18 Killed in Afghan Attacks During Hagel's Visit

Afghan National Army soldiers keep watch at the site of attack in Kabul, March 9, 2013.

ISLAMABAD — A suicide bomber riding a bicycle blew himself up outside the Afghan Defense Ministry Saturday while U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel was in Kabul, but the Pentagon chief was nowhere near the scene. Another suicide bomber in the eastern city of Khost killed a policeman, children and other civilians. Together, the two incidents claimed 18 lives, and highlighted serious concerns about security in Afghanistan.

A spokesman for the international forces in Afghanistan, Charlie Stadtlander, said Hagel was not in the defense ministry at the time. He said there was no apparent connection between the bombing and the Pentagon chief's visit to the Afghan capital.

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14 troops, 12 militants die in Yemen fight

SANAA, Yemen, Oct. 19 (UPI) -- Suicide bombers attacked a military base in south Yemen Friday, killing at least 14 soldiers and 12 al-Qaida operatives, military officials said.
Military officials said two of the five suicide bombers who breached the military facility in the southern province of Abyan blew themselves up and the three others were killed during fighting with government forces, The New York Times reported.

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Putin Says 313 Terrorists 'Eliminated' In Recent Months

A Russian soldier photographs the bodies of four alleged militants killed in clashes in Daghestan. (file photo)

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said security operations "in recent months" have killed 313 "terrorists" who refused to surrender, including 43 leaders of terrorist groups.

The Russian president also said 479 "bandits" have been apprehended in those operations but provided no further details.

Putin speaking at a meeting with security chiefs said Russia's security agencies have been more effective in the last several years.

But he exhorted those agencies to battle terrorists relentlessly and "audaciously."


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Islamic militants help seize missile base in Syria

BEIRUT — Fighters from a shadowy militant group with suspected links to al-Qaeda joined Syrian rebels in seizing a government missile-defense base in northern Syria on Friday, according to activists and amateur video.
It was unclear whether the rebels were able to hold the base after the attack, and analysts questioned whether they would be able to make use of any of the missiles they might have taken.
Nevertheless, the assault underscored fears of advanced weaponry falling into the hands of extremists, whose role in Syria’s civil war appears to be increasing.

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Mali Islamists 'buying child soldiers for £375'

Malian soldiers patrol near Kati military camp Photo: GETTY IMAGES

Rebel fighters, among them extremists with links to al-Qaeda, are "buying loyalty" among the local population by abolishing taxes and paying for fighters and wives in a country where more than half the people live on less than 80p a day.

Women bought as wives from their families for as little as £620 are frequently resold in a form of "enforced prostitution", said Ivan Simonovic, the UN Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights, said after a fact-finding visit to the country.

There have been three public executions, eight amputations and two floggings, he added, and as well as bans on smoking and listening to music, women are now expected to cover their heads and their ability to work has been restricted.

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6 Afghan local police killed following blast in Helmand

According to local authorities in southern Helmand province of Afghanistan, at least 6 Afghan local police forces were killed following a roadside improvised explosive device explosion in this province.

The officials further added the incident took place early Wednesday morning at Nad-e-Ali district.

Nad-e-Ali district chief Mohammad Ibrahim confirming the report said the incident took place around 7:00 am local time after a local police vehicle struck with the roadside bomb.

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Afghan Police Kill a U.S. Special Operations Captain “To Make a Statement”

Army photo / Sgt. Ken Scar

U.S. Army soldiers and their Afghan army partners set up a traffic checkpoint in March in Paktika province, where Captain Greg Escobar found training Afghan troops to be a challenging task.

Army Major Greg Escobar served as an operations officer in Afghanistan in 2010 and 2011, training Afghan police in Kunar province for the first half of his deployment, and Afghan troops in Paktika province for the second half.
He is a glass-half-empty kind of guy, as he makes clear in this July interview recently posted by the Combat Studies Institute at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Yet he believes his final mission – training Afghan troops to defend their border with Pakistan and keep terrorists out — remains “doable.” Excerpts:
In my opinion, pre-deployment training was a bit lacking. The things we focused on were language training and cultural awareness training. Although very important, the language that we were trained on was not the language for the area that we were deploying into, so it was a waste of time…
We were trained in Dari, which is in my opinion what the United States is pushing on the country as a national language, which is why we were taught it, versus what the people along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border are speaking, which is multiple languages, primarily Pashtu…

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Nigerian Army Says 30 Boko Haram Terrorists Killed in Gunbattle

Nigeria's army says soldiers on Sunday killed 30 suspected Boko Haram members during a gunfight in northeastern Yobe state.
A spokesman says a senior aide to Boko Haram's leader was among those killed. Nigerian soldiers seized a number of weapons including rifles, knives and bows and arrows.
The army says it arrested 10 Boko Haram suspects who it says are helping troops track down other members.


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US winks again at Pakistani terror tactics

WASHINGTON: As it has happened in the past, Pakistan has been spared the rod by the United States for its international transgressions, this time for its continued patronage of terrorism in the region, in the interest of what Washington believes is American national security.

The US state department last month waived legal requirements that made its nearly $ 2 billion annual aid to Pakistan contingent on its cooperation in counter-terrorism, ending nuclear proliferation and building democratic institutions, a Congressional Research Service (CRS) report released recently has revealed. 


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Yemen 'foils al-Qaeda plan to bomb air base'

Security officials in Yemen have foiled a plan by fighters linked to al-Qaeda to bomb an air base used by US soldiers in the southern province of Lahj to train local forces in combating terrorism, officials have said.
A military official disclosing information on condition of anonymity said a car packed with explosives was discovered on Saturday in a wooded area near the gate of al-Anad air base.
He added that it had apparently been "smuggled in several days ago".
"We foiled an attack by a car packed with explosives that managed to breach several security checkpoints leading into the air base.
"The attack was to be implemented today (Saturday)" and "Americans on the base were the target of the attack," he added.
Lahj governor Ahmed Abdallah al-Majidi was quoted on the ministry website "The military police defeated an afternoon attack on the al-Anad base."

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Extradited terrorism suspects appear in US courts

Enlarge PhotoAssociated Press/Elizabeth Williams - In this courtroom drawing, defense attorneys Sabrina Shroff and Jerrod Thompson Hicks represent accused terrorist Abu Hamza al- Masri, center, before magistrate judge Franklin …more 

NEW YORK (AP) — A partially blind extremist Egyptian-born preacher charged in multiple terrorism plots entered a U.S. court for the first time Saturday without the use of his arms, complaining that prosthetic hooks he uses were taken away as he and four other terrorism defendants were flown to New York overnight from London.

Abu Hamza al-Masri, 54, indicted under the name Mustafa Kamel Mustafa, entered a Manhattan courtroom under heavy security to face charges he conspired with Seattle men to set up a terrorist training camp in Oregon and helped abduct 16 hostages, two of them American tourists, in Yemen in 1998.

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Troops kill 12 Kurdish fighters in southeast Turkey

(Reuters) - Turkish security forces killed 12 Kurdish militants in clashes in southeastern Turkey on Tuesday after the insurgents tried to infiltrate a district military post, security sources said, the latest episode in a growing cycle of violence.
Militants from the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), considered a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, have carried out a spate of attacks on military targets in the past few months, stepping up a 28-year-old insurgency.


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Afghanistan: Death toll in suicide bombing rises to 20, 3 Americans killed

Afghan authorities said the death toll in Monday’s suicide bombing in Kabul, Afghanistan has risen to at least 20 people, including three coalition soldiers they identified as Americans.
Local authorities said the attack occurred when a bomber on a motorcycle rammed into a convoy of NATO and Afghan forces carrying out a joint patrol in the eastern city of Khowst.
LA Times reports that Taliban insurgents claimed responsibility for the attack that occurred at about 8:30 a.m. Monday in the middle of a busy plaza.
Governor for the Khowst province, Abdul Jabar Nahimi, said the blast killed three Americans, an Afghan interpreter, 10 Afghan civilians and six Afghan police officers.

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Camp Bastion defenders discuss repelling insurgent attack

CAMP BASTION, Afghanistan (Sept. 24, 2012) — Sergeant Rasheem Thomas never thought his first night working on Camp Bastion would turn into a gun battle with 15 insurgents.

When Thomas was told he was transferring from 1st Platoon to 2nd Platoon, the landing support specialist with Combat Logistics Battalion 2, Combat Logistics Regiment 15, thought nothing of it. Instead of working on Camp Leatherneck, Thomas would be working at the rotary wing Arrival Departure Airfield Control Group on Camp Bastion, an adjoining base ran by British Armed Forces. He would be responsible for getting coalition forces and cargo on helicopters departing Camp Bastion’s airfield heading for remote forward operating bases throughout Regional Command Southwest’s area of operations.

Thomas’ first night on Camp Bastion was Friday, Sept. 14. He and a fellow sergeant were driving through a checkpoint close to the airfield when they heard an explosion.

“At first we didn’t know if the explosion was on base or off,” said Thomas, from Manhattan, N.Y. “We decided to go check on our Marines at the cargo lot and we saw an explosion by the (cryogenics) area. That’s when we knew the base was under attack.”


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EXCLUSIVE: Senior al Qaeda figure 'living in Libyan capital'

Image of al-Libi from the FBI poster seeking information to help in his capture

A veteran al Qaeda operative indicted in connection with the bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa is alive and well in Libya, according to Western intelligence sources.

Abu Anas al Libi, 48, has been seen in the capital, Tripoli, the sources say, and there is concern that he may have been tasked with establishing an al Qaeda network in Libya.  It's unclear whether Libya's government is aware of his presence, or whether it has been approached by Western governments seeking al Libi's arrest.
One Libyan official told CNN he didn't know whether al Libi was back in Tripoli but was aware that he had been in Afghanistan.
Counterterrorism analysts tell CNN that al Libi may not have been apprehended because of the delicate security situation in much of Libya, where former jihadists - especially those who once belonged to the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group - hold considerable sway.  He is wanted in the United States, but there is no extradition treaty between the U.S. and Libya.

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Raw Video: Insurgents Prepare for Base Attack

Published on Sep 24, 2012 by AssociatedPress

The Taliban published a video which purportedly shows insurgents preparing for the brazen attack on Camp Bastion, a major NATO base, on September 14th. The AP can not independently verify the content. (Sept. 24)

4 Killed Including 3 Militant And One Israeli Solider

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Three armed militant killed when they try to slim into Israel from Egypt's Sinai peninsula. Clashed claimed life of one Israeli soldier and wounded another.
"A big terror attack was thwarted," Israeli army spokeswoman Lieutenant-Colonel Avital Leibovich said of Friday's violence.
It was at least the fourth cross-border attack in just over a year - violence that has persisted despite an Egyptian army and police crackdown on Sinai militants begun last month.
Israeli officials say one attacker's explosives detonated during the clash, which they described as a terrorist attack.  The incident took place in the Har Harif region.

12 Killed In Retaliation Bombaing By Militant In Kabul

12 killed in Kabul bombing claimed by militants in retaliation for anti-Islam film

 

Afghan security personnel investigate at the site of a suicide attack near Kabul airport in Afghanistan. (Reuters)

Afghan insurgent group Hezb-e-Islami claimed responsibility for a suicide attack on a minibus that killed 12 people, including 7 foreigners, near Kabul airport on Tuesday and said it was launched in retaliation for a film mocking the Prophet Mohammed.

“A woman wearing a suicide vest blew herself up in response to the anti-Islam video,” said Zubair Sediqqi, a spokesman for Hezb, which does not usually carry out such attacks, according to Reuters.

A senior police source said seven of those killed were foreigners working for an international courier company.

An Afghan official confirmed the death toll and said that two Afghan policemen were wounded. “The foreigners were from a private company working at the airport,” the official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.


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Man Who Killied Two American Soldiers Confessed

'I waited until they took off their body armor off... and then I shot them dead:' Chilling account of 'green on blue' attack by Afghan who killed two U.S. soldiers

Confession: This unidentified man said that while he was being trained as a member of the Afghan Local Police in October 2009, he killed two American soldiers during an insider attack

 

An Afghan man has confessed to shooting dead two American soldiers who were training him as a police officer in an attack which took place three years ago.
In a chilling and candid account, the unidentified man said he had waited until Sergeant Aaron Smith and Private First Class Brandon Owens had taken off their body armour before calmly gunning them down in Wardak Province, central Afghanistan.
His confession comes just a day after four American soldiers were gunned down by Afghan police at a checkpoint in a similar incident. The latest in a spate of so-called green-on-blue attacks.

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Egyptian Forces Again Clash With Militants

Egyptian Forces Clash With Militants in Sinai Security Sweep

An Egyptian man points to a tunnel that was used to supply cars to Gaza, in Rafah city September 12, 2012. (photo by REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih) 

 

 

Violent clashes erupted yesterday [September 16] between security forces and gunmen in the city of Sheikh Zuweid in northern Sinai as part of the Sinai campaign to hunt down criminals. The area witnessed street battles between militants and security forces. Ten people, including seven police personnel, were injured during the confrontations, and eight suspects were arrested. A helicopter was reportedly targeted as well.

According to eyewitnesses, the clashes began yesterday at dawn. A joint security campaign comprising of police and army forces raided four houses in the village of al-Muqataa near the city of Sheikh Zuweid, searching for those involved in the raiding of the Multinational Force and Observers’ (MFO) North Camp in the region of al-Gorah last Friday [September 14]. The raid led to an exchange of gunfire between security forces and militants, which resulted in the injury of seven soldiers, a child and an elderly woman who were later transported to Sheikh Zuweid hospital.

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