I hope this doesn't come back to bite them. From AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) No evidence exists to back reports that al-Qaida terrorists are in Central America, the chief of the regional office for the international police agency Interpol said Wednesday.Saul Hernandez said police in the region were on the watch for terrorists, but he said there was no evidence showing overseas terrorists have tried to contact Central American gangs.
Interviewed by a small group of reporters during Interpol's annual assembly here, Hernandez said investigators also had been unable to confirm the presence in Central America of a suspected al-Qaida member, Adnan Gushair El Shukrijumah, despite earlier official reports he had been spotted in Honduras.
``We do not have information that effectively confirms that this person was there,'' said Hernandez, who is also El Salvador's police commissioner.
Interpol obviously didn't interview ranchers on the American side of the border that have to contend with the MILLIONS of people that a flowing over the border, trashing their property, killing their stock, and threatening them with bodily harm. These ranchers, Spanish speakers, can tell the difference between indigenous Mexicans and Central Americans and "others." Agents of the Border Patrol have even captured a few "others," and incomprehensively have not received the requisite support to shut down the dangerous flow of illegals.
A South American hub of Islamism is at the junction of Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay and various places in the Andes are becoming training and staging areas.
Venezuela, now moving to the Left and in cahoots with Cuba, has invited Islamists to operate there...for afternoon tea, of course.
Although our focus has been on the ME and Asia, we can't afford to take our eyes off what's happening on our own borders and points south.
South America, long free of the corrupting influenecve of muslim presence is also now getting polluted. this is bad news indeed.
Where are ruthless Nicaraguan guerilla forces and Mexican and Columbian drug cartels when you need them. I came up with the notion years and years ago that if terrorist wanted to get into america , their best bet would be via Central America, because they look very simular, at a glance, to Latinos.
Border control (if they exist), should do a test on all attempting immigrants, if they can't speak spanish; arrest them. Or they could have a translator of mexican origin working with them who is knowledgeable of all the different accents and dialects of central and south america. This is because I'm sure some islamic terrorists trying to get into the states, have took it upon themselves to learn spanish, but there's no way they'll have had the time or resources to study dialects and accents, learning the language will bve challenge enough for them.
To a knowledgeable enough translator, a muslim posing as a Latin American would stand out like a sore thumb, if not just for the fact that his/her spanish linguistics aren't too impressive.
If I am thinking of counter-measures such as this ( and I'm British), why aren't the US government, who are supposedly cracking down on terrorism.
Are there any countries in the world which DON'T have muslims?
By the way Rikki. Colombian drug cartels would probably join forces with muslims, I wouldn't wonder.
Rikki,
All of your suggestions make very good sense, and many--possibly most--of us in the US are frustrated beyond endurance at the failure of our policy-setter and government officials, who have sworn to uphold the Constitution, to protect the integrity of our borders.
My tongue was only slightly in my cheek when I suggested we "outsource" the job of border security to Israel.
I just wonder if our government is sincerely trying to stop terrorists from entering our borders. The Mexican border should be the first place that we put our troops, we are at WAR.
cubed:
Take your tongue completely out of your cheek. I'm with you on the outsourcing issue of border security. As a matter of fact, there are a lot of areas where I'd like to see more Israeli involvement in our Homeland Security - the translation of messages intercepted by the FBI, for example. They are EXPERTS, after all. We're playing catch-up.
Arab communities, or individuals, in South America need to be investigated. There are, for example, certain companies that export fruit (raspberries, that sort of thing), that are based in Chile, and one hears of "Palestinian" Arabs who head at least one of these companies. Is it true, and if it is true, does it make any difference? That is, is there evidence of diversion of money from these companies for other purposes? Might the same ships or planes that are used to transport fruit also ship other kinds of cargo, including humans, weapons, etc.? This is the kind of thing alert security services will want to consider, and the wrong attitude is to pooh-pooh any of this.
I would not trust our (US) security to Interpol. If Mexican and Central American police are considered to be our intelligence and defense in Central America, we are in great danger.
Police in Latin America are not like our police. Saudi money can do wonders for jihadists there.
Voltaire,
Are there any countries in the world where there are no cockroaches?