Zawahiri Tape May Herald Attack: Warning
United Press International (01/31/06) ; Sieff, Martin
The videotape released Monday by Al Qaeda's Ayman al-Zawahiri could be a prelude to more attacks from the terrorist group, according to Middle East analyst James Phillips of the Heritage Foundation. Noting that al-Zawahiri mentions the recent U.S. air strike in Pakistan, Phillips says that one of the purposes of the video appears to be to paint the United States as an aggressor so that future terrorist attacks can be justified as being defensive in nature. Some Al Qaeda attacks have caused outrage in the Muslim community because they have killed Muslims, and Phillips indicates that the video seeks to deflect this outrage in advance of any more attacks by providing justification for more attacks.
Security Management Daily – February 1, 2006.
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Central Asia: Is Islamic Movement Of Uzbekistan Really Back?
Authorities in Central Asia suggest that an outlawed group responsible for terrorist attacks in the past poses a renewed threat in the region. The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) was thought to have been largely destroyed in the U.S.-led military campaign in Afghanistan. But officials in Tajikistan have blamed several recent incidents on the IMU. Abdugaffor Qalandarov, the chief prosecutor in Tajikistan's northern Soghd Province, warned that the IMU has been increasingly active since an uprising and subsequent crackdown by security forces in Andijon, in eastern Uzbekistan.
Email from Mr. Mayer Nudell dated February 3, 2006.
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Blasts rock Nepal, Amnesty asks King to act
Kathmandu – February 2, 2006 – Explosions blamed on Maoists rocked several towns overnight in Nepal on Thursday just hours after King Gyanendra claimed his year of direct rule had curtailed attacks by the insurgents. Suspected rebels in the town of Kapilbastu bombed the house of Ram Das Gupta, a mayoral candidates, to disrupt the municipal elections. The rebels also reportedly exploded the houses of two other candidates contesting municipal elections in Tikanpur.
Binaj Gurubacharya / Associated Press
The Indian Express – February 1, 2006.
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Security scare shuts Lanka House
Colombo – February 2, 2006 – Sri Lanka’s Parliament was adjourned for two weeks on Thursday after police sniffer dogs began barking inside the chamber, sparking fears of a security threat. A security official said nothing was found when the carpet was removed and speculated that the dogs might have smelled sulphur – a chemical also used in explosives – in the adhesive used to attach it to the floor.
AP
Hindustan Times – February 3, 2006.
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‘Pak terror groups a threat to US’
Washington – February 3, 2006 – The United States has warned that Pakistani militant groups that are active in Kashmir are a “persistent threat” not only to South Asian stability, but to American interests in the region as well. Before the Senate Intelligence Committee, National Intelligence Director termed India a “reliable ally” in the fight against global terrorism. This is party due to the fact that India has been “a frequent target for Islamic terrorists, mainly in Kashmir,” he said.
S. Rajagopalan
Hindustan Times – February 4, 2006.
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Talking to Terrorists
US officials in Iraq are now holding face-to-face talks with high-level Iraqi Sunni insurgents, NEWSWEEK has learnt. The pace of a Sunni outreach effort that has brought US officials and Iraqi insurgents to the negotiating table is quickening – and may be producing results. Americans are now engaging in direct sit-down talks with “senior members of the leadership” of the Iraqi insurgency, at US military bases in Anbar province, as well as in Jordan and Syria, according to US and Iraqi officials. The groups include Baathist cells and religious Islamic factions, as well as former Special Republican guards and members of the security services, according to a US official. This is the first time Americans or insurgents have admitted that “senior leaders” have met at the negotiating table for planning purposes.
Scott Johnson, Rod Norland and Ranya Kadri
Newsweek - February 2006.
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JI School in Pak grooming more terrorists
Kuala Lumpur – February 3, 2006 – Jemaah Islamiah ( JI) has a house in Pakistan where students from Malaysia and Singapore are indoctrinated and prepared for militant activities. Gungun Rusman Gunawn, a brother of Ridwan Ishamuddin (Al-Qaeda’s key man captured in Thailand in August 2003) revealed this in his confession to the Indonesian police last year. Gungun and 18 others were picked up by the Pakistan Federal Agency and the CIA in Karachi in September 2003 for suspected militant activities.
The Star/ANN
The Statesman – February 4, 2006.
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Hizb fund conduit in police net, RDX seized
New Delhi – According to police, on Friday evening, a suspected ISI agent, Nasir Sharif Mir having links with Huriyat chairman and banned terrorist outfit, Hizbul Mujahideen, was caught with two kilograms of RDX from Defence Colony area in south Delhi. “Nasir frequently visited Delhi and was involved in funding terrorist organizations through hawala channels. He ran two money exchanges in Dubai called Rima Exchange and Cash Express Exchange,” said joint commissioner of police (special cell), Delhi, on Saturday. Special Cell seized two kgs of RDX, an ABCD timer, a detonator, a pistol with six live cartridges, and Rs.55 lakh of hawala from him. Nasir told police that the explosives and money he was supposed to deliver to Zahoor and it was meant for use of Hizbul Mujahideen’s network operating in and around the Capital, but could not provide any details about the militants’ plans. Two Kashmiri businessmen, acquaintances of Nasir, had also been detained.
Times News Network
Times of India – February 5, 2006.
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170 Taliban surrender in Afghanistan
Afghanistan – More than 170 Taliban and other Islamist fighters surrendered Sunday as part of a government amnesty scheme, vowing to lay down arms and work to rebuild war-ravaged Afghanistan, officials said.
The Times of India – February 6, 2006.
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Top Qaeda Commander arrested in Iraq
Iraqi police have arrested the fourth-ranking figure in al-Qaeda in Iraq, state television said on Sunday. The brief report on Iraqi television identified the suspect as Mohammed Rabei, also known Abu Dhar. The report identified him as No.4 in the organization led by Abu Musab al-Qarqawi but gave no further details.
The Times of India – February 6, 2006.
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Money changers funding militants in Kashmir
New Delhi – Investigation into certain cases detected by the Special Cell of the Delhi police has revealed that certain money exchange offices based in the Middle East are suspected to be involved in hawala operations to fund militants in Jammu and Kashmir. During interrogation, Nasir Safi Mir, a wealthy Dubai-based money exchanger passing on huge amounts to the banned militant outfit Hizbul Mujahideen, has allegedly disclosed that till 1997, he had passed on about Rs.1.8 crores of hawala money. And in the recent past, he forwarded at least four consignments of hawala money to militants and separatist leaders, and in addition he has given Rs.55 lakhs and a consignment of RDX, detonator and ABCD timer for distribution among Hizbul militants and a top separatist leader.
Devesh K. Pandey
The Hindu – February 6, 2006.
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13 Qaeda men flee from Yemen jail
Sanaa – Interpol issued a global security alert on Sunday over the escape of at least 13 convicted al-Qaeda militants who tunnelled their way out of a jail in Yemen, calling them a “clear and present danger to all countries”. The escapees included Jamal Badwai, mastermind of the bombing of the USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden in October 2000, which killed 17 US sailors. The 13 militants were among 23 inmates who broke out of jail in the capital Sanaa in a major embarrassment for Yemeni authorities.
Reuters
The Times of India – February 7, 2006.
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On poll eve, Maoists slaughter 7 policemen
Kathmandu – Communist rebels killed seven police officers and soldiers in two overnight attacks ahead of municipal elections in Nepal that the guerrillas have vowed to disrupt, officials said on Tuesday. The attacks came hours before the prominent newspaper published an interview in which the Maoist rebels’ elusive leader said he could accept a constitutional monarchy, and he was willing to consider a cease-fire, like the one abandoned by the rebels at the start of the year.
AP
The times of India – February 8, 2006.
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Grenade attack on MLA’s house in J&K
Jammu – Former minister and legislator Majid Wani’s house was shelled by unidentified militants in Doda late last night, injuring four policemen, said officials.
P.T.I.
The Indian Express – February 8, 2006.
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Putin asks FSB to treat terrorists ‘like rats’
Moscow – February 7, 2006 – President Vladimir Putin today asked Russia’s security services to resolutely combat terrorism and destroy them “like rats” in their hideouts. “This is how you should act to solve the main objective in the fight against terrorists: strike at all caves where terrorists are hiding and eliminate them like rats,” Putin said in his remark at a Russian Federal Security Service (FSB, ex-KGB) meeting.
Dadan Upadhyay
The Indian Express – February 8, 2006.
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4 U.S. Marines killed in Iraq
Baghdad – Rebels killed four US Marines and at least seven Iraqis died in attacks on Tuesday. The Marines were killed in two separate roadside bomb attacks, the US military said.
AFP
The Hindu – February 8, 2006.
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Iraq minister escapes blast; Shias attacked
Baghdad – Iraq’s education minister escaped unhurt from a car bomb attack on his convoy in Baghdad early wednesday, but at least three of his bodyguards were lightly wounded, a spokesman said. Also on Wednesday, gunmen opened fire on a group of Shias performing rituals in Baghdad, wounding six people, police said.
Agencies
The Times of India – February 9, 2006.
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Taliban kill Indian engineer
New Delhi – February 8, 2006 – An Indian who was killed in a bomb attack by the Taliban in western Afghanisitan on Tuesday has been identified as Bharat Kumar, an engineer working with a Turkish company. He is the second Indian to be killed in Taliban terrorism in the past two months.
The Asian Age – February 9, 2006.
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Blast in Pakistan nuclear facility
Islamabad – A technician was killed in explosion in a nuclear research facility in Pakistan, military spokesman said on Wednesday. The blast involved only conventional explosives and not nuclear material, Major General Shaukat Sultan told.
AFP
The Hindu – February 9, 2006.
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7 killed in Maoist attack
Kathmandu – Communist rebels attacked an army convoy on a key highway in western Nepal, killing two soldiers and a civilian and taking at least l10 soldiers hostage, officials and the guerrillas said Friday. Four Maoist rebels were also killed in the fighting that followed the attack.
AP, Kathmandu
Hndustan Times – February 11, 2006.
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19 killed in Russia clash
Moscow – At least 12 militants and seven Russian policemen were killed in a fierce clash in southern Russian village near Chechnya. The militants of the so-called Nogay battalion linked with Chechen militants were holed up in three houses in Tukui Mekteb in Stavropol. It was decided to “eliminate” the militants after their plan to attack a local school and take its students hostage was uncovered, a police source was quoted by Ria Novosti.
The Indian Express – February 11, 2006.
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Maoists kidnap 3 Nepal officials
Kathmandu – February 12, 2006 – Communist rebels abducted three government officials in south-west Nepal, officials said on Sunday. They were grabbed by Maoist rebels late on Saturday near the village of Parsia, about 360 kms south-west of the capital, Kathmandu. The militants have been striking security bases, government offices and targeting those who helped with last week’s municipal elections.
Binaj Gurubacharya/AP
The Asian Age – February 13, 2006.
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UNICEF plea to LTTE on child troops
Colombo – UNICEF has appealed to the LTTE to stop recruiting children for its combat units, and return those already recruited to their parents. UNICEF’s representative in Sri Lanka said in a press release on Tuesday that the LTTLE had, in the past six months, recruited, on an average, 43 children a month. In its defense, the LTTE argued that the children in its ranks were not soldiers but destitute village boys and girls, who were used for in special institutions called “Sencholai”.
P.K. Balachandran
Hindustan Times – February 15, 2006.
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Al Qaeda papers reveal strategy
Washington – February 16, 2006 – Al Qaeda documents, obtained during recent anti-terrorism operations, show terrorist leaders struggling over strategy, facing challenges by subordinates and issuing guidelines listing minimum qualifications for terrorism training camp supervisors. Drawn from a classified data-base called “Harmony” compiled by the US Special Operations Command, the documents were disclosed in a report released this week by West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center. Among the 28 documents are several written by bin Laden during the 1990s. The documents show Al Qaeda is committed to waging a holy war against “dictators of the earth and secular groups” that will end only when “everyone believes in Allah.” Many documents show Al Qaeda leaders discussing the need for a successful public relations strategy. Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is also criticised in some documents. One letter by operative Abd Al Halm Adl in June 2002 challenges bin Laden’s leadership and blames him for the “misfortune and disaster” brought on by post-9/11 US military actions. Adl asks the recipient, identified only as Mukhtar, to urge bin Laden to change course and “stop all foreign actions, stop sending people to captivity, stop devising new operations.”
USA Today
Hindustan Times – February 17, 2006.
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Blair secures support for anti-terror law
London – February 16, 2006 – British Prime Minister Tony Blair has finally succeeded in shaking off his run of bad days in the House of Commons and more crucially has won over about two-thirds of the 60-odd serial rebels among his party MPs. Blair swept aside opposition to his controversial anti-terror laws and emerged unscathed from one of the most gruelling weeks of his premiership. Blair had been striving hard to get “glorification” of terrorism banned and punishable but the House of Lords had retuned the bill after expunging the clause for banning it. MPs finally voted by 315 to 277 for the measure, giving a bigger than-expected majority of 38, with only 17 Labour backbenchers defying the government.
Varun Dutt
Hindustan Times – February 17, 2006.
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Pentagon’s new anti-terror plan
The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has completed a new, classified counter-terrorism strategy that for the first time orders the military to focus on nine areas identified as necessary for any terrorist network to operate, senior Pentagon officials say, and warns that ill-conceived military operations could add to terrorists’ ranks. The strategy document orders the Defence department to undertake a broad campaign to find and attack or neutralize terrorist leaders, their havens, financial networks, methods of communication and ability to move around the globe. It also orders the military to focus on terrorist information-gathering systems, personnel and ideology.
The New York Times
Hindustan Times
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Over 20 killed in bombings, shootings in Iraq
Baghdad – February 19, 2006 – Car bombs and gunmen killed more than 20 people including an American soldier, as the government said insurgency-related violence cost the country’s vital oil industry abut $6.25 billion in damage and lost revenue last year. Most of the attacks on Saturday were directed against the US military and Iraqi police, with civilians caught up in the violence. It was the first death of an American soldier since Tuesday and brought the number of US personnel killed since the Iraq war began in March 2003 to at least 2,273, according to an Associated Press count. Four Iraqi policemen were killed when a roadside bomb exploded near a fuel tanker. Another bomb exploded in east Baghdad, killing three Iraqi civilians and injuring four, the police said.
Robert H. Reid
The Asian Age – February 20, 2006.
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Clerics’ fatwa clears N-response
London – February 19, 2006 – Iran’s influential hardline spiritual leaders have issued a fatwa or holy edict, sanctioning the use of atomic weapons as a “countermeasure” against other nuclear powers. Meanwhile Iran has warned that any Israeli attack against it would provoke a swift response, state-run television reported. The pronouncement is particularly worrying because it has come from Mr. Mohsen Gharavian, a disciple of the ultra-conservative Ayotollah Mohammed Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi, who is widely regarded as closest to Iran’s new President.
(PTI,AP)
The Asian Age – February 20, 2006.
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Muslims warn armed struggle
Colombo – February 19, 2006 – A leading Muslim human rights activist from the North-Eastern province of Sri Lanka has warned that Muslims may be forced to take up arms and seek help from the Muslim world if the LTTE continues to harass them and the government ignores their plight. M.I.M. Mohideen, Chairman of the Muslim Rights Organization (MRO), told the Hindustan Times, “If this state of affairs is allowed to continue, we will have a problem of immense magnitude – that is, the possibility of Muslim youths taking up arms and seeking support from neighbouring Muslim countries who will certainly not allow their brothers and sisters here to be left undefended.”
P.K. Balachandran
Hindustan Times – February 20, 2006.
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Five killed
Imphal – Five persons, including four Manipur police commando personnel, were killed and two commando personnel injured in an ambush by insurgents in Thoubal district on Monday, official sources said. The insurgents fired at a police commando force at Thoubal Bazar complex, about three km south-east of here, around 4 p.m., the sources said.
PTI
The Asian Age – February 21, 2006.
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19 killed
Baghdad – Three bombs killed at least 19 people in Iraq on Monday, as the US ambassador warned against sectarianism and militias in the new government. The attack took place in the Kadhimiya district of Baghdad, where a suicide bomber strapped with explosives bounded a bus and blew himself up, killing at least 12 people.
Reuters
The Asian Age – February 21, 2006
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Islamic group plotting attacks in Jakarta
Jakarta – February 23, 2006 – The Jemaah Islamiyah terror network survived the death of its master bomb-maker last year, and is now splintered into independent cells that continue to recruit suicide bombers in Indonesia, a confidential government report says. The cells are called “Thaifah Mansurah” (or Winning Team), and operate independently according to a confidential document.
(AP)
The Asian Age – February 24, 2006.
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Suicide attack bid on Saudi oil facility
Dubai – Saudi security forces appeared to have foiled an attempt by suicide car bombers to attack a major oil refinery complex in the kingdom’s oil-rich eastern province. Officials said the bombers in two cars tried to storm the Abqaiq refinery complex. The Arabic language al Araybia television quoting an Interior Ministry statement said two cars exploded at a side entrance of the facility after a firefight with security guards. Two Saudi security men were critically wounded in the attack.
Atul Aneja
The Hindu – February 25, 2006.
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Car bomb attack in Karbala, shootings across Iraq
Baghdad – A series of bombings, including a car bomb attack in the Shia holy city of Karbala, and shootings across Iraq on Saturday have killed at least 24 persons and left dozens wounded, officials said. Rebels blew up a car bomb in Karbala killing five persons and wounding 52. Karbala police chief told Iraqi television that police were alerted to a suspicious car parked 200 metres from a security checkpoint. The car exploded, killing three policemen and two civilians. The sectarian-fuelled bloodshed raged on Saturday as 12 farm labourers were found shot dead in an orchard in the mixed province of Diyala on Saturday. Two policemen and one Iraqi soldier were killed and 10 wounded in a bomb attack and shooting on the funeral procession of an Al-Arabiya journalist kidnapped and shot dead while reporting on the bombing of the samara shrine, police said. In other violence, three people, including a child, were killed when a rocket hit a house in Baghdad’s Shia dominated Sadr city, an official said. In another incident, one worker of a leather factory was killed and two wounded when gunmen stormed the factory.
AFP
The Hindu – February 26, 2006.
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Men rob bank for Qaeda in Pakistan
Peshawar – February 25, 2006 – Two armed men dressed like security guards stole more than $1 million and 5.3 million Pakistani rupees from the main branch of the Saudi-owned Al-Faisal Bank in north-western Pakistan on Saturday by holding the staff hostage. They left a note saying they were stealing for Al Qaeda, the police said.
(AP)
The Asian Age – February 26, 2006
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Car bomb attack injures 2 in Srinagar
Srinagar – February 26, 2006 – Militants today exploded a car-bomb when an Army convoy was passing through central Srinagar injuring two jawans critically, official sources said. A parked Maruti car laden with explosives went off near a hospital at Bemina at 9.50 A.M. when an Army convoy was passing through the area and the splinters hit a vehicle injuring two jawans.
Express News Service
The Indian Express – February 27, 2006.
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3 soldiers, 16 rebels die in Nepal clashes
Kathmandu – February 27, 2006 – The Communist rebels attacked a security checkpoint on a highway near the Nepalese capital on Monday, killing at least three soldiers, while at least 16 insurgents died in fierce fighting in the country’s west, officials said. In fighting on Sunday in southwest of Kathmandu, 16 rebels were killed in a gun-battle after the Maoists attacked a security patrol. At least five soldiers were also wounded in the fighting.
Binaj Gurubacharya/(AP)
The Asian Age – February 28, 2006.
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Food for Thought
Being busy does not always mean real work. The object of all work is production or accomplishment and to either of these ends there must be forethought, system planning, intelligence, and honest purpose, as well as perspiration. Seeming to do is not doing.
- Thomas A. Edison
In my youth I stressed freedom, and in my old age I stress order. I have made the great discovery that liberty is a product of order.
- Will Durant
The power of accurate observation is frequently called cynicism by those who don’t have it.
- George Bemard Shaw
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