Right Truth

U.S. Consulates In Mumbai And Calcutta Threatened With Bomb Attacks

Via Weasel Zippers:

Hopefully, there is response to adequately protect our people.

Via Times Of India:

MUMBAI: The Western Naval command headquarters has alerted the city police about the threat of a bomb attack on the US consulate here on July 21. The intelligence was shared with reference to an anonymous letter received by the consulate-general and American Centre in Kolkata, threatening to attack both places.

A copy of the single-page letter was passed on by Sanjay Kumar, command intelligence officer, western naval command. The letter has ‘Al-Jihad’ written on top, much like a logo or the name of an organization. It said US consulate officials are the targets and told the Americans to vacate the consulates. It also said, “We shall carry out blasts in public places and railway stations of Hyderabad, Bangalore and Mumbai in July this year.”

It was unclear when the US consulate received the letter and why July 21 was chosen. Al-Jihad is not known to intelligence agencies but they are taking the threat seriously as terror outfits are known to hide under various names. The input has been shared with the Intelligence Bureau headquarters and its wings in Hyderabad, Kolkata, Bangalore and Mumbai.

Keep reading…

 

India: the world's fourth most dangerous country for women

Via CNN:

[snip]

"Why are they killing girls, while they're still in the womb? It's a sin for which they'll have to be answerable to God. [snip]

A Thomson Reuters Foundation expert poll last year ranked India as the world's fourth most dangerous country for a woman, behind only Afghanistan, Congo and Pakistan. 

Even though the practice is outlawed, 300,000 to 600,000 female fetuses are aborted every year in India because of the preference for boys, according to a 2011 study by The Lancet. And the discrimination that begins while in the womb continues throughout a girl's life. [snip]

...  "They send boys to good schools, they give them good food, nice clothes to wear. They treat them well. They say, 'Oh, it's my son.' To the daughter they say, 'Get the cow dung, sweep the floors. What will you do with an education?'"

  (continue reading at CNN, hat tip Marcus Wilder)

 

City worker jailed for stealing $10M from fund to identify 9/11 remains still holding on to cash

Former city worker Natarajan Venkataram was sentenced to 15 years in jail for siphoning $10 million meant for identifying 9/11 victims.

Ten years after the Sept. 11 attacks, ex-city worker Natarajan Venkataram says he’s sorry he stole millions of dollars meant for identifying the remains of trade center victims. 

He’s just not sorry enough to turn over $400,000 sitting in his bank account in India.

The city has recovered $7 million of the $10 million he and an accomplice stole, but he went to court to hold onto this final portion of his ill-gotten gains. (image Jane Rosenberg)

In a phone interview from the federal prison camp at Fort Dix, N.J., Venkataram, 46, whined about jail conditions and apologized repeatedly for his crime.

Asked about the disputed cash, Venkataram said: “All the issues are still pending in the court.”

The city medical examiner’s office got millions of dollars from the feds to help identify the remains of nearly 3,000 victims.

Venkataram, then a manager dealing with the medical examiner’s computer system, and his girlfriend, Rosa Abreu, siphoned off millions via shell companies and fake contract bids.  (continue reading at NewYork Daily News)

Mumbai Under Attack

Three separate explosions rocked Mumbai today killing at least 10 and injuring over 100.  Attacks in Mumbai three years ago, two luxury hotels, a Jewish center and a busy train station, were perpetrated by a Pakistan-based terror group.  David Headley, a Pakistani-American businessman who has confessed to his involvement in the attacks,  testified that Pakistan's ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate) helped Lashkar-e-Taiba carry out the 2008 attachs.  Pakistan, once again, pretending to help fight terrorism while supporting it.  These attacks today come on the apparent birthday of Ajmal Qasab, the only gunman captured alive in the 2008 attacks.  No word on who is responsible for today's attacks.  NDTV has live video updates.

The blasts hit the crowded Dadar neighborhood, the famed jewelry market Jhaveri Bazaar and the busy business district of Opera House,...

The explosions happened around 7 p.m., when all the neighborhoods would have been packed with office workers and commuters.

The explosions hit locations where a terror siege nearly three years ago killed 166 people.

The blasts -- if confirmed as a terror strike -- would mark the first major attack on Mumbai since 10 militants laid siege to India's financial capital for 60 hours in November 2008. (Fox News)

Forbes reports that the three bomb explosions, taking place 15 minutes apart, may be just the beginning and that more blasts could be imminent from bombs planted in unknown locations that have yet to explode. 

Updates as they become available.

Stratfor reports:

Nonetheless, the attack comes at a critical juncture in U.S.-Pakistani relations as the United States is trying to accelerate a withdrawal of its military forces in Afghanistan. The 2008 Mumbai attacks revealed the extent to which traditional Pakistan-based Islamist militant groups, such as elements from the defunct Lashkar-e-Taiba, had collaborated with transnational jihadist elements like al Qaeda in trying to instigate a crisis between Islamabad and New Delhi. Such a crisis would complicate U.S.-Pakistani dealings on Afghanistan, potentially serving the interests of al Qaeda as well as factions within Pakistan trying to derail a negotiation between the United States and Pakistan. Follow our coverage »

Girl ends life to donate eyes to dad, kidneys to brother...

... But she is cremated before her note with instructions is found.

NADIA: For days, Mumpy would listen quietly as the elders discussed how only an eye surgery could save her father's vision and a kidney transplant her brother's life. But both surgeries were beyond the family's meagre means. So, Mumpy hit upon a plan, which to her 12-year-old mind seemed the answer to all troubles. She would kill herself, which would save the dowry, too, and her organs would give her loved ones back their lives.

Mumpy did stick to her plan. But the suicide note in which she had scribbled down her wishes was found the day after she was cremated. [snip]

Mumpy had taken elder sister Monica, a Class VIII student, into confidence and had urged her to commit suicide as well for the "cause". When Mumpy told Monica about her plan on the morning of June 27, the latter laughed it off and left for school. Their father was away at work and mother Rita had gone to fetch rice.

"Finding herself alone at home, Mumpy consumed Thiodan, a pesticide. Then, she ran to meet her father, who was about half a kilometre away. She told him that she had dreamt that someone had poured poison into her mouth and her stomach ached. Her alarmed father took her to a local pharmacy immediately where she was given some medicines. But her condition worsened soon and she had to be rushed to the local Baranberia hospital. From there, she was referred to Anulia hospital. But the doctors declared her brought dead," Tarafdar said.

It was only the day after her cremation that Mumpy's father found a note on her bed. Addressed to her mother, the girl requested her to make use of her eyes and kidney for the treatment of her father and brother. This left the aggrieved family inconsolable. "We were too late in understanding the feelings of a very sensitive child," Mridul wept. Mumpy's mother has gone into shock.  (Times of India)

 

Prosecutor Defends Deal With Mumbai-Attacks Plotter

by Sebastian Rotella
ProPublica, June 13, 2011, 4:46 p.m

The chief prosecutor in a landmark terrorism trial [1] that ended last week in Chicago says a plea bargain with a confessed American terrorist was justified because of his value as a source of intelligence and as a key witness in any future prosecutions.

Jurors last Thursday convicted Tahawwur Rana, a Chicago businessman, after a trial that revealed unprecedented details about the alliance between Pakistani militant groups and that country's intelligence service [2]. In addition to investigative work by the FBI in the United States, Pakistan, India and Denmark, the case centered on five days of testimony of David Coleman Headley, who confessed to doing reconnaissance for the 2008 Mumbai attacks and a failed plot in Denmark.

Michelle Obama, You Are No Jackie O'

Jackie Kennedy Onassis has class, style, poise and I'm tired of reading drivel like this comparing Michelle Obama's fashion sense to to that of Jackie O'.  Even in jeans or slacks, Jackie Kennedy Onassis looked classy.  You be the judge, look at Jackie then look at pictures of Michelle from the India trip this week.

 

 

I report, you decide.

An expensive study reveals ....

A study comparing "Sunday shopping" vs "Sunday church attendance" and "happiness" done by researchers from DePaul University in Chicago and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, revealed that some White women would rather shop on Sunday than attend church and as a result they were less happy than if they had attended church.  Whew!  I'm so glad somebody did a study on that, it sure is a load off my mind.  But like most studies these days there is very little scientific data and lot of assuming going on.

So why would Sunday shopping make women less happy? Part of the reason may be that some of the women were required to work on Sundays after the repeal of blue laws. “People don’t like to work on Sundays,’’ Dr. Sander said.

Or the decline in women’s happiness once Sunday shopping is allowed may be linked to the behavior of their children, many of whom may start hanging out at shopping malls on Sundays. Earlier research has shown that the repeal of blue laws is linked with more risk-taking behavior by teens.

Or it may simply be that the lure of shopping is more powerful than the desire to attend church, even though it brings less happiness.

Notably, the finding was true only for women. For men, the repeal of blue laws didn’t seem to influence church attendance or levels of happiness.  (New York Times Blogs)

Donald Sensing points out:

   ...  this blinding glimpse of the obvious:

The study specifically focused on the behavior of Catholics and Protestants because they were most likely to attend church on Sundays.

Imagine that! How about this: The study specifically focused on the behavior of Catholics and Protestants because they were most likely to attend church at all. 

Another study:  Child-abduction study find capable kids are their own best defenses.   All that "don't talk to strangers" you try to teach them doesn't count, because when confronted with danger or abduction they escape harm mostly through their own fast thinking or fierce resistance.

The new analysis examines more than 4,200 cases of attempted but unsuccessful abductions, and it shows that children were their own best protectors.

"They escaped these things not through the efforts of good Samaritans, but through recognizing a bad situation and either getting away from it, avoiding it, or screaming and kicking to draw attention," said Ernie Allen, president of the missing children's center.

In the vast majority of the cases examined, children escaped harm through their own actions. In 16 percent of the cases, an adult stepped in to help.  (Washington Post)

Could it possibly be that parents and teachers actually taught their children what to do in case they are confronted with danger and the kids actually remembered and obeyed?  Nah, that would be too easy.

And who paid for these useless studies?  Probably a large sum of taxpayer money.  I can think up some "study" I would like to do say... for a million bucks or so...

 

Other Reading:

Seven killed, four injured in US drone strike in North Waziristan(Third strike in the past 24 hours) (JAWA Report)

5 Predators after one pickup truck...they wanted someone real bad.  SIFY

Uh Oh - Brits lost some weapons and guess who might have them now?, BlackFive

At the Daily Telegraph is a story about an investigation into some missing weapons that are feared to be in the hands of the Taliban

China in Kashmir, By blackfive@gmail.com (Pundit Review Radio) on Current Affairs

Take note of these Chinese troops in Kashmir, with Islamabad's apparent permission, securing their route to the western sea with a new highway and -- India fears -- perhaps a railroad.

China's railroad made an appearance in the Grand Strategy post.

Catholic church hall to be converted to mosque in Nova Scotia, By Christian Knight

Sydney - A Catholic church hall will be converted into a mosque in Sydney, Nova Scotia. The building will be...

Exclusive: Concerns Mounting Over Ground Zero Mosque Funding, By Christian Knight

NEW YORK (CBS 2) – New and disturbing questions are mounting about the source of funding for the

Radical Islam is world's greatest threat - Tony Blair, By Christian Knight

Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has described radical Islam as the greatest threat facing the world

Pakistan: 4 more Christian villages deliberately flooded,By Christian Knight

Four Christian and Hindu villages in the southeastern Pakistani province of Sindh have been deliberately flooded

The London Conference on Afghanistan and Yemen - Look who's coming to dinner!

A one day London Conference on Afghanistan to be held at Lancaster House on January 28, 2010, will see more than sixty countries and international organizations gather to focus on three key agenda items: security, economic development and governance, and regional relations.  The Yemen conference will be held on January 27, 2010.  Turkey will host a meeting of Afghanistan's neighbors on January 26.  There will also be post-conference meetings in Kabul.

A copy of the draft communique, obtained by Reuters, anticipates  Afghan troops to take "security primacy" in some provinces by early 2011, with foreign forces in a supporting role. The communique also commits Afghanistan to establish -- and the West to fund -- a program to "reach out to insurgents" and pay fighters to lay down arms. (Reuters)

"It is very important that the political system is open enough to bring those insurgents who are willing to work within the Afghan constitution," Foreign Secretary David Miliband told BBC television.

Reconciliation with the Taliban similar to the reconciliation with the Sons of Iraq, JAM, individual tribes and other groups in Iraq over the last few years?  Can you picture a Taliban member or Taliban representative at the table for the London conference?  Can you picture Mullah Omar ready to lay down arms and join the political process?  Will the Taliban reject sharia law, allow women to shed the burqua and veil, participate in business and politics? 

The United States recognizes that the Taliban  are now part of the political fabric of Afghanistan,  Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates  said here on Friday, but the group must be prepared to play a legitimate role before it can reconcile with the Afghan government. 

That means, Mr. Gates said, that the Taliban must participate in elections, not oppose education and not assassinate local officials.  (New York Times)

Can you moderate the Taliban, and if so what would you get???  Something similar to a Wahhabi???  If we invite the Taliban to the table at the Afghanistan conference, shouldn't we then invite representatives from al-Qaeda to the Yemen conference???  Do we think they too can be moderated?  And if so what would that look like?  Can we picture Taliban and al-Qaeda 'participating in the political process'??? 

Attendees to the Afghanistan conference will include Afghan President Hamid Karzai, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs Lawrence Cannon, several European, Asian and Middle Eastern countries,  and foreign ministers of Afghanistan's other foreign partners.  Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said if Iran’s views are considered at the conference, Tehran will study the invitation to attend the conference with a positive view; otherwise there will be no reason to attend the conference.  

Nato commanders and the Afghan government will say they must grow the Afghanistan army from its current level of 100,000 to 172,000  and the police force must also rapidly grow from 95,000 to 109,000 by October next year.  (The Telegraph)  No easy task.

After the recent fraud-filled elections in Afghanistan, presidential and parliamentary elections originally scheduled for May 22, 2010 have now been postponed until September 18, 2010.

This past week the terror threat to the UK was raised to "severe" - meaning an attack is considered "highly likely"- raising much speculation as to the reason for this change.  It was feared the London conferences on Yemen and Afghanistan could be used by al-Qa'ida as an opportunity to strike at the West, Whitehall sources said yesterday.  Other concerns were a warning that a group of female terrorists, who may have a "non-Arab" appearance, had been trained to attack western targets,  and MI5 fears that Islamic terrorists planned to hijack an Indian airliner and crash it into a British city. (Independent.uk)

In addition to the London conferences and items listed above, there are many other reasons for terror concerns --the trial in New York of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed;  other potential Yemen terrorists following the underwear bomber on Northwest Airlines plane to Detroit on Christmas Day;  Al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula promising blue-eyed, blond terrorists headed to the U.S.; the Western-looking women suicide bombers;   the killing of CIA agents in an attack on a US base in Afghanistan last month; and an audio tape from Al-Qaeda's number one Osama bin Laden today. 

"The Osama bin Laden audio message released to Al-Jazeera on 24 January 2010 contains specific language used by bin Laden in his statements in advance of attacks," IntelCenter said in a statement.

The group said it considered the language "a possible indicator of an upcoming attack" in the next 12 months.

"This phrase, 'Peace be upon those who follow guidance,' appears at the beginning and end of messages released in advance of attacks that are designed to provide warning to Al-Qaeda's enemies that they need to change their ways or they will be attacked," the group said.  (More)

Robert Gates said, "al-Qaeda, the Taliban in Afghanistan, Tehrik-e-Taliban in Pakistan, Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Haqqani network – this is a syndicate of terrorists that work together" ...  al-Qaeda was "orchestrating attacks" using these different groups."  He later backtracked saying "they don't operationally co-ordinate their activities, as best I can tell".  Well, which is it?    

Four years ago on February 1, 2006, the Afghanistan Compact was signed as the way forward for Afghanistan and the international community.  

Also known as the London Agreement, the Afghanistan Compact had the Government of Afghanistan and the international community affirming “their shared commitment to continue, in the spirit of the Bonn, Tokyo and Berlin conferences, to work toward a stable and prosperous Afghanistan, with good governance and human rights protection for all under the rule of law, and to maintain and strengthen that commitment over the term of this Compact and beyond.”   (United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan)

Concerning Afghanistan, we can expect a similar document to be accepted and signed at this 2010 conference.

American officials have given qualified support to a proposed Afghan initiative to provide jobs, security and social benefits to Taliban followers who defect.

Concerning the Yemen conference:  A Yemen delegation, led by Prime Minister Ali Muhammad al-Mujawar, comprises Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Kurbi, Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Abdul Karim al-Arhabi and Deputy Prime Minister for Security and Defense Affairs Rashad al-Alimi, and about 21 countries are expected to attend the London conference on supporting Yemen's efforts to get rid of extremist groups, including the United State, the Gulf Cooperation Council's states, Jordan, Turkey, Russia, Spain, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Canada, the United Nations, the World Bank, Saba News said.  All this in spite of terror fears from al-Qaeda in the region, according to Xinhauanet.

I wish attendees of both conferences God-speed in their efforts.  With low expectations perhaps I will be pleasantly surprised.  I'm sure U.S. President Barack Obama is looking forward to something positive from these conferences with goals of (1) having something positive for his State of the Union speech;  (2) encouragement for a quick withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan;  (3) and perhaps getting some real commitment from the terror training ground known as Yemen.

"The Fall of Capitalism and the Rise of Islam"

Hotels are increasing security after the suicide bombings at the Jakarta JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton hotels that killed eight people yesterday, and now we learn they are probably linked to the mastermind of the Bali bombings.  Excuse me for expecting the obvious -- why didn't they increase security after the bombings in Mumbai India???  Perhaps they did, but it really doesn't matter when we allow the terrorists to book rooms and hold anti-American conference and recruiting sessions in our US hotels.  That's right, Hizb ut-Tahrir, a global Sunni network with reported ties to confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Al Qaeda in Iraq's onetime leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi who is committed to establishing an international Islamic empire (caliphate) and has operated discreetly in the U.S. for decades, is now out in the open.   (Fox)

On July 19 Hizb ut-Tahrir is holding a conference entitled, "The Fall of Capitalism and the Rise of Islam," at a posh Hilton hotel in a suburb of Chicago.  That's right, Chicago... home town of Liberals, dirty politics, Barack Obama, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, and on and on.  Fits right in with the Chicago way.  Welcome to America, at least for now.

"Hizb ut-Tahrir is one of the oldest, largest indoctrinating organizations for the ideology known as jihadism," Walid Phares, director of the Future of Terrorism Project at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told FOXNews.com.

Phares said that Hizb ut-Tahrir, rather than training members to carry out terrorist acts like Al Qaeda, focuses instead on indoctrinating youths between ages of 9 and 18 to absorb the ideology that calls for the formation of an empire — or "khilafah" — that will rule according to Islamic law and condones any means to achieve it, including militant jihad.

Hizb ut-Tahrir often says that its indoctrination "prepares the infantry" that groups like Al Qaeda take into battle, Phares said.

"It's like a middle school that prepares them to be recruited by the high school, which is Al Qaeda," he said. "One would compare them to Hitler youth. ... It's an extremely dangerous organization."  (read much more at Fox)

US President Barack Obama's "foreign policy wife" Hillary Clinton is in Mumbai for five days, staying in the same hotel that was bombed.  Wonder if she's wearing her head scarf or burqua?   Which leads me to Dr. Phyllis Chesler's latest bombshell, the anticipation of untold numbers of Muslims here in the US.:

America’s New Immigration Policies Regarding Battered Women and Palestinians

Fellow Americans: Prepare to receive the entire female population of Pakistan sometime soon. And that’s just for starters. I don’t oppose this—but I honestly don’t know if we can economically afford to do it. Given the recession/depression, I rather doubt we can. But get ready for something like this to happen anyway.

Today, the Obama administration reversed a Bush-era policy and opened the way for “foreign women who are victims of severe domestic beatings and sexual abuse to receive asylum in the United States.” The battered women will have to meet “strict conditions for asylum” and will also have to show that “domestic abuse is widely tolerated in their country…that they could not find protection from institutions at home or by moving to another place within their own country.”  (continue at Pajamas Media)

No wonder over 70% of Americans like Sarah Palin.  I'd love to hear her thoughts of both topics, the terrorists holding recruitment seminars inside the US and unlimited immigration.

The FBI, CIA, police, counterterrorism experts, and any other alphabet organization we have in the US needs to be present both openly and undercover to observe, identify, and possibly arrest members and supporters of Hizb ut-Tahrir.  Seems like a 'hey duh" to me, but then again I'm a Conservative and against terrorists, unlike many Obama supporters.