Japanese gangster sentenced to hang for mayor's assassination

TOKYO, 27 May — A Japanese court on Monday sentenced a gangster to death by hanging for gunning down the mayor of Nagasaki in a rare assassination that led the country to tighten controls on guns.

Tetsuya Shiroo, 60, who was associated with Japan's largest criminal syndicate, was convicted of shooting Mayor Iccho Ito as he campaigned for re-election in April last year.

"This was a crime that shook the democratic system from its root and was equivalent to denying the electoral process," Judge Yoshimichi Matsuo said in the southwestern city, as quoted by Jiji Press.

Shiroo's "crime was premeditated with a strong intention of murder. Shiroo made the decision to assassinate him immediately after he expressed his candidacy," Matsuo said.

The judge said Shiroo blamed his personal financial problems on the mayor's administration and decided to "flaunt his power" by killing him.

Shiroo had previously had a dispute with the city authorities over compensation for a traffic accident.

Shiroo, wearing a pale pink shirt underneath a suit, stood and showed no emotion as the judge read the verdict, Jiji Press said.

He said during the trial that he was ready to be hanged.

"I would like to sincerely receive the ultimate punishment," he had said.

A court official confirmed to AFP that the death sentence was handed down.

Ito, 61, was an outspoken pacifist born just weeks after Nagasaki's best-known event -- the world's second and last atomic attack.

His assassination led Japan, which already had strict gun control laws, to raise punishments for illegal possession of firearms.

More than 1,130 people rushed to the courthouse Monday to grab tickets for only 39 seats for the session, media reported.

Japan is the only major industrial nation other than the United States to administer capital punishment, but it is rare for courts to give a death sentence to people who have killed only one person.

Prosecutors called for the death penalty, saying that the assassination was "an atrocious act, an act of terrorism aimed at an election."

Shiroo "planned to prevent a re-election and obstructed the right to have an election in a way that has no precedent in the criminal history of our country," said a closing statement read out by a prosecutor.

Japan has one of the world's lowest crime rates. Most gun violence is linked to gangs, which have vast interests in nightlife and other underworld businesses.

The country has seen several attacks on politicians in recent years. In 2002, an ultra-nationalist stabbed to death Koki Ishii, an opposition lawmaker known for his aggressive investigations of corruption.

In Nagasaki, Shiroo had grievances with the city authorities after his vehicle was damaged at a construction site five years ago. He had reportedly gone more than 30 times to a city office seeking up to 2.7 million yen (26,150 dollars) in compensation.

Zimbabwe military 'plotting' Tsvangirai assassination

May 19, 2008 NAIROBI — A top official of Zimbabwe's opposition party on Monday accused the government's military intelligence of plotting to assassinate its leader Morgan Tsvangirai.

"President Robert Mugabe and his cronies are natural killers," Tendai Biti, secretary general of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) told AFP during a visit to Nairobi.

"They have been killing our people since 1980 and now Mugabe's military intelligence has compiled a list of 36 to 40 people to be assasinated. Top of the list are our leader Morgan Tsvangirai, myself and our spokesman Nelson Chamisa," he said.

After more than a month out of the country due to fears for his safety, Tsvangirai had been expected back in Harare on Saturday to begin campaigning ahead of a run-off presidential election in June.

Yet his return was delayed following MDC claims of an assassination plot against him. The opposition party had not previously specified who was behind the alleged conspiracy.

Tsvangirai beat veteran president Mugabe in a first round of voting in March, but not by enough to secure outright victory. He has made a series of demands to ensure a fair run-off, including the presence of foreign peacekeepers and election monitors.

"We know that there is a group of about 18 snipers from the military intelligence who have been assigned to carry out the killing of our leader and the rest of us. But we will not be cowed," Biti claimed.

"This is the same group that has been killing our people for some time now," he said, adding that the same purported had already assassinated two MDC youth leaders.

Benazir Bhutto Assassinated

Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, 54, was assassinated during a suicide attack on a party rally in Rawalpindi's Liaquat Bagh area ahead of the January 8 polls.

Witnesses said Ms. Bhutto, who was appearing at a political campaign rally, was fired upon at close range by a gunman, and then struck by shrapnel from a bomb detonated by a suicide bomber.

Bhutto, who had twice been the country’s prime minister and was a leading contender to be the next prime minister after elections in January, was declared dead by doctors at a hospital in Rawalpindi at 6:16 p.m. local time.

Officials said she had just finished addressing the rally and was sitting in a car waving at the crowd when she was hit in the head by a bullet fired by a sniper who was concealed in a nearby building. The car moved on for another twenty metres before a suicide attacker blew himself up.

Doctors tried to revive her for 35 minutes, but her shrapnel wounds and head injuries were too sever and her heart failed.

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf declared a three-day period  of mourning. World leaders condemned the attack. President Bush said “The United States strongly condemns this cowardly attack by murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan’s democracy.”

Ms. Bhutto’s death is the latest blow to Pakistan’s treacherous political situation, and leaves her party leaderless in the short term and unable to effectively compete in hotly contested parliamentary elections

At the hospital where Ms. Bhutto was taken, a large number of police began to cordon off the area as angry party workers smashed windows. Many protesters shouted “Musharraf Dog.” One man was crying hysterically, saying his sister had been killed. Dozens of people in the crowed beat their chests and chanted slogans against Mr. Musharraf.

Nahid Khan, a close aide to Ms. Bhutto, was sobbing in a room next to the operating theater, and the corridors of the hospital swarmed with mourners.

The assassination comes just days after Mr. Musharraf lifted a state of emergency in the country, which he had used to suspend the Constitution and arrest thousands of political opponents, and which he said he had imposed in part because of terrorist threats by extremists in Pakistan.

Ms. Bhutto’s assassination immediately raised questions about whether the parliamentary elections scheduled for January will now go ahead or be postponed. Mr. Musharraf was carrying out an emergency meeting with top government officials Thursday following Ms. Bhutto’s death, the aide to Mr. Musharraf said. He said no decision had been made on whether to delay the national elections.

Ms. Bhutto, 54, returned to Pakistan this year at a time of great volatility in a state that has been under military rule for eight years. She was the leader of the country’s largest opposition political party, founded by her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, one of Pakistan’s most flamboyant and democratically inclined prime ministers.

WASHINGTON Saturday 10 November: Arthur H. Bremer, who as a young loner in 1972 made a bold grab for notoriety by shooting Alabama Governor George C. Wallace, was released from state prison early Friday morning after officials said he had turned himself into "a model prisoner."

Now 57, the man who put Wallace in a wheelchair was set free by a Maryland state law mandating his supervised release because he had amassed numerous credits for good behaviour behind bars. But authorities said Bremer must adhere to strict guidelines, never leave the state and "stay away from any local, state, federal or foreign official or office holder, as well as a current candidate."

His release appears to mark the first return to freedom for any of the perpetrators of a string of successful or attempted assassinations from the 1960s to the early 1980s. Lee Harvey Oswald was killed in custody shortly after shooting President Kennedy. Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassin, James Earl Ray, died of natural causes in prison. Others have been denied parole, including Sirhan Sirhan, who shot Robert F. Kennedy; Mark David Chapman, killer of John Lennon; and Sara Jane Moore and Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, who made separate failed attempts on President Ford in 1975.

The only other one close to getting out appears to be John W. Hinckley Jr., who shot and wounded President Reagan in 1981. He has been allowed to leave a Washington mental institution for brief visits with his family.

"I would describe Arthur Bremer as a model prisoner," said Rick Binetti, spokesman for the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services. "He kept to himself. He stayed out of trouble."

Wallace, whose cry of "segregation forever" catapulted him to national attention, was running a racially charged campaign for president when he was confronted by Bremer in a shopping mall parking lot in Laurel, Md., on May 15, 1972. The candidate was shaking hands with supporters as Bremer jammed the barrel of a .38-caliber revolver against Wallace's abdomen.

The young man from Wisconsin started firing rapidly, hitting Wallace four times, sending one of the bullets into his spine. Three others in the crowd also were shot.

Wallace would never walk again. His presidential prospects effectively ended that afternoon.

His son, George C. Wallace Jr., said his father spent the rest of his life in constant pain. Before his death in 1998, the former governor and White House hopeful wrote to Bremer in prison, offering his forgiveness and telling him that if he accepted Jesus Christ as his savior, as he had, "we'll be in heaven together, Arthur."

Records and Bremer's personal diaries from before the shooting showed that he also had considered shooting then-President Nixon, and that his ultimate goal was to seize notoriety after a childhood of shyness that often left him the target of cruel jokes in school.

Bremer pleaded insanity, but a jury convicted him of four counts of assault with intent to murder. He was sentenced to 53 years, and if he violates the terms of his release, he could be returned to prison until 2025.

He spent most of his incarceration at a state penitentiary, largely forgotten.

Maryland prison officials said that over the years Bremer changed dramatically. They said he worked as an educational aide to other inmates, and sometimes earned up to $1 a day. But he has never spoken about the shootings. He repeatedly turned down requests for interviews. On Friday, he was released before dawn so as to avoid the cameras.

Roger Bremer of Milwaukee, his younger brother, told the Baltimore Sun he was uncertain how Arthur would adapt to life outside prison.

"I'd be afraid to see him," Roger Bremer said. "Nobody knows what he'll be like after all these years. He's 57 years old. How's he going to find a job?"

He added that authorities said his brother was "kind of like a hermit" in prison and "doesn't talk and won't say what's on his mind."

Roger Bremer agreed with that assessment: "He was always a loner."

Karachi, Pakistan, October 19: At least 135 people were killed and 545 injured when two bombs exploded near Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto’s truck during her homecoming parade in Karachi.

Bhutto escaped unhurt and was evacuated to her residence in the city. A procession that had attracted several hundred thousand supporters was abandoned in chaos.

The attack came hours after a teary-eyed Bhutto had set foot on her home soil for the first time after 1999 when she fled Pakistan to escape arrest on corruption charges.

General Pervez Musharraf had dropped the charges against Bhutto, paving the way for her return apparently under a power-sharing deal

Two weeks ago, Baitullah Masood, a Taliban commander, vowed to send suicide bombers to kill her. The Taliban threatened to assassinate Ms Bhutto after she suggested that she would help American troops hunt for Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaida fugitives inside Pakistan. "She has an agreement with America. We will carry out attacks on Benazir Bhutto as we did on General Pervez Musharraf," Taliban commander Haji Omar said yesterday.

Last night's attack, one the deadliest in the country's history, is likely to deepen the ongoing political crisis against the backdrop of a surge in Islamist violence.

Local television stations captured the two blasts, which occurred in quick succession near a heavily protected truck carrying Ms Bhutto and her party leaders through the throng. A blazing police vehicle stood beside the deserted Bhutto truck, which was emblazoned with the slogan "Long Live Bhutto".

Television footage showed onlookers running towards the vehicle after the first blast, only to be caught in the second explosion. Party official Qasim Zia said Ms Bhutto had descended into the vehicle to use the bathroom at the time of the explosion.

About 20,000 security personnel lined the route and sophisticated anti-bomb jamming devices were fitted to her vehicle. Mobile phone signals were blocked in the area and armed bodyguards accompanied her truck. The rooftop had been fitted with a bullet-proof enclosure but she spent most of the day standing at the front, chatting to party officials and waving at well-wishers.

Many of the dead were thought to be police and party security officials who had formed a moving security cordon around the vehicle. A local television cameraman also died.

Government security officials met in Islamabad last night to discuss further measures to protect Ms Bhutto, who had planned to hold a rally in her home town, Larkana, this weekend.

Charismatic Sheik Assassinated a Week After he Met George Bush

Baghdad, September 13: A high-profile Sunni Arab sheik who collaborated with the American military in the fight against jihadist militants in western Iraq was killed by a bomb near his desert compound. Two guards were also killed in the attack.

The precisely-planned assassination of Abdul Sattar Buzaigh al-Rishawi was meant to undermine one of the Bush administration’s trumpeted achievements in the war.

Just last week he had shaken hands with President Bush during the president’s surprise visit to Anbar to extol the Sunni cooperation that has made the province, once Iraq’s most dangerous, relatively safe.

Iraqi and American officials were caught off guard by the assassination, which came just hours before Mr. Bush addressed the American people about his plans for Iraq. But they said it would not derail the collaboration of the alliance of Sunni clans, known as the Anbar Awakening Council, and groups in other provinces.

In his speech, Mr. Bush acknowledged the killing. “Earlier today, one of the brave tribal sheiks who helped lead the revolt against Al Qaeda was murdered,” he said. “In response, a fellow Sunni leader declared: ‘We are determined to strike back and continue our work.’ And as they do, they can count on the continued support of the United States.”

Sheik Sattar, 35, who was also known as Abu Risha, had become the public face of the Sunni Arab tribes in lawless Anbar Province that turned against the Sunni jihadists of Al Qaeda and began to fight on the side of the Shiite-led Iraqi government and the American military. His council was formed a year ago.

He had credibility with the tribes because he and his family had suffered so much at the hands of jihadist extremists. In an interview earlier this year, he said that his father had been killed in an attack by Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia in 2004 and that two of his brothers had been abducted and never heard from again; a third was shot dead. He had survived three car bombs outside the Anbar home he shared with his wife and five children.

On Thursday, the American military said a bomb destroyed the vehicle he was in, but it was unclear whether it was a roadside bomb or a suicide bomber. No group had claimed the assassination by late Thursday, but security officials in Iraq appeared convinced that responsibility lay with Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia.

Thai authorities have arrested a top LTTE terrorist who allegedly financed the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. Kumaran Padmanathan, aka KP, who was holding an Eritrean passport, was captured by Interpol in Bangkok.

Padmanathan, also known as Shanmugan Kumaran Tharmalingham, was based in Thailand and Cambodia and controlled a global network that supplied weapons to the Tamil Tigers. His extradition could help unravel the conspiracy behind the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi who was assassinated by a 17-year-old Tamil Tiger as he began his election campaign in 1991.

D R Karthikeyan, who headed the assassination Special Investigation Team suggested that KP had a hand in arranging the explosives which the suicide bomber, Dhanu, used to kill the former Prime Minister.

The Sri Lankan authorities also want to question Padmanathan and this has held up Pakistan’s extradition request. KP would be a prize catch for Sri Lanka, desperate to quell the Tamil insurgency which has terrorised the country for decades.

KP's detention comes at a time when Sri Lankans appear to be gaining a distinct edge in their long drawn battle against the Tamil Tigers fighting for the creation of a separate state to be carved out of the Tamil-dominated pockets in northern and eastern Sri Lanka.

FBI Spied on Coretta King

Atlanta, USA. August 30: Newly released documents show federal agents spied on the widow of the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. for several years after his 1968 assassination. The documents were obtained by Houston television station KHOU.

The information reveals the FBI worried about Coretta Scott King following in the footsteps of the slain civil rights icon. The Bureau voiced concerns that she might attempt "to tie the anti-Vietnam movement to the civil rights movement."

One memo shows that the FBI read and reviewed King's 1969 book about her late husband, "My Life With Martin Luther King Jr." The agent made a point to say that her "selfless, magnanimous, decorous attitude is belied" by her "actual shrewd, calculating, businesslike activities."

Four years after MLK's death, the FBI closed its file on Coretta Scott King, saying, "No information has come to the attention of Atlanta which indicates a propensity for violence or affiliation of subversive elements." Coretta Scott King died in 2006 at the age of 78.

The Rev. Joseph Lowery served as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which King co-founded in 1957, says the documents illustrate the FBI's pattern of "despicable and devious" behaviour against the organisation and those affiliated with it.

Apartheid-Era Officials Laced Cleric’s Underwear With Poison

Johannesburg, South Africa, August 17: Two of the apartheid era's most visible faces of government repression have pleaded guilty to attempting to assassinate an opponent in 1989. They received suspended sentences under a deal made with prosecutors.

Former law and order minister Adriaan Vlok and former police chief Johannes van der Merwe entered their pleas in the Pretoria High Court along with three lower-ranking policemen.

The men were charged with attempting to kill cleric Frank Chicane, then a leading anti-apartheid figure, by lacing his underwear with poison during a trip to the United States. He became violently ill but survived the incident.

Chikane, now a top adviser to President Thabo Mbeki, welcomed the plea bargain. "I'm pleased that this thing is over and that we can move forward," he said

Hundreds of apartheid-era criminals have won amnesty from the country's Truth and Reconciliation Commission which encouraged people who had committed atrocities to reveal their misdeeds in exchange for protection against prosecution.

The commission, which was headed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu during the mid-1990s, is regarded as an international model for societies attempting to overcome legacies of violence and repression. But it also left many South Africans feeling as though their oppressors had escaped punishment.

Yet despite demonstrations outside the courtroom Friday, many South Africans said they were pleased the case had been resolved, even if Vlok and the others managed to avoid prison.

Vlok, who has undergone a religious conversion, gained prominence because of a public act of repentance last year, when he apologized to Chikane and washed his feet.

Russian Hitman Intercepted by M16 as he Attempted to Assassinate Boris Berezovsky

London, July 17: A Russian hitman planned to execute an outspoken “enemy of Moscow” at the Hilton Hotel on London’s Park Lane, the English newspaper The Sun has revealed.

He sought to shoot exiled tycoon Boris Berezovsky — who has called for the violent overthrow of Russian president Vladimir Putin — in the back of the head. The assassin was accompanied by a child in a cold-blooded attempt to avoid raising suspicion.

But MI5 and MI6 intercepted intelligence about the plot — due to have been carried out within the last fortnight. The hitman was seized before he could open fire.

The murderous mission was revealed 24 hours after Britain ordered the expulsion of four Russian diplomats. And its disclosure will plunge the cold relations between London and Moscow into the deep freeze.

Mr Berezovsky, 61, fled to Britain from Russia in 2000 and was granted political asylum three years later. Today he mixes in the highest echelons of society and lives in a 172-acre Surrey estate he bought for £10million from radio DJ Chris Evans.

Mr Berezovsky was also a friend of former KGB spy Alexander Litvinenko — poisoned with a lethal dose of radioactive Polonium-210 in a London sushi bar last November.

The targeted tycoon is at the centre of a hotbed of opposition to the Putin regime and is the Russian president’s fiercest critic. He is understood to have offered cash, housing and support to a string of Russian exiles, including Litvinenko.

The hitman planned to strike after luring Mr Berezovsky to a meeting in a room at the Hilton. But details of the plot were rumbled by Britain’s security services. Together with anti-terrorist cops from Scotland Yard, they mounted a round-the-clock surveillance operation to shadow Mr Berezovsky and the assassin.

They took over a room adjoining the meeting place and seized the hitman before he could open fire.

A source said: “The Russian suspect was monitored attempting to buy obvious weaponry for the planned mission. Disturbingly, he was accompanied by a child in an attempt to blend into the background. This ‘family persona’ tactic is also thought to have been used in the murder of Litvinenko.”

Security officials stressed there was no direct connection between the assassination plot and the row which has led to the expulsion of the Russian diplomats. The officials got the boot after Mr Putin refused to allow the extradition from Moscow of former KGB agent Andrei Lugovoy, the prime suspect in the Litvinenko case.

But despite the lack of a link, a senior Government security source said: “We cannot tolerate a situation where Russian hit squads can roam the streets of London trying to take out enemies of their regime. In the case of Litvinenko, the lives of hundreds of Londoners were put at risk by the use of a radioactive substance.

“It is clear Mr Berezovsky has been a persistent critic of Mr Putin and his regime. It is our experience that the Russians have no compunction about taking action against their critics abroad. We only have to look at the cold-blooded murder of Mr Litvinenko to see the lengths to which they will go.”

Last night Mr Berezovsky said there had been a series of plots to murder him in Britain. He told the BBC’s Newsnight: “There were several attempts to kill me in this country.” He added: “Scotland Yard pay a lot of attention to my protection and I’m happy about that.”

He also accused Mr Putin of killing Mr Litvinenko. He said: “I’m 100 per cent sure that behind this murder is not just Andrei Lugovoy but Putin himself. That’s the reason Russia protects Lugovoy, because they are protecting Putin.”

Mr Berezovsky built a fortune after the Cold War ended in car sales, oil and the media. His estate is guarded by a squad of ex-French foreign legionnaires. The complex features bullet-proof windows, reinforced steel doors, laser monitors and spy cameras.

Even before the Putin era, he was in the sights of the Russian mafia, surviving several attempts to kill him. In 1994 his Mercedes was blown up by a car bomb, decapitating his chauffeur and leaving Berezovsky with serious burns.

When Putin came to power, he was at first a cordial friend of the new President. But they fell out over Putin’s decision to probe how oligarchs like Mr Berezovsky made their money. The tycoon fled to Britain when charges of tax evasion and embezzlement were brought against him.

He now runs several businesses here while also plotting Putin’s demise. He boasts of bankrolling a group in Russia who aim to bring Putin down by force.

CIA to Show the World its "Family Jewels"

Washington DC, Monday June 25: The US Central Intelligence Agency is preparing to release a set of documents compiled more than 30 years ago detailing the agency’s involvement over the previous quarter century in crimes both at home and abroad. These include assassination attempts against foreign heads of state, covert spying on newspaper columnists and other US citizens, the infiltration of left-wing groups and the testing of mind-alerting drugs on unwitting American subjects.

The CIA’s current director, Gen. Michael Hayden, announced the decision to release the documents, known within the agency as the “family jewels,” at a conference in Washington of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations.

The 693-page document was compiled in response to a 1973 directive issued by then-CIA Director James Schlesinger ordering senior agency officials to provide an accounting of all CIA activities that had been conducted in violation of the agency’s charter, which specifically bars it from carrying out domestic operations.

Schlesinger’s order to catalogue these illegal activities was prompted by the arrest of two longtime CIA operatives—E. Howard Hunt and James McCord—in connection with the break-in at the Democratic Party’s Watergate offices. The Watergate crisis exposed broader agency involvement in the so-called “dirty tricks” carried out by the Nixon administration against its political opponents.

It was under