West Asia News and Discussions

BBC - very chankian move by italy - convert their problem into everyone's problem...give the boys papers and send them on to richer northern european lands

France blocks Italian trains carrying migrants

Authorities in France temporarily blocked trains from Italy in an attempt to stop north African migrants from entering the country.

Trains were stopped at the border for hours - prompting Italy to launch an official complaint with France. Services were later resumed.

Italy has angered France by giving temporary resident permits to thousands of Tunisian migrants.

The permits allow them to travel freely in many European countries.

The Italian foreign ministry said the French move was "illegitimate and in clear violation of general European principles".

Pranav · Post by **Pranav** » 18 Apr 2011 12:35

A chilling account of the brutal clampdown sweeping Bahrain - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/ap ... iot-police

Virupaksha · Post by **Virupaksha** » 18 Apr 2011 13:05

bringing democracy and freedom one step at a time.

oops, one massacre at a time onleee.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 18 Apr 2011 19:20

army mutiny and rebellion erupts in west african nation of Burkina Faso.

Economy of Burkina Faso - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Main export partners, People's Republic of China 29.6%, Singapore 15.7%, Thailand 7.2% ... Burkina Faso is one of the poorest countries in the world with an ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Burkina_Faso

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 18 Apr 2011 19:27

bahraini pro-democracy types will have to arm themselves to get anywhere.

I believe 4 have been kicked to death in police stations last week.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 18 Apr 2011 21:38

Well it would help if the id of the Bahrain Police fofrces comes out. Such brutality is a Paki trait.

Meanwhile Mubarak takes one more blow on the chin for Egyptian stability.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 18 Apr 2011 21:50

pakis are just H1 contractors, every arab nation bar none has thuggish police and autocratic rulers to start with.

Mahendra · Post by **Mahendra** » 18 Apr 2011 23:30

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 18 Apr 2011 23:37

I guess the wannabe Araps try to out do them!

abhischekcc · Post by **abhischekcc** » 19 Apr 2011 00:13

Pranav wrote:A chilling account of the brutal clampdown sweeping Bahrain - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/ap ... iot-police

I had said that GCC/KSA's direct involvement in the 'security' of its Sunni neighbours will complicate matters for them (KSA). Now, all the Shias in the region will see Sunni Islam as the threat, not the lack of democracy.

KSA may have acted in its best interests by pre-emptively attacking the Shia groups in the peninsula, but all it has done is destroy the sympathy of those people for their governments, and for KSA.

The article above shows how future Shia terrorist/freedom fighters are being created with police brutality.

--------------
In earlier posts, I had said that the best situation for India will be if the muslim world lacks a caliphate, a single strong country that unites the passions of the ummah. Because that will keep them engaged with each other and not seek to attack outside countries. The current moves by KSA show that the muslim world will not be a united house for a long long time to come.

Their failure in Libya, and their ham handed approach to a non-issue in their back yard will ensure that muslim society will not recover its balance (mainly because of oil wealth) in the next couple of generations.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 19 Apr 2011 00:57

ShyamD, Looks like Niall Fergusson is expecting a new Caliphate in ten years.

Gagan · Post by **Gagan** » 19 Apr 2011 01:34

Iran's Nuclear Facilities
The discussion about Bushehr got me thinking.
The main aim of any military strike against Iran will almost certainly seek to degrade its nuclear weapons program, while perhaps leaving the civilian portion of the nuclear program relatively intact.

This lists some of the main known nuclear related sites in Iran. This includes both the civilian and the weapons program related sites.
Apart from the ones listed below, Tehran itself has universities which conduct nuclear research, there was a laser based enrichment facility in Tehran which was shut down, and Tehran is where their atomic commission is headquatered.
The Tehran Nuclear Research Center (TNRC) has a 5 MW pool type research reactor set up in 1967 by the US (atoms for peace program) which used HEU. After the revolution and a stoppage of fuel supply, Iran did a deal with Argentina to convert this to a LEU plant and for supply of fuel. The fuel 19.75% enriched LEU was delivered in 1993.

The under construction NPP in Darkhovin is an indigenous Iranian effort and is a 360 MW PHWR, based on the IR-40 research reactor at Arak. This reactor is still in very early stages of construction.

The Bushehr NPP is a 1000 MW VVER plant similar to India's Kudankulam NPPs. This plant was built by the Russians after the original German contractors left after the 1979 revolution.
Apart from this there are Uranium mines and yellow cake production factories, which have a dual civilian and military uses. I don't know if they are likely to be targeted on a priority basis.
__________________________________________________________________________________________
I am listing some of the Nuclear related sites that are likely to be targeted.

Arak IR-40 Research Reactor
This plant is still under construction and is around 2 years away from commissioning. Once it is operational, Iran will have access to a large quantity of Plutonium for nuclear weapons, and will be able to produce a variety of materials needed for a plutonium based weapons program.

Heavy Water Production Plant
Next to the reactor itself is a PUREX based heavy water production plant. Notice the exchange towers that are typical of such a plant. This plant will supply heavy water to both the IR-40 Research reactor next door and perhaps to the Darkhovin reactor when it is complete.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Esfahan Nuclear Technology Center
This is a huge complex that manufactures fuel rods for nuclear reactors. It also is reported to have a missile factory where Iran builds its SRBMs and MRBMs. There are several tunnels visible on various ends of the hill in the center.
This facility also has 4 research reactors supplied by the chinese including:
1. 27 KW neutron source research reactor
2. 27 MW research reactor
3. Zero power research reactor
The Uranium Conversion Facility has 24 workshops which convert yellowcake into Uranium Hexaflouride.
The Zincronium Production Plant next door produces the alloys needed for nuclear reactors.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Natanz Uranium Enrichment Facility
Everyone has heard about this facility. It began with the Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant which housed 164 centrifuges of the IR01 design (based on the pakistani P-01 design). The facility has undergone expansion with the addition of the Fuel Enrichment Plant section which has three large underground halls, buried 75ft underground. These house about 3000 centrifuges currently but will eventually house upto 50,000 of them. The centrifuges are reportedly based on the improved P-02 Pakistani design where temperature variations are also regulated on the centrifuge.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Qom Uranium Enrichment Facility
So far these are only a set of tunnels dug into a hillside, but it is believed will house centrifuge cascades eventually. There is a big Revolutionary Guards base next to one site.

Two points worth mentioning here:
1. Each of these sites has a VERY impressive array of AA sites surrounding them. Mostly these are AA guns but there are SAM sites nearby.
2. Iran seems to like building tunnels and hiding the things that they don't want to be seen underground. There is an impressive array of tunnels and underground facilities, bunkers all over the country. Again I wonder how many of these underground facilities are vulnerable to airstrikes.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 19 Apr 2011 06:55

Optimism for Arab spring fades in face of complicated U.S.-Saudi alliance

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_theenvoy/ ... i-alliance

Airavat · Post by **Airavat** » 19 Apr 2011 08:59

US fears Syrian reprisals after WikiLeaks disclosure about secret funding of dissident groups

Sushupti · Post by **Sushupti** » 19 Apr 2011 17:06

The coming MidEast blood bath and the death of Turkey

http://europenews.dk/en/node/42411

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 19 Apr 2011 19:55

Airavat wrote:US fears Syrian reprisals after WikiLeaks disclosure about secret funding of dissident groups

Do bad things and then leak them to show your prowess and then blame the victims in case anything bad happens to you. Good pre-emptive Paki behavior!!!

Venkarl · Post by **Venkarl** » 19 Apr 2011 23:25

Thanks Gagan for maps and details. Talking of an attack on any of those facilities.... during my BRF lurking years in 2006..I remember reading some US plan to attack these facilities with penetrating nukes and pentagon's some software analyzed and simulated the resultant fall out....some millions would die in India & Poki due to cancer caused by radiation...that was in the case of a nuclear attack on underground nuke facilities in Iran...wouldn't a conventional bombing of such facilities cause a comparable if not similar to above mentioned magnitude of damage w.r.t India?....I tried to elicit some opinion from our Gurus here on that front in my last post..

Added later:
I found the link I read

http://www.informationclearinghouse.inf ... e12693.htm

Physicians for Social Responsibility examined the risks of a more advanced buster-bunker weapon, and it eerily tabulated the toll from an attack on the underground nuclear facility in Esfahan, Iran. “Three million people would be killed by radiation within two weeks of the explosion, and 35 million people in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India, would be exposed to increased levels of cancer-causing radiation,” according to a summary of that study in the backgrounder by the Union of Concerned Scientists.

abhischekcc · Post by **abhischekcc** » 19 Apr 2011 23:42

x-posted.

Shyamd ji, do you have any insights into how Libya is procuring weapons?

shyamd · Post by **shyamd** » 21 Apr 2011 01:59

abhishekcc - via the egypt border. KSA is partly financing this. Qatar is also doing its bit. Please re-visit US & KSA partnership to defeat Qaddafi take over of northern Chad in the 80s. Very similar.

abhischekcc · Post by **abhischekcc** » 21 Apr 2011 09:06

No, no

I meant how is Q replenishing his weapons, not his opponents.

shyamd · Post by **shyamd** » 21 Apr 2011 11:19

He bought a lot of stuff prior to the war starting. Mainly from Syria and a few other friendly countries. I'm slightly out of the picture at the moment.

-------------------------
Qatr will have a coup if they dont change their ways and fall in line.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 21 Apr 2011 12:22

shyamd wrote:Qatr will have a coup if they dont change their ways and fall in line.

shyamd ji,

Curiosity is awake now! What ways? What line? Whose line? Coup from whom? Coup supported by whom?

thanks for any info!

Gagan · Post by **Gagan** » 21 Apr 2011 12:28

I thought that Qatar was also part of the small nations who had decided to enter into a loose confederation with KSA if the situation demands.

Qatar has a HUGE US military airbase, and one can see an amazing array of aircraft parked there.

I wonder if anyone can move within Qatar without the US's approval. Qatar would probably be even more closely managed by massa than the Pakistanis.

Advait · Post by **Advait** » 21 Apr 2011 22:08

The question to be asked and answered here is how to reduce India's dependence on West Asia oil. So that we don't have to bow and scrap before this desert barbarians who just happened to pitch their tents in the right place and whose oil industry was developed by Western brains and Indian capital and manpower.

I can't understand why Hindus still go to work there. Don't they have any self-respect? Infact this just makes them used to being dhimmis. Mallus keep shouting slogans of workers rights and secularism and freedom of religion etc and then go to work in Gulf where there is none of that.

Samudragupta · Post by **Samudragupta** » 21 Apr 2011 23:37

Advait wrote: I can't understand why Hindus still go to work there. Don't they have any self-respect? Infact this just makes them used to being dhimmis. Mallus keep shouting slogans of workers rights and secularism and freedom of religion etc and then go to work in Gulf where there is none of that.

Well Read what Dubai Police chief have commented sometime back......

negi · Post by **negi** » 22 Apr 2011 00:00

Advait wrote: I can't understand why Hindus still go to work there. Don't they have any self-respect? Infact this just makes them used to being dhimmis.

Whether you like it or not, self respect does not fill an empty stomach; it's as simple as that.

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 22 Apr 2011 02:47

>>I can't understand why Hindus still go to work there. Don't they have any self-respect?

Many people go because they need to eat, and feed families back home. As one of the mallus whose father was there, I can tell you we may not have made it otherwise. My parents survived on one meal a day before they got married, both families. Up until I was about three the situation was the same - although my father did have jobs and by then they were able to have two meals a day. They remember it well, and made damned sure me and my sisters never forgot it. It was only after my father got a job in the gulf, yes bowing and scraping to these Arabs, although he was in a fairly senior position in national oil company, that they could breathe easy. There are literally millions of families who went through this. It is men like my father who do this day after day, swallowing their pride, not letting humiliation come in the way of their families' income stability, and mothers who day after day after day stretched all the pennies to event-horizon levels, that allowed our generation to ask questions like the above. We should be on our collective knees in reverence to the millions of unacknowledged or unrecognised men and women like these, who had awe-inspiring courage and fortitude - not just a momentary act of instinctive bravery, but decades of stubborn blood thickening hard headed sustained courage.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 22 Apr 2011 02:57

JMHT...

I think the connection between working in Dubai/ME and Hindu pride is not sensible.

Work place means a business entity, thus not a religious place by definition. So work is worship in such a place(of course the true meaning of 'work is worship' is different). To ME society's credit non-muslims are not entertained in the two holy places of Mecca and Madina (I wonder if all that construction in those cities? was/is done by muslims).

We should appreciate the fact that Hindus are not persecuted (overtly) for their belief at work in ME. We should also appreciate the fact that millions of Hindus keep their personal faith unscathed even when they do not have any place to overtly enjoy it. That means there is opportunity for more introspection and contemplation; a true puja in my opinion. Often they are the ones who donate (because they can) more to dharmic activities back home.

Prasad · Post by **Prasad** » 22 Apr 2011 03:06

Well look at it this way. While people get jobs, the govt through better contacts can slowly work towards better treatment of our citizens there, be it religious rights or workers rights. We can't say we wont send people to work there until our standards are met. People will have to find other means to make a living until then wouldn't they?

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 22 Apr 2011 06:29

Syriana: After Bashar al-Assad, the deluge: BY ROBERT D. KAPLAN

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2 ... 21/syriana

Advait · Post by **Advait** » 22 Apr 2011 08:57

Menon ji and others who are saying empty stomachs had to be filled. I understand times were tough till early 90s. But not today.

A person can find work anywhere in India and feed himself and his family. Infact, I have heard and read stories of Mallus buying houses and fancy cars etc from money made in Gulf.

So at least a substantial number of them today go there to make more money, not just survivial money. These Hindus are traitors, pure and simple. Because they are greedy, and there is no end to greed.

Hindus who go to Gulf get used to the idea of being dhimmis. They say "its not so bad", at least we get ghar and gadi. Menonji with no disrespect intented to your father, ask him how he really felt when he couldn't eat because the illiterate camel riders tent dwellers were fasting.

If one of them comes here and tells me to stop eating, then even if he is my boss, I will

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 22 Apr 2011 09:24

there is a highway sign outside places like makkah and madina which has kafirs drive on bypass road skirting the place. kafir not allowed under any circumstances inside these places except in special cases like when a bunch of rebels took over the kabah complex and french GIGN operators were called in - for H&D purposes as 'advisors' - who knows what they did below ground.

if there is a perfect match of mediaeval savagery, mental mediocrity, virulent religious hatred and disposable money - it is saudi arabia. the place would be a bigger yemen or a sudan if not for oil. somewhere god goofed up and gave them boundless oil and unkil did the rest to make it a virus for the rest of us.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 22 Apr 2011 09:27

Boss i don't see how you will adjust to the forum. You have less than 25 posts and already pass opinions on our members. I see no benefit in your posts. I just want to let you know I have you on my watch list.