Ayman al-Zawahiri, the second-in-command to al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, has released his first English-language video call for jihad in Pakistan, the US-based IntelCenter said on Sunday.
The message was aired on Pakistan’s ARY television network, IntelCenter said in a statement, adding that it marked “the first official message ever ... in which he speaks English.”
Zawahiri “calls for the people to support jihad in Pakistan and lists a litany of grievances against the Pakistani government and US involvement there,” said IntelCenter, which monitors extremist Web sites and communications.
In particular, Zawahiri accuses Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf of being “thirsty for money and a bribeseeker,” arguing that he is working to support US and Western interests and that he has committed crimes against Muslims all over the world.
Zawahiri also calls Abdul Qadeer Khan — the father of Pakistan’s atomic bomb under house arrest for transferring nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea — a “scapegoat to appease the Americans.”
“Let there be no doubt in your minds that the dominant political forces at work in Pakistan today are competing to appease and please the modern day crusaders in the White House, and are working to destabilize this nuclear capable nation under the aegis of America,” Zawahiri was quoted as saying by IntelCenter.
In related news, Pakistan’s intelligence agency is helping the Taliban pursue an insurgency in Afghanistan that has seen a 50 percent hike in attacks in some areas this year, a NATO commander said.
The number of foreign fighters, including Europeans, is also increasing while NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) still lacks the soldiers it needs, US General David McKiernan said in a weekend interview.
“There certainly is a level of ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence] complicity in the militant areas in Pakistan and organizations such as the Taliban,” the four-star general said, echoing allegations by Afghan President Hamid Karzai and others. “I can’t say to what level of leadership that goes to but there are indications of complicity on the part of ISI ... to the extent that they are facilitating these militant groups that come out of the tribal areas in Pakistan.”
Karzai has directly accused the ISI of fueling the unrest in Afghanistan, which sees near daily militant attacks, but Pakistan has rejected the claim.
Meanwhile, Taliban militants attacked two Pakistani security posts in a tribal area bordering Afghanistan on yesterday, sparking fierce clashes in which 20 rebels were killed, officials said.
Fighters attacked a paramilitary fortress and stormed a checkpost in the semi-autonomous Bajaur tribal zone, a known haunt of al-Qaeda and Taliban rebels, they said.
“The Taliban launched a big attack on Tor Ghundi fort and Iskandro post. Security forces responded and 20 militants were killed,” a paramilitary official told reporters.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) launched a week-long diplomatic blitz of South America on Thursday by inaugurating a massive deep-water port in Peru, a US$1.3 billion investment by Beijing as it seeks to expand trade and influence on the continent. With China’s demand for agricultural goods and metals from Latin America growing, Xi will participate in the APEC summit in Lima then head to the Group of 20 summit in Rio de Janeiro next week, where he will also make a state visit to Brazil. Xi and Peruvian President Dina Boluarte participated on Thursday by video link in the opening
‘HARD-HEADED’: Some people did not evacuate to protect their property or because they were skeptical of the warnings, a disaster agency official said Typhoon Man-yi yesterday slammed into the Philippines’ most populous island, with the national weather service warning of flooding, landslides and huge waves as the storm sweeps across the archipelago nation. Man-yi was still packing maximum sustained winds of 185kph after making its first landfall late on Saturday on lightly populated Catanduanes island. More than 1.2 million people fled their homes ahead of Man-yi as the weather forecaster warned of a “life-threatening” effect from the powerful storm, which follows an unusual streak of violent weather. Man-yi uprooted trees, brought down power lines and smashed flimsy houses to pieces after hitting Catanduanes in the typhoon-prone
HOPEFUL FOR PEACE: Zelenskiy said that the war would ‘end sooner’ with Trump and that Ukraine must do all it can to ensure the fighting ends next year Russia’s state-owned gas company Gazprom early yesterday suspended gas deliveries via Ukraine, Vienna-based utility OMV said, in a development that signals a fast-approaching end of Moscow’s last gas flows to Europe. Russia’s oldest gas-export route to Europe, a pipeline dating back to Soviet days via Ukraine, is set to shut at the end of this year. Ukraine has said it would not extend the transit agreement with Russian state-owned Gazprom to deprive Russia of profits that Kyiv says help to finance the war against it. Moscow’s suspension of gas for Austria, the main receiver of gas via Ukraine, means Russia now only
RSS