Saudi Arabia: seeking security (catch all)

[davidbfpo]

A rather breathless CNN reporter is on the Saudi-Yemen border with the Saudi border police. He gives some stats, 42k illegal perons detained in six months, including children smuggling Qat across - leaving unexplained who for - and in three months 500k tonnes of Qat seized.
Link:http://edition.cnn.com/videos/us/201...men-border.cnn

[davidbfpo]

A short round up by WINEP, which includes this - which I'd not seen before about the Iraqi-Saudi cross-border raid by ISIS In January:

...one of the four Saudi militants who attacked the kingdom's border from Iraq in January had been previously arrested for al-Qaeda ties. He was eventually released on bail, according to Saudi authorities.

Link:http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/p...orm-new-threat

[davidbfpo]

A WaPo journalist visits a Saudi jail for terrorists undergoing rehab:http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...wpmk=MK0000203

How effective is this?

Gen. Mansour al-Turki, spokesman for the powerful Ministry of Interior, whose Mabahith secret police run the five high-security prisons....Turki said that about 20 percent of those who have gone through the rehabilitation program have returned to terrorism-related activities. Many rights activists think the failure rate is higher than Saudi officials admit.

Note in 2013 (Post 28) this was the failure rate:

The percentage of those who rejoin the deviant minority does not exceed 10%.

So if we accept officialdom's statement the programme now has higher failure rate!

[davidbfpo]

An overview of KSA after the Yemeni operation, by a British SME, Alastair Crooke:http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alasta...b_7163776.html

[davidbfpo]

Not my title, but that in The Daily Telegraph and a short piece by:

Nawaf Obaid is a Visiting Fellow and Associate Instructor at Harvard Kennedy School and a former strategic affairs advisor to the Saudi government.

Link:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...uperpower.html

Hardvard bio:http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/...waf_obaid.html

To date the interventioin in the Yemen hardly appears positive, ah well the Saudis will learn (again) and of course few nations have offered to shed their blood.

[davidbfpo]

Another article by Nawaf Obaid (bio in previous post) and is hardly reassuring:

Saudi Arabia has for past several years been laying the groundwork for a civil nuclear program with no PMDs (possible military dimensions). However, there is a strong possibility that the Kingdom might begin to engage in contingency planning for a defensive nuclear program with PMDs. This planning represents an emerging Saudi nuclear defence doctrine.

(Later) None should doubt that the Saudi scientific community possesses the know-how and technical infrastructure to realize this nuclear defense doctrine

Link:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/gene...r-weapons.html

Somehow I doubt KSA has such a national capability, given its track record in importing talent in the securitys ector and elsewhere. More likely the talent will be imported, from Pakistan in particular.

[davidbfpo]

A succint briefing from The Soufan Group and BLUF:

The Saudi Arabian government announced that it has arrested 431 individuals, most over the last month, on charges associated with the Islamic State • Few countries are as sensitive to instability concerns as Saudi Arabia, and the country faces a serious domestic threat of Islamic State cells
• Following a steady procession of suicide bombings and shootings, Saudi Arabia is trying to disrupt the Islamic State’s momentum inside the country
• The number of Saudi nationals who have traveled to join the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq pales in relation to the potential recruiting pool of radicalized young Saudis who might prefer to fight at home.

Link:http://soufangroup.com/tsg-intelbrie...state-at-home/


I wonder if anyone in KSA has pointed out that in the Yemen the KSA is acting in apparent concert with AQAP?