Spanish police have broken up a people-trafficking racket that was smuggling migrants into southern Spain. The smugglers charged $5,000 a head and used jet skis to carry the refugees across the Western Mediterranean from Morocco.
In other news, destitute and starving Venezuelans are pouring across the country’s borders into neighboring states, especially Colombia.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to Charles Low, Insubria, JD, KS, Reader from Chicago, SS, 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: Bazoli, Massiah: Others Indicted Over UBI Case
Bankers indicted with 29 others
(ANSA) — Bergamo, April 27 — A preliminary hearings judge on Friday indicted veteran banker Giovanni Bazoli, UBI Banca CEO Victor Massiah and another 29 defendants, including the bank itself, for the UBI misconduct case. Bazoli is emeritus president of Italy’s biggest bank by assets, Intesa Sanpaolo.
Prosecutors filed charges of obstructing oversight bodies and alleged irregularities relating to procedures for the 2013 AGM which decided on the UBI governance.
The trial starts July 25.
Bazoli’s lawyer Stefano Lojacono said his client was innocent of the charges.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
One Year Later: Illinois on the Verge of Downgrade to Junk; Its Residents $5 Billion Poorer
Submitted by Ted Dabrowki and John Klingner of Wirepoints
Illinois’ brutal political campaigns may have distracted attention from the reality of the state’s crumbling finances, but an upcoming $500 million bond borrowing by the state will remind investors and Illinoisans alike how little has improved.
Both Moody’s and S&P recently affirmed Illinois’ one-notch-above-junk rating in preparation for the state’s upcoming bond, even as Moody’s continues to maintain a negative outlook on Illinois’ rating. That means a downgrade by the agency is more likely than an upgrade in the next year.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
800,000 People to Flee New York & California in Next Three Years
Over the past decade, more than 3.5 million Americans have left high-tax blue states like California, New York, and many others in the Northeast, for low-tax red states like Arizona, Florida, and Texas.
While the migration has been happening for years, conservative economists Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore are forecasting the next significant movement out of blue states could be right around the corner.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
The House Intelligence Committee’s just-released report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election reveals in a footnote that an ongoing, private investigation into Trump-Russia claims is being funded with $50 million supplied by George Soros and a group of 7-10 wealthy donors from California and New York.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Trump Brings Up North Korea — The Audience Erupts in Chants of ‘Nobel! Nobel!’
President Trump was talking about North Korea at a rally in Washington Township, Michigan on Saturday when the audience began to break out in chants of “Nobel! Nobel!”
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
“Excuse Shopping” In Aftermath of Toronto Terror Attack Not Helpful
On Friday’s episode of Rebel Roundup, Toronto Sun reporter Joe Warmington joined me to discuss the despicable act of terror that recently occurred in Toronto.
A seasoned reporter, Joe is no stranger to tragedy but this one hit close to home.
Watch as I speak with Joe at the scene of the crime and he explains why the “excuse shopping” that has occurred in the aftermath of this horrific attack, isn’t helpful.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Austria: Uber Back on the Road in Vienna
Uber said on Friday it had resumed operations in Vienna, two days after a court ruling took the ride-hailing service off the road following a complaint from a local taxi firm.
| — Hat tip: Charles Low | [Return to headlines] |
Austrian Police Raid Multiple Identitarian Activists’ Homes, Including Martin Sellner’s
Austrian police have raided ten homes and offices of identitarian activists, including Generation Identity co-leaders Martin Sellnerand Patrick Lenart.
The authorities seized Sellner’s electronic devices including his phone and computers, with a Graz prosecutor looking to prosecute the activists as a criminal organisation.
The announcement of the raids came from Martin Sellner himself, who took to Twitter saying that the police had raided his apartment in Vienna and confiscated all of his electronic devices.
[Comment: It looks like that Austria and the US have a similar problem: the judiciary and law enforcement have rogue leftist elements.]
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
European Union Advocates for Soros-Funded ‘Independent Fact Checkers’ To Combat ‘Fake News’
The European Commission has proposed new measures to tackle disinformation and so-called ‘fake news’ online, including an EU-wide code of practice on disinformation and support for an “independent fact-checking network.”
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Europe: Safeguard Values or Disappear
We no longer replace our numbers; instead we rely on immigration to compensate for the shortfall in births. This immigration is for the most part Muslim; the effect of our demographic decline is, therefore, the Islamization of Europe.
The response of members of the political class, at least in Italy, is to shrug their shoulders, and say, “So what?” European elites believe that religion is private. However, most Muslims do not believe that religion is private, and some are working hard to create a state in which Islamic law is the legal foundation for everyone. The effect of this is already being felt across the European continent. We have more Islamic veils and mosques, and fewer cartoons of Mohammed.
Without the courage to insist on safeguarding our values, and passing our inheritance on to our children, we Europeans will simply disappear — as many groups have before. With us, however, will disappear the most enlightened civilization the world has ever known.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Is UK Gov. Using “Hate Speech” Laws to Try to Cover Up Murder of Alfie Evans?
It’s bad enough that the British government played medical judge and jury before the death of little Alfie Evans, denying his parents the opportunity to take him to Italy for care. They also, say critics, have used the hate-speech principle to cover up their own complicity.
As LifeNews.com reported Wednesday, before Alfie passed on:
British police have announced that they will monitor and prosecute anyone who posts on social media a “malicious communication” supporting Alfie Evans or complaining about the hospital and courts.
Nevermind [sic] that Alder Hey Children’s Hospital is apparently misleading the court about Alfie, if anyone posts anything negative about the hospital or its officials and their treatment of Alfie, apparently they will be monitored and potentially prosecuted by local police in London.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Former BMPS Bosses to Stand Trial for Fraud
Two former executives of Italy’s troubled lender Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena (BMPS) were ordered on Friday to stand trial on fraud charges.
| — Hat tip: Charles Low | [Return to headlines] |
Macron Faces Embarrassing Independence Referendum: This Territory May Split From France
EMMANUEL Macron will follow his successful meeting with US President Donald Trump with a visit to New Caledonia, a French territory that could embarrass Mr Macron by cutting ties with Paris.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Muslim Woman Tells French Gay Couple They Shouldn’t be Alive: “in Algeria, We’d Slit Your Throats”
On March 12th, inside a Rueil-Malmaison supermarket, a young French Muslim woman went on a violent homophobic rant against a male couple, Le Figaro reports. The reason: they supposedly passed over her in the supermarket’s queue.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Spanish Police Break up Jet Ski Migrant Smuggling Ring
(THE TIMES) — A gang who used jet skis to smuggle migrants across the Strait of Gibraltar in trips that took half an hour and cost £3,500 has been broken up by Spanish police.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Swedish Minister Says the Country’s Elderly Are the Problem and Not Refugees
Sweden’s Minister of Social Affairs, Annika Strandhäll, told newspaper Aftonbladet that the country’s elderly and not refugees, are overloading the healthcare system.
The Swedish health care system is so overloaded that the care queues for surgery are so long that patients literally start to rot, Aftonbladet reported earlier.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Landlord Mamun Rashid Jailed for Raping Series of Female Tenants in London
Mamun Rashid has been imprisoned after targeting young women as tenants on SpareRoom.com and carrying out “appalling” attacks when they refused to have sex.
Wood Green Crown Court heard that the 30-year-old used the house-share website to purposefully advertise his spare room to females aged between 18 and 45.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
ENI Ramps Up Production at Egypt’s Zohr Field
Production to reach 2.7 bn cfd by 2019
(ANSA) — Rome, April 26 — ENI on Thursday announced the start-up of the second production unit (T-1) of the offshore Zohr project 190 km north of Egypt’s Port Said. The development, which comes just four months after the launch of production at the natural gas field, increases installed capacity by 400 million cubic feet per day to 800 million cubic feet per day, a statement said.
Production is planned to reach 2.7 billion cubic feet per day (cfd) by 2019, ENI added. Zohr, the largest gas discovery ever made in Egypt and in the Mediterranean, falls within the Shorouk Block.
ENI holds a 60% stake in the Shorouk Block, Rosneft 30% and BP 10%.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
State Dept. Complicit in Weaponizing UN Against Israel
By Martin Sherman
On April 18, 2018, 51 Members of Congress signed a letter to President Trump requesting that he order the declassification of a document which was classified “despite no apparent national security threat or known historical precedent for classifying such a report.”
Ongoing Congressional Misgivings
According to the Congressmen, “this classification was inappropriate and a deliberate attempt to conceal information from American taxpayers,” and they urged that, “The report should be declassified without further delay.”
The document in question is a 2015 State Department report drawn up pursuant to a 2012 directive from Congress to account for how the billions of U.S. tax payer dollars, allocated to UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency) — the entity charged with dealing with the “Palestinian refugees” — were being used … or perhaps, abused.
Expressions of Congressional misgivings as to both the intrinsic nature of UNRWA and to its aberrant behavior have emerged into the public discourse from time to time in the last decade.
One of the first assertive attempts to address the perverse and pernicious role of UNRWA was a legislative initiative by Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL), designed to disperse the fog of uncertainty over just how many people were benefitting from U.S. funding allocated for “Palestinian refugees” — and what criteria were used to determine who was, and who wasn’t, entitled to such benefits.
The rationale underlying the initiative was to determine how many Palestinians were designated “refugees” according to generally accepted criteria and how many were so designated according to anomalous criteria applicable only to Palestinians…
| — Hat tip: KS | [Return to headlines] |
Hungary Builds Another School in Iraq
Hungary will build another school in Iraq, the human resources minister said at a ceremony in Budapest on Friday.
Prime Minister Viktor Orban suggested that building another school in Iraq should be among the first decisions of his new government to take office after the inaugural session of parliament scheduled for May 8, Zoltan Balog told the ceremony in which the young Christians persecuted in their homeland and studying in Hungary on a government scholarship closed the academic year.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Here’s the Full Text of Joint Declaration Issued at North, South Korean Summit
As previously reported, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in agreed Friday to finally end a seven-decade war this year, and signed a declaration to pursue the “complete denuclearization” of the Korean Peninsula, although they did not announce any concrete steps to dismantle the North’s nuclear programs.
The two leaders embraced after signing the deal during a historic meeting on their shared border, the first time a North Korean leader has set foot on the southern side. They announced plans to formally declare a resolution to the war and replace 1953 armistice that ended open hostilities into a peace treaty by year’s end.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Outraged shoppers at the JC Plaza shop in south east Melbourne, Australia, were shocked when they found a ‘terrorist man’ costume (pictured) showing a man with a long beard holding a gun.
| — Hat tip: SS | [Return to headlines] |
South Africa: Mbalula Says ‘We Must Get the Damn Land Back’
The former minister of police and sport said on Freedom Day that land expropriation without compensation is topping the ANC’s agenda.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
‘Their Country is Being Invaded’: Exodus of Venezuelans Overwhelms Northern Brazil
PACARAIMA, Brazil — Hundreds turn up each day, many arriving penniless and gaunt as they pass a tattered flag that signals they have reached the border.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
“Prepare for the Worst Possible Outcome” Migrant Caravan Warned as it Enters the US
Around 400 migrants about to cross into San Diego are refusing the advice of immigration attorneys, who say the asylum-seekers risk a lengthy detention, or being separated from their families, before eventual deportation back to Central America.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Austria’s Vice Chancellor Attacks Soros: He Was Involved in Bringing Refugees to Europe
In a TV debate, Austrian vice chancellor and FPÖ leader, Heinz-Christian Strache, said that American billionaire George Soros has a strong connection with Europe’s migrant crisis.
During the debate between the leader of the FPÖ and Christian Kern, who is leader of the SPÖ, Soros was an emotionally charged subject, Austria’s Der Standard reports.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Brad Trost: The Impact of Canada’s Migrant Crisis
On last night’s episode, Brad Trost, Conservative MP for Saskatoon-University, joined me to discuss the impact of Canada’s growing migrant crisis.
When Donald Trump first announced his travel ban, Trudeau tweeted:
To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada
Ever since that tweet, Canada has experienced a surge in migrants sneaking into Canada illegal from the United States.
These illegal migrants are threatening the sustainability of Canada’s socialized healthcare system, and are flooding shelter’s in Toronto.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Danes Furious After Immigration Minister Says Migrants “Cheat, Lie and Abuse”
In an editorial that has drawn the fury of progressives in Denmark, possibly the most conservative of the Nordic states, the country’s immigration minister said “a significant group” of refugees “cheats, lies and abuses our trust” to soak the Danish government for additional benefits — or to cheat on exams that allow them to receive asylum status.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Police Arrest Two North African Migrants After Night of Death and Bloodshed
Italian police arrested two North African migrants on Friday in connection with four separate violent episodes, including the knife murder of a 22-year-old woman which took place Thursday night, in and around Milan.
The two men are accused of stabbing a young woman to death as well as stabbing a 21-year-old woman from England in the abdomen during a robbery in the area of Milan’s central train station.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Southern European Countries Want Reform of the Dublin Regulations
Italy, Greece, Malta, Cyprus, and Spain will be teaming up to apply greater pressure in talks over reforms of the Dublin Rules.
They are asking for less weight of migration flows to be placed on the shoulders of the first countries the migrants arrive in.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
We Are Against Mass Migration Because the Safety of Our People is Our First Priority — Hungarian FM
On Thursday Hungary’s Foreign Minister Péter Szijjarto, replied to a draft report of the European Parliament’s committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE).
In the report, the committee concludes that Hungary risks violating EU values, like the “fundamental rights of migrants, asylum seekers and refugees”.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
“Sweden’s Minister of Social Affairs, Annika Strandhäll, told newspaper Aftonbladet that the country’s elderly and not refugees, are overloading the healthcare system.”
Well, since this one is hitting the Swedes where it hurts them, I mean their parents, I know a few Swedes who came to criticize immigration just upon this basis: That their parents had to wait 8 hours in the waiting room just to be treated. In Stockholm.
It is kind of funny how the Swedish establishment dances around the fire of hot topics: I mean, overloaded hospitals are the old Swede’s fault, and when it comes to immigration, it is the working immigrants who “steal jobs from Swedes”. They just refuse to look in the fire of non working, benefit eating, lazy welfare riders, who – on top of all things – are stupid, aggressive, and would like to enrich Sweden’s boring culture, full of boring uninteresting quitet hard workers.
“Sweden’s Minister of Social Affairs, Annika Strandhäll, told newspaper Aftonbladet that the country’s elderly and not refugees, are overloading the healthcare system.”
These Quislings really have no idea what forces they are playing with….. They just can’t unless they truly are suicidal.
Their retirement/escape holes in the Bahamas won’t keep them safe.
One of these days in the press caught an interesting note: it turns out the Ministry of Justice of Russia goes to report to the Council of Europe on the rights of migrants.
At the same time, the authorities assure us that Europe and America are our enemies.
———
Recently in Cairo detained several so-called. “Russian” Islamists. And in fact, Dagestan’s wives and children of militants.
Human Rights Ombudsman Moskalkova demanded explanations from the Egyptian authorities regarding the detention of “Russians”.
At the same time, no one is interested in the rights of ethnic Russians who stayed in the republics of the former USSR. No one is interested in the fact that ethnic Russians are fleeing the North Caucasus.
This country is not Russia.
There is some kind of total betrayal.
It’s the same argument which has been used in the UK for some time; that it’s the elderly bed-blockers, the ones who have paid for the “free” National Health Service all their lives through national insurance, who are fouling up the availability of hospital beds and health care, not the millions of incomers who have brought all sorts of complex illnesses and diseases once eradicated from the UK. Not to mention the FGM-alleviation surgery, or the lifelong treatment for genetic deformities caused by generations of consanguineous marriage.
The full article on changes to Dublin accord is
http://www.ansamed.info/ansamed/en/news/sections/politics/2018/04/27/italy-pushing-for-dublin-rules-reform_767962e6-77ae-418f-956a-4735328b3bbe.html
If you read into it though it is not about reducing migrant flow but about money and shifting the burden of initial accommodation to other countries in a shorter time frame.
Point is that the whole show is a chaos and political theme where EU accomodation is the groundplan and individual countries accept that but compete to make it more even and stand up for their own interests within that plan.
Seems a major disconnect from reality, where nations are all headed towards merging into an EU superstate with little national policy choice bicker over the details that will be meaningless eventually – almost a sideshow to keep the nation happy until then.
As with many other of these details, simple solution :
Make nationality law by descent.
Obviously this is not going to be the direction, the opposite has been the trend and to reset that system is not going to happen easily.
Jumping back to a previous article you linked on seafaring to Crete, I’ll add these as good reads :
Timeline of island colonisation by study of paleofauna pdf
https://www.google.pt/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://archeozoo-archeobota.mnhn.fr/IMG/pdf/427_2014_Medit_Islands_Eurasian_Prehist-1.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwii7M3W3t_aAhVDchQKHeSgCywQFjABegQICBAB&usg=AOvVaw30A2UzAJ5ihEcfIjoSWRSl
And here is a readjustment on Iberian cultural prominence that places copper smelting as amongst the earliest of all regions, if not the earliest ( smelting from ore, not scarce raw native copper). This is 3000 bc , two thousand years before Phoenician contacts, though there may have been other trading routes or formats. The copper use ties into bell beaker history, assumed originating in Iberia, for those interested
http://www.fundacion.atlantic-copper.com/data/pdf/Mil_a%C3%B1os.pdf
Might add
https://www.persee.fr/doc/paleo_0153-9345_2000_num_26_2_4716
which looks at how melting/refining copper merged into smelting.
The transition timeline is not obvious, as refining may look like smelting, so very roughly 6000 BC refining was taking place, and around 3000 BC smelting was definitely taking place. Copper, later hardened with arsenic, then eventually with tin (bronze) was a major feature of the material (technological) and cultural evolution of the time. The relationships between different societies of that time are still being understood, as are the migration, origin, ethnicity of the people and cultures being argued out.
thank you for the links, it is the kind of stuff I’m after as well, although don’t have time to read it just now, saved it for future 🙂
All in all I am convinced that the world really was wiped out in a flood that covered the highest hills, might had been oceans on the move, and everything wiped clean, arecheologists now discover that mankind really originated somewhere in middle east and spread out from thence. Central European archaeology certainly covered a few cultural migrations, all coming from the east to the west. I am convinced that the same thing can be discovered around the coast of Europe, from “Babylon” out through the Mediterannean and out into the Atlantic, Nor’way’, Iceland, Greenland, and ultimately, the Americas.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_Current
This is how the prehistoric man done it in canoes made of trees as big as – well – the prehistoric trees.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/Del_Norte_Titan_230.jpg
Instead of running away, those “destitute and starving” Venezuelans ought to find out who is responsible for their plight and hang them.
What will happen is what happens when those without guns stand up to those that do.
It will alleviate some of the caloric shortfall in Venezuela.
Very funny article. Why are articles of stupid people published in major publications? Why do they think that readers are complete idiots?
I thought that only in Russia is the most degrading press. But no.
————————
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/anti-muslim-groups-influencing-world-leaders-to-help-push-islamophobia
Anti-muslim groups are influencing world leaders to help push Islamophobia, research reveals
————————-
Or am I mistaken and this is a second-rate newspaper?
Or I again had difficulty translating and this is a very profound article?
Or am I mistaken and this is a second-rate newspaper?
Or I again had difficulty translating and this is a very profound article?
The Brits would know more than I but it does appear to be a second-rate news outlet. Does it even exist outside the ether?
Here’s a clue: the org they cite for their news about Islamophobes is a group called Hope Not Hate. So far to the Left and so dim, HnH even called for Gates of Vienna to be closed down by the British Parliament. Last year or the year before, I forget now when it happened.
The EDL is no longer really a thing in Britain as far as I know. Tommy Robinson was one of its founders and after he left it began to decline. Now it appears to be little more than a handy govt-fronted disinformation group. I’m sure you’re familiar with such groups in Russia. We have them here, too.
How interesting. I would never have thought that in the countries of the west websites are blocked.
Gatestone
“We no longer replace our numbers; instead we rely on immigration to compensate for the shortfall in births. This immigration is for the most part Muslim; the effect of our demographic decline is, therefore, the Islamization of Europe.”
Point is there is no great reason to set the population of any territory at a certain level. Maybe we like to imagine a cultural or ethnic competition, but going that way will see expansive conflict in times of stress and eventual globalisation and people farming during merger or conquest.
Resources are finite, “living space” is not a uniquely German phenomenon, the ability of a society to manage and self support itself is being forgotten for fast profit and new temptation, the ability to secure the safety of any society from exterior invasion overlooked in various ways.
There is no reason the population of a country should not shrink by half and it still be a good, if not better, environment to inhabit. Selection in that circumstance will favour those that are better organised and committed at a family level, local level, if you remove the oversize greedy footprint of state and its lax, senseless and exaggerated ways, people might remember ot regain a grasp of the true values that keep a society functional.
Currently the cities, that ingest an ever increasing part of the population, are simply not productive in any true sense of the word – dynamic and entrepreneurial in some ways, innovative in others, but they have claimed well above their weight in say with regards to their own importance, their managerial role that originates with the financial ability to implement a mass production that outstrips any simpler economy has led to a forward escape, the only destination they know and sell is one of greater centralised control as they already see their own discipline as superior due to the reliance it has created benefiting its masters.
We might think there is space for diversity and original concept in that great all, but own experience and that of others often demonstrates that is not the case, those that do not subscribe to the wider theme, no matter how peaceful they are, find themselves object of curiosity and target of disruption and interference – this while all kind of abomination is encouraged or lauded.
This is not the world I once knew, it has become formatted and pre-prepared, absorbing every competitive edge available to channel adherence to… to what ?
Wait, people are fleeing Venezuela? No wai! I thought communism was totes supposed to work this time, you guis!!
*eyeroll*