The United Nations' International Narcotics Control Board (INCB)
released its annual report
on Tuesday, which documents the successes won and challenges faced by
governments worldwide as they struggle to crack down on drug
trafficking. The study paints a gloomy picture of the fight against the
global drug trade, describing it as “a problem that has gathered
enormous momentum” and which threatens “health, educational, criminal
justice, social welfare, economic and, in some instances, political
systems in countries around the globe.”
Friday, March 9, 2012
Security Forces Warn Organized Crime May Overwhelm Ecuador
An assessment by the security forces reportedly says that
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Estonian Couple arrested for allegedly serving as Russian Spies
Aleksei Dressen, a member of Estonia’s security police for almost two decades, and his wife, Viktoria Dressen, were taken into custody on February 22 at Tallinn Airport for purportedly turning over classified information and state secrets to Russia. According to prosecution spokeswoman Kadri Tammai, Mr. Dressen went to the airport to drop off a folder containing classified data with his wife, who herself was arrested while in the process of boarding a flight headed for Moscow. He had been employed by the domestic security arm of the security police, designated the Kapo. Ms.Tammai disclosed that Mr. Dressen was privy to state secrets but would not give details, other than that his alleged espionage activities spanned a number of years. In addition, Mrs. Dressen supposedly operated as a carrier of classified documents to Russia’s chief intelligence agency, Federal Security Service (FSB), amid reports she was holding such documents at the time of her arrest. A treason conviction for Mr. Dressen could bring imprisonment of 20 years to life.
Will There Be A Kremlin U-Turn On Syria?
Whenever the world seemed to start caving in around them, Syrian politicians have leaned on the Russians for support. Moscow, both now and during the Soviet era, has always been Syria’s “security blanket”. Syrian leaders, however, have almost equally misjudged how far Russia was willing to go to help them.
In 1956, then-president Shukri al-Quwatli visited Moscow seeking Russian support for Egypt in the infamous Suez War. He roared at the Kremlin: “Syria wants you to send in that big Red Army that defeated [Adolf] Hitler!” A few years earlier, president Husni al-Za’im threatened at a press conference: “If the Americans continue to provoke me, I will extend my hand to the Russians. Yes, I will do that. I will go to Moscow and let a Third World War erupt from right over here, from Damascus!”
Tunisie : Sommes-nous devenus des espions pour la CIA à cause de facebook et twitter ?
Nous entendons souvent parler de la présence des services d’intelligencia extérieures dans notre pays via leurs agents secrets. Ces personnes qui s’infiltrent pour récolter le maximum d’informations «secrètes» et de l’envoyer sous forme de rapport aux CIA et autres services de renseignement/espionnage. Et pourtant, jamais le citoyen moyen n’a pu avoir des preuves réelles sur leur existence. Plus maintenant grâce à Internet.
Bien qu’ils ne pèsent guère dans la balance économique mondiale, les pays arabes sont paradoxalement tout le temps dans le collimateur des grandes puissances mondiales, telles que les Etats Unis. Ils lorgnent ses richesses naturelles et son pétrole en particulier. La grogne sociale contre les régimes despotiques, et dont la Tunisie était pionnière, ne peut donc qu’augmenter la crainte de l’occident de perdre leur main mise sur l’or noir des pays du Moyen Orient.
Des récentes révélations dans la presse ne cessent de conforter cette idée. En plus de ses agents spéciaux infiltrés au sein de la population, les services secrets du monde entier, dont la célèbre Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), se feraient aidé par les réseaux sociaux à l’instar de Twitter pour récolter les informations.
Sahel : ce que cachent les 30 millions d’euros pour libérer les espagnols enlevés à Tindouf
Trente millions d'euros est le montant
de la rançon qu’un mouvement dissident d’AQMI réclame pour la libération
des deux otages espagnols enlevés dans les camps de Tindouf (sud-est
algérien). Le Mouvement Unicité et Jihad en Afrique de l'ouest (MUJAO),
qui tient en otages le couple d’humanitaires espagnols, fait ainsi une
entrée fracassante dans l’univers du terrorisme sahélien à travers cette
exigence financière inédite, qui constitue le montant exigé le plus
important à cette date, soit près de 15 millions d’euros par otage. De
surcroit, le MUJAO vient de revendiquer un attentat à la voiture piégée
perpétré contre une caserne de la gendarmerie algérienne, au
centre-ville de Tamanrasset (1925 km au sud d’Alger), faisant une
vingtaine de blessés et d’importants dégâts matériels. Le choix de cette
ville est tout sauf fortuit, car Tamanrasset abrite depuis avril
2010, le QG du bureau de commandement de la coordination sécuritaire
entre les armées des pays du Sahel.
Hamas rules out military support for Iran in any war with Israel
Hamas will not do Iran's bidding in any war with Israel, according to
senior figures within the militant Islamic group. "If there is a war between two powers, Hamas will not be part of such a
war," Salah Bardawil, a member of the organisation's political bureau
in Gaza City, told the Guardian. He denied the group would launch rockets into Israel at Tehran's
request in response to a strike on its nuclear sites. "Hamas is not part
of military alliances in the region," said Bardawil. "Our strategy is
to defend our rights" The stance underscores Hamas's rift with its key financial sponsor and
its realignment with the Muslim Brotherhood and popular protest
movements in the Arab world.
Bosnia and Herzegovina on the Map of the Battle Over Dominance in Europe
Traditionally for the republic which
used to be a part of the former Yugoslavia, the March 1 Sarajevo
celebration of the two decades of Bosnia and Herzegovina's independence
attracted Croats and Muslims but was completely boycotted by the local
Serbian community. Croat representative to the tripartite presidency of
Bosnia and Herzegovina Zeljko Komsic said on the occasion that the
republic became an independent and sovereign country on March 1, 1992 in
line with the will of the majority of its citizens, with his Muslim
peer Bakir Izetbegovic adding, in a reference to the dissenting Serbian
community, that eventually all of the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina
would learn to love it. Serb member of the tripartite presidency Nebojša
Radmanović shunned the ceremony.
Russia's National Interests and Foreign Policy
On February 27, with Russia's
presidential poll already in sight, Moskovskie Novosti
daily featured an international politics opinion piece by Vladimir
Putin, which came as the seventh in a series of programmatic papers by
the Russian prime minister and March 4 elections front-runner. The
vision of foreign policy issues and perspectives laid out by Vladimir
Putin drew responses worldwide and merits an in-depth analysis.
BRICS – The Basis of Multipolar World
It’s not only the common interests
in the field of modernization and economic development that have made
possible the strengthening of relations between Brazil, Russia, India,
China and South Africa (since 2010) in recent years. It’s rather common
foreign policy approaches, that by and large coincide, that bring these
countries together. The political coordination within the BRICS framework is the major driving force of
transformation from unipolar to multipolar world.
***
In 2001 Jim O'Neal, leading analyst in "Goldman Sachs” investment bank,
came out with the thesis that global economic integration is to form a
new potential union including Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC).
The assessment was based on macroeconomic data of some rapidly
developing economies, especially taking into account demography, GDP
growth and availability of strategic natural resources. He made a
conclusion that most likely these countries will dominate in the XXI
century. Indeed, the tendency to strengthen their global geopolitical
status was evident in the first dozen of years of the century. Some of
them, especially Brazil, India and China tried to bolster their
independence in the world giving priority to regional and global level
commercial and economic agreements. No doubt the rapid GDP growth of
these countries-continents is what the coming new world order is based
on.
«Arab Spring» is Arab Socialism’s Fall
The fall of autocratic regimes in
the Arab Middle East and North Africa, which had more to do with
skyrocketing unemployment and inflation than in a desire to
«democratize,» gave the circling vultures of Western «pro-democracy»
think tanks and foundations the opportunity to put stakes in the hearts
of governing pan-Arab socialist political parties long seen as a threat
to the goals of «uber-capitalist» globalization. The Ba’ath socialist
party of Saddam Hussein in Iraq was the first victim of a desire by the
global forces of extreme capitalism to re-make the Middle East’s
financial, demographic, political, and social construct.
Rising energy tensions in the Aegean - Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, Syria
The discovery in late 2010 of the huge natural gas bonanza off Israel’s Mediterranean shores triggered other neighboring countries to look more closely at their own waters. The results revealed that the entire eastern Mediterranean is swimming in huge untapped oil and gas reserves. That discovery is having enormous political, geopolitical as well as economic consequences. It well may have potential military consequences too.
Preliminary exploration has confirmed similarly impressive reserves of gas and oil in the waters off Greece, Turkey, Cyprus and potentially, Syria.
ALBA Expands its Allies in the Caribbean
The weekend of February 4th and 5th saw the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas (ALBA) convene their 11th summit in
Trafficker Gives Insider's Look at Nicaragua Drug Trade
"Tumbadores" are paid by cartels to steal drug loads from their competitors. El Faro interviews a Nicaraguan trafficker who got his start in the business this way.
Rivas is the only
The difference between the Pacific and the Atlantic coast is that the latter is a marine highway, where motorboats with 800 horsepower engines speed past, and, at the most, stop only to refuel. By contrast, on Rivas’ side, a large percentage of the drugs pass overland, to take advantage of the amount of traffic on [Lake Nicaragua], and thus arrive easily to
Tracking the Rise of Paraguay's Rebel Army
In spite of a security surge by the Paraguayan military, the country’s elusive rebel army is rapidly gaining momentum, having dramatically stepped up its operations last year.
When the Paraguayan government called a 60-day state of emergency last October in order to capture members of the Paraguayan People’s Army (EPP), Vice President Federico Franco promised to "make war" until the group was eliminated. But although troops were deployed to the rebel’s area of influence in the north, no high-profile arrests were made. The EPP even released a statement mocking the security surge.
“They claim, with characteristic falsehood, that they didn’t find the EPP,” the statement read. “This couldn’t be further from the truth! It is the EPP who was looking for them all over in order to engage them in combat. But our desires were never satisfied.”
The communique’s victorious rhetoric is surprising coming from a group that has come off as hopelessly amateur in the past. In January 2011, officials broke up an EPP “training camp” in which idealistic young recruits read revolutionary leftist pamphlets and trained with wooden weapons. But this shift in tone fits well with the group’s rapidly growing political profile.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
The Real Meaning of Obama’s New Policy: War is Inevitable
Does
President Barack Obama now love Israel? Is he lying to help his
reelection bid? Precisely what is the meaning of this or that sentence
in his AIPAC speech? All of this debate misses the point. What is needed here is not a
partisan view or one which focusses on Obama himself but rather a
strategic analysis.
Here it is:
Whether he realizes it or not, Obama changed history with his AIPAC speech. What he did is to make a war between Israel and Iran almost inevitable, let’s say more than 90 percent probable, most likely some time in late 2013, 2014, or 2015.
What a lot of people are going to miss is not that Israel now thinks Obama is reliable but that it knows he has now locked publicly into a major commitment. If Israel ever were to attack an Iran on the verge of getting nuclear weapons, how is Obama going to bash Israel for doing so? In effect, then, Israel has traded patience for freedom of action. Obama laid out a very clear chain of events. If and when Iran obtains a nuclear weapon then the U.S. government will support an attack by Israel on Iranian nuclear facilities. It might even join in with such an attack.
Here it is:
Whether he realizes it or not, Obama changed history with his AIPAC speech. What he did is to make a war between Israel and Iran almost inevitable, let’s say more than 90 percent probable, most likely some time in late 2013, 2014, or 2015.
What a lot of people are going to miss is not that Israel now thinks Obama is reliable but that it knows he has now locked publicly into a major commitment. If Israel ever were to attack an Iran on the verge of getting nuclear weapons, how is Obama going to bash Israel for doing so? In effect, then, Israel has traded patience for freedom of action. Obama laid out a very clear chain of events. If and when Iran obtains a nuclear weapon then the U.S. government will support an attack by Israel on Iranian nuclear facilities. It might even join in with such an attack.
Goldman Secret Greece Loan Shows Two Sinners as Client Unravels Read more: Goldman Secret Greece Loan Shows Two Sinners as Client Unravels
Greece’s secret loan from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. was a costly mistake from the start. On the day the 2001 deal was struck, the government owed the bank
about 600 million euros ($793 million) more than the 2.8 billion euros
it borrowed, said Spyros Papanicolaou, who took over the country’s
debt-management agency in 2005. By then, the price of the transaction, a
derivative that disguised the loan and that Goldman Sachs persuaded
Greece not to test with competitors, had almost doubled to 5.1 billion
euros, he said. Papanicolaou and his predecessor, Christoforos Sardelis, revealing
details for the first time of a contract that helped Greece mask its
growing sovereign debt to meet European Union requirements, said the
country didn’t understand what it was buying and was ill-equipped to
judge the risks or costs.
Big Happenings in a Big Desert
The last 24 hours have seen an unusual amount of activity by and
involving terrorist groups in the Sahel. This morning a suicide bomber
detonated a Toyota truck filled with explosives at the gates of the
Gendarmerie in the southern Algerian city of Tamanrasset, an attack swiftly claimed
in a phone call to the AFP in Bamako by the AQIM “splinter group” MUJWA
– the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa. The attack came just
hours after AQIM freed a Mauritanian gendarme kidnapped in a cross-border raid in December, Ely Ould Elmoctar. And reports circulated today that MUJWA had also freed an Italian humanitarian worker
kidnapped in the Polisario-run camps at Tindouf in October, Rossella
Urru. Oddly enough, a source close to the negotiations for Urru and two
Spaniards taken from Tindouf told the AFP today that MUJWA wanted $30 million for the hostages, including Urru.
The Call to Islam: Hitin Urdu Magazine Interviews al-Qa’ida’s Head of Da’wah Khalid bin ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Husaynan
Over the past year or two, with the death of many senior leaders as well as al-Qa’ida’s longing for religious legitimacy, Khalid bin ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Husaynan (Abū Zayd al-Kūwaytī) has risen in the ranks and has been described by Jarret Brachman as “Zawahiri’s in-house version of Awlaki” and by Christopher Anzalone as part of al-Qa’ida’s “missionary vanguard.” I would simply describe al-Husaynan as al-Qa’ida’s head of da’wah (the call to Islam/proselytization). Surprisingly, little has been written about al-Husaynan.
With the rise of Abu Yahya al-Libi from 2005-2008 many saw al-Libi as a potential Bin Ladin successor or at least al-Qa’ida’s main religious mouthpiece. Indeed, al-Libi has touched upon religious areas and performed al-Qa’ida’s khutabahs for ‘Id al-Fitr and ‘Id al-Adha, but al-Libi has also been a figure that discussed political issues just as much as religious ones. In contrast, al-Husaynan more or less has stuck to purely religious topics, not mixing his lectures with political overtones. This is important to note because many in the Muslim and non-Muslim world have questioned al-Qa’ida’s Islamic character (and not to mention the fact that 9 in 10 individuals al-Qa’ida has killed over the years have been Muslims) and bona fides. As such, one could argue that al-Husaynan is al-Qa’ida’s answer to its critics by showcasing a purely religious side of its media releases. In 2010, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, al-Husaynan released twenty-eight lessons related to religious life that one should ponder during Ramadan. Similarly, in April 2011, al-Husaynan began a series of “Da’wah Lectures” dealing with similar purely religious topics. For instance, the most recent was “Lecture 12: The Virtues of the Night Prayer.”
With the rise of Abu Yahya al-Libi from 2005-2008 many saw al-Libi as a potential Bin Ladin successor or at least al-Qa’ida’s main religious mouthpiece. Indeed, al-Libi has touched upon religious areas and performed al-Qa’ida’s khutabahs for ‘Id al-Fitr and ‘Id al-Adha, but al-Libi has also been a figure that discussed political issues just as much as religious ones. In contrast, al-Husaynan more or less has stuck to purely religious topics, not mixing his lectures with political overtones. This is important to note because many in the Muslim and non-Muslim world have questioned al-Qa’ida’s Islamic character (and not to mention the fact that 9 in 10 individuals al-Qa’ida has killed over the years have been Muslims) and bona fides. As such, one could argue that al-Husaynan is al-Qa’ida’s answer to its critics by showcasing a purely religious side of its media releases. In 2010, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, al-Husaynan released twenty-eight lessons related to religious life that one should ponder during Ramadan. Similarly, in April 2011, al-Husaynan began a series of “Da’wah Lectures” dealing with similar purely religious topics. For instance, the most recent was “Lecture 12: The Virtues of the Night Prayer.”
The Impact of the Parliamentary Elections in Iran
Predicting Iranian politics is usually a fool’s game. After all, few
observers have accurately forecast the dramatic twists and turns of
contemporary Iranian history – neither the 1979 upheaval that
transformed a pro-American monarchy into a truculent anti-Western
theocracy, nor the rebirth of the revolution’s leftist radicals as
moderate reformers fifteen years later, nor the subsequent rise of a new
generation of hard-liners, as epitomized by President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad. And even fewer outside Iran predicted the response to
Iran’s last experience with the ballot box, in 2009, when the dubious
declaration of Ahmadinejad’s overwhelming reelection prompted the first
sustained protests and opposition movement since the revolution itself.
Eurozone Economy Shrinks in 4Q as Recession Fears Mount
A collapse in household spending, exports and manufacturing
sucked the life out of the euro zone's economy in the final months of
2011, the EU said on Tuesday, showing the scope of the downturn that
looks set to become a fully fledged recession. Output in the 17 countries sharing the euro shrank 0.3 percent in
October to December from the third quarter, the European Union's
statistics office Eurostat said, confirming its estimate of last month
and giving a more detailed breakdown.
Bust Reveals Government Runs Hacking Groups
The establishment media has characterized the leader of LulzSec ratting out his hacktivist comrades as betrayal,
but the incident reveals something far more sinister – government is
responsible for creating and unleashing computer hacker groups. Hector Xavier Monsegur, said to be the leader of LulzSec, worked for
the FBI, according to news reports. He was reportedly arrested in Puerto
Rico last June, pleaded guilty to hacking charges, and then began
working with the FBI – or so the cover story would have it.
15 Reasons Why U.S. Economic Crisis Is An Economic Consolidation By Elite Banking Powers
Is the United States experiencing an “economic crisis” or an
“economic consolidation”? Did the financial problems of the last
several years “happen on their own”, or are they part of a broader plan
to consolidate financial power in the United States? Before you dismiss
that possibility, just remember what happened back during the Great
Depression. During that era, the big financial powers cut off the flow
of credit, hoarded cash and reduced the money supply. Suddenly nobody
had any money and the economy tanked. The big financial powers were
then able to swoop back in and buy up valuable assets and real estate
for pennies on the dollar. So are there signs that such a financial
consolidation is happening again?
Well, yes, there are.
Well, yes, there are.
The Secret Iraq Files
In the biggest leak of military secrets in history, WikiLeaks, the
whistleblower website, has released 400,000 secret US files detailing
every aspect of the war in Iraq, copies of which have been obtained by
Al Jazeera. The sheer magnitude of data contained in the secret
files reveals a graphic narrative of the war that goes far beyond any
information about the conflict ever released into the public domain. Using
thousands of classified US military reports, Al Jazeera is now able to
tell the inside story of a war which left thousands dead and a country
fractured along sectarian lines. Working with the Bureau of
Investigative Journalism in London for the past 10 weeks, Al Jazeera has
analysed tens of thousands of documents, finding facts the US has kept
hidden from public scrutiny. What has been uncovered often
contradicts the official narrative of the conflict. For example, the
leaked data shows that the US has been keeping records of Iraqi deaths
and injuries throughout the war, despite public statements to the
contrary. The latest cache of files pertains to a period of six
years – from January 1, 2004, to December 31, 2009 – and shows that
109,000 people died during this time. Of those, a staggering 66,081 –
two-thirds of the total – were civilians.
Sinaloa Cartel Beats Competition to Australian Drug Market
The Sinaloa Cartel has moved faster than some of its competitors in accessing the Australian market, US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) intelligence chief Rodney Benson told NPR. Seizures of the drug increased to 796 kilograms in fiscal year 2010-2011, up 103 percent on the previous year's total of 404 kilograms, according to Australian government figures.
Venezuelan Police Clash With Indigenous Suspected Fuel Traffickers
A shootout between police in northern
El Universal reports that police sighted the alleged trafficker when he was filling up his vehicle at a pump in a northern neighborhood of the city of
According to the police, the suspect fled and hid in a building, where he and other traffickers engaged in a shootout with police that left him dead and 12 others injured. A group of protesters then went to the police station and mayor's office, demanding that the police who had fired the fatal shots be handed over. They claimed that the shooting had broken out when the suspects refused to pay bribes to the police.
Trial of Rogue Tijuana Gang Raises Question of Violence Spilling Over to San Diego
The
The two defendants, Jose Olivera Beritan and David Valencia, are charged with involvement in several kidnapping and murder cases in
Mexico Gang Turns to Women to Hold Key City
In the midst of a years-long fight against the Zetas for control of prized sections of borderland territory, the Gulf Cartel is increasingly relying on a previously untapped resource: women.
As Excelsior reported last week;
“The army has evidence that women have begun to occupy important positions inside the Gulf Cartel; in [Reynosa] they have begun to obtain information that not only is the number of women who are dedicated to assassinations rising, but they have also gone from managing safe houses and administering funds to carrying out intricate operations for the purchase and smuggling of drugs and undocumented immigrants ...The Gulf Cartel has bet on women to come and fortify an organization that has been worn down by casualties suffered in confrontations with the Zetas.”
Paramilitary to testify Drummond paid to kill unionists: Victims' lawyer
A former AUC paramilitary member will testify before a
The member, who uses the alias "Samirio," will testify Tuesday during a hearing in a northern Colombian courtroom, according to attorney Terry Collingsworth.
Samirio is one of three paramilitary members whom an
Collingsworth, representing more than 600 victims in the civilian case against Drummond, said in a press release that Samirio, whose real name is Alcides Manuel Mattos Tabares, will testify that the U.S. coal company made payments of millions of dollars to the United Self Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC). He also said he would testify about how Drummond operatives directed the AUC to kill union leaders.
After Two Year Struggle Gulf Cartel, Zetas at Impasse
The Monitor
Two years have passed since the
Gulf Cartel and the Zetas broke their alliance and turned their weapons on each
other. During that time, there have been untold firefights, executions,
kidnappings and other violent events as the two rival organizations continue to
fight for control of lucrative drug trade routes.
In recent months, the struggle
between the rival cartels has reached an impasse. While the Zetas appear to be
the larger of the organizations, the alliance that the Gulf Cartel has with the
Sinaloa Cartel and the Knights Templar, which is made up of the remaining
members of the Familia Michoacana, evens the numbers out.
Despite the impasse and
uncertain future of both the drug war and the war between cartels, much has
changed near the Tamaulipas-Texas border since the struggle between the cartels
began.
Monday, March 5, 2012
H.R. 347: Another Step in the Elimination of the First Amendment
It is fairly obvious Obama and Congress rushed through H.R. 347
in order to curtail demonstrations that will undoubtedly occur during
both Democrat and Republican conventions this summer. Also known as the
“Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act of 2011,” the
bill makes it a felony to disrupt or protest at any place or event
attended by any person with secret service protection. “Current law makes it illegal to enter or remain in an area where
certain government officials (more particularly, those with Secret
Service protection) will be visiting temporarily if and only if the
person knows it’s illegal to enter the restricted area but does so
anyway,” Michigan Rep. Justin Amash
wrote on his Facebook page. “[H.R. 347] expands current law to make it a
crime to enter or remain in an area where an official is visiting even
if the person does not know it’s illegal to be in that area and has no
reason to suspect it’s illegal.” Amash, Paul Broun, a Georgia Republican, and Ron Paul were the lone
dissenting voices opposed to this bill, which is being called the “First Amendment Rights Eradication Act”
designed specifically to counter the Occupy movement and other
political groups opposed to the bankster regime in control of the
Congress and the presidency. Democrats have characterized opposition to the bill as “a whole lot of kerfuffle over nothing.”
Cameroun: la bataille entre Chinois et Français pour le contrôle du port général de Kribi
Le groupe Bolloré qui gère le terminal à
conteneurs du port de Douala entend ajouter le port en eau profonde de
Kribi dans son escarcelle. Seule menace sérieuse : les firmes chinoises
déjà présentes dans la construction du nouveau port de Kribi. En
attendant les résultats des appels à manifestation, Achille Mbog Pibasso
décrypte les enjeux de cette énième confrontation entre Chinois et
Français.
La bataille entre les firmes chinoises et
françaises déjà épique dans les secteurs des télécommunications, de
l’eau, des travaux publics et du bâtiment, avec des fortunes diverses
pour l’une et l’autre parties, va se poursuivre et s’intensifier. Cette
fois-ci, les deux parties sont en concurrence pour la gestion portuaire,
en l’occurrence, le terminal à conteneurs du port en eau profonde de
Kribi dont les premiers bateaux sont attendus en 2013. Alors que les
résultats des appels à manifestation lancés par le gouvernement restent
attendus, les sources proches du dossier, aussi bien dans les services
du Premier ministre qui pilotent l’opération, qu’au ministère de
l’Economie, de la Planification et de l’Aménagement du territoire,
chargé du suivi technique de l’opération, révèlent que les Français et
les Chinois sont au coude à coude.
Boko Haram plans 'to eradicate Christians' from areas in Nigeria
Boko Haram, the radical Islamist terror group that has been linked to
al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb as well as Shabaab, al Qaeda's
affiliate in East Africa, is intent on turning its insurgency in the
north of Nigeria into a full-fledged war between Christans and Muslims.
The terror group has bombed numerous churches in the country in the past
two years, including a suicide attack at a church in Jos at the end of February. Leadership, a Nigerian news outlet, interviewed a Boko Haram spokesman who said that the group will "eradicate Christians from certain parts of the country" while fighting to establish "a proper Islamic state."
France restores military censorship
Syrian state television endorsed on Saturday, 3 March 2012 at midday, the information reported two weeks earlier by Voltaire Network that the Syrian National Army had captured 18 French agents in Homs and the 19th in Azouz. This confirmation attests to the failure of the negotiations between
Paris and Damascus and that Syria has decided to ramp up the pressure on
France by going public on the case. Since February 14, our information has been widely relayed and
commented on by the international press, except in France. This can be
explained by the difficulty of the French media to ascertain such
sensitive facts.
Israel delivers ultimatum to Barack Obama on Iran's nuclear plans
Their relationship, almost from the outset, has been frostier than not, a
mutual antipathy palpable in many of their previous encounters. Two years ago, Barack Obama reportedly left Benjamin Netanyahu to kick his
heels in a White House anteroom, a snub delivered to show the president's
irritation over Israel's settlement policy in the West Bank. In May, the
Israeli prime minister struck back, publicly scolding his purse-lipped host
for the borders he proposed of a future Palestinian state. When the two men meet in Washington on Monday, Mr Obama will find his guest
once more at his most combative. But this time, perhaps as never before, it
is the Israeli who has the upper hand. Exuding confidence, Mr Netanyahu effectively brings with him an ultimatum,
demanding that unless the president makes a firm pledge to use US military
force to prevent Iran acquiring a nuclear bomb, Israel
may well take matters into its own hands within months. The threat is not an idle one. According to sources close to the Israeli
security establishment, military planners have concluded that never before
has the timing for a unilateral military strike against Iran's nuclear
facilities been so auspicious.
Shining Path Leader Confesses to Killings, Denies Drug Crime
The captured leader of
Last week "Comrade Artemio" was removed from the police hospital in
UN Report Enforces Orthodox Drug Strategy
The UN's latest annual report on drug trafficking offers a bleak assessment of efforts to
fight drug trafficking and presents some sharp criticism for the
growing number of countries in the region questioning the US-led "war
on drugs," a response which risks making the organization looking
irrelevant.
Are Police-Run Militias Spreading Across Brazil?
Warnings that militias made up of police
may have been responsible for dozens of murders during recent police
strikes in Bahia, north Brazil, draw attention to the spread of these
illegal groups beyond Rio de Janeiro.
State police in Bahia
went on strike in February to demand better pay. At least 3,000
officers joined in, initiating a 12-day stand off with federal forces,
who began policing the streets. Some 181 people were killed in greater
Salvador, the state’s capital, in the ensuing chaos, which is more than
double the city’s murder rate for the same period in January. A
disturbing pattern emerged in the killings: some 45 of the victims were
bound and shot in the head with high-caliber weapons. Despite recent
assurances to the contrary by the state’s public security
secretary, an official from the state's civil police, the investigative
arm of law enforcement, suggested militias could have taken
advantage of the strike to kill with impunity. The civil police has
opened
an inquiry into the issue of militias in Bahia.
A Renewed Negotiation: Will Santos Seize the Moment?
Signaling an unprecedented change in
course and strategy, the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia
(Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia —FARC) announced
this week that the guerrilla body would no longer use kidnapping as
a tool to achieve its revolutionary objectives against Colombian
authorities. Kidnappings have long served as an important financial
source for the insurgent group that first took up arms against the
government in 1964, but the recent decision by the FARC leadership
indicates the possibility of a return to negotiations with the
government of Manuel Santos.
Peru: Shining Path’s Last Major Leader, Artemio, has been Captured
While international attention is
currently centered on issues including the protests and violence in
Syria, the ongoing spats between Argentina and the United Kingdom over
the Falkland/Malvinas islands, and the presidential race in the U.S.,
there seems to be a lack of attention regarding the new critical
development regarding Peru’s national security situation which took
place in February. On Sunday, February 12, Peruvian military and police
forces captured Florindo Eleuterio Flores Hala, commonly known as
Artemio. He is the last major leader of the Peruvian terrorist movement
Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso – SL), which has waged war against the
government since 1983 (though this group was founded in the late 1960s).
Artemio’s capture counts as a huge victory not only for Peruvian
intelligence capacity and security services but also for President
Ollanta Humala, who has been in office for just over six months.
Nevertheless, it is still too early to consider placing a “Mission
Accomplished” banner outside the government palace in downtown Lima.
Reckless: The Inside Story of How the Banks Beat Washington (Again)
One year ago, the largest financial institutions on Wall Street were desperate to show off their strength by paying out, or raising, dividends for the first time since the Great Recession. After conducting a secretive test of the banks' health, the Federal Reserve granted most of their requests in March 2011 -- over loud objections from economic luminaries in Washington and across the country. Now, for the first time, we tell the story of why the Federal Reserve caved, and how Wall Street still owns the place.
In early November 2010, as the Federal Reserve began to weigh whether the nation's biggest financial firms were healthy enough to return money to their shareholders, a top regulator bluntly warned: Don't let them.
"We remain concerned over their ability to withstand stress in an uncertain economic environment," wrote Sheila Bair, the head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., in a previously unreported letter obtained by ProPublica.
The US and the New Middle East
In the first of a two-part series, Fault Lines examines how the Obama administration is reacting to the enormous changes taking place across the Middle East. The decision by the US to intervene in the Libyan conflict has a profound impact on the future of the country. But what are the driving forces behind America’s decision to get involved? White House officials claim that they acted to prevent a humanitarian disaster – but was such a disaster imminent and what were the other factors involved? Did the US intervene to stabilise Libyan oil production for the global markets? Did the White House decide to depose Muammar Gaddafi to send a message to others in the region? And how does this open up the US to accusations of double standards in its foreign policy? In the second part, Fault Lines travels to the Persian Gulf to look at US policy in the region, and to explore why the US has taken an interventionist policy in Libya, but not in Bahrain, where there has been a brutal crackdown on protesters. Why does the White House strongly back democracy in one Arab country, but not another?
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