The Taliban captured a district center Wednesday in southern Afghanistan, killing at least 13 government soldiers. The fighting comes as Russia asserted the Taliban is getting stronger and called for increased efforts to reach a negotiated settlement to the 17-year-old war.
Bottom Line Up Front:
-China has created a highly controlled environment in Xinjiang where it monitors ethnic Uighurs, relying on emerging technologies to track and surveil its citizens.
-The Chinese Communist Party cites widespread religious extremism as the reason behind its draconian counterterrorism strategy.
-There is a palpable fear in the West that China could seek to export to other authoritarian regimes its counterterrorism model, utilizing technology to harass and control minority populations.
-China could seek to extend its influence through highly invasive technology incorporated into its BRI initiative, collecting and analyzing data of friends and foes alike.
More than 250 people were killed in a series of coordinated terrorist attacks in churches and hotels in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on 20 April during Easter Sunday. Local Islamic orgasnisations NJT and JMI are held responsible for the attack. Islamic State has also claimed responsibility. Sri Lanka has had a long history of majoritarian Buddhist and state violence against religious and ethnic minorities. During the civil war, the Tamil group LTTE too had attacked Muslims in its Eastern province. However, there have been no cases of inter-ethnic clashes between Muslims and Christians in the island nation. Motivation for these attacks apparently came from what is seen as persecution of Muslims in other countries.Multi religious and multi-ethnic countries of South Asia are especially in danger of being sucked into global terror spawned by imitations of the Islamic State and its virulent ideology. Before Colombo, there was the Dhaka attack on a café in which 29 people were killed. Signs from Pakistan and Afghanistan are not propitious where IS inspired terror groups have deeper base. Like Sri Lanka, India toois not immune from this kind of terror.
Bottom Line Up Front:
On April 16, Egypt’s parliament passed amendments to the Constitution that provide President al-Sisi with a path forward to maintain power until 2030.
There is little observable public opposition to the constitutional changes, likely a result of the oppressive nature of the Egyptian government.
The number of suspected foreign ISIS fighters being detained by US-backed forces in Syria has now surpassed 2,000, with a small number claiming to be US citizens, three US officials told CNN.
Bottom Line Up Front:
Global arms sales are booming, with a spike caused by a years-long increase in spending from countries in the MENA region.
Countries exporting arms cite the link between deterrence and stability to justify these sales, while often downplaying the role these weapons play in helping autocrats oppress their populations and often prolong wars and insurgencies.
Bottom Line Up Front:
A serious military escalation is underway in Libya as General Khalifa Haftar and his forces move to take Tripoli.
The battle is now unifying a range of violent non-state actors with the recognized interim government against Haftar, who is receiving significant external state support.
Since taking office in 2013, German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen has done little to alleviate the problems in the military. The best-known projects during her tenure were kindergartens for the soldiers' families; the procurement of flat screen television sets and mini-fridges for the barracks; the announcement of efforts to make the German army "more attractive for gay, lesbian and transgender people"; buying uniforms for pregnant soldiers, and making battle tanks suitable for pregnant soldiers. As worthwhile as these efforts may be, they do little to address the core problems.
"Apparently the readiness of the Bundeswehr is so bad that the public should not be allowed to know about it." — Tobias Lindner, a Greens Party member, serving on the budget and defense committees.Francis Boyle, Professor of International Law at the University of Illinois pre-recorded this interview for the tenth Unity4J Vigil which took place on 30 December 2018.
The Counter Extremism Project (CEP) today called on members of the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary to use their Tuesday hearing on hate crimes and white nationalism to hold the tech industry accountable for its failure to permanently remove extremist and terrorist content in disregard for public safety and security, particularly in the wake of the New Zealand shootings. Ahead of Facebook and Google’s testimony, CEP is releasing a list of questions with the aim of holding tech companies accountable for their inaction regarding extremist content online.