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via translation - The Pakistani army claims to have killed 1000 Islamist fighters, including 5 counts Khare (Pakistan) - The Pakistani army said Friday have killed more than 1,000 Islamist fighters, including five of their leaders, since launching a major offensive in the tribal areas of northwestern Pakistan bordering Afghanistan . In addition, twenty-seven soldiers of the Pakistani army were also killed in operations in the tribal district of Bajaur, said Tariq Khan, an official of the army. "The total balance exceeds thousand deaths among militants" Islamists, "said Khan to reporters transported by helicopter on the ground in Bajaur.

BULLETIN TROPICAL STORM KYLE ADVISORY NUMBER 1 NWS TPC/NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL AL112008 500 PM AST THU SEP 25 2008 ...LOW PRESSURE AREA FINALLY DEVELOPS INTO A TROPICAL CYCLONE... INTERESTS IN BERMUDA SHOULD MONITOR THE PROGRESS OF KYLE. FOR STORM INFORMATION SPECIFIC TO YOUR AREA...INCLUDING POSSIBLE INLAND WATCHES AND WARNINGS...PLEASE MONITOR PRODUCTS ISSUED BY YOUR LOCAL WEATHER OFFICE. REPORTS FROM AN AIR FORCE RESERVE HURRICANE HUNTER AIRCRAFT AND SATELLITE IMAGES INDICATE THAT THE LOW PRESSURE AREA THAT MOVED NORTHWARD FROM HISPANIOLA HAS DEVELOPED INTO A TROPICAL STORM. AT 500 PM AST...2100Z...THE CENTER OF TROPICAL STORM KYLE WAS LOCATED NEAR...

Excerpt - Thursday afternoon, the Faulkner County Sheriff's Office says there could be as many as 15 victims in what they're describing as a "very sensitive" investigation in its early stages. This comes on the heels of Wednesday's discovery of human remains in Industrial Park in Jacksonville. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - All flights in Pakistan have been suspended after a major security alert at Islamabad airport, according to reports. The country's civil aviation authority is said to have instituted a state of emergency. A huge search is underway at Islamabad airport after a phone call saying the building would be blown up at 12.40pm local time (7.40pm UK time), say local TV reports. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - WASHINGTON -- Barack Obama and his team were caught off guard by John McCain's suspension of his campaign and his call to delay the first presidential debate so he could return to Capitol Hill to work on the financial crisis -- just as they were surprised when McCain tapped little-known Sarah Palin as his running mate. The Obama team has not figured out yet that McCain is waging an asymmetrical campaign, meaning at times he will take a risky, counterintuitive course, just as he did on Wednesday. The Obama campaign is very smart, but in the closing weeks...

Excerpt - Presidential debates are important -- and the first debate is the most important of all, establishing an arc of opinion that persists unless jarred loose by big mistakes or dramatic events. So whether this year's first presidential debate between Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain is Friday night or postponed a few days, it may be the fall's most critical event. In the nine first debates since 1960, the perceived winner of the debate averaged a 4.2 point net swing in the Gallup poll. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - There is a broad consensus that Congress must act to stave off deeper turmoil on Wall Street. Irrespective of the final agreement yet to be reached, there are several principles that must be part of a broader reform effort that begins this week and continues in the coming months. ~ snip ~ I've proposed a new Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC), to launch a national effort to help homeowners refinance their mortgages. The original HOLC, launched in 1933, bought mortgages from failed banks and modified the terms so families could make affordable payments while keeping their homes. The...

Excerpt - Karachi, 24 Sept. (AKI) - By Syed Saleem Shahzad - The alleged mastermind of last Saturday's deadly truck bombing of the Marriott hotel in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, has emerged. The suspect, Qari Zafar (photo), has become part of Al-Qaeda's hardline Takfiri inner circle. He enjoys the protection of Pakistani Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud and is believed to be hiding out in the lawless South Waziristan tribal area of North West Frontier Province. Zafar is not only the suspected mastermind of the Marriot bomb blast, but has created a network which will shortly target strategic installations belonging to...

Excerpt - Aiming to prove how serious he is about addressing the financial crisis, John McCain has instructed his staff to take all his campaign commercials off the air, a spokesman tells Politico. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - The McCain and Obama campaigns will issue a joint statement this afternoon on the financial crisis, according to an Obama spokesman ~ snip ~

Breaking News - Republican officials say the Bush administration will accept executive-pay curbs as part of the bailout. President Bush plans to address the nation Wednesday at 9:01 p.m. EDT on the financial crisis.

Excerpt - WASHINGTON — One of the giant mortgage companies at the heart of the credit crisis paid $15,000 a month from the end of 2005 through last month to a firm owned by Senator John McCain’s campaign manager, according to two people with direct knowledge of the arrangement. The disclosure undercuts a statement by Mr. McCain on Sunday night that the campaign manager, Rick Davis, had had no involvement with the company for the last several years. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - The U.S. Supreme Court today issued a stay of execution for Troy Anthony Davis less than two hours before he was to be put to death by lethal injection. ~ snip ~

Many people may be dead following a shooting at a high school in Finland, police have said. The individual with the gun is still inside the vocational college in Kauhajoki, 120 miles from Helsinki, and students are being evacuated.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Monday evening that the Islamic Republic of Iran is the world safest country. The president who arrived in New York on Monday to attend the 63rd meeting of UN General Assembly which is to open on Tuesday, made the remarks while addressing an Iftar (fast breaking) ceremony attended by a large group of Iranians residing in the US. He said that each Iranian national living anywhere in the world is considered as the Iranian flag, ambassador and spokesperson. The Iranian nation, along the history, has always played determining role in basic developments in the human...

Excerpt - A roadside bomb has killed an Afghan district chief and a police official in the southern Kandahar province. The attack took place when the district chief of Registan, Amir Mohammad, was driving home with police official Assadullah, police said. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - WASHINGTON - The hunt for the hacker who broke into Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's personal e-mail account is shaping up to be a remarkably simple investigation, by the standards of major cybersecurity whodunits. ~ snip ~

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba: Confessed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed offered Monday to help persuade one of his co-defendants to leave his prison cell for a pretrial hearing at Guantanamo Bay. ~ snip ~

Excerpt - David Kernell, the young Memphis man at the center of a controversy over Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s personal e-mail, has hired a Knoxville attorney to help him deal with the issue, his father, state Rep. Mike Kernell, said today. ~ snip ~ “He’s hired an attorney,” Mike Kernell said by phone this afternoon. Kernell confirmed that the lawyer is Wade V. Davies of Knoxville. ~ snip ~

ROME (Reuters) - A group of foreigners, including five Italians, was kidnapped in Egypt. This was announced by the Foreign Ministry, without giving other details on the exact place where the abduction took place. "The foreign minister, Franco Frattini, in flight to the United States, follows closely with the crisis unit of the Ministry of kidnapping cases in Egypt by a group of foreigners, among whom there are five Italians," you law in a note. "The minister - continues the note - has provisions to enable the full cooperation between the countries concerned, and the foreign ministry at this...