Category Archives: The Denise Simon Experience

Trump has his First Call with Iraq PM on ISIS

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Wonder if al Abadi told Trump this: Kurds must give up captured territory once ISIS is defeated, Iraqi leader says as Trump pledged his full support to Iraq.

Iraqi troops expand foothold in Mosul as Islamic State pledges more suicide attacks

Reuters: U.S.-backed Iraqi troops expanded their foothold on the eastern side of Islamic State’s stronghold of Mosul on Friday, as the group pledged to mount more suicide attacks on their offensive to take the city.

The elite Counter-Terrorism Service (CTS) stormed the Tahrir district on the northeastern edge of Mosul, the last major city under control of the Sunni hard-line group in Iraq.

A Reuters correspondent reporting from the CTS-held line in Tahrir saw civilians streaming out of the nearby Aden district where fighting blazed, pushing trolleys containing their belongings and carrying home-made white flags.

The women were still shrouded in black robes imposed by the militants but most had uncovered their faces as they fled intense fighting.
Reuters, go here for a photo essay.

Militants have been steadily retreating from areas around Mosul into the city since the battle started on Oct. 17, with air and ground support from a U.S.-led coalition.

“The advance is slow due to the civilians,” said CTS Lt. General Abdul Wahab al-Saidi, adding that the U.S.-trained unit aims to clear the rest of the neighborhood during the day.

A Friday prayer sermon referring to “mujahideen”, or holy warriors, could be heard coming from a mosque under control of the jihadis in the vicinity. An armed man, possibly a sniper, was in the minaret of the mosque.

As the offensive entered its second month, Iraqi government forces are still fighting in a dozen of about 50 neighborhoods on the eastern part of Mosul, which is divided by the Tigris River that runs through its center.

Militants are dug in among the civilians as a defense tactic to hamper air strikes, moving around the city through tunnels, driving suicide car bombs into advancing troops and hitting them with sniper and mortar fire.

A loud explosion was heard several streets away from the CTS lines. An officer said it was a suicide bomber who blew himself up after being surrounded in a house. The CTS unit was using a drone to try to detect insurgents.

The number of fighters who are ready to blow themselves up is increasing, an insurgent commander told Islamic State’s weekly magazine, al-Nabaa, published online on Thursday.

“We’re giving you the good news that the number of brothers ready for martyrdom is very large and, with God’s grace, the brothers who are demanding martyr operations are increasing,” said the commander, who was not named.

The offensive to take Mosul, the largest city under Islamic State control in either Iraq or Syria, is turning into the biggest battle in Iraq’s turbulent history since the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003.

The CTS became the only unit to have breached the city limits from the eastern side two weeks ago. Other army units have yet to breach the northern and the southern sides.

Iranian-backed militias earlier this week announced the capture of the Tal Afar air base, west of Mosul, part of their campaign to choke off the route between the Syrian and Iraqi parts of the caliphate Islamic State declared in 2014.

The base is located just south of Tal Afar, a mostly ethnic Turkmen town that Turkey would not want to fall under the control of the mostly pro-Iranian militia coalition known as Popular Mobilisation, or Hashid Shaabi.

The Hashid plans to besiege the town for now, a spokesman of Kata’ib Hezbollah, one of the main paramilitary groups making up the coalition, told Reuters on Friday.

Iraqi military estimates put the number of Islamic State fighters in Mosul at 5,000 to 6,000. Facing them is a 100,000-strong coalition of Iraqi government forces, Kurdish fighters and Shi’ite paramilitary units.

Iraqi authorities have declined to give a timeline for recapture of the whole city, but the battle is likely to last for months. Militants have launched waves of counter-attacks against advancing forces, tying them down in lethal urban combat in narrow streets still full of residents.

The Islamic State commander cited in al-Nabaa said the battles with the Shi’ite paramilitary groups known as Popular Mobilisation west of Mosul will continue “in long episodes”.

Iraqi authorities have not published a casualty toll for the Mosul campaign overall – either for security forces, civilians or Islamic State fighters. The warring sides claim to have inflicted thousands of casualties in enemy ranks.

A resident said a mother and her three children were killed in Instissar, one of the eastern neighborhood already taken by the CTS, when a mortar shell hit their home, probably fired by Islamic State.

Nearly 59,000 people have been displaced because of the fighting, moving from villages and towns around the city to government-held areas, according to U.N. estimates.

The figure does not include the thousands of people rounded up in villages around Mosul and forced to accompany Islamic State fighters to cover their retreat towards the city as human shields.

In some cases, men of fighting age were separated from those groups and summarily killed, according to residents and rights groups. Human Rights Watch said on Thursday more than 300 former police officers were likely killed last month and buried in a mass grave near the town of Hammam al-Alil, south of Mosul.

Mosul’s capture is seen as crucial towards dismantling the caliphate, and Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, believed to have withdrawn to a remote area near the Syrian border, has told his fighters there can be no retreat.

 

H.E. PM Dr. Haider Al-Abadi discusses on phone with U.S. President elect Mr. Donald Trump the victories achieved against Da’esh.

IRS Audit Proves Taxpayer Data Exposed

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The report is here and the numbers mentioned were a random sampling.

IRS exposed taxpayers’ info through shoddy emails, audit shows

Staff sent tax return data through unencrypted messages

WashingtonTimes: A surprising number of IRS employees are sending unencrypted emails containing personal taxpayer information to private accounts, putting that information at risk of being stolen, the agency’s inspector general said Thursday.

Auditors found hundreds of unencrypted emails sent that risked leaking taxpayers’ personal information, after running through a random sample of 80 employees’ emails from the IRS’s small business/self employed division for four weeks in 2015. Extrapolated over a year, that could mean more than 1.1 million emails, covering more than 28 million taxpayers’ information, could have been sent by the division.

“These unencrypted e-mails violated IRM requirements and potentially compromised the security of taxpayer information,” Inspector General J. Russell George said.

Most of the unencrypted messages were sent to other IRS employees, posing a lower risk because they were inside the agency’s firewall. But some 15 percent of the messages were sent outside the IRS — including some that IRS agents sent to their own personal email accounts, for reasons that were unclear.

The IRS, in its official response, said the review didn’t prove that information had gotten into the wrong hands, and said most of the messages identified were at least kept within the agency’s firewall.

“These communications are within the extensive protections of the IRS firewall, and pose a minimal risk of disclosure or access,” Karen Schiller, commissioner of the small business division, wrote. “But, nonetheless, we agree that encryption provides an added layer of protection.”

She said the agency has already upgraded some of its checks since the inspector general’s 2015 review.

IRS officials have repeatedly warned employees to be careful with what’s dubbed “personally identifiable information,” or PII in government-speak. Email is a particular risk, the agency says.

Personal information can be sent within the IRS to other employees who have a need to know, but even then it’s supposed to be encrypted. And sending personal information outside the IRS is forbidden, even if a taxpayer gives OK, unless an exception is specifically approved.

During the four-week test, involving 80 employees, the auditors found 32 of them — 40 percent — broke the rules by sending a total of 326 unencrypted messages containing “tax return information” from more than 8,000 taxpayers.

Of those, 51 were sent outside the IRS. More than half were sent directly to taxpayers, 14 were sent to taxpayers’ representatives, three were sent to other government agencies or third parties, and in six cases employees sent taxpayers’ information to their own personal email addresses. In some cases they sent their own information to themselves — which is still prohibited.

IRS rules allow for employees to be admonished or fired for breaking email privacy — though neither the audit nor the agency’s official response said whether anyone has been disciplined.

In a separate audit released Thursday the inspector general said the IRS didn’t always take steps to protect data transferred in bulk to other federal agencies, state and local governments, banks or contractors.

“It is essential that the IRS fully protect sensitive personal and taxpayer information that it transmits externally,” Mr. George, the inspector general, said.

Will Obama Burrow-in on the Trump Admin? Likely

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A smooth and successful transfer of power on the surface perhaps…but beware of those in the shadows and lurking forever in dark hallways inside the beltway.

Primer: Obama tells anti-Trump protestors to march-on.

President Obama, speaking at a press conference in Germany, passed up the opportunity Thursday to tamp down the anti-Donald Trump protests back home — urging those taking part not to remain “silent.” 

The president fielded a question on the protests during a joint news conference in Berlin alongside German Chancellor Angela Merkel. 

“I suspect that there’s not a president in our history that hasn’t been subject to these protests,” he answered. “So, I would not advise people who feel strongly or who are concerned about some of the issues that have been raised during the course of the campaign, I wouldn’t advise them to be silent.” 

He added: “Voting matters, organizing matters and being informed on the issues matter.” 

Have you heard of the Senior Executive Service?

The Senior Executive Service (SES) lead America’s workforce. As the keystone of the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, the SES was established to “…ensure that the executive management of the Government of the United States is responsive to the needs, policies, and goals of the Nation and otherwise is of the highest quality.” These leaders possess well-honed executive skills and share a broad perspective on government and a public service commitment that is grounded in the Constitution.

Members of the SES serve in the key positions just below the top Presidential appointees. SES members are the major link between these appointees and the rest of the Federal workforce. They operate and oversee nearly every government activity in approximately 75 Federal agencies.

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) manages the overall Federal executive personnel program, providing the day-to-day oversight and assistance to agencies as they develop, select, and manage their Federal executives.

Obama by using his mighty pen and phone can covert some of his most trusted operatives to be permanent government employees, undermining the missions of the next administration. Let that sink in a moment.

****

Personnel—Political-to-Career Conversions (“Burrowing In”)

Some individuals, who are serving in appointed (noncareer) positions in the executive branch, convert to career positions in the competitive service, the Senior Executive Service (SES), or the excepted service. This practice, commonly referred to as “burrowing in,” is permissible when laws and regulations governing career appointments are followed. While such conversions may occur at any time, frequently they do so during the transition period when one Administration is preparing to leave office and another Administration is preparing to assume office.

Generally, these appointees were selected noncompetitively and are serving in such positions as Schedule C,  noncareer SES, or limited tenure SES24 that involve policy determinations or require a close and confidential relationship with the department or agency head and other top officials. Many of the Schedule C appointees receive salaries at the GS-12 through GS-15 pay levels. The noncareer and limited tenure members of the SES receive salaries under the pay schedule for senior executives that also covers the career SES.  Career employees, on the other hand, are to be selected on the basis of merit and without political influence following a process that is to be fair and open in evaluating their knowledge, skills, and experience against that of other applicants. The tenure of noncareer and career employees also differs. The former are generally limited to the term of the Administration in which they are appointed or serve at the pleasure of the person who appointed them. The latter constitute a work force that continues the operations of government without regard to the change of Administrations. In 2007, Paul Light, a professor of government at New York University who studied appointees over several Administrations, indicated that the pay, benefits, and job security of career positions underlie the desire of individuals in noncareer positions to “burrow in.”

Beyond the fundamental concern that the conversion of an individual from an appointed (noncareer) position to a career position may not have followed applicable legal and regulatory requirements, “burrowing in” raises other concerns. When the practice occurs, the following perceptions (whether valid or not) may result: that an appointee converting to a career position may limit the opportunity for other employees (who were competitively selected for their career positions, following examination of their knowledge, skills, and experience) to be promoted into another career position with greater responsibility and pay; or that the individual who is converted to a career position may seek to undermine the work of the new Administration whose policies may be at odds with those that he or she espoused when serving in the appointed capacity. Both perceptions may increase the tension between noncareer and career staff, thereby hindering the effective operation of government at a time when the desirability of creating “common ground” between these staff to facilitate government performance continues to be emphasized.28

Appointments to Career Positions

Appointments to career positions in the executive branch are governed by laws and regulations that are codified in Title 5 of the United States Code and Title 5 of the Code of Federal Regulations, respectively. For purposes of both, appointments to career positions are among those activities defined as “personnel actions,” a class of activities that can be undertaken only in accordance with strict procedures. In taking a personnel action, each department and agency head is responsible for preventing prohibited personnel practices; for complying with, and enforcing, applicable civil service laws, rules, and regulations and other aspects of personnel management; and for ensuring that agency employees are informed of the rights and remedies available to them. Such actions must adhere to the nine merit principles and thirteen prohibited personnel practices that are codified at 5 U.S.C. §2301(b) and §2302(b), respectively. These principles and practices are designed to ensure that the process for selecting career employees is fair and open (competitive), and free from political influence.

Department and agency heads also must follow regulations, codified at Title 5 of the Code of Federal Regulations, that govern career appointments. These include Civil Service Rules 4.2, which prohibits racial, political, or religious discrimination, and 7.1, which addresses an appointing officer’s discretion in filling vacancies. Other regulations provide that Office of Personnel Management (OPM) approval is required before employees in Schedule C positions may be detailed to competitive service positions, public announcement is required for all SES vacancies that will be filled by initial career appointment, and details to SES positions that are reserved for career employees (known as Career-Reserved) may only be filled by career SES or career-type non-SES appointees.

During the period June 1, 2016, through January 20, 2017, which is defined as the Presidential Election Period, certain appointees are prohibited from receiving financial awards. These

appointees, referred to as senior politically appointed officers, are (1) individuals serving in noncareer SES positions; (2) individuals serving in confidential or policy determining positions as Schedule C employees; and (3) individuals serving in limited term and limited emergency positions.

When a department or agency, for example, converts an employee from an appointed (noncareer) position to a career position without any apparent change in duties and responsibilities, or the new position appears to have been tailored to the individual’s knowledge and experience, such actions may invite scrutiny. OPM, on an ongoing basis, and GAO, periodically, conduct oversight related to conversions of employees from noncareer to career positions to ensure that proper procedures have been followed. More here from FAS.

 

There Already is a Registry Database, NSEERS Kinda

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It is called NSEERS.

There is an entry and exit program managed by the Department of Homeland Security….well they maintain it but don’t use it to remove people…but it does exist to the point of a backlog of 1.6 million and it actually a Visa Overstay system.

Thank you GW Bush, as NSEERS was launched in 2002 and used to collect names, backgrounds and locations of people that were inside the United States that would pose a threat and cause additional harm to the homeland. The Bush administration earnestly applied all elements of this program and performed thousands of deportations as well as criminal investigations on violators or those connected to nefarious groups and organization. By the end of the calendar year 2002, 3,995 wanted criminals had been arrested attempting to cross into the United States. 

The 9/11 Commission Report dedicated an entire chapter to immigration and the flaws. Many of the hijackers were in the United States illegally. Okay, then the 9/11 Commission also made stout recommendations of which everyone in Congress agreed to and signed. Then a few years later, those agreements began to fall apart on the Democrat side and continue to be forgotten today.

So, Obama Should Pardon ‘Dreamer’ Immigrants, Democrats Say

Bloomberg: A group of House Democrats called on President Barack Obama to pardon about 750,000 young undocumented immigrants who are temporarily shielded from deportation under a 2012 executive order, a move that reflects growing concern about a shift in immigration policy expected after President-elect Donald Trump takes power in January. More here.

*****

Back to that database.

Then the Obama administration decided there were legal challenges to its application and use.

GAO had previously reported that, as of January 2011, DHS had a backlog of 1.6 million unmatched arrival records that had not been reviewed through automated or manual processes. DHS tracks arrivals and departures and closes records for individuals with matching arrival and departure records. Unmatched arrival records indicate that the individual is a potential overstay. In 2011, DHS reviewed this backlog of 1.6 million records, closed about 863,000 records, and removed them from the backlog. As new unmatched arrival records have accrued, DHS has continued to review all of these new records for national security and public safety concerns. As of June 2013, DHS’s unmatched arrival records totaled more than 1 million. More here from the 2013 report.

The Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties was asked to take a hard look at the NSEERS program and they made some deletions with the approval of Secretary Jeh Johnson in 2011.

DHS Removes Designated Countries from NSEERS Registration (May 2011)

As part of the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties‘ (CRCL) outreach efforts, we have translated the following announcement into Arabic, Bengali, Farsi, French, Pashto and Urdu.

DHS announced the removal of the list of countries whose nationals have been subject to registration under the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS)—effectively ending the NSEERS registration process through the publication of a notice in the Federal Register.

DHS and the U.S. government have conducted roundtables, meetings, and town halls with our community partners around the nation, regarding the NSEERS process. NSEERS was first implemented in 2002 as a temporary measure in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and was designed to record the arrival, stay, and departure of certain individuals from countries chosen based on an analysis of possible national security threats. The NSEERS registration required approximately 30 minutes in secondary inspection, per person, per arrival; and NSEERS registrants were also required to register upon departure at one of the 118 designated ports of departure, limiting travel flexibility.

So for the year 2015, DHS issued an Entry/Exit Overstay Report and the real change in word definitions began to change.

An overstay is a nonimmigrant who was lawfully admitted to the United States for an authorized period but stayed or remains in the United States beyond his or her lawful admission period. DHS identifies two types of overstays—those individuals for whom no departure has been recorded (Suspected In-Country Overstay) and those individuals whose departure was recorded after their lawful admission period expired (Out-of-Country Overstay). The overstay identification process is conducted through arrival, departure and immigration status information, consolidated to generate a complete picture of individuals traveling to the United States.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) collects biographic information on all nonimmigrant arrivals to the United States through an inspection by a CBP officer. In the air and sea environment, CBP officers validate the manifest information provided by commercial and private aircraft operators. For many nonimmigrants, submission of biometric information is also required upon admission and is captured in the presence of a CBP officer.1 In addition, CBP has strengthened the document requirements at air, land, and sea Ports of Entry (POEs) by reducing the number of accepted travel documents one may use to enter the United States, 2 which in turn has increased CBP’s ability to quickly and accurately collect information on arriving aliens, particularly at the land borders.

The United States did not build its border, aviation, and immigration infrastructure with exit processing in mind. Consequently, United States airports do not have designated areas exclusively for travelers leaving the United States. Instead, departures of travelers are recorded biographically using outbound passenger manifests provided by commercial carriers. Under regulations governing the Advance Passenger Information System, carriers are required to validate the manifest information against the travel document being presented before a traveler is permitted to board their aircraft or sea vessel.

In the land environment, travelers arrive at land POEs via various modes of transportation, including cars, trains, buses, ferries, bicycles, trucks, and on foot. There are major physical infrastructure, logistical, and operational hurdles to collect an individual’s biographic and biometric data upon departure. Due to the existing limitations in collecting departure data in the land environment, this report does not include departure and overstay information from those travelers who entered the United States through a land POE. CBP is addressing these limitations through various efforts, including increased information sharing and partnerships, targeted operations, analyzing land POE departure traffic, and several pilots to experiment with innovative means of collecting biometric information from individuals departing via land POEs.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) anticipates the ability to provide a broader scope of data in future Entry/Exit Overstay Reports. Efforts by CBP, as described in this report, are ongoing and will continue to improve the existing process and availability of departure data.

In January 2012, CTCEU initiated the use of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) in support of its Overstay Program to screen overstays by identifying potential matches to derogatory intelligence community holdings.

FY 2015 only, the Department determined that there were a total of 44,928,381 nonimmigrant admissions to the United States for business or pleasure through air or sea POEs that were expected to depart in FY 2015. Of this number, the Department calculated a total overstay rate of 1.17 percent, or 527,127 individuals. In other words, 98.83 percent had left the United States on time and abided by the terms of their admission.

At the end of FY 2015, Suspected In-Country Overstays were 482,781 individuals, with a Suspected In-Country Overstay rate of 1.07 percent. This data indicates that 98.93 percent had departed the United States or transitioned to a lawful immigration status.

If you can stand reading the report and how the numbers are filtered and sifted, go here.

 

Afghanistan Wasted our $$ and now 45,000 al Qaeda Fighters

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UNITED NATIONS –  U.N. experts say fighters loyal to al-Qaida have taken on a more active supporting role for the Taliban during the current offensive in Afghanistan while the position of the Islamic State extremist group in the country “has distinctly weakened.”

In a report to the Security Council circulated Friday, the experts said the Afghan government and several other countries estimate that there are about 45,000 opposition fighters in Afghanistan and between 20 and 25 percent are foreigners.

It said these “bad actors … mutually reinforced each other and presented a significant and rising terrorist challenge.”

The experts said several governments highlighted that relations between the Taliban and al-Qaida strengthened during the time Akhtar Mansour led the Taliban and the improved relations have continued under his successor, Haibatullah Akhundzada.

FNC: Welcome to the Hotel Kabul, where you can’t check in anytime you like.

In December 2006, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), the U.S. government’s development finance institution, approved a proposal to build a 209-room, five-star hotel and an apartment building across the street from the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan.

The Marriott Kabul Hotel and the adjacent apartment building would provide a gateway for Afghans returning to their country and would be a major boost to the nation’s post-war reconstruction efforts, proponents said.

But today, 10 years later, all that’s there is an empty shell — a ghost hotel.

Hotel Kabul1

Special Inspector General John Sopko, who investigates cases of fraud and waste from the Afghan reconstruction, recently toured the unfinshed facility in Kabul. (SIGAR)

US TAXPAYERS MADE MILLIONAIRES OUT OF AFGHAN GANGSTERS, WARLORDS AND CONNECTED CLASS

Hotel Kabul4

Once touted as a gateway for returning Afghans and a major boost to post-war reconstruction efforts the Marriott Kabul Hotel was never completed and sits vacant and crumbling. (SIGAR)

DOD SPENT $150M ON PRIVATE VILLAS FOR ‘HANDFUL’ OF EMPLOYEES IN AFGHANISTAN

Now an investigation by the Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has determined that nearly $85 million in investments have gone down the drain, thanks to “troubling management practices and lax oversight” at the site of the project.

And that’s not all. SIGAR says American taxpayers have spent thousands, if not millions, of dollars more on security because of the abandoned project’s proximity to the embassy.

Hotel Kabul2

Over $80 million was spent on the hotel and an adjacent luxury apartment building which was also never finished. (SIGAR)

“The Marriott Hotel Kabul is emblematic of our reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan,” Special Inspector General John Sopko told FoxNews.com. “Great ideas, tons of money, poor execution and no oversight create incredible opportunities for fraud.”

One month after it received the proposal, OPIC approved an initial loan of $60 million to build the hotel. It ultimately made three loan payments totaling $58 million for the hotel, plus a $27 million loan in 2011 for the construction of the luxury apartment building.

“The Marriott Hotel Kabul is emblematic of our reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan. Great ideas, tons of money, poor execution, and no oversight create incredible opportunities for fraud.”

– Special Inspector General John Sopko

Hotel construction began in early 2009 after the first loan payment, and OPIC received status reports after its subsequent payments. But in 2013, after the construction company delivered its fourth and final report, it notified OPIC that it was stopping all work on the project due to what they claimed were “security issues.” Since then, due to the site’s vacant status and proximity to the U.S. Embassy, it has been deemed a security threat and has been guarded by embassy personnel, on the taxpayers’ dime.

In August, SIGAR inspectors toured the abandoned worksite and found structural cracks in the roof, damaged fireproofing on beams and columns, sections of walls that were demolished, uninstalled doors and windows and incomplete water and electrical systems.

“As a result, the $85 million in loans is gone, the buildings were never completed and are uninhabitable, and the U.S. Embassy is now forced to provide security for the site at additional cost to U.S. taxpayers,” Sopko recently wrote to OPIC’s president and CEO, Elizabeth L. Littlefield.

“While our investigation of these two projects and a third OPIC project in Afghanistan is ongoing, we believe the issues raised by these loans have broader implications which deserve your immediate attention.

“The failure to properly manage and oversee these loans may indicate systemic problems in the management and oversight of OPIC loans for other projects in Afghanistan and elsewhere around the world, putting additional millions of dollars at risk.”

The SIGAR inspectors accused OPIC of not doing enough to monitor the construction on-site and taking the builder’s status reports at face value.

“OPIC accepted either invoices or receipts as proof to demonstrate how the loan proceeds had been spent,” they wrote. “However, without on-site verification of activities and progress, neither the invoices nor receipts required by OPIC provided sufficient evidence to support purported purchases.”

WAR ON WASTE: PENTAGON AUDITOR SPOTLIGHTS US BILLIONS BLOWN IN AFGHANISTAN

In a statement provided to FoxNews.com, OPIC said it is working on resolving the issue.

“In 2006 when OPIC started work on this project, the U.S. government was focused on economic development in Afghanistan to advance both its foreign policy and national security objectives,” OPIC wrote. “The hotel and residences projects were intended to host business leaders, foreign ministers and investors seeking to improve the long-term success of Afghanistan’s economy. The timing, location and purpose of this investment is fully consistent with OPIC’s mission.

“Since OPIC supports American investors operating in the world’s toughest markets, at times it must work with borrowers to navigate unique challenges. This project is no exception. OPIC continues to work to bring resolution to this project.”

SIGAR has asked OPIC to increase its oversight practices for future large-scale construction projects and to try to recoup the loans associated with the hotel project.

**** Maybe the Taliban and al Qaeda can share the space eh?

At least 45,000 opposition forces are operating in Afghanistan with foreign insurgents comprising around 20 to 25 of the forces, the United Nations experts have said.

The experts informed regarding the estimated number of the insurgents as they presented a report to the United Nations Security Council on Friday.

According to the report, the Taliban militants group’s relations with the Al-Qaeda terrorist network have strengthened, specifically during the Mullah Akhtar Mansoor times.

The report further added that the relations between Taliban and Al-Qaeda are still persisting since the new Taliban leader assumed charge of the group after Mullah’s Mansoor’s death.

The report also added that the position of the loyalists of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group has distinctly weakened in the country.

This comes as the regional countries are concerned the attempts by the terrorist groups to expand foothold in Afghanistan as they fear the growing instability could further destabilize the region.

The Russian Presidential envoy to Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov estimated earlier this year that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group has 10,000 loyalists in Afghanistan.

Kabulov who is also director of the Second Asian Department at the Russian Foreign Ministry has said the terror group is expanding its military activity in Afghanistan.

“The IS activity has grown significantly in Afghanistan since summer 2014. The group numerical strength is estimated at 10,000 people,” Kabulov said.

However, the Afghan forces launched a major offensive in eastern Nangarhar province of Afghanistan to eliminate the loyalists of the terror group as efforts were underway by the terror group to turn the province into a regional operational base.

The US forces based in Afghanistan also conduct regular airstrikes against the ISIS loyalists, Taliban insurgents, and Al-Qaeda terrorist network in the country, killing the top Al-Qaeda leader in the region in Kunar province last month.