Iran & the Middle East

• According to the Iraqi Ministry of Defense, Iranian troops have attacked Kurdish rebel positions inside of Iraq. The report said Iranian troops bombed border areas near the town of Hajj Umran, before crossing into Iraq.

• Iran on Sunday said it would be willing to discuss Moscow’s proposal to move uranium enrichment to Russia and would allow snap inspections of its facilities if the UN Security Council were to send its case back to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

• Asharqq Alawsat is reporting that "eight fundamentalist Islamist organizations have received large sums of money in the last month from the Iranian intelligence services, as part of a project to strike U.S military and economic installations across the Middle East" in the event of military action against Iran, with the plan being called "Judgement Day." Steve Emerson says Iran is capable of terrorist attacks in the U.S. at any time.

• Former Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Arens says that Israeli forces should retake part of the Gaza to prevent rocket attacks against Israel, but are reluctant to do so as it would be a tactical admission that retreat from Gaza was a mistake in the first place.

• The Israeli army says Palestinian militants have smuggled some Katyusha rockets into the Gaza Strip, potentially threatening towns well inside Israel. Military sources say the rockets have been smuggled into Gaza through tunnels in the Rafah area, running under the border with Egypt.

• Hezbollah has scoffed at being named a terrorist organization once again by the United States, and responded by saying that "the right move to place on a terrorism list is the one who supports Israeli terrorism against the Palestinian people and the Zionist occupation and aggression on Arab states."

• A bomb exploded next to an Israeli bus near the West Bank village of Beit Fourik on Saturday night, fortunately not wounding anyone. The Aksa Martyrs' Brigade organization of the Fatah claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement to the press.

• Time Magazine takes a look at the situation in Egypt, where response to recent bombings and civil unrest has regime watchers concerned.

• Sunni Muslims in Bahrain staged a small but noisy demonstration in support of Palestinian and Iraqi insurgents on Friday, but their underlying aim appeared to be a bid to raise their community's profile against the Shi'ite Muslim majority, which has dominated protest politics in Bahrain. Shouting "Death to America," the 150 protesters called on Arab governments to support Iraqi insurgents and the Hamas government in the Palestinian Authority. They demanded that the United States withdraw from Iraq and handed out T-shirts bearing the image of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.

• Egyptian security forces killed three terrorists suspected of involvement in last week's attack in Dahab. The suspects were also wanted in connection with bombings in the Sinai resorts of Taba and Ras Sahtan in October 2004 and in Sharm el-Sheik in July 2005. Two other suspects, captured two days earlier, have also been detained.

• Israeli defense forces captured 11 wanted terror suspects Friday morning, a night after arresting seven others near Shechem and Hebron. Five wanted Islamic Jihad members were caught west of Jenin and another six were arrested in the village of Arabeh, a little further south.

• Senator John McCain warned Russia and China of damaging their relationship with the United States by failing to hold Iran accountable. McCain told a Brussels conference that Iran’s nuclear program posed the greatest security threat to the world alongside terrorism. The U.N. Security Council should impose sanctions including an investment ban, a travel ban and asset freezes on government leaders and nuclear scientists.

• Ahmed Jibril, the leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) warned the United States and Israel on Friday that if they attacked Syria or Iran, members of his militant organization would fight them, saying "we will not allow any aggression against Syria or the Islamic Republic of Iran."

• Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is ordering a rapid completion of the West Bank barrier as minister meet to discuss amendments in the route of the barrier. "We must go forward as quickly as possible," Olmert said Sunday, adding that "the decisions which we are taking will enable us to complete the security barrier as quickly as possible so that we can best prevent terrorist attacks."

• Two Kassam rockets were launched out of the Gaza Strip on Friday night landing in open areas in Israel. Earlier in the day, two other rockets were also fired. There were no reported injuries or damage in any of the attacks.

• Terrorism expert Olivier Guitta highlights al Qaeda's expansion into Gaza and the newly released fatwa of Al Tawhid and Jihad in Syria and Palestine, which calls for the slaughter of Fatah leaders.

America Domestic Security & the Americas

• Two men charged last week in a terrorism case traveled to Washington D.C. to shoot "casing videos" of the Capitol building and other potential targets, a prosecutor alleged during a bail hearing. Prosecutors leveled the new allegations against Ehsanul Islam Sadequee and Syed Haris Ahmed while challenging a New York judge's earlier decision to release Sadequee to house arrest at his mother's residence in Roswell, Georgia on $250,000 bail.

• The U.S. attorney on Friday said he was confident the conviction of a Lodi man on terrorism-related charges will be upheld despite a signed statement from a juror saying she was improperly pressured into casting a guilty vote. "Hamid Hayat remains convicted of providing material support to terrorists and of lying to the FBI about that conduct. It is a long settled principle of law that second thoughts about a verdict by a juror are not enough to overturn that verdict," U.S. Attorney McGregor Scott said in a statement.

• The Pentagon plans to release nearly a third of those held at Guantanamo Bay for terrorism suspects here because they pose no threat to U.S. security, an official of the war crimes tribunal said Monday. Charges are pending against about two dozen of the remaining prisoners, the chief prosecutor said. But he left unclear why the rest face neither imminent freedom nor a day in court after as many as four years in custody.

• The U.S. on Friday said Canada has become a "safe haven" for Islamic terrorists who exploit lax immigration laws and weak counterterrorism enforcement to raise money and plan attacks.

• The president of Colombia flew to this mountain-ringed city Friday to personally oversee an investigation into the murder of a former president's younger sister. Authorities said they did not know whether Liliana Gaviria's slaying was the act of common criminals or intended as a message, a month ahead of presidential elections, that the law-and-order government cannot guarantee Colombians' safety.

• The long terrorism conspiracy case of Sami Al-Arian is drawing to a close and the former Tampa college professor could soon walk out of his jail cell and into the hands of immigration officers to be deported. Al-Arian, 48, a former University of South Florida computer engineering professor, is expected to be sentenced Monday morning after pleading guilty April 14 to providing support to members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a terrorist group responsible for hundreds of deaths in Israel and the Palestinian territories.

• Five relatives of a U.S. citizen suspected of being a senior al-Qaida operative were arrested in California and Utah on charges of defrauding banks of hundreds of thousands of dollars. The FBI said it was investigating whether any of the money was used to finance Middle East terrorism. Four of the five defendants - all U.S. citizens or legal residents from Jordan where the family of al-Qaida suspect Shawqi Omar has extensive ties - were arraigned Thursday. The fifth was excused for medical reasons.

Russia, Caucasus & Central Asia

• Three militants were killed in a special operation in Nalchik, the capital city of the Russian North Caucasus republic of Kabardino-Balkaria. The sweep was carried out jointly by the local department of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) and the local Interior Ministry. "The militants were hiding in an apartment in a five-story house on 2nd Tamanskoi Divizii Street in Nalchik," a source in Kabardino-Balkar law enforcement told Interfax on Saturday.

• Chechen prime minister Ramzan Kadyrov said Saturday he had disbanded an anti-terrorism center and the "Kadyrov security service." He said last month that over 7,000 militants had surrendered and returned to a peaceful life in the past few years.

• Chechen separatists' information service claims that Russian secret services control real estate purchases and renting by the Chechens and other Caucasian natives, Kavkaz Center reports. There is an order to report of any transactions with real estate – especially in Moscow, to the FSB, the service claims. The Russian Real Estate Agency is said to be reporting to the secret services of any "suspicious" buyers or renters.

• A regional security alliance of five ex-Soviet states and China will draw up a comprehensive list of terrorists and groups operating in Eurasia to boost the efficiency of their counter-terrorism efforts. Vyacheslav Kasymov, managing director of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization's anti-terror unit, said the list would be compiled using databases provided by the security forces of individual member countries - Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and China.

• Four suspected militants were arrested in the southern Russian region of Chechnya on suspicion of involvement in bomb attacks on federal interior troops.

• Commenting on recent base deals between the U.S. and Bulgaria and Romania, Andrei Kokoshin, chairman of the Russian Duma’s CIS Affairs Committee, said "the action undertaken by the U.S. would destabilize the situation in East Europe and would not promote truly joint efforts in fighting both terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction."

• Abkhaz and South Ossetian leaders Sergey Bagapsh and Eduard Kokoity, respectively, said on April 28 in Sukhumi that cooperation between the two regions is aimed at peace and is not directed against Georgia. Kokoity and Bagapsh signed a protocol on exchange of notes on ratification of an “Agreement on Friendship and Cooperation between Abkhaz and South Ossetian Republics” in Sukhumi.

• "The existence of secret jails on the territory of Azerbaijan is out of the question," said Samed Seidov, head of the Azerbaijani delegation at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. Seidov said Azerbaijan had presented an official reply to a CE query about the possibility of secret prisons being run by the CIA in the country, adding that reports about the existence of such prisons in Azerbaijan were designed to tarnish the country's international image.

Afghanistan & Southern Asia

• Pakistan arrested four members of Hizb-ut-Tahrir -- an international Islamic group -- for allegedly publishing hate material, police said. Authorities in Karachi seized pamphlets, sealed a printing press and arrested its owner, suspected group member Arshad Salim, police officer Mohammad Boota told AFP on Friday.

• Thousands of Nepalis surrounded the gates of the country's revived parliament on Friday, waving party flags and chanting slogans to keep up pressure for a new constitution after weeks of street protests. But with 84-year-old prime minister-designate Girija Prasad Koirala too sick to attend his swearing-in ceremony in the morning, the legislature was unlikely to take any major decisions to immediately satisfy the crowd, politicians said. "Parliament will sit, but it will only be a formal sitting," said Krishna Prasad Situala, spokesman for Koirala's Nepali Congress party, the country's largest.

• Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf said in a British newspaper interview that he was not fighting terrorists in his country purely on behalf of the United States. Covert American air strikes against Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network in Pakistan were an infringement of national sovereignty, the general told the Guardian newspaper in Rawalpindi.

• Pakistan must help prevent the spread of the resurgent Taliban militia in Afghanistan and within its own borders, the United Nations Special Representative to Afghanistan said. The two countries must also cooperate instead of constantly accusing each other publicly of failing to act against the Islamic fighters, Tom Koenigs told reporters in Kabul on Thursday.

• Police shot and killed nine Maoist rebels, including six women, when the guerrillas attacked a patrol in southern India, officials said. Police said it was the largest number of Maoist rebels killed in a single incident this year and said the dead may include some senior Maoist leaders. The gunbattle took place in the forests of Kadapa district, some 500 kilometers (300 miles) south-east of Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh state.

• A senior Afghan police official narrowly escaped an assassination attempt Friday but his two guards were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near his vehicle in southern Afghanistan.

• Afghan President Hamid Karzai marked the 14th anniversary of the defeat of a communist government on Friday with a call to the Taliban to give up their insurgency and rejoin society. Mujahideen holy warrior forces captured Kabul on April 28, 1992, ending the rule of a pro-Soviet government but ushering in a civil war that only ended when the Taliban seized power in 1996.

• Mine attacks killed five military personnel and wounded five Thursday in northern Sri Lanka, the latest bout of violence that threatens to return the island nation to all-out civil war. Separately, police found five headless corpses near the capital, Colombo, and said they were investigating whether the deaths were linked to the recent surge in fighting with Tamil rebels.

• Here are the daily updates from the South Asia Terrorism Portal for Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

• A US government study released on Friday reports an increase in terrorist activities in South Asia during 2005 but acknowledges that Pakistan has ‘significantly increased’ its effort to fight terrorists. The report notes that terrorism remained a major problem in the region, with increases in activity by terrorist groups in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. “Pakistan captured or killed hundreds of terrorists, significantly increasing the effectiveness of its counter-terrorism operation,” says the report, noting that in July, President Pervez Musharraf declared a ‘jihad on extremism’ and promised to close down extremist institutions.

• A body found in Afghanistan has been identified as that of an Indian telecommunications engineer who was kidnapped earlier in the week by Taliban members, a regional police chief said.

• An explosion ripped through a bus in the northern Indian state of Punjab on Friday, injuring 15 passengers, police said. Twelve of those hurt were hospitalized in Jullundur, a key city in Punjab, in serious condition, said Ishwar Singh, senior superintendent of police. Eight other passengers escaped without injury, he told The Associated Press.

• A Qaeda has claimed a March suicide bomb attack which killed five, including an American diplomat and a US consulate employee in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi just before US President George W. Bush visited. In the statement, whose authenticity could not be immediately verified, the organisation promised a "summer of hell" for US troops in Afghanistan.

Far East & Southeast Asia

• Indonesian security forces killed two terrorists in a raid on Saturday in Java, that target wanted Jemaah Islamiyah leader Noordin Mohammed Top. The two men killed were explosives experts and had been accused of involvement in the September 2004 Australian embassy attack in which nine people were killed.

• Security forces are on heightened alert in the southern Philippines following intelligence reports of a possible bomb attack by the Southeast Asian terror network Jemaah Islamiya (JI). According to Filipino Army spokesman Francisco Simbajon, "There are reports that JI is planning an attack on civilian targets. Security forces are in red alert and we appeal to citizens to report to authorities any suspicious person or abandoned package or bag in public places."

• Abu Sayyaf member Abdusalih Dimah was captured in Sumisip town in the rebel stronghold of Basilan island, according to military intelligence officials said. Dimah helped support Abu Sayyaf members who kidnapped three American tourists and 17 Filipinos from a resort in May 2001.

• The political party of democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi on Saturday rejected allegations by Myanmar’s military government of ties to terrorist groups.

• China and Vietnam are conducting joint military patrols off the Gulf of Tonkin, the first-time the Chinese navy has taken part in military exercises with another country. The countries signed an agreement in October to begin the joint patrols when Vietnamese Defense Minister Pham Van Tra met with his counterpart Cao Gangchuan in Beijing.

• According to the Filipino government, Jemaah Islamiyah and Abu Sayyaf are attempting to torpedo peace talks between the government in Manila and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

Europe

• Five men pleaded not guilty to charges stemming from an alleged failed attempt to mimic the deadly July 7 suicide bombings in London last year. During a 90-minute hearing at the Old Bailey criminal court, they denied charges of conspiring to attack London's transport network and murder passengers on July 21 -- exactly two weeks after the bombings.

• One of the leading figures indicted in the March 11, 2004, train bombings in Madrid used a simple trick that allowed him to communicate with his confederates on ordinary e-mail accounts but still avoid government detection, according to the judge investigating the case. Instead of sending the messages, the man, Hassan el Haski, saved them as drafts on accounts he shared with other militants, said papers issued by the judge, Juan del Olmo.

• Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is to resign on Tuesday - more than three weeks after his narrow election defeat. His announcement came after his centre-right alliance failed to get its candidate elected as Senate speaker.

• Macedonian Interior Minister Ljubomir Mihajlovski denied any involvement of Macedonia in the alleged transfer of the German citizen Khaled Al-Masri to Afghanistan by US secret agents. "There are no indications that foreign intelligence officers, i.e. CIA, were involved in this case", said Mihajlovski after the meting with the European Parliament's delegation, which arrived in Macedonia to investigate the case.

Africa

• There has been a car bomb attack near an oil refinery in Nigeria's Delta region, reports say. State officials told the AFP news agency there were no casualties when the car blew up near the port town of Warri, but several cars were damaged. The car was parked at a truck stop used by oil tankers which service the town's refinery, a military official said.

• A post at Threats Watch says "the US Army’s Strategic Studies Institute has published a new monograph by Colonel Thomas Dempsey that is well worth your time: Counterterrorism in African Failed States: Challenges and Potential Solutions. The monograph focuses on Sub-Saharan Africa, principally the failed states of Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Somalia."

• The U.S. government has decided to repatriate 10 of 12 Somalis who fired upon two U.S. Navy vessels in an incident that occurred on March 18. The U.S. government worked with the International Committee of the Red Cross to make arrangements for today's repatriation. The two remaining Somalis continue to receive follow-on medical care aboard USS Peleliu for injuries sustained during the initial incident.

• Mediators from the African Union (AU) agreed in the early hours of Monday to give the warring parties from Sudan's Darfur region an extra 48 hours to strike a peace deal after a midnight deadline expired. International pressure on the government of Sudan and three Darfur rebel factions intensified in the build-up to the deadline, but only the government said it would sign an 85-page settlement drafted by the AU. The rebels insisted they wanted more of their demands to be met.

The Global War

• Tigerhawk has a comprehensive post up at the Belmont Club about reconsidering victory conditions in the wider war.

• Some believe that the rift between al Qaeda and other Islamic terrorist organizations is growing wider, symbolized by the condemnation from Hamas of the terror attacks in Egypt last week. The AP article says the rift has "largely has not been acknowledged among Western powers, who tend to lump Islamic radicals together."

• The judge in the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui has admonished one of the jurors for consulting an online dictionary for the definition of the term "aggravating."

• The most intractable safe havens for terrorists tend to exist along international borders in Asia, Africa and South America where there is ineffective governance, according to a fact sheet issued by the State Department.

• According to former CIA operative turned critic/author Mike Scheuer, is saying the Bush administration passed on killing Zarqawi because they were catering to diplomatic efforts.

• According to some analysts, the prison escape by 23 suspected Al Qaeda terrorists three months ago has raised questions about Yemen’s ability to contain militancy and cast a chill over US-Yemen relations.

• The Strategy Page explains why al Qaeda is retreating from Iraq.

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