According to FOX News, the Obama administration’s call for citizens to rat out people who diss its healthcare plan may be unconstitutional.In other news, a swine flu hotline in the UK run by the National Health Service is staffed by 16-year-old high school students.
Thanks to Aeneas, C. Cantoni, CB, Gaia, heroyalwhyness, Insubria, JD, Sean O’Brian, Steen, VH, Vlad Tepes, Zonka, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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Fisheries: 6,000 Jobs at Risk in Sicily
(ANSAmed) — PALERMO, JULY 29 — The international economic downturn is placing Sicily’s fishing industry at risk, with 6,000 jobs on the line by the end of the year. The figure emerged at a meeting of the Economic Fisheries Observatory, held in Palermo this morning. According to estimates for the fishing district of Mazara del Vallo, the impact of the crisis could affect both Sicilian and non-EU workers equally. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Geithner Asks Congress for Higher U.S. Debt Limit
WASHINGTON (Reuters) — U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner formally requested that Congress raise the $12.1 trillion statutory debt limit on Friday, saying that it could be breached as early as mid-October.
“It is critically important that Congress act before the limit is reached so that citizens and investors here and around the world can remain confident that the United States will always meet its obligations,” Geithner said in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid that was obtained by Reuters.
A Treasury spokeswoman declined to comment on the letter.
Treasury officials earlier this week said that the debt limit, last raised in February when the $787 billion economic stimulus legislation was passed, would be hit sometime in the October-December quarter. Geithner’s letter said the breach could be two weeks into that period, just as the 2010 fiscal year is getting underway.
The latest request comes as the Treasury is ramping up borrowing to unprecedented levels to fund stimulus and financial bailout programs and cope with a deep recession that has devastated tax revenues.
It is expected to issue net new debt of as much as $2 trillion in the 2009 fiscal year ended September 30 and up to $1.6 trillion in the 2010 fiscal year, according to bond dealer forecasts.
The request to increase the debt limit will likely raise the ire of Republicans who have accused President Barack Obama of runaway spending. They may try to hold up the legislation in effort to win concessions on Obama’s health care reform plan.
Geithner urged Reid to not let politics hamper U.S. credit-worthiness and said he looked forward to working with the Nevada Democrat to secure enactment of legislation on the debt limit as early as possible.
“Congress has never failed to raise the debt limit when necessary. Because members of both parties have long recognized the need to keep politics away from this issue, these actions have traditionally received bipartisan support,” he wrote. “This is clearly a moment in our history that calls for continuation of that tradition.”
| — Hat tip: heroyalwhyness | [Return to headlines] |
Airspeed Systems Failed on US Jets
ASHINGTON — On at least a dozen recent flights by U.S. jetliners, malfunctioning equipment made it impossible for pilots to know how fast they were flying, federal investigators have discovered. A similar breakdown is believed to have played a role in the Air France crash into the Atlantic that killed all 228 people aboard in June.
The discovery suggests the equipment problems are more widespread than previously believed. And it gives new urgency to airlines already scrambling to replace air sensors and figure out how the errors went undetected despite safety systems.
[…]
While a car’s speedometer uses tire rotation to calculate speed, an airplane relies on sensors known as Pitot tubes to measure changing air pressure. Computers interpret that information as speed. And while a car with a broken speedometer might be little more than an inconvenience, many airplane control systems rely on accurate speed information to work properly.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
As Senators Go on Summer Break, Healthcare Debate Heats Up
SENATORS left Washington yesterday for a month-long summer recess that usually offers an opportunity to test the mood among constituents and persuade voters that they are representing their interests effectively.
After a week of increasingly rowdy demonstrations at town hall meetings hosted by members of the US House of Representatives, who broke up at the end of July, some senators are having second thoughts about facing their constituents at all.
In St Louis, Missouri, on Thursday, police arrested five people following scuffles at a meeting on healthcare hosted by Democratic congressman Russ Carnahan. The same evening, violence broke out at another healthcare town hall in Tampa, Florida, when conservatives started chanting “Tyranny, tyranny, tyranny!” at Congresswoman Kathy Castor.
As a larger mob gathered outside the meeting, the congresswoman was escorted from the building by police.
Conservative activists claim that the demonstrations are spontaneous expressions of outrage against what they view as President Barack Obama’s plan to nationalise the healthcare system. A number of pro-business lobbyists have played a role in the protests, however, listing Democratic town hall meetings on their websites and providing talking points and heckling tips to the demonstrators.
The role of groups such as Freedom Works, chaired by former Republican congressional leader Dick Armey, has led to Democratic charges of “astroturfing” — the creation of a fake grassroots movement.
Before Democratic senators left Washington this week, they received a briefing from senior White House aides David Axelrod and Jim Messina that included video clips of disrupted meetings.
The senators were urged to plan their meetings carefully and to work with unions and other groups that back healthcare reform in an effort to counterbalance the conservative protesters.
“It’s a challenge, no question about it, and you’ve got to get out there and make the case. This is not the time for the faint-hearted,” Connecticut senator Chris Dodd said after the meeting.
Obama’s reform plan would forbid insurance companies from refusing to cover patients with pre-existing conditions or to stop covering policy-holders who become ill. Democrats claim that the plan would reduce healthcare costs in the long term but Congress has yet to agree many key details of the plan.
Among the issues yet to be resolved is whether the government should set up its own insurance plan to compete with private insurers in an effort to drive down prices.
Obama has promised that anyone who is happy with their current health coverage will be able to keep it but private insurers say that a government-run option would be so big and attractive that it could drive many of them out of business.
Business lobbyists latched onto a stray proposal that would publicly fund doctors’ consultations with terminally ill patients who are considering drawing up a “living will” setting out the treatment they want in the final stages of their illness.
“Adolf Hitler issued six million end of life orders — he called his program the final solution. I kind of wonder what we’re going to call ours,” a speaker from Patients First, a product of the conservative group Americans for Prosperity, told activists.
Talk radio host Rush Limbaugh spent much of this week comparing Obama to Hitler, suggesting that a logo for the president’s group Organising for Healthcare looks like a Nazi banner.
“Now what are the similarities between the Democrat party of today and the Nazi party in Germany? Well, the Nazis were against big business. They hated big business and, of course, we all know that they were opposed to Jewish capitalism. They were insanely, irrationally against pollution. They were for two years’ mandatory voluntary service to Germany. They had a whole bunch of make-work projects to keep people, working one of which was the Autobahn,” Limbaugh told his listeners.
“They were against cruelty and vivisection of animals but in the radical sense of devaluing human life, they banned smoking. They were totally against that. They were for abortion and euthanasia of the undesirables as we all know and they were for cradle-to-grave nationalised healthcare.”
Obama’s political organisation, Organising for America, has launched an e-mail campaign to encourage supporters to voice support for healthcare reform and to rebut false claims about the plan. As politicians head into what promises to be a hot, noisy and bad-tempered August break, however, most of the passion seems to be on the other side of the debate.
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Home Front Getting Ugly for Recessed Congress
At town halls around the country, many flooded by more protesters than event organizers anticipated, lawmakers returning from Washington are finding constituents don’t want to listen; they want to be heard.
“Why won’t you let the people speak?” shouted one protester in Tampa, Fla., at a public forum where Rep. Cathy Castor, D-Fla., attempted to pitch Obama’s health care reform plan to her constituency.
The Tampa protest made national headlines afterward, as dozens of protesters were pushed out the door in a scuffle, some claiming to have received injuries, and the doors were locked to bar their chanting protest: “You work for us!”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
National Guard Asked to Explain ‘Internment’ Jobs
Campaign recruiting for workers at ‘civilian resettlement facility’
An ad campaign featured on a U.S. Army website seeking those who would be interested in being an “Internment/Resettlement” specialist is raising alarms across the country, generating concerns that there is some truth in those theories about domestic detention camps, a roundup of dissidents and a crackdown on “threatening” conservatives.
The ads, at the GoArmy.com website as well as others including Monster.com, cite the need for:
“Internment/Resettlement (I/R) Specialists in the Army are primarily responsible for day-to-day operations in a military confinement/correctional facility or detention/internment facility. I/R Specialists provide rehabilitative, health, welfare, and security to U.S. military prisoners within a confinement or correctional facility; conduct inspections; prepare written reports; and coordinate activities of prisoners/internees and staff personnel.
The campaign follows by only weeks a report from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warning about “right-wing extremists” who could pose a danger to the country — including those who support third-party political candidates, oppose abortion and would prefer to have the U.S. immigration laws already on the books enforced.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Democrats’ ‘Control Gene’
There must be some yet-undiscovered gene in the DNA of people who feel the need to control others. Kings, mullahs, tyrants, despots, dictators and Democrats are all afflicted with this malady. Not since Franklin Roosevelt has evidence of this disorder been so rampant in Washington.
The Obama regime is restructuring and empowering government to ensure that all people everywhere are subject to its control.
First, understand the strategy: 1) identify problem(s); 2) devise action plan; 3) authorize plan in law; 4) implement plan.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
White House Move to Collect ‘Fishy’ Info May be Illegal, Critics Say
The White House has been under fire since posting a blog on Tuesday that asks supporters to e-mail any “fishy” information seen on the Web or received electronically.
The White House strategy of turning supporters into snitches when they see “fishy” information about the health care debate may run afoul of the law, legal experts say.
“The White House is in bit of a conundrum because of this privacy statute that prohibits the White House from collecting data and storing it on people who disagree with it,” Judge Andrew Napolitano, a FOX News analyst, said Friday.
“There’s also a statute that requires the White House to retain all communications that it receives. It can’t try to rewrite history by pretending it didn’t receive anything,” he said.
“If the White House deletes anything, it violates one statute. If the White House collects data on the free speech, it violates another statute.”
Napolitano was referring to the Privacy Act of 1974, which was passed after the Nixon administration used federal agencies to illegally investigate individuals for political purposes. Enacted after Richard Nixon’s resignation in the Watergate scandal, the statute generally prohibits any federal agency from maintaining records on individuals exercising their right to free speech.
The White House has been under fire since it posted a blog on Tuesday that asked supporters to e-mail any “fishy” information seen on the Web or received electronically to flag@whitehouse.gov.
“There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there,” the blog said, adding that “since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help.”
The blog was posted partly in response to a video posted on the Web that claimed to show Obama explaining how his health care reform plans eventually will eliminate private insurance.
The video, featured on the Drudge Report, strung together selected Obama statements that the White House said were taken out of context.
The White House said it wanted to be made aware of “fishy” comments about its health care plan because it wants to set the record straight. But critics called White House move an Orwellian tactic designed to control the health care debate.
“This is a very troubling attempt to stifle the free speech of Americans who have the constitutional right to express their opinion and concerns about health care,” said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice. He called on Obama to repudiate his blog.
“This move is an attempt to intimidate those who have legitimate concerns about the health care plan,” Sekulow said. “And, worse, it turns the White House into some sort of self-appointed ‘speech police.’ This new White House reporting program strikes at the heart of the First Amendment and has no place in this important debate about health care.”
Sekulow said he imagines that opponents of mandatory abortion coverage are engaging in what the White House considers “fishy” speech and should be reported.
“What the White House is touting is absurd,” he said.
But Napolitano said the White House probably cannot be sued because of sovereign immunity, unless someone was harmed by what the government did with the records. But that’s unlikely, he said, because the person would probably be unaware of the harm.
“That’s a silent violation of your right to privacy,” he said.
The ACLU said in a statement to FOXNews.com that the White House blog is a “bad idea that could send a troublesome message.”
But the organization added, “While it is unclear at this point what the government is doing with the information it is collecting, critics of the administration’s health care proposal should not fear that their names will end up in some government database that could be used to chill their right to free speech.”
The White House Thursday denied that it was playing “Big Brother.”
“Nobody is collecting names,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. “We have seen, and as I’ve discussed from this podium, a lot of misinformation around health care reform, a lot of it spread, I think, purposefully.”
Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who has called on Obama to end the program, rejected the White House explanation.
“Of course the White House is collecting names,” he said, arguing that anyone with access to the e-mail account has access to private information.
“The question is not what the White House is doing, but how and why,” he said. “How are they purging names and e-mail addresses from this account to protect privacy? Why do they need the forwarded e-mails, names, and ‘casual conversations’ sent to them instead of just the arguments that they want to rebut?
Asked by FOX News whether the White House was using the blog post as a way to expand the e-mail list for the administration and Obama’s political arm, Organizing for America, Gibbs said the two are “not in any way connected” and repeated that the White House is not collecting names.
Pressed about the program’s goal, Gibbs said it was to clarify for everybody what the misinformation is, adding that’s not a new tactic.
“When you make a mistake in your report, sometimes I e-mail you,” Gibbs said to FOX News’ Major Garrett. “Occasionally, I call. Sometimes I just throw something against the wall. Occasionally, it’s all three.”
Garrett asked why it’s necessary to ask so many people to e-mail the White House.
“All we’re asking people to do is, if they’re confused about what health care reform is going to mean to them, we’re happy to help clear that up for them. Nobody’s keeping anybody’s names. I do have your e-mail. ….Maybe that’s because I assume future mistakes. But I’m not going to say that,” Gibbs said, drawing laughter.
“But nobody’s collecting information,” he added. “Everybody is trying to give people only the facts around what we all understand is a very complicated issue.”
| — Hat tip: Zonka | [Return to headlines] |
Environment: 311 Black Flags Fly Over Spanish Coast
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, JULY 28 — 311 black flags fly over Spain’s coastline. The environmental deterioration symbolised by the flag is primarily found in Galicia and Andalusia, but in all of the autonomous regions the environmental situation has worsened compared to 2008. This is what comes out of the report “Black Flags 2009. The Crisis, an Opportunity for the Coast”, presented today by the ‘Ecologistas en Accion’ association cited today by the Europa Press agency. There were 311 black flags awarded to areas with a high level of environmental deterioration and the risk of serious threats to the ecosystem, 392 awarded to areas with a small or medium level of severity. The report warns that, in spite of the fact that urban areas, indicated as “the primary motor behind coastal damage”, have slowed activities due to the crisis, the projects that have been started are overloading the coastline. The research carried out by ‘Ecologistas en Accion’ also refers to the situation on Spain’s northern coastline, with projects for some 122 ports and 19,000 new moorings in Galicia and over 4,000 homes included in Asturias’ urban planning. The situation is alarming in Andalusia, where “the coast has been suffering for the last 11 years, from Almeria to Cadiz, aggression persists from human activity, primarily from urban planning”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Environment: Dolphins and Whales Back in Mediterranean
(ANSAmed) — PARIS — The Mediterranean is cleaner and regaining some of its biodiversity, says Mike Ridell, chairman and founder of the National Maritime Reserve in the Western Mediterranean, which coordinates the Delphis 2009 project, after last week’s operation which made it possible to count cetaceans and assess the state of the shared sea along the Italian and French coasts to Malta and Morocco. “We have found numerous colonies of marine turtles, groups of dolphins, many schools of moon fish,” reported Le Parisien, “all cetacean species have been seen, whales, grey mullets, dolphins, rorquals (Minke whales), and cachalots, indicators of marine health, and all were seen in large numbers. We were able to verify that these species are growing in number and this is a sign of recovery in terms of biodiversity.” Today the number whales in the Mediterranean is estimated at 3,000 and dolphins at 30,000 (the most widespread species), according to the Sos Grand Bleu association, which says that the density of maritime traffic continues to be fatal to whales. The data is comforting, however, coming as it does the day after a report by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature which said that, overall, almost a fifth of mammals, freshwater fish, amphibians, birds, cartilaginous fish, crabs and shrimp, dragonflies and reptiles living in the Mediterranean are at risk of extinction, while 1% have already disappeared. According to a scale in terms of the danger of extinction, 5% are at high risk, 7% at5 risk and 7% vulnerable. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
EU: Birth Rate Climbing, France Leads Mediterranean States
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, AUGUST 3 — The birth rate in the EU27 is rising. In 2008 this rate reached 10.9 live births per thousand inhabitants, 0.3 more than in 2007. France has the highest birth rate of the Mediterranean countries with 13 births per 1,000 inhabitants, against 12.9 in 2007 and 13.3 in 2000. Cyprus ranks second recording a sharp increase: from 10.9 births per thousand inhabitants in 2007 to 11.6 in 2008 (and 12.2 in 2000). The third place is held by Spain, with 11.4 births per thousand inhabitants, more than the 11 recorded in 2007. Slovenia is fourth with 10.4 live births per thousand inhabitants, (9.9 in 2007), followed by Greece with 10.3 (10 in 2007), Malta with 10 (9.5 in 2007), Portugal with 9.8 (9.7 in 2007) and Italy with 9.6, slightly more than the 9.5 of 2007. Among the EU candidates, Turkey goes against the trend: in 2008 the country’s birth rate fell to 17.9 per thousand inhabitants (in 2007 19.4, 20.2 in 2000), 7 babies above the EU average. Macedonia recorded a birth rate of 11.1 in 2007 and 11.2 in 2008), Croatia saw its births increase from 9.4 in 2007 to 9.9 in 2008. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
EU: Med Salaries, From Portugal’s 525 to France’s 1,321
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, AUGUST 4 — >From 524 euros in Portugal to the 1,321 that the French earn every month: this is the gap of the minimum gross salaries established by law in 2009 for the EU countries that face the Mediterranean. So reports Eurostat, the European Statistics Office, after comparing 20 EU member nations in which a minimum national pay check exists (Italy didn’t figure among them). Considering all of the countries that were examined, the gap is even wider. Those with the scarcest salaries are the Bulgarians with just 123 euros per month, while the inhabitants of Luxembourg are the richest with 1,642 euros. Among the EU’s Mediterranean countries, after France comes Spain (728 euros), Greece (868 euros in July 2008), Malta (630), Slovenia (589) and Portugal (525). The Turkish, who sit on Europe’s border, have a legal minimum salary of 319 euros and earn more than the countries of Eastern Europe, that is the inhabitants of the Czech Republic (306), the Slovakians (296), the Polish (281), Estonians (278), Hungarians (270), Latvians (254), Lithuanians (232), Romanians (153) and Bulgarians (123). In the USA, the minimum federal salary is that of 844 euros. In view of the annual growth rate for minimum salaries in the EU’s Mediterranean countries, it is the Slovenians to show the highest increase between 2008 and 2009, +8.6%, while for the Portuguese the increase was that of 5.3%, Spain 3.8%, France 3.1% and Malta 2.8%. The Turkish and the Americans showed the highest rates of increase with 8.6% and 10.7% respectively. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Fisheries: EC, Plan to Protect Anchovy Stock in Bay of Biscay
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, JULY 29 — Today the European Commission approved a proposal for a long-term plan for the management of anchovy stocks in the Bay of Biscay, between France and Spain. The goal of the plan is to keep stocks at a level allowing for sustainable fishery, stabilising the fishing industry and making it more profitable at the same time. Anchovies have a short lifespan. The plan is based on the simple rule that an annual fishing quota will be established based on scientific advise, given shortly before the start of the season on July 1. “Anchovy fishing in the Bay of Biscay was stopped in 2005,” explained European Commissioner for Fisheries and Maritime Affairs Joe Borg. “This is bad news both for anchovy stocks and the fishermen” he added “whose livelihoods depend on them. I am extremely optimistic that this new plan, with its innovative approach, can succeed in restoring the fishery to good health, also because the momentum behind it has come in large measure from both scientists and the sector itself.” (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
France Plans ‘Bingo for Africa’
The French government is considering introducing a special lottery for Africa to supplement development aid.
“It could be bingo for Africa, or a lotto,” said the French Secretary of State for Co-operation, Alain Joyandet.
The lottery could be launched next year and would be aimed especially at raising funds for education in Africa.
“It could generate about 10 million euros [£8.5m] annually,” Mr Joyandet said, adding that he had discussed it with France’s state betting monopoly.
Mr Joyandet said the new lottery would fit into the category of “innovative funding” for aid projects. These already include a special tax on airline tickets and reduced charges for Africans sending money home.
The French state earns 2.5bn euros annually from the lottery and scratch cards, the French newspaper Le Figaro reports.
“Our game, where from the outset each player knows that part of his bet is destined for Africa, is supposed to be educational. It’s important for everyone to be aware that, even in times of crisis, the poor must not be abandoned,” Mr Joyandet said.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Non-EU Citizens to Get Local Votes Should SPD Form Government
The Social Democratic Party (SPD) says it will allow non-EU foreigners to vote in local elections should it win September’s election — opening the polls to Americans and Russians, as well as the country’s large Turkish population.
Thomas Oppermann, head of the SPD parliamentary party, told the BZ am Sonntag newspaper said the party had drawn up plans to enable non-EU citizens who had lived in Germany for more than six years to be able to vote in the local elections.
“Whoever has legally lived for a minimum of six years in Germany, can then for example vote in municipal elections as a Turk or Russian in Berlin,” he said.
The paper says around seven million foreigners live in Germany, but is not clear how many of these would qualify.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Internet: EU, Still Not Widespread in Mediterranean
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, AUGUST 5 — For most of the French navigating on the Web has become a habit but for most citizens of other EU countries in the Mediterranean it is not a very widespread activity. The situation is different in companies, where the internet is more present all the time, and also in services of e-government. This emerged from the latest EU Commission report on the spread of digital technology among the 27 member states, among whom France is top of the class. How many people in Mediterranean countries have never used internet? According to the EU figures at least 56% of Greeks, 54% of Italians, Portuguese and Cypriots, 49% of Maltese, 40% of Slovenes and 38% of Spaniards have not compared with a quarter of French people, who therefore beat the European average in which a third of citizens never use it. And regular users of the Web? In all 63% of French surf the Web at least once a week against a European average of 56% followed by the Slovenes (52%), Spaniards (49%), Maltese (46%), Portuguese (38%), Italians (37%), Cypriots (35%) and Greeks (33%). The French place third, meanwhile, in the downloading of film and music or viewing of videos on line and the Spaniards place 10th. Then behind them arrive the Maltese and Slovenes with the Greeks, Portuguese, Cypriots and Italians at the end, the latter at the bottom of the 27. The use of the Web depends also on factors such as how widespread is the availability of broadband, which is available to 57% of families in France and to 55% in Malta, more than in Slovenia, in line with the European average at 49%, followed by Spain (45%), Portugal (39%), Cyprus (33%), Italy (31%) and Greece (22%). Another aspect is the spread of e-government services, both as private citizens and as firms, to avoid queues and loss of time at counters. Over three months, a quarter of the French have used internet to send documents compared with 13% of the Portuguese, and an EU average of 12%, below which the other Med countries are placed. In terms of firms using e-government, seven out of 10 in Slovenia use it to send forms, slightly more than in Portugal, France and Greece with Cyprus placing last with 18% while Malta, Spain and Malta are below the EU average of 50%. The standings change again if one looks at applications on line made by businesses for themselves — here the Maltese, Portuguese and Italians are among the top 10 EU countries followed by the Slovenes, French, Cypriots, Greeks and Spanish. And on-line sales? They have not yet taken off, given that only 16% of EU firms last year decided to take advantage of that opportunity. Among the Med countries, the biggest number of firms selling on the Web are in Portugal (19%), then France and Malta (13%), Spain (10%), Slovenia (10% in 2007), overtaking decisively Cyprus (7%), Greece (6%) and Italy (3%).(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Inflation Hits Zero
Lowest since 1959
(ANSA) — Rome, July 31 — Italy’s inflation rate dropped from 0.5% in June to zero in July, its lowest since the -1.1% registered in September 1959, national statistics bureau Istat said in a preliminary estimate Friday.
The consumer price index fell by 1.2% between June and July, Istat said. Food prices fell by 0.3% from June to July with pasta down 1.4% while petrol was down 1.1%.
This meant that food prices were up only 1.4% on July 2008 while petrol was down 16.3% compared to a year ago.
Pay-TV was up 13.6% over the year but air travel was down 18.4%. Eurozone inflation meanwhile fell to -06%, its lowest rate ever.
It was the second straight month there was negative inflation in the eurozone, Eurostat said.
June, with -0.6%, was the first time the zone showed negative inflation since the single currency was adopted a decade ago.
The zone’s rate was zero in May.
The official July rates for Italy and the eurozone will be issued in mid-August.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Actress Says She’s ‘Just Friends’ With PM
Rome, 7 August (AKI) — A young actress has admitted to dining with Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi at his homes in Milan and Rome but says she is not a prostitute and has never received money from the scandal-plagued premier. Graziana Capone, told the gossip magazine, Oggi, that she dined with Berlusconi at his private villa in Arcore near Milan, and at his official Rome residence, Palazzo Grazioli.
“I’ve been to dinner with Berlusconi, but we’re just friends. I adore him — he’s a fascinating man and I am honoured to be his friend,” she told Italian weekly Oggi.
“He’s never suggested anything untoward.”
Capone, a law student and daughter of a builder, she comes from Gravina di Puglia, a town near the southern city of Bari, home to 42-year-old escort Patrizia D’Addario, the woman at the centre of lurid allegations surrounding Berlusconi’s private life.
D’Addario claims to have slept with Berlusconi and that she and many other prostitutes were sent to him by local businessman, Gianpaolo Tarantini.
Bari prosecutors have been investigating Tarantini for alleged corruption and for abetting prostitution and supplying cocaine. They have questioned D’Addario and dozens of other women during their probe.
Left-leaning Italian newspaper La Repubblica last month said Capone was under investigation by Bari prosecutors for allegedly being hired by Tarantini to attend parties thrown by Berlusconi.
“Yes, I went to Berlusconi’s parties. I don’t see anything bad or improper about that,” said Capone last month.
In the latest interview, she admitted to Oggi that Tarantini had introduced her to Berlusconi.
“But I never saw D’Addario or any other women. I have never been to the Marc Messegue Health Centre or to Villa Certosa,” she said.
La Repubblica and its sister publication L’Espresso, has reported that 72-year-old Berlusconi spent the weekend of November 28-30 last year at the luxurious health spa near the picturesque hilltop town of Todi in Umbria, with Tarantini and several women.
Capone told Oggi she first met Berlusconi last September when Tarantini took her to a football match at his club AC Milan’s San Siro stadium in Milan.
“I don’t like football but Gianpi said ‘Come on! I’ll introduce you to Silvio Berlusconi!’ Silvio was immediately terribly nice to me and wanted me beside him,” she said.
Capone said Berlusconi invited her to Milan’s club lounge after the match and she and Tarantini were among 10 people who were invited to dinner with him that evening in Arcore.
“We had two different pasta dishes, fish and vegetables. The prime minister is careful about his diet — he eats rusks,” she said.
Conversation during the dinner revolved around the re-launch of Italian airline Alitalia and opinion polls showing 60 percent of the population approved of Berlusconi, Capone said.
She said she and Berlusconi — a former cruiseship crooner — sang pop songs to the other dinner guests accompanied by a pianist.
“It got very late…at about 3 or 4 am, a chauffeur drove me back to Milan with Tarantini and some other girls,” she said.
Berlusconi called her the following day to say hello, and said he was spending the day — his birthday — with his family.
Capone said Berlusconi had given her presents including rings, bracelets, necklaces and watches.
She said she last saw the prime minister earlier this year, before the media furore broke over his relationship with the teenage lingerie model Noemi Letizia, whose 18th birthday party he attended in Naples.
“But we’ve kept in touch by phone,” Capone added.
Capone said she wants to study jazz at a music conservatory after she graduates and also aspires to become a judge.
“I don’t need a leg-up from Berlusconi,” she claimed.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Legalizes Vigilante Patrols
[Note the incendiary headline. These are actually citizen patrols — a far cry from a vigilante. — ed.]
Taking advantage of a gap in existing legislation, volunteers have formed groups to carry out patrols in cities including Milan, Padua, Parma and Bologna.
Last month vigilante groups from the left and the right clashed violently in the Tuscan town of Massa Carrara.
Maroni told the Corriere della Sera that the minimum age for vigilantes would be 18, not 25 as previously reported. A junior minister said the patrols must be on foot and have no more than three people, and that police- or military-style uniforms, and weapons, would be banned. “Their only equipment [will be] a walkie-talkie that keeps them in contact with the local police or Carabinieri station,” Alfredo Mantovano told La Stampa.
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Legalisation of Vigilante Patrols Prompts Outcry in Italy
SILVIO BERLUSCONI’S government, which has already put several thousand soldiers on the streets of Italy, will today legalise vigilante patrols and set out the guidelines under which they will operate.
The plans prompted an outcry from opposition politicians and police unions, but got a mixed reception from Italy’s mayors, who must decide whether they want law enforcement volunteers in their towns. An overwhelming majority of those in favour run cities in the north, where the anti-immigrant Northern League has long argued for wider use of vigilantes.
Italian interior minister Roberto Maroni, a member of the Northern League, denied the plan was to introduce vigilantism: “The decree does not create [vigilante] patrols; it regulates them.”
After first rejecting the scheme, Rome’s mayor, Gianni Alemanno, a former neo-fascist, appears to have embraced it. The head of his council’s security committee, Fabrizio Santori, said vigilantes in fluorescent jackets would be deployed in parks, outside schools and at tourist sites.
Taking advantage of a gap in legislation, volunteers have formed groups to carry out patrols in cities including Milan, Padua, Parma and Bologna. Last month, vigilante groups from the left and the right clashed violently in the Tuscan town of Massa Carrara.
The rules will restrict groups such as the Italian National Guard, which is being investigated by a prosecutor in Turin. The guard, which claims 2,000 members, has a reconnaissance aircraft and a uniform, complete with armbands, reminiscent of the Nazi SA (Sturmabteilung).
The leader of Italy’s biggest opposition group, Dario Franceschini of the Democratic party, called the use of vigilantes “demagogic and dangerous”. — (Guardian service)
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Alhambra Archive and Library on-Line in September
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, AUGUST 5 — The Alhambra of Granada is known for the beauty of its Muslim architecture, but inside it another treasure is hiding, which will be accessible for the public from September: the documents of the archive and library on the history of the complex from the Catholic kings to modern times. The head of the Alhambra Archive and Library, Barbara Jimenez, explained to the press that the documents can be consulted through the internet, thanks to the Archive’s new scientific portal. All documents in the library have been digitalised, catalogued and conserved by a group of 15 archivists over a period of several years. As a result the whole Alhambra library is now available to the public. The scientific portal will give access to 386 drawings, 19,656 photographs, 159 edgings, 7,810 planimetries, 1,397 images of the Angel Barrios Fund, the books of the Romanones Fund and the Alhambra book collection. The collection will keep growing with the digitalisation of the archives still in progress. Last year, the Alhambra Archive and Library was visited by around a thousand researchers and was concluded 176,500 times. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: 100,000 Reports Per Year of Medical Malpractice
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, AUGUST 3 — The number of lawsuits for alleged malpractice in Spanish hospitals quadrupled in four years. In the country 100,000 cases are reported per year, according to a survey published today by daily Publico. In a recent case, Rayan, the baby of the first swine flu victim in Spain, died because he was given milk intravenously. The increase in lawsuits has led to changes in the health service, according to Civil Law professor of the University of La Coruña, Domingo Bello Janeiro, quoted by the newspaper. Many doctors and nurses are now practicing “defensive medicine”, subjecting their patients to many tests to prevent possible later claims. Moreover, the cost of insurance policies for medical professionals has gone up by more than 200%. Doctors demand a law on criteria to quantify medical damage and compensations, which in Spain doesn’t exist. Due to this lack of regulation, the parameters for damage payments in case of road accidents are often used. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Domestic Violence, 4 Out of 10 Victims Reported Abuse
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, AUGUST 4 — An announced massacre: 4 out of 10 women who were victim of domestic violence in the first half of the year in Spain had previously reported their assailant. This is what was reported today during a press conference in Madrid with the government delegate for violence against women, Miguel Llorente, who highlighted that 40% of the victims had reported a similar event to authorities, compared to 27% percent last year. 33 women have been killed since the beginning of the year, killed by their husband or ex-partner, 5 less than for the same period of 2008. The government representative also explained that there has been an almost 12% increase compared to last year in the number of women who refused the protection measures offered by the authorities. According to Llorent, once the violence is reported, “the perception of risk is reduced to a critical level” in the mistreated woman and this “is turning into the very serious results we are witnessing”. In other words, the victims put their guard down after having reported their assailant and this is often taken advantage of to deal the final blow. As the statistics released today show, the number of foreign women killed by their spouse or partner has gone down, passing from 37.9% in 2008 to 26.9% for the beginning of 2009, and the number of aggressors of other than Spanish nationality has gone down from 41% to 34% (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
UK: And Today’s Lesson is… Tess the Traveller, The PC Role Model for Children Learning to Read
There are few things more evocative of childhood innocence than primary school reading books.
Even the characters’ names — Janet and John, Peter and Jane, Topsy and Tim — conjure images of sunny picnics, friendly shopkeepers and spotless playgrounds.
But today’s first readers are learning of a very different (and very politically correct) world thanks to a series of storybooks featuring Tess the Traveller.
Tess lives in a truck with her son Toby and their dog Teabag and moves around the country in a set of books recommended by the Department for Children, Schools and Families.
The tales, aimed at ages three to seven, are on many education authorities’ reading lists.
Unlike the middle-class, two-parent families that usually star in such books, Tess is a single mother and at no point is Toby’s father mentioned.
And instead of a trip to the market or the beach, the stories show Tess making money cash-in-hand at a car boot sale and other travellers earning a living by picking fruit.
They also describe a gipsy dance at a horse fair, meeting friends who run a circus, a trip to a green gathering and fixing a flat tyre on the family’s mobile home.
The books have already been sent out to hundreds of primary schools and some large local education authorities have bought bulk sets to hand out to their schools.
It is part of a Government diversity drive to promote children’s awareness and tolerance of gipsy and traveller issues from a young age.
But critics accuse the stories of romanticising the traveller lifestyle and encouraging children to follow it instead of achieving in education.
Conservative MP Ann Widdecombe said: ‘If we’re really committed to family life in this country we need to show children the values of the family.
‘If we want to promote stability then we need to have books that show characters living with two parents in a conventional home.
‘Otherwise children will grow up believing that a traveller’s life is something beneficial.’
The books, which are recommended by the charity The Children’s Society, were paid for by a grant from the Lloyds TSB Foundation. The bank is 43 per cent state owned after the Government bailed it out with millions of pounds of public money.
A spokesman for Friends, Families and Travellers, which campaigns against discrimination towards gipsies and travellers, said the books would raise awareness among schoolchildren.
She added: ‘Children grow up learning about people from all sorts of backgrounds, so why not travellers?’
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Arrests at Anti-Islamic Protest
Police in Birmingham have arrested 33 people during protests by anti-fascists and a group demonstrating against Islamic fundamentalism.
One protest involved a group known as Casuals United, which police said were made up of local football fans.
Another “counter-protest” in the city centre was organised by Unite Against Fascism, West Midlands Police said.
The protest, which began at 1800 (BST), is ongoing and police said disorder had been sporadic.
A police spokeswoman said public safety was an “absolute priority”.
Speaking before the demonstration on the West Midlands Police website, Superintendent Matt Ward said there had been a similar protest against Islamic fundamentalism a month before which 70 to 90 people attended.
He said the police wanted to balance the rights of protesters with retailers and shoppers who wanted to use the city centre for their normal business.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Birmingham City Centre Protests: 31 Arrested
RIOT police fought running battles with rival protesters tonight as racial tensions spilled over on the streets of Birmingham.
West Midlands police arrested 31 people after violence broke out in the city centre between a group campaigning against Muslim extremists and members of an anti-BNP rally.
Both protests, held in separate parts of the city centre, had been conducted peacefully until violent skirmishes broke out on New Street at about 7pm.
Terrified shoppers cowered in Primark and Saturday night revellers fled in panic as police clad in riot gear struggled to contain the random outbreaks of violence.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Girl Dies of Meningitis After Swine Flu Diagnosis
A two-year-old girl died of suspected meningitis hours after paramedics diagnosed her with swine flu and told her parents to keep her at home.
Tasha Keeling and Paul Sewell called an ambulance after their daughter, Georgia Keeling, developed a rash, bruising and a high fever at home on Tuesday.
A paramedic diagnosed the toddler with swine flu and told her parents to give her Tamiflu and put her to bed, but hours later Mrs Keeling noticed her eyes glazing over and dialed 999 again.
Georgia was rushed to hospital, where medics fought to resuscitate her for 40 minutes before pronouncing her dead from suspected meningitis.
Her parents hit out yesterday at the treatment she received and insisted they had raised fears that she had meningitis.
Mr Sewell, of West Earlham, Norwich,: “She was failed by the system big time. I just want to know how come they didn’t take her into hospital straightaway.
“You trust them because they are qualified professionals, you don’t really think to question what they say.
“I’m not a doctor but you could see she was really ill.”
[Comments from JD: Obama’s health care plan is based on the UK one.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Lapping Up the Sun With His Super-Rich Friends… Mandy, The Man Who’s Supposed to be Running the Country
Whether mixing with the super-yacht set, or strolling poolside in Corfu, this was Lord Mandelson running Britain yesterday.
The Business Secretary took over the reins of power from Harriet Harman — but refused to cut short his holiday with the rich and famous on the Greek island.
He chose to oversee Whitehall business from 1,300 miles away, armed with little more than an official BlackBerry, his own mobile phone and a pair of swimming goggles.
Lord Mandelson is a guest of financier Nat Rothschild at his 30-acre estate on the north-east tip of Corfu. It is a repeat of his notorious visit 12 months ago, before his controversial return to the Cabinet.
Also there was Shadow Chancellor George Osborne, and the two men met controversial Russian businessman Oleg Deripaska. Mr Osborne later claimed that Lord Mandelson, then plain Mr and an EU Commissioner, had ‘poured pure poison’ into his ear about Gordon Brown.
But, within days, Labour’s original spinner had turned the tables with the help of Mr Rothschild, who revealed that Mr Osborne had tried to solicit a donation to the Tory Party from foreign-born Mr Deripaska, which would be banned under British election law.
Lord Mandelson spent much of yesterday soaking up the sun. But at 8.30pm he was down on the waterfront to meet Hollywood magnate David Geffen and other guests arriving by launch from Mr Geffen’s 452-foot super-yacht Rising Sun.
Lord Mandelson greeted the flamboyant music billionaire with a hug before the group walked through an olive grove for dinner at the Rothschild estate.
Mr Geffen shares the Rising Sun with software magnate Larry Ellison, the head of Oracle, who was entertaining Tony Blair on the same vessel off Sardinia just two weeks ago.
Downing Street went into a tailspin yesterday after it became clear that not one leading minister was in London to take charge in the event of a terrorist attack or other emergency such as a surge of swine flu.
The Mail has established that the Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell — ranked a lowly 16th out of 23 in Mr Brown’s Cabinet — was the most senior member actually at her desk.
Lord Mandelson’s aides confirmed that he had been ‘on call’ as day-to-day coordinator of government business from midnight, when Miss Harman’s turbulent fortnight at the helm came to an end and she headed for a family holiday in Italy.
They made clear that the Business Secretary will not be home until Monday afternoon.
No 10 spokesmen claimed that Gordon Brown, who is holidaying in Scotland, remains in charge and would step in if there was an emergency.
But Downing Street sources admitted that Lord Mandelson is the designated ‘heavy lifter’, expected to coordinate day-to-day business.
Officials admitted they had been aware of the impending black hole in Government holiday cover but chose to take the ‘media hit’ rather than ask ministers to rearrange their vacations.
‘What do you want us to do, make Harriet delay her holiday for three days when there’s nothing going on?’ one said.
The ‘nothing’ yesterday included the deaths of three more British soldiers in Afghanistan.
No 10 faced further embarrassment because it appeared that Lord Mandelson had violated an express order from Downing Street in a memo reading:
‘The Prime Minister expects duty ministers to be on duty in London or on departmental visits at all times.’
Downing Street aides claimed that edict applied only to the minister on call in each government department rather than for the Prime Minister’s own holiday stand-ins.
Asked whether the Business Secretary was running the country by BlackBerry, a colleague said: ‘You know Peter, he’s always on the phone.’
When Lord Mandelson flew to Corfu on Monday with the budget airline easyJet, one passenger revealed, he was twice asked to switch off his BlackBerry but sneakily continued using it behind a copy of the Financial Times.
Communication may not be so easy now, given the unpredictable mobile phone signal on Corfu.
In some inlets and tucked-away tavernas, mobile reception can be lost completely or the telecoms provider can unexpectedly switch to an Albanian network, raising issues about the security of Lord Mandelson’s calls home.
Tory Party chairman Eric Pickles said: ‘Lord Mandelson’s vicelike grip on power means he’s untouchable and can do whatever he wants.
‘You really know the country is in a shambolic state when we have an unelected official calling the shots from his holiday hideout.’
Liberal Democrat frontbencher Norman Baker added: ‘It doesn’t say much for their forward planning that Labour can’t even manage to leave one person in charge of the country who’s actually in the country.’
Last night it was reported that David Cameron will try to stop Lord Mandelson moving from the House of Lords to the House of Commons.
Amid speculation that the business secretary is hoping to make a come-back, the Conservatives will oppose a government measure allowing life peers to retire from the upper house and parachute back into the Commons into a safe Labour seat.
Mr Cameron’s ally Lord Strathclyde, Tory leader in the Lords, said he would ensure Mandelson remains ‘trapped’ on the red benches, according to
‘We will definitely oppose it’, he told the Financial Times.
Read more:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1205049/Lapping-sun-super-rich-friends—Mandy-man-whos-supposed-running-country.html
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Muslims Attack Anti-Sharia Protesters in Birmingham
Fascists assembling under the banner of uniting against fascism attacked football supporters who were protesting in Birmingham city centre against Islamic fundamentalism. We have seen many demonstrations in Britain over recent years at which Islamic radicals have been visible undermining the British state and its tradition of openness and tolerance. THIS article from the Daily Mail includes some footage of the brutality meted by Islamic radicals to the football supporters.
It seems that ever since the football supporters declared that they wanted to protest the developing British sharia state in Birmingham certain elements from the Muslim community seem to have been determined to try to undermine the protest with violence.
The violence that has apparently taken place in Birmingham illustrates the sad spectacle of our broken political protest here in Britain where laws are enacted to prevent the regular participation in the political process and the demonization of those who raise legitimate and reasonable concerns about immigration and the associated Islamisation.
I am sure that the mainstream media will, over the following days, demonize the football supporters’ concerns and sing the praises of those who attacked them. However, the British people are not stupid and will realize that the establishment is trying to mislead them.The British people need reassurances that Sharia law will NEVER be the law of the land in Great Britain but the authorities are not in a position to guarantee this.
| — Hat tip: Aeneas | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Prominent Imam Visits Blackburn
ONE of the world’s most prominent Muslim leaders came to Blackburn to lead prayers for thousands of worshippers.
Sheikh Dr Abdul Rahman Al Sudais, Imam and speaker of the Grand Mosque in Islam’s holiest city, Mecca, came to Masjid-e-Tauheedul Islam mosque, Bicknell Street, Blackburn.
The streets were cordoned off to allow an overflow of worshippers to pray outside, with temporary prayer mats laid down on the floor.
Sheikh Al Sudais led evening prayers and delivered a speech warning against linking Islam and terrorism, and calling on fellow Muslims to be “the best ambassadors of their country through good contact and character.”
He said Islam was a religion of peace and security.
The sheikh had been accompanies by police escort, diplomats and officials into the mosque on Sunday evening.
The congregation was hosted by Blackburn peer Lord Adam Patel, who spoke of the work of mosques across the country and thanked the sheikh for attending.
Speaking afterwards, he said the visit had to be arranged at short notice through the Saudi embassy.
He said: “I have never seen anything like it in all my time in Blackburn. Bicknell Street was totally blocked and we spread carpet on the street.
“It is a great honour for Blackburn, because Mecca is the holiest place in the world for Muslims.
“He gave us the message that Muslims are not just responsible for other Muslims, they are responsible for all of mankind.”
Sheikh Sudais had promised to return when the rebuilding of the Bicknell Street mosque was complete, Mr Patel said.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Pension Age ‘Could Rise Further’
The state pension retirement age could be increased further, the UK’s pensions regulator has told the BBC.
David Norgrove said rising life expectancy meant millions of people would “undoubtedly” have to wait longer in future to draw a state pension.
People will not save as much for retirement as in the past, with many people “frightened” to do so, he said.
The state pension age is due to rise to 68, and Pensions Minister Angela Eagle said there were no plans to raise that.
Government debt
Currently, the state pension age is 60 for women and 65 for men, but four years ago Lord Turner published a report calling for it to rise to 68 for everyone by 2044.
But Mr Norgrove said he thought it would end up higher.
Mr Norgrove said: “People are going to have to work longer, partly because we’re not going, as a nation, to save as much for retirement as we did in the past.”
He added: “The government’s recent legislation is increasing the state retirement age progressively to 68. I think it will end up higher than that.”
He said the ability of the current working generation to pay for the retirement of its predecessor would be “a real issue for the next 30 years”, not least because of a lack of knowledge among the public about how to save.
“The evidence is that people generally are frightened of saving for pensions,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Swine Flu Hotline Run by 16-Year-Olds: NHS Pays GCSE Pupils to Give Advice and Hand Out Drugs
An NHS call centre is employing 16-year-olds to assess suspected cases of swine flu.
They earn up to £16.40 an hour reading out a prepared script of questions.
It is their responsibility to hand out powerful anti-viral drugs such as Tamiflu — known to have violent side-effects.
The revelation comes amid concerns that problems with the phone hotline are leading to incorrect diagnoses.
At least eight pupils from the same school are among 15 youngsters employed at the pandemic hotline call centre in Watford.
Many have been working late into the night, in contravention of employment law guidelines for under-18s.
A source said last night: ‘Some of the kids are just so young I would be surprised if they could even spell the word pandemic.’
Liberal Democrat health spokesman Sandra Gidley called the news worrying.
‘Expecting people with little or no experience to work on such a complex subject is irresponsible,’ she said.
‘It’s bad enough that people can answer three questions and bingo, you get Tamiflu. The danger is that the Government, far far from being prepared as it claimed, is actually rushing things through in a way that is bad for the public.’
The call centre held a weekend of job interviews to find 800 part-time staff to supplement 200 existing full-time workers.
Some 5,000 people queued outside the headquarters of NHS Professionals, lured by £10 an hour on weekdays and £16.40 at weekends.
It is one of 19 centres set up in July after Health Secretary Andy Burnham announced a National Pandemic Flu Service.
The centre opens at 8am and closes its lines at midnight. Staff generally work ten-hour shifts, the last of which runs until midnight.
Under UK employment law, with a handful of exceptions, no one between 16 and 18 should work between 10pm and 6am. They should work no more than eight hours a day or 40 a week.
The new staff were given three hours of training in how to read a prepared script of questions to discover whether a caller — or a member of their family — was exhibiting swine flu symptoms.
If the caller answers yes to a certain number of questions, the call centre worker can suggest taking Tamiflu.
Callers are given an authorisation number which they hand to a ‘flu friend’ who can pick up the anti-viral from a collection point.
But an insider claimed that operators were advising higher numbers of people to get Tamiflu ‘so they could show they were working hard’.
The source added: ‘Not only is the Department of Health employing young kids awaiting their GCSE results — they also hire people who simply cannot make themselves understood to the public.
‘Many have accents which are difficult to understand and some have difficulty in reading from the prepared script.’
NHS Professionals is a not-for-profit company which supplies temporary workers to the NHS. It employs around 46,000 staff.
The revelation that GCSE students are diagnosing flu comes just days after nine out of ten family doctors said they feared phone diagnosis would lead to serious diseases being missed.
NHS Professionals refused to discuss the hiring of schoolchildren and referred questions to the Department of Health.
Last night, the Department said: ‘As soon as it was brought to the call centre’s attention that a small number of call workers under 18 had worked past ten o clock, they took immediate action.
‘The call centre is now using a workforce management application to ensure that no one under 18 works past 10pm.
‘Call workers were recruited because they were the best candidates for the job.’
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Universities Close Courses to UK Pupils
Up to 40,000 Britons will not get places but overseas students are still welcome
LEADING universities have closed their doors to well-qualified British applicants while recruiting heavily from overseas candidates paying up to £15,000 a year.
Institutions including Bristol, Edinburgh, Nottingham and Surrey are exploiting a government policy which puts no restrictions on the lucrative international student market, while imposing strict caps on British numbers.
The situation will be exacerbated by clearing, the last-minute scramble for degree places that follows next week’s A-level results.
There has been a surge of 9.7% in university applications, partly from school-leavers wanting to delay going into the labour market during the recession. But despite Labour falling about 7% short of Tony Blair’s target of half of young people going to university by 2010, the government has refused to fund enough places to take the extra applicants. Even after clearing, some 20,000-40,000 are expected to be left with no place at all this autumn.
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The clearing crisis
Meanwhile, universities will be allowed to advertise places in clearing as being available only to non-European Union students, compounding the frustration for British applicants.
“The brutal fact is that foreign students bring in much more money than British ones — that is exactly why the government needs to reform the system,” said David Willetts, the shadow universities secretary.
“We are going to have large numbers of British students with good A-levels who can’t get a place even while they are recruiting more from abroad than ever.”
In addition to recruiting foreign students in clearing, universities court those who contact them directly for advice.
Last week, Sunday Times reporters posing as foreign applicants or teachers at overseas schools phoned admissions staff at dozens of institutions in the Russell Group and 1994 Group of top research-based universities.
Admissions staff at nine said they were closed to applications from Britain but would welcome those from abroad.
A staff member at Bristol’s chemistry department, where non-EU students pay £14,750 a year compared with the £3,225 charged to British and EU undergraduates, told a reporter posing as a representative of a foreign school: “Let’s be perfectly frank about it. For overseas students, the university will bend over backwards because they are paying astronomical fees.”
At Nottingham, an official in biology said the course would be entering clearing “potentially for international”, but for home or EU students — “no places for those, unfortunately”.
At Cardiff, a member of the maths staff said: “There’s a cap for home students and we’re full up … but we’d be interested in international for sure.”
Staff on other courses said they were in a similar position, including English and physics at Bristol; law and management at Leeds; nine different subjects at Edinburgh; history at Sheffield; English at Newcastle; economics at Manchester and psychology at Surrey.
While many universities created since 1992 are growing, older ones are freezing or cutting numbers of British students.
University College London has completed this year’s recruitment, but plans by 2012 to cut UK undergraduates by about 600 and replace them with undergraduates and postgraduates from outside the EU. This is to improve its finances and become more international. Surrey has introduced a similar policy on a smaller scale.
Divya Pathak, 18, daughter of a teacher and an accountant from Hounslow, west London, is among British students frustrated by the system.
Pathak, a former pupil at Heston community school, is planning a gap year after rejection by all her chosen universities — King’s College London, Queen Mary, Cardiff and Sheffield — to study dentistry. This was despite being predicted three As and a B at A-level.
“My form tutor tried to discourage me and said it was difficult to get in, but I’ve wanted to be a dentist pretty much all my life.” Pathak said it was “pretty unfair” overseas students were still able to find places while those for British applicants were so squeezed.
Anthony McClaran, chief executive of the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service, said: “I understand it is frustrating, but overseas students make up only around 10% of total numbers.”
Universities contacted this weekend said while they understood some applicants were frustrated, they were acting in accordance with rules that impose penalties for exceeding quotas on UK students but place no curbs on overseas numbers. Several, including Bristol, said they had not finalised this year’s clearing policy.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Bosnia: 2009 Foreign Investments Total 204.4 Mln Euros
(ANSAmed) — ROME, AUGUST 3 — During the first half of 2009, foreign investments into Bosnia Herzegovina totalled 204.4 million euros according to reports in the Italian Trade Commission (ICE) Office in Sarajevo, which cited data issued by the Foreign Investment Promotion Agency of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FIPA). The most important investments included projects by Austrian companies totalling 36.6 million euros, followed by Croatian projects, which reached 13.7 million euros. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia-Russia: Joint Company for Gas Pipeline to be Formed
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, AUGUST 5 — A joint company of Russian Gazprom and Serbian Srbijagas for the construction of a section of the South Stream gas pipeline in Serbia will be founded in Switzerland by September 15, Srbijagas general manager Dusan Bajatovic said, reports BETA news agency. Bajatovic said that this was agreed at a meeting with Gazprom representatives in Moscow. “The company will be called South Stream Serbia,” Bajatovic said, adding that participants in the meeting also discussed the manner of financing the joint company and forming a daughter company in Serbia, for the sake of acquiring a gas business license in Serbia. Bajatovic also said that Gazprom and Srbijagas officials agreed on the beginning of work of a technical team that will perform a feasibility study on the construction of the pipeline in Serbia. “The final investment decision on the construction of the South Stream pipeline is to be made after the completion of a feasibility study for the entire project, which is due to be done by the end of June 2010,” Bajatovic said. The basic agreement on forming a joint company for the pipeline’s section in Serbia was signed by Bajatovic and Gazprom head Alexei Miller in May. Gazprom will control the majority 51% stake in the joint company, whereas Srbijagas will hold 49%.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia-Croatia: Cross-Border Cooperation Program Presented
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, AUGUST 5 — The first Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA) cross-border cooperation program between Croatia and Serbia by 2013, worth EUR3.24 million, was unveiled in Novi Sad, reports BETA news agency. At the presentation, officials pointed out that cross-border cooperation projects in the fields agriculture, cross-border research, development of innovations, tourism, the protection of natural resources in border regions, and the enhancement of good neighborly relations of local communities on both sides of the border will be financed within the program. They also emphasized the program’s general goal, which enables the creation of capacities of local, regional and state institutions for the implementation of EU programs and their preparation for future EU structural funds. The officials also presented instructions for project applicants, the application form and budget, as well as application and project evaluation procedures. Of the EUR3.24 million IPA funds for this program, Croatia will receive EUR1.44 million, while Serbia will get EUR1.8 million. (ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Slovenia and Croatia to Jointly Govern Piran Bay
The condominium, i.e. joint governance, is a solution advocated by Peter Tos, one of the heads of the joint commission for borders.
Peter Tos, former Slovene diplomat who headed the joint Croatian-Slovene commission for borders, presented his vision of the best solution of the diplomatic soap opera between Croatia and Slovenia to the Slovene Dnevnik.si daily. According to him, “the optimal solution would be a condominium over the Savudria Cove”, i.e. Piran Bay. Tos hopes that talks between the two countries would continue in this direction.
- None of the countries advocate such a solution. It enables Slovenia free access to the open sea and spreading of the fishery zone, i.e. it does not seize Croatian territory and does not limit the contact of its territorial sea with Italian — Tos told the Dnevnik daily.
Slovene media guess that Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor and her Slovene counterpart Borut Pahor discussed this solution at a recent meeting in Trakoscan.
Tom has a lot of confidence in Croatia’s Kosor, saying that Slovenia and Croatia will now finally resolve the border dispute on their own, without a third party, “especially now that Croatia has a new premier”.
Slovenes and Croats have had enough of the dispute
Former Croatia PM Ivo Sanader sent out Slovenia rather a dramatic message on several occasions: Croatia will not buy European Union membership with territorial compromises to Slovenia.
However, Sanader’s firm position may have made the Slovenes compromise and think of a condominium, given that the aggressive plan of using their EU member status for attaining territory has failed, much like Italy did to Slovenia during its EU accession process.
Peter Tos pointed out to the media that “quiet diplomacy” was essential at this point, adding that the citizens of both countries have had enough of the border dispute. According to him, the time is right for a final solution. Furthermore, Tos shares PM Pahor’s optimism, as presented in Trakoscan, for the “final solution” to be reached by the end of year.
Condominium exists only in theory
In political theory, i.e. international law, a condominium is a political territory in which two sovereign powers have equal rights. The countries can also jointly govern this territory, without dividing it to national zones. Although condominia are recognised in legal systems as a theoretical possibility, they are rare in practice. The biggest problem and reason why there are so few of them, are difficulties in securing co-operation between the countries. For instance, the Caspian Sea is a condominium between Russia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, just as the small Pheasant island is a French-Spanish condominium. Furthermore, Croatian port Rijeka became a condominium of Hungary and Croatia within the Habsburg Monarchy in 1868.
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Archaeology: Algiers, 2,000 Years of History Under Casbah
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, AUGUST 5 — Two thousand years of history found by chance under the Casbah in the heart of Algiers: evidence of a past which dates from the colonial period to the Ottoman empire, to the Romans and perhaps as far back as the Punic civilisation has been uncovered just a few metres below the surface. Objects from the French colonial period were brought to light during work on a metro station in Martyrs Square, work was stopped and archaeologists were brought in to replace workers from the Ministry of Transport. A blacksmith’s workshop from the Ottoman period was discovered at a depth of 2.30 metres. “We found ovens and iron tools which were still intact” explained archaeologist Arifi Lyes, “they were used to make weapons and domestic implements”. The workshop was probably situated in an artisans’ district and was built on top of a medieval city whose remains were discovered, including a cemetery with skeletons which were still intact. The team of 20 Algerian and 8 French archaeologists unearthed a Paleo-Christian basilica from the 4th-5th century AD, where the bases of the columns are still visible, showing a space 20 metres wide with a geometric mosaic floor. Going back a few centuries the archaeologists uncovered a perfectly preserved stone wall from the 1st century BC, when Algeria was known as Numidia. In these 4.5 metres the history of Algiers goes back 2,000 years, but archaeologists want to carry on digging in the hope of finding traces of the Punic period when the city of Ikosim was founded by the Phoenicians during the 3rd century BC. There is a good chance that their hopes are not unfounded, as a small collection of coins with Ikosim writing and the profile of a man, possibly the Phoenician god Malquart, was unearthed during excavations years ago along one of the streets of the Casbah, which was named a Unesco World heritage site in 1992. (ANSAmed)
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Egyptian Cadres Receive Nuclear-Safety Courses
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, AUGUST 5 — Adopting an integrated strategy to train its cadres in the field of nuclear safety and radiation control, Egypt is aiming to hone the competitive skills of engineers and technicians to serve its civilian nuclear program. Hassan Younis, the Egyptian Electricity Minister, said Wednesday work teams have been formed to set regulations and conduct field studies, besides, of course, inspecting nuclear sites. Experts from the National Center for Nuclear Safety and Radiation Control (NCNSRC) are training the cadres as part of phase one of this strategy, Younis said. Seven experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency are expected here this month to hold a workshop as a second step, the minister added. He made it clear that the third stage has to do with inking agreements with foreign parties, such as the EU, to upgrade the NCNSRC. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Morocco: Monarchy Survey, Newspaper Turns to Court
(ANSAmed) — RABAT, AUGUST 4 — The publishing group TelQuel presented a formal complaint to a Casablanca court after the seizure of two newspapers that had published a survey on the Moroccan monarchy, sources from the group reported. Yesterday the interior ministry approved the seizure and the destruction of 100,000 copies of the TelQuel weekly and the Arabic version, Nichane, as a result of the survey on the monarchy that was carried out in collaboration with the French paper Le Monde, which was also seized. The Moroccan group asked for the annulment of the decision made by the ministry and the court responded that the request would be examined today. The survey showed an alluring opinion of the monarchy. In fact 91% of those interviewed judged the first ten years of the reign of Mohammed IV in a positive light. But the Communication Minister, Khalid Naciri, declared that “the monarchy is not an equation and cannot be the subject of debate, not even through surveys”. The seizure of the August 4 edition of Le Monde brought the intervention of the French Foreign Minister, who stated that he was “surprised and saddened” over the decision of the Moroccan authorities. A condemnation of the seizure of the papers was expressed by the Moroccan Press Union and Reporters Without Borders. (ANSAmed).
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Morocco: Monarchy Survey, French Government Protests
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, AUGUST 4 — The French government has protested over the seizure in Morocco of yesterday’s Le Monde newspaper which published the survey on the first ten years of Mohammed IV carried out in collaboration with the Moroccan weekly TelQuel on the front page. “We are very surprised over the decision that we are criticising. We are particularly attached to freedom of expression, in that it is protected under the UN International Pact regarding civil and political rights that was also signed by Morocco, and the related subject of freedom of the press”, declared a spokesperson from the French Foreign Ministry. The survey was carried out from June 27 to July 11 on a sample of 1,108 Moroccans above the age of 18, by the LMS-CSA institute, the Moroccan subsidiary of the French institute CSA, for the two papers. King Mohammed IV’s popularity was confirmed, but the survey also showed some criticism on the fight against poverty and promoting women’s rights, an issue supported by the King. According to 49% of the interviewees, too many rights were given to women, while 30% stated that more rights should not be given to them. (ANSAmed).
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Fatah: Return Jerusalem Before Talks Go On (2)
Fatah’s sixth General Assembly on Saturday approved a resolution saying Jerusalem is an “integral part of the Palestinian homeland and political entity” and vowing to foil Israel’s alleged efforts to erase the city’s Arab and Islamic character.
The resolution is the latest in a series of hard-line decisions that were adopted by the conference over the past few days.
The new resolution says that Fatah considers Jerusalem a “red line” that no one could cross. It defines Jerusalem as the “eternal capital of Palestine, the Arab world and the Islamic and Christian worlds.”
The city “is awaiting our sacrifices” and Fatah pledges to continue to make sacrifices “until Jerusalem returns to the Palestinians void of settlers and settlements,” according to the resolution.
The conference also endorsed the Aksa Martyrs Brigades as Fatah’s official armed wing.
Zakariya Zubeidi, one of the commanders of the armed group who delivered a speech before the assembly over the weekend, hailed the decision.
He said the decision to endorse his group was announced by Othman Abu Gharbiyeh, chairman of Fatah’s sixth General Assembly.
“Abu Gharbiyeh announced before the conference that Fatah would never give up the Aksa Martyrs Brigades,” Zubeidi said. “He stressed that the endorsement of our group was parallel to the continued brandishing of the olive branch as a symbol for peace.”
Zubeidi is among some 700 delegates who have presented their candidacy for the 120-member Revolutionary Council. He said that if elected he would represent the Aksa Martyrs Brigades in the council.
Fatah leaders had initially banned Zubeidi, who for many years was wanted by Israel for his involvement in terrorism, from participating in the meetings of the conference.
However, under pressure from many Fatah members, he was eventually permitted to attend as a delegate representing the armed group.
The Aksa Martyrs Brigades, which was established shortly after the beginning of the second intifada in September 2000, has been responsible for many terrorist attacks — including suicide bombings — that killed and wounded hundreds of people.
Zubeidi was not the only member of the Brigades to attend the conference. Another top operative of the armed group, Rabi Hamed from Ramallah, also attended the meetings.
The endorsement of the group as Fatah’s official armed wing contradicts promises made by the Fatah leadership to the effect that the Aksa Martyrs Brigades have been dismantled.
Moreover, it shows that the group is still active in the West Bank and that its gunmen are active members in some of Fatah’s institutions.
The conference also decided to appoint 20 Fatah security prisoners held in Israeli jails as members of the Revolutionary Council, “in honor of the sacrifices and devotion of all the prisoners.”
Issa Qaraqi, the Palestinian Authority’s minister for prisoners affairs, said the decision was aimed at sending a message to Israel that the Palestinian prisoners are not “murderers and terrorists.”
Also on Saturday, the conference unanimously elected PA President Mahmoud Abbas as “general commander” of Fatah for another five-year term. Abbas was the only candidate for the top post.
His election was received with thunderous applause by a majority of delegates.
“Everyone came to the conference with a desire to achieve the goal of liberating the land,” Abbas said in a short speech after his election.
The Foreign Ministry spokesman said the Israeli government had no comment on the statements coming from the conference.
Delegates were supposed to vote on Friday for new members of the Revolutionary Council and the Central Committee of Fatah. However, the vote was postponed until Sunday due to a row over the participation of delegates from the Gaza Strip.
Hundreds of Fatah members have been banned by Hamas from leaving the Strip to attend the conference. Their absence has been exploited by the Fatah leadership in the West Bank to squeeze the Gaza Strip representatives out of the faction’s key decision-making bodies.
To avoid a deepening crisis, some Fatah operatives have raised the possibility that the faction’s members in the Gaza Strip would cast their votes either by phone or e-mail or at ballot boxes stationed inside the Qatari Embassy in Gaza City or on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing.
At least 110 delegates have presented their candidacy for membership of the Central Committee, considered the most important Fatah institution. The committee, which has only 21 members, has long been dominated by old guard leaders of Fatah.
Veteran Fatah leaders appeared determined over the weekend to retain exclusive control over the committee. About 85 percent of the candidates are considered representatives of the old guard.
On Friday, the conference witnessed yet another stormy session as delegates discussed the circumstances that led to Fatah’s collapse in the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007.
Addressing the conference, the former Fatah security commander in the Gaza Strip, Muhammad Dahlan, held the movement’s political leadership responsible for the Hamas victory.
He accused the Fatah leadership of failing to take action to prevent the Gaza Strip from falling into the hands of Hamas. He said that the Fatah Central Committee even refused to issue a statement condemning the assassination attempt on the life of Tarek Abu Rajab, then head of the PA’s General Intelligence Service in the Strip.
Dahlan added that when Hamas militiamen surrounded the home of Muhammad Gharib, another Fatah security commander, for 12 hours before murdering him in cold blood, the Fatah leadership failed to act to save his life.
Dahlan criticized the findings of a special commission of inquiry that was formed after the defeat of Fatah, saying it had indicted those who fought but lost instead of blaming those who “colluded” with Hamas.
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Fatah: Return Jerusalem Before Talks Go On
The sixth Fatah General Assembly decreed on Saturday that the return of both east and west Jerusalem to Palestinian control was a “red line” which was non-negotiable, and would need to be fulfilled before any peace talks with Israel could renew, Israel Radio reported.
According to the report, a document adopted by the Fatah delegates of the assembly declared that Palestinians would “continue to be sacrificed until residents of Jerusalem are free of settlements and settlers.” The document went on to state that all of Jerusalem, including the surrounding villages, belonged to the Palestinians, and lands conquered following the Six Day War shared the same status as those located within the Green Line.
Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz blasted the statement Saturday, saying that the declaration was a clear message to all those who maintained the “illusion that the Palestinians were prepared for compromise,” Israel Radio reported.
Israel should take legal steps in response to the decree, Israel Radio quoted the minister as saying. According to the report, he urged the government to expand the municipal authority of Jerusalem to include Ma’aleh Adumim, Givat Ze’ev, Gush Etzion, and Beitar. In addition, Katz encouraged further construction in surrounding neighborhoods so as to increase Jewish presence in the city.
Also at the conference on Saturday, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was named head of Fatah.
“This convention must be a new beginning for the Fatah movement,” said Abbas to thunderous applause. “In our history we’ve had many launches and setbacks. Sometimes we have reached the edge of the abyss — but we have always returned stronger,” he said.
Hundreds of delegates cheered and clapped as senior Fatah official Tayib Abdul Rahim announced that Abbas was chosen to lead the party. There was no vote because no other candidate came forward to challenge Abbas’ five-year rule.
Technically Abbas can only lead the party for five years, until a new conference is announced, but this is the first time Fatah members have met in 20 years and it is not clear when they will convene again.
| — Hat tip: CB | [Return to headlines] |
Israel and the ‘Realists’
Voices in America calling for downgrading US relations with Israel seem to multiply by the day. One of the new voices in the growing anti-Israel chorus is the Atlantic’s well-respected military affairs commentator, Robert Kaplan. This week Kaplan authored a column for the magazine’s online edition titled “Losing patience with Israel.”
There he expressed his support for the US to downgrade its relations with Israel while pressuring Israel to allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons and to facilitate the establishment of a Judenrein Palestinian state.
Although Kaplan’s piece adds nothing new to the current pile-on against Israel, it is a relatively concise summary of the so-called “realist” view of Israel, and for that reason it is worth considering his arguments.
As Kaplan sees things, the US’s experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan in the eight years since the September 11 attacks have transformed America’s interests and goals in the Middle East. The frustrations in Afghanistan and the combat losses in Iraq have rendered “the search for stability, rather than democracy, paramount, and created a climate in which interests are to be valued far more than friends.”
The notion that friends and interests may actually not be in conflict is roundly rejected by Kaplan, particularly in the case of Israel. He gives three reasons why the US’s alliance with Israel no longer serves its interests. First, he repeats the familiar “realist” claim that the only way for America to build good relations with the Muslim world is by distancing itself from Israel.
Second, he argues that after September 11, the US was wrong to believe that it shares common interests with Israel. Whereas Israel’s interests would be served by preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, in Kaplan’s view, the US can afford to look on a nuclear-armed Iran with indifference. On the other hand, an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear installations can place US forces in Iraq at risk. Hence, as far as Kaplan is concerned, American interests are best served by allowing Iran to become a nuclear power and preventing Israel from doing anything to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear power.
The third reason why Kaplan views Israel as a strategic liability to the US in this new era of “realism” is because it is no longer a strong military power. As he put it, Israel’s failure to defeat Hizbullah and Hamas in its recent wars in Lebanon and Gaza “reduced its appeal.”
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Swine Flu: Israel, 50 Kabbalists on Plane Against Infection
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, AUGUST 5 — As swine flu begins to worry seriously health authorities in Israel, with two people dead so far and some 2,000 mild cases, 50 Kabbalistic rabbis decided to battle the illness by embarking on a special airplane they have chartered to fly over the Jewish state. Once airborne the rabbis will blow ritual Jewish horns and recite psalms, the newspaper ha-Yom reported. Organiser of the unusual rite is the head of the Nahar Shalom rabbinical college in Jerusalem, Benyahu Shmueli. He explained that the threatening form of influenza is a consequence of the “degeneration of habits,” among Israelis. “Mouth hygiene must be maintained,” he suggested in what was evidently also a reference to the habit in ultra Orthodox circles of being verbally virulent against their rivals. Rabbi Shumueli also condemned the “Gay Parades” that have been held in Israeli cities, terming them “one of the most abominable phenomena today.” Orthodox Jews should not, however, express anger to lay people as they are “only child-like souls, contaminated despite themselves,” Shmueli said. (ANSAmed).
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Embassy Workers on Trial in Iran
Two Iranian employees of the British and French embassies in Tehran and a French teacher are among a group on trial in Iran after its disputed poll.
Hundreds were arrested during violent protests that erupted in the wake of the 12 June presidential election.
Those on trial are accused of acting against Iran’s national security by taking part in the protests and spying.
Opposition leaders say such proceedings are “show trials”. The French and UK governments say they are “outrages”.
Last week more than 100 people appeared in court in Tehran on charges including conspiracy. Several leading reformers were among the detainees.
There are reports that riot police dispersed a large crowd, including relatives of defendants, from outside the court.
‘Spying for foreigners’
This is the second group trial of those accused of taking part in the post-election unrest. Reformist lawmakers and journalists were among the group, all wearing grey prison clothes.
Hossein Rassam, the most senior Iranian employee at the British embassy, is accused of “spying for foreigners”, Iranian state media quoted the judge as saying.
Mr Rassam was held after the protests with eight other embassy colleagues and later released on bail.
Prosecutors accuse him of monitoring the riots on the ground along with two UK diplomats who have since been expelled.
The prosecutors say he was asked to meet representatives of political groups, ethnic and religious minorities and student groups, and inform London about the riots, state media reported.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Energy: Bahrain Announces Solar Power Plan
(ANSAmed) — MANAMA, AUGUST 5 — Bahrain will be able to generate renewable energy from the sun and wind in three years, government officials have said. Plans are currently being drawn up by a newly formed committee to develop solar and wind energy sources, Abdul Majeed Ali Alawadhi told a press conference, according to a report in the Gulf Daily News. “The committee held its first meeting last month where they drew up a plan to develop two solar and wind energy,” he said. “We expect to start using renewable energy in Bahrain in nearly three years.” The press conference was to update progress on the $1.2bn GCC power grid, which connects Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar to a single power source. Alawadhi told local media that the grid would be able to use nuclear power if member states adopted this form of energy production. The UAE and Oman are set to link up to the power grid in the future.
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Health Care Personnel for Mecca Pilgrimages Increased
(ANSAmed) — ROME, AUGUST 3 — The Saudi Arabian Pilgrimage (Hajj) Ministry has decided to employ a large team of doctors and nurses in the association that deals with organising pilgrimages to Mecca (Tawafa), which will take place this November. According to Arab News newspaper, which is covering the story, the decision was made mainly to protect pilgrims from a possible swine flu pandemic. “The ministry is in constant contact with health care officials to implement all of the necessary precautionary measures to combat the flu,” said Fouad Al-Farsy, the Pilgrimage Minister. Al-Farsy then underlined the efforts made by the government of Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries involved in the organisation of the event, stating that the increase in the number of participants in minor pilgrimages (Umrah) “by 300,000 compared to 2008 is an indication that we are acting properly”. (ANSAmed).
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Iraq: State TV Announces Removal of Blast Walls and Reopens Streets
The blast walls that have divided Baghdad communities and turned its streets into canyons of concrete since the US-led invasion in 2003 will be removed within 40 days, the al-Iraqiyya state TV announced yesterday citing an official decree attributed to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. Official confirmation is attended on the news, reported also by the ‘Aswat al-Iraq’ news agency. In its service, al-Iraqiyya added that among the roads to be reopened to traffic will be the one that from Damascus square crosses the Green Zone, home to government offices and western embassies that since 2003 has been among the most protected and defended zones. Attacks and violence however continue in Baghdad and other areas of the country, though with less intensity of the years following the US military intervention.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Lebanon: Saudi Loan to Build Arab Highway
(ANSAmed) — ROME, AUGUST 3 — The government of Saudi Arabia has said that it wants to offer a low-interest loan of 50 million USD to the Lebanese government to build an Arab Highway, which will connect Beirut and Damascus. In May of 2009 construction began on the first sections of the motorway thanks of financing from the Saudi Fund for Development and the OPEC Fund for International Development. (ANSAmed).
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Sailing: Emirates to Host the Next America’s Cup
(ANSAmed) — ROME, AUGUST 5 — The United Arab Emirates (UAE) will host the 33th edition of the America’s Cup. The choice was officially announced today by the Swiss Alinghi team, current holder of the Cup and therefore organiser of the next race. “The Emirate of Ras al-Khaimah will host the 33rd edition of the America’s Cup,” said Fred Meyer, deputy commodore of the Geneva Nautical Society for which the Alinghi team competes, this morning. Following an ancient sailing tradition, the holder of the Cup has the right to choose the location for the next race where it will try and defend the Cup from its challengers. The Swiss team has picked the Emirates after excluding other options like Spain, Italy, Greece and Brazil. “The meteorological situation at this location is exceptional and very good for sailing races in February. The local authorities are interested in the event and are willing to support the event,” said Mayer when motivating the choice for Ras al-Khaimah. Ras al-Khaimah, one of the seven emirates of the UAE, has a surface of 1,700 square kilometres. It borders with Oman and is located in the southern part of the Persian Gulf. Around 200 thousand people live in the country that is reigned by Sheikh Saqr bin Mohammad Al-Qassimi. At the age of 91, the sheikh is the oldest king in the world. The capital Ras al-Khaimah is less than an hour away from the international airport of Dubai. An artificial island of 22 hectares will be constructed for the participants in the sailing competition, the press and the public. The island will be part of the Al Hamra Village lagoon, a new luxury resort with more than 3,500 homes on the coast of Ras al-Khaimah. No cost to the project has yet been announced, but Sheikh Saqr bin Mohammad Al-Qassimi expressed his satisfaction at the news that his emirate had been chosen. “It is a great moment for us to host the America’s Cup here. It is significant because it reflects how the Emirates have become a place for hosting international events. It is also a reflection on what we have achieved in terms of becoming the destination for tourists and trade and industry and is a reflection of our integration in the world at large”. Sailing is one of the most practiced sports in the Arab Emirates: there are more than 500 clubs in the various coast cities and more than 80 shipyards which build all kinds of sailing ships. The 33rd America’s Cup — preceded by the elimination stage in which will be determined who will be allowed to challenge Alinghi — will be awarded to the winner after three races, which will start on February 8 2010. On Friday Alinghi will arrive at the port of Genoa to start an intensive training period. (ANSAmed).
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Syria: Possible Agreement With Italian Tratos
(ANSAmed) — DAMASCUS, JULY 30 — The Syrian Industrial Ministry recently discussed the possibility of a joint venture between the Communications Ministry and the General Engineering Establishment with Tratos Cavi, an Italian company that manufactures fibre optic cables. The Italian Trade Commission (ICE) office in Damascus specified that Tratos presented a feasibility study for a 9-million euro project involving a plant capable of manufacturing 4500km of cable per year. (ANSAmed).
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Terrorists Kidnap, Torture Boy to Bully Iraqi Policeman
FALLUJA, Iraq (CNN) — Like many young boys, Khidir loves playing with toy cars and wants to be a policeman like his father when he grows up. But it was his father’s very job that caused the tiny child to suffer the unimaginable.
Khidir was just 6 years old when he was savagely ripped away from his family, kidnapped by al Qaeda operatives in Iraq.
“They beat me with a shovel, they pulled my teeth out with pliers, they would go like this and pull it,” said Khidir, now 8, demonstrating with his hands. “And they would make me work on the farm gathering carrots.”
What followed was even more horrific, an ordeal that would last for two years in captivity. Khidir and his father spoke to CNN recently, more than half a year after his rescue by Iraqi police.
“This is where they hammered a nail into my leg and then they pulled it out,” he says, lifting up his pant leg to show a tiny wound.
He says his captors also pulled out each of his tiny fingernails, broke both his arms, and beat him repeatedly on the side of the head with a shovel. He still suffers chronic headaches. He remembers them laughing as they inflicted the pain.
“I would think about my mommy and daddy,” he replies, when asked how he managed to get through the agony.
His father, Abdul Qader, struggles for words. “When he tells me about how they would torture him, I can’t tolerate it. I start crying,” he says. “What hurts me the most is when they hammered a nail into his leg.”
The father, a police officer, was sleeping at the police station in Falluja when his son was kidnapped. It was too dangerous to go home regularly. Although Falluja was no longer controlled by insurgents, assassinations against police were common.
“I woke up to the sound of a huge explosion … and then I heard my name on the radio. I ran outside and they came to me saying your house was blown up,” he says.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey Plays Double Game on EU Energy Security
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS — Turkey has agreed to grant access to Russia’s South Stream gas pipeline through its part of the Black Sea, in a move which could hurt the prospects of an EU-backed project to reduce Russian energy dependency.
The Turkish deal is a major breakthrough for the Russian pipeline, which has to cross the maritime economic areas of either Turkey or Ukraine, but with Ukraine very unlikely to give consent.
At a signing ceremony in Ankara on Thursday (6 August), Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, insisted that South Stream is not a rival to the EU-backed Nabucco pipeline project.
“Even with the construction of South Stream, Nabucco will not be closed,” Mr Putin said at a news conference. “The more infrastructure projects, the better, because that will create reliability and stability of energy supply to Europe.”
The European Commission also officially rejects the idea the two projects are in competition.
“We consider [South Stream] a complementary initiative to our ongoing Nabucco efforts,” commission spokesman Martin Selmayr said at a press briefing in Brussels.
South Stream is designed to bring more Russian gas under the Black Sea to Bulgaria and Italy. Nabucco is to bring gas from Caspian Sea area countries to Europe via Turkey, bypassing Russia.
Experts warn that if South Stream is built the EU will be forced to buy Caspian gas at a much higher price, however.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
UAE Population to Top 5 Million for First Time, Ministry
(ANSAmed) — ABU DHABI, AUGUST 4 — The UAE’s population will exceed five million for the first time at the end of this year, new official figures show. The bulk of the increase of nearly 300,000 people will be in the expatriate community while Dubai is projected to maintain its status as the most populated emirate in the UAE for the second year running, the Ministry of Economy report said as reported by Arabian Business online. The report goes against previous claims that the UAE’s population would shrink in 2009, mainly due to the thousands of expats who lost their jobs during the global economic crisis and left the country. But the new report says the country’s total population will peak at more than 5 million at the end of 2009, an annual growth of around 6.3 percent, Emirates Business reported. The local population will grow from about 892,000 at the end of 2008 to 923,000 at the end of 2009 while expatriates will increase from about 3.8 million to 4.1 million. Dubai was the most populated emirate at the end of 2008 after overtaking Abu Dhabi for the first time, and is expected to surge to 1.7 million by the end of 2009, the report added. Abu Dhabi is projected to reach 1.6 million at the end of 2009 with Sharjah he third most populated emirate with more than 1 million people projected to live there at the end of 2009. The UAE has a dominant young population, the report showed, with the 25-29 years emerging as the largest group of about 777,000 at the end of 2008, expected to peak at 830,000 at the end this year. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
UAE: Iraqi Military Operations Cause Sandstorms, Research
(ANSAmed) — ROME, AUGUST 4 — Over the last few days, a high number of sandstorms, originating in the Iraqi region, have been hitting the Gulf area and the United Arab Emirates in particular, causing problems to transports and increasing the number of people affected by respiratory ailments. These meteorological events have always been fairly common in the region but, over the last few years, experts noticed an increase in the magnitude and intensity of the phenomena. Sandstorms are created by a complex network of concomitant causes but one of the main factors, according to Adnan Akber, from the Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research, is probably also the most surprising: “If I am asked which is the main cause of sandstorms in the Emirates, and in the Gulf area in general, I have to admit that military operations in Iraq are partly to blame, as they considerably modify the composition of soil, thus increasing the concentration of sand in the atmosphere”, Akber said in an interview published today by Emirates’ newspaper The National. “It is a phenomenon we only recently started observing: this year in particular there has been an increase in the number of storms which hit the Emirates”, the researcher said. Akber then analyzed the possible causes of this increase: “Six years of troops and military vehicle moving across the region have transformed solid ground into grains of sand, and these grains then went on to form pulverized clouds in the area. The military operations completely pulverized vast areas of land, which were previously compact, creating sand particles that can more easily enter the atmosphere”. However, numerous scientists disagree with Dr. Akber’s theory. NASA researchers, for instance, see the formation of sandstorms as the result of a series of concomitant factors: the drought that hit the region, the deviation of river beds towards other areas (the eastern regions, for instance) and the increasing desertification. Also Alan Nicol, director of the World Water Council, disagrees with Dr. Akber. “Sandstorms hitting the Emirates are mostly linked to the drought in the marshlands of Southern Iraq”. Different scientific opinions, all trying to find the real cause behind the formation of these meteorological events. But one thing is for sure, according to Ahmed Habib, director of the Abu Dhabi Meteorological Centre: “I don’t know what’s going on in Iraq, but the number of sandstorms originating in the area is considerably increasing”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
India: Priest Killed in Karnataka
The local bishop excludes the possibility that he was killed in a robbery. The priest is remembered as someone who helped people of every faith. The Global Council of Indian Christians wants an official inquiry into anti-Christian violence in Karnataka.
New Delhi (AsiaNews) — The Syro-Malabar diocese of Belthangady (Karnataka, southern India) is distraught after one of its clergymen, Fr James Mukalel, was assassinated and left naked by the roadside in the village of Thottathady. At present the local bishop, Mgr Lawrence Mukkuzhy, has no clues as to who might have murdered the priest or why, but is certain that robbery was not the motive. The chancellor of the diocese, Fr Tomy Mattom, said that the killing was done in a “systematic way.”
According to early results in the investigation, Father James, 39, met his death as he was making his way home after conducting a funeral in the village of Thottathady. His naked body was found on the side of a road, his motorcycle lying not far away. For Father Tomy, the body of the dead man showed no mark of injury but there were visible signs of suffocation.
Father James was originally from the diocese of Tellichery but had moved to Belthangady to carry out his duties.
“Father James was very much loved by the parishioners and people in this area,” Bishop Mukkuzhy told AsiaNews. “He was a good person, and did not have enemies; a zealous missionary, selflessly serving all people; he was inclusive in his mission, serving people of all faiths and creed,” he said.
“We just cannot understand why anyone would kill him,’ the bishop said, but “one thing is sure is that this is not a case of robbery.
The priest probably died around 9 pm last night, and was found around 7 am this morning. After that the body was taken away for a post mortem.
The Global Council of Indian Christians has called on the Central Bureau of Investigation to launch a full investigation into the murder of Fr James Mukalel as well as into other attacks against Christians in the State of Karnataka.
Last year when anti-Christian violence broke out in Orissa, similar attacks took place in Karnataka, causing the destruction of 20 churches and chapels.
On 3 August the diocese of Belthangady will open its missionary congress.
“The blood of Father James will not have been shed in vain. His blood will serve the Church and the mission in India. We pray God for justice and protection,” the bishop said.
The diocese of Benthangady has 22,100 members, divided in 45 parishes, out of a total population of 3.25 million people.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesian Police Kill 2 Suspected Militants Outside Jakarta, Find 500 kg of Bombs
Members of counterterrorism squad Densus 88 checking bags containing explosives removed from a house at the Nusapala Housing Complex in Jati Asih, Bekasi, on Saturday.
Indonesian police have killed two suspected Islamic militants and seized 500 kilograms of explosives after a raid on a house in the Bekasi area near Jakarta, National Police chief Gen. Bambang Hendarso Danuri said on Saturday.
In Central Java, antiterror officers also surrounded a home and exchanged gunfire with militants. Local media reported that one of the men inside that property was believed to be Southeast Asia’s most wanted terrorist, Noordin M Top.
Bambang said that at a house in Nusapala, Jati Asih, Bekasi, two suspected militants were killed and three were arrested during the raid at 3 a.m. on Saturday morning. He said officers seized explosives and a car bomb that was intended for “a specific target” but gave no more details.
The residence was a “safe house” for the planning and organization of the July 17 hotel bombings, Bambang said.
The two men killed in the raid were identified as ex-prisoner Air Setyaawan, believed to be connected to the bomb attack on the Australian Embassy in Jakarta in 2004, and Eko Peyang, suspected of being a bomb assembler.
Noordin is suspected in all of Indonesia’s major terror attacks, including suicide bombings at the JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels last month and blasts on the resort island of Bali in 2002. The hotel bombings killed nine and broke a four-year gap in terror strikes in Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation.
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Threat of Terrorism in Indonesia Still Strong After Noordin
Members of the Densus 88 counterterrorism squad removing the body of a suspected terrorist shot dead during a raid on a house in Beji village, Temanggung, Central Java, on Saturday [8-8].
The threat of terrorism will continue to exist in Indonesia despite the reported death of Malaysian terrorist Noordin M Top in a police raid in Temanggung, Central Java, this Saturday, according to a top official.
“[Noordin’s] presence in Indonesia for such a long time, with a series of terrorist actions carried out until July 2009, shows that he has continued to build up his power base in the form of cells,” said Ansyaad Mbai, head of the anti-terror desk at the coordinating ministry for political, legal and security affairs.
“It would therefore be incorrect to assume that with his death, his entire terror network has been paralyzed.”
Many terrorism suspects related to Noordin M Top were still at large, he said.
“The skills of the Noordin M Top group in making bombs has continued to be developed and can be seen from their modus operandi… these skills, of course, have also been acquired by members of their cells which have been built up for a long time — at least over the past four years,” he said.
Although Noordin M Top was reportedly dead, all parties must continue to be on alert to the threat of terrorism in any form, he added.
Antiterror police [Detachment 88] on Saturday raided a house believed to be a terrorist hideout at 9:30 a.m. local time at Beji village in Temanggung, Central Java. Noordin M Top was
The Indonesian government has intensified efforts to find Noordin M Top following the bombings of two hotels at Mega Kuningan, in Jakarta last month which killed nine people and injured 53 others.
—- Adding (1):
[…] The owner of the house, Mohdari, was the first to be arrested, just after Friday prayers [on August 7]. “At around 3 p.m. we arrested two other suspects, Indra and Aris, who also lived at the house,” the source said. “Indra and Aris often take Noordin around on their motorbikes. Aris confirmed that Noordin was hiding at their home.” […]
—- Adding (2)
Ari Aryani (25), alias Arina Rahmah [the wife of Noordin Top], was detained July 22. Her lawyer, Asludin Hatjani, said Ari, her mother and her two young children had been taken by police to a safe house in Jakarta. […]
Asludin said Ari believed her husband was a man named Abdul Halim, and that if he was, in fact, Noordin, then she was unaware of his true identity.
“My client told police she did not know much about her husband,” Asludin said. “She described him as like any other husband, except that he would stay home for one or two weeks and then disappear on business for a month or more. Her father, Bahrudin Latif, knows more about him,” Asludin added.
Bahrudin, 60, the head of the Al Muaddib Islamic boarding school in Cilacap, Central Java, is currently wanted by the police. Believed to be a Noordin accomplice, Bahrudin has been on the run since police found bomb-making materials buried in the yard of his home in Cilacap a few days before the Jakarta bombings. […]
| — Hat tip: VH | [Return to headlines] |
Mali: Women Finally Demand Law Against Genital Mutilation
Yesterday, some 700 activists, mostly women, have marched in favor of the introduction of laws to ban the practice of female genital mutilation (FMG) in Bamako. The demonstrators presented the request directly to parliament. The long overdue initiative, organized by the Coordination of women’s NGO’s in Mali, was repeated in other areas of the country, where more women also staged small gatherings. “The rate of FMG in Mali is very high, reaching some 92%” said Nicola Giovannini of the “No Peace without Justice” NGO to MISNA; the organization has been engaged in a vast campaign against female mutilation alongside Malian NGO’s. Giovannini said that in Mali, there is a strong political consensus for a law to ban the practice, but authorities have so far suggested that Malian society itself is not yet ready to penalize this terrible and very established practice. The participation in anti FMG protests suggests that there is an ever stronger — if long overdue — desire for change. [AB]
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Nigeria: Boko Haram: How 3 Pastors Were Beheaded Eyewitness
One of the victims of last week’s attack by the Yusufiya sect in Borno State has given a shocking account of how the Islamic extremists killed three pastors who were captured along with other victims on the second day of the insurgence. The victim was among those held hostage in Yusuf’s enclave.
Speaking exclusively to Daily Sun in Maiduguri, the eye witness who preferred anonymity disclosed that the three pastors were beheaded on the instruction of the sect leader, Mohammed Yusuf shortly after bringing them out of his inner chamber.
“The pastors alongside one Ibo man were asked to change their faith to Islam like they did to other people taken as hostages. I think there was an argument by one of the pastors which gave the others some level of confidence to also resist accepting Islam.
“The Yusufiya men who were armed on that Tuesday afternoon were not comfortable with the pastors and they took one of them to the sect leader in his inner chamber. They came out later to the courtyard within the compound and cut their heads one after the other and thereafter, shouted allah akbar in wild celebration accompanied with several gun shots,” the eye witness disclosed.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Somalia: US Support for Somali Government “Crucial”
United States support for the national unity government is “crucial” for the Somali population, said Somalia’s President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed in a news conference in Nairobi after a meeting yesterday with US State Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton. Sheikh Sharif, former leader of the “Islamic Courts” combated between 2006 and 2007 by Ethiopia with US political and financial assistance, stressed the importance of the US pledge to support security efforts with new military provisions and army training. According to the US State Department, Clinton pledged to double an initial provision of 40 tons of arms sent to Somalia. The accord between Washington and Somalia also foresees the training of Somali soldiers at the US base in Djibouti. Clinton yesterday said that the US “strongly” supports the Somali government, which for three months has been battling a growing Islamist insurgency that controls a large part of the country.
[BO]
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
A Fifth of European Union Will be Muslim by 2050
Britain, Spain and Holland will have an even higher proportion of Muslims in a shorter amount of time, an investigation by The Telegraph shows.
Last year, five per cent of the total population of the 27 EU countries was Muslim. But rising levels of immigration from Muslim countries and low birth rates among Europe’s indigenous population mean that, by 2050, the figure will be 20 per cent, according to forecasts.
Data gathered from various sources indicate that Britain, Spain and Holland will have an even higher proportion of Muslims in a shorter amount of time.
The UK, which currently has 20 million fewer people than Germany, is also projected to be the EU’s most populous country by 2060, with 77 million people.
The findings have led to allegations that policy-makers are failing to confront the widespread challenges of the “demographic time bomb”.
Experts say that there has been a lack of debate on how the population changes will affect areas of life from education and housing to foreign policy and pensions.
Although some polls have pointed to a lack of radicalisation in the Muslim community, little attention is being given to the integration of migrants, it is claimed, with fears of social unrest in years to come.
| — Hat tip: Steen | [Return to headlines] |
Australia: MP Links Immigration to Terrorism
A FEDERAL Labor MP wants Australia’s migration intake to be slashed so authorities can conduct more rigorous security checks.
Kelvin Thomson said a smaller migration program would make it easier to assess whether applicants posed a terrorism threat.
His comments come just days after police arrested several men in Victoria for alleged links to a Somali-based terrorist group.
“Given time, it would be possible to get to the bottom of the background of applicants from Somalia; and elsewhere work out whether they have any association with fundamentalist groups and make a rational assessment of whether they pose a risk,” he told year 12 students at a foreign affairs forum in Melbourne.
Mr Thomson, a government backbencher, said Australia’s immigration intake should be cut back to where it was during the Keating years.
“Reducing our rates of immigration intake to the rates prevailing back in the 1990s would provide authorities with much more time in which to assess applications, and thereby improve Australia’s security,” he said.
“My own view about this is that there needs to be more vetting of both prospective migrants and temporary residents, including students, to minimise the risk that people who do not respect Australia’s laws and legal system will enter this country.”
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Muslim Europe: The Demographic Time Bomb Transforming Our Continent
The EU is facing an era of vast social change, reports Adrian Michaels, and few politicians are taking notice
Britain and the rest of the European Union are ignoring a demographic time bomb: a recent rush into the EU by migrants, including millions of Muslims, will change the continent beyond recognition over the next two decades, and almost no policy-makers are talking about it.
The numbers are startling. Only 3.2 per cent of Spain’s population was foreign-born in 1998. In 2007 it was 13.4 per cent. Europe’s Muslim population has more than doubled in the past 30 years and will have doubled again by 2015. In Brussels, the top seven baby boys’ names recently were Mohamed, Adam, Rayan, Ayoub, Mehdi, Amine and Hamza.
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Gaddafi attacks Sarkozy plan for Union of the MedEurope’s low white birth rate, coupled with faster multiplying migrants, will change fundamentally what we take to mean by European culture and society. The altered population mix has far-reaching implications for education, housing, welfare, labour, the arts and everything in between. It could have a critical impact on foreign policy: a study was submitted to the US Air Force on how America’s relationship with Europe might evolve. Yet EU officials admit that these issues are not receiving the attention they deserve.
Jerome Vignon, the director for employment and social affairs at the European Commission, said that the focus of those running the EU had been on asylum seekers and the control of migration rather than the integration of those already in the bloc. “It has certainly been underestimatede_SLps there is a general rhetoric that social integration of migrants should be given as much importance as monitoring the inflow of migrants.” But, he said, the rhetoric had rarely led to policy.
The countries of the EU have long histories of welcoming migrants, but in recent years two significant trends have emerged. Migrants have come increasingly from outside developed economies, and they have come in accelerating numbers.
The growing Muslim population is of particular interest. This is not because Muslims are the only immigrants coming into the EU in large numbers; there are plenty of entrants from all points of the compass. But Muslims represent a particular set of issues beyond the fact that atrocities have been committed in the West in the name of Islam.
America’s Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, part of the non-partisan Pew Research Center, said in a report: “These [EU] countries possess deep historical, cultural, religious and linguistic traditions. Injecting hundreds of thousands, and in some cases millions, of people who look, speak and act differently into these settings often makes for a difficult social fit.”
How dramatic are the population changes? Everyone is aware that certain neighbourhoods of certain cities in Europe are becoming more Muslim, and that the change is gathering pace. But raw details are hard to come by as the data is sensitive: many countries in the EU do not collect population statistics by religion.
EU numbers on general immigration tell a story on their own. In the latter years of the 20th century, the 27 countries of the EU attracted half a million more people a year than left. “Since 2002, however,” the latest EU report says, “net migration into the EU has roughly tripled to between 1.6 million and two million people per year.”
The increased pace has made a nonsense of previous forecasts. In 2004 the EU thought its population would decline by 16 million by 2050. Now it thinks it will increase by 10 million by 2060. Britain is expected to become the most populous EU country by 2060, with 77 million inhabitants. Right now it has 20 million fewer people than Germany. Italy’s population was expected to fall precipitously; now it is predicted to stay flat.
The study for the US Air Force by Leon Perkowski in 2006 found that there were at least 15 million Muslims in the EU, and possibly as many as 23 million. They are not uniformly distributed, of course. According to the US’s Migration Policy Institute, residents of Muslim faith will account for more than 20 per cent of the EU population by 2050 but already do so in a number of cities. Whites will be in a minority in Birmingham by 2026, says Christopher Caldwell, an American journalist, and even sooner in Leicester. Another forecast holds that Muslims could outnumber non-Muslims in France and perhaps in all of western Europe by mid-century. Austria was 90 per cent Catholic in the 20th century but Islam could be the majority religion among Austrians aged under 15 by 2050, says Mr Caldwell.
Projected growth rates are a disputed area. Birth rates can be difficult to predict and migrant numbers can ebb and flow. But Karoly Lorant, a Hungarian economist who wrote a paper for the European Parliament, calculates that Muslims already make up 25 per cent of the population in Marseilles and Rotterdam, 20 per cent in Malmo, 15 per cent in Brussels and Birmingham and 10 per cent in London, Paris and Copenhagen.
Recent polls have tended to show that the feared radicalisation of Europe’s Muslims has not occurred. That gives hope that the newcomers will integrate successfully. Nonetheless, second and third generations of Muslims show signs of being harder to integrate than their parents. Policy Exchange, a British study group, found that more than 70 per cent of Muslims over 55 felt that they had as much in common with non-Muslims as Muslims. But this fell to 62 per cent of 16-24 year-olds.
The population changes are stirring unease on the ground. Europeans often tell pollsters that they have had enough immigration, but politicians largely avoid debate.
France banned the wearing of the hijab veil in schools and stopped the wearing of large crosses and the yarmulke too, so making it harder to argue that the law was aimed solely at Muslims. Britain has strengthened its laws on religious hatred. But these are generally isolated pieces of legislation.
Into the void has stepped a resurgent group of extreme-Right political parties, among them the British National Party, which gained two seats at recent elections to the European Parliament. Geert Wilders, the Dutch politician who speaks against Islam and was banned this year from entering Britain, has led opinion polls in Holland.
The Pew Forum identified the mainstream silence in 2005: “The fact that [extreme parties] have risen to prominence at all speaks poorlye_SLps about the state and quality of the immigration debate. [Scholars] have argued that European elites have yet to fully grapple with the broader issues of race and identity surrounding Muslims and other groups for fear of being seen as politically incorrect.”
The starting point should be greater discussion of integration. Does it matter at all? Yes, claims Mr Vignon at the European Commission. Without it, polarisation and ghettoes can result. “It’s bad because it creates antagonism. It antagonises poor people against other poor people: people with low educational attainment feel threatened,” he says.
The EU says employment rates for non-EU nationals are lower than for nationals, which holds back economic advancement and integration. One important reason for this is a lack of language skills. The Migration Policy Institute says that, in 2007, 28 per cent of children born in England and Wales had at least one foreign-born parent. That rose to 54 per cent in London. Overall in 2008, 14.4 per cent of children in primary schools had a language other than English as their first language.
Muslims, who are a hugely diverse group, have so far shown little inclination to organise politically on lines of race or religion. But that does not mean their voices are being ignored. Germany started to reform its voting laws 10 years ago, granting certain franchise rights to the large Turkish population. It would be odd if that did not alter the country’s stance on Turkey’s application to join the EU. Mr Perkowski’s study says: “Faced with rapidly growing, disenfranchised and increasingly politically empowered Muslim populations within the borders of some of its oldest and strongest allies, the US could be faced with ever stronger challenges to its Middle East foreign policies.”
Demography will force politicians to confront these issues sooner rather than later. Recently, some have started to nudge the debate along. Angel Gurría, the OECD secretary-general, said in June: “Migration is not a tap that can be turned on and off at will. We need fair and effective migration and integration policies; policies that work and adjust to both good economic times and bad ones.”
| — Hat tip: Steen | [Return to headlines] |
Hegelian Dialectic, Pandemic & Creative Destruction
Creative Destruction is not a new concept. It is, however, a new-age term for the Hegelian Dialectic. Call it what you want, the global results are the same.
In order to achieve one-world governance, existing systems all over the globe had to be dismantled and eliminated. For instance, national sovereignty, national loyalty, national patriotism, personally selected lifestyles, individual beliefs and preferences, and naturally occurring communities versus socially engineered “communities” had to be dismantled, eliminated, and redefined by think tankers financed by philanthropic and government money.
In order to achieve such a tremendous undertaking, money (specifically wages) had to be strategically controlled. Hence, the wildly successful America had to eliminate its jobs. Jobs = wages. Wages = personally selected lifestyles, individual beliefs and preferences, and naturally occurring communities.
Next, the one-world think tankers told us that love of country and specifically patriotism led to “ethnic” battles, conflicts, and domestic terrorism. They also told us that the political expression of and belief in individual freedom was the religious concept of chronically stupid and terrorist-leaning radicals. Keeping in mind that America always accepted immigrants from every country — immigrants and their religious beliefs — the wealthy think tankers decided to incorporate illegal immigration in order that America could be far more “multicultural” and at the same time elevate “racism” to new definitions and levels.
[…]
Creative Destruction commands the slow death of nature. In order to achieve the global collection of private property under corporate global governance, nature had to become terminally ill, so we were told, by the merciless treatment of the land-owning rabble. However, before we the rabble were told of our merciless treatment of nature, hundreds of millions of acres all over the world were locked down, without our knowledge, in the form of Biosphere Reserves, conservation corridors, and World Heritage Sites. (To this day, ask your neighbors about Biosphere Reserves. They’ve never heard of them).
Add to these hundreds of millions of acres every individual burg’s watershed systems, state, local, and Federal parks, all the “governed” wetlands, not to mention 90% of the American West and 95% of the State of Alaska and the “international territories” of the Great Lakes “region,” Cascadian “region,” and the now infamous Southwestern International Border “region” where America’s first Third World guerilla war between international drug cartels is currently taking place as the Creative Destruction mechanism for assisting the United Nations to eliminate the Second Amendment.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Okays Abortion Pill
Vatican says users and doctors will be excommunicated
(ANSA) — Rome, July 31 — Italy’s pharmaceutical agency AIFA has approved the so-called abortion pill despite fierce opposition from the Vatican and conservative politicians.
AIFA rules that the RU486 pill — not to be confused with the morning after pill that has been in use in Italy since 2000 — can be taken by women up until the 49th day of pregnancy under medical supervision in hospital, offering an alternative to surgical abortion.
Ahead of the decision on Thursday evening, the Vatican warned that women who take the pill and doctors who prescribe it would be automatically excommunicated.
Pontifical Academy of Life President Emeritus Msgr Giulio Sgreccia said the pill “isn’t a drug but a lethal poison” that also threatens the lives of the women, pointing to 29 cases worldwide in which the drug has been linked to deaths.
Msgr Screccia said that since taking the pill was the same as having a surgical abortion, it constituted a “crime and a sin in a moral and juridical sense” that led to automatic excommunication from the Catholic Church.
The government said it would assess the agency’s decision.
Welfare Undersecretary Eugenia Roccella expressed concern about the safety risks for women taking the pill and called on AIFA to clarify the situation. Roccella said she was concerned the green light for the pill could lead to “legalised clandestinity” with women aborting at home since the exact moment of the abortion after taking the bill cannot be predicted.
Luca Volonte’ of the Catholic centrist UDC party said the move signalled the beginning of a “dance of death with pharmaceutical multinationals”, adding that making the pill available “as if it were aspirin” violated Italy’s strict abortion laws.
But AIFA’s decision was hailed by many women and doctors.
“Finally! It’s above all a victory for Italian women, who from today have more choice,” said Silvio Viale, a gynecologist and member of the Radical Party.
Silvana Mura of the opposition Italy of Values party hailed AIFA’s decision as offering women a “much less invasive” means of terminating a pregnancy than the surgical method.
Margherita Boniver of Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s People of Freedom party called for an end to polemics, underlining that the pill was not going to be sold over the counter but would be administered in hospital.
ABORTION RATE DROPPING.
RU486, or mifepristone, was first introduced in France in 1988 and is now used in most European countries including Greece, Spain, Belgium and the United Kingdom.
In Italy the pill will still have to be administered within the terms of the Italian abortion law, which came into effect in 1978 and allows abortions until the 90th day of pregnancy.
After this point, terminations may be carried out only if the mother’s health is at risk or the foetus is deformed.
The rate of abortions in Italy has been falling over recent years and is one of the lowest in the West.
According to health ministry figures released on Wednesday, there were 121,406 abortions in 2008, a drop of 4.1% on 2007, and a decrease of 48.3% on 1982 when the highest number of cases, 234,801, was recorded.
An estimated 15,000 illegal abortions are also carried out each year.
Pro-choice activists have complained that a growing number of pro-life medical practitioners is making it tougher for women to obtain abortions.
Under Italian law, doctors can refuse to perform an abortion if it runs counter to their principles.
Recent health ministry figures suggest that 70% of all Italian gynaecologists are now ‘conscientious objectors’ compared to 58.7% in 2003 while 50.4% of anaesthetists are opposed to abortion, compared to 45.7% in 2003.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Profs for Prostitution?
The headline in the August 3 Rhode Island Providence Journal, “Academics urge R.I. to keep indoor prostitution legal,” took me down memory lane. It was 1977, and I arrived in Swansea University in Wales to speak at the British Psychological Association conference on Love and Attraction. There I stumbled upon a nascent political movement that became what can be called “The Academic Pedophiles and Perverts Party” (APPP).
The Providence Journal reported that 50 “professors” wrote to their lawmakers, “imploring them not to ban indoor” brothels. The Rhode Island prostitution traffic got support from “professors…from across the country and around the world” are lobbying for Rhode Island to maintain its “sensible” policy, enacted in 1976, which makes indoor prostitution legal.
Why? Well the smart folks explain that girls and women being prostituted in brothels are less often “assaulted, raped, or robbed” and infected less with multiple STDs than are streetwalkers who have to solicit before they go into rooms “indoors.”
Moreover, our “professors” think girls are older before they join brothels and have “more education.” It is unclear to me why Tillie in Room 5 is better off having control of advanced calculus than Sally in Room 3 when both obey the paying poo-bah (or professor) and smile while being sexually enslaved.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
1 comment:
a swine flew hotline [emphasis added]
People said that pigs would fly before America ever had a Black President.
Well, 100 days later and Swine Flu.
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