Terrorists belonging to the Islamic fundamentalist group Boko Haram attacked a government installation in northern Nigeria, freeing 105 prisoners and burning down a police station, an army barracks, and government buildings. More than fifty people were killed.
In other news, ten people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a political gathering in northwest Pakistan.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, DS, Insubria, JD, Jerry Gordon, JP, McR, TV, Vlad Tepes, 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.
Consumer Spending Lowest Since 2000, Say Italian Retailers
Confcommercio index fell 3.4% in March
(ANSA) — Rome, May 7 — Consumer spending in recession-hit Italy in March plummeted to the level of 2000, retailers’ association Confcommercio said Tuesday. Confcommercio said its consumer spending index (ICC) fell 3.4% in March with respect to the same month in 2012 and 0.1% with respect to February, taking it down to the level of 13 years’ ago.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Employers Oppose Berlusconi’s Line on Property Tax
Scrapping IMU not priority, says Confindustria
(ANSA) — Rome, May 7 — Italian industrial employers’ confederation Confindustria waded into a high-voltage political debate on Tuesday when President Giorgio Squinzi said cutting labour taxes was more important than scrapping the IMU property tax. IMU is at the centre of the political tensions for Premier Enrico Letta’s fledgling left-right government as former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s People of Freedom (PdL) party is threatening to pull its support and sink the executive unless the widely despised tax is abolished.
Berlusconi also wants the 2012 revenues collected from IMU returned to taxpayers to respect the key pledge he made in the run-up to February’s inconclusive general election.
Letta has said that June’s IMU payments would be suspended as part of a review of the tax, but he has not promised to abolish it completely.
“It is absolutely more important to intervene on labour taxes than on house ones,” Squinzi said.
“The priority at the moment is jobs and regaining growth”. Reducing labour taxes is seen by many as a good way to promote job creation, with almost three million Italians unemployed and close to four in 10 young people on the dole as the country endures its longest recession in 20 years. Last week OECD Chief Economist Pier Carlo Padoan said that: “if the priorities are growth and jobs, the first thing to cut is labour taxes… Reducing labour taxes is more important than reducing IMU”.
IMU was instituted among a series of austerity measures under former premier Mario Monti’s emergency technocrat government to restore health to Italy’s public finances.
Abolishing IMU and reimbursing the 2012 revenues from it would create a hole of around eight billion euros in this year’s budget.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Benghazi: Will Hillary be Charged With Obstruction of Justice?
On page 2 of the Benghazi report under Findings: “This progress report reveals a fundamental lack of understanding at the highest levels of The State Department as to the dangers presented in Benghazi, Libya, as well as a concerted attempt to insulate the Department of State from blame following the terrorist attacks.”
Let’s be more specific. There was a concerted attempt to protect Hillary Clinton over the death of her friend Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. Hillary is the top Democrat contender for President in 2016 and she must be protected at all costs but there is much more to this than even Hillary’s political viability at stake here.
Remarkably, the Congressional leaders are missing the bigger picture. This “concerted attempt” to insulate the State Department is not just about protecting Hillary, it’s also about protecting the Obama-Clinton regime’s policy, their agenda that continues today.It’s about concealing from public view what Ambassador Christopher Stevens was really doing in Benghazi meeting with the Turkish Consul General Ali Sait Akin because it threads through the policy that John Kerry as Hillary’s replacement as Secretary of State has seamlessly continued — Syria.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Dr. Richard L. Rubenstein on the Jewish Surrender Syndrome
This is an NER interview with Dr. Richard L. Rubenstein, noted theologian, historian, former university president and author of acclaimed works, After Auschwitz, The Cunning of History and Jihad and Genocide. Dr. Rubenstein is a colleague and contributor to the New English Review. In light of recent episodes where Jewish theological groups and defense organization have engaged in outreach and collaboration with Muslim Brotherhood front groups in America, most recently in Florida blocking important human rights legislation, American Law for American Courts, Dr. Rubenstein’s insights are an important warning of delusional and myopic views about Jewish accommodation of radical Islamic groups, the latter intent on using them to further Stealth Jihad in this country. Rubenstein condemns Jewish organizations in the diaspora for their reflexive obsession with the surrender syndrome as it is self destructive and delusional. Rubenstein returned in our conversation prior to this recording to his re-reading on Thucydides, The History of the Peloponessian War and the Athenian Dialogue with the Melians, allies of Sparta on the Island of Melos when the later are told by the Athenians they could not remain neutral. To wit: “The strong do as they can and the weak suffer what they must”. Thucydides in his commentary notes: “The Nation that makes a great distinction between its scholars and its warriors will have its thinking done by cowards and its fighting done by fools.” Rubenstein is clear eyed about the threat of the Surrender Syndrome prevalent among his coreligionists in the diaspora.
| — Hat tip: Jerry Gordon | [Return to headlines] |
Former Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina Wins U.S. House Seat
Mark Sanford, the former South Carolina governor once so tarnished by a spectacular lie about a love affair that few expected him to recover, is now heading to Congress.
Mr. Sanford beat Elizabeth Colbert Busch, a Democrat with no previous political experience.
Mrs. Colbert Busch had briefly led Mr. Sanford in early polling, buoying hopes among some voters that a Democrat would, for the first time in more than 30 years, represent the coastal district that includes Charleston.
| [Return to headlines] |
How to Find a Most Wanted Terrorist
We have seen in the Boston bombings case how terrorists depend on a network of sympathizers. But the Russian connection remains a mystery. The press should follow up on the Russian angle to the Islamic terrorist bombers story before President Obama gets carried away with cooperating with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The assumption by the media that the former KGB officer is genuinely interested in helping the U.S. solve its Islamic terrorism problem should be subjected to scrutiny. After all, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri has been identified by KGB defectors as a Russian agent. Former PLO chief Yasser Arafat and the international terrorist Carlos the Jackal, who converted to Islam and is in prison in France, were also identified as KGB agents. Putin doesn’t have clean hands in this dirty business.
The FBI’s addition of convicted cop-killer Joanne Chesimard, also known as Assata Shakur, to the “Most Wanted Terrorists List,” is an extraordinary development that reminds us of how the old Soviet client state of Cuba played a significant role in the Soviet-sponsored terrorist networks of the 1970s and 1980s. She killed New Jersey State Policeman Werner Foerster in 1973, escaped from prison in 1979, and fled to Cuba, with the help of the Cuban-backed Weather Underground. She has stayed there ever since.
At a news conference on Thursday, the FBI and New Jersey State Police said Chesimard, a member of the Black Liberation Army, is still associated with international terrorist networks from her base in Cuba, and that she has supporters and contacts in the U.S.
[Comment: Well worth reading; Chesimard is linked to a veritable infestation of Communists in the US.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Massachusetts ‘Cannibal’ Admits Plot to Kidnap and Eat a Child in Dungeon Under His Home
[WARNING: *** EXTREMELY DISTURBING CONTENT ***]
A British man living in Massachusetts has pleaded guilty today to horrific crimes involving children and now faces deportation back to Britain after a sentence, under a plea agreement of between 18 and 27 years in prison.
Geoffrey Portway 40, had numerous chats with many individuals about a ‘mutual interest in abducting, raping, murdering, and eating children,’ said an agreed statement of facts released by the US attorney in Boston.
In July last year, federal agents searching Portway’s residence in Worcester, Massachusetts, discovered a locked dungeon in the basement of his home.
- Agents found child pornography and photos of children who appeared to be dead on his computer
- Authorities have identified more than 140 child victims in seven countries
- Portway, pleaded guilty to soliciting the kidnapping of a child and to the distribution and possession of child pornography
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Mike Huckabee: Obama Will be Ousted Over Benghazi
Former Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee said on his radio show Monday that President Obama “will not fill out his full term” because he was complicit in a “cover-up” surrounding the attack that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans in Libya.
“I believe that before it’s all over, this president will not fill out his full term,” Huckabee said. “I know that puts me on a limb, but this is not minor.”
“When a president lies to the American people and is part of a cover-up, he cannot continue to govern,” he added. “And as the facts come out, I think we’re going to see something startling. And before it’s over, I don’t think this president will finish his term unless somehow they can delay it in Congress past the next three and a half years.”
Some Republicans have maintained that the administration has not been forthcoming in the circumstances surrounding the attack, pointing to U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who went on Sunday news shows and argued the attacks were a spontaneous reaction to an offensive video. The administration later admitted Rice’s claim was made with insufficient intelligence, and labeled the event an act of terror.
On Monday, House Republicans released portions of an interview with State Department whistle-blower Gregory Hicks, who took over as the top U.S. diplomat in Libya after Stevens was killed.
Hicks told investigators that U.S. forces were prepared to fly in to provide support to the besieged embassy, but were told to stand down. The claim contradicts previous testimony from Obama administration officials who said all available resources in the region were utilized during the attack.
Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), the ranking Demcrat on the oversight committee, accused Republicans of leaking “selective and distorted” portions of Hicks’s testimony to “drum up hearing publicity.”
“The highest levels of people in the United States government all the way up to the president knew that what they did tell us was not true,” Huckabee continued. “And they continued to tell it throughout an election season and beyond, and they’ve tried to change the subject. And when the facts come out, they will not be able to stand. They will have lost the right to govern.”
No other Republicans have yet gone as far as Huckabee in claiming that there was a full-blown cover-up or that the president was involved.
White House spokesman Jay Carney on Monday defended the administration’s telling of the attacks, saying the State Department had conducted a “rigorous and unsparing” assessment of the events.
Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, said the only way Obama would not get impeached was if Democrats made gains in both chambers of Congress.
“If they’re able to get control of the House and maintain the Senate, this will not happen because they won’t let it happen,” he said. “And they won’t let it happen not because they’re protecting just the president, they’re trying to protect their entire political party. If they try to protect the president and their party, and do so at the expense of the truth, their president and their party will go down. Now, here’s what I’m going to suggest will happen — as the information and facts begin to come out, it will become so obvious that there was a concerted and very, very deliberate attempt to mislead this country and its people, to lie to Congress, as well as to you.”
| — Hat tip: McR | [Return to headlines] |
On the way home in my car this afternoon, Sean Hannity took a call from a military member who claims to have been the sensor operator for the Predator drone mission over Benghazi on the night of September 12, 2012. The caller, who identified himself as “John,” said the UAV spent only about five minutes over the consulate before being repositioned over the nearby CIA annex. He described seeing a crowd of hundreds of fighters outside the consulate, through the drone’s sensors.
John also confirmed what this blog—and other sources—have reported for months. The situation in Benghazi was actively monitored by various governmental organizations, civilian and military. He noted that the secure “chat” rooms, which allow various nodes to share information during UAV missions, were very active that night. It’s also no secret that the drone’s video feed was available at various command nodes, including the White House Situation Room; CIA Headquarters, the State Department and the National Military Joint Intelligence Center (NMJIC) in the Pentagon.
Now, here’s the shocker. John told Sean Hannity that no one from his unit has been contacted or questioned by Congressional investigators. He was unable to confirm if the video from that terrible night still exists. According to the sensor operator, the sensor “haul” from “uneventful” sorties is eventually erased, and the storage space is used for more recent missions…
| — Hat tip: DS | [Return to headlines] |
Rural America in the Crosshairs
“There is no week, day, or hour when tyranny may not enter upon this country, if the people lose their roughness and spirit of defiance.” — Walt Whitman
Back in 2004, we were involved, with several other rural landowners, in opposing a particularly onerous proposed environmental ordinance in our county. We gave testimony at several public hearings and we organized quite a few public protests at which several dozen landowners turned out. We even got some of the local media to attend our protests. We also wrote many guest editorials and letters to the editors outlining our objections. In spite of a fairly significant turnout by the effected rural landowners, the Democrats on the county council, that held the majority, passed the ordinance into law literally in the dead of night, in spite of vociferous opposition and over 100 amendments put forth by the Republicans.
The county council at the time consisted of thirteen members, 7 Democrats and 6 Republicans. Two of those Republicans represented the rural areas of the county … only two. The rest of the council members were elected by the urban population and held an urban mindset when it came to zoning, the environment and land use issues. In effect, the rural landowners of the county were disenfranchised from any political outcome. They had to “eat” whatever the urban representatives dished out to them. The upshot was that rural landowners were being forced to bear almost the entire burden of environmental protection, while their city brethren got off virtually scot-free.
We debated an environmentalist on a radio show at one time during the debate over the ordinance and he kept saying that: “we have to protect OUR rural lands.” On three occasions during the show we had to remind him that the rural lands did not belong to him or anyone else in the big city. Rural lands belong to real people who paid for their land and worked their land and those landowners have constitutional rights.
Upon further investigation we found that these kinds of ordinances were being inflicted on rural landowners all over America, mostly driven by the United Nations Agenda 21 policies of so-called sustainable development, livable communities, public transportation and smart growth.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
If the personal freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution inhibit the government’s ability to govern the people, we should look to limit those guarantees. — Bill Clinton in an August 12, 1993 speech.
And what my constitutional values are are wholly irrelevant to the job, and so neither you nor anyone else will know what they are. — Elena Kagan
For the bureaucrat, the world is a mere object to be manipulated by him. — Karl Marx
“We live in a dirty and dangerous world. There are some things the general public does not need to know, and shouldn’t. I believe democracy flourishes when the government can take legitimate steps to keep its secrets and when the press can decide whether to print what it knows.” — Katherine Graham, Publisher of the Washington Post, in a speech to CIA recruits, 1988
In Marx’s statement above, the key word is manipulated. The Constitution loving American public has been manipulated and marginalized. (We have been relegated to an unimportant or powerless position within society). Let me explain, and give a few examples.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Muslim Student Association and the Boston Terrorist Connection
by Daniel Greenfield
While the hunt for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was still underway, the President of the Muslim Student Association at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth stepped forward to claim that he had tried to get Dzhokhar to join the MSA several times only to be turned down…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. Defenseless to ‘Back Door’ EMP Attack
WASHINGTON — Former U.S. ambassador Henry Cooper, who headed the Strategic Defense Initiative under President Ronald Reagan, has warned that the United States lacks any defense against a “back-door” attack by North Korea using a long-range missile with a nuclear warhead, according to a report in Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.
Cooper said such a back-door attack would pass over the southern polar ice cap, where the U.S. has little or no defense.
“Our missile defense of the U.S. homeland is primarily deployed against a ‘front-door’ attack over the North Pole,” Cooper said. “It is critically (and) urgently important to assure that such a back-door attack cannot be carried out by North Korea, or in the future, Iran.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Ahmadiyya Muslims Spread ‘Love for All’ Message
Ahmadiyya Muslims were out to spread a message of peace on the weekend. Local members went door to door to promote the national Love for All, Hatred for None campaign. Members of the faith want people to know that terrorism and violence have no place in their religion…
[JP note: Sure.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Toronto Marathon Runners Show Support for Boston Bombing Victims
TORONTO, May 5 (Xinhua) — Besides testing their physical limits, thousands of runners took part in the Toronto Marathon on Sunday to pay tribute to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings. The tragedy in Boston, which killed three people and injured over 260 others just last month, set the tone for the 35th annual run — a qualifier for the Boston Marathon — in the Canadian city of Toronto. Besides a moment of silence before the 42-kilometer race, there were many small visual reminders throughout the event. Marathoners donned blue-and-yellow outfits, had small “Remember Boston” ribbons printed on their bibs, and special T-shirts that read “Boston, we run with you”, to show their support…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
When in Rome, it’s tempting to try the city’s world-famous ice cream.
But some British tourists were left with a nasty aftertaste — a £54 bill.
Following their complaints over being charged £13.50 each for their take-away cones, an Italian politician has called for a clampdown on such extortionate prices.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: MP From Angela Merkel’s Coalition Defects to Alternative Fuer Deutschland
Berlin German euro-sceptic party Alternative fuer Deutschland has claimed its first high-ranking defector from mainstream politics, after a regional MP with Angela Merkel’s coalition partners the Free Democrats announced he was switching sides over the single currency.
Jochen Paulus, who will keep his regional parliament seat in Hessen, said his decision was prompted by Mrs Merkel’s “unconditional backing of a crazy Euro policy.” Alternative fuer Deutschland is tapping into growing unease in Germany over the European debt crisis, with a poll last month showing that they would get the 5% minimum share of the vote required to enter the Bundestag…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Italian-Built Vega Satellite Carrier Launched Into Space
‘A model for Italian hi-tech’ says Premier Letta
(ANSA) — Rome, May 7 — The European Space Agency’s newest satellite carrier was launched successfully into space early Tuesday.
Vega, which was built outside Rome, took off from the ESA’s launch facility in Kourou, French Guiana, carrying with it three satellites that will track land cover and vegetation changes over the entire globe every couple of days.
The launch was originally scheduled for Friday but was postponed due to dangerous winds. “The success of the Vega launch shows that investments in research and innovation create a model for the Italian hi-tech industry,” said Italian Premier Enrico Letta. “It can and must represent a springboard for economic growth in the country and in Europe, especially during an age of crisis”. The ESA mission is Vega’s second.
The first took place on February 13, 2012.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Probes Into Party Fund Spending for 52 Piedmont Councillors
Investigators suspect money used for sports and manicures
(ANSA) — Turin, May 6 — Investigators began hearing testimonies on Monday for probes into 52 regional councillors in Piedmont suspected of spending party funds for personal use such as manicures and golf equipment.
On Monday, regional caucus leader Mario Carossa for the Northern League party was the first called to testify.
Carossa was asked to answer questions regarding 29,000 euros of spending in restaurants and bars, as well as car maintenance and sporting equipment.
Regional assembly Whip Marco Botta from the right-wing Fratelli d’Italia party submitted a 10-page dossier detailing expenditures but did not speak to prosecutors. Investigators are probing Botta for over 54,000 euros of spending, part of which the councillor said was for “representation services”, including tanning booths, manicures and hair cuts.
Democratic Party (PD) Regional Assembly Whip Aldo Reschigna will testify on Monday afternoon.
Testimonies have been scheduled for the next 20 days by prosecutors.
A recent raft of regional corruption cases have hit parties across the established Italian political spectrum in various parts of the country.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: First Suspect Named in Web Defamation Against House Speaker
Journalist Antonio Mattia ‘posted doctored risque’ images’
(ANSA) — Rome, May 6 — Investigators put their first suspect under investigation Monday into the mountain of Internet-based threats and grotesque photomontages directed at Italian House Speaker Laura Boldrini. Antonio Mattia, a journalist for the publications Popolo Italiano and Napoli News Magazine, was the first person to post online doctored risque’ images depicting the Speaker, according to prosecutors. The case is going after alleged threats, defamation and violation of privacy.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: ‘Fair Solution’ For Marines Says Bonino
Foreign minister sees ‘positive, acceptable’ end to affair
(ANSA) — London, May 7 — Foreign Minister Emma Bonino on Tuesday said she hoped the case of two Italian marines awaiting trial in India for allegedly killing two Indian fishermen would reach a “fair, positive and acceptable solution.” It was new minister Bonino’s second statement on the drawn-out affair, which has put Italy and India at loggerheads, on her first trip outside Italy, to a Somalia conference in London. On April 29, after being sworn in in Enrico Letta’s right-left government, she said she was certain an agreement would be found for the two anti-piracy marines, Massimiliano Latorre and Salvatore Girone.
“India is a great country, and one of rights. Our countries need to listen to each other,” she said,.
Latorre and Girone face charges of shooting and killing Valentine (aka Gelastine) and Ajesh Binki after allegedly mistaking them for pirates while guarding a merchant ship off the Kerala coast in February 2012.
The two countries have been in a diplomatic impasse and relations have been tense since the incident.
Italy has contested India’s claim that it has jurisdiction over the case, arguing that the deaths occurred in international waters.
But Rome agreed to send the pair back to India after home leave to vote when India said they would not face the death penalty.
At the height of the spat, when Italy reneged on a pledge to return the marines, India stopped the Italian ambassador leaving the country and the BRICS nations were said to be considering sanctions.
Italy’s then foreign minister, Giulio Terzi, quit after the decision to send Latorre and Girone back, saying his views had been discounted.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Son of Sindona’s Slain Liquidator Shuns Andreotti Ceremony
Ambrosoli Mob hit ordered by banker linked to late statesman
(ANSA) — Milan, May 7 — The son of a financial liquidator killed on the orders of a late Mafia-linked banker with ties to Giulio Andreotti on Tuesday walked out of a Milan commemoration of the seven-time premier who died Monday aged 94.
Centre-left Lombardy co-ordinator Umberto Ambrosoli is the son of Giorgio Ambrosoli, a Milanese lawyer slain by the Mafia in 1979 at the age of 45 after he found evidence of malpractice while liquidating one of the Italian banks of Michele Sindona — a Cosa Nostra-linked Sicilian financier once hailed by Andreotti as “the saviour of the lira”. Umberto Ambrosoli walked out of a regional assembly commemoration of former Christian Democrat statesman Andreotti, saying: “I have a personal history which mingles with the dark sides of Andreotti’s.
“It is right for institutions to commemorate men of institutions, but those belonging to them should examine their consciences”.
Lombardy Governor Roberto Maroni of the right-wing Northern League called Ambrosoli’s act “inelegant”. Giorgio Ambrosoli was named by a court as liquidator of Banca Privata Italiana, one of the biggest private Italian banks controlled by Sindona.
After finding evidence of criminal malpractice he provided the US Justice Department with evidence to convict Sindona for his role in the collapse of the Franklin National Bank.
According to Ambrosoli, Sindona paid an illicit $5.6 million commission to Vatican Bank chief Cardinal Paul Marcinkus, who later left his post under a cloud, and Roberto ‘God’s Banker’ Calvi, the former head of Italy’s biggest private bank, who was found hanging under Blackfriars Bridge in London in 1982, slain by Cosa Nostra, Italian prosecutors said, because he failed to pay them back huge sums of money.
On July 11, 1979, a few hours after talking to US authorities, Ambrosoli was shot dead by three Mob hitmen commissioned by Sindona.
Sindona was afraid Ambrosoli would expose his shady dealings in the Banca Privata Italiana case, Italian courts found. Shortly before Ambrosoli was killed, the American Mafia hitman William Arico, a convicted bank robber, made an apparently intimidating reference to Andreotti in a threatening phone call taped by the liquidator.
Arico fell to his death while trying to escape from a federal prison in New York in 1984.
In 1986 Sindona was sentenced to life imprisonment for having ordered the murder. A poisoned cup of coffee killed him shortly after his sentence began, amid speculation he was going to ‘name names’.
According to Mafia informant Francesco Marino Mannoia, Sindona laundered the proceeds of heroin trafficking for the Bontade-Spatola-Inzerillo-Gambino network. The mafiosi were determined to get their money back and would have played an important role in Sindona’s attempt to save his banks.
Ambrosoli was killed shortly after he had a talk with Palermo Police chief Boris Giuliano, who discovered cheques and other documents which indicated that Sindona had been recycling the proceeds from heroin sales by the Mafia through the Vatican Bank to his Amincor Bank in Switzerland. Only 10 days after the killing of Ambrosoli, Giuliano was shot and killed by the Mafia on July 21, 1979.
Ambrosoli was posthumously awarded a medal for civic heroism and a film about him was made in 1995, entitled A Middle-Class Hero, directed by Michele Placido.
Andreotti, Italy’s most influential postwar politician, was convicted and later cleared of Mafia links 10 years ago but judges said he had ties to the Mob until 1980 which could not be punished because they dated too far back.
He was also convicted, and later cleared, of ordering the murder of a muckraking journalist.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Lord Lawson of Blaby, 81, described the EU as ‘a bureaucratic monstrosity’ and said leaving ‘would substantially outweigh the costs’. ‘The case for exit is clear,’ he said.
Margaret Thatcher’s longest-serving Chancellor pledged to vote No in any referendum on membership, in a move that piles further pressure on Mr Cameron, emboldening Tory Eurosceptics and threatening the stability of the coalition.
But Mr Cameron played down the threat to his position. He told a press conference: ‘I think it has been a good day for the pledge that I have made that, if re-elected, I will hold an in/out referendum so that everybody can have not just a voice about Britain’s future in Europe but also have a vote about Britain’s future in Europe.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Six ETA Suspects Arrested in France
MADRID, May 7 (Xinhua) — French authorities, working in collaboration with the Spanish Civil Guard, have arrested six members of the Basque separatist group ETA, it was announced on Tuesday. The arrest of the six suspected terrorists, who are thought to be involved with the group’s logistical operation, took place in an operation in three different places in France…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: David Cameron Has Two Years Left to Summon Up the Spirit of 1992
by Benedict Brogan
Despite the Ukip threat, the signs are growing that the PM can copy John Major’s upset
As of today, there are two years to go to the general election in 2015. From now on, the contest will shape all decisions taken by the political parties. For the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, resources that were concentrated on the act of governing will increasingly be diverted to the imperative of winning. The time for jettisoning the men at the top has passed, and all three parties are reconciled to pressing on with the leaders they have, whatever the consequences…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: EU: The Time Has Come for a ‘Mandate’ Referendum
by Bernard Jenkin
David Cameron should ask Parliament to approve a plebiscite for next year, setting out terms for a new relationship with Europe
This is not a time to panic. Only 7.6 per cent of those eligible to vote supported UKIP. But it is time for an end to wishful thinking in the Westminster village. Ed Miliband must be shattered that Labour only got 29 per cent of the vote. He’s meant to be roaring ahead. But the Conservatives were beaten into second place on 25 per cent — the lowest share in county elections ever. Pause and reflect. UKIP’s 23 per cent share of the poll is “spectacular” (analyst Professor Curtice). UKIP inflicted a mortal blow to Michael Howard’s prospects for No 10 in the 2004 Euro elections. We technically won that election, but only got 29 per cent share of the vote, the lowest ever Conservative share of a national poll. UKIP came second. What will they achieve in next year’s Euro-elections?
[…]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Human Rights That Put Children at Risk
[WARNING: ** Disturbing Content **]
With proven re-offending rates as high as 20 per cent, Parliament had sound reasons for insisting that child molesters and rapists jailed for 30 months or more should remain on the Sex Offenders’ Register indefinitely.
Indeed, this was a basic precaution to protect the vulnerable, since it meant that at least the police could know the whereabouts of serious offenders.
But that was before human rights judges intervened — and put the rights of criminals, yet again, above those of their potential victims.
Overturning the will of Parliament, the Supreme Court ruled in 2010 that offenders should be allowed to appeal against staying on the register for life.
Today, a Mail investigation reveals the disturbing consequences of that ruling.
In just seven months, police in England and Wales have removed at least 43 serious offenders from the register, approving almost half of applications at the rate of one every five days.
Chillingly, they include eight rapists and 27 child sex attackers — with a surge of similar applications expected as many more criminals become eligible to appeal.
More worrying still, appeals are conducted in secret, with each case signed off by a middle-ranking police officer. And since the identities of those applying to be removed are not revealed, the public cannot come forward with evidence against them.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Lord Lawson: David Cameron Must Lead Britain Out of the EU
David Cameron must lead Britain out of the European Union, according to former Tory Chancellor Lord Lawson of Blaby.
The peer, who was Margaret Thatcher’s most successful chancellor, said the EU has become a “bureaucratic monstrosity” and that the benefits of leaving “would substantially outweigh the costs”. Lord Lawson said it was pointless to try to improve terms on Britain’s EU membership ahead of a an in/out referendum in 2017 and that Mr Cameron has to resign himself to four years of “inconsequential” negotiation with his EU partners. Lord Lawson — who voted for Britain to join the EU in 1975 — said he would be backing Britain’s exit in 2017. His comments are likely to add pressure to the Prime Minister to offer concessions to the Tory right after the strong advances made by the United Kingdom Independence Party in the local elections last week…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: MP Hugh Bayley Sees Plans for Bull Lane Mosque
YORK Central MP Hugh Bayley met with members of the city’s Muslim community and their new Iman, Sheikh Abid Salik, to discuss their plans for a new mosque. They are currently raising funds for a new two-storey eco-friendly place of worship which will house 600 worshippers and will have full wheelchair access and facilities for disabled people. The MP inspected a model of the new mosque in York Mosque and Islamic Centre in Bull Lane. He said: “It is a well respected Muslim faith group and it has strong links with the local community…
[JP note: All hunky dory then.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Rapist in Legal Battle to Live Where He Chooses is Granted Anonymity by Judge
[WARNING: ** Disturbing Content **]
A notorious rapist walking the streets of Britain has been granted anonymity by a judge as he uses human rights laws to dictate to the authorities where he wants to live.
The violent sex attacker is using Article 8 of the Human Rights Act to demand that he be allowed to move from England, where he committed his crime, to another part of the UK.
But even before the case has been heard, a judge has thrown a cloak of secrecy over proceedings following an application by his lawyers.
The man, whose identity is known to the Daily Mail, raped a woman after breaking into her house armed with a knife.
He was sentenced to more than a decade behind bars but released after serving half his sentence.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Rise of the UKIP ‘Hedgehogs’
by Douglas Murray
The ‘foxes’ of European politics have presided over a still-ongoing car crash.
A divide has opened in British politics. It is not between north and south, or left and right, but between hedgehogs and foxes. Isaiah Berlin first popularized the idea (taken from a fragment of the Greek poet Archilochus) that “the fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.” He used the notion to categorize the difference between various thinkers. But since last week’s local-election upset for the U.K.’s major political parties, it is a way to understand our changing politics…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Tomorrow Will See the Queen’s Speech. So Here Again is the Alternative Queen’s Speech
by Paul Goodman
The Queen’s Speech takes place tomorrow. Harry Phibbs wrote about its contents over the weekend. Last year, this site published an entire alternative Queen’s Speech, and I thought it would be worth listing its measures in full:
– British Bill of Rights Bill — “In all but the most exceptional circumstances, human rights cases brought in or against Britain should be decided in our Supreme Court, not Strasbourg.”…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
15 May: International Imad Day
Since 22 year old Imad Iddine Habib founded the Council of Ex-Muslims of Morocco (the first public atheist organisation in a country with Islam as the state religion), he has received numerous threats.
Morocco’s High Council of Ulemas (the highest government religious institution headed by the King) issued a fatwa decreeing the death penalty for Moroccans who leave Islam. Currently, under Morocco’s penal code, those who “impede or prevent worship” face imprisonment and fines.
The threats continue to escalate. Recently, Imad’s father has been interrogated by the secret service. He was told to tell Imad to stop his activities and that this would be the “last warning before they react”. Imad’s registered address has also been raided by security forces.
We, the undersigned, are extremely concerned about Imad’s safety and life and call on the Moroccan government to guarantee his security and respect freedom of expression and thought. Rather than prosecute freethinkers, the government should prosecute those who issue fatwas and death threats.
On 15 May we call for an International Imad Day in order to stand with and defend Imad.
He is all of us…
| — Hat tip: TV | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt: Opposition Slams ‘Islamising’ Cabinet Reshuffle
Cairo, 7 May (AKI) — Egypt’s opposition on Tuesday criticised the reshuffle of nine cabinet posts, calling the move further Islamisation of the government ahead of parliamentary polls expected in October.
“This is a further step towards the total dominance of the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood,” said Amr Moussa, former Arab League chief and leader of the main National Salvation Front (NSF) opposition bloc.
Egypt announced on Tuesday a reshuffle of nine ministers including those of petroleum, justice and finance, the state-run Ahram Online news website reported.
“The reshuffle does not add anything new and it will need to be changed in the short run,” said Moussa, who is also a head of the opposition Conference Party, said in statement on Tuesday.
“There must be a national unity government with high qualifications and to be trusted with the people,” Moussa added.
The reshuffle included nine ministries, two of which were given to prominent Muslim Brotherhood figures, Al-Ahram reported.
Key ministers involved in Egypt’s ongoing loan negotiations with the International Monetary Fund were replaced, including all economy ministers and the minister of petroleum, the paper said.
New petroleum minister Sherif Hadarra is reportedly very close to the Muslim Brotherhood.
An earlier cabinet reshuffle in January was sharply criticised by opposition figures who accused Egypt’s Islamist president Mohammed Morsi and his prime minister Hisham Qandil of “Brotherhoodising” the government, after giving several prominent Muslim Brotherhood figures ministries.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Gunmen Order Libya Cabinet to Quit
Gunmen besieging government ministries in Libya issued an ultimatum for the cabinet to quit today after the adoption of a law to purge Gaddafi-era officials from official posts.
The law purges former officials of Col Muammar Gaddafi’s regime from public office, threatening the public careers of many senior leaders. Groups of young militiamen celebrated on Sunday night, whooping and standing out of the windows of their pickups as they sped through the capital’s streets. Emboldened by the successful attempt to pressure the country’s constituent assembly into passing the law, armed groups demanded the departure of Ali Zeidan, the prime minister…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Preacher Rapes Boy Inside Egypt Mosque
An Egyptian Islamic preacher raped his 12-year-old Quran student inside a mosque in the North African Arab country after seducing him into the workers’ room. Police arrested the preacher after the boy’s father reported the incident at the mosque in Cairo and examination showed the boy was telling the truth. Newspapers said the Sheikh, who holds a degree in Islamic law, lured the child into the workers’ room at the mosque, claiming he wanted to give him a new Quran lesson…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
On the eve of the 46th Commemoration of Yom Yerushalayim, Jerusalem Mayor, Nir Barkat held an interview that was reported in The Times of Israel. He made it abundantly clear where Israelis stood: Setting out a resolutely uncompromising vision of continued Israeli sovereignty throughout Jerusalem, the capital’s Mayor Nir Barkat rejected any notion of Palestinian rule in any part of the city, and branded international pressure on Israel to freeze building over the pre-1967 lines in Jerusalem as “illegal.” In arguably the most candid and forthright interview he has given since winning office in 2008, Barkat suggested that if the Palestinians wanted a capital in Jerusalem they could rename Ramallah “Jerusalem” or “northern Jerusalem.” It was in Jerusalem’s DNA to be a united city, under sole Jewish rule, he said. “By definition, that DNA cannot be divided.” Palestinian demands for some degree of sovereignty in the city, largely endorsed by the international community as integral to an Israeli-Palestinian accommodation, were unacceptable and unworkable, he said. “That kind of thinking will get us nowhere. It will get us to a dead end, to a bad deal… The answer is no separation of the city”. Kol Hakavod (outstanding!) to Jerusalem Mayor Barkat and to Jerusalem the eternal and undivided capital of Israel, the Jewish nation. Hag Yom Yerushalayim. (Happy Jerusalem Day).
| — Hat tip: Jerry Gordon | [Return to headlines] |
Netanyahu Freezes Settlement Construction
Alarmed, pro-settler party threatens to boycott finance bill
Jewish settlers protest Premier Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to freeze new colony construction (archive photo)
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV — Contrary to prior policy, Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu has quietly frozen new Jewish settlement construction in the West Bank, in a decision army radio said was taken days ago under US pressure to restart stalled peace negotiations with the Palestinians.
Alarmed, Jewish settler movement leaders have asked to meet with the premier, who is in China. Netanyahu reportedly announced his decision to Jewish Hearth leader and construction minister Uri Ariel in a private meeting a few days ago. In a radio interview on Tuesday, Ariel neither confirmed nor denied that such a policy is underway, but stated his party, which supports the colonist movement, wants assurances from the Netanyahu administration that it will get behind new settlement building “throughout Israel”: a phrase nationalists understand to include East Jerusalem and the West Bank, i.e. what the international community calls the Palestinian Occupied Territories.
Jewish Hearth might otherwise vote against the premier’s new finance bill next week, Ariel implied on the radio.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
At Least 10 Killed, 26 Wounded in Attacks in Iraq
BAGHDAD, May 6 (Xinhua) — At least 10 people were killed and 26 others injured on Monday in attacks in Iraq, the police said. Six people were killed and 13 others injured when unidentified gunmen throw a grenade at worshipers when they were leaving the Sunni Ihsan Mosque in the Mansour district in western Baghdad, a police source told Xinhua…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Checkmate: From Global Makeover to Takeover
We’re rapidly approaching a potential checkmate moment in the Mideast. There are 41 nations plus the U.S., for a total of 42 nations currently participating in military maneuvers off the coast of Iran. Despite all of the saber rattling about Iran, we are being deceived about the coming global battle, which will almost certainly begin in Syria, not Iran.
What we are seeing is both deadly serious and under-appreciated by most Westerners, who have grown weary of wars and rumors of wars in the Mideast long ago. Exhaustion aside, the events continue to march forward, the consolidation of forces and interests are forming until that final moment when we will have a single group of tyrannical global controllers left standing. A checkmate moment, where the aspirations of the globalists will have succeeded in a plan of global domination, consolidation of power, energy and wealth, all obtained from the blood and bodies of our family members fighting a war without our consent…
Benghazi and the Israeli strikes near Damascus are not unrelated. The Israeli attacks in Syria are collateral effects of our covert operations throughout the Middle East and North Africa and in that manner, tangentially related to Benghazi. Benghazi was, and is, all about Syria. And Syria is not Iraq or Afghanistan, or even Egypt or Libya. Those countries imploded, while Syria is set to explode, and therefore enjoin other nations into a regional and ultimately, a world war.
For this reason, people need to fully understand the significance and secrets that full disclosure about Benghazi would reveal. You see, opening the curtains to expose the planners and producers of the Benghazi stage act would reveal secrets so closely held that it threatens the agenda of the Obama regime who are working on behalf of the Saudis and their globalist handlers. Such a misstep of full disclosure about Benghazi could cause a critical setback of an agenda advancing across the world stage where timing is critical.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
One Soldier Killed by Secessionist Gunmen in Southern Yemen
ADEN, Yemen, May 6 (Xinhua) — A group of secessionist gunmen killed one soldier in an armed attack Monday on a military post in Yemen’s southern province of al-Dhalea, a government official told Xinhua…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Russia Probes US Air Defenses Again!
According to the Washington Free Beacon — “Two Bear H nuclear-capable bombers were detected flying into the military’s Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) near the Aleutians, where a strategic missile defense radar is located, and Alaska’s North Slope region by the Arctic and Chukchi Seas on April 28 and 29, military officials told the Washington Free Beacon.”
It would appear “ole Vlad” is turning up the pressure on Obama to show some of that “flexibility” he promised Putin he would have after he was elected to a second term…
Russia continues to rebuild their armed forces while the US — under Obama — continues to, basically, disarm its military.
The US can expect more of these probes by Russia, and soon, we expect, from China, as well.
Obama projects weakness. Maybe that is because he IS a weak leader. NOTHING invites trouble more than the the appearance of weakness.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
“Princess of Uzbekistan” Courts Muslims
Her father is tough when it comes to religion, but it looks like Gulnara Karimova is now reaching out to Muslims. Could this be, some wonder, a bid to assert herself as an inclusive candidate to succeed her father, President Islam Karimov?
The Uzdaily.uz website reports that Karimova, in her capacity as chairwoman of the Mekhr Nuri (“Ray of Mercy”) foundation, awarded grants to 20 distinguished students from ten (officially sanctioned) Islamic educational establishments in Uzbekistan on May 4. The ceremony was held in Bukhara Region as part of a folk art festival. The Directorate of Muslims, a state body, provided organizational assistance to Karimova’s charity, Uzdaily said. Uzdaily did not specify the size of the grants, but noted that Karimova pledged to improve infrastructure at Islamic institutions as well…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
10 Killed as Suicide Blast Hits Political Gathering in NW Pakistan
ISLAMABAD, May 7 (Xinhua) — At least 10 people were killed and several others were injured as a suicide bomber hit a political gathering in Pakistan’s northwest Hangu District Tuesday afternoon, local Urdu TV channel Geo reported.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Fears of Violence Grow After 41 Killed in Bangladesh Blasphemy Protest
DHAKA, May 6 (Xinhua) — Anxieties grow across Bangladesh over deadly violence that erupted Sunday afternoon and continued until the evening hours of Monday, leaving at least 41 people dead and hundreds injured. At dinner tables, family gatherings, business meetings and even tea stalls, Bangladeshis are asking about the raid of early Monday with 10,000 law enforcers sweeping away thousands of Islamists from Dhaka’s commercial district Motijheel where they were camped to press home their demand for a new blasphemy law. “Now we worry every moment because we don’t know what will happen next,” Mollah, a tea hawker at Dhaka’s diplomatic Baridhara area, told Xinhua. Mollah, who uses single name, said gloomy conditions prevail everywhere…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Myanmar Charges 6 Muslims for Sectarian Violence
YANGON, Myanmar—A Myanmar court has charged six Muslims with murder for their alleged role in the death of a Buddhist monk during sectarian violence that shook the country in March. The charges filed Monday mark the latest legal action against minority Muslims in the central city of Meikthila, one of several recent flashpoints of violence that rights groups have called an organized campaign of ethnic cleansing in the Buddhist nation…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Myanmar President Urges Communities to Live in Peace in W. State
YANGON, May 6 (Xinhua) — Myanmar President U Then Sein Monday urged the two communities in the country’s western Rakhine state — Rakhine Buddhists and Muslims to live in good term to ensure lasting peaceful coexistence…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Roadside Bomb Kills 4 Afghan Police, Wounds 1
GHAZNI, Afghanistan, May 7 (Xinhua) — A roadside bomb struck a police van in Ghazni province 125 km south of Kabul on Tuesday killing four policemen and injuring another, spokesman for provincial administration Nabi Jan said…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Al-Shabaab Claims Suicide Car Bomb Attack in Somali Capital
Mogadishu — The Al-Qaida linked Somali radical group of Al-Shabaab on Sunday claimed responsibility for a suicide car bomb assault, which killed 10 people and injured several others. The attack targeted a convoy carrying foreign officials, who survived the explosion, according to official sources. The death toll from the blast at the busy main K4 intersection in the capital Mogadishu has risen to 10 and several others, mostly civilians, sustained injures…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Attack on Qatari Officials in Somalia — At Least 10 Killed
Mogadishu — Suicide bombers drove a car packed with explosives into a convoy carrying aid officials from Qatar through the Somali capital on Sunday, killing at least ten people and wounding another 18…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Countering the Radicalization of Kenya’s Youth
Nairobi — Unemployment, poverty and political marginalization are contributing to the Islamic radicalization of Kenya’s youth, a situation experts say must be addressed through economic empowerment and inclusive policies…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Failure to Support Somalia ‘Will Lead to Terrorism’
Failure to properly support the rebuilding of Somalia will lead to “terrorism and mass migration”, David Cameron will warn, as the international community gathers in London to discuss the country.
Almost 50 governments are expected to attend the meeting — which the Prime Minister is co-hosting with Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud — alongside the IMF, World Bank and other global bodies. Mr Cameron will hail progress in stabilising the African nation after it was ripped apart by two decades of brutal civil war, but demand action to ensure the momentum is maintained. That will allow many Somalis who fled the bloodshed to Britain and elsewhere to return home, he will say…
[JP note: Eton mess.]
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Nigeria: Finding Answers Beyond Kano Bus Bombing
by Osita Ebiem
Nigeria is unworkable as one nation-state because of intractable internal ethnic rivalries and the deeply rooted determination of the north to Islamise everyone.
Kano as an Ancient Trading City
Kano as an important commercial city in Nigeria’s Islamic North also serves as gateway to some of Nigeria’s northern neighbours. Countries like Niger, Chad and beyond have for centuries shared with the city lucrative business relationships.
In the course of this time the people have established many trade routes across this harsh environment of the Sahara.
The routes run from Kano and extend all the way to the northernmost parts of North Africa to places like Sudan, Libya, Egypt and the Arabian Peninsula.
Some few hundred years back Arabian Islam penetrated the city and its surrounding areas through these trading routes and replaced the once glorious indigenous NOK Culture that flourished throughout most of what is today’s Northern Nigeria and further south to the valleys and highlands of the Benue-Plateau region. With the ease and continuous cultural infiltration of these parts by the Arabs (Fulani) the city and other parts of northern Nigeria have always been heavily influenced by events and some of the most violent doctrines coming out of the Islamic lands of the Middle East. It is therefore not surprising that Kano, since the recent worldwide revival of violent expansionist Islam and its spread through the holy jihad, is at the forefront of the campaign…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Nigeria: Gunmen Kill 14, Injure 12 in Adamawa, Borno States
Gunmen Sunday attacked members of the Ekklisiyar Yan’uwa a Najeriya (EYN) Church in Jilang village of Mahia Local Government Area in Adamawa State killing 10 persons and injuring 12 others. The attack on the church came on the heels of an earlier attack by suspected members of the dreaded Boko Haram sect on Saturday in Ngamdu, a border town between Borno and Yobe States, resulting in the death of two Islamic clerics and two other residents of the town…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Nigeria: ‘Many Dead in Boko Haram Raid’ In Borno State
Fifty-five people have been killed in the north-east of Nigeria in co-ordinated attacks by the Boko Haram militant group, the Nigerian army says.
It said 105 prisoners were freed in the pre-dawn raid in Bama, Borno state.
Bama’s police station, military barracks and government buildings were burned to the ground, said the military and witnesses.
Correspondents say extremist attacks are common in the region but the scale of bloodshed makes this raid stand out.
This strike — coming on the back of other deadly attacks — undermines the suggestion that the military operation against the militants has diminished the threat they pose, says the BBC’s Will Ross in Lagos.
President Goodluck Jonathan has set up a committee to agree the terms of an amnesty for the rebels but Boko Haram’s leader, Abubakar Shekau, has so far rejected the idea.
Tuesday’s raid in the remote town began when some 200 heavily-armed suspected members of Boko Haram arrived in buses and pick-up trucks at about 05:00 (04:00 GMT), said Musa Sagir, a military spokesman based in Maiduguri, some 70km (44 miles) from Bama.
“Some of the gunmen attacked the military barracks but they were repelled. Ten of them were killed and two were arrested,” he told AFP news agency.
“But the gunmen broke into the prison, freeing 105 inmates, and killed all prison warders they could see except those who hid in a store where cooking utensils were kept,” he said.
Some of the attackers wore army uniforms for the assault, which continued for almost five hours, he added.
Children
Twenty-two police officers, 14 prison wardens, two soldiers and four civilians are said to have died along with 13 members of Boko Haram.
Bama police commander Abubakar Sagir was quoted as saying the civilians comprised a woman and three children.
Police and public buildings — reportedly including a magistrate’s court — were razed to the ground…
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Remove the UN Arms Embargo or We Cannot Defeat Al-Qaeda, Says Somalia
The United Nations should lift its arms embargo on Somalia and Britain should mobilise funds for a new national army that can defeat al-Qaeda, the country’s defence minister said today.
On the eve of a conference in London designed to build support for Somalia’s official government, Abdulhakim Haji Faqi told The Daily Telegraph that an arms embargo first imposed in 1992 should now be abandoned. “To live peacefully within ourselves, we need our military to be equipped properly — and that is why we need completely to lift the arms embargo,” he said…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Somalis Express Cautious Hope About London Conference
MOGADISHU, May 6 (Xinhua) — As the last of Somalia’s delegations left the country for London to attend the International conference in the British capital, residents of the capital Mogadishu expressed hope about the outcome of the talks that will kick off on Monday. Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud and a delegation comprising cabinet ministers, lawmakers and senior government advisers left Saturday. President Hassan will co-chair the conference with British Prime Minister David Cameron.
London Conference will focus on assessing the needs of the Somali government and supporting it in the reform of the country’s security apparatus, the judiciary, reconstruction and investment in the Somali economy, said Somalia’s foreign Minister Fawzia Haji Yusuf. Many express the hope that the talks in the British capital will lead in the political reconciliation between the central Somali government and northwestern regions, known as Somaliland, which proclaimed unilateral independence from the rest of the country back in 1991…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Geologists have announced the discovery of what has been dubbed the ‘Brazilian Atlantis’, some 900 miles from Rio.
Roberto Ventura Santos, a top official at Brazil’s Geology Service (CPRM), said granite samples were found two years ago during dredging operations in an area known as “Rio Grande Elevation”, a mountain range in Brazilian and international waters. The area could be part of the continent submerged when the Atlantic Ocean was formed as Africa and South America drifted apart 100 million years ago. Granite is seen as a continental rock. “This could be the Brazilian Atlantis. We are almost certain but we must bolster our hypothesis. We will have final (scientific) recognition this year when we conduct drilling in the area to retrieve more samples of these rocks,” Mr Ventura told the G1 news website.
Initially, the scientists thought they were mistaken, Mr Ventura noted. But last month, their case was bolstered when a team of Brazilian and Japanese scientists aboard Japan’s manned research submersible Shinkai 6500, observed the underwater geological formation located opposite the Brazilian coast, he added…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Three Killed in Haiti Gang Clash
SANTO DOMINGO, May 6 (Xinhua) — Three people were killed and six others injured in weekend clashes between rival gangs in one of the poorest and most dangerous zones of the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince, authorities there said Monday. The fight took place in the densely-populated Cite Soleil (Sun City), north of the capital, where tensions have been running high for several weeks, said the capital’s interim mayor, Jean Ronald Coby…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Integration Minister Criticizes Immigrant Detention Centers
Cecile Kyenge calls for decriminalizing illegal immigrants
(ANSA) — Rome, May 6 — Comments by recently appointed Integration Minister Cecile Kyenge that she wants Italy’s immigrant detention centers shut down sparked fierce reaction from the right of the political spectrum.
In comments during a RAI3 news talk show on Sunday, Kyenge also said she will work on repealing a law passed during ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi’s administration making clandestine immigration a crime, and will back giving automatic citizenship to children born on Italian soil of immigrant parents.
“The EU directive does not require us to place minors, the ill and the fragile in CIEs, but only people who are deemed dangerous or criminal”, Kyenge said of Italy’s so-called Centers for Identification and Deportation (CIE). CIEs descend from so-called Temporary Detention Centers first established in 1998 by the center-left government under the so-called Turco-Napolitano anti-immigration law. In 2002, the center-right Berlusconi government passed a similar but much more restrictive law, in 2011 extending detention times to a maximum of 18 months, nine times longer than in the past.
Similar detention practices are widespread across Europe, and the EU legal framework supports both restricting illegal migrants and integrating legal ones. Italy distinguishes itself by stressing criminality and not human rights. The fact of being detained simply for being an immigrant, without any lawbreaking, is exclusive to the Italian legal code, and a 2011 report by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR) complained about the conditions of refugees, migrants and asylum seekers detained in Italy.
Members of the center-right People of Freedom (PdL) party on Monday criticized Kyenge’s comments. Senate PdL caucus leader Renato Schifani said Premier Enrico Letta should “rein in his ministers”, while MP Anna Maria Bernini said the minister’s comments were “misplaced”.
“We need to debate these issues and we may or may not reach an agreement. I will do my best, but we’ll see”, Enrico Letta commented on a different RAI 3 talk show. “Having a former illegal immigrant as a minister can only happen in Italy, and it’s making a laughing stock of us”, said the secretary of the anti-immigration Northern League, Matteo Salvini. “If the minister doesn’t think being an illegal alien is a crime that’s her problem, but she better not be thinking of bringing her 38 brothers here because they’ll find there’s no room”.
Italy’s first black cabinet minister, Kyenge, 48, was born in Congo and moved to Italy three decades ago to study medicine.
An eye surgeon, she lives in Modena with her Italian husband and two children. Premier Enrico Letta tapped her to be minister of integration in his left-right government that won its second vote of confidence last week. Since then she has been the target of racist slurs by politicians of the anti-immigrant Northern League and members of neo-fascist Internet groups.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
So many migrants flooded into Britain from Eastern Europe that authorities were unable to count them, Whitehall admitted yesterday.
Official migration figures missed out nearly half a million people who came to the UK after their countries joined the EU in 2004, according to a newly-published document.
The scale of the problem was only revealed in the 2011 census, which showed the population was even bigger than estimated.
The admission comes amid growing concern over immigration, as Britain prepares to open its doors to citizens from Romania and Bulgaria.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Mass Immigration Has Left an Alarming Legacy
The recent surge has put pressure on the fabric of society.
It is one of the most startling examples of disconnection between rulers and ruled in recent memory. The Labour Party flung open Britain’s doors to an unprecedented wave of mass immigration — and then professed itself bewildered by the complaints from those who found themselves unable to cope with the flow of new arrivals. Even now, anger over immigration has played a powerful part in the success of Ukip in the local elections, with its candidates falling over themselves to condemn the European Union rules on freedom of movement that will soon allow Bulgarians and Romanians to join their Eastern European neighbours in the British employment market.
One of the most obvious criticisms of mass immigration, now widely if belatedly accepted, was that the greater the volume of newcomers, the harder it would prove to integrate them. The latest research from the think tank Demos bears out this fear. It shows a continuing pattern of “white flight” from areas where indigenous Britons find themselves surrounded by new minority communities. Indeed, according to the latest Census, the number of white Britons in London was some 600,000 fewer in 2011 than in 2001 — the equivalent of a city the size of Glasgow — even though the city’s total population increased by almost a million. In the areas such people have abandoned, minority communities have become more concentrated and more isolated, raising the risk — as David Goodhart, Demos’s director, delicately puts it — of their having “limited familiarity with majority cultural codes”. In the words of Trevor Phillips, the former chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, this is “not good news for the cause of integration”.
It is important not to exaggerate the scale of the problem: one encouraging phenomenon is the way that members of ethnic minorities have been absorbed into communities, away from the major cities, that were previously overwhelmingly white (what Mr Phillips calls “the Ambridge effect”). But one has only to look at the ghettos of Paris to see what happens when immigrants are encouraged to build lives on the edge of the economy and society, and permitted to cluster in islands of deprivation without being absorbed into the mainstream.
Britain has an enviable track record in assimilating immigrants, yet the recent surge has put pressure not just on public services, but in some places on the fabric of society. That so many Britons should be on the move suggests that politicians have still not come to terms with the depths of the public’s disquiet, or done enough to reassure them that things will be different in future.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
The Marxist Revival That Never Happened
Isn’t about time that major awards — like the Oscars and the Emmys — were opened up to a public vote? The answer to that, of course, is no — for the very good reason that the public can’t be trusted. For instance, if the Brits (awards for popular music artists, m’lud) were to go fully democratic, then we could expect the most popular boy band of the moment (currently One Direction) to win in every category including best female solo artist.
Prospect magazine’s ‘world thinkers poll’, provides another object lesson in the perils of the public vote. With the lads of One Direction having been cruelly excluded from the short list, the way was left open for the celebrity atheist Richard Dawkins to top the poll. To add insult to impiety, the celebrity Marxist Slavoj Zizek came sixth — a remarkable result for an unrepentant exponent of a discredited ideology.
However, as Walter Lacquer reminds us in the National Interest, it could be worse. Among certain academics — with more taxpayers’ money than sense — Marx is certainly back in vogue. But as to any danger of this revolutionary fervour spreading from the chattering classes to the workers, the chances are on the slim side…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
(NaturalNews) As the Obama administration continues its attempted cultural purge of conservativism, gun owners and anyone who practices religion, there is a massive underground backlash that’s building up steam and may be nearing the stage of revolt.
This article is a tour of several astonishing recent poll results and statistics that paint a picture of an armed cultural backlash taking shape in America. It’s off the radar of the mainstream media because the media doesn’t want to acknowledge the reality of what’s happening. But beneath the surface, a cultural backlash is seething, fed up with the criminal occupation of America by anti-freedom socialists and Marxists who are quite literally working to destroy the U.S. economy and cultural conservatism.
Regardless of where you stand on the Obama Administration or even being “progressive” vs. “conservative,” this cultural backlash needs to be on your radar because it leads to a boiling point that may bring America to the brink of civil war.
Consider these facts of what’s really happening:
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Going High-Tech to Keep the World’s Muslims Halal
Hamzah Mohd Salleh’s lab is trying to ensure the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims can stick to their religion’s strict halal rules
Can you explain the concept of halal?
In Islamic law, there are things that are allowed, known as halal, and things that are forbidden. In terms of Islamic dietary laws, things that are forbidden include pork, products derived from pork, and alcohol. But many products are in a grey area. Muslims are advised to only consume things which are clearly halal.
What type of research do you do?
My colleagues and I aim to find ways to detect non-halal materials in products that are to be certified halal. Our chemists check for porcine DNA or an unacceptable level of alcohol, for example. We also try to find alternatives to forbidden ingredients, such as gelatin made from fish skin instead of from pigs. Our research assists the halal industry — estimated to be worth trillions of US dollars per year globally — and the religious organisations that certify products as halal.
Does halal go beyond food?
Yes, it extends to cosmetics, personal care products and pharmaceuticals, to name but a few. Most capsules for medicines contain gelatin, for example. More and more pharmaceutical companies, at least those in the Muslim world, are trying to source gelatin from halal sources. And Muslims want to know whether the lipstick they wear or the lotion they put on their skin is acceptable. We are also looking at the food animals eat, so whether it is OK to use a pig’s body parts as animal feed, and whether pig hair is permissible for use in, for example, a pastry brush.
Are there other areas of active research?
We are working on making sure the processes used to make drugs are halal. To make vaccines and other proteins, you need to culture cells in a bioreactor. To increase the density of the cells you can use microcarriers — insoluble particles that the cells congregate around — usually made of porcine gelatin. I’m developing a microcarrier that works in the same way but is made of halal materials. The next step will be ensuring that nutrients given to the cells to make them grow are also permissible…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
by Andrew G. Bostom
Despite a number of (deliberately?) mitigating biases, both methodological and interpretative, the latest Pew Research Forum report, “The World’s Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society,” released April 30, 2013, confirms the broad appeal of the totalitarian Sharia, Islam’s religio-political “law,” across Islamdom…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Moscow’s probes towards Alaska and Guam are being misread.
Putin has to build up his military cred with Beijing — while kissing the hand he can’t bite.
The only way to do so is to engage in mock attacks/ drills against American bases — which probes can be conducted safely — in terms of geopolitics and the military arts.
Russia will never probe Chinese defenses — because her most sensitive facilities are so close to Russia that Beijing must have a fire-on-warning policy.
As it stands, Red China has more atomic throw weight than Russia and America combined.
This is the real reason that Putin now doesn’t want to join Buraq in further atomic reductions.
The PLA atomic strategy is blowing back. Taiwan has gone atomic — with enough ballistic missiles to reach all of Red China with a first class strategic missile radar now operational. (Raytheon)
Soon, Korea and Japan must follow Nationalist China; next up — Australia.
Osita Ebiem’s article on Nigeria is full of inaccuracies. Nigeria is basically a Christian state with a large Moslem minority. Islam has always been the main problem with the country, with endemic corruption coming in a good second. The 13 Moslem-majority ‘Northern states’ are variably out of control, especially the North East corner and Borno state in particular. There are no efficient border controls between the porous borders of Nigeria with Chad, Niger and Cameroon, and there is no supervision of mosque activity nor teachings in the unofficial [Almajiri ] schools which teach ONLY the Koran. The Boko Haram ‘insurgents’ as Ebiem calls them are quite simply a collection of small groups of mass-murderers who get a buzz out of murdering Christians, Government officials and any Moslem who stands against them. They hide in safe places like Northern Cameroon and plan their attacks using satellite images and strikes in the dead of night. Most of them really believe that Islam licenses them to commit these barbaric murders, and when caught they cannot understand why they are being stopped from doing their ‘ work ‘. These people should be relatively easy to exterminate as the initial solution is military containment, but the Joint Task Force are a little sluggish and are mostly themseves Northern Moslems who sometimes sympathise with the locals. Basically the area needs a Boston type lockdown of the entire area until the terrorists are flushed out. It hasn’t helped in any way that the French familly were ransomed for 2 million dollars because that will buy these baddies a lot more arms. But it is far too early to jump to the conclusion that a two-state solution is necessary.