ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

Several top officials of the al-Qaeda-linked group have either defected or have been killed in recent months Somalia's militant Islamist group al-Shabab has killed by firing squad four men accused of spying for the CIA and other intelligence agencies. The men, who included two government soldiers, were shot in front of a large crowd in the southern town of Bardhere, witnesses said. A court run by al-Shabab had earlier convicted them of spying for the CIA, Ethiopia and the Somali government. US air strikes have killed two senior al-Shabab commanders in recent months. 'Blindfolded' "One of the spies worked with the CIA and facilitated the killing of an al-Shabab commander," a judge in the al-Shabab-run court said. He did not name the commander, but al-Shabab leader Ahmed Abdi Godane was killed in a US air strike in September and last month its intelligence chief, Tahlil Abdishakur, was assassinated in a similar strike in southern Somalia. Somalia's army has been...

Boko Haram controls large swathes of territory in north-eastern Nigeria Nigeria's militant Islamists have carried out a second attack on the key north-eastern town of Baga, an official has told the BBC. Boko Haram fighters burnt down almost the entire town on Wednesday, after over-running a military base on Saturday, Musa Alhaji Bukar said. Bodies lay strewn on Baga's streets, amid fears that some 2,000 people had been killed in the raids, he added. Boko Haram launched a military campaign in 2009 to create an Islamic state. It has taken control of many towns and villages in north-eastern Nigeria in the last year. The conflict has displaced at least 1.5 million people, while more than 2,000 were killed last year.Abandoned On Monday, lawmaker Maina Maaji Lawan said Boko Haram controlled 70% of Borno state, which is worst-affected by the insurgency. Mr Bukar, a senior government official in the area, said that fleeing residents told him that the town, which had a population of abo...

A general view shows firefighters, police officers and forensics gathered in front of the offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris on January 7, 2015 (AFP Photo / Martin Bureau) Download video (126.86 MB) Three gunmen are on the run after killing 10 journalists and two policemen at the Paris headquarters of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. Police launched a manhunt and raised security levels in the French capital. READ MORE: Fatal shooting at Charlie Hebdo HQ in Paris LIVE UPDATES At least two black-hooded men gunmen armed with Kalashnikov rifles entered the building of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo in the 11th district on Wednesday morning. Some reports suggested that they even had a rocket-propelled grenade. “Somebody who was nearby on the roof and saw much of the incident said three policemen then arrived on a pushbike,” Henry Samuel, the Daily Telegraph's Paris correspondent, told Sky News. "When they saw how armed these men were they...

Brazil # 10 Kicking off the list we have Brazil at number 1o. Brazil currently has more than 300,000 active military personal for a population of just under 200 million. They also have a budget of nearly 23 billion dollars to go along with that. Even though South America is a relatively peaceful place, that hasn’t stopped Brazil from becoming a military powerhouse. Italy # 9 Coming in number 9 for the most powerful militaries in the world is Italy. Even though Italy has a slightly smaller active military force then Brazil, they have a more powerful Navy and and slightly higher defense budget. Italy helps make Europe a force to be reckoned with. South Korea # 8 Coming in at number 8 is South Korea. Boasting an active military with nearly 700,00 active personal South Korea has become a legitimate force. Even though they have no nuclear capability, being backed by the United States has helped South Korea become much more threatening than their neighbors to the north. Germany # 7 At our...

Reuters / Dado Ruvic The Danish Defence Intelligence Service (FE) has stated its readiness to launch cyberattacks against hostile states and organizations, according to Politiken daily. Over the next 2 years some $75 million will be invested in an “offensive” cyber division. By 2017 Denmark will pour some 465 million kroner ($75 million) into developing an offensive cyber-attack capability, according to the report . This is apparently so that Denmark can expand its capabilities from focusing solely on defending itself against hacker attacks, to also attacking hostile targets. The idea is being developed in the wake of attacks over past several years which allegedly targeted the country’s defense and business sector for sensitive information. Since 2012 at least four Danish companies have reportedly been targeted in “incredibly” sophisticated, “state-sponsored” attacks blamed on the usual suspect, China, according to the report from FE. While an offensive cyberattack should typically be...

Special Report: The rapid expansion of America’s right-wing media began in the 1980s as the Reagan administration coordinated foreign policy initiatives with conservative media executives, including Rupert Murdoch, and then cleared away regulatory hurdles. By Robert Parry The Reagan administration pulled right-wing media executives Rupert Murdoch and Richard Mellon Scaife into a CIA-organized “perception management” operation which aimed Cold War-style propaganda at the American people in the 1980s, according to declassified U.S. government records. Although some records relating to Murdoch remain classified, several documents that have been released indicate that he and billionaire Scaife were considered sources of financial and other support for President Ronald Reagan’s hard-line Central American policies, including the CIA’s covert war in Nicaragua. A driving force behind creation of Reagan’s extraordinary propaganda bureaucracy was CIA Director William Casey who dispatched the CI...

All-out war is coming to Libya, as rebel militias and a government-in-hiding begin a battle for control of the country. By Bel TrewBel TRIPOLI, Libya — Zeina, 27, was hanging out her washing when the first Grad rocket smashed into a neighbor’s house at the end of her dusty street. The deafening boom was followed by the telltale buzz of more incoming rockets. Libya’s civil war had landed on her doorstep. “It started as a normal day — then we heard the sound of shelling and rockets,” said the young mother. “Without warning, they hit our houses. We fled with just the clothes we were wearing.” Zeina is now crammed together with seven other people in a cinderblock outhouse that is part of Tripoli’s zoo. They are just a handful of the more than 400,000 people who are currently displaced inside Libya, which is witnessing its worst crisis since the 2011 NATO-backed revolt that toppled dictator Muammar Qaddafi. For three years, Libya has been without a functioning government, police force, or ...

Protesters build a barricade on February 21, 2014 at the Independent square in Kiev.(AFP Photo / Bulent Kilic) The armed coup in Kiev is painfully similar to CIA operations to oust unwanted foreign leaders in Iran, Chile and Venezuela, said US filmmaker Oliver Stone after interviewing Ukraine’s ousted president for a documentary. Stone spent four hours in Moscow talking to Viktor Yanukovich, who was deposed from power during the February 2014 coup, the filmmaker wrote on his Facebook page. “Details to follow in the documentary, but it seems clear that the so-called ‘shooters’ who killed 14 police men, wounded some 85, and killed 45 protesting civilians, were outside third party agitators,” he said.“Many witnesses, including Yanukovych and police officials, believe these foreign elements were introduced by pro-Western factions – with CIA fingerprints on it.” The filmmaker added that the events in Kiev, which led to collapse of the Ukrainian government and imposition of a new one hostil...