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Tag: terrorism

  • Georgetown Student Arrested for Making Ricin in Dorm

    A Georgetown student was arrested in Washington Friday, after showing his resident advisor a bag of homemade ricin he’d made in his dorm room. The advisor contacted police, and Daniel Harry Milzman, 19, of Bethesda, Md., was taken into custody, after testing confirmed the substance was ricin, according to a court document.

    Milzman claims to have learned how to produce the lethal substance using his iPhone, and went and purchased the ingredients at retail stores.

    Ricin is a highly toxic, naturally occurring lectin (a carbohydrate-binding protein) produced in the seeds of the castor oil plant Ricinus communis. A dose the size of a few grains of sand can kill an adult, and acts as a toxin by inhibiting protein synthesis. Ricin causes severe diarrhea, and victims can die of circulatory shock. Symptoms typically don’t present themselves for a few hours to a full day after exposure, and most victims die within 3-5 days. Survivors typically experience long-term organ damage.

    Most acute poisoning cases due to overdose are attributed to the ingestion of whole castor oil beans. Just 5-20 beans can be fatal to an adult, though those who survive experience nausea, diarrhea, tachycardia, hypotension and seizures persisting for up to a week.

    The U.S. military first examined weaponizing ricin during World War I, though the conflict ended before the substance could be deployed as a biological agent. During World War II, the military considered coating bullets with the substance, but mass production of ricin proved to be uneconomical.

    Ricin is listed as a schedule 1 controlled substance under both the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention and the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, and has been viewed as a domestic threat, as castor beans are easy to come by.

    Andrew Ames, a spokesman for the FBI’s Washington Field Office told The Washington Post, “Based on our investigation, we do not believe there is any connection to terrorism.There is no immediate threat to members of the Georgetown community.”

    Georgetown University issued a press release concerning the incident stating, “Anyone exposed to ricin would have presented with severe symptoms within 24 hours. This window has passed and there are no reports consistent with ricin exposure.”

    Image via Wikimedia Commons.

  • Brazil No-Fly Zones for World Cup: With a Catch

    Brazil’s Air Force has established no-fly zones around the stadiums hosting the 64 soccer games of the 2014 FIFA World Cup taking place July 12-13. A four mile perimeter has been set around each stadium, and the suspensions will begin one hour before each game, and last 4-5 hours, though takeoffs are permitted. Planes cannot land at any of the eight airports that sit near any stadiums hosting games during the no-fly period.

    Though, there is a bit of a catch. The Brazilian Air Force isn’t legally allowed to shoot down any offending planes, and the anti-aircraft guns posted around the stadiums cannot legally be fired at intruders, according to Air Force Brigadier Antonio Carlos Egito. The games will take place in 12 cities, and though defenses are in place, as of now, they can’t be utilized if an incident were to occur. The Air Force is lobbying to change some laws before the games begin.

    The following clip describes the cities and stadiums where the 2014 World Cop games will be hosted:

    The no-fly zone measure won’t affect any of Brazil’s major airports, though the suspensions will hinder flights at Rio de Janeiro’s domestic airport Santos Dumont. Still, civilian aviation regulator ANAC president Marcelo Guaranys says that only ten percent of seats have been sold on Brazilian domestic flights for the games.

    An estimated 600,000 foreigners are expected to arrive for the World Cup, along with another 3 million Brazilians. In order to alleviate the impending crunch due to the influx of visitors, the Air Force is allowing certain flights to land at various bases. Portugal’s team will land in Campinas, followed by a press plane with 200 journalists and four private jets carrying superstar Cristiano Ronaldo and his family.

    Civil Aviation Minister Wellington Moreira Franco confirmed that Italy will be able to use Santa Cruz Air Force base near Rio de Janeiro, in order to bypass the city’s crowded airports.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons.

  • Malaysia Airlines Plane: The Mystery Continues

    The mysterious disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 remains unexplained, even though multinational search teams are in the Asian waters, where it is thought to have gone down, and in the air, searching relentlessly.

    One consideration of the disappearance is foul play, as suspicions were raised by officials discovering that two passengers were traveling on fake passports. Interpol said in a statement it was investigating all other passports used to board Flight MH 370 and was working to determine the “true identities” of the passengers who used the stolen passports.

    “I can confirm that we have the visuals of these two people on CCTV,” Malaysian Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said at a news conference late Sunday, adding that the footage was being examined. “We have intelligence agencies, both local and international, on board.”

    A technical malfunction or an explosion caused by terrorism are among possibilities under scrutiny as the search for wreckage continues. Mostly due to the lack of any warning or communication from the flight deck, suggesting a sudden, catastrophic incident.

    However, with technical difficulty it is unlikely that a mayday or radio contact would not have been made. At cruising altitude in good weather, even with a total loss of engines – pilots would have ample time to make an emergency call.

    Because of the lack of wreckage in the areas being searched makes it more likely that the plane blew up high in the air, rather than breaking up upon sudden impact with water.

    A third theory is that the plane was deliberately steered into the sea, under duress by a hijacking, or by the pilot committing suicide.

    Meanwhile, Thailand’s navy is shifting its search focus away from the Gulf of Thailand and the South China Sea, Thai Navy Rear Adm. Karn Dee-ubon told CNN on Sunday. The shift came at the request of the Malaysians, who are looking into possibilities that the plane could have turned around and could have gone down in the Andaman Sea, near Thailand’s border, Karn said.

    But the pilot appears to have given no signal to authorities that he was turning around, the officials said.

    One promising lead has turned out to be a dead end. A “strange object” spotted by a Singaporean search plane late Sunday afternoon is not debris from the missing jetliner, a U.S. official familiar with the issue told CNN on Sunday.

    By the end of the day Sunday, more than 40 planes and more than two dozen ships from several countries are involved in the search. And if that isn’t enough, the Chinese navy dispatched a frigate and an amphibious landing ship, according to a online post by China’s navy. Those ships are expected to arrive on site Monday morning.

    Malaysian authorities have not yet confirmed the report of the oil slicks spotted from the air, which came from Vietnam’s official news agency.

    But there are certainly big questions that far outweigh the few fragments of information that have emerged about the plane’s disappearance.

    And lets not forget the relatives of the 227 passengers and 12 crew members on board. The agony of not knowing what really happened, and the wait for their friends and loved ones that most likely will not return.

    Among the passengers, there were 154 people from China or Taiwan; 38 Malaysians, and three U.S. citizens. Five of the passengers were younger than 5 years old.

    Image via YouTube

  • Malaysia Airlines Plane: Was It Hijacked?

    As the search for the vanished Flight MH370 continues, the likely outcome becomes grimmer and grimmer with each passing minute. Already the surviving family members of those on board have been told to prepare for the worst.

    Even though it remains uncertain exactly what went wrong or even where the plane may have crashed, investigators are already considering various scenarios.

    According to military radar, the Boeing 777 may have turned back around prior to disappearing from the radar. Despite the revelation, Vietnamese Air force chief Rodzali Daud says that they cannot say for certain what direction the plane may have been headed in its last few minutes.

    Daud said in a press conference, “We are trying to make sense of this.The military radar indicated that the aircraft may have made a turn back and in some parts, this was corroborated by civilian radar.”

    It is standard procedure for pilots to inform traffic control officials if they intend to do a U-turn said Malaysia Airlines Chief Executive Ahmad Jauhari Yahya.

    This had not been done. There was also no distress signal or indication of any kind that the plane may have been in trouble, which officials find especially odd given the circumstances.

    The bizarre nature of the airplane’s last few documented minutes and its sudden disappearance both suggest to authorities that something of a criminal nature may have occurred.

    Officials revealed on Saturday that at least two passengers whose names were listed on the flight’s manifest were not their own. The identities used by two individuals matched the names on two passports that were reported stolen in Thailand.

    Malaysian Transport Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said that authorities were looking into the identities of four suspicious passengers and that the relevant information had been passed on to intelligence agencies in the international community. The FBI is also said to be looking into the matter.

    The sudden vanishing of the plane is said by experts to be consistent with a possible explosion.

    Was the plane’s disappearance due to an attempted hijacking gone wrong or act of terrorism? Each new clue seems suggest something nefarious to be at the root of the disappearance of Flight MH370.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Americans Still Cite Terrorism as Top Concern

    It’s been over 12 years since the World Trade Center tower fell, yet terrorism still remains the top concern for Americans when considering threats to their country.

    New Gallup poll results out today show that 77% of U.S. adults believe international terrorism is a critical threat to the vital interests of the U.S. Another 19% consider terrorism to be an important, but not critical threat to the U.S. Other threats that a majority of those surveyed consider critical include Iran developing nuclear weapons (76%), Islamic fundamentalism (57%), the conflict between North and South Korea (53%), and the economic power of China (52%).

    Though fears of terrorism and Iran’s nuclear program remain high, Americans have come to recently view both issues as slightly less critical to the U.S. That 76% who believe Iranian nukes are critically important are down from the 83% who thought the same thing last year – more than even the 81% who considered terrorism a critical threat in 2013. This, less than one year after the Boston Marathon bombings rocked the U.S. with another incident of domestic terrorism.

    While terrorism concerns have fallen slightly since last year, concerns about Islamic fundamentalism have jumped in recent years. Gallup’s survey in 2013 found 53% of Americans considered Islamic fundamentalism a critical threat, and even that was up from the 51% who stated the same in 2004.

    In its blog post Gallup pointed out that terrorism and nuclear weapons have consistently appeared as top U.S. threat concerns over the past decade. The polling firm, however, steers clear of addressing the irony of Americans considering nuclear weapons, religious zealots, and economic superpowers some of the most critical threats to their country.

  • Israeli Airstrikes Target Hezbollah Weapon Shipments

    In 2006, Israel and Hezbollah fought a 34 day battle which ultimately resulted in nothing gained but many lives lost. This conflict, known as the 2006 Lebanon War or 2006 Israel-Hezbollah War, was just part of the much larger Israeli-Iranian proxy-war, a perpetual struggle for power between the Jewish Israeli state and the Muslim state of Iran.

    Since hostilities officially ended in the summer of 2006, however, Israel and Hezbollah have not forgotten their deep-seated hatred for one another, a feud aided by the geographic closeness of the fighting parties. It was this close proximity which led to the airstrikes enacted by the Israeli government late Monday night somewhere along the Lebanese-Syrian border.

    On Tuesday, Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, declined to confirm reports that Israel had indeed conducted an airstrike along the Lebanon-Syria border, simply stating, “Our policy is clear. I don’t comment about what we did or didn’t do—but we will do whatever is needed to protect Israel’s security.”

    While Israel has a history of declining to comment on its foreign affairs, a senior Israeli security official confirmed to TIME that the strike had hit a convoy transporting surface-to-surface missiles from Syria into Lebanon, the homebase of Hezbollah militants.

    Hezbollah’s presence in Syria has increased drastically since the onset of the Syrian civil war in 2011. Because Hezbollah’s main population is derived from Shi’a Muslims, it closely follows the political actions of Iran, a state which has attempted to bolster the defense of the Assad regime in Syria to cement the ties between the two countries and maintain proper defense against the Israeli state.

    In return for Hezbollah’s assistance in the Syrian civil war, Assad and the Syrian regime have given Hezbollah many missiles to be transported and stockpiled in Lebanon. Since 2006, Israel estimates that Hezbollah has amassed a stockpile of over 100,000 rockets and missiles given by the Iranian and Syrian governments.

    Eyal Ben-Reuven, a former senior official in a military camp in Northern Israel near the Lebanese border, believes that Hezbollah’s engagement in the Syrian conflict makes it less likely that Israel will see any form of retaliation for striking the weapons convoy. Ben-Reuven does believe, however, that Hezbollah, Iran, and Syria pose severe threats to the existence of the Israeli state: “Israel has always stayed as the main objective for Hezbollah and Iran. A terror organization gets these kinds of capabilities not for deterrence, but for acts. This is the difference between states and organization. This is something that we have to keep in our hands to prevent this kind of transfer of game-changing weapons.”

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Terrorism on the Rise, Shows New Report

    Terrorism on the Rise, Shows New Report

    The “War on Terror” is well over a decade long at this point, and it doesn’t seem that much progress has been made to stamp out terrorism. A new report has even shown that terrorist attacks worldwide have spiked significantly over the past few years.

    The report, issued by analyst firm IHS, estimates that there were 18,524 attacks in 2013 performed by non-state armed groups. This represents a 150% rise in attacks over the past five years, up from just 7,217 attacks recorded in 2009.

    Unsurprisingly, the Middle East is at the heart of this rise in violence. The instability caused by the Arab Spring in 2010 and beyond has reverberated throughout the region.

    “The epicenter of 2013 activity was in the Middle East, with significant pockets of violence radiating out to neighboring regions in Africa and South Asia,” said Matthew Henman, manager of IHS Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Centre. “We have also seen a dramatic rise in the number of militant and non-militant casualties. In 2012, 13,872 militants and 10,562 non-militants deaths were recorded from open sources. In 2013, non-militants fatalities almost doubled to 17,554 and militant fatalities numbered 21,490. These are some of the largest rises we have recorded in the past several years.”

    Nowhere has the violent influence of the Arab Spring been more evident than in Syria. The country is now embroiled in a bloody civil war in which many neighboring countries have a hand. IHS estimates that terrorist attacks in Syria rose to 4,694 in 2013, a nearly 76% increase over attacks seen in 2012.

    The U.S. has scaled down operations in Iraq in recent years and violence in the country has risen at the same time. The IHS report shows that terrorist attacks increased 52% year-over-year in 2013 and that non-militant fatalities in the country rose by 148%. Suicide bombings are quickly becoming a problem in Iraq, with 2013 suicide bombings rising to four times the amount seen in 2012 – more than twice the suicide bombings recorded in either Syria or Afghanistan last year.

  • Toothpaste Alert? Legitimate Fear, Bizarre Sources

    According to CNN, the United States is telling all airlines headed for Russia to be on the lookout for something peculiar: toothpaste.

    The House Homeland Security Committee’s chairman said Wednesday night that they believed that there is a possibility that individuals would attempt to smuggle explosive materials in toothpaste tubes and cosmetic cases. Sochi, where the Winter Olympics is being hosted, is the anticipated target of these efforts.

    CNN says that a law enforcement source told them that the concern of the officials is limited to the immediate start of the games. Even though U.S. officials are confident about the level of security around Sochi and the actual Olympic games, they say they have heard an increased amount of discussion regarding the targeting of places outside of Sochi, such as public transportation.

    For those that are monitoring the issues with terrorism in Russia, the Caucasus region has been a particularly active source of extremist activity. At the same time, the United States is concerned about the possibility of al Qaeda-related terrorism.

    There were letters sent to several European nations and the United States back in January that threatened Olympians through a possible bombing. Though the letters were dismissed at the time, it may be possible that the latest intelligence may make officials take a closer look.

    As for this new information, as bizarre as it is to connect toothpaste with terrorism, the authorities feel this lead to be true.

    “It’s real. It’s real and we got very good information,” an anonymous government official told the network, “It’s based on a credible source. We’re taking it seriously.”

    When it comes to threats on the United States, it appears for now there is no major concern about any related or unrelated threats at this time. However, there is concern for Americans who are traveling to Russia to watch the games or participate.

    The Obama administration has not declared the event unsafe for Americans to travel to despite the concerns about terrorism. Secretary of State John Kerry says the US isn’t telling people not to go. “…Anybody who wants to go to the Olympics, which are just a great event, should go.”

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Sochi Olympics: Will Security Be Tight Enough?

    The Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia are preparing to get underway as teams across the world begin competing for the gold, silver, and bronze on Thursday evening.

    Both snowboarding and team figure skating will be broadcast on Thursday, even though the Opening Ceremonies will not take place until Friday, February 7th at 7:30 p.m. EST. The Ceremonies will be held at Sochi’s Fisht Olympic Stadium.

    NBC is the official broadcasting network of the Games, and will stream coverage – everything except for the Opening Ceremonies – from Sochi on their website.

    Amid the excitement of the upcoming Games, one question is clearly on the mind’s of fans across the world; how secure will Sochi be? Ticket sales have proved to be dismal, with only 213,000 spectators expected in Russia. An estimated 10,000 of these travelers will be from the U.S.

    In light of the bombings at the Boston Marathon almost a year ago, many of the would-be travelers are avoiding the Games because of safety threats. Back in the summer, the leader of Caucasus Emirate, a terrorist group, implored fellow extremists to wreak havoc on the Games, according to reports from USA TODAY.

    As well, Russian forces have been relentlessly hunting a group of “black widows,” the wives’ of extremists who have been killed by the Russian military; three of these women are believed to have perpetrated two suicide bombings just 400 miles from Sochi two months ago. The deadly bombings, which took place in Volgograd, killed 34 people.

    However, amid the security threats of “black widows” and other radicals, the measures in place to prevent terrorism are numerous; the Russian military is on high-alert and well-staffed, already checking travelers at train stations and other transportation hot spots.

    The United States has prepared a Naval ship to be stationed nearby Sochi, on the Black Sea, to evacuate the thousands of American citizens attending the Games should the need arise. As well, former members of the special ops military group, Delta Force, founded a private security company that will be tracking its clients every move throughout the area, saying that they are able to locate a person within a 3-foot radius using their system. The firm, TigerSwan, is also working with Olympic officials and sponsors of the Games to provide tighter security.

    CEO of TigerSwan, James Reese, says that they also have an emergency assistance team armed and ready.

    Other officials and security experts are not quite as certain of the safety of fans at the Games, saying that while security may be tight at the events, it would be difficult to incorporate such a high level of the same security at all transportation meccas in the area. Also cited are the threats of terrorism that have already taken place.

    Bill Rathburn, a former Olympic security director recently said, “This is the only Games in history where there’s been an announced credible threat well before the Games. Since that threat was made last July, there’s been at least three terrorist incidents that have demonstrated their capability of carrying out that threat. So I think it’s very, very real.”

    Main image courtesy @Olympics via Twitter.

  • Boston Marathon Bombing Suspect May Face Death Penalty

    The Justice Department announced today that they plan to seek the death penalty if a jury finds Dzhokhar Tsarnaev guilty of the Boston Marathon bombing. The Boston Marathon bombing occurred last April and took the lives of three people and injured more than 200 others. The American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts has condemned the decision as Massachusetts has been without the death penalty for approximately 20 years.

    “After consideration of the relevant facts, the applicable regulations and the submissions made by the defendant’s counsel, I have determined that the United States will seek the death penalty in this matter,” Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement. “The nature of the conduct at issue and the resultant harm compel this decision.”

    Tsarnaev, 20, along with his 26-year-old brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev are believed to be the men behind the pressure cooker bombs placed near the finish line at the Boston Marathon. The blasts left more than a dozen people amputated and three people, including an 8-year-old boy, dead. After authorities were able to identify the suspects in the bombing, the brothers allegedly killed an MIT police officer and Tamerlan was eventually killed in a shootout with police. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was injured in the shootout and was later found hiding in a boat.

    Holder’s announced that the death penalty will be sought if a jury convicts Tsarnaev didn’t sit well with the Massachusetts ACLU. Massachusetts, one of 18 states that does not have the death penalty, did away with capital punishment in 1984. ACLU of Massachusetts executive director Carol Rose released a statement on the death penalty for the Boston Marathon bomber today:

    The ACLU is disappointed that Attorney General Holder has authorized prosecutors to seek the death penalty against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. The ACLU opposes the death penalty in all cases, because it is discriminatory and arbitrary, and because it inherently violates the Constitutional ban against cruel and unusual punishment.

    In this case, it is important to keep in mind that the people of Massachusetts, through their elected representatives, have repeatedly rejected the death penalty. Even shortly after the horrible Boston Marathon bombing, a Boston Globe poll found that the people of Boston said two-to-one that they would prefer a sentence of life without parole for Tsarnaev, if he is convicted.

    After the Marathon attack, this community rallied around the slogan “Boston Strong.” Even—and especially—in case like this, that means not letting terrorists or anyone else shake us from our values.

    A victim of the bombing says that she has mixed feelings on the death penalty for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. “It’s not going to change what happened,” Lee Ann Yanni said. “I really don’t think there is a right or wrong in this situation. It’s not going to bring anybody back.”

    A date for Tsarnaev’s trial hasn’t been set, but his lawyers don’t expect it to begin in 2014.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Winter Olympics Will See The Least American Visitors

    As we’re weeks away from this year’s Olympic games, it looks like Sochi will see the least amount of American spectators visiting an Olympic games in the last 20 years. US tour operators blame poor reception on several factors: terrorism fears, lack of hostels and resorts, and the difficulty of obtaining a travel visa to Russia. Now, there’s even been a travel alert issued, after two suicide bombings in nearby Volgograd killed 30 people.

    It’s been reported that Russia, who was expecting to do well with ticket sales, still has 30% of tickets unsold for the games. (The last Winter Olympics, held in Vancouver, sold 97% of their tickets.) Despite Putin’s promise that the games will be safe, along with thousands of police and security patrolling the area, the threats against the games feel very real and possible to many spectators.

    ”It doesn’t take an expert to look at that region and say the Olympics will be such a large target that insurgents will not try to do something,” says a security analyst for NBC. ”There has been an average of 10 to 15 attacks in North Caucasus every month in recent years. It’s just now the press is paying more attention to it.”

    Lt. Col. Robert Schaefer, a who wrote on the conflict happening in the North Caucasus, says the biggest concern should be in the construction workers: “many of them foreigners, they could have taken bribes to look the other way while explosives were buried or caches of weapons stored in the frenzied buildup of facilities over the last few years.”

    The games were decided to be held in Sochi back in 2007, when a personal appearance by Putin, selling his scenic snowy mountains and resort town by the Black Lake, convinced the committee on the location over South Korea and Austria. Now it seems up to Putin onto hold that promise. Schaefer also says that this is Putin’s chance to show that’s he’s the president that can tame the rebellion. ‘What could sell the world more than anything else is he’s the guy who finally did what all Russian Czars couldn’t – he tamed the Caucasus,” Schaefer says. ”You have a large Olympics and you pull it off without incident, then you demonstrate to everybody that you’ve beaten them.”

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Ricin Guilty Plea, Man Also Nabbed For Molestation

    Tupelo, Mississippi native James Everette Dutschke pleaded guilty on Friday to charges related to sending Ricin-laced letters to President Obama. The 41-year-old was also on the hook for mailing letters to Mississippi’s Senator Roger Wicker and Sadie Holland, a Lee County judge.

    Dutschke has been in jail since he had been accused of mailing the toxic letters back in April. Until his plea change, he had vehemently denied any involvement in the act of domestic terrorism.

    Says Lee County Sheriff Jim Johnson about the press release, “It’s closure, and any time you can get that it’s a good thing. [The guilty plea] has eased our community.”

    Johnson also feels that his admission will ease the hurt that Dutschke has brought to local victims.

    As it turns out, before the Ricin accusations were made, he had been arrested for an act of child molestation involving a 7-year-old girl. Dutschke had been taken into custody last January and released on a $1 million bond, after which he was ordered to avoid any contact with the children of his karate school, their families, or even third parties.

    According to the agreement, Dutschke would plead guilty to the molestation charge next week and after having plead guilty to the charges of possessing ricin, mailing the ricin-laced letters, and threatening the life of the president. He will serve his sentences concurrently in a federal prison. Given that he was facing the maximum of life imprisonment, his defense attorney Ken Coghlan viewed this as the best possible outcome.

    “He was facing a lot of uncertainty and at least now he knows where he stands.”

    The Justice Department says that the sentencing will come in sixty days.

    Initially, Paul Kevin Curtis was set up as the fall guy for the terrorist act with James Everette Dutschke going as far as to lift quotes from the Elvis Impersonator’s Facebook account to try and falsely connect him to the sending of the ricin letters.

    Image via WorldBreakingNews

  • Underwear Bomber Appeal Denied; Court Says Claims Have No Merit

    On Monday a federal appeals court upheld the life sentence of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab (aka “underwear bomber”) for trying to blow up a plane headed for Detroit with a bomb hidden in his underwear on Christmas Day, 2009. He had filed an appeal asking for review of the sentence.

    Just one day after his trial began, in October 2011 Abdulmutallab pleaded guilty to eight counts. Abdulmutallab, who is Nigerian, seemingly took great pride in his suicide mission, calling it a “religious duty” aimed at avenging American attacks against his faith. Yet, he argued in his appeal application that the life sentence was cruel and unusual punishment. He challenged a number of decisions by U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds such as failing to order for medical examinations and allowing him to defend himself despite doubts about his competence.

    The appeals court rejected all the defendant’s arguments and challenges against the sentence, saying “none of these claims have merit.” The court said, contrary to Abdulmutallab’s claims, the trial judge had warned him of the consequences of not being represented by an attorney but the now 27-year-old terrorist insisted on representing himself at the time.

    Abdulmutallab, whom the court described as an “educated and adept individual” was trained in Yemen by a radical cleric called Anwar al-Awlaki. Abdulmutallab hid a bomb in his underwear aboard a plane headed to Detroit from Amsterdam. The plane had 281 passengers and a crew of 11 aboard.

    The court ruled that the life sentence was adequate considering the gravity of the crime and the fact that Abdulmutallab deliberately knew what he was doing.

    “These actions show the deliberate, conscious, and complicated path Abdulmutallab chose to pursue in the name of martyrdom.”  The three-judge bench argued that these actions clearly indicated the exact opposite of “incompetence.”

    The 281 passengers on Northwest Airlines flight 253 were lucky. They are alive today because Abdulmutallab’s bomb failed to explode.

    Image via Wikipedia

  • Kerry Says No U.S. Troops Will Return to Fallujah

    Iraqi forces are planning a “major attack” against al Qaeda militants in Fallujah, and while Washington has said it would assist, Secretary of State John Kerry has made it clear that no new U.S. troops will be redeployed to the region.

    The al Qaeda occupation of Fallujah and parts of the Anbar provincial capital Ramadi marks the first instance of militants exacting such open control in major urban areas since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

    Secretary of State Kerry told reporters in Jerusalem on Sunday that the U.S. would assist Iraqi forces that are mostly posted up on the outskirts of Fallujah, commenting that it was “their fight.” Baghdad already has special forces troops conducting small operations inside the city. Kerry added that Washington is “very, very concerned” about the al Qaeda resurgence, but asserted that no new U.S. ground troops would be redeployed after their withdrawal in December 2011.

    “We are not obviously contemplating returning, we are not contemplating putting boots on the ground, this is their fight,” Kerry said, adding, “But we’re going to help them in their fight. We are going to do everything that is possible to help them.”

    Fighting intensifies for control of Fallujah:

    Fallujah is presently under the control of members of the al Qaeda-linked Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which has also claimed the village of Bubali near Ramadi on Sunday. Iraqi ground forces commander Staff General Ali Ghaidan Majeed commented, “we do not know what is happening in Fallujah,” but said the city should “wait for what is coming.”

    On Friday and Saturday, more than 160 people were killed in the Anbar province. In 2013, violence in the region reached a level not seen since 2008, when the country was just recovering from a brutal period of sectarian slayings.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons.

  • Alabama Terrorism: Two Men Receive Maximum Sentence

    Alabama seems an unlikely place for overseas terrorism, but this case proves that you never know where it can occur.

    Reuters tells us that Randy “Rasheed” Wilson and Mohammad Abdul Rahman Abukhdair were each sentenced to 15 years in prison today by U.S. District Judge Kristi DuBose for “conspiring to provide material support to terrorists.”

    The two met online in 2010, and Abukhdair moved in with the Wilson family in Mobile, Alabama a year after. By this time, Abukhdair had already been jailed in Egypt on suspicion of terrorist-related activities, and by 2011 the FBI began recording the two new roommate’s conversations and emails. Authorities stepped in earlier this year after they both were found attempting to leave the country after settling on a place and action for, in the judge’s words, their “well-researched plan” for jihad.

    It has also been reported that Wilson was also friends with the recently killed prominent member of the al Shabaab (and Alabama native) Omar Hammami. The al Shabaab are connected to the recent Kenya and Somalia attacks.

    Attorneys asserted to the court that the accused only said disturbing things, and that one should not be punished for that. The final decision today, however, ended with both defendants receiving the maximum sentence for the charge.

    What do you think? Were Randy Wilson and Mohammad Abukhdair unfairly sentenced or was it just action performed by the United States?

    Image via Youtube

  • Haqqani Leader Killed in U.S. Drone Strike

    The AFP reported on a U.S. drone strike that took place in Pakistan last Thursday. This particular strike was a rare happenstance: it is only the second drone strike targeted outside of Pakistan’s tribal zones.

    Previous drone strikes had targeted the frontier Bannu region and a North Waziristan tribal district in an effort to reduce the influence of Taliban leaders. Accurate casualty counts are hard to come by because of the forbidden nature of the Pakistani tribal districts: no journalists, reporters, or foreign aid workers are allowed inside.

    The drone fired a missile at a religious seminary that fell under the umbrella of the Haqqani terror network, security officials acknowledged. At least six people were killed in the attack, including a high-level Haqqani spiritual leader by the name of Maulana Ahmad Jan.

    Local police sources, speaking to the AFP about Jan, said “He was the spiritual leader and head teacher of the Haqqani network… He was receiving people who were coming to [sic] condole the death of Nasiruddin Haqqani because followers of were not able to meet any other member of Haqqani family.”

    One Haqqani source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said “The seminary served as a base for the network where militants fighting across the border came to stay and rest, as the Haqqani seminaries in the tribal areas were targeted by drones.”

    Pakistani officials responded as expected: by condemning the drone strike as “a violation of sovereignty and counterproductive to efforts to end militancy.” Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Muhammad Nawaz Sharif, insisted last month in a meeting with President Obama that he stop the drone attacks.

    Despite Sharif’s protests, the drone attacks will most likely continue, as they are considered by the U.S. to be a necessary tool in eliminating militants.

    The Haqqani terror network has long been targeted by Washington, D.C. over their Afghan insurgent attacks, including a 2011 assault on the U.S. embassy in Kabul. Various estimates place the number of “drone war” casualties between 2500 and 3700, and Amnesty International thinks the U.S. may be guilty of war crimes over the attacks.

    [Image via Facebook]

  • New Taliban Leader: Same Boss Who Wanted Malala Dead

    CBS News and The Week have both reported that, following the drone bombing of Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud, a new leader for the Pakistani Taliban Movement has been chosen.

    The AP confirmed the ascendance of a new leader with a statement from the Taliban’s leadership council. Mehsud, in particular was a difficult target to hit, with several previous reports of his death proving false and a $5 million bounty placed on his head. But the official word from the Taliban indicates he is quite dead this time, and has been replaced by a man named Mullah Fazlullah.

    Fazlullah’s age isn’t accurately known, but he rose to fame in 2006 when he started broadcasting Islamist messages from a pirate radio station he called “Mullah Radio” in the Swat Valley region. Fazlullah’s broadcasts encouraged a return to Sharia criminal law, the closing of all girls’ schools and the complete cessation of female education.

    In 2009, Pakistani military forces attempted to wrest Swat Valley from Taliban influence. Many homes were looted in the fighting, but a tentative peace was established; Fazlullah dodged the Pakistanis in a game of cat-and-mouse, taking him through the mountains on the border with Afghanistan. He is suspected to be directing operations in both countries using that same mountain range.

    2012 saw Fazlullah step up his campaign against women’s education, particularly when he ordered an inspirational 14-year-old named Malala Yousafzai shot for publicly condemning his desire to close girls’ schools. She survived the attempt, and became an international symbol of defiance against Islamist hardliners in a way that remains similar to her namesake, Malala of Maiwand, who became a symbol of defiance against British Imperialism in the 19th century.

    The Taliban’s previous leader had indicated a willingness to go to the negotiating table. Fazlullah is an extreme propagandist, who appears regularly on YouTube encouraging violence while carrying a U.S.-made M4 assault rifle, perhaps a wartime trophy. After Malala survived the assassination attempt, Fazlullah made additional threats against her and her family.

    Fazlullah and his fellow Taliban hardliners believe they are the sole inheritors of Mohammed’s vision of society in Medina, a mystical egalitarian community that the Islamic Prophet allegedly created in Saudi Arabia. But that vision sometimes clashes with the tribal rules and laws that the Taliban leaders must follow, as their insurgents need shelter, sustenance, and supplies — which they would not get if they operated outside their tribal structure.

    [Image of the old Taliban leader via YouTube]

  • Woman Fired for Boston Marathon Costume [IMAGE]

    Woman Fired for Boston Marathon Costume [IMAGE]

    Yes, Halloween has been over for four days. No, there isn’t any shortage of awful costumes that are making headlines. This costume might not be quite as offensive as the Trayvon Martin costume that outraged many people, but it’s close. Really close. A Michigan woman, Alicia Ann Lynch, came under fire after posting a photo of her tasteless costume on Twitter–she went as a Boston Marathon bombing victim.

    Not only did the 22-year-old woman think that dressing as a Boston Marathon victim was a good idea, she wore the costume to work. According to BuzzFeed, Lynch has since lost her job. Check out the costume Lynch posted to her Twitter account below. The account, @SomeSkankinMI (yes, that’s her real handle) has since been suspended, but once it’s on the Internet, forever it stays, right?

    (image)

    The smiling young woman is dressed as a marathon runner, complete with open wounds and blood trickling down her legs. Lynch received a flurry of Twitter posts condemning her costume, as should be expected. Post your thoughts below.

    Things went downhill for Lynch after one enterprising Twitter poster discovered that the young woman had posted a copy of her driver’s license on her profile, complete with her home address. After that, someone else found some nude photos and videos containing Lynch on Tumblr, which they quickly circulated.

    NY Daily News managed to get a screen capture of some posts made from Lynch’s account regarding the costume before her account was suspended:

    (image)

    Once Lynch’s private information was made public, she says that she has received death threats for her costume choice. “I’ve had voicemails where they want to slit my throat and they want to hang me and tear off my face,” Lynch said. “I’m just like, I don’t even know how to respond to this right now.”

    Lynch’s parents are also receiving threats. Lynch said that someone told her parents “they’re going to blow up her house and hang her child.” Lynch feels really bad for her parents because they had nothing to do with her Boston Marathon bombing victim costume. “My family didn’t know what I was doing. I don’t live with them. And they’re all getting dragged into this for something I did.”

    While the young woman did apologize, she still doesn’t think what she did was that bad. “Honestly, it’s the Day of the Dead,” she says. “I wasn’t a dead person, I wasn’t being disrespectful. I was a survivor of a marathon. And it’s not like I was walking around with a fake leg or my arm torn off or something like that.”

    [Images via All Michigan Live and NY Daily News]

  • Kenya Seizes Ivory, Cuts Off Terrorist Funding

    Kenyan customs officers in Mombasa have seized almost four tons of elephant ivory in two separate shipments Wednesday, amid a spike in poaching of the animals. The illicit ivory trade on the black market has been discovered to help fund terrorism.

    Kenya Revenue Authority official Fatma Yusuf said that one cache of ivory weighing roughly 4,200 pounds was found Friday, under a bag of sesame seeds in the port city of Mombasa, on the Indian Ocean. On Tuesday, another 4,400 pounds was found disguised in a similar manner. Both stockpiles were scheduled to be shipped to Turkey.

    Ivory poaching has been on the rise – Zimbabwean poachers recently poisoned 87 elephants with cyanide in Hwange national park, which holds one of the world’s largest herds. Zimbabwean environment minister Saviour Kasukuwere said that park rangers and police have recovered 19 tusks, cyanide and wire snares, while searching villages close to the park.

    The Kenyan seizures are indicative of the poaching of several, if not hundreds, of elephants. Also found in the Mombasa raid was 1,000 pounds of pangolin scales. Pangolins are anteaters and the only mammal known to be covered in armor made of keratin. The scales are used in Chinese traditional medicine, similar to the way rhinoceros horns are used, and as fashion accessories in Asia.

    Kenya Wildlife Service director Arthur Tudor said searches at Mombasa were being increased in a bid to stop smugglers. “We want to ensure that our port is not used as a transit point of ivory,” he said, adding, “We have to step up the war on poachers to completely wipe out the ivory trade – it is threatening elephant populations in the country and entire region.”

    Ivory trade is illegal under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). Black market ivory generates up to $10 billion a year, and is mostly fostered by clients in Asia and the Middle East. It’s also been suggested that poaching has helped to fund the terrorist attack on the Westgate Mall in Nairobi.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons.

  • US Captures Al Qaeda Leader Responsible for ’98 Embassy Bombing

    According to CNN, U.S forces have captured Abu Anas al Libi, in Tripoli, Libya. Al Libi is said to be a key Al Qaeda operative and had been wanted for his role in the bombing of the U.S. embassies in  Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; and Nairobi, Kenya. The bombing in Nairobi killed more than 200 people and wounded another 5,000. The blast in Dar es Salaam went off synchronously , leaving 11 people dead.

    Its been well over a decade since U.S. officials have been searching for al Libi. The government even put out a $5 million reward leading to his capture,  on charges of murder, destruction of government property, destruction of U.S. defense utilities and conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals.

    The 49-year-old fugitive, whose birth name is actually Nazih Abdul-Hamed al-Ruqai,  is said to have also attempted to establish an al Qaeda presence in his native country of Libya, and according to western intelligence sources, al Libi appears to have been in the country in 2011, around the time Moammar Gadhafi was ousted.

    Al Libi is also known to be a key ally of Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda’s most capable operative. In 2000, the police raided his home in Manchester, England, and found documents detailing plans to destroy various embassies. The documents became known as the “Manchester Manual”. He fled England and had since been at large till now.

    His capture marks the most significant victory against al Qaeda  since the killing of Osama bin Laden, two years ago.

     

    (source via CNN)

     

     

  • Boston Marathon Bomber Wants Restrictions Lifted

    According to the lawyers for Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, his special status in prison is making it too hard for them to defend him. They have asked a judge to lift some of the restrictions placed on the bomber, particularly those regarding his isolation. The lawyers say that Tsarnaev hasn’t done anything since being arrested for the bombing to make officials think he would do anything violent.

    “The government has not alleged that Mr. Tsarnaev has done or said anything since his arrest to commit violence, incite violence, or engage in communications that pose a security threat,” his lawyers said in the filing. “There is no indication that Tsarnaev’s intentions have changed since then.”

    The restrictions are partly in place because of Tsarnaev’s anti-American beliefs, which he could spread to other prisoners if given the opportunity. After he was captured, Tsarnaev told the FBI that he “reaffirmed his commitment to jihad and expressed hope that his actions would inspire others to engage in violent jihad.”

    Should the Boston Marathon bomber’s restrictions be lifted? Respond below.

    The court documents filed further describe his restrictions in prison:

    In respect to legal phone calls, no person, other than pre-cleared attorneys, paralegals, or investigators may participate in phone calls with Tsarnaev or even “listen to or overhear” any part of the calls. Calls cannot be recorded.

    Tsarnaev’s non-legal mail, phone calls, and visits are restricted to immediate family members only.

    Tsarnaev can send only one letter — comprised of three double-sided pages — to one adult per week.

    Only one adult can visit Tsarnaev at a time, and there can’t be any physical contact.

    Family members aren’t allowed to record phone calls with Tsarnaev or discuss the contents of their communication with any third party. (In June, Tsarnaev’s mother released a recording of one of her calls with her son from prison.)

    Tsarnaev isn’t allowed to talk to the media.

    Tsarnaev isn’t allowed to share a cell, participate in group prayer service, or communicate with any of the other inmates.

    Tsarnaev has limited outdoor access and is only allowed to see the outside world in a small, outdoor enclosure.

    Then 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was one of the two brothers involved in the Boston Marathon bombings in April that killed three people and injured more than 200 others. After a firefight that killed older brother Tamerlan and wounded Dzhokhar, police were able to apprehend the younger brother after a man called in to report seeing a bloody body in his boat.

    Image via YouTube