india news

1. Israel drips two-month old advisory against India travel

Israel's Counter-Terrorism Bureau on Tuesday canceled a two-month-old advisory against travel to India, citing a drop in the threat of terror in that region.

The Bureau on Thursday had warned Israelis in mid-October about a concrete threat of a possible terror attack, particularly in the Goa area.

The bureau had issued a similar warning ahead of the Jewish New Year saying that Israelis throughout India could be targeted by terrorists.

read more @ haaretz
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1136861.html

more on all this here




2. Kasab denies involvement with LeT, was a COOK with a catering company

Lone surviving Pakistani gunman Ajmal Kasab on Tuesday said he was not a "jihadi" and had not undergone any training at the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) camp in Pakistan.

Kasab told the court, which was recording the gunman's final statement on the prosecution evidence, he was a cook with a catering company in "Saarayee-Alamghir" near Jhelum in Pakistan.

Denying any involvement with terror outfits LeT and Jamat-ul-Dawa (JuD), Kasab declined meeting Hafiz Sayed, Zaki-ur-Lakhvi, Abu Kahfa and Abu Hamza--all wanted accused and alleged LeT operatives.

"I heard the names of Lash-e-Taiba and JuD from the police here. Crime Branch officials had shown the photograph of Lakhvi," Kasab said.

Asked by the court if he was introduced to one Major General Saab at the training camp, Kasab said, "This is absolutely wrong."

The judge, M L Tahaliyani, was putting questions to Kasab on the basis of his confession before magistrate in February; however Kasab disowned the confession, saying it was given under duress.

When special Judge M L Tahaliyani referred to his statement in the confession that Hafeez Sayed had told 30 boys at the LeT training camp that they would have to lay down their lives for liberating Kashmir, Kasab said: "This is absolutely wrong".

Alleging that the police had threatened to administer electric shocks to him if he did not give a statement to the magistrate, Kasab said the police had prepared the confession and forced him to recite it.

Asked by the court, if he was told in the training that they would go to heaven if they attacked India, Kasab replied in the negative saying he did not attend the training.

Kasab also denied having told the police anything about Kuber boat and a dead body found on the boat.

According to the prosecution, the group of ten terrorists had highjacked Kuber on their way to Mumbai from Karachi in Pakistan.

"I have never seen the boat; crime branch and FBI had showed me pictures of Kuber and my clothes and articles seized from the boat. These articles must belong to either fishermen or smugglers. The AK 47 rifle may belong to the police and it is not mine."

An I-card recovered from his trouser pocket was shown to Kasab in the court today, but he refused to identify himself. "It's not me. Trousers are not mine, I was wearing leather pants," he stated.

Similarly, about the money seized from him, he said that it was not his.

"The police had taken Rs 2,400 from me on November 25, which I had kept for my return ticket. Those currency notes did not have any marks on them. These notes have something written on them," Kasab said when he was shown the Rs 100-note.

The gunman further alleged that all the witnesses were briefed by the police.

"One witness had in the identification parade identified me as the one in Hotel Taj. That witness was not brought to court during the trial," Kasab said.

He further said all the witnesses were shown his photograph prior to the parade and thus they could identify him and witnesses were prompted by the police.

Kasab also alleged that even when he was in jail custody, three crime branch officials were guarding him and used to threaten him to give the statement before the magistrate.

"I had given this complaint in writing to the magistrate on February 18, when I was produced for recording my confession. But when nothing was done on it, I kept mum and did not complain again," Kasab said.

Kasab and two Indians- Faheem Ansari and Sabaudding Ahmed are facing trial for their involvement in the 26/11 terror attacks.

source: the hindu



3. opinion: singing the enemy's song

Ever since news broke that Lashkar-e-Taiba clandestine operative David Headley had been a Drug Enforcement Administration informant, speculation has grown that the Pakistani-American jihadist may also have worked for the United States Central Intelligence Agency. The evidence for the claim is thin. Headley’s links with the Lashkar, Federal Bureau of Intelligence detectives say, was only detected in July, 2009, when he posted inflammatory messages in an internet chat-room. Even at the time of his arrest, they claim, no evidence was available to suggest he had carried out pre-attack reconnaissance in Mumbai. For its part, the CIA has flatly denied any association with Headley.

But the Headley rumours offer an opportunity to examine the efforts of intelligence services around the world to infiltrate the global jihadist movement -- and what sometimes happens when their assets turn out to have been double agents, singing the enemy’s song.

read more @ the hindu

protect who?

1. single dose of vaccine enough to protect kids

Infants and children can be protected from H1N1 virus with just one dose of vaccine, a new study claims.

As part of the research, Terry Nolan, from the University of Melbourne, Australia, and colleagues examined the effectiveness of two doses of a 2009 influenza A(H1N1) vaccine in 370 healthy infants and children.

The kids were aged between six-months to less than 9 years and were living in Australia.

They were divided into groups before they received a two-injection regimen in a gap of 21 days.

The vaccine dose was limited to either 15-micrograms or 30-micrograms.

In the end, the experts noted that every child had achieved an antibody level considered high enough to protect against the H1N1 virus.

read more @ the hindu

2. child dies after single dose

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – A gynecologist is planning to sue the Centers for Disease Control over the death of his seven-year-old son after receiving the A (H1N1) flu virus vaccine, reports said Tuesday.

The CDC denied there was a link between the two and said it would continue its present inoculation campaign.

The Taichung boy, surnamed Liu, did not have any history of medical problems before being immunized at school on November 19, said Chang Yao-tsung, an opposition Democratic Progressive Party member of the Taichung City Council speaking on behalf of the child’s parents.

His health started deteriorating the following day, with red blotches appearing on the sole of his feet. The boy’s father, a gynecologist only mentioned with his surname Liu, took him to a local private clinic where he was told the problem might be a skin disease or an allergy provoked by the vaccine....The seven-year-old officially died of sepsis Monday, more than a month after being inoculated.

read more @ taiwan news



3. former director of CDC named president of Merck vaccine division

Dr. Julie Gerberding, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was named president of Merck & Co Inc's vaccine division, the company said on Monday.

Gerberding, who led the CDC from 2002 to 2009, stepped down when President Barack Obama took office.

She had led the agency from one crisis to another, including the investigation into the anthrax attacks that killed five people in 2001, the H5N1 avian influenza, the global outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, and various outbreaks of food poisoning.

"As a preeminent authority in public health, infectious diseases and vaccines, Dr. Gerberding is the ideal choice to lead Merck's engagement with organizations around the world that share our commitment to the use of vaccines to prevent disease and save lives," Merck Chief Executive Officer Richard Clark said in a statement.

"I am very excited to be joining Merck where I can help to expand access to vaccines around the world," added Gerberding, who will head up the company's $5 billion global vaccine business that includes shots to prevent chickenpox, cervical cancer and pneumonia.

source: prevent disease

people with money

1. Moscow business news

Andy Potts

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has told members of the House of Lords that he is "deeply concerned" about the Nov. 16 death in prison of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky and has called for a "full and transparent" investigation, raising the prospect of a new row between London and Moscow over the rule of law.

The Daily Telegraph reported that the British government was closely following the ongoing Russian fraud case involving Hermitage Capital Management, who Magnitsky was representing. He died after allegedly failing to receive medical treatment while in pre-trial detention.

Hermitage CEO Bill Browder said: "Gordon Brown has shown ... that people around the globe are deeply concerned about ... the deterioration of the rule of law in Russia."

New Yukos target

In another possible row with Britain, Russian prosecutors have indicated they are seeking the extradition of former Yukos treasurer Andrei Leonovich in connection with the ongoing trial of jailed oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Kommersant reported in an article titled: "We ask and ask. But Britain doesn't give them up."

Leonovich fled to the UK in 2004 after Khodorkovsky's arrest.

Britain's refusal to extradite several Russian businessmen wanted by Russian prosecutors, including former Kremlin kingmaker Boris Berezovsky, has led to strained relations with London.

Lebedev renews Indy bid

Russian newspaper magnate Alexander Lebedev has restarted his bid to buy troubled British titles The Independent and The Independent on Sunday, The Guardian reports.

Lebedev, who already owns liberal newspaper Novaya Gazeta and the London Evening Standard, has been linked with a bid for the two British broadsheet titles all year.

But reports in Britain suggest that talks are gaining momentum after a financial restructuring at the newspapers aimed at eradicating losses of £13 million a year and making them profitable by the end of next year.

read more @ moscow news

2. Sackass explodes his reputation

Georgia, a former Soviet republic, was supposed to celebrate the 43rd birthday of its President Mikhail Saakashvili on December 21. As it was expected, there was no birthday party, but a huge international scandal instead.

As we reported earlier, the government of Kutaisi, Georgia’s second biggest city, was anticipating a grand event – Mr. Saakashvili was supposed to visit the city on his birthday. The city government prepared a special gift for the president – the explosion of the War Memorial, which was erected in memory of the Georgians who fell in the Great Patriotic War. A new building of the parliament is to be built instead of the memorial.

The event failed to look like a celebration. The Georgian opposition was going to organize a protest action the day when Saakashvili was supposed to arrive in the city. Opposition members said that they would be ready to encircle the memorial to defend the memory of war heroes. The government of Kutaisi eventually decided to explode the monument on December 19.

The authorities did not put up any enclosure, not did they take other safety measures in an attempt to destroy the monument as soon as possible. Many people were standing near the moment when the explosion finally took place. A woman and her daughter were killed, some other people were wounded.

Saakashvili, who personally authorized the explosion of the war memorial, interrupted his trip to Denmark. The Georgian Security Council, which gathered for an emergent session, quickly found a scapegoat: the governor of the region was dismissed from his position.

The director of the company, which organized the explosion of the monument, was arrested too. In general, the unfortunate and infamous explosion ended with the arrest of ten officials.

Opposition activists gathered for a meeting in Kutaisi and harshly condemned President Saakashvili.

“It is Mikhail Saakashvili who is guilty for the deaths of innocent people. It is his maniac fear of history and deeds of true heroes that became the reason of the act of vandalism,” Koba Davitashvili, the leader of Georgia’s People’s Party said.

Salome Zurabishvili, the leader of Georgia’s Way said: “I am ashamed for the residents of Kutaisi who did not save the monument. I am ashamed for the residents of Tbilisi, who kept silence about it. I am ashamed for Georgian TV channels that advertise New Year events at the time when our own administration is waging war against us. I do not want a president like that!” she said.

“There will be no parliament built here. Saakashvili won’t build the building of glass and concrete on the blood of his citizens, and his cowardly servants won’t be sitting there,” another opposition leader of Georgia, Zurab Nogaideli said.

source: pravda

3. construction of new European Central Bank premises to start in spring 2010

Monday 21 December 2009

The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) has announced the positive outcome of the Europe-wide public tendering procedure for the new premises for the European Central Bank, to be built in Frankfurt, Germany. Construction of the main construction works for its new premises will start in spring 2010.

COOP HIMMELB(L)AU won the competition for the new premises of the European Central Bank in 2005. The project is located in Frankfurt's Ostend and will be built at the site of the Grossmarkthalle (wholesale market). At a height of around 185 meters,
the double tower – with its polygonal shape and east-west orientation – has a striking profile that is visible from all important reference points in Frankfurt's city center, as well as from the river Main.

The imposing form of the Grossmarkthalle unites with the vertical profile of the towers to form a significant ensemble that considers both the local urban design environment and the general urban spatial context, thus creating a tension between Frankfurt's banking district and the Ostend area. The opening of the European Central Bank is scheduled for 2014.

read more @ europe-re.com



4. Russian richest man sets up oligarch bank

MOSCOW, Dec 22 (Reuters) - Russia's richest man Mikhail Prokhorov will pool funds with three other oligarchs that will chase distressed banks and firms, creating an unusual joint war chest for some of Russia's most aggressive portfolio investors.

Prokhorov's MFK bank said on Dec.22 it would get three new shareholders. The combined wealth of the four tycoons was estimated at around $19 billion by the Russian edition of U.S. Forbes magazine and some of this money is real cash.

The shareholders will include investor Suleiman Kerimov, a co-owner of gold miner Polyus Gold, Alexander Abramov, a co-owner of steel maker Evraz Group, and Viktor Vekselberg, a shareholder in aluminium giant UC RUSAL and BP's Russian oil venture TNK-BP.

read more @ kyiv post


5. Kleindeinst to build at Dubai islands despite Nakheel bankruptcy

A German property developer announced on Monday plans to build luxury villas and hotels on six artificial islands off the Dubai coast despite the Gulf emirate’s recent financial woes....The project, dubbed “Heart of Europe,” is expected to cost a total of $850 million and be completed in 2015, Kleindienst said, adding that it will include villas, hotels and restaurants.

Asked about the risk he was taking - particularly should state-owned construction giant Nakheel go bankrupt - Kleindienst said: "We remain confident in the investment potential of The World. Dubai is a first class travel destination. We do not see a risk at all."

read more @ the local



6. Chaarat: exploring and developing Kyrgyz gold

Nestling in the north west corner of Kyrgyzstan, on the highly prospective Tien Shan gold belt, is the 604 sq km Sandalash emerging gold province being explored and developed by Chaarat Gold (AIM:CGH) which has held the licence since 2002.

The current focus at Sandalash is three distinct clusters of gold occurrences in a Prospect Area 6km wide over 28 km of strike along the Sandalash river. Originally explored for gold and antimony by the North Kyrgyz Geological Expedition (NKGE), it had been the subject of both surface and underground work, including soil and rock sampling, geophysics, trenching, drilling and the excavation of several adits. NKGE identified a series of north-east trending gold anomalies which were later further explored in the late 90s by Apex Silver and Newmont, so that in 2002 when Chaarat acquired the licence, an impressive database came with it. New eyes on old data revealed that the Prospect Area had, in fact, greater potential than had at first been realised, and the "new eyes" decided to focus on the centre of the strike at the Chaarat project, leaving the outer projects - Kashkasu and Minteke - for exploration at a later date.

read more @ mineweb

failure is an orphan

1. "hijack" comment, fabricated failure of Copenhagen are really "farcical"

BEIJING, Dec. 22 (Xinhua) -- When an individual British politician claimed the Copenhagen climate change conference was "hijacked" by some countries, presented "a farcical picture" and failed, he actually has put himself at an arrogant, arbitrary and "farcical" disadvantage.

The politician, in an article in Monday's Guardian newspaper, alleged the Copenhagen talks from Dec. 7 to 19 were characterized by "a chaotic process dogged by procedural games," displayed "a farcical picture to the public," and eventually fell flat due to the "hijack" by China and several other developing countries.

These comments are utterly unfounded, unreasonable and unfair.

Contrary to the claim of "hijacking" the conference, China has shown great sincerity and broken its back to push forward the talks and help strike a deal, best exemplified by Premier Wen Jiabao's attendance and speech at the meeting.

As a matter of fact, China has all along exerted arduous and unremitting efforts in saving energy, reducing carbon dioxide emissions and combating climate change.

read more @ chinaview


2. Brazil blasts US performance at Copenhagen

RIO DE JANEIRO, Dec. 21 (Xinhua) -- Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Monday criticized Washington's weak performance at the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen.

The United States is not doing much for the planet, Lula commented in his weekly radio program.

The United States did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol and the country only set a goal to reduce its carbon emissions by 4 percent compared with 1990 levels, which is too little, he said.

Everybody knows that developed countries started polluting the atmosphere long before Brazil, China, India, and other countries, said Lula.

read more @ chinaview



3. South Africa blasts Copenhagen failure

South Africa says Copenhagen's failure to produce a legally binding climate change agreement was unacceptable, joining a global chorus of condemnation even though it helped draft the final accord.

South Africa's environment minister Buyelwa Sonjica and her two top climate change negotiators said Tuesday that part of the blame rested with the way the host guided the conference. In their first media briefing since returning from talks in the Danish capital that ended Saturday, the trio described an atmosphere of distrust and suspicion that Denmark was plotting to force its own position on other nations.

In the end, South African negotiator Joanne Yawitch said, the Danes unveiled a draft at the 11th hour that Yawitch said was "seriously problematic." She said negotiators edited late into the night and came up with a document South Africa found more balanced, but that she felt substantive changes were unwelcome.

read more @ taiwan news


ET CETERA

ready set go

1. police expect Mumbai style attack on London

Scotland Yard has warned businesses in London to expect a Mumbai-style attack on the capital.

In a briefing in the City of London 12 days ago, a senior detective from SO15, the Metropolitan police counter-terrorism command, said: “Mumbai is coming to London.”

The detective said companies should anticipate a shooting and hostage-taking raid “involving a small number of gunmen with handguns and improvised explosive devices”.

The warning — the bluntest issued by police — has underlined an assessment that a terrorist cell may be preparing an attack on London early next year.

read more @ times online

2. more terror attacks soon?

Never before have I put people or ongoing plans at risk by speaking of an operation that is still live. Historical intelligence operations are one thing, but ongoing ones are something else.

But this is different, informed sources tell me a very sinister operation in the “Strategic Deceptions” category is being planned to be unleashed soon by the British government “on its own people”.

Preparations are being made for a December Spectacular. We’ve already seen the US/Israeli 9/11 attacks, and the British 7/7 bombings, which were part of a series of False Flag operations that have been planned to happen periodically.

In 1929 the Rothschild banks were allowed to take the public for a huge ride with the latter day equivalents of the Bernie Madoff scam. So shafting the public is nothing new and what they did to the German economy helped bring Mr. Hitler to power.

read more @ the truth seeker


3. aangirfan: do security services ever attack their own people?

It could be argued that the Mumbai attacks of 2008 were carried out by the CIA and its friends.

Attacks of this kind are normally the work of the security services. (False flag operations from Amman to Zambia)

1. On 20 December 2009, in the Hindustan Times, Vir Sanghvi wrote the following about the American called David Headley, who is suspected of planning the Mumbai attacks of 2008 (Did America keep mum on 26/11? ):

"The only explanation that fits is this: he was an American agent all along.

"The US arrested him only when it seemed that Indian investigators were on his trail.

"He will be sentenced to jail, will vanish into the US jail system for a while and will then be sprung again — as he was the last time."


read more @ aangirfan



4. govt tables Mumbai report

The report went into the response by the police to the 26/11 attacks and pointed out “total confusion” in processing of Intelligence alerts at the level of the state government and “inadequacies” in the existing mechanism for analysing alerts about possible strikes.

The panel report cited instances of non-adherence to the Standard Operating Practice (SOP) during the terror siege.

read more @ the hindu



5. report find serious lapses by police leadership, no problem found with intelligence agencies O_o

A high-level committee appointed by the Maharashtra government to go into the Mumbai terror strikes has found serious lapses on the part of the then Mumbai Police Commissioner Hasan Gafoor in handling the “war-like” multi-pronged attack.

However, the two-member committee did not find any serious lapses to act or react on the part of individual officers and police men of the Mumbai Police.

“There was absence of overt leadership on the part of Hasan Gafoor, the CP, and lack of visible Command and Control at the CP’s office,” said the report prepared by former Governor and Union Home Secretary R.D. Pradhan.

...The committee said "we have come to the conclusion that there was absence of visible and overt leadership on the part of Hasan Gafoor, the CP".

The committee did not find any failure to act on inputs provided by the central intelligence agencies.

It had a word of praise for the then Director General of Police A N Roy, who it found that throughout the operations, he made himself available to provide information and offered help while taking care not to intrude into the functioning of Mumbai Police officers.

read more @ hindu


6. Kasab: i did not kill Karkare

Pakistani gunman Ajmal Kasab on Monday denied the killing of police officers Hemant Karkare, Ashok Kamte and Vijay Salasakar on the night of 26/11, claiming he was not present at the site.

“There is no question of me shooting at them as I was not present on the site,” he told the special court during the trial.

Kasab said that he was not present at CST, Cama Hospital or Girgaum Chowpati (where he was nabbed by police) during Mumbai attack, because he was already in police custody when the terror attack took place.

After the attack, he was taken out by Crime Branch officers in a police vehicle, and was shown the sites, he said.

“They are police, they need an accused. So they framed me up,” he alleged.

When the court asked him how he received a bullet injury on his hand, Kasab alleged that when he was in custody, police gave him local anaesthesia in his hands, and shot him.

read more @ the hindu

always ready to help

1. US helped Yemen with hardware, intelligence

WASHINGTON: The United States gave military hardware, intelligence and other support to Yemeni forces who raided suspected Al-Qaeda hide-outs this week, the New York Times reported yesterday. The newspaper cited officials familiar with the operations as saying the US help, approved by President Barack Obama, had been given at the request of the Yemeni government.

The support was intended to help Yemen prevent Al-Qaeda from mounting attacks on American and other foreign targets inside its borders, the Times reported. "Yemen should be commended for actions against Al-Qaeda," Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, told the newspaper. Yemeni officials said their security forces and warplanes had killed around 30 militants in the country's largest attack on the group in some years. One Yemeni source said the operations had foiled a planned series of suicide bombings.

read more @ kuwait times



2. US sent Americans to help Cuba's opposition

Cuban President Raul Castro dashed hopes Sunday for warmer ties with the United States, accusing the Obama administration of trying to help dissidents undermine the region's sole one-party communist state. "The enemy is as active as ever," Castro charged in his annual address to the National Assembly. "In recent weeks, we have witnessed an increasing number of efforts by the new (US) administration with that objective," the 77-year-old president added.

"The fostering of open and covert subversion against Cuba is on the rise." An American man arrested in Cuba on December 5 "was involved in illegally supplying sophisticated means of communications to 'civil society' groups hoping to coalesce against our people," Castro said, claiming Washington earmarked 55 million dollars to support Cuban dissidents. "The fact is that the instruments of aggressive policy against Cuba remain intact; the US government has not given up on destroying the revolution, and on producing a change in our social and economic regime," he added.


read more @ al manar tv

the illicit weapons were going to the middle east of course

1. Weapons seizure hits North Korea hard

BANGKOK - The detention in Thailand of a cargo plane transporting weapons and the arrest of its crew remain shrouded in mystery. The destination of the weapons and identity of their buyers is uncertain. American officials and analysts believe, however, that the intervention dealt a blow to North Korea's arms sales.

The Air West flight's outbound journey was normal enough. After leaving Ukraine, the aircraft stopped to refuel in Azerbaijan, Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Bangkok before landing in Pyongyang. After picking up the cargo in North Korea, the crew told authorities, the flight was scheduled to stop in Bangkok, Sri Lanka, the UAE and finally Ukraine. What they haven't told investigators is where they planned to offload the weapons.

Thai authorities are baffled about why the plane stopped in Bangkok on the return trip since Thailand is known for close ties to the United States. A more direct route would have been over China, stopping in Lashio or Mandalay in Myanmar to refuel. Another flight from North Korea in November 2008 took this route in an attempt to take cargo to Iran that American authorities feared could be related to weapons of mass destruction. That flight was blocked when India refused to allow the plane to fly through its airspace. The Air West flight's scheduled stop in Colombo, Sri Lanka, was likely an attempt to avoid a repeat.

read more @ asia times



2. nevermind, mystery solved, the weapons were bound for the Middle East. natch. and if the director of intelligence says it it must be true (wink)

WASHINGTON - AN ILLICIT North Korean arms shipment seized in Thailand last week was destined for the Middle East, the head of US intelligence said on Friday.

About 30 tonnes of sanctions-busting weapons were confiscated in Bangkok on Saturday but it had remained unclear where the North Korean shipment was headed.

'Teamwork among different agencies in the United States and partners abroad just last week led to the interdiction of a Middle East-bound cargo of North Korean weapons,' Dennis Blair, the director of national intelligence, wrote in a commentary in the Washington Post.

Adm Blair's reference marked the first public comment by the administration on the destination of the arms and the first official confirmation on the US role in the case. Thai officials had said they seized the cargo plane carrying missiles, rocket-propelled grenades and other weapons on a tip from the United States.

The cache was discovered after the plane landed for refueling on Friday. The plane began its journey in Pyongyang and Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said the weapons came from a North Korean company.

Thai officials said they were enforcing United Nations Resolution 1874 passed in June following North Korean missile and nuclear tests. It was the first known airborne arms cargo from Pyongyang to have been seized since the resolution banned all its weapons exports. -- AFP

source: straits times

Hamas claims responsibility for organizing arrest warrant campaign, opening door for pearl-clutching over 'virus of abuse' toward Israel

1. Hamas, apparently in a burst of power over other countries judiciaries, admits masterminding arrest warrants of Israelis abroad

Hamas admits to being behind the legal proceedings initiated in Europe in which arrest warrants were issued for Israeli public figures for committing war crimes.

The British newspaper The Times spoke with Diya al-Din Madhoun, who heads the Hamas committee set up to coordinate the campaign, in occupied Jerusalem.

About a week ago, an arrest warrant was issued against Israeli Opposition Chairwoman Tzipi Livni, who served as foreign minister during Operation Cast Lead that killed more than 1400 Palestinians, including 420 children and injured over 5300 others. It seemed as if the effort to put Israeli leaders on trial was continuing full force ahead. Madhoun told the Times, "All the political and military leaders of the occupation in our sights”, although he did not specify its future targets. “This has absolutely become our policy,” he said.

The Hamas committee, which was formed after Operation Cast Lead, is composed of legalists and experts. The team put together 1,500 cases in just a few months and has encouraged victims to submit complaints against Israeli leaders in countries like Britain, Spain, Belgium, and Norway.

Their objective is to facilitate between these victims of crimes and the legal institutions of Europe, which could help file complaints. "We do this as a government trying to protect our people and prevent these massacres from recurring," said Madhoun.

“These reports show that it is not human rights that drive these suits but an anti-Israeli campaign at the service of Hamas,” Yigal Palmor, the Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman, said.

source: al manar tv


2. Ambassador: UK gripped by 'virus of abuse' toward Israel


LONDON - Israel's ambassador to London said Monday there was a "virus of abuse" towards his country spreading through Britain as he slammed those behind an arrest warrant for former foreign minister Tzipi Livni.

It comes after the director of a committee set up by the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip said it was providing information to European lawyers investigating alleged war crimes by Israel in the Gaza war.

Livni, the leader of the Kadima main opposition party and the foreign minister during the conflict, cancelled a trip to London last week after an arrest warrant was issued against her by a British court, sparking a diplomatic row.

An "obsession to delegitimise and demonise the Jewish state" was now daily routine in Britain, Israeli ambassador Ron Prosor wrote in The Daily Telegraph newspaper.

"A virus of abuse towards Israel and Israelis has spread throughout British public life.

"When this obsession leaps from the campus soapboxes to courts, the British public can no longer ignore the alarm bells.

"In this instance and at a time when both Israel and Britain find themselves confronted by terrorist foes, their sympathisers are cynically abusing Britain's legal system.

"The scandalous treatment of Mrs Livni is another example of 'lawfare', waged for the sole purpose of delegitimising the State of Israel and its leaders.

"The fanatics who specialise in hounding Israelis are the first to defend the worst abusers of human rights and decency.

"As ever, where attacks on Israel are concerned, double standards, hypocrisy and irony are never far away."

read more @ middle east online

stealing

1. Yes Israel DID harvest organs without permission -- small limited hangout here

JERUSALEM (Map, News) - Israel has admitted that in the 1990s, its forensic pathologists harvested organs from dead bodies, including Palestinians, without permission of their families.

The issue emerged with publication of an interview with the then-head of Israel's Abu Kabir forensic institute, Dr. Jehuda Hiss. The interview was conducted in 2000 by an American academic, who released it because of a huge controversy last summer over an allegation by a Swedish newspaper that Israel was killing Palestinians in order to harvest their organs. Israel hotly denied the charge.

Parts of the interview were broadcast on Israel's Channel 2 TV over the weekend. In it, Hiss said, "We started to harvest corneas ... Whatever was done was highly informal. No permission was asked from the family."

The Channel 2 report said that in the 1990s, forensic specialists at Abu Kabir harvested skin, corneas, heart valves and bones from the bodies of Israeli soldiers, Israeli citizens, Palestinians and foreign workers, often without permission from relatives.

read more @ examiner.com

2. Egypt demands return of Nefertiti bust from Germany

Egypt's antiquities chief Zahi Hawass said on Sunday that Cairo will demand the return of a 3,400 year-old bust of Queen Nefertiti, accusing Germany of fraudulently acquiring it.

Hawass, who heads the Supreme Council of Antiquities, made the announcement after talks in Cairo with Friederike Seyfried, director of the Egyptian Museum and Papyrus Collection at the Neues Museum in Berlin.

Hawass will "convene an extraordinary meeting to examine the steps required to officially ask for the return of the statue," a statement said. The statue was discovered in 1912 in southern Egypt by German Egyptologist Ludwig Borchardt. Hawass said that Seyfried presented him with the agreement signed in 1913 that divided archeological finds between Germany and Egypt.

He said that Borchardt deliberately described the bust as made of plaster and depicting a royal princess, "despite knowing that it was a limestone statue of Queen Nefertiti." This "proves that Borchardt wrote the description so that Germany could keep the statue," Hawass said.

"It confirms information we had that the statue left Egypt in an unethical manner and that there was fraud and deception from the German part at the time," he said, adding that the fact that Borchardt hid the bust in Germany for about 10 years before revealing it is further proof.

Egypt first requested the statue's return in 1930 but successive German governments have refused. Hawass claims that Nefertiti was sneaked out of Egypt under a coating of clay and shipped to Germany. Berlin insists it acquired the statue legally and is reluctant even to loan it to the Egyptians, citing the danger of moving the "fragile" bust.

source: the local

Middle East meetings

1. Hariri's visit to Damascus ends years of bitterness

BEIRUT, Dec. 20 (Xinhua) -- Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri ended on Sunday a landmark visit to Damascus, pledging with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to open new prospects on bilateral relations.

The 39-year-old prime minister's visit to Syria ends nearly five years of bitterness with Damascus. Relations between Hariri and Syria have been edgy since Feb. 14, 2005, when Hariri's father Rafik Hariri, the former Lebanese prime minister was assassinated in Beirut. Syria is suspected of being involved in the killing.

Hariri's meeting with Assad is seen as an opportunity to change the course of relations between the two neighboring countries. It is also seen as a significant sign of rapprochement between Syria and Saudi Arabia, both of them have been exerting major political influence in Lebanon.

uh oh. read more @ chinaview



2. 12/20: Mubarak meets with Iranian parliament speaker

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak met Sunday with Iranian parliament speaker Ali Larijani in the first high-level talks between both countries since relations were strained after Israel's war on Gaza.

...Relations between Iran and Egypt were highly strained during the war on Gaza at the turn of the year, with Cairo accusing Tehran of trying to dominate the region through its alliances with Hamas and Hizbullah.

read more @ naharnet news



3. 12/21: Egypt's intelligence chief meets top Israeli officials

JERUSALEM: Egypt's intelligence chief Omar Suleiman was in Israel yesterday to meet with top officials during a low-profile visit to the Jewish state, an Israeli official said.

Suleiman met Defence Minister Ehud Barak in his Tel Aviv office and was also due to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as the head of the Mossad, Israel's foreign spy service, according to the official.

Barak's office said in a statement that the talks focused on "ways to deal with the regional threats and challenges which both countries face," referring mainly to Iran. The two also discussed ways to renew Middle East peace talks.

...The visit comes a day after Egypt's Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit implicitly confirmed that his country was building an underground barrier with the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip in a new bid to prevent smuggling through tunnels. [also comes a day after Mubarak met with Larijani - ed.]

read more @ kuwait times


4. Japan favors Iran's role in stabilizing security in East Asia

TEHRAN (FNA)- Japanese Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada on Monday highlighted the importance of Iran's position for regional and global developments, urging the country to contribute a role in stabilizing security in East Asia.

read more @ FARS



5. Ex-Brit envoy: Iran poses no threat to Persian Gulf neighbors

TEHRAN (FNA)- Former British Ambassador to Tehran Richard Dalton stressed that the emphasis on Iran's military and political threat to Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (PGCC) member states has been exaggerated.

read more @ FARS

crimes and punishments

1. billionaire sentenced to death in China

BEIJING - A COURT in north-east China sentenced to death a billionaire who hired two people to kill his former business partner following a legal dispute, state media reported late on Friday.

Wang Wenxiang, 49, paid his personal secretary, Bai Peng, and a migrant worker, Yu Yi, to murder Zhong Yishi in May this year, Xinhua news agency said.

...Wang, whose company Xinheng Corporation is involved in real estate, hired Bai and Yu to kill Mr Zhong, who ran a construction company, following a legal dispute over money, Xinhua reported. Bai and Yu strangled Mr Zhong in an underground garage before burning his body in an abandoned brick kiln, the report said. They also stole 4,000 yuan (S$820) from him.

read more @ straits times

2. rich US man faces 145 years in prison for insider trading

On December 15, founder of Galleon Group, 51-year old billionaire Raj Rajaratnam was indicted by the New York court for creating the largest insider trading scheme in history. He is suspected in obtaining at least $20 million in improper profits.

Rajaratnam is facing 145 years in prison. He is accused of applying fraudulent insider schemes using sources for non-public information. The complaint alleges that he have engaged in insider trading in shares of Intel, IBM, AMD, Hilton, and Google. According to American financial analysts, this is the largest insider trading scheme of the kind.

Fourteen people were arrested in Galleon Group case. They include five high-ranking employees, Rajaratnam’s deputy, and a number of top managers from several world-famous companies.

They were arrested back in October. According to the investigators, within the last three years alone they have obtained huge improper profits on a “mutually beneficial basis” using insider information.

Rajaratnam is a Tamil born in Sri Lanka. His net worth is estimated at 1.3-1.5 billion dollars. He was ranked 236th richest American and 559th richest person in the world by Forbes.

It is the third large insider information scandal in the USA in the last year. A former Federal Prosecutor Jacob Frenkel believes that it is directly connected with the ongoing financial crisis. He said that the “criminal interest” in Wall Street and stock market has increased lately. The criminals use “aggressive methods.”

read more @ pravda

3. 183 Filipinos in China jails for smuggling drugs

MANILA, Philippines—A total of 183 Filipinos, mostly women, are in various jails in China for illegal drug trafficking, the Department of Foreign Affairs said.

Citing the report of Philippine Ambassador to China Sonia Cataumber Brady, the DFA also said that since 2007, a total of 48 Filipinos have been meted out the death sentence while 26 the life sentence for acting as so-called drug mules or bringing illegal narcotic drugs into China.

“Despite repeated warnings by the Philippine government, our kababayans (compatriots) continue to be victimized by these drug syndicates with wide network operations in various parts of Asia,” she said, noting that more and more Filipinos continue to be enticed to carry illegal drugs in exchange for money

Brady thus urged “Filipinos to resist any offer of financial reward from these syndicates for carrying prohibited drugs to China or to any other country in the world.”

...All those arrested were caught with narcotic drugs in their person or luggage given to them by “friends” they met in transit or in another country (in particular Bangkok in Thailand, Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, Macau, Kathmandu in Nepal, Vientiane in Laos, and Hanoi in Vietnam), the ambassador said.

These same “friends” gave them air tickets and pocket money to travel to Hong Kong, Macau, or mainland China with the promise that they would be paid $500 or more upon delivery of the drugs to a contact in their destination, she added.

read more @ global nation

4. Brazilian woman dies after swallowing crack cocaine to save son from cops

A Brazilian woman died after swallowing 60 crack cocaine rocks to prevent police from arresting her son on drug charges, a media report said.

Joselita de Moraes died Saturday at a hospital in Maceio, the capital of the northeastern state of Alagoas. Police went to the woman's residence Friday to question her 16-year-old son, who had been identified as a drug dealer, the Terra Web site reported. The teenager had 60 crack cocaine rocks at home that Moraes swallowed in a desperate attempt to destroy the evidence.

Officers called for an ambulance to take the woman to the hospital, where she died from the overdose of crack cocaine, which is becoming increasingly popular in Brazil.

source: brazil news


5. Brazil man stuck stepson with needles as revenge

RIO DE JANEIRO —

A Brazilian man publicly confessed to pushing dozens of needles into his 2-year-old stepson, saying Sunday in a jail cell interview that he intended to kill the boy out of spite for his wife and didn’t think he would be discovered.

Speaking to Globo television’s “Fantastico” program from the northeastern state of Bahia, 30-year-old bricklayer Roberto Carlos Magalhaes described mixing water with wine to dope the child before he and his lover held the boy down and stuck sewing needles into him.

“I did this two or three times a week during one month,” Magalhaes said....The bricklayer told detectives that dos Santos would enter into trances and give him commands to insert the needles, police inspector Helder Fernandes Santana said.

read more @ japan today


6. DC cop pulls out handgun after snowball hits his Hummer

This is the terrifying moment that an American police detective pulled out his handgun after he was targeted in a snowball fight.

Washington police are investigating the incident, when the off-duty officer drew his gun in the midst of the light-hearted battle.

About 200 people from a Washington D.C. neighbourhood had gathered to brave a snowstorm for a massive snowball fight.

'It was pretty fun,' one unidentified participant told reporters. 'But when the gun came out, it just changed the tone of the thing a little bit.'

read more @ daily mail

no comment

1. danger bibi netanyahu

The Kuwaiti newspaper al-Sayissa reported Wednesday that Iran has urgently summoned either Syrian Vice President Farouk Sharaa or Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem and Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah. They are apparently being called to the Iranian capital to receive orders to be carried out in the event of Iranian nuclear sites being targeted in war, Israel Radio reported.

The newspaper quoted a Gulf state diplomat as saying that Nasrallah will travel to Teheran in the coming days in order to receive his marching-orders.

Iranian opposition organizations in Paris told the newspaper that the Iranian intelligence apparatus has established a bank of targets including political leaders and others, who would be targeted if the Iranian sites are attacked.

According to the report, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is among those who would be targeted for assasination, as well as Defense Minister Ehud Barak and others from the UK, France, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

The Jerusalem Post could not independently confirm the report.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1260930887037&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

2. top markets in 2009: brazil, ukraine for the decade

Brazil may have been the best bet for global equity investors in 2009 but it was Ukraine — in spite of the fractiousness of its political elite in recent years — that offered an unbeatable return of nearly 900 percent over the decade, data compiled by Reuters show.

The former Soviet state was the best performing stock market in the world in the last 10 years, surging 890 percent in dollar value, though 1999-2009 returns from government debt generally outstripped those generated by equities.

read more @ cnbc



3. and YET, Ukrainians are not happy. go figure. who is making all this money then???????

voters unhappy with choices, want jobs: kyiv post - click to enlarge images


As the first presidential election in five years approaches on Jan. 17, pollsters and experts warn that voters will be bombarded by a sea of skewed sociological survey results intended to sway their choices. Often, such bogus polls seek to persuade voters that their preferred candidate has no chance of making it into a second-round runoff on Feb. 7, thereby encouraging votes for one of the front-runners. With such spin doctoring at play, Ukrainians need reliable surveys. The graphs and tables show polls conducted on Nov. 21-29 by trusted sources. The surveys were conducted by U.S.-based International Foundation for Electoral Systems and financed by the United States Agency for International Development. The data are representative of the national population of Ukraine and have a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percent. All the interviews were conducted in Ukrainian and Russian by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).

bankers, trafficking, porn and dead communists

1. Nauru - the island that roared

Anna Arutunyan

Few people have ever heard of Nauru, but the world's smallest island nation is big news in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

The eight-mile long Pacific Island (population: 10,000 and shrinking) has become the fourth state to officially recognise the breakaway Georgian republics, joining Russia, Nicaragua and Venezuela in putting the pair on the map.With Nauru's economy constipated by the collapse of a phosphate mining industry based on vast stacks of calcified seagull droppings, a report of a possible $50 million aid package from Russia surfaced in Kommersant.

In 2002, Nauru accepted $130 million in aid from China, allegedly in exchange for refusing to recognise Taiwan. Then in 2005 Nauru recognised Taiwan and broke off diplomatic relations with China. Taiwan later rescued Nauru's fledgling national airline.

According to Russian diplomatic sources cited by Kommersant, Nauru had offered to recognise Abkhazia and South Ossetia if Russia took an active part in an international donor conference last month. Diplomatic sources told the paper that Russia was asked for $50 million to support "immediate socioeconomic projects".

Nauru diplomats did not immediately respond to e-mailed requests for comment.

Abkhazia's foreign minister, Sergei Shamba, called speculation about an aid deal "complete nonsense". He said he did not know about the request for $50 million, but added, "There was a visit to Russia [by Nauru delegates] and they spoke about projects like this."

Nauru's tiny GDP of $39.9 million is dwarfed by the $70 billion of Russian money which allegedly passed through its banks during a 1990s bid to become an offshore finance capital, The Washington Post reported at the time.

read more @ moscow news


2. Russia's fall guy

Anna Arutunyan

Yegor Gaidar's ‘shock therapy' policies left millions of Russians in poverty, but reformers claim he laid the foundations for a later economic recovery.

...Fellow reformers and members of his team while in government concede that the economic transition was so painful that most Russians associated their troubles with one man. Gaidar's name became forever linked with the crisis of the early 1990s, when people lost their savings and literally had to struggle to survive.

...But critics insist that as a leading proponent of price liberalization and privatization in the early 1990s, Gaidar deserves his fair share of the blame for Russia's economic collapse. In the seven years after the Soviet collapse, the country's industrial production fell by nearly half.

"It is difficult to find tactful words about the death of Yegor Gaidar," Communist Party deputy leader Ivan Melnikov said in a statement. "He wasn't just a person, but primarily a symbol of the colossal problems faced by the people of our country."

Asked about Gaidar's legacy, another Communist, State Duma Deputy Yevgeny Lokot, said: "What happened to the nation's industry ... was a direct result of the programme that was adopted when [Gaidar] was acting prime minister. Yeltsin was president, but Gaidar is responsible for the idea itself. The liberal experiment failed in Russia. It offered no advantages besides an onslaught of cheap [low-quality] goods. We are still dependent on oil."

read more @ moscow news



3. Liberia's shady diamond deals and free war criminals

According to the reports, the Liberian government has failed to implement the Kimberly Process that is meant to ensure blood-free diamond trade, enforce forest resource transparency obligations and enforce UN travel ban on war criminals.

"Of most concern are indications of abuses of the system of internal controls, mounting evidence of the presence of regional trading networks and the potential infiltration of sanctioned Ivorian [Côte d’Ivoire] diamonds into Liberian exports. The political will to implement the Kimberley Process certification scheme has diminished, at least within the Ministry of Lands, Mines and Energy," the panel revealed.

read more @ afrik.com



4. bank gives porn site link to Swedish school kids

A Swedish bank inadvertently published a link to a porn site in a magazine distributed to hundreds of thousands of Swedish school children.

Lyckoslanten (‘Lucky Penny’), published by Swedbank, is billed as a “fun magazine about money” distributed in schools to more than 500,000 Swedish 9- to 12-year-olds.

The latest issue of the magazine included an article about the ten most expensive internet domain names ever sold.

Coming in at number five on the list is webcam.com, a website featuring hardcore pornography, which sold for 7.1 million kronor ($1 million).

“It’s very unfortunate,” Swedbank spokesperson Anna Sundblad told the Metro newspaper, explaining that the magazine is “much appreciated” by children.

“To all of the upset parents we can only say we are really sorry about what happened.”

Sundblad added that Swedbank has since published information in Lyckoslanten with information about how parents can block their computers from accessing pornographic websites.

source: the local



5. Africa: dealing with human trafficking, forced sex and labor

When 20-year-old Isoke Aikpitanyi was offered a job in Italy in 2000, she leapt at the chance. She knew that she would have to enter the country illegally, but being a nanny or a maid in Europe seemed better than remaining unemployed in Nigeria. It was only after her arrival, she told Al-Jazeerah television in 2008, that she was told that “foreigners without permits can only do one job in Italy — work the streets” as a prostitute. The men who smuggled her into the country demanded payment of $20,000. “The week before, they killed a girl who slept in my bedroom because she refused to pay” she said. “I was a sex slave. They deceived me to come to Italy for a job that didn’t exist.”

This illegal trade in people through trickery and violence is now a global, multi-billion dollar business known as “human trafficking” and Ms. Aikpitanyi story is all too typical. Indeed, the only thing unusual about her ordeal is its happy ending. After months of brutality she finally broke free of her captors and started an aid organization for African trafficking victims, the Association of Benin City Girls. So far, she noted, more than 300 women have sought help.

...A recent report by the UN Office for Drugs and Crime bears her out. The study, found that trafficking within Africa is widespread — fueled by local economic conditions, seasonal demands for labour, military conflicts and environmental degradation that disrupt livelihoods, and cultural practices and gender and ethnic discrimination that limit economic opportunities for women, children and minorities, and make abuses of their rights more acceptable to society.

read more @ afrik.com


6. Frankfurt police say missing American, son of Morgan Stanley financial advisor, fell in river

Frankfurt police said on Friday they believe a 22-year-old American man who went missing last month probably fell into the Main River in an alcohol-related accident.

“As of now the missing persons department assumes that Devon Hollahan fell into the Main River in a helpless alcohol-related state,” the police said in a statement. “There are no indications indicating suicide or a crime.”

Devon Hollahan disappeared around 3 am on November 21 from the city’s central Taunusalange metro station after attending a concert with his friend Josh Friedman. The two had travelled from Prague, where Hollahan worked as an English teacher, to attend a Portugal The Man concert and joined the band for a party afterwards. ...The man’s father, Morgan Stanley financial advisor Jeff Hollahan, launched an international media campaign to find his son, appearing on US news shows and travelling to Frankfurt from his home in Scottsdale, Arizona to aid in the search.

...But Friday’s statement from police revealed new details of their search that point to an alcohol related accident. Witnesses called an ambulance around 4 am, not long after Hollahan went missing, to report a helpless man laying on the pavement on Eschenheimer Straße. “The helpless person was without a doubt the missing person, who was lying on the sidewalk and was barely articulate,” the statement said. When the passersby told the man in English that an ambulance was on the way, he jumped up and disappeared, they said.


source: the local


OK so he was helpless and barely articulate, lying on the ground, but as soon as he heard an ambulance was coming he we suddenly not helpless anymore because he jumped up and disappeared. mmhmm THAT MAKES NO FUCKING SENSE. - ed.


7. Rosa Luxemburg murder mystery probed

Experts have performed an autopsy on the alleged body of murdered communist revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg more than six months after it was discovered in the cellar of a Berlin hospital, state prosecutors told The Local on Thursday.On May 29, head of forensic medicine at Berlin’s Charité hospital Michael Tsokos sparked a media frenzy when he said that a decapitated body without hands and feet – in possession of the hospital for almost nine decades – was likely the remains of the iconic left-wing leader.

Luxemburg was murdered in 1919 by right-wing Prussian soldiers, but after conducting tests on the 90-year-old corpse, Tsokos said he was convinced that the wrong woman was buried in her place.
...Born on March 5, 1871, Rosa Luxemburg was a Polish Jew. She was also a co-founder of the Social Democratic Party in Poland and Lithuania. Along with Karl Liebknecht, Luxemburg was instrumental in founding Germany’s Communist Party in 1918.

As left-wing activists moved towards revolution in early 1919, Luxemburg and Liebknecht were both murdered by soldiers from the right-wing Freikorps on January 15 of that same year. Luxemburg’s body was not found until four months later on May 31 in the Landwehrkanal, a canal parallel to Berlin’s Spree River.

read more @ the local

same shit different country

1. US arms shipments may fall into hands of warlords, Arroyo pals

MANILA, Philippines—Part of Washington’s new arms shipments to the Philippines may once again fall into the hands of warlord friends of the Arroyo administration, militant groups warned on Friday.

The groups were reacting to reports that the US Congress had increased Washington's development and security aid to Manila for fiscal year 2010 to $135 million, up 13 percent from last year's $119.7 million.

..."American aid did, in fact, contribute to the arming of the warlord clan responsible for one of the most barbaric acts of mass murder in recent history. Should US taxpayer dollars go to a military involved in summary killings and torture or mass-murdering warlords?" Tinio told the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

..."Given the gross human rights abuses of the Arroyo administration and the fact that US weapons have been found in the possession of warlords in Maguindanao, increased US aid is unacceptable," Reyes said.

He noted that "with this latest action, the US government has once again ignored the realities in the Philippines and has in effect given its seal of approval to the dictator and warlord-coddler Gloria Arroyo."

read more @ inquirer.net

2. palace vows to probe how gov't arms, ammo landed in hands of Ampatuans -- could we get a scapegoat please??

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang Thursday vowed a swift investigation to determine how government-issued armaments landed in the hands of the powerful Ampatuan clan, blamed for the election-related massacre of 57 people.

Gary Olivar, deputy presidential spokesperson, agreed with former Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro that it was not difficult to resolve the matter, given the markings on the recovered firearms and ammunition.

“It’s just a matter of time and, hopefully, it will take sooner than later to get to the bottom, the origin of these firearms and ammunition,” Olivar told reporters.

Olivar said President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo was determined to settle the problem in Maguindanao.

“The President, together with everyone else in this country and perhaps even the rest of the world, is interested in getting to the bottom of what happened last Nov. 23,” he said.

...“You don’t need an extensive probe to do it,” he said. “Every delivery has a route. Those recovered ammunition have lot numbers. By simply looking at the bullet casing, we can easily trace the last supply officer who handled those bullets.”

...and that poor slob will be the Lynndie England of this sordid affair... - ed.

read more @ inquirer



3. US "development" projects in Maguindanao to resume shortly

MANILA, Philippines—Expect US development projects in Maguindanao to resume shortly, said outgoing US ambassador to the Philippines Kristie Kenney.

The US Agency for International Development (USAID), which is overseeing Washington's projects in that province in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, will be back there as soon as they can, Kenney told reporters.

The projects include, among others, building classrooms, school libraries, roads and boat landing areas, and putting up solar panels.

Kenney said the US embassy in Manila and USAID were "monitoring (the situation in Maguindanao) day by day."

"In the very instant we think it's the right thing to do, we will be back there," she said.

Kenney noted Maguindanao folk "need us more than ever and as things progressively settle down, we want our work back there."

Earlier, the American envoy said the Nov. 23 massacre, which left 57 people including 30 journalists dead, prompted the US government to suspend its projects in Maguindanao.

Kenney said she did not want any of USAID and embassy employees to get hurt.

She said it was "normal when you have a massacre like that and you don't know who's behind it or what happened."

Kenney assured that "as soon as it looks like it's safe, we will be back at work. I don't want to suspend the projects any longer."

Early this week, US embassy spokesperson Rebecca Thompson told the INQUIRER that despite the lifting of martial law in Maguindanao, Washington's development projects there remained indefinitely suspended.

USAID programs in the province were "on hold until we feel confident about the safety of our personnel that work on the development projects."

But "the rest of our development projects across Mindanao continue," Thompson said.

source: global nation

big lies blowing up in big important faces BRING IT

1. climategate: russians reveal how significant data was omitted from the global temp data sets -- OH HEY YOO HOO!! YOU FORGOT TWELVE POINT FIVE PERCENT OF THE WORLD'S LANDMASS IN YOUR DATA!!!!

On the whole, climatologists use the incomplete findings of meteorological stations far more often than those providing complete observations.

IEA analysts say climatologists use the data of stations located in large populated centers that are influenced by the urban-warming effect more frequently than the correct data of remote stations.

The scale of global warming was exaggerated due to temperature distortions for Russia accounting for 12.5% of the world’s land mass. The IEA said it was necessary to recalculate all global-temperature data in order to assess the scale of such exaggeration.

read more @ times online



2. CIA supporting terror inside Pakistan

A CIA helicopter evacuated top TTP leadership into Afghanistan before the start of Pakistani military operation

Terrorists from TTP enjoy safe havens inside Afghanistan with the help of CIA and RAW

Satellite mobile phones from a Gulf state were provided to the terrorists of TTP & Swat

CIA helped RAW establish a base in Afghanistan

No CIA drones ever attacked any of the TTP & Swat terrorists as they freely called BBC and western media

Nuristan province in Afghanistan has a base run by CIA, RAW & NDS providing full support to terrorists inside Pakistan

In 1995, Benazir Bhutto and Ashraf Jahangir Qazi purged 125 ISI officers to appease CIA

The proof about instances of covert US support to some hardened militant outfits and terrorist activities they carried out over the past few weeks and months, was presented to Panetta. It was indeed a startling revelation for the top US spy and a bold maneuver of Pakistan Army. General Pasha's move surprised Panetta as the evidence presented was categorical in proving that the CIA officials provide assistance to perpetrators of some of the most serious and deadly attacks on offices and key persons in Pakistan’s security services. Here are the details of what transpired between ISI’s Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha and CIA’s Leon Panetta.

read more @ ahmed quraishi



3. US security firm DynCorp bribes Pakistani officials, top ministry officer arrested

· Over US $ 250,000 paid as bribes to people inside the Interior Ministry to license illegal weapons

· PS to State Minister of Interior arrested

· Bribes were paid after US Ambassador personally lobbied for the licenses

· Capt. Zaidi, Jamil Abbasi, Mr. Qadir and Dr. Dara are under arrest

· Fears the accused are being protected and might possibly be allowed to escape the country

· A total of 100 former SSG commandos secretly hired by US to create rapid-intervention teams for unknown purposes

read more @ ahmed quraishi



4. Mumbai attacker Kasab (too fat to be a jedi) retracts confession, claims meeting HEADLEY

NEW DELHI, Dec. 18 (Xinhua) -- Mohammed Ajmal Amir alias Kasab, the only militant caught alive in Mumbai terror attacks, Friday retracted his earlier confession before an Indian special court, said officials sources.

But Kasab also claimed he had met arrested U.S. citizen David Coleman Headley, who has recently been charged by the FBI for planning the Mumbai attacks, as the latter interrogated him with four whitemen in his cell at the Mumbai police custody after he was captured, said the sources.

In the special court at Arthur Road prison, Kasab told Judge MLTahaliyani that his statement was made under duress, adding that every claim made against him were absolutely false, said the sources.

"I have not given any confession before the magistrate and my statement has been falsely implicated," he was quoted as saying by the sources.

Kasab also claimed that he was not involved in the terror attacks at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus railway station in Mumbai on Nov. 26 last year and also denied that he entered India through the sea route in a dingy along with nine other terrorists.

In fact, he told the court that he was in India 20 days prior to the Mumbai terror attacks and was here to make a career in Bollywood.

read more @ chinaview



5. Headley of the CIA???????

Mumbai bombing suspect Kasab claims he met David Headley, the alleged CIA agent.

Some of the mainstream media are not reporting this.

Kasab, also known as Mohammed Ajmal Amir, has retracted his confession before an Indian special court, say official sources.

Kasab also claims he met U.S. citizen David Coleman Headley, who is suspected of planning the Mumbai attacks.

Kasab says Headley, who is alleged to be a CIA agent, interrogated him, with four whitemen, in his cell at the Mumbai police custody after he was captured, said the sources.


read more @ aangirfan


6. german military filmed Kunduz strike from the ground -- kind of like a snuff film i guess

German soldiers were on the ground filming ahead of the controversial deadly bombardment that killed up to 142 people in Afghanistan, daily Bild reported on Friday.

As new details of the incident continue to increase pressure on German officials, the paper reported that Col. Georg Klein – who ordered the September 4 air strike – was also referring to video taken by Bundeswehr soldiers near the site where two fuel tanks hijacked by the Taliban were bombed.

Bild reported that until now it was thought that Klein only used videos taken by US fighter jets to make his decision. But the Bundeswehr video, featured on the paper’s website, shows the moments leading up to the attack, followed by a dramatic fireball and shots of the burning fuel trucks.

Meanwhile weekly newspaper Die Zeit reported it had seen documents proving that Germany's elite KSK special forces – which work separately from the Bundeswehr – were involved in the incident and in close contact with German military headquarters in Potsdam on the night of the bombardment.

“Can it be that Col. Klein [...] was part of a long running operation by the KSK against the Taliban?” the paper asked.


read more @ the local

jumping the shark in copenhagen

1. PROBLEM: climate talks in trouble

COPENHAGEN - PROSPECTS for a strong UN climate pact grew more remote on Thursday at the climax of two-year talks as ministers and leaders blamed leading emitters China and the United States for deadlock on carbon cuts.

Dozens of heads of state were arriving in the Danish capital to address the Dec 7-18 conference, meant to sign a new pact to curb greenhouse gas emissions on Friday. Negotiators' failure to draft a coherent text means they have a mountain to climb.

'The news that we've been receiving is not good,' Chancellor Angela Merkel told the German parliament. 'I must say very honestly, that the United States offer to cut by 4 per cent compared to 1990 levels is not ambitious.' Environment ministers at the talks have so far failed to close a rift over how far the developing world should join industrialised countries in cutting carbon emissions.

read more @ straits times

2. REACTION: highest level public figures make a series of hysterical threats and bold proposals

The world has only seven years before climate change causes a “point of crisis” that will drive food shortages, terrorism and poverty, the Prince of Wales has warned. LOOKING VERY TANNED.


The "future of humanity" is at stake in the Copenhagen climate talks, Gordon Brown has said.


Hillary Clinton has attempted to break the deadlock at the Copenhagen climate conference by offering a huge amount of money from the United States to help poor nations deal with global warming. MY PEOPLE WILL PAY YOUR PEOPLE, WE'LL DO LUNCH...



3. SOLUTION: Just Die. OK? Come on. Don't You Care About This PLANET??!@!??!!?!? That's very selfish of you...can we get some volunteers? NO???

The official British policy for the Copenhagen conference is now out, in explicit language: Massive population genocide, on a scale that would make Adolf Hitler blush. The London School of Economics, the anchor of the Fabian Gordon Brown government, has produced a study for Copenhagen, released by the British organization Optimum Population Trust (OPT), calling for the reduction of world population by between three to five billion people between now and 2050. This flagrant call for mass extermination is based on the argument that the single greatest cause of global warming is over-population, and that the most "cost-effective" cure for global warming is radical population reduction.

According to a recent OPT study, the so-called global warming crisis can be solved, most cheaply, by reducing the world population by 500 million between now and 2050. Since linear population projections put world population at well-over 9 billion by that date, the proposal to cut back world population to just over 6 billion people, would mean the elimination of 3 billion people. Indeed, an OPT press release, dated March 16, 2009, titled "Earth Heading for 5 Billion Overpopulation?" reported, "Based on ecological footprint and biolgoical capacity data which have become available over the last decade, OPT estimates the world's sustainable population currently at 5 billion and the U.K.'s at 18 million (the U.K.'s actual current population is 61 million).

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