Posted at 12:02 PM in Breaking news, Current Events, In Depth Analysis, Latin America ports, Logistics, Security, Southeast Ports, Trade, US Maritime Highway | Permalink | Comments (0)
Huge news: Infrastructure funded, ExIm Bank Restored
President Barak Obama took another step down the path of history recent when he signed a bill that would fund America's roads, bridges and mass-transit systems and revive the charter of the U.S. Export-Import Bank over the objections of conservative Republicans.
The Senate where signs of wisdom still exist, voted 83 to 16 to approve the $305 billion legislation hours after the bill cleared the House of Representatives by a margin of 359 to 65, thanks to the election year. As the first long-term U.S. highway bill in a decade, the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act, or FAST Act, represents a rare victory for bipartisanship in Congress.
"It proves to the American people that we can get things done," said House Transportation Committee Chairman Bill Shuster, a Pennsylvania Republican. The legislation returns the EXIM Bank to operation over conservative opposition that allowed its charter to expire on June 30. The agency, which helps U.S. companies with foreign competitors, would have its charter renewed through Sept. 30, 2019, but with a lower lending limit and other reforms.
Boeing Co, EXIM's biggest beneficiary, and General Electric Co have warned that the loss of agency support could cause them to move manufacturing jobs out of the United States. Ethiopian Airlines [ETHA.UL] also expressed concern in September about its ability to take delivery on Boeing jets without EXIM support.
The new act drew accolades from Republicans for providing $280 billion in funding for infrastructure projects from the Highway Trust Fund without increasing the federal gasoline tax.
Democrats cautioned that the modest spending increases would not be enough to fully address the nation's crumbling roads, bridges and rail systems. To avoid higher taxes, the bill's authors opted for a series of controversial measures including a transfer from the Federal Reserve's surplus funds, an increase in customs fees and a requirement for the Internal Revenue Service to use private tax collection agencies.
The measures would leave the Highway Trust Fund with $10 billion at the end of 2020, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. A number of add-on provisions in the legislation were the subject of intensive lobbying by the transportation industry and safety advocates.
Posted at 12:55 PM in Breaking news, Jobs, Logistics, Navigation hazards, Security, Trade, Travel | Permalink | Comments (0)
The US Federal Emergency Protection Agency (FEMA) has announced the FY 2015 Port Security Grant Program (PSGP) awards.
The PSGP provides $100,000,000 for transportation infrastructure security activities to implement Area Maritime Transportation Security Plans (AMSPs) and facility security plans among port authorities, facility operators, and state and local government agencies required to provide port security services.
The purpose of the FY 2015 PSGP is to competitively award grant funding to support increased port-wide risk management; enhance domain awareness; conduct training and exercises; expand port recovery and resiliency capabilities; further capabilities to prevent, detect, respond to, and recover from attacks involving improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and other non-conventional weapons.
These activities will assist ports in the implementation of the National Preparedness System by supporting the building, sustainment, and delivery of core capabilities essential to achieving the Goal of a secure and resilient Nation.
Out of the total of $100,000 available nation-wide, Florida’s Port Security Grant programs secured about $5 million. The grantees are:
Fort Pierce St. Lucie County $325,633
JacksonvilleCity of Jacksonville / Jacksonville Sheriff's Office $35,512 JacksonvillePort Authority $1,050,000
NassauCountyBoard of CountyCommissioners $27,755
St. Johns County Fire Rescue $420,000 Tynda Holdings, LLC $39,000
Key West City of Key WestPort $99,475
MiamiFlorida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) $173,241 Miami River Marine Group $657,324
Miami-DadeCounty $153,938
Port Canaveral Canaveral Port Authority $675,675
Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) $173,241
Port Everglades Broward CountyBoard of CountyCommissioners $1,265,887 BrowardCounty Sheriff's Office $131,376
City of Fort Lauderdale $874,312
Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) $173,241
TampaBayHillsboroughCounty Sheriff's Office $57,500
ManateeCountyPort Authority $326,250
TampaPort Authority $1,609,440
Posted at 03:37 PM in Breaking news, Cruise , Customs and BP, Cyber attacks , Security | Permalink | Comments (0)
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A crippling virus has slipped its bonds in Africa and Asia and is invading whole new continents faster than people canlearn to pronounce its name. In one decade, chikungunya (chihk-uhn-GUHN-yuh) fever has gone from an obscure tropical ailment to an international threat, causing more than 3 million infections worldwide. The virus has established itself in Latin America and may now have the wherewithal to inflict its particular brand of misery in cooler climates.
Chikungunya rarely kills its victims, but it can bring a world of hurt. It comes on like the flu — fever, chills, headache, aching joints — and typically lingers for a week. Many patients later develop severe joint pain that can recur for months or years. In the Makonde language of East Africa, where the virus was first identified in 1952, chikungunya means “to walk bent over” or “to become contorted,” a reference to the stooped posture of many sufferers.
Going places
Chikungunya virus has broadly expanded its tropical range and made fleeting inroads into temperate zones. The virus moves via infected travelers who get bit by a mosquito — Aedes aegypti orAedes albopictus — which then passes the virus to its next victim, sparking an outbreak in a new region. Map shows most major outbreaks since 1952. Mosquito ranges are approximations and hint at potentially vulnerable areas.
Click map to enlarge
Sources: PAHO; M. Aubry et al/Emerg. Infect. Dis. 2015; A. Powers and C. Logue/J. Gen. Virol. 2007; S. Weaver and M. Lecuit/NEJM 2015; S. Weaver/PLoS Negl. Trop. Dis. 2014
Just how chikungunya went global in 10 years is a story of international travel, viral mutations and an accomplice with wings. Historical accounts suggest that the mosquito-borne virus has ventured from its natural home in Africa several times, even hitting North America in the 1820s. But apart from settling into Southeast Asia in the late 1950s, other sorties from Africa have fizzled.
Not this time. In 2005, chikungunya departed Kenya, hit several islands in the Indian Ocean and spread like a brush fire through India and Southeast Asia, where it lingers today. In 2013, the strain of chikungunya that had been ensconced in Asia since the 1950s found its way to the Caribbean and even nicked Florida in 2014.
It’s not unprecedented for a tropical disease to reach other warm regions. But one strain of the chikungunya virus has found a way to survive in mosquitoes that live in temperate zones, leading to recent forays into Italy and France. North America, China and Europe are now fair game.
That means chikungunya could be coming to a mosquito near you. The virus has not established long-term roots in temperate zones, and no one knows whether it has the chops to do so. But Stephen Higgs, a parasitologist and chikungunya expert at KansasStateUniversity in Manhattan, says U.S. outbreaks are a real possibility.
Crossing the pond
The sleepy island of Réunion sits isolated in the Indian Ocean, far from major shipping lanes. It would seem like an ideal place to dodge global health problems.
But in 2005 and 2006, the French territory became a jumping-off point for the epidemic of chikungunya that sprang from Kenya and still churns in Asia today. The scourge devastated Réunion, racking up 266,000 cases on an island of roughly 800,000 people. At the height of the outbreak, patients were streaming into clinics at a rate of 40,000 per week. The virus also blew through Madagascar, Comoros, Mauritius and Seychelles. When it made landfall in India in late 2005, chikungunya hit the jackpot, causing close to 1.4 million infections. From India it crossed Southeast Asia, spawning outbreaks in Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia and elsewhere.
This explosion of infections from a previously obscure virus stunned global health experts. India had a spotty history of chikungunya, but hadn’t had a case in 32 years. Réunion had never seen it before. Something had changed.
Story continues after interactive map
Western migration
Hot spots of chikungunya transmission have cropped up widely over the last 60 years, lately reaching the Western Hemisphere. The first U.S. outbreak affected a handful of people in Florida, but elsewhere, outbreaks have varied from hundreds to more than 1 million suspected cases.
SOURCES: M.C. ROBINSON/TRANS. ROYAL SOC. TROP. MED. HYG. 1955; K.A. TSETSARKIN ET AL/PLOS PATH. 2007; REZZA ET AL/LANCET 2007; S.-D. THIBERVILLE ET AL/PLOS NEGL. TROP. DIS. 2013; PAHO MAY 2015; M.L.G. FIGUEIREDO AND L.T.M. FIGUEIREDO/REVISTA DA SOCIEDADE BRASILEIRA DE MEDICINA TROPICAL2014; S. HIGGSAND D. VANLANDINGHAM/VECTOR-BORN ZOO. DIS. 2015; M. AUBRY ET AL/EMERG. INFECT. DIS. 2015; A. POWERS AND C. LOGUE/J. GEN. VIROL. 2007; S. WEAVER AND M. LECUIT/NEJM 2015; S. WEAVER/PLOS NEGL. TROP. DIS. 2014; MOYEN ET AL/PLOS ONE 2014
Réunion seemed an odd stopover for chikungunya because the island had little or no Aedes aegypti, the tropical mosquito that typically carries the virus around Africa and Asia. Researchers soon figured out that the African chikungunya that hit Réunion had mutated to thrive inside a new carrier, the Asian tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus (SN: 6/29/13, p. 26). Réunion, like many parts of the world, has tiger mosquitoes.
Before the virus mutated, the tiger mosquito couldn’t effectively spread chikungunya. But the mutation has rendered the virus 100 times as adaptable to the tiger mosquito’s innards as it once was. Specifically, the virus underwent a single amino acid change in one of its glycoproteins, a carbohydrate-protein mix called E1, making virus replication much easier in the tiger mosquito. When the mosquito takes a blood meal from a person carrying mutated chikungunya, the pathogen proliferates rapidly in the insect’s midgut and travels to its saliva. As a result, the mosquito’s next bite is like a hypodermic needle loaded with virus. Other mutations found later seemed to help this virus adapt to the tiger mosquito, its new host.
DRILLING DOWN One strain of chikungunya virus has found a way to hitchhike in the Asian tiger mosquito (bottom), which is found in much of the eastern United States. In the tropics, the most common chikungunya carrier is the Aedes aegypti mosquito (top).
BOTH: JAMES GATHANY/CDC
The tiger mosquito offered chikungunya what amounted to frequent flier miles on a fleet of jets bound for cooler climes. Within a few years the virus showed up in Italy and France, ferried from person to person by black-and-white striped tiger mosquitoes. Italy reported about 200 infections in 2007.
That’s a modest number, but it established that chikungunya could successfully venture outside the tropics. “That was a game changer,” says Scott Weaver, a virologist at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston.
Westward bound
A second surprise came in 2013 when chikungunya showed up on the sun-splashed Caribbeanisland of Saint Martin. A traveler — from the Far East according to genetic characteristics of the virus — apparently arrived in Saint Martin carrying the virus and was bitten by a local mosquito, which then spread it to other people, says Ann Powers, a molecular virologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Fort Collins, Colo. This launched the epidemic in the West.
“Our luck ran out,” Weaver says. In the ensuing year and a half, chikungunya established a foothold in the Americas that it may never relinquish. Florida had 11 cases in 2014 transmitted by local mosquitoes. The warm GulfCoast may be at risk since the tropical Ae. aegypti,which appears to be driving the epidemic, can live there, says Higgs.
The good news for now is that the chikungunya strain that hit the Caribbean and Florida isn’t carried by the much-despised tiger mosquito, he adds. That’s probably why the Caribbean infections haven’t penetrated North America beyond Florida. If chikungunya were to catch on in Europe or the eastern United States, it would arrive in a sick traveler but would need to be a strain already adapted to the tiger mosquito.
Meanwhile, Ae. aegypti is spreading the Asian strain of chikungunya in Latin America and the Caribbean, with tens of thousands of cases confirmed and more than 1 million suspected. The epidemic has stretched to Brazil, which has reported hundreds of cases of person-to-mosquito-to-person spread.
Much of Brazil is home to both the tiger mosquito and Ae. aegypti, and scientists are trying to determine which insect is spreading the virus there. Brazil has a second two-headed problem: It has cases of the Asian strain of chikungunya that swept the Caribbean as well as the African strain of chikungunya that spilled into the Indian Ocean and learned to ride the tiger mosquito. Researchers don’t know yet if the African strain has mutated in Brazil as it did in Réunion and parts east.
The three strains of chikungunya virus
West African strain
Asian strain
East/Central/South African strain
Source: David Morens and Anthony Fauci/NEJM 2014
If the virus in Brazil morphs, the West could face a worst-case scenario, because Panama, Mexico and many other countries also harbor both mosquitoes. The risk posed by having a version of chikungunya in the West that has adapted to temperate-zone carriers keeps U.S. infectious disease experts up at night.
“It’s certainly something I worry about,” says Mark Heise, a virologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. There is plenty of air traffic between Brazil and North America, he says, and the tiger mosquito’s ever-expanding range includes much of the United States east of the Mississippi River.
To become contorted
The best that can be said about a case of chikungunya is that it confers lifetime immunity. People rarely get it twice. Once is bad enough.
Ann Powers first witnessed people with chikungunya in Comoros in the Indian Ocean, which was hit about the same time Réunion was. “It was incredible to see people in that much pain,” she says. Powers interviewed some patients as they lay down because their ankles were so inflamed they couldn’t stand. “Shaking hands hurt them,” she says.
In a long-term study of 102 Réunion patients, 60 percent still reported joint pain three years after contracting chikungunya, a French team reported in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases in 2013. In Italy, a one-year follow-up found nearly 67 percent of patients continued to have joint or muscle pain.
Why the virus goes after the joints is a mystery. Joints lack circulation, which might help the virus evade the immune system, Heise says.
The crippling joint symptoms can disable a whole community, says David Morens, a pediatric infectious disease physician at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda, Md. “In Asia you see these really massive outbreaks where everybody gets sick at once. The whole town gets incapacitated. There are no taxicabs, no teachers.”
Pregnant women face special risks. Of 39 pregnant women in Réunion who had chikungunya fever around the time they were in labor, 19 had infected newborns. Ten of those infants developed serious complications, most with swelling of the brain. Four became disabled, a French research team reported inPLOS Medicine in 2008.
Treatment options are lacking. Aside from fever reducers and fluid replacement, the drug ribavirin shows some benefit. Antibodies from a recovered chikungunya patient might help an exposed person, but more testing is needed.
A 2013 study identified antibodies in mice that can neutralize chikungunya virus and prevent the animals from getting ill. The antibodies even worked when injected after the mice were exposed to the virus, but not if the animals were already showing symptoms, says Heise, who coauthored the report, in PLOS Pathogens.
One of the problems with chikungunya is how little scientists know about it. In humans, the incubation period — time between exposure and first symptoms — is a guesstimate of one to 12 days. Lab tests show mosquitoes other than Ae. aegypti and Asian tiger are capable of harboring the virus, but whether they do so extensively in the wild isn’t known. Chikungunya has circulated in Africa for hundreds of years. The natural reservoirs are understood to be nonhuman primates and maybe rodents or other animals. When a mosquito bites an infected animal, that infected blood can be transmitted to humans with the next bite. But even though Asia has millions of monkeys and a history of outbreaks, no wild reservoirs have been identified there.
Outwitting a tricky virus
The molecular structure of chikungunya may provide more guidance — and a way to stop it. The virus relies on two glycoproteins, E1 and E2, to enter and infect a cell. It targets cells found in the blood, muscle, joints, lymph nodes and liver. Once inside a cell, E1, E2 and other viral proteins trigger a complex series of events that revs up manufacture of more virus. In the Réunion outbreak, the mutational change in the viral E1 glycoprotein put this process into overdrive in the Asian tiger mosquito, which spread it around the island, Higgs and his colleagues reported in 2007 in PLOS Pathogens.
DAZZLINGLY DANGEROUS A chikungunya virus particle comes studded with tools for infecting cells. The E2 glycoproteins (fuchsia) anchor the virus on cells by binding with protein docking stations called receptors. The E1 glycoproteins (red, blue and yellow) orchestrate cell penetration and virus replication. The viral membrane (green) encloses chikungunya’s genetic material. Once inside a cell, the virus induces its host to produce more virus.
FELIX REY/PASTEUR INSTITUTE
These same proteins might be turned against the virus in a vaccine. One candidate vaccine that contains E1, E2 and other chikungunya proteins can elicit an immune reaction in monkeys and people. In 25 volunteers, a three-shot regimen of these proteins triggered neutralizing antibodies against chikungunya after two doses, NIAID vaccine researcher Julie Ledgerwood and colleagues reported December 6 in the Lancet.
The protection remained for 44 weeks and probably lasts longer, she says. Vaccination helped turn the corner against yellow fever, another mosquito-borne virus. While yellow fever is deadlier, it has been suppressed by a long-lasting vaccine and now crops up only sporadically, usually in parts of Africa with low vaccination rates.
Another group is testing a chikungunya vaccine added to a measles shot. At the 2014 meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in New Orleans, Erich Tauber of Themis Bioscience GmbH in Vienna, reported that 42 healthy volunteers given the vaccine produced a strong immune response after the second shot of a three-shot regimen. And Weaver and his colleagues reported in theJournal of Infectious Diseases in 2014 that a vaccine they developed showed strong protection against chikungunya in monkeys.
These vaccines are likely to protect against all three major strains of chikungunya, Ledgerwood says, including the morphed virus carried by the tiger mosquito. The greater challenge may be to find funding for testing and mass production. “We’re not short on ideas or tools,” Higgs says. “We’re short on investment.” Whether Big Pharma will go all in against an obscure virus with a funny name is anyone’s guess.
North versus south
How chikungunya will play out in cool climates is equally unclear. If the virus sparks new outbreaks in temperate regions, they will probably be summertime events, Powers says. Winter would douse the fire in North America. “You’re much more likely to have annual reintroduction of the virus” in warm months by travelers coming from endemic areas, she says, than year-round spread.
The use of bug spray and mosquito avoidance might — at least in developed countries — offset the growing reach of the Asian tiger mosquito and thwart chikungunya.
“My feeling is that people in countries like Italy and the United States are probably not exposed to mosquitoes enough,” Weaver says. “We might see small outbreaks but not major epidemics,” thanks mainly to air-conditioning and window screens. Whether those upgrades will be enough to stall the disease remains unknown.
Heise says a lack of these amenities in poor parts of cities could make them high-risk areas. The Asian tiger, he says, “is an incredibly aggressive mosquito.”
For people in the American tropics, the deal may be done. “I don’t see us, in these circumstances, driving chikungunya out of South and Central America,” Higgs says.
Some tropical countries with both kinds of mosquitoes lack good sanitation and have people housed in close urban quarters, a recipe for mosquito-borne disease transmission, Morens says. These conditions, often considered the price of finding work and getting ahead in life, are an ideal setting for disease spread. “Human progress creates opportunities for microbial progress to follow,” he says.
Others doubt that the disease will linger in the West. Historically, chikungunya (mistaken for dengue before the 1950s) may have emerged from Africa every 50 or 60 years, run rampant and burned itself out, says Scott Halstead, an infectious disease physician at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md. He was in Asia in the 1960s when the virus seemed to do just that, even though conditions were ideal for its continued spread. For this reason, Halstead doubts that the current global expansion is permanent.
Morens says that for the virus to stay in the West, it has to either adapt itself to humans or to wild animals. If it infects New World monkeys, as yellow fever did, chikungunya could linger under the radar and periodically jump to people. This is what chikungunya does in Africa. “The other possibility is more alarming,” he says. “The virus adapts itself to a new cycle, completely human-to-mosquito-to-human. Once in that cycle, it’s almost never going to go away.” This is how dengue fever established itself in the Americas, and it’s how chikungunya spreads in Asia.
Infection rates in Central America are down during the current dry season. But that’s about to change, Powers says. “Expect an increase in the number of cases in the near future.” The rainy season is right around the corner.
Posted at 10:15 AM in Breaking news, Caribbean Basin ports, Caribbean Maritime Exchange, Logistics, Navigation hazards, Science, Security, Southeast Ports, Trade, Travel | Permalink | Comments (0)
Senior Official: Gulftainer Shipping Weapons to Iranian-Backed Terrorists In Iraq
· Published on Sunday, 31 May 201508:40
Written by Alan Jones
Alan Jones | 1776 Channel
Gulftainer shipping weapons to Iranian-backed terrorists in Iraq: Former senior official for coalition embassy in Iraq cites Iraq port authority officials’ leak to Iraqi media
(1776 Channel) Gulftainer, the UAE container terminal operator that was recently awarded a 35-year lease at strategically-important Port Canaveral, FL, adjacent to a U.S. Navy nuclear submarine base and NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, has allegedly been shipping weapons through the Port of Umm Qasr to two Iranian-backed terrorist militia groups in Iraq, the Badr Brigades and Asaeib Ahl al-Haq (AAH), according to a leak from Iraq General Port Company officials in Basra to Iraqi media.
“AAH is an Iranian-backed Shiite militant group that split from Moqtada al-Sadr’s Jaish al-Mahdi (JAM) in 2006. Since that time, AAH has conducted thousands of lethal explosively formed penetrator (EFP) attacks against U.S. and Iraqi forces, targeted kidnappings of Westerners, rocket and mortar attacks on the U.S. Embassy, the murder of American soldiers, and the assassination of Iraqi officials”. – Institute of the Study of War
The Iraq General Port Company, part of the Iraq Ministry of Transport, is the embattled nation’s port authority.
UMM QASR PORT, IRAQ, Iraq General Port Company administrative offices.
A former senior official with a coalition embassy in Iraq has confirmed to 1776 Channel that the report, which was published in Arabic by electronic newspaper Al-aalem Al-jadeed on February 10, 2015, charges that Gulftainer is moving weapons to terrorist groups the Badr Brigades and Asaeib Ahl al-Haq (AAH).
Al-aalem Al-jadeed describes itself as an “electronic newspaper free from influence of partisan and sectarian and owners.”
Gulftainer’s 35-year lease with Port Canaveral was negotiated in secret and then approved by the Obama Administration, without a national security review, despite Port Canaveral’s strategic location and it’s extreme proximity to some of the U.S. government’s most sensitive space and defense installations.
SEE RELATED STORY: America’s strategic infrastructure compromised: Did Clinton pay-to-play arrangement hand over port container operations inside national security nexus to wealthy foreign associates?
Gulftainer operates the Iraq Container Terminal inside Iraq’s deep-water UmmQasrPort, located on the Persian Gulf near Kuwait.
PHOTO ABOVE from this SOURCE and Google Translate to English is HERE, and Kolff Tinner is Gulftainer
The Badr Brigades and Asaeib Ahl al-Haq (AAH) are backed by Iran’s extremist Islamic regime.
Both Shiite militant groups are listed as terrorist organizations by the UAE government, according to the report.
Privately-owned Gulftainer and its corporate parent the Crescent Group are based in the UAE.
Hadi Al-Ameri leads the Badr Organization, a Shiite political faction in Iraq associated with the Badr Brigades. Al-Ameri is the former Iraq Transport Minister, and likely has deep connections with port officials and shipping companies.
Gulftainer’s shadowy deal with Port Canaveral
As reported earlier by 1776 Channel, Gulftainer’s new GT USA division plans to begin operations next month in Port Canaveral, FL near sensitive U.S. national security installations including a U.S. Navy submarine base and NASA’s KennedySpaceCenter.
Map of Port Canaveral, Florida showing Gulftainer’s area of operations, US Navy Trident submarine base and Canaveral Air Force Station.
Gulftainer’s 35-year lease at Port Canaveral, secretly negotiated by Canaveral officials under code name ‘Project Pelican’, was approved without a national security review by Treasury Secretary Jacob ‘Jack’ Lew, a long-time associate of former President Bill Clinton.
It is unclear if Treasury Secretary Lew, the Department of Commerce or other officials within the Obama administration accessed any intelligence reports indicating that Gulftainer was possibly involved in trafficking weapons to Iranian-backed terrorist militias in Iraq. U.S. officials decided that Gulftainer should not be subjected to a national security review before commencing operations at Port Canaveral.
Gulftainer previously attempted to secure a lease at the Port of Jacksonville (JAXPORT), close to NavalSubmarineBaseKingsBay and Naval Air Station Jacksonville, but was abruptly rebuffed by Port of Jacksonville officials.
Bill Clinton met last summer with Malik Jafar, a member of the family that owns Gulftainer and who is also a top executive at Crescent, the parent company of Gulftainer.
Although the official business of the meeting between former President Clinton and Jafar concerned the Business Backs Education Foundation, the two men met during the same time period in which Gulftainer and Port Canaveral officials were secretly negotiating Project Pelican. 1776 Channel reported on that meeting and the possibility that Clinton engaged Gulftainer in a pay-to-play arrangement to secure Department of Treasury approval for the deal.
SOURCE: 1776 Channel
Alan Jones is an investigative journalist who published a series of groundbreaking stories at the Washington Times Communities. Several of those stories were subsequently covered by other media outlets, including World Net Daily, Infowars, Daily Caller, and New American
Posted at 11:38 AM in Breaking news, Customs and BP, Security, Trade | Permalink | Comments (0)
About $100 million will be available to various port authorities, facility operators, and state and local government agencies who have developed an Area Maritime Security Plan as part of the 2015 FEMA port security grant program
Eligibility Criteria is established pursuant to the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002, as amended (MTSA) wherein DHS established a risk-based grant program to support maritime security risk management.
This year funding is directed towards the implementation of AMSPs and Facility Security Plans (FSP) among port authorities, facility operators, and state and local government agencies that are required to provide port security services.
Application Submission Deadline: May 19, 2015 at 11:59 PM EDT
In administering the grant program, national, economic, energy, and strategic defense concerns based upon the most current risk assessments available will be considered.
This year there will be no Port Area Group Designations. Instead, all Port Areas will be selected for funding through the FY 2015 PSGP competitive review process.
For the most part those who were eligible to apply in 2014 will be eligible this year except “Applications for the purpose of providing a service, product, project, or investment justifications (IJ) on behalf of another entity such as sub-recipients or a consortia are ineligible for funding. Applications will only be accepted and considered for funding from direct recipients.”
(so let us know if you need a hand)
Only one (1) application per eligible entity within each Port Area is permitted. Each application may contain multiple IJs. An investment justification supports the funding of a proposed project. The location where the project is primarily implemented is considered the Port Area of the application. Applicants with facilities in multiple Port Areas may submit one (1) application per Port Area. Since program funding is risk based by Port Area, no single application should include investment justifications for projects intended to be implemented in multiple Port Areas. For example, state entities that operate in multiple Port Areas within the state must submit separate applications to fund projects in each of these Port Areas.
Cost Share or Match
There is a Cost-Match requirement for this program. All PSGP award recipients must provide a non-Federal match (cash or in-kind) supporting at least 25 percent of the total project cost for each proposed project. Exceptions to the cost match requirement may apply. Please see Appendix B – PSGP Funding Guidelines for details. The non-Federal share can be cash or in-kind, with the exception of construction activities, which must be a cash-match (hard).
The steps involved in applying for an award under this program are:
1. Applying for, updating or verifying their DUNS Number;
2. Applying for, updating or verifying their EIN Number;
3. Updating or verifying their SAM Number;
4. Establishing an Authorized Organizational Representative (AOR) in Grants.gov;
5. Submitting an initial application in Grants.gov; and
6. Submitting the complete application in ND Grants.
NOTE: If you are going to apply for this funding opportunity and have not obtained a Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number and/or are not currently registered in the System for Award Management (SAM), please take immediate action to obtain a DUNS Number, if applicable, and then to register immediately in SAM. It may take 4 weeks or more after you submit your SAM registration before your registration is active in SAM, then an additional 24 hours for Grants.gov to recognize your information. Information on obtaining a DUNS number and registering in SAM is available from Grants.gov at: http://www.grants.gov/web/grants/applicants/applicant-resources.html
Posted at 12:33 PM in Breaking news, Customs and BP, Cyber attacks , Port of Miami River, Security, Southeast Ports, Trade | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Jake DesVergers Chief Surveyor at International Yacht Bureau
The US Coast Guard issued a notice announcing the declaration of Sea Area A1 in certain areas off the coast of the United States. The declaration is based upon the performance of the Coast Guard Rescue 21 System and in accordance with the SOLAS Convention.
The areas included in this designation are: the East, West, and Gulf coasts of the United States, excluding Alaska; and including Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands of Saipan, Tinian, and Rota.
These locations are where more than 90% of the area within 20 nautical miles seaward of the territorial baseline is within coverage of the Coast Guard very high frequency (VHF) Coast Stations that provide both a continuous watch for Digital Selective Calling (DSC) distress alerts on Channel 70 and a capability to respond to distress alerts.
Posted at 09:17 AM in Breaking news, Logistics, Security | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
TOMORROW Updated Cuban Assets Control Regulations Take Effect
By Jennifer Diaz on January 15th, 2015
Posted in Export, Import, International Travel, OFAC
cuba map
Today, the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) announced it is amending the Cuban Assets Control Regulations, 31 C.F.R. part 515 (the “CACR”), which will be published in the Federal Register tomorrow, January 16, 2015, at which time the changes will take effect.
You can review the changes that will be published tomorrow here.
This is important, as it means the changes announced by OFAC tomorrow will be effective as of tomorrow, January 16, 2015, but, the Congressional response to those changes is still unknown.
OFAC is implementing policy changes announced by the President on December 17, 2014, which include “facilitating authorized travel to Cuba by U.S. persons, certain authorized commerce, and the flow of information to, from and within Cuba”.
OFAC also published a number of Frequently Asked Questions pertaining to this regulatory amendment.
Stay tuned, tomorrow, we will go through the changes and what is now legal.
Posted at 11:04 AM in Breaking news, Caribbean Basin ports, Caribbean Maritime Exchange, Customs and BP, Export opportunities, Jobs, Latin America ports, Port of Miami River, Security, Trade | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Imagine that you are English literature graduate Maj. Mariam Al Mansouri screaming across the Syrian skies at the throttles of a smart bomb-loaded US –built F-16 struggling for a metaphor.
On patrol awaiting your targeting instruction you are under command of your generals at the United Arab Emirates plus the AWACs mission controller with the strong Alabama accent.
You are the first of eight women to graduate from the Emirates’ air force academy after it began to admit women, and you are the nation’s first female fighter pilot, a veteran of one successful mission against ISIL over Syrian and Iraq.
The sky around you and the ground below you are throbbing with testosterone as young male pilots who never thought they would get a real chance are zinging around from Qatar, Bahrain, Australia, France, England, Saudi Arabia and Pensacola, each intent on finally getting a chance to pull the trigger in anger.
You are already a combat veteran from the earliest days of the Syrian bombing when the chatter and chaos was substantially less; only the Americans and the UAE controllers to sort out and no SAM missiles or Syrian interceptors to dodge.
No one has ever seen a Qatarian jet fighter in the sky in action. The tiny nation owns only 12 and punishes anyone who so much as takes a photo as a spy. And yet it seems you now have a Qatar Mirage 2000-5 as your wing man. Or is that an Israeli?
At about the expected moment, a target is painted on your targeting screen and a go is given to launch your smart bomb run along with the Qatari jet, aiming at a small brick building just outside the Syrian capital.
In the headquarters of the CIA just outside of Washington DC, meanwhile, the leaders of the free world are watching the action with a cynical satisfaction.
“Turn up the chatter,” one specialist demands
On command, the airwaves over Syria are filled with more languages, instructions, vectors and commands in a half dozen languages.
“Good,” the coordinator at Langley says. “That ought to cover it when it comes time to meet the press.”
In a moment the second act in a drama that began four days ago will reach its dénouement as the Major dutifully bombs the Syrian building to smithereens and turns for home.
She will not know for a few more hours, once act 3 is underway, that she has changed the course of history.
Four days earlier the US president approved a NSA and CIA proposed plan to use several emissaries including Oliver North to contact the Syrian President Al Assad with a proposal.
Big Al has proven more resilient than anyone expected and the US intelligence community now agrees that the US must either recruit Big Al as an ally or kill him. So the offer is made.
Bashar Al-Assad is offered a chance to lead the Shiite and Sunni world into a new day against the forces for fundamentalist barbarism embodied by the Islamic State and its allies. If he will agree to reconcile with his moderate Sunni enemies, admit his transgressions and promise to stand for a free and open election in Syria, the US will let him off the hook and bankroll his battle with ISIS.
Of course, no one likes this plan, except there is only one other alternative amid the chaos of the Islamic State’s march through the region. Big Al has gassed his enemies and committed acts equal to genocide against the citizens of his divided nation. President Barack Obama is on record against any deal with Big Al, and must remain so.
Yet Big Al and his powerful Shiite allies in Iran and Pakistan have a lot to offer if they can be swayed to join the coalition against ISIL and lower the hate level with the Sunni. Heck even the Sunnis in Saudi Arabia are on board against the Sunni- ish band of thugs who lead ISIL. Most now realize ISIL is akin to Abu Nidal, a band of soulless gangsters who use religion as a veil to hide their criminal, money- hungry enterprise and who will murder anyone and side with either Sunni or Shiiite if the booty suits them.
Bashir Al Assad considered the offer for a minute then decided he could go it alone without the headache of seeking peace and rebuilding the nation of Syria.
Then the intermediary told him the punch line. “You see, Big Al, we know where you are every minute of every day. We have placed a marker on your every movement so that we don’t accidentally bomb your convoy or bunker or headquarters with all this other stuff going on.”
The emissary continued, “That’s the good news. The bad news is that with all these different air forces our there with different radar and targeting systems of different generations and all that confusion, it is very possible that one of them could accidentally mistake the signal that says, ‘THIS IS BIG AL, don’t bomb him.’ with an indication of a high value target that ought to be pulverized. You get the picture Big Al?”
“You really think this will work,” the NSA guy asked the CIA guy.
“You watch and try to remember if you can recall anything about those US Air Force female pilots flying A-10s over Baghdad during shock and awe. At least one of them had a little difficulty sorting out the correct targets. Of course you don’t remember. Who would criticize our brave women pilots risking their lives in the chaos of battle?"
"It’s a tested scenario, trust me."
And with that the order was given to the Major to deliver the ordinance she had been so well trained to deliver at the very moment Big Al stepped out of the garden entrance of his mistress’s hideaway.
The roar of the F-16 was the last thing he heard.
In the debriefing after the accidental bombing of the Syrian president, three scenarios were discussed with no conclusion. The Major had misunderstood the signal to avoid the target for a signal to attack, the AWACs had misunderstood the signal to avoid the target as a signal to attack or the Qatar fighter had misunderstood the mission and dropped his bombs just as the Major pulled up.
President Obama apologized saying that innocent civilians are frequently collateral damage when leaders such as Al-Assad refuse to follow international law and the rules of common decency.
And he thanked the Syrian foreign minister for supporting the air strikes in Syria before the United Nations and for volunteering to lead the new government.
Posted at 10:31 AM in Eyerdam Opinion, Follow up, Security | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
A thousand words!
The ISL NAZI Reich in Context
Obama’s quest to find friendly enemies
among his enemy’s enemies
Frida Ghitis, the columnist made this assertion recently:
“If president Obama can pull off the complicated maneuver of eradicating the Islamic State without handing a victory to Syrian dictator Bashar Al Assad and his Shiite allies in Iran and Iraq, he will salvage the foreign policy record of his presidency. The task is extraordinarily challenging for many reasons.”
That's for sure.
Most Shias (between 68% and 80%) live in four countries: Iran, Pakistan, India and Iraq. Iran has 66 million to 70 million Shias, or 37-40% of the world’s total Shia population. Iraq, India and Pakistan each are home to at least 16 million Shias.
So if helping the Shiite leader Al Assad defeat the Sunni-backed ISIS not only helps Iran and Iraq it should also benefit our allies in Pakistan and India, if the logic holds. In four countries – Iran, Azerbaijan, Bahrain and Iraq – Shia Muslims make up a majority of the total population.
And it might create some concern in Lebanon where Hizbullah, Hizballah, etc.—is a Shi'a Islamist militant group and political party based in Lebanon but primarily funded by Iran. But the Shiites are a minority. Lebanon's population is estimated to be 48% Muslim (25% Shia; 23% Sunni).
Instead, it seems, Obama has decided to make his enemy’s enemy his friends by backing the Syrians who are not Shiites, and those are the Sunnis, Christians and Kurds; buying them some fancy war boots and letting them do the walking against ISIS and Al Assad. And why should they fight ISIS and the Shiite Assad on our behalf?
1. The US and its allies will give them some fine weapons and most of the men in this region really appreciate a good weapon.
2. The leaders of ISIS are seeking both a self-proclaimed caliphate to politically rule all Muslims, and religious authority over all Muslims across the world. Muslims don't like to be told what to do by anyone but their own leaders.
3. ISIS identifies itself as jehadist Sunni, not unlike the early Taliban under Osama Bin Laden, but far more rutheless and willing to murder across tribal and family ties a far less interested in enforcing the Quoran.
And that is the reason why Obama has tried to alter the religious landscape by claiming the ISL or ISIS is not Islamic. By doing so he is attempting to blur the Sunni background of its leaders and diffuse the potential problems inherent in asking Sunnis to join with Shiites, Kurds and Christians to kill Sunnis. “
“No religion condones the killing of innocents, and the vast majority of ISIL’s victims have been Muslim,” Obama said. “ISIL is a terrorist organization, pure and simple. And it has no vision other than the slaughter of all who stand in its way.”
Let us put aside the contrived labels and look at this Islamic conflict in historic terms. The competition is, as it has always been, among the Sunni tribes and the Shiite tribes (Shia) whatever else they call themselves.
The Islamic radicals are simply the members of those two rival political/religious groups who are willing to murder anyone and everyone to achieve the destruction of their rivals under the bogus façade of their religious background.
Now ISL has emerged like the NAZI version of Islamic radicalism willing to slaughter Sunni and Shia, women and children to accomplish its Reich, the Caliphate Reich that dominates all Muslims and their natural resources.
But you cannot start with nothing and create a movement. You need a tradition of retribution and some festering hate.
It began with Muhammad's death in AD 632, when disagreement broke out over who should succeed him as leader of the Muslim community. None of Muhammad's sons survived into adulthood, therefore direct hereditary succession was never an option.
Umar (Umar ibn al-Khattab), a prominent companion of Muhammad, nominated Abu Bakr. Others added their support and Abu Bakr was made the first caliph. This choice was disputed by some of Muhammad's companions, who held that Ali (Ali ibn Abi Talib), had been designated his successor.
Ali bin Abu Talib was a cousin of the Prophet Muhammad, the son of the Prophet's uncle Abu Talib.
Muhammad Ali was adopted into the Prophet's household when he was a young boy, and he embraced Islam at an early age.
Ali married the Prophet's daughter, Fatima, and lived a very humble life. The couple had two children, Hassan and Hussain. Ali was known for being brave and heroic, frequently fighting in defense of the Muslim community. He became known as "the lion of Allah."
The Shia Muslims believe that following the Prophet Muhammad's death, leadership should have passed directly to his cousin/son-in-law, Ali bin Abu Talib.
Throughout history, Shia Muslims have not recognized the authority of elected Muslim leaders, choosing instead to follow a line of Imams which they believe have been appointed by the Prophet Muhammad or God Himself; the Islamic version of Catholic bishops.
The word "Shia" in Arabic means a group or supportive party of people. The commonly-known term is shortened from the historical "Shia-t-Ali," or "the Party of Ali." They are also known as followers of "Ahl-al-Bayt" or "People of the Household" (of the Prophet).
Sunni Muslims agree with the position taken by many of the Prophet's companions, that the new leader should be elected from among those capable of the job. This is what was done, and the Prophet Muhammad's close friend and advisor, Abu Bakr, became the first Caliph of the Islamic nation. The word "Sunni" in Arabic comes from a word meaning "one who follows the traditions of the Prophet."
In both sects the belief of the other is considered apostacy if not heresy punishable by death or other serious punishment. It may seem as trivial to us in the West as the rift among those who believe that faith alone saves men and those who believe good works are also required for salvation seems to Muslims. In both cases the division has festered into generations of violence and retribution.
Of the total Muslim population, 10-13% are Shia Muslims and 87-90% are Sunni Muslims. Most Shias (between 68% and 80%) live in just four countries: Iran, Pakistan, India and Iraq according to the Pew Research Center report: Mapping the Global Muslim Population: A Report on the Size and Distribution of the World’s Muslim Population.
Sunnis include followers of the Hanafi, Shafi, Maliki and Hanbali schools of Islamic jurisprudence as well as the Wahhabi or Salafi movement.
Shias include Ithna Asharis (Twelvers), Ismailis, Zaydis, Alevis and Alawites.
There also are a few Muslim groups that are difficult to classify as either Sunni or Shia. These include Kharijites in Oman and the Nation of Islam movement in the United States, as well as the Druze, who are located primarily in and around Lebanon.
Living as Majorities and Minorities
While 80% of the world’s Muslims live in countries where Muslims are in the majority, significant numbers – about one-fifth of the world’s Muslim population – live as religious minorities in their home countries.
Of the roughly 317 million Muslims living as minorities, about 240 million – about three-quarters – live in five countries: India (161 million), Ethiopia (28 million), China (22 million), Russia (16 million) and Tanzania (13 million). Two of the 10 countries with the largest number of Muslims living as minorities are in Europe: Russia (16 million) and Germany (4 million).
These minority populations are often quite large. For example, India, a Hindu-majority country, has the third-largest population of Muslims worldwide. The Muslim population of Ethiopia is about as large as that of Afghanistan. China has more Muslims than Syria; Russia is home to more Muslims than Jordan and Libya combined; and Germany has more Muslims than Lebanon.
Between 116 million and 147 million Shias live in Asia, representing about three-quarters of the world’s Shia population (note that Iran is included in the Asia-Pacific region). Meanwhile, nearly a quarter of the world’s Shias (36 million to 44 million) live in the Middle East-North Africa.
Looked at in a different way, 12-15% of the Muslim population in the Asia-Pacific region is Shia, as is 11-14% of the Muslim population in the Middle East-North Africa region. The figures for Shias are generally given as a range because of the limitations in the secondary-source data, according to the Pew Study.
More than half the countries in the Middle East-North Africa region have populations that are approximately 95% Muslim or greater. These include Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Morocco, Palestinian territories, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Western Sahara and Yemen.
Other countries in the region also have populations with a high percentage of Muslims, including Syria (92%), Oman (88%), Bahrain (81%), Qatar (78%), United Arab Emirates (76%) and Sudan (71%).
Although most of the citizens of the Persian Gulf countries of Oman, Bahrain, Qatar and United Arab Emirates are Muslim, these countries have a substantial number of non-Muslim workers who are not citizens; this brings down the total percentage of their populations that is Muslim.
North Africa is home to the three largest Muslim populations in the Middle East-North Africa region: Egypt (79 million), Algeria (34 million) and Morocco (32 million).
Other countries in the region with large Muslim populations include: Iraq (30 million), Sudan (30 million), Saudi Arabia (25 million), Yemen (23 million), Syria (20 million) and Tunisia (10 million).
The population of the remaining 11 countries and territories in the region – Libya, Jordan, Palestinian territories, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Israel, Qatar, Bahrain and Western Sahara – totals about 31 million.
The Palestinian territories are home to about 4 million Muslims. In addition, Israel is home to roughly 1 million Muslims, slightly more than Qatar. Although Israel has a Muslim population similar in size to those of some western European countries, Muslims constitute a much larger portion (about 17%) of its population. By comparison, the United Kingdom is home to between 1 million and 2 million Muslims, about 3% of its total population.
Most Shias (between 68% and 80%) live in four countries: Iran, Pakistan, India and Iraq. Iran has 66 million to 70 million Shias, or 37-40% of the world’s total Shia population. Iraq, India and Pakistan each are home to at least 16 million Shias.
Sizeable numbers of Shias (1 million or more) are found in Turkey, Yemen, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Nigeria and Tanzania. Shias constitute a relatively small percentage of the Muslim population elsewhere in the world. About 300,000 Shias are estimated to be living in North America, including both the U.S. and Canada, constituting about 10% of North America’s Muslim population.
Shia Muslims are in the majority in Iran, Iraq, Bahrain, Azerbaijan and, according to some estimates, Yemen. There are large Shia communities in Afghanistan, India, Kuwait, Lebanon, Pakistan, Qatar, Syria, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Egypt
Shia are 2% of the population.
Malaysia
Malaysia bans Shias from promoting their faith.
Bahrain
Over two thirds of the citizen population of Bahrain are Shia Muslims. The ruling Al Khalifa family, who are Sunni Muslim, arrived in Bahrain from Qatar at the end of the eighteenth century. Thus the Sunni rule the majority Shiites
Indonesia
I
Indonesia is the most populous Muslim country in the world which is dominated by Sunni.
Lebanon
The most recent study conducted by Statistics Lebanon, a Beirut-based research firm, found that Lebanon's population is estimated to be 48% Muslim (25% Shia; 23% Sunni), 4.6% Druze, who do not consider themselves to be Muslims, 46.4% Christian.
Hezbollah (pronounced /ˌhɛzbəˈlɑː/;[9][10] Arabic: حزب الله Ḥizbu 'llāh, literally "Party of Allah" or "Party of God")—also transliterated Hizbullah, Hizballah, etc.—is a Shi'a Islamist militant group and political party based in Lebanon but primarily funded by Iran.[12][13][14] Hezbollah's paramilitary wing is the Jihad Council;[15][16] once seen as a resistance movement throughout much of the Arab world,[12] this image upon which the group's legitimacy rested has been severely damaged due to the sectarian nature of the Syrian Civil War in which it has become involved since 2012
United Arab Emirates (Dubai)
The United Arab Emirates is a federation of absolute hereditary monarchies. It is governed by a Federal Supreme Council made up of the seven emirs of Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Fujairah, Sharjah, Dubai, Ras al-Khaimah and Umm al-Qaiwain. All responsibilities not granted to the national government are reserved to the emirates. A percentage of revenues from each emirate is allocated to the UAE's central budget.]
Article 7 of the UAE's Provisional Constitution declares Islam the official state religion of the Union. The Government funds or subsidizes almost 95 percent of Sunni mosques and employs all Sunni imams; approximately 5 percent of Sunni mosques are entirely private, and several large mosques have large private endowments. The government distributes guidance on religious sermons to mosques and imams, whether Sunni or Shi'a, and monitors all sermons for political content. Shias are 10%-20% of UAE's native population.
Saudi Arabia
Islam is the state religion of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is the location of the cities of Mecca and Medina, where Muhammad, the messenger of the Islamic faith, lived and died, and which attracts millions of pilgrims annually, and thousands of clerics and students who come from across the Muslim world to study. The official title of the King of Saudi Arabia is "Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques"—the two being Masjid al-Haram in Mecca and Al-Masjid al-Nabawi in Medina—considered the holiest in Islam. Saudi Arabia is the birthplace of the Arabic language, the language of the Quran, the central religious text of Islam.
In the 18th century a pact between Islamic preacher Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab and a regional emir, Muhammad bin Saud, brought a fiercely puritanical strain of Sunni Islam first to the Najd region and then to the Arabian Peninsula. Referred to by supporters as "Salafism" and by others as "Wahhabism", this interpretation of Islam became the state religion and interpretation of Islam espoused by Muhammad bin Saud and his successors, (the Al Saud family), who eventually created the modern kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1932.
In modern day Saudi Arabia, the Sunnis limit Shia political participation. Saudi Shias comprise roughly 15% of the 28 million Saudis (estimate 2012)
Unlike Iraq and Lebanon which have a sizable number of wealthy Shia, Saudi Arabia has nothing resembling Shia elite of any kind. There have been no Shia cabinet ministers. They are kept out of critical jobs in the armed forces and the security services.
Iran
Islam is the religion of 98% of Iranians. 89% of Iranians are Shi'a and 9% are Sunni, most Sunnis in Iran are Larestani people (from Larestan), Turkomen, Baluchs, and Kurds living in the south, southeast, northeast and northwest.
Almost all of Iranian Shi'as are Twelvers. Iranians are do not consider themselves a part of the Arab world.
Iraq
More than half of the population of Iraq (ca. 60%-70%) are Shia Muslims. Most Iraqis identify strongly with a clan (العشيرة 'ashira). Thirty of the 150 or so identifiable tribes in Iraq are the most influential. Tribes are grouped into federations (qabila). Below the tribe, there are the clan (الفخذ fukhdh), the house (البيت beit) and the extended family (الخمس khams).
On its accession to power in 1968, the Ba'ath party announced its opposition to tribalism ( القبلية al-qabaliyya), although for pragmatic reasons, especially during the war with Iran, tribalism was sometimes tolerated and even encouraged.
The Ba'th Party was founded in 1943 in Damascus, Syria, by Michel ʿAflaq and Ṣalaḥ al-Dīn al-Bīṭār, adopted its constitution in 1947, and in 1953 merged with the Syrian Socialist Party to form the Arab Socialist Ba’th (Renaissance) Party. The Ba'ath Party espoused nonalignment and opposition to imperialism and colonialism, took inspiration from what it considered the positive values of Islam, and attempted to ignore or transcend class divisions. Its structure was highly centralized and authoritarian.
The Syrian Ba'athists took power in 1963, but factionalism between “progressives” and “nationalists” was severe until 1970, when Ḥafiz al-Assad of the “nationalists” secured control. In Iraq the Ba’athists took power briefly in 1963 and regained it in 1968, after which the party’s power became concentrated under Iraqi leader Ṣaddām Ḥussein.
Differences between the Iraqi and Syrian wings of the Baʿth Party precluded unification of the two countries. Within both countries the Baʿthists formed fronts with smaller parties, including at times the communists. In Syria the main internal threat to Baʿth hegemony stemmed from the Muslim Brotherhood, while in Iraq Kurdish and Shīʿite opposition was endemic. The Iraqi branch of the party was toppled in 2003 as a result of the Iraq War.
Syria
Sunnis make up 74% of the total, mostly of Arab, Kurdish and Turkoman ethnicities. Shia's make up the remaining 13%: Alawites are the predominant Shia group, followed by Twelvers and Ismailis. Sunnis are mainly of the Shafi'i madhhab with pockets of Hanafi and Hanbali.
Afghanistan
Islam is the official state religion of Afghanistan, with approximately 99.7% of the Afghan population being Muslim. About 80-90% practice Sunni Islam, belonging to the Hanafi Islamic law school, while 10-20% are Shias. Majority of the Shiites belong to the Twelver branch and only a smaller number follow Ismailism.
al-Qaeda
Arabic: [ælqɑːʕɪdɐ], translation: "The Base" and alternatively spelled al-Qaida and sometimes al-Qa'ida) is a global militant Islamist and Wahhabist (Sunni) organization founded by Osama bin Laden, Abdullah Azzam, and several other militants, at some point between August 1988[26] and late 1989, with origins traceable to the Soviet war in Afghanistan
ISIS
The Islamic State (IS) (Arabic: الدولة الإسلامية ad-Dawlah l-ʾIslāmiyyah), formerly the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL /ˈaɪsəl/; Arabic acronym: داعش Dāʿish) or the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS /ˈaɪsɪs/),[a] is a Sunni jihadist group in the Middle East. In its self-proclaimed status as a caliphate, it claims religious authority over all Muslims across the world[66] and aspires to bring most of the Muslim-inhabited regions of the world under its political control beginning with Iraq, Syria and other territories in the Levant region which include Jordan, Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Cyprus and part of southern Turkey.[68]
ISIS was preceded by the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), that was established during October 2006, and comprised of various insurgent groups, most significantly the original Al Qaeda Organization in the Land of the Two Rivers (AQI) organization, al-Qaeda in Mesopotami - led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Mujahedeen Shura Council in Iraq, and Jund al-Sahhaba (Soldiers of the Prophet’s Companions), which was integrated into the ISI.
ISIS members' allegiance was given to the ISI commander and not al-Qaeda central command. The organisation known as the ISIS was formed during April 2013 and has evolved in one of the main jihadist groups fighting government forces in Syria and Iraq. ISIS regards Baquba, Iraq, as its headquarters with its allegiance to Abu Omar al-Baghdadi as the group’s emir. Baghdadi’s real name is Hamed Dawood Mohammed Khalil al-Zawi.
Taliban
The majority of the Taliban are made up of Afghan Pashtun tribesmen. The Taliban's leaders were influenced by Deobandi fundamentalism, and many also strictly follow the social and cultural norm called Pashtunwali.[27]
The Taliban (Pashto: طالبان ṭālibān "students"), alternative spelling Taleban, is an Islamic fundamentalist political movement in Afghanistan. It spread throughout Afghanistan and formed a government, ruling as the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan from September 1996 until December 2001, with Kandahar as the capital. However, it gained diplomatic recognition from only three states: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Mohammed Omar is the founder and has been serving as the spiritual leader of the Taliban since its foundation in 1994.[21]
Posted at 12:49 PM in Eyerdam Opinion, Follow up, In Depth Analysis, Security, Special Report , Update | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)