Thanks to Abu Elvis, C. Cantoni, Dymphna, Fausta, Insubria, JD, Lexington, Queen, Steen, TB, turn, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Details are below the fold.
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Naked Dog Walker Tasered
Buzz up! TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A 40-year-old man walking his dog in the nude was Tasered by police when he refused to follow an officer’s commands.
David McCranie of the Tallahassee Police Department says an officer on patrol spotted the man shortly after 8 p.m. Friday.
The man was asked what he was doing and told the officer, “Allah told me to watch a Bruce Willis movie and walk the dog,” McCranie said.
McCranie said using the Taser was the only way to subdue the man without having to hurt him. The man was then sent for mental-health evaluation and treatment.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Pickens Gives New Meaning to ‘Self-Government’
By Steven Milloy
The more you learn about T. Boone Pickens’ plan to switch America to wind power, the more you realize that he seems willing to say and do just about anything to make another billion or two.
This column previously discussed the plan’s technical and economic shortcomings and marketing ruses. Today, we’ll look into the diabolical machinations behind it.
Simply put, Pickens’ pitch is “embrace wind power to help break our ‘addiction’ to foreign oil.” There is, however, another intriguing component to Pickens’ plan that goes unmentioned in his TV commercials, media interviews and web site — water rights, which he owns more of than any other American.
Pickens hopes that his recent $100 million investment in 200,000 acres worth of groundwater rights in Roberts County, Texas, located over the Ogallala Aquifer, will earn him $1 billion. But there’s more to earning such a profit than simply acquiring the water. Rights-of-way must be purchased to install pipelines, and opposition from anti-development environmental groups must be overcome. Here’s where it gets interesting, according to information compiled by the Water Research Group, a small grassroots group focusing on local water issues in Texas.
Purchasing rights-of-way is often expensive and time-consuming — and what if landowners won’t sell? While private entities may be frustrated, governments can exercise eminent domain to compel sales. This is Pickens’ route of choice. But wait, you say, Pickens is not a government entity. How can he use eminent domain? Are you sitting down?
At Pickens’ behest, the Texas legislature changed state law to allow the two residents of an 8-acre parcel of land in Roberts County to vote to create a municipal water district, a government agency with eminent domain powers. Who were the voters? They were Pickens’ wife and the manager of Pickens’ nearby ranch. And who sits on the board of directors of this water district? They are the parcel’s three other non-resident landowners, all Pickens’ employees.
A member of a local water conservation board told Bloomberg News that, “[Pickens has] obtained the right of eminent domain like he was a big city. It’s supposed to be for the public good, not a private company.”
What’s this got to do with Pickens’ wind-power plan? Just as he needs pipelines to sell his water, he also needs transmission lines to sell his wind-generated power. Rights of way for transmission lines are also acquired through eminent domain — and, once again, the Texas legislature has come to Pickens’ aid.
Earlier this year, Texas changed its law to allow renewable energy projects (like Pickens’ wind farm) to obtain rights-of-way by piggybacking on a water district’s eminent domain power. So Pickens can now use his water district’s authority to also condemn land for his future wind farm’s transmission lines…
| — Hat tip: turn | [Return to headlines] |
EU Extradition on Demand Undermines Justice
“Osama bin Laden has done more for European integration than anyone since Jacques Delors,” says Graham Watson, the Lib Dem MEP. His claim sounds perverse — until you remember how persuasive the threat of terrorism has been in getting countries to accept pan-European steps to “integrate procedures for criminal justice”.
Supporters of ever-closer integration on matters of criminal justice insist that those who oppose it are “weakening the fight against terrorism”.
Their argument has been very effective. Just how effective can be gauged from a measure passed by the European Parliament two weeks ago, which our own Government has just endorsed.
The new law would mean that no member state could refuse to extradite an individual sought by another member state — even if that individual had been given a heavy prison term after a trial at which he was not present, could not defend himself, and may not even have known about.
Isn’t the right to defend yourself in person essential to a fair trial — and isn’t that right so basic that it is enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights? Well, yes — but as the preamble to the new regulation states, the right itself is “not absolute”. So EU bureaucrats, lawyers and parliamentarians have concluded that it can be dispensed with when doing so increases “efficiency”.
And indeed, it is unquestionably very inefficient to have all those pesky protections for people who are accused of crimes. They prevent the state from convicting people swiftly and cheaply.
So the new EU regulation will sweep them all away: if you are found guilty in absentia by a court in another EU state, our Government will have no option but to extradite you to serve your prison sentence there.
That measure would be a threat to the liberty of law-abiding Britons even if every EU country had uniformly high standards of justice. No trial in absentia can be fair, and the procedure can only be justified as a last, desperate response to the most exceptional and severe conditions.
The EU regulation, however, places no significant conditions at all on trials in absentia: the “safeguards” which it is claimed will prevent miscarriages of justice can all be satisfied by ticking boxes.
Furthermore, the idea of “common standards of justice” across the EU is a bureaucratic fantasy.
Standards vary enormously…
| — Hat tip: Lexington | [Return to headlines] |
Islam: Work on Second Paris Mosque Resumes
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, SEPTEMBER 3 — Frozen for over two years, the works for the reconstruction of the second mosque in Paris, on rue Tanger, in the 19th arrondissement, resumed on the eve of the Ramadan for the great relief of the Paris Muslim community, which is often forced to pray in emergency places or on the streets due to the lack of places of worship. The Addàwa Mosque will be a complex place of worship rather than a simple mosque. The building will host a prayer hall for 1,600 people overlooked by a cupola, and a seven-storey building with conference rooms, rooms for study and places for social and cultural activities. Addàwa is rising where the warehouses of Bouchara, a textile and curtains chain of stores, used to be before being transformed in 1979 in a hall of prayer capable of welcoming up to 4,000 faithful. The new mosque will be funded through the religious association of the neighbourhood with donations from the believers because the Muslim tradition does not allow the resort to loans, representatives of the association said. However, there are serious doubts that the mosque will be completed by 2011. The funding envisaged by the planned budget, over 14 million euro, has not been raised yet and Larbi Kechat, head of the Grand Mosque of Paris, in the fifth arrondissement, said that currently there are funds only for the foundations of the building. The effects of the lack of places of worship for the Muslims are particularly evident during the month of Ramadan. In many places people improvise spreading carpets on the street where they kneel to pray amid the speeding cars. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Senior Cleric Berates Attitudes to Immigrants and Poor
Rome, 8 Sept. (AKI) — The head of the Catholic charity, Caritas, Monsignor Vittorio Nozza, has sharply criticised Italy’s treatment of immigrants and the poor.
“The war declared by some Italian municipalities against beggars and car windscreen washers, has met with a kind of tacit consent — as if it has suddenly become normal to bar the poor from cities,” Nozza said.
He was writing in an editorial published in the September issue of the Caritas magazine, headlined ‘Moving on the poor — an injustice that suits many’.
“Local administrations, tourists, shopkeepers, and ‘respectable citizens’ all applaud these measures,” said Nozza.
“We need to recall that a human being, however ragged, is worth more than the tidiness of a pavement or a city’s decorum,” he stressed.
Nozza said he found particularly repugnant the many members of the public interviewed on TV who unashamedly brand beggars as “a nuisance”.
He criticised the TV networks for their coverage of the issue and attacked politicians “who allay the public’s fears of the poor by preaching fiscal federalism and self-sufficiency”.
“Together with the economic slowdown, this is making everyone more impatient, superficial and heartless.” Nozza stated.
“Perhaps it is time to remember that rooting through a rubbish bin is not pleasurable for anyone, less still for a poor person.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Sharia Courts Operating in Britain
Sharia courts have been operating in Britain to rule on disputes between Muslims for more than a year, it has emerged.
Five sharia courts have been set up in London, Birmingham, Bradford and Manchester and Nuneaton, Warwickshire. The government has quietly sanctioned that their rulings are enforceable with the full power of the judicial system, through the county courts or High Court. Previously, the rulings were not binding and depended on voluntary compliance among Muslims.
Lawyers have issued grave warnings about the dangers of a dual legal system and the disclosure drew criticism from Opposition leaders.
Dominic Grieve, the shadow home secretary, said: “If it is true that these tribunals are passing binding decisions in the areas of family and criminal law, I would like to know which courts are enforcing them because I would consider such action unlawful. British law is absolute and must remain so.”
Douglas Murray, the director of the Centre for Social Cohesion, added: “I think it’s appalling. I don’t think arbitration that is done by sharia should ever be endorsed or enforced by the British state.”
Muslim tribunal courts started passing sharia judgments in August 2007. They have dealt with more than 100 cases that range from Muslim divorce and inheritance to nuisance neighbours.
It has also emerged that tribunal courts have settled six cases of domestic violence between married couples, working in tandem with the police investigations.
Sheikh Faiz-ul-Aqtab Siddiqi, whose Muslim Arbitration Tribunal runs the courts, said that sharia courts are classified as arbitration tribunals under a clause in the Arbitration Act 1996.
The rulings of arbitration tribunals are binding in law, provided that both parties in the dispute agree to give it the power to rule on their case.
The disclosures come after Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, sparked a national debate and calls for his resignation for saying that the establishment of sharia in the future “seems unavoidable” in Britain.
| — Hat tip: Steen | [Return to headlines] |
OIC: Secretary General Received the Foreign Minister of Kosovo
The Secretary General of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, Professor Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu received today 13 September 2008, Mr. Skender Hyseni Foreign Minister of Kosovo and his accompanying delegation at the OIC General Secretariat.
The Secretary General recalled the major role played by OIC in the Balkans and emphasized that the situation in Kosovo is an important item on the OIC agenda. He reaffirmed OIC support for Kosovar people and hoped that more cooperation from the OIC Organization would benefit Kosovo’s people.
On his part, Mr. Hyseni thanked the Secretary General for the assistance and support extended to Kosovo people. He briefed the Secretary General on the latest developments on Kosovo since the declaration of independence on 17 February 2008. He expressed the hope that More OIC Member States would recognize the independence of Kosovo. He also reaffirmed Kosovo’s desire and readiness to forge closer cooperation with the OIC and its Member States.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia: Iraq; Zastava Guns for President, Prime Minister
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, SEPTEMBER 11 — Serbian weapons producing factory Zastava oruzje, based in Kragujevac (central Serbia), exported in Iraq a first stock of 200 luxury guns and 4,000 standard guns CZ 99. The luxury weapons, produced in limited edition, will be given as presents by the Iraqi president and prime minister to international and national officials, Belgradés radio B92 reported. The contract signed by Iraq envisages that Zastava oruzje provides to the Arab country 18,000 guns, 3,000 of which luxury. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Israel Releases Terrorist … Terrorist Threatens U.S.
‘American embassy and citizens are not secure’
JERUSALEM — A convicted child-killing terrorist recently freed by Israel in a controversial prisoner exchange deal yesterday issued a threat against the U.S.
“If there will be an Israeli attack against Lebanon in the future, American citizens and the American embassy in Lebanon will not be secure,” said Samir Kuntar, who led a protest yesterday outside the U.S. embassy in Beirut.
Kuntar was release in July along with four other Lebanese convicts in a deal with the Hezbollah terror group that saw the remains of two Israeli soldiers returned to Israel. He was serving multiple life sentences in an Israeli prison for murdering three Israelis, including smashing to death a 4-year-old girl with the butt of his rifle.
In Lebanon, Kuntar now chairs the Lebanese Committee for Solidarity with Cuba, which is an organization that petitions for the international community to normalize relations with Cuba.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Saudi Clerics Want Death Penalty for TV Owners
Two senior Saudi clerics have issued fatwas calling for the owners of Arab television channels that broadcast shows promoting magic, debauchery and vice to be tried in court and face the death penalty.
The sheikhs, both members of the Higher Council of Clerics, said Sunday they stopped short of directly condemning to death purveyors of these shows but denounced them as unsuitable for the holy month of Ramadan.
The head of the Saudi Supreme Judiciary Council Sheikh Saleh al-Lihedan said in an interview with Saudi TV Sunday that he objected to the content of many satellite channels but that he did not intend to incite people to kill channel owners, claiming that his original religious ruling broadcast on Saudi radio last week had been taken out of context.
Another senior cleric, Sheikh Saleh al-Fozan, weighed in on Sunday in response to the furor ignited by his colleague and condemned horoscope and advice shows as equivalent to sorcery and therefore apostasy worthy of the death penalty.
“Sorcerers who appear on satellite channels who are proven to be sorcerers have committed a great crime … and the Muslim consensus is that the apostate’s punishment is death by the sword,” Fozan told the daily al-Madina newspaper
“Those who call in to these shows should not be accorded Muslim rites when they die,” the prominent cleric added.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Syria: Volume of Trade With Italy on the Rise
(ANSAmed) — DAMASCUS, JULY 1 — According to the recent ISTAT data for the first three months of 2008, Italy confirms the positive trend of 2007 in the trade with Syria by exporting products for 269.4 million euro, up 7.63% compared to the same period of 2007, while the import from Syria rose by the considerable 143.5% to 283.6 million euro. The total trade reached 553 million euro, up 50.8%, the Italian Foreign Trade Institute (ICE) said. The balance, which was surprisingly extremely positive for Italy (133.8 million euro) in the first quarter of 2007 returned to negative as usual, but only with 14.2 million euro. This turn was determined by the increase of the purchase of crude oil and natural gas (up 586.3% compared to the same period of 2007) with 257.6 million euro. In terms of Italian supply, the following increases stand out: refined petroleum products (up 6.6%) at 144.1 million euro, machines and appliances for the production and use of mechanical energy (up 137.8%) at 12.5 million euro, other machinery of general use (up 45.8%) at 11.5 million euro, automobiles (up 58.7%) at 10.6 million euro, iron and steel industry products (up 36.8%), household appliances (up 27.4%) at 4.3 million euro, paper and pulp (up 208.6%), cutlery products (up 34.4%), pharmaceutical products (up 170.9%) at 2.25 million euro, and clothing at 1.8 million euro (up 23.4%). Some of these increases are result of the recent liberalisation of the market. The petroleum products generate 53.5% of the Italian export, instrumental goods (machinery, mechanical equipment and electric appliances) 22.1% or 59.8 million euro, and their export is up 11.1% compared to the same period of 2007. The biggest share of the Italian import is taken by crude oil and natural gas, representing 90.8% of the total import from Syria. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Sex Appeal: Day Off for Lovers
Lovers in a Russian province are getting a day off work to have sex as part of a drive to boost the country’s birth rate.
The governor of Ulyanovsk is offering prizes to couples as an incentive to conceive.
If they have a baby on Russia Day, on June 12, they could win fridges, televisions, washing machines, cars or money.
The event is unofficially known as Conception Day in Ulyanovsk.
Since it was launched four years ago, the region’s birth rate has risen by around five per cent.
A Russian news website is reporting that this year’s ‘Give Birth to a Patriot’ day will coincide with a ‘Day of Soberness’.
Governor Sergei Morozov wants couples to focus on conceiving rather than drinking.
According to the report, businesses in the region have been ordered not to sell any alcohol throughout the day.
In terms of territory, Russia is the largest country in the world covering more than an eighth of the earth’s surface.
But with fewer than 142 million people, it is one of the most sparsely populated.
The population has been shrinking since the 1990s and is falling by almost half a per cent every year.
It is estimated Russia could lose 40 million people by the middle of the century.
| — Hat tip: Queen | [Return to headlines] |
New Delhi Rocked by Blasts in 3 Markets; 18 Killed
Sept. 13 (Bloomberg) — India’s capital New Delhi was rocked by blasts in three busy market areas, killing at least 18 people, the worst bomb attack in the country since 50 people were killed in the city of Ahmedabad in July.
Home MinisterShivraj Patil, who said five blasts took place within 45 minutes starting at about 6 p.m., condemned the attacks in a televised statement in the capital.
A group calling itself Indian Mujahideen, which claimed responsibility for the terrorist attacks in Gujarat state, said it was behind the blasts, Press Trust of India reported, citing an e- mail sent by the group. The e-mail made references to blasts in Jaipur and Ahmedabad and was signed Arbi Hindi, the agency said.
The aim of those behind the blasts is to “disturb social harmony,” Patil said. He appealed for social harmony and said those responsible will be given “stringent punishment.”
More than 200 people have been killed in terrorist attacks in the country over the past year by bombs placed on bicycles, kept under theater seats and near markets. Most of the attacks have not been solved, although some arrests have been made. Six people have been detained in connection with today’s blasts, the Headlines Today television channel said, without elaborating.
As many as 50 were injured in the blasts, Delhi Police chief Y.S. Dadwal told reporters at one of the bomb sites. Some television channels put the toll as high as 20 and the number of those injured at 92.
Two of today’s blasts took place in the central Connaught Place area and two at a market in the upscale Greater Kailash area, Dadwal said. One blast took place at Ghaffar Market in the Karol Bagh area, he said.
Debris, Blood
One of the blast sites in the Connaught Place area, outside the Barakhamba Road Delhi Metro Rail Corp. station entrance, was strewn with debris from the blast, minutes after a bomb went off in or near a dustbin. Pools of blood could also be seen.
Police cordoned off the second blast site at Connaught Place, the Central Park in the middle, and didn’t allow reporters any closer, as rescue efforts were under way.
“We have received reports that some groups have claimed responsibility but that needs to be confirmed,” Shakeel Ahmad, junior home minister, said in New Delhi. There were no details about the kind of explosives used.
The attack comes about three years after 59 people were killed and 224 injured in New Delhi when three explosions took place in two crowded markets and on a public bus. The blasts of Oct. 29, 2005, took place as people shopped for the main Hindu festival of Diwali and the Muslim festival of Eid.
Diwali, Ramadan
Today’s bombs went off as India prepares for the festival season next month, which includes Diwali, the country’s biggest, and mid-way through the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which started at the beginning of September.
President Pratibha Patil, Prime MinisterManmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi, president of the ruling Congress party, all condemned the attacks.
“The president has condemned the serial blasts and condoled the loss of lives in this mindless act of violence,” said an e- mailed release from the president’s office.
U.S. Ambassador to India David C. Mulford extended his government’s sympathies to the victims and their families.
“There is no justification for the vicious murder of innocent people,” Mulford said in an e-mailed release. “The U.S. stands shoulder-to-shoulder with India in the fight against terror.”
One live bomb has been defused, Ahmad said, without elaborating on where this was. Most of the injured have been admitted to the Ram Manohar Lohia hospital in central New Delhi. Television channels said as many as three bombs had been defused.
The first priority of the police is to look for any further bombs and defuse them, Ahmad said. “We have asked people to remain calm. It is an unfortunate development.”
States on Alert
The ministry of home affairs is alerting all states and union territories to remain vigilant, step up security and take all precautionary measures, Home Ministry spokesman Onkar Kedia said.
A team of federal experts has gone to the blast sites and the health authorities have been alerted, he said.
Sixteen bombs exploded in Ahmedabad within 20 minutes late on July 26, a day after seven bombs tore through India’s technology hub of Bangalore, killing two. At least 20 devices hidden in cars and garbage cans were discovered and defused in the Gujarat city of Surat, days after the Ahmedabad blasts.
The Indian Mujahideen had claimed responsibility for the Ahmedabad blasts and threatened more attacks. The group claimed at the time that the attack was in revenge for violence in Gujarat between Hindus and Muslims in 2002, in which almost 2,000 people were killed.
The government has previously blamed terrorist attacks on organizations linked to foreign powers, without offering evidence or making arrests. Local media often blame the attacks on groups backed by Pakistan or Bangladesh, without identifying the security officials who provided the information.
Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi condemned the blasts, in a statement made to the CNN-IBN television channel.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan Sends Fighter Jets to Tribal Region
ISLAMABAD, Sept.13 (Xinhua) — Pakistan Air Force (PAF) on Saturday sent its fighter aircraft to the northwestern tribal region as the U.S.-led coalition forces are increasing cross-border raids, local media reported.
The fighter jets conducted flights in North Waziristan tribal region, News Network International (NNI) news agency said.
At least 12 people were killed in North Waziristan in a suspected U.S. missile attack on Friday.
The coalition forces are increasing their missile and drone attacks on targets inside Pakistan in recent month, blaming Pakistan’s local Taliban for rising insurgency in Afghanistan.
Reports said that U.S. President George W. Bush has authorized U.S. raids against militants inside Pakistan without prior approval from the country.
The attacks have also caused many civilian deaths and triggered mounting anger and criticism across the country.
But Pakistan has repeatedly excluded the operation by foreign forces on its territory.
Pakistan’s army chief General Ashfaq Kayani on Wednesday issued a harsh-wording statement, criticizing the cross-border attacks by the coalition forces from Afghanistan and vowing to defend the country “at all cost”.
“The sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country will be defended at all cost and no external force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan,” said Kayani.
He said there is no any agreement or understanding with the coalition forces whereby they are allowed to conduct operations on Pakistani soil.
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said on Friday Pakistan would take up the unilateral strikes “on diplomatic level”.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Liberal Party Wins Government in Western Australia
Sept. 14 (Bloomberg) — Colin Barnett will become the next premier of Western Australia after his Liberal Party won National Party support for a coalition government, opening the way for uranium mining and genetically modified crops in the state.
The National Party received “very good” proposals from the Liberals and incumbent Labor Party before making its decision, Nationals Leader Brendon Grylls told reporters in Perth today. The Liberals won 24 seats in the 59-seat lower house and will form a government with the support of four Nationals and two independent members, ending a week of uncertainty after the Sept. 6 poll left no party with a majority.
Barnett, who promised to open up uranium mines and allow genetically modified crops, will head a state that accounts for a third of the nation’s exports with 10 percent of its population.
“Those key policies of uranium and genetically modified crops will come through very quickly,” said Peter Van Onselen, associate professor in political science at Perth’s Edith Cowan University. “Between them they also control the upper house.”
Nationals lawmakers will reserve the right to vote against government policy, unlike traditional Liberal-National coalition governments which present united policies.
“We took this very seriously,” Grylls said today. “We are not prepared to go into a traditional coalition, so we’ll be accepting ministries based on being independent ministers.”
Current Premier Alan Carpenter called the election on Aug. 6, two days after Barnett’s predecessor Troy Buswell quit as leader after admitting he snapped a staffer’s bra strap and sniffed the chair of a female colleague. Labor had promised to maintain its ban on uranium in a state that holds as much as 10 percent of the world’s reserves. Carpenter today resigned as Labor leader.
| — Hat tip: Dymphna | [Return to headlines] |
Mexico’s Failure to Sort Veggies May Have Led to Outbreak
ALLENDE, Mexico — At the end of a dirt road in northern Mexico, the conveyer belts processing hundreds of tons of vegetables a year for U.S. and Mexican markets are open to the elements, protected only by a corrugated metal roof.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration suspects this packing plant, its warehouse in McAllen, Texas, and a farm in Mexico are among the sources of the United States’ largest outbreak of food-borne illness in a decade, which infected at least 1,440 people with a rare form of salmonella.
A plant manager confirmed to The Associated Press that workers handling chili peppers aren’t required to separate them according to the sanitary conditions in which they were grown, offering a possible explanation for how such a rare strain of salmonella could have caused such a large outbreak.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Russian Bombers Will Return in Days From Venezuela
MOSCOW (Reuters) — Two Russian long-range bombers will return to base from Venezuela in four days after a visit designed to show off Moscow’s military strength and build ties with a foe of the United States.
The bombers, known in the West by the NATO codename “Blackjack”, are capable of carrying nuclear weapons but were not doing so during the flight to South America. They will return to Russia on September 15, Air Force commander Vladimir Drik told Interfax news agency.
“There were no nuclear weapons on board these planes,” Drik said.
The visit by the Tu-160 bombers is a sign of Russian assertiveness at a time of tension with the United States, including over the Russia-Georgia conflict and U.S. plans for a missile defence shield in eastern Europe.
Residents could see the large white bombers — one emblazoned with a red star and the Russian flag, the other carrying a blue circle with a picture of a swan — standing at a Venezuelan air force base near the industrial city of Maracay.
On Wednesday Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said the planes were in the South American oil-exporting nation to strengthen military ties and counter U.S. regional influence.
| — Hat tip: Fausta | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Immigrants Find New Routes to Reach Europe, Says Report
Rome, 12 Sept. (AKI) — Illegal immigrants bound for Italy are now departing from the Egyptian coast and no longer from Libya, according to a report by Arab TV station Al-Jazeera.
The closure of the border between Egypt and Libya are pushing young people to migrate to Europe, said the president of the Egyptian Association of Immigrant Studies, Ayman Zuhri.
“Until March 2007 it was easy to go to Tripoli aboard small buses, but since then it has become difficult to go to Libya from Egypt overland due to a new law,” he said. “It has become impossible for many Egyptian labourers to work there.”
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi visited Libya in early September and agreed to pay 5 billion dollars in reparations for its 32-year occupation of the country more than 50 years ago.
Part of the money is destined for increased border security to stop illegal immigrants crossing from Africa to Europe, but particularly to Italy, which has the longest coastline of any European Union country at 4,500 kilometres.
“Initially, illegal immigrants would all depart from Libya. Once they arrived they would lose their passport so they could not be identified,” said a young Egyptian human trafficker, ‘Hamdi’.
“They would spend days in warehouses with other Arab, Asian and African immigrants before embarking on a boat and arrive to Lampedusa in Italy,” ‘Hamdi’ told Al-Jazeera.
According to some witnesses, in order to reach the small Italian island of Lampedusa in the south of the country, boats departing from Alexandria in northern Egypt take approximately seven days, while boats departing from the Libyan coast used to take far less time.
More than 15,000 would-be migrants are believed to have landed in southern Italy in 320 landings since the beginning of January 2008.
In 2008 a total of 34 Egyptians have been sentenced to a year in prison and fined 186 dollars for trying to reach Libya through the Sahara desert.
Hamdi said during his last trip to Italy, he took 115 people and departed from the coastal city of Rashid, located near Alexandria.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Sir Paul: Terror Target
SIR Paul McCartney has been threatened that he will be the target of suicide bombers unless he abandons plans to play his first concert in Israel.
Self-styled preacher of hate Omar Bakri claimed the former Beatle’s decision to take part in the Jewish state’s 60th anniversary celebrations had made him an enemy of all Muslims.
Sources said Sir Paul was shocked but refused to be intimidated.
In an interview with Israeli media yesterday he said: “I was approached by different groups and political bodies who asked me not to come here. I refused. I do what I think and I have many friends who support Israel.”
Sir Paul, 65, should have gone to Israel with the Beatles in 1965 but they were barred by the Jewish nation’s government over fears they would corrupt young people.
Yesterday a number of websites described him as an infidel and suggested he was going to Israel only because of the reported £2.3m fee for the one-off concert.
A message posted on one website said: “Shame on you Paul McCartney for day trippin’ to apartheid Israel” and vowed never to buy his music again.
Bakri, who made his weekly internet broadcast to fellow extremists from his home in Lebanon, where he has lived in exile since being banned from returning to Britain, said Sir Paul was “making more enemies than friends”.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Islam: Videogame Incites to Muslim Massacre
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, SEPTEMBER 12 — “To massacre the greatest number of Muslims possible, so that no Muslim man, no Muslim woman are spared”: this is the aberrant mission of a videogame which can be downloaded free of charge from the Internet, bearing the unequivocal name “Muslim Massacre”. The M of “Muslim Massacre” represents the US flag as “the United States has declared war on Islam”, and the subtitle reads that it is “the game of modern religious genocide”. Released on the quiet in the United Kingdom in January, it triggered the anger and indignation of the Ramadhan Foundation, an organisation of Britain’s Muslim youth, which expressed “deep condemnation and anger”, calling for the immediate closure of the site, according to French media. The videogame, author of which is Sigvatr, a controversial and provocative artist and designer of games, well-known for his “shock” sites — invites the users “to wipe out the Muslim race with an arsenal of the world’s most destructive weapons”. The player is asked to enter into the role of an “American hero” armed with a submachine gun and rocket launcher, dropped by his government in the Middle East with the mission exactly to exterminate all the Muslims without sparing any of them. The Internet users advance in levels, first killing the ordinary people, and then eliminating the head of al Qaeda Osama bin Laden, the Prophet Muhammad and, in the end, Allah. And he who does not download the game, the first page reads, “is a liberal pussy”. “The game glorifies the murder of Muslims in the Middle East, encouraging children and young people to kill Muslims is unacceptable, in the worst of tastes, and extremely shocking,” Mohamed Shafiq, manager of the Ramadhan Foundation, protested calling for the immediate closure of the site www.muslimmassacre.com and noting that “if the game incited Muslims to kill Israelis, or Americans, there would be a general outcry, and justly”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
U.N. Agency Eyes Curbs on Internet Anonymity
A United Nations agency is quietly drafting technical standards, proposed by the Chinese government, to define methods of tracing the original source of Internet communications and potentially curbing the ability of users to remain anonymous.
The U.S. National Security Agency is also participating in the “IP Traceback” drafting group, named Q6/17, which is meeting next week in Geneva to work on the traceback proposal. Members of Q6/17 have declined to release key documents, and meetings are closed to the public.
The potential for eroding Internet users’ right to remain anonymous, which is protected by law in the United States and recognized in international law by groups such as the Council of Europe, has alarmed some technologists and privacy advocates. Also affected may be services such as the Tor anonymizing network.
“What’s distressing is that it doesn’t appear that there’s been any real consideration of how this type of capability could be misused,” said Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington, D.C. “That’s really a human rights concern.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
2 comments:
Well - I don't see why muslem-organisations would be so shocked by disgusting, hateful and murderous games or movies..
It's not as if islamic countries have shown themselves overscrupulous with regard to hatemongering; you reap what you sow..
But it is a novelty in Europe, that's for sure!
"“The game glorifies the murder of Muslims in the Middle East, encouraging children and young people to kill Muslims is unacceptable, in the worst of tastes, and extremely shocking,” Mohamed Shafiq, manager of the Ramadhan Foundation, protested calling for the immediate closure of the site www.muslimmassacre.com and noting that “if the game incited Muslims to kill Israelis, or Americans, there would be a general outcry, and justly”."
First, these kind of games are disgusting and vile. Second, the last quote that states, "if the game incited Muslims to kill Israelis, or Americans, there would be a general outcry, and justly" is not true because Muslims are always inciting Muslims to violence, and we just accept it as normal behaviour for Muslims. Muslims do not like the shoe on the other foot - they have no tolerance from non-Muslims what they themselves inflict upon others.
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