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Tuesday, 24 July 2007 |
 The UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) was increased from 2,000 to 13,300 peacekeepers after the month-long war last summer between Israel and Hezbollah. The UN peacekeepers are led by elite European troops and are charged with helping the Lebanese Army ensure that the tense border remained calm. But a year on, UNIFIL still finds itself under threat, not from the Shiite Hezbollah, but from suspected radical Sunni militants possibly inspired by Al Qaeda. And in a bizarre twist, some UNIFIL contingents are now seeking the cooperation of the powerful Hezbollah, which also views militant Sunnis as a threat, to help provide tacit security for the peacekeepers, Hezbollah and UNIFIL sources say. Comments (1)
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Tuesday, 24 July 2007 |
 A group of South Korean religious leaders issued a statement Monday pleading for the prompt and safe return of 23 South Koreans kidnapped in Afghanistan. The captives, mostly females in their 20s and 30s, were in the war-torn country providing medical services when they were seized on Thursday by a group of Taliban rebels in a bus while they were en route to Kandahar, a southern Afghan city, from Kabul. The militants initially demanded that South Korea, which has 210 army engineers and medics in Afghanistan, pull its troops out. But they later changed their demand, saying 23 Taliban prisoners should be freed, or the hostages would be killed.
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Sunday, 22 July 2007 |
 Hidden away in the diaries of Blair's right-hand man is a revealing admission a key components of the controversial Iraq War dossier was spun out of all recognition. The diaries capture well the frustration as Campbell and his team struggled to render the nuances of the spooks' official language into easily digestible English. At the beginning of the process, he had said that the dossier would have to be "revelatory". When the intelligence people had done their work, he knew the dossier would demand a "media-friendly editorial job". The nuclear issue proved particularly tricky. Throughout September of 2002, Campbell pressurised John Scarlett, then head of the Joint Intelligence Committee and now head of MI6, to improve an insufficiently worrying assessment of Saddam's alleged nuclear programme. Campbell's admitted "bombardment" of Scarlett, which was backed by Blair, resulted in the tentative assessment of the intelligence services being replaced with a more compelling one.Comments (1) |
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Sunday, 22 July 2007 |
 "Be certain that Yasser Arafat's final days are numbered, but allow us to finish him off our way, not yours. And be sure as well that ... the promises I made in front of President Bush, I will give my life to keep." Those words were written by the Fatah warlord Mohammed Dahlan, whose US- and Israeli-backed forces were routed by Hamas in the Gaza Strip last month, in a 13 July 2003 letter to then Israeli defense minister Shaul Mofaz and published on Hamas' website on 4 July this year. Dahlan, who despite his failure to hold Gaza, remains a senior advisor to Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas, outlines his conspiracy to overthrow Arafat, destroy Palestinian institutions and replace them with a quisling leadership subservient to Israel.Be first to comment this article |
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Friday, 20 July 2007 |
 As opposed to the forecast, energetic diplomatic activity - which in the distant past was called the "peace process" - began during the July-August vacation, of all times. Summit meetings, a prisoner release, economic gestures, optimistic declarations and diplomatic plans are all making us feel that something serious is really happening. Because if not, such important people would not be devoting so much time to involvement in the diplomatic process, especially during the summer vacation. The problem is that the reality does not show signs of surrendering to theories and desires. Israeli construction on the West Bank continues at a rapid pace and infrastructure networks are covering the entire area; a regime that is severing and crushing the Palestinian community is taking root; the separation fence is being built; the isolation of the West Bank from the Gaza Strip is taking on the character of a quasi-permanent geopolitical separation.Be first to comment this article |
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Friday, 20 July 2007 |
 The Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran has strongly criticised the Financial Times and launched a complaint with the Press Complaint Commission over the publication by the FT of a story making incriminating and unfounded allegations about Iranian government's complicity with Al-Qaeda launching terrorist operations in Iraq, using Iranian territory. The story by Stephen Fidler in the Financial Times, "Al-Qaeda linked to operations from Iran" , 6 July, makes serious allegations about Al-Qaeda and Sunni extremists linked to Al-Qaeda using Iranian territory as a base for launching terrorist operations in Iraq with the possible knowledge and cooperation of the Iranian government. The FT uses unsubstantiated allegations, invariably attributed to anonymous "officials" or "analysts", without questioning the plausibility of these dangerously incriminating claims.Be first to comment this article |
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Tuesday, 17 July 2007 |
 A new analysis of official figures from the Ministry of Defence has shown that British troops in Iraq are being wounded at double the rate of last year, while in Afghanistan the number of wounded this year already exceeds the total for the whole of 2006. This has gone hand in hand with an increase in troops killed on operational duty in Iraq, where 32 soldiers have already been lost in 2007, compared with 29 during the whole of last year. Advances in battlefield medicine and casualty evacuation mean that many more soldiers survive, and with much worse injuries, for every one who loses his life. But anger is growing among military commanders and charities at the Government's failure to face up to the implications of Britain's wars for veterans who will suffer pain, disability and mental problems for the rest of their lives.Be first to comment this article |
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Tuesday, 17 July 2007 |
 Although Washington has been accusing Syria and Iran of helping insurgents in Iraq, it is the US ally Saudi Arabia which is the largest source of foreign insurgents in Iraq, a media report has said. A new report suggests that 45 percent of all the foreign fighters and bombers in Iraq are Saudi nationals despite the US allegations. Official US military figures made available to The Times also show that nearly half of the 135 foreigners in US detention facilities in Iraq are Saudis. Fighters from Saudi Arabia are thought to have carried out more suicide bombings than those of any other nationality, the newspaper added.Comments (20) |
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