Crackdown launched against Xe private security companies, 3 guards arrested

The federal police conducted a search operation against several security companies in different sectors of the capital after recovering of illegal arms from the house of an owner of a security company and arrested three security guards.

According to sources, the late night operation was conducted by the police after getting red signal from the interior ministry.

The late night raids on other security companies were made after large cache of arms were seized from a company providing security to US diplomats. The police during the raid inquired about details of licenses of arms.

Kohsar Police has also arrested three security guards of security company on suspicion.

Sources told that the Interior Ministry after recovering of illegal arms in huge quantity from the owner of house of Inter-Risk Security Company has decided to conduct a survey of hiring 200 residential buildings by US embassy. Sources said that the decision has been taken to know objectives behind hiring these houses.

Meanwhile US Embassy spokesman Rick Snelsire said the US contract with Inter-Risk to provide security at the embassy and consulates took effect this year. It is believed to be the first US contract for the firm, Snelsire said. He did not know how long the contract was for or what it was worth.

“Our understanding is they obtained licenses with whatever they brought into the country to meet the contractual needs,’’ he said. “We told the government that we had a contract with Inter-Risk.’’

A man who answered the phone number listed for the company and identified himself as Riaz Hussain said a raid had occurred, but gave no more information.

According to Inter-Risk’s website, it was first formed in 1988 and offers wireless home alarm systems as well as security guards and other services.

Though the US Embassy in Islamabad does have American security staff, much of the work is done by local workers. At checkpoints and gates leading to the embassy compound, for instance, Pakistani security guards inspect vehicles and log in visitors.

Scandals involving private contractors have dogged the United States in the Middle East and South Asia.

In Washington on Friday, the Commission on Wartime Contracting heard testimony about another contractor – ArmorGroup North America – involving alleged illegal and immoral conduct by its guards at the US Embassy in Afghanistan.

Earlier this year, the Iraqi government refused to grant Xe Services – the new name for what was once Blackwater – an operating license amid continued outrage over a 2007 lethal firefight involving some of its employees in Baghdad, although the State Department has temporarily extended a contract with a Xe subsidiary to protect US diplomats in Iraq.

Many of the recent rumors in Pakistan have been prompted by US plans to expand its embassy space and staff.

Among the other unsubstantiated stories the United States denies: that 1,000 US Marines will land in the capital, and that Americans will set up a Guantanamo-style prison.

Pakistan, China agree to develop new satellite

by: ChinaDaily

Pakistan and China signed an agreement on Friday to develop a new satellite, PAKSAT-1R, in about three years period, Pakistan’s Economic Affairs Division (EAD) said in a press release in Islamabad.

According to the framework agreement signed by EAD Secretary Farrakh Qayyum and Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan Luo Zhaohui, China will fund the satellite project with a soft loan of 1.35 billion yuan ($200 million) carrying maturity period of 20 years.

The communication satellite will have 30 years transponders, 12 in C-Band and 18 in Ku-Band, each of 36 MHz Bandwidth. The program is in line with Pakistan’s Medium Term Development Framework (MTDF 2005-10) objectives and may provide better satellite communications for Pakistan, said the press release.

Pakistan Space and Upper Atmospheric Research Commission (SUPARCO) and China Great Wall Industry Corporation (CGWIC) will jointly develop the new satellite to replace the Pakistan Space Craft, which is likely to expire in 2011.

3 Wrongs Don’t Make a Right

The recent visits to Moscow and Tehran by Hugo Chavez raise a number of concerns about the deepening relations between Russia, Iran and Venezuela.

The motivation behind the Russia-Iran-Venezuela alliance is often misunderstood. On the one hand, there is the narrative that these governments are pursuing national interests, seeking to deepen their security against ever-present external threats and accrue regional power. Others argue that the alliance is driven by an attempt to build an “alternative architecture” of global relations, one that is conveniently unconcerned with democracy and human rights and bound solely by the common value of anti-Americanism.

Both these assumptions are dangerously misleading. In reality, the foreign policies of these three states are driven by the personal interests of clans that control the highest offices of their governments.

In addition to sharing a national leader-for-life mentality, the leaders of these three countries regularly employ the powers of the state in support of clan-controlled businesses, especially in the energy and arms sectors. When Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin travels to Venezuela (he visits Caracas with extraordinary frequency), there is little to no separation between his diplomatic duties and personal financial interests in inking deals between Rosneft and PDVSA. When the Iranians travel to Caracas, they are given a red carpet welcome to jointly operated factories and the assistance of elaborate money-laundering networks.

Chavez’s family and close-knit clan of loyal military officers have become multibillionaires under his rule. Known as the boligarchs, they benefit directly from the alliance of Russia and Iran since it lends much-needed credibility and legitimacy to their plunder of the country. In exchange, Chavez last week visited Moscow and announced that Venezuela would recognize the independence of the Georgian breakaway regions, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. On the way, he stopped in Turkmenistan to invite the president to join the Russian-inspired gas cartel — despite the fact that Venezuela is a net importer of natural gas from Colombia.

It is important to recognize that reciprocally reinforcing mechanisms of corruption hide behind the facade of state institutions in all three countries. These systems are inherently duplicitous, using laws and instruments of state authority to enhance rather than control corruption. It is corruption cloaked in nationalism, religion and self-defense. All three countries — with Venezuela far in the lead — have unstable civil-military relations that are fraught with the tensions of unlimited power and limited ability to control some key interest groups. Ironically, Iran is the most pluralist of the three.

What are the symptoms of clan rule?

• The horizontal of incompetence. Rather than a vertical of power, there is a horizontal of incompetence, characterized by a systemic inability to delegate power because of the lack of trust and poorly defined institutional responsibility.

• Short-termism. The ongoing internal fights over property in all three countries leave elites focused more on internal than external battles. Policy flip-flops are the rule rather than the exception. The only constant is the need for crisis. From the Georgian war to the FARC to the virulent anti-Semitism of Chavez and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the fire of the invective is inversely proportional to the need to mobilize security forces and keep internal opposition off-balance. The speed of opposition crackdowns is the one constant.

• Definitional anti-Americanism. The image of the Great Satan is another constant that needs to be continually kept alive. For leaders who speak of multivector diplomacy, there is a compulsive need to be obsessed with U.S. power and to foster anti-American attitudes as a tool to unite their societies. Yet in the face of the Obama administration, readiness for this is becoming harder to sustain.

Russia’s legislation to ring-fence the “strategic sectors” of the economy provides a compelling example of clan-based interests at work. It is more accurate to call this the siloviki retirement plan because it protects businesses controlled by key individuals around the prime minister. But even better, it allows them to enrich their friends through tied sales between military, energy, and civilian nuclear technology. And now, if you are Chavez, throwing in recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia will give you a cheap credit to buy 100 Russian tanks.

The crackdowns on civil liberties recently in evidence in Tehran, Caracas and Moscow reflect the insecurity of three juntas that lack internal legitimacy and are fighting to maintain the private property they have amassed. Whether it is the Venezuelan boligarchs, the Revolutionary Guard or the siloviki, the torture and cruelty of the jails and show trials are directly related to their interest in safeguarding assets rather than ideology. All three leaderships are engaged in a quest for impunity and the possession of nuclear weapons sought by Iran and Venezuela is part of that process. The success of North Korea is not lost on these leaders. It is small wonder that Russia has so little interest in resolving the nuclear impasse over Iran.

The real danger, however, is that we too often confuse cause and symptom and fail to recognize how false fronts operate in these countries. Nearly all analyses, whether internal or external, see their systems through a prism that hides the power of clans and cabals. In order to formulate effective policies to respond to the new alliance of Russia, Venezuela and Iran, our first step should be to better understand what is motivating such odd bedfellows.

Robert R. Amsterdam is an international lawyer who represents political prisoners in several countries, including Eligio Cedeño in Venezuela and Mikhail Khodorkovsky in Russia. The views expressed in this comment are his alone.

Courtesy: Moscow Times

UN urges Israel to allow nuclear inspection

Global Research, September 18, 2009

Al Arabia – 2009-09-19

VIENNA (Agencies) — The U.N. nuclear assembly voted on Friday to urge Israel to accede to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and place all atomic sites under U.N. inspections, in a surprise victory for Arab states.

The resolution, passed narrowly for the first time in nearly two decades, expresses concern about “Israeli nuclear capabilities” and calls on International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed al-Baradei to work on the issue.

Initially, Western states tried to stop the resolution from going to a vote, arguing it would be counterproductive to single out Israel, particularly after a resolution had been passed the day before calling on all states in the Middle East to foreswear nuclear weapons.

But the adjournment motion was defeated and voting went ahead, with a total 49 countries in favour, 45 against and 16 abstentions.

It is the first time since 1991 that such a resolution has been adopted.

Israel’s arch-enemy Iran had spoken in favour of the resolution, describing Israel’s nuclear capabilities as “a potential threat to the peace and security of the world.”

It also undermined the integrity and credibility of the non-proliferation regime and the NPT, argued Tehran’s ambassador to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh.

After the vote, Soltanieh described the resolution as “very good news and a triumph for the oppressed nation of Palestine.”

Russia and China also backed the resolution.

Israel refuses cooperation

Israel is one of only three countries worldwide along with India and Pakistan outside the nuclear NPT and is widely assumed to have the Middle East’s only nuclear arsenal, though it has never confirmed or denied it.

“The delegation of Israel deplores this resolution,” David Danieli, deputy director of Israel’s atomic energy commission, told the chamber after the vote.

“Israel will not cooperate in any matter with this resolution which is only aiming at reinforcing political hostilities and lines of division in the Middle East region.”

The measure was last voted on in 1991 when it passed by 39-31 with 13 abstentions when IAEA membership was much smaller.

Since then there has only been presidential summaries of debate on this item or motions for adjournment or no action that carried the floor.

Diplomats pointed to the increased number of abstentions — from countries ranging from India to Argentina and Nigeria as an important factor in the resolution’s adoption.

U.S. Missile Shield Plans: Retreat Or Advance?

by Rick Rozoff
	.// <![CDATA[// // <![CDATA[//
Global Research, September 18, 2009 On September 17 the White House and the Pentagon, Barack Obama and Robert Gates, announced that after a sixty-day review of the project, the U.S. is going to abandon plans to station ten ground-based interceptor missiles in Poland and a forward-based X-band missile radar installation in the Czech Republic. The deployments were negotiated with both prospective host countries by the preceding George W. Bush administration under the guise of protecting the United States from alleged long-range missile attacks by what were described as rogue states: Iran and North Korea. Interceptor missiles in Poland would only be of use in protecting the U.S. if Iran possessed intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of being fired over the Arctic Ocean. No serious person has ever suggested Iran has such a capability or ever will. But Russian ambassador to NATO Dmitry Rogozin remarked last November that U.S. missiles in Poland could hit his nation's capital of Moscow in four minutes, as NATO warplanes that have patrolled the skies over the Baltic Sea since 2004 could reach Russia's second largest city, St. Petersburg, in five minutes. Leading Russian officials, political and military, have unanimously accused Washington of targeting their own nation and its strategic forces rather than Iran with its third position missile shield plans. Surveys have consistently demonstrated that a majority of Poles oppose the stationing of American missiles and the troops that would accompany them in their nation. Polls in the Czech Republic show over two-thirds opposition to the basing of interceptor missile radar in that country. Much of the world, then, was relieved to read the news that the U.S. was reversing course and renouncing designs to base missile shield facilities in Eastern Europe. What Washington has stated, though, is not so straightforward. President Obama's statement began with "President Bush was right that Iran's ballistic missile program poses a significant threat. And that's why I'm committed to deploying strong missile defense systems which are adaptable to the threats of the 21st century." The second sentence confirms the position on so-called missile defense that his administration has repeatedly and unswervingly voiced since coming to power in January: A global interceptor missile system will be deployed when and exactly where it is proven to be most capable of achieving its purpose and in the most cost-effective manner. In American vernacular, the White House and the Pentagon want more bang for the buck. The underlying motive for a universal interceptor missile system - based on land, at sea, in the air and in space - is to secure uncontested American international military superiority by making itself and key allies impenetrable to retaliation by nations like Russia and China. Obama also said, "I have approved the unanimous recommendations of my Secretary of Defense and my Joint Chiefs of Staff to strengthen America's defenses against ballistic missile attack. This new approach will provide capabilities sooner, build on proven systems, and offer greater defenses against the threat of missile attack than the 2007 European missile defense program." There is nothing equivocal about that pledge. Obama is promising a missile shield system not only more effective but more ambitious than the one he has rejected. The major drawback of ground-based missiles in Poland is that they would be fixed-site deployments. For several years now Russia has warned that it was prepared to base Iskander theater ballistic missiles in its Kaliningrad region, which borders Poland, should Washington deploy its missiles to that nation. Obama and his defense secretary Robert Gates have suggested a more mobile, less detectable system that cannot be as easily monitored and if need be neutralized. The American president boasted that "we have made specific and proven advances in our missile defense technology, particularly with regard to land- and sea-based interceptors and the sensors that support them. Our new approach will, therefore, deploy technologies that are proven [and] do so sooner than the previous program.” That is, he proposed an alternative that in no manner indicates a retreat from his predecessor’s plan. Perhaps quite the contrary, as he announced a “new missile defense architecture in Europe [that] will provide stronger, smarter, and swifter defenses of American forces and America’s allies. It is more comprehensive than the previous program; it deploys capabilities that are proven and cost-effective; and it sustains and builds upon our commitment to protect the U.S. homeland against long-range ballistic missile threats; and it ensures and enhances the protection of all our NATO allies.” The last eleven words are key to understanding why the U.S. is preparing to abandon bilateral arrangements with Poland and the Czech Republic. The shift in policy is one of emphasis and not essence and portends the expansion and not the constriction of missile deployment plans in Europe. The following words of Obama’s clarify the situation yet further: “This approach is also consistent with NATO missile – NATO’s missile defense efforts and provides opportunities for enhanced international collaboration going forward. We will continue to work cooperatively with our close friends and allies, the Czech Republic and Poland….Together we are committed to a broad range of cooperative efforts to strengthen our collective defense, and we are bound by the solemn commitment of NATO’s Article V that an attack on one is an attack on all.” To invoke NATO’s Article 5 is to speak of war. The North Atlantic Treaty founding document of 1949 describes it as follows: “The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.” The reference to United Nations Article 51 was a Cold War concession to the norms of international law, one which NATO cast off in 1999 with its war against Yugoslavia. Article 5 was first employed after September 11, 2001 and used for the invasion of Afghanistan and military operations throughout the Mediterranean Sea and the Horn of Africa, all of which continue to this day, eight years later, and in the first and third cases have been escalated dramatically over the past year. For the last two years leading American elected officials have clamored for the application of Article 5 in defense of Estonia against alleged cyber attacks and even non-NATO members like Georgia and Israel. With Georgia, the calls were made during and after the five-day war with Russia it provoked in August of 2008. Estonia and Georgia cannot even pretend to be threatened by Iran much less North Korea and Syria, so Obama’s mention of NATO’s Article 5 pertains to another nation. Russia. A major Russian news site responded to the news of September 17 with this observation: “As expected, when President Obama spoke to the press on Thursday evening Moscow time, he did not speak about shelving or abandoning anything, but adopting a ‘new missile defense program,’ based on ‘proven and cost effective technology’ that will ‘better counter the current threat.’ It was, he said, ‘more extensive’ than the previous program involving the Czech Republic and Poland.” [1] The same source quoted an analyst at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies, Oksana Antonenko, as saying the former plans for the Czech Republic and Poland “wouldn’t cover the whole territory of Europe, and even from the American point of view the location was not ideal.” Instead, deployments would be focused closer to Iran: “Israel, or possibly Turkey…these are areas where missile systems with existing capabilities would make more sense.” [2] Previous articles in this series have examined Washington’s plans to extend its global interceptor missile system into Israel, Turkey and the Balkans. [3] And the South Caucasus. Another Russian news site quoted Dmitry Polikanov, an analyst at Russia’s Center for Political Studies: “I assume that if further statements by the US administration are made – like the movement of sea-based systems closer to Iranian territory, or like the statement that was made about the possible deployment of a missile defense system in the Caucasus – this of course can cause some concerns for Moscow.” [4] Obama’s Pentagon chief Robert Gates, inherited from the Bush administration, stated on September 17 that “Those who say we are scrapping missile defense in Europe are either misinformed or misrepresenting the reality of what we are doing.” Gates asserted that the new system “provides a better missile defense capability…than the program I recommended almost three years ago.” [5] The Defense Secretary, then, has not indicated a change of course but rather a more sophisticated version of his previous plans. He further stated that “We have now the opportunity to deploy new sensors and interceptors in northern and southern Europe that near term can provide missile defense coverage against more immediate threats from Iran or others.” Or others. He specified the deployment of Aegis class warships equipped with SM-3 [Standard Missile-3] interceptors which “provide the flexibility to move interceptors from one region to another if needed.” [6] The U.S. currently has fifteen destroyers and three cruisers equipped with the Aegis combat system and has incorporated Norway, Spain, Australia, Japan and South Korea into what is developing as a worldwide, sea-based, rapid deployable missile shield structure. The USS Lake Erie, an Aegis class guided-missile cruiser, shot down an American satellite in space in February of 2008 with an SM-3 missile in what some in Russia saw as the opening salvo in American plans for war in space. Gates further laid out his plans for the next generation Star Wars system in stating, “The second phase, about 2015, will involve fielded, upgraded, land-based SM-3s.” Lest anyone believe that Washington’s new plans are an abandonment rather than a refinement of previous ones with Poland and the Czech Republic, Gates was obliging enough to reveal that the Pentagon has already opened negotiations with the two nations “about hosting a land-based version of the SM-3 and other components of the system.” [7] Nothing has been said about reversing U.S. designs to deploy 96 Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missiles in Poland, ones “accurate enough to select, target, and home in on the warhead portion of an inbound ballistic missile.” [8] In fact all indications are that more PAC-3s are headed to Europe to be integrated into a multi-layered NATO missile shield grid to cover the entire continent. On the same day that Obama and Gates made their pronouncements, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said, “It is my clear impression that the American plans on missile defense will involve NATO as such to a higher degree in the future concerning the establishment of missile defense. I highly appreciate that. I think it is in full accordance with the principle of solidarity within the alliance and the indivisibility of security in Europe.” Rasmussen gave particular attention to “our eastern allies within the NATO alliance.” [9] Czech Foreign Minister Jan Kohout said that although the U.S. will not locate the X-band missile radar in his country that it originally intended to, “the Czech Republic will be able to join the new system that the USA wants to create within NATO,” a new system that is “to be more flexible, more efficient and cheaper” and “is to protect the whole of Europe.” [10] As to what aspects the new system could include, former chief of the Russian General Staff Leonid Ivanov was cited as speculating “the U.S. could use military satellites and aircraft carrying laser weapons instead of the radar and interceptor missile base.” [11] Previous articles in this series have dealt with the Pentagon’s Airborne Laser (ABL) missile interception program as well as all other facets of global and spaced-based missile shield components [12]. In August the Pentagon’s Missile Defense Agency announced that it had successfully deployed a modified Boeing 747-400F prototype airplane with laser weapons and that it “found, tracked, engaged and simulated an intercept with a missile seconds after liftoff. It was the first time the Agency used an ‘instrumented’ missile to confirm the laser works as expected. Next up this fall will be the first live attempt to bring down a ballistic missile….” [13] Shortly after the test described above, the Wall Street Journal applauded it in these terms: “Along with space-based weapons, the Airborne Laser is the next defense frontier. The modified Boeing 747 is supposed to send an intense beam of light over hundreds of miles to destroy missiles in the ‘boost phase,’ before they can release decoys and at a point in their trajectory when they would fall back down on enemy territory….The laser complements the sea- and ground-based missile defenses that keep proving themselves in tests. “Never has Ronald Reagan’s dream of layered missile defenses – Star Wars, for short – been as…close, at least technologically, to becoming realized.” [14] The Missile Defense Agency conducted a Space and Missile Defense Conference from August 17-20 of this year and during the proceedings the Boeing Company’s vice president and general manager for missile defense Greg Hyslop presented a design for a “47,500-pound interceptor that could be flown to NATO bases as needed on Boeing-built C-17 cargo planes, erected quickly on a 60-foot trailer stand and taken home when judged safe to do so.” One that would be “globally deployable within 24 hours….” [15] A nearly 50,000-pound mobile interceptor missile launcher deployable within hours, along with laser weapons and SM-3s, would fit in nicely with plans for a joint U.S.-NATO layered missile shield to take in the entire European continent except for Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. Though former director of the Missile Defense Agency Lieutenant General Henry Obering also mentioned Ukraine for inclusion in the system during his tenure at the agency. When U.S. President Barack Obama, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Czech Foreign Minister Jan Kohout – seemingly in unison and at practically the same time – spoke of enhanced missile shield cooperation between Washington and Brussels, the foundation of what such a system would entail is indicated by the Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS). MEADS is a joint U.S.-German-Italian-NATO theater interceptor missile program to upgrade current Patriot and Nike Hercules systems in Europe under NATO command and “will provide capabilities beyond any other fielded or planned air and missile defense system. It will be easily deployed to a theater of operation.” [16] It includes forward-based X-band radar, 360 degree surveillance radar, missile launchers and next-generation Patriot interceptor missiles. “MEADS is interoperable with other defense systems….It can work in association with other missile defense systems, including the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system and the Aegis sea-based missile defense systems….MEADS…may be able to make a material contribution the Active Layered Theater Ballistic Missile Defense system that NATO planners are currently designing.” [17] Foreshadowing the news of September 17, last month the White House requested almost $600 million in funding for MEADS for next year and “Congress is on track to support the Administration’s request.” [18] The Times of London responded to the news about Poland and the Czech Republic with a feature detailing the advancement of the Star Wars program since Ronald Reagan first announced it in 1983. It mentioned, inter alia, Aegis class warships “fitted with Standard [SM-3] missiles that are capable of intercepting enemy rockets, just like the systems based at Fort Greely in Alaska and at Vandenberg airbase in California” and “an airborne laser…that can destroy ballistic missiles by heating them until they fail structurally,” and situated these 21st Century innovations within a broader perspective: “[T]he Americans have been installing [worldwide missile-tracking radar facilities] in locations around the globe: notably, upgrading the radar early-warning site at RAF Fylingdales in North Yorkshire and deploying X-band radar in Japan and Israel.” [19] To which should be added the U.S. missile-tracking base in Vardo, Norway, forty miles from the Russian border, and a comparable facility at the Thule Air Base in Greenland. The news about the cancellation of plans for deploying a missile radar base in the Czech Republic was hailed by the No To Bases organization, the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSCM) and the Czech Social Democratic Party (CSSD), all opponents of the project. But the Czech Social Democrats, who currently have 32% support in the polls and are poised to win next year’s federal elections, differ from other radar opponents in that they have no objection to missile shield components in their country per se but instead are in favor of bringing the Czech Republic into a continent-wide NATO system rather than into a bilateral U.S.-Czech one. Obama’s and Gates’ statements should satisfy that preference, one which prefigures a wider and permanent interceptor missile system that takes in most all of Europe and North America. If that scenario continues to materialize the relief and enthusiasm that greeted September 17th’s news in many parts of the world may prove to be short-lived.

Israel bars Muslim worshippers from reaching Al-Aqsa

By: Daily.pk

The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and Palestine Sheikh Mohammed Hussein said the general closure Israel imposed on the West Bank prevents thousands of Palestinian worshipers from attended the last Friday prayers of the Muslim month of Ramadan at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem (known by Muslims as Al-Quds).

The Israeli security establishment was on high alert Friday, the eve of Jewish New Year. The West Bank was put under a general closure at Thursday midnight, which will be lifted until after Monday.

At the same time, security activity in crowded areas, shopping centers, hitchhikers stations and trains has been increased. Particularly busy areas will be deemed security territory where temporary police stations will be set up for the publics safety.

Police volunteers will secure many synagogues. In addition, security checks at international border crossings will be boosted and activity against illegal residents will continue.

Hussein told Arab News that nearly 150,000 Palestinian worshipers have reached Al-Aqsa, Islams third-holiest mosque after the Grand Mosque of Makkah and the Prophets Mosque in Madinah.

Since the early hours of Friday morning, thousands of Palestinian from across the northern West Bank cities Ramallah, Nablus, Tulkarm, and Jenin gathered at the Qalandiah crossing, north of Jerusalem, Al Aizariyah crossing to the east of Jerusalem, waiting in long-crowded rows to be allowed entry.

The Israeli security forces have allowed Palestinian married men aged 50 and over and women aged 45 and over to enter Jerusalem.

Whereas Muslims from all around the world are holding the International Day of Al-Quds, the Israeli suppressive measures have prevented Palestinian worshipers from reaching Al-Aqsa, said Sheikh Hussein.

Al Quds Day is held each year on the last Friday of Ramadan. Rallies in support of Palestine are held in every capital of the world.

India’s nuclear power a ‘myth’

Dean Nelson | Daily Telegraph, UK

India’s status as a nuclear power has been described as a “myth” by the scientist who carried out its controversial hydrogen bomb tests in 1998.

He said the device had only “fizzled”. The claims by the test director K Santhanam have provoked an outcry in India which treasures its nuclear status as a symbol of its power in Asia where it has been locked in an arms race with both Pakistan and China.

The Indian Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh recently unveiled India’s first nuclear submarine as a statement of its naval ambitions.

But according to K. Santhanam, who directed the secret detonations of five Shakt’ nuclear devices at their nuclear test site at Pokhran, in the Rajasthan desert, the true test results were covered up and falsely hailed as a success by the Hindu nationalist BJP government.

At the time the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee declared: “India is now a nuclear weapons state. We have the capacity for a big bomb now.”

Although he stated India’s bomb would never be a weapon of aggression, the tests were widely denounced and provoked retaliation from Pakistan which tested its own nuclear device 15 days later.
But Mr Vajpayee’s statement was not true, Mr Santhanam has claimed. The data sent to his office revealed the devices had yielded only around half the 45 kilotons it had claimed.

“The decision to declare the hydrogen bomb a success was more of a political fatwa than a considered scientific-technical determination,” he said. He has now called for an inquiry into the test results and warned that the creation of nuclear power could not be “based on myths.”

Courtesy: PKKH

Israelis Now Taps ALL US Telephones And Faxes

by Brian Harring, Domestic Intelligence Reporter

-from various sources-

“It turns out that Israel has had a potential wiretap on every phone in America for years, along with the ability to monitor and record who any person is calling, anywhere in America; information of great value even if one does not listen to the calls themselves. Amdocs, Inc. the company which sub contracts billing and directory services for phone companies around the world, including 90 percent of American phone companies, is owned by Israeli interests. Yet another company, Comverse Infosys, is suspected of having built a “back door” into the equipment permanently installed into the phone system that allows instant eavesdropping by law enforcement agencies on any phone in America. This includes yours.” -From JMP Aurelius whatreallyhappened.com January 17, 2006

It has been clearly established that during the term of President George H.W. Bush, (once head of the CIA and very friendly towards Israel) the Israeli Mossad, or foreign intelligence agency, had gained permission to send approximately 50 of their agents to the United States in order to “observe possible Arab terrorist groups” that might be operating in the relative safety of that country. These Mossad agents worked through the various Israeli diplomatic establishments as well as the Israeli Trade Commission office in New York and such Jewish organizations as the Anti Defamation League.

These agents, who were known to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, were supposed to merely observe possible Arab terrorist groups and were required to pass on any information they discovered on suspect Arab individuals and groups to the FBI. Highly confidential reports indicate that the Mossad agents did not do so and further, were strongly suspected of using their Presidential mandate to carry out very extensive espionage against the United States.

Top secret military hardware was a well-known target and Mossad agents had a very large stable of informants in various sensitive military and governmental agencies, the great bulk of whom were Jewish and who gladly supplied information to the Mossad as what they conceived was their “sacred duty” to the state of Israel.

The document concludes: “Israel possesses the resources and technical capability to achieve its collection objectives.”

A spokesman for the Israeli embassy in Washington issued a routine denial saying that any suggestion that Israelis are spying in or on the U.S. is “simply not true.”

Following the September 11 attacks there were approximately 60 Israelis who had been detained in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorism investigation. U.S. investigators now strongly suspect that some of these Israelis had infiltrated and were spying on Arabs in this country, and probably turned up information on the planned terrorist attacks in September of 2001 that was not passed on to American authorities..

A very important issue concerns an Israeli-based private communications company, for whom a half-dozen of the 60 detained suspects worked. American investigators fear information generated by this firm may have fallen into the wrong hands and had the effect of impeded the Sept. 11 terror inquiry..

American terrorist investigators fear certain suspects in the Sept. 11 attacks may have managed to stay ahead of them, by knowing who and when investigators are calling on the telephone. This is accomplished by obtaining and analyzing data that is generated every time someone in the U.S. makes a telephone call.

Here is how the system works. Most directory assistance calls, and virtually all call records and billing inside the U.S. are done for the telephone companies by Amdocs Ltd., an Israeli-based private telecommunications company.

Amdocs has contracts with the 25 biggest telephone companies in America, and even more worldwide. The White House and other secure government phone lines are protected, but it is virtually impossible for any American to make a call on any American phone without generating an Amdocs record of it.

In recent years, the FBI and other government agencies have investigated Amdocs more than once. The firm has repeatedly and adamantly denied any security breaches or wrongdoing. In 1999, the super secret National Security Agency, headquartered in Ft. George Meade in northern Maryland, issued what is called a Top Secret Sensitive Compartmentalized Information report, TS/SCI, warning that records of calls in the United States were getting into foreign hands – in Israel, in particular.

Investigators do not believe such calls are being listened to, but the data about who is calling whom and when is extremely valuable in itself. An internal Amdocs memo to senior company executives suggests just how Amdocs generated call records could be used. “Widespread data mining techniques and algorithms…combining both the properties of the customer (e.g., credit rating) and properties of the specific ‘behavior….’” Specific behavior, such as who the targeted customers are calling.

The Amdocs memo says the system should be publically advertised as “helping to prevent telephone fraud.” However, U.S. counterintelligence analysts say it could, and unquestionably was, also be used to spy via the records of the American telephone system. The N.S.A has held numerous classified conferences to warn the F.B.I. and C.I.A. how Amdocs records could be used.

At one classified NSA briefing, a diagram by the Argonne National Laboratory was used to show that if phone records are not completely secure, major security breaches are more than possible.

Another NSA briefing document said, “It has become increasingly apparent that systems and networks are vulnerable…Such crimes always involve unauthorized persons, or persons who exceed their authorization…citing on exploitable vulnerabilities.”

Those vulnerabilities are growing, because according to another briefing, the U.S. relies too much on foreign companies like Amdocs for high-tech equipment and software. “Many factors have led to increased dependence on code developed overseas…. We buy rather than train or develop solutions.”

U.S. intelligence does not officially believe the Israeli government is involved in a misuse of information, and Amdocs insists that its data is secure. What U.S. government officials are worried about, however, is the possibility that Amdocs data could get into the wrong hands, particularly organized crime. And that would not be the first time that such a thing has happened.

In a 1997 drug trafficking case in Los Angeles, telephone information, specifically of the type that Amdocs collects, was used to “completely compromise the communications of the FBI, the Secret Service, the DEA and the LAPD.”

There has been considerable but very quiet concern about the 60 Israelis who were detained in the anti-terror investigation, and the suspicion that some investigators have that they may have picked up information on the 9/11 attacks ahead of time and not passed it on.

There exists a classified Justice Department report stating that the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, did indeed send representatives to the U.S. to warn, just before 9/11, that a major terrorist attack was imminent. How does that leave room for the lack of a warning?

What investigators have stated is that that warning from the Mossad was nonspecific and extremely vague and general, and they believe that it may have had something to do with the Israeli desire to protect what are called “sources and methods” in the intelligence community while at the same time attempting to convince American authorities that they were being cooperative and friendly. There is very substantive and documented evidence that those sources and methods were, and still are, taking place in the United States.

The question arose in the Select Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill, chaired by former CIA agent, and subsequently DCI, Porter Goss. Concern was expressed concerning this Mossad spying issue but nothing came of this and the matter was very quickly, and quietly, shelved

An official listing of known Mossad agents and a much larger one listing Mossad informants in the United States is perhaps the best indicator of the degree and extent that this official Israeli organ has penetrated American security, business and military organizations. Its publication would certainly create terrible havoc and would very adversely impact on American/Israeli diplomatic and military relations.

Reports indicate that such established agencies as the Anti Defamation League, several identified national newspapers and one major television network also harbor and assist a significant number of active Mossad agents engaged in espionage activities.

The concern about telephone security extends to another company, founded in Israel, that provides the technology used by the U.S. government for electronic eavesdropping. The company is Comverse Infosys, a subsidiary of an Israeli-run private telecommunications firm, with offices throughout the U.S. It provides wiretapping equipment for law enforcement. Investigative reports also indicate that these offices have been and are being used as bases for intelligence operations directed against the United States via the Mossad agents working in this country.

Here is the method that foreign wiretapping works in the U.S.

Every time a call is made in America, it passes through the nation’s elaborate network of switchers and routers run by the phone companies. Custom computers and software, made by companies like Comverse, are tied into that network to intercept, record and store the wiretapped calls, and at the same time transmit them to investigators.

The manufacturers have continuing access to the computers so they can service them and keep them free of technical errors. This process was authorized by the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA. Senior government officials have reluctantly acknowledged that while CALEA made officially authorized, and unauthorized, wiretapping much easier for Federal authorities, it has led to a system that is seriously vulnerable to compromise, and may have undermined the whole wiretapping system.

Ex-Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller were both warned on October 18, 2001 in a hand-delivered letter from 15 local, state and federal law enforcement officials, who complained that “law enforcement’s current electronic surveillance capabilities are less effective today than they were at the time CALEA was enacted.”

Congress insists the equipment it permits to be installed is secure. But the complaint about this system is that the wiretap computer programs made by Comverse have, in effect, a back door through which wiretaps themselves can be intercepted by unauthorized parties.

In this case, the unauthorized parties is the Israeli Mossad and through them, the government and commercial interests of Israel itself.

Adding to the suspicions is the fact that in Israel, Comverse works closely with the Israeli government, and under special programs and gets reimbursed for up to 50 percent of its research and development costs by the Israeli Ministry of Industry and Trade. But investigators within the DEA, INS and FBI have all privately stated that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying through Comverse is considered career suicide because of the enormous political and political power wielded by the Israeli lobby, the extremely pro-Israeli American television and print media and many Jewish financial organizations in the United States.

And sources say that while various F.B.I. inquiries into Comverse have been conducted over the years, they have been halted before the actual equipment has ever been thoroughly tested for leaks. A 1999 F.C.C. document indicates several government agencies expressed deep concerns that too many unauthorized non-law enforcement personnel can access the wiretap system. The FBI’s own small office in Chantilly, Virginia that actually oversees the CALEA wiretapping program, is among the most agitated about the Israeli ongoing threat.

It is the FBI’s office in Quantico, Virginia, that has jurisdiction over awarding contracts and buying intercept equipment. And for years, they have awarded the majority of the business to Comverse. A handful of former U.S. law enforcement officials involved in awarding Comverse lucrative U.S. government contracts over the years now work for the Israeli-based company.

Numerous sources say some of those individuals were asked to leave government service under what knowledgeable sources call “troublesome circumstances” that still remain under administrative review within the Justice Department.

And what troubles investigators the most, particularly in New York City, in the counter terrorism investigation of the World Trade Center attack, is that in a number of cases, suspects they had sought to wiretap and survey immediately changed their telecommunications processes. This began as soon as those supposedly secret wiretaps went into place

There are growing and very serious concerns in a very significant number of top-level American intelligence and counterintelligence. Many of these agencies have begun compiling evidence, and instigating a very highly classified investigation, into the very strong probability that the Israeli government is directly involved in this matter and has been from the outset.

Speaking confidentially, top U.S. intelligence agencies indicate that “the last thing needed is another Pollard scandal.”

Following the 9/11 attacks, Federal officials have arrested or detained nearly 200 Israeli citizens suspected of belonging to an “organized intelligence-gathering operation.” The Bush administration has deported most of those arrested after Sept. 11, although some are in custody under the new anti-terrorism law. Some of these detainees are being investigated for their possible penetration of known Arab terrorist groups located in the United States, Canada and Europe and through this, having gained specific knowledge of the time and location of the September 11 attacks.

It has been established that an Israeli firm generated billing data that could be used for intelligence purpose, and a recent Justice Department report describes concerns that the federal government’s own wiretapping system may be vulnerable.

In Los Angeles, in 1997, a major local, state and federal drug investigation suddenly collapsed. The suspects: Israeli organized crime organizations, composed mostly of Russian Jews, with ongoing operations in New York, Miami, Las Vegas, Canada, Israel and Egypt.

The allegations: cocaine and ecstasy trafficking, and sophisticated white-collar credit card and computer fraud. . A DEA report under date of December 18 stated that there existed serious security breaches in DEA telecommunications by unauthorized “foreign nationals” — and cites an Israeli-owned firm with which the DEA contracted for wiretap equipment .

The problem: according to classified law enforcement documents, is that the Israeli-based gangsters had the Federal and State law enforcement beepers, cell phones, even home phones under constant surveillance. Some identified Israeli gangsters who did get caught, readily admitted to having hundreds of confidential law enforcement telephone and beeper numbers and had been using them to avoid arrest.

An official LAPD intelligence report states:

“This compromised law enforcement communications between LAPD detectives and other assigned law enforcement officers working various aspects of the case. The Israeli-based criminal organization discovered communications between organized crime intelligence division detectives, the FBI and the Secret Service.”

Shock spread from the DEA to the FBI in Washington, and then the CIA. An investigation of the problem, according to law enforcement documents, concluded, “The (criminal) organization has apparent extensive access to database systems used to identify pertinent personal and biographical information.”

When investigators tried to find out where the information might have come from, they looked at Amdocs, a publicly traded firm based in Israel. Amdocs generates billing data for virtually every call in America, and they do credit checks. The company denies any leaks, but investigators still fear that the firm’s data is getting into the wrong hands.

When investigators checked their own wiretapping system for leaks, they grew concerned about potential vulnerabilities in the computers that intercept, record and store the wiretapped calls. A main contractor is Comverse Infosys, which works closely with the Israeli government, and under a special grant program, is reimbursed for up to 50 percent of its research and development costs by Israel’s Ministry of Industry and Trade.

Asked about another sprawling investigation and the detention of 60 Israeli since Sept. 11, the Bush administration treated the questions with frightened circumspection.

No information considered “injurious” to Israel is ever discussed, or released to the public, by the current Administration

Comedy of errors: IAF bombs Gandhi canal in Jaisalmer-India

By: RupeeNews | Moin Ansari

• Indian planes accidently bomb their own territory–thrice
• IAF planes dropped bombs on Indian territory by mistake on February 7 and February 13.
• Both incidents were reported in Jaisalmer district. On February 7, a bomb fell on Kamode village and on February 13, one more crashed into Doshe Khan ki Dhani.

JAISALMER: In the third such instance this year, an Indian Air Force fighter plane managed to drop a bomb on Indian territory, this time Cops inspect the spot where a Mirage 2000 fighter plane dropped a bomb by mistake in Jaisalmer on Monday night. (TOI Photo) miraculously missing the Indira Gandhi Canal that is a lifeline for millions in western Rajasthan.

A Mirage-2000 aircraft that took off from Gwalior on a routine exercise, mistimed an operation and dropped a 100-pound bomb 12 km from Mohangarh town in Jaisalmer district on Monday night. It was sheer chance that the bomb exploded some 100 feet from the Indira Gandhi Canal. Though the boundary of the canal was damaged, a large chunk of the canal could have breached had the projectile fallen a little closer, flooding nearby towns. A 100-pound bomb can cause damage to life and property up to 200 feet from the spot of explosion.

Confirming the incident, spokesman for the South-Western Air Command Group Captain Manoj Mehta said, “The aircraft had taken off from Gwalior as part of a routine exercise on Monday evening and was to drop the bomb at a target in Chandhan Range, 25 km away from the place where the bomb actually fell.” The Pakistan border is 60 km from Mohangarh town. Two other small villages, Hasam Ki Dhani and Hameed Nada, are barely 1 km from the site of the explosion.

The bomb created a 25-feet-wide crater and over 80 trees were burnt. Dhanna Ram, a security guard at a nearby forest department outpost, claimed he was a witness. “I heard a loud explosion near 1404 RD (an identification marker) of the Indira Gandhi Main Canal around 10.30 pm. When I rushed out of the outpost building, I saw fire and two aircraft flying in the sky,” said Dhanna Ram. On Tuesday morning, he mustered enough courage to visit the spot and then inform police.

Group Captain Mehta added that the bomb may have been released either due to a technical snag or there was delay in the release of the bomb by the pilot for some unknown reason. A four-member team headed by Wing Commander Ajay Kaul and Wing Commander Sudhir inspected the area on Tuesday morning. An inquiry has been ordered into the near-disaster.

IAF planes dropped bombs on Indian territory by mistake on February 7 and February 13. Both incidents were reported in Jaisalmer district. On February 7, a bomb fell on Kamode village and on February 13, one more crashed into Doshe Khan ki Dhani. There were no injuries but the February 13 bombing damaged crops and led to cracks in buildings.

Another eyewitness, Ragaram Vishnoi, also a security guard at the outpost, said he thought the explosion which shook the ground was an “act of God”, but later realised that the bomb could have been dropped by an aircraft.

Shrapnel from the bomb was scattered over an area of 200 metres. “It was sheer luck that the bomb did not hit the canal’s boundary or the bridge which is situated just 100 feet away from the place where the bomb dropped. Mohangarh could have submerged in water if any such thing had happened,” said Ragaram. IAF plane almost bombs Indira Gandhi Canal Vimal Bhatia, TNN 16 September 2009, 12:57am IST

Pakistan elected to Board of Governors of IAEA

Pakistan was elected Friday to the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) against the regional seat reserved for the Middle East and South Asia (MESA) region.

Pakistan was the consensus candidate of MESA. Pakistan’s election took place by acclamation at the 53rd regular session of the IAEA General Conference which is underway in Vienna from 14 – 18 September 2009. Pakistan will now commence its seventeenth (17th) two-year term on the IAEA Board, says a statement issued by the Foreign Office.

Pakistan’s election to the Board of Governors is a recognition of its long standing commitment to the aims and objectives of the IAEA. It has pursued peaceful uses of nuclear technology, in particular nuclear power generation. Pakistan has traditionally played an active role in the Agency. During this term Pakistan will work closely with the Agency and fellow member states for further development of peaceful nuclear energy at the national, regional and international levels.