Negative Blogs

How many cease-fires can you announce and break before everyone stops paying attention?

Spaniards inured to cease-fire announcements by the violent Basque separatist group ETA were mulling whether the latest one holds anything different or will fail like the others to end Europe’s last major armed militancy.

The government on Monday swiftly ruled out holding negotiations on a Basque homeland and rejected Sunday’s truce as a desperate gambit by an extremist group staggering after the arrests of its leaders.

Spain claimed the cease-fire was just another gambit by ETA in order to buy time, regroup and rearm. And a major newspaper, El Mundo, ran a cartoon Monday of a hooded ETA gunman in a traditional Basque beret offering an olive branch — albeit one that stuck out of a gun barrel.

Since launching its campaign for an independent Basque homeland in the late 1960s and killing more than 825 people in the process, ETA has announced 11 cease-fires, the last of them in 2006, which it called permanent.

Promising peace talks with the government ensued but quickly went nowhere, and nine months later ETA reverted to violence with a massive car bomb that killed two Ecuadorean immigrants in a parking garage at Madrid’s Barajas Airport.

This time, inside, not outside, forces appear to have prompted three masked ETA members to declare a cease-fire Sunday in front of a ETA sign with a snake slithering around an ax. While ETA historically has called the shots, the pressure for a new halt to violence seems to have come from the group’s own political supporters.

Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said Monday that when ETA shocked Spain by abruptly ending the 2006 cease-fire, “many people in the Basque nationalist movement woke up and said, ‘With this ETA we are not going to get anywhere.’”

Those divisions have been growing as ETA’s banned political wing, Batasuna, apparently came to the conclusion that bombs and bullets were doing nothing to achieve the goal of Basque independence.

ETA’s last deadly attack was a July 2009 car bomb that killed two policemen on the island of Mallorca. But Spain has no tolerance for terrorism now after Islamic militants killed 191 people in a 2004 train bombing in Madrid.

By Daniel Woolls

In this video grab provided by the Basque militant separatist group ETA to the newspaper website Gara.net on Sunday, Sept. 5, 2010, three masked ETA members declare a cease-fire in their efforts to establish an independent Basque homeland in northern Spain and southwestern France.

Two Russian pilots were abducted on Sunday in the city of Nyala in Sudan’s South Darfur province, the country’s SUNA news agency reported on Monday.

Both pilots were employees of the Khartoum-based Badr Airlines, the agency said without giving further details. The airliner provides cargo and passenger air services for various international aid programs.

The civil war that broke out in the western region of Darfur in early 2003 has claimed the lives of more than 300,000, according to United Nations estimates, and forced 2.7 million people from their homes. Sudan puts the number of dead at 10,000.

Abductions of foreigners, including aid workers and peacekeepers, have been on the rise in the war-torn region in the past months. In most cases, foreign nationals are being abducted for ransom.

In the most recent similar incident, a Mi-8 helicopter of the Russian aviation company UTAir was seized by an armed tribal group in late July. The helicopter, with a crew of four Russians, later returned to its base in Nyala.

Darfur Independence Front/Darfur Independence Army (DIF/DIA) militants

The French Foreign Ministry has said the deployment of Russian S-300 air defense systems in the former Georgian republic of Abkhazia undermines stability in the region.

Russian Air Force head Col. Gen. Alexander Zelin said on Wednesday S-300 systems had been placed in Abkhazia to protect the airspace of Abkhazia and the other former Georgian republic of South Ossetia. He did not say how many S-300s had been deployed.

“We are concerned about [Russia's] announcement about the deployment of air defense systems in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. It [deployment] harms stability in the region,” a spokeswoman for the French Foreign Ministry told a news conference in Paris.

France acted as an intermediary in the settlement of a five-day conflict between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia in August 2008.

Russia recognized Abkhazia and South Ossetia two days after the conflict, which began when Georgian forces attacked South Ossetia in an attempt to bring it back under central control.

Russia signed agreements with South Ossetia and Abkhazia earlier this year on establishing permanent military bases in the republics.

The bases are located in Gudauta, on Abkhazia’s Black Sea coast, and in South Ossetia’s capital, Tskhinvali. Each base hosts up to 1,700 servicemen, T-62 tanks, light armored vehicles, air defense systems and a variety of aircraft.

On Wednesday, the Georgian Foreign Ministry described the Russian move as “extremely dangerous and provocative,” saying it threatened “not only the Black Sea region, but European security as a whole.”

Washington later downplayed the Russian move by saying that the move was not a new development as Moscow had been deploying S-300 missiles in Abkhazia for the past two years.

By RIA Novosti

Russian S-300 air defense system

In a move that is antagonizing North Korea and irking China, South Korea commenced a major naval exercise in the Yellow Sea Thursday, the largest since 46 South Korean sailors died in March in the sinking of a warship.

The five-day exercise involves some 4,500 personnel and all four branches of the military, according to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency.

Seoul, which oversaw an international investigation into the March sinking of the Cheonan, claims a North Korean submarine sank the corvette and is demanding an apology. A multinational investigation also found North Korea responsible. Pyongyang has vehemently denied the accusation.

Prior to the Cheonan’s sinking, the South Korean navy had largely discounted the threat of submarines in the Yellow Sea, due to the shallow waters in the area.

North Korea said via state media that it would undertake “strong physical retaliation” and warned fishermen to stay clear of the Northern Limit Line, the disputed maritime border between the Koreas.

The drills amount to an “undisguised military intrusion,” Pyongyang has said.

“The army and people of the DPRK are closely watching every move of [South Korean President] Lee Myung-bak’s group of traitors. And if the puppet warmongers dare ignite a war, they will mercilessly destroy the provokers and their stronghold by mobilizing most powerful war tactics and offensive means beyond imagination,” the Secretariat of the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea said, according to North Korea’s state-run news agency KCNA.

“Raising issue with the legitimate, defensive exercise is a provocation in itself,” South Korean Rear Adm. Kim Kyung-sik retorted Wednesday, speaking to local reporters.

Meanwhile, China, which has refused to condemn North Korea over the alleged torpedo attack and which remains Pyongyang’s closest strategic ally, is reportedly carrying out air defense drills on its Yellow Sea coast across from the Korean peninsula.

Given North Korea’s decrepit military, experts say the chances of a naval attack on well-prepared South Korean forces are small.

“The North Koreans have to rely on asymmetric capabilities,” said Dan Pinkston, who heads the international Crisis Group’s Seoul offices. “In a straight-up fight they are not that capable.”

Deadly North Korean strikes in past years — a commando raid on the South Korean presidential mansion in 1968; terrorist bombings in 1983 and 1987; and naval clashes in 1999 and 2002 — all used the element of surprise, an element that would be difficult to spring on the large, alert force South Korea is fielding for the maneuvers.

If North Korea retaliates, it will likely be with a weapons test rather than a direct confrontation, said one expert.

“They do not do eye-for-eye, tit-for-tat responses,” said Choi Jin-wook of the Korea Institute of National Unification. “Shooting a missile or testing a weapon or some kind of diplomatic action are possible, but I don’t think there will be a military reaction.”

The exercise does not include any U.S. assets, leading some commentators to wonder whether Washington is wary of angering Beijing in the Yellow Sea.

South Korean and U.S. forces conducted exercises together in the Sea of Japan last month. Those exercises included an anti-sub infiltration component — intended to thwart a submarine attack on a ship.

If the joint exercises continue, such a move could be part of a gradual build-up of American pressure on China.

“The U.S. is slowly containing China in other places, and they could exercise in the East Sea in the future,” said the Korea Institute of National Unification’s Choi. “I think the U.S. is very deliberately pressuring China.”

The warship sinking has heightened tensions between the two neighbors who fought a war from 1950 to 1953. The war ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty, meaning the two nations are still technically at war. About 28,500 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea.

By the CNN

A South Korean destroyer drops depth charges during anti-submarine drills on Thursday.

A suicide bomber wearing an explosives-laden jacket killed at least three people, including a key security official, in the northern Pakistani city of Peshawar Wednesday.

Among the dead was Sifwat Ghayour, commander of the paramilitary Frontier Constabulary, said Bashir Ahmed Bilour, a provincial government official. Ghayour had just left his office and his car was stopped at a traffic light when the attack occurred.

The Frontier Constabulary is spearheading the fight against Islamic militants in the northwestern frontier province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and is supported by the United States.

In southern Pakistan, the death toll rose Wednesday to 57 in widespread violence that broke out after the killing of a provincial lawmaker. The number of wounded has also gone up — to 110, said Rafiq Gul, deputy superintendent of Karachi police.

Syed Raza Haider, a leader of the MQM party, was shot Monday evening at a mosque in the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi. Haider was attending the funeral of a relative, Gul said. The gunman also killed the politician’s bodyguard.

Haider’s death triggered political and ethnic violence in the city, as mobs set fire to vehicles and gunfire erupted. Gul said 48 vehicles, eight shops and several gas stations were set ablaze in the mayhem. The MQM is part of the ruling coalition backing President Asif Ali Zardari’s Pakistan People’s Party.

By the CNN

A suicide bomber wearing an explosives-laden jacket killed at least three people, including a key security official, in the northern Pakistani city of Peshawar Wednesday.

A car that exploded outside a police station in Londonderry contained 200lbs of homemade explosives, police have said.

Dissident republicans are being blamed for the attack.

No-one was injured in the attack which happened at 0320 BST but several businesses were badly damaged in the blast.

Police said the bomb was loaded into a hijacked taxi and the driver ordered at gunpoint to drive to the station.

Divisional Commander Steve Martin said it was fortunate no-one was killed because the device went off more than 20 minutes before a warning said it would.

He said two men hijacked a taxi in the Bogside. The driver was taken to Glenfada Park where the bomb was loaded into the car.

The driver was then ordered at gunpoint to drive to Strand Road police station and warned he would be shot if he did not.

Supt Martin said they had been warned the device would go off in 45 minutes, however only 23 minutes had passed when the car exploded.

He also revealed that a policeman risked his own life when he walked past the bomb twice to bring to safety staff at a nearby fast food shop.

The first and deputy first ministers have condemned the attack.

Peter Robinson said he was thankful there was no loss of life.

“Using a taxi driver to deliver the device shows the cowardice of those behind the attack and my sympathies are with him and all those targeted,” he said.

Martin McGuinness said those who planned the attack were an “embarrassment” to the people of Derry.

“It’s about trying to undermine the peace process, about trying to undermine Sinn Fein’s peace strategy,” he said.

“If they think they will destroy the political institutions the people of Ireland voted for, if they think they’re going to destroy the working relationship I have with Peter Robinson, if they think they will undermine the peace process they are living in cloud cuckoo land.”

SDLP Mayor of Derry Colum Eastwood blamed dissident republicans for the attack.

“Police didn’t even have time to evacuate a nursing home or apartments right beside the police station.

“We are very lucky today not to be talking about fatalities. It’s an attack not just on the police but the entire community.”

‘Panic’
Lotfi Jalloul, whose kebab shop was destroyed in the blast, had been cleaning up for the night when he saw the car arrive at the police station.

“I thought he was a taxi driver picking up a passenger but about 15 minutes later, we were evacuated by the police,” he said.

“There was a lot of panic. I left the money in the till and didn’t even get the chance to pull down the shutters - thank God we got out of there, I can’t believe we’re still alive.”

He said he had been told his business had been destroyed by the explosion but had not yet been able to see what damage was caused because the area remains cordoned off.

Conor Kelly, who lives in an apartment block near the police station, said it had been a terrifying experience.

“I was still awake and reading when I heard an enormous noise like thunder and saw debris flying past my window,” he said.

“There were no alarms or attempts to evacuate the building.”

He said the front of a fast food outlet had been “ripped to shreds” and other buildings had windows blown out.

In May, a mortar bomb was fired at the same police station. It struck a wall but failed to explode.

The attack comes just weeks after Derry was picked to be UK City of Culture in 2013.

SDLP MP Mark Durkan said the bombing was “a cowardly, dangerous and vulgar act”.

“Those responsible for this incident have achieved nothing and this campaign of violence will achieve nothing,” he said.

By BBC

Forensic scientists examined the taxi destroyed by the bomb.

BAGHDAD — On Sunday, a journalist for Al Arabiya, an Arabic-language news channel, sat in the newsroom and explained that his staff had recently returned to the bureau after being forced to leave for weeks by threats from Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia.

“Thank God we are able to work,” said the journalist, Mohammed Zuhair, the chief of the channel’s newsroom.

Less than 24 hours later, a suicide bomber drove a white minibus packed with explosives past several checkpoints and detonated the vehicle in front of the news channel’s office, killing 6 and wounding 16. The dead included security guards and a cafeteria worker, but no journalists. Among the wounded was a former Iraqi deputy prime minister who lives nearby. Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia took responsibility for the bombing.

On Monday evening, two other explosions struck Shiite pilgrims as they marched from Najaf to Karbala to commemorate the birthday of Imam Mahdi, a revered Shiite saint. The attacks, which also bore the hallmark of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, killed close to 20 and wounded more than 50, according to officials in Baghdad and Karbala.

While the bombing at Al Arabiya’s office spared the newsroom, the attack was a brutal reminder of the dangers Iraqis face in practicing journalism, which they have had the freedom to do for only seven years. The war here has been the deadliest in history for journalists. More than 140 have been killed in Iraq since the war began, the vast majority of them Iraqis, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists.

Many newsrooms in Baghdad display photographs of slain colleagues. At Al Sumariya, another popular TV news channel, large photos in a hallway serve as reminders of two correspondents who were kidnapped and killed.

The attack on Monday came as officials have again been debating proposals for a new law to protect journalists — in the event that the country’s political class can end the nearly five-month stalemate that has followed March’s parliamentary elections and form a new government.

Among the ideas are to provide government protection for targeted journalists; offer compensation to the families of those killed; and set up regulations aimed at protecting the newsgathering process. A new law might also elevate a crime against a journalist to a higher level, a parallel to hate crime laws in the United States.

A draft law was sent to Parliament last year but never enacted; many here expect it will be taken up again. Officials recently held a workshop to discuss the proposals.

Mr. Zuhair, who was not hurt in Monday’s bombing, said a law would “give a capability to journalists and a stature.”

The need for a media law — which could also impose fines for publishing false information — is itself a matter of debate. Mindful of prior abuses — when the press was a propaganda arm of Saddam Hussein’s tyranny, and the death penalty could be imposed for criticizing his government — some want no government interference in the news media, even with the aim of protection. Last year, journalists in Baghdad protested against a media law, fearing it would restrict them.

Feryad Rawandozi straddles the worlds of politics and the press. A former member of Parliament, he is the spokesman for the Kurdistan Alliance, a coalition of politicians from Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region, and a newspaper columnist. His position is nuanced.

“Without a law, we cannot compensate families for losing their sons,” Mr. Rawandozi said. “Some areas are still very dangerous for journalists, but not all the Iraqi areas.”

As a politician, however, he believes the Iraqi press is not advanced enough to police itself on ethics, and favors a law to regulate the profession. “Some people think we need some sort of regulation because we are not exercising freedom of speech in the right way,” he said, mentioning an article that he said misquoted him. “It’s very hard to say that journalists stick with the ethics.”

Iraq’s Constitution protects freedom of opinion and speech, but some Western groups are urging the government to give the media a deeper constitutional imprimatur. A group of press advocacy groups working with Unesco recently published an open letter advocating the passage of a freedom of information law, writing, “We still lack the legal mechanism that guarantees the citizen’s right to have access to information.”

The Iraqi government is wading into the affairs of the news media in other ways, recently establishing a special press court to adjudicate libel offenses and press freedom issues. Western advocates have criticized the court, saying the government has not disclosed enough information about the court’s procedures.

“A specialized press court is hardly the solution to the problems Iraqi journalists face on a daily basis,” Mohamed Abdel Dayem, Middle East director for the Committee to Protect Journalists, said in a recent statement. “Historically, press courts have been used for restriction rather than protection.”

On Monday afternoon, Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia took credit for the bombing at Al Arabiya on a Web site it often uses to communicate, suggesting the attack was in response to a broadcast about the influence of the extremist group. The program was called “Creation of Death.”

“Wait for more,” the group’s statement said.

The capabilities of the group, which is homegrown but is believed to have some foreign leadership, have diminished in recent months with the killing of many top leaders, but it is still able to regularly carry out suicide attacks against institutions of Iraq’s nascent democracy.

Ayad Allawi, the former interim prime minister whose coalition won the most seats in the parliamentary elections, went to the scene of the bombing.

About a month ago the Interior Ministry notified Al Arabiya, whose headquarters are in Dubai, that it had intelligence that the network’s Baghdad office might become a target of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, according to Tariq Maher, a local correspondent for the channel who is a former employee of The New York Times in Baghdad.

The network’s Iraqi staff decamped to the Al-Rasheed Hotel for several weeks, and only in the last couple of days had returned to its office, with a scaled-down staff and added protection from the Interior Ministry, according to Mr. Maher, who was in the building when the explosion occurred. He had been up late working, and he and a colleague had gone to bed for a nap just after 9 a.m. He said a blanket that he pulled over his head saved him from falling debris.

“That is how the miracle happened, why we survived,” he said. “Two guards turned completely to ash.”

By TIM ARANGO

Soldiers inspected the Baghdad office of Al Arabiya, an Arabic news channel, after a bombing Monday in which six people died.

The Taliban has captured two US soldiers in eastern Afghanistan, a spokesman for the Islamic insurgents said.

American officials separately confirmed that two US soldiers serving with Nato forces were missing, but did not comment on the Taliban claims.

In the eastern Afghanistan province of Logar, local radio broadcast offers of a $20,000 reward for information that led to the safe release of the pair.

“Early this morning two coalition personnel went missing,” the announcement said. “They are believed to have been captured by insurgents somewhere in Logar province.

“They may have been separated from one another or maybe in the process of being moved to another location.”

A Taliban spokesman said that three servicemen with the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) had been captured but one had died. He did not give further details.

The soldiers were tracked and ambushed in a shoot-out by Taliban fighters as they drove through Logar in a four-wheel drive armoured vehicle, according to the account of a local Afghan chief.

He also thought that one of men may have been killed and the other captured.

Samer Gul, district chief of Charkh district in Logar province, said Saturday that the vehicle was seen on Friday night by a guard working for the district chief’s office. The guard tried to flag down the vehicle, carrying a driver and a passenger, but it kept going, Mr Gul said.

”They stopped in the main bazaar of Charkh district. The Taliban saw them in the bazaar,” he said. ”They didn’t touch them in the bazaar, but notified other Taliban that a four-wheel vehicle was coming their way.”

The second group of Taliban tried to stop the vehicle. The insurgents opened fire and the two occupants in the vehicle shot back, he said, adding that one may have been killed and the other taken hostage by the Taliban.

”Maybe they wanted to go to Paktia province or to the American base, but they came down the wrong road toward Charkh,” Mr Gul said. ”They didn’t pay any attention to the police. Otherwise we could have kept them from going into an insecure area and now this unfortunate incident has happened.”

Military officials could not confirm the district chief’s account.

In the radio broadcast one of the missing men was described as about six foot tall and weighing 15st 10lbs with blond hair and brown eyes. The other was described as 13st 8lbs, bald with a thin moustache. Both men have tattoos, the broadcast said.

“Coalition forces are offering $20,000 reward for any information that leads to the successful return of these two,” the statement said, without identifying the men.

A Nato statement said later that two ISAF service members left their compound the previous day in Kabul but did not return. A search is under way for them.

The statement did not identify the pair by nationality but US officials said they were Americans.
There is believed to be only one other ISAF soldier being held by the Taliban, who released a video of him last Christmas.

Meanwhile, five US troops died on Saturday in two separate roadside bombings.The two unnamed US personnel were wearing standard military camouflage, according to the radio report.

By Philip Sherwell

MINGORA, Pakistan—An apparent suicide bombing near a bus terminal in Pakistan’s Swat Valley killed five people and wounded at least 58 on Thursday, officials said, a sign that Islamist militants remain active in the northwest region despite a massive army operation.

The explosion went off around noon in Mingora, the main town in the one-time tourist haven that was largely overrun by Taliban militants in 2007.

Pakistani TV footage showed vehicles bent and twisted due to the force of the blast. Some men were desperately trying to open the doors of a car to reach a woman and man sitting in the front who were bloodied and appeared unconscious.

The area struck was crowded, so the death toll could rise significantly. Senior police official Qazi Ghulam Farooq said five people died, including two women, and that officials believed a suicide bomber was involved. At least 58 people were wounded, he said.

The Pakistan military launched its biggest operation against the Taliban in Swat in 2009 after a failed attempt at a peace deal that included pledges to impose Islamic law in the area. The operation forced some 2 million people to flee, but after a few months, the army said it had taken control and many of the refugees returned home.

Still, violence has occasionally flared in Swat, shaking people’s confidence. A handful of targeted killings of anti-Taliban elders in particular has worried those who fear the insurgents are staging a comeback in the valley.

In recent weeks, several major suicide attacks have shaken Pakistan. Last week, a pair of suicide bombers blew themselves up in the Mohmand tribal region, killing at least 102 people in the deadliest attack in the U.S.-allied nation this year.

The attacks come as Washington is pushing Pakistan to do even more to root out militant groups that use its soil to plan attacks on Western troops across the border in Afghanistan.

The U.S. has also launched more than 100 missile strikes against Taliban and al-Qaida fighters in Pakistan’s semiautonomous tribal area along the Afghan border. The attacks have been especially frequent in North Waziristan, the home base of the al-Qaida-linked group led by Jalaluddin Haqqani and his son Siraj.

One Thursday evening, three suspected U.S. missiles landed in North Waziristan’s Mada Khel area, killing at least two people, said two intelligence officials. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media on the record.

Pakistan officially condemns the missile strikes but is believed to secretly assist the covert, CIA-run program.

Militants have responded to the strikes by assassinating tribesmen whom they accuse of spying, including two men whose bullet riddled bodies were found Thursday in the Datta Khel area of North Waziristan, said an intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.

The bodies were accompanied by notes saying they were killed for spying on the Taliban, he said.

By Sherin Zada and Riaz Khan

Pakistani soldiers and police officers guard the site of an apparent suicide bombing in Mingora, capital of Pakistan's troubled Swat valley on Thursday, July 15, 2010. The apparent suicide bombing near a bus terminal in Pakistan's Swat Valley killed three people and wounded at least 35 people Thursday, officials said, a sign that Islamist militants remain active in the northwest region despite a massive army operation against them. (AP Photo/Naveed Ali)

Coalition troop deaths in Afghanistan continued to add up in what has been a hot and bloody struggle, with eight American and four British troops slain over the last 48 hours.

NATO’s International Security Assistance Force confirmed the eight American deaths. Five died Wednesday in southern Afghanistan, one in a bombing and the others in a small-arms attack. Three were killed Tuesday as they repelled an insurgent attack on a police base in Kandahar city.

The British Defence Ministry reported four deaths in Helmand province — that of a Marine shot during a foot patrol in the Sangin district of Helmand province and those of three soldiers who were killed in a premeditated attack by a member of the Afghan National Army.

The death toll is on pace to match the killings recorded in June, the bloodiest month so far for U.S. and international troops during the Afghan war.

Sixty Americans were among the 102 international troops slain in June. So far this month, 45 coalition troops have been killed, including 34 Americans.

By the CNN Wire Staff

U.S. troops drive through a valley in Afghanistan last week on a mission to clear improvised explosive devices.