Africa
One of the gunmen responsible for the attack on Kenya’s Garissa University College last week, which killed 148 people, was the son of a Kenyan district official. He had been missing for over a year, since dropping out of law school. His father has been cooperating with authorities since reporting his son missing last year. The attack, and other similar, though less deadly ones that have occurred since 2011, are a reaction to Kenya’s fight against al Shabab in Somalia. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Garissa attack fits a broader pattern of al Shabab’s targeting of Christians.
French special forces operating in Mali rescued a Dutch man taken hostage by a militant group linked to al Qaeda more than three years ago. The hostage, Sjaak Rijke, was captured with his wife and two other men while they sat in a restaurant in Timbuktu in 2011. Mr. Rijke’s wife had managed to escape. The rescue comes as part of a large French counter-terrorism operation in Mali called Operation Barkhane. A number of militants were killed and several were captured in the operation.
Americas
Closing arguments began on Monday in the trial against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the man accused of orchestrating the 2013 bombings at the Boston Marathon in the United States. Mr. Tsarnaev faces 30 charges, including conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction. His lawyers have conceded that he was responsible for the bombings, but questions remain regarding the jury’s decisions on some of the charges as well as whether he should face the death penalty. The defense argued that Mr. Tsarnaev was strongly influenced by his older brother and should not be put to death. After its first day of deliberation on Tuesday, the jury had not reached a verdict. On Wednesday, the jury returned a verdict of guilty on all 30 charges. The trial will now move to the sentencing phase.
Gunmen ambushed a Mexican police convoy on Monday, as the police traveled between Puerto Vallarta and Guadalajara. Fifteen police officers were killed, and five more were injured. Drug cartels in Mexico have kidnapped or killed hundreds of people in recent years. Researchers have demonstrated that the government’s estimates of the number of missing people are far too low.
Human Rights Watch (HRW), an NGO headquartered in New York, sued the United States Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) over its bulk collection of American’s phone call records. HRW argued that DEA’s collection violates the First and Fourth Amendments to the United States Constitution. DEA’s collection program has since been discontinued, but it served as a model for subsequent surveillance programs operated by the National Security Agency.
The United States Department of Justice filed a complaint in the Eastern District of North Carolina on Wednesday, seeking the arrest and extradition of Inocente Orlando Montano Morales. Mr. Montao was a colonel in the Salvadoran military, and he is allegedly responsible for the killing of five Spanish Jesuit priests in 1989. Along with 19 other former Salvadoran soldiers, Mr. Montano has been indicted in Spain for the murders.
On Wednesday, Canadian aircraft executed their first airstrikes against the Islamic State (IS) in Syria. The strikes were aimed at an IS garrison, and Canada’s Department of National Defence reported that they were successful. Canadian aircraft have already targeted IS operations in Iraq, but this was their first foray into Syria.
A Wisconsin man was arrested at a Chicago airport on Wednesday, accused of attempting to join the Islamic state. The man was charged with attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization. He allegedly traveled to Istanbul last August and attempted to enter Syria, but was unable to do so.
Even if the framework agreement on Iran’s nuclear program negotiated in Switzerland last week eventually stops Iran’s development of nuclear weapons, American security experts are concerned that Iran will continue to develop an arsenal of cyber weapons. One American official said that the executive order President Obama issued last week that gave him the power to sanction cyber attackers was a message to Iran.
Asia
India has confirmed that it has the capability to build intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that can strike targets beyond the 10,000 kilometer range. Currently, India’s longest range ICBM is the Agni V, with a range of about 5,000 km.
Malaysia’s parliament is set to vote on a counter-terrorism law that would permit the government to detain people indefinitely without trial. Human Rights Watch says the bill mirrors the “notorious” Internal Security Act, which was revoked in 2012 after it was used to detain government opponents, demonstrators, and protestors.
Two U.S. Marine F/A-18C Hornets landed at an air force base in southern Taiwan last week. The landing was reportedly a precautionary measure taken after one of the aircraft repeatedly flashed an engine oil pressure light. However, the landing comes as China’s air force conducted a training mission in Bashi Channel that separates Taiwan an the Philippines. It also occurred on the fourteenth anniversary of an incident in which a U.S. Navy aircraft collided with a Chinese interceptor, forcing the Americans to land on Hainan Island.
A court in Turkey ordered internet service providers to block access to certain social media sites to prevent the sharing of photos taken during an incident last week in which militants stormed a courthouse and took a prosecutor hostage. The two militants and prosecutor were eventually killed during a shootout. Twitter subsequently announced that it would remove the photos, and a Turkish official confirmed that the ban would then be lifted. However, Turkey has claimed that certain information is terrorist propaganda to censor journalists in the past.
A firefight between NATO troops and Afghan soldiers left one American soldier and one Afghan soldier dead, and two Americans and two Afghans wounded. Though the Taliban has claimed credit in the past for incidents like this one, these so-called “insider attacks” are more frequently the result of misunderstandings or arguments between troops. It is the second death of a coalition member in Afghanistan during 2015. The United States Institute of Peace argues that the coalition must remain in Afghanistan for the long haul if there is to be hope of stabilizing the country. CNN reports that, as NATO withdraws, many of its former supporters within Afghanistan, including translators, are struggling.
On Thursday, gunmen dressed in army uniforms entered the office of the attorney general in the city of Mazar-e-Sharif in northern Afghanistan. Witnesses heard gunfire and explosions shortly after five men went inside. After a seven hour standoff, soldiers from the Afghan National Security Forces killed all five gunmen. Five security officers were killed and 26 government officials were wounded. The Taliban claimed credit for the attack.
Ashton B. Carter, America’s defense secretary, arrived in South Korea on Thursday to the news that North Korea had fired two short-range surface-to-air missiles off of its western coast. United Nations resolution prohibit North Korea from conducting ballistic missile tests, but the country often does so anyway.
Europe
Poland has announced plans to build six 50-meter (164-foot) towers to monitor the border with Kaliningrad, a Russian enclave nestled between Poland and Lithuania. The towers are anticipated to ready by June and will cost about $3.8 million.
Prisons in eastern Ukraine are in deplorable conditions. They are low on food and lack medical supplies to combat a widespread tuberculosis epidemic. Some prisoners are refusing to take the little medicine that has gotten through, out of fear that authorities are testing drugs on them or because of unpleasant side effects. Doctors Without Borders is running tuberculosis and HIV prevention programs in the prisons in a heroic effort to combat the spread of disease.
Amnesty International reported on Thursday that pro-Russian separatist rebels in the eastern Ukraine have summarily executed captured Ukrainian soldiers. Amnesty condemned the killings as “a war crime, plain and simple.”
On Thursday, Oleksander Turchynov, head of Ukraine’s national security council, denounced Russia’s support of separatist rebels and affirmed the country’s goal of joining NATO. The announcement is sure to irritate the Russians, who oppose the possibility of NATO warships based in the Black sea near Crimea.
Middle East
In continuing coverage of the framework agreement reached between the P5+1 powers (United States, United Kingdom, China, France, Russia, and Germany) and Iran, Anthony Cordesman, writing for the Center for International and Strategic Studies, argues that the framework “has the potential to meet every test” for a final product that will prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons and a regional arms race. While American president Barack Obama reassured Israel of America’s support, Israel’s minister of intelligence and strategic affairs, presented a list of modifications for the final agreement, including an end to Iran’s research on advanced centrifuges. The New Scientist focuses on the verification process to ensure Iran sticks to the deal. The Economist has a detailed backgrounder on the whole process. Foreign Policy analyzes Israel’s position on the deal and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s power to influence it. Jeremy Shaprio, writing for the Brookings Institution, argues that the details of the deal don’t really matter because it’s part of a broader effort to integrate Iran into the “regional order” of the Middle East and change Iran’s intentions. RAND Corporation experts also weighed in on the deal. Speaking on Wednesday, Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was decidedly noncommittal regarding the framework agreement. The Mr. Khamenei warned Iranian diplomats that the United States cannot be trusted, but said he would nonetheless support an agreement that upholds Iran’s interests and honor.
In the United States,In the United States, Senate Republicans believed as of Friday, April 3 that they were close to gaining enough support from their Democratic colleagues to pass a bill that would give the Senate approval authority over any nuclear agreement with Iran. However, by Wednesday, debate was ongoing about the details of a bill that would give Congress approval authority over the deal with Iran. Wednesday Also on Wednesday, John O. Brennan, director of America’s Central Intelligence Agency, said that the sanctions regime crippled Iran’s economy and forced the country to negotiate regarding its nuclear program.
Jabhat al-Nusra (JN), a militant organization operating in Syria that is linked to al Qaeda, kidnapped 300 Kurdish men in the northern part of the country. JN has not claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. In Iraq, IS released 216 Yazidi prisoners that the group had held for eight months. The prisoners, 40 of whom were children, were reportedly in poor health and showed signs of abuse and neglect. IS did not give a reason for releasing the prisoners.
The burgeoning civil war in Yemen continued this week, with rebel Houthi fighters engaging militias in the southern port city of Aden. Despite continuing Saudi airstrikes, Houthi fighters entered the capital of Shabwa, a province in eastern Yemen on Thursday. Earlier that same day, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula captured the al-Siddah district in central Yemen from the Houthis. The Supreme Leader of Iran, which supports the Houthis, stated that Saudi Arabia would not win the war in Yemen and argued that Saudi airstrikes amount to genocide. A Foreign Policy article expresses concern that suicide bombings carried out by IS in Yemen on March 20, which killed more than 140 people, may have sparked an Arab world war.
The Red Cross has negotiated safe passage through Saudi Arabia to deliver aid shipments to Yemen. Fighting in Yemen has already killed hundreds of people, many the victims of off-target airstrikes by the Saudi-led coalition combating the Houthi rebels. While the Saudi coalition and Houthis face off, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, an enemy of both, is gaining ground in the eastern part of the country. The Brookings Institution analyzes Saudi Arabia’s motives for intervening and the moral issues involved.
After a combination of Iraqi security forces and paramilitary groups captured the city of Tikrit from the Islamic State (IS) last week, looting and revenge, sometimes violent, against IS fighters has consumed the city. Additionally, divisions have arisen between the Iraqi security forces and their American partners. The two sides agree that their next effort should be to liberate the city of Benji, 25 miles northwest of Tikrit, which is partially controlled by IS. After that, though, the Americans advocate a push north to Mosul, IS’s de facto capital and Iraq’s second-largest city. But Iraqi militias want to move west to the Euphrates River to expel IS from Anbar Province. The appear to have already begun that push, with the Iraqi Army and militia troops attacking IS fighters near Ramadi on Wednesday. Some officials claimed the attacks marked the beginning of a major offensive in Anbar province, but others said that the fighting was not “the big joint operation.” Meanwhile, IS fighters who have fought in Iraq report that former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baathist army play a major role in directing IS’s operations in the country.
In Egypt, former army officers are joining militant Islamist groups. They provide advice on strategy and training to the groups, which are making it more difficult for President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to challenge the militants.
Jaish ul-Adl, a Sunni militant group, claimed responsibility for an attack on Iranian border guards who tried to stop the militants from entering Iran from Pakistan. Three militants and eight border guards were killed.
In the West Bank on Wednesday, a Palestinian man stabbed two Israeli soldiers, seriously injuring one and lightly wounding the other, before security forces shot and killed him. Israeli security officials have reported a series of attacks recently, though the attacks have been intermittent and apparently spontaneous, with the Israelis believing the attackers have acted without clear instructions or support for Palestinian militant organizations.
Oceania
The United States and the Philippines announced that their annual war games will double in size this year. The games will be held later in April, and some exercises will take place near the disputed waters around Scarborough Shoal, which China controls but lies within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.