Pakistan
Pakistan’s Punjab: Terror™s training ground
Pakistan’s Punjab: Terror™s training ground
General McChrystal denies rift with Obama on Afghan war
The military is planning to send more troops to Jolo island to combat Abu Sayyaf terrorists due to an increase in violence in recent days. The military also announced that three school teachers who were kidnapped in Zamboanga Sibugay province and held hostage for six months were released.
Changing the militant mindset: Few signs of success
US: How using imam in terror inquiry backfired on police
4 Indian soldiers, 4 militants killed in Kashmir clashes
So goes the refrain from a host of pundits who posit a maliciously empowered Iran as a consequence of the US invasion of Iraq. Subscribers to the possibility include David Ignatius, Brookings, and Thomas Ricks, who has authored grim appraisals of Iran being the “biggest winner” after the invasion. This popular narrative has various appeals. […]
Police arrested 20 al Qaeda leaders and fighters in Babil. Insurgents killed three soldiers and a policeman in IED attacks in Mosul. Five civilians and three soldiers were wounded in bombings in Fallujah. Insurgents wounded four civilians in Diyala and three more in Baghdad.
US forces shift focus to Afghan cities
Security forces arrested 24 members of a “terrorist network” in various cities throughout Morocco. The suspects are alleged to be recruiting volunteers for suicide bombings in Iraq, Somalia, and Afghanistan, and for terrorist operations in Morocco itself. They are suspected to have connections with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, from whom they intended to […]
US military and intelligence officials warn that al Qaeda maintains a robust network in northwestern Pakistan despite two years of targeted strikes.
Al-Shabaab terrorists ‘living in Australia’
Twelve civilians were killed in Mogadishu after Somali insurgents fired mortars at the presidential palace and attacked African Union bases. Shabaab conducted security operations against bandits on the main road that links Mogadishu to Km50 and signed a “total peace” agreement with the Daud clan in the middle region of Shabelle in southern Somalia. Uganda’s […]
The Taliban killed 12 civilians in IED attacks across the country. Twenty-one Taliban fighters were killed in a Coalition airstrike in Nimroz province. A local Taliban commander and two fighters were killed during a clash with a rival group. Afghan and Coalition forces detained “several” Taliban and Haqqani Network fighters during raids in Khost and […]
US lawmakers are holding off on passing new Iran sanctions until after the diplomatic summit. President Ahmadinejad plans on offering solutions to world crises in his UN speech. An Iranian army commander stressed the importance of bolstering Iran’s defensive power.
Indonesia: terrorists recruit teens at sports clubs, schools
Obama is considering strategy shift in Afghan war
A federal judge ordered Najibullah Zazi, the main suspect in the busted terror plot to conduct attacks in the US, to be held without bail. Stadiums and hotels across the US have been alerted to be on the lookout for hydrogen-peroxide bombs hidden in backpacks.
Afghan officials live in fear of Taliban assassins
Forty-five Pakistani troops and 34 Taliban fighters were killed during clashes in North and South Waziristan. Security forces detained a Taliban commander and 10 fighters in Swat and Malakand. The Taliban bombed a girls’ school in Peshawar. The US Congress approved $2.376 billion in aid for Pakistan.
Ayman al Zawahiri, al Qaeda’s second in command, released a 106-minute-long videotape titled “The West and the Dark Tunnel.” Adam Gadahn was also featured on the tape, which focused on attacking Presidents Obama and Bush, and portraying the US prison and interrogation facilities as torture machines.
Afghanistan – Little Afghan appetite for more voting
Over at The Weekly Standard, I noted that the proposal to rely on counterterrorism techniques, specifically Predator/Reaper strikes, to take out al Qaeda’s senior leadership in Pakistan in lieu of a counterinsurgency program to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan, is seriously flawed. The proponents of this strategy make the assumption that al Qaeda and the […]
Afghan warlords will fight if US gives weapons
Abu Mansur al Amriki (standing, background) at the Abu Suleim camp in Somalia. Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera has some interesting news on the covert raid conducted by US Special Forces, dubbed Celestial Balance, that targeted an al Qaeda leader in Southern Somalia on Sept. 14th. According to a local stringer for the newspaper, […]
US-Iraqi partnership growing, general says
US Congress approves $2.3bn aid package for Pakistan
Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula threatened to conduct more suicide attacks in Saudi Arabia. “By Allah, they will climb your walls and will come to you from where you do not expect,” said Abu Baseer al Wuhayshi, the leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, in a videotape released on the Internet.
Iran has made new generation centrifuges
Italy: Algerian terror suspect arrested in Rome