March 10 2010
Zimbabwe: political and security threats to transition
Despite some reasonable progress in restoring political and social stability, "major threats" could still stall the reform process, says a new report by the International Crisis Group. The report says that the biggest threat to the trasition process comes from the "resistance of intransigent and still powerful security sector leaders and fractious in-fighting between and within the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU-PF) and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)."
International Crisis Group
Iran's President Ahmedinejad in Afghanistan for talks
Iranian President Mahmooud Ahmedinejad has arrived in Kabul for talks with his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai. A spokesman for Mr Karzai said the two presidents would discuss a possible "expansion of economic relations," including a railway line from Tajikistan through Afghanistan to Iran.
BBC
Biden condemns Israel over homes plan
US Vice-President Joe Biden has spoken out against a plan, approved by Israel's Interior Ministry, to build 1,600 homes on occupied Palestinian land in East Jerusalem. Biden said the plan for Ramat Shlomo, an ultra-orthodox settlement in an area of the West Bank annexed to Jerusalem "undermines the trust we need right now and runs counter to the constructive discussions I've had in Israel."
The Guardian
March 09 2010
In the Nigerian killing fields
Dozens of bodies lined the dusty streets of three Christian villages in northern Nigeria yesterday morning. Nigeria's acting President Goodluck Jonathan has now ordered troops into the area "to confront and defeat these roving bands of killers." Last night he sacked Sarki Mukhtar, the national security adviser, a powerful figure in the inner circle of the ailing President, Umaru Yar'Adua.
The Times
EU passports unsafe, says expert
After the Dubai killing of a Hamas commander, by a team of 27 assassins using fake EU and Australian passports for a cloak and dagger escapade, passport security is under the microscope.
euobserver
Passenger data deal vital for catching terrorists, says US
A provisional deal allowing American authorities to tap into the passenger details of EU passengers crossing the Atlantic helped find a third of the "hundreds" of terrorism suspects identified last year, a US official has said, in a bid to convince wary Euro-deputies to approve the agreement.
euobserver
North Korea creates medium-range rocket division
The official North Korean news agency, Renkhap, announced today that a special ballistic missile divison has been created in the North Korean People's Army. The division's task will include the targeting of medium-range rockets, capable of reaching destinations in Russia, India and the Pacific Ocean. "Such weapons threaten the security not only of the Korean peninsula, but also of the US 7th Fleet, which is based in Japan."
Kommersant
Iran's ex-President Banisadr: "People want regime change"
Abu I-Hasan Banisadr, who became Iran's first President after the 1979 revolution against the Shah, describes current President Ahmedinajad's rule as "a dark dictatorship" and says "the Iranian people do not want this regime." He advises the West to "be unambiguous about its wants and wishes so that the Iranian people are reassured that it is not looking for an Iranian regime dominated by foreign powers."
world security network
Boeing 747 would have survived the Flight 253 bomb
A test explosion on a decommissioned Boeing 747 revealed that the Christmas Day Flight 253 to Detroit would have landed safely - even if the bomb had been detonated successfully. A test blast on a Boeing 747 airliner in England, using PETN explosives like those discovered on the Amsterdam - Detroit flight, failed to rupture the hull. British experts said it showed the suspected bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, and the passenger sitting next to him, would have been killed. But the suspect carried too little explosive to rupture the pressure hull and the remaining 287 passengers on Flight 253 would have survived. The experiment was carried out for the BBC Two documentary How Safe are our Skies? screened on March 4, 2010.
BBC
US Coast Guard: 3 per cent cuts scare
In a leaked memo, the USA's coastguard commandant Robert J. Papp, has warned that the world's biggest coastguard is being cut by 1100 personnel without 'full appreciation' of the operational impact on homeland security, The commandant's 'remarkably honest and sometimes disturbing' memo revealed 'asset reduction decisions' in the 2011 budget. There is however some support in Congress for avoiding cuts at the Coast Guard by cutting staff at the headquarters of the Department of Homeland Security, the overlord agency widely perceived to be less reliable than the Coast Guard.
DoD Buzz
March 08 2010
My fears for Nigeria by former Head of State Buhari
"Nigeria is witnessing an awful institutional collapse similar to the conditions that preceded the failure of Somalia, yet with all the potential of being worse than the Somali experience."
Nigerian News
TRAINING NOT EQUIPMENT KEY TO
CYBER SECURITY, SAYS EXPERT
Jay Bavisi
One of the world’s leading specialists on cyber security and hacking told participants at Security and Defence Learning 2009 that “equipment-based security solutions” were “easy” to circumvent. Jay Bavisi, President of EC-Council, whose company employs “ethical hackers” to test the security systems of major organisations including, the Pentagon, said that better training was the key to eliminating the problem. He said it was vital to abandon the “equipment-based security mentality” and to focus instead on training and best practice.
TOP SECURITY TRAINERS AT BERLIN CONFERENCE
Keynote speakers at Security
and Defence Learning 2009
will include Ken Lawson of UK
Emergency College and
Peter-Martin Meier of Swiss
Police Institue
Senior figures from the Swiss Police; INTERPOL; the Scottish Police; NATO, the Ministry of Justice of Brazil and the UK Emergency Planning College will join other leading experts on security training in Berlin on December 2nd for this year’s ‘Security and Defence Learning 2009’, the fifth International Conference on Technology Assisted Learning for Security , Defence and Emergency Services.
EDUCATION ‘FORGOTTEN’ IN POST-CONFLICT AID
“Education is the forgotten aspect of post-conflict humanitarian aid and aid for refugees”, New Security Foundation Chairman Dr Harold Elletson told delegates at a ground-breaking workshop on ‘post-conflict distance learning’ during ‘eLearning Africa’ in Dakar, Senegal. Dr Elletson reminded delegates that nine years earlier in Dakar, the World Education Forum had set the target of universal primary education for every child by 2015, which was adopted as one of the UN’s millennium goals. “However, over 100 million children still don’t attend primary school. And, of these, 50 per cent are in countries which are either suffering from conflict or recovering from it.”
E-LEARNING AND POST-CONFLICT RECONSTRUCTION
How can education and training survive conflict and catastrophe?
In war zones and regions devastated by a natural disaster, the education needs of the population can easily be overlooked. Yet, experience in Afghanistan suggests that education should be a fundamental part of any reconstruction package and e-learning offers an effective, affordable solution to many problems.
SECURITY TRAINING UNDER SCRUTINY
The latest trends in security training will be under scrutiny at ‘Security And Defence Learning 2009’ in Berlin on December 2nd. A call for papers has been issued by the New Security Foundation, which hosts the conference, and key themes are likely to include the future of gaming and simulation, training for the growing cyber threat to critical infrastructure and the potential impact of new developments, such as Web 3.0 and ‘brain science,’ on security and security training.