RICHARD BEESTON Afghan News Network
AMERICA has reportedly won approval from two former Soviet Central Asian states to deploy combat aircraft from their bases north of Afghanistan. According to The Washington Post, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan have both agreed to allow the US Air Force to use its facilities to mount patrols and even combat missions against Osama bin Laden, the fugitive terrorist, and his hosts, the Taleban religious authorities. If the deployment goes ahead it would mark the first time since the collapse of Communism a decade ago that American warplanes have been allowed to use facilities in the former Soviet Union on combat missions.
When the move was first proposed, in the wake of last week's bombings, Russia's military chiefs angrily condemned the idea, fearing that America would gain a toehold in a region that Russia has considered its backyard since the 19th century. However, President Bush is known to have held direct talks with President Karimov of Uzbekistan. The Kremlin's approval was regarded as necessary for the use of Tajik bases, where thousands of Russian troops are based.
Spokesmen for the two countries yesterday denied that any deal had been made, but it is entirely possible that the American deployment will take place in total secrecy. A similarly secret deployment of American airborne troops is expected in Pakistani air bases near the Afghan border.
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09/21/2001 ||
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AFP
The specter of war loomed closer Friday as more countries joined the United States in pledging to take action after Afghanistan's Taliban rulers defied a US ultimatum to surrender terror suspect Osama bin Laden. "We have resolved to hold to account all of those who are responsible for aiding, financing and otherwise supporting and harbouring terrorists," US Secretary of State Colin Powell said at a meeting of the Organization of American States (OAS) in Washington.
"We act in concert with the rest of the civilized world," he said, underlining what he said was a determination to take "concerted actions in defense of freedom." Earlier, Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia rejected US President George W. Bush's demand for the immediate handover of bin Laden, the chief suspect in the September 11 airborne attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that left more than 6,800 people dead or missing. "Without evidence, no," Taliban Ambassador to Pakistan Abdul Salam Zaeef told reporters in Islamabad.
The US administration responded swiftly, saying its warning to the Taliban was plain. "If they harbor terrorists, the president's message is clear: We will defeat you," said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer.
In a tough speech to the US Congress, Bush on Thursday demanded that the Taliban deliver bin Laden and destroy bases of his al-Qaeda terrorist network. Otherwise, he said, they would face the wrath of US forces.
This article starring:
ABDUL SALAM ZAIF
Taliban
Ari Fleischer
Colin Powell
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09/21/2001 ||
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Financial Times Brian Groom and Stephen Fidler
The US and Britain are to take military action by themselves against Osama bin Laden, prime suspect behind last week's terrorist atrocities, and his protectors in Afghanistan. According to senior British officials, President George W. Bush and Tony Blair, the UK prime minister, agreed that a tight command structure was needed and that the military operation should be undertaken largely, perhaps wholly, by their own forces. The White House declined to comment. However, one lesson US military planners took from Nato's bombing campaign in Kosovo in 1999 was that a large alliance complicated and delayed the choice of objectives.
The agreement between the two leaders came in meetings at the White House on Thursday, before Mr Bush delivered his address to Congress. In the speech, widely praised by political supporters and opponents, Mr Bush delivered an ultimatum to Afghanistan's Taliban rulers to hand over those connected to Mr bin Laden's network and to close down terrorist bases. The Taliban, he said, "will hand over the terrorists or they will share in their fate".
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09/21/2001 ||
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Reuters
With President Bush warning the hour for military action was near, U.S. heavy bombers and elite troops prepared on Friday to move within striking distance of Afghanistan. Defense officials said KC-135 tanker aircraft had set up an ''air bridge'' to refuel B-1 and B-52 bombers ordered to fly from the United States to the Gulf and Indian Ocean and confirmed that a senior Air Force general was now in the region to oversee any strikes.
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09/21/2001 ||
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WSJ Best of the West Today
The News International, a Pakistani paper, carries a report that quotes "sources close to the Taliban" as saying that bin Laden has already left Afghanistan "for an undisclosed destination and has moved out of the Afghan territory at least 4 days before the religious Shura of the clerics issued its recommendation to leave the country."
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09/21/2001 ||
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Pravda
After it was announced that the WTC in New York had been attacked, the mass media of many countries, especially in Israel, hurried to avail themselves of the incident and declared mourning for 4,000 Israelis working in the towers of the World Trade Centre. All of a sudden, the Israeli workers stopped being talked about. It became clear later that they did not turn up at work that day when four passenger jets were hijacked in the USA and used in terrorist attacks. Nobody is talking about the Israelis being killed or wounded in the attack. According to Arab diplomatic sources cited by the Jordan newspaper Al-Wattan, the Israeli workers just did not appear at work that day, because they had taken a "hint" from Israeli secret police (Shabak). This fact caused concern among American officials who want to know how the Israelis knew of the attacks before they attacks were carried out and why the Israelis did not advice the US authorities about it?
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09/21/2001 ||
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TNR Idiocy Watch
"The attack on September 11 was certainly not about people hating our freedoms. It was purely in response to America's foreign policy; and it was primarily about our monetary and military support of Israel.... We cannot afford to be manipulated by powerful lobbies who owe their allegiance to Israel over that of America. You must also certainly recognize that the agenda of the Jewish-dominated news media can seriously conflict with the interests of the American people. I pray that you as our President will single-mindedly put the interests of the American people first, last and always."--"An Open Letter to the President of the United States," by David Duke, September 21
This article starring:
David Duke
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09/21/2001 ||
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By Michelle Oswell and Michael Burdei FrontPageMagazine.com
A CONGREGATION of faithful left-wing fundamentalists descended en masse at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Monday night, to practice one of their most sacred rituals: spewing hatred for America. "If I were the President, I would first apologize to all the widows and orphans, the tortured and the impoverished, and all the millions of other victims of American imperialism. Then . . . I would announce that America's global interventions had come to an end," preached William Blum, author of Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower. "I would then reduce the military budget by at least 90 percent and I would use the savings to pay the reparations to our victims and to increase social services. . ."
Nod, nod, nod clap, clap, clap responded the 700 faculty, students and community members in attendance.
"If one [of the perpetrators] is Osama bin Laden, send the international police for him and pick up Henry Kissinger and Augusto Pinochet on the way home," declared Catherine Lutz, professor of Anthropology.
This article starring:
Catherine Lutz
William Blum
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09/21/2001 ||
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Washington Times
Witness Susan Sontag, writing in the current issue of The New Yorker: 'The voices licensed to follow the event seem to have joined together in a campaign to infantilize the public. Where is the acknowledgment that this was not a 'cowardly' attack on 'civilization' or 'liberty' or 'humanity' or 'the free world' but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed superpower, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions?'
This article starring:
Susan Sontag
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09/21/2001 ||
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JOE SOUCHERAY St Paul, Minn., Pioneer Press
This is not a complicated issue. There are people who hate us. Their hatred of us is ancient. Now, what I would like to know from all the hug-and-love people is just what they anticipate might come as a result of proceeding tentatively, trying to understand, exercising caution. This enemy doesn't want our love. They don't want you to throw your arm around their shoulders and invite them to the next backyard barbecue.
The brand of hatred practiced by Muslim terrorists is based on the belief that we are inconsequential and do not deserve to be on the same earth. Now, let me ask the hug-therapy-and-forgiveness crowd something else: You are the same people who worship at the new American altar of diversity. We are to be understanding of the differences among us, you say. I agree. We are all human souls under different kinds of skin. I buy that.
Why then, don't you expect the same from the terrorists? These people obviously don't practice any acknowledgement of diversity. You want to forgive and hug and proceed slowly and not rock the boat. Well, why don't you demand of the enemy that they, too, welcome diversity, meaning that they should welcome us? Their idea of diversity is to kill as many different kinds of Americans as they can. For example, I do not intend to hijack any airliners and dive-bomb them into Mecca. Right off the bat that makes me more enlightened than the thugs who killed us in New York and Washington.
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09/21/2001 ||
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FoxNews.com
Thousands of sports fans decided hockey could take a back seat to national affairs Thursday night, electing to postpone a contest between the Philadelphia Flyers and the New York Rangers in order to watch President Bush's nationally televised speech.
The third period of the National Hockey League exhibition game was about to start as the stadium scoreboard announced that Bush's speech to Congress could be watched in the outer concourses. But when the speech was taken off the scoreboard screen, the 19,117 fans booed in protest, eventually erupting into a chant. "Leave it on! Leave it on!" echoed throughout the Philadelphia arena. The protests turned to loud cheers when the speech was restored. By the time Bush concluded his address 36 minutes later, the teams lined up to shake hands. The game was declared a 2-2 tie "out of respect for where the United States was headed in the near future."
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09/21/2001 ||
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Reuters
A top Islamic cleric has warned that Muslims will unite against the United States if it carries out its threats to strike Afghanistan in retaliation for last week's suicide attacks on U.S. landmarks. "We warn America that all the Muslim world will unite against it if it acts on its whims and its haughty drive to hit innocent people," Sheikh Youssef al-Qardawi, a widely respected Egyptian cleric based in Qatar, said. "Many leaders may submit to U.S. tyranny and threats, but the people will not submit. America will not frighten the people, they will not be scared off by its military arsenal, nuclear weapons or economic might because they believe in God," he said in a sermon aired on Qatar-based al-Jazeera television.
This article starring:
SHEIKH YUSEF AL QARDAWI
Learned Elders of Islam
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09/21/2001 ||
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Jane's
There is consternation within Western intelligence groups at Libya's developing ties with Pagad, a South African Islamic fundamentalist group labelled as terrorist by the US State Department. During a recent visit to Southern Africa, a South African intelligence source told IAA that the Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Ghadaffi had meetings with senior Pagad members in the Zimbabwe capital. Ghadaffi had travelled to the Zimbabwe capital from Lusaka, Zambia, in a 150-vehicle motorcade protected by special squads of his trained women bodyguards.
It was there, notably, that he proclaimed on television that: "Africa is for the Africans and the whites must all go back to Europe". Before leaving Harare, Ghadaffi promised Zimbabwe President Mugabe US$360m in oil and contributed $1m to the funds of his ZANU-PF party with which to fight the next election.
This article starring:
Muammar Ghadaffi
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09/21/2001 ||
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Reuters
Shouting "God is Great", setting fire to shops and stoning cars, thousands of protesters across Pakistan raged at their president's decision to stand with the United States in the hunt for Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden. "Stop aggression against Afghanistan", "We will fight until the destruction of the USA", shouted a crowd of 5,000 in the heart of Peshawar, capital of the North West Frontier Province that borders Afghanistan.
Protests in Peshawar, home to at least two million Afghan refugees, were noisy and demonstrators burnt an effigy of U.S. President George W. Bush. "We have to show and tell the people how unjust America's actions are to try to attack the Taliban without any concrete evidence," said Abdul Khaliq, spokesman for the hardline Jamiat Ulema Islam. "The government should know what the people are thinking," Khaliq added.
"If Musharraf supports the Taliban that is good, if not he is our enemy," said one protester in Peshawar who described himself as a mujahid, or holy warrior.
Hundreds of thousands are expected to participate in rallies after midday prayers, said a spokesman for the groups organising the protests, including the militant Mutahidda Qaumi Movement (MQM). "We have issued a call for a peaceful strike and assured the authorities that there will be no violence," the spokesman said.
"This hasty decision made by the Pakistani government does not enjoy the support of the masses since this is tantamount to mortgaging the national sovereignty for mean and petty games," Qazi Hussein Ahmed, head of Pakistan's largest Islamic party Jamaat-e-Islami, said in Islamabad on Thursday.
This article starring:
ABDUL KHALIQ
Jamiat Ulema Islam
QAZI HUSEIN AHMED
Jamaat-e-Islami
Jamaat-e-Islami
Jamiat Ulema Islam
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09/21/2001 ||
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Reuters
Canadian government officials on Friday said they were unhappy that President Bush had failed to mention Canada in a major speech thanking Washington's allies for their support. Canada, which in many ways is Washington's closest ally, was not among the many nations which Bush on Thursday said had either backed Washington after last week's deadly attacks or had lost citizens. "It's raised a lot of eyebrows here. We are disappointed,'' one senior official told Reuters. Canada took in around 250 airliners and 30,000 passengers after U.S. airspace was closed last Tuesday while many Canadians lined up to give blood. Around 75 Canadians are still missing.
Critics said Bush was clearly criticizing what they described as the tepid response by Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, who has kept a low profile since the attacks.
This article starring:
Jean Chretien
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09/21/2001 ||
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AFP
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak says he has not seen any proof of Osama bin Laden being "the brains" behind the terrorist attacks on the United States and warns Washington against over-hasty reprisals in a newspaper interview to be published on Saturday. "That's what the Americans say and they surely have their reasons," Mubarak told the French daily, Le Figaro.
He also strongly criticised Britain's asylum policy for allowing Islamic radicals into the country as refugees. In the interview, he urged Washington not to rush into taking action: "Wait until your investigation is finished. Hold back until you know who the criminals are. If you launch an indiscriminate attack against Afghanistan or one of the other countries on your list of 'rogue states', you are going to kill a lot of innocent people. Just like the terrorists who came to kill innocent people in your country. If the US punishes solely the murderer, then no-one will criticise it and no muslim will accuse it of waging war against Islam because our religion is against terrorists and murderers. But the remedy must not end up being worse than the problem."
Mubarak said he believed the current lack of information could not allow one to blindly join the coalition being advocated by US President George W. Bush. He proposed instead an international conference, under UN auspices, which could draw up an agreement declaring terrorism as illegal.
This article starring:
Hosni Mubarak
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/21/2001 ||
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Susan B. Glasser Washington Post
MOSCOW, Sept. 21 President Vladimir Putin today ruled out any "haggling" with the United States over Russia's cooperation with American efforts to battle terrorists, saying support for retaliatory strikes was not contingent on the United States backing away from its planned missile defense system. "We don't want and won't do any haggling," Putin said. "Combining efforts in combating terror is a separate part of our cooperation."
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09/21/2001 ||
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The Japanese government may dispatch elements of the Self-Defense Forces to Pakistan as well as to the Indian Ocean to provide logistic support to the U.S. military should it follow through with threats of force in the region. The government and the Liberal Democratic Party plan to submit a bill to the extraordinary Diet session that convenes Thursday to enable the SDF to support a U.S.-led multinational force. The bill features measures to provide support for refugees who may flee areas affected by any military action and identifies Pakistan as one possible haven.
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09/21/2001 ||
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CNN
Three men and one woman were arrested Friday by anti-terrorist branch officers in connection with last week's attacks on the World Trade Center, the Scotland Yard said. Meanwhile, a federal judge denied bond Friday for three men arrested this week in connection with the investigation into the September 11 terrorist attacks. Also, French counter-intelligence officers arrested eight people suspected of belonging to extremist Islamic groups thought to be planning attacks on U.S. interests, the French Ministry said.
The men denied bond Friday were arrested on Monday in Detroit and identified in court documents as Karim Koubriti, 23; Ahmed Hannan, 33; and Farouk Ali-Haimoud, 21. All were described as resident aliens and Arabs. They were arrested after FBI agents went to a Detroit apartment Monday in search of another man, Nabil Al-Marabh, identified as a potential suspect or associate of the 19 hijackers from last week's attacks. Al-Marabh was later arrested outside Chicago, FBI officials said Thursday. Authorities had discovered false visas, passports and other ID, as well as what appeared to be a diagram of an airport flight line.
In England, police also apprehended two men and a woman in west London during a 3 a.m. raid, and then arrested a fourth man in the West Midlands around 7 p.m., the Scotland Yard said. All four are now being questioned in a central London police station, police said. No nationalities were given of those arrested.
This article starring:
Ahmed Hannan
Farouk Ali-Haimoud
Karim Koubriti
Nabil Al-Marabh
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/21/2001 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
