The Agonist - Arabia

An Arms Dealer Returns, Now Selling an Image

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 03:32:41 -0800

Michael Slackman | Nov 15

NYT - He was a small man, with a very neatly trimmed black mustache, seated in a corner, leaning forward on his walking stick, smiling, sipping Scotch from a glass that seemed too large for his frail hands. His face brightened with a smile as he reminisced about the dictator’s wife who once locked herself in the bathroom of his private jet and the star-studded, five-day extravaganza he threw for his 50th birthday.

Oh, the memories of a fallen billionaire arms trader.

“My personal philosophy is I don’t regret matters that happen, good or bad,” said the man, Adnan M. Khashoggi, who is 74 years old and these days prefers to be remembered as “Mr. Fix It,” rather than the arms dealer involved in the Iran-Contra scandal. “I just accept this as my destiny. It’s a personal attitude.”

Mr. Khashoggi has been linked to — but never convicted in — almost every major scandal of the late 20th century: Wedtech, B.C.C.I., the indictment of the Marcoses in the Philippines, as well as Iran-Contra. He is a favorite of conspiracy buffs, who have connected him to such things as the death of Princess Diana (her boyfriend at the time, Dodi al-Fayed, was his nephew) and to voting irregularities in Florida in the 2000 presidential election (a former employee was a local election official).

Now, he is trying to make a comeback. After a lifetime spent using his connections to make deals for himself, he is working as a consultant, selling his connections.

Saudis impose Yemen 'buffer zone'

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:33:15 -0800

November 12

Al Jazzera - Saudi Arabia is enforcing a 10km deep buffer zone inside Yemen in an attempt to keep members of a Yemeni rebel group away from its southwestern border, a Saudi government adviser has said.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, he warned on Thursday that any Yemenis caught crossing into Saudi Arabia would be interrogated to make sure no fighters were among them, and then placed in camps.

Heavy artillery and aircraft pounded the supected position of Houthi fighters inside Yemen, Saudi officials said, creating what the the Saudi media referred to as a "kill zone".

Houthi fighters said that Saudi rockets had hit Yemeni villages.

Saudi jets 'attack Yemen rebels'

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 06:35:40 -0800

November 5

BBC - The Saudi air force has attacked rebels in northern Yemen following Wednesday's killing of a Saudi security officer in a border area, reports have said.

Saudi aircraft had targeted strongholds of the Houthi rebels on the Yemeni side of border, spokesmen for the group and Arab media said. A Saudi official told Reuters they had hit rebels occupying its territory.

The Houthis said on Wednesday that they had taken "full control" of a mountainous section of the border region of Jabal al-Dukhan. In a statement on its website on Wednesday, the group said Saudi warplanes and helicopters had dropped phosphorus bombs on its fighters in the areas of al-Malahaid, Jabal al-Mamdud, al-Husama and al-Mujdaa.On Thursday, rebel spokesman Mohammed Abdul Salam said the bombs had hit "crowded areas including a local market in the northern province of Saada".

In Yemen, War Centers on Authority, Not Terrain

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 23:55:10 -0700

Robert F Worth | Sana | Oct 25

NYT -

For almost seven weeks, Khasan Muhammad Abdullah and his family cowered in their house in northern Yemen while a war raged outside and their food slowly ran out. He could hear government fighter jets screaming across the sky, and he knew the Houthi rebels by their distinctive logos and headbands. But he could not understand what the two sides were fighting about.

Yemen has been fighting Houthi rebels in the north.

“What do they want, what are they thinking?” Mr. Abdullah said wearily, sitting on a friend’s floor here a week after escaping the war zone, along Yemen’s remote northwestern border with Saudi Arabia.

Those questions are being asked across the Arab world and beyond. More than two months of fierce fighting have left thousands dead. Whole villages have been pounded to rubble. The conflict has forced tens of thousands to flee their homes, fueling a humanitarian crisis and worsening the chaos that has already made Yemen a new haven for Al Qaeda and other militant groups.

Yet this mysterious war seems to have more to do with the crumbling authority of the Yemeni state than with any single cause. The Houthi rebels, after all, are a small group who have never issued any clear set of demands. They have been fighting the government on and off since 2004, and it is not clear why President Ali Abdullah Saleh decided in August to force an all-out war.

Many in Yemen’s own government say the conflict is less about controlling terrain — always a tenuous prospect in this tribally splintered country — than about Mr. Saleh’s struggle to reassert his military powers, in the face of widening insurgencies and intensifying political rivalry in the capital.

No way home: The tragedy of the Palestinian diaspora

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 02:41:08 -0700

Judith Miller & David Samuels | Oct 22

The Independent - You might think Palestinian refugees would be welcomed by their Arab neighbours, yet they are denied basic rights and citizenship

It is a cynical but time-honoured practice in Middle Eastern politics: the statesmen who decry the political and humanitarian crisis of the approximately 3.9 million Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and in Gaza ignore the plight of an estimated 4.6 million Palestinians who live in Arab countries. For decades, Arab governments have justified their decision to maintain millions of stateless Palestinians as refugees in squalid camps as a means of applying pressure to Israel. The refugee problem will be solved, they say, when Israel agrees to let the Palestinians have their own state.

Yet in the two decades since the end of the Cold War, after two Gulf wars, and the rise and fall of the Oslo peace process, not a single Palestinian refugee has returned to Israel – and only a handful of ageing political functionaries have returned from neighbouring Arab countries to the West Bank and Gaza. Instead, failed peace plans and shifting political priorities have resulted in a second Palestinian "Nakba", or catastrophe – this one at hands of the Arab governments. "Marginalised, deprived of basic political and economic rights, trapped in the camps, bereft of realistic prospects, heavily armed and standing atop multiple fault lines," a report by the International Crisis Group (ICG) in Lebanon recently observed, "the refugee population constitutes a time bomb."

Fresh clashes claim more Yemeni lives

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 20:37:30 -0700

Saada, Yemen | October 17

PressTV - Military officials say an unspecified number of people have been killed in fresh fighting in northern Yemen, as the army continues its offensive against Houthi fighters.

"Ferocious battles broke out in the morning in the old quarters of the city of Saada, which left people dead," an unnamed military official told AFP.

Another official said fighters attacked throughout the night targeting positions they had lost in the northern mountains.

"Dozens were killed when the Yemeni army was trying to keep the rebels away from positions the army has captured in the past days," he said.

'Saudi forming militia to fight Houthis'

PressTV, October 11

The Houthi fighters say Saudi Arabia is recruiting gunmen to form a militia in a bid to help the Yemeni government's crackdown on the Houthis.

In a statement issued on Sunday, the Shia fighters accused the Saudi Interior Ministry of planning to form the militia to fight them on both sides of the Saudi-Yemeni border.

It added that Saudi Arabia also dispatched a number of Wahabi clerics to mobilize al-Qaeda elements inside Yemen to help the army fight the Houthis in the Sa'ada region.

"The Saudi authorities have mobilized the remnants of the so-called Mujahideen forces to train Wahabi militants, who have already announced readiness to fight Houthis," read the statement

Saudi King leaves Damascus after "historic" two-day visit

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 07:03:19 -0700

Damascus | Oct 8

DPA - Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz left Damascus Thursday ending his two day 'historic' visit to Syria, in which he held political and economic talks with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Saudi Arabia has called on Syria to take part in efforts to solve inter-Palestinian problems, support Iraq and Lebanon as well as cooperating to fight terrorism and extremism in the region, sources in the Saudi delegation told the German Press Agency dpa.

Abdullah arrived in Syria Wednesday, in a move hailed as a 'historical' and 'landmark shift' in diplomacy between the two countries.

Syria and Saudi Arabia are two of the Arab world's longest standing rivals, with the latter having close relations with the US and Damascus having been implacably opposed to Washington's influence in the region for decades.

Saudis ask for aid if world cuts dependence on oil

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 03:30:44 -0700

Michael Casey | Bangkok | Oct 8

AP - There are plenty of needy countries at the U.N. climate talks in Bangkok that make the case they need financial assistance to adapt to the impacts of global warming. Then there are the Saudis.

Saudi Arabia has led a quiet campaign during these and other negotiations -- demanding behind closed doors that oil-producing nations get special financial assistance if a new climate pact calls for substantial reductions in the use of fossil fuels.

just great, more bailing out of the rich and greedy :D

Iran sees U.S. role in researcher's disappearance

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:45:10 -0700

Tehran | Oct 8

Reuters - Iran accused the United States on Wednesday of involvement in the disappearance of a technology university researcher "rumored" to be involved in Tehran's nuclear program, Iranian media reported.

ISNA news agency referred to "some rumors that Shahram Amiri, who went missing during a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia in June, was an employee of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization who wanted to seek asylum abroad.

Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki did not confirm that when he made the allegation against the United States, which suspects the Islamic Republic is seeking to develop nuclear weapons. Iran denies the charge.

"We have found documents that prove U.S. interference in the disappearance of the Iranian pilgrim Shahram Amiri in Saudi Arabia," he told reporters, according to the website of state Press TV, without giving details.

U.S. State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said, "We saw that wire story, and we looked into it.

"We just basically don't have any information on this individual," Kelly told reporters.

Government admits filming torture of Gitmo inmate, alleged 9/11 plotter

Tue, 06 Oct 2009 02:09:53 -0700

Stephen C. Webster | Oct 6

Raw Story - The United States government admitted on Monday that the torture of a Saudi man alleged to be part of the 9/11 plot was recorded on video, according to court documents procured by the Center for Constitutional Rights.

The tapes, allegedly showing the torture of Mohammed al Qahtani, 31, have long been kept under wraps, but a discovery motion for video of his interrogations led the court to acknowledge their existence and order their release.

"The videotapes the government is required to produce will reveal the time period at the end of three months of intensive solitary confinement and isolation that immediately preceded the implementation of the 'First Special Interrogation Plan,' a regime of systematic torture techniques approved by former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for use against Mr. al Qahtani," claimed a CCR media advisory.

Lawyers with the Center for Constitutional Rights have represented Qahtani since 2005. The accused 9/11 plotter has been a Guantanamo inmate since 2002.

Yemen: The land with more guns than people

Sun, 20 Sep 2009 05:49:14 -0700

Jane Merrick & Kim Sengupta | Sept 20

The Independent - At least 150,000 people are displaced in Yemen by fighting between Shia rebels and Sunni government forces.

Entire villages of people in north Yemen are being forced to flee by bands of Shia rebels as a sharp escalation of violence in the region prompts warnings that the conflict could become as bitter as that in Darfur. Fighting in the unstable Arab country, where weapons outnumber people and 50 per cent are illiterate, has already displaced about 150,000 souls.

In the past month the conflict has worsened, leaving tens of thousands without access to water and sanitation.And in the past 48 hours, sources reported that two of the largest tribes have begun to polarise behind opposing sides, with one amassing behind the Yemeni president's "popular army" and another falling in behind the Shia rebels, known as al-Houthi. Aid agencies are concerned that a tribal element to the fighting could add immeasurably to its ferocity.

Yemen rebels warn of "long war" after offer rejected

Wed, 02 Sep 2009 06:29:40 -0700

Sanaa | Sept 2

Reuters - Yemeni Shi'ite rebels fighting in the north of the troubled Arabian Peninsula country warned of a "long war" on Wednesday after the government rejected a truce offer.

"Since the authorities have rejected the initiative, we remind them that they have lost a valuable opportunity," said a statement from the office of the opposition group's leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi.

"From now on they will see the grave consequences of the war and we promise them major surprises and a long war of attrition, longer than they think and in which we shall be patient. We will stand up to their aggressions and tyranny."

The rebels of the Shi'ite Zaydi sect say they want more autonomy, including Zaydi schools in their area. They oppose the spread of Saudi-influenced Sunni fundamentalism and say they are defending their villages against government oppression.

NKorean arms headed to Iran seized in UAE

Sat, 29 Aug 2009 03:18:11 -0700

United Nations | Aug 29

AFP - The United Arab Emirates has seized a ship carrying North Korean weapons bound for Iran in violation of UN sanctions, a diplomatic source said Friday.

The diplomat, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said UAE government officials had informed the UN Security Council's sanctions committee, which is responsible for implementing sanctions on Pyongyang.

"It is an issue that is being processed by the committee," said the source, who declined further comment on details on the weapons.

The UAE mission to the United Nations also declined comment on the case.

The Financial Times reported earlier Friday that the ship was seized "some weeks ago," and identified some of the armaments as basic weaponry, including rocket-propelled grenades.

The arms had been falsely labeled as "machine parts," the Times reported.

Yemen announces truce conditions for rebels

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 07:55:56 -0700

Sanaa | Aug 13

Reuters - Yemen announced six conditions on Thursday for a ceasefire with Shi'ite rebels, days after government forces launched an offensive against them in the north of the poor Arab country.

The conditions for a ceasefire in the mountainous northern province of Saada include a rebel withdrawal, the removal of checkpoints they have set up and the clarification of the fate of kidnapped foreigners, the country's top security body said.

The conditions also require rebels to return captured military and civilian equipment, hand over those behind the June kidnapping of a group of nine foreigners and to refrain from intervening in local authority affairs, it said.

Authorities have accused the rebels, who belong to the Shi'ite Zaydi sect and are led by Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, of being behind the abduction, a charge the rebels deny.

'Sex interview' shocks Saudi Arabia

Sun, 09 Aug 2009 15:30:24 -0700

AL Jaz - Authorities in Saudi Arabia have closed the Jeddah office of a Lebanon-based television network after it aired an interview with a Saudi man apparently discussing his sexual encounters... The controversy stems from a July 15 episode of LBC's "Ahmar Bilkhat al-Areed", or Bold Red Lines programme, in which a Saudi man spoke frankly about sex while the programme showed off erotic toys.

...Abdul-Jawad has been charged with publicising vice and lawyers say he may face the death penalty.