PrairiePundit

Washington Post: Saudi women will vote this weekend for the first time ever Opening this path for women’s political engagement redefines Saudi citizenship at a time of huge challenges. The Saudi custom of making women wear funny clothes that conceal every feature by their eyes will make it difficult to prevent vote fraud.  It would be possible that even men could dress in the head to toe garb and vote although cross dressing is usually limited to people trying to avoid detection and arrest.

Miami Herald: A Colombian drug kingpin faces double-barreled charges in Miami and New York, accusing him of smuggling tons of cocaine from Venezuela to the United States while financially supporting leftist guerrillas in his homeland, authorities said Tuesday. Jose Evaristo Linares-Castillo, designated by the U.S. government as one of the “most significant” narco-traffickers in the world, is accused of producing cocaine at his labs in Colombia and storing about 20,000 kilos of it in the Apure state of Venezuela. In Apure, near the Colombian border, Linares-Castillo used clandestine airstrips controlled by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia to transport loads of cocaine to Honduras or Guatemala and then to Mexico, prosecutors say. From there, most of the drugs were smuggled into the United States. Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/04/30/3373428/colombian-kingpin-faces-drug-charges.html#emlnl=The_Americas#storylink=cpy ...  Venezuela is also a base for ex...

NY Times: U.S. Sting That Snared African Ex-Admiral Shines Light on Drug Trade The former chief of the Guinea-Bissau Navy, who was labeled a “drug kingpin” by American officials, faced trafficking charges Monday after a D.E.A. sting. Guinea-Bissau has been a major drug transit point receiving shipments flown in from Venezuela and transferring them to  al Qaeda or operatives protected by al Qaeda to transport the drugs across North Africa through countries like Mali for ultimate distribution in Europe.  The West African government has had a problem with corruption as a result of the drug trade.

Guardian: Guinea-Bissau coup suspected as military seizes parts of capital What I find interesting about this coup is that it follows the one in Mali.  Both countries are transit points for dope from South America via Venezuela.  The drugs are then taken to Europe for sell there.   Perhaps the military wanted a larger share of the profits from the trade or they object to it.  It is more likely the former.  Al Qaeda is known to be the main group responsible for the African transshipment of the drugs.

Strategy Page: For the last four months, troops from Mauritania and Mali have been seeking out and killing al Qaeda members hiding in the Wagadou Forest (actually a thousand hectares/2,500 acres of brush and trees in a semi-desert area), which lies astride the border. Al Qaeda have apparently been there since early last year. The Wagadou Forest has become a way station for cocaine and hashish al Qaeda escorts from Guinea-Bissau to the Mediterranean coast. This is how al Qaeda finances itself in West Africa these days.  Two years ago Al Qaeda has proclaimed the formation of a new chapter south of Algeria, among tribal rebels and disaffected urbanites in Niger, Mali, Chad and Mauritania. This was more PR than reality. There are some Islamic terrorists in the region, and these pronouncements appear to be an attempt to unify pro-Islamic terrorist elements via the Internet and the mass media. So far, the many disaffected groups in the region have shown little interest in uniting. To...

Strategy Page: The U.S. recently cut all military aid to of the African nation of Guinea-Bissau, which was in response to Guinea-Bissau refusing to remove military officers known to be involved with cocaine smugglers. The U.S. believes that the military has not only been bought off by drug gangs, but that the newly appointed head of the army, general Antonio Indjai, is heavily involved in the drug business. Because of the South American drug gangs using Guinea-Bissau as part of their new smuggling route to Europe and the Middle East, West Africa is becoming a new source of income for al Qaeda. At first, the U.S. attacked the problem by putting sanctions, last April, on two senior military commanders in Guinea-Bissau. Air force chief of staff Ibraima Papa Camara and former navy chief of staff Jose Americo Bubo Na Tchuto were accused of being "drug kingpins" and key members of a drug smuggling operation that moves cocaine from South America to Europe and the Persia...

Independent: Drug traffickers are increasingly using sophisticated submarines to transport their illicit cargo in the supply chain from Latin America to Britain and Europe, senior Royal Navy officers said yesterday. Wealthy crime cartels based in Colombia are taking recourse to the underwater craft in an attempt to counter the rising number of naval patrols in the Caribbean. The "narco-submarines" carrying cocaine sail from South to North America and islands in the Caribbean for shipment to Western Europe. Investigators say the size and range of the vessels have grown in recent times and some have been crossing the Atlantic to West Africa as an alternative route to the lucrative European markets. The political dimensions of the narcotics trade have been highlighted by the fighting in Jamaica, where attempts by security forces to arrest suspected drug lord Christopher "Dudus" Coke, wanted in the US, triggered a virtual insurgency, while the US has a...

Strategy Page: West Africa is becoming a new source of income for al Qaeda. So the U.S. is attacking the problem with some unique tactics. That includes putting sanctions on two senior military commanders of the African nation Guinea-Bissau. Air force chief of staff Ibraima Papa Camara and former navy chief of staff Jose Americo Bubo Na Tchuto were accused of being "drug kingpins" and key members of a drug smuggling operation that moves cocaine from South America to Europe and the Persian Gulf, via Guinea-Bissau. The sanctions freeze any assets the two men have in the United States, and prohibit Americans from doing business with the two. Al Qaeda has been seen operating in Guinea-Bissau for several years now. Two years ago, two al Qaeda members were arrested and charged with the murder, in Mauritania, of four French tourists. At the time, the United States was suspicious of al Qaeda involvement in cocaine trafficking in South America. Then al Qaeda operatives be...

Reuters: In early 2008, an official at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security sent a report to his superiors detailing what he called "the most significant development in the criminal exploitation of aircraft since 9/11." The document warned that a growing fleet of rogue jet aircraft was regularly crisscrossing the Atlantic Ocean. On one end of the air route, it said, are cocaine-producing areas in the Andes controlled by the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. On the other are some of West Africa's most unstable countries. The report, a copy of which was obtained by Reuters, was ignored, and the problem has since escalated into what security officials in several countries describe as a global security threat. The clandestine fleet has grown to include twin-engine turboprops, executive jets and retired Boeing 727s that are flying multi-ton loads of cocaine and possibly weapons to an area in Africa where factions of al Qaeda are believed to be facilitatin...

NY Times: First the general was blown up. Then the president was shot dead , the former prime minister was arrested and tortured, a presidential candidate was killed in his villa, and the former defense minister was ambushed and shot on the bridge outside town. Despite those chilling messages — reportedly carried out by men in military uniform — Sunday’s election to replace the assassinated president, João Bernardo Vieira, will go on. There is jolly music and dancing in the decaying streets; earnest international observers crisscross Bissau, the capital; the remaining candidates hold buoyant rallies in preparation for the vote; and trucks packed with chanting supporters bounce up and down over the little city’s deep potholes. Underneath, though, there is anxiety and doubt here in Guinea-Bissau, a former Portuguese colony that is pitch-black at night because of a lack of electricity and that is so fragile it is being abandoned even by the drug traffickers, according to a United Nations ...

NY Times: Army troops shot dead João Bernardo Vieira, the president of neighboring Guinea-Bissau, early on Monday following a bomb attack that killed the army chief of staff, according to diplomats in the region. News reports said army troops blamed the president for the death of the army chief, General Batista Tagme Na Wai, who died in an explosion on Sunday night. Diplomats, who spoke in return for anonymity under customary rules, said the president was killed at around 5 a.m. in an attack outside his house and the country’s borders had been closed. “Nobody knows who is in charge,” one diplomat said. “Nobody knows what the army will do.” The army command denied that a coup was underway, saying an “isolated group” of soldiers killed the president. In a statement broadcast on state radio, the military pledged to respect the “constitutional order” providing for the head of parliament to succeed the president until elections within three months. Guinea-Bissau is a former Portuguese colon...