Islamic State Claims Responsibility for Deadly Tunisia Attack

BEIRUT – The Islamic State, or IS, claimed responsibility on Thursday for the deadly attack on Tunisia’s national Bardo museum that killed 23 people, including 18 tourists of various nationalities.

The jihadist group made the announcement in an audio recording that was broadcasted on the Internet, and the authenticity of which has not yet been verified, that two IS members perpetrated the attack, identified as Abu Zakaria al-Tunisi and Abu Annas al-Tunisi.

Earlier in the day, Tunisian authorities said that they had identified the assailants of the Bardo Museum terrorist attack, but that any affiliation to jihadist groups had not been confirmed.

The Tunisian Prime Minister Habib Essid told French radio station RTL that the terrorists responsible for the attack, who were subsequently killed by the Tunisian security forces, were Saber Khachnaoui and Yassin Labidi.

Essid explained that Labidi was already being monitored and investigated by the Tunisian intelligence services, but the measures did not reveal anything noteworthy about him.

“We are in the process of further investigation. We cannot say which organization they belong to,” Essid added. 

Tajikistan alarmed by IS activity at its border with Afghanistan

DUSHANBE, March 18. /TASS/. Tajikistan is alarmed by the activity of Islamic State’s armed groups close to its border with Afghanistan, a spokesman for the republic’s State Committee for National Security told TASS on Wednesday in comments on the border situation.

"Over the recent time, we have been witnessing movements of armed groups in the [northern] Afghan provinces of Tahar and Kunduz about 60-80 kilometers from the zone of responsibility of our Pyandzh border guard detachment," the officer said.

He said the aim of this activity was not yet clear, but such concentration of armed groups was alarming, as routes of terrorist groups went through areas not controlled by the Afghan government forces. 

He said the strength of armed groups was reported as some 1,000 people, including supporters of the Islamic State, as well as joining them Taliban fighters, gunmen from the Uzbek Islamic movement and Ansarullah movement, whose emissaries have been actively working in Tajikistan for years.

"We are closely contacting with our colleagues from Russia, Afghanistan, partners from other countries" on that problem, the officer said.

Stunning Polar Lights Over Moscow and Other Russian Cities

Kremlin Refuses to Swap Imprisoned Ukrainian Pilot Savchenko for Sister

Russia will not exchange Ukrainian captive pilot Nadezhda Savchenko for her sister, as it would be equivalent to hostage-taking, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the Interfax news agency on Tuesday.

"Savchenko's sister appealed to President Vladimir Putin to allow her to trade places with her in the pretrial detention center," Peskov, who spoke to the sister in person, told Interfax.

"We responded that the investigation is ongoing, and that under our law we do not take such actions, which can be compared to hostage-taking," he said.

Savchenko, who is accused of involvement in the deaths of two Russian journalists in war-torn eastern Ukraine last year, was on a hunger strike from Dec. 12 until March 5, when she stopped it due to severely deteriorating health. On Monday the pilot said she would resume the hunger strike, according to a statement by the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry.

The Ukrainian prosecutor general has passed Moscow information that "gives investigators a plausible excuse [to release Savchenko]," Interfax cited Savchenko's lawyer Mark Feigin as saying Wednesday.

Feigin did not reveal the contents of the documents.

Moscow accuses Savchenko of abetting the killing of the two Russian journalists who died during an artillery strike last summer. She was captured by pro-Moscow forces in eastern Ukraine and handed over to Russia this summer.

Kiev and Western governments have urged Moscow to release the pilot, who has emerged as a symbol of resistance to Russia in her home country. Since her July arrest she has been elected to the Ukrainian parliament and also became a member of the Ukrainian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko has called for the "serious condemnation of Russia's actions in illegally holding on its territory several hostages, including Nadezhda Savchenko," Interfax reported Tuesday.

U.S. Envoy Caroline Kennedy Receives Death Threats in Japan

WASHINGTON – The U.S. and Japanese governments are investigating death threats against Washington’s ambassador to the Asian nation, Caroline Kennedy.

“We take any threats to U.S. diplomats seriously,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Wednesday. “We take every step possible to protect our personnel.”

Japanese police disclosed on Tuesday that someone telephoned the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo several times last month to threaten the life of the ambassador, who is the last surviving child of President John F. Kennedy.

The caller was a man who spoke in English, Japan’s Kyodo news agency said, citing unnamed sources close to the investigation.

Japanese media report that the same man also threatened to kill Alfred Magleby, the U.S. consul-general on the southern island of Okinawa, which has the largest concentration of American military personnel in Japan.

Many Okinawans are unhappy over the massive U.S. military presence on their island.

News of the threats to Kennedy coincided with U.S. first lady Michelle Obama’s arrival in Japan on a tour to promote the education of girls.

Concern about the safety of U.S. diplomats has been heightened by a knife attack earlier this month on Washington’s ambassador to South Korea.

The assailant was described as an ultranationalist angry about U.S.-South Korean joint military exercises.

Though seriously injured, Ambassador Mark Lippert survived the assault and has returned to work.

Police Clash with Protesters in Southern Peru

LIMA – A protest by inhabitants of the southern Peruvian city of Andahuaylas against the regional electric utility on Monday turned into clashes with the National Police, authorities said.

Demonstrators, who had been encouraged since last Thursday to take part in a general strike, struggled against cops sent from the neighboring Ayacucho region to strengthen security, a police spokesman told Efe.

For his part, the president of the Andahuaylas Confrontation Committee, Julian Merino, said on RPP radio that the clash was the consequence of “government provocation” of the protesters who are waiting for Prime Minister Ana Jara to make an appearance.

Merino said the cops faced the locals with firearms.

As yet there has been no official report of casualties in the struggle.

The demonstrators demand the return of unjustified fees collected by the utility Electro Sur Este, accusing it of having doubled and even tripled monthly charges in one of the poorest areas of Peru.

Apurimac regional Gov. Wilber Venegas said on RPP that he will go Monday to Jara’s office in order to accompany her to Andahuaylas, fully believing that she is ready to go there and resolve the people’s demands.

The prime minister announced Sunday the dispatch of a high-level delegation to Andahuaylas.

The delegation tried Sunday to reach agreements with the protest leaders and local authorities, but the talks broke down over the demand that Jara come personally to that Andean city.

The people of Andahuaylas have taken to the streets for days and Saturday saw another face-off with police that left 15 people wounded.

Argentine Government Accuses Nisman of Embezzlement

BUENOS AIRES – Argentina’s Cabinet chief on Wednesday slammed late prosecutor Alberto Nisman as a “scoundrel” on the two-month anniversary of his death, accusing him of embezzling public funds.

“Nisman received funds to clear up the (deadly 1994 terrorist attack on the AMIA Jewish organization in Buenos Aires),” Anibal Fernandez told reporters outside the presidential palace.

“If he used them to go out with women and pay ‘ñoquis’ (slang for government employees paid for work they haven’t done), then he was thumbing his nose all this time at the 85 people killed and more than 300 wounded.”

Nisman was fatally shot in his Buenos Aires apartment on Jan. 18, four days after bringing charges against President Cristina Fernandez, Foreign Minister Hector Timerman and six other people of trying to conceal Iran’s alleged role in that attack.

An aide to Nisman, IT consultant Diego Lagomarsino, who has been charged with lending Nisman the handgun used in his death, accuses the special prosecutor of withholding roughly half of his 41,000-peso monthly salary, according to Buenos Aires daily Pagina/12, which reported that Lagomarsino shared an account with Nisman and several of the special prosecutor’s family members in the United States.

The attorney for Lagomarsino, the only person charged thus far in Nisman’s death, was to inform the Attorney General’s Office Wednesday about the withheld wages, Pagina 12 reported.

“Lagomarsino says here that of the 40,000 pesos they gave him, 20,000 were deposited in a bank account. For starters, what he was doing was embezzling public funds, and there was also passive bribery,” the Cabinet chief said.

“It’s hard for one to believe that this man, on vacation at the time, was going to go to the home of the scoundrel who was stealing half of his salary to give him a gun to protect himself,” he added.

Lagomarsino has previously said that Nisman wanted the gun because he feared for his life.

Meanwhile, a group headed by Argentine philosopher Santiago Kovadloff held a demonstration Wednesday outside the Supreme Court building to honor Nisman two months after his death.

Kovadloff briefly responded to the Cabinet chief’s accusations against Nisman.

“He attacked a dead man. When you attack a dead man and discredit him in the way he did, it’s because that dead man is alive. If he’s alive, it’s because he’s has a great deal of significance. Because he has a great deal of significance, you have to discredit him,” he told Argentine television channel Todo Noticias.

The official investigation has not conclusively determined the cause of Nisman’s death, while an independent probe headed by Nisman’s ex-wife, Judge Sandra Arroyo Salgado, found that the prosecutor was murdered.

An Argentine judge late last month dismissed the charges that Nisman had brought against Fernandez, Timerman and the six other people and which had been taken up by another prosecutor.

Magistrate Daniel Rafecas found that the evidence does not provide even minimal support for the accusations and on the contrary “categorically contradicts” Nisman’s notion of a conspiracy.

Nisman’s accusation against Fernandez cited the Memorandum of Understanding her administration signed with Iran in 2013 to facilitate the AMIA investigation as the principal instrument of the purported cover-up.

The late prosecutor said that intercepts of telephone calls among some of the prospective defendants – though not Fernandez or Timerman – showed the outlines of a plan for Argentina to get Interpol to rescind the red notices the international police agency had issued for the arrest of Iranians accused in the AMIA bombing.

Yet the man who headed Interpol for 15 years until last November rebutted Nisman’s key accusation.

“I can say with 100 percent certainty, not a scintilla of doubt, that Foreign Minister Timerman and the Argentine government have been steadfast, persistent and unwavering that the Interpol’s red notices be issued, remain in effect and not be suspend or removed,” Ronald K. Noble said in January.

Many in the Argentine Jewish community believe the AMIA bombing was ordered by Iran and carried out by Tehran’s Hezbollah allies.

Both the Iranian government and the Lebanese militia group deny any involvement and the accusation relies heavily on information provided by the CIA and Israel’s Mossad spy agency.

Prosecutors have yet to secure a single conviction in the case.

In September 2004, 22 people accused in the bombing were acquitted after a process plagued with delays, irregularities and tales of witnesses’ being paid for their testimony.