Dinah Lord

India: England's Badminton team threatened by Muslim terror group L-e-T

... and are forced to withdraw from the World Championship. 

From the Daily Mail.

England has withdrawn from the World Badminton Championships in India after a Muslim terrorist threat was made against the competition.

The eight-strong squad, including Olympic silver medallist Nathan Robertson, has pulled out of the Hyderabad tournament, which starts tomorrow, following reports of a threat by extremist group Lashkar-e-Taiba.

Badminton England chief executive Adrian Christy said: 'This was an incredibly tough decision and one we didn't take lightly.

Bad News: Pakistan High court frees purported Mumbai Massacre mastermind.

India is unhappy with the decision.  Really?  Gee, you think they could have at least 'condemned' it or have been 'gravely concerned'.  Something.  This is a travesty and an insult to all who were killed or terrorized by these attacks.  To add insult to injury, the Indian government is making arrangements for the last surviving Mumbai terrorist to get a visit from his Pakistani Mum.  (I wonder how many Indian children wish they could have a visit from their parents but can't because the ir parents were killed by Kasab and his group of murderers.)

From The Asian Age.

"...a high court ordered the release of Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the founder of an outlawed militant group which was accused of organising an assault on the Indian city of Mumbai in November, his lawyer said.

New Delhi had earlier urged nuclear-armed rival Pakistan "dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism" after the Mumbai attacks killed 166 people and said it was "unhappy" with Saeed’s release.

It is also likely to dismay the United States which has been alarmed by deteriorating security in an ally whose help it needs to defeat Al Qaeda and subdue the Taliban in Afghanistan."

Update:  Speaking of the Mumbai massacre... 

Dubai resident funded Mumbai attacks?

Even as details regarding the financial transactions -- which financed the November 26 terror attacks -- emerge, another man who the police suspect could be associated with the financing has been put on the radar of investigating agencies.

Khameez Obaid, a resident of Dubai who was arrested by the Hyderabad Police for possessing fake currency worth Rs 2.36 crore, is said to be involved in financing the 26/11 attack in Mumbai.

Obaid was held by the Hyderabad Police on August 25, 2007 -- the same day the twin blasts rocked the city.

Obaid will be crucial to the Mumbai Police, who are trying to crack the network which financed the Mumbai terror attack. Sources told rediff.com that Obaid may be interrogated by the Mumbai Police regarding the financial links to the attack.

During interrogation, Obaid is believed to have revealed the names of several people involved in financing terror in India. The Hyderabad cops say it does not appear that Obaid was directly involved in any act of terror -- he confined his operations only to financing. 

Obaid had to be re-arrested immediately after his release since a link to the Mumbai attack was emerging. He is believed to be closely linked to Abdul Azeez, the man who funded the Mumbai attack. The Mumbai Police is likely to interrogate him regarding his links to Azeez, who has now been sentenced to life by an Oman court for planning terror strikes in that country.

During interrogation, Obaid revealed that he was part of a Bangladeshi group, which actively financed terror in India. A large chunk of the money, he had been sent across, was from Dubai where he was based prior to his visit to Hyderabad. He is said to have transferred crores of rupees through the sea route to Mumbai, which was later distributed to other parts of the country.

Apart from the Mumbai Police, cops from Bangalore, Delhi and Gujarat are also likely to seek his custody.

Pakistan: Probe into Mumbai Massacre completed...

...but don't expect them to provide any details of their findings.  (Evidently, they're taking 'transparency' tips from the Obama administration.)

From Dawn.com:

The FIA chief did not provide details of the investigations into the Mumbai terror strikes and attacks on Gen Musharraf and Marriott Hotel, but said these had been completed. He said Pakistan had arrested five suspects of the Mumbai attacks and they would be charge-sheeted by an anti-terrorism court in Rawalpindi on Tuesday.

P.S. They sure took their sweet time about it, didn't they?

Now you're talking, India: No PAK peace talks til Mumbai Plotters booked.

Finally!  India grows a pair.  Sort of.

From Dawn.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said Saturday the peace process with neighbouring Pakistan would remain on hold unless it prosecuted those behind last year’s attacks on Mumbai, AFP reports.

Pakistan and India began a slow-moving peace process in February 2004 but it came to a halt after New Delhi blamed the November attacks, in which 166 people were killed, on the Pakistan-based militant organisation Lashkar-i-Taiba.

New Delhi has said it has ‘overwhelming evidence’ that ‘official agencies’ in Pakistan were involved in plotting and carrying out the attacks, an apparent reference to such Pakistani institutions as its spy agency and army.

‘Our minimum demand is that Pakistan must take effective steps to bring the culprits of the Mumbai attack to book before we can resume the talks,’ Singh told reporters in the southern city of Chennai, where he was campaigning in India’s general elections.

India has in the past accused Pakistan of not doing enough to dismantle training camps and infrastructure on its soil allegedly used for launching attacks across their common border.

And that would be the truth.

Pakistan: Taliban raze Sikh homes because they refuse to pay the jizya

(I missed this earlier because I was so disgusted with the whole Pakistani mess I had to take a break from the action.  I'm back now.  And if I thought I was disgusted before?   Imagine if this happened in your neighborhood.  What would you do?)

The Taliban on Wednesday night demolished 11 houses of the Sikh community in the Orakzai Agency for refusing to pay ‘Jazia’.

The action was ordered by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan chief for Orakzai Agency, Hakeemullah Mehsud, after the deadline given to the Sikh community for payment of Jazia passed on Wednesday.

Earlier, the Sikh community had postponed its decision about vacating the area following the demand of the Tehrik-i-Taliban for payment of ‘Jazia’ being non-Muslims for their protection.

They gathered in the Merozai area to finalise their decision for leaving the area, but a dispute erupted over the issue among them and the meeting was postponed till Thursday.

The Taliban had asked the Sikh community living in the tribal area for centuries earlier this month to pay annual Jazia because ‘Sharia had been enforced in the area and every non-Muslim had to pay protection money’.

The Sikh community comprising 30 to 35 families shifted from the Feroze Khel area to the nearby Merozai in Lower Orakzai Agency because they could not arrange Rs150 million demanded by the Taliban.

The Taliban had forcibly occupied shops of two Sikh businessmen, Sewa Singh and Kalak Singh, and houses of several Sikhs to force them to pay Jazia. Later, the Sikh community refused to pay Jazia and decided to leave Orakzai and settle in some other area.

Most of tribal families belonging to a particular sect have also migrated to different parts of Hangu and Kohat due to the fear of Taliban.

India spoke out, issuing a demarche and the Pakistani government pretty much told them to go shi& in their turbans.

Hillary wakes up to Taliban Nuke threat. Or maybe not. She might just be doing Sec of State as drama queen.

Oh, this is a cluster fark of the first water right here.  Hillary sounds the alarm that the nukes might not be so safe after the US gives the Indian government 'high level assurances that the nukes are totally safe'.  Unh-huh.  Does anybody have a reset button handy?

From the Deccan Herald.

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton raised the ultimate scare this weekend saying the "unthinkable" could actually happen in Pakistan — that the Taliban and Al Qaeda could topple the government, giving them "the keys to the nuclear arsenal".

In an interview in Baghdad, she said the US would not "let this go on any further, which is why we're pushing so hard for the Pakistanis to come together around a strategy to take their country back".

Clinton's statement raised eyebrows in India, because it came just a few days after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh declared, at an election rally, that he had been "assured" that Pakistan's nuclear weapons were safe. Singh's announcement came as a response to BJP's concerns on the issue. He said, "We have been assured that Pakistan's nuclear weapons are in safe hands as of now. And I have no reason to disbelieve the assurance."

Although he did not name the source of his assurance, its clear that it would have to be the US at a very high level. The PM had recently met US President Barack Obama in London and officials said Pakistan was very much part of the discussions.

Besides, as Indian officials say, apart from Pakistan, the US is the only country that has close to intimate knowledge of Pakistan's nuclear weapons.

Indian officials say whenever India has asked the US about the security of Pakistan's N-arsenal, the US confidently reassures them that the weapons are "safe". In fact, Mike Mullen, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, had said not long ago that he was "reasonably confident that the nuclear weapons were secure". But on Saturday, Clinton said the danger was that the weapons were "dispersed" all over the country.

Mumbai Massacre: Another suspect arrested by Pakistan authorities

5 of 9 suspects now held in custody.

Pakistan's top civilian security official says authorities have arrested a fifth suspect in last year's deadly siege of Mumbai.  Interior Ministry chief Rehman Malik says Shahid Jamil Riaz was arrested in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi.

Mr. Riaz is alleged to have maintained financial accounts and helped plan the November attack, which killed 164 people in India's commercial capital.

Mr. Malik further said Monday that Pakistan needs more information from India to aid its investigation. He says five of nine suspects are in custody. He did not say when Mr. Riaz was picked up.

But in my view, they are still dragging their feet on the investigation.

Pakistan on Monday sought more specific information from India on its probe into the Mumbai attacks, saying the details provided earlier were not sufficient to carry forward its investigation.

A month after India gave replies to 30 questions posed by Islamabad on the Mumbai terror strikes, Pakistan Interior Ministry chief Rehman Malik told reporters here that New Delhi's response did not contain details related to SIM cards used by terrorists as well as the GPS coordinates.

He said Pakistan also wants copy of the full chargesheet filed against the lone surviving attacker, Ajmal Amir Kasab, and information on any Indian national involved in the Mumbai attacks.

Mumbai Massacre: Following the money trail.

More details are trickling out about the money men.

From AKI.

A Pakistani money transfer agent in the northern Italian city of Brescia has denied any involvement in the Mumbai terror attacks which killed 173 people last November. Mohammed Yaqub Janjua is the owner of the Madina Trading telephone centre and Western Union branch which was allegedly used by a collaborator linked to the attacks.  Yaqub was referring to Javed Iqbal, a 46 year-old Pakistani national, who was recently arrested in Pakistan for allegedly being one of the main conspirators behind the Mumbai attacks.

According to media reports, Iqbal, a resident of the Spanish city of Barcelona, is alleged to have travelled to Brescia and transferred 238 dollars to a US address in the state of New Jersey, in the name of Nizar al-Sharif.  From there it was allegedly used to buy five telephones, three of which were used in the Mumbai bombings.

According to a report in The Times of India, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation revealed that the handlers used VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) calling platforms registered in the US, as well as numbers with an Austrian prefix.  Reports also said the US number was used to route calls to terrorists in India.

The FBI said the US number was set up through a US telecom company called Callphonex, which facilitates Internet VOIP calls.  The account with Callphonex was allegedly set-up by a man called Kharak Singh, who claimed to be of Indian nationality. However, an individual named Mohammed Ashfaq is said to have activated the account after a moneygram was transferred under his name.  The payment was made from Yaqoub's agency in Brescia.

When questioned about his security standards at his money transfer agency and how it was possible that Iqbal sent the money using a fake passport, Yaqub told AKI that the Pakistani suspect fulfilled the requirements to send money through his agency.

"At least 30 people come and go every day to send money, this is not a question of security," Yaqub said. "I don't know how to tell the difference between a real or fake passport. I just saw a Pakistani passport, it was old because I know now they have new ones, and also, if the document is not valid, the system does not allow me to send the money."

However, he also told AKI that in order to send money, the only thing that was required was an official document such as an Italian identity card, permit of stay, or foreign passport, and an address in Italy, which Iqbal provided.  "The man gave me an original passport as far as I'm concerned and provided me with an address here in Brescia, Via Milano 125. If an Englishman came to send money, and he gave me his passport and address of the hotel where he was staying, then he too could send money," said Yaqub.

Yaqub, who has been running the agency for more than 10 years, said he would never have suspected that Iqbal was involved in the Mumbai bombings. He also told AKI that his business was routinely checked by Italy's finance police and they had never found any problems.  "There are so many Javid Iqbals in Pakistan and here in this country. If a person comes to send money, I only see this, but I don't know his intentions, especially when he only sent such a small amount (229 dollars), we don't ask him 'What will you do with the money?" he said.

Forget al Qaeda. Is L-e-T the next big threat to America?

Was the Mumbai Massacre just the warm-up act?

That's what some are now saying.

From DAWN.

American terrorism experts are now warning that the next major attack on the US soil may come from militants associated with Lashkar-e-Tayyaba and not al-Qaeda.
 
Juan Zarate, the deputy national security adviser for counterterrorism in the Bush administration, told the Chicago Tribune that even before the Mumbai terrorist attacks last November, the FBI and other US intelligence agencies were focusing on LeT as the next big threat to US security.
 
‘We are and should be concerned about the threat LeT poses, given its global network,’ said Zarate in an interview published on Sunday. ‘It doesn’t just reside in South Asia. It is an organization that has potential reach all over the world, including the US.’  The report claimed that the LeT threat had become one of the most crucial national security and diplomatic challenges for the Obama administration and Congress.
 
Bruce Riedel, chairman of the Obama administration's Pakistan-Afghanistan strategy review team, said he believed such a ‘global jihadist syndicate’ of disaffected young Pakistanis was the most likely mechanism for launching an attack on US soil.
 
Riedel said Mumbai was only the latest of several attacks by such militants on soft targets frequented by Americans, including hotels in Kabul and Islamabad.
 
FBI Director Robert Mueller also highlighted the concern in a recent speech, saying US authorities fear a Mumbai-style commando attack on the mainland and that such militants from ‘less well-known terrorist groups are merely an e-ticket away from the United States.’
 
FBI intelligence chief Donald Van Duyn recently told Congress that the bureau was investigating ‘a limited number’ of people in the US with suspected links to the Lashkar but that there was no evidence the group had an organized US presence.
 
The Tribune reported that Washington wants Pakistan not only to dismantle LeT but also other similar groups founded during the Afghan war or later to fight India in Kashmir.
 
Quoting US and allied intelligence, the report claimed that potentially tens of thousands of Pakistanis have been trained in Lashkar’s guerrilla camps in Pakistan, many of whom have gone on to work with Al Qaeda.
 
That includes a small number of US residents, some of whom are believed to have returned to the United States. Nearly a dozen Americans, including many members of the so-called Virginia jihad network, have been convicted in US courts for training at Lashkar camps and conspiring to provide material support to the group.
 
Yet, America’s main concern is the thousands of disaffected Westerners and Pakistanis in Britain and other countries in Europe who travel frequently to Pakistan, the report added. Citizens of these countries do not need a visa for coming to the United States.
 
The report claimed that an unknown number of those have trained in Lashkar camps and, after getting indoctrinated in its hatred of the West and returning home, they were free to travel to the United States with virtually no background check.
 
The report quoted US authorities as saying that the Lashkar is in many ways a bigger threat than Al Qaeda, whose leadership is on the run from numerous CIA airstrikes in the Pakistani tribal areas. 

Meanwhile the L-e-T is denying it had anything to do with the Sri Lanka cricket team attack.  Could there be a global jihadist syndicate?  Well, Pakistan is now looking into two other militant Islamic group as possible suspects in the Sri Lanka cricket team ambush, LeJ (Lashkar e Jhangvi) and JeM (Jaish e Mohammed)

While we're speaking about LeT and terror attacks, I found this statement about the evidence linking the Mumbai attacks to LeT and the Pakistani government disturbing.

When international pressure mounted on Pakistan after the terrorist attack on India's Parliament in December 2001 and the finger of blame was pointed to the LeT, the Pakistani security establishment told Western nations, including the US and Britain, that it would keep a tight check on the group as it could not be wound up, diplomatic sources said.

"The Western powers were told that the LeT had an extensive network within Pakistan and any effort to root it out could lead to massive security problems within the country. Thus it would not be possible to wind up the group," a diplomatic source, who was aware of details of the assurance given by Pakistan's security set-up to countries like Britain said.

"The Western countries were told that the security establishment would instead establish a cordon sanitaire around LeT camps. So even if people were still training within these camps, they would not be able to move about freely to carry out attacks anywhere," the source said.

Update:  Want to learn more about the LeT menace in our midst?  Thanks to my twin, Janice over at You Heard it Here... for this quality linkage providing more background and color on this bunch.

Jihadi training camps in the United States.

Islamberg NY:  Jihadi training camp and much, much more.

Ladies Night in Islam

In honor of International Women's Day let's see what Ladie's Night is like in Islam.  Just for fun.

Girls study computer technology in Swat.  ->

Pakistan:  "Terrified, locked up at home and courting death if they go out alone, women oppressed by extremists in Swat have nothing to celebrate on International Women's Day. Nearly 100 years after the annual day was created to mark the struggle for equal rights for half the world’s population, most women in Swat look blank and go silent when asked about gender rights and discrimination.

They’re too frightened to speak in public. They can only leave the confines of their homes accompanied by a male relative, their bodies hidden in veils.

‘How can I tell you my name, are you crazy? I was told not to give my name to anyone because the Taliban could hurt me,’ one girl in the ninth grade told AFP by telephone from the former ski resort.The girl’s dreams of becoming a doctor are over. She worries the Taliban will stop her finishing school, regardless of her parents’ support."

India J&K -  "All-female paramilitary police units are to be deployed in Kashmir during the Indian general elections next month to prevent female Islamist vigilantes from intimidating women voters who refuse to wear the veil.

The move aims to counter the Dukhtaran-e-Millat (DeM), (editor's note:  'Millat' means Islamic Nation and is equivalent to Third Reich) an all-woman Muslim group that is opposed to Indian rule – and to women wearing Western-style clothes.."  In this pic DeM members protest French hijab laws - in India.

The Khyber region of Pakistan:  Omar Farooq, the commander of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan in Khyber Agency, warned the National Database and Registration Authority that its offices would be attacked if it issued identity cards to women. Farooq told reporters on phone from an unknown location that making identity cards for women went against Islamic rules. The Taliban will not allow women to obtain these cards, he said. He also warned women that they would have to face the consequences if they went to NADRA offices to get themselves registered for the identity cards.

Chechnya:  President pays cash for all babies born on March 8. MALE BABIES, that is. (editor's note: Ironic, isn't it that March 8th is also International Women's Day?)Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov on Tuesday promised a cash payout of 50,000 rubles ($1,400) to the families of all boys born in Chechnya on March 8, the birthday of the Muslim prophet Mohammed. "I will ask parents to name these boys after Mohammed," Kadyrov said, Itar-Tass reported...Kadyrov advocates polygamy for Chechens, although it is forbidden under Russian law, and last month he issued a decree limiting alcohol sales in Chechnya to only two hours every day."

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Happy International Women's Day...