Mogadishu - street bombs as Somali Governemnt is in disarray - Transport plane with tons of quat on board crashes on landing approach today.

Nur al Cubicle (Wednesday, August 13, 2008 - Our Ally Ethiopia, the War Criminal) brings us a report from Corriere della Sera reporter Massimo Alberizzi in Mogadishu.


Massimo is a well known journo on the Eritrea beat and has been advising the UN Security Council into the investigation of arms trafficking of arms in the Horn of Africa.

He was kidnapped by the Islamic Courts in December 2006 but was released after 2 days .Good article in Corriere translated into English by Giles Watson about the kidnap racket in Somalia by
him. "Ten thousand dollars gets you a phone call from the hostages and 100,000 dollars buys a photo taken by the abductors. A million dollars – about 600,000 euros – will free them. Everyone is peddling information, none of it certain."


On Sunday morning 3rd August at 8:30 terrorists struck a group of 30 women hired to remove the garbage from the main avenue, Maka Al Mukarama, near the Hotel Ambassador. Yussuf Hannan, a stringer for the Corriere della Sera, ran to the scene ""It was horrible. At least 25 women [mothers] between the ages of 29 and 40 were torn to pieces by the blast,"

Maka Al Mukarama, has been heavily guarded because the US intelligence people are billeted in the Hotel Ambasador - which heavily guarded by Ethiopian forces who were probably the target for the bomb.

By collecting the rubbish the women are actually being employed effectively as human minesweepers - the women were employed as part of an NGO project sponsored by ADRA (Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) International - based in Silver Spring, Maryland, USA) that provides food (wheat and oil) for cleaning the trash mointains that have grown for 15 years and can easily be used to camouflage bombs.

Voice of America (VOA) say that witnesses counted 15 bodies at the scene, while five other people died after being taken to Mogadishu's Medina Hospital. More than 40 others were injured.

Nobody has claimed responsibility for the bomb which was placed between Ambassador hotel and the Haji Pasto Garage in the southern part of the city where most Ethiopian soldiers are stationed.

Dr. Dahir Mhoamoud Mohamed, deputy director of Medina Hospital said ,'We have admitted so far 50 shrapnel-wounded people, mostly old aged women and children." 5 were dead and the rest suffered seriously injured.

Apparently there was a similar incident last year when five women municipal street sweepers were killed in a blast in the southern part of Mogadishu by a bomb hidden in a pile of garbage.

In a separate incident, Islamist insurgents attacked Ethiopian forces in Mogadishu's Towfiq neighborhood early today. Witnesses say at least three soldiers were killed.

Ethiopian troops are supporting the Somali transitional government in its fight against the Islamist insurgency. There is however much jockeying for power and the deadly bomb attack came as the political crisis in Somalia deepened over the weekend with 11 ministers of the transitional federal government resigning in protest against Prime Minister, Nur Hassan Hussein for sacking mayor Habeeb without consulting the cabinet. VOA

The visit therefore of ex mayor Mohamed Omar Habeeb to the hospital to visit the victims was of some significance - he said that those behind the bomb were enemies of peace. No shit Sherlock.

Twin Turbo Prop AT 72-500 with cargo of quat from Kenya crashes into radio antenna on approach at Mogadishu (12 hours ago)

A Fly 540 (49% ownd by Lonrho) ATR 72-500 plane yesterday crashed near Mogadishu Airport, Somalia. The Italian / French Fokker ATR 72-500 is certified to operate on unpaved runways through installation of a kit to ensure landing gear and lower fuselage protection.can carry up to 74 passengers in a four abreast, centre-aisle configuration. The standard configuration includes two cargo compartments.

The flight had three crew members on board when it went down in the morning - now reported dead. The airplane was seen approaching the airport, 50km from Mogadishu, twice and going around before colliding with a telecommunication antenna owned by "Nationlink Telecom" about 2km from the airport, airport officials reported. A lot of humidity was around the airport, impairing visibility.

Airstrip K50: Coordinates: N 01°59'55.62" E44°58'53.04 - see Google Earth.

The aircraft was carrying 5.4 tonnes of khat, from Jomo Kenyatta Airport, Nairobi, local police reported.

Previous crash of this type ..

On August 6, 2005, a Tuninter ATR 72 en route from Bari, Italy, to Djerba, Tunisia, ditched into the Mediterranean Sea about 18 miles from the city of Palermo. Sixteen of the 39 people on board died. This was thought to be due to fuel starvation - due perhaps to installing the wrong fuel indicators.

One ponders that even in this most desperate war, someone somewhere is organising the trade in quat - 5.4 tonnes which must be (say) 16 pallets. Distribution is urgent because the halucinogenic properties of the drug die off after 36 - 48 hours. Street price in Manchester is about £8 for 1/2 kilo which is a days supply.

Quat (qat, kwat) is not on the list of substances controlled under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 in the UK, but it is illegal in many countries including most European nations and the US. Meanhwile beggars are in the streets and women are paid in oil and wheat to clean the steets and act as "minesweepers".

Learn more about quat here its use in the UK and possible connection with the 21/7 London Transport bombers.

.. and finally Nur gets angry ..."In any case, the US-sponsored Ethiopian occupation of Somalia is going to hell. I have no kind words for Jendayi Frazer, the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, who was the No. 1 cheerleader for this bloody mess. I hope her career will forever bear this stain.

Jendayi was personally selected for her post by Condi Rice , who has had to interrupt her holidays to worry her tiny little head about Georgia. Mr Mugabe doesn't like Jandayi either , after he wasn't voted in on the first round of the elections in Zim , and she publicly criticised him , he said ..."You saw that little American girl [Frazer] trotting around the globe like a prostitute..." CNN Mugabe labels U.S. diplomat a 'prostitute'

Lebanon - no president, a quarter of the Cabinet has resigned, parliament deadlocked - assassinations, bombs - riots - Uncle Sam appears at sea

Future Television, is a Lebanese TV Channel owned by Saad Hariri who heads the majority anti-Syrian bloc in parliament. On Saturday the station broadcast advice that the Saudi Arabian Embassy was advising their mationals to leave Lebanon "as soon as possible."

A government source said that the Lebanese government was advised about the Saudi decision which called on their citizens to "leave Lebanon if they can and to be very careful in their movements inside the country."

Kuwaiti citizens living in Lebanon are also reported to have received urgent messages on their mobiles saying that "all Kuwaiti citizens are asked to evacuate Lebanon as soon as possible."

On February 18th, Saudi Arabia issued a travel restriction advisory, urging citizens to avoid Lebanon because of the "unstable" security situation in the country.

This was a result of some factions of the Hezbollah-led opposition accusing Saudi Arabia of blocking a settlement to the ongoing political crisis in Lebanon. It also followed sharp verbal attacks by pro-Syrian figures against Saudi officials.

The anti-Syrian majority coalition blames Syria and Iran for obstructing a settlement in Lebanon.

The UK Embassy advice remains unchanged since their Letter to Wardens on January 30th .."We have not changed the main message of the FCO travel advice for Lebanon, that British nationals should not travel to Lebanon unless their visit is essential. For those of you already here, avoid large crowds and public demonstrations, which have the potential to turn violent.... "

Observers have said major Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Gulf states, might boycott the forthcoming Arab Summit scheduled for March 29 in Damascus if the Lebanese crisis persists.



Lebanese uneasily feel that their domestic problems are becoming part of a regional conflict - a proxy confrontation between the United States and some of its Arab allies on one side and Hezbollah's allies, Iran and Syria, longtime opponents of America's Mideast policies.

Meanwhile a US naval fleet assembles off the Lebanese coast beyond the Lebanese patrol boats and the 11 UN controlled "peacekeeping" warships. White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Washington has regular consultations with Siniora and U.S. allies in the region. "There's constant communications at various levels," he said.

It must be remembered that UNIFIL's Maritime Task Force (MTF) handed over after 14 months to the European Maritime Force (EUROMARFOR) that is currently led by Italy - it will be operating under a United Nations mandate - on February 29th , 2008. Press Release

Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who is said to speak with the Syrian-backed opposition, linked the deployment of U.S. warships off Lebanon to Israel's missile strikes in Gaza Strip.

"The target [of U.S. warships] is Gaza. It is aimed to allow what must happen in Gaza to happen without anyone moving to support [Palestinians]," Berri said late Friday in an interview with the private ANB television.

"This is a real threat, not merely a muscle-flexing," Berri said. He added that the U.S. military move was designed to focus attention on Lebanon in order to "cover up the massacres being committed in Gaza."

"This [U.S.] fleet comes to back Israel so that it can complete its plan," Berri said.

State Department spokesman Tom Casey, said last week the warships are an important sign of U.S. commitment to security in the region. "It should provide comfort to our friends and, for U.S. adversaries, a reminder that we are there," he said.

He said the U.S. is not drawing a link between the warships and Syria, but added that, "If the Syrians want to take a message from it, happy to have them do so if what that means is it gets them out of the business of subverting democracy and the will of the Lebanese people."

Meanwhile Michael Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Thursday the deployment should not be viewed as threatening or in response to events in any single country.

Military officials did not say when the ships were due to arrive in the eastern Mediterranean. The deployment includes a Navy guided missile destroyer, the USS Cole, and the USS Nassau, an amphibious warship, said a military officer, speaking on condition of anonymity because full details about the ship movements are not yet public.

During the 1975-1990 civil war US ships were a familiar site, in 1983, at the height of U.S. intervention, about 17 ships - two aircraft carrier battle groups and two mammoth battleships - patrolled the Lebanese coastline, bombarding Muslim militia positions on shore, and a Marine contingent was stationed at Beirut airport.

Suicide bombings - blamed on Mughniyah - against the Marine base and the U.S. Embassy in 1983 and 1984 killed hundreds of Americans, eventually convinced Ronald Reagan to withdraw from Lebanon. The US will fight for Israel but they won't die for it.

The last time U.S. ships came to Lebanon was during the 34-day Second Lebanon War between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006, when the American Navy helped evacuate Americans.

Sheik Abdul-Amir Kabalan - deputy head of the influential Supreme Shiite Islamic Council, the religious governing body of Lebanon's 1.2 million Shiites - warned Americans, at a Friday sermon, recalling the 1983 attacks and an unexpected Hezbollah missile attack against an Israeli warship offshore during the 2006 war.

"We warn America and advise it not to play with fire."

Another Dead Body in lebanon - this time in Sidon..

After the 9th season of excavation at Sidon one of the most important coastal towns of ancient Phoenicia, referred to in Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian and Greek sources has been publishing some details of the last season's work led by John Curtis, Keeper of the Department of the Ancient Near East at the British Museum has been published.

Work has concentrated on remains from the Third Millennium BC, Early Bronze Age in which 69 burials of the Middle Bronze Age were excavated .This is one found with a necklace with amethyst beads. Note the jug accompanying the body.