Weekend 090714

Sunday September 7th 2014

Ukraine crisis: 1 dead as heavy shelling breaks ceasefire

The truce between Ukraine's government and pro-Russian rebels has collapsed in the port city of Mariupol where artillery fire left 1 dead and 3 wounded

Ukrainian government forces came under artillery fire late on Saturday at a checkpoint near the strategic port of Mariupol in eastern Ukraine, in the first serious violation of a ceasefire declared just 30 hours earlier.

The city authorities said that one woman was killed and three people wounded when a national army position was bombarded. 

The presidents of Russia and Ukraine had earlier said the ceasefire, part of a peace road-map intended to end five months of conflict, was largely holding across eastern Ukraine, where Kiev's forces have been battling pro-Russian separatists.

Prolonged artillery fire was heard to the east of Mariupol, a key flashpoint in the past week of fighting, with a truck, a gas station and an industrial facility ablaze within the limits of the city. 
rucks were also witnessed rushing eastwards, conveying agitated-looking pro-government militia volunteers. Tanks and armoured personnel carriers also headed in the same direction.
"There has been an artillery attack. We received a number of impacts. We have no information about casualties," a Ukrainian officer said.
The area had previously been quiet since the ceasefire took effect on Friday evening, but many residents and combatants in Mariupol and in Donetsk, the other main flashpoint in the conflict, have expressed doubts that the ceasefire can last.
In his statement, Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko said he and Russia's Vladimir Putin had agreed in a telephone call that "overall the ceasefire was being implemented" and that they needed to find ways to make it more durable.

Governor of Iraq's contested Anbar province wounded in clash with Islamic State militants

BAGHDAD –  An Iraqi army spokesman says the governor of the country's contested Anbar province has been wounded during fighting with Islamic State militants.
Army military spokesman Lt. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi said Gov. Ahmed al-Dulaimi was wounded Sunday during clashes near Haditha. The U.S. said Sunday its forces launched airstrikes at the Haditha Dam to stop Islamic State militants from capturing it.

Al-Moussawi did not elaborate on al-Dulaimi's condition.
Anbar long has been a contested region between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants backed by allied Sunni tribes. The situation deteriorated significantly in late December, and the militants took over parts of the provincial capital of Ramadi and the city of Fallujah.
Iraqi forces have been trying unsuccessfully to take back Anbar since January. The U.S. airstrikes may boost their efforts.

ISIS Claims To Behead Another Lebanese Soldier

Islamic State fighters on Saturday claimed to have beheaded a second Lebanese soldier captured by the militant group last month.
Supporters of the group posted photos on Twitter claiming to show the hostage, identified as Abbas Medlej, being decapitated. Medlej's family said the images appear to be real, the Associated Press reported. Lebanese military officials said the army had received the images and was investigating whether they are authentic.
An Islamic State leader in Lebanon told Turkey's Anadolu Agency that the group killed the 20-year-old soldier after he attempted to escape. According to the group, the soldier pretended to go to the bathroom and opened fire on his captors.
If confirmed, the man would be the second Lebanese solder to be beheaded in recent weeks by the extremist group, previously known as ISIS. On Wednesday, the first Lebanese soldier, Sgt. Ali Sayid, was buried in Lebanon a week after militants posted a video of his decapitation.
Around two dozen members of Lebanon's security forces were captured by the Islamic State when they stormed the Lebanese border town of Arsal earlier in August, in the worst-seen spillover of violence from neighboring Syria. In the aftermath of the attack, the U.S. sent an emergency weapons shipment to the Lebanese military.
Militants have demanded the release of Islamist prisoners in exchange for the hostages, but the Lebanese government has rejected a prisoner swap, according to Lebanon's Daily Star newspaper.

US air strikes against Islamic State at Haditha Dam in Iraq

United States air force has launched attack near Haditha Dam 'at the request of the Iraqi government' to support their army against threat of Islamic State 

The United States expanded its air campaign in Iraq on Sunday, bombing jihadist positions close to a major dam to the west of the country.

The strikes came as Iran accused the US of not taking the threat from the burgeoning Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group sufficiently seriously.

“There is still no serious understanding about the threat and they have as yet taken no serious action,” Mohammad Javad Zarif, the Iranian foreign minister, was quoted as saying by Iran’s Mehr news agency.

Tehran is opposed to Isil, and Iran would likely need to play some role in President Barack Obama’s international coalition against Isil, if it is to succeed in quashing the jihadists, who now control more than one third of Iraq and the oil reserves in Syria.

The two nations found common ground in Iraq, both backing Shia Haider al-Abadi to take over as prime minister. 
However, they remain on opposing sides of the civil war in Syria, with Iran funding the regime of Bashar al-Assad, and the US siding with the opposition.
In August, the US started an air campaign in northern Iraq under a mandate of protecting minorities who were being forced from their homes in the hundreds of thousands, and to stop Isil marching on to the Kurdish capital, Erbil.
Sunday’s strikes represented a further expansion of that campaign, with fighter jets striking Isil positions in Iraq’s western Anbar province for the first time.
The offensive was designed to protect the Haditha dam, the country’s second largest hydroelectric facility, which supplies water and electricity to millions of Iraqis.
US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said they had been carried out at the request of the Iraqi government.
“If that dam would fall into Isil’s (Islamic State’s) hands or if that dam would be destroyed, the damage that that would cause would be very significant and it would put a significant, additional and big risk into the mix in Iraq,” he told reporters during a trip to Georgia’s capital Tbilisi.
Isil has been careful to target vital infrastructure in it’s campaign to take territory from Syria and Iraq to create its “Islamic State”.

Afghan gang rape: Seven men given death sentences

Seven Afghan men have been sentenced to death following a gang rape case that has sparked national outrage.

The men were found guilty of kidnapping and attacking four women who were returning to Kabul after a wedding in August. Five were convicted of rape.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai had been among those who called for the men to be executed.
Activists say violence against women is prevalent in Afghanistan, but rarely attract this much attention.
Human Rights Watch said that many women in Afghanistan who reported rapes to police ended up being arrested for adultery.
Police uniforms The men were said to have carried out the attack on 23 August.
Police said the men were wearing police uniforms when they stopped a convoy of cars near Paghman, a town near Kabul. The men pulled out four of the women, and robbed and attacked them.

Libya accuses Khartoum of flying weapons to Islamist rebels in Tripoli

Sudan insists weapons were intended for legitimate border forces patrolling the southern desert

Libya has expelled the Sudanese military attache after accusing Khartoum of flying weapons to Islamist rebels in Tripoli, raising fears of a widening regional conflict.
The government, which has fled Tripoli for eastern Libya, accused Khartoum of sending a transport plane loaded with munitions for the Islamist-led Libya Dawn militias who control the capital.
"Sudan is interposing itself by providing arms to a terrorist group that is attacking the headquarters of the state," said a government statement. "This also represents a clear violation of international resolutions, and the latest UN Security Council resolution."
The government said the plane entered Libyan airspace without permission on Thursday, making a refueling stop in the southern oasis town of Kufra, where the weapons were discovered. It said the weapons were destined for the Tripoli airport of Mitiga, controlled by Libya Dawn.
Sudan, which is sympathetic to Libya's Islamists, confirmed sending the plane but insisted the weapons were intended for legitimate border forces patrolling the southern desert.
"The plane did not carry any material for armed groups in Libya," Sudan's army spokesman al-Sawarmi Khalid told the local TV channel Shouruq, according to Reuters.
The incident has fueled fears that Libya's civil war, which has pitched an Islamist-led coalition against pro-government forces, is now drawing in outside powers. Last month Washington sources accused the United Arab Emirates and Egypt of bombing Libya Dawn forces in support of the Libyan government.

The Huge U.S. Counterterrorism Operation You've Probably Never Even Heard About

As many headlines around the country focus on President Obama's moves in Iraq to contain the violence wreaked by Islamist militants, the news of U.S. airstrikes in Somalia this week targeting the leader of the extremist group al-Shabab may have seemed out of the blue.
Yet the U.S. has quietly been building up a large counterterrorism operation in Africa in recent years. The tiny African nation Djibouti, which neighbors Somalia, is home to the busiest Predator drone base outside the Afghan war zone, according to The Washington Post. The 500-acre base, called Camp Lemonnier, has 4,000 U.S. civilians and military personnel mostly engaged in counterterrorism in East Africa and Yemen, including a secretive Special Operations task force which coordinates drone missions. The U.S. is investing almost $1 billion to expand the base, according to a congressional report for fiscal year 2014.
Although the U.S. military pulled out of Somalia after two Black Hawk helicopters were shot down in 1993, counterterrorism operations in the country never stopped. After 9/11, the CIA worked with Somali warlords to hunt down al Qaeda-linked militants and take them to secret jails -- the so-called "extraordinary renditions" program -- according to an investigation by the Army Times. The U.K.'s Bureau of Investigative Journalism has documented up to 20 covert American operations in Somalia since 2001. And in 2011, The Nation's Jeremy Scahill reported that the CIA had recently established a more permanent base at the airport in Mogadishu to train Somali intelligence officers.
Over the past year, American operations in the country have started to emerge from the shadows. Last October, U.S. Navy SEALs raided a Somali beach town seeking to capture a senior commander from the al-Shabab militant group, but were forced to retreat. That same month, U.S. military advisers started arriving in Mogadishu to set up a longer-term coordination center.

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Barack Obama is afraid of me, says Robert Mugabe

Zimbabwean president says country's remaining white citizens should "go back to England", and he is excluded from summits because Western leaders fear him

President Robert Mugabe has claimed the ability to strike fear into President Barack Obama, adding that this explains his exclusion from summits attended by Western leaders.

Zimbabwe's leader was one of a handful of African presidents who was pointedly not invited to attend a US-Africa summit in Washington last month. America joined Britain and the European Union in imposing a travel ban and asset freeze on him 12 years ago.

But Mr Mugabe, widely condemned for human rights abuses and rigged elections, said that fear lay behind these decisions. Addressing an audience of supporters, he said: "It's your support which enables me with my small frame to instill fear in the likes of Obama. They invite all other leaders to meetings but say Mugabe cannot come and I wonder whether it's my misfortune. In the past, when we attended these meetings, Western leaders would disappear once they knew that I was around."

Mr Mugabe, 90, cannot be excluded from all international meetings. He is still able to attend United Nations gatherings – even if they are held in a country that enforces a travel ban – and he was a mourner at the funeral of Pope John Paul II in 2005. However, he is regarded as such a pariah that Western leaders generally avoid him even when they are at the same event.

Yemen's Shiite rebels escalate standoff with government, block road to international airport

SANAA, Yemen –  Yemeni security officials say Shiite rebels holding anti-government sit-ins have blocked a main road leading to the capital's international airport.
The officials say the Hawthis pitched tents Sunday on the road leading to Sanaa's airport and near the ministry of communications. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters.

The Hawthis have been camping out for nearly three weeks in the capital, protesting against the government and calling for the reinstatement of fuel subsidies.
The group is reportedly supported by the political party of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Armed Hawthis have moved from their stronghold in the northern Sadaa province to the outskirts of the capital in recent days, in a further escalation of the protests.

North Korea to try detained American Matthew Miller next week

• No charges specified for 14 September trial
• Miller tore up his passport and claimed asylum in AprilThe detained American Matthew Miller will be tried next Sunday, North Korean state media said, less than a week after the detainee made a rare foreign media appearance to plead for help.
Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency said in a brief dispatch on Sunday that the supreme court decided to “judge” Miller on 14 September. It did not elaborate on specific charges against him, although past reports have accused him of hostile acts.
Miller, 24, was detained after entering the country on 10 April, when he tore up his tourist visa at the airport and shouted that he wanted to seek asylum, KCNA has reported.
In a brief interview with the Associated Press in Pyongyang last week, Miller and two other Americans held by North Korea, Jeffrey Fowle and Kenneth Bae, called for Washington to send a high-ranking US representative to make a direct appeal for their freedom.
North Korea has often used detained Americans as bargaining chips with Washington in the past. Senior statesmen including former President Bill Clinton have made trips to Pyongyang to secure the release of detainees.
Bae, a Korean-American missionary who is accused of plotting to overthrow the Pyongyang regime, has been sentenced to a 15-year term. He said last week that his health has deteriorated at the labour camp where he works eight hours a day.

Obama delays immigration reform plan

US President Barack Obama has abandoned a plan to force through immigration reform in the coming weeks.

In June, he promised to use executive orders that were expected to change visa rules, boost border security and give a path to citizenship for some 11 million US-based illegal immigrants.
But the White House says the plans have been shelved until after mid-term elections in November.
Each year tens of thousands try to get into the US from Mexico.
Many are unaccompanied children, and Mr Obama has called the situation a "humanitarian crisis".

Mr Obama has spent years promising immigration reform, but has been thwarted by Republicans in Congress.
White House officials said on Saturday that the Republicans' "extreme politicisation of this issue" meant it would be harmful to the long-term prospects for reform to take action before the election.
Officials said immigration reform would still be forced through before the end of the year.

Romney: Obama 'out of touch' on Islamic State, other global threats

Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney on Sunday ripped into President Obama for his handling of Islamic State militants and other foreign policy decisions, accusing the president several times of being “out of touch.”
Romney, who lost to Obama in the 2012 presidential elections, eschewed several opportunities during a “Fox News Sunday” interview to revisit his assertions during the campaign that Russia was the United States’ biggest geopolitical threat, considering Moscow’s recent foray into Ukraine.

He said he’s instead focused on U.S. foreign policy today, including what to do about the rise of Islamic State militants.
“I think the president is really out of touch with reality,” Romney said. “He’s so out of touch with reality that he hasn’t taken the necessary steps. … He’s too busy on the golf course. I don’t know if you can see the reality from the fairway, but he doesn’t see reality."
Romney said Obama has known for at least a year about the Islamic State threat, yet has taken no action.
“The president has a very different foreign policy than what the United States has had over the past 60 years,” Romney said. “It’s based on common humanity, and humanity is not common. … Bad people do bad things.”

Obama To Announce Game Plan Against ISIS

WASHINGTON, Sept 7 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said he will explain to Americans and congressional leaders this week his plan to "start going on some offense" against Islamic State militants, who he said could eventually become a threat to the United States.
Obama will make a speech on Wednesday to "describe what our game plan's going to be," and meet congressional leaders on Tuesday to seek their support for his strategy to halt the militant Islamist group, which controls parts of Syria and Iraq.

The president, who campaigned on getting U.S. troops out of Iraq, has struggled to articulate how he wants to address Islamic State, telling reporters last month that "we don't have a strategy yet" to tackle the group.
"I just want the American people to understand the nature of the threat and how we're going to deal with it and to have confidence that we'll be able to deal with it," Obama said in an interview with NBC's "Meet the Press" that aired on Sunday. The interview was conducted in Washington on Saturday.
"The next phase is now to start going on some offense," he said.
The Wednesday speech will come a day ahead of the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, when al Qaeda militants flew hijacked planes into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon, killing almost 3,000 people.

Huge family detention centre to open in Texas for undocumented migrants

• Facility south-west of San Antonio will have 2,400 beds
• Critics decry private firm profiting from incarcerated children

Federal officials are due to open a huge family detention centre in southern Texas that will house immigrant adults with children while they await deportation.
The Texas Observer reports that federal officials are preparing to open the nation’s largest family detention centre, a 2,400-bed facility that will nearly double the current capacity to house immigrant families awaiting deportation. The centre will be developed on a sprawling 50-acre property near the town of Dilley, 70 miles south-west of San Antonio, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials told the monthly magazine.
The Observer says the centre will be run by the nation’s largest for-profit corrections company, the Tennessee-based Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). The company, which operates more than 60 detention centres and prisons across the country, has been mired by controversies that include inmate abuse, falsifying official records and aggressive lobbying tactics.
The announcement enraged advocates, who argue that detention is no place for children.
“The Obama administration should be ashamed of itself for returning to the policy of mass for-profit detention of immigrant families,” said Bob Libal, executive director of Grassroots Leadership, an advocacy group opposed to for-profit prisons.
Family detention centres operated by private prison companies have a poor track record, especially in Texas. In 2009, federal officials removed all immigrants with children from a 490-bed Texas facility operated by CCA. The facility had been the focus of a damning 2007 report on family detention by the Women’s Commission for Refugee Women and Children that concluded detention was wildly inappropriate for children.

Coalition against Isil: country by country

The US announced today it had formed the "core coalition" against Isil but not every country is on the same page

U.S.: President Barack Obama has reluctantly been dragged back into conflict in Iraq and is eager for allies in the fight against Isil. The US announced today it had formed a 10-nation "core coalition" though it was unclear what specific commitments the allies had made. John Kerry will travel to the Middle East to enlist Arab countries in the effort. The US has carried out more than 100 strikes against Isil and has more than 1,000 troops on the ground advising Iraqi forces and its diplomats. Mr Obama is considering extending US strikes into Syria, where Isil has its core territory. 

Britain: David Cameron is open to joining US strikes against Isil and has ordered government whips to begin gauging support in Parliament. However, no decision has been taken and a vote is not expected imminently. Britain is less emphatic than the US that the "core coalition" is in place and believes more diplomatic work needs to be done. The RAF is already involved in intelligence and humanitarian flights and is delivering arms from other countries to the Kurds. Mr Cameron is considering sending British weapons to the Kurds. Public support for action has hardened since the release of a video showing a Englist-accented jihadist threatening to murder a British hostage. 

France: Francois Hollande is eager for France to join action against Isil, partly to lift dire approval ratings which show he's the least popular leader since the Second World War. The socialist Mr Hollande is a hawk on foreign affairs, ordering French troops into battle against Islamists in Mali and supporting strikes against the Syrian government last year. France is now prepared to join airstrikes against Isil and could launch jets from its base in Corsica using mid-air refueling or off the Charles de Gaulle, its aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean. An estimated 700 French citizens have joined the fighting in Syria, more than any other European country. 

Australia: Tony Abbott has been strident in his calls for the West to confront Isil, calling the group "pure evil" and saying the execution of hostage "abundantly justifies" Australian military intervention. Australia has said F-18 Superhornets could be used to bomb Isil targets or escort other allied aircraft. Like Francois Hollande, Mr Abbott is struggling domestically and is eager to pivot to foreign policy as a way of projecting strength. Australian aircraft based in the United Arab Emirates have already begun flying aid missions and delivering cargo loads of weapons to the Kurds. 

Germany: Germany is less enthusiastic about conflict with Isil than other European allies. At a dinner with other Nato leaders in Wales, Angela Merkel spoke at length on Afghanistan while the others wanted to discuss Isil. The German public is more focused on the crisis in Ukraine, where economic sanctions are already hurting the German economy, than the Middle East. Germany is very unlikely to join airstrikes. Unlike Britain and the US, Germany has never suffered a major jihadist attack on its soil. However, Mrs Merkel is delivering 16,000 assault rifles and heavy anti-tank weapons to Kurdish forces in a break from Germany's tradition of non-intervention. 

Others: Iran, which is Shia, is focused on defeating the Sunni jihadist movement and Iran's supreme leader has taken the unusual step of ordering the Iranian military to coordinate with US forces in Iraq. Turkey, which shares a long border with both Iraq and Syria, has committed to intercepting foreign fighters en route to the conflict. The US is hoping Saudi Arabia will provide financing for the effort and the arming of anti-Isil rebels inside Syria. Jordan may be asked to provide intelligence support about the inner workings of Isil and help establish targets for Western bombing. 

Prentice to become next Alberta premier

EDMONTON - Former federal cabinet minister Jim Prentice will be Alberta's next premier after winning the Progressive Conservative leadership race Saturday.
Votes were counted Saturday.
Prentice had 17,963 votes.
"Tonight we begin the work of advancing and protecting sound Conservative principles," Prentice told the crowd.
"Today we begin the work of restoring trust in government."
Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi immediately congratulated Prentice on Twitter.
"You'll find a willing and eager partner in Calgary City Hall. Looking forward to it," he said.
British Columbia Premier Christy Clark issued a statement congratulating Prentice, nothing that she was looking forward to "working towards our shared goals, particularly the continued reduction of internal trade barriers under the New West Partnership and across Canada."
Prime Minister Stephen Harper also issued a statement saying he was looking forward to working with Prentice "on issues of importance for Albertans and all Canadians, including the economy, responsible resource development and job creation."
Prentice officially entered the race on May 16 He was widely considered the front-runner in the race, operating a big-money campaign that raised over $1.8 million from 564 donors. He touted five priorities for Alberta, which include a return to fiscal conservative principles, maximizing value for Alberta's resources and respecting property rights.
Backed by a majority of the current PC caucus, Prentice bills himself as an outsider who promises to be a "new broom to sweep clean" the entitlements of the Redford government by passing legislation to end sole-source contracts, eliminate automatic severances and set term-limits for MLAs and premiers.
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