And lots more. . .
First, from the London Telegraph, a real national security threat warning from a surprising source:
Shadow banking now poses top risk to US stability, warns IMF
Non-financial lending has reached $15 trillion since the crisis and is outside the control of authorities warns the Fund’s deputy chief
The US shadow banking nexus is coming back to haunt like some hydra-headed beast and now poses the biggest potential threat to the American financial system, the International Monetary Fund has warned.
Zhu Min, the IMF’s deputy chief, said regulators have successfully cleaned up much of the global banking system since the Lehman crisis, but the excesses have moved off books and are once again growing to disturbing proportions.
“The key risk has shifted to shadow banking,” he said, speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
While the explosion of China’s shadow banking is well-known, Zhu Min said there has been a surge of lending by asset management funds and others non-bank players to US companies. This is outside normal control and is hard to track. “Non-financial corporations have raised $1.3 trillion (£860bn) through shadow banking in the US alone,” he told the Telegraph.
CBC News covers another source of anxiety north of the border:
Christopher Phillips, ID’d as biochemical weapons expert, arrested in Ottawa
CBC sources say RCMP issued internal communication about Phillips after N.S. evacuations
RCMP had warned Phillips was travelling with poisonous chemical osmium tetroxide.
RCMP said suspect Christopher Phillips is former biochemical weapons specialist
Suspected arrested in hotel without incident. police say
A man suspected of travelling from Nova Scotia with potentially hazardous chemicals and arrested at an Ottawa hotel today has been identified by the RCMP as a former military biochemical weapons specialist from the United States.
The RCMP issued an internal communication Tuesday about Christopher Phillips, who lives in the Halifax area, identifying him as an ex-military weapons specialist with possible mental-health issues, sources confirmed to CBC News. However, RCMP in Nova Scotia wouldn’t confirm the suspect’s identity during a media conference just outside Halifax on Wednesday afternoon.
Phillips, who was living in the Halifax area, is the ex-husband of gymnast Shannon Miller, the most decorated gymnast in U.S. history, whose achievements included winning seven Olympic medals. Phillips and Miller divorced in 2006.
The Associated Press covers the hardly surprising:
France to get better guns, more intel agents to fight terror
France announced sweeping new measures to counter homegrown terrorism Wednesday, including giving security forces better weapons and protection, going on an intelligence agent hiring spree and creating a better database of anyone suspected of extremist links.
The measures detailed by Prime Minister Manuel Valls came as four men were handed preliminary charges of providing logistical support to one of the Paris terror attackers — the first charges issued for three days of mayhem that left 20 people dead, including three gunmen.
The new security measures include increased intelligence-gathering on jihadis and other radicals, in part by making it easier to tap phones. Valls said Internet providers and social networks “have a legal responsibility under French law” to comply with the new measures.
In all, France will spend 425 million euros ($490 million) over the next three years for all the counter-terror efforts, he said.
From Al Jazeera America, arrests:
France charges 4 for alleged links to gunman, unveils security measures
Officials say suspects helped gunman who attacked Jewish supermarket; announce new measures to combat violent extremism
Four suspects have been charged with assisting the gunman who French authorities said fatally shot a policewoman and killed four people in a hostage drama at a Jewish supermarket nearly two weeks ago, Paris Prosecutor Francois Molins said Wednesday.
The announcement of the arrests came amid Prime Minister Manuel Valls’ announcement of sweeping new measures to counter homegrown violent extremism, including giving security forces better weapons and protection.
Outlining a web of phone calls and prison friendships, Molins said the four suspects given preliminary charges — all in their 20s and all arrested in the Paris region — will remain behind bars while the investigation continues. He identified them only as Willy P., Christophe R., Tonino G. and Mickael A.
The Guardian covers bizarrely inept racism:
Photograph of Germany’s Pegida leader styled as Adolf Hitler goes viral
Lutz Bachmann, said by German intelligence services to be a target for Islamist terrorists, posted the picture on Facebook
A photograph of the leader of a growing “anti-Islamisation” movement in Germany styled as Adolf Hitler has gone viral and raised new questions about the group’s allegiance to the far-right scene.
Lutz Bachmann, 41, a butcher’s son from Dresden and a co-founder of Pegida, posed as Hitler after a session at his hairdresser’s, complete with a Hitler hairstyle dyed black and parted on the right, and a toothbrush moustache.
The image, which appeared on Bachmann’s Facebook page, was accompanied by the line “he’s back”, after a bestselling 2012 novel about Hitler, Er ist wieder da, by author Timur Vermes.
And here he is, in all his Hitlerian. . .well, we’ll leave it to you to decide just what:
An update from BBC News:
Germany Pegida: Protest leader quits amid ‘Hitler’ row
The head of Germany’s “anti-Islamisation” movement has quit after a photo showing him apparently posing as Hitler was published in newspapers.
Lutz Bachmann is also being investigated by prosecutors over disparaging comments about refugees attributed to him by German newspapers.
He stepped down as thousands of people gathered in the eastern city of Leipzig for the Pegida movement’s latest rally. Mr Bachmann has apologised for his “ill-considered” remarks.
From Deutsche Welle, a healthy response:
Counter-demonstrators block Leipzig rally by PEGIDA offshoot
“Anti-Islamization” protesters have gathered for a rally in the city of Leipzig, blocked by thousands of counterdemonstrators. A large contingent of riot police were called in to separate the two.
LEGIDA’s rally got underway on Wednesday evening with the organizers hoping to attract tens of thousands of supporters, although many faced difficulty reaching their destination.
According to the DPA news agency, only a fraction of the anticipated number had reached the Augustusplatz – the city’s largest square – by early evening. Counter-demonstrators blocked the way in surrounding streets, chanting the refrain “Get lost!” and brandishing signs reading “No PEGIDA, No LEGIDA.”
LEGIDA is the Leipzig offshoot of the PEGIDA group centered around Dresden, whose name loosely translates as “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West.”
While Der Spiegel covers anxiety:
#notinmyname: German Muslims Fear Backlash after Paris Attacks
The vast majority of Muslims in Germany condemn the attack on Charlie Hebdo in Paris. But they are concerned that a new wave of Islamophobia may wash over the country anyway.
Germany has experienced a fundamental shift, from a republic that sought to keep immigrants at arm’s length to one that is now the second-most attractive immigrant country after the United States. But societal cohesion is currently being tested. The anti-immigration, Islamophobic protests in Dresden organized by Pegida have shown that there is still a significant amount of angst about foreigners in Germany and the Paris attacks have triggered fear that it could happen at home. “Everyone is unsettled,” says Bilkay Öney, minister of integration in the state of Baden-Württemberg. “Both Muslims and non-Muslims.”
Resentments and prejudices are on the rise. Mazyek has only to look into his in-box. For days, racists have been flooding it with hate mail. “Every Muslim is a potential murderer. You are not welcome. The only good Muslim is a dead Muslim,” reads one. “The world will rise up and Islam will be eradicated,” reads another.
Germany is home to around 4 million Muslims. There are Sunnis, Shiites, Alevis and Ahmadiyyas. There are immigrants from Turkey, from the Balkans and from Lebanon. There are those whose families have been here for several generations and those who have just recently fled their homelands, not infrequently to escape Islamist terror. University students and high-school dropouts, doctors and manual laborers: It is a heterogeneous group with their faith often being the only thing they have in common. But Pegida and Paris have intruded on their daily lives and triggered a variety of emotions. And a variety of reactions.
From TheLocal.se, Swedish anxiety:
Sweden confirms 100 citizens fighting for Isis
Sweden’s Security Service, Säpo, has confirmed data suggesting that at least one hundred Swedes have fought alongside Islamist extremists in Iraq and Syria.
The move followed an interview that Säpo’s head Anders Thornberg gave to Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter on Saturday, in which he said that the security service was working hard to control fighters who had returned to Sweden and could “perhaps” be prepared to carry out terror attacks on home soil.
Thornberg has previously cited anecdotal evidence which suggests that up to 300 Swedes have joined Isis (also known as the Islamic State) and said he also stood by this figure.
“We have seen an increasing number of young Swedes travelling to Syria where they go and get training in training camps, they learn to become terrorists, handle explosives, handle weapons,” he told the TT news agency on Wednesday.
On to the spooky front, first with the Guardian:
CIA torture report architect denounces Republican attempt to claw back copies
Feinstein’s successor wants Obama administration to give back document
Move would put 6,000-page report outside Freedom of Information Act
The architect of the Senate’s landmark inquiry into Central Intelligence Agency torture is denouncing an unusual demand from her successor to return all classified copies of the investigation.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat who relinquished the chairmanship of the intelligence committee when Republicans took control of the Senate this month, said she objects to Senator Richard Burr’s request that the Obama administration return all copies of the full, 6,000-plus-page classified study.
“I strongly disagree that the administration should relinquish copies of the full committee study, which contains far more detailed records than the public executive summary,” Feinstein said in a statement late on Tuesday.
“Doing so would limit the ability to learn lessons from this sad chapter in America’s history and omit from the record two years of work, including changes made to the committee’s 2012 report following extensive discussion with the CIA.”
From To Vima, political wiretapping in Greece:
Prosecutor orders immediate investigation into wiretapping allegations
The central offices of New Democracy, SYRIZA and PASOK were allegedly being monitored
The Athens First Instance Court Prosecutor has ordered an immediate investigation into serious allegations of illegal wiretappings of political party phone lines, based on a report published in Ta Nea on Tuesday.
In the two-week investigation, the reporter used a Cryptophone 500 made by GSMK to locate suspect activity in the vicinity of the central offices of New Democracy and SYRIZA. The Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten had used the same device in a similar report published last month.
Of the 17,371 readings that Ta Nea carried out, it recorded 193 “very suspicious” events, along with 64 “serious threats”, 78 “medium threats” and 263 “low threats”. After the publication of the article on Tuesday though, it appears that the wiretaps have “gone silent”.
After the jump, it’s on to the hacking front and ISIS efforts in Spain, Turkish hacks in Ghana, hacking via Flash, Web habits could harm Chinese credit applicants, and a corporate warning of rampant hacks to come, Europe confronts its own torture problem, Edward Snowden cites a panopticon fail, a spooky forensic coverup, the value of Humint reaffirmed, another black man killed surrendering to U.S. cops, a cop sent to prison for road rage, Washington makes a sinister “border protection” move, scrutiny of the Argentine president increases amidst bombing deal allegations, pressure on Shinzo Abe mounts in Japanese ISIS hostage crisis, Pakistan claims a win over ISIS, and Pakistani teachers raise alarm over plan to arm them in the classroom, Nigerian Boko Haram leader claims a divine massacre mandate, Vietnam sub buys raise island dispute stakes, while China ramps up its own island dispute fleet, plus another Skynet warning. . .
ISIS hackery in Spain via RT
ISIS ‘lovers’ hack websites in 40 Spanish towns
At least forty municipalities in the Navarre province of Spain had their websites compromised, with the hackers leaving messages in support of the Islamic State (IS, formerly known as ISIS/ISIL) extremist group.
An estimated 70 municipal websites were attacked on Tuesday evening, police say, according to El Diario de Navarra.
Instead of their usual content, the websites displayed black IS flags and threats in Arabic. The message started with the words “I love ISIS” and ended with “Je suis Mohammed” and “Je suis ISIS”.
The posts also included insults targeting France and Israel. The pages were signed either with “hackers Algeria 2015″, or with “hacked by Team System Dz.”
And Turkish hacks in Ghana, via BBC News:
Ghana government websites targeted by hackers
The majority of the Ghanaian government’s websites, including its main site, have been hacked and are currently offline. A message reading “Hacked by Alsancak Tim” appeared on the sites.
On its social media accounts, Alsancak Tim describes itself as a nationalist Turkish hacker group.
The deputy communications minister said experts were working to restore the websites by the end of the day and were investigating who was behind it.
From Network World, not a flash in the pan but a hack in Flash:
Attackers are exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Flash Player
Attackers are using compromised websites to exploit a new and currently unpatched vulnerability in Flash Player, a malware researcher has reported.
The new exploit was observed in drive-by-download attacks launched with an exploit kit called Angler, according to an independent researcher who uses the online alias Kafeine.
Exploit kits are malicious Web applications that contain exploits for vulnerabilities in browsers and browser plug-ins such as Java, Flash Player, Adobe Reader and Silverlight. Attackers silently redirect users’ browsers to exploit kit installations by inserting rogue code in compromised websites and malicious advertisements.
From Want China Times, Web habits could harm Chinese credit applicants:
Internet browsing habits could affect credit rating in China
A social media background check would allow an institution to judge whether the client is a part of social circles composed of “normal” friends, in turn exposing those surrounded by people with a dubious background or criminal history.
For example, if someone opened an account on Taobao in 2008, this record would roughly paint a personal picture. An unchanged user address over time could indicate house ownership. If a man and a woman used the same address and the same IP address, they are most likely a couple, married, siblings, or parent and child.
An internet user’s consumption habits also relate to their credit. A user buying food vs furniture vs fitness equipment will get different ratings in a credit evaluation. If a user frequently donates, she will get an even better rating.
The rising popularity of wearable devices could make this monitoring process 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
And a corporate warning of rampant hacks to come, via USA Today:
Cisco CEO: Hacking attacks about to get a lot worse
Cisco Systems chief executive John Chambers expects hacking attacks to become a lot worse this year, and he’s positioning his digital networks company to take advantage of it.
“Security was bad last year,” Chambers told USA TODAY in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, referring to high-profile hacks on companies such as Sony Entertainment and retailer Target. “Unfortunately, this year it’s going to be much worse.”
As long as companies view digital security as a defense rather than an opportunity to grow with others in their industries, they will be vulnerable to malicious hacking, Chambers said. Most companies still don’t know how vulnerable they are and that will play out with more high-profile hacks in coming months, he added.
Europe confronts its own torture problem, via Deutsche Welle:
Report: Torture is a European problem too
A day after Amnesty International published a report on Europe’s collusion with the CIA’s torture program, the Council of Europe published its own shocking survey of abuse in detention centers across the continent.
Guards in several European countries carried out reprisals against detainees who gave an interview to the Council of Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT), the new CPT report has revealed. The council considers this a violation of the spirit of cooperation between the CPT and the Council of Europe’s member states.
According to the CPT’s 24th General Report, released on Wednesday, reprisals were carried out against prisoners in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Greece, Hungary, Moldova, Russia, Spain, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and Ukraine.
“Intimidation or retaliation against persons the CPT has interviewed may not only violate their human rights but also strikes a blow to the preventive mechanism established by the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture,” CPT President Letif Hüseynov said in a statement. “I urge national authorities to respect their obligation to prevent, investigate and punish such actions.”
Snowden cites a panopticon fail, via The Hill:
Snowden: French spying didn’t stop terror attacks
Edward Snowden is pointing to the recent terror attacks in Paris as proof that government surveillance can’t stop terrorism.
“The problem with mass surveillance is that you’re burying people under too much data,” the government leaker said in an interview with a Dutch public broadcaster.
“We see that France passed one of the most intrusive, expansive surveillance laws in all of Europe last year, and it didn’t stop the attack,” he added. “This is consistent with what we’ve seen in every country.”
Snowden pointed to attacks in Spain, London and the 2013 bombing of the Boston Marathon.
The Associated Press covers a spooky forensic coverup:
British agents allowed to wear disguises at US trial
A judge has ruled that British intelligence officers can testify in disguise at the U.S. trial of an alleged al-Qaida operative.
Judge Raymond Dearie gave the go-ahead on Wednesday. Federal prosecutors told him the disguises are needed to protect the undercover status of the MI5 agents.
Authorities say the agents conducted surveillance on Abid Nasser while investigating a failed plot to bomb a mall in Manchester in 2009.
He’s pleaded not guilty to charges he was part of broader conspiracy that included another al-Qaida plot to bomb New York City subways.
Humint — human intelligence — proves supreme once again, via the McClatchy Washington Bureau:
Inside witnesses helped FBI nab Yemeni al-Qaida suspects
In a case in which the Justice Department appears to have made unusual inroads inside al-Qaida, a federal judge in New York Tuesday unsealed criminal charges accusing two Yemeni nationals of joining the terror group and conspiring to murder U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq between 2003 and 2009.
Bryant Vinas, a young New York man who pleaded guilty in 2009 to felony counts alleging he plotted an attack on the Long Island Railroad for al-Qaida, agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and played a key role in implicating the two al-Qaida suspects, according to papers filed by prosecutors in federal court in Brooklyn. The papers also describe another confidential source who assisted the inquiry.
In addition to the conspiracy charge, both Saddiq Al-Abbadi, also known as Sufiyan-al-Yemeni, and Ali Alvi, also known as Issa al-Yemeni, were charged with providing material support to al-Qaida.
And two headlines from the Associated Press about police violence, first from the Garden State:
Video shows man shot by New Jersey police raising his hands
Another videotaped police killing is raising tensions in another town, this time in New Jersey, where a tense traffic stop ended with a passenger shot to death as he stepped out of a car with his hands raised at shoulder height.
The newly released footage from a police dashboard camera shows Bridgeton officers Braheme Days and Roger Worley in a Dec. 30 stop that escalates quickly after Days warns his partner about seeing a gun in the glove compartment of the Jaguar.
Days screams over and over at the passenger, Jerame Reid, “Show me your hands!” and “If you reach for something, you’re going to be f—— dead!” The officer appears to reach into the car and remove the gun. But the brief standoff ends with Reid disregarding Days’ order to not move, stepping out and getting shot.
The second hails from the Land of Enchantment:
Ex-New Mexico lawman gets 10 years in bizarre road rage case
A federal judge on Wednesday sentenced a former New Mexico sheriff to 10 years in prison for abusing a driver in a bizarre, off-duty traffic stop that prosecutors described as a fit of road rage.
Ex-Rio Arriba County Sheriff Thomas Rodella told the judge during the sentencing hearing that he did good deeds during his tenure, and the court received letters from community members who praised his service.
However, others wrote letters criticizing the former sheriff over allegations that he abused his office. One letter compared Rodella to the Dallas Cowboys, U.S. District Judge James Browning said. Either you love him or you hate him, he said.
And Washington makes a sinister “border protection” move, via the American Civil Liberties Union’s Blog of Rights:
If the Government Gets Its Way, the Future Pablo Nerudas of the World Could Be Barred From the US
In a case currently pending before the Supreme Court, the government is arguing that courts should not be able to decide if the executive branch followed the law in denying a visa to a non-citizen seeking to enter the United States — even if the visa denial affects the constitutional right of a U.S. citizen.
This week, the ACLU filed an amicus brief highlighting the dangers of giving the government unchecked authority to exclude any foreign citizen for any reason.
The case involves a visa application by an American citizen who seeks to have her noncitizen husband join her in the United States. We don’t agree with the government’s claim that American citizens have no constitutional right to live with their spouses in the United States. But we focused our brief on the government’s even more extreme argument that courts have no role to play in the visa denial context, even if American’s constitutional rights are at stake.
If the Supreme Court accepts this extreme argument in Kerry v. Din, that could do major damage to Americans’ First Amendment right to hear from foreign speakers whose views the government disfavors.
From United Press International, scrutiny of the Argentine president increadses amidst bombing deal allegations:
Criminal complaint by dead prosecutor against Argentine president released
A judge in Argentina released the criminal complaint by recently deceased prosecutor Alberto Nisman against Argentina’s President Cristina Kirchner.
The complaint offers evidence, including intercepted phone calls, in support of the claim that President Kirchner, Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman and others conspired with Iran in a coverup.
In the complaint, Nisman alleged Kirchner ordered negotiators to offer Iran immunity to Iranian suspects in exchange for oil. Nisman spent 10 years investigating the 1994 bombing of the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA) Jewish center in which 85 people died.
Pressure on Shinzo Abe mounts in Japanese ISIS hostage crisis, via the Associated Press:
Japan’s Abe ‘fighting against time’ seeking to free hostages
Japan is doing all it can to free two hostages the Islamic State group is threatening to kill unless it receives $200 million, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Wednesday, vowing never to give in to terrorism.
Abe returned to Tokyo from a six-day Middle East tour slightly ahead of schedule and convened a Cabinet meeting soon after.
“We are fighting against time, and we’ll make an all-out effort and use every diplomatic route that we have developed to win the release of the two,” he said.
From the New York Times, an Afghan opening for ISIS:
Taliban Fissures in Afghanistan Are Seen as an Opening for ISIS
Across a violent swath of southern Afghanistan, rumors are swirling about a band of former Taliban fighters who have claimed allegiance to the Islamic State and are said to be fighting their former comrades for dominance.
Reports of a firefight this month between the competing bands of jihadists in the remote district of Kajaki, in Helmand Province, quickly created a stir. Some Afghan officials described a growing threat from the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, more than a thousand miles from its home territory.
But interviews with Western and Afghan officials, along with accounts from local residents, the Taliban and a militant who described himself as a subcommander in the new ISIS band, pointed less to a major expansion of the Islamic State than to another example of internal divisions within the Taliban.
Pakistan claims a win over ISIS, via the Express Tribune:
Security forces arrest local Islamic State commander in Lahore: sources
Pakistani security forces have arrested a man they believe is the commander of the Islamic State group in the country as well as two accomplices involved in recruiting and sending fighters to Syria, intelligence sources said on Wednesday.
Authorities in South Asia are concerned about the rise of the militant group in a region already beset by home-grown insurgencies fighting to topple local governments and set up strict Islamic rule.
Three intelligence sources, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said the man, Yousaf al Salafi, was arrested in Lahore and confessed during interrogation that he represented IS in Pakistan.
And Pakistani teachers raise alarm over plan to arm them in the classroom, via BBC News:
Peshawar school massacre: Row over Pakistan armed teacher plan
Teachers in north-western Pakistan have criticised a government plan to allow them to carry weapons to defend schools from militant attacks.
Speakers at a teachers’ convention in Peshawar city said their job was to educate, not to provide security. The local authority, which announced the plan last week, insisted no teacher would be forced to carry a weapon.
Taliban gunmen stormed a school in Peshawar last month and killed more than 150 people, most of them children.
Nigerian Boko Haram leader claims a divine massacre mandate, via the Los Angeles Times:
Boko Haram leader says God ordered him to carry out massacre
The leader of the terror group Boko Haram says God commanded that his fighters massacre hundreds of people in northeastern Nigeria, an attack described by human rights groups as the worst so far by the militants.
More than 7,500 people fled the assault that began Jan. 3 on the town of Baga on Lake Chad, according to the United Nations. Survivors described Boko Haram gunmen shooting people on sight, or dragging them from their homes and killing them.
Claiming responsibility for the massacre, Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau said in a YouTube video released Tuesday that the devastation of the Baga attack was nothing compared to future attacks he was planning.
“We are the ones who fought the people of Baga, and we have killed them with such a killing as he [God] commanded us in his book,” said Shekau, as Nigeria and its neighbors worked to deploy a regional force to confront the violent Islamist militia.
More from the Guardian:
Boko Haram claims Baga massacre and threatens Nigeria’s neighbours
Abubakar Shekau boasts in a video that the killing ‘will not stop’
Region’s leaders meet in Niger to discuss a response to violence
The message came as Nigerian leaders met their regional counterparts in Niger’s capital, Niamey, to discuss a regional response to the threat and Chadian troops headed to Cameroon to help repel repeated Boko Haram attacks.
The US president Barack Obama discussed the Nigerian crisis with French president francois Hollande on Tuesday, Reuters reported.
The White House said the pair spoke about the situation in a telephone call, agreeing to work with other countries to help Nigeria hold credible and peaceful elections and to support a regional strategy to counter Boko Haram.
“Heavy clashes” between Islamist fighters and Cameroon soldiers were reported in the far northern border village of Bonderi on Tuesday night.
Vietnam sub buys raise island dispute stakes, via Want China Times:
Vietnam receives 3 new subs as S China Sea race heats up
Vietnam’s recent acquisition of three new 636MV attack submarines has cast the spotlight on the burgeoning regional submarine race in the South China Sea, reports China’s official Xinhua news agency.
Towards the end of last year, the third of six Kilo-class subs Vietnam contracted to buy from Russia for US$1.8 billion in 2009 were delivered to southeast Vietnam’s Cam Ranh Bay. The last of the six large torpedo-equipped attack subs is expected to be delivered by 2016.
This is a significant upgrade of Vietnam’s submarine fleet, which had previously relied on the two Yugo-class midget submarines it acquired from North Korea during the 1990s as part of a “rice for arms” deal.
The new Kilo-class subs are equipped with Club S anti-ship missiles, which are believed to include 3M54E1 supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles that have a range of around 300 kilometers, giving Hanoi the ability to attack China’s key naval base on Hainan Island and the People Liberation Army’s South Sea Fleet command center located in Zhanjiang in Guangdong province.
While China ramps up its own island dispute fleet, via Want China Times:
Has China already commissioned Zubr landing craft fleet?
Among photographs of various ships being built in Chinese shipyards that have recently surfaced online, two hovercrafts resembling the Ukrainian Zubr-class air-cushioned landing craft appear. One of them sports the serial number 3352, a number that would only be stamped once the craft has been commissioned, reports China’s Global Times.
China has a vast eastern coastline and is engaged in several disputes with neighboring countries over islands and reefs in the South and East China seas. The potential addition of the Zubr landing craft to its fleet has naturally attracted a lot of attention.
With the end of the basic construction of China’s first home-built Zubr and the arrival of the second imported Zubr, a fleet is already in its infancy, said the report. When China completes the full fleet of four, it will allow the PLA’s marine corps to transport supplies and replacement troops to island garrisons, as well as provide them with military support.
And we close with another Skynet warning, via the London Telegraph:
‘Sociopathic’ robots could overrun the human race within a generation
Computers should be trained to serve humans to reduce their threat to the human race, says a leading expert on artificial intelligence
At a session at the World Econoimc Forum in Davos, Stuart Russell, a leading expert on artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics, made the bold prediction that AI would overtake humans “within my children’s lifetime”.
The chief challenge was to control these advances by making sure that computers continue to serve human needs, rather than become a threat to them, the Berkeley professor argued.
To do so, it was imperative that robots were endowed with the same values as humans.
Professor Russell defined the ideal relationship as similar to that of Bertie Wooster and Jeeves where the long-suffering butler understands perfectly what his master wants without needing to be told.
