How Mexico’s drug war washed up on Canada’s West Coast

Constables Phil Gomes and Mike Clark – a.k.a. Shake ‘n’ Bake – are 27 and 28, clean-cut and solidly built, and together form the newest and least-known front in Mexico’s drug wars: Canada.

Members of the coveted Integrated Gang Task Force in British Columbia, their orders are to “disrupt and dismantle” drug gangs, many of which maintain a cocaine lifeline to Mexico.

They don’t talk about it much, but they spend their days chasing down the “bad guys” and “sitting on” drug houses around Vancouver and the Lower Mainland of B.C. (Toronto Star)

Thousands getting terror training

Thousands of UK workers are being trained to help respond to a future terror attack as part of an updated counter-terror strategy, ministers say.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said shop and hotel workers would be among 60,000 people able to deal with an incident.

The updated approach, aimed at tackling immediate terrorist threats and the causes of extremism, would be the most comprehensive in the world, she added. (BBC)

Mercy dash family denied entry to US

AN AUSTRALIAN family on a mercy dash to a dying relative in the United States were detained without food or water before being sent to a detention centre and forced to spend the night with criminal suspects. Their ordeal finished with them being deported.

Mr Fazle Rabbi, his wife, Rokeya, and their two sons, Rakin, 14, and Raiyan, 8, left Sydney on Tuesday, January 13 to visit Mr Rabbi’s ailing 84-year-old father in Los Angeles.

However, instead of the emotional reunion they expected, the family was detained at Los Angeles International Airport by US Customs and Border Protection officers. (SMH)

India To Build Homeland Security on U.S. Model

Indian Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram will discuss with U.S. officials how to model India’s future Homeland Security Agency on the lines of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security during a Jan. 9-10 visit to Washington, sources in the Indian Home Ministry said.

Chidambaram replaced Home Minister Shiv Raj Patel as a fallout of the Nov. 26 Mumbai terrorist attacks. Sources said Chidambaram is scheduled to visit U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and with members of the transition team of President-elect Barack Obama. (Defense News)

PM abandons ‘cumbersome’ homeland security department

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has formally abandoned the plan for a massive new department of homeland security Labor took to the election.

In his long-awaited national security statement, Mr Rudd said he’d taken the advice of former Defence Department head Ric Smith that to lump all the security and intelligence agencies into one new department would be too cumbersome. (The Age)

Indian government reviews policy on aircraft hijacking and terrorism

The Indian government on Tuesday reviewed its policy on terrorism and decided to formulate new norms on how to handle cases of aircraft hijack and terrorism.

The Crisis Management Committee (CMC) that has authorised the National Security Guards (NSG) chief to liase with the defence commandoes during the Mumbai terror attacks on Monday met to analyse the situation. (Daily Times)

Suicide attack near U.S. embassy in Kabul

Early reports of suicide attack attempt on U.S. Embassy in Kabul. (AP)

No immediate reports of casualties (other than the suicide attackers).

Multiple coordinated terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India

Multiple sites have been attacked by bombs and shootings in the Indian city of Mumbai in what appears to be a coordinated terror attack. The Prime Minister’s office has confirmed at least 25 people dead and dozens more injured in five separate blasts. Gunmen reportedly opened fire at several sites throughout the city, including a crowded train station and a popular restaurant. (Mahalo)

Ski resort circled on map: terror trial

A popular NSW ski resort was circled on a map recovered from the home of a Sydney man linked to an alleged terrorist plot, a jury has heard.

Plastic piping, a shopping list of combustibles and partially destroyed instructions for a car park rendezvous were also seized during a police raid on the home of Omar Baladjam. (Link)

The jolly life of a pirate ring

With a reported nine commercial ships hijacked over the past 12 days – including a spectacular strike on a Saudi Arabian oil supertanker – the world has become captivated by pirates. Specifically, a loose band of some 1,500 freebooters drawn from Somalia’s ranks of unemployed fishermen and hardscrabble Islamic militias by the lure of easy money and, one can only assume, a life of high adventure. (More)

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