Once again, there are so many stories that I can’t include headline links for all articles. Scroll down from an article to see similar ones.Also, notice all the adulatory rhetoric about Obama. He’s being set up for a catastrophic fall, because nobody could possibly satisfy all those expectations.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Diana West, Fjordman, Insubria, IS, JD, Paul Green, SIOE, Steen, Tuan Jim, TV, VH, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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$1 Billion Allocated for Batteries
Website invites analysis of economic stimulus proposal
How about spending a billion dollars on batteries? After all, they are “advanced.”
That’s a proposal in the proposed $850 billion economic stimulus plan being considered in Congress, and is one of the reasons for the establishment of a new website, ReadTheStimulus.org, which is trying to collect volunteers to analyze the dollars and cents written into the 300-plus-page plan.
“One of the additional features we want to add is more detail on the actual dollar amounts being appropriated in the bill text,” the website says. “But to do that, we need to extract out all the individual appropriations and put them in a spreadsheet.
“Unfortunately, there’s just no way to do that automagically, and so that means we have to brute force it: have real live humans manually read each page of the document and enter in the dollar appropriations into a collaborative spreadsheet,” the site says.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Barack Obama Inauguration: This Emperor Has No Clothes, It Will All End in Tears
This will end in tears. The Obama hysteria is not merely embarrassing to witness, it is itself contributory to the scale of the disaster that is coming. What we are experiencing, in the deepening days of a global depression, is the desperate suspension of disbelief by people of intelligence — la trahison des clercs — in a pathetic effort to hypnotise themselves into the delusion that it will be all right on the night. It will not be all right.
We have been here before. In the spring of 1997, to be precise, when a charismatic, young prime minister entered Downing Street, cheered by children bussed in for the occasion waving plastic Union Jacks. A very few of us at that time incurred searing reproaches for denouncing the Great Charlatan (as I have always denominated Tony Blair) and dissenting from the public hysteria. Three times a deluded Britain elected that transparent fraud. Yesterday, when national bankruptcy became a formal reality, we reaped the bitter harvest of the Blair/Brown imposture.
The burnt child, contrary to conventional wisdom, does not fear the fire. After the Blair experience there is no excuse for anybody in Britain falling for Obama. Yet today, in this country, even some of those who remained sane during the emotional spasm of the Diana aberration are pumping the air for Princess Barack. At a time of gross economic and geopolitical instability throughout the Western world, this is beyond irresponsibility.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Day 1: White House Bashes George Bush
Official U.S. site rips ex-prez for ‘unconscionable ineptitude’
Unable to let go of its campaign mantra blaming the nation’s ills on the “failed policies” of George W. Bush, the White House of President Barack Obama immediately posted on its website charges that Bush broke promises and allowed “catastrophic failures” responding to the needs of Americans.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Hezbollah Expected to be a Major Threat by 2014
By David Bedein, Middle East Correspondent
Jerusalem — Hezbollah could be one of the first security challenges faced by the new Obama administration. An official government report concludes the Iranian-backed Islamic terror group has been forming sleeper cells throughout the United States that could become operational.
The report estimates Hezbollah could become a much more potent national security threat by 2014. The group was responsible for the 1983 Beirut Marine Barracks bombing, which killed 241 U.S. Marines and 58 French servicemen.
“The Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah does not have a known history of fomenting attacks inside the U.S., but that could change if there is some kind of ‘triggering’ event, the homeland assessment cautions,” the report said.
The report, obtained by the Middle East Newsline and marked “for official use only,” did not define a “triggering event.” Most of the threats cited in the report had been raised by the Homeland Security Department.
The 38-page report, titled 2008 Interagency Intelligence Committee on Terrorism, said Hezbollah was being directed by the leadership in Lebanon as?well as Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC)…
| — Hat tip: Paul Green | [Return to headlines] |
How to Destroy America
[Comment from JD: I highly recommend this speech by former Colorado Gov. Lamm. This speech is from a couple of years ago — but well worth revisiting.]
Moments later, former Colorado Governor Richard D. Lamm stood up and gave a stunning speech on how to destroy America. The audience sat spellbound as he described eight methods for the destruction of the United States. He said, “If you believe that America is too smug, too self-satisfied, too rich, then let’s destroy America. It is not that hard to do. No nation in history has survived the ravages of time. Arnold Toynbee observed that all great civilizations rise and fall and that ‘An autopsy of history would show that all great nations commit suicide.’“
“Here is how they do it,” Lamm said:
“First, to destroy America, turn America into a bilingual or multi-lingual and bicultural country.” History shows that no nation can survive the tension, conflict, and antagonism of two or more competing languages and cultures. It is a blessing for an individual to be bilingual; however, it is a curse for a society to be bilingual. The historical scholar, Seymour Lipset, put it this way: ‘The histories of bilingual and bi-cultural societies that do not assimilate are histories of turmoil, tension, and tragedy.’ Canada, Belgium, Malaysia, and Lebanon all face crises of national existence in which minorities press for autonomy, if not independence. Pakistan and Cyprus have divided. Nigeria suppressed an ethnic rebellion. France faces difficulties with Basques, Bretons, and Corsicans.”
Lamm went on: Second, to destroy America, “Invent ‘multiculturalism’ and encourage immigrants to maintain their culture. I would make it an article of belief that all cultures are equal. That there are no cultural differences. I would make it an article of faith that the Black and Hispanic dropout rates are due solely to prejudice and discrimination by the majority. Every other explanation is out of bounds. […]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
In-Flight Confrontations Can Lead to Charges Defined as Terrorism
Reporting from Los Angeles and Oklahoma City — Tamera Jo Freeman was on a Frontier Airlines flight to Denver in 2007 when her two children began to quarrel over the window shade and then spilled a Bloody Mary into her lap.
She spanked each of them on the thigh with three swats. It was a small incident, but one that in the heightened anxiety after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks would eventually have enormous ramifications for Freeman and her children.
[…]
Freeman is one of at least 200 people on flights who have been convicted under the amended law. In most of the cases, there was no evidence that the passengers had attempted to hijack the airplane or physically attack any of the flight crew. Many have simply involved raised voices, foul language and drunken behavior.
Some security experts say the use of the law by airlines and their employees has run amok, criminalizing incidents that did not start out as a threat to public safety, much less an act of terrorism.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Mussolini Inspired Optimism, Too
“He made the trains run on time.”
Nearly 65 years after Benito Mussolini was killed and strung up by a mob in Milan, the fallacious slogan credited to the Italian fascist dictator is still used in some circles. It is often cited as a testimonial to the fact that he was at one time loved by Italian people for his accomplishments, despite his eventual grisly end.
The thing is that the train slogan was a complete falsehood, propaganda calculated to underscore the competence of the National Fascist Party. It was believed — and still is by many to this day.
In case you missed it, on Tuesday, Barack Hussein Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States. There is so much wrong with this that I don’t know where to start, although the talking points have been pretty much covered in this space over the last 10 months.
The shameless fanfare associated with the inaugural (that being, all the events of Jan. 20) was beyond the surrealism of a near-future, post-apocalyptic B movie. From the headlines four years ago, one would think that George W. Bush put America in hoc with the extravagance of his inaugural. Obama spent three times as much, and one would think that it was a Hollywood couple-of-the-month’s wedding, so proud were the press and fawning Obamanoids of the expenditure.
Vapid scum from the entertainment industry were out in full force, including wastes of skin from the rap music sector. This in itself could be a testament to the president’s guilt by association, were anyone in America concerned with whom he associates. The ceremony itself included a nauseating, racist benediction from the Rev. Joseph Lowery.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Retakes Oath of Office
But Barack sworn in without hand on Bible
Barack Obama has retaken the oath of office that was administered by U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts at the ceremonial inauguration yesterday.
Legal experts had suggested the move because of the multiple stumbles and flubs at the original event.
Obama ended up transposing the word “faithfully” during his inauguration in Washington. When he should have said he would “faithfully execute the office of president of the United States,” he instead said he will “execute the office of president of the United States faithfully.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Inauguration: Words of History … Crafted by 27-Year-Old in Starbucks
When Barack Obama steps up to the podium to deliver his inaugural address, one man standing anonymously in the crowd will be paying especially close attention. With his cropped hair, five o’clock shadow and boyish face, he might look out of place among the dignitaries, though as co-author of the speech this man has more claim than most to be a witness to this moment of history.
Jon Favreau, 27, is, as Obama himself puts it, the president’s mind reader. He is the youngest chief speechwriter on record in the White House, and, despite such youth, was at the centre of discussions of the content of today’s speech, one which has so much riding on it.
[…]
In composing the high notes of the speech, Obama has leant on Favreau, whom he discovered almost by chance four years ago when the younger man was working on John Kerry’s failed presidential bid. “Favs” has since studied Obama’s speech patterns and cadences with the intensity of a stalker. He memorised the 2004 speech to the Democratic national convention which first brought Obama into the limelight. He is said to carry Obama’s autobiography, Dreams From My Father, wherever he goes. As a result, last November when Favreau sat down to write the first draft of the inaugural address, he could conjure up his master’s voice as if an accomplished impersonator.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
President Obama’s Latest Racist Pastor
Exclusive: Jane Chastain expresses outrage over ‘deliberate insult’ hurled by Rev. Lowery If you were not enraged and insulted at the benediction delivered by the Rev. Joseph Lowery, a United Methodist minister, at the inauguration of President Barack Obama, you are either 1) ignorant, 2) were smoking something you shouldn’t, or 3) simply were not paying attention.
This is the bombshell that Lowery dropped in the last lines of his closing prayer, which ended the ceremony:
Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day
when black will not be asked to get back,
when brown can stick around,
when yellow will be mellow,
when the red man can get ahead, man,
and when white will embrace what is right.
That last line all but destroyed any hope I have that Obama will be a healer and not a divider, a man not simply given to lofty rhetoric, but one who has turned a page from his racist past.
[…]
Lowery is the man who linked arms with PLO terrorist Yasser Arafat and sang “We Shall Overcome.” Lowery is the man who said that Iraqi mothers consider U.S. troops to be “terrorists.” Lowery believes that the U.S. government was behind the assassination of Martin Luther King and the CIA imported drugs from Central America.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Raw Deal for Ramos and Compean
When Sutton issued an arrest warrant for the agents, Ramos and Compean were not given the courtesy of surrendering to their supervisors in the US Border Patrol, or even quietly to US Marshals. Sutton arranged for simultaneous SWAT teams to stage assaults on their homes, deliberately traumatizing their families and very deliberately sending a message to every Border Patrol agent that attempting to arrest those who violate our borders has a horrible price. (It worked. Arrests along the border by Border Patrol agents plummeted. They simply turned their backs on illegals crossing into the United States, images of Ramos and Compean etched into their minds.)
[…]
They were railroaded by the US Attorney and maliciously prosecuted at the insistence of the Attorney General of the United States. US District Court Judge Kathleen Cardone, a Bush-43 judicial appointment, railroaded the defendants. During the trial, Sutton attempted to inflame the non-sequestered jury by issuing a three page statement to the media that he could not legally enter into evidence in which he said the two agents “…fired their weapons at a man who was attempting to surrender by holding his open hands in the air.”
During jury deliberation, three members of the jury, believing Ramos and Compean were innocent, held out for a not guilty verdict against nine jurors who were convinced the agents would never have been charged if they weren’t guilty. That fact notwithstanding, at 2:15 p.m. on March 15, 2006 the jury found them guilty. When the verdict was read, the three jury members began to cry.
A few days later Ramos’ lawyer, Mary Stillinger, contacted the jury members whom she witnessed crying. They agreed to speak to her on the record. They told Stillinger the jury foreman was told by Judge Cardone that the jury would vote either “guilty” or “not guilty.” She would not accept a hung jury. If the three couldn’t convince the other nine, they would have to vote guilty. The three should have insisted on seeing the judge’s instructions in writing. If she did tell the jury foreman that, Cardone would never put such a demand in writing. The judge was engaging in jury intimidation.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Republicrats Flock to Obama
The new year has already witnessed an unseemly rush on the part of some Republicans to cozy up to President Barack Obama. Sucked in by the lights, the parties, the adoring fans, and of course the fawning “paparazzi,” these politicians have traded loyalty to the convictions of their constituents for pilgrimage to kiss the ring of the one whom Farrakhan called “the messiah.”
Where did the train fly off the track folks? If Obama couldn’t be trusted prior to the election, as even Senator John McCain indicated, or if he supported all methods of abortion and opposed the Second Amendment prior to the election, as Obama’s own record indicated he did in both cases, then he is still an untrustworthy, pro-abortion, anti-gunner. Getting elected did not change these things.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Something Fishy? Counterfeit Foods Enter the U.S. Market
Some of your favorite foods may be fakes.
Foods masquerading as something else — a more nutritious something else — have been big news in the past two years. Chinese food companies in particular have been blamed for making deadly alterations to dairy, baby and pet foods by adding melamine. The chemical makes it appear that the food or beverage has the required level of protein.
But what about food producers in this country? What fraudulent foods do U.S. consumers have to fear from American companies?
Experts say dangerous U.S.-produced foods are comparatively few, but producers have been known to practice “economic adulteration” — adding a little to their bottom line by padding, thinning or substituting something cheap for something expensive.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Sorry to be a Party Pooper, But I Can’t Share This Swooning Obama Hysteria
Has everyone lost their marbles? The inauguration of President Obama is being treated like the Second Coming.
The coverage is so gushing we might all drown. Of course it’s a great thing that America, with its history of slavery and segregation still a shockingly recent memory, now has a black President; the palpable joy of African-Americans is entirely understandable and deeply touching. And there’s no doubt that Obama is a highly charismatic and attractive personality.
But what’s more than a wee bit troubling is that the swooning hysteria reflects the fact that people appear to believe that as of today the world will be saved. Swords will be beaten into ploughshares, peace will be brought to the Middle East, Iran will be pacified, every American will have health insurance, poverty will be eliminated and utopia will have arrived.
[…]
The very reason that so many in the west are so entranced by Obama is thus the very reason why our enemies are today rubbing their hands in satisfaction.
Obama stands for “soft power” — the replacement of military action in defence of his nation by talking, negotiation and compromise. But with people who have non-negotiable and unconscionable agendas — such as Iran’s genocidal intention to wipe Israel off the map and destroy the west — such an approach merely plays into their hands while catastrophically undermining more moderate regimes and allies.
And there’s a still more troubling aspect of America’s new President. For his whole career has been solidly embedded in an ultra-radical tradition which believes in revolution from the grass-roots up — and which teaches that to gain power, an activist must pose as a centrist while pursuing his real agenda of radicalising the people and revolutionising society.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Obama Presidency: Here Comes Socialism
But in the name of a largely unsuccessful effort to end the Depression, Roosevelt passed crucial and permanent reforms that have dominated our lives ever since, including Social Security, the creation of the Securities and Exchange Commission, unionization under the Wagner Act, the federal minimum wage and a host of other fundamental changes.
Obama’s record will be similar, although less wise and more destructive. He will begin by passing every program for which liberals have lusted for decades, from alternative-energy sources to school renovations, infrastructure repairs and technology enhancements. These are all good programs, but they normally would be stretched out for years. But freed of any constraint on the deficit — indeed, empowered by a mandate to raise it as high as possible — Obama will do them all rather quickly.
But it is not his spending that will transform our political system, it is his tax and welfare policies. In the name of short-term stimulus, he will give every American family (who makes less than $200,000) a welfare check of $1,000 euphemistically called a refundable tax credit. And he will so sharply cut taxes on the middle class and the poor that the number of Americans who pay no federal income tax will rise from the current one-third of all households to more than half. In the process, he will create a permanent electoral majority that does not pay taxes, but counts on ever-expanding welfare checks from the government. The dependency on the dole, formerly limited in pre-Clinton days to 14 million women and children on Aid to Families with Dependent Children, will now grow to a clear majority of the American population.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
US Agencies Chase Down Potential Inauguration Day Threat
US intelligence services chased reports of a potential terrorist threat Tuesday as President Barack Obama was sworn in before massive crowds amid an unprecedented security lockdown. Officials were tightlipped about the seriousness of the terrorist threat, with the Department of Homeland Security saying the information was “of limited specificity and uncertain credibility.”
But a Homeland Security official, who asked not to be identified, said it was linked to a militant Somali group called al-Shabab. “The FBI has acknowledged publicly that there has been a lot of incoming information, all of which we are running to ground. This is the only specific bulletin that has gone out,” the official said.[…]
Officials would say little about the potential terrorist threat attributed to al-Shabah, an Islamist group that emerged in a two-year-old struggle for power in Somalia and is classified as a foreign terrorist group by the US State Department.
Some Somalis living in the United States were recently reported to have returned home for training by the group, officials said. “The FBI, the Department of Homeland Security (including the USSS) and the intelligence community are coordinating with other law enforcement authorities to investigate and analyze recently received information about a potential threat on inauguration day,” Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said.
“Authorities at all levels are vigorously pursuing any lead relating to this threat information,” Knocke said, adding Obama’s transition team had been briefed.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Canada: Mom Disappointed After Appeal of Sentence in Daughter’s Death
A Nova Scotia mother left a Toronto court disappointed today after hearing the appeal of a manslaughter sentence for the man who killed her daughter.
Alice Dort says she’s not optimistic that the 30-month sentence imposed on Wayne Ryczak will be extended.
Dort says no sentence would be true justice for the March 2007 killing of her pregnant daughter, but says she was outraged when Ryczak, 55, was given just one additional day in custody after being sentenced.
He had been in custody for almost 15 months after being arrested and, as is customary, was given double credit for the time he served awaiting trial.
The Crown sought a sentence of seven to 10 years and an appeal of the sentence was granted after a protest campaign by Dort and other supporters.
The Crown called the sentence “manifestly unfit.”
Ryczak said he was startled and attacked by 29-year-old Stephine Beck, who broke into his home, and he ended up strangling her in self defence.
Court heard Beck was a prostitute and a drug addict, and Ryczak was also known to do drugs and hire sex workers.
Her official cause of death was strangulation, although court also heard the concentration of cocaine in her body that night “could cause death.”
The Crown said aggravating factors in Ryczak’s case were the fact that he strangled the victim at least twice and dumped her partially naked body after discovering she was dead.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
‘What Else Should a Reporter be’ But a Liberal?
Helen Thomas tells interviewer conservatives are neither thinking nor caring people
So what do you get when you mix a Canadian TV hostess with the venerable Helen Thomas? An admission of bias so strong that it could ward off a vampire. Just why the image of the undead first came to my mind is anybody’s guess, but there you have it.
On a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation morning TV interview show called “Sun Day,” Thomas was interviewed on how she felt about presidents past, present what was to be future with the Obama inauguration still then days away. She was also quizzed on her profession in which Thomas claimed only liberals should be engaged. And that isn’t all. She also said that conservatives are neither thinking nor caring people.
Like most of her ilk and her era, she felt John F. Kennedy was “the best” president. It has always been a bit ridiculous to rank JFK as a great president, though. With his scant 2 years in office he didn’t really have the time to affect the policies and government of the nation in a way that might find him placed among the greats. It can be said, however, that he greatly affected the members of the media that adored him, covered for him, and elevated him to near Godhood. To folks like Thomas, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was the greatest despite his small number of accomplishments as president.
I can’t help but feel that the Kennedy era primed the Old Media for this sycophancy for Obama. They had, after all, already fallen for a man with a very small record of actual achievement before. It isn’t too much lower to go to fall for Obama, a man with even fewer actual achievements than their last great hero. The bar was lowered terribly for Kennedy and now it lay nearly on the ground for Obama in the eyes of the media.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
A Norwegian Thatcher?
By Bruce Bawer and Daniel Johnson
These days nearly every Western European country has at least one of them — a large political party that’s held at arm’s length by the media, political establishment, academia and the chattering classes. Some of these black sheep — such as the British National Party, Jean-Marie Le Pen’s National Front and the late Jorg Haider’s crew in Austria — really are beyond the pale; others are demonized simply because they challenge statist dogma and/or speak forbidden truths about Islamic immigration.
In Scandinavia, the home of statism at its statiest, the most high-profile such entity is probably Pia Kjaersgaard’s Danish People’s Party. Two months after 9/11, voter anxiety about Islamization swept out the Social Democrats (in power since 1924) and installed a conservative coalition — which, with strong DPP support, has since instituted effective, and popular, reforms (and stood foursquare for free speech during the cartoon crisis).
The picture in Sweden is different: Although the 2006 election exchanged Goran Persson’s long-dominant Social Democrats for a “moderate” coalition, systemic changes have been modest, and the only major critics of the Swedes’ essentially unmodified “see-no-evil” immigration policy have been the Sweden Democrats — a group, alas, that has a history of neo-Nazi ties and anti-Semitic rhetoric (and, in any case, has yet to win a single Riksdag seat).
Somewhere in between lies Norway, whose major antiestablishment faction is the Progress Party, or Fremskrittspartiet (FrP for short). Founded in 1973, it was run for 28 years by the charismatic Carl I. Hagen, whose tough-talking pugnacity made him a standout, in the ‘80s and ‘90s, in a largely bland political firmament. Though nothing in the party’s program would raise eyebrows in, say, moderate Republican circles in the US, its rejection of long-standing Nordic assumptions about the role of the state has long led the media to caricature its ideology as dangerous, its supporters as unevolved lowbrows and Hagen as a demagogue…
| — Hat tip: Steen | [Return to headlines] |
Assimilation Studies: Muslim and Non-Muslim Immigrants to Britain Originating From the Same Region.
By Stanley Kurtz
A preference for marriage with cousins characterizes large sections of the Muslim world. In two previous pieces, “Marriage and the Terror War” and “Marriage and the Terror War, Part II,” I’ve argued that the Muslim preference for cousin marriage (along with several associated social practices) helps explain why it has become difficult to reconcile Islamic social life with modernity, why Muslim immigrants in Europe have been slow to assimilate, and ultimately, why we are engaged in a war with Islamic terrorists.
Cousin marriage, I have argued, helps to create and organize a deep-lying bias in the Muslim world toward in-group solidarity—a social strategy that has the effect of walling off Muslim society from outside influences, heightening internal cohesion, and insuring cultural continuity. By no means do all Muslims marry their cousins. Yet, throughout much of the Muslim world, the cultural ideal and practice of cousin marriage helps to set and reinforce in-group solidarity as a leading social theme…
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
BBC Newsnight — Warming Up President Obama’s Inaugural Speech?
What should the BBC do if the new US President’s references to global warming in his inaugural speech don’t quite come up to expectations?
Last night I was reading through the full text of Barak Obama’s speech just before the BBC’s daily current affairs magazine, Newsnight, came on television. So his words were fresh in my mind when Susan Watts, Newsnight’s science editor, presented a piece on the implications of the speech for science in general and global warming in particular. I was surprised when it started with this sound bite from the inaugural speech:
We will restore science to its rightful place, [and] roll back the spectre of a warming planet. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.
I didn’t seem to remember him saying that at all.
When the program was over, I went back to the text and this is what I found.
It would seem that someone at the BBC had taken the trouble to splice the tape so that half a sentence from paragraph 16 of the inauguration speech was joined on to half a sentence from paragraph 22, and this apparently continuous sound bite was completed by returning to paragraph 16 again to lift another complete sentence.
Susan Watts then started her report by saying…
| — Hat tip: SIOE | [Return to headlines] |
Catalunya Cancels Shoah Memorial Ceremony Over Gaza Op
BARCELONA — The Catalunya government has called off the ceremony marking the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which was scheduled to take place on January 27, citing the Israeli offensive in Gaza as the reason.
The Gaza campaign has inflamed the already pro-Palestinian public opinion in the northeastern Spanish region, and the local media has run endless stories comparing the Israeli stance on the situation in the Strip to Nazi atrocities.
Over 30,000 people marched in Catalunya’s streets in support of Hamas, during the three-week campaign, burning Israeli flags and handing out flyers threatening local pro-Israel journalists.
The overwhelming public support for the Palestinians has propmted the government to cancel the Holocaust Remembrance Day service. This was to be the only public event marking the day, and was scheduled to take place in Barcelona’s central piazza.
“Marking the Jewish Holocaust while a Palestinian Holocaust is taking place is not right,” a local City official told Barcelona’s La Vanguardia newspaper.
| — Hat tip: IS | [Return to headlines] |
Czech Bishops Criticise EP’s Free Approach to Abortion
Prague — Czech bishops criticise the EP’s resolution on human rights observance in the EU countries for promoting a too liberal approach to abortion, children’s sexual education and same-sex partnership, they said after a plenary session of the Czech Bishops’ Conference (CBK) today.
Czech bishops, for instance, do not agree with registered partnership of same-sex couples having the same status as heterosexual marriage.
They also raised objections to the proposal that advisory centres for youths be established to give advice in intimate problems, such as possible abortion, CBK spokeswoman Irena Sargankova said.
The bishops criticised the efforts to introduce sexual education lessons at school independent from parents’ influence.
“We have nothing against sexual education, but we do have objections to the fact that parents would not be allowed to interfere in it,” Olomouc Archbishop Jan Graubner said.
The bishops also challenged the Czech government bill on specific health care service, which, they say, includes a number of provisions unacceptable from the ethical point of view.
The bill extends conditions for abortion and assisted reproduction, Graubner recalled.
He, on the contrary, welcomed the Czech Republic’s support for pro-family policy, within the Czech EU presidency in the first half of 2009.
The Labour and Social Affairs Ministry plans to hold a conference on parental childcare and policy of employment in February, which Cardinal Ennio Antonelli, president of the Pontifical Council for the Family, is to attend.
Graubner praised this initiative.
Czech bishops also wished the Czech EU presidency success in its efforts to reach peaceful cohabitation and deeper solidarity in Europe. They also called on believers to pray for all who work on the Czech presidency.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Ex-Gurkhas Go Into Battle… to Fix Britain’s Railways
Up to 400 combat-trained Gurkhas are being drafted in to keep Britain’s railways in good repair. The legendary Nepalese fighters will form the spear-head of a bid to repair tracks for Network Rail. The initiative to recruit the former Gurkhas — whose motto is ‘It is better to die than to be a coward’ — to repair the railways is being launched tomorrow by recruitment and rail maintenance company Ganymede Solutions. A spokesman for Ganymede hailed ‘the launch of a unique initiative which will result in the employment of up to 400 former Gurkha combat engineers’.
She added: ‘The initiative is being spearheaded by Ganymede’s managing director Gary Hewett MBE, a retired Wing Commander who served alongside the Gurkhas in the Falklands. ‘The company is only too aware of the skill base they offer. And with employment after leaving the Army being of key importance, Ganymede is paying to retrain the former combat engineers to become railway engineers.’ Ganymede Solutions has tendered to supply Network Rail with up to 400 temporary engineers by the end of 2009 and is ‘actively recruiting’ Gurkhas around Aldershot, Hampshire and their UK bases.
The new initiative is being launched in Wandsworth, South West London. The first team are being trained at Clapham. Lord Addington, the Liberal Democrat spokesman for Defence, is attending to lend his support. Gurkhas have a long, distinguished and heroic history serving Britain. Members serving with Gurkha units have won 26 Victoria Crosses — a record unequalled by any other British unit. Half the Army’s 3,400 Gurkhas are infantry soldiers in the Royal Gurkha Rifles, and half serve in specialist Gurkha ‘corps’ units providing engineering, logistics, signals and medical support. Unlike the rest of the Army, every Gurkha undergoes full infantry combat training. As a result, if infantry are in short supply in the field, a Gurkha engineering or signals unit can pick up their rifles and join in an attack. The flexibility it offers is hugely prized by the Army, already facing a serious shortage of infantry. In October last year Gurkha war heroes won the right to stay in Britain after the Government was ordered to recognise its ‘debt of honour’ to them. Veterans wept with joy and bellowed the traditional war cry of ‘Ayo Gorkhali!’ — ‘the Gurkhas are coming!’ — after the landmark judgment. More than 2,000 former Gurkhas were refused permission to live here because they had retired before July 1, 1997. Immigration officials said they had not shown ‘strong ties’ to Britain, despite 200 years of Army service. But following a campaign supported by the Daily Mail and actress Joanna Lumley, a High Court judge condemned the policy as ‘unlawful’ and ordered Jacqui Smith to review the immigration guidelines urgently. About the GurkhasBritain’’s links to the Gurkhas date to 1814 when our forces fought a fierce war against Nepal and a deep mutual respect developed. British commanders began to recruit them and enemies across the world learned to fear the diminutive men with their trademark Kukris — the 16-inch curved knife which every Gurkha carries. Gurkha regiments helped put down the Indian Mutiny of 1857. During the First World War, 100,000 Gurkhas fought and died. In the Second World War, Gurkhas distinguished themselves in every theatre of conflict. The Japanese army saw them as their most fearsome foes. Gurkhas also fought in the Falklands, Balkans, Iraq and Afghanistan. Such is the kudos of joining up that 17,000 Nepalese teenagers compete in gruelling tests each year for fewer than 300 places.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Helsinki Sees Demonstrations Almost Every Second Day
Whenever some kind of agitation occurs in the world it also results in public concern oin the streets of Helsinki. Demonstrations take place in the centre of the Finnish capital almost every second day, with the total number for last year being 170.
“The latest cause for protest has been the Israel-Gaza conflict, which has generated a demonstration every third day”, reports Chief Inspector Jussi-Pekka Lämsä, who is in charge of the Downtown Police Precinct . Last Tuesday, the supporters of Israel organised an exceptionally large demonstration, with more than 2,000 participants. The march went peacefully.
On Thursday, rythmic chants and the beating of drums could be heard ringing out from the Three Smiths statue at the junction of Aleksanterinkatu and Mannerheimintie, when about a hundred demonstrators supporting the Iranian opposition demanded that their organisation, the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI), should be removed from the EU blacklist, which designates the PMOI as a terrorist organisation. The aim of the protest was to affect Finland’s policieis within the European Union. Similar demonstrations have also taken place recently in a number of other cities in Europe.
At the beginning of the current decade, the number of protests was increasing year after year. Last year, the number of demonstrations nevertheless stopped growing, falling below the previous year’s figures. Moreover, the numbers of incidental disturbances and acts of vandalism have declined as well. “Most protests are carried out pretty much according to the manuscript. The police know most organisers, and it is easy to agree on routes and other details with them”, Lämsä notes. It has been agreed upon between several organisers and the police that the demonstrators have security people of their own, who are ready to keep order and calm down the crowd if necessary. As a rule, the biggest distruptions from demonstrations are mostly felt by motorists in downtown Helsinki.
In 2008, only a few protests resulted in disturbances and material damage. The most dramatic of them was the so-called Töhryfest event, a demonstration arranged in September as an counterblast to the City of Helsinki’s project called Stop töhryille (“Stop Tagging”), which was launched in 1998 in order to clean up tags and graffiti as well as stickers and posters in the city as soon as they appear. During the demonstration, bottles and bags containing paint were thrown at police officers and patrol cars. One officer sustained a head injury and five police vehicles were damaged. The police apprehended 27 demonstrators. Furthermore, both the EuroMayDay demonstration on May 1st and another protest called the Night of the Street Arts that took place in downtown Helsinki during the 2008 Night of the Arts (part of the Helsinki Festival) caused a sizeable amount of material damage, according to the police.
On the other hand, anti-fur demonstrations have largely calmed down since the time when the first frenzied protests took place. All the same, some occasional protests against individual stores were also recorded last year. For example, a demonstration was arranged in front of the Finnish fashion house Halonen in Helsinki’s Pohjoisesplanadi once a week.
In addition, the traditional protests by activists who called themselves Kuokkavieraat (“Uninvited Guests”, “Gatecrashers”) were no longer organised on Independence Day in 2008. In previous years the group used to arrange a demonstration to coincide with the Independence Day reception at the Presidential Palace, disturbing many of the distinguished guests when they were arriving at the venue. In 2001 and 2002 such protests led to riots in the streets nearby.
The number of police patrols to be sent to each demonstration venue is based on a threat assessment made by the Finnish Security Police (SUPO). Small demonstrations are not necessarily attended by police at all. The annual number of protests involving only one or a few people is around 20 to 30. To take one example, two people turned up last Independence Day with signs objecting to possible Finnish membership in NATO. “If one protester is standing with a placard in front of the Parliament Building, a police patrol car driving past can run a cursory check that everything is going peacefully”, says Lämsä.
Finland’s internal affairs frequently generate a demonstration on the steps in front of Parliament. “Whenever a pulp mill is closed down somewhere, or when some large organizations are to be transferred from Helsinki to another part of the country, protesters are ready to make a move”, Lämsä observes, in a reference to the recent spat over the move to Kuopio by the National Agency for Medicines. The relocation plans did not go down well among staff.
So far, the largest demonstration in recent Finnnish history occured in 1995 when some 20,000 unemployed people protested in front of Parliament. Finland was digging out from the depths of recession at the time, and jobless figures were frighteningly high.
The all-time most difficult demonstration to handle was the protest organised by the Central Union of Agricultural Producers and Forest Owners (MTK) in 1999, the police report. The behaviour of the protestors was unusually fierce, and they were carrying carcasses and setting fires, blocking Mannerheimintie for several hours. It took place at the same time as Helsinki was hosting a European Council summit during Finland’s first stint as EU President, and hence the demonstrators knew they had a ready international audience (see attached article from 1999).
A typical Finnish demonstration involves some 30 to 100 people, lasting for 2 to 3 hours. The area in front of the Kiasma Contemporary Art Museum in downtown Helsinki is a very popular place to congregate. “Usually protesters first walk in procession from Kiasma to Aleksanterinkatu via Mikonkatu, and then a little further towards the district of Katajanokka until they turn to the right and stop in front of the European Commission Representation at Pohjoisesplanadi 31. Eventually the demonstration proceeds along Mannerheimintie, ending up either in front of Parliament or at the Narinkka Square in Kamppi Center”, Lämsä reports.
The demonstration that has sparked the highest number of complaints against police was the Smash Asem protest in September 2006. The police apprehended a total of 136 people in front of the Kiasma art museum and elsewhere in downtown Helsinki, and later faced charges themselves of using excess force during the riot. The Parliamentary Ombudsman’s Office received more than 60 complaints against the police’s way of handling the situation, issuing reprimands to four officers.
When organising a demonstration, one has to notify the police of the event at least six hours before the beginning of the planned protest. However, the police hope to be told of any such event at the earliest possible opportunity, particularly if the numbers attending are likely to be large. Spontaneous protests without notifying police beforehand do take place, but their incidence is declining.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Finland Cautioned About Prison Conditions
The Council of Europe anti-torture Committee has issued a report with recommendations on improving human rights conditions in the Finnish prison system.
The Council of Europe’s Committee for the prevention of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment (CPT) carried out a visit to Finland in April of last year, at the request of the Finnish authorities.
On Tuesday, it published a report containing recommendations aimed at eliminating the practice of holding remand prisoners in police cells. In this context, the Finnish authorities have informed the Committee of plans to adopt measures to decrease the number of remand prisoners in police establishments and to shorten the periods spent by them in police custody.
The CPT’s delegation also found that persons detained under the Aliens Act were still frequently held in police establishments. The Committee has recommended that the Finnish authorities consider the possibility of opening a second specialised holding facility for aliens, like the one opened in Metsälä.
The report also addresses in detail various issues related to prisons, in particular the phenomenon of inter-prisoner violence and intimidation as well as the situation of prisoners held in high security and closed units. The CPT has recommended that a national approach be developed to address the issue of “fearful” prisoners, and that a suitable programme of purposeful activities be provided to prisoners held in conditions of high security or segregated by court order.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Indian Faces Human Smuggling Charges in Fake Movie Scheme
An Indian man arrested last autumn in Finland’s largest-ever human smuggling case was formally charged on Wednesday. He faces charges of illicitly bringing young Indians into the country as well as several counts of aggravated fraud.
The prosecutor is demanding unconditional imprisonment and damages of more than 600,000 euros. That sum is based on information that those who were smuggled into Finland paid him some 15,000 euros each. If the funds are recovered, they will be paid to the State of Finland.
The damages cover 42 people, of whom 20 were demonstrably smuggled into the country. An attempt to bring the other 22 in was intercepted.
Three of those brought into Finland have applied for asylum. They told Finnish officials that the organizer promised them passage to Italy or Spain.
The suspect was part of an international criminal organisation, which managed to arrange visas for 117 people, who were said to be coming to Finland to film movies and music videos. The group had struck a deal worth hundreds of thousands of euros with a Finnish cinema production company to shoot films here.
Most of those smuggled in were people in their 20s from the Punjab region. Most have been sent back to India.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
France: Diversity Chief: France Heading ‘Straight Into Apartheid’
‘We are creating a social civil war in this country’
Yazid Sabeg issued a wakeup call to the French nation, which has already suffered major rioting from alienated immigrant youth in the country’s social housing projects.
He stressed that the current financial crisis will hit those suffering from discrimination and lack of opportunity most severely.
“We are creating a social civil war in this country,” said Sabeg. “I believe that today we are digging a ditch that leads straight into apartheid.”
Sabeg spoke during a program on the Parliamentary Channel in which he responded to reporters’ questions.
Sabeg is the son of Algerian immigrants and is known for his efforts to bring equality to the workplace.
President Nicolas Sarkozy appointed Sabeg in December to the newly created post of diversity and equality commissioner. He is to oversee a government action plan aimed at putting more ethnic minorities on TV screens, in political parties and in elite schools that lead to jobs in government and industry. Details of the plan are to be presented in March.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: EU Implores Hamas to Follow IRA and Renounce Violence
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, JANUARY 20 — The Czech foreign minister, Karel Schwarzenberg, has appealed to Hamas to follow the example of the IRA and renounce violence and become a strictly political movement. Mr. Schwarzenberg was speaking today at a meeting of the foreign affairs committee at the European Parliament. “If Hamas were to renounce terrorism and accept the guidelines set by the Quartet (UN, EU, USA and Russia), it could develop a normal political movement and thus begin political discussions”, said Schwarzenberg, “but whilst Hamas continues to have violent goals, it cannot become a partner of the EU”. The European Union has added Hamas to its list of terrorist organisations and refuses to have official contact with its leaders. Although this does not mean that there are not meetings between the two camps. Schwarzenberger has clarified that “obviously, all channels of communication are open, particularly through Egypt and some others, but these are informal contacts”, adding that “formal and offical contact can only be possible if Hamas renounces the use of weapons, as other terrorist movements like the Irish Republican Army (IRA) have done”. Whilst the EU waits for Hamas to move towards a less extremist, more political position, the community feels that it is essential that “the position of the leader of the PNA (Palestinian National Authority), Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) is strengthened, particularly in the Gaza Strip”. The Czech foreign minister is not convinced that the idea of a provisional Gaza-based government (in exchange for which the block on the Strip could be lifted) is the order of the day. Instead he has said that, “we have a legitmate government led by Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), which is recognised by the European Union and by the international community: we know that the PNA must be involved”. The minister spoke of “the success of European diplomacy in the Middle East”, noting also that Israel is now “prepared to listen” and the fact that the truce in Gaza “is holding strong”. The EU wants to go even further though, and start looking at political process again. The next few days will be particularly intense for European diplomacy, with the Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, coming to Brussels to take stock of the situation in the Middle East with her European colleagues. Furthermore, the 27 EU foreign ministers will meet with their counterparts from Egypt, Jordan, Turkey and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) on Sunday evening, just before the EU foreign affairs council convenes on Monday. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: EU Mission Only if PNA in Control of Border
(ANSA) — CAIRO, JANUARY 21 — An EU peacekeeping mission along the Egypt-Gaza border could only be reactivated if the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) controls the Gaza side of the frontier, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said Wednesday. “It’s clear that EUBAM cannot be deployed if the PNA is not on the Palestinian side of the border,” Frattini told journalists in Cairo following talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Sharm el-Sheikh. Frattini added that the relaunch of the EU mission “cannot mean police forces in Egyptian territory”. Frattini confirmed Italy’s willingness to send Italian Carabinieri (police) to join a new EUBAM mission. The mission first began in 2005 but was suspended in 2007 after Hamas seized control of Gaza by force. Frattini reconfirmed that Italy is also ready to contribute to a naval force to block arms smuggling into Gaza by sea. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Holland’s National Suicide Note
The Dutch court of appeal has ruled that Geert Wilders, the Member of Parliament and anti-terrorism activist, must stand trial for hate speech.
You can read the English page of the court’s website announcing the decision here.
It is a national suicide note, a white flag of surrender flown by a once-great empire in the face of illiberal fascists and hoodlums. It is a homicide note, too — announcing the murder of freedom of speech and freedom of religion. And it is a warning note to other Western democracies. The warning is this: liberal democracy, multiculturalism and immigration — pick any two.
Holland has picked multiculturalism and immigration, and has heaved liberal democracy overboard.
The announcement is so eye-scratchingly stupid, it really must be read line for line. Here goes. (The spelling, punctuation and grammatical errors are from the court’s own English translation):
Amsterdam, 21 january 2009 — On 21 January 2009 the Court of Appeal in Amsterdam ordered the criminal prosecution of the member of parliament Geert Wilders for the incitement to hatred and discrimination based on his statements in various media about moslims and their belief.
Did you catch that? It’s just like the execrable section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act. Incitement to… what? Violence? Murder? Riot? No. Incitement to hatred.
Hatred is an emotion. And apparently in Holland, “making” someone feel that emotion is a crime. And inciting “discrimination” is, too. Not just discrimination itself, mind you. But inciting someone to discriminate. The Dutch court has not announced the prosecution of anyone who Wilders has “incited” to discriminate against someone else. But they’re still charging Wilders with discrimination, once removed — even if that discrimination hasn’t happened, and isn’t logically tied to his political criticisms of Islamic fascism. (Question: don’t we all have a duty to incite each other to discriminate against — or at least hate — fascists who would destroy our liberal way of life?)
In addition, the Court of Appeal considers criminal prosecution obvious for the insult of Islamic worshippers because of the comparisons made by Wilders of the islam with the nazism.
I appreciate the honesty. This is the criminalization of “insults”. …
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Il Giornale: Here is Why the Anti-Bush Choir Disgusts Me
After September 11th he lived in difficult and new times, but he fought terror without being defeated.
Giving the welcome to Obama, surely for his qualities and for the beautiful novelty that America has a black president, permit me to be a bit disgusted by the skirt of slapdash attitudes with which it comes about at the expense of George W. Bush’s exit from office. The exiting president was recently hit with a stupid shoe by an Iraqi journalist and all were happy, but that incident averts from the stage all that, which we must attribute to Bush. These include the good results brought about by General Petraeus’ “Surge” in Iraq, by now recognized even by his enemy the New York Times: stigmatized overall for the War in Iraq, we can appropriate to Bush a pact of reciprocal strategic help between Washington and Baghdad. Afghanistan and atomic Pakistan have been blocked on the path toward fundamentalism. In addition, one of the worst dictators of history has been defeated, the Shiite refugees have returned home, the Sunnis have revolted against the Al Qadea Sunnis, the majority of Shiites have detached themselves from Iran and democracy peeps into communications, schools and the economy, as well as in institutions and in agreements. It is hard, errors have been made, but where is the defeat? Terror has been distanced from America for seven years; the growth, surely not attributable to Bush, but still attributed to him, of the Islamist offensive have not prevented good American relations with the entire moderate Muslim front. On the contrary, if they can ascribe to Bush an error, it is that of not only having combatted terrorism in Iraq with more military force, but also of not having closed the border with Syria.
Obama has invited to unite with him the Minister of Defense Bob Gates, the Minister of Treasury Timothy Geitner and many other men of management today. He has sent to Baghdad his vice president John Biden, who at the time had voted in favor of the War in Iraq (just as Obama did as well in 2004) and now the course for the pull out is no longer six months, but three years; of Guantanamo for now he still doesn’t know; and Obama has invited for a “very useful” conversation the very bad Dick Cheney: on terrorism he has accepted his advice, he has said, of not deciding anything without having in hand all the the elements.
Bush is unpopular simply because he proposed to the Europeans the unavoidability of the war on terror, of which Europe doesn’t want to hear spoken about…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Istat: Italy Last in Divorces; “Boom” Predicted in 10 Years
(AGI)- Rome, May 7 — Italy ranks last in Europe in divorces, excluding Malta, where divorce is illegal. This fact was released by Istat, the Italian National Statistical Institute, which presented its volume of “100 statistics for the country” today. Only 8 in 10,000 Italians actually go to court for an official divorce. Spain records double the amount of divorces and Germany triples that number. Topping all European countries in divorces is Lithuania with 30 divorces for every 10,000 residents. Taking a closer look, it’s a certainty that in the last 10 years divorces have grown 74pct and in the last five years 17.4pct. Leading all Italian regions in divorces is Liguria, which in 2005 registered over 20 divorces per 10,000 residents, followed by Lazio with 19.6, and Piemonte with 18.4.
Calabria recorded the fewest amount of divorces with 7 per 10,000 residents. If there are few divorces, it is true that there are also few marriages: only in Luxemburg and Slovenia are there fewer marriages than in the Belpaese. The marriage rate in 2006 was 4.1 for every 1,000 residents, while the EU average was 4.9. Furthermore, between 2001 and 2006 the total number of marriages dropped 7.8pct. The argument changes if one considers civil ceremonies alone: in this case, in the last five years there has been a 14pct increase in the marriage rate.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Life Senator Calls for Review of Obama Address
Rome, 21 Jan. (AKI) — Italian life senator Francesco Cossiga on Wednesday appealed to prime minister Silvio Berlusconi and key ministers to review the “profound and substantial changes” he claimed were announced by new US President Barack Obama.
In a media statement, Cossiga said the government should seek more information about the changes announced by the new president in his inauguration address on Tuesday, particularly his intentions for foreign affairs and military security.
He asked Berlusconi, foreign affairs minister Franco Frattini and defence minister Ignazio La Russa, if they believed Italy should review the country’s bilateral cooperation with the US in the light of his speech.
Cossiga is a former prime minister and president of Italy and was made a life senator in 1992.
In his statement, he also questioned whether the Italian government should declare as “lapsed” the rights of Americans to have military bases on Italian national territory and whether the Atlantic-US alliance that influences political and military relations should be “declared closed”.
Obama became America’s 44th president — and its first black leader — on Tuesday and attended numerous events to mark the historic occasion.
Within hours of his inauguration, the new president requested a halt to military trials at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. On Wednesday he was to meet economic and military advisers to discuss a 825 billion dollar domestic economic rescue package and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
New Age of Rebellion and Riot Stalks Europe
[Comment from Tuan Jim: While I don’t dispute some of the points in this article — I’ve read a lot of about the chain reaction riots in the Baltic states over the last week — note the complete absence of any reference to the Islamic-Leftist riots across the entire continent (not to mention London) over the past few weeks — which have most certainly been on a larger scale and caused more physical property damage than anything else recently — with the probable exception of the Greek riots last month.]
Iceland has no army, no navy and no air force — but it does have riot police.
On Tuesday night the black-uniformed troopers came out to quell the latest riots in Reykjavik, which erupted in front of parliament. The building was splattered with paint and yoghurt, the crowd yelled and banged pans, shot fireworks and flares at the windows and lit a fire in front of the main door.
Yesterday the protesters gathered again, hurling eggs at the car of Geir Haarde, the Prime Minister, and banging cans on its roof.
The transformation of the placid island into a community of seething anger — there have been half a dozen riots in recent weeks — is more than a regional oddity.
In Riga last week 10,000 protesters laid siege to the Latvian parliament; yesterday hundreds of Bulgarians rallied to demand that the Socialist-led Government should take action or step down, in a second week of demonstrations, and last month the police shooting of a 15-year-old Greek boy led to days of running battles in the streets of Athens and Salonika.
The protests went beyond the usual angry reflexes of societies braced for recession. The Greek riots heralded sympathetic actions across the world, from Moscow to Madrid, and in Berlin the Greek Consulate was briefly stormed. The Riga unrest spread rapidly to Lithuania. It is, some say, just the beginning: 2009 could become another 1968 — a new age of rebellion.
The LSE economist Robert Wade addressed about 1,000 Icelanders recently at a protest meeting in a Reykjavik cinema, warning that large-scale civil unrest was on the way. The tipping point, he said, would be this spring.
“It will be caused by the rise of general awareness throughout Europe, America and Asia that hundreds and millions of people in rich and poor countries are experiencing rapidly falling consumption standards; that the crisis is getting worse, not better, and that it has escaped the control of public authorities, national and international,” he said.
The global liquidity emergency became a full-blown crash so quickly that there was no time to hold governments to account. Now leaders all over Europe have declared themselves to be the saviours of the economy and are nationalising assets, extending loans and guarantees to failing banks and manufacturers. But the price is high: unemployment is starting to soar and cuts in public spending are hurting hospitals, schools and universities. Personal bankruptcies are at record levels.
Every segment of society has been hit, but it is the young who feel the pain most — and just as in 1968, it is they who are leading the rebellion.
The Greek disturbances, the worst since 1974, were triggered by the killing of the teenager, but the anger was stoked by a sense that the young were going to have to pick up the bill for the miscalculations of the political class. Unemployment among Greeks aged 15 to 24 has reached 21.2 per cent; for 25 to 34-year-olds it is 10.5 per cent. The good years have come to an end suddenly.
The boom in Iceland led to the few narrow streets of the capital becoming jammed with expensive 4x4s. Latvia had double-digit growth for years; now GDP is set to contract 5 per cent in the coming year and Latvian youths are beginning to rail against mismanagement and corruption.
In the EU, migration was always a way out of a tight domestic labour market. No more: the sheer magnitude of the recession means there is no easy escape. There are reports of anti-immigrant trouble brewing in Spain. Usually at this time of year migrant workers, most of them from Morocco, pile into the country to pick strawberries. This year the Spaniards are making it clear that they are unhappy about migrants taking jobs.
Each flare-up touches on a separate aspect of the crisis. In Greece it was partly about the failure of the education system (as in 1968). In Vilnius it was over high taxes. In Iceland it is about massive debt. In Russia unrest in Yekaterinburg and Vladivostok was about dearer car import duties.
But there are common threads. Across Europe, protesters demand a change of government. Politicians in wealthier countries can try to prop up banks and industries, but it does not work in heavily indebted nations with bloated and exposed financial sectors.
And there is a shared shock that the good times have gone. “The explosion conceals a compressed desperation,” the Greek psychology professor Fotini Tsalikoglou said of last month’s outburst in Athens. “Many young people live with the unbearable knowledge that there is no future.”
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Pope May Pardon Lefebvre’s Bishops
Lifting excommunication would open door to rebel group
(ANSA) — Vatican City, January 22 — Pope Benedict XVI is ready to revoke the excommunication imposed on four bishops ordained by the late dissident French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, the Italian press reported on Thursday.
Official sources at the Vatican would neither confirm nor deny to ANSA whether the reports printed in the dailies Il Giornale and Il Riformista were true. Msgr. Lefebvre, who died in 1991, was excommunicated in 1988 along with four bishops he ordained without permission from the Vatican.
Last summer the pope set conditions for the followers of the traditional French archbishop, who belong to the Society of Saint Pius X which he set up in 1970, to rejoin the Church of Rome.
The Fraternity responded to the overture by asking that the excommunications be lifted before any discussion of the conditions began.
The ultra-traditionalist Society of Saint Pius X broke with Rome over the changes made at the Second Vatican Council, the ground-breaking meeting of all the world’s Catholic bishops in the early 1960s.
The Council, which tried to equip the Church for life in the modern world, introduced reforms in liturgy, ecumenism, inter-religious dialogue and religious liberty.
Among the changes was the shift from the ‘Tridentine’ or Latin Mass towards ceremonies held in modern languages. This change particularly outraged Lefebvre, who saw it as a betrayal of the Catholic Church’s identity.
It is well known that Benedict is interested in drawing Lefebvre’s followers back to the Church and in June 2007 he took steps to revive the old Latin Mass.
The German-born pope himself is an admirer of the traditional rites in Latin and his initiative to allow its return — as an option alongside the modern mass — had been expected almost since he was elected in April 2005.
The Society of Saint Pius X is the only group to break away from the 1.1-billion strong Roman Catholic Church since the reforms of the early 1960s. Despite its lack of official status the Fraternity is present in 59 countries and counts 453 priests and four bishops. It also runs seminaries in Switzerland, France, Australia, Argentina, the United States and Germany.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Reykjavik Riots: Tear Gas From Police Point of View
Seven police officers were injured when the protests got out-of-hand for the second day in a row, according to a press release from the Reykjavik police. Just like on Tuesday, stones and glass bottles were used to attack officers yesterday as well, they say.
“As with the day before, the protesters congregated outside parliament in the early afternoon; but around 14.00 they moved to the Prime Minister’s offices, where windows were smashed. The protesters then went back to Parliament House and several bonfires were lit in the evening. Several windows were smashed and others damaged. Two police officers were hurt, one seriously.
“At around 20.00 the protesters moved to the National Theatre and lit a bonfire outside. Just before midnight the group went back to parliament and panes of glass in the main front door were smashed. Three police officers were injured by paving stones being thrown. Shortly after midnight two more police officers were injured, one of them was hit in the head with a paving stone. The police sprayed pepper spray as a warning and then fired tear gas to disperse the crowd. The protesters then went back to the Prime Minister’s offices. The police operation ended there around 03.00,” the police press release says.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Smoking: Spain, Madrid Loses Battle Against Anti-Tobacco Law
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, JANUARY 21 — The community of Madrid has lost its battle against the anti-tobacco laws, laid down by the central government in 2005. The Supreme Court of Justice in Madrid (TSJM), has revoked the regional decree, which was approved in November 2006, and contained measures that were a lot more permissive than the national legislation allowed for, since it allowed people to smoke in bars and offices, and thereby eliminated the need to physically separate smoking and non-smoking zones in enclosed spaces of over 10 square metres. The ruling of the TSJM, which dates back to December 30 but was only made public today, welcomes the administrative appeal presented by the Minister for Health, by numerous organisations dedicated to the fight against smoking, and by the Organisation of consumers and users, without however ever going into the merit of the appeal, simply pointing to the fact that the laws were conflicting. The tribune declared that the decree was annulled, “since in its drawing up, it left out the normative relation it would have with the regional Consumer council”. The regional Vice Councillor for Health, Belen Prado, underlined in a statement that the media quoted today, that “the revocation of the decree is only due to an error in its form”. “We have never stopped observing national law”, she added. The Minister for Health presented an appeal in 2006, not only in light of the Madrid ruling, but also for those decrees approved by councils in Valencia, La Rioja and Castilla Y Leon, arguing that the ruling passed in the region of Madrid represented “a flagrant violation of the law”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Madrid; Press, the Spies of the Regional Councillor
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, JANUARY 19 — A private spy network, investigating political scandals and bribery rings in municipalities ruled by Socialists in the Madrid region, was allegedly signed up by the councillor with the Presidency and in charge of Interior Affairs of the Madrid Community and secretary general of the PP for Madrid Francisco Granado, the daily El Pais quoted today regional government sources as saying. The network, headed by a former police detective inspector, Marcos Pena, who was allegedly signed up in July as a security advisor, reportedly included 15 people, out of which at least three were former officers of the Civil Guard, who were assigned intelligence work to prepare files. The latter allegedly provided information on the bribery cases which recently concerned the municipalities of Ciempozuelos and Coslada, ruled by the Socialists, and also “municipalities ruled by PP officials with whom regional party directors are on strained terms”, El Pais reported. The daily quoted Granado as saying the group was assigned “tasks of counter-surveillance and security in buildings”. Yet, Pena himself confirmed he prepared files whose contents were relayed only to the councillor with the regional Presidency. Sources in the Madrid Community government said the activity of this “secret service” was unknown to the president of the regional government, Esperanza Aguirre, as well as to his deputy, Ignacio Gonzalez. (ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Swedes ‘Too Quick to Pick Sides’ in Gaza Conflict
An Israeli Jew on a temporary stay in Sweden, Omri Grinberg is dismayed by the lack of nuance displayed by supporters of both sides in the Gaza war.
Though geographically, mentally and culturally very distant from the Palestinian territories and Israel, Sweden somehow manages to maintain an intense interest in what goes on in the conflict-ridden Middle East.
The sheer volume of demonstrations across Sweden and opinions expressed in the media regarding the recent attacks by the Israeli army in Gaza is truly astonishing; a complex phenomenon which deserves to be thoroughly researched.
A week after a huge anti-war demonstration at Humlegården in Stockholm on Saturday January 10th, with 8,000-12,000 participants, a smaller one took place at the same venue.
Though not as well-attended, to me it seemed like quite a success; I could never have imagined that the situation in Gaza would garner so much interest here in Stockholm. The speakers and the crowd called on Israel to stop its attacks on Gaza, declared it a non-democratic state, chanted in favour of boycotting it completely and showed its support for the Palestinian people.
Though all done in a peaceful and calm, yet effective and powerful, manner, there were a few matters that made my insides twist.
It is very tempting to compare what goes on in Israel and Palestine to other brutal regimes in history, such as the apartheid period in South Africa or the more extreme comparison to Nazi Germany. However, the situation in Israel is unique and different from both of those — while a boycott might have been a useful tool in ending apartheid, if people actually understood how different both cases are then they might realize that this is an empty chant for a useless “solution”.
A more superficial yet disturbing issue concerns various signs and placards comparing Israel to Nazi Germany — a disgusting provocation which, if anything, only leads to more hate and misunderstanding. I hardly want to mention the “communists” (if wearing an Adidas jacket with CCCP sewn onto it makes you a communist…) with flags celebrating violence in a ridiculous, pastiche manner, but they were also there, making some noise.
While clearly full of compassionate solidarity, it seems that a lot of protesters lack an in-depth understanding of the complexity of the situation. Maybe the protests ease the consciences of some of the participants and offer them a way to ventilate their feelings. But they do not offer a true spirit of change or present a real challenge to the many mechanisms which allow the Israeli occupation to continue.
A day after the anti-war march, which was also to some extent an anti-Israel protest, a show of solidarity and support for Israel was scheduled at the Great Synagogue of Stockholm. Though in the same city, and just about 500 metres away from where the anti-war demonstration took place, this was a different world.
A small crowd of about 250 people, most of whom knew each other, gathered in the beautiful synagogue to listen to various key figures in the Jewish and Israeli community. The demonstration was a show of support for the people living in the southern regions of Israel, who have been the target of rockets from Hamas (and other terrorist groups) for over seven years, and for the Israeli soldiers in Gaza.
Unfortunately, much like the anti-war demonstration, this turned from a humanistic support rally into a gathering with strong national-political overtones, especially when the Israeli ambassador Benny Dagan tried to convince the crowd (which didn’t need much convincing) that Israel’s attacks were “a diplomatic effort” — if it wasn’t a disgustingly tragic statement, it could have been hilarious.
Being a Jewish-Israeli who has moved (temporarily) to Sweden, I am often approached as a representative of the state of Israel. I am far from being that: I am often ashamed of the crimes committed by the Israeli army and Israeli politicians, crimes that do not help any cause but the vague interests of the politicians themselves.
However, this does not mean that I see Israel as the side solely responsible for the many suffering civilians (both Palestinian and Israeli). The politicians in the Palestinian territories are at least as responsible — I wonder how many of the supporters at Saturday’s demonstration actually know the history, causes and doctrine of Hamas?
It might be a bit naive to expect Israelis to make some humanistic distinctions in the current situation, understanding that a human is a human, pain is pain, death is death and suffering is suffering, just as it might naive to expect the Palestinians to re-consider their strategy for reaching the goal of their own state.
But how come people who live in Sweden can’t take a deep breath, sit down, read, listen and think things through?
This desire to pick a side automatically and show support through clichés and stereotypes seems odd, to say the least, when it comes from people who are in a position to understand the complexity of the situation.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Swedish Grocers Selling ‘Spanish’ Fruit From Israel
Stores from two separate grocery chains in Sweden have changed the country of origin displays for fruit imported from Israel.
Lidl stores in Malmö and Gothenburg have sold Israeli persimmons shown as having come from Spain, writes the Metro newspaper.
And shelves at an Ica shop in Malmö display avocados that reportedly come from Kenya, while a closer look at the packaging shows they in fact imported from Israel.
Signs at another Ica store in Stockholm proclaim the shop’s avocados hail from Spain, even through the crates from which they are unpacked say Israel.
The head of Lidl in Sweden, Mathias Kivikoski, wrote in an email to Metro that the mix-up is a result of problems with the store’s internal procedures.
And quality control manager Mats Ovegård from Ica said that it’s merely a coincidence that signs for fruit from Israel were wrong.
“The problem is that stores are poor at recognizing that they receive some of their orders from different countries and forget to change the signs. It’s regrettable, since the consumers themselves should be able to choose for themselves which country’s products they want or do not want to buy,” he told the paper.
Kristina Mattsson from the Swedish Board of Agriculture (Jordbruksverket), tells Metro her agency plans to investigate the faulty labeling as soon as possible.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Swedish Muslim Could Set New Headscarf Precedent
Cherin Awad, known for her work on a controversial Sveriges Television (SVT) programme, may well become the first practising attorney in Sweden to wear a headscarf.
On Monday, the 23-year-old Awad began her pioneering action at a law firm in Stockholm.
Awad gained notoriety recently for refusing to shake hands with Aftonbladet newspaper columnist Carl Hamilton in an episode of SVT’s Halal TV, which features three young women born and raised in Sweden, but who have roots in different countries in the Middle East and North Africa.
While she thinks it’s a shame that most Swedes likely recognize her from the much-discussed handshake incident, she remains steadfast in her belief that, as a practising Muslim, she shouldn’t make physical contact with people of the opposite sex.
“We have different ways of showing one another respect; I place my right hand on my heart instead. I plan to continue with that and I don’t think there will be any problems. Those who seek me out are most interested in my legal competence,” Awad told the TT news agency.
She has completed her law degree and is now working as a junior lawyer at a law firm. But she has to wait a few years before passing the Swedish bar exam and becoming a full-fledged attorney.
Awad has no qualms about getting a chilly reception.
“So far I’ve had nothing but positive reactions. I don’t think my religion is going to limit my choice of clients. For me it’s important to show what Muslim women can do and encourage others to go out and try things they might not otherwise have thought they could do,” she said.
Her boss, attorney Ismo Salmi, thinks it goes without saying that others’ religious customs need to be respected and that it’s important to support diversity.
“She does a goes job and is evaluated only according to that,” said Salmi.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
The Messiah is Here!
The Mayor’s ceremonial rooms were packed. Most of the people were American residents of Paris. VIP’s. The Israeli Ambassador to Paris. And many anonymous individuals, as we say when we cannot attach a name to every face. An overheated atmosphere: cries and tears when Obama appeared on the screen. They were living an historic moment. Ecstasy and devotion before this handsome guru. A “holy man”, in the words of Judith, a black French-American woman: “Obama is our new prophet, he is the Messiah, he is Jesus, he is going to save America, our country will guide the entire world, he will perform miracles, I am sure that in the Bible, they must be talking about him…”
In this sugary-sacred atmosphere, it is near hysteria. The osmosis is complete. It’s a question of who will glorify Obama the most. “Under Bush, my life was sad, I was ashamed to say I was American,” confesses a white French-American woman. “Today, I live again, I’m American.” In such a devoted gathering there was obviously no criticism. The youngest among them were on cloud nine over their new idol: “Obama is sexy and handsome, we love him,” exclaimed a group of young American students.
And the French who were present? Same thing. Total adoration for Obama. Jean, a middle-aged man: “For me, the president of the U.S.A. is the future of the world and our savior, you’ll see that thanks to him the financial crisis will be settled, the Arabs and the Jews will make peace, he will give birth to a new era. Normally I don’t believe in miracles, but with him, I do.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: ‘Insensitive’ Miliband Upsets His Indian Hosts
David Miliband is at the centre of an unprecedented diplomatic spat with one of Britain’s oldest allies.
The Foreign Secretary has been accused of upsetting his hosts in India with his ‘patronising’ manner and ‘offensive’ remarks on terrorism.
Mr Miliband, 43, was said to have referred to counterparts decades his senior by their first names, even though they scrupulously called him ‘Your Excellency’, as is customary for foreign dignitaries.
Titles are particularly important in conservative Indian society. He caused further dismay by writing a newspaper article on the highly-sensitive issue of Kashmir.
Mr Miliband suggested India’s long conflict with neighbouring Pakistan over the disputed territory was fuelling support for Islamist terror groups in the region.
He then told a news conference last week that he believed the Pakistani government had not directed last November’s Mumbai terror attacks.
That contradicted Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh’s insistence that Pakistan must have had a hand in the plot.
One senior Indian official last night criticised Mr Miliband’s ‘attention span’ and ‘loud focus’ on sensitive issues. ‘He did not come across as the foreign minister of a friendly nation,’ the official said.
Indian officials were also dismayed by Mr Miliband’s informal manner. He was said to have repeatedly addressed Pranab Mukherjee, India’s 73-year-old foreign minister, by his first name.
‘He was totally tactless,’ said Arundhati Ghose, India’s former ambassador to the United Nations. ‘It was so familiar that it is almost condescending.’
A senior Indian official claimed that Mr Singh was so dismayed by Mr Miliband’s trip that he had taken the extraordinary step of writing to Gordon Brown to complain about it.
But later both the Indian prime minister and Downing Street denied the existence of any such letter. The main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party described the visit as a ‘diplomatic disaster’.
An editorial in the Hindu newspaper said Mr Miliband’s visit was an ‘ill-conceived foray’ and criticised the link he made between the Mumbai attacks and Kashmir.
An editorial in the Asian Age said: ‘Such appeasement of terrorism is startling … What next? That the chief imam of London’s Finsbury Park Mosque should be elevated to the House of Lords?’
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Arrogant, Ignorant and Out of His Depth, is Banana Boy Miliband Our Worst Foreign Secretary Ever?
The most startling thing about David Miliband is that he has been taken as seriously as he has for so long.
His latest achievement is to have upset the government of India so badly that it has reacted with unprecedented public fury. This is because on his visit there last week he suggested that the only reason India was targeted by Islamic terrorism was its dispute over Kashmir, and that the government of Pakistan had played no part in the terrorist attack on Mumbai last November.
Not only did this contradict India’s belief that Pakistan had been involved, but it also firmly believes — with overwhelming justification — that the Islamists who target it do so not just because of Kashmir but because they regard India and Hinduism, along with America, Israel and the west, as enemies of Islam to be obliterated or conquered.
To cap it all, the Indians believe Miliband behaved boorishly and insensitively on his visit, described by the opposition party as a “diplomatic disaster”.
It’s quite something for Britain’s Foreign Secretary to have so grievously offended one of Britain’s oldest allies. But this is merely the latest of Miliband’s debacles. It followed a much-mocked article he wrote in the Guardian in which he claimed that Islamic terrorism did not have one unifying characteristic but was merely caused by different grievances — such as Kashmir — and that the best way of dealing with it was not through confrontation but “co-operation”.
For a Foreign Secretary to display as he did such ignorance about the nature and antecedents of global Islamic terrorism was simply astounding.
This in turn followed a series of diplomatic upsets with another ally, Israel, where he first urged a more rigorous enforcement of the EU boycott of produce from Israeli settlements even than the EU itself wanted, and then called for a ceasefire by Israel in Gaza virtually as soon as it started attacking Hamas — thus suggesting it was not entitled to defend itself by military means against Iranian-backed rocket attacks on its population.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Cars to be Crushed in Insurance Crackdown
TWO million uninsured drivers face having their vehicles seized and crushed under a proposed new government crackdown announced yesterday. It will be made illegal to own an uninsured car. This would close a loophole because it is currently only illegal to drive without insurance.
The move is aimed at the estimated 6.5 per cent of drivers who do not insure their vehicles.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Face Scanners to be Introduced in British Schools in New ‘Big Brother’ Row
[Comment from JD: This is done to acclimatize the next generation into giving providing biometric data as if it is a trivial issue — like shaking hands or something.]
The school will initially use the technology to help them identify late-comers.
But the use of facial recognition systems in schools merely for administrative convenience was condemned by campaigners, who attacked Big Brother-style surveillance and warned about the risk to pupils of identity theft.
[…]
David Clouter, of the pressure group Leave Them Kids Alone, branded the development ‘appalling’ and warned that children could in future be vulnerable to identity fraud.
‘It is alarming that this information will be stored on school systems,’ he said.
‘There’s no way a school could have the level of security of the passport office. That would cost millions and schools would not have the budget.
‘If the data itself is ever compromised, that’s it — you can’t rewind and get a new face or get new fingerprints.
‘If children get used to presenting fingerprints or looking into something, they will do it for trivial situations, and all these things help a Big Brother state and could lead to all databases about you being tied into one place.’
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Gordon Brown Brings Britain to the Edge of Bankruptcy
Iain Martin says the Prime Minister hasn’t ‘saved the world’ and now faces disgrace in the history books
They don’t know what they’re doing, do they? With every step taken by the Government as it tries frantically to prop up the British banking system, this central truth becomes ever more obvious.
Yesterday marked a new low for all involved, even by the standards of this crisis. Britons woke to news of the enormity of the fresh horrors in store. Despite all the sophistry and outdated boom-era terminology from experts, I think a far greater number of people than is imagined grasp at root what is happening here.
The country stands on the precipice. We are at risk of utter humiliation, of London becoming a Reykjavik on Thames and Britain going under. Thanks to the arrogance, hubristic strutting and serial incompetence of the Government and a group of bankers, the possibility of national bankruptcy is not unrealistic.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Injured British Soldiers’ Fury at Being Treated Alongside Taliban in Afghanistan Field Hospital
British troops injured while fighting the Taliban are angry that Army medics treat them alongside their enemy, it was claimed today.
Enemy combatants in Afghanistan are routinely treated at the Camp Bastion Field Hospital in line with the Geneva Convention.
But, according to the BBC, some service personnel at Camp Bastion have complained that the British wounded are sometimes forced to share the same ward as injured Taliban fighters.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Mervyn King Paves Way to Start Bank Print Presses
[Comment from JD: This is what Zimbabwe does…]
The Bank of England’s Governor paved the way last night to unleash the weapon of “printing money” in a last-ditch drive to combat the rapidly deepening recession.
Mervyn King braced Britain for a further sharp slump and a “difficult year for all of us”, and laid the groundwork for the Bank to turn to “unconventional measures” as interest rates fall towards zero.
The Governor made clear that the Bank is preparing to turn soon to so-called “quantitative easing” measures — pumping money into the economy by buying bonds from banks, firms and the Treasury — after interest rate cuts to a record low of 1.5 per cent left it short of ammunition.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Make Them Taste the Misery of Horror: Al-Qaeda Leader Demands Terror Attacks in Britain to Avenge Israel Invasion of Gaza
An Al Qaeda leader singled out Britain as the target for terrorist attacks in retaliation for Israel’s offensive in Gaza.
In the first specific call for attacks against the UK this year, Abu Yahya al-Libi called on the terror network’s followers to rise up like ‘angered lions’ and declared : ‘It is high time that this criminal country, I mean Britain, paid the price of its history.’
Speaking on a video posted on an Islamist website, the Libyan-born Al Qaeda recruiter continued : ‘There is no child who dies in Palestine … without this being the outcome of the (country) that handed Palestine to the Jews … Britain.’
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Sterling’s Finished, Says Soros Partner as the Pound Plunges to New Low
[Comment from JD: UK may not have a choice now. They will be blackmailed into the Euro.]
Jim Rogers, who made his fortune when he founded the Quantum Fund with billionaire George Soros, issued a dire warning to traders earlier this week.
‘I would urge you to sell any sterling you might have. It’s finished. I hate to say it, but I would not put any money in the UK,’ he said.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Second MP in Row as Police ‘Enter With No Warrant’
A CONSERVATIVE MP last night claimed that police entered his Commons office without a search warrant and demanded constituency correspondence. Daniel Kawczynski said it was “disgraceful” that police entered his office after the row over the arrest of front-bencher Damian Green. But the Metropolitan Police said they attended “by appointment” and had not tried to carry out a search.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Kosovo: Prisons, European Council Denounces Abuse
(ANSAmed) — STRASBOURG, JANUARY 20 — Physical abuse took place, even if not systematically, in police stations and prisons in Dubrava. This is the outcome of the Kosovo report, as published today by the European Council’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT). During a visit which took place in March 2007, the CPT recorded numerous accusations of abuse inflicted by the Kosovan police on detainees, but not by the international police, which instead represents an element of reliability. In most cases the detainees were beaten up, hit and kicked, but “in some cases the abuse could easily be described as torture” the report reads, using the example of a mock-execution. To make the situation worse, even when the abuse suffered at the hands of the police was reported, judges failed to open an inquest into the case. The CPT gathered further accusations in Dubrava prison. Here detainees accuse the emergency service teams, known as Delta Bravo, of physical abuse, excessive use of force and aggressive or taunting behaviour during searches in the cells. In the CPT report, a case is described wherein the detainee, after having been involved in a quiet row, was taken away by members of the Delta Bravo team, to a school in the prison, where he was beaten in front of other detainees and the director of the prison. The CPT report also exposes the conditions of parts of the prison, which is the largest in Kosovo. Although some blocks are in excellent conditions, others are in a dilapidated state. Jail centres adjoining police stations are also in terrible conditions. The CPT president described them as “claustrophobic places, suitable for holding people for a day or two, but certainly not for months, as is currently happening”. The cells are tiny, without natural light, and in some cases without even artificial light, and hygiene levels are extremely low. The report says instead that detention conditions in other prisons which were visited were good, as were the living conditions of patients in psychiatric institutions, even if exceptions remain: the forensic psychiatric unit in Pristina, where patients are held for months in a state of complete inactivity, and the Mental Health Centre in Shtime, which is lacking the resources necessary to assure patients of even the most basic necessities, such as clothes and shoes. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Maghreb Countries Re-Examining Adherence to Med Union
(ANSAmed) — TRIPOLI, JANUARY 21 — Today in Tripoli, according to a spokesperson for the presidency of the Arab Maghreb Union (Uma), Maghreb countries have “started to re-examine” their participation in the Union for the Mediterranean (Upm) following the Israeli offensive in Gaza. The spokesperson, cited (but not identified) by Libyan press agency, Jana, said, “Uma countries have started to re-examine their adherence to the Union for the Mediterranean, which include Israel and Palestine as members, particularly after what occurred in Gaza”. Libya, which is president of the Arab Maghreb Union, formed by Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Mauritania and Tunisia, said that it was against the Union for the Mediterranean, started by French President Nicola Sarkozy. After the beginning of the Israeli offensive in Gaza, the Libyan media launched a violent campaign against the Upm saying that the war in the Gaza Strip was the “result” of the Union. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Al-Qaeda Cell Killed by Black Death ‘Was Developing Biological Weapons’
[Comment from JD: I suspect many thought this to be the case…]
It was initially believed that they could have caught the disease through fleas on rats attracted by poor living conditions in their forest hideout.
But there are now claims the cell was developing the disease as a weapon to use against western cities.
Experts said that the group was developing chemical and biological weapons.
Dr Igor Khrupinov, a biological weapons expert at Georgia University, told The Sun: “Al-Qaeda is known to experiment with biological weapons. And this group has direct communication with other cells around the world.
“Contagious diseases, like ebola and anthrax, occur in northern Africa. It makes sense that people are trying to use them against Western governments.”
Dr Khrupinov, who was once a weapons adviser to the Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev, added: “Instead of using bombs, people with infectious diseases could be walking through cities.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: UN Recognizes Gaddafi Foundation as NGO
(ANSAmed) — TRIPOLI, JANUARY 21 — The Gaddafi Foundation has become a non governmental organisation recognized by the United Nations, and is the first Libyan civic institution to be granted this status. The announcement was given by Brian Gleeson, coordinator of the United nations Office in Libya. In “congratulating” the son of the Colonel and chairman of the foundation Seif Al Islam, Gleeson and those in charge of the United Nations Development Programme in Libya made it known that this role would facilitate and increase partnership opportunities with the United Nations. The Gaddafi Foundation is already involved in a number of joint programmes with the United nations, including a project to demine Libya, several against AIDS and a recent study for the cleaning up and valorization of the land, with a pilot project having been set in motion in the city of Sabratha. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Terrorism: Algeria, 5 Soldiers Injured in Explosion
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, JANUARY 21 — Five soldiers, including an officer, were injured yesterday evening when a rudimentary bomb went off in Ammal, in the Boumerdes zone, 50 km east of Algiers. The bomb, wrote the daily paper El Watan, reportedly exploded when an army patrol was passing by, engaged for the past two days in a vast sweep-up operation in the region near Kabylia. Yesterday security forces bombed the zone, where there had been reports of an ‘imported’ terrorist group linked to Al Qaeda for the Islamic Maghreb (formerly known as the Salafite Group for Preaching and Combat). The attack has not yet been confirmed by official sources. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Palestinian Writer, Israeli Leaders Not Ready for Peace
(By Nina Fabrizio) (ANSAmed) — ROME, JANUARY 21 — Palestinian writer Suad Amiry has faith in Obama to turn the page in the Middle East after the “tragedies” of the Bush administration, but she warns that “nothing will change” if the USA and the EU fail to put pressure on Israel, which does not want to pay “the price of peace”, in other words “the peace agreement”. Even though she is convinced that the Israeli leaders are not ready. Presenting the Italian edition of her latest book “No sex in the city” at the Casa Internazionale delle Donne in Rome, Amiry talked with ANSAmed and made clear that “the recent war in Gaza was a war against civilians, with the aim of demoralising the Palestinian people and convincing them that they are a beaten people with nothing left”. Amiry has no doubt that Israel’s strategy is to carry forward “Bush’s catastrophic paradigm: to convince the world of the existence of an Iranian-Lebanese-Gaza axis of evil. With this latest attack, Israel wanted to insist on the position that Sharon held: “to convince the world that there is no interlocutor to make peace with”. The writer believes that there is an interlocutor, and his name is Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). “He has recognised Israel, he puts kids in prison if they throw even a single stone, he has even been accused of siding with Israel, what more do you want?” But the problem for the Palestinians, explains Amiry, is ending the occupation. “Anyway, if they stand still peacefully what do they get? Nothing, or new settlements. If they react and throw those stupid rockets, they get the destruction and war crimes of recent days”. We need to focus on the reasons for the rocket launches as a reaction, according to Amiry. “We always look at the symptoms, not the causes: 1.4 million Palestinians have been under an embargo for nearly 2 years without access to water, food, medicine, electricity”. This is why the first thing to do is “remove the embargo”. Paradoxically though, this situation could have positive consequences for the Palestinian people, observes Amiry: “I believe that it will create unity among Palestinians: it’s possible that Hamas and Fatah realise that we have been abandoned, that the world is tired of us and nobody will help the Palestinian people if they don’t find a single direction”. The hope is for transitional government of unity. “We will only solve the internal situation in this way, but we need Israel for a global solution. But I don’t believe that Livni or Barak or Netanyahu are ready for peace. If each of them believes that killing Palestinian civilians is the way to get elected, we are in big trouble”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Israel Willing to Pay “Terrible” Price for Shalit
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, JANUARY 21 — The Israeli government is prepared to attenuate its firm stance against Hamas over the issue of Corporal Gilad Shalit — prisoner in the Gaza Strip of the Palestinian Islamic movement for two and a half years — even to the point of “paying a terrible price” for his release. This was written today on the online site of the Haaretz newspaper, citing information gathered from a number of different ministries on the basis of which it is considering a possible “barter” (Shalit in exchange for several hundred Palestinians kept in Israeli jails) of some individuals accused of serious crimes, which Premier Ehud Olmert had in the past firmly said “no” to. In favour of a softening up of negotiating positions was reportedly — in a Cabinet meeting — the head of the Shin Bet domestic secret services Yuval Diskin, as well as the Foreign Minister (and centrist candidate for premier of the Kadima party in the upcoming elections of 10 February), Tzipi Livni. But also Olmert, according to the governmental sources quoted by Haaretz, has reportedly “realized that at this point there are no alternatives to paying the price” requested. “By now there is a solid majority in the Cabinet in favour of the release of numerous assassins in exchange for Shalit’s release,” stressed a minister to the newspaper, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Today Israeli negotiator Amos Gilad will once again be raising the issue of Shalit in talks in Cairo with Egyptian mediators involved in stabilizing the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip after the war of the last few weeks, who are also in contact with a Hamas delegation. We are engaged in “enormous efforts for the release of Gilad Shalit” said Olmert in an interview published this morning by Maariv, saying that he was convinced that the war had “supplied the necessary leverage to speed up his return home.”(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Hamas Says Attacks Have Made it ‘More Popular Than Ever’
[…] “Israel killed 48 of our fighters and those deaths will only bring more fighters to us,” said Talal Nassar, the chief Hamas spokesman in Syria. “Each martyr will have brothers, cousins, nephews and they will join Hamas to get revenge. We see the majority of the Palestinian people supporting Hamas, even those who disagreed with us in the past. No one can say Hamas is finished; we are more popular than ever.”
He insisted that the group was well stocked with materials and had even received a shipment of smuggled weapons yesterday despite the siege.
And Hamas’s military wing would have no trouble resuming attacks on Israeli forces if they failed to withdraw completely from Gaza by Sunday, he said, when a week-long ceasefire is due to end. […]
“We will welcome any kind of help from the international community, from Europe or the United Nations, even if Mahmoud Abbas works with them, “ Mr Nassar said in an interview at Hamas’s headquarters in the Yarmouk neighbourhood of Damascus, an area mainly populated by Palestinian refugees. […]
Branding Mr Abbas a “traitor” to the Palestinian cause, Mr Nasser nevertheless said Hamas would work with him to secure international funding for rebuilding Gaza. Hamas, considered a terrorist organisation by the United States and Europe, remains wary that international aid will come with strings attached designed to bypass it and prop up Fatah.
“We will not allow money to be given to Mahmoud Abbas so that he can then control Gaza,” Mr Nassar said. “We will establish joint committees between Hamas and Fatah to rebuild. The legitimate elected authority in Gaza remains under Ismail Haniyeh”, the Hamas leader in Gaza.
Reconstruction assistance would also come from Syria and Iran, key supporters of Hamas, Mr Nassar said.
In his remarks, the Hamas spokesman predicted a quick formation of a Palestinian unity government. “Very soon we will sit with Mahmoud Abbas and we will establish a national coalition government. Not because Abbas is strong or wants it, but because he is weak and now has no other choice than to sit with us.”
And while he offered the prospect of a longer truce with Israel, if the current week-long ceasefire held, Mr Nassar said future violence was inevitable. […]
“After the ceasefire, if the Israelis pull out, maybe we will sign a one-year truce with them,” Mr Nassar said. “Maybe we will sign a truce and after that we will continue to liberate all the Palestinian lands, from the river to the sea, including the 1948 lands. Whomever feels sympathy for the Zionists about this, let them open their countries to them.
“There can be no accommodation with Israel. Anyone who signs such an accommodation is a traitor. Between us and the Zionists there is just the language of the gun.”
International leaders, including key figures from the European Union, have been in the Middle East this week trying to turn the temporary truce into a more permanent peace and get desperately needed humanitarian aid into Gaza. The British prime minister, Gordon Brown, announced on Sunday a threefold rise in UK funds to the territory, promising an additional £20m. […]
Mr Nassar warned that Europe’s Muslim population would not forget the EU’s lack of hard action.
“The European position through this was not good and effectively supported the Zionists,” he said. “They should understand that Europe will be the first to get damaged by the Islamic movements there. Revolutions always arise out of injustice.
“Now the Arabs see Europe as raising empty slogans while doing nothing on the ground. If these massacres had been done against animals Europe would have been upset about animal rights. When it is Arabs or Muslims being killed no one does anything.”
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Israeli Warning on Gaza Tunnels
Israel has warned of renewed military strikes on Gaza if tunnels used for smuggling in goods from Egypt are reopened by Palestinians.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said the situation could not return to how it was before Israel’s 22-day offensive in Gaza, which ended last Sunday. But media reports say that some of the tunnels are already back in operation, with fuel being smuggled in. […]
Destroying the network of tunnels between the Gaza Strip and Egypt was one of Israel’s main aims when its offensive began in late December.
The Israelis say the tunnels are used to smuggle weapons in to militants from Hamas, but the Palestinians argue that Israel’s tight control of their borders means the tunnels are the only way they can get enough fuel and basic goods to survive.
Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak said on Wednesday that 150 tunnels had been destroyed during the Gaza assault.
Before their offensive in Gaza was over, Israeli officials had said they had destroyed 60% to 70% of the tunnels. But media reports now say that some tunnels are already back up and running.
TV images on Wednesday showed a truck being filled with petrol, apparently smuggled in through a tunnel. And on Thursday, one tunnel owner told Reuters: “Soon it will be operational, I will not bring drugs or weapons, I plan to use it to bring in what people need most — food and fuel, and that is very profitable.”
Israel bombed the tunnels heavily during its offensive, and Ms Livni was clear that Israel would not tolerate the resumption of smuggling. “Things must be clear — Israel reserves the right to react militarily against the tunnels once and for all,” the AFP news agency quoted her as saying.
“If we have to act, we will do so, we will exercise our right to legitimate defence, we will not leave our fate… to the Egyptians, nor to the Europeans nor to the Americans.”[…]
And diplomats gathered in Cairo were continuing their efforts to find a lasting ceasefire agreement for Gaza, with the issue of smuggling at the top of their agenda. Israel is expected to urge Egypt to put an end to the practice, while Hamas is likely to demand that Israel relaxes its control over Gaza’s borders. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Murder, Torture Allegations in Gaza. Mass Protests Fail to Materialize.
From ezralevant.com: (Canada)
There is a terrible massacre going on in Gaza right now — including mass torture. Hospitals and schools are being turned into make-shift torture chambers. At least 100 people have been killed that way since the weekend. I call for a U.N. denunciation! I call for protests in Canadian streets! Where is Sid Ryan? What? What’s that? The massacre and torture are being conducted by Hamas against their fellow Palestinians? So the Jews can’t be blamed for this one? OK then. Everyone go back to what you were doing.
…
From The San Francisco Chronicle: (US)
As Israel’s last troops left the Gaza Strip Wednesday, Hamas officials conceded that they are executing Palestinians suspected of collaborating with Israel during the three-week invasion. In the West Bank, Fatah officials said at least 19 of its members have been executed and many more brutally tortured. Gaza residents say Hamas is using schools and other public buildings in Gaza City, and the towns of Khan Yunis and Rafah as detention centers to interrogate members of Fatah, their political rivals. They said three men have been blinded during questioning and more than 60 have been shot in the legs as punishment. “They are committing human rights violations in a very brutal manner,” Mahmoud Habbash, Palestinian Authority minister of social welfare said in Ramallah. “Not only did Israel perpetrate war crimes, but Hamas also has been targeting innocent Palestinians.”
…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
The Battle of Gaza
by Cliff May
What took place in Gaza and Israel over the past three weeks was not a war — it was one battle in a war. Or, to be more precise, it was one battle in what the soldier/scholar John Nagl has described as a “global insurgency” aimed at overthrowing the existing order, what we used to call — in a more confident era — the Free World.
“Yes, Allah is greater than America.” Hamas supreme leader Khaled Mashaal said on al-Jazeera television a few years ago. “Allah is greater than the superpowers. We say to this West: By Allah you will be defeated.”
Too many people refuse to understand: Hamas is not fighting for a Palestinian state. Hamas is fighting for the annihilation of Israel which it would replace with an Islamic emirate. Not the same thing at all.
Hamas takes inspiration, funding and instructions from the ruling mullahs of Iran, heirs to the Iranian Revolution that erupted 30 years ago next month when the Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile in France and established his theocratic regime. In the years since, Syria has become Iran’s client; Hezbollah, based in Lebanon but with terrorist branches as far flung as South America, its proxy.
Israel’s latest battle against Hamas began just after Christmas and ended just before the inauguration of Barack Obama. Israel’s leaders apparently felt it prudent to announce a cease-fire before Obama sat down in the Oval Office and wrote “Stop the fighting!” at the top of his presidential to-do list.
In Arab and Muslim capitals, it did not go unnoticed that, as Hamas was being pounded by Israel, Iran did nothing to help. Nor was Hezbollah willing to open a second front on Israel’s northern border. But as soon as a cease-fire was declared, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad spun into action — by spinning: According to official Iranian press reports, he called Mashaal — who resides in Damascus rather than Gaza — and told him: “Today is the beginning of victory!”
There are those who will believe him. But if Israel has succeeded in destroying most Hamas weapons caches and factories, as well as most of the tunnels through which Hamas imported thousands of missiles — even as it claimed Israel was blocking supplies of food, fuel and medicines through its “siege” — Israel achieved important, if short-term military goals.
Hamas spokesmen are saying they lost fewer soldiers than did the Israelis, and that they destroyed 47 Israeli tanks and armored vehicles. The carcasses of those machines have yet to be displayed for the cameras. And, by most accounts, Hamas fighters were short on both skills and fervor, despite Iranian and Hezbollah training.
Many Hamas military commanders removed their uniforms and hid among women and children. “They turned houses and mosques into battlegrounds so that the people would protect them and those who trusted them now regret it,” wrote Abd al-Fattah Shehadeh in the on-line Arabic newspaper ELAPH. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
UN Launches Gaza Inquiry
The UN’s humanitarian chief has launched a firsthand examination of the devastation wrought in the Gaza Strip by Israel’s offensive so the organisation can gear up to provide desperately needed relief to the territory’s 1.4 million people.
John Holmes called the steep Palestinian casualty toll “extremely shocking” and suggested the UN might ask Israel to compensate it for wartime damage to UN compounds in Gaza. Hundreds of tonnes of humanitarian aid were destroyed by an Israeli shelling of the main UN compound.
“We want to make sure it is properly investigated and that we get proper accountability for it and proper compensation if it is needed, and I think it will be needed,” Mr Holmes said at his first stop in Gaza City. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Kuwait: Economic Crisis Costs Arabs Us$ 2.5 Trillion
Gulf Cooperation Council nations postpone or cancel 60 per cent of their development projects. First Arab economic summit involving 22 Arab countries opens today in Kuwait.
Kuwait City (AsiaNews) — Arab investors have lost US$ 2.5 trillion from the credit crunch as 60 per cent of development projects in the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates) are postponed or cancelled, Kuwaiti Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammad al-Sabah said. His country is host to an Arab economic summit that opened today.
“The Arab world has lost 2.5 trillion dollars in the past four months,” he explained, with about 60 per cent of development projects in the GCC area put off to a later date or simply abandoned.
The biggest loss was an estimated 40 per cent drop (or US$ 600 million) in the value of Arab investments abroad.
Arab investors were further affected by a sharp decline in oil revenues, the declining value of property investments and other repercussions of the global downturn.
The summit, which is the first Arab economic meeting involving the leaders of all 22 Arab countries, will also tackled the issue of aid and reconstruction assistance for Gaza.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Plan to Negotiate Buys Iran Time to Complete Nuclear Program
Iran, the experts believe, will ostensibly respond favorably to the American courtship and will even reciprocate with some gestures of its own, but in practice, Iran will accelerate its nuclear program and there are already signs of this. Even leading U.S. intelligence officials acknowledge that Iran is likely to produce its first nuclear bomb as early as this year. Remarks to this effect were made last week by CIA Director Michael Hayden, and the director of national intelligence, Michael McConnell, who said he is concerned Iran would continue along a path that will end with nuclear weapons. The comments were made during a press conference last week as he prepares to leave office.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Saudi Arabia: Arab Petrochemical and Real Estate Giants in Crisis
In Kuwait City Arab states call for greater economic integration but postpone major decisions. Leading Arab petrochemical giant sees net income drop 95 per cent.
Riyadh (AsiaNews/Agencies) — Net income for the Saudi Basic Industries Corp (Sabic), the world’s largest chemical maker by market value, crashed by 95 per cent to 311 million riyals (US$ 82.9 million) from 6.87 billion riyals (US$ 17,75 billion) a year ago. In Kuwait City Arab leaders adopted a declaration in favour of “monetary and fiscal policies to enable Arab nations to face the consequences of the global financial crisis”. They also agreed to a number of economic resolutions in favour of economic integration, including plans for a pan-Arab power grid and a rail network project.
Sabic’s losses (headquarters pictured) are the result of a huge decline in the auto industry and the associated drop in demand for plastics and chemical products from the United States, Japan and Germany.
The Riyadh-based company, also the kingdom’s largest steelmaker, had to cut prices for the metal since October as domestic construction orders slowed.
Renamed Sabic Innovative Plastics, and still specialising in plastics, the company plans to eliminate about 1,000 jobs from its workforce of 10,500.
Just over a year ago it bought General Electric Co.’s plastics business for US$ 11.6 billion; since then it has seen sales for resins and thermoplastic sheets used in cars, roofs and lighting drop substantially.
The credit crunch has indeed hit Arab countries hard, already floored by the drop in oil prices, their main export.
One victim has been Dubai’s real estate market which has lost hundreds of jobs in the last two months.
Local service companies are also cutting staff by 10-15 per cent as the economic downturn shows no signs of ending any time soon.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Deaths in Moscow
Political killings have become systematic in Russia. Their punishment has not
ON MARCH 26th 2000 Vladimir Putin was elected president of Russia. By coincidence his election, partly promoted by the war in Chechnya, was soiled by a horrific crime that same night. A Russian colonel, Yuri Budanov, entered a house in the Chechen village of Tangi, home to an 18-year-old girl, Elza Kungaeva. Mr Budanov ordered his soldiers to wrap her in a blanket, put her in his armoured personal carrier and take her to his quarters.
Two hours later she was dead, her strangled naked body displaying marks of severe beating. She was buried in secret but an autopsy later showed that she had been raped and sodomised. After a three-year legal odyssey, Colonel Budanov was sentenced to ten years in prison for the murder. A rare case of a Russian officer being brought to justice for a wartime crime in Chechnya, it became a symbol of the army’s atrocities there.
On January 15th Mr Budanov was freed on parole for good behaviour, 18 months early. Stanislav Markelov, a lawyer for the Kungaev family, protested vainly against his early release. On January 19th Mr Markelov held a press conference, claiming that Mr Budanov was freed only after a false statement by the prosecution service.
After the news conference, Mr Markelov walked towards a Moscow metro station along a busy street, accompanied by Anastasia Baburova, a 25-year-old journalist for Novaya Gazeta, one of Russia’s most daring remaining independent newspapers. A masked man following behind shot Mr Markelov dead. Ms Baburova chased the killer; he turned and shot her in the head, and she later died. It was about 3pm, barely a mile from the Kremlin. Even by Russian standards this was brazen.
Mr Budanov denied any involvement. Mr Markelov had defended many victims of human-right abuses, in Chechnya and elsewhere. He was particularly hated by Russia’s nationalists and neo-fascists, for whom Mr Budanov is an idol and a cause célèbre. (Ms Baburova had written about just these groups in her newspaper.)
As Mr Markelov argued in his final news conference, Mr Budanov’s release reflected neither his own interest, nor the state’s. “It was in the interest of those who seek to undermine legal institutions in the Caucasus,” he said. Jailing Mr Budanov was a way to show Chechens that they could seek justice peacefully rather than turning to separatists for revenge. His release argued the opposite.
In Chechnya, it was seen as yet another sign of Moscow’s contempt. Even Ramzan Kadyrov, the republic’s pro-Kremlin president, was outraged. The killing of Mr Markelov eliminated a man whose name in Chechnya, according to Tatyana Lokshina of Human Rights Watch, a campaigning group, “was synonymous with hope for justice.” It also epitomised the atmosphere of lawlessness and impunity that has flourished in Russia in recent years.
The list of dead journalists, campaigners for civil liberties and those who seriously harm the interests of over-mighty state officials is getting longer by the day. On January 13th a former Chechen rebel, Umar Israilov, who had turned against Mr Kadyrov and formally complained to the European Court of Human Rights of his involvement in kidnappings and torture, was gunned down in Vienna.
Last August Magomed Yevloyev, a journalist and owner of an opposition internet site in another north Caucasus republic, Ingushetia, was detained and “accidentally” shot by an interior ministry guard. His supporters blamed Ingushetia’s then president and interior minister. To the joy of the whole republic the Kremlin fired both men in October. But on December 30th Russia’s president, Dmitry Medvedev, appointed the former interior minister to a new job of “federal inspector” in Moscow. Impunity, it seems, still prevails.
Mr Putin prides himself on having pacified Chechnya. The war is indeed over, but its legacy continues to poison and haunt Russia. Its methods have spread far beyond Chechnya to reach Moscow. In a recent road-rage incident in the Russian capital, two Chechen policemen bearing special security passes beat up and fired at a bus driver who cut in front of their Mercedes.
Mr Medvedev once pledged to fight “legal nihilism” in Russian society. But neither he nor Mr Putin has uttered a word about the killing of Mr Markelov and his brave companion, both of whom tried to defend the law from the abuses of the state.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Books: Dink’s Story About Being Armenian in Turkey
(ANSAmed) — MILAN, JANUARY 20 — “I feel as scared as a trapped dove but I know the people of this country will not touch me, because here they don’t hurt doves. Doves live among the population, scared as I am but free,” wrote the Armenian journalist and Turkish citizen Hrant Dink before being killed in Istanbul on January 19 2007 by a young fanatic. “The dove’s unrest” is the title of his book which is published posthumously, a collection of the articles we wrote for the weekly Agos, which he has founded. The book will be sold in Italy as well. It was presented yesterday evening during a tribute to Dink organised in Milan by the Armenian House. “Hrant” said Boghos Levon Zekiyan, Armenian from Istanbul and professor at the University Cà Foscari in Venice, friend of Dink “was killed because he had become a magnet for Turkish intelligentsia”. “He knew” explained Zekiyan, who wrote the preface to the book “that the only way for Turkey to recognise the Armenian genocide was to create a public opinion able to support this burden. His work has been useful: now every day a new Turkish intellectual stands behind this need”.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
India: Widow of Graham Staines: “Do Not Give Up Hope, Pray for India”
10 years ago in Orissa, Hindu extremists burned alive the Christian Graham Staines and his two sons. His wife, back in India, connects the recent anti-Christian persecution to her husband. To the many recent widows of Kandhamal, she speaks of forgiveness and strength “in Christ.”
Mumbai (AsiaNews) — Ten years have passed since the night of January 22, 1999, when Hindu extremists burned alive the Australian Christian missionary Graham Stewart Staines and his sons Philip and Timothy (ages 9 and 7, in the photo) while they were sleeping in their station wagon in the village of Manoharpur, district of Keonjhar (Orissa). The widow Gladys Staines talks to AsiaNews about the drama of Hindutva violence and the recent anti-Christian persecution in Orissa.
The woman has been back in Orissa since June of 2006, together with her daughter Esther. About the recent anti-Christian violence in Kandhamal, she says “I feel very sad and I am pained at their suffering.” On January 22, there will be a commemorative Mass in Monoharpur, at the site of the murder. On the morning of the 23rd, a prayer service will be held at the Baripada Mission, which will conclude with the inauguration of a new physiotherapy hall.
Staines remembers her husband and sons calmly, with tenderness. “During these ten years, there have been times of sadness, I feel sad that I do not have my husband to support me, to guard me, but these are just momentary emotions of sadness which also fill me with great hope, the hope of heaven and of being reunited with my husband and children in paradise and seeing the Father face to face. This guarantee fills me with consolation.
“I cannot express that how I felt when I got the news of my husband and sons being burnt alive. I told my daughter Esther that though we had been?left alone, we would forgive and my daughter replied, ‘Yes, we will’.”
But time has not taken away the sadness. Last week, Gladys and Esther visited the Hebron Ooty school, where Philip and Timothy studied. Gladys tells AsiaNews, “I feel sad that I do not get to see my sons growing up. Christ has been my companion, but at times I miss the support of my husband. God gives me great support, and the prayers of people has been?a source of great consolation, and this is the solidarity I share with the widows of Kandhamal. It is Jesus who is the source of every consolation and support. God gives us the strength to be able to carry our cross and to live in?His will. Our life and our work here on earth has to go on according to His holy will.
“These sisters of mine in Kandhamal who have sacrificed their husbands?for the sake of Christ — I tell them be strong, stay strong, and Christ will be?your support, your companion, your guide and your strength. When God is working with us, nothing can be against us. I am in prayerful solidarity with them, I share their sufferings and I want to encourage them with hope. It is painful and sad but importantly — it is not how we live, but what matters is ‘whether we are in the will of God’. Support them with your solidarity and prayers.”
Staines says that she will always continue working to fulfil her husband’s dream to live in peace and harmony, and work together for the good of all. “I forgive the other, because I have first received forgiveness from Jesus Christ — I have encountered the presence of Jesus in my life and this is the spirit I share. When we forgive, there is no bitterness and we live our lives and continue the task entrusted to us — with His grace and peace. These Kandhamal widows have also been touched by Jesus. All Christians who have known the intervention of Jesus in their lives will have this gift to forgive and to be the witnesses of His peace and presence. Support them with your solidarity and prayers.
“To the people of the world I say, do not give up hope, pray for India.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
India: World Must Discipline Recalcitrant States: Pranab
Equating the Mumbai terror strikes with the September 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S., the India External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said it was time states supporting terrorism were disciplined by the international community.
“Terrorism is not just the act of misguided individuals. Since 9/11 the magnitude, depth and audacity of terror acts, as once again manifested in Mumbai attacks, demonstrate that this is no longer a problem of a state or of a region but of the whole world. This problem becomes more acute when it becomes state sponsored. Recalcitrant states must be brought to discipline by various international measures,” Mr. Mukherjee observed.
He was delivering the keynote address at the ‘Delhi Dialogue’ on cooperation and security with the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) on Wednesday.
Organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry here, the seminar was supported by the Singapore-based Institute of South East Asian Studies and SAEA Group Research.
Mr. Mukherjee suggested forging of closer economic and political links among countries opposed to terrorism to “rebuff such evil attempts that strike at our common civilisational roots” and to ensure a peaceful environment. “As the recent brutal terrorist attacks in Mumbai have shown, both India and ASEAN will need to act resolutely. Our growing economic and political links will send a message that the terrorists’ designs will have to be defeated not just by India but by the international community as a whole,” he said. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Malaysia Bans Foreign Recruitment
Malaysia has banned the hiring of new foreign workers in factories, shops and other services. The government said the move was to protect its citizens from unemployment during the economic downturn.
It has also told employers that if they want to cut back their workforce they must sack foreign staff first.
Malaysia is a leading Asian importer of labour, with more than two million foreign workers — mostly from Indonesia and other South East Asian countries.
The ban on new foreign workers is indefinite and will affect key manufacturing and services sectors which currently employ about half of Malaysia’s foreign workforce.
Exemptions may be given to those working in highly skilled service industries and factories.
Syed Hamid told the New Straits Times that the decision had been prompted by a human resources ministry report which showed 45,000 people would be laid off by the end of the month.
“This is not the time for employers to ask for foreign workers,” he told the newspaper.
“The first to be retrenched should be foreigners and not locals,” he added.[…]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Brazil: Nazi Angel of Death Josef Mengele ‘Created Twin Town in Brazil’
The Nazi doctor Josef Mengele is responsible for the astonishing number of twins in a small Brazilian town, an Argentine historian has claimed.
[…]
In a new book, Mengele: the Angel of Death in South America, the Argentine historian Jorge Camarasa, a specialist in the post-war Nazi flight to South America, has painstakingly pieced together the Nazi doctor’s mysterious later years.
After speaking to the townspeople of Candido Godoi, he is convinced that Mengele continued his genetic experiments with twins — with startling results.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Mexico Police Chief’s Head Found in Ice Box
Incident came as 16 others killed in northern state of Chihuahua
The head of a Mexican police chief was delivered to his colleagues in an ice box in the country’s latest drug-related violence.
The incident came as 16 other people were also killed in Mexico’s northern state of Chihuahua in attacks the authorities believe are linked to the country’s drug wars.
“Hitmen cut off commander Martin Castro’s head and left it in an ice cooler in front of the local police station,” said a statement issued by the state justice authorities.
His head was left in the town Praxedis with a message from the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel.
The police commander was abducted on Saturday, along with five other police officers and a civilian, only five days after starting his job.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
53 Migrants Land on Lampedusa
(ANSAmed) — LAMPEDUSA (AGRIGENTO), JANUARY 21 — Carabinieri have brought in 53 migrants, all male, found on the inlet of the Pisana beach on Lampedusa. They have just got off a raft which has not yet been found. The men have been taken to a temporary detention centre, where yesterday there were over 1,800 in a structure with a maximum capacity of 800 beds. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Greece: 12 Illegal Immigrants Arrested
(ANSAmed) — ATHENS, JANUARY 21 — Port authorities on the island of Lesbos in the eastern Aegean have arrested 12 illegal immigrants arriving from neighbouring Turkey on a rowboat. According to the Kathimerini newspaper, it is not yet known where the immigrants were originally from. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Obama to Stop Ousting Illegals?
President asked for executive order to halt deportation, work raids
A former illegal alien who sought sanctuary in a Chicago church in 2006 before being deported back to Mexico has written a letter to President Barack Obama, asking him to issue an executive order to stop sending illegals home.
[…]
Oscar Chacón, executive director of the National Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean Communities, told New York’s El Diario Americans can expect to see a change in immigration policy as early as this year.
“There is no doubt that the Obama Administration will push immigration reform,” Chacón said. “In a meeting we … had recently with the Obama transition team’s immigration advisers, they assured us that he has in his plans an immigration reform for the first year of his government.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Supo Chief: Finland Still Has Time to Deal With Immigration Issues
Ilkka Salmi, head of Finland’s Security Police, or SUPO, says that Finland still has time to prevent problems that may be linked with immigration.
In a YLE television interview programme on Saturday, Salmi said that there are no indications in Finland of powerful radicalisation among immigrants in Finland. If integration efforts fail, however, Salmi fears that it could be reflected as problems in public order and security.
“Then there is the danger that this group would become marginalised. Some immigrants might become marginalised, and … consider themselves threatened, and if this happens, in the worst case it could be reflected in public order and security, and even as more serious activities on Finnish territory”, Salmi said.
Salmi says that escalation could theoretically lead to a situation in which those who are marginalised might be recruited to serve international terrorism.
Espionage Still Going Strong
Ilkka Salmi also says that espionage did not end with the end of the Cold War. SUPO keeps tabs on foreign agents from all directions. Counter-espionage takes most of the resources of SUPO. Salmi said that both industrial espionage and political surveillance are practiced in Finland.
“There is a boom in surveillance. The surveillance environment has hardly changed at all since the Cold War.”
Salmi says that SUPO knows all of the spies that operate in Finland, but he will not reveal the number. He also says that some foreign agents have been expelled from the country.
“Finland does not spy abroad. SUPO is purely a security police, which operates within the borders of the country.”
In addition to counterespionage and preventing terrorism, the mandate of SUPO, which underwent a reorganisation at the beginning of this year, includes drawing up briefings for national leaders on the impact of international crises on Finnish security.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UNHCR, Lampedusa, Untenable Situation
(ANSAmed) — ROME, JANUARY 21 — The first point of arrival Welcome Centre in Lampedusa is in an “untenable situation” which could degenerate to create “serious risks for the safety of immigrants and the staff who work there”. The UNHCR, the UN agency for refugees, raised the alarm, stressing that besides the risks surrounding safety, there was the danger of wasting the two and half years worth of work trying to make the Lampedusa centre into a model for the rest of Europe. “The overcrowding”, the spokesperson Laura Boldrini underlined, “is creating first of all a lowering of the standards of assistance offered to the immigrants. But there is also the risk that the situation could deteriorate, at which point the safety of immigrants, asylum seekers, humanitarian workers, doctors and directors of the centre would be put in jeopardy”. Moreover, Boldrini added, “there has been a huge investment both from Rome and from the European Commission to make Lampedusa a model. If the current situation is not resolved soon, Lampedusa is at risk of becoming the example of how not to do things”. On the basis of what is currently taking place, the UNHCR stressed, there are new provisions put in place from Rome for those immigrants arriving in boats, which would plan to send them back to their own country directly from the island of Pelagie. A decision which has also provoked, Boldrini said, “the suspension of the guarantees laid out in the laws for asylum seekers, who should be sheltered in open’ centres and instead they continue to be dealt with in the closed’ centre in Lampedusa.” The situation, furthermore, could create another problem: “there is the worry that the application for asylum could be seen as the solution to the problem of a failed move”, the UNHCR explained, “and therefore that it is an exploitable tool in the right to asylum”. The Centre should in any case be emptied as soon as possible, also considering the protests from the citizens of Lampedusa. “Their worries are understandable”, Boldrini concluded, “but immigrants and asylum seekers cannot be made into the scape goat in this situation”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Canada: Polygamists’ Defense: ‘Gay’ Marriage
Lawyers: Canada’s step to legalize same-sex unions will help in trial
VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Canada’s decision to legalize gay marriage has paved the way for polygamy to be legal as well, a defense lawyer said Wednesday as the two leaders of rival polygamous communities made their first court appearance.
The case is the first to test Canada’s polygamy laws.
Winston Blackmore, 52, and James Oler, 44, are each accused of being married to more than one woman at a time. The charges carry a maximum penalty of five years in prison, British Columbia Attorney General Wally Oppal said.
But Blackmore’s lawyer, Blair Suffredine, said during a telephone interview that marriage standards in Canada have changed.
“If (homosexuals) can marry, what is the reason that public policy says one person can’t marry more than one person?” said Suffredine, a former provincial lawmaker. Canada’s Parliament extended full marriage rights to same-sex couples in 2005.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
White House Outlines Obama’s Pro-Homosexual Agenda
The Barack Obama administration has wasted no time in announcing what his pro-homosexual agenda will include.
Just hours after becoming president, the Whitehouse.gov website has laid out Barack Obama’s agenda. Under a section of that agenda titled Civil Rights is a very detailed outline of what Obama plans to do for the homosexual community.
First on the list is the expansion of “hate crimes” statutes to include extra punishment for crimes committed because of sexual orientation and gender identity. Highlighted is the president’s political history of support for hate crimes legislation.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Is Technology Driving Us to Early Graves?
It is almost a given — very nearly trite and obvious — to say that the pace of modern society has increased. As society moves faster, and as we as individuals are deluged with more information at a greater rate of absorption, stress levels increase and the demands on us as human beings also increase. What few people stop to consider, however, is that the body and the mind become accustomed to stress just as a muscle grows stronger in response to being worked out. Just as it is possible to over-train a muscle, it is possible to over-stress your body and mind. Our technology makes this more possible than ever, and raises important issues concerning our mental and physical health in the context of modern society.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Is the Wilders Movie ‘Fitna’ a Distortion of Islam?
by Andrew Bostom
Rick Moran’s blog entry “Geert Wilders to face anti-Islam charges,” is uninformed with regard to his claim that the film Fitna distorts Islam. Wilder’s documentary Fitna (watch it here) is entirely faithful to classical, mainstream Islamic exegesis on the Koranic verses cited in the film (see Robert Spencer’s excellent analysis from March 2008 here; and for details on the jihadist and Antisemitic Koranic verses and their classical exegeses, see my two books here and here) — regardless of what faux “scholars” — i.e., cultural jihadists, and their witting or unwitting abettors, may claim.
Moreover, Winston Churchill equated the Koran with Mein Kampf — in appropriate fashion. Specifically, Winston Churchill on p. 50 of “From War to War,” the first part of the first volume of his 6-part Second World War, proclaimed Hitler’s Mein Kampf to be, “…the new Koran of faith and war: turgid, verbose, shapeless, but pregnant with its message.”…
Below is the statement I gave to Family Security Matters on the subject.
| — Hat tip: Diana West | [Return to headlines] |
Paleos Must Defend the West…and That Means Israel Too
By Ilana Mercer
Geert Wilders is a Dutch parliamentarian, and leader of the Freedom Party (PVV). He, and sixty percent of the Dutch population, “considers mass immigration to be the worst mistake since the Second World War.” An equal percentage of Wilders’ countrymen see Islam as the number one threat to their national identity. Wilders recently spoke in Jerusalem, which he called “the city of David. The city that, together with Rome and Athens, symbolizes our ancient heritage”.
Warned Wilders:
“[I]f we don’t fight the Islamization we will lose everything; our cultural identity, our democracy, our rule of law, our liberties, our freedom. We have the duty to defend the ideas of Rome, Athens and Jerusalem. The ancient heritage of our forefathers is under attack; we have to stand up and defend it.”[ ‘We have to win war against Islam’, By Brenda Gazzar, Jerusalem Post, December 15, 2008 (Full text of speech)]
Like Wilders, I’m from a religious background, but irreligious (he’s Catholic; I’m Jewish). Like Wilders, I religiously defend the West’s Judeo-Christian heritage.
Hellene and Hebrew: A systematic, philosophical defense of the distinctly Western character of America and Europe must incorporate both. Heck, one can’t appreciate the greatest composer of all times—Bach—without acknowledging the contribution of his muse—Christianity—to the glory of his music. The self-anointed left-liberal, American Jewish leadership has managed to cast Jews as a mere faction among a multicultural mob, a position Jews (being leftists) love. But as I see it, the proper metaphor for the relationship between Judaism and Christianity is that of proud parent and progeny…
| — Hat tip: TV | [Return to headlines] |
Scientists, Data Challenge New Antarctic ‘Warming’ Study
‘It is hard to make data where none exist’
Comprehensive Data Round Up Debunks New Antarctic ‘Estimate of Temperature Trends’
Washington, DC: A new study on Antarctic temperatures — which is contrary to the findings of multiple previous studies — claims “that since 1957, the annual temperature for the entire continent of Antarctica has warmed by about 1 degree Fahrenheit, but still is 50 degrees below zero.”
Despite the fact that the study was immediately viewed with major skepticism by scientists who are not skeptical of anthropogenic global warming claims, many in the media pounced on the study as a chance to attack those skeptical of man-made climate doom. According to the release of the study, “The researchers devised a statistical technique that uses data from satellites and from Antarctic weather stations to make a new estimate of temperature trends. […] The scientists found temperature measurements from weather stations corresponded closely with satellite data for overlapping time periods. That allowed them to use the satellite data as a guide to deduce temperatures in areas of the continent without weather stations.” (emphasis added)
Few media outlets noted that in 2007 Antarctic “sea ice coverage has grown to record levels since satellite monitoring began in the 1979, according to peer-reviewed studies and scientists who study the area.”…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
U.N. Human Rights Worker Found With Child Porn
Sexual material discovered in luggage as he was boarding flight for Thailand
A high-ranking human rights worker with ties to the United Nations was nabbed at Kennedy Airport Tuesday with kiddie porn in his suitcase, officials said.
Clarence Dias, 65, president of the International Center for Law in Development, whose offices are located at the UN, had the smut in his carry-on bag as he passed through security on his way to a flight bound for Bangkok, Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said.
Transportation Security Administration officials doing a random bag check around 8:20a.m. allegedly found a DVD whose cover featured an apparently underage nude boy and an adult male in Dias’ handbag, prosecutors said.
The video’s title — “Winner Pub Pattaya” — apparently refers to a beach resort in Thailand, authorities said. There were also other lewd photographs in the bag, authorities said.
Dias — who holds a doctorate in law from Bombay University and Cornell Law School and has taught at Boston College of Law — claimed the porn was for research, authorities said.
“He admitted it was his — but tried to play it off. He said he was doing research on how to better make sure kids’ rights were not abused,” a police source said. “Yeah, sure. It’s always research.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
1 comments:
The Geneva Convention only applies to prisoners from an enemy that has signed the convention or acts according to its provisos. Neither of these conditions applies to the Taliban. Hence the UK is under no obligation to treat Taliban prisoners in the same way as its treats its own wounded soldiers.
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