Afghan Taliban boldly attack on Kabul airport

Afghan security and intelligence official inspects wreckage at the site of a suicide attack near Kabul military airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, June 10, 2013. Seven heavily armed Taliban insurgents launched a pre-dawn attack near Afghanistan's main airport Monday, apparently targeting NATO's airport headquarters with rocket-propelled grenades, assault rifles and at least one large bomb. Two Afghan civilians were wounded and all the attackers were killed after an hours-long battle.

Afghan policemen sit atop a vehicle upon arrival after Taliban fighters attacked near Kabul airport, Afghanistan, Monday, June, 10, 2013. Seven heavily armed Taliban fighters launched a pre-dawn attack near Afghanistan’s main airport Monday, apparently targeting NATO’s airport headquarters with rocket-propelled grenades, assault rifles and at least one large bomb. (AP Photo/Ahmad Jamshid)

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Seven Taliban fighters with rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns launched a rare assault onNATO's operational headquarters at the military section of Kabul's international airport on Monday. All seven militants were killed.

Their failed attack showed that despite an asphyxiating security blanket around the capital, Afghanistan's insurgency is far from defeated after nearly 12 years of war, and militants can still menace the capital.

Gunfire and explosions from the pre-dawn battle could be heard in many parts of Kabul. No one was killed except the attackers, but it emphasized the challenges faced by Afghanistan's fledgling security forces as they prepare to take the lead from a U.S.-led coalition that is rapidly withdrawing its remaining forces.

The spectacular attacks are aimed at demoralizing the population and sowing mistrust in the Afghan security forces' ability to protect their citizens — rather than military gains.

"We can expect high profile attacks, we can expect insider threats and we can expect maybe some assassinations," said German Gen. Gunter Katz, spokesman for the U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force. "We adapt our security measures appropriately, we assess the security situation on a permanent basis and we remain very vigilant."

The Taliban, who claimed responsibility for the airport attack, have been testing Afghan security forces as foreign combat troops pull back more than a decade after the U.S.-led invasion to oust the Taliban regime for sheltering al-Qaida's leadership after the Islamic extremist group launched the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States.

In declaring their spring campaign, the Taliban said they would target Afghan and coalition forces and government officials around the country. Although they said they would not target civilians, the overwhelming number of dead and wounded so far has been ordinary Afghans.

The attack was one of three against state facilities on Monday morning by insurgents around the country.

In addition to the airport attack, six militants wearing suicide bomb vests tried to storm the provincial council building in the capital of southern Zabul province, while three attempted to attack a district police headquarters near the capital. Elsewhere, a roadside bomb killed a Polish soldier in the NATO force.

Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqi said that in Zabul the attackers wounded 18 people, including three police officers, when they detonated a car bomb outside the building in the city of Qalat, but security forces shot and killed them before they could enter. On the outskirts of Kabul, police killed one attacker and arrested two others who tried to storm the headquarters building in the Surobi district.

At the airport, the insurgents did not get close enough to attack aircraft and were not near the runway's flight path. Even if they had managed to damage the airport, it would have affected civilian flights but not had an impact on military operations, which are carried out from a military airfield at Bagram about 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of the capital.

But they did manage to sneak in a minivan full of explosives, rocket-propelled grenades, heavy machine guns and assault rifles along with their suicide vests. Such weapons have been used repeatedly in Kabul attacks over the recent months, including an eight-ton bomb on a truck in March that was discovered just before it was to be used to attack a NATO base.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai said his government would not be deterred.

"These cowardly terrorist attacks on the Afghan people cannot change the chosen path of the Afghan people toward progress, development, peace and elections," Karzai said, referring to next spring's poll to elect a new head of state.

Karzai was not in Kabul during the attack, but was visiting the Gulf state of Qatar, where he was discussing his country's stalled peace process and the possible opening of a Taliban office in Doha.

Both Afghanistan and the United States support the opening of a Taliban political office in Qatar as part of an effort to rekindle talks with the insurgent group. But first, Kabul and Washington say, the Taliban must renounce all ties to al-Qaida and other terrorist groups and accept Afghanistan's constitution.

Sediqi said the attacks are motivated by the upcoming handover of the lead for security from the U.S.-led coalition to the Afghan army and police. Afghan forces are now leading 90 percent of the military operations in areas where 80 percent of the country's population lives. After the handover later this month, the coalition will assist, train and mentor, providing military support only in emergencies.

The 352,000-strong force numbered less than 40,000 six years ago. The coalition will shrink by half its current 97,000 troops at the end of this year.

"Of course, in the coming days, there will be a transition and security is going to be handed over to Afghan forces," Sediqi said. "They are trying to sabotage that process and trying to bring the ability of the Afghan security forces into question, which they cannot because today's incidents in three different parts of the country were all foiled without significant casualties."

The Kabul airport itself was not damaged and reopened shortly after the fighting was over, said airport chief Yaqub Rassuli.

"There was no damage to the runway. Some shrapnel fell nearby, but we have cleared it away," Rassuli said.

Deputy Kabul police chief Dawood Amin said two insurgents blew themselves up with suicide vests at the start of the assault and five were shot and killed by police during the battle.

The last major incident in Kabul was May 24, when six suicide bombers attacked a U.N.-affiliated group, killing three people. On May 16, a suicide bomber rammed a car into a NATO convoy, killing 15 people, including two American soldiers and four civilian contractors.

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Associated Press writers Amir Shah, Rahim Faiez and Kay Johnson contributed.

Philadelphia collapse survivor describes ordeal

Philadelphia collapse survivor says she heard falling bricks seconds before walls crashed down

Associated Press -

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- The city's top prosecutor announced a grand jury was being convened to investigate a building collapse that killed six people and injured 13 others, including a woman who on Monday described hearing the sound of falling bricks moments before the walls came crashing down around her.

District Attorney Seth Williams said the scope and depth of the grand jury process will help prosecutors, the city and others to "completely and appropriately investigate" what happened when a downtown building under demolition collapsed onto a neighboring Salvation Army Thrift Store, killing two employees and four customers.

"I know Philadelphians demand action. I heard their voices loud and clear," Williams said at Monday's news conference. "We want Philadelphians to be patient as we gather all the evidence."

Meanwhile, police detectives on Monday visited the north Philadelphia home of general contractor Griffin Campbell, who had been hired to demolish the four-story building that collapsed. A handful of investigators emerged from the home about 45 minutes later, carrying a box. Police and prosecutors earlier declined to comment on reports of a search of the home.

Campbell's attorney issued a statement defending his record and the qualifications of an excavator operator charged in the case, urging that there be no "rush to judgment."

Attorney Kenneth Edelin said in a statement that Campbell was "confident that the results of the investigation will reveal that professional and safety-conscious business practices were in place." He said he believes his client will be cleared of responsibility for the tragedy.

Edelin said Campbell has more than 20 years in the construction business and four years in demolition and earlier successfully demolished several nearby buildings. He said excavator operator Sean Benschop was hired because of his "extensive experience" in demolition.

But he said Campbell never instructed the excavator to be used for the demolition that day. Because the company didn't have access to the thrift store roof, he said, "the demolition of the wall closest to the thrift store was being done brick by brick."

Edelin said federal and city inspectors and inspectors on behalf of the thrift store visited the site after demolition began "and gave the site a clean bill of health."

Benschop surrendered Saturday to face six counts of involuntary manslaughter, 13 counts of reckless endangerment and one count of risking a catastrophe. He is the only person charged in the collapse and is being held without bail pending a hearing June 26. His attorney said the building collapse was an accident and his client is not responsible.

At least six survivors have filed lawsuits against the contractor and the building's owner. One of them, Felicia Hill, said Monday that she heard bricks falling and looked at another co-worker just moments before the ceiling collapsed with the weight of bricks and debris.

"And then the wall came down, and I didn't see her anymore," Hill said of Kimberly Finnegan, who was killed on her first day of work at the thrift store.

After the collapse, Hill heard another co-worker calling, "Somebody, help me, please. Somebody help."

Attorney Robert Mongeluzzi, representing Hill and five other survivors, said Hill is emotionally scarred but lucky.

"There were six people that weren't so lucky," he added.

Williams said the grand jury likely will "investigate the myriad municipal agencies and departments, and policies and protocols, surrounding the collapse."

Also Monday, the City Council announced the formation of a special committee to conduct a broad review of procedures and regulations regarding licenses and permits, construction and demolition, the certification of workers, building maintenance and other issues.

Unsafe construction work is a common issue in Philadelphia, and "unfortunately, it took such a tragic event for us to finally do something about it," Council President Darrell L. Clarke said.

Councilman Jim Kenney, who is the chair of the labor and civil service committee, said safety standards are sometimes not met for the sake of costs.

"There is an underground economy that's grown up as a result of the issue relative to the cost of construction," Kenney said. "The cost of the construction should not trump safety."

Kenney also said there needs to be better coordination between the building inspectors and the revenue department, which could help "track down these unscrupulous and unlicensed and non-tax-paying entities."

Since the June 3 collapse, officials have begun inspecting hundreds of demolition sites citywide. Mayor Michael Nutter said Friday that the city was preparing to implement sweeping changes in its regulations of building demolition.

A demolition permit indicates that contractor Griffin Campbell was being paid $10,000 for the job. Building owner Richard Basciano's attorney declined to comment.

Memorial services began over the weekend for some of the victims, who included a student at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, a retired secretary and a Liberian immigrant and longtime store employee.

A woman pulled from the rubble more than 12 hours after the collapse was upgraded Monday from critical to serious condition, a hospital spokeswoman said. One other victim remained hospitalized. The 11 other survivors are all out of the hospital.

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No mistaking how NSA story reporter feels

Columnist Glenn Greenwald makes no secret of feelings on phone records case

Associated Press -

NEW YORK (AP) -- The man who claimed to leak state secrets on U.S. government eavesdropping sought to break the story through a columnist for a UK-based publication who has made no secret of his distaste for intrusions on privacy.

Edward Snowden brought his information first to Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian, illustrating the passion an opinion-driven journalist can bring to a breaking news story at the same time it raises questions about fairness.

Greenwald, author of three books in which he argues the government has trampled on personal rights in the name of protecting national security, wrote the original stories exposing the extent of the government's data collection. Over the weekend, he identified intelligence contractor Snowden as his source at Snowden's request, and said more stories are coming.

"What we disclosed was of great public interest, of great importance in a democracy, that the U.S. government is building this massive spying apparatus aimed at its own population," Greenwald said Monday on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

Greenwald also told The Associated Press that he's been contacted by "countless people" over the last 24 hours offering to create legal defense funds for Snowden.

The topic is personal for Greenwald, 46. The former constitutional and civil rights lawyer, educated at the New York University Law School, began the "Unclaimed Territory" blog in 2005 and wrote "How Would a Patriot Act?" a year later. The book criticized the Bush administration for its use of executive power.

Greenwald, now based in Brazil, wrote a regular column for Salon for five years until joining The Guardian last year. He said he wanted to reach a more international audience, a desire that coincided with the news organization's effort to expand its reach in the U.S. market.

One program he wrote about collects hundreds of millions of U.S. phone records. The second program takes in audio, email and other electronic activities primarily by foreign nationals who use providers like Microsoft and Apple. Greenwald described the collection of phone records on Monday as "rampant abuse and it needs sunlight. That's why this person came forward and that's why we published our stories."

On "Morning Joe," he snapped that co-host Mika Brzezinski was using "Obama talking points" when she challenged him with a question.

"The wall of secrecy behind which they operate is impenetrable and it is a real menace to democracy," said Greenwald, who won a 2010 Online Journalism Association award for his coverage of Bradley Manning, who is charged with giving classified documents to WikiLeaks.

Snowden, however, had not just gone to Greenwald with his information. Barton Gellman of The Washington Post wrote on Sunday that Snowden had contacted him about the story. He said Snowden had asked that the Post publish within 72 hours the full contents of a presentation he had made about the collection of electronic activity from the Silicon Valley companies.

Gellman said the Post would not make any guarantees and sought the government's views about whether the information would harm national security. The Post eventually agreed to publish a small sample of what Snowden was offering, but Snowden backed away, writing that "I regret that we weren't able to keep this project unilateral," Gellman wrote.

He then contacted Greenwald, the Post said.

Greenwald's clear point of view doesn't necessarily weaken the story, said Jay Rosen, journalism professor at New York University and author of the Press Think blog.

"In many ways it strengthens it," he said. Greenwald has a clear stance on privacy and national security, but they aren't partisan; he's criticized Democratic President Barack Obama and his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush. Journalists who have strong viewpoints is a tradition with a long history in the U.S., Rosen said.

"The fact that sources now may choose (outlets) on the basis of commitment is a fact and journalists whose professional stance is no commitment may find themselves at a disadvantage," he said.

Greenwald's known feelings on the issue "does leave a little opening for critics," said Ellen Shearer, head of the national security journalism initiative at Northwestern University. There's always a risk that such passion can work against a journalist; some people would worry that facts contradictory to a predisposed belief could be overlooked.

To this point, Shearer said there's been little pushback on the facts, with the debate primarily about whether the information should be published.

Intelligence officials are investigating the leak and its impact on its programs. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper called the revelation of the intelligence-gathering programs reckless and said it has done "huge, grave damage."

The Guardian took care not to publish material that may help other countries improve their eavesdropping or could put the lives of covert agents at risk, Greenwald said.

"We've published these things they marked 'top secret' that don't actually harm national security but conceal what they've done from the public," he said.

The story is a coup for the Guardian, a U.K.-based independent news organization that started covering the United States more aggressively when it determined that one-third of its web traffic came from the U.S. Offices in New York and Washington were opened in 2011, and the Guardian now has 57 employees in the U.S.

The Guardian doesn't offer its newspaper for sale in the U.S. But web traffic to its news website in the U.S. market has increased 47 percent over last year and is likely to jump further with this month's exposure.

U.S. Prepares Charges Against Alleged NSA Leaker: Sources

Russia would consider asylum for U.S. cyber leaker

By Steve Gutterman

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia would consider granting asylum to the American who has exposed top-secret U.S. surveillance programs, if he were to ask for it, President Vladimir Putin's spokesman said on Tuesday.

Spokesman Dmitry Peskov stopped short of saying Moscow would accept Edward Snowden, but pro-Kremlin lawmakers spoke out in favor of the idea, tapping into a lingering Cold War rivalry with the United States and a vein of anti-American sentiment Putin has often encouraged.

"Promising Snowden asylum, Moscow takes upon itself the defense of people persecuted for political reasons," Alexei Pushkov, chairman of the international affairs committee in the lower house of parliament, said on Twitter.

"There will be hysteria in the United States. They recognize this as their right alone," he said.

Putin and other Russian officials have often accused the United States of hypocrisy, saying it tries to impose standards of human rights, freedom and democracy on other nations while falling far short of them itself.

"This is an ideological catastrophe for the United States," Pushkov said, referring to Snowden's release of top secret details of National Security Agency eavesdropping programs.

Snowden, who provided the information for reports that revealed broad monitoring of phone call and Internet data by the NSA, fled to Hong Kong and has said he hopes that Iceland might grant him asylum.

"WE'LL CONSIDER IT"

He is not known to have mentioned the possibility of asylum in Russia, where the government taps the phones of opposition members and keeps close tabs on social networks, but Peskov was quoted in Russian daily Kommersant as saying Moscow was open to such an approach.

Asked by Reuters whether Russia would be inclined to grant a request from Snowden, the spokesman said: "It is impossible (to say) now. No one has applied yet. If he says: I request (political asylum), then we will consider it."

Accused by the West of curtailing democracy and civil liberties over 13 years in power, Putin has missed few chances to champion public figures who challenge Western governments, and to portray Washington as an overzealous global policeman.

He has pursued warm ties with U.S. foes such as the late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, and this year granted Russian citizenship to Gerard Depardieu after the French actor abandoned his homeland to escape high taxes.

In 2010, the Kremlin suggested Wikileaks founder Julian Assange should be nominated for a Nobel prize.

"By tapping telephones and conducting surveillance on the Internet, the U.S. security services have violated the laws of their own country. In this sense Snowden, like Assange, is a rights defender," Pushkov tweeted on Tuesday.

Russia recently began criticizing the United States in annual reports on the state of human rights around the world - fighting back for the drubbing Russia gets in yearly rights reports by the U.S. State Department.

In another pointed intervention, Putin offered on Friday to send Russian troops to the Golan Heights buffer zone between Israel and Syria, after Austria said it would withdraw from a U.N. peacekeeping force. His proposal went down badly in the West because of Russia's support for the Syrian government.

(Additional reporting by Alexei Anishchuk; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)