IRAQ BRIEFING

• As a result of the ongoing insurgency, the US is keeping high force levels inside Iraq indefinitely.

• Former Iraqi general Mohammed Latif has assumed command of the Fallujah Brigade. Latif appears confident of his ability to restore order in the city.

• Unfortunately, al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab Zarqawi appears to have escaped from Fallujah.

• Time Magazine has a short story on the Thulfiqar Army that is currently killing off Sadr's jackboots in An Najaf. I've got a little bit more on this and other issues that you can read here.

• US forces fought off a Mahdi Army attack near An Najaf. British troops appear to have netted quite a few Sadr followers as well.

• The US has launched its first major assault against the Mahdi Army enclaves in Karbala with Polish support.

• A number prominent Iraqi Shi'ite leaders are telling Sadr to hang it up, including an An Najafi tribal leader who supports US action in An Najaf to get rid of the Mahdi Army.

• Former Iraqi human rights minister Abdel Basset Turki is claiming to have to Bremer about the abuses by US troops at Abu Gharib prison in November 2003.

• CIA officials are claiming that they were not involved with the abuses at Abu Gharib.

IRAN REPORTS

• MEMRI has a nice round-up concerning Iranian involvement with Muqtada al-Sadr.

• Is Ahmed Chalabi, easily among the more controversial figures in the Iraqi Governing Council, in cahoots with Iran? Mark Hosenball of Newsweek suggests so, while the New York Sun suggests otherwise.

• Iran has reimposed a death sentence on dissident academic Hashem Aghajari.

THE WIDER WAR

• The details of the Pakistani amnesty in Waziristan appear to be serving as their own parody. First, it appears that members of the al-Qaeda affiliate IMU served as Nek Mohammed's security detail during his appearance before the Pakistani military and now the Pakistani government is extending the amnesty offer for al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters.

• A car bombing in Pakistani Baluchistan has killed 3 Chinese engineers.

• 10 Afghan troops have been killed in a Taliban attack in Zabul province.

• Suspected Taliban have poisoned Afghan schoolgirls as part of a bid to prevent them from attending school.

• A splinter faction of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hizb-e-Islami wants peace and has cut all ties to the renegade warlord.

• Thailand is boosting security in the south following the recent violence by the Pattani separatists. Time takes a good look at the forces that shaped the road to radicalism in southern Thailand

• GSPC fighters in Algeria have stepped up attacks in recent days, including the deliberate killing of women and children.

• Filippino JI member Abdulgani is claiming that an Indonesian named Usman is responsible for funding JI in the Philippines.

• All four participants of the recent terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia came from the same family who wrote farewell letters before the attack. No doubt all of them Zionists to a man ...

• The Times of India takes a look at why the CIA opted to place the Nepalese People's War on the terrorist list.

• Somalia is chalk full of sightings of al-Qaeda leader Fazul Abdullah Mohammed.

• The Washington Post has a long but useful primer on Menad Benchellali and al-Qaeda's quest for WMDs.

• We try to end on a lighter note if possible. I've heard of a cat burglar before, but this is ridiculous ...