Phone call tipped off U.S. to bin Laden compound..[ 2266 ]

Phone call tipped off U.S. to bin Laden compound, source says

By the CNN Wire Staff

May 7, 2011 -- Updated 1406 GMT (2206 HKT)

A call by one of Osama bin Laden's trusted couriers led the United States to his hideout in Pakistan.

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(CNN) -- A single phone call by Osama bin Laden's trusted courier tipped off U.S. officials to his Pakistan compound, ultimately leading to last week's raid that killed the al Qaeda leader, a senior Pakistani intelligence official told CNN Saturday.
The telephone call the courier made was "not the final one -- it was the initial piece of evidence" that sparked the focus on the compound in Abbottabad, the official said.

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• Phone call tipped off U.S. to bin Laden compound

"Osama Bin Laden dead' ( Al-Qaeda )..[ 2265 ]

Al-Qaeda 'confirms Osama Bin Laden dead'

 

The statement appeared on jihadist web forums

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BBC.,,6 May 2011 Last updated at 13:59 

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Al-Qaeda has confirmed the death of its leader Osama Bin Laden, according to a statement attributed to the group and posted on jihadist internet forums.

The statement said his blood would not be "wasted" and that al-Qaeda would continue attacking the US and allies.

Bin Laden's death would be a "curse" for the US and urged an uprising in Pakistan, the statement added.

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Bin Laden was shot dead on Monday when US commandos stormed his compound in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad.

Several rallies are being held across Pakistan on Friday in protest at Monday's raid. 

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The statement said an audiotape would soon be released of the al-Qaeda leader speaking a week before his death.

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"[Osama Bin Laden's blood] will remain, with permission from Allah, the Almighty, a curse that chases the Americans and their agents, and goes after them inside and outside their countries," it warned.

"Their happiness will turn into sorrow, and their blood will be mixed with their tears. We call upon our Muslim people in Pakistan, on whose land Sheikh Osama was killed, to rise up and revolt."

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Correspondents say many Pakistanis are angry at what they see as a US infringement of their country's sovereignty.

They are also critical of Pakistan's government for allowing the commando operation to happen, although officials deny they were told.

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Around 1,000 people gathered in central Abbottabad following Friday prayers, AFP news agency reported.

They set fire to tyres, blocked a main road and shouted "Down, down USA!" and "terrorist, terrorist, USA terrorist".

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Anti-American sentiment also appeared to be high at a similar protest in the south-western city of Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province.

Greek figs export ... [2264]

The most famous village (for the export of figs)

Thursday, 05 May 2011, 1:53

The village "Taxiarchis" in Evia is known around the world for figs

"Taxiarchis, a  village in northern Evia Is. ( Greece ) can be small, but is well known worldwide because of production of figs which feeds both the Greek, and the global market.

Countless tons produced each year by the agricultural cooperative in the village giving jobs to almost all young people in the region.

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Aid to Libya rebels..[ 2263 ]

Allies aim to get aid to Libya rebels

Misrata evacuees arrive in Benghazi (01:29) Report
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By James Mackenzie and Lin Noueihed

ROME/TRIPOLI | Thu May 5, 2011 7:22am EDT
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(Reuters) - The NATO-backed coalition against Muammar Gaddafi said on Thursday it would create a fund for rebels running short of supplies and money, as the Libyan leader's forces pounded a rebel town in the west.
Italy, host of a meeting in Rome of the "Contact Group" on Libya, said the temporary special fund would aim to channel cash to the rebel administration in its eastern Libyan stronghold of Benghazi.
A rebel spokesman in rebel-held Zintan, south-west of the Libyan capital, said pro-Gaddafi forces had fired about 50 Russian-made Grad rockets into the town so far on Thursday.
The spokesman, called Abdulrahamn, said the first salvo landed at about 6:45 (0445 GMT). There were no immediate reports of casualties, the spokesman said.
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While the fighting has generally descended into a stalemate, the rebel Transitional National Council (TNC), which has been recognized by France, Italy and Qatar, has appealed for loans of up to $3 billion as it seeks to tip the balance.
But efforts to unblock Libyan state assets frozen in overseas accounts, or to allow the rebels to get past U.N. sanctions that prevent their selling oil on international markets, have been held up.
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"We'll be discussing a financial mechanism, we'll be discussing other forms of aid," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said at a joint news conference with Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini.
"I will be formally announcing our non-lethal assistance so I think that there is an effort with urgency to meet the requests that the TNC is making," she said.
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Thursday's meeting brings together foreign ministers from more than 20 countries including France, Britain, the United States, Italy and Qatar as well as representatives of the Arab League and the African Union.
Mahmoud Shammam, chief spokesman for the transitional council, has said the rebels urgently need $1.5 billion to cover immediate running costs.
"We need this for medical supplies, for food supplies, to keep the minimum functions of normal life -- electricity, running hospitals etc," he said on Wednesday.
Other rebels have spoken of needing $2 billion- $3 billion to try to shore up an administration created from scratch with no substantial sources of funding, and to pay the state salaries on which most people depend.
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"NO ENVELOPE OF CASH"

The meeting is not expected to address military issues but ministers are likely to restate their confidence in the NATO mission, despite a lack of progress since the initial airstrikes drove Gaddafi's forces away from Benghazi in March.
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Signs of impatience with the coalition's lack of coherence have emerged. French President Nicolas Sarkozy is planning a separate conference of the "friends of Libya" in the coming weeks to discuss the future of the country.
Of particular concern is the fate of civilians in the surviving pockets of resistance to Gaddafi in cities in western Libya such as Misrata and Zintan.
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An aid ship defied shelling by Gaddafi's forces to rescue more than 1,000 people from Misrata but was forced to leave behind hundreds of Libyans desperate to flee the fighting.
"The boat arrived safely this morning in Benghazi," International Organization for Migration spokeswoman Jemini Pandya said on Thursday.
Misrata's port is a lifeline for the city, where food and medical supplies are low and snipers shoot from rooftops. In all about 13,000 people have now been rescued by 13 ships.
The IOM hoped to carry out a further evacuation mission, but this would depend on the security situation, Panyda said.
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The United States on Wednesday condemned the continued shelling of Misrata and called on Gaddafi's forces to permit the IOM to resume evacuating wounded people from the port.
The insurgents trying to topple Gaddafi after 41 years in power had hoped for a swift victory, akin to the ousting of the leaders of neighboring Egypt and Tunisia by popular uprisings.
But his better-equipped forces halted the rebels' westward advance from Benghazi, and the front line is now largely static.
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The United States, Britain and France, leading a NATO air campaign, say they will not stop until Gaddafi is toppled.
Britain said it had expelled two more Libyan diplomats from London days after it ordered the country's ambassador to leave.
"I ordered the expulsion of the two diplomats on the basis that their activities were contrary to the interests of the UK," Foreign Secretary William Hague said.
On Sunday, Libyan ambassador Omar Jelban was given 24 hours to leave Britain after the British government said its embassy in Tripoli had been attacked.
The attack on the British mission followed a NATO air raid on Tripoli that the Libyan government said had killed Gaddafi's youngest son and three of his grandchildren.
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(Additional reporting by Arshad Mohammed and Sivia Aloisi; Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva, Tarek Amara and Abdelaziz Boumzar in Dehiba, Hamid Ould Ahmed in Algiers; Matt Robinson in Tunis; Joe Logan in Dubai; Mariam Karouny in Beirut; Jospeph Nasr in Berlin; Writing by Giles Elgood; Editing by Angus MacS

Rissia: Obama bin Laden's death is a psychological victory. [ 2262 ]

Fighting Islamic Terrorism Seen as Common Ground for US, Russia

Photo: AP/A Russian special forces trooper stands amidst the rubble following a major police operation in Khasavyurt, Dagestan, near the border with Chechnya (file photo)

(VoA),James Brooke | Moscow  May 03, 2011

In Moscow’s struggle against its southern Islamic insurgency, Russian officials see the death of Osama bin Laden as a psychological victory.

From President Dmitry Medvedev on down, Russian officials have warmly hailed the successful American effort to track and kill Osama bin Laden.

Russia’s foreign ministry, hardly known for its pro-American statements, issued a congratulatory note, saying: "as members of the anti-terrorism coalition, we share the Americans’ feelings."

Combating Islamic terrorism constitutes a rare point of common ground for the old Cold War rivals.

Last year, Russia lost as many security officials in its Muslim majority North Caucasus as the United States lost soldiers in Afghanistan. Last year, 440 Russian police and soldiers were killed in the Caucasus - roughly the same number as American troops killed by hostile action in 2010 in Afghanistan. In both countries, about 10 security officials were wounded for each one killed.

But in both battlegrounds, Osama bin Laden’s influence seems to have recently been far more inspirational than operational.

Alexander Cherkasov, Caucasus expert for the Memorial Human rights group, says that Osama bin Laden was a powerful symbol for Russia’s radicalized Muslims.

He said the financing for the rebels now is largely generated locally, through extortion rackets.

Pavel Baev, Caucasus expert for the International Peace Research Institute in Oslo, Norway, agrees, saying that the rebel groups in the four Islamic majority regions of Russia’s Caucasus no longer live off donations from Saudi Arabia. Instead, they feed off the massive aid transfers from Moscow to the region. "Structure of funding is very certainly linked to Moscow, and not to any other sources of external funding.  So Al Qaeda has a symbolic role, maybe, as creator of ideals and discourse, but hardly anything greater than that," Baev said.

Historically, there are links. Osama bin Laden acquired his guerrilla skills fighting against Soviet soldiers in Afghanistan. Until his death on Monday, he often posed with a Kalashnikov rifle that he said he seized from a Russian soldier he had killed in the 1980s.

In late 1996, after Russian soldiers withdrew from Chechnya,  Ayman al Zawahiri, then al Qaeda’s number two, traveled to Chechnya, looking for a new home for the movement.

On leaving Chechnya, he was jailed for several months in the neighboring Russian republic of Dagestan. After that experience, al Zawahiri decided it would be safer to move al Qaida to Afghanistan.

Three years later, when Russian soldiers moved to reassert control over Chechnya, hundreds, possibly thousands, of Arab mujahedin traveled to Chechnya to fight against the Russians.

But Andrei Soldatov, a Russian security analyst, said most of the foreign fighters did not depend on bin Laden and his Saudi financing. And bin Laden had shifted his target - from Russians to Americans.

"To be frank, al Qaida was never very significant for the North Caucasus. And al Qaida itself never considered Chechnya as a front against for example American or British targets," Soldatov said.

But, to gain a wider international prominence, several insurgent units in the Russian Caucasus claim loose affiliation with al Qaida. And every year, a few Arab fighters are killed in the Russian mountains.

Two weeks ago, Ramzan Kadyrov, head of Chechnya, announced that his soldiers had killed "the chief representative of al-Qaida in the North Caucasus," Khaled Yusef Muhammed, a Saudi national.

Self-styled as Commander of the Arab Mujahideen in Chechnya, Muhammed was sharing a camp with one bodyguard when he was killed. Kadyrov said he was sold out by a comrade for bounty.

Kadryov and other regional officials say that bin Ladin’s death removes a charismatic symbol for the radical Islamic movement.

Baev, the analyst, agrees. "So the death of bin Laden is merely of abstract importance," Baev said.

But with operations controlled and financed inside Russia, the Islamic insurgents remain powerful forces who may want to respond to the death of their hero.

Russians are bracing for more violence. Security is being tightened for the annual Red Square military parade, which will take place on Monday to mark the anniversary of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany.

Looking ahead, Alexander Bortnikov, director of the FSB, the successor agency to the KGB, warns that terrorists plan to target the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, a normally peaceful resort city - on the western end of the Caucasus mountain chain.