MILNET's Middle East Terrorism News   For the week ending 3/26/2005

Domestic

1.  N.J. Man Indicted in Laser Beam Case

NEWARK, N.J. Mar 23, 2005 - A man accused of pointing a green laser beam at a small passenger jet, temporarily blinding the pilot and co-pilot, was indicted Wednesday  under the federal anti-terror Patriot Act.

David W. Banach, who claimed he was looking at stars with his daughter, also was accused of lying to the FBI about the Dec. 29 incident in which the jet's windshield and cabin were hit three times with a beam as the plane approached Teterboro Airport.

The charges in the federal indictment were similar to those filed against Banach in an FBI complaint in January; the indictment replaces the complaint.

Attorney Gina Mendola-Longarzo said Banach was using the laser for stargazing when the plane was hit by the beam.

"I think it's an absolute abuse of prosecutorial discretion to charge my client under the Patriot Act for non-purposeful conduct," she said.

U.S. Attorney Christopher J. Christie said in a statement officials took the actions "very seriously, and we will not condone lying to federal agents."

Banach, 38, faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted of interference with pilots of an aircraft "with reckless disregard for the safety of human life," a provision of the USA Patriot Act passed following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

He also was charged with two counts of making false statements to law officers, each of which carries up to five years.

Source: Associated Press


2.  Terrorism Ruled Out In Texas Blast

(CBS/AP) FBI agents have ruled out terrorism, but federal regulators estimate  it will take them months to determine what caused an oil refinery explosion that killed 15 and injured more than 100.

Investigators from two agencies, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, arrived Thursday at the 1,200-acre BP plant to start sorting through the debris.
Also Thursday, an FBI spokesman in Houston dismissed a statement posted on an Islamic Web site claiming responsibility for the blast. He said there was no indication of foul play.

Wednesday's blast came during a maintenance period in an area that boosts the octane level of gasoline. An explosion happened during a maintenance period the same time last year, but no one was injured.

"History has shown that many of these kinds of accidents tend to happen before, during or after a maintenance turnaround," said Angela Blair, lead investigator for the Chemical Safety Board.

CBS News Correspondent Lee Cowan describes the scene of the blast as leaving a crater so deep that it looked as if the nation's third largest refinery had been struck by a meteor.
"First I heard a little small explosion, five seconds later, you hear a big explosion knocked everybody's hard hat off and people are falling down, and the next thing you know people are running and I'm just trying to run with everybody else," said Tory Scott who works at the plant.

About 1,100 employees and 2,200 contract workers were on site when the explosion took place, shortly before 1:30 p.m. Those killed were all contract workers. It was not immediately known who employed four, but 11 worked for J.E. Merit Constructors Inc., a subsidiary of Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. in Pasadena, Calif.

Source: Associated Press


3.  Report ties suspect to bin Laden escape

WASHINGTON - A terror suspect held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, was a commander for Osama bin Laden during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan  in the 1980s and helped the al-Qaida leader escape his mountain hide-out at Tora Bora in 2001, according to a U.S. government document.

The document, provided to the Associated Press in response to a Freedom of Information request, says the unidentified detainee "assisted in the escape of Osama bin Laden from Tora Bora." It is the first definitive statement from the Pentagon that bin Laden was at Tora Bora and evaded U.S. pursuers.

The detainee is not identified by name or nationality. He is described as being "associated with" al-Qaida and having called for a jihad, or holy war, against the United States.

In an indication that he might be a higher-level operative, the document says he "had bodyguards" and collaborated with regional al-Qaida leadership. "The detainee was one of Osama bin Laden's commanders during the Soviet jihad," it says, referring to the holy war against Soviet occupiers.

The events at Tora Bora were a point of contention during last year's presidential race, and President Bush as well as Vice President Cheney asserted that commanders did not know whether bin Laden was there when U.S. and allied Afghan forces attacked the area in December 2001.

Cheney said last Oct. 26 that Gen. Tommy Franks, the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, had "stated repeatedly it was not at all certain that bin Laden was in Tora Bora. He might have been there or in Pakistan or even Kashmir," the Indian-controlled Himalayan region.

The newly revealed statement is contained in a document the Pentagon calls a "summary of evidence" against one of 558 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

Source: Associated Press


4.  Pentagon Won't Reopen Probe Into Media Abuse

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The Pentagon has refused to reopen an investigation into allegations by three Iraqis working  for Reuters that they were abused and mistreated by U.S. forces, saying it stood by an initial probe exonerating American troops.

Reuters says the investigation, during which none of the three was interviewed, was inadequate and should be reopened.

Lawrence Di Rita, special assistant to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, said Central Command and Pentagon lawyers had reviewed the military's initial investigation.

"The investigation was found to be sufficient, and no basis was found to reopen it," Di Rita said in a letter dated March 7 and received by Reuters this week.

"It is unfortunate that Reuters remains dissatisfied with the action taken in regard to the incident," Di Rita said.

"I'm very disappointed that the Department of Defense has chosen not to reopen a clearly flawed investigation into a very troubling incident," Reuters Global Managing Editor David Schlesinger said Tuesday.

The three Iraqis, along with another Iraqi freelancer working for U.S. network NBC, were detained by soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division on Jan. 2, 2004, while covering the aftermath of the shooting down of a helicopter near Falluja.

When they were released without charge three days later the Iraqis said that during their detention in Forward Operating Base Volturno near Falluja they were subjected to repeated beatings, torture and sexual humiliation, similar to the abuse later uncovered at Abu Ghraib prison.

Source: Reuters


5.  Terror detainee denies threat in rare open hearing

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba - A Sudanese detainee denied being a threat to the United States during an unusual hearing  that was open to the public Tuesday in military proceedings that are determining whether terrorism suspects jailed here should remain in custody.

Three other prisoners refused to participate, and their hearings were held without their presence.

The hearings, many of which have been closed to journalists, come amid a Defense Department effort to persuade home countries to take custody of some 545 detainees at this Navy base. Detainees determined by the hearings not to be a threat to America or not to be a potential source of information about terrorist groups could be freed.

The 30-year-old Sudanese, who slouched in a plastic chair and looked down frequently, insisted he went to Afghanistan before the U.S.-led campaign that toppled the Taliban regime in late 2001. He said he went to fight the Soviet army, which occupied Afghanistan in the 1990s, and tried to flee to avoid fighting Americans.

The other three suspects - a Saudi, an Azerbaijani and an Algerian - refused to attend their hearings. There have been 64 hearings held so far and only 29 suspects have attended.

All four suspects, whose names were not released, have been at Guantanamo Bay since January 2002.

U.S. authorities allege the Sudanese man told interrogators he would fight Americans again to protect his religion and country - a charge he denied.

Asked by a panel member if he posed a threat to the United States, he replied: "I don't pose a threat to the United States. From the beginning I haven't posed a threat."

Source: Associated Press


6.  Transfer of Guantanamo Detainees on Hold

A federal judge expressed skepticism yesterday about the legality of possible Bush administration plans to transfer dozens of men from the U.S. military prison in Cuba  to the custody of foreign countries, saying that would remove detainees from the reach of U.S. courts and eliminate their legal claims for freedom.

U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr. extended for 10 days a temporary restraining order that bars the government from transferring detainees from the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He said he needs that time to decide whether the court has power over such transfer decisions and can order the government to provide detainees' lawyers with advance notice of a proposed transfer to a foreign government.

Kennedy's decision would mark the first time that a judge has ruled on whether U.S. courts can oversee the Bush administration's decisions about where to move Guantanamo Bay detainees. About 540 detainees remain at the prison, accused by the government of having ties to terrorist groups or the Taliban.

The United States has transferred 65 detainees to the control of other nations. But such transfers have become increasingly controversial as a growing number of Guantanamo Bay detainees say that U.S. interrogators have threatened them with torture and transfer to a foreign prison if they did not cooperate.

Families and lawyers of some detainees in foreign prisons contend that U.S. intelligence agencies have ordered or coordinated these imprisonments with foreign governments because the countries can use aggressive interrogation techniques prohibited in the United States.

Source: Washington Post


7.  A Daily Look at Military Deaths in Iraq

As of Thursday, March 24, 2005, at least 1,523 members of the U.S. military have died  since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

At least 1,163 died as a result of hostile action, according to the Defense Department. The figures include four military civilians.

The AP count is four higher than the Defense Department's tally, last updated at 10 a.m. EST Thursday.

The British military has reported 86 deaths; Italy, 21; Ukraine, 18; Poland, 17; Spain, 11; Bulgaria, eight; Slovakia, three; Estonia, Thailand and the Netherlands, two each; and Denmark, El Salvador, Hungary, Kazakhstan and Latvia one death each.

Since May 1, 2003, when President Bush declared that major combat operations in Iraq had ended, 1,385 U.S. military members have died, according to AP's count. That includes at least 1,054 deaths resulting from hostile action, according to the military's numbers.

Source: Associated Press

International

1.  Harkat supporters denounce court ruling

OTTAWA - Supporters of alleged terror suspect Mohamed Harkat vowed Wednesday to keep battling federal security certificates like the one that has kept Harkat in prison for over two years.

A Federal Court judge on Tuesday upheld a security certificate issued against Harkat, setting the stage for his deportation to Algeria. Justice Eleanor Dawson concluded there were reasonable grounds to believe Harkat had "supported terrorist activity" as a member of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network, based on her assessment of secret evidence against him.

Harkat supporters denounced the decision as another step in an unjust process.
"Of course we were hoping for a different decision but we are not shocked by (the) outcome," said Christian Legeais of the Justice for Mohamed Harkat Committee.

"There is no justice with a process that does not conform to essential international legal standards," he said in a statement.

Harkat's wife, Sophie, who has been leading a campaign to free him, said she's outraged by the ruling.

"The justice system in Canada is in a sad state, and today I am outraged," she said through tears at an Ottawa news conference.

"I am disgusted that I had to face my husband in jail . . . to let him know that the Canadian government had ruled against him," she said.

"I was basically confirming a death sentence."

Justice Minister Irwin Cotler, testifying at a Commons committee, defended the security certificate process and maintained it does not violate the Charter of Rights.

Source: Canadian Press


2.  U.S. Warns of Easter Security Threat in Indonesia

Mar 24, 2005 - JAKARTA (Reuters) - U.S. citizens in Indonesia face an increased threat of terrorist attacks during the Easter holiday period , the American embassy in Jakarta said on Thursday.

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, has been the scene of several bomb attacks blamed on militant Islamic groups, including the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people and deadly blasts at a U.S-run hotel and the Australian embassy in Jakarta.

"The U.S. embassy reminds Americans that the terrorist threat in Indonesia continues and may increase over the Easter holiday period," the embassy said in a statement.

"Recent arrests of terrorists with explosives in the Philippines - including Indonesian members of Jemaah Islamiah (JI) - who were plotting to commit terrorist attacks there" suggested the threat of similar attacks in Indonesia.

The militant Jemaah Islamiah network has been blamed for a spate of terrorist attacks in Southeast Asia.

"The targets of these attacks could include restaurants, shopping malls, schools, places of worship, or any other locations where Westerners congregate," the embassy said.

Phillippine security forces have said an Indonesian national they arrested was suspected of being a bomb expert for Jemaah Islamiah and had trained local Muslim rebels for an attack in the capital Manila last month.

The Indonesian man, identified as Rohmat, was arrested on March 16 on the Phillipine's southern island of Mindanao.

Indonesia's official news agency Antara said on Thursday that police in the country had been hunting for Indonesians who had received terrorist training in the southern Philippines.

Source: Reuters


3.  Insurgents cling to training camp after Iraq-US assault

SAMARRA, Iraq : Insurgents were still manning a training camp in northern Iraq in defiance of a blistering raid by the authorities, as British lawmakers accused the US-led coalition of "mistakes and misjudgments" by failing to prepare for the insurgency .

About 30 to 40 fighters were seen Wednesday at the lakeside training camp attacked by US and Iraqi forces on Tuesday and denied they had ever left, an AFP correspondent who visited the site said.

There were numerous discrepancies in the accounts given by the rebel and Iraqi security forces. The US military said Thursday it was investigating the new accounts of a rebel presence after what had been reported as a crushing raid.

The AFP correspondent, who traveled Wednesday with other journalists to the camp in the village of Ain al-Hilwa on Lake Tharthar, 200 kilometres (120 miles) north of Baghdad, said he saw the remains of three burnt-out vehicles on a dusty road leading to the site.
A fighter named Amer, who claimed membership in the Secret Islamic Army of Iraq, said the men had never abandoned the camp and only 11 of his comrades were killed in airstrikes on the site.

Iraqi commanders have said 85 suspected insurgents were killed in an assault by Iraqi troops and US aircraft on the camp Tuesday, adding that no one was captured and others had fled by boat.

Asked about the presence of rebels at the camp late Wednesday, a member of the Iraqi police commandos that took part in the operation said Iraqi and US troops withdrew from the area at about 6:30 pm (1530 GMT) Tuesday.

Local hospitals told AFP they had received no casualties from the battle.

Source: Agence France Presse


4.  Baghdad Shopkeepers Kill Three Militants

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Shopkeepers and residents on one of Baghdad's main streets pulled out their own guns Tuesday and killed three insurgents <>  when hooded men began shooting at passers-by, giving a rare victory to civilians increasingly frustrated by the violence bleeding Iraq.

The clash in the capital's southern Doura neighborhood erupted when militants in three cars sprayed bullets at shoppers. Three people - a man, a woman and a child - were wounded.

The motive was unclear, but there have been previous attacks in the ethnically mixed neighborhood. Earlier in the day, gunmen in the same quarter killed a policeman as he drove to work, police Lt. Col. Hafidh Al-Ghrayri said.

A forceful citizen response is rare, but not unheard of in a country where conflict has become commonplace and the law allows each home to have a weapon. Early this month, police said townsmen in Wihda, 25 miles south of Baghdad, attacked a group of militants believed planning to raid the town and killed seven.

Tuesday's gunbattle came as seven-member U.S. congressional delegation paid a one-day visit to Baghdad, and the man expected to serve as the next prime minister, Shiite politician Ibrahim al-Jaafari, reportedly told the group he is in no hurry for U.S. troops to leave Iraq.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, a Democrat from California who strongly opposed the war, said al-Jaafari didn't seem as "upbeat as our people, who seem to be very excited about the quality of the Iraqi police force."

"My sense was he was certainly in no rush to hand over security to his new police force," she said.

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., agreed, saying that "it's too early to declare success." But Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., expressed "quiet optimism" about Iraq's future.

Source: Associated Press


5.  U.S. officials fear more attacks in Qatar

U.S. officials fear that the suicide bombing attack this weekend on a Qatari theater, which killed a British school teacher and wounded a dozen others, could be a harbinger of more attacks on other "low-protection targets" such as restaurants and schools frequented by Westerners in the emirate.
The blast killed a Briton who worked for the Doha Players Theatre. It took place at 9 p.m. local time on a Saturday night during the next-to-last performance of "Twelfth Night."

"This wasn't an embassy, wasn't a gated residential community," said a U.S. intelligence official, referring to previous targets. "It was a theater showing Shakespeare to an expat [expatriate] community. There is a large expat community there, mostly Brits, who felt safe there. This was a huge shock and it is not insignificant," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Intelligence officials noted that the theater's location, next to the Doha English Speaking School was not far from the U.S. embassy and other public facilities used by Americans.

Jund al-Sham, aka Army of the Levant, claimed responsibility for the attack, but "It's too early to tell if they are responsible," the official said. "A group using the same name claimed responsibility for the 2004 Egyptian hotel attacks, but we are uncertain that the claim is true."

Moreover, Jund al Sham is a name used by many different groups in the region, said the official. So it could be the same group or it could be new a group, the official added.

However, there are no direct ties or obvious links to al-Qaida. "But groups tend to splinter."

Liberal shift

Qatar has increasingly drawn criticism from Islamic fundamentalists over the regime's increasing liberalism, its ties to the U.S. military, and even low-level indirect contacts with Israel.

Al Jazeera, the satellite television channel, operates from the country with few restrictions and the government recently encouraged "The Doha Debates," modeled on the Oxford Union, a free-wheeling political forum unheard of in the Middle East. And a lot of that liberalization is being driven by the wife of the emir, Qatar's first lady, Sheikha Moza.

"It's giving the fundamentalists the willies," said one former high-ranking CIA official.

Moreover, much of the U.S. military effort against Iraq was headquartered at large U.S. military bases in Qatar. But until Saturday, there hadn't been any fundamentalist attacks or bombings in the country.

Source: MSNBC


6.  'Dozens' with terror links

UP to 80 people in Australia have trained or had close links with terrorist groups , including al-Qaeda, but most will probably never face prosecution.

ASIO director-general Dennis Richardson estimated yesterday that "probably less than 10 per cent" of those with links to al-Qaeda, Jemaah Islamiah and other terrorist groups would be charged with terrorism offences.

This was because relevant laws in Australia dealing with terrorist offences only came into force in July 2002, together with the added difficulty of gathering sufficient evidence to meet legal standards.

"I suspect it would be a similar story in most other countries," the nation's top spy said yesterday.

Five people have faced or are facing legal proceedings in relation to Australian terrorism laws.

Attorney-General Philip Ruddock told The Australian the Government knew precisely how many people had actively associated with terrorist groups but declined to give exact figures.

Mr Ruddock said security agencies possessed the relevant powers to monitor persons of interest.

"They can be applied under warrant to all Australians," he said.

He said he had no plans to introduce any new counter-terrorism measures but stressed the Government's approach was a "work in progress".

"We don't act in a precipitate way," Mr Ruddock said.

Source: The Australian


7.  Attacks Kill 15 in Iraq, Including 5 Cleaning Women at U.S. Base

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 25 - A string of suicide bombings and armed assaults across central and northern Iraq on Thursday and today left at least 15 people dead , officials said.

The attacks, ending a week of relative quiet here, included three suicide car bombs, the assassination of a high-ranking police official and the killing of five Iraqi cleaning women working for the American military.

In Ramadi, west of the capital, a suicide bomber drove a sedan packed with explosives into a checkpoint at the city's eastern border on Thursday evening, killing 9 Iraqi police commandos and wounding 16, Interior Ministry officials said. Two American soldiers and two Iraqi civilians were also wounded in the attack, American military officials said.

The Islamic Army of Iraq, a militant group, posted a statement on Islamist Web sites today taking responsibility for the attack.

In southern Baghdad, five Iraqi women working at an American military base were shot dead Thursday afternoon as they drove home together, Interior Ministry officials said. The attackers had driven up in an Opel sedan and opened fire on the three sisters and two friends.

Many civilians working for Americans or for the Iraqi interim government have been killed in recent months, including a substantial number of women. In some cases, bodies have been found with the word "collaborator" pinned to their bodies.

Also in the capital, gunmen killed Maj. Gen. Salman Muhammad, the commander of an Iraqi Army brigade based in Basra, as he drove away from a friend's funeral, Interior Ministry officials said. The general's two sons were also wounded in the attack, the officials said.

In Iskandariya, a recurrently violent area south of the capital, a suicide bomber detonated his vehicle near an Iraqi Army convoy today, killing six soldiers and wounding three, Reuters reported.

Source: The New York Times


8.  British anti-terror measures behind suspect's suicide attempt: interview

LONDON : One of 10 terrorism suspects ordered to follow strict anti-terrorism measures set up this month in Britain blamed the government for his attempted suicide at the weekend , saying it had "made me a danger to myself".

Mahmoud Abu Rideh took a drug overdose at the weekend, only days after being released from years in detention in high-security psychiatric care.

"People think I am dangerous, but I am not dangerous.... I only want to kill myself. I don't want to kill anybody else," he told The Guardian newspaper in the first interview given by one of the 10 suspects since their release to house arrest.
Abu Rideh, a Jordanian-born Palestinian father of five, was among a group of foreign terrorism suspects held for several years without charge under a 2001 measure that was deemed unlawful, forcing the government to come up with an alternate set of "control orders".

Those orders, forced through parliament two weeks ago after a major political battle, freed the terrorism suspects but set up a complicated system of house arrest, electronic tagging and curfew.

Abu Rideh walked into its offices without escort and said he was able to roam freely during the day, although he had to be home by 7:00 pm, in line with the curfew.
"The government is playing games. If I am a risk to security, why are they letting me out to be with people?" he asked.

"I am not a danger to anybody else, but this government has made me a danger to myself. It is just as bad to be free with a control order as it is in Belmarsh prison or Broadmoor hospital," he said, referring to his former detention centers. 

Source: Agence France Presse

9.  Ukraine to Withdraw Troops From Iraq

KIEV, Ukraine - President Viktor Yushchenko has signed the order to withdraw Ukraine's troops from Iraq, cementing a pledge by the new leadership to bring back its 1,650-strong force, the head of the country's security council said Tuesday.

The end date for the pullout will be "fixed after consultations with the other coalition members," and the entire Ukrainian contingent is likely to leave Iraq in November or December, Petro Poroshenko said.

Earlier this month Yushchenko and top defense officials ordered Ukraine's soldiers to leave by year's end, and the pullout began last week. The ex-Soviet republic provided the sixth-largest contingent in the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq.

Eighteen Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in Iraq and more than two dozen have been wounded, fueling public dismay about the unpopular deployment.

More than 130 soldiers returned home last week, and Ukraine plans to withdraw an additional 550 soldiers from Iraq by May 15, the Defense Ministry has said.

The troop pullout was one of the new president's campaign promises.

Ukraine strongly opposed the U.S.-led war but later agreed to send a large contingent to serve under Polish command in central and southern Iraq.

The deployment was widely seen as an effort by former President Leonid Kuchma to repair relations with Washington, frayed by allegations that he approved the sale of radar systems to Saddam Hussein's regime in violation of U.N. sanctions.

Source: Associated Press


10.  Militant Somali cleric vows to fight peacekeepers to the death

MOGADISHU - A militant Muslim cleric accused by the United States of terrorism ties has warned against the deployment of regional peacekeepers to Somalia , saying gunmen affiliated with the lawless nation's Islamic courts would fight them to the death.

"We will fight fiercely to the death any intervention force that arrives in Somalia," said Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, the chairman of Islamic courts in southern Mogadishu.

"Foreign troops are not needed in the Somalia and their presence in our country is waste of resources," he told reporters here late on Thursday.

An east African peacekeeping force being organized by the seven-member regional Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) is expected to begin deploying to Somalia as early as next month in a bid to help the country's transitional government relocate from exile in Kenya.

Despite a request for the mission from the government and the authorization of the African Union (AU), many in Somalia are deeply opposed to the presence of any foreign troops there and like the sheikh have pledged to resist.

The 70-year-old cleric, who was identified as having terrorism links by the US Treasury and State Departments two months after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, also urged Somali Muslims not to surrender their weapons to non-believers.

They "should obey their government but not give their weapons to non-Muslims who want to enter Somalia as peacekeepers," he said. "We will keep our weapons until we really achieve genuine reconciliation."

"It is our responsibility to fight for our people, religion and sovereignity of the republic. We will not surrender our independence to foreigners."

The militant also urged international donors to refrain from funding the peacekeeping mission.

Source: Agence France Presse


11.  Terror-stricken Iraqi villagers wonder will bloodshed end

TAJI, Iraq (AFP) - Four leaders from villages near the US military base in Taji, 15 kilometres north of Baghdad, met a US captain and begged him to seal off their communities with concrete blast walls and barbed wire.

The worried men wanted their homes turned into enclaves resembling the fortified Green Zone in Baghdad, home to the Iraqi government and the US embassy.

This sleepy green farmland heading north from the capital is a terrain of bombings, kidnappings and rebel checkpoints.

On this treacherous roadway stands Taji and its cavernous Saddam Hussein era military base that has been converted into a major US airfield and training centre for the Iraqi army, hosting more than 8,000 US soldiers and contractors.

Taji's surrounding villages are home to army veterans, many of whom pride themselves on being Baath loyalists. Some villages mix Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds and have broken with former regime elements involved in the insurgency.

Despite the area's paranoia about attacks, violence has actually gone down around Taji since landmark elections two months ago.

The dip has nourished the belief among American commanders and locals that this is a pivotal moment where the insurgency might be beaten. However, it is still too soon to tell.

In their meeting with the US captain, the community leaders, who did not want their names or villages identified, asked the Americans to dynamite the road from the former rebel bastion of Fallujah to the west, down which insurgents travel to Taji.

Source: Agence France Presse


12.  Yemen to extradite 24 "terror" suspects to Saudi Arabia

Yemeni security authorities will extradite 24 Saudis suspected of several "security crimes"  to the Saudi authorities in the next few days, an official source in the Yemeni Interior Ministry was quoted as saying on Thursday.

According to SABA, the source added that the Interior Minister Rashad al-Alimi had sent a letter to his Saudi counterpart Nayif bin Abdul-Aziz dealing with the suspects to be extradited to the Saudi authorities. Extradition of those persons who were arrested in Yemen came in the framework of the security agreement that was signed between the two sides on exchanging criminals and wanted, the source added.

Source: al-Bawaba