Threatens (5)

North Korea threatens nuclear 'holy war

101223_koreamilitary.grid-8x2.jpg?width=300POCHEON, South Korea — North Korea's minister of armed forces said on Thursday its military was prepared to wage a "holy war" against the South using its nuclear deterrent after what he called Seoul's attempt to initiate conflict.

Minister Kim Yong Chun repeated Pyongyang's charge that the South had been preparing to start a war by conducting live-fire drills off the west coast, speaking at a rally to mark leader Kim Jong Il's rise to the country's top military post 19 years ago.

He was quoted by North Korea's KCNA news agency which regularly threatens the South, but which had up to now been relatively restrained in its criticism of the military drills.

"To counter the enemy's intentional drive to push the situation to the brink of war, our revolutionary forces are making preparations to begin a holy war at any moment necessary based on nuclear deterrent," KCNA quoted Kim as telling the rally in Pyongyang.

His remarks came shortly after South Korean fighter jets dropped bombs and tanks fired artillery in the South's largest air and ground firing drills of the year.

It was a show of force staged a month after North Korea's deadly shelling of a front-line island.

Hills erupt in smoke
Tanks raced down mountain roads firing artillery rounds. The boom of cannons echoed through the valley and the hills erupted in smoke.

Rockets streamed across the valley and slammed into the side of a hill as helicopters overhead fired rockets at targets and F-15 fighters zoomed by dropping bombs.
Image: F-15K fighter jets drop bombs during military exercises
Wally Santana / AP
Two F-15K fighter jets drop bombs during military exercises on Thursday in Pocheon, South Korea.

The drills, which lasted about 40 minutes, were the armed forces' largest joint firing exercises this year, and the biggest-ever wintertime air and ground firing exercises, government and army officials said on condition of anonymity, citing department rules.

Forty-seven similar exercises have taken place this year but Thursday's maneuvers were scheduled in response to the North Korean attack, according to army officials.

Exactly one month ago, routine South Korean live-fire drills from Yeonpyeong Island in the Yellow Sea triggered a shower of North Korean artillery that killed two marines and two construction workers.

It was the first military attack on a civilian area since the 1950-53 Korean War ended in a truce.

North Korea, which claims the waters around the South Korean-held island lying just 7 miles from its shores as its territory, accused the South of sparking the exchange by ignoring Pyongyang's warnings against staging the live-fire drills near their disputed maritime border.

Amid international concerns of all-out war on the tense Korean peninsula, South Korea has pushed ahead with military exercises over the past several weeks, including live-fire drills from Yeonpyeong Island and Thursday's exercises.

"We will thoroughly punish the enemy if it provokes us again as with the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island," Brig. Gen. Ju Eun-sik, chief of the South Korean army's 1st Armored Brigade, said in a statement Wednesday.

The two Koreas remain technically at war because their 1950s conflict ended in a cease-fire, not a peace treaty.


In a rare trip to the front line, South Korean President Lee Myung-bak visited a military unit near the border to inspect defensive readiness against Pyongyang.

"We had believed patience would ensure peace on this land, but that was not the case," Lee told troops.

Lee has replaced his top defense officials with more hawkish military men, a response to criticism of a perceived weak response to hostile acts from the North. .

The military tension over the past month has been the worst in more than a decade, and comes on the heels of the March sinking of a South Korean warship that Seoul blames on Pyongyang, but which North Korea denies attacking. Forty-six sailors died in that incident.

South Korea's navy also was conducting annual anti-submarine exercises off the east coast.

In Pocheon, dozens of soldiers and civilians, including schoolchildren in bright yellow jackets, watched the drills.

"We are facing a crisis because of North Korea, so I came to see this air and ground operation. I want to feel and see the level of South Korea's armed forces," said Kim Tae-dong, 70. "Another North Korean provocation will happen. We should prepare our military perfectly for that."

China, the impoverished North's only major ally, has urged dialogue to resolve the crisis and has been reluctant lay to blame, frustrating Washington and its allies which want Beijing to do more to rein in Pyongyang.

Barack Obama is expected to press this point when Chinese President Hu Jintao visits the United States on January 19 .
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MEND threatens new attack

jpeg&STREAMOID=yCDGsfq7fNQNqin3K8zQny6SYeqqxXXqBcOgKOfTXxQc5DuYqMnIg2GPWnjbp0EEnW_PgxgftuECOcfJwS6Jtlp$r8Fy$6AAZ9zyPuHJ25T7a9GKDSxsGxtpmxP0VAUyHL6IDcZHtmM2t7xO$FHdJG95dFi6y2Uma3vSsvPpVyo-The Movement for Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND) today warned of another attack in Abuja, largely to protest the trial of Henry Okah in South Africa and what it said is the persecution Of ‘innocent people' in Nigeria..

In a statement sent by its usual spokeman, Jomo Gbomo, the group said it will "give a thirty minutes advance warning to avoid civilian casualties then sit back and watch how the blame game will be played out on all those already falsely accused."

The group, which also claimed the bomb attack (which it described as a perfect opportunity) in Abuja on the morning of the October 1, said President Goodluck Jonathan's presidential bid has been been brought above every other thing and that the federal government is involved in an "attempt to intimidate anyone opposed to the presidential ambition of Goodluck Jonathan."

Describing it as "hiding under the cloak of terrorist hunting and witch-hunting, by falsely accusing and harassing its perceived opponents," the group repeated an earlier claim that linking Raymond Dokpesi and Henry Okah in South Africa is a product of the Nigerian government threat to nationalize the South Africa communication group, MTN if South Africa does not follow its script.

NEXT's efforts to trace the origin of the email shows that although the Yahoo internet server through which it was routed is located in Spain, the person who sent the email did so from a Zoom Mobile modem here in Lagos.
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Questions Arising : IS HENRY OKAH JOMO GBOMO ? Who is Jomo Gbomo ? there are photos of Jomo Gbomo on the web but he seems to be a guru Internet User as he is the one that sends all these emails ? Why cant he be tracked ? Or is the CIA really helping The FG in this case ?
The former leader of Nigeria's armed group has said he was arrested because he refused to tell the group to retract a statement claiming responsibility for last week's deadly attacks in the capital, Abuja.

Henry Okah, currently being held in jail in South Africa, told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that he received a phone call from a "close associate" of Goodluck Jonathan, the Nigerian president, telling him to urge the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) to withdraw its claim for the bombings, which killed at least 10 people and left 36 others injured on the 50th anniversay of Nigeria's independence.
Photo 1 Henry Okah confirmed Photo 2 Jomo Gbomo

"On Saturday morning, just a day after the attack, a very close associate of President Jonathan called me and explained to me that there had been a bombing in Nigeria and that President Jonathan wanted me to reach out to the group, Mend, and get them to retract the earlier statement they had issued claiming the attacks," Okah said.

"They wanted to blame the attacks on northerners who are trying to fight against him [Jonathan] to come back as president and if this was done, I was not going to have any problems with the South African government.

"I declined to do this and a few hours later I was arrested. It was based on their belief that I was going to do that that Jonathan issued a statement saying that Mend did not carry out the attack."

'Unpatriotic elements'

Jonathan, who hails from the country's south and has declared his intentions to stand in next year's presidential election, said investigations had revealed Mend, which is fighting for a greater share of Nigeria's oil wealth, knew nothing about the attacks.

He said the bombings had been carried out by a small group based outside Nigeria, sponsored by "unpatriotic elements within the country".

Nigeria will be holding elections in January almost a year after Jonathan assumed the presidency after the incumbent president failed to complete his term due to illness and eventual death.

Jonathan's predecessor, Umaru Yaradua, came from the northern state of Katsina and Nigeria has an unwritten agreement for the presidency to alternate between the mainly Muslim north and the largely Christian south.

Al Jazeera did not get any immediate reaction from the Nigerian government about Okah's claims.

Meanwhile, the authorities have released nine people they arrested in connection with the bomb blasts on Monday, including an aide for Ibrahim Babangida, the country's former military leader.

Raymond Dokpesi, the director of Babandida's campaign to become the ruling party presidential candidate, was questioned by the country's intelligence services over the blasts, an aide said on Tuesday.

Dokpesi, who also owns one of Nigeria's leading television and radio stations, was summoned to the State Security Services (SSS) on Monday, Kassim Afegbua, a spokesman for Babangida, told the AFP news agency.

"He was released yesterday and is to report back today at about 3'oclock (1400 GMT)," Afegbua said.

"They said it is to do with complicity in the bomb incident of October 1."

Several media reports on Tuesday said text messages found on the mobile phone of one of the nine suspects arrested by the state secret police led to the summoning of Dokpesi.

Threats of fresh bomb explosions heightened yesterday, as the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said it would wreak more havoc should the Federal Government repatriate and put its leader, Henry Okah to trial over the October 1 bomb attack in Abuja.

Spokesman of MEND, Jomo Gbomo during an online interview with the Daily Sun maintained that the group was responsible for the bombings, which coincided with the parade ceremony during the nation’s 50th Independence anniversary.
If Okah is repatriated, he contended, he would not get fair trial because the MEND leader has always been blamed for what he is not involved in.

“We will come down very hard on the system because it will be another Ken Saro Wiwa kangaroo trial.
“Henry Okah has always been blamed for what he is not involved in. This is not the first-time, so, it is not coming as a surprise to us. If he was not arrested during the Bonga and Atlas Cove attacks, he would have been blamed as the mastermind,” he said.

More Bombings In store

Gbomo has averred that MEND had made its point with the bombings in Abuja and would employ the same method of attack on military targets. This, he explained, would happen when the group declares resumption of hostilities.
He, however, tendered apology to the families of innocent Nigerians that lost their lives to the Abuja explosions, saying, it was not their intent to kill them.
According to him, “Our apology stems from the avoidable loss of innocent lives as this was not our intent. We wanted to use the opportunity to blame the security agencies for not playing their roles considering the forewarning we gave them.

“We have made our point and we will use this method of attack on military targets after we declare a resumption of hostilities.”
Reacting to President Goodluck Jonathan’s statement that MEND was not responsible for the attacks but perpetrated by terrorists, Gbomo asserted: “It is an obvious political comment which any smart person can see through.”
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shuo na by force abeg make i go get my camera joo !

2011: Gbemi Saraki must contest or we walk naked•Female group threatens

AS the issue of who takes over from Dr. Bukola Saraki as the next governor of Kwara State gathers momentum, a female group, comprising students from various higher institutions of learning in the state, has vowed to walk the streets of Ilorin naked if Senator Gbemisola Saraki failed to contest for governorship in 2011.Photo Ekiti women in recent Naked protest

The group also said that it would go on exile if the senator refused to contest.

The group, under the aegis of distinct Ladies of Gbemisola Saraki Forum (DLGSF), while speaking with newsmen in Ilorin, on Sunday evening, stated that the senator should come out and declare her intention to contest for the position.

According to the Coordinator of the group, Miss Bola Babs, whether the senator is from the family of Saraki or not is immaterial to her political ambition, “after all Dr Olusola Saraki, who is the father of both, has the final say over the matter of who becomes the governor of Kwara.”

Her words: “For sometime now, we have been drumming it to the ears of Senator Gbemisola Saraki to go out and represent the women folk come 2011 but she has not answered us. We want her consent to become the next governor of this state yet she has refused to answer us.
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IS the Senate on DRUGS ? Is it now they want to defend the pride of the Nation ! No President,No Fuel , No Jobs ,Home Based Financial Terrorists going scot free from the system called Justice Come on ! Please America It is the Nigerian Senate that makes this threats NOT us The Masses of Nigeria, As controversy and anger continue to trail the listing of Nigeria as one of the 10 countries on the United States of America's top security watch list, the Senate has threatened to severe diplomatic relations with the country if by next week, it fails to remove Nigeria from the list of countries "of interest" for terrorism. The Senate said this through its spokesperson, Ayogu Eze. He told National Assembly reporters on Tuesday in Abuja, "We are very unhappy about the development and when we resume, we are going to take this matter very seriously if America has not taken Nigeria's name off that list." The U.S., through its Transport Security Administration (TSA), on Sunday announced the inclusion of Nigeria on the list of countries that are considered "of interest" (with regards to terrorism) based on its latest terrorism intelligence. Also included in the list with Nigeria are Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, and Yemen. Mr. Eze, who told reporters that he was talking on behalf of the Senate president, said, "For them (America) to embarrass the entire country with this type of classification without justification is totally unacceptable. The American president himself clearly admitted that this was a failure of system and the manpower of Americans. I don't see how Nigerians come in there and moreover this is just one instance of a Nigerian who it is clearly established had no links with any fundamentalist group or any interest group within Nigeria, not even with his own parents." Failure of intelligence He added, "This was a boy whose disappearance was reported to the security agencies, the American authorities and all the relevant authorities; and America did nothing. For them to turn round and punish Nigerians for the sin of an isolated case like this is very unacceptable to the Nigerian government and unacceptable to the Nigerian Senate." He said the Senate has also watched with keen interest several other breaches that have taken place in the American system even before the alleged attempted terror attack by the Nigerian. He cited the issue of the uninvited guest who beat White House security to crash a party organised in honour of the Indian president. "That was not a Nigerian. Americans should look inwards and search their soul; something is wrong with their system and they should not punish ordinary Nigerians, who are very law-abiding and good international citizens for the failure and irresponsibility of American citizens. Nigeria will not take that." A word for America Mr. Eze offered an advice to the superpower, "We also want to advise America that it is in their own interest to ensure that they conduct this matter in a manner that will not result in a diplomatic row between America and Nigeria. It will be most unfair, given the kind of relationship that has existed between America and Nigeria for America to jump to this type of conclusion without even adequate consultation with all the authorities. This is not acceptable to us and we are going to do whatever we can as a nation to prove to America that we will not take this. This is not how diplomacy is conducted and we are going to engage all our diplomatic gears to ensure that we either have a relationship with America or we don't." It has been widely reported that since the December 25 incident involving a Nigerian, many Nigerians have been subjected to dehumanising treatments and body searches by American security officials. This, Mr. Eze observed, "Must be stopped immediately. Do they think America is the only country that has citizens the country is responsible to?" he asked. "We also have citizens and we are responsible for them and we will not wait and allow Nigerians to be molested wherever they go," Mr. Eze said. The listing of Nigeria in the ‘countries of interest list' means, all NIgerian passengers as well as those whose flights originate from Nigeria will be subjected to full body and hand luggage searches. Analysts have also said foreign investors are likely to be wary of investing in the country as a result of the listing.
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