The report from CBS News (a video report is at the link):
U.S. forces are about to get some much-needed help as they fight the Taliban in Afghanistan, reports CBS News chief foreign affairs correspondent Lara Logan in an exclusive report. The Colombian commandos are U.S. trained and battle-tested from having defeated terrorists in their own country.
Ten years ago, they didn’t even exist. Today, elite Colombian Special Operations troops are preparing to fight alongside the U.S. in Afghanistan, reports CBS News chief foreign affairs correspondent Lara Logan.
For Colombia, it’s a way to give something back to the U.S., and the American Green Berets who’ve spent the last decade training them.
General Freddy Padilla de Leon, Colombia’s top military man, chose an interview with Logan to make the surprise announcement his men would join the fight in Afghanistan.
“Very soon … Maybe in August or September. This will be our first opportunity in our history,” Padilla said.
Argentina is facing drought, political turmoil and rising food prices. As a result, the South American bread basket, is experiencing its worst wheat sowing season in more than a century.
Teresa Bo reports from Cordoba, on Argentina’s poor and hungry facing the prospect of even less to eat.
The UK Guardian reports on concerted effort to start unprecedented talks between the Taliban and British and American envoys.
Senior ministers and commanders on the ground believe they have created the right conditions to open up a dialogue with “second-tier” local leaders now the Taliban have been forced back in a swath of Helmand province.
They are hoping that Britain’s continuing military presence in Helmand, strengthened by the arrival of thousands of US troops, will encourage Taliban commanders to end the insurgency. There is even talk in London and Washington of a military “exit strategy”.
Speaking at the end of the five-week Operation Panther’s Claw in which hundreds of British troops were reported to have cleared insurgents from a vital region of Helmand province, Lieutenant-General Simon Mayall, deputy chief of defence staff, said: “It gives the Taliban ’second tier’ room to reconnect with the government and this is absolutely at the heart of this operation.”
The second tier of the insurgency are regarded as crucial because they control large numbers of Taliban fighters in Pashtun-dominated southern Afghanistan. The first tier of Taliban commanders – hardliners around Mullah Omar – could not be expected to start talks in the foreseeable future. The third tier – footsoldiers with no strong commitments – are not regarded as influential or significant players.
Operation Panther’s Claw is a recently concluded campaign in Helmand Province conducted by British troops. British commanders hope that campaign will prove a decisive turning point in the eight-year conflict. The operation took nearly 3,000 British troops, many engaged in gun battles, to capture an area of 150 square miles. The advances helped to secure the territory with a population of 80,000 which had been held by a estimated Taliban force of 500.
California health programs will lose more than a billion dollars under the state’s new budget. The cuts could eliminate thousands of children, seniors and the disabled from health care programs.
Tajik President Imomali Rahmon is calling on families to stockpile food, due to the Central Asian nation’s deepening economic woes.
Food shortages are “becoming a serious problem” and stocks lasting two years should be built by those who can afford it, Rahmon said in an address carried by the Khovar state news agency on July 28.
“As a result of the [global financial] crisis, and due to various natural disasters, drought, shortages and other factors, the provision of food in many countries around the world is becoming a serious problem, and according to expert analysis, this process will continue in the future,” he said.
Poverty is endemic in the cash-strapped state and international organizations warn that the full force of the economic slowdown has yet to be felt.
In January, a World Food Program report classified in “around 1.5 million [Tajiks] as food insecure, with 400,000 of them severely so.”
Robbers storm Baghdad’s most heavily policed districts, making off with $6.5m after killing eight security guards. But as Al Jazeera’s Bernard Smith reports, no group has yet claimed responsibility.
Thieves killed eight security guards and made off with nearly $7 million in a bank heist early today that could have been the work of insurgents, police officials said.
The heist came as U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates flew to Iraq on an unannounced visit to get a firsthand look at conditions on the ground now that U.S. combat troops have withdrawn from Iraq’s cities.
Police said the thieves used guns equipped with silencers to kill three guards outside a branch of the state-owned Rafidain Bank in Baghdad’s Karrada neighborhood. They then shot dead five guards who were sleeping inside the bank, before making off with the cash.
Baghdad has witnessed a spate of robberies recently that has given rise to suspicions that insurgents are embarking on a crime spree to finance their activities. Monday, three people were killed and 12 wounded in a noontime shootout between robbers and guards at a popular money exchange, also in Karrada. The thieves escaped, but police said it appeared they hadn’t taken any money.
The U.S. military said it is possible insurgents are involved.
“I cannot confirm that the attacks were terrorist related,” said Major David Shoupe, spokesman for U.S. forces in Baghdad. “It does fit past trends of terrorist groups in Iraq financing their operations through criminal enterprise — like kidnappings for ransom, robberies and black marketeering.”
Iraqi security forces did not ask for U.S. assistance in either of the incidents, he said.
Gates’ visit came amid reports of tensions on the ground between U.S. soldiers and Iraqi forces seeking to interpret the terms of the security agreement governing their relationship. American forces now may enter Iraq’s cities only with the permission of the Iraqis, which has given rise to confusion about what U.S. troops can do in many areas.
Gates also plans a visit to the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan, where heightened tensions between Kurds and Arabs have given rise to fears that a full-scale conflict may erupt if disputes over territory are not resolved by the time U.S. combat forces withdraw from Iraq altogether in August 2010.
Sergio Fajardo habla de la reunión que sostuvieron Los Quintuples el 27 de julio de 2009. Los quíntuples son los cinco candidatos independientes a Presidencia de la República de Colombia e incluyen a Sergio Fajardo, Lucho Garzón, Antanas Mockus, Enrique Peñalosa y Martha Lucía Ramírez.
Más información gracias a la pluma de Leon Valencia en El Colombiano:
Los llamados quíntuples es lo más novedoso que se ha presentado en la política colombiana en los últimos meses. La posibilidad de que se geste una coalición o un movimiento encabezado por Sergio Fajardo, Lucho Garzón, Antanas Mockus, Enrique Peñalosa y Martha Lucía Ramírez, para disputar la presidencia de la república y las elecciones parlamentarias, ha generado grandes expectativas en la opinión pública.
No es para menos. Tener en una sola foto a tres ex alcaldes de Bogotá con gran popularidad y prestigio, al mejor alcalde que tuvo Medellín en los últimos veinte años y a la única mujer que ha ocupado el Ministerio de Defensa, es un lujo que muy pocas fuerzas políticas se pueden dar.
Un movimiento de esta naturaleza tendría grandes probabilidades de arrasar con el voto de las grandes ciudades y de dar el salto a una segunda vuelta en las elecciones presidenciales. No les quedará difícil a estos cinco dirigentes buscar el apoyo directo o indirecto de los actuales alcaldes de Medellín, Cali, Barranquilla, Cartagena y otras ciudades de más de quinientos mil habitantes. Tampoco tendrán grandes dificultades para entusiasmar al electorado bogotano.
Tienen otra ventaja. No han participado de la aguda polarización que se ha presentado en los últimos años entre uribistas y antiuribistas y por ello no han acumulado grandes resistencias de los seguidores del Presidente, pero, a la vez, representan la opción cultural más distante y la más opuesta al uribismo.
Es, quizás, el más rudo contraste entre el mundo rural y el urbano. Entre un Uribe enfundado en su poncho y armado de un lenguaje campesino que evoca un viejo conflicto armado y un Sergio Fajardo que les habla a los jóvenes en las esquinas de las ciudades vestido de bluyines y camisas informales de marca.
La duda, desde luego, es si tendrán el realismo, la sabiduría y la humildad para declinar algo de sus ambiciones personales y encontrar un lugar y una función para cada uno. No es poca la gente que no da un centavo por este proceso unitario. Se les hace impensable que personalidades con una autoestima tan alta, precedidos de grandes éxitos en la política, puedan tramitar con tranquilidad sus diferencias y acceder a jugar en un proyecto colectivo.
La esperanza de quienes le apuestan a este proyecto se cifra en que una parte del país necesite de su unidad y también ellos se necesiten de manera apremiante. Y hay muchas señales de que estas dos condiciones se empiezan a dar.
El despliegue que le dieron los medios de comunicación al anuncio de la posible coalición indica que una parte de la dirigencia empresarial y política empieza a buscar un relevo confiable para el presidente Uribe y ve en estos líderes una esperanza para hacer una transición tranquila.
Y las ventajas de que se presenten juntos a la contienda electoral, es indiscutible. Quizás es la única manera de asegurar su paso a la segunda vuelta. A la primera vuelta se presentará el presidente Uribe o un candidato fuerte de su coalición, el candidato del Polo y el que resulte de la consulta liberal, también algún disidente del uribismo. Un miembro de la coalición uribista tiene prácticamente asegurado su paso a la segunda vuelta y el otro cupo se lo disputan el resto de fuerzas. Es esta la presión mayor para buscar la unidad.
Pero los obstáculos para llegar a la coalición no son menores. Ahora mismo es difícil encontrar una manera para escoger el candidato presidencial. Sergio Fajardo ha adelantado un gran trabajo en todo el país durante año y medio. Ha visitado más de ciento veinte ciudades y ha conformado grupos en todos estos lugares. Así mismo cuenta con un gran registro en las encuestas. Los demás integrantes de los quíntuples apenas están arrancando su campaña. No le pueden pedir a Sergio que decline lo que ha logrado. Pero Sergio tampoco se puede negar a buscar una fórmula que satisfaga las aspiraciones de sus compañeros.