Free Republic

A North Korean soldier who defected to the South has been found to have anthrax antibodies in his bloodstream, local news reports. The unidentified soldier, believed to be the man who defected in November this year, would have been either exposed to or vaccinated against anthrax before he defected to South Korea. This comes after a report that North Korea is conducting biological weapons experiments to test the possibility of loading anthrax-laden warheads on its intercontinental ballistic missiles.

North Korea is beginning tests on mounting anthrax onto intercontinental ballistic missiles that would strike the U.S., a report said on Wednesday just two days after the White House’s U.S. National Security Strategy stated Kim Jong Un is pursuing chemical and biological weapons. The Hermit Kingdom is beginning experiments to test out if anthrax can endure immense heat and pressure it will have to endure when loaded into an ICBM and launched toward the earth’s atmosphere, Japan’s Asahi newspaper reported, citing an unidentified person connected to South Korea’s intelligence services. “North Korea has started experiments such as heat and pressure...

FORT DETRICK, Maryland (CNN) -- FBI agents searched the apartment of a former researcher at the U.S. Army's biological warfare defense laboratory at Fort Detrick for the second time in two months Thursday. The researcher, Steven Hatfill, 48, had previously been questioned in the investigation of last fall's anthrax attacks and had his apartment searched in June. No arrests are imminent, sources said. FBI Director Robert Mueller said only that investigators had made progress (snip)

Law James Comey Has A Long History Of Questionable Obstruction Cases From Martha Stewart to Frank Quattrone to Steven Hatfill, former FBI director James Comey has left a long trail of highly questionable obstruction of justice cases that he used to make a name for himself. Mollie Hemingway By Mollie Hemingway June 12, 2017 Following countdown clocks on cable outlets and dramatic claims in the media about what devastating testimony to expect, James Comey sat down before the Senate Intelligence Committee last week. The hearing ended up being a bit of a let-down for critics of President Trump who hoped...

The Justice Department on Monday charged a former CIA officer with repeatedly leaking classified information, including the identities of agency operatives involved in the capture and interrogation of alleged terrorists. The case against John Kiriakou, who served as a senior Senate aide after ending his CIA career, extends the Obama administration’s unprecedented crackdown on disclosures of national security secrets to journalist. Kiriakou, who was among the first to go public with details about the CIA’s use of water-boarding and other harsh interrogation measures, was charged with disclosing classified information to reporters and lying to the agency about the origin of...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 12 — A former Iraqi intelligence officer who was said to have met with the suspected leader of the Sept. 11 attacks has told American interrogators the meeting never happened, according to United States officials familiar with classified intelligence reports on the matter. Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir al-Ani, the former intelligence officer, was taken into custody by the United States in July. Under questioning he has said that he did not meet with Mohamed Atta in Prague, according to the officials, who have reviewed classified debriefing reports based on the interrogations. American officials caution that Mr. Ani may...

<p>The Indiana Board of Animal Health has issued an advisory after livestock on a southern Indiana beef cattle farm was infected with anthrax.</p> <p>A veterinarian collected tissue samples for laboratory testing after the animal died unexpectedly. Only a single, mixed-breed bull died; other animals in the herd have not shown signs of infection.</p>

The conviction last week of Ali al-Timimi, an American-born Islamic scholar, on terrorism charges thrust the so-called "Virginia Paintball Jihad" case to the forefront as the federal government's greatest court victory against terrorism. All told, federal prosecutors counted 10 convictions in the case. Al-Timimi's conviction marked the first post-Sept. 11 case in which the government won a terrorism conviction for actions tied to philosophy and words designed to help the enemy, rather than deeds, such as providing money, equipment or actual combat help to that enemy. "Until now these people have escaped. It is a very powerful position to be...

Problematic, in a very big way even if the offer was made.Qatar’s ties to Al Qaeda and ISIS aren’t news. They’ve effectively served as intermediaries in everything from ransom exchanges for hostages to Taliban negotiations. But actually trying to secure terrorist swaps for prisoners on their own behalf would have been a new frontier. Before he was released from a U.S. maximum-security prison last week, a confessed al Qaeda sleeper agent was offered up in a potential prisoner swap that would have freed two Americans held abroad.According to two individuals with direct knowledge of the case, the proposition was...

The Russian military has reportedly sent biological warfare teams to the Russian arctic in northern Siberia after at least 40 people and 1,200 reindeer died as the result of a violent and rapid spread of what is believed to be Bacillus Anthracis, more commonly known as Anthrax. Russian officials said the infection may have started after a contaminated corpse was exposed following a warm summer in the Arctic which saw temperatures rise as high as 95 degrees Fahrenheit. There were dramatic scenes as the Russian army’s Chemical, Radioactive and Biological Protection Corps, equipped with masks and bio-warfare protective clothing, flew...

<p>A taxpayer has been charged with mailing a threatening communication after he responded to a notice from the Internal Revenue Service about overdue taxes by scribbling a profanity on the letter and mailing it back to the IRS.</p> <p>Enrique Santiago of the Bronx, N.Y., allegedly wrote, “I do not live at this address anymore, so go f–k yourself,” on the IRS notice and told the post office to return it to the sender. The IRS had intended the notice for his nephew, named Enrique A. Santiago, but he had moved out of the elder Santiago’s home a month earlier after a “physical altercation” with his uncle, according to the New York Post. Santiago shares a similar name with his nephew, who owes the IRS $3,032.57 in unpaid taxes.</p>

Chemical attack foiled in UK 22/11/2003 15:50 - (SA) London - A terror attack in Britain was foiled after a company financed by "the Islamic community" tried to buy a large quantity of toxic chemicals, arousing the supplier's suspicions, the Financial Times newspaper reported on Saturday. British laboratory Amersham Biosciences received an order in Autumn 2002 for 500kg of saponin from a company giving a London post office box address, the newspaper said. It said the "terrorist group" planning to launch the lethal attacks was London-based. "Their plot came to light when the supplier became suspicious about the quantities of...

A US Army research facility mistakenly shipped live anthrax to labs in the US and abroad for more than 10 years because of ineffective sterilization methods for killing the deadly bacteria, according to a federal report obtained by USA Today. In the three-page report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the US Army facility in Utah was cited for three violations of federal regulations for working with potential bioterror agents, and was ordered to cease shipment of “inactivated” anthrax specimens immediately. The Dugway Proving Ground’s Life Science Test Facility is at the center of the scandal. It was...

When American tanks smashed into Baghdad, Saddam had already completed construction of an anthrax production facility, which was a week away from going live. If it had been permitted to go into production, this one facility could have produced ten tons of weaponized anthrax a year. Experts estimate that anthrax spores that infect the skin will kill 50 percent of untreated victims. Inhaled anthrax will kill 100 percent of untreated victims and 50 percent of those receiving immediate treatment. That means that a mere 1 percent of Saddam’s annual production (200 pounds) sprayed by crop-duster over New York City would...

The Department of Defense has ordered a review of all labs following revelations that the number of labs that received live anthrax samples is larger than first reported."As of now, 24 laboratories in 11 states and two foreign countries are believed to have received suspect samples. We continue to work closely with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), who is leading the ongoing investigation pursuit to its statutory authorities. The Department will continue to monitor the situation and provide updates to the public," Defense Department said in a statement.The Defense Department had previously reported labs in nine states...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday it is investigating what the Pentagon called an inadvertent shipment of live anthrax spores to at least one, and perhaps as many as nine, laboratories that expected to receive dead spores. "At this time we do not suspect any risk to the general public," CDC spokeswoman Kathy Harben said.

The Pentagon confirmed Wednesday that live anthrax was shipped from a lab in Utah to other states.

When Bruce E. Ivins, an Army microbiologist, took a fatal overdose of Tylenol in 2008, the government declared that he had been responsible for the anthrax letter attacks of 2001, which killed five people and set off a nationwide panic, and closed the case. Now, a former senior F.B.I. agent who ran the anthrax investigation for four years says that the bureau gathered “a staggering amount of exculpatory evidence” regarding Dr. Ivins that remains secret. The former agent, Richard L. Lambert, who spent 24 years at the F.B.I., says he believes it is possible that Dr. Ivins was the anthrax...

he U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention plans to hire a chief of laboratory safety, a new post that has taken on more urgency after a CDC scientist was possibly exposed to Ebola in a laboratory last week. Creating a new high-level safety position was a key recommendation of a months-long internal investigation into the mishandling of anthrax and bird flu in CDC labs this past summer, according to an internal CDC memo obtained by Reuters. Those incidents called into question safety practices at more than 1,000 laboratory and support facilities across the CDC's sprawling network of scientists.

The suicide bombings in London raise questions of assimilation for the 3 million Muslims in the US. WASHINGTON - It's called the "Virginia Jihad" case: Iraqi-American medical researcher Ali al-Yimimi, who preached in northern Virginia mosques and disseminated his radical thinking on the Web, was sentenced to life imprisonment last week. His crime: inciting followers, many of them young American-born Muslims, to a violent defense of Islam and war against the United States and its intervention in Islamic countries. Mr. Timimi's sentencing in an Alexandria, Va., courtroom came against the backdrop of the London bombings, which British police now say...