Asian American Gangs
In recent years, the issue of Asian American youth gangs has gotten a lot of attention from the media and law enforcement. This phenomenon shares many similarities with other “gang problems” in the Black and Latino communities. However, certain ethnic and cultural aspects come into play with Asian gangs that make their situation and consequences of their actions unique.
http://www.asian-nation.org/gangs.shtml
Yakuza diary : doing time in the Japanese underworld / by Christopher Seymour.
http://magic.msu.edu/record=b3107229a
Organized Crime and Gangs:
http://dir.yahoo.com/Society_and_Culture/crime/organized_crime/
Title: The Threat of Russian Organized Crime
Series: Issues in International Crime
Author: James O. Finckenauer and Yuri A. Voronin
Published: National Institute of Justice, June 2001
Subject: International Issues: transnational/international organized crime
http://www.ncjrs.gov/txtfiles1/nij/187085.txt
The Threat Posed from the Convergence of Organized Crime, Drug Trafficking, and Terrorism
Statement of
Frank J. Cilluffo
Deputy Director, Global Organized Crime Program
Director, Counterterrorism Task Force
Center for Strategic & International Studies
to the
Subcommittee on Crime
U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary
The Challenge We Face As the Battle Lines Blur
As we begin the 21st Century, America is faced with a new national security challenge that is both vexing and complex. The once clear lines between the international drug trade, terrorism and organized crime are blurring, crossing and mutating as never before. Unfortunately, Washington is only beginning to come to grips with this deepening phenomenon. The continued use of an inflexible 20th Century bureaucratic entanglement of government agencies will not answer this call. We must see this threat clearly. We must understand its roots. We must understand what it means to our future.
continues......
http://www.globalsecurity.org/security/library/congress/2000_h/001213-cilluffo.htm
Statement of
Chris Swecker
Assistant Director, Criminal Investigative Division
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Before the
Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere
House International Relations Committee
April 20, 2005
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee. I appreciate the opportunity to testify before you today about the FBI’s efforts to combat gangs in the United States, including Latin American or Hispanic gangs, such as MS-13.
Gangs and other criminal enterprises
continued.
http://www.fbi.gov/congress/congress05/swecker042005.htm
Country Reports on Terrorism 2006 (html format)
U.S. law requires the Secretary of State to provide Congress, by April 30 of each year, a full and complete report on terrorism with regard to those countries and groups meeting criteria set forth in the legislation. This annual report is entitled Country Reports on Terrorism. Beginning with the report for 2004, it replaced the previously published Patterns of Global Terrorism.
Background Information: Country Reports on Terrorism and Patterns of Global Terrorism
— Table of Contents
— Chapter 1 — Strategic Assessment
— Chapter 2 — Country Reports: Africa Overview
— Chapter 2 — Country Reports: East Asia and Pacific Overview
— Chapter 2 — Country Reports: Europe and Eurasia Overview
— Chapter 2 — Country Reports: Middle East and North Africa Overview
— Chapter 2 — Country Reports: South and Central Asia Overview
— Chapter 2 — Country Reports: Western Hemisphere Overview
— Chapter 3 — State Sponsors of Terrorism Overview
— Chapter 4 — The Global Challenge of WMD Terrorism
— Chapter 5 — Terrorist Safe Havens (7120 Report)
— Chapter 6 — Terrorist Organizations
— Chapter 7 — Legislative Requirements and Key Terms
— National Counterterrorism Center: Annex of Statistical Information
— International Conventions and Protocols on Terrorism
—04/30/07 Briefing on Release of 2006 Country Reports on Terrorism; Frank C. Urbancic, Acting Coordinator for Counterterrorism; Washington, DC
http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/crt/2006/
Balkan Organized Crime
The term “Balkan Organized Crime” applies to organized crime groups originating from or operating in Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro, Bulgaria, Greece, and Romania.
Balkan organized crime is an emerging threat in the U.S. While several groups are active in various cities across the country, they do not yet demonstrate the established criminal sophistication of traditional Eurasian or La Cosa Nostra (LCN) organizations. However, they have proven themselves capable of adapting to expanding criminal markets and becoming involved in new activities, much like the historical growth of other organized crime groups.
History of Balkan Organized Crime
Organized crime in the Balkans has its roots in the traditional clan structures. In these largely rural countries, people organized into clans with large familial ties for protection and mutual assistance. Starting in the 15th century, clan relationships operated under the kanun, or code, which values loyalty and besa, or secrecy. Each clan established itself in specific territories and controlled all activities in that territory. Protection of activities and interests often led to violence between the clans. The elements inherent in the structure of the clans provided the perfect backbone for what is considered modern-day Balkan organized crime.
Many years of communist rule led to black market activities in the Balkans, but the impact of these activities was limited to the region. When communism collapsed in the late 1980s and early 1990s, it led to the expansion of Balkan organized crime activities. Criminal markets once closed to Balkan groups suddenly opened, and this led to the creation of an international network. Within the Balkans, organized crime groups infiltrated the new democratic institutions, further expanding their profit opportunities.
Balkan criminal organizations have been active in the U.S. since the mid-1980s. At first, these organizations were involved in low-level crimes, including bank robberies, ATM burglaries, and home invasions. Later, ethnic Albanians affiliated themselves with the established LCN families in New York, acting as low-level participants. As their communities and presence have become more established, they have expanded to lead and control their own organizations.
There is no single Balkan “Mafia,” structured hierarchically like the traditional LCN. Rather, Balkan organized crime groups in this country translated their clan-like structure to the United States. They are not clearly defined or organized and are instead grouped around a central leader or leaders. Organized crime figures maintain ties back to the Balkan region and have established close-knit communities in many cities across the nation.
Albanian organized crime activities in the U.S. include gambling, money laundering, drug trafficking, human smuggling, extortion, violent witness intimidation, robbery, attempted murder, and murder. Balkan organized crime groups have recently expanded into more sophisticated crimes including real estate fraud.
Organized Crime home
http://www.fbi.gov/hq/cid/orgcrime/balkan.htm
I went and this is what Snopes has at the link.....
granny
Subject: golden compass
go to the link at the SNOPES site below and read........all parents
with
impressionable children, I don’t care if you do or do not believe in
G-D as
an entity, it is what he/she represents in us, the good, the caring,
the
responsibility, etc (unless you are a muslim of course).
You may already know about this, but I just learned about a kids movie
coming out in December starring Nicole Kidman. I believe it’s called
The
Golden Compass, and while it will be a watered down version, it is
based on
a series of children’s books about killing God (It is the anti-Narnia).
Please follow this link, and then pass it on. From what I understand,
the
hope is to get a lot of kids to see the movie - which won’t seem too
bad -
and then get the parents to buy the books for their kids for Christmas.
The
quotes from the author sum it all up.
http://snopes.com/politics/religion/compass.asp
http://snopes.com/politics/religion/compass.asp
From: osint@yahoogroups.com
http://khilafahtoday.wordpress.com/2007/11/21/a-proposed-the-constitution-of-the-islamic-state/
Reasons To Establish Khilafah
A Proposed The Constitution of The Islamic State
A Draft Constitution (This constitution is always under review and debate)
[Sounds like he plans on setting it up, soon.
We will not like his rules.
granny]
India : Dawood, terrorist groups target India’s oil assets
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2007/20071122/main2.htm
A Tribune Exclusive
Dawood, terrorist groups target India’s oil assets
by Swati Chaturvedi
New Delhi, November 21
India’s high value oil assets are being targeted by an unholy nexus of
the
underworld and terrorist groups such as the Jaish-e-Mohammed, says a
report
by the National Security Adviser, M K Narayanan, to the Cabinet
Committee on
Security Affairs.
Interestingly, the entire Dawood Ibrahim family has been awarded high
educational qualifications by the ISI to facilitate fake travel
documents
and visas. In one passport issued to Ibrahim he holds a doctorate and
is
called Dr Altaf Mohammed while his wife Mehjabeen who is not even a
matriculate has been given a post-graduate degree. His 20-year-old son
and
other family members have also been given assorted higher education
qualifications by the ISI. Copies of the passports and other documents
are
available with the IB. This also points to the fact that the entire
clan
still travels pretty freely. And Dawood is still roaming around without
getting caught in the Indian net.
Quoting several instances where containers and carriers of Indian oil
have
been targeted for hijack in Maharashtra, the report is categorical in
asserting that India’s old bugbear, wanted terrorist don Dawood
Ibrahim, is
behind this.
Commercial gain appears to be the main motive while targeting strategic
assets is in line with the operational framework of the jehadi groups
who
have significantly increased their operations in Mumbai and in other
parts
of Maharashtra such as Yawatmal and Beed - bordering Naxalite affected
Andhra Pradesh.
Security forced have also uncovered some kidnap plots against senior
officials of the oil companies and the latest security review carried
out by
the Intelligence Bureau (IB) has suggested that round-the-clock
security has
to be provided to them.
Narayanan says that of late there has been a coalescing of threat to
high
value strategic assets rather than the random ``scattered terror’’. He
goes
on to describe it as an unholy nexus.
Contrary to popular perception that Ibrahim has been marginalised he is
still active and with the help of the ISI coordinates with the jehadi
groups. The D-company has carried out several joint-operations with the
JeM
in vulnerable Mumbai.
Inter-group chatter picked up by the intelligence agencies points to a
great
deal of logistical planning and coordination between the terrorists.
This
trend is in consonance with the targeting of scientific institutions,
nuclear installations and the people working there.
A new trend identified by the report is the likely investment in
infrastructure such as telecom, power and ports by sovereign funds of
certain countries. To protect national interest the report suggests
that a
clear policy be formulated by the intelligence agencies in certain
sectors.
For example recently the Chinese government owned funds have picked a
significant stake in Blackstone, a leading private equity involved with
investments in several projects.
This renewed concern over security related aspects comes in at a time
when
oil rich countries such as Saudi Arabia and the UAE with huge foreign
exchange reserves are investing in various parts of the world through
specially created funds.
It may be recalled that a move by the UAE to invest in a port in the
United
States had led to a furore and eventually the US government denied
permission.
The report says that the Cabinet should consider a countrywide freeze
to
keep out investment from South Korea, China and Pakistan.
[Found this on my computer, could not read it, until I updated my Adobe reader, it has been awhile since I downloaded it, a google shows it at ISN.....granny]
Document number AFGP-2002-003677
This is 20 pages of handwritten text, including some key
aliases and codewords along with personal letters. Lines
prefixed with {TN} are my notes
Page (1)
Contents:
1- The Muslim Islamic Movement (AIM)… 1
2- Terrorism Training Camps in Iran… 1
3- Terrorism Training Camps in Sudan… 4
4- Operation to Destroy the Marines’ Building and the
French Center in Beirut… 7
5- Operation to Blow Up the American Embassy in Beirut… 10
6- The Hizbullah Operation in Paris, Responsible for the
Paris Explosions… 11
7- Assassination of Shahbour Bakhtiar in Paris… 16
8- The Airport Operations in Rome and Vienna… 18
9- Hizbullah in Lebanon… 19
Page (2)
{TN} Back of page (1)
Page (3)
Partial cipher:
==
L A K B S I N M D
2 4 6 8 9 3 7 5 1
LA KBSIR MD
24 68937 51
Special cipher for Abi al Faraj
Page (4)
Codewords: SATTS (meaning) – when necessary, follows:
{TN} RIGHT COLUMN
Azerbaijan – “LI (Ali)
Daghistan – ASAMA (Osama)
Chechnya – SIF (Saif)
Iran - :?HB (Shihab)
Sudan – M”AZ (Mi’adh)
Somalia – “BID? (Abida)
Djibouti – JLAL (Jilal)
Yemen – IASR (Yassir)
Bahrain – BLAL (Bilal)
America – AADM (Adam)
England – HMD (Hamad)
France – FARS (Faris)
Ethiopia – RFA”I (Rifa’i)
Kenya – TRAB (Turab)
Khartoum – TAJ (Taj)
Cairo – R;Q (Razq)
San’a – OALD (Khalid)
Alexandria – DLIN(Dalin)
Nairobi – ALUWIL (Taweel)
Addis Ababa – U? (Tah)
Mombassa – SLAM (Salaam)
Dar el-Salaam – ABW “BID? (Abu Abida)
Cambala – “ISI (‘Aissa)
{TN} CENTER COLUMN
Abu Abdullah – HM;? (Hamza)
Abu Hafs – ABD ALRHIM (Abdul Rahim)
Abu Talha – ALFATH (Al-Fatih)
Osama - :AML (Shamil)
Abu Islam – S?L (Sahal)
The Doctor – NWR (Noor)
Abul Hiz – ABRA?IM (Ibrahim)
Abul Faraj – XLAH (Silah)
Ashraf – RBI” (Rabi’a)
{TN} LEFT COLUMN
V.X – FITAMIN (Fitamin) [vitamin]
Saman – SHN? (Sahna) [expression]
Sarin – FITAMI 2 (Fitami 2) [vitamin 2]
Red Mercury – AL;AIED? (Al-Za`ida) [the additive]
Anthrax – ALJDDI (Al-Judadi)[the new ones]
Uranium – BWR (Bour) [port]
Plutonium – BRWFIN (Provine)(the F is written with three
dots, pronounced as V)
The Specialist – ALDKTWR (the Doctor)
Information – MLA;IA (Malaysia)
Intelligence – ALVRAIEB (al-dara`ib) [the taxes]
Prison – ALSAQI? (As-Saqi)[ditch]
Fax – ALRSAL? (ar-risala) [the letter]
The Brothers – ALAQARB (al-aqarib) [the relatives]
Press Agencies – X.B. (P.O. Box)
Operation – XDIQ (Sadiq) [friend]
{TN} Below the columns:
5,4 Fax messages to al-Fatih {TN: Above this is Abu Talha}
— —
Weapons from Muhammad ‘Atif’s group
(10,000) Dollars
NWR (Nour) contacts YASR (Yassir)
Date
Notes:
(1) Word of Safety – How are you – Praise God – Praise
God, Good (means there is danger)
(2) Appointments are two hours before, ex: Monday means
10 o’clock, Saturday means 8 o’clock, using GMT {TN:
Examples have been scratched out, but are still
readable}
(3) Regarding the friend (the operation), the timing
will be based on GMT
(4) Regarding telephone numbers, switch number 3 with
number 5
{TN: Parts of this page are wrinkled and covered over (top
right, bottom left) another copy, a look at the original
will yield a little more information}
{TN: Page (5)}
Report on Security Observations
America has failed to get any evidence on you. We expect
them to try to assassinate you again in another way, using
the following weapons:
1) Osama and his high-ranking assistants eat together
once a week (lunch on Friday)
a. Source of the food: the special kitchen in the
receiving building. That kitchen is thought to be
in a bad place, since so many Arabs and Afghans
know where it is, and there is so little
security. This is good for America, it is an open
door for them. first negative point
b. How the food is distributed: it is distributed
between the new and old people gathered second
negative point
c. While the plates are being handed out it is
clearly obvious which plate is for the Sheikh
third negative point
d. The way you drink your water: I’ve observed that
when you sit in the hangar, a glass of water is
brought to you by one of the accompanying guards
who is there for a general visit fourth negative
point
{TN} end of page 5, remainder of this letter is not present
{TN} Page 6, letter on Human Concern International
letterhead (Peshawar, Pakistan)
To Abu Abdullah (Osama bin Laden)
This is a thank you letter for all of his actions that
support Muslims worldwide. The author says we are sending
two men, ‘Ilam Farouq and Muhammad Tibb.
From Wazir Al-Hasan
{TN} Page 9
letter to Qari Saahib
asking for help getting the following brothers out of
prison:
1) Abul Jirah (Yemeni)
2) Abu Yousef (Sudanese)
3) Abu Abdullah Al-Laili Al-Milki
4) Abu Umran al Ghamdi
From Saif al’adl
Nov 19 1997
{TN} page 11
Letter to Abu Ibrahim
1) Ghazwan’s trip was five days, it went very well.
2) If anyone wants to come, living there is not bad
3) Abdul Jabar sold about 45 fudan which he was planting.
{TN: chances are this is a codeword}
4) Abu Tariq and al-Nawawi’s donkey (nuclear) is valued
at $350,000 even if it was sold for $100,000
a. {TN: chances are these are codewords}
5) We hope Abu Awaiss is well and can visit us to put his
things in order
6) The three member committee met after Abu Awaiss left
and they decided not to divide.
7) As for the papers of Khalifa, we will send them when
they are ready
8) For Omar Abdul Hasan the Mauritian, we met him through
the Mauritian Sheikh Abdullah… he wants to join the
company and be one of us, he was sent to Egypt
9) Jan (John) Agha is very worrisome, please don’t send
any letters to him until the last sign and pass this
on to the whole company.
From Muhammad Atif, 14 Aug 1996
{TN: Page 13&14, full translation}
Addendum to the first letter
Read after 5
1 – After the meeting with the prisoners who were released
a few days before this addendum, we are sure that our three
brothers who are with 85 Pakistanis really were moved more
than two months ago to Tajikistan, and from there to
Mashhad, Iran. Those prisoners remembered the names of all
of our brothers and they described them. They remembered
that they complained very strenuously to the administrator
of the prisoners, whose name was Mujahid, and he was a
corporal in charge of the prisoners within the prison. They
mentioned to him that they were not able to stay with the
Pakistanis in the same place, he moved them in with the
Afghanis, they also mentioned to him that they might act as
if they had recovered completely from their injuries, and
that their morale was very high. The prisoners said that
after they had moved the Arab and Pakistani brothers, under
an attempt to move the Afghani prisoners, these attempts
were a failure. The first attempt failed in Masoud’s
airplane which was coming to transport them. Another time,
the truck rolled over with the prisoners and guards,
killing eight guards, two Pakistanis and four Taliban and
injured others, and these events halted completely with the
arrival of the last airplane. Because of this, there were
ideas being tossed around that they were trying to get rid
of the most important of our brothers.
A – Operations to mediate, directly or indirectly, in
a limited way with the Iranians to talk about releasing the
prisoners. It will be somewhere between diplomacy and
threats with an operation which is something against their
interests.
B – The operation to take Iranian hostages to trade
for our prisoners will embarrass Iran quite a bit
nationally, as a truly moderate party in Afghanistan, then
for a country whose feelings clearly run that way. The
operation will become a statement to Muslims in general to
confirm and delimit their position. There will be
responses, both positive and negative, but it is not bad to
have discussions about it. Maybe the Taliban will benefit
from some of this.
C – Operation to bomb something Iran has an interest
in, and the threat to repeat that if they do not release
the prisoners. This could be in Pakistan or in an Arab
country, Iran’s interests are spread all over the world.
The first solution is best for us, and it could open the
door through which the Taliban may return as well.
2 – The time of Hamza’s (the Pakistani) punishment has
ended or passed. Please send him back to us, we need him
urgently. We have started to shrink unnoticeably, but the
training program is almost over and we will start the
operations training in the next few days. During this time,
I will go through the training for personality and courage,
and the necessary preparations to conduct an operation that
is successful, and has an impact on the general situation,
if God wills.
Signed Adbul Hadi Al-Ansari
11-2-1998
Monday, 14 Rajb 1419h
{TN: Page 15-16}
A letter to Sheikh Abu Hafs
1 – With praise to God, we have destroyed one of the
enemy’s cars on the way to Maradbik using an 82 mm mortar,
and we destroyed another car on the way to Bakram using a
tank. Also, in Bakram we scored a direct hit of two enemy
tanks, and now we are trying to hit the third tank which is
in front of our position after they withdrew the fourth
tank. If you were here with us while we were shooting at
them using Abu Turrab’s tank, you would have laughed at the
way they were running away!
2 – After three days of unrelenting attempts, we were
finally able to meet with Sheikh Muhammad Rabbani. We
talked to him about:
a – things dealing with
the prisoners. After bringing up the issue of pursuing
their release, he asked me not to get inextricably involved
with any faction as an attempt for us (Arabs) to release
our brothers or to get support to them because we heard
that they are not in a good situation and they need money
(this is from the three who brought news that they are in
Bengshir). He said that we are sending them aid, which
will go to all of them without exception.
He specified one of the intelligence officials for us
to work with on this issue. He asked us not to attempt
trading with them for money, as this would open a door that
would not close.
b – I asked him for the paper for the car or for a
car. Then he told me that he heard that you had sent us
two cars. I denied this, and refuted the story of the cars
since the beginning of our participation. I told him how
the Sheikh (Abu Abdullah) sent us his personal car which is
now on the front lines. He said to me – and it appeared to
me that he did not believe what I said – that he would talk
to you about this car situation.
c – Afterwards, I asked him for a house for us to use
as a headquarters because we have tired from the rent and
the properties. He told me that they had moved away from
Wazir Akbar Khan and the center of Kabul. They had moved
to the outskirts of Kabul far from observation, because
Sulaiman Al-‘Amri(The Saudi Consul) has asked about us and
is concerned about our news. He has eyes to follow us, and
we must show deference to their (the Taliban) position and
not show defiance or embarrass them!!!!!!!!!??? So he sent
Mullah Hamad Allah Zahid to find us an appropriate house.
May God bless him and keep him standing in the truth.
Finally, he sent his greetings to all of you.
- Please talk to him about the cars, he promised that
he would.
3 – We have sent brother Mirouis (Shahib) on his way, after
supplying him with the necessary reasons and securing his
needs. Just about no one knows about this except me, may
God keep him.
4 – We have learned that one of the Pakistani prisoners has
been released from prison after his brother and father went
to Bengshir via the Pakistani and Afghani learned men. He
told them that in the Dashtarak prison in Bengshir there
were three Arab brothers, their names according to what he
remembered are (Ali, Mahmoud, Abeed), two of whom have leg
injuries, (Abeed and Ali). They were shot after they were
captured, and they sustained serious injuries. They have
gone without treatment until the Red Cross intervened and
began treatment, along with the rest of the injured. Now
their injuries are doing well. We also learned that their
fourth colleague with them was also injured. However, the
enemy shot and killed him when they were captured. He
doesn’t know him or his name, or where he comes from, or
anything about him or where he was. According to their
descriptions in their memory, (Abeed is Abu Abeeda – and
his name was Omran earlier) (And Mahmoud is Abu Yusef Al
Sudani) and (Ali is Abu Abdullah Al-Layli) and the other
two are from the group of the Sheikh’s son who joined us at
the end of the matter. The three were in the back of the
house belonging to the brothers there. The fourth one in
the house was Ibn al-Jarah who is possibly the one that was
killed (This is only a possibility). The brother who
visited us in the house also mentioned that that he heard
that there is an Arab with 12 Pakistanis who are now
prisoners, who are now in Jabal al-Siraj, and this brother
is possibly (Nabisha). This also is only a possibility,
since the last of the folks have come down from the
mountain. He could have been the last of the Afghanis and
Pakistanis, at that time he was on the mountain in
observation {TN: watch post} with Qutaiba al-Ghamadi who
came down a little before him.
If God permits, we will keep trying to find out about the
fate of the others and to get to know the brother in Jabal
al-Siraj with the Pakistanis.
We are waiting for your instructions.
We know that at last they asked Qari Saif Allah Akhtar for
one million Pakistani Kildar in exchange for releasing each
of them, after they had initially asked him for a one for
one exchange.
{TN: Last page of letter missing}
{TN: Page 17, 18 is back side}
To Abdul Aziz
(1) Concerning the program, we are waiting for two. As I
told you in the last letter, this is based on what Abu
Ihlam said, they are concentrating. I think, and God knows,
waiting is good for you until we receive it, and if God
wills it won’t be long.
(2) Concerning the issue of the drama you talked about in
your letter to the Sheikh, the Sheikh saw no problems with
it initially, but you should send us pictures of the
matter, how much it will cost and your opinion on it from
the perspective of security. It is appropriate to study it
from the security standpoint.
As for my opinion, I am afraid for your security. There is
no need for recklessness, God knows.
(3) Concerning the steel {TN: could be code word, ALHDID}
please turn it over to Abdul Hadi so he can take care of it
in a safe place until another place is designated. This is
because moving it now would raise a lot of questions.
My greetings to all who are with you,
Your brother, Ahmed Abdul Aziz
11 Ramadan, 1419 {TN: 1999}
{TN: next letter starts page 20, second half on 19}
{TN: does not mention name of addressee}
Concerning the situation on the front…
The situation on the front is very strange… I don’t know
who should pray for mercy for those brave Mujahideen who
died… how sad the things are that a person must see here…
but you are not saddened by this beginning which is not
given up… The position of the Taliban is strong and good
all along the front. Mas’ud’s position is shaky… the
Taliban have now begun shelling and striking and Mas’oud’s
groups have started to move to the rear. There are only
two or three posts left to take the advance… The Taliban
are advancing {TN: under crease in page} and they have
started to retreat, but there is no reason for them to
retreat… Mas’oud’s groups are again giving up their
positions… this is the way things have been repeated three
times here until the present… I am sure that if Mas’oud
advanced forcefully and didn’t have the mountains in front
of him, you would be seeing the Taliban’s vehicles with
you.
Up to this point, I don’t have any ideas other than that
the Taliban have lost their will to sacrifice. The price
and unfortunately the severity of this situation has
created a bad response by a lot of our brothers who have
lost their will to stay for the Taliban… Consequently they
have lost the feeling that holds them together, as the
bombing against them is intense and there are injuries or
martyrs every day. The Taliban are not advancing…
Disregarding the position of the Taliban, if only they had
some semblance of the way the prophet behaved, or
something… This is with no indication of inoculating the
guys with a new motivation to work… and if they were to
open their mouths for something other than confirmation and
rumors… this is the short version of the situation I found
when I returned, and we ask God to guide you to a way to
fix this…
- Regarding the following line:
There is no official in Kabul that I can talk to on this
matter in any real way… The Secretary of Defense is in
Pakistan… Akbar Agha is in Kandahar… and the rest of them
are not qualified… I could probably go myself in the midst
or just two… and I don’t know where to get people to bring
here… The situation of the brothers has become as follows:
1 – The Yemeni brothers have all gone and none of them
remain except for Abdul Aziz, but you already know this.
2 – The rest of the remaining brothers are as follows:
a – Abu Khalid Yemeni and Ayoub wouldn’t stay on the front
line after Muhannad was killed without being forced. I told
them to write to you so you can know them yourself.
b – Anas and Abu Mahjan have family situations, one has a
sister getting married and the other is leaving in order to
see his relatives. He wants to meet you and get to know
you… He is a brave brother but he is in a hurry and was
impatient waiting with us on the day of the blessed tanks.
c – Al-Zabir al-Maliki and Zaid al-Khair say that they
have a special program to work on the peninsula {TN: Saudi
Arabia} and they want to consult you about it.
d – Samu’al arrived by way of the son of the Sheikh; he
has a letter of introduction for you to become acquainted
with him.
e – The guy from Ogadin {TN: Ethiopia} and his brother,
the first says that you put him in the new security group –
Eritria – and the second is to get married.
3 – The brothers who are staying on the front include:
a – the group at Baghram. Abu Ziyad is responsible for
observation… Abu Tamim Group BMI {TN: BMI is written in
English letters}… The Jordanian Abdul Hadi group, gharnai
{TN: place name or Russian word??}… The Triberlamini group,
tanks and the Iraqi brother is with them who recently
arrived from Jalalabad and you sent him to report… That’s
it, no more.
googled:
5 seek medical attention after United Airlines treats employees to Thanksgiving dinner
ASSOCIATED PRESS
1:34 a.m. November 23, 2007
CHICAGO – Five United Airlines workers sought medical attention for nausea and vomiting after the company provided a Thanksgiving meal to employees.
United offered the turkey dinner Thursday to nearly 3,000 mechanics, baggage handlers and other employees working the holiday at O’Hare International Airport. Flight crews didn’t participate.
continues.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20071123-0134-botchedturkeydinner.html
154 evacuated safely from cruise ship after it struck ice off Antarctica
By Bill Cormier
ASSOCIATED PRESS
7:02 a.m. November 23, 2007
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina – A Canadian cruise ship struck ice off Antarctica and began taking on water, but all 154 passengers and crew took to lifeboats and were rescued safely Friday by a passing Norwegian liner, officials said.
The passengers and crew from the Explorer were picked up by the Nordnorge, a Norwegian cruise ship that was nearby and responded to the distress call, said Susan Hayes of G.A.P. Adventures of Toronto, which owns the stricken vessel.
The 91 passengers included at least 13 Americans, 22 Britons and 10 Canadians, officials said. In addition to the passengers, there were nine expedition staff members and a crew of 54, Hayes said.
“The passengers are absolutely fine,” Hayes said. “They’re all accounted for, no injuries whatsoever.”
continues..........
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20071123-0702-britain-shipsinking.html
Refusal to allow U.S. carrier into Hong Kong, perplexes Pacific commander
By Audrey McAvoy
ASSOCIATED PRESS
8:40 p.m. November 22, 2007
HONOLULU – The top U.S. military commander in the Pacific said he’s “perplexed and concerned” by China’s last-minute decision to deny a U.S. aircraft carrier entry to Hong Kong for a previously scheduled port visit.
The USS Kitty Hawk and its escort ships were due to dock there for a four-day visit Wednesday until they were refused access. Hundreds of family members had flown to Hong Kong to spend Thanksgiving with their sailors.
“It’s hard to put any kind of positive spin on this,” Adm. Timothy Keating told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Thursday while flying back to the U.S. after visiting troops in Iraq. “I’m perplexed and concerned.”
China later reversed its decision and said the ships could enter on humanitarian grounds, but the notice came while the vessels were already on their way back to their home ports. The vessels chose not to turn around.
Thousands of sailors aboard the Kitty Hawk and its carrier battle group marked the Thanksgiving holiday at sea.
“The crew members were disappointed, but that did not deter them from celebrating Thanksgiving on the ships with meals and movies,” said Lt. Cmdr. Steven Curry, a spokesman for the 7th Fleet, which has its home port in Yokosuka, just south of Tokyo.
It was the second time in a week that China refused to let U.S. Navy ships into the port.
continues....
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/military/20071122-2040-pacificcommander-warshipsbarred.html
Crime -breaking News - San Diego:
http://weblog.signonsandiego.com/news/breaking/index.html
[Update]
Feds: Homemade video shows Egyptian college student talking about remote explosives
ASSOCIATED PRESS
9:00 p.m. November 22, 2007
TAMPA, Fla. – An Egyptian college student arrested after authorities said they found explosive chemicals in his car made a video suggesting that “martyrdom” can be avoided by using remote-controlled explosives, authorities said.
A court filing released earlier this week provided new details about the video, which is a key piece of evidence in the case against University of South Florida student Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed. He faces federal explosives charges.
Mohamed said in his video that instead of carrying out “martyrdom operations,” people can use the remote-controlled explosives and save themselves for the real battles, according to prosecutors.
Mohamed and fellow USF student Youssef Samir Megahed were pulled over by police in August for a traffic stop in Goose Creek, S.C., about 15 miles northwest of Charleston and near a Navy weapons station.
Officers found explosives in their car and a laptop belonging to Mohamed that contained the video he made that demonstrates how to convert a remote-control toy car into a detonator for bombs, the FBI said.
The laptop was used to upload the video onto YouTube, the court filing said, and it contained a record of an e-mail sent to YouTube in July asking why the submitted video hadn’t been posted on the Web site.
A folder labeled “Bomb Shock” in Mohamed’s laptop contained files about ingredients for explosives, according to the filing by Assistant United States Attorney Jay Hoffer in Tampa.
continued.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20071122-2100-explosivesarrest.html
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iCUSdzylGyuWRlWqz92rGX2CCyWwD8T28LG00
Immigrant Smugglers Use Crooked Firms
By JACQUES BILLEAUD – 1 day ago
PHOENIX (AP) — Smugglers who bring illegal immigrants into the U.S. are getting crucial help from seemingly legitimate businesses that supply them with cars, lodging, plane tickets and other services, knowing full well what’s going on.
Investigators say the number of these corrupt businesses is small, but they play a significant role in helping illegal immigrants reach the country’s interior.
The accomplices have included landlords and rental agents who provide homes for smugglers to hide immigrants; taxi drivers near the border who bring immigrants to the closest cities; used-car dealerships that let smugglers register vehicles under false names; and travel agencies that sell blocks of plane tickets for immigrants.
“At every stage along the way, a process has been taken over, corrupted, in order to facilitate the transportation” of illegal immigrants, said Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard, whose office has prosecuted such cases.
Authorities are unable to estimate the number of businesses helping smugglers but say the biggest concentration is in Arizona, the busiest illegal gateway into the United States. Immigrant smuggling in Arizona is believed to be a $1.7 billion-a-year business.
Businesses also are cooperating with smugglers in San Diego, Los Angeles, Houston, San Antonio and El Paso, Texas.
Immigration agents said some of these accomplices are criminal operations through and through. But others are bona fide businesses willing to break the law now and then for the extra bucks.
Authorities have prosecuted only a modest number of businesses, saying smuggling operations are often family-run and difficult to infiltrate with informants or undercover officers. Also, recorded conversations are needed to prove that businesses knew they were breaking the law.
The businesses “are willfully blind to what on the face should be obvious,” said Alonzo Pena, chief of investigations for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Arizona. But “we can’t convict someone for willful blindness. We have to show an actual element of knowledge or intent.”
One success was a 2005 case in which undercover agents posing as smugglers were rented rooms at six motels in Mesa, Ariz. The motel operators were accused of coaching the agents on how to conceal their illegal activities.
In 2004 and 2005, 16 people associated with car lots in Arizona were convicted on various charges of helping smugglers.
continues................
November 23, 2007 Anti-Terrorism News - UnitedStatesAction.com
(Iraq) Twin bombings kill at least 26 in Iraq - in Baghdad pet market and suicide bomber in Mosul
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071123/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_violence_11;_ylt=AkHiwkzAgdpbnduIfqCTZZFX6GMA
Iraqi school guard and wife beheaded as children watch — by three suspected al Qaeda militants,
including two sisters, in Diyala
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/iraqi.school.guard.and.wife.beheaded.as.children.watch/14826.htm
(Iraq) 34 killed as Qaeda fighters attack Iraqi villages - update on Wednesday attacks
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/focusoniraq/2007/November/focusoniraq_November96.xml§ion=focusoniraq
(Iraq) Al Qaeda rolodex’ found in Iraq
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/11/22/iraq.fighters/index.html
(Afghanistan) Taliban militants behead 7 police in southern Afghanistan
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/23/asia/AS-GEN-Afghan-Violence.php
(Afghanistan) Australian soldier killed in Afghanistan during attack on Taliban bomb makers
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/23/asia/AS-GEN-Australia-Afghanistan-Soldier-Killed.php
(Afghanistan) Leaders deny Taliban rules half of nation — Afghan president, NATO secretary-general
dispute The Senlis Council report - Afghan president seeks to negotiate with Taliban -
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22812288-15084,00.html
— Senlis report - “Stumbling into chaos: Afghanistan on the brink” (PDF file)
http://www.senliscouncil.net/modules/publications/Afghanistan_on_the_brink/documents/Afghanistan_on_the_brink
Pakistan imposes food blockade on militants: officials
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071123/wl_sthasia_afp/pakistanunrestnorthwest_071123102817;_ylt=AuSmGvIpJ81BVvx0PGqD9A3zPukA
(Pakistan) ‘Foreigners in Pakistan planning global attacks’
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\11\23\story_23-11-2007_pg7_52
http://www.dawn.com/2007/11/23/top4.htm
(Pakistan) Family urges Pakistan to drop extradition of British bomb plot suspect
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/22/asia/AS-GEN-Pakistan-British-Suspect.php
(Pakistan) Explosion cuts power supply to Lasbela
http://www.dawn.com/2007/11/23/top17.htm
(India) Terror strikes Uttar Pradesh, 14 killed in six blasts — Blasts in Lucknow, Varanasi and Faizabad
http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Terror-strikes-UP-14-killed-in-six-blasts/242572/
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071123/india_nm/india306506_8;_ylt=AuInVVUa35.o9u_PbGYLrfYTv5UB
(India) HuJI behind multiple blasts in UP?
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/HuJI_behind_multiple_blasts_in_UP/articleshow/2565457.cms
(India) After UP blasts, security stepped up in Delhi
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/After_UP_blasts_security_stepped_up_in_Delhi/articleshow/2565258.cms
(India) Bomb attacks hit 3 Indian courthouses — where lawyers had decided not to defend
terrorism suspects
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/23/asia/AS-GEN-India-Blasts.php
India: Anger over controversial writer had brewed for 15 days
http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Security/?id=1.0.1589103352
(India) Exiled Bangladeshi writer asked to leave western Indian city fearing attacks by Muslims
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/23/asia/AS-GEN-India-Bangladesh-Exiled-Writer.php
(India J&K) Missing Kashmir terror financier had RAW links
http://www.hindu.com/2007/11/23/stories/2007112355441400.htm
Iran rejects UN sanctions as invalid
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1195546708227&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
(Iran) West, Tehran split as IAEA meets on Iran
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/iran_nuclear;_ylt=AjvM01kWJMGq9UCCaXbWyElSw60A
(Iran) Split widens over Iran’s nuclear plans
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/11/23/wiran123.xml
Iran is ready to defend itself: commander
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071123/ts_nm/iran_enemies_dc_1;_ylt=ArDFsfuQ.IMLZoAxHPa6pelSw60A
(Iran) Germany probes 50 firms over atomic sales to Iran
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/927002.html
(Syria) Israeli: Syrian site hit not a nuclear reactor — but was probably a plant for assembling a nuclear bomb
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071122/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_syria_1;_ylt=AieP1BhIaL8He63aeDosrYmCscEA
US weekly: Syrian radar destroyed before strike
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1195546701923&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Hamas and Islamic Jihad to convene ‘Anti-Annapolis’ conference Monday
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3474823,00.html
(Israel) IDF arrests 5 terror suspects in West Bank
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1195546706477&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
(Israel) IDF psychiatrist suspected of attempting to spy for Iran
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1195546707349&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
(Saudi Arabia) Ex-Fighter in Iraq Tells His Story - Young Saudi, brainwashed to fight in Iraq, repents
& warns other Saudis
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=103900&d=23&m=11&y=2007
Somalia: Country Appoints New Prime Minister, Violence Kills 3
http://allafrica.com/stories/200711230007.html
Nigeria charges five suspected al-Qaida-linked militants with terrorism
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/22/africa/AF-GEN-Nigeria-Terrorism.php
Algerian expelled from UK jailed for terror links
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20071122/tpl-uk-algeria-britain-trial-47c7853.html
(Russia) Five dead in bus blast in Russia: police
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/theworld/2007/November/theworld_November674.xml§ion=theworld
Danish Muslims convicted in bomb plot trial
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/danish.muslims.convicted.in.bomb.plot.trial/14827.htm
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071123/wl_afp/denmarkattackstrial_071123135543;_ylt=AvqyvC_fuKWu0bT_53kjua8Tv5UB
German Police Chief Calls for Wider Powers to Fight Web Crime, Terrorism
http://www.redorbit.com/news/technology/1155029/german_police_chief_calls_for_wider_powers_to_fight_web/index.html?source=r_technology
(Belgium) More anti-terrorism detectives needed
http://www.expatica.com/actual/article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=46281
(Indonesia / Australia) Bali bomber warns: Australia is next
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22808468-2,00.html
(Thailand) 8 suspected insurgents arrested in Narathiwat
http://www.nationmultimedia.com/breakingnews/read.php?newsid=30057193
Philippine police arrest 2 suspected extortionists in deadly shopping mall bombing
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/23/asia/AS-GEN-Philippines-Mall-Blast.php
(Sri Lanka) Sea battle off Sri Lanka’s northwest coast kills 17 Tamil rebels, says military
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/23/asia/AS-GEN-Sri-Lanka-Civil-War.php
(North Korea) Restoring disabled N.Korea nukes would need year: U.S.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071122/pl_nm/nuclear_northkorea_usa_dc_1;_ylt=AjQir67r5jU1pKJpgceF0EeCscEA
N. Korea nuclear talks could resume in early December
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1195546706254&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
__._,_.___
If reposting elsewhere, please credit source of this research as UnitedStatesAction.com
RFE/RL: A Year After Litvinenko’s Death, A Legacy Of Mistrust And Fearc
A Year After Litvinenko’s Death, A Legacy Of Mistrust And Fear
By Brian Whitmore
November 23, 2007 (RFE/RL) — Just over a year ago, KGB defector Oleg
Gordiyevsky received a phone call from his friend Aleksandr Litvinenko.
Litvinenko, a former Russian security officer and fierce Kremlin
critic,
had fallen ill and was laid up in a London hospital. His health was
deteriorating rapidly. Gordiyevsky, a former KGB officer who defected
to
Britain in the 1980s, says Litvinenko suspected foul play.
“He phoned me from the hospital and informed me of the circumstances.
He
said that he felt very poorly. Very, very poorly,” Gordiyevsky recalls.
“I said, ‘what has happened? How did it happen? You must be poisoned.’
And he said, ‘Yes, it looks like I am poisoned.’”
Less than two weeks later, Litvinenko was dead from a lethal dose of
highly radioactive polonium-210. On his deathbed, he accused Russian
President Vladimir Putin of being personally responsible.
Moscow-London Chill
Today marks the first anniversary of Litvinenko’s death, an event that
roiled Britain’s Russian emigre community, caused an enduring chill in
Russian-British relations, and deepened the West’s suspicion of Moscow.
It also led to a climate of fear among Kremlin critics.
Litvinenko fled Russia in 2000 after claiming that the Federal Security
Service, the main KGB successor, was behind the deadly September 1999
apartment-building bombings in Moscow and other cities. He became a
British citizen in October 2006.
Longtime Russia-watcher Edward Lucas, the deputy international editor
of
“The Economist,” calls Litvinenko’s death — which many have called the
assassination of a British citizen on British soil by foreign agents —
a “game-changing event” that significantly altered Russia’s relations
with the West.
“I think that the Kremlin lost its last threads of trustworthiness and
credibility in the eyes of at least some Westerners who were prepared
to
give it the benefit of the doubt until then,” Lucas says. “This was
something that was so alarming, and so dangerous, and so brazenly rude
as well.”
British prosecutors announced in May that they were charging Russian
businessman and former KGB agent Andrei Lugovoi with killing Litvinenko
by spiking his tea with polonium-210 in a London hotel on November 1.
Extradition Refusal
Moscow, citing a constitutional prohibition, has refused to extradite
Lugovoi — who is now running for a seat in the State Duma and has been
treated as a hero in Russia.
As a result of Russia’s refusal to hand over top suspect Lugovoi,
Britain in July expelled four Russian diplomats, sparking the
tit-for-tat expulsion of four British diplomats from Moscow.
For his part, Lugovoi has alleged that Litvinenko was probably an agent
with Britain’s MI6, and said his death was “useful” to the British
establishment, which had long sought to “humble and discredit Russia.”
“Britain’s MI6, always invisibly involved in this scandal, has done and
will continue to do all it can to sideline an objective investigation,”
Lugovoi told reporters in Moscow earlier this month.
Moscow has repeatedly and strenuously denied any involvement in
Litvinenko’s death. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has called
suggestions of Russian involvement “pure nonsense.”
The Kremlin’s denials, however, have been met with widespread
skepticism
in the West.
David Satter, author of “Darkness At Dawn: The Rise Of The Russian
Criminal State,” says the Kremlin’s reaction to Litvinenko’s killing
and
those of other critics have fueled suspicion.
“Even if we argue, hypothetically, that the highest authorities are not
responsible for these killings,” Satter says, “they are definitely
responsible for the way in which they have responded to these killings
— in the most callous and contemptuous way possible, with thinly
disguised satisfaction over the death of their opponents.”
Politkovskaya Death
Litvinenko’s death came fewer than two months after another Kremlin
critic — journalist Anna Politkovskaya of “Novaya gazeta,” who wrote
extensively about human-rights abuses in Chechnya — was shot dead in
her Moscow apartment building on October 7, 2006.
Lucas says that as a journalist he has noticed that in the aftermath of
Politkovskaya’s and Litvinenko’s deaths, his contacts in Russia are
becoming more reluctant to criticize the regime openly.
“It is more difficult now to get Russians to talk critically on the
record about what is going on, and that’s a pity,” Lucas says. “And I
would say it is not quite as bad as Belarus, but I think twice before
phoning someone up who I don’t know and talking on their main phone
line.”
And Satter says he believes this was precisely the message the Kremlin
was trying to send.
“It does appear that elements in the Russian leadership are issuing a
thinly veiled warning to real and potential critics of the regime that
they may resort to these methods under certain circumstances,” Satter
says. “Under these circumstances, of course, it’s clear that the level
of security for anyone who is critical of Russia or who in some way
crosses the Russian authorities, is not what it should be and even not
what it was. And this is to a certain extent an aftermath of the
Litvinenko case.”
Former world chess champion and opposition leader Garry Kasparov, for
example, has said that he only consumes food and drinks prepared by
people he knows and trusts.
The jitters that followed the March 2007 shooting of Paul Joyal, an
American security consultant specializing in Russian affairs, were
indicative of the new climate of fear that followed the Litvinenko
killing.
Joyal was shot and wounded outside his home in Maryland days after he
said in a televised interview that Litvinenko’s death was a warning to
all critics of the Putin government. Joyal’s shooting initially sparked
speculation might be a Litvinenko-style hit in the United States.
“The fact that people were even considering the possibility [of Russian
involvement] is itself an indication of how the atmosphere has
changed,”
Satter says.
Police determined that the shooting was a simple case of street crime,
but Lucas says that given the circumstances, it was disturbing
nonetheless.
“I think people were quite alarmed when Paul Joyal got shot,” he says.
“It’s not quite clear whether that was just street crime or something
more sinister. But my feeling is that Politkovskaya was a warning to
Russians; Litvinenko was a warning to emigres; and there is yet to be a
warning to Westerners who say nasty things about Russia — but I think
it will come.”
Litvinenko releases more secrets in his newly published book
23.11.2007
The anniversary of death of ex-FSB and -MI 6 agent Mr. Litvinenko was
marked in London by releasing his book Allegations.
Marina Litvinenko, the wife of the dead agent, told to the BBC Russia,
that this book includes the already published books Blowing Up Russia
and Lubyanka Criminal Group. It also contains the articles Mr.
Litvinenko published in the Internet. For the first time it’ll be
issued
as a separate edition. The book is in English. The Russian version is
to
be published much later in America.
The event devoted to the first anniversary of the death of Alexander
Litvinenko and the book presentation was organized by Lord Pearson of
Rannach. It was also attended by a UKIP MEP, Gerard Batten, Mr.
Litvinenko’s father Vladimir Bukovsky, Oleg Gordievsky, a KGB officer,
Akhmed Zakayev, the ex-leader of Chechen separatists, who lives in the
UK.
Alexander Litvinenko was killed in London on November 23, 2006.
http://www.russia-ic.com/news/show/5234/
Village deputy chief found dead in burnt car in Chechnya
GROZNY, November 23 (Itar-Tass) — The deputy chief of the Geleny
village administration was found dead in the burnt car in Chechnya.
“The body of the man was found at the driver seat of the burnt car
VAZ-21099 on the outskirts of Geleny in the Nozhai-Yurt district on the
roadside leading to Zandag. The man was identified as the deputy chief
of the Geleny administration, Selimkhadzhi Khansultanov, 44,” a source
in the Chechen Interior Ministry told Itar-Tass on Friday.
No traces of the crash are found in the car. A forensic expertise is
underway to establish the causes of the official’s death.
To visit your on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/chechnya-sl/
PW: Said Batalov deported. - Re: Czech Republic deports Chechen citizen to Russia (!) - RIAN
23.11. - Chechen national Said Batalov, who was today repatriated from
the Czech Republic to Russia, has become the first person to whom the
Russia-EU agreement on visa facilitation and readmission has been
applied, Prague Watchdog has learnt at Russia’s Federal Migration
Service.
A new law in Russia, allows them to stop russia escapers and get them returned to Russia, as they did to this sportsman.
Operation Bell Bottoms
http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=6533&IssueNum=233
http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=6533&IssueNum=233
Operation Bell Bottoms
Investigators’ files tell of possible Hezbollah link
~ By JEFFREY ANDERSON ~
A criminal element exposed in a recent series of federal indictments
casts
an alarming shadow over the already dangerous L.A. County suburbs of
Cudahy
and Bell.
A multi-agency task force led by the Justice Department’s national
security
unit and FBI counter-terrorism agents arrested and charged 12 people on
November 6 with drug trafficking, counterfeiting clothes, and
concealing
assets.
But the takedown, dubbed Operation Bell Bottoms, which nabbed Hispanic
and
Middle Eastern residents of the two neighboring cities, was about more
than
drugs and blue jeans. As the New York Daily News reported on November
9, the
criminal conspiracy actually was targeted for funding Lebanese terror
organization Hezbollah.
Federal court records, police reports, and interviews with local law
enforcers suggest that criminals of Middle Eastern descent in the area
are
not a new phenomenon. And that if drug and counterfeit clothing
conspiracies
are aimed at Hezbollah funding, then such enterprises could make for
strange
local bedfellows.
The task force descended on a house at 4235 Live Oak Street in Cudahy
on
November 6, where they arrested 48-year-old Moussa Matar, among others.
Matar is charged with structuring financial transactions to conceal
assets
from the government.
Matar is not the first Middle Easterner at that address to be
prosecuted. In
2001, Hassan Khanafer, a fugitive from New York, was charged and
convicted
of conspiracy and credit card fraud. Sources familiar with the
transaction
say Khanafer sold the Live Oak Street house to Matar in 2003 for cash,
below-market price.
There are other apparent connections between Khanafer and Operation
Bell
Bottoms defendants. Bell resident Mazen Hassan Saleh put up a house at
4026
Brompton Avenue as surety for a bond for Khanafer. Two brothers in Bell
with
the same last name are the proprietors of a store named in the
indictment -
Star City A&H - and are accused of trafficking counterfeit goods
through the
store and attempting to smuggle cash out of the country.
Law enforcers seized 30 kilograms of cocaine and hundreds of thousands
of
dollars worth of counterfeit clothing in the operation. Police sources
say
it is rare that such criminal activity takes place in Cudahy without
the
18th Street Gang looking to levy street taxes - even on alleged drug
transactions originating in Mexico and resulting in proceeds the
government
believes are bound for Hezbollah.
Which might explain a bizarre sequence of events spelled out in an
affidavit
filed in the case - if not a seemingly innocuous traffic stop in 2006:
On March 30, according to the affidavit, Cudahy resident Juan Galindo,
a
suspected multi-kilogram cocaine trafficker, reported to Maywood Police
Department an attempted robbery at his apartment at 5022 Elizabeth
Street.
According to a report of the incident, police regarded the incident as
a
drug deal gone bad and left. However, an inspection of Galindo’s
apartment
revealed evidence of drug trafficking and he was arrested. According to
sources close to the investigation, Galindo claimed he was being taxed
by
the 18th Street Gang. Then he dropped the name of Vice Mayor Osvaldo
Conde,
a grocery store owner best known around Cudahy as a man who commands
respect
on the street, and who has a taste for the nightlife.
A different incident - seemingly unrelated to Operation Bell Bottoms -
concerns another well-known local figure: Hector Marroquin is a
longtime
18th Street Gang member and suspected Mexican Mafia tax collector who
was
charged this year with selling machine guns and assault rifles to
undercover
ATF agents.
Shortly after midnight on April 26, 2006, Marroquin was pulled over by
Bell
Gardens police for driving a 2006 Lincoln Navigator with dealer paper
plates
but without displaying temporary registration.
When police searched the vehicle they found his license plates tucked
between the seats, but they found something else that might have made
little
sense at the time: 40-50 pairs of $120 jeans with generic labels that
Marroquin said he bought on the internet - and two small envelopes
containing a total of $14,000 in cash.
Marroquin, according to a police report obtained by CityBeat, told
police he
is a businessman and owns several businesses in Cudahy. Besides hanging
around a restaurant he owns in Cudahy, Marroquin is often seen at the
One-Stop lube shop on Florence Avenue in Bell, test riding his Harley
or
getting one of his vintage cars worked on.
from: osint@yahoogroups.com
In 2001, Hassan Khanafer, a fugitive from New York, and his email address is in the link above this one:
Jihad and the Saudi petrodollar II
BBC Middle East analyst Roger Hardy investigates Wahhabism, Saudi Arabia’s austere brand of Islam, which is accused by its critics of funding religious extremism.
In the second of his two-part series, he meets top US investigators who have had the frustrating task of finding out where Saudi cash ended up.
In 2002, just a year after the 11 September attacks, the US authorities shut down a Saudi charity headquartered in Chicago.
“It was a big hoopla,” recalls Sam Roe, an investigative journalist who covered the story for the Chicago Tribune.
“The US attorney general at the time, John Ashcroft, flew out to Chicago and held a press conference.
“It was trumpeted as one of the first major victories in the ‘war on terrorism’.”
The charity was the Benevolence Foundation.
‘Al-Qaeda front’
The Benevolence Foundation had been set up in Chicago a decade earlier by a wealthy Saudi businessman, Adel Batterjee.
I never met Osama Bin Laden. I have never flown to any of these hot places
Soliman al-Buthi
But he soon handed over the running of it to his right-hand man, a Syrian called Enaam Arnaout.
The two men had met in Afghanistan in the 1980s when both had been helping Muslims fight the Soviet occupation forces.
The charity began to arouse the suspicions of the US authorities in the 1990s. But it was only after 11 September that the case acquired any real urgency - and attracted the attention of a star US attorney, Patrick Fitzgerald.
Speaking to me at his office in an imposing federal building in Chicago, he told me how he became convinced the Benevolence Foundation was an al-Qaeda front.
Documents found at its office in Bosnia, he says, described al-Qaeda’s founding meeting, its membership and the shipment of weapons.
But however strong his suspicions, Patrick Fitzgerald could not make the terrorism charges stick.
Wealthy and respected
On the eve of the trial, he struck a deal with Mr Arnaout, who was convicted on a racketeering charge.
He was found guilty of supplying boots and uniforms to Bosnian Muslim fighters, while pretending he was only helping civilians.
It was, at best, an ambiguous victory for the US authorities. They had shut down a charity but had failed to prove its links to al-Qaeda.
While Arnaout serves out his jail term, his former boss Adel Batterjee remains in the Saudi city of Jeddah, a wealthy and respected businessman.
Did he break his ties with Benevolence in the 1990s, as he has always claimed? Or did he run it from afar, as the court documents suggest?
After repeated efforts to hear his side of the story, I spoke briefly to him on his mobile phone - but he declined to be interviewed.
For Saudi Arabia, however, the charity issue refused to go away.
Charity
In 2004, at a joint press conference in Washington, the US and Saudi governments announced the closure of five branches of a prominent Saudi charity, al-Haramain.
Have the Saudis bankrolled the global jihad? They certainly have a case to answer
Eventually 10 branches - stretching from the Netherlands to Indonesia - were designated “financiers of terrorism” and shut down.
Set up in the 1990s, al-Haramain was a large and prestigious organisation with close ties to the Saudi government and ruling family.
At its height, it had some 50 branches worldwide.
Its literature proclaimed it had built hundreds of mosques, run orphanages and helped equip clinics and hospitals.
At a tent in a Riyadh suburb, I met the Saudi who had set up a branch of al-Haramain in Ashland, Oregon.
He is now a wanted man.
‘Compelling evidence’
Sitting on cushions drinking tea, in the company of two American lawyers, Soliman al-Buthi laughed off the charge that he was a “specially designated global terrorist”.
“I never met Osama Bin Laden,” he told me.
“I have never flown to any of these hot places - Bosnia or Chechnya or Afghanistan or Pakistan.”
He insists that he was engaged in the non-violent propagation of Islam - and that no real evidence has ever been presented against al-Haramain.
But for investigators like Dennis Lormel, a senior FBI official who worked on the case, the evidence of links to al-Qaeda was compelling.
Persuading the Saudi authorities to take it seriously, however, was another matter.
It took more than two years of sustained US pressure for them to act.
Eventually 10 branches of al-Haramain were shut down, and its director in Riyadh was sacked.
The Saudi ambassador to Washington, Adel Jubeir, told me the kingdom was not responsible for the overseas branches of its charities.
He acknowledged that a Saudi charity commission responsible for activities overseas - whose birth he himself had announced in 2004 - had still not materialised.
But he insisted that over the last few years Saudi Arabia had taken draconian steps to regulate its charities.
Dynamic
The two case studies show how hard it has been for the American authorities to turn suspicion into proof.
It is a striking fact that, in these and other Muslim charity cases in the US, they have not managed to secure a single conviction on a terrorism charge.
But what’s also clear is that, for decades, Saudi charities were virtually unregulated.
Have the Saudis bankrolled the global jihad? They certainly have a case to answer.
The export of Wahhabism - which got going with the oil boom of the 1970s - acquired a dynamic of its own and ended up empowering radical Islamists.
After 11 September, the chickens came home to roost.
The second part of Roger Hardy’s series Jihad & the Petrodollar will be broadcast on the BBC World Service on Friday, 23 November.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/middle_east/7106382.stm
Published: 2007/11/22 12:27:14 GMT
© BBC MMVII
Press Release
For Immediate Release
November 23, 2007
Washington D.C.
FBI National Press Office
(202) 324-3691
FBI’s Top Ten News Stories
For the Week Ending November 23, 2007
1. FBI Releases 2006 Hate Crime Statistics
The FBI’s 2006 Hate Crime Statistics, released on November 19, 2007, includes data from hate crime reports submitted by law enforcement agencies from across the country. Full Story
2. FBI Laboratory to Increase Outreach in Bullet Lead Cases
The FBI Laboratory has undertaken an additional round of outreach, analysis, and review efforts concerning bullet lead analysis. Full Story
3. Baltimore: Former State Senator Sentenced on Racketeering Charges
Former Maryland State Senator Thomas L. Bromwell was sentenced for racketeering conspiracy and filing a false tax return. Bromwell’s wife was also sentenced for mail fraud. Full Story
4. Houston: Laredo Woman Sentenced to Prison for Kidnapping Scheme
Maria Christina Rodriguez, 31, a legal permanent resident alien, was sentenced to 168 months for her role in conspiring to hold two U.S. nationals hostage in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, until payments were made for their release. Full Story
5. New York: Former District Court Judge Sentenced
Former Nassau County District Court Judge David A. Gross was sentenced for conspiring to launder money obtained through the sale of purportedly stolen diamonds and watches. Full Story
6. Dallas: Operation Fish Bowl Defendants Sentenced to Lengthy Prison Terms
As a result of Operation Fish Bowl, three defendants were sentenced to substantial prison terms for their roles in a crack cocaine distribution organization. Full Story
7. New York: U.S. Army Officer Arrested in Gas-for-Cash Scheme
U.S. Army Chief Warrant Officer Joseph Crenshaw was arrested for participating in a scheme to accept bribes in exchange for stealing fuel from Camp Liberty in Baghdad. Full Story
8. Albany: Suspicious Powder Mailed to FBI Office
The FBI along with other federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies is conducting a joint investigation into the mailing of 12 letters which contained a powdery substance. Full Story
9. Albany: Guilty Plea in Violating Airport Security
William Contreras Ramos pled guilty to entering an aircraft and airport area in violation of security requirements. Full Story
10. New Orleans: Former City Council Member Sentenced on Public Corruption Charges
Former New Orleans City Councilman Oliver Thomas was sentenced for soliciting and accepting illegal cash bribes. Full Story
# # #
http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel07/topten_112307.htm
[photo 2, close enough to read shoulder patches, photo3, dog at work, close with camera, glad it wasn’t a gun...granny]
Al Qaeda in Europe: New Islamist Video Threatens Germany, Austria
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2958508,00.html
Terrorism | 20.11.2007
New Islamist Video Threatens Germany, Austria
Image shows 13 headshots of members of Austria’s parliament with the
Austrian flag in the background
http://www.dw-world.de/image/0,,2958445_4,00.jpg
http://www.dw-world.de/image/0,,2822512_4,00.jpg
http://www.dw-world.de/image/0,,2326514_4,00.jpg
Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift:
This screenshot taken from the video shows Austrian politicians
German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble has said his government is
taking seriously a new threat contained in an Islamist video demanding
that Germany and Austria pull their troops out of Afghanistan.
In the video received by the Austrian broadcasting corporation ORF on
Tuesday, Nov. 20, a group calling itself the Global Islamic Media
Front indirectly threatened attacks in Germany and Austria if the two
states do not pull their troops from Afghanistan.
It also demanded that Austria release two Islamists held in detention
there.
Austrian Interior Ministry spokesperson Rudolf Gollia said the roughly
four-minute-long video was predominantly focused on Germany and that
Austria was mentioned toward the end.
“The German soldiers still occupy Afghanistan and we repeat our call
from the last video that Germany withdraw its troops from
Afghanistan,” the video’s German subtitles say. “This only serves your
own security in your country.
“The same applies to Austria too. The Mujahideen have spared you so
far, therefore the number of dead soldiers is not particularly high.
But this will now change...”
Germany has some 3,000 troops in Afghanistan as part of the ISAF
mission. Three Austrian soldiers serve as part of ISAF in Kabul.
No immediate threat
“There is no identifiable, immediate threat, but nevertheless such a
message needs to be taken seriously,” the ministry’s Rudolf Gollia
said. Austria has not raised security levels for government members
depicted in the video.
The video, among other things, glorifies the terrorist attacks on the
United States of Sept. 11, 2001, and announces a winter offensive of
the Taliban in Afghanistan, he said.
Gollia said the video also mentions the arrest of two alleged Islamic
militants in September in Vienna over another Online threat, calling
their detention a “mistake.”
Schäuble said although Germany was taking the threat seriously, it did
not require a reappraisal of the general security situation by the
government.
ORF said it planned to air the video Tuesday evening. In an online
report, ORF also said the Austrian Interior Ministry had admitted to
having received a copy of the video “a few days ago” and that it was
“working closely” with Germany’s Federal Office of Criminal
Investigation.
DW staff (kh)
Missing radioactive material worries officials
CanWest News Service
Friday, November 23, 2007
OTTAWA - A record number of low-level radioactive materials, the kind terrorists could fashion into dirty bombs, have gone missing in Canada this year, raising concerns about the effectiveness of federal controls over nuclear materials.
News of the jump in thefts and lost material coincides with an International Atomic Energy Agency meeting in Europe at which nuclear counter-terrorism specialists were told this week of an almost fourfold increase in nuclear smuggling since 2006, a further indication al-Qaeda-inspired radicals may be trying to obtain radioactive material for a bomb.
As of Wednesday, 26 radioactive sources have been reported lost and stolen so far this year in Canada, compared to 15 last year and a dozen in 2005 and previous recent years, according to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, the federal nuclear regulator.
© Times Colonist (Victoria) 2007
http://www.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/news/story.html?id=3f70290f-1bfe-4130-87d0-88fd09b65d33
Danish court jails three men for planning bombings
AFP
Friday, November 23, 2007
by Slim Allagui
A Copenhagen court on Friday sentenced two suspected Islamist militants
to 11 years in prison and a third to a four-year jail term for
planning terrorist bombings in Denmark.
The men were found guilty of acquiring chemicals and laboratory
instruments to make triacetone triperoxide (TATP) explosives, often used by
Islamist suicide bombers.
TATP devices were used in the July 2005 London bombings.
Mohammad Zaher, a 34-year-old Dane of Palestinian origin, and Ahmed
Khaldhahi, a 22-year-old Iraqi Kurd, were sentenced to 11 years each,
while Abdallah Andersen, a 32-year-old Dane who converted to Islam,
received a four-year sentence.
The three had risked life in prison.
A fourth man on trial, a 19-year-old Dane named Riad Anwar Daabas, was
acquitted.
“There is every indication that the group had concrete and serious
discussions about three possible targets in Copenhagen: the city hall
square, the parliament and political meeting (areas),” prosecutor Charlotte
Alsing Juul said Friday, insisting the plans “endangered state
security.”
She had called for the men to be sentenced to between 10 and 14 years
behind bars.
The four men on trial, who frequented a mosque known for its radical
interpretations of Islam, were part of a group of nine arrested in a
September 2006 swoop in Odense in central Denmark.
Six of them were released, including Daabas, while the three others
have been held in custody since then.
The Danish intelligence agency PET revealed in April that a Dane
identified only as Lars had infiltrated the group to obtain information. PET
had paid the man 84,000 kroner (11,750 euros, 16,700 dollars) for the
information.
Lars, 33, who had converted to Islam and went by the name Youssouf, was
a former municipal employee who wrote the intelligence agency an email
in December 2005 stating that he had met radical Muslims at the Odense
mosque.
The agency considered him credible and he was hired as an informant and
equipped with hidden microphones and recording materials, according to
Lars’s testimony.
The defence argued that Lars had encouraged the group to do and say
things they would not normally have done, and said he had bought and paid
for the chemicals used to make explosives.
Lars was considered an active member of the group, and helped identify
potential targets, the defence lawyers said.
Judge Folmer Theilmann however said Thursday that the court considered
Lars a “credible” witness and a “good citizen”.
The trial was the second terrorism-related case held in Denmark.
In the first case, which wound up in February, a Copenhagen jury found
four young suspected Islamists guilty of planning terrorist attacks in
Denmark or Europe.
However, the judges overturned the decision and acquitted three of the
four.
Justice Minister Lene Espersen, acting on the recommendation of
Denmark’s prosecutor general, meanwhile ordered one of the acquitted to appear
in a retrial with a new judge and jury.
No date has been set for the retrial.
Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved.
from:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/global-analyst/
THE TALEBAN’S NORTHERN FRONT
The insurgents are building their network in the province of Badghis,
in an attempt to open a gateway to Afghanistan’s north.
By Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi in Mazar-e-Sharif
While the attention of the Afghan government and the media is focused
on major battles in the south of the country, the Taleban are making
major headway in a northern region.
Badghis, a north-western province wedged between Herat and Faryab, has
been the scene of heavy fighting for the past two months, and the
insurgents have occupied three of the province’s seven districts. They have
also established intelligence and operational networks in most district
centres.
This was the first of the north-western provinces to fall to the
Taleban in 1997. Now the insurgents are looking to repeat their earlier
success, using Badghis as a launchpad for operations in the provinces
further east, which include Jowzjan, Balkh, Takhar, and Badakhshan.
In Faryab, directly to the north of Badghis, the Taleban have
established a foothold in mountainous areas, and are trying to expand their
networks there as well. The Taleban have launched several sorties in both
provinces in the past two months and claim that the Bala Murghab,
Ghormach and Qades districts of Badghis are largely in their hands.
“We are trying to open up this route just as we did in the past,” said
Mullah Dastagir, a self-proclaimed Taleban commander in Badghis. “Our
policy is different up here. We have openly engaged the government and
foreign forces in the south, but in the north we are quietly expanding
our area. The government is weaker here than in the south and the
mountains have provided good terrain for our operations.”
Dastagir claimed that the Taleban were in control of many mountainous
parts of Badghis.
“We would like to occupy the province right away, since the capital
[Qala-ye Nau] and some of the districts are still under government
control. We could do it in one single attack, but we are waiting for a larger
operation. Our strategy is to go for many provinces at once,” he said.
The Taleban are increasing their military presence in the area and will
soon be ready for action, said Dastagir, adding, “We are trying to
work under cover now, and we see that people are welcoming us warmly. Soon
we will occupy the whole entrance to the north.”
The Taleban attacked Badghis’s Bala Murghab district on September 20,
in a three-hour battle that left four policemen and 20 insurgents dead.
Two days later, the Taleban attacked Qaisar, a district in Faryab,
resulting in the capture of an insurgent commander named as Rassulak.
On September 25, a police vehicle hit a roadside mine in the Ghormach
district of Badghis, killing three and injuring four. Officials blamed
the insurgents. When a helicopter belonging to NATO’s International
Security Assistance Force crashed in Ghormach the same day, the Taleban
claimed responsibility. Also that day, a Chinese road construction company
worker was kidnapped by the insurgents in the Qaisar district.
Afghan government forces launched a counter-offensive in the Ghormach
and Bala Murghab districts, and official reports put the death toll
among the Taleban at more than 20. The rebels denied this.
The governor of Badghis, Ashraf Naseri, denies that the Taleban are
gaining ground in his province.
“The Taleban’s claims that they have captured mountainous areas show
that they are weak,” he told IWPR. “They cannot fight on flat terrain;
they hide out in the mountains where normal people don’t live.”
But officials in Faryab confirm that the Taleban are making headway.
“Yes, they are coming to us through Badghis,” said General Khalilullah
Ziayee, Faryab’s security commander. “They are trying to attract people
to their side.”
The general insisted that the north would not go the way of the south,
where the insurgents control large swathes of territory.
“The Taleban do not have military operations in this province they way
they do in the south,” he continued. “They are acting covertly,
gathering intelligence. Sometimes they carry out attacks on motorbikes, just
to show that they are active here.
“Our mountainous areas like Qaisar, Almar and Kohistan are becoming
vulnerable. We have expanded our operational and intelligence activities.
We have increased our forces in some particularly exposed areas and
have even sent forces to Ghormach district to help the Badghis police. The
Taleban cannot operate freely.”
But residents of Badghis and other northern provinces say that the
Taleban now exert an influence that is felt in their daily lives.
“The Taleban have reached the area,” said Fazel Rahman, a resident of
Bala Murghab district. “It is not important how many buildings are under
the government’s control. The Taleban are present in the villages and
many people have joined them. Unemployment and the government’s failure
to help people have resulted in this situation – the Taleban are
getting stronger by the day.”
According to Fazel, clashes between the Taleban and government forces
most often result in victory for the insurgents.
“The police just return to their bases after the fighting, but the
Taleban remain to spread their message among the people,” he said. “The
government knows exactly where the Taleban are concentrated, but they
cannot do anything; they just watch as the Taleban gain ground.”
The Afghan government, backed by NATO, has recently deployed more
forces in Badghis to combat the Taleban’s growing influence. Brigadier
General Dieter Warnecke, the NATO commander for the northern region,
confirmed that the Taleban have established small centres in the north-western
part of Afghanistan from which to launch their operations.
Speaking at a press conference in September, he said the Taleban have
set up camps in Faryab where they plan attacks on other parts of the
north.
“According to our information, Pakistan and Iran play a significant
role in establishing and developing these centres in north-western parts
of Afghanistan,” he said. “For this reason, Faryab has become a
trouble-spot for us.”
Satar Barez, the deputy governor of Faryab province, agreed with the
NATO commander’s assessment.
“Currently the army, police and NATO forces have been deployed in
Faryab, particularly in Qaisar district,” he said. “This is the only thing
that can prevent the further expansion of the Taleban.”
He insisted the Taleban forces here consisted largely of mercenaries
and foreign fighters, and not local recruits.
“People in this region will not cooperate with these Taleban,” he said.
But many people are not optimistic about the government’s attempts to
stop the insurgents’ forward advance here.
Maulawi Sheikh Ahmad, a member of parliament from Faryab province,
blames the international troops for the Taleban expansion.
“It is the presence of foreign forces that has caused an increase in
the number of Taleban,” he said, speaking at the funeral of a former
militia commander in late October. “In the past, there were no foreigners
and no Taleban. Now that foreigners have come into the region, the
Taleban have followed. The foreigners have provoked them, and this will
result in people joining hands with the Taleban. Our people do not have
good memories of foreign operations in the south and the east.”
Political observers believe the high concentration of NATO and Afghan
forces in Badghis and Faryab is evidence that the government is taking
the threat seriously.
“The government’s statements that they have increased their deployment
of NATO and Afghan troops in Badghis and Faryab show that the Taleban
have a lot of influence in these provinces,” said Qayum Babak, an editor
and analyst in Mazar-e-Sharif. “Up until now, the government has been
underestimating the threat.”
Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi is an IWPR staff reporter in Mazar-e-Sharif.
FROM POMEGRANATES TO POPPIES
Helmand’s farmers are chopping down their pomegranate trees for the
more lucrative opium plants, while blaming the government for failing to
help them.
By Mohammad Ilyas Dayee in Lashkar Gah
The beautiful red flowers of the pomegranate tree used to cover
Helmand, a province which was famous for the luscious red fruit. But these
days a different sort of flower blooms, as more and more of Helmand’s
sandy soil is given over to the opium poppy.
“I had 1,500 pomegranate trees five years ago,” said Abdul Jabbar, a
resident of Nawzad district. “They gave a very good yield. We loved the
orchard, and I would never have destroyed it, but what else could I do?
There was no market to sell the fruit. Birds would destroy the
pomegranates on the branch, or else we’d pick them and they would rot at home.”
He finally decided to cut his losses and grow poppy.
“The government says it’s against poppy, but drug traffickers go from
house to house and buy our crop and give us a lot of money,” he said.
“Find me a market for my pomegranates. Everyone hates poppy cultivation.”
Pomegranates cannot hope to compete economically with opium, which
provided Helmand’s farmers with an estimated 530 million US dollars in
2007. Last year, this one remote province in southern Afghanistan furnished
nearly half the world’s opium and its major derivative, heroin.
An average farmer can earn over 4,000 dollars per hectare for poppy,
while the yield for pomegranate is barely one-tenth of that. Added to
that is the problem of markets and storage.
But farmers like Abdul Jabbar say that they would prefer fruit to
opium, if only the government would provide storage facilities and help them
develop markets. The government, in turn, insists that farmers are not
asking for help but are rushing to cut down their trees to make way
for poppy.
While exact figures are difficult to come by, Helmand farmers say that
the majority of the province’s pomegranate orchards have been destroyed
in the past few years. This corresponds inversely to the astronomical
rise in opium production over the same period. The amount of land given
over to poppy in Helmand has nearly quadrupled in the past two years,
rising from some 27,000 hectares in 2005 to 103,000 in 2007, according
to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
Runaway poppy production has been fuelled by the growth of the Taleban
presence, which has made control all but impossible. Widespread
corruption among government officials has contributed to the failure of a
loudly-trumpeted crop eradication effort, and leads to a disdain for the
law among citizens of the province.
Expensive alternative livelihood projects have mostly failed, in part
because of the same factors, the insurgency and corruption.
Opium is easier to store and sell than almost any other commodity,
insist Helmand’s farmers.
“I used to have 300 pomegranate trees, now I have just 20. The rest of
my land is being used for poppy,” said Jahan Gir Aka, a farmer in
Babaji district.
There was simply no market for the fruit, he said. “I believe that if
the government could find us markets at a national and international
level, all of Helmand’s farmers would go back to growing pomegranates,” he
added.
Another problem is the absence of adequate storage facilities for
pomegranates, which are perishable.
Naseem Kharotai has a shop in Bolan, near Lashkar Gah, and has 500
kilograms of pomegranates to sell.
“If I don’t sell them soon, they will rot,” he said. “If we had cold
storage, we could earn a good income on pomegranates. They aren’t very
expensive right now, but if we had storage facilities we could sell them
at a higher price in winter.”
Pomegranates keep well when stored properly, he said.
In neighbouring Kandahar, where the United States Agency for
International Development has helped provide cold storage and quality control,
earnings on pomegranates have nearly doubled.
But security problems have held back development in Helmand, and
farmers complain that the government has been slow to provide assistance. For
their part, officials say the farmers are not asking for help.
“Not a single farmer has come to us to ask for help in finding markets
of building storage facilities,” said Engineer Ghulam Nabi, the head of
the department of agriculture in Helmand.
Even if they did, the government has limited resources, he admitted.
“If the farmers come to us to demand markets and storage facilities, we
might be able to do something for them,” he said. “We don’t have the
capacity to do it on our own, but we could seek assistance from donor
organisations. The important thing is that the farmers should come to
us.”
The internationally-funded counter-narcotics programme, which in the
past few years has pumped well over 100 million dollars into alternative
livelihood programmes in Helmand, might be able to help.
But Engineer Abdul Manan, head of Helmand’s counter-narcotics
department, told IWPR that it was not the job of his office to help farmers with
other crops.
“No one has come to us to ask for such services,” he said. “If they do,
we can send them to the department of rural development. But we do
hope that farmers will turn to other crops than poppy for their
livelihood.”
It will take more than hope, however.
Nano Aka, a farmer in the Nawzad district, is against growing opium
poppy. But he too cultivates the crop because, even with the risk of
eradication, harvesting wages, tithes to local mullahs and bribes for the
government, it brings him more income.
“I really don’t like poppy,” he said. “No one would grow it apart from
the fact that it brings in money. Me, I like cultivating pomegranates.”
Mohammad Ilyas Dayee is an IWPR staff reporter in Helmand.
www.iwpr.net
