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Saudi Arabia Warned US About Boston Bomber

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia sent a written warning about accused Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in 2012, long before pressure-cooker blasts killed three and injured hundreds, according to a senior Saudi government official with direct knowledge of the document.

The Saudi warning, the official told MailOnline, was separate from the multiple red flags raised by Russian intelligence in 2011, and was based on human intelligence developed independently in Yemen.

Citing security concerns, the Saudi government also denied an entry visa to the elder Tsarnaev brother in December 2011, when he hoped to make a pilgrimage to Mecca, the source said. Tsarnaev’s plans to visit Saudi Arabia have not been previously disclosed.

The Saudis’ warning to the U.S. government was also shared with the British government. ‘It was very specific’ and warned that ‘something was going to happen in a major U.S. city,’ the Saudi official said during an extensive interview.

It ‘did name Tamerlan specifically,’ he added. The ‘government-to-government’ letter, which he said was sent to the Department of Homeland Security at the highest level, did not name Boston or suggest a date for his planned attack.

If true, the account will produce added pressure on the Homeland Security department and the White House to explain their collective inaction after similar warnings were offered about Tsarnaev by the Russian government.

A DHS official denied, however, that the agency received any such warning from Saudi intelligence about Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

‘DHS has no knowledge of any communication from the Saudi government regarding information on the suspects in the Boston Marathon Bombing prior to the attack,’ MailOnline learned from one Homeland Security official who declined to be named in this report.

The White House took a similar view. ‘We and other relevant U.S. government agencies have no record of such a letter being received,’ said Caitlin Hayden, a spokesperson for the president’s National Security Council.

The letter likely came to DHS via the Saudi Ministry of Interior, the agency tasked with protecting the Saudi kingdom’s homeland.

A Homeland Security official confirmed Tuesday evening on the condition of anonymity that the 2012 letter exists, saying he had heard of the Saudi communication before MailOnline inquired about it.

An aide to a Republican member of the House Homeland Security Committee speculated Tuesday about why the Obama administration contradicted the knowledgeable Saudi official.

‘It is possible the Department of Homeland Security received the information from the Saudi government but never passed it on to the White House,’ the GOP staffer said. ‘Communication between DHS and the White House’s national security apparatus isn’t always what it should be.’

‘I can easily see it happening where one hand didn’t know what the other was doing because of a turf war.’

‘Just like the different agencies in the Boston JTTF [Joint Terrorism Task Force] want credit for breaking the Tsarnaev case,’ the aide added, ‘they sometimes jealously guard the very intel they should be sharing the most freely. Sometimes it makes no sense at all.’

House Homeland Security Committee chairman Mike McCaul plans to announce on Wednesday an investigative hearing to probe what U.S. intelligence knew prior to the Boston attacks, two senior Republican sources told MailOnline.

Separately, President Obama announced Tuesday that the U.S. government will launch a wide-ranging inquiry into the sharing of information among the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Homeland Security and other intelligence and law-enforcement agencies of the federal government.

‘We want to leave no stone unturned,’ the president said in a rare White House press conference.

The internal review will be led by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and several inspectors general.

‘This is not an investigation,’ Clapper’s spokesman Shawn Turner said in a prepared statement. ‘This is an independent review of information-sharing procedures. It is limited to the handling of information related to the suspects prior to the attack.’

It is not yet clear whether information from Saudi Arabia will be involved in Clapper’s inter-agency review.

Utah Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz appeared on CNN Tuesday afternoon, upbraiding the Obama administration for presuming that the federal government’s handling of intelligence prior to the Boston bombings was appropriate and effective.

‘As soon as the bombing happened we had officials, locally and from the feds, saying, “Oh, this was an isolated case, there was just one person involved.” We didn’t know that,’ Chaffetz said.

The ‘starting point’ for a federal investigation, he said, must be, ‘This is unacceptable, we will not stand for it, we will get to the bottom of it, and we will not rest until we figure it out.’

‘Mr. President,’ he said, addressing Obama, ‘the starting point should be an intolerance that this thing happened.’

The high-ranking Saudi official whom MailOnlne interviewed at length provided a wealth of detail about the warning he says his government sent to the United States. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to talk publicly about foreign intelligence, or about Saudi Arabia’s diplomatic relationship with the United States.

He suggested that the Saudi Ministry of Interior sent the letter out of an abundance of caution in order to be helpful to the United States, even though its intelligence on Tsarnaev wasn’t yet fully developed.

‘With Saudi Arabia it’s always code red,’ he said. ‘There’s no code orange, or code yellow. Always red.’

The Saudi government, he added, alerted the U.S. in part because it believed American authorities should be inspecting packages that came to Tsarnaev in the mail in order to search for bomb-making components.

The written warning also allegedly named three Pakistanis who may be of interest to British authorities. The official declined to provide more details about the warning to the UK, but said the two governments received the same information.

The Ministry of Interior, he said, sent the letters in 2012, likely after Tsarnaev returned from Russia to the United States in July.

President Barack Obama’s published schedule indicates that he met in the Oval Office with Prince Mohammed bin Naif bin Abdulaziz, the Saudi Interior minister, on January 14, 2013.

The Saudis denied Tsarnaev entry to the kingdom when he sought to travel to Mecca in December 2011 for a pilgrimage known as an Umrah — one that is undertaken during months that don’t fall within the regular Hajj period of the year.

That rejected application came one month before he traveled to Russia, where U.S. intelligence sources believe he acquired training enabling him to construct and detonate the bombs that he and his younger brother placed hear the Boston Marathon’s finish line.

The younger brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, is in federal custody at a prison medical facility.

The Saudi official speculated that Tsarnaev’s residence in the United States might have made it more difficult for him to gain entry into the kingdom.

‘U.S.-based Muslims who become radicalized and want to visit Mecca create an unusual problem,’ he said, compelling the Saudi government ‘to carefully examine applications.’

In the wake of the April 15 Boston Marathon bombings, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal met with Secretary of State John Kerry on April 16, and then had an unscheduled meeting with President Obama on April 17.

‘This is the DNA of the Saudi government,’ said the Saudi official, referring to officials in the royal court in Riyadh. ‘This is how they work. They sent the letter, but that wasn’t enough. They then sent the top guy to meet personally with the president.’

He dismissed the idea that Tamerlan Tsarnaev was likely trained by al Qaeda while he was outside the United States last year.

The Saudis’ Yemen-based sources, he explained, said militants referred to Tamerlan dismissively as ‘the volunteer.’

‘He was a gung-ho, self motivated jihadi who wasn’t tasked by a larger group,’ he said.

‘There is no reason for anyone in Afghanistan to have in his thinking a scenario like this,’ the official added, referring to pressure-cooker bombs at the Boston Marathon. ‘He took the initiative. That’s why they call him “the volunteer.”‘

‘The Boston thing is beneath them,’ he said of al Qaeda. ‘They don’t think like this. This is like a firecracker to them. They want something big.’

Tamerlan may have boasted about his plans online, the Saudi official said, offering an explanation for how Yemen-based sources first learned of him. Islamist militants have well-developed social networks that can enable news to migrate quickly across vast distances.

The Saudi government sometimes tracks such radicals by launching fake jihadi websites to attract extremists. The Ministry of Interior then tracks them electronically, often across the world, and shares information with governments it considers friendly, including the United States.

‘The Saudi Arabian government is doing everything it can to wipe out these people and treat America as a true friend,’ the official said.

The Saudi intelligence services have a long history of providing credible information to America and Great Britain about looming threats.

‘This is the fourth time the Saudi Arabian government has given the U.S. specific intel’ about a possible terror plot, the official said, citing prior warnings about Richard Reid, the so-called shoe bomber who repeatedly tried to light a fuse in his shoe to bring down American Airlines flight 63 bound for Miami in December 2001.

He also cited the 300-gram ‘ink-cartridge bombs’ planted on two cargo planes headed for the United States from Yemen in October 2010. Those explosives were intercepted in Dubai, and at an East Midlands airport in Great Britain.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s namesake was a 15-century Central Asian warlord who referred to himself as ‘the sword of Islam.’ Sometimes spelled ‘Tamerlane’ in English, he was known for his cruelty.

When he conquered Baghdad, he reportedly made a pyramid of human skulls from unfortunate residents of that city.

Although still revered in Chechnya and throughout Central Asia, the original Tamerlane is sometimes vilified in modern-day Saudi textbooks.

By David Martosko
http://www.dailymail.co.uk

Richard Miniter contributed the American Media Institute’s reporting for this story.

Assyrian International News Agency

Saudi Arabia and Qatar: Dueling Monarchies

saudi-arabia-qatar-arab-awakening-relations-muslim-brotherhoodThe demise of secular autocratic regimes in the Middle East and North Africa has heralded a renaissance for Islamist parties in the region, igniting a rivalry for the hearts and minds of the Sunni world between the Gulf powers of Saudi Arabia and Qatar. These neighboring petro-monarchies have sought to influence political transformations in the Levant and North Africa on their own respective terms, both to advance geopolitical interests and to ensure that their own populations do not initiate popular uprisings.

Although neither country is a bastion of democracy at home, Qatar has proven much more amenable than Saudi Arabia to bolstering democratic Islamist movements abroad. The resulting Saudi-Qatari rivalry undermines Saudi Arabia’s historic role as the “self-proclaimed bulwark of Islamic conservatism” in the Middle East and the powerhouse of the Gulf Cooperation Council.

Historical Tensions

Historically, the Saudi-Qatari relationship has been defined by mutual distrust, albeit tempered by a common interest in maintaing stability in the Persian Gulf. Prior to Qatar’s indepedence in 1971, the Saudi royal family’s connections with Qatari businessmen, members of Qatar’s ruling family, and Qatari Bedouin tribes faciliated strong Saudi influence in the affairs of its tiny Gulf neighbor.

In 1992, two Qatari guards were killed in a clash along the Saudi-Qatari border, precipitating a decade of poor relations. A few years later, members of Qatar’s government accused Riyadh of attempting a counter-coup in 1996 after Emir Shaikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani overthrew his father in a bloodless palace coup in 1995. Relations worsened as each country’s  state-owned media portrayed the other country negatively throughout the 1990s. In July 2006, Saudi officials contacted the financial backers of the Dolphin undersea natural gas project, a $ 3.5-billion pipeline linking Qatar to the U.A.E., and reported that the pipeline would enter Saudi territorial waters without Riyadh’s consent. A proposed pipeline linking Qatar and Kuwait created similar tensions.

Nonetheless, a rapprochement began during September 2007, when Qatar’s head of state paid a visit to the Saudi royal family in Riyadh, followed by a visit of Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz to Doha in December. Throughout 2008 and 2009, Saudi and Qatari officials exchanged diplomatic visits and resolved many of the tensions from the previous 15 years, although Qatar’s cordial ties with Iran remained a thorn in relations between Riyadh and Doha.

The Arab Awakening

Despite the warming of relations that began half a decade ago, the Arab Awakening has reignited tensions. Saudi Arabia—frequently labeled the “counter-revolutionary state” for its role in suppressing democratic movements throughout the region—fears the wave of popular uprisings that threatens its position as the anchor of a conservative order that has defined the regional balance of power for generations. By contrast, except in neighboring Bahrain, Qatar has sided with revolutionary forces. 

Opposing positions on the Muslim Brotherhood have become a source of particular tension.

The Saudi royal family holds a dim view of the democratic victories of the Muslim Brotherhood’s various affiliates in the region, viewing the Brotherhood’s explicitly Islamist mode of democratic politics as a threat to its own autocratic monarchial system. David Ottaway, a senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center, explains: “In Saudi Arabia, there are no political parties, no labor unions, and very little civil society,” he writes. “In Egypt, it’s almost the exact opposite. You have lots of political parties, labor unions, civil society. The Muslim Brotherhood accepts the realities of Egypt – realities that the Saudi reject for their own society.” In return, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood is stridently opposed to the Saudi monarchy, which it views as a decadent and corrupt puppet of Western powers.

By contrast, Qatar has fostered a congenial alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood.  Enthusiastic coverage of the Egyptian uprising by Al Jazeera, Qatar’s state-owned news network, unquestionably contributed to the fall of dictator Hosni Mubarak. “Once the protest momentum had begun to build, communication and coordination became less essential. Everyone could simply watch al-Jazeera to find out where and when protests were happening,” writes Marc Lynch, director of the Institute for Middle East Studies at George Washington University. Al-Jazeera “became the unquestioned home of the revolution on the airwaves,” providing “a focal point for audiences everywhere to share in revolutionary protest.”

Indications of Qatar’s influence continued to surface after the fall of the regime. In March 2011, Khairat al-Shater—then the Muslim Brotherhood’s nominee for president—visited Qatar for several days to discuss “coordination between the Brotherhood, the Freedom and Justice Party, and Qatar in the upcoming period,” according to the Egyptian Independent, implying that Doha had vested interests in the outcome of Egypt’s democratic elections. Additionally, a popular Al Jazeera television host—Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a Qatari national of Egyptian origin—is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood.

But while Al Jazeera was championing the uprising in Tahrir Square, Saudi King Abdullah was offering to bankroll Mubarak. The Saudi king advised the Obama administration to remain loyal to the dictator to the very end, even if Egyptian forces began killing unarmed protestors. When President Obama refused to heed Riyadh’s advice, the Saudi regime bitterly accused Washington of discarding Mubarak “like a used kleenex.”

In Tunisia, too—the birthplace of the Arab Awakening—many have attributed the Islamist Ennahda party’s success to an infusion of Qatari petro-dollars. The fact that Prime Minister Rashid al-Ghannouchi’s first post-election international visit was to Qatar—and that his son-in-law, formerly a researcher for Al Jazeera in Doha, became his Foreign Minister—has further stoked suspicions about ties between the Gulf emirate and the Ennahda party.

The speculation has even led to protests in Tunisia against Qatari interference in Tunisia’s affairs. By contrast, Ghannouchi is not even allowed in Saudi Arabia, where the deposed dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali immediately recieved political aslyum after his regime collapsed under the weight of popular protests.

The Muslim Brotherhood-Salafi Divide

To counter the rise of moderate Islamists affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, Saudi Arabia has tended to support Salafis, rivals of the Muslim Brotherhood typically considered more extreme in their Islamism. “The Salafis view the Brotherhood as insufficiently Islamist and too compromising,” explains Khalil al-Anani, a scholar of Middle East politics at Durhan University. “The Brothers, in turn, view Salafi positions as naïve, overly rigid, insufficiently centrist, and inappropriate in a modern Egyptian context. The Brothers have shown during sporadic participation in past parliaments that their primary focus is on politics and not on religious or cultural issues.”

Following the 2011-2012 elections, a Muslim Brotherhood leader stated that his party’s priorities were “economic reform and reducing poverty … not [fighting] bikinis and booze.” The Salafis, by contrast—according to Davidson professor Christopher Alexander—have rallied around “a return to the veil in universities and public offices,” “gender segregation and public prayer on university campuses,” and “an elimination of political parties and elections as infringements on God’s sovereignty.”

According to Mara Revkin, a scholar at the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, the Salafi Al Nour party—which came in second place behind the Freedom and Justice Party with 24.3 percent of the vote in Egypt—received a “steady stream of funding, much of it originating in the Gulf States, [which] gave Salafi candidates a significant financial edge over their rivals.”

Revkin adds that Saudi support for Egyptian Salafis is “spiritual as well as material.” A Salafi cleric from Saudi Arabia, Adnan Alkhtiry, visited Egypt shortly before the parliamentary elections and delivered a sermon encouraging Egypt’s conservative Muslims to take advantage of “a great opportunity” to “establish an Islamic state” and not to “emerge from the election empty-handed” or “leave it those who don’t live the religious life.”

The View from Riyadh

The “Arab Awakening” is not the first Middle Eastern movement that has unnerved the Saudi regime.  The rise of Arab nationalism during the 1950s and 1960s and the Iranian revolution of 1979 both challenged Riyadh’s position as the anchor of a regional order.

Just as Saudi foreign policy proactively countered the rise of Nasser by supporting his enemies in Yemen and struck against Khomeini’s revolutionary regime by financing Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq war, Riyadh’s support for Salafi factions in countries undergoing political openings is the latest attempt to counter the rise of regional movements that conflict with the kingdom’s interests. Yet with its own resource wealth and competing regional agenda, Qatar is unusually well placed to rival Saudi largesse in the greater Middle East.

By placing bets on different horses in Egypt and Tunisia, Saudi Arabia and Qatar have become rivals in a transitioning Arab world. The rise of a conservative yet democratic form of Islamism may be a wave that Qatar can ride, to Saudi Arabia’s dismay. However, Qatar’s influence could be crowded out by a rising Egypt or even Iraq in the future. Furthermore, if the Arab Awakening spreads from Bahrain into other Gulf emirates, Doha may need to reign in its international ambitions and address its democratic deficit at home.

Indeed, when it comes to democracy in the Gulf, the two kingdoms are rivals no more.

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Meade: contracting market in Iraq is growing strong rival Saudi Arabia

Baghdad/JD/… Magazine (MED) Contracting market in Iraq is growing strong rival Saudi Arabia, stressing that the South Korean companies dominate the construction markets in the Middle East and North Africa

She magazine (MED) in a report published by the Kuwaiti daily (home): the reputation of South Korean companies continued promotion and dissemination in construction markets in the Middle East and North Africa, which span many sectors including oil and gas, petrochemicals, reflected fully in control of this year’s list of the 10 biggest contractors in the world in the sphere of project engineering, procurement and construction EPC.

The magazine said that daelim co. International, based in Seoul, four South Korean companies topped the great managed to acquire $ 13 billion worth of projects in the hydrocarbon sector over the past 12 months, which increases by about $ 5 billion of total contracts awarded to six other companies remaining from the list of top 10 companies.

While the magazine felt that this is an achievement worthy of admiration, and the fact that most of the contracts had been concluded with Saudi Arabia, but there is a broader opportunities on the horizon in strong growth markets such as Iraq, where it is expected to invest over $ 37 billion in the country’s hydrocarbon sector projects over the next year.

Since Iraq was home to about 10 percent of global oil reserves, it intends to promote oil production to 12 million bpd by 2017, there is no doubt that such a target is very ambitious, and that if possible, Iraq could become a rival to Saudi Arabic Queen as the largest producer of oil in the world today.

While it is expected that the South Korean construction companies play a dominant role in facilitating and implementing these projects, however, cannot overlook the role played by European contractors have taken European companies led by saipem and call she catered each Italian, Spanish tikenkas company serious steps and bold to ensure profitable contracts during the past 12 months, this has generated significant revenue contracts.

Conclusion «Med» said the company also achieved British petrovac great successes in the construction sector in the Middle East and North Africa, in particular through established alliances with competitors from South Korean companies to secure stakes in projects that arise now and then, it is expected that such a strategy of creating a road map for European companies to expand their presence in the region./finished/22/

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Saudi Arabia Calls for Monitoring of Mosques After Mosque Found Manufacturing Explosives

Saudi Arabia Calls for Monitoring of Mosques After Mosque Found Manufacturing Explosives

Posted GMT 8-28-2012 14:59:2

JEDDAH — A number of religious scholars and academics have stressed the need for the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, Endowment, Call and Guidance to beef up monitoring of places of worship. It followed the recent report of a Riyadh mosque serving as a facade for manufacturing explosives.

The Interior Ministry said in a statement on Sunday that it discovered explosive substances and devices at a lean-to of a quiet mosque in Riyadh. Mosques normally use attached rooms to accommodate workers or for library service.

The scholars also demanded deterrent punishments to those who exploit the spiritual atmosphere in mosques to promote chaos in the country, Al-Madinah daily reported on Monday.

“Those who seek to destabilize the country and fight against security forces come under the category of ‘those who rebel against Allah and His Messenger’ and a country’s legitimate government and hence should be punished severely,” said Sheikh Abdullah Al-Manie, who is a member of the Council of Senior Religious Scholars and adviser at the Royal Court.

The scholar also congratulated the Interior Ministry for its successful preemptive strike against the Riyadh cell and protecting the people from such heinous deeds.

“The Islamic Affairs Ministry should ensure that imams and muezzins inspect the mosque premises regularly and thoroughly, so that the facilities are not misused for subversive activities. The sacred houses of worship should not be converted into dens of destructive acts,” he said.

Member of the Fiqh Academy Muhammad Al-Nojaimi stressed the duty of the worshipers and residents in nearby buildings apart from imams and muezzins to see that mosques are not exploited for subversive activities. “Officials concerned should also investigate why some expatriates are unofficially undertaking duties at mosques. They should also launch campaigns and raids at such mosques,” he said.

Head of Islamic studies at the Umm Al-Qura University Muhammad Al-Sahli said it was a matter of deep pain for all Muslims, especially students and teachers of religious knowledge and preachers, that a mosque had been used as a cover for destructive activities.

Director of the Makkah branch of the International Islamic Relief Organization Ahmed Al-Muwarraie urged parents and teachers to protect their children or students from vicious ideologies they might be exposed to in the present circumstances.

Professor of Political Studies at King Saud University Abdullah Al-Lehaidan said the uncovering of a terror cell in Riyadh was not a matter to be taken lightly. “The latest discovery shows that the terror menace is still existing in the country and could be uprooted only after flushing it out from the neighboring Yemeni territories, just as terrorist activities were flushed out from the Kingdom.”

An academic specialized in political sciences at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Waheed Hashim, said Al-Qaeda in Yemen facilitated terrorists to infiltrate into the Kingdom. Another political science expert at the university said Al-Qaeda in Yemen changed its strategy of sending explosives to the Kingdom from outside. “Now they make explosives in the Kingdom, unlike what they did in the past.”

The academics also viewed that the political and economic failure of Yemen provided a breeding ground for terrorists. “The terrorist ideology thrived in Yemen because of rampant poverty, hunger, and endless disputes between religious or tribal sects, insecurity, and a weak central government. The country’s strategic geographical position enables terrorists to secretly enter Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries.”

Meanwhile, a former Saudi fighter in Afghanistan, Sheikh Siraj Al-Zahrani, warned against the dangers of Saudi youths being carried away by the temptation to be martyrs in Syria. Siraj said he joined the Afghan Taleban fighters on the assumption that they were fighting on the straight religious path, but experience made him disillusioned and prompted him to return home. “No youth should go to Syria or other war fronts without the permission from their guardians. A family should be cautious about its sons being lured to war zones for jihad,” the sheikh said.

www.arabnews.com

Assyrian International News Agency

* Odai Awad: Saudi Arabia is fighting Iraq economically by preventing the export of oil through its territory

Follow-up – and babysit – said a member of the Commission on oil and energy parliamentary continuing crisis between Iraq and Saudi Arabia on the subject of a tube of Iraqi oil flowing in Saudi territory, attributing the cause to the political Arabia anti-Iraq, noting that Saudi Arabia is justified attempt the seizure of the tube to the failure to resolve the differences between Iraq and Kuwait. [he says ]

The MP said the Liberal bloc of the Sadrist movement Odai Awad today that “the cause of the dispute with Saudi Arabia is trying to Saudi Arabia seized on the tube Iraqi passing in Yanbu within Saudi territory, arguing that a” pipeline was built with Iraqi funds and there were approvals political, but after the fall of the former regime Saudi Arabia surprised trying to control the line. “

Awad added that “this line effect on the ratio of exports of Iraqi oil because of the policy followed by Saudi Arabia in the acquisition of the line and trying to fight against Iraq, economically, noting that Saudi Arabia is not new to the practice of policy hostile to Iraq since the fall of the regime and so far”.

He accused Awad Saudi practice of terrorism and the fight against Iraq politically, economically and socially, for reasons purely sectarian and said, “Saudi Arabia to justify infringing on the tube by claiming that the pipeline was built with funds Saudi Arabia and that this dialectic has not solved so far and when you try the House of Representatives to open this topic with Saudi Arabia surprised to link this issue, the issue of relations Kuwait-Iraq and Iraq was that the issue of the pipeline will not be solved except in the case of resolving the issue of the outstanding problems between Iraq and Kuwait, totally. “

A source in the Iraqi government had confirmed that the oil pipeline, built by Saudi territory in Iraq costs about two billion dollars and the export of energy absorbed million and 600 thousand barrels per day.

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* Odai Awad: Saudi Arabia is fighting Iraq economically by preventing the export of oil through its territory

Follow-up – and babysit – said a member of the Commission on oil and energy parliamentary continuing crisis between Iraq and Saudi Arabia on the subject of a tube of Iraqi oil flowing in Saudi territory, attributing the cause to the political Arabia anti-Iraq, noting that Saudi Arabia is justified attempt the seizure of the tube to the failure to resolve the differences between Iraq and Kuwait. [he says ]

The MP said the Liberal bloc of the Sadrist movement Odai Awad today that “the cause of the dispute with Saudi Arabia is trying to Saudi Arabia seized on the tube Iraqi passing in Yanbu within Saudi territory, arguing that a” pipeline was built with Iraqi funds and there were approvals political, but after the fall of the former regime Saudi Arabia surprised trying to control the line. “

Awad added that “this line effect on the ratio of exports of Iraqi oil because of the policy followed by Saudi Arabia in the acquisition of the line and trying to fight against Iraq, economically, noting that Saudi Arabia is not new to the practice of policy hostile to Iraq since the fall of the regime and so far”.

He accused Awad Saudi practice of terrorism and the fight against Iraq politically, economically and socially, for reasons purely sectarian and said, “Saudi Arabia to justify infringing on the tube by claiming that the pipeline was built with funds Saudi Arabia and that this dialectic has not solved so far and when you try the House of Representatives to open this topic with Saudi Arabia surprised to link this issue, the issue of relations Kuwait-Iraq and Iraq was that the issue of the pipeline will not be solved except in the case of resolving the issue of the outstanding problems between Iraq and Kuwait, totally. “

A source in the Iraqi government had confirmed that the oil pipeline, built by Saudi territory in Iraq costs about two billion dollars and the export of energy absorbed million and 600 thousand barrels per day.

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Saudi Arabia Condemns Russian Comments

Saudi Arabia has condemned comments by Russia’s human rights envoy as “hostile” and an interference in the kingdom’s internal affairs. 

Konstantin Dolgov had expressed “grave concern” after two people were killed and twenty wounded in what Dolgov described as clashes in eastern Saudi Arabia last Sunday sparked by the arrest of a Shiite cleric. 

The Saudi interior minister had said the two were killed by assailants and not security forces. 

Eastern Province is home to most of Saudi Arabia’s Shiite community, who complain of discrimination by Saudi Arabia’s Sunni monarchy and have staged protests. 

Analysts say the exchange between Russia and Saudi Arabia may be in part a result of their opposing stances on Syria.

Based on reporting by Reuters

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

* Saudi Arabia announces it will not allow Iraq to export oil through its territory

Said government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said “Iraq has the right to use the first Iraqi pipeline that passes in Saudi Arabia in the case of closing the Strait of Hormuz.”

Dabbagh said that “the Iraqi ownership of the entire pipeline is Iraq’s right to use the tube which was set up specifically in the event of crises.”

“The confiscation of the tube and the ownership of the pipeline by Saudi Arabia to be illegal, Iraq retains full right to use this line as agreed upon by the former.”

Saudi Arabia announced yesterday that it “will not allow Iraq to export oil through its territory.”

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Saudi Arabia Plans to Fund Syria Rebel Army

Posted GMT 6-23-2012 17:26:44

Saudi officials are preparing to pay the salaries of the Free Syria Army as a means of encouraging mass defections from the military and increasing pressure on the Assad regime, the Guardian has learned.

The move, which has been discussed between Riyadh and senior officials in the US and Arab world, is believed to be gaining momentum as a recent flush of weapons sent to rebel forces by Saudi Arabia and Qatar starts to make an impact on battlefields in Syria.

Officials in the Saudi capital embraced the idea when it was put to them by Arab officials in May, according to sources in three Arab states, around the same time that weapons started to flow across the southern Turkish border into the hands of Free Syria Army leaders.

Turkey has also allowed the establishment of a command centre in Istanbul which is co-ordinating supply lines in consultation with FSA leaders inside Syria. The centre is believed to be staffed by up to 22 people, most of them Syrian nationals.

The Guardian witnessed the transfer of weapons in early June near the Turkish frontier. Five men dressed in the style of Gulf Arabs arrived in a police station in the border village of Altima in Syria and finalised a transfer from the Turkish town of Reyhanli of around 50 boxes of rifles and ammunition, as well as a large shipment of medicines.

The men were treated with deference by local FSA leaders and were carrying large bundles of cash. They also received two prisoners held by rebels, who were allegedly members of the pro-regime militia, the Shabiha.

The influx of weapons has reinvigorated the insurrection in northern Syria, which less than six weeks ago was on the verge of being crushed.

The move to pay the guerrilla forces’ salaries is seen as a chance to capitalise on the sense of renewed confidence, as well as provide a strong incentive for soldiers and officers to defect. The value of the Syrian pound has fallen sharply in value since the anti-regime revolt started 16 months ago, leading to a dramatic fall in purchasing power.

The plan centres on paying the FSA in either US dollars or euros, meaning their salaries would be restored to their pre-revolution levels, or possibly increased.

The US senator Joe Lieberman, who is actively supporting the Syrian opposition, discussed the issue of FSA salaries during a recent trip to Lebanon and Saudi Arabia.

His spokesman, Whitney Phillips, said: “Senator Lieberman has called for the US to provide robust and comprehensive support to the armed Syrian opposition, in co-ordination with our partners in the Middle East and Europe. He has specifically called for the US to work with our partners to provide the armed Syrian opposition with weapons, training, tactical intelligence, secure communications and other forms of support to change the military balance of power inside Syria.

“Senator Lieberman also supports the idea of ensuring that the armed opposition fighters receive regular and sufficient pay, although he does not believe it is necessary for the United States to provide this funding itself directly.”

US defence secretary Leon Panetta said this week Washington was not playing a direct role in gun-running into northern Syria. “We made a decision not to provide lethal assistance at this point. I know others have made their own decisions.”

Earlier this week the New York Times reported the CIA was operating in southern Turkey, helping allies decide which opposition fighters would get weapons.

Diplomatic sources have told the Guardian two US intelligence officers were in Syria’s third city of Homs between December and early February, trying to establish command and control within rebel ranks.

Interviews with officials in three states reveal the influx of weapons — which includes kalashnikovs, rocket propelled grenades and anti-tank missiles — started in mid-May, when Saudi Arabia and Qatar finally moved on pledges they had made in February and March to arm rebel forces.

The officials, who insisted on anonymity, said the final agreement to move weapons from storage points inside Turkey into rebel hands was hard won, with Ankara first insisting on diplomatic cover from the Arab states and the US.

Turkey is understood to view the weapons supply lines as integral to the protection of its southern border, which is coming under increasing pressure as regime forces edge closer in an attempt to stop the gun-running and attack FSA units.

Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar were all allies of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad until several months into the uprising, which now poses a serious threat to his family’s 42-year rule over the country.

All three states have become increasingly hostile as the revolt has continued, with Saudi Arabia in February describing the suggestion to arm rebel groups as an “excellent idea” and Qatar having offered exile to Assad and his family.

For the first few months of this year the three states were waiting for the US to take a proactive role in intervening in Syria, something Washington has so far not seriously considered.

With a presidential election later this year, and weighed down by the troubled legacy of Iraq, Barack Obama has shown no enthusiasm for a major foreign policy play. Polling in the US has consistently shown that voters have little appetite for intervention in Syria, while officials from Washington to London and Brussels have warned of grave risks to the region which may follow the fall of Damascus.

Assad continues to cast his regime’s battle for survival as an existential threat from radical Sunni Islamists, who he says are backed by foreign states.

The Free Syria Army says its members are almost exclusively Syrian nationalists who disavow the world view of jihadists who flocked to neighbouring Iraq from 2004-07. It acknowledges that some foreign Arab fighters have travelled to Syria to join its ranks, particularly in Homs and in Douma near Damascus, but claims they do not play a decisive role.

Intelligence officials say a power vacuum would provide an attractive environment for militants who espouse a global jihad world view. “The next three to six months are crucial in Syria,” one official said. “The ingredients are right for them [jihadists] to turn up and start acting decisively. That would not be a good outcome.”

By Martin Chulov, Ewen MacAskill, John Densky
www.guardian.co.uk

Assyrian International News Agency

Saudi Arabia set to bury crown prince

Saudi Arabia is preparing to bury Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz amid worldwide condolences and with defence minister Prince Salman seemingly poised to become the new heir to the throne.

An aircraft bearing the body of Prince Nayef left Geneva early on Sunday for the kingdom’s western city of Jeddah, Al-Arabiya pan-Arab network reported.

The funeral of the Gulf nation’s long-time interior minister is expected to take place later in the Muslim holy city of Mecca after sunset [at about 16:00 GMT].

He will be buried in Al-Adl cemetery near the Grand Mosque, where several members of the royal family and prominent Islamic scholars are interred, the local Okaz newspaper said.

“Crown Prince Nayef devoted his life to promoting the security of Saudi Arabia,” said Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, while US President Barack Obama praised his co-operation in the fight against terror that “saved countless American and Saudi lives”.

French President Francois Hollande said his country had lost a “friend” while Switzerland, where Nayef died, offered “deepest condolences”.

The 79-year-old prince died of “cardiac problems” while at his brother’s residence in Geneva, a medical source in the city who asked not to be identified said.

Questions over succession

Nayef’s death, just eight months after he replaced his late brother Sultan as crown prince, raises the issue of succession because of the advanced age of the first line of apparent heirs, in a time of turmoil rocking the Arab world.

King Abdullah himself is 88 and ailing, and nobody is officially in line to replace Nayef.

However, his brother Prince Salman, 76, who took the defence portfolio after Sultan’s death, appears to be a strong candidate.

“Prince Salman is the most likely successor,” Khaled al-Dakheel, a Saudi political scientist, said.

Anwar Eshqi, head of the Jeddah-based Middle East Centre for Strategic Studies, said: “All expectations point to Prince Salman to succeed Prince Nayef for his experience in administration, security and politics.”

In 2006, the Saudi monarch established the allegiance council, a body of around 35 senior princes, as a new succession mechanism whose long-term aim was to choose the crown prince.

Nayef was the middle prince of the Sudairi Seven, the formidable bloc of sons of King Abdul Aziz by a favourite wife, Princess Hassa al-Sudairi.

In addition to Salman, remaining Sudairis include Prince Abdul Rahman, Prince Turki and Prince Ahmed, who is deputy interior minister and likely to succeed Nayef at the security helm in the oil powerhouse.

Crackdown on al-Qaeda

Nayef, who spearheaded Saudi Arabia’s clampdown on al-Qaeda following a wave of attacks in the conservative kingdom between 2003 and 2006, became heir to the throne in October last year.

“He was one of the pillars of stability in the kingdom,” wrote al Jazirah daily.

“He managed to overcome crises and navigate this country to the shores of safety.”

Seen as more conservative than King Abdullah, Prince Nayef was a staunch defender of the Saudi dynasty and resisted any form of opposition.

He ordered and oversaw a fierce crackdown on Al-Qaeda, forcing the armed group’s leaders and fighters to flee to neighbouring Yemen.

514

AL JAZEERA ENGLISH (AJE)

Saudi Arabia to Lead UN Counter Terrorism Initiative

Posted GMT 6-14-2012 18:39:26

If the UN were to form an anti-terrorism group dedicated to attacking the menace on a global scale, who do you think would be asked to lead it? A nation with a proven track record of anti-terror initiatives? A nation that esteems human rights and freedoms above all else? Unfortunately, in the case of the UN Centre for Counter Terrorism (UNCCT), the answer is emphatically neither.

The UNCCT was formed in September 2010 with the purpose of executing the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, adopted by the General Assembly in 2006. In a move more befitting Alice in Wonderland than the United Nations, Saudi Arabia was named chair of the organization.

The Resolution that created the UNCCT highlighted four key “pillars” in the fight against terrorism. The first of these pillars, “tackling the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism,” was undermined almost immediately upon the organization’s establishment. Three months after the UNCCT’s formation, WikiLeaks exposed a trove of diplomatic cables in which Secretary of State Hilary Clinton wrote “Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al-Qa’ida, the Taliban, LeT, and other terrorist groups, including Hamas.” Clinton’s US embassy cables also revealed Saudi resistance to prioritizing the issue in terms of its own domestic policy.

These revelations are perhaps not so surprising in light of the Saudi kingdom’s lukewarm response to terrorism funding and recruitment within its borders. Remember when, in the months following the 9/11 attacks, Saudi Arabia denied the fact that 15 out of the 19 hijackers were Saudi citizens, before eventually confirming the undeniable truth in 2002? Even worse, this past February two former US senators involved in the 9/11 inquiries suggested in separate affidavits that the Saudi government may have played a direct role in the attacks themselves.

It’s an ironic twist that the UN appointed Saudi Arabia, a country historically labeled by groups like the CATO Institute as a state sponsor of terrorism, to chair the flagship effort to end such practices. The UN’s actions speak to a certain cluelessness it exhibits as a governing body: the organization bows to diplomatic and political courtesies while ignoring what’s happening on the ground.

The designation is also farcical in another sense. Saudi Arabia’s human rights record blatantly contradicts the UNCCT’s fourth pillar, “ensuring respect for human rights against the backdrop of the fight against terrorism,” as evidenced by the nation’s treatment of its own citizens. Amnesty International’s 2012 Report details the state’s numerous abuses: public demonstration is forbidden, females face harshly oppressive discrimination in both the law and society, citizens are subject to torture and confinement for excessive periods of time without due process of law, etc. And the Amnesty International report is not even comprehensive. For example: it fails to mention LGBT rights or the fact that homosexuality in the Saudi kingdom is a capital offense.

Moreover, Saudi Arabia’s state-sponsored curriculum continues to foster a learning environment of intolerance and discrimination. As detailed in the Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom’s recently published report, the Saudi Kingdom’s academic curriculum for grades 1-12 contains textbooks that disparage Christianity and Judaism and tutors on the subject of jihad and war against nonbelievers. In 2010, a special investigation by the BBC’s Panorama discovered that part-time schools “teaching the official Saudi national curriculum” in the United Kingdom were imparting messages of anti-Semitism and homophobia to young Muslim students, as well as illustrating how to punish thieves by cutting off the criminal’s hand or foot.

It is no secret that Saudi Arabia holds a strong anti-democracy stance, as exemplified in March 2011 when the kingdom sent troops into Bahrain to help repress protests during a government crackdown. Freedom of expression is nearly non-existent; a draft of the nation’s own anti-terror law leaked in July 2011 would suppress free speech and could punish blasphemy with death.

The greatest irony of all is the UN’s failure to come up with a legal definition for the act of terrorism while purporting to fight it with projects like the UNCCT. While the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism has been in the works since 2000, the UN General Assembly Sixth Committee (Legal) has reached an impasse in negotiations. The result is that the UNCCT exists without any clear international definition the word “terrorism.”

The standoff is the outcome of maneuvering by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), a 57-member voting bloc that represents itself as the “collective voice of the Muslim world.” The group refuses passage of any Sixth Committee Resolution defining terrorism unless it exempts certain kinds of conflicts, such as “armed struggle against foreign occupation.” This means that, according to the OIC, attacks on civilians would not constitute terrorism as long as they were citizens of a so-called “occupying power.” This is obviously unacceptable.

The UN must first facilitate a consensus between states on the definition of terrorism if it is to effectively combat the threat. Furthermore, it’s incumbent upon all Western democracies and especially the Obama administration to lobby for the removal of Saudi Arabia from the UNCCT. The UN needs to stop playing political games when human lives are thrown into the mix; terrorist groups will continue to survive as long as there are nations that remain lax on enforcement and bodies like the UN that reward complacency. Only an international campaign that possesses both legitimacy and resolve has the potential to eradicate — or at least suppress — terrorism.

By Brooke Goldstein and Zack Kousnetz
American Thinker

Assyrian International News Agency

Saudi Arabia to Lead UN Counter Terrorism Initiative

Posted GMT 6-14-2012 18:39:26

If the UN were to form an anti-terrorism group dedicated to attacking the menace on a global scale, who do you think would be asked to lead it? A nation with a proven track record of anti-terror initiatives? A nation that esteems human rights and freedoms above all else? Unfortunately, in the case of the UN Centre for Counter Terrorism (UNCCT), the answer is emphatically neither.

The UNCCT was formed in September 2010 with the purpose of executing the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, adopted by the General Assembly in 2006. In a move more befitting Alice in Wonderland than the United Nations, Saudi Arabia was named chair of the organization.

The Resolution that created the UNCCT highlighted four key “pillars” in the fight against terrorism. The first of these pillars, “tackling the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism,” was undermined almost immediately upon the organization’s establishment. Three months after the UNCCT’s formation, WikiLeaks exposed a trove of diplomatic cables in which Secretary of State Hilary Clinton wrote “Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al-Qa’ida, the Taliban, LeT, and other terrorist groups, including Hamas.” Clinton’s US embassy cables also revealed Saudi resistance to prioritizing the issue in terms of its own domestic policy.

These revelations are perhaps not so surprising in light of the Saudi kingdom’s lukewarm response to terrorism funding and recruitment within its borders. Remember when, in the months following the 9/11 attacks, Saudi Arabia denied the fact that 15 out of the 19 hijackers were Saudi citizens, before eventually confirming the undeniable truth in 2002? Even worse, this past February two former US senators involved in the 9/11 inquiries suggested in separate affidavits that the Saudi government may have played a direct role in the attacks themselves.

It’s an ironic twist that the UN appointed Saudi Arabia, a country historically labeled by groups like the CATO Institute as a state sponsor of terrorism, to chair the flagship effort to end such practices. The UN’s actions speak to a certain cluelessness it exhibits as a governing body: the organization bows to diplomatic and political courtesies while ignoring what’s happening on the ground.

The designation is also farcical in another sense. Saudi Arabia’s human rights record blatantly contradicts the UNCCT’s fourth pillar, “ensuring respect for human rights against the backdrop of the fight against terrorism,” as evidenced by the nation’s treatment of its own citizens. Amnesty International’s 2012 Report details the state’s numerous abuses: public demonstration is forbidden, females face harshly oppressive discrimination in both the law and society, citizens are subject to torture and confinement for excessive periods of time without due process of law, etc. And the Amnesty International report is not even comprehensive. For example: it fails to mention LGBT rights or the fact that homosexuality in the Saudi kingdom is a capital offense.

Moreover, Saudi Arabia’s state-sponsored curriculum continues to foster a learning environment of intolerance and discrimination. As detailed in the Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom’s recently published report, the Saudi Kingdom’s academic curriculum for grades 1-12 contains textbooks that disparage Christianity and Judaism and tutors on the subject of jihad and war against nonbelievers. In 2010, a special investigation by the BBC’s Panorama discovered that part-time schools “teaching the official Saudi national curriculum” in the United Kingdom were imparting messages of anti-Semitism and homophobia to young Muslim students, as well as illustrating how to punish thieves by cutting off the criminal’s hand or foot.

It is no secret that Saudi Arabia holds a strong anti-democracy stance, as exemplified in March 2011 when the kingdom sent troops into Bahrain to help repress protests during a government crackdown. Freedom of expression is nearly non-existent; a draft of the nation’s own anti-terror law leaked in July 2011 would suppress free speech and could punish blasphemy with death.

The greatest irony of all is the UN’s failure to come up with a legal definition for the act of terrorism while purporting to fight it with projects like the UNCCT. While the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism has been in the works since 2000, the UN General Assembly Sixth Committee (Legal) has reached an impasse in negotiations. The result is that the UNCCT exists without any clear international definition the word “terrorism.”

The standoff is the outcome of maneuvering by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), a 57-member voting bloc that represents itself as the “collective voice of the Muslim world.” The group refuses passage of any Sixth Committee Resolution defining terrorism unless it exempts certain kinds of conflicts, such as “armed struggle against foreign occupation.” This means that, according to the OIC, attacks on civilians would not constitute terrorism as long as they were citizens of a so-called “occupying power.” This is obviously unacceptable.

The UN must first facilitate a consensus between states on the definition of terrorism if it is to effectively combat the threat. Furthermore, it’s incumbent upon all Western democracies and especially the Obama administration to lobby for the removal of Saudi Arabia from the UNCCT. The UN needs to stop playing political games when human lives are thrown into the mix; terrorist groups will continue to survive as long as there are nations that remain lax on enforcement and bodies like the UN that reward complacency. Only an international campaign that possesses both legitimacy and resolve has the potential to eradicate — or at least suppress — terrorism.

By Brooke Goldstein and Zack Kousnetz
American Thinker

Assyrian International News Agency

* News of the possible collapse of the royal family in Saudi Arabia

Press sources revealed on the developments in the political arena sudden Arabia. She said that the Palestinian newspaper Al-Manar news from within the family confirms that Saudi Arabia, Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz, who is currently outside the country for the treatment of speech has been lost, and that in a critical condition summoned his children to promote their sites. Adding that King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz in the case of Sherrod my mind, and aware of what’s going on around him, and added that the Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, intensified by the disease is the other, and the possibility of paralysis, which prompted Washington to send officials to monitor the situation there

LINK

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Dinar Daddy’s Tidbits

Saudi Arabia Pledges $3.25 Billion To Help Fight Al-Qaeda In Yemen

Saudi Arabia, concerned about the threat of Al-Qaeda-linked militants in Yemen, has pledged $ 3.25 billion in aid to its impoverished Arabian Peninsula neighbor.

Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal announced the aid on May 23 at an international conference in Riyadh.

No details were immediately provided on how the money will be used.

Representatives of more than 20 nations, including the six Gulf Cooperation Council member states, the United States and Britain are attending the Riyadh meeting to discuss how to help Yemen tackle poverty and lawlessness.

Around 100 Yemeni soldiers were killed in an Al-Qaeda suicide bomb attack May 21 in Sanaa.

Al-Qaeda has sought to expand its operations in Yemen since the country was gripped by turmoil last year, which eventually forced President Ali Abdullah Saleh from power.

Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

Saudi Arabia Closes Its Embassy in Egypt; Pulls Ambassador

Posted GMT 4-28-2012 18:4:46

Cairo (CNN) — Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Cairo and closed its embassy in Egypt, as well as its consulates in the Egyptian cities of Alexandria and Suez, state media reported Saturday .

The move followed protests in front of the embassy and “attempts to storm and threaten the security and safety of its employees of both Saudi and Egyptian nationality,” according to the Saudi Press Agency.

Throngs of Egyptians gathered in front of the Saudi Embassy this week, calling for the release of Egyptian human rights lawyer Ahmed el-Gezawi, who was detained earlier this month for allegedly insulting King Abdullah. Saudi officials say el-Gezawi was arrested for allegedly trying to smuggle thousands of pills into the country.

But the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights say el-Gezawi had been traveling on a pilgrimage to Mecca when he was detained.

The Cairo-based group credited the activist for demanding better treatment of Saudi-held Egyptian detainees and criticizing the kingdom over alleged human rights abuses.

El-Gezawi has since been sentenced to be flogged and faces one year behind bars, the group reported.

Video of the demonstrations in Cairo was posted online earlier this week and showed sign-wielding crowds chanting slogans in front of the Saudi embassy.

“Say it, don’t be afraid, The Egyptian will be lashed,” the crowd chanted. “We will lash the ambassador! Lash us imprison us! Tomorrow the revolution will be in Medina.”

Protests in Egypt and Saturday’s decision by Saudi authorities to remove its diplomatic personnel from the country appear to have again ratcheted up longstanding tensions between the two Middle Eastern nations.

“It’s a relationship that’s been flawed,” said Steven Cook, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “Especially since the uprising, many Egyptian’s regard Saudis as a counterrevolutionary force in the region.”

Egypt, considered the most populous Arab country in the region, has often engaged in “a subtle competition” with their Saudi counterparts “over this question of regional leadership,” Cook said.

The country erupted in protest last year during 18 days of demonstrations in Cairo’s Tahrir Square following after similar uprisings in neighboring Tunisia, ultimately ousting Egypt’s longtime president Hosni Mubarak after nearly three decades in power.

“The Saudis were not enthusiastic about their uprising,” Cook said of Egypt, pointing to apparent concerns among elites in the oil rich kingdom over their own grip on power. “And they were angry at the United States for its role in supporting the movement.”

In February 2011, President Barack Obama called for orderly transition in Egypt to a fully representative democracy, saying the transition “must be meaningful, it must be peaceful and it must begin now.”

By David Ariosto

CNN’s Caroline Faraj and Salma Abdelaziz contributed to this report.

Assyrian International News Agency

Bin Laden family ‘en route to Saudi Arabia’

Local media in Pakistan is reporting that the widows of Osama Bin Laden, as well a number of children, have been deported from the country.

Aamir Khalil, the family’s lawyer, told the Reuters news agency that the family is expected to arrive in Saudi Arabia early Friday morning.

“Yes, they’re being deported to Saudia Arabia,” said Khalil, adding that the family had been booked on a “special flight” on Thursday night.

A Pakistani court in April charged Bin Laden’s widows and two of his grown-up daughters with illegal entry and residency in the country.

Bin Laden’s two Saudi and one Yemeni widows, together with their children, have been living under the protection of the authorities in Pakistan since the al-Qaeda chief was killed by US Navy SEALs on May 2, 2011.


AL JAZEERA ENGLISH (AJE)

A Church in Saudi Arabia?

Posted GMT 4-7-2012 21:13:6

Interfaith dialogue has become an important exercise in finding the right words to overcome both extreme violence and ordinary misunderstanding. True progress, however, is best measured in deeds. The inauguration last week of Qatar’s first Christian church — a small Catholic chapel bearing neither bells nor visible crosses — has been hailed as a welcome step forward in relations between Catholicism and Islam. But an even more dramatic development is under discussion just across the border: The Vatican has confirmed that it is negotiating for permission to build the first church in Saudi Arabia.

Presiding over the cradle of Islam and home to its holiest sites, the Saudi monarchy has long banned the open worship of other faiths, even as the number of Catholics resident in Saudi Arabia has risen to 800,000 thanks to an influx of immigrant workers from places like the Philippines and India. Mosques are the only houses of prayer in a country where the strict Wahhabi version of Sunni Islam dominates. But Archbishop Paul-Mounged El-Hachem, the papal envoy to the smaller countries on the Arabian peninsula, such as Kuwait and Qatar, has confirmed that talks are under way to establish formal diplomatic relations between the Vatican and Saudi Arabia, and to eventually allow for Catholic churches to be built there. Pope Benedict XVI is believed to have personally appealed to King Abdullah on the topic during the Saudi monarch’s first ever visit to the Vatican last November.

Top Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said that a Catholic parish in this key Islamic country would be “a historic achievement” in the push to expand religious freedom and foster a positive interfaith rapport. Under Benedict, the Catholic hierarchy has stepped up calls from its Muslim counterparts for “reciprocity,” demanding that the same religious freedom enjoyed by Muslims in the West should be granted to Christian minorities in the Islamic world. They note that Europe’s biggest mosque, built with Saudi funds, was opened in 1995 in Rome, just across the river from the Vatican.

Pope Benedict passionately condemned last week’s death of Chaldean Catholic Archbishop of Mosul, Paulos Faraj Rahho, who was kidnapped on Feb. 29 in the northern Iraqi city. As many as 350,000 of the 800,000 Christians in Iraq before the war have since fled the country, while smaller but similar exoduses have occurred in the Palestinian territories, Lebanon and other parts of the Arab world.

While Christians in those areas trace their roots to the earliest centuries of the faith, the Catholics in Saudi Arabia are mostly migrant workers. And the restrictions on any outward manifestation of their religious beliefs have been particularly severe. The celebration of non-Muslim holidays is forbidden, as is the wearing of crucifixes and other religious symbols.

Benedict has been seen as both stumbling block and catalyst in the search to improve relations between Christians and Muslims. His Septempber 2006 lecture at Regensberg University in Germany on the relationship between faith and reason, and how it might explain religiously inspired violence, included an offensive historical reference to the Prophet Muhammed. But after initial Muslim anger at his remarks cooled — and the Pope made a conciliatory visit to the Blue Mosque in Istanbul — there have been signs of a productive Catholic-Islam dialogue taking shape. Prominent Muslim and Christian clerics have exchanged messages expressing a mutual desire for better understanding, and Vatican officials last month announced the first in a series of high-level meetings with Muslims next November, which will include an appearance by Benedict.

In little-reported remarks just three months after his controversial speech in Germany, the Pope spoke of the challenge posed to Islam by a violent minority within its ranks. “The Muslim world today is finding itself faced with an urgent task. This task is very similar to the one that has been imposed upon Christians since the Enlightenment,” Benedict said in a speech to officials of the Roman Curia. “On the one hand, one must counter a dictatorship of positivist reason that excludes God from the life of the community and from public organizations, thereby depriving man of his specific criteria of judgment. On the other, one must welcome the true conquests of the Enlightenment, human rights and especially the freedom of faith and its practice, and recognize these also as being essential elements for the authenticity of religion.”

After Easter week, Benedict will no doubt be focusing on his next big speech, where some of the same themes may very well recur. On April 18, the pontiff arrives in New York to address the General Assembly of the United Nations.

By Jeff Israely
www.time.com

Assyrian International News Agency

Iraq’s Fugitive Vice President Arrives in Saudi Arabia

Posted GMT 4-7-2012 19:49:25

RIYADH (AP) — Iraq’s fugitive vice president arrived Wednesday in Saudi Arabia hours after he vowed in a television interview that he would return home.

Tariq al-Hashemi, the top Sunni official in Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government, flew to Saudi Arabia from neighboring Qatar where he stayed for four days, the official Saudi news agency reported. He was greeted by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal in the Red Sea port city of Jiddah, according to a Saudi Foreign Ministry official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media. He had no further details on the visit.

Al-Hashemi is wanted in Iraq on terror charges for allegedly running death squads against Shiite pilgrims, government officials and security forces. Iraqi authorities issued a warrant for his arrest in December, touching off a political crisis in Baghdad and deepening the country’s sectarian divide just days after the U.S. military withdrawal.

Al-Hashemi, who has denied the charges and says they are politically motivated, took refuge in the self-ruled Kurdish region in northern Iraq, out of the jurisdiction of the central government in Baghdad.

He told the pan-Arab television channel Al-Jazeera in an interview that the charges were designed to “push me out of the political process” and launched a scathing attack on Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

“I will return to Kurdistan without a doubt. I will never abandon my country,” al-Hashemi said, adding that he would be ready to leave Kurdistan if he felt his presence there was a burden to its government.

He said that al-Maliki, a hardline Shiite who has been in power for nearly six years, “has so much hatred and malice inside him that go beyond the political differences between me and him.”

Al-Maliki, he added, was discriminating against the nation’s once-powerful Sunni minority and that his policies posed a risk to Iraq’s unity. Also for sectarian reasons, he charged, al-Maliki was allowing Iraq’s airspace to be used by Iranian aircraft to ferry weapons to the embattled regime of President Bashar Assad in Syria. He provided no evidence to support his claim.

He also claimed that Iraqi Shiite militiamen were fighting alongside the Syrian regime’s forces. He gave no details.

Syria has a Sunni majority but the ruling Assad dynasty are Alawites, followers of a sect that is an offshoot of Shiism. Assad came to power in 2000, succeeding his father Hafez who ruled the country for about 30 years.

Al-Hashemi’s visit to Qatar was his first trip abroad since the allegations were leveled against him. Iraq called on Qatar to extradite him so he can stand trial in Baghdad. Doha refused the request.

Associated Press writer Mazin Yahya in Baghdad contributed to this report.

Assyrian International News Agency

* Iraq’s fugitive vice president in Saudi Arabia

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Iraq’s fugitive vice president arrived Wednesday in Saudi Arabia hours after he vowed in a television interview that he would return home.

Tariq al-Hashemi, the top Sunni official in Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government, flew to Saudi Arabia from neighboring Qatar where he stayed for four days, the official Saudi news agency reported. He was greeted by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal in the Red Sea port city of Jiddah, according to a Saudi Foreign Ministry official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media. He had no further details on the visit. Al-Hashemi is wanted in Iraq on terror charges for allegedly running death squads against Shiite pilgrims, government officials and security forces. Iraqi authorities issued a warrant for his arrest in December, touching off a political crisis in Baghdad and deepening the country’s sectarian divide just days after the U.S. military withdrawal. Al-Hashemi, who has denied the charges and says they are politically motivated, took refuge in the self-ruled Kurdish region in northern Iraq, out of the jurisdiction of the central government in Baghdad. He told the pan-Arab television channel Al-Jazeera in an interview that the charges were designed to “push me out of the political process” and launched a scathing attack on Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. “I will return to Kurdistan without a doubt. I will never abandon my country,” al-Hashemi said, adding that he would be ready to leave Kurdistan if he felt his presence there was a burden to its government. He said thatal-Maliki, a hardline Shiite who has been in power for nearly six years,“has so much hatred and malice inside him that go beyond the political differences between me and him.” Al-Maliki, he added, was discriminating against the nation’s once-powerful Sunni minority and that his policies posed a risk to Iraq’s unity. Also for sectarian reasons, he charged, al-Maliki was allowing Iraq’s airspace to be used by Iranian aircraft to ferry weapons to the embattled regime of President Bashar Assad in Syria. He provided no evidence to support his claim. He also claimed that Iraqi Shiite militiamen were fighting alongside the Syrian regime’s forces. He gave no details. Syria has a Sunni majority but the ruling Assad dynasty are Alawites, followers of a sect that is an offshoot of Shiism. Assad came to power in 2000, succeeding his father Hafez who ruled the country for about 30 years.

Al-Hashemi’s visit to Qatar was his first trip abroad since the allegations were leveled against him. Iraq called on Qatar to extradite him so he can stand trial in Baghdad. Doha refused the request.

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Dinar Daddy’s Tidbits

Saudi Arabia Pushing Bahrain to Solve Crisis, Fears Syria Effect

Posted GMT 3-21-2012 20:58:53

MANAMA (Reuters) — Saudi Arabia wants Bahrain’s government and opposition to resolve a political crisis that it fears could worsen because of the sectarian fallout of fighting in Syria and destabilize its Eastern Province, a diplomat and opposition politician said.

Bahrain has been in turmoil since the Arab Spring protest movement first erupted a year ago. Clashes have become a daily occurrence, usually in districts populated by majority Shi’ite Muslims who have dominated the protests.

“We heard that at end of January the Saudis were reaching out to Wefaq and wanted to hear how Wefaq – if Act 1 was last year – how they were going to play their role in Act 2,” a senior Western diplomat said.

The leading Shi’ite opposition party Wefaq was involved in backroom talks during a pro-democracy uprising last year on reforms offered by Crown Prince Salman, but the they were cut short when Saudi troops rolled in and martial law was imposed.

The revolt was led by Shi’ite Muslim majority population on an island which is important to Washington as the base for the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet.

The Shi’ite majority has called for sweeping democratic reforms that would reduce the Sunni ruling family’s monopoly on power and allow parliament real powers to legislate and form governments.

One year on clashes between riot police and youths in Shi’ite districts have escalated, with heavy use of petrol bombs against police who in turn use large amounts of tear gas. Activists say at least 32 have died since martial law ended, though police question the causes of death.

In January Wefaq members met with Royal Court Minister Khaled bin Ahmed for preliminary discussions on a formal dialogue on democratic reforms.

The diplomat said Wefaq, which faces radicalization among many Shi’ite youth who oppose the monarchy, had met for a second time with the minister in recent weeks.

“There is stuff going on but it’s getting more difficult than they imagined it would be. They are finding it difficult to get common ground,” he said, citing government fears that Wefaq would command a parliamentary majority.

“You can foresee a political solution here that would keep the Saudis very happy, but I think the red lines would be slightly tighter than last year,” he added.

Analysts say Riyadh sent troops last year because of alarm that Bahrain had not contained protests that had the potential to spill over into the Shi’ite Eastern Province region, where major Saudi oilfields are located.

An opposition politician, who did not wish to be named, said Saudi Arabia now feared that the conflict in Syria, in which Shi’ite Iran and its ally Hezbollah back Bashar al-Assad’s rule, could sharpen Bahrain’s sectarian divide – detracting attention from Syria and firing up Saudi Shi’ites.

“The Saudis are worried (the stalemate) could push the Shi’ites towards Iran… and at what could emerge as a consequence of Syria,” he said.

Loyalist Sunni groups in Bahrain, who look to the ruling Al Khalifa for protection, have held protests against Assad and accuse Shi’ites of sympathy for Assad.

Media in Iran and Hezbollah give positive coverage to Bahrain’s Shi’ite opposition, and Iraqi Shi’ites often demonstrate in support of their Bahraini coreligionists.

Some Sunni leaders in Bahrain fear the fate of Iraq’s Sunnis, sidelined after Shi’ites gained power through elections.

Unrest in the Saudi Eastern Province has flared again in recent months.

“The Saudis really don’t need unrest in the Eastern Province right now,” said Michael Stephens, researcher at the Doha-based Royal United Services Institute. “The policy priority for Saudi Arabia has been Syria for last three months.”

By Andrew Hammond

Assyrian International News Agency

Saudi Arabia, Iraq Sign Deal to Repatriate Prisoners

Posted GMT 3-19-2012 19:55:46

DUBAI (Reuters) — Iraq has agreed to repatriate Saudi prisoners who fought alongside Islamist insurgents against U.S.-led forces under a deal that signals further improvement of relations between the two major Arab countries.

The prisoner exchange deal comes less than a month after Saudi Arabia, which has had uneasy relations with Iraq’s Shi’ite Muslim-led government, named an ambassador to Baghdad for the first time since Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990.

It also comes ahead of an Arab summit in Baghdad on March 29 which has been delayed twice by regional turmoil and acrimony between Baghdad and some Sunni Muslim Gulf Arab states over a crackdown by Bahrain’s Sunni rulers on Shi’ite protesters.

“The agreement emanates from the strong relations between the two brotherly people and in the interest of strengthening friendship and cooperation between them,” the Saudi Justice Ministry said in a statement.

It was issued after the accord was signed in Riyadh by Justice Minister Muhammad al-Eissa and his Iraqi counterpart Hassan al-Shimari. Iraqi officials were not immediately available for comment.

It was not immediately clear how many people would benefit from the accord. But rights activists say hundreds of Saudis held in Iraq, mostly for involvement in an insurgency against U.S.-led troops, as well as Iraqis held in Saudi Arabia for criminal offences, are expected to be affected.

Thousands of Saudis travelled to Iraq to fight alongside Islamist insurgents after the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. Official rights group statistics show that less than 100 Saudis are held in Iraq, but the number is believed to be much higher and could reach hundreds.

Under the accord, prisoners from each country will serve out the remainder of their sentences in their home countries without being eligible for pardons. Saudi media said the deal does not cover inmates facing the death penalty.

Reporting by Sami Aboudi; Editing by Mark Heinrich.

Assyrian International News Agency

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