Free Republic

Ships don't come with much more historical ballast than the MV Liemba. The steamer still shudders and belches its way across Lake Tanganyika every Wednesday and Friday, a century after it was built as a warship in Germany. In its time it's been a pawn in the colonial scramble for Africa. It's been scuttled and then raised again from the deep. It may have been the model for the warship sunk by The African Queen, a steam-powered launch in the film of the same name, starring Katharine Hepburn as a prim spinster and Humphrey Bogart as the rough captain. And...

Islamists demolish foundation; police withhold crime report from court. NAIROBI, Kenya – On an island off the coast of East Africa where the local government limits the ability of Christians to obtain land, officials in one town have colluded with area Muslims to erect a mosque in place of a planned church building. On the Tanzanian island of Zanzibar, Pastor Paulo Kamole Masegi of the Evangelistic Assemblies of God had purchased land in April 2007 for a church building in Mwanyanya-Mtoni, and by November of that year he had built a house that served as a temporary worship center, he...

SNIPPET: "Conclusion Radicalization remains an issue in the United Kingdom, although the threat has evolved away from the old structures that used to make up the infamous Londonistan. Radicalization today is more difficult for policymakers to legislate against. Dangerous extremist activities online are hard to distinguish from the vast mass of meaningless extremism on the internet, while parts of the real-world portion have melded into the mainstream of British political discourse. This makes it difficult to craft legislation that targets groups specifically that does not also catch harmless and legitimate forms of political discourse. Physical jihad continues to hold sway,...

Note: The following text is a quote: March 30, 2010 Eritrean man pleads guilty to alien smuggling WASHINGTON - Samuel Abrahaley Fessahazion, 23, an Eritrean national, has pleaded guilty to helping smuggle illegal aliens to the United States for private financial gain, following an investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Custom and Border Protection (CBP). Fessahazion, aka "Sami," aka "Sammy," aka "Alex" and aka "Alex Williams" pleaded guilty on March 29, 2010, in Houston to one count of conspiracy and two counts of encouraging and inducing aliens to come to, enter or reside in the United...

East Africa is emerging as the next oil boom following a big strike in Uganda's Lake Albert Basin. Other oil and natural gas reserves have been found in Tanzania and Mozambique and exploration is under way in Ethiopia and even war-torn Somalia. The region, until recently largely ignored by the energy industry, is "the last real high-potential area in the world that hasn't been fully explored," says Richard Schmitt, chief executive officer of Dubai's Black Marlin Energy, which is prospecting in East Africa. The discovery at Lake Albert, in the center of Africa between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of...

SNIPPET: "An al Qaeda leader wanted by the US for a string of deadly attacks has been named the new leader of terror group's network in East Africa. Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, one of several al Qaeda leaders charged with carrying out the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, was appointed the leader of al Qaeda in the Horn of Africa. Fazul was "inaugurated" during an open ceremony in the southern city of Kismayo, according to a translation received by The Long War Journal of an article posted Waaga Cusub, a website operated by the Hawiye clan,...

I have been reading the history of Egypt and the Nile Valley, stretching some 6,000 years back, in preparation for my teaching lectures, and I must say I am thoroughly impressed. Diehard racists can say what they like, but there is no doubt, from solid evidence, that the Nile Valley was the cradle of human civilisations. While Western Europe was still steeped in slumber and darkness, the communities of the Nile — Egypt, Nubia, Kush, Aksum and Meroe — were teaching their children reading and writing, mathematics, philosophy, algebra, trigonometry and fine art. For a long time, the truth about...

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. has decided not to seek the death penalty against a former Guantánamo detainee who was ordered by President Obama to face trial in a civilian court in New York. Mr. Holder communicated the decision to federal prosecutors in Manhattan on Friday, and they in turn informed the federal judge who is presiding in the case. “You are authorized and directed not to seek the death penalty against Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani,” Mr. Holder wrote to Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York. Mr. Ghailani faces federal charges of conspiring...

From Gloucester to Afghanistan: the making of a shoe bomber Saajid Badat this week pleaded guilty to plotting to blow up a plane. What drove this quiet football fan to thoughts of terror? Mark Honigsbaum and Vikram Dodd Saturday March 5, 2005 The Guardian He seemed the model British Muslim citizen - a poster boy for integration whose knowledge of the Qu'ran and achievement at grammar school made Gloucester's close-knit Islamic community proud. When in November 2003 anti-terrorist police turned up at the terraced house in the Barton and Tredworth district of the city that Saajid Badat shared with his...

May 16, 2009 SNIPPET: "There have been a number of reports of foreign fighters, with possible links to al-Qaeda, fighting alongside hardline Islamists of al-Shabaab and Hisbul-Islam, said Mr Carson, the US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs. "We're extremely worried about the reports." "There seem to be fairly serious and creditable reports that al Shabaab does have, amongst its fighters, a number of individuals of South Asian and Chechen origin," said Mr Carson. "This is a very disturbing situation and reflects the seriousness of the problem in Somalia." Mr Carson also expressed concern about flights from Eritrea were...

January 22, 2009 Note: The following text is a quote: http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2009/January/09-crm-060.html Foreign National Sentenced to Five Years in Prison for Smuggling East Africans to the United States WASHINGTON – A Ghanian man was sentenced today in the District of Columbia for his role in smuggling East Africans into the United States, Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal Division Rita M. Glavin, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeffrey A. Taylor and Acting Assistant Secretary of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) John Torres announced. Mohammed Kamel Ibrahim, a/k/a Hakim, 27, a native of Ghana and naturalized citizen of Mexico,...

5 EYEWITNESS NEWS has learned that federal law enforcement sources believe that a Twin Cities man blew himself up in a suicide bombing in Northern Somalia last month. The FBI and Homeland Security are investigating whether Shirwa Ahmed had developed a terrorist recruiting network in the area. 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS learned that Ahmed came to the Twin Cities in 1996 and graduated from Roosevelt High School in Minneapolis. He was a naturalized U.S. citizen. More than a dozen young men of Somali descent, mostly in their 20s, from the Minneapolis area have recently disappeared, U.S. law enforcement officials tell 5...

Mr Kiir, Sudan's vice-president, has warned of a return to war Former southern rebels in Sudan have suspended their involvement in the national unity government.The Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) said its northern partners had failed to implement parts of a 2005 deal that ended a 21-year civil war. These include boundary demarcations and the redeployment of northern troops from the south. South Sudan's President Salva Kiir warned recently there could be a return to war if the deal was not kept to. Some 1.5 million people died in the conflict - Africa's longest civil war - which pitted...

Mr Mubarak wants to change election and terror laws Egyptians have begun voting in a key referendum on constitutional changes which the opposition criticise as paving the way for a police state.The 34 amendments include a ban on the creation of political parties based on religion, and sweeping security powers. The government says the changes will deepen democracy in the country and help in the fight against terrorism. Secular and Islamist opposition groups have called on supporters to boycott the referendum. If approved, the changes will allow the drafting of a new anti-terrorism law to replace the emergency legislation...

About 300 Sudanese have sought sanctuary in Israel Three years ago, David, a 26-year-old corn farmer, fled his burning village in the Darfur region of Sudan. Janjaweed - Arab militiamen loyal to the Khartoum government - rode into the village on horseback armed with machineguns and began killing the inhabitants. They torched his family home. "The fire ate my father," said David. His brother was also killed in the attack. David escaped to Egypt but was afraid that the authorities would send him back to Sudan. He then took the extraordinary step of paying Bedouin smugglers to take him...

1/9/2007 - WASHINGTON (AFNEWS) -- Air Force AC-130 gunships struck al Qaeda targets in Somalia Jan. 8, news sources reported last night. The operation allegedly hit al Qaeda concentrations in the southern part of the country, but Pentagon officials did not comment. The Navy 5th Fleet moved the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower into the waters off Somalia in an effort to capture al Qaeda terrorists attempting to flee the country, a 5th Fleet spokesman said. Officials of the United Nations-recognized Somali government said the strikes were aimed at al Qaeda terrorists who planned the attacks against the U.S....

US navy patrols Somalia's coast Somali soldiers may struggle to maintain order in Mogadishu US naval forces have deployed off the Somali coast to prevent leaders of defeated Islamist militias escaping. Kenya has also significantly tightened border security to stop an influx of fleeing fighters, as aid agencies called for help for genuine refugees. Uganda's president is travelling to Ethiopia to discuss forming an African force to stabilise the country. A two-week advance by Ethiopian troops swept the Islamist militias from areas they had controlled for six months. Location of militias and US Navy patrols The militias - known...

Somalia is officially an Islamic state and conversion is prohibited. The country has a population of approximately 8.3 million, nearly all of them Sunni Muslims. There is a small, extremely low-profile Christian community. According to the International Religious Freedom Report 2006 issued by the US State Department last Friday, proselytizing for any religion except Islam is prohibited in Puntland and Somaliland and effectively blocked by informal social consensus elsewhere in the country. Somalia has had no government since the fall of Siad Barre in 1991. The Union of Islamic Courts (UIC), which grew out of individual courts' efforts to establish...

May 21, 2003, 8:45 a.m. Trails Lead to SaudisA Virginia terror probe continues. By Matthew Epstein In March 2002, Federal terrorism investigators descended upon a group of Saudi-backed executives operating out of northern Virginia. The government hauled away truckloads of files and computer hard drives from the "SAAR Network," a web of dozens of related companies with interlocking officers, directors, and corporate headquarters. The Treasury Department suspected the group was laundering money for al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations. Now over a year after the raids, many are asking whether the Justice Department will hand down indictments or clear the...

The United States and 11 African countries Monday opened in Nairobi a regional center to coordinate response to terrorist attacks and natural disasters. The new center is the headquarters for "Golden Spear," a United States-led operation to help east African countries deal more effectively with natural disasters and terrorist attacks. Operation "Golden Spear" coordinates disaster relief among the 11 participating African nations and the United States Central Command, which has a large presence in Djibouti. Among the government officials attending the opening ceremony was Kenyan Vice President Moody Awori, who read a speech by President Mwai Kibaki. He said programs...