GOP senators push bill to limit Gitmo transfers, call for ‘time out’ after attacks

This March 1, 2002 file photo shows a detainee at Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base, Cuba. (AP)

Republican senators on Tuesday introduced new legislation to clamp down on President Obama’s ability to transfer terror suspects out of Guantanamo Bay, calling for a “time out” on releasing detainees in the wake of the Paris terror attacks.

Sen. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire introduced the far-reaching legislation to “extend and enhance prohibitions and limitations” on transferring or releasing Guantanamo prisoners.

She cited the steady stream of detainees allegedly tied to Al Qaeda who have been transferred in recent months, even to Yemen, which she called the “wild West” for terrorists.

“It’s clear that we need a time out,” she said.

A Yemeni government official briefed on the investigation into last week’s terror attacks in France told Fox News that one of the suspects in that attack met with American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen in 2011 at an Al Qaeda camp.

The Yemen connection has raised new concerns about transfers to that country and elsewhere, and GOP senators who joined Ayotte on Tuesday said the Paris attack shows that governments are limited in their ability to monitor suspects.

Joining Ayotte in backing the measure were Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain of Arizona; Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr of North Carolina; and Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.

The measure would repeal current law that has allowed the administration to transfer prisoners to foreign countries and reduce the population at Guantanamo to 127. The bill also would prohibit transfers of terror suspects to foreign countries if there has been a confirmed case where an individual was transferred from Guantanamo and engaged in any terrorist activity. It would specifically bar transfers to Yemen for two years.

Further, the bill would prohibit the transfer of terror suspects considered to be high-risk or medium-risk – some of the recently transferred detainees fell into those categories.

The administration is currently conducting an assessment of all detainees at the facility, and is almost certain to oppose the Senate legislation.

On Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said closing the facility is “in the clear national security interest” of the country.

“That continues to be the goal that this administration has,” Earnest said. 

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf echoed the White House in calling it a security priority to close the prison camp. Asked about the specific legislation, she said, “that’s not something we think is going to help us close Guantanamo” and stressed the importance of working with other countries to transfer detainees. 

Obama has pushed to close Guantanamo since his inauguration in January 2009, but has faced strong opposition from congressional Republicans and some Democrats who argued that the facility is the best location for terror suspects since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Past laws have repeatedly included provisions barring any transfer of terror suspects to U.S. prisons.

The administration has been transferring detainees cleared for movement to other countries. Five men who were held for a dozen years without charge at Guantanamo were sent to the Central Asian nation of Kazakhstan for resettlement in late December.

Nearly 30 prisoners were resettled in third countries last year as part of Obama’s renewed push to close the detention center.

The Senate measure also would bar the use of any government funds, whether in the budget for the Defense Department or in any other agency, to construct or modify facilities in the United States to house terror suspects.

Fox News’ Catherine Herridge and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

View the original article here

GOP senators push bill to limit Gitmo transfers, call for ‘time out’ after attacks

Pro-Russian separatists destroy airport, reportedly kill 12 on bus in attacks across Donetsk

Jan. 13, 2015: In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Interior Ministry, a man walks past snow covered with blood as he passes by a bus destroyed by a rebel shell at the checkpoint near the town of Volnovakha in the Donetsk region, eastern Ukraine. (AP) (The Associated Press)

This photo provided by the Ukrainian Interior Ministry shows the inside view of a bus destroyed by a rebel shell at the checkpoint near the town of Volnovakha in the Donetsk region, eastern Ukraine, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2015. At least 10 civilians were killed and a further 13 wounded as the bus was hit by a pro-Russian separatists’ shell while passing through the checkpoint, local officials said. (AP Photo/Ukrainian Interior Ministry) (The Associated Press) The media surround British officials as they present ten armored vehicles from the British government to the OCSE special monitoring mission in Ukraine’s east, hit by a war conflict with pro-Russian separatists, in Kiev, Ukraine, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2015.(AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky) (The Associated Press) The media surround British officials as they present ten armored vehicles from the British government to the OCSE special monitoring mission in Ukraine’s east, hit by a war conflict with pro-Russian separatists, in Kiev, Ukraine, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2015.(AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky) (The Associated Press) The media surround British officials as they present ten armored vehicles from the British government to the OCSE special monitoring mission in Ukraine’s east, hit by a war conflict with pro-Russian separatists, in Kiev, Ukraine, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2015.(AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky) (The Associated Press)

Pro-Russian separatists unleashed a series of bomb attacks Tuesday in eastern Ukraine, leveling a key airport in Donetsk, killing 12 in an attack on a passenger bus and almost certainly dooming a short-lived cease-fire, according to reports.

A senior State Department official confirmed to Fox News that the separatists destroyed the government-held airport in eastern Ukraine Tuesday afternoon.

The facility has been “flattened” and the air control tower was “decimated,” the official said. “They are now fighting over rubble.”

Maria Ivanovna, a local retiree, told The Associated Press she has become desensitized to the blasts and drew an arc with her arm to show how shells fly over her home toward the airport.

“We will survive the same way we did after World War II. Ration cards for bread; 11 ounces for children; 800 grams for factory workers and 1,200 grams for miners,” she said.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said on Tuesday the bus attack was “egregious” and blamed Russia for helping to arm the separatists.

“We again call on Russia to fulfill its commitment under the Minsk Agreement, which includes ceasing its substantial military support to the separatists, restoring Ukrainian sovereignty over the international border between Ukraine and Russia, releasing all hostages, and working toward the peaceful resolution of the conflict in Eastern Ukraine,” Harf said.

Across Donetsk, the city that Russian-backed separatists call their capital, explosions and the sound of shells whistling overhead are again unnerving the local population. The holiday period was spent in relative tranquility after a new truce was called in December between government troops and Russian-backed militia. But by late last week, that uneasy calm was steadily unraveling.

In the single largest loss of life so far this year, civilians traveling on a commuter bus from Donetsk were killed Tuesday afternoon by what Ukrainians say were rockets fired from a Grad launcher in rebel territory. Regional authorities loyal to Kiev said the bus was passing a Ukrainian Army checkpoint at the time, putting it in the line of fire.

Leading rebel representative Denis Pushilin denied responsibility for the attack.

The warring sides are now trading accusations over who is responsible for the breakdown in the truce that led to Tuesday’s deaths.

Military spokesman Andriy Lysenko said that separatist attacks in recent days suggest an attempted onslaught to push back the frontline is under way. Separatist leader Alexander Zakharchenko says Ukraine’s armed forces unilaterally resumed hostilities and that his fighters would respond in kind.

An AP reporter over the weekend saw a convoy of around 30 military-style trucks without license plates heading for Donetsk, suggesting that new supplies were coming in for the rebels.

NATO’s top commander, Gen. Philip Breedlove, said Tuesday that there has been a continued resupply and training of rebel forces over the holiday period.

“Those continue to provide a concern and something that we have to be thinking about,” Breedlove said.

Ukraine and the West have routinely accused Russia of being behind such consignments. Moscow flatly rejects the charges, although rebel forces are so well-equipped with powerful arms that the denials have become increasingly hollow.

In the rebel-held Donetsk suburb of Makiivka, the thrash of outgoing mortars shakes still-inhabited neighborhoods on a daily basis. Separatists have consistently denied using residential areas for cover, but there are ample witness accounts undermining those claims.

Ukrainian responses to artillery lobbed out of Donetsk are woefully inaccurate and regularly hit houses and apartment blocks, often killing people inside. The separatist military headquarters in Donetsk said Tuesday that 12 people had been killed and another 30 injured in the preceding three-day period. It did not specify who had been killed.

There is little sign of life in Makiivka these days. People rush home from work or aid distribution points and occasionally come out of shelters to exchange information about where shells are landing.

A senior U.N. human rights official said this week that developments look poised to go in one of three directions — a frozen conflict, an escalation in violence or an evolution to sustainable peace.

“In case of frozen conflict, we will more or less continue to be seeing [the same] human rights violations that we have been facing so far,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. “But in case of escalation of hostilities, which is quite possible, we could also be seeing further internationalization of the conflict and far more human rights violations and suffering.”

The grimmest of outcomes appears most likely.

A hoped-for round of peace negotiations this week between the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France has been put on ice — possibly indefinitely.

Ukrainian military authorities talk like they are bracing for the long-haul and Tuesday laid out plans for a new round of mobilization.

Volodymyr Talalai, deputy head of the army’s mobilization planning, said recruits will be drawn from all regions of the country. He gave no figure for how many people will be mobilized, but said that the primary aim of the upcoming drive is to enable the rotation of forces.

Unremitting violence is radicalizing the mood. One resident of Donetsk’s Petrovsky neighborhood — one of the most intensely bombed — said she took up arms and joined the separatist army after a rocket hit a home in her neighborhood.

“A Grad landed … and people were killed and blown to bits,” she said, giving her name only as Vera. “How were we supposed to react? We are out here defending ourselves.”

Wearing a balaclava and cradling an automatic rifle, Vera said her 19-year-old son too wanted to sign up, but that she refused to let him.

“I told them I would rather go myself than let my child do it,” she said.

Fox News’ James Rosen and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

View the original article here

Pro-Russian separatists destroy airport, reportedly kill 12 on bus in attacks across Donetsk

Tsarnaev lawyers ask judge to suspend jury selection over Paris attacks - Hernandez jurors asked about Pats games, tattoos

Jan. 5, 2015: In this file courtroom sketch, Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, left, is depicted beside U.S. District Judge George O’Toole Jr., right, as O’Toole addresses a pool of potential jurors in a jury assembly room at the federal courthouse, in Boston.(AP)

BOSTON –  Lawyers for Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev asked a judge on Tuesday to suspend jury selection in his trial for at least a month because the recent terrorist attacks in France have again placed the marathon bombings “at the center of a grim global drama.”

The lawyers said a delay would allow some time “for the extraordinary prejudice flowing from these events — and the comparison of those events to those at issue in this case — to diminish.”

They said potential jurors have been instructed to avoid media reports about Tsarnaev’s case, but were exposed to reports about the French attacks. Jury selection began last week.

“Almost immediately after the attacks, the press, politicians, and commentators drew parallels between the French attacks and the Boston Marathon bombing,” the lawyers wrote.

In the marathon case, authorities say Tsarnaev and his older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, planned and carried out the attack as retaliation for U.S. wars in Muslim countries. Three people were killed and more than 260 were wounded when twin bombs exploded at the finish line April 15, 2013.

Tamerlan was killed in a shootout with police days after the bombings. Dzhokhar, 21, could face the death penalty if convicted.

In the Paris attacks, two gunmen, brothers Cherif and Said Kouachi burst into the offices of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, killing 12 people. A total of 17 people were shot dead in the three-day terrorist killing spree, including four hostages. The Kouachi brothers and a third gunman were killed by police.

While “Boston Strong” became the slogan used to show unity following the marathon attacks, “Je suis Charlie” (“I am Charlie”) has become a popular slogan since the Paris attacks.

The Paris attacks began Jan. 7, which was the third day of jury selection in Tsarnaev’s trial in Boston. More than 1,350 prospective jurors have been called in to federal court to fill out lengthy juror questionnaires. The judge is scheduled to begin questioning individual jurors Thursday.

Tsarnaev’s lawyers have asked repeatedly to delay the trial and to move it outside Massachusetts, where almost everyone seems to know someone connected to the marathon or personally affected by the 2013 bombings. Federal Judge George O’Toole Jr. has rejected the defense requests.

“Even before the Paris attacks, there was no modern precedent of which we are aware for attempting to seat an impartial jury in a community that had been so recently, so grievously, and so widely affected by a single series of crimes,” the defense lawyers wrote Tuesday.

“Now, at the very moment this attempt is to be made, the Boston bombings are being newly placed at the center of a grim global drama. At a minimum, the court should pause long enough to let this latest storm subside,” they wrote.

Legal analysts said earlier Tuesday that the French terror attacks could provide new grounds for Tsarnaev’s lawyers to argue for a delay or for moving the trial outside Boston.

Jeffrey Abramson, a professor of law and government at the University of Texas at Austin, said that if he were one of Tsarnev’s lawyers, he would ask for a delay of three to six months “until the Paris comparison fades a bit.”

“Whatever scabbing or healing had begun to take place, the Boston wound is freshly ripped open by the events in Paris,” said Abramson, who has written extensively about the jury system in the United States.

Abramson said it would be difficult for any jury pool not to see similarities between the two cases and be potentially influenced by them.

“It just cries out for comparison,” he said.

Veteran Boston defense attorney Jeffrey Denner said Tsarnaev’s defense could argue that the pall cast by the Paris attacks will make it difficult to find jurors who can be impartial in Tsarnaev’s case.

“Emotions are really running high now. The terrorist problem, while it’s always this 800-pound elephant sitting in the room, right now it’s the 800-pound elephant sitting right on the defendant,” Denner said. “It’s hard to ever view terrorist threats in an impartial way, but it’s almost impossible where the events are so fresh and poignant as last week.”

But Denner said suspending a trial after jury selection has begun would be highly unusual.

“On the other hand, the central issue still remains: Can any defendant get a fair trial given the circumstances and context of the case? The context has changed when the whole terror situation has been exacerbated dramatically over the past week,” he added.

Denner said he also thinks it’s unlikely the judge would reconsider moving the trial because of the Paris attacks.

“Right now, I think it would be hard to get a fair trial anywhere,” he said.

View the original article here

Tsarnaev lawyers ask judge to suspend jury selection over Paris attacks - Hernandez jurors asked about Pats games, tattoos

VIDEO: Lavrov attacks US "military interference"

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has used his speech at the United Nations General Assembly to attack America’s military “interference” in Syria.

He also accused Washington and Europe of supporting a coup d’etat in Ukraine and being unable to change their Cold War ”genetic code.”

View the original article here

VIDEO: Lavrov attacks US "military interference"

Man attacks teen with Guinness bottle

A fine of $5,000 was imposed on a man in the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate’s Court last Wednesday, after he allegedly used a Guinness bottle to slap his 17-year-old girlfriend in the head.

Charged with unlawful wounding is Jermaine Cole.

According to Cole, he and the teen with whom he shared a relationship were involved in an altercation. It is understood that the teen hit him in a gunshot wound he had, which caused him to vomit blood.

It was at that point Cole slapped the teen in her head with the bottle.

Senior Resident Magistrate Judith Pusey ordered that Cole pay $5000 or serve six months in prison.

View the original article here

Man attacks teen with Guinness bottle

MANGO USED TO TRICK 9-Y-O - Mob attacks man for molesting child

Rasbert Turner, Star Writer

The police had to rescue a man from an angry mob recently after it was alleged that he used a mango to lure a nine-year-old girl to his house in order to make sexual advances on her.

The members of the St Catherine South police had to rush to the community, near Old Harbour, St Catherine, after the mob decided they wanted to ‘discipline’ the man.

It is alleged that he had touched the girl inappropriately after luring her to his house by promising to give her ripe mangoes.

It is further alleged that after giving the child the fruits, he touched her upper body and made suggestive remarks to her.

Following his advances, the child was said to have managed to run from the premises and related her ordeal to her parents.

Soon thereafter, persons descended on the dwelling and demanded that he be flogged, however, the police intervened.

The accused man was taken into police custody on suspicion of sexual touching.

View the original article here

MANGO USED TO TRICK 9-Y-O - Mob attacks man for molesting child

21-y-o attacks, stabs teen over man

ST ANN, Jamaica — A 21-year-old woman was brought before the St Ann’s Bay Resident Magistrate Court on Tuesday, July 9 after she allegedly attacked and cut a 16-year-old girl three times during a dispute in Ocho Rios.

Angela Marie Morrison reportedly attacked the teenager who was said to be involved with her boyfriend.Allegations are that Morrison pretended to be a friend of the teen and lured her to a popular fast food restaurant in Ocho Rios where the incident took place. The teen was cut two times on the left hand and once in the lower abdomen.She was reportedly hospitalised for two days.When the matter came before RM Vaughn Facey on Tuesday, the teen requested $300,000 in compensation.However, Nathan Morrison, the attorney representing the accused, said that the figure was too high and a lower amount should be requested, as the accused is a single mother.He said that $120, 000 was more reasonable or he would be prepared to have the matter tried.RM Facey however said he would await the medical certificate in order to decide if the compensation requested was justified.When asked by the judge if she was involved with the man, the teen said no.The matter will return before the courts on September 10.— Renae DixonLike our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/jamaicaobserverFollow us on Twitter https://twitter.com/JamaicaObserver

HOUSE RULES

1. We welcome reader comments on the top stories of the day. Some comments may be republished on the website or in the newspaper – email addresses will not be published.

2. Please understand that comments are moderated and it is not always possible to publish all that have been submitted. We will, however, try to publish comments that are representative of all received.

3. We ask that comments are civil and free of libellous or hateful material. Also please stick to the topic under discussion.

4. Please do not write in block capitals since this makes your comment hard to read.

5. Please don’t use the comments to advertise. However, our advertising department can be more than accommodating if emailed:mailto:advertising@jamaicaobserver.com.

6. If readers wish to report offensive comments, suggest a correction or share a story then please email: community@jamaicaobserver.com.

7. Lastly, read our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy

comments powered by

View the original article here

21-y-o attacks, stabs teen over man