ABC News Exclusive: Suicide Bomb Teams Sent to U.S., Europe

June 18, 2007 -- AL QAEDA/TALIBAN

Exclusive: Suicide Bomb Teams Sent to U.S., Europe

Large teams of newly trained suicide bombers are being sent to the United States and Europe, according to evidence contained on a new videotape obtained by the Blotter on ABCNews.com. (ABC News)

AFGHANISTAN

At Least 7 Afghan Children Killed in U.S. Air Strike

The American-led coalition forces in Afghanistan killed seven children during an air strike on a religious school thought to be an Al Qaeda safe house in the remote east of the country, spokesmen for the coalition said today. (NY Times)

35 Killed In Kabul Suicide Attack

A Taliban suicide bomber blew up a police bus in the Afghan capital Sunday killing around 35 people, police said, in apparently the single deadliest bombing to hit Afghanistan since the Taliban were ousted in 2001. (Reuters)

IRAQ WAR

Blair Knew US Lacked Post-War Iraq Plan

British Prime Minister Tony Blair worried that the United States had no plans for the Iraq invasion aftermath, his aides and friends told a television documentary to be screened on Saturday. (Daily Times)

36 Killed in Southern Iraq

U.S. and Iraqi forces began major military operations Monday to the north and south of Baghdad, while Iraqi officials said 36 people were killed in clashes in southern Iraq. (AP)

Who Killed the Americans in Karbala?

January's attack on U.S. forces at the Iraqi government complex in Karbala has become a kind of epic unsolved mystery among troops at Forward Operating Base Iskan, where soldiers from the unit involved are based. There is no shortage of theories among the roughly 30 troops who were there as to whom was responsible for the attack. (Time)

IED Strike: The Deadly Devices Cause Most U.S. Casualties

For U.S. troops in Iraq, May was the worst month since 2004, with 126 killed. The summer months may be worse, given a new Pentagon assessment concluding the surge is not reducing violence. Now a former Marine officer says the corps has failed to supply its Marines on the front lines with the best protection against the improvised explosive devices that cause most of the carnage. (Newsweek)

Iraq Now Ranked Second Among World's Failed States

Iraq has emerged as the world's second most unstable country, behind Sudan, more than four years after President George W. Bush ordered the U.S. invasion to topple Saddam Hussein, according to a survey released on Monday. (Reuters)

PAKISTAN

Armed Men Storm Home of CJ's Relative in Quetta

Advocate Amir Rana, nephew of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, has alleged that about 15 armed men entered his house in the early hours of Sunday after overpowering the watchman, scaling the boundary wall and breaking the main door. (Dawn)

Abbas' New PM Outlaws Hamas

Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas swore in a new cabinet on Sunday and immediately outlawed rival Hamas movement's fighters after their bloody seizure of power in Gaza. (Daily Times)

Fatah Kills Suspected Collaborator with Israel in West Bank Hospital

Palestinian militants on Sunday shot and killed a man they suspected of collaborating with Israel, as he lay on the X-ray table at a hospital in the West Bank city of Nablus, witnesses and a militant group said. (AP)

ABU GHRAIB PRISON

The General's Report :How Antonio Taguba, Who Investigated The Abu Ghraib Scandal, Became One Of Its Casualties.

On the afternoon of May 6, 2004, Army Major General Antonio M. Taguba was summoned to meet, for the first time, with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in his Pentagon conference room. Rumsfeld and his senior staff were to testify the next day, in televised hearings before the Senate and the House Armed Services Committees, about abuses at Abu Ghraib prison, in Iraq. (The New Yorker)

HAMAS VS. FATAH

Palestinian Group Denies Deal to Free Reporter

A Palestinian militant group holding BBC reporter Alan Johnston said on Sunday there was no deal to free the Briton abducted in Gaza three months ago and said he would only be released if its demands were met. (Reuters)

Two Rockets Hit Israel from South Lebanon

Two Katyusha rockets were fired from South Lebanon into Israel on Sunday, and Israeli troops launched five shells into Lebanon in retaliation. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon condemned the rocket attack as a "serious violation" of Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended last summer's war with Israel. (The Daily Star)

The Gaza Effect

The Israelis didn't want Palestinian elections back in January 2006. Even Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, had been worried about them and kept asking for delays. As early as the spring of 2005, Abbas had warned American officials that he did not have the popular support to disarm Hamas, the Islamist party that turned suicide terror bombings into a standard tactic in Israel and which both Abbas and the Israelis saw was growing in power. But Bush administration officials insisted, confident of the curative powers of democracy. Later, after Hamas stunned the world by winning control of the Palestinian Parliament, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice claimed: "Nobody saw it coming." (Newsweek)

U.K.

U.K. – Muslim Relations: Rushdie Knighthood 'Justifies Suicide Attacks'

The award of a knighthood to the author Salman Rushdie justifies suicide attacks, a Pakistani government minister said today. (The Guardian)

TURKEY

Turkey Opens Investigation into Iraq's Barzani

Turkish state prosecutors opened an investigation on Monday into Masoud Barzani, head of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, whom Ankara suspects of supporting Turkish Kurdish rebels. (Reuters)

CAMBODIA

New Text Gives Cambodians Glimpse of Khmer Rouge Period

Cambodia offers plenty of Khmer Rouge "killing fields" attractions. There is a grisly genocide museum complete with torture instruments and former mass graves that draws camera-toting tourists. (AP)

PEDOPHILIA

Police Smash Global Pedophile Ring

Police smashed a global Internet pedophile ring, rescuing 31 children and rounding up more than 700 suspects worldwide, authorities said Monday. (AP)

KENYA

Wanted Man Surrenders to Police

A clothes dealer presented himself to police yesterday after his photograph was circulated in the media linking him to last week's explosion in Nairobi. (Daily Nation)

ETHIOPIA

In Ethiopia, Fear and Cries of Army Brutality

The rebels march 300 strong across the crunchy earth, young men with dreadlocks and AK-47s slung over their shoulders. Often when they pass through a village, the entire village lines up, one sunken cheekbone to the next, to squint at them. "May God bring you victory," one woman whispered. (New York Times)

SOMALIA

Grenade Attack Kills Child in Somalia

A suspected Islamist insurgent tossed a hand grenade into a government-run bank in Somalia's south central town of Baidoa, killing a child outside, residents said Sunday. (Reuters)

SOUTH AFRICA

Paramedics Kept Busy In Violent Jo'burg Weekend

A 12-year-old boy helped his dad fight off a gang of armed robbers in Pretoria in one of at least 19 violent incidents that Gauteng paramedics dealt with at the weekend. (Sapa)

ANALYSIS & OPINION

Nihilists without Borders

In what seemed an attempt by Al Qaeda to stoke sectarian hatreds in Iraq, powerful explosions Wednesday destroyed the two minarets that were left standing after last year's bombing of a sacred Shi'ite shrine in Samarra. This second bombing of the shrine seems to be having the desired effect; in the days since then, Sunni mosques have come under attack, as Iraq's civil war rages on. (Boston Globe)

World Bank's Ongoing Corruption Battle

By Danny Leipziger and Sanjay Pradhan

The recent turbulence surrounding the resignation of Paul Wolfowitz from the presidency of the World Bank has underscored the need to push ahead with the bank's good governance and anticorruption agenda. This is necessary not only for the sake of the bank itself but, more fundamentally, for the sake of the poor in developing countries, whose access to public services and opportunities for a better life are undermined by weak governance and graft. (The Japan Times)

Dinner with a Warlord

By Nicholas D. Kristof

One hint that this would be an unusual interview came when the warlord walked in wearing a button reading "Rebels For Christ." Then when I reached to sip the café au lait that the guerrilla leaders offered me in their jungle redoubt, they looked reproachful and quickly bowed their heads and said grace. (International Herald Tribune)

Hamas's Coup in Gaza Casts a Pall over Bush-Olmert Meeting

By James Phillips

The violent coup in Gaza carried out by Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic extremist movement, is a devastating setback for U.S. foreign policy, the prospects for Israeli-Palestinian peace, and efforts to democratize the volatile Middle East. Hamas's consolidation of power in Gaza is a major victory for Iran and a threat to Egypt and Jordan, as well as Israel. When President George W. Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert meet tomorrow, two major issues on their agenda will be how to contain Hamas and how to restrict the spread of Iranian influence in an increasingly turbulent Middle East. The Bush Administration should reach out to allies in the region, in addition to Israel, also threatened by Iran's rise. (The Heritage Foundation)

U.S.: The Real Reason behind Ballistic Missile Defense

Washington has spent the last six months trying to convince the world that the expansion of the nascent U.S. ballistic missile defense (BMD) system into Europe poses no threat to Russia's strategic deterrent, but rather is only intended to counter Iran and other Middle Eastern threats. The U.S. claims are accurate -- for now. (Stratfor)

The Insider Daily Investigative Report (DIR) is a summary of major news articles and broadcasts relating to investigative news, including international terrorism and developments in Iraq. The DIR is edited daily from foreign and U.S. sources by Chris Isham and Elizabeth Sprague of the ABC News Investigative Unit. The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ABCNEWS.