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news without borders
Pakistan captures
Taliban base, struggles
with refugees
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on
Wednesday boasted of a mili-
tary victory in a small Taliban
stronghold but struggled to
provide for 1.5 million people
who fled its onslaught as fears
grow of a lengthening crisis.
The military ordered the
offensive last month under US
pressure to crush rebels in the
northwest, which Washington
said threatened the very exist-
ence of the Muslim country
and posed the greatest terror
threat to the West.
Government troops have
been battling fighters around
Sultanwas – a small town
under Taliban control in Buner
district – for some time, but
the military claimed to have
regained control and killed 80
rebels in a fierce assault.
“Security forces cleared
Sultanwas last night after
intense clashes. Reportedly
80 militants were killed,” the
military said in a statement.
Egyptian tycoon gets death for murder
CAIRO: Egyptian construction magnate
Hesham Talaat Moustafa (pix) was sen-
tenced to death yesterday for the murder
of Lebanese singer Suzanne Tamim in
Dubai, court sources said.
Moustafa, former chairman of the
Talaat Moustafa Group and a prominent
politician, had been accused of paying
security man Muhsen el-Sukkari US$2
million (RM 7.2 million) to stab Tamim to
death at her house in Dubai in the United
Arab Emirates on July 28.
Sukkari was also sentenced to death in the
case, and the men’s files were referred to Egyptian
religious authorities for review, as normal in capital
cases in Egypt.
Witness reports of heavy of refugees, of IDPs
fighting in Buner this week have (internally displaced
embarrassed claims from the persons),” said Rienk
interior minister on Sunday that Van Velzen, a spokes-
operations there had ended. man for aid group
As the conflict ploughs on, World Vision.
concerns are mounting about The US defence
how to cope with the displaced, representative in Is-
uprooted in what rights groups lamabad, Rear Admiral
have called Pakistan’s biggest Michael LeFever, said
movement of people since par- Pakistani authorities
tition from India in 1947. expected large numbers
Tens of thousands of people of displaced people would
are living in government-run remain at the temporary
camps, crammed into tents in camps to the end of the year.
the scorching summer heat “It appears that this will last,
with poor sanitation. they say they anticipate this
“Life in this camp is even
worse than the life of animals,”
said Amna Rashid, a student
population in IDP camps to last
through December,” LeFever
told reporters in Washington in
sheltering at a camp near the
town of Mardan.
“When I leave my tent, camp
a teleconference.
The United Nations said that
around 1.5 million people left
staff look at me as if I were a call their homes this month and
girl. It is really disgusting and registered with authorities, join-
painful,” she said by telephone. ing about 550,000 IDPs who fled
“Neither we nor the govern- previous bouts of fighting in the
ment expected this number troubled northwest. – AFP
The indictment had accused Sukkari
of killing Tamim after tricking her into
opening the door of her Dubai apart-
ment by posing as a representative of
the building owners. He then attacked
her with a knife.
It accused Moustafa of participat-
ing in the crime through “incitement,
agreement and assistance” in the
killing.
The evidence included tape
recordings of telephone calls between Moustafa
and Sukkari, security video footage from the Dubai
apartment and DNA from the bloodied clothes that
Sukkari was accused of leaving close to the scene
of the crime. – Reuters
People displaced from
restive Buner region of
Malakand agency, return
to their native villages
after the army cleared
the area of militants.
Four arrested for planning
terror attacks in New York
NEW YORK: Four men appeared in a US federal
court yesterday to face charges linked with plan-
ning attacks against a Jewish synagogue and US
warplanes based at a New York military base,
prosecutors said.
The group, residing in New York, where Al
Qaeda extremists with hijacked commercial airlin-
ers destroyed the World Trade Centre on Sept 11,
2001, were arrested on Wednesday on charges of
plotting to detonate explosives near a synagogue in
the Bronx borough of New York, according to court
documents.
The men, who according to a US congressman
were all born in the United States, also “planned
to shoot down military planes located at the New
York Air National Guard Base at Stewart Airport in
Newburgh, New York, with Stinger surface-to-air
guided missiles,” officials said.
The suspects – identified as James Cromitie,
David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen
– were all residents of Newburgh and had been
tracked for over a year, officials said.
They were set to appear in federal court in White
Plains, New York yesterday. The charges hold a mini-
mum sentence of 25 years in prison to a maximum
sentence of life imprisonment.
Three of the men were of Arabic descent and
one of Haitian descent, according to New York
Governor David Paterson. They all used Arab aliases.
New York Representative Peter King said the men
briefs
Intruder had ‘vision’ Suu Kyi
in danger: Lawyer
YANGON: The American man at the centre
of the trial against Myanmar opposition leader
Aung San Suu Kyi swam to her house after hav-
ing a vision that her life was in danger, Suu Kyi’s
lawyers said yesterday.
Yesterday’s session heard the first hint of
a motive for John Yettaw’s bizarre actions two
weeks ago that could see Suu Kyi jailed for up
to five years if she is found guilty of breaking
the terms of her house arrest.
Nyan Win, a member of her defence team,
said Yettaw had made the comments on Tues-
day as the court heard testimony from a police
officer who had questioned the American.
“I had come to Myanmar to warn Myanmar
authorities and Suu Kyi against that danger,” Nyan
Win quoted the 53-year-old as saying. – Reuters
‘Duck island’ sinks Tory in
British expenses row
LONDON: Britain’s political expenses row
threw up a new embarrassing revelation
theSun | FRIDAY MAY 22 2009
EPAPIX
were Muslim and that some had converted to Islam
in prison.
In their efforts to obtain weapons for the attack,
the defendants dealt with an informant from the
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) who provided
the group “with an inactive missile and inert explo-
sives.”
In June 2008, Cromitie told an FBI informant
about his anger over the US-led war in Afghanistan.
The suspect then “expressed an interest in doing
‘something to America’,” the complaint said.
Beginning in October 2008, the informant began
meeting with the four men at a house in which the
FBI had concealed video and audio equipment.
The group “expressed desire” to attack targets in
New York, and Cromitie “asked the informant to sup-
ply surface-to-air guided missiles and explosives,”
court documents said.
In April 2009, the group agreed on the synagogue
they intended to attack and proceeded to conduct
surveillance, including taking photographs of the
warplanes at the military base.
“As alleged in the complaint, the defendants
wanted to engage in terrorist attacks,” said acting
US attorney Lev L Dassin.
“Fortunately, the defendants sought the assist-
ance of a witness cooperating with the government.
While the weapons provided to the defendants were
fake, the defendants thought they were absolutely
real.” – AFP
yesterday, as an opposition lawmaker
was forced to quit after claiming £1,600
(RM8,800) for a “duck island”.
Senior Conservative MP Sir Peter Vig-
gers bought the wooden structure – provid-
ing a comfortable retreat for ducks in the
middle of a garden pond – for his home in
Hampshire, southern England, The Daily
Telegraph newspaper said.
“I spoke to him and I said ‘you are going
to announce immediately your retirement or I
will remove the Conservative whip’ and he has
announced immediately his retirement,” Con-
servative leader David Cameron said. – AFP
Obama defiant on Gitmo
closure, slams Bush ‘mess’
WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama yes-
terday vowed no retreat on closing Guantanamo
Bay despite raging debate, branding the camp
a “mess” and charging Bush-era anti-terror
tactics were rooted in fear and ideology.
In a major speech designed to grab back
control of an acrimonious debate over national
security policies, Obama also raised the pros-
pect of holding the most dangerous Al Qaeda
detainees indefinitely in US “super-max” jails.
Minutes after the speech, former vice-presi-
dent Dick Cheney defended Bush policies in his
own televised speech, saying he would make the
same decisions again “without hesitation”. – AFP