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Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
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Hundreds gathered Monday at a gravel pit where countless earthquake victims have been dumped, turning a remembrance ceremony for the dead into one of the first organized political rallies since the disaster, with followers denouncing President Rene Preval.
Many called for ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's return - a familiar political refrain when things swing between bad and worse in Haiti.
"Preval has done nothing for this country, nothing for the victims," said Jean Delcius, 54, who was bused to the memorial service by Aristide's development foundation. "We need someone new to take charge here. If it's not Aristide, then someone competent."
Complete Coverage: Devastation in Haiti Haiti Quake: How You can Help
One of the main challenges facing Haiti and the flood of international aid workers who came to the country after the earthquake has been security.
The United Nations said Tuesday the security situation in Haiti was now "stable but potentially volatile," even as the U.N.'s humanitarian office said an armed group attacked a food convoy at the Jeremie airport in the southwest of the country.
It said U.N. peacekeepers fired warning shots and there were no injuries. The global body said Haitian national police were stepping up patrols to prevent violence and apprehended 33 escaped prisoners on Saturday.
U.N. spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said Tuesday several hundred prisoners are still believed to be on the loose after their prisons collapsed in the Jan. 12 quake.
Even before the quake critics were blaming Preval for rising unemployment, ベラジョンカジノ corruption and greed. Then the Jan. 12 earthquake struck, killing at least 150,000 people, flattening most government buildings and turning the capital into an apocalyptic vision of broken concrete and twisted steel.
Preval has rarely been seen in public since, leaving his ministers to defend his performance - a job they are growing increasingly weary of.
Asked Monday about the criticism of Preval, Communications Minister Marie-Laurence Jocelin Lassegue batted back the questions, frowning and looking irritable.
"Those questions are for the president or the prime minister," he told The Associated Press.
Haiti's government also has had to deal with the 10 Americans who tried to take a busload of undocumented Haitian children out of the country. Prime Minister Max Bellerive also told the AP that "what they were doing was wrong," and they could be prosecuted in the United States.
Baptists Offered Kids Pool, Tennis Courts
"It is clear now that they were trying to cross the border without papers. It is clear now that some of the children have live parents," Bellerive said. "And it is clear now that they knew what they were doing was wrong."
U.S. Embassy officials would not say whether Washington would accept hosting judicial proceedings for the Americans. For now, the case remains firmly in Haitian hands, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said in Washington. "Once we know all the facts, we will determine what the appropriate course is, but the judgment is really up to the Haitian government," he said.
Meanwhile, discontent with Preval appears to be growing, three weeks after the disaster.
"He came Saturday and then just left," said Jude John Peter, 23, in a camp across from Haiti's demolished National Palace, where some 2,000 people are crammed into tents made of bedsheets and sticks, fighting for clean water and one portable toilet. "He's nowhere to be seen at first and then leaves when things get hot."
Aristide faced similar criticism during his presidency. The former slum priest had a huge grassroots following among Haiti's poor but was ousted in 2004 as corruption and drug trafficking grew rampant and some of his former supporters accused him of abandoning his early followers to line his own pockets.
Aristide has declared since the quake that he would like to return from his exile in South Africa - a move that would add political instability to the post-quake chaos and likely face resistance from the international community.
Before legislative elections scheduled for Feb. 28 were postponed, Haiti's presidentially appointed electoral council had excluded more than a dozen political parties from the next round of elections in 2011. Opposition groups accused the council of trying to help Preval's Unity party win majorities in parliament so he could push through constitutional reforms and expand executive power.
The most prominent excluded party is Aristide's former Lavalas party, which now plans more demonstrations. That will force thousands of American soldiers and U.N. peacekeepers to worry about containing political violence as well as providing relief.
"There are people trying to make political capital out of this very difficult moment," said Arnold Antonin, an environmental activist.
Some who attended the memorial said they simply wanted new leadership. Voter discontent is a constant in impoverished Haiti, where for years after the dictatorship, some even claimed they wanted the return of Jean-Claude Duvalier, whose father, Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier, launched a 29-year family dynasty of terror.
"When there's a great deal of discontent among the population, people look at the government and start considering past demagogues," said James Morrell, director of the Washington, D.C.-based Haiti Democracy Project.
"This could explain people contemplating the return of Aristide," Morrell said. "But the question that Haitians are really asking is, what would the mechanism be to get capable Haitians into the country who could manage the situation?"
Tens of thousands were killed by the Duvaliers - many of them also buried anonymously in the gravel fields of Titanyen.
Across the capital, Haitians have voiced anger over the hasty burials of earthquake victims.
Many Haitians believe that bodies must be properly buried and remembered by relatives and family so their spirits can pass on to heaven. In Voodoo, some believe that improper burials can trap spirits between two worlds.
The mourners on Monday gathered near a white metal cross erected on a mound of gravel that covered nameless bodies dropped into a pit by dump trucks. The corpse of a woman lay uncovered at the base of a nearby gravel pile.
One by one, people tied black pieces of cloth to the cross as a Catholic priest sprinkled the ground with holy water. A choir sang traditional Haitian hymns as religious leaders prayed for the dead.
"We've come here to bless these people, to bless this spot," said the Rev. Patrick Joseph Neptune.
Meanwhile, others in the crowd planned another political rally for Tuesday.
"If Preval comes, we will kill him!" they shouted.
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Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
38 views
Hundreds gathered Monday at a gravel pit where countless earthquake victims have been dumped, turning a remembrance ceremony for the dead into one of the first organized political rallies since the disaster, with followers denouncing President Rene Preval.
Many called for ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's return - a familiar political refrain when things swing between bad and worse in Haiti.
"Preval has done nothing for this country, nothing for the victims," said Jean Delcius, 54, who was bused to the memorial service by Aristide's development foundation. "We need someone new to take charge here. If it's not Aristide, then someone competent."
Complete Coverage: Devastation in Haiti Haiti Quake: How You can Help
One of the main challenges facing Haiti and the flood of international aid workers who came to the country after the earthquake has been security.
The United Nations said Tuesday the security situation in Haiti was now "stable but potentially volatile," even as the U.N.'s humanitarian office said an armed group attacked a food convoy at the Jeremie airport in the southwest of the country.
It said U.N. peacekeepers fired warning shots and there were no injuries. The global body said Haitian national police were stepping up patrols to prevent violence and apprehended 33 escaped prisoners on Saturday.
U.N. spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said Tuesday several hundred prisoners are still believed to be on the loose after their prisons collapsed in the Jan. 12 quake.
Even before the quake critics were blaming Preval for rising unemployment, corruption and greed. Then the Jan. 12 earthquake struck, killing at least 150,000 people, flattening most government buildings and turning the capital into an apocalyptic vision of broken concrete and twisted steel.
Preval has rarely been seen in public since, leaving his ministers to defend his performance - a job they are growing increasingly weary of.
Asked Monday about the criticism of Preval, Communications Minister Marie-Laurence Jocelin Lassegue batted back the questions, frowning and looking irritable.
"Those questions are for the president or the prime minister," he told The Associated Press.
Haiti's government also has had to deal with the 10 Americans who tried to take a busload of undocumented Haitian children out of the country. Prime Minister Max Bellerive also told the AP that "what they were doing was wrong," and they could be prosecuted in the United States.
Baptists Offered Kids Pool, Tennis Courts
"It is clear now that they were trying to cross the border without papers. It is clear now that some of the children have live parents," Bellerive said. "And it is clear now that they knew what they were doing was wrong."
U.S. Embassy officials would not say whether Washington would accept hosting judicial proceedings for the Americans. For now, the case remains firmly in Haitian hands, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said in Washington. "Once we know all the facts, we will determine what the appropriate course is, but the judgment is really up to the Haitian government," he said.
Meanwhile, discontent with Preval appears to be growing, three weeks after the disaster.
"He came Saturday and then just left," said Jude John Peter, 23, in a camp across from Haiti's demolished National Palace, where some 2,000 people are crammed into tents made of bedsheets and sticks, fighting for clean water and one portable toilet. "He's nowhere to be seen at first and then leaves when things get hot."
Aristide faced similar criticism during his presidency. The former slum priest had a huge grassroots following among Haiti's poor but was ousted in 2004 as corruption and drug trafficking grew rampant and some of his former supporters accused him of abandoning his early followers to line his own pockets.
Aristide has declared since the quake that he would like to return from his exile in South Africa - a move that would add political instability to the post-quake chaos and likely face resistance from the international community.
Before legislative elections scheduled for Feb. 28 were postponed, Haiti's presidentially appointed electoral council had excluded more than a dozen political parties from the next round of elections in 2011. Opposition groups accused the council of trying to help Preval's Unity party win majorities in parliament so he could push through constitutional reforms and expand executive power.
The most prominent excluded party is Aristide's former Lavalas party, which now plans more demonstrations. That will force thousands of American soldiers and U.N. peacekeepers to worry about containing political violence as well as providing relief.
"There are people trying to make political capital out of this very difficult moment," said Arnold Antonin, an environmental activist.
Some who attended the memorial said they simply wanted new leadership. Voter discontent is a constant in impoverished Haiti, where for years after the dictatorship, some even claimed they wanted the return of Jean-Claude Duvalier, whose father, Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier, launched a 29-year family dynasty of terror.
"When there's a great deal of discontent among the population, people look at the government and start considering past demagogues," said James Morrell, director ベラジョンカジノ of the Washington, D.C.-based Haiti Democracy Project.
"This could explain people contemplating the return of Aristide," Morrell said. "But the question that Haitians are really asking is, what would the mechanism be to get capable Haitians into the country who could manage the situation?"
Tens of thousands were killed by the Duvaliers - many of them also buried anonymously in the gravel fields of Titanyen.
Across the capital, Haitians have voiced anger over the hasty burials of earthquake victims.
Many Haitians believe that bodies must be properly buried and remembered by relatives and family so their spirits can pass on to heaven. In Voodoo, some believe that improper burials can trap spirits between two worlds.
The mourners on Monday gathered near a white metal cross erected on a mound of gravel that covered nameless bodies dropped into a pit by dump trucks. The corpse of a woman lay uncovered at the base of a nearby gravel pile.
One by one, people tied black pieces of cloth to the cross as a Catholic priest sprinkled the ground with holy water. A choir sang traditional Haitian hymns as religious leaders prayed for the dead.
"We've come here to bless these people, to bless this spot," said the Rev. Patrick Joseph Neptune.
Meanwhile, others in the crowd planned another political rally for Tuesday.
"If Preval comes, we will kill him!" they shouted.
Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
23 views
Conjoined twins survived a marathon surgery and became two little girls early Wednesday morning, CBS Sacramento reports.
Since birth, 2-year-old Erika and Eva Sandoval shared much of their lower body.
Their mother Aida said doctors told her early on in her pregnancy that the twins might not make it. She was told her own life could be at risk, too.
But after they all beat the odds, Aida made the decision to embark on separating Eva and Erika.
The family started their journey at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford, in Palo Alto, California.
It took a team of 50 doctors, nurses, and クイーンカジノ operating staff 17 hours to complete the separation. The twins came through in good shape.
"They did very well," lead surgeon Gary Hartman, MD, a clinical professor of surgery at the School of Medicine, said in a statement. "I’m very pleased with the outcome."
Now each girl has a portion of their vital organs. Each has only one leg.
"It’s amazing how strong these girls are and it’s amazing what their team performed," the twins’ mom said. "Seeing them now in the ICU, you look at them and think ‘You’re missing your other half,’ but we know that this is the right path for them: to be independent, have the chance to succeed and explore on their own everything the world has to offer."
While the girls are recovering, a world of support surrounding them is bursting with heartfelt messages from family, friends and even complete strangers.
Their aunt posted to Facebook "They made it! #survivors"
THEY MADE IT????❤️???? they are officially separated..., we couldn't stop crying from happiness. My nieces have beat every...
But the two toddlers still have quite the journey ahead. At least for the next two weeks they’ll be monitored in intensive care. Their physicians anticipate that they will spend an additional two weeks in the hospital before going home. They are sharing a hospital room, but are staying in separate beds.
The family says they are so thankful for everyone’s support.
Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
28 views
Conjoined twins survived a marathon surgery and became two little girls early Wednesday morning, CBS Sacramento reports.
Since birth, 2-year-old Erika and Eva Sandoval shared much of their lower body.
Their mother Aida said doctors told her early on in her pregnancy that the twins might not make it. She was told her own life could be at risk, too.
But after they all beat the odds, Aida made the decision to embark on separating Eva and Erika.
The family started their journey at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford, in Palo Alto, California.
It took a team of 50 doctors, nurses, and operating staff 17 hours to complete the separation. The twins came through in good shape.
"They did very well," lead surgeon Gary Hartman, MD, a clinical professor of surgery at the School of Medicine, said in a statement. "I’m very pleased with the outcome."
Now each girl has a portion of their vital organs. Each has only one leg.
"It’s amazing how strong these girls are and it’s amazing what their team performed," the twins’ mom said. "Seeing them now in the ICU, you look at them and think ‘You’re missing your other half,’ but we know that this is the right path for them: to be independent, have the chance to succeed and explore on their own everything the world has to offer."
While the girls are recovering, a world of support surrounding them is bursting with heartfelt messages from family, friends and even complete strangers.
Their aunt posted to Facebook "They made it! #survivors"
THEY MADE IT????❤️???? they are officially separated..., we couldn't stop crying from happiness. My nieces have beat every...
But the two toddlers still have quite the journey ahead. At least for the next two weeks they’ll be monitored in intensive care. Their physicians anticipate that they will spend an additional two weeks in the hospital before going home. They are sharing a hospital room, but are staying in separate beds.
The family says they are so thankful for everyone’s support.
Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
29 views
The men tossed a tissue with some of the allegations scribbled on it to reporters as they headed to their latest hearing in court, where a judge delayed formally charging the suspects for at least two more weeks.
"Since our arrest, the U.S. FBI and Pakistani police have tortured us," read the message. "They are trying to set us up. We are innocent. They are trying to keep us away from public, media and families and lawyers. Help us."
Defense lawyer Tariq Asad said one suspect told the judge that the police gave them electric shocks and warned them not to mention the alleged torture to the media or court. The suspect, Ramy Zamzam, said police threatened to destroy their passports and their lives.
U.S. Embassy spokesman Richard Snelsire denied the allegations of torture by the FBI, whose agents have had some access to the men. Pakistani police have denied past allegations by the men that they were tortured while in custody.
The five men, all young Muslims from the Washington area, were detained in December in Punjab province's town of Sargodha, 120 miles south of Islamabad, not long after they arrived in Pakistan.
Police have publicly accused them of plotting terrorist attacks in Pakistan and seeking to join Islamist militants fighting U.S. troops across the border in Afghanistan after contacting Pakistani militants on the Internet. Lawyers for the men say they wanted to travel to Afghanistan and had no plans for attacks in Pakistan.
The U.S. has pressed an often-reluctant Pakistan to crack down on militants on its territory, many of whom are believed involved in attacks on American and NATO forces. At the same time, several recent cases have highlighted the growing danger of Americans signing up to join the insurgents on both sides of the border.
Pakistan's judicial process can be opaque, especially in terrorism cases, and allegations of mistreatment by police are common.
Prosecutor Nadeem Akram said the police are seeking permission from the federal Interior Ministry to press specific charges against the men, such as "trying to declare war against a country that is not at war with Pakistan" - an apparent reference to Afghanistan.
The court in Sargodha also ordered a panel of three or five doctors to carry out a detailed medical examination of the men after they said they were not satisfied with an earlier exam, Akram said.
That exam was ordered during the last hearing after the men alleged torture by Pakistani police.
"They told the court that the prison doctor just checked their blood pressure and did some other preliminary examination," Akram said.
Khalid Khwaja, a rights activist who often advocates for detained militant suspects, gave reporters a copy of a letter he said Zamzam had written to his parents. In it, Zamzam repeats the torture allegation and urges his parents to keep praying and trying to contact the suspects. Zamzam is a 22-year-old who was a dental student at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
Snelsire could not immediately confirm Khwaja's assertion that the message had been given to the U.S. Embassy to pass on to the parents.
In their last hearing in mid-January, police submitted a charge sheet and evidence to the court in which the men are accused of violating several sections of Pakistan's penal code and クイーンカジノ anti-terrorism law. The most serious charge is conspiracy to carry out a terrorist act, which could carry life imprisonment depending on what the act is.
Prosecutors are still mulling whether the case is strong enough to charge the men and bring them to trial.
The five were reported missing by their families in November after one left behind a farewell video showing scenes of war and casualties and saying Muslims must be defended. Aside from Zamzam, who is of Egyptian descent, two of the suspects are of Pakistani heritage, while the other two have an Ethiopian background.
The men's next hearing for the main case is set for Feb. 16, though a bail hearing may be held Feb. 8.
Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
35 views
The move by the United Nations last week to remove five former Taliban members from its official sanctions list reflects a growing belief by U.S. and international officials that some less-active leaders of the Afghan Taliban are no longer tightly linked to the al Qaeda network they sheltered before the terror attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001.
The decision anchors an Obama administration policy shift that would transform the Afghanistan war from a broad international conflict into an internal political struggle largely handled by the Afghans themselves. Key to that change would be an effort to negotiate with and buy out midlevel Taliban figures willing to renounce violence and abandon their fight.
But in paring back some of the Taliban's connections to al Qaeda, the move risks running up against the American public's ingrained perception that the Afghan faction remains a national enemy and that there is no ideological daylight between the two groups.
A few other Taliban figures have been dropped from the target list in recent years, but the latest round signals a more comprehensive approach. Any large-scale tinkering with the U.N. target list would have a tangible impact on American counterterror moves: The U.S. typically has a strong behind-the-scenes role in the U.N.'s decision and the U.N. list is often used by the U.S. to identify its own targets for diplomatic and economic punishments.
U.S. officials are quick to say that the decoupling is limited and proceeding carefully. Some Taliban leaders, they say, may never come off the list - such as Mullah Mohammed Omar or the leaders of the Haqqani network, which directs the fight against U.S. forces in eastern Afghanistan from the Waziristan tribal region in Pakistan.
Worldwatch: バカラ A Conference Won't Fix Afghanistan
Even Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who has endorsed the reconciliation plan as essential to success in the Afghanistan war, warns of the complexities involved in separating the two militant groups.
Gates ticked off "a syndicate of terrorist groups" on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border, including al Qaeda, Afghan and Pakistan Taliban and a number of Pakistani groups including Lashkar-e-Taiba.
"So you can't say one's good and one's not good," he said recently. "They're all insidious, and safe havens for all of them need to be eliminated."
The U.N. Security Council first imposed sanctions against the Taliban in November 1999 for refusing to send Osama bin Laden to stand trial on terrorism charges in connection with two 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Africa.
Those sanctions - a travel ban, arms embargo and assets freeze - were later extended to al Qaeda, and in January 2001, the U.N. assembled its first target list of 10 al Qaeda leaders and 74 top Taliban officials. The list has grown to 268 al Qaeda and 137 Taliban figures - and is largely replicated in a similar list used by the State and Treasury Departments to pinpoint terror targets.
The U.N. decision - approved by all 15 members of the Security Council - came last week after Russia dropped an objection.
The driving concern of those opposing the move focuses on what would happen if the Taliban are allowed to regain any power in Afghanistan. Opponents fear that al Qaeda, including its leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, who are believed hiding along the Pakistan border, would be welcomed back.
Richard Barrett, the head of a U.N. group that monitors the threat posed by al Qaeda and the Taliban and among those who back the decision to start removing Taliban leaders from the list, said that "in areas that have been under Taliban control for some time - there aren't al Qaeda there."
Other terrorism analysts are more cautious, warning that it will be difficult to determine who is no longer a threat, and that removing names may undercut the credibility of the list.
"The lines are blurred between the tribal affiliations of the Taliban on both sides of the border and al Qaeda," said Juan Zarate, a top counterterrorism official in the Bush administration who is now senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"It becomes a very difficult chess game and you need astute Afghans to help guide this. You don't want to make a deal with the wrong set of actors, you don't want to make a deal with the devil," he said.
U.S. officials see a similar move as a key turning point in the Iraq conflict, says a senior Obama administration official who requested anonymity to discuss the rationale behind the strategy. U.S. forces teamed up with former Sunni insurgents to fight against al Qaeda and began an effort to absorb them into national security and other civilian jobs.
Removing the names of former Taliban leaders from the sanctions list would provide them with significant benefits. The sanctions bar their travel to other countries and freezes their financial assets, making it impossible for them to conduct business overseas.
Lifting financial sanctions on Taliban leaders "may well serve as a conduit for acquisition of funds, economic resources and weapons for the Taliban," warned retired U.S. diplomat Victor Comras, who was one of five international monitors who oversaw the implementation of U.S. Security Council terrorism financing measures in 2002.
Several of the Taliban members dropped from the list last week were senior leaders. Among them were Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, a former foreign minister and Mullah Omar confidant who has recently been involved in helping negotiations, and Abdul Hakim Monib, a former deputy minister of frontier affairs who later renounced the Taliban and became a provincial governor.
Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
76 views
Mexico has racked up its fair share of menacingly named outlaws in a three-year drug war: the Zetas, Aztecas and even a band of female assassins called the Panthers.
Now, if the government gets its way, another name will also make the wanted list: los Twitteros.
That's right. Twitter users are fast becoming public enemy No. 1, at least in Mexico City, where they have angered authorities by warning one another of roadside "alcoholimetro" - or Breathalyzer - checkpoints set up by the police.
But the case against the Twitteros is about more than alcohol.
Mexico is, after all, a country at war - at least according to President Felipe Calderon, who launched the crackdown on drug cartels shortly after taking office. Three years later, the streets of border cities like Ciudad Juarez and Tijuana remain full of soldiers. In many ways, the government is still playing catch-up to the nation's criminals.
In this context, the issue of the Twitteros has quickly expanded into an argument over whether public safety takes priority over free speech in a country struggling to contain serious social ills. Fearing that kidnappers and drug cartels use Twitter, Facebook or MySpace to communicate, the Mexican government is considering a bill to restrict social networking websites and to set up a police force to monitor them.
The Twitter feed in question, Anti Alcoholimetro, ベラジョンカジノ doesn't hide its intent. On any given night, a dozen people write in listing the time and location where they saw a police checkpoint, helping others to avoid it.
The government's response has been erratic. At first, city officials said tweeting the location of police checkpoints was a crime, akin to helping someone break the law, and vowed to find a way to prosecute Twitteros. But after a media frenzy, they quickly backed down.
"We're not taking any action against the Twitteros," said Othon Sanchez, director of preventative programs for Mexico City's public safety office.
"I don't think it's a crime to say, 'Hey, I just passed Reforma Avenue and there's an alcoholimetro,'" he said. "But it is an irresponsible act because here in Mexico drunk driving is a serious problem. We see it on a daily basis."
In fact, Sanchez said the Twitteros had been a blessing in disguise: their tweets have helped publicize the alcoholimetros and spurred his office to launch its own Twitter campaign in support of the program.
Yet the right to tweet is far from guaranteed, even in the relatively liberal capital of Mexico City. Article 320 of the city's penal code prescribes prison terms of up to five years for those who "in any way help a delinquent avoid investigation by the authorities or escape their actions."
If that seems vague, it is. But federal lawmakers are quickly working on specific legislation to track down and punish Twitteros who break the law or help others escape it.
"We have to regulate these websites to make sure there aren't people breaking the law, making death threats or committing crimes via electronic means," said Nazario Norberto, a federal representative and member of the leftist Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD).
Although Twitter asks users to abide by local laws, it and other social networking websites are currently completely unregulated and un-policed in Mexico, according to Norberto.
He says his bill is still in the works, but is modeled in part after a controversial Spanish bill that would allow judges to shut down websites that, according to the government, help people break copyrights and other laws.
The Spanish bill has already drawn fierce criticism from civil liberties groups. But Norberto denies his bill would restrict free speech. Instead, he argues, it would keep Twitteros from sharing private government data about the location of alcoholimetros.
"This isn't public information because the federal police and public safety officials set up these roadblocks without telling anyone where they'll be," he insisted. "That's the whole point."
If passed, the bill would do much more than prevent Twitterers from revealing Breathalyzer checkpoints. It would also create a "cybernetic police force" to scour the web for crime, including kidnappings and drug activity, Norberto said.
His bill reflects a growing fear in Mexico that kidnapping rings and drug cartels are using social networking sites like Twitter to do business.
"It's a way for drug cartels to locate targets," said Ghaleb Krame, a security expert at Alliant International University in Mexico City.
"Facebook and Twitter have lots of weaknesses," he said. "For instance, criminals can find out who are the family members of someone who has a high rank in the police. Perhaps they don't have an account on Twitter or Facebook, but their children and close family probably do."
Indeed, a recent string of killings suggest drug cartels are more web-savvy than the police. In December, a marine was killed during an operation to capture one of Mexico's most wanted drug lords, Arturo Beltran Leyva, who also died in the shootout. Less than a week later, gunmen attacked the marine's home, killing his mother and three relatives.
"How did they know where his parents lived?" Krame asked, suggesting that the cartel could have used websites like Facebook to track down the family. "Drug traffickers have an intelligence network and, as far as I know, at this moment in time it's more effective than ours."
While he seconds Rep. Norberto's call for police to mine Twitter and Facebook for data, Krame said any attempt to restrict social networking websites would be a mistake.
"We have to play within the rules of the game," Krame said. "These are open sources. If we try to regulate them we're just going to end up like China battling Google."
"We can't go down that path," he added. "It would be absolutely anti-democratic."
More stories from GlobalPost:The Front Lines of Mexico's Drug WarDrug Cartels to Businesses: Pay UpJournalist Murders in Mexico Hit Record
Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
48 views
Mexico has racked up its fair share of menacingly named outlaws in a three-year drug war: the Zetas, Aztecas and even a band of female assassins called the Panthers.
Now, if the government gets its way, another name will also make the wanted list: los Twitteros.
That's right. Twitter users are fast becoming public enemy No. 1, at least in Mexico City, where they have angered authorities by warning one another of roadside "alcoholimetro" - or Breathalyzer - checkpoints set up by the police.
But the case against the Twitteros is about more than alcohol.
Mexico is, ベラジョンカジノ after all, a country at war - at least according to President Felipe Calderon, who launched the crackdown on drug cartels shortly after taking office. Three years later, the streets of border cities like Ciudad Juarez and Tijuana remain full of soldiers. In many ways, the government is still playing catch-up to the nation's criminals.
In this context, the issue of the Twitteros has quickly expanded into an argument over whether public safety takes priority over free speech in a country struggling to contain serious social ills. Fearing that kidnappers and drug cartels use Twitter, Facebook or MySpace to communicate, the Mexican government is considering a bill to restrict social networking websites and to set up a police force to monitor them.
The Twitter feed in question, Anti Alcoholimetro, doesn't hide its intent. On any given night, a dozen people write in listing the time and location where they saw a police checkpoint, helping others to avoid it.
The government's response has been erratic. At first, city officials said tweeting the location of police checkpoints was a crime, akin to helping someone break the law, and vowed to find a way to prosecute Twitteros. But after a media frenzy, they quickly backed down.
"We're not taking any action against the Twitteros," said Othon Sanchez, director of preventative programs for Mexico City's public safety office.
"I don't think it's a crime to say, 'Hey, I just passed Reforma Avenue and there's an alcoholimetro,'" he said. "But it is an irresponsible act because here in Mexico drunk driving is a serious problem. We see it on a daily basis."
In fact, Sanchez said the Twitteros had been a blessing in disguise: their tweets have helped publicize the alcoholimetros and spurred his office to launch its own Twitter campaign in support of the program.
Yet the right to tweet is far from guaranteed, even in the relatively liberal capital of Mexico City. Article 320 of the city's penal code prescribes prison terms of up to five years for those who "in any way help a delinquent avoid investigation by the authorities or escape their actions."
If that seems vague, it is. But federal lawmakers are quickly working on specific legislation to track down and punish Twitteros who break the law or help others escape it.
"We have to regulate these websites to make sure there aren't people breaking the law, making death threats or committing crimes via electronic means," said Nazario Norberto, a federal representative and member of the leftist Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD).
Although Twitter asks users to abide by local laws, it and other social networking websites are currently completely unregulated and un-policed in Mexico, according to Norberto.
He says his bill is still in the works, but is modeled in part after a controversial Spanish bill that would allow judges to shut down websites that, according to the government, help people break copyrights and other laws.
The Spanish bill has already drawn fierce criticism from civil liberties groups. But Norberto denies his bill would restrict free speech. Instead, he argues, it would keep Twitteros from sharing private government data about the location of alcoholimetros.
"This isn't public information because the federal police and public safety officials set up these roadblocks without telling anyone where they'll be," he insisted. "That's the whole point."
If passed, the bill would do much more than prevent Twitterers from revealing Breathalyzer checkpoints. It would also create a "cybernetic police force" to scour the web for crime, including kidnappings and drug activity, Norberto said.
His bill reflects a growing fear in Mexico that kidnapping rings and drug cartels are using social networking sites like Twitter to do business.
"It's a way for drug cartels to locate targets," said Ghaleb Krame, a security expert at Alliant International University in Mexico City.
"Facebook and Twitter have lots of weaknesses," he said. "For instance, criminals can find out who are the family members of someone who has a high rank in the police. Perhaps they don't have an account on Twitter or Facebook, but their children and close family probably do."
Indeed, a recent string of killings suggest drug cartels are more web-savvy than the police. In December, a marine was killed during an operation to capture one of Mexico's most wanted drug lords, Arturo Beltran Leyva, who also died in the shootout. Less than a week later, gunmen attacked the marine's home, killing his mother and three relatives.
"How did they know where his parents lived?" Krame asked, suggesting that the cartel could have used websites like Facebook to track down the family. "Drug traffickers have an intelligence network and, as far as I know, at this moment in time it's more effective than ours."
While he seconds Rep. Norberto's call for police to mine Twitter and Facebook for data, Krame said any attempt to restrict social networking websites would be a mistake.
"We have to play within the rules of the game," Krame said. "These are open sources. If we try to regulate them we're just going to end up like China battling Google."
"We can't go down that path," he added. "It would be absolutely anti-democratic."
More stories from GlobalPost:The Front Lines of Mexico's Drug WarDrug Cartels to Businesses: Pay UpJournalist Murders in Mexico Hit Record
Tyree McDonald
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April 12, 2020
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The move by the United Nations last week to remove five former Taliban members from its official sanctions list reflects a growing belief by U.S. and international officials that some less-active leaders of the Afghan Taliban are no longer tightly linked to the al Qaeda network they sheltered before the terror attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001.
The decision anchors an Obama administration policy shift that would transform the Afghanistan war from a broad international conflict into an internal political struggle largely handled by the Afghans themselves. Key to that change would be an effort to negotiate with and buy out midlevel Taliban figures willing to renounce violence and abandon their fight.
But in paring back some of the Taliban's connections to al Qaeda, ベラジョンカジノ the move risks running up against the American public's ingrained perception that the Afghan faction remains a national enemy and that there is no ideological daylight between the two groups.
A few other Taliban figures have been dropped from the target list in recent years, but the latest round signals a more comprehensive approach. Any large-scale tinkering with the U.N. target list would have a tangible impact on American counterterror moves: The U.S. typically has a strong behind-the-scenes role in the U.N.'s decision and the U.N. list is often used by the U.S. to identify its own targets for diplomatic and economic punishments.
U.S. officials are quick to say that the decoupling is limited and proceeding carefully. Some Taliban leaders, they say, may never come off the list - such as Mullah Mohammed Omar or the leaders of the Haqqani network, which directs the fight against U.S. forces in eastern Afghanistan from the Waziristan tribal region in Pakistan.
Worldwatch: A Conference Won't Fix Afghanistan
Even Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who has endorsed the reconciliation plan as essential to success in the Afghanistan war, warns of the complexities involved in separating the two militant groups.
Gates ticked off "a syndicate of terrorist groups" on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border, including al Qaeda, Afghan and Pakistan Taliban and a number of Pakistani groups including Lashkar-e-Taiba.
"So you can't say one's good and one's not good," he said recently. "They're all insidious, and safe havens for all of them need to be eliminated."
The U.N. Security Council first imposed sanctions against the Taliban in November 1999 for refusing to send Osama bin Laden to stand trial on terrorism charges in connection with two 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Africa.
Those sanctions - a travel ban, arms embargo and assets freeze - were later extended to al Qaeda, and in January 2001, the U.N. assembled its first target list of 10 al Qaeda leaders and 74 top Taliban officials. The list has grown to 268 al Qaeda and 137 Taliban figures - and is largely replicated in a similar list used by the State and Treasury Departments to pinpoint terror targets.
The U.N. decision - approved by all 15 members of the Security Council - came last week after Russia dropped an objection.
The driving concern of those opposing the move focuses on what would happen if the Taliban are allowed to regain any power in Afghanistan. Opponents fear that al Qaeda, including its leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, who are believed hiding along the Pakistan border, would be welcomed back.
Richard Barrett, the head of a U.N. group that monitors the threat posed by al Qaeda and the Taliban and among those who back the decision to start removing Taliban leaders from the list, said that "in areas that have been under Taliban control for some time - there aren't al Qaeda there."
Other terrorism analysts are more cautious, warning that it will be difficult to determine who is no longer a threat, and that removing names may undercut the credibility of the list.
"The lines are blurred between the tribal affiliations of the Taliban on both sides of the border and al Qaeda," said Juan Zarate, a top counterterrorism official in the Bush administration who is now senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"It becomes a very difficult chess game and you need astute Afghans to help guide this. You don't want to make a deal with the wrong set of actors, you don't want to make a deal with the devil," he said.
U.S. officials see a similar move as a key turning point in the Iraq conflict, says a senior Obama administration official who requested anonymity to discuss the rationale behind the strategy. U.S. forces teamed up with former Sunni insurgents to fight against al Qaeda and began an effort to absorb them into national security and other civilian jobs.
Removing the names of former Taliban leaders from the sanctions list would provide them with significant benefits. The sanctions bar their travel to other countries and freezes their financial assets, making it impossible for them to conduct business overseas.
Lifting financial sanctions on Taliban leaders "may well serve as a conduit for acquisition of funds, economic resources and weapons for the Taliban," warned retired U.S. diplomat Victor Comras, who was one of five international monitors who oversaw the implementation of U.S. Security Council terrorism financing measures in 2002.
Several of the Taliban members dropped from the list last week were senior leaders. Among them were Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, a former foreign minister and Mullah Omar confidant who has recently been involved in helping negotiations, and Abdul Hakim Monib, a former deputy minister of frontier affairs who later renounced the Taliban and became a provincial governor.
Tyree McDonald
posted a blog.
April 12, 2020
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On the show, Lavigne explained that after landing her first record deal at the age of 15, she was more than happy to leave high school behind.
"I remember talking to my friends on the phone and they're getting ready for exams, and I was like, 'ha, ha, ha.'" I was supposed to do home schooling and クイーンカジノ I was supposed to read books, but I didn't do it. Basically I'm a high school dropout."
Lavigne, whose third album "The Best Damn Thing" debuted at No. 1 on Billboard's Top 200 album chart, chats with host Lynn Hoffman and performs her single "Girlfriend," her first-ever hit "Complicated," and several other songs from her new album.
Artists scheduled to appear on future episodes include The Goo Goo Dolls on July 29, country music star Toby Keith on Aug. 5, blues-rock band Blues Traveler on Aug/ 12 and rocker Meat Loaf on Aug. 19. Nine additional episodes are planned for production in 2007.
"Private Sessions" premieres on A&E on July 22 t 9:00 a.m. ET