DND, RCMP mum on UFO mystery

*As the RCMP says, it is a confirmed “something” lol*

People who saw a missile-like object soaring through the sky over a small rural community in Newfoundland Monday night are getting no answers about what it was, although police say they’d gotten to the bottom of the mystery.

Darlene Stewart spotted the object while taking pictures of the sunset over Harbour Mille, a community of about 200 residents on the south coast of the province. She says she started snapping photos.

She then called her neighbour, Emmy Pardy, and the two women, along with Stewart’s husband, say they saw three similar objects flying through the air minutes apart, one up close and two farther off in the distance.

“I really did get sick to my stomach, I was shaking when I seen it,” Stewart told CBC News Wednesday. “We were just in awe of what we seen.”

The photos taken by Stewart show blurry pictures of what appears to be a long, round object, much like a missile, seemingly rising from the ocean, with either smoke or flames shooting out the back end.

Objects made no noise

Stewart said the objects didn’t make any noise.

“We confirmed that it was something,” Sgt. Wayne Edgecombe told CBC News Wednesday. But Edgecombe said he couldn’t reveal what the police investigation uncovered.

He said the focus of any police investigation is on whether something criminal has occurred.

“It’s nothing criminal,” he said, in relation to the unidentified object.

Edgecombe said he contacted the Department of National Defence and “they gave me some info,” but he said that it is up to that department to release the information publicly.

Defence department officials were refusing comment.

The sighting has intrigued people in the Harbour Mille area, with some saying they were told by officers who were in the community Tuesday investigating the sightings, that the objects were test missiles launched from the nearby French islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon.

Edgecombe said that rumour is completely false.

The suggestion that the object possibly involved the military has Liberal MP Gerry Byrne, who represents the Newfoundland riding of Humber-St. Barbe-Baie Verte, demanding answers.

“There’s a credible body of evidence,” Byrne told CBC News, “that suggests there’s something spectacular happened off of our shore. Before this goes any farther, I think the government needs to actually respond very quickly with a straightforward, factual statement.”

Was safety in jeopardy?

Byrne said if it was some kind of military test, then people should be told whether their safety was jeopardized.

“If indeed this was a man-made object, that it was a missile, was there any potential risk to health and safety from collateral damage should the missile fire have failed?”

Byrne used the mystery to take a shot at the federal government for proroguing Parliament. He said if the House of Commons was opened, he’d be able to question the ministers of defence, transport and public safety about the incident.

“It’s cloaked in relative secrecy,” he said. “And the only way to get around that secrecy is a special institution called the floor of the House of Commons.”

Stewart said Tuesday she has been overwhelmed by the number of calls she has received about the sighting. But she said nobody has told her officially what it was that she saw.

“I would like to get to the bottom of it,” she said.

Read more: 
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/newfoundland-labrador/story/2010/01/27/nl-ufo-military-012710.html#socialcomments#ixzz0dqwfnWCx

Syria reportedly test-launches Scud D splitting-warhead missile

Syria test-launched a Scud D missile in the past few weeks, Channel 2 revealed on Monday.

The Scud D missile has a splitting warhead, a design geared at ‘confusing’ the Israeli Arrow missile defense system that would have difficulty targeting the destructive piece of the warhead and not the decoys.

Meanwhile, Channel 10 reported that Washington reiterated to Syria that the country must cease hosting terror groups and purge itself of Hamas elements currently enjoying refuge in the country.



http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1239710862447&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

North Korea Has Two Nuclear Warheads for Missile, Kyodo Reports

*Here we go.*

North Korea has two nuclear warheads it can load on its mid-range Rodong missile, Japan’s Kyodo News reported, citing an analyst at the International Crisis Group, a non-government organization.

The warheads were built using plutonium extracted from North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear plant, Kyodo reported, citing Daniel Pinkston, who said he got the information from a government official without divulging which country.

South Korean and U.S. intelligence officials have obtained evidence of the warheads, Pinkston told Kyodo.

North Korea said earlier this month it plans to fire a rocket carrying a satellite into orbit between April 4 and 8. South Korea and the U.S. suspect the launch is a cover for a test of a long-range ballistic missile, which would be a breach of a United Nations resolution.


http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601101&sid=aMDehZBzI84I&refer=japan

‘US strike’ kills 27 in Pakistan

At least 27 militants have been killed in a suspected US missile attack in north-west Pakistan, officials say.

The missile strike hit a house in the South Waziristan area, near the Afghan border, which officials said was used as a hide-out for Taleban militants.

The US has carried out more than 20 air strikes from drones in north-western Pakistan in recent months.

President Asif Zardari has told US TV that the Taleban are now established across much of Pakistan.

“We’re fighting for the survival of Pakistan. We’re not fighting for the survival of anyone else,” CBS says he told them in an interview to be screened on Sunday.

Islamabad has long argued that US air strikes complicate its own fight against insurgents, and violate its sovereignty.

Pakistani leaders had expressed hope that the new US administration of Barack Obama would halt the controversial manoeuvres.

But earlier this week Mr Obama said there was no doubt militants were operating in safe havens in Pakistan’s tribal belt and that the US would make sure Pakistan was a strong ally in fighting that threat.

Wanted militant

The latest suspected drone attack took place on Saturday morning in a village near the town of Ladha.

A house owned by a local clan member was struck by two missiles. Most of the dead were Uzbeks, officials say. Several people were wounded.

Witnesses in the area say the rockets were fired from a drone and say the house was frequented by militants from Pakistani Taleban leader Baitullah Mehsud’s organisation.

The BBC’s Shoaib Hasan, in Islamabad, says Mehsud is one of the most wanted men in the region.

Our correspondent says Mehsud is believed to be responsible for a number of atrocities, including the assassination of former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto – President Zardari’s wife.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7889950.stm

North Korea ready to fire more missiles: report

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea has deployed more than 10 missiles on its west coast for what appears to be an imminent launch, a South Korean newspaper said on Thursday, two days after the North fired two short-range missiles into the Yellow Sea.

It would be an unprecedented test if the North fired all of the surface-to-ship and ship-to-ship missiles, but intelligence sources quoted by the Chusun Ilbo paper said they thought the North may launch five to seven of them.

The North has forbidden ships to sail in an area in the Yellow Sea until October 15 in preparation for the launch, an intelligence source told the paper.

The North fired two short-range missiles on Tuesday as part of routine military drills, South Korea’s defense minister said on Wednesday.

The activities come after a senior U.S. nuclear envoy visited the North Korean capital last week in a bid to convince the state to return to a disarmament-for-aid deal and halt plans to restart an aging nuclear plant that makes bomb-grade plutonium.

“If the North fires a large number of missiles, it would be difficult to see it as routine exercise,” the source was quoted as saying.

North Korea has a history of timing its missile launches at periods of increased tension to show that it is ready to take a hard and defiant line, analysts say.

North Korea fired seven ballistic missiles in July 2006 including a long-range Taepodong-2 off its east coast. Three months later, it conducted a nuclear test.


http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE49808S20081009

Suspected U.S. missiles hit Pakistani village

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan — Pakistani intelligence officials are reporting a suspected U.S. missile strike on a militant stronghold near the Afghan border.

Two intelligence officials said informants told them that several missiles hit a house in the South Waziristan region on Wednesday evening. They had no immediate word on any casualties.

They said an unmanned drone of the type used by U.S. forces in Afghanistan was heard in the area shortly before the attack.

Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak openly to the media.

A spokesman for the Pakistan army said it was looking into reports about the incident.


http://www.wral.com/news/national_world/world/story/3560285/

Pakistan troops fire at US choppers

Firing by Pakistani troops forced US military helicopters to turn back to Afghanistan after they crossed into Pakistani territory in the early hours of Monday, Pakistani security officials said.

The incident took place near Angor Adda, a village in the tribal region of South Waziristan where US commandos in helicopters raided a suspected al Qaeda and Taliban camp earlier this month.

“The US choppers came into Pakistan by just 100 to 150 metres at Angor Adda. Even then our troops did not spare them, opened fire on them and they turned away,” said one security official.

Pakistan is a crucial US ally in its war on terrorism, and its support is key to the success of Western forces trying to stabilise Afghanistan.

But Washington has become impatient over Islamabad’s response to the threat from al Qaeda and Taliban fighters in Pakistan’s tribal regions on the border.

At least 20 people, including women and children, were killed in the South Waziristan raid earlier this month, sparking outrage in Pakistan and prompting a diplomatic protest.

Pakistani army chief General Ashfaq Kayani said in a strongly worded statement last week that Pakistan would not allow foreign troops onto its soil and Pakistan’s sovereignty and territorial integrity would be defended at all costs.

Another security official said on Monday that US armoured vehicles were also seen moving on the Afghan side of the border, while US warplanes were seen overhead.

He said Pakistani soldiers sounded a bugle call and fired in the air, forcing the helicopters to return to Afghan territory.

Military spokesman Major Murad Khan confirmed that there had been shooting. But he said the American helicopters had not crossed into Pakistani airspace and Pakistani troops were not responsible for the firing.

“The US choppers were there at the border, but they did not violate our airspace,” Khan said.

“We confirm that there was a firing incident at the time when the helicopters were there, but our forces were not involved.”

The New York Times newspaper reported last week that US President George Bush has given clearance for US raids across the border.

The raid on Angor Adda on September 3 was the first overt ground incursion by US troops into Pakistan since the depolyment of US forces in Afghanistan in late 2001.

The United States has intensified attacks by missile-firing drone aircraft on suspected al Qaeda and Taliban targets in Pakistani tribal lands in the past few weeks.


http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/1318360/2077444

US-Poland missile deal “cannot go unpunished” says Russia

MOSCOW – An agreement that will allow the United States to install a missile defense battery in Poland exposes the ex-communist nation to an attack, a Russian general said Friday.

Poland and the U.S. struck a deal on Thursday to deepen military ties and place a missile interceptor base in Poland.

Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, deputy chief of the Russian general staff told reporters Friday that the agreement exacerbates U.S.-Russian relations that are already tense because of fighting between Georgian and Russian forces. He said the deal “cannot go unpunished.”

And in the strongest threat Russia has issued in reaction to plans to put elements of a missile defense system in former Soviet satellite nations, the Interfax news agency quoted Nogovitsyn as saying Poland was risking attack.

“Poland, by deploying (the system) is exposing itself to a strike — 100 percent,” Interfax quoted Nogovitsyn as saying.

Washington says the planned system, which is not yet operational, is needed to protect the U.S. and Europe from possible attacks by missile-armed “rogue states” like Iran. The Kremlin, however, feels it is aimed at Russia’s missile force.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080815/ap_on_re_eu/russia_us_missile_defense