Central Europe: The Wilted Charms of the Euro
Europe’s sovereign debt crisis has dampened enthusiasm for the single currency in most of the countries of Central Europe. Today, only the Baltic States are still eager to join the Eurozone, writes “Rzeczpospolita”.
The Hungarian government wants the country’s new constitution, which will be finished in April, to include a clause to officially mandate the forint as the country’s currency. “Our country is not ready for the euro. We cannot imagine introducing it before 2020,” says Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. “Hungary has to defend the forint, because all of its economic contracts are in this currency.”
However, as Rzeczpospolita points out, when they joined the European Union, the countries of the region made a commitment to adopt the euro at some future date. As it stands, only Slovenia (2007), Slovakia (2009) and Estonia (2011) have joined the Eurozone. The other countries of Eastern and Central Europe have yet to satisfy the Maastricht criteria that would enable them to become part of the Eurozone.
Now many of them are less than eager to adopt the single currency…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Greece: 6th Day of Losses on Athens’ Stock Exchange
(ANSAmed) — ATHENS, APRIL 5 — The Greek bourse’s benchmark index declined for a sixth day in succession on Monday to register a new low for the last two-and-a-half months, as daily Kathimerini reports. The Athens Exchange (ATHEX) general index ended at 1,492.44 points, dropping by 2.24% from last Friday’s close at 1,526.60 points. The blue chip FTSE/ATHEX 20 index contracted by 2.59% to end at 682.58 points. The govenment’s apparent failure to achieve the fiscal targets of the first quarter, the revision of last year’s deficit, the considerable deterioration in listed companies’ figures and the downgrading of the top banks’ credit ratings have contributed to the local market’s bearish mood.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Moody’s Cuts Portugal’s Rating
(ANSAmed) — ROME, APRIL 5 — International rating agency Moody’s has cut Portugal’s rating to Baa1 from A3.
Moody’s’ announced that it has also put the country’s short-term debt under revision for a possible downgrade. The agency’s decision is based mainly on the political and economic uncertainties in the country after the resignation of Premier Socrates and the rejection of the reconstruction programme.
Instability, Moody’s writes in a statement, increases the risks to the Portuguese bonds. Bank deposits have not been downgraded.
Moody’s has decided to cut Portugal’s rating by a single step, hoping that the other Eurozone countries will support the country, even before Portugal will apply for and obtain assistance from the European rescue fund EFSF.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Portugal: Record Interest Over 10% for 5-Year Bonds
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, APRIL 5 — Political uncertainty and the continuing ratings cuts by agencies, with a potential bail-out on the horizon, have ensured that Portugal’s 5-year government bonds today exceeded the 10% interest mark, higher than the figure recorded by the Irish bond before the country’s fallback on international aid. Flight by investors has meant a further rocketing in interest on Portuguese bonds, the national Lusa agency reports. The situation is most dramatic for 5-year bonds, with interest today standing at over 10%, though 3-year and 10-year bonds also registered record interest rates, of 9.70% and 8.83% respectively. The risk differential with the reference German bund has risen to 545 base points.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Ann Barnhardt: Vox Populi? Let’s Hope
by Diana West
Below, I am posting links to a 2-part video by a gal in Colorado named Ann Barnhardt whom I am most pleased to call a fellow citizen — as opposed to such fellow citizens as the craven Lindsey Graham, the battle-stressed David Petraeus and the Islamophile Barack Obama (?), to name a few of the most prominent dhimmis functioning in and dominating the public space.
About that public space: It’s extremely hard to get a word in there — hard to stand out against the static, hard to punch through the murk of propaganda and appeasement that serves as an excuse for news and policy. Punching through becomes the work of activists, lightning rods, so-called “zealots,” people whom it is all too easy for gloss-encased, college-pedigreed elites to dismiss as “nuts,” and worse. Random, recent examples here, here.
But, folks — due to the emergency crisis in our leadership, civilian and military, professional and clerical, and their total surrender to Islam, as evidenced never before more gut-wrenchingly than in this latest Afghan-massacre-queued capitulation by the presidency (no surprise, obviously), by the military command, by the Congress, by the media, by the undefinable but still perceptible “consensus” — we are down to these supposed “nuts” and lightning rods. God bless them and America.
The fact is, I could write a (relatively) non-”nutty” syndicated column a week for 10 years on the copiously, redundantly, patently documented evils of Islam (gee, come to think of it …). I could get lots of supportive mail that I deeply appreciate, refine my arguments, work on a book or two (half) on related subjects, give talks at home and even abroad — and what. Nothing changes. No ignition — except, of course, that of the country, which continues, hell-in-handbasket-style, to go up in smoke, which is a far stretch worse than a single copy of the Koran burning; or, as our dhimmified, diss-able “leaders” prefer, aping the “a la mode,” the holy Qu’ran..
| — Hat tip: Diana West | [Return to headlines] |
Former NASA Chief: Muslim Outreach is ‘Perversion’ Of Nasa’s Mission
Michael Griffin, who headed NASA during the last four years of the Bush administration, says the space agency’s new goal to improve relations with the Islamic world and boost Muslim self-esteem is a “perversion” of NASA’s original mission to explore space. “NASA was chartered by the 1958 Space Act to develop the arts and sciences of flight in the atmosphere and in space and to go where those technologies will allow us to go,” Griffin said in an interview Tuesday. “That’s what NASA does for the country. It is a perversion of NASA’s purpose to conduct activities in order to make the Muslim world feel good about its contributions to science and mathematics.”
Griffin calls NASA’s new mission, outlined by space agency administrator Charles Bolden in an interview with the al-Jazeera news agency, “very bad policy for NASA.” As for NASA’s core mission of space exploration, Griffin points out that it has been reaffirmed many times over the years, most recently in 2005, when a Republican Congress passed authorizing legislation, and in 2008, when a Democratic Congress did the same thing.
“NASA has been for 50 years above politics, and for 50 years, NASA has been focused by one president or another on space exploration,” Griffin says. “Some presidents have championed it more strongly than others, and it is regrettable that none have championed it as strongly as President Kennedy. But no president has thought to take NASA’s focus off of anything but space exploration until now, and it is deeply regrettable.”
Griffin says NASA has always played an important, but indirect, role in diplomacy. “I have championed the use of NASA as a powerful diplomatic and inspirational tool for U.S. policy writ large,” Griffin says. “But the way NASA achieves those goals is by doing great things. NASA does those things that make people all over the world say, ‘Wow.’ If NASA is making people say, ‘Wow,’ then they want to be part of what we do. That’s NASA’s role — it’s to do those things that make other people want to join us.”
For all his unhappiness with the new policy, Griffin says blame for the situation does not belong with NASA administrator Charles Bolden, whom Griffin calls “one of the best human beings you will find.” “When I see reports in the media excoriating Charlie for this position, that blame is misplaced,” Griffin says. “It belongs with the administration. That is where policy for NASA is set. The NASA administrator does not set policy for NASA, the administrator carries it out.”
“This is not about personalities,” Griffin concludes. “It is about the intellectual content of the policy, which I find to be bankrupt.”
| — Hat tip: AC | [Return to headlines] |
Obama’s New Mission for NASA: Reach Out to Muslim World
In a far-reaching restatement of goals for the nation’s space agency, NASA administrator Charles Bolden says President Obama has ordered him to pursue three new objectives: to “re-inspire children” to study science and math, to “expand our international relationships,” and to “reach out to the Muslim world.” Of those three goals, Bolden said in a recent interview with al-Jazeera, the mission to reach out to Muslims is “perhaps foremost,” because it will help Islamic nations “feel good” about their scientific accomplishments.
In the same interview, Bolden also said the United States, which first sent men to the moon in 1969, is no longer capable of reaching beyond low earth orbit without help from other nations.
Bolden made the statements during a recent trip to the Middle East. He told al-Jazeera that in the wake of the president’s speech in Cairo last year, the American space agency is now pursuing “a new beginning of the relationship between the United States and the Muslim world.” Then:
When I became the NASA Administrator — before I became the NASA Administrator — [Obama] charged me with three things: One was he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math, he wanted me to expand our international relationships, and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering.
Later in the interview, Bolden discussed NASA’s goal of greater international cooperation in space exploration. He said the United States, more than 40 years after the first moon mission, cannot reach beyond earth’s orbit today without assistance from abroad:
In his message in Cairo, [Obama] talked about expanding our international outreach, expanding our international involvement. We’re not going to go anywhere beyond low earth orbit as a single entity. The United States can’t do it, China can’t do it — no single nation is going to go to a place like Mars alone.
Bolden’s trip included a June 15 speech at the American University in Cairo. In that speech, he said in the past NASA worked mostly with countries that are capable of space exploration. But that, too, has changed in light of Obama’s Cairo initiative. “He asked NASA to change…by reaching out to ‘non-traditional’ partners and strengthening our cooperation in the Middle East, North Africa, Southeast Asia and in particular in Muslim-majority nations,” Bolden said. “NASA has embraced this charge.”
“NASA is not only a space exploration agency,” Bolden concluded, “but also an earth improvement agency.”
| — Hat tip: AC | [Return to headlines] |
Republican Weaknesses Are Obama’s Greatest Strength
Can US President Barack Obama win re-election? His performance so far has been far from perfect. But, say German commentators, the lack of a serious Republican challenger could result in four more years for Mr. Change.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Which Form of Energy is the Safest?
Even with 40 year-old reactors, nuclear power is the safest source around by far. Imagine how much safer nuclear could be if Mr. Obama’s NRC ever got off its fat, lazy, pompous arse, and did its job?
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Berlin’s La Belle Nightclub Bombing Remembered 25 Years on
The blast injured a further 230 people including more than 50 American servicemen who regularly attended the club, popular as it was with US soldiers deployed in the West German capital during the Cold War. Nine days later, US President Ronald Reagan unleashed Operation El Dorado Canyon, a series of retaliatory airstrikes involving warplanes from the US Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps against Libya — the origin of the terrorists as discovered in cable transcripts between Tripoli and the Libyan embassy in East Berlin which were obtained by West German and US authorities in the days following the bombing.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Berlusconi Planned to Make ‘Madam’ an MP, Wiretap Transcripts Suggest
Transcript of conversation said to be between Italian PM and Nicole Minetti published ahead of his underage prostitution trial
Silvio Berlusconi planned to make his alleged “madam” a member of Italy’s national parliament, according to wiretap transcripts published a day before the start of the most lurid trial he has faced so far.
The transcripts emerged against a background of rising tension over the case. Adversaries of the prime minister were planning demonstrations in Rome as the parliament braced for a vote on whether to ask the constitutional court to scrap the trial, in which Berlusconi is accused of paying an underage prostitute and then abusing his position to cover up the alleged offence.
One of the transcripts is a conversation said to be between him and Nicole Minetti, an Anglo-Italian former showgirl who emerged from obscurity as a dental hygienist to become a member of Lombard regional assembly representing Berlusconi’s party. She is currently under investigation along with two other people on suspicion of aiding and abetting prostitution, including juvenile prostitution.
Documents sent to parliament by the prosecutors earlier this year suggested that the three procured a stream of young women for dinners at Berlusconi’s mansion near Milan followed by so-called “bunga bunga” sessions. According to the prosecutors, the women — some masked, others wearing police officers’ or nurses’ uniforms — performed erotic dances, at the end of which Berlusconi chose “one or more” with whom to spend the night.
According to the Italian daily Corriere della Sera last August, Berlusconi was recorded by police as telling Minetti: “Everyone is speaking so well of you, darling. Everyone. The [Northern] League people. Our people … So then, when there are elections, you’ll come into parliament.”
The wiretaps, published by the newspaper, also contained evidence that Berlusconi secured auditions for his young guests. On 4 October, he is alleged to have taken a call at his Rome residence from María Ester García Polanco, an aspiring Dominican showgirl.
“I’m in Rome”, she tells him. “Lord! I’ve come to do the audition with [a noted TV, film and theatre director]. You remember?”
“Yes”, Berlusconi replies, according to the transcript. “The one I got for you. No?”
“Yes, darling”, says García Polanco, laughing.
Berlusconi remarks that he has been asked — it is unclear by whom — whether she could “do a few numbers” for his own channels, which are managed by his son by his first marriage, Pier Silvio. “I’m trying to convince my son,” the prime minister adds.
Showgirls are not the only purported beneficiaries of Berlusconi’s charity. According to another daily, La Repubblica, the prosecutors will also submit evidence to show that a 28-year-old television reporter on one of Berlusconi’s channels was paid more than €500,000 (£440,000) from accounts registered in the name of either the TV magnate or his accountant. Police allegedly established that the reporter, who is well known to Italian viewers, was a guest at the prime minister’s home on at least one occasion in 2010.
Publication of the wiretaps is bound to prompt a storm of protest from Berlusconi’s followers, one of whom has tabled a bill to prevent transcripts being included in court papers. Even under present legislation, however, conversations involving a member of parliament ought not to have been inserted in the prosecution’s submission, which becomes publicly accessible once an inquiry is closed.
Berlusconi denies all wrongdoing.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Debate on Islam Provokes Ire in France
Debate on secularism in French society becomes increasingly divisive after Interior Minister Claude Gueant says the number of Muslims in the country is ‘a problem’ amid the far-right making gains in the polls. Rights groups say they will file a legal complaint against Gueant, while the opposition socialists hit out at the minister’s provocative statement
Muslim residents walk past racial slurs painted on the walls of a mosque in the town of Saint-Etienne, central France. AP photo.
A debate about the place of Islam in French society on Tuesday became increasingly divisive after Interior Minister Claude Gueant said the number of Muslims in the country was “a problem.”
President Nicolas Sarkozy’s ruling UMP party, which has organized the debate for Tuesday, has been accused of trying to poach votes from the far-right National Front, or FN, party after it made strides in last month’s local elections. “It’s true that the increase in the number of faithful in this religion (Islam), a certain number of behaviors, poses a problem,” Gueant said Monday.
Sarkozy’s closest advisor before becoming minister in January, Gueant said that France’s secular law dates from 1905 when there were “very few Muslims,” while their number today is as high as 6 million.
The SOS Racisme rights group said it would lodge a legal complaint against Gueant, while opposition socialists hit out at the minister’s provocative statement. “Since becoming interior minister, every time Claude Gueant says something, there’s controversy,” said Francois Hollande, a potential Socialist Party candidate in next year’s presidential election. “He’s obsessed with talking about Muslims.”
Gueant in March provoked the ire of political left and rights groups after saying that French people “sometimes no longer feel at home” because of “uncontrolled immigration.” Such statements could have come straight from the mouth of FN leader Marine Le Pen, whose anti-immigration party is on the rise according to opinion polls, to the detriment of Sarkozy and his UMP party.
Several polls put Le Pen, who took over as party head in January from her father Jean-Marie, ahead of Sarkozy in a hypothetical first round presidential election. Since taking over the party, Le Pen has tried to align her party with the European far right, axed on the place of Islam in society.
She has repeatedly lashed out at Muslims who, lacking prayer space, worship in the streets of a tiny number of neighborhoods in France. The so-called “traditional” right has picked up the message, with Sarkozy himself condemning praying in the street while UMP head Jean-Francois Cope has vowed to take measures on the matter “in the coming days.”
Cope is the driving force behind the contentious debate on Islam the UMP is hosting late Tuesday, which has been criticized by the left and the right, threatening even to implode the UMP. Sarkozy’s Prime Minister Francois Fillon will not take part in the debate, having in February warned against any measure that could lead to the stigmatization of Muslims in France. In response, Cope last week accused Fillon of “not being a team player.”
Other ministers have sought to distance themselves from the initiative, which will examine 26 UMP proposals on maintaining France’s strict separation of religion and state. The UMP wants, for instance, to draw up a law to forbid citizens rejecting a public service employee because of their sex or religion.
Cope said such a measure would resolve what he called “complex situations” in hospitals where “women, often under pressure from their husbands, refuse to be treated by a male doctor.” He will also put a draft resolution to parliament, which has no legal weight, solemnly recalling France’s cherished secular principles.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
French Police Warned Not to Arrest Any Women Wearing Muslim Veils Close to Mosques
FRENCH cops have been told not to arrest women wearing veils “in or around” mosques.
The order yesterday, from interior minister Claude Gueant, came in advance of a controversial burka ban, carrying a £132 fine.
From April 11, women can only wear the veil at home, in a hotel room or as a passenger in a car. Men who force wives or daughters to cover up risk prison and a penalty of up to £25,000. The public were warned not to take the law into their own hands after a shopper ripped a veil from a woman’s face last year.
But police said the ban would lead to “burka-chasing” by officers among France’s six million Muslims. A police union spokesman said: “We have more important matters to deal with.”
| — Hat tip: AC | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Neo-Nazis Infest Tiny Village of Jamel
Cries of “Sieg Heil” in the street, neo-Nazi rallies, far-right slogans on walls: welcome to Jamel, a tiny northeast German village locals say has been annexed by Nazi sympathizers.
Until recently a sign at the entrance to the village said visitors had arrived at the “community of Jamel: free, social, national,” evoking the National Socialists or Nazis.
A wooden signpost pointed the way to Braunau am Inn, the Austrian birthplace of Adolf Hitler.
A campaign poster for the far-right NPD party is one of the first things visible in the hamlet of 10 or so tumbledown houses. Around six of these houses are home to neo-Nazis, said Birgit and Horst Lohmeyer, a couple fighting a high-profile campaign to tell the world about Jamel.
Visitors can instantly see which houses belong to far-right extremists, said Birgit, a 52-year-old author.
“They have all painted their houses the same colour: a sort of reddish-brown,” she said in her farmhouse kitchen.
The Lohmeyers moved here from Hamburg, Germany’s second largest city and main port, in 2004, hoping to swap urban life for their dream of a rustic farmhouse in an idyllic country setting.
But that dream turned swiftly to a nightmare as far-right extremists moved to the village.
“We knew that a famous and convicted far-right extremist, Sven Krüger, lived here with his mother and sister, but we moved here anyway. We were convinced we could deal with it,” said Birgit.
“Since then, the situation has gotten a lot worse. More of Krueger’s far-right buddies have moved into the village. They see the village as theirs and they treat it as such. The atmosphere is one of extreme hostility.”
The couple has heard reports of children greeting each other with Hitler salutes. They have themselves heard neo-Nazi songs ringing out into the street — “Adolf Hitler is our Führer.”
“We get big festivals here, far-right festivals where neo-Nazi songs are sung,” Birgit said.
The Krüger in question is a senior NPD member and owns a demolition firm in nearby Grevesmühlen whose company logo shows a man smashing what seems to be a Jewish Star of David.
“We’re the boys for the dirty work,” is the firm’s slogan.
Police recently raided the premises.
“Authorities found a machine gun and 200 rounds of ammunition. He is now in custody,” said Stefan Urbanek, a spokesman for prosecutors in nearby Schwerin, capital of the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
Since that raid things have begun to change in Jamel. The “national” sign disappeared, the directions to Hitler’s birthplace were taken down.
“We don’t know if it was the authorities or Krüger’s men,” said Birgit.
Repeated efforts to contact Krüger were unsuccessful and an approach to one of the brown-red houses in the village was met with a volley of insults. Krüger’s Grevesmühlen office is protected by barbed wire, fierce guard dogs and a watchtower, complete with searchlight.
“It’s amazing, he’s created his very own concentration camp,” said Horst, shaking his head.
Back in Jamel, the Lohmeyers said they suffer from what they call a “constant, latent threat.” People hiss “piss off” over the fence. But they are uncowed and decided to fight back. Every year they hold a large music festival “for democracy,” attended by a few hundred people. Last year, far-right sympathisers infiltrated the concert and broke someone’s nose, they said.
They have received much unexpected recognition for their lonely stand. German President Christian Wulff has invited them to Berlin to tell him their plight and they won an award from the Jewish community for civil courage.
“With their extremely courageous stance in Jamel, they are not only giving a brave signal in the fight against far-right extremism, but also encouraging others … not to give up,” said Dieter Graumann, head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany.
Still, the question remains. Why live in constant fear in such circumstances?
The answer is simple. The Lohmeyers see themselves as a bulwark against a creeping extremism they believe is becoming widespread in their part of eastern Germany.
“The problem in Jamel is actually not what we consider the biggest problem. The real problem is that the whole region is being overrun by far-right extremists … Jamel is just a microcosm of the issue,” said Birgit. “They are slowly taking over small places like Jamel and infiltrating them with their ideology,” she said.
“It’s a definite strategy,” added her husband.
And despite the fear and the unpleasant atmosphere in the village, it has become a point of principle for the pair.
“Leave now? What sort of sign would that be for the right-wingers? Of course we’re not leaving,” said Birgit. “This fight continues.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Corruption Case Returns to Court With Premier in Tunisia
Sex trial set to start Wednesday
(ANSA) — Rome, April 4 — A case into alleged corruption at Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s Mediaset TV empire returned to court on Monday even though Berlusconi was away on a visit to Tunisia for talks on stemming the flow of migrants from there.
It is one of four legal proceedings the premier faces with the most hotly awaited, a trial into allegations he used an underage prostitute, set to start on Wednesday. He is expected to miss that hearing too.
Monday’s was a second preliminary hearing into whether Berlusconi should be sent to trial for alleged tax fraud on broadcasting rights traded by a Mediaset unit, Mediatrade.
Berlusconi, who denies any wrongdoing, attended the previous Mediatrade hearing last Monday to make his first court appearance since 2003.
He says all four cases, like previous charges against him, are groundless and have been trumped up by left-leaning prosecutors trying to oust him.
None of a long series of corruptions trials into alleged wrongdoing by Berlusconi have led to a definitive conviction, sometimes following law changes passed by his governments or the expiry of the statute of limitations.
In the Mediatrade case, Berlusconi has been indicted along with his son Piersilvio, Mediaset Chairman Fedele Confalonieri and nine others.
They are accused of arranging for Mediatrade to buy Paramount Hollywood film rights at inflated rates, with a part of the fees being fed back into offshore accounts controlled by Berlusconi to dodge taxes.
Legal experts say it will not be easy for prosecutors to prove this and, even if they do, that Berlusconi had a hand in any of the wrongdoing.
The premier said last week he had “never dealt with TV rights,” and described himself as “the most indicted man in history and in the universe”.
Prosecutors say their charges are backed by anomalies such as the fact that Mediatrade bought the rights through an intermediary and that the intermediary was not a company but an individual, Egyptian director and producer Frank Agrama. They also cite the fact that it has been shown that Agrama paid kickbacks to some Mediaset managers.
Berlusconi said his company was obliged to deal with Agrama to obtain certain film rights and that court papers proved the Mediaset managers had used any kickbacks they received for their “own interests”.
Prosecutors dispute the first part of this and told Monday’s hearing that they had evidence that Berlusconi was a secret partner of Agrama’s.
Berlusconi also faces another corruption trial regarding alleged offences at Mediaset, with the next hearing set for April 11, and one for allegedly bribing British tax lawyer David Mills for favourable testimony in two past cases.
On Wednesday the trial will begin into allegations he paid to have sex with a Moroccan belly dancer, Karima El Mahroug, aka Ruby ‘Heartstealer’, before she was 18 years of age, during alleged sex parties at his home near Milan.
Berlusconi and Ruby both deny ever having sex and she said money she received from him was just a gift.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Northern League Proposes Regional Armies
(AGI) Rome — The Northern League has presented a Draft Bill for the creation of regional armies, similar to the National Guard in the USA, to maintain public order and deal with natural catastrophes. The opposition has totally rejected the idea.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Govt Wins Ruby Vote
Ballot to put jurisdiction before top court closer than expected
(ANSA) — Rome, April 5 — The government on Tuesday won a House vote on asking Italy’s top court if prosecutors should have jurisdiction in a trial opening Wednesday against Premier Silvio Berlusconi for allegedly using an underage prostitute called Ruby and allegedly abusing his position to get her out of police custody on an unrelated theft charge.
The margin of victory was thinner than expected, at 12 votes, with 314 MPs voting in favour of putting the matter up to the Constitutional Court, and 302 voting against.
Berlusconi’s People of Freedom (PdL) party argues prosecutors have overstepped the mark in pushing on with the Ruby trial despite a previous parliamentary vote to put the matter in the hands of a special tribunal for ministers.
“The conduct of the Milan prosecutors has encroached on the prerogatives of the House,” said House Deputy Speaker Antonio Leone, a PdL member.
The opposition accused the government of wasting parliament’s time to vote on the premier’s judicial woes instead of addressing more important issues.
“Today we have witnessed another truly shameful page (in parliamentary history),” said the House whip for the largest opposition group, Dario Franceschini of the Democratic Party (PD). “It’s extraordinary to see the government benches full and a foreign minister who, in the midst of an international crisis, spends his days voting to defend the premier,” claimed Franceschini, a former leader of the PD. “Today is another day of ordinary madness because while outside the world is burning, between wars and nuclear emergencies, the Italian parliament is gathered here only to deal with the premier’s judicial issues,” said Antonio Di Pietro, leader of the smaller centre-left Italy of Values party.
A key argument in the government’s claim that the case should have been handled by the ministers’ court is that Berlusconi was carrying out his official duties when he telephoned a Milan police station to ask about the detained Ruby in May, before she was released into the care of a PdL official.
Berlusconi has said he was trying to avoid a diplomatic incident because Ruby was, as he wrongly believed at the time, a relative of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
The House vote is not expected to affect the Ruby trial but observers say it will reignite tensions between the executive and the judiciary, who are protesting against reform plans aimed at curbing their powers.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Merkel Blocks India-Iran Oil Payments
Chancellor Angela Merkel has put a stop to plans that have irked Washington and Israel for India to channel oil payments to Iran through the German central bank, a press report said Tuesday.
According to the Handelsblatt business daily, India, under US pressure to break direct commercial links with the Islamic republic, intended to place money for its Iranian oil imports in an account with the Bundesbank.
The Bundesbank would then transfer the money — around €9 billion annually — to the European-Iranian Trade Bank (EIH), based in the northern German city of Hamburg, the paper has reported.
The German government had said it was powerless to stop the deal because EIH, also known as EIHB, was not subject to sanctions. This was because the bank was not involved in financing Iran’s controversial nuclear activities.
The New York Times last week quoted an unnamed US Treasury official as saying the United States was “concerned” and that Washington wanted “to work with all our allies to isolate EIH.”
Israel and Jewish groups were also reported to be annoyed.
But now, Berlin has stepped in, the Handelsblatt cited high-ranking German government officials as saying on Tuesday. Payments for oil already delivered can go ahead, but no new transactions will take place, the paper said.
Contacted by AFP, neither the Bundesbank nor the German economy ministry were immediately available for comment.
Germany has long been under fire for its close business ties with Iran, with the country’s exports there totalling €3.8 billion in 2010, according to official figures.
Sales generated by German industrial giant Siemens in its last business year, which ended September 30, rose more than 20 percent to €680 million, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
New Berlin Exhibition Exposes Police Role in Holocaust
A new exhibition at the German Historical Museum (DHM) in Berlin explores the role the police played in the Holocaust, with rare documents offering insight into how and why ordinary officers were complicit with the worst of the Nazi crimes.
In the decades following the Second World War, thousands of former police officers for the Nazi regime slipped back into their country’s civilian workforce with impunity, their crimes lost to history.
Now, building on over 30 years of research, the new exhibition, “Order and Annihilation — The Police and the Nazi Regime,” sets the record straight on the crimes of the police work in that era.
“The very normal uniformed green police [the regular urban police] force was, until 1942 … a primary perpetrator of the Holocaust,” museum project director Dr. Wolfgang Schulte told news agency DAPD this week.
“The police had various functions and responsibilities in the Nazi state,” continues a placard at the exhibition, “and as a general rule, police officers dutifully performed their given tasks — be it traffic control or mass executions.”
The 1945-46 Nuremberg Trials indicted scores of high-ranking Nazi officials, but a majority of police officers, war criminals themselves, escaped justice and were never held accountable in court.
The global public knew little about the role of the police for several decades after the war, but the DHM exhibition delves into the gritty details. It tracks the lifespan of the force from its right-leaning origins in the Weimar Republic to its use as an instrument of terror during the Third Reich, to the eventual return of thousands of former Nazi officers to police forces across both East and West Germany.
Click here for more photos of the exhibition.
During the war, according to the exhibition, the 355,000 men and women serving in the police force methodically carried out their duties of registering, collecting and exterminating undesirable groups in occupied territories. These were not just officers of the infamous Gestapo, but belonged to all branches of the police.
Even without any official punishment for the refusal to carry out an order, few officers abstained from their role in the killing, imprisonment and forced labor of millions of civilians in occupied territories.
“The manuscripts, the photos and videos the museum has compiled are disturbing, but also compelling and I think important to see,” said Werner Hinrich, a history professor visiting from Potsdam.
“We’ve known about the crimes for a few years now,” he added. “But it’s important to remember and revisit the past, always, so we can make the future better.”
Almost as unsettling as the crimes themselves was the re-employment of former Nazi officers in German police forces — including those administered by the Allied powers occupying West Germany.
One section of the exhibition tells the story of former SS officer Julius Wohlauf, a “good example” of a police officer, who took up a job as a salesman immediately after the war in 1945, before rejoining the Hamburg police force ten years later.
In all, he lived and worked freely for nearly two decades until he was brought to trial for war crimes in 1963, and sentenced in 1968 to eight years in prison for complicity in the murder of 9,200 people during the war.
The curators postulate that Wohlauf, alongside many officers like him, participated in the Nazi scheme for various reasons — out of “blind obedience, vocational ambition, ideological schooling, peer pressure and racism,” but also out of “sadism and personal gain.”
Despite such an explanation, the motives behind the police crimes during the Nazi era remain difficult to understand. But the new exhibition goes a long way in exposing a history that remained hidden for many years.
“Order and Annihilation — The Police and the Nazi Regime” runs until July 31 at the German Historical Museum in Berlin. Guided tours are also available.
External link: The official website of the exhibition “
Amrit Naresh (news@thelocal.de)
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Portugal: Socrates Defends Lisbon-Madrid High-Speed Train
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, APRIL 5 — Despite the profound crisis that has hit the Portuguese economy, Portugal’s Prime Minister José Socrates is defending plans for a high-speed railway line between Madrid and Lisbon. In an interview last night on public television, Socrates distanced himself from the stance taken by the conservative Social Democratic Party (PSD), which has supported the idea of freezing or cancelling the project ahead of the June 5 elections. Socrates, who resigned on March 23 after Portuguese Parliament rejected his fourth package of anti-deficit measures, said that the contract for one of the railway lines, which will connect Poceirao in Portugal and Caia (Badajoz) in Spain, in Extremadura, “has already been awarded and has guaranteed financing at a very low rate” thanks to a deal with the banks prior to the economic crisis. “Why should we cancel this plan?” asked Socrates, who pointed out the importance of the project in terms of employment and its value as a connection. The project for the railway line is currently under examination by Portugal’s National Audit Office, which has the task of assessing its feasibility. Socrates avoided making any mention of the bid for the railway line that will connect Lisbon with Poceirao, which was cancelled in September.
Uncertainty remains about whether or not the bid will be rescheduled.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Skulls of Spanish Women Grew Over 300 Years
Like his body, a man’s skull and its features are generally larger than a woman’s. An analysis of Spanish skulls spanning approximately 300 years showed, however, that the difference between the sexes’ cranial features shrank over time. This conclusion is based on examinations of more than 200 crania — the part of the skull that holds the brain — contained in two collections, one amassed during the 19th century by a doctor, and one from an excavated cemetery dating back to the 16th through 17th centuries. While both sexes’ crania got bigger, women’s grew more, decreasing the gender gap, the researchers found.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: New Islamic Council for 1.5 Million Muslims
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, APRIL 5 — Following months of negotiations, Muslims residing in Spain have formed the Islamic Council of Spain, a new body to represent the Muslim community, which is estimated to have reached 1.5 million and has formed 850 organisations in the country. Of those, 300 were not recognised by the Islamic Commission of Spain (CIE), the only existing representative body up until now. Another 550 organisations which fall under the Union of Islamic Communities in Spain have left the CIE to join the new umbrella group.
The decision to create the new federation was adopted last weekend, during a meeting held at Madrid’s Calle 30 mosque.
Participants included all the Muslim organisations listed in the Justice Ministry’s Religious Bodies register.
The new Islamic Council, whose creation the media announced today, will represent nearly 93% of the 916 religious bodies signed up with said Ministry. Its main goal is to “foster appropriate dialogue with the State”, as well as the development and implementation of the cooperation agreement for the Muslim community legally approved in 1992. The Council will strive to overcome the deadlock which has paralysed the CIE for the past 2 years, due to the diverging views held by the majority faction, the Union of Islamic Communities in Spain and minority faction FEERI, the Spanish Federation of Islamic Religious Bodies, which represents pro-Moroccan groups less prone to accepting the integration of Muslim entities from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.
The Council’s first initiative was to form a Managing Board, with a 3-month term, which will kick-start the organisation’s projects. This board will include the following: the President of the Union of Islamic Communities in Spain, Riay Tatary; 3 members of the Muslim Federation of Spain (FEME); the Vice-President of Murcia’s Islamic federation, Munir Benjelloun; and the head of Valencia’s Islamic Cultural Centre, Amparo Sanchez.
“The Council was formed with a view to integrating all the religious bodies registered with the Ministry of Justice”, claims Mr Tatary, “and with the aim of broadening Muslim practices in Spain in line with the Constitutional framework and in accordance with principles of democratic coexistence.” After the first three transitional months, the Council will form a permanent Assembly to elect the new Executive Board, which will be tasked with liaising with government representatives. To this end, a request has already been submitted to the government for the Council to be granted the same cooperation agreements as those granted the former CIE.
The only defector, and sole remaining member of the CIE, is FEERI president Mohamed Hamed Alì. Speaking with the media, he stated that the formation of the Council “was a premature move triggered by the administration.”
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Study Finds Facial Structure of Men and Women Has Become More Similar Over Time
Research from North Carolina State University shows that they really don’t make men and women (and women particularly) like they used to, or at least in Spain. The study, which examined hundreds of Spanish and Portuguese skulls spanning four centuries, shows that differences in the craniofacial features of men and women have become less pronounced.
“Improving our understanding of the craniofacial features of regional groups can help us learn more from skeletal remains, or even help us identify an individual based on his or her remains,” says Ann Ross, associate professor of anthropology at North Carolina State and principal investigator of the study which she co-authored with Douglas Ubelaker of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History, and E.H. Kimmerle of the University of South Florida.
Looking at more than 200 skulls dating to 20th and 16th century Spain, as well as approximately 50 skulls from 20th century Portugal, the researchers found that craniofacial differences between contemporary men and women are less pronounced than they were in the 16th century.
Ross, Ubelaker and Kimmerle found that craniofacial differences between contemporary men and women are less pronounced than they were in the 16th century. The researchers also found that, while craniofacial features for both sexes in Spain have changed over time, the changes have been particularly significant in females. For example, the facial structure of modern Spanish females is much larger than the structure of 16th century females. This difference may stem from improved nutrition or other environmental factors.
The researchers paid particular attention to structural differences between male and female skulls because “this can help us establish the sex of the remains based on their craniofacial features,” Ross says — which is particularly important when an incomplete skeleton is found. “Being able to tell if a skull belonged to a man or woman is useful in both criminal investigation and academic research.”
Assessing the 16th century skulls was important to the researchers because it allowed them to determine how the different features of male and female skulls have changed over time. “This has applications for characterizing older remains,” Ross says. “Applying 20th century standards to historical remains could be misleading, since sex differences can change over time — as we showed in this study.”
The study also found that the craniofacial sexual differences were very similar between Spanish and Portuguese populations, implying that standards developed for identifying sex in Spanish skulls could also be applied regionally.
A paper describing the research, “Implications of dimorphism, population variation, and secular change in estimating population affinity in the Iberian Peninsula,” is forthcoming from the journal Forensic Science International. The study was funded, in part, by the National Institute of Justice.—Matt Shipman, North Carolina State University.
| — Hat tip: AC | [Return to headlines] |
Swede Extradited Over ‘Muhammad Cartoon Plot’
A man arrested in Stockholm in connection to a foiled plot to murder staff at Jyllands-Posten, a Danish newspaper that published caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, is set to face trial in Denmark, a Swedish court ruled Monday.
Sabhi Zalouti, a 37 year-old Swede of Tunisian origin, was arrested in Stockholm in December while three of his alleged accomplices — two of them Swedish citizens — were arrested and are currently held in Denmark.
“Sabhi Zalouti will be sent to Denmark for legal proceedings in accordance to the European arrest order Denmark’s justice ministry put out on March 9th 2011,” the Attunda district court in the Stockholm suburb of Sollentuna said in its decision.
Court documents showed Zalouti agreed with the decision on the basis that he could serve his sentence in Sweden.
He was being held on suspicion of “preparing terrorist crimes” and is wanted in Denmark on charges of attempted terrorism.
Danish officials said Zalouti and his accomplices were planning to kill as many as possible at the Copenhagen offices of the Jyllands-Posten daily.
In 2005, Jyllands-Posten published a dozen cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad that triggered violent and sometimes deadly protests around the world.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Swedish Flamingoes Die in Frenzied Anteater Attack
A flock of ten flamingoes have met a brutal end at a zoo in Eskilstuna in eastern Sweden after a curious anteater broke into their compound and clawed them to death, leaving a further five birds nursing injuries.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The £650m Apology: Forget Our Ailing Education System, That’s What Britain’s Giving to Pakistani Schools to Make Amends for the Past
David Cameron vowed to hand hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money plus vital military secrets to Pakistan yesterday to make amends for offending the Muslim nation last year.
The Prime Minister pledged to invest £650million in Pakistani schools at a time when the education budget at home is being cut.
Britain is also to give highly sensitive military technology to combat roadside bombs to the Pakistani security services, which are widely blamed for funding and arming the Taliban.
In a huge gamble with the lives of British troops in Afghanistan, Mr Cameron agreed to spend millions more on a centre of excellence for the country’s soldiers and spies near Peshawar, a hotbed of militancy.
The gesture came after Mr Cameron sparked a diplomatic rift last year when he accused the country of ‘looking both ways’ on terrorism.
The technology deal sparked fears that the Pakistani intelligence service, the ISI, would hand details to the Taliban, enabling them to build more effective improvised explosive devices (IEDs).
The huge cash injection for schools by the Department for International Development will make Pakistan the UK’s biggest recipient of overseas aid.
The UK will have no control of the curriculum in schools receiving funding, meaning taxpayers could see their money pumped into madrassas peddling extremism.
Mr Cameron defended the payments, saying it was ‘in our interest’ to help Pakistan.
He said: ‘If Pakistan is a success we’ll have a good friend to trade and invest and deal with.
‘If we fail we’ll have all the problems of migration, of extremism, problems that we don’t want to see. So it’s in our interest that Pakistan succeeds.’
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said he believed a ‘root cause’ of terrorism was illiteracy.
But Tory MP Philip Davies said: ‘Particularly at the moment when we’ve got no money, there’s absolutely no justification for increasing the amounts that we give to other countries.
‘That is especially the case with countries that can afford to spend billions on defence. If they can afford submarines they can afford to educate their own people.
‘We need to concern ourselves with our own schools because countries around the world are overtaking us in educational attainment.’
In a speech to university students, Mr Cameron vowed to get over the ‘tensions’ sparked by his comments last year and create a ‘new start’ in relations with Pakistan.
But he also said Pakistan had to raise taxes and stamp out corruption to justify British generosity. ‘Understandably, the British people want to know every penny we spend is going to the right places.
‘I need to convince them that it is. But my job is made more difficult when people in Britain look at Pakistan, a country that receives millions of pounds of our aid money, and see weaknesses in terms of government capacity and waste.’
Mr Cameron, who was accompanied on his one-day visit by Tory party chairman Baroness Warsi, who is of Pakistani origin, ducked questions about whether he could guarantee that the ISI will not hand the anti-IED technology to the Taliban.
The £650million investment for Pakistan schools will come out of the existing aid budget.
¦ The reputation of Britain’s international aid programme is at risk because of lax controls to prevent fraud and corruption, the National Audit Office warned last night.
It said the Department for International Development was doing too little to prevent taxpayers’ money being siphoned off by corrupt officials in deprived countries.
International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell insisted that weaknesses in the systems set up by Labour had been addressed.
David Cameron sparked a backlash last night after telling a Pakistani audience that Britain is responsible for ‘many’ of the world’s problems.
The Prime Minister sought to blame the British Empire for the situation in Kashmir which has been a running sore in Pakistan’s relations with India since partition in 1947.
But he laid himself open to the charge of running down Britain on an overseas trip.
At a university in Islamabad, the Prime Minister was asked how Britain could help end the row over Kashmir.
He replied: ‘I don’t want to try to insert Britain in some leading role where, as with so many of the world’s problems, we are responsible for the issue in the first place.’
His gaffe could lay Britain open to legal action by relatives of those killed in Kashmir or other conflicts sparked by the end of empire.
Mr Cameron’s claim is not even accurate about the fate of Kashmir, which has been the subject of three major wars between India and Pakistan in 1947, 1965 and 1999.
The disputed province, which has a predominantly Muslim population, would probably have joined Pakistan when it broke away from India had it not been for the intervention of the state’s Hindu Maharaja Hari Singh, who insisted on remaining with India.
Sean Gabb, of the Libertarian Alliance, said yesterday: ‘It’s a valid historical point that some problems stem from British foreign policy in the 19th and 20th Centuries, but should we feel guilty about that? I fail to see why we should.
‘Some of these problems came about because these countries decided they did not want to be part of the British empire. They wanted independence, they got it, they should sort out their problems instead of looking to us.’
A No 10 official said: ‘Sometimes a bit of humility goes a long way.’
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Truth is Irrelevant, Censorship is Good
For the Dutch TV coverage in January of the hatespeech trial against Lars Hedegaard I asked the opinion of Anita Bay Bundegaard, Head of the Editorial Board of the Danish newspaper “Politiken”: “The trial against Hedegaard is necessary and we see too few of them. His statements stigmatize. They form dangerous opinions. Countering his arguments like in the American model won’t do: we don’t have that kind of self-censorship. It has to be enforced”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Battle of the Minarets Continues: Now Public Inquiry Will Decide Whether Mosque Can be Built Yards From Sandhurst
Controversial plans to build a mosque with two towering high minarets next-door to Sandhurst will be aired at a public inquiry that begins tomorrow.
The £3million building would have had a clear view over Britain’s top military academy and is just 400 yards from its parade ground — prompting fears it could be a security threat.
Plans to demolish a listed Victorian school building to make way for the huge Arab-style building were initially approved last year.
But, after the intervention of army chiefs, the local MP and education secretary Michael Gove, and 7,000 residents who signed a petition, Surrey Heath Borough Council changed their mind.
Now planning officials will make their final decision though a six-day public inquiry after an appeal by the Bengali Welfare Association, which worships at the former school in Camberley.
There remains fierce opposition and angry locals expected to queue from the early hours of tomorrow morning to get in the Camberley Theatre, which only seats 360.
The Save Our School group, which organised the anti-mosque petition, said it was planning to hire lawyers for the inquiry.
‘To be effective and have the best chance of winning, we need legal representation,’ a statement on its website said.
‘The Bengali Welfare Association has hired expensive consultants, and we must combat the arguments they will make to push this through despite our opposition.’
Local residents were outraged that the association wanted to knock down the historic building to make way for the new mosque.
They were also concerned at the scale of the proposed new building, particularly the 100ft-high minarets, which locals said were out of character with the district’s architecture.
Alan Kirkland, from Save Our School, told The Guardian: ‘There is nothing in the Qur’an that says you should have domes and minarets,’ he said.
‘They need a mezzanine floor that is for women only. To most people, that’s objectionable.
‘They are trying to target us as racist. I’m slightly offended by that. My ex-brother in law is Muslim, so are my niece and nephew.’
Planning papers showed that the massive structure would have towered over local buildings.
As well as the two minarets, it would have featured a large central dome, five smaller outlying domes, a morgue, a library and a separate worship area for women.
It would have overlooked Sandhurst where hundreds of newly-commissioned Army officers take to the parade ground each year for the academy’s passing out ceremony.
The event attracts senior members of the Royal Family, including the Queen when her grandson Prince Harry was commissioned in 2006.
The gigantic mosque was the idea of the Bengali Welfare Association, which worships at the al-Kharafi Islamic Centre in Camberley.
The Victorian school, built in the 1860s, has been used for worship since 1996.
The plans for a new mosque were originally approved by Surrey Heath Borough Council’s planning committee earlier least year, but overturned on a technicality.
However, in Marsh, officials backtracked after massive public opposition.
A special council meeting had to be held — also at the Camberley Theatre — because of the volume of interest.
Residents queued from 9.30am to make sure they got into the meeting, which started at 7pm.
All but two of the 36 councillors voted to refuse the planning application — a decision which was greeted with cheers both in and outside the theatre.
A spokesman for Surrey Heath Borough Council said: ‘The Planning Inspectorate has decided that the planning appeals into the proposal for a mosque on London Road, Camberley, will be heard by means of a public inquiry.
‘It will be held at the Camberley Theatre on April 5, 6, 7, 8, 12 and 13, starting at 10:00am each day.’
Abdul Wasay Chowdhury, from the association, said: ‘If people were so concerned about heritage, why didn’t they buy the building?
‘If we hadn’t bought it, it would have been empty for the last 15 years. That would have been worse.’
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia: 700,000 Live Below Poverty Threshold, Nearly 10%
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, APRIL 4 — In Serbia, 700,000 people, the equivalent of 10% of the entire population, live below the poverty threshold. This means that these neediest families (averaging three members) have a monthly income less than 18,500 dinars (about 181 euros), a figure that is far below the basket of minimum expenses estimated at 23,000 dinars (225 euros), said Labour Minister Rasim Ljajic, speaking to ‘TV B92’. “Serbia is not Belgrade, and 30km to the north and to the south of the capital, the situation is very different,” said Ljajic, who added that the population in these areas “is in the midst of a catastrophic situation resulting from botched privatisations and a lack of progress in the transitional process. The people in these areas are living in the 1990s mentally,” added the minister.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia: After 8-Year Probe, Folk Diva Star Indicted for Stealing Millions
Belgrade, 29 March (AKI) — Serbian folk diva Svetlana Raznatovic has been indicted for allegedly stealing millions of dollars illegal football player transfers from her Belgrade club to foreign squads, Belgrade television B92 said Tuesday, citing comments by prosecutors.
Raznatovic, 37, popularly known as Ceca, has been under investigation for the past eight years and prosecutors confirmed the indictment on Monday, the television said. She faces up to 12 years in prison if convicted.
Ceca had been married to Zeljko Raznatovic Arkan, late former leader of the Tiugers paramilitary suspected war crimes during the 1991-1995 war that followed the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia.
Arkan was the owner of a first division Serbian Obilic football club which Ceca inherited after he was murdered in January 2000 in a gang-style killing.
According to the indictment, Ceca, her sister Lidija Velickovic and two other club officials embezzled some four million German marks (2 million euros) and 3.5 million dollars from the sale of Obilic players to foreign clubs.
The transfer money was never paid to the club but to private accounts opened by Ceca and her sister in several European countries, the indictment said. Obilic eventually fell out of the first division and has practically ceased to exist.
Ceca was arrested in March 2003, following the murder of prime minister Zoran Djindic by a Belgrade criminal gang, and spent three months in detention. The police discovered in her Belgrade villa an arsenal of weapons which she claimed were the trophies of her late husband.
Prosecution spokesman Tomo Zoric said last week the probe stretched eight years because the investigators were gathering documents from several European countries.
He confirmed that there had been pressure to prosecute Ceca on the one hand, and to drop the case on the other. Ceca is a close friend of a current Serbian police minister Ivica Dacic, but he has said he would not interfere in the case.
In a separate development, former Yugoslav all time football star, Dragan Dzajic, is currently standing trial in a Belgrade court illegal player transfers. Dzajic, 64, and two Belgrade Red Star officials have been indicted for embezzling up to eight million euros from the transfers.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia: EU Commission: Advanced Status Talks Premature
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, APRIL 5 — The European Union Commission claims that for the time being, tabling talks on an advanced status for EU-Tunisia relations is “premature”. Speaking in Brussels today, Natasha Butler, Spokesperson for Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule, explained that the Commission’s reluctance to discuss this bilateral special partnership of sorts stems from the fact that its priority at the moment is to support the interim government during the next election, as well as to lend its support to the country’s less developed areas. According to Ms Butler, “at this stage we cannot begin to discuss the nature of the agreement nor the advanced status in concrete terms.” Indeed, these are talks “which must be held with more permanent authorities, because this is a long-term process.” In order to achieve an advanced status in bilateral relations with the EU, “the authorities must agree to respect a range of criteria, which will enable us to assess the appropriateness of these negotiations”, she concluded.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Recognises Libyan National Council
Frattini dismisses Gaddafi envoy proposals to end conflict
(ANSA) — Rome, April 4 — Italy on Monday recognised the anti-Gaddafi Libyan National Council as its only legitimate talking partner for relations with the North African Country.
“We have decided to recognise the Libyan National Council as the only legitimate talking partner for bilateral relations,” Foreign Minister Franco Frattini told reporters after talks in Rome with the Council’s foreign minister, Ali al-Essawi.
He said the recognition would be made in a “formal way, as France and Qatar have already done and as other countries and the Arab League are considering”.
Addressing a press conference with al-Essawi, Frattini dismissed proposals to end the Libyan crisis advanced by a Gaddafi envoy in Athens, including a transition led by one of Gaddafi’s sons, as “not credible”.
He said Italian planes and a hospital ship would take wounded rebels from the besieged city of Misurata and did not rule out arming the rebels as a last resort in the fight against Geddafi. Frattini also said Gaddafi’s besieged regime was using illegal immigration as a “weapon” in the conflict.
Al-Essawi thanked Italy for its contribution to the international efforts to stop Gaddafi and its “support for the revolution” against his 40-year rule.
Stressing that Italy was “very important for Libya”, al-Essawi also underscored that any action leading to the division of his country was “unacceptable”.
Earlier in a newspaper interview, Frattini dismissed speculation that the Council might lead to the creation of an Islamic ‘caliphate’, saying he had been struck by the “secular” nature of the rebel coalition. Separately, in an interview with ANSA and Italin state television, Council leader Mustafa Abdul Jalil said NATO should either provide the rebels with arms or else stop rooftop snipers from picking them off.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Rebel Council Remains ‘An’ Interlocutor for EU
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, APRIL 4 — The European Union’s stance on Libya remains as written in the conclusions reached in the European Council session of March 11: Libya’s National Council (NTC) is an “interlocutor” with which to discuss the democratic transition and move it forward. This remark was made by Michael Mann, spokesman of EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton, in the light of the statements made by Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini. Frattini had said after a meeting with NTC representatives in Rome that Italy has decided to recognise the Council as the “only” interlocutor.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Rebels Due to Load Tanker for First Oil Export
Tripoli, 5 April (AKI/Bloomberg) — Libyan rebels pushed forward against forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi in the central part of the country as the opposition prepared to export crude oil for the first time since the conflict began six weeks ago.
Rebels regained control of most of the oil port at Brega from Gaddafi loyalists, Al-Jazeera television said. Sky News reported “heavy fighting” around the city. The oil tanker Equator, which can carry 1 million barrels, was about 56 off Libya’s eastern coast and due today at a port near rebel-held Tobruk, according to AISLive Ltd. ship- tracking data compiled by Bloomberg.
The conflict, which began with an uprising aimed at ending Gaddafi’s 42-year rule, has threatened to grind into a stalemate and complicate a Nato-led air campaign that’s targeted Gaddafi’s forces. European governments have repeatedly said Gaddafi must go and rejected diplomatic overtures from the Libyan government, which yesterday called for an “international dialogue” to resolve the conflict.
The regime in Tripoli would offer elections, though any resolution wouldn’t involve an exit by Gaddafi in the near future, government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said yesterday at a press conference broadcast on Sky News. Gaddafi’s future must be decided by the Libyan people since he has “symbolic significance” for the nation, Ibrahim said.
Italy rejected a reported cease-fire proposal and yesterday became the latest government to recognize the rebels’ interim council as the nation’s legitimate government. So far France, Qatar and Italy have recognized the rebels. The US and the UK, which are taking part in air strikes on Gaddafi forces and have contacts with the rebels, haven’t formally recognized the opposition.
U.S. and Nato warplanes yesterday destroyed regime targets, including military vehicles near Brega hit by a US ground- attack jet, according to a Pentagon statement. Rebels moving into Brega came under artillery fire as they took a section known as New Brega, the Associated Press reported.
Brega’s refinery could boost the opposition’s control of oil in the east. The rebels’ national council said 1 April that it had reached a deal to have Qatar help market Libyan oil, with proceeds going for food, fuel, medicine and other uses. Italian oil company Eni has been in contact with the Libyan rebels now that Italy has recognized the council.
Gaddafi’s acting foreign minister, Abdul Ati al-Obeidi, met yesterday with officials in Greece, Turkey and Malta. The Libyan official made no comment before leaving the Maltese capital Valletta after midnight. The island nation’s prime minister, Lawrence Gonzi, declined to say what al-Obeidi had offered.
“I insisted that no mediation can take place unless there is a credible cease-fire in place and that Gaddafi withdraws all his troops and military hardware from every town, village and city,” Gonzi told reporters after the meeting.
The Greek government said that al-Obeidi’s visit was the latest attempt by the Libyan leader to resolve the crisis through a settlement. Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini yesterday dismissed the reported cease-fire proposal by the Libyan leader, calling it “not credible.”
The US military pulled out its fighter jets after yesterday’s mission over Libya, carrying out a pledge by president Barack Obama to hand over most military missions to Nato and its allies. The US will keep attack aircraft on standby and resume flights if necessary, while US command and control aircraft and navy ships remain in action.
A rebel official yesterday in Rome complained that the air campaign led by the Nato had lost momentum and cost civilian lives. Ali al-Essawi, a foreign- policy official for the rebels, told the New York Times that the western mission had been encumbered by bureaucratic delays.
“There’s a delay in reacting and lack of response to what’s going on on the ground,” al-Essawi said as cited by the newspaper.
Gaddafi’s son, Seif al-Islam, told BBC television that Libya’s former foreign minister Moussa Koussa, who abandoned the regime and traveled to Britain last week, was free to go because of health problems.
Asked whether a wave of defections might presage a collapse of Gaddafi’s regime, Seif al-Islam said: “We will see.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya Releases Europe’s Old Rivalries
“Whatever the outcome, what seems most unlikely is that the rebels’ newly visible generals will be leading their troops into Tripoli any time in the near future,” claimed the writers of a comprehensive coverage on the latest developments in Libya published in the British Guardian.
Peter Beaumont and Chris McGreal also claim that the situation in Libya is likely to “descend into a stalemate as U.S. winds down air strikes.” And if latest rumors prove to be true, the reverse of fate on the ground in favor of the Gadhafi troops has now opened the way to an energetic diplomacy between the western alliance and the Libyan leadership which may lead to a middle solution instead of a radical change. A middle solution would keep the status quo with Gadhafi in charge but with a commitment to reform.
“We are talking to both sides, of course we do not want to interfere in the internal affairs of another country but we believe we have the experience and the knowledge to give our advice to whoever needs it in order to contribute to a peaceful and democratic solution,” a senior government official said in reply to my question inquiring about with whom Ankara was talking to in the Libya affair just before the London Conference. It was also an answer to another question: “Why is it that the Turkish prime minister has not come out to advise Gadhafi to listen to the call of the times and leave his post in order to prevent bloodshed.”
But Libya is obviously not Egypt and the identity of the “voice of the people” is not clearly defined. Plus, Libya has got enormous economic importance for Turkey which was enhanced during the Gadhafi regime. Ankara’s cautious if not unsteady diplomatic treading before the London conference can be seen as an attempt to buying time in order not to burn its bridges with any of the sides in Libya on the one hand, while keeping its role as a trusted member of NATO on the other. If the situation on the ground turns decisively in favor of the Gadhafi regime, then this will alleviate the burden on Turkish diplomats to having to start a new chapter of relations with the opposition leadership.
But while Ankara’s diplomatic zigzagging has been discussed, justified or criticized extensively in this part of the world, less attention was given to the other country that had also opposed the western intervention to Libya — like Turkey, initially — but did not change its position in the end — unlike Turkey: Germany.
An interesting debate has started both inside and outside Germany about the deeper meaning that the alliance against Libya has had for European politics. And this debate centers around the assumption that during the last years, Germany has risen as a European economic and political superpower against France and Britain; its newly acquired status has given it the superior hand to impose its terms and conditions within the Eurozone — an attitude which Greece in particular was made to experience in its toughest form for the past year. Here is an interesting approach by Greek commentator Y. Malouchos writing for TA NEA newspaper: “Through this international intervention against Gadhafi, the most important change is the one which takes place inside Europe itself: after so many years, Europe ceases to be just a technical/financial concept —something that never was throughout its history — and becomes again what it always has been above all: a geopolitical concept. Financial issues, although they do not cease to be of highest importance, they lose their monopoly of power in Europe which finds something of its old lost self, balancing its priorities through a new more complex set of balances where the Pact for the Euro and the Competitiveness Pact are no longer the only deities worshiped in the Old Continent.”
“The war in Libya put a break to the German-European hegemonic attitude. It demonstrated that Berlin has neither the capacity nor the necessary will to move as a leader on tough power issues. That its monetary and industrial power is not enough for the role it wishes to play…Not only could it not dictate what it was going to happen in Libya, but it also found itself isolated against the rest of the West,” writes Greek Professor N. Kotzias, who has long experience in German politics.
This particular analysis of course elevates the role of France as a representative of the old “central” Europe and ignores the importance of the U.S. in European politics.
At any rate, there is no doubt that the prolonged conflict in Libya will bring to the surface more interesting aspects of struggles for supremacy within Europe and the degree of involvement that the U.S. wishes to have in the events in North Africa. It will also show where the diplomatic ball of Ankara will finally settle.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
NATO Raids Destroy 30% of Gaddafi’s Military Resources
(AGI) Brussels — NATO’s General Mark van Uhm, quoting information provided by the commander of military operations against Libya, General Charles Bouchard, has reported that air raids over Libya by the coalition have destroyed 30% of Muammar Gaddafi’s military resources .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
The War in Libya Cost the U.S. $4 Million a Day
(AGI) Washington — Military operations against Libya cost the United States $4 million a day, a figure that is expected to drop as America’s involvement decreases, military sources report. About 50 U.S. military aircraft of various types were involved.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey, Indonesia Call for Libya Ceasefire
Turkey and Indonesia on Tuesday called for a ceasefire in Libya and promised to help rebuild the country, as rebels and government forces battled for key eastern cities under a U.N. no-fly zone.
The call came after Moammar Gadhafi’s regime on Friday rejected an opposition offer of a truce provided his forces ended their assaults on rebel-held cities. Turkish President Abdullah Gül said it was time to “stop the bloodshed”, following talks in Jakarta with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
“We discussed this issue… to stop the bloodshed in Libya. Infrastructure should not be destroyed,” he told a joint press conference at the state palace, according to an Indonesian government translator. “It is not possible to have a closed regime (in Libya)… Democracy will come to this region and people in Libya should not suffer anymore.”
In a joint statement, the two leaders “stressed the importance of the preservation of the sovereignty, national unity and territorial integrity of Libya.” “In this connection, the two presidents underscored the need for an immediate and effective ceasefire and an end to hostilities to bring about a complete end to the violence against long-suffering innocent civilians.
They also called for a “United Nations presence” to monitor any truce. Yudhoyono said Indonesia — the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation — was ready to send peacekeepers. “When the ceasefire is established, certainly there’ll be surveillance and Indonesia is more than willing to take part in some sort of peacekeeping mission,” he told reporters.
Coalition aircraft have been striking Gadhafi’s forces since March 19 under a U.N. resolution to enforce a no-fly zone and protect civilians.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Goldstone Report “Legitimate” For UN Despite Author’s Change of Mind
Richard Goldstone, a South African Jew, retracts his conclusions, saying that Israel’s “possible war crimes” in Gaza were not “intentional. A Palestinian family that had 28 members killed by Israeli soldiers responds to the judge. In the past few years, Goldstone was ostracised by world Jews, banned from praying in his synagogue.
Jerusalem (AsiaNews) — For the United Nations Human Rights Council, the original Goldstone Report on the Gaza War of 2008-2009 (operation ‘Cast Lead’) is still legitimate despite second thoughts expressed by one of its authors, Judge Richard Goldstone. “UN reports are not canceled on the basis of an op-ed in a newspaper,” Council spokesman Cedric Sapey said.
He was referring to an article published last Friday in the Washington Post signed by Richard Goldstone (“Reconsidering the Goldstone Report on Israel and war crimes,” in The Washington Post, 1 April 2011) in which he said that he had changed his mind about the report’s conclusions as first released (See Joshua Lapide, “UN: Israel and Hamas guilty of war crimes in Gaza,” in AsiaNews, 16 September 2009) and which he later defended (“Goldstone challenges US over Gaza crimes, China sides with Israel,” in AsiaNews, 26 October 2009).
According to the report, Israeli troops and Hamas probably committed “crimes against humanity” for targeting civilians.
At the time, humanitarian organisations said that “Cast Lead’ had killed 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians and children. Three Israeli civilians and ten soldiers died during the war.
In the wake of the report, the United Nations General Assembly called on Israel and the Palestinians to launch investigations on possible war crimes.
Both Israel and Hamas rejected the Goldstone Report, claiming it was biased. Goldstone himself defended it as honest.
In his article, Judge Goldstone said that his change of heart was based on the fact that Hamas’ possible crimes were “intentional”, meant to strike at civilians, whilst those by Israeli forces were “unintentional”, caused by mistakes in processing information.
Goldstone did express regret that Israel refused to cooperate with the commission of inquiry, which, in his opinion, meant that the latter did not have all the facts to reach a conclusion.
Israel refused to cooperate with the inquiry because it does not accept outside interventions in what it considers an internal matter.
In the article, Goldstone cites as an example of mistake in processing information, the killing of 28 members of the Samouni family. In fact, he acknowledged that the Israeli military had launched an inquiry into the massacre.
Contacted by a journalist, the survivors of the Samouni family said they were shocked. “How could this action be an accident, [. . .] a mistake, while they put women, kids, men [. . .] and they start to shoot at them [. . .] (see Ken O’Keefe, “Samouni Family Responds to Justice Goldstone Backtrack on Israeli War Crimes,” in SalemNews, 4 April 2011)
Conversely, Israeli newspapers are full of praise for Goldstone’s “change of mind”. After the report was released, the South African judge, who is also an Orthodox Jew, endured heavy-handed criticism, with some calling him a “traitor”. Jews around the world turned against him and even his synagogue banned him from praying.
Now with Goldstone’s retraction, Israel wants the report squashed. However, the UN Human Rights Council still considers it valid. For it to be cancelled, Goldstone would have to submit a written request.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Second Gaza Flotilla Seeks EU Political Cover
The organisers of a second flotilla aiming to break Israel’s siege on Gaza are seeking EU diplomatic protection after Israeli commandos killed nine people and injured 52 during their first trip in 2010. Speaking to EUobserver from Paris on Monday (4 April), Claude Leostic from Association France Palestine Solidarite (AFPS) said the group will next week send letters to top EU officials Herman Van Rompuy and Catherine Ashton urging them to threaten Israel with economic sanctions if there is a repeat of last year’s violence.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Jordan: Regional Turmoil Hurts Tourism in Petra
(ANSAmed) — AMMAN, APRIL 5 — Regional political turmoil has lead to a 19 percent drop in the number of tourists arriving to the red rose city of Petra, official figures showed today.
Petra Development and Tourism Region Authority (PDTRA) Deputy Commissioner Mohammad Abu Ghanam said 154,439 tourists visited Petra between January and March this year compared to 191,255 in the same period of 2010. The decline is due to cancellation in joint packages to neighbouring countries such Egypt and Syria, where popular uprisings have gripped the nations for weeks.
Officials say at least 102,918 tourists visited the Nabataean city in March last year, compared to approximately 54,008 last month, a drop to more than half.
However, officials said revenues of tourism increased by 23 per cent, or JD8.406 million compared to JD6.808 million in the first quarter of 2010, due to what they say a rise in entry fees.
Meanwhile, the government launched a campaign to promote internal tourism through a programme named “Jordan is Beautiful,” in an attempt to cushion the impact of declining foreign tourists to the kingdom.
Jordan has been grappling with protests since nearly three months in demand for political and economic reform.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Syria: Saudi Fund to Finance Deir-ez-Zor Power Plant
(ANSAmed) — DAMASCUS, APRIL 5 — The Saudi Fund for Development (SFD) has joined the group of investors for the project planning to build a combined cycle power plant in the Syrian city of Deir-ez-Zor. Co-financing will amount to 100 million dollars, according to a statement from Syria’s Finance Ministry, and will be used to build a 750 MW power plant. The funds pledged by the SFD, reports the Italian Trade Commission (ICE) office in Damascus, join the 400 million dollars in funding from various investors, including the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development (100 million), the European Bank for Investments (200 million euros) and the Islamic Development Bank (87 million euros). The project, whose overall value totals 678 million euros, was awarded in 2010 to a consortium formed by Greek company Metka and Italian company Ansaldo.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tribe of Yemen President Clashes With Army, 3 Dead
Tribesmen loyal to Yemen’s embattled president on Tuesday clashed with a group of soldiers whose commander has sided with the opposition, and the fighting in a suburb of the capital Sanaa left three tribesmen dead, according to tribal elders and military officials.
It was the latest violence in weeks of turmoil in Yemen, where President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s military and police forces have cracked down on protesters demanding he step down after 32 years in power.
The clash erupted as a convoy of about 30 cars with armed tribesmen from Saleh’s Sanhan tribe arrived at the headquarters of the 1st Armored Division in western Sanaa to meet with its commander, Maj. Gen. Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, who had earlier joined the opposition.
Tribal members and army officers at the scene said al-Ahmar, who also hails from Saleh’s tribe, met a tribal chief, Ismail Abu Hurriya, who tried to persuade the renegade commander to return to the president’s camp.
It was unclear how exactly the shooting started at the gate of the army compound. Several tribesmen were also wounded by the gunfire, witnesses said. Some said a group of government supporters appeared at the scene and opened fire but the confusing reports could not be immediately clarified.
Security officials said the visit was an attempt by Saleh to mediate with al-Ahmar. All the witnesses and officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the tense situation.
Earlier Tuesday, Saleh’s office said in a statement that the president had met with some leaders of his tribe to discuss the tensions. The powerful Sanhan tribe is split on those remaining loyal to Saleh and those who have crossed over to the opposition. The tribe is also affiliated with the Hashid, the country’s biggest and most powerful tribe, which has sided with the opposition.
Al-Ahmar’s troops have stationed themselves close to the central square near Sanaa University to protect thousands of anti-Saleh protesters who have been camping for weeks, refusing to give up their protest until Saleh leaves office.
Meanwhile, Yemen’s opposition parties urged the international community, regional powers and human rights groups to help stop the bloodshed in the country. More than 120 people have been killed and 5,000 injured since Yemen’s protests started in Feb. 11, inspired by the popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt.
The parties issued a statement late Monday accusing Saleh, his sons and relatives, as well as security and military apparatuses they control of carrying out planned attacks against peaceful demonstrations with the intent to kill.
Saleh has clung to power, saying Yemen will sink into chaos if he goes. In Taiz, dozens of protesters were treated from breathing problems after police fired tear gas as thousands of demonstrators took to the streets for a third consecutive day to press for Saleh’s ouster.
On Monday, at least 15 people were killed when military forces and police snipers opened fire on the demonstrators who marched past the governor’s headquarters in Taiz.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Yemen: Protests Bloodily Repressed, At Least 17 Dead
(ANSAmed) — BEIRUT, APRIL 4 — The names of at least 17 more Yemenite civilians, killed today by plain-clothes officers of Yemen’s security forces, have been added to the long list of “martyrs” among the protesters who have been demanding the end of the regime of President Ali Abdallah Saleh for more than two months now. The Yemenite leader, a long-standing ally of the USA because of his anti-al Qaeda commitment, seems more and more isolated.
After the defections of army generals and tribe leaders announced two weeks ago, the American press reports that Washington is urging Saleh to step down and spare the country more bloodshed. The death toll of yesterday’s violence south of Sanaa is still provisional and could rise: at least 17 people were killed this morning by gunshots fired in Taiz, in the south of the country, by plain-clothes officers and members of the security forces who were trying to disperse yet another anti-Saleh march headed for the government seat, the symbol of central power. At the same time more than 200 civilians were injured in clashes with the police in the Red Sea port of Hudayda according to local medical sources. The police fired live rounds and used teargas against the protesters. It was the most dramatic day of violence since March 18, when 52 people, most of them young, were killed by gunshots fired by snipers from buildings that face the square of Sanaa’s State university. That massacre caused many Yemenite ambassadors, tribe leaders and army generals who had remained faithful to the President up to that point to distance themselves from the regime and to join the opposition. After giving in to the pressure, claiming at first that he did not want to run for a new presidential mandate in 2013, and later that he was willing to step down as President this year, Saleh has now mobilized his most loyal supporters in an attempt to put down the protests. The opposition and demonstrators do not give up however. They want Saleh to resign and to temporarily hand over power to a vice-president who has to reorganise the army and control agencies before carrying out political reforms and holding presidential elections. In this climate the news was announced today by the American press that last week the US ambassador in Sanaa handed an ultimatum to Saleh in which the White House urges him to step down, without openly challenging him, to guarantee a bloodless transfer of power.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Moscow Patriarchate Calls on the Faithful to Hang the Crucifix in Schools and Offices
Archpriest Chaplin calls on Orthodox to be more courageous in demonstrating their faith. Human rights activists protest: ideas that contribute to dividing society.
Moscow (AsiaNews) — Fresh controversy has broken out in Russia between the Orthodox Church and human rights organizations. The head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s Department for Relations between the Church and society, Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, has appealed to the community of believers to be more courageous in showing their faith. “We should have no qualms about making the sign of the cross wherever we like, or hanging an image of the crucifix, where we live and work,” the priest wrote in an article published in the April issue of the Orthodox journal Sovereign Rus’.
The idea of the crucifix in the workplace or in schools has angered human rights activists. “The problem in our society is not the number of crucifixes on the walls, but immorality,” Lev Ponomarev, a noted leader of a human rights movement, told Interfax. “Concern yourselves more with prayers and sermons — he continued, addressing Chaplin — and not with pushing for official displays of Orthodox attributes”.
He stressed that in Russia, church and state are separate and attacked the Patriarchate’s interference in civil society. “I think that religious symbols have no place in public offices, schools or in institutions — added Ponomarev — for example, if they were hung in schools, what would the many Muslims say? Would they start asking to hang the crescent? And why is it needed? All this will only contribute to dividing society. “ Ponomarev has, however, admitted that if some people work in offices that are considered Orthodox, nobody has the right to prevent them from hanging a cross. “ Bolstered by the decision of the European Court of Human Rights that has found display of crucifixes in classrooms not in violation of human rights, Chaplin continues to launch high-impact hypothesis on a society that is still recovering from 70 years of state atheism. In the case against Italy raised by a citizen of Finnish origin Sole Lautsi, the Moscow Patriarchate has always openly supported Italy.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Afghanistan: Protesters Chant ‘Death to America’ In Wake of Koran-Buring Violence
Kabul, 5 April (AKI) — Hundreds of demonstrators on Tuesday gathered in Afghan capital Kabul to protest against the burning of the Koran by an American evangelist pastor.
The protesters chanted “death to America” demanding that pastor Terry Jones, from the American state of Florida, be brought to trial for burning the Koran.
Twenty-four people in died during Afghan protests reacting to Jone’s Koran burning which was streamed live online and promoted on Facebook.
On 1 April protesters stormed a UN compound in northeast Afghanistan following a rally denouncing the burning. The UN office was ransacked and seven of its staff were killed in the violence.
Five Afghans were also killed by police.
The latest protest was in front of at Kabul University in the presence of many police.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Bangladesh: When Wives Are Set on Fire for Their Dowry
At least 249 women were killed in 2010. Out of anger or vengeance, husbands throw kerosene on their wives and set them on fire. The problem is widespread despite the fact that Islamic law, which is in place in Bangladesh, requires would-be husbands to pay a price for their future wives.
Dhaka (AsiaNews) — At least 249 women were killed in 2010 for their dowry, this according to the Bangladesh Society for the Enforcement of Human Rights (BSEHR). Whether out of anger or for vengeance, husbands often beat their wives or set them on fire with kerosene, sometimes with the complicity of their families. In some cases, women are strangled and then hanged to simulate a suicide. The figures are incomplete though because many cases are not reported. In fact, if in 2007, there were 145 recorded cases, dropping to 114 in 2008 and 109 in 2009, the numbers last year showed a marked reversal. At the same time, the BSEHR also reported that last year at least 122 women were tortured.
Under the existing dowry system, a bride’s family must pay her future groom a sum of money. The practice first appeared some 50 years ago. Before that, would-be husbands had to pay instead a ‘bride price’ to the woman’s family in accordance with Islamic law. The change appears to be the result of an imbalance in the country’s demography, as there were more women than men of marriageable age at that time. For example in 1950, the population of women of marriageable age was 10 per cent more than that of eligible men; by 1975, the percentage had risen to 43.
However, men do not necessarily demand a dowry before marriage; in some cases, they do it afterwards to assert their authority over their wives when the latter do not obey. Violence can ensue in a number of situations in a society where tradition places the husband in a position of superiority.
Not all families are willing or financially capable of paying a dowry for their daughters, a situation that some husbands see as an insult that calls for vengeance.
This kind of tragedy occurs in both big cities and small villages, among upper middle classes as well as the poor. A few months ago for instance, a university professor was killed over her dowry.
For affluent people, the dowry is a matter of prestige, and a way to ensure that daughters can pick a rich husband. For the poor, it is a real hardship though because many families do not have the wherewithal to do to marry off their daughters.
In 1980, a law banning dowries was adopted. Since then, it has been changed two or three times. Nevertheless, it is in not enforced, partly because of police negligence, partly because of threats from grooms’ families. The law itself is also very vague and provides little guidance for enforcement. This ends up penalising the weakest party, i.e. women.
Even so, Bangladesh has signed the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women, the 30-article United Nations treaty that defines discrimination against women and sets out ways to fight it.
However, Bangladesh has not accepted Article 16, which requires measures to eliminate discrimination against women in matters relating to marriage and family, because it contradicts Islamic law.
The dowry has also other consequences. First of all, poor families end up taking on debt to raise enough money to pay for their daughters’ dowry. In some cases, parents end up not sending their daughters to school to save money for their dowry or because they see education as something their daughters would lose after marriage. Finally, early marriage (two out of five women marry between 15 and 17) has serious consequences because of early pregnancies, which are often followed by deep depressions as well as psychological and physical violence.
For things to change, the law must change to make sure that it is actually enforced. Work must be done to change social attitudes and political will as well.
Religious institutions have a key role to play in all this. Unfortunately, it is well known that mosque leaders are not concerned by the practice even if it is contrary to the Qur’an.
There are some exceptions. Every year, a Muslim spiritual group organises a mass gathering that draws millions of people. During the event, hundreds of couples get married, publicly announcing their intention to renounce the dowry and wed in accordance to Islamic principles.
This shows that at least one group is aware of the dire consequences of a problem too often ignored by most mosque leaders. More generally, conservative Muslims religious leaders have opposed changes to the law itself.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Human Capital and Indian Development
Another story in the WSJ on human capital in India. Some readers objected to a related post I made last week, accusing me of Chinese jingoism for pointing out some qualitative differences in Indian and Chinese economic development. Let me say that I have nothing but respect for the many talented Indians I have known in physics and in technology. But it’s important to clarify to what extent elite (highly selected) subgroups, such as, e.g., Indians in the US, or IIT graduates, are representative of the broader population upon whom India’s continued economic growth depends. It’s entirely possible, as the article below suggests, that India’s IT and outsourced service industries are starting to experience real human capital limitations.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
India = Silicon Valley + Africa ?
A few hundred million (relatively) affluent middle class knowledge workers surrounded by almost a billion slumdogs is not a desirable development outcome. It may in fact be unstable (see below).
The only way I know of to raise the standard of living of a billion people is through the well-traveled (but dirty and energy intensive) path of industrialization and manufacturing. That is how the West, Japan, and Asian Tigers did it, and what China is doing now. Software parks and call centers are wonderful gleaming instantiations of modernity, but only a small fraction of the population in India have the cognitive ability to write code or deliver complex services in English. India optimists are only thinking about the elite minority — what about the rest of the population?
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
China’s Baidu Launchs Browser Against Google and Microsoft
(AGI) Beijing — Baidu has planted a new flag as part of its strategy to conquest the web. China’s most important search engine has officially announced it’s project for the development of an autonomous browser, a move which would put China’s colossal internet in direct competition with Microsoft Explorer and Chrome, developed by Google.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Japanese Leader Shunned for Western-Style Crisis Management
Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan has adopted a Western approach to solving his country’s deep crisis. In doing so, he is violating Japan’s traditional rules — and putting his credibility on the line.
For three weeks, the man who is expected to save the country stopped wearing suits, preferring instead to appear in public in freshly starched blue overalls. Even today, the hands he used to open widely like a preacher during speeches can often be seen clenched into fists. His smile has disappeared, and the more grimly determined he looks as he gazes into the television cameras, the more anxious his fellow Japanese become about the future.
Naoto Kan, 64, is Japan’s fifth prime minister in five years. He is also just the fifth prime minister since 1955 who is not a member of the powerful Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which has been in power for most of its 54 years in existence. But Japan is unlikely to forget Kan, as they have many of his predecessors.
If it hadn’t been for the disaster in Fukushima, Kan would probably no longer be in office. On the morning of March 11, he was forced to admit before parliament that he had accepted illegal political donations. But that afternoon, a powerful earthquake struck northeastern Japan. The ensuing tsunami flushed a crisis of overwhelming proportions into Kan’s court, providing him with a second chance as a politician.
The only problem is that Naoto Kan has remained Naoto Kan, a type of politician whose leadership style doesn’t seem right for Japan.
Kan is trying to govern Japan with the top-down leadership style of an American president. In June 2010, he campaigned on a platform of “resurrecting a powerful Japan.” He told his people that he intended to double the sales tax rate to rein in the country’s massive debt.
Avoiding Humiliation
The results of his announcements were soon apparent. His Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) promptly lost its majority in the July 2010 election for the upper house of the Japanese legislature, and Kan became a “lame duck.”
Then Fukushima happened, and now Kan is trying to do everything right. But instead of using Japanese role models to approach the crisis, he seems to be doing everything he can to avoid the humiliation that then US President George W. Bush suffered after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
On the morning after the tsunami, Kan donned Japanese military fatigues, boarded a military helicopter and was flown over the devastated northeast Japanese coast to the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant.
He was photographed gazing seriously and silently out of the helicopter, seemingly mimicking statesmen in the West. For many of his fellow Japanese, the photo disqualified Kan as a crisis manager.
The opposition and most Japanese media organizations accuse the prime minister of having delivered a pathetic and thoroughly un-Japanese solo “performance,” a word so alien to the island people that there is no equivalent in Japanese, except the Japanese version of the English word: “pafoomansu.”
In a country where everyone learns from an early age to be modest and conform, Kan’s performance violated social norms. He was even accused of having hindered efforts to save the nuclear power plant with his helicopter outing. To protect the premier from radiation, the plant’s operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), allegedly postponed a steam release from one of the overheated reactors — far too long, say critics, to prevent the explosion that destroyed the building surrounding Reactor Unit 1 soon afterwards.
A Metaphor of Crisis
Kan rejected such criticism in a speech to the Japanese parliament last Thursday. But words fade away, while the photo of Kan sitting in a helicopter endures. For many Japanese, it depicts a politician who is jeopardizing the enormous national effort by diverting energy into Western-style political theater. Kan’s photo became, as it were, the metaphor of a natural disaster that is growing into a political crisis. All the while, Japan’s citizens, used to a highly regulated, high-tech environment, are forced to look on as radioactivity from Fukushima continues to spread — radioactivity which will likely be around for years to come.
The Japanese have, however, been impressed by the desperate battle being waged by the more than 400 technicians and workers on the grounds of the stricken nuclear facility. They admire the dedication of the roughly 100,000 soldiers working in the areas devastated by the tsunami. The members of the country’s military, known as the Japan Self-Defense Forces, had never been particularly popular among their fellow Japanese. With its pacifist constitution of 1946, the country had fundamentally distanced itself from anything that was even remotely related to war and the military.
But now the soldiers are bringing food to towns and villages where private truck drivers no longer dare to go. They are building temporary bathing facilities where local residents living in the often unheated emergency shelters can bathe and warm themselves. And they are searching for the dead and burying the bodies with as much dignity as possible under the conditions.
Compared with these heroes, the crisis managers in Tokyo often look like failures. Although they are keeping up appearances, which includes bowing and begging for forgiveness, it is impossible to ignore their many mistakes…
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Japan Stops Leaks From Nuclear Plant — Facility
Engineers have stopped highly radioactive water leaking into the sea from a crippled Japanese nuclear power plant, the facility’s operator has said today, a breakthrough in the battle to contain the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl.
However, Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) still needs to pump low-level contaminated water into the sea because of a lack of storage space at the facility.
“The leaks were slowed yesterday after we injected a mixture of liquid glass and a hardening agent and it has now stopped,” a TEPCO spokesman told Reuters.
Engineers had been desperately struggling to stop the leaks and had used sawdust, newspapers and concrete as well as liquid glass to try to stem the flow of the highly-contaminated water.
The liquid glass was injected into the ground beneath the leaking storage pit yesterday and stopped the leak after solidifying the earth.
Engineers are still faced with the massive problem of how to store 60,000 tonnes (60 million litres) of contaminated seawater used to cool over-heated fuel rods and are being forced to pump 11,500 tonnes of low-level radioactive water back into the sea.
“The situation is not under control yet,” said Thomas Grieder, Asia analyst at forecasting firm IHS Global Insight.
“TEPCO’s decision to displace the contaminated water into the ocean reflected the urgency of clearing the turbine buildings and trenches of radioactive water so as not to damage equipment needed for restoration of cooling systems.”
Workers are struggling to restart cooling pumps — which recycle the water — in four reactors damaged by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that hit northeast Japan.
Until those are fixed, they must pump in water from outside to prevent overheating and meltdowns.
Radiation Fears
Japan is facing its worst crisis since World War Two after a 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami hit its northeast coast, leaving nearly 28,000 people dead or missing, thousands homeless, and rocking the world’s third-largest economy.
The world’s costliest natural disaster has hit Japan’s economy and left a damages bill which may top US$300 billion (NZ$403b), forcing the Japanese government to plan an extra budget to pay for the massive recovery.
Radiation fears have seen several countries ban Japanese food imports from the nuclear zone, while India is the first to ban food imports from all areas of Japan over radiation fears.
Japan has called for calm over radiation concerns, but is itself considering imposing radioactivity restrictions on seafood for the first time after contaminated fish were found.
Samples of the water used to cool reactor No. 2 were five million times the legal limit of radioactivity, officials said on Tuesday, adding to fears that contaminants had spread far beyond the disaster zone.
Small levels of radiation have been detected as far away as Europe and the west coast of the United States.
Radioactive iodine of up to 4800 times the legal limit has been recorded in the sea near the plant. Caesium was found at levels above safety limits in tiny kounago fish in waters off Ibaraki Prefecture, south of Fukushima, local media reported.
Ad Feedback Iodine-131 in the water near the sluice gate of reactor No. 2 hit a high on April 2 of 7.5 million times the legal limit. The water, which was not released into the ocean, fell to five million times the legal limit on Monday.
Condolence Money
TEPCO has started paying “condolence money” to those affected in the Fukushima region where the plant is based. But one city rejected the money and local mayors who came to Tokyo to meet Prime Minister Naoto Kan demanded far more help.
“We have borne the risks, co-existed and flourished with TEPCO for more than 40 years, and all these years, we have fully trusted the myth that nuclear plants are absolutely safe,” said Katsuya Endo, the mayor of Tomioka town.
He was one of eight Fukushima prefecture mayors who went to Kan to demand compensation and support for employment, housing and education for the tens of thousands of crisis evacuees.
TEPCO shares continued to tumble on Wednesday, already having hit a 60-year low on Tuesday.
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Rising Seas Made China’s Ancient Mariners
A rising tide lifts all boats, but in a surprising twist, ascending sea levels launched a flotilla of rafts or canoes on voyages from China to Taiwan around 5,000 years ago, a new study suggests.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Cyprus: 20,000 Migrants Could Get Fast-Track Citizenship
(ANSAmed) — NICOSIA, APRIL 1 — More than 20,000 migrants could receive Cypriot citizenship under a new proposal to tackle “unmanageable” numbers of asylum applicants, the government as daily Cyprus Mail reports today. In a surprise move, the assistant head of migrant integration, Nancy Yuren-Jie, who received her own citizenship just last week, presented the plan to naturalise all new arrivals, starting immediately, and with a view to extending this to illegal immigrants within a year.Yuren-Jie said the new measures could cut asylum-seeker numbers to almost zero. Cyprus currently receives the most asylum applications in the industrialised world, according to the UNHCR’s latest report. The bill is due to be discussed in parliament next week.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
EU Court Condemns Greece in Case Involving Minor
(ANSAmed) — STRASBURG, APRIL 5 — Today the European Court of Human Rights condemned Greece for not having provided adequate care and for having illegally detained an unaccompanied minor who was seeking asylum. The case involves a 15-year-old Afghan orphan, who arrived illegally to the island of Lesbos in the summer of 2007. On the island, he was initially incarcerated for several days in the detention centre for immigrants in Pagani and then released under the supervision of an alleged cousin, with an expulsion order. The boy arrived to Athens on his own where an NGO took responsibility for him at a hostel where he is currently being accommodated. In its condemnation of Greece, the court underlined how considering the age of the boy, the authorities were obligated to provide him with protection, an adequate place to stay while assessing his case, and appoint a guardian. However, observed the court, none of these steps were taken. The boy was incarcerated in a detention centre whose conditions have been defined as ‘inhumane’ and then released under the supervision of a man for whom the Greek authorities could not prove any relation nor provide any identification. The court also stated that once released, the boy was abandoned, and that even after the authorities were notified of this by the NGO that is currently caring for him, they took no steps to intervene.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Everyone for Germany!
Polityka Warsaw
The 1st May will mark an end to quotas to limit the access of workers from former communist countries to the German labour market. While the German population fears a wave of cheap labour from Poland, Polityka argues that the German economy stands to benefit.
Cezary Kowanda
Writing under the pseudonym of Justyna Polanska, a Polish cleaning lady has recently published a book entitled Under German Beds, which recounts the grim details of her relationships with her German customers and all the terrible things she has found in their homes. And it is worth noting that for the Justyna Polanskas of this world, the 1st May is not going to change anything. They will continue to do battle with the housework in German homes, and they will still be employed illegally. But in spite of that, the opening of the labour market is the subject of a much sturm und drang for the citizens of Poland’s western neighbour.
According to a recent poll by the IMAS Institute, two thirds of Germans are convinced that the inhabitants of the new members of the EU are about to arrive en masse. And close to 70 percent believe that an end to the quotas will have a negative impact on Germany, as opposed to 16 percent who think it will be beneficial.
According to an even more alarming survey published by Welt am Sonntag, three quarters of the population believes that Germans will have to contend with fewer employment opportunities as a result of the suppression of quotas for Poles, Czechs and the citizens of other countries that joined the European Union in 2004.
Economic emigration
Those of you who are familiar with today’s Germany will not be surprised by the results of these polls. Pressure from public opinion is the main reason why successive German governments have not put an end to restrictions on access to the German labour market. In fact, flying in the face of advice from economists, the applicable period for these restrictions has been extended on two occasions. But that is not to say that the Poles are complaining. On the contrary, they have learned to get around German bureaucracy and exploit loopholes in the country’s legislation — a fact born out by figures from the Polish statistics office, which reports that in recent years 400,000 Poles have been legally employed in Germany. At the same time, a significantly larger number have found jobs in Great Britain, which took the step of opening its labour market in 2004.
The majority of German experts are not expecting much in the way of change following May 1. Joachim Muller, the director of an employment agency research institute, estimates that the inflow of workers to the German labour market from new EU member states will amount to 100,000 people per year, and a significant percentage of these will be Polish. According to the Polish-German chamber of commerce, the removal of access restrictions will encourage between 200,000 and 400,000 Poles to emigrate within the next few years. Most will come from regions close to the border, although a certain proportion will also come from Mazovia and Opole. But the overall picture is one of regional emigration, which bears no comparison to the large-scale migration that immediately followed Polish accession to the EU.
In Germany the employment agencies are already rubbing their hands with anticipation, while the country’s employers, although they do not like to admit it, already rely heavily on Polish labour. The Germans are especially interested in well-qualified migrants — doctors, nurses and IT specialists — but they are also eager to recruit temporary personnel such as warehouse staff, says Karina Kaczmarczyk of Work Service International.
Shortages in the German labour market
For years Germans have been complaining about a death of IT staff, which in part has been prompted by the fact that new technology specialists usually prefer to emmigrate to the US rather than Europe. The ongoing recruitment campaigns that Germany has launched in several countries have not met with much success, and this is particularly the case in Poland where IT experts tend prefer to work in the own country. Workers in another sought-after employment category, auxiliary nurses and midwives, have shown a willingness to work in Germany but only on a temporary basis. As for Polish doctors, most of them prefer to emigrate to Great Britain. So as it stands, the Polish workers that are most likely to emigrate to Germany are those with limited language skills who are the least qualified.
And the country does have opportunities for workers in this category. Just like its counterpart in Poland, the Bundeswehr is now a professional force offering a range of jobs that do not interest young Germans. In this context, the German ministry of defence is planning to recruit young people who are resident in the country even if they do not have German citizenship. So it may happen that a sizable proportion of the hundreds of thousands of Poles who set out to seek their fortune on German labour will end up in the German armed forces, which says a lot about the changing world we live in. You can hardly imagine a stronger symbol of today’s united Europe…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Church President: Refugees Are Enhancement
In light of thousands of Tunesians on the Italian island Lampedusa, the Hesse-Nassau Church President Volker Jung (photo) has expressed support of the reception of these refugees in Germany. In a conversation with evangelisch.de, the 51-year-old theologian is campaigning for a “genuine culture of welcome” toward immigrants and criticizes the European Union’s lacking policy on refugees.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Continues Talks With Tunis, No Halt to Migrant Flood
Over 900 arrive in Lampedusa late Monday, early Tuesday
(ANSA) — Tunis, April 5 — The Italian government continued talks with Tunisian authorities Tuesday on stopping the flow of migrants from the North African country the day after a visit by Premier Silvio Berlusconi failed to finalise a deal.
Italy is seeking an agreement for the repatriation of Tunisian migrants, who form the overwhelming majority of 20,000 to have arrived this year following a wave of unrest in North Africa.
Italy also wants Tunis to intensify controls of its maritime borders to stop the flood, which continued late on Monday and early on Tuesday with the arrival of 917 migrants on the southern island of Lampedusa, approximately half from Tunisia and half from conflict-hit Libya. “We are here to conclude the agreement,” said Interior Minister Roberto Maroni, who returned to Tunis Tuesday to continue negotiations after he accompanied Berlusconi Monday.
The Italian government is said to be trying to encourage Tunisian government that assumed control after Zine El Abidine Ben Ali’s regime was ousted in January to help with the migrant crisis by offering a credit-and-aid package worth some 250 million euros.
At the weekend the Tunisian authorities denied Italian government claims that a deal on the migrant crisis had been reached the week before during a visit by Maroni and Foreign Minister Franco Frattini.
The new arrivals on Lampedusa have taken the number of migrants there back up to around 1,500, following the shipping away last week of most of some 6000 migrants who were packed on the tiny island in miserable conditions with food scarce.
They have been relocated to camps in other parts of Italy, including a big one near the southern town of Manduria near Taranto, where migrants staged mass breakouts on Friday.
The interior ministry wants to set up camps in every region in Italy except Abruzzo, which is still struggling to recover from a devastating earthquake two years ago, although it has not yet reached an agreement with the nation’s regional governors for this.
The Italian government says its European neighbours, France in particular, have provided little help in handling the migrant crisis and last week threatened to issue the North African arrivals with permits that would enable them to roam its neighbouring countries.
This move came after France blocked Tunisian migrants at the French-Italian border, with the French saying they had the right to stop undocumented migrants without breaking the Schengen Agreement that abolished border controls in much of mainland Europe.
But this would no longer be the case if Italy issued the migrants with temporary papers and Premier Silvio Berlusconi won over the Northern League at a meeting on Monday night after the junior government coalition partner had expressed reservations about the idea. On Tuesday the European Parliament voted to approve a motion calling on the EU and its member states to give Italy greater support in managing the crisis.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Migrant Boats Continue to Arrive as Government Majority is Threatened
Rome, 5 April (AKI) — Hundreds of migrants continued to arrive by boat to Italy from Tunisia even as officials from the two countries meet to hammer out a deal that would keep them from departing from the shores of the North African country. A member of a key ally of Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s government threatened to pull the plug on the coalition if the migrant issue isn’t resolved.
Around 900 people disembarked on the island of Lampedusa on Monday and Tuesday, adding to the more than 20,000 migrants that have arrived since Tunisian president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali almost three months ago fled to Saudi Arabia amid a month of protests against his authoritarian rule that began in 1987.
Italian interior minister Roberto Maroni, returned to the Tunisian capital Tunis on Tuesday where is is expected to draw up an accord that is expected to tighten patrols of the Tunisian coast to intercept migrant boats.
Of those who have arrived over the last 48 hours around half began their journey in Tunisia, while the other boats left from Libya where rebels are battling forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi, according to news reports.
Maroni on Monday accompanied Berlusconi to negotiate a deal to end what the government has called a “crisis.” News reports said the accord would include 250 million euros in aid, including credit.
“We are here to conclude the agreement,” said Maroni upon his return to the Tunisian capital on Tuesday.
Italy has transferred almost all the migrants to detention centres in Sicily and on the Italian mainland. Local news broadcasts showed scenes of hundreds of people jumping fences or simply walking through the centres’ gates and sprinting away, almost unopposed by police and security.
The subject has caused tension within Berlusconi’s conservative coalition, on Tuesday prompting a threat to bring down the government by a member of the Northern League, an anti-immigrant party of which Maroni is one of its most prominent members.
“We can’t be patient for eternity. Our electorate is furious,” said Davide Boni, president of Milan’s wealthy Lombardy region and a League member. “If the premier doesn’t bring home some good results with Tunisia we will have to open a crisis,” he told left-leaning weekly L’Espresso. “The League is ready to abandon the government.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Bossi: Close the Tap and Empty Out the Tub
(AGI) Rome — “We have to close the tap and empty out the tub”, said Umberto Bossi to reporters asking him to comment the emergency. The comment was made at the Chamber of Deputies and, replying to those who pointed out that boats keep landing on Lampedusa, the leader of the Lega Nord simply put up his middle finger. “What matters is that Berlusconi has taken action”, underscored Bossi, who also added that “the fact that he went to Tunisia is very important”. “Let Maroni work undisturbed”, is the advice given by the Lega Nord leader in relation to the agreement with Tunisia.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Malmstrom: Soon Projects With Tunisia and Egypt
(ANSAmed) — STRASBURG, APRIL 5 — After its recent visits to Egypt and Tunisia, the European Commission promises to launch cooperation projects with these two countries on the short term in order to deal with the immigration emergency. At the same time the EC asks for more resources for Frontex, which depend from contributions made by member States, explained EU Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom during a debate at the European Parliament. “Specific projects will soon be launched with Tunisia and Egypt”, said Malmstrom, “for cooperation in border control and the fight against organised crime, which is behind human trafficking”. The EU commissioner also underlined the need to “strengthen Frontex, both to assist and organise repatriation flights and by the deployment of EU Rapid Border intervention Teams (RABIT)”. According to Malmstrom, in the current situation “it is important that Frontex will be supplied with more efficient instruments”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
More Migrants Arrive in Lampedusa
(ANSAmed) — LAMPEDUSA (AGRIGENTO), APRIL 5 — Following yesterday’s mass repatriation, which left Lampedusa virtually empty, another wave of migrants landed on the island. Two barges with over 600 migrants on board docked on the Island at dawn this morning. One of the vessels, which allegedly left Libya carrying some 400 emigrants, most of whom are Eritrean and Somali, managed to escape notice and reach Cala Creta, where some of the refugees took off on foot. Several women and a dozen children were also on board the barge. Police units are still conducting searches in the area.
Another barge was intercepted last night, having broken down some 60 miles off the coast. The Coast Guard brought it to safety during the night, and a tugboat took it to Lampedusa this morning. A total of 77 migrants were on board, in addition to the 34 illegal immigrants who reached the port a few hours ago after being discovered some 20 miles from the Island. A fifth barge was spotted at sea early this morning and “escorted” to the port by a Port Authorities unit.
Last night another three barges reached Lampedusa, bringing a total of over 200 people.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Number Foreign Citizens Down for First Time Since 1996
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, APRIL 4 — The population of Spain counted 47,150,0819 people in 2010, 0.3% more than in the previous year, though the number of non-EU citizens fell for the first time since 1996. The figures were released today by the national statistical institute (INE). In detail, the number of residents in January 2011 increased by a total of 129,788 people, while the number of non-EU citizens decreased by 59,386 from the previous year. The number of Spanish citizens reached 41,420,152, against 5,730,667 foreigners, 12% of the total population. Of all residents 49.3% are men and 50.7% women; the Spanish population counts more women (51%), while men are in the majority among foreign citizens (52.2%). Looking at age, 15.7% of the population are 16 years or older; 41.8% are between 16 and 44 years old and 42.5% are older than 45. The percentage of foreigners is highest on the Balearic Islands, followed by Valencia (17.2%) and Madrid and Murcia (16.4% each). The lowest percentage of foreign residents can be found in Estremadura (3.7%); Galicia (3.9%) and the Asturias (4.7%).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisian Press: ‘Cordial Disagreement?’
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, APRIL 5 — The very cordial meeting between Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi and his Tunisian counterpart Beji Caid Essebsi is reported on the front pages of all Tunisian newspapers, which underline however that the two countries still have not reached an agreement to stop illegal emigration. “No agreement announced between Tunis and Rome”, headlines Le Quotidien. Le Temps uses a more biting headline: “‘Cordial’ disagreement?”, and La Presse writes that the issue will now be “thoroughly examined” by a mixed Italian-Tunisian commission. Le Temps is the only newspaper to print a comment on Berlusconi’s visit (the others published the official statement issued by TAP). The newspaper stresses that the two countries have no interest in letting immigration “spoil the ties” between Italy and Tunisia. But, writes Lofti Ouenniche, Tunisia is writing a new page of its history “and needs the help and assistance of all its friends in this crucial period”.
“Italy”, the leader writer adds, “will have to be the first to reach out to its Mediterranean neighbour due to the strategic and special relation the country has with Tunisia and their economic partnership. Italy understands the dangers Tunisia is exposed to in this period of transition”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
One in Four Shuns Religion in Switzerland
The role of organised religion in Switzerland is an increasingly small one, according to a publicly funded study.
Through hundreds of questionnaires as well as dozens of in-depth interviews with individuals across the country, researchers have found that the Swiss population has distanced itself from organised Christianity as well as traditional spirituality in recent decades.
Currently, Protestants account for 32 per cent of the population, closely followed by Catholics at 31 per cent. Some 12 per cent are members of non-Christian religions. The remaining 25 per cent do not belong to any religion at all.
It is a figure that is on the rise. Forty years ago, only one per cent of the Swiss population had no religious affiliation. By 2000 it was about 11 per cent.
However, as the authors of the National Science Foundation study note, a lack of religious affiliation does not necessarily translate into atheism.
“Official membership of a religious denomination — or a lack thereof — does not say anything about the religious practices or beliefs of the person involved,” states the study, which was led by Lausanne University professor Jörg Stolz and Münster University professor Judith Könemann.
“For example, the unaffiliated might believe in God or be alternatively spiritual.”
Believing or belonging?
In their survey of 1,229 people and more detailed interviews with 73, the researchers identified four types of people in terms of their relationship to religion. They were classified as: distanced, institutional, secular and alternative.
At 64 per cent, the “distanced” formed the largest group. These are people who might attend church on occasion, but for whom religion does not play an important role.
“It’s not that the ‘distanced’ believe in nothing; they have certain religious and spiritual beliefs and practices,” pointed out the researchers.
Markus Ries, a theologian at Lucerne University, agrees. “There are very many people who believe in God, but they don’t describe their beliefs in the way that they did during their childhood — and they think that the Church still does it that way,” he told swissinfo.ch.
For example, 24-year-old “Elina” told researchers that she couldn’t imagine Christmas without a mass even though she hardly went to church otherwise.
“I like to go and sing and be part of this cultural and traditional event,” she said, adding that it was a nice chance to see people from her hometown and wish them a happy new year.
Then there are the “institutional”, who accounted for 17 per cent of those queried. In addition to believing in God, they are active members of a church.
Ten per cent were labelled as “secular” because of their indifference or even hostility toward religion. “Siegfried”, 39, said that religion caused more suffering than it alleviated.
“Religion is synonymous with violence, war and conflict, sects and authoritarianism,” he said.
The last group, the “alternative”, represented nine per cent of those surveyed. They are characterised by their interest in topics such as meditation, reincarnation and herbal remedies. This category was dominated by women, whereas there tended to be more men in the secular category.
Ries predicts that there will continue to be a considerable amount of shifting in the religious landscape.
“The way in which people practise their beliefs changes; being part of a church or a religious congregation will not be the same in 25 years as it is today. There will be much more plurality and much less homogeneity, the same as in society itself.”…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Sexy Action Heroines Push Dangerous ‘Superwoman Ideal’
Watching Angelina Jolie kick robot butt in the 2001 movie “Tomb Raider” makes viewers expect real-world women to be both bold and beautiful — an ideal that has been linked to disordered eating. College students who watched clips of beautiful and aggressive women such as Jolie were more likely than others to endorse the so-called “superwoman ideal,” the notion that women should excel in traditional feminine roles such as beauty and nurturing while also shining in traditionally male areas such as aggression. In contrast, those who watched the less conventionally attractive Kathy Bates acting out an aggressive scene tended not to buy into these “have it all” expectations. “It’s pretty clear when you look at the content where this comes from,” study researcher Laramie Taylor, a communications professor at the University of California, Davis, told LiveScience. “Lara Croft in ‘Tomb Raider’ kills the robots and kills people and steals the treasure and still looks like Angelina Jolie in makeup at the end. It’s fine for the movies, but what we show is that those expectations seem to transfer to audiences.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Today’s College Virtually Useless?
If you are attending college to get teacher certification, you will probably be required to attend classes on “multicultural education.” This is supposed to bring diversity to the classroom and prepare teachers to teach pupils of various ethnic or national backgrounds. The textbooks in these courses typically include “Teachers as Cultural Workers” by Paulo Freire, a Brazilian socialist who preached that society is divided into oppressors and oppressed. Other required readings teach that Americans are an institutionally racist society and are designed to train teachers to create political radicals to promote “progressive” social change.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Pride and Prejudice in Tower Hamlets
East End Gay Pride has been cancelled. What a wasted opportunity to challenge an enclave of homophobia
The cancellation of this weekend’s planned East End Gay Pride is disappointing for a whole host of reasons. It’s disappointing because, contrary to what was printed on those stickers, east London is not a ‘Gay Free Zone’, and a Pride event would have been a great way to show the homophobes that we’re not going away. It’s disappointing because, in spite of what some people have been saying, there is a problem with homophobic harassment and hate crime in the area, as many lesbians and gay men living and working there know only too well.
It’s disappointing because, contrary to the allegations made by some on the hard left, most people who were planning to attend East End Gay Pride were doing so in good faith, and were not part of some right-wing conspiracy. And it’s disappointing because, contrary to their public pronouncements, it appears that at least one of the people behind the event hadn’t been entirely open with us.
Thanks to the LGBT Muslim group Imaan, it was revealed that one of the oganisers did have links with a far-right organisation. He resigned, and the event was called off. There had been a suggestion, supported by Imaan, that Pride London and other community groups might step in and take up the reins. But it wasn’t to be. East End Gay Pride was cancelled. And then the accusations really started flying.
A reporter for one hard-left newspaper accused journalists who supported East End Gay Pride of having sympathies with far-right organisations. For the record, I do not have any sympathies with far-right organisations. What I do have is a firm belief that someone is innocent until proven guilty, and it wasn’t until weeks after we began listing East End Gay Pride in Time Out that any such proof was provided.
Until this point, the people who were against East End Gay Pride had offered a number of objections, many of which I still find questionable. Some said that any demonstration of gay pride in the area was ‘a provocation’, and compared gays marching in Tower Hamlets to fascists. Strangely, many of those same people were happy to support last year’s Hackney Pride, which also involved gay people marching in east London. I also happen to know several gay Muslims who were planning to attend East End Gay Pride. Are they fascists too?
Then there were those who said that there should have been greater consultation with the East London Mosque. Yes, the same East London Mosque where homophobic preachers have been invited to speak, though it says it has tightened procedures to make sure they’re not welcomed any more. Even so, an (undated) video online showing Abdul Karim Hattin at the mosque playing a game of ‘Spot the Fag’ makes chilling watching.
And since when did we ask religious institutions about our right to protest against homophobia? Did we consult with Catholics about our right to ‘Protest the Pope’? Pride events are about our right to live free from fear and prejudice, not about pandering to religious organisations. When East End Gay Pride was cancelled, a colleague emailed me to say, ‘This is a bad day for liberalism in London.’ And in many ways, it was. Whoever was behind those ‘Gay Free Zone’ stickers must surely be laughing now. But I hope that from this, we can all move forward. There are now plans for a Pride event in Victoria Park later this year. Maybe by then we’ll have put aside our differences and the shameful suggestion that gay pride is ‘a provocation’. Religious homophobia is a provocation. Anti-gay attacks are a provocation. Those ‘Gay Free Zone’ stickers are a provocation. Gay pride is only a provocation to those who hate us.
[JP note: Yes, but expect UK’s liberal left to favour Islam over any other type of diversity.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
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