[Khaama (Afghanistan)] President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani ...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. .. has dismissed some officials in the Ministry of Public Health during a surprise visit to the compound of ministry on Saturday.
The Office of the President, ARG Palace, said President Ghani ordered to dismiss the high level officials of the ministry who have remained negligent on their duty.
He also announced that those ministry employees who have been illegally appointed are dismissed, emphasizing that the recruitment of the employees should be based on the law.
President Ghani also asked the ministry officials to present a one month reform plan in the light of assessment and improvement of hospitals.
Deputy public health minister Ahmad Jan Naeem said the current hospitals in Kabul ...the capital of Afghanistan. Home to continuous fighting from 1992 to 1996 between the forces of would-be strongman and Pak ISI/Jamaat-e-Islami sock puppet Gulbuddin Hekmayar and the Northern Alliance, a period which won Hek the title Most Evil Man in the World and didn't do much for the reputations of the Northern Alliance guys either.... can not respond to the people considering the growing population of the capital and old equipment used in the hospitals.
He proposed to the President that new hospitals should be built in the capital and only Wazir Akbar Khan is providing orthopedic services and the Indhira Gandhi hospital provide services to the children which are not sufficient.
Naeem however said the public health sector also had achievements including the establishment of heart surgery section for the children.
President Ghani instructed for an audit of the ministry and the vacant positions should be announced in a bid to ensure fair recruitment of the employees in the ministry.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/10/2016 00:00 ||
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[DW] The Ethiopian government has declared a state of emergency across the country following days of deadly anti-government protests. Prime Minister Desalegn insists the move will not breach the basic rights of citizens.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[LibyaHerald] The Libyan army’s southern commander claimed today to have scotched an attempt to replace him. Rebellious officers met on Friday in Brak Al-Shatti and chose General Suliman Kanah as their new chief.
General Mohamed Ben Nail said that his troops had surrounded the rebel commanders and used mediators to persuade them to hand over their arms. According to LANA in Beida the rebels had then been allowed to go free. There was no mention of where this confrontation took place nor whether Kanah was among the disarmed commanders who were released.
Nail blamed the attempted takeover on a conspiracy hatched by UNSMIL chief Martin Kobler which he said had been aimed to divide the Libyan army. Nail added that the army had now reinforced its positions in Sebha.
The Brak Al-Shatti rebellion was seen as a challenge to armed forces commander-in-chef Khalifa Hafter. The rebels had said they still considered themselves under army orders but did not wish to become involved in polarised politics.
The army’s claimed success in countering the breakaway would appear to have increased its hold on Sebha, the major town in the south. Until July the dominant armed group was Misrata’s Third Force which in April 2014 had been sent south as peacekeepers.
However this July, as the manpower demands of the Bunyan Marosus operation against IS terrorists in Sirte increased, the greater part of the Third Force was withdrawn from the Sebha region.
It had been headquartered in Sebha’s Qadaffi-era People’s Palace and also occupied the Tamenhint airbase and barracks outside the town.
[AlArabiya] Next to the rusting shell cases outside Misrata’s museum of Libya’s 2011 uprising is a new addition: a scaffold used by ISIS in Sirte to display bodies of executed prisoners, mounted on a would-be suicide bomber’s captured truck.
Five years after Misrata’s fighters killed Muammar Qaddafi in Sirte, his home city, they are on the verge of ending another campaign there, this time against ISIS militants who controlled the city for a year.
The battle has been costly and drawn-out. Many Misratans, who form one the strongest of the rival military forces to emerge after Gaddafi’s overthrow, say they are tired of war.
But defeating ISIS in Sirte, about 230 km (140 miles) southeast of Misrata along the Mediterranean coast, will leave their city far from secure. Other enemies remain, and some Misratans are ready to fight again if pushed.
In early September, with the war in Sirte already approaching its end, eastern commander Khalifa Haftar seized some of Libya’s major oil ports, one just 200km east of Sirte.
It was a challenge to the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli that is trying to unite competing armed groups. Misrata has supported the GNA; Haftar rejected it.
“We are trying to avoid war, but Haftar is not clear and his intentions are not clear,” said Ibrahim Baitulmal, the head of Misrata’s military council. “Sometimes war is imposed on us, and when the enemy approaches, you have to defend yourself.”
Just two years ago, Misrata was the power base for Libya Dawn, an Islamist-leaning alliance that prevailed against forces aligned with Haftar in a battle for control of Tripoli.
The conflict left Libya with two competing sets of governments in the capital and the east, and eastern authorities later named Haftar, a former Qaddafi ally, to head their forces.
Haftar waged a military campaign in Benghazi against an alliance of Islamists and other opponents that Misrata supported. Misrata swung its support behind the UN-brokered deal that resulted in the GNA, and has provided security for the new government in Tripoli since its arrival in March.
Misrata’s brigades began the campaign in Sirte after ISIS advanced north-west toward their city in May.
Though the operation has been supported by small teams of Western special forces, and since Aug. 1 by US air strikes, Misratans say they feel abandoned.
A large majority of fighters are from Misrata itself. Many lack training and equipment, and casualty rates have been high, with more than 560 fighters killed and at least 2,750 wounded.
Misrata businessmen have made donations, and hundreds of women prepare food each day to be driven in to Sirte.
“We have been alone in this battle,” said Mustafa Ben Haiba, a 46-year-old police employee who lost two of his seven sons in 2011 and another in Sirte in June.
Support for Tripoli
The campaign in Sirte is nominally under the GNA’s command, but the government, which has struggled to establish its authority, has been slow to provide support.
Officials in Misrata say the fight against ISIS has improved relations with residents of Sirte and the inland town of Bani Walid, both bastions of Qaddafi support that Misrata rebels attacked during 2011.
This is part of a broader push for reconciliation that included a recent deal to allow the return of residents to Tawergha, another inland town, which was destroyed and emptied in 2011 after Qaddafi forces used it as a base.
There have also been prisoner exchanges with the western pro-Haftar town of Zintan, said Ali Abusetta, a member of Misrata’s municipal council.
He does not exclude a rapprochement between east and west but, like many in Misrata, he suspects that Haftar wants to become the country’s military ruler.
Both Abusetta and Baitulmal said Misrata would respond if Haftar’s forces advanced further west or tried to keep oil revenues for themselves. But there is little confidence that the GNA and its Western backers would come to Misrata’s defense.
Ziad Bellam, a brigade leader from Misrata, pointed to Egyptian and Emirati support for Haftar, and the presence of French special forces who worked alongside the eastern commander’s troops.
“If they want Haftar, it’s strange that they helped us overthrow Qaddafi,” he said.
Posted by: badanov ||
10/10/2016 00:00 ||
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The top U.S. envoy to the UN visited Seoul on Sunday and warned North Korea that her government willing to use every means to pressure the North to give up its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. Samantha Power sounded the warning in a press conference a day after arriving here on a four-day visit.
Samantha Power is an intellectual and moral lightweight who believes that the U.S. should fight only when it has nothing at stake. She's been a key part of the failed foreign policies (all of them) of the Obama administration. The Russians, Chinese and Iranians laugh at her. I suspect some of our allies also laugh at her. The Norks certainly won't regard her with any gravity whatsoever.
"While the Security Council resolutions are one tool in our toolbox and a very important instrument of pressure, we are committed to using all the tools in our tool kit to address this serious threat, including the diplomatic pressure that we are mobilizing around the world to convince other nations to isolate the regime," Power said.
Power oversees negotiations over sanctions against North Korea at the UN. Her visit comes as the North prepares for what appears to be either another nuclear test or missile launch as it marks the anniversary of its Workers Party on Monday.
Power said North Korea's nuclear problem is also a human rights problem. Arriving at Incheon International Airport on Saturday, she said the North Korean regime is an "abomination" and guilty of the "worst crime."
About which we've done virtually nothing. We're not pressing the sanctions with the vigor required. We're not making it painful for China to use the Norks as their cats paw. We're not trying to go around Fat Boy to help the North Korean people. Our response has been vapid, and has been so since at least the Clinton administration.
In the press conference she accused Pyongyang of investing all its resources into producing illegal weapons even though one in four North Korean children suffers from malnutrition.
That's not news.
The comments reflect Washington's two-track strategy of accusing Pyongyang of both human rights abuses and illegal weapons development.
Which isn't working.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/10/2016 00:00 ||
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#1
If the Norks don't straighten up and fly right, we will unleash the dreaded hash tags on Twitter! Then they'll be sorry!
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
10/10/2016 9:36 Comments ||
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[DW] Security is tight as demonstrators rally for Unity Day celebrations in Dresden marking 26 years since German reunification. German Chancellor Merkel was met with chants of "Merkel must go" and "Traitor to the people."
Posted by: Fred ||
10/10/2016 00:00 ||
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[DW] At least three Turkish diplomats have sought refuge in Germany following the failed July 15 coup, German media report. The reports come amid a tense period in relations between Ankara and Berlin.
The three asylum cases included a military attaché to the Turkish embassy in Berlin, the German daily "Suddeutsche Zeitung," along with broadcasters "NDR" and "WDR," reported Friday.
The applications were made after Turkish authorities denied the validity of hundreds of diplomatic passports in the wake of the attempted putsch by a section of the Turkish military.
Tens of thousands of police, members of the military, academics, judges and others were either fired or detained in the weeks that followed, and diplomats posted abroad weren't spared either, according to the latest in a string of joint investigations by the three news outlets.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/10/2016 00:00 ||
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[Jpost] A Muslim audience member asked about Islamophobia on Sunday night, and how the two candidates planned to deal with rising racism in the US.
Responding first, Donald Trump said that Islamophobia was "a shame," but said that the US Muslim community bears communal responsibility for Islamic terrorism, and that Clinton would not even admit the problem and call it by its name.
Clinton, responding, said that America is not at war with Islam, but with radical jihadist terror, and that Muslim Americans need to be shown that they have a place in the country. And if this was the only difference between the two of them, it would be enough.
#1
So far as I can tell, it is the left who created the term "Islamaphobia." Specifically, it was most likely CAIR that coined this PC crap to try to neuter enemies. Recall that CAIR was an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation trial. Now we find out that in the 28 pages of the 911 report recently released indicates SA was complicit in 911--something most of us suspected ever since 911. So I have to ask, who is responsible for most of the modern day terrorism in the world? The record would indicate that it comes largely from Muslim countries and sleeper Muslim terrorist immigrants that have come to Western countries.
#2
Well, Hillary considers all 'white' America responsible for slavery and segregation, when it was in fact a institution of the Democratic Party. Why won't she accept the logic of that to apply to the Muslim community? /rhet question
#3
What was interesting on this answer was how both candidates almost said the same thing (we need Muslims to report crimes) yet came at it from totally different angles.
[HINDUSTANTIMES] Pakistain-based terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba ...the Army of the Pure, an Ahl-e-Hadith terror organization founded by Hafiz Saeed. LeT masquerades behind the Jamaat-ud-Dawa facade within Pakistain and periodically blows things up and kills people in India. Despite the fact that it is banned, always an interesting concept in Pakistain, the organization remains an blatant tool and perhaps an arm of the ISI... (LeT) suffered the maximum damage in the cross-LoC surgical strikes on terror launch pads carried out by Indian army with assessment reports of radio intercepts indicating that around 20 of its hard boyz were killed.
The assessment reports available from Indian Army’s field units which included radio conversations between various Pak formations showed maximum damage was inflicted on LeT at Dudniyal launchpad in Pakistain-occupied-Kashmire (PoK), opposite to Kupwara sector of North Kashmire, according to sources in the know of details of the recent surgical strikes.
The sources said on Sunday that five teams culled out from the army division in the area were tasked to destroy launchpads of terror groups located at Kail also known as Kel and Dudniyal.
In a well calibrated operation, which started on the intervening night of September 28 and 29, the Indian Army moved across the LoC and smashed four launch pads that were under the guard of a Pak post located 700 metres from the LoC.
The sources said that the bully boyz were not expecting an action by the Indian Army and therefore were taken by surprise.
The terrorists, mainly belonging to the LeT, were seen running towards the Pak post when they were killed by the Indian troops, according to the assessment reports.
After the successful strike inside the PoK, an effective radio monitoring and strict vigil was maintained, the sources said, adding the wireless messages from radio intercepts of Mighty Pak Army indicated that at least 10 LeT bully boyz had been been killed during the multiple and near synchronised surgical strikes on four launch pads.
There was heavy movement of Mighty Pak Army vehicles till the break of dawn and all the bodies were cleared off and taken away, the sources said, adding as per the radio intercepts there was a mass burial in the Neelum valley.
Similar blow was dealt to the terrorist launch pads located at Balnoi area opposite of Poonch in which nine people belonging to LeT were killed as per the radio intercepts of Mighty Pak Army, the sources said.
Two Pak soldiers belonging to 8 Northern Light Infantry were also killed in the strike in this sector, they said.
However, there is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened... the sources said that post 8.30 AM of September 28, radio and wireless intercepts between various formations of Pakistain have fallen silent.
According to the sources, there were intelligence reports that bully boyz were planning to enter into India from various directions in Kashmire as well as Jammu region.
The sources said that the army waited for the opportunity when the bully boyz were in the process of gathering at one place before giving them a bloody nose.
Pakistain has contested the claims of Indian army and said that there was no surgical strikes carried out. They only admitted that two of their soldiers were killed in cross border firing.
However, there is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened... after the operation was over, the sources said, duty officer at the Director General of Military Operation in Pakistain was informed about the strikes carried out by the army in PoK.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[DAWN] There’s no role for militancy in policy-making and non-state actors cannot be allowed to operate from the Pak territory, says a parliamentary delegation from Pakistain, which completed its five-day visit to the US capital on Saturday.
In a briefing to Pak, and later an Indian, journalists at the end of their visit, the prime minister’s special envoys on Kashmire also said that the United States was doing "positive pushing and prodding" for reducing tensions between India and Pakistain.
Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed, one of the two envoys sent to the United States to present Pakistain’s case on Kashmire, said that they would not be surprised if Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi finally came to Islamabad to attend the Saarc summit "and embrace Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif ... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Moslem League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf... ".
"There is no alternative for talks. And this is a message that the Americans are also sending to both India and Pakistain," said the other envoy, MNA Shezra Mansab Ali, while explaining why she believed India and Pakistain would soon engage one another for reducing tensions.
A Pak media report that the civilian government sent a blunt message to the country’s military leadership last week, saying that Pakistain would be completely isolated if it did not stop cross-border Death Eater attacks, also echoed at the briefing.
Senator Syed said that there was complete consensus on this issue in parliament, where all parties have jointly drafted a 22-point resolution, asking the government to end militancy. "There is no role for militancy in policy- making and non-state actors cannot be allowed to operate from the Pak territory," he said
The militancy, particularly cross-border attacks, was an issue that the delegation had to confront at almost each of more than a dozen meetings it attended in Washington.
Since Sept 18, when murderous Moslems attacked a military facility in Uri and killed at least 18 Indian soldiers, the US State Department, the White House and the Pentagon have almost daily spoken about the situation in held Kashmire and the consequent tensions between India and Pakistain.
In these statements, US officials regularly mentioned the Uri attack, calling it an act of "cross-border terrorism" and urging Pakistain to stop these attacks.
US officials and think tank experts also raised this issue with the Pak parliamentary delegation, reminding it of the need to end cross-border attacks if Pakistain wants its stance on Kashmire to be heard.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/10/2016 00:00 ||
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Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
also, many Persians are looking for a less awful religion and finding out that Zoroaster is a Persian
unfortunately, the existing sacred texts of Zorasterism are loaded with arcane details of litergy and ceremony and in a language which is only partly known
Posted by: lord garth ||
10/10/2016 9:54 Comments ||
Top||
#2
That's ok, lord garth. They can be Reform Zoroastrians rather than Orthodox. ;-)
#4
Always thought they were worth a look for this kind of thing alone:
Ehtirám-i sag; or “great respect for the dog;” is a command among Zoroastrians. In Zoroastrianism, the dog is regarded as an especially benevolent, and virtuous creature, which must be fed and lovingly taken care of. The dog is praised for loyalty, intelligence and having special spiritual virtues.
Dogs receive a striking degree of attention in the “legal” (dâtîc) books of the Avesta, notably in the “Vi-dêv-dâd” and the “Dvâsrôb” or the 16th Nask/Volume of the Avesta, the contents of which are known from Dênkart (q.v.) 8. Detailed prescriptions for the appropriate treatment of dogs are found in the Vi-dêv-dâd (one of the legal Avestan scriptures), especially in chapters 13, 14 and 15, where the faithful are required to assist dogs, both domestic and stray, in various ways. Help or harm to a dog is equated with help and harm to a human. Responsibility toward dogs is repeatedly linked with responsibility toward humans.
[RUDAW.NET] The Peshmerga forces and Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi militia that are expected to take part in an anticipated battle to liberate djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... from the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS) will not enter the city, a Kurdish official stressed. In that case I suspect nobody's getting in.
Saeed Mamuzini also said that, as part of its preparations, ISIS has dug tunnels and trenches across Mosul and is filling the trenches with crude oil in a bid to halt the opposition forces from breaking into the city.
"According to a recent agreement between Baghdad and Erbil, Peshmerga forces and the Hashd al-Shaabi will stay out of Mosul, but the army and federal police are authorized to enter, in case if they do not need the Peshmerga," Mamuzini added.
He pointed out that it is important for the Peshmerga to preserve and defend the Kurdish areas in the Nineveh plains during the battle, which is highly anticipated to start this month.
"It does not matter if there is an agreement or not, the Peshmerga is committed to defending the Kurdish inhabited areas in the Nineveh province," Mamuzini said.
Mamuzini, who is media officer of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) for Mosul, said that ISIS is also preparing to fight back the coming assault with boom-mobiles and jacket wallahs.
"ISIS has also brought in many Lions of Islam to the Bashik front as reinforcement," he explained, referring to the front southeast of Mosul, which briefly fell into ISIS’ hands in late 2014 and was retaken by the Peshmerga a few months later.
Mamuzini said that ISIS has divided its Lions of Islam according to their nationalities. "The German Lions of Islam have been ordered to carry out media affairs and foreign Arabs to carry out suicide kabooms," he explained. "The ex-Baathists will be fighters on the ground and the city’s populations will be used as human shields."
The KDP official also stated, based on information he obtained from locals inside Mosul, that several local opposition cells exist inside the city, ready to fight ISIS once the assault begins.
"Secret opposition groups inside Mosul are operating against ISIS leaders and hard boys. For example, two ISIS Lions of Islam were bumped off with silent pistols at the Qahira neighborhood today," he explained.
ISIS overran Mosul in June 2014 when the terrorist group swept into a third of Iraq, and Iraqi army forces in the city melted away in the face of the onslaught.
Comments by military officials suggest that the offensive on Mosul will come sometime this month.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/10/2016 00:00 ||
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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.
...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. ..
[DW] Security is tight as demonstrators rally for Unity Day celebrations in Dresden marking 26 years since German reunification. German Chancellor Merkel was met with chants of "Merkel must go" and "Traitor to the people."
[DW] At least three Turkish diplomats have sought refuge in Germany following the failed July 15 coup, German media report. The reports come amid a tense period in relations between Ankara and Berlin.
