US Navy fires laser weapon in Mideast amid drone boat threat

 

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The U.S. Navy announced Wednesday it tested a laser weapon and destroyed a floating target in the Mideast, a system that could be used to counter bomb-laden drone boats deployed by Yemen’s Houthi rebels in the Red Sea.

The test Tuesday saw the USS Portland test-fire its Laser Weapon System Demonstrator at the target in the Gulf of Aden, the body of water separating East Africa from the Arabian Peninsula.

The Navy’s Mideast-based 5th Fleet described the laser as having “successfully engaged” the target in a statement. Previously, the Portland used the laser to bring down a flying drone in May 2020.

The Gulf of Aden sits along the southern coast of war-torn Yemen, which has been at war since Iranian-backed Houthi rebels seized its capital, Sanaa, in 2014. A Saudi-led coalition entered the conflict in March 2015 but the stalemate conflict has dragged on for years, becoming the world’s worst humanitarian disaster and killing an estimated 110,000 people.

The war also has bled into the surrounding waterways, like the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb, which connects the sea to the Gulf of Aden. These waterways lead to the Suez Canal and onto the Mediterranean Sea, making them crucial for international shipping and global energy supplies.

The Houthis have deployed drone boats into these waters, which can be piloted remotely and sent up to a target before detonating. These boats are suspected of being built with Iran’s help.

Emirati officials in 2018 showed off footage they described as coming from a drone boat computer that had Iranians building components for the boat’s guidance system, with a hat visible in the background of one picture bearing the symbol of Iran’s hardline paramilitary Revolutionary Guard. Iran has denied arming the Houthis, though United Nations experts, independent analysts and Western nations point to evidence showing Tehran’s link to the weapons.

Two Abu Sayyaf militants killed in southern Philippine clash

The Philippine troops killed two Abu Sayyaf militants during a clash on Sunday in the mountainous Patikul town in Sulu Province in the southern Philippines, a military spokesman said.

Major Arvin Encinas of the military's Western Mindanao Command (Westmincom) said army scout rangers battled 40 militants near the village Bakong at around 1 p.m. on Sunday while trying to rescue five Indonesians and a Filipino doctor that Abu Sayyaf kidnapped last month and early this month.

Encinas said two militants were killed and the rest fled and were chased by the elite troops.

At least two army scout rangers were also injured in the clash, Encinas said.

"This is part of our rescue operation but we are not yet sure if this is the specific group holding the kidnap victims," he added.

Westmincom commander Lieutenant General Cirilito Sobejana said Sunday's encounter is an offshoot of the military's continued search and rescue operation to find all the hostages that Abu Sayyaf kidnapped last month and early this month.

On Jan. 16, Abu Sayyaf gunmen seized five Indonesian fishermen off Sabah in Malaysia and brought them to Sulu. Philippine troops recovered the boat the kidnappers used and killed one of their captors following a firefight in Sulare island in Parang town, Sulu two days later.

Abu Sayyaf gunmen also abducted a Filipino doctor in the remote Jolo town in Sulu Province on Feb. 4, bringing the total number of hostages to six.

Abu Sayyaf is considered the smallest but the most violent of the extremist groups in the southern Philippines. The group, which has an estimated 400 fighters, is active in the impoverished island provinces of Sulu and Basilan.

The group is responsible for the series of kidnappings-for-ransom, deadly bombings, ambushes of security personnel, public beheadings, assassinations, and extortion in the Mindanao region.

The group, which has been terrorizing the Philippine southern region since the 1990s, preys on foreign tourists, businessmen and fishermen not only from the Philippines but also from Indonesia and Malaysia and hide them in Philippine jungles or remote islands.

Nigeria: 5 churches burned, many Christians killed in Boko Haram invasion

More than 100 Boko Haram militants opened fire sporadically and indiscriminately and set churches and houses on fire, killing many people, in the town of Garkida in Gombi area of the northeastern state of Adamawa, according to initial reports.

At least five churches were destroyed, including two houses of worship belonging to the Church of the Brethren denomination, an Anglican Communion church, and a church and a separate office of Living Faith Church.

There are unconfirmed reports of possible abductions.

Riding on about 60 motorbikes, with two men each carrying AK47s and RPGs, and accompanied by roughly 20 mounted gun trucks, the Boko Haram militants arrived from the Sambisa Forest area on Friday evening, according to Save the Persecuted Christians.

Nigerian security forces initially fought with the attackers but had to retreat for reinforcement. The militants then advanced to neighboring towns and carried out attacks. Civilians fled to a nearby mountain area and into bushes.

“Garkida is currently on fire … many people have been killed and their houses covered with smoke,” TheCable quoted a source as saying.

“People ran to hide inside the mountains while they watched their houses being burnt by the insurgents,” a resident added.

The Catholic Women's Conference, an annual large gathering in Gardika, was scheduled for Friday evening and the women were still arriving when the attack took place.

The attack possibly carried on until at least Saturday, when ait.live reported that “the insurgents are exchanging gun fire with the local vigilante and security operatives deployed to the area.”

Earlier this month, suspected Boko Haram militants burned and killed at least 30 people, including a pregnant woman and her baby, and abducted others in northeast Nigeria and the Lake Chad region. The militants set the sleeping travelers on fire in the Auno village of Borno state as they were camping out for the night after missing an evening curfew in the state capital of Maiduguri, about 10 miles away.

Boko Haram is an Islamic militant insurgency responsible for killing tens of thousands and displacing millions in the last decade-plus. The terrorist group pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in 2016 but soon splintered after Islamic State leadership tried to replace Boko Haram’s leader, Abubakar Shekau. 

Although the Nigerian government claims to have defeated Boko Haram militarily, Boko Haram and its offshoot Islamic State West Africa Province continue to carry out attacks in Borno.

Boko Haram over the years has abducted hundreds of school girls. The group has also abducted pastors and others in attempts to raise funds through ransom payments.

Last month, Boko Haram executed Rev. Lawan Andimi, chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria’s chapter in the Michika Local Government Area of Adamawa State. Andimi was kidnapped in early January and was seen in a ransom video praising God before his death.

Also in January, the Islamic State released a propaganda video purporting to show the killing of a Nigerian Christian university student by a child soldier. In December, the Islamic State faction claimed to have killed 11 Christian aid workers in Nigeria in retaliation for the killing of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Femi Fani-Kayode, a former Nigerian Minister of Culture and Tourism, and Aviation, recently accused former U.S. President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton of their “sheer wickedness” in helping Boko Haram by “funding and supporting” the 2015 election of Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who later canceled contracts to eradicate the terrorists, LifeSite reported.

“What Obama, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton did to Nigeria by funding and supporting Buhari in the 2015 presidential election and helping Boko Haram in 2014/2015 was sheer wickedness and the blood of all those killed by the Buhari administration, his Fulani herdsmen and Boko Haram over the last 5 years are on their hands,” Fani-Kayode wrote on Facebook.

The Nigerian government has faced international criticism for an ineffective response to the increasing violence carried out by Boko Haram factions and Fulani radical attacks. Insecurity has led to Nigeria becoming one of the most dangerous countries to live in the world. 

As Nigeria ranks as the 12th worst country in the world on Open Doors USA’s 2020 World Watch List of countries where Christians are most severely persecuted, Nigeria was added to the U.S. State Department’s special watch list of countries that tolerate or engage in severe violations of religious freedom in December.

Over a dozen Gaza rockets fired at south as violence erupts after morning lull

Iron Dome shoots down at least 12 of 14 projectiles; attack follows threats from both Palestinian and Israeli officials of renewed fighting

Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip fired at least 14 rockets at southern Israel on Monday afternoon, with 12 of them being intercepted by the Iron Dome missile defense system, shattering a tense calm following an intense battle between Israel and terror groups in Gaza and Syria the night before, the military said.

One rocket struck an empty playground in the town of Sderot, causing damage, but no injuries, police said.

Another rocket appeared to strike an open field outside the community of Nir Am in the Sha’ar Hanegev region, according to local government.

Shrapnel from one of the Iron Dome interceptions also shattered a car windshield in the community of Nir Am, a Sha’ar Hanegev spokesperson said.

In response, to the rocket attacks, the Israel Defense Forces launched a series of airstrikes on Islamic Jihad targets in the Gaza Strip.

How China Is Humiliating Pakistan

Pakistan sees itself as a major regional power but recent events show that Beijing considers Pakistan little more than a subordinate colony to be exploited but not heard.

nside Pakistan, India is an obsession. Communal violence surrounding the 1947 partition of India claimed up to two million lives. India and Pakistan subsequently fought three wars: In 1965, when India retaliated for Pakistani efforts to infiltrate forces into Jammu and Kashmir, in 1971 against the backdrop of the Bangladeshi War of Independence, and again in 1999, when Indian forces pushed back against a Pakistani offensive in Kargil, along the line-of-control. 

As the late Princeton historian Bernard Lewis pointed out, if scholars embraced the same definition of “refugee” that the United Nations applies to Palestinians who have been displaced by Israel, then South Asia would be home to more than two hundred million refugees. Tensions remain evident across the country. In 2000, in Peshawar, a mockup of a Pakistani nuclear missile stood in the midst of a traffic circle with the slogan “I’d love to enter India” written underneath it. In the Pakistani capital of Islamabad today, giant billboard clocks mark the time since India imposed a curfew on Kashmir.

There is no shortage of anti-Indian animus within Pakistan but in recent months it has been China which has humiliated Pakistan in a manner which India never could. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the long-time leader of the All-India Muslim League and the founding father of Pakistan, conceived the new country as a land for the Muslims. Because Pakistan based its legitimacy more on religion than on ethnicity, it really is the first Islamic state of the modern era.

Pakistanis have historically been at the forefront of advocacy and action against the oppression of Muslims, real or imagined. This is what guided Pakistan to oppose Soviet designs on Afghanistan. Pakistan is among the most anti-Israel and anti-Semitic countries on earth. The Pakistani press regularly covers the plight of Myanmar’s persecuted Rohingya Muslims. Pakistani charities work in Chechnya. There is no shortage of the terrorist groups Pakistan sponsors who target India and are motivated more by religion than nationalism. And, yet, when it comes to China’s incarceration of more than a million Uighur Muslims—solely because they are Muslim—Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan has been silent on one hand and on the other he has both defended China’s repression of its Muslims and persecuted for China the Uighurs in Pakistan.

Sister city twinning is a common diplomatic practice in order to advance tourism and ties between the world’s major cities. China and Pakistan have taken this to a new level with provincial twining. Recently, Pakistan’s mission in Beijing gave a draft memorandum of understanding to the Chinese foreign ministry in order to establish sister province relations between Xinjiang and Gilgit-Baltistan. Not only, therefore, is Khan cowed by Chinese pressure to the point that he must turn a blind eye to the greatest repression of Muslims in the twenty-first century but he now seeks to honor the Chinese province that is at the epicenter of Chinese anti-Muslim repression. Even if Khan is motivated by the implied threat to treat the people of the disputed Gilgit-Baltistan region like China treats the Xinjiang, that does not paper over the implied endorsement of Beijing’s Islamophobic leadership.

The coronavirus abandonment of Pakistani students in Wuhan further humiliates Pakistan. Almost every other country—including India—has evacuated its citizens from the coronavirus epicenter. While Imran Khan spends a great deal on himself, his foreign travel, and the military, he has left Pakistan’s public health infrastructure a shamble. Khan knows that corruption and disorganization mean that medical quarantine will not work in Pakistan, which is why he seeks to keep those potentially infected abroad. China, meanwhile, cares little for the Pakistanis who remain within its territory. To be Pakistani in the age of Imran Khan means to suffer in silence at the back of the line.

Pakistan’s anti-Americanism greased its turn toward China. China, meanwhile, built for Pakistan highways and a port. Pakistan allowed itself to believe that it had become the crown jewel of China’s belt-and-road policy. Now, reality should set in: Rather than preserve Pakistan’s independence and dignity by playing Beijing and Washington off-each other, successive Pakistani governments have fallen so far under China’s grasp that Pakistan is powerless to stand up for its citizens—let alone Muslims. Pakistan sees itself as a major regional power but recent events show that Beijing considers Pakistan little more than a subordinate colony to be exploited but not heard.

TSA halts employees from using TikTok for social media posts

The Transportation Security Administration says it won't allow employees to use the China-owned video app TikTok to create social media posts for the agency after the Senate’s top Democrat raised concerns about potential national security issues.

WASHINGTON -- The Transportation Security Administration said Sunday it has stopped allowing employees to use the China-owned video app TikTok to create social media posts for the agency after the Senate’s top Democrat raised concerns about potential national security issues.

New York Sen. Chuck Schumer sent a letter letter Saturday to TSA Administrator David Pekoske, months after news reports that the U.S. government launched a national security review of the app, which is popular with millions of U.S. teens and young adults. Schumer also cited a Department of Homeland Security policy prohibiting TikTok on agency devices.

The TSA said in a statement Sunday that a "small number of TSA employees have previously used TikTok on their personal devices to create videos for use in TSA’s social media outreach, but that practice has since been discontinued.”

In his letter, Schumer said national security experts have raised concerns about TikTok’s collection and handling of user data and personal information, locations and other content. He also noted in the letter that Chinese laws compel companies to cooperate with China’s government and intelligence collection.

“Given the widely reported threats, the already-in-place agency bans, and the existing concerns posed by TikTok, the feds cannot continue to allow the TSA’s use of the platform to fly,” Schumer said in a statement to The Associated Press.

Over the past few months, the agency has posted a number of videos reshared on other social media platforms such as Twitter, which have amassed hundreds of thousands of views.

The agency said it never directed viewers to TikTok or published content directly to the platform, despite videos reposted on other TSA social media accounts having the TikTok logo in the bottom of the screen. The agency said it had an “active and award-winning presence on several social media platforms.”

Some of the videos are musical parodies about what can and cannot be brought on an aircraft, while others advertise services like TSA's expedited screening program known as PreCheck. In one of the videos, a TSA spokeswoman with Nutella spread on her face is showing different containers of the chocolate-hazelnut spread to detail which one can be brought in carry-on luggage.

Ryanair CEO wants to focus security checks on Muslims

Terrorists “are generally Muslim men,” Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary said during an interview published in Saturday’s The Times. 

When he was asked about security at airports, the 58-year-old CEO told the British paper that security checks on families should be less thorough because there was “practically” no chance of there being any terrorists among them.

But he hinted these checks should focus on Muslim men.  

“Who are terrorists? Single men travelling alone,” he claimed. 

“We can’t say certain thing because it’s racist, but they’re generally Muslim men,” he continued. “If that’s where the threat is, we need to deal with it.” 

A spokesman from the Muslim Council of Britain accused him of Islamophobia. 

Labour MP Khalid Mahmood also said O’Leary was “encouraging racism.”  

“A white man killed eight people in Germany this week. Should we screen white people to see if they’re fascists?” he said, referring to the racist attack in Hanau. 

O’Leary is often provocative and known for his controversial comments. He has previously suggested making passengers fly standing up, making them pay to use the toilet and making obese people pay extra.  

Turkey prevents 4 Russian military aircraft from crossing into Syria

Russian daily newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported that Turkey has prevented four Russian military aircraft, including two bombers, from crossing its airspace to Syria.

Field sources knowledgeable about the Russian Hmeimim Air Base, revealed on Thursday that the Russian forces brought in military reinforcements from the storage facilities of the Russian army to the airbase, in an indication that battles may intensify in north-western Syria.

The sources revealed the arrival of heavy shipments of modern Russian tanks and missile launchers, heavy artillery and anti-armour missiles, in addition to shipments of bombs and missiles used by Russian strategic bombers and fighters, as well as the bombs used by Sukhoi aircraft of various categories.

Russian reinforcements also included tanks, troop carriers and mechanisms used to lift dirt berms and build fortifications, as well as defensive barriers.

The measures undertaken by the Russian forces came as tension escalates and rifts deepens between Ankara and Moscow over the developments in Idlib and the countryside of Aleppo, northern Syria, especially following the failure of technical and political negotiations between Russian officials and their Turkish counterparts.

Israel’s new type of war means Iran will never achieve its goals in Syria

Iran has turned its focus to long-term, strategic advantages it hopes can strengthen its influence in the Syria/Lebanon territorial sphere.

In the eight years since Iran embarked on an embedding process to establish a permanent presence in Syria, Israel has struck Iranian targets hundreds of times but in recent months there has been a steep uptick in those attacks.

Ten Syrians and foreign fighters — almost always Iranian — were killed in Quneitra last June and 11 more in November. On February 13, Damascus International Airport was struck for the umpteenth time, when Israeli missiles killed seven fighters believed to have been involved in a weapons delivery that had just arrived from Iran.

The Syrian government under President Bashar Assad is powerless to prevent the attacks or the repeated breach of its territorial sovereignty, despite that it casts itself as the protector of the Syrian people. However, there’s nothing new about that.

What is telling is that Assad’s government is penniless; it has little to no material way of paying Iran back for the multitude of ways Tehran has helped throughout the conflict.

There is one important way, however, Damascus can repay the debt: allow Iran free rein to use Syria to get at Israel.

As a result, Iran has turned its focus to long-term, strategic advantages it hopes can strengthen its influence in the Syria/Lebanon territorial sphere. It is thought to command tens of thousands of militia members across Syria but more important are its attempts to establish a web of covert operations.

In December, a Fox News report claimed Iran was building underground tunnels — large enough to pass vehicles through — on the Syrian-Iraqi border at its Imam Ali base, close to Albukamal. The implication is that Tehran’s big picture plan is to link Iran all the way to Lebanon through a series of cross-border tunnels.

It’s likely Iran is attempting to replicate the kind of subterranean network Hezbollah built over the decades in southern Lebanon, some of which extended into Israeli territory. Israel said last year it found and destroyed all tunnels that impinged on its territory but Reuters reported that some of those tunnels went 22 storeys — 80 metres — deep.

As Hamas did in Gaza in 2014, Hezbollah was expected to use tunnels to fire rockets from inside Israel proper, before their discovery.

Iran’s plan in Syria looks very similar, indeed. That would explain why most of the Iranian activity — and Israeli attacks — have been concentrated in Syria’s southern regions close to Israel, such as Daraa and Quneitra.

Tehran probably hopes to one day connect Hezbollah’s infrastructure in Lebanon with a similar underground system close to the illegally occupied Syrian Golan Heights. It’s likely it, too, has hopes of tunnelling into the Golan Heights proper.

Israel, of course, knows this. On February 11, Israeli Defence Minister Naftali Bennett told a memorial gathering that “we are now engaged in a continued effort to weaken the Iranian octopus through economic, diplomatic and intelligence measures, as well as with military means and various other approaches” and that “you (Iran) have no business being in Syria and, so long as you continue to build terrorist bases there, we will continue to hurt you even further.”

Days previously, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu warned: “I’ll tell you what else (Iran is) failing at: in transferring weapons to Syria and Lebanon because we are operating there all the time, including at this time.” In this, Israel basically admitted it had spies on the ground in Syria.

This helps paint a larger picture of how advanced Israel’s intelligence and security activities are and how we can expect it to always be one step ahead of Iran.

That’s because an incredible 20% of global venture capitalist investment in cybersecurity is made in Israeli companies. Israel’s drone technology development industry puts it in the top two or three countries in the world. Iran, by contrast, is struggling with mass public unrest.

In January, it was reported that Israel had begun building an “anti-tunnel sensor” along its border with Lebanon. The system apparently uses cutting-edge acoustic and seismic measurements to detect subterranean digging.

What can Iran ever hope to gain in Syria with Israel constantly on its back? Very little, it seems.

Almost every time it attempts to move weapons into or across Syria, often using commercial planes to disguise the cargo, Israel attacks, lives are lost and further infrastructural damage is visited on the country’s main airport. Israel targeted the Imam Ali base with missile strikes in September and again in January.

It’s becoming increasingly clear that Iran is deploying 20th-century weapons — spies, boots on the ground and underground tunnels in Syria — in an attempt to win a 21st-century war in which cybersecurity, unmanned drones and satellite technology will decide the outcome.

As a result, however much time, effort and expense Iranian officials put into carving out a long-term presence in Syria, their dream of operating freely over an open, borderless landmass from Tehran to the Mediterranean will remain exactly just that.

Niger military operation 'kills 120 terrorists' after jihadist attacks

More than 100 “terrorists” have been killed in south-west Niger by local forces in a joint operation with French troops, the country’s defence ministry said.

As of Thursday “120 terrorists have been neutralised” in the operation in the vast Tillaberi region near the border with Mali and Burkina Faso, the statement on Friday said, adding there had been no losses among Nigerien or French troops. Vehicles and bomb-making equipment were seized.

Niger’s defence minister, Issoufou Katambe, praised the “cooperation ... in the battle against terrorism”, the statement said.

Authorities in the restive Tillaberi region have ramped up security restrictions, closing markets and banning motorbike traffic after attacks by jihadist groups over December and January killed 174 Nigerien soldiers.

A state of emergency has been in place in the region for the past two years.

Since 2015, Niger has struggled against a wave of jihadist attacks near the borders with Mali and Burkina Faso in the west, exacerbating needs in the Tillaberi and Tahoua regions, where nearly 78,000 people have been displaced.

France this year said it would boost its military presence in the troubled west African region by deploying 600 fresh troops to its 4,500-strong operation.

Intel officials say Russia boosting Trump candidacy

WASHINGTON (AP) — Intelligence officials have warned lawmakers that Russia is interfering in the 2020 election campaign to help President Donald Trump get reelected, according to three officials familiar with the closed-door briefing.

Trump pushed back Friday accusing Democrats of launching a disinformation campaign.

“Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7!” Trump tweeted.

The officials, who asked for anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence, said Thursday that the briefing last week focused on Russia’s efforts to influence the 2020 election and sow discord in the American electorate. The intelligence warning was first reported by The New York Times and The Washington Post.

A senior administration official told The Associated Press that the news infuriated Trump, who complained that Democrats would use the information against him. Over the course of his presidency, Trump has dismissed the intelligence community’s assessment of Russia’s 2016 election interference as a conspiracy to undermine his victory. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private meeting.

A day after the Feb. 13 briefing to the House committee, Trump berated the then-director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, and he announced this week that Maguire would be replaced by Richard Grenell, a Trump loyalist.

Moscow denied any meddling. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday that the allegations are “paranoid reports that, unfortunately, there will be more and more of as we get closer to the elections (in the U.S.). Of course, they have nothing to do with the truth.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeted that, “American voters should decide American elections — not Vladimir Putin.” She added that all members of Congress “should condemn the President’s reported efforts to dismiss threats to the integrity of our democracy & to politicize our intel community.”

Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the chairman of the House intelligence committee, tweeted: “We count on the intelligence community to inform Congress of any threat of foreign interference in our elections. If reports are true and the President is interfering with that, he is again jeopardizing our efforts to stop foreign meddling. Exactly as we warned he would do.”

U.S. intelligence agencies say Russia interfered in the 2016 election through social media campaigns and stealing and distributing emails from Democratic accounts. They say Russia was trying to boost Trump’s campaign and add chaos to the American political process. Special counsel Robert Mueller concluded that Russian interference was “sweeping and systematic,” but he did not find a criminal conspiracy between Russia and the Trump campaign.

Republican lawmakers who were in last week’s briefing by the DNI’s chief election official, Shelby Pierson, pushed back by noting that Trump has been tough on Russia, one of the officials said.

While Trump has imposed severe economic sanctions on Russia, he also has spoken warmly of Russian leader Vladimir Putin and withdrawn troops from areas, like Syria, where Moscow could fill the vacuum. He delayed military aid last year to Ukraine, a Russian adversary — a decision that was at the core of his impeachment proceedings.

The Times said Trump was angry that the House briefing was made before Schiff, the panel’s chairman, who led the impeachment proceedings.

Trump on Thursday formally appointed Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, to replace Maguire as the new acting director of national intelligence. Maguire was required to step down soon under federal law governing acting appointments. The Times cited two administration officials as saying the timing, after the intelligence briefing, was coincidental.

Grenell’s background is primarily in politics and media affairs. He lacks the extensive national security and military experience of Maguire, as well as previous holders of the position overseeing the nation’s 17 intelligence agencies.

His appointment does little to heal the president’s fraught relations with the intelligence community, which Trump has derided as part of a “deep state” of entrenched bureaucrats that seek to undermine his agenda. The administration has most notably feuded with the intelligence community over the Russian interference and the events surrounding Trump’s impeachment.

Pierson told NPR in an interview that aired last month that the Russians “are already engaging in influence operations relative to candidates going into 2020. But we do not have evidence at this time that our adversaries are directly looking at interfering with vote counts or the vote tallies.”

Pierson, appointed in July 2019 by then-Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, works with intelligence agencies like the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security to identify anyone seeking to interfere with U.S. elections.

Pierson told NPR that the U.S. doesn’t know exactly what the Russians are planning, but she said it’s not just a Russia problem.

“We’re still also concerned about China, Iran, non-state actors, hacktivists and frankly — certainly for DHS and FBI - even Americans that might be looking to undermine confidence in the elections.”

At an open hearing this month, FBI Director Christopher Wray told the House Judiciary Committee that Russia was engaged in “information warfare” heading into the November election, but that law enforcement had not seen efforts to target America’s infrastructure. He said Russia is relying on a covert social media campaign to divide the American public.

Turkey's Erdogan confirms sending Syrian fighters to Libya

Turkish president for the first time announces presence of Syrian fighters allied with Turkey in Libya to support GNA.

Pro-Turkish Syrians are fighting in Libya alongside military trainers dispatched by Ankara, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted for the first time on Friday. 

Turkey supports the UN-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA) based in Tripoli and sent dozens of military training personnel after the two countries signed a series of deals last year.

"Turkey is there with a training force. There are also people from the Syrian National Army," Erdogan told reporters in Istanbul, referring to the group of rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government.

The GNA has been under sustained attack for months from eastern-based renegade military commander Khalifa Haftar, whose principal backers include the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Egypt.

Last month, the warring sides agreed to a truce and although there have been violations, they have held two rounds of talks in Geneva.

Haftar, meanwhile, said he would agree to a permanent ceasefire if Syrian "mercenaries" left Libya, and Turkey ended its support for the GNA, according to RIA news agency.

"A ceasefire [would] be the result of a number of conditions being fulfilled … the withdrawal of Syrian and Turkish mercenaries, an end to Turkish arms supplies to Tripoli, and the liquidation of terrorist groups," Haftar was quoted as saying on Friday.

But Haftar warned he would not hesitate to use force if his conditions were not met. 

The GNA in Tripoli agreed to resume negotiations on Thursday after suspending talks with Haftar's Libyan National Army (LNA) after rocket attacks on the capital's strategic port on Tuesday.

Several rounds of talks focused on economic issues, including fairer distribution of Libya's oil wealth, have also taken place in Egypt and Tunisia, while talks aimed at a political solution are scheduled to start in Geneva on February 26.

Ceasefire talks between Libya's warring sides are going in the "right direction" while hitting hurdles over violations of an arms embargo and the truce declared last month, the UN envoy for Libya Ghassan Salame told Reuters News Agency on Friday.

Salame, in an interview during a break in military talks in Geneva, said he expected political-level talks to convene in the Swiss city on February 26 but was already working on confidence-building measures.

"In parallel, we are trying to make air travel a bit safer in Libya especially from Mitiga as well as Misrata. We are also trying to reopen the port to be a safe harbour," Salame said. "And we are also trying ... to help in an exchange of prisoners between the parties."

U.S. Intelligence Analyst Pleads Guilty to Leaking Classified Information to Media

U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) counterterrorism analyst Henry Kyle Frese pleaded guilty on Thursday to leaking information to the press in 2018 and 2019.

According to a DIA press release, Frese faces up to 10 years in prison for leaking sensitive military information from five separate classified documents. Frese was employed by the DIA as either a contractor or employee from January 2017 to October 2019.

Over the course of two years, Frese illegally obtained and distributed classified military intelligence information to two journalists. But court filings state that the information was published in eight articles written by the same journalist — Amanda Macias, a national security reporter for CNBC, and Frese’s girlfriend at the time.

Court documents claim Macias later asked Frese via Twitter direct messages whether he would share the information with another journalist whose identity has not yet been disclosed. Frese then “searched on a classified United States government computer system” to obtain the information requested.

“Frese violated the trust placed in him by the American people when he disclosed sensitive national security information for personal gain,” Assistant Attorney-General for National Security John Demers said. “He alerted our country’s adversaries to sensitive national defense information, putting the nation’s security at risk.”

In a statement released by the Department of Justice, Virginia District Attorney G. Zachary Terwilliger said the case should “serve as a clear reminder” that “unilaterally disclosing such information for personal gain, or that of others, is not selfless or heroic, it is criminal.”

Frese was arrested in October. He pleaded guilty to two charges of “willful transmission of national defense information” on Thursday. He will be sentenced in federal court on June 18.

Nearly 10,400 civilians killed, wounded in Afghanistan in 2019: UN

The United Nations released its latest report on civilian casualties in Afghanistan which documents up to 10,400 civilian deaths and injuries during the year 2019.

The UN Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) in a statement said “The new report documents 3,403 civilians killed and 6,989 injured, with the majority of the civilian casualties inflicted by anti-government elements.”

UNAMA further added “It is the sixth year in a row that the number of civilian casualties has exceeded 10,000.”

“The figures outlined in the new report – released jointly by UNAMA and the UN Human Rights Office – represent a five per cent decrease over the previous year, mainly due to a decrease in civilian casualties caused by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant – Khorasan Province (ISIL-KP),” the report stated.

It also added “Civilian casualties caused by the other parties increased, particularly by the Taliban (21 per cent increase) and the international military forces (18 per cent increase), mainly due to an increase in improvised explosive device attacks and airstrikes.”

“All parties to the conflict must comply with the key principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution to prevent civilian casualties,” said Michelle Bachelet, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. “Belligerents must take the necessary measures to prevent women, men, boys and girls from being killed by bombs, shells, rockets and improvised mines; to do otherwise is unacceptable.”

19 ISIS militants killed in Afghan Special Forces raid, airstrikes in Kapisa and Kunar

The Afghan Special Forces killed six militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria Khurasan (ISIS-K) in North-eastern Kapisa province.

The informed military officials said Friday the Special Forces also destroyed a small cache of weapons of the terror group during the same operation which they conducted in Nejrab district.

The officials further added that an airstrike killed additional 6 ISIS Khurasan militants in the same district.

Meanwhile, the officials said an airstrike killed 7 militants of the terror group in Chawkai district of Kunar.

The ISIS sympathizers have not commented regarding the operations so far.

Islamic terrorism spreading in majority-Christian Mozambique; 700 dead, 100,000 displaced

Over 100,000 people have been displaced and at least 700 have died in the majority-Christian country of Mozambique since 2017, as the spread of radical Islamic extremism in Africa is starting to plague the continent’s southeast region. 

This month, the U.N.'s High Commission for Refugees said it is boosting its response in Mozambique’s northeastern Cabo Delgado province, an oil-rich coastal region on the Indian Ocean.

Although southeast Africa was once considered relatively peaceful compared to its counterparts in the north, there’s concern that the region is becoming a foothold for militants that appear to be aligned with the Islamic State. 

The Institute for Security Studies, an Africa-based think tank, published a report last month stating that as many as 350 terror incidents have occurred in Mozambique since the local jihadi group Ahlu Sunnah Wal Jammah simultaneously attacked police and military bases in October 2017. 

However, the UNHCR warns that the most recent weeks have proved to be the most “volatile period” as attacks are now spreading across most of Cabo Delgado’s 16 districts. 

Cabo Delgado is one of the least developed regions in the country. According to UNHCR spokesperson Andrej Mahecic, hundreds of villages have been burned and abandoned because of the “indiscriminate campaign of terror.”

“Armed groups have been randomly targeting local villages and terrorizing the local population,” Mahecic said at a press briefing earlier this month in Geneva, Switzerland.  “Those fleeing speak of killings, maiming, and torture, burnt homes, destroyed crops and shops.”

Mahecic explained that there have also been reports of beheadings, kidnappings, and disappearances of women and children. Mahecic said the attackers, at times, warn locals when and where they will attack, causing a mad rush of residents to flee those areas. 

As attacks are spreading southward across the province, the U.N. notes that many in the provincial capital of Pemba are starting to flee. 

Bishop Luiz Fernando Lisboa of the Diocese of Pemba told the Catholic Charity Aid to the Church in Need that one attack in the region targeted an agricultural teacher training school in Bilibiza with over 500 students. 

“The school was burned down, then [the attackers] smashed up other shops and businesses nearby,” the bishop said. “It is a sad fact that the military and security forces are unable to contain these attacks without international support. If the government had done something to improve conditions, then perhaps this problem would have been resolved, but instead many people are dying.”

Lisboa warned that as villages are being vacated entirely, no one is left to plant crops. 

“That means that there will be hunger, and we will have thousands of internally displaced people,” he warned. 

According to ISS consultant Peter Fabricius, the insurgency morphed into a terror campaign directed mainly at unarmed civilians after it began with attacks on the military bases. 

Fabricius reported in January that the death toll when including security personal, insurgents and civilians stands at over 600 since 2017. However, the medical charity Doctors Without Borders told AFP that at least 700 have been killed. 

Fabricius stressed, however, that the government in Maputo “continues to present these atrocities as mere criminality” and that member states of the Southern African Development Community are “going along with that complacent view.” 

Additionally, internal sources told AFP that security forces in Mozambique are despondent and do not have the capacity to intercept the militants’ communications. AFP quoted sources as saying that security units opt not to respond to attacks on villages to “avoid casualties in our ranks.” 

“No Mozambique insurgency has yet made it onto the agenda of SADC’s Organ on Politics, Defence and Security which is mandated to address such regional threats,” Fabricius stressed. “This despite evidence of spillovers into neighboring Tanzania and links with other jihadists up the east coast.”

As the extremism spreads, Fabricius notes that a big problem is that little is known about the perpetrators because ASWJ has not publicly claimed any attacks. 

ASWJ is known locally as “Al-Shabaab” but is not believed to have any connection with the deadly Somalia-based terror group with the same name, according to AFP.

While ASWJ has not taken public credit for the attacks, the Islamic State terror network has claimed the responsibility of over two dozen attacks, according to ISS. 

Last June, the Islamic State took credit for an attack on the Mozambique military by saying that the militants were “soldiers of the caliphate.” As reported by The Guardian at the time, the Islamic State claimed that Africa is a central component to its effort to create a global network of extremists.

“This raises questions about how IS and ASWJ are related,” Fabricius writes. “Is ASWJ the local affiliate of IS? Is IS simply claiming credit to boost its public stature, especially since the loss of face caused by the fall of its caliphate in Syria and Iraq?”

The UNHCR says it is expanding its presence in Mozambique in response to a request from the Mozambican government. 

“Rooted in the soil of Cabo Delgado, conditions common to such insurgencies seem to have given it birth and continue to give it life,” Fabricius wrote.

“These include grinding poverty and a sense of marginalization and inequality, both between the citizens of the province and the elite down south in Maputo and elsewhere in the country, and among certain ethnic groups and Muslim factions in Cabo Delgado.”

Militants throughout Africa have claimed ties to the Islamic State. Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Cameroon and Mali have also seen a rise in terror attacks.

In Burkina Faso, over 600,000 have been displaced since an escalation of terror attacks began in 2016. In 2019 alone, displacement in Burkina Faso rose 1,200 percent, according to the U.N.