Five years after US special force killed Osama Bin Laden, president Barack Obama says he hopes that in the last movements the terror mastermind realized that Americans had not forgotten about 9/11. In an interview with CNN broadcast on Monday, Obama marked the anniversary of what many see as one of his presidency's greatest achievement:ending the long hunt for the illusive Saudi-born al Qeuda boss.US special force killed Bin Laden in Pakistan on may 2,2011."Hopeful, at that movement, he understood that the American People hadn't forgotten some 3,000 people who he killed,"Obama said. Obama Leaves office in January, with al Qaeda significantly dismissed by drone strikes and somewhat eclipsed by its offshoot, the so called Islamic State group.
Showing posts with label International. Show all posts
Showing posts with label International. Show all posts
Five years after US special force killed Osama Bin Laden, president Barack Obama says he hopes that in the last movements the terror mastermind realized that Americans had not forgotten about 9/11. In an interview with CNN broadcast on Monday, Obama marked the anniversary of what many see as one of his presidency's greatest achievement:ending the long hunt for the illusive Saudi-born al Qeuda boss.US special force killed Bin Laden in Pakistan on may 2,2011."Hopeful, at that movement, he understood that the American People hadn't forgotten some 3,000 people who he killed,"Obama said. Obama Leaves office in January, with al Qaeda significantly dismissed by drone strikes and somewhat eclipsed by its offshoot, the so called Islamic State group.
LIMOGES:A flight from Liverpool to Alicante was forced to land in France on Thursday after two drunken British nationals began fighting on board. The captain said he decided to divert to the central French city of Ligmoges as he felt the incident was an endangering the other passengers on board. Both men were taken to a local police station. "They are being held while they sober up, and between them being drunk and the language barrier, it is difficult to be certain about their reasons for the fight and going to Spain ," said a police spokesman. "The two men will be heard later in the day, when an English speaking interpreter is present." The Boeing 737 was able to resume its flight to Spain.
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Mentioned above are the few advantages and disadvantages of publishing AdSense ads on your website or blog. Adsense is good for some and is not good for some, it depends on your revenue aspirations and also on the kind of content you have and the kind of visitors you get.Keywords : disadvantages of Adsense
An Istanbul court on Thursday sentenced two prominent Turkish journalists to two years behind bars for illustrating their columns with a cartoon of the prophet Mohammad originally published by French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo. The sentence handed to columnists with the opposition cumhuriyet daily,has intensified alarm over press freedoms in turkey.
Source:
BAGHDAD — Iraqi forces, backed by American airstrikes and advised by American officers, have been making strides in Anbar Province, slowly taking back territory from the Islamic State.
But in Falluja, a city in Sunni-dominated Anbar that has been in the hands of the Islamic State longer than any other in Iraq or Syria, civilians are starving as the Iraqi Army and militias lay siege to the city. And elsewhere in the province, Shiite militias supported by Iran are carrying out kidnappings and murders and restricting the movement of Sunni Arab civilians, according to American and Iraqi officials.
For seasoned observers of the American military involvement in Iraq — going back more than 25 years to the start of the Persian Gulf war — it is all part of a depressingly familiar pattern: battlefield gains that do not bring stability in their wake.
“Unfortunately, as has been a trademark of American involvement with Iraq at least since 2003 (and arguably since 1991), military success is not being matched with the commensurate political-economic efforts that will ultimately determine whether battlefield successes are translated into lasting achievements,” Kenneth M. Pollack, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a longtime Iraq analyst, wrote recently in an online column.
A growing number of critics are warning that American-backed military victories need to be backed up with political reconciliation between Sunni and Shiite Arabs, something Iran is working against, and with determined efforts to rebuild cities so that civilians can return. In Anbar, they note, the situation is bleak: Shiite militias have worsened sectarian animosities, and hundreds of thousands of civilians have been unable to return home.
More broadly, analysts and officials say, it has become clear that though the United States and Iran both want to defeat the Islamic State in Iraq, they have been unable to work together to promote unity in the country — even after a deal was reached last year over Iran’s nuclear program, which many hoped would allow them to cooperate more closely.
Nowhere is this dynamic more pronounced than in Anbar, a vast desert area of western Iraq that for years has been a homeland for the Islamic State and its forerunner, Al Qaeda in Iraq, and where hundreds of American soldiers and Marines were killed after the American invasion of Iraq in 2003.
As the United States supports the Iraqi Army and some local tribal fighters in battling the Islamic State, Iran has quietly pursued its objectives in the province, officials say. It wants to secure a land route to Syria and its allies, the government of President Bashar al-Assad and Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite movement, and to protect Baghdad and the Shiite-dominated south of Iraq.
The situation in Anbar has grown increasingly muddled as the Obama administration has stepped up its military support to Iraq, announcing that it will deploy Apache helicopters and position more troops closer to the front lines. It has touted victories in Anbar as an important step toward liberating the country from the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and as a prelude to a campaign, possibly this year, to retake Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city.
But Iran’s proxies are undercutting efforts to unite the civilian population, a necessity if Iraq is to eventually extinguish extremism. In the siege of Falluja, a Sunni city, the Shiite militias have prevented civilians from leaving Islamic State territory while resisting calls to allow humanitarian aid to reach the city. Sunni Arab civilians in the province are increasingly reporting kidnappings and murders by the militias, accounts that American and Iraqi officials say are credible.
In some cases, after civilians have disappeared, their families have received ransom demands. Abu Abdulrahman, a resident of Amiriyat al-Falluja, a city in Anbar under the control of the government, said three of his cousins vanished last year after being stopped at a militia checkpoint.
“We haven’t heard anything about them since then,” he said, although a man approached the family and demanded a ransom of $8,000, which was paid. “He disappeared with the money,” he said.
Conditions are so dire in Falluja for the tens of thousands of civilians trapped there that dozens of people have starved to death, civilians and activists say. Food prices have skyrocketed, with a bag of flour that would cost $15 in Baghdad going for $750, Human Rights Watch has reported.
The rights group recently warned that if aid does not reach Falluja, “the results for civilians could be calamitous.”
“We are profoundly worried about Falluja,” Lise Grande, the United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Iraq, said in a recent statement. “There are reports of widespread food shortages and lack of medicines. We don’t have access to the city, but we have to assume based on what we are hearing that people are in terrible trouble.”
Hadi al-Ameri, a prominent Iraqi official who leads the Badr Organization, a longstanding militia backed by Iraq, said in an interview this year as the siege of Falluja began that it was a military necessity to “surround the city, to cut off supply lines.”
When asked about the demand from the United Nations and other groups to find a way to send food in, he said, using another acronym for the Islamic State, “to give food to who — to Daesh?”
Inside Falluja, some civilians who say they initially supported the Islamic State as preferable to the government in Baghdad now say they would welcome liberation. But they say they are caught between the Islamic State, which has become more brutal toward civilians as the siege has dragged on, and the government and militias.
“The situation inside Falluja is difficult because of the siege imposed by the security forces outside Falluja, and from the inside by ISIS, who won’t let us get out of the city,” said Ahmed Mohammed, a Falluja resident reached by telephone.
Cellphone reception is spotty, and anyone seen talking on a cellphone is at risk of arrest. “It has become very difficult for us to use our mobile phones because ISIS expects that we may be talking with the government,” said Qais al-Jumayli, who was reached by phone last week. “Therefore, we are very cautious.”
He added, “We don’t know our destiny, or the destiny of our families.”
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The US President however pressed his point in an address to a gathering of young people in the town hall. |
His appeal has met with a barrage of criticism from the Vote to Leave supporters ranging from accusations that his speech at the press conference with Prime Minister David Cameron was written by Downing Street to interference and ill-considered advice to a sovereign country.
The left-right political divide in Britain has become increasingly blurred in the debate. For example Nigel Farage, leader of the pro-Brexit and anti-immigration United Kingdom Independence Party, has called Mr. Obama the “most anti-British” of American presidents for championing the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). Calling the secret deal a “corporatist stitch-up between the U.S. establishment and the European Union” that will ultimately privatise the National Health Service (NHS) and open it up to big multinationals. On immigration he said “Let’s get real; would any American President seriously open up their borders unconditionally to Mexico as the UK has done to the whole of the EU? No chance.”
Boris Johnson, whose description of President Obama as part-Kenyan has attracted much criticism, with Labour Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell calling it an example of “dog-whistle racism.”
The US President however pressed his point in an address to a gathering of young people in the town hall. He told them to “reject pessimism and cynicism” and "know that progress is possible and problems can be solved”. Going back to the “arc of history” argument he made in his op-ed in the Daily Telegraph, Mr. Obama told his young audience to take the long view in measuring the success their endeavors.
“Don't give up and succumb to cynicism if after five years poverty has not been eradicated and we haven't resolved all of the steps we need to take to reverse climate change.”
Mr. Obama is a popular figure in the UK, with his popularity ratings higher than those of Mr. Cameron or Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.
Mr. Obama and his wife Michelle Obama visited the Globe Theatre where a travelling group of Shakespearian actors have returned to the Globe on Shakespeare’s centenary day after a two-year world tour in which they enacted Hamlet in diverse locations.
Keywords: US President Barack Obama, Barack Obama visit to United Kingdom, Obama address to British youth
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| French President Francoise Hollande addresses the UN ahead of signing the climate change pact, on Friday. |
The historic agreement on climate change on Friday marked a milestone, with a record 175 countries, including India, signing it. But world leaders made ot clear that more action is needed, and quickly, to fight a relentless rise in global temperatures.
With the planet heating up to record levels, sea levels rising and glaciers melting, the pressure to have the Paris Agreement enter into force and to have every country turn its words into deeds was palpable at the U.N. signing ceremony.
“The world is in a race against time,” U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in his opening speech. “The era of consumption without consequences is over. Today you are signing a new covenant with the future. This covenant must amount to more than promises,” he said.
The agreement will come into force once 55 countries representing at least 55 per cent of global emissions formally join it, a process initially expected to take until 2020.
But following a host of announcements at the signing event, observers now think it could happen later this year.
China, the world’s top carbon emitter, announced it would “finalise domestic procedures” to ratify the agreement before the G20 summit in China in September. The United States, the world’s second-largest emitter, reiterated its intention to ratify this year, as did Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the leaders of Mexico and Australia.
Maros Sefcovic, the energy chief o another top emitter, the 28-nation European Union, also said the EU waned to be in the “first wave” of ratifying countries.
Congo’s President Joseph Kabila, speaking on behalf of the world’s 48 least-developed countries, said all were committed to “to move in one irreversible direction to secure a safer climate”. Even though small emitters, he said they would take the steps required to ratify the agreement “as soon as possible”, a reflection of the wide reach of the agreement.
The Washington-based World Resources Institute said that at least 25 countries representing 45 per cent of global emissions had either joined the agreement on Friday or committed to joining it early.
French President Francois Hollande, the first to sign in recognition of his key role in achieving the December agreement, said he would ask parliament to ratify it by this summer.
“There is no turning back now,” Mr. Hollande told the gathering, adding that a key to success in combating climate change will be to get governments, companies, and people all over the world to work together to move from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
U.S. Secretary of State Kerry said the signing of the agreement had to be followed by a recommitment by world leaders to actually win the “war” against carbon emissions that are making the world hotter every year.
Putting the deal into economic terms, he said, “the power of this agreement is what it is going to do to unleash the private sector” to define the new energy of the future and set the global economy on a new path to growth and development that preserves the environment.
Academy Award-winning actor Leonardo Dicaprio, a U.N. messenger of peace and climate activist, captured the feelings of many when he said: “We can congratulate each other today, but it will mean absolutely nothing if the world’s leaders gathered here go home and do nothing.”
“No more talk, no more excuses, no more 10-year studies,” he told the VIPs. “The world is now watching. You will either be lauded by future generations or vilified by them.”
After he spoke, leaders and diplomats from the 175 countries were called to the front of the chamber to sign the agreement. Mr. Kerry carried his granddaughter in his arms, a symbol of the future generations the agreement is aimed at protecting.
The signing set a record for international diplomacy — Never have so many countries signed an agreement on the first available day. States that didn’t sign on Friday have a year to do so.
The ceremony, held on Earth Day, brought together a wide range of states that might sharply disagree on other issues.
North Korea’s Foreign Minister Ri Su Yong made a rare U.N. appearance to sign and Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe brought applause when he declared, “Life itself is at stake in this combat. We have the power to win it.”
Prime Minister Enele Sosene Sopoaga of Tuvalu, which has seen four of its small islands disappear into the Pacific Ocean since 2000, said the agreement can change the world but islands on the frontline of climate change urgently need better access to financing to protect themselves against rising oceans. He urged international support for an insurance program for Pacific island nations.
Tuvalu was one of 15 nations that not only signed but ratified the agreement on Friday.
Those that haven’t indicated they will sign include some of the world’s largest oil producers Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Nigeria and Kazakhstan, according to the World Resources Institute.
The Paris Agreement was a major breakthrough in U.N. climate negotiations, which for years were slowed by disputes between rich and poor countries over who should do what.
Under the agreement, countries set their own targets for reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The targets are not legally binding, but countries must update them every five years.
Already, states face pressure to do more. Scientific analyses show the initial set of targets that countries pledged before Paris don’t match the agreement’s long-term goal to keep global warming below 2°C (3.6°F), compared with pre-industrial times. Global average temperatures have already climbed by almost 1°C. Last year was the hottest on record.
The latest analysis by the Climate Interactive research group shows the Paris pledges put the world on track for 3.5°C of warming. A separate analysis by Climate Action Tracker, a European group, projected warming of 2.7°C.
“We have a once-in-history opportunity to create a new, shared, inspiring and sustainable world,” Professor Nicholas Stern, who heads the climate change institute at the London School of Economics, told a luncheon hosted by the secretary-general. “If we delay, it will be gone.”
“If we do get it right, we will launch a new wave of dynamic innovation and growth in the medium-term,” Prof. Stern said. “The consequences of getting it wrong are unthinkable.”
Keywords: Paris Climate Agreement
Naman Ahuja is professor of Indian art history at Jawaharlal Nehru University and co-editor of Marg, a magazine of the arts published from Mumbai. He has curated major exhibitions of Indian artefacts in Europe, Britain and India in “an effort to share the richness of Indian culture with both the vernacular and global audiences”. In a telephone interview, Prof. Ahuja speaks of India’s poor record in cultivating its museums, and why the country’s obsession with one royal stone whittles down the larger question of reparations and repatriation.
Solicitor General Ranjit Kumar told the Supreme Court that if India demands the Kohinoor, other countries will start asking India to return their items. The Centre then took a U-turn, stating that it will “make all possible efforts to bring back the diamond”. What do think about the ongoing debate?
No, India does not stand to lose assets which it will be forced to return to other nations, but several nations may feel guilty about not returning Indian objects to India. What possessions of other countries does India even have to even return? Hardly any! But that is not the point. The debate on Kohinoor is entirely rhetorical at the moment. Even if objects like the diamond were to be returned, where will they be kept? In our understaffed and uncared-for museums where stories of theft and negligence are legend?
Do you think the debate has gained momentum now because objects like the Kohinoor are seen as symbols of national pride? Or is there a larger question of righting the exploitations of colonial rule?
The momentum has been provided by the media to act as a strategic counterbalance to Prince William’s visit to India. It is unfortunate and embarrassing that so much attention is being given to the Kohinoor — and this debate has been going on for over 50 years. It receives traction whenever there is a visit of an Indian premier to the U.K. or vice versa. At the end of the day we must remember that it is but one flashy stone from the treasury of the Mughals, the Sikh Maharajas, and the British royal family. There are thousands of sculptures from stupas and temples which have a larger civilisational history, religious manuscripts and treatises on ancient science, entire portions of famous buildings and textiles that adorned those buildings — things that mattered to the people of India and affected their lives — that are in museums abroad. But we dumb down the larger debate by only asking for the Kohinoor. Incidentally, Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s court was in Lahore and now Pakistan has also made a claim to the diamond.
The whole discussion is a symbolic tool. When any British dignitary visits India, the media makes some symbolic gesture about colonial reparations, and the Kohinoor has become a rather exhausted device which is used to that end. It would be worthwhile to look at far more meaningful strategies of reparation rather than waste public and media attention on something so rhetorical.
Stolen antiquities are being returned to the country of origin — for example, those traded by art smuggler Subhash Kapoor. So, why not those taken away by colonial rulers?
Because we haven’t made a cause for them; we’ve never formally made a legal case in British courts or the international courts. We’ve only been asking for this flashy stone, which whittles down the larger question of reparations and repatriation.
When Greece asked for the Elgin Marbles to be returned to it, the British Museum responded that the sculptures are better positioned in London to “serve world audiences”. Do you think this is a patronising standpoint or a fair point — to begin a debate on whether the country demanding the return has the infrastructure to preserve the object in question?
Patronising though it seems, there is some truth to it. We must accept some historical facts. Let us first look after all that we have before we greedily seek more and ruin that too. It has taken the Chennai Museum more than 35 years to repair and reopen its Amaravati gallery! The artworks, meanwhile, have suffered irreversibly. We have to start improving our museums. However, it’s not just that Western museums are well equipped; over the past 200 years their universities and publishers have produced extraordinary knowledge on these objects and the civilisations they came from. India has a long way to go to raise curiosity about history, cultivate its museums, and raise its bar on research.
A second major fact of our times is that we are forced to think beyond the limitations of our national boundaries. After all, Indian people live all over the world: will they be denied the privilege of living with Indian art in the new countries they have sought to make home? Globalisation is a fact and Indian culture is a part of world history.
Third, repatriating everything to the place of origin makes it a one-stop sitting target; it runs a very serious risk these days when artworks are regularly attacked because of censorship in the name of protecting someone or the other’s idea of what ‘tradition’ is, in times when changing political agendas can suddenly redefine what is no longer acceptable in a nation, and times when art museums are being attacked by terrorists all over the world. We have to be sensible to mitigate the potential loss by sharing these assets and placing them in different locations and repositories.
The All India Human Rights and Social Justice Front that has filed a PIL in the Supreme Court asking for the Kohinoor to be returned has also asked for the return of the ring, sword and other treasures of Tipu Sultan, Bahadur Shah Zafar, the Rani of Jhansi, and other Indian rulers. Where do you think this begins and ends? And is it a necessary settling of accounts?
Yes, I do believe that inequities have to be settled in some way, but not by claiming back royal jewels which have little to give us civilisationally except some publicity.
The way forward is not to seek the asset back but to seek the sharing of what that asset leverages — an equal sharing of the knowledge that comes out of it, a joint participation in it, not merely the onerous responsibility of being its caretaker.
What do you mean by asset leverage?
I mean the potential return of an investment. What an object can mean for civilisation, how it can be used to create a more informed or tempered view of society, to foster religious tolerance and sympathies for communities different from one’s own — these are the unquantifiable benefits of what intelligently curated museums exhibitions can achieve. What assets have we leveraged to such ends in India?
Do you see artefacts as global property or as symbols of culture that define and explain a community’s past?
They are global property; they define and explain a community’s past, not just for the sense of pride of that community alone but something that the community has to offer to the rest of the world — just as that community itself stands to learn from the achievements and objects created by other people in the world. Art is universally acknowledged for its capacity to disturb us, to express feelings that take us out of our comfort zone and make us see things afresh. Museums and their collections therefore hold the potential to foster respect for difference. A provocative space like that is a must for any society, and such spaces need protection.
A sailor lost his leg and two others were injured in an oxygen cylinder blast on board naval ship INS Nireekshak on April 16.An inquiry has been ordered.
A senior Navy official said that the explosion took place while a diving bailout bottle -- a small 12 inch bottle which is carried by Divers in their diving helmet -- was being charged.
“The explosion happened while the crew was working on the deck of the ship,” he said and added that this is the first time such an incident has happened in the Navy.
One sailor sustained serious injuries and his right leg had to be amputated above the knee and two other sailors sustained splinter injuries in the stomach and on the leg.
The injured were initially admitted in the Military Hospital in Thiruvanthapuram as the ship was on its way to Mumbai from Visakhapatnam. Their condition has since stabilised and they have now been shifted to Mumbai.
Keywords: INS Nireekshak, INS Nireekshak blast, Indian Navy, submarine blasts
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| Kausalya Satyakumar, Apoorva Sadanand and Ally Matthan |
Kausalya Satyakumar, Apoorva Sadanand and Ally Matthan share a passion for indigenous techniques of weaving, embroidery and everything that goes into Indian textiles. All through 2015, they observed the enthusiasm created by #100SareePact (a movement started by friends Anju Maudgal Kadam and Ally Matthan), where women across India pulled out saris from their wardrobes and re-discovered the treasures handed down over generations.
“A lot of women began observing things closely and asked questions about the jamdani, dabu, bagru and the many techniques we have. We are all passionate about textiles and were talking about what can be done to take this movement forward,” says Kausala Satyakumar, a textile expert who has travelled extensively to conduct textile trails.
Bangalore-based friends Kausalya, Ally and Apoorva Sadanand noticed that while Chennai had the Yarn Club, their city could do with an awareness drive. The drive had to generate interest, sustain it and be modelled such that it can travel to other cities. Apart from creating awareness, the trio wanted a project that would help revive neglected weaver pockets. Together, they formed The Registry of Sarees which will have a two-fold approach — focussed learning events on indigenous techniques and second, lending support to struggling looms.
The Registry of Sarees had its first learning session recently where designer Ashdeen Lilaowala, a graduate of National Institute of Design, took the audience through a brief history of Parsis in India. “Ashdeen spent the last decade between Persia, India and the rest of Asia and has documented the history of Parsis. We learnt interesting facts — that they were ship builders and their link with China among other details. The motifs we see in Parsi gara embroidery then made more sense; we understood how the peacock motif in India is different from that of China. The learning session helped us read the embroidery patterns better,” says Ally.
The idea of learning sessions is to provide insights and open up perspectives. Ally confesses, “Growing up as a South Indian, I had thought nothing can match the Kanchi silk. As I began learning about other textiles in the country, I learnt to appreciate our textile history better.”
The Registry of Sarees team worked in tandem with Dastkari Haat to train two weaver groups — one from Bengal and the other from Karnataka.
In December 2015, when Jaya Jaitley met a few women passionate about Indian weaves, she told them of the plight of gamcha weavers in Bengal who earned Rs. 30 to 40 per day. “Dastkar Haat helped in training some of them to weave saris, which will help them earn more,” says Kausalya.
Meanwhile, Hemalatha Jain, another textile enthusiast identified weavers specialising in patteda anchu in Karnataka in a similar plight. “We helped set up four looms in both sectors. Each weaver wove 25 saris and the two groups will be meeting potential customers at their residences on April 22 and 23 to directly sell the saris, a method that was followed decades ago,” says Ally.
The method helps weavers connect with customers and get feedback. “We don’t need to hand hold weavers once they develop a customer base,” Kausalya points out.
Apoorva Sadanand felt this model had to be self sustaining than running on charity. The trio decided to have exhibitions of rare weaves on The Registry of Sarees portal (which will be up soon). The collections will be curated by Kausalya and the proceeds will be used to set up looms in other sectors and organise learning events.
The Registry of Sarees is open to conducting learning events in different cities on invitation. “Even someone’s house will do. Some space and a focussed audience interested in textiles is all it takes,” reiterates Kausalya.
Terrorism is not new and even though it has been used since the early times of recorded history, it can be relatively hard to define terrorism.
Terrorism has been described variously as both a tactic and strategy; a crime and a holy duty; a justified reaction to oppression and an inexcusable abomination. Obviously, a lot depends on whose point of view is being represented. Terrorism has often been an effective tactic for the weaker side in a conflict. As an asymmetric form of conflict, it confers coercive power with many of the advantages of military force at a fraction of the cost. Due to the secretive nature and small size of terrorist organizations, they often offer opponents no clear organization to defend against or to deter.
That is why pre-emption is being considered to be so important. In some cases, terrorism has been a means to carry on a conflict without the adversary realizing the nature of the threat, mistaking terrorism for criminal activity. Because of these characteristics, terrorism has become increasingly common among those pursuing extreme goals throughout the world. But despite its popularity, terrorism can be a nebulous concept. Even within the U.S. Government, agencies responsible for different functions in the ongoing fight against terrorism and extremism use different definitions.
The United States Department of Defense defines terrorism as “the calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological.” Within this definition, there are three key elements—violence, fear, and intimidation—and each element produces terror in its victims. The FBI uses this definition: "Terrorism is the unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives." The U.S. Department of State defines terrorism to be "premeditated politically-motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by sub-national groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience".
Outside the United States Government, there are greater variations in what features of terrorism are emphasized in definitions. The United Nations produced the following definition of terrorism in 1992; "An anxiety-inspiring method of repeated violent action, employed by (semi-) clandestine individual, group or state actors, for idiosyncratic, criminal or political reasons, whereby - in contrast to assassination - the direct targets of violence are not the main targets." The most commonly accepted academic definition starts with the U.N. definition quoted above, and adds two sentences totalling another 77 words on the end; containing such verbose concepts as "message generators" and "violence based communication processes". Less specific and considerably less verbose, the British Government definition of terrorism from 1974 is "...the use of violence for political ends, and includes any use of violence for the purpose of putting the public, or any section of the public, in fear."
Terrorism is a criminal act that influences an audience beyond the immediate victim. The strategy of terrorists is to commit acts of violence that draws the attention of the local populace, the government, and the world to their cause. The terrorists plan their attack to obtain the greatest publicity, choosing targets that symbolize what they oppose. The effectiveness of the terrorist act lies not in the act itself, but in the public’s or government’s reaction to the act. For example, in 1972 at the Munich Olympics, the Black September Organization killed 11 Israelis. The Israelis were the immediate victims. But the true target was the estimated 1 billion people watching the televised event. Those billion people watching were to be introduced to fear - which is terrorism's ultimate goal. The introduction of this fear can be from the threat of physical harm/a grizzly death, financial terrorism from the fear of losing money or negative effects on the economy, cyber terrorism harming the critical technological infrastructures of society and psychological terrorism designed to influence people's behaviour. Terrorism is designed to produce an overreaction and anecdotally, it succeeds at that almost all the time.
The Black September Organization used the high visibility of the Munich Olympics to publicize its views on the plight of the Palestinian refugees. Similarly, in October 1983, Middle Eastern terrorists bombed the Marine Battalion Landing Team Headquarters at Beirut International Airport. Their immediate victims were the 241 U.S. military personnel who were killed and over 100 others who were wounded. Their true target was the American people and the U.S. Congress. Their one act of violence influenced the United States’ decision to withdraw the Marines from Beirut and was therefore considered a terrorist success.
There are three perspectives of terrorism: the terrorist’s, the victim’s, and the general public’s. The phrase “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” is a view terrorists themselves would gladly accept. Terrorists do not see themselves as evil. They believe they are legitimate combatants, fighting for what they believe in, by whatever means possible to attain their goals. A victim of a terrorist act sees the terrorist as a criminal with no regard for human life. The general public’s view though can be the most unstable. The terrorists take great pains to foster a “Robin Hood” image in hope of swaying the general public’s point of view toward their cause. This sympathetic view of terrorism has become an integral part of their psychological warfare and has been countered vigorously by governments, the media and other organizations.
Keywords : What is Terrorism?, Terrorism, Terrorist, Terrorist in Nepal, Terrorist in India,
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| The Supreme Court Bench reiterated that it would test the “so-called” customary practice under the provisions of the Constitution. |
The question popped up during a half-day hearing of a petition filed against the ban on women of a certain age from entering and worshipping in the famous Sabarimala temple in Kerala where a celibate deity presides.
Senior advocate and amicus curiae Raju Ramachandran was arguing before a Bench of Justices Dipak Misra, V. Gopala Gowda and Kurian Joseph that a ban on women worshipping a deity just because of their biology was detrimental to their dignity.
He said any other morality, including an institutional one based on tradition that access to worship for women aged between 10 and 55 at Sabarimala temple would “disturb” the celibate deity, was subservient to constitutional morality that there should not be discrimination in the name of gender, sex, caste, etc.
Mr. Ramachandran said it was a facile argument to say that only women of a certain age were banned entry. The ban affected women during their most active years and thus had the impact of discriminating against women as a class. He submitted that women could worship Lord Ayyappa at any other shrine except Sabarimala.
At this point, Justice Kurian suddenly asked: “Why do you worship?” To this, Mr. Ramachandran replied that it was for getting blessings and to say thanks.
The second part of saying thanks is corollary to the first part — blessings. Only if you get the first will you say the second,” Justice Kurian remarked.
Justice Kurian then went on to ask: “But here if the deity says ‘I don’t want to see you’, why do you compel Him to see you? If the deity does not want to be pleased, why do you compel Him to be pleased?”
Mr. Raju Ramachandran responded that the notion of the deity wanting to keep aloof from women worshippers of a certain age was merely an “interpretation created by those who have managed the temple.”
Protected by Constitution
“If I, a woman, have faith. If I want to worship. I must have access to see Him... that part is protected by the Constitution irrespective of sex, gender, caste or biological phenomena,” Mr. Ramachandran said.
Keywords: Sabarimala temple, temple entry ban, Happy to Bleed, Indira Jaising
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We want answers from Chidambaram, Soniaand Rahul: Nirmala |
This comes after a media report claimed that Mr. Chidambaram, the then Home Minister, had signed the first affidavit in the encounter case stating that Jahan was both a Lashkar-e-Taiba operative and part of a plot to assassinate the then Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
“You underplayed a terror plot that could eliminate [Prime Minister Modi]. You are clearly admitting that you cannot fight this politically. So eliminate or allow to eliminate or encourage elimination of the leader who you are mortified of fighting politically,” she said in a strongly worded statement.
She said it proved that the Congress wanted to project Prime Minister Modi as being against “some sections of the population… as if there is no terror threat against him.”
“They wanted to quietly watch the terror plot bloom to eliminate a political opponent… a very serious fallout is the way this country’s intelligence and counter-intelligence have been weakened,” Ms. Sitharaman said. She said the matter would be raised in Parliament, set to reconvene on April 25.
The Congress questioned the authenticity of the document that was being cited by a TV channel and the BJP, with senior party leader Shakeel Ahmed accusing the BJP government at the Centre of “planting false stories” in the media.
“The question is not whether Ishrat Jahan was a terrorist or not. The question is that whether she was killed in a genuine or a fake encounter,” he said. “The Modi government is trying to divert the attention from the fact that she was killed in a fake encounter. The court has established this, not only one court, but lower court, High Court, and a CBI enquiry monitored by the high court,” Mr. Shakeel said.
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| Dempsey Nibbs has been jailed after he was found guilty of murdering his partner Judith Nibbs |
A crane driver who decapitated his wife and tried to flush her severed head down the toilet has been jailed for life with a minimum of 21 years.
Jealous Dempsey Nibbs, 69, became enraged after Meals On Wheels worker Judith Nibbs, 60, after she admitted she had been having sex with at least eight other men .
He was found guilty of murdering the mother of his two children at the flat they shared in Hoxton, east London, on the evening of April 10 last year.
Nibbs knocked her out with an iron bar before cutting her head off, smashing it up with a mallet and disposing of the pieces in the lavatory.
Afterwards, he wrote a note to his 30-year-old son Kirk and called 999 to say police would find two bodies at the property.
A police officer broke down the door when he saw Mrs Nibbs' headless body through the letterbox and bravely grappled a shotgun and knife from Nibbs as he attempted to stab himself in the bathroom.
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| Judith Nibbs had admitted to her long-term partner Dempsey that she had been cheating on him with at least eight other men |
Nibbs, who had been diagnosed with prostate cancer , said he killed his wife because he thought she was a "snake" but jurors heard he had shown no signs of mental illness.
His lawyer Ian Henderson QC told the court that his client acknowledged that his ill health meant he would die in jail.
The Recorder of London Nicholas Hilliard QC jailed Nibbs for life with a minimum of 21 years.
He told him: "I'm sure you don't regret your wife's death save for its effect on your own comfort and well-being."
During the trial at the Old Bailey, prosecutor Crispin Aylett QC told the jury that the couple's relationship soured in the spring of 2014 as Nibbs suspected his wife of having affairs.
Their son said that since his mother, who had three daughters from a previous marriage, no longer had to care for his younger sister, Nibbs felt she had changed and was not "the housewife" she used to be.
When Nibbs had asked him to go through his mother's computer, he found videos of her blowing kisses and saying "I love you" as well as sexually explicit pictures which he stored in a file entitled "Mum Slut".
Nibbs searched his wife's drawers and discovered bank transfer slips from their joint account to one in Morocco in the name of a close male friend and neighbour with whom she had gone on a road trip to Rabat in 2013.
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| Nibbs knocked her out with an iron bar before cutting her head off, smashing it up with a mallet and disposing of the pieces in the lavatory |
An examination of her computer was to show that she went on to exchange sexually explicit messages on Skype with another man called Khalid in Morocco.
Mrs Nibbs had confided in her sister and a colleague at Meals On Wheels that her husband had threatened to kill her and grabbed her by the throat.
During a row on April 7, Mrs Nibbs, who was originally from Kirkham, near Preston, Lancashire, admitted seeing other men, taunting Nibbs by saying: "I have had sex eight times."The next day, the mother of five predicted her own killing as she left work, with the words: "If I'm not in Friday, I might be dead."
Nibbs, of the Charles Estate in Hoxton, told jurors he had not meant to kill his partner when he went to confront her over money taken from their bank account, which he took as "proof" of her infidelity.
He said he had only meant to "slap her around a bit" and it was only after she was dead that he cut her head off in anger because she "betrayed" him.
Judge Hilliard rejected Nibbs's claim he only initially "tapped" his wife on the head with a metal bar to get her attention, and noted the victim's tooth had been knocked out and swallowed with the root still attached during the attack.
Cutting her head off afterwards was an act of "grotesque savagery" in revenge for her perceived "treachery", the judge said. Leaving her breasts exposed was intended to "humiliate her even in death", he added.
Mrs Nibbs' sister Frances described the mother-of-five as a "very kind and caring person" in a statement on behalf of the family.
They were all "shocked and devastated" by her murder, she said: "Whatever problems there were in her relationship, Judith did not deserve to die in such a callous and brutal way."
Her son Kirk had been greatly affected by the trial and did not feel able to submit a victim impact statement, the court heard.
Keywords: prostate cancer
Keywords: prostate cancer
