Summaries here and here and here.

Gunmen shot dead three Sunni clerics in separate attacks in a single day in Iraqi Nineveh province’s capital of Mosul, a provincial police source said on Sunday. Article

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This one item stood out insofar as ye old scribe is concerned. In addition to insurgent elements blowing up bridges, the U.S. is doing the same thing?

In Iraq, Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcons targeted an enemy bridge in Al Muqdadiyah with GBU-38s and GBU-12. The JTAC reported the bridge was destroyed. Source

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A look at at least some of what is known from inside Iraq regarding the Blackwater debacle. Shorter version: War without constraint of rules by profit-oriented mercenaries.

Since the fatal Sept. 16 Blackwater USA shooting in Baghdad’s Nasoor Square, officials from the private security company have insisted that their guards were responding to fire from “armed enemies.” Yet an extensive evidence file put together by the Iraqi National Police and obtained by NEWSWEEK—including documents, maps, sworn witness statements and police video footage—appears to contradict the contractors’ version of events. A confidential incident report, which has been provided by Iraqi National Police investigators to American military and civilian officials, concludes that the Blackwater vehicles “opened fire crazily and randomly, without any reason.”

[snip]

…One of the police documents lists 17 fatalities and many more wounded from the shooting. Other accounts have put the death toll at 11.

[snip]

At times, the official National Police version of events seems to be tinged with hyperbole. Al-Awadi, the National Police commander, told NEWSWEEK that there were “hundreds—hundreds—of American vehicles” on the scene shortly after the incident. That is almost certainly an exaggeration. Still, the Iraqi police accounts also roughly jibe with the stories of civilian eyewitnesses interviewed by NEWSWEEK shortly after the shooting. Iraqi officials have hinted that additional videotapes of the incident may exist that have yet to be made public.… Article

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Keeping up with the charges and hearings.

A military panel on Saturday sentenced an Army sniper to five months in prison, a reduction in rank and forfeiture of pay for planting evidence in connection with the deaths of two Iraqi civilians.

[snip]

Spc. Jorge G. Sandoval, 22, was acquitted of murder charges in the April and May deaths of two unidentified men. The panel decided he was guilty of a lesser charges of placing detonation wire on one of the bodies to make it look as if the man was an insurgent. Article

Also:

A judge on Sunday delayed court-martial proceedings for a second U.S. Army sniper accused in the deaths of two unarmed Iraqi civilians a day after a military panel sentenced a 22-year-old specialist to five months in prison for his role in the crimes.

Jorge G. Sandoval also received a reduction in rank to private and a forfeiture of his pay after he was convicted Thursday of planting evidence on one of the unidentified Iraqis who died last spring. He was acquitted of two murder charges. Article

Afghanistan summary here and here.

Pakistan summaries here and here and here and here.

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Monitoring the pre-’election’ pressure cooker.

#1:

Pakistani journalists marked [Sunday] as a “black day” to condemn police beatings during opposition protests against President Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s pursuit of another five-year term. Musharraf picked up a key legal victory Saturday when the Election Commission approved his candidacy for the Oct. 6 vote — as lawyers and opposition activists staged protests in front of the commission building in the capital, Islamabad.

Protesters clashed with police, who wielded batons and fired tear gas to disperse them before turning on journalists covering the melee.

Sixty-four people were injured, including 13 police officials, 31 journalists, two opposition lawmakers and several passers-by, the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan news agency reported [Sunday], citing an official statement.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court’s top judge will hold a hearing Monday on the violence. He has summoned police, Interior Ministry and district officials to appear for an explanation, according to a court statement that quoted a senior court official as calling the police response “highly excessive.” Police “outnumbered the agitating lawyers … and missed no opportunity to thrash” them, it said.… Article

#2:

Over 230 Opposition lawmakers resigned from Pakistan’s national and provincial assemblies to resist President Pervez Musharraf’s re-election bid, as journalists observed a “Black Day” today condemning the police action during protests against the general.

Eighty-four members of the national assembly and 152 of the four provincial assemblies from the Opposition alliance All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) submitted their resignations to their respective party leaders, Raja Zafarul Haq, senior leader of Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N), told reporters here. Article

Summary here and here.

What’s up:

The Defense Department said Sunday it had released eight more Guantanamo Bay captives - six Afghans, a Libyan and a Yemeni - in what appears to be a continuing campaign to thin the population at the U.S.-run prison camps in southeast Cuba.

Although a Pentagon press statement did not name the men, or describe the reason for their detentions, it suggested they were all long-held Guantanamo detainees who had been subjected to military review panels set up in 2004.

[snip]

At this stage, Yemen has the overwhelmingly largest number of nationals in the prison camps in the U.S.-controlled portion of Cuba - close to 100 men among the estimated 330 captives.

Defense officials have systematically thinned the two other large population groups it once held there - Saudis and Afghans. Britain, meantime, has asked for the repatriation of five former residents, a request the Bush administration is weighing.

The Pentagon statement, issued Sunday morning, did not say when the transfer operation occurred.

But the single airstrip serving the Navy base was until little over a week ago closed to large-body aircraft for a two-week repaving operation. Article

The latest contract with Blackwater — note that the “Area of Responsibility” is conceived to be so through 2011.

Presidential Airways, Inc., an aviation Worldwide Services company (d/b/a Blackwater Aviation), Moyock, N.C., is being awarded an indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) type contract for $92,000,000.00. The contractor is to provide all fixed-wing aircraft, personnel, equipment, tools, material, maintenance and supervision necessary to perform passenger, cargo and combi Short Take-Off and Landing air transportation services between locations in the Area of Responsibility of Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan. This contract was competitively procured and two timely offers were received. The performance period is from 1 Oct. 2007 to 30 September 2011. Source

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Duty dictated by dogma — in a word, SNABU.

Britsh MPs visiting the Pentagon to discuss America’s stance on Iran and Iraq were shocked to be told by one of President Bush’s senior women officials: “I hate all Iranians.”

And she also accused Britain of “dismantling” the Anglo-US-led coalition in Iraq by pulling troops out of Basra too soon.

The all-party group of MPs say Debra Cagan, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coalition Affairs to Defence Secretary Robert Gates, made the comments this month.

[snip]

It was her tone when they met her on September 11 that shocked them most.

The MPs say that at one point she said: “In any case, I hate all Iranians.”

Although it was an aside, it was not out of keeping with her general demeanour.

“She seemed more keen on saying she didn’t like Iranians than that the US had no plans to attack Iran,” said one MP. “She did say there were no plans for an attack but the tone did not fit the words.”

Another MP said: “I formed the impression that some in America are looking for an excuse to attack Iran. It was very alarming.”

[snip]

The Pentagon denied Ms Cagan said she “hated” Iranians.

“She doesn’t speak that way,” said an official.

But when The Mail on Sunday spoke to four of the six MPs, three confirmed privately that she made the remark and one declined to comment. The other two could not be contacted. Article

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The pieces don’t quite fit together, but noted FYI:

The United States said it had no information to support claims by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan that the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) had US-made heavy military equipment in Iraq, while Erdog(an said the information has been published in Internet media.

“I have no idea what that statement would be based on. It would be pretty difficult to see how heavy military equipment would get into the hands of the PKK,” US State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey said at a daily press conference on Friday. “Certainly it would not be anything that would be supported by this government or any member of the US military that I’m familiar with. There is no information that I have of any kind that would support such an allegation.”

On Saturday, Erdogan appeared to be clarifying claims that the PKK in Iraq was using US-made tanks and heavy guns, saying the issue was not anything new and citing Internet media as a source. “It was on Internet sites in the past. It could be stolen or something else. There are photos showing PKK members getting training with these weapons on the Internet,” he told a press conference as he wrapped up a 12-day visit to United States, where he attended a UN General Assembly meeting.

The prime minister also rectified a statement he made last week that Turkey would consider letting the US use Turkey in a possible troop pullout from Iraq. Erdogan said use of Turkish soil was out of the question in response to inquiry about whether Turkey would help. “I said we could look warmly on this and assess it. This is all I said,” he explained. Article

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Lethality of export for 2006 (before already announced increases and special deals in the cases of both Pakistan and Saudi Arabia).

The United States maintained its role as the leading supplier of weapons to the developing world in 2006, followed by Russia and Britain, according to a Congressional study. Pakistan, India and Saudi Arabia were the top buyers.

The global weapons market is highly competitive, with manufacturing countries seeking both to increase profits and to expand political influence through weapons sales to developing nations that reached nearly $28.8 billion in 2006.

That sales total was a slight drop from the 2005 figure of $31.8 billion, a trend explained by the strain of rising fuel prices that prompted many developing states - except those that produce oil - to choose upgrading current arsenals over purchasing new weapons.

[snip]

In 2006, the United States agreed to sell $10.3 billion in weapons to the developing world, or 35.8 percent of these deals worldwide, according to the study. Russia was second with $8.1 billion, or 28.1 percent, and Britain was third with $3.1 billion, or 10.8 percent.

Pakistan concluded $5.1 billion in agreements to purchase arms in 2006. That total was followed by India with $3.5 billion in agreements and Saudi Arabia with $3.2 billion in deals. Article

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The sheer heaviness and massive force of gravity of the debt racked up under the woebegone G. Walker administration will crush and distort the entirety of the government for, literally, generations. Even countries with a huge bounty of inflated energy revenues to spend in the international monetary markeplace must eventually look askance at investing in a system so deeply in the red (and addicted to being so).

Whatever happens over the next 16 months, President Bush will leave office having presided over one of the fastest accumulations of government debt in the history of the United States.

During his time in office, federal debt held by the public – Washington’s equivalent of a credit-card balance – will have increased by more than 50 percent, to about $5.5 trillion. Uncle Sam will be paying interest on that sum for years to come. [That’s $5,500,000,000,000. — voxd ]

[snip]

The bottom line: Uncle Sam’s credit-card balance has become very large. Federal debt held by the public – the figure experts use to measure the US fiscal burden – was $3.3 trillion when Bush took office. It will be $5.5 trillion when he leaves, according to projections of the White House Office of Management and Budget.

The US has to pay interest to maintain that debt, just as individuals have to pay interest on their Visa and Mastercard balances. The rates are better – Uncle Sam has a lot of leverage in the credit markets – but the cost is still a considerable burden. This fiscal year, the US laid out $235 billion in net interest, according to Congressional Budget Office figures. That’s a number that’s half the size of the Pentagon budget.

When the next president takes office, interest will be the third largest item in the budget, after military spending and Social Security, says Mr. Collender of Qorvis Communications.… Article

Topically related — dunning the children now is already under way.

NEW MEANING TO HIGH HEELS

The “weird sandals” bust.

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BUT IT LOOKS SO SLEEK ON THE LIFT

For a cool quarter-mil, it would also be nice if it worked as intended.

Summaries here and here and here.

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Re-rolling the dice, rebalancing the scales?

MP Izz al-Din al-Dawlah said on Saturday the parliamentary blocs of Accordance, Fadhila (Virtue), Sadrist, Iraqi National List, National Dialogue, Turkmani, and Yezidist had made progress in negotiations to establish an expanded front within the House of the Representatives to combat the U.S. Senate resolution on dividing Iraq.

[snip]

If a new front was established by these blocs, it will occupy some 125 out of a total 275 seats within the Iraqi parliament, while the Shiite and Kurdish alliance will hold no less than 140 seats.

“The first decision taken by the negotiating blocs is to stand against the U.S. Senate resolution on dividing Iraq,” al-Dawlah said. Article

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Latest verse, same as the first — except that in this case, the timetable happens to coincide with the end of the woebegone G. Walker admnitsrtaion’s term of office.

Iraq will ask the U.N. Security Council to extend the mandate of 160,000-stong U.S.-led multinational force in Iraq for only one more year – through the end of 2008, foreign ministry officials told The Associated Press on Saturday.

The officials said Iraq would then seek a long-term, bilateral security agreement with the United States like the ones Washington has with Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, Qatar and Egypt.

Aides to Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said the mandate extension for the U.S.-led forces in Iraq, due to be discussed at the end of this year, would be “the last extension for these forces.”

[snip]

The resolution, drafted by the United States, authorizes a review of the mandate at the request of the Iraqi government every six months. The mandate last was extended for one year on Dec. 31 and expires at end of this year.

“We will ask the council to extend the mandate for another year…then our negotiations with the Security Council will be kicked off,” Zebari was quoted as saying.

[snip]

According to a provision in the current mandate, which comes up for renewal in December, the council would cancel it at any time “if requested by the government of Iraq.”

Last June, legislators led by followers of a radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr passed a resolution requiring the government to seek parliamentary approval before asking the United Nations to extend the U.S. mandate.

The measure was approved along party lines – with Sunnis joining the bloc loyal to al-Sadr and another disaffected Shiite party to support it – and Shiite and Kurdish backers of al-Maliki’s government in opposition.

The parliamentary move could snarl the mandate renewal, as Iraqis and their legislative representatives grow increasingly disenchanted with the U.S.-backed government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Article

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The album of testimony grows. It is exceedingly crude (but blatantly necessary, very unfortunately) to ask what percentage of weight Iraqi witnesses are accorded (as opposed to U.S. and U.S.-funded sources) within the woebegone G. Walker administration?

Iraqi forces held their fire as Blackwater security guards shot into a crowd in Baghdad, five alleged witnesses claim.

“The Iraqi security forces had the right to shoot at them when they saw the (Blackwater) convoy shooting at the people, but they did not shoot at the convoy,” said Ahmed Ali Jassim, 19, a maintenance worker who said he saw the Sept. 16 incident.

The account contradicts initial reports from Blackwater and the U.S. State Department, which maintain Blackwater guards were returning fire when they shot into the crowd, killing at least 11 Iraqis, The Washington Post reported Saturday. Article

Related: Reckless, rampant Rambo-ism.

On Sept. 9, the day before Army Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. military commander in Iraq, and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker told Congress that things were getting better, Batoul Mohammed Ali Hussein came to Baghdad for the day.

A clerk in the Iraqi customs office in Diyala province, she was in the capital to drop off and pick up paperwork at the central office near busy al Khilani Square, not far from the fortified Green Zone, where top U.S. and Iraqi officials live and work. U.S. officials often pass through the square in heavily guarded convoys on their way to other parts of Baghdad.

As Hussein walked out of the customs building, an embassy convoy of sport-utility vehicles drove through the intersection. Blackwater security guards, charged with protecting the diplomats, yelled at construction workers at an unfinished building to move back. Instead, the workers threw rocks. The guards, witnesses said, responded with gunfire, spraying the intersection with bullets.

Hussein, who was on the opposite side of the street from the construction site, fell to the ground, shot in the leg. As she struggled to her feet and took a step, eyewitnesses said, a Blackwater security guard trained his weapon on her and shot her multiple times. She died on the spot, and the customs documents she’d held in her arms fluttered down the street.

Before the shooting stopped, four other people were killed in what would be the beginning of eight days of violence that Iraqi officials say bolster their argument that Blackwater should be banned from working in Iraq.

During the ensuing week, as Crocker and Petraeus told Congress that the surge of more U.S. troops to Iraq was beginning to work and President Bush gave a televised address in which he said “ordinary life was beginning to return” to Baghdad, Blackwater security guards shot at least 43 people on crowded Baghdad streets. At least 16 of those people died.

Two Blackwater guards died in one of the incidents, which was triggered when a roadside bomb struck a Blackwater vehicle.

Still, it was an astounding amount of violence attributed to Blackwater. In the same eight-day period, according to statistics compiled by McClatchy Newspapers, other acts of violence across the embattled capital claimed the lives of 32 people and left 87 injured, not including unidentified bodies found dumped on Baghdad’s streets.

The best known of that week’s incidents took place the following Sunday, Sept. 16, when Blackwater guards killed 11 and wounded 12 at the busy al Nisour traffic circle in central Baghdad.

[snip]

A joint commission of five U.S. State Department officials, three U.S. military officials and eight Iraqis has been formed to investigate the incident, though almost two weeks later, the commission has yet to meet. A U.S. Embassy statement on Thursday, the first official written comment from the embassy since the al Nisour shooting, said that the group was “preparing” to meet.

Blackwater and the U.S. Embassy didn’t respond to requests for information about the other incidents.

[snip]

Three days later, Blackwater guards were back in al Khilani Square, Iraqi government officials said. This time, there was no shooting, witnesses said. Instead, the Blackwater guards hurled frozen bottles of water into store windows and windshields, breaking the glass. Article

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Noted FYI:

In view of a recent cholera-caused death in Iraq, the Ministry of Health [of Kuwait] recently announced a state of alert amongst its emergency and preventive health staffs. “Though Kuwait is still safe of such danger, we warn people of having any food stuff coming from Iraq,” informed sources at the preventive health department pointing out that the department staffs were highly experienced in facing such diseases in Iraq. Article

Afghanistan summary here and here.

Four staff members of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) were released today after being seized by an armed group in Wardak Province, south-west of Kabul on 26 September.

[snip]

The ICRC had contacted all parties concerned over the past three days, to ensure the swift release of its personnel. Two of the staff members involved are from Afghanistan, one is from Myanmar and the other from the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. Article

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Is it even a remote possibility that an Iraq-obsessed (and Iran-obsessed) G. Walker administation would let something such as this to proceed under the radar? Magic 8-ball says: ‘don’t hold your breath.’

Too, the brutish Hekmatyar has been officially branded by even the ‘we pardon ourselves’ Afghan legislature, so Karzai is (likely) either making empty gestures or trying to place himself in a martyr’s circle by operating as a one-man band.

In his most dramatic peace overture yet, Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Saturday offered to meet Taliban leader Mullah Omar and give militants a position in government. Karzai’s offer came hours after a suicide bomber in army disguise attacked a military bus in Kabul, killing 30 people.

Strengthening a call for negotiations he has made with increasing frequency in recent weeks, Karzai said he was willing to meet the reclusive Omar and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a former prime minister and factional warlord leader.

“If I find their address, there is no need for them to come to me, I’ll personally go there and get in touch with them,” Karzai said. “Esteemed Mullah, sir, and esteemed Hekmatyar, sir, why are you destroying the country?”

[snip]

“If a group of Taliban or a number of Taliban come to me and say, ‘President, we want a department in this or in that ministry or we want a position as deputy minister … and we don’t want to fight anymore … . If there will be a demand and a request like that to me, I will accept it because I want conflicts and fighting to end in Afghanistan,” Karzai said.

“I wish there would be a demand as easy as this. I wish that they would want a position in the government. I will give them a position,” he said.

The U.S. Embassy in Kabul has said it does not support negotiations with Taliban fighters, labelling them as terrorists, though the United Nations and NATO have said an increasing number of Taliban are interested in laying down their arms. NATO’s ambassador to Afghanistan, Daan Everts, said this month that NATO would look into the possibility of talks.

[snip]

A State Department duty officer said he couldn’t immediately comment on Karzai’s offer to meet Omar, noting that most policy makers were still in New York. Article

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Let’s review. It is nominated for (and there is solid industry buzz about) an Oscar. Lengthy reviews have appeared in all the major media. Earlier this month it was screened at the White House.

Not saying there is a diect cause and effect of that last to the petty and mean-spirited denial of visas. But am certainly suggesting there is a connection.

“Not famous enough” is both a fatuous and a nonsensical excuse (as well as one which no administration and no White House has any rational business making in the first place).

It is already being billed as an Oscar contender – with good reason.

The Kite Runner, the tale of two Afghan boys united in war-torn Kabul by their love of kites, is based on the international bestseller by Khaled Hosseini.

It is produced by Steven Spielberg and directed by Marc Forster….

All three men are expected to attend the premiere of the £10million film at a theatre in west Hollywood next month, along with members of the cast and crew and a host of stars.

Yet on the night there will be two noticeable absentees. Zekeria Ebrahimi and Ahmad Khan Mahmidzada, the young Afghan stars of the film, will not be there.

Despite American protestations that they have brought liberty and normality to the streets of Kabul, the US government has turned down the boys’ visa applications on the grounds that the film ‘is not famous enough’. Article

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Noted FYI:

The Canadian Forces are using a controversial private security firm to train some of its troops sent to Afghanistan.

Select Canadian soldiers have been sent to Blackwater U.S.A. in North Carolina for specialized training in bodyguard and shooting skills. Other soldiers have taken counterterrorism evasive-driving courses with the private military company now at the centre of an investigation into the killings of Iraqi civilians and mounting concerns about the aggressive tactics of its workers in the field.

Critics of Blackwater label the firm as a mercenary organization and question why a professional military such as the Canadian Forces can’t do its own training in specialized areas.

[snip]

Canadian military police trained by Blackwater operated in Kandahar last year in support of coalition special forces. Members of the Strategic Advisory Team, which operates in Kabul, also underwent counterterrorism driving training, according to a military official.

The Ottawa-based counterterrorism unit, Joint Task Force 2, has also maintained ongoing training links to the company.

Military officials did not have further details on why Blackwater would be hired, but promised to provide those. Later, however, they did not comment on the matter.

Canadian Forces spokesman Lt.-Col. Jamie Robertson said the military does not discuss its special forces training. But he noted that Blackwater and other firms have been contracted to provide services for other units.

“The Canadian Forces has occasionally contracted companies to provide specialized training to our personnel in those cases when specialized training is not available within the Canadian Forces due to a range of factors, including the unavailability of training resources, expertise or specialized facilities and equipment,” said Robertson.

He said the training is adapted to Canadian Forces requirements and procedures.

Still, Dawn Black, the NDP’s defence critic, questioned the need for Blackwater to be involved in training Canadian troops.

“My understanding is we have some of the best-trained forces in the world, and great trainers, so why do we need our armed forces personnel to be trained by a mercenary organization?”

A total dollar figure on what has been spent on Blackwater training was not available by press time, since training is contracted out individually on a unit-by-unit basis, said Robertson. Article

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Recall that when the ‘trained’ police didn’t quite pan out, Karzai set up “auxiliary police.’ The courts don’t function, so now proposals to create auxiliary courts?

A nod to (and incorporation of) traditional forms and systems is one thing; a quasi-official set-up of multiple (and far from identically constituted or inclined) fiefdoms dispensing rulings and ‘justice’ on a non-statutory basis, essentially independent of centrality, is something extremely different.

Afghanistan’s latest National Human Development Report has called for a new and hybrid justice system that will bring together modern formal justice systems and the local traditional shuras and jirgas that have functioned as dispute-resolution mechanisms.

The proposal for a collaborative model is a radical departure from the current efforts to expand the reach of the modern formal justice system, an effort that has met with limited success so far. The differences in the two justice systems, both in law and in principle, are also likely to stir up some controversy, especially among purists.

Proposing the launch of a pilot project of the hybrid model in five provinces by mid-2008, the report, released on Wednesday, argues that the current formal justice system does not reach the majority of Afghans, with more than 80% of the cases throughout Afghanistan settled through traditional decision-making assemblies. By acting in isolation, state and non-state institutions of justice are missing an opportunity to improve the delivery of justice significantly, the report states.

The justice sector is an area that is commonly accepted to have lagged far behind others in the efforts at reconstruction of the country. Despite sporadic efforts at reform, the changes have not been far-reaching. Severe constraints in capacity, including basic training and education of judicial staff, have severely hampered uniform delivery of justice through the formal court systems, and public perception of corruption of the courts is also high.

The report notes this, saying the judiciary suffers from severe deficiencies: “Most judges cannot access legal textbooks, procedures and practices.” Only a little more than half of the judges (in a random survey) were holders of university degrees in law or sharia. “Allegations of corruption within the formal justice system have tarnished its legitimacy and made the informal justice sector more appealing in the eyes of the many citizens.”

The formal court system, however, does represent Afghanistan’s attempts to evolve a secular interpretation of law, based on international law and Western jurisprudence, elements that are missing in some aspects of the traditional justice system.

The traditional mechanism relies on customary law, or orf, that is delivered through the shuras or jirgas to settle disputes. The customary law varies according to region and ethnic group. While the main principle of customary law is to restore balance and order in a community, this order can sometimes be achieved by means that are considered to be brutal or violative of internationally recognized principles of humanitarian and human rights laws.

“Although the restorative aspect is a positive concept in itself, the way crimes and disputes are settled has an extremely harmful impact on the lives of women,” a recent report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime states.

[snip]

While arguing that the proposed collaborative system would make justice more widely accessible, efficient, cost-effective and humane, the report recognizes the challenge of reconciling inherent tensions between the formal and informal justice system while nurturing the respective strengths of these sometimes competing and conflicting approaches to the rule of law.

Though the proposal of the hybrid model is likely to evoke some controversy, what is undisputed is the urgent need for justice-sector reform and justice delivery systems. The judicial system is a first line of defense to many social ills in any democracy, especially in war-ravaged societies. The report’s data on human development indices paint a dismal picture, showing that Afghanistan’s human-development indicators are actually lower than earlier assessments. Article

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Monitoring the pre-’election’ pressure cooker.

#1:

More than three dozen people were injured Saturday when police clashed with hundreds of protesters in the Pakistani capital Islamabad as the Election Commission approved President Pervez Musharraf’s re-election bid.

Riot units baton-charged a column of more than 300 lawyers, who tried to reach the commission’s office when Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and several other ministers arrived to respond to the objections against Musharraf’s candidacy.

‘Our 35 to 40 colleagues were injured and ten of them severely,’ the head of Supreme Court Bar Association Munir Malik told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

They were brutally manhandled and this was fascism in its purest form, he said, adding that the protests would continue and the lawyers would come back on Monday with new petition against Musharraf’s re-election plan.

The police also beat up the journalists, leaving four of them severely injured.

Aziz and Minister for Information Mohammed Ali Durrani quietly watched the scene from the commission’s building, where they remained besieged for more than four hours.

Durrani left the building hiding in an ambulance, while his deputy Tariq Azim was chased and beaten up by angry crowds.

The government also blocked TV transmission of several news channels, particularly in Islamabad, to prevent them from airing live coverage of the demonstrations. Article

#2:

Pakistani police fired tear gas at lawyers and journalists and beat them with batons as the election commission Saturday approved Pervez Musharraf’s nomination for an October 6 presidential vote.

[snip]

At least two lawyers and a journalist were seen with blood coming from head wounds, one of them after being hit by a stone thrown by the police. Several ambulances rushed to the scene.

[snip]

Police fired tear gas at another 500 lawyers who rallied in Lahore to protest the beatings of their colleagues in Islamabad. Eight were arrested, officials said. Article

#3:

Eight journalists were injured after police baton-charged them outside the ECP office. The journalists were covering the lawyers’ protest against President General Pervez Musharraf’s bid to get himself re-elected. Witnesses said DSP Habibullah and Inspector Arshad ordered the policemen to target the journalists.… Article

#4:

Authorities in Pakistan on Saturday temporarily suspended transmission of independent news TV channels to stop coverage of opposition rallies against President’s bid for re-elections, private TV channels and subscribers said.

Police fired tear gas shells and beat protesting lawyers and political activists who staged demonstrations in Islamabad to protest against President Musharraf.

Protest rallies were planned outside the office of the Chief Election Commissioner, who held scrutiny of the nomination papers of President Musharraf and his rival candidates.

Major private TV channels were showing live pictures of injured lawyers with blood on their heads and faces.

Police severely beating and arresting senior lawyers and opposition activists and firing tear gas shells were also aired live on TV channels.

Only those people could watch TV channels who had facility of satellite dish receiver.

Three major TV channels Geo, ARY and Aaj TV said their transmissions went off the air in Islamabad, Rawalpindi and most parts of the country.

The state-run Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMA) had warned all TV channels not to air programs, talk shows and interviews in which comments are offered on courts matters. Article

Summary here.

It takes lifetimes for an oil painting to craze and crack. It takes any political entity a much, much less lengthy timeframe.

Somalia’s president rebuked his top security aides on Saturday after insurgent attacks on police stations that killed five people overnight highlighted precarious security in the capital Mogadishu.

President Abdullahi Yusuf called the meeting to deal with persistent violence by remnants of a militant Islamist group his government ousted with Ethiopian military help in the New Year.

“The president called the cabinet ministers, the head of the police force and mayor of Mogadishu to discuss about the security of Mogadishu,” an aide who declined to be named told Reuters.

A legislator close to the president who confirmed the meeting said Yusuf was not pleased with the performance of his security forces. In some cases, newly trained policemen or soldiers have fled their positions after coming under attack.

“He is not happy with the lack of coordination and accountability,” the legislator told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

[snip]

The meeting came after insurgents attacked police stations across Mogadishu overnight, killing at least two police officers and three civilians, witnesses said. Officials denied any officers were killed. Article

Remember this from Aug. 22?

Addressing a news conference in Nairobi, [Somali Interior Minister] Guled said some 4,500 newly-trained government soldiers would pacify the city in the next 20 days.

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Chaos abides.

Somali and Ethiopian troops have ordered thousands in the Somali capital to vacate their homes to allow them to conduct searches for arms and insurgents, a human rights group said yesterday.

The order was issued on Thursday following an insurgent attack on a government base earlier in the week, said Sudan Ali Ahmad, chairman of Elman Human Rights, an independent Somali group.

“I cannot give you precise numbers of displaced people but I believe they are in the thousands, and they were forced by Ethiopian and Somali troops to vacate their homes,” Ahmad told The Associated Press, basing the figures on interviews conducted with residents people forced from their homes.

Most have either left Mogadishu or have sought refugee with relatives and friends in other parts of the city, he said.

[snip]

On Friday, the UN refugee agency said its staff in Mogadishu reported that the city was divided in two - the north deserted as residents flee, the south calm.

“The streets of northern Mogadishu are so empty during the day,” the UN agency said in a statement. Article

That this story has not received more prominent play is both shocking and disappointing. Not quite interchangeable with the lawyer’s revolt in Pakistan, but definitely carries a faint echo of the same heightened tension between the judiciary and a heavy-handed, militarily-enamored, despotically inclined executive (in this case the woebegone G. Walker administration).

The American Bar Association said this week that it was backing out of an agreement to find lawyers for Guantanamo detainees because it did not want to “lend support and credibility” to what it called inadequate legal protections for the 340 men held there.

The bar association, the largest lawyers group in the United States, said it had agreed to help find volunteer lawyers before Congress stripped the courts of the power to hear habeas corpus cases, which are attacks by prisoners on the government’s authority to hold them.

The move was the latest chapter in a broad legal debate over what rights Guantanamo detainees may have in contesting findings that they are enemy combatants who can be held indefinitely.

“It would be inconsistent with the ABA’s strong position” against limits on detainees’ filing habeas cases, the bar association president, William Neukom, said in a letter to the Justice Department on Thursday. He added that participating in finding lawyers for less expansive cases would “lend support and credibility to such an inadequate review scheme.”

[snip]

Neukom noted in his letter that the bar group, which has more than 400,000 members, recently filed a brief supporting detainees in a Supreme Court case. The case is expected to test the Bush administration’s argument that foreigners who are held as enemy combatants outside the United States do not have the right to file habeas suits.

The current dispute centers on notices that military officials gave in recent weeks to 14 “high value” detainees at Guantanamo who were previously held in secret CIA prisons. Those detainees include Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who has said he was the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The notices were given to detainees after military panels - combatant status review tribunals - found that all 14 were properly held. Critics have attacked the fairness of the military panel system because detainees were not permitted lawyers for the hearings and cannot see much of the evidence against them.

The forms included a request a detainee could sign seeking representation for an appeals court challenge of a tribunal finding. “I request the American Bar Association find a lawyer who will represent my best interests, without charge,” it said. Article

When grown-ups talk: We needed him then, we need him even more now. A plaintive plea: Why isn’t Mr. Cuomo (or for that matter anyone who can — and doesn’t shy from — coherently and directly frame a cogent debate on policy) running for president?

Compare just this one segment to any or all of the current field running for the presidency in ‘08, who resemble in toto nothing so much as some grating, screwy, endless run of The Bickersons, quareling ad infinitum over how many timetables can dance on the head of a pin.

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Political cronyism of the worst kind. Never addressed as Howard but called ‘Cookie‘ (shades of Scooter), this one looks headed for a much-deserved crumbling. (See also here.)

Aides to State Department Inspector General Howard Krongard threatened two investigators with retaliation this week if they cooperate with a congressional probe into Krongard’s office, the chairman of a House of Representatives panel and other U.S. officials said Friday.

The allegations are the latest in a growing uproar surrounding Krongard. Current and former officials in his office charge that he impeded investigations into alleged arms smuggling by employees of the private security firm Blackwater and into faulty construction of the new U.S. embassy in Baghdad.

[snip]

Officials at the State Department and other agencies said support for Krongard appeared to be slipping, and that it remained uncertain whether he could keep his job. They spoke on condition of anonymity, because Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice hasn’t made a final decision in the matter.

The probe into Krongard’s office is being led by Rep. Henry Waxman, D- Calif., the chairman of the House oversight committee.

The two investigators said they were threatened with retaliation – perhaps including losing their jobs – if they cooperated, Waxman said in a letter to Krongard.

[snip]

According to an e-mail obtained by Waxman’s committee, Krongard intervened when federal prosecutors asked for help from his office in investigating the Blackwater arms-smuggling allegations.

The investigations division of the inspector general’s office “is directed to stop IMMEDIATELY any work on these contracts until I receive a briefing from the (assistant U.S. attorney) regarding the details of this investigation. SA Militana, ASAIC Rubendall and any others involved are to be directed by you not to proceed in any manner until the briefing takes place,” Krongard wrote to a subordinate July 11.

Krongard denied those allegations on Sept. 18 and said he’d made “one of my best investigators” available to help the Justice Department.

That investigator, Waxman wrote Friday, was Militana. Article

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This is noted especially as it brings out what is being pronounced to a primarily Middle Eastern audience by high muckety-mucks like Adm. Fallon; somewhat less cagey and panicky than what is given out to American media.

Fallon was peppered with questions about Iran at every stop in his trip.

Gulf rulers fretted about how conflict would derail their countries’ galloping growth as malls, villas and skyscrapers - including the world’s tallest in Dubai - sprout in the vanilla-hued sand. Dubai currently hosts about one-quarter of the world’s construction cranes, according to local boosters.

The Gulf’s military brass presented their own worries. Most of them were spun around grave scenarios in which an Iran-U.S. war would quickly swallow the entire region and make the Iraq battles seem like a sideshow.

In Kuwait - separated from Iran by just a small sliver of Iraqi coast - Fallon was urged to review its defence pact for new contingencies including threats by Shiite militiamen and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

Fallon did his best to soothe the anxiety.

“This constant drum beat of conflict is what strikes me which is not helpful and not useful,” Fallon said in a half-hour interview with Al-Jazeera television broadcast Sept. 23. Article

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Shorter version of DNI McConnell’s petulant mendacity: If we just had carte blanche, so that we could do (and listen in on) anything, anytime, anywhere — no questions asked (and without having to deal with those pesky and trifling things such as laws or courts or accountability or oversight) — it would make the process so-o-o much simpler.

Bluntest version of the woebegone G. Walker administration’s dangerous whine: But the KGB did it, why can’t we? (See also here.)

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The chickens labeled ‘misuse’ and ‘abuse’ of the military come home to roost. One of the very basics of a government’s military is that it is not a private business, and treating it as if it were is antithetical to its function (as well as detrimental to the public purse).

Also, there have been multiple (and one is too many) stories over recent years of promises (specifically tuition funds) being arbitrarily denied.

The Army’s top official called Thursday for the acceleration of a multiyear expansion of the country’s biggest fighting force, a move that probably would require radical new approaches for keeping soldiers in uniform.

Army Secretary Pete Geren said the planned expansion from its official size of 482,000 to 547,000, announced by President Bush in December as the first post-Cold War increase in U.S. forces, should be completed in four years rather than five to alleviate the strain on troops from frequent combat tours.

Defense officials planning for the increase have voiced concern over recent loosening of standards for new enlistees because of the heavy pressure to meet recruiting goals.

The new Army plan would attempt to build the larger force in a shorter time by instead moving aggressively to retain personnel.

The military has begun to consider options beyond the traditional cash bonuses and college scholarships to entice soldiers to continue service. New approaches under consideration include the promise of graduate school for young officers and the offer of educational benefits for career soldiers’ children.

[snip]

At the same time, the Pentagon will consider ways to curb enticement of valuable soldiers by high-paying private-sector employers. One step under consideration is the use of “noncompete” clauses to prevent private security firms and other contractors doing business with the Pentagon from hiring experienced employees from the enlisted ranks. [Uh-huh. And donkeys fly. — voxd]

Such clauses are used in private workplaces to protect proprietary information. Pentagon lawyers are considering whether they could be used in documents signed by contractors.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Thursday that he was inclined to support the Army plan to speed up the expansion. But he said he would not allow the Army to enlist more recruits without high school diplomas.

“I have been very explicit that as least as long as I’m here, I will not allow them to lower the standard,” Gates said at a news conference.

About 76% of current Army recruits have high school diplomas, Gates said, down from more than 90% in past years. “We’d like to see that get back up,” Gates said.

A final decision on whether to speed up the growth plan may depend on whether the Army makes its recruiting goals for the 12-month period ending Sunday, Army officials said.

The Army has already boosted recruiting goals to help expand the force by about 7,000 soldiers a year to meet congressional authorization for a temporary increase of 30,000. The Army struggled to meet those higher targets, missing monthly goals in May and June. Although the recruiting pace picked up in July and August, the Army would need to have recruited about 8,000 soldiers in September to make its goal for the year.

[snip]

Young captains already have been offered the choice of graduate school, a $25,000 bonus, or the ability to choose their home base if they remain in the service for three additional years.

Geren outlined other preliminary plans to overhaul the educational benefits offered to solders. The Army currently offers a maximum of $72,900 for college tuition in return for six years of service.

Rather than offering more money for college, Geren said, the Army is considering the new step of extending educational benefits to Army spouses and children. Article

Draw your own conclusion on just one facet of G. Walker’s detour of process vis-a-vis India:

Israel is looking to a U.S.-India nuclear deal to expand its own ties to suppliers, quietly lobbying for an exemption to non-proliferation rules so it can legally import atomic material, according to documents made available Tuesday to The Associated Press.

The move is sure to raise concerns among Arab nations already considering their neighbor the region’s atomic arms threat. Israel has never publicly acknowledged having nuclear weapons but is generally considered to possess them.

The new push is reflected in papers Israel presented earlier this year to the “Nuclear Suppliers’ Group” – 45 nations that export nuclear fuel and technology under strict rules meant to lessen the dangers of proliferation and trafficking in materials that could be used for a weapons program.

The initiative appeared to be linked to a U.S.-India agreement that would effectively waive the group’s rules by allowing the United States to supply India with nuclear fuel despite its refusal both to sign the nonproliferation treaty and allowing the IAEA to inspect all of its nuclear facilities.

[snip]

Despite close U.S.-Israeli ties, Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns appeared to rule out special treatment for the Jewish state, telling reporters earlier this year that NSG countries needed to know the deal with India “won’t be a precedent to bring other countries in under the same basis.”

But Daryl Kimball, an analyst and executive director of the Arms Control Association, said that – even if unsuccessful – any attempt by Israel to move closer to nations exporting sensitive nuclear technology and material that could potentially be turned into fissile material for warheads would alarm many in the Middle East.

“There is a great deal of tensions between non-nuclear (Arab) weapons states and Israel, and the mere existence of this proposal would exacerbate … the Middle East situation,” he said from Washington.

And despite U.S. assurances, “Israel’s proposal illustrates the danger of making exemptions for individual countries from nonproliferation rules and standards,” he said.

The most recent tensions over Israel’s nuclear capabilities surfaced at the IAEA’s 148-nation general conference. On Thursday, the Vienna meeting’s penultimate day, only the U.S. and Israel voted against a critical resolution implicitly aimed at the Jewish State for refusing to put its nuclear program under international purview. Article

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Sound and fury of the woebegone G. Walker administration, signifying nothing. The blinding presence of heat of whipped up in a fear frappé, the blinding absence of the light of hard evidence.

A tiny bank in Macau that was at the center of stalled talks over North Korea’s nuclear program will be quietly returned to its former owner Saturday, a move that seems to clear him of charges that he helped Pyongyang launder counterfeit U.S. cash.

[snip]

The Bush administration continues to list the bank as a “primary money laundering concern,” and the Treasury Department didn’t immediately respond Friday to questions about why concerns over the bank’s alleged past activities may have dissipated.

When the Treasury Department first fingered the bank in 2005, Macau authorities froze some $25 million in North Korean-linked money in some 50 accounts.

In a complex, U.S.-brokered deal in June that was intended to get the nuclear talks back on track, the frozen assets reportedly were transferred to the New York Federal Reserve, then to the Russian central bank and finally to a private Russian bank where North Korea has an account.

Macau made no mention of past allegations in announcing the bank’s return to Au, saying only that its Monetary Authority would perform “supervisory duties to safeguard the interests of depositors and to maintain the stability of the financial system.”

The Banco Delta Asia statement suggested that the bank had become a pawn in a conflict between the United States and North Korea.

“The ‘BDA Affair’ is neither a commercial nor a business dispute. It is a political case and BDA has been unwillingly and unknowingly dragged into the epic center of a political whirlpool,” it said.

In May, the 66-year-old Au sought to regain control of his bank with a sworn statement that included a pledge not to rehire any former employees of the bank who’d prompt objections from the U.S. Treasury Department.

In a sign that Treasury’s allegations against the bank appear to have been withdrawn, Banco Delta Asia appears ready to rehire a number of former employees. In its statement, it listed 12 board members and executive staff who’d return to the bank under Au’s direction. Only three are new.

“The rest have been with us for some time,” bank spokeswoman Eva Hui said, “but they may have had other positions in the past.” Article

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Keeping up with the kidnappings in Nigeria’s oil region (and a follow-up to the reports cited yesterday).

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) has denied carrying out Thursday’s attack on Saipem, an Italian oil service company during which a Colombian was killed and two other expatriates and a Nigerian kidnapped.

MEND said, “Some faceless bodies or group” might have latched on to the threat it issued to resume hostilities, to launch the attack during which militants wearing military fatigue stormed the Acker Base yard of the oil servicing company and sprayed it with bullets. “MEND was not involved in that attack. Our statement announcing the resumption of hostilities might have emboldened the attackers who fear us more than the Nigerian military,” it clarified.

[snip]

Unknown militants had Thursday stormed the Saipen complex through the waterfront and in their bid to break through the security cordon and gain access to the expatriates, shot and killed the Colombian, Henry Tonado, who died in the hospital shortly after the militants had disappeared with others into the creeks.

So far, all attempts to get the identities of those taken hostage by the militants have been frustrated by Saipem officials who insisted that it would cause more trauma to their families than any other purpose it might serve the media. Article

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Missed this little gem from earlier in the week:

Six Catholic nuns have been excommunicated for heresy after refusing to give up membership in a Canadian sect whose founder claims to be possessed by the Virgin Mary, the Diocese of Little Rock announced Wednesday. Article

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A perfect storm of artifice: A fictional Marine (best known for uneducated foul-ups) gets a real promotion at a staged ceremony held at a fort (in reality a piece of prime recreational beachfront) which is as much of a defensive outpost as is White Castle.

QUASI-KORANIC COHABITATION KALEIDOSCOPE

1) Divorce.

2) Marriage.

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SOMETIMES THE HUNTER SHOOTS THE GAME…

…sometimes the game shoots the hunter.

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WHERE THE ELITE MEET TO SEEK

As ye old scribe’s grandmother used to say: “You should have such problems.”

Summaries here and here and here and here.

A British military base at Basra Airport was hit by mortars Thursday night, the British troops in southern Iraq said on Friday.

[snip]

This is the second attack against the British troops in the south since they withdrew from the Basra Palace in mid August. Article

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No apparent rush, to the detriment of all sides.

A US-Iraqi commission to provide oversight of private security contractors in Iraq was still to meet on Friday almost a fortnight after an American firm was accused of killing 10 Iraqis by mistake.

[snip]

…a joint statement from the commander of US forces in Iraq, General David Petraeus, and US ambassador Ryan Crocker, said the body — conceived as a watchdog for the booming security industry in Iraq — was still to meet.

“The full Iraqi-US joint commission on US government Protective Security Detail (PSD) operations in Iraq is preparing for its first meeting in Baghdad,” the statement said. Article

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Initial reaction here is that it was more imperative that something be signed than that anything substantive be hammered out.

Turkey and Iraq signed an anti-terrorism deal on Friday targeting Kurdish rebels based in northern Iraq, but failed to agree on a plan that would have let Turkish troops chase militants across their shared border.

Ankara claims the right under international law to send its troops across the mountainous frontier in “hot pursuit” of guerrillas of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), but Iraqi Kurds opposed any concession by Baghdad on this issue.

“We could not reach agreement on the article concerning improvement of border security cooperation. Our negotiations on this issue will continue,” Turkish Interior Minister Besir Atalay said after the signing ceremony.

[snip]

raqi Kurds were quick to question the legitimacy of Friday’s deal, saying it must be approved by the Kurdish regional parliament as well as by Baghdad and Ankara.

They also said the real target of the deal should not be the PKK but militant groups active in Iraq such as al Qaeda.

“The minister of interior has no right to sign agreements allowing foreign forces to enter Iraq, without being approved by the Iraqi parliament and Iraqi government,” Jabbar Yawar, spokesman for the Kurdish armed forces, told Reuters.

An earlier draft of Friday’s agreement had suggested Ankara ask Baghdad for permission each time it wanted to conduct pursuit raids into Iraq. But this was unacceptable to Turkey, which diplomats say conducts occasional cross-border forays. Article

On the same subject, a Turkish perspective:

Hours before the signing of the deal in Ankara, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdog(an warned in New York that the number of options of the Turkish government concerning its fight against PKK terrorism have been gradually decreasing due to the absence of concrete action by the Iraqi and US governments against the organization.

[snip]

The Iraqi delegation, headed by Interior Minister Jawad al-Boulani, was prepared to leave on Thursday evening after disputes over the right to “hot pursuit” brought the talks to an impasse on the third day of negotiations. He was convinced to stay for another day by Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Ertugrul Apakan.

[snip]

In New York, Erdogan also strongly warned that continued inaction by Washington against the presence and activities of the PKK from its bases in Iraq was harming US relations with its key NATO ally.̾

[snip]

As of Friday, Iraqi Kurdish authorities, speaking with The Associated Press, signaled they might agree to the Iraqi-Turkish counterterrorism pact after Ankara dropped its demand to send troops in pursuit of PKK members fleeing across the border into northern Iraq. But officials in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region complained the agreement had been reached without their prior consultation.

“We are not committed to any security agreement connected to Kurdistan’s security that was drawn up without any active participation from the regional government,” Brig. Gen. Jabbar Yawar, an undersecretary for the ministry governing Kurdish peshmerga forces. “If this agreement is a routine one for sharing intelligence and fighting terrorism, then we will support it, but we will not support anything that violates the sovereignty of the regional government,” he added in a telephone interview with the AP.

Jamal Abdullah, a spokesman for the Kurdish regional government, said any pact must be approved by Iraqi constitutional institutions, including the Parliament, the Cabinet and the Presidential Council. “Any agreement to be signed with another country behind the back of the Kurdistan regional government and parliament will be totally rejected,” Abdullah said. Article

Also:

Though not agreed to by the Iraqi side, Turkey based its argument to stage hot pursuit operations into northern Iraq on, among other things, Iraq’s Constitution Article 7, Paragraph 2, which holds the Iraqi government responsible for dealing with all kinds of terrorist acts. The Iraqi government is also responsible for working against its territory becoming a base for terrorists and preventing the use of its territory as a staging ground for terrorist activities.

Since the Iraqi government has branded the PKK a terrorist organization under the new agreement, Ankara now expects Baghdad to act in line with its constitution, though it declined to insert a hot pursuit clause in the accord, said another Turkish security expert.

Turkey staged almost 20 hot pursuit or cross-border operations into northern Iraq between 1989 and 1999, some of them in coordination with Iraqi Kurds. Iraqi Kurdish authorities earlier banned the activities of the northern Iraq-based Islamic Movement of Kurdistan after US complaints that the organization had close links with al-Qaeda. Article

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Chaos abides.

Two Iraqi oil fields’ guards were killed and three injured when an improvised bomb targeted a pipeline in Thee Qaar province in southern Iraq, Iraqi security source said on Friday. Article

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There is a necessity to be blunt about this. That is to say that the U.S. military is so overstretched and overburdened that they are now rushing (ahead of even their ill-chosen schedule) to cram Marines and probably other forces into controversial and ill-designed and ill-tested vehicles, unsuited to the environment — into what can be described for all intents and purposes as flying deathtraps.

The top U.S. Air Force general said the service may rush to bring the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft into combat to offset helicopter shortages.

Gen. T. Michael “Buzz” Moseley, Air Force chief of staff, said the Texas-built aircraft, which is considered controversial because of its high cost of production and a pair of crashes that resulted in the deaths of 23 U.S. Marines, has been re-engineered and retested and may be put into combat operations ahead of schedule, the Dallas Morning News reported Friday. Article

Afghanistan summaries here and here and here.

Pakistan summary here.

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What’s up regarding the ICRC personnel being held:

Negotiators were in touch Friday with the captors of four Red Cross workers, two of them foreigners, who were held in Afghanistan during a mission to free a German kidnapped by the Taliban.

Contact had been made with the group that seized the men on Wednesday in the province of Wardak, about 50 kilometres (30 miles) from Kabul, and military action had been ruled out to free the men, an Afghan official told AFP.

“The Red Cross office advised us not use any military action for the safety of the kidnapped people and the issue must be solved via mediation through tribal elders,” said the governor of Sayed Abad district where they were taken.

[snip]

The Red Cross workers did not return to Kabul on Wednesday after their mission in Wardak, where the 62-year-old German engineer and five Afghans were captured 10 weeks ago.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) did not say they have been kidnapped but that they had been detained and were expected to be freed soon.

Besides the two Afghans, one of the men was from Myanmar and another from Macedonia, it said.

“We are in contact with all the involved parties,” spokeswoman Graziella Leite Piccolo said in Kabul. An “armed group” was involved in the abduction, she said, without elaborating.

The incident comes after a string of abductions of foreigners in Afghanistan, some claimed by the insurgent Taliban movement and some blamed on criminals seeking ransom.

The Taliban reiterated Friday that it was not involved in the disappearance of the Red Cross staff.

A man identifying himself as the group’s main spokesman, Yousuf Ahmadi, said: “This is not our work. I cannot say anything at this stage who might have done it.” Article

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Billions for bombs, bupkis for balms: Just a bit more than a week until the beginning of Year Seven of war operations, and yet another report details minimal progress on multiple fronts:

On the global Human Development Index (HDI), Afghanistan is ranked 174 out of 178 countries, while the Human Poverty Index describes the country as “one of the worst in the world”, far below Mali, which is considered one of the poorest of the world’s poor.

The HDI, which is a brainchild of the U.N. Development Programme (UNDP), is a composite indicator that measures education, longevity and economic performance.

The 176-page Human Development Report 2007, authored by the Centre for Policy and Human Development at Kabul University, portrays a stark picture of the economic and social conditions in a battle ravaged country struggling for survival, six years after the repressive Taliban regime was ousted from power.

Commissioned by UNDP, the study says that although Afghans have made tremendous progress in human development since 2002, “the country is not progressing enough in most sectors”, with “dire consequences for the poor and the vulnerable.”

A number of factors contribute to the low HDI value for Afghanistan: 6.6 million Afghans do not meet their minimum food requirements.

[snip]

…there are over 37,000 children who work and beg in the streets of Kabul alone, some 80 percent of them boys, 36 percent of whom are aged 8-10 years.

The GDP per capita (in purchasing power parity terms) has increased from 683 dollars in 2002 to 964 dollars in 2005.

An additional 132,000 square kilometres of land was cleared of landmines in 2006. The number of telephone users has leapt to about 2.5 million (or 10 percent of the population) while school enrolment has grown in the past five years: from about 900,000 to nearly 5.4 million.

The prevalence of malaria and tuberculosis has dropped dramatically, according to the study. Still, Afghanistan ranks 17 out of the 22 countries with the highest tuberculosis levels.

“The soil, water and the forests– the basis of livelihood for most Afghans– have been degraded severely due to excessive demands from agriculture and household energy use.” Article

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Keeping up with the charges:

Maj. Gen. Thomas R. Csrnko has dismissed all charges against two Fort Bragg Special Forces who killed an “enemy combatant” who was “under the control of friendly forces” in Afghanistan.

Capt. Dave Staffel and Master Sgt. Troy Anderson were accused of premeditated murder in the shooting of Nawab Buntangyar on Oct. 13, 2006, at the village of Ster Kalay near the Pakistan border.

…Several witnesses testified that they had little confidence in the competence of the Afghans working with the Special Forces soldiers who were supposed to have control over the man. Article

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Monitoring the pre-’election’ pressure cooker:

Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Friday dismissed major legal challenges to President Pervez Musharraf’s bid for re- election, clearing the way for the military ruler to remain in uniform when he seeks another five-year term on October 6.

[snip]

Ten petitions from opposition parties, civil society groups and individuals had sought to obstruct Musharraf’s candidacy and his parallel holding of the post of army chief, with some arguing that this precluded him under the constitution from running for president.

Six members of a panel of senior judges dismissed the petitions as ‘non-maintainable’, against three who wanted to uphold them.

[snip]

At a separate session Friday, Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry set an October 17 date for Aziz and other officials to formally explain their deportation of Sharif from the country.

Despite an earlier court ruling that he could return home unimpeded almost seven years in exile, the politician was arrested and put on a plane to Saudi Arabia within five hours of landing in Islamabad on September 10. Article

Also:

Pakistani authorities have released dozens of opposition leaders and workers following an order by the country’s chief justice, officials said [Friday].

The activists were held at the weekend after threatening to stage protests against the re-election of military ruler President Pervez Musharraf on October 6.

“Those detained under the maintenance of public order laws have been released on the direction of the Supreme Court,” said an interior ministry spokesman. Article

Summary here.

Four Somali soldiers have been killed and several wounded when insurgents ambushed an army truck in the capital, an official and witnesses said [Friday].

The soldiers were heading to reinforce their colleagues in Mogadishu’s Suqaholaha district overnight when they came under rocket-propelled grenade attack, they said.

“Four of our men were killed and several others wounded when insurgents ambushed them near the Arafat area. I believe the death toll might rise,” an army commander said.… Article

What’s up.

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While out of Australia, it has an unassailable Guantáamo connection, and is an exemplar of why evidence must not be wantonly stamped secret and thenceforth not presented or made available to any accused or to his/her defense.

A handwriting expert has cast doubt on whether former Guantanamo Bay detainee Mamdouh Habib wrote a series of damning notes about weapons training that have been at the heart of the Federal Government’s case against him.

In yet another blow to the authorities’ argument that the Sydney father is a national security threat, questions have also been raised about whether just one person penned the 10 pages of handwritten notes and diagrams about guns and military-style weapons alleged to have been seized from Mr Habib’s home in the city’s southwest during a raid in 2001.

Forensic document examiner Paul Westwood, who was engaged by The Weekend Australian to examine the documents, has found considerable differences between Mr Habib’s handwriting and that in the notes.

“The presence of what appear to be significant differences between some characters in the questioned and specimen documents gives rise to some doubt that they were written by one and the same person,” said Mr Westwood, the former director of the document examination section of the Australian Federal Police.

The notes have been used by authorities to prosecute their case that Mr Habib, who was detained in Pakistan in 2001 and held at Guantanamo Bay until his release without charge in February 2005, had undertaken weapons training with the now banned group Lashka e-Toiba in Pakistan.

[snip]

It has also been discovered that another document used by the authorities to portray Mr Habib as a terrorist sympathiser was an assignment written by his wife, Maha, eight years ago for a TAFE class.

Former Australian spy turned commentator and novelist Warren Reed said intelligence gathering had to be meticulous, and the circumstantial evidence in the Habib case did not add up.

“When the veracity and viability of any intelligence is in doubt, it calls into question the whole intelligence-gathering process.”

Rod Broadhurst, head of the school of justice at Queensland University of Technology, said the secrecy surrounding terrorism cases made accountability much more fraught.

He said one continuing concerns was whether, given the rapid expansion of the secret services since the attacks of September 11, 2001, intelligence officers had “sufficient experience and training to be able to make the key decisions about the relevance of the information”.

Mr Westwood examined the notes and compared them with samples of Mr Habib’s own handwriting. He said there were some limitations to his investigations, including the poor reproduction quality of the notes and the lack of previous handwriting samples by Mr Habib with which to compare.

However, he doubted that the 10 pages were all produced by one person. Article

Keeping up with the kidnppings in Nigeria’s oil region.

A Colombian man was believed killed in a militant attack on an oil installation in Nigeria’s petroleum-rich Niger Delta, the Vanguard newspaper reported Friday.

Four others were reportedly abducted by the gunmen that attacked the Saipem Nigeria Limited facility in Rivers State. Article

This would seem to be the same event, with additional info:

Few days after Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), threatened to resume attacks without notice over the arrest of their leader, Mr Henry Okah alias Gbomo Jomo, militants yesterday afternoon attacked Saipem, an Italian oil firm, killed one Columbian and took three others away.

The attack is coming barely 24 hours after military authorities dismissed the threat of attack as “empty hot air,” and vowed to do everything to protect the interest of law abiding citizens of the country.

Though names of those taken in the attack at Saipem yard, a subsidiary of Nigerian Agip Oil Company 0(NAOC), Acker base in Rumuolumeni close to the NNS Pathfinder, Port Harcourt, Rivers State, were yet to be known, the police said they include an Australian, a Filipino and a Nigerian. Article

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An informative piece on the energy-driven dickering and relations underway in and with Turkmenistan.

HARDY LITTLE BUGGERS

“For the first time ever, animals are now being exposed to an unmitigated space environment, with both vacuum conditions and cosmic radiation,” says the ecologist Ingemar Jönsson, a researcher at Kristianstad University in Sweden.

One of the aims of sending the tiny tardigrades into space is to find out whether they can cope with the rugged conditions in space, which has previously been predicted but never tested.

Tardigrades are one of the most tolerant animals on earth when it comes to dehydration and radiation, a characteristic that would be required in order to survive a trip through space. But the project is also part of research into the fundamental physiology of the tardigrade, primarily of the mechanisms that underlie their ability to withstand desiccation.

The project, named TARDIS, has been selected by the European Space Agency (ESA) to be one of ten European projects being given the opportunity to carry out scientific experiments in a true space environment. Article

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THAWED FROM MULTI-MILLENNIAL SLEEP

Antarctica’s Dry Valleys are among the most desolate places on the planet. Here, no plants cling to the slopes, no small mammals scurry among the scree. The freeze-dried landscapes, with their rocks chiselled by the wind, seem utterly lifeless. When Captain Scott first chanced upon their craggy peaks and troughs in 1905, he labelled them the “valleys of the dead”.

Now, a little more than a hundred years on from Scott’s exhibition, US scientists have discovered that the icy landscapes may not be so barren after all. Microbiologists from New Jersey have chanced upon tiny frozen organisms that have remained alive for millions of years, embedded in some of the oldest ice on the planet.

Dr Kay Bidle of Rutgers University, who was part of the research team, extracted DNA and bacteria from ice found barely metres beneath the surface of a Dry Valleys glacier, and, remarkably, claims to have grown the bacteria in a lab. “This is by far the oldest ice in which we have found encased microbes, cultured them and formed a growth,” he says.

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Braving the barren hills, where footsteps made 50 years ago can still be seen, the researchers took samples that ranged in age from 100,000 to eight million years. Drilling deep beneath the shifting surface of an ice floe, they dredged up frozen material that, when scrutinised under a microscope, left them stunned. Not only could they see microscopic bacteria that they could extract, but these enduring creatures were from the most ancient ice samples.

Once the bacteria were extracted and fed in a laboratory, they began to multiply. While the number of organisms found in the 100,000-year-old ice doubled in size every seven days, those from the eight million-year-old ice grew much more slowly. Dr Bidle says that the “young stuff grew really fast”, but the older colony doubled in size only every two months, suggesting that over time, the bacteria’s DNA , which controls its reproduction, had been damaged.

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The scientific community has heralded the discovery as “significant”, but the team’s conclusions might disappoint science-fiction buffs. There will be no global pandemic – or at least there shouldn’t be. The scientists say that while extremely old bacteria will be released into the world’s oceans as a result of global warming, it is not a “cause for concern”. Dr Bidle says that marine bacteria and viruses are less harmful to human health than those found on land. “Clearly this melting has happened many times over the Earth’s history,” he says. “We didn’t find any pathogens. What we found were organisms closely related to common environmental bacteria.”

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Whenever the ice caps melt they inject a huge amount of genetic material into the oceans. Bacteria can incorporate external DNA into their own genetic material – through a process known as “lateral transmission”– and if they are good genes they can help the bugs survive. If they are not, they won’t. “[Lateral transmission] can be advantageous or it can be deleterious. This is one of main ways in which microbes get new data,” Bidle says. “It’s up to natural selection to sort that out.” In other words, the thawing of Antarctic ice could fast-track the microbes’ evolution. Article

CRUDE ‘TUDE

A guarded gesture.

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JUST SET IT AND FORGET IT

Will the last person to leave the office turn out the lights? But first make triply certain that you are the last person.