Report – al Qaeda Has Not Abandoned Plans For WMD’s
You may remember in September of 2003 when al Qaeda’s #2 man, Ayman al-Zawahiri, called off a planned chemical attack on New York’s subway system and offered a rather chilling explanation: The plot to unleash poison gas on New Yorkers was being dropped for “something better,” Zawahiri said in a message intercepted by U.S. eavesdroppers.
The meaning of Zawahiri’s cryptic threat remains unclear more than six years later, but a new report warns that al-Qaeda has not abandoned its goal of attacking the United States with a chemical, biological or even nuclear weapon.
The report, by a former senior CIA official who led the agency's hunt for terrorist’s weapons of mass destruction portrays al-Qaeda’s leaders as determined and patient, willing to wait for years to acquire the kind of weapons that could inflict widespread casualties.
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North Korea Thought To Have 13 Biological Weapons
As if the nuclear threat from North Korea is not bad enough for it’s neighbors, The Straits Times is reporting that North Korea is thought to have up to 13 types of viruses and germs in their weapons arsenal which can be used in biological weapons, as well as up to 5,000 tons of chemical weapons. This according to South Korea’s defense ministry, says the report.
From The Straits Times
The chemical weapons could be deliverable by artillery or missile to cause massive civilian casualties in South Korea, the Brussels-based think-tank said.
The stockpile includes between 2,500-5,000 tons of mustard gas, phosgene, blood agents, sarin, tabun and persistent nerve agents and can be delivered by long-range artillery, missiles, aircraft and naval vessels, it said.
In a report to parliament, the ministry said the communist North has one of the world’s largest stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons.
The list of diseases that could be caused by the biological weapons includes cholera, yellow fever, smallpox, eruptive typhus, typhoid fever and dysentery, it said.
The ministry estimated its neighbour’s stockpile of chemical weapons at between 2,500 to 5,000 tons.
via N.Koreas 13 biological weapons.
al Qaeda-Taliban Combo Has Chemical Weapon Formula
April 6, 2009 by national
Filed under World Report
The al-Qaida-Taliban combo plans to use parts of the Middle East as launch pads for attacks against the west. Not only so, the groups
have also developed some expertise in making bio-chemical weapons, NWFP police chief Malik Navid told a Pakistan National Assembly’s standing committee.
Navid warned that the Pakistan government needed to urgently focus on containing militancy as it spread from its bases. “Taliban’s philosophy is to create pockets everywhere,” he said, adding that jihadi groups were moving through southern Punjab and eventually aimed to reach the financial hub of Karachi.
The frank assessment of the police official serves to confirm concerns about whether Pakistan and its military complex in particular was prepared to clearly acknowledge the threat posed by jihadists given the army and ISI see Taliban as allies in ensuring a “friendly” dispensation in Afghanistan while also feeding the jihad in Jammu and Kashmir. The army’s sporadic efforts to roll back jihadis lacked conviction and have predictably shown poor results.
Navid’s testimony also points to the virtual merger of al-Qaida with Taliban, with the latter being both part of the core and the major striking arm. Indian intelligence assessments see anti-India groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba being very much a part of this conglomerate.
via ‘Qaida-Taliban combo has chemical weapon formula’ – South Asia – World – The Times of India.
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Mystery Cargo – Somali Pirates Dying Aboard Hijacked Iranian Ship
September 28, 2008 by national
Filed under World Report
Somali pirates who have taken over a Iranian merchant ship laden with a mysterious cargo have suffered skin burns, lost hair and fallen gravely ill “within days” of boarding the MV Iran Deyanat. Reports are also stating that several have died.
Andrew Mwangura, the director of the East African Seafarers’ Assistance Programme, when asked about the situaion reponded: “We don’t know exactly how many, but the information that I am getting is that some of them had died. There is something very wrong about that ship.”
The vessel’s declared cargo consists of “minerals” and “industrial products”. But officials involved in negotiations over the ship are convinced that it was sailing for Eritrea to deliver small arms and chemical weapons to Somalia’s Islamist rebels.
The drama over the Iran Deyanat comes as speculation grew this week about whether the South African Navy would send a vessel to join the growing multinational force in the region.
A naval spokesman, Lieutenant-Commander Greyling van den Berg, told the Sunday Times that the navy had not been ordered by the government to become involved in “the Somali pirate issue”.
About 22000 ships a year pass through the Suez Canal and the Gulf of Aden, where regional instability and “no-questions-asked” ransom payments have led to a dramatic rise in attacks on vessels by heavily armed Somali raiders in speedboats.
The Iran Deyanat was sailing in those waters on August 21, past the Horn of Africa and about 80 nautical miles southeast of Yemen, when it was boarded by about 40 pirates armed with AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades. They were alleged members of a crime syndicate said to be based at Eyl, a small fishing village in northern Somalia.
The ship is owned and operated by the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines, or IRISL, a state-owned company run by the Iranian military.
According to the US Treasury Department, the IRISL regularly falsifies shipping documents to hide the identity of end users, uses generic terms to describe shipments and operates under various covers to circumvent United Nations sanctions.
The ship set sail from Nanjing, China, at the end of July. According to its manifest, it was heading for Rotterdam where it would unload 42500 tons of iron ore and “industrial products” purchased by a German client.
At Eyl, the ship was secured by more pirates — about 50 on board, and another 50 on shore.
But within days those who had boarded the ship developed mysterious health trouble.
This was also confirmed by Hassan Allore Osman, minister of minerals and oil in Puntland, an autonomous region of Somalia.
He headed a delegation sent to Eyl when news of the toxic cargo and illnesses surfaced.
He told one news publication, The Long War Journal, that during the six days he had negotiated with the pirates, a number of them had become sick and died.
“That ship is unusual,” he was quoted as saying. “It is not carrying a normal shipment.”
The pirates did reveal that they had tried to inspect the ship’s cargo containers when some of them fell sick — but the containers were locked.
Osman’s delegation spoke to the ship’s captain and its engineer by cellphone, demanding to know more about the cargo.
Initially it was claimed the cargo contained “crude oil”; later it was said to be “minerals”.
And Mwangura has added: “Our sources say it contains chemicals, dangerous chemicals.”
But IRISL has denied that — and threatened legal action against Mwangura. The company has reportedly paid the pirates 200000 — the first of several “ransom instalments”, but that, too, has been denied.
