Monday, November 26, 2012
Syrian warplanes have bombed a rebel headquarters near the Turkish border, missing their target but sending hundreds of Syrians fleeing across the frontier.
Monday’s attack on the Free Syrian Army (FSA) base in Atima, two kilometres from the border, came a day before Turkish and NATO officials were due to start assessing where to station surface-to-air missiles close to the 900km border.
Ahmed, an opposition activist who lives within a few blocks of the base, said: “Two Syrian fighter jets came and fired five rockets. Three have hit farm areas and another two hit buildings near the base.”
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Dozen of Algerian jihadists have arrived in the Malian city of Timbuktu to support armed Islamist groups who are imposing an increasingly brutal version of sharia law in the vast northern areas under their control, security sources said Sunday.
The latest influx of foreigners joining the Al-Qaeda linked Islamists was revealed as interim authorities in Bamako postponed a key conference to plan the country’s transition back to democracy and tackle the crisis in the occupied north.
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Sunday, November 25, 2012
Spain’s right-leaning government flatly rejected Sunday an offer by armed Basque group ETA to negotiate its disarmament and dissolution.
ETA, blamed for 829 killings in more than four decades of fighting for a Basque homeland, said Saturday it was ready to discuss disarming and disbanding with France and Spain under certain conditions.
The group, which last year said it had abandoned violence, said in a statement on Basque newspaper Gara’s website that one outstanding issue was the transfer of Basque prisoners to jails closer to home.
But Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s Popular Party government refused to consider talks with ETA.
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Basque separatist group ETA may disarm and disband, if able to successfully negotiate the release of prisoners with the Spanish government.
The group has released a statement saying they are also willing to demilitarise the Basque region of Euskadi.
Among others, ETA may want to talk about the release of Izaskun Lesak, a suspected ETA leader arrested in France in October.
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Saturday, November 24, 2012
Armed clashes reportedly broke out Saturday in Somalia’s southern port city of Kimayo, a town formerly held by Islamists about 500 Km (310 Miles) south of Mogadishu.
Witnesses said heavily armed unknown militias have stormed bases manned by Kenyan forces in the heart of the city late on Friday night, causing unconfirmed human losses.
Local residents reported that the attack raged on for several hours and the Kenyan army managed to fend off the assault from their positions.
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