NATO bombing kills 5 Afghan troops.

Nato airstrike kills five Afghan soldiers.

Dawn photo

Kabul | Dawn News | Mar 06 2014:: A provincial government official says an early morning Nato airstrike in Afghanistan's central Logar province killed five Afghan National Army soldiers and wounded another 17.

The official, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorised to talk to the media, says the strike occurred at 2 am Thursday.

He said government officials were in meetings to decide their response and to conduct a further investigation into the incident.

There was no immediate response from Nato to requests for comment. If it turns out that a Nato strike killed ANA troops, it is likely to set Afghan President Hamid Karzai on another attack against US and Nato soldiers in his country.

The president has been deeply critical of civilian deaths by international forces.

An insurgent compound explodes after a U.S. Air Force B-1 Lancer drops a 

38GBU  bomb on the facility in northern Bala Murghab Valley, Baghdis province, 

Afghanistan, April 4, 2011. Afghan officials say NATO forces accidentally bombed 

Afghan National Army forces in the pre-dawn hours of Thursday, killing five and 

wounding at least eight others. COURTESY: U.S. AIR FORCE

Courtesy: Dawn.

Al-Shabab attacks Kenyan border towns.

Al-Shabab attacks Kenyan border towns.

Three killed in attacks by Somali terrorist group responsible for attack on mall; vows to continue until Kenyan troops leave Somalia

Dawn breaks over the still-smoldering Westgate Mall in Nairobi,
 Kenya, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2013. (photo credit: AP/Ben Curtis)

NAIROBI | Kenya | AP | 26 Sep 2013 ::  The Islamic extremist group that killed scores of people at a Nairobi mall has now attacked two Kenyan towns near the Somali border, killing three people. The leader of the Somali group affiliated with al-Qada said the attacks will continue until Kenyan troops are withdrawn from Somalia.

The leader of al-Shabab said in a message that there is no way Kenya can “withstand a war of attrition inside your own country.”

“Make your choice today and withdraw all your forces,” said Ahmed Abdi Mohamed Godane, who goes by his nom de guerre Mukhtar Abu Zubayr, in a new statement posted on the Internet late Wednesday. “Otherwise be prepared for an abundance of blood that will be spilt in your country, economic downfall and displacement.”

Al-Shabab said the Nairobi mall attack was not only directed at Kenya, but was also “a retribution against the Western states that supported the Kenyan invasion and are spilling the blood of innocent Muslims in order to pave the way for their mineral companies,” according to the statement from Godane.

Al-Shabab attacked Nairobi’s upscale Westgate mall Saturday and held it for four days in a siege in which at least 67 people were killed. Forensic experts from around the world, including the US, Britain, Germany and Canada, continued their work Thursday reconstructing events in the crime scene including by carrying out fingerprint, DNA and ballistic analysis.

Early Thursday, Al-Shabab fighters attacked the border town of Mandera, killing two police officers, injuring three others and destroying 11 vehicles, said regional police chief Charlton Mureithi.(Courtesy:The Times of Israel)

Suicide attack on Pakistani church kills 75.

Suicide attack on Pakistani church kills 75.

A Pakistani man carries an injured Christian woman on her arrival
at the hospital after two suicide bomb attacks on a Church in
 Peshawar on September 22, 2013. Two suicide bombers killed at
 least 53 people and wounded more than 100 in an attack on a
 church service in the restive northwestern Pakistani city
of Peshawar, officials said.

PESHAWAR | Pakistan | 22 Sep 2013 :: A pair of suicide bombers detonated their explosives outside a historic church in northwestern Pakistan on Sunday, killing 75 people in the deadliest-ever attack on the country’s Christian minority, officials said.

A wing of the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the bombing in the city of Peshawar, saying it would continue to target non-Muslims until the United States stopped drone attacks in the country’s remote tribal region.

The latest drone strike came Sunday, when missiles hit a pair of compounds in the North Waziristan tribal area, killing six suspected militants, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The attack on the All Saints Church, which also wounded 110 people, underlines the threat posed by the Pakistani Taliban at a time when the government is seeking a peace deal with the militants. It will likely intensify criticism from those who believe that negotiating peace with the Taliban is a mistake.

Syrian Troops Attack Sunni Village, 15 Killed.

Syrian Troops Attack Sunni Village, 15 Killed.

VOA | 21 Sep 2013 :: Syrian activists say government troops backed by militia fighters have killed at least 15 people during a raid on a Sunni village in the center of the country.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Saturday two women and a child were among those killed in the attack on Sheik Hadid village.

The group said the fighters used guns and knives to kill the residents, calling the raid a "massacre." It said it is not clear if the rest of the men killed were rebel fighters or civilians.

Syria's government is fighting a Sunni-dominated rebel force. Over 100,000 people have been killed in the two-and-a-half-year conflict.

Diplomatic efforts have recently focused on a U.S.-Russian deal that would require Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to give up his stockpile of chemical weapons.

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons says the Syrian government has begun supplying information about its chemical weapons, in line with the deal.

In a VOA interview Friday, spokesman Michael Luhan said the group has received a partial inventory of the weapons and expects to receive additional information by this weekend.

He said the OPCW would not release details of what was in Syria's declaration.

U.S. and Russian officials agreed, last Saturday, on a framework for ending Syria's chemical weapons program that included a one-week deadline for Damascus to submit a comprehensive list of such weapons.

The plan also calls for Syria to eliminate or remove all chemical weapons material and equipment by mid-2014.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Syrian non-compliance could lead to a request for punitive action in the U.N. Kerry said Friday that he had discussed prospects for a "firm and strong" U.N. resolution with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov.

Luhan said the next step for his agency was supposed to be a Sunday meeting to discuss plans regarding Syria's chemical weapons. However, he says the meeting has been postponed indefinitely.

A U.N. report released earlier this week showed overwhelming evidence that chemical weapons were used in an attack near Damascus, last month. However, the report does not assess blame.(Courtesy:Voice of America)

Syria to target Israel if US attacks.

‘Syria to target Israel if US attacks’

Press TV | 14 Sep 2013 :: The Syrian minister of reconciliation warns that Israel will be among Syria’s prime targets in case of any US attack on the Arab country, Press TV reports.

In an interview with Press TV on Friday, Ali Haidar said the right of Damascus to defend itself will begin from within Syrian territories and extend beyond its borders. 

Haidar also highlighted Saudi Arabia’s role in the Syrian conflict, saying the head of kingdom’s intelligence apparatus Prince Bandar Bin Sultan is the man who is pushing for government-change in Syria. 

On Saturday, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reached an agreement on a framework for Syria to verify it is eliminating all its chemical weapons. 

Under the agreement, the government of President Bashar al-Assad must destroy its stockpile of chemical weapons by mid-2014. 

On September 9, Syria welcomed a proposal made by Russia to put its chemical weapons stockpile under international control. 

The Russia plan was aimed at averting a US military strike in retaliation for an alleged chemical weapons attack last month in the suburbs of Damascus which the White House blames on the Syrian government. 

Damascus has categorically rejected the allegation, saying the foreign-backed militant groups staged the attack to incriminate the government. 

The Syrian ambassador to the UN said on Thursday that his country became a full member of the international treaty prohibiting the use of chemical weapons. (Courtesy:Press Tv)

Taliban releases 'pointless' for Afghan peace: officials.

Taliban releases 'pointless' for Afghan peace: officials.

Afghan and US officials, at the time of Abdul Ghani
 Baradar's arrest, hadaccused Pakistan of
sabotaging peace efforts by arresting him.

KABUL | AFP | 14 Sep 2013 ::  Afghan officials say Pakistan's release of 33 Taliban prisoners from jail, a policy initially trumpeted by Kabul as an opportunity to ignite peace talks, has resulted in no concrete progress.

The Afghan government, desperately searching for a way to negotiate peace before Nato troops leave next year, has said that the release of influential insurgents could encourage their comrades to the negotiating table.

But despite the 33 Afghan Taliban prisoners released by Pakistan and dozens of others freed in Afghanistan, there is still no peace process and some fighters have returned to the battlefield.

The Taliban still refuse publicly to deal with the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, branding him a US puppet.

They have also shown no willingness to participate in elections on April 5, 2014 when Karzai will step aside for a new leader for the first time since the 2001 US-led invasion.

Instead their readiness to negotiate with the Americans about a prisoner swap has only infuriated Karzai, who late last month asked Pakistan to help find a direct channel of communication.

In parts of Afghanistan, which continue to suffer daily from Taliban violence, the releases have been met with incomprehension if not anger by local government officials.

“The Taliban who are released... rejoin the battlefield again,” said Zurawar Zahid, police chief of the flashpoint southern province of Ghazni.

“We put our lives in danger to arrest them, but the central government releases them under different pretences,” he added.

Zahid told AFP that more than 40 Taliban, including some senior commanders, who were recently freed from Ghazni central prison on Karzai's orders have gone back to the battlefield.(Courtesy:Dawn)

Qaeda calls for attacks inside United States.

Qaeda calls for attacks inside United States.

The Nation | 13 Sep 2013 :: Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri urged small-scale attacks inside the United States to "bleed America economically", adding he hoped eventually to see a more significant strike, according to the SITE monitoring service.

In an audio speech released online a day after the 12th anniversary of the 9/11 strikes, Zawahri said attacks "by one brother or a few of the brothers" would weaken the U.S. economy by triggering big spending on security, SITE reported.

Western counter-terrorism chiefs have warned that radicalized "lone wolves" who might have had no direct contact with al Qaeda posed as great a risk as those who carried out complex plots like the 9/11 attacks.

"We should bleed America economically by provoking it to continue in its massive expenditure on its security, for the weak point of America is its economy, which has already begun to stagger due to the military and security expenditure," he said.

Keeping America in such a state of tension and anticipation only required a few disparate attacks "here and there", he said

"As we defeated it in the gang warfare in Somalia, Yemen, Iraq and Afghanistan, so we should follow it with ...war on its own land. These disparate strikes can be done by one brother or a few of the brothers."

At the same time, Muslims should seize any opportunity to land "a large strike" on the United States, even if this took years of patience.

The Sept 11, 2011 attacks, in which hijacked airliners were flown into New York's World Trade Center, the Pentagon in Washington and a Pennsylvania field, triggered a global fight against al Qaeda extremists and their affiliates. Almost 3,000 people were killed in the attacks.

In his audio speech, Zawahri said Muslims should refuse to buy goods from America and its allies, as such spending only helped to fund U.S. military action in Muslim lands.(Courtesy:The Nation)

U.S. Drone Strike Kills 6 in Pakistan, Fueling Anger.

U.S. Drone Strike Kills 6 in Pakistan, Fueling Anger.

US drones have fired missiles into inaccessible border
 areas such as North Waziristan since 2004 [Reuters]

ISLAMABAD | Pakistan | 06 Sep 2013 :: At least six people were killed in an American drone strike in Pakistan’s restive northwestern tribal areas early Friday, according to government officials and local news reports.

The strike was directed at a house in the Ghulam Khan area of the North Waziristan tribal region, close to the border with Afghanistan.

A senior Haqqani network commander was killed, a security official said. The official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said that the ranking Haqqani official in the region, Sangin Zadran, had been killed. “He was the most influential commander in the area,” the official said. “The Americans had been after him for a long time.”

North Waziristan has long been a haven for Taliban and Qaeda militants.

American drone strikes are deeply unpopular in Pakistan, and opposition to them has become an essential staple of local politics and grievances against the United States. Pakistani politicians and government officials condemn the missile strikes, which are directed by the Central Intelligence Agency, as a violation of the country’s sovereignty.

Opposition politicians like Imran Khan, leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf political party, have campaigned against the strikes, saying that they result more in civilian casualties than militant killings. In October 2012, Mr. Khan led a big protest rally to the edges of the tribal regions against the use of drones on Pakistani soil.

The number of drone strikes has, however, dropped sharply in recent months. The last strike occurred on Aug. 31, when at least four suspected militants were killed in an attack in North Waziristan.(Courtesy:New york times)Read More>>>

U.S. building coalition for Syria strikes, Kerry says.

U.S. building coalition for Syria strikes, 

Kerry says.

A protester raises the national flag of Syria during a demonstration
 against possible U.S. military intervention in Syria in front of the
 U.S. embassy in Rio de Janeiro, September 4, 2013. (Reuters)

Al Arabia | 05 Sep 2013 :: U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Wednesday that an international coalition set to take action against the Syrian regime is growing, adding that Arab countries are being approached to participate.

“We are building support with ... other countries, among them the Arab League,” Kerry said, as the U.S. administration tries to sell its plan for military action to Congress.

The move against the government of President Bashar al-Assad was triggered by a suspected chemical weapons attack on a suburb of the Syrian capital last month, which Washington says has killed at least 1,400 people.

“Specific countries that have talked in terms of acting” include Turkey and France, as well as some Arab states, Kerry said in a statement carried by AFP.

Kerry said the United States had reached out to more than 100 countries in efforts to form a coalition that supports military intervention in Syria.

The news comes as a resolution authorizing a military strike on Syria was approved on Wednesday by the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee.(Courtesy:Al Arabia)Read More>>>

Al-Qaeda set up anti-drone cells, reveal secret U.S. documents.

Al-Qaeda set up anti-drone cells, reveal 

secret U.S. documents.

A banner protesting U.S. drone attacks on Yemen earlier this year. (AFP)

Al Arabia  | AFP | 04 Sep 2013 :: Al-Qaeda’s leaders have been bolstering their anti-drone efforts, setting up cells of engineers to shoot down, disable or hijack U.S. drones, the Washington Post reported late Tuesday classified documents.

The militant leadership is “hoping to exploit the technological vulnerabilities of a weapons system that has inflicted huge losses against the terrorist network,” the Post said online.

“Although there is no evidence that Al-Qaeda has forced a drone crash or successfully interfered with flight operations, U.S. intelligence officials have closely tracked the group’s persistent efforts to develop a counterdrone strategy since 2010,” the report said, citing the secret documents.

The newspaper also reported that al-Qaeda commanders are keen to achieve “a technological breakthrough (that) could curb the U.S. drone campaign, which has killed an estimated 3,000 people over the past decade.”

Drone strikes have forced al-Qaeda operatives to limit their movements in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia and other places.(Courtesy:Al Arabia)

Israel confirms testing missile jointly with US.

Israel confirms testing missile jointly with US.

Press Tv | 03 Sep 2013 :: Israel says it has successfully conducted a joint missile test with the United States in the Mediterranean Sea, amid high tensions in the region over a possible attack on Syria.

According to the Israeli Ministry of Military Affairs, an Ankor-type radar missile was launched on Tuesday in the joint test with the US. 

Israeli media say the missile was fired to simulate ballistic missiles such as Shahab and Scud. 

This is while the US Navy says it has fired no missiles. 

Earlier in the day, the Russian Defense Ministry said it had detected two “ballistic targets” fired toward the eastern part of the Mediterranean from the sea’s central part. 

The launch of the ballistic objects was detected at 10:16 Moscow time (06:16 GMT) by a radar system in the southern Russian city of Armavir, a Defense Ministry spokesman was quoted by Russia’s Ria Novosti as saying. 

Tensions are running high as Washington is pushing for military action against Syria over the alleged use of chemical weapons by Syrian government forces in the suburbs of Damascus on August 21. 

Damascus has vehemently denied the accusations, saying the chemical attack was carried out by the militants themselves as a false-flag operation. 

Syria has been gripped by deadly unrest since 2011. According to reports, the Western powers and their regional allies - especially Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey - are supporting the militants operating inside Syria. 

On July 25, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said more than 100,000 people have been killed in Syria since the outbreak of the foreign-sponsored militancy in the country. (Courtesy:Press Tv)

Seven million displaced in Syrian conflict.

Seven million displaced in Syrian conflict.

a group of Free Syrian Army fighters carry
a woundedcomrade to cover in the town
 of Harem, Syria - File Photo/AP

DAMASCUS | AP | 03 Sep 2013 ::  The United Nations (UN) estimates that five million Syrians have been displaced inside the country due to the ongoing civil war. Another two million have fled to neighboring countries, bringing the total up to seven million, which is nearly one-third of Syria’s population.

Before the outbreak of the conflict, Syria had a population of about 23 million people.

Tarik Kurdi, the representative of the refugee agency in Syria, said that the funding gaps for those displaced remain wide. Donor countries spend less than one-third the amount required to help.

More than 100,000 lives have been lost in Syria’s two-and-a-half-year-old conflict, including the hundreds who were recently killed by an alleged chemical weapons attack on August 21.

While the Syrian government has denied involvement, no proof has so far been submitted to back up the allegations.

In Washington, President Barack Obama was lobbying Congress to support a military strike to punish the Assad regime for its alleged chemical weapons use.

While Obama initially seemed poised to launch military action, the president recently decided to seek congressional approval before deciding on a course of action.

A vote is expected after Congress returns from summer recess on September 7.

On Capitol Hill, senior administration officials briefed lawmakers in private on Sunday to explain why the U.S. was compelled to act against Assad. Further meetings were planned from Monday to Wednesday.

The Arab League, meanwhile, stopped short of endorsing military action.

In an emergency meeting in Cairo on Sunday, it called on the United Nations and the international community to take ''deterrent'' measures under international law to stop the Syrian regime's crimes.(Courtesy:Dawn)Read More>>>

Fears Growing as Syrians Wait for U.S. Attack.

Fears Growing as Syrians Wait for U.S. Attack.

BEIRUT | Lebanon  | 30 Aug 2013 ::  In a narrow alley in the old city of Damascus, a shopkeeper who opposes the Syrian government spent Thursday as usual, drinking coffee with the other merchants who keep him company in place of long-vanished tourists. But the calm on the cobblestone street, he said, could hardly mask the fear and ambivalence over an American military strike.

“Disorder, revenge. Sectarian violence,” he said in a text message, ticking off what he sees as the worst potential consequences of the missile strikes that American officials have threatened against President Bashar al-Assad’s government, which they blame for a deadly chemical attack last week.

In Damascus, as people stock up on food and water and the government closes central streets and moves troops and matériel into residential areas and schools, even staunch supporters of the uprising against Mr. Assad are divided on the looming attack.

Many here feel even a limited strike threatens to inject a new, unpredictable dynamic into a civil war that has largely spared their storied city. And some opponents of the government are loath to see direct American military intervention in their fight, fearful it will hijack and discredit the uprising they have waged for more than two years at great cost.

Though some called early on for NATO intervention, others said they wanted support and arms from Washington — not an attack by the American military.(Copy from:The New York Times)

Findings of Abbottabad Commission: How US reached Osama.

Osama Bin Laden.

ISLAMABAD | 08 Jul 2013 ::  The Abbottabad Commission Report, which is yet to be made public, contains a treasure trove of information on the hunt for the world’s most wanted man – Osama Bin Laden.

Its findings reveal that the arrest of Khalid Bin Attash (an Al Qaeda member who was involved in the pre-9/11 attacks such as on USS Cole and the embassies in Africa) in ‘2002’ from Karachi led to the first major breakthrough – he is the one who identified Abu Ahmed Ali Kuwaiti (the Kuwaiti born Pakistani who was OBL’s right hand man and courier and the man who led the Americans to Bin Laden.

After this information came to light, the Kuwaiti intelligence service was contacted but it could not provide any details about the man.

During the search for this man, CIA provided four phone numbers between “2009 to Nov 2010” to Pakistan but without any details as to who they were searching for, a source privy to the report’s details has told Dawn.

Dawn has learnt that these numbers “most of the time remained off” but while the ISI kept the CIA in the loop it did so “without knowing the context and to whom these numbers belonged”.

Now in retrospect, the commission report confirms Attash’s disclosure – Kuwaiti was OBL’s right hand man.

According to what the commission has discovered, he was with OBL’s family in Karachi when it moved to the port city in Oct/Nov 2001.

In 2002, when the family (including OBL’s wives) moved to Peshawar, Kuwaiti was with them and this is where OBL joined them – in mid-2002.

From here they moved to Swat where OBL was visited by Khalid Sheikh Mohammad.

A month later, KSM was arrested in Rawalpindi, prompting the scared OBL family to move to Haripur.

Kuwaiti and his brother Ibrar (who had joined the fugitives in Swat) were with OBL and they all stayed in Haripur till 2005.

And it is here that the move to Abbottabad was planned and executed by Kuwaiti. He is the one who purchased a plot in Abbottabad by using a fake identity card and also supervised the construction of the house, which says a source was custom built.

It contained three complexes. “One open compound, an annexe where Kuwaiti and his family lived and the main three storey house,” said the source, adding that the two top storeys were used by OBL and his family.

The youngest wife stayed on the second floor while the older wives – Sharifa and Khaira – stayed on the lower floor.

Ibrar and his wife lived on the ground floor.

The source explained that the house was built so that the children of Ibrar could not see OBL.

The commission has been told that OBL never had a phone line, an internet or cable connection either in Swat, Haripur or Abbottabad though a dish was used to watch Al Jazeera in more than one city that the families stayed in.

Dawn has learnt that the commission has pointed out the violations committed by the residents of the Abbottabad House which remained unchecked by the authorities at the local level.

For instance, it has noted that a manual ID card was used to purchase land even though a computerised CNIC had been made mandatory in 2004 by Nadra – “the manual NIC was accepted by the Revenue Department, Cantonment Board and others,” said the source, adding that the identities and the addresses were never verified.

He also said that the third floor was built in violation of the building plan and once again no authority intervened.

In addition, the commission has noted that “the fort type construction remained unnoticed by cantonment board, police, intelligence agencies and the locals. The occupants also remained unchecked for non-payment of property tax since 2005”.

Last but not least, Dawn has learnt that the commission has given recommendations to the government that are aimed at averting another May 2 like operation.

It was not possible to find out whether or not the report has investigated and/or made any recommendations to prevent fugitives such as OBL from hiding in Pakistan. Neither is it clear whether or not the commission has held anyone responsible for the presence of OBL in the country or the May raid by the Americans.

The recommendations that Dawn has learnt about are focused on checking American activity in the country and averting operations by outside forces by suggesting that the role of the post of chairman joint chiefs of staff committee be enhanced for more effective coordination between the armed forces. It has also recommended strengthening the National Security Council so that it can take immediate steps as the commission has noted that certain high government functionary could not be contacted during operation.

The commission has also recommended a probe over the issuance of visas to a large number of US contractors who established a spy network within Pakistan.(Courtesy:Dawn)