American paranoia

Last chance to post something before I'll be pretty much incommunicado for 10 days backpacking around Iran. Time to travel there before the Americans bomb the place... interesting what Seymour Hersh claims in the New Yorker. I guess this is what you'd term running an idea up the flagpole and ensuring that Iran gets the message that if you don't back down on developing nukes we're coming after ya. Of course, Pentagon officials have termed the article full of fabrications, rumours, blah blah, ... but where there's smoke...

After the latest big shootout incident in Kuwait on Saturday, where security forces busted a terrorist cell in Umm Al-Haiman district, I was extremely pissed off to find an event I was going to that evening was cancelled as the American Embassy had notified all their citizens to stay indoors and not go out. Really guys, get a life!! To put this in perspective, the Kuwait Prime Minster can see fit to inspect the site of the terrorist bust, but all American citizens are advised to stay indoors. I wouldn't be surprised if the advice mentioned warm milk and cookies, and cuddling up with their favourite teddybear too.

[I'd really love to just link to relevant Kuwaiti newspaper articles but they don't archive the pages... and I'm getting sick of cutting & pasting, as the formatting in Blogger doesn't work to well when you use quotation marks - can anyone advise me on this one?]

And now it's even safer to venture out. According to today's Arab Times they've let out all the bad cops - is this to put them in the front-line for further terrorist cell busts (where the security forces seem to be coming off second best), use them as informers, or put them back on the beat to waste their days idly sipping tea at the police station? Actually, the latter is kinda like prison anyhow.

Jailed policemen to be freed: Upon instructions of the First Deputy Premier
and Minister of Interior Sheikh Nawaf Al-Ahmed Al-Sabah, Lieutenant-General
Nasser Al-Othman, Undersecretary of the Ministry recently issued a decision to
release all police personnel who are serving time in a military jail, reports a
press release issued by the ministry. The decision is taken on the occasion of
Eid Al-Adha.