The European Union is attempting to coerce member states into accepting more migrants by threatening to withhold financial grants. Britain and various Central European countries would be particularly affected by such a policy.
In other migration news, hundreds of asylum seekers demonstrated outside the main railway station in Budapest after the Hungarian government kept the station closed for a second day.
In other news, a freighter bound for Syria that was stopped off the coast of Greece was carrying thousands of guns and half a million rounds of ammo.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, Jerry Gordon, Phyllis Chesler, 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.
India Feels China Crisis, As Growth Halts at 7%
The figure refers to the last quarter. The crisis in the Chinese market offers new opportunities for expansion for India. Expert says: “China will not disappear from investors radar”. Lack of private investment in India, amid need for an increase public spending. Infusion of capital announced by New Delhi will not remedy the difference of money required by state banks.
New Delhi (AsiaNews / Agencies) — India’s economic growth stood at 7% in the quarter from April to June 2015, and is lower than the expected 7.5 percentage points. The Indian market is closely following the crisis in China, which in August recorded a drop both in manufacturing and industrial production. According to some, the slowdown in China could encourage more foreign investment in India, but other experts warn that New Delhi will not replace Beijing in driving the global economy in the short term.
The setback of the Indian economy is a blow to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was elected last year with a promise to accelerate growth and create new jobs. Published today, the data shows that in the last quarter of 2015 India grew by “only” 7%, equaling the growth rate in China.
According to some commentators, concerns over the continuing crisis of the Chinese market could lead investors to direct their capital to the Indian sub-continent. But the Times of India today quoted an economist at HDFC Bank [fifth largest bank in the country — Ed] who reports: “ There’s a lot of emphasis that’s being put on the opportunities that lie ahead for India and not too much attention is being paid to the challenges that remain today “. First of all, the lack of investment in the private sector. For this, the newspaper reports on the proposal put forward by some government bureaucrats to cut interest rates up to 50 percent, in order to encourage the private sector spending.
Alternatively, to offset the lack of private sector, the Firstpost stresses that the only alternative would be to increase public spending, as the government has already announced. “But the state banks — continues the site — which usually lend money for high-risk, long-term projects are capital constrained. Rating agencies have also noticed that the capital infusion of 70 thousand crore [700 billion Euros — ed], recently announced by the government, will not be enough to bridge the difference of capital required by state banks. “
For this reason, Karishma Vaswani, a correspondent for the BBC from Asia and an expert in economics, says: “The reality is that India will not replace China as head of global growth. Its economy is only one-fifth of China’s. Despite all the problems that now afflict Beijing, it will not disappear completely from the radar of investors. There is no doubt that the slowdown in China will offer India expansion possibilities, but this means that India must act quickly to take advantage of them”.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Ashley Madison Code Shows More Women, And More Bots
After searching through the Ashley Madison database and private email last week, I reported that there might be roughly 12,000 real women active on Ashley Madison. Now, after looking at the company’s source code, it’s clear that I arrived at that low number based in part on a misunderstanding of the evidence. Equally clear is new evidence that Ashley Madison created more than 70,000 female bots to send male users millions of fake messages, hoping to create the illusion of a vast playland of available women.
Today Ashley Madison released a statement saying that I couldn’t have figured out how many active women are on the site based on the data dump. The company is right about that. It may still be true that a relatively small number of women are active on Ashley Madison, but the evidence that I thought supported my claims means something else entirely—more on that below.
What I have learned from examining the site’s source code is that Ashley Madison’s army of fembots appears to have been a sophisticated, deliberate, and lucrative fraud. The code tells the story of a company trying to weave the illusion that women on the site are plentiful and eager. Whatever the total number of real, active female Ashley Madison users is, the company was clearly on a desperate quest to design legions of fake women to interact with the men on the site.
[Comment: AM were preparing to go public on the stock market just before the data hack.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
China and Russia Are Waging War on America
In a typically cynical article, “GOP presidential candidates have a new country to bash: the People’s Republic of China,” Politico complains about “China-bashing” by various Republican candidates. The story by Nahal Toosi carries the headline, “The Republicans’ Red Scare,” but only mentions one time that China is a “communist-led state.”
Politico uses the term “red scare” to suggest that the problem is being greatly exaggerated.
If there is any doubt about the “red” in Red China, consider the Chinese Constitution, which declares, “The People’s Republic of China is a socialist state under the people’s democratic dictatorship led by the working class and based on the alliance of workers and peasants. The socialist system is the basic system of the People’s Republic of China. Sabotage of the socialist system by any organization or individual is prohibited.”
Mao Zedong, considered by many the greatest mass murderer in history, is pictured on the Chinese currency.
After Politico went to press with its defense of Beijing, the Los Angeles Timesreported that “Foreign spy services, especially in China and Russia, are aggressively aggregating and cross-indexing hacked U.S. computer databases—including security clearance applications, airline records and medical insurance forms—to identify U.S. intelligence officers and agents, U.S. officials said.” The Times added, “At least one clandestine network of American engineers and scientists who provide technical assistance to U.S. undercover operatives and agents overseas has been compromised as a result, according to two U.S. officials.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Civil Disobedience — Defying the Powers-That-Be for Your Christian Beliefs
There comes a time in every person’s life where they have to decide what they stand for and what they believe in. What is the line that you just won’t cross, no matter the consequence? Many people never consider that question until they are forced to. For Christians, it is an easy choice. They answer to a higher power than the government or the courts. For Kim Davis, that day came a while back when she was asked to issue marriage licenses for gay couples. The Supreme Court just recently trashed the Constitution and in a move that violated First Amendment freedom of religion, they gave gay couples the right to marry and mandated that all observe that as the law of the land. Kim Davis said firmly, “I will not comply.” Then she stood her ground amid death threats through email, phone calls and social media. She also faces the very real possibility of financial penalties and imprisonment. People are also threatening to burn down her home and rape her on her front lawn. All because she won’t violate her Christian beliefs.
As a County Clerk, Kim Davis has now stated she will continue to deny marriage licenses to gay couples. She says she’s doing so “under God’s authority.” She came out of her office this morning after several gay couples were denied marriage licenses. She asked David Moore and David Ermold, who’ve been rejected four times, to leave. They refused, surrounded by reporters and cameras. There was a tense confrontation while the media gobbled it up.
Ermold said: “We’re not leaving until we have a license.” Davis responded: “Then you’re going to have a long day.”
There was a group in the back of the room cheering Davis on shouting, “Praise the Lord!” and “Stand your ground!” Others screeched that Davis is a bigot and told her: “Do your job!” “The Supreme Court denied your stay,” one of the men told Davis. “I pay your salary! I pay you to discriminate against me right now.” Then they dared her to call the police on them.
I understand the police eventually removed everyone and Kim retired to her office and closed the blinds. This must break her heart. The media made a big deal of the gay couples being teary and red-eyed. They also claimed to be shaking. What manipulative wusses. “It’s just too hard right now,” one gay man said, choking back tears and holding hands with his fiance as they rushed to their car. I don’t believe them at all, they were reveling in the spotlight. I also don’t feel sorry for these people. They could have gone elsewhere for a marriage license — this was to make a point. It’s the gay militaristic persecution of Christians and it is being condoned by the federal government.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Democrat Senators Provide Final Votes Supporting President Obama on the Iran Nuclear Pact
Maryland Democrat Senator Barbara Mikulski clinched President Obama’s Iran Nuclear Deal today by announcing her support making it a virtual fait accompli. The President can now veto Congressional Resolutions rejecting the pact. The Washington Post headline today tells the story, “Chris Coons and Bob Casey back Iran deal, putting Obama one vote from major diplomatic victory.” The Iran nuclear pact comes up for a vote 15 days from now at the latest could be mooted by a possible filibuster or may be ended by a likely Presidential veto of a majority vote rejecting it in both Chambers of Congress. It begs the questions of whether there is any means of stopping this dangerous and misguided deal from being implemented. Depending on whether a successor overturns the multilateral agreement that according to the Administration would be a major diplomatic faux pas. As we have written in a September 2015, NER article there may be more options than simply voiding it as an executive political agreement by a new President in January 2017. Republicans and a few Democrats are seeking to target sanctions against Iranian Revolutionary Guard Leaders and the Ayatollah who own companies that would benefit economically from the release of $100 billion in sequestered funds in US financial institutions resulting from implementing the JCPOA. There is also increasing interest in several legislative alternatives. That is reflected in a FrontPage Magazine article published today by Robert B, Sklaroff and Lee S. Bender, Esq., “The Only Way to Block the Iran TREATY: Sue Obama.” Their bottom line:…
| — Hat tip: Jerry Gordon | [Return to headlines] |
EPA Threatens Man With $16 Million Fine Over Pond
A Wyoming rancher facing more than $16 million in fines from the Environmental Protection Agency is preparing to take his case to federal court.
The incident began in 2012 when Fort Bridger resident and rancher Andy Johnson built a small stock pond in order to provide water to his livestock.
Shortly thereafter, Johnson was approached by the EPA and told that his pond violated the federal Clean Water Act, an infraction that carries a maximum fine of $37,000-per-day.
Despite the fact that Congress has exempted stock ponds from the Clean Water Act, the EPA appears to remain undeterred in their targeting of Johnson.
“Threatening me with ruinous fines even though I’ve done nothing wrong is extortionate,” Johnson told Watchdog.org. “This is a battle about more than my land, my livestock and my pond. The EPA is on a mission to expand its power. They want to take over jurisdiction over private property throughout the United States.“
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Fox News Anchor Harris Faulkner Sues Hasbro Over Hamster Toy
A Fox News anchor is suing a US toy company, Hasbro, for more than $5m (£3.3m) over a toy hamster that she says resembles her and shares her name.
Harris Faulkner said the company’s portrayal of her as a plastic hamster “was demeaning and insulting”.
She filed a legal case saying the toy resembled her traditional professional appearance, including complexion, eye shape and eye make-up design.
The toy is part of the company’s popular Littlest Pet Shop collection.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
How Soybean Oil Consumption Ballooned by 1000x in 100 Years
With GMO soy’s recent connections to a host of health issues, it would seem there could be no chart or graph, no tidbit of information that could make this single crop seem more undesirable — until you look at the changes in vegetable oil consumption starting around 1967. This is when soybean growers and food manufacturers lobbied heavily to grow a ‘cheap’ oil to sell to American consumers. As a result of this effort, we now consume 1000 times more soybean oil today than we did 100 years ago.
Soybean oil and other soy products lurk in many foods on our grocery store shelves, much of it hidden in ways that consumers don’t readily notice. ‘Farming’ in the Midwest now equals growing GM soy or GM corn, and the once-rich heritage of growing multiple crops to feed a family, let alone a nation, has been replaced by mechanized, large-scale GM food factories. Is it any wonder we eat so much of the stuff?
Although growing cereal grains became a trend in the 1960s, soy and corn sales eventually skyrocketed because food manufacturers could use these oils in place of butter or lard. This gave a big boost to their bottom lines.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The practice of objective journalism has been effectively banned from the body politik. The social culture is driven by the embodiment of an unceasing drumbeat of disinformation; spoon fed prevarications and carefully shaped distortions, projected by a mass media that is in the tank for protecting the ruling elite. The myth that the press is endowed with an inherent courage to confront the establishment has been laid bare for any honest observer to witness. However, the problem is that the bulk of the marginally functioning intellects that still accept the mind control of the corporate media, continue to linger on in their dream world of obeying the prevailing order.
Some order, the nation is breaking apart at the seams all over the country. The reign of terror that appears on the boob tube, news site or printed rags from the accepted moguls of the new social media keeps pushing out the tired diatribe that the system still is working well.
PLEASE, wake up and smell the coffee.
Running the gambit of ideological shades of grey, the mainstream media all share the same common trait; keep the can kicking down the road. It is a universal prerequisite to achieve a long lasting career in the bowels of the beast that a propagandist must ignore truth to power.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Wins Critical Backing on Iran Deal, Virtually Ensuring Survival in Congress
The Obama administration now appears to have enough support in Congress to stave off Republican efforts to reject the president’s controversial Iran nuclear deal, after a retiring Maryland Democratic senator came out Wednesday morning in favor of the pact.
Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., announced her support for the deal as Secretary of State John Kerry delivered a lengthy and detailed address in Philadelphia defending the accord.
In his speech, Kerry disputed what he called “false information” circulating on the deal. He said, contrary to the views of many critics, that the deal provides “access” to keep Iran in check, preserves “every option” to respond if Iran balks, and has elements that will last “for the lifetime of Iran’s nuclear program.”
“President Obama and I are convinced beyond any reasonable doubt that the framework that we have put forward will get the job done,” Kerry said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sheep Led to the Slaughter: The Muzzling of Free Speech in America
Consider, if you will, that the U.S. Supreme Court, historically a champion of the First Amendment, has declared that citizens can exercise their right to free speech everywhere it’s lawful—online, in social media, on a public sidewalk, etc.—as long as they don’t do so in front of the Court itself.
What is the rationale for upholding this ban on expressive activity on the Supreme Court plaza?
“Allowing demonstrations directed at the Court, on the Court’s own front terrace, would tend to yield the…impression…of a Court engaged with — and potentially vulnerable to — outside entreaties by the public.”
Translation: The appellate court that issued that particular ruling in Hodge v. Talkin actually wants us to believe that the Court is so impressionable that the justices could be swayed by the sight of a single man, civil rights activist Harold Hodge, standing alone and silent in the snow in a 20,000 square-foot space in front of the Supreme Court building wearing a small sign protesting the toll the police state is taking on the lives of black and Hispanic Americans.
My friends, we’re being played for fools.
The Supreme Court is not going to be swayed by you or me or Harold Hodge.
For that matter, the justices—all of whom hale from one of two Ivy League schools (Harvard or Yale) and most of whom are now millionaires and enjoy such rarefied privileges as lifetime employment, security details, ample vacations and travel perks—are anything but impartial.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Dying Institutions of Western Civilization
Judiciary Branch Has Self-Abolished
The US no longer has a judiciary. This former branch of government has transitioned into an enabler of executive branch fascism.
Privacy is a civil liberty protected by the US Constitution. The Constitution relies on courts to enforce its prohibitions against intrusive government, but if the executive branch claims (no proof required) “national security,” courts kiss the Constitution good-bye.
Federal judges are chosen by the executive branch. The senate can refuse to confirm, but that is rare. The executive branch chooses judges who are friendly to executive power. This is especially the case for the appeals courts and the Supreme Court. The Justice (sic) Department keeps tabs on district court judges who rule against the government, and these judges don’t make it to the higher courts. The result over time is to erode civil liberty.
Recently a three-judge panel of the US Appeals Court for the District of Columbia ruled that the National Security Agency can continue its mass surveillance of the US population without showing cause. The panel avoided the constitutional question by ruling on procedural terms that NSA had a right to withhold the information that would prove the plaintiffs’ case.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Right of the People Peaceably to Assemble
by Phyllis Chesler
Two thousand people took to the streets against the Iran deal. One of the organizers publically claimed that the “police estimated a crowd of “7,000 people.” They came early, they stayed late—and as I file this story, they are still there. Theyare chanting. “We can do this. It’s not too late. We can never give up.”
The Suits: Senator Lindsey Graham, former Senator Joe Lieberman, former CIA director James Woolsey, former Navy Seal Ken Stethem, took to the New York City streets.
Where else can they, together with academics (Michael Ledeen) and the victims of Iranian terrorism (Staff Sergeant Robert Bartlett, Daniel Miller, Sarri Singer), protest New York State Senator Kirsten Gillibrand’s pro-Iran vote except beneath her office window on Third Avenue? Where else can they support Senator Chuck Schumer’s pro-America vote, whose office is also there?…
| — Hat tip: Phyllis Chesler | [Return to headlines] |
Three US Citizens Sentenced for Conspiracy to Start a Revolution Using WMDs
While the US has had a surge in violence over the past several years, its defining feature was the generally chaotic and uncoordinated nature of each such — usually lethal — act.
That changed over the weekend when the FBI announced three US citizens — Brian Cannon, 37, Terry Peace, 47, and Cory Williamson, 29, — were sentenced to 12 years in prison for “conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction in attacks against federal government agencies. The defendants planned to attack critical infrastructure while motivating militia groups in other states to rise up and join them in removing government officials who they believed had exceeded their Constitutional power.”
Specifically, the three sentenced men “participated in Internet chat rooms frequented by militia members and others with a shared anti-government ideology. During the chat room conversations, Cannon, Peace and Williamson discussed starting a revolution against the federal government by conducting an attack aimed at the infrastructure supporting the Transportation Security Administration, the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Administration.” The complaint further notes that “according to their conversations, their goals included forcibly removing government officials who the defendants believed acted beyond the scope of the U.S. Constitution.” And this is how the FBI summarized the bust…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
‘Who Needs This?’ Police Recruits Abandon Dream Amid Anti-Cop Climate
Police departments face a recruiting shortage amid a growing anti-cop mood that some fear has taken the pride out of peacekeeping and put targets on the backs of the men and women in blue.
Open calls for the killing of police have been followed by assassinations, including last week’s murder in Texas of a Harris County sheriff’s deputy. Instead of dialing back the incendiary rhetoric, groups including “Black Lives Matter” have instead doubled down at demonstrations with chants of “Pigs in a blanket, fry me like bacon.” Public safety officials fear the net effect has been to demonize police, and diminish the job.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Belgium Gets First Islamic Secondary School
BRUSSELS — Amid growing demand for Islamic education, Belgium’s first Islamic secondary school will open next Thursday, accommodating scores of students who have been waiting for a place to pursue their studies.
“There is a strong demand for Islamic education among the Muslim community in Belgium but our schools regretfully cannot accommodate all the pupils and this year we have about 200 pupils who are waiting to find a place,” Mohammad Allaf, secretary general of the six-member committee of Islamic education in Belgium, told KUNA news agency on Tuesday, September 1.
The new school will offer places for 144 boys and girls, who have already registered. Nevertheless, there is still a shortage of 40 places.
According to the official education system in Belgium, Muslims are allowed to establish schools with the same Belgian curriculum and under the supervision of Belgian authorities.
These authorities also offer the salaries of the teachers in the Muslims schools.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Chiara Vigo: The Last Woman Who Makes Sea Silk
Silk is usually made from the cocoons spun by silkworms — but there is another, much rarer, cloth known as sea silk or byssus, which comes from a clam. Chiara Vigo is thought to be the only person left who can harvest it, spin it and make it shine like gold.
Villagers stare as I knock on the door of Chiara Vigo’s studio, otherwise known as the Museum of Byssus, on the Sardinian island of Sant’Antioco. One sign on the door says: “Haste doesn’t live here.” Another adds: “In this room nothing is for sale.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
EU Court Lambasts Italy for Costly Sojourn Permits
Charges from 80 to 100 euros ‘disproportionate,’ judges say
(ANSA) — Brussels, September 2 — The European Court of Justice Wednesday ruled against the Italian law that imposes charges of 80 to 200 euros on non-European citizens for issuing or renewing short term sojourn permits. The judges said the cost is “disproportionate compared to the purposes of EU regulations, and can create obstacles to people exercising their rights”. The court was ruling on an appeal from Italian trade union CGIL.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Islamist Vigilantes Face Trial for ‘Sharia Police’
State prosecutors in the Ruhr city of Wuppertal said on Tuesday that they have brought charges against notorious Islamic fundamentalist Sven Lau, who was behind a short-lived ‘Sharia police’ vigilante force in the city.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Greece Calls on Turkey to Respect International Treaties
Athens has reacted after Turkey’s new foreign minister, Feridun Sinirlioglu, reiterated a claim about the existence of areas of undefined sovereignty in the Aegean Sea.
Labeling Ankara’s claims as “incomprehensible,” a statement Tuesday by Greek Foreign Ministry spokesman Constantinos Koutras said the maritime borders between the two states are “clearly determined based on the international agreements in force (1923 Treaty of Lausanne, 1926 Athens Protocol, 1932 Italian-Turkish Agreement and Protocol).
“These treaties are of course in force and are binding for Turkey, and so any of its claims in the current case are legally groundless and conflict with international law,” the statement said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
In Iceland You Can Watch Rare Whales by Day and Eat Whales (Rare) By Night
Fin whales are the world’s second-largest animal. There’s only one man they need to steer clear of.
If there’s one man keeping Iceland’s controversial whaling industry alive, it’s Kristjan Loftsson. He owns Hvalur HF, the only commercial fin-whaling company in the world.
He’s also the chairman of HB Grandi, a major fishing and fish-processing company, making him one of Iceland’s richest men. He is one of the whaling industry’s most vocal proponents. He explains the controversial process in simple terms.
“These whales are all around, and we come out and shoot them. That’s it.” The meat, Loftsson says, is “healthy, with no other hormones, the best you can get.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Renzi Rebuffs EU Criticism of Property Tax Cuts
Hot weather may have affected judgments in Brussels, Renzi says
(ANSA) — Rome, September 2 — Italian Premier Matteo Renzi rebuffed Wednesday criticism from the European Union of his pledge to abolish the IMU and Tasi taxes, saying that he hoped it was just hot summer weather that affected judgements in Brussels.
“The European Union, which turns its back on migrants, thinks to come to us and explain taxes,” Renzi told Rtl radio.
“Somebody in Brussels thinks to draw up the list of taxes to cut”.
“I hope this was because of the heat, it is up to us to decide which taxes to cut, not Brussels”.
Italians will pay “on December 16 their second tranche of Tasi, which will mark the funeral of taxes on homes,” Renzi said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Mystery ‘Zombie’ Drug Used in Paris Muggings
Two women have been arrested after allegedly using a substance with similar effects to Colombia’s infamous Devil’s Breath ‘zombie drug’ to rob elderly Parisians.
The woman with Chinese nationality were arrested near the Goncourt metro station in the capital’s 10th arrondissement on suspicion of having made dozens of Asian victims inhale the substance before robbing them, Le Parisien newspaper reports.
A search of their apartment revealed Chinese herbs, a set of scales, gloves and filters, a police source told the paper.
A third person was later arrested on suspicion of preparing the drug.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Police Search Home of France Train Suspect’s Parents in Southern Spain
Police in Spain on Tuesday searched the family home of an alleged jihadist accused of launching a foiled attack on a French express train last month.
Officers searched an apartment in the southern city of Algeciras on Tuesday morning at the request of the French courts which are investigating the August 21st attack, a police source told AFP.
The apartment is home to the parents of Ayoub El Khazzani, who is accused of launching an attack on the train armed with a pistol, an assault rifle and 270 rounds of ammunition.
French prosecutors have brought terrorism charges against the 25-year-old Moroccan, accusing him of a “targeted and premeditated” attack on the Amsterdam to Paris train after he stepped out of a toilet cubicle with an assault rifle, 270 rounds of ammunition and a Luger pistol strapped to his chest.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Search of Freighter Stopped in Greece Nets 5,000 Shotguns, Nearly 500,000 Bullets
Greek authorities say a partial inventory of unregistered weapons found on a Libya-bound freighter includes nearly 500,000 rounds of ammunition and 5,000 “police-style” shotguns.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Secret Anti-Immigration Blogger’s Name Exposed
‘Julia Caesar’, an anonymous right-wing blogger who has blasted Swedish journalists for writing an “epoch of lies” about the benefits of immigration, is herself a former reporter for Sweden’s biggest broadsheet, Dagens Nyheter, according to a Swedish tabloid.
The controversial writer, who has sought to keep her identity secret, has been causing a huge stir on social media since 2010. Her blog posts lay into mainstream politicians and what she describes as “the corrupt media” for promoting what she argues is an “epoch of lies” about immigration. They also praise the rise of the nationalist Sweden Democrat Party.
“It simply isn’t possible to lie about the blessings of multiculturalism or mass immigration forever when citizens clearly see with their own eyes how their country is being dismantled in front of them,” reads one of her recent posts, which has also been translated into English on a separate blog by one of her supporters.
On Wednesday, Sweden’s Expressen tabloid revealed that the blogger — who has also published three books — is herself a former journalist for Dagens Nyheter (DN), a Swedish newspaper.
According to Expressen, ‘Julia Caesar’ is in fact Barbro Jöberger, who wrote for the daily broadsheet in the 1970s and 1980s.
Expressen’s move to expose her identity comes after the blogger claimed over the weekend that two other Swedish journalists (freelancer Annika Hamrud and DN’s Niklas Orrenius) had been stalking her to try and get an interview. But Hamrud wrote in Expressen on Wednesday that they had approached Jöberger in accordance with Swedish journalistic guidelines in order to give her the opportunity to respond to ongoing criticism of her work.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Tiniest Lego: A Tale of Nanoscale Motors, Rotors, Switches and Pumps
Inspired by biology, chemists have created a cornucopia of molecular parts that act as switches, motors and ratchets. Now it is time to do something useful with them.
The robot moves slowly along its track, pausing regularly to reach out an arm that carefully scoops up a component. The arm connects the component to an elaborate construction on the robot’s back. Then the robot moves forward and repeats the process — systematically stringing the parts together according to a precise design.
It might be a scene from a high-tech factory — except that this assembly line is just a few nanometres long. The components are amino acids, the product is a small peptide and the robot, created by chemist David Leigh at the University of Manchester, UK, is one of the most complex molecular-scale machines ever devised.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Lord Janner’s Trial on 22 Sex Abuse Charges Won’t be for at Least Another Six Months
The former MP for Leicester West is accused of 15 counts of indecent assault and seven counts of a separate sexual offence against a total of nine alleged victims in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Wilders Threatens to Go Public With ‘Shocking’ Secret Information
Populist MP Geert Wilders is threatening to reveal ‘shocking and unacceptable’ information which he has gleaned from a top security government commission, Dutch media report. Wilders is planning to introduce a parliamentary motion based on what he has been told in the parliamentary commission for security and the security services, which is open to all party leaders. The discussions within the committee are considered to be so confidential that they have to remain secret, even from party members. Wilders has said the ‘shocking and unacceptable facts’ cannot be ignored. He says they should either be shared with all MPs in a closed session or that he will bring in a motion in which he says nothing about the contents but that ministers will understand what he is referring to. However, security service sources have told broadcaster Nos they have no idea what Wilders is referring to and there is ‘no shocking new’ information about the terrorist threat in the Netherlands.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt Says Zohr Gas Find Will Not Undermine Talks on Imports From Israel
Negotiations between Egypt’s private companies to buy gas from Israel and Cyprus are ongoing, says oil minister Sherif Ismail after Zohr gas field find sparks panic in Tel Aviv
The discovery of the Zohr natural gas field off Egypt will not undermine private-sector negotiations about buying gas from Israel, Egypt’s petroleum minister said, playing down fears that potential deals could be under threat.
Italian energy company Eni announced on Sunday that it had found an estimated 30 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of gas in the Zohr field, making it the biggest discovery in the Mediterranean and the world’s 20th largest.
The find raised concerns in Israel’s gas industry that its Leviathan field would lose a deal to supply gas to a liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant in Egypt.
“Any negotiations between private companies in Egypt and in the eastern Mediterranean, and by this I mean Israel and Cyprus, will not stop,” Petroleum Minister Sherif Ismail told Reuters in an interview.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
An Israeli Defender of Threatened Minorities in the Muslim Middle East
an interview with Dr. Mordechai Nisan
by Jerry Gordon
Nisan: Moderate half-measures, a multi-cultural spirit, defeatism packaged as political correctness, feeble democracy, and fear of engaging the enemy — will assure Islam’s victory. The only option is a swift and total victory against the global jihad/ISIS/Al Qaeda, and all other branches and movements whose goal is the destruction of liberal Western civilization. We are witnessing a barbaric, unrelenting, hate-filled Islamic enemy on all fronts, countries, and continents: primitive religious Nazism. If Islam is not confronted, smashed, and defeated, then the increasing Islamization of the world will crush all in its ruthless path.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Bombs at Mosque in Yemen’s Capital Kill at Least 20 People
SANAA, Yemen — An Islamic State-claimed suicide bomber and a subsequent car bombing killed at least 20 people Wednesday at a mosque in Yemen’s rebel-held capital, Sanaa, amid the country’s raging civil war, officials said.
The suicide bomber blew himself up inside the mosque during the evening call to prayers, while the car bomb exploded outside an entrance, they said. Medical officials said the death toll may rise with people now in operating rooms in several hospitals.
Witnesses said the car bomb exploded while people were carrying out the wounded from inside the mosque, adding to the casualties.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Iran Police to Confiscate Cars of ‘Poorly Veiled’ Women
Women drivers in Iran’s capital could have their cars impounded by police if they are caught driving with a poorly fixed veil or without their heads covered, a police chief said Wednesday.
“If a (female) driver in a car is poorly veiled or has taken her veil off, the vehicle will be seized in accordance with the law,” the head of Tehran’s traffic police, General Teymour Hosseini, was quoted as saying by the official ISNA news agency.
He added that any woman who had her car seized would need to obtain a court order before getting it back.
Since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, wearing a veil in public has been mandatory for all women in Iran…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Putin Targets US Monetary System: “Aims to Eliminate the US Dollar and the Euro From Trade”
Last year Russia began unloading massive amounts of their US dollar reserves. In the month of December 2014 alone Putin sold some 20% of the country’ s U.S. Treasurys, a move that further increased tensions surrounding what can only be described as economic warfare between East and West.
Then, as if part of a coordinated effort, this summer it was revealed that China had implemented a similar strategy, dumping half a trillion in dollar denominated assets.
But that’ s just the beginning of the end for the US dollar. Amid a major meltdown in Chinese stock markets the People’ s Republic sold off billions in dollar assets last week in what was reported to be an effort to stabilize their collapsing financial markets.
And now, as Russia’ s economy collapses under the weight of American and European sanctions, including what many believe to be widespread downward manipulation of oil prices, Vladimir Putin is sending a clear signal to the central bank of the world’ s reserve currency.
A new bill drafted by the President of the Russian Federation aims to completely eliminate the US dollar from the trade of goods:
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Russia, China Expand Ties With Largest Naval Exercise Yet
The Russian and Chinese militaries recently completed the largest combined naval exercise ever conducted between the two nations, building on cooperation that has been expanding over the past decade.
Designated Joint Sea II and held in the Sea of Japan and off Vladivostok, the exercise was a continuation of Joint Sea I, an April joint exercise held in the Mediterranean Sea. Some 22 warships, submarines, and other vessels; 20 aircraft; and at least 500 hundred marines took part. The Russian large guided-missile cruiser Varyag led the Russian side.
The two nations have been holding joint naval exercises since 2005. Joint Sea II focused on amphibious assault drills, anti-submarine combat, and air defense tactics.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Afghan Man and Woman Given 100 Lashes in Public for Adultery
The footage, taken in the western province of Ghor, showed the woman and a man each receive the punishment from a man in a turban wielding a leather whip, watched by a group of mostly seated men.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Foreign Militants Get ID Cards From Corrupt Officials in Pakistan, Giving Freedom to Operate
Foreign Islamic militants have been able to secure Pakistani national identity cards for years in exchange for bribes as low as $100, giving them vastly greater freedom to operate, according to a report by Pakistan’s top intelligence agency obtained by The Associated Press.
The issue of foreign jihadis operating so easily in Pakistan has regional and even global implications. The country has long been a destination for aspiring global jihadis to receive training, some of whom are sent back abroad to conduct attacks. Foreign governments, particularly neighboring Afghanistan, have frequently accused elements of the Pakistani government of sheltering Islamic militant groups that frequent the porous and lawless tribal regions along the Afghan border.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Myanmar: Electoral Commission Rejects Candidacy of Muslim Leaders
Rejected the request of 17 aspiring MPs (out of 18), for problems related to citizenship. Of these 11 are from Rakhine State, the scene of sectarian Islamic-Buddhist violence. The party, Muslim-based, now risks dissolution. Solidarity from NLD: “unconstitutional”.
Yangon (AsiaNews / Agencies) — Myanmar’s Election Commission (UEC) yesterday rejected the proposals made by all members of an Islamic party over issues of citizenship, effectively blocking the party’s participation in the general elections scheduled for 8 November.
The committee members rejected the applications of 17 people (out of a total of 18) who wanted to run for a seat in Parliament. The UEC say they violate the rule under which a candidate must have parents of Burmese nationality at birth and must have lived for at least 10 consecutive years in the country.
The decision, say the leaders of the party, may well determine the dissolution of the Democracy and Human Rights Party (DHRP) of Islamic inspiration.
At least 11 of the rejected candidates come from the western state of Rakhine, plagued since 2012 by sectarian violence between Burmese Buddhists and Muslim Rohingya. A conflict which in recent months have caused the flight of hundreds of thousands of refugees. The other six are living in Yangon Division.
Interviewed by Radio Free Asia (RFA) Dhrp leader Kyaw Min said that “the notification of refusal does not specify the reasons” but says only that the candidates violate “laws and regulations”. Party leaders have seven days to appeal, added the man, also a Rohingya, who was a member of Parliament in the 1990 election (won by the National League for Democracy and never acknowledged by the military dictatorship).
If the Election Commission confirms the decision on appeal, the party is destined to dissolution according to the rule laid down by the Law on the registration of political parties, because any party requires at least three valid candidates to justify its existence. And, again by law, they cannot be replaced in the running by candidates who do not comply with the requirements established by law.
Kyaw Min said that all candidates have the necessary citizenship documents and all of them are registered in the national lists. “The rejection — he concluded — is not based on the law. It is just an attempt by them to not give us [political] space “.
On the subject, speakers included representatives of the National League for Democracy (NLD), that the decisions made by UEC — which rejected the applications for issues of citizenship — are quite “unconstitutional”.
In recent days the Myanmar political and institutional leaders of the have taken a number of decisions which, according to activists and experts, affect the rights and traditions of the Muslim minority (5% of the total). In addition to the rejection of candidates, there is the enactment of a set of rules — the most recent published recently which prohibits polygamy — strongly desired by Buddhist extremist fringe that has long campaigned against the followers of Islam in the country .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Police Hunt Turkish Man Over Bangkok Blast
Thai police have issued an arrest warrant for a Turkish man, whose Thai wife is also a suspect in the August 17 bombing. Investigators say they’ve made significant progress in solving the case over the past few days.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Report: Main Suspect in Bangkok Massacre is Uyghur Muslim Jihadist
A 25-year-old Uyghur jihadist terrorist from Xinjiang, an Islamist hotbed region in western China, is the prime suspect behind a massive bombing in Bangkok’s Erawan Shrine on August 17, Thai authorities have said.
“The man found and arrested by the Burapha Task Force matches the suspect in the yellow T-shirt described in the arrest warrant,” Winthai Suvaree, the Thailand National Council for Peace and Order spokesman, said Tuesday in a press conference.
Local media has reported that the man primarily responsible for the bombing, which resulted in the deaths of 20 innocents and injured 131 more, has been identified as Yusufu Mieraili, according to the Bangkok Post. The 25-year-old is reportedly from Xinjiang, China, which is home to the vast majority of the country’s Uyghur Muslim minority population.
Islamic terrorists from Xinjiang have been responsible for multiple terrorist attacks throughout the region over the past few years, resulting in the deaths of hundreds. Chinese state-media estimated last year that over 100 had left Xinjiang to join the Islamic State and fight on behalf of the jihadi group.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Thailand: Second Bangkok Bombing Suspect Arrested, An Ethnic Uyghur
The man, 25 and from Xinjiang, was stopped at a checkpoint on the eastern border. Three suspects are still on the loose. The Thai police punishes 22 officials for negligence.
Bangkok (AsiaNews / Agencies) — Thai police have arrested a second suspect in the bomb attack two weeks ago in central Bangkok. It is the second arrest after that of August 29.
According to Thai authorities, the man would have a key role in the terrorist act, even if they have not revealed whether he placed the bomb that killed 20 people and injured more than 100. Three other suspects, including a woman Muslim, are still at large.
Prime Minister Prayut Chan o-cha said the arrested man “is not an ethnic Thai and was stopped at the checkpoint in Sa Kaeo”, on the eastern border of the country. Probably added the former general, “he was trying to escape.”
Local media reported that the man is a 25 year-old Chinese national, from Uyghur Autonomous Region Xinjiang. This has once again led to suspicions that the attack is Muslims revenge against the government in Bangkok. At the beginning of July, nearly 100 Uyghurs were repatriated to China by force by the Thai authorities. The man stopped had a passport with the name Yusufu Mieraili.
Just one day after a number of police pocketed the ransom for progress made in the investigation, Thai police officers transferred 22 agents from checkpoints on the borders accused of negligence. Six of the transferred worked in Sa Kaeo. “It was my decision — said Somyot Pumpanmuang police chief — because foreigners have been able to illegally enter, without strict controls”.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Hong Kong Kuomintang Exhibit Reopens the Debate on the War With Japan
Organised by a collector son of a KMT official, the event highlights the role of China’s Nationalists in the fight against Japan. For the former, the untold stories of the anti-colonial struggle “aren’t told now because the Communist Party claims that they won the war when in fact they were attacking Nationalist soldiers.” The venue is set to open in a few days to mark the end of the war in Asia.
Hong Kong (AsiaNews/Agencies) — The story of the Sino-Japanese conflict has yet to be written, said an architect. His collection of historical documents describing the role China’s Nationalists played in fighting the Japanese during the Second World War is set to go on display at a Hong Kong museum.
Soong Shu-kong, the 53-year-old collector, owns a collection of rare artefacts, documents and calligraphies. It is featured in ‘Mountains Ablaze: The Republic and the Sino-Japanese War 1912-1946,’ the second instalment of an exhibition on modern Chinese history that opens on Friday in the former British crown colony.
For the Taiwan-based architect, who is the son of a KMT official, “Today we are dealing with more and more people who want to twist Chinese history.” However, “As intellectuals, we must maintain our conscience. Only slaves ignore the truth and kowtow to those in power.”
Speaking about the various stories related to the struggle, he noted that the latter “were not told during colonial times because they could induce nationalistic emotions,” and “aren’t told now because the Communist Party claims that they won the war when in fact they were attacking Nationalist soldiers.”
The choice of Hong Kong is not accidental. “Hong Kong played a significant role as many of the revolutionaries met each other in the city,” said Soong, a native of the city. “But besides Dr Sun, many of these names are [now] forgotten in Hong Kong.”
Since the fall of the imperial system in 1911 and the end of the civil war 1949, the Kuomintang (founded in 1912) and the Communist Party (founded in 1921) clashed for political and ideological reasons.
After Japan renewed its invasion of China, the two theoretically put aside their differences to fight the common enemy. However, their respective forces often fought each other rather than the occupier.
The exhibition covers the period that goes from the 1911 revolution, when Sun Yat-sen, the father of modern China, overthrew the Qing dynasty, to the end of the second Sino-Japanese War.
More than 300 pieces of artworks and artefacts will be on display, including important historical documents written by Chiang Kai-shek, leader of the Kuomintang government, and the US$ 20 million loan from the United States — the first loan to support the Chinese in their fight against the Japanese during the war.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Starfish-Killing Robot Close to Trials on Great Barrier Reef
An autonomous starfish-killing robot is close to being ready for trials on the Great Barrier Reef, researchers say.
Crown-of-thorns starfish have have been described as a significant threat to coral.
The Cotsbot robot, which has a vision system, is designed to seek out starfish and give them a lethal injection.
After it eradicates the bulk of starfish in a given area, human divers can move in and mop up the survivors.
Field trials of the robot have begun in Moreton Bay in Brisbane to refine its navigation system, Queensland University of of Technology researcher Matthew Dunbabin told the BBC.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Mexico’s President Acknowledges Distrust, Fear in State-of-Nation Speech
Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has acknowledged that Mexico’s crime, corruption and economic troubles have caused distrust and anger among Mexicans.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
11 Dead in Two Shipwrecks Off Coast of Turkey
At least 11 migrants, most likely of Syrian origin, died and 5 are still missing in the aftermath of two shipwrecks off the coast of Turkey, on Wednesday, press agency Dogan reported.
The migrants were attempting to reach the Greek island of Kos from the Bodrum peninsula on the Turkish Mediterranean coast. The first vessel sank with 16 people on board. Seven migrants drowned, four were rescued and 5 remain mssing.
Another women and three children died in the aftermath of a second shipwreck a few hours later, while other two people survived by swimming to the mainland.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Alto Adige to Take in 300 to 400 Migrants for Germany
Bavaria calls on Italian region for emergency help
(ANSA) — Bolzano, September 2 — Alto Adige is to take in 300 to 400 migrants bound for Bavaria after the Italian government agreed Wednesday to assist the German region with a massive wave arriving from the Balkans.
Alto Adige has offered to host the migrants for a few days “as a temporary measure to allow Bavaria to regroup and face the imminent emergency”, according to a note from the Province of Bolzano.
The provincial government said the refugees would be housed in gyms, where adequate hygienic facilities and infrastructure already function, while Italy’s Civil Protection and local non-profit groups will be called in to manage the improvised shelters.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Belgium Wants EU Emergency Fund to Care for Refugees
Belgian deputy migration minister Theo Francken told the state broadcaster he wants an emergency EU fund to help western member states shelter refugees. “It can’t go in one direction only. Solidarity goes two directions”, he said, adding mostly eastern and southern countries benefit from the EU’s agricultural and structural funds.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Budapest Migrant Standoff Enters Second Night
Hundreds of migrants are in a standoff with police for a second night outside a Budapest railway station.
Earlier, scuffles broke out between the two sides as frustration among migrants boiled over outside Keleti station.
Many of the migrants have tickets and are insisting they be allowed to travel on to Germany and other countries, but Hungary says it is enforcing EU rules.
Meanwhile, Germany, Italy and France have called for “fair distribution” of refugees throughout the EU.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Eleven Migrants Drown Heading From Turkey to Greek Island
At least 11 migrants believed to be Syrians drowned as two boats sank after leaving southwest Turkey for the Greek island of Kos, Turkey’s Dogan news agency reported on Wednesday.
It said a boat carrying 16 Syrian migrants had sunk after leaving the Akyarlar area of the Bodrum peninsula, and seven people had died. Four people were rescued and the coastguard was continuing its search for five people still missing.
Separately, a boat carrying six Syrians sank after leaving Akyarlar on the same route. Three children and one woman drowned and two people survived after reaching the shore in life jackets.
Tens of thousands of Syrians fleeing the conflict in their homeland have descended on Turkey’s Aegean coast this summer to board boats to Greece, their gateway to the European Union.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
EU Commission Aims to Ease Asylum Rules for Frontier, Report Says
The European Commission is drafting a proposal to change the so-called Dublin rule that obliges migrants to request asylum in the country they first arrive in, Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported on Tuesday.
The paper, which did not say where it got the information from, said the commission will finalize its ideas on Sept. 8, submit them to European Union interior ministers in Brussels on Sept. 14 and then later to heads of state and government.
Following pressure from Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi among others, the package would amend the Dublin regulation that allows a member state to forcibly return asylum seekers to the first EU country they entered.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
EU Tells Members: Take Migrants or Lose Grants
The European Union has effectively threatened to cut funding to countries like Britain unless they agree to take more refugees.
Officials from Austria and Germany said they were considering a plan whereby EU grant spending would be focussed on countries that take in most migrants, something that would put pressure on Britain and Eastern European nations that have so far refused to take part in migrant quota schemes.
Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann said yesterday he was in favour of a scheme that would “reduce EU funding” to countries that took fewer migrants. He also indicated he could torpedo David Cameron’s EU renegotiation package unless Britain showed greater “solidarity” by accepting more migrants.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Eurostar Train Turned Back Amid Disruptions Around France’s Calais, Reported Migrant Action
Hundreds of Eurostar train passengers trying to travel under the English Channel were stranded in France after migrants climbed on tracks overnight in the port city of Calais, officials said.
The problems are the latest in a summer wracked by travel disruptions and diplomatic tensions around Calais, where thousands of migrants are camped in hopes of sneaking through the tunnel or on ferries to Britain.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Greece: Caretaker Gov’t to Introduce Measures for Refugees on Islands
Greece’s caretaker government will introduce measures to improve conditions for the tens of thousands of refugees and migrants arriving on eastern Greek islands, as well as for the islands’ residents, the migration policy minister said Wednesday.
The country has borne the brunt of a massive refugee and migration influx to the European Union, with more than 200,000 people arriving so far this year. The coast guard said it had rescued 1,058 people at sea in 28 incidents from Tuesday morning to Wednesday morning. Those do not include hundreds who make it to the islands themselves.
Three people reported missing at sea overnight off the island of Kos were found alive and rescued by a fishing boat Wednesday, the coast guard said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Heartbreaking Image of Drowned Toddler Goes Viral, Highlighting Severity of Europe’s Migrant Crisis
The tragic image of a drowned toddler whose body washed up on a beach in one of Turkey’s most popular resorts went viral Wednesday, underscoring the increasingly desperate plight of migrants trying to flee Africa and the Middle East in hopes of a better life in Europe.
The boy, presumed to be from Syria, was found dead Wednesday near the town of Bodrum. A Turkish police officer is shown in the image carrying the boy’s body away from the waves.
At least 12 migrants, including the boy and four other children, drowned off the Turkish coast when two boats carrying them to the Greek island of Kos capsized, Turkish officials told The Associated Press.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Hundreds of Migrants Protest Hungary Travel Ban as More Die at Sea
“What we want? Peace! What we need? Peace!”
Hundreds of migrants chanted defiant slogans outside Budapest’s main international train station Wednesday as Hungarian police blocked them for a second day from seeking asylum in Germany and other wealthy European Union countries.
“What we want? Peace! What we need? Peace!” a few hundred migrants chanted outside Keleti station, the latest focal point for continentwide tensions over the unrelenting flow of migrants from the Middle East, Asia and Africa fleeing war and poverty.
At other pressure points in the route into Europe, Turkish media reported that 11 migrants drowned as they tried to cross the sea to Greece. French authorities said cross-Channel Eurostar trains were returning to normal Wednesday after serious overnight disruptions triggered by reports of migrants running on the undersea tunnel tracks and trying to climb atop trains.
On a beach in Turkey, Turkish media showed the body of a child and reported the 11 deaths. Six other migrants were rescued and five others remained missing when two boats carrying them from Bodrum to the nearby Greek island of Kos capsized Wednesday. The private Dogan agency said the dead included a mother and three children.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: First Hearing Set for Ivorian Suspected of Killing Couple
Woman ‘may have been raped’
(ANSA) — Caltagirone, September 1 — A judge will rule in a hearing on Wednesday whether to confirm the Sunday arrest of Mamadou Kamara, an 18-year-old Ivorian man accused of killing a couple in Palagonia at the weekend, the Caltagirone prosecutor’s office said Tuesday.
At Wednesday’s hearing, chief prosecutor Vincenzo Verzera will ask the judge to order Kamara to be held in pre-trial custody in prison.
Autopsies on the bodies of both victims, Vincenzo Solano, 68, and his wife Mercedes Ibanez, 70, were completed during the night Tuesday, with an initial report to be filed with the prosecutor’s office by the end of Wednesday.
A judicial source said Ibanez may have been raped before being killed.
The source said the autopsy revealed “just clues, although they are various, that don’t give certainties”.
Final autopsy results will be filed with the prosecutor’s office within 60 days.
According to an initial report, the murder weapons may have been a screwdriver and a large pair of pliers. A judge on Tuesday signed an order allowing the bodies to be returned to the victims’ families for funeral ceremonies, which are scheduled to take place on Wednesday at 5 p.m.
Police arrested Kamara Sunday after he was found with blood-stained trousers as well as a mobile phone and clothes belonging to Solano in the Cara di Mineo migrant reception centre, where he had been living since June.
The couples’ daughter, Rosita Solano, on Monday blamed the government as “also” responsible for the killings.
“They let these migrants come here and they do what they want, including burgling and killing,” Solano said.
On Tuesday, Solano challenged Premier Matteo Renzi to “show his face” in Palagonia.
“The death of my parents evidently doesn’t even merit a tweet from Premier Renzi or Minister Alfano,” Solano said.
“I want justice, not political controversy. Renzi, come talk to me, show your face, before the funeral,” she said.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Greece Hotspots by Year’s End — De Maiziere
Berlin can’t solve situation alone says interior min
(ANSA) — Berlin, September 2 — Italy and Greece must set up so-called hotspots or migrant registration centres by year’s end, German Interior Minister Thomas De Maiziere said in a statement on the refugee emergency Wednesday. “Germany cannot resolve (the current situation) alone,” he said. Germany recently said it would take in Syrian refugees in a move it said it hoped would encourage its EU partners.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Schengen Set to be Suspended at Brenner Pass
‘Itaky poised to act at Germany’s request’
(ANSA) — Rome, September 2 — Italy at Germany’s request has said it is prepared to reinstate border checks at the Brenner Pass, temporarily suspending the Schengen border-free Europe accords, authorities in the northern province of Bolzano said Wednesday. Schengen has been suspended before, notably on the occasion of a recent G7 summit.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Migration Crisis and the Big EU Question in Daily Mail Comment
This was a bad day for David Cameron’s hopes of keeping Britain in the EU with the the scenes at a Budapest station (pictured), evacuated by Hungarian police to stop a stampede by thousands of migrants.
First, the Electoral Commission recommended (and, to his credit, the Prime Minister immediately accepted) a change from the yes/no referendum question to remove any subliminal bias in favour of the status quo.
But this was a minor blow beside the scenes at a Budapest station, evacuated by Hungarian police to stop a stampede by thousands of migrants desperate to board trains for Austria and Germany.
Like the daily images of overcrowded boats in the Mediterranean, Arabs and Africans encamped in European cities and migrants pouring into Greece and Italy or storming fences in Calais, these brought home graphically the terrifying scale of the crisis confronting Europe.
Indeed, Ukip’s Nigel Farage is hardly exaggerating when he says the EU’s shambolic open borders and asylum policies have encouraged ‘an exodus of biblical proportions’.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Migrants Protest in Budapest as Hungary Blocks Westbound Travel for Second Day
BUDAPEST, Hungary — Hundreds of migrants chanted defiant slogans outside Budapest’s main international railway station Wednesday as Hungarian police blocked them for a second day from seeking asylum in Germany and other European Union countries to the west.
“What we want? Peace! What we need? Peace!” a few hundred migrants chanted outside Keleti station, the new focal point for continent-wide tensions over the unrelenting flow of migrants from the Middle East, Asia and Africa fleeing war, persecution and poverty.
Hungary’s police said in a statement they intend to reinforce their positions outside the Keleti terminal as the volume of migrants arriving from Serbia continues to grow by the hour, with an estimated 3,000 already encamped near the station. They said officers working jointly with colleagues from Austria, Germany and Slovakia also were searching for migrants traveling illegally on other Hungarian trains and described the security push as compatible with the EU’s policy of passport-free travel.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Refugee Arrivals in Athens Prompt New Discussions
More than 4,200 refugees were due to arrive in Piraeus on two ships from Lesvos Tuesday, only temporarily easing the pressure on scant resources on the island but at the same time increasing concern in Athens about the fate of those who would disembark.
Authorities on Lesvos have registered some 17,500 refugees and migrants over the past week but the transfer to Athens of many of those people would only provide brief respite as hundreds more are arriving each day.
While many refugees head for Greece’s border with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), some end up stranded in Athens. Victoria Square in the city center has become a popular gathering point for refugees.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Chaotic scenes and 16 hour delays hit London-bound Eurostar services overnight as migrants climbed on to the roof of an 186mph train and attempted to break into train carriages.
Passengers on board one train stranded near Calais are understood to have threatened to smash the windows after a power outage left the sweltering carriage in total darkness for five hours.
The power failure also saw those on board left without air conditioning and unable to communicate with Eurostar staff before the stricken train eventually returned to Paris.
As they searched in vain for the migrants, Eurostar staff went as far as making the bizarre move of appealing to passengers to listen out for the sound of movement on the roofs of the trains.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Canada: Peel Board Won’t Exempt Kids From Learning About Gay Families, Gender Issues
Director Tony Pontes says the board is willing to lose students over its stance on inclusion issues in the curriculum.
Parents can remove their kids from sex-ed classes for religious reasons, but any requests for students to opt-out of learning about gay families or diverse gender identities won’t be tolerated, says the director of Ontario’s second largest school board — one that expects to be hard hit by protests over the new health curriculum.
The same day as anti-sex-ed rallies were planned outside Liberal MPP offices across the province, Tony Pontes was to tell teachers and superintendents about the Peel board’s tough stand, saying if parents have a problem with such strong support for equity and inclusion, the public system may not be right for them.
“Let’s be clear: Some in our community may not like this,” he says in a speech to be given Wednesday morning, a copy of which was provided to the Star.
After noting the 905-area board is opening its first gender-neutral washroom at a high school as well as introducing a new gender identity guideline for educators, some parents “may choose to switch school systems … if so, that is a price we must be willing to pay.
[Comment: Arrogantly daring parents to remove their kids from the public shool system…if a stranger talked to young kids the way this “sex-education” promotes, it could be called grooming or ‘corruption of a minor’ and he/she would likely got to prison.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Will Young Men be Helped? New Study Says Young Women Earn More Than Young Men
The gender wage gap has been one of the talking points for a lot of liberals, economists and politicians. Constantly we are informed of how women earn 23 cents less than men and how there needs to be legislation to increase this. The data that support this claim has been widely refuted. It should also be noted that the figure is just based on one study. Since then, there have been a large number of other studies to discredit this notion (SEE: 9 statistics Patricia Arquette needs to read on gender wage gap myth).
But what if we were to find that men earned 23 cents less than woman? Would these same people call for the legislation to balance it out? Nope.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Global Count Reaches 3 Trillion Trees
Approach combines ground-based surveys with satellite imaging to find higher density than anticipated.
There are roughly 3 trillion trees on Earth — more than seven times the number previously estimated — according to a tally1 by an international team of scientists. The study also finds that human activity is detrimental to tree abundance worldwide. Around 15 billion trees are cut down each year, the researchers estimate; since the onset of agriculture about 12,000 years ago, the number of trees worldwide has dropped by 46%.
“The scale of human impact is astonishing,” says Thomas Crowther, an ecologist now at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology in Wageningen who led the study while at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. “Obviously we expected humans would have a prominent role, but I didn’t expect that it would come out as the as the strongest control on tree density.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Making of 2001: How Kubrick and Clarke Designed the Future
HALF a century ago, Stanley Kubrick wrote to Arthur C. Clarke about a movie idea. Clarke was enthusiastic: “The ‘really good’ science-fiction movie is a great many years overdue.” So began their collaboration on Journey Beyond the Stars.
The film acquired several nicknames (“How the Solar System was Won” was a favourite), before its release in 1968 as 2001: A Space Odyssey. As a vision of the future it stands the test of time: a tribute to a writer who dreamed up communications satellites long before a satellite was launched, and a director who, even as Sputnik circled the Earth, was working through reels of Japanese sci-fi to find the effects he would need to imagine his way into space.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
It’s good to know that Hitler is spinning in his grave as all the Muslims clogging the trains in Hungary want to go to Deutschland Uber Alles!
You do realize that Hitler’s body was never recovered and buried in any marked grave?
Well, for one Englishman, this summer has been a turning point. It began with our general election, when 87% of the electorate voted for pro-mass-immigration parties. (That’s actually *good* news as the figure was about 96% five years ago.) But the illegal immigrant crisis has changed everything. This morning, almost the entire UK press jumped ship to the extreme-left, open-door lobby. They were swung by a single photo, of a dead baby on a beach. They were probably thinking of their women readers.
Before, I used to fear my homeland could be taken over during my lifetime. Now it is a certainty. My home city has gone from 10% ethnic to around 30% ethnic in ten years. Ten xxxxing years. Britain took in 600,000 people last year alone. English people will become a minority in their homeland in three or four decades at most. They will lose control of all of their big cities some time before that. We will soon have a semi-Afro-Asian cabinet. Islam will become politically untouchable, if it isn’t already, and will take over all the cities. Churches will quite literally be turned into mosques.
I will go on doing my tiny bit to resist, talking to people and writing, but my heart is no longer in it. Now I want to escape. I no longer feel any affinity or respect for a people, my own people, who are allowing their homeland to be stolen, their historic culture to be obliterated, their birthright trampled, their history rewritten, their very streets and houses occupied before their eyes. And who are actually paying through the nose to enable their own dispossession and humiliation. Nature has no use for species that behave like this, and neither have I. In a way, I kind of wish the “migrants’ luck. We indigenous Europeans are finished. Western Europe today is one big bucket of maggots, from the traitors that rule it to the council estate cretins that go on voting for more treachery and more punishment. The settlers are better, tougher stock. (Anybody who really thinks they are idlers and dross should spend 24 hours in a Calais or Budapest carpark.)
Where to go? Don’t care. If I move to say Belgium or back to Scandinavia, I will see the same tragedy unfolding, but it won’t be my people or my culture, and I shall not care. I shall take what I can from the useful idiots who will be running whichever European country I end up in and–let the natives rot. Why should I care? They’ve got what they voted for.
I’ve done my bit for the cause of ethnic self-preservation, and got only abuse for it. From now on, it’s me first.
I can empathise, as a fellow Briton. I also feel what’s the use when your own kin promote and seek their own decline. It is shameful. Fortunately I have a get out, an escape option to the Far East, in a culture I respect and whose language I have a decent grasp of. Yet to go would be a tremendous shame, but being faced everyday with such treachery and seeing smug lefties continue to promote their agenda causes me untold stress. I don’t want the refugees here like I don’t want Turkey in the EU (whilst we are stuck in it) but part of me thinks maybe both will either hasten our civilisational destruction or open people’s eyes when the deluge is so obviously negative, so should it be welcomed in a sense? Of course not, I’m clutching at straws but it couls perhaps create a rapid meltdown with a chance of a major wake up call than the drip drip effect of mass immigration and the apathy that results.
Reluctantly inclined to agree at this point …
Any fight back will come from European enclaves of defeat … that will most probably be brutal and bloody.
Suicidal madness has taken hold of the peoples of Europe.
It seems that the Australians have a good strategy and implementation of that strategy. The ships are not allowed to land.
There is more info about it somewhere here on GoV, but I’ve never learned how to do a Search on this site (sigh) and cannot provide you with the link(s).
I don’t know what New Zealand’s policy and practice are. I cannot, unfortunately, recommend my own country (or at least California), as the multi-cultural, politically correct mental condition seems to have taken over almost everyone involved in public education and public office. 🙁
NZ is spinning around right now, from a small refugee limit to Amnesty International getting air time and telling us to raise the limit and then raise it some more. And the photo of a dead child is apparently enough to make our government change its policy. Admittedly, our limit is very small currently and I’m not at all against helping more people truly persecuted by ISIS (gays, liberals, christians, atheists), but I want to know how they ensure we don’t get islamists mixed in.
BTW, if you prefer caucasians for some reason, don’t come to NZ. We are a multi-ethnic society and it’s fine.
Multi ethnic: OK. Multi cultural: lovely if it’s about food and languages and music and dancing. NOT OK if it leads to inequality for men and women, oppression of homosexuals etc.
I actually empathise with Maoris although that doesn’t mean to say I advocate anything. Just objectively speaking, they are the native population. I wouldn’t view it in the same context as Europe for that reason.
Ethnic, shmethnic! That has never been my concern. I’m just worried about islam’s hatred for women, gays, jews, kuffars. I really don’t care what colour people are (much better sun protection if one has more melanin), as long as they are for equal rights for all people. Islamists are not for equal rights.
Would you believe that even the very dark skinned can get sunburn?
True, but melanin still helps, and we all need some sun for vitamin D :).
One can only hope that Germany is flooded with enough of them to the point they finally collapse as a state and then take the EU with them. It couldn’t happen to a better nation that has supported Merkel and her genocidal anti-Western policies.
It as if Merkel is completing the final solution in her own twisted way. Not by force of arms to eradicate Europe(as Hitler planned to) but by importing unlimited numbers of 3rd worlders.
Evidently the German people are on board with it, given her how many times they’ve elected her. Quite sickening display of national suicide if you ask me.
The AfD is gaining support by the hour, I reckon.
Quite sickening display of anti-German slander here. But that is the “counterjihad”.
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=412152095647943&id=295676633962157&p=10&refid=52
This has to be one of the most ridiculous excuses I have ever read!
The f’ing arabs… Is the oil really so important now with ethical oil coming out of Canada and the US as well as significant finds off Israel and Egypt.
Shut these people down!
There are at least 57 Islamic countries. And that is the excuse for not taking in these Islamic “refugees”?
Of course, most of us have figured out that the “migration” is a hijra, not a genuine migration but a politically motivated one whose goals would be hindered, not helped, by having these Africans and Mideasterners join the Islamic countries.
What we see in Europe is not just a migration crisis, it will prove to be an islamocommunist revolution.
https://khabaristantimes.com/world/deliberately-ignoring-refugees-to-allow-spread-of-islam-in-west-saudi-official/#.VeixnySa7Oo.twitter
Here is another post I got off the internet. I don’t vouch for it but… It sure sounds like the real thing.
Seemed like it was sending up our fears rather than genuine reporting.