In an audio recording purportedly made by al-Qaeda-linked militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and found online yesterday, assassination threats are made against Iraq's interim prime minister and it is promised that the fight against "infidels" will continue "until Islamic rule is back on earth."
"As for you [Iyad] Allawi ... the democratically elected prime minister ... you don't know that you have already survived traps we made for you. We promise you that we will continue the game with you until the end," the online recording said.
"We will not get bored until we make you drink from the same glass that Izzadine Saleem tasted," the recording said.
Saleem, a former Governing Council president also known as Abdel-Zahraa Othman, was killed May 18 in a car bombing in Baghdad.
"You [Allawi] are the symbol of evil and the infidel nation; you are the source of all traitors," the recording said.
Allawi heads an interim government that is to take over at the end of June.
"We will carry on our jihad against the Western infidel and the Arab apostate until Islamic rule is back on earth," the voice said.
There was no way to authenticate the recording, but the voice sounded like that of al-Zarqawi.
The Jordanian terror suspect is believed to have ties to al-Qaeda, and groups associated with him have claimed responsibility for a number of bombings and attacks in Iraq, most recently Tuesday's beheading of South Korean hostage Kim Sun-il.
After news of the beheading and the discovery of Kim's body, US forces launched an airstrike in Fallujah on what it said was a safehouse used by followers of al-Zarqawi. Three people were killed and nine wounded in the strike, said a doctor at Fallujah hospital
But on the recording, the voice purported to be al-Zarqawi said he was not in Fallujah.
"I am like a tourist in Iraq. I move around the country staying with my family and brothers," he said.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
RSS