Lest we forget... From the New York Times, Jan. 26:

Woman Who Survived 9/11 Is Killed by a Car in the City
It was a beautiful morning on Sept. 11, 2001, so Florence Cioffi made a decision that helped save her life: She left her office in the World Trade Center for a coffee break and was able to flee the devastation of the terrorist attack.

In a front-page story Jan. 25, "US Asking Iraq for Wide Rights in Fighting War," the New York Times writes: "With its international mandate in Iraq set to expire in 11 months, the Bush administration will insist that the government in Baghdad give the United States broad authority to conduct combat operations and guarantee civilian contractors specific legal protections from Iraqi law, according to administration and military officials... The American negotiating position for a formal military-to-military relationship, one that would replace the current United Nations mandate, is laid out in a draft proposal that was described by White House, Pentagon, State Department and military officials on ground rules of anonymity. It also includes less controversial demands that American troops be immune from Iraqi prosecution, and that they maintain the power to detain Iraqi prisoners." Meanwhile, a video posted on YouTube of a Jan. 3 appearance in Derry, NH, has presidential candidate John McCain responding to a question about whether US troops could be in Iraq 50 years: "Make it 100. We've been in Japan for 60 years, we've been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That would be fine with me."

Hundreds of Afghans chanted anti-US slogans in Ghazni Jan. 24 to protest the deaths of nine police, including a district commander, who local officials said were killed the previous day in an anti-Taliban operation by coalition troops. The coalition denied the claims, saying four insurgents were killed and nine were detained on the mission. Faced with troop shortages, US and NATO-led forces rely increasingly on air-strikes. (AP, Jan. 24)

Police in Barcelona arrested 14 men and raided several apartments, two mosques and a bakery over the weekend. Authorities said the group included 12 Pakistanis, an Indian and a Bangladeshi, and that bomb-making materials were confiscated. Spain's Interior Minister Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba said Saturday that the detainees "belonged to a well-organized group that had gone a step beyond radicalization." He said Spanish authorities cooperated with foreign intelligence agencies in the raids, while local newspaper accounts said Madrid had been tipped off about militants leaving Pakistan to initiate a terror plot in Barcelona.

While the Shi'ite Ashura festivals went off peacefully in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir this year, there were riots on the Indian side of the Line of Control. Islamabad's official Associated Press of Pakistan writes Jan. 21 that "[T]he occupying Indian troops subjected hundreds of mourners to brute force in Srinagar and several other places in the held state to prevent them from taking out Ashura procession." India's NDTV reports that incidents of "stone-pelting" erupted after police tried to break up "clashes...between members of the Shia and Sunni communities...after a Shia procession was taken out in Gojwara, which is a predominantly Sunni area." The Srinagar-based Greater Kashmir News Network reports Jan. 24 that ten detainees in the city are on hunger strike to protest their failure to be brought before a magistrate.

Chad's Alliance for National Resistance (ANR) said Jan. 19 they had shot down an army MI-24 helicopter gunship which attacked their positions at Beda near the Sudanese border. The rebels used a SAM-7 ground-to-air missile. (AFP, Jan. 19) Sudan accused Chadian aircraft of bombing western Darfur in "repeated aggressions" last month. Read a Foreign Ministry statement: "In an unprecedented escalation, Chadian forces have violated the joint border as three Chadian war planes bombed two areas...in West Darfur...on December 28." (Reuters, Dec. 30) Gibraltar-based Signet Mining, with operations in Chad, Niger and South Africa, plans to build a uranium processing plant at its Madagzang prospect in Chad "sometime next year," said CEO Calvyn Gardner. (Mining Weekly Online, Jan. 22)

The US State Department has condemned the Sudanese government for appointing purported Janjaweed commander Musa Hilal as a special advisor to President Omar al-Bashir. Said spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos: "We deplore the government of Sudan's decision to name him to a senior position. He is under both US and UN sanctions for the role he played in Darfur." In April 2006, the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Hilal and three other Sudanese nationals accused of war crimes in Darfur, freezing their financial assets. On a visit to Turkey, Bashir defended Hilal's appointment: "Musa Hilal is an influential person in Darfur. Through his leadership, he has contributed greatly to security and stability in the region. We believe the accusations against him are baseless." (AFP, Jan. 22)

Mexican federal police backed up by the army's elite Airborne Special Forces Group (GAFES) detained at least six municipal police in the border city of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, in a surprise pre-dawn raid on their headquarters Jan. 19. Nuevo Laredo mayor Ramón Garza Barrios did not challenge the arrests, saying he would defer to federal authorities until more information is available. (El Universal, Jan. 19)