Archive for September 29th, 2008
Somali pirate demands $20 million ransom
As a heavily armed U.S. freighter patrolled nearby and planes flew overhead, a Somali pirate spokesman told The Associated Press his group was demanding a $20 million ransom to release a cargo ship loaded with Russian tanks.
The spokesman also warned that the pirates would fight to the death if any country tried military action to regain the ship, and a man who said he was the ship’s captain reported that one crew member had died.
Pirates seized the Ukrainian-operated ship Faina off the coast of Somalia on Thursday as it headed to Kenya carrying 33 Russian-built T-72 tanks and a substantial quantity of ammunition and spare parts. The ordinance was ordered by the Kenyan government.
(…) In a rare gesture of cooperation, the Americans appeared to be keeping an eye on the Faina until the Russian missile frigate Neustrashimy, or Intrepid, reaches the area. The Russian ship was still somewhere in the Atlantic on Sunday, the Russian navy reported.
Pirate spokesman Sugule Ali said he was speaking Sunday from the deck of the Faina via a satellite phone — and verified his location by handing the phone over to the ship’s captain, who also spoke with the AP. It was not possible to further confirm their identities.
“We want ransom, nothing else. We need $20 million for the safe release of the ship and the crew,” Ali said, adding that “if we are attacked, we will defend ourselves until the last one of us dies.”
Somali pirate demands $20 million ransom – Africa – msnbc.com.
Well, we know more things than yesterday. We know who had bought those weapons. I wonder what will happen. The pirates know very well that if they are attacked the munitions can explode, so they will be worth nothing.
Anyway, the mistery remains about the Iranian State’s cargo ship.
Looks like the cargo was destined for Sudan and not for Kenya, as was thought at first.
India’s Catholic bishops ask government to subdue violent Hindu radicals
CNA:
The executive body of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India, meeting in Bangalore on Friday, issued a statement expressing “utter disappointment” at the “apathy and inaction” of the national and state governments in the face of anti-Christian violence committed by extremist Hindus. Calling upon Indian officials to stop the violence and to help its victims, they denied allegations of forced conversions to Christianity and suggested such charges are self-serving.
The bishops lamented the murder of innocent people, the molestation of women, the desecration and destruction of churches and religious places, and the destruction of Christians’ homes in various districts of the east coast state of Orissa, the Indian Catholic reports.
“The State Government kept giving an assurance that things were normal and security arrangements were perfect,” the statement read. “Yet when representations were made, it pleaded inability to control the mobs that vandalized church property [and] assailed religious personnel and the Christian population.”
The bishops claimed that the perpetrators of the violence were “trained agents of radical Hindutva activists” acting under instructions and executing a “master plan of destruction.”
The bishops’ statement also reports that the violence has spread to Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh.
According to the bishops, the violence is undermining India’s ancient values of “Ahimsa (non-injury), Truth, Tolerance, and Respect for Religions.”
The attacks have also damaged India’s international image of secular democracy, the bishops claim.
I fear that the inaction against Islamists have helped other groups to consider why they weren’t using violence for their own goals.
Related posts:
President Evo Morales congratulates second Bolivia region for expelling US aid programs
President Evo Morales says a second Bolivian region has asked the United States to withdraw its aid programs as diplomatic relations between the two countries continue to sour.
Morales on Saturday congratulated local indigenous groups in the southern Bolivia province of Chuquisaca for becoming “territory free of … American imperialism” after deciding this week to expel the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID.
He did not offer futher details.
So he will receive more Venezuelan aid… it’s just changing a country that is far for other which is nearer, a neighbour in fact. If he really wants to “free” Bolivia, this is one of the most stupid moves I have seen…
Related posts:
- Morales has spoken for a quick dialogue, critisizing Catholic Church’s partiality.
- Pando’s prefect under arrest.
- Morales struggles to control Bolivia amid violence.
- Bolivian constitutional tribunal stops referendum for revoking mandates to regional governors.
- Bolivia: oil companies demand compensations.
Man who tried to murder sister sentenced to 14 years in jail
The Nazareth District Court sentenced Khaled Muslemi, 24, to 14 years in prison for the attempted murder of his sister.
According to the indictment, Muslemi, a resident of the Arab Village Of Naura in the Jezreel Valley, decided to execute an “honor killing” in March, after hearing rumors that his sister was behaving promiscuously.
He convinced her to accompany him to a field near their village, where he pulled out a gun and shot her in the head, the shoulder and the leg from a distance of three feet. He then called the Gilboa Region Magen David Adom station and confessed to the murder.
The woman, gravely injured but still alive, pretended to be dead, thus averting further shots. Her resourcefulness saved her life.
The prosecution asked the court to sentence Muslemi to 15 years in prison, but the defense asked to court for a lighter, 11-year sentence, citing extreme emotional duress.
“The despicable, repetitive phenomenon of murder and the attempted murder of innocent women under the pretence of ‘honor killings’ must be condemned in the harshest manner possible,” noted the court.
Man who tried to murder sister sentenced to 14 years in jail – Israel News, Ynetnews.
Related posts:
- Homosexual cleansing rampant in Iraq.
- Last news on honor killings.
- A book to read: “Honor killings. Stories of men who killed”.
- Pakistan: couple falls victim of honor killing.
- Palestinian father buries daughter alive.
- Three suspects of honor killings arrested.
- Pakistan “Honor” Killings: Three Teenage Girls Buried Alive for Choosing Their Own Husbands...
- Georgia “Honor Killer”: Father Held Without Bond.
- Alleged man “honor killing”: he was a Christian going out with a Muslim woman.
- Lawyers: Daughter’s murder not “honor killing”.
- Sexy singer Suzam Tamim: killed out of honor?
- Turkey: a gay honor killing?
- Another “honor killing” in USA: brother knives sister.
- The inaction of feminists regarding “honor killings”.
- Turkey: survey reveals honor killings perpetrators are not rejected by society.
- Honor Killing in Pakistan.
- Irsad Manji speaks about Honor Killings.
- Honor Killing in Pakistan: the woman was suspected of “having bad character”.
- Georgia’s honor killer: “I have done nothing wrong”.
- “The family was very stressed”.
- Honor Killing in Georgia.
- Two brothers charged with honor killings.
Report: Religious freedom in Egypt, declining
Freedom of religious belief in Egypt “declined” between July 2007 and June 2008, according to the US State Department’s annual assessment of religious freedom throughout the world, the International Religious Freedom Report.
The report is compiled on the basis of information obtained “from a variety of sources, including government and religious officials, NGOs, journalists, human rights monitors, religious groups and academics” according to its preface.
The report describes legislation and governmental practices which discriminate against Egypt’s religious minorities and adherents of Islamic teachings viewed as heretical by the state.
Acts of discrimination against Egypt’s largest religious minority, Christian Copts, take up the bulk of the report.
“The government again failed to redress laws and governmental practices discriminative against Christians, effectively allowing their discriminatory effects and their modelling effect on society to become further entrenched,” the report states.
Daily News Egypt – Full Article.
Related posts:
Extremists threaten to kill Muslim cleric Omar Bakri’s pole dancing daughter Yasmin Fostok
The terrified pole-dancing daughter of radical cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed is in hiding after death threats from Muslim extremists.
Yasmin Fostok, 27, who has a three-year-old son, is said to feel suicidal after it was revealed she works as a pole dancer.
Police went to her flat in South East London on Friday night after deciding to move her to a safe house.
A police source said:”She is worried about threats from people who have extreme views. She has a young toddler and can’t take any risks.”
She left the flat with a suitcase, looking down at the ground as seven officers, plus plain-clothes detectives escorted her into a police van.
She and her son are now staying at separate locations to protect him from attacks.
A friend added last night: “She’s suicidal. She can’t even see her own son or go to her own home. She’s very fearful at the moment.”
Well, I can’t say this is something that surprises me at all, given the background… I think it was somewhat irresponsible to publish so many details of her locations, her tatoos and all in a public MSM. Let’s hope she is not caught by unwanted gangsters…
