Category Archives: News

Anjem Choudary was a leader. His conviction will damage terror networks

Raffaello Pantucci writes: The conviction of Anjem Choudary marks a significant moment in the history of British jihadism, but it is unclear what kind of an impact it will have. Terrorist groups and networks do suffer when they lose charismatic leaders. Their removal is unlikely to completely destroy a group, but it does change the dynamic.

Terrorist networks are, at their core, groups of people gathering around an ideology. Individuals are drawn in for various (often deeply personal) reasons, but to function as an effective unit that works to advance an ideology requires organisation and leadership. Otherwise, it is just a cluster of angry people with no particular direction.

It is here that leadership figures are key. They provide direction and can help motivate others, as well as offering some practical experience and, crucially, contacts. An individual who has risen to the top of a terrorist network after a long period of time will develop an understanding of what works. The relationships they will have developed over time are hard to replicate. [Continue reading…]

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Presidential debates: Roger Ailes expected to coach Donald Trump on facing accusations of sexism

The New York Times reports: Mr. Ailes brings enormous experience in preparing for presidential debates, but his addition to Mr. Trump’s team also raises intriguing questions.

Mr. Trump’s support among female voters has eroded during the course of his campaign, after a number of incendiary statements.

Mr. Trump’s challenge during the crowded Republican primary debates was far less pronounced than it will be in what could be a head-to-head against Mrs. Clinton over 90 minutes. He was one of ten candidates onstage and could often filibuster his way through questions or avoid them entirely as his rivals consumed airtime — an approach that would be untenable in a one-on-one or even a three-way matchup including the Libertarian candidate, Gary Johnson.

What is more, some of Mr. Trump’s worst moments in the primary debates involved Ms. Kelly and Carly Fiorina, the only woman vying in the Republican nomination contest. Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly swatted away accusations of sexism during the campaign, will likely require coaching on how to handle the potential first female president in a debate.

Whether Mr. Ailes can best address that concern is unclear. [Continue reading…]

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Aid worker in Aleppo says joint U.S.-Russian airstrikes would be ‘diabolical’

The Intercept reports: A British aid worker based in rebel-held East Aleppo says that reported plans by the United States and Russia to conduct joint airstrikes against the city are “ludicrous and diabolical,” and, if carried out, would have a disastrous impact on civilians living there.

Tauqir Sharif, 29, speaking to The Intercept from a hospital in Aleppo, says that Russian and Syrian government airstrikes on the city are creating nightmarish conditions for ordinary people. The addition of American forces to the mix would compound the misery of civilians, while giving the impression that the United States was openly siding with the Assad government.

Last week an alliance of Syrian rebels and Islamist groups broke the longstanding government siege on the eastern half of the city. Sharif says that since then, the frequency and intensity of airstrikes has increased. “There has been an almost constant bombardment from strikes because the regime is very, very angry that a corridor has been opened into the city from the south,” Sharif says. “The siege in some ways is still in place because it is very difficult to bring aid in due to constant airstrikes on vehicles driving the routes to the city.” [Continue reading…]

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Russia uses Iran as base to bomb Syrian militants for first time

Reuters reports: Russia used Iran as a base from which to launch air strikes against Syrian militants for the first time on Tuesday, widening its air campaign in Syria and deepening its involvement in the Middle East.

In a move underscoring Moscow’s increasingly close ties with Tehran, long-range Russian Tupolev-22M3 bombers and Sukhoi-34 fighter bombers used Iran’s Hamadan air base to strike a range of targets in Syria.

It was the first time Russia has used the territory of another nation, apart from Syria itself, to launch such strikes since the Kremlin launched a bombing campaign to support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in September last year.

It was also thought to be the first time that Iran has allowed a foreign power to use its territory for military operations since the 1979 Islamic revolution. [Continue reading…]

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China seeks closer military ties with Syria

Reuters reports: China wants to have closer military ties with Syria, state media on Tuesday cited a senior Chinese officer as saying during a rare visit to the war-torn Middle Eastern country.

While relying on the region for oil supplies, China tends to leave Middle Eastern diplomacy to the other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, namely the United States, Britain, France and Russia.

But China has been trying to get more involved, including sending envoys to help push for a diplomatic resolution to the violence there and hosting Syrian government and opposition figures.

Guan Youfei, director of the Office for International Military Cooperation of China’s Central Military Commission, met Syrian Defence Minister Fahad Jassim al-Freij in Damascus, China’s Xinhua state news agency said. [Continue reading…]

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China launches quantum satellite for ‘hack-proof’ communications

The Guardian reports: China says it has launched the world’s first quantum satellite, a project Beijing hopes will enable it to build a coveted “hack-proof” communications system with potentially significant military and commercial applications.

Xinhua, Beijing’s official news service, said Micius, a 600kg satellite that is nicknamed after an ancient Chinese philosopher, “roared into the dark sky” over the Gobi desert at 1.40am local time on Tuesday, carried by a Long March-2D rocket.

“The satellite’s two-year mission will be to develop ‘hack-proof’ quantum communications, allowing users to send messages securely and at speeds faster than light,” Xinhua reported.

The Quantum Experiments at Space Scale, or Quess, satellite programme is part of an ambitious space programme that has accelerated since Xi Jinping became Communist party chief in late 2012.

“There’s been a race to produce a quantum satellite, and it is very likely that China is going to win that race,” Nicolas Gisin, a professor and quantum physicist at the University of Geneva, told the Wall Street Journal. “It shows again China’s ability to commit to large and ambitious projects and to realise them.”

The satellite will be tasked with sending secure messages between Beijing and Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, a sprawling region of deserts and snow-capped mountains in China’s extreme west.

Highly complex attempts to build such a “hack-proof” communications network are based on the scientific principle of entanglement. [Continue reading…]

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Secret ledger in Ukraine lists cash for Trump’s campaign chief, Paul Manafort

The New York Times reports: On a leafy side street off Independence Square in Kiev is an office used for years by Donald J. Trump’s campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, when he consulted for Ukraine’s ruling political party. His furniture and personal items were still there as recently as May.

And Mr. Manafort’s presence remains elsewhere here in the capital, where government investigators examining secret records have found his name, as well as companies he sought business with, as they try to untangle a corrupt network they say was used to loot Ukrainian assets and influence elections during the administration of Mr. Manafort’s main client, former President Viktor F. Yanukovych.

Handwritten ledgers show $12.7 million in undisclosed cash payments designated for Mr. Manafort from Mr. Yanukovych’s pro-Russian political party from 2007 to 2012, according to Ukraine’s newly formed National Anti-Corruption Bureau. Investigators assert that the disbursements were part of an illegal off-the-books system whose recipients also included election officials.

In addition, criminal prosecutors are investigating a group of offshore shell companies that helped members of Mr. Yanukovych’s inner circle finance their lavish lifestyles, including a palatial presidential residence with a private zoo, golf course and tennis court. Among the hundreds of murky transactions these companies engaged in was an $18 million deal to sell Ukrainian cable television assets to a partnership put together by Mr. Manafort and a Russian oligarch, Oleg Deripaska, a close ally of President Vladimir V. Putin. [Continue reading…]

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‘No first use’ nuclear policy proposal assailed by U.S. cabinet officials, allies

The Wall Street Journal reports: A proposal under consideration at the White House to reverse decades of U.S. nuclear policy by declaring a “No First Use” protocol for nuclear weapons has run into opposition from top cabinet officials and U.S. allies.

The opposition, from Secretary of State John Kerry, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, as well as allies in Europe and Asia, leaves President Barack Obama with few ambitious options to enhance his nuclear disarmament agenda before leaving office, unless he wants to override the dissent.

The possibility of a “No First Use” declaration—which would see the U.S. explicitly rule out a first strike with a nuclear weapon in any conflict—met resistance at a National Security Council meeting in July, where the Obama administration reviewed possible nuclear disarmament initiatives it could roll out before the end of the president’s term.

During the discussions, Mr. Kerry cited concerns raised by U.S. allies that rely on the American nuclear triad for their security, according to people familiar with the talks. The U.K., France, Japan and South Korea have expressed reservations about a “No First Use” declaration, people familiar with their positions said. Germany has also raised concerns, one of the people said.

Mr. Carter raised objections to the “No First Use” declaration on the grounds that it risked provoking insecurity about the U.S. deterrent among allies, some of which then could pursue their own nuclear programs in response, according to the people familiar with the discussions. North Korea’s nuclear ambitions and Russia’s actions in Europe have also complicated any change to the U.S. nuclear posture for the Pentagon.

Mr. Moniz, who weighs in on nuclear issues for the Department of Energy, also expressed opposition to a “No First Use” posture, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

Mr. Obama ultimately didn’t issue a decision on the “No First Use” proposal at the National Security Council meeting, but people familiar with the White House deliberations say opposition from the critical cabinet members and U.S. allies reduces the likelihood of the change. They say a decision by Mr. Obama to press ahead with the declaration appears unlikely in his remaining months, given the controversy it would stir in the midst of a presidential election, but it isn’t impossible. [Continue reading…]

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The tale of two victories against Syria’s worst killers

Hassan Hassan writes: On two consecutive Fridays this month, Aleppo was the site of major victories against the Assad regime and ISIL in Syria. In southwestern Aleppo, anti-government forces broke a month-long siege enforced by the regime. In eastern Aleppo, a coalition of Arab and Kurdish forces drove out ISIL from one of its critical strongholds, Manbij.

The two developments are a blow to the country’s worst killers, and thus should be commended. The win in southwestern Aleppo saved about 300,000 civilians from a crippling siege and a slow death, while the defeat of ISIL in Manbij will further weaken the group and deprive it a crucial planning and recruitment hub.

Notwithstanding the benefits of defeating regime forces in southern Aleppo, the liberation of Manbij is in many ways a far greater victory for Syria.

The battle for breaking the siege was framed as a victory for Al Qaeda’s newly-rebranded Jabhat Fateh Al Sham (JFS), formerly Jabhat Al Nusra. A week after the JFS-led forces stormed the Artillery Academy, one of the regime’s key bastions near the city of Aleppo, a tug-of-war erupted on social media after JFS members lashed out at attempts by some rebels to take credit for the accomplishment. [Continue reading…]

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Swiss court backs Iran in decades-old oil row with Israel, ordered to pay $1.1 billion plus interest

Reuters reports: The Swiss Federal Tribunal rejected an appeal, citing lack of due process, against an arbitration ruling last year. The verdict, dated June 27, was available on the Lausanne court’s website.

It also awarded Iran 450,000 Swiss francs ($461,302) in court costs and lawyer fees.

It remains unclear whether Israel will pay up given restrictions its “trading with the enemy” laws.

Lawyers for each side had been locked in an arbitration over the Eilat-Ashkelon Pipeline Co (EAPC), a joint venture set up in 1968, when the two nations were friendly, to transport Iranian oil to the Mediterranean.

For a decade, the pipeline successfully carried oil from the Red Sea for export to Europe. But since the Islamic revolution that brought the ayatollahs to power, Iran has been demanding its share of revenues and assets that remained in Israel.

Since the partnership collapsed, EAPC has grown into a complex of energy assets, now mostly handling oil from former Soviet states.

How much profit it has made or how much it is worth is unknown, largely because it is protected in a similar way to Israel’s intelligence agencies, including by gag orders restricting coverage of its activities. [Continue reading…]

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Trump seems to be seriously inciting intimidation of minority voters

 

Based on its analysis of the polls, FiveThrityEight currently gives Donald Trump an 11.9% chance of winning Pennsylvania’s 20 electoral votes on November 8. In its aggregate of all recent polls in Pennsylvania, RealClearPolitics finds that in a two-way race, Hillary Clinton leads with 49.2% and Trump trails at 40.0%.

With collapsing support, Trump seems to have concluded that the only way he can win in a state like this is by promoting a stop-the-vote campaign targeting minority voters.

The Los Angeles Times reports: In remarks with strong racial overtones, Donald Trump told a mainly white rural crowd in Pennsylvania on Friday that vote fraud could cheat him out of victory and vowed to dispatch police who support him to monitor polls in “certain parts” of the state.

“We’re going to have unbelievable turnout, but we don’t want to see people voting five times, folks,” the Republican presidential nominee said at a rally in Altoona, Pa.

After months of racially charged violence between Trump supporters and protesters at his rallies, the comments raised the specter of confrontations on election day in precincts with many minority voters.

Trump, who previously suggested the Nov. 8 election would be rigged for Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, said he’d “heard some stories about certain parts of the state, and we have to be very careful.”

“Maybe you should go down and volunteer or do something,” Trump told the audience, bemoaning Pennsylvania’s lack of voter identification requirements.

“We have a lot of law enforcement people working that day,” he said. “We’re hiring a lot of people. We’re putting a lot of law enforcement — we’re going to watch Pennsylvania, go down to certain areas and watch and study, and make sure other people don’t come in and vote five times.”

Trump’s remarks came two weeks after a federal appeals court struck down a voter ID law in North Carolina, another presidential battleground state. The law targeted African Americans “with almost surgical precision” in an effort to suppress the black vote, the court found. [Continue reading…]

The Washington Post reports: After telling an audience in Altoona, Pa., that he would seek their help in policing the polls in November to root out voter fraud — something that even the state of Pennsylvania has noted doesn’t exist in any meaningful way — Donald Trump’s campaign nationalized the effort on Saturday morning. Now eager Trump backers can go to Trump’s website and sign up to be “a Trump Election Observer.” Do so, and you get an email thanking you for volunteering and assuring you that the campaign will “do everything we are legally allowed to do to stop crooked Hillary from rigging this election.”

There are any number of problems with this, again starting with the fact that the frequency of in-person voter fraud in elections is lower than getting five numbers right in the Powerball. But there’s a potentially bigger legal problem noted by election law expert Rick Hasen of the University of California at Irvine: Trump’s unnecessary effort could be violating a prohibition against voter intimidation that applies to the Republican Party. [Continue reading…]

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Syrian doctors write letter to President Obama, urging him to act in Aleppo

ABC News reports: Some of the last doctors remaining in the besieged Syrian city of Aleppo have written a letter to President Obama, urging him to intervene to break the siege of the city and stop bombardments of hospitals. Their plea comes as fighting continues despite Russia’s announcement of a partial ceasefire.

“We have seen no effort on behalf of the United States to lift the siege or even use its influence to push the parties to protect civilians,” the doctors wrote in the letter obtained by ABC News. “Continued U.S. inaction to protect the civilians of Syria means that our plight is being willfully tolerated by those in the international corridors of power. The burden of responsibility for the crimes of the Syrian government and its Russian ally must therefore be shared by those, including the United States, who allow them to continue.”

The doctors said that last month alone Syria saw 42 attacks on medical facilities and that a medical facility in Syria is attacked every 17 hours. Two weeks ago, four newborn babies gasping for air suffocated to death after a blast cut the oxygen supply to their incubators, according to the doctors.

“At this rate, our medical services in Aleppo could be completely destroyed in a month, leaving 300,000 people to die,” the doctors wrote.

They explained that what pained them most was being forced to choose who will live and who will die.

“Young children are sometimes brought into our emergency rooms so badly injured that we have to prioritize those with better chances, or simply don’t have the equipment to help them,” they wrote. “We do not need tears or sympathy or even prayers, we need your action. Prove that you are the friend of Syrians, not the friend of our killers.” [Continue reading…]

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The 75,000 Syrian refugees trapped on Jordan’s border

Jason Cone writes: For millions of Syrian civilians trapped for five years by a relentless war, mere lifesaving aid, let alone refuge, is out of reach. But for the 75,000 displaced people caught on Jordan’s desert frontier with Syria, salvation is only yards away. Unlike many of their fellow citizens, they can be saved. So why have they been effectively abandoned?

They are assembled in a kind of buffer zone on an inhospitable strip of land, much of it within Jordanian territory, just north of the official Jordanian border. But that border is closed, which prevents aid from reaching these desperate refugees and at the same time prevents them from seeking safety. If they move, they risk being pushed back into Syria or perishing in the harsh desert. Both options are morally intolerable and completely avoidable.

The refugees have amassed in makeshift camps in an area known as the berm, so named for its distinctive raised barrier of sand, which marks a mileslong no man’s land between Syria and Jordan. Military bases, checkpoints and patrols dot the area, along with various Syrian armed groups, some of whom mix among the refugees.

Since the start of Syria’s war in 2011, the area around the berm has served as an entry point to safety in Jordan from the unremitting violence in Syria. But on June 21, Jordan closed its northern border after a car bombing that day at a nearby Jordanian military base.

For the last seven weeks, relief agencies based in Jordan have not been able to get to the berm. Adequate food, water and medical supplies are not reaching the refugees, just as summer temperatures soar. Rodents roam the sprawling settlement, which lacks proper latrines and shelter. Dust storms regularly rip apart makeshift tents.

With the border closed, a critical lifeline has been cut, threatening death by starvation, illness, heat stroke or unattended medical complications. While some water is provided by a rudimentary pipeline, it’s unclear how many refugees have access to it. And it’s not known if an ad hoc delivery of food last week, dropped by crane over the berm, reached all those in need.

What is clear is that no medical aid is getting through. Just this week, Doctors Without Borders teams in Jordan received reports from United Nations personnel that pregnant women at the berm had died in labor.

According to the United Nations, four out of five of the refugees at the berm are women or children. Even before the border closing, medical assessments conducted by Doctors Without Borders revealed alarming medical needs. Children suffered from diarrhea and malnutrition. Hundreds of pregnant women lacked adequate obstetric care. Many people were afflicted with respiratory illnesses and skin infections because of the harsh living conditions. [Continue reading…]

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Aid and attention dwindling, refugee crisis intensifies in Greece

The New York Times reports: As her young children played near heaps of garbage, picking through burned corn cobs and crushed plastic bottles to fashion new toys, Shiraz Madran, a 28-year-old mother of four, turned with tear-rimmed eyes to survey the desolate encampment that has become her home.

This year, her family fled Syria, only to get stuck at Greece’s northern border with Macedonia in Idomeni, a town that had been the gateway to northern Europe for more than one million migrants from the Middle East and Africa seeking a haven from conflict. After Europe sealed the border in February to curb the unceasing stream, the Greek authorities relocated many of those massed in Idomeni to a camp on this wind-beaten agricultural plain in northern Greece, with promises to process their asylum bids quickly.

But weeks have turned into months, and Mrs. Madran’s life has spiraled into a despondent daily routine of scrounging for food for her dust-covered children and begging the authorities for any news about their asylum application. “No one tells us anything — we have no idea what our future is going to be,” she said.

“If we knew it would be like this, we would not have left Syria,” she continued. “We die a thousand deaths here every day.” [Continue reading…]

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Human rights groups vow to challenge burkini ban on Cannes beaches

The Guardian reports: A French human rights association and Muslim groups have said they will take legal action against the mayor of Cannes for issuing a decree banning burkinis from the resort’s beaches.

David Lisnard signed off on a ruling last month preventing women from wearing the full-body swimsuits in the Côte d’Azur town. The decree was introduced shortly after the Bastille day attack in Nice in July, where a delivery driver killed 85 people when he ploughed into crowds celebrating the French national holiday on the seafront.

The decree states that Muslim women wearing burkinis could be a threat to public order and will be cautioned and fined €38 (£33).

“Beachwear which ostentatiously displays religious affiliation, when France and places of worship are currently the target of terrorist attacks, is liable to create risks of disrupting public order (crowds, scuffles etc), which it is necessary to prevent,” it says.

Thierry Migoule, the head of Cannes municipal services, said: “We are not talking about banning the wearing of religious symbols on the beach … but ostentatious clothing which refers to an allegiance to terrorist movements which are at war with us.”

Lawyers, human rights groups and Muslim associations have described the decree as illegal and preposterous. [Continue reading…]

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A massive new study debunks a widespread theory for Donald Trump’s success

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The Washington Post reports: Economic distress and anxiety across working-class white America have become a widely discussed explanation for the success of Donald Trump. It seems to make sense. Trump’s most fervent supporters tend to be white men without college degrees. This same group has suffered economically in our increasingly globalized world, as machines have replaced workers in factories and labor has shifted overseas. Trump has promised to curtail trade and other perceived threats to American workers, including immigrants.

Yet a major new analysis from Gallup, based on 87,000 interviews the polling company conducted over the past year, suggests this narrative is not complete. While there does seem to be a relationship between economic anxiety and Trump’s appeal, the straightforward connection that many observers have assumed does not appear in the data.

According to this new analysis, those who view Trump favorably have not been disproportionately affected by foreign trade or immigration, compared with people with unfavorable views of the Republican presidential nominee. The results suggest that his supporters, on average, do not have lower incomes than other Americans, nor are they more likely to be unemployed. [Continue reading…]

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Chemical weapons attacks in Syria may normalise war crimes, experts warn

The Guardian reports: A woman and two children have been killed and dozens injured in an alleged chlorine gas attack in Aleppo, doctors have said, as experts warned that the frequent use of chemical weapons in Syria risks normalising war crimes.

There have been dozens of attacks with chlorine gas since Syria officially agreed to give up its weapons stockpile following a 2013 sarin gas assault on a Damascus suburb, rights groups and doctors on the ground said.

The latest reports came as Russia offered to halt fighting for three hours a day to allow aid into besieged parts of the city, but the UN countered by saying it needed at least 48 hours a week to take convoys through heavily bombed and mined roads into eastern Aleppo.

There are still 1.5 million people living in Aleppo, the city that was Syria’s largest before the civil war and is now at the heart of the brutal battle for its future. About 300,000 civilians in rebel-held areas are at grave risk from water shortages and disease as fighting has intensified, said the UN envoy to Syria, Staffan de Mistura.

Asked about the chemical attack on the Aleppo district of Zubdiya, he said there was a lot of evidence that it took place, and it would constitute a war crime if chlorine gas was used, but he added that it was not his remit to verify the attack. “If it did take place, it is a war crime and as such it would require everyone … to address it immediately,” he added.

Last week, doctors in the neighbouring province of Idlib said they had treated more than two dozen patients following a suspected chlorine attack on the town of Saraqeb. [Continue reading…]

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