Gazette 092413

Tuesday September 24th 2013

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Kenyan forces comb Westgate site

Security forces are combing the Nairobi shopping centre attacked by suspected al-Shabab militants, as they seek for a fourth day to secure the site.

An explosion and gunfire were heard at the Westgate complex on Tuesday morning, but later a senior police source said the operation was "over".
At least 65 people have been killed, including three soldiers.
Meanwhile, Kenya's foreign minister said "two or three" Americans and a British woman were among the attackers.
In an interview with the US TV programme PBS Newshour, Amina Mohamed said the Americans were 18 or 19 years old, of Somali or Arab origin, and lived "in Minnesota and one other place".
She said the Briton was a woman who had "done this many times before".
Ms Mohamed appeared to contradict earlier comments from Kenya's interior minister, who suggested that all the attackers were men - though some may have been dressed as women.

Gunmen attack Sunni town in Iraq

An Iraqi official says that gunmen have tried to take over a small Sunni town in the county's west, sparking battles that left 11 people including six attackers dead.

Waqas Adnan, the mayor of Ana, said that the assault on the town started Tuesday at dawn when a car bomb exploded near the town's police station. The mayor says that about 30 gunmen attacked his house.
Adnan says his brother died in the two hours of fighting that ensued, as well as four policemen and six attackers.
Ana is 330 kilometers (200 miles) northwest of Baghdad.
Violence has spiked in Iraq in recent months as insurgents capitalize on rising sectarian and ethnic tensions. More than 4,000 people have been killed over the past five months alone, according to U.N. figures.

Hezbollah Leader Denies Syria Chemical Weapons Claim

BEIRUT -- The leader of the Lebanese political party and militia Hezbollah in a speech on Monday night strongly denied charges that his group had acquired chemical weapons from the Syrian regime.
Hassan Nasrallah, the secretary general of Hezbollah -- a group that has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States but holds a prominent place in Lebanese politics -- called the reports "truly laughable" in his first public comments since an American plan to bomb Syria came and went in response to a chemical weapons attack in eastern Damascus.
"Religious reasons [prevent] us from owning or using chemical weapons," Nasrallah said, according to the Lebanese news outlet Now Lebanon. "These accusations have dangerous repercussions on Lebanon ... they will endanger the country and all of its people."
The denial comes at a moment when Iran, one of the chief backers of Hezbollah, seems headed toward a possible rapprochement with the U.S., particularly over the issue of the conflict in Syria.
Hasan Rouhani, the newly elected president of Iran, has made several overtures towards the West in recent weeks, and on Monday he arrived in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, live-tweeting his travel and speaking optimistically about the possibility of opening a dialogue with Washington.
White House officials have yet to say whether they will hold such a meeting, although they have not ruled it out. Meanwhile, in an interview with the BBC, a top U.N. official repeated an earlier assertion that Iran will have to be included in any eventual dialogue over ending the Syrian crisis. 

North Korea 'has technology to build uranium-based nuclear bombs'

North Korean scientists are thought to have attained the ability to build uranium-based nuclear bombs on their own, cutting the need for imports that had been one of the few ways outsiders could monitor the country's secretive atomic work.
According to evidence gathered by two North American experts, material published in North Korean scientific publications and news media shows that Pyongyang is mastering domestic production of essential components for the gas centrifuges needed to make such bombs.
The development further complicates long-stalled efforts to stop a nuclear bomb programme that Pyongyang has vowed to expand, despite international condemnation.
If Pyongyang can make crucial centrifuge parts at home, outsiders cannot track sensitive imports, which could spell the end of policies based on export controls, sanctions and interdiction that have been the centrepiece of international efforts to stop North Korea's nuclear programme over the last decade, Joshua Pollack, a Washington-based expert on nuclear proliferation, said.
"If they're not importing these goods in the first place, then we can't catch them in the act," said Pollack, who gathered the evidence with Scott Kemp, an expert on centrifuge technology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "We won't necessarily see anything more than what the North Koreans want us to see."
The state of North Korea's nuclear programme is of vital concern to Washington because Pyongyang wants to build an arsenal of nuclear-armed missiles that can reach American shores.
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Temple Mount closed due to threats of Palestinian rioting


The Temple Mount was closed to thousands of visitors Tuesday morning, including Jews making a pilgrimage to the holy site for Succot, after police received threats of rioting by Palestinian Muslims at the site.
According to Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld, following a security assessment, police determined that closing the holy site was necessary to protect visitors from possible violence at the hands of Arabs who reject Jewish rights to pray there.
Asked if the site would be reopened to visitors Wednesday, Rosenfeld said police are taking a wait and see approach.
“We’ll see what takes place tomorrow,” he said.
A police officer was lightly injured and three members of the northern branch of the fundamentalist Islamic Movement were arrested at the Temple Mount last week, after several rock-throwing Palestinians attacked visiting groups, police said.

'Soldier who claimed SAS hand in Diana's death flees'

LONDON: A former SAS soldier who had made the sensational claim that the elite British army regiment had a hand in Princess Diana's death has fled the UK before he could be quizzed by police, a media report has said.

Known only as Soldier N, the former SAS sergeant vanished days before he was due to be interviewed as part of a "scoping exercise" into information surrounding Diana's death, the Daily Express reported.

He had been expected to meet Scotland Yard officers in the coming days as part of a new assessment of the evidence in connection with the 1997 car crash in which Diana and Dodi Fayed died.

Last night a spokesman for the Metropolitan Police was quoted as saying by the paper: "The met is currently scoping recent information regarding the deaths of Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed. This scoping exercise is not complete."

News about the ex-soldier suddenly leaving the country is bound to throw the probe into disarray, the report said.

Officers were keen to speak to him after he reportedly told his estranged wife that a special forces hit squad was behind the death of Diana, the report said. The claims were only made public last month.

Pakistani Christians protest deadly church bombing as toll climbs

Peshawar, Pakistan: Pakistani Christians rallied Monday to denounce the deadliest attack ever in this country against the religious minority as the death toll from the church bombings the day before climbed to 85.
Two suicide bombers blew themselves up amid hundreds of worshippers outside the historic All Saints Church Sunday in the northwestern city of Peshawar.

Our people have been killed ... Nobody seems to bother about us 

A wing of the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the bombings, saying they would continue to target non-Muslims until the US stops drone attacks in Pakistan.
The bombings raised new questions about the Pakistani government's push to strike a peace deal with the militants to end a decade-long insurgency that has killed thousands of people.

"What dialogue are we talking about? Peace with those who are killing innocent people," asked the head of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance, Paul Bhatti, whose brother, a federal minister, was gunned down by an Islamic extremist in 2011.
The death toll reached 85, after seven more of those wounded in Peshawar died overnight, according to the commissioner of Peshawar, Sahibzada Anees.

Strong earthquake kills 30 in remote part of Pakistan

A powerful earthquake hit a remote, impoverished part of western Pakistan on Tuesday, killing at least 30 people and destroying scores of mud houses in a thinly populated area, officials and residents said.
Tremors were felt as far away as the Indian capital of New Delhi, hundreds of kilometres to the east, where buildings shook, as well as the sprawling port city of Karachi in Pakistan.
The United States Geological Survey said a 7.8-magnitude quake had struck 230 kilometres southeast of Dalbandin in Pakistan’s earthquake-prone province of Baluchistan, which borders Iran.
Abdul Qadoos, deputy speaker of the Baluchistan assembly, told Reuters 30 people had been killed and at least 30 percent of houses in the impoverished Awaran district had caved in.
In the Baluch regional capital of Quetta, officials said some areas appeared to be badly damaged but it was hard to assess the impact quickly because the locations were so remote.
Baluch chief secretary Babar Yaqoob said earlier that 25 people had been injured and that the death toll was expected to increase.
A rescue operation had begun in the desert and mountain region which has no major industrial installations.
“We are trying to assess the damage,” said Baluch Home Secretary Asad Gilani.
Local television reported that helicopters carrying relief supplies had been dispatched to the affected area. The army said it had deployed 200 troops to help deal with the disaster.

Former Warlord Preps for Western Withdrawal

While the West is trying to extricate itself from the war zone in Afghanistan as quickly as possible, old warlords like Ismail Khan are preparing for a post-withdrawal period that many anticipate will be violent.

Ismail Khan abruptly gets up from his armchair. "I understood the question," he says. "So you want to know whether now, 12 years after Western troops arrived, every village finally has electricity." Afghanistan's minister of water and energy walks over to a map on the wall on which rebuilt hydroelectric power plants, new solar plants and modern wind turbines are marked. 
Khan grabs a pointer, taps it onto an area west of Herat and says: "This is where I came across the border from Iran with 17,000 men in 1996, during the Taliban era. Then we continued through Faryab and Mazar to Faizabad and back to Herat." He drags the pointer to the north and then to the east, sweeping it across all the wind turbines and power plants, as if they were nothing but hindrances. "My militias fought bravely everywhere," says Khan.
This minister doesn't want to talk about water and electricity, or about what his ministry has been up to since the Taliban was ousted. All he wants to talk about is the past, about fighting the Soviets, about the regime of former President Mohammad Najibullah and about the Islamists after they assumed power in Afghanistan.
But when he mentions the Taliban, he is also talking about the future. He foresees a return of the fundamentalist Taliban, the collapse of the government in Kabul and the eruption of a new war between ethnic groups. He sees a future in which power is divided between the clans as it was in the past, and in which the mujahedeen, the tribal militias seasoned by battles against the Soviets and later the Taliban, remain the sole governing force.

Russia’s Growing Ties with Vietnam

Recent deals leave Beijing disgruntled and represent an additional layer of complexity in the regional security web.

Russia’s policies in Southeast Asia often pass without a great deal of remark. But missing the latest twists and turns in Russia’s relationship with Vietnam risks a failure to grasp key elements of the way in which these two important Asian actors are responding to China’s rising power and to trends in Asian security. Although Sino-Russian ties are deepening, at least in the context of the United States, in Southeast Asia Russia has in fact quietly but openly resisted Chinese encroachments and is forging a deeper military-political relationship with Vietnam.

Beijing has repeatedly demanded that Moscow terminate energy explorations in the South China Sea, clearly responding to Russia’s visibly enhanced interests in the region. In 2012, Russia announced its interest in regaining a naval base at Cam Ranh Bay, a step probably connected to joint Russo-Vietnamese energy projects off Vietnam’s coast, and a potential means of checking China. Gazprom also signed a deal to explore two licensed blocks in Vietnam’s continental shelf in the South China Sea, taking a 49% stake in the offshore blocks, which hold an estimated 1.9 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and more than 25 million tons of gas condensate. Those actions precipitated Beijing’s demand that Moscow leave the area. Yet despite its silence, presumably to avoid antagonizing China, Moscow stayed put. Since then it has stepped up support for Vietnam involving energy exploration in the South China Sea and, perhaps more ominously from China’s standpoint, arms sales and defense cooperation.

Obama Announces Big Diplomatic Step

Obama Announces That John Kerry Will Pursue Nuclear Weapons Agreement With Iran

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — President Barack Obama says he has directed Secretary of State John Kerry to pursue a nuclear weapons agreement with Iran and that he firmly believes "the diplomatic path must be tested."
Obama told the United Nations General Assembly Tuesday he's encouraged that Iranian President Hasan Rouhani is pursuing a more moderate course. But he said Rouhani's "conciliatory words will have to be matched by actions that are transparent and verifiable."
The West has long suspected that Iran is seeking a nuclear weapon. Tehran has consistently denied the charge.
It's still unclear if Obama will meet with Rouhani while at the United Nations. The leaders of the two countries haven't had face-to-face contact in more than 30 years.
U.S. officials say no meeting is planned, although they haven't ruled one out.

Gallup poll: Harry Reid is the most unpopular congressional leader

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is the most unpopular of the top four Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress, according to a Gallup poll that suggests the American people might support them more if they got along better.
Just 33 percent of voters approve of Reid's performance, compared with 53 percent of Gallup survey respondents who disapprove, which amounts to a net approval rating of -20. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, fares only slightly better; his 37/54 percent favorable/unfavorable numbers give him a net rating of -17.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., both have a net approval rating of -12. McConnell's approval rating (35 percent) is lower than Pelosi's (39 percent), but Pelosi's disapproval rating (51 percent) comes in higher than McConnell's (47 percent).
Gallup reported Monday that, heading into a congressional debate about defunding Obamacare or shutting down the government, 53 percent of Americans polled support compromise, compared to 25 percent who say its "more important [for legislators] to stick to their principles."

Ex-FBI agent pleads guilty to leaks

An ex-FBI agent has agreed to plead guilty to leaking information to a reporter about an al-Qaeda bomb plot and to child pornography charges.

Donald Sachtleben, 55, is to be sentenced to 12 years in prison.
The May 2012 disclosures jeopardised an international intelligence operation and put lives at risk, officials said.
Investigators identified him after seizing phone records of the Associated Press, which published an article on the Yemen-based al-Qaeda plot.
"This unauthorized and unjustifiable disclosure severely jeopardized national security and put lives at risk," Deputy Attorney General James Cole said in a statement.
"To keep the country safe, the department must enforce the law against such critical and dangerous leaks, while respecting the important role of the press."
In May 2012, the Associated Press published an article describing a successful effort to disrupt a plot by Yemen-based al-Qaeda militants to bomb a US-bound airliner.
In court documents, Sachtleben of Indiana admitted giving a reporter information on a plot matching that description.

Shutdown would affect pay for 800,000

A government shutdown next week would jeopardize the paychecks of more than 800,000 federal workers who could be told to stay home. More than 2 million other employees who are deemed essential by the government — including the active military — would be entitled to their salaries but might not get paid on time.

While there is no law requiring that nonessential employees be compensated if they are ordered off the job, Congress has in the past voted to reimburse their losses once shutdowns ended. 
But this go-round could be different. The bitterly divided Congress includes many lawmakers who are unsympathetic to the plight of federal workers and could be loath to help them recoup their money.
“It’s a very different time and a very different Congress,” said Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents 150,000 federal workers. “I’m concerned when employees who were here remember that last time employees were paid and think it will happen again, because it’s not a given at all.”
After the past two shutdowns in the 1990s — when federal workers were furloughed for five days in November 1995 and 21 days from December of that year into January — Congress passed a bill awarding them back pay.

IRS official who pleaded Fifth during tea party tax probe resigns

WASHINGTON — Lois Lerner, at the center of the Internal Revenue Service scandal and in the crosshairs of Congress, stepped down on Monday before an internal review reportedly was set to remove her for mismanagement.
Lerner headed the Tax Exempt & Government Entities Division at the IRS, which grants tax-exempt status to non-profit organizations. IRS leaders have acknowledged that the office inappropriately targeted for extra scrutiny groups that had political-sounding names, especially conservative groups and tea party organizations.
“We can confirm today that Lois Lerner has retired. Under federal privacy rules, the IRS cannot comment further on individual employee matters,” the IRS said in a statement Monday afternoon.
Lawmakers said Lerner’s resignation came as an Accountability Review Board formed by temporary IRS chief Daniel Werfel was set to remove Lerner for mismanagement. Werfel has ushered out the door numerous IRS officials who had knowledge of the inappropriate targeting of applicants, which involved targeting by names and by special “be-on-the-lookout” lists that flagged groups for special scrutiny.
The scandal began after Lerner took a question at a legal conference in May, later revealed to be a planted question, in which she suggested some overzealous IRS employees had used inappropriate criteria to slow down requests for tax-exempt status from conservative groups. Hearings have shown that Washington headquarters was deeply involved in the process.
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