BREAKING NEWS Taliban Kill Scores in Attack on Pakistani Military School

December 16, 2014 By administrator

In one of Pakistan’s bloodiest attacks in recent years, scores of people were killed after a group of Taliban gunmen stormed a school in northwestern Pakistan, officials and rescue workers said on Tuesday. Hundreds of students remained trapped inside the compound as security forces exchanged fire with the gunmen, officials said.
The siege started Tuesday morning around 10 a.m. when at least five to six heavily armed Taliban gunmen entered Army Public School and Degree College in Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province. According to initial reports, the gunmen opened fire on students and have taken dozens of them as hostages. Some students managed to escape the school compound, the local news media reported.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has left the capital, Islamabad, for Peshawar, state-run news media reported, saying he would personally supervise the operation against the militants.

ISIS forces launch multiple attacks on Kurdish territory in Iraq

October 21, 2014 By administrator

ISIS militants launched about 15 near-simultaneous attacks on Kurdish forces in northern Iraq on Monday in what Kurdish government officials and the news agency Rudaw said was a fierce and renewed push for territory, CNN reported.

ISIS also launched attacks against Mosul Dam, a strategic prize, and also renewed its offensive on the Sinjar mountain range in northern Iraq.

An ISIS-commandeered military truck loaded with explosives targeted a Peshmerga checkpoint along the security belt circling the dam, killing six security force members and injuring seven others critically, according to Peshmerga spokesman Said Mamazeen.

At almost the same time, ISIS militants launched an attack on the Nineveh Valley near the dam, which was repelled by Peshmerga forces using European and American weapons, the spokesman said.

Another Kurdish military official, who asked not to be named for protocol and security reasons, said that despite the attacks, it would be difficult for ISIS to gain control of the dam because of the large numbers of Peshmerga forces in the area.

ISIL kills 15, abducts 300 Kurds in attacks on Kurdish towns in Syria

May 30, 2014 By administrator

TODAY’S ZAMAN / ANKARA

The al-Qaeda-linked Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) killed 15 Kurds, including seven children, in an attack on a village in northern Syria and abducted 300 Kurds in a village close to Aleppo, according to news outlets.

The attack, in which 15 people were killed, is the latest in the ISIL offensive against Syrian Kurds during a six-month period in Rojava, the Kurdish name given to northern Syria, where the Kurds have gained the upper hand in control of the area in recent months.

There have been ongoing clashes for months between ISIL and Syria’s Democratic Union Party (PYD) — an offshoot of the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) — over control of several key towns in northern Syria along the Turkish border. During the clashes, the son of PYD leader Saleh Muslim was killed. However, the clashes have escalated in the past days between the PYD and ISIL for control of areas.

Kurds have gained considerable swathes of territory in Syria’s north as a result of fierce fighting with al-Qaeda-linked radical groups, tightening their grip on an area where they have set up autonomous rule.

The reports based the information on the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and a freelance photographer, who stated that the attack took place on Thursday at Tilleye, a village 100 meters away from the Turkish border, after militants stormed the village.

According to news reports, around 30 people were killed in the attack. The reports added that the People’s Defense Units (YPG), the armed militia of the PYD, came to the village in the early hours of Friday and clashed with the ISIL forces in order to gain control of the village.

“This village is known to be Yezidi. However, the village was evacuated due to the clashes and the YPG gained control of the village. Later on, the Arabs who fled from Aleppo settled in the village. They [ISIL] probably thought these Arabs were Yezidis,” said Muslim in an interview with the Turkish Hürriyet daily.

Muslim noted that Serekaniye was an area in which clashes between the YPG and ISIL frequently took place and that clashes between the two groups were still going on.

Last year, the PYD had seized control of Ras al-Ain following days of clashes with fighters affiliated with the al-Nusra Front. Ras al-Ain is part of Syria’s northeastern oil-producing province of Hasaka, home to many of the million-strong Syrian Kurdish minority. One Reuters photograph showed six bodies, including three young boys.

The attack is said to be retaliation for a recent PYD bomb attack near the ISIL-controlled Lazor Hotel located in the northern city of Raqqa, where ISIL has control. Sixty-seven people were killed in that attack.

Three hundred Kurds were abducted by ISIL during the al-Qaeda-affiliated group’s recent raid on Al-Bab village in Syria’s Aleppo province. Recently, Kurdish residents of the town of Al-Bab and surrounding villages stated that they were deeply concerned about deadly fighting among rival opposition groups and about a takeover by al-Qaeda groups. Al-Bab, which is close to Ceylanpınar, a town in Turkey’s southeastern province of Şanlıurfa, is a multiethnic town home to Kurds, Arabs, Christians and Turkmens.

According to reports, on Thursday night members of ISIL raided the town and carried out an identity check of residents there. After the identity check, the group abducted 300 people and left the town.

According to Al Jazeera, those abducted were all Kurds and that the place where they were taken was unconfirmed.

The PYD leader had previously accused Turkey of having a hand in the atrocities committed by extremist groups fighting against the regime in Syria. Ankara has denied the claims several times, saying it will not take part in the ongoing fighting in Syria.

Muslim later said Ankara’s policy towards radical groups changed after Syria’s extremist groups started to pose a threat to the security of Turkey and it cut support to al-Qaeda-affiliated groups in Syria. “Moreover, international pressure has also contributed [to the change of policy on radical groups],” Muslim added.

Azerbaijan attacks the Gülen movement

May 23, 2014 By administrator

Azerbaijan seems to join the campaign by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan against a religious movement led by Imam Muslim residing in the United States Fethullah Gülen.

Erdogan said that members of the Gülen movement intend to bring down his government, and during the last year, he led a crackdown where all barred against the alleged members Gülenistes. On April 8, Erdogan told members of his ruling Justice and Development he had discussed this motion with Azerbaijani officials during a visit to Baku in April and was given a list of Azerbaijanis considered supporters Gülen. Azerbaijan is the closest regional ally of Turkey.

For several years, the Azerbaijani government has tried to restrict the activities of Islamist groups, but, until recently, had made no public action against supporters of Gülen. These people – called nurçular referring to Sunni theologian Said Nursi 20th century, which inspired the education initiatives Gülen – do not carry the same weight in Azerbaijani society as they have in Turkey. But over the past two weeks, there were several indicators that Baku changed its position.

Representatives of the Gülen movement deny the allegations Erdogan of having engaged in anti-state activity – but nervousness against groups critical of government is strong in Azerbaijan. In recent weeks, rampant speculation on social networks and pro-government media in Baku focused on the fact that members of the Azerbaijani government could sympathize with the Gülen movement. A suspected sympathizer Gülen, spokesman of the Presidential Administration Elnur Aslanov was fired on March 17.

The Azerbaijani government has not commented on the information. But without doubt, the events speak for themselves already.

In early March, Khalik Mammadov, Vice-President of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) has announced that the energy company managed by the government took over management of 11 secondary schools in Turkish 13 centers of exam preparation universities and the private University of Baku-based Caucasus, all run by a Turkish company called educational CAG Öğrətim (Age Education).

Since 2011 SOCAR launched a network of schools in the alleged purpose is to improve the educational standards of Azerbaijan. CAG Öğrətim, now known as the International Centre for Education in Baku, Azerbaijan works since 1992 and has enjoyed a reputation for producing students disciplined sensitive to Islamic ethics and able to enter universities leading in the world.

CAG Öğrətim never acknowledged a link with the Gülen movement, but most education specialists from Azerbaijan and policy experts saw its facilities within the school network in 140 countries of the Gülen movement. Öğrətim AG is part of the International Association of Manufacturers and Entrepreneurs of Turkey and Azerbaijan, a group that contains many Turkish companies that uphold principles of Gülen.

Representatives of SOCAR did not elaborate on the interest of the conglomerate in schools but CAG Öğrətim Caucasus University was acquired last year and some observers see a link with suspicions of Turkey on the Gülen movement. “I think for the Azerbaijani authorities, the idea is definitely that” we can control more effectively if we manage, “commented specialist Bayram Balci Turkey to Paris, who worked in Baku for the French Institute of Anatolian Studies (IFEA).

In March, in a move seen as an attempt to target the finances of Gülen, Turkey closed private schools associated with Gülen who, like during Araz CAG Öğrətim, prepare students for university entrance exams. Erdoğan called on other countries to follow this example.

Balci explained that the Turkish government has probably called the “fraternal” Azerbaijan, a country which shares linguistic and cultural ties with Turkey, “pay attention” to these schools. “For the Azerbaijani government, it is a good opportunity to show Ankara Baku is always in solidarity with Ankara.”

SOCAR partner of Turkey longtime seems a natural candidate for any exercise. The spokesman for the company could not be reached for comment. Similarly, CAG Öğrətim has not responded to requests for interviews on the transition to SOCAR. The rector of the University of Caucasus Sanic Ahmet told EurasiaNet.org he prefers not to discuss the question “for a while.” Even if there was no pressure from Ankara, Azerbaijani leaders seem to have reason to be wary of schools and centers of exam preparation CAG Öğrətim. Outside Baku, schools exist in key regional centers such as population Ganja, Lankaran and Sumgait and more distant locations. This presence in the regions is a potential source of concern to the Azerbaijani government, which has faced large-scale regional events in recent years some observers believe.

“As former students of these schools, as elsewhere in the world, they have their own community. In Azerbaijan, where political parties and other institutions have been weakened, their network [school] … is more distinguished, “said Altay Goyushov, a professor of Islamic history at the State University of Baku. “This is what the Azerbaijani government does not like: The competition.”

Yet Erestin Orujlu, director of the research center East-West of Baku, says some officials use what happens against this movement in Azerbaijan simply to “weaken the position of the other.”

Aside Aslanov a published list of alleged Gülenistes Azerbaijan has also updated the names of Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov, the head of the State Committee for Work with Religious Organizations Elshad Iskenderov and ironically Mammadov of SOCAR.

As Aslanov, who now works at the Ministry of Communications, the Ministry of Defence denied the allegations about the alleged affiliation of Defence Minister Hasanov with the Gülen movement. Other persons named above have not commented publicly.

For some Azerbaijanis, silence is not a surprise. The allegations are “fabricated” accused Orujlu. “The Azerbaijani government does not face any threat of nurcu movement.”

Editor’s Note:

Shahla Sultanova is a freelance journalist focusing on Azerbaijan.

Eurasianet.org