Afghan government forces have been pursuing Taleban fighters in the south after a major battle. The clashes in Kandahar province on Friday were some of the most serious in a recent upsurge of fighting. The governor of Kandahar said seven police were killed and the bodies of 13 Taleban had been found - but that there were reports of up to 41 Taleban dead. On Saturday further shots were fired as police and army units searched for other insurgents. Correspondents say it is the first time in a long while that so many Taleban have clashed with police and the national army in the restive province of Kandahar. Previous violence has consisted of suicide attacks and roadside bombs, says the BBC's Alistair Leithead in Kandahar. ... http://news.bbc.co.uk censor News |
Editor - 09:02:00 04-15-06 |
DEFINING A CONFLICT On the ground, it's a civil war |
The conflict in Iraq is not marked by front lines or raging battles between warring Iraqi factions. There is no Green Line separating sectarian militias, as in Beirut in the 1970s and 1980s, nor are there clearly defined armies and commanders. But by any measure, Iraqis will tell you that their country is embroiled in what amounts to civil war.Since the Feb. 22 bombing of the al-Askari mosque, a Shiite shrine in the city of Samarra, waves of suicide bombers have struck other Shiite targets, killing hundreds of civilians. They have been followed by reprisals in the forms of assassinations and kidnappings, with hundreds of Sunni Muslims bound, gagged and shot in the head across Baghdad and surrounding towns."We are losing each day, as an average, 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more," former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi told the British Broadcasting Corp. last month. "If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is."... http://fairuse.100webcustomers.com/fairenough/trib02.html
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Editor - 00:21:00 04-15-06 |
ISP snooping gaining support. |
The explosive idea of forcing Internet providers to record their customers' online activities for future police access is gaining ground in state capitols and in Washington, D.C. Top Bush administration officials have endorsed the concept, and some members of the U.S. Congress have said federal legislation is needed to aid law enforcement investigations into child pornography. A bill is already pending in the Colorado State Senate. Mandatory data retention requirements worry privacy advocates because they permit police to obtain records of e-mail chatter, Web browsing or chat-room activity that normally would have been discarded after a few months. And some proposals would require providers to retain data that ordinarily never would have been kept at all. CNET News.com was the first to report last June that the U.S. Department of Justice was quietly shopping around the idea of legally required data retention. If it walks and quacks like a Police State, is it just a Duck?... http://news.com.com/ISP+snooping+gaining+support/2100-1028_3-6061187.html
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Editor - 18:03:00 04-14-06 |
CIA failed to warn of Indian N-tests, and how? |
US intelligence failed to warn of India's nuclear tests conducted in 1974 & 1998 despite tracking the Asian giant's atomic weapons potential for nearly half a century, according to documents declassified on Thursday. The Indian nuclear activities scrutinized by the US intelligence agents are at the core of a current controversy over Bush administration's landmark civilian nuclear deal with New Delhi. The National Security Archive, in releasing 40 secret documents covering the 1958-1998 period, said the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) & other intelligence groups had been monitoring and analysing Indian civilian & military nuclear energy programs since the 1950s & could have provided decision-makers with ‘far more detailed assessments.’ Now don’t harp on the CIA and its historic massive screw-ups, it’s not a total flop. They also insisted Iraq had Mobile Biological Weapons Trailers even after they had possession of them, they were at least partly right, Iraq had Trailers. ... http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?NewsID=1024110
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Editor - 16:34:00 04-14-06 |
Chernobyl Is Troubling Visit 20 Years After Catastrophic Explosion Spewed Radiation Across Europe |
The visit to the Chernobyl power plant begins as a bit of a letdown. I had expected the 30-mile-radius contaminated zone around the plant to be strewn with shriveled tree trunks and rotting cottages and empty of life. But after camouflaged guards check our passports and motion our van through the barrier at the edge of the zone, there is oncoming traffic. In the town of Chernobyl, 11 miles from the plant, laundry hangs on balconies, people chat with each other on the street and a small store has well-stocked shelves: bananas, vodka, pasta sauce. About 4,000 people live in Chernobyl but only for two weeks at a time. They are workers brought in for short rotations to keep watch on the contaminated zone around the reactor and carry out decontamination work. ... http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1843986
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Editor - 15:42:00 04-14-06 |
Tornadoes Rip Through University, Iowa, Illinois, Killing 1 |
Tornadoes tore across the University of Iowa campus, ripped walls off a downtown church and killed a woman in a mobile home outside of town. The National Weather Service said five tornados touched down in Johnson County on Thursday night, the most destructive carving a 3 1/2-mile path of damage through downtown and the university. High winds, hail and at least one tornado hit Illinois as well. "There was debris flying everywhere inside the house," said Melissa Fortman, an Iowa sophomore who huddled with friends in the basement of the Alpha Chi Omega house as the sirens sounded. She then decided to run upstairs for her homework just as the tornado hit. "I couldn't go down stairs because there was debris and glass flying up the stairs, so I just hid in a telephone booth we have in our house and I just hid there crying," she told ABC's "Good Morning America." ... http://abcnews.go.com/US/Weather/wireStory?id=1843925&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312
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Editor - 15:40:00 04-14-06 |
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