• British military personnel run courses for snipers • Human rights groups furious over Riyadh link Britain is training Saudi Arabia’s national guard – the elite security force deployed during the recent protests in Bahrain – in public order enforcement measures and the use of sniper rifles. The revelation has outraged human rights groups, which point out that the Foreign Office recognises that the kingdom’s human rights record is “a major concern”. In response to questions made under the Freedom of Information Act, the Ministry of Defence has confirmed that British personnel regularly run courses for the national guard in “weapons, fieldcraft and general military skills training, as well as incident handling, bomb disposal, search, public order and sniper training”. The courses are organised through the British Military Mission to the Saudi Arabian National Guard, an obscure unit that consists of 11 British army personnel under the command of a brigadier. The MoD response, obtained yesterday by the Observer , reveals that Britain sends up to 20 training teams to the kingdom a year. Saudi Arabia pays for “all BMM personnel, as well as support costs such as accommodation and transport”. Bahrain’s royal family used 1,200 Saudi troops to help put down demonstrations in March. At the time the British government said it was “deeply concerned” about reports of human rights abuses being perpetrated by the troops. “Britain’s important role in training the Saudi Arabian national guard in internal security over many years has enabled them to develop tactics to help suppress the popular uprising in Bahrain,” said Nicholas Gilby of the Campaign Against Arms Trade. Analysts believe the Saudi royal family is desperate to shore up its position in the region by preserving existing regimes in the Gulf that will help check the increasing power of Iran. “Last year we raised concerns that the Saudis had been using UK-supplied and UK-maintained arms in secret attacks in Yemen that left scores of Yemeni civilians dead,” said Oliver Sprague, director of Amnesty International’s UK Arms Programme. Defence minister Nick Harvey confirmed to parliament last week that the UK’s armed forces provided training to the Saudi national guard. “It is possible that some members of the Saudi Arabian national guard which were deployed in Bahrain may have undertaken some training provided by the British military mission,” he said. The confirmation that this training is focused on maintaining public order in the kingdom is potentially embarrassing for the government. Coming at the end of a week in which the G8 summit in France approved funding for countries embracing democracy in the wake of the Arab spring, it has led to accusations that the government’s foreign policy is at conflict with itself. Jonathan Edwards, a Plaid Cymru MP who has tabled parliamentary questions to the MoD about its links to Saudi Arabia, said he found it difficult to understand why Britain was training troops for “repressive undemocratic regimes”. “This is the shocking face of our democracy to many people in the world, as we prop up regimes of this sort,” Edwards said. “It is intensely hypocritical of our leadership in the UK – Labour or Conservative – to talk of supporting freedoms in the Middle East and elsewhere while at the same time training crack troops of dictatorships.” The MoD’s response was made in 2006, but when questioned this week it confirmed Britain has been providing training for the Saudi national guard to improve their “internal security and counter-terrorism” capabilities since 1964 and continues to do so. Members of the guard, which was established by the kingdom’s royal family because it feared its regular army would not support it in the event of a popular uprising, are also provided places on flagship UK military courses at Sandhurst and Dartmouth. In Saudi Arabia, Britain continues to train the guard in “urban sharpshooter” programmes, the MoD confirmed. Last year, Britain approved 163 export licences for military equipment to Saudi Arabia, worth £110m. Exports included armoured personnel carriers, sniper rifles, small arms ammunition and weapon sights. In 2009, the UK supplied Saudi Arabia with CS hand grenades, teargas and riot control agents. Sprague said a shake-up of the system licensing the supply of military expertise and weapons to foreign governments was overdue. “We need a far more rigorous case-by-case examination of the human rights records of those who want to buy our equipment or receive training.” An MoD spokesman described the Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, as “key partners” in the fight against terrorism. “By providing training for countries to the same high standards used by UK armed forces we help to save lives and raise awareness of human rights,” said the spokesman. Labour MP Mike Gapes, the former chairman of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, said British military support for Saudi Arabia was about achieving a “difficult balance”. “On the one hand Saudi Arabia faces the threat of al-Qaida but on the other its human rights record is dreadful. This is the constant dilemma you have when dealing with autocratic regimes: do you ignore them or try to improve them?” Saudi Arabia Bahrain Arab and Middle East unrest Military Middle East Human rights Jamie Doward guardian.co.uk
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Health secretary attacked after calls to smoking, drugs and lifestyle helplines plunged following spending freeze The health secretary, Andrew Lansley, has been forced into a major U-turn on funding for public health campaigns, after evidence emerged that the spending freeze had cost lives. An extra £15m has now been set aside for promoting the government’s anti-smoking website and £14m will be made available for a campaign promoting healthy living. The decision has come in response to a damning Department of Health (DoH) report on the consequences of the government’s decision to “all but cease” publicly-funded advertising last year. The DoH found that the number of people ringing the drug abuse support helpline, Frank, had fallen by 22%, that visits to the Smokefree website had fallen by 50% and that the number of people joining the government’s lifestyle website was down by two-thirds. Most worryingly, the report said, there was evidence that “the cessation of marketing activity [had] resulted in declining quit attempts, and subsequent loss of life from smoking-related illness”. It added: “Following the coalition government’s freeze on non-essential marketing expenditure, all social marketing programmes were reduced and expenditure on advertising all but ceased. “We have now had the opportunity to learn from the freeze and to assess where the loss of mass communications had a negative impact… We now recommend that some advertising, and other forms of mass communication such as sponsorship, paid media partnerships and PR, be resumed.” The revelation follows savage criticism of the DoH decision last year to axe the £1.5m awareness campaign for flu vaccinations. Figures released this month showed there had been a rise in deaths from 474 in 2009/10 to 535 in 2010/11 and that a disproportionate number had been among the young. Lansley justified the freeze on marketing spending last year as a departure from the “lecturing” attitude, which he said characterised some previous government’s interventions. But shadow health secretary John Healey said Lansley needed to publicly apologise for his mistakes: “Mass publicity must play a part in good public health. This report shows that Andrew Lansley made the wrong judgment in axing anti-smoking promotions, just like he did on the flu-jab adverts last autumn. “The health secretary needs to tell people that he’s learnt the lessons and won’t make the same mistake again.” Key evidence for the loss of life caused by the government’s policy was provided in a submission to the all-party parliamentary group on smoking and health by Professor Robert West, director of Tobacco Studies at Cancer Research UK. West told the group: “Evidence shows that total spending on government mass media campaigns in a given quarter is associated with smoking cessation activity in that quarter. If, as seems likely, this association is causal, the recent suspension of mass media campaigns will lead to significant loss of life, and with every month that passes without further activity the death toll will grow.” West told the Observer that the most recent figures on giving up smoking confirmed his fears: “For smoking, most of the population are in a state of motivational tension, they are a bit dissonant about it and what the marketing does is tip them over the edge into activity. So if you stop doing that they carry on being dissonant. “We looked at a number of objectives – markers of cessation activity, attendance at clinics, hits on the website and the quit line – and the correlation is very striking. The association between marketing activity and spend was very strong. “It [lack of marketing] will have cost lives. For every year that someone over the age of 35 carries on smoking they lose three months of life expectancy. So if you just lose a year of significant activity you have already lost lives. That is the inescapable logic of it.” Research by the DoH suggests smokers’ motivation to quit is in decline, with the number of people saying they do not want to quit at all at 30%, its highest level since tracking began in 2007. Over recent years, there has also been a year-on-year decline in people trying to stop smoking, from 43.5% in 2007 to 35.8% in 2010. On top of the spending on anti-smoking and the healthier living campaign, Change4Life, a further £4m will be spent on marketing targeted at young people, and £11m on advertising issues related to older people. Professor Geof Rayner, an adviser to the Change4Life programme, said he was delighted: “I am pleased the civil service has put this in front of the politicians and that the politicians have seen some sense. They should be pragmatic, not ideological, about public health.” However, the total spending is still less than half the £93m spent by the Labour government in 2009/2010. A DoH spokesman denied the decision to start spending again was a U-turn but claimed that the freeze had been an opportunity to test the efficacy of previous spending. “Our campaigns have a high impact,” he added. “A study found that two-thirds of the public think advertising is vital to the success of government campaigns.” Health policy Andrew Lansley Health & wellbeing Smoking Drugs policy Daniel Boffey guardian.co.uk
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If South African president Jacob Zuma’s peace mission fails, Nato will deliver its heaviest blow to Libyan leader’s forces Nato has only one question as it prepares to unleash Apache helicopters against the forces of Muammar Gaddafi this week, and Captain Ali Mohammed, one of the defenders of the besieged rebel city of Misrata, can supply the answer. If, as most pundits predict, tomorrow’s peace mission to Tripoli by South African president Jacob Zuma fails, Nato will hit the Libyan leader harder than it has ever hit him before. British Apaches, together with French Tiger attack helicopters, will launch surgical strikes on Gaddafi’s forces besieging Misrata. They have the ability to destroy individual gun positions in the town of Zlitan, west of Misrata, with less risk to the civilian population kept there as human shields. But there is a problem. This kind of war takes time, and time is the commodity Nato does not have as critics complain it has extended the original United Nations no-fly zone mandate into what is regime change in all but name. The big question is whether the defenders will crumble under the onslaught, or fight with the same tenacity shown by their rebel enemy in Misrata. “If you use Apaches, it is sure they will run away,” said Mohammed. “There is a big difference between Gaddafi’s men and ourselves. I am defending my home, my family, my city. But Gaddafi’s forces do not believe in what they are doing.” The captain has led a band of fighters in this shell-scarred city, not just surviving the onslaught but pushing pro-Gaddafi forces back to the outskirts. Yet Gaddafi’s troops continue to rain death on the city outskirts, which shuddered under a bombardment of hundreds of mortars and missiles on Friday, fired from launchers too far back for the rebels to counter. To respond, they need the Apaches, four of which are on the helicopter carrier HMS Ocean, cruising somewhere beyond the horizon visible from Mohammed’s position. A second vessel, the French amphibious assault carrier Tonnerre, has four equally ferocious Tiger attack helicopters, plus a dozen of the more elderly Gazelles. All are armed with Hellfire missiles which have the ability to be launched from five miles off with pinpoint accuracy, precisely destroying gun positions and machine gun nests, leaving the local civilians unharmed. It is these weapons that the alliance hopes will finally break the will of Gaddafi’s forces. Fast jets continue pounding targets in both Tripoli and behind the front lines. In the skies across Libya, British and American Reaper drones, which can stay on patrol for 14 hours, circle endlessly. They watch the few highways out of Tripoli day and night, using their own Hellfire missiles to destroy any vehicle they see, in effect making it impossible for Gaddafi to reinforce or supply his units at Misrata and those further west near Benghazi. But his firepower has its limits. The UN resolution mandating Nato’s action prohibits the use of ground troops, leaving the alliance needing to win with only the lightly armed rebel troops to actually take and hold ground. Additionally, Apaches are vulnerable; slow and ponderous, they dare not venture over enemy territory for risk of being shot down by machine gun fire. Instead they are likely to linger over rebel lines, engaging only Libyan positions in the immediate vicinity. Given enough time, the Apaches can take out gun positions one by one, but time is not on Nato’s side. Many members, notably Germany and Turkey, were reluctant partners from the start and at the United Nations China and Russia have complained that the western alliance did not consult over the extension of a mandate designed to protect civilians into what is a full-scale war. Nato needs victory quickly by breaking the will of Gaddafi’s troops. “Sixty per cent of Gaddafi’s army do not want to fight,” says Abdulla Ali, a rebel army spokesman in Misrata. “They are forced there. If they do not fight they are shot.” Mohammed says Nato has instructed his forces to stay behind a “red line” marked out along the Misrata front, allowing Nato to kill anything it sees west of that line. It is an instruction he intends to obey. His dark eyes betray the strain of fighting through the streets of his city for the past 70 days. He stands, clad in a green shirt, pale jeans and black sandals amid a sand-encrusted checkpoint of corrugated iron and a few battered plastic chairs. Around his chest is the shoulder strap of a battered AK-47 machine gun, on his shirt a small badge with the picture of Ramadan Swehli, hero of the city’s resistance against Italian occupation nearly a century ago, superimposed over the rebel red, green and black tricolour. However, before the Apaches are unleashed, Nato has decided to give diplomacy a final shot. The key part of this plan fell into place on Friday when Russia’s president Dmitry Medvedev announced – possibly through gritted teeth – that he now supported Nato’s demand that Gaddafi step down immediately and unconditionally. That message will be delivered by Zuma in Tripoli tomorrow, coupled with the threat that if the Libyan leader refuses, Nato will unleash what will be the heaviest attack the alliance has mounted. Yesterday brought a clear sign of its increasing impatience with the regime as a rare daytime air strike was launched on the capital of Tripoli. For diplomats, the problem is not with Zuma’s negotiating skills, but with the fact that the message he conveys to Gaddafi offers no carrots, only sticks. Capitulation means he faces certain death if he stays in Libya. If he flees, any country willing to take him will shortly receive demands from the UN to hand him over to the International Criminal Court, whose judges are expected to issue an arrest warrant for crimes against humanity within weeks. The chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo, has already called for one of his sons, Saif, to be indicted, and more charges against three more members of the regime are expected to follow later this year. In Misrata, few rebels expect the Libyan dictator to agree to step down, even in the face of Nato’s bolstered firepower. “He will not listen – he will stay and fight,” said Osama Alfitory, a fighter from Benghazi who volunteered to come and help in Misrata, for him a brother-city. “This guy is insane. I think he believes he will win in the end.” Nato hopes that if its renewed assault begins – which could happen as early as Tuesday night – Gaddafi’s army will start to think differently. Muammar Gaddafi Nato Libya Jacob Zuma Arab and Middle East unrest Middle East Africa guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …If South African president Jacob Zuma’s peace mission fails, Nato will deliver its heaviest blow to Libyan leader’s forces Nato has only one question as it prepares to unleash Apache helicopters against the forces of Muammar Gaddafi this week, and Captain Ali Mohammed, one of the defenders of the besieged rebel city of Misrata, can supply the answer. If, as most pundits predict, tomorrow’s peace mission to Tripoli by South African president Jacob Zuma fails, Nato will hit the Libyan leader harder than it has ever hit him before. British Apaches, together with French Tiger attack helicopters, will launch surgical strikes on Gaddafi’s forces besieging Misrata. They have the ability to destroy individual gun positions in the town of Zlitan, west of Misrata, with less risk to the civilian population kept there as human shields. But there is a problem. This kind of war takes time, and time is the commodity Nato does not have as critics complain it has extended the original United Nations no-fly zone mandate into what is regime change in all but name. The big question is whether the defenders will crumble under the onslaught, or fight with the same tenacity shown by their rebel enemy in Misrata. “If you use Apaches, it is sure they will run away,” said Mohammed. “There is a big difference between Gaddafi’s men and ourselves. I am defending my home, my family, my city. But Gaddafi’s forces do not believe in what they are doing.” The captain has led a band of fighters in this shell-scarred city, not just surviving the onslaught but pushing pro-Gaddafi forces back to the outskirts. Yet Gaddafi’s troops continue to rain death on the city outskirts, which shuddered under a bombardment of hundreds of mortars and missiles on Friday, fired from launchers too far back for the rebels to counter. To respond, they need the Apaches, four of which are on the helicopter carrier HMS Ocean, cruising somewhere beyond the horizon visible from Mohammed’s position. A second vessel, the French amphibious assault carrier Tonnerre, has four equally ferocious Tiger attack helicopters, plus a dozen of the more elderly Gazelles. All are armed with Hellfire missiles which have the ability to be launched from five miles off with pinpoint accuracy, precisely destroying gun positions and machine gun nests, leaving the local civilians unharmed. It is these weapons that the alliance hopes will finally break the will of Gaddafi’s forces. Fast jets continue pounding targets in both Tripoli and behind the front lines. In the skies across Libya, British and American Reaper drones, which can stay on patrol for 14 hours, circle endlessly. They watch the few highways out of Tripoli day and night, using their own Hellfire missiles to destroy any vehicle they see, in effect making it impossible for Gaddafi to reinforce or supply his units at Misrata and those further west near Benghazi. But his firepower has its limits. The UN resolution mandating Nato’s action prohibits the use of ground troops, leaving the alliance needing to win with only the lightly armed rebel troops to actually take and hold ground. Additionally, Apaches are vulnerable; slow and ponderous, they dare not venture over enemy territory for risk of being shot down by machine gun fire. Instead they are likely to linger over rebel lines, engaging only Libyan positions in the immediate vicinity. Given enough time, the Apaches can take out gun positions one by one, but time is not on Nato’s side. Many members, notably Germany and Turkey, were reluctant partners from the start and at the United Nations China and Russia have complained that the western alliance did not consult over the extension of a mandate designed to protect civilians into what is a full-scale war. Nato needs victory quickly by breaking the will of Gaddafi’s troops. “Sixty per cent of Gaddafi’s army do not want to fight,” says Abdulla Ali, a rebel army spokesman in Misrata. “They are forced there. If they do not fight they are shot.” Mohammed says Nato has instructed his forces to stay behind a “red line” marked out along the Misrata front, allowing Nato to kill anything it sees west of that line. It is an instruction he intends to obey. His dark eyes betray the strain of fighting through the streets of his city for the past 70 days. He stands, clad in a green shirt, pale jeans and black sandals amid a sand-encrusted checkpoint of corrugated iron and a few battered plastic chairs. Around his chest is the shoulder strap of a battered AK-47 machine gun, on his shirt a small badge with the picture of Ramadan Swehli, hero of the city’s resistance against Italian occupation nearly a century ago, superimposed over the rebel red, green and black tricolour. However, before the Apaches are unleashed, Nato has decided to give diplomacy a final shot. The key part of this plan fell into place on Friday when Russia’s president Dmitry Medvedev announced – possibly through gritted teeth – that he now supported Nato’s demand that Gaddafi step down immediately and unconditionally. That message will be delivered by Zuma in Tripoli tomorrow, coupled with the threat that if the Libyan leader refuses, Nato will unleash what will be the heaviest attack the alliance has mounted. Yesterday brought a clear sign of its increasing impatience with the regime as a rare daytime air strike was launched on the capital of Tripoli. For diplomats, the problem is not with Zuma’s negotiating skills, but with the fact that the message he conveys to Gaddafi offers no carrots, only sticks. Capitulation means he faces certain death if he stays in Libya. If he flees, any country willing to take him will shortly receive demands from the UN to hand him over to the International Criminal Court, whose judges are expected to issue an arrest warrant for crimes against humanity within weeks. The chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo, has already called for one of his sons, Saif, to be indicted, and more charges against three more members of the regime are expected to follow later this year. In Misrata, few rebels expect the Libyan dictator to agree to step down, even in the face of Nato’s bolstered firepower. “He will not listen – he will stay and fight,” said Osama Alfitory, a fighter from Benghazi who volunteered to come and help in Misrata, for him a brother-city. “This guy is insane. I think he believes he will win in the end.” Nato hopes that if its renewed assault begins – which could happen as early as Tuesday night – Gaddafi’s army will start to think differently. Muammar Gaddafi Nato Libya Jacob Zuma Arab and Middle East unrest Middle East Africa guardian.co.uk
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Fifa’s ethics committee due to deliver a verdict on claims of backhanders and bought votes in world football On Sunday night the 12 members of Fifa’s ethics committee will deliver a verdict that could decide the future of football’s governing body, amid growing calls for fundamental reform and fresh criticism from politicians and major sponsors. As the 208 member nations gather in Zurich to choose Fifa’s president for the next four years, there is growing pressure for the election to be suspended, given that both candidates, the incumbent Sepp Blatter and Mohamed bin Hammam, face serious corruption allegations. The calls come as Jack Warner, Fifa’s vice-president, who is also appearing before the ethics committee to deny bribery claims, predicts a “football tsunami” will hit the organisation in the next couple of days that will “shock” the world. “The time has come when I must stop playing dead so you’ll see it, it’s coming, trust me you’ll see it by now and Monday,” Warner told newspapers in his home country of Trinidad and Tobago. Meanwhile the British sports minister, Hugh Robertson, is to speak to his foreign counterparts in an effort to form a consensus that action needs to be taken to reform Fifa. Robertson feels this crisis could be Fifa’s “Salt Lake City moment”, referring to the bribery scandal that forced the International Olympic Committee into reform in 1999. While Blatter’s supporters believe he holds the upper hand and will claim a fourth term as president on Wednesday, many think he has underestimated the strength of feeling outside the Fifa bubble. “This happens to people when they do jobs for too long,” Robertson said. “They live in an ivory tower and lose any connection with the world outside. They probably think people will dismiss this, without realising how serious it is.” Much will depend on the outcome of today’s deliberations by the ethics committee, which could suspend either or both men. Alternatively, it could provisionally suspend both Blatter and Bin Hammam while it deliberates further. Blatter, whose 13-year tenure at the top of world football has been marked by recurrent scandal, became the 10th of its 24 executive committee members to face corruption allegations last Friday. His opponent, Bin Hammam, who is charged with attempting to buy votes in Wednesday’s election, has claimed that payments made to Caribbean Football Union officials were for legitimate expenses and that Blatter knew all about them, having been told by Warner. It was Warner, who has held a powerful position in Fifa for 28 years by virtue of controlling Concacaf’s bloc of 35 votes, who arranged Bin Hammam’s special conference with 25 voting members of the CFU on 10-11 May, at which bundles of $40,000 (£24,000) in cash are alleged to have been distributed. The claims are documented in a dossier collated by John Collins, a Chicago attorney who was asked to investigate by Concacaf general secretary and Fifa executive committee member Chuck Blazer when he was approached by concerned CFU members. Bin Hammam, a Qatari who has spent 15 years on Fifa’s executive committee, claims the allegations are a plot to undermine his chances in the election, and accuses Blatter of “tawdry manoeuvre” amid “increasing evidence of a conspiracy”. For his part, Blatter insists that he knew nothing of the allegations until Wednesday morning. Last week’s events have shown the folly of the continued insistence from both men that they will overhaul Fifa’s tarnished image. They were once close, with Bin Hammam helping Blatter to victory in the 1998 and 2002 elections, but fell out when Bin Hammam felt that Blatter had reneged on a promise to stand down this year. Blatter is likely to dismiss calls for reform from Britain, Australia and the US as sour grapes over their World Cup bid humiliations, and will take heart from the support of Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin, whom he helped to victory in the 2014 race. But he will find it harder to dismiss the concerns of the major sponsors who have bankrolled Fifa, which is now sitting on reserves of $1.3bn a year thanks to television and advertising deals. “I have to say that in general we have had a good relationship with Fifa for a long time,” Adidas chief executive Herbert Hainer told the Observer. ” But obviously all that has happened in the past few days is neither positive for sport nor for Fifa.” It was partly Blatter’s desire to turn the bids for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups into a twin-track circus that created the climate for corruption and turned the spotlight on Fifa’s inner workings. The FA has passed its own file of evidence to Fifa collected in the wake of allegations made by the former FA chairman Lord Triesman against four executive committee members – Warner, Nicolás Leoz, Ricardo Teixeira and Worawi Makudi – of soliciting inducements during the 2018 World Cup bidding process. A claim that Warner asked for financial help to build an education centre has been backed up by Premier League chairman Sir Dave Richards, while the file also includes an email from Warner to Triesman asking the FA to pay for Haiti’s World Cup TV rights through him. Two other Fifa executive committee members, the Nigerian Amos Adamu and Oceania’s representative Reynald Temarii, were suspended by Fifa in October following a cash-for-votes investigation by the Sunday Times . Two more, Jacques Anouma and Issa Hayatou, were accused by an anonymous whistleblower of accepting bribes of $1.5m (£910,000) from the Qatar 2022 World Cup bid according to evidence submitted by the paper to a parliamentary inquiry. Hayatou, Leoz and Teixeira were also accused by a BBC Panorama documentary of accepting bribes from a $100m slush fund administered by ISL in the 1990s. All have denied the allegations. Sepp Blatter Fifa Owen Gibson guardian.co.uk
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Bomber in police uniform targets provincial governor’s office killing a police chief and injuring several others A Taliban suicide bomber attacked a provincial governor’s compound in Takhar, killing the police chief of northern Afghanistan and seriously injuring a top Nato commander. Two other Afghan officials were also reported to have died in the attack. Several international servicemen were reported injured by eyewitnesses. German officials confirmed to Spiegel magazine Major General Markus Kneip, who commands Nato forces in the north Afghanistan, had received wounds that were “severe” but not life-threatening. A Nato spokesman in Kabul confirmed western casualties but was unable to provide details. The Taliban, meanwhile, claimed responsibility for the attack and pledged that “killing high ranking officials will continue.” Mujeebullah Rahman, the deputy director of the local council in Takhar province, said the attack took place at about 4pm when a meeting to discuss local security operations was ending. “The bomber was waiting in the corridor, wearing the uniform of an Afghan policeman,” Rahman said. The attack capped a bloody 48 hours in which seven Americans, two British and two other Nato servicemen were killed by roadside bombs or by insurgents in the south of the country. So far 44 Nato soldiers have been killed this month, and .nearly 200 have died in the year. The British servicemen, from 42 Royal Marine Commando, were on patrol when a hidden explosive device was triggered. However, the Takhar attack was more audacious. The German general may have been specifically targeted as he commands a zone which has seen a high number of special forces operations against insurgents in recent months. But the main target may have been General Mohammed Daoud Daoud. He served as a deputy interior minister for narcotics before being posted as police chief in the north, and was also the former bodyguard of the legendary guerilla leader Ahmed Shah Massod who was killed by suicide bombers in 2001. Targeting high profile figures has long been an aim of the insurgents, for having a major propaganda impact overseas. The fighting this year is seen as a key test of strength as it comes against a background of US decisions about troop withdrawals this summer, the death of Osama bin Laden and tentative moves to find some kind of political settlement to the conflict, now in its tenth year. Afghanistan Nato Taliban Jason Burke guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Michele Bachmann blames her reading of articles for getting everything wrong
May 28, 2011 No CommentMichele Bachmann went on CNN with John King to talk about her possible presidential run and said that her decision was not going to be based on whether Sarah Palin gets in the race. Riiiiiiight. I highly doubt that she’ll enter if Palin jumps because they have the same followers. But King then called Bachmann out on all the many false statements she made about Obama. Her response was to say that, well, she reads a whole lot (slap to Palin?), and then blamed the articles she read in the AP for getting all her facts wrong. King told her she shouldn’t be blaming factually correct news reports for her mistakes. She admitted that she could use a little messaging discipline. Hey, at least she heard of the AP. John King, USA: KING: Let’s deal with a few things. They should watch you, that’s right. You had a conversation with Chris Wallace right after the Libya invasion started, the Libya bombing started, where you said, you know, you heard a report from an ambassador in Tripoli that maybe 10,000 or 20,000 or 30,000 people had been killed. That number was, of course, not anywhere near reliable. So some people said, well, Michele Bachmann just sees one little report and goes and quotes it on television. Do you have to work on discipline if you’re going to run for president? BACHMANN: I think it’s important to have discipline and a message. That’s true. And have I been right in — have I been accurate in everything that I’ve said? No, that’s not true. You can — you can fact check. But the fact is, I read and I read a lot. And that morning, I had read in a — a TV — a report by A.P. And the overall number was correct and it was a number that was given by the ambassador. It wasn’t in one particular engagement, but it was the number of people who had been wounded so far. So that was accurate. You see she reads. However, making sure of the facts comes second. KING: Another thing people cite is when the president was going to India, there was a report in a publication over there that used this wildly exorbitant number about how much his trip would cost. And you… BACHMANN: Oh, sure. KING: — you, for several days… BACHMANN: And — and what I was doing… KING: — were talking about that. BACHMANN: — again, I was — I was quoting from “The Financial Times.” And so I — I gave the source that I was quoting from and it was a financial newspaper from India. And so it isn’t my job to go and fact check sources that come out in publication. And so I was using that quote. But you’re right… KING: It’s your job as a candidate… BACHMANN: — when it’s — when it… KING: — when people… KING: — the left… BACHMANN: You have a very good point… Doesn’t she have a staff working for her? We know she’ll repeat falsehoods or make up insane ideas like the anti-Americans in Congress at the drop of a dime KING: — the left—-likes to use you as a galvanizer. BACHMANN: You have — you have a very good point, though, that I think when you’re — when you’re in the presidential realm, I do think that message discipline is required. And I think that that is something that, you know, all of us have areas that we need to do better on and that’s certainly one that I’ll pay a lot of attention to. KING: I read a fundraising e-mail under your name just an hour or so ago. It was talking about: “Our president is too busy gallivanting around Europe with his Irish cousins to focus on rebuilding our economy and strengthening our nation.” Now, people have a lot of fun in fundraising letters. But a President Bachmann would never take a little personal detour on a very important overseas trip for a G8 summit or sitting down with the prime minister of the United Kingdom? BACHMANN: Well, of course presidents take trips. But remember, I think if the shoe was on the other foot and if we had a Republican as president and we just saw the devastation in Joplin, Missouri and we see the president of the United States playing ping pong on TV and we see him serving up hamburgers in — in a day when we aren’t dealing with devastation in the heartland of the United States, that would be fine for the president to be out doing those things. I don’t fault him for that. And it’s actually a — a small thing in the scheme of things. The right keeps on trying to find a false equivalency for Bush falling down on the job in NOLA and can’t do it, but Michele doesn’t mind fundraising off any crazy thought. The fake “$200-million-dollar-a-day trip to India story” was debunked immediately, but it didn’t stop her or the Limbaughs from transmitting it as much and as often as they could. I was kind of shocked that King went at many of her falsehoods directly, but good for him. We need more of this from the media in any campaign against any party. Bachmann is a treasure trove of misinformation and badly spun talking points, so King and his cohorts have a lot of work to do if or when she gets in the race.
Continue reading …Maybe There’s Some Hope for Us Yet – High School Students Take on Bachmann and Creationists
May 28, 2011 No Comment
MSNBC featured two very bright high school students on Hardball and then on Lawrence O’Donnell’s Last Word and seeing these kids stand up to the history revisionists like Michele Bachmann or these people trying to push creationism into our school kids as science gives me some hope for our future. Click here to view this media In the video above — Andy Kopplin’s son takes his anti-creationism campaign to ‘Hardball’ : Zack Kopplin, the son of Andy Kopplin, Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s chief of administration, was featured on a segment of “Hardball with Chris Matthews” this evening. Kopplin, a high school student, discussed his efforts to combat the Louisiana Science Education Act, a 2008 law that governs how local school systems can introduce supplemental materials into science lessons on topics such as evolutionary biology, global warming and cloning. During the segement, Kopplin expressed his belief that Gov. Bobby Jindal, who graduated as a biology major from Brown University and signed the act into law, in his “heart of hearts” knows “how vital evolution is to biology.” Click here to view this media And the subject of the threats did not come up on O’Donnell’s show, but here’s a reminder of what this student put up with after challenging Bachmann that Dave wrote about last week — Right-wingers flood teen who challenged Bachmann to a debate with threats of violence .
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RAF Typhoons take part in Nato attack destroying guard towers at Libyan ruler’s Bab al-Aziziyah complex in Tripoli British RAF jets have taken part in a rare daytime strike by Nato aircraft on the Libyan capital, destroying the guard towers at Muammar Gaddafi’s compound in Tripoli. The Libyan dictator was not a target and there was no way of knowing whether he was there at the time, the military alliance said. Followed a fifth straight night of attacks, British Typhoons were among the aircraft that used precision bombs early Saturday to bring down guard towers along the walls of the Bab al-Aziziyah complex. The British chief of defence staff’s spokesman, Major General John Lorimer, said: “For decades Colonel Gaddafi has hidden from the Libyan people behind these walls, spreading terror and crushing opposition. “The massive compound has not just been his home but is also a major military barracks and headquarters and lies at the heart of his network of secret police and intelligence agencies. “Last night’s action sends a powerful message to the regime’s leadership and to those involved in delivering Colonel Gaddafi’s attacks on civilians that they are no longer hidden away from the Libyan people behind high walls.” Previous Nato attacks had hit command and control and other military facilities within the complex, Lorimer said. A big boom shook Tripoli at about 8am GMT but it was unclear if it was caused by a bomb or missile. A Nato military spokesman said the daylight raid also targeted “a vehicle storage compound 600 to 800m to the east of Gaddafi’s so-called tent private area. It is not part of the main Gaddafi complex.” Following the Friday night strikes, the Libyan state broadcaster said Nato raids also caused “human and material” damage near Mizda, to the south. The strikes came as Nato prepared to deploy attack helicopters over Libya for the first time as a range of countries try to intensify pressure on Gaddafi to relinquish power. Gaddafi has been left diplomatically deserted after Russia, his sole international interlocutor, joined the rest of the G8 nations in declaring the Libyan leader had lost all legitimacy and must go. Libya Military Middle East Africa Arab and Middle East unrest Nato Ben Quinn guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Huckabee: It’s ‘Amazing to Me That Kids Are That Ignorant of Their History’ – So Here’s How I Make it Worse
May 28, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media No, Huckabee didn’t actually say that, but he may as well have. Mike Huckabee is so concerned with the fact that most American children don’t know enough about their country’s history that he’s ready to step in there and do what he can go fill that gap, by making it worse of course. This isn’t a new story but it’s disgusting to see Van Susteren giving him another plug for this garbage on her show last night. Mike Huckabee Fixes American History : Don’t worry, American youth: Mike Huckabee has fixed American history. No longer will you suffer under what Huckabee calls “the ‘blame America first’ attitude prevalent in today’s teaching.” Late Wednesday, Huckabee announced LearnOurHistory.com , a sort of BMG Music Club for what he calls “unbiased” historical lessons for kids. For around $15 each, the company will send you a new animated tale of American history each month, told through the eyes of a gang of time traveling kids. The first video (available for just $9.95, with a gift bag full of goodies)? “The Reagan Revolution.” Naturally. In this 90-second preview of the video, one sees a tale of an America in 1970s decay, where unemployed muggers in “DISCO” tanktops threatened anyone they could find with knives. Then came a man that could restore hope to the land: Ronald Reagan. Read on… It wasn’t long ago that Huckabee was also promoting David Barton’s dangerous revisionist history at the “Rediscover God In America” conference I posted on here — Huckabee Says He Wants Americans To Be Indoctrinated At Gunpoint by David Barton . I guess someone’s got to make up for Beck eventually leaving the air at Fox. Transcript below the fold. VAN SUSTEREN: All right, well, let me just turn quickly you have a learn our history. It’s a program you have. What is that? HUCKABEE: Greta, you know, if you tell an 8-year-old, Hey, I’d like to teach about American history, they’ll probably say to you, Why don’t you just set my hair on fire? But if you tell an 8-year-old, Hey, would you like to watch some cartoons, they’ll say, Oh, yeah. If the cartoons teach them that America is a good country and teaches them some wonderful things about America’s history, that’s Learn Our History is all about. It’s really a program for kids ages 7 and up to teach them American history in a language and in a format that makes sense to kids. Now, the thing that I find interesting, 91 percent of liberals who were shown the videos said they not only learned something, they would buy them for their kids. What I find interesting is that we’ve got a real serious history deficit in the country. Do you realize that only 25 percent of high school seniors in America surveyed even know that George Washington was the first president? That’s amazing to me that kids are that ignorant of their history of this great country. So Learn Our History is about helping them to learn it beyond the classroom in an entertaining and fun way. And I hope that people will take a look at the videos for their kids at Learnourhistory.com. VAN SUSTEREN: Yeah and it’s probably great for adults, too. I probably could use some refresher myself. Thank you, Governor. HUCKABEE: Thank you, Greta.
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