About Us

IMRA
IMRA
IMRA

 

Subscribe

Search


...................................................................................................................................................


Saturday, September 20, 2014
Excerpts: Egypt's Sisi re ISIS. ISIS returned 49 Turkish hostages. Belgium prevents jihadist attacks. Ukraine-Rebels buffer-zone deal signed. Jordan Court denies bail to Muslim Brotherhood September 20, 2014

Excerpts: Egypt's Sisi re ISIS. ISIS returned 49 Turkish hostages. Belgium
prevents jihadist attacks. Ukraine-Rebels buffer-zone deal signed. Jordan
Court denies bail to Muslim Brotherhood September 20, 2014

+++SOURCE: Al Arabiya News 20 Sept.’14:”Sisi says Egypt willing to back
anti-ISIS push”, by Staff Writer

SUBJECT:Egypt’s Sisi re ISIS

QUOTE:Sisi also said supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood would be able to
return to politics if they renounced violence.

FULL TEXT:Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said Saturday[20 Sept. he
was willing to offer support to the campaign against the Islamic State of
Iraq and Syria (ISIS) but said military action was not the only answer.

Sisi’s comments, which came during an interview with the Associated Press,
come a day after the recently elected president is due to arrive in the
United States for his first official visit to that country.

On action against ISIS, Saturday did not elaborate what kind of support
Egypt might give but appeared to rule out sending troops, saying Iraq's
military is sufficient and "it's not an issue of ground troops from abroad."

Instead, he spoke of a "comprehensive strategy" that confronts militants
across the region, not just ISIS.

He said he had warned about the threat of terrorism in the region a year ago
but others only understood when ISIS fighters overran parts of Iraq.

He also said supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood would be able to return to
politics if they renounced violence

+++SOURCE: Al Arabiya 20 Sept.’14:”ISIS releases 49 Turkish hostages seized
in Iraq”
SUBJECT:ISIS returns 49 Turkish hostages

QUOTE:”Turkey had publicly resisted joining a coalition to defeat
group(ISIS)”

EXCERPTS:Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Saturday[20 Sept.] that
49 Turkish hostages who were seized by Islamist militants in Iraq have been
freed and safely returned to Turkey, ending Turkey’s most serious hostage
crisis.

Turkish broadcaster NTV said Turkey did not pay a ransom for the hostages
who were held for three months by ISIS militants.

- - - The Turks were captured ISIS overran Mosul and stormed the
Turkish Consulate there. The hostages included Consul General Ozturk Yilmaz,
other diplomats, children and special forces police.

- - - .He did not provide details on the circumstances of their release but
said the hostages were freed through the intelligence agency’s “own methods”
and that no operation was carried out. He thanked Turkey’s intelligence
agency and the Foreign Ministry’s head official for their efforts toward
their release.
- - -
Turkey had publicly resisted joining a coalition to defeat group, citing its
49 kidnapped citizens.
- - -

Thirty-two Turkish truck drivers who were also seized in Mosul in June 6
were released a month later. Turkey did not provide information surrounding
their release.

+++SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon) 20 Sept.’14:”Reports: Belgium Thwarts Jihadist
Attacks”, Agence France Presse
SUBJECT:Belgium prevents jihadist attacks

QUOTE:”Belgian authorities prevented several attacks by jihadist fighters
returning from Syria and by sympathyzers with the Islamic State extremist
group”

FULL TEXT:The Belgian authorities have prevented several attacks by jihadist
fighters returning home from Syria and by sympathizers with the Islamic
State extremist group, a report said Saturday[20 Sept]..

The daily L'Echo cited unnamed sources as saying the planned attacks could
have been similar to the one on the Jewish Museum in central Brussels in May
which left four people dead.

The suspect in that case, Frenchman Medhi Nemmouche, spent more than a year
fighting with Islamist extremists in Syria and is now being held in Belgium
on charges of "murder in a terrorist context".

Up to 400 Belgian nationals are estimated to have gone to fight in Syria,
with about 90 known to have returned home, L'Echo said.

"Our starting point is that among them, one out of nine aim to carry out an
attack," a source said. "That is a conservative estimate, if you also take
into account the people who help them."

The newspaper said its sources did not want to give details of the planned
attacks nor of the operations to prevent them, for reasons of security and
so as not to alarm the public.Several arrests have been made, it added.

Officials declined to provide any details but did confirm that several
operations had been carried out."We are working full time on the problem of
the returning fighters," Belga news agency cited a federal judicial
spokesman as saying. "We work together with the security services and that
led us to carry out several operations," the spokesman said.

Belgium like many European countries is increasingly concerned about
nationals going to fight in Syria and Iraq for fear they will return home
battle hardened and even more radicalized, posing a threat to security.

In June, a court ordered that 46 suspected members of Sharia4Belgium, a
radical Islamist group believed to be involved in sending young fighters to
Syria, should stand trial on various charges, including involvement in a
terrorist organization.

+++SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon) 20 Sept.’14:”Ukraine Signs Buffer Zone Deal
with Rebels”, by Agence France Presse
SUBJECT: Ukraine –Rebels buffer-zone deal signed

QUOTE: “Forces from both sides are required o retreat 15 kilometers from
front lines within 24 hours of the accord.

FULL TEXT:”Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian militias were due Saturday[20
Sept.] to pull back their troops from a demilitarized zone created under a
new peace plan agreed in marathon overnight talks.

A nine-point agreement thrashed out in the early hours of Saturday[20 Sept.]
in the Belarussian capital Minsk also requires the withdrawal of all
"mercenaries" from the conflict zone and an immediate end to hostilities.

But Russia appeared ready to keep up the pressure on its westward-leaning
neighbor by sending in a new 30-truck convoy it said was carrying aid for
the rebel-held city of Donetsk, but that Ukraine never approved.

Former Ukrainian president Leonid Kuchma -- who is representing Kiev in the
stuttering efforts to resolve the five-month conflict -- said the agreement
rested on the creation of a 30-kilometer (19-mile) buffer zone.

Forces from both sides are required to retreat 15 kilometers from current
frontlines within 24 hours of the signing of the accord and allow monitors
from the OSCE pan-European security organization into the area to make sure
the truce holds.

The areas under rebel control would be left open to their administration
under a temporary self-rule plan adopted by lawmakers in Kiev on Tuesday[23
Sept.].

The Minsk pact -- also signed by Moscow's ambassador to Kiev and the
self-proclaimed "prime ministers" of the rebel-run regions of Donetsk and
Lugansk -- aims to shore up a ceasefire deal agreed two weeks ago.

The agreement crucially requires both sides to immediately withdraw "foreign
mercenaries" from the conflict zone in industrial eastern Ukraine.

Kiev and Western allies accuse Russia of clandestinely slipping at least
1,000 paratroopers into east Ukraine to help the guerrillas mount a surprise
counter-offensive late last month.

The Kremlin denies ordering soldiers into Ukraine. But Moscow's Kiev envoy
Mikhail Zurabov told Russian media after the signing of the Minsk deal that
both sides appeared to have hired foreign mercenaries.

The sides agreed to leave the most divisive political issues for future
negotiation in order to get the terms of the truce worked out first.

Donetsk separatist leader Alexander Zakharchenko stressed that the explosive
question of the status of rebel-held Donetsk and Lugansk was not discussed
in Minsk by mutual consent.

"We each have our own understanding of (Kiev's) law on special status,"
Russian media quoted Zakharchenko as saying.

"These are issues for future negotiations that will last another year."

The elusive ultimate goal is to find a lasting solution to a conflict that
has claimed nearly 3,000 lives and stoked Western alarm about Russia's
territorial ambitions.

The talks came in the wake of a peace overture by Ukrainian President Petro
Poroshenko that included a limited self-rule offer for separatist-controlled
areas in the east and an amnesty for all fighters.

The offer was welcomed in Moscow but treated with caution by rebel
commanders who had been seizing back large swathes of territory from
Ukrainian forces in the days preceding the September 5 truce.

The ceasefire has helped calm the worst fighting but continues to be
regularly broken around Donetsk -- the scene of almost daily shelling on the
city's outskirts -- and other disputed parts of the Russian-speaking
industrial heartland.

Rebel representatives in the city of nearly one million -- now with
neighborhoods abandoned by families devastated by constant shelling and food
shortages -- said they had received a Russian humanitarian convoy overnight.

The press service of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic said the
volume of aid "was very large" but provided few other details

Moscow had twice before overlooked concerns in Kiev that the shipments may
be hiding weapons or other supplies for militias and ordered the trucks
across the border without its neighbor’s permission.

The Minsk meeting came at the end of a dizzying week for Poroshenko that
included Ukraine's ratification of a landmark EU association agreement for
which he personally lobbied and a visit to Washington for talks with U.S.
President Barack Obama.

But the 48-year-old chocolate baron failed to convince Obama to become more
directly involved in resisting Russia's "aggression" by providing Kiev with
offensive arms.

The United States instead approved an additional $46-million non-lethal aid
shipment that will provide Ukraine with equipment such as night vision
goggles and bullet-proof vests.

Poroshenko had told a joint session of Congress that aid such as "blankets"
could not help his army with the war.

Ukraine was still set to receive an important boost from the 28-member NATO
military alliance when its defense chiefs gather Saturday[20 Sept.] in the
Lithuanian capital Vilnius for a three-day meeting focused on ways to
counter Kremlin's expansionist threat.

The Western military alliance is due to set up regional command centers in
eastern Europe that would help coordinate the actions of a rapid-response
"spearhead" force approved by NATO earlier this month.

SourceAgence France Presse


+++SOURCE: Jordan Times 20 Sept.’14:”Muslim Brotherhood leaders denied bail”
by Taylor Luck
SUBJECT: Jordan Court denies bail to Muslim Brotherhood

FULL TEXT:AMMAN — The State Security Court (SSC) on Thursday[18 Sept.]
refused to grant bail to two detained leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood
movement facing charges of undermining the state.

Mohammad Saeed Baker and Adel Awad, who were arrested on Monday[15 Sept.],
are to remain in the Marka and Juweideh correctional facilities respectively
until their next bail hearing on Monday[22 Sept.] under the decision,
according to their defence attorney Abdel Qader Al Khatib.

The two veteran Brotherhood members are facing charges of “undermining the
state” for statements critical of authorities during a pro-Gaza rally in
late August.

If convicted, the two men face up to 15 years in prison.

Also on Thursday[18 Sept.], two Brotherhood supporters were referred to the
SSC for making statements deemed threatening to the state during a rally
calling for the jailed Islamists’ release on Tuesday [23 Sept.].

Security officials refused to detail the charges the two men face.

However, Khatib said the two men face charges of “undermining the state” for
comments deemed critical of the regime during the Amman rally.

=====
Sue Lerner - Associate, IMRA

Search For An Article

....................................................................................................

Contact Us

POB 982 Kfar Sava
Tel 972-9-7604719
Fax 972-3-7255730
email:imra@netvision.net.il IMRA is now also on Twitter
http://twitter.com/IMRA_UPDATES

image004.jpg (8687 bytes)