This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Foreign Policy

  • Another benefit of living in Iran

    We can all think of the things that make living under the regime of the Islamic Republic such a wonderful life. Things like not being pestered by homosexuals, not having to sexually satisfy your wives, not being forced to see the faces of beautiful women, not having to think about politics or your wardrobe.

    Well let me add this to the list (from Kamangir The Archer);

    [youtube nCOlv-8nmZk nolink]

    If your hair gets too long, the police will cut it for you – or burn it off for you. Well, between smacks to your noggin – but then nothing is really free, is it.

  • Saturday night must-reads

    I’ve got two cats sleeping on my lap and so all you get is links tonight;

    First, stop by and take at look at the Gathering of Eagles who were rewarded for braving the weather to support the military recruiters in Times Square by a visit from Pamela Gellar from Atlas Shrugs.

    If Baldilocks says he’s dead, then he’s dead as far as I’m concerned.

    Big Dog defends John McCain in the Boeing contract kerfuffle.

    The American Pundit catches the media lying about McCain’s position on waterboarding.

    Bloodthirsty Liberal examines Arab techniques of border control.

    Gaius at Blue Crab Boulevard writes on the absurdity of Hillary’s statement that she ended the hundreds of years of Britain’s war with the Irish.

    Jammie Wearing Fool writes about an idiot judge who disagrees with the war against terror, so she keeps a foster kid from enlisting. I’d always thought judges were supposed to lay aside their own bias when they rule – I must be wrong.

    The Liberty Pundit ties in yesterday’s job report to the only legislation the Democrats passed last year – the minimum wage.

    Gateway Pundit rounds up news on the death of the latest FARC leader found in pieces several miles apart.

    Bob Parks at Outside the Wire dissects the Obama sucker factor and reports that Obama doesn’t have a plan to withdraw from Iraq. Bob Owens at Confederate Yankee explains what that means. Meanwhile, Flopping Aces writes that Hillary’s military advisor says she won’t pull troops out of Iraq. I’m beginning to see a pattern here.

    Wild Thing explains in detail the history of the Weather Underground buddies of Barak Obama.

    Crotchety Old Bastard compares Michele Obama’s speeches to Che Guevara’s “New Man” speech.

    Pam at Right Voices reports on a stunning archaeological find.

    The Hatemonger’s Quarterly has the exclusive report on several fictional TV characters and who they support in the Presidential campaign.

    Moonbattery‘s Van Helsing warns that environmentalists are coming for your X-Box.

    Jay at Stop the ACLU explains why he’s voting for John McCain.

    GI Jane at The Foxhole tears up the Washington Post for their self-flagellating over their treatment of Muslims.

    Weasel Zippers writes on the Hamas admission that they’re supported by Iran – and I feign surprise.

    Dean Barnett at The Weekly Standard Blog writes that the New York Times will take a swipe at Barak’s Iraq policy tomorrow.

  • Terrorist act precedes Spanish elections again

    Nora, The Spanish Pundit, reports that two days prior to the Spanish general election, ETA (Basque) terrorists murdered a former councilman;

    AS you probably know, there will be general elections on Sunday. Today someone has killed a ex-councilman, 42 year-old, Isaías Carrasco, this morning at 12.45 pm Spanish time. He was a “very easy target as he did not have any kind of public representation now”. The bastards have killed him in front of his wife and his daughter who have shouted “Murderers” to the shooters. The Basque department of Interior has not confirmed ETA’s responsibility yet, but it looks like it is the responsible.

    He has received two shots in the neck and another one in the head. The murderer, who was wearing a beard but with no mask on it. The Interior Department of the Basque Government confirmed his death but it is said to be on “clinical death”, according to the Basque Health Service.

    You may remember that before the last general election, March 11, 2004, a terrorist attack on the Madrid train system left over 2,000 casualties (CNN link) and influenced Spanish voters to install an appeasement government headed by Jose Zapatero, a socialist. So I wonder if the murder of a former government official in front of his family is enough to swing the Spanish voters back the other way.

  • Border incident between Colombians and Venezuela

    Noticias24 reports a border incident between Colombian civilians and the Venezuelan Army. My rough Spanish-as-a-second-language translation follows;

    In a confused incident, a unit of the DISIP (Venezuelan Security forces) has crossed the frontier and has penetrated into Colombian territory in Paraguachón. The inhabitants have surrounded the patrol and they have not allowed that the Venezuelan officials to recover the patrol.

    Apparently, the unit of the DISIP was recovering a vehicle. The group of citizens of Paraguachón has exchanged insults against the DISIP of Venezuela and, with their aggressive attitude, units of the National Guard have crossed the border to help them and to protect them.

    After minutes of tension, the situation returned to the calm but the vehicle of the DISIP still is in Colombian territory surrounded by the inhabitants of the locality. Colombian police units have approached the place.

    Well, when you move a bunch of pissed off people towards each other with just an invisible barrier between them, something is bound to happen.

  • Another FARCer in pieces

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    Photo from Reuter’s

    Manuel Marulanda (R), a top commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), welcomes Venezuelan Foreign Minister Luis Alfonzo Davila (L) as the FARC’s Ivan Rios (C) observes in Los Pozos, Caqueta province in this March 8, 2001 file photo.

    Kate at A Colombo-Americana’s Perspective reports another FARC tango rests in pieces, thanks to the Colombian Army;

    In the department of Caldas, Iván Ríos, a member of the FARC’s Secretariat was killed today. For those of you who don’t remember, he famously paraded around with Chávez and Colombian senator Piedad Córdoba last fall at Miraflores.

    The Spanish language Noticias24 article. From Reuter’s AlertNet;

    Rios, a member of the seven-member secretariat of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, died in combat with soldiers in the northwest coffee-producing part of the country.

    From the Associated Press;

    Colombian security forces carrying out an arrest warrant Friday for a top rebel leader killed a man in a shootout, and were trying to confirm his identity, an official in the chief prosecutor’s office said Friday.

    The raid targeted Ivan Rios, a member of the FARC guerrillas’ ruling junta. If the body is identified as his, it would be the second member of the ruling secretariat of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, to be killed in a week.

    That would be a huge blow to Latin America’s oldest and strongest insurgency, shaken by the death Saturday of spokesman Raul Reyes in a cross-border raid in Ecuador that has set off an international diplomatic crisis.

    It may be that Colombia’s cross-border gambit paid off. And this is happening while Uribe tears up the Correa government in Santo Domingo (Bloomberg link);

    Colombia’s President Alvaro Uribe tore into his Ecuadorean counterpart Rafael Correa during a regional summit, accusing the socialist leader of receiving campaign money from Colombian guerrillas.

    Uribe, speaking to 15 Latin American presidents during the Rio Group summit in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, said Ecuador isn’t an ally in the fight against terrorism and acknowledged he didn’t inform Correa in advance of a military operation in Ecuadorean territory last week that killed top rebel leader Raul Reyes.

    “I didn’t inform him of the operation because we have not received cooperation from his government in the fight against terrorism,” Uribe told the leaders.

    An unconventional war calls for unconventional methods. Since when do the criminals get to violate all of the rules while we just bleed. But Uribe was just warming up;

    Uribe, who has been mostly silent since the Organization of American States criticized his military’s violation of Ecuador’s sovereignty this week, saved no criticism of his neighbors’ alleged collaboration with the FARC rebel group.

    He said four laptop computers seized during the cross- border raid contained documents pointing to FARC financing of Correa’s 2006 presidential campaign. This week, Uribe alleged the same files show Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has been funding the FARC. Correa and Chavez have denied allegations they help the group.

    “One letter from Marulanda to Raul Reyes transferring $50,000 to help Correa win the second round in his election,” said Uribe, referring to septuagenarian FARC commander Manuel Marulanda.

    That’s going to leave a mark.

  • Chavez accuses US of cross-border raid (UPDATED)

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    Photo from AP/Ramon Espinosa

    Colombian President Uribe in Santo Domingo

    Still chewing his daily coca leaves, apparently, Chavez has decided that the best way to come out of the situation into which he’s cornered himself is to make up stuff according to the Associated Press (Washington Examiner link);

    On his arrival in Santo Domingo, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez made jibes at Colombia and the United States, which has supported the Andean nation with more than $4 billion in counterinsurgency and anti-drug aid since 2000.

    “The U.S. empire has taken over Colombia,” Chavez said.

    Chavez claimed the strike that killed Raul Reyes, a top leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, was “planned and directed” by the U.S. Later, he said he had information that “gringo soldiers” participated in the attack, but provided no evidence to back the claim.

    I can’t imagine the Defense Department taking the chance on losing US troops in a potential battle in a country where they’re not invited – I know that’s the stuff of Hollywood drama, but that’s not how it works.

    The Miami Herald reports that this dust-up is hurting Venezuelans more than it’s affecting Colombia;

    Before the restrictions, about 30,000 Colombians crossed the border in San Antonio every day to work in Venezuela, and Venezuelans went the other direction to shop.

    ”The situation is very grave on the border,” City Councilman Alejandro García said. “For a problem that’s between Ecuador and Colombia, we Venezuelans are paying the price.”

    He added that the fuel restrictions had forced a local jeans factory to close after it didn’t receive enough diesel oil to keep production going.

    And many Venezuelans suspect that Chavez has ulterior motives for throwing his troops into the frontier gaps;

    Many in San Antonio speculated that Chávez had sent troops to the region to protect guerrillas taking shelter there from Colombian attack. Many in the region said that extortion, kidnappings and executions at the hands of Colombian as well as Venezuelan guerrillas were regular occurrences.

    ”Of course there are Colombian guerrillas here, and the government knows where they are,” García said.

    Manuel at The Devil’s Excrement writes that the Venezuelan Army tried to block Argentine reporters from recording and interviewing protesters outside of Miraflores Presidential Palace in Caracas;

    And today a group of Argentinean reporters were detained and clashed with the Military Police as they deviated from the program and attempted to go and tape and interview protesters right outside the Miraflores Presidential Palace. According to the reports, the police got violent with them and actually blocked their path so that they could not get to the protesters. They also attempted to take away their equipment but were helped by other reporters.

    The Washington Times reports that the DEA aided Thai police in the capture of Victor Bout, international gun dealer buying weapons for FARC. I wondered yesterday if his arrest isn’t the result of the Colombian raid against Raul Reyes last weekend and some of the electronic evidence the Colombians gleaned from the equipment found among the pieces of Reyes.

    The Real Cuba writes that my ruminations about Victor Bout might prove to be correct;

    Viktor Bout, an international arms dealer dubbed the “Merchant of Death,” was arrested in Thailand and charged in New York on Thursday with trying to sell weapons to Colombian rebels, officials said.

    According to a report in Spanish newspaper El Pais, Bout was found thanks to information contained in the computer of Raul Reyes, the FARC leader who was killed by the Colombian army last week.

    Gateway Pundit writes that it was a phone call from Chavez that enabled Colombians to pinpoint assembled pieces of Raul Reyes right before they disassembled him;

    That was a big mistake.
    NOTE TO TERROR LEADERS: When Chavez calls- Don’t pick up.

    Jim also shows remarkably good taste by linking to my story yesterday – thanks.

    There’s more on the phone call at El Universal.

    UPDATE: After nearly a week of drama queen over-reaction, Hugo Chavez calls for calm (AP link);

    Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called Friday for a cooling of tensions with Colombia and predicted a summit of Latin American presidents in this seaside capital “is going to be positive.”
    […]
    “People should go cool off a bit, chill out their nerves,” Chavez told journalists at his hotel before leaving for the summit at the foreign ministry of the Dominican Republic. “I think the meeting today is going to be positive, because it is going to help the debate. We have to debate, talk, and this is the first step toward finding the road.”

    That’s hilarious. After mobilizing his army, navy and air force to the Colombian frontier, even though the attack against Raul Reyes happened all the way across Colombia from Venezuela, Chavez is trying to act like the great peacemaker. Porque Chavez no se calla?

    An Ol’ Broad’s Ramblings says it before I thought of it;

    It’s possible the loony toon figured out his mouth was writing checks his ass couldn’t cash?

    But maybe the reason Chavez is calling for calm is this from Gaius at Blue Crab Boulevard about a Washington Post article on those documents Colombian officials found on Reyes’ computers;

    The correspondence appears to show that Venezuelan officials are eager to work with rebel commanders to isolate Colombian President Álvaro Uribe, an ally of the Bush administration. The documents also include letters to Chávez from FARC leader Manuel Marulanda.

    The Post article goes on to claim that Colombia is willing to allow external police organizations verify the origins of the documents;

    The chief of Colombia’s National Police, Brig. Gen. Óscar Naranjo, said the government has asked a team from Interpol to examine the laptops and hard drives to confirm that they belonged to FARC commanders. That multinational team is to work in Bogota on Tuesday.

    “We have nothing to hide,” Naranjo said by phone Thursday afternoon. “We’re entirely open to any technical review.”

    But back to the AP article; Danny Ortega of Nicaragua decided to break off relations with Colombia and no one noticed. I suppose that’s one less truckload of bananas for Colombians. But Colombia has at least one ally at the conference;

    One of the rare regional voices offering support for Colombia was Salvadoran President Tony Saca, who said the Colombian government should be able to defend its citizens.

    “We need to understand Colombia has the legitimate right to go after terrorists … wherever they may be, of course without harming the sovereignty of another country,” Saca said on arrival in Santo Domingo.

    Salvadorans probably remember their own struggle with communist guerillas who hid out in Guatemala and were supplied by Cuba and Nicaragua.

    In Ecuador, Security Minister Gustavo Larrea said the army captured five suspected FARC rebels on Thursday. The suspects were nabbed “a few meters from the Colombian border,” in the general area where the raid took place, Larrea said.

    Yeah, I’ll believe that when I see it.

  • Chavez’ bad luck continues

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    Photo from AFP

    A Colombian police officer keeps watch on the San Miguel international bridge linking Ecuador and Colombia.

    The comedy that is South American politics this week is continuing. Martha Colmenares, a Venezuelan blogger writes that files that the Colombian Government found on the computer belonging to the pieces of Raul Reyes indicate that the FARC supports the Obama campaign. (Translation from Gateway Pundit and Free Republic);

    6. The gringos will ask for an appointment with the minister to solicit him to communicate to us his interest in discussing these topics. They say that the new president of their country will be Obama and that they are interested in your compatriots. Obama will not support “Plan Colombia” nor will he sign the TLC (Colombian Free Trade agreement). Here we responded that we are interested in relations with all governments in equality of conditions and that in the case of the US it is required a public pronouncement expressing their interest in talking with the FARC given their eternal war against us.

    This on the heels of reports that Chavez has either promised or delivered $300 million to FARC recently(Gateway Pundit link).

    The slow-moving debating society called the Organization of American States which has trouble stepping on anyone’s toes can’t agree to the wording of a statement on the escalating conflict between Venezuela, Ecuador and Colombia, according to the Associated Press.

    In the meantime, Fausta’s Blog reports that Chavez cuts off his nose to spite his face by turning back food shipments to Venezuela from Colombia (Colombia is Venezuela’s largest importer of foodstuffs) which exasperates the severe food shortages already experienced in Venezuelan urban centers.

    Daniel at Venezuela News and Views reflects Venezuelan’s worry over this war;

    Because [this] is the real mood here, the real war, how to find ALL the basic food staples that you need and that are imported in increasing amounts. A couple of mines dropped by Colombia in front of Puerto Cabello and La Guaira and in a few weeks we are all starving.

    Quico at Caracas Chronicles mentions that Chavez’ mobilization ran into problems yesterday on the road to the frontier;

    Two days ago, President Chávez ordered 10 mechanized batallions to the border in preparation for who-knows-what…but the mobilizations from Caracas ended up getting delayed yesterday because taxi drivers in La Victoria blocked the strategically critical Central Regional Highway for seven hours as they protested the crime wave that grips their town.

    Meanwhile, Rafael Correa, president of Ecuador, is pestering other South American nations by jetting around on Burro One (AP link);

    Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa began a six-nation tour in Peru and Brazil, calling Colombian President Alvaro Uribe a liar who “wanted war.” Correa warned that if the attack goes unpunished, “the region will be in danger, because the next victim could be Peru, it could be Brazil, Venezuela, Bolivia, any one of our countries.”

    Not if they’re not providing a safe haven for terrorists – I doubt Colombia has any interest in any of those nations. Correa loses sight of his own malfeasance causing this dilemma in the first place.

    And that’s the whole problem – Chavez saw FARC as a way to keep the region unstable and to ensconce himself more firmly in power in Venezuela and in the community of South American nations. The Uribe government has drawn back the blinds and Chavez’ spate of bad luck continues.

    UPDATE: Babalu Blog links to a Brazilian blog’s (Wickets and Guayaba) report that Brazil is selling arms to Chavez – so Lula has chosen sides.

  • Democrats to urge more Iran sanctions

    Chuckie Schumer announced that he has a letter to the White House with 23 Senators’ signature urging sanctions against an Iranian bank (WSJ Online link);

    A letter urging President Bush to take action is expected to be sent to the White House today by Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, who said yesterday that 26 Democrats have signed the letter, including Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Majority Whip Richard Durbin of Illinois.

    The letter is an attempt to influence internal deliberations within the Treasury and State departments about whether to levy the new sanctions, Mr. Schumer said in an interview. “We are trying to weigh in on what we think is the right side,” Mr. Schumer said.

    “The one really effective thing we have done against Iran is the sanctions on the banks,” he added. “And now what the banks have done is that the central bank is handling their business for them, so unless you sanction the central bank, you are not going to get anywhere.”

    The letter contends that the bank “is heavily involved in the funding of terrorism and the financing of Iran’s proliferation activities,” according to a draft, which cites statements on the matter made in recent years by both the Treasury and State departments.

    Now, see, the Senate Democrats have admitted, on the record, that they’re aware of the Iranian government’s involvement in worldwide terrorism, yet they’re reluctant to come right out and urge the use of force against Iran. Even though there’s abundant evidence that Iran is funding and training resistance against US forces in Iraq (World Tribune link);

    The U.S.-led coalition has captured a senior Iranian operative who helped finance and equip Shi’ite militias.

    U.S. Army paratroopers detained the suspected senior leader of the Iranian-sponsored Special Groups network during an operation in Baghdad’s Beida neighborhood on Feb. 27, Middle East Newsline reported.

    Officials said the Special Groups was trained and equipped by Iran. They said the organization, believed to comprise a series of cells, introduced the Explosively-Formed Penetrator, designed to destroy U.S. — and other Western origin main battle tanks.

    The UN voted for additional sanctions yesterday (AFP/Yahoo link)

    Fourteen of the council’s 15 members voted in favor of Resolution 1803, sponsored by Britain, France and Germany, which slapped a third set of economic and trade sanctions on Iran in 15 months.

    Indonesia abstained during the vote which was presided over by Russia, the council chair for March.

    But Libya, South Africa and Vietnam, which joined Indonesia in expressing reservations about the need for fresh sanctions at a time when Iran is cooperating with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), voted in favor in the end.

    After the vote, the six powers trying to scale back Iran’s nuclear ambitions issued a statement calling for new talks between EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran’s nuclear negotiator.

    But Ahmadinijad announced today that sanctions are “worthless” (ABC News/AP link)

    Iran vowed to push ahead with uranium enrichment Tuesday, a day after the U.N. Security Council passed a third round of sanctions that Tehran called “worthless” and politically biased.

    Now, I remember L’il Chuckie Schumer, when he was in the House, called sanctions against Serbia worthless and urged the (Democrat) Administration to use military force against Serbia – Serbia, which posed no military or economic threat to the United States at all.

    The Washington Times (and Atlas Shrugs) reports that Qatar is funding Hamas – does Chuckie want us to freeze Qatar’s assets, too? After all, his reasoning for freezing Iran’s assets is their funding of terrorists, but then, Chuckie, the senior self-hating Jew in Congress, probably doesn’t think Hamas is a terrorist organization.