Islamist threat to Timbuktu's ancient scientific texts

[Valin]

New Scientist : Andy Coghlan

7/3/12

 

Timbuktu's priceless collection of ancient scientific texts is at risk of destruction by hard-line Islamists.

 

Ansar Dine, a Tuareg militia, occupies territory around Timbuktu, a town in northern Mali listed as a world heritage site. In recent weeks, the group has destroyed historic tombs in the town (see picture), which house the remains of Islamic Sufi saints and which Ansar Dine says are idolatrous.

 

"We know six or seven shrines have been attacked," Lazare Eloundou Assomo, chief of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre's Africa Unit, told New Scientist. "But there are many scientific documents at risk too, and no one can tell if they'll be safe."

 

*UNESCO has accepted a request by the government of Mali to add Timbuktu to the list of heritage sites at risk of destruction.

(Snip)

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDqzqEo9tgM

 

* Like that means a damn thing to these "Militants".

 

 

More Here

[Valin]

Get Ready for the Mali Invasion

10/22/12

 

 

France is sending drones to Mali while hundreds of Islamist fighters are coming in from across the Middle East, preparing to defend their safe haven.

 

(Snip)

 

Meanwhile, according to Voice of America, the Islamist fighters are calling in reinforcements:

 

Mali was first destabilized thanks to NATO’s intervention in Libya, which sent weapons and fighters streaming into the northern deserts, where they found little opposition from the government. Other Islamist fighters from the Middle East soon came flocking in to this sandy patch of ungoverned territory. Their ranks are reportedly bolstered by thousands of local child soldiers.

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

Foreign jihadists continue to pour into Mali

Bill Roggio

October 27, 2012

 

Both Malian security officials and Ansar Dine's spokesman have confirmed that foreign fighters are continuing to travel to northern Mali, where al Qaeda-linked jihadists from the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa (MUJOA), Ansar Dine, and al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb have been in control since February. From Magharebia (which has done an excellent job of covering the conflict in Mali):

 

 

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One month ago, AFP reported that foreign jihadists from West African countries such as Togo, Benin, Niger, Nigeria, Guinea, Senegal, and the Ivory Coast, as well as Egyptians, Algerians, and Pakistanis, have been filling out the ranks of the three main jihadist groups in Mali. Additionally, at least two training camps have been established in Gao, the largest city in northern Mali [see Threat Matrix report, West African jihadists flock to northern Mali].

 

Meanwhile, the United Nations, the European Union, the African Union, the Economic Community of West African States, and the US are still trying to figure out how do deal with the deteriorating security situation in northern Mali. All indications are that no military action will occur until sometime in 2013. And the African Union has indicated that it "will leave the door of dialogue open to those Malian rebel groups willing to negotiate."

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

Islamists Declare A War On Music

[NCTexan]

Thanks for posting the article @Valin.

 

I was glad to see Timbuktu make the headlines again.

 

At the finals of the National Poetry Competition the two finalist were an unlikely pair.

 

Finalist number one was a Harvard educated professor of literature and the winner of several previous competitions.

 

Finalist number two was a young Marine Lcpl. from the hills of West Virginia who needed help filling out the entry form.

 

The final round consisted of each competitor being given the same word and having thirty seconds to complete a verse, using the word.

 

The Professor went first. The Judge said, " The final word this year is 'Timbuktu'"

 

The Prof. started thinking. Ten seconds went by. Twenty seconds.

 

The crowd became nervous. After twenty eight seconds the Prof. began,

 

"Across the hot Sahara sand,

Trekked the dusty caravan.

Men on camels, two by two,

Destination- Timbuktu."

 

The crowd went wild, there was no way that the Hillbilly Marine would ever top that.

 

The Lcpl. was brought on stage. The judge gave the word, "Timbuktu."

 

The young Lcpl. looked to the sky, he thought for 10-15 seconds, stepped up to the microphone, cleared his throat, and began,

 

"Tim 'en me, a-hunting went,

Met three girls in a pop-up-tent,

They was three and we was two,

So, I bucked one and Tim Buck Two!"

[Valin]

@NCTexan

 

 

GROAN!!!!!

 

YOU Go to your room!

[Valin]

International Jihadis Descend on Mali

10/30/12

 

Any possible intervention in Mali is weeks away, Xan Rice reports for the FT. Moreover, it is uncertain at this point who exactly would do the “intervening”, whether those forces will be prepared to face the jihadis, and what the situation on the ground in Mali really is.

 

(Snip)

 

It’s been six months since an al-Qaeda-friendly zone was established in northern Mali. Now it looks as if there will be many months more before anything happens to disturb the peace of the jihadi training camps there.

 

Not since Osama and friends were able to sit peacefully in Afghanistan and plot air strikes against the U.S. have so many dangerous and experienced jihadis had so much time on their hands to train new recruits and plan new strikes. And despite the boasts from Washington that Al-Qaeda is on its last legs, there are plenty of signs that the global jihadi movement is more flexible and has more manpower than before.

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

SPIEGEL ONLIN: A Trip Through Hell

Daily Life in Islamist Northern Mali

Paul Hyacinthe Mben

10/29/12

 

Across northern Mali, where Islamists have seized control, fighters, often adolescents, with Kalashnikovs are telling locals what is acceptable behavior and what is not. Sharia law is also being implemented -- often in grisly ways.

 

A checkpoint set up by the Islamist police on the road to Gao marks the beginning of the region controlled by the new rulers of northern Mali. Adolescents wielding Kalashnikovs stand at the barrier with their legs apart. The oldest one keeps repeating the same instructions through a megaphone: "No cigarettes, no CDs, no radios, no cameras, no jewelry," an endless loop of prohibitions, a list of everything that's haram, or impure, with which this journey to the north begins. The men stand guard in the name of the Prophet Muhammad.

 

With arrogant gestures, they stop the few long-distance buses still coming from southern Mali. One of the men, holding his weapon at the ready, inspects the busses by walking down the aisle and checking to make sure everyone is in compliance with the Islamists' rules: Are women and men sitting in separate areas? Are the women wearing the hijab? And are the men wearing trousers that reach to their ankles, the kind of trousers that radical Muslims believe the Prophet favored? They are now obligatory in Gao.

 

The driver and the passengers submit to the procedure in silence. When it's over, the inspector jumps out of the back door, still wielding his Kalashnikov, and calls out "Salam alaikum," the greeting commonly used in the Muslim world. The bus has now been cleared to pass through the checkpoint.

 

(Snip)