World News Thread & Breaking News!!

[perfume]

Can Link it yet (I'm new), But:

The UK is sending Armoured Vehicles and Body Armour to the Rebels.

What are they thinking? Now the UK is actively supporting the rebels? This will be the downfall of the Conservative Party in the next election.

 

[Quickie]

Malaysia Hunts Missing Filipino Gunmen as More Fighters Arrived

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AFP
Wednesday, Mar 06, 2013

FELDA SAHABAT, Malaysia-Malaysian forces searched house-to-house Wednesday after armed Filipinos apparently escaped a military assault, as a Philippine guerrilla warned more fighters had arrived.

Malaysia Tuesday launched an attack with jet fighters and soldiers on up to 300 followers of Sultan Jamalul Kiram III of Sulu in a bid to end a three-week standoff in which 27 people had already been reported killed, including eight policemen.

But authorities later indicated the militants had escaped into surrounding farmland in the remote region of Borneo island, where residents were already on edge over reports of roaming gunmen and two bloody shootouts.

Sulu rebels? The Malaysian and Phillipine governments has labelled them as terrorists after they've killed a number of Malaysian policemen and mutilating their bodies. No way the millions of people of Sabah will agree to a bunch of a few hundreds terrorists from a foreign land on how to manage their state and country.

 

[JsCh]

Can Link it yet (I'm new), But:

The UK is sending Armoured Vehicles and Body Armour to the Rebels.

What are they thinking? Now the UK is actively supporting the rebels? This will be the downfall of the Conservative Party in the next election.

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Britain is to supply armoured vehicles and body protection to the Syrian opposition for the first time as part of a significant up scaling of support for anti-Assad forces.
...

 

[B.I.B.]

Hugo Chavez will be greatly missed!
RIP mate!

"Hugo Chavez" :Hugo Hugone Hucares. As some have suggested, he would have made a great Mayor of Chicago.

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

"Hugo Chavez" :Hugo Hugone Hucares. As some have suggested, he would have made a great Mayor of Chicago.

Even though if can never run now. I am pretty sure he will still be registered and voting regularly. After all it is chicago.

 

[plawolf]

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When I saw that article, all I could do is roll my eyes at the pompousness and delusional state of the UK government.

British troops actually fighting and dying overseas under their orders have been nicknamed the 'borrowers' because of their chronic lack of essential kit and supplies causing them to have to constantly borrow stuff from their allies, notably the Americans.

They had to make do with paper skinned 'snatch' landrovers, and many troops were not even issued with body armour for years and taken many needless losses as a result.

It would be a crowing irony if the armoured vehicles being supplied by the UK to the non-government forces (I can no longer justify calling them 'Syrian rebels' on account of how many foreign fighters are now amongst their ranks) fighting in Syria end up coming out of the pool of new bomb proof Mastiffs armoured vehicles the UK bought for its troops operating in Afghanistan, against some of the same groups, if not the same individuals, who are now fighting in Syria.

It always staggers me how much the West's arrogance and self righteousness blinds them to facts and truths in life. Or is that just cold calculation?

By being so overtly and unrelentingly against the Syrian government and backing the rebels no matter what they do, the west has given the rebels and anti-government forces no incentive whatsoever to offer any sort of remotely acceptable concessions and compromises, which effectively made any sort of negotiated deal impossible. All Assad had to choose from were to give up and almost certainly get arrested, tried and executed; flee, and very likely get arrested tried and executed, or fight and hope to win or at least force a stalemate and keep whatever parts of the country he can hold, which is actually not as long of a shot as expecting to not get arrested a or tried if he just gave up and surrendered. It is hard to come up with a better example of how to corner someone and leave them no choice but to fight to the bitter end, hell, it would be stupid of Assad to choose any of the alternatives the West has left him.

Supplying 'non-lethal' help is just tip toeing towards increased western direct involvement and a last ditch attempt to prop up the west's favoured factions fighting the Syrian government. When that only escalates the conflict, expect more mission creep and escalation to supply of weapons and munitions. Then, when things go from bad to worse, expect Special forces or even air strikes, and finally, after Assad is gone and the extremists start to take over, maybe we will see a Mali style direct involvement, after Syria's defences had been completely shattered and all sides had been weakened by the free-for-all to claim the crown from Assad's still warm corpse. Look out for reruns of past favourate excuses, like needing to secure Syria's WMD or to stop Syria from turning into a failed state and a base for terrorists.

 

[Franklin]

North Korea ends peace pacts with South

North Korea says it is scrapping all non-aggression pacts with South Korea, closing its hotline with Seoul and shutting their shared border point.

The announcement follows a fresh round of UN sanctions punishing Pyongyang for its nuclear test last month.

Earlier, Pyongyang said it had a right to carry out a pre-emptive nuclear strike and was pulling out of the armistice that ended the Korean War.

The US said "extreme rhetoric" was not unusual for Pyongyang.

China, which is the North's only major ally, called for both North and South to show restraint and to continue talking.

Beijing rarely criticises its ally, but has criticised the North's nuclear tests and has given support to the UN's sanctions.

South Korea's President Park Geun-hye said the current security situation was "very grave" but that she would "deal strongly" with provocation from the North.

She also said she was ready to talk to Pyongyang if it "comes out on the path toward change".
'Puppet traitors'

The North Korean announcement, carried on the KCNA state news agency, said the North was cancelling all non-aggression pacts with the South and closing the main Panmunjom border crossing inside the Demilitarized Zone.

The two Koreas have reached a range of agreements over the years, including a 1991 pact on resolving disputes and avoiding military clashes, but the North Korean statement did not expand on what was being cancelled.

It also said it was notifying the South that it was "immediately" cutting off the North-South hotline, saying there was "nothing to talk to the puppet group of traitors about".

The hotline, installed in 1971, is intended as a means of direct communication at a time of high tension, but is also used to co-ordinate the passage of people and goods through the heavily-fortified Demilitarized Zone.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un also visited front-line military units that were involved in the shelling of a South Korean island in 2010, KCNA reports.

The reports said he had urged soldiers to keep themselves ready to "annihilate the enemy" at any time.

The BBC's Lucy Williamson in Seoul says it appears the North is trying to build a sense of crisis domestically, with a large rally staged in Pyongyang on Friday and reports of camouflage netting on public transport.

North Korea has breached agreements before and withdrawing from them does not necessarily mean war, our correspondent says, but it does signal a more unpredictable and unstable situation.

Shutting down the hotline will leave both more exposed to misunderstandings, she adds.
'Punishment mode'
map

Seoul's defence ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok said that if the North were to carry out a nuclear attack on South Korea it would become "extinct from the Earth by the will of mankind".

He also warned that in response to any provocation from the North, Seoul would "immediately" turn the US-South Korean military drills currently being conducted "into a punishment mode to respond to it as planned".

The US, the main focus of North Korean ire, said it was capable of protecting itself and its allies from any attacks.

"One has to take what any government says seriously," state department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said of the nuclear threat.

"It is for that reason that I repeat here that we are fully capable of defending the United States. But I would also say that this kind of extreme rhetoric has not been unusual for this regime, unfortunately."

The North Korean declaration came after the UN Security Council in New York unanimously backed Resolution 2094, imposing the fourth set of sanctions.

The resolution targets North Korean diplomats, cash transfers and access to luxury goods.

It imposes asset freezes and travel bans on three individuals and two firms linked to North Korea's military.

South Korea's ambassador to the UN, Kim Sook, said it was time for North Korea to "wake up from its delusion" of becoming a nuclear state.

"It can either take the right path toward a bright future and prosperity, or it can take a bad road toward further and deeper isolation and eventual self-destruction," he said.

US ambassador to the UN Susan Rice said the sanctions would "further constrain" North Korea's ability to develop its nuclear programme.

She warned that the UN would "take further significant actions" if Pyongyang were to carry out another nuclear test.

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[Franklin]

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It seems to me that these days when it comes to foreign interventions (Libya, Mali, Syria) the Europeans have become more belligerent than the Americans. But the Europeans unlike the Americans don't have the firepower to make their rhetoric stick.

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

It seems to me that these days when it comes to foreign interventions (Libya, Mali, Syria) the Europeans have become more belligerent than the Americans. But the Europeans unlike the Americans don't have the firepower to make their rhetoric stick.

Not quite the european nation's have always played hard ball in foreign affairs Perhaps not with the speed and effectiveness of the usa, but still none the less are very active. The key difference is the european nations like to try and cover themselves with the image of being better at it or more open to negotiation then the "borish" americans. The key difference right now is the administration in the us is more isolationest meaning european powers who always dealt with such things by theatrically playing the good cop to the us bad cop . Now are playing the bad cop well the us is the wall cop who stands there and stares at the problem like a lion at the zoo. Expect us support for this.

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

It seems to me that these days when it comes to foreign interventions (Libya, Mali, Syria) the Europeans have become more belligerent than the Americans. But the Europeans unlike the Americans don't have the firepower to make their rhetoric stick.

Not quite the european nation's have always played hard ball in foreign affairs Perhaps not with the speed and effectiveness of the usa, but still none the less are very active. The key difference is the european nations like to try and cover themselves with the image of being better at it or more open to negotiation then the "borish" americans. The key difference right now is the administration in the us is more isolationest meaning european powers who always dealt with such things by theatrically playing the good cop to the us bad cop . Now are playing the bad cop well the us is the wall cop who stands there and stares at the problem like a lion at the zoo. Expect us support for this.