Saturday, September 6, 2014
The US military has killed the leader of an al-Qaida-linked Islamic group in a Somalia airstrike, the Pentagon announced Friday.
“We have confirmed that Ahmed Godane, the co-founder of al-Shabaab, has been killed,” Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby said in a statement. “The U.S. military undertook operations against Godane on Sept. 1, which led to his death. Removing Godane from the battlefield is a major symbolic and operational loss to al-Shabaab. The United States works in coordination with its friends, allies and partners to counter the regional and global threats posed by violent extremist organizations.”
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Friday, September 5, 2014
Ukraine and pro-Russian rebels reached a ceasefire agreement on Friday, the first step toward ending fighting in eastern Ukraine that has caused the worst standoff between Moscow and the West since the Cold War ended.
The ceasefire deal was struck in the Belarussian capital Minsk along with a deal allowing for prisoner exchanges, deliveries of humanitarian aid and the withdrawal of heavy weapons after five months of a conflict that has killed more than 2,600 people.
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Mozambican President Armando Guebuza shook hands with opposition leader Afonso Dhlakama, agreeing to end months of violence.
The meeting today in the capital, Maputo, marked the ratification of a peace agreement between the Mozambican National Resistance, known as Renamo, and the ruling Front for the Liberation of Mozambique, or Frelimo, signed last month.
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Thursday, September 4, 2014
Hundreds of civilians are fleeing Nigeria’s northeastern city of Maiduguri as fears grow that Islamist Boko Haram militants may try to assault the Borno state capital after seizing towns and territory around it, residents said on Thursday.
Heavily-armed Boko Haram fighters using captured military vehicles and weapons have taken towns and villages to the north, east and south of Maiduguri in the last few weeks and days in an apparent strategy to encircle the city and hold territory.
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In an alarming development, al-Qaeda has established a new branch to wage jihad in India, revive its caliphate and impose sharia in the Indian sub-continent, US media and intelligence agencies said today.
The creation of the group called “Qaedat al-Jihad in the Indian Subcontinent” was announced by As Sahab, al-Qaeda’s official media outlet, in a lengthy video posted on the social media outlets including You Tube. The group, headed by senior Pakistani militant Asim Umar, would report to top Taliban leader Mullah Omar.
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