Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. Thursday's Winds of War briefings are given by me, Colt, of Eurabian Times.
TOP TOPICS
- Two Americans have been beheaded by al-Qaeda in Iraq. A video of the third hostage has been released. Ken Bigley is shown begging for his life. Zarqawi has demanded the release of all female prisoners. It has been suggested that the women that concern him the most are the delightfully named Doctors 'Germ' and 'Anthrax'. Dr Germ was to be released today, but that has apparently changed. Two Italian aid-workers have also been murdered.
- U.S. intelligence still believes that al-Qaeda is planning a 'spectacular' for this election season.
- An al-Qaeda attempt to bomb European embassies in Lebanon has been thwarted.
Other Topics Today Include: Iran Reports; Domestic Brief; new al-Qaeda leader; dead Tawhid ideologue; Karzai attacked; Jerusalem bomb blast; JI attacks 'every six months'; Kashmir fighting; FSG fights terror; Syrian troops out of Beirut; US in Niger; Nigerian Islamists on rampage; Islamists in Algiera; al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia.
IRAN REPORTS
- The U.S. is looking at the possiblity of isolated strike on Iran. The strike bit is challenging enough; the 'isolated' is the real problem though...
- The IAEA is taking a soft line on the rogue state's nuclear program.
- But even that line is too harsh for the Iranians, who are promising to enrich more uranium.
- Perhaps in a sign of things to come, Israel is purchasing some 5,000 smart bombs from the United States, including bunker busters.
- Iran is trying to limit women's rights and foreign investment.
- The Iraqi defence minister says Iran has scaled back its interference in Iraq.
DOMESTIC SECURITY BRIEFINGS
- A small explosive has been found on an Australian passenger jet.
- Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had a visa to enter Australia in August 2001.
- Yusuf Islam, AKA Cat Stevens, has been forbidden entry in to the United States. The Muslim convert is on the terrorist watch list, and has 'unwittingly' donated to terrorist groups in the past.
THE WIDER WAR
- A Libyan named Abu Faraj al-Libbi has taken charge of al-Qaeda cells in Britain and the US.
- A senior al-Tawhid man has been killed in Iraq by US forces.
- President Hamid Karzai and his vice-president have both survived recent attempts on their lives.
- President Musharraf says there are al-Qaeda terrorists in Pakistan. Unfortunately, they are getting their act together.
- A teenage suicide bomber has killed two Israeli policemen in Jerusalem.
- Indonesian police believe JI are planning attacks every six months.
- More fighting in Kashmir.
- The FSB says it has stopped an attack in Moscow. The terrorist, ahem, died in custody. The FSB also claim they've busted a suicide bomber recruitment group in Chechnya.
- Syria is moving some 1,000 troops out of Beirut to elsewhere in Lebanon, despite international pressure to withdraw all troops from the country.
- An interesting look at US efforts to train Nigerien soldiers to fight Salafi terrorists.
- Nigerian Islamists have attacked a police station.
- A Russian officer has been arrested for failing to prevent the bombings of two Russian airliners. He briefly detained both suicide bombers.
- Not entirely reliably, Debka reports Russian troops have moved to prevent fighting between North Ossetians and the Ingush.
- An overview of the Islamist campaign in Algeria.
- Al-Qaeda have claimed responsibility for the shooting of a Brit in Riyadh last week.
- Saudi police have arrested a wanted extremist in Tabuk.
- A Saudi enemy combatant will be transferred from American to Saudi custody.
- Any Dr Seuss fans out there?
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>>"The duty officer confirmed that the man later suffered a heart attack and died while in police custody, but the officer refused to elaborate."
Looks like old habits die hard at 2 Dzerzhinsky Square. Nothing like a good, old-fashioned torture-murder to inspire public confidence in the justice system. Maybe the FSB/KGB's "rubber-hose cryptanalysis" turned up information that might foil another terrorist attack. That would make everything ok, right?
Aren't our new "friends" wonderful?
The Dr. Seuss link is inane doggerel. An insult to the great man.
My solution to Iran is much cheaper and better. Air drop hundreds of thousands of Uzis and ammo over all the population centers. End of the mullahs and their bully boys within 48 hours, guaranteed.
A-hem. Everyone should know that it really was Colt's Birthday on Monday. Happy Birthday Colt!
Brian H. Well, I thought it was funny. :)
In the words of the immortal bard himself,
'From near to far, from here to there,
funny things are everywhere!'
Happy birthday to you, Colt!
The news from Nigeria is very interesting. I would say that the jihadist tide amounts to more than 200 harebrained madrassa students.
It is strange how little is known about the fundamentalist movement there. The last thing they did (the supreme council of the Sharia, headed by a disgruntled presidential candidate) was to campaign against the children being vaccinated against polio arguing that the vaccine was part of a western plot to make Muslim girls sterile. (I’m not kidding)
Polio, which was on the verge of being eradicated has spread from Northern Nigeria to 11 sub-Saharan countries…
More about that in these links:
Conspiracy Theories And Religious Extremism Keep Polio Alive in Africa
Nigerian parents still refusing polio vaccine
More links here:
Social Capital News Server – Polio Nigeria
To the story belongs that the president of the Sharia Council is a doctor…
It's me again...
After posting here, I was checking out links at the Social Capital News Server and found that the campaign against the vaccine has spread from Nigeria to Northern India –where if I’m not mistaken there is big proportion of Muslims. This is from Medical News Today:
Polio vaccine resistance in Eastern India, infertility fears
22 Sep 2004
Some people living in the slums of Gaya in the eastern state of Bihar, India, have refused to allow health workers to orally vaccinate their children against polio out of fear that the drops contain substances that could harm the children's fertility, the AP/Washington Times reports.
The people refusing the vaccines are distrustful of the government and believe that the vaccines are part of government efforts to control population growth, according to the AP/Times (AP/Washington Times, 9/18).
UNICEF health workers have recruited counselors to try to handle the concerns, the AP/Philadelphia Inquirer reports (Qadir, AP/Philadelphia Inquirer, 9/9).
The northern Nigerian state of Kano earlier this year stopped its polio immunizations out of fear that the vaccines were part of a U.S.-sponsored plan to spread HIV and infertility among Muslims. However, the state in July agreed to end its boycott of the vaccines after tests showed that the immunizations were free of HIV and would not cause infertility.
Nigeria previously had eradicated the disease, but state and city bans on polio vaccines led to the disease's re-emergence (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 7/21).
World Health Organization experts say that a single case of polio could lead to an outbreak of the disease and cause a setback to the organization's campaign to eliminate polio worldwide by 2005 (Qadir, AP/Philadelphia Inquirer, 9/19).
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=13821
Thank you :-)
T. J. Madison
>>"The duty officer confirmed that the man later suffered
>>a heart attack and died while in police custody, but
>>the officer refused to elaborate."
He was beaten to death - this is the from Russian media, for example Izvestia. It is a known fact, that is; the article is a bit behind. Moreover, his own wife and two former colleagues were shown the body and did not recognize him, so this may be a different person from what's purported. An investigation is started too.
>>Looks like old habits die hard at 2 Dzerzhinsky Square.
Oh no, this is no "old habits", this is new habits. All humanitarian considerations aside, in the olden days an important arrestee in KGB's hands would not die like that; they were much more competent. It's not in their interests to have him dead.