Nigel Farage, the leader of UKIP, was chased out of a pub by a group of protesters, who then jumped on the bonnet (hood) of his car when he tried to drive away. His attackers were a diverse group, and included immigrants, disabled people, breast-feeding mothers, HIV activists, and gay people.
In other news, Israeli authorities have allowed 620 trucks carrying agricultural produce and commercial goods to pass through a border crossing into Gaza.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, Ivan Winters, JD, Papa Whiskey, Steen, 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.
Italy: Retirement Age Raised to 66 Yrs Seven Months in 2016
Based on longer life expectancy says INPS pensions agency
(ANSA) — Rome, March 20 — Men’s retirement age will be raised to 66 years seven months between 2016 and 2018, INPS pensions and social security agency said Friday.
INPS implemented the measure after the economy ministry raised retirement age by four months based on longer life expectancy.
Another adjustment will be made in 2019.
Female retirement age between 2016-2018 will be 65 years seven months in the public sector, 66 years seven months in the private sector and 66 years one month for self-employed women.
As of 2016, men will be able to take early retirement after 42 years and 10 months of social security contributions, women after 41 years and 10 months.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Padoan Rejects ECB’s Debt Criticisms
Central bank says Italy reforms could gradually add 10% to GDP
(ANSA) — Rome, March 19 — Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan on Thursday denied Italy is breaking European Union budget rules, just hours before Premier Matteo Renzi was due to attend an EU summit in Brussels.
Padoan’s remarks came after a European Central Bank (ECB) report said Rome was some distance away from meeting its commitments under the Stability and Growth Pact. Padoan said that European rules on budget discipline among member States had several goals and included a certain flexibility for members in times of difficulty.
“You respect the debt rule in part by conducting decisive reforms, as the European Commission has said,” Padoan commented.
Padoan added if the rules are inadequate to deal with exceptional circumstances, such as a prolonged recession, a “contradiction” can develop.
That happened with Italy during the development of the 2015 budget, when Renzi and Padoan argued strenuously for greater flexibility in the application of rules, which the EC came to accept.
The ECB said Thursday that Italy was a long way from meeting its commitments to the EU in terms of cutting its massive public debt of over two trillion euros.
The Frankfurt-based central bank added in its regular economic bulletin that Belgium was also behind. “In both Italy and Belgium, there continues to be significant deviation from the structural effort that is required under the debt rule (of the Stability and Growth Pact),” read the ECB report. The bank also suggested the European Commission was wrong not to open excessive deficit procedures against Italy and Belgium over their 2015 budgets.
Still, the ECB report praised the structural reform efforts and said that if Italy continued in this regard, its reforms could in the long run add 10% to gross domestic product (GDP).
The European Commission for its part said it would continue its regular monitoring of Italy and Belgium’s fiscal movements and its adherence with respect to debt rules.
Valdis Dombrovskis, the Commission’s vice-president, said the EC is “aware” of the ECB’s concerns.
But no excess-deficit procedure had been opened against Italy because the EC was aware of progress being made by Renzi’s government on implementing structural reforms.
Meanwhile, Padoan said that he was concerned the European Union’s strength was flagging and said that the European Parliament must taken on a greater role in encouraging economic growth.
“The EU Parliament must have a stronger voice, and there should be put into place a more effective relationship” between Parliament, the European Council and the Commission, said Padoan.
This is especially important at a time when the European Union is working to identify and put into motion an economic strategy for the long term, he added.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden Risks Property Bubble as Currency War Intensifies
Having twice cut rates into negative territory, Sweden’s central bank is locked in a high-stakes currency war with the European Central Bank that could stave off deflation but risks creating another property bubble.
The Riksbank is worried that a strengthening crown, fuelled in part by ECB bond-buying, will reverse a recent upturn in consumer prices and raise the spectre of deflationary damage to Sweden’s fast-growing AAA economy.
The moves by Riksbank Governor Stefan Ingves represent a dramatic rethink by a bank that was accused of “sado monetarism” for keeping policy tight after the financial crisis for fear of stoking household debt that is among the highest in Europe at 170 percent of disposable income.
The Riksbank cut its key interest rate by 0.15 percentage points last week, to -0.25 percent, and said it would buy a further 30 billion Swedish crowns (2 billion pounds) of government bonds.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Next Move for the Fed: “Trial Ballooning” QE4
Before that question is answered let’s consider the current economic environment in the United States. First of all Q1 GDP is likely to be much softer than current expectations. Most of the economic data point to it i.e. throw a dart at the Q1 economic calendar and you are sure to hit a soft statistical series. Key to this trend is the $88B Q4 inventory build that is not being depleted. Wholesale and business inventory data from Q1 are sluggish which is not entirely unexpected. More importantly though, Q1 wholesale and business sales are dramatically lagging this anemic inventory growth suggesting a further bulging of finished goods for Q1. This is not a good recipe for Q1 economic growth…or the Q2 outlook.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Big Pharma Used “Statistical Deception” To Sell Deadly Statin Scam to Americans, Study Concludes
(NaturalNews) Statins are a deadly scam, and new research published in the journal Expert Review of Clinical Pharmacology undoubtedly proves this. Using “statistical deception” to make statins appear safe and effective, the drug industry has deviously sold the United States and other Western nations a bill of goods, say researchers, as actual data shows that statins provide almost no benefits while causing serious harm…
When poring through the data, the two doctors found that nearly every drug-industry-backed study claiming that statins are safe and effective used “relative risk” data rather than “absolute risk” data. This deceptive tactic is often employed to make drug treatments appear more effective than they actually are, as well as to cover up any adverse effects associated with drug interventions.
By comparing the treatment outcome of one specific group of people to another specific group (relative risk), rather than evaluating how each individual responds to a particular treatment over time irrespective of all others (absolute risk), drug companies deceitfully veil the ineffectiveness of pharmaceuticals and their respective risks from the public.
This is how statin researchers are able to claim that statins benefit 30-50% of the population (relative risk) rather than 1% or less of the population (absolute risk)…
Meanwhile, ending statin trials early under the guise of prudence — most drug industry-pioneered statin studies are terminated within two to five years — conveniently hides the fact that statins come with major health risks. One of these risks is cancer, as demonstrated by at least one long-term trial which showed a dramatic increase in breast cancer rates among women who took statins for 10 years or longer.
In fact, using statins to artificially lower cholesterol levels, as millions of Americans and others do daily, appears to be directly associated with cancer incidence — statins clearly cause cancer! But you’ll be strained to find this information anywhere in the industry literature, which is so mendaciously formulated as to make statins appear like a miracle drug rather than a lethal ruse.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Body of WSJ Energy Markets Reporter Found in River
A body found in a New Jersey river has been positively identified as David Bird, a Wall Street Journal reporter who disappeared more than a year ago, officials said on Thursday.
Dental records were used to identify Bird, 55, an energy markets reporter at the Journal, published by News Corp , who had been missing since taking a walk from his home by the Passaic River in Long Hill Township, New Jersey, on Jan. 11, 2014, the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office in a statement.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Prince Charles to Americans: Capitalism Has “Enormous Shortcomings”
Prince Charles ended his tour of the United States in Louisville, Kentucky yesterday where, the Independant reports, that during a speech at the Cathedral of the Assumption Prince Charles took a shot at capitalism by stating that it had “enormous shortcomings”:
[Comment: Yes, the New World Order Feudal system is much better for the elitists.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Senator Says Obama’s ‘Open Hostility’ To Netanyahu Causing Democrats to Lose Trust in President
President Obama’s hostility towards Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is creating a backlash in congress among Democrats, Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC) told The Washington Post in an interview published on Friday.
This backlash is beginning to damage the President’s agenda with respect to Iran and Israel, according to Graham. The deteriorating relationship also elicited a strong response this morning from Senator John McCain (R-AZ), a close Graham ally.
“It’s been unnerving seeing the president show his open hostility,” Graham told The Washington Post. “It’s immature and over the top and has made people suspicious…He makes it hard for Democrats to trust him.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
(NaturalNews) The corporate media won’t report such cases because their bottom line is more important than being honest with their readers, but vaccine damages do occur, even if the big newspapers don’t want to risk their pharmaceutical industry ad purchases to tell you about them.
But not all media is corrupted in that manner, so our hats go off to the small-time Charlotte Observer, of Charlotte, North Carolina, which had the courage to tell the story of a local resident whose child has no future, thanks to vaccines.
As the paper reported in its February 28 edition online:
As they started their family, Mooresville residents Theresa and Lucas Black dutifully got their children immunized, never doubting their doctor’s word that vaccines are safe and necessary.
But their faith in those promises was shaken in 2001, when their 3-month-old daughter, Angelica, developed life-threatening seizures and brain damage just three days after getting several vaccinations.
A neurologist in Charlotte diagnosed Angelica with vaccine-related encephalopathy — a brain injury. And in 2006, she was awarded $2 million plus $250,000 from a little known federal judiciary called the “vaccine court,” which was established just for this purpose: Paying out vaccine-related injury claims.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Starbucks Baristas Stop Writing “Race Together” On Cups
Starbucks baristas will no longer write “Race Together” on customers’ cups starting Sunday, ending as planned a visible component of the company’s diversity and racial inequality campaign that had sparked widespread criticism in the week since it took effect.
The coffee chain’s initiative will continue more broadly without the handwritten messages, Starbucks spokesman Jim Olson said.
The cups were always “just the catalyst” for a larger conversation and Starbucks will still hold forum discussions, co-produce special sections in USA TODAY and put more stores in minority communities as part of the Race Together initiative, according to a company memo from CEO Howard Schultz said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Ted Cruz to Announce Presidential Bid on Monday
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz will announce his presidential bid on Monday during an address at Liberty University in Virginia, NBC News confirms.
Cruz, a conservative Republican famed for his staunch opposition to the president’s signature health care law and his executive actions on immigration, will become the first GOP hopeful to formally announce a White House run.
A person with knowledge of the announcement tells NBC that the senator will announce the bid during a convocation ceremony at Liberty, a Christian university in Lynchburg, Virginia.
A favorite of Tea Party activists, Cruz is known for his filibuster-like speech to protest the Affordable Care Act as a government shutdown loomed in 2013.
First elected to the Senate in 2012, Cruz previously served as the the solicitor general of Texas.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Ted Cruz’s Presidential Run is Bad News for Rand Paul
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Tex., on Monday is expected to announce he’s running for president. However well he ends up doing in the Republican primaries, one thing is for sure — the development is terrible news for Sen. Rand Paul’s presidential ambitions.
Whatever small chance Paul had in the 2016 presidential race was premised on his ability to reach beyond the core supporters of his father’s, by articulating a message that appealed to a broader coalition of Republicans. The biggest opportunity Paul had for growth was with Tea Party voters who would be drawn to his limited government message. The biggest obstacle he had was foreign policy views that are also out of step with many of those voters.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
A new video shows the terrifying moment a film crew rushed to save the life of Oscar-winner William Hurt.
The crew of the Gregg Allman biopic Midnight Rider can be seen dashing to get him off the tracks of a railroad bridge, along with their equipment, as he lay across the railway filming a scene in Georgia while a train rushes towards him and the crew at breakneck speed.
The other actor in the scene, Wyatt Russell, can also be seen trying to scramble out of the train’s path.
Hurt and Russell somehow made it to safety. But, several crew members suffered injuries.
Camera assistant Sarah Elizabeth Jones was tragically killed. She was just 27 years old…
Prosecutors said all three defendants knew that CSX Transportation, which owned the trestle spanning the Altamaha River, had denied them permission in writing to film on its tracks.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. Marine Corps Urges ‘Vigilance’ After ISIS Online Threat
The U.S. Marine Corps on Sunday urged “vigilance” among staff after the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group published the alleged names and addresses of 100 military personnel and urged supporters to kill them.
“Vigilance and force protection considerations remain a priority for commanders and their personnel,” U.S. Marine Corps Lt. Col. John Caldwell said in a statement.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Woolly Mammoth Could Roam Again as Extinct DNA Merged With Elephant
A major step forward in bringing back the woolly mammoth has been taken by scientists at Harvard University who have inserted DNA from the extinct mammal into the genetic code of an elephant.
Geneticists have studied DNA from mammoths which were preserved in Arctic permafrost looking for genes which separated them from elephants, such as hairiness and ear size.
They then replicated the genes and spliced them into the genetic code of an elephant where they functioned normally.
It is the first time that mammoth genes have been alive for more than 3,300 years — although so far it has only been done in the lab.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Belgium: Gangsters Raid Delhaize With Kalashnikovs
Following a wild chase in and around the capital police detained three youngsters suspected of involvement in an armed raid on a Delhaize store in Brussels on Saturday morning.
A Delhaize supermarket in the centre of the Belgian and Flemish capital was the target for the raid. The 19-, 21- and 22-year-old gangsters employed Kalashnikov rifles during the hold-up.
Nobody was injured during the raid and no shots were fired, but the gangsters got away with spirits, cigarettes and the content of cash registers.
The gangsters sped off in a car with French number plates with the police in hot pursuit.
The gangsters from Brussels borough of Molenbeek led the police in circles over the Brussels orbital ring road before stopping on the hard shoulder and heading into woodland between Groot-Bijgaarden and Ternat.
In Dilbeek they hi-jacked a car. The car was later involved in an accident in the Brussels borough of Molenbeek where police were able to detain the suspects.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Dazzling Supertide Transforms France’s Mont Saint-Michel Into an Island, Delighting Thousand
A supertide has turned France’s famed Mont Saint-Michel into an island and then retreated out of sight, delighting thousands of visitors who came to see the rare phenomenon.
The so-called “tide of the century” actually happens every 18 years. Although the tide rushes in and out along the whole northern French coast, it’s especially dramatic at the UNESCO world heritage site, which is normally linked to the mainland only by a narrow causeway at high tide.
The high tide, said to rise at the pace of a horse’s gallop, turned the Mont briefly into an island Saturday, while the day’s low tide allowed people to walk on the expansive flat seabed.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Finally, The Beauty of France’s Chauvet Cave Makes Its Grand Public Debut
The simulated cavern is not only a stunning tribute to a place, but also to a moment. It celebrates the cold afternoon in December 1994 when three friends and weekend cavers—Jean-Marie Chauvet, Eliette Brunel and Christian Hillaire—followed an air current into an aperture in a limestone cliff, tunneled their way through a narrow passage, using hammers and awls to chip away at the rocks and stalactites that blocked their progress, and descended into a world frozen in time—its main entrance blocked off by a massive rock slide 29,000 years ago. Brunel, the first to wedge through the passage, glimpsed surreal crystalline deposits that had built up for millennia, then stopped before a pair of blurry red lines drawn on the wall to her right. “They have been here,” she shouted to her awe-struck companions.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Red Cross Wants More Foreign-Background Blood Donors
The Finnish Red Cross’ blood bank service wants to see more donors with foreign backgrounds rolling up their sleeves to give blood. They say that while suitable donors can be found in emergency situations, rare blood types can create complications in cases where patients require repeated or major transfusions.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
For years, Finland has been the by-word for a successful education system, perched at the top of international league tables for literacy and numeracy.
Only far eastern countries such as Singapore and China outperform the Nordic nation in the influential Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) rankings. Politicians and education experts from around the world — including the UK — have made pilgrimages to Helsinki in the hope of identifying and replicating the secret of its success.
Which makes it all the more remarkable that Finland is about to embark on one of the most radical education reform programmes ever undertaken by a nation state — scrapping traditional “teaching by subject” in favour of “teaching by topic”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
French Electrician Guilty of Hiding Picasso Works
A French court Friday handed down a two-year suspended sentence to a former electrician and his wife, who hid 271 Picasso works in their garage for close to 40 years.
The court in the French Riviera town of Grasse found Pierre and Danielle Le Guennec guilty of possessing stolen goods, after a trial that made headlines in France and abroad.
The works have been seized by authorities and will be returned to the Picasso Administration, which represents the artist’s heirs.
There has been no value placed on the collection.
“We’re disappointed,” mumbled Pierre Le Guennec, now 75 and retired.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
By Robert Spencer
“Anything that delays an Islam of France, even if this is already a reality, that’s the great challenge we must face.” Valls is dreaming. He thinks Muslims in France will create an Islam shorn of Sharia hudud punishments, shorn of political supremacism, shorn of jihad terror. If imams in France did somehow devise such an Islam, other Muslims would denounce them as heretics and apostates, and they’d live thereafter under a death fatwa.
But upon this weak reed Valls is basing the future survival of France as a free nation.
“Nothing must slow down Islam,” Gallia Watch, March 14, 2015 (thanks to Thomas Pellow):
The comments made by Manuel Valls on March 3 during a visit to the grand mosque of Strasbourg (above) are worth noting, even though I’m a bit late in reporting them. They come under the same category as those made by Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve, who recently announced a new “dialogue” with Muslim leaders and the relaunching of an Islamic “foundation” to fund various cultural activities. Both men are working diligently to implant Islam firmly in France. With every new mosque, every new concession to halal food, every new welcome to imams, they eradicate a bit more of French tradition, and bring the country a step closer to overt conflict. From Le Point:
Manuel Valls wants to meet the challenge of “anything that slows down the Islam of France,” in particular with regard to the training of imams. But he wants also to stem the “reflex” of soliciting foreign countries to finance mosques. “I hope to act, we hope to act… and we hope that everybody, you first among them, see the depth of the problems we have to deal with today,” he declared during a meeting with Muslim leaders at the grand mosque of Strasbourg. “Anything that delays an Islam of France, even if this is already a reality, that’s the great challenge we must face.”
[…]
“We must not hide from the challenges we are facing.The rise of populism, of the extreme right, in Europe and in France, feeds naturally on the rise of jihadism, terrorism, and radical extremism. At bottom, these two extremisms feed one another and represent a major danger for our democracy, our society and our ability to live together. I am sometimes surprised, angered, by the fact that people are not sufficiently aware of this.”
[Yes, how dare the hoi polloi have the temerity to expose, analyze, criticize, and mock the odious creed whose baneful presence you’re determined to inflict upon them! — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Pirelli Share Price Rises Amid Reports of Sale to Chinese
Russian investor ‘delighted to cooperate with China’
(ANSA) — Milan, March 20 — Shares in Italian tire-maker Pirelli closed above 15 euros Friday, the sale value set by the company’s largest shareholder amid reports of an imminent deal.
Investment firm Camfin confirmed it was in talks with an international company to sell its 26.2% stake in Pirelli at a price of 15 euros per share but would not confirm reports that the purchaser is a Chinese firm.
At that price, the deal would give Pirelli a value of more than 7.15 billion euros. Sources say that investor is State-controlled China National Chemical Corporation and a spokesman for the Russian government, which has a stake in Camfin, said that it would be comfortable working with Chinese investors.
“We are delighted to cooperate with China in all formats,” said Denis Manturov, of the Russian ministry of industry and trade.
He said that through Camfin, Russia’s Rosneft owns about 10% of Pirelli but would not comment on deal rumours.
Investors were driving up the share price on word of the potential deal and by mid-afternoon Friday, shares had gained 5.23% on the day to reach 15.68 euros per share before closing at 15.23 euros.
Chinese companies have been increasingly interested in Italy in recent years, with investments taking a leap around a visit last August by Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The People’s Bank of China has taken stakes in Italy’s largest listed companies: Generali, Eni, Enel, Prysmian, Telecom and Fiat.
Giant utilities company State Grid Corporation of China has acquired 35% of CDP Reti — the parent company of the energy and gas distribution networks Terna and SNAM — while Shanghai Electric has bought a 35% stake in Ansaldo Energia.
Pirelli has developed a world-famous brand through such high-profile events as being the sole tire supplier for all Formula teams.
And its famous pinup calendar has boasted such models as Italian iconic film star Sophia Loren, Penelope Cruz, Cindy Crawford, and Jennifer Lopez.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Finmeccanica Reports 2014 Net Income of 70 Mn Euro
Order book increased last year to 15.62 bn euros, up 560 mn
(ANSA) — Rome, March 18 — Industrial giant Finmeccanica closed 2014 with net income of 70 million euros, up from a loss of 649 million euros reported in 2013, the company said Wednesday. In a financial statement approved by the board of directors, the company added that revenues rose to 14.663 billion euros last year, an increase of 7.1% over 2013. Its order book reached a total of of 15.619 billion euros projects outstanding, which the note said “ensures the Group coverage for the production equivalent of 2.5 years”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Wine Investment Up by 10% in 2014, Sales 2015 Likely Stable
Wine sector bucks recession trend, Mediobanca report says
(ANSA) Milan, March 20 — Italy’s thriving wine-producing sector attracted a hefty 10% increase in investment last year, bucking the lacklustre trend in the economy as a whole where investment dipped on average by 0.4%, according to a study by Mediobanca.
The information was released on the eve of the Vinitaly fair and was based on polling of 122 wine producing firms.
In all 82% of the wineries predicted that sales will hold steady this year, thanks in part to a significant surge by 17% of Italian exports in Asia, Mediobanca’s report said
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
‘Jan Has a Better Chance of a Job in Holland Than Mohammed’
The unemployment rate among people with an ethnic minority background is higher in the Netherlands than in any other EU country apart from Sweden, the Volkskrant reported at the weekend. According to figures from EU statistics office Eurostat and the OECD, 77% of the native Dutch working population have a job, compared with 49.5% of people from an ethnic minority. Only Sweden has a worst record, but Sweden accepts three times more asylum seekers than the Netherlands, the Volkskrant said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
London Protesters ‘Chase UKIP Leader Farage Out of Pub’
Anti-UKIP protesters have invaded a pub in south London where party leader Nigel Farage was having lunch.
Mr Farage was in the Queen’s Head in Downe, Kent, with his wife and two younger children at the time.
Demonstrators first went to the George & Dragon, believing it to be Mr Farage’s local, before they found him.
They said they chased the family out of the pub and jumped on the politician’s car bonnet as he drove away. Mr Farage later branded them “scum”.
Mr Farage, who is standing in Kent’s Thanet South constituency in May’s general election, said: “I hope these ‘demonstrators’ are proud of themselves. My children were so scared by their behaviour that they ran away to hide.
“… A relative has gone to look for them, and they are not yet at home. These people are scum.”
Mr Farage’s children aged 15 and 10 were understood to have later been found.
Protest organiser Dan Glass said the group was in fancy dress to stage “a cabaret of diversity” and included migrants, HIV activists, gay people, disabled people and breastfeeding mothers.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sarkozy Staves Off Surging National Front, France Exit Polls Suggest
Ex-President Nicolas Sarkozy’s conservative UMP and its allies led voting in the first round of French local elections, exit polls suggest. They pushed the far-right National Front into second, with President Francois Hollande’s ruling Socialists in third.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Socialists Beaten Into Third Place in France’s Local Elections
Voters in France have gone to the polls in a first round of local elections. Initial indications were that the conservatives came in first, with the far-right National Front next in line ahead of the ruling Socialists.
A number of exit polls have found that the Union for a Popular Movement party (UMP) of former President Nicolas Sarkozy and its conservative allies finished first in France’s local elections on Sunday, taking between 29 and 32 percent of the vote. The polls indicated that Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Front (FN), was on track to take between 24.5 and 26 percent.
The Socialists of President Francois Hollande were in third place, with their exit poll results ranging between 19.7 and 25 percent in the first round of the voting for councils of the 101 “departments” or administrative regions in France.
The result will likely come as a disappointment for Le Pen and her anti-immigrant, anti-euro FN, though, after an opinion poll published by France’s parliamentary television channel on Friday predicted that they could take almost 30 percent. Some reports in France following this poll had suggested that Socialist supporters might tactically vote UMP to thwart the far-right group.
This could also prove a setback for Le Pen’s ambition to run in the next presidential election in 2017.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden Tries to End Maelstrom Over Wallstrom
Sweden’s Parliament summoned Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom to formally appear in an investigation into the crisis she caused with her criticism of Saudi Arabia, Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper reported on Saturday. Swedish-Saudi trade ties have been greatly affected by Wallstrom’s statement and are now uncertain after the Saudi decision to halt visas for Swedish businessmen and not renew expired visas. Wallstrom tried to back down on her statement and said Saudi Arabia is a pivotal country in the Middle East and its stand is very important to Sweden and EU countries.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Secret Lives of Spain’s Work-at-Home Porn Stars
The crisis has led to an increase in amateurs earning money performing live sex acts online
Two years ago, Melanie, 32, left her job as an admin assistant in the Andalusian city of Jaén. Her parents, whom she still lives with, assume she is looking for work, and is making ends meet through her unemployment benefit.
But most evenings, after dinner, Melanie — an assumed name — retires to her room, leaving her parents to watch television, locks the door, and takes on the role of BichitaXXX, earning around €1,000 a month performing online sex acts in real time using the webcam on her desktop computer.
Melanie is among the thousands of young women and men throughout Spain earning a living in this way, either alone, or with their partners — some of them simply doing the housework without any clothes on. As it has always done, pornography has adapted to changing times, in this case, to our seemingly limitless fascination with the sex lives of other people like us, who can be found on sites such as Chaturbate or MyFreeCams.
MORE …….
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Anti-Semitic Attackers Yelling ‘We Will Kill You’ Storm Synagogue in London
A group of approximately 20 youths attacked a local synagogue in the London suburb of Stamford Hill over the weekend, yelling threats, beating worshipers and vandalizing property, according to IsraelHatzolah’s official twitter account.
One witness belonging to the “Ahavat Torah” congregation described the mob as shouting “we will kill you” as they proceeded to physically assault the worshipers inside the synagogue and tear apart prayer books.
Another Jewish local who had passed by the scene rushed inside, grabbing one of the suspects with the intention of bringing him to the police, but was quickly overwhelmed by the other attackers and suffered strikes to the face, losing a tooth.
Police confirmed that they were treating the attack as an anti-Semitic incident. Police were called to the scene early on Sunday morning, just after 1 a.m. local time, when a group of intoxicated men, believed to have come from a nearby party, tried to gain entry into the synagogue.
One man suffered injuries while trying to prevent the men from entering. Some of the group did succeed in entering, eventually being removed by security staff.
Six men were arrested for disturbing public order and assault…
| — Hat tip: Steen | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Dozens of Hilbre High School Pupils Given Detention for Watching Solar Eclipse
Hilbre High School, in Wirral, Merseyside, had announced an eclipse-based science project with its younger pupils, but the rest of the school were ordered to remain indoors during the spectacle.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Jimmy Savile: ‘He Was the Tip of the Iceberg’
[WARNING: Disturbing Content.]
The wide-ranging investigation into Sir Jimmy Savile’s depraved activities has focused attention once more on claims of a possible paedophile ring and a ‘culture of cover-up’ on Jersey.
Rumours about abuse at Haut de la Garenne had been rife for years but, according to Harper, junior police officers who tried to help those making allegations were “thwarted by corrupt seniors”. He claims that the 2008 inquiry so infuriated and embarrassed Jersey’s establishment that a campaign was initiated to smear the lead officers and label them credulous and money-wasting.
The dig at the home was discredited, supposedly having found nothing, but even Harper’s critical successors in the investigation admit that at least three human bone fragments were found and children’s teeth, from between 10 and 65 children of all ages.
These have never been adequately explained, Harper says. “They were not from a long ago cemetery or all animal bones, but the bones proved impossible to date. One anthropologist said they were a couple of decades old, but another said they could not be dated. We’ll never know. They were definitely human and juvenile.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
A multimillionaire food tycoon’s son who left a toddler brain damaged and paralysed following a horror car crash has been jailed for a second time after blinding a man in a brutal bar attack.
Antonio Boporan Singh, 28, was sentenced to a year in prison after pleading guilty to inflicting actual bodily harm and violent disorder after two men were punched, kicked and hit with broken bottles at Birmingham’s Nuvo Bar.
Singh, heir to a £130million chicken fortune, has already served 21 months in jail for causing horrific injuries to one-year-old Cerys Edwards in a crash while speeding at 72mph on the wrong side of a 30mph road in November 2006.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Nigel Farage Brands Pub Invaders ‘Scum’ As Protesters Jump on His Car Bonnet
Nigel Farage and his family have been chased out of a pub in Kent and had their car attacked by protesters demonstrating against the UK Independence Party (Ukip).
The Ukip leader labelled the demonstrators “scum” on Sunday afternoon and said his two children had yet to return after the family got split amid the hostility.
Mr Farage said his children were so scared they had to hide from the protesters and criticised them for using force to make their point.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Nigel Farage has branded anti-Ukip protesters ‘scum’ after they stormed a pub where he was having a family lunch and chased his car down the road.
The party leader was dining with his wife and two younger children at the Queen’s Head in Downe, Kent, when the incident took place.
He claimed his two youngest children were so scared by the protesters that they ran away and hid.
They have since been found safe and well.
[Comment: Nigel is 100% correct.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Richard III: Leicester Welcomes King’s Remains
King Richard III’s remains have arrived at Leicester Cathedral ahead of his reburial.
His funeral cortege entered the city at the historic Bow Bridge after touring landmarks in the county.
Cannons were fired in a salute to the king at Bosworth, where he died in 1485.
His coffin will be on public view at the cathedral from 09:00 GMT on Monday. He will finally be reinterred during a ceremony on Thursday.
Richard’s skeleton was found in 2012, in an old friary beneath a car park.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Richard III: Farewell to a King
Leicester, England (CNN) Thousands of people are expected to line the streets in tribute to Richard III as the King’s long-lost remains are carried through the English city of Leicester on Sunday, ahead of his burial.
The body of Richard III, missing for centuries since his death in 1485, was found buried beneath a car parking lot in 2012.
Archaeologists and scientist have spent more than two years studying the bones, unearthing a host of clues to the medieval monarch’s life and times.
Leicester University’s president and vice-chancellor Paul Boyle said the discovery of the bones had been a “defining moment” which “reshaped history.” He pointed out that the university had been custodian of Richard III’s remains for longer than he had been King.
This week, after a long-running argument about where he should be buried, Richard III will be laid to rest in Leicester Cathedral, just a stone’s throw from the spot where it was exhumed, stunning historians around the world.
On Sunday, Richard III, the last King of England to be killed in battle, is to be taken back to the site of his death before being carried to Leicester in a ceremonial procession.
[It is unfortunate for poor old Richard that he lives in the memory of most as the crouchbacked villain of what the novelist Josephine Tey once called “a blatant piece of political propaganda, a criminal libel on a fine man, and an extremely silly play.” — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Six Arrested After Stamford Hill Synagogue Attack
Six people have been arrested after a group forced its way into a synagogue in what police have described as an “anti-Semitic” incident.
Police said the drunk men had just left a nearby party and tried to get into the synagogue in Stamford Hill, north London, in the early hours of Sunday.
One man was punched in the face as he tried to stop them.
The six were held for public order offences and assault. Police said one man had made an anti-Semitic comment.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Government will apologise this week for what has been called the worst treatment disaster in the history of the National Health Service — the infection of thousands of patients with deadly diseases through use of contaminated blood products.
Following the personal intervention of David Cameron, there will be a formal statement of regret given to the House of Commons, similar to those acknowledging the official failures of Bloody Sunday and the Hillsborough football disaster.
This will come after the publication on Wednesday of the 1,800-page Penrose Inquiry, a six-year report into a scandal that has led to more than 2,000 British deaths.
About 7,500 people, many of them haemophiliacs, are known to have contracted HIV and hepatitis C after being given imported blood products taken from high-risk donors such as prostitutes and prisoners in the 1970s and 1980s.
Their lives were devastated, with many unable ever to work again and forced into financial hardship.
Scores of victims needed liver transplants or regular dialysis, while others inadvertently infected partners and children.
Health officials believe another 27,000 patients may have been infected with hepatitis without ever being identified…
What makes it even worse in Mackie’s case is that he was part of a group of Edinburgh haemophiliacs whose medical records indicate they were used to study AIDS from the year before he was infected.
Clearly, they were being used as guinea pigs. There was medical knowledge of the risks they faced — yet the patients were not asked for consent or given warnings over their treatments.
In Britain, the use of paid donors is banned since it attracts people desperate for money. Yet incredibly, imports were permitted of Factor VIII using blood taken from American prisoners paid to give blood.
[Comment: Same thing happened in Canada. The supplier was based in Arkansas, where Clinton was governor at the time: la.indymedia.org/news/2006/10/184548.php]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Video: Dutch Pranksters Show Ikea Art to Art Experts
The bright sparks at Dutch viral video company LifeHunters placed a painting from Swedish furniture chain Ikea in a museum in Arnhem and told art experts it was by the famous IKE Andrews. The reactions varied from ‘an artist who can put all his emotions in the painting’ til ‘I think it’s worth €2.5m.’ Most of those who had waxed lyrical about the art were good humoured when told about the painting’s real origins. But not all.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt Red Sea Resort Shark Attack Kills German Tourist
A German tourist has been killed in a rare shark attack off an Egyptian Red Sea resort, police say.
The shark reportedly bit off the 52-year-old man’s leg at the knee.
The attack took place on Sunday off the coastal city al-Qusair, the first such incident in five years.
The species of shark has not been confirmed. A spate of attacks in 2010 that also led to one death was believed to have been carried out by an oceanic whitetip.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Morocco Dismantles Islamic State-Linked Network Planning Attacks, Interior Ministry Says
Moroccan authorities have announced the dismantling of a militant network linked to the Islamic State group across nine cities that had been planning attacks.
The statement by the Interior Ministry Sunday didn’t specify how many were arrested, but said the network was present in several cities, including Agadir, Tangiers, Taroudant and Marrakech.
In the southern coastal city of Agadir, police seized firearms and a large quantity of ammunition that was to be used in attacks against military and political figures, it said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Over 45,000 Egyptians Flee Libya After IS Beheadings
More than 45,000 Egyptians have fled Libya since jihadists published a video last month showing the beheading of Coptic Christians, most of them Egyptian, an official and state media said Friday.
Hundreds of thousands of Egyptians work in the restive country to the west and send money home to support their families, but their exact number is uncertain because many enter illegally.
Egyptian Copts have been increasingly targeted by Islamist militants, who beheaded 21 hostages, most of them Egyptian, prompting Cairo to carry out air strikes on a jihadist stronghold in Libya.
By Friday, 11,500 Egyptians had flown home via Tunisia, Libya’s western neighbour, since the beheadings were announced, said civil aviation ministry spokesman Mohamed Rahma…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Third Attacker on Run After Deadly Museum Attack: Tunisian President
A third gunman in the massacre of tourists in Tunisia’s Bardo Museum is still at large after two others were killed, Tunisian President Beji Caid Essebsi said Sunday.
“Definitely there were three,” Essebsi told Itele television and Europe 1 radio, adding that the third attacker was “still” at large.
The gunmen killed 21 people Wednesday at the National Bardo Museum in Tunis, all but one of them foreign tourists.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia Terror Attack Survivor: “I Am Not Going Back to African Countries”
“That could have been us,” explains Catalina Llinás, a retired woman and a tireless traveler. “I am not going back to African countries.”
Llinás was visiting the ruins of Carthage with her husband, Plácido Sedal, when the Islamist attack on the Bardo Museum took place on Wednesday.
The two cruise ships that had taken Spanish passengers to Tunisia as part of a tour package returned to the ports of Barcelona and Palma de Mallorca on Friday.
The operating companies, MSC and Costa Cruceros, have cancelled their Tunisian stops following the terrorist attack in the north African country.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisian President Says Hunt on for Third Man in Museum Attack
A third attacker in the deadly assault on the National Bardo Museum in Tunisia is still on the run, the country’s president said Sunday, but he “won’t get far.”
President Beji Caid Essebsi said the Wednesday attack at the museum in Tunis — which left 23 dead — involved “three aggressors” and the third man escaped. He was speaking live with French network iTele from inside the museum, its elaborate tilework visible behind him.
“There are two who were executed and one who is on the run somewhere. But in any case, he won’t get far,” Essebsi said.
Tunisia’s Interior Ministry released security camera footage of Wednesday’s attack showing two gunmen walking through the museum, carrying assault rifles and bags.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Israel Allows 620 Trucks of Construction, Agricultural Goods Into Besieged Gaza
Israel has allowed the passage of hundreds of trucks carrying goods into the Palestinian Gaza Strip through its Karam Abou-Salem border crossing, Ahram Arabic website reported on Sunday.
Palestinian border liaison officer Raed Fattouh said in a press statement that the occupation authorities have allowed the entry of 620 trucks loaded with commercial and agricultural goods.
Israeli occupation forces shut down the cross-border on Fridays and Saturdays.
Fattouh pointed out that 120 trucks carried gravel to build infrastructure roads, while 124 trucks were loaded with construction materials for homes.
Israel has prevented the entry of fuel and electricity as well as a wide range of goods such as vinegar, biscuits, poultry and meat since Tel Aviv imposed a siege on the Gaza strip in 2007.
The occupation also prevents fishing in deep water.
All border crossings between Gaza and the occupied territories of 1967 have been closed since 2007 after Hamas became the de-facto rulers of Gaza.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
1,400 Saudis Trained in Culture of Dialogue
The Riyadh-based Dialogue Academy for Training and Public Opinion Polls (DATPOP) said on Saturday that it has trained 1,400 Saudis in the past eight months through 45 programs conducted across the Kingdom. The program was part of the initiative by King Abdul Aziz Center for National Dialogue (KACND) that seeks to promote the culture of dialogue through community-based training. It brings together all sects and groups for dealing with various issues and to consolidate the value of dialogue through the community. The trainees represented governmental, civil and private sector organizations.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
In this stunning intervention, literary colossus V.S. NAIPAUL says ISIS is now the Fourth Reich
The Nobel Prize-winning author V.S. Naipaul has warned that Islamic State are the most potent threat to the world since the Nazis.
In a hard-hitting article in today’s Mail on Sunday, the revered novelist brands the extremist Muslim organisation as the Fourth Reich, saying it is comparable to Adolf Hitler’s regime in its fanaticism and barbarity.
Calling for its ‘military annihilation,’ the Trinidadian-born British writer says IS is ‘dedicated to a contemporary holocaust’, has a belief in its own ‘racial superiority,’ and produces propaganda that Goebbels would be proud of.
A long-term critic of Islam as a global threat, he also challenges those who say the extremists have nothing to do with the real religion of Islam, suggesting that the simplicity of some interpretations of the faith have a strong appeal to a minority.
The author of A House For Mr Biswas, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2001, is known for his sharp views.
| — Hat tip: Ivan Winters | [Return to headlines] |
CIA Head: U.S. Intel Has ‘Robust’ Knowledge of Iran Nuclear Capabilities
Washington (CNN) Iran would build a nuclear bomb “at their own peril” if nuclear talks with the United States and other leading countries falter, Central Intelligence Agency Director John Brennan said Sunday.
“I think they realize that there’s going to be tremendous costs and consequences and implications if they were to decide to go for a ‘breakout,’“ Brennan said on “Fox News Sunday,” referring to Iran amassing enough of the materials necessary to build a nuclear bomb rather than use those materials for civil energy.
[…]
Brennan said he is “confident that our intelligence capabilities are sufficiently robust and that we have a good understanding of what the Iranian nuclear program entails.”
[Glad to hear it, Mister Director. But isn’t “need to know” a cardinal principle of intelligence operations, rather than “need to reveal things on TV for the political benefit of your boss?” — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Khamenei Calls ‘Death to America’ As Kerry Hails Progress on Nuke Deal
Iran’s Supreme leader Ali Khamenei called for “Death to America” on Saturday, a day after President Barack Obama appealed to Iran to seize a “historic opportunity” for a nuclear deal and a better future, and as US Secretary of State John Kerry claimed substantial progress toward an accord.
Khamenei told a crowd in Tehran that Iran would not capitulate to Western demands. When the crowd started shouting, “Death to America,” the ayatollah responded: “Of course yes, death to America, because America is the original source of this pressure.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Nine British Medical Students Believed to be in Syria — Report
(Reuters) — Nine British medical students have travelled to Syria, apparently to work in hospitals controlled by Islamic State, Britain’s Observer newspaper reported on Saturday.
The group of four women and five men crossed into Syria from Turkey last week, having travelled from Sudan where they had been studying, said the story, published on the website of the Observer’s sister paper, the Guardian.
It quoted Turkish opposition politician Mehmet Ali Ediboglu, who had met members of the students’ families who were trying to persuade the students to return.
Britain’s security services estimate that some 600 Britons have gone to Syria or Iraq to join militant groups, including the man known as “Jihadi John”, who has appeared in several Islamic State beheading videos.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Nine British Medical Students Join ISIS as Families Beg Them to Return
Nine British medical students have travelled to Syria to work in hospitals in Islamic State-held areas. The four women and five men kept their plans secret until close to the border.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Reaffirmed Commitment: Jordan, Russia to Sign Agreement for First Nuclear Plant
Jordan and Russia will sign an intergovernmental agreement before the end of this month in which the two sides stress commitment to supporting the country’s first nuclear power plant, according to Jordan Atomic Energy Commission (JAEC) Chairman Khaled Toukan.
The agreement, which will be signed in Amman, represents the legal and political framework between the governments of the two countries and highlights their support of the plan, which entails building two nuclear reactors with a total capacity of 2,000 megawatts (MW) and at a total cost of $10 billion.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Tapped Communications Confirm US is Supplying ISIS
A commander of Iraq’s popular forces disclosed that wiretapping of ISIS’s communications has confirmed the reports that the US planes have been airdropping food and arms supplies for the Takfiri terrorists.
“The wiretapped ISIL communications by Iraqi popular forces have revealed that the US planes have been dropping weapons and foodstuff for the Takfiri terrorist group,” Commander of Iraq’s Ali Akbar Battalion told FNA on Wednesday.
He noted that tapping on ISIS disclosed the terrorist group’s regular contacts with the US army, and said, “They exchanged sentences like if they would have a share of the ammunition dropped near (Spiker Military Base) or responses such as ‘you will also receive your share’.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey’s EU Minister: Using Terms “Islamic State” & “Islamic Terrorism” Offends Muslims
Identifying Islam with terror is a mistake that should be avoided, Turkey’s EU minister told an anti-terrorism meeting in Brussels on Saturday.
The terms like Islamic terrorism and Islamic state are offending Muslims and should not be used, Volkan Bozkir said at the German Marshall Fund’s 2015 Brussels Forum session on “Countering the New Wave of Terrorism at Home and Abroad.”
“Using the terminology Islamic state or Islamic terrorism, I do not think is the correct thing to do, because then we are naming something in a wrong way and causing the rest of the Islamic world to feel bad,” said Bozkir.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey’s EU Minister Warns Against Identifying Islam With Terror
Identifying Islam with terror is a mistake that should be avoided, Turkey’s EU minister told an anti-terrorism meeting in Brussels on Saturday.
The terms like Islamic terrorism and Islamic state are offending Muslims and should not be used, Volkan Bozkir said at the German Marshall Fund’s 2015 Brussels Forum session on “Countering the New Wave of Terrorism at Home and Abroad.”
“Using the terminology Islamic state or Islamic terrorism, I do not think is the correct thing to do, because then we are naming something in a wrong way and causing the rest of the Islamic world to feel bad,” said Bozkir.
[The proper rejoinder to this is, “You must be confusing us with someone who gives a hoot.” — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
US Trains Iraqi Forces as Battle for Tikrit Continues
As the U.S. mission to Iraq expands, so do its efforts to arm and train the country’s security forces to combat the Islamic State group, with large-scale operations continuing to recapture territory from the Sunni militants.
Hundreds of American advisers are working at the Camp Taji military base just north of Baghdad to train Iraqi forces on issues like weaponry and better coordination and integration of ground action with coalition airstrikes.
The goal, U.S. military officials say, is to teach the different divisions of the Iraqi military how to harmonize the operations of its various fighting units.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Activists Help Bury Afghan Woman Who Was Beaten to Death by Mob
Afghan women’s rights activists dressed head-to-toe in black broke with tradition Sunday to carry the coffin of a woman who was beaten to death by a mob in the capital Kabul over allegations she had burned a Koran.
The mob of men beat 27-year-old Farkhunda before throwing her body off a roof, running over it with a car, setting it on fire and throwing it into a river near a well-known mosque.
The attack was apparently sparked by allegations that Farkhunda, who like many Afghans has just one name, had set fire to a Koran. But Afghanistan’s most senior detective said no evidence had been found to support those claims.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia Leader Eyes Investment, Defence on Japan Trip
Indonesian President Joko Widodo will arrive in Tokyo late on Sunday, kicking off a week-long tour of Japan and China aimed at attracting investment and boosting defence co-operation.
“We want to develop (infrastructure) with particular focus on electric power plants, railways and express ways. I would like to ask Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for co-operation on this issue,” Widodo said in footage aired by Japan’s public broadcaster NHK.
Widodo, who took office in October, will be in Japan until Wednesday and will meet Abe as well as Japanese businessmen.
Widodo told the Yomiuri Shimbun that he and Abe would sign a memorandum on boosting defence co-operation…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew Dies at 91
Lee Kuan Yew, the statesman who transformed Singapore from a small port city into a wealthy global hub, has died at the age of 91.
Mr Lee served as the city-state’s prime minister for 31 years, and continued to work in government until 2011.
Highly respected as the architect of Singapore’s prosperity, Mr Lee was also criticised for his iron grip on power.
Under him freedom of speech was tightly restricted and political opponents were targeted by the courts.
The announcement was made “with deep sorrow” by the press secretary of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Mr Lee’s son.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew Dies Aged 91
Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s first prime minister and architect of the tiny Southeast Asian city-state’s rapid rise from British tropical outpost to global trade and financial centre, died early on Monday, aged 91, the Prime Minister’s Office said.
“Mr Lee passed away peacefully at the Singapore General Hospital today at 3.18 am,” a statement on the prime minister’s Facebook page said.
Mr Lee, a Cambridge-educated lawyer, is widely credited with building Singapore into one of the world’s wealthiest nations on a per capita basis with a strong, pervasive role for the state and little patience for dissent.
He co-founded the People’s Action Party (PAP), which has ruled Singapore since 1959 and led the newly born country when it was separated from Malaysia in 1965.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Tajikistan: President Rakhmon Appoints His Son to Head State Anti-Corruption Agency
The 27 year-old Rustam Emomali is the new director of the official body that punishes crimes of corruption. The son of the incumbent president had a fast-tracked political career. The International community has accused the agency of pursuing the president’s opponents. The current appointment lays the foundation for the succession to the presidency of the country.
Dushanbe (AsiaNews) — On 16 March, the President of Tajikistan Emomali Rakhmon appointed his eldest son to head the state anti-corruption agency. Rustam Emomali, 27, is the new director of one of the most important and criticized government institutions, the Agency for State Financial Control and Combating Corruption. Rustam succeeds Abdufattokh Goib, appointed head of Tajikistan’s customs office.
Despite his young age, the president’s son is not new to high profile government positions. At 20 he won a seat in the capital’s municipal council. Since 2013 he has directed the customs offices. He is also one of the founders of the Tajikistan Football Federation and has his own football team.
President Rakhmon has assigned one of the most delicate tasks in the country to his son. In the past, the anti-corruption agency has been accused of having favored the rise of some political groups and criminals as a political instrument through which the government has eliminated its opponents. Chief among them,the opposition movement “Group 24”, whose leader was killed in early March in Istanbul.
Tajikistan is placed 152nd (out of 175 countries) in the Corruption Perceptions Index compiled by the NGO Transparency International.
According to Deputy Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies (organ reporting to the President), Rustam’s appointment will concretely contribute to the fight against rampant corruption in the country. The analyst reports that he highlighted the flaws in the customs offices when he was head there and eliminated them.
However, according to an independent analyst, the appointment of “the head of state’s son, would earn the image of a fighter against corruption and thus raise his rating in the eyes of the public, gaining new points in his political career for further growth”.
The first act of the new agency headed by Rustam Emomali was to arrest Izatullo Azizov, director of the Committee on Religious Affairs and the regulation of national rituals of Tajikistan. The senior government official was caught while pocketing a bribe of 2 thousand dollars to allow the departure of a citizen on a pilgrimage to Mecca.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
US Troop Pullout From Afghanistan Hinged to Developing Forces
WASHINGTON — The pace of U.S. troop withdrawals from Afghanistan will headline Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s visit to Washington, yet America’s exit from the war remains tightly hinged to the abilities of the Afghan forces that face a tough fight against insurgents this spring.
President Barack Obama has promised to end the longest U.S. war — it began in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks — and get the remaining troops out of Afghanistan by the end of his presidency. Deficiencies in the Afghan security forces, heavy casualties in the ranks of the army and police, a fragile new government and fears that Islamic State fighters could gain a foothold in Afghanistan have combined to persuade Obama to slow the withdrawal.
Instead of trimming the current U.S. force of 9,800 to 5,500 by the end of the year, U.S. military officials say the administration now might keep many of them there well into 2016. Obama had said that after that, the U.S. would only maintain an embassy-based security force in Kabul of perhaps 1,000 troops. But on Friday, Jeff Eggers of the White House’s National Security Council said that too could be changed. He said the post-2016 plan will be considered on an on-going basis.
[In other words, “You should live so long!” — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
China: Government to Universities: No More Foreign Books or Values
A circular from the Ministry of Education orders higher educational institutions to carry out a survey on “how foreigners textbooks are used, whether these are really useful and how they were obtained.” In a campaign against “Western values in universities” and in favor of a “better representation of the Communist Party and its leaders.”
Beijing (AsiaNews) — The national universities will have to answer a questionnaire on the use of foreign textbooks in faculties. The order is contained in a circular issued by the Ministry of Education, demanding universities to carry out a survey on “how foreign textbooks are used, whether these are really useful and how they were obtained.” The order is part of a broader campaign against “Western values” launched in January 2015 by the Minister Yuan Guiren.
Subjects regarded as “sensitive” by the government are being particularly targeted. These include journalism, law, politics, sociology, history, economic and financial management, philosophy. To counter the “the distortion of these subjects” universities were told to step up propaganda and teaching efforts in Marxism and Chinese socialism to ensure such values “get into the students’ heads”.
During a speech on the situation of national education, last January 29, 2015, Yuan said universities must exert tighter control over the use of imported textbooks “that spread Western values”.They must also safeguard their political integrity and keep criticism of national leaders or the political system out of the classroom”. The ministry has moved on direct mandate of Chinese President Xi Jinping, who at the end of 2014 called for “greater ideological supervision of universities” and strongly urged the authorities of the Party to “improve the leadership and CCP’s grip on the people”.
The survey imposed by the Ministry regards the major state universities — nearly all based in Beijing — and colleges of the provinces of Shaanxi, Hubei, Fujian, Anhui, Tianjin, Hainan and Jilin. This decision, says Xian’s Jiaotong University website, “will help to further strengthen and improve the regulations on the use of foreign textbooks”. “Textbooks”, specifies the circular, “are those published abroad, photocopies of works purchased abroad and translated versions of works that are not Chinese”.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Kavalan Whisky From Taiwan Named Best in the World
A whisky from Taiwan has beaten off competition from around the globe to be named the best single malt at the 2015 World Whiskies Awards.
Kavalan Solist Vinho Barrique won the award at the ceremony which also saw prizes go to whiskies from Scotland, Japan, Ireland, France, Sweden, South Africa, Australia and the US.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Windows 10 to Make the Secure Boot Alt-OS Lock Out a Reality
At its WinHEC hardware conference in Shenzhen, China, Microsoft talked about the hardware requirements for Windows 10. The precise final specs are not available yet, so all this is somewhat subject to change, but right now, Microsoft says that the switch to allow Secure Boot to be turned off is now optional. Hardware can be Designed for Windows 10, and offer no way to opt out of the Secure Boot lock down. I am so surprised. The next step, of course, is to ban the disable-secure-boot option altogether. Just like everyone who knows Microsoft predicted.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Security Gaps, Isolated Muslims May Explain Why Australia is a Hotbed of Islamic State Recruiting
A nightclub bouncer who reportedly became a terror group leader. A man who tweeted a photo of his young son clutching a severed head. A teenager who is believed to have turned suicide bomber, and others suspected of attempting to travel to Syria to join the Islamic State movement. All of them, Australian.
The London-based International Center for the Study of Radicalization and Political Violence reports that between 100 and 250 Australians have joined Sunni militants in Iraq and Syria. Given Australia’s vast distance from the region and its population of just 24 million, it is a remarkable number. The center estimates that about 100 fighters came from the United States, which has more than 13 times as many people as Australia.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
South Africa: Durban Writer Believes Praise for Rushdie Behind Vicious Attack
Durban writer Zainub Priya Dala believes she was assaulted for expressing admiration for controversial novelist Salman Rushdie, her publisher said on Saturday.
“Author ZP Dala… was assaulted in Overport, Durban, on Wednesday,” Umuzi publishers, the South African imprint of Penguin Random House publishers, said in a statement.
Dala was due to launch her first novel this week, but the event was cancelled following the attack. The attack came after a session in which she expressed her admiration for Rushdie’s writing style in Chatsworth on Tuesday.
A number of teachers and pupils walked out after she made the remark. On Wednesday, Dala’s vehicle was forced off the road by three men in a car. Two of the men accosted her, held a knife to her throat and hit her in the face with a brick while calling her “Rushdie’s bitch”.
British Indian author Rushdie’s controversial 1988 novel ‘The Satanic Verses’ sparked protests by Muslims in several countries. He received death threats and was named in a 2010 Al-Qaeda “hitlist” by Islamic militant Anwar al-Awlaki.
[To paraphrase Orwell, “Imagine a brick in your face — forever.” — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Dead Argentine Prosecutor Was Zeroing in on a Terror Threat to the Entire Western Hemisphere
As days go by, the mystery surrounding the death of Argentine prosecutor Alberto Nisman — who was found shot in the head in his locked apartment two months ago — becomes murkier.But we’re learning a lot more about the explosive findings of his decade-long investigation.
Testimony from journalists and government officials suggest that in addition to describing Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner’s hand in protecting the perpetrators of a 1994 Buenos Aires terrorist attack, Nisman was also working to blow the lid off the workings of Iran’s terrorist organization in Latin America.
Nisman’s decade of work on the subject pointed to Iran.
[Whose agent of influence, the Shiraz-born, Farsi-speaking Valerie Jarrett, is Barry Hussein’s substitute mommy — a woman who, according to a 2008 New York Times report, “he’s not going to say no to.” — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Belgium: 8% Jump in Asylum Applications
There has been an 8% increase in the number of asylum applications in Belgium. Belgium today counts 2.1 asylum applicants per 1,000 head of population. The figure is nearly double the European average of 1.2 applications per 1,000 head of population according to a new report from Eurostat, the EU’s statistics office.
Last year well over a half a million people applied for asylum across the EU. The figure is up 44% on the year. 20% of applicants hailed from Syria.
In all there were 626,000 applications in the EU. The figure is up 191,000. 123,000 Syrians applied for asylum.
The number of boat refugees reaching Italy from Africa more than doubled. After Syria, Afghanistan and Kosovo are the top countries of origin.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Belgium: “Faulty Migration Policy Led to Jihadi Fighters”
The mayor of Antwerp, Bart De Wever, has blamed mistaken migration policies of the past decades for the radicalisation of some Muslim youngsters and the fact that a large number of jihadi fighters active in Syria hail from Belgium. The leader of the Flemish nationalist party was speaking at the presentation of a new book by researcher Bilal Benyaich.
In his tome “#Radicalisme, #Extremisme, #Terrorisme” (Radicalism, Extremism, Terrorism) Bilal Benyaich describes the causes and a possible way of tackling extremism and terrorism in Belgium. The author claims that migration policy has failed to provide newcomers and subsequent generations a proper place in society and that results in their becoming frustrated.
Mayor De Wever agrees: “If we had followed different migration policies, if we had pursued a competent integration policy, if we had tackled the problems of discrimination and racism that this provoked much more quickly, then we would have been in a better place today.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Number of Asylum Applicants to EU Jumps 44 Percent
The number of applicants for asylum to EU countries increased last year to 626,000, a surge of 44 percent fueled by refugees from the civil war in Syria, the European Union’s statistics agency said Friday.
The overall figure for asylum applicants increased by 191,000 over the previous year, with the number of Syrians rising to 122,800 from 50,000 in 2013, Eurostat said.
In 2014, Germany registered the highest number of requests, with 202,700 or 32 percent of the total, it said…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Police Departments Hiring Immigrants as Officers
Law enforcement agencies struggling to fill their ranks or connect with their increasingly diverse populations are turning to immigrants to fill the gap.
Most agencies in the country require officers or deputies to be U.S. citizens, but some are allowing immigrants who are legally in the country to wear the badge. From Hawaii to Vermont, agencies are allowing green-card holders and legal immigrants with work permits to join their ranks.
[Comment: More easily led to follow unconstitutional orders.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Ten Arrested on Dakar Flight After They Tried to Prevent a Deportation
Passengers attacked officers at Madrid airport after Senegalese man called for help
A fight broke out on an Iberia airplane flying from Madrid to Dakar on Wednesday after passengers assaulted police officers who were in charge of the deportation of an illegal migrant.
The undocumented man, who was being taken back to Senegal, began shouting for help. That prompted several fellow countrymen to get up from their seats and try to pull him away from the two Spanish officials, said a National Police spokesman.
The detainees have been charged with causing personal injuries, disorderly conduct and assaulting law enforcement officers
Both police officers and two flight attendants were injured in the ensuing scuffle, and 10 passengers were arrested, including the deportee.
The incident took place at 6.30pm at Madrid’s Adolfo Suárez-Barajas airport. The undocumented migrant’s identity has not been released.
The two officers under attack requested assistance from their colleagues at the police precinct inside the airport, according to the same sources.
The detainees have been charged with causing personal injuries, disorderly conduct and assaulting law enforcement officers.
One police officer sustained a fractured ankle, while the other suffered extensive bruising, as did the two female flight attendants.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Belgium: “We’re Not Heading for Euthanasia Tourism”
Each year euthanasia on psychiatric grounds is carried out on some 50 people in Belgium.
Prof Wim Distelmans, the chair of the federal euthanasia commission, says that it is a small group but the numbers are not negligible.
A number of requests come from abroad. Prof Wim Distelmans: “More and more people are aware euthanasia is possible in Belgium. We’re not heading for euthanasia tourism. It often involves seriously ill people, often elderly. We usually do not proceed with requests from foreigners for euthanasia on psychiatric grounds because we cannot provide sufficient support.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Openly Gay Puglia Governor ‘Wants to Marry His Man’
Nichi Vendola on marriage, family, and civil rights
(ANSA) — Bari, March 17 — Openly gay Puglia Governor Nichi Vendola said Tuesday he wants to marry his partner of ten years, Ed Testa.
“Everything will change (after regional elections) in May,” said Vendola, the founder and leader of the small leftwing Left Ecology Freedom (SEL) party.
“I’d like to marry Ed, but only if he asks me,” the governor told Chi tabloid magazine in an interview that hits the stands Wednesday.
“I will also think about whether or not to become a father,” said the governor and LGBT activist.
“I have always loved the world of childhood and would like to write a book of nursery rhymes”.
Asked what he thought of Dolce & Gabbana and their defense of the traditional heterosexual family, Vendola answered “I believe that from the height of their social rank, they truly do not understand what it means to live in a country in which homophobia kills and the civil rights deficit weighs on many lives”.
A firestorm erupted at the weekend when Elton John and other celebrities called for a boycott of the fashion house after Domenico Dolce made what appeared to be disparaging comments about in vitro fertilization and surrogate motherhood, techniques often used by gays who want children. Vendola — who last November called for a new leftwing alliance called Human Factor to challenge what he said is the government’s “drift to the right” — went on to say that he has always held the battle for civil rights to be a central tenet for him as a politician.
“I believe in equality…and I would like for this principle to be at the center of everything,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Pope Under Fire as Disgraced Anti-Gay Cleric Quits as Cardinal
Pope Francis came under fire on Friday after accepting the de facto resignation of a British cardinal disgraced in a sex scandal without any follow-up on the allegations against him.
A statement from the Vatican said Francis had accepted British former archbishop Keith O’Brien’s resignation of the rights and privileges of a cardinal in a highly unusual move for which the last precedent dates from 1927.
It came two years after O’Brien stepped down as Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, having admitted inappropriate sexual behaviour towards priests in the 1980s…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Dentists Could Soon be Fixing Your Teeth With Cement
Research on a new material to fill dental cavities takes a small step forward.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Time Now to Act on Looming Water Crisis, UN Warns
Without reforms, the world will be plunged into a water crisis that could be crippling for hot, dry countries, the United Nations warned Friday.
In an annual report, the UN said abuse of water was now so great that on current trends, the world will face a 40-percent “global water deficit” by 2030 — the gap between demand for water and replenishment of it.
“The fact is there is enough water to meet the world’s needs, but not without dramatically changing the way water is used, managed and shared,” it said in its annual World Water Development Report.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Hmmm, Farage’s welcoming committee has all the marks of being professionally organized with it’s very PC/MC mix of protesters. It’s as if someone at the Beeb or #10 Downing Street had a say in it’s makeup.
He’d be well advised to hire some ex-SAS fellas or at least some very competent doormen to watch out for him and family when he’s out and about. Because it’s going to get worse if he starts winning, the establishment will go after him.
Goodness! Listen to Farage and Geert Wilders… two wonderful, reasonable, clever, realistic, love their people and Europe, sincere, preventing Europe enslavement ti Islam. . . etc. and see how they are treated?
Is this how wars start? Was the situation in Germany in the ’20s with the people and politicians having the same thinking and attitude: i.e. They become blind to truth and see falsehoods as truth? And it take 60 million corpses and 6 years until humans understand.
Cameron and other clowns want fame abjectly: to be PM. Ok why don’t they do it the Wilders way or Farage way, in a noble manner. No one, in that case would object as long as they do reasonable things and decisions.
Why we see that democracies are hell bent to destroy themselves and the real rulers don’t see that? Was not this one of the reasons for the creation of democratic rule.
If rulers of “democracies” take just the unreasonable, illogical, anti-state, anticitizens, anti everything, pro islam decisions . . the what’s the difference between them and dictatorship.
Elect diabolical satanic rulers and give them a bank check. Does that constitute democracy?
Look at Hussein what he said about Bibi. Hussein is determined to destroy Israel by encouraging its enemy. Just listen to him how seriously he talks. Compare that to his slack friendly, intimate address to Iran Nawrooz.
Either Satan existed and has entered western politicians or satan has left the earth when surpassed by western politician’s deeds.
Why man / woman is so fiendish? This makes me believe Noah’s story.
And what about ordinary Britons? Why don’t they defend Farage to death. If there are any saints today they are Farage and Wilders and others like them.
This incident with Mr. Firage seems like kind of a clown show although I am pretty sure no one will be arrested. One might think that is as it should be; a bunch of people dressed up in stupid costumes (child breasting women?) But, think about the other political arrests or non arrests that have taken place in the UK. TR is absolutely correct when he says that there is a two tiered justice.
I’d be fairly sure that this was organised by the fascist Unite Against Fascism group or their sidekicks the marxist Socialist Workers Party. No doubt both were probably assisted by Red Ed Miliband’s Labour Party.
Speaking of cleaning up (which I was a moment ago in the comments)…this is the translation of the block of material below:
War photographer says goodbye to Jean
by Christophe Degreef © Brussels This Week
Sint-Jans-Molenbeek
08:13 – 03/19/2015
Teun Voeten war photographer and anthropologist, and lived until recently in Jean. He went away, because he is the impoverishment and the Islamization no longer tolerated. “It is an ethnic-religious enclave has become a very closed, insular community.”
——————————————————–
Oorlogsfotograaf neemt afscheid van Molenbeek
door Christophe Degreef © Brussel Deze Week
Sint-Jans-Molenbeek
08:13 – 19/03/2015
Teun Voeten is oorlogsfotograaf en antropoloog, en woonde tot voor kort in Molenbeek. Hij trok er weg, omdat hij de verpaupering en de islamisering niet meer kon verdragen. “Het is een etnisch-religieuze enclave geworden van een zeer gesloten, bekrompen gemeenschap.”
Where is this? The specific town, I mean.
According to Wikipedia, Sint-Jans-Wolenbeek is one of 19 municipalities in the Brussels region of Belgium: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sint-Jans-Molenbeek .
Brussels is an “interesting” case, linguistically. The northern provinces are Dutch-speaking (first priority), while the southern provinces are French-speaking (first priority). But in Brussels (at least when DH and I were there in 2004), the Help Wanted signs I read in shop windows wanted staff who could speak Dutch, French, and English. Some wanted Dutch, French, and Turkish (even then).