A brief world news roundup for 20 October 2009.

United States & the Americas

• DoD Buzz – The Senate wants to build an unproven but technologically attractive reconnaissance spy satellite said to be relatively cheap. The House wants to build a technologically proven but more expensive spy satellite.
• FBI – Stewart David Nozette, of Chevy Chase, Maryland, was arrested on charges of attempted espionage for knowingly and willfully attempting to communicate, deliver, and transmit classified information relating to the national defense of the United States to an individual that Nozette believed to be an Israeli intelligence officer.
• Al Jazeera – A US-based billionaire’s arrest in the largest US hedge fund insider trading case has prompted new scrutiny in Sri Lanka over the possibility his money found its way to Tamil separatists.
• McClatchy – The case involving Hosam “Sam” Smadi and the government’s claim that he wanted to blow up a Dallas skyscraper is the latest in a long line of terrorism cases with ties to North Texas.
• America.gov – Vice President Biden will travel to Poland, Romania and the Czech Republic to discuss a range of issues at a critical time for East European nations that are transitioning from local agendas to a broader global security environment, Biden’s senior national security adviser says
• Payvand – Venezuela’s president has said that countries including Venezuela, Russia and Iran have proposed the US dollar should be replaced as the currency used for oil trade
• Venezuela – The President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, on behalf of the Venezuelan people and government, condemns in the strongest terms the attack against a meeting of community leaders and a group of officials from the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps in the province of Sistan – Baluchistan,
• ISNA – Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will pay a visit to Brazil in November. Brazilian charge d’affaires in Tehran told ISNA that the trip will probably take place on 23 November for two days if Iran’s cabinet approves the date suggested in Brazil’s invitation. This will be the first time after Iran’s Islamic Revolution that the Iranian President travels to Brazil.
• COHA – Rehabilitating Mexico’s Drug War; The fundamental miscalculations of the long and inconclusive drug war in Mexico have come under scrutiny in recent months as widespread violence repeatedly disturbs local communities and dominates international headlines.
• LAHT – Government troops killed 16 leftist FARC rebels in a month-long series of clashes in southwestern Colombia, while 40 guerrillas were captured Monday in the northern part of the country.

Russia, Caucasus & Central Asia

• Russia Today – Ahead of President Medvedev’s signing of key agreements with Serbia this week, Turkey has OK’d the start of South Stream feasibility studies, with key players looking at a construction start late next year
• Kremlin – Dmitry Medvedev sent his condolences to President of the Islamic Republic of Iran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad following a series of terrorist attacks.
• Times Online – Mikhail Gorbachev condemned elections in Russia as a “mockery” of democracy yesterday and accused the Kremlin of ballot rigging. The last leader of the Soviet Union called for a grassroots campaign to restore democracy, saying that people had lost faith in elections.
• Caucasian Knot – On initiative of Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, measures are undertaken in the territory of the republic, aimed at finding hijacked cars and those with excessive glass tinting, as the “Interfax” reports. As stated by Ruslan Alkhanov, Minister of Internal Affairs of Chechnya, such cars are used by criminals for moving in the territory of the republic.
• Today’s Zaman – While hailing the current course of affairs in bilateral relations between Kazakhstan and Turkey, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev has expressed his country’s willingness to supply oil to a pipeline transporting Caspian crude oil to Western markets through Turkey’s Mediterranean port of Ceyhan.
• New Europe – On the heels of US Special Envoy for Eurasian Energy Richard Morningstar’s visit to Astana, another high-ranking American official, US Deputy Secretary of Energy Daniel Poneman, arrived in Kazakhstan, in a move that shows the emphasis the administration of US President Barack Obama is placing on the former Soviet republic’s rich energy resources but also on nuclear and renewable energy. Poneman and Kazakh Energy Minister Sauat Mynbayev signed a joint action plan on energy partnership
• RIA Novosti – A local leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan in Tajikistan has been sentenced to life in prison, a spokesman for Tajik prosecutors said on Monday. Anvar Kaumov and his five accomplices were charged with the murders of at least nine border guards and police officers. The spokesman said the trial finished late last wek.

Middle East

• MNF Iraq – Iraqi Security Forces arrested five suspected terrorists today during three security operations conducted in northern Iraq. Near Bahiyah, located approximately 103 km northeast of Baghdad, Iraqi Police, with U.S. advisors, arrested one individual during a security operation targeting a suspected terrorist closely tied to key members of al-Qaeda in Iraq and the Islamic State of Iraq
• Voices of Iraq – Iraqi forces arrested during the early hours of Monday two men wanted on “terrorist” charges, one of them suspected of involvement with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard forces, a source from the Multi-National Force (MNF) information office said. “Iraqi security forces detained a wanted man in central Basra. The man, a suspected member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, carries arms and munitions from a neighboring country into Iraq with the aim of backing the militias and armed groups,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.
• Long War Journal – Iraqi security forces have detained four Iranian operatives since the beginning of October… Two other Hezbollah Brigades operatives have been captured in Baghdad this month. On Oct. 3, Iraqi troops arrested a man thought to be affiliated with the Hezbollah Brigades during a raid in Baghdad. Another Hezbollah Brigades operative was detained on Oct. 12, also in Baghdad.
• Al Sumaria – At least five people were killed and 16 others wounded in a car bomb explosion targeting a popular coffee house in Al Aazamiya District on Sunday night. A bomb planted in a car in Al Karrada, central Baghdad, killed one person and wounded three others. A sniper shot a policeman on duty at a checkpoint in Al Zaafaraniya, southern Baghdad. A bomb exploded in the same neighborhood wounding two people. In Al Qarya Al Asriya village, southern Baghdad, a bomb explosion in a bus parking lot killed a person and wounded nine others.
• Matthew Levitt – Foreign Fighters and Their Economic Impact: A Case Study of Syria and al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI)
• ISNA – Iran’s ambassador to Baghdad denied allegations that Iran has kept a great amount of Iraq’s national archives of historic documents. Iraq’s National Archives director, Saad Iskander, claimed Iran and Syria have stolen Iraq’s missing part of national achieves including maps, documents, agreements on oil, borders and rivers after US 2003 invasion against the country by buying them from smugglers or gathering them from political factions.
• Haaretz – Sultan Abu al-Ghneim, who represents Fatah in the refugee camps of Lebanon, gave a speech last week at a Ramallah rally and called on Fatah to resume suicide bombings against Israel, according to the report in the London-based Al-Quds al-Arabi. But how reliable the report is remains unclear
• Al Manar – In a statement it released at pre-dawn, Hezbollah hailed the “major accomplishment” achieved by the Islamic Resistance when its members “uncovered and thwarted an Israeli enemy aggression,” a reference to three Israeli spy devices that have been blown up in south Lebanon over the weekend.
• ynet – Intelligence agencies warn against terror attacks planned by Hezbollah against Israeli and American targets in Turkey, according to a report published on the Turkish news website “Haberturk”.
• EurasiaNet – The once-vital relationship between Turkey and Israel is going through a distinctly frosty period. The chill began after the invasion of Gaza earlier this year, which Ankara criticized harshly. But now ties between the two Middle East allies are diving further and some experts are now wondering if the relationship is coming to end.
• ISN – Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said that his decision to bar Israel from taking part in NATO military exercises last week was based on “diplomatic sensitivities” and public opinion in his country, Ron Synovitz writes for RFE/RL
• Mehr – Iranian Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi has praised Turkey’s decision to exclude Israel from the Anatolian Eagle joint military exercise, which was scheduled to be held last week.
• GlobalPost – The politics behind Lebanon’s big hash bust; There’s more to the recent clean out of drug gangs and the destruction of their hash crop in the lawless Bekaa Valley than meets the eye.
• SANA – President al-Assad Condemns Terrorist Attack in Iran, Offers Condolences over Victims
• NOW Lebanon – Yemen’s president says Iranians funding Shiite rebels
• Saba – An official Yemeni military source has said that about 30 insurgents were killed and others injured as they were trying to infiltrate to army posts in Razih region Saturday last night, the state-run al-Motamar.net has reported. The source also said eight other insurgents have been killed as they were trying to infiltrate to farms nearby the main road of Saada province and farms nearby al-Kamp and al-Maqash regions.

Iran

• Press TV – The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has vowed to give a severe response to the Pishin attack that killed 42 people, including commanders and tribal figures.
• Chatham House – Iran’s hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, the Pasdaran, are sheltering substantial parts of the country’s nuclear project and closely control its missile programme. The election turmoil in June demonstrated the Guards’ unprecedented influence in the political arena. Now western diplomats and experts as well as politicians in Iran are observing the continuing rise of the Guards with growing concern. But the power of the Pasdaran might soon face its limits.
• Michael Ledeen – The bombing was a very big deal.  It was indeed a suicide bombing, the man’s name was Abdul Rahed Mohammadi Sarabani, who was associated with the military wing of Jundullah, headed by Abdulmalik Khan Rigi.  The IRGC had killed two of his brothers, and this was an act of vengeance, carried out to inflict maximum damage on the RGs.  The target was a large theater, which holds up to two thousand people.  It is part of a large military complex, one of the most important in the country.
• Mehr – Expediency Council Chairman Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said the spread of terrorism in the region is due to the presence of foreign forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
• Payvand – Iranian Offshore Oil Company has finalized technical and financial details with a European company for the development of Lavan gas field in southern Iran. SHANA news agency quoted IOOC Managing Director Mahmoud Zirakchianzadeh as saying on Sunday that an Iranian delegation will travel to Europe next month to conclude a contract with the European firm. The name of the European company has not been revealed.
• Fariborz Ghadar, CSIS – Q1: Does Iran desire and is it on the verge of developing a nuclear weapons capability?
• Press TV – As nuclear discussions are set to open in Vienna, Tehran says it will continue its work to enrich uranium to the 20 percent required for its research reactor should talks fail.
• Fars – Qatari finance minister on Monday hailed his country’s positive ties with the Islamic Republic of Iran, and underlined Doha’s willingness to further expand relations with Tehran.

South Asia

• CSM – Afghanistan’s troubled presidential election may be headed for a run-off after an international commission invalidated more than a million fraudulent votes Monday. The final results have yet to be certified by the country’s Independent Election Commission (IEC). However, binding decisions by the United Nations-backed Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) left no single candidate with a majority, triggering a second round between the two candidates.
• Times of India – The Taliban in Afghanistan are running a sophisticated financial network to pay for their insurgent operations, raising hundreds of millions of dollars from the illicit drug trade, kidnappings, extortion and foreign donations that American officials say they are struggling to cut off.
• MEMRI – Report on Taliban Operations in Kunar Province, Afghanistan – Including Interview with Taliban Field Commander and Head of Taliban Courts in Wardak
• AFPS – Afghan and international security forces killed multiple militants and detained several suspects in operations in Afghanistan over the past four days, military officials reported
• Pentagon – The Department of Defense announced today the death of four soldiers who were supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.  They died Oct. 15 in Kandahar province, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their vehicle with an improvised explosive device
• UK MoD – British troops are working with a variety of coalition partners in Helmand province, including Australian Gunners, who over the summer have been supporting 19 Light Brigade in the Upper Gereshk Valley.
• Australia DoD – Taliban extremists operating against Australian and coalition forces continue to suffer significant setbacks with the discovery and destruction of two weapon caches by Australian soldiers in Oruzgan province.
• Dawn – According to an ISPR statement here on Monday, in the last 24 hours, reportedly 18 terrorists have been killed while two soldiers were martyred and 12 sustained injuries during security forces’ operation in South Waziristan. On Jandola Sararogha Axis, security forces have made an envelopment maneuver around the town of Kotkai.
• Geo – At least 24 militants were killed in separate operations carried out in Bajaur, Mohmand and Upper Orakzai agencies on Monday, Geo news reported. Six militants were killed and three injured in clashed between security forces and militants in tehsil Salarzai of Bajaur Agency meanwhile heavy amount of suspected armaments were also seized during security forces’ search operations in Khar tehsil, sources said
• Geo – Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan”s Karachi Chief Akhtar Zaman was arrested along with three accomplices Samiullah, Fazal Karim and Munnawar Khan from Sohrab Goth area of Karachi; said CCPO Wasim Ahmed. Police arrested more then 80 suspects during search operation in Westridge area of Rawalpindi
• The News – Statements of key witnesses in the 26/11 case in an anti-terror court in Mumbai will be forwarded by India to Pakistan to be used as evidence in the trial there, special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam said here on Sunday. The court has allowed the prosecution’s plea for certified copies of the statements and within a day or two they will be forwarded to Pakistan through diplomatic channels, Nikam told the Press Trust of India (PTI).
• Times of India – Besides issuing separate visas to Indian passport holders from Jammu and Kashmir, China is also projecting the disputed territory as an independent country in other ways. Visitors to Tibet, especially journalists invited by the Chinese government, are given handouts where Kashmir is indicated as a country separate from India.
• Irrawaddy – India has deployed more troops on its Assam border with Burma to counter illegal drug and arms trading by insurgent groups, according to sources in the region. The deployment follows a three-day visit to the Burmese capital, Naypyidaw, last week by Indian Army Chief General Deepak Kapoor, during which he discussed counter-insurgency and border ethnic issues with junta leaders.

Far East & Pacific

• Bangkok Post – Police suspect a militant group led by Usman Dorkhor was responsible for a bomb attack yesterday on a fresh market which injured 25 people. The group was accused recently of killing five rangers and was also suspected of being involved in several bomb attacks in the past, the source said.
• Asia Times – As China deepens its ties with Southeast Asia, Cambodia has become a major beneficiary of its loans, aid and investment largesse. Some fear the lack of human rights and good governance strings attached to such bilateral deals have adverse effects on society, while others see Beijing as offering Phnom Penh a vital financial lifeline.
• Xinhua – Xu Caihou, vice chairman of China’s Central Military Commission, will visit the United State from Oct. 24 to Nov. 3 at the invitation of U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, according to the Ministry of National Defense.
• China Daily – Trade between China and Russia in the first three quarters topped $28.04 billion, down 34.9 percent from the same period last year, said a report from the General Administration of Customs of China Monday.
• The Australian – Former AWB managing director Andrew Lindberg deliberately or negligently ignored the danger signs and failed to stop the flow of $300 million in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein’s regime on the eve of the war with Iraq, the corporate watchdog has claimed in its first civil case against a wheat board executive over the kickbacks scandal.
• Straits Times – Suspected Muslim extremists abducted a school principal on the southern Philippine island of Jolo, scene of the recent killing of two US soldiers, a military spokesman said on Tuesday.

Europe

• RIA Novosti – Russia guarantees uninterrupted natural gas supplies to Europe, and will solve gas transit problems taking into account the interests of all parties, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday.
• Times Online – Eta, the Basque separatist organisation, was dealt another serious blow today with the arrest of the armed group’s political chief in France. Aitor Elizaran Aguilar was detained in Carnac, in the northwest of the country, in a joint operation between French police and Spanish anti-terrorist officers.
• Islam in Europe – The Norwegian court administration is considering a ban on all religious and political clothing for court officials, following the debate on hijab in the police.
• AKI – Italy’s interior minister Roberto Maroni from the anti-immigrant Northern League party said he would not back a proposal to teach Islam in Italian schools to improve integration. “The Northern League is absolutely against the proposal of an hour of Islamic religion in Italian schools,” Maroni told the commericial TV programme Mattino 5.
• UPI – A delegation from Russian energy giant Gazprom met with French officials to discuss cooperation in the energy sector, mainly the South Stream gas pipeline.
• UK Foreign Office – The British Government condemns the terrorist attack in the Province of Sistan and Baluchistan in Iran and the sad loss of life which it caused.  Terrorism is abhorrent wherever it occurs. Our sympathies go to those who have been killed or injured in the attack and their families.
• Switzerland Foreign Ministry – The Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA) condemns the suicide attack that took place yesterday in the Sistan and Baluchestan Province of Iran. The FDFA deplores the loss of human lives and presents its condolences to the members of the victims’ families. The FDFA launches an appeal for differences of opinion to be resolved by means of dialogue and not by violence.

U.S. Navy personnel and equipment from Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 3, stationed in Rota, Spain, come ashore in Monrovia, Liberia, Oct. 17. U.S. Navy personnel and equipment were transported to shore by amphibious landing craft attached to the Dutch Africa Partnership Station platform HNLMS Johan de Witt (L 801). The Seabees are in Liberia to rebuild the Liberian Coast Guard base that was destroyed by factional groups in the country's 2005 civil war (photo from U.S. Naval Forces Europe, 6th Fleet Public Affairs)

Africa

• Garowe – Somali Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed “Jengeli” has condemned Eritrea for fanning the flames of war in Somalia, Radio Garowe reports.
• Shabelle – the Islamist fighters of Jubba regions under the control of Harakat Al-shabab Mujahideen in Kismayu town have shot and fallen unknown spy plane revolving over the town 500 kilometers south of the Somali capital Mogadishu, witnesses and officials said on Monday
• Al Arabiya – Hardline al-Shabaab rebels have destroyed a mosque and the grave of a revered Sufi Muslim sheikh in central Somalia after shooting in the air to drive away local protesters, residents said on Monday.
• State Dept – Background Briefing on Sudan
• Enough Project – U.S. Sudan Policy -The Fierce Urgency of Implementation
• Sudan Tribune – The second largest Northern opposition party in Sudan blasted an agreement made this week that paves the way for conducting the 2011 referendum in South Sudan
• Magharebia – An al-Qaeda terrorist sought since 1995 died October 7th while attempting to flee Algerian security forces in El Bayadh, El Khabar and other local media outlets reported on Sunday (October 18th). Trained engineer Mourad Louzaï, 43, aka Nouh Abou Qotada El Salafi, joined the former GSPC in 1994. In 2009, after being named head of Algeria internal communications for al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, he became responsible for co-ordinating contact between local fighters and zone commanders, sources said.
• Daily Star – Libya is planning to buy more than 20 Russian fighter jets in $1 billion arms deal with Moscow, the Interfax news agency reported on Monday, citing a military-diplomatic source. “Libya is planning to buy 12 to 15 Su-35 multipurpose fighters, four Su-30s and six Yak-130 combat training planes from Russia,” the unidentified source was quoted as saying.
• UN – Night-time attacks on civilians and rape by armed men remain widespread in a strife-torn region of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) where nearly 5,400 cases of rape were reported in the first six months of the year, United Nations officials said today.
• BBC – Nigerian officials are reportedly planning to give 10% of the country’s oil revenues to people in the Niger Delta, an area plagued by insurgencies. Presidential adviser Emmanuel Egbogah told the UK’s Financial Times that the money would go directly to communities, bypassing powerful state governors.
• AFRICOM – The partnership exercise named Natural Fire 10, a multinational military exercise involving five East African partner states — plus partners from the U.S. military — began October 16, 2009 in northern Uganda.

Members of the U.S. and Indonesian navies and Marine Corps participate in a welcoming ceremony on Marine Camp Baluran Training Center, Malaysia, prior to the start of a multinational training exercise, Oct. 17, 2009. (photo by Cpl. Shawn M. Spitler)

The Global War

• Peter Bergen, TNR – How the Taliban and Al Qaeda Are Merging  – And Why We Should Be Very Worried
• Charles Krauthammer – Among these crosscurrents, my thesis is simple: The question of whether America is in decline cannot be answered yes or no. There is no yes or no. Both answers are wrong, because the assumption that somehow there exists some predetermined inevitable trajectory, the result of uncontrollable external forces, is wrong. Nothing is inevitable. Nothing is written. For America today, decline is not a condition. Decline is a choice.
• Business Standard – Indo-US military collaboration has taken a big step this month, with the launch today of Exercise ‘Cope India-09’, a five-day joint exercise between the Indian Air Force (IAF) and the United States Air Force (USAF) at the Air Force Station, Agra, even as an even bigger exercise between the two countries’ armies, ‘Yudh Abyas 2009’ rolls on at Babina, Madhya Pradesh, in a 17-day programme which concludes October 29.
• Air Force – U-2 aircraft No. 068-0337 was accepted by Air Force officials in 1968, and exceeded the 25,000th hour of flight Oct. 18, 2009, in a mission out of Southwest Asia
• US Navy – The George Washington Carrier Strike Group (GW CSG) completed a bilateral exercise with the Republic of Korea (ROK) Oct. 16.
• UN – The Secretary-General strongly condemns yesterday’s terrorist attacks in the Sistan-Baluchistan province of Iran, which resulted in the death of a large number of people and many injured.  He extends his condolences to the families of the victims and to the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and wishes those injured a full recovery

Sights & Sounds

Robert Wright and Ann Marlowe: The Afghanistan Fog; Ann’s disagreement with Gen. McChrystal… Bob: How bad would “losing” Afghanistan really be?… How America helped screw up Afghanistan… Can the US overhaul Afghan society?… Concrete steps to improve the lives of Afghans… Has even small-scale counterinsurgency worked in Afghanistan?

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BBC – In Programme Two, we find out what were spies really up to behind the Iron Curtain. MI6 chief John Scarlett describes his clandestine meeting with an agent, and the Russian defector Oleg Gordievsky talks about his reasons for coming over to the other side.

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