Thursday, April 23, 2015

Fleet of Iranian ships heading to Yemen turns around after being tracked by US warships

Fleet of Iranian ships heading to Yemen turns around after being tracked by US warships

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A nine-ship Iranian convoy believed to be laden with weapons bound for rebels in Yemen turned around Thursday after being followed by U.S. warships stationed in the area to prevent arms shipments, multiple sources in the Pentagon told Fox News.
The sources said the nine-ship convoy is south of Salalah, Oman, and now headed northeast in the Arabian Sea in the direction of home. The ships, which include seven freighters and two frigates, had sailed southwest along the coast of Yemen heading in the direction of Aden and the entrance to the Red Sea. They appeared to drop anchor in the north Arabian Sea, after the USS Theodore Roosevelt, the USS Normandy and a half-dozen other American ships arrived in the Arabian Sea on Monday, and U.S. officials said that they could intercept the convoy.
The USS Theodore Roosevelt, a 100,000-ton nuclear-powered aircraft carrier known as the “Big Stick” and her escort, the USS Normandy, a guided missile cruiser, have been shadowing the convoy for the past few days, the sources said.
Fighter jets taking off from the carrier have been relaying the convoy’s location to the U.S. Navy's higher command since the start of the week.
The Iranian Navy ships are characterized as "smaller than destroyers," a Pentagon official with knowledge of the convoy said Tuesday. Asked what type of weapons the freighters are carrying, one Pentagon official said, "they are bigger than small arms."
The reversal was welcomed by Pentagon officials, but they expressed caution saying, “this isn’t over yet,” and insisted Roosevelt will maintain observation on the convoy.
Iran backs the Houthi rebels, who chased the Yemeni president from Sanaa and are fighting for control of the Gulf nation. Warships from Saudi Arabia and Egypt, who back Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, are positioned to the southwest of the convoy, forming a blockade of the Gulf of Aden and the port city of Aden.
Western governments and Sunni Arab countries say the Houthis get their arms from Iran. Tehran and the rebels deny that, although Iran has provided political and humanitarian support to the Shiite group.
The U.S. also has been providing logistical and intelligence support to the Saudi-led coalition launching airstrikes against the Houthis. That air campaign is now in its fourth week, and the U.S. also has begun refueling coalition aircraft involved in the conflict.
The campaign meant to halt the rebel power grab and help return to office Hadi, a close U.S. ally who fled Yemen.
The defiant Shiite rebels pressed their offensive in the country's south on Thursday, apparently ignoring an overture from Saudi Arabia earlier this week, while the kingdom's warplanes continued to target their positions, officials said.
The rebels’ prized goal -- the port city of Aden -- remained an elusive one, in part thanks to the Saudi-led airstrikes.
Meanwhile, Pakistan's top leaders, including Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif, arrived Thursday in Saudi Arabia to push for negotiations in the Yemen conflict. The two are to meet with King Salman to discuss the crisis, according to Pakisitan's Foreign Office spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam.
Both predominantly Sunni majority countries, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are close allies, and Islamabad has supported the Saudi-led coalition, though it declined to send troops, warplanes and warships to join it.
The kingdom and Gulf Arab allies launched the airstrikes March 26, trying to crush the Houthis and allied military units loyal to ousted President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
The Saudis believe the rebels are tools for Iran to take control of Yemen.
Loud explosions shook the cities of Taiz and Ibb in western Yemen on Thursday, as well as Aden when coalition warplanes bombed the rebels and their allies, witnesses said.
Residents also said the Houthis and Saleh's forces were attacking the city of Dhale, one of the southern gateways to Aden, with random shelling.
All Yemeni officials and witnesses spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media or feared for their safety amid the fighting.The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Five Signs the World is Now On the Cusp of All Out War

Five Signs the World is Now On the Cusp of All Out War

By MONEY MORNING STAFF REPORTS
Should the rise of conflicts across the Middle East and Ukraine serve as a warning sign that something much more dangerous is approaching?
According to Jim Rickards, the CIA's Asymmetric Warfare Advisor, the answer is yes.
In a startling interview he reveals that all 16 U.S. Intelligence Agencies have begun to prepare for World War III.
Making matters worse, his colleagues believe it could begin within the next 6 months.
However, the ground zero location for this global conflict is what makes his interview a must-see for every American.
Take a few moments to watch it below and decide for yourself.
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New eruption at Turrialba produced ash column reaching more than 6,500 feet

New eruption at Turrialba produced ash column reaching more than 6,500 feet

Posted on April 23, 2015 by
Costa Rica Volcano 2
April 2015 – COSTA RICA – Costa Rica’s Turrialba volcano erupted again Tuesday afternoon, producing a column of ash, gas, and water vapor that reached some 6,500 feet over the volcano’s crater, according to the Volcanological and Seismological Observatory of Costa Rica (OVSICORI). The eruption began at 4:04 p.m. and continued for 22 minutes, according to OVSICORI. Constant seismic activity has been recorded at the volcano since Saturday, and local residents have reported a strong smell of sulfur for the last several days.
San Jose’s Tobias Bolanos Airport announced a partial closure of the airport Tuesday evening due to potential ashfall, but was back to normal operation by Wednesday morning. An eruption of similar magnitude most recently occurred on Tuesday, April 7th. One of Costa Rica’s most well-known volcanologists, Gino Gonzalez of the National Seismological Network (RSN), said in December that Turrialba could remain active and belching ash for as long as two years.  –Inside Costa Rica
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Alabama Senate Opens With Prayer Seeking ‘Forgiveness for Allowing Sexual Perversions’

Alabama Senate Opens With Prayer Seeking ‘Forgiveness for Allowing Sexual Perversions’

April 22, 2015 | Filed under: Law & Government,Life & Society,Top Stories | By:

Alabama Capitol PDMONTGOMERY, Ala. – The Alabama Senate was opened with a prayer on Tuesday that sought forgiveness for the nation’s embrace of sexual perversion.
“Forgive us for allowing sexual perversions to be considered as normal,” prayed David Gonnella, pastor of Magnolia Springs Baptist Church in Theodore.
He was later approached by Mike Cason of AL.com, who asked if his words pertained to homosexuality. Gonnella said that he was referring to anything that God considers an abomination.
However, he noted that he disagrees with January’s federal court ruling surrounding the state’s Sanctity of Marriage Act and supports Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore’s efforts to uphold the state Constitution. The amendment at issue, passed in 2006 with 81 percent of the vote, states that “[m]arriage is inherently a unique relationship between a man and a woman.”
“The people of Alabama voted that marriage should be between one man and one woman and that should be what is done,” Gonnella said.
As previously reported, in 2013, two lesbians in the state sued Gov. Robert Bentley, Attorney General Luther Strange and Mobile County Probate Judge Don Davis—among others—in an attempt to overturn the law after one of the women was denied from adopting the other woman’s child. U.S. District Judge Ginny Granade ruled in favor of the women, stating that the Alabama Sanctity of Marriage Act “harms the children of same-sex couples.”
But Moore found the ruling to be tyrannical, and forbid probate judges throughout the state from issuing same-sex licenses.
“Lower federal courts are without authority to impose their own interpretation of federal constitutional law upon the state courts,” he wrote in a statewide memo. “Not only is the Mobile federal court acting without constitutional authority, but it is doing so in a manner inconsistent with the Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution.”
Moore also called upon Gov. Bentley to uphold the state Constitution and reject the ruling. He additionally pointed to the Scriptures in his plea, as Jesus declared in Mark 10:6-9 that “from the beginning of creation God made them male and female, [and] for this cause, a man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and they twain shall be one flesh.”
The high court justice noted a U.S. Supreme Court ruling from 1885, which was reiterated in 1908, which stated that the foundation for marriage and family is “the union for life of one man and one woman in the holy estate of matrimony.”
But Bentley, a former Sunday school teacher and elder, said that he felt he must uphold the ruling despite his disagreement with it. Bentley’s pastor, Gil McKee of First Baptist Church Tuscaloosa, has been encouraging Bentley that it is the Christian’s duty to obey God rather than men, just as God’s people did in Scripture.
“There’s nothing grey about this issue—not if you’re going to go with what God says, and God has made it clear that marriage is between one man and one woman, period, and that settles it,” he said in a sermon in February. “The issue is, are we going to go with God, or are we going to go with somebody else?”
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Drone with radioactive material found on Japanese prime minister's office roof

Drone with radioactive material found on Japanese prime minister's office roof

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Japan: Drone apparently carrying small amount of radioactive fluid found on prime minister's roof
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was traveling in Indonesia when drone was found by office staff
A small drone aircraft containing what was believed to be a minute amount of radioactive cesium was discovered Wednesday morning on the heliport above Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s office.
No one was injured, and Abe was traveling in Indonesia at the time the drone was found by office staff, but police said they were investigating the incident as possible terrorist threat.
The drone was plainly marked with the universal sign for radiation, and authorities said they had detected minute levels of radiation from it.
Tokyo police sources said the drone had four propellers with a diameter of about 18 inches, plus a small camera and plastic container attached. The container, about 1 inch by 4 inches, held a small amount of a radioactive liquid, they said.
The Tokyo police bomb squad was called in to investigate the device but found no explosive materials. The levels of radiation detected from the drone were far too low to affect human health, officials said.
Police did not immediately determine who piloted the drone or when it landed atop the office.
According to the Transport Ministry, Japan has no laws regulating drone flights at altitudes below about 650 feet, and it is not illegal to fly drones over government buildings or even the prime minister’s residence.
A police source, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said officers were investigating whether anti-nuclear activists landed the drone on the office to call attention to the government’s handling of nuclear issues.
The Abe government has been pressing forward with plans to restart Japan’s nuclear reactors despite substantial public opposition lingering from the triple meltdown at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant in March 2011 after the country was struck by a massive earthquake and tsunami. On Wednesday, minutes before the drone was discovered, a district court in Kagoshima approved the restarting of a nuclear power plant in southwest Japan.
Government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said at a news conference that police were investigating the situation and that the government would take steps to prevent further incidents. He noted that Japan had begun studying possible counter-measures against unmanned aircraft after a drone crash-landed on the White House grounds in January.
In that case, the man who had been in possession of the drone was not charged; he told authorities he had borrowed the drone from a friend and lost control of craft while attempting to fly it. Forensic analysis later indicated that the drone was not under control of the operator at the time it crashed.
Adelstein is a special correspondent.
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