ed Vulliamy, writing in The Observer, charts Sulejmen Talovic’s tragic journey from Srebrenica to Salt Lake City
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Omarska - Fifteen Years On
Author: Chris Keulemans
Uploaded: Tuesday, 26 June, 2007
Writing in Dani (Sarajevo), Dutch writer and journalist Chris Keulemans reports from the camps set up by Karadzic’s Belgrade-backed forces in 1992, and in particular on the ongoing campaign to create a memorial centre at Omarska, on land now owned by Mittal Steel
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Partneri ili nema razgovora
Author: D. Vujanovic
Uploaded: Tuesday, 26 June, 2007
Article in Belgrade daily incorporating interview with RS premier Milorad Dodik in which he casts doubt on the future of B-H, promises to resist integration of its police forces, raises the spectre of an RS referendum on secession, and says he will block any B-H recognition of Kosova independence
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RS Premier: ‘Only ally for Croats are Serbs’
Author: Karmen Horvat, Belgrade
Uploaded: Tuesday, 26 June, 2007
Report (by the Croatian News Agency in Belgrade) of an interview given by Milorad Dodik to a Serbian daily in which he ‘calls B-H an experiment that will not succeed’, promises to resist integration of the country’s police forces and raises the spectre of a referendum on RS secession
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Zlocin i kazna
Author: Chris Keulemans
Uploaded: Tuesday, 26 June, 2007
Writing in Dani (Sarajevo), Dutch writer and journalist Chris Keulemans reports from the camps set up by Karadzic’s Belgrade-backed forces in 1992, and in particular on the ongoing campaign to create a memorial centre at Omarska, on land now owned by Mittal Steel
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Families and friends bury 80 civilian victims of ethnic cleansing
Author: Associated Press, Brcko
Uploaded: Tuesday, 26 June, 2007
AP report from the autonomous district of Brcko in northern Bosnia on the funeral of some of the civilian victims of the 1992 genocidal assault by Belgrade-backed forces in 1992, found in a mass grave last year and since identified through DNA analysis
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http://www.serbianna.com/news/2007/01968.shtml
Slain Al-Qaida Bomber One of Albanian Returnees
SAN’A, Yemen (AP)—Yemeni authorities confirmed Friday an Egyptian national killed in a gunfight when resisting arrest was an al-Qaida suspect and an alleged plotter of the suicide bombing that killed seven Spanish tourists and two Yemenis earlier this week.
Authorities said Ahmed Bassiouni Dewidar was killed Thursday in San’a, the capital, during a countrywide sweep that led to the arrest of some 20 suspects in the attack on a group of tourists visiting an ancient temple in the Marib region of northern Yemen.
“He was one of the leaders...who planned the terrorist attack in Marib,” a security official said.
Egypt has asked Yemen to send a DNA sample of the slain suspect to confirm his identity, an Egyptian security official told the AP on Friday.
An Islamic fundamentalist, Dewidar was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment in Egypt on terrorism charges, a Yemeni security official said.
Yemen’s Interior ministry described Dewidar as an important al-Qaida operative and said he opened fire and threw hand grenades at security forces who came to arrest him, injuring five.
“He had a wide and active relationship with al-Qaida elements in Yemen, Egypt, Syria and Iraq,” the Interior Ministry said in a statement.
After killing him, security forces searched his apartment and found weapons, explosives, and forged passports and identity cards apparently used by al-Qaida members to travel to Iraq or other Arab countries, the ministry said.
Dewidar is known in Egypt for a high profile 1999 terrorism case known as the trial of Albanian Returnees, when 107 alleged fundamentalists were brought to court, including 13 extradited to Egypt by Albania.
He was among 62 to be tried in absentia on charges including criminal conspiracy, subversion, membership of an outlawed group, plotting to carry out attacks on officials and police, and forgery.
He sought political asylum in Yemen in 2001, where he got married to a Yemeni national and had two children, the Yemeni official said.
Since Tuesday, Yemeni security forces backed by a team of Spanish investigators have rounded up some 20 Islamic fundamentalists including three alleged al-Qaida members suspected of providing assistance to the suicide attack.
Authorities are also looking for three other suspects believed to have provided cover fire for the bomber. This second car has led authorities to consider whether the blast that killed the seven Spanish tourists and wounded six others was possibly detonated by remote control rather than by a suicide bomber.
A second security official said that the U.S. embassy in Yemen had also dispatched a team of investigators to probe the bombing.
“The Americans want to know whether the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber or if the bomb was detonated by a remote control,” said the Yemeni official close to the investigation. “It seems this is very important to them.”
He said the method used in the attack could indicate a shift in al-Qaida tactics and U.S. investigators were looking for signs of cooperation between Yemeni terrorists and insurgents in Iraq.
Monday, a suicide bomber rammed his car into a group of Spanish tourists visiting the ruins of a temple linked to the ancient Queen of Sheba in northern Yemen.
The attack came less than two weeks after the U.S. Embassy warned Americans to avoid the area, which until recent years was rarely visited because of frequent kidnappings of foreigners.
Yemen is the ancestral home of Osama bin Laden, and police said they had received information last month about a possible al-Qaida attack. A number of known al-Qaida operatives remain at large in Yemen, part of a group of two dozen who escaped from a prison last year.
The northern Marib region is home to four powerful tribes with more than 70 branches and is known to be a hotbed of support for al-Qaida.
Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh has offered a $76,000 reward for any information about those responsible for the attack.
July 06, 2007 07:03 ET (11:03 GMT)
http://www.serbianna.com/news/2007/01974.shtml
Jihad expert testifies in Padilla case
July 09, 2007 4:59 PM
MIAMI-Defense lawyers in the Jose Padilla terrorism support trial on Monday questioned a prosecution expert’s testimony that a global Islamic jihad movement was a main instigator of armed conflicts in places such as Chechnya, Somalia and Kosovo.
The attorneys suggested through their questions to terrorism expert Rohan Gunaratna that the violence was the result of aggression directed against Muslims, who reacted by seeking help from elsewhere in the Islamic world and even from the U.S. government.
Jeanne Baker, attorney for Padilla co-defendant Adham Amin Hassoun, quoted from a U.S. State Department document on Chechnya asserting that there was little evidence of links between al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and Omar Ibn al-Khattab, a Chechen rebel leader who died in 2002.
“I would dispute that,” said Gunaratna, head of the Singapore-based International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research. “Their relationship was very close to each other. They respected each other.”
Gunaratna agreed with Baker that the U.S. government sometimes sided with Muslims in these conflicts, including 1990s support of ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo against the Serbian government and criticism of Russia for harsh actions Moscow took against the rebels in its breakaway Chechnya province.
“The Muslim community worldwide was very concerned about what was happening?” Baker said.
“Yes, the Muslims were very concerned,” Gunaratna replied.
The testimony by Gunaratna came at the start of the ninth week in the trial of Padilla, Hassoun and Kifah Wael Jayyousi on charges of being part of a North American cell supporting Islamic extremist groups around the world. All three face potential life prison sentences if convicted.
Padilla, a 36-year-old U.S. citizen, was held for 3 1/2 years as an enemy combatant after his 2002 arrest on suspicion of plotting to detonate a radioactive “dirty bomb” in the U.S. Those allegations are not part of the Miami trial, which focuses on Padilla’s alleged recruitment by the support cell to train at an al-Qaida camp in Afghanistan.
Defense lawyers have claimed that what prosecutors say was support for Islamic extremists was actually assistance aimed at oppressed Muslims in conflict zones.
“Not everyone who sends supplies or material into an area of humanitarian crisis is a support cell, are they?” asked Jayyousi lawyer William Swor.
“Not everyone is a terrorism support cell,” Gunaratna replied.
Defense lawyers are expected to wrap up cross-examination of Gunaratna this week, with the prosecution likely to complete its main case sometime next week.
http://www.serbianna.com/news/2007/01970.shtml
More witnesses sought for atrocities of a Bosnian Muslim
July 09, 2007 1:07 PM
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) -The former commander of Bosnia’s Muslim-dominated army went on trial Monday for allegedly failing to prevent foreign Islamic fighters from murdering, raping and torturing dozens of Serbs and Croats during the country’s 1992-1995 war.
The trial of retired Gen. Rasim Delic, 58, started despite prosecutors warning that he likely will be cleared of war crimes if judges do not allow them to call more witnesses.
Delic, one of only a handful of Muslims indicted by the U.N.’s Yugoslav war crimes tribunal, is charged with murder, rape and cruel treatment.
Prosecutors say Delic, who was commander of the Bosnian army’s main staff, failed to prevent foreign Islamic fighters known as mujahadeen gunning down prisoners and beheading others during the Bosnian war.
“He had a duty to act,” Mundis said in his opening statement. “He failed in that duty and as a result crimes were committed and perpetrators were allowed to escape justice.”
The trial started amid wrangling between judges and prosecutors over how long the case will last.
In order to speed up the trial, judges curtailed the number of witnesses prosecutors can call to 55 from the 91 originally requested.
The tribunal is under increasing pressure from the United Nations, which foots the multimillion-dollar court bill, to finish its work quickly. The court is due to finish its trials by 2008 and round off all appeals and shut down in 2010.
Prosecutors filed a flurry of motions last week asking judges to grant them more time and witnesses.
“If we are required to start the trial under these conditions, the likely outcome would be acquittal,” prosecutor Daryl Mundis told judges at the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal.
“To start the trial when this office believes there is insufficient time or witnesses to prove the charges is irresponsible,” he said.
But judges insisted the trial start and said prosecutors could ask for more witnesses later.
“This is precious time,” presiding Judge Balkone Moloto said. He said that by saying he could not get a conviction without more witnesses, Mundis was “putting a gun to the head of the chamber.”
Delic surrendered to the court after he was indicted in 2005 and has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Last week, Mundis asked another panel of tribunal judges to transfer the case to a court in Sarajevo. There has been no decision yet on that request.
Delic is one of the highest-ranking Bosnian Muslims to appear at the tribunal, which has indicted more than 160 suspects, the vast majority of them Serbs.
Prosecutors indicted him on the basis of command responsibility, arguing he knew about the mujahadeen’s crimes but failed to prevent or punish them.
The mujahadeen poured into Bosnia in 1992 from Islamic nations such as Egypt, Algeria and Saudi Arabia to protect and fight alongside Bosnia’s Muslims. Many of them were battle-hardened in conflicts such as the war to expel Russian occupiers from Afghanistan and fighting in Kashmir, the disputed region divided between India and Pakistan.
According to Delic’s indictment, in July 1993, they summarily executed about 24 captured Bosnian Croat soldiers and civilians near the village of Maline.
Two years later, mujahadeen soldiers captured a group of Bosnian Serb troops and imprisoned them at a detention facility called Kamenica Camp.
There, one of the prisoners was shot and killed. A mujahadeen fighter then “retrieved a saber, decapitated the corpse and the prisoners were then forced to kiss the severed head, which was then hung on a hook in the room where they were detained,” Mundis said.
The mujahadeen also are accused of torturing other prisoners and raping three Bosnian Serb women and murdering other Serb prisoners in September 1995.
[you can feel the hate they have for Israel, some grizzley photos, slanted of course..........granny]
http://pedulipalestina.blogspot.com/2007_07_01_archive.html
Thursday, July 05, 2007
Did Imam Khomeini Support Arafat?
[photo of the kiss?]
http://www.xerces.com/blackhole/showthread.php?t=7672
Egypt Qaeda branch calls for attacks on “Crusaders”
Very obscure article........not hitting the headlines.
http://www.dailystaregypt.com/articl...ArticleID=7873
Egypt Qaeda branch calls for attacks on “Crusaders”
By Reuters
First Published: June 25, 2007
DUBAI: A man described as a leader of Al Qaeda’s wing in Egypt called for attacks on Israeli and Western targets in the Arab world’s most populous country in support of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas.
continues:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1863373/posts?page=2
“Realism” Is Ugly in North Korea
AEI ^ | 07/02/07 | David Frum
Posted on 07/09/2007 7:36:57 PM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
“Realism” Is Ugly in North Korea
By David Frum Posted: Monday, July 2, 2007
ARTICLES National Post (Canada) Publication Date: June 30, 2007
[you will want to read this]
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1863192/posts
North American union plan headed to Congress in fall
WorldNetDaily.com ^ | 7-9-07
Posted on 07/09/2007 1:32:44 PM PDT by JKrive
WASHINGTON – A powerful think tank chaired by former Sen. Sam Nunn and guided by trustees including Richard Armitage, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Harold Brown, William Cohen and Henry Kissinger, is in the final stages of preparing a report to the White House and U.S. Congress on the benefits of integrating the U.S., Mexico and Canada into one political, economic and security bloc.
The final report, published in English, Spanish and French, is scheduled for submission to all three governments by Sept. 30, according to the Center for Strategic & International Studies.
CSIS boasts of playing a large role in the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994 – a treaty that set in motion a political movement many believe resembles the early stages of the European Community on its way to becoming the European Union.
“The results of the study will enable policymakers to make sound, strategic, long-range policy decisions about North America, with an emphasis on regional integration,” explains Armand B. Peschard-Sverdrup, director of CSIS’ Mexico Project. “Specifically, the project will focus on a detailed examination of future scenarios, which are based on current trends, and involve six areas of critical importance to the trilateral relationship: labor mobility, energy, the environment, security, competitiveness and border infrastructure and logistics.”
(Excerpt) Read more at wnd.com ...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1863304/posts
Pakistan troops storm Islamabad mosque: military
afp ^ | 09/07/2007 | afp
Posted on 07/09/2007 5:26:04 PM PDT by mdittmar
Pakistani troops early Tuesday launched a massive operation against a cleric and his armed men in a besieged Islamabad mosque after negotiations failed, a top military official told AFP.
“The troops are now inside the mosque, they are at the roof top,” top military spokesman Major General Arshad Waheed told AFP.
“It is a final push to clear the place of armed militants,” he said, adding that the militants were putting up stiff resistance.
The talks between the Pakistani government and a cleric holed up with armed men at the mosque failed early Tuesday after he refused to release women and children allegedly held hostage, an official said.
Top government negotiator Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain announced the failure after 11 hours of talks, which was followed immediately by heavy firing and two massive blasts.
“After 11 hours of negotiations we are deeply disappointed that the talks did not succeed,” he told a news conference near the Red Mosque.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1863383/posts
Time running out for strike against Iran
JPOST.COM ^ | 10 Jul 07 | YAAKOV KATZ
Posted on 07/09/2007 7:48:18 PM PDT by elhombrelibre
Predicting that sanctions will ultimately fail to stop Teheran’s nuclear program, Brig.-Gen. (res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, former head of Military Intelligence’s Research Division, told The Jerusalem Post on Monday that time to launch an effective military strike against Iran’s nuclear installations was running out.
According to Kuperwasser, who stepped down from his post last year, Iran is “very close” to the point that it will cross the technological threshold and have the capability to enrich uranium at an industrial level. Once they master the technology, the Iranians will have the ability to manufacture a nuclear device within two to three years, he added.
“The program’s vulnerability to a military operation is diminishing as time passes,” Kuperwasser said, “and they are very close to the point that they will be able to enrich uranium at an industrial level.”
In an article entitled “Halting Iran’s Nuclear Weapons Program: Iranian Vulnerabilities and Western Policy Options” published this week by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs - run by former Israeli ambassador to the UN Dr. Dore Gold - Kuperwasser spells out what he believes is the only course of action that will stop Iran’s race to nuclear power.
Thanks to technological sophistication, advances in producing raw materials as well as intermediate products and the improvement in protection of the program’s components, the Western world is beginning to find it difficult to plan an effective strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities, he said.
On Monday, The Washington Post revealed new satellite photos of Iran’s enrichment facility at Natanz which showed the digging of a tunnel that analysts said could be used to hide and protect key nuclear components.
Iran, Kuperwasser said, was working on two parallel tracks - one at Natanz to enrich uranium and the plutogenic track being worked on at the Arak heavy water facility.
As long as Russia was not aligned with the United States, Kuperwasser said sanctions would not work on their own to stop Iran.
“For significant sanctions to be effective the world needs to at the same time threaten the use of military force,” he said. “Iran needs to be made to understand that if the sanctions won’t work, the world is prepared to use military force to stop the nuclear program.”
He said Iran was preparing for the possibility of war, but that deep down the Islamic leadership did not believe that either the United States or Israel were in a position of strength that would enable them to launch such a complicated military operation. Iran, he said, was purchasing Russian air defense systems and was fortifying its nuclear facilities and moving key elements to underground bunkers in preparation for the possibility that its assessments were wrong and it would in the end be attacked.
“The Iranians are working around the clock on improving military capabilities and they are also moving centrifuges to underground facilities,” he said.
Kuperwasser said that a real threat of military action - backed up by credible threats by world leaders as well as the deployment of a large military force to the region - could have the right effect in deterring Iranian leaders from continuing with their nuclear program.
A credible military threat combined with economic leverage had a chance at preventing the need for a future clash with a nuclear Iran and perhaps could also make it unnecessary to deal today with an Iran that is close to nuclearization, he said.
http://www.fbi.gov/page2/july07/spying070907.htm
THE SPYING GAME
Tricks of Today’s Trade
07/09/07
Silhouettes shaking hands
One of your execs is on a business trip overseas. At an opportune time, a foreign spy covertly plants software on her laptop. Unsuspecting, she returns home and plugs her laptop into your company’s computer network. By the time your security experts get wind of it, your most cherished business secrets are long gone.
Welcome to the twenty-first century world of espionage. Threats like these may sound like the stuff of fiction, but they are real and could well be coming to a factory, office, or university near you.
But there’s some good news. Armed with an understanding of the possibilities, you can minimize the risk of you and your organization becoming an unwitting target.
So what do you need to know? Here are some basics.
Know What Spies Want
At the top of their country’s hit lists:
* The inside skinny on our government’s policies and intentions towards their country.
* Details on U.S. military plans and weapons systems.
* The crown jewels of our economy: our nation’s best scientific and technological innovations and research, both public and private.
* Cutting edge U.S. management practices, which themselves are a valuable asset.
Know Their Favorite “Disguises”
* Representatives at supposed “research institutes”;
* Visiting business professionals and scientists who want to tour your state-of-the-art plants and operations worldwide (a great place to take pictures and make friends);
* Tourists or visitors on non-immigrant visas;
* Diplomatic officials, the standard cover;
* False front companies; and
* Students and educators.
Know Their Collection Strategies
Here are just a few you might not expect:
* Out of the blue, you get a call asking for the latest manual for one of your products. Or someone shows up unannounced at your plant and asks to buy large quantities of your electronics. The end game? They dissect your products and then go out and start producing the technologies themselves.
* You hire a foreign-born engineer who has been educated in this country. Over a 10-15 year period, she rises to mid-level management. Then, she returns to her home country—where she gets paid by that government to set up a business that competes with yours.
* A series of university students and professors from overseas take jobs in research labs on campus and get involved in related military projects. Individually, they learn only bits and pieces. But collectively, when they pass that information back to their home country, it paints a telling picture of our country’s defense initiatives.
* Foreign intelligence operatives strike up a relationship with a business professional, tourist, diplomat, expatriate, or student visiting their country. At first, it’s a purely social relationship. But then it slowly turns to talk of what that person may know. In some cases, that person may end up selling vital secrets for cash.
And know this: we can help you better understand these threats and take specific actions to stop them.
Specifically: Join our Counterintelligence Domain Program or our Research and Technology Protection program.
Also visit our Counterintelligence webpage for more information.
http://www.fbi.gov/page2/june07/iraq062907.htm
THE FBI IN IRAQ
The Work of Our Legal Attaché
06/29/07
Map of Iraq
In this age of globalization, protecting the U.S. takes us to many different parts of the world. That includes the Middle East, where we now have permanent offices in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Pakistan, Jordan, Yemen, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and more recently, Iraq.
Our Baghdad office was officially opened in the U.S. Embassy in March 2005, though our people were on the ground in the country two years earlier. Today, we have dozens of special agents, intelligence analysts, and other professionals in Iraq, making it one of our largest international contingents.
“Why are we in Baghdad? Because we have to be,” says Special Agent Andrew R. Bland III, who served 19 months in the capital city as our first permanent overseas representative or Legal Attaché before being replaced recently by Special Agent Jim Davis. “A lot of what happens in Iraq is pivotal to protecting the homeland, not to mention our soldiers and other Americans in Iraq itself.”
A few examples of what we do that’s so pivotal:
* We interview suspected terrorists captured by the military. These suspects may have vital information about terrorist operatives and operations both inside and outside Iraq, and possibly even in the U.S.
* We gather intelligence, which is quickly processed, analyzed, and shared, sometimes leading to still more intelligence, creating a lightning fast real-time intel cycle. The military, in particular, increasingly relies on us for intelligence, especially about the movement of forces within the country gleaned from our investigations or other work.
* We collect evidence from crime scenes—whether it’s from a massive car bomb or a mass grave. As Davis says, “The U.S. military is made of war fighters. They don’t have the expertise to collect and process evidence if they come across atrocities or major crime scenes.”
* We help find kidnapped Americans. At least 13 American soldiers and civilians were kidnapped in Iraq just between October 2006 and February 2007.
* We investigate crimes committed by Americans against the Iraqi people, as well those Iraqis commit against their fellow citizens. In concert with several other U.S. agencies, we recently created a major crimes task force that investigates some of the worst crimes committed by Iraqis against other Iraqis.
* We help train the Iraqi police and intelligence forces.
According to Davis, our work in Baghdad is different than in other countries.
First, it’s probably our most dangerous overseas assignment. Attacks on the Green Zone, where our offices are located, are common. Trips outside the zone are perilous.
Second, most of our international offices track down leads for agents in the states or in other regions of the world. In Iraq, the work is largely self-generated: teams are actively working on cases under U.S. jurisdiction almost as soon as they’re reported.
Third, there are far more U.S. agencies and actors to coordinate with in Iraq, not to mention the many international partners. Our relationship with the military is especially symbiotic. “The FBI can’t succeed without working with the military, and the military can’t succeed without working with the FBI,” Bland asserts.
And the FBI can’t succeed in its mission of protecting the U.S. from attack without being in Iraq…and without having a presence across the globe.
Resources:
- Our International Offices
- More on our Work Overseas
Read the exclusive, eye opening details in a July 10th Defense & Foreign Affairs analysis posted on AntiMullah at the permalink shown below, confronting the denials with facts.
http://alanpetersnewsbriefs.blogspot.com/2007/07/details-of-bribing-of-un-special-envoy.html
The UN is a bag of slimy sh*t in so much of its dealings.
the longest conflict in history is that of Muslim vs. non-Muslim
http://search.news.yahoo.com/search/news/?fr=yalerts-keyword&c=&p=%22Syria%22&ei=utf-8
290 News PhotosPlay Play 10 News Videos
* 1.
Israel offers direct peace talks with Syria Open this result in new window
International Herald Tribune - 1 hour, 46 minutes ago
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel called on President Bashar Assad of Syria to reopen peace talks without American mediators.
* 2.
Olmert offers to open Syria talks Open this result in new window
Channel 4 - 27 minutes ago
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has called on Syrian President Bashar Assad to reopen peace talks between the two countries. Israel had already appealed to Syria to open negotiations, but Syria insisted that talks be mediated by the Americans, who are not interested, Olmert said.
* 3.
Israel tells Syria willing to return Golan Open this result in new window
Tiscali - 2 hours, 30 minutes ago
Spokesmen for Olmert and the Foreign Ministry declined comment on the report although a Foreign Ministry spokesman noted Israel had long been willing to give Syria the Golan area, which commands the approaches to Damascus, in return for peace.
* 4.
Iran, Syria aim for more economic deals Open this result in new window
ArabicNews.com - Jul 09 9:36 PM
Iran and Syria on Sunday agreed to give impetus to implementation of previously signed bilateral agreements through their joint economic commission. The issue was discussed in a meeting between Iran’s Ambassador to Damascus “Mohammad Hassan Akhtari” and Syrian Minister of agriculture “Adel Safar.”
* 5.
Iran, Syria aim for more economic deals Open this result in new window
ArabicNews.com - Jul 09 9:34 PM
Iran and Syria on Sunday agreed to give impetus to implementation of previously signed bilateral agreements through their joint economic commission.
* 6.
Ahmadi-Nejad Syria visit on agenda Open this result in new window
ArabicNews.com - Jul 09 9:38 PM
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad-Ali Hosseini said on Sunday an upcoming visit to Syria of President Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad is on the agenda. The date of the visit will be announced later.
* 7.
Peres says prospects for peace with Syria still “stuck” Open this result in new window
Tiscali - 2 hours, 30 minutes ago
But after leaking the existence of secret channels via Turkey and Germany to ask Syria the price it would be willing to pay for the return of the occupied Golan Heights, Israel says it is still waiting for a definitive answer.
* 8.
Analysis: Rumors of Syria-Israel war Open this result in new window
UPI - Jul 09 7:16 AM
Well-informed sources in Washington fear a confrontation between Syria and Israel may happen this summer. The sources say that Syrian intelligence is abuzz with activity reports of an imminent Israeli attack across the Golan Heights, while others believe
* 9.
Official: Syria Aims to Disrupt Lebanon Open this result in new window
The New York Sun - Jul 09 1:03 PM
Recent media reports that Syria warned its nationals to flee Lebanon ahead of a major outbreak of violence and civil war there are “unfounded,” Lebanon’s Druze Leader Walid Jumblatt told the New York Sun today. Mr. Jumblatt said rather than evacuating, Syria has been sending “thousands of so-called workers and tourists per day,” possibly ahead of an attempt to destabilize the country. “There is ...
* 10.
Minister of Housing and Rural development arrives in Syria Open this result in new window
Islamic Republic News Agency - Jul 09 3:30 PM
Iran - Minister - Syria Iran’s Minister of Housing and Rural Development Mohammad Saeedi Kia arrived in Damascus on Monday evening at the head of a delegation to attend the joint economic commission follow-up committee.
I fear you are correct.
Davey Crockett is on vacation, so I will say thanks for coming to read and join in on our thread.
http://alanpetersnewsbriefs.blogspot.com/2007/07/details-of-bribing-of-un-special-envoy.html
Alan Peters has an expose’ on the UN in Kosvo, at the above link, you should read it.
Thanks to Fars for alerting us to it.
WT posts 1040 to 44 or there abouts are also Kosvo related articles that almost tie in with this one, or kinda back it up.
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