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‘Topless Jihad’: FEMEN flashes Tunisian president during Paris summit
The Ukrainian-based feminist group FEMEN, famous for their international bare-breasted protests, stormed a conference in Paris attended by Tunisian President Moncef Marzouki in their recent ‘Topless Jihad’ campaign to protect Muslim women’s rights.
The topless activists came to support Tunisian Amina Tyler, who has been threatened with death in her home country for posting a topless picture of herself online. They also demanded the names of those who shot and killed Tunisian opposition leader Chokri Belaid in February, chanting “Who killed Chokri Belaid?”
Amina Tyler, 19, wrote “My body is mine, not somebody’s honor” across her chest in Arabic in a show of solidarity with FEMEN, and made the image public. The picture sparked rage among religious Muslimsm and ultraconservative Tunisian religious groups now say the girl deserves death by stoning.
Hackers defaced the FEMEN Tunisia page on Facebook, and Tyler now says she wants to… Continue reading
Nigerian army says kills 14 Islamist insurgents in raid| Reuters
KANO, Nigeria (Reuters) – Nigerian soldiers killed 14 suspected Islamist insurgents on Sunday during a dawn raid on a house in the main northern city of Kano, the military said.
Islamist sect Boko Haram wants to carve an Islamic state out of Nigeria. It and other Islamist groups have become the main threat to stability on Africa’s top oil-producing state and increasingly menace neighbors like Cameroon.
Boko Haram has killed hundreds in gun and bomb attacks, including 25 in Kano earlier in March, since it intensified an insurgency two years ago.
In Sunday’s raid, one soldier was killed and another seriously injured while a suspected suicide bomber was arrested in a car packed with explosives, the army said.
“This operation was conducted following a tip-off from our intelligence. You can see that there are over 10 of the terrorists all dead,” Iliyasu Abbah, an officer in the military task… Continue reading
Egyptian ‘missionary’ tortured to death in Libya – human rights lawyer
Egyptians stand outside a damaged Coptic church after an explosion in the town of Dafniya, west of Misrata, Lybya, December 31, 2012 (Reuters / Stringer)
An Egyptian Christian suspected of trying to convert Muslims in Libya was tortured to death while in police custody, an Egyptian human rights lawyer said. Ezzat Hakim Attallah “died after being tortured with other detainees” in Libya’s second largest city Benghazi, Naguib Guebrayel, a Coptic Christian lawyer who heads the Egyptian Union for Human Rights, told AFP.
Guebrayel’s claim contradicts an Egyptian Foreign Ministry official who said on Sunday that Attallah, who suffered from diabetes and heart ailments, had likely died of natural causes. Attallah was among five Evangelical Christian Egyptians detained in Libya for allegedly attempting to seek religious converts in the predominantly Muslim nation.
His death follows the March 1 detention of four dozen Egyptian Christians in the city.
“Forty-eight… Continue reading
Four feared dead as piece of missing UN helicopter found in DR Congo
A helicopter tailpiece has been found in the mountain jungles of the Democratic Republic of Congo, bringing fears that a UN helicopter with four Russian crewmembers crashed in the area. An Mi-8AMT helicopter of the Russian airline UTair went missing on Saturday near the eastern DR Congolese town of Bukavu in complex weather conditions. The four-crew helicopter was performing a flight under a UN contract with no cargo or passengers on board.
Torrential rains and hard-to-access terrain has hindered an immediate start of the ground rescue operation. However, an aerial search on Sunday discovered a piece of helicopter in the mountains, which raised fears of a crash.
“According to preliminary information, a Russian Mi-8 helicopter crashed in mountainous terrain at an altitude of 2,700 meters, some 20km [12 miles] southwest of the town of Bukavu,” a source in Russia’s law-enforcement agencies told RIA Novosti.
Another source has detailed… Continue reading
Al-Qaeda leader behind Algeria gas plant hostage massacre killed in Mali – Chadian army
A senior commander for al-Qaeda’s north African wing has been killed by Chadian soldiers in Mali. Mokhtar Belmokhtar allegedly masterminded the raid on the gas plant in southern Algeria that left 37 hostages dead. Mokhtar Belmokhtar was killed during an assault on an Islamist rebel base on Saturday, Chad’s military have reported.
“The Chadian forces in Mali completely destroyed the main jihadist base in Adrar of the Ifoghas mountains,” an army statement said, adding that the death toll included “several dead terrorists, including their leader Mokhtar Belmokhtar.”
West Africa and Chad sent some 1,000 soldiers to Mali in January to help the French effort to drive Al-Qaeda linked forces out of the northern part of the country, which was seized following a coup in Mali in March last year. The purported killing of Belmoktar comes a day after Chad’s president announced that another senior regional… Continue reading
Egypt orders $2.5mln worth of teargas from US despite plunging economy
Egypt’s Interior Ministry has ordered shipments of 140,000 teargas canisters from US in January. The total cost of the shipment amounts to nearly US$2.5 million, despite the country’s collapsing economy and calls for a ‘freer’ state. The order was made to cover Egypt’s shortage of teargas after months of aggressive clashes between police and protesters, Egypt Independent reports quoting letters between Interior Ministry and Defense Ministry officials.
“In light of the ongoing incidents and growing need for gas bombs to deal with rioters and preserve the nation’s safety, Al-Guindy Company for Imports and Exports, a representative of the US Combined System Company in Egypt, has been contracted to import 70,000 gas bombs and 70,000 long-range gas projectiles from the US to Egypt,” a letter stated as cited by the paper.
After the supplier failed to deliver the shipment by sea, Egypt stressed the urgency of the order… Continue reading
3,000-year-old pyramid of Pharaoh’s adviser discovered in Luxor
An ancient Egyptian pyramid dating back more than 3,000 years has been discovered in the city of Luxor. The monument was built for an adviser to King Ramses II’s vizier Khay. The remains were unearthed during excavations on the hill of Sheikh Abdel Qurna, by the Belgian archaeological mission from the Free University of Brussels and Liege.
The mud-brick pyramid, whose original height was 15 meters, comes with quite a history.
“Stamp impressions on the bricks indicate that the pyramid belongs to a vizier of Upper and Lower Egypt named Khay, who held this charge for 15 years during the reign of pharaoh Ramses II (1279-1213 BC) in the 19th dynasty,” the mission said in a Wednesday statement.
The pyramid is engraved with an ancient Egyptian scene depicting the god Ra-Hurakhti. “The monument was largely dismantled in the 7th and 8th century AD, when the tomb was… Continue reading
Tunisian PM steps down after crisis prompted by political assassination
Tunisian Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali has announced his resignation. It comes after Jebali’s plan to form a cabinet of technocrats failed. Opposition to the proposed government came from the leader of Jebali’s own Ennahda party, Rached Ghanouchi.
“I promised and assured that, in the event that my initiative failed, I would resign as head of the government, and that is what I have done,” Jebali said in a statement.
Jebali pushed for “another solution” after the failure of his initiative to form a government of technocrats.
He met with the cabinet on Tuesday morning to say goodbye and ask them to “continue to expedite current matters,” a government member said, as quoted by Al Arabiya.
The country has been in political crisis since the killing of opposition politician Chokri Belaid, which triggered mass protests earlier this month and led to resignations from the country’s coalition… Continue reading
British Royal Navy to send frigate to Libya to boost defense sales
Amid an undeclared arms race among European defense contractors to reequip Libya’s armed forces, Britain is sending a Royal Navy war ship to Tripoli to act as a floating show room for security firms.
A British government agency, UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), is organizing an arms fair on a Royal Navy frigate, which will dock in Tripoli, Libya at the beginning of April.
UKTI has so far refused to disclose exactly what businesses will be there and what gear they will be showcasing.
“There is a scramble among European arms firms to sell to Libya with the Italians and French leading the way. In 2001 before the imposition of the arms embargo, EU countries had approved licenses to Libya worth 34 million euro,”Kaye Stearman, Media Co-ordinator for the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) told RT.
UKTI describes the event on its website as “an opportunity for UK… Continue reading
Russia is sending firearms to Mali: Russian official
The head of Russia’s arms export agency says Moscow has delivered a consignment of arms to Mali and may send more weapons amid the ongoing French-led war on the African country. Anatoly Isaikin, the director of Rosoboronexport, said on Wednesday, “We have provided firearms, and the last delivery was made two weeks ago. Negotiations are under way over smaller additional supplies.”
France launched its war on Mali on January 11 under the pretext of halting the advance of fighters in the country.
On January 17, the foreign ministers of the European Union agreed to back up France in its operations in Mali by launching a military mission to train and restructure Mali’s embattled army. Thousands of people in Mali have been forced to flee their homes amid the French-led war. On February 1, Amnesty International condemned “serious human rights breaches” including the killings of “three children” in… Continue reading
