EU: ‘Italy and Spain to Shun Aid Unless Bond Yields Spike’
Rome, 21 Sept. (AKI/Bloomberg) — Italy and Spain won’t request bailouts unless a new surge in bond yields leaves them shut out of markets as no government will voluntarily accept conditions imposed for the aid, a senior Italian government official said.
“There won’t be any nation that voluntarily, with a preemptive move, even if rationally justified, would go to an international body and say — ‘I give up my national sovereignty,’ “ Gianfranco Polillo, undersecretary of finance, said in an interview in Rome late Thursday.
“I rule it out for Italy and for any other country.”
Italian and Spanish 10-year bond yields have dropped more than 1 percentage point since European Central Bank President Mario Draghi first signaled on 2 August that the bank would buy the debt of distressed euro-region nations in tandem with the European Union’s bailout funds.
While Italy’s unelected technocrat prime minister Mario Monti championed the EU bond-buying plan, Draghi’s insistence on imposing conditions on any aid has left Monti and Spanish premier Mariano Rajoy reluctant to make a request.
The program “will be activated only when the single countries have the water up to their necks,” Polillo said.
Italy’s 10-year yield fell 3 basis points to 4.96 percent as of 9:55 a.m. Rome time, down from a peak of 7.5 percent on Nov. 9. Spain’s benchmark fell 4 basis points to 5.73 percent. It reached a euro-area high 7.75 percent on 25 July.
EU officials are working on a new Spanish bailout plan, unlimited buying of Spanish bonds by the ECB and helping Madrid prepare a new programme of reforms to be unveiled next week, the Financial Times reported Friday citing sources.
Monti was due to meet Rajoy in Rome on Friday, a day after the Italian government increased its budget-deficit forecast for this year amid a deepening recession.
Italy now expects a deficit of 2.6 percent of gross domestic product this year, up from a 1.7 percent forecast in April.
High borrowing costs are weighing on the two nations’ public finances, jeopardising efforts to contain budget shortfalls.
Spanish deputy prime minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said this week that Spain will consider seeking a bailout if the conditions imposed are acceptable.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
GM Goes From Bad to Worse Despite Obama Bailout
Obama talks about the auto bailout frequently, since it’s one of the few things in his record that gets positive responses in the polls. But he’s probably wise to avoid probing questions, since the GM bailout is not at all the success he claims.
GM has been selling cars in the U.S. at deep discount and, while it’s making money in China — and is outsourcing operations there and elsewhere — it’s bleeding losses in Europe. It’s spending billions to ditch its Opel brand there in favor of Chevrolet, including $559 million to put the Chevy logo on Manchester United soccer team uniforms — and just fired the marketing exec who cut that deal.
It botched the launch of its new Chevrolet Malibu by starting with the green-friendly Eco version, which pleased its government shareholders but which got lousy reviews. And it’s selling only about 10,000 electric-powered Chevy Volts a year, a puny contribution toward Obama’s goal of 1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2015.
“GM is going from bad to worse,” reads the headline on Automotive News Editor-in-Chief Keith Crain’s analysis. That’s certainly true of its stock price.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The latest announcement (9/2012) by the Fed is that they are beginning QE3. The first two attempts did not solve the problems in the national economy, so they want to try again, expecting different results.
QE3 will have the Fed buying $40 billion in MBS each month going forward until they decide the employment situation has improved to an acceptable level of stability. In other words, the Fed is beginning an open-ended, monthly injection of $40,000,000,000 into the money supply. At that rate, another half trillion dollars will be added each year until they decide to stop…
So, where does the Fed get so much money to do all of these purchases? They must be very rich. Well, they are, but that is getting the cart before the horse. They are not doing all of these purchases with their accumulated wealth. (Remember, the Fed is not a government agency or department. It is a private corporation.) The Fed has been charged with the duty of printing U.S. dollars. Since dollars are no longer backed by gold or silver, or anything else for that matter, the Fed is in a position to just print money as they feel the need to do so.
It is this freshly printed (or electronically generated) money that is used to make the purchases of these bonds and hard assets (gold and MBS). Just in case you have not pieced this together in your mind, the Fed makes up new money and then uses that money to buy hard assets and to lend money to the Treasury (at interest, of course). Over the past couple years the Fed has become the largest buyer of Treasury Bonds and now is the largest holder of U.S. debt. So, yes, the owners of the Fed are rich. They transform paper and ink into money which they use to enrich themselves by us paying them interest or by becoming the owners of hard assets.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Unprofitable Sardinian Plant Workers Occupy Ferries
Olbia, 11 Sept. (AKI) — Hundreds of workers from a loss-making aluminium plant in Sardinia on Tuesday occupied ferries from the Italian mainland when they docked in Olbia, in protest at the smelter’s planned shuttering.
After the two-hour occupation, the workers disembarked from the ferries, aboard which they had returned overnight to Sardinia after a tense protest march in the Italian capital, Rome.
Defiant trade union representatives said they were planning further protests aimed at averting the closure of the plant, where 1,500 jobs are at risk.
“We’ve recharged our batteries and are ready to launch fresh initiatives,” the local secretary of Italy’s Fiom-Cgil union, Franco Bardi, told Adnkronos.
“We occupied the ferry to send a signal to the government so that it knows that we will hold a protest every day until the situation is settled.”
Fifteen workers were injured Monday in violent clashes in Rome between the workers and baton-wielding police outside the industry ministry.
Government officials, labour unions and executives from the plant’s owner, US aluminium giant Alcoa were meeting inside the ministry in a last-ditch effort avert the plant’s closure and find a buyer.
Junior infrastructure and transport minister Mario Ciaccia said Tuesday he was “optimistic” over the future of the smelter in Portovesme, southwestern Sardinia.
The Italian government is under intense pressure from labour unions to save the smelter, which employs 500 people directly with a further 1,000 directly depending on the plant.
Its closure would be a heavy blow for an island where joblessness is already 15 percent.
“The government is paying very close attention to employment — people’s jobs and the welfare of their families need to be taken very seriously…I am optimistic there will be a positive turn of events,” Ciaccia stated.
Swiss industrial group Klesch offered a possible lifeline by expressing interest in the plant, but Alcoa later on Monday said in a statement it had “not received any expressions of interest that are viable or different to those previously considered”.
Alcoa said in the statement it would go ahead with the gradual shutdown of the smelter which began on 1 September.
Industry minister Corrado Passera has described the challenge of keeping the factory open as “almost impossible”.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
A Perilous Game of Catch and Release
“It was a ‘catch and release’ system. A few weeks later they’d be back on the streets and the only way to get them off the streets was is if they were dead. If we found guns, we arrested the fighters only to see them go free a few months later. Often we recaptured the same guy multiple times during a single deployment.” That sentence was from Mark Owen, the alias Seal Team member who describes in his 2012 book, NO EASY DAY about the mission that killed Osama Bin Laden (OBL) shown on SIXTY MINUTES on September 9th. However, that title above was borrowed from a 9/8/2012 article in our local Salem Statesmen. It was about a man who had been arrested on a drug charge who authorities determined was no threat to the community. Like so many government entities today, our county is teetering on bankruptcy and the jail was full so they turned him loose. The next day he shot a man in the Walmart parking lot.
Mark went on to describe what happens when they arrest Middle East suspected terrorists. The first thing required of them was the completion of paper work. Then the captured is asked to fill out a questionnaire. The first question they were asked, “How were you treated (by our military)?” Of course, they quickly figured out how to lie about their treatment which then makes it necessary for internal reviews and more paper work for the Seal Team and the captured terrorist is often released. I’m sure our police who try to get the criminals off the street in America are put through a similar routine. And then the ACLU sues.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Anti-Jihad ‘Savage’ Ads to Appear in NYC Subway
The New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority says its “hands are tied” after a court ruled that a pro-Israel ad campaign that likens Muslim radicals to savages can go ahead.
Poster advertisements likening Muslim radicals to savages are set to appear on the New York subway system on Monday after a conservative blogger won a court order allowing them to be displayed.
The provocative ad reads: “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad.”
Rightwing writer Pamela Geller, who once led a campaign against an Islamic centre near the site of the 9/11 terror attacks in New York, won the court order in August.
The posters will appear in 10 city subway stations from Monday.
The New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) had initially refused to allow Geller’s advertisements to be displayed, calling the message “demeaning”.
But a US District Court Judge ruled last month that she was protected under the First Amendment, which provides freedom of religion and of expression.
“Our hands are tied,” MTA spokesman Aaron Donavan told the Associated Press. “Under our existing ad standards as modified by the injunction, the MTA is required to run the ad.”
The poster campaign will run for one month, at a cost of 6,000 dollars. The same posters have also appeared in recent weeks on buses in San Francisco, where many were defaced with words such as “Defeat Racism” plastered over the word “Jihad”, which means Muslim Holy War.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Is Media Downplaying Terrorism to Help Obama Win Election?
As reported by The Huffington Post, Adel Daoud was arrested Friday and charged with attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction, and attempting to damage and destroy a building with an explosive. This FBI arrest came at the end of a string operation in which Daoud was provided with a fake bomb after discovering the plot, according to The Inquisitr.
So why hasn’t this been a more prominently featured story? Why haven’t we heard about Daoud’s background and associations, especially since Daoud, himself, reportedly mentioned to agents that he had been discussing the topic of an attack with others?
Could the reason that this hasn’t become a bigger story have anything to do with a media that has a strong liberal bias, not wanting to focus too much attention on homegrown terrorism so close to the election?
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Philly Developer Ticks Off City
THERE’S a lot of trouble brewing next to a coffee house in a fast-developing neighbourhood.
Ori Feibush, a real estate developer, has turned a rubbish-strewn city-owned lot — vacant for roughly 30 years — into a welcoming spot for customers of his month-old corner cafe, where they can enjoy their fair trade organic java and pastries from local bakeries.
It may sound like a win-win, but the now-sparkling urban respite has angered city officials. They say Feibush shouldn’t have done work on a lot he doesn’t own or rent, shouldn’t be using taxpayer-owned property to benefit his business and should have played by the rules.
Feibush said the city has rebuffed his overtures to buy the 20-by-100-foot lot in Point Breeze, a rowhouse neighbourhood southwest of downtown Philadelphia, PA where he has lived since 2006. So he said he spent at least $20,000 to remove 40 tons of rubbish and to add planters, tables and landscaping to it.
Feibush did not return calls and messages to his personal and business phone numbers and Facebook pages. But a post on the real estate blog he owns and operates, Naked Philly, showed pictures of the “horrifying, city-owned cesspool” that existed, along with new shots of the manicured yard.
“Looking at the before and after photos, does this make any sense whatsoever to any human in the city of Philadelphia?” the post asked.
“We get it that you’re supposed to follow a process with this sort of thing, but what are you to do when the process is set up in such a backwards way that several years of requests through multiple channels somehow are never recognised or processed?”
The blog later posted two letters that Feibush said he sent last year inquiring about buying the lot.
In a statement, a spokesman for the city Redevelopment Authority said it had no record of any such inquiries. Paul Chrystie said Feibush could have sought to lease or buy the lot from the city before starting the renovations but chose not to.
“Mr Feibush himself purchased three publicly owned properties earlier this year, so he knows how the process works,” Chrystie said in the statement.
Besides Feibush, three others have expressed interest in buying the lot, which is worth at least $50,000. City officials did not elaborate on whether negotiations are in progress to sell the property or when a buyer would be picked.
Business owners in similar situations pay the city rent to use lots next to their properties, but Feibush is essentially using public property to benefit his business at taxpayers’ expense, Chrystie said.
“It is not fair to either the taxpayers or the potential buyers who have played by the rules for Mr Feibush to attempt to acquire the lot simply by occupying it,” he said.
A woman walking by the coffee shop late on Thursday afternoon said she couldn’t understand the controversy.
“This makes the neighbourhood better, so why would anyone try to mess with that?” asked Mindy Aaron, who said she moved in with a friend recently to an apartment a few blocks from the contested tract. “It’s like someone giving you an amazing gift and you’re turning it down.”
Commenters on Facebook and local websites also were generally supportive of Feibush’s efforts, but some acknowledged the city’s concerns were valid, even if it took a wrongheaded approach. Last weekend, a group of neighbours held an event at the coffee shop to celebrate what they described on Facebook as “a thriving, safe community space”.
Development has been fraught with tension in recent years in Point Breeze, where a flurry of new homes continue rising on vacant lots and dilapidated homes are being gutted and rehabbed.
The changes have pitted longtime residents fearing gentrification and higher property taxes against new neighbours whose pricey houses are raising home values. Neighbourhood zoning hearings have grown so heated, with allegations of vote tampering, racism and governmental wrongdoing, that police were called.
Feibush, whose OCF Realty has built more than 150 homes in the neighbourhood, has become a symbol of the changes. Some of his buildings were vandalized this spring and an anonymous flier pasted around Point Breeze portrayed him as Mr Burns, the villainous cartoon mogul of The Simpsons, and accused him of “preying on minorities and the poor”.
| — Hat tip: McR | [Return to headlines] |
Proposal Would Expand DNA Collection to More Than Just Convicted Felons
Anyone arrested for a felony offense and all adults convicted of misdemeanor crimes would be required to provide a DNA sample to law enforcement under a proposal from the state Department of Justice. Adults arrested for certain misdemeanor crimes — such as fourth-degree sexual assault and prostitution — also would need to provide DNA samples, which would be entered into a national database used to match DNA evidence collected at crime scenes to suspects.
Currently, state law allows DNA to be collected only from adults and juveniles convicted of felonies, with about 12,000 samples obtained each year. Brian O’Keefe, administrator for the DOJ’s Division of Law Enforcement Services, said the expected addition of about 68,000 DNA samples a year — at least initially…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter thinks the decline of civic education is putting the United States in danger. During a question and answer session last week at University of New Hampshire School of Law, Souter described “pervasive civic ignorance” as one of the biggest problems in the United States. He warned that Americans’ ignorance about their own government could lead to a dictatorship. “I don’t worry about our losing a republican government in the United States because I’m afraid of a foreign invasion, he said. “I don’t worry about it because of a coup by the military, as has happened in some other places.
What I worry about is that when problems are not addressed people will not know who is responsible, and when the problems get bad enough — as they might do for example with another serious terrorist attack, as they might do with another financial meltdown — some one person will come forward and say ‘Give me total power and I will solve this problem.’“ “That is how the Roman republic fell,” Souter continued. “Augustus became emperor not because he arrested the Roman senate. He became emperor because he promised that he would solve problems that were not being solved.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Government officials have hit out at CNN for reporting on the personal journal of murdered ambassador Chris Stevens, saying they did so against the wishes of his family.
Anderson Cooper revealed on Friday night that the news channel had used the document as a source after finding it inside the U.S. consulate in Benghazi.
But a State Department spokesman on Friday claimed that CNN had promised not to mention the journal, and described their U-turn as ‘disgusting’ and ‘indefensible’.
Mr Stevens died alongside three other Americans on September 11 when militant jihadists stormed the consulate in protest against an American-made anti-Muslim video.
CNN found the ambassador’s personal journal four days later, and used it to report on his state of mind during Mr Cooper’s primetime show on Wednesday.
However, the network broke a pledge to Mr Stevens’ family that it would not report on the diary, said State Department spokesman Philippe Reines.
The family was informed within hours about the discovery of the journal, a hard-bound book that included seven handwritten pages.
CNN gave the document to an Italian official at the State Department’s request, and it is now being returned to the ambassador’s relative.
‘Given the truth of how this was handled, CNN patting themselves on the back is disgusting,’ Mr Reines said in his statement.
‘Whose first instinct is to remove from a crime scene the diary of a man killed along with three other Americans serving our country, read it, transcribe it, email it around your newsroom for others to read and then call the family?’
In a phone call with the Stevens family, CNN ‘agreed to abide by the clear wishes of the Stevens family, and pledged not to use the diary or even allude to its existence until hearing back from the family,’ he added.
But four days later, ‘They just went ahead and used it.’
CNN defended its use of the journal’s contents and asked, ‘Why is the State Department now attacking the messenger?’
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
The Evil of Monsanto and GMOs Explained
Monsanto’s actions are designed to maximize its corporate profits, not to serve the people. Its entire seed-and-herbicide business model is designed to trap farmers in a system of economic dependence… to turn farmers into indentured servants who can never return to traditional farming after their soil has been destroyed with Roundup.
Monsanto’s GM corn grown a toxic chemical right inside each and every corn kernel. This corn is what is subsequently eaten by humans.
Rats fed this corn grew horrifying cancer tumors as shown here:[pic]
In a recent scientific study, a shocking 70 percent of female rats died prematurely when fed GMOs. Fifty percent of males died early. Almost all of them died from cancer tumors.
Read more about the link between GMOs and cancer tumors at:[url]
Monsanto is spending millions of dollars to try to defeat Proposition 37 in California — a bill which would simply require GMOs to be indicated on food labels.
But Monsanto and other companies such as those that own Larabar, Silk and Kashi do not want consumers to know the truth about GMOs in the foods they buy. (See the GMO boycott infographic here.) They’re also spending huge sums of money to try to defeat Proposition 37 so that the food companies can keep GMOs a dirty little secret about the poison in your food.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Miracles of Chairman Obama: Studies in Secular Religious Phenomena
Only one true Marxist revolution occurred in history, bringing Mao Zedong to power in China, becoming the greatest murderer in history. Mao was presented as godlike (much like Obama in 2007), the father of incredible feats. His miracles were presented to individuals increasingly traumatized by epic and utterly stupid government decision-making, ending up eliminating 77 million souls. (Mao’s bio: Who was Chairman Mao, Lionized by Obama’s White House?) Obama, too, was presented as a messianic political miracle-worker. And now, like all previous Marxist “messiahs,” Barack is exposed as utterly incapable of the simplest feats of leadership…
Do Barack’s great feats really belong in the same category as Mao’s Miracles? Yes, for several important reasons. First, they are supposedly epic in nature. Second, these are touted breathlessly by government-controlled leftist journalists who never allow for error. Third, they are so totally falsified as to bring comic absurdity into any discussion. Finally, they are the wallpapering over the perpetual failure of all progressive movements. And here are Barack’s greatest works:
[…]
B. Causing Peace to Fall Across Middle East
This Obama Miracle occurred when Barack decided to end despotism in the Middle East, one tyranny at a time. In “A Moment of Opportunity” (May 19, 2011), Obama took credit for the Arab Spring revolutions:
Shouts of human dignity are being heard across the region. And through the moral force of non-violence, the people of the region have achieved more change in six months than terrorists have accomplished in decades. That’s why, two years ago in Cairo, I began to broaden our engagement based upon mutual interests and mutual respect. So we face an historic opportunity. We have embraced the chance to show that America values the dignity of the street vendor in Tunisia more than the raw power of the dictator. There must be no doubt that the USA welcomes change that advances self-determination and opportunity. Yes, there will be perils that accompany this moment of promise, etc etc
The results? Charles Krauthammer claims Barack created the unthinkable: a Shariah law zone across the Middle East where were once American-friendly states existed. Further, world war now seems possible. For this, we say — Thank you very much, Barack!
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
America. Understand that this is America where we have constitutional rights to freedom of speech, freedom of expression and freedom of religion. There are those in this world that do not believe that anyone should be able to voice their personal opinion on some things.
This last week we saw violence rise all around the Middle East within the muslim nations presumably because a Israeli-American made a You Tube video about Mohamed. Here is the problem. The video portrayed Mohamed as a womanizer, killer and a pedophile. Here is the truth: Mohamed was a womanizer, killer and a pedophile. The new president of Egypt has called for the prosecution of the person who made the YouTube video. Why? The video told the truth about Mohamed. The big problem is there was an actor that portrayed the alleged prophet of islam.
Under shariah law you cannot make nor have any kind of an image depicting Mohamed. News flash for the Egyptian president. America is NOT an Islamic nation nor do we operate under shariah law. In America we are allowed to tell the truth about anybody any time no matter how offensive it might seem to be.
[…]
But the big aspect of the riots is not what it seems. The White House says it was because of the YouTube video. Not so. That is only a poor excuse, something to ‘blame’ all the unrest on. This was a planned uprising several months in the planning to ‘celebrate’ the anniversary of 9/11. There are over 20 countries where the protestors are causing problems and attacking anything American. We must remember that the radical islamists hate America and everything about America. They hate our freedoms, they hate our support of Israel, and they hate our culture.
In Dearborn, MI it is against the law to ring church bells because the church bells are offensive to muslims.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Rutherford Institute Sounds Warning on Privacy
Brace yourselves for the next wave in the surveillance state’s steady incursions into our lives. It’s coming at us with a lethal one-two punch. To start with, there’s the government’s integration of facial recognition software and other biometric markers into its identification data programs. The FBI’s Next Generation Identification (NGI) system is a $1 billion boondoggle that is aimed at dramatically expanding the government’s current ID database from a fingerprint system to a facial recognition system.
NGI will use a variety of biometric data, cross-referenced against the nation’s growing network of surveillance cameras to not only track your every move but create a permanent “recognition” file on you within the government’s massive databases. By the time it’s fully operational in 2014, NGI will serve as a vast data storehouse of “iris scans, photos searchable with face recognition technology, palm prints, and measures of gait and voice recordings alongside records of fingerprints, scars, and tattoos.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Do you remember when the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) were proposed and passed? (Well, CAFTA didn’t really pass, except through legislative trickery.) Promises were made about the abundant benefits that would fall into the laps of its signatories, but especially into the lap of the United States. None of those promises were ever kept, except to the large corporations in partnership with their government concubines.
And “Free Trade” as a name in those agreements’ titles? That was a misnomer if there ever was one. Those incredibly lengthy documents were all about “Managed Trade” and not the free market. If they had truly been about free trade, then it would have taken one-page, maybe two (for the signatures) to set forth the parties’ agreement: “All tariffs and trade barriers between and among the signatory parties are hereby eliminated.” So, the Agreements are nothing but a costly joke and a way to usher into our lives a soul-numbing harmonization that already is reducing our freedoms into dim memories and pat slogans of patriotism.
Now arrives yet another insult to our freedoms — the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which some are already describing as “NAFTA on steroids.” The TPP, as it is called, is a very-secretive, multi-national trade agreement currently being negotiated among eleven different Pacific-Rim countries and pushed by both Republicans and Democrats. In its fourteenth round of negotiations — which just finished in Leesburg, Virginia, as you read these words — the parties hope to make wide-ranging changes to all parties’ laws, rules, and regulations. (See this web page)
[…]
The TPP is so secretive that even Senator Ron Wyden, chairman of the Senate committee charged with jurisdiction over “trade” agreements like the TPP, has been blocked from reviewing the United States’ own negotiating proposals. Yet, 600 corporate representatives — excuse me, lobbyists — have full access to TPP documents and a special role in negotiations for the United States, let alone all of those other lobbyists acting with the other participating countries.
[…]
There are 26 chapters to the Agreement; but, unsurprisingly, only two of them deal with trade matters. The rest — the 24 other chapters — are a wish-list of the Elite. So, calling this Agreement a “trade agreement” is like calling an automobile a radio. As Lori Wallach wrote in her article, “NAFTA on Steroids,” “Think of the TPP as a stealthy delivery mechanism for policies that could not survive public scrutiny.”
From what we do know, the TPP threatens to extend restrictive intellectual property laws into its partner countries and rewrite international rules for their enforcement. Leaked drafts of the Agreement reveal the negotiators’ plans to limit freedom of speech, right to privacy and due process, as well as cripple individuals’ abilities to innovate. This includes making copyright infringement a criminal offense! (See the February 2011 draft Chapter on Intellectual-Property Rights)
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
British Scholar Pours Water on ‘Fake’ Papyrus Text That Claimed Jesus Had a Wife
A British scholar has called the ancient papyrus claiming that Jesus had a wife a ‘fake’.
New Testament scholar Professor Francis Watson of Durham University says the fragment, which caused an international sensation this week, is a collage of texts from the Gospel of Thomas, copied and reassembled out of order.
The 8cm by 4cm fragment supports an undercurrent in Christian thought undermining centuries of Church dogma by suggesting the Christian Messiah was not celibate but married to Mary Magdalene…
He wrote in a paper published online: ‘The text has been constructed out of small pieces — words or phrases — culled mostly from the Coptic Gospel of Thomas… and set in new contexts.
‘The author has used a “collage” or “patchwork” compositional technique, and this level of dependence on extant pieces of Coptic text is more plausibly attributed to a modern author, with limited facility in Coptic, than to an ancient one.’
According to The Guardian, he said: ‘I think it is more or less indisputable that I have shown how the thing was composed.
‘I would be very surprised if it were not a modern forgery, although it is possible that it was composed in this way in the fourth century.’
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Chi Editor Signorini Says: “I’d Have Published Even More Scandalous Shots if I’d Had Any”
Topless Kate Pics “Middle-Class, If Anything”
ROME — “I’m never going to publish topless pics of the Queen. Promise”. Alfonso Signorini is hugely amused by the diplomatic waves caused by today’s issue of Chi magazine, with its embarrassing photos of Kate and William under the headline “La regina è nuda” [The Queen is Naked]. “They’re fabulous photos, but all too politically correct. So middle-class, sadly. If I’d had any even more scandalous shots, I’d have happily published them”, said Mr Signorini, thrilled by his coup. He has just released a 26-page feature with the best of 150 photographs of the ray-catching heir to the throne and consort, purchased (it is not known from whom or for how much) by his Berlusconi family-owned Mondadori group magazine.
Among them is the famous royal topless pic, published by the Mondadori France-owned Closer magazine and then by the Irish Daily Mail. There is more, however. Chi consulted plastic surgeon Paolo Santanchè, who assured the magazine that there was no evidence of nipping and tucking (“Besides you can see there’s not much to nip or tuck”, comments Mr Signorini). Chi also publishes the shots that Closer said were too intimate to be shown. “They’ll have said that to soothe the royals, who have taken legal action”, was the view yesterday of Mr Signorini, who denied there was anything offensive about the photos. “Perhaps they’re afraid and that’s why they’re so worried”, he teases, offering an advance peek at some of them — the duchess in a fuchsia beach suit arriving on the terrace of the Provence home of William’s cousins, sunbathing with her husband, doing a few stretching exercises. And not much more — a bikini bottom disturbed by the application of suncream, a less than royal pose, a glance at the “crown jewels”. “Nothing over the top. Kate comes out of it as a modern princess doing what not even Diana dared to do”.
Meanwhile, an international political scandal is coming to the boil as the finger is pointed at the owner of the Mondadori group, Silvio Berlusconi. No diplomatic initiatives have been forthcoming from the British embassy in Rome but this was the reply of former British prime minister, John Major, when he was asked what he would say to Mr Berlusconi if he met him: “This is all very distasteful. It might not be a good conversation”…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
France: Louvre Museum Unveils New Islamic Art Wing
Paris’ Louvre museum has opened to the public a $131 million Islamic art department, unveiling a new wing with 3,000 precious artifacts dating back from the seventh to the 19th century — including the oldest love letter in the Muslim world.
Paris’s famed Louvre museum on Saturday opened to the public a new wing of Islamic art in a bid to improve knowledge of a religion often viewed with suspicion in the West.
Costing nearly 100 million euros ($131 million), it is funded by the French government and supported by handsome endowments from Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Kuwait, Oman and Azerbaijan.
About 3,000 precious works from the seventh to the 19th centuries are spread across 3,000 square metres (33,000 square feet) over two levels of the former palace.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Islam Inflamed: Paris “Security-Proofed”
(AGI) Paris — Paris is security-proofed for the weekend after a week of protests against the blasphemous film throughout Islam.
The wave of protests also concerned the cartoons on Mohammed published by the French satirical paper Charlie Hebdo. A squadron of 800 police agents was unleashed in all the places at risk in the French capital: mosques, cultural institutes and especially the newspaper’s head office. The Gendarmerie arrested 21 persons, including several women wearing a veil, close to Place de la Concorde and blocked unauthorized protest marches starting out from the Trocadero and the Grand Mosquee.
Interior Minister Manuel Valls informed that the French Government “will give a show of great resoluteness” and French Muslim Associations CFCM and UOIF collaborated calling on followers to keep calm and avoid the protest demonstrations.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
‘Kate Without Slip’: Danish Magazine to Publish New ‘Hot’ Nudo Photos
(AGI) Rome — The Danish magazine ‘Se og Hor’ is about to incur the wrath of the UK royal family by publishing new photos of Kate. From topless pictures to those without pants: the magazine is set to publish photos hitherto kept in reserve. The Duchess will appear without bikini bottoms, while changing her swimming costume on the terrace of the castle in Provence where she was spending a few days holiday with Prince William.
According to the Sun, the most ‘intimate’ shot of Kate is a full frontal nude.
However, Kim Henningsen, the editor of the Danish magazine, isn’t just challenging the crown when he publishes the prohibited photos, a few hours after the decision of the Paris courts to ban the magazine Closer from selling a third of the pictures. ‘Would they have published topless pictures of Princess Mary of Denmark?’, asked the Sun.
Henningsen gave a dismissive response: “Mary knows what to do as a royal. She would never be on pictures like this”.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Marine Le Pen Asks to Ban Veil and Kippah in Public Places
(AGI) Paris — The French far right leader Marine Le Pen was inspired by the tensions in the Muslim world over the Mohammed cartoons and the Anti-Islam film to ask for the ban of veil in all public places, including streets. According to the Front National president, the ban should be enforced in “shops, transports, streets” and “it is evident that if we ban veil we also ban kippah”, the head gear which is the symbol of the Jewish religion. Coming back from the Summer holidays, Marine Le Pen gave a long interview to Le Monde attacking past French governments, guilty — according to her — of laxity towards “political and religious fundamentalist groups”. “No negotiation is possible with them”, she added .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UK: 4,000-Mile Birmingham Bus Link to Kashmir’s ‘Little Brum’
It promises to be Birmingham’s longest bus route — all the way to Kashmir almost 4,000 MILES away.
Plans have been drawn up for a bus service between Birmingham and Mirpur, the city dubbed ‘Little Birmingham’.
The region’s transport minister Tahir Khokher says the intercontinental route will span seven countries and include stop-overs in the troubled cities of Quetta, near the Afghan border, and the Iranian capital Tehran.
Bus tickets for the 12-day trip are expected to be priced £130, for which Mr Khokher has promised “a thrilling ride with particular arrangements for sightseeing, camping and restauranteering.”
Birmingham is home to the world’s largest population of Kashmiri expatriates, many having emigrated from Mirpur in the 1960s after being displaced by the building of a dam. The picturesque city nestling in the Himalayan foothills soon came to be known as Little Birmingham and is famed for its grand villas and mansions built by wealthy ex-pats who pay regular visits.
Mr Khokher says he hopes the service will strengthen ties and tourism between the two cities, which have strong family and business links.
[…]
| — Hat tip: EnglishDefenceLeague@Official_EDL | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Taxman to Target All £1m Home Owners in New Anti-Affluence Crackdown
Everyone who owns a home worth £1 million or more will be targeted in a new ‘anti-affluence’ crackdown by the Coalition.
A beefed-up squad of computer and legal experts will pore over their property, savings and income. If they think the individual is not paying enough tax, they will have the power to knock on their front door and force them to account for every penny.
The move is part of a tax-dodging purge on the rich forced through by Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Benghazi: The Birthplace of Libya’s Revolution Now Hangs in the Balance
At noon, the poster with the Kalashnikov is still hanging under the veranda: “People of Benghazi, return your weapons to Freedom Square from ten in the morning until seven in the evening.”
The Minister of the Interior has asked. The Defense Ministry has asked. The Religious Affairs Ministry has asked. There was even a lottery: “You can win a car and other valuable prizes!”
By noon there is still almost nobody. No weapons anywhere. The televisions are broadcasting a hurried comment from the Defense Ministry, which knows it has once again lost the battle. “The day for returning weapons has been postponed to Saturday, September 29. Those who wish to comply beforehand may go to a barracks.”
From the roof of the court house, at the angle of the square, hang five enormous banners with the photos of the 225 martyrs of the Revolution, which spread from this coastal city to the rest of Libya. There is the pilot who refused to bomb Benghazi, the engineer who loaded his car with gas cylinders and drove into the gate of a barracks full of Gaddafi supporters, as well as the seaside peddler who had offered “liberty tea.”
Everyone who stops before the pictures, who is mourning a friend, who brings a rose, walks past the Kalashnikov poster. But all day long, no one comes with weapons to turn in. The reason? Fear has returned, and the city is still not safe.
Hassan al Waddawi, 37, a soldier of the “Security and Prevention Corps,” is finishing his useless Sunday without a weapon, without taking a lottery ticket. “To think that for three months I haven’t seen my salary. They just give me these cigarettes.” At least, he says, the cigarettes put him in a good mood.
Others come here to declare their own disagreement, like Mehmet Beit Himal, 46, a waterworks employee. “We are still floating in a dirty lake. The government needs to wake up. First, they should arrest everyone who goes around with weapons. Why don’t they do that? Why isn’t there a law yet that requires that?”
Sunday was to have been the celebration of Libya’s national holiday to commemorate its hero Omar Al Mukthar, hanged 81 years ago by Italian General Graziani at Sluq, 30 minutes by car from Benghazi…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libyan Authorities Decide to Disband Unacknowledged Militia
(AGI) Tripoli — Libyan authorities announced that they will disband all unacknowledged militia and armed groups existing at the time of the fall of Gaddafi. The decision was made on the day after peoples’ attack to the HQ of Islamist Ansar al-Sharia, as announced by the President of the General Assembly, Mohamed al-Megaryef .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Death Toll in Benghazi Clashes Rises to 11
(AGI) Benghazi- Clashes in Benghazi on Friday afternoon saw the victims tally rise to at least 11 dead and 70 wounded. Armed protesters attacked pro-government Islamist and Salafist militia. Medical sources stated that six of the victims were part of the security forces and were killed in the manner of a cold-blooded execution. The violence sparked on September 22 after 30 thousand citizens marched for the “Save Benghazi” day to protest the presence of armed militia in the city and to honour the US ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, who was killed the previous week.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: ‘For Gaddafi, Rape Was a Weapon’
A French reporter has published a book of testimonies from women forced into former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s harem. France 24 interviewed the author about the ordeals the women endured and the problems they face in a post-Gaddafi Libya.
Young and beautiful, they were kidnapped, beaten, humiliated and raped by former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Annick Cojean, a reporter for French daily Le Monde, has gathered testimonies from the women forced into Gaddafi’s harem and published them in a book entitled “Les Proies: Dans le harem de Kadhafi” (or “Prey: In Gaddafi’s Harem”).
The book recounts the experiences of these women, whose lives became a living nightmare after they had the misfortune of catching Gaddafi’s eye. One example is Soraya*, who became the Libyan tyrant’s sex slave at age 15.
“It was one of my most painful investigations,” Cojean confided.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Morsi to the US, To Change Policy With Arab World
(AGI) Washington — Egyptian President, Islamist Mohammed Morsi, urges the US to change its approach to the Arab world. Morsi underlined the need to reinvigorate ties after this tide of violence caused by teh anti-Islam film, thus revitalizing the alliance with Egypt. The Egyptian President will participate in the UN General Assembly, in New York. On the eve of his trip to the US, Morsi was interviewed by the New York Times and said that “Successive American administrations essentially purchased with American taxpayer money the dislike, if not the hatred, of the peoples of the region.” The NYT interpreted this as a reference to dictatorial regimes in the region, and the unconditioned support to Israel.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Israel Rejects Revision of Peace Treaty With Egypt
Israel’s foreign minister has said the Jewish state will not accept any revision of its peace treaty with Egypt. The Islamist government in Cairo has launched an offensive in the Sinai Peninsula to root out militants.
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told Israeli public radio on Sunday that “Egypt must fulfill its obligations in Sinai,” but firmly rejected the idea of revising the 1979 Camp David peace accords, which limit the number of troops allowed in the peninsula.
“There is not the slightest possibility that Israel will accept the modification of the peace treaty with Egypt,” Lieberman said. “We will not accept any modification of the Camp David accords.”
On Friday, an Israeli soldier and three Islamist militants were killed in an exchange of fire near the Egyptian border. The militants had snuck across the border from Sinai into Israel and opened fire on troops, according to the Israeli army.
A Sinai-based Islamist militant group named Ansar Bayt al-Maqdes claimed responsibility for Friday’s attack, calling it “a disciplinary attack against those who insulted the beloved Prophet (Muhammad).” The group said the operation was in retaliation to the film “Innocence of Muslims,” which has sparked deadly protests across the Islamic world.
The clash was the latest cross-border incident amid simmering military tensions in the Sinai Peninsula. Egypt has launched a major military offensive in the region in order to root out Islamist militants, who killed 16 members of the Egyptian security forces on August 5 and breached the Israeli border.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Iran Accuses Siemens of Planting Bombs in Nuclear Equipment
(AGI) Tehran- Iran accused Germany’s Siemens of placing small-sized explosives in the equipment acquired for its nuclear program. Siemens denied the allegations and noted that it ceased to supply the the Islamic Republic with equipment for its nuclear program in 1979 (the year of Khamenei’s revolution). According to the accusations launched by Alaeddin Boroujerdi, chairman of the Committee for Foreign Policy and National Security in Iran’s Consultative Assembly, Iranian intelligence discovered the miniscule explosives before they were set off. “The equipment was supposed to explode after being put to work, in order to dismantle all our systems,” Boroujerdi said. Siemens had begun the construction of Iran’s first nuclear reactor for the Shah in 1974, and it is now part of the Bushehr plant, completed by the Russians and only activated in 2011.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Iranian Commander: Israeli Strike Could Trigger WWIII
Revolutionary Guards commander says war would be “historic opportunity” to destroy Israel and “reclaim Palestine”; deputy commander warns that “our enemy will begin the war, but we will be the ones to end it.”
A senior Iranian military commander on Sunday said that an Israeli pre-emptive strike on Iran could “trigger World War III,” repeating threats made over the past few weeks that Tehran will attempt to destroy Israel if the Jewish state launches an attack on Iran either with or without the US.
Brigadier General Amir-Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the IRGC’s aerospace division, also told state-owned al-Alam TV that Iran would target US bases in the region should Israel attack.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Lebanon: Aoun Denounces, They Tried to Kill Me
(AGI) Beirut — Former Lebanese chief head of staff, denounced his convoy was under gunfire on Saturday night. Maronite Christian Michel Aoun -once strong opposer of the Syrian regime and now an ally of Hezbollah Shiites- denounced that some unidentified aggressors tried to kill him.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
US to Remove People’s Mujahedin of Iran From Blacklist
(AGI) Washington — “The People’s Mujahedin of Iran” will be removed from the United States’ blacklist of terrorist organisations. It was announced by US Republican Congressman Ted Poe. The move is likely to anger Iran at a time of difficult relations between Teheran and the West. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had given herself until October 1 to make a decision on the militant revolutionary movement, aka Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), which advocates the overthrow of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
KIEV — The presidents of Ukraine and Poland have unveiled a memorial to the thousands of Ukrainians, Poles and others killed by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin’s secret police before and during World War II.
The memorial is part of a remembrance complex in Bykivnia, outside the Ukrainian capital, where up to 120,000 people are buried.
The victims include 3,500 Poles executed in the Kiev region by the Soviet secret police as part of what became known as the Katyn massacre.
Katyn is one of the most painful pages of Polish history, and Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was eager Friday to show respect and support to Poland, Kiev’s biggest ally in its push to integrate closer with the European Union.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Bangladesh on Strike to Protest Movie
(AGI) Dhaka — Most schools, offices and stores are closed in Bangladesh to protest against the amateur movie against Mohammed. The country has 153 million inhabitants, mostly Muslim. Some forty activists were briefly detained after they tried to erect a barricade across one of the central streets of the capital. . .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
China’s Top Security Officer Makes Four-Hour Visit in Kabul
(AGI) Beijing — China has stepped up diplomacy with Afghanistan, as the 2014 deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO troops approaches. A senior official, Zhou Yongkang, China’s top security officer, carried out a mission in the country on Saturday, the first in almost half a century. The visit lasted only four hours, but it is a sign of how China is aiming to to strengthen its influence in a country with a central position in the region. Over the centuries Beijing had always looked upon Afghanistan with great interest .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
National Strike in Bangladesh in Film Protest
(AGI) Dhaka — A national strike has been called in Bangladesh in protest against the amateur film mocking the Prophet Muhammad. The majority of schools, offices and shops are closed for the strike called by opposition parties. Thousands of police flooded the streets of the capital of a country with a population of 153 million, a large majority of whom are Muslims. Forty activists were briefly detained after trying to set up a barricade in one of the city’s central streets.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan Minister Offers $100,000 Reward for Death of US Filmmaker
A Pakistani Cabinet minister has today offered a US$100,000 reward for the death of the US filmmaker whose movie features a depiction of Islam’s Prophet Mohammed.
Railways Minister Ghulam Ahmad Bilor said he would pay the reward out of his own pocket.
He also urged the Taliban and al-Qaida to perform the “sacred duty” of helping locate and kill the filmmaker.
More than 20 people died yesterday in clashes with police in cities throughout the country.
Scores of people were injured today in a clash in Bangladesh’s capital between police and hundreds of demonstrators, as protests continued in the Muslim world against the film.
Police fired tear gas and used batons today to disperse the stone-throwing protesters, who were from about a dozen Islamic groups.
The protesters burned several vehicles in Dhaka, including a police van, witnesses said.
Dozens of protesters were arrested at the demonstration and inside the nearby National Press Club, where participants took refuge, a Dhaka Metropolitan Police official said.
Police and witnesses said scores of people were injured.
The clash erupted when authorities attempted to halt the demonstration, police said.
Authorities have banned all protests near the city’s main Baitul Mokarram mosque since yesterday, when more than 2,000 people marched and burned an effigy of President Barack Obama.
The protesters announced a nationwide general strike tomorrow to protest the police action.
The protesters — from the Minhaj-ul-Quran religious group — marched through Islamabad’s streets and then gathered near Parliament, chanting slogans against the filmmaker and demanding stern punishment for him.
Thousands of people also protested today in Nigeria’s largest city, Kano. The crowd marched from a mosque to the palace of the Emir of Kano, the region’s top spiritual leader for Muslims.
About 200 students in Srinagar, the main city in Indian-controlled Kashmir, chanted “Down with America” and “Long live Islam” in a peaceful protest.
| — Hat tip: McR | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan: “Mindless” Violence on the Day of Love for the Prophet: 23 Dead and 200 Wounded
The demonstrations which started peacefully, were derailed by militants and activists. In the capital, the rampaging mob burned four cinemas, six banks, four police cars, two restaurants, a lot of cars. Many buildings plundered. Several people embittered by killing “in the name of Allah.” Electoral interests and power struggle behind the scandal of the anti-Islam film.
Islamabad (AsiaNews) — “Stupid violence”, “we are only hurting ourselves,” “destroying our property to criticize a movie made in the USA”, “Shame on Pakistan: burning, looting, killing our people in … name of Allah! “: these are some of the comments in the “ The Dawn” the morning after a day of violence and death in the capital and other cities in Pakistan, which have killed 23 people and wounded more than 200.
Yesterday, the Pakistani Government had launched a “day in the love of the prophet,” to criticize the anti-Islam film made in the U.S., considered blasphemous towards Muhammad. But various extremist groups of tens of thousands hijacked the event to violently commit, murder, arson and theft in Peshawar, Lahore, Islamabad, Karachi and other cities. The previous day, prominent government and religious leaders urged people to protest against the anti-Islam film in a peaceful manner. The shock wave of violence began shortly after Friday prayers. The demonstrations were led by various religious groups like the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam, Jamaat-i-Islami, Sunni Tehrik and the Majlis-i-Muslimeen Wahdatul. They had promised to maintain peaceful demonstrations. But later militants and activists arrived, to incite the crowds.
In the capital, the rampaging mob burned four cinemas, six banks, four police cars, two restaurants, a lot of cars. For hours they continued to loot banks and other buildings along the route of the parade.
The police had set up blocks and checkpoints to protect the U.S. embassy, ??but soon groups of militants, armed with sticks and stones, began to attack the police cordons. The police first fired tear gas, then fired into the air, finally they fired live ammunition into the crowd. Tree policemen were among those killed.
In other cities like Lahore and Karachi, the protesters tried to get close to the U.S. consulate, but were pushed back by the police.
According to several analysts, the protests sparked by the anti-Islam film has become an opportunity exploited by religious groups to increase their influence and power in the elections. Along with these, there are also bands only interested in destabilizing the government and marginalizing rival groups.
In other cities such as Cairo and Kuala Lumpur, demonstrations were held in entirely peaceful manner.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan’s ‘Day of Love for the Prophet’ Turns Into a Show of Hatred for U.S. Over Anti-Islam Film
Pakistani officials say at least 19 people have been killed and more than 200 wounded in clashes between police and people protesting a film that denigrates Islam’s Prophet Muhammad.
Officials at two different hospitals, Seemi Jamali and Aftab Channar, say 12 were killed and 82 wounded Friday in the southern port city of Karachi.
Police official Bashir Khan says three others were killed and 61 wounded in the northwest city of Peshawar. Hospital official Tanveer Malik says 25 people were wounded in the capital, Islamabad.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Police Patrol for Trouble During Bangladesh Strikes
Public workers in Bangladesh have gone on a nationwide strike in protest against the anti-Islam film “Innocence of Muslims.” Police are out in numbers to ensure the strikes remain peaceful.
Shops, offices and schools were closed on Sunday across Bangladesh on what is usually a normal working day. The strikes in the mostly Muslim nation of more than 150 million people were called in response to the video from the US and caricatures from a French magazine, both of which mocked the Prophet Muhammad.
The strikes were initiated by several Islamic groups allied with the main opposition party.
In the capital, Dhaka, as many as 10,000 police and rapid response forces had been deployed to monitor the strikes. On Saturday, activists taking part in protests against the film and the caricatures clashed with police, which led to several dozens injuries. The police action against the protests was one of the reasons Sunday’s general strike was called.
So far on Sunday, the protests have remained largely peaceful, although about 40 people were detained briefly for throwing objects at police.
The prime minister, Sheikh Hasina Wazed, has condemned “Innocence of Muslims,” and the country recently blocked YouTube access to the film.
There have been more than 50 deaths across the Muslim world related to protests against the film, which started on September 11.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Two British Soldiers Die in ‘Suspected Suicides’ On Bases in Southern Afghanistan
Two British soldiers are believed to have committed suicide in Afghanistan yesterday, taking the number of British fatalities for the week to four.
The names of the servicemen have yet to be released by the Ministry of Defence, but next of kin have been informed.
One of the men was from the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers based at Camp Bastion, the UK headquarters in Helmand province.
A second serviceman is thought to have shot himself a few miles away from the base.
Defence sources say an investigation has been launched into the suspected Camp Bastion suicide, the camp at which Prince Harry is based — it is not thought to be the result of hostile action.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Chinese Company to Acquire Complete Genomics, Become World Genomics Powerhouse
Complete Genomics, the whole human genome sequencing powerhouse in Mountain View, California, is being acquired by the Chinese company BGI-Shenzhen. The acquisition could be read as a signal to the world that China is determined to be a major competitor in the future genome sequencing market.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
North Korea: Not Just Kate: Pyongyang Censors First Lady’s Past
Instead of fighting the famine, the regime led by Kim Jong-un has launched a campaign to retrieve a CD containing the songs by “companion Ri”, wife of the dictator. The “pop” image clashes with that of the sober matron concerned about the revolution and the people.
Seoul (AsiaNews) — Instead of carrying out the program of economic reforms, the authorities of North Korea prefer to launch a campaign against pop music. The reason behind this decision is to prevent the population from finding out that the new wife of the dictator, “companion Ri Sol-joo”, was until last year a mediocre pop singer.
A source tells the Daily NK: “In practice, there are buyers all over Pyongyang. They are searching for the CD containing her songs, including one titled ‘Sobaeksu’: the album cover is in fact a photo of her face “. The mission involves the Department of propaganda and Agitation.
The campaign aims to eliminate the “awkward” past of the first lady of North Korea. As the source explains, “her role as a singer clashes with the image of matron concerned about the health of the North Korean people. Nevertheless, thanks to the new media, it is very difficult to keep a secret. Lots of people know she sang with the ‘Unhasu orchestra. “
The marriage of Kim Jong-un, the third son and successor of the “Dear Leader” Kim Jong-il, and “companion Ri” was combined by his uncle (and guardian). She was presented as a fervent revolutionary, an image required by the wife of the leader who wants to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather Kim Il-sung.
However, the two have already been the focus of several small scandals while people are dying of hunger and the country is in fact marginalized by the international community, the couple opened an amusement park and a fast food restaurant in the capital. In addition, photos of the new Mrs. Kim with an expensive designer bag have outraged the North Koreans.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Genetic Study Finds Complexity in Cradle of Humanity
The melting pot of early human history has just been given a good stir. The largest study of genetic variance across present-day populations in southern Africa suggests that there is no single place in Africa from which all modern humans emerged. Instead, our species is the result of mixing between numerous early human populations across a vast area.
Mattias Jakobsson at Uppsala University, Sweden, and his colleagues analysed around 2.3 million single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) — variations in DNA that are useful for comparing regions of the genome between populations — in 220 individuals from 11 southern African populations.
“When we start digging into this data, the most striking result is the deep population structure that we find,” says Jakobsson. This structure suggests that modern humans emerged from a geographically diverse group, in contrast to the “bottleneck” theory in which all humans alive today are descended from a single, relatively homogenous group of people.
“This is important,” says Robert Foley at the University of Cambridge, who was not involved in the study. “One of the big questions has always been where in Africa humans evolved. Given the size of the continent — three times the size of Europe — saying we evolved in Africa does not really answer the question.”
Genomic studies let us investigate the question more fully, says Foley. “Just as today, the earliest modern humans and their descendants lived in populations that did not have clear-cut boundaries, but existed in a world of other African populations,” he says.
The study suggests that population structure continued to be complicated even after modern humans had evolved. It showed that one group that survives to this day — the click-speaking Khoe-San of the Kalahari — was one of the earliest to separate from the rest of humanity, at least 100,000 years ago.
However, the study also found divergence within the Khoe-San themselves, with the Namibean and Angolan groups in the north having separated from those in South Africa as early as 25,000 to 40,000 years ago.
“Most astonishing to me is the deep divergence among the Khoe-San populations,” says Brenna Henn at Stanford University, California. “This really suggests we need to understand the structure of southern African populations in much finer detail.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Mega Protest March in Nigeria Invades the Streets of Kano
(AGI) Kano — A thousands-strong mega-protest against the blasphemous film and cartoons invaded the streets of Kano, North Nigeria. Dozens of thousands of people took to the street crying “Death to America, Israel and to the enemies of Islam”.
The protest demonstration was rallied by the Islamic Movement in Nigeria, a pro-Iranian group that belongs of the Shiite branch of Islam. “This event — explained the Group’s leader Muhammed Turi — aims at launching a message to the US Government which must first put an end to blasphemy against Islam”. Among the streamers, some displayed the image of Barack Obama but there were also anti-Israel banners. “The prophet means everything for us” said one of the protesters, prompting the Nigerian Government to publicly denounce the film.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Nigeria: Suicide Bomber Killed and 3 Hurt in Church Attack
(AGI) Kano — Another attack has targeted Christians in Nigeria’s Muslim north. A suicide bomber blew himself up outside St. John’s Catholic Church in Bauchi, the capital of the federal state of the same name in northern Nigeria. Yushau Shuaib, a spokesman for the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), told AGI that bomber died and three people were injured in the attack.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Somalia: Islamist Militia Al Shabab Kill MP in Mogadishu
(AGI) Mogadishu — Islamist militia Al Shabab, close to al Qaeda, killed a member of Parliament last night in Mogadishu.
The news was released by the President of the Parliamentary Assembly, Osman Jawari; the victim’s name was Mustaf Haji Mohamed .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Zimbabwe: Tsvangirai Marries Bypassing Anti-Polygamy Laws
(AGI) Harare — Zimbabwe prime minister, Morgan Tsvangirai got married for the second time, bypassing a court ban. Locardia Karimatsenga opposed the prime minister’s wedding, stating that he is already married according to tribal laws on polygamy.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Argentina Mints Coin to Commemorate Falklands War
(AGI) Buenos Aires — Thirty years after the defeat in the Falklands war, which caused the fall of the military junta, Cristina Fernandez’s democratic Argentina once again commemorates that disastrous invasion of the islands, this time by minting a 2 pesos coin (30 Eurocents) with the verso bearing the islands’ profile and the writing “Malvinas” (the local wording for the archipelago) — Regional cause of the Americas”, with the dates 1982-2012.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Gay Actor Convicted of “Acts Against Nature” In Nigeria
(AGI) Abuja — In Abuja, capital of Nigeria, a court condemned 26-year-old actor Bestwood Chukwuemeka to three months of imprisonment “for crimes against nature”. The actor’s crime, not very popular, not even in Nollywood, as the Nigerian cinema is called, is homosexuality, which according to the Nigerian law may be punished with even harsher sentences. The penalty was in fact mitigated by Bestwood’s defence, who declared himself “guilty” and asked for “mercy, for having committed the crime under the influence of alcohol”. The ‘offence’ took place in Nigeria’s capital in August, and to be more precise, “in the bed of the culprit”, as public prosecutor Mohammed Umar explained during the ‘trial’. Bestwood, who at first had claimed innocence, had been accused by his former mate, a Nigerian man a bit younger than himself. In Nigeria, “crimes against nature”, which are part of the local criminal justice system since the independence of the country in 1960, include, beyond homosexuality, also sexual acts with animals and some heterosexual practises. However, trials and sentences against homosexuals are very rare in Nigeria, though a bill providing for strong limitations of their rights and harsher punishments for gays wishing to get married is pending at the Senate in Abuja. After reading the sentence against Bestwood, Justice Nafisatu Buba said he hoped that the sentence “might be a teaching and an admonition to young people”. It is difficult to find criticism to the sentence on Nigerian websites, while public prosecutor and Justice Buba received general approval .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
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