The Friendship Bridge between Uzbekistan and Afghanistan will reopen soon, allowing humanitarian aid through for the first time since 1996. The opening was announced by Secretary of State Colin Powell and Uzbek President Islam Karimov in Tashkent.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Civil war became likely as Gul Agha was reported preparing to move out of Kandahar to take over neighbouring provinces Helmand, Uruzgan and Zabul, as well as Herat and Farah in the west. Herat and Farah are currently under the control of ethnic Tajik commander Ismail Khan, a senior member of the Northern Alliance forces. "I will send my men or lead myself if need be. I will give them plans and a movement order," Gul Agha commander Jalal Khan said. "We are already in consultations on when to advance in these provinces."
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12/08/2001 ||
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U.S. Marines buried an Afghan anti-Taliban fighter with military honors after he was killed by an errant American bomb. The Afghan, who was not identified, was one of six anti-Taliban fighters killed when an Air Force B-52 dropped a one-ton satellite-guided bomb that also killed three Army Green Berets. Twenty Americans and 18 Afghans were wounded.
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12/08/2001 ||
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British journalist Robert Fisk was attacked and badly beaten by a mob in Pakistan. Fisk, 55, a correspondent for the London based Independent newspaper, was set upon by a group of around 100 Afghan refugees after his car broke down on the road between Quetta and Chaman.
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12/08/2001 ||
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FoxNews reports that Jihad Johnny, the American traitor, is being held for safekeeping at Camp Rhino. The Marines are probably too gentlemanly to use him as a urinal.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Heavy fighting has erupted in a power struggle among anti-Taliban tribal leaders in Paktia province, AIP. Fighting in the provincial capital of Gardez was ignited by the supporters of Pacha Gul Zadran in a bid to occupy positions in the shura, the post-Taliban administrative council established in the province.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Ex-potentate Mullah Mahommad Omar was rumored to be near Kandahar in the custody of a warlord sympathetic to the Taliban. Khaled Pashtoon, a spokesman for Gul Agha, said his group would demand that the Taleban Supreme Leader be handed over at an imprending tribal meeting. The South Asian Dispatch Agency, based in Pakistan, quoted Omar's spokesman Syed Tayyab Agha as saying both he and the Taliban chief remained in Kandahar. "I am here and will remain here until otherwise ordered," he said. "As long as Mullah Omar is here, I will be here. Many of our people are still in this city." Omarâs family entered Chaman, in Pakistan, after fleeing Kandahar the BBC Pushto service reported. It said the family was first spotted in two vehicles at Spin Boldak, and then they were seen at Chaman.
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12/08/2001 ||
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"In the Taliban days, there was a leader of the faithful who sat in Kandahar, not having the faintest idea about people who were in poverty, who were killed, whose houses were burned, whose children died of hunger. And still he claimed to be a leader of Islam and a leader of his country." - from a sermon by Mullah Abdul Rauf in Kabul See, the Talibs are out of small arms range now...
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12/08/2001 ||
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Pakistani Gen. Rashid Quereshi said "there is no truth in the reports that Osama bin Laden or Mullah Mohammed Omar have already entered Pakistan." Quereshi said troops have sealed all trails leading into his country from Tora Bora. Pakistan moved helicopter gunships and troop reinforcements to the border to prevent fleeing Taliban or members of al Qaeda sneaking into the country.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Following the Taliban withdrawal, tensions were running high in Kandahar, with rival armed groups -- one under Mullah Naqibullah and the other under Gul Agha -- claiming control of key parts of the city. Armed Taliban are still roaming the streets despite a deal to surrender, a Taliban fighter said. "There are still Arab Taliban moving around the city. They are armed," said Hafiz Abdul Rub. "No one is in control of the city." Forces loyal to Afghan tribal chief Gul Agha claimed control as a meeting of rival clans sought to end the chaos. Mullah Naqibullah, who was supposed to take over the city under the terms of the Taliban's surrender, was reported confined to the main military base in Kandahar, under siege by rival forces.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Hamid Karzai's priorities for Afghanistan: "To bring peace and security for the people of Afghanistan; provide Afghan people a good economic opportunity; have excellent relations with our neighbors and the rest of the world; and -- very important -- to make sure we get rid of terrorism in Afghanistan and the rest of the world." He might also add averting civil war as Pashtun commanders ignore him.
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12/08/2001 ||
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In New Windsor, Md., President Bush visited a warehouse "full of love and decency" where the first relief supplies bound for Afghan children and bought with contributions from American youngsters began the journey to Afghanistan.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Yemeni army and police have freed a German businessman held hostage by tribal kidnappers for 10 days and captured one of the abductors in Marib province. The hostage, identified by the German embassy in Sanaa as Karl Lehnardt, 47, was freed "without shots being fired" by either side. What do they think the place is? Sardinia?
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12/08/2001 ||
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Israeli helicopters fired missiles at Palestinian security buildings the Rafah refugee camp in southern Gaza in retaliation for the firing of mortar shells at Jewish settlements. No injuries were reported. Three buildings belonging to military intelligence and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's personal guard, Force 17, were badly damaged.
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12/08/2001 ||
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"The Palestinian representatives have continued to deceive us ... to give the impression that they have really embarked on a war against terrorism," an Israeli spokesman said. He was speaking at the end of Palestinian-Israeli security talks which were also attended by US peace envoy Anthony Zinni and representatives of the US Central Intelligence Agency. "In reality they only arrested second and third-ranking terrorists and not those who are really dangerous." Really? We are so surprised. Really.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Jerusalem Mufti Sheikh Ikrema Sabri issued a statement in which he justified suicide bombings against Israel. The remarks also slammed religious rulings in Egypt and Saudi Arabi that condemned suicide attacks. "The opposition [to Israel] is legitimate, and he who gives his life, does not have to ask permission from anyone....We have to concentrate on the legitimacy of the opposition, it is forbidden to oppose the Intifada and the Jihad, but [an obligation] to stand beside them and support them." said Sabri, who was appointed as Jerusalem Mufti by Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Palestinian Chairman-for-Life Yasser Arafat said that "I extend my hand for peace with Israel for the sake of our children, despite everything... I am ready to implement all the agreements which have been concluded," with Israel, Arafat told an interviewer, reiterating that his Palestinian Authority had publicly accepted a truce with Israel. Betcha I can hold my breath longer than it lasts...
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12/08/2001 ||
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Arafat said that US peace envoy Anthony "Zinni gave me the night before yesterday a list of 33 men wanted by Israel and I arrested so far 17 of them," Arafat said in the same interview. Gosh. That's even better than a dozen. (You heard it here first!)
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12/08/2001 ||
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Arafat also charged that the recent spate of Palestinian suicide bombings in Jerusalem and Haifa that killed 25 people "are not aimed against you (the Israelis) but against the Palestinian people." The attacks have been claimed by the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, and a third bombing that wounded several people in Jerusalem by the smaller Islamic Jihad group. The two groups are the main Palestinian opposition to Arafat's authority. Yasser, I think their aim's off...
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12/08/2001 ||
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Two prosecutors in Chechnya were killed when their car was blown up by a remote-controlled land mine in Grozny. Separately, assailants fatally shot a Chechen policeman after breaking into his house in Gudermes. The land-mine blast killed prosecutors Akhmed Khamzatov and Alexander Leushin. The policeman, Shamkhan Magomadov, was shot at point-blank range by two masked assailants.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Dahmane Abd Al Sattar, a 39-year-old Tunisian who was one of the two assassins of Ahmed Shah Masood, was an active representative in Belgium of al-Qaeda, according to the Belgian newspaper Le Soir. Al Sattar held a university degree in journalism from his home country and held a forged and stolen Belgian passport. Le Soir said French intelligence "became convinced that Masood's assassination was ordered by al-Qaeda and carried out by a Tunisian movement with a representation in Brussels of which Dahmane served as a way-station".
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12/08/2001 ||
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"The family of Dr. Ayman al-Zawahri declares to the Muslim nation the death of Azza Anwar Nuwaira and her children," said a notice published in the obituary columns of Egypt's Al-Ahram. Earlier reports said they were killed in a U.S. airstrike, and the notice said they died as martyrs.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Islamic militants attacked an Indian army convoy in Kashmir, killing a soldier and sparking a gunbattle that left five civilians, two attackers and a policeman dead. In addition to the nine killed, hospital officials said 23 civilians and seven soldiers were wounded.
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12/08/2001 ||
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Saudi Arabia's foreign minister Prince Saud Faisal told The Washington Post that his nation expects to take custody of any Saudi citizens captured in Afghanistan and punish those who were "criminally involved." Hey, it could happen!
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12/08/2001 ||
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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.
