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India sets up team to probe Jaipur blasts
Published: May 16, 2008 at 11:01 AM
NEW DELHI, May 16 (UPI) -- India has set up a special investigative team to probe Tuesday's bomb explosions in the city of Jaipur in which 64 people were killed. -
Sadr fighters lay down their weapons
Published: May 15, 2008 at 10:44 PM
BAGHDAD, May 15 (UPI) -- Forces loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr laid down their weapons Thursday as reports emerged from Iraq of relative calm in the Baghdad district of Sadr City. -
U.S. claims Iranian weapons are in Iraq
Published: May 15, 2008 at 10:42 PM
BAGHDAD, May 15 (UPI) -- A spokesman for the U.S. military in Baghdad said emerging evidence suggests Iran is backing the so-called special groups targeting coalition and Iraqi forces.
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Feature: U.S. cites attacks despite truce
Published: May 16, 2008 at 2:34 PM
By RICHARD TOMKINS
BAGHDAD, May 13 (UPI) -- A new cease-fire has been declared between the Iraqi government and Shiite gunmen of radical cleric Moqtada Sadr, but U.S. and Iraqi forces say their troops are still coming under attack in Sadr City. -
Dogs of War: Blackwater, Najaf -- Take Two
Published: May 16, 2008 at 10:28 AM
By DAVID ISENBERG
WASHINGTON, May 16 (UPI) -- One aspect of private military and security contractors that is relatively ignored is their relationship with regular military forces. Such discussion, as there is, is generally limited to sound bites about the reported envy that soldiers have for allegedly better paid security contractors. -
Analysis: Indian agencies start blame game
Published: May 15, 2008 at 8:36 PM
By KUSHAL JEENA
UPI Correspondent
NEW DELHI, May 15 (UPI) -- India's intelligence and security agencies are indulging in a blame game over a recent foiled infiltration bid by militants on the Pakistani border, with one agency accusing the paramilitary forces guarding the border of lacking alertness. -
Iraq press roundup
Published: May 15, 2008 at 7:20 PM
By HIBA DAWOOD
UPI Correspondent
The daily Al Mashriq newspaper had an editorial Thursday titled "Last lines for the chaotic months" that said although Iraq has been in a war for five years, the government in the last few weeks has been chaotically carrying out quick military operations and offensives in many cities and areas around the country. -
Features: More graves found
Published: May 15, 2008 at 2:31 PM
By RICHARD TOMKINS
ZAHAMM, Iraq, May 13 (UPI) -- The number of human remains unearthed in an al-Qaida killing field northeast of Baghdad in Diyala province is nearing 70 with the discovery of more graves by villagers who had volunteered to search an abandoned pomegranate orchard. -
Analysis: USAF's cyber offense capability
Published: May 15, 2008 at 2:23 PM
By SHAUN WATERMAN
UPI Homeland and National Security Editor
WASHINGTON, May 15 (UPI) -- Procurement documents from the U.S. Air Force give a rare glimpse into the Pentagon's plans for developing an offensive cyberwar capacity that can infiltrate, steal data from and if necessary take down enemy information technology networks.
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Turkish-Kurdish conflict reaches Europe
Published: Oct. 29, 2007 at 12:10 PM
By STEFAN NICOLA
UPI Germany Correspondent
BERLIN, Oct. 29 (UPI) -- As the Turkish-Kurdish conflict threatens to escalate into a military invasion of northern Iraq, the violence has reached other countries in Europe.
Over the weekend tens of thousands of Turks and a smaller number of Kurds demonstrated in Western Europe.
Some 7,000 Turks from the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany took to the streets in the Dutch city of Utrecht; though windows were smashed, the demonstration remained largely peaceful, and police managed to keep the situation under control.
Yet in Brussels some 100 protesters of Turkish origin were arrested Sunday after an illegal demonstration ended in clashes with Belgian police.
In Berlin, a city home to an estimated 200,000 Turks, a protest against the Kurdistan Workers Party, known by its acronym PKK, on Sunday also turned violent.
The demonstration in Berlin’s immigrant-dominated districts of Kreuzberg and Neukoelln was organized under the slogan “Unity and fraternity between Turks and Kurds,” but that changed when a group of young Turks began to yell extremist chants and throw stones into Kurdish restaurants.
According to the Berliner Zeitung newspaper, the situation escalated when a small group of protesters believed to be members of the extremist Turkish nationalist group Gray Wolves tried to free a man arrested by police. A street battle ensued around Kottbusser Tor, an urban square dotted with Kebab restaurants and Turkish cafes. Demonstrators injured 18 police; 15 protesters were arrested.
This reporter tried to reach the scene of the demonstrations via subway, yet several trains were canceled because subway stations were overcrowded with young Turkish protesters waving Turkey’s flag and chanting anti-PKK, pro-Turkey and pro-Islam slogans.
On Saturday some 500 Kurds demonstrated in Berlin’s posh Charlottenburg district against a Turkish military operation in Iraq, but things remained peaceful.
On Monday German security officials said they expected more violence if the conflict between Turkey and the Kurdish rebels hiding in mountainous northern Iraq continues.
Claudia Schmid, head of Berlin’s Office for the Protection of the Constitution, a domestic intelligence and security agency, said Berlin is home to some 1,000 members of the Kurdish rebel group PKK, branded by the United Nations and the European Union a terror organization.
"The conflict in the border region of Iraq has come to Berlin, and we need to be very careful and keep our eyes open," she told a Berlin-based radio station.
While some criticized police for arriving at the scene too late and in too few numbers, police officials said officers were able to prevent an even larger outbreak of violence. They spoke of Turkish gangs armed with machetes, ready to use them against Kurds.
The violence in Europe demonstrates how tensions are rising in the conflict that started on Oct. 21 when 12 Turkish soldiers were killed in an ambush by PKK fighters, some 3,500 of whom are believed to be hiding in mountainous northern Iraq, right at the border with Turkey.
The public pressure in Turkey to act against the PKK rebels is increasing each day, reflected by massive -- partly violent -- demonstrations in several Turkish cities with hundreds of thousands of participants.
Iraqi and U.S. authorities have not been able to stop the violence originating from northern Iraq; they have also denied Turkish calls to hand over PKK leaders.
Faced with little progress within Iraq, Turkish lawmakers earlier this month gave the formal green light to a Turkish military operation against the rebels. Senior Turkish politicians, however, have said they would not rush into a military mission but would rather lead an operation together with the United States. Experts have also said the PKK is doing everything it can to provoke Turkey into marching across the Iraqi border.
Washington is trying to defuse tensions between some of its staunchest allies in the region: On the one hand NATO member Turkey, which fosters close ties with the United States, and on the other hand the Iraqi Kurds, who after years of oppression after the U.S.-led Iraq war established a self-governed, pro-American, pro-business province in northern Iraq.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit Istanbul on Friday, and President Bush will visit the Turkish capital three days later. The U.S. diplomatic offensive intends to prevent a military one, which all observers agree would have terrible consequences for the entire region.
UPI Germany Correspondent
BERLIN, Oct. 29 (UPI) -- As the Turkish-Kurdish conflict threatens to escalate into a military invasion of northern Iraq, the violence has reached other countries in Europe.
Over the weekend tens of thousands of Turks and a smaller number of Kurds demonstrated in Western Europe.
Some 7,000 Turks from the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany took to the streets in the Dutch city of Utrecht; though windows were smashed, the demonstration remained largely peaceful, and police managed to keep the situation under control.
Yet in Brussels some 100 protesters of Turkish origin were arrested Sunday after an illegal demonstration ended in clashes with Belgian police.
In Berlin, a city home to an estimated 200,000 Turks, a protest against the Kurdistan Workers Party, known by its acronym PKK, on Sunday also turned violent.
The demonstration in Berlin’s immigrant-dominated districts of Kreuzberg and Neukoelln was organized under the slogan “Unity and fraternity between Turks and Kurds,” but that changed when a group of young Turks began to yell extremist chants and throw stones into Kurdish restaurants.
According to the Berliner Zeitung newspaper, the situation escalated when a small group of protesters believed to be members of the extremist Turkish nationalist group Gray Wolves tried to free a man arrested by police. A street battle ensued around Kottbusser Tor, an urban square dotted with Kebab restaurants and Turkish cafes. Demonstrators injured 18 police; 15 protesters were arrested.
This reporter tried to reach the scene of the demonstrations via subway, yet several trains were canceled because subway stations were overcrowded with young Turkish protesters waving Turkey’s flag and chanting anti-PKK, pro-Turkey and pro-Islam slogans.
On Saturday some 500 Kurds demonstrated in Berlin’s posh Charlottenburg district against a Turkish military operation in Iraq, but things remained peaceful.
On Monday German security officials said they expected more violence if the conflict between Turkey and the Kurdish rebels hiding in mountainous northern Iraq continues.
Claudia Schmid, head of Berlin’s Office for the Protection of the Constitution, a domestic intelligence and security agency, said Berlin is home to some 1,000 members of the Kurdish rebel group PKK, branded by the United Nations and the European Union a terror organization.
"The conflict in the border region of Iraq has come to Berlin, and we need to be very careful and keep our eyes open," she told a Berlin-based radio station.
While some criticized police for arriving at the scene too late and in too few numbers, police officials said officers were able to prevent an even larger outbreak of violence. They spoke of Turkish gangs armed with machetes, ready to use them against Kurds.
The violence in Europe demonstrates how tensions are rising in the conflict that started on Oct. 21 when 12 Turkish soldiers were killed in an ambush by PKK fighters, some 3,500 of whom are believed to be hiding in mountainous northern Iraq, right at the border with Turkey.
The public pressure in Turkey to act against the PKK rebels is increasing each day, reflected by massive -- partly violent -- demonstrations in several Turkish cities with hundreds of thousands of participants.
Iraqi and U.S. authorities have not been able to stop the violence originating from northern Iraq; they have also denied Turkish calls to hand over PKK leaders.
Faced with little progress within Iraq, Turkish lawmakers earlier this month gave the formal green light to a Turkish military operation against the rebels. Senior Turkish politicians, however, have said they would not rush into a military mission but would rather lead an operation together with the United States. Experts have also said the PKK is doing everything it can to provoke Turkey into marching across the Iraqi border.
Washington is trying to defuse tensions between some of its staunchest allies in the region: On the one hand NATO member Turkey, which fosters close ties with the United States, and on the other hand the Iraqi Kurds, who after years of oppression after the U.S.-led Iraq war established a self-governed, pro-American, pro-business province in northern Iraq.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit Istanbul on Friday, and President Bush will visit the Turkish capital three days later. The U.S. diplomatic offensive intends to prevent a military one, which all observers agree would have terrible consequences for the entire region.
© 2007 United Press International. All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be reproduced, redistributed, or manipulated in any form.
This material may not be reproduced, redistributed, or manipulated in any form.
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