T. Boone Pickens notes that despite its six-year military commitment on behalf of Iraq, the United States is not gaining access to the country’s oil fields. He says that once our military withdrawal is complete, all the business will go to China and other countries.In other news, Americans are losing their faith in climate change. In the latest survey, only 57% of the respondents believe that the globe is warming up, down from 77% two years ago.
Thanks to AG, Barry Rubin, Dazed & Confused, Furor Teutonicus, Insubria, JD, JP, KGS, Michael Freund, Zenster, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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Bernanke Not Obama to Make “Trillion Dollar Decision”
The biggest decision of the economic recovery will be made in the next six months, and Barack Obama will have almost nothing to do with it.
Forget the debate over TARP, and never mind the questions about a second stimulus. This decision is about when to pull out $1 trillion that’s propping up the U.S. banking system. And it will be Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his Fed colleagues who make the call.
That’s hard enough for a White House that knows its political fortunes rise and fall with the economy.
What’s worse is that Bernanke and Obama — like many presidents and Fed chairmen past — won’t necessarily have the same goals for this trillion-dollar decision.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
AARP’s Tradition of Betrayal
Nonprofit in name only, “AARP is the equivalent of a Fortune 500 company, employing a staff of 2,419 employees, (incurring) $1.16 billion in operating expenses and overseeing annual revenues (well above) $1 billion,” around 60% of which comes from so-called Medigap supplemental insurance sales.
According to Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), “Some of these products are total rip offs,” so bad, in fact, that AARP was forced to withdraw its Essential Health Insurance Plan and Essential Plus Health Insurance Plan, developed by United Health Group and sold to 44,000 of its members.
PNHP calls AARP “part of the problem and not part of the solution. It is nothing but an insurance (and financial) broker disguised as an advocacy group — and they will never take on the health insurance industry. (It) represent(s) the insurance industry (and its own self-interest) rather than (its members and) the public welfare in discussions about health reform.”
As a result, it’s largely profit-driven offering 17 types of insurance reaping hundreds of millions annually in royalties. Millions more from selling drugs; other products and services including mutual funds; plus federal subsidies exceeding $80 million annually; and annual membership dues of $16 per year, $43 for three years, or $63 for five x 40 million members.
It’s also active on Capitol Hill with a 50-person staff and a 2008 $28 million lobbying budget, much like major corporations and for the same purpose — profits at the expense of member interests, unaware how they’re ill-served by an organization claiming to be their advocate.
| [Return to headlines] |
Berit Kjos: The Ominous “Success” Of Re-Education
“The purpose of education and the schools is to change the thoughts, feelings and actions of students.”[1]
“As the home and church decline in influence… schools must begin to provide adequately for the emotional and moral development of children. …The school… must assume a direct responsibility for the attitudes and values of child development. The child advocate, psychologist, social technician, and medical technician should all reach aggressively into the community, send workers out to children’s homes…”[2] “Joint Commission on Mental Health of Children”
“A proposal for new social studies curriculum in Texas public schools removes a mention of Christmas in a sixth-grade lesson, replacing it with a Hindu religious festival…”[3]
“…the breakdown of traditional families, far from being a ‘crisis,’ is actually a. … triumph for human rights against ‘patriarchy.’“[4] UN Population Fund leader
The traditional Christian family has been a continual obstacle to the globalist vision of solidarity. And for over sixty years, the United Nations and its mental health gurus have fought hard to eradicate those old “poisonous certainties” that stood in their way. They seem to be gaining ground!
Since Hitler outlawed homeschooling about 70 years ago, German parents have faced the harshest battles. Now other nations are catching up. Notice the government attitudes in the following examples:…
[…]
The Marxist change agents behind this transformation are too numerous to list, but behavioral psychologist Kurt Lewin gives us a simple formula. Linked to infamous psychological research institutes in London (Tavistock) and Germany (Frankfurt Institute), Lewin moved to America when Hitler began his reign. His influence spread through MIT and other universities, then paved the way for “sensitivity training” and the formation of National Training Laboratories that would prepare transformational tactics and textbooks for public schools.
Lewin outlined his program with a 3-step formula:
1- UNFREEZING minds 2- MOVING the students to the new level 3- FREEZING group minds on the new level.[9]
For the students, the transition back to reality — to home, family and normal life — was painful. For some it was lethal. “When I came back home, I sort of wrote a suicide note to myself,” confessed LeAndrew Crawford. “Not actually wanting to kill myself, but wanting to kill the reality of what society had been teaching me for so long… I was totally down, because my family just didn’t feel like my family… I didn’t want to be back.”[7]
Brandon Hawk did kill himself within a year. Hearing about his death, other concerned parents contacted Brandon’s parents.
[…]
Another mother testified that, “My son came back from [Clinton’s] Governor’s School and his favorite line was ‘There are no absolutes; there are no absolutes.”[7]
It didn’t take long to change the students’ minds and hearts, did it? Yet few teachers or parents are aware of this subversive agenda.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Doctors May ‘Fire’ Parents Who Don’t Vaccinate Children
When Cathlene Echan walked into her pediatrician’s office two weeks after giving birth, she was nervous about discussing her recent decision not to vaccinate her second baby.
But Echan, of Orange County, Calif., did not expect to be asked to leave.
“The doctor said it was too much of a liability to have us as patients,” said Echan, a 28-year-old stay at home mom. Echan’s oldest child, Josiah, now 5, had just been diagnosed with autism around the same time her second son Torren, now 2, was born.
Echan said she did research and read articles online about autism, she talked with other parents and then came to the pediatrician’s office with doubts about vaccines.
“I hadn’t come to a conclusion at that point when I saw the doctor, but I was so nervous because they’re brothers, and I thought there could be a predisposition for it,” said Echan. “As a mom, I can’t knowingly do something to my second child when I believe it played a role in causing my older child’s neurological disorder.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Heavily Armed Law Enforcement Teams Will Scatter Across the Bay Area This Weekend
Armed officers in full battle gear will be scattered throughout the Bay Area this weekend, rescuing hostages, fighting bank robbers and quelling terrorism at the Oakland Airport, Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, the NASA Ames Research Center and 22 other high profile sites.
There will be the sound of gunfire and blasts — all part of Urban Shield, one of the biggest domestic terrorism drills in the country. The $1 million, two-day event begins Saturday and will test the training of 27 crack teams from throughout the state, elsewhere in the country and the world.
For the first time in the three-year history of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department-sponsored exercise, there will be a foreign team of officers taking part and international observers. An eight-member team representing the French National Police’s Research, Assistance, Intervention, and Dissuasion unit will compete.
The exercise is a non-stop, 48-hour event meant to test a team’s endurance and equipment in high stress situations such as shootouts, nuclear facility threats and airline hijackings. Each team is graded on their performances and at the end of the weekend, the top three teams are recognized.
Amaury de Hauteclocque, chief of the French RAID team, said although there are opportunities in Europe to cross train with other countries’ forces, there is nothing like Urban Shield, with 25 realistic scenarios at on-site locations.
“There are situations in the States we don’t have in France, like a mass murder in a university,” Hauteclocque said. “Fortunately we don’t have them in France at this time, but we don’t have a reason not to expect this to happen.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
How They Are Turning Off the Lights in America
On October 31,2009, the once largest aluminum plant in the world will shut down. With it goes another American industry and more American jobs. The Columbia Falls Aluminum Company in Montana will shut down its aluminum production because it cannot purchase the necessary electrical power to continue its operations.
How did this happen in America? America was once the envy of the world in its industrial capability. America’s industrial capacity built America into the most productive nation the world had ever known. Its standard of living rose to levels never before accomplished. Its currency became valuable and powerful, allowing Americans to purchase imported goods at relatively cheap prices.
America grew because of innovation and hard work by the pioneers of the industrial revolution, and because America has vast natural resources. A great economy, as America once was, is founded on the ability to produce electrical energy at low cost. This ability has been extinguished. Why?
Columbia Falls Aluminum negotiated a contract with Bonneville Power Administration in 2006 for Bonneville to supply electrical power until September 30, 2011. But, responding to lawsuits, the 9th US Circuit Court ruled the contract was invalid because it was incompatible with the Northwest Power Act. Therefore, the combination of the Northwest Power Act and a US Circuit Court were the final villains that caused the shutdown of Columbia Falls Aluminum.
But the real reasons are much more complicated. Why was it not possible for Columbia Falls Aluminum to find sources of electricity other than Bonneville?
We need to look no further than the many environmental groups like the Sierra Club and to America’s elected officials who turned their backs on American citizens and in essence themselves, for they too are citizens of this country. These officials bought into the green agenda promoted by the heavily funded environmental groups. Caving to pressure, they passed laws and the environmental groups filed lawsuits that began turning off the lights in America. The dominos started to fall.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
More Republican Deception
As my husband is fond of saying, we have Socialist Party A and Socialist Party B, there is little difference. It seems quite obvious to even the least politically involved that both parties are melding into one and both are far too liberal for the conservative, small government voters who favor our founding fathers’ beliefs and desires for America. In 1965, I remember a close friend telling me that the Soviet Union and America would meld into one combining both communism and capitalism. I’ve thought of that statement many times over the years.
Countless phone calls from the Republican National Committee, the College Republican National Committee, and every other form of Republican National group out there has phoned me for a donation. If that isn’t enough, the RNC and various other Republican groups continue to send me snail mail which includes two and three page questionnaires and surveys, and at the end of same, an area to mark for the amount of your donation. With the disgust I’ve felt for so long regarding the Republican choices for office, I mostly pitched these costly forms in the trash. However, after the 2008 election, I decided to change my strategy.
[…]
The former head of the Aspen Institute, new age environmentalist Maurice Strong, has membership in the following organizations, but this does not include the entire list:
* Senior Advisor to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan
* Senior Advisor to World Bank President James Wolfensohn
* Chairman of the Earth Council
* Chairman of the World Resources Institute
* Co-Chairman of the Council of the World Economic Forum
* member of Toyota’s International Advisory Board
He is also a long time member of the Futurist Society (which Newt Gingrich also belongs to as well as Newt’s long time friends Alvin and Heidi Toffler). (See Toffler’s book, THE THIRD WAVE) To digress, remember Newt recently came out for the republican nominee in New York’s 23rd congressional district, Dede Scozzafava, who represents the Democratic party with her entire platform but is running on the Republican ticket against a constitutionalist running on the conservative party by the name of Doug Hoffman.
The following is from the website, THE ASPEN INSTITUTE AND THE CLUB OF ROME
“The Aspen Institute was founded in 1949, by Aldous Huxley, and John Maynard Hutchins, in commemoration of the 200th birthday of German philosopher and author of Faust, and a member of the Illuminati, Goethe. Robert O. Anderson also contributed significant funds to a project initiated by the Rockefeller family, together with Aurelio Peccei and Alexander King, at the Rockefeller’s estate at Bellagio, Italy, called the Club of Rome.
In 1972, this Club of Rome, and the US Association of the Club of Rome, gave widespread publicity to their publication of the notorious “Limits to Growth.” Supported by research done at MIT, this report concluded that industrialization had to be halted to save the planet from ecological catastrophe.
These organizations were exploiting the panic induced, when Paul Ehrlich, a biologist at Stanford, and admirer of Bertrand Russell, in 1968, wrote his Malthusian projections in a best-selling book called The Population Bomb. “
Quite obviously, our Republican party has joined with the enemy. Weak kneed, spineless men like former Tennessee Senator Dr. Bill Frist, Senators from Maine, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins, Minority leader Boehner and Newt Gingrich who is backing Dede Scozzafava, and countless others too numerous to name, who do not represent conservative Republicans or ideals, do not deserve to have our cash to continue their happy allegiance with the Marxist ideologues of the left.
[…]
When you receive phone calls and snail mail from the RNC, I urge you to tell them you feel highly qualified to do your own research on where you’ll send your monies, and that they are wasting their time calling you for cash that they’ll distribute to the likes of Scozzafava (500,000 from the RNC), Snowe, Collins and others who are simply Republicans in name only.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Now Mayor Daley is Floating a Water Sale?
To save his bloated city budget Mayor Daley sold the Chicago Skyway toll road. Then he sold the city parking meters. And now? Now Daley wants to sell the city water system in order to keep paying all his broken nosed pals their monthly stipend.
CBS Channel 2 is reporting that that Chicago is considering leasing its water system.
Apparently there is a local precedent for this idea already in the Will County city of Homer Glen that leased its city water services to a German-owned company.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Number of Americans Who Believe in Climate Change Drops, Survey Shows
Only 57% of Americans feel that the planet’s atmosphere is warming, a fall from 77% two years ago
The number of Americans who believe in global warming has plummeted, falling 20% in two years, a survey said today.
Only 57% of Americans believe there is solid scientific evidence that the Earth’s atmosphere is warming, said the poll of 1,500 people by the Pew Research Centre for the People & the Press.
That is a fall of 77% from 2007. The number of people who believe that human activity is causing global warming also fell to just 36%.
The public uncertainty about the evidence behind global warming comes as the Senate prepares to begin debate next week on climate change legislation. Yesterday, 18 scientific organisations wrote Congress to reaffirm the consensus behind global warming.
Michael Dimock, the associate director of the Pew Centre, said the economic crisis and the struggles over healthcare reform had squeezed out climate change and the environment as issues of concern. “The public is just not as focused on global warming and environmental [issues] as they have been in the past.”
But James Hoggan, a PR executive and author of Climate Cover-Up, blamed an intense lobbying campaign against global warming legislation now before the Senate. “I would say a big part of this problem is this campaign to mislead Americans about climate science,” he said. “This is a very sophisticated group of people who know how to create doubt and confusion and they have done a very good job of it.”
The decline was sharpest among independent voters and Republicans. Republicans in Congress have almost uniformly lined up against climate change legislation. There were also regional differences, with people in the mid-west and Rocky mountain states less inclined to see climate change as a serious problem.
But the perceived lack of concrete evidence for global warming did not necessarily hurt the prospects of voting on climate change legislation, Dimock said. Half of Americans polled remain in favour of putting limits and carbon emissions and making companies pay for their emissions — the basics of the cap and trade bill now before the Senate.
A majority, 56%, also want America to join other countries in a global agreement on climate change.
| — Hat tip: AG | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Offers Millions in Muslim Technology Fund
The White House said the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) had issued a call for proposals for the fund, which will provide financing of between 25 and 150 million dollars for selected projects and funds.
The Global Technology and Innovation Fund will “catalyze and facilitate private sector investments” throughout Asia, the Middle East and Africa, the White House said in a statement.
[…]
In his speech to the Muslim world in Cairo last June, Obama argued that “education and innovation will be the currency of the 21st century” and that under-investment was rife in many Muslim nations.
As well as the fund, Obama also said he will host a summit on entrepreneurship this year to deepen ties between business leaders in the United States and Muslim communities around the world.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Things to Watch for During a “Declared National Emergency”
As I predicted—though I was unsure whether it would be the H1N1 virus or the collapse of the dollar—the Communist Puppet would use something to cement his total control over every aspect of our lives.
From the day he took office, Obama and his puppet masters have been building a shadow Government with all power vested in them. The Czars he has appointed, who were not vetted and approved by Congress nor elected, now have the authority to control every aspect of American commerce.
I challenge you to look at the Executive Orders that have been signed over the last 30 years and are still in place. Also carefully read the provisions of the Violent Crime Control Act. They are listed here America In Peril and I include a partial list below…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Fishing: EU: Med Countries Against Red Tuna Ban
(by Chiara Spegni) (ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, SEPTEMBER 23 — The difficult issue being faced in Brussels on red tuna fishing is still unresolved. The proposal to include this fish in the list of species at risk of extinction, and ban its commerce, promoted by the Principality of Montecarlo and supported by the European Commission, was not backed by the 27 member states, currently divided on the issue. Those against are the Mediterranean countries of Italy, France, Spain, Greece, and Malta while Cyprus abstained and Portugal declared itself in favour with the other EU countries. The position was taken despite the provisional character of an eventual support for the Montecarlo initiative that is awaiting upcoming data on the scientific situation of the resources, expected at the meeting in November, of the International Committee for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna (ICCAT), the international organisation that decides on management practices for red tuna stock. But the five Mediterranean countries are biding their time, agreeing on the position taken by shipping companies and European fishing cooperatives Europeche and Cogeca who believe the ban on red tuna would be “a radical measure, out of proportion and not founded on scientific facts”. The Commission expressed “deep concern on the state of the stock of this type of fish, which is rapidly decreasing after years of excessive fishing”. The European Environment commissioner, Stavros Dimas, expressed his disappointment and the European commissioner for Fishing, Joe Borg, said that now the responsibility lies with ICCAT. Environmentalist, with the WWF and Greenpeace at the head, were disappointed, having fought for years to conserve the species and against illegal fishing which greatly depleted red tuna stock. “A position with such a reduced view and without ambitions on the part of the EU and Mediterranean member states against marina protection, is disappointing”, commented Aaron McLoughlin, head of the WWF European marine programme. In Italy the WWF tried to influence the government with an ad hoc campaign showing a tuna being caught with sushi chopsticks. “The blind attitude of the Mediterranean governments will lead to the extinction of red tuna and will leave fishermen with nothing to fish in a few years time”, said Greenpeace Brussels activist Saskia Richartz. The ball now passed to ICCAT to save the species. Scheduled to meeting in November to consider the updated scientific data and the initiative that have already been adopted including the reorganization plan stated by the EU in 2006 which committed Italy to reduce tuna fishing boats from 49 to 22 by 2012. In any case there is still time to support the proposal made by the Principality of Montecarlo which will be discussed at the CITES meeting in March 2010. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy-Jordan: Milan Forum Opens Door for New Cooperation
(ANSAmed) — MILAN, OCTOBER 22 — King Abdullah II of Jordan ended his state visit to Italy in Milan. From the heart of the Italian economy, the Italian stock exchange, during the Italy-Jordan Economic Forum he spoke of the opportunities for collaboration with his country beginning from nuclear energy. Jordan, in fact, possesses 3% of the world’s uranium and intends to exploit it. He already has a national plan in mind with the construction of two or three plants and for this reason has closed agreements with France, South Korea and Germany. With the French company Areva, for example, there was the agreement signed in mid September for the construction of a reactor with surrounding facilities for desalination and the extraction of minerals. The amount of uranium to be extracted will be quantified “half way through next year and when we know how much”, the king explained, “this could allow us to be partners with both the Italian government and Italian companies”, seen that Italy is setting the stones for its own nuclear programme. The energy which he is talking about is not only however atomic, but includes natural gas (which Jordan would like to begin exporting) and also renewables. The deputy foreign minister, Stefania Craxi, reminded that Jordan is building what will be one of the largest photovoltaic facilities in the world in the southern part of the country and that with the 10 memorandums signed today at the Italy-Jordan Forum, one involved Italy directly in the project. The national transport plan that will be launched next year and that plans for connections to Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, is another of the opportunities that King Abdullah II offered to Italian companies “specialised on the global level”, he stressed, “in the sector”. “I am very satisfied by the visit to Milan”, the king concluded, “where there are many new business opportunities”. Regarding the signed memorandums, they involve the sectors of investment, tourism, furnishings, renewable energy (more specifically Solar), ICT, training and economic and industrial cooperation, from food to the diagnostic and health sectors. At the centre of the meeting there was also the constitution of a committee of Italian-Jordanian business and the opening in Italy of a Jordan Investment Board office, an agency which promotes investment from the Kingdom of Jordan. “Jordan”, the Italian Minister of Economic Development, Claudio Scajola, stressed, “is a strategic country for our economic policy, always focusing on developments in the Middle East and its players”. The about 2,000 face-to-face encounters between representatives of 70 Jordanian companies and 275 Italian companies which took place in the afternoon demonstrate it. Abdullah spoke to a full house with his wife Rania in a beautiful red dress seate in the front row, next to Stefania Craxi and the mayor of Milan Letizia Moratti, who had a private meeting with her and the king. For the sovereign this was the first visit to the city, while the Queen received honorary citizenship. The Queen also took advantage of the meeting of 40 Italian and Jordanian entrepreneurs, the Minister of Economic Development, Claudio Scajola, King Abdullah, the mayor, the president of Lombardy, Roberto Formigoni and the president of Promos (the company of the Chamber of Commerce which organised the Forum) for a walk and a cappuccino in Via Dante. (ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Railways: High-Speed; Scajola, TGV Must Not Stop at Nice
(ANSAmed) — VENTIMIGLIA (IMPERIA), OCTOBER 20 — ‘The TGV (high-speed train) must not stop at Nice, it must pass through Italy. We must integrate the high-speed train with the new railway; we are close, but in the railway sector the node connecting France and Italy has perhaps lagged behind”. Minister Scajola tackled the theme of rail transport during a meeting yesterday evening in Montecarlo with ministers from Monaco. ‘France invested a lot in the high-speed network compared to Italy before. At the end of December one will be able to travel at high speed from Turin to Salerno, and it takes 2 hours 50 minutes to go from Milan to Rome. A second track is being laid along Liguria Ponente. In a year and a half the new track between San Lorenzo and Finale Ligure will be opened, things are moving forward. The problem will be overcoming the bottleneck in Montecarlo. So we must find a solution, combining our energies, as a cross-border territory. This has also been a topic for discussion amongst the ministers of Monaco”.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Slovenia: Government Wants to Introduce Property Tax
(ANSAmed) — LJUBLJANA, OCTOBER 23 — The Slovenian government wants to start taxing property as of 2011. The Italian Trade Commission (ICE) office in Ljubljana points out that so far, based on the Yugoslavian law from the ‘80s, tax has only been levied on the use of buildings, building sites, private terrains and buildings with a surface of more than 160 square metres. Under the new law, which is expected to come into force in 2011, all property will be taxed based on their value, at the rate of 0.1% on 80% of the property’s value. First homes, with a surface up to 150 square metres, is not considered to be luxury and will therefore be taxed at the minimum rate. The tax could also be reduced according to the number of people living in the building. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Nurses Got Sick From the “Swine Flu” Vaccine in Sweden * Update — 1 Suspected Death
Yesterday 30 people had been reporting to the authorities in Sweden that they experienced such severe side effects that they felt the need to contact a hospital. Today the number is 140. The swedish newspaper Expressen is the only one in Sweden reporting on these cases and as usual this is most likely only the tip of a rather large iceberg. UPDATE: According to Dagens Nyheter, the number of reported side effects are now a few hours later 190. 1 person dies after the injection but “no direct relation with the injection has been established”. The biggest medical scandal in the history of Sweden has just started.
[…]
A nurse who took the shot on wednesday last week is still feeling sick. She got high fever and shivers from the swine flu shot. “-I was shaking in my whole body. It was so sever that I could not even hold a glass of water in my hand.”, Lotta Lindström says.
“- I am now thinking about what it is I have been injected with. I really was affected. It feels really unpleasant.”
Maria Strindlund is not so sure she made the right choice to tae the shot. She also got a severe fever and shivering reaction. “- Since I work as a nurse, I decided it was the best thing to do.”, she says. At first she felt nothing from the vaccinaton, but a few hours later the side effects kicked in. “- I got a extreme pain in my arm. I could no longer lift it.” The came the fever and the shivering. “ _ I was lying in bed shivering and was feeling very cold and stood in a hot shower to get warm.” She says many colleguse who also took the vaccine have had similar reactons. She has been taking many vaccines in the past without any reactions whatsoever.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Fourth Person Dies From Swine Flu Jab
The news that a fourth person has died after taking the “swine flu” jab in Sweden is focussing attention on the failure of the Swedish Medical Products Agency (MPA) to halt the “swine flu” programme even as reports of serious side effects flood in.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Albanian Wanted for Murder in 1996 Found Living in North East With Wife and Two Children
One of Europe’s most wanted men has been discovered living in a quiet village in north east England.
To his neighbours, Sokol Sinani appeared like any other ordinary married father bringing up his two children in a quiet cul-de-sac in Ryton, near Gateshead.
But the 37-year-old Albanian was hiding a deadly secret.
For the past 15 years he has been on the run from police after committing a brutal murder in his home country.
Following Sinani’s arrest, villagers spoke of their amazement after learning that one of Interpol’s most wanted men had been living among them.
One said: ‘I’m not sure where he comes from — we didn’t even know his name. They never speak to anyone.’
Although his photograph was circulated to police forces across Europe, officers failed to track him down because he used the alias Ismail Sinani.
Instead of being brought to justice, the fugitive was allowed to live freely with his wife, his mother-in-law and two children in a semidetached council house for the past five years.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Diwali Wars: As Election Fight Looms, Politicians and the Palace Vie to Host Parties for Hindu Festival of Lights
It is a sparkling religious festival that is celebrated widely in the Indian community — but one that normally passes virtually unrecognised at Westminster.
However, this year politicians have been falling over themselves to host parties for Diwali, the five-day ‘festival of lights’ marked earlier this month by 1.5million of the UK’s Hindus, Sikhs and Jains.
Gordon Brown and David Cameron held personal Diwali parties for the first time, and separate events were hosted by the Queen and MPs.
During the celebrations, small clay lamps filled with oil are lit to signify ‘victory over the evil within’ and sweets are shared between guests.
The outbreak of ‘Diwali wars’ — as it was dubbed by one MP — left some guests confused about which events to attend, while others, such as the controversial millionaire Lord Paul, happily accepted multiple invitations.
Sceptical community leaders said they were delighted by the sudden upsurge of interest in their traditions — but hoped it would continue after next year’s General Election.
David Cameron was first out of the Diwali blocks, hosting an event for 600 people at Tory headquarters on Monday October 12. The £10,000 party was funded by Dolar Popat, the care home mogul whose wealth is estimated at more than £40million.
‘It was completely chaotic,’ said one guest. ‘Cameron clearly hadn’t held one of these parties before, and some guests were left grumbling that he hadn’t shaken their hands.’
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Grandmother Who Objected to Gay March is Accused of Hate Crime
After witnessing a gay pride march, committed Christian Pauline Howe wrote to the council to complain that the event had been allowed to go ahead.
But instead of a simple acknowledgement, she received a letter warning her she might be guilty of a hate crime and that the matter had been passed to police.
Two officers later turned up at the frightened grandmother’s home and lectured her about her choice of words before telling her she would not be prosecuted.
Mrs Howe, 67, whose husband Peter is understood to be a Baptist minister, yesterday spoke of her shock at the visit and accused police of ‘ wasting resources’ on her case rather than fighting crime.
‘I’ve never been in any kind of trouble before so I was stunned to have two police officers knocking at my door,’ she said.
‘Their presence in my home made me feel threatened. It was a very unpleasant experience.
‘The officers told me that my letter was thought to be an intention of hate but I was expressing views as a Christian.’
[Comments from JD: Americans can expect the same treatment once Obama signs the hate bill.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Islamists Who Want to Destroy the State Get £100,000 Funding
Members of a group regarded as an ‘organisation of concern’ by the Home Office has secured large government grants for schools , reports Andrew Gilligan.
Leading members of a group that wants to bring down the British state and replace it with a dictatorship under Islamic law have secured more than £100,000 of taxpayers’ money for a chain of schools.
Accounts filed at the Charity Commission show that the Government paid a total of £113,411 last year to a foundation run by senior members and activists of Hizb ut-Tahrir — a notorious Islamic extremist group that ministers promised to ban.
The public money helped run a nursery school and two Islamic primary schools where children are taught key elements of Hizb’s ideology from the age of five.
Chris Grayling, the shadow home secretary, last night described the disclosure as “astonishing and outrageous” and accused the Government of “sleeping on the job”.
Hizb regards integration as “dangerous” and says that British Muslims should “fight assimilation” into British society. It wants to create a global Islamic superstate, or “caliphate”, initially in Muslim-majority countries and then across the rest of the world.
It says that “those [Muslims] who believe in democracy are Kafir”, or apostates. It orders all Muslims to keep apart from non-believers and boycott “corrupt” British elections and political processes. It has a tiny following and its views are rejected by most British Muslims.
Hizb, which operates worldwide, insists it is non-violent and condemned the London bombings.
However its website previously displayed a leaflet urging Muslims to “kill [Jews] wherever you find them” and at a rally in London earlier this year, Imran Waheed, its chief media adviser in Britain, said that there could be “no peace” with Israel, calling on Muslims to “fight” a “jihad… in the way of Allah” against it.
Its anti-Semitism has resulted in the group being banned in Germany and on some British university campuses.
After the bombings in London on July 7, 2005, Tony Blair, who was then prime minister, also promised to ban Hizb, describing it as “fanatical”.
A ban has not been introduced but the Tories have pledged to outlaw the group and the Home Office continues to regard it as an “organisation of concern”.
The three schools — in Tottenham, north London, and Slough, Berks — are run by the Islamic Shakhsiyah Foundation, a registered charity. The foundation’s lead trustee is Yusra Hamilton, a leading Hizb activist who is married to Taji Mustafa, the group’s chief spokesman in Britain.
At least three of the four trustees are Hizb members or activists, including Farah Ahmed, the head teacher of the Slough school, who has written in a Hizb journal condemning the “corrupt Western concepts of materialism and freedom”.
On their website, the schools say their “ultimate goal” and “foremost work” is the creation of an “Islamic personality” in children The creation of an “Islamic personality” is a key tenet of Hizb’s ideology.
The schools’ history curriculum states that children are taught that “there must be one ruler of the khilafah [caliphate]”. The schools’ website says that “in the glorious history of Islam… the Sharia was the norm”.
Children learn Arabic from the age of three. A spokesman for the foundation insisted that it was not a Hizb ut-Tahrir operation but involved “Muslim women from a wide variety of backgrounds”.
The spokesman claimed that Mrs Hamilton resigned two years ago. However, Charity Commission records, accessed yesterday show that she remains the lead trustee.
In January 2009, Mrs Hamilton was described by Ofsted, the schools inspectorate, as the “proprietor” of the Shakhsiyah Foundation’s Slough school. The Foundation’s annual report of December 2008 shows her as a trustee.
Mrs Hamilton is listed on the electoral roll as residing just around the corner from the Foundation’s Tottenham school, with Mr Mustafa under his real name, Urutajirinere Fombo.
Contacted by telephone, he confirmed his identity as Mr Mustafa and said that Hizb did not “run” the foundation, but added: “We would certainly approve of those in the Muslim community who seek to establish good Islamic schools.”
The Shakhsiyah Foundation spokesman said the government money, from Whitehall’s “Free Entitlement” and “Pathfinder” programmes, had been claimed by parents on behalf of the school.
However, a spokesman for Haringey council, which administered the grant, said this was incorrect and that the foundation had applied for the money.
The Tottenham school’s landlord, a moderate Muslim organisation, said it had serious reservations about its tenant. “They have a contract with us,” said Serkan Yumakci, a spokesman for the landlord.
“But if we had known then what we know now, things would be very different.” Mr Yumakci said that Mr Mustafa had previously been a frequent visitor to the school but had now been asked not to come by the landlord.
A report out next week by the Centre for Social Cohesion, a think-tank, says that Hizb is creating a number of similar “front organisations” to win public money and enlist support from mainstream politicians.
“Hizb is a fringe group but it is being given a public platform, legitimacy and funding by the very institutions it wishes to destroy,” said Houriya Ahmed, one of the authors of the report. “Just as everyone sees the BNP for what they really are, it’s time for us all to recognise how dangerous and divisive this group is.”
Outside a Victorian Gothic priory in Tottenham, which houses two of the Islamic Shakhsiyah Foundation’s schools, boys spilt out at home-time in their royal blue uniform sweatshirts.
Even the smallest girl wore the hijab. Most parents said they liked the school, but not all were aware of its links with Hizb. “We don’t really know about it,” said one father.
Others, however, were more political. “Hizb ut-Tahrir is not an extremist group,” said one mother, Khadija. “They’re people who want to stop the US domination of the Middle East.” Was it a good school? “It’s a lovely school,” she said.
“Because they love Islam.” When the school realised there was a journalist outside, a teacher came to tell the parents not to talk to us. Some, however, ignored their orders.
“To be honest with you, I don’t prefer this school,” said one father. “They don’t teach good English. Personally, I would say it’s not good for integration.”
“It is a good school,” his daughter, aged about six, interrupted. Asked what she was taught, she replied: “Arabic.”
Elsewhere in north London, a new organisation called MCRCIA, Muslim Community Representatives in Camden and Islington Association, has organised or participated in a number of community events in the two boroughs.
Its website includes endorsements from a local Labour councillor and a representative of the area’s police and community consultative group.
However, the symbol MCRCIA chooses on its blog is the logo for a Hizb ut-Tahrir campaign, Stand for Islam. A spokesman for MCRCIA said it had “links” with Hizb, but it was not a “front organisation” and its members were not in Hizb.
The CSC report said that a number of other front organisations have been created in Tower Hamlets, several of them meeting in council-controlled buildings and community centres.
Hannah Stuart, another CSC researcher, described the proliferation of such groups as “genuinely worrying,” adding: “Young people who get involved with Hizb ut-Tahrir’s fronts are tricked into believing its radical agenda represents true Islam.”
Hizb has sometimes been accused of being a “conveyor-belt to terrorism”, a charge it vehemently denies.
The Shakhsiyah school in Slough has been praised in a “light-touch inspection” by Ofsted, which said it “provides a good quality of education and meets its aims effectively” and that “pupils develop knowledge and understanding of British institutions and traditions”.
However, there is no Ofsted report on the Tottenham school.
A Department for Children, Schools and Families spokesman said: “We give that money to local authorities and they are responsible for ensuring that providers are appropriate.”
| — Hat tip: Dazed & Confused | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Leading Bishops ‘Ready to Quit Church of England and Join the Pope’
Two senior figures from the Church of England have said they may choose to be re-ordained as Catholic priests in a move that could prompt a mass exodus of clergy.
The Bishop of Chichester, the Rt Rev John Hind and the former Bishop of Rochester, Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, said they would consider converting to the Roman Catholic Church following the Pope’s offer to disaffected Anglicans.
Bishop Hind said he would be ‘happy’ to accept the olive branch extended by Rome because issues such as the consecration of women bishops and acceptance of gay clergy had created an unbridgeable division in the Anglican church.
[…]
Under the terms of the offer the Pope would let converting clergy maintain certain parts of their Protestant heritage, making it one of the most important developments since the Reformation.
In a further blow to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s hopes of preventing a haemorrhaging of clergy, the Bishop of Fulham, the Rt Rev John Broadhurst, claimed that ‘the Anglican experiment is over’.
He said: ‘Anglicanism has become a joke because it has singularly failed to deal with any of its contentious issues.
‘There is widespread dissent across the [Anglican] Communion.
‘We are divided in major ways on major issues and the Communion has unravelled.’
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Secret Court Seizes £3.2bn From Elderly… And Even Forces Furious Families to Pay to Access Own Bank Account
A secret court is seizing the assets of thousands of elderly and mentally impaired people and turning control of their lives over to the State — against the wishes of their relatives.
The draconian measures are being imposed by the little-known Court of Protection, set up two years ago to act in the interests of people suffering from Alzheimer’s or other mental incapacity.
The court hears about 23,000 cases a year — always in private — involving people deemed unable to take their own decisions. Using far-reaching powers, the court has so far taken control of more than £3.2billion of assets.
The cases involve civil servants from the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG), which last year took £23million in fees directly from the bank accounts of those struck down by mental illness, involved in accidents or suffering from dementia.
The officials are legally required to act in cases where people do not have a ‘living will’, or lasting power of attorney, which hands control of their assets over to family or friends.
But the system elicited an extraordinary 3,000 complaints in its first 18 months of operation. Among them were allegations that officials failed to consult relatives, imposed huge fees and even ‘raided’ elderly people’s homes searching for documents.
Carers trying to cope with a mentally impaired loved one, forced to apply for a court order to access money, said they felt the system put them under suspicion as it assumed at the outset that they were out to defraud their relatives.
Opposition politicians said the system, set up by Justice Secretary Jack Straw, needed to be overhauled to take account of the fact that most people were ‘honourable and decent’ and had their loved ones’ best interests at heart.
The Government now says everyone should establish a lasting power of attorney to state who should look after their affairs should they become incapacitated — although most people will be utterly unaware of this advice.
Only 60,000 people in Britain have registered these ‘living wills’ with the authorities, and the problems begin when someone is suddenly, unexpectedly mentally impaired.
Without this document, relatives must apply to the courts and the anonymous OPG, part of the Ministry of Justice based in an office block in Birmingham, is required to look into the background of carers to decide if they are fit to run the ill or elderly person’s affairs.
More…
The organisation has 300 staff, costs £26.5million a year to run and is headed by £80,000-a-year career civil servant Martin John, a former head of asylum and immigration policy in Whitehall. It prepares reports for the Court of Protection, based in a tower block in Archway, North London.
In many cases relatives have to complete a 50-page form giving huge amounts of personal information about themselves, their family, their own finances and their relationship with the person they wish to help care for.
The majority of applications are decided on the basis of paper evidence without holding a hearing. But applications relating to personal welfare, or large gifts or settlements, may be contentious and require the court to hold a hearing to decide the case.
These hearings, before a senior judge, examine evidence and witnesses, who can be compelled to appear. The court has the same powers as the High Court, but is closed to all but the parties involved in the case and their lawyers. The Press and public are banned.
The presiding judge then decides whether a family member can become a ‘deputy’ acting for their mentally impaired loved one. If no one is available, or if the judge decides a family member is not suitable, the court can appoint a local authority or in some cases a solicitor to carry out the task..
The OPG then charges an annual fee of up to £800 to supervise the activities of the deputy, whether they are a family member or a professional appointee.
The court takes over control of people’s finances, which means deputies — whether a relative or not — must get authorisation to pay expenses such as rent and household bills on their behalf.
Only if a relative is given power of attorney before a person is mentally incapacitated will they be able to avoid applying to the court and the OPG for the right to control their assets later.
Any cash controlled by the court is held in the name of the Accountant General of the Supreme Court and administered by the Court Funds Office. In some cases money is voluntarily lodged with the court.
The current Court of Protection replaced a previous body with the same name which had more restricted powers and was overseen by the High Court. The new body can rule on property and financial affairs and decisions relating to health and personal welfare, without referring it to a higher court.
But relatives caught up in the system say they are suddenly confronted by a legal and bureaucratic minefield.
Children’s author Heather Bateman was forced to get permission from the court to use family funds after an accident left her journalist husband Michael in a coma.
In a moving account of her family’s ordeal in Saga magazine, she wrote: ‘Michael and I were two independent working people. We had been married for 28 years. We had written our wills, both our names were on the deeds of the house we shared in London and the Norfolk cottage we had renovated over the years.
‘We had separate bank accounts and most of the bills were paid from Michael’s account. Now, to continue living in the way we always had done, I needed to access the money in his account.
‘The Court of Protection brought me almost as much anger, grief and frustration into my life as the accident itself. [It is] an alien, intrusive, time-consuming and costly institution, which was completely out of tune with what we were going through. It ruled my waking moments and my many sleepless nights.’
Mrs Bateman even had to apply to the court for permission to pay the couple’s daughter’s university fees.
She added: ‘I could write as many cheques as necessary up to £500. But if I needed to access more I had to get permission from the court.’
Sunita Obhrai’s mother Pushpa has lived in council-run sheltered housing for 15 years. About two years ago, the 76-year-old widow started to become forgetful and once left the oven on, and the fire brigade had to be called.
Miss Obhrai claims that without her knowledge the local authority, Buckinghamshire County Council, were appointed to run her mother’s affairs.
She said: ‘They took over running my mother’s bank account and charged her over £1,000 a year in fees, and all they were doing was ensuring her rent and utility bills were paid by direct debit.
‘She is given just £20 a week pocket money. Council officials even came and searched her flat while she was asleep in her bedroom. They told me they had to retrieve documents so they could do their job. But someone should have been with my mother. It is unbelievable that they can behave in this way.’
Early this year Miss Obhrai applied to the court to take over from the local authority and oversee her mother’s finances herself. But the court rejected her appeal.
She said: ‘Many of our other relatives and friends wrote to the court backing me, but the court ignored them. I have never done anything to harm my mother, nor would I, but the council claims I am not a fit person to look after my mother’s affairs and there is little I can do to defend myself.’
The council said it could not discuss the case in detail, but did not deny that officials had let themselves into the elderly woman’s home uninvited and unaccompanied by a family member. A spokeswoman said: ‘The court has already deemed our action appropriate.’
An internet support group, Court of Protection Problems, reveals other struggles with the system.
One recent posting by ‘gillm1’, whose mother suffers dementia, said: ‘They are causing me so much stress and worry and I feel I am being treated like a criminal. Their letters are bullying and threatening and they completely ignore everything I say.
‘I have grown to hate them! They took years to process my application and I object strongly to the extortionate fees they are demanding.’
Another writes: ‘They have upped my supervision level without taking any notice of my appeal — therefore costing my mum yet another £800 per year. It’s nothing short of robbery.
‘All I want is to be left alone to pay my mum’s bills and to safeguard as much of her money as I can, but these people are constantly demanding high fees for their “services” which, as far as I can see, consist of harassing people and little else!’
‘Everybody is often assumed to be predatory,’ said ‘robb5’. They ‘are treated as guilty until proven innocent. Repeatedly I’ve felt like I’m forever on trial, we’ve had to undergo financial and psychological strip-searches without the first bit of evidence to suspect anything.’
Shadow Justice Minister Henry Bellingham said: ‘It appears the system is set up with the assumption that people’s close relatives do not have their loved one’s best interests at heart.
‘We are looking at this to see if it would be more efficient and a good deal fairer for the system to assume that most people are honourable and decent and then to deal with those few people who abuse their loved ones’ trust.’
A spokeswoman for the Department of Justice said the courts and officials involved faced a delicate balancing act.
She said: ‘Decisions are entirely a matter for the courts, based on the individual circumstances. It is a careful balancing act between protecting vulnerable people who have lost mental capacity and recognising their views and the perspectives of those close to them.
‘The next of kin is not necessarily the most appropriate person to act in such circumstances. The OPG recommends that every adult considers making a lasting power of attorney. This enables people to choose someone they know and trust to make decisions about their property and affairs or their personal welfare, should they become unable to make decisions for themselves.’
Neil Hunt, of the Alzheimer’s Society, said: ‘It is important that people make plans for their future. But the disturbing truth is that making plans for the future is often the last thing on our minds.
‘Everyone should make a lasting power of attorney to ensure their wishes and rights are protected.’
The first Court of Protection was set up by Labour’s 2005 Mental Incapacity Act, which for the first time formalised the arrangements for dealing with the assets and care of people suffering from dementia and other similar illnesses.
Before this it was left to families and social services to make arrangements — but it was argued this ad hoc system was open to abuse by both family members and by officials.
| [Return to headlines] |
UK: The BNP Can be Dismissed — But Their Constituency Can Not
The Government’s inability to explain itself on immigration was apparent when Jack Straw was asked about the subject. His answer was so convoluted that he himself appeared to lose the thread half-way through. It is tempting to say, as a member of the audience did, that the rise of the BNP is a direct result of Labour’s immigration policy. Certainly, the spikes in immigration have strained services and depressed wages. But immigration alone is not the issue that is driving support for the BNP. Those in the frontline of the political fight against it on both the Left and the Right say that identity is as important as immigration, if not more so. The sense that communities are changing beyond recognition, that no one is standing up for what Griffin calls “the indigenous people”, is what really offers the BNP an opening.
Sitting in affluent London — one of the most successful multi-ethnic, multi-faith cities in the world — it is tempting to dismiss these concerns as small-minded. But to do so would be to play right into Griffin’s hands. Immigration without integration is unsustainable and a recipe for the balkanisation of society. There is nothing racist about believing that immigrants should learn English, that everyone who has a vote should know how that right was won, and that sealed ghettoes are unhealthy. But identity politics and multi-culturalism have so distorted our thinking that the Government is, as Andrew Gilligan reveals in this newspaper today, handing out grants to an organisation run by members of Hizb ut Tahrir, a group that wants to replace our parliamentary democracy with a theocratic dictatorship.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Gang Shootings That Put Police With Machine Guns on London’s Streets
Spate of tit-for-tat murders between Turkish drugs gangs is behind Met’s decision to deploy armed patrols
It began with a scuffle in a snooker hall. By all accounts, the altercation at the Manor Club in Haringey, north London, last January was over nothing in particular, a respect issue between two “mid-level” members of two of the capital’s most violent Turkish gangs.
Losing respect in gangland Britain these days is, say police, sufficient to ignite long-running feuds. When you lose face in a stand-off between the Bombacilar and the Tottenham Boys, north London’s most prominent and feared Turkish crews, the fallout can be fatal.
In the following weeks tensions grew, finally erupting on 22 March as Holloway shopkeeper Ahmet Paytak, 50, locked up his grocery store after another slow Sunday. A motorbike, an unusual red and black Benelli TNT, mounted the pavement outside. Its pillion passenger took aim; the assassin couldn’t miss. Paytak was murdered in the doorway of Euro Wine and Food at 10.40pm. Moments later his 21-year-old son was shot in the leg as he turned to face the killer. The gunman has never been found, despite a £20,000 reward and the almost immediate realisation that the wrong man had been killed. Paytak was innocent, a “case of mistaken identity”, according to murder squad officers.
But the blunder failed to stem the bloodshed. Quite the opposite. Shootings between the Bombacilar and the Tottenham Boys increased. “The levels of violence have been shocking, and the number of shootings there, in London terms, is very high,” said Metropolitan police commander Steve Kavanagh.
Three weeks ago the feud’s most audacious killing took place. Oktay Erbasli, a prominent member of the Tottenham Boys, was waiting at traffic lights at a busy junction in his Range Rover when a motorcycle pulled alongside. A hitman linked to the Bombacilar gang opened fire, killing the 23-year-old, but missing his five-year-old stepson seated beside him. Within the tit-for-tat mentality of gangland retribution, reprisals are inevitable. In Erbasli’s case it came within 72 hours: Cem Duzgun, 21, had been playing snooker in a Clapton social club with friends when two hooded men approached at 10.50pm and opened fire with a semi-automatic weapon.
For Scotland Yard’s senior command, Duzgun’s death was the final straw. Something had to give, something drastic was required to tackle the vortex of violence. The decision was taken; for the first time, officers armed with Heckler & Koch semi-automatic sub-machine guns would be deployed on routine patrol on London’s streets. They could also have fast motorbikes at their disposal. History may well interpret Duzgun’s killing as the catalyst for the UK’s first step towards an armed police service.
But the news last week attracted the inevitable backlash, with critics accusing the Met of a disproportionate, knee-jerk response that challenged the long-held British tradition of policing by consent and not force.
Yet the details behind the agreement to routinely deploy C019, the Met’s specialist firearms unit, on selected London streets reveals a narrative that offers a disturbing insight into how violent, anarchic gangs are able to terrorise and oppress entire communities. The decision, ratified in a recent meeting between Met borough commanders and CO19 senior officers, had followed months of anxious reports from community leaders that their areas were under siege and concerns among senior officers that they risked losing control.
In particular, the criminal landscape within a narrow two-mile band of north London, between the Green Lanes area of Haringey and Clapton to the east, had reached a critical stage. A ferocious turf war between Bombacilar and the Tottenham Boys was spiralling out of control; in the period immediately before Duzgun’s death the gangs were involved in a major shooting every week.
Endemic extortion, intimidation and thuggish protection rackets were increasingly administered to Haringey’s large Turkish and Kurdish communities as the turf war took hold. Gang members appeared to be acting with impunity, bragging to local Turkish newspapers that they were only dealing a bit of cannabis and harming no one. But underworld sources revealed the gangs had ready access to an arsenal of firearms. And neither side was shy about using them. Intelligence indicated it was only a matter of time before more innocent bystanders were killed.
Kavanagh, the officer in charge of policing the area, said: “We have had a mother evacuated when they burnt out a store, murders, innocent people being shot and good honest shopkeepers bullied and extorted.”
He said the wives of extorted shopkeepers and the girlfriends of gangsters had, for months, pleaded with him to do something; anything to break the cycle of violence. Skirmishes between the Bombacilar and Tottenham Boys have seen 11 major shootings since August, all confined to the slender north London corridor.
Police raids seized three loaded pistols, a sawn-off shotgun and a converted firearm connected to the Bombacilar and Tottenham Boys. Intelligence indicated that some of the weapons originated from eastern Europe, and although the area was “not flooded with firearms” it was the gangs’ willingness to shoot first, think later, that worried Kavanagh.
Suleyman Ergun, formerly one of Britain’s most prominent Turkish criminals, who at the age of 21 became the world’s third-biggest heroin dealer before being jailed for 14 years, told the Observer how easy it was for gangs to obtain guns. He said the majority of firearms arrived from Germany and Belgium, and there were even AK-47s (Kalashnikovs) from Afghanistan, the traditional source of heroin for Turkish traffickers.
“Firearms are still coming over with the heroin to north London, it’s what we used to do as well,” said Ergun. He added that the current price for an unused pistol in north London was £800-£900, while a brand-new submachine gun would cost £1,000-£1,500. Replica guns such as the Olympic BBM 9mm revolver could also be bought for £85 on the high street and converted by criminals to fire live ammunition.
What added to the decision to use armed patrols was the intelligence that both Turkish groups had forged alliances with some of London’s most notorious black gangs, all of whom held a long-standing reputation for violence and the casual use of firearms.
Kavanagh believes that the unprecedented union suggests that the long-standing black gangs of Hackney had joined forces with the Turkish crews to widen their drugs markets and broaden their influence. “The expansion is to do with drugs and violence and kudos and what opportunities they have to support each other. Those bonds are quite chaotic relationships, but involve well-known Hackney gangs, the usual suspects,” he said.
So far detectives have been able to link three murders since March to the mounting friction between the Bombacilar and Tottenham Boys, but the involvement of the black crews, the Yardies and crack dealers, usually investigated under Operation Trident, meant that the threat and killing potential of the Turkish gangs had intensified.
Senior officers were aware the decision to send routine armed patrols on to British streets would lead to accusations of heavy-handed American-style policing, but they also knew that what was happening in one small area had increased gun crime in London by 17% and the city was being blighted.
As commanders weighed up the advantages against the chorus of opprobrium such a move would inevitably attract, the decision was made to ask one of Scotland Yard’s most experienced homicide detectives to establish whether more murders were linked to the arrival of the “super-gangs”.
Detective Superintendent John Sweeney of the Yard’s specialist crime directorate, known for leading the Met’s review into the death of cricket coach Bob Woolmer, is examining whether other shootings in the capital can be linked to the Bombacilar and Tottenham Boys.
Kavanagh is no stranger to the lethal potential of north London’s gunmen and the Turkish gangs’ propensity for violence. He was the senior investigating officer in the 2002 murder of Alisan Dogan, 43, a cleaner who was caught in the crossfire and died from stab wounds when dozens of criminals staged a running battle in the busy shopping street of Green Lanes. The incident — which left four men with gunshot wounds — is thought to be connected to Turkish organised crime involving the Bombacilars.
One theory behind the surge in shootings points to the power vacuum left in the wake of Ergun’s imprisonment and, three years ago, the jailing of Abdullah Baybasin, who was one of the country’s most feared criminals and who ruled his £10bn heroin empire with violence and intimidation. The Turkish 48-year-old, who lived in north London, commanded a gang of foot soldiers who racketeered, imported drugs and instilled fear into London’s Turkish and Kurdish communities. His jailing for 22 years destabilised the gangs’ natural order, creating a power struggle now filled by the dozens of young men affiliated to the Bombacilar and Tottenham Boys.
Ergun and Kavanagh agree that the structure of the new hierarchy lacks the organisation and disciplined heroin dealing of Baybasin’s network and, instead, is characterised by more chaotic, gung-ho individuals preoccupied with issues of respect as much as earning riches. Ergun said: “They’re only little kids who don’t respect anyone. In my opinion they are just idiots who think that selling a bit of brown [heroin] and having a gun means you’re a gangster.”
Yet Ergun and Kavanagh disagree on one facet — drugs. The police commander believes that the supply of heroin has been replaced by cannabis dealing and extortion rackets against Turkish and Kurdish businesses.
Ergun believes that the trade in heroin, traditionally controlled in London by Turkish organised criminals, remains as rife as ever. He said: “You’ve got the Kurds bringing it over, 10, 15, 20 kilos at a time, and these youngsters are buying it off them and selling it on the street, and that’s where the war is coming from.
“It’s just a price war or the usual stepping on one another’s toes, poaching one another’s customers. That’s where all this
ing mix-up is.”
In Helmand province, where British troops continue their fight against the Taliban, the latest bulletins indicate that large quantities of heroin are still leaving the area and passing through Turkish suppliers and into north London.
Steve Coates, deputy director of the Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) and an expert on the heroin trade for the past 20 years, confirmed that the Turkish gangs still “dominated” the heroin trade in the UK, controlling at least 50% of the country’s supply.
He said the latest intelligence had pinpointed key figures in Turkey as well as the traditional Turkish crime gangs of north London, though he would not name the Bombacilar and the Tottenham Boys.
As Soca attempts to squeeze the heroin supply to the capital’s Turkish gangs, Met officers in the Green Lanes area and Tottenham will supplement their armed patrols with visits to vulnerable shopkeepers, analysis of car numberplates and a fresh round of meetings with representatives of the Turkish and Kurdish communities.
So far, the “proactive” CO19 patrols are credited with instigating an instant drop-off in activity from the Bombacilar and Tottenham Boys. “We have got them reeling because we are showing that the levels of violence are not being tolerated,” said Kavanagh.
The Met’s hierarchy is watching the trials closely. Gun-related crime in London has risen year-on-year, with the number of gun crimes in September alone up from 230 last year to 300 this year, a 30% rise. It is hoped that the trials in Green Lanes, Tottenham and south of the river in Brixton, where street shootings have also spiked, will quash the trend.
But the Yard’s commanders equally know that any fatal error, any accidental shooting from a firearms unit which is still tarnished with the death of Jean Charles de Menezes at Stockwell tube station in 2005, means that the experiment will be over.
| — Hat tip: Furor Teutonicus | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Snooper’s Census: 2011 Survey Will Ask for the Name, Sex and Birth Date of All Our ‘Overnight Visitors’
Ministers are being accused of planning to snoop into citizens’ private lives in the most intrusive national census ever carried out.
The 2011 survey will demand to know how many bedrooms there are in homes and detailed information about any ‘overnight visitors’.
Other new questions include how well respondents can speak English, what kind of central heating they have installed, whether they have a second home, how they define their national identity and whether they are in civil partnerships.
The Conservatives said the attempt to find out sleeping arrangements was particularly objectionable.
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Energy: USA Company to Modernized Serbian Refinery
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, OCTOBER 20 — The Serbian Oil Industry (NIS) has signed a contract with the USA company CB&I Lummus on the construction of a hydrocracking and hydroprocessing complex in Oil Refinery Pancevo, reports BETA news agency. The contract stipulates that CB&I Lummus is to provide engineering services, equipment delivery, monitoring and construction of the complex, and the total value of the contract exceeds USD 70 million, NIS announced. The construction of the hydrocracking and hydroprocessing complex will enable the Serbian company to increase its range of products, as well as the quality of its finished products, and to become a competitive player on the European market. It is planned that the construction, which should bring Serbia one of the most contemporary refinery complexes in Eastern Europe, will be completed in the third quarter of 2012. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Algeria: Risk of Arms Arriving From Darfur
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, OCTOBER 21 — Border controls in sub-Saharan Africa are practically inexistent, and it is impossible to stop arms trafficking between countries in the region, especially to Algeria. The charge is made in a report presented to army commanders from the countries in the Sahel region and reported in today’s edition of Algerian paper El Khabar, which cites reliable sources. The newspaper underlines Algeria’s concerns over a possible arrival of weapons from Darfur intented for armed groups linked with Al Qaeda for the Islamic Maghreb. “Algeria has called on the countries of the Sahel region to reinforce controls over arms trafficking in the region over fears about the arrival of sophisticated weapons from Darfur, which will end up via Chad and Niger in the hands of terrorists”, writes the paper. Algerian security forces also reveal in the report that border guards at the southern border of Algeria are involved in trafficking, accusing them of helping fighters from the north African wing of Al Qaeda between 2002 and 2005. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Algeria: Algerian Nationality to 47,000 Foreigners Since 1970
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, OCTOBER 21 — 47,000 foreigners have asked for and obtained the Algerian nationality since 1970. Most of them, explained the newspaper El Khabar, quoting a supervisor from the Justice Ministry, were from the ‘70s and ‘80s when Algeria wanted to benefit from the experience of foreign managers, while others were French people who after Algerian independence chose to remain in the country. The French are in fact the largest portion of foreigners to have obtained Algerian nationality, followed by Palestinians, Syrians, Egyptians, Iraqis and Tunisians. In 2008 nationality was granted to 683 people.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt Muslims Stone Coptic Churches in Sectarian Clash
CAIRO — Muslims students stoned Coptic Christian churches and homes in a southern Egyptian village on Saturday after four Muslims suspected of killing a Copt were kept in custody, police said.
The unrest began when the prosecutor extended the detention of the Muslims in the village of Dairut who are suspected of killing an elderly Copt in his home last week, a police official said.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Fisheries: Tunisia Bets on Aquaculture and Bluefin Tuna
(ANSAmed) — ROME, OCTOBER 20 — Northern bluefin tuna is saving Tunisian aquaculture, respecting international quotas which were also signed by the North African country, said Mostafa Ben Dag, director of the Tunisian Technical Centre for Aquaculture. The director will participate in ‘Acquacoltura Med’ (Aquaculture Med) to be held at Veronafiere on October 22 and 23. Tunisia has put its money on aquaculture, a growing high-potential activity, and is interested in learning new techniques of farming fish, in line with strict health regulations. “Italy is one of the main countries we export to” the director explained, “and Italy has high demands for its market”. Promotion of the activity started in 2006-2007, particularly to satisfy the domestic market which takes up 70% of production and to slow the progressive exhaustion of marine resources. “The are still mackerels and sardines in the sea” Ben Dag explained, “but it is become increasingly difficult to find sea bream, dentex, bass and gilthead”. Aquaculture in the North African country includes the farming of bluefin tuna, but also bass and gilthead. The fish is farmed in cages with an average density of 15 kg of fish per cubic metre, all food is supplied. In the north of Tunisia mussels and some oysters are farmed as well, more than 300 tonnes. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
3 Policemen Lightly Wounded as Temple Mount Clashes Resume
Three policemen were lightly wounded late Sunday morning as security forces stormed the Temple Mount for the second in just a few hours after dozens of young Muslims began throwing rocks.
The security forces hurled stun grenades to quell the rioters.
Two of the policemen wounded by the rock-throwers were treated at the scene, while the third was evacuated to the capital’s Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital.
It came just as police officers were talking to the Waqf in order to get dozens of young Muslim protesters involved in earlier violence to come out of the Aksa Mosque where they had holed themselves up and descend from the mount. Police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld said that the officers had promised not to arrest them.
Rosenfeld stressed that at no time during the morning disturbances did police enter the Aksa mosque, but in the latest outbreak of violence, Muslim worshipers claimed they saw security forces inside the premises.
Police said that the earlier disturbances began when officers were accompanying a group of tourists up to the mount, and several Muslim youngsters were caught on video camera preparing to cause trouble, including pouring oil onto the ground to hinder the access of security forces and the visitors.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Pro-Settlement Troops: Protest Causes Stir
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, OCTOBER 23 — An act of insubordination organised by some Israeli troops in support of the settlement movement during yesterday’s official ceremony at Jerusalem’s Wailing Wall has caused quite a stir. At the moment the commander of their brigade started his speech, several soldiers lined up on the square held up a large banner on which was written: “Shimshon (the name of their unit, editor’s note) will not clear out Homesh”. That particular settlement (in the northern part of the West Bank) was cleared out in 2005 on orders of the Israeli premier at the time, Ariel Sharon, as part of the policy of separation from the Palestinians. But since then groups of settlers have been trying to return to the ruins of Homesh. The blatant protest of the pro-settlement troops is getting broad attention in the press today and it has been condemned by military leaders. At the same time it seems to have stirred up certain sentiments that have been felt in some army units for a long time, making the future mass evacuation of settlements even more problematic, if the government should decide to give the order. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Rabbis Against Top Model Rafaeli’s Risqué Poster
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, OCTOBER 22 — The Jewish ultra-orthodox community is angry with Bar Rafaeli, the Israeli supermodel also known as the former girlfriend of Leonardo Di Caprio, who was recently criticised by an Israeli colleague for avoiding military service. The latest advertising campaign of Fox, a well-known clothing brand in the country of which Bar is testimonial, is too ‘risque” for the orthodox Jews. “Certain images” fulminated rabbi Mordechai Bloi, spiritual guide of an Israeli orthodox community and promoter of the Guardians of Sainthood and Education group, in an interview with the Jerusalem Post, “poison the environment”. Religious Jews have threatened to boycott the brand. A threat to be taken seriously by Fox, which sells many of its clothes to “haredim” (religious) families with their many children, drawn to the Fox megastores in Jerusalem and other locations due to the low prices. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Energy: S.Craxi, Photovoltaic Centre in Sothern Jordan
(ANSAmed) — MILAN, OCTOBER 22 — In southern Jordan one of the largest photovoltaic centres in the world will be built, including the contribution from Italy. The deputy foreign minister, Stefania Craxi, explained the project during the Italy-Jordan economic forum which took place in Milan. The Shams Màan project “will create in the southern part of the country”, she emphasised, “one of the largest photovoltaic facilities in the world with an initial capacity of 100 megawatts”. 10 memorandums were signed today for the project at the forum for the development of economic relations between the two countries. It is not because solar energy is the only sector in which Italy can collaborate with Amman. “Our economic presence in Jordan”, she explained, “is characterised mostly by trade” and little is focused on production. Therefore “we need to pass from the export of products to the sharing of experiences, and this is possible”. Italy must not however be the only one to look to the Middle East, according to the deputy minister, but all of Europe. “If the European Union doesn’t look to its south and remains closed in trap”, she concluded, “it will not benefit from the challenges, not only of the United States, but of “China, India and Brazil”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Iranian Negotiations: Ploy of the Week or Deal of the Century?
by Barry Rubin
There are widespread reports about an imminent deal with Iran regarding its nuclear program. Here’s how the New York Times optimistically presents the proposal:
“Iranian negotiators have agreed to a draft deal that would delay the country’s ability to build a nuclear weapon for about a year, buying more time for President Obama to search for a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear standoff.”
(To be fair, even this somewhat cautious note may be much less ecstatic than what we’ll be hearing if the deal goes through.)
What is the proposed bargain? It is based on an offer the Iranian government made in 2007 and reintroduced last June. In practice, the result would be that Iran enriches unlimited amounts of uranium to a level near that needed for weapons, a large amount of this would be shipped off to France and/or Russia where it would be converted into something useful for medical purposes alone. Thus, it could be said that Iran having nuclear weapons has been either stopped or delayed considerably, though in fact it would only be delayed (if at all) not very long.
If the deal is made—and don’t take for granted it will be as the Iranian regime can think of plenty of delaying tactics, demands for modifications, real or imaginary internal conflicts blocking acceptance, etc.—there will be general rejoicing and the idea of further sanctions will be put on a back shelf to gather dust.
Indeed, it could effectively be argued, that existing sanctions could be removed. This does not seem likely at present—it would require a UN resolution undoing existing sanctions—but such a thing could arise in the future. And of course various countries in Europe could interpret the restrictions more loosely to allow deals that would not have gone through otherwise.
In other words, Iran could go on sponsoring terrorism (in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, against Israel, and in other places) and calling for Israel’s destruction while being treated as a regular member of the international community. It would only be a matter of a week or two before media outlets start writing that this proves President Barack Obama did deserve the Nobel Peace Prize…
| — Hat tip: Barry Rubin | [Return to headlines] |
Italy-Syria: Marrazzo, Syrian Tourism Week in Rome
(ANSAmed) — DAMASCUS, OCTOBER 22 — Rome will hold its first week of Syrian tourism next February, as announced by Region of Lazio president Piero Marrazzo, quoted today by SANA, the official Syrian press agency, who is visiting Damascus for a number of meetings on bilateral cooperation between Italy and Syria. During the event any tourist visiting Rome be invited to discover architectural relics of the Roman era in Syria through a series of meetings, exhibits, and the distribution of information. Marrazzo guaranteed that Lazio will supply “all the assistance necessary to promote travel in Syria in full cooperation with Syrian ministry of Tourism, and also proposed to increase the number of flights from Rome to Damascus to support the flow of tourists. In the context of cultural and economic exchanges between Italy and Syria, a number of Italian experts will travel to Damascus to hold training courses for the tourist sector. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Lebanon: Crackdown Against ‘Criminal’ Motorbikes
(by Ziad Talhouk) (ANSAmed) — BEIRUT, OCTOBER 21 — Used by criminals, as well as ‘bullies’ on the motorway to show their stuff or disrupt the public quiet at night in many cities, motorcycles and scooters are officially in the sights of Lebanese police, who since the beginning of the year have confiscated 13,000 of them. Recently the offensive against the two-wheelers has taken off yet again, after the murder of a young man in a Christian neighbourhood of Beirut during a parade of numerous motorcyclists who arrived from a Hezbollah stronghold, a southern suburb of the city. It was an event which caused the Interior Minister, Ziad Barud, to prohibit the use of motorcycles and scooters from 6:30 in the afternoon to 5:00 in the morning. Doctors, journalists and other professionals are exempt from the measure as long as they obtain a “special permit”, even if it is still unclear who releases them. In the meantime, the police have set up dozens of road blocks and filled entire lorries with confiscated motorbikes, the riders left to their feet to beg and complain in vain. According to what is reported in the newspaper an Nahar, a special police unit was charged with the task of “exclusively” applying the ban on traffic in the southern suburbs of Beirut, “in coordination with the parties concerned”, or Hezbollah, which has its own ‘Indibat’ (Discipline) units, a force which substitutes the city police in the area and widely uses motorcycles. Criminality and hooliganism are not the only motives for the hostility of a good portion of the population towards the motorcyclists. They are also associated with “lethal chaos” and “nuisances”. At the funeral of a young man who was killed in a motorcycle accident last week, the parliamentary representative Akram Shehayeb described the two-wheelers as “moving coffins”. “This is the 600th young man killed this year on our roads, due to”, he stated, “the disobedience of traffic ordinances”. According to the youth association for social awareness (Yasa), who is particularly occupied with road safety, a large portion of the 500,000 motorcycles and scooters that circulate in Lebanon are not registered and cause an average of 130 deaths every year. But it is a phenomenon with a difficult solution. The roads are full of powerful cylindered motorbikes that accelerate noisily, or old scooters driven by kids without helmets who play games in traffic under the indifferent eyes of police, many of whom use rusty scooters to return home when they finish work. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Michael Freund: Arab States Meet to Reinvigorate Israel Boycott
Representatives of 16 Arab states convened in Damascus last week for a conference aimed at strengthening the decades-old Arab economic and trade boycott of Israel.
The annual event brought together regional Arab League boycott liaison officers from participating Arab countries, as well as representatives of the Palestinians and the Organization of the Islamic Conference.
Although the Arab League has its headquarters in Cairo, the organization’s Office for the Boycott of Israel has been based in the Syrian capital since its establishment in 1951.
Speakers at the conference stressed the importance of enforcing the embargo on Israel as a means of applying pressure to the Jewish state.
Arab League Assistant Secretary General for Palestine Affairs Mohammed Subaih said the boycott is necessary “to confront Israel’s aggression and crimes” and he thanked the conference’s Syrian hosts for their support.
Muhammad al- Tayyeb Busala’a, who serves as commissioner general of the Arab League’s Central Bureau for the Boycott of Israel, denounced what he termed “the persistent Zionist aggression” and said that the Jewish state should be held accountable for its “war crimes”.
In recent years, enforcement of the boycott has waned. Some Arab League members, such as Egypt and Jordan, ceased applying it after signing peace treaties with Israel, while others, such as Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia, do not enforce it.
Other Arab states, such as Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, continue to bar entry to goods made in Israel or those containing Israeli-made components.
| — Hat tip: Michael Freund | [Return to headlines] |
Nuclear Energy: King of Jordan, Uranium Supply to Italy
(ANSAmed) — MILAN, OCTOBER 22 — Jordan has presented itself as possible nuclear energy partner of Italy, especially regarding uranium. King Abdullah II stressed this idea in today’s Business forum between Italy and Jordan in the Milan Stock Exchange. The king, accompanied by his wife, Queen Rania, who wore a glittering red dress, pointed out that 3% of the world’s uranium can be found in Jordan. “Halfway next year we will quantify how much we have” he explained, “and that will allow us to become a possible partner of the Italian government and Italian companies”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Smoking: Lebanon Among Highest Number of Smokers
(ANSAmed) — BEIRUT, OCTOBER 20 — The expression is no longer ‘smoking like a Turk”, but ‘like a Lebanese”: with over 65% of men and 54% of women smoking cigarettes or the more traditional narghile (water pipe), Lebanon has one of the highest levels of smokers in Asia Minor, the Middle East and north Africa. A report by Credit Libanese, one of Beirut’s leading banks, says that one of the factors encouraging young people to take up the smoking habit is the particularly low cost of cigarettes: a packet of twenty in Lebanon costs as little as 35 Euro cents. Smoking has already been banned in public places in Turkey, and will also be banned in Syria within six months, and in Gulf countries there are high fines for selling cigarettes to under-20s, but a lack of laws against the consumption and sale of tobacco puts Lebanon in last place for countries in the region trying to combat the smoking habit. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
T. Boone Pickens on Iraq: ‘We Leave There With the Chinese Getting the Oil’
WASHINGTON — A leading energy developer said the United States has been excluded from Iraq’s revived energy market.
T. Boone Pickens told Congress that U.S. companies were losing opportunities in the Iraqi crude oil and natural gas sectors to competitors from China and Europe.
The senior executive said the United States could lose all influence in the Iraqi oil sector after the military withdrawal in 2011.
“They’re opening them [oil fields] up to other companies all over the world,” Pickens told the Congressional Natural Gas Caucus on Oct. 21.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
‘Dishonest’ Blair and Straw Accused Over Secret Plan for Multicultural UK
Jack Straw and Tony Blair ‘dishonestly’ concealed a plan to allow in more immigrants and make Britain more multi-cultural because they feared a public backlash if it was made public, it has been claimed.
The allegation was made after a former Labour adviser said the Government opened up UK borders partly to humiliate Right-wing opponents of immigration.
Andrew Neather, who worked for Mr Straw when he was Home Secretary, and as a speech writer for Mr Blair, claimed a secret Government report in 2000 called for mass immigration to change Britain’s cultural make-up forever.
It also emerged that:
Home Office Minister Barbara Roche, who pioneered the open-door policy, wanted to restore her Labour reputation after being attacked by Left-wingers for condemning begging by immigrants as ‘vile’.
Civil servant Jonathan Portes, who wrote the immigration report, was a speechwriter for Gordon Brown and is now a senior aide to Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell.
Labour chiefs decided to brand Tory leaders William Hague and Michael Howard as racists to deter them from criticising the covert initiative.
Mr Neather said there was a ‘driving political purpose’ behind Labour’s decision to allow in hundreds of thousands of migrants to plug gaps in the labour market.
He said the stance was foreshadowed by a report by Mr Blair’s Performance and Innovation Unit (PIU) think-tank, which said the nation would benefit from more migrants.
Mr Neather claimed that earlier, unpublished versions of the report made clear that one aim was to make Britain more multi-cultural for political reasons.
‘I remember coming away from some discussions with the clear sense that the policy was intended — even if this wasn’t its main purpose — to rub the Right’s nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date,’ he said.
The report, entitled Research, Development And Statistics Occasional Paper No67 — Migration: An Economic And Social Analysis, was published in January 2001 by the Home Office, then run by Mr Straw.
Most of its key statistics came from a PIU team led by Mr Portes. The report paints a rosy picture of mass immigration, stating: ‘There is little evidence that native workers are harmed by migration. The broader fiscal impact is likely to be positive because a greater proportion of migrants are of working age and migrants have higher average wages than natives.’
It goes on: ‘Most British regard immigration as having a positive effect on British culture.’
Mr Portes remains an enthusiastic advocate of the benefits of immigration. He wrote a report for the Department of Work and Pensions last year rejecting claims that Eastern European workers had stolen the jobs of British counterparts, arguing Britons lacked the skills and motivation.
A former Government adviser told The Mail on Sunday: ‘If the Government had been prepared to have an open debate about immigration, we would not have had the problems we have seen with the BNP. But it did not want immigration policy discussed.
‘It is not a very honest Government. They knew immigration was a hot issue and they did not want to get into a fight on it.’
The source said Labour deliberately targeted William Hague and Michael Howard when they called for tougher immigration controls.
Mr Hague was accused of ‘playing the race card’ in 2001 when he said Mr Blair was turning Britain into a ‘foreign land’. Michael Howard was called a ‘racist’ in 2004 after he went to BNP stronghold Burnley, in Lancashire, to denounce Labour’s stance on asylum seekers.
A Labour insider suggested Mrs Roche relaxed immigration controls partly in response to the outcry she faced after criticising begging Romanian mothers.
‘She was called a scumbag,’ said the source. ‘She wanted to show she was a genuine liberal.’
| — Hat tip: KGS | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: IOM Conference on Human Trafficking
(ANSAmed) — TRIPOLI, OCTOBER 22 — This morning’s meeting in Tripoli organised by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), in collaboration with the US State Department, the Libyan Justice Ministry and with participation of the Italian anti-mafia department, focused on the fight against human trafficking. Sixty Libyan judges and attorneys involved in the Ethjic project, initiated by the IOM last year to improve the capacity of the Libyan justice system to deal with human trafficking and funded by the GTIP Fund of the US State Department, have presented their recommendations to the Libyan Justice Minister, Mustafa Mohamed Abdel Jalil, on ways to improve the Libyan approach to the problem. “The new relation between Libya and the USA also includes the fight against terrorism and human trafficking, the modern form of slavery” said American ambassador Gene Cretz, the first US ambassador to Libya after 36 years. “Last July’s training of the Libyan judges at the Italian anti-mafia department” said Giusto Sciacchitano of the department, today in Libya to participate in the final conference of the Ethjic project, “has been a great success. Now these judges want to propose new instruments and revise their legislation on the fight against human trafficking”. According to Sciacchitano “fighting human trafficking also means fighting drugs for Italy, since the two phenomena often go together”. According to Teresa Albano, IOM expert on human trafficking, and Carmela Godeau, deputy director of the IOM for the Mediterranean area, “the project has been useful to better understand the problem and to give the Libyans new instruments to reconsider some legal aspects of the trade, and for us to understand that closer cooperation between countries in the security sector is necessary”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Oh, Danny Boy! Gay Tourism to Ireland Booming
Did you know that Dublin has more gay men and women per capita than San Francisco? Or that in recent years Ireland’s become a go-to destination for gay and lesbian travelers? Recent banner attractions for the GLTB visitor have included the Bingham Cup — sometimes referred to as the gay Rugby World Cup — which was held in Dublin in 2008.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Left Wants to Legalise Abortion Up to 22 Weeks
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, OCTOBER 23 — The far-left in Spain has upped the ante in the approval of an abortion reform law launched by Zapatero’s government and under the examination of Congress, where its five votes will play a determining role. MPs from Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya and Izquierda Unida announed that, in the partial amendments to the text of the reform to the current law from 1985, they will ask for abortions to be made legal in the 22nd week of pregnancy, an increase from the current reform proposed by the government allowing them until the 14th week. The latter period is indicated in the reform law as the limit for a voluntary interruption of a pregnancy only in case of serious malformations to the fetus or danger to the physical or mental health of the mother. ERC and LU will not vote for the reform if the right for a 16-year-old to have an abortion without their parent’s consent is taken away, which is the most controversial point in the draft law. On October 17, a few hundred-thousand people demonstrated in Madrid against abortion in a rally called by the pro-life and Catholic movements. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Steam Secret of Natural Fission
by Stuart Nathan
The world’s only known natural nuclear reactor, which decommissioned itself over two billion years ago, could provide insights into how modern nuclear plants can operate more safely. The world’s only known natural nuclear reactor, which decommissioned itself over two billion years ago, could provide insights into how modern nuclear plants can operate more safely.
The site, in Gabon, West Africa, ran for 150million years without blowing up, and storing its own waste in a safe manner.The reactor was a natural deposit of uranium.
Today, and for the last two billion years, natural uranium will not undergo nuclear reactions, because it contains too little of the fissionable isotope, uranium-235 (U235).But in the distant past, U235 was more abundant, comprising 3% of the total amount — the approximate concentration of enriched uranium used in nuclear fuel today.
The Gabon deposit also contained, by a quirk of geology, a mixture of minerals which acted as a neutron moderator, slowing the neutron flux enough to allow the fission process to take place.In a nuclear reactor, it takes large numbers of specialists and serious application of high technology to prevent reactions from running away.
‘The big question we addressed was: when the uranium reached criticality, why didn’t it blow up?’ says Alexander Meschik of Washington University in St Louis, Missouri.The answer, it appears, is that the site functioned like a geyser.
The energy generated by the nuclear reaction boiled the groundwater around the deposit. Water is a natural neutron moderator, so as it was converted into steam, it stopped absorbing neutrons and shut down the chain reaction.
As the rocks cooled down, the steam condensed, and the presence of water once again slowed the neutrons down and restarted the chain reaction. Meschik calculates that the reactor operated for about half an hour at a time, then shut down for two and a half hours.
Meschik deduced this by analysing the other neutron moderator in the deposit, a ‘mineral assembly’ containing lanthanum, cerium, strontium and calcium and known as alumophosphate. This also acted as a waste storage medium, the researchers found; it absorbed the isotopes of xenon which were formed by the fission of the U235.
Xenon is extremely rare on Earth and is a characteristic marker of a fission process. It occurs in nine isotopes, and it was the analysis of the relative abundances of these which gave the researchers the clue to the way the reactor operated.
The find could provide insight into how to operate industrial reactors more safely. ‘This is very impressive, to think that this natural system not only went critical, it also safely stored the waste,’ Meschik says. ‘Just using the fact that the water boiled at the reactor site might give contemporary nuclear reactor researchers ideas on how to operate more safely and efficiently.
| — Hat tip: Zenster | [Return to headlines] |
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