On the first day of Cologne’s week-long Carnival, 22 sexual assaults were reported, which was far higher than the average for that day. Police attributed the increase in part to greater willingness on the part of women to report such crimes. One of the suspected perpetrators arrested for an alleged rape was a 17-year-old Afghan “refugee”.
In other news, the Islamic terror group Al-Shabaab took over the southern port town of Marka in Somalia after troops of African Union and the Somali National Army fled.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to AF, C. Cantoni, Caroline Glick, Dean, Fjordman, Insubria, Matt Bracken, Srdja Trifkovic, Upananda Brahmachari, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.
Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.
Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.
ArcelorMittal to Mine Stock Market After Massive Loss
ArcelorMittal said Friday it would ask shareholders for fresh funds, sell assets and slash costs after falling commodity prices pummelled its performance last year, leaving a gaping hole in its accounts.
The world’s largest steelmaker reported a net loss of $7.95 billion for 2015, more than four times the previous year’s net loss of $1.86 billion in 2014.
To help fill the shortfall, ArcelorMittal said it would tap into shareholders’ pockets via a capital increase of $3 billion by mid-2016, and also sell its stake in Spanish automotive company Gestamp, roughly netting another $1 billion.
The company’s shares plunged on the Paris stock exchange in anticipation of the cash call, dropping by over 6 percent in morning trading…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
EC Raises Deficit Forecast, Tells Italy to Listen
Commission says Italian debt coming down only ‘slightly’
(ANSA) — Rome, February 4 — The European Commission on Thursday raised Italy’s deficit forecast and told Rome to listen carefully in upcoming debates about budget flexibility.
Updating a slew of economic data, the EC also said that Italy’s big debt — the second highest in the eurozone behind Greece’s — was coming down “only slightly”.
Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan responded by saying that public finances, including the debt, was “under control”, while European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi said the ECB would not “surrender” to low inflation.
The EC said that it had raised its deficit-to-GDP forecast for Italy to 2.5% for 2016, up from the 2.3% it predicted in November. “Despite positive growth, the deficit will only come down marginally,” the EC said in its winter forecasts. “This reflects the expansionist impact of the (2016) budget law (of Premier Matteo Renzi’s government), including 3.2 billion euros in additional spending on security and culture, which increased the deficit forecast in the DEF (Economic and Financial Document) from 2.2% to 2.4%”.
The Commission further said that “after the peak of 2015,” Italy’s public debt in 2016 will fall “only slightly, in part because the structural deficit is deteriorating”. The Commission revised up its 2016 debt forecast for Italy to 132.4% of GDP, compared to the 132.2% it predicted in November. It said Italy’s debt-to-GDP ratio will be 130.6% in 2017, up from its previous forecast of 130%. But it also estimated that Italy’s debt last year stood at 132.8%, rather than 133% in its November forecast.
European Economic Commissioner Pierre Moscovici, for his part, said Italy should show “serenity and an ability to listen” in discussions on budget flexibility. “I am convinced that the spirit of dialogue must prevail over clashes. Serenity, patience, hard work, a mutual capacity to listen to each other and dialogue are needed,” said Moscovici when asked when he would reply to Italy’s demands for greater flexibility. “You know the rules, the reply to the flexibility requested will be in May, we’ll examine demands continuing dialogue with Italy, in a serene and objective, methodical way and with a precise deadline, recalling that Italy is the only (country) that already benefits from a significant flexibility”.
The EU will back structural reforms in Italy without betraying the spirit of the Stability and Growth Pact, Moscovici said Thursday. “Italy has received 0.4% of (budget) flexibility for important reforms, then asked for more flexibility for reforms and investments, then asked for more for migrants and, a few weeks ago, asked for a further margin of spending for anti-terrorism and culture spending,” he said. Moscovici said there was “an open dialogue of quality” on all this and added “we will respond in May with a spirit of support for reforms but without contravening the spirit of the Pact”. The commissioner also slammed Italian media depictions of him as “schizophrenic” in allegedly voicing differing opinions on Italy’s flexibility demands. “I don’t appear to suffer from this disease,” he said.
The European Commission “has not issued Italy a warning on its failed debt reduction” in its debt sustainability report, Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan told the Senate. The Commission’s macroeconomic forecasts “are not far from the government’s September forecasts, when the outlook was more favorable,” Padoan said.
Padoan told the Senate that “Italy’s public finances are under control and pensions spending is sustainable”. Padoan said European Commission analysts believe Italy’s debt “can withstand various scenarios”, including “significant shocks” from interest rate changes. The minister also told lawmakers Italian banks hold net non-performing loans equal to 88 billion euros, not 201 billion.
“(The latter) is not the number weighing on bank balances, because devaluations and deferments have already been carried out,” the minister explained.
Also on Thursday, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said that there are forces in the global economy that are “conspiring” to hold down inflation. “Those forces might cause inflation to return more slowly to our objective,” Draghi added. However, “there is no reason why they should lead to a permanently lower inflation rate,” he continued. Forces influencing the inflation rate include demographic change, aging populations, the long-term cycle in commodity prices and technological change including e-commerce, the ECB chief said. Draghi said that the ECB will not “surrender” to low inflation. “The risks of acting too late outweigh the risks of acting too early,” Draghi stressed.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
EC Says Italian Debt Coming Down Only ‘Slightly’
Commission sees debt-GDP ratio of 132.4% this year
(ANSA) — Brussels, February 4 — The European Commission said on Thursday that “after the peak of 2015,” Italy’s public debt in 2016 will fall “only slightly, in part because the structural deficit is deteriorating”. The Commission revised up its 2016 debt forecast for Italy to 132.4% of GDP, compared to the 132.2% it predicted in November. It said Italy’s debt-to-GDP ratio will be 130.6% in 2017, up from its previous forecast of 130%. But is also estimated that Italy’s debt last year stood at 132.8%, rather than 133% in its November forecast.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Finances Under Control, Pensions Sustainable Says Padoan
Net toxic loans of 88bn minister tells Senate
(ANSA) — Rome, February 4 — Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan told the Senate on Thursday that “Italy’s public finances are under control and pensions spending is sustainable”. Padoan said European Commission analysts believe Italy’s debt “can withstand various scenarios”, including “significant shocks” from interest rate changes. The minister also told lawmakers Italian banks hold net non-performing loans equal to 88 billion euros, not 201 billion. “(The latter) is not the number weighing on bank balances, because devaluations and deferments have already been carried out,” the minister explained.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Caroline Glick: A (Much) Better Year
On Wednesday the US media interrupted its saturation coverage of the presidential primaries to report on President Barack Obama’s visit to a mosque in Maryland. The visit was Obama’s first public one to a mosque in the US since entering the White House seven years ago. The mosque Obama chose to visit demonstrated once again that his views of radical Islam are deeply problematic.
Obama visited the Islamic Society of Baltimore, a mosque with longstanding ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas. During Operation Protective Edge, the leaders of the mosque accused Israel of genocide and demanded that the administration end US support for the Jewish state.
According to The Daily Caller, the mosque’s former imam Mohammad Adam el-Sheikh was active in the Islamic American Relief Agency, a charity deemed a terror group in 2004 after the US Treasury Department determined it had transferred funds to Osama bin Laden, Hamas, al-Qaida and other terrorist groups…
| — Hat tip: Caroline Glick | [Return to headlines] |
DHS Ordered Me to Scrub Records of Muslims With Terror Ties
By Philip Haney
Amid the chaos of the 2009 holiday travel season, jihadists planned to slaughter 290 innocent travelers on a Christmas Day flight from the Netherlands to Detroit, Michigan. Twenty-three-year old Nigerian Muslim Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab intended to detonate Northwest Airlines Flight 253, but the explosives in his underwear malfunctioned and brave passengers subdued him until he could be arrested. The graphic and traumatic defeat they planned for the United States failed, that time.
Following the attempted attack, President Obama threw the intelligence community under the bus for its failure to “connect the dots.” He said, “this was not a failure to collect intelligence, it was a failure to integrate and understand the intelligence that we already had.”
After leaving my 15 year career at DHS, I can no longer be silent about the dangerous state of America’s counter-terror strategy, our leaders’ willingness to compromise the security of citizens for the ideological rigidity of political correctness—and, consequently, our vulnerability to devastating, mass-casualty attack.
Just before that Christmas Day attack, in early November 2009, I was ordered by my superiors at the Department of Homeland Security to delete or modify several hundred records of individuals tied to designated Islamist terror groups like Hamas from the important federal database, the Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS). These types of records are the basis for any ability to “connect dots.” Every day, DHS Customs and Border Protection officers watch entering and exiting many individuals associated with known terrorist affiliations, then look for patterns. Enforcing a political scrubbing of records of Muslims greatly affected our ability to do that. Even worse, going forward, my colleagues and I were prohibited from entering pertinent information into the database.
A few weeks later, in my office at the Port of Atlanta, the television hummed with the inevitable Congressional hearings that follow any terrorist attack. While members of Congress grilled Obama administration officials, demanding why their subordinates were still failing to understand the intelligence they had gathered, I was being forced to delete and scrub the records. And I was well aware that, as a result, it was going to be vastly more difficult to “connect the dots” in the future—especially beforean attack occurs…
| — Hat tip: Matt Bracken | [Return to headlines] |
George W. Bush to Campaign for His Younger Brother Jeb in South Carolina
Former US President George W. Bush will campaign with his brother, Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush, during the upcoming South Carolina primaries later in February, the former Florida governor told US media on Friday.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Jeb Bush, who is also a son of a former US president, explained that his strategy was to “not abandon” who he was because he was “proud to be a Bush, it is who I am.”
“He’s [George Bush] going to campaign for me in South Carolina and I’m excited about that,” Jeb Bush told MSNBC’s Morning Joe.
On Thursday, George W. Bush released a campaign ad endorsing his brother for US president after the Republican candidate finished in the sixth place in the Iowa caucus earlier in the week.
In the latest polls, the popularity of the former governor of Florida has fallen compared to his rivals real estate tycoon Donald Trump, Texas Senator Ted Cruz and Florida Senator Marco Rubio.
New Hampshire is the next state after Iowa to hold a vote for Republican and Democrat presidential candidates seeking their parties’ nominations. The New Hampshire primaries are scheduled to take place on February 9.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Morning Briefing: Former AIG Boss May Withdraw Jeb Bush Endorsement
Former AIG boss may withdraw Jeb Bush endorsement
Former AIG CEO Maurice “Hank” Greenberg may no longer support Jeb Bush’s presidential bid and endorse another Republican candidate instead.
Greenberg, one of the biggest contributors to the 2016 race for the White House, told Bloomberg that he will wait for one or two more state caucuses before deciding whether to back Florida Senator Marco Rubio.
The insurance veteran had donated $10 million to a super-PAC financing the campaign of Bush, who came in sixth in Monday’s Iowa caucuses, with about 3 percent of the votes. Rubio came in third, just behind billionaire Donald Trump.
The former chairman and CEO of AIG, the 90-year-old Greenberg continues to hold the same positions at CV Starr & Co.
Greenberg recently commented that AIG CEO Peter Hancock was right to resist pressure from outspoken activist investor Carl Icahn, who wants to split AIG into three separate companies to avoid tighter regulations from the Federal Reserve.
12.7 million Americans sign up for Obamacare
Around 12.7 million people signed up for health insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act, exceeding last year’s tally and government expectations for Obamacare enrolment in 2016.
Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell said Thursday about 4 million new customers signed up for plans on HealthCare.gov after enrolment closed on 31 January. Another 5.6 million also returned to buy insurance again.
The government still expects the numbers to rise since some states have extended their enrolment deadlines.
Burwell noted that millions of Americans have gained health insurance under the law, calling the Obamacare enrolment for this year a “success.”
“It is clear that marketplace coverage is a product that people do want and need,” Bloomberg quoted Burwell as saying.
The government predicted last October that at least 11 million will sign up for individual health insurance or renewed policies at this point of the year. Around 11.7 million enrolled to Obamacare in 2015.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Obama’s Mosque Visit: Wrong Message, Wrong Venue
by Srdja Trifkovic
President Barack Obama’s Wednesday speech at the Islamic Society mosque in Baltimore, a venue tainted by a long history of preaching radicalism, summarizes his thinking about Islam and national security. That address has troubling implications and deserves detailed scrutiny.
OBAMA: “[I]f we’re serious about freedom of religion—and I’m speaking now to my fellow Christians who remain the majority in this country—we have to understand an attack on one faith is an attack on all our faiths . . . We have to reject a politics that seeks to manipulate prejudice or bias, and targets people because of religion.”
FACTS: The implication is that Islam (with over 3,000 active mosques) is under attack in America, and that Obama’s “fellow Christians” are the culprits who need to listen. Since 9/11 89 Americans have been killed in 48 separate attacks of deadly Islamic terror in the U.S. while one Muslim was killed in an apparent “revenge” attack during the same period. Only Muslims routinely target members of other faiths on American soil. The number of Muslims involved in terrorism in the U.S. rose dramatically in 2015: it more than doubled over 2014. Two-thirds of them were born in America. The resulting public perceptions are not based on prejudice or bias, but on reason and empirical evidence.
OBAMA: “Muslim Americans keep us safe. They are our police. They are our fire fighters. They’re in (the Department of) Homeland Security.” The President added that Muslims don’t hear “thank you” enough.
FACTS: Proportionately very few Muslims become police officers, which is unsurprising considering that seven-in-ten U.S. Muslims (69%) say religion is very important in their lives, and are therefore reluctant to serve in enforcing man-made, Kufr (“infidel”) laws. It is seldom reported that, in view of many non-Muslim officers, their Muslim colleagues’ motives, loyalty and commitment are open to doubt. The situation is even more troubling at DHS: in 2010 Obama appointed Egyptian-born Muslim Brotherhood supporter Mohamed Elibiary as senior member of its Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC). He resigned in 2014, after indisputable evidence of his core loyalties had come to light. That evidence had been freely available during his vetting process…
| — Hat tip: Srdja Trifkovic | [Return to headlines] |
Sanders Catches Clinton at National Level
A few days before New Hampshire primaries
(ANSA) — Washington, February 5 — Bernie Sanders has caught up with Hillary Clinton in US national polls too ahead of next week’s primaries in New Hampshire.
According to the latest poll from Quinnipiac University, the Vermont Senator is on 42%, against 44% for the former Secretary of State.
Further, if the presidential election took place now Sanders would beat Donald Trump by 10 points and both Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio by four points.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
The Latest: Missouri Suspects Led Police on Chase
MILTON, Fla. — The Latest on Missouri couple suspected in a multistate crime spree. All times local:
10:40 a.m.
Officials say a chase that led to a standoff with a couple suspected in a multistate crime spree started with a report of a robbery at a Famous Footwear store in Pensacola, Florida.
Escambia County Sheriff David Morgan said at a Friday news conference that a call at 7:56 p.m. Thursday alerted authorities to the armed robbery. Officers spotted the couple near Pensacola Beach, before they headed east, eventually ending up on Interstate 10 before cutting back toward Pensacola. Morgan says the couple held a family hostage in their Pensacola home before fleeing in the family truck.
Morgan says deputies spotted Blake Fitzgerald and Brittany Nicole Harper in the truck, and they went into a neighborhood and had a 15-minute standoff with authorities. Morgan says officers engaged in gunfire with the couple as they tried to leave the truck and enter a home.
Fitzgerald was killed and Harper wounded.
| — Hat tip: Dean | [Return to headlines] |
Trump Leading in New Hampshire — Polls
On 30%, ahead of Rubio on 17%, Cruz on 15%
(ANSA) — New York, February 4 — Donald Trump is the frontrunner in polls ahead of next week’s New Hampshire primaries.
In the latest NBC/Wall Street Journal poll Trump was on 30% ahead of Marco Rubio on 17% and Ted Cruz on 15%.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
92% of Brits Want to Quit the EU: Shock Poll Result as Asylum Claims Rocket Yet Again
By last night, of the 68,777 who took part in an exclusive online poll for express. co.uk, 92 per cent voted to leave.
In a separate telephone poll in the Daily Express yesterday, 99 per cent of readers said they did not trust the Prime Minister’s deal.
The poll results came as it was revealed that the number of people claiming asylum in Britain rose by almost 50 per cent last summer as the EU failed to get to grips with the global migration crisis.
| — Hat tip: AF | [Return to headlines] |
Calais Bans PEGIDA March, Brands Movement an ‘Extremist Splinter Group’
The prefecture of Calais has taken steps to prevent the local branch of Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West (PEGIDA) marching through the French port town on Saturday, citing possible clashes with far left groups. Movement leaders in the area have vowed to march regardless, citing their right to free expression.
In a statement confirming the ban this afternoon, the local authority claimed that PEGIDA is an “extremist splinter group,” Le Figaro has reported. He justified the ban on the grounds that there is “tangible proof that this event poses a risk of generating confrontation between the ultra-right movement and the ultra-left movement in the centre of Calais.”
In response, local PEGIDA leaders have started a petition in which they announce their intention to march on Saturday in defiance of the ban.
“We regret to inform you that the French people do not want to abide by the ban,” the statement says.
It continues: “In France we have a right to free expression, and we will use it. We will be [in] Calais whether you like it or not… We want to defend ourselves against what is believed to be an injustice
| — Hat tip: AF | [Return to headlines] |
Cologne Police Record 22 Cases of Sexual Assault at Carnival
Cologne police said Friday they recorded 22 complaints of sexual assault on the first day of the city’s giant carnival, after security was beefed up to prevent a repeat of the New Year’s Eve crime spree that shocked Germany.
The number of cases was sharply up from the nine reported on the opening day last year, but police put it down to the greater readiness of victims to report crime.
The complaints ranged from harassment to one reported rape, police said, adding that on average, around 50 sexual offences are recorded annually during the week-long carnival…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
How Will the UK Look in Ten Years? Expert’s Chilling Predictions for the World’s Future
Private Intelligence firm Strategic Forecasting published a report predicting the next decade’s worth of global economic and political developments.
Europe will be split into four: The report claims Europe will become divided ten years from now.
They believe the countries will become Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, and the British islands as relations break down and they become increasingly estranged from each other.
China will face political chaos: The report states that China will have a slow decade as economic growth declines.
Russia is set for collapse: Strategic Forecasting claimed that Vladimir Putin will see an uprising in Moscow.
The US will take a more isolationist stance: Strategic Forecasting claimed that the world is set to become a more “disorderly” place.
| — Hat tip: AF | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Pushes Cultural Heritage Protection in Washington
Theme of rotating presidency of European cultural institutes
(ANSA) — Washington, February 4 — Italy this year is promoting cultural heritage protection in Washington D.C. as current rotating president of the European Union National Institutes for Culture (EUNIC).
The EUNIC Protecting Our Heritage program — a network of national institutes for culture from EU member States — will be launched by the Italian Cultural Institute and is being inaugurated Thursday with an exhibition opening at the Italian embassy in the US capital.
An exhibit titled Passages showcases photos by photographer and archaeologist Massimiliano Gatti exploring the history of ongoing conflicts in the Middle East.
The show, which runs through March 15, will be introduced by Professor Jonathan Green, founding executive director of the ARTSblock cultural complex at the University of California, Riverside, and by Dr. Alexander Nagel, an archaeologist at the Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History.
The program will continue throughout 2016 with conferences, seminars, exhibits, screenings and concerts organized in partnership with leading American and European cultural organizations.
The initiative is sponsored by UNESCO and supported by the European Union’s delegation to the US in Washington.
It pursues two goals — raising public opinion awareness and boosting the network of international operators acting to protect cultural heritage from dangers ranging from terrorism and crime to climate change and oblivion. The program will remain open throughout 2016 to new input and projects from interested organizations.
The themes already scheduled for debate have been presented in the form of open-ended questions.
“The protection of the cultural heritage of humanity is a theme that is very dear to Italy around which we are registering great enthusiasm here in Washington as well,” commented Ambassador Claudio Bisogniero.
“We will use this occasion to give our contribution to a global cause, to help the international community forge a coalition based on its commitment — an imperative for all — to preserve our common memory at all cost,” Bisogniero said.
“We will do this through commemorative events, to remember the sacrifice of those who went as far as putting their lives in danger to protect art,” continued the ambassador.
He cited the so-called monuments men who helped recover artistic and cultural treasures during World War Two, the so-called mud angels who acted to save Florence’s heritage during a catastrophic 1966 flood, and archaeologists working in crisis areas today. “Most of all, we will do it by trying to share experiences, catalyze energies and projects and explore new working methodologies together,” he concluded.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: High School Prof Fired ‘For Peeing Into a Bush’
On the job 14 years, fined 11 years ago and forgot to say so
(ANSA) — Bergamo, February 4 — A high school philosophy professor was fired after 14 years on the job because he forgot to report he was fined 200 euros for urinating into a bush 11 years ago, Corriere della Sera paper reported Thursday.
Stefano Rho’, 43, a father of three born in Uganda of humanitarian doctor parents, in the summer of 2005 attended a village feast in Averara, pop. 182, located in the northern Brembana Valley.
The village shut down early and there was no bathroom available, so Rho’ and his friend relieved themselves in a bush.
Police caught them in the act, cited them, and a justice of the peace eventually fined them 200 euros. In 2013, Rho’ signed an education ministry form stating he had no criminal record. But the Bergamo school system discovered the discrepancy, and censured him. However the Audit Court later ruled that lying about one’s record is grounds for firing, and he was.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Labour Court Judge Suspended for Alleged Favouritism
Luciano D’Agostino also suspected of conflict of interest
(ANSA) — Catanzaro, February 4 — A judge at a labour tribunal in the southern Calabria region was suspended from duty on Thursday following an investigation into alleged favouritism in the distribution of assignments among official court consultants.
Luciano D’Agostino, a judge at Locri court, is also suspected of conflicts of interest in the handling of trials involving tax collection authority Equitalia. He has been suspended from his judicial functions and banned from all relative activities.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: EU to Examine All Gazprom Contracts in Member Countries
Suspicion of tariffs not in line with Bruxelles regulation
(ANSA) — TRIESTE — The European Union intends to examine all the contracts stipulated between the Russian energy giant, Gazprom, and companies in its member countries, amid suspicion of unfair tariffs not in line with Bruxelles regulation, Tanjug agency reported citing an article published by Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. According to the newspaper, the EU is interested in examining all contracts with a duration of more than one year and a supply covering over 40% of national demand. Last April, the European Commission had accused Gazprom of violating the EU single market rules by forbidding the resale of gas among member countries, and of causing damage to competition in Central and Eastern European markets, in which the Russian giant operates as dominant supplier.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Rock-Bottom Rents May Cost Rome Over 100 Mn a Year
Commissioner Tronca vows to get to bottom of scandal
(ANSA) — Rome, February 3 — Rome Commissioner Francesco Paolo Tronca on Wednesday vowed to get to the bottom of a scandal into city-owned apartments in luxury neighborhoods being rented for a pittance. Earlier this week the extraordinary commissioner said he had uncovered several bizarre cases, citing the examples of a flat in the Borgo Pio historic district near the Vatican being rented out at 10.29 euros a month, another in the central Corso Vittorio Emanuele rented at 24.21 euros a month.
There was also another with a view over the Imperial Forums rented at 23.65 euros a month. “It’s an ethical question because this time we have to get to the bottom of it,” Tronca told RAI public broadcaster. “We owe it to the people of Rome and to city workers”. Tronca said that losses from the failure to get reasonable rents from the apartments “could amount to over 100 million euros a year”.
The commissioner said he was “astounded” to discover that Rome did not have a complete census of its rented properties when he was put in charge of the city after former Mayor Ignazio Marino was forced out last year following an expenses scandal. He added that this was an “anomaly for an administration and that this “it creates some doubts in your mind” about whether this was deliberate.
“We want to know who is responsible for this shameful situation — which city managers failed to check or outright favored it,” Green Party spokesman Gianfranco Mascia said.
However this issue should not be used as an excuse to sell off the city’s real estate assets to the benefit of “the usual suspects”, Mascia said.
Alfio Marchini, who is running for Rome mayor on an independent ticket, said Wednesday that he reported on this scandal a year ago on State broadcaster RAI.
“A year ago we denounced on two RAI programs what is emerging today,” he said.
“They’ve discovered hot water.
“Those in power at the time said it was all falsehood….
The responsibility is a political one, and it’s down to those who have been running the city”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Intesa Sanpaolo 2015 Profit Up to 2.73 Bn Euros
Big dividend pay-out spurs shares
(ANSA) — Milan, February 5 — Intesa Sanpaolo on Friday posted a 2015 profit of 2.73 billion euros, up from 1.25 billion in 2014.
The bank reported fourth-quarter profits of 13 million euros compared to 48 million in the last quarter of 2014.
It paid out a dividend of 2.4 billion euros.
The larger-than-expected dividend boosted shares by over 4%.
CEO Carlo Messina confirmed the target of a 3-billion-euro dividend in 2016.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Milan Gears for Centre-Left Mayoral Primaries
Sala, Majorino, Balzani, Iannetta in the running
(ANSA) — Milan, February 5 — Voting will take place from Saturday afternoon until Sunday evening to decide the centre-left candidate to run for mayor in June.
There are four candidates: Expo commissioner Giuseppe Sala, current councillors Pierfrancesco Majorino and Francesca Balzani, and disabled-sports manager Antonio Iannetta. The results will be released Sunday evening.
Sala, who established a reputation for sound management skills during the unexpectedly successful Expo world’s fair, is the favourite.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Amber Fund Won’t Take Part in Hitachi Bid for Ansaldo STS
Even after Consob ordered price to be raised
(ANSA) — Milan, February 5 — Italy’s Amber fund won’t take part in Hitachi’s bid for transportation company Ansaldo STS, not even after bourse regulator Consob ordered the price to be raised, the fund said Friday. “We are convinced that Ansaldo is worth a lot more than what’s on offer, thanks to the synergies that can be extracted from collaboration with Hitachi,” a source told ANSA. Amber, which reportedly has 2.3% of Ansaldo STS, is weighing whether to appeal to a regional administrative court (TAR) against Consob.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Has 35,000 Cases of Female Genital Mutilation
Data in light of UN International Day of Zero Tolerance for FGM
(ANSA) — Rome, February 5 — About 35,000 women in Italy have undergone female genital mutilation (FGM) and more than a thousand girls are at risk, despite a 2006 Italian law forbidding the practice, said Liliana Ocmin, director of the Migrant, Women and Youth Policies Department of Italian labour union CISL.
February 6 each year is the United Nations’ International Day of Zero Tolerance for FGM.
The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) aims to eliminate FGM by 2030 as part of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
Ocmin, who also serves as CISL’s national women’s coordinator, said FGM is becoming more prevalent in Italy due to migration from women fleeing war, poverty and environmental disasters.
The European Parliament estimates that half a million women and girls living in Europe have undergone FGM and 180,000 more are at risk each year, Ocmin said.
She said more must be done, more quickly, in terms of awareness and education.
“At this pace, UNFPA said it will take until 2074 to see the phenomenon decrease by half. It becomes essential, then, to increase activities and initiatives to speed up the process of awareness,” Ocmin said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Politicians of All Parties Must Unite to Set Britain Free From EU, Says Patrick O’Flynn
WELL David Cameron’s dance of the seven veils is almost over. We pretty much know now that Britain’s referendum on EU membership is going to take place on Thursday, June 23.
Word coming out of Whitehall suggests that Messrs Cameron and Osborne are so worried by the possibility of an Islamist terror attack in Britain facilitated by the EU’s Schengen shambles, or another summer of general migration chaos or a global economic downturn triggering another full-on euro crisis, that they want the referendum out of the way in short order.
They do not want you to see even into the mid-distance, let alone have an idea of what the EU is cooking up long-term.
That gives us less than five months to win over the broad swathe of British people to the idea that we can and will do better outside the control of Brussels.
| — Hat tip: AF | [Return to headlines] |
Swedish Police Under Fire for Not Sharing Information on Jihadi Returnees
The Swedish police are not giving local authorities enough information about returning Islamic militants, the country’s coordinator for fighting extremism told Sveriges Radio.
Sweden’s police and interior ministry are neglecting to provide sufficient information to local authorities about jihadists returning from the Middle East, raising the risk of recruitment to jihadism, the country’s coordinator against violent extremism told Sveriges Radio.
“There is a great risk that those who are returning are seen as heroes. They could become role models who successfully recruit new fighters,” Mona Sahlin said.
“That is why, in order to properly prepare people psychologically and give those surrounding them immunity against this ideology, not only the police should know who they are.”
Sahlin, a former leader of Sweden’s Social Democratic party, was appointed Sweden’ first official coordinator against violent extremism in July 2014.
Her agency is tasked with “protecting democracy against violent extremism,” by working to improve cooperation between government agencies, municipalities and organizations at the national, regional and local level.
According to Sahlin, 126 Swedish Muslims are believed to have returned to the country after fighting for militant Islamic groups in Iraq and Syria.
[…]
Not only do they present a risk of radicalization to those around them, they may also have children who have been traumatized by their experiences in the Middle East.
“It means that when children start school or kindergarten, teachers or kindergarten staff do not know about what these kids have been through, and why they fight and behave as they do. It thus becomes difficult to really protect these children,” Sahlin said.
The coordinator against violent extremism believes that while communication between the Swedish Security Service (SAPO) and the police has improved recently, the exchange of information with municipal authorities is still lacking.
“It is also about old prejudices about what police work is and what social work is. Many look down on preventive work and see it as an obscure part of the business. I think it is an equally important part of law enforcement,” Sahlin said.
Jonas Hysing, head of the police’s tactical unit, told Sveriges Radio that while communication with authorities could be improved, he rejected the idea that there is a reluctance to support municipalities.
“Our aims to support municipalities in preventive work are very high.”
Hysing said that the police are working to overcome legal, structural and developmental problems, but are stretched and that confidentiality laws can prevent information from being passed on.
Sveriges Radio reported that SAPO echoed the police concerns about confidentiality, and added that the communication of relevant information to municipal authorities is usually the responsibility of the police.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UK Terror Warning: ISIS Threaten Doomsday Attack on Major Tourist Spots in London
Militants from the terror group, also known as Daesh, identified Britain as its number one terror target in the chilling message.
It said that the UK is due the “lion’s share” of ISIS’s wrath — in revenge for the RAF’s bombing campaign in Iraq and Syria.
The jihadis are thought to have their sights set on central London, after a recent video highlighted a string of potential targets.
Footage released last week includes frames of high-profile attractions which could be the site of an attack.
They include Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square, Tower Bridge and Big Ben.
| — Hat tip: AF | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Intelligence Rules Out Links to Regeni
‘Amazement and consternation’ at press reports
(ANSA) — Rome, February 5 — Italian intelligence sources on Friday denied press reports of links between the intelligence services and Giulio Regeni, the Italian researcher murdered in Cairo. “All and any link by Giulio Regeni with Italian intelligence is to be categorically denied,” they said. The sources said “indescribable falsehoods and exploitation” of the affair were to be “refuted with determination”. The sources expressed “amazement and consternation” at the reports. Regeni, 28, was found dead in a ditch Wednesday night, his body bearing signs of torture. The Cambridge PhD researcher was working at the American University in Cairo and secretly freelancing with Rome daily il manifesto on the Egyptian trade union movement.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: U.S.: Grateful to Italy But More Efforts Welcome
State Department spokesman Kirby,it is up to Rome’ to decide
(by Claudio Salvalaggio) (ANSAmed) — WASHINGTON, FEBRUARY 5 — Italy’s role in Libya is good but a greater engagement would be welcome, according to the US State department. The deployment of troops from Italy and other European countries to create a local stabilization force after the creation of a new national unity government is, according to the New York Times, one of the options under consideration to confront the escalating ISIS threat in Libya.
The threat, according to US media, is increasing the pressure put by top US national security advisers on Obama to approve the use of military force in Libya to open a new front against the caliphate, in parallel with international diplomatic efforts for the approval of a new national unity government.
Meanwhile US State Department spokesman, John Kirby, has stressed that Washington is grateful for Italy’s engagement in the North African country, praising in particular the role undertaken by Carabinieri officers in training the Libyan military. However, he noted that greater engagement from Italy would be welcome. The United States — he said — will increase their efforts and we would like other countries to do the same.
But the decision is up to them, noted the spokesman.
US President Barack Obama meanwhile is preparing to take action. The White House only needs to decide, an anonymous top State Department official was quoted as saying by the New York Times, explaining that the dossier has been extensively examined by all departments.
However, Obama, after meeting last Thursday with security advisors and top Pentagon officials, appears hesitant on what to do, worried to undertake in the last year of his mandate another military adventure in Libya after the disastrous void created by Gaddafi’s ouster.
At the same time, however, he must act quickly to prevent the risk of the ramification of ISIS at Europe’s door, which could directly threaten American citizens and interests. For this reason, the US president has called for increased efforts to create a new Libyan government while the Pentagon ponders its options, including air raids, raids with commandos and advisors for Libyan troops on the ground, as special operation forces are doing now in eastern Syria.
Large-scale troop deployment has been ruled out so far. But discussion within the Obama administration has not ended yet, and the scale or context of a potential US military involvement in Libya, which would be coordinated with European allies, have not been decided yet.
Hope mainly depends on the approval of the new Libyan government, already rejected once by parliament with on the background the fight between rival factions. In case of success, each intervention could be coordinated with the new leadership, including the deployment of Italian and other European troops to create a local stabilization force.
Options include relaunching a former Pentagon plan to train anti-terror troops. But time is running short, while ISIS continues to grow stronger: according to US defense, the number of ISIS fighters in Libya has increased from 5,000 to 6,500 — over twice the number of estimates made last fall by government analysts. For this reason, according to some top and former officials of the administration, if parallel processes supporting the political process in Libya and fighting ISIS “strengthen each other”, at one point the US could act unilaterally (as already warned yesterday by Obama) or with allies if faced with a credible threat from the Caliphate’s Libyan positions.
Pentagon chief Ash Carter has said “we will try to help them gain control of their country”, adding however that the intention is to avoid a situation like the ones in Syria and Iraq. Generals are awaiting orders, it is now up to the commander-in-chief, the president, to take that decision.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Jihadi Jack’s Parents Arrested After Sending Him Money — to Buy Glasses
The parents of a British man accused of traveling to Syria to join Daesh, also known as Islamic State, have been arrested for trying to send their son, who is a Muslim convert, money — to buy glasses.
Jack Letts, dubbed ‘Jihadi Jack’, is suspected to be the first white British citizen to join Daesh. The 20-year-old British Muslim convert, who goes by the name of Abu Mohammed, reportedly left his home in Oxford and traveled to war-torn Syria.
His parents Sally Lane and John Letts, who strongly deny the claim, have been arrested under the terrorism act for trying to send their son money, which they insist was for buying new glasses.
“We can confirm a 55-year-old man and a 53-year-old woman, from Oxford, were arrested on suspicion of sending money to Syria which could be used for terrorism purposes … and were bailed until 17 February,” the south-east counterterrorism unit said.
In an emotional interview with Channel 4 News the couple said that they fear their son “won’t get out alive”.
“We don’t know exactly where he is. If you know he’s in danger or can’t see straight, what parent isn’t going to try get their child a pair of glasses if he can’t see straight,” Mr Letts said.
“I’m furious really. I’m very upset. I think it’s crazy that we can’t send a penny to our ill son to help him get out or to help him in any way because we’ll be seen as supporting terrorism.”
According to Jack’s parents, he also suffers from “really severe” Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), with which he was diagnosed as a child. They believe his condition drove him to study the Qur’an.
“He’s sending desperate messages to us saying it’s cold or he doesn’t have food or he can’t see. We know that legally we’re not allowed to help him. I just don’t understand that,” Ms Lane said.
Ms Lane insisted that her son would not lie to her about joining Daesh and there is absolutely no evidence to support that claim and Mr Letts believes the police just “put two and two together and made ten”.
“He has the freedom to practice whatever he wants, that’s British values,” Mr Letts added.
Jack Letts left his home in Oxford two years ago and has reportedly been in Syria ever since.
He is one of 700 people, according to UK police, who are suspected of leaving Britain and traveling to Syria and Iraq to join various jihadist organizations. However, other figures suggest the number is more than twice the official police estimates.
“We are still seeing at least about five people leaving the UK for Syria and Iraq every week — and that’s not to count the ones we don’t know about,” a foreign intelligence source told the Sunday Times.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Soccer Player Disqualified Over Peace With Kurds
12 days to Naki from Amedspor for ‘ideological propaganda’
(ANSAmed) — ISTANBUL, FEBRUARY 5 — A soccer player has been disqualified for 12 days and fined for 19,500 Turkish liras (a little over 6,000 euros) by the Turkish soccer federation over “ideological propaganda”. Amedspor forward Deniz Naki had said in an interview that he hoped for a peaceful solution to the conflict between Ankara and the Pkk after seeing the terrible situation in Cizre, the south-eastern Kurdish city under total curfew since last December 14.
Naki, the 26-year-old Turkish-German soccer player, in 2014 was attacked in Ankara, where he was playing, for expressing solidarity to the Kurds fighting against ISIS in Kobane.
Since last summer, the conflict in south-east Turkey has resumed with unprecedented levels of violence since the 1990s, causing hundreds of deaths, including civilians, and dozens of displaced. Amedspor, the team of Kurdish ‘capital’ Diyarbakir, has threatened not to play the match of the Turkish cup against Fenerbahce if the decision to exclude its fans, accused of chanting pro-Kurdish slogans, will not be revoked. A week ago, about 100 of them were held by police and the club’s headquarters searched.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Five Held After India Mob Beats, Partly Strips Tanzanian Student
India police arrested five people Thursday over an enraged mob’s attack on a Tanzanian student who was beaten, her shirt ripped off and car set ablaze in the city of Bangalore.
Tanzanian High Commissioner John W. H. Kijazi said he has urged the Indian government to step up security for all African students in Bangalore in the wake of the attack.
“They are really disappointed, frustrated and scared actually,” the commissioner told the CNN-IBN network of the students.
India Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj branded the attack “shameful” and demanded swift justice for those responsible, as she moved to defuse diplomatic tensions over the incident…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Islamic Human Trafficking Racket Busted in Kerala
Islamically Organised Human Trafficking Takes Place in Kerala (INDIA) to felicitate the lust and debauchery of Arab Sheikhs and Muslim clerics. Hindu and Christian girls are targeted as preferential choice of them for ‘Halal Defloration’.
Excerpts… It is seen how the Muslim Police official and their kin in another Govt department is involved in such a human trafficking racket meant for flesh trade, smuggling and allegedly connected with the feminine Jihad under Burka. The probability of brainwashing for these trafficked girls for a bloody Jihad cannot be subsided anyway viewing the current trends in Middle East, gulf countries, the Arabic world and the areas of Islamic States…
| — Hat tip: Upananda Brahmachari | [Return to headlines] |
Get Lost, GPS: China Plans Launch of 40 Beidou Navigation Satellites
China is planning to launch approximately 40 Beidou navigation satellites over the next five years, Xinhua reported.
Over the next five years, China plans to launch around 40 Beidou satellites, which will eventually provide global satellite coverage to rival the US-developed Global Positioning System (GPS), Xinhua reported on Wednesday.
“By the end of 2018, another 18 satellites will be put into orbit for Beidou’s navigation service,” Ran Chengqi, spokesperson for the Beidou Navigation Satellite System, told Xinhua.
Ran explained that the positioning accuracy of the Beidou Navigation Satellite System inside China had reached five meters thanks to the development of the technology, including the improvement of a software algorithm.
On February 1, China launched the latest addition to the Beidou Navigation Satellite System from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in the southwestern province of Sichuan. It was carried into medium-earth orbit by the Long March 3C carrier rocket, where it was deployed at an altitude of about 13,670 miles (22,000 km), inclined 55 degrees.
“It is the 21st satellite in the Beidou Navigation Satellite System, and takes China one step closer to providing an alternative to the United States’ GPS system,” Xinhua reported.
The satellite was the fifth of a new generation of Beidou satellites, the first of which was launched in March 2015.
The system’s first satellite, Beidou-1A, was launched on October 30, 2000, and formed an experimental Beidou navigation system when a third satellite was launched in 2003.
The five new generation satellites are tasked with “testing inter-satellite crosslinks and a new navigation-signaling system that will set the framework and technical standards for global coverage,” Xinhua reported.
By 2018, China is planning to expand the services of its Beidou navigation satellites to most countries involved in its Belt and Road initiative, before offering global satellite coverage by 2020.
The New Silk Road Economic Belt aims to connect China with Central Asia and Western Asia, Russia and Europe, and the Maritime Silk Road will connect China with Southeast Asian countries, Africa and Europe.
In May 2015 China and Russia agreed a new stage of cooperation between China’s Beidou system and Russia’s Global Navigation Satellite System (Glonass). The agreement aims to strengthen the compatibility, interoperability and common development of the two systems to provide better and more reliable satellite navigation service.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Al Shabaab Take Control of Port Town in Somalia
Somalia’s al Shabaab militants took control of the southern port town of Marka on Friday hours after African Union troops and the Somalia National Army left, the rebels and witnesses said.
“We now control Marka police station and the entire town. AMISOM left the town early this morning,” Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab, al Shabaab’s spokesman for military operations, told Reuters on Friday.
Residents said the militant Islamist group raised its flags inside the town, which is situated 100 kilometers (60 miles)southwest of Mogadishu, and started to preach to residents using loudspeakers…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
President Ouattara Says ‘Won’t Send Any More Ivorians to ICC’
President Alassane Ouattara on Thursday said he would “not send any more Ivorians” to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, where his longtime rival Laurent Gabgbo is currently on trial over deadly violence sparked by disputed 2010 polls.
Speaking during a meeting with his French counterpart Francois Hollande in Paris, Ouattara said Ivory Coast now had “an operational justice system”.
…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australia is resisting mounting international pressure not to deport child asylum seekers, with a minister warning Thursday that allowing them to stay could attract more refugees to come by boat.
Australia’s 3-year-old policy of paying the tiny Pacific nation of Nauru to accommodate asylum seekers who attempt to reach Australian shores by boat survived a challenge in the High Court on Wednesday.
The test case ruling means 267 asylum seekers, most of whom came from Nauru to Australia for medical treatment or to support a family member who needed treatment, face potential deportation back to Nauru.
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said that asylum seekers, including children, would be returned to Nauru once their medical needs had been met
| — Hat tip: AF | [Return to headlines] |
Austria Pressures Morocco to Take Back Migrants
Threatens to cut aid if repatriation not implemented
(ANSAmed) — RABAT , FEBRUARY 5 — Morocco is under pressure to repatriate migrants from both Germany and Austria now, which are threatening to call on Europe to halt aid to the country if it does not repatriate its migrants that lack the right to asylum. Austrian foreign minister Sebastian Kurz raised the issue on the public radio station Oe1. “At the moment, the EU gives 480 million euros to Morocco and 414 million to Tunisia every year, and yet these countries refuse to take back asylum seekers,” Kurz said.
His words then circulated among Arab dailies online, which noted that the next EU summit in Brussels on February 18-19 might be when the “threats” become operative. In recent days Germany had applied pressure to this end on the issue of a group of Moroccans who had pretended to be Syrians to get refugee status, reported Akhbar Al-Youm. Deputy German chancellor Sigmar Gabriel noted that “Morocco and Algeria receive economic aid from Germany and in exchange they refuse to collaborate. This is unacceptable.” A telephone call between King Mohammed VI and German chancellor Angela Merkel then discussed what the next steps would be. The two countries’ diplomatic officers are working to implement repatriations. The crackdown came after violence on New Year’s Eve in the German city of Cologne, in which most of the perpetrators were found to be of Moroccan origins. German interior ministry figures say that Moroccan asylum seekers rose in number from 368 in June 2015 to 2,896 in December.
The latest Moroccan census — in 2011 — put the number of those from the country living in Germany at 150,000.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Icelandic Prime Minister Slams EU Open-Border Policy for Refugees
Iceland disagrees with the European open-border policy and suggests that the flow of migrants should be limited, Icelandic Prime Minister Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson told Sputnik.
LONDON (Sputnik) — Iceland criticizes the European open-border policy and suggests limiting the flow of migrants to eligible asylum seekers coming from UN camps in the region, Icelandic Prime Minister Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson told Sputnik on the sidelines of an international donors conference in London.
“Having a controlled flow of refugees is a better option rather than having open borders, making it possible for those who qualified and cannot return home to come (to Europe) directly from the UN or other agencies’ refugee camps in the region,” Gunnlaugsson said.
At the same time, he noted that migrants who cannot be qualified as refugees “should be supported in the neighboring to Syria countries through education and health care, so they have a chance to rebuild Syria.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Alfano Says Two-Pronged Approach on Integration
‘Help for those who want to integrate, tough on those who don’t’
(ANSA) — Naples, February 4 — Interior Minister Angelino Alfano said Thursday the government will help those who want to integrate into Italian society. “The State will give you a helping hand if you want to integrate,” Alfano said at the end of a public safety committee meeting in Naples. “But we will be tough on those who don’t”. The committee signed a protocol to build 44 homes for Romani people who have been living in makeshift camps on the outskirts of Naples. “We will go forward on these two lines,” Alfano said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
John McDonnell: Every Country Will Have Open Borders by the End of the Century
Shadow chancellor says boundaries between countries will soon become almost ‘irrelevant’ as the world moves towards a borderless state
Britain and other European countries should have no border controls, John McDonnell has suggested as he predicted there will be total free movement across the world one day.
Labour’s shadow chancellor said that “inevitably in this century we will have open borders” and added that boundaries between countries will become almost “irrelevant”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden Expects 100,000 Asylum Seekers This Year
Sweden’s Migration Agency said Thursday it expected around 100,000 asylum seekers in 2016, fewer than the 163,000 last year, but warned its estimates remain uncertain given Europe’s struggle to control the migration crisis.
“One can hardly speak of forecasts now. The future depends entirely on the decisions and actions taken at the European Union level and in Sweden,” agency director Anders Danielsson said in a statement.
Sweden, a country of 9.8 million, was one of the EU states with the highest proportion of refugees per capita last year as Europe battles its worst migration crisis since World War II…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Terror Warning: Germany ‘Receives Hundreds of Tip-Offs That ISIS Jihadis Pose as Refugees
The surge in terror tip offs comes as hundreds of police officers scrambled to carry out mass raids across Germany in the hunt to find four men connected to the depraved death cult.
The raids, which involved a total of 450 officers in the heavily immigrant areas of Kreuzberg, Templhof and Berlin-Mitte, were carried out to prevent “severely violent attacks” police revealed.
Meanwhile Police spokesman Stefan Redlich said four Algerians were being sought for their suspected links with ISIS terrorists in Syria.
It comes as surging migrant populations and the increasing threat of jihadi terror have led to tighter security across Europe.
| — Hat tip: AF | [Return to headlines] |
‘Woman Raped in Cologne, Afghan Refugee Arrested’ — Bild
‘Beaten senseless then sexually assaulted’
(ANSA) — Rome, February 5 — A 22-year-old woman was raped during the Cologne Carnival, Bild online reported Friday, adding that a 17-year-ol Afghan refugee was being held in the case.
According to the report, the refugee beat the woman senseless and then allegedly raped her.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
“Shadow chancellor says boundaries between countries will soon become almost ‘irrelevant’ as the world moves towards a borderless state
Britain and other European countries should have no border controls, John McDonnell has suggested as he predicted there will be total free movement across the world one day.”
John McDonnell is MP for the Hayes and Harlington constituency, a muslim majority area where I used to live. He is a bit of a lefty, having once proposed that statues be erected for IRA terrorists. He is now chasing the muslim vote.
Yes, the Right of Free Movement is seen as a basic human right in leftist ideology. It is destructive in the extreme–which is as they wish it.
I should say the Right of Free Universal Movement. (ROFUM?)
Or might we say endless free movement from non welfare states into welfare states? It is clear that the more generous welfare states are the preferred destinations.
It does seem evident that the political people who are most insistent upon having such states are also most adamant about having unlimited immigration of all sorts. In addition, they always know that the poor outnumber the rich, by their own definition anyway, for voting purposes. At the same time, they never seem to know that there is not an unlimited number of people to tax to support those who cannot or do not work.
Welfare states are least compatible with large scale immigration yet are most supportive of it. There is something slightly insane about this.
I wonder if there may be some sort of addictive need to feel good about oneself that contributes to it. Could narcissism be more addictive than tobacco?
They know what they’re doing, but don’t care because as Anthony Weiner said “You aren’t paying anything in that case because you’ll be dead.”
I’ll even use a leftist friendly source:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/08/megyn-kelly-anthony-weine_n_794026.html
It’s the same attitude. The country may go to hell but the people who caused it will be dead so they don’t care.
This is the problem with de facto religions that incorporate materialist annihilationism. Too many people are too narcissistic and unless they somehow continue after their current lifetime, they don’t care what happens after that.
Would suggest that the Shadow Chancellor and All open border fanatics are sent to Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, India, Turkey or similar nations and spout their nonsense there. These deluded “activists” were in the vanguard of the recent migrant riots in Calais flying Trade Union Flags!
That they are so unafraid of any consequences for their treacherous actions bears testament to the impotence of Porcine Cameron and his party whilst we remain in the EU.
At the heart of their “narcissism” is the delusion of the inevitability of liberty, of progress and of the co-incidence of the two. Actually, that is true of the liberal mind, not the ideological leftist. For the latter, it is indeed an indifference (“you’ll be dead”) to anarchy and to carnage. Revolution is blindness.
“Cologne police said Friday they recorded 22 complaints of sexual assault on the first day of the city’s giant carnival………….The number of cases was sharply up from the nine reported on the opening day last year, but police put it down to the greater readiness of victims to report crime.”
Greater readiness of victims to report crime? Rubbish! This is a standard Police excuse made whenever they are criticised for an increase in reported crime which they have failed to prevent. Right across Europe, crime prevention has become a thing of the past. Nowadays they rely on surveillance cameras, which in themselves are no guarantee that the police will get off their backsides and do anything.
It is rubbish if, either, it is not true or the number of that type of report (would not have been reported under “normal” circumstances) is known and be compared to the other numbers. Given that, it is equivalent of rubbish to claim that the police can know that particular number.
http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/02/06/gambian-migrant-accused-of-murdering-american-nanny-in-vienna/
“According to authorities, the Gambian was living at Caritas refugee centre in Erdberg and was scheduled to be deported back to his home country in Africa. There was already a warrant out for his arrest at the time of the murder and it is through that Lauren M. had hidden him in her small one bedroom home so that he could escape deportation.”
The planned PEGIDA demo in Calais was banned by the authorities, fearing that group could “create tensions, division and violence.” A police snatch squad arrested General Christian Piquemal, the former commander of the French Foreign Legion, to stop him from giving his planned address to the Calais rally today.
Set this scene against the utter bedlam of several “no borders” marches held in Calais, lately, and you can see the stark difference in the attitude of the authorities. The port of Calais was stormed by some of the protestors and ferry services were halted.
“The group, which has British members in Calais, has been accused by police of encouraging migrants from the Jungle to riot.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/12118368/British-anarchists-arrested-as-migrants-stormed-Port-of-Calais.html
There are too many pieces that are fragmenting day by day, when we get told that meetings, groups could “create tensions, division and violence.” It’s a load of baloney and some people here in France are realizing this, that the authorities actually know allow acts of violence right under their noses and do nothing about it. This is especially so we get this in Paris Match, an article on the relatives of Hervé Cornara who was decapitated by Yassin Salhi at Saint-Quentin-Fallavier in a botched suicide attack on a high risk industrial site. Yassin Salhi was known to the authorities but no one thought to let his employer know this, especially working in a sensitive job involving dangerous goods.
http://www.parismatch.com/Actu/Societe/Salhi-etait-fiche-S-et-personne-ne-nous-a-prevenus-908623
“Because we need to be reassured by saying that it was mainly a personal conflict between an employer & employee? The IS flags, my father’s photo sent to Syria, the contacts there on the ground, all of that doesn’t count. I would like to remind that his killer had chosen to die as a martyr on a site of an American company where there were no anticipated deliveries.
« Parce qu’on veut se rassurer en se disant qu’il s’agissait d’un conflit personnel entre un employeur et son salarié ? Les drapeaux de Daech, la photo de mon père expédiée en Syrie, les contacts sur place, tout ça, ça ne compte pas. Je rappelle que son assassin avait choisi de mourir en martyr sur le site d’une société américaine où il n’avait aucune livraison prévue. »
To be followed…