The Star Online: World Updates
The Star Online: World Updates |
- Hurricane Adrian becomes Category 4, moves out to sea
- Chicago man guilty of aiding Pakistan militant group
- Ex-NSA worker to plead to lesser charge in leak case
| Hurricane Adrian becomes Category 4, moves out to sea Posted: 09 Jun 2011 09:00 PM PDT MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Hurricane Adrian, the first of the 2011 Pacific season, became a Category 4 storm on Thursday as it moved farther out to sea to the northwest, away from Mexico's coastline. The hurricane, with 130-mph (210-kph) winds, was "well off the Pacific coast of Mexico," the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. The hurricane is expected to lose strength by the weekend as it moves farther out into the Pacific. Mexico has no oil installations in the Pacific but its coastal area is dotted with beach resorts popular with U.S. tourists. In its 6:30 p.m. EDT (2230 GMT) advisory, the Miami-based hurricane center said the storm was 320 miles (520 km) south of Manzanillo, Mexico. It was moving west-northwest at 9 mph (15 kph). Adrian developed from a tropical storm on Wednesday when its winds exceeded 74 mph (119 kph). As a Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale, it is considered a major storm. Last summer, Hurricane Frank killed at least three people in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. (Reporting by Elinor Comlay and Patrick Rucker; Editing by Peter Cooney) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. | ||
| Chicago man guilty of aiding Pakistan militant group Posted: 09 Jun 2011 09:00 PM PDT CHICAGO (Reuters) - A U.S. jury on Thursday found Pakistani-born Chicago businessman Tahawwur Rana guilty of providing support to the Lashkar-e-Taiba, responsible for the 2008 assault on Mumbai, but not guilty of taking part in the attack.
In a mixed verdict, the jury also found Rana, 50, a former Pakistan Army doctor with Canadian citizenship, guilty of conspiring to attack a Danish newspaper, a plot hatched by the militant group but never carried out. In the trial, held in U.S. federal court in Chicago, the key witness -- Rana's childhood friend, David Headley -- implicated Pakistan's intelligence agency, ISI, in the Mumbai attack which killed 166 people. Headley admitted scouting targets for the Mumbai attackers sent by the LeT, the militant group behind both plots and designated by the U.S. State Department a terrorist organization. The judge gave both sides 60 days to file post-trial motions and did not set a sentencing date. Rana faces a maximum of 15 years in prison for each of the two counts. U.S. Justice Department officials said the case was not over. "I'm hoping there are other defendants ... that other people are brought to justice, both here and overseas," said Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. Attorney in Chicago who has led prosecutions of several Islamic militants. Fitzgerald would not say what steps might be taken to track down the six Pakistanis charged in the U.S. case, including Headley's main contact with the ISI, known only as Major Iqbal. None is in custody. The case revealed contacts between ISI and Islamic militants who are fighting India over the disputed territory of Kashmir. It comes on the heels of the killing of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in Pakistan by U.S. special forces that worsened already strained U.S.-Pakistani ties. Headley testified that other ISI officers were helpful to him and trained him in spycraft, but that he suspected ISI "higher-ups" did not know of the Mumbai plot. Rana, 50, was charged with supporting the plots to attack Mumbai and Denmark, and of supporting Lashkar-e-Taiba. He was found guilty of supporting the Danish plot and Lashkar, but the jury did not find his support of Lashkar resulted in any deaths, sparing him a life prison sentence. 'BUYING A PLANE TICKET' "We think they got it wrong," Rana's lawyer, Patrick Blegen, said of the guilty verdicts, adding he planned to appeal. "He faces 30 years for basically buying a plane ticket," defense lawyer Charles Swift said, referring to Rana arranging one of Headley's tickets to Denmark to perform reconnaissance work on the Jyllands-Posten newspaper. The planned attack was intended to avenge published cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed that angered many Muslims. "Given the background of the people the threat was very real," Fitzgerald said, citing the plan to storm the newspaper's Copenhagen offices and behead its staff. Headley, who pleaded guilty, provided valuable information to U.S. authorities in exchange for avoiding the death penalty and extradition to India, Fitzgerald said. Prosecutors said he identified three-dozen other potential targets, most in India. Rana sat blinking in court as U.S. District Judge Harry Leinenweber read the verdict. Some of Rana's family members in court bowed their heads. He has a wife and three children. "He's in shock," Swift said of his client. Over five days of testimony, Headley, a 50-year-old former U.S. drug informant, recounted the months he spent scouting targets for the Mumbai attackers and Major Iqbal. He claimed he kept Rana informed all along while using the cover story that he worked for Rana's immigration business. Headley said he was told by Major Iqbal and his Lashkar contacts to back off the Danish plot because of the intense investigation brought to bear following the Mumbai attack. But Headley, an American with a Pakistani father, pursued the plan with al Qaeda-linked Pakistani militant Ilyas Kashmiri, who he met through a former Pakistani army officer who is also charged in both plots. In another sign of strained ties between the nominal allies, officials in Pakistan and the United States cannot agree if Kashmiri was killed in a recent U.S. drone strike. (Editing by Sandra Maler and Vicki Allen) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. | ||
| Ex-NSA worker to plead to lesser charge in leak case Posted: 09 Jun 2011 07:59 PM PDT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A former U.S. National Security Agency official accused of mishandling classified data and obstructing a probe into leaks of sensitive information agreed on Thursday to plead guilty to a significantly lesser charge. Thomas Drake was scheduled to go on trial next week on 10 felony counts, including mishandling classified information by taking it home, impeding a probe into leaks from the NSA and making false statements as investigators sought the culprit. Under the agreement, Drake will plead guilty to a single misdemeanor of exceeding his authorized use of NSA computers, punishable by up to one year in prison. He faced decades of prison time if convicted on the original charges. A plea hearing is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. (1330 GMT) on Friday in federal court in Baltimore. In plea agreement documents filed in federal court late on Thursday, prosecutors said they would not object if the judge decided not to sentence Drake to any prison time. He previously pleaded not guilty and said he considered himself a whistle-blower. The deal was reached after the judge in the case said efforts to protect classified information in certain evidence prosecutors planned to use at trial hampered the defense. As a result, prosecutors said they would not use some of it. The case could mark a setback for the Obama administration as it tries to crack down on leaks of sensitive and classified information, an effort begun in earnest by the previous Bush administration but beset with similar problems. "It seems like in all noteworthy recent cases the same result is reached, the government is forced to decide whether to allow the public airing of classified information or drop its charges," said Glen Donath, a former federal prosecutor and now a private attorney. "And it's almost always gone the latter route." Drake is one of several individuals facing prosecution over alleged leaks about sensitive government activities and programs, and the plea could have a significant impact on those cases as well. Justice Department spokeswoman Laura Sweeney declined to comment on the plea deal as did Drake's attorney, James Wyda. Drake worked for several years at NSA headquarters at Fort Meade, Maryland, as a technical leader in the engineering directorate and had secret clearance that gave him access to signals intelligence information. He left the NSA headquarters in September 2006 to teach at the National Defense University but still worked for the NSA and retained his security clearance until it was suspended in November 2007, according to the indictment. He left the agency in April 2008 when he faced being fired. Although prosecutors said Drake discussed classified information with a Baltimore Sun newspaper reporter, he was never charged with leaking at a time when the NSA was under pressure after the failure to detect the Sept. 11 attacks. The original indictment said he traded hundreds of emails and met the reporter, identified previously by a U.S. official as Siobhan Gorman who now works at The Wall Street Journal, serving as a source for many articles. Between February 2006 and November 2007, Gorman wrote dozens of articles involving the NSA, including about its secret surveillance programs, the spy agency's efforts to bolster cybersecurity and attempts to stop leaks. Drake has publicly denied providing her any classified information. (Editing by Peter Cooney) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
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