Global Fed Bashing Casts Shadow Over G-20
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Growing criticism of U.S. Federal Reserve policy is fueling global tensions as leaders of the world’s largest economies prepare to meet in South Korea Wednesday.
Last week the Fed announced it would pump another $600 billion into the U.S. economy through the purchase of long-term Treasuries, a move known as quantitative easing, or “QE2,” since it is the second round of such purchases.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Frank Gaffney: Politicizing the Pentagon
It’s bad enough that precious Pentagon resources are being expended supporting and securing President Obama’s pasha-like excursion to India and other Asian nations this month. After all, such expenditures come at a time when the defense budget is being dramatically cut — even as wartime operations continue in two countries.
Team Obama is simultaneously undertaking what is, arguably, an even more egregious assault on the armed forces: politicizing them in the interest of advancing a rank partisan purpose — appeasing homosexual activists who seek to make major progress on their broader political agenda by obtaining repeal of the 1993 law that prohibits them from serving in the military.
President Obama and his allies insist that that law — which is incessantly and incorrectly called “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the nickname for a Clinton-era Defense Department regulation that was intended to undermine the statute by allowing gays to serve as long as they kept their sexual preferences a secret — is a throw-back to an by-gone era. In a way they are right…
| — Hat tip: CSP | [Return to headlines] |
Missile Shot Off Los Angeles Still a Mystery for Pentagon Officials
A video that appears to show a missile launch off the coast of California is so far “unexplained” by anyone in the military, a Pentagon spokesman told reporters Tuesday morning
Col. Dave Lapan said he is not able to concur with an official from North American Aerospace Defense Command/U.S. Northern Command who told Fox News earlier that there was “no threat to the homeland.”
Lapan said the military doesn’t know exactly what the so-called mystery missile was so can’t say it’s harmless.
A local CBS affiliate in Los Angeles on Monday evening captured on video the image of the “spectacular” projectile flying about 35 miles out to sea, west of Los Angeles and north of Catalina Island.
The Missile Defense Agency told Fox News it did not launch any test missile Monday night that could explain the dramatic images. The Navy and the Air Force were also unable to offer an explanation.
Lapan said it does not appear that whatever was flying was part of a “regularly scheduled missile test.” He noted that before a missile test, notifications are sent to mariners and airmen. This does not appear to be the case here.
At this point, the military is working only with video taken from the local news camera, and NORAD and Northcom apparently were not able to detect the contrail on their own.
It appears from the video, Lapan said, the object was launched from the water and not U.S. soil, though at this point there is no way to be certain.
If a test missile or an accidental missile was launched in the region it would have either come from Naval Air Station Point Mugu or Vandenberg Air Force Base. At sea it could have come from a U.S. submarine or a surface ship. But so far, it all remains a mystery.
| — Hat tip: Wally Ballou | [Return to headlines] |
Mystery Missile Launch Seen Off Calif. Coast
Military Mum on Nature of “Big Missile” Rising Out of Pacific
(CBS) A mysterious missile launch off the southern California coast was caught by CBS affiliate KCBS’s cameras Monday night, and officials are staying tight-lipped over the nature of the projectile.
CBS station KFMB put in calls to the Navy and Air Force Monday night about the striking launch off the coast of Los Angeles, which was easily visible from the coast, but the military has said nothing about the launch.
KFMB showed video of the apparent missile to former U.S. Ambassador to NATO Robert Ellsworth, who is also a former Deputy Secretary of Defense, to get his thoughts.
Scroll down for KFMB video showing the launch.
“It’s spectacular… It takes people’s breath away,” said Ellsworth, calling the projectile, “a big missile”.
Magnificent images were captured by the KCBS news helicopter in L.A. around sunset Monday evening. The location of the missile was about 35 miles out to sea, west of L.A. and north of Catalina Island.
A Navy spokesperson told KFMB it wasn’t their missile. He said there was no Navy activity reported in the area Monday evening.
On Friday night, Vandenberg Air Force Base, in California, launched a Delta II rocket, carrying an Italian satellite into orbit, but a sergeant at the base told KFMB there had been no launches since then.
Ellsworth urged American to wait for definitive answers to come from the military.
When asked, however, what he thought it might be, the former ambassador said it could possibly have been a missile test timed as a demonstration of American military might as President Obama tours Asia.
“It could be a test-firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile from a submarine … to demonstrate, mainly to Asia, that we can do that,” speculated Ellsworth.
Ellsworth said such tests were carried out in the Atlantic to demonstrate America’s power to the Soviets, when there was a Soviet Union, but he doesn’t believe an ICBM has previously been tested by the U.S. over the Pacific.
Officially, at least, the projectile remains a mystery missile.
| — Hat tip: DS | [Return to headlines] |
Somali Gangs Trafficked Girls for Sex
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Twenty-nine people have been indicted in a sex trafficking ring in which Somali gangs in Minneapolis and St. Paul allegedly forced girls under age 14 into prostitution in Minnesota, Tennessee and Ohio, according to an indictment unsealed Monday.
The 24-count indictment, unsealed in U.S. District Court in the Middle District of Tennessee, said one of the gangs’ goals was recruiting females under age 18, including some under age 14, and forcing them into prostitution so the defendants could get money, marijuana or liquor.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Soros Group Wants Obama to Rule by Executive Order
Organization cites mid-terms, claims progressives registered victory
NEW YORK — It was progressives who won the mid-term elections, particularly incumbents in a socialist-founded congressional caucus that emerged from last week’s ballots virtually unscathed, boasted an article published by the George Soros-funded Institute for Policy Studies, a Marxist-oriented think-tank in Washington, D.C.
The article recommends that President Obama govern from executive order to push through a progressive agenda.
“Progressives won in the 2010 mid-term elections,” wrote Karen Dolan, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, or IPS, and director of the Cities for Progress and Cities for Peace projects based at the radical organization.
“The Congressional Progressive Caucus, the largest caucus in the House Democratic Caucus at over 80 members, emerged virtually unscathed, losing only three members,” she wrote, in the piece published on the IPS website.
[…]
She went on to recommend that progressives “throw our support unabashedly behind the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and let’s push Obama to finally do the right thing through as many Executive Orders as we can present to him.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. Says it Will Tackle Discrimination, Prisons
(Reuters) — The United States promised on Tuesday to tackle racial discrimination and treat prisoners humanely in its jails at home and abroad, in line with recommendations by the U.N. Human Rights Council.
A U.S. delegation, responding to 228 recommendations made by other countries during a U.N. debate last Friday, said that the Obama administration was working to close its detention center for foreign terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and would not tolerate torture anywhere.
But it rejected as “political provocations” recommendations about some judicial cases handled by U.S. courts. These had been raised by ideological foes including Cuba, which called for the release of five Cuban agents convicted of spying.
“While we are humbled by the work that remains, the United States is proud of our record of accomplishments, determined to extend it, and committed to continuing this dialogue,” Harold Hongju Koh, State Department legal adviser, told the council.
The Obama administration will give its formal response to the council at its March session, after U.S. agencies make a full review of the recommendations, he said.
The Geneva forum is gradually reviewing the human rights record of all 192 U.N. members over a four-year period to 2011.
The United States defended itself against criticism of its performance from friend and foe alike last Friday at the council. It joined the body last year, ending a boycott by the administration of Obama’s predecessor, George W. Bush.
“No Stone Unturned”
Many countries and human rights groups criticized the U.S. justice system as disproportionately jailing racial and ethnic minorities. Prison conditions are often inhumane, they said.
“We will leave no stone unturned in our efforts to eliminate racial profiling in law enforcement, to ensure that juveniles in our justice system are treated with respect and to guarantee humane treatment in detention,” Koh said on Tuesday.
The United States was also committed to ensure all qualified voters could participate in elections and would enforce laws to ensure equal access to housing, credit, jobs and education.
“At a time when the U.S. has its first African-American President and Attorney General, a female Secretary of State, our first Hispanic Supreme Court justice and an Arab-American and two Asian-American cabinet members, we see visible progress in our national quest for equality and fair treatment,” said Koh, an American lawyer of Korean origin.
The United States, in its armed conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq and against al Qaeda militants, abides by all applicable law, including those upholding humane treatment, detention and use of force, he said.
“The United States defends the legality under the laws of war of using detention to remove adversaries from the conflict, but does not — and will not — countenance torture or inhumane treatment of detainees in its custody, wherever they are held,” he added.
Jamil Dakwar of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said in a statement that the Justice Department should expand its criminal investigation of torture to include not just the interrogators who mistreated captives, “but the senior Bush administration officials who authorized and facilitated it.”
Bush said in his memoir “Decision Points” which hit bookstores on Tuesday that he approved a tough interrogation technique known as waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning condemned by human rights activists as torture, to try to extract information from al Qaeda operatives. He strongly defended it as critical to efforts to prevent a repeat of the Sept 11, 2001 attacks.
| — Hat tip: KGS | [Return to headlines] |
Brussels’ Archbishop Gets a Pie in the Face While the Choir Sings on
[…]
The outspoken conservative prelate has been under fire from his brother bishops, Catholic publications and politicians for weeks for mishandling the Church’s sexual abuse crisis, [for] calling AIDS a kind of punishment for sexual freedom and [for] urging leniency for retired priests accused of sexually abusing minors in the past.
His spokesman quit last Tuesday, saying he could no longer work for a man he compared to someone who drives down a highway against the traffic and believes all the other drivers are wrong.
The series of misfortunes has now reached new heights — or lows — with the news that he got a pie in the face during an All Saints Day service last Monday in the cathedral in Brussels. A young person dressed in black ran up and “pied” him as he stood at a lectern while the choir sang a hymn.
[…]
NOTE: There is a video at the URL. The French word for this ritual pie-in-face is “Entarté”, or in this atory, making the rounds on French and Belgain websites, “ENTARTÉ!!!”
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French Export Drive Threatens to Crush Europe’s Eels
Tiny, slimy — and pricey. This is the glass eel, the baby of the critically endangered European eel. As market prices hit a record $2800 per kilogramme, France has blocked an agreement to stop European exports, crippling efforts to restock Europe’s increasingly eel-less rivers.
Eel numbers have fallen 99 per cent since 1980 because of pollution, overfishing and dams that stop elvers migrating up rivers.
Despite this, wildlife group Traffic reported last week that between 1998 and 2008, Europe exported 2 billion glass eels to stock Chinese eel-fattening farms, and caught a further 2 billion for its own farms.
Last year, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) said trade in eels should be controlled, and government scientists who advise the European Commission on CITES called for zero exports this year. But at a meeting in Brussels, Belgium, last week, France — Europe’s leading exporter — disagreed. As a result, no export quota was set.
This winter, France may resume exporting glass eels — elvers at the stage of leaving the sea, when they are translucent — says Vicki Crook of Traffic. If that happens, the record prices mean not enough eels will be left to restock European rivers.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Police Act to Bust ‘Gypsy-Mafia’ Drug Ring
Catanzaro, 9 Nov. (AKI) — Italian police early Tuesday sought to arrest dozens of members of the Roma Gypsy community in the southern Italy city of Catanzaro in an effort to break up what investigators say is a Gypsy-mafia drug ring.
On the orders of investigators, police conducted raids throughout the city located in the Calabria region. Many of the 70 targets of the pre-dawn operation were women allegedly involved in selling large quantities of cocaine and heroin.
Anti-mafia investigators say their probe has shed light on connections between some members of the Gypsy community and the ‘Ndrangheta, the name for the organised crime web in the Calabria region.
Tens of thousands of Roma Gypsies have entered Italy in the past few years since Slovakia and Romania joined the EU, and are being blamed by many Italians for much of the recent rise in crime rates.
The ‘Ndrangheta is considered the strongest of Italy’s top mafia crime networks that include Sicily’s Cosa Nostra and the Camorra from the Naples area.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Police Arrest 16 Naples Terror Suspects
Rome, 9 Nov. (AKI) — Police in the southern Italian city of Naples on Tuesday arrested 16 people, mainly North Africans, who are suspected of having links to a terrorist cell. Two Italians were among the suspects, sources told Adnkronos. The suspects allegedly provided logistical support to terrorism by abetting illegal immigration, forging and trafficking false documents and counterfeiting bank notes.
“The organised forging documents that abetted illegal immigration made it highly likely that the suspects helped subversive elements,” the source said.
One of the two Italians arrested was ‘specialised’ in forgery, police said. Most of the arrested North Africans were Algerians, Tunisians and Moroccans, according to police.
The arrests were made during a counter-terrorism operation, code named ‘Matmata, carried out by paramilitary Carabinieri police. Police recovered forged driving licences, identity cards and official stamps during raids on dozens of properties.
‘Matmata’ followed an earlier investigation, ‘Full Moon’, which uncovered an a Salafite cell with operatives in Italy’s northern Lombardy and Veneto regions.
‘Full Moon’ led to the arrest of three Algerians and their conviction for terrorist offences.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Large Cardinals: Maths Shaken by the ‘Unprovable’
In the esoteric world of mathematical logic, a dramatic discovery has been made. Previously unnoticed gaps have been found at the very heart of maths. What is more, the only way to repair these holes is with monstrous, mysterious infinities.
To understand them, we must understand what makes mathematics different from other sciences. The difference is proof.
Other scientists spend their time gathering evidence from the physical world and testing hypotheses against it. Pure maths is built using pure deduction.
But proofs have to start somewhere. For all its sophistication, mathematics is not alchemy: we cannot conjure facts from thin air. Every proof must be based on some underlying assumptions, or axioms.
And there we reach a thorny question. Even today, we do not fully understand the ordinary whole numbers 1,2,3,4,5… or the age-old ways to combine them: addition and multiplication.
Over the centuries, mathematicians have arrived at basic axioms which numbers must obey. Mostly these are simple, such as “a+b=b+a for any two numbers a and b”. But when the Austrian logician Kurt Gödel turned his mind to this in 1931, he revealed a hole at the heart of our conception of numbers. His “incompleteness theorems” showed that arithmetic can never have truly solid foundations. Whatever axioms are used, there will always be gaps. There will always be facts about numbers which cannot be deduced from our chosen axioms.
Gödel’s theorems showed that maths meant that mathematicians could not hope to prove every true statement: there would always be “unprovable theorems”, which cannot be deduced from the usual axioms. Most known examples, it’s true, will not change how you add up your shopping bill. For practical purposes, the laws of arithmetic seemed good enough.
However, as revealed in his forthcoming book, Boolean Relation Theory and Concrete Incompleteness, Harvey Friedman has discovered facts about numbers which are far more unsettling. Like Gödel’s unprovable statements, they fall through the gaps between axioms. The difference is that these are no longer artificial curiosities. Friedman’s theorems are “concrete”, meaning they contain genuinely interesting information concerning patterns among the numbers, which must always appear once certain conditions are met. Yet, Friedman has shown, the fact that such patterns always appear does not follow from the usual laws of arithmetic.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Making Muslim Integration Work
Right now, virtually anywhere in Europe, elections can turn on debates over immigration and integration. In Sweden, extreme anti-immigration parties have gained a foothold in parliament for the first time. In Holland, the anti-immigrant and Islamaphobic Party for Freedom is now the third-largest, ahead of the traditional conservative Christian Democrats. In France and Belgium, debate rages over state bans of the veil, and Italy may be next.
In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel recently said that multiculturalism had failed. In the United Kingdom, immigration was a key issue in the last election. Even in Switzerland, voters last year approved a referendum banning minarets, to the surprise of practically the whole European intellectual and political elite.
This is a big and growing issue, and it cannot be understood simply in terms of cultural questions about immigration.
In Pakistan last year, terrorism killed around 3,300 people—more than in Afghanistan. Such violence scars many other countries, including Iraq, Somalia, Yemen and more. In the conflict in Mindanao, in the Philippines, 150,000 have been killed. This violence is bound up with all sorts of political and regional disputes, but it feeds into the European alarm that immigration, terrorism, religious faith and ethnicity are all dimensions of the same problem.
The danger, certainly in Europe, is very clear. Especially in tough economic times, this issue can inject division, sectarianism and even racism into societies based on equality. Traditional political parties get trapped. Either they pander, but of course they can never pander enough; or they seem in a state of denial and condemn themselves to the position of out-of-touch elites. The backlash grows. The center ground becomes diminished.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: Wilders Trial ‘A Bit of a Farce’, Say Plaintiffs’ Lawyer
The trial of MP Geert Wilders on charges of inciting hatred and discrimination took a new twist on Monday when a senior court official wrote a weblog entry saying the legal proceedings should not have been suspended.
A special panel at Amsterdam district court halted the trial last month and ordered it start again with new judges because the chief judge had acted in a way which could be prejudicial.
But writing in his own name on the legal blog njblog.nl, high court advocate general Diederik Aben said the case against Wilders should not have been suspended pending the appointment of new judges.
Judge’s request
According to the Telegraaf, he wrote the item at the request of Amsterdam judge Jan Moors, who was at the centre of the controversy.
Wilders’ lawyer Bram Moszkovicz said it was ‘incomprehensible’ that a high court advocate general had made such a statement and said the trial had become a ‘farce’
Gerard Spong, a lawyer representing some of the people taking legal action against Wilders, said Aben was exercising his right to freedom of speech.
Nevertheless, the trial had become ‘a bit of a farce’, Spong said.
Re-start
The trial should be removed from the Amsterdam court and continued elsewhere with new officials, he said.
The public prosecution department, which itself had been forced to take the case by the appeal court, asked for all charges against Wilders to be dismissed.
It is not clear when the trial will now take place.
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Spiegel Interview With Geert Wilders: ‘Merkel is Afraid’
In a SPIEGEL interview, Dutch Islam-opponent Geert Wilders discusses his fight for a Koran ban, why German Chancellor Angela Merkel is running scared on the immigration issue and his belief that the Netherlands’ debate over Muslims has now crossed the border into Germany.
SPIEGEL: Mr. Wilders, you are said to be the strong man behind the new Dutch government because the minority cabinet depends on your support in parliament. Why is your party, 65 years after the Holocaust, relying on outdated approaches — on religious and racial exclusion?
Wilders: We do not support religious exclusion — and certainly not racial exclusion. We have no problems with other skin colors, nor with Muslims — our problem is with Islam. Indeed, we are expressing exactly what many of our compatriots feel. We became the third strongest party during the elections in June and are now, according to the most recent opinion polls, already the second strongest party in Holland.
SPIEGEL: What do you have against Islam?
Wilders: Europe’s greatest problem — not just today, but already for decades now — is cultural relativism. This has led to a situation today where Europeans no longer know what they should be proud of and who they really are — because a so-called liberal and leftist-imposed concept says that all cultures are the same.
SPIEGEL: The same or equal?
Wilders: It has to do with what is described by the wonderful German word Leitkultur, which means “dominant” or “guiding” culture. I think that we should be proud that our culture is better than Islamic culture, for instance. Anyone who says this is not a racist, Nazi or xenophobe. Those are labels that have been put on many people in the Netherlands, Germany and England — just because we believe that Islam is a totalitarian and violent ideology. More of an ideology than a religion, comparable to communism and fascism. Islam threatens our freedom.
SPIEGEL: You maintain that Dutch culture is better than the culture of Islamic countries. Why do you consciously seize upon comparisons that degrade other religions?
Wilders: Anyone who compares the traditions of Judaism, Christianity and humanism with those of Islam doesn’t have to be an Einstein to see the difference. Do you know of a country in the Middle East where Islamic culture prevails and where there is a genuine constitutional state and independent journalism? Where non-believers, women and gays can do what they want? In the West people have given their lives for the freedoms that we enjoy today.
SPIEGEL: You do not acknowledge that cultures and religions can be changed by people. Isn’t that exactly how it was with the Catholic Church?
Wilders: Yes, but how long did it take? I am not saying that I want to ban Islam. I want less Islam in Europe — because it doesn’t allow any room for debate. By contrast, take Judaism and the life in the yeshivas: That is where they debate how the Talmud should be interpreted. With the Koran, however, anyone who does not believe every word is an infidel. And the punishment for that is well known: death.
SPIEGEL: You live around-the-clock with bodyguards and sleep in a heavily guarded residential complex owned by the government. When do you actually meet the people whose interests you claim to advocate?
Wilders: I take part in election campaigns. I show myself on the streets. That is nevertheless, admittedly, a strange sight: There are more police officers around me than you can count.
SPIEGEL: A costly burden for Dutch taxpayers.
Wilders: True. But the alternative would be that a democratically elected politician like myself, who has never threatened anyone with death, can no longer appear in public. In the struggle for the freedom of the Dutch people, I have lost my own freedom. I know that there can be no normal life for me, neither today nor tomorrow. But that is the price that has to be paid.
‘What We Have Witnessed Here Is Now Occurring in Your Country’
SPIEGEL: You are one of the most despised politicians in Europe. But in reality you love it when your arguments create a stir.
Wilders: People love or hate me; there is no gray area. My party and I are a threat to the political elite in many countries. But they will not stop us. Take a look at German Chancellor Angela Merkel who is now trying to create a copy.
SPIEGEL: A copy of your policies as you have just maintained, in all seriousness?
Wilders: Merkel is afraid — because there are opinion polls which show that a charismatic figure, if one were to emerge in Germany as I have done in the Netherlands, could count on 20 percent of the vote. I mean a figure without a far right-wing background — in other words, not from the Republikaner (REP) or the National Democratic Party (NPD). This represents a threat to the mainstream political parties, which is why they are now trying to copy us: Merkel has declared that the multicultural society has failed.
SPIEGEL: She also said that Islam belongs to Germany — and that we need additional immigration.
Wilders: Yes, but I have never heard her say before that the multicultural society has failed. And the majority of Germans reject the statement by German President Christian Wulff that Islam is part of Germany. This means that what we have already witnessed here in Holland is now occurring in your country as well — the political elite is in turmoil.
SPIEGEL: Who are you thinking of in particular?
Wilders: The head of Germany’s conservative Christian Social Union (CSU), Horst Seehofer, not only says that the multicultural society is dead, but also that he wants no more Turkish and Arab immigrants. If I said the same thing in Holland, I would be taken to court. When I appeared in Berlin in October, nearly half of the German cabinet voiced their objections — isn’t that a sign that the elite there are rattled?
SPIEGEL: You compare the Koran with Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.” Have you read “Mein Kampf”?
Wilders: Yes, but not in its entirety. The Koran has, in any case, more anti-Jewish passages. In principle, these are concoctions with a totalitarian approach, which allows no room for other opinions. Fascism, communism and Islam adhere to the same principle.
SPIEGEL: Your own principle is apparently this: The more drastic the comparison, the more headlines it generates.
Wilders: I don’t need headlines. For me, it’s the truth that matters.
SPIEGEL: The truth is that you are dividing Dutch society: Here in The Hague, nearly half of the residents come from immigrant families, and many of them are Muslims. And you are calling for the Koran to be banned?…
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Sweden: Malmö Shooter Suspect Remanded in Custody
The 38-year-old man arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder in connection with the shootings in Malmö was formally remanded into custody by the city’s district court on Tuesday.
The man, named as Peter Mangs by the Expressen daily on Tuesday, is suspected of murder and five cases of attempted murder. He denied all charges in the hearing at lunchtime on Tuesday.
There was massive interest in the case at the court, with up to 70 people attending the hearing which was held in the court’s security chamber, including journalists from Denmark, Norway and Finland.
Mangs was driven by car to the hearing with a street behind the court cordoned off and a large number of police officers in attendance.
The prosecutor asked for non-disclosure, which is a more stringent restriction than confidentiality of investigations and meaning that details of court proceedings may not be revealed.
The court ruled that Mangs should be remanded into custody on probable cause — the highest level of suspicion under Swedish police guidelines.
According to Expressen, police have concluded after tests that at least one of the weapons licensed to Mangs matches bullet fragments found at one or more of the shootings of which he is suspected.
Skåne police spokesperson, Ewa-Gun Westford, declined to confirm the report.
Prosecutor Solveig Wollstad confirmed at a press conference on Tuesday afternoon that suspicions against the man had strengthened and that he remains suspected for a further two attempted murders which were not addressed in the remand hearing.
Wollstad added that she was required to bring charges before November 23rd, but added that this would not happen and that an extension of the remand ruling would be sought.
Peter Mangs was arrested on Saturday after a tip from a member of the public. Police have confirmed only his age, that he “has a Swedish background” and that he does not have any previous criminal convictions.
A possible motive for the attacks has not been released by the police, but Mangs’ father was quoted by the Aftonbladet daily on Monday as saying that his son “lived in fear of immigrants taking over Swedish society.”
Police are working on up to 20 unsolved shootings that they believe may have been deliberately targeting people with immigrant backgrounds in the city. The suspect has been remanded in connection with six of the cases.
The murder occurred on October 10th 2009, when 20-year-old Trez Persson. The five attempted murders occurred, according to court documents, from October 10th 2009 to August 2010.
Malmö police have issued calls to the public to assist with information pertaining to the case.
The announcement spread panic in the city and a connection was quickly established with the case of an immigrant-shooting sniper in Stockholm in the early 1990s nicknamed “Laser Man.”
“Laser Man” was the nickname given to John Ausonius, who shot 11 people of immigrant origin, killing one, around Stockholm from August 1991 to January 1992.
Ausonius, who got his nickname by initially using a rifle equipped with a laser sight, was sentenced to life behind bars in 1994 and remains in prison.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Iceman’s Last Stand
The story of a famous corpse gets a surprising twist
It is one of the most evocative ancient corpses ever discovered: a 46-year-old man with an arrow wound in his left shoulder, whose body and belongings came to rest in a high mountain pass some 5,000 years ago. Ever since hikers first spotted the remains of Ötzi the Iceman, as he is known, emerging from the melting ice in the Ötztal Alps near the Austrian-Italian border in 1991, scientists have been working to determine how he died and what he was doing in such a remote spot. The leading theory holds that he had fled there and froze to death after being shot with a bow and arrow during a skirmish with members of a rival tribe. A new study challenges this disaster scenario and suggests instead that the Iceman died in a fight in the valley below and was later transported to the lofty locale for a grand ceremonial send-off.
A team of Italian and American researchers reached this conclusion after analyzing the distribution of the Iceman’s personal effects, which include a backpack and other items traditionally construed as mountaineering equipment. They reasoned that if he died in or near the place where he was found and had been carrying his possessions when he died, then the melting and freezing cycles should have distributed the artifacts in a random pattern all around his body. In fact, the distribution pattern they found showed two distinct clusters of artifacts, one near some stone slabs, which they interpret as the remnants of a burial platform, and another in the nearby depression where the hikers found the Iceman’s body. The study suggests that his body and bulky accoutrements were deposited precisely on the small stone platform and later borne by flowing water to the depression. Furthermore, the unfinished weapons and grass mat that accompanied the Iceman are better explained as grave goods and a funeral shroud than as mountaineering gear. Earlier pollen analyses also indicated a delay between the time of death and burial. Taking this evidence together, the investigators propose that the Iceman passed away at low altitude in the spring and that his clansmen packed his body in ice until late summer, when they carried him up the mountain for a final farewell. Luca Bondioli of the National Museum of Prehistory and Ethnology in Rome and his colleagues described the results of their study in the journal Antiquity.
Not everyone is so sure about these conclusions. Klaus Oeggl of the University of Innsbruck in Austria notes that the team has not supplied convincing evidence that the stone slabs represent a burial platform and that subsequent pollen tests have failed to uphold the original signal indicating a late summer burial. He agrees that a ritual of some kind would explain the presence of unfinished artifacts at the site but maintains that the disaster theory remains the best explanation. Still, he remarks, the new study is stimulating because it is the first to discuss the burial hypothesis extensively.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Faith Healer ‘Died Under Torture’
A faith healer found dead in Bedfordshire had been stabbed and beaten and salt rubbed in his wounds, a jury has heard.
The body of Alfusaine Jabbi, 22, was found in Luton’s Leagrave park in 2006.
Rubina Maroof, 30, who lived in Pembroke Avenue, Luton, at the time of Mr Jabbi’s death, denies murder and conspiracy to imprison Mr Jabbi.
Prosecutors have told Luton Crown Court he was tortured to make him repay money he had charged Ms Maroof.
Pathologist Nicholas Hunt said Mr Jabbi died from a loss of blood and internal bleeding caused by a combination of beatings and a stab wound.
“He had lost about half the blood circulating in the body, it was a very significant blood loss.”
‘Severe pain’
The court heard bruising to the back of his thighs would have required the kind of force similar to a road crash or a fall from a considerable height.
There was also bruising to his shins and other parts of his body, and evidence that his wrists had been bound.
Dr Hunt said salt was also found at the injury sites.
“The blows to the front of the shins were delivered deliberately to cause severe pain and the stab wound was to a very sensitive area of the body.
“I would expect the assault to have been very painful,” he said.
He told the court he could not give an exact time on how long it would have taken Mr Jabbi to die, but he “would not expect it to be rapid”.
The jury has heard from prosecutor Frances Oldham QC, who said Mr Jabbi was able to persuade vulnerable clients to part with large sums of money in return for his services.
She said these included promising to sacrifice camels in the Gambia and rituals involving wrapping sums of cash in clean underwear.
“We say that Rubina Maroof had given him a lot of money as a client and that money was needed back,” he said.
The trial continues.
| — Hat tip: GB | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Get Used to Cattle Class: MPs Warn Rail Commuters Face ‘Intolerable’ Overcrowding by 2014
Rail passengers face years of worsening ‘cattle-truck’ conditions despite soaring fares, a parliamentary watchdog warned today.
MPs say available space on trains could fall by up to a third, forcing rush-hour commuters to endure even worse levels of overcrowding.
They will face more ‘standing room only’ journeys, despite ticket prices increasing above the rate of inflation, warns a report by the all-party Public Accounts Committee.
MPs say the Office of Rail Regulation has failed to take control of the problem over the past decade.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Lutfur Rahman Council Promotes Extremist Preacher Who Supports Wife-Beating
Two weeks after the extremist-backed politician, Lutfur Rahman, became mayor of Tower Hamlets, his council has placed CDs of sermons by an extremist Islamic preacher in its Town Hall.
The preacher, Abdur Raheem Green, has stated that “Islam is not compatible with democracy.” He also says that a husband has the right to administer “some type of physical force… a very light beating” to his wife, to prevent her from committing “evil.” There is, of course, a considerable irony here. You may remember that Lutfur won the mayoralty with the help of smear literature falsely claiming that his Labour opponent was… a wife-beater.
The CDs are being handed out to council workers and visitors as part of an official council-sanctioned display mounted in the Town Hall reception area from last week by an organisation called One Reason. Two councillors have been given them and have passed them to me.
One Reason’s website includes a link allowing you to order the Green CD and a clip of one of Green’s sermons. The YouTube link from One Reason’s homepage connects to the YouTube channel of an organisation called iERA, whose advisers include
- Green;
- Bilal Philips, described by the US an “unindicted co-conspirator” in the 1993 al-Qaeda attack on the World Trade Center;
- Zakir Naik, banned from the UK for saying that “every Muslim should be a terrorist;”
- Haitham al-Haddad, who believes that music is a “prohibited and fake message of love and peace;” and
- Hamza Andreas Tzortzis, another man with extremist connections.
Several of these people have also preached at the hardline East London Mosque, the chaps whose backing for Lutfur has proved so important in his political career.
As I showed in August, iERA successfully duped the Guardian newspaper into reporting, on the basis of its research, that 75% of people believed Muslims had made a negative contribution to British society (the actual figure was less than half that.) iERA’s agenda, there as elsewhere, is to foster distrust, division and suspicion between communities in much the same way as the BNP.
In a piece I think even he may come to be embarrassed by, another Guardian writer, Dave Hill, today continues his inexplicable one-man effort to whitewash Rahman. Lutfur will, we learn, “reach out to every community” and “lead by example.” He is, we’re told, a “first-class chap” and a “good person.” If only Dave had taken the trouble to look around him when he was waiting in reception for his PR chat, he might have seen just who Lutfur’s council is in fact “reaching out” to.
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
UK: My 13-Year-Old Pupil Swung His Fist at Me and Yelled ‘I’M Gonna Break Your Jaw’: One Teacher Exposes the Wilful Anarchy in Britain’s Wild West Classrooms
To my everlasting shame, I left a teaching job because I was scared of a child. Although he was only 13, Ralph was a well-built boy who was known for taking an irrational dislike to new teachers. Unfortunately, he displayed a greater antagonism towards me than to any of the other five supply teachers at his West Yorkshire school.
Retreating to the back of the class during lessons, he’d proclaim my failings to the other pupils — ‘Mr Carroll stinks of s***’; ‘Sir’s a virgin’; ‘Don’t listen to him. He’s only a supply teacher — he don’t know nothing.’
If I told him to be quiet, he spoke louder; if I ignored him, he laughed. I wished I could send him out, but the head had made it clear that once the pupils were in a classroom, we had to do our best to keep them there.
[…]
And I’d been shocked to discover that almost half of all England’s newly qualified teachers are now leaving the profession within five years.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Measures to Prevent Violent Extremism Come Under Review
A review of policies to prevent extremism will look at prisons, universities and mosques, the Home Secretary has announced.
Theresa May said Lord Carlile, the outgoing terror laws watchdog, would look at the policies launched in the wake of the 7/7 London attacks.
Ministers say a review is needed as the policies are not working as well as they could.
Mrs May also named David Anderson QC as the new reviewer of terrorism laws.
Lord Carlile’s last task as the outgoing watchdog would be to look at the arrests and subsequent release of six men under terrorism laws during the Pope’s visit to the UK.
The government’s policy to prevent violent extremism, commonly known as Prevent, is a key plank of the wider counter-terrorism strategy.
Announcing the review, Mrs May said in a written ministerial statement that there was no question that the UK needed to take steps to deal with the causes as well as the symptoms of terrorism.
But she added: “We want to avoid the mistakes of the previous government. The new Prevent strategy will follow the principles of our counter-terrorism legislation.
“It will be proportionate to the specific challenge we face; it will only do what is necessary to achieve its specific aims; and it will be more effective.”
The review is expected to focus on a number of key areas including work in prisons, universities and how best to enlist Muslim community organisations, such as mosques. It will also look at the role of the police and other bodies.
Lord Carlile will also be asked to look at how domestic Prevent strategies can be joined up with counter-terrorism work overseas.
Mrs May also said that the government’s revised Prevent programmes would be separated from work on community cohesion and integration undertaken by the Department for Communities and Local Government.
‘Stigmatising’ claims In a report last March, the cross-party Communities and Local Government Committee attacked the former government’s approach, saying Prevent had stigmatised and alienated Muslims.
The MPs said that the politices had tainted many local projects that would have been otherwise seen as playing an important role in strengthening communities.
In her first speech on counter-terrorism last week, Mrs May echoed that concern when she pledged that the coalition government would not “securitise our integration strategy”, adding there had to be a new dialogue and relationship between government and Muslim communities.
At the same time, there has been a growing debate in higher education over how to prevent extremists grooming potential recruits on university campuses — although the exact nature of the threat has so far proved difficult to quantify.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Scandal of Lambs to Eid Slaughter
Recent news reports reveal that there has been a surge in the trade of live Irish lambs to the Middle East in the past few weeks as the last of the Muslim festivals, Eid al-Adha, approaches.
Live exporters have drastically increased activity and have been sourcing and purchasing large numbers of lambs over the last two weeks.
Does nobody care?
How can it be morally acceptable to transport large numbers of lambs on journeys of several days simply to satisfy a religious custom of ritual slaughter? Are there no ethical standards in the Irish farming industry at all?
It’s bad enough exporting calves and cattle to European countries but young lambs to the Middle East, where their throats will be slit while fully conscious?
How can this be justified? One treads on delicate ground when questioning any aspect of Muslim culture, but it’s impossible to remain silent when thousands of Irish lambs are subjected to such an appalling fate.
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
‘Wilders is a Fascist’
Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party is a fascist movement. That’s according to Dutch philosopher Rob Riemen in an essay sent to all members of parliament. He says he cannot understand why people are afraid to call a spade a spade.
Up until the 1990s, World War II and the catastrophe of fascism and Nazism were the ultimate moral benchmark in Dutch politics. However, since the debate about immigration and the rise of Geert Wilders, it has become taboo to mention this. Any comparison of Wilders’ anti-Islamic party with fascism was regarded as muddying the waters.
Nonsense, says Rob Riemen, Wilders is simply a fascist.
“I don’t mean that as a term of abuse, it’s an objective historical judgment. There are numerous parallels between fascism then and now. History is there to learn from and, if we don’t, we will make the same mistakes.”
Crisis
Rob Riemen is the founder of the prestigious Nexus Institute which organises symposia each year at which leading thinkers like Jürgen Habermass and Francis Fukoyama examine the major issues of our time. His essay is entitled The Eternal Recurrence of Fascism.
According to Riemen fascism is not a genuine ideology with a vision of how society should be organised. It’s a political technique, a way of dealing with certain symptoms of crisis in society. It is characterised by appeals to feelings of unease — fear, loathing and hatred. It always identifies a scapegoat — Jews, blacks, Muslims — who are them blamed for everything. There is always a charismatic leader too and the movement is anti-democratic and anti-elitist.
Geert Wilders, he says, meets all these criteria.
“What you can clearly see with Wilders is the cultivation fo feelings of unease and fear in society. Societal unease is blamed on a single scapegoat, Muslims. He is also an authoritarian, charismatic leader who has little time for democracy. As with the fascists in the 1930s, the Freedom Party is more a movement than a party and Wilders avoids all debate with his opponents outside of parliament.”…
| [Return to headlines] |
EU Scraps Visa Requirements for Albania and Bosnia
Albania and Bosnia are soon to join other Balkan countries in enjoying visa-free travel to the European Union, EU interior ministers announced Monday. The ministers also discussed plans to tighten air cargo security.
Interior ministers of the European Union’s 27 member states unanimously agreed on Monday to eliminate visa requirements for citizens of Albania and Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Under the agreement, Albanians and Bosnians with biometric passports would be able to travel to the 25 EU nations in the border-free Schengen zone, which excludes Ireland and the United Kingdom, for up to three months.
The decision came after France, Germany and the Netherlands expressed concerns that there could be an increase in unfounded asylum claims from the two countries.
The EU got rid of visa requirements for Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia late last year, apparently leading to an influx of asylum seekers from Serbia and Macedonia.
European Commission could roll back decision
The ministers stipulated that the European Commission could “propose the suspension of visa-free travel” if it felt that citizens of the two countries were abusing the system.
“It is of the utmost importance that Albania and Bosnia-Herzegovina continue to intensify their information campaign with the aim to properly explain to their citizens the meaning of short-term visa-free travel,” Cecilia Malmstrom, EU commissioner for home affairs, said in a statement. “A visa-free regime also comes with responsibilities.”
Malmstrom said the European Parliament and the bloc’s member states must still approve the proposal, and that it could enter into force as early as mid-December.
It would leave Kosovo, whose independence is not recognized by all EU states, as the only Balkan country without visa-free travel in the EU.
Both Bosnia and Albania hope to join the EU, but face years of tough democratic reforms before they will likely be able to do so…
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Europe Eyes Security Threat in Balkan Weapons
BELGRADE/SARAJEVO: Security experts concerned that the next militant attack in Europe could be a Mumbai-style commando raid are looking at the Balkans as a likely place for them to find weapons quietly and efficiently.
Western governments and intelligence sources have stepped up warnings recently of preparations for attacks in Europe and the United States, and said the attackers might emulate the 2008 assault on Mumbai’s financial district in which 166 were killed.
Experts have said strict gun controls, heavy surveillance of miltant groups and police penetration of crime gangs are deterrents to buying weapons in most of Europe, but noted that a gap remains — in the Balkans.
“The smallest problem for terrorists is to get weapons and ammunition here,” Adem Huskic, a member of Bosnia’s central parliament commission for security and defence, told Reuters.
Millions of pieces of small arms and ammunition remain unaccounted for since the collapse of the former communist Yugoslav army and a decade of wars in the 1990s.
“Between 1991 and 1999, almost everyone in war zones had a weapon, issued with little or no control,” said a Belgrade-based businessman and a former weapons trader with the now-defunct state-run ZINVOJ military industrial conglomerate.
In addition, thousands of pieces of unexploded ordnance and millions of landmines remain on former frontlines or are held by individuals in the Balkans after successive 20th-century wars.
The region’s gun culture and its many organised crime gangs also help to make it a potential source of arms for militants.
“I’m sure the Balkans could be a good source of assault rifles, as indeed they have been for all sorts of other weaponry over the years,” Peter Clarke, former head of the London Metropolitan Police’s Anti-Terrorism Branch, told Reuters.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
It’s Come to This: Muslim Website Selling “Virginity Capsule”…
It’s a vaginal suppository capsule full of red dye that simulates blood, it’s sad but something so simple can save a woman’s life in the Islamic world…
[…]
According to Elaph.com (Arabic), a capsule is being sold in Arab communities in the Middle East — including in Israel — that is inserted vaginally before the wedding night. It then explodes, giving off a red dye that resembles blood, thus potentially saving the woman’s life, as well as her reputation.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Raps Israeli Plans for 1,300 Jewish Settler Homes
US President Barack Obama has criticised Israeli plans to build some 1,300 settler homes in East Jerusalem.
Speaking in Indonesia, he said neither the Israelis nor the Palestinians were making the extra effort needed for a breakthrough in stalled peace talks.
The chief Palestinian negotiator has urged the international community to recognise a Palestinian state in response to Israel’s latest plans.
The row over settlements has caused the re-launched peace talks to break down.
The Palestinians are refusing to go back to the negotiations without a stop to settlement building on the territory they want as their future state.
Constructing settlements on occupied Palestinian land is illegal under international law, but Israel disputes this.
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas has previously floated the idea of going to the United Nations to declare statehood as one option if peace talks collapse, but only after seeking support from Washington.
‘Not helpful’ Speaking in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, President Obama said Israeli settlement building was “never helpful when it comes to peace negotiations”.
“I’m concerned that we’re not seeing each side make the extra effort involved to get a breakthrough that could finally create a framework for a secure Israel living side by side in peace with a sovereign Palestine,” he added.
The Palestinians meanwhile, said the world must recognise Palestinian statehood in response to Israel’s decision to build the 1,300 new homes in the East Jerusalem settlements of Har Homa and Ramot.
“This latest unilateral Israeli act necessitates dramatic international action for immediate recognition of the Palestinian state [based] on the 4 June 1967 borders,” chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said in a statement.
Also on Tuesday, reports said a further 800 units were planned in the settlement of Ariel in the northern West Bank.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Carla Bruni Labelled Adulteress by Iranian State Newspaper in Stinging Attack on Sarkozys
Iran has launched a second scathing barrage of insults at French First Lady Carla Bruni — branding her an adulteress with a ‘vastly immoral lifestyle’.
The hardline newspaper Kayhan — the mouthpiece of the extremist Islamic regime — also claimed President Nicolas Sarkozy had said he would be ‘happy if his wife died’.
The verbal onslaught comes after both Sarkozy and Bruni had pleaded with Iran not to stone to death 43-year-old mother-of-two Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani, accused of cheating on her husband and then helping to kill him.
Bruni signed a petition in August calling for Sakineh’s release, and saying: ‘I just can’t see what good could come out of this macabre ceremony, whatever the judicial reasons put forward to justify it.’
Her stance prompted the Kayhan newspaper to label her a prostitute and a hypocrite for her own ‘marital infidelities’.
Earlier this month President Sarkozy warned Iran that diplomatic relations will be frozen if the death sentence on Sakineh is carried out.
Kayhan has now retorted with a further tirade of vitriol aimed at Bruni and Sarkozy.
It wrote in an editorial this week: ‘Sarkozy speaks up to defend an murderous and unfaithful woman in Iran while it emerges he is apparently very unhappy with his own third wife Carla Bruni, because of her infidelity and vastly immoral lifestyle.
‘It’s for this reason that he says that even if Bruni dies, not only would this not sadden him, it would actually make him happy.
‘Sarkozy, after having cheated on and divorced his first two wives, then married the Italian Bruni who has surpassed even him in the area of infidelity.’
Kayhan aims to ‘defend the ideology of the Islamic Revolution’ and is directly under the supervision of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s government.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Lebanon on Verge of Collapse
Nation’s pro-Western chief could be replaced
The pro-Western government of Lebanese Prime Minister Raad Hariri is on the verge of collapse, according to warnings from sources close to the issues at hand, says a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.
Those sources close to Hezbollah as well as a close armed ally, the National Syrian Socialist Party, have told the G2Bulletin that Hariri could be forced to resign within three weeks, although the resignation would not be through military force.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Making Sure it Won’t be Us
One of the happiest consequences of last week’s Republican tsunami is that Long Island’s Rep. Peter King is set to regain the chairmanship of the House Committee on Homeland Security.
This will make America safer — by restoring to a critical Capitol Hill post a man who fully comprehends the threat to the nation posed by radical Islam.
Someone, in other words, who gets it when US-born Yemeni cleric Anwar al-Awlaki — linked to the Fort Hood massacre and the failed Christmas and Times Square bombings — declares, as he did last weekend, that Muslims should not hesitate to kill Americans because “it is either them or us.”
And who, as his past record shows, refuses to be intimidated.
(The notorious Council on American-Islamic Relations has publicly blasted King as “bigoted” — a mark of honor in our book.)
Certainly, the Democrats who’ve run the Homeland Security Committee for the past four years never got it.
As King wrote on these pages yesterday, the committee held no hearings on the Fort Hood massacre or on Gitmo detainees — focusing instead on Hurricane Katrina, workplace diversity at the Department of Homeland Security and other non-terrorism issues.
It held no hearings on how Maj. Nidal Malik Hassan, who was known to US intelligence and Army brass as a self-radicalized, home-grown terrorist, was allowed the freedom to open fire on US troops last year, killing 13 of them.
It held no hearings on why Gen. George Case, the Army chief of staff, could only talk about what a “shame” it would be “if our diversity became a casualty” of Fort Hood — even as his soldiers were still wiping up the blood from the floor.
King, happily, vows to change that.
He promises to hold hearings on Fort Hood — including “al Qaeda’s tactic of recruiting and radicalizing individuals residing in America.”
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Out of the Mouth of Al-Qaeda
Samir Khan who came to America at the age of seven, referred to himself as “A typical American Kid”, according to a NY Times article by Michael Moss October 15, 2007.
How does one go from being “a typical American kid” to becoming the al-Qaeda English spokesman and web designer?
Following his time-line and the groups he associated with can not only help us understand the road to terror, but can also give us some insight on the organizations that are operating freely in this country that take people down that road.
Samir Khan was born in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, when he was 7 his family moved to New York City and settled into the Queens neighborhood of Maspeth.
In August 2001 at the age of15, he went for one week to summer camp at a mosque in Queens, which was sponsored by the Islamic Organization of North America (IONA).
According to the ‘background’ tab in the IONA website, the organization now known as Islamic Organization of North America started as the Markazi Anjuman Khuddam-ul-Qur’an Lahore (Society of the Servants of Al-Qur’an) which was established in 1972.
The Tanzeem-e-Islami (Islamic Organization) was then founded in 1975, and Tahreek-e-Khilafat Pakistan (Khilafah Movement) was launched in 1991 out of the Tanzeem-e-Islami Pakistan. In 1993, Tanzeem-e-Islami North America, or T.I.N.A. was established.
In 2003 T.I.N.A. became independent from Tanzeem-e-Islami Pakistan. It is now known as the Islamic Organization of North America (Al-Tanzeem Al-Islami Amrika Al-Shamaliah) or IONA.
So, basically in simple terms, the IONA grew out of Tanzeem-e-Islami Pakistan.
The ‘Objective’ tab on their website is pure Sharia (Islamic law), here is the page in full,
The obligations of a Muslim as ordained by the Qur’an and Sunnah, can be understood as having four levels:
A Muslim is required to develop real faith and conviction (iman) in one’s heart
A Muslim is required to live a life of complete submission to the will of Allah (SWT)
A Muslim is required to propagate and disseminate the message of Islam to the entire humanity
A Muslim is required to try his utmost in establishing the Just Islamic Order
The fundamental objective of establishing IONA is to assist the Muslims in North America to uphold and implement these obligations first on themselves, next on their families, inform their friends and then to invite the non-Muslims to Islam. The ultimate goal is to seek Allah (SWT)’s pleasure and salvation in the Hereafter.
Required to live a life of complete submission to the will of Allah and required to try his utmost in establishing the Just Islamic Order?
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan: Safety Fears Cause Haider to Quit
Pakistan wicketkeeper Zulqarnain Haider today retired from international cricket after admitting he feared for his safety and that of his family.
Haider yesterday left the Pakistan team hotel in Dubai just hours before the fifth and final one-day international against South Africa and flew to London after receiving death threats following his part in Pakistan’s victory in the fourth ODI, in which he made 19 not out and hit the winning runs.
He said he did not want to “sell out the dignity and respect of my motherland” by agreeing to throw matches and that and the threats of violence prompted today’s decision.
The 24-year-old told Geo News: “I have decided it is best for me to retire from international cricket since my family and I are constantly getting threats.
“It is best for me to step down because I can’t play in these circumstances.
“But I would like to continue to play domestic cricket.
“I received death threats to lose the fourth and fifth one-day internationals against South Africa, but I could not compromise the dignity of my country.
“I would rather flee away than sell out the dignity and respect of my motherland.
“I can assure you that I am safe and sound. I’m not under arrest but I cannot say where I am hiding for the sake of protection of my life.”
Haider revealed his problems started when he was approached by an unknown individual prior to the fourth game in the United Arab Emirates.
“When I went out of the hotel to eat dinner once, he came up,” he said.
“He was alone but I felt there were two to three people behind him.
“I can describe him. He spoke Urdu but I cannot describe the accent accurately.
“He said you will make lots of money if you join us and help us.
“If not, then staying in the team could be difficult and we can make things difficult for you.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Radical Yemeni Cleric Anwar Al-Awlaki Calls for Killing of Americans
A US-born radical Yemeni cleric has called for the killing of Americans in a new video message posted on radical web sites on Monday.
Anwar al-Awlaki said Americans are from the “party of devils” and so don’t require any special religious permission to kill.
In the 23-minute Arabic language message entitled “Make it known and clear to mankind,” al-Awlaki said it was “either them or us”. He also called all Arab and Yemeni leaders “corrupt” and said it was time for religious scholars to take charge.
“Kings, emirs, and presidents are not now qualified to lead the nation, or even a flock of sheep,” he said. “If the leaders are corrupt, the scholars have the responsibility to lead the nation.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Sinhalese Muslim Teenager Sentenced to Death in Saudi Arabia. Appeal of Catholics
Fr. George Sigamony, director of Caritas Sri Lanka, calls on all Catholics to pray after the verdict that decrees the death sentence for Rizana, just 17 years old, in prison on false charges of murder. The Asian Human Rights Commission: “Do not let Rizana Nafeek become a victim of the infamous practice of Saudi Arabia to sentence juvenile offenders to death.”
Colombo (AsiaNews) — It’s official: the young girl Rizana Nafeek only 17 years of age, in prison since 2005 on false charges of murder, has been sentenced to death. Fr. George Sigamony, national director of Caritas Sri Lanka, speaks out on his case, and together with AsiaNews launches and appeal for her, and for all migrant workers whose situation has become unsustainable, “Now that, unfortunately, the verdict has been issued, the only thing we can do is continue to pray for her and her situation”. The girl’s death sentence was upheld on appeal in late October. Rizana, a minor at the time, was sent to Saudi Arabia — on a false passport — to work as a waitress. When the child of her employer died while she was serving, she was accused of murder and sentenced to death in a sham trial based on a signed confession, the content of which she did not know, because it was written in another language. After obtaining legal protection and a translator, she retracted the confession, explaining that the tragic death was simply an accident. But nothing has helped.
Fr. Sigamony has been campaigning for Rizana’s release since 2007. He tells AsiaNews: “We have carried out many campaigns in Sri Lanka, and collected thousands of signatures that we sent to the competent authorities in Saudi Arabia. In addition, we have attracted international attention, thanks to the Caritas network, but without success. “ The director of Caritas also underlines another aspect of the situation: “The culprit who sent Rizana to Saudi Arabia illegally [the girl was underage when she started to work] is still alive, free, working and enjoying all his rights : is also to blame. We wish to express our opposition, and urge the Government to implement a policy that protects migrant workers”.
Meanwhile, the Asian Human Rights Commission (Ahcr) has released a statement: “Do not let Rizana Nafeek become a victim of the infamous practice of Saudi Arabia to sentence juvenile offenders to death.” It states that there is need for constant pressure to be brought to bear on the highest authorities, King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, and the interior minister, to grant a pardon, and ask forgiveness to the family of the child.
According to the Ahcr, Saudi Arabia has one of the highest rates of executions in the world. According to Amnesty International statistics on death sentences, at least 69 were executed in Saudi Arabia in 2009, 102 in 2008. In late 2009, Amnesty International denounced the presence of at least 141 people on death row in Saudi Arabia, including 104 foreign nationals. Migrant workers from Africa, Asia and the Middle East are the main victims.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Ukraine: Yulia’s Breath of Stale Air
by Srdja Trifkovic
Chronicles Online, November 8th, 2010
According to a seasoned observer of Moscow’s political scene, the Russian political class cringed last Wednesday morning on learning that Obama had suffered a humiliating political defeat. The Russian leaders don’t think much of Obama personally, but they are worried over what the Republican control of the House might mean for the fledgling “reset” in US-Russian relations—the solitary foreign policy success of the Obama administration.
“One vulnerable target for the Republicans is the new START treaty which the Obama administration hopes to get ratified during the lame-duck session of the sitting Senate,” our source says. “Another likely victim of the Republican congressional victory could be Obama’s measured and cautious policy in the post-Soviet space, with clear signs of respect for Russia’s legitimate, if not privileged, interests in the region. Republican control of the House and its Foreign Affairs Committee means that they would be in a position to pass provocative legislation … or provide financial support and even military assistance to Georgia”—enough to disrupt and perhaps destroy the “reset.”
Moscow’s fears over the future of the “reset” may well be justified. The neoconservatives, atavistically Russophobic and unhappy with the limited “engagement” of America around the world over the past two years, hope to use the Republican majority in the House to advocate a fresh round of bear baiting. Their agenda is apparent from the prominence the neoconservative flaghship, The Wall Street Journal, gave to ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s plea (“Save Ukraine’s Democracy,” October 29) for renewed Western meddling in Ukraine’s internal affairs.
Having failed to interest anyone influential the West in her ill-founded claims of foul play following the presidential election last winter, Ms. Tymoshenko has rehashed the same talking points in connection with last Sunday’s elections of regional councils and city mayors in Ukraine. “They are not just a local affair,” she warned, “[t]hey warrant international scrutiny due to mounting evidence suggesting that they will neither be free nor fair. The European Union should be wary of a neighboring country that controls the flow of gas to millions of EU households sliding into authoritarianism”:…
| — Hat tip: Srdja Trifkovic | [Return to headlines] |
India: Bedspreads, Ganeshas, Toys… Michelle Can’t Stop Buying at Crafts Museum
New Delhi, Nov 8 — Indian textiles and handicrafts charmed their way into Michelle Obama’s shopping bag Monday as the US first lady almost ran out of money, picking up bedspreads, Ganeshas and wooden toys which, she said, would make for ideal Christmas gifts!
Michelle went on a shopping spree after arriving at the National Handicrafts and Handloom Museum in Pragati Maidan complex at 10.45 a.m. She was in the museum for nearly two hours, shooting well past her one-hour scheduled programme.
Museum director Ruchira Ghosh walked Michelle through the galleries devoted to the traditional textiles, rural handicrafts and art of India.
‘Michelle was so impressed with the Indian handicrafts on display that she did not want to leave the museum. She went on a shopping binge, buying almost everything that she came across,’ said Ghosh.
Michelle said she would have bought more had she been left with more money, those at the museum said.
The US first lady exhausted her shopping budget at the crafts museum and said the Indian craft items were ideal gifts of Christmas, barely one-and-a-half months away!
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan: Punjab: Christian Woman Sentenced to Death for Blasphemy
For the first time, a woman is sentenced to death in Pakistan for this kind of “offence”. The blasphemy law was introduced in 1986 by then Pakistani dictator Zia-ul Haq and since then it has become a tool for discrimination and violence. Part of the Pakistan Penal Code, the law imposes life in prison for defiling the Qur’an and death for insulting Muhammad.
Islamabad (AsiaNews/Agencies) — Pakistan has “crossed a line” in sentencing a Christian woman to death for blasphemy. Asia Bibi, a 37-year-old farm worker mother of two, was convicted of committing blasphemy before her fellow workers during a heated discussion about religion in the village of Ittanwali in June last year.
Some of the women workers had reportedly been pressuring Bibi to renounce her Christian faith and accept Islam. During one discussion, Bibi responded by speaking of how Jesus had died on the cross for the sins of humanity and asking the Muslim women what Muhammad had done for them.
The Muslim women took offence and began beating Bibi. Afterwards she was locked in a room. According to Release International, a mob reportedly formed and “violently abused” her and her children.
The charity, which supports persecuted Christians, said that blasphemy charges were brought against Bibi because of pressure from local Muslim leaders.
Release International’s chief executive, Andy Dipper, expressed his shock at Sunday’s ruling.
“Pakistan has crossed a line in passing the death sentence on a woman for blasphemy,” he said.
In addition to the death sentence, Bibi was also fined the equivalent for an unskilled worker of two and a half years’ wages.
Another Christian woman, Martha Bibi (no relation to Asia), is also on trial in Lahore for blasphemy.
According to the National Commission on Justice and Peace (NCJP) of the Catholic Church, between 1986 and August 2009, at least 974 people have been charged for defiling the Qur’an or insulting the Prophet Muhammad. They include 479 Muslims, 340 Ahmadis, 119 Christians, 14 Hindus and 10 from other religions.
The blasphemy law has often been used as a pretext for personal attacks or vendettas as well as extra-judicial murders. Overall, 33 people have died this way at the hands of individuals or crazed mobs.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Tajikistan Calls Students Home From Egypt in Bid to Prevent Radicalisation
The students, who had been studying illegally at Cairo’s Al-Azhar University, the world’s highest seat of Islamic learning, were rounded up by Egyptian authorities on Monday at the request of the Tajik government.
“On Monday … Tajik Airlines returned about 134 young Tajiks to the country from Egypt, where they were studying,” said a spokesman for the Tajik Ministry of Religious Affairs.
Tajikistan is pushing for the return of almost all of the 1,000 Tajiks presently studying at Al Azhar, all but a handful of whom are there without government permission.
The repatriated students had travelled via Russia and other countries to reach Egypt, the spokesman said.
Emomali Rakhmon, Tajikistan’s president, announced earlier this year that Tajik parents should stop sending children to study abroad at foreign madrassas, or religious schools, saying they risked being recruited as terrorists.
The al-Qaeda-linked Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) claimed responsibility for an ambush on a military convoy in September that killed 28 troops, and Tajik authorities blames terror groups for a suicide car bombing the same month.
Since September, Tajik forces have been engaged in a sweep operation against militants in the Rasht valley on the border with Afghanistan.
Tajikistan, the poorest country of the former Soviet Union, has an 800-mile border with Afghanistan that is almost impossible to police. It suffered a brutal civil war in the early 1990s, which pitted Mr Rakhmon’s supporters against the Islamic opposition, and left tens of thousands dead.
Al-Azhar has tried to distance itself from Islamic fundamentalists, in 2001 branding the perpetrators of the attacks on the World Trade Centre as heretics. But its alumni include many militants, including Omar Abdel-Rahman, who is currently serving a life sentence in the US for his role in the 1993 World Trade Centre bombings; Hassan al Banna, one of the founders of the banned Egyptian group, the Muslim Brotherhood; and Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, one of the founders of Hamas.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Caroline Glick: Out of South Africa
Last month I was invited to South Africa by the South African Zionist Federation. The visit, my first to the country, opened my eyes to the daunting challenges facing the country and its dwindling Jewish community of 70,000 16 years after the end of the apartheid regime.
South Africa is a country of paradoxes. On the one hand, it is exhilarating to see the blacks now in charge after their long struggle. On the other, the ruling African National Congress’ record of governance is at best a mixed bag.
On the positive side, in 2008 it peacefully and democratically replaced the failed former president Thabo Mbeki with his opponent, President Jacob Zuma.
But the negatives are glaring. Corruption is endemic. Rather than punishing officials for criminal behavior, the ANC is going after the messenger. South Africa’s ruling party intends to pass a draconian media law to bar journalists from reporting on governmental corruption. The ANC has dismissed opposition to the bill as racist, accusing opponents of attempting to advance a “white agenda.”…
| — Hat tip: Caroline Glick | [Return to headlines] |
1 in 4 Children Born in Nevada to Non-Citizen Moms
Roughly one-in-four children born in Nevada in 2008 were to mothers who were not U.S. citizens, according to a new report.
The Census Bureau said 26.3 percent of children born in Nevada that year were to non-citizen mothers, second only to California, which had a rate of 29.1 percent, the Reno Gazette-Journal reported Monday. The report did not distinguish whether the mothers were legal or illegal immigrants.
The findings were part of the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, taken every year.
Education and health care officials were not surprised by the report.
In Washoe County, the school district has 11,243 students in English language programs, and 75 percent of them were born in the United States, said Mary Ann Robinson, district coordinator for the English Language Learner department.
Robinson said many schools have bilingual clerks and parent facilitators who are bilingual. There are bilingual aides in classrooms, and the school can hire translators if needed so staff can talk with parents.
“We do everything we can to communicate with parents to make sure that they know where their children are academically and what support we’re providing for them,” Robinson said.
Health care representatives said non-citizen patients often lack health insurance, which puts a financial strain on providers.
Bill Welch, president of the Nevada Hospital Association, said in the past 18 months, four southern Nevada hospitals have closed their obstetrics wards.
“We have other hospitals evaluating their OB services at this time based on the number of uninsured and underinsured patients presenting to deliver babies,” Welch told the newspaper.
“OB already tends to be a loss leader for most hospitals,” Welch said. “What is collected in payments for services is typically less than what it costs to operate that department.”
Bob Fulkerson, executive director of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada, cautioned against blaming non-citizens for problems in the health field.
“This is a prime example of why Congress needs to pass immigration reform, so that non-citizens can become citizens,” Fulkerson said. “It shows the failure to act nationally is having a profound effect at the community level.”
He said non-citizens also contribute to local economies.
“They pay their sales taxes when they buy everything else here,” he said. “They pay property tax through their landlord or through the homes they own. They are paying into the system.
“Let’s not blame them for national immigration problems,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
‘Arizona Style’ Immigration Law Proposed in Texas
Less than an hour after the period began for filing bills for consideration in the 2011 Legislative session, State Rep. Debbie Riddle (R-Tomball), a leader of the newly muscular conservatives in the Legislature, filed an ‘Arizona style’ measure that would crack down on illegal immigration, 1200 WOAI news reports.
Riddle says her measure is a response to what she says is the escalating violence caused by Mexican and Latin American gangs in Texas.
“It is absolutely out of control with the gang related crime, which is going through the roof, so, yes, we are addressing this, and quite frankly, I am not worried about political correctness,” Riddle told 1200 WOAI news.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Illegals Made Democrat Governor in Connecticut?
‘Sanctuary city’ issued thousands of IDs accepted for voter registration
Connecticut’s lame-duck attorney general and new senator-elect, Richard Blumenthal, is obligated to investigate credible accusations of voter fraud that linger in the state’s gubernatorial election — including possible illegal alien voting — despite Republican candidate Tom Foley’s concession yesterday to Democratic opponent Dannel Malloy, charges the GOP’s attorney general candidate in last Tuesday’s election, Martha Dean
Dean, who is considering further legal action challenging the eligibility of her victorious Democratic opponent, argued Blumenthal is sworn to uphold the federal and state constitutions, making it his obligation to investigate voter fraud “without regard to whether it has been requested or approved by the secretary of state.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Immigration Minister ‘Weak’ Over Albanian Visas, Says Wilders
Immigration minister Gerd Leers put in an ‘ultimately weak performance’ when EU ministers approved the ending of visas for people from Bosnia and Albania, Geert Wilders, leader of the anti-Islam party PVV says in Tuesday’s Volkskrant. Leers, attending his first EU meeting in Brussels, said he had little choice but to vote in favour because the decision had effectively already been taken. ‘Our resistence would have been voted down,’ the paper quoted him as saying.
However, ministers did agree visas could to be reintroduced if large numbers of Bosnians and Albanians move to the Netherlands or other countries, EU news websites said.
Dialogue
Leers said after the meeting it is important to build a dialogue with Europe.
‘The Netherlands must not be seen as a pariah. I am not going to come up with all sorts of extreme proposals which will die a death because we are isolated, he said.
The new minority government’s policy on immigration, which was partly drawn up by the PVV, includes a number of measures which involve changes in EU legislation.
Wilders said Leers should have voted against. ‘The result is very poor; the borders are open, which the Netherlands does not want,’ Wilders said. ‘Nor do I understand what he means by ‘pariah’ and ‘extreme proposals’.
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
Switzerland: The New Justice Minister, Simonetta Sommaruga, Wants to See Integration Measures for Immigrants Made Mandatory.
In an interview with the SonntagsZeitung newspaper, the recently-elected cabinet minister from the centre-left Social Democratic Party said the approval or extension of residency permits should be closely linked to the efforts immigrants make to integrate themselves.
“Compulsory schooling must be respected. Children should attend all courses and exceptions made on religious or other grounds, for example in swimming classes, should no longer be possible,” Sommaruga told the SonntagsZeitung.
“The approval or extension of residency permits or the withdrawal of this right for anyone in violation of the integration rules is not only a way to apply pressure but is also in the interest of one and all,” the justice minister said. “Everyone living here should be able to stand on their own two feet.”
Sommaruga said it would be possible to implement the stricter requirements as part of a proposal the government has put forward to counter a plan by rightwing parties to automatically deport foreigners convicted of crimes. The issue comes to a nationwide vote on November 28.
Her support of the counter proposal, which restricts deportation to cases involving the most serious crimes, has put her at odds with her own party.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Labour MPs ‘Mutiny’ Against Leadership in Support of Phil Woolas
Over the weekend, Ms Harman said she would bar the former minister from contesting his seat in a by-election triggered by a court ruling that he had lied during the General Election campaign.
The former MP for Oldham East and Saddleworth was thrown out of Parliament as a result of the case but has launched an appeal.
He is trying to capitalise on a groundswell of support from fellow Labour MPs to fund his legal challenge.
Gordon Brown and Tony Blair’s wife Cherie are among those said to be supporting his bid to overturn the election court ruling at a judicial review, for which he must raise £50,000 by the end of the week.
It is not known whether they are among a number of Labour MPs who have agreed to contribute to his legal fund.
At a heated meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party earlier this week, Harriet Harman, Labour’s deputy leader, was called a “disgrace” for publicly ruling out a return to national politics for the former immigration minister, saying that he had “no place” in the party.
Accusing her of “pre-judging” Mr Woolas’ judicial review, one unnamed ex-minister is said to have called on Miss Harman to “consider her position” as acting leader — tantamount to demanding her resignation.
Mr Woolas is in Westminster this week and has been seen canvassing fellow MPs for financial support for his legal challenge.
He told his local paper: “I’ve been overwhelmed. There has been backing from political allies and opponents. They realise the damage this decision could do to democracy.
“Mr Brown has said he does not believe I am a dishonest man while Cherie has given her support.”
A spokesman for Mrs Blair said that she was close friends with Mr Woolas’s wife Tracey and added that she “felt sorry for the family”.
In an interview with the Oldham Evening Chronicle, Mr Woolas vowed to clear his name.
He said: “A lot of MPs are absolutely outraged that someone who has been in the Labour Party for 30 years and has given his life to it should be treated like this.
“The public of Oldham has elected me four times and I think it is not fair they are not allowed to have a choice.
“If people think I have cheated and lied the people of Oldham should be allowed to judge that. No-one knows other than me whether I believe what I say is true and I have never lied.”
Standing in for Ed Miliband, the party leader, who is on paternity leave, Miss Harman said on Sunday that there is no way back for Mr Woolas because he had been found to have lied about his election opponent.
In the first case of its kind for 99 years, the election court found on Friday that Mr Woolas produced leaflets about his Liberal Democrat opponent which knowingly contained untruths.
He also sought to stir up racial tensions in the town by claiming that Muslim extremists had threatened him.
[…]
| — Hat tip: DF | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Sales Tag on Bride’s Dress? The Marriage is a Fake, Church Wardens Warned After Diocese is Targeted
As three more people involved in bogus marriages in the Lancashire town of Accrington face jail, church officials have vowed to step up the fight against the Nigerian and East-European immigration gangs.
Last month a special police unit was set up to tackle the problem in Accrington, already identifying around 40 sham ceremonies in the small town — with mainly Nigerian grooms paying up to £10,000 to marry cash-strapped East-European women legally living here.
Detectives in the newly formed Lancashire Immigration Crime Team believe crime gangs have targeted Accrington because its clergy ‘are not as alive to this kind of abuse’.
Now the Blackburn Diocese has put it’s priests on red alert for telltale signs such as: ‘no intimacy between the couple’, ‘not speaking the same language’, ‘cultural and religious differences’ and other indicators such as ‘tags still in suits and wedding dresses’ — as the crooks intend to return them to the store the next day.
The diocese said: ‘The 14 area Deans in the diocese have been additionally alerted to keep a watching brief in their areas through their contacts with local clergy.
‘The Diocese is continuing to monitor the situation, with a view to producing further advice and updated information, as this may be needed and felt appropriate.
‘Church wardens there have been made aware of the situation and warned about any further marriage applications that may appear suspicious.’
Clergy have been forced to become ultra vigilant after three more people involved in bogus marriages in the same Accrington church, St Peters, are now facing jail.
Nigerian Olarotimi Ojugbele, 41, of London, and East-European mother-of-two Nadezda Mirgova, 26, of Longsight, Manchester, are the latest couple to be brought before the courts.
They have admitted taking part in a bogus wedding with the aim of allowing Ojugbele to be allowed to stay in this country.
In a separate case, Anna Gabcova, 32, of Wavertree, Liverpool, admitted assisting unlawful immigration to a member state and bigamy.
Despite all three people being from either Merseyside, Manchester or London, they all appeared to target the small St Peter’s church in Lancashire.
All three defendants’ cases were adjourned until December 10, for pre-sentence reports.
Ojugbele was remanded in custody and his pregnant co-defendant was bailed. She must live at her home address and report to the police station.
Judge Beverley Lunt warned Ojugbele and Gabcova: ‘You must both understand quite clearly that the most likely outcome will be a sentence of immediate imprisonment.’
In September Czech woman Monika Slepcikova, 23, and Nigerian Unchenna Peter Ezimorah, 36, were each jailed after undertaking a sham marriage at St Peter’s Church, on June 2009.
As the legal citizen, Slepcikova was paid £2,000 to go through with the ceremony so that Ezimorah, who paid a third party £3,000 for ‘administration’, could apply to the Home Office for permanent UK residency.
Then last month Czech ‘bride’ Natasa Lakatosova, 38, of Liverpool, was given a six month suspended sentence at Burnley Crown Court for taking part in a fake marriage — again at St Peter’s.
Lakatosova was offered £2,000 to stage the fake ceremony to help a Nigerian national try to cheat UK immigration rules, despite the fact she has been married herself since 1992.
Lancashire Police’s Inspector Dave Magrath offered his own explanation why Accrington was being targeted, saying: ‘It is certainly the case that the vicars in metropolitan areas with bigger demographics are more alive to this kind of abuse.
‘You can take the reverse from that as to why churches in Accrington are being used.
‘We are particularly active in the metropolitan areas with enforcement so it is reasonable to assume they head to a more remote region with less chance of being apprehended.
‘We are now educating them on how to spot sham marriages and they are alive to this kind of thing now in East Lancashire.
‘We are making excellent headway. Immigration rules have been beefed up around asylum, so now these people are testing other avenues to achieve the ultimate goal — that is to stay in the UK.’
Insp Magrath said there was no suggestion of any priests being complicit in the scam, as happened with East Sussex Rev Alex Brown, who was jailed earlier this month for carrying out 360 sham ceremonies.
In September, a seven-strong gang of foreign nationals who ran a fake wedding scam were jailed for a total of 14 years and 10 months and will be booted out of the UK.
The Eastern European-organised crime group headed by Vladimir Murko, 37, staged 15 bogus marriages involving illegal Nigerian, Pakistani and Syrian immigrants across the North-West of England from October 2006.
The immigrants jetted into Britain and handed over £1,500 each to wed — securing their stay as they could then obtain a National Insurance number and either work or claim benefits.
The defendants — six Czechs and one Slovak — had the right to live in the UK as European citizens but abused it by organising dozens of sham ceremonies, Manchester Crown Court heard.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Church of England ‘Is Like Failing Coffee Chain’ Says Bishop
A bishop who is converting to Rome has likened the Church of England to a ‘coffee chain going out of business’.
The Right Reverend Andrew Burnham, Bishop of Ebbsfleet, said there were signs the Church was losing a sense of where it came from.
He said: ‘If Costa Coffee, every time you went to a branch, did something different and you didn’t know what the product was, they would go out of business.
‘We have got to the stage now in the Church of England where there are so many different products that you don’t know what you’re going to get.’
Mr Burnham’s comments came as the Church of England appeared to have beaten off the threat of a mass desertion to Rome by bishops, priests and congregations yesterday.
Just five junior bishops announced that they were quitting the Anglicans over the CofE’s intention to allow the consecration of women as bishops.
But the flight of disaffected Anglo-Catholic opponents of women included none of the Church of England’s 53 senior-rank diocesan bishops.
And only 500 of the Church of England’s 800,000 regular Sunday churchgoers have indicated their intention of moving over to the Roman Catholic Church, under an offer from Pope Benedict to convert to Rome while keeping Anglican traditions.
As well as the Rt Rev Burnham, the other four junior bishops were the Rt Revs John Broadhurst, Keith Newton, Edwin Barnes and David Silk.
Mr Newton, Bishop of Richborough, said his difficulties with the CofE went further than the ordination of women.
‘There has been a more lax attitude towards moral issues.
‘The whole question of blessing gay marriage — there is a lot of pressure for that to happen in the Church of England — abortion, and life and death issues.’
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Family Minister Schröder Locked in Blazing Feminism Row
A blazing row over feminism erupted Tuesday between Family Minister Kristina Schröder and Germany’s leading women’s rights campaigner, Alice Schwarzer, following an interview by the minister that had other women politicians bristling too.
Schwarzer, the 67-year-old leading feminist and founder of the women’s journal EMMA, blasted Schröder in an open letter as a “hopeless case” and “simply unqualified.”
Schröder, 33, is the youngest woman ever to sit in Germany’s cabinet. In an interview this week with Der Spiegel magazine, the conservative Christian Democrat took issue with some of Schwarzer’s assertions in the latter’s famous feminist book, Der kleine Unterschied und seine großen Folgen, or “The Small Difference and its Great Consequences.”
The minister questioned Schwarzer’s purported view that “heterosexual sex was hardly possible without the subjugation of the woman.”
“It is absurd when something that is essential to the survival of humanity is defined as subjugation. That would mean that without the subjugation of woman society could not continue.”
Schröder also said: “I don’t find it convincing that homosexuality should be the solution to the disadvantage of women.”
The radical feminist tendency to reject relationships between men and women was not a solution for equal rights, she said.
“I believe that early feminism at least partially overlooked that partnership and children bring happiness,” she told the magazine.
The minister also rejected the idea of quotas to improve women’s standing in the workplace, calling it a “political capitulation.” She blamed some women’s own choices for the fact that they earned less than men.
“The truth is this: Many women prefer to study German philology and humanities, while men study electric engineering — and that has consequences when it comes to wages. We can’t forbid companies from paying electric engineers more than a philologist.”
Schröder told Der Spiegel that a new part of her policy would be providing more support to boys, who are falling behind girls in schools. Government policies have neglected boys and men, she said.
The Family Minister’s comments were not appreciated by feminist leader Schwarzer, who made a brutal retort in an open letter to Schröder, also published by Der Spiegel.
“I consider you to be a hopeless case. Simply unqualified,” Schwarzer wrote.
“Whatever the motive of the chancellor might have been in appointing you of all people — it cannot have been competence and empathy for women.”
Schwarzer accused Schröder of using “cheap clichés” about “the most momentous social movement of the 20th century,” which Schröder, among many other young women, could thank for their personal success in their careers.
She went on to blast Schröder for employing “populist wisdom” and “outrageous nonsense” about Schwarzer’s book.
She said she had waited for the past year for deeds and action from Schröder, but “in vain.”
“The only exciting news from your office was your change of name from Köhler to Schröder,” she said, referring to the minister’s name change after she got married in February.
Meanwhile Green party parliamentary group leader and candidate for Berlin mayor Renate Künast said she was “dumbfounded” by the Family Minister’s comments, calling them “crude and antiquated.”
Another opposition politician, Social Democrat deputy leader and Minister of Social Affairs and Health in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Manuela Schwesig, called the interview “nonsense.”
“Mrs. Schröder has absolutely no understanding of the historic meaning of feminism,” she told Der Spiegel, adding that she was also uninformed about the modern problems of women.
The deputy leader of the socialist Left party, Katja Kipping, weighed in on the debate with equal vigour, questioning Schröder’s knowledge of the movement, saying it had “never been about man-hating, but about fighting the patriarchy — that is, structures that discriminate against women.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
German Family Minister Slammed for Comments on Feminism
In an interview with SPEIGEL published on Monday, German Family Minister Kristina Schröder challenged several central beliefs of feminists. Politicians and leading feminists are not impressed. Leading women’s rights activist Alice Schwarzer says she is unqualified for her job.
There is little doubt that Germany is not the easiest place to live and work if you are a woman. According to statistics released earlier this year, women earned an average of 23.2 percent less than men in 2008 — a number that has been going up in recent years. There is also an extreme paucity of female executives at leading German companies.
Indeed, the situation is such that European Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship Viviane Reding saw fit to censure Germany in March. “In economic terms,” she said, “Germany is one of the most developed countries. As such, it should be a good role model rather than a straggler. I expect more ambition and more drive.”
Given such a background, the biting criticism of German Family Minister Kristina Schröder, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats, this week is perhaps unsurprising. In an interview with SPIEGEL published on Monday, Schröder, 33, expressed opposition to the idea of legally mandating a certain percentage of women in executive positions. She also gave short shrift to concerns over unequal pay.
“The reality looks like this: Many women like to study German and humanities; men, on the other hand, electrical engineering — and that has consequences when it comes to salaries,” she said.
‘Crude and Antiquated’
Schröder also dismissed feminists by saying “I don’t agree with a core statement by most feminists, the statement by Simone de Beauvoir: ‘One is not born a woman, one becomes one.’ Even as a schoolgirl I wasn’t convinced by the claim that gender has nothing to do with biology and is only shaped by one’s environment.”
Her comments have not been universally well received. Renate Künast, co-floor leader of the Green Party in parliament, said she was “flabbergasted” by Schröder’s interview and said her comments on feminism were “crude and antiquated.” She accused Schröder of having a “split personality — another word for schizophrenic.”
Manuela Schwesig, deputy head of the center-left Social Democrats, also blasted Schröder. “I haven’t read so much nonsense in connection with women’s issues in a long time,” she said. “Ms. Schröder has absolutely no understanding of the historical significance of feminism.” She also accused Schröder of having “no idea” about the very real problems facing women today.
Perhaps the fiercest broadside, though, came from Alice Schwarzer, Germany’s leading feminist voice and the editor of the influential women’s magazine Emma.
In her interview, Schröder took direct aim at Schwarzer, saying “I have read a lot of her work — first ‘The Little Difference,’ later ‘The Big Difference’ and ‘The Answer.’ I found all these book very well argued and worth reading. But I found that many of her theories went too far. For example that heterosexual intercourse was barely possible without the submission of the woman. I can only say to that: Sorry, that’s wrong.”…
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
MSNBC’s New Lineup Includes Avowed Marxist
Anchor Lawrence O’Donnell reveals: ‘I am a socialist’
During an angry tirade over Democrat election losses, the host of the new MSNBC political show, “The Last Word,” blurted out that he’s a “socialist,” while blasting colleagues for hiding behind less radical labels such as “liberal” or “progressive.”
“I am a socialist,” declared MSNBC anchor Lawrence O’Donnell. “I live to the extreme left of you liberals.”
O’Donnell, who got his start in TV as creator of the NBC series “The West Wing,” made the remarks while appearing Friday as a guest on a live broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” He got into a heated exchange with Salon.com contributor Glenn Greenwald during a debate among panelists on the program about why Democrats lost so many seats during the midterm congressional election.
[…]
During his testy exchange, O’Donnell also revealed his agenda to “ban all guns in America.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: PVV Biggest Party Among Homosexuals
THE HAGUE, 10/11/10 — The Party for Freedom (PVV) has come out as by far the biggest party in a half-yearly poll by gay periodical Gay Krant.
In the run-up to the 9 June elections, Geert Wilders’ PVV attracted the vote of 16.6 percent of the readers of Gay Krant. This is now 22.3 percent. In fact, the PVV scored even higher in 2009 (nearly 24 percent).
Labour (PvdA) in particular has fallen out of favour with the gay voters, it emerges from the poll among 1,024 Gay Krant readers. Since May, support for the PvdA had dropped from 18.2 percent to 13.0 percent. The conservatives (VVD) also lost a lot of ground, from 20.1 to 16.6 percent.
Centre-left D66 is now the second party among gay voters, with a following of slightly over 18 percent. The leftwing Greens (GroenLinks) and Socialist Party (SP) rose slightly in the poll. The Christian democrats (CDA) scored less than 4 percent and Christian parties ChristenUnie and SGP and the Party for Animals (PvdD) did not even achieve a single percent of support.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Margaret Mead’s War Theory Kicks Butt of Neo-Darwinian and Malthusian Models
Why war? Darwinian explanations, such as the popular “demonic males” theory of Harvard anthropologist Richard Wrangham, are clearly insufficient. They can’t explain why war emerged relatively recently in human prehistory—less than 15,000 years ago, according to the archaeological record—or why since then it has erupted only in certain times and places.
Many scholars solve this problem by combining Darwin with gloomy old Thomas Malthus. “No matter where we happen to live on Earth, we eventually outstrip the environment,” the Harvard archaeologist Steven LeBlanc asserts in Constant Battles: Why We Fight (Saint Martin’s Griffin, 2004). “This has always led to competition as a means of survival, and warfare has been the inevitable consequence of our ecological-demographic propensities.” Note the words “always” and “inevitable.”
LeBlanc is as wrong as Wrangham. Analyses of more than 300 societies in the Human Relations Area Files, an ethnographic database at Yale University, have turned up no clear-cut correlations between warfare and chronic resource scarcity. Similarly, the anthropologist Lawrence Keeley notes in War before Civilization: The Myth of the Peaceful Savage (Oxford University Press, 1997) that the correlation between population pressure and warfare “is either very complex or very weak or both.”
Two tribal societies—the Semai of Malaysia and the Waorani of the Ecuadorian Amazon—represent especially striking exceptions to the Malthusian model. According to the anthropologists Clayton and Carole Robarchek (pdf), who lived among both societies, the Semai population is 60 times denser than the Waorani, and they have much less food, because their soil less fertile and game less plentiful. And yet the Semai, the Robarcheks pointed out, “are among the most peaceful people” known to anthropology (even though some Semai helped British colonialists fight communist insurgents in the 1950s). The Waorani, however, are one of the most violent known societies, with casualties from warfare claiming as much as 60 percent of the population.
War is both underdetermined and overdetermined. That is, many conditions are sufficient for war to occur, but none are necessary. Some societies remain peaceful even when significant risk factors are present, such as high population density, resource scarcity, and economic and ethnic divisions between people. Conversely, other societies fight in the absence of these conditions. What theory can account for this complex pattern of social behavior?
The best answer I’ve found comes from Margaret Mead, who as I mentioned in a recent post is often disparaged by genophilic researchers such as Wrangham. Mead proposed her theory of war in her 1940 essay “Warfare Is Only an Invention—Not a Biological Necessity.” She dismissed the notion that war is the inevitable consequence of our “basic, competitive, aggressive, warring human nature.” This theory is contradicted, she noted, by the simple fact that not all societies wage war. War has never been observed among a Himalayan people called the Lepchas or among the Eskimos. In fact, neither of these groups, when questioned by early ethnographers, was even aware of the concept of war.
In discussing the Eskimos Mead distinguished between individual and group violence. Eskimos were “not a mild and meek people,” she noted. They engaged in “fights, theft of wives, murder, cannibalism,” often provoked by fear of starvation. “The personality necessary for war, the circumstances necessary to goad men to desperation are present, but there is no war.”
Mead next addressed the claim that war springs from “the development of the state, the struggle for land and natural resources of class societies springing, not from the nature of man, but from the nature of history.” Here Mead seems to invoke Marx as well as Malthus. Just as the biological theory is contradicted by simple societies that don’t fight, Mead wrote, so the theory of “sociological inevitability” is contradicted by simple societies that do fight. Hunter—gatherers on the Andaman Islands “represent an exceedingly low level of society,” but they have been observed waging wars, in which “tiny army met tiny army in open battle.”…
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Thor Heyerdahl and Hyperdiffusionism
Lately I’ve been thinking and giving some talks about Scandinavian pseudoarchaeological writers, that is, people who publish books on the past with unsubstantiated claims to scientific credibility. The beyond all comparison most famous of them is the Norwegian Thor Heyerdahl (1914-2002).
Heyerdahl is mostly known not as an archaeologist, but as a great navigator, being the organiser of numerous projects where he would have a reconstruction built of some ancient boat and make an ocean voyage with it. Most famously, he travelled by balsa raft from Peru westwards to Tuamotu in 1947 (with my countryman Bengt Danielsson on board). What may not be apparent to everyone is that almost everything Heyerdahl did throughout his professional life was motivated by one overarching archaeological hypothesis: hyperdiffusionism.
Diffusionism is the view that ideas (such as tech inventions) travel. If I invent something good or interesting, then people who see it may pick up the idea and run with it, and the idea will propagate across the world like rings on a pond do when you drop a prosthetic silver nose into it…
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Under New Plan, Satellites to Beam Solar Power Down From Space
In a step toward solving the global energy crisis, a new plan aims to harvest the sun’s energy from space with satellites then beam it down to Earth.
The initiative, announced Nov. 4, is spearheaded by former president of India A.P.J. Kalam and the National Space Society, a nonprofit dedicated to making humanity a spacefaring civilization.
Space-based solar power has the potential to turn Earth into a “clean planet, a prosperous planet, and a happy planet,” Kalam said during a Thursday press conference announcing the Kalam-NSS Energy Initiative.
The initiative’s plan is to launch a satellite containing a large array of solar panels that would collect energy from the sun, then convert this energy into a microwave beam that could be directed back down to Earth. A special receiving antenna on the ground — called a rectenna — would then turn the microwave energy back into electricity, which would be fed into the power grid.
Earth’s energy crisis
Global energy needs are expected to grow by 87 percent by the year 2035. Traditional renewable energy sources will only be able to meet part of that demand, proponents of the space plan said.
Space-based solar power could be directed to multiple locations in the world, and wouldn’t suffer from outages during nighttime or bad weather, as solar panels on the ground do, said Mark Hopkins, chair of the National Space Society’s executive committee.
The technology offers the potential to deliver a tremendous amount of energy without harming the environment, he said.
“It produces virtually no carbon dioxide, therefore it’s a very clean, renewable energy source,” Hopkins said.
However, the full technology to achieve such a vision is not yet developed.
“One of the critical things to keep in mind regarding this capability is that it has enormous promise to deliver power globally — power that would be very green — but also that we’re not quite ready to do it yet,” said John Mankins, president of the Space Power Association. “It has some remaining technical challenges.”
Leaders of the plan agreed the idea will take some work, but added that’s why it’s important to get the project started now.
“I personally believe it is a project of about 15 years,” Kalam said, adding that it would take the support of more countries than the United States and India to make space solar power a reality. He proposed approaching the governments of G8 and G13 countries to eventually join the initiative.
International solar initiative
NASA does not currently have an official space solar power program, though it has funded research into the field in the past. Work to send a solar energy-beaming experiment to the International Space Station was canceled in 2008.
The U.S. military has also experimented with solar energy beaming, as it may present a way to deliver power to remote areas of the globe.
Ultimately, such a partnership between the U.S. and India could have ramifications not just for the energy crisis, but for international politics, the initiative’s leaders said.
“India is rapidly rising and this is in the interest of both nations,” Hopkins said. “Neither of our nations wishes to contain China — however, a prosperous India increases the chances the rise of China will be peaceful.”
Under the Kalam-NSS plan, the United States would contribute technology, while India could take care of much of the low-cost manufacturing.
“The potential of combining those two could generate a large amount of jobs in both countries,” Hopkins said.
India could also potentially launch the power-gathering satellite aboard one of the nation’s rockets.
“It is known that such a proposal can become reality only if the cost of launching satellites into outer space is made economical,” said T.K. Alex, director of the Indian Space Research Organization Satellite Centre, which launches spacecraft for both communications and science.
The ISRO has ramped up its space activities in recent years, notably with the launch of India’s first moon satellite, Chandrayaan-1, in 2008, with a second mission under development.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
1 comments:
I'm really not a fan of Margaret Mead. She has helped to steer the West into chaos. Personally, I think all of her work should be dumped for the trash that it is.
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