New Age Islam News Bureau
8
Aug 2014
Pakistani Sunni, Shia protest the anniversary of demolition of Jannat ul Baqi
Arab World
• Abu Bakar al-Baghdadi, threatens to occupy Kuwait, take revenge against America
• Syrian Forces Ambush Insurgent Positions, Kill Over 200
• 60 ISIL terrorists killed northern Amirli
• After taking Sinjar, IS draws Iraqi Kurds into full-scale war
• Iraqi Air Strike Kills 8 ISIL Terrorists in Diyala
• Iraqi Army Continues Inflicting Losses on ISIL Terrorists
• Iraq militants control Mosul dam: Officials
• Saudi Wahhabi authorities released Shiite poet and photographer “Habeeb al-M’ateeq”
• Facing slaughter by Muslim jihadists, Iraqi Christians head into exile
• Kuwait committed to fight terrorism
• Bahrain accuses Qatar of luring citizens to switch nationality
• Emergency OIC meet to focus on Israeli brutality
• Executed: Sex pest behind grisly murder of two Yanbu maids
Pakistan
• Pakistani Sunni join Shia rally to protest the anniversary of demolition of Jannat ul Baqi
• Two soldiers, 7 militants killed in Turbat clash
• Widening of Zarb-i-Azb operation likely
• Nawaz again offers dialogue to opposition to end political crisis
• Country under civilian martial law: Shujaat
• Sharifs, not me, planning to flee country: Qadri
• Govt ready for ‘give and take’ with Imran Khan
• Pakistan: Parliamentary parties likely to join national security conference
India
• 'India's Kashmir experience can be a model for Israel in Gaza'
• Incongruity in Meerut victim’s story
• BJP, Parivar outfits to intensify campaign against ‘love jihad’
• Concern over radicalisation of educated J&K youth
North America
• Hillary Clinton admits US involvement in creation of ISIL: Media
• India will help shape a new world order in 21st century: US
• 'Help Israel avoid war crimes charges,' Netanyahu urges US lawmakers
• Obama authorizes air strikes to prevent Iraq ‘genocide’
• US puts Harakat and its affiliates on terror list
South Asia
• Kandahar police chief orders execution of militants arrested during operations
• Charge sheets against 41 BNP men accepted
• War crimes tribunal hears on war child for the first time
• John Kerry presses for Afghanistan unity government
• Karzai says election results must be announced by August end
Europe
• UN confirms ISIL kidnapped 150 Yazidi families, moved them to Syria
• France says ready to support Iraqi Kurdish forces against Islamists
• Messi issues statement to protect children of Gaza
• UNSC to hold urgent talks as militants seize Iraq's Christian town
• Suppression of Islam in Kosovo
Mideast
• Gaza truce expires without agreement between Israel and Hamas
• Hamas says executed Palestinians suspected of spying for Israel
• Thousands of Iraqis fleeing from jihadist violence seeking refuge in Turkey
• Rafsanjani: Zionists, Terrorists Committing Most Horrible Crimes against Humanity
• Palestinian factions refuse to extend Israel truce: Hamas
• Palestinian negotiator rejects disarming of resistance, charges US biased mediator
• Finger on trigger, war not over yet: Hamas leader
• Israel resumes Gaza strikes in response to rockets
Africa
• Nigeria: U.S. Planes Spot Chibok Girls
• Boko Haram gathers new recruits in Cameroon
• Mali jihadi leader reappears to threaten France
• Libya calls for UN-supervised ceasefire
Southeast Asia
• Stay out of politics and stick to job scope, Sultan tells Selangor Islamic officers
• Indonesia’s Baha’i Community Grateful for Long-Awaited State Recognition
• Cops nab woman, release pics of alleged 15, in nude games
Compiled by New Age Islam News Bureau
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Arab World
Abu Bakar al-Baghdadi, threatens to occupy Kuwait, take revenge against America
August 8, 2014
(IraqiNews.com) Kuwaiti security sources confirmed that the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, Abu Bakar al-Baghdadi, has threatened to occupy Kuwait in order to “take revenge and fight” against America. Kuwaiti security sources are monitoring Kuwaiti accounts on social networking sites which sympathize with ISIL.
The Jordanian newspaper “Sawsana” also cited Kuwaiti security sources that “the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant who calls himself Muslim Caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, threatened to occupy Kuwait in order to fight against America.”
Sawsana added in their article, titled “al-Baghdadi threatens to occupy Kuwait,” that al-Baghdadi said on his personal account on the social networking site Twitter that “we have scores to settle with America, but we cannot reach them so we will occupy Kuwait, then America will come to us and we will fight them and our take revenge.”
http://www.iraqinews.com/arab-world-news/urgent-isils-leader-abu-bakar-al-baghdadi-threatens-occupy-kuwait-take-revenge-america/
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Syrian forces ambush insurgent positions, kill over 200
August 8, 2014
Syrian armed forces have conducted operations across the country targeting hiding dens and staging areas of foreign-backed insurgent groups and crushing their infiltration attempts in multiple neighborhoods and eliminating scores of the terror elements.
Government troops killed nearly 200 armed insurgent in an operation targeting hiding dens of the terror elements in the hills overlooking the areas of Wadi Bheiran, Kafr Hour, Bait Saber, Wadi Bal’eh and al-Khalal in the outskirts of Damascus, state news agency SANA reported Thursday, citing a military source.
Several of the insurgents’ vehicles equipped with heavy machine guns were also destroyed during the operation.
Army units also targeted insurgents in Bait Tima, al-Zohour Street and the agricultural establishment in Khan al-Sheih farms in Damascus Countryside, killing and injuring numerous armed elements.
In the same general area, Syrian forces further thwarted attempts by terrorists to infiltrate a military post in the vicinity of Bait Tima town, leaving most of them dead and wounded and destroying their weaponry and ammunition.
In the Quneitra countryside, meanwhile, army units targeted an insurgent staging ground in Ovania village, killing and wounding numerous armed elements and destroying a vehicle.
Government forces further ambushed insurgent fortification in the outskirts of Homs, killing and wounding scores of armed insurgents in Talbiseh, Um Sharshouh, al-Ghajar, Izz-Eddin, Ein Hussein, Rahhoum and Masa’deh and destroyed the weaponry.
In Daraa countryside, Syrian army troops killed and injured more terrorist elements in Haret al-Bajabejeh, surrounding al-Daraj well, al-Sa’eleh water tank in al-Dahiya in Daraa al-Balad, and in Inkhel and near Tal al-Mutawak.
Other army units in the same general area foiled insurgent attempts to infiltrate into al-Jumruk al-Kadim in Daraa al-Balad from al-Katibeh al-Mahjoura, eliminating a number of them and destroying a vehicle carrying several armed elements.
In Aleppo suburbs, meanwhile, Syrian troops stormed a number of insurgent bunkers and staging grounds in several neighborhoods killing a number armed militants and destroying their vehicles.
A number of terrorists were also killed and wounded when their hideouts were targeted by government forces in Bab al-Hadid, al-Salihin, al-Enzarat, Kafar Joum, al-Mansoura, Qadi Askar and al-Sheikh Fares in Aleppo countryside.
Moreover, an army unit killed and wounded a number of terrorists and destroyed their vehicles armed with heavy machineguns while targeting their staging grounds in the towns of al-Sirmanieh, al-Qarqous, al-Sheikh Sindian and Qastal al-Burj in Idleb countryside.
http://en.alalam.ir/news/1620996#sthash.bcx5tkve.dpuf
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60 ISIL terrorists killed northern Amirli
August 8, 2014
Diyala (IraqiNews.com) The Military Intelligence announced killing 60 ISIL terrorists of northern Amirli in Diyala
A statement by the Military Intelligence received by IraqiNews.com cited “The Iraqi Air Force in cooperation with the Intelligence Department bombarded the ISIL terrorists in Amirli district in Diyala and destroyed some of their vehicles.” /End/
http://www.iraqinews.com/iraq-war/0-isil-terrorists-killed-northern-amirli/
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After taking Sinjar, IS draws Iraqi Kurds into full-scale war
August 8, 2014
ERBIL, Iraq — Iraqi Kurdistan appears to be in a state of all-out war as its peshmerga forces have engaged in heavy clashes with Islamic State (IS) militants along a nearly 1,500-km (932-mile) line stretching all the way from the Syrian border in the west to areas close to the Iranian border in the east.
For the first time in the past couple of months, IS fighters attacked areas near Gwer district on the evening of Aug. 6 just some 50 kilometers (31 miles) west of Iraqi Kurdistan’s capital city, Erbil. They seized some villages in the Gwer area, according to Kurdish officials, and fighting is still ongoing in the area.
The chairman of the Peshmerga Affairs Committee in the Kurdistan parliament, Ari Harsin, told Al-Monitor Aug. 7 that the center of Gwer is under peshmerga control. He said peshmerga forces had succeeded in taking back some villages in Gwer, but this assertion could not be immediately verified.
As news of IS’ advance toward Gwer spread on Wednesday night, Erbil residents panicked. The mass influx of residents of the Gwer and Makhmour areas into Erbil intensified the general anxiety. Some people left for nearby mountainous towns to the east and long queues formed at gas stations. At the same time, many civilians took to the streets to boost morale and some engaged in a campaign of shaming those who were leaving the city. Many volunteers, especially men from Gwer and Makhmour, also joined the front lines in the area and the peshmerga ranks have been reinforced. Senior Kurdish officials also went to Makhmour, less than an hour’s drive from Erbil, and appeared on TV to calm and reassure the population that the peshmerga forces were in control.
“[The Islamic State's] most successful tactic has been their propaganda,” Harsin said as he headed toward Makhmour Thursday morning. “They scare people that way; otherwise, they don’t have a large fighting force.”
When Sunni militants led by IS swept Mosul and other areas in northwestern and central Iraq in June, many in Iraqi Kurdistan did not think the jihadist forces would be able to take on Kurdish security forces in a large-scale campaign.
But less than two months later, it has become apparent that the jihadist group plans to expand its caliphate to include the Kurdistan Region. IS fighters have been able to wrest some territory from Kurdish troops in Sinjar and Zummar near the Syrian border in western Ninevah province.
Sinjar's fall on Aug. 3 sent shock waves among Iraqi Kurds at a time when it appeared as though their troops were solidly in control of the areas. Following the successful IS attacks in the area, Kurdistan Regional Government President Massoud Barzani declared war on the extremist group.
“We decided to go beyond the defensive position and fight terrorists to the last breath,” Barzani said in an Aug. 4 statement. “We have ordered the peshmerga forces to attack the terrorists and the enemies of the people and the land of Kurdistan with all their power.”
Following Barzani’s order, peshmerga forces changed strategy and are now launching offensives on several fronts, from areas around Rabia, Sinjar and Zummar to the northern and eastern outskirts of Mosul all the way down to Makhmour, southwest of Erbil.
Al-Monitor visited some areas near Zummar and Rabia on Aug. 4 and found that hundreds of soldiers with heavy weaponry in addition to armed civilian volunteers had been deployed to the front lines and nearby areas.
Kurdish forces control the areas around the lake in Mosul, where Iraq’s largest dam is located. The fault line between Kurdish troops and IS in Kirkuk and Diyala provinces is currently relatively calmer, but those areas have witnessed heavy fighting in recent weeks as well.
The fall of Sinjar has led to a sense of outrage among Kurds, and many ask why the peshmerga forces evacuated the area. As IS militants stormed Sinjar, tens of thousands of the area’s residents abandoned their homes for other towns controlled by Kurdish forces.
There appears to be a broad consensus that some military officials in the Sinjar area had not carried out their tasks properly. Harsin said some senior military commanders have been suspended from their positions and that an investigation is ongoing.
“A soldier’s duty is to defend his country, and if he fails to do that he has not carried out his duty properly and has to be held accountable,” said Harsin, who declined to name the suspended senior Kurdish officers.
The majority of Sinjar’s population adheres to the ancient Mesopotamian Yazidi faith, which predates Islam and Christianity. Yazidis are viewed as infidels by the jihadists.
Although no reliable figures are available, some media reports suggest that the militants have killed hundreds of Yazidi civilians and have taken scores of Yazidi women as spoils of war. Many Yazidis feel betrayed by the peshmerga’s pullout from their areas and say that little resistance had been put up.
“Thousands of forces were there,” said Elias Babasheikh, a prominent Yazidi figure in the Shekhan area, north of Mosul. “How did they leave the area to IS within hours and leave people [at the hands of] IS?”
Some peshmerga officials in the area say they did not just walk away from Sinjar without a fight.
“There was heavy resistance in Sinjar for nearly two months. IS relies on that whole area a lot for moving between the Iraqi and Syrian borders,” Halgurd Khidir Zahir, the commander of the area's Safin Division of peshmerga, told Al-Monitor. He added that IS fighters have more advanced weapons at their disposal, with many US-made arms seized from the Iraqi army in Mosul.
Iraqi warplanes have also bombed IS positions in Ninevah as there appears to be some cooperation between the Iraqi military and the Kurds.
“Everything can happen in a war. It’s not always success,” Zahir said.
An IS statement also announced that the group had taken Sinjar after “heavy battles.”
Since the evening of Aug. 3, peshmerga forces have launched a broad counteroffensive around Zummar, Rabia and Sinjar. On the night of Aug. 6, a Kurdish peshmerga commander told the Kurdish Rudaw news network that his forces had reached a mountain on the outskirts of Sinjar, where UN reports say as many as 200,000 Yazidis are stranded with little food and water.
Forces from the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) are also engaged in the fight in Sinjar and Rabia. Pro-YPG media sources say the group played a major role in the fight, but while acknowledging some involvement, Iraqi Kurdish officials say the YPG did not participate on a large scale.
Zahir confirmed to Al-Monitor that there has been cooperation between peshmerga forces and the YPG, saying, “There is some limited cooperation. We are both based alongside the border and are close to each other.” He added that Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga forces are capable of retaking lost ground.
“Some things are temporary. I might not be here today but will get back tomorrow,” Zahir said in a school turned into a makeshift base in the village of Omar Khalid, near Zummar.
http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/08/iraq-kurdistan-yazidis-peshmerga-isis-islamic-state.html#ixzz39jXmJXl1
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Iraqi Army Continues Inflicting Losses on ISIL Terrorists
August 8, 2014
Iraqi army troops inflicted heavy losses on the terrorists of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group in the suburbs of Hamadanya area, and forced them to withdraw while their leader stole billions of Iraqi dinars and fled.
An informed source said that the Iraqi security forces, using artillery and mortar shells, inflicted heavy losses on the terrorists during its battles against them in the suburbs of Hamadanya area.
Abo Jafar al-Sabaway, the so-called minister of finance of the ISIL terrorist group fled to an unknown destination.
The terrorists started to withdraw and the escape of their minister affected them very negatively since he took 20 billion IQD with him, the source concluded.
http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13930516000510
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Iraq militants control Mosul dam: Officials
August 8, 2014
Arbil: Militants have seized Iraq’s largest dam north of their hub of Mosul, giving them control over the supply of water and electricity for a vast area, officials said on Friday.
“Mosul dam has been in insurgent hands since last night,” said Holgard Hekmat, spokesman for the Kurdish peshmerga force that previously guarded the key infrastructure.
The head of the provincial council of Nineveh, of which Mosul is the capital, confirmed the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) group had captured the dam on Thursday.
“Fierce fighting took place which eventually saw Daash (Isil) take control of the dam,” Bashar Kiki said.
Full report at:
http://gulfnews.com/news/region/iraq/iraq-militants-control-mosul-dam-officials-1.1369646
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Saudi Wahhabi authorities released Shiite poet and photographer “Habeeb al-M’ateeq”
August 8, 2014
(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - On 4 August 2014, the Saudi authorities released the Shiite poet and photographer Habeeb Ali al-M’ateeq, from Al-Rabeeya town in Qatif.
Habeeb al-M’ateeq was detained in February 2012 at his workplace in “SABIC” (Saudi Basic Industries Corporation) in Jubail city in the Eastern province by members of Saudi Directorate of General Investigations (al-Mabahith al-’Amma).
On 1 April 2012, he was fired from the company.
On 2 June 2014, the Court of Appeal in Riyadh, uphold the sentences of jail against him two years in prison.
Full report at:
http://www.abna.ir/english/service/middle-east-west-asia/archive/2014/08/06/629297/story.html
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Facing slaughter by Muslim jihadists, Iraqi Christians head into exile
August 8, 2014
BAGHDAD - Iraqi Christians are again under threat, with tens of thousands that fled after jihadists seized several northern towns today just the latest wave to seek shelter elsewhere in the country and abroad.
Gunmen from the Sunni Muslim Islamic State (IS) seized Qaraqosh, Iraq's largest Christian town, and several others near Mosul following the withdrawal of Kurdish peshmerga fighters, inhabitants said.
Chaldean Catholic Patriarch Louis Sako called the occupation part of a "humanitarian disaster" that has displaced 100,000 Christians and seen churches occupied, their crosses removed and manuscripts burned.
In mid-July, thousands of Christians in Mosul fled after IS gave them an ultimatum to convert to Islam, pay jizya (protection money) or leave on pain of death.
The exodus raised concern in Western capital, and governments began to accept the fleeing Christians as refugees.
Before the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, the country had an estimated Christian population of more than one million, including more than 600,000 in Baghdad, 60,000 in Mosul and concentrations in the oil cities of Kirkuk and Basra.
The latest estimates put the overall number at around 400,000 with more than half living in the northern Nineveh province, of which Mosul is the capital.
Patriarch Sako says there were around 35,000 in Mosul before the IS launched an offensive, though other sources give lower figures, and almost all have since fled.
Christian tradition attributes the evangelisation of what is now Iraq to the apostles Thomas and Thaddeus, and their disciples Mari and Aggai.
Today, the majority of Iraqi Christians are Chaldean Catholics, members of a self-governing church in communion with Rome.
Full report at:
chronicle.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=335852:facing-slaughter-by-muslim-jihadistsiraqi-christians-head-into-exile&Itemid=2#ixzz39jaXidZZ
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Kuwait committed to fight terrorism
August 8, 2014
KUWAIT CITY — Kuwait’s ambassador to the United States says his country is committed to fighting terrorism after the US Treasury Department sanctioned three Kuwaiti men suspected of helping finance terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria. The official Kuwait News Agency, known as KUNA, reported late Wednesday that Ambassador Sheikh Salem Abdullah Al-Jaber reaffirmed Kuwait’s commitment and said it is “approving a law to combat terrorist activity and financing.”
Full report at:
http://www.saudigazette.com.sa/index.cfm?method=home.regcon&contentid=20140808213997
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Bahrain accuses Qatar of luring citizens to switch nationality
August 8, 2014
Bahrain has accused wealthier neighbour Qatar of harming its national security by "luring" some nationals to take Qatari citizenship, state news agency BNA said, a charge that could widen a rift among Gulf Arab countries.
Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates recalled their ambassadors from Doha in March, accusing Qatar of failing to honour an accord not to interfere in each others' internal affairs. The countries are all members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), along with Kuwait and Oman.
Efforts to patch up the rift, largely centred around Qatar's backing for the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood movement which the other countries deeply oppose, have so far failed.
BNA quoted the Interior Ministry's Undersecretary for Nationality, Passports and Residence Affairs, Sheikh Rashid bin Khalifa Al-Khalifa, as saying Qatar had "targeted specific families and singled out a particular category of people" with no consideration to Bahraini laws.
"The naturalisation of Bahrainis would affect Bahrain's national security and vital interests negatively," the agency said on its English website late on Wednesday, quoting the official.
Sheikh Rashid gave no details on who was being targeted for naturalisation or how many had been granted Qatari citizenship.
Bahrain is acutely sensitive to changes in its demographic balance between Shi'ite Muslims and Sunnis.
The Sunni-ruled kingdom has a Shi'ite majority and an ongoing conflict between the government and predominantly Shi'ite protesters calling for more democracy has strong sectarian elements.
Full report at:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/107983/World/Region/Bahrain-accuses-Qatar-of-luring-citizens-to-switch.aspx
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Emergency OIC meet to focus on Israeli brutality
August 8, 2014
The executive committee of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) will hold an emergency meeting here Tuesday to discuss the repercussions of the brutal Israeli attack on Gaza.
The OIC said several foreign ministers have confirmed their participation in the Jeddah meeting, which will discuss how to raise the issue of Israeli barbarism on Palestinians at international forums. The executive committee includes Egypt, Senegal, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Guinea.
OIC Secretary-General Iyad Madani has been following up the resolutions taken by the committee last month by contacting international organizations to stop the continuous Israeli aggression in Gaza.
Full report at:
http://www.arabnews.com/news/featured/613291
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Executed: Sex pest behind grisly murder of two Yanbu maids
August 8, 2014
A Yemeni was beheaded Thursday for sexually assaulting and murdering two Asian housemaids in separate incidents in Yanbu.
Awdah Salem was also found guilty of pouring acid onto the body of one of the victims and hiding the remains of both women at different locations.
The culprit confessed that he had persuaded one of the two maids to run away with him one night during Ramadan for a sexual encounter, after which he killed her and threw her body into an abandoned well 18 km north of Yanbu in 2007. The crime had gone unnoticed at the time.
Full report at:
http://www.arabnews.com/news/613306
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Pakistan
Pakistani Sunni join Shia rally to protest the anniversary of demolition of Jannat ul Baqi
August 8, 2014
(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Sunni Muslims joined their Shiite brothers in a rally that was staged in Karachi on Monday night to condemn the demolition of sacred shrines and graves of Ahl-e-Bait (AS), Companions and relatives of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH), the last apostle and Prophet of God.
The protestors began rally from Sadat Colony that culminated at Shahrah-e-Pakistan near main Super Highway. They were raising slogans against the Saudi Wahhabi monarchs. They were demanding reconstruction of the holy shrines and graves.
Poets and elegy reciters such as Zafar Abbas Zafar, Shuja Rizvi and Dasta-e-Imam Hassan (AS) recited elegies and the faithful Muslims beat their chest to mourn the demolition on its anniversary.
Full report at:
http://www.abna.ir/english/service/centeral-asia-subcontinent/archive/2014/08/06/629269/story.html
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Two soldiers, 7 militants killed in Turbat clash
August 08, 2014
TURBAT - Unidentified armed men ambushed a convoy of Frontier Constabulary in Turbat district of Balochistan killing at least two security men and injuring six others on Thursday.
According to sources, militants ambushed a security convoy of FC in Nasirabad area of Turbat killing two security men on the spot. Six others were injured in the attack. The paramilitary force personnel retaliated and killed seven attackers, the sources said. The dead bodies and injured security men were transferred to District Hospital Turbat. The law enforcement agencies cordoned off the area and conducted a search operation to arrest the attackers.
THREE POLICEMEN AMONG 11 INJURED IN CHAMAN BLAST
At least 11 people, including three policemen, were injured in an explosion in Chaman area on Thursday.
According to police official Mir Ahmed, a remote-controlled bomb was planted in a bicycle parked outside the residence of a government official near Chaman Jail on Mall Road which went off with a bang, injuring 11 people including three policemen and six passersby.
The blast was so powerful that it was heard far and wide. In the recent past, militants have carried out low-intensity bombings in Chaman, targeting police stations and other national installations.
Full report at:
http://www.nation.com.pk/national/08-Aug-2014/two-soldiers-7-militants-killed-in-turbat-clash
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Widening of Zarb-i-Azb operation likely
August 8, 2014
PESHAWAR: The government has asked people in Mirali and Shawal sub-divisions of the conflict-hit North Waziristan Agency to leave their homes amid reports of expansion of ground offensive to other areas.
The people of Razmak, Spinwam, Shewa, Shawal, Eidek and other areas of the agency were exempted from evacuation before the launch of Zarb-i-Azb on June 15.
The authorities issued evacuation notices to the people of Shawal a few days ago. They have been asked to move to Bannu.
According to officials, the political administration asked about 4,000 families of Eidek, some seven kilometres west of Mirali, to vacate their homes after Saturday. The notices triggered resentment among the residents of the area and they refused to follow the orders.
Know more: Zarb-i-Azb: Widen the operation
The military operation has already forced over 52,000 families in Miramshah and Mirali to move to Bannu. Initially, over 92,000 families were registered as IDPs but their number has been reduced after verification by the National Database and Registration Authority.
The army has claimed that Mirali, Miramshah and adjacent villages have been cleared of militants. Over 500 local and foreign terrorists were killed. Air Force planes have been attacking militant hideouts in Shawal, where hundreds of local and foreign terrorists are reported to have moved in after the operation was launched in Miramshah.
An official in the office of Bannu’s deputy commissioner said evacuation of civilians from the mountainous Shawal area, near the Afghan border, would start on Friday. They will arrive at the Sidgai checkpost in Frontier Region Bannu for registration – mandatory for receiving cash and food assistance.
The Fata Disaster Management Authority (FDMA) has deputed staff at the checkpost where about 4,000 families are expected to come from Eidek. An FDMA official said that arrangements had been made at the checkpost, including registration of IDPs, provision of cooked food, water and distribution of SIM cards. “We are prepared to tackle the new influx,” he added.
Full report at:
http://www.dawn.com/news/1123981/widening-of-zarb-i-azb-operation-likely
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Nawaz again offers dialogue to opposition to end political crisis
August 8, 2014
ISLAMABAD: Expressing his inclination to initiate a political dialogue with the opponents, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif told opposition and allied political leaders in a meeting on Thursday that all the political forces, especially PTI, should refrain from agitation, as dialogue is the only way to resolve issues.
Separately, the PML-N government is planning to hold a consultative meeting with its important leaders and ministers to work out a consensus response to the political challenge thrown up by the PTI and PAT, it has been learnt. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is also being advised by close aides to take the nation into confidence soon through a televised address. Meanwhile, on Thursday, the prime minister received an MQM, a joint ANP-PPP delegation, and a Balochistan National Party (Bazenjo) delegation separately at the Prime Minister’s House to discuss the political situation emerging in the backdrop of proposed marches of PTI chief Imran Khan and Tahiurl Qadri’s PAT.
Full report at:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/islamabad/08-Aug-2014/nawaz-again-offers-dialogue-to-opposition-to-end-political-crisis
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Country under civilian martial law: Shujaat
August 8, 2014
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said on Thursday that the country was under a civilian martial law. Addressing a press conference, he said that “their destination is very close and days of present Nawaz government have been counted”. To a query weather he believes Tahirul Qadri’s prediction that the Nawaz government would be ended by end of this month, PML-Q chief said this regime would surely end before August 31.
Full report at:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/islamabad/08-Aug-2014/country-under-civilian-martial-law-shujaat
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Sharifs, not me, planning to flee country: Qadri
August 8, 2014
LAHORE: Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) chief Tahirul Qadri on Thursday claimed that the Sharif family plans to flee to the US to prevent accountability.
Qadri affirmed that he would not leave Pakistan without bringing about what he called revolution in the country. “I’m here to forge rule of law, the rule of God and to eliminate corruption and rigging and for the accountability of looters. No matter the government is planning to put me on the ECL, I assure you that I’m not going anywhere,”
Full report at:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/punjab/08-Aug-2014/sharifs-not-me-planning-to-flee-country-qadri
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Govt ready for ‘give and take’ with Imran Khan
August 8, 2014
SWAT: Building momentum ahead of his “Azadi March” next week, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief Imran Khan vowed on Thursday that monarchy will be replaced with real democracy. “We are left with no other option but to come out on roads till we get justice. We are going to snatch back our independence which our ancestors acquired by their sacrifice,” said Imran while addressing his supporters at the inauguration ceremony of a micro hydropower plant in Matta town of Swat in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Continuing to criticise his rival Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the PTI chief said that a businessman should never be the head of state as he will always look out for his own interest over his country’s.
Full report at:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/national/08-Aug-2014/monarchy-will-end-on-aug-14-imran
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Pakistan: Parliamentary parties likely to join national security conference
August 08, 2014
ISLAMABAD – Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will chair a national security conference on Saturday in which parliamentary leaders of various political parties will also join the government bloc contrary to normal practice.
Sources confirm that the security conference had not been planned and was summoned on an emergency basis to discuss the political scenario prevailing in Pakistan country, particularly the impending marches of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and the Pakistan Awami Tehreek and their impact on Zarb-e-Azb military operation.
The conference – to be held at the PM House and attended by Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif and Inter Services Intelligence Director General Zaheerul Islam – is also scheduled to discuss matters relating to Pakistan’s internal security and the participants are expected to be briefed on the anti-terror war as well as the military operation underway in North Waziristan tribal agency.
Full report at:
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/national/08-Aug-2014/parliamentary-parties-likely-to-join-national-security-conference
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India
'India's Kashmir experience can be a model for Israel in Gaza'
August 8, 2014
GAZA: Amid the deadly Israeli-Hamas conflict, a Kashmiri woman who is married to a Palestinian here feels Israel can learn from India's experience in Kashmir while dealing with the volatile situation in Gaza.
"It used to be quite terrible in Kashmir but things started to take a positive turn when the Indian government started to invest in education and found ways to send youngsters to learn outside the state," says Lubna, a bio-chemist who works for the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) in Gaza in its Department of National Defence.
"Their energies got channelised into constructive things. It helped ease the situation and also get control over the spiralling violence. Things would have been very different if India would have resorted to violent means to take control of the disturbed territory," she said.
Lubna says that Israel could learn quite a lot from the Indian handling of the situation in Kashmir and make good use of it in Gaza.
"There is almost no work but the PNA has retained all its staff even after its ouster from Gaza," she said.
Full report at:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Indias-Kashmir-experience-can-be-a-model-for-Israel-in-Gaza/articleshow/39829915.cms
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Incongruity in Meerut victim’s story
August 8, 2014
A 20-year-old girl who was allegedly raped and coerced into converting to Islam at Sarawa village, 60 km east of Delhi, belonged to a distressed upper caste family and knew the accused, Muslims of the same village.
Her mother, Urmila Tyagi (name changed), believes her daughter’s decision to teach in the local Madrassa Sultania and her close friendship with a Muslim girl, who is arrested as an accused in the case, led her into a trap. “She was brainwashed, converted, and raped. She was repeatedly threatened that if she related her ordeal to anyone, the power of the Koran would destroy her and the family. She was lured with the promise of a job. She should not have trusted Muslims,” said the mother. “But our gods were stronger. They rescued her.”
In a Ghaziabad hospital, the victim is critically ill from infection possibly due to inadequate care following a surgery to remove an ectopic pregnancy two weeks ago. The complaint says she was raped on June 29. She went away from home on July 23 giving some excuse to her parents and retuned on July 27. The girl underwent the surgery during those days, but investigators have found that two boys, who find no mention in her complaint, accompanied her to the hospital: one a Muslim, the other Hindu. The police have also found that the surgery did not take place in Muzzaffarnagar as stated by the girl, but in Meerut.
On July 29, the girl left home again, which first led to a missing person complaint and three days later, when she returned, a complaint of abduction and rape. She said she was forced to covert in the meanwhile. “We are in the process of verifying all this. There are many things that are not adding up,” said K. Satyanarayana, Deputy Inspector-General of Police, Meerut. The police have arrested five people in the case so far.
Full report at:
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/other-states/incongruity-in-meerut-victims-story/article6292700.ece
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BJP, Parivar outfits to intensify campaign against ‘love jihad’
August 8, 2014
‘New Shuddhi movement: Will free villages of Christians’
“Hindu mahilaon ka apmaan, nahi sahenge, nahi sahenge, (We will not tolerate the humiliation of Hindu women)”a handful of well-dressed city dwellers who descended on Sarawa village, 60 km east of Delhi, shouted outside the tumbledown house of a 20-year old girl who was allegedly raped and forcibly converted to Islam. Rakhi Tyagi, who led the women, said she was the Uttar Pradesh state general secretary of the Mahila Morcha, the women’s wing of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
According to a police complaint filed on August 3, the girl was abducted, kept in custody and raped by several men before being converted to Islam. Allegations are yet to be ascertained, said Alok Sharma, Inspector General of Police. “Only the girl can tell us truth, and whatever she says would be deemed true. The problem occurs when she gives contradictory versions.”
Also read: Incongruity in Meerut victim’s story
Ambiguities in the girl’s and her parents’ accounts of the incidents may impede the investigation but not the politics fuelled by the fact that the girl is a Hindu and the accused are Muslims. Dr Chandramohan, spokesperson of the UP State BJP, surrounded by several other party leaders at his home, told The Hindu, “This is part of a global love jihad that targets vulnerable Hindu girls who are entrapped and forced to convert to Islam. The BJP will oppose forced conversions and intervene on behalf of the victims,” he said, adding that social organisations would intensify awareness among the Hindus to be alert.
Full report at:
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/bjp-parivar-outfits-to-intensify-campaign-against-love-jihad/article6292554.ece
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Concern over radicalisation of educated J&K youth
AHMED ALI FAYYAZ
August 8, 2014
The Omar Abdullah government in Jammu and Kashmir is perturbed over the sustained radicalisation of educated youth — unemployed as well as employed.
“Reports are pouring in regarding hectic induction of youth for terrorist activities. Matter of recruitment raises further concern, upon induction of even educated youths. Reports further suggest about growing radicalisation, especially in semi-urban and rural areas, a feature hitherto unknown in society,” Inspector General of Police (Tech/CIV) at the J&K Police Headquarters wrote to Kashmir’s Inspector-General of Police vide No: CIV/Int-15/2014/2318 dated 14-07-2014.
Full report at:
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/other-states/concern-over-radicalisation-of-educated-jk-youth/article6293002.ece
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North America
Hillary Clinton admits US involvement in creation of ISIL: Media
August 8, 2014
The US embassy in Beirut has taken to social media to deny claims that the United States created and condones the terrorist group of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
Media reports in Lebanon have claimed that in former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's memoir Hard Choices, she "admitted in her book that the United States created the Islamic States and planned on acknowledging its presence."
Clinton's book has no reference of any kind to US involvement in the creation of ISIL or plans to recognize it as a legitimate organization.
Full report at:
http://en.alalam.ir/news/1621056#sthash.bpRWpr2b.dpuf
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India will help shape a new world order in 21st century: US
August 8, 2014
Describing India as one of the most significant countries in the world, U.S. Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel has said the world’s largest democracy will help shape a “new world order” that is emerging in this century.
“When you look at the world today, and you’re all quite familiar with this, that India not only represents one of the most significant countries by any measurement in the world today, but will help shape a new world order that is emerging in this young century,” Mr. Hagel told reporters travelling with him to India.
Mr. Hagel, who landed in India on his maiden trip as Defence Secretary on Thursday, is scheduled to meet his Indian counterpart Arun Jaitley and other leaders of the new government.
His visit comes in less than a week after Secretary of State John Kerry and Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzeker visited New Delhi for India-U.S. Strategic Dialogue.
“The relationship between the United States and India certainly for our interests, for U.S. interests, and I think for India’s interests, as well as the Asia Pacific, but also global interests, is important,” he said.
“Where we can find common interests, where we can share areas that help promote our own countries’, our own economies’ stability, security, peace, trade, technology,” he said, adding that the point of his trip here is to take advantage of the opportunity to meet with a new Indian government.
Recalling his last trip to India in 2008 as an American Senator, Mr. Hagel said, “In those meetings in 2008, it was pretty clear then that the potential for India and what they were evolving toward was going to be very important for our future.”
“When you look at the region itself, South Asia, the instability that lies to the west of India, and a different kind of a world that lies to their east, and their south, and their north, they all represent different kinds of challenges for India,” he said.
“The sooner we can find ways, the United States and India, to participate in these areas of mutual benefit and also concern, I think the better as we see this world that is uncertain and complicated and dangerous and unpredictable continue to evolve,” he said.
He said big power stability and big power security have always been important in the world and their importance is not going to be diminished over the next few years.
Mr. Hagel said his current India trip is to acquaint himself with the ground realities and that he would be more in listening mode.
Full report at:
http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/world/india-will-help-shape-a-new-world-order-in-21st-century-us/article6294157.ece
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'Help Israel avoid war crimes charges,' Netanyahu urges US lawmakers
August 8, 2014
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu appealed to American legislators to help Israel stave off what is likely to be a concerted global push to haul the country’s military and political leaders to international courts for alleged war crimes committed in Gaza, The New York Post reported on Thursday.
According to the Post, during a meeting on Wednesday with members of Congress who are visiting Israel as guests of AIPAC, Netanyahu urged the American representatives to summon their powers in assisting Israeli officials who wish to avoid trial by the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
The congressional delegation includes Rep. Steve Israel (D – NY), who heard the latest from the Israeli premier regarding the tenuous Gaza cease-fire as well as Jerusalem’s strained relations with the Obama administration.
“The prime minister asked us to work together to ensure that this strategy of going to the ICC does not succeed,” Israel told The New York Post.
Netanyahu “wants the US to use all the tools that we have at our disposal to, number one, make sure the world knows that war crimes were not committed by Israel, they were committed by Hamas. And that Israel should not be held to a double standard,” the congressman said.
The Israeli diplomatic and military establishments are girding for a legal onslaught that could implicate some of the country’s leaders in war crimes trials.
The Israel Defense Forces high command has begun to make preparations for legal battles and anticipated war crimes charges in international forums in the wake of the nearly month-long campaign against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Israel Radio reported on Thursday.
Fearful of the growing international chorus demanding that IDF officers be tried for war crimes allegedly committed against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, senior military brass has ordered a comprehensive internal probe of the army’s actions during Operation Protective Edge.
Full report at:
http://www.jpost.com/Operation-Protective-Edge/Help-Israel-avoid-war-crimes-charges-Netanyahu-urges-US-lawmakers-370352
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Obama authorizes air strikes to prevent Iraq ‘genocide’
8 August 2014
President Barack Obama said he had authorized US air strikes on Iraq and humanitarian supply drops to prevent a "genocide" by Islamist extremists against minorities.
"We can act, carefully and responsibly, to prevent a potential act of genocide," Obama said, referring to the attacks against the besieged Yazidi minority.
"I therefore authorized targeted air strikes if necessary to help forces in Iraq as they fight to break the siege and protect the civilians trapped there," Obama said.
Obama, who did not say whether air strikes have been carried out, said US forces have already started to drop food and water to Iraqis racing to flee the so-called Islamic State fighters.
Full report at:
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/world/article/obama-authorizes-air-strikes-to-prevent-iraq-genocide#sthash.dcSx1nIV.dpuf
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US puts Harakat and its affiliates on terror list
August 8, 2014
WASHINGTON: The United States put Harakat ul-Mujahideen and all its affiliates on a list of “foreign terrorist organisations” and “specially designated terrorists” on Thursday.
In a statement issued in Washington, the US Treasury Department said that after international sanctions, Harakat ul-Mujahedeen continued to work under various names. The names include Al-Faran, Al-Hadid, Al-Hadith, Harakat ul-Ansar, Harakat ul-Mujahidin, Jamiat ul-Ansar, HuA, HuM, Ansar-ul-Ummah and Its leader, Maulana Khalil, has been linked to Osama bin Laden and signed his February 1998 fatwa that called for attacks on Western interests. Cell phones discovered from bin Laden’s hideout in Abbottabad showed that the al-Qaeda chief maintained regular contacts with Maulana Khalil.
Full report at:
http://www.dawn.com/news/1123996/us-puts-harakat-and-its-affiliates-on-terror-list
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South Asia
Kandahar police chief orders execution of militants arrested during operations
August 8, 2014
Kandahar police chief, Gen. Abdul Raziq, has ordered to execute Taliban detainees who are arrested during the military operations.
Gen. Raziq was speaking to reporters following an operation against Taliban militants in Zherai district of southern Kandahar province.
At least 171 Taliban militants were killed and nearly 40 others were injured during the operations in Zherai district, where around 300 Taliban militants launched an offensive around two weeks ago.
Full report at:
http://www.khaama.com/kandahar-police-chief-orders-execution-of-militants-arrested-during-operations-6522
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Charge sheets against 41 BNP men accepted
August 8, 2014
A Dhaka Court yesterday took cognisance of charges against BNP acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, and the party’s standing committee members Barrister Moudud Ahmed, Mirza Abbas and 38 others in two cases filed for assaulting police and torching vehicles on March 2 last year.
Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate SM Ashiqur Rahman accepted the charges after scrutinising the dockets in the cases filed against the 41 BNP men.
On August 5, the Detective Branch of police submitted two separate charge sheets in the case to Dhaka Chief Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court.
Full report at:
http://www.dhakatribune.com/politics/2014/aug/08/charge-sheets-against-41-bnp-men-accepted#sthash.ZgnceMpH.dpuf
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War crimes tribunal hears on war child for the first time
August 8, 2014
The prosecution yesterday ended placing their closing arguments in the case against war crimes accused Syed Mohammad Qaisar, a former Jatiya Party state minister, seeking death penalty and compensation for three victims, including a war child.
This is the first case where the prosecution has demanded compensation for war victims.
Prosecutors Tureen Afroz and Tapas Kanti Baul placed arguments on legal points of the case, a day after prosecutor Rana Dasgupta concluded arguments on the factual ground.
During her submission, Tureen said: “For the first time, a war child has testified in a war crimes trial in Bangladesh. Two women victims and the war child, also a woman, have been enduring miserable life. They were also subjected to social harassment. They are real claimants for compensation.”
Then the tribunal asked her about the process of paying compensation, if Qaisar was convicted. The prosecutor replied that it was possible to pay the victims from the property of the accused.
In her argument, Tureen submitted that the accused could be given death penalty for aiding, abetting, facilitating and contributing towards heinous crimes of rape. Qaisar might also be ordered to pay adequate compensation to Hiramoni Santal, Mazeda Begum and the war child for the social dishonour, ostracism and isolation these victims had to suffer.
Chief of “Qaisar Bahini” during the war in Habiganj and Brahmanbaria, the accused was indicted on February 2 on 16 charges of crimes against humanity. A total of 32 prosecution witnesses testified against him. The defence refused to present any witness.
The prosecution started their arguments in the case on July 24 and concluded after submitting for six days.
Full report at:
http://www.dhakatribune.com/crime/2014/aug/08/war-crimes-tribunal-hears-war-child-first-time#sthash.7Y4EPBKU.dpuf
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John Kerry presses for Afghanistan unity government
Aug 8, 2014
KABUL, Afghanistan: US secretary of state John Kerry on Friday opened a second day of talks in Afghanistan aimed at preventing the fragile country from collapsing into political chaos after disputed elections.
Kerry paid a courtesy call on Afghan President Hamid Karzai and was later to meet with the two men — former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah and former finance minister Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai — locked in a bitter dispute over who will succeed Karzai.
Kerry saw the feuding candidates separately on Thursday and US officials said he hopes to bring them together for three-way talks on Friday.
Both Kerry and Karzai appeared grim as they began their meeting before reporters and cameramen at the presidential palace, but neither spoke to reporters and the specific reason for their apparent unease was not immediately clear.
Kerry is on a previously unannounced visit to Kabul to urge the candidates to accept the results of an ongoing audit of all ballots from the June election and form a national unity government by early September when NATO leaders will meet in Wales to consider their options in Afghanistan.
The US believes the September 4 NATO summit would be an opportunity for the eventual election winner to present himself to the alliance and introduce his new Cabinet, which, under a formula brokered by Kerry on his last visit to Kabul in June, would include the election loser appointing a new "chief executive officer," who would serve under the president. Once created, the Afghan government would convene a "loya jirga," or nationwide assembly, to formalize the chief executive post as a prime minister, the plan envisions.
Kerry's trip comes as results from the June 14 runoff are being audited in a process that he brokered last month but that had halted to mark the end the of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in late July. The audit resumed earlier this week with representatives of both candidates participating but still at odds over charges of widespread malfeasance in the vote. Preliminary results showed Ghani Ahmadzai well ahead of Abdullah, but both sides claimed irregularities and fraud.
Full report at:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/rest-of-world/John-Kerry-presses-for-Afghanistan-unity-government/articleshow/39875839.cms
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Karzai says election results must be announced by August end
August 8, 2014
Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Thursday that the presidential vote results must be announced by the end of this month.
President Karzai met with the UN special representative for Afghanistan Ján Kubiš to discuss the process of votes audit currently underway.
Karzai expressed concerns regarding the negative impact of election delays which has negatively affected the country’s security, stability and economy of the country, the presidential palace said in a statement.
Full report at:
http://www.khaama.com/karzai-says-election-results-must-be-announced-by-august-end-6526
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Europe
UN confirms ISIL kidnapped 150 Yazidi families, moved them to Syria
August 8, 2014
(IraqiNews.com) The Iraqi High Commission for Human Rights announced on Wednesday that militants of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant kidnapped 150 Yazidi families and transferred them to Syrian territory.
Al-Iraqiya TV channel said, in a newsflash followed IraqiNews.com, that “that militants of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant kidnapped 150 Yazidi families and took them to the Syrian territory in the Hol camp near the Syrian-Iraqi border.”
Full report at:
http://www.iraqinews.com/features/urgent-un-confirms-isil-kidnapped-150-yazidi-families-moved-syria/
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France says ready to support Iraqi Kurdish forces against Islamists
August 8, 2014
France said on Thursday it was ready to support the forces of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq to block the advance of Islamic State militants, but gave no details of what form this would take.
French President Francois Hollande spoke on the telephone with Masoud Barzani, the Kurdish region's president, and the two agreed to cooperate, Hollande's office said in a statement.
"They emphasised their desire to cooperate to block the Islamic State's offensive in northeast Iraq," it said. "The head of State confirmed that France was ready to support forces engaged in this fight."
Full report at:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/107976/World/Region/France-says-ready-to-support-Iraqi-Kurdish-forces-.aspx
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Messi issues statement to protect children of Gaza
August 8, 2014
Argentinean star Lionel Messi issued a statement on Thursday on his official Facebook page asking for protection for children harmed by the military conflict in Gaza and for an end to the violence.
"As a father and a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, I am terribly saddened by the images coming from the conflict between Israel and Palestine, where violence has already claimed so many young lives and injured countless children," read the statement published in Arabic and English.
Full report at:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/6/55/107966/Sports/World/Messi-issues-statement-to-protect-children-of-Gaza.aspx
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UNSC to hold urgent talks as militants seize Iraq's Christian town
August 8, 2014
UNITED NATIONS: The UN Security Council is to hold an emergency meeting on Iraq on Thursday, after Islamic State militants seized the country’s largest Christian town.
The meeting was requested by France, which expressed concern over the advance of Islamic State fighters and the seizure of Qaraqosh, in a new offensive that has driven tens of thousands of people from their homes.
The talks are scheduled to begin at 5:30 p.m. (2130 GMT), a diplomatic source said.
“France is very deeply concerned by the latest advances of (IS militants) in the north of Iraq and the taking of Qaraqosh, the biggest Christian city in Iraq, as well as by the intolerable abuses that were committed,” French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said in a statement.
“Given the seriousness of the situation — the first victims of which are civilians and religious minorities — France is requesting an urgent meeting of the Security Council so the international community can mobilize to counter the terrorist threat in Iraq and support and protect the population at risk,” he said.
The latest advance saw the Sunni extremist Islamic State extend its writ over northern Iraq and move within striking distance of autonomous Kurdistan.
IS, which proclaimed a “caliphate” straddling Syria and Iraq in late June, moved into Qaraqosh and other towns overnight after the withdrawal of Kurdish peshmerga troops, residents said.
Religious leaders said IS militants have forced 100,000 Christians to flee and have occupied churches, removing crosses and destroying manuscripts.
Joining world alarm over the IS advance, Pope Francis called on the international community to protect the mostly Christian communities of northern Iraq fleeing a lightning advance by jihadist militants.
Full report at:
http://www.arabnews.com/news/world/612956
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Suppression of Islam in Kosovo
Olsi Jazexhi
August 8, 2014
1.
The violent separation of Kosovo from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1999 and the declaration of her independence from Serbia in 2008 created many hopes for the Albanian Muslims of Kosovo. After 95 years of separation from the Ottoman Empire, they hoped that the time had come for them to enjoy their own state and long denied freedoms which they had lost under the regime of Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia. However, independence from Serbia in 2008 did not help Muslim ethnic Albanians to create a state as they wanted, nor realize their long dream for independence. The conditions of Muslim Albanians in post-Yugoslav Kosovo have deteriorated in every aspect. Many of them dream of the days of Tito’s Yugoslavia, when they enjoyed economic prosperity and freedom of movement in the world, even though religiously they were discriminated as in the present time.
2.
Even though the census of 2011 states that Muslims make 95.60% of Kosovo’s population, when the Kosovars had their constitution written by the United Nations Special Envoy Martti Ahtisari in 2008, they found out that the Western designers of their state had excluded Islam from their constitution. As the state of Kosovo started to mature, Muslims witnessed that Islam was being excluded from every aspect of their daily lives. In 2008 they saw the first cases of dismissals of hijab-wearing teachers from public schools, and two years later, Enver Hoxhaj, the minister of Education, Science, and Technology, issued an administrative instruction by which his Ministry legalized the official expulsion of hijab-wearing students in all the schools of the new state.
While Muslims and Islam were excluded from public life in the Kosovar Republic, its American installed rulers have shown open contempt against Islam and their practicing Muslim citizens. The president of Kosovo, Atifete Jahjaga (who was appointed in her position by the US ambassador in Prishtina, Christopher Dell) is one such an example. She has on more than one occasion insulted Muslims and Islam, and has openly declared that the national hero of Kosovo is Scanderbeg “who fought for civilization and European Christianity against the Ottoman Empire and Islam.”i She has also attacked Islam’s holy law, the Shariah, while defending Lek Dukagjini’s Catholic Canonic law, and claiming that the Shariah was imposed on the Albanians by “Ottoman invaders”.ii
Islam has not been attacked by the new Albanian rulers of Kosovo only, but even by many EU and American sponsored media outlets, NGOs, and a number of “civil society” actors that the US administrators, Soros and the European Union have formed and/or funded after the war. In an interview that Kosovo’s Foreign Minister Enver Hoxhaj gave to Zeri newspaper on January 2, 2014,iii he declared quite frankly that the government of Kosovo did not want to see any Islam in the state. He explained that in order to put an end to the revival of Islam in the country, his government was being helped by the foreign presence (read: EU and American embassies that rule the country) which through their:
“… political projects, through a very professional media, the civil society, and their investments have created a social engineering situation in the Republic of Kosovo.”iv
Kosovo’s Foreign Minister went on to explain that in order to de-Islamize the country, he had adapted a militant version of laicism:
"I think that secularism has been a sacred value for the state of Kosovo, in the past, and at the present. The reason why I have decided to prohibit the headscarfs (in the schools), is to testify my personal commitment towards the secular state… and what we should do, is to try and stop any connection between nationalism and the religious elements. "v
The “foreign presence”, which refers to NATO through the KFOR mission,vi the European Union, the American government and their agencies, have transformed Kosovo into a NATO colony, which although no longer takes orders from Belgrade, it is now commanded from Brussels and Washington. The “foreign presence” has invested millions of dollars to create its own mediavii and civil society, through which it attacks on daily basis the Muslim traditions of Kosovars, as well as other disobedient groups and minorities. Since religious Kosovar Muslims, like the Serbs, are perceived as a problem for the grand geo-strategy of NATO in the Balkans, they are continuously branded and insulted as terrorists, Wahhabis, “Arabs”, a security threat, foreign imports and “leftovers of Turkey”. The practicing Muslims who perceive themselves as Muslims first and see their identity connected to the Ottoman past, the Muslim Ummah, Turkey, etc, and refuse the Catholic myths of Greater Albanian nationalism – like those associated with Scanderbeg, Mother Theresa etc that the new Kosovar state has imported from Albania - are accused by the media as traitors, anti-Europeans, “Turks”, and agents of Turkey and Serbia etc. Some Muslim Kosovars have even been imprisoned for desecrating these Catholic symbols.viii
3.
Even though the political conditions for being a Muslim in postwar Kosovo are not favorable, many Kosovars have nevertheless rediscovered their roots and faith. Many of them, who feel themselves to be Muslim first and reject the Catholic myths of Albanian nationalism, have demanded from the “foreign presence” and their politicians to show more respect for their culture and religion. The Muslim Community of Kosovo, which administers the country’s mosques and is the main body that represents Islam in the country, has demanded from the politicians to allow the Kosovars to learn their religion in public schools, be allowed to build a big mosque in Prishtina and to allow hijab-wearing women to pursue their studies and work in the public sector. However, their demands and especially their desire to teach Islam to Muslim children in public schools have been ignored and vehemently rejected by the Catholic and Protestant Churches, the “Foreign Presence” and laicist Kosovar rulers. The Kosovar government, which prohibits its Muslims to learn Islam in their public schools, has instead entrusted the teaching of religion for the children of Kosovo to the infamous Islamophobe, Tony Blair, through his “Tony Blair Faith Foundation”.ix
The assertion of the Islamic roots by many Kosovars after the NATO invasion of 1999 has upset the “foreign presence” of Kosovo and those secular politicians whom the Americans brought to power after the war. They thought that the Kosovars wanted to separate themselves from Serbia only because they were Albanians, and not because they were even Muslims. However, the Islamic tendency of the bulk of the Kosovar population, their mass following of mosques and evangelizing imams is creating big headaches for NATO-s geo-strategy in Southeastern Europe. Their annoyance with Kosovars’ rediscovery of Islam can be understood when someone sees the reactions of the media that the Americans sponsor in Prishtina, their ambassadors, top NATO commanders, or the declarations of NATO-ist politicians like the suspected war criminal Ramush Haradinaj, who has openly called the bearded Muslims of Kosovo “filthy” and promised to persecute them after coming to power.
Full report at:
http://www.worldbulletin.net/world/142108/suppression-of-islam-in-kosovo
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Mideast
Gaza truce expires without agreement between Israel and Hamas
August 8, 2014
A three-day Israel-Hamas truce has ended in Gaza Aug. 8 with no word on extension. The militant Hamas group that dominates the enclave said all Palestinian groups in Gaza have refused to extend the ceasefire, but negotiations are ongoing.
"All the Palestinian factions, including Hamas, have agreed not to renew the ceasefire because (Israel) is refusing to accommodate our demands, but negotiations continue in Cairo," Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum told AFP.
Meanwhile, the Israeli army said militants in the Gaza Strip fired rockets at Israel minutes after the 72-hour truce between ended without agreement.
"Since 08:00 IDT (0500 GMT), terrorists fired a barrage of at least five rockets at southern Israel. A rocket was intercepted over Ashkelon," a statement from the military read. "Additional rockets hit open areas in southern Israel."
Shortly before the end of the ceasefire, the Israeli army sent out a text message to journalists, saying: "Just now, two rockets fired from Gaza hit southern Israel. No injuries reported."
There was no immediate Israeli military response, an army spokeswoman told AFP. Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri however said that "the Israeli claim of firing two rockets from Gaza is only an accusation to confuse the issues."
Israel had said earlier it was ready to "indefinitely" extend the ceasefire. Following the Hamas indication it would refuse to extend the truce, an Israeli official warned that "we might have to continue" the military campaign. "The reaction must be harsh" if Hamas renews its fire at Israel, head of the influential parliamentary foreign affairs and defence committee Zeev Elkin told public radio, without going into detail.
A senior Palestinian official earlier accused Israel of procrastinating, warning it could lead to a resumption of the fighting when the deadline runs out. "The Israeli delegation is proposing extending the ceasefire while refusing a number of the Palestinian demands," he said, without elaborating.
Full report at:
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/gaza-truce-expires-without-agreement-between-israel-and-hamas.aspx?pageID=238&nID=70141&NewsCatID=352
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Hamas says executed Palestinians suspected of spying for Israel
August 8, 2014
GAZA - Hamas said on Thursday it had executed several Palestinians on suspicion of helping Israeli forces during the month-long Gaza conflict.
"The spies were executed after they were caught red-handedly informing on the whereabouts of the resistance (or) disrupting the work of resistance men and defusing ambushes prepared against the enemy," Al-Majd, a pro-Hamas website, quoted an unnamed member of the Islamist group's security services as saying.
Full report at:
http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Hamas-says-executed-Palestinians-suspected-as-spying-for-Israel-370429
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Thousands of Iraqis fleeing from jihadist violence seeking refuge in Turkey
August 8, 2014
At least 25,000 Iraqi nationals who have fled from jihadist violence in their homeland are seeking refuge in Turkey, with the number of figures sharply increasing since July as hundreds of thousands of Iraqis suffer at the hands of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
The number of Iraqi citizens who have tried to appeal to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) office in Ankara for refugee status after having fled from jihadists since May is estimated to be around 25,000, sources said.
The UNHCR Office has only had the capacity to process applications for 15,000 of the refugees since May, the same sources said.
The UNHCR is able to handle 300 out of 700-800 people applying on a daily basis, sources said. Some 3,000 Iraqis have now begun applying on a weekly basis, according to sources.
The UNHCR said 1,884 Iraqi citizens finalized applications in May, 4,968 people in June, and 7,130 people in July.
Sources said the number 25,000 did not necessarily reflect the total number of Iraqi citizens who have taken shelter in Turkey due to ISIL’s terror, since all of them might not have been able to reach a UNHCR Office for application.
Full report at:
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/thousands-of-iraqis-fleeing-from-jihadist-violence-seeking-refuge-in-turkey-.aspx?pageID=238&nID=70126&NewsCatID=359
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Rafsanjani: Zionists, Terrorists Committing Most Horrible Crimes against Humanity
August 8, 2014
Chairman of Iran's Expediency Council Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani voiced concern about Israel's recent savage attacks on the defenseless Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, and said the Zionists and terrorists are committing the most horrible crimes against humanity.
Addressing a group of industrialists in Tehran on Wednesday, Rafsanjani said that massacre of innocent and defenseless Palestinian civilians in Gaza has hurt sentiments of all human beings.
Current conditions in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and occupied Palestine are very critical, he said.
Terrorists and Zionists in an obviously orchestrated effort and under meaningful silence and support of global powers are now committing the most horrible and shameless crimes against humanity, Rafsanjani said.
Full report at:
http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13930516000479
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Palestinian factions refuse to extend Israel truce: Hamas
August 8, 2014
All Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip have refused to extend a three-day truce with Israel, the Hamas group that dominates the enclave said Friday, as the ceasefire ended.
Full report at:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/107986/World/Region/Palestinian-factions-refuse-to-extend-Israel-truce.aspx
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Palestinian negotiator rejects disarming of resistance, charges US biased mediator
August 8, 2014
Palestinian factions' weapons are the major source of disagreement in ongoing talks in Cairo to find a ceasefire in Gaza, according to Egyptian and Palestinian sources speaking on condition of anonymity.
Israel has called for disarming Hamas and other Palestinian groups in Gaza in exchange for lifting the siege on the strip, the sources told Al-Ahram's Arabic news website.
Moussa Abu Marzouk, member of the Palestinian delegation and deputy of Hamas' political bureau, tweeted late Thursday morning on the issue, questioning the ability of Washington to propel the current negotiating process.
US Secretary of State John Kerry had said on Monday that international efforts to agree a truce between Israel and the Palestinians in Gaza must lead to the disarmament of Hamas.
Kerry told reporters he was continuing to work "toward establishing an unconditional humanitarian ceasefire." But he added: "We also believe that any process to resolve the crisis in Gaza in a lasting and meaningful way must lead to the disarmament of Hamas and all terrorist groups."
Full report at:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/107944/World/Region/Palestinian-negotiator-rejects-disarming-of-resist.aspx
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Finger on trigger, war not over yet: Hamas leader
Associated Press | Gaza City | August 8, 2014
A senior Hamas official told supporters at a Gaza City rally Thursday that the war with Israel won’t be over until the group’s demands for a lifting of the Gaza blockade are met, insisting that its fighters would never give up their arms.
“Our fingers are on the trigger and our rockets are trained at Tel Aviv,” the official, Mushir al-Masri said, as Egypt struggled to broker a lasting truce between Israel and Hamas, with an Egyptian official saying Gaza-based militants were refusing to compromise.
Cairo is mediating indirect talks between Israel and Hamas on extending a 72-hour ceasefire that expires Friday morning. Hamas has demanded the lifting of an Israeli and Egyptian blockade imposed on the coastal territory after the Islamic militant group seized power in 2007.
Full report at:
http://indianexpress.com/article/world/middle-east-africa/finger-on-trigger-war-not-over-yet-hamas-leader/
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Israel resumes Gaza strikes in response to rockets
Aug 8, 2014
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip: Israel and Gaza militants resumed cross-border attacks on Friday, after a three-day truce expired and Egyptian-brokered talks on a new border deal for blockaded Gaza hit a deadlock.
It was not clear if the renewed fighting would derail the Cairo talks aimed at reaching a sustainable truce, or whether the Egyptian mediators can find a way to prevent a further escalation and a return to full-out war.
Militants from Gaza fired first, after the temporary truce expired at 8am (0500 GMT) on Friday, launching 21 rockets toward Israel. Most landed it open fields, but two were intercepted over the coastal city of Ashkelon.
READ ALSO: Gaza militants resume rocket fire at Israel after truce expires
The Israeli military said it responded with strikes "across Gaza."
Gaza police said an Israeli airstrike hit in the area of a housing project in northern Gaza and that there were reports of casualties. Another strike hit a farm south of Gaza City, they said.
Police also reported fire from Israeli tanks on northern Gaza and from Israeli gunboats at the central area of the territory.
In Cairo, both sides are under intense international pressure to reach a deal. As part of such an arrangement, Israel wants to see Hamas disarmed or prevented from re-arming, while Hamas demands Gaza's borders be opened. No progress was reported in all-night talks that ended before dawn on Friday.
Full report at:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/middle-east/Israel-resumes-Gaza-strikes-in-response-to-rockets/articleshow/39875542.cms
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Africa
Nigeria: U.S. Planes Spot Chibok Girls
August 8, 2014
After about three months of frantic search for the abducted Chibok schoolgirls, recent US surveillance flights over northeastern Nigeria showed what appeared to be large groups of girls held together in remote locations, raising hopes among domestic and foreign officials that they are among the group that Boko Haram abducted from their school in April, US and Nigerian officials said.
It will be the first time a near definite information about the location of the abducted schoolgirls will be made by the international forces who had offered to help search for the kidnapped girls.
Full report at:
http://allafrica.com/stories/201408071308.html?aa_source=mf-hdlns
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Boko Haram gathers new recruits in Cameroon
2014-08-08
Yaounde - The Nigerian Islamist movement Boko Haram has recruited and trained hundreds of young Cameroonians to carry out attacks in their own country, according to the police and civilians.
As the militant group seeks to gain a foothold in the poor, rural north of Cameroon, experts warn that violence may spread beyond border areas to other parts of the central African country.
"Boko Haram has recruited many young people" from Cameroon's Far North region, a police officer from the area told AFP on condition of anonymity.
The hardline movement, whose loosely translated name means "Western education is forbidden", has for years sown terror throughout Nigeria's northeast, then trained youths "to attack Cameroon", the officer said.
"They are now asking them to prove themselves on home ground", he said.
On Wednesday, the Islamists murdered nine passengers on a bus and a soldier in a separate vehicle in a remote northern town, according to Cameroon's state radio and local paramilitary police.
Precise figures are unavailable on how many young Cameroonians have been recruited by Boko Haram, but security sources estimate the number to be in the hundreds.
In April, a local police inspector said that close to 200 young people, aged 15-19 years were recruited in just two months in Kolofata, a small border town in the Far North.
Recruitment drive
Now, the same inspector says the recruits have completed their training. "Some have recently returned to their villages before going to the front."
The jihadist recruitment drive coincides with an increase in attacks within Cameroon, including one particularly brazen operation that targeted the country's deputy prime minister, Amadou Ali.
"At a recent meeting, Amadou Ali said he had 'a list of 450 young people' from Kolofata [his hometown] who were recruited by Boko Haram", according to the police officer.
The warning from Ali, a prominent figure in Cameroon's fight against Boko Haram, proved to be a prescient one when militants attacked his home and a number of others in Kolofata on 27 July.
Full report at:
http://www.news24.com/Africa/News/Boko-Haram-gathers-new-recruits-in-Cameroon-20140808
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Mali jihadi leader reappears to threaten France
August 8, 2014
The leader of a jihadist group driven from northern Mali by French troops has reappeared for the first time in 18 months with a video message calling for Muslims to rise up against France, "which detests Islam".
Iyad Ag Ghaly, who led a Tuareg rebellion in the Sahara before setting up the armed group Ansar Dine ("Defenders of the Faith"), disappeared in January 2013 soon after France intervened to stop a column of Islamist insurgents taking Mali's capital Bamako and toppling the government.
In a 23-minute video in Arabic put online on Tuesday, he signalled a return to combat, saying his group was "ready to unite with our brothers on the ground to face up to the crusaders and infidels who have united to fight Islam in our land".
Full report at:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/9/107972/World/International/Mali-jihadi-leader-reappears-to-threaten-France.aspx
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Libya calls for UN-supervised ceasefire
August 8, 2014
The newly inaugurated Libyan parliament has threatened to act against warring militias who don't abide by its call for an immediate cease-fire, which it says would be supervised by the United Nations.
The parliament's call late Wednesday is among its first since it convened in the eastern city of Tobruk, after violence swept through the capital, Tripoli, and Libya's second largest city of Benghazi.
In a statement obtained by The Associated Press on Thursday, the parliament called on "all warring parties without exception," to enact an "immediate and unconditional ceasefire, ending all violence and attacks on civilians and civilian areas."
Also on Wednesday, the parliament made changes to a previous constitutional declaration, giving itself more powers it said would help it rein in out-of-control militias.
The parliament's call could very well fall on deaf ears however, like several other appeals for cease-fires made by the outgoing interim government. Militias have grown in power since the toppling of dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.
The decision came as representatives of the governments of neighboring Egypt and Algeria, as well as the United States, expressed "deep concern" about violence in Libya and possible regional repercussions. In a statement issued after the representatives met on Wednesday, the group urged for an immediate ceasefire and talks and expressed opposition to "outside interference in Libya's transition."
Full report at:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/107970/World/Region/Libya-calls-for-UNsupervised-ceasefire.aspx
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Southeast Asia
Stay out of politics and stick to job scope, Sultan tells Selangor Islamic officers
August 8, 2014
The Sultan of Selangor today reminded the state's Islamic authorities not to get involved in any partisan political agenda and remain independent.
Speaking to staff of the Selangor Islamic Department (Jais), Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah said there were political leaders who would use Jais and Selangor Islamic Council (Mais) in exploiting issues related to Islam.
"Currently, there are some politicians who take the opportunity to exploit issues related to Islam and question actions by the Islamic institutions such as Mais and Jais as part of their political agenda," he said during an audience with the ruler attended by Islamic department enforcement officers in Shah Alam.
"I want all parties in Mais and Jais to avoid getting involved in the political agenda of any parties," he said.
Full report at:
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/selangor-sultan-tells-islamic-authorities-to-stay-out-of-politics#sthash.uK8tq9UT.dpuf
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Indonesia’s Baha’i Community Grateful for Long-Awaited State Recognition
August 8, 2014
Jakarta. The Indonesian Baha’i Society thanked the government on Thursday for officially recognizing the monotheistic faith as a religion, after Religious Affairs Minister Lukman Hakim Saifuddin’s recent statement that worshippers will be protected by the Constitution.
“We are gratefully and happily welcome [the minister’s] statement… that Baha’is, as Indonesian citizens, are recognized by the law,” the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’i society said in a statement.
“We express our deepest gratitude to the government, members of the press and the Indonesian public for their attention interest in our society.”
Through his Twitter account @lukmansaifuddin, Lukman tweeted last month that “Baha’i is a religion, not a sect,” in response to a letter sent by the Home Affairs Ministry requesting clarification about the 200-year-old faith.
The ministry is currently reviewing the suggestion of officially allowing the religious option of Baha’i on Indonesian KTP, or identity card.
Citizens are required to state their religion on their KTP, which they acquire at the age of 17. At present, only six government recognized religions can legally appear on an ID card, namely Islam, Protestant, Catholic, Buddhist, Hindu and Confucianist.
“I told [the ministry] that Baha’i is a religion protected by articles 28E and 29 in the Constitution,” Lukman tweeted on July 24.
Not long after, however, the Indonesian media began accusing the minister of promoting a new religion.
Full report at:
http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/news/indonesias-bahai-community-grateful-long-awaited-state-recognition/
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Cops nab woman, release pics of alleged 15, in nude games
August 8, 2014
Police have arrested a woman and released photographs of the 15 people who were allegedly involved in the nude sport games held on a beach in Penang in May.
The woman, identified only as “Ellen”, was picked up from her home in Bayan Lepas at 9.55pm last night.
Southwest district police chief Superintendent Lai Fah Hin said the arrest was made following a report filed in Bayan Lepas.
We are confident this Ellen, who is a 34-year-old private music teacher from Penang, can help our investigations.
"We appeal to the rest of the group to come forward to assist investigations. Please go to the nearest police station," he said at the district police headquarters in Balik Pulau today.
Police have also appealed to those with information of the individuals to contact investigation officer Assistant Superintendent Mohd Sani Mat Ali on 012-5424455.
Lai said the 15 are all in their 20s to 50s.
The two main individuals are Chew Tok Hwa and Albert Yam.
Chew is reported to be a retired English teacher and a former Gerakan Wanita chief from Taman Ria Jaya in Sungai Petani, Kedah.
Her last known address is No. 1722 Lorong Inai 6/1, Taman Ria Jaya, Sungai Petani.
Yam is an unemployed Malaysian with Singaporean citizenship.
"We have yet to locate them," Lai said.
The others are identified as Kok Hong, a director from Singapore; Singaporeans Terry and Lionel Lau; Malaysians Carmen Chan, Thomas Kong, Janice, Justin Ang, and Michael; Burmese Newman and his unnamed girlfriend; Indian national James Kumar and Filipino Marvin Cuevas.
Lai said the group committed an offence at the national park, where visitors are allowed to have recreational activities.
Full report at:
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/cops-nab-woman-release-pics-of-alleged-11-in-nudist-games#sthash.Mtw16PIO.dpuf
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URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/abu-bakar-al-baghdadi,-threatens/d/98484