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GUARDIAN Tue, 09 Feb 2010 13:32:56 GMT
Senate votes to give power to Goodluck Jonathan as speculation grows over health of missing president
The Nigerian senate today voted to transfer power to vice-president Goodluck Jonathan in the prolonged absence of the president, Umaru Yar'Adua, who has been receiving hospital treatment in Saudi Arabia.
The motion approved by the senate would also allow Yar'Adua, who left Nigeria in November last year, to reassume the presidency if he returns healthy enough to lead the country of 150 million people. However, many think he is too ill to serve again, casting doubt on the leadership of the ruling party in the run-up to next year's presidential election.
"The vice-president … shall henceforth discharge the functions of the office of the president, commander-in-chief of the armed forces of the federation, as acting president," the motion said.
Pressure to transfer power to the vice-president has grown in recent weeks. Nigeria's influential state governors backed plans last week for Jonathan to be appointed acting president to fill the political vacuum and urged parliament to act. Jonathan could be immediately sworn in as president, if the lower house passes a similar measure.
Yar'Adua, who has suffered from kidney ailments, left the country several times for what his advisers said were medical checkups before going to Saudi Arabia in November. He was admitted to a hospital the next day and has remained there, leaving Nigeria in a political limbo.
Amid rumours about the president's health – some reports said he was dead – his doctor released a statement saying he had acute pericarditis, an inflammation of the sac surrounding the heart.
While the government says Jonathan has been acting in Yar'Adua's place, protesters have taken to the street warning the country will remain rudderless until the situation is clarified. In Yar'Adua's absence more than 300 people have died and thousands displaced in religious violence between Christians and Muslims, a major kidnapping and a pipeline attack have occurred in the oil-rich Niger delta and a young Nigerian attempted to bring down an airliner over Detroit, prompting the introduction of new security regulations for those travelling from Nigeria.
Giving power to the vice-president creates its own problems as it would disrupt an unwritten power-sharing agreement between Nigeria's Christian south and Muslim north. Jonathan, a Christian, would be taking over from Yar'Adua, a Muslim, before the president's appointed time was up.
Until he took over as Nigeria's president in May 2007, Yar'Adua, 58, was governor of his northern Katsina home state for eight years.
He has given one interview since being out of the country. In January, he told the BBC he hoped to recover and return to power. The senate president, David Mark, said that telephone interview served as the notification needed to allow Jonathan to take power. "The BBC interview is as good as the letter envisioned by the constitution," Mark said.
Nigeria
Mark Tran
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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GUARDIAN Wed, 03 Feb 2010 11:51:58 GMT
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who tried to blow up plane with underpants bomb, is said to have waived right to silence
The Nigerian man accused of trying to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day has been providing fresh intelligence in several terrorism investigations, officials have said.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who had a bomb hidden in his underwear, is said to have been co-operating with investigators since last week.
The Obama administration had been under fire for giving Abdulmutallab the right to remain silent rather than interrogating him as a military prisoner.
In the days following the failed bombing, a pair of FBI agents flew to Nigeria and persuaded Abdulmutallab's family to help them. They brought family members back to the US, according to a senior administration official briefed on the case. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.
FBI officials continued to question Abdulmutallab, working with the CIA and other intelligence authorities, the official said, and Obama was receiving regular updates.
A law enforcement official, also speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to discuss the case, said Abdulmutallab had provided information about his contacts in Yemen, where an al-Qaida branch has claimed responsibility for the failed attack.
Authorities had hoped to keep Abdulmutallab's co-operation secret while they continued to investigate his leads but details began to trickle out during testimony on Capitol Hill by the FBI director, Robert Mueller, and director of national intelligence, Dennis Blair.
The Senate intelligence committee chairwoman, Dianne Feinstein, asked Mueller: "It is also my understanding that Mr. Abdulmutallab has provided valuable information. Is that correct?"
"Yes," Mueller replied.
Mueller then confirmed that the interrogation had continued despite the suspect being advised of his right to have a lawyer and remain silent.
al-Qaida
Global terrorism
United States
Obama administration
US politics
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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GUARDIAN Thu, 07 Jan 2010 12:09:50 GMT
Yemen deputy PM says Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was recruited by al-Qaida in London and met influential cleric
A Nigerian man accused of attempting to blow up a US-bound plane on Christmas Day was recruited by al-Qaida in London and met with Anwar al-Awlaki, one of the extremist group's influential clerics, Yemen's deputy prime minister said today.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, appeared in court yesterday on charges including attempted murder and trying to use a weapon of mass destruction to kill nearly 300 people aboard the Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit.
He has reportedly told US intelligence officials that he was trained in Yemen, raising fears about the spread of extremism in the country.
"The information provided to us is that Umar Farouk joined al-Qaida in London," Rashad al-Alimi, Yemen's deputy prime minister for defence and security, told a news conference. He said Abdulmutallab met Awlaki and al-Qaida leaders in Yemen.
Awlaki's notoriety rose last year when it was revealed that he exchanged dozens of emails with Major Nidal Malik Hasan, who is accused of killing 13 people in a mass shooting at the Fort Hood army post in Texas on 5 November. The cleric is popular among al-Qaida sympathisers for his calls for holy war.
Alimi said Yemen had arrested and was interrogating a number of al-Qaida elements who had contacts with Abdulmutallab.
Barack Obama is due to disclose more information about the failed airline bomb plot today and detail the steps he is taking to prevent future terrorist attacks. The White House is making public a declassified account of the incident and the US president will address the nation about its findings and recommendations.
On Tuesday, Obama criticised intelligence agencies, saying the system "has failed in a potentially disastrous way". But he is not expected to announce any firings as a result of the security failings.
Global terrorism
Al-Qaida
Yemen
United States
UK security and terrorism
London
Haroon Siddique
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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GUARDIAN Mon, 04 Jan 2010 08:09:15 GMT
Everyone flying into US from or through countries including Nigeria and Yemen to face 'enhanced screening' at airports
Foreign passengers flying into the United States from 14 mostly Muslim countries deemed to have links with terrorism are to face extra security checks at airports from today amid signs of increased nervousness in the US after the failed attempt to blow up a passenger jet on Christmas Day.
The US transportation security administration announced that everyone flying into the US from or through these countries would go through "enhanced screening" at airports.
The list includes Nigeria, home of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the failed suicide bomber who tried to blow up a Detroit-bound passenger plane using an explosive device hidden in his underpants. It also includes Yemen, where it is claimed he was trained.
The other "countries of interest" are Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Somalia, and four countries the US regards as state sponsors of terrorism: Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria.
From today US airports have also been instructed to increase "threat-based" screening of passengers who may be acting in a suspicious manner. The screening will include full-body pat-downs, bag searches, full-body scanning and scans by explosive detection technology.
The introduction of the new measures coincided with a security alert at New Liberty international airport in New Jersey, which was locked down for several hours after a man walked through a security checkpoint without being screened last night.
Planes were grounded for six hours and thousands of passengers had to go through security again, while the authorities went through CCTV footage in search of the man. He was eventually tracked down by security officials.
The TSA said the ability to enforce the new security measures was the "result of extraordinary co-operation from our global aviation partners". In a statement it said: "TSA is mandating that every individual flying into the US from anywhere in the world travelling from or through nations that are state sponsors of terrorism or other countries of interest will be required to go through enhanced screening."
Pakistan International Airlines said it had been applying the new approach to US-bound passengers since Saturday.
Yesterday, Gordon Brown confirmed that full-body scanners are to be introduced at Britain's airports.
Air transport
US national security
United States
Global terrorism
Airline industry
Matthew Weaver
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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GUARDIAN Wed, 30 Dec 2009 10:14:45 GMT
Detroit plane bomber slipped through because authorities didn't piece together clear warning signs, says US president
Barack Obama has described US intelligence failings as "totally unacceptable" after it emerged agencies knew that leaders of a branch of al-Qaida in Yemen were talking about "a Nigerian" being prepared for a terrorist attack.
The US president interrupted his vacation in Hawaii to speak bluntly about lapses that allowed Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to board a Northwest Airlines flight from Nigeria via Amsterdam.
A senior official told the New York Times Obama was given a briefing that the US had information that would have been a clear warning if shared among agencies. This included information about where Abdulmutallab had been and some of his plans.
"When our government has information on a known extremist and that information is not shared and acted upon as it should have been, so that this extremist boards a plane with dangerous explosives that could cost nearly 300 lives, a systemic failure has occurred and I consider that totally unacceptable," Obama said.
The New York Times reported that while US agencies did not have the name of the 23-year-old Nigerian, they could have found it by comparing with information already available about him.
Abdulmutallab has been charged with trying to blow up a flight to Detroit on Christmas Day.
Obama said in his statement. "Had this critical information been shared it could have been compiled with other intelligence and a fuller, clearer picture of the suspect would have emerged. The warning signs would have triggered red flags and the suspect would have never been allowed to board that plane for America."
Senior US officials have told the Associated Press that intelligence authorities are looking at conversations between Abdulmutallab and at least one al-Qaida member. The unnamed officials said the conversations were vague or coded but US intelligence believed that in hindsight they may have been referring to the Detroit attack.
Obama's homeland security and counter-terrorism adviser, John Brennan, is due to present the president with an early report by tomorrow based on recommendations and summaries from across the government.
Yemen, meanwhile, has warned of hundreds more militants on its soil planning to attack the west and appealed for help to stop them.
Yemen's foreign minister, Abu Bakr al-Qirbi, told the BBC that up to 300 extremists backed by al-Qaida were waiting to follow the example of Abdulmutallab, who obtained enough explosives in Yemen to have blown a large hole in the aircraft.
"Of course there are a number of al-Qaida operatives in Yemen and some of their leaders. We realise this danger. They may actually plan attacks like the one we have just had in Detroit ... I can't give you exact figures. There are maybe hundreds of them – 200, 300," he said. The minister said Britain, the US and other western nations could do "a lot" to improve Yemen's response to militants on its own soil and it was the "responsibility" of developed countries with strong intelligence capabilities to warn Yemen about the movements of terror suspects.
"We have to expand our counter-terrorism units and this means providing them with the necessary training, military equipment, ways of transportation – we are very short of helicopters," he said, claiming the US, UK and EU could do a lot more. "There is support but I must say it is inadequate."
Yemen's government confirmed that Abdulmutallab visited the country twice in recent years – for several months in 2005 and again from August until shortly before his failed attempt to down the airliner on Christmas Day. Abdulmutallab has told FBI interrogators that he was trained in Yemen by al-Qaida.
Abdulmutallab described Yemen as "great" in internet postings after visiting the country for the first time to learn Arabic while he was a boarder at an elite international school in west Africa.
Global terrorism
US....
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NEWS SUMMARY
Saadi Gaddafi flees Libya to Niger - video
Gaddafi son given refuge in Niger
VIDEO: Saadi Gaddafi 'arrives in Niger'
Gaddafi’s son flees to Niger as march on Bani Walid continues
Gaddafi's son 'arrives in Niger'
Nigeria cattle theft amputation
Children killed in Nigeria attack
Indian crew dead after ship blast
Gaddafi denies fleeing to Niger as fighting continues
VIDEO: Migrants 'mistreated' by Libyan rebels
Niger undecided on Gaddafi refuge
Libyan leaders fear Gaddafi may flee south across the border into Niger
Libya: hunt for Gaddafi - live updates
Gaddafi aide 'in Niger capital'
VIDEO: Would Niger take in Col Gaddafi?
Elders hold talks over Gaddafi stronghold
Messi 'too costly' for Dhaka fans
Bani Walid talks continue amid reports Gaddafi has fled to Niger - video
VIDEO: 'Wall of water' floods Nigerian town
'Like an ocean wave'
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