Excerpts: Sudan pro-Israel editor severely beaten. I S militants in Syria
gasfield July 20, 2014

+++SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon) 20 July ’14:”Sudan Editor Severely Beaten
after Call for Israeli Ties”, Agence France Presse
SUBJECT: Sudan pro-Israel editor severely beaten
QUOTE: “Armed men raided the offices of a Sudanese newspaper. . .and
severely beat the chief editor who had called for a normalization of ties
with Israel”
EXCERPTS:Armed men raided the offices of a Sudanese newspaper on Saturday[19
July] evening and severely beat the chief editor who had called for
normalization of ties with Israel, a colleague said.

The violence against Osman Mirghani, chief editor of the Al-Tayar daily, was
an unusual physical attack against a journalist in Sudan, although reporters
regularly complain of censorship by the National Intelligence and Security
Service.

Mirghani was admitted to Al-Zaytouna Hospital in downtown Khartoum after
"they just started beating him in his head, in his leg, using the guns and
the sticks," Faisal Mohamed Salih, an award-winning Sudanese journalist and
press freedom advocate, told AFP.

Ibrahim Ghandour, top assistant to President Omar al-Bashir, visited
Mirghani and told journalists that the editor was unconscious, Salih said.

Speaking from the hospital and citing information from Al-Tayar reporters,
Salih said about seven gunmen drove up to the newspaper's office just before
the evening iftar meal when Muslims break their fast during the holy month
of Ramadan.

"They ordered the journalists to lay down. They collected all the mobile
phones and the laptops. They cut all the computer connections," before
turning on Mirghani in his office, said Salih, who won the 2013 Peter
Mackler Award for Courageous and Ethical Journalism.

"The way they behaved, they were very organized."

The attack occurred just a few days after Mirghani called on local
television for Islamist Sudan to normalize relations with Israel, Salih
said.

. . . Israeli officials have long accused Sudan of serving as a base of
support for Hamas militants.

. . . .Salih said the attack against Mirghani, though unusual, is "a
real threat to media freedom and journalists in general. And also it is an
indicator that maybe no one can guarantee the security of the journalists
anymore."

Sudan ranked near the bottom, at 170 out of 179, in the Reporters Without
Borders (RSF) 2013 World Press Freedom Index.

SourceAgence France Presse




+++SOURCE: Saudi Gazette 20 July ’14:”Militants kill 270 in anti-regime raid
on Syria gas field”, Agence France Presse
SUBJECT:IS militants in Syria gasfield
EXCERPTS:BEIRUT – (IS)Militants have killed 270 Syrian regime fighters,
civilian security guards and staff since seizing a gas field in Homs
province, most of whom were executed, a monitoring group said on Saturday[19
July].
. . .
The Observatory described Thursday’s[[17 July] takeover of the Shaar field
as “the biggest” anti-regime operation by the IS since the militant group
rose to prominence last year among rebel groups in the Syrian conflict.

The watchdog said it had documented “the death of 270 people killed in the
fighting or executed” since the takeover of the field in central Syria.

“A large majority of the men killed were executed at gunpoint after being
taken prisoner following the takeover of the camp,” said Observatory
director Rami Abdel Rahman.

“Eleven of the dead were civilian employees, while the rest were security
guards and National Defense Forces members,” he added.

On Saturday[19 July], regime forces, a day after launching a counter-attack,
had “re-taken large areas of Shaar,” according to Abdel Rahman. “Fighting is
continuing around the gas field.” The counter-attack had left at least 40 IS
militants dead, while 11 soldiers had been killed and 10 others who were
injured had been taken to hospital in Homs, said the Observatory, which
relies for its information on a network of activists and medics on the
ground. The fate of nearly 100 people who worked at the site remained
unknown, according to earlier figures released by the Observatory. — AFP



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Sue Lerner - Associate, IMRA