| Down Under |
| Australia's US ambassador Kevin Rudd faces calls to resign over disparaging anti-Trump comments |
| 2024-11-12 |
| [NY Post] "Oops! Taken out of context!" Australia’s US Ambassador Kevin Rudd is facing calls to resign after his slew of disparaging comments against President-elect Donald Trump resurfaced — causing concerns over whether he’ll be able to work with the incoming president. Rudd called Trump "the most destructive president in history" and "a traitor to the West" in past tweets, as well as "a village idiot" and "incompetent" in a 2021 video interview uncovered by Sky News. "The most destructive president in history. He drags America and democracy through the mud. He thrives on fomenting, not healing, division," Rudd wrote on X in June 2020. "He abuses Christianity, church and the Bible to justify violence." Rudd hastily deleted his past tweets insulting Trump soon after it appeared likely that the Republican would cinch the election against Vice President Kamala Harris last week. But Australian officials, who are particularly concerned over Trump’s 10% tariff proposal, worry that the damage is already done — Rudd’s insults could hurt Australia’s relationship with the US under a Trump presidency. "Loose-lipped Rudd is so arrogant he actually thinks he can walk back every insult ever delivered about Trump and get away with it," The Nightly editor-in-chief Christopher Dore wrote in a Sunday opinion piece. "It is ludicrous to even contemplate keeping Kevin Rudd in Washington as our ambassador to the US," Dore argued. Michael Kroger, the former president of Australia’s Victorian Liberal Party and a frequent conservative commentator, said Rudd should do what’s best for the country and step down. "Kevin Rudd knows Australia’s best interests are not served by a ferocious critic of Donald Trump as our Ambassador in Washington," he told the Herald Sun. "For Australia’s national interests, Mr Rudd needs to hand in his commission to the Prime Minister who should then appoint a more diplomatic ambassador." Former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer told the publication that Rudd has made his own job incredibly difficult by his criticism of the US president-elect. "Kevin Rudd may find this hard to believe but he might find that Donald Trump has more on his mind than the future of Kevin Rudd," said Downer, who also served as Australia’s ambassador to the UK. Related: Kevin Rudd 11/17/2022 Trump not first politician to be ditched by Rupert Murdoch Kevin Rudd 05/05/2022 A word from the Australian Government Kevin Rudd 09/29/2021 The Collapse of Biden's World |
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| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| Diplomat Who Prompted FBI Trump Spying Helped Raise $25M for Clinton Foundation |
| 2018-05-22 |
| [Breitbart] Before his tip sparked a divisive witch hunt, former Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer helped to secure $25 million for the Clinton Foundation. Downer arranged one of the largest foreign donations ever made to the Clinton Foundation in February 2006. He and former President Bill Clinton signed a "Memorandum of Understanding" that purportedly dedicated the substantial funding to a project meant to provide screenings and drug treatment for AIDS patients in Asia. The donation, originally intended for the Clinton Foundation, was then rerouted through an affiliate ‐ the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI). The project was lauded for its help in China, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and Vietnam, but auditors criticized its "management weaknesses" and inadequate budgetary oversight. "The Clintons’ tentacles go everywhere. So, that’s why it’s important," said Rep. Jim Jordan, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee that has taken up arms in defense of the Trump administration over the course of the Russia probe. "We continue to get new information every week it seems that sort of underscores the fact that the FBI hasn’t been square with us." Interestingly, The New York Times failed to disclose these details in a May 16 story entitled "A Secret Mission, a Code Name and Anxiety: Inside the Early Days of the F.B.I.’s Trump Investigation" in which they detailed Downer’s involvement in "Crossfire Hurricane," the code name for the interview which led directly to an investigation into ties between Russia and then Presidential candidate Donald Trump. They did, however, manage to capture something that Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida once told the Fox Business Network: "It’s like the deep state all got together to try to orchestrate a palace coup," he said. |
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| Down Under |
| Australia's new leader vows better global ties |
| 2007-11-25 |
| Incoming Labour prime minister Kevin Rudd, a Mandarin-speaking former diplomat, has pledged closer Australian ties with overseas allies and unity at home after ending 11 years of conservative rule under John Howard. Rudd (50) presented himself as a new-generation leader by promising to pull about 500 front-line Australian troops out of Iraq and sign the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, further isolating Washington on both issues. "To our friends and allies around the world, I look forward as the next prime minister of Australia to working with them in dealing with the great challenges which our world now faces," he told cheering supporters at a victory party late on Saturday. The surge to Labour left Howard battling to win even his own parliamentary seat, which he has held since 1974. He was in danger of becoming the first prime minister since 1929 to lose his constituency. As part of Rudd's promised "fresh thinking", he also teamed with a female deputy, former lawyer Julia Gillard, who will be Australia's first woman deputy prime minister. "King Kevin the new conqueror," said the Sun-Herald newspaper in Howard's home town of Sydney on Sunday. "It's Labour in a Ruddslide", said the national newspaper the Australian. Up to six government ministers, including Howard, looked likely to be ejected in only the sixth change of government since World War II. Labour is set to hold up to 86 seats in the 150-seat Parliament. Rudd is expected to forge closer ties with China and other Asian nations and has said he wants a more independent voice in foreign policy, with past Labour governments more supportive of an energetic United Nations and global organisations. But he has also promised to maintain Australia's close alliance with the US as the cornerstone of Australia's foreign and strategic policy. "Rudd will have to open negotiations soon with the United States about the withdrawal of Australia's combat troops from Iraq. This is a delicate operation because it will be Labour's first testing of the alliance," veteran political commentator Michelle Grattan wrote in the Sun-Herald. US President George Bush congratulated Rudd on his election victory, and praised Howard's leadership. "The United States and Australia have long been strong partners and allies and the president looks forward to working with this new government to continue our historic relationship," the White House said in a statement. Rudd promised to sign the Kyoto climate pact immediately and lead his country's delegation to next month's UN climate summit in Bali, which is expected to kick-start talks on a post-Kyoto deal to slash greenhouse-gas emissions globally. He also pledged unity at home, vowing to shut down controversial offshore detention of illegal immigrants and to take care of Aborigines in the wake of a conservative intervention to seize control of remote indigenous communities with troops and police. "I will be a prime minister for all Australians, a prime minister for indigenous Australians, Australians who have been born here and Australians who have come here from afar," he said. Family Minister Mal Brough, responsible for the Aboriginal intervention to stop rampant sexual abuse of children and "rivers of grog" in remote outback towns, was a high-profile casualty of the Labour win, losing his Queensland seat. But Labour could be frustrated by a hostile Upper House. The conservatives will have a Senate majority until July next year, possibly delaying Rudd's agenda and his promise to dump unpopular labour laws that supercharged his victory. Centre-left Labour will have to negotiate with diverse minor Senate parties including the left-leaning Australian Greens and the conservative, Christian-values Family First party. The election was fought mainly on domestic issues, with Labour cashing in on anger at labour laws and rising interest rates that put home owners under financial pressure at a time when Australia's economy is booming. The result puts Labour in power nationally and in all of Australia's six states and two territories. The lord mayor of the northern city of Brisbane is now the senior-ranking elected official in Howard's Liberal Party. Outgoing Foreign Minister Alexander Downer glumly said it had been hard for the conservative government to present itself as fresh and new after more than 11 years, despite 16 years of economic expansion and unemployment at 33-year lows. "I think at the end of the day, people just thought it was time for a change," Downer told local television on Sunday. |
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| Down Under |
| 'Comedians' Breach APEC secuirty with fake motorcade, 11 arrested |
| 2007-09-06 |
| Eleven crew from the ABC TV comedy show The Chaser have been detained by police after staging a fake motorcade through Sydney as part of an APEC week stunt. The team from the satirical TV program The Chaser's War on Everything were in a convoy of three cars and two motorbikes which was reportedly ushered through two checkpoints in Sydney's APEC security "red" zone. The convoy was pulled over in Macquarie Street on a block adjacent to the InterContinental Hotel, where US President George W Bush is a guest during the APEC summit. The ABC said Chaser stars Julian Morrow and Chas Licciardello were detained late on Thursday morning following the stunt near the hotel. Chaser members said they had dressed up a convoy to look like an official Canadian motorcade, on a day during which a number of official motorcades crossed the city. Southern Cross Broadcasting reported that the convoy carrying the Chaser team passed "through two checkpoints around the hotel before one of The Chaser pranksters jumped out (dressed) as Osama bin Laden". "They had been waved through, they had three cars ... big black Hummer-style cars decked out with Canadian flags on the front," a reporter said. "A couple of Chaser team members were in the back of each of these cars and rest of the team were dressed up as bodyguards. "As many as 11 people were detained and two of those were Chaser team members." Chaser team member Chris Taylor told the Fairfax website the motorcade comprised "three cars, a couple of motorbikes, and a lot of crew". He said the Chaser convoy had Canadian flags attached to the cars and "Canada" signs visible in the front windscreen. "No particular reason we chose Canada," Taylor said. "We just thought they'd be a country who the cops wouldn't scrutinise too closely, and who feasibly would only have three cars in their motorcade - as opposed to the 20 or so gas guzzlers that Bush has brought with him." He said the motorcade had been allowed into the red zone, past two sets of gates, before being pulled over on the corner of Bridge and Macquarie streets. Taylor said Morrow and Licciardello had been taken to Surry Hills police station, and police confirmed the pair had been arrested for breaching the restricted zone. Chaser crew members had initially been detained in their cars while "police on the ground" waited for special units to arrive, Taylor said. ABC spokesman Peter Ritchie said ABC lawyers and management were in discussions with police. "They were shooting for the program, they were at the hotel, police detained them and ABC lawyers and management are with the boys," Mr Ritchie said. The Southern Cross Broadcasting report said "security services went crazy when they realised something had gone wrong". "They very quickly detained these people," a reporter said. Authorities have warned there will be a presumption against bail for people arrested in the APEC security zone. "The simple message that everybody needs to understand is that if you misconduct yourself during the APEC period in a security zone, there is a jail bed waiting for you," Attorney-General John Hatzistergos said last week. The Chaser's War on Everything resumed on ABC TV on Wednesday night and included a number of stunts aimed at testing APEC security. Morrow told News Ltd newspapers last weekend the Chaser team was planning something "extreme" for APEC. Chaser team members on Wednesday staged a stunt during an anti-APEC protest, with Taylor appearing as a police officer on a pantomime horse - a dig at the fact equine flu has prevented NSW police horses being used for APEC security. Foreign Minister Alexander Downer denied The Chaser team had revealed a chink in APEC security, saying as they were arrested, the system worked. But he told an APEC news conference:"Whatever you think of the humour of The Chaser ... they were clearly not going to harm anybody in a physical way. "They presumably were, as is the nature of their show, aiming to humiliate a lot of well-known people. "In my particular case on this one, I managed not to see them, so it just shows how lucky you can get," Mr Downer said, smiling. "The point is they were in any case arrested, so I think the security works." Police are furious that the Chaser comedians managed to breach APEC security, but they deny the stunt embarrassed authorities in charge of the Sydney summit. NSW Police Assistant Commissioner Dave Owens said police were investigating "a possible breach of the restricted area". As a result of the breach, new measures were being added to what he described as a multi-layered security operation. "I'm not embarrassed at all. What I am is very angry that such a stunt like this would be pulled," Mr Owens said. "We have 21 world leaders here and while I enjoy, like everyone else, a good laugh, this wasn't funny." NSW Police Minister David Campbell said he was particularly disappointed The Chaser production team had disregarded specific requests from police not to go too far in their pursuit of satire. "I don't see a funny side to what's happened today. I don't see a funny side at all," Mr Campbell said. "I'm extremely concerned people would take the sense of security so lightly." Mr Campbell refused to criticise the police who reportedly waved The Chaser team through checkpoints. He congratulated officers who made the arrests. |
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| Down Under |
| West underestimates the evil of Islam |
| 2007-08-20 |
THE West was still underestimating the evil of Islam, an influential Muslim thinker has warned, insisting that Australia and the US have been duped into believing there is a difference between the religion's moderate and radical interpretations. On a two-week "under the radar" visit to Australia, Syrian-born Wafa Sultan secretly met both sides of federal politics and Jewish community leaders, warning them that all Muslims needed to be closely monitored in the West. In an interview with The Australian, Dr Sultan - who shot to recognition last year following an interview on al-Jazeera television in which she attacked Islam and the prophet Mohammed - said Muslims were "brainwashed" from an early age to believe Western values were evil and that the world would one day come under the control of Sharia law. The US-based psychiatrist - who has two fatwas (religious rulings) issued against her to be killed - warned that Muslims would continue to exploit freedom of speech in the West to spread their "hate" and attack their adopted countries, until the Western mind grasped the magnitude of the Islamic threat. "You're fighting someone who is willing to die," Dr Sultan told The Australian in an Arabic and English interview. "So you have to understand this mentality and find ways to face it. (As a Muslim) your mission on this earth is to fight for Islam and to kill or to be killed. You're here for only a short life and once you kill a kafir, or a non-believer, soon you're going to be united with your God." Dr Sultan, who was brought to Australia by a group called Multi-Net comprised of Jews and Christians, met senior politicians, including Attorney-General Philip Ruddock, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer and Labor deputy leader Julia Gillard. Private security was hired for Dr Sultan, who left Australia yesterday, and state police authorities were also made aware of her movements in the country. The organisers of her visit asked the media to not publish anything about her stay until she had left the country because of security-related concerns. Dr Sultan said Islam was a "political ideology" that was wrongly perceived to have a moderate and hardline following. "That's why the West has to monitor the majority of Muslims because you don't know when they're ready to be activated. Because they share the same basic belief, that's the problem," said the 50-year-old, who was last year featured in Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people in the world. Dr Sultan, who was raised on Alawite Islamic beliefs before she renounced her religion, began to question Islam after she witnessed her university teacher get gunned down by Muslim hardliners in Syria in 1979. The mother of three, who migrated to the US in 1989, said the West needed to hold Muslims and their leaders more accountable for the atrocities performed in the name of Islam if they wanted to win the war on terror. But while she considered the prophet Mohammed "evil" and said the Koran needed to be destroyed because it advocated violence against non-believers, Dr Sultan struggled to articulate her vision for Muslims, whom she said she was trying to liberate from the shackles of their beliefs. "I believe the only way is to expose the Muslims to different cultures, different thoughts, different belief systems," said Dr Sultan, who is completing her first book, The Escaped Prisoner: When Allah is a Monster. "Muslims have been hostages of their own belief systems for 1400 years. There is no way we can keep the Koran." |
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| Iraq |
| Australia grants 3 former Iraqi diplomats asylum |
| 2007-08-16 |
| Australia's decision to grant asylum to three former Iraqi diplomats and their families would not create a precedent for other Iraqis who want to flee their embattled homeland, the foreign minister said Thursday. Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said that the three, who were attached to the Iraqi embassy in Canberra before they were recalled in December last year, were granted asylum on humanitarian grounds. While Downer did not detail the reasons, he said the decision did not mean that all Iraqis who do not want to return to their homeland could successfully apply for asylum. "It's not a generic decision; it's a decision that relates to the circumstances of those three individual people," Downer told reporters, adding that Baghdad |
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| India-Pakistan |
| Australian uranium bound for India |
| 2007-08-14 |
| AUSTRALIA has decided to start uranium shipments to India with the condition that Australian inspectors be allowed to check on-site that the yellowcake is used only for peaceful purposes and electricity generation. The Australian nuclear safety inspectors would check the "chain of supply" of nuclear material from Australia to India to ensure none was siphoned off into weapons programs. The National Security Committee of federal cabinet decided last night, after more than two hours, to allow the uranium shipments to India, despite the subcontinental nuclear power not signing the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Australia has only recently decided to ship uranium to China for the first time. The National Security Committee discussed ways for Australia to export uranium to India without contributing to nuclear tensions between India and Pakistan or assisting the spread of nuclear weapons. John Howard will contact his Indian counterpart Manmohan Singh, who is also Minister for Atomic Energy, to explain the conditions before formally announcing the agreement. The cabinet committee was under pressure to both allow India access to uranium - a process the US has offered to assist with - and defend its record on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. Labor has accused the Howard Government of being prepared to water down strict controls on uranium exports and move away from the international agreements limiting nuclear weapons. Pakistan has also asked for uranium to power its domestic electricity grid if India is sold it. The Australian Government wants to help India with its peaceful energy needs but does not want to contribute to the nuclear tensions between India and Pakistan. The decision comes as the ALP has committed to a scare campaign over nuclear power reactor sites in Australia. Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said yesterday the fact India already had nuclear weapons meant "there is no risk" of contributing to nuclear proliferation by exporting uranium to the energy-hungry economy. "I think the reverse in fact is the case - that the more you can get the India civil nuclear program under UN inspections and under the UN protocols of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the better," Mr Downer told the ABC. "I think that creates a safer and more secure environment for those power stations." Labor foreign affairs spokesman Rob McClelland said any step towards uranium exports to India would be moving away from the NPT signed by Australia. "We see that the Government is prepared to further undermine the NPT by selling uranium to India while that country remains outside the non-proliferation regime," he told the UN Association of Australia last night. "The bottom line is that the Howard Government is worse than ambivalent when it comes to nuclear non-proliferation - it is positively obstructive." Even the uranium industry has reserved judgment on the Government's support for uranium exports to India until it hears how the NPT can be protected. Michael Angwin, executive director of the Australian Uranium Association, said Australia's policy of exporting uranium only to signatories to the treaty had been successful to date. India now needs to win IAEA approval of its planned safeguards, the support of an international grouping of nuclear suppliers, and ratification of its nuclear co-operation agreement with the US. Only then can it do a bilateral deal with Australia to allow the uranium trade and start negotiating with local miners. Last week Pakistan's Minister for Religious Affairs, Ejaz ul-Haq, said Australia should consider selling uranium to Pakistan as well. He rejected concerns Islamabad would use the uranium in nuclear weapons. But Mr Downer ruled out selling uranium to Pakistan. |
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| Caribbean-Latin America |
| Australia calls Chavez 'rogue bull' |
| 2007-08-03 |
| Australia on Thursday lambasted Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez as a rogue bull as it came to the defence of close ally the United States. Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, speaking on the sidelines of Asias annual security summit in Manila, was asked about the no-show by his US counterpart, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. With Rice unavailable to attend due to a trip to the Middle East, Downer denied the United States had lost interest in Asia and said the world should be sympathetic to the problems it faced. The US has pressures their counterparts dont have, Downer said. You have to be sympathetic with the pressures the US has in the Middle East. In Latin America it has people like Chavez raging around like a rogue bull, trying to disrupt good policies, he said. While we would like to have the US send its senior people to regional meetings like this, we do understand. Chavez has been a sharp and highly visible critic of the United States, once comparing President George W. Bush to Satan in an appearance at the United Nations. In June he likened US cultural domination to imperial bombardment. |
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| Down Under |
| Oz FM refuses Pakistan's uranium request |
| 2007-07-28 |
| The [Australian] Government has rejected calls from a Pakistan Government official for Australia to sell uranium to the south Asian country. Pakistan's Minister for Religious Affairs, Muhammad Ijaz ul Haq, has raised the issue after Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer recently said Australia should consider selling uranium to power stations in India. Mr Ijaz ul Haq says it is a diplomatic issue and Pakistan should be considered alongside India. But Mr Downer says its out of the question because Pakistan's two nuclear power stations are not monitored by the United Nations. "I don't think there's any prospect in the foreseeable future of exporting to Pakistan, unless Pakistan gets into some sort of a system of UN inspections and control over its two civil nuclear facilities and it comes to Australia and seeks a nuclear safeguards agreement," he said. |
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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Mate of Aussie champ says 'Trigger' too nice to be a terrorist |
| 2007-06-28 |
| A friend of Ahmed Elomar, one of four Australians arrested in Lebanon, said he would be surprised if the boxer was involved with terrorism. Elomar, 24, who uses the name "Trigger" in the boxing ring, was one of four dual Australian-Lebanese citizens recently arrested in the country's north over alleged connections to the militant group Fatah al-Islam. The reigning Australian super featherweight champion, who fought on the undercard for an Anthony Mundine fight last year, left Australia two weeks ago with his wife and two young children. Sydney Muslim youth leader Fadi Rahman said his friend was a devoted family man. "He's of very good character, a very kind person, he's fairly quiet, a family orientated person," Mr Rahman told Network Ten. "It would quite surprise me if he was involved in such a thing." Boxing coach Tony Mundine, the father of Anthony, said he was also surprised by the reports. "He was very polite to me and at our boxing tournament, he was very, very nice and very gentle," Mr Mundine told ABC Radio. Australian consular officials continue to be denied access to the four men, with Lebanese authorities saying they want to first complete their questioning. "We haven't got consular access to them and we have been told by the Lebanese defense ministry that we'll get consular access once they're charged," Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said in Israel on Wednesday. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) is refusing to confirm the name of any of those arrested. But the family of Ibrahim Sabouh, a devout Muslim who moved from Sydney to Lebanon with his wife and family a year ago, say he is among the four. The other three are Elomar, former taxi driver Omar Hadba and another man, Mohammad Basal, media reports say. News Ltd has reported that the four men are linked to Sydney-based hardline Muslim cleric Faiz Mohammed, who is based at the Global Islamic Youth Centre in Liverpool, in Sydney's south-west. Calls to the centre were not returned on Wednesday. The Australian Federal Police (AFP) would not confirm whether the four men had previously been known to them. "The AFP is conducting inquiries into these men through its senior liaison officer in Beirut," a spokesman said. "It is not appropriate for the AFP to comment as to whether these inquiries could result in an investigation in Australia." DFAT also is investigating reports at least one other Australian had been taken into custody, and that an Australian had been killed during the fighting. |
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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Lebanon links Islamists to the UN attack |
| 2007-06-26 |
| Lebanon on Monday linked a bomb attack that killed six UN peacekeepers in the south of the country to a deadly standoff between Al-Qaeda-inspired militants and the army in the north. Information Minister Ghazi Aridi pointed the finger at the Islamists, based on confessions extracted from Fatah al-Islam gunmen captured during fierce fighting at a Palestinian refugee camp which is now in its sixth week. Security has been tightened in south Lebanon following the attack, which has further rattled the fragile security situation in the deeply divided country. "There is a link between the attack which targeted the Spanish contingent of UNIFIL and the combat between the Lebanese army and the terrorists of Fatah al-Islam in Nahr al-Bared," he told reporters after a cabinet meeting. "Lebanon is the victim of a terrorist wave striking from the north to the south in which the latest target was the Spanish contingent. This attack was preceded by confessions from arrested terrorists about preparations against UNIFIL." It was the first fatal attack on peacekeepers since the UN Interim Force in Lebanon's mandate was expanded last year in the wake of a devastating 34-day war between Israeli troops and the Hezbollah Shiite militia. Lebanese legal sources, quoting confessions from detained fighters, said earlier this month that Fatah al-Islam -- which emerged in the Nahr al-Bared camp late last year -- was planning to attack UN peacekeepers. Abu Salim Taha, a spokesman for the extremist group, had accused UNIFIL forces of siding with the army and threatened to attack the Blue Helmets. Security was heightened in the south on Monday where Spanish Defence Minister Jose Antonio Alonso was visiting his country's troops after the blast, which killed three Spaniards and three Colombian nationals. No one has claimed the attack, which a Lebanese security source said was carried out by car bomb detonated by remote control. It struck as the peacekeepers' armoured vehicle passed by in the Marjayoun-Khiam valley, an area about 10 kilometres (six miles) from the Israeli border. A Spanish colonel told reporters it was a "deliberate attack". "This attack was very well prepared in advance," the officer said at the scene. "The bodies of two of the victims were blown several metres (yards) by the force of the blast." UNIFIL commander Major-General Claudio Graziano of Italy said the bombing was aimed at destabilising the region. "It's not an attack against Lebanon and UNIFIL only but against the stability of the region. This attack has made UNIFIL more committed to fulfil its mission in southern Lebanon," he said in a statement. Hezbollah too was quick to condemn the bombing in an area considered its stronghold. "This act of aggression is aimed at increasing insecurity in Lebanon, especially in the south of the country," it said. UNIFIL first deployed in Lebanon in 1978 after an Israeli invasion but was expanded from some 2,000 members after the July-August war between Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas who dominated the south of the country. It now has 13,225 soldiers from 30 nations, including nearly 1,100 from Spain. The attack came on top of a series of car bombings targeting anti-Syrian politicians in and around Beirut and as the army pursued its bloodiest internal fighting since the 1975-1990 civil war with Fatah al-Islam. At least 157 people, including 80 soldiers and 55 Islamists, have died in the standoff. Lebanon's pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud said the attack on UNIFIL was part of a "campaign of destabilization". The Lebanese parliament majority accuse Syria of creating, training and funding Fatah al-Islam. They also claim it is an offshoot of Fatah al- Intifadah , an operation of the Syrian Intelligence , created to destabilize the Palestinian refugee camps and undermine Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement. Syria denied any connections with the militant group, but refused to hand over its leader shaker el Absi to the Jordanians when they asked for his extradition. Absi, the Fatah al Islam leader was sentenced to death by Jordan for the murder of a US diplomat EU Commissioner for External Relations Benita Ferrero-Waldner condemned it as a "heinous attack" said those responsible should be swiftly brought to justice. In the north, 11 people died in clashes in the port city of Tripoli overnight Saturday, including six Sunni Islamists from Fatah al-Islam and a policeman's 4-year-old daughter. It was the first clash in the mainly Sunni Muslim city since the fighting between Fatah al-Islam and the army in Tripoli and Nahr al-Bared began on May 20. Three Australian men were also arrested in Tripoli at the weekend and are allegedly Islamist extremists involved in the clashes, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said. One of the Islamists that was killed in Tripoli is a Lebanese Australian. |
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| Southeast Asia |
| Indonesia captures another JI kingpin |
| 2007-06-15 |
| Indonesian authorities have landed another stinging blow to regional terror network Jemaah Islamiah (JI), announcing that they had nabbed the de facto head of the shadowy organisation. Zarkasih - who has several aliases including Nuaim and Mbah and has headed JI since 2005 - was captured in Yogyakarta in central Java six hours after Indonesia's elite anti-terror squad Detachment 88 arrested the country's most-wanted Islamic militant, JI military wing chief Abu Dujana, on Saturday. Both men appeared in video confessions on Friday admitting their involvement in the secretive group, which has been blamed for a string of terrorist attacks in Indonesia including the 2002 Bali bombings, which killed 202 people including 88 Australians. Authorities delayed revealing the arrests to exploit information gleaned as they hunted other top terror suspects, including Bali bombings mastermind Noordin M Top. But Detachment 88 head Suryadarma Salim said Dujana was refusing to give up the location of the terror leader, whom he is accused of protecting after the Bali blasts. "Even though (Dujana and Noordin) are in different structures, Dujana will not betray him by revealing his whereabouts," he said. Terrorism analyst Sidney Jones, of the International Crisis Group, said the arrest of Zarkasih was a significant blow for JI, which has undergone significant restructuring in recent years. "He became the de facto head sometime after 2004 when there was a restructuring of JI," Jones said. "This is as big if not bigger than Abu Dujana." Jones said Indonesian authorities may have been "trying to deflect attention from the fact they got the number one head" by naming Dujana as their most-wanted terrorist. "Obviously if the network was going to be somewhat weakened by catching one (leader), it's going to be even more weakened by catching two. I think we have to look beyond the leaders and to look at the base (of JI), but I think this is going to be a major spanner in the works for JI." Brigadier General Salim said Zarkasih, who trained in Afghanistan, was appointed emergency head of JI during a meeting of high ranking JI leaders in 2005 after the previous leader was caught in June 2004. "Zarkasih's duty was to control the activities and operations of JI in Indonesia," he said. In the videotape confession, Zarkasih also told authorities Abu Bakar Bashir lead the terrorist network between 2000 and 2002, before being replaced by Abu Rusdan. He said JI experienced a "vacuum of power" during 2004, when he was elevated as de facto head and also charged with finding a new emir to lead the organisation. "This effort is very difficult because we are trying to find a credible emir," Zarkasih said. "The rest of the group appointed me as the head of the commission (to find a new leader) - I don't know whether that is as emir or not. But we have to find a good emir to lead the spread of Islam teachings and jihad." Salim said the leader had fought in Afghanistan in the 1990s and studied in Pakistan. He said the anti-terror operation was continuing to hunt other unnamed high-ranking terror suspects, including three men who headed up the organisation's education, preaching and logistics arms. "Our team is all over Java and eastern Indonesia," he said. "The Jemaah Islamiah network still exists. They are building their power by recruiting ... and holding military training sessions and also collecting guns, ammunitions, explosives and ready-to-use bombs." Salim also said Dujana had been planning to assassinate the head of a central Java university, and that his military wing was partly-funded by the theft of the equivalent of $A66,000 from the provincial government in Poso, Sulawesi. Meanwhile, Indonesia's vice president Jusuf Kalla said Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander Downer had been "a little bit inappropriate" talking about the arrest of Dujana two days before it was made public. |
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