NEW DELHI — The recent seizure here of massive shipments of illegal Ephedrine and the highly addictive sedative Mandrax, as well as the June capture in Mumbai of a container packed with some $100 million worth of cocaine, spotlights the rise of illicit drug abuse and the burgeoning drug trade in South Asia — especially in India. Over the past year and a half alone, authorities say an estimated 216 kilograms of cocaine, more than 600 kilos of Ephedrine, 247 kilos of heroin and 4,400 kilos of Mandrax have been seized in India, the major portion captured in New Delhi [...]
RIBNITSA, Transnistria — Last month, a trolley bus ambled along a Soviet-era street on a hot afternoon, and blew up before it reached its next stop. Eight people were killed, and 46 injured in this July bomb blast, creating a rumble not quite strong enough to pique the interest of the war-fatigued Western press. It happened again two weeks ago when a trolley bus on a similar route, this time touring around on a quiet Sunday afternoon, was blown to bits, killing a 50-year-old man and six-year-old girl. Ten people were injured, many of them seriously. The following day, a [...]
When Marine Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler presided over the July transfer of the American-led anti-terrorism task force in the Horn of Africa from the U.S. Marines Corps to the U.S. Navy, his statement of achievement was simple. “Since the camp was established [in late 2002] there has not been one terrorist attack in the Horn of Africa, although there have been many attempts,” he said. When the American military’s Combined Joint Task Force – Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA) was established in November 2002 in the tiny country of Djibouti, the region was fast becoming a theater of operations for [...]
