Hat tip: Dazed and Confused.
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Gates of Vienna News Feed 3/18/2009
President Obama backed down from his proposal to force combat veterans’ treatment to be covered by private insurers instead of the VA.
The Messiah seems to have a real tin ear for traditional American political issues. Any halfwit could have told him what would happen with this particular one. But maybe no one did.
Thanks to AA, Brutally Honest, C. Cantoni, CSP, Gaia, Henrik, Insubria, islam o’phobe, JCPA, JD, KGS, TB, Torchlight, Tuan Jim, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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“Getting Tough” With Predator Financial Institutions
AIG, Larry Summers and the Politics of Deflection
The political ‘outrage’ expressed by the Obama Administration is an example of ‘perception management.’ The population is being slyly duped into believing their officials are working in their interest. In reality the officials are channeling growing popular outrage over endless bank bailouts away from the real problem to an entirely tertiary one. The US Government has injected $180 billion since September 2008 to keep the ‘brain dead’ AIG in business and honoring its Credit Default Swap obligations. In effect, they are propping up the casino to continue endless gambling with taxpayer dollars.
The rise of a market in derivatives or ‘swaps’ contracts supposedly to ‘insure’ against a company going into default and not being able to honor its debts, the Credit Default Swaps market, is at the heart of the global financial catastrophe. The market was ‘invented’ by a young economist at JP MorganChase, interestingly enough one of the few big banks recording profit today.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Europe Falls Out of Love With Labor Migration
With unemployment soaring, many European Union countries want the migrant workers they once attracted to go home as quickly as possible. They are sparing no expense or effort to encourage them to leave…
Construction companies and restaurants in these countries were only too pleased to employ the cheap labor from the East. More and more families hired Polish women to clean their houses or nannies with Slavic accents to put their children to bed. The migrants’ wages were modest, and yet in some cases three times as high as they were at home. The newcomers sent as much of their earnings home as possible, injecting capital that helped their hometowns gain unprecedented prosperity.
Once the global economic crisis erupted those days were over. Unemployment has risen twice as fast in Great Britain and Spain as elsewhere in Europe. Now the citizens of Western European countries need the jobs themselves, and their governments are resorting to all kinds of tricks and incentives to get rid of the wiling hands they once needed so badly…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Fed to Buy Up to $300b Long-Term Treasury Bonds
Fed will buy up to $300 billion of long-term government bonds; keeps key rate at record low
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve announced Wednesday it will spend up to $300 billion over the next six months to buy long-term government bonds, a new step aimed at lifting the country out of recession by lowering rates on mortgages and other consumer debt.
At the same time, the Fed left a key short-term bank lending rate at a record low of between zero and 0.25 percent. Economists predict the Fed will hold the rate in that zone for the rest of this year and for most — if not all — of next year.
Fed purchases should boost Treasury prices and drive down their rates. That would ripple through and lower rates on other kinds of debt. The last time the Fed set out to influence long-term interest rates was during the 1960s with Operation Twist, conceived by the Kennedy administration.
The Fed also said it will buy more mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to help that battered market. The central bank will buy an additional $750 billion, bringing its total purchases of these securities to $1.25 trillion. It also will boost its purchase of Fannie and Freddie debt to $200 billion.
“This is not only going to keep mortgage rates low for a long period of time,” said Greg McBride, a senior financial analyst at Bankrate.com. “The mere announcement may produce a honeymoon effect and bring mortgage rates down to even lower levels in the coming days.”
In addition, the Fed said a $1 trillion program to jump-start consumer and small business lending could be expanded to include other financial assets.
The program — which is rolling out this week — currently is focused on spurring lending for autos, education, credit cards and loans for business equipment. The government already has announced an expansion to include commercial real-estate assets. Any broadening of the program would be beyond that area.
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues are taking the new steps as the economy sinks deeper into recession.
Since the Fed last met in late January, “the economy continues to contract,” the policymakers observed.
“Job losses, declining equity and housing wealth and tight credit conditions have weighed on consumer sentiment and spending,” they said.
Businesses, meanwhile, are facing weaker sales prospects and credit troubles have them cutting inventories. Problems overseas have crimped demand for U.S. exports, dealing domestic companies another blow, the Fed said.
| — Hat tip: Henrik | [Return to headlines] |
JP Morgan Will Use $400 Million of the Bailoutmoney to Send Thousands of Jobs to India
New information pertaining to the billions in bailout funds given to American financial institutions has come light, shredding Washington’s carefully crafted meme that the money was needed to “ease credit” and exposing the shenanigans of AIG and JP Chase Morgan who received billions of tax payer funds.
Coming on the heels of AIG’s bountiful 165 million bonuses to employees is the revelation that yet another bank bailout, JP Morgan Chase, is going to spend 400 million to outsource thousands of jobs to India.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Klaus: Europe and the Ongoing Financial Crisis
Thank you for the possibility to be with all of you here tonight because I do not very often speak in Milano. I am glad that the Istituto Bruno Leoni gave me this opportunity. I am aware that the institute plays an important role in Italy. I am also very pleased that my book “Pianeta blu, non verde”, in its Italian version, was officially launched today.
As you probably know, it is not a book about climatology or about the technicalities of global warming. It is a book about an ideology called environmentalism and about the dangers behind the ambitions — based on this ideology — to fight the non-existent problem of global warming. I will not go into these arguments here now. I know you wanted me to talk about the ongoing economic crisis, but a connection of the global warming hysteria with the crisis does exist and I have to mention it here.
There is, of course, no connection between temperature and economic growth. We know that there are economically successful countries with both cold and hot climate. Nigel Lawson says in his recent book that “the average annual temperature in Helsinki is less than 5°C/41°F. That in Singapore is in excess of 27°C/81°F — a difference of more than 22°C/40°F.” There is, however, a connection between policies, based on attempts to mitigate the allegedly dangerously growing temperatures, and long-term economic growth.
These policies have been putting obstacles in the way of economic development and we can, therefore, argue that they do contribute to the depth of the current crisis and especially to its prolongation — despite the fact that they did not trigger it.
The connection in the opposite direction is not that clear. I don’t share the erroneous hope of some people that the current crisis will fundamentally change priorities and will make the debate about global warming more rational. I am afraid it is only a wishful thinking. The politicians and their “fellow travelers” have invested so much in global warming they are not willing to devalue this — for them — so precious political capital.
Nevertheless, the financial and economical crisis is here, and is here to stay for some time. There is no miraculous way to get rid of it even though some politicians in Europe and America promise to do it. Let me put this issue into a broader perspective.
A month ago, I spent three days discussing this topic with an important group of leading politicians at the World Economic Forum in Davos and my depressing feeling from these discussions is that both the elementary rationality and the economic science have been more or less excluded, suppressed or forgotten.
I am surprised that no one was prepared for the crisis. To assume that good weather, blue skies, azzurro, will be here permanently is a short-sightedness, if not an intellectual defect. The very unpleasant, day by day deeper economic crisis should be treated as a standard, cyclically repeated economic phenomenon. We should also take it as an unavoidable consequence and hence a “just” price we have to pay for the long-term playing with the market by the politicians and their regulators. Their attempts to blame the market, instead of themselves, should be resolutely rejected. Their activities, aiming at “reforming”, which means re-regulating the economic system world-wide, are all very doubtful and I as said in Davos: “I am getting more afraid of reforms bringing in more rules and increased international regulation than of the crisis itself.” A large increase in the scope of financial regulation and protectionism, as is being proposed these days, will only prolong the recession in the short-run, and undermine the long-term growth potential.
My country has not, luckily, experienced any financial crisis so far. We had one ten years ago, in the moment of the Asian financial turmoil, and it forced our banks to become very cautious. Only three OECD countries have not pumped money into their financial system now — Czech Republic, Slovakia and Mexico. That’s the reason why we are frustrated when the West European media put us together with some of the visibly vulnerable countries of Eastern Europe.
What we did import is the economic crisis. This happened partly because of the fall of demand for our exports, and partly because of the behaviour of foreign banks which own our local banks. Due to the problems in their mother countries, and in the attempts to rebalance their portfolios, they dangerously restricted credits even in countries without apparent financial problems. This is the effect of globalization and of our rapid selling off our state-owned banks after the fall of communism when there was and could not be any domestic capital at our disposal.
Aggregate demand needs strengthening. One traditional way to do this is to increase government spending, mostly on public infrastructure projects, on condition these are available and the country is ready to massively increase its indebtedness. The Czech government has not yet decided to do so because we do not believe in this procedure. Not all of us are Keynesians, even now. We are well aware of the crowding-out effect. It would be much more helpful to initiate a radical reduction of all kinds of restrictions on private initiatives introduced in the last half a century during the era of the brave new world of the “social and ecological market economy”. The best thing to do right now would be to temporarily weaken, if not permanently repeal, politically correct labour, environmental, social, health and other “standards”, because they block economic activity more than anything else.
The question which is raised these days wherever I come is whether the current financial and economic crisis has been caused by capitalism, perhaps by too much capitalism, or — on the contrary — whether it was caused by lack of capitalism, by suppressing its normal functioning, by introduction of policies that are not compatible with capitalism, of policies that undermine it. My answer is that we witness a government failure, not a market failure as some politicians try to tell us.
Not to be misunderstood, I am not in favor of anarchy or elimination of the state. But I don’t believe in the capabilities and the motivations of the state. For most of my life — till twenty years ago — I lived in a system where political, social and all other non-economic arguments and claims of the state dictated the economy, not the other way round. This sequencing is crucial. The horse must always be in front of the carriage, not behind it.
The wrong sequence was the defining feature of the communist system, and the whole idea of our transformation from communism to freedom and market economy was to change this. Our aim was to let the market function, and to supplement market economy with rational social, and now also environmental policies. I stress supplement, which means to add ex-post, not to impose ex-ante. I am sorry to say that the current European, originally German, now also more and more American social and ecological market economy leads us into a totally different world. This is what bothers me.
Václav Klaus, Notes for Milano, Palazzo Realo, Istituto Bruno Leoni, March 16, 2009
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Recession: France, First Fall in National Wealth in 30 Years
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, MARCH 17 — The steep downturn on stock markets and the slump in property prices may appears to have led to a 3% drop in France’s net national wealth in 2008, the first fall since 1978. This is the finding of a study by the country’s statistical agency, INSEE, which examines the country’s national wealth during the 30-year period from 1978 to 2007. At the end of 2007, French families boasted net overall wealth of 9,500 billion euro, two-thirds of which was made up of non-financial assets. Over the 30 years in question, the percentage of France’s population who are home-owners rose from 47% to 58%, and in the past 10 years the value of these assets rose sharply from representing 4.4 years of gross income during the period 1978-1997, to reach 7.5 years of gross income in 2007. There was a rise of over 10% in the value of wealth held between 2003 and 2006 thanks to a boom in property prices. In 2007 this growth saw a slow-down and in 2008 “this turned into a fall, of around 3%, for the first time in 30 years, in view of the stock-market downturn and a reverse of trend on the property market”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
UK: A Strong Family and Small State Ought to Go Hand in Hand
The economic crisis is forcing the Tories to rethink their policy agenda. In the first part of a new series, Tim Montgomerie argues that social reform matters more than ever before
If you ask a traditional Conservative to list the causes of economic wealth, they’ll give you a familiar list. Low and simple taxation. Light touch regulation. Free trade. Opposition to monopolies. Property rights. Low inflation.
All good answers but not, says David Cameron, the full answer. Since he became Tory leader he has been arguing that Britain’s long-term health — and wealth — depend upon the strength of society, too. Families that stay together. Children who leave school with meaningful qualifications. Adults who stay free of drug and alcohol dependency. A welfare state that encourages personal industry, not dependency.
These hallmarks of a socially conservative society should also be the goal of every fiscal conservative. A society full of strong families is a society that doesn’t need expensive state welfare. A society that nurtures educated and independent citizens is a society that will produce more tax revenue. The link between family structure and later success in life is established by empirical study.
As the economy worsens there will be pressure on Mr Cameron to retreat from his social agenda. He must resist that pressure. Although, as prime minister, he will need to get an urgent grip on the ballooning budget deficit, he must also have a long-term focus on building the kind of strong society that makes a small state sustainable…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Public Sector Job Numbers Soar as Unemployment Hits Two Million for First Time in 12 Years
But while private firms bore the brunt of the job losses, the number of people employed in the public sector actually rose over the past year.
Public sector jobs soared by 30,000 to 5.78million last year while employment in private firms fell by 105,000 to 23.6million, said the Office for National Statistics.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
ACORN to Play Role in 2010 Census
The U.S. Census Bureau is working with several national organizations to help recruit 1.4 million workers to produce the country’s 2010 census, including one with a history of voter fraud charges: ACORN.
The U.S. Census is supposed to be free of politics, but one group with a history of voter fraud, ACORN, is participating in next year’s count, raising concerns about the politicization of the decennial survey.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
AIG Exec Digs Che Guevara?
The gentleman second from the right in the picture below [wearing a Che Guevera T shirt], Gerry Pasciucco, heads the AIG Financial Products unit. “We learned over the weekend,Che fan” reads a letter dated March 17 from New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo to Rep. Barney Frank, that AIG had, last Friday, distributed more than $160 million in retention payments (bonuses) to members of its Financial Products Subsidiary, the unit of AIG that was principally responsible for the firm’s meltdown.”
[…]
The Soviets sent the equivalent in economic subsidies of eight Marshall Plans to Cuba, which was not a war-ravaged continent of 300 million people but an island of 6 million people who shortly before had enjoyed a higher-per-capita income than half of Europe. These Cuban citizens had owned more TVs’ per capita than any European country, had enjoyed the services (some free, most extremely cheap) of more doctors and dentists per capita then citizens in the U.S. or Britain and had never emigrated from their homeland. Instead, in the 40’s and 50’s when Cubans could get U.S. visas for the asking and Cubans were perfectly free to emigrate with all their property and family, fewer Cubans lived in the U.S. than Americans in Cuba. At the time Cuban laborers earned the 8th highest wages — not in Latin America— but in the world.
By a process that defies not only the laws of economics, but seemingly the very laws of physics , 40 years later Castroite Cuba emerged from this Soviet largesse with among the lowest per-capita incomes in the Hemisphere, a lower credit rating than Somalia, fewer phones per capita than Papua New Guinea, fewer internet connections than Uganda, and 20 per cent of her population gone — all at total cost of their property and many at extreme cost to life and limb
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
First Fifty-Six Days: What Obama Hath Wrought
The first fifty-six days of the Obama presidency have been—to put it mildly— planned frenzy. Frenzy in an attempt to keep We-the-People from knowing what’s really going on (chaos is a tyrant’s friend) and planned because it was! Just some of what Obama and his supplicant Congress have wrought includes: …
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Gates Readies Big Cuts in Weapons
WASHINGTON — As the Bush administration was drawing to a close, Robert M. Gates, whose two years as defense secretary had been devoted to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, felt compelled to warn his successor of a crisis closer to home.
The United States “cannot expect to eliminate national security risks through higher defense budgets, to do everything and buy everything,” Gates said. The next defense secretary, he warned, would have to eliminate some costly hardware and invest in new tools for fighting insurgents.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Hijab-Wearing Basketball Star Scores Big in US
For most teenagers high-school is tough enough facing peer-pressure and acne, but being a Muslim female who wears a hijab, or headscarf, can make it even more daunting, especially when you are a top-scoring, history-making basketball player.
For Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir, who is on her way to becoming the first player in Massachusetts state history—male or female—to score 3,000 points, wearing the hijab was not an option but she was determined not to let it be an obstacle either.
“I’d like to really inspire a lot of young Muslim girls if they want to play basketball “
Bilqis—young basketball star”It really wasn’t a decision. I had to.” Bilqis told Sports Illustrated. “I had to get used to it, no matter how hard it was for me. I know the first few weeks in school kind of tested me.”
At 5’ 3.5”, Bilqis started playing as an eighth-grader for New Leadership Charter School in Springfield but it was not until she reached puberty that she put the Muslim veil on and consequently start playing in full Muslim dress with her arms and legs completely covered beneath her uniform.
Bilqis said it was not easy and she frequently turned heads as people taunted her about the “tablecloth” on her head or for being a “terrorist.”
“Sometimes they yell out, ‘Terrorist!’“ one of Bilqis’ teammates told the Boston Globe. “She gets mad, but she doesn’t lash out. I don’t know how she handles it. She just takes it.”
Things changed for the honor student when she stunned critics and proved to be an exceptional player with her major skills on the court. Bilqis is now expected to become the first Muslim player in NCAA Division I history.
Bilqis is set to start college on a full basketball scholarship next fall in Memphis and hopes to become a heart surgeon.
“I’d like to really inspire a lot of young Muslim girls if they want to play basketball,” Bilqis told the paper. “Anything is possible. They can do it, too.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
John Bolton: the Coming War on Sovereignty
Barack Obama’s nascent presidency has brought forth the customary flood of policy proposals from the great and good, all hoping to influence his administration. One noteworthy offering is a short report with a distinguished provenance entitled A Plan for Action, which features a revealingly immodest subtitle: A New Era of International Cooperation for a Changed World: 2009, 2010, and Beyond.In presentation and tone, A Plan for Action is determinedly uncontroversial; indeed, it looks and reads more like a corporate brochure than a foreign-policy paper. The text is the work of three academics-Bruce Jones of NYU, Carlos Pascual of the Brookings Institution, and Stephen John Stedman of Stanford. Its findings and recommendations, they claim, rose from a series of meetings with foreign-policy eminences here and abroad, including former Secretaries of State of both parties as well as defense officials from the Clinton and first Bush administrations. The participation of these notables is what gives A Plan for Action its bona fides, though one should doubt how much the document actually reflects their ideas. There is no question, however, that the ideas advanced in A Plan for Action have become mainstays in the liberal vision of the future of American foreign policy.That is what makes A Plan for Action especially interesting, and especially worrisome. If it is what it appears to be-a blueprint for the Obama administration’s effort to construct a foreign policy different from George W. Bush’s-then the nation’s governing elite is in the process of taking a sharp, indeed radical, turn away from the principles and practices of representative self-government that have been at the core of the American experiment since the nation’s founding. The pivot point is a shifting understanding of American sovereignty…
| — Hat tip: CSP | [Return to headlines] |
No Use for Unions
Labor: In the same week legislation that would kill the secret ballot used to form a union is introduced, a poll finds fewer than one in 10 non-union workers wants to join a union. No wonder coercion is necessary.
The bill is called the Employee Free Choice Act. But instead of liberating workers, it would enslave them to unions.
Under current law, a work force is organized when a simple majority of workers, voting with secret ballots, approves of unionization. The Employee Free Choice Act, more appropriately called the card check bill, turns that honorable practice on its head.
If it becomes law, unions would be certified if a simple majority sign the cards that are used to gauge employee interest in voting on union participation. The signing is done publicly, where workers are vulnerable to intimidation from union representatives.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Drops Controversial Health Care Plan for Wounded Veterans
President Obama will not advance a plan to require private insurance carriers to reimburse the Department of Veterans Affairs for the treatment of troops injured in service.
President Obama, after an uproar by veterans groups, has scrapped a plan to require private insurance carriers to reimburse the Department of Veterans Affairs for the treatment of troops injured in service.
“In considering the third-party billing issue, the administration was seeking to maximize the resources available for veterans,” White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Wednesday in a written statement. “However, the president listened to concerns raised by the [veteran service organizations] that this might, under certain circumstances, affect veterans’ and their families’ ability to access health care.
“Therefore, the president has instructed that its consideration be dropped,” Gibbs said.
Obama met with 11 veterans service organizations on Monday and explained his plan to increase funding for Veterans Affairs by $25 billion over five years and bring more than 500,000 eligible veterans of modest income into the VA health care system by 2013.
But the American Legion, the nation’s largest veterans group, said the president’s plan would have increased premiums, made insurance unaffordable for veterans and imposed a massive hardship on military families. It could have also prevented small businesses from hiring veterans who have large health care needs, the group said.
The American Legion applauded Obama’s decision to drop the plan on Wednesday.
“We are glad that President Obama listened to the strong objections raised by The American Legion and veterans everywhere about this unfair plan,” Cmdr. David K. Rehbein of the American Legion said. “We thank the administration for its proposed increase in the VA budget and we are always available to assist by providing guidance to ensure a veterans health are system that is worthy of the heroes that use it.”
The American Legion wants the existing system to remain in place. Service-related injuries currently are treated and paid for by the government. The American Legion has proposed that Medicare reimburse the VA for the treatment of veterans.
| — Hat tip: Brutally Honest | [Return to headlines] |
Soldiers Pledge to Refuse Disarmament Demands
Campaign urges members of military to ‘steel resolve’ to ‘do the right thing’
An invitation to soldiers and peace officers across the United States to pledge to refuse illegal orders — including “state of emergency” orders that could include disarming or detaining American citizens — has struck a chord, collecting more than 100,000 website visitors in a little over a week and hundreds of e-mails daily.
Spokesman Stewart Rhodes of Oath Keepers told WND his organization’s goal is to remind military members their oath of allegiance is to the U.S. Constitution, not a particular president.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Knock on the Door
A sitting President of the United States is “organizing a political organization loyal to him, bound by a pledge, outside the government and existing party apparatus. The historical precedents are ominous.”
[…]
As Politico reported, OFA will take the 10 million person database built up by the Obama campaign “to mobilize support for the president’s legislative agenda.”
A visit to the OFA website reveals that supporters are not simply asked to sign up, they are asked to take a pledge. A pledge to support — not the flag, not the constitution, not the country, not even the Democratic Party, but Obama and his “bold plan.” OFA does not use the Democratic Party logo but the “O”-shaped logo of the Obama campaign in which the red white and blue of the flag are abstracted to soft pastel colors.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Canada: Lorne Gunter: “Housing First” Homeless Strategy Won’t Work for Alberta … or Anywhere
Anytime someone proposes an elaborate new plan to end homelessness, the first thing they should be asked is “Are you going to reinstitute involuntary committal of mental patients who refuse to take their medications?”
If not, then ask them politely to move along and keep their hands off your tax money.
There are two causes of homelessness that tower over all others — mental illness and drug addiction — and unless and until governments, poverty activists and social agencies are prepared to confront these two, no appreciable dent will be made in homelessness.
The fashionable philosophy in homeless programming for the past two decades has been “housing first”: Get the homeless their own housing and the rest of their problems, while not disappearing, will be far easier to solve.
This may sound sensible, but it is truly nothing more than another way to demand that governments build more “social” housing.
After the fad of building subsidized housing died in the late 1980s, advocates struggled for ways to repackage their argument, until an initiative called Housing First was born in New York in 1992 as a strategy to deal with vagrants, addicts and squeegee men by moving them into their own apartments.
On Monday, even Alberta succumbed to this fad. That day, the Alberta Secretariat for Action on Homelessness — a provincial government-commissioned agency — laid out a $3.3-billion, 10-year strategy to eliminate homelessness in the province by 2019.
Yes, the report does recommend that provincial jails, foster homes, hospitals and nursing homes not be permitted to release inmates, wards, patients and residents on to the street, or even into shelters. This comes close to reviving the proven notion of involuntary committal. But without a plan (and budget) that would enable such facilities to hold on to potential homeless people indefinitely, such a recommendation is no more than wishful thinking.
The cornerstone of the homeless secretariat’s report, instead, is a call for 8,000 or more new, affordable, public housing units over the next decade, as well as improved and streamlined support services for those living on Alberta’s streets.
That sounds an awful lot like “housing first” to me. And given that the strategy has been tried across North America for nearly two decades without major success, it is time to tell the nice Alberta secretariat people to move on and leave taxpayers’ money alone.
Moreover, at least two-thirds of the homeless are on the streets because they are off their meds or addicted to drugs. Poverty is not the root cause of their status. So even if you build them new affordable housing, they will still be mentally ill or addicts. Nice, new apartment or not, they will still suffer from the very conditions that led them to homelessness in the first place.
This is not a call to ignore the homeless. Most are victims of their conditions, not the author of their own circumstances. This is not even a call for construction of vast new warehouses in which to consign the homeless until they are “cured.” A system in which mental patients live in mainstream society, but in which they are required to report to authorities to prove they are taking their pills — or be committed — would probably be preferable.
But if you are going to start by asking for $3-billion for “housing first,” you may as well be asking for $3-billion for happy-face stickers. That will do just as much good.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Canada: Terrorism Double-Standard
As members of this editorial board watched tens of thousands of Tamil Canadians throng downtown Toronto on Monday, we couldn’t help but be struck by a curious double-standard that afflicts Canadian ethnopolitics. To wit: Why are Canadian Tamils permitted to express support for terrorism in a manner that would be considered outrageous if the demonstrators were Arab or Muslim?
The rally that took place in Toronto on Monday was not just, as organizers claimed, an expression of support for Tamil civilians in war-torn Sri Lanka. Many of the participants carried flags of the Tamil Tigers, a terrorist group that practices suicide bombings and abducts children to use as soldiers. (In 2006, Canada’s federal government officially designated the Tamil Tigers a terrorist group, a move that criminalized the group’s fundraising efforts in this country.) Some of the banners displayed on Monday also depicted Tiger leader Velupillai Prabhakaran, a wanted mass murderer who personally authorizes the acts of terrorism the group has committed over the last three decades.
Yet there was little outrage. To our knowledge, no politicians at any level of government have come forward to denounce this open demonstration of support for a banned terrorist group. In fact, Liberal MP Gurbax Singh Malhi recently appeared personally at a similar rally in Ottawa, and another Liberal MP, Derek Lee, has urged other MPs to join in, too.
Imagine for a moment, if the protestors had instead been Arab or Muslim. Would Stephen Harper, Michael Ignatieff, Dalton McGuinty and David Miller be silent if 120,000 supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah paralyzed downtown Toronto as they chanted slogans and waved flags praising groups that slaughter Jews?
To his great credit, Mr. Ignatieff recently denounced “Israel Apartheid Week” when he saw that it was being used as a cover for poisonous attacks against the Jewish state. Jason Kenney, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, has lashed out against the Canadian Arab Federation for its leader’s unhinged attacks in the same vein. This zero-tolerance attitude toward terror-apologism is praiseworthy — but we would like to see it applied across the board. The Sinhalese Sri Lankan victims of Tamil Tiger terrorism are no less deserving of support than the Jewish residents of Ashkelon or Sderot.
The reason for this double standard is obvious: There are more than 200,000 Canadians of Sri Lankan Tamil descent in Canada, enough to comprise a swing vote in suburban Toronto-area ridings. This is the reason that the Liberals were too scared to ban the Tamil Tigers as a terrorist organization when they were in power — even with an (otherwise) principled anti-terror activist, Irwin Cotler, ensconced as Justice Minister. It was only when the Conservatives took power that the Tamils were added to the list of banned terrorist groups.
That move was a welcome one: Tamil bagmen can now no longer operate with impunity, extorting “contributions” from Tamil-owned businesses to fund the war back in Sri Lanka. And the police have since busted up a number of fundraising fronts tied to the Tigers. But public figures must also speak out when supporters of the Tigers make a spectacle of themselves, as they did in Toronto.
The message must be: Terrorism is a criminal affront to Canadian values, wherever it is practiced. Just because Canadians don’t pay as much attention to Sri Lanka as they do to Israel doesn’t change that fact.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
CIA Snatch Trial Adjourned
Prosecutors optimistic court ruling won’t halt case
(ANSA) — Milan, March 18 — A Milan trial into the CIA’s rendition of a Muslim cleric in 2003 has been adjourned until the Constitutional Court issues a formal explanation of its recent ruling that prosecutors broke state secrecy.
The Constitutional Court ruled on March 12 that prosecutors broke secrecy rules in some cases but not others in their investigation of the abduction of Hassan Mustafa Omar Nasr. The verdict’s explanation, which the trial judges need in order to determine whether the case can go ahead, is expected in about a month.
The Milan judges adjourned proceedings until April 22.
The lead prosecutor in the case, Armando Spataro, told reporters he did not think the case would be halted when the Constitutional Court verdict emerges in full.
“I don’t think it will be stopped,” he said.
The verdict, expanding on a brief communique issued on the night of the ruling, is expected to set a new framework for court proceedings. In Spataro’s view, it will likely spell out that prosecutors will have to “stick closely to limits” when questioning defendants.
Last week’s ruling upheld some petitions from successive Italian governments but rejected others, allowing both sides to cry victory.
According to legal experts, it meant that certain documents on the activities of military intelligence agency SISMI would be ruled inadmissible, as well as the confession of a Carabinieri officer who said he took part in the snatch.
But prosecutors would be allowed to use wiretaps of SISMI agents, experts said.
Spataro last week said the verdict “showed we were correct” while the state’s general advocate, Ignazio Francesco Caramazza, claimed “a complete victory”.
Legal experts added that the prosecutors would perhaps be hampered by not being allowed to ask questions about relations between the CIA and SISMI.
The Constitutional Court took two days to examine three pleas from Italian governments on the trial of several top Italian spies and 26 CIA agents in the abduction of Nasr.
It also considered two counterpleas, from the Milan judge and the prosecution in the case, arguing that state secrecy norms were not violated and the abduction itself was a “subversive” act that breached the Constitution.
Spataro has accused Berlusconi and his predecessor Romano Prodi of using national security norms to obstruct justice and “prevent the truth emerging”.
Italian governments, while denying any role in Nasr’s abduction, have argued that the probe compromised relations with foreign security agencies.
The abduction of Nasr claimed headlines worldwide and stoked discussion of the controversial US policy of ‘extraordinary rendition’, which was recently extended by President Barack Obama under the proviso that detainees’ rights should be respected.
The top Italian defendant in the case is Niccolo’ Pollari, the former head of SISMI, which recently changed its name to AISE.
Eight Italians including Pollari and his former deputy Marco Mancini are on trial with the 26 CIA agents, who are being tried in absentia.
The US agents include ex-Rome CIA station chief Robert Seldon Lady and ex-Milan chief Jeff Castelli.
Nasr, the former head of Milan’s main mosque, disappeared from the northern Italian city on February 17, 2003.
Prosecutors say he was snatched by a team of CIA operatives with SISMI’s help and whisked off to a NATO base in Ramstein, Germany.
From there, he was taken to Egypt to be interrogated, allegedly under duress.
Nasr, who was under investigation in Italy on suspicion of helping terrorists, was released early in 2007 from an Egyptian jail where he says he was beaten, given electric shocks and threatened with rape.
He has demanded millions of euros in compensation from the Italian government.
Berlusconi, who was in power at the time of the events, has been called to testify at the trial.
Prodi, his predecessor and successor, has also been admitted as a witness.
The CIA was first granted permission to use rendition in a presidential directive signed by President Bill Clinton in 1995 and the practice grew sharply after the September 11 terrorist attacks.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Czech Rep: Týden: Klaus Provokes Abroad, Unable to Advise Home
Prague, March 16 (CTK) — Czech President Vaclav Klaus cultivates “provocacy” abroad, which is his personal form of diplomacy, but he is somehow unable to give advice at home, Martin Fendrych writes in weekly Tyden Monday.
“He ridicules, he teaches lessons to Washington, Brussels, he utters witty sentences and he even sometimes hits the target,” Fendrych writes.
He reminds the lectures Klaus delivered in the United States early this month and his criticism of US President Barack Obama in meetings with journalists and at a climate conference in Santa Barbara.
“I can hardly believe my own eyes when I see how much you trust the government and how much you mistrust the free market,” Fendrych quotes Klaus as saying on one occasion.
Klaus was alluding to the doubling of the United States’ state debt and Obama’s effort to “bribe” the economic crisis, he writes.
Klaus also criticised the fundamental cuts in US armament expenditure that, he said, might lead to a “new American isolationism,” Fendrych writes.
Klaus did not attract the attention of the major US media, but this does not mean much. The more important is that he is taunting the US “icon” shortly before he is to arrive in Prague for an informal meeting with EU heads of state and government on April 4-5, Fendrych writes.
This can be overlooked neither by the Czech media nor the US embassy staff who are preparing Obama’s Czech visit, Fendrych writes.
He says Klaus is easily and quickly becoming Obama’s rival and thanks to the criticism he will reach his level.
Similarly he became a sort of rival to former US vice-president Al Gore thanks to his global warming scepticism compared with Gore’s struggle against climate change.
Klaus is right in many respects. A freedom-loving individual must like his attacks on the new US “God.” Praguers, for their part, must be even more pleased because Obama’s visit will only bring them various restrictions, Fendrych writes.
He says Klaus knows this well and he skillfully chooses themes. It would be difficult not to share his resentment of the Eurobureaucracy, Fendrych writes.
He says that many a Czech felt mischievous joy when Klaus said in the European Parliament in February that the Union has “a democratic deficit.”
Klaus’s criticism of Obama and the “undemocratic” EU, however, is rather out of place when developments in his country are considered, Fendrych writes.
In the United States no one will remind Klaus of that the Czech state poured some 500 billion crowns into the collapsing banks in the latter half of the 1990s and that the problems surfaced when he was prime minister, and that no one was punished for the siphoning off of assets from the banks, Fendrych writes.
In Brussels, no one will unfortunately remind him of the fundamental Czech democratic deficit — the ill judiciary, the most difficult law enforcement, and the length of lawsuits some of which are dragged out for more than ten years, Fendrych writes.
“One can hardly imagine a worse deficit,” he writes.
At home, Klaus would have many opportunities to show how brilliant he is. One them is the existence of 300 ghettos, mainly inhabited by Romanies, that is the biggest and least popular problem.
“In ghettos, however, the free market and its invisible hand are represented by usurers, and this is something else than global warming or the U.S. debt,” Fendrych writes.
He says “Klaus has one very Czech feature: the strong need to criticise, a great portion of irony, the cheap concept of freedom, and dislike of and inability to solve really burning, local, unpopular, acute problems.”
“It tastes sweet to ridicule warming, but it tastes bitter to live with socially deprived citizens,” Fendrych writes in conclusion.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Denmark: Police Figures Show Massive Shootings Increase
Recent gang-related gun violence in Copenhagen weighs heavily in the latest national crime statistics
The latest figures from the National Centre for Investigation (NEC), outlining gang membership and arrests in Denmark, show a sharp increase in the number of gang-related shootings.
In 2007, police registered 28 shooting episodes, of which 12 were attributed to gangs currently being monitored by the authorities. Last year, that figure rose to 167 shootings, of which 76 were gang-related.
Police continuously monitor 80 different biker and immigrant gangs, including support groups for each. Police keep tabs on a total of 944 gang members — 585 associated with the bikers and 359 linked to immigrant gangs. More than 6,500 sentences were handed down to gang members and their support groups by Danish courts last year amounting to 2,228 years in prison terms.
The NEC is the police branch responsible for the investigation of organised crime, within and outside Denmark’s borders. In its latest report, investigators fingered the struggle for the control of the drugs market as the primary cause of tension between the biker and immigrant criminals.
Throughout last year, the Hells Angels bikers established ten new AK81 support groups to help strengthen their position and mark their territory. AK81 means Altid Klar (always ready), with 81 representing the numeral letters of the alphabet — H and A.
The national police also highlighted the age difference between the bikers and their opposition. The average age of a Hells Angels member is 39 years old, while the immigrant gangs are on average ten years younger.
Members of the AK81 support group average 27 years old.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
EU Bans Use of ‘Miss’ and ‘Mrs’ (and Sportsmen and Statesmen) Because it Claims They Are Sexist
Using ‘Miss’ and ‘Mrs’ has been banned by leaders of the European Union because they are not considered politically correct.
Brussels bureaucrats have decided the words are sexist and issued new guidelines in its bid to create ‘gender-neutral’ language.
The booklet warns European politicians they must avoid referring to a woman’s marital status.
This also means Madame and Mademoiselle, Frau and Fraulein and Senora and Senorita are banned.
Instead of using the standard titles, it is asking MEPs to address women by their names.
And the rules have not stopped there — they also ban MEPs saying sportsmen and statesmen, advising athletes and political leaders should be used instead.
Man-made is also taboo — it should be artificial or synthetic, firemen is disallowed and air hostesses should be called flight attendants.
Headmasters and headmistresses must be heads or head teachers, laymen becomes layperson, and manageress or mayoress should be manager or mayor.
Police officers must be used instead of policeman and policewoman unless the officer’s sex is relevant.
The only problem words that do not fit into the guidelines are waiter and waitress, which means MEPs are at least spared one worry when ordering a coffee.
They have reacted with incredulity to the booklet, which has been sent out by the Secretary General of the European Parliament.
Scottish Tory MEP Struan Stevenson described the guidelines as ‘political correctness gone mad’.
He said: ‘This is frankly ludicrous. We’ve seen the EU institutions try to ban the bagpipes and dictate the shape of bananas, but now they seem determined to tell us which words we are entitled to use in our own language.
‘Gender-neutrality is really the last straw. The Thought Police are now on the rampage in the European Parliament.
‘We will soon be told that the use of the words “man” or “woman” has been banned in case it causes offence to those who consider ‘gender neutrality’ an essential part of life.’
West Midlands Conservative MEP Philip Bradbourn is calling on the Secretary General to reveal who authorised the publication of the booklet and how much it has cost.
He described it as ‘a waste of taxpayers’ money’ and ‘an erosion of the English language as we know it’.
‘I will have no part of it. I will continue to use my own language and expressions, which I have used all my life, and will not be instructed by this institution or anyone else in these matters,’ he said.
‘I shall also expect the many translators who sit in the European parliament to translate accurately the language I use. I find this publication offensive in the extreme.
‘The Parliament, by the publication of this document, is not only bringing itself as an institution into more disrepute than it already suffers, but it is also showing that it has succumbed to the politically correct clap-trap currently in vogue.’
| — Hat tip: AA | [Return to headlines] |
Greece: New Laws Target Hoodies
Vandals, rioters offending while wearing hoods will have jail terms doubled
Justice Minister Nikos Dendias yesterday heralded the introduction of stricter penalties for hooded demonstrators caught vandalizing public property or disturbing the peace, proposing that jail terms be doubled for those found guilty of wreaking havoc while concealing their identity.
“We envisage a series of provisions (to discourage) the use of hoods, the concealment of features,” Dendias said after talks with Inner Cabinet officials. “Greek citizens should not be afraid to show their faces, particularly while protesting,” he added.
The new stricter penalties would range from two years for disturbing the peace — an offense that currently carries a one-year jail term — to 10 years or more for causing widespread damage to public property and injuring citizens or police officers….
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: Two Out of Three Serious Teenage Criminals Are Immigrants
THE HAGUE, 18/03/09 — Two out of three serious teenage criminals are children of parents born outside the Netherlands. In most cases, no prison sentence is imposed, it emerges from a study sent to parliament by Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin.
In the research, 447 case files of youngsters aged from 12 to 17 were studied. All the files involved cases in which the perpetrator was convicted of a crime for which the maximum jail sentence is 8 years or more. These were murder, manslaughter, robbery with violence, extortion, arson, public acts of violence and sexual crimes.
Only just over one-third (37 percent) of the convicted youngsters are white Dutch. Two-thirds are of immigrant origin, meaning that they themselves or their mothers were born abroad.
“The most prevalent group of youthful immigrants (among the perpetrators) are young Moroccans (14 percent),” according to the report. For another 14 percent, the parents’ country of birth could not be determined. A further 8 percent of the young criminals came from Turkey, 7 percent from Surinam and another 7 percent from the Netherlands Antilles, 9 percent from the category ‘other non-Westerners’ and 4 percent, ‘other Westerners.’
The report also reveals that most offenders did not have to go to jail. Although detention was imposed in 69 percent of the cases — whether or not in combination with community service — the sentences were largely suspended.
Some 25 percent of offenders only received suspended detention. Another one-third received a combination of suspended and real detention and just 11 percent, only an unconditional prison sentence.
Fourteen percent of the very serious crimes were committed by 12-13 year olds, 25 percent by 14-15 year olds, and 50 percent by 16-17 year olds. All very serious types of crime were more frequently committed by 16-17 year olds except sexual offences, for which the 14-15 year olds were the biggest group. Here, the 12-13 year olds also deliver “a large share compared with the other types of offences.”
The core question in the study was how judges deal with youngsters aged from 12 through 17 who commit very serious offences. Hirsch Ballin concludes “that the courts can operate adequately with the sentences and measures that youth criminal law offer them. The study offers a nuanced picture of the handling of serious youth cases,” according to the minister.
| — Hat tip: Torchlight | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: MP Calls Chinese “Slit-Eyes”, Then Apologises
Conservative MP Arend-Jan Boekestijn has apologised for referring to Chinese as “slit-eyes”. In the course of an online discussion about dictators Mr Boekestijn said that he might have underestimated the number of Chinese victims during Mao Zedong’s rule. When challenged in a twitter conversation started by author Ronald Giphart the MP wrote “Yes, I may have missed a slit-eye or two, there are so many of them!”
The MP later deleted his remark from his twitter page, but meanwhile other sites had copied and republished the text. He later published an apology: “I regret my remark about Chinese. I had no intention of offending anyone.”
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Norway: the Progress Party Tops Latest Poll
The right wing Progress Party now has the support of 30.9 per cent of the electorate, and is again the nation’s largest political party, according to the latest poll carried out by Opinion. The decline for Labour continues. Opinion’s results for March:
- Progress Party 30.9 (+6.4)
- Labour Party 28.4 (-2.1)
- Conservatives 13.2 (-3.5)
- Agrarians 6.8 (+1.6)
- Socialist Left 6.4 (-0.4)
- Liberal Left 6.1 (-1.2)
- Chr. Democrats 5.6 (-0.4)
- Red 1.8 (+0.1)
The poll was made for the ANB news agency
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Red Ken: I Said Brown Was a Liability and Time Has Proved Me Right
KEN LIVINGSTONE launched a savage personal attack on Gordon Brown today, criticising his handling of the economy and blaming the Prime Minister’s national polling for costing him the mayoral election.
In a wide-ranging interview to be published tomorrow, the former mayor of London claimed that Labour’s unpopularity led directly to his defeat at the hands of Boris Johnson last summer.
Mr Livingstone also hinted that he would run as an independent if the party should “rig” its candidate selection process for the next mayoral race in 2012.
Mr Livingstone caused uproar within the Labour party when he called for Mr Brown to be sacked as Chancellor in 1998.
At the time, he accused Mr Brown of “economic misjudgments”, “subservience to the City” by guaranteeing big bonuses, and claimed that Britain was “heading towards an unnecessary recession entirely of Gordon’s making”.
Most wounding of all, Mr Livingstone wrote in 1998 that Mr Brown could not “ grasp the grand picture” and lacked an “instinctive feel for the huge sweep of movements in the global economy”. He wrote: “Quite clearly, Gordon is not on top of macro-economic policy.”
In last year’s mayoral election, he ditched his criticisms as the pair campaigned against Mr Johnson.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
Special Report/ the Gaza War and the Rise of the Neo-French
One citizen or resident of France out of five has Islamic and/or third world roots. No political party or political leader in France can ignore it any more. Not even Sarkozy.
BY MICHEL GURFINKIEL.
For about fifty years, from the Charles de Gaulle presidency (1959-1969) to the Jacques Chirac one (1995-2007), France’s policies in the Middle East were shaped primarily by nationalistic ” grand strategic ” factors : hostility towards American hegemony, the lure for cheap oil and then for oil-related trade and investment, and a fascination for a French-Arab or Euro-Islamic alliance. On all three accounts, Israel was seen as a nuisance, if not an enemy.
The nationalist paradigm was partially relaxed under François Mitterrand (1981-1995), who was interested, for various reasons and at least to a point, in smoother relations with both the United States and Israel. A second relaxation occured in Chirac’s final years (2004-2007). The Iraq War, that Chirac had fiercely opposed, had destroyed or weakened several of France’s associates or former associates in the area : Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, but also the Assad dynasty’s Syria and Muammar Kadhafi’s Libya. It was safer, accordingly, to adapt to the new American-dominated situation. In addition, Ariel Sharon’s about-face on the Palestinian question allowed for a quick reconciliation with Israel without any ” loss of face ” on the part of France.
In 2007, nationalism seemed to be gone for good, as Nicolas Sarkozy, a supporter of Nato, a friend of America and an open admirer of Israel, was elected president. Two years later, however, France is clearly relapsing into its former pro-Arab and pro-Islamic options. Not for grand strategy reasons any more, but out of sheer domestic concerns : France, once a Western, White country with a Christian background, is morphing into a multicultural, multiethnic and multireligious nation, with a strong Islamic element.
Like most other Western countries, and in spite of its nationalistic posturing, France has ingathered large numbers of alien immigrants for decades, mostly from the third world : either citizens of the former colonies in North Africa, Subsaharan Africa, the Levant, the Indian Ocean, the Far East, or citizens of other Middle Eastern or tropical countries, or even ” cultural aliens “, i. e. French citizens from overseas territories in the West Indies, the Indian Ocean and Oceania, who settled, or were induced to settle, in France proper. In the long run, it has led to a dramatic demographic and societal transformation.
Under French law, no census may be taken on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion or national origin. Even academic investigation is somehow restricted regarding these matters. Still, it is widely estimated that : (a) about 10 million residents of metropolitan France, out of a total number of 63 million, i. e. one resident out of six, have third world roots ; (b) if one is to include the overseas territories, which are technically part of the same country under French law and international law, one should rather say that 13 millions residents out of 66 millions, i. e. one resident out of 5, have third world roots ; (c) the immigrant or overseas communities are much younger and more prolific than the metropolitan communities : when it comes to the younger brackets of the global French population, they amount to 30 % of the total population at least, and in some cases, to 50 %.
Quite naturally, the Neo-French (” les Français issus de la diversité “, as they are currently refered to — something to be loosely translated as ” the more diverse Frenchmen “) tend to exert as much leverage as they can on French politics…
| [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Liberal Party Looking to Reduce Migration Board’s Influence
A working group within the Liberal Party (Folkpartiet) wants to strip the Swedish Migration Board (Migrationsverket) of its power to appoint legal representatives to asylum seekers.
Integration minister Nyamko Sabuni believes the agency’s only roll should be to decide if an asylum seeker be allowed to stay in Sweden, she told Sveriges Radio (SR).
“It’s a question of credibility,” she said.
Sabuni says that having the agency charges with deciding an asylum seeker’s fate shouldn’t also be in charge of deciding who represents the asylum seeker in arguing their case.
The Liberal Party working group proposes instead that Sweden’s migration courts take over responsibility for assigning legal representation to asylum seekers.
Moreover, the Migration Board’s role can be changed in a number of ways, according to the Liberal Party.
Municipalities, volunteer organizations, or private contractors could also take over responsibility for accepting asylum seekers into the country. In particular, activities such as teaching the Swedish language and orientation for new arrivals could be handled by groups other than the Migration Board.
By reducing the number of activities for which it is responsible, the agency would be able to focus on its “core tasks” or handling asylum claims and other residence permit matter, according to Sabuni.
A could would also result in diminished influence for the Migration Board, a smaller budget.
Sabuni said her party’s working group plans to put forward a number of proposals which it hopes will improve Sweden’s integration policies.
“We can see today that the median time for new arrivals to enter the workforce after being granted a residence permit is seven years. Therefore, we’re argueing that we need to be more effective and offer better conditions for individuals, from when they come to our borders and seek asylum to the time they get a decision and can be introduced into society,” Sabuni told SR.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Swimsuit Rules ‘Sexist’: Swedish Swimmer
Swimmer Therese Alshammar has slammed as ‘sexist’ new rules preventing swimmers from wearing two swimsuits, which led to the Swede being stripped of a new world record on Tuesday.
Online sports betting by www.bwin.com
Alshammar set a world record of 25.44 in the 50 metre butterfly at the Australian Swimming Championships, shaving 0.02 seconds off her existing world mark, but was disqualified for wearing two swimming suits.
The Swede said she was trying to preserve her modesty in the hi-tech suits, which are skin tight and can become see-through.
She slammed Swimming Australia laws introduced late last year, which allow female swimmers to wear bikini bottoms or briefs under their suits but not an entire costume.
“I thought a modesty suit would be a modesty suit,” Alshammar told Channel 10 television. “I would almost claim that’s a bit sexist saying that the men can cover their private parts up with briefs and women can only also wear briefs.
“I would totally, even though I’m Swedish, understand that a modesty suit would be to cover your modest parts. I guess you can’t even wear a modesty suit any more.”
The 31-year-old was competing at the Australian meet as a training foreigner as she prepares for her bid to secure a spot on the Swedish team for the world titles in Rome next July.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Switzerland: Muslims to be Offered Course on Swiss Society
Fribourg University is to be the first Swiss institution to offer a course to imams and Muslim community leaders on understanding how Swiss society works. The vocational training is also open to non-Muslims with the purpose of fostering cross-cultural knowledge. It has largely been welcomed by the Islamic community.
The course will start in October and is organised by the university, the Group of Researchers on Islam in Switzerland (GRIS) and the Paris-based International Institute of Islamic Thought.
Stéphane Lathion, GRIS head and director of the “Islam, Muslims and Civil Society” course, said there are currently no practical studies on Islam and society in Switzerland.
“The idea is to offer some answers to the federal and cantonal authorities which in recent years have had to deal with problems linked to the Muslim community, such as people not keeping to the principles of Swiss democracy,” he told swissinfo.
“So there’s the problem of how to be sure that imams and community leaders know about Swiss society and on the other hand, Muslims themselves are calling for their leaders to be better trained about the Swiss situation.”
Integration role Lathion said that apart from their religious duties, many imams played a key role in integration.
“If someone comes from Turkey, Saudi Arabia or Tunisia, they don’t know the Swiss context so the idea is to offer imams or community leaders the tools so they can work better in their daily role in Muslim communities,” he explained.
With more than 350,000 members or 4.3 per cent of the population, Islam is the second-largest religion in Switzerland. Twelve per cent of Muslims have a Swiss passport.
The course will encompass modules on history of religion and European and Swiss society, as well as elements of Muslim theology adapted to the European context.
Vocational modules, which can be taken separately by health or social work professionals on job-related issues, will be a first in Europe, says Lathion.
Headscarves, for example, might be tackled in the health module where wearing the veil at hospital would be discussed.
More than 50 experts, including many from the Muslim community, will help teach the course, which runs until June 2010.
Minaret debate “The situation is not yet too serious in Switzerland concerning relations between Muslims and non-Muslims compared with what’s happening in France, Germany and Britain, but we have to anticipate any future issues,” said Lathion.
The heated debate about whether to allow minarets in Switzerland proves that it is the right moment to tackle difficult questions, he added.
“We should have debate on Islam and Muslims in Europe, but contrary to the debate on minarets, we should keep it on what can be done and not on the level of fantasy and emotion,” said Lathion.
Community leaders’ feedback on the course has mostly been positive. The Federal authorities are also watching its progress.
Ender Demirtas from the Foundation for the Muslim Community in Geneva said that the project had a wide reach — non-Muslims could learn more about Islam and the Muslim community would be able to better organise their community leader training.
He said that he thought that some Muslims would participate, but that some might be reticent because the project was new.
“You have to look at it in the long term and it is more important to train and interest the future generations,” Demirtas, who would like to send two young people to the course, told swissinfo via e-mail.
Community reaction The Inter-Knowing Foundation in Geneva, which promotes relations between Muslims and non-Muslims, is also on board. Spokesman Hafid Ouardiri said that his institution had already put forward the idea of having a humanities and Islamic studies centre in 2003 and had been following the issue ever since.
“We agree with the initiative to do something on civil society and Islam, but Muslims should really do this themselves because it’s important that it comes from them,” he told swissinfo.
“People don’t want a situation like in France and don’t want the feeling that something has been imposed on them.”
But he stressed it was important to be a partner and to work towards having a good quality course. It is important for societies to live together in dignity and friendship and communication is key to this, added Ouardiri.
For his part, Lathion says a civil society course is a better solution than any Swiss training for foreign imams, which would not be accepted by the Muslim community.
“What we are proposing doesn’t interfere on a theological basis and we don’t judge anyone who might have had training in Tunisia or elsewhere,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Islamic Terror Suspect Awaiting Extradition to U.S. Wins £60,000 for Police Brutality
A terror suspect, wanted in the U.S. for raising funds for jihad, has won £60,000 in damages from Scotland Yard after being assaulted by the officers who arrested him. The High Court heard that Babar Ahmad was subjected to ‘serious gratuitous prolonged unjustified violence’ and ‘religious abuse’ during an anti-terror raid.
Ahmad, a 34-year-old IT support analyst, was never charged following the dawn operation at his home in Tooting, south-west London, in December 2003. But he was later re-arrested, at the request of the authorities in U.S., who want to prosecute him over separate terrorism charges. Lawyers for Met Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson, who had initially disputed the claim, agreed at the High Court that Ahmad had been the victim of gratuitous violence. One of the officers alleged to have been involved will now face criminal action, the court was told. On Monday, Ahmad’s lawyer Phillippa Kaufmann told the High Court that officers dragged her client from his home using handcuffs and subjected him to dangerous neck-holds which made him fear for his life. Police had been told that Ahmad, a Muslim, was believed to be connected to Al Qaeda, was the head of a South London terrorist group and was potentially very dangerous, she said….
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Why Italy is Staying Away From Durban II
Andrea Loquenzi for Hudson New York
The March 12th conference, organized by the Italian-Israeli friendship association at the Senate, represented the Italian way to say no to the “anti-Semite conference against democracy” that is Durban II. The Italian foreign minister, Franco Frattini, was among the speakers and explained why our country is staying away from the preliminary works of the conference, while all the other European countries are participating.
Our foreign Minister has made clear that “Italy cannot negotiate what is not negotiable” and explained why. The first reason being anti-Semitism: “We believe in the dignity of the UN and we cannot contemplate a document headed ‘United Nations’ including a paragraph defining Israel as a threat to international peace.” The second main reason for the Italian forfàit is freedom of expression: we cannot support a document that states “the right to free expression cannot be extended to criticisms of any religious creed whatsoever” and therefore we are not going to collaborate at the preparation of this conference unless the a major shift in policy will take place, we are doing this “in the name of the credibility of the United Nations,” said Frattini.
Regarding the first reason, Frattini thinks that “like in 2001, also this time we see five paragraphs of the document dedicated to Israel. In this “abnormally long document” these five paragraphs are the only part of the document dedicated to a regional issue. “None of the other 245 paragraphs — Frattini went on saying — contain references to regional issues but only horizontal matters, as it should be”. The document speaks about Israel as an “actor of a racial discrimination policy”, a country “responsible for the apartheid, torture and criminal acts which constitute a threat to the international peace and security”. These expressions “go beyond the limit of legitimate criticism toward the State of Israel,” according to Frattini. They could easily become an incitement to racial hatred against the Jews.” This is really serious — said the Minister — because the UN is a member of the Quartet and should for this reason send reconciliatory messages in order to favor the peace process.”
Freedom of expression would be the second main reason why our country is pulling out from the preliminary work of the Durban II conference (which is due to take place in Geneva from April the 20th to the 24th). Frattini underlined that the paragraph dedicated to the “very-insidious-so-called religious defamation rule” was totally unacceptable. Various countries are trying to introduce “complementary standards” when it comes to every sort of criticism toward a whatsoever religious cult. “This is about the notorious incident of the Danish cartoons and would prevent freedom of expression…it is clear that Italy is opposing this,” explained Frattini.
So, Italy will not take part in the Durban II conference unless the conditions will change: Frattini hope for the “total cancellation of these paragraphs and the reduction of the entire document to just some chapters and few horizontal themes upon which we all agree on,” added Frattini who also said that “if today we bend over such an important issue as anti-Semitism or the freedom of expression, tomorrow we will have to bend over everything else and this is not acceptable”.
Our foreign Minister spoke for about fifteen minutes and was interrupted several times by the claps of his audience. The room was filled with some two hundred people, give or take. Among the other speakers, Professor Gerald Steinberg, the Executive Director of NGO Monitor, explained what he calls “the Durban strategy”: “The Durban speeches and resolutions largely ignored the issues for which this conference was ostensibly called — Steinberg said — focusing instead on branding Israeli anti-terror responses as ‘war crimes’ and ‘violations of international law.’ The Durban conference crystallized the strategy of delegitimizing Israel as “an apartheid regime through international isolation based on the South African model. This plan is driven by UN-based groups as well as non-governmental organizations (NGOs) which exploit the funds, slogans and rhetoric of the human rights movement.”
“On this basis — Steinberg added — a series of political battles have been fought in the UN and in the media. These include the myth of the Jenin ‘massacre’, the separation barrier, the academic boycott, and, currently, the church-based anti-Israel divestment campaign.”
Also the notorious Italian journalist (and member of the Parliament for the PDL) Fiamma Nirenstein attended the conference and her words were the most applauded. She attended the first Durban conference and that she said that she remembers exactly how the people there, were manifesting against Israel just for the sake of doing it and that there was no rational criticism whatsoever. All she saw was people chanting against the Jewish State and gathering above Osama Bin Laden’s signs.
“During that conference I’ve even heard Robert Mugabe and Fidel Castro talking about human rights,” said the Honorable Nirenstein, people laughed. “I heard people in Europe -after the first Durban conference — chanting ‘Hamas, Hamas the Jews to gas’. “I’m still not surprised though — said the MP — because we also heard people clapping hands while homosexuals were being hanged in Iran and women stoned to death”. “We must be careful cause anti-Semitism might have been more effective in the past but it was never such a broadly spread ideology as it is today…this is frightening.” “I also think that Italy has done an historical thing by not joining the preliminary works of this conference — continued Fiamma Nirenstein — but be careful! The situation here is messy and we must do something about it, if we don’t do anything we’ll soon face the consequences, we can’t let these people [the organizers of the Durban conference] switch from political dialogue to the incitement to genocide! It already happened in the past and that is what we talk about when we say never again.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Bosnia: UN Tribunal Cuts Term for Former Serb Leader
The Hague, 17 March (AKI) — The United Nations war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia on Tuesday reduced by seven years the 27-year sentence given to former Bosnian Serb parliament speaker Momcilo Krajisnik.
While the court said he must serve 20 years for the deportation and forced resettlement of non-Serbs in Bosnia, it reversed some of his convictions for crimes against humanity.
Krajisnik, 65, was arrested in April 2000 on charges of genocide, murder and the persecution of Muslims and Croats during Bosnia’s 1992-1995 war. He was sentenced to 27 years behind bars in September 2006.
A key ally of the Bosnian Serb wartime president Radovan Karadzic, who is currently facing the charges before the court, Krajisnik has already spent eight years in detention.
Prosecutors demanded a life sentence, while Krajisnik’s defence asked for his acquittal.
Presiding judge Fausto Pocar said Krajisnik had the right to a retrial, but the court’s appeals panel has decided that “under the present circumstances it wouldn’t be in the interest of justice”.
Pocar said Krajisnik was a part of a “joint criminal undertaking” by Bosnian Serb leaders, aimed at the forced resettlement and deportations of Muslims and Croats in Bosnia.
But he said Krajisnik was not guilty of “other crimes which derived from that undertaking”.
Karadzic is currently on trial at The Hague on 11 charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in Bosnia’s war.
He was arrested on a Belgrade bus in July 2008, after 13 years in hiding.
Former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic and Goran Hadzic, a leader of rebel Serbs in Croatia, are still at large.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Commissioner Backs EU Enlargement in Balkans
BRUSSELS — The European Union should not freeze plans to admit western Balkan countries as members, the union’s enlargement chief said yesterday, responding to German doubts about the pace of expansion.
German chancellor Angela Merkel said on Monday that the EU needed a “consolidation phase” before it added new members.
Asked about the statement, EU enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn said prospects to join the Union helped to anchor political stability and economic reform in the western Balkans, a region torn by wars in the 1990s. “We cannot take any sabbatical from our invaluable work for stability and . . . progress in the western Balkans, which is essentially provided by a European perspective,” Mr Rehn told a news conference.
“This is . . . an anchor of stability in southeastern Europe. We should not shake this anchor.”
Mr Rehn said the economic crisis and efforts to ratify the Lisbon Treaty should not be a distraction from the enlargement efforts. “The EU is able to handle several things at the same time,” he said.
Mr Rehn spoke after a meeting with foreign ministers from Slovenia and Croatia, which are locked in a border row that is blocking Zagreb’s EU entry talks.
Croatia hopes to wrap up EU accession talks this year and join the Union in the next few years, but the goal is threatened by EU member Slovenia’s veto on further progress of the talks. Mr Rehn said he presented a compromise to the countries, which now needed to be studied. “It is still work in progress. I don’t want to go into details regarding a possible agreement,” he said. — (Reuters)
| — Hat tip: islam o’phobe | [Return to headlines] |
Croatia: Brit People Smuggler Arrested
ZAGREB (Croatia) — CROATIAN police said on Wednesday they arrested a British national and six Afghan teenagers he was trying to smuggle into the European Union. The 50-year-old Briton and six of the illegal immigrants were stopped in a van near the northern Dubrave Krizovljanska border crossing with Slovenia, police spokeswoman Marina Kolaric told AFP.
The six Afghans, aged between 15 and 17, had formally requested asylum in Croatia ‘a few days ago,’ said Kolaric.
They had each paid the Briton $7,000 for his help, but were returned to the asylum centre where they were being housed, she added.
The British national, whose identity was not revealed, is due to appear before an investigating magistrate. He faces a penalty of up to three years in prison.
Croatia, which aspires to join the European Union by 2011 at the latest, lies on a Balkan route used by organised crime gangs to smuggle drugs, arms and people into western Europe. — AFP
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Montenegro: Berlusconi and Djukanovic to Boost Bilateral Links
Podgorica, 17 March (AKI) — Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi and his counterpart in Montenegro Milo Djukanovic have vowed to boost bilateral trade and cooperation. On a brief visit to Montenegro late Monday, Berlusconi met Djukanovic and pledged Italian support for the country’s bid to join the European Union.
“Italy is among first ten investors in Montenegro and our goal is to be among the first five,” Berlusconi told journalists at a media conference with Djukanovic after their talks.
Djukanovic said that Italian businesses were mostly interested in investing in Montenegro’s energy, tourism, and transport sectors, including the privatisation of the country’s main port of Bar and the modernisation of the Bar-Belgrade rail link.
The two leaders said they also discussed a possible project to lay cable under the Adriatic Sea to transport electricity between Italy and Montenegro.
Berlusconi said he had been among the first “to see the right solution for west Balkan countries lay in EU membership” ..
He vowed to support Montenegro in its EU membership bid.
But Montenegro’s opposition leaders criticised Berlusconi’s visit. His meetings with Djukanovic and president Filip Vujanovic were seen as “meddling” in the electoral campaign ahead of parliamentary polls on 29 March.
Opposition leader Nebojsa Medojevic said Berlusconi had refused to meet him and other parliamentary opposition leaders, choosing to meet with a group of Italian language students instead.
Medojevic also criticised Berlusconi’s meeting with Djukanovic, saying it sent “a bad message that organised crime pays off.”
Djukanovic has been investigated by Italian prosecutors for his alleged role in a multimillion dollar mob-run cigarette smuggling racket to Italy in the 1990s and for money laundering.
But the case was dropped after Djukanovic, known as Montenegro’s political “godfather”, became prime minister again last February.
A controversial figure, Djukanovic has already served four terms as prime minister and one term as president, but he withdrew from politics in 2006 to dedicate himself to his business interests.
Montenegro’s opposition leaders have claimed Djukanovic accumulated millions of euros in investment and banking schemes between 2006 and 2008.
“We are disappointed that the Italian premier is meeting ahead of the election a man who was indicted by the Italian judiciary,” Medojevic said.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Serge Trifkovic: The More Things Change…
…the More Washington’s Quest for Global Dominance Stays the Same.
The war waged by the U.S.-led North Atlantic Alliance against Serbia started ten years ago and it is substantively unfinished to this day. That Clinton’s war was illegal, illegitimate, aggressively premeditated, justified by blatant falsehoods, and “objectively” disastrous in its consequences, is eminently beyond dispute to the remaining thinking men. We are still facing the complex task of defining the geopolitical essence of that war, however.
That essence is apparent in the fact that the attack’s key architects believe that it was successful. Not one has had any second thoughts over the past decade. Particularly noteworthy is the position of the U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, who remains proud of having pressed her husband to start the Kosovo war in 1999. In her 2003 Senate speech just before the Iraq war vote she pointed approvingly to his decision. She has reiterated that position during last year’s presidential campaign. At a time when the power and authority of this country are increasingly challenged around the world, she sees the Balkans as the last geopolitically significant area where the U.S. can continue to assert its “credibility” along the lines charted in the spring of 1999.
[…]
| — Hat tip: islam o’phobe | [Return to headlines] |
Council of Europe: North-South Prize to Jorda’s Queen Rania
(ANSAmed) — LISBON, MARCH 16 — Queen Rania of Jordan and the former President of the Republic of Portugal, Jorge Sampaio, received the 2008 North-South Prize from the Council of Europe during a ceremony in Portuguese Parliament in Lisbon. The award was presented by the Portuguese head of state Anibal Cavaco Silva, in the presence of King Abdullah of Jordan. Since 1995, the North-South Centre has awarded the prize — a statuette made of Portuguese marble with a base made from African wood — to two public figures, one from the north and the other from the south. The Centre, located in Lisbon, is a branch of the Council of Europe and aims to defend human rights, democracy and reciprocal awareness and solidarity between the northern and southern parts of the world. 20 countries, including Italy belong to the centre. Emma Bonino has received the award in the past. In an interview with daily “Diario de Noticias”, Queen Rania expressed a wish that dialogue and negotiations to resolve the problems in the Middle East should resume. Queen Rania said that “the situation for women has registered progress in many Arab countries, but there is still a long way to go. The greatest challenge today for Arab women is to change the mentality of men, and I can say that this is changing”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Fishing: Sicily-Egypt Agreement Operative From July
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, MARCH 16 — From July 1, fishermen from Mazara del Vallo will be able to fish and explore Egyptian waters, as stated in the agreement signed last August 13 between the Region of Sicily, Industrial Fishing Production District of Mazara del Valo (COSVAP), the Egyptian Minister for Agriculture and the Egyptian Union for Living Water Resources, which gave the go-ahead to six fishing vessels from the Sicilian city to fish in the waters of the Red Sea. The news emerged from the fourth Mediterranean Forum currently in course in Cairo, with ten delegations from the Mediterranean countries. “Already from June 15”, affirmed the president of the fishing district, Giovanni Tumbiolo, “the vessels will be present in Egypt to begin the cooperation project between the two countries. The fishing licence, which will begin from July 1, will be valid for three months. Regarding the fishing quotas, 25% will go to Egypt, 75% to Italy. On the basis of the agreement, moreover, there will be the possibility for 5 Egyptian fishermen to participate on Italian fishing expeditions for training”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Med Union: EU, Can Aid Peace in the Middle East
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, MARCH 17 — “The strengthening of the programme of the Union for the Mediterranean (UPM) is in the interest of the citizens of the two shores. Now it is necessary to concentrate on our partnership to resolve the deadlock, face the global security issue and the impact of the economic crisis,” said Karl Schwarzenberg, the Foreign Minister of the Czech Republic and holder of the rotating presidency of the EU, addressing representatives gathered for the 5th plenary session of the Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly (APEM) today in Brussels. According to the Czech minister “the Union for the Mediterranean does not substitute other peace initiatives in the Middle East, but it will be able to contribute” to a relaunch of the process. The President of European Parliament and the current President of APEM, Hans Gert Poettering, made and appeal to the representatives of the two shores of the Mediterranean at the session: “The APEM has an important role to play in building dialogue. The Middle East is the key for security and stability in the Mediterranean”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia-Italy: Cinelli in Tunis for Military Cooperation
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, MARCH 17 — Italy’s Lieutenant General, Aldo Cinelli, general secretary of Italy’s Defence Ministry and inspector of infrastructure to the Italian general staff, has been received by Tunisian Defence Minister, Kamel Morjane at the start on his four-day visit to Tunisia. Talks focused on military cooperation between the two countries, which was described as “exemplary”. Also examined were the details of the meeting of the mixed Italian-Tunisian military commission (the eleventh in the current series), which is to be held in Tunis this June. Among the issues under examination will be the formation of military panels, professional training in the Tunisian armed services and military health-care. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Algeria: Terrorism Returns, New Attack in Tebessa
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS — Following the attack that cost the lives of five members of the same family, there were a further two civilian deaths yesterday in a bomb blast at Oued Essania, in the same Algerian region of Tebessa, close to the border with Tunisia. Meanwhile, four military service personnel were killed and five seriously injured in an explosives attack near Tadmait yesterday afternoon, just a few steps away from the barracks of the municipal guard which had been the target of a suicide attack last week. Citing sources inside the security forces, the Algerian press is today attributing these attacks to groups affiliated with the Al Qaeda Organisation in the Islamic Maghreb (formerly the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat), which is still active in various regions of Algeria. At least 18 persons have died during the past month in attacks carried out in the Tebessa area.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt: Imports From Italy Rise 35% to 2.62 Bln in 2008
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, MARCH 17 — In the first 11 months of 2008, Italian exports to Egypt totalled 2.62 billion euros with a net increase of 35.1% compared to the same period in the previous year. According to data from the National Statistics Office (ISTAT), in the same period under examination, Italian imports registered an increase of 25.8% compared to the first 11 months of 2007, bringing them to 2.14 billion euros. Trade between the two countries also increased by 30%, totalling 4.75 billion euros, with an increasing positive balance for Italy (478.8 million euros compared to 237.6 million in the same period in 2007). These figures, reported a note from the Italian Foreign Trade Commission (ICE) in Cairo, show that in a three-year span, trade between the two countries has more than doubled, increasing substantially in both imports and exports, and allowing Italy to increase its balance. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt: Cleric Asks Neighbours to Enforce Divorce
Cairo, 13 March (AKI) — A fatwa or religious edict issued by a senior Egyptian cleric invites people to end their neighbours’ marriages if they can prove they are collapsing from irreconcilable differences.
“If the evidence that the neighbours present is verified, the court has the right to make the couple divorce,” said Sheikh Jamal Qutb, cited by Dubai-based TV network Al-Arabiya.
Qutb, an Islamic scholar and former head of the fatwa committee at Egypt’s most prestigious religious institution Al-Azhar, said that a community, including family members or neighbours, should have the same right to end a marriage as the couples themselves.
However, he said neighbours should try to intervene and solve a couple’s differences. If they fail, they can then go to court and present evidence that the marriage cannot be saved.
The cleric also said that a couple’s refusal to divorce may be for several reasons, and that a judge should investigate whether these reasons are valid.
In Islam, a man has no right to go back to his wife if he has married and divorced her three times unless she has remarried and divorced from her second husband.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Morocco: MPs Look at Bill to Protect Domestic Workers
Rabat, 13 March (AKI) — The Moroccan parliament is examining a bill aimed at giving domestic workers greater protection, Arabic satellite TV channel Al-Arabiya reports.
The bill has already been backed by the country’s leading jurists. It aims to regulate a sector where many of the weakest sections of the population are employed informally and are vulnerable to exploitation and abuse including physical assault and rape.
It could become law in the next few weeks.
The bill makes it illegal for employers to hire domestic workers who are less than 15 years old and obliges the employer to give them a day off each week.
It sets a minimum monthly wage of 100 euros and requires employers to allow inspectors to pay home visits to ensure they are respecting the law.
Under the bill, domestic workers who have worked for an employer for at least six months must be given annual holidays.
“The bill is a very important step for Morocco, even though the minimum salary should reflect the inflation being seen here,” said legal expert Abdel Malik al-Zaza.
“But the biggest breakthrough is the protection the bill gives to young girls working in households, where they are often subjected to violence and rape.”
Human Rights Watch estimates there are 66,000 girls aged under 15 who are working as home help in Morocco.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
TV: Algeria, Two New Channels for Koran and Berbers
(by Laura De Santi) (ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, MARCH 17 — Tomorrow, which is the day before the opening of the electoral campaign for the presidential elections, due on April 9, two new satellite channels will be launched by Algerian state TV, ENTV, the only broadcaster in the country, since the sector remains closed to private businesses. The 4th channel, reported a message from the Institute for Public Television (EPTV), will broadcast programmes exclusively in a range of dialects including the Amazigh (Berber) language, while ‘Maerifa’ (to know in Arabic), the 5th channel, will be entirely dedicated to the Koran. A “strategic” initiative, reads an editorial in Algerian daily Liberté, because Algerians “have been bombarded by fatwas (religious edicts) for years from eastern satellite channels in the hands of Salafist preachers, far from the Malakite sect and the ancestral traditions of Algeria”. Its mission, said the Minister of Religion, Bouadbellah Ghlammalah, a few days ago, “is to preserve the religious authority of the state, represented by the Malachite sect, which is threatened by the Salafists (one of the most fundamentalist sects of Islam, editor’s note)”. El Watan was also critical, asking if this initiative is not just “an operation of electoral seduction” to secure “Kabyle and radical Islamic electorate who are eluding central power”. The daily continued, that the two channels are bound to “have the same political orientation as their mother company” and “do not meet the need to end the state monopoly and to open the audio-visual sector, demanded by the opposition and all those who are fighting to break away from this single-ideology system”. Broadcasts on the Berber channel, managed by Said Lamrani, will be run 6 hours per day, from 5pm until 11pm in all of the Berber languages spoken in Algeria: Kabyle, the most widespread and spoken in Kabilya (east of Algeria), Targuie, a dialect of the populations in the Algerian Sahara, Chaoui of the Aures Plateau (east), and Chenoui, spoken in the Tipaza zone (70km west of Algiers). Maerifa will be run by Mohamed Aouadi and will go on air from 4pm to 12am. Both channels, which will be broadcast in addition to the three generic channels of ENTV (ENTV, Canal Algerie, A3), will be transmitted by Hotbird, AB3, and Nilesat satellites in addition to conventional transmissions. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Al-Qaeda Behind West Bank Strike, Debka Says
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, MARCH 17 — Al-Qaeda was probably behind the attack carried out in Massuà (West Bank) two days ago, in which two Israeli police officers were killed by attackers who then disappeared without trace. According to an Israeli news website specialising in intelligence issues, Debkafile, a leaflet claiming responsibility for the attack and listing numerous details about the course of events, was distributed in the West Bank and Jordan yesterday. According to Debka, the leaflet was signed by a hitherto unknown group: ‘The Brigades of the showdown in Jerusalem’, which claims to be the armed wing of Al-Quaeda in the West Bank and to be preparing further attacks. Debka finds it noteworthy that the attack and distribution of the leaflets coincided with the release of a new audio cassette by Osama Bin Laden. The attack had already been claimed by another mystery group, “Imad Mughniyeh Group’, but Israeli security services commented that this appeared to be a bogus claim. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Conflicting Reports About Shalit’s Future
Gaza City, 17 March (AKI) — Kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit may be freed on Thursday in exchange for 450 Palestinian prisoners, sources have told the Palestinian news agency, Maan.
However, Israel’s industry, trade and labor minister, Eli Yishai, said on Tuesday that the current government would not be able to secure the soldier’s freedom and that it was up to the next government to resolve the issue.
Yishai was quoted in the Israeli daily, The Jerusalem Post, ahead of a special cabinet meeting.
“It seems that this government won’t succeed in resolving the Shalit saga,” he said before meeting prime minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu.
“But the next government will be committed with the same intensity to bringing Gilad back. That is its duty, despite the difficulties anticipated.”
Quoting unnamed sources, the Maan report said Shalit would be transferred on Thursday to Egyptian security forces and then to Israel.
Maan said that it was not immediately clear whether the prisoner exchange would include four detainees that Israel had previously refused to release including Abbas As-Sayyed, Abdullah Al-Barghouthi, Ibrahim Hamid and Ahmad Saadat.
There was no mention of prominent jailed Palestinian leader Marwan Barghouti.
On 5 March, the director of the Free Marwan Barghouti campaign, Saed Nimr told Adnkronos International (AKI) that Barghouti would be released as part of the prisoner exchange deal.
However, Israeli media also said that Israeli ministers had ‘seriously harmed’ talks on Shalit.
“The conduct of ministers gave Hamas a feeling that the domestic pressure in Israel was intolerable,” the sources said, quoted by Israeli daily Haaretz.
“They saw this as an opportunity and radically toughened their demands, out of an understanding that Israel would agree to this.”
Israeli media said negotiations have failed and will no longer continue under the auspices of outgoing prime minister Ehud Olmert, and instead would resume under Netanyahu’s leadership.
Netanyahu is still trying to form a government over a month after winning 27 seats in Israel’s general elections in February. He has until 4 April to create a workable coalition.
Shalit was kidnapped in June 2006 by Hamas-linked militants in a cross-border raid. He is believed to be being held in the Gaza Strip, which Hamas overran in mid-2007.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Israel: Rebuilding Hamas’ Killing Machine
There’s been a long and ugly tradition of the left romancing tyrants and terrorists, and the Obama administration has now picked up the torch — flirting with Hamas and planning to hand over $900 million of American taxpayers’ money into its blood-soaked hands.
Hamas, just in case you’re new to the political scene, is the Palestinian Nazi Party. That’s why its members do charming little things like engage in the Nazi salute. And that’s why their favorite book of all time is “Mein Kampf.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama: Destroying Human Life for the ‘Greater Good’
The suitability of adult stem cells for potential cures and the many medical successes have attracted significant financial support from private companies, universities, and venture capitalists. The same cannot be said about embryonic stem cells experimentation. This is due to the lack of any medical evidence where a malady has been healed using embryonic stem cells, the difficult ethical and moral issues raised, and the tendency of these treatments to produce tumors as a side effect, including the recent discovery of brain and spinal cord tumors in a young man in Israel undergoing fetal stem cell therapy.
The lack of private capital is the reason embryonic stem cell advocates are beating down the doors of government. In his criticism of California’s Proposition 71 (which authorized $3 billion of state funds to support embryonic experimentation), social ethicist Wesley J. Smith explained:
Think about it. If this were really likely to bring about cures any time soon, you would have to beat venture capitalists away with a stick. But the money to pay for cloning and embryonic stem cell research is not flowing from the private sector, so they want the public to pay for the research with borrowed money that is not accountable to the legislature.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Darwin in Turkey
‘Most Express Sympathy for the Censorship’
The firing of a magazine editor in Turkey over her intention to put a story about Darwin’s evolution theory on the cover has generated a flood of criticism. SPIEGEL ONLINE spoke with the editor about just how conservative Turkish society has become.
No issue divides Turks more than the country’s alleged creeping Islamization. Early last week, the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (Tubitak) sparked an international controversy after it prevented the publication of a cover story about Charles Darwin’s evolution theory in Bilim ve Teknik (Science and Technology), one of the country’s leading science journals. The publication’s editor-in-chief, 41-year-old Cigdem Atakuman, claims she was fired as a result of the incident.
Secular Turks are outraged and the world is watching. Did Tubitak, which publishes Bilim ve Teknik, censor a feature about the theory of evolution under pressure from the conservative Islamic-oriented AKP-led government because it couldn’t be reconciled with Muslim religious beliefs?
A senior Tubitak official has blamed the editor for removing the story, according to Turkish daily Hürriyet, saying changes were made at the last minute and rushed. But Atakuman has denied the allegation, saying the deputy head of the council, Ömer Cebeci, told her the cover story was too controversial and that he no longer trusted her to responsibly perform her duties. The paper claims the incident has been reduced to a case of “one person’s word against the other’s.”
In an interview with SPIEGEL ONLINE, Atakuman defends her position and says she is worried about the future of bias-free science in her country….
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Media: Gaza War Reportage Debated at Al Jazeera Forum
(ANSAmed)- DUBAI, MARCH 17 — The role played by the media in reporting what happened during the last Israeli military offensive on the Gaza Strip was the concluding debate at the Al Jazeera Forum on ‘Power, Information and the Middle East’, three days of debate in Doha. According to the Al Jazeera director Ahmed Al Sheikh, the satellite broadcaster from Qatar played a brave and unique role. ‘Whilst most of the media chose to give the war zones a wide berth and to ‘make information’ from other bases, the burden of reporting the suffering and brutal acts committed fell upon our correspondents,” Al Sheikh explained, pointing his finger at the Western media, accusing them of having “failed miserably”. Different European information resources played a key role instead, according to Robert Fisk, Middle East expert and correspondent of England’s The Independent, who reported not only on Operation Cast Lead, but also what happened before and its consequences. Despite Fisk’s criticism that Al Jazeera’s coverage of the events was more balanced in the English language broadcasts and more pro-Palestine in the Arab language broadcast, the deputy director of Le Monde Diplomatique, Alan Gresh, said that Al Jazeera remained however “a model to emulate”. Despite the Israeli government’s careful preparation of the media, which included organised visits to Sderot to support their forced decision to launch war on Gaza in response to Hamas’ rockets, Israel lost the war of information for “long-term untenable propaganda”, argued Gresh, also mentioning the lack of credibility that Arab journalists still have in the eyes of westerners, precisely because they are Arabs and not westerners. (Ansamed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Terrorist Bombing May Have Targeted Koreans Yet Again
Blast hits convoy carrying officials, kin of victims of explosion in Yemen
A possible suicide bomber has again targeted Koreans in Yemen, officials there told wire services.
Korean officials, however, say it¡¯s too soon to know what was behind the second bombing. What is clear is that a bomb exploded in Yemen yesterday as two vehicles carrying South Korean government officials, family members of Sunday¡¯s bombing victims and the victims¡¯ remains were on their way to the airport in Sana, the Yemeni capital.
The officials had been sent to investigate the earlier bombing that killed four South Korean tourists.
According to the ministry, the bomb went off between a Yemeni patrol car and one of the vehicles. A high-ranking Foreign Ministry official in Seoul said no one in the convoy was injured though the car windows were shattered.
The government officials and family members continued on to the airport. They are scheduled to arrive in Korea today.
The Korean government said it was still trying to determine whether the bomb had been planted on the roadside, had been thrown from a distance or had been carried by a suicide bomber. A high-ranking ministry official said while there was a bloodstain on the attacked vehicle, no one in the car actually bled following the explosion.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Moon Tae-young used the words ¡°terrorist bombing¡± in his statement on the explosion. Yemeni security officials told various wire services that yesterday¡¯s attack was a suicide bombing.
One security source told Reuters that the bomber was waiting by the roadside before the attack. One official told the Associated Press that the bomber walked in between the two cars and set off the bomb.
If that proves to be true, it would likely mean the attacker had knowledge of the convoy¡¯s whereabouts and targeted the Koreans. The same official said the convoy included the South Korean ambassador to Yemen, Kwak Won-ho, but the Foreign Ministry here said that wasn¡¯t true.
¡°It¡¯s not clear whether the Koreans were specifically targeted,¡± an official said on condition of anonymity. ¡°It could have been a random attack [by militants] against the government, since there was a Yemeni police car in the convoy [suggesting it was escorting high-ranking officials].¡± Foreign Ministry spokesman Moon added that the Korean government “has all possibilities open.”
According to the ministry, in the cars were three surviving family members, two government officials from Seoul, one official from the Korean Embassy and an employee of the Korean travel agency used by the victims.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
The Obama Administration Reaches Out to Syria: Implications for Israel
by David Schenker
- In early March, two senior U.S. officials traveled to Damascus for the highest-level bilateral meeting in years, part of the new administration’s policy of “engagement.” Washington seeks to test Damascus’ intentions to distance itself from Iran. While a “strategic realignment” of Damascus is unlikely, in the short term the diplomatic opening is sure to alleviate international pressure on Damascus.
- The Assad regime made no secret of its preference for Barack Obama last November. At the same time, Syrian regime spokesmen appear to be setting preconditions for an effective dialogue, saying Washington would first have to drop the Syria Accountability Act sanctions and remove Syria from the list of State Sponsors of Terrorism.
- U.S. diplomatic engagement with Syria comes at a particularly sensitive time, just a few months before the Lebanese elections, where the “March 14” ruling coalition faces a stiff challenge from the Hizbullah-led “March 8” opposition, and Washington has taken steps to shore up support for its allies.
- Should the U.S. dialogue with Damascus progress, Washington might consent to take on an enhanced role in resumed Israeli-Syrian negotiations. However, U.S. participation on the Syria track could conceivably result in additional pressure for Israeli concessions in advance of any discernible modifications in Syria’s posture toward Hizbullah and Hamas.
- Based on Syria’s track record, there is little reason to be optimistic that the Obama administration will succeed where others have failed. Washington should not necessarily be faulted for trying, as long as the administration remains cognizant of the nature of the regime. Damascus today remains a brutal dictatorship, which derives its regional influence almost exclusively through its support for terrorism in neighboring states and, by extension, through its 30-year strategic alliance with Tehran…
| — Hat tip: JCPA | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Kurds, 5 Arrested Over Mass Graves in South-East
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 17 — Turkish police have arrested five persons in connection with the recent discovery of mass graves in the south-eastern region of the country, with the remains of around a score of persons coming to light. Digging began on March 9 in connection with an open investigation to establish whether or not mass graves indeed existed containing the bodies of persons of Kurdish ethnicity who had been killed by Turkey’s security forces. The investigations are being carried out in the Silopi area, in the Sirnak province, under the orders of a magistrate who opened a dossier on the case following the publication of various newspaper articles alleging that a large number of people who disappeared during the 1990s — the period of heightened violence in the Kurdish rebellion in the region — were in fact executed and buried in mass graves. Among those arrested — according to judicial sources cited by broadcaster NTV — are two sons of a former mayor of the city of Cizre, situated on the border between Iraq and Syria, and three inhabitants of a village close to the site where the remains have come to light. The same sources have stated that police are seeking the former mayor, who is allegedly a member of the Kurdish militia which was armed and financed by the Ankara government to combat Kurd separatists of the PKK (the Kurdistan Worker’s Party). Today’s arrests are the first in connection with the investigation, which is also trying to establish whether the victims’ bodies were dissolved in acid before being buried. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Darwin; Sacked Magazine Editor Reinstated
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 17 — Editor of Turkish scientific magazine Science and Technology’ Cigdem Atakuman, who was sacked at the beginning of March for putting a photo of Charles Darwin on the front cover of the magazine, has been reinstated. Private pro-government TV station CNN Turk reported that the Turkish Council for Scientific Research and Technology (Tubitak), which is the highest scientific institution in the country, “took a step back”. Her reinstatement follows the controversy which was sparked after vice president of Tubitak Omar Cebeci sacked Atakuman because she had decided to dedicate the cover of the magazine and a 16-page article to the British naturalist and founder of the theory of evolution on the 200th anniversary of his birth. Atakuman’s dismissal sparked protests throughout the Turkish scientific community, who stated that they were “witnessing one of the most shameful episodes in the history of the Turkish Republic’. The episode also led president of the Italian Senate Emma Bonino to write and ask the relevant EU bodies to condemn ‘this flagrant violation of freedom of thought and scientific independence”. The Islamist scholars’ lobby is extremely powerful in Turkey, which is a secular country in its constitution only, and where the pro-Islam Justice and Development party has been in power for six years. The lobby maintains that Darwin’s theory is incompatible with the Koran, which teaches creation theory. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Five Held in Probe Over Allegations of Killings
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 17 — Turkish police detained five people after human bones were unearthed as part of an investigation into alleged extrajudicial killings, news agencies reported Tuesday. The detained include two sons of the former mayor of Cizre town, Kamil Atak, in Sirnak province, as well as three residents of a southeastern village near where nearly 20 bone fragments were unearthed Monday. The state-run Anatolian Agency reported that the detainments came on the testimony of an anonymous witness who said that some people were detained by Atak on the claims they provided support to the PKK and were handed to the terror organization Turkish Hezbollah for interrogation, the report said. An investigation was launched after Abdulkadir Aygan, a former informant from the terror organization PKK said many people were murdered by anti-terrorism squads in the 1990s and buried in wells after being dipped in acid baths. Excavations started under the investigation at two different sites in Silopi that produced several bone fragments, including pieces of a human skull, clothing and human hair. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Veterans Groups Denounce Private Insurance Proposal
An Obama administration proposal to bill veterans’ private insurance companies for treatment of combat-related injuries has prompted veterans groups to condemn the idea as unethical and powerful lawmakers on Capitol Hill to promise their opposition.
Nevertheless, the White House confirmed yesterday that the idea remains under consideration, and Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and leaders of veterans groups are scheduled to meet tomorrow to discuss it further.
The proposal — intended to save the Department of Veterans Affairs $530 million a year — would authorize VA to bill private insurance companies for the treatment of injuries and medical conditions related to military service, such as amputations, post-traumatic stress disorder and other battle wounds. VA already pursues such third-party billing for conditions that are not service-related.
Veterans groups said the change would be an abrogation of the government’s responsibility to care for the war wounded. And they expressed concern that the new policy would make employers less willing to hire veterans, for fear of the cost of insuring them, and that insurance benefits for veterans’ families would be jeopardized.
Lawmakers explicitly ruled out the proposal yesterday in budget recommendations from the Senate and House veterans’ affairs committees.
The chairman of the Senate panel, Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii), said a majority of the committee members say the plan is fundamentally unfair.
“America’s veterans and their families pay the true cost of war everyday, and we must pay for the care and benefits they have earned. I look forward to working with my colleagues and the Administration to pass a budget worthy of their service,” Akaka said in a statement.
Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), a senior member of the Veterans’ Affairs and Budget committees, warned VA Secretary Eric K. Shinseki last week that the idea would be “dead on arrival,” and she vowed yesterday that any budget containing the provision “is not going to pass.”
“The VA has an obligation to pay for service-related care, and they should not be nickel-and-diming vets in the process,” she said in an interview. “This proposal means that family members will be hurt because, if a vet meets the maximum [benefit amount] for their insurance, their wife and kids would not be able to get insurance [benefits] anymore. . . . God forbid a wounded vet from Iraq has a wife who gets breast cancer.”
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said yesterday that the Obama administration has not made “the final . . . decision on third-party billing as it relates to service-related injuries.”
At the same time, Gibbs noted that the administration is seeking an 11 percent increase in discretionary spending in the VA budget, a decision lawmakers and veterans groups have praised. “This president takes very seriously the needs of our wounded warriors that have given so much to protect our freedom on battlefields throughout the world,” Gibbs said at a White House news conference.
VA and the Office of Management and Budget did not respond to requests for more details on the proposal.
Veterans groups said the plan was a puzzling political misstep by the new administration in its relations with the 25 million Americans who have served in the military. Obama heard firsthand about such objections Monday when he met with leaders of the groups at the White House.
“To ask veterans to save $500 million in a [VA] budget of over $100 billion is not only bad policy, it is bad politics,” said Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, who attended the meeting.
“It could be a rookie mistake,” he said. “Ultimately, it’s only going to hurt the president.”
Another problem, critics said, is that the proposal could hurt wounded veterans’ employment opportunities, particularly with small businesses.
“A small company is not going to want to take on the burden of increased premiums” by hiring a wounded veteran, said Craig Roberts, media relations manager for the American Legion. He added that the proposal could make buying private health insurance prohibitively expensive for these veterans.
Details of the proposal remained unclear yesterday, and a spokesman for the health insurance industry said its potential impact is difficult to assess. “We are going to carefully evaluate any proposal that is made,” said Robert Zirkelbach, spokesman for the trade association America’s Health Insurance Plans.
Lawmakers and veterans advocates said VA could save $500 million by simply collecting from private insurers all that it is authorized to bill for non-service injuries each year.
More broadly, the issue underscores a significant challenge confronting the administration: ballooning health-care costs for veterans and active military members taking up an ever-larger share of VA and Pentagon budgets.
It is uncertain how many veterans would be affected by the proposed change, which would concern only those with private health insurance. As many as 7 million veterans are enrolled in the VA health-care program, and about 5 million use VA facilities each year.
Some veterans groups voiced concern that the administration’s plan could represent a move toward privatizing VA benefits.
Other experts said it reflects the broader dilemma of how to increase cost-sharing for medical care in comprehensive programs such as the VA one. “There has been no change in cost-sharing features for 10 or 12 or more years,” said William Winkenwerder Jr., the Pentagon’s former top health official, who runs a private health strategy and consulting firm in the Washington area. “That is what is most responsible for driving up the cost of those programs to the government,” he said.
Still, any proposals to increase cost-sharing “tend not to be very popular politically, especially at this time,” Winkenwerder said.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
At G20, Kremlin to Pitch New Currency
The Kremlin published its priorities Monday for an upcoming meeting of the G20, calling for the creation of a supranational reserve currency to be issued by international institutions as part of a reform of the global financial system.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia: Cleric Arrested Over Child Bride
JAKARTA — A WEALTHY Indonesian Muslim cleric who married a 12-year-old girl faces up to 15 years in jail after being arrested for obscenity, reports said on Wednesday.
Pujiono Cayho Widiyanto, a 43-year-old businessman and cleric, was arrested by police in the Central Java city of Semarang on Tuesday, The Jakarta Globe English-language daily said.
Widiyanto sparked nationwide outrage by taking a poor village girl, Lutfiana Ulfa, as his second wife in August last year.
‘We’ve collected enough evidence to charge him with under age obscenity under the Criminal Code,’ chief detective Royhardi Siahaan was quoted as saying, adding the charges carried a maximum of 15 years jail.
The cleric was arrested after police collected documents proving Ulfa was under age, Mr Siahaan said.
Widiyanto and his supporters say his actions are acceptable under Islam but others say he should abide by state law, which sets 16 as the minimum age for marriage.
Police were not immediately available to confirm the report.
Although Indonesian law carries stiff penalties for paedophilia, arranged marriages between older men and girls are common in poor rural areas, but are not registered with the government.
About 90 per cent of Indonesia’s 234 million people are Muslim, but the country has sizeable Hindu, Buddhist and Christian minorities. — AFP
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Outrage Over British Ambassador Peter Hughes’s Homage to North Korea
Britain’s ambassador to North Korea has sparked outrage on his first foray into the blogosphere with an extraordinary puff piece on springtime in Pyongyang.
Peter Hughes was accused of painting Pyongyang as an idyll with his lyrical blog entry on the “festive atmosphere” of elections in the reclusive dictatorship.
The account of polling day omitted to mention the lack of opposition parties, the handpicking of candidates by the regime or the laws forcing every citizen to vote.
“Spring seems to have arrived in Pyongyang,” Mr Hughes waxed in his debut blog on the Foreign and Commonwealth Office website, filling in for the British ambassador to Seoul, who is on annual leave.
“There was a very festive atmosphere throughout the city. Many people were walking to or from the polling stations, or thronging the parks to have picnics or just stroll.”
“Outside the central polling stations there were bands playing and people dancing and singing to entertain the queues of voters waiting patiently to select their representatives in the country’s unicameral legislature. The booths selling drinks and snacks were very popular with the crowds and everyone seemed to be having a good time.”
Mr Hughes went on to report — straightfaced — the unsurprising results, published a day later. “There was a reported turnout of over 99 per cent of the voters and all the candidates, including Kim Jong Il, were elected with 100 per cent approval.”
He noted with pleasure the warmer weather that was bringing schoolchildren “marching through the streets in their blue uniforms with red neck kerchiefs, carrying red banners and flags” in support of their leader. “The children sing songs and chant slogans as they either walk gaily hand in hand, or march solemnly by.”
Springtime has also sparked a frenzy of vegetable planting in the small plots of land around apartment blocks — presumably to insulate against the country’s notorious food shortages. Pyongyang’s residents, however, are the country’s elite and best fed, trusted not to embarrass their Government in front of foreign guests.
Ed Davey, the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, said: “This is taking ‘going native’ to another level.” A reader who commented on the blog asked: “Is this meant to be some sort of insight from someone who works for the UK Govt, or is this just a press release from the North Korea news agency?” Another scoffed: “Peter Hughes, you make North Korea sound like an Idyllic place to live.”
Mr Hughes wrote in his defence that he would not “apologise for portraying Pyongyang as a normal city”.
“My entry in Martin Uden’s blog was not intended as political commentary, rather it was an opportunity to show that Pyongyang is not a dark and evil place populated by demons, but a city inhabited by human beings who make the best of their lives in spite of the difficulties they face on a daily basis.”
There was no mention of the joys of Pyongyang’s new Italian restaurant, reportedly opened on the orders of Kim Jong Il after he developed a fondness for pizza.
Mr Hughes confirmed, however, that his controversial guest appearance will not become a permanent fixture. “I regret that I do not have a blog because the technology to set one up is not available to us here,” he lamented.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: Rape Case Sparks Calls for Abolition of Military Pact With US
Manila, 17 March (AKI) — Leftwing non-governmental organisations and former lawmakers on Tuesday called on the Philippines government to abolish a controversial military agreement with the United States that has allowed a US marine convicted of rape to avoid jail pending an appeal.
Called the ‘Junk the Visiting Forces Agreement’ movement, the group includes former political heavyweights such as former Vice President Teofisto Guingona Jr. and former senator Sergio Osmena III.
The Philippines government has come under fire from the movement, the parliament and Filipina woman Nicole who was raped by US marine Lance Cpl. Daniel Smith. They criticise the government for failing to transfer Smith from the US embassy compound to a local prison despite an order last month from the Supreme Court.
The ruling overrode an agreement inked in 2006 between Manila and US Ambassador Kirstie Kenney that saw Smith moved from a local jail and placed in the custody of the embassy, where critics say he is being held in far better conditions.
Washington claimed custody of Smith saying this was “granted under the VFA,” which came into effect in May 1999.
Philippines president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and US president Barack Obama have both voice support for the VFA and talked on the phone last weekend.
The VFA states that Philippine authorities have jurisdiction over US military personnel who commit crimes here, unless they are crimes under US military law or against other US service members.
However, the agreement adds that when US authorities ask for jurisdiction over suspects “to maintain good order and discipline among their forces,” Philippine authorities will waive their right “except in cases of particular importance to the Philippines”, and that the US military can have custody over servicemen “until completion of all judicial proceedings.”
Washington said it is still studying the Supreme Court ruling and so far has been granted temporary custody of Smith.
Smith has said that Nicole and he had consensual sex in November 2005 and has appealed the December 2006 verdict that sentenced him to at least 20 years in jail for her rape.
The government reiterated on Monday that it is negotiating a solution to the current deadlock.
“The VFA is not about Smith. We have not abandoned Nicole. We will be supporting her all the way and I’m sure there will be some kind of a compromise agreement between the two countries so that we can come to terms for the best, for what would be the best for Nicole,” said deputy presidential spokesperson Lorelei Fajardo.
Nicole is said to have left the Philippines and moved to the US. Smith is doing clerical work during his detention at the United States embassy compound in Manila.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: Recantation to Affect Vfa Review — Palace
MANILA, Philippines — A Palace official admitted yesterday that the recantation made by Subic rape victim “Nicole” against American Marine Lance Corporal Daniel Smith could have an impact on the review of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA).
At the weekly press conference at Malacañang, Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said the review of the VFA would now depend on the action to be taken by the United States, particularly on the provisions covering the custody of American servicemen involved in a crime.
Ermita said the move of Nicole also took the Palace by surprise, as he reiterated that they had nothing to do with it.
Calls for a review of the VFA were prompted by a ruling by the Supreme Court (SC), which declared the VFA constitutional but directed Smith to be placed under the custody of Philippine authorities.
Members of the Senate were among the most vocal on the need to review the VFA, with some even pushing for its abrogation for failure of the Philippine government to get custody of Smith.
Just a few days after the SC handed down its ruling, Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo met with US Ambassador Kristie Kenney to discuss the custody of Smith…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: ‘Nicole’ Faces Perjury Raps
MANILA, Philippines — Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez believes that “Nicole” and her lawyers could be charged with false testimony and perjury after she backtracked on her complaint that she was raped by US Marine Lance Corporal Daniel Smith.
Speaking to reporters yesterday, Gonzalez said it appeared that “we have been taken for a ride” in the Subic rape case.
“So many problems have been created by this. Foreign policy has been affected,” he said. “So much time has been spent. It has split public opinion and caused a lot of emotional upsurge. So whatever she did has created a lot of problems for us.”
Gonzalez said Nicole’s recantation will have “no bearing” on Smith’s appeal before the Court of Appeals since it is not part of the records of the trial.
“Unless you can convince the court to open the trial to admit the affidavit, this will not pass as newly discovered evidence,” he said.
“Under the Rules of Court, there is such a thing as the court taking judicial knowledge or judicial cognizance of events that take place,” he added.
Gonzalez said the CA justices are aware that Nicole had backtracked on her court testimony through the newspapers.
“That is only where this thing could play some role,” he said. “It is up to the court if the justices subconsciously take cognizance of the affidavit. But technically, it should not be given weight.”
Gonzalez said it is remote that the CA would allow a retrial of the case since Nicole is no longer in the country.
Nicole should not ask the court to reopen the case, he added.
He could not recall any case where recantation of the complainant or witness had been given weight after conviction of the accused, Gonzalez said.
‘It was a family decision’
The mother of Nicole said yesterday her daughter’s recantation was a family decision.
“(President Arroyo) has nothing to do with this,” she told abs-cbnNEWS.com. “It was a family decision.”
It was unlikely that they would consult the government because “the government has never helped us,” she added.
Nicole’s mother said her daughter wants to move on as she wants to get married abroad.
In a separate interview with GMA 7, Nicole’s mother denied any alleged “US pressure” on her daughter to recant her testimony of the rape.
Speaking in Filipino, she said her family had decided to put an end to the “sad story” of her daughter.
“My family has grown tired of this (rape) case for the past three years,” she said. “So we thought that that’s enough.”…
…Senators dismayed
Senators expressed dismay yesterday over Nicole’s decision to recant her testimony in court.
Sen. Francis Escudero said Nicole’s recantation should not be used as leverage by the United States to negate efforts to abrogate the VFA.
“Nicole may have recanted but this doesn’t mean that Mr. Smith now goes to Washington,” he said.
“And the US government should be advised not to use Nicole’s latest true confession to plan his exit out of the country.”
Escudero said Nicole’s affidavit is not a “boarding pass to freedom” as legal procedures would have to be followed.
“I cannot blame Nicole for deciding to settle out of court,” he said.
“But her affidavit will just be treated as a mere scrap of paper unless she affirms it in open court.”
Senators Rodolfo Biazon, Joker Arroyo, Loren Legarda and Pia Cayetano agree that Nicole’s action would have a great impact in the renegotiation of the VFA.
Biazon said Nicole’s recantation has raised moral, legal and judicial questions.
“(These questions include) who is the victim, Nicole or Smith?” he asked.
“Smith had lost his career if not a big part of his life. Nicole even raised the question of deficiencies of our justice system. Justice for whom? For Nicole? For Smith? For the Filipino people? Or justice for the Filipina Maria Clara?”….
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: 2 Soldiers Slain, 2 Hurt in Lanao Clash
MANILA, Philippines — At least two soldiers were killed and two others were wounded in a clash with an unidentified group of gunmen Tuesday night, a military official said Wednesday.
Colonel Benito de Leon, commander of the 104th Brigade, said in a statement that the brief firefight occurred in the hinterlands of Barangay (village) Sandor, Baloi town at around 10 p.m. Tuesday.
He said the soldiers had been protecting routes taken by residents in the area because of “threat reports targeting local leaders.”
De Leon did not identify the casualties pending notification of their families.
Lanao del Norte is believed to be the area of operation of wanted Moro Islamic Liberation Front leader Abdul Macapaar alias Commander Bravo, one of the rebel leaders accused of attacking civilian communities in Central Mindanao last year.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
New Zealand: Killer’s Actions Blamed on Saddam Torture
An Iraqi refugee jailed yesterday for stabbing two men to death in Auckland blamed the attack on his torture in one of Saddam Hussein’s jails.
Baseem Ridha Kadhim Abbad al Amery, 31, was granted refugee status in 2001 after he fled Iraq where he claimed he had been locked up, tortured and sentenced to death.
But in the High Court at Auckland yesterday, Justice Rhys Harrison rejected Amery’s troubled past as a mitigating factor, saying much of what he said was self-serving, self-obsessive and lacked empathy for his victims.
“If anything, members of this society would have expected that a person who has been given asylum and the opportunity of a new life in a country of social and political stability that values the sanctity of human life would respect that privilege — not abuse it in the way you have chosen.”
Amery was sentenced to life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 18 years for the murders of David Roberts, 43, and Deni Rudiantonio, 41. Mr Roberts was from Wales and Mr Rudiantonio from Indonesia.
Amery’s victims: Deni Rudiantonio and David RobertsAn Iraqi refugee jailed yesterday for stabbing two men to death in Auckland blamed the attack on his torture in one of Saddam Hussein’s jails.
Baseem Ridha Kadhim Abbad al Amery, 31, was granted refugee status in 2001 after he fled Iraq where he claimed he had been locked up, tortured and sentenced to death.
But in the High Court at Auckland yesterday, Justice Rhys Harrison rejected Amery’s troubled past as a mitigating factor, saying much of what he said was self-serving, self-obsessive and lacked empathy for his victims.
“If anything, members of this society would have expected that a person who has been given asylum and the opportunity of a new life in a country of social and political stability that values the sanctity of human life would respect that privilege — not abuse it in the way you have chosen.”
Amery was sentenced to life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 18 years for the murders of David Roberts, 43, and Deni Rudiantonio, 41. Mr Roberts was from Wales and Mr Rudiantonio from Indonesia.
The two men got in Amery’s way on July 14 last year when he was intending to kill his former girlfriend.
Mr Roberts was property manager of Alpha Apartments in central Auckland, and Amery went to him for the master key so he could get to his former girlfriend, Ying Wang. He wanted to kill her because she had left him.
Yesterday, he was also sentenced to one year’s jail for threatening to kill Miss Wang.
In mitigation, defence lawyer Charles Cato said: “He [Amery] had a terrible period in Iraq under the hands of that monstrous man Hussein.”
Justice Harrison said Amery “may have suffered great trauma in Iraq as a teenager and this may explain why you showed such little regard for the lives of two innocent men.”
But, he said, that was no excuse for what Amery did…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
New Zealand: Spend Tax Cut or Give it to the Needy: PM
John Key wants people who don’t need to spend their upcoming tax cuts to donate them to charity, a step he hopes will help develop an American-style culture of giving.
The next round of tax cuts, due in a fortnight, will give workers on $45,000 an extra $11.54 a week in the hand and those earning $100,000 about $24.
Speaking at a Philanthropy New Zealand conference yesterday, Mr Key said those who “can’t bring themselves to spend their tax cuts” should give the money to a charity rather than save it.
The cuts are part of the Government’s economic stimulus plans, aimed at increasing household spending in the recession.
Mr Key said though many people needed the tax cuts to pay debt or bills, “I am just as sure there are many who are in a position to donate some.
“I’ll be reminding people that if they can’t bring themselves to spend their tax cuts, there are many organisations who could benefit.”
Labour leader Phil Goff said Mr Key’s reasoning was deeply flawed, as were tax cuts designed to favour the wealthy. The cuts gave little to low-income workers who would have spent it, and more to those on high incomes who were less likely to spend it.
“It smacks of the old aristocracy to say ‘we will make things worse for the low-income people and then, out of the generosity of my heart, I will call on other well-heeled people to donate theirs to charity’.”
Mr Key, whose tax cut will be $98 a week, gives a “reasonable portion” of his $393,000 salary to charities and intends to continue doing so.
Though New Zealanders donated as much per head as comparable countries, he said there was potential to do more, especially when the recession ended. He would like to see New Zealanders become more like Americans, who give twice as much of their income to charity.
When living in America he had admired its “culture of giving”. This was partly because Americans earned more, but also because of a “culture of generosity and giving ingrained in them for generations.
“That’s the kind of attitude I want to foster here.”…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
New Zealand: Survey Suggests Parents Unclear on Smacking Law
A lobby group campaigning for the repeal of anti-smacking legislation has released survey findings showing many parents are confused about the law change.
In research commissioned by Family First NZ, respondents were asked whether the new law made it always illegal for parents to give their children a light smack.
As the law stands there are some circumstances where a light smack would not be illegal.
Fifty-five per cent of the 1000 people surveyed thought smacking was always illegal, 31 per cent thought it was not, and 14 per cent did not know.
“This proves just how confusing the law is to parents and it is this confusion that is causing huge harm,” said Family First national director Bob McCoskrie.
To add to the confusion, a survey undertaken by the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in November last year found that 43 per cent of those surveyed who knew of the law change supported it.
“Only 28 per cent were opposed to the law change. The remainder were neutral,” Commissioner Cindy Kiro said.
The survey was conducted as part of efforts to judge public opinion in the lead-up to a referendum taking place in August this year on the 22-month-old law, which removed the defence of reasonable force for disciplining a child.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
New Zealand: Nats Out to Sink 3-Strike Law, Says Act MP
The Act MP who designed the proposed three strikes law says National has expanded it to include offences like bestiality in a “Machiavellian” attempt to make it look unworkable.
National has toughened the law by adding 20 crimes like bestiality, incest and acid throwing to the list of “strike offences” that could see a repeat offender sentenced to life imprisonment with a 25-year non-parole period.
But hardline Act MP David Garrett said many of the new offences arguably did not justify a life sentence and were possibly an attempt to undermine three strikes.
“It may be a Machiavellian move by National designed to sink the three strikes provision. Many will say incest, for example, while a deeply unpleasant offence, should not be a reason to send someone to jail for 25 years.”
Three strikes has been introduced to Parliament by National as a condition of the Act Party’s agreement to support it as Government.
National has made three strikes a provision of its own Sentencing and Parole Reform Bill, which is how it added the extra offences….
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Somali Insurgent Group Led by a Swede
A Swedish citizen of Somali origin previously held in Sweden on terror financing suspicions has returned to his homeland to assume a leadership position in a newly created armed insurgent movement.
Yassin Ali was released on June 11th, 2008 after spending more than three months in custody last year following his arrest in a joint raid carried out by Swedish and Norwegian security police.
He and two other men were suspected of having sent money to al-Shabaab (‘The Party of Youth’), a Somalia-based Islamist insurgent group with ties to al-Qaeda.
Al-Shabaab has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States and is considered a terrorist group by both the Swedish and Norwegian security police.
One of the men was released shortly after the February arrests, while Ali and a second man remained in custody as prosecutors continued to build their case.
But Swedish prosecutor Ronnie Jacobsson eventually closed the case in September 2008 without filing formal charges, saying he had been unable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the men had sent money to finance terror groups in Somalia.
“The investigation has not been able to show to a sufficiently high degree to whom or what in Somalia, and for what purpose, the money was sent,” wrote Jacobsson in a statement at the time.
Having since returned to Somalia, Ali has assumed a top leadership position within Hisbi Islam (also known as Hizbul Islaam — ‘The Islamic Party’) a recently formed coalition of four insurgent Islamist groups united in fighting the Somali government.
In late February, both al-Shabaab and Hisbi Islam were involved in a fierce battle with African Union peacekeepers which claimed more than 20 lives and left dozens wounded.
Following the revelations that Ali was leading an armed insurgency in Somalia, Jacobsson said he knew that Ali had return to the country but wasn’t aware of his role.
Jacobsson added that he didn’t think there was much he could do about the matter.
“I’d have to think about it awhile,” he told the Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) newspaper.
“But just being a member in something identified as criminal isn’t enough to be convicted of a crime.”
Mats Paulsson, who heads the counter terrorism division with Sweden’s security police, Säpo, was also skeptical as to whether Swedish authorities have any power to stop Ali.
“Under current legislation it’s not possible to impede, legally speaking, Swedes from participating in these types of groups,” he told SvD.
Per Gudmundson, an editorial writer with SvD who has written extensively about Swedish terror connections in Somalia, says it’s regrettable that Swedish authorities weren’t able to build a case against Ali and prevent him from returning to Somalia to participate in more violence.
“Part of the problem is that the Swedish security services, law enforcement, and prosecutors don’t have the resources to carry out the costly and time consuming work of tracing money all the way back to al-Shabaab,” he told The Local.
“Of course, they also operate with the goal of preventing crimes from taking place in Sweden, and don’t have the legal tools to prevent crimes from occurring abroad.”
Gudmundson also noted that revelations of a Swedish citizen leading an Islamic terrorist group in Somalia hadn’t gotten much attention in the Swedish press or among Swedes in general.
While news about Africa seldom attracts a great deal of attention, he theorized that Swedes’ views about citizenship may also have something to do with the general lack of awareness of Ali’s case.
“In the eyes of most Swedes, a Swedish citizen of Somali origin is simply considered Somali,” he said.
“Swedes don’t really think it has anything to do with them.”
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Sudan: President’s Expulsion of Foreign Aid Groups Concerns the UN
New York, 17 March (AKI) — The top United Nations humanitarian official has expressed “surprise” at reports on Monday that Sudan’s president Omar Al-Bashir has called for all international aid groups to leave the vast African nation within one year.
Under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs John Holmes said his office had yet to receive any communication from the Sudanese government regarding al-Bashir’s order to all overseas aid groups to leave the country.
“I think our position will clearly be that this decision is not appropriate and it’s a decision which should be reversed,” the UN official told reporters in New York late on Monday.
Sudan two weeks ago ordered the expulsion of 13 major international aid organisations, immediately after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant on 4 March for al-Bashir for alleged crimes committed in the war-torn western Darfur region.
Al-Bashir also ordered the country’s ministry of humanitarian affairs to ‘Sudanize’ the voluntary work in the country and told aid organisations to “leave their food aid at the airport.”
Referring to humanitarian aid operations in Darfur, Holmes said: “The relief operation is already heavily ‘Sudanized’.”
He pointed out that 13,000 out of the 14,000 relief workers currently operating in Darfur are Sudanese.
While the UN is happy for Sudan to play a larger part in assisting those in need “in principle,” Holmes stressed that “it needs to be done in a practical way.”
Joint UN-government missions are under way to assess critical gaps in aid and are expected to return to the capital, Khartoum on Wednesday, Holmes said.
Holmes warned the effects of international aid organisations’ withdrawal will not be immediately felt.
“But over time, it will have a dramatic impact if we’re not able to fill the (aid) gaps” in areas such as water and sanitation, treating disease outbreaks and food distribution, he said.
He expressed concern over meningitis cases in some camps, voicing hope that a vaccination campaign targeting 100,000 people can be carried out by non-governmental organisations still operating in Darfur.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Desaparecidos Ringleader Condemned
‘Angel of Death’ Alfredo Astiz ran death flights, court says
(ANSA) — Rome, March 18 — Italy’s supreme court on Wednesday found an Argentinian ex-navy officer responsible for all the death flights during Argentina’s so-called Dirty War in the 1970s and ‘80s.
Upholding a life sentence for former captain Alfredo Astiz for the murders of three Italians, the Cassation Court noted that the so-called ‘Blond Angel’ or ‘Angel of Death’ had told a former prisoner that “rivers give back corpses but killer whales eat bodies”.
Astiz also confided in Maria Alicia Milia that the death flights were used to ease overcrowding at the infamous Navy School of Mechanics (ESMA) barracks and were reserved for the estimated 20% of the suspected leftist opponents of the regime deemed “irredeemable”.
In April 2008 a Rome appeals court upheld guilty sentences for Astiz and three other Argentinian ex-navy officers in the murders of the three Italians who ‘disappeared’.
The four ex-officers, who contested the legitimacy of the proceedings, were tried in absentia.
Three of them — Astiz, Jorge Eduardo Acosta and Alfredo Ignacio Antonio Vanek — are being held in Argentina for similar offences while the fourth, Jorge Raul Vildoza, is a fugitive.
A fifth former officer, Hector Antonio Febres, was also convicted at the original trial in 2007 but has since died of poisoning in his Argentine cell.
The defendants were convicted of torturing and murdering three Italo-Argentinians during Argentina’s military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983.
Angela Maria Aieta, the Calabrian mother of a Peronist MP, was seized by the Argentinian military in April 1977.
Businessman Giovanni Pecoraro was seized together with his daughter Susanna in June 1977.
The three were all taken to a torture centre in downtown Buenos Aires and never heard of again.
The appeals court last April also confirmed a preliminary determination of compensation of 150,000 euros for the victims’ relatives.
Italy has repeatedly asked for the four to be extradited.
A sixth defendant, former admiral Emilio Eduardo Massera, was scratched from the list because of health problems. He may be tried separately.
The six men are alleged to have been part of a group which helped run ESMA, a military academy which was turned into a torture centre.
Rome prosecutor Francesco Caporale based part of his case against the ex-officers on testimony provided by ESMA detainees who escaped death.
The court found that thousands of people held at ESMA were drugged and dumped alive into the ocean from military transport planes.
During Argentina’s ‘Dirty War’ against suspected leftist opponents, as many as 30,000 people were killed, including an estimated 500 Italians who joined the ranks of the desaparecidos, the ‘disappeared’ or ‘missing ones’.
CAMPAIGN BY VICTIMS’ FAMILIES.
Families of the Italian-born victims have been campaigning for years for the cases to be brought before the Italian courts.
Caporale took up the case of the three disappeared Italians in the wake of the 2000 convictions in absentia of seven Argentinian military and police officials accused of abducting and murdering eight Italian nationals.
Former general Carlos Guillermo Suarez Mason, one of the most notorious officers of the military dictatorship who died in 2005 while being held in solitary confinement, was handed a life sentence together with another ex-general, Omar Santiago Riveros.
The five other defendants, who included police chief Juan Carlos Girardi, were sentenced to 24 years.
In a related case that grabbed headlines here at Christmas 2007, a Uruguayan ex-navy intelligence officer accused of murdering four Italian citizens was found to have been living in Salerno for years undisturbed.
A year later Italy refused an extradition request for the man, Nestor Jorge Fernandez Troccoli, on the grounds that he was an Italian citizen.
Troccoli was one of 140 people named in arrest warrants issued by Rome prosecutors investigating the deaths of 25 Italian citizens in a decades-old cross-border operation aimed at hunting down leftists.
The others are former government chiefs and military and intelligence officers in seven South American countries including Argentina.
Rome prosecutor Giancarlo Capaldo has asked the Italian justice ministry to forward extradition requests to the countries whose military regimes sent teams to kill fugitive dissidents.
The Brazilian justice ministry has said it was unlikely to grant such requests.
The other countries concerned — Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Bolivia, Paraguay and Peru — did not respond.
Capaldo started his probe in December 1998 on the basis of suits filed by the relatives of the Italians who ‘disappeared’ during Operation Condor, which ran from 1975 to the mid 1980s.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
182 Land Near Siracusa, 5 Traffickers Stopped
(ANSAmed) — SIRACUSA, MARCH 17 — Five Somali men between 18 and 35 years old were stopped for aiding and abetting illegal immigration as part of an investigation into the landing of 182 immigrants, including three children and 25 women, yesterday at Portopalo di Capo Passero, in the province of Siracusa. Eleven foreigners were admitted to hospitals in Noto and Avola for medical checks.(ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
29 Young Algerians Stopped at Sea
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, MARCH 17 — In 48 hours, several boats with 29 young people on board were intercepted by the Algerian navy off the eastern and western coasts of Algeria. According to reports from APS, 10 Algerians between the ages of 20 and 30 were stopped yesterday off the coast of Oran, 400km west of Algiers, on board a dinghy loaded with food and fuel, while they were trying to reach the northern shore of the Mediterranean, more specifically, Spain. On Sunday, 19 Algerians between the ages of 22 and 34 were stopped at sea 11 miles from Annaba, a point of departure for migrants headed to Italy. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Vanhanen: Finland Needs Immigration Despite Present Economic Problems
Soini: True Finns’ party image affected by “a few outspoken individuals”
Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen (Centre) believes that increasingly wary Finnish attitudes toward immigration are the result of the current economic slump. According to a Helsingin Sanomat Gallup poll published on Tuesday, opposition to increased immigration has increased by about ten percentage points in the past 18 months. “I assume that it is linked with the phase of job cuts and temporary redundancies that is going on. It is an emotional reaction”, Vanhanen said at a seminar in Stockholm on Tuesday.
The Prime Minister emphasised that Finland needs immigrants. “It is important that all those who bear responsibility will say openly that we will need work-based immigration in the future.” Vanhanen said that it is important to view the matter beyond the current temporary crisis.
He emphasised that in the coming two decades Finland will not cope without work-based immigration and a lengthening of the time that people remain at work. Vanhanen feels that immigrants will be needed in all kinds of professions, from the highest researchers and doctors on down. “It needs to be based on the real needs of the labour market. At present, as people are being laid off; we are not getting work-based immigration, because work is not available”, Vanhanen noted.
In asylum policy Finland needs to act according to international agreements. “Asylum applications are processed. If there are good reasons, the people will be accepted into Finland, and if not, they will be turned away.”
The same poll indicated that the True Finns party is perceived as a group whose statements and actions are exceptionally xenophobic. More than a third of respondents felt this way about the True Finns. “That can probably be explained by the statements of a few outspoken individuals”, said True Finns’ chairman Timo Soini to Helsingin Sanomat. “The image that the True Finns are seen like this comes from somewhere of course — there is no point in blaming the mirror of the face is crooked. However, I sharply deny that I, or the party would be anti-foreigner.” “I claim to know where our support comes from, and I stipulate that this [immigration policy] is not a very significant factor in the increase in our popularity.”
Soini characterises his party’s views on immigration as “moderately critical”. He emphasises that he is referring to the views of the party, the party leadership, and the Parliamentary group, and not the views of “some local councilman or deputy councilman”. Soini expects immigration policy to be a minor theme in the upcoming elections to the European Parliament, and that the economic crisis will be the focus of attention.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Halonen and Ahtisaari Differ Slightly on Immigration
President Halonen and predecessors attend Presidential Forum Tuesday
Finnish President Tarja Halonen says that she is not surprised at the recent growth in anti-foreigner sentiment in Finland.
“It has been smoldering under the surface for a long time”, Halonen said on Tuesday at the ninth Presidential Forum held at the President’s palace in Helsinki.
The President was commenting on the results of Tuesday’s poll, which was commissioned by Helsingin Sanomat and conducted by Suomen Gallup, according to which support for increased immigration had declined to 45 per cent from 55 per cent in September 2007.
“It is human to notice that one is prejudiced”, Halonen observed.
In her speech Halonen warned against treating immigrants as mere available labour. She said that while she is in favour of free migration, she is opposed to the idea of “importing labour”.
“People must not be handled as mere labour. Work is important, but people do not live on work alone. We need to take care of immigrants also when they get old.”
Former President Martti Ahtisaari noted that his views diverge somewhat from those of President Halonen. In his view, there is nothing wrong with trying to encourage people with the kinds of skills that the country needs to immigrate to Finland. However, he emphasised the need to focus on refugee policy as well.
He pointed out that Finland is not an easy country for immigrants to come to. “We have a foreign culture, a unique language, and a rough climate.”
He emphasised the importance of tolerance. “Finns should see arrivals as a resource, and not a burden.”
Ahtisaari also underscored the importance of teaching the Finnish language and culture to immigrants. He said that there are examples in many European countries how integration of immigrants can fail…
| — Hat tip: KGS | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Entrepreneurs Up by 15,000 in 2008
(ANSAmed) — ROME, MARCH 17 — In 2008, 36,694 businesses were opened in Italy by people born outside the European Union. Compared to the previous year, the total number of individual businesses run by immigrants from non-EU countries has increased by 15,187 (compared to an increase of over 60,000 in 2007) standing at 240,596 companies, 6.7% more compared to 2007, a year in which the increase was 8%, said Unioncamere. The figures from 2008 confirm the vitality of entrepreneurship in the immigrant community, although this sector has not passed through this phase of the crisis unscathed. Compared to 2007, a slowdown in registrations and an increase in sales of businesses has been observed, compared both to the 4th quarter in the same period, and compared to the entire year. As a result, the balance from 2008, although positive, shows a decrease compared to the previous year. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Obama, Hispanic Dems to Huddle on Immigration
Hispanic Democrats will have their first West Wing meeting with President Obama on Wednesday morning to discuss immigration reform, according to Democratic sources.
The meeting is the first face-to-face sit-down between Obama and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) since the president was sworn in. Some in the CHC have recently expressed frustration that Obama has not talked more about immigration in his first two months in office.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: ‘Hunt of Immigrants’ Reported to Prosecution Office
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 17 — A report has been filed with the national prosecution office over the “hunt of immigrants” which was allegedly ordered by the ministry of the Interior. The report was filed today by some 200 unions, which are asking for damages to be paid to non-EU citizens and for Interior minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba’s resignation. According to reports by the Efe agency, the report was filed by the spokesperson of the ‘Sindicato Obrero Inmigrantes’ union (Soi-Ctm), Jesus Hidalgo, who hopes to see an investigation into the “selective dragnets” targeted against immigrant populations, which in his opinion were ordered as of 2008 to identify those lacking a residency permit in Spain. According to the filed report, four police unions confirmed that they received “orders for indiscriminate mass identifications in the street or in given locations, targeting people with physical characteristics which denote foreign origin”. The associations condemned the “illegal methods” adopted for the identification of immigrants, seeing that “the fact of being without a permit to stay is a purely administrative breach and not a crime that can be criminally persecuted”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Asian Postmaster Takes Immigration Stand by Banning Customers Who Can’t Speak English
An Asian postmaster has provoked the ire of race equality campaigners by banning customers from his branch who cannot speak English. Deva Kumarasiri claims all immigrants in Britain should learn the language so they can communicate properly with others here and embrace British culture. ‘If you come to Britain you have got to speak English,’ said the father-of-two, who moved here himself 18 years ago. ‘I am from a different country but when I came here I became British. My job is to give a service. I cannot give a service if they cannot tell me what they want.’ Mr Kumarasiri, 40, said he had banned about half a dozen customers from Sneinton Boulevard Post Office in Nottingham. ‘Some of them say, “You are not British,”‘ he said. ‘I keep telling them, “Don’t come here or I am not going to help you.”…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UK: French Immigration Minister Pours Scorn on UK Claims of Plan to Halt Migrants at Calais
Immigration Minister Phil Woolas has been humiliated after his French counterpart flatly denied his announcement that a joint Anglo-French detention centre is to be built outside Calais to deal with thousands of migrants trying to reach Britain.
In the surprise move yesterday, Mr Woolas claimed that he has held talks with his French counterparts over a secure camp.
He said he was trying to persuade them that it would be the solution to dealing with would-be asylum seekers trying to get into the UK.
But in an embarrassing rebuttal to Mr Woolas, French immigration minister Eric Besson insisted today there was ‘no question’ of a new centre being built…
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Abortion: Spain; Soria, Ways of Church and Society Part
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 17 — The “path” followed by the Episcopal Conference with a campaign against a law reforming abortion policies “is different from the path followed by society,” said Health Minister Bernat Soria to the media today. According to Soria, right now, the social debate “is over whether or not there should be an acceptance or rejection of abortion” because this controversy took place in Spain 20 years ago. For Soria, it is about “adapting Spanish legislation to the European context” and to establish similar laws to “countries that we continually say that we want to resemble”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Abortion Sparks Row of Government and Bishops in Spain — Feature
Madrid — For about a year, a relative peace had reigned between Spain’s socialist government and its Catholic bishops. But it has turned out to be short-lived. Government plans to liberalize abortion have put Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero on a collision course with the Bishops’ Conference, which announced a “massive” campaign saying the rights of animals were protected better than those of unborn children.
The government wants to free women from having to justify their abortions in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy.
The health ministry describes the measure as putting Spanish legislation in line with other European countries, but the church sees it as a head-on attack against Christian values.
Since Zapatero was elected prime minister in 2004, Spain’s generally conservative clergy has seen him as representing one of the Vatican’s main concerns: the galloping secularization of Europe.
Zapatero’s first term was marked by constant clashes with the country’s bishops, as he introduced sweeping social reforms.
Spain became one of the world’s first countries to grant homosexuals full marriage rights, prompting church representatives to attend massive rallies opposing the law.
Spain’s Catholic Church has also protested other reforms, such as fast-track divorce, stem cell research and downgrading religion as a subject in schools.
For the Vatican, Spain is a key battleground in its defence of the Catholic faith, not only because the country is a traditional Catholic stronghold, but also because of its influence in Latin America.
Nearly 80 per cent of Spaniards still regard themselves as officially Catholics, though less than 30 per cent of the Catholics practise the religion outside social events such as communions or weddings, polls show.
Spanish clergymen have not spared words in criticizing the way society is evolving, describing abortion as an “abominable crime” and gay weddings as the worst thing that has happened to the Catholic Church during its 2,000-year history.
The government, on its side, has slammed the clergy as fundamentalist.
The deepening confrontation prompted the government to seek an ally in the Vatican, with Pope Benedict XVI reportedly advising the Spanish bishops to adopt a more conciliatory approach.
The government increased the amount of taxes that Catholics can voluntarily pay into church coffers, and laid aside some of its most controversial plans such as the legalization of euthanasia.
When Vatican secretary of state Tarcisio Bertone made a private visit to Spain in February, he was given a reception appropriate for a head of state.
The government was not, however, willing to shelve its plans to reform the 1985 abortion law, which technically regards abortion as a crime.
However, more than 110,000 pregnancies are terminated annually in Spain, usually on grounds of danger to the mother’s health.
Allowing abortion on demand in the first 14 weeks would let women take independent decisions about their pregnancies, and free doctors from the fear of prosecution, Equality Minister Bibiana Aido argued.
The new law is also expected to allow abortion up to 22 weeks in certain cases, such as a serious threat to the mother’s health or malformation of the fetus.
Aido also pledged to increase sexual education, the insufficiency of which is seen as one of the main reasons why the number of abortions has doubled in a decade.
The bishops’ campaign against the planned abortion law will feature nationwide posters, showing a child and a lynx, a protected species.
“And me? Protect my life!” the child says.
Environmentalists accused the church of despising animal rights, but the campaign won the sympathies of about 1,000 scientists and other intellectuals.
They signed a manifesto against the liberalization of abortion, arguing that an embryo consisting of a single cell was already a form of human life.
Opponents of the new law are especially upset about the possibility that girls as young as 16 years might be allowed to abort without their parents’ knowledge.
The main opposition centre-right People’s Party (PP), however, avoided siding too clearly with the church, aware that many of its voters did not want it to appear excessively conservative in social matters.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Football: Spain, Women Revolt Against Discrimination
(by Paola Del Vecchio) (ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 17 — They are the only individuals to suffer discrimination in Zapatero’s Spain, which recognises human rights for all, even chimpanzees. They are women, who in the 21st century, cannot play professional football, because according to the regulations of the Real Federacion Espanola, women are expressly forbidden from obtaining a professional license. But now women on the pitch have decided to make their voices heard. Leading the battle is the Caceres (Estremadura) women’s football club, a team from Group V of the first national division, which through captain Maria Angela Garcia, and President Maria José Lopez, has decided to shake this ancient prejudice to its very foundations. “We have sent several groups a legal study and we are drafting another one,” explained Garcia and Lopez to Publico daily. The objective is to destroy the legal barriers which in football as in other sports, do not exist in reality. “Many people are surprised by the situation, although the National Football Federation, to whom we have raised the issue on numerous occasions, has not paid attention to us,” said the representatives from Caceres. But they are determined to cross national boundaries and turn to the International Federation of Professional Football Players, headed by Spanish national Gerardo Gonzalez Movilla, who in October created an ad hoc study commission. “They have already drawn up a report, showing that they are worried about the issue,” observed Maria José Lopez. Over 24,000 women in Spain play football, where there is a rigid difference between professionals and amateurs. Sports laws recognise the Liga Bbva, first division, the Liga Adelante, in men’s football, and the Liga Acb for men’s basketball as professional competitions. Handball, in which Spain is champion at a world level, is not part of the exclusive circle. Female football players effectively have no rights as employees, and do not have a collective agreement. Only women’s basketball has been a pioneer in this field, having agreed upon a collective contract in 2008, which according to experts, represents an example that should be followed by other professional disciplines. In football, there is the case of Milene Dominguez, alias Ronaldinhà, the ex-wife of the Brazilian superstar, who declared revenue of 252,000 euros in the 2002-2003 season, mostly (216,000 euros) from image rights paid by sponsors. Ronaldinhà lost out on important offers, like a 60,000 euros salary offered by Torrejon, due to a ban on playing in professional competitions, but she was a pioneer in her own way, managing to convince the Federation to change its regulations, accepting two foreigners per team in the Superliga. “It is necessary to give women at least the same possibilities as men, then we will see what each individual manages to earn by working,” said Raul Polo, ex-player for Valladolid and coach of the Caceres women’s football team, saying that he is sure that “women demonstrate much more willpower and desire to play on the field than men”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Quran is Compatible With Modern US Values: Film
Despite being revealed some 1,400 years ago, Islam’s holy book is compatible with contemporary American values, Indian filmmaker Faruq Masudi argues in his new documentary that describes the Quran as a “matrix that leads you into a spiritual journey like none other.”
Quran Contemporary Connections, set to be released online in the coming months, is a documentary-type film based on research by a group of American professors who were asked to delve deep into the minds of Muslims and find out if the Quran is out of step with modern times.
“ In Islam, sex is a good thing. Allah is not a Muslim specific God; even Arabic speaking Jews and Christians use the word Allah in their liturgies. Polygamy is a blessing. Muslims do not worship Muhammad. Everybody is a born Muslim. “
Official website”In Islam, sex is a good thing. Allah is not a Muslim specific God; even Arabic speaking Jews and Christians use the word Allah in their liturgies. Polygamy is a blessing. Muslims do not worship Muhammad. Everybody is a born Muslim,” were among the panel’s findings according to the documentary’s website.
“The film talks about the major themes of the Quran, including the most controversial ones, like jihad, women, sex, polygamy, peace and violence,” Masudi told AlArabiya.net.
Masudi explained that the documentary places Islam in a modern context and refutes the view that Islam is out-dated by linking the Quran to modern concepts like democracy, charity and diversity.
“There are so many similarities between Islam and the West because the Quran was meant to be for all of mankind, Muslims do not have a monopoly on Islam, on the book or on Allah,” Masudi said.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. to Sign U.N. Gay Rights Declaration
The Obama administration will endorse a U.N. declaration calling for the worldwide decriminalization of homosexuality that then-President George W. Bush had refused to sign, The Associated Press has learned.
U.S. officials said Tuesday they had notified the declaration’s French sponsors that the administration wants to be added as a supporter. The Bush administration was criticized in December when it was the only western government that refused to sign on.
[…]
According to negotiators, the Bush team had concerns that those parts could commit the federal government on matters that fall under state jurisdiction. In some states, landlords and private employers are allowed to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation; on the federal level, gays are not allowed to serve openly in the military.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Webster’s Dictionary Redefines ‘Marriage’
Now includes references to same-sex relationships
One of the nation’s most prominent dictionary companies has resolved the argument over whether the term “marriage” should apply to same-sex duos or be reserved for the institution that has held families together for millennia: by simply writing a new definition.
“I was shocked to see that Merriam-Webster changed their definition of the word ‘marriage,’ a word which has referred exclusively to a contract between a man and a woman for centuries. It has now added same sex,” YouTube user Eric B. noted to WND.
“The 1992 Webster’s Dictionary does not mention same sex at all,” he wrote.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
An Anti-Islamization Movie by Pro-Köln
Our Flemish correspondent VH alerts us to the following notice about an anti-Islamization film which is being produced in Germany by Pro-Köln, and will be available for distribution in a few weeks. It is being created as an deliberate parallel to Geert Wilders’ Fitna.
Here’s his translation of an article from the Pro-Köln website:
Islam-critical movie by Pro-Köln
Premiere expected early April in Cologne — Parallels to the film Fitna are definitely intentional
In connection with the Anti-Islamization Congress this year, the production of an Islam-critical film by pro-Köln is under way at this very moment. It will also be an invitation to join the Congress in Cologne on May 9 of this year. A movie production team from Berlin has been working hard these past weeks on time-consuming shooting sessions with people engaged with the Pro-movement in Cologne and the surrounding area.
In terms of content, the film will also deal with the scandalous events during the Congress in last year and will be a relentless criticism of Islamization, using disturbing and sometimes shocking images. The pioneering and leading role in Germany of the Pro-movement in this political struggle for the heritage of the Christian West will be the main connecting strand of the work.
Apart from being a professional account of the events of 20 September 2008 in Cologne, the film will also be a documentary on the disastrous state of democracy and freedom of expression in Germany, and will impressively illustrate the “capitulation of the rule of law” (Henryk M. Broder) to Leftist violence on that day [when the Autonomer, Antifa, and extreme Left supported by the CDU Mayor of Cologne rampaged though the city, assaulted people, and blockaded the event].
– – – – – – – – –
The premiere of the film is expected to take place early April in Cologne. Different versions of the film will subsequently be distributed via the Internet, e-mails, DVDs and other channels with the purpose of reaching as wide an audience as possible. A series of presentations with screenings throughout Germany is also being planned.
The project manager on the part of the Pro-movement is the 32-year old political scientist and journalist Markus Wiener: “After shooting is completed here, the production will continue intensively in the Berlin studio. In about two weeks’ time the result will be available on DVD and as Internet-optimized versions. Viewers may expect a film that will polarize and focus on an indictment of the Leftist-ideological blindness to the Islamization in our country. A significant and clear criticism of Islam, comparable with the film Fitna by the Dutch politician Geert Wilders, will be included as well. I am sure that a massive distribution of this film will make a significant contribution to the mobilization campaign for the Anti Islamization Congress of 2009.”
Values vs. Realism
The following article appeared yesterday in Document.no, and was originally published in a mixture of Danish and Norwegian. Fjordman recommended it to us, and our Danish correspondent Kepiblanc has kindly translated it for Gates of Vienna:
The battle of values gets more and more dissociated from the physical and biological universe
By Nina Hjerpset-Østlie on March 17, 2009
The political debate unfolds itself in a universe increasingly remote from the physical and biological universe in which we live, writes Jens Lintrup, medical doctor, civil engineer (retired) and secretary of the Demographic Council and Society (DROS), in the Danish weekly edition of Berlingske Tidende.
To noble, unselfish people the communist society must stand as an example well worth fighting for. In reality, however, it’s evident that the struggle for power in those communities favors the most cynical and ruthless people. Which is not strange at all. If the human brain had not evolved and tuned itself for gaining power within family and society the species of mankind would probably have vanished about three million years ago. In a capitalist society it’s hard to find bank executives who don’t identify their own, personal interests with the broader society’s interests.
This unfortunate trait of human nature has been countered by accepting universal human rights and democracy. So well in fact, that many people now think that one can construct a society founded upon legislation without taking the biological nature of mankind into account. An outstanding example here is the battle of values with regard to fugitives, where numerical considerations are deemed irrelevant.
Throughout the last 2,000 years the populations of the Middle East and North Africa grew very slowly in harmony with the economical development, but during the 100 years between 1950 and 2050 those populations are bound to increase eightfold. Although the birthrates have slowed down recently, it is not the case in the least developed regions such as the Gaza strip. The birthrates there have grown far beyond anything the society can sustain.
Productivity in The Middle East and North Africa doesn’t have a chance to create jobs for all those young people. Regardless of oil revenues, unemployment will continue to rise and standards of living will deteriorate in the coming generations. The Muslim Brotherhood has no understanding of that and grabs every opportunity to incite political chaos and civil wars resulting in huge tsunamis of refugees.
On the other hand it appears that the populations of Western Europe will decrease with something like twenty percent during that same period. (1950-2050). Such is the tendency in the materialistic world in which Denmark and the rest of Western Europe live.
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In 1950 there were almost three people in Western Europe compared to one in The Middle East and North Africa. In 2050 this relation will be reversed. Inevitably the overpopulation of The Middle East and North Africa will render life for those citizens so hopeless that they will spare no effort and take great risks in order to gain asylum in Western Europe. And with good reason.
Lintrup considers it unbelievable that some influential politicians in Denmark still label it paranoia when anyone fears a Muslim majority in Western Europe around 2050. Only ignorance about the upcoming demographic shift can explain an attitude like this, writes Lintrup:
Considering the colossal shift in demography and, accordingly, the democratic balance of power between the two sides of the Mediterranean Sea it seems without reason to limit the debate on asylums to a debate on values. One must take the numbers into consideration.
During the preceding century Georg Brandes was an intellectual person with great influence upon humanistic ideology. But at the same time he was very realistic. He would probably be spinning in his grave, if he had to listen to all those well-meaning but naïve arguments about values nowadays spewing from the pulpit of Parliament.
Religious freedom is good, but mostly within the spiritual realm. Insofar as religious freedom limits the physical universe with regard to food, clothes, freedom of expression, and sexual behavior it’s a dubious blessing, prone to creating conflicts. The mullah-regime in Iran has restricted free schooling to the first two children in a family. That’s against human rights. It is discrimination against additional children. But if it spares the Iranians the misery of overpopulation so prevalent in Arab states, one could call it a blessing. Here, human rights work is a barrier to human welfare. What looks beautiful in the universe of spiritual values might manifest itself harmfully in the physical universe, when it comes to reality.
Indeed, it would be a blessing for society if we had a little less of a battle of values and a little more realism, opines Lintrup. But one cannot blame the politicians exclusively; they just want to get re-elected, and in that regard so-called values tend to count. Everyone has an opinion on values, but not necessarily an understanding of physical and biological realities. And here the media don’t honor their responsibility; they prefer to sell exciting stories that everybody can comprehend. Trends in underlying data might appear dusty and boring without any entertaining effect. Accordingly, they are without merit in the stream of daily news:
Take Afghanistan. There politicians as well as the media talk about the Taleban threat. It’s entertaining on TV. In reality however, the threat from overpopulation is far more imminent. During the 100 years from 1950 to 2050 it looks like the Afghan population will increase from 8 million to more than 80 million. Presently it is already at 32 million. And yet, from the pulpit of the Danish Parliament they constantly underscore the importance of civilian aid alongside the military effort against the Taleban. That kind of talk must be considered as nothing but hot air as long as one does not include whether the rebuilding of that country aims at a state of 8 or 80 millions. It is no secret that the average birthrate for Afghan women still is as high as 6.5 — the highest outside Africa. But nobody talks about what can be done about that.
And one could blame university-employed scientists who know the demography of the Middle East for not objecting when politicians and the media flash their ignorance of this ongoing development. Basically, demography is a science of fundamental political importance, but has been relegated by the universities to a minor corner of geography.
In short, the problem of overpopulation doesn’t concern anyone as long as it isn’t a battle of values of interest to the people of Western Europe. No politician gets elected for taking on this battle. That is why it rests in silence among politicians and academicians. But the battle of values must be moved from the spiritual to the biological and physical universe, and preferably quickly, concludes Lintrup:
Politicians might get so embedded in the remote universe of values, that their grip on material matters in the physical universe become unrealistic. Even our Minister for the Environment does not look ashamed when she organizes a ‘climate-summit’ focusing on material energy conservation, while ignoring the potential energy-saving brought by slowing down the increasing overpopulation. It is not even a part of the summit’s agenda. Every decade the growth of mankind far exceeds the present number of humans in Europe from the Atlantic Ocean to the Ural Range. How many decades can the globe’s environment sustain this? In this situation, will it be at all possible to save the globe without limiting the growth of populations, for example like the Mullahs’ measures in Iran? But what politician can get away with saying something like that?
If one feels comfortable in the physical and biological universe it is evident that mankind has reached a line where it must choose between growth in numbers and growth in welfare. The debate on values in the spiritual universe has not reached that line yet. May it do so soon!
A.I.G. on his Face
Up until now I’ve refrained from joining in the orgy of A.I.G.-bashing.
As everyone knows, executives at the insurance giant are under fire for being paid lavish bonuses after their company was bailed out by the government to keep it from going under. President Obama is leading the charge against all this “greed”, and the company is under a virtual siege.
So, just to be contrary, I’ll go on the record and say that those corporate titans deserved every penny that they got.
“Baron,” you say, “Have you lost your mind? These fat cats pocketed $165 million while their company went down the toilet and was rescued by Uncle Sam! How could they possibly deserve those bonuses?”
It’s simple. Those bonuses are mandated by their employment contracts, and are performance-based: the amount of the bonus depends on how much income they bring into A.I.G. Last fall they steered $173 billion into the company’s coffers, thanks to the US government’s generosity with the American taxpayers’ money.
That’s an impressive accomplishment. As corporate managers, their job is to serve their company’s shareholders, a task which they performed admirably. The bonuses are a well-earned reward.
However, now that the government is the effective owner of A.I.G., any further bailout-based bonuses are an obvious conflict of interest.
So this particular gravy train was a one-off. Sorry, guys — that’s it!
The reason I broach this topic is that our new president, Mr. Barack Hussein Obama, received a little bonus of his own from A.I.G. His political campaign pocketed a cool hundred grand from the company during the 2008 election cycle.
According to The Examiner:
Senator Barack Obama received a $101,332 bonus from American International Group in the form of political contributions according to Opensecrets.org. The two biggest Congressional recipients of bonuses from the A.I.G. are — Senators Chris Dodd and Senator Barack Obama.
The A.I.G. Financial Products affiliate of A.I.G. gave out $136,928, the most of any AIG affiliate, in the 2008 cycle. I would note that A.I.G.’s financial products division is the unit that wrote trillions of dollars’ worth of credit-default swaps and “misjudged” the risk.
The Washington Post reports a “mob effect” at A.I.G financial products division:
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A tidal wave of public outrage over bonus payments swamped American International Group yesterday. Hired guards stood watch outside the suburban Connecticut offices of AIG Financial Products, the division whose exotic derivatives brought the insurance giant to the brink of collapse last year. Inside, death threats and angry letters flooded e-mail inboxes. Irate callers lit up the phone lines. Senior managers submitted their resignations. Some employees didn’t show up at all.
[…]
Now that the Wall street Journal has revealed that A.I.G. paid bonuses of $1 million or more to 73 employees, it’s time to ask if recipients of A.I.G. “bonuses,” including President Obama, will give what now ought to be taxpayer money back?
But it gets even worse. The administration is employing a bait-and-switch tactic by pounding A.I.G.’s officers for their greed and profligacy while more important issues go unexamined.
It’s relatively easy to set up rich Wall Street executives as greedy fat cats sucking the lifeblood out of the American worker. The tactic is tried-and-true, and it’s been a staple of Democrat rhetoric for well over a hundred years. Nobody ever lost votes by attacking the pig-snouted top-hatted capitalist with his cigar and his big bag of money.
But in this case the stratagem has the added advantage of distracting attention from what A.I.G. actually did with its bailout money. Here’s a report from Bob Owens:
Barack Obama’s lack of leadership in a down economy has now hit crisis proportions, as his claimed inability to block millions of dollars in bonuses for executives of bailout recipient AIG has caused even his supporters to turn on him.
But while the ire of Congress and the media focus are on the $165 million that AIG paid out in bonuses to their executives, the president is hoping you won’t notice the $100 billion in taxpayer bailout dollars that AIG paid out to other banks, including $58 billion to foreign banks and $36 billion given to French and German banks alone.
The Obama administration is allowing AIG to bail out the rest of the world with your tax dollars.
So by all means, the president is happy to have you railing at “evil” but relatively small potatoes AIG executive bonuses, as it points your outrage away from his own far more costly executive abuses.
It’s worth noting that this process — in which the government pulls money from the pockets of American taxpayers and funnels it through A.I.G. to prop up the international banking system — is one small piece of the Obama plan to create a socialist state in America.
First you destroy the collective wealth of ordinary people by devaluing their assets, assuming their mortgages, and taxing them to the bone. While you’re at it, you confiscate their firearms. Then, when they are once again helpless infants mewling and puking in their nurse’s arms, you make them into wards of the state, and the People’s Republic of America is born. The USA becomes just like Sweden, only poorer and with much less free enterprise.
But if that really is our future, ponder this: Among the largest contributors to Barack Obama’s presidential campaign were Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase & Co., Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Wachovia, and Lehman Brothers.
These are hardcore capitalist-pig enterprises, the fattest of the fat cats. Why in the world would they bankroll the Socialist-in-Chief?
Are they really that stupid?
Or could it be that the wealthiest and most influential managers of the American banking and finance systems see an opportunity to turn a tidy profit by joining the Great Socialist Enterprise?
Hat tips: Holger Danske and Fausta. Thanks to Vlad for his help when our satellite connection went out.
Gates of Vienna News Feed 3/17/2009
Tonight the news feed has reached a new milestone: it contains more than a hundred articles.
If you’re experiencing a slow load of this blog, the news feed is probably responsible, because even though the bulk of it is below the fold, the “invisible” text loads along with the above-the-fold portions when the page opens.
I have no solution to offer, except to start a separate blog for the news feed, which I am loath to do…
Thanks to Abu Elvis, Andy Bostom, C. Cantoni, Craig Karpel, Fausta, heroyalwhyness, Insubria, islam o’phobe, JD, TB, Tuan Jim, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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Czech Rep: Hundreds of Jobless Foreigners Decide to Leave Czech Republic
Prague — A total of 738 foreigners have applied for free air tickets and a 500-euro allowance by March 15, thus making use of the government offer to the unemployed foreigners who decide to return home voluntarily, Hana Mala, from the Interior Ministry, told CTK today.
Mongolians were largest group of applicants for the free air tickets home and the allowance in the first month since the government measure aimed at helping the foreigners who lost jobs due to the economic crisis took effect on February 16, Mala said.
She said 550 Mongolians who had asked for the aid made up three-quarters of all applicants, followed by citizens of Uzbekistan — 104, and Vietnam — 37.
Among the 516 foreigners who have left for home there were 405 citizens from Mongolia, 58 from Uzbekistan, 18 from Vietnam, 19 from Ukraine, six from Indonesia, four from Georgia, three from Bosnia and Herzegovina, two from Moldova and one from Russia, Mala said.
The largest number of applications — 250 — were registered in the first week since the measure took effect while 200 applications on average were registered in the following weeks, she said.
Foreigners most often apply for the government aid at the foreigner police in Prague and Plzen, west Bohemia, Mala said.
The foreigners who are leaving the country voluntarily receive the 500-euro allowance on board the plane. Children receive half of the sum, she said.
The government measure aims at preventing jobless foreigners from remaining in the Czech Republic where they would stay and work illegally.
A total of 2000 foreigners could apply for the aid within the first phase of the project that will cost about 60 million crowns.
Interior Minister Ivan Langer said if foreigners showed an increased interest in returning home voluntarily he would try to convince the government to extend the project.
He said he wanted the government to continue financing the project from its budget reserve.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
How Elite Environmentalists Impoverish Blue Collar Americans
Entire economy based on large-scale, high-tech agriculture is being brought to its knees.
The great Central Valley of California has never been an easy place. Dry and almost uninhabitable by nature, the state’s engineering marvels brought water down from the north and the high Sierra, turning semi-desert into some of the richest farmland in the world.
Yet today, amid drought conditions, large parcels of the valley — particularly on its west side — are returning to desert; and in the process, an entire economy based on large-scale, high-tech agriculture is being brought to its knees. You can see this reality in the increasingly impoverished rural towns scattered along this region, places like Mendota and Avenal, Coalinga and Lost Hills.
In some towns, unemployment is now running close to 40%. Overall, the water-related farming cutbacks could affect up to 300,000 acres and could cost up to 80,000 jobs.
However, the depression conditions in the great valley reflect more than a mere water shortage. They are the direct result of conscious actions by environmental activists to usher in a new era of scarcity.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Banks to Get ‘Stress Test’
Government must stay out of the banking business, Draghi says
(ANSA) — Rome, March 17 — Italian banks will soon be given a ‘stress test’ to determine whether they have sufficient capital to make it through the current economic recession, Bank of Italy Governor Mario Draghi told parliament on Tuesday.
The aim of the initiative, he told the lower house finance committee, was no longer to calculate the value of their so-called ‘toxic assets’ but to “put a number on how much they expect to lose from bad loans, how many of their clients will not pay their debts and how they plan to balance this in their budgets”.
“Once we have this number, we will ask them: do you have enough cash?”, Draghi added.
The governor said the period under examination will run until June 2010, when the recession is expected to be over, and in making their calculations banks will need to factor in how much they lost in previous recessions and the amount of debt their clients had at the time.
Looking at the global credit crunch, Draghi said that while central banks and the state “were able to keep the financial system from collapsing, insufficient light was shed on the balance sheets of those banks which had invested heavily on what became toxic assets,” or bad loans and investments.
“We still do not know for certain how big the losses were for the world’s leading banks and how these losses were distributed,” Draghi explained.
The governor defended the Bank of Italy’s performance as the country’s financial watchdog and pointed to the fact that “banks did not fail in Italy the way they did in other countries”. Draghi also recalled that when he took office in February 2006 he had drawn attention to the risks created by the derivatives market — which later triggered the crisis — and how the central bank’s watchdog function had been more focused “on operators rather than on products”.
GOVERNMENTS MUST NOT INTERFERE IN THE BUSINESS OF BANKING.
Turning his attention to the action the Italian and other governments have taken to deal with the global credit crunch, Draghi stressed that while governments should work to ensure the correct functioning of the credit system, they must not interfere in the business of banking.
In Italy’s case, the central bank governor explained that the government’s monitoring of the credit sector on a local level “must not result in pressure on banks to lower their standards which guarantee a healthy and cautious management of their clients”.
Draghi added that “banking must remain a business activity based on a cautious, professional evaluation of the validity of projects seeking credit”.
On their part, he said Italian banks must now demonstrate greater foresight in making decisions during this period of economic turmoil.
Draghi observed that “at a time when the quality of credit will inevitably worsen due to the recession, decisions are needed which show foresight. To be a good banker it is not enough to keep accounts in order”.
Showing foresight, the governor explained, meant “giving firm support to clients who deserve credit” in order to avoid “an excessive credit squeeze which would only aggravate the recession and worsen the position of bank clients”. In order to foster the flow of credit, Draghi urged banks to “take advantage of support offered by the state to pump credit into the economy”. The Treasury has offered to buy up short-term bonds issued by banks on the condition that the funds be used for personal loans, mortgages and to help small businesses. In return, banks will pay a yield of 7.5%-8.5% on the bonds which will gradually increase with time in order to ensure their short-term nature. Looking at what more could be done to help the banking sector, Draghi suggested tax cuts for banks and other credit institutions in order to make them more competitive. High taxes, he explained, “translate into less self-financing, fewer assets and a reduced ability to extend credit”. According to Draghi, current limits on tax deductions and additional VAT payments in services performed within banking groups subtracted some two billion euros from net profits in the banking sector.
In his appearance before parliament, Draghi also announced that the Bank of Italy will soon issue guidelines to determine salaries for top bank executives.
These will not entail establishing a salary cap but “will link earnings to their ability to avoid taking unnecessary risks, unlike before,” he said.
The guidelines, which Draghi said would be the first in the world by a central bank authority, would also ensure greater salary transparency by making these known to and approved by shareholder meetings.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
State Considers Return to Gold, Silver Dollars
Proposed bill slams Fed, allows payments in precious metals
A bill being considered in the Montana Legislature blasts the Federal Reserve’s role in America’s money policy and permits the state to conduct business in gold and silver instead of the Fed’s legal tender notes.
Montana H.B. 639, sponsored by State Rep. Bob Wagner, R-Harrison, doesn’t require the state or citizens to conduct business in gold or silver, but it does require the state to calculate certain transactions in both the current legal tender system and in an electronic gold currency. It further mandates that the state must accept payments in gold or silver for various fees and purchases.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Stimulus Plan: Spend Now, Details Later (Promise)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama wants governors to hurry up and begin building bridges and schools to revive the economy. His administration is learning that spending $787 billion as quickly and transparently as promised is no easy task.
States wanting desperately to tap into the new money are having trouble keeping track of the application deadlines and requirements in the 400-page stimulus bill. Governors must sign pledges saying they’ll spend the money appropriately, but the administration is still figuring out what the rules are.
“Well, that’s kind of scary,” said Richard Eckstrom, South Carolina’s comptroller general.
Hanging over all of this are two threats. The first was written into the law, saying that if states miss a deadline or don’t spend the money fast enough, they lose the cash. Vice President Joe Biden delivered the second threat last week, warning that if states misspend the money, “don’t look for any help from the federal government for a long while.”
Yet figuring out how to spend the money correctly isn’t easy. For example:
- The Housing and Urban Development Department is offering $1.5 billion for homeless prevention, but there’s confusion over who qualifies.
- Governors are required to report how many jobs are being saved or created, but there has been no explanation of how to count them.
- The Energy Department is giving out money to make homes energy-efficient, and the work must begin soon, but there aren’t enough trained workers for all the remodeling jobs.
When Washington tries to spend a lot of money, spend it quickly and spend it responsibly it usually succeeds only in two of those three goals. Federal aid after Hurricane Katrina was wasted on temporary house trailers and fraudulent assistance applications. Some of the government loans rushed out to help small businesses recover after the Sept. 11 terror attacks went instead to a radio station in South Dakota, a motorcycle shop in Utah and more than 100 Dunkin’ Donuts and Subway franchises.
The Obama administration is working to prevent such stories about the stimulus bill. Governors, meanwhile, are making some tough calls.
California, for instance, is counting on at least $10 billion from the stimulus to stabilize its budget. If it comes up short, it probably will need to cut $1 billion. That decision needs to be made soon. But right now, there’s no way to know for sure how much the state will get.
“There’s mass confusion still at this stage,” Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said.
At a conference for state officials at the White House complex last week, a representative from Utah asked Obama’s budget officials what data they would be required to collect from contractors. He was told to expect an answer within the next several weeks.
But the governor was preparing to sign a contract. Should he delay the project?
There were more questions than answers at the conference, where representatives from 49 states assembled to learn more about the stimulus money. Idaho is restricting travel by state employees and didn’t send anyone.
Why haven’t the feds produced a comprehensive list of deadlines and rules? What did Congress mean by “permanent” when it ordered permanent changes to state unemployment insurance? Will all federal agencies collect the same data or will each agency set its own rules?
And how, exactly, are states supposed to track and report all this spending when there’s no money in the law for tracking or auditing?
Deputy Controller Danny Werfel spent the day alternating between fielding such questions and pacing the hallways with his cell phone, trying to get answers.
Werfel is one of many Obama budget officials trying, in a matter of days, to reinvent a Byzantine federal spending process.
“Everybody would like more specifics. But they’re giving us as many specifics as they can,” said Pamela Walsh, deputy chief of staff to New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch. “Nobody has more sympathy for what they’re trying to do than a bunch of people who are trying to do the same thing at the local level.”
William Newton, Alabama’s deputy finance director, said he was surprised that the Obama administration was struggling as much as states to make sense of the new law.
“We’ve been looking at this from our state’s point of view. But now I realize they’re getting calls from 49 other states and they don’t have answers,” Newton said.
Even the watchdogs have new roles. Earl Devaney, the chief auditor overseeing the stimulus spending, said he can’t be a traditional inspector general who roots out and exposes fraud. He has to prevent it.
Devaney and other watchdogs said they need to hire new investigators. Some agencies are recruiting auditors out of retirement. Ideally, Devaney said, he would have started working on this a year ago. Instead, he’s had about three weeks.
“I’m very concerned,” Devaney told state leaders. “But we’re going to try to do everything possible to help you.”
Most governors are willing to give the Obama administration time to figure out the details, said John Thomasian of the National Governors Association, who hosted a conference call last week for governors’ staffs to discuss working through these problems.
“There’s a recognition that everyone is trying to do it well and we’re all in the position of trying to make this work,” Thomasian said. “Frustration will surface if these questions have not been answered in a few months.”
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Stimulus Jobs: Non-Union ‘Need Not Apply’
When President Obama talked about those shovel-ready jobs, we now know who was using the shovel and what was being shoveled.
“The stimulus package that has passed both houses of Congress is tilted toward union contractors, said the president of an association of nonunion builders.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Don’t Let Mandarins Ration Mortgages
One of the more insidious consequences of the crash has been the Government’s worrying conviction that only it has the answer to our most intractable problems. Having bailed out the banks, it believes that it must now bring its unrivalled expertise to bear on other aspects of the crisis, because market mechanisms have failed. Tomorrow we will learn how Whitehall intends to run the housing market when Lord Turner delivers, at Gordon Brown’s request, his ideas for reforming bank regulation.
Central to the Turner blueprint, it appears, will be the state rationing of mortgages. That is not the way it will be portrayed, of course, but that is what we are getting. Lord Turner apparently intends to establish industry guidelines fixing a ceiling of three times salary for mortgages, while 100 per cent advances will not be allowed. Micro-managing housing finance in this way is not the business of government. No one would deny that the property boom (fuelled, remember, by a Government and a central bank happy to see interest rates kept dangerously low for too long) spawned bad practices. They always do. The most egregious were the “extreme loans” of up to 10 times salary and the self-certifying mortgage, both of which acted as an open invitation to the irresponsible to take on unaffordable debt. Yet while bad debts were incurred, there was nothing in this country on the scale of the US subprime debacle. The rate of home repossessions testifies to that: there were 40,000 last year compared with 75,000 in 1991, the last time property values fell.
So why does the Government feel the urge to intervene in the mortgage market so crudely? It will make life tougher for first-time buyers and delay the revival of the housing market, without which the wider economy will not start to perk up. The lessons of the bust will not be lost on any lender. It is already far tougher to get housing finance without HMG putting its oar in. The Prime Minister sees this statist intervention as encouraging the “reinvention of the traditional savings and mortgage bank in Britain”. That is meant to sound like a return to the good old days; but in reality it will be a return to the bad old days when raising the finance to buy a home was an uphill slog and the property market was inflexible and inefficient as a consequence.
But this is not about efficiency — it is about control. The instincts on display here are the same as those that informed Professor Sir Liam Donaldson’s clumsy attempt to price alcohol out of the reach of the feckless. It is a recrudescence of that tired old idea that the gentleman in Whitehall knows best. Well, he doesn’t.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Are You a Terrorist Suspect?
Did you support Ron Paul for president last year?
Do you believe there are people actively working to merge the U.S. with Mexico and Canada?
Do you display an American flag?
Did you ever display a Libertarian Party bumper sticker on your car?
Do you buy gold?
Any of these characteristics might lead law enforcement authorities to conclude you represent a danger to the republic. You are more likely to be a militia member or a domestic terrorist, according to a document distributed to Missouri police and, potentially, law enforcement authorities nationwide..
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Formerly Useful Idiots
Lenin famously said of liberals in the West that they were “useful idiots.”
A number of really smart (go ahead, ask them) people endorsed Obama only to find out that they were hoodwinked. He’s not the guy they fell in love with. It’s the morning after, and they’ve been forced to confront the fact that he’s a fraud. A forgery.
In John LeCarre’s “Smiley’s People” master spy George Smiley points out that “the more one has paid for a forgery, the more one defends it in the face of all the evidence to the contrary.” And, these people have paid plenty for their forgery.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama Snubs Mideast Allies
Notably, President Obama did not respond to greeting messages from America’s Mideast allies until weeks after he’d entered the White House. The Iraqi leadership had to wait three weeks. Afghan President Hamid Karzai waited 40 days. Leaders of traditional allies such as Morocco, Egypt, Turkey, Jordan and Saudi Arabia didn’t wait as long — but got only protocol calls devoid of political content.
Obama’s emissaries to the region have made it clear that the new administration is keener on cultivating its foes than courting its friends.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Rome is Burning, Nero is Fiddling
Did you know that the White House is being bombarded by “minutiae?” That the president’s personal aide is a “hunk”? That his speech writer has a “buzz cut?”
While America slides precipitously toward an all-out economic depression, while Also Known As (AKA) Obama continues to break every promise he made on the campaign trail, this is what the New York Times thinks is important for people to know!
Wow, aren’t you just really impressed?
And the lamestream media wonders why people are turning off their television sets, terminating their newspaper subscriptions, and using their computers to access alternative media sources and joining news loops to learn what is really going on in this nation.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Republicans Can Take Heart as Barack Obama Staggers to the Left
The President’s recent display of liberalism — and confusion — can only help the opposition, says Janet Daley.
The Republicans now believe they have a grip on what Barack Obama is about. At least for this week. The grip is subject to reappraisal because Mr Obama has developed a gift for reinventing himself with remarkable alacrity. One very senior commentator on the Right said to me, “First we had Candidate Obama, who was a liberal [ie Left wing]. Then we had President-Elect Obama, who was post-partisan and centrist. Now we have President Obama, who has reverted to being ultraliberal.”
The question of who Mr Obama really is, and what he truly believes, underlies the growing list of Very Odd Things that seem to be happening under his administration. Among the most perplexing of these mysteries is why, when he went to such pains to assemble a huge and widely experienced team of White House economic advisers (even going to the lengths of parading them at a press conference before he took office) he then handed over the actual drafting of his economic policy to the old Democratic fixers in Congress. The Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, and the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, are now, for all intents and purposes, running the Obama recovery plan.
Even if you do not regard the former as a monster and the latter as pretty hopeless, one thing is for sure: bipartisan they are not. So there is nothing very centrist about the budget which they are hoping to push through under the banner of Obama’s “change we can believe in”. The result: this is a $3.6 trillion Pelosi budget, embodying most of the wish-list of liberal projects that the Left of the Democratic Party has been dreaming of for more than 20 years. Should we assume, then, that this is what Mr Obama always wanted? Or that he is simply out of his depth and being steamrollered by the formidable Democratic machine in Congress?
Most of the Republicans I have spoken to here are inclined to think that this peculiar turn of events can be attributed to Rahm Emanuel, who is Mr Obama’s Alastair Campbell. This is partly because they are inclined to think that pretty much everything in the Obama presidency can be attributed to Mr Emanuel, but also because of his revealing comment that “every crisis should be seen as an opportunity”. This can be roughly interpreted as, “Never let a good crisis go to waste.”
When I met Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, at a Washington breakfast, he expressed the suspicion openly that the Democrats might actually be deliberately avoiding attending to the banking and housing crises because they wanted to prolong the moment in which they could push through their favoured liberal packages (such as health care, and environmental policies) under the cover of an emergency rescue operation. (And who better to bludgeon such measures through Congress than those old Democrat manipulators Pelosi and Reid?)
Another quandary that bemuses the opposition — while it deeply disturbs Mr Obama’s supporters — is why the President is having so much trouble staffing his Cabinet team. His Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, may not be sitting in splendid isolation any longer (the administration has finally succeeded in making three Treasury appointments) but there are still 17 unfilled positions in what is arguably the most important government department of the day.
Quite apart from the possibility of embarrassment over past tax and social security payments, are plausible candidates worried about being associated with high-risk White House strategy? Maybe, but given that Mr Obama swept into the White House on a tide of popular approval, surely he should be able to find enough people who are appropriate and willing to serve?
When I put this question to Fred Barnes, executive editor of the Weekly Standard, he pointed out that most of the Obama camp consisted of people who wanted to work in social and environmental policy: in those areas, and in the tactical-public relations business, the White House is staffing up like crazy. (Interestingly, another Washington journalist told me that a number of major business donors to Mr Obama’s campaign who had expected to have at least an advisory role in his Treasury policy have been cold-shouldered. The White House seems to be taking very little advice on economic recovery from outsiders or even from that raft of gurus it drafted in during the much-publicised “transition” project.)
Meanwhile, the sharp swerve to the Left accelerates. One of the most startling measures to which the Obama-Pelosi-Reid administration has committed itself is the Employee Free Choice Act (commonly known as the “card check” bill) which does precisely the opposite of what it says on the tin. The Act would effectively abolish the right of trade union members to secret ballots. In other words, it would give American union bosses the kind of power to intimidate their membership into strike action that used to belong to British union leaders before the Thatcherite reforms.
I was amazed to discover that most US Republicans were unaware that the statutory right to a secret ballot was one of the most crucial aspects of the 1980s British industrial relations revolution. Needless to say, when I imparted that snippet of information to Mitch McConnell, he and his press officer looked as if all their birthdays had come at once.
But from the opposition point of view, there are some upsides to this White House Leftism: assuming that the Obama-Pelosi-Reid juggernaut stays on its present course, the Republicans can see a very clear path for themselves. In the Senate, Mr McConnell will set them solidly against borrowing too much, spending too much and taxing too much.
But the success of that stand depends on Mr Obama staying in one place long enough to be confronted. At the end of last week he had shifted his description of the economic crisis from being “as deep and dire as any since the Great Depression”, to “not being as bad as we thought”.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Union Thuggery Hits New Low
The motto of unions should be, if you cannot win fairly — buy politicians, buy a president and have them lie for you while you complain how bad you have it. In other words, lie, cheat and bribe to get what you want. That is precisely what the “Employee Free Choice Act” is.
Card Check, as the proposed bill is also called, would change how unions are allowed to organize workers in the U.S. It purposes to eliminate the private ballot. And if you are wondering what that means and why same is important, imagine not being able to cast your vote for the candidate of your choice in private.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Veterans: Who Pays for War Wounds?
[Comment from Tuan Jim: Let me get this straight — *The One* wants to create a socialized national health care system on “par” with the UK and Canada — while simultaneously making us pay for injuries that we received while serving our country!?! WTF?]
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is considering making veterans use private insurance to pay for treatment of combat and service-related injuries.
The plan would be an about-face on what veterans believe is a longstanding pledge to pay for health care costs that result from their military service.
But in a White House meeting Monday, veterans groups apparently failed to persuade President Barack Obama to take the plan off the table.
“Veterans of all generations agree that this proposal is bad for the country and bad for veterans,” said Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. “If the president and the OMB (Office of Management and Budget) want to cut costs, they can start at AIG, not the VA.”
Under current policy, veterans are responsible for health care costs that are unrelated to their military service. Exceptions in some cases can be made for veterans without private insurance or who are 100 percent disabled.
The president spoke Monday at the Department of Veterans Affairs to commemorate its 20th anniversary and said he hopes to increase funding by $25 billion over the next five years. But he said nothing about the plan to bill private insurers for service-related medical care.
Few details about the plan have been available and a VA spokesman did not provide additional information. But the reaction on Capitol Hill to the idea has been swift and harsh.
“Dead on arrival” is how Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington described the idea.
“When our troops are injured while serving our country, we should take care of those injuries completely,” Murray, a member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, told a hearing last week.
“I don’t think we should nickel and dime them for their care,” she added.
In separate comments, Republican Sen. Kit Bond of Missouri said the nation “owes a debt to the veterans who fought and paid for our freedom.”
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Veterans: President Won’t Budge on Insurance Proposal
[Comments from JD: link above includes screenshot of original yahoo article, in case the yahoo article is mysteriously removed.]
The leader of the nation’s largest veterans organization says he is “deeply disappointed and concerned” after a meeting with President Obama today to discuss a proposal to force private insurance companies to pay for the treatment of military veterans who have suffered service-connected disabilities and injuries. The Obama administration recently revealed a plan to require private insurance carriers to reimburse the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in such cases.
“It became apparent during our discussion today that the President intends to move forward with this unreasonable plan,” said Commander David K. Rehbein of The American Legion. “He says he is looking to generate $540-million by this method, but refused to hear arguments about the moral and government-avowed obligations that would be compromised by it.”
The Commander, clearly angered as he emerged from the session said, “This reimbursement plan would be inconsistent with the mandate ‘ to care for him who shall have borne the battle’ given that the United States government sent members of the armed forces into harm’s way, and not private insurance companies. I say again that The American Legion does not and will not support any plan that seeks to bill a veteran for treatment of a service connected disability at the very agency that was created to treat the unique need of America’s veterans!”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Jonathan Kay on the Globe & Mail’s Appalling Front-Page Smear on Religious Christians
Canadians differ on whether a supernatural entity had a role in the creation of human life. In a 2007 poll, 26% of respondents said they believe in creationism, 29% picked evolution, and 34% said they believe in some combination of the two.
But according to militant secularists — given disgracefully prominent play by the Globe & Mail in today’s edition — that’s not good enough. They want everyone in society — or at least everyone leading this country — to dogmatically subscribe to the minority view that a supernatural entity had no role at all in human creation.
In a Tuesday front-page article — “Minister won’t confirm belief in evolution: Researchers aghast that key figure in funding controversy invokes religion in science discussion” — Globe science writer Anne McIlroy breathlessly reports that “Canada’s science minister [Gary Goodyear], the man at the centre of the controversy over federal funding cuts to researchers, won’t say if he believes in evolution”; that “some have expressed concern that Mr. Goodyear, a chiropractor from Cambridge, Ont., is suspicious of science, perhaps because he is a creationist”; and that “Mr. Goodyear’s evasive answers on evolution are unlikely to reassure the scientists who are skeptical about him.”
In fact, Goodyear’s remarks (delivered in a private interview with MccIlroy) seem to have been carefully considered words from a man trying conscientiously to balance his personal faith with his public responsibilities. To wit: “Obviously, I have a background that supports the fact I have read the science on muscle physiology and neural chemistry … I do believe that just because you can’t see it under a microscope doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It could mean we don’t have a powerful enough microscope yet. So I’m not fussy on this business that we already know everything. … I think we need to recognize that we don’t know.”
But that sort of intellectual modesty and agnosticism is boring: It too closely approximates the way millions of ordinary Canadians think about the mysteries of the cosmos. So McIlrony instead decided she’d go for the Globe’s front page by getting some sexed up reaction quotes from outraged secularists who could be depended on to slam any inkling of spirituality as a portend of theocracy.
Brian Alters, founder and director of the Evolution Education Research Centre at McGill University, gets trotted out first. He is “shocked” by Goodyear’s refusal to disavow any possibility of God’s role in human creation. (“It is the same as asking the gentleman, ‘Do you believe the world is flat?’ and he doesn’t answer on religious grounds” etc.) We also get a chime in from a “flabbergasted” Jim Turk — executive director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers — who falsely alleges that Goodyear “rejects the basis of scientific discovery and traditions.”
In general, I try not to get too animated by what runs in other newspapers. On slow news days, all editors — including those at this newspaper — occasionally feel obligated to get readers riled up about not-so-exciting b-rate news events. But this particular Globe story is a disgrace. There is an air of witch-hunt about it. What other public figures will the Globe “out” as suspected Godly followers, one wonders? The clear implication is that service in the federal Cabinet is a privilege open only to that minority of Canadians who subscribe rigidly to the tenets of atheism.
And please, no letters from readers complaining about yet another “gaffe” from a “socially conservative” Conservative “re-awakening fears” about a “secret agenda.” Unless Canadians expect their politicians to lie about their own personal belief in God, there was no gaffe here — just a journo-concocted pseudo-scandal. If it becomes a real scandal, it will be soley due to the Toronto media’s own echo chamber — not anything Goodyear actually said.
There is a broader issues at play here. So permit me to leave the fishbowl of Canadian politics for a moment. Seventeen years ago, in the case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, a plurality of U.S. Supreme Court Justices wrote these soaring words: “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not define the attributes of personhood were they formed under compulsion of the State.”
The 1992 decision, which upheld the broad constitutional right to abortion, was slammed by conservatives for the touchy-feely way it conceived human morality and metaphysics. Yet those same words should echo in our minds as noisy activists, and the cheerleader journalists who cover them, try to convince us that a person’s private belief in God disqualifies him from a leadership role in Canadian politics.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
‘Sex as the Carrot to Fulfil Evil Intentions’
TORONTO — A girl on trial for the first-degree murder of Stefanie Rengel was the driving force of hate, obsession and “intense jealousy” behind the killing, a jury heard yesterday.
In his closing address, Crown prosecutor Robin Flumerfelt told a jury they need look no further than the 17-year-old accused — known as MT — when looking for why a now-19-year-old called DB slaughtered Rengel outside her East York home on New Year’s Day in 2008.
“Without her (MT), there is no crime; without her, there is no murder; without her, we are not here,” Flumerfelt said. “Without her, Stefanie Rengel goes on living the life she is destined to live.”
He outlined a litany of electronic messages — between May 2007 and the moments following the murder — where MT tells DB she wants Rengel dead, using sex as a reward.
[…]
| — Hat tip: islam o’phobe | [Return to headlines] |
A Devastating Picture of the Polish Political Class
Polityka 02.03.2009 (Poland)
Adam Krzeminski paints a devastating picture of the Polish political class. Cosmopolitan, educated men like Bronislaw Geremek are nowhere to be found. And the politicians aren’t interested in letting such people emerge. “The aggressive provincialism and national eccentricity of the Law and Justice Party have set the tone for Polish politics in recent years. Not very many politicians from the younger generation can be found, even though there are thousands of well-educated youth with Polish and foreign university degrees who have proven themselves in international institutions. But there’s no system for recruiting them for poltical parties, let alone a long-term plan for directing their careers based on principles that aren’t purely mercenary. A few years ago, responding to a question about how many fellowship recipients his group had sent to foundations belonging to sister parties in France, Germany, or the UK, a leading politician of one of our parties responded with amusement: Am I so suicidal that I want to nurture an executioner who’ll lop my head off someday?”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Austria: Josef Fritzl Offered Counselling ‘to Cope With Trial’
Josef Fritzl who raped his daughter Elisabeth more than 3000 times during the 24 years he imprisoned her in a cellar has been offered counselling to help cope with the trauma of his trial.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Czech Rep: Czech Town Launches Crusade Against Drug Addicts
Chomutov — The Chomutov Town Hall that started seizing part of welfare allowances from rent-defaulters via a distraint officer in mid-February wants to launch a crusade against drug addicts who bother residents this week, spokesman Tomas Branda told CTK today.
Apart from money distraints the authorities have also been evicting notorious rent-dodgers from their municipal flats and moving them to special tin container-like flats on the outskirts of the town.
The Town Hall has also taken tough measures against local prostitutes. The repression measures are part of the Safety Belt project aimed to protect decent residents against those unadaptable, Branda said.
Town Hall employees, in cooperation with the state and municipal police, will search all shadow places, restaurants and bars where drug addicts spend most time, he said.
“The goal of the measure is to reduce the number of drug addicts and drunkards’ attacks on decent residents on the streets in broad daylight,” Mayor Ivana Rapkova (senior ruling Civic Democrats, ODS) said.
The latest attack was registered by the police last week when a drugged young man attacked a policeman who received sick leave injuries, municipal police head Vit Sulc said.
In the past, ombudsman Otakar Motejl and Human Rights and Ethnic Minorities Minister Michael Kocal (for the Greens) criticised the Chomutov Town hall for the seizure of debtors’ money immediately after they receive their social benefits as unlawful.
But Rapkova has rejected the criticism and argued that those who criticise the Town Hall’s steps had offered no solution to the situation with rent-defaulters.
The Chomutov District Court supported her position last week when it rejected three proposals for the stoppage of money distraints from rent-defaulters’ social allowances.
This means that the town authorities are acting in accordance with the law, Branda said.
However, the court is still only to make decisions regarding further proposals and its verdicts could be different if the matter was heard by a different panel of judges.
Rapkova’s steps have been supported by the mayors of Czech statutory towns and by Interior Minister Ivan Langer (ODS).
Last October, the Chomutov police started to operate a camera system that consistently follows the areas where prostitutes offer their services.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Denmark: Record Arrests Did Not Stop Gang War
In 2007, a record number of biker and gang members were sentenced for serious crime — but it didn’t stop the gangwar shootings.
Last year, police managed to charge and convict a record number of criminal elements within biker groups and immigrant gangs, according to the National Police Investigation Centre annual report on gang crime which is soon to be published.
According to the report, police managed a record 400 convictions for serious crime involving members of the Hells Angels and its support group AK81, the Bandidos and five immigrant gangs.
Shootings Nonetheless, it remains uncertain whether the police focus on gang crime has actually worked. Since August 2007, Copenhageners have been plagued by an historically large number of armed attacks between bikers and immigrant groups.
Liberal Party Justice Spokesman Kim Anders says, however, that the police focus is working.
“The large number of convictions show that the police are on the right track. But the figures also show that we are dealing with hardened criminals. The unfortunate thing is that despite police successes and their focus, new members are coming into the gangs,” Andersen says.
Loose groupings The police report shows that the National Police is monitoring five Category 1 gangs, in which members are mainly from ethnic minorities. Due to their loose organization, it is difficult to determine how many members they have, but police estimate some 172 members.
Some 139 charges were brought against the groupings, with convictions for serious crime in 131 cases involving violence, narcotics or weapons possession.
One conviction each The report goes on to say that the Hells Angels had 120 members at the end of 2007 with members being charged 87 times and receiving 61 convictions for serious crime.
The Hells Angels support group AK81 — with 113 members at the end of 2007, was, on paper at least, the worst of the gangs with 314 charges and 164 convictions. This means that on average, each member of AK81 received more than one conviction in 2007.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Stefan Wallin Calls for Nordic Defence Alliance
Stefan Wallin, Chairman of Finland’s Swedish People’s Party has come out in favour of the idea of a military alliance of the Nordic Countries. Speaking on Friday at a meeting of the executive of the Swedish People’s Party, he that such an alliance could be set up through a declaration of mutual solidarity. The idea of such an arrangement was launched by Norway’s former foreign minister Thorvald Stoltenberg, who advanced the proposal in a report on foreign and security policy cooperation, which was commissioned by the Nordic foreign ministers.
The defence alliance was the last item on the three part programme suggested by Stoltenberg, but Wallin feels that it is the most fundamental of the proposals. “And it is not even very strange. We have a statement in the EU on support, so why shouldn’t we have that in the Nordic region, which remains politically, economically, and culturally our traditional reference group?” Wallin said. Wallin noted that Sweden has stated officially on a couple of occasions that if some EU country or Nordic country would come under threat, Sweden would not stand by.
Wallin continued to say that he does not believe that there is reason to doubt that Finns would take a positive view of showing solidarity toward the other Nordic countries. He pointed out that if a solidarity declaration were drawn up, it could lead to broader defence cooperation, and to monetary savings in materiel acquisition.
Wallin also took issue with the composition of a committee headed by Jukka Rantala on delaying the start of retirement. Wallin pointed out that all eight members of the working group are men, and felt that women would be needed there. The working group, which now comprises representatives of the labour market organisations and pension experts, is to be augmented by two representatives of government ministries. Wallin says that it would not be enough even if both of the new members were women. “As Minister for Equality Affairs I demand that at least four women will be part of the final composition of the working group.
Four new candidates for the European Parliament elections were named on Friday. They are Päivi Storgård from Helsinki, Charly Salonius-Pasternak from Helsinki, and Bo Lindeman from Vaasa. The Swedish People’s Party now has 12 candidates for the elections of the European Parliament. The remaining eight are to be named next month.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Demand for Somali-Language Literature in Finland Rising
Demand for youth Somali-language literature is growing in Finland, as the majority of the 10,000 Somali-speaking inhabitants in Finland are children and youths. Experts say libraries should stock more Somali-language books that deal with everyday issues facing the Somali community, such as learning to live in a new culture.
Libraries in the greater Helsinki area say they currently have 150 Somali-language titles on their shelves for children and 262 for adults.
“It’s important that we as quickly as possible find new publishers of Somali-language books,” says Antti Mäkinen of Helsinki City’s Multilingual Library.
Mäkinen says libraries should recognise the important role they play in bringing a variety of issues to light through their choice of book orders.
“Collections should cover more than folklore. There is for example a demand for books about societal issues pertaining to integration and how Somali youths and adults adapt to new environments around the world,” says Mäkinen.
Somali Culture Traces Roots to Poetry
While “standard Somali” was only introduced in 1972, Somali has been transliterated into other scripts—including Arabic— for centuries.
Poems are particularly popular among the Somali diaspora.
“We are a nation of poets. Poetry is the social fabric of the Somali community,” says Mohamed Sh Hassan, who manages the Scansom publishing house, which publishes Somali-language materials in Canada and Sweden.
Hassan says he expects demand for bilingual books to increase. Children’s Somali-language story books could include texts in Finnish, Swedish or English, according to Hassan.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Atheist Bus Campaign Coming to Finland
[Comment from Tuan Jim: These guys really are all over.]
A much-debated international advertising campaign is coming to Finland. The Atheist Bus Campaign is to be promoted on buses in Helsinki and Tampere, with the message: ‘There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life’.
The Finnish Humanist Union, together with the Union of Freethinkers of Finland, is currently collecting funds to carry out the campaign, which will be fully financed through donations.
Freethinkers of Finland Chairman, Jussi K. Niemelä, says the intention is to discuss atheism in a positive way.
‘The intention is to create a discussion’, says Nimelä.
The Atheist Bus Campaign was launched across the UK on January 6 2009, and has since been carried out in several big cities across the world. Comedy writer/journalist Ariane Sherine initially started the campaign in response to evangelical Christian ads, which she saw on London public transport.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Turk Faces “Terrorism” Charges in Germany — Prosecutors
KARLSRUHE, Germany (AFP)—A Turkish citizen, whose brother is accused of involvement in a bomb plot, has been charged with “terrorist-related offenses” in Germany, federal prosecutors said here Tuesday.
The 22-year-old man, identified as Burhan Y., has been charged with transferring 1,100 euros (1,400 dollars) to a contact in Istanbul who was to pass it on to the Al-Qaeda-linked Islamic Jihad Union.
This group is believed to have set up training camps for Islamist radicals along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, prosecutors said.
His brother, identified as Adem Y., was arrested along with two others in September 2007 in western Germany and charged with involvement in a major plot to attack U.S. citizens based here.
The suspects, who are also believed to be connected to the Islamic Jihad Union, are accused of planning to use chemicals to attack installations such as U.S. military bases in Germany and sites popular with U.S. citizens.
A fourth bomb plot suspect, a 23-year-old German, identified only as Attila S., was extradited from Turkey to Germany in November.
He is believed to have procured 26 detonators recovered in September 2007 with drums of hydrogen peroxide, the substance used in the deadly 2005 attacks on London’s transport system.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Porn Star in Bourse Panty Attack
Financiers ‘stripped Italians of everything but underwear’
(ANSA) — Milan, March 17 — A semi-naked Italian porn star shook up the Milan stock exchange Tuesday by accusing financiers of “stripping Italians of everything but their underwear”.
Laura Perego, a 22-year-old Sicilian who staged a similar stunt at the recent Sanremo Song Fest, slipped into the bourse clad in a sober black suit only to strip down to her underwear, climb onto a table and shout: “I want to launch a message to all those who mismanaged our savings”.
Perego was also wearing body paint in the colours of the Italian flag as well as the words of her ‘underwear’ accusation, which she repeated several times to the bemused brokers before being bustled out of the building
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Luxembourg Legalises Euthanasia
Luxembourg has become the third European Union country, after the Netherlands and Belgium, to decriminalise euthanasia. Terminally ill people will be able to have their lives ended after receiving the approval of two doctors and a panel of experts.
Last year, Luxembourg became embroiled in a constitutional crisis when Grand Duke Henri refused to sign the euthanasia bill into law. The crisis led to his power being curtailed and laws no longer need to be signed by him.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Mafia Families ‘Need Shrinks’
Growing pyschiatric problems as ‘culture crumbles’
(ANSA) — Palermo, March 17 — The relatives of Mafia members are increasingly in need of psychiatric help, according to a new study from the University of Palermo.
“Psychiatric problems are steadily rising among the families, a sign that the monolithic culture of Mafia society is crumbling,” said the author of the study, Palermo University psychologist Girolamo Lo Verso, who has studied the increasing frailty of the Mafia mindset for years.
Lo Verso’s new study, entitled The Psychology of Organised Crime in the Mezzogiorno, found clinical anxiety in 20% of Mafia relatives and personality disorders in 17%.
The study, which builds on a 2003 book that found rising numbers of bosses taking to the psychiatrist’s couch, examined 81 patients — 55 adults, nine teenagers and seven children — in Italy’s three main Mafia organisations, Sicily’s Cosa Nostra, Campania’s Camorra and Calabria’s ‘Ndrangheta.
“These people are victims of terrible identity crises because they aren’t used to seeing their world view challenged,” Lo Verso says in the study, set for publication in Sicilian magazine S on March 21.
“They’re like fundamentalists, but as soon as something happens that brings the security wall down, they have crises”.
Lo Verso’s work since the mid-1990s appears to have proved that the plot lines of Hollywood hit Analyze This and Mafia TV serial The Sopranos are not at all far-fetched.
In particular, his 2003 popular book, “La Psyche Mafiosa” (The Mafia Psyche), found more and more mobsters turning to shrinks just like the dons played by Robert De Niro and James Gandolfini.
The book cites a raft of clinical cases, such as drug-taking or bulimic offspring and the wife of a murdered boss suffering from panic attacks like De Niro’s character treated by Billy Crystal in Analyze This and its sequel.
Just as The Sopranos revolved around the mental fall-out from mob life and family problems affecting boss Tony Soprano, La Psyche Mafiosa shows a Mafia grappling with psychological ills created by stressed-out modern living, Lo Verso found.
As well as food disorders, anxiety and depression, the book details the sort of sexual problems that occasionally beset the fictional Tony, along with the kind of shame he feels at failing to live up to macho stereotypes.
In one real-life case, a homosexual son of a top Trapani boss rebels against his father’s code and dares to come out of the closet, causing personal pain and wider clan uproar.
Informants in witness-protection schemes are facing particular problems in adjusting to their new lives, the book says.
Lo Verso, who collated the case studies that make up the book, described their condition as “dramatic.” “Death is a recurrent leitmotiv in their dreams, a nightmare for them,” he said in the book’s introduction.
One of the contributors, sociologist Renate Siebert, describes them as “unthinking practitioners of the systematic use of terror”.
“(But) this system is now closing in on them, also psychologically, leading them to identify with their past victims and even act like them,” she says.
“They seem increasingly uncertain that they’ve made the right choice,” Lo Verso says.
Some seek solace in the religious devotion that is another hallmark of the Mafia lifestyle, the book says.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: Bus Drivers: 300 Complaints About Public Aggression
Bus drivers say they are continuing to be threatened, scolded or spat on by passengers. A complaints centre set up by the FNV trade union received 300 complaints about aggression last week. The drivers say there is a lack of professional help and claim they are being made to go back to work too quickly after being harrassed by the public. Other complaints focused on the tight timetables. Drivers often find that passengers are frustrated because their bus is late.
The complaints centre is part of a union project intended to improved security on buses. The drivers’ experiences will be included in an inventory of grievances which will be published by the union later this month.
The action comes after a series of incidents. Only last week, drivers in the town of Ede near Arnhem went on strike for a couple of hours to protest at the aggressive behaviour of some passengers.
One week ago a 17-year-old youth in the southern town of Tilburg was arrested for an assault on a bus driver in late January.
In October 2008, tension mounted in the city of Gouda after a bus driver was robbed at knifepoint, allegedly by Moroccan youths. Although no connection with any Moroccans could be established, drivers refused for a couple of days to drive their buses through the neighbourhood where the incident took place, citing earlier instances of aggression.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: Wilders’ Supporters — What Do They Want?
“I want to become prime minister.” That’s what Geert Wilders said after a private meeting with 200 followers in his home town of Venlo on Monday. “One day my party will be the biggest, and then it will be an honour to accept the prime-ministership.”
According to a recent poll, Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party (PVV) is the most popular party in the Netherlands. But exactly who supports this party is unclear. Two Volkskrant journalists tried to find out.
If there were elections today, the right-wing populist PVV would get 27 of the 150 seats in the Dutch parliament. That, at least, was the outcome of a poll conducted by Dutch researcher Maurice de Hond a few weeks ago. This sudden rise of popularity is mainly due to the fact that party leader Geert Wilders was recently denied access to the UK.
But who really are the supporters of Geert Wilders? As the Freedom Party does not have members, the profile of his followers remains a bit unclear. The stereotype image is that of the low-paid and low-educated inhabitants of poor neighbourhoods who saw their familiar surroundings change beyond recognition by the coming of immigrants.
But a recent poll [TNS NIPO] reveals that the Freedom Party is also attracting increasing numbers of voters with a higher education. Thirteen percent of Mr Wilders’ current followers have received higher education, in contrast to nine percent at the time of the elections of 2006. Also, it turns out that the average Freedom Party supporter is now earning more than before.
Profile In a long article in the Volkskrant (20th February 2009), journalists Janny Groen and Annieke Kranenberg attempted to profile the typical Freedom Party supporter. They approached a number of people who wrote hate mails to Gerard Spong, the lawyer who filed a legal complaint against Wilders for discrimination and inciting hatred. 15 of them were willing to talk: some of them were indeed low-paid and lived in poor neighbourhoods, others lived in better parts of town.
It’s said that the turning point in Mr Wilders’ life came when he spent some time in Israel in the 1980s. To this day he maintains a strong bond with the country. Back in the Netherlands, he won a seat in parliament for the conservative VVD in 1998. He became party spokesperson on foreign policy. His colleagues were impressed by the breadth of his knowledge of the Middle East.
Fear of Islamisation is the dominant theme with all. Many of Geert Wilders’ supporters are convinced that Muslim politicians have a secret agenda to Islamise Europe. Mr Wilders, in their view, is the only politician who understands this and dares to speak about it.
No respect In the poor neighbourhoods the stereotype image is not far from the truth. There is a general sense of frustration that the immigrants living there have no respect for Dutch norms and values. Daily annoyances about the deterioration of the living surroundings play a big part in this frustration.
The interviewees, all over 50, are annoyed by people who park their cars on the pavement and throw their garbage from the balconies of their apartments; and by children running wild through the halls and staircases of the apartment blocks at midnight without being kept in check by their parents. They feel threatened by groups of immigrant youths in the streets and mention the increasing crime rate in their surroundings.
“Recently, an old woman was robbed of her wallet”, says 72-year-old Alida Kroep in the Volkskrant article.
All the interviewed agree that “Moroccan criminals should be sent back to their country of origin”. Remarkably, however, Geert Wilders’ supporters never fail to emphasise that they do not consider themselves racists.
“I do not hate these people”, says Lisa Looper (57), “but they have to adapt themselves goddammit!”
Conspiracy The better educated Freedom Party supporters live in neighbourhoods where Dutch-Moroccan boys on scooters are rarely seen. The daily annoyances about deteriorating living conditions are absent here and the fear of Islamisation is more abstract.
Company director Joost Wildschut (37) compares Islamisation with Nazism. He believes in the existence of a conspiracy to Islamise Europe, as described in the book Eurabia by the Jewish-Egyptian author Bat Ye’or: “I think it’s bizarre that there are separate hours for Muslim women in the swimming pool and a special financial system for Islamic ‘halal’ mortgages. And it annoys me to see a Muslim woman wearing a burqa in the market.” Qualified nurse Ger Dalen (53) states that he only wants to socialise with Muslims who embrace democracy, denounce the headscarf and view non-Muslims as their equals.
Many Freedom Party supporters feel that the growing influence of Islam causes them to lose more and more rights, in particular the right to express themselves. They harbour a deep suspicion against the established political parties who try to shut them up by dismissing them as racists, which in their own view they aren’t.
To them Geert Wilders is the only politician who has the courage to withstand this and express what they think. That explains why they view him as a hero of free speech and why they are so furious about the pending legal prosecution of Wilders.
Freedom of speech Something, however, does not quite add up with Mr Wilders’ new persona as a hero for freedom of speech. His supporters are angry because he is being brought to court for discrimination and sowing hatred and because he was denied access to the UK. But Wilders himself wants to prohibit the Qur’an and deny radical Muslim preachers access to the Netherlands.
[Comment from Tuan Jim: Note the lack of reference (even in a Dutch publication) to the fact that “Mein Kampf” is already banned and that there is a precedent.]
According to Paul Schnabel, director of the Dutch Bureau of Social and Cultural Planning, this contradiction is not a coincidence. He says in an interview with the Volkskrant (23 February 2009): “The issue is not the freedom of speech, but our freedom of speech. The idea that people from outside come here to tell me that I’m not allowed to say what I want, is unbearable.” At the end of the day, says Paul Schnabel, it all boils down to one question: Whose country is this? “It’s a matter of power. Who bows for whom? We do not want people from outside to tell us what we can do and what we can’t. They have to adapt to our rules.” Mr Schnabel, by the way, believes that Geert Wilders merely says what people think and should not be classified as ‘extreme right’. “He does not play on the classical themes of the extreme right. He is for the emancipation of homosexuals and women and he is not anti-Semitic.”
*RNW Translation (hs)
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Netherlands: “Export of Social Benefit Payments” Challenged
[Comment from Tuan Jim: Again…Why is this even something that needs to be discussed — or why was it taking place to begin with?]
A centre-right majority in the Dutch Lower House is in favour of ending child support benefits for children of Moroccan and Turkish immigrants who are attending school in their parents’ countries of origin. The money is paid into the account of the parents.
The House debated the matter on Tuesday with Deputy Social Affairs minister Jette Klijnsma, following press reports of benefit fraud. The conservative VVD party pleaded for freezing treaties with Turkey and Morocco regarding what was referred to as “the export of social benefit payments”. Christian Democrat MP Mirjam Sterk says that such treaties cannot be cancelled unilaterally; instead, she suggested a new treaty with Turkey and Morocco, retaining the export of benefits but excluding child benefit payments.
The third party demanding an end to support payments for children who are not Dutch residents is Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Newsweek Explores ‘Jihad Chic’ in London
The current cover of Newsweek advertises a story on “Taliban Chic” in London, and it’s natural to assume it might be another story lauding the “burqini.” Instead, it’s a chilling look at how the openness of London (and Western society) can create space for Islamic radicalism.
Newsweek reporter Sami Yousafzai clearly wrote in the spirit of the new Newsweek: a first-person account with no real objectivity or detachment. But it was gripping, as he began by describing how he came to London after being shot by Islamic radicals in Peshawar, Pakistan. Hoping for a safe environment, he was disturbed to discover London youths dressed like the Taliban: “I saw a tall young Afghan who reminded me of my would-be assassin, striding down the street like a bad dream.”
His neighborhood nickname was “Talib Jan,” a “friendly Afghan slang term for a Taliban member, something like GI Joe for Americans.” He found “during my three-month stay in England I met a surprising number of Muslims who shared Jan’s fascination with the Taliban…Few seemed troubled by the brutality that characterized Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar’s reign, or by his banning of music or girls’ education. Indeed, many looked back on Omar’s rule as a kind of Islamic utopia, and they eagerly snapped up the Islamist leaflets handed out after Friday prayers at various mosques around town.”
Yousafzai decided to try and befriend the man they called Talib Jan:
| — Hat tip: Fausta | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Doctors at Risk of Aggression, 7 Out of 10 Victims
(by Paola Del Vecchio) (ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 16 — Doctors run a high risk in Spain, where last Wednesday a 34 year old female doctor was gunned down with a pistol in a healthcare centre in Moratalla (Murcia) by a 74 year old patient, who didn’t like the treatment he received for respiratory problems. A paramedic who was also injured during the shooting and miraculously survived is still currently undergoing treatment in hospital. The murder of Maria Eugenia, the doctor who was killed, is only the tip of the iceberg of the phenomenon of violence against healthcare professionals, which has taken on disquieting dimensions on the Iberian Peninsula if it is true, according to data released today by ‘La Vanguardia’, that 7 doctors out of 10 and half of all employees at emergency rooms have been victim to physical and psychological aggression at some point in their careers by patients disappointed by the level of service received, even if only an extremely reduced 5% reports the aggression or insults they suffered. Sources from the sector assure that Spain ranks first in Europe for the phenomenon of violence in healthcare centres. The medical profession is becoming a target, in spite of the professional organisations and healthcare administrations that continue to invent measures to curb it. Ashtrays, stethoscopes, and even orthopaedic limbs; anything can be used as a weapon against medical personnel if one considers the doctors’ and nurses’ painful experiences published in the newspaper. According to the Institut Català de la Salut (ICS ), the number of assaults is increasing slightly, since 2008 852 cases were reported by healthcare personnel, compared to the 845 reported in 2007, even if judicial proceedings are increasing regarding the matter. It is a percentage that is considered low, however, if the 50 million medical visits every year are considered. But, the enormous number of unreported cases are not included in the statistics, sometimes due to intimidation or fear of retaliation from the patients and their families. The vice-secretary of the general council of physicians, Francisco Toquero, pointed out that “lack of health education” is the primary cause of this security emergency. “Violence has increased in hospitals and healthcare centres”, Toquero said, “because healthcare personnel are perceived as an official and the patients believe themselves to be in possession of all the rights, but no duties”. According to the representative of the organisation, in the rest of Europe “healthcare is perceived as an expensive service, which contrary to Spain, should not be abused”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Government Agreement With Andalusia on Historic Debt
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 16 — The Spanish central government has reached an agreement with the Council of Andalusia for the payment of the so-called ‘historic debt’ of 1,204 billion euros. The historic debt is the amount of money Andalusia maintains the state owes the region to meet its underdeveloped socio-economic conditions, a claim that first appeared in the 1981 charter for autonomy, which was re-established in the current charter, and which is considered to be a valid regulation. The agreement on the historic debt was announced today in a statement released by the Ministry for Public Administration, headed by Minister Elena Salgado. Of the 1.204 billion euros stipulated in the agreement with Andalusia, the state has already paid 420 million, made in two payments in 1996 and in 2008. The remaining amount, according to the understanding, will be paid before March 20 2010, as specified in the region’s charter. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Students Tie £56 Camera to Balloon and Send it to Edge of Space to Capture Stunning Images of Earth
Teenagers with a £56 camera and latex balloon have managed to take stunning pictures from 20 miles above Earth.
Proving that you don’t need Google’s billions or the BBC weather centre’s resources, the four Spanish students managed to send a camera-operated weather balloon into the stratosphere.
Taking atmospheric readings and photographs, the Meteotek team of IES La Bisbal school in Spanish Catalonia completed their incredible experiment at the end of February this year.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Police to Quiz 8 Year Olds in Sex Crime Probe
[Comment from Tuan Jim: Should I be surprised that Malmo is also referenced in this article?]
Police in Skåne in southern Sweden have begun investigating an eight-year-old boy’s claims that he was sexually abused at school by boys his own age.
The boy at the centre of the investigation told staff at the school in January that he was the victim of sexual assaults perpetrated by two other boys. He named both of his alleged tormentors.
Staff at the school are also to come under investigation for failing to adequately look into the boy’s claims.
Only in exceptional cases will police in Sweden investigate suspicions of criminal actions carried out by young children. Initially, Malmö’s deputy chief prosecutor elected not to take up the case.
But after reexamining the details at hand, Chief Prosecutor Peter Herrting has now ordered a full police investigation. The seriousness of the allegations means that the young suspects will face police questioning.
The chief prosecutor has also argued that an investigation is necessary if the alleged victim is to be entitled to financial damages.
Police are also to investigate a Malmö Council employee for slander after a statement appeared on the council’s website dismissing the boy’s claims as “a rumour” that lacked any truth.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Two Explosions Shake Gothenburg
Police in Gothenburg continue their search for suspects believed to be involved with two separate explosions that rocked different parts of the city on Sunday night.
The first blast occurred shortly before 11pm on Sunday near a police car which was out on patrol in the city’s Hvitfeldtsplatsen neighbourhood.
Police suspected that someone may have thrown a hand grenade at the vehicle.
“Colleagues in the car think so, judging from the strength of the explosion and now we’re looking for fragments in the area,” said Johan Ljung of the Gothenburg police to the TT news agency.
Shortly after midnight, another blast occurred in a public toilet near Kungsparken, close to the Stora teatern theatre.
The explosion was thought to be of roughly the same strength as the evening’s first blast.
“The blast was of equal power, so it seems as if both incidents are related. Which makes one think it could have been a coincidence that a police car was in the area when the explosion occurred. It can also be a diversionary tactic for something else taking place,” said Per Mattson of the Gothenburg police to TT.
Police still don’t know what sort of explosive material was used in either blast and both areas remained blocked off through the night while police conducted investigations.
Following the first explosion, police said they believed two assailants between 25 and 30-years-old were involved.
No one was injured in either explosion.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Switzerland: Young Campaigner Raises Stakes in Parliament
Lukas Reimann, the youngest member of parliament, takes pride in being Swiss and makes it his mission to defend traditional values. The poker-playing representative of the rightwing Swiss People’s Party spearheaded a vote in February against a labour accord with the European Union.
The reputation that precedes him and his track record are impressive enough. Some see the 26-year-old parliamentarian as the new shooting star of his party.
No less remarkable is the fact that Reimann mounted a challenge against the EU labour deal against the wishes of his party elders, prompting a spectacular party policy reversal.
Now he is again at the forefront of a campaign — this time aimed at bringing down a law on the introduction of biometric passports to be voted on in May.
Not just an avid campaigner, Reimann is parliament’s champion of online communication. He boasts the highest numbers of friends on Facebook.
Sitting face-to-face in the parliament lobby during the spring session, you see a different side to him: friendly and modest, nothing showy and no strong statements. It’s not what you necessarily expect from a representative of the controversial People’s Party.
Face-to-face He’s wearing a suit and tie and seems shy at first. He looks straight at you and speaks with a firm voice, occasionally lapsing into party political jargon.
Start him on subjects such as the EU and other perceived threats to Switzerland’s independence, and you understand why his supporters trust in his strong convictions and fall sway to his charisma.
“If you know a lot about a particular subject you have no reason to doubt your position,” says Reimann.
But he does not rush to form opinions and sometimes has initial doubts.
“I read more than 30 books on Islam over the years. The same goes for my interest and knowledge of the EU. That’s what makes me sure about my political position.”
Labels Reimann is uneasy when asked whether he considers himself a conservative. “I don’t like being boxed into a category.”
He says there are issues where he is definitely liberal, but he hesitates when asked for concrete examples.
He prefers the label of pragmatist and shares with the Greens what he calls “an anti establishment attitude”.
Role models for Reimann are hard to find, and there is no use looking for prominent names in his own party. Even his uncle, Max, who is a senator, does not come close.
“He has been important and I often had discussions with him. He is as strongly opinionated as I am,” Reimann smiles.
Influence A definite influence was a former politician of the German Liberals of the 1990s. Reimann admires the talent of Jürgen Möllemann. “He was able to explain in simple words the liberal policies: less state intervention, lower taxes, fewer laws and more freedom.”
As for his own talents and personal ambitions, Reimann does not believe he is a particularly fascinating speaker or gifted with an exceptional sense for politics. “There are plenty of better orators here in Bern,” he says.
His special interests appear to be campaigning and organising, but he says he likes the different aspects of politics. Over the past 14 months he has begun to appreciate the work in parliamentary committees, although it is seldom in the media spotlight.
A priority in his life is his law studies. At the moment he devotes more time to his studies than to his political mandate. But it was the opposite when he led the campaign for a referendum against an EU treaty.
“I have no plans for an executive position in politics,” he says convincingly. “But I quite like the idea of being a consultant and running an agency for campaigns one day.”
Is there a life beyond debates and campaign politics for someone like him who imbibed politics as a teenager?
Reimann lists hiking, playing cards and watching football among his hobbies. He regrets there’s hardly enough time for these activities.
And when it comes to card games he found a way to link hobby and politics. Reimann lodged a motion last year to legalise private poker tournaments.
Images The young politician could be considered a typical conservative Swiss, but his personal experience goes beyond the alpine environment.
Reimann spent 12 months in the United States and has fond memories of his stays in Scandinavian countries. As an EU critic he has built up a network of like-minded people, as a look at his travel schedule over the next weeks shows.
He takes time to consider the question as to whether he occasionally feels uneasy about clichéd images of Switzerland as a mountain paradise.
“I like it when people have a positive image of Switzerland,” he says disarmingly.
It’s true what is said about Reimann. Although it’s hard to dislike him, you can’t lose sight of the astute tactician behind the boyish face.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Switzerland: Parliament Opposes Ban on Storing Arms at Home
Proposals to break with the longstanding tradition of storing army weapons in Swiss homes have been dismissed by the country’s parliament. Monday’s debate in the House of Representatives was the latest in series of discussions over gun law issues over the past few years.
Legislators threw out an initiative, supported mainly by centre-left parliamentarians, which would have forced members of Switzerland’s militia army to keep their rifles at army bases instead of storing them in households.
Ninety-nine parliamentarians came out against a proposed ban, while 82 were in favour. The chamber also threw out a similar non-binding petition launched by students in the wake a 2007 killing of teenager by a soldier outside Zurich.
However, politicians narrowly approved calls by a Green Party representative for the creation of a central arms registry.
Members of the Swiss army are issued with rifles and 50 rounds of ammunition. They keep their firearms after completing military training and take regular refresher courses to be ready for a call to arms in times of crisis.
However, two years ago, parliament moved to outlaw the keeping of army-issue magazines in households, except for the about 2,000 specialist troops.
Safety before tradition “How many more people have to die until parliament is ready to disarm the households,” asked Chantal Galladé, a parliamentarian of the centre-left Social Democrats, who championed the proposal.
Ida Glanzmann, a Christian Democrat, pointed out that safety came before tradition. She welcomed the storage of ammunition in arsenals as a first step in the right direction.
“The central storage of weapons can save lives,” she said on behalf of several members of a centre-right group.
Anti-gun campaigners argue that weapons at home are a serious safety risk. Experts say guns play a central role in suicides and family conflicts. About 300 people in Switzerland are killed every year by standard-issue weapons, according to official statistics.
There has been a series of highly publicised cases of murders with army weapons over the past decade, beginning with an attack by a gunman on a cantonal parliament in central Switzerland, in 2001.
Responsibility The centre-right and rightwing majority in the house said the decommissioning army rifles was tantamount to undermining Switzerland’s security and would represent a vote of no confidence in its soldiers.
“Don’t blame the weapon. It’s the man who commits weapons abuses,” said Andrea Geissbühler of the Swiss People’s Party. “There is no need for the state to patronise its citizens.”
In a similar vein, Corina Eichenberger of the centre-right Radicals said citizens should take responsibility. But she also called for soldiers to be allowed to store their army weapons at barracks on a voluntary basis.
Defence Minister Ueli Maurer said the government wanted to maintain the tradition in principle. He added that moves were underway to increase efforts to prevent abuses and facilitate the storage of individual weapons at barracks.
The Senate, Switzerland’s other parliamentary chamber, backed the government in a debate two weeks ago. Voters will have the final say on a possible ban of storing personal army-issue weapons at home.
A broad alliance of centre-left political parties, unions, church and peace groups, as well as women’s, health and human rights organisations collected enough signatures for a nationwide ballot on the issue.
The people’s initiative was handed in to the authorities last month and will come to a vote at a later date.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Embarrassment for New Met Chief After He Personally Leads Helicopter Raid With 80 Officers — for Suspect Who’d Already Been Arrested
Britain’s new top policeman was left red-faced today when he led a raid on the home of a chief suspect only to discover he had been arrested hours earlier.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson directed a team of 80 police officers — some armed with Taser stun guns — who swooped on a notorious burglary gang by raiding seven addresses in South London and Surrey.
At the address of the gang’s suspected handler, as a Met helicopter hovered overhead, officers used a battering ram to smash their way through the front door. But the suspect was nowhere to be found.
It later emerged that he had been arrested after an alleged break-in.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Gerry Adams Says IRA Killings ‘should Not be Exaggerated’ as He Calls for British Forces to Stay Out of Ireland
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams has renewed his attack on the use of British Special Forces in Northern Ireland following the three brutal murders in the province last week.
Speaking in Washington, Mr Adams today claimed that it was the use of British troops to track down the dissident IRA murderers that ‘could undermine the peace process’.
Last week, two British soldiers and a policeman were killed in shootings which brought the spectre of sectarian violence back to Northern Ireland.
But in words certain to anger those mourning last week’s killings, Mr Adams claimed that ‘it was important we don’t exaggerate what occurred’.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Obama Backs Peace in Northern Ireland as Gerry Adams Says IRA Killings ‘should Not be Exaggerated’
[Comments from JD: Contrast this with the reception he gave Gordon Brown.]
Barack Obama has backed the Northern Ireland peace process as he called America’s bond with Ireland ‘one of the strongest in the world’.
[…]
Mr Obama met Mr Cowen in the Oval Office as part of a day full of events to mark the holiday, and said that he hoped to visit Ireland.
Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams also held talks with Hillary Clinton, the American Secretary of State, about the current situation.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Patients Died Due to ‘Appalling Care’ at Staffordshire Hospitals — Healthcare Commission
Appalling standards of care have been exposed at Mid-Staffordshire Hospitals trust, where between 400 and 1,200 more patients died than would be expected in just three years, according to a damning report by the Healthcare Commission.
Sir Bruce Keogh, medical director of the NHS, described the failures as a ‘gross and terrible breach of trust’ of patients.
A litany of poor standards of care was uncovered by the Healthcare Commission in one of the most critical reports of NHS treatment.
It is not clear how many patients died as a direct result of the failures but the Commission found that mortality rates in emergency care were between 27 per cent and 45 per cent higher than would be expected, equating to between 400 and 1,200 excess deaths.
Health Secretary Alan Johnson offered his apologies to patients and staff who suffered as a result and the trust chief executive Martin Yeates, and chairman, Toni Brisby, both resigned earlier this year.
Sir Ian Kennedy, chairman of the Healthcare Commission, said the report is a ‘shocking story’ and that there were failures at almost every stage of care of emergency patients. “There is no doubt that patients will have suffered and some of them will have died as a result,” he said.
The investigation of the trust now called the Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, found overstretched and poorly trained nurses who turned off equipment because they did not know how to work it, newly qualified doctors left to care for patients recovering from surgery at night, patients left for hours in soiled bedclothes, reception staff expected to judge how seriousness of patients arriving at A&E, patients left without food or drink, others who received the wrong medication or none at all, blood and faeces left on lavatories and floors, and doctors diverted away from seriously ill patients in order to treat minor ones who were in danger of breaching the four hour waiting time target.
When high mortality rates triggered questions, the trust board of directors ‘fobbed off’ investigators by saying the rates were a result of statistical errors but the Healthcare Commission found this was not that case.
The report said there was a ‘reluctance to acknowledge or even consider that the care of patients was poor’.
The trust was more concerned with hitting targets, gaining Foundation Trust status and marketing and had ‘lost sight’ of its responsibilities for patient care, the report said.
Sir Ian said: “The resulting report is a shocking story. Our report tells a story of appalling standards of care and chaotic systems for looking after patients.
“These are words I have not previously used in any report. There were inadequacies in almost every stage of caring for patients.”
Bill Cash, the Tory MP for the neighbouring Stone constituency, said: “We have a history with the hospital. Frankly, it just simply cannot go on like this. It has to stop, it has to improve.
“What we have to do now is look to the future and have a complete radical shake-up. There are some wonderful staff, there is no doubt about that, and we’ve got to get back to bringing the hospital to the highest possible standards.”
Eric Morton, new Chief Executive of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, said: “The report has highlighted instances where care standards fell below those that our patients had a right to expect of their hospital and we regret this.
“We would like to take this opportunity to offer our very sincere apology. We would like to reassure the local community that our focus is, and will remain, on providing high quality, efficient and safe health care for the people of Staffordshire.
“As a NHS Foundation Trust we have made significant changes within a very short period of time and put in place new management, effective governance structures and made operational system changes, in order to address the key issues of accountability, staffing levels and staff training. In addition we have put in place a robust financial system which has enabled us to invest substantially in new staff, equipment and services in order for us to continuously improve.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Hospital Where ‘at Least 400’ Could Have Died Needlessly to be Exposed in Damning Report
Unacceptable standards of patient care could have led to hundreds of deaths at a single hospital in a three-year period.
A damning report to be released tomorrow by the Healthcare Commission will outline a catalogue of failings at a hospital trust blinded by a drive to save money and abide by Government waiting-time targets.
An advance copy of the report seen by the Daily Mail estimated ‘at least’ 400 deaths between 2005 and 2008 could not be accounted for by ‘other factors or by chance variation’.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The Sandwich Box Stasi: Parents’ Fury Over School Which Inspects Lunches and Confiscates Junk Food
A primary school has been accused of running a ‘mealtime Gestapo’ after insisting on inspecting children’s lunchboxes for unhealthy food.
If pupils are found to have sweets, chocolate, fizzy drinks or full-fat crisps, teachers confiscate them and hold them in the staffroom.
The snacks are returned at the end of the day but only if parents ask.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: The PC Procession: Carnival Queen Scrapped for Being Sexist… Now She’s a ‘Community Champion’
A carnival queen competition is being scrapped after more than 50 years because organisers think it sexist.
They say the event does not promote equal opportunities and is past its sell-by date.
Instead they are introducing a ‘carnival community champion’.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Trusting the Police
Why, if there are more police officers than ever, are fewer seen on the streets? One reason is that the form-filling necessary to comply with Home Office standards and targets keeps them tied up for hours in their stations. Another is that most officers patrol in pairs. It is rare to see a bobby patrolling alone, yet it used to be unusual to see them on the beat together. It is heartening, then, to learn that London’s new police chief, Sir Paul Stephenson, intends to require his officers to patrol as singletons except when it would be patently dangerous to do so. This would double police visibility and make officers more likely to communicate with members of the public instead of with each other.
There will be arguments, especially from the Police Federation, that the job is more dangerous than it once was; and in some inner-city estates this may well be true, though that owes much to the loss of authority that has come with changes to the way the police act and dress. While officers are often expected to put themselves in harm’s way, recent Home Office figures suggest non-injury assaults have fallen and there is no reason why a brace of officers should patrol a leafy suburban avenue or a crowded town centre.
Sir Paul and his like-minded colleagues elsewhere are to be encouraged in their efforts to inject some common sense back into policing. Over the past 20 years or so, the police have become increasingly estranged from the law-abiding majority on whom they could once rely for almost unstinting support. This is an unhealthy state of affairs. The great strength of policing in Britain has always been that it is carried out with the consent and approval of the public. If Sir Paul and his fellow chiefs are serious about reinstating the sort of policing on which such trust was based, that can only be a good thing.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Bulgaria: Radical Islam Row Continues
A hero’s welcome greeted the mayor of Gurmen municipality in southwestern Bulgaria, Ahmed Bashev, and Mourat Boshnak, a teacher of Islam in the village of Ribnovo, on their return on March 16 2009 from the State Agency for National Security (SANS).
The two were taken to SANS’s headquarters in the early hours of March 16 2009 for questioning after a request from prosecutors in relation to tip-offs that the two had been preaching radical Islam and forcing youngsters to adhere to an Islamic dress code and way of life.
The tip-off came from independent MP Yane Yanev who, on March 14 2009, almost got into a fight with Boshnak during a debate on private national bTV broadcaster about whether radical Islam was on the rise in the western Rhodopi mountains, where the population is predominantly Muslim.
Yanev claimed that people from the area had told him about both Bashev and Boshnak forcing students and teachers to wear Muslim clothes (headscarf for the girls) when coming to school and that all students were forced to sign up to Boshnak’s lessons in Islam.
Bashev and Boshnak spent several hours in SANS custody and were released without charge, the two told private national broadcaster Nova Televisia on March 17 2009.
When they returned to Ribnovo TV cameras showed several hundred of the 3000 inhabitants gathered at the village square to applaud the pair.
Bashev was lifted aloft and wrapped in the Bulgarian flag. “This whole thing was just a set-up by Yanev who wants to see himself elected to Parliament again after this summer’s elections,” Bashev told Nova. “Once elections are over, no one would ever remember Ribnovo,” he said.
“I am pleased with SANS’ actions and I think that this is what they should do: to investigate whenever they have doubts. I have no criticism of them,” he said. “They came to my door at about 6am and let me get dressed and were very polite,” he said.
However, SANS actions were criticised by some media as gesture tactics. Instead of marching in with masks SANS could have simply summoned Bashev and Boshnak, just like any other Bulgarian citizens, Dnevink daily said on March 17 2009.
Both Bashev and Boshnak dismissed Yanev’s allegations that they were preaching radical Islam using foreign foundations’ money.
“I was born Bulgarian, I am a Bulgarian citizen, I have served in the Bulgarian army, I pay my taxes here and I want to die here as a Bulgarian,” Boshnak said.
“I have never been to Saudi Arabia and I don’t speak any language other than Bulgarian. I have studied in Macedonia and in Bulgaria,” he noted.
“All children who are studying Islam with me have done it by their own volition with the knowledge of their parents,” he said.
Bashev, a former principal of the school, said that at the end of every term parents can ask schools to form classes on certain topics and that religion (Christianity and Islam) is one of them. “Ribnovo is 100 per cent Muslim, so we picked Islam,” he said. “Everything happens under the direct control of the state in the form of the Education Ministry and its regional inspectorate”.
“I teach by textbooks in Bulgarian that have been approved by Education Ministry,” Boshnak said. “I don’t teach the Koran but Islam,” he said. “Of course, Islam is based on the Koran but I’m not only teaching them that,” he said.
As for the dress code allegations, the two said that every student and teacher could choose what to wear. However, they admitted that the school had internal rules stipulating that a teacher could not come to work in jeans and women could not wear skirts that fell short of their knees.
“These are regulations valid for most public buildings in Bulgaria,” they said. As for the headscarf, Boshnak said it was up to the students themselves and part of local tradition.
A Nova TV reporter from Ribnovo showed women wearing scarfs. “I wear it because I want to, not because someone told me or forced me to do it,” a middle-aged woman said. “I decide what to wear, not someone else; it is how we dress up here,” she said. “Some people wear modern clothes and everybody is fine with that.”
The reporter talked to a young girl wearing jeans and a leather jacket. “The whole affair (Yanev’s allegations) is a lie,” she said. “No one forces us to wear traditional Muslim clothes. I’ve been living here for 23 years and nothing here happens in the way of radical Islam.”
“When we graduated we wanted to go to Greece and we went; it was great fun,” she said, when asked whether students are being sent to trips in Turkey by the school.
Talking to Nova TV on March 17 2009, Yanev continued claiming that radical Islam was being taught in Ribnovo. He said that he had been tipped-off by people living in Ribnovo who had complained about the actions of Bashev and Boshnak.
Several hours later Yanev tipped off SANS about another alleged transgression in the village of Satovcha, southern Bulgaria. Yanev told Bulgarian National Radio that the principal of the school in Satovcha, who is currently on leave, had forced students into a lifestyle compatible with radical Islam.
Education Ministry’ regional inspectorate has also started an investigation into Yanev’s claims.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Montenegro: Berlusconi Accused of Electoral ‘Meddling’
Podgorica, 16 March (AKI) — Montenegro’s political opposition on Monday accused Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi of interfering in the local campaign for political elections to be held on 29 March. It also said Berlusconi’s meeting with Montenegro’s current premier and so-called political ‘godfather’ Milo Djukanovic sent “a bad message that organised crime pays off.”
Berlusconi was to arrive for a surprise visit to Podgorica late Monday for talks with president Filip Vujanovic and Djukanovic, known as Montegro’s political ‘godfather’.
A controversial figure, Djukanovic has already served four terms as prime minister and one term as president, but he resigned in 2006 to dedicate himself to his business interests.
Montenegro’s opposition leaders have claimed Djukanovic accumulated millions of euros in investment and banking schemes between 2006 and 2008.
Berlusconi was also to meet Italian language students, but refused to meet politicians from Montenegro’s opposition parties.
Nebojsa Medojevic, president of the opposition Movement for Changes party, said he requested a meeting with Berlusconi through the Italian embassy in Podgorica, but Berlusconi had declined the request.
Medojevic said the embassy replied that Berlusconi would meet “only with representatives of official institutions”.
Medojevic said that Berlusconi’s visit came at a “very sensitive moment at the end of a parliamentary election campaign and everything should be done to avoid a possible political manipulation of the visit.”
Djukanovic has been investigated by Italian prosecutors for his alleged role in a multimillion dollar mob-run cigarette smuggling racket to Italy in the 1990s and for money laundering.
But the case was dropped after he became prime minister again last February.
Medojevic said that Berlusconi’s visit was a “private arrangement with some people at the pinnacle of power”.
“We are disappointed that the Italian premier is meeting ahead of the election with a man who was indicted by the Italian judiciary,” Medojevic said.
“That could only send a message that organized crime pays off.”
Montenegro foreign ministry said in a statement that relations between Rome and Podgorica were “excellent” and that Berlusconi’s visit was a “support to their further development.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Fishing: Egypt Minister, 15,000 Jobs From Project With Italy
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, MARCH 16 — The Egyptian Fisheries Minister, Mohamed Fathy Osman, has said that he is convinced that ‘the realisation of several fishing projects between Italy and Egypt could create 15 thousand jobs in the sector”. The minister was speaking at the IV Mediterranean Forum which is underway in Cairo. ‘One of these projects”, Fathy Osman continued, ‘will begin in three months and will regard aquaculture. The Italians will provide the expertise to start this type of initiative on the north-west coast of Egypt. The project will get underway thanks to an agreement signed by the two countries in 2008 and will involve Italian universities, the Egyptian Water Regulatory Authority and Italian credit funds”. ‘This forum”, Osman concluded, ‘is an effective tool that not only allows an exchange of information about fishing but which also increases commercial, cultural and political relations between Mediterranean countries”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Mediterranean Union: Secretary General to be Named by April
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS — The Mediterranean Union will resume its work by the end of April with the appointment of its secretary-general and deputy secretaries, announced French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner today during the Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly in the European Parliament in Brussels. Kouchner and Ahmed Aboul Gheit, his Egyptian counterpart, have discussed the need to continue the Union’s activities after the crisis in the Middle East. Kouchner listed the next steps to be taken by the Mediterranean Union. By the end of April a decision must be taken on the choice of secretary. There are several candidates for the position: a Tunisian, a Palestinian and a Jordanian. Reportedly an agreement on the deputy secretaries has already been reached. Then there will be meetings on the projects initiated by the Union: in May a meeting in Greece on transport and in Egypt on energy, followed the session in June in the Principality of Monaco on finances. Kouchner said he is in favour of the idea of welcoming an EMPA delegation as observer of the projects of the Mediterranean Union: “That way EMPA MPs become observers of the projects of the Mediterranean Union” as already is the case in the Arab League. Kouchner added that his proposal is backed by the co-president of the Mediterranean Union, Egypt.(ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Algeria: Danone Wants to Import 11,000 Cows
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, MARCH 16 — The Danone Djurdjura Algeria group, a branch of the French brand, signed a convention with the national agricultural loans bank (Cassa nazionale agricola di mutuo, Cnma) which also provides for the purchase of 11,000 cows over the next two years to try to lower the importation of powdered milk. Mohamed Soulak, director of the national milk office (Onil), explained that “the convention will allow for greater guarantees to the breeders”. Danone’s 450 breeders and suppliers, who own 5,000 cows, “will be insured by Cnma”. Soulak added that “We want to modernise the milk supply chain, increase the production of fresh milk and thus lower dependency on imports”, and announced the creation of 3 farm-schools to train breeders. Algeria, which has a milk deficit of some 900 million litres, spends 600 million dollars every year for powdered milk. With a yearly pro-capita milk consumption of 110 litres, milk represents a central product in the Algerian diet. Algerian authorities had announced in 2008 the import of 145,000 units of cattle to deal with this milk crisis. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Algeria: National Koran Week Opens
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, MARCH 16 — Minister Abdelaziz Belkhadem, the personal representative of president Abdelaziz Bouteflika, inaugurated the tenth national week of the Holy Koran that opened today in Algiers. Belkhadem stated that the religious event organised during the third month of the Islamic calendar, Raba El Aouel, on occasion of the Mouloud festivity, anniversary of the birth and death of prophet Mohamed, “is now a tradition for Algeria”. The week’s schedule, promoted by the Algerian minister of religion, will include subject meetings, conferences on the various aspects of the life of the Prophet, and a competition for the reading and psalmody of Islam’s sacred text. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Egypt: Non-Oil Exports at +23% in 2008, Italy Main Importer
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, MARCH 16 — Egypt’s non-petroleum exports amounted to 17.445 billion dollars in 2008, up 23 percent from the year earlier, said a report released by the Ministry of Trade and Industry. The report said the country’s non-oil exports dragged down by 24 percent and 1 percent in November and December respectively, compared to the same period in 2007. Non-oil exports were down by 17 percent in January and 9 percent in February 2009, compared to the same period in 2008. The report said Italy was the biggest importer of the Egyptian non-oil products with 1.59 billion-dollar imports. The Saudi markets ranked the second with 1.35 billion-dollar imports while the US came the third with 1.16 billion-dollar imports. Minister of Trade and Industry Rashid Mohamed Rashid attributed the rise in the non-oil exports to the free trade deals signed with Arab and foreign countries. He said the country’s non-oil exports to Arab countries reached to 6.800 billion dollars in 2008, compared to 1 billion dollars in the previous year. Rashid, however, said the global financial turmoil affected the country’s non-oil products. (ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Terrorism: Algeria, Family Massacred in Tebessa
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, MARCH 16 — A group of armed men raided a farm in Chetabia, in the Tebessa region, during the night between Saturday and Sunday, not far from the Algeria-Tunisia border, and after having slaughtered 300 rams, killed their owner. Shortly afterwards, upon the arrival of neighbours and security forces, reported the Algerian press today, two explosives placed by terrorists inside of the house detonated, killing the shepherd’s three other family members and a city councillor. A vast round-up operation by the army immediately began afterwards. On February 12, seven people, including four civilians, died in a double-attack in the same region (600km southeast of Algiers). A few days later, four soldiers were killed in another attack in Tebessa. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia: Elections in October, First Moves of the Opposition
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, MARCH 16 — In preparation of the Tunisian presidential elections scheduled for next October, three opposition parties are starting to draw up their respective strategies. The three parties have already participated in past elections: Party of People’s Unity (PUP), Unionist Democratic Union (UDU), and Ettajdid. Based on a new constitutional amendment, the head of each party can present their candidacy. The PUP, which already participated in the 1999 and 2004 presidential elections has decided to nominate their current Secretary-General Mohamed Bouchicha. A special commission has been formed to draw up the election manifesto to take the party’s message to the electorate. The PUP also plans to use new computer and communications technology to get its message to the people. The UDU, which nominated a candidate in the 1999 elections, this year plans to nominate the party’s Secretary-General Abderrahmane Tlili who has already begun to outline his electoral programme. Ettajdid will nominate its Secretary-General Ahmed Brahim, heading up a coalition of political entities and independents. Ettajdid participated in the 2004presidential elections as part of a coalition called the “Democratic Initiative”. All eight opposition parties have announced their participation in the legislative elections, also scheduled for October at the same time as the presidential elections. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Western Sahara: Polisario, Morocco Obstructing Solution
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, MARCH 16 — “The plan for autonomy, presented by Morocco as a take-it-or-leave-it and only solution, is an obstacle to the finding of a just and durable solution to the Western Sahara conflict”, declared Mohamed Salem Ould Salek, Foreign Minister of the self-proclaimed Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), which is recognised by around eighty countries but by no western State. “Unfortunately, Morocco persists with its traditional intransigence,” reads a note, and “continues to obstruct the construction of the Arab Maghreb, of peace, cohesion and stability in the region”. “Rabat’s attachment to its autonomy plan does not contribute to the success of the fifth round of direct negotiations between the Polisario and Marocco”, continued Salek. Morocco’s Foreign Minister, Taieb Fassi Fihri, on Saturday turned down once more the idea of organising a referendum for the self-determination claimed by the Sahrawi. The most recent direct negotiations began in 2007 in Manhasset, near New York, under the aegis of the UN, came to a halt in March 2008. The new United Nations envoy for the Western Sahara, Christopher Ross, recently visited the region to try and re-launch negotiations. The issue of the former Spanish colony, occupied by Morocco in 1975, continues to divide the Maghreb region: Algeria, which has always stood alongside the Polisario, sees ‘the organisation of a referendum which allows the Sahrawi people to choose their future freely”; Morocco is ready to concede autonomy to the region, but under its sovereignty. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Criticism of Israel Dropped From Durban II Draft Resolution
United Nations officials said Tuesday that Muslim-backed references to ‘defamation of religion’ and criticism of Israel have been dropped from a draft being prepared for next month’s world racism meeting.
Initial draft resolutions for the United Nations Durban II summit branded Israel as an occupying state that carries out racist policies.
Islamic countries were campaigning for wording in the draft that would equate criticism of a religious faith with a violation of human rights and would take Israel to task for its treatment of Palestinians.
The latest draft declaration, a compromise 17-page text issued by Russian working group chairman Yuri Boychenko after private consultations, omits any reference to the Middle East conflict as well as defamation of religion.
It now speaks only of concern about the negative stereotyping of
religions and does not single out Israel for criticism, according to the officials.
“The document contains no reference to Israel, the Middle East or defamation of religion,” said one United Nations source.
“The text goes in the right direction,” an EU diplomat said.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
EU Warns Israel, Two State Solution is a Must
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS — While Israel is preparing for a government dominated by the right-wing and Arab countries sound the alarm on peace negotiations, the European Union has begun to make its voice heard: not all that comes with the new Netanyahu administration is welcome, said the EU Council of Ministers and the European Commission, because it goes against the solution that calls for the formation of a Palestinian nation. If Israel does not support the two states for two peoples solution, supported by the Arab countries and by the entire West, “there could be consequences” according to the High Representative for Foreign Policy, Javier Solana. “The EU is ready for business as usual with the new Netanyahu government as long as it is willing to continue with the solution that everyone is calling for”, Solana explained. That of two independent states, one Palestinian and one Israeli, which will exist side by side in peace and in complete sovereignty. It is the hypothesis that the EU and all of the West has supported for some time. “We would like for the new Israeli government and all of its ministers to accept the same solution that we support”, said External Relations Commissioner, Benita Ferrero Waldner. Also according to Italian Foreign Minister, Franco Frattini, Israel “must immediately resume negotiations for the peace process based on the two states for two peoples solution”. If not, that is “if this message was to be abandoned, we (the EU, ed.) would be in serious difficulty, because it is that which the Quartet for the Middle East established”, Frattini specified. But if the EU has begun to make itself heard, Arab countries continue to sound the alarm on the rightward turn of the new Israeli executive branch. “It is dangerous for the peace process”, the Egyptian Foreign Minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, said speaking at the Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly today in Brussels at the European Parliament. Gheit defined the coalition agreement between incumbent Premier Benjamin Netanyahu and the extreme right Likud party led by Avigdor Lieberman (Israel Beitenu) “a negative factor”, because the emergence of a right-wing government in Israel “could damage the peace process”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Letter to UN Asking for International Investigation
(ANSAmed) — ROME, MARCH 16 — Antonio Cassese, the first president of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, former president of Ireland Mary Robinson and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu are among the sixteen signers of a letter to UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, to ask for an international investigation into the violation of human rights by Israel and armed Palestinian groups during the Gaza conflict. The open letter, an initiative of Crisis Action backed by Amnesty International which published its text, reads: “Without a credible and impartial investigation into what has happened during the conflict in Gaza, it will be difficult for the communities that have paid a very high price for the violence to overcome the consequences of the conflict and to work together to build a better peace… A quick, independent and impartial investigation would for a public documentation on the serious violation of human rights and would advise on the way those responsible will have to respond for what they’ve done… We ask the world leaders to make it clear that hitting civilians during a conflict is completely unacceptable. We ask them to support the institution of a UN Investigating Commission on the Gaza conflict.. There is a desperate need for aid an reconstruction but, to really heal the wounds, we must find out the truth about the crimes committed against civilians by both parties”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Kouchner, Yes to Independent International Investigation
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, MARCH 16 — “We have always been in favour of international justice and we are in agreement with our Egyptian counterpart, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, for an investigation, as long as it is independent and impartial,” said Bernard Kouchner, French Foreign Minister, responding to the possibility of Israel being judged by an international court for its aggression in Gaza, during a debate in the Political Affairs Commission of the Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly (EMPA) held today in Brussels. “We must put an end to double standard policies,” said Taysir Qubaa, a representative from the Palestinian delegation. “Why aren’t decisions analogous to the ones made for Eastern Europe made also with Israel? Why not appeal to the International Criminal Court?”. “For Parliament members like myself, there cannot be peace without justice,” said Ahmed Fati Sorour, the president of Egyptian Parliament. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gilad: Hamas, Hizbullah Can’t be Trusted
[TJ: This sounds a lot like what Spencer, et al have been saying for years.]
Terror groups can agree to 30-year truce, violate it 30 days later, top security official says
Both Hamas and Hizbullah will continue to seek Israel’s destruction and must not be granted any legitimacy, top security official Amos Gilad said Monday.
Speaking at a conference at the Interdisciplinary Center, the head of the Defense Ministry’s Diplomatic-Security Bureau said terror groups were “decent enough to say what they think — that Israel has no right to exist.” He said both Hamas and Hizbullah are “entities with an incredibly radical worldview, but they’re flexible in terms of timetable.. For them, there is no such thing as defeat or surrender.”
“If they sustain a blow, as happened in Operation Cast Lead for example, they may accept a temporary agreement. However, in terms of their value system, they can always violate such deal the moment they feel strong enough,” he said.
“This is what happened with the previous lull,” Gilad said, noting that he was deeply familiar with the issue. “I’m telling you that the lull was unlimited and was not restricted to six months, as Hamas claimed. They violated it because they thought Israel is weak and won’t enter Gaza.”
“They are capable of agreeing to a 30-year ceasefire and violating it after 30 days,” he said. “Those who think that such agreements can serve as a basis for negotiation are wrong. We should never be tempted into strategic negotiations with Hamas.”
‘No chance for peace deals’
Turning his attention to the recent British willingness to engage in dialogue with Hizbullah, Gilad said: “I see elements in the Western world that are considering dialogue with these groups in an attempt to convince them, but it won’t make a difference. It’s possible to reach agreements with them, but we should never think this will lead to peace treaties.”
Replying to Ynet’s question about whether Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s latest speech, where he hinted of willingness to engage in talks with the US, constituted a change in policy, Gilad replied: “Hamas and Hizbullah are open to any kind of dialogue. Legitimacy is very important to them. If the Western world is willing to recognize them, they will of course accept that, and this is what Nasrallah meant. However, they will not change their ways, and Israel will always be a target for elimination in their eyes.”
During the evening, Gilad refused to respond to questions regarding the Gilad Shalit negotiations.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Israel: Government; Deal With Netanyahu, Lieberman FM
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, MARCH 16 — Premier designate Benjamin Netanyahu (Likud) is stepping up the pace in an attempt to present his new government to the Knesset next week. He still doesn’t rule out a broad coalition with Kadima, but last night he signed a political agreement with the radical right-wing party Israel Beitenu, whose leader Avigdor Lieberman will become foreign minster together with a total of five ministries that will be appointed to the party. Today Likud wants to sign another deal with the orthodox Shas party and other agreements with three more religious and right-wing parties. But Netanyahu has already warned future government partners that he wants to leave the possibility of a broad government with Tzipi Livni’s Kadima and Ehud Barak’s Labour party open. Lieberman, when signing the agreement, confirmed that he is in favour of a possible government with Kadima. But Livni at the moment only wants Kadima to govern if Netanyahu is willing to re-launch the Annapolis process, in other words if he commits to the formation of ‘two States for the two peoples’. Rumours say that negotiations with the Palestinians are not explicitly mentioned in the political agreement between Likud and Israel Beitenu. The parties promise however that Israel “will not negotiate with terrorist organizations” and that Israel’s strategic objective will be to bring down the Hamas regime in Gaza. The new government sees “an immediate threat” in Iran’s nuclear programme, which “must be warded off for Israel’s safety and for the people of the Region and the free world”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Jerusalem Tractor Drivers Fear for Their Lives Following Terror Attacks
East Jerusalem tractor drivers say have become easy targets in wake of series of terror attacks in capital. ‘We have done nothing wrong, but people still give us hateful looks in the street,’ one of them says during demonstration, ‘anyone who shoots a tractor driver is considered a hero’
Daniel Edelson Published: 03.17.09, 12:35 / Israel News
Several dozen tractor drivers from east Jerusalem protested outside Teddy Stadium in the capital Tuesday and carried signs reading “I am not a terrorist”.
The drivers said their lives were at risk in the wake of a series of terror attacks in Jerusalem in which tractors were used. In July three people were killed and 36 others were injured during a tractor attack on Jaffa Street.
In September a similar attack on King David Street left 18 people wounded, and during the most recent tractor attack, carried out in early March, two police officers were lightly injured when a tractor plowed into their squad car on Menachem Begin Boulevard.
In all of the incidents the terrorists driving the tractors were shot and killed.
“We have done nothing wrong, but people still give us hateful looks on the street,” said Isam Jaradat, a 35-year-old tractor driver from Wadi Joz. “We are afraid that any mistake on our part may result in a bullet to the head. One of my drivers quit because of this. All we want is to make an honest living, and we urge the public not to fear us.”
Another tractor driver said, “Anyone who shoots a tractor driver is considered a hero; anyone holding a gun will want to open fire because he thinks he may receive a million shekel (about $242,000) reward.
“One day I entered a very narrow alley and hit a car’s side-view mirror by mistake. The owner of the car immediately began shouting ‘terrorist, terrorist!’ I fled the scene for fear someone would shoot me. Had I waited for the police to show up, I wouldn’t be talking to you right now,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Abu Elvis | [Return to headlines] |
Judges Call for Alleged Gaza War Crimes Inquiry
Jerusalem, 16 March (AKI) — A 16-strong group of the world’s most experienced investigators and judges called on Monday for a full international investigation into alleged breach of international law during the recent Gaza conflict.
The call is made in an open letter to United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-moon as well as all members of the UN Security Council.
The letter comes at a time when a UN Board of Inquiry is expected to report to Ban on its initial findings regarding attacks on UN facilities and personnel in Gaza.
The new letter stresses the need for an investigation into “all serious violations of international humanitarian law committed by all parties to the conflict.”
It argues that the UN investigation “should not be limited only to attacks on UN facilities.”
The signatories — who have led investigations of crimes committed in former Yugoslavia, Kosovo, Darfur, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, South Africa, East Timor, Lebanon and Peru — say that they have been “shocked to the core” by events in Gaza.
The signatories argue that they “have seen at first hand the importance of investigating the truth and delivering justice for the victims of conflict and believe it is a precondition to move forward and achieve peace in the Middle East.”
The letter’s signatories urge world leaders “to send an unfaltering signal that the targeting of civilians during conflict is unacceptable by any party on any count.”
The signatories include Antonio Cassese (First President and Judge of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, Richard Goldstone (Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda and Chairman of the UN Inquiry on Kosovo).
The letter calls for the establishment of a UN commission of inquiry into the Gaza conflict that has a mandate to carry out a prompt, thorough, independent and impartial investigation of all allegations of serious violations of international humanitarian law committed by all parties to the conflict.
William A. Schabas, former member of the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission and a signatory to the letter, said: “The international community must apply the same standard to Gaza as it does to other conflicts, and investigate all abuses of the laws of war and human rights.
The current UN inquiry is no substitute for a full investigation. It is not only the UN personnel that deserve truth and justice, but Palestinians and Israelis themselves.”
The signatories conclude that: “relief and reconstruction are desperately needed but, for the real wounds to heal, we must also establish the truth about crimes perpetuated against civilians on both sides.”
The 22-day Israeli military operation launched on 18 December killed some 1,330 Palestinians, injured more than 5,400, over one-third of them children, and caused widespread damage and destruction in Gaza.
Thirteen Israelis — including ten soldiers — died during the offensive, whose stated aim was to end rocket attacks by Palestinian Islamist militants against Israel.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Iran to Send Female Skier to Winter Games
Iran is to send a female skier to the Winter Olympics for the first time at next year’s Games in Vancouver, Canada, the head of the Islamic Republic’s ski federation told state media Monday.
Fatemeh Kiadarbandsari, competing at last month’s World Ski Championships, in France.
The chosen competitor will ski in “full Islamic dress,” Iran’s National News Agency reported.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Iraq Looks to Future With “Optimism.” Economic Crisis Feared More Than Security
Violence and lack of security are not the main cause of concern. 85% of Iraqis call the current situation “very good or quite good.” Sources for AsiaNews confirm the reopening of shops and businesses. The country must promote economic alternatives to oil, like tourism and agriculture.
Baghdad (AsiaNews) — Violence and lack of security are no longer the main cause of concern for Iraqis. This is the result of a recent survey, and is confirmed by sources for AsiaNews in the country. “An improvement in the quality of life is evident,” confirms one Iraqi Chaldean Christian, but there remains the “concern over attacks in recent days in Baghdad,” following which the government and the Presidency Council have opened “an official investigation” to discover the “causes and perpetrators of these actions.”
According to a survey conducted in February by the BBC, ABC News, and NHK, for the first time since 2003 Iraqis say they are “more upbeat” about the future. The survey examined the responses of 2,228 citizens of the 18 provinces into which the country is subdivided: the main concerns stem from “everyday problems” like “the economy and work.” In the matter of security, 85% of those interviewed call the current situation “very good or quite good,” with an increase of 23% compared to last year. Only 8% say that security has worsened, compared to 26% in 2008. 59% say they “feel safe” in the area where they live, compared to the previous 37%.
“The improvement in the level of security,” confirm the sources for AsiaNews, “is a concrete fact, but we must not let down our guard. The recent attacks in Baghdad are confirmation of this.” Last March 13, a series of dynamite attacks killed one woman and wounded seven other people; on March 10, a suicide attack northwest of the capital killed or injured at least 60 people. “The new development with respect to the past is that the government and the Presidency Council have promoted a parliamentary inquiry into the reasons for the attacks. The intention is to understand whether these are due to a breach in the security system, or whether they were just isolated incidents.”
For Iraq as well, the main causes of concern derive from the global financial crisis and the effort to revive the nation’s economy: “Shops and businesses are being reopened. In Mosul,” one local source recounts, “a car repair shop has been reopened, run by a Christian family. The demand for repairs is strong, and the spare parts are available. The people want to revive businesses that were abandoned because of the war. There is again talk of hospitals, schools, education, energy and raw materials.”
In recent days Iraqi interior minister Jawad al-Bolani has stated that “the military operations against al Qaeda are over”; now the focus will shift to “targeted activity on the level of intelligence and the secret services,” against the “leaders of the movement.” The first victims of terrorism have been the Iraqi Christians, for whom “a sense of threat remains,” because “the memory of the recent massacres” is still strong. “There is not absolute trust,” confirm the Christians of Mosul, “but there is an undeniable sense of hope for the future.”
In order to provide a new boost to the country’s economy, it is necessary to guarantee high standards of security, so that “the big international companies may again invest in Iraq.” “The economic crisis and the fall in the price of oil,” confirm the sources for AsiaNews, “have aggravated the problem, but the country can rely on its natural resources and water reserves, on agriculture and archaeological and religious tourism: if the country is truly able to stabilize itself, the economy will also see beneficial effects over the long term.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Iraqi Fan Kills Soccer Player During Close Game
BAGHDAD — Police say an Iraqi soccer player has been shot dead just as he was about to kick what could have been the tying goal in a weekend game south of Baghdad.
Police Maj. Muthanna Khalid says a striker from the Buhairat amateur team was facing only the goalie during a Sunday match in Hillah when a supporter of the rival Sinjar club shot him in the head in the final minute of play.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Piracy: Turkish Frigate Intercepts Pirates in Gulf of Aden
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 16 — A Turkish frigate intercepted a group of pirates in the Gulf of Aden as they attempted to hijack a cargo ship, Hurriyet Daily reported. The Turkish frigate, Giresun, prevented the pirates from boarding the Vietnamese vessel off-coast of South Yemen. The two Turkish AB-212 helicopters also participated in the interception, which was carried out in cooperation with a war ship from Danish Naval Forces Command. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Syria: Human Rights, 3 Years in Jail for Political Dissident
(ANSAmed) — DAMASCUS, MARCH 16 — A Syrian writer and human rights activist, who has been in prison several times for publicly asking for political reforms in the country that has been ruled by the Baath regime for forty years, was sentenced to three years in prison today. According to Syrian human rights organisation ONDUS, Habib Saleh (62 years old) was sentenced today to three years in prison by the criminal court of Damascus under charges of “spreading false information to weaken national sentiment and to reawaken confessional dissent”. “Many European and Western diplomats, as well as activists in the community, were present this morning when the verdict was read”, an ONDUS note explains. Saleh, who was arrested six times between 1982 and May 2008, was arrested almost a year ago by government security services after publishing an article on internet in which he asked for political reforms. Since the accession in the summer of 2000 of President Bashar al-Assad, son of the deceased Hafiz al-Asad, tens of civilians and human rights activists have been imprisoned for “spreading false information to weaken national sentiment”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Terrorism: ‘Teenage Suicide Bomber’ Behind Yemen Blast
The bomb blast that killed four Korean tourists in the city of Shibam in the southeastern province of Hadramaut, Yemen, on Sunday afternoon was a suicide attack linked to the Al-Qaeda network. DPA on Monday quoted local investigators as saying a terrorist wearing an explosives vest committed the suicide attack in a style typical of Al-Qaeda. Yemen’s official Saba News Agency also said Al-Qaeda is behind the incident. Hamid Al-Kurashi, the head of Hadramaut police, said investigators found a video message the suicide bomber, a teenager, had left. The Korean Foreign Ministry said it is checking the facts.
The blast took place at around 5:50 p.m. on Sunday afternoon, or 11:50 p.m. Korean time, claiming the lives of four Korean tourists and injuring three people including a tour guide from Amman, Jordan, and other tourists. A group of 18 Korean tourists, including the four dead, left Incheon International Airport on March 9, and 13 of them were sightseeing in the city of Shibam on Sunday, the seventh day of their tour.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Nationalist Slogans to be Removed From Hillsides
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 16 — The Islamic-rooted ruling Justice and Development Party (Akp) of premier Tayyip Erdogan, is ready to cleanse the mountains of nationalist slogans and reintroduce removed Kurdish place names, daily Taraf reports. The AKP’s plan has two steps: first, the Party will introduce legal amendments to revert to the Kurdish names of places that previously held a Kurdish name; second, nationalist slogans such as “How happy is he who calls himself a Turk”, — written on mountainsides particularly in the country’s Southeast — will be removed in a bid to reconcile with the Kurdish population of the country. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
US-Turkey: Washington May Need Ankara for Iraqi Withdrawal
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 16 — US may need Turkey’s cooperation while withdrawing its troops from Iraq, Anatolia news agency reported quoting Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ali Babacan. “US has not yet made plans about the number of soldiers and the route it would withdraw the troops”, Babacan said, adding that “Washington will inform Turkey about its plans and Turkey would make assessments about it”. “Iraqi people supports withdrawal of US soldiers and they want this to take place soon”, the head of Turkish diplomacy declared noting that “Iraq had given a signal to Turkey to assist this”. Concerning the agenda of Barack Obama’s meeting, Babacan declared that “Afghanistan-Pakistan relations, developments in the Middle East, Iran, the Caucasus, Balkans, Cyprus, Armenia, as well as Iraq would be discussed during the talks”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Zbigniew Brzezinski: More Bad Advice on Iran
The most discredited foreign policy official in U.S. history has the president’s ear.
by Craig Karpel
Gen. Douglas MacArthur ended his farewell address to Congress on April 19, 1951, by quoting the refrain of a barracks ballad that went, “Old soldiers never die, they just fade away.” Former presidential national security advisers, in contrast, neither die nor fade away. They’re too busy drumming up business for their inevitable consultancies and tweaking their “legacies” by writing op-ed pieces and testifying before legislative committees.
Zbigniew Brzezinski was Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser. He advocated the cessation of U.S. support for the shah of Iran, thereby contributing to (and some would say resulting in) the Islamist takeover of the country 30 years ago. On March 5, Brzezinski testified alongside his Bush 41 counterpart Brent Scowcroft at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on U.S. policy toward Iran. Both called for talks with Tehran and said the main problem posed by Iran’s nuclear program is not that nuclear-armed Iranian missiles will threaten Western cities, but that Iran’s possession of such weapons will spur other countries in the region and around the world to acquire nuclear weapons.
In his testimony, Brzezinksi lambasted an Israeli government memorandum that was leaked to the Israeli daily Ha’aretz just before Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit to Jerusalem this month. The document, drafted to provide talking points for the officials who would be meeting with Clinton, contained four recommendations…
| — Hat tip: Craig Karpel | [Return to headlines] |
Russia Announces Rearmament Plan
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has said Moscow will begin a comprehensive military rearmament from 2011.
Mr Medvedev said the primary task would be to “increase the combat readiness of [Russia’s] forces, first of all our strategic nuclear forces”.
Explaining the move, he cited concerns over Nato expansion near Russia’s borders and regional conflicts.
Last year, the Kremlin set out plans to increase spending on Russia’s armed forces over the next two years.
Russia will spend nearly $140bn (£94.5bn) on buying arms up until 2011.
Higher oil revenues in recent years have allowed the Kremlin to increase the military budget, analysts say. But prices have averaged $40 a barrel in 2009 compared with $100 last year.
In his first address to a defence ministry meeting in his capacity as supreme commander, Mr Medvedev said considerable sums are being channelled towards developing and purchasing modern military equipment.
“Despite the financial problems we have to cope with today, the size of these sums has remained virtually the same as planned.”
Analysts say the brief war in Georgia exposed problems with outdated equipment and practices within Russia’s armed forces and led to calls for military modernisation.
President Medvedev’s remarks also appear significant for what they say about the diplomatic game between Moscow and the new administration in the United States, says the BBC’s James Rodgers in Moscow.
Both sides are looking for a solution to issues — such as US missile defence plans in Europe — which bitterly divided the Kremlin and the White House during the Bush administration. Neither, though, seems willing simply to abandon previously-held positions, our correspondent adds.
The Russian Security Council is currently developing a new military doctrine which is expected to reflect current and forthcoming international developments, including any changes Nato may set out this year, missile defence deployments and WMD proliferation.
“The Security Council will approve Russia’s national security strategy until 2020 in the near future,” President Medvedev said.
| — Hat tip: islam o’phobe | [Return to headlines] |
Russian PM Vows to Increase Nuclear Arsenal on the Day Gordon Brown Says He Wants to Scrap Some Trident Warheads
Britain is willing to scrap a significant number of Trident nuclear warheads for a new push on disarmament, Gordon Brown said today.
In a keynote speech he claimed that a new deal to reduce the world’s stockpiles of nuclear weapons could be in sight.
But his announcement came as Russian president Dmitry Medvedev promised to do just the opposite and boost Russia’s nuclear forces.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
China Plans Opera Version of Karl Marx’s Das Kapital
Normally disdained by revolutionaries as a bourgeois art form, the show’s producers insist that in the confident, modern-day People’s Republic, opera is a novel way to explain the proletariat’s triumph in the class struggle.
“The particular performance style we choose is not important, but Marx’s theories cannot be distorted,” said director He Nian, in an interview with China’s Wen Hui Bao newspaper.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Koreas: North Reopens Border
North Korea, in a see-saw move, yesterday reopened the inter-Korean border to allow South Koreans to head either to the North or home to the South. The Unification Ministry said more than 500 South Koreans were able to travel to the Gaeseong Industrial Complex and other permitted areas in the North, with some 300 returning to the South following a message the North sent at around 10 a.m.
Minutes later, Pyongyang also said it would allow South Koreans to travel to the North via the Donghae Railway to access the Mount Geumgang resort.
Few South Koreans are in Gaeseong or Mount Geumgang as tours to those areas have been temporarily halted amid increasing inter-Korean hostility.
Yesterday marked the second time in a little more than a week that the North reopened the Military Demarcation Line, allowing not only people but essential raw materials and foodstuffs needed for the operation of the joint complex and the mountain resort.
North Korea, protesting a joint military drill between South Korean and U.S. troops, on March 9 banned access across the demarcation line. It reopened the border a day later, but closed it again on Friday.
On Monday, it permitted South Koreans to travel home, but not to the North.
“The North has said it would cause ‘inconvenience’ for the South over the duration of the drill, and that is exactly what it is doing by opening and closing the border at whim. So this situation may keep up until March 20 when the drill is scheduled to end,” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies here.
He added that the real problem would occur if the North attempts to continue using the border closure option even after the Key Resolve and Foal Eagle exercises are over to keep Seoul on its toes up until Pyongyang’s planned rocket launch in early April.
The Unification Ministry yesterday said it was uncertain if the North may keep the border open or close it down again.
The North, as part of its brinkmanship aimed at both Washington and Seoul, has recently notified international naval and aviation agencies of its intent to launch a satellite between April 4-8.
Most of international society believe the North will try to fire a long-range missile. This, according to the six parties discussing North Korea’s denuclearization, would be in violation of a United Nations Security Council resolution.
Hit with rising complaints and concerns from the firms operating in Gaeseong, the Seoul government this week indicated it is considering possible options for ensuring the safety of South Koreans in the Gaeseong complex. Some have suggested a temporary halt.
Critics, however, believe such a move would only offer the North a chance to blame the South for the deadlock in inter-Korean ties. Pyongyang has continuously blasted President Lee Myung-bak for assuming a tougher stance towards it.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: China Sends Former Warship to Patrol Contested Spratly Islands
The Spratly and Paracel islands are contested by China, the Philippines, and other countries. Last week, the Filipino parliament claimed sovereignty over some of the islands. Now there is fear of an armed confrontation, with unpredictable results.
Beijing (AsiaNews/Agencies) — Since yesterday, a 4,450 ton Chinese ship has been navigating around the Paracel Islands (in Chinese: Xisha) in the South China Sea, after a new Filipino law last week declared Manila’s sovereignty over these. The islands are also claimed by Vietnam and Taiwan, while the nearby Spratly Islands are claimed by China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Brunei, which want exploit the rich oil and mineral reserves beneath the sea bed.
Official Chinese sources say that the ship China Yuzheng 311, a former military ship and now one of the most powerful patrol boats, departed a week ago and is intended only to “protect fishing vessels . . .. in China’s southernmost maritime territory.” It is not known whether the Chinese ship is armed.
In addition to having extensive energy resources, the area is also one of the busiest shipping routes.
Beijing has defined as “illegal and invalid” the new Filipino law claiming sovereignty over the Paracel Islands. For his part, Malaysian prime minister Abdullah Badawi paid a visit on March 5 to the Danwan Reef in the Spratly Islands, claiming sovereignty over this.
In 2002, China and the countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations signed an agreement rejecting military confrontation, and pledging support for a peaceful solution for the South China Sea. Now the Filipino foreign minister has called on “all sides” of the agreement to observe their commitments.
But experts note that an increasing confrontation is taking place among countries with a stake in the area, and the developments of this are unpredictable.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: China Shows Might in South China Sea
Security chief Gonzales worried by move
MANILA, Philippines—China’s dispatch of a state-of-the-art patrol ship in the South China Sea doesn’t necessarily smack of gunboat diplomacy, but Malacañang is taking it seriously.
National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales Sunday said he would call for an immediate meeting of the Cabinet’s security group to discuss the Chinese action in the wake of Beijing’s protest over the signing of the Philippine Archipelagic Baselines Law.
“The deployment of the patrol ship was a message and we cannot just ignore it,” Gonzales told the Philippine Daily Inquirer in a phone interview. “We have to take it seriously.”
China’s state media Sunday reported that the country had dispatched its “most modern patrol ship” in the South China Sea following an incident with a US naval vessel and the signing of the Philippine baselines law.
“This should remind us that even in this era of dialogue and understanding in the world, there will always be nations that will show might and threaten perceived weak nations like us,” Gonzales said.
He said the meeting of the national security cluster would tackle the Philippine government’s response to the ship deployment in the context of the 2002 Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea.
“That’s where we should be going,” he said. “The only thing we can do is to resort to diplomacy.”
In the declaration, China and Southeast Asian nations agreed to “exercise self-restraint in the conduct of activities that would complicate or escalate disputes and affect peace and stability including, among others, refraining from action of inhabiting on the presently uninhabited islands, reefs, shoals, cays and other features, and to handle their differences in a constructive manner.”
Baselines bill ‘illegal’
China had earlier protested the signing of the baselines bill, describing it as “illegal.”
But the Philippine government maintained that it was standing by its claim on the Spratly Islands and Scarborough Shoal—an area potentially rich in oil.
The baselines law excludes the disputed Kalayaan Group of Islands and the Scarborough Shoal from the archipelago, treating them instead as part of a “regime of islands.”
Still, China was adamant that the Philippines was claiming its territories in the Spratlys, particularly Huangyan Island and the Nansha Islands.
Gonzales said the Chinese protest could be considered a form of diplomatic “posturing.”
Press Secretary Cerge Remonde Sunday described Beijing’s move as a “normal conduct in international diplomacy.”
“We should not be worried about it,” Remonde said in his Sunday media forum on state-owned Radyo ng Bayan. “The United Nations will be the final arbiter of the issue.”
UN Law of the Sea
Remonde maintained that the baselines law was consistent with requirements of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
“What our President and our government (officials) did was in accordance to their sworn constitutional duty which is to uphold and protect the sovereignty of our country,” he said.
Remonde said the Philippine government would also have lodged a similar diplomatic protest if China or other claimants of the disputed island came up with an official action similar to the baselines law.
No official reaction has been issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs, but a DFA official who did not wish to be named said that the Chinese move seemed to comply with the 2002 declaration, particularly its provision on notification coursed through official media.
Beijing News said the Chinese vessel would conduct patrols of what it called China’s exclusive maritime zone in the disputed waters surrounding the Paracel and Spratlys, according to Agence France Presse…
…The Spratly and Paracel island chains have been flash points for years.
The Spratlys are claimed in full or part by China and Vietnam, as well as the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan, and the Paracels are claimed by China, which now occupies them, as well as by Vietnam and Taiwan.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: Saga of Baselines Law
Hopefully, an insider would one day write the saga of the Philippine Baselines Law enacted last week. It could prove to be an interesting document full of twists and turns as well as political and diplomatic drama.
The law defines the maritime borders of the Republic and its exclusive economic zone as well as its claims to portions of two groups of islands in the South China Sea. However, that is not the only reason why this law is remarkable.
Equally notable is the fact that legislators crossed party lines and ultimately put up a united front in order to assert national sovereignty-despite the very really likelihood of offending the country’s more powerful neighbor nations with which it has conflicting territorial claims in the Spratly Islands and Scarborough Shoal.
In fact, only a few months ago it did not seem as though Filipinos could ever be made to agree on how to define the maritime borders of their own archipelago.
It was three years or so when Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. first raised the alarm on the approaching deadline set in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Seas. The Philippines and other countries were given until May 13, 2009 to “deposit” with the UN general secretariat their baselines.
According to lawyer Henry Bersuto Jr., secretary general of the Commission on Maritime and Ocean Affairs Secretariat of the Department of Foreign Affairs, the baselines law “puts the whole world on notice” that the Philippines now has clearly defined maritime borders.
For one thing, when the baselines law becomes fully operational, 15 days after it was signed, there will no longer be any “pockets of high seas” within Philippine waters. In such pockets, complete freedom of navigation had prevailed for decades.
These pockets of high seas were exploited by foreign fishermen poaching in Philippine waters. A couple of the pockets are located between the islands of Samar and Leyte and in the Sulu Sea off Palawan. When intercepted by Philippine authorities, foreigners invariably claimed they were sailing on international waters.
The baselines law puts an end to this legalistic nonsense.
No cakewalk
Bersuto and his staff were largely responsible for getting both chambers of Congress to finally pass what is now known as Republic Act No. 9522, or the Philippine Baselines Act. Not that it was an easy process-far from it.
The maritime commission formulated several options for the lawmakers’ deliberations. From the get-go, however, Bersuto and his staff indicated their preference for a formula that would depict the Kalayaan Island Group in the Spratlys and Scarborough Shoal as a “regime of islands” distinct from the main archipelago.
The option triggered angry reactions from senators, congressmen and other quarters who decried what they considered as the surrender of the country’s territorial claims on the South China Sea islands, believed to be sitting atop huge oil and natural gas deposits.
In the Senate, one powerful member even initially refused to heed the advice of international law experts, insisting that “the only expert I need to rely on is myself.”
In the House of Representatives, however, the baselines proponents were able to gain the support of Rep. Antonio Cuenco of Cebu, the foreign affairs committee chairman, and Rep. Ferdinand Marcos 2nd of Ilocos Norte, who authored the chamber’s version of the bill.
The congressmen threw their support for the baselines bill after they were assured that the regime of islands formula would not prejudice Philippine claims to the KIG and Scarborough Shoal.
Speaking at the weekly Kapihan sa Sulo media forum on Saturday, Cuenco revealed that he even had to plead with his Senate counterpart, Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago, to “hear out the experts.”
In time, resistance to the baselines bill melted as Bersuto and his staff tirelessly sought to convince lawmakers-and the public at large-to support their version of the proposed law through countless briefings.
At the Kapihan, too, Bersuto said R.A. 9522 adds 94 million hectares to the country’s territorial waters-three times more than what was provided for in the Treaty of Paris of 1898, “which no other country actually respected anyway.”
As for the objections coming out of Beijing immediately before the baselines bill was enacted, Bersuto said they had anticipated “political protests from the countries affected by [R.A. 9522]. It is their way of asserting their claims because silence could be interpreted as acquiescence.”
Bersuto added, however, that “we did what we have to do for the interest of the country.”
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Philippines: Muslims Seek Supreme Court Representation
Party-list Rep. Hataman notes that no Muslim has been appointed to the High Court since Cory’s time
MUSLIM lawmakers are now asking seeking their representation in the Supreme Court (SC) by asking the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) and President Arroyo to recommend and appoint a Muslim Associate Justice in one of the six vacancies before the high court this year.
In a press conference, Anak Mindanao Party-list Rep. Mujiv Hataman said that there has been no Muslim appointed to the high court for the past 22 years. The first time and only time that a Muslim became a Justice of the Supreme Court was during the administration of then President Aquino when she appointed Supreme Court Justice Abdulwahid Bidin. No Muslim has since followed Bidin.
Hataman said that they are now invoking the laws that allow representation of Muslim applicants to the High Court.
This includes the 1995 Peace Agreement and Republic Act 6743 or the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao law (ARMM) and the 1976 Tripoli Agreement.
The said laws mandate that there should be at least one Justice who will be appointed for the Supreme Court and two Justices for the Court of Appeals.
Hataman said that among the Muslim members of the House of Representatives who are batting for the appointment of a Muslim Justice before the High Court are Rep. Nur Jaafar of Tawi Tawi, Representatives Munir Arbison and Yusoph Jikiri of Sulu.
He said that the appointment of a Justice to the High Court would help a lot in solving the peace and order situation in Mindanao.
“We believe that the appointment of a Muslim Justice to the Supreme Court will help a lot in solving the peace process in Mindanao,” Hataman said.
Hataman pointed out that the appointment of representatives in different agencies of government is the long-time clamor of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
“This has been the clamor of the MILF and there are the laws like the 1995 Peace Agreement and the ARMM law which says that there should be a Muslim Representative to the Supreme Court,” he pointed out.
Currently, two Muslim Magistrates from the appellate court will attempt to enter the high court and seek the representation for the cultural minorities.
Court of Appeals Justices Japar Dimaampao and Hakim Abdul-wahid were included in the list of candidates for the vacancy following the retirement on February 16 by Associate Justice Adolfo Azcuna.
Both Dimaampao and Abdul-wahid now hold the highest positions in the judiciary.
Dimaampao, a Maranao, was a former State Prosecutor of the Department of Justice and afterwards he became the youngest Regional Trial Court (RTC) Judge in the country after being appointed at the Mandaluyong RTC. He now holds the record as the youngest justice of the appellate court at the age of 40 and eventually could become the youngest magistrate of the SC at the age of 45. He is a Certified Public Accountant, bar reviewer, Sharia bar examiner and author of books in Taxation and Commercial Law.
Abdulwahid, a Tausug and Yakan, was a former Judge of Zamboanga RTC and a graduate of the University of the Philippines and a member of the influential Sigma Rho Fraternity. He was a former examiner in Sharia bar examinations
Both Dimaampao and Abdul-wahid are part of the list of 18 candidates for the Azcuna vacancy.
Also attempting to enter SC again is Solicitor General Agnes Deva-nadera and businessman Rodolfo Robles who were both disqualified by the JBC during the last nomination for the post vacated by Justice Ruben Reyes.
Other applicants are Court of Appeals Justices Amelita Tolentino, Lucas Bersamin, University of Santo Tomas Law School Dean Robert Abad and human rights lawyer Pablito Sanidad.
Tolentino became popular when she convicted Hubert Webb, son of former Sen. Freddie Webb, for the Vizconde massacre case while Bersamin was the former president of the guillotine club during his stint as a judge of Quezon City RTC. Other applicants from the CA are Justices Portia Hormachuelos, Martin Villarama, Andres Reyes, Remedios Salazar-Fernando and Juan Enriquez.
In the Sandiganbayan the applicants are Acting Presiding Justice Edilberto Sandoval along with Justice Francisco Villaruz.
Court of Tax Appeals Presiding Justice Ernesto Acosta will now apply for the incoming SC vacancy along with Ateneo Law Dean Cesar Villanueva and former Bureau of Internal Revenue commissioner Jose Buñag.
Besides Reyes and Azcuna, the five other vacancies in the SC shall Justice Azcuna, a former 1986 Constitutional Commission delegate and later on became the Chief Presidential Legal Counsel of then President Corazon Aquino will retire on February 16, 2009.
The April 30, 2009 vacancy shall be incurred by Justice Alicia Austria-Martinez who applied for early retirement and the next one will be on May 11, 2009 when Justice Dante Tinga retires.
The other retirees for 2009 are Justice Consuelo Ynares-Santiago (October 5), Justice Leonardo Quisumbing (November 6) and Justice Minita Chico-Nazario (December 5).
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Australia: Malcolm Turnbull Turns Up the Heat on Carbon Trading
MALCOLM Turnbull has linked emissions trading to thousands of feared job losses in Queensland, claiming three Townsville metal smelters will close, the state’s coal industry will face a “carbon bill” of $2.4 billion over five years and even green jobs will be threatened by the Rudd Government’s scheme.
With Queensland the first state to go to the polls since the economic crisis hit, the federal Opposition Leader intensified his attack on the potential jobs consequences of the ETS, including the plight of Queensland-based company Envirogen, which generates power from coalmine waste gas. It could close and put 100 people out of work if the ETS replaces state greenhouse incentive schemes.
“Why are you putting people out of work?” Mr Turnbull asked the Prime Minister, particularly since the ETS did “little or nothing to protect the environment”.
In a letter to the Opposition, Envirogen chairman and former Queensland Labor treasurer David Hamill said the ETS would put “current investment of $455 million and 100 jobs … at risk”.
He said the company would “certainly not be in a position to make planned new investments” if the ETS proceeded as planned.
But claims from Opposition emissions trading spokesman Andrew Robb that the scheme would also cost up to 4000 jobs in Townsville were undermined by at least one of the companies named.
“Townsville’s three refineries — Xstrata’s copper refinery, BHP’s nickel refinery and the Sun Metals zinc refinery — will all be made uncompetitive if Mr Rudd’s emissions trading scheme is allowed to go ahead as planned,” Mr Robb said in a statement, claiming this would “cost thousands of local jobs”. A spokesman for Sun Metals said the claim about his refinery was “not true”.
“We had a meeting with (Opposition climate change spokesman) Mr Greg Hunt three or four months ago and at that time there was no emissions-intensive assistance for zinc, but since then we have made significant progress and we will now get significant compensation, so I can say for sure there is no way we will shut down,” the spokesman said. “This story is based on very old information. I don’t know why Mr Robb would say these things.”
In a separate statement Steve de Kruijff, of Xstrata Copper North Queensland, and Brian Hearne of Xstrata Zinc, said their operations would be “under even more pressure” over the long term, rather than cause immediate closure.
Premier Anna Bligh, who faces an election on Saturday, said Queensland had warned the federal Government it would be one of the states most seriously affected by an ETS, and had insisted on adequate compensation and protection for trade-exposed industries.
Renewable energy company Pacific Hydro said the emissions trading scheme and the Government’s proposed 20 per cent renewable energy target would create thousands of new jobs.
But coal miner Peabody, which operates 10 mines in Australia, said the ETS would have a severe impact on its two underground mines, in Queensland and in NSW.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Darwiche Texts Threat From Jail
ONE of the state’s most dangerous prisoners, who may know the whereabouts of several stolen rocket launchers, has sent an ominous message to the people involved in the murder of his brother, the crime boss Abdul Darwiche.
The weekend murder of Darwiche, the 37-year-old alleged head of a Sydney drug syndicate, has led to fears of reprisal violence.
Those fears have been heightened following the message sent from behind the walls of the state’s highest security prison, Goulburn’s Supermax, yesterday by Darwiche’s brother.
Adnan “Eddie” Darwiche is serving a life sentence at Supermax for a 2003 double murder related to the ongoing feud between the Darwiches and the Razzaks.
An underworld source yesterday described the message to the Herald: “It said, ‘I’m going to kill you, even if it’s kids, I don’t care’. Once that’s said, you can imagine what will happen.”
Police will be particularly worried by the threat, given it is being issued by the man they believe purchased several stolen Australian army rocket launchers on the black market years ago. Only one of the nine weapons has been recovered.
Police cut a deal with Adnan Darwiche to recover one of the launchers and about 20 kilograms of light explosives, but they fear he may know the location of several more.
Yesterday police attached to Strike Force Solomon continued to search for Darwiche’s killer, believed to be a family member of one of the people murdered in the 2003 violence.
Despite police officially saying they were confident there would be no reprisals for Darwiche’s murder, one senior investigator told the Herald: “I don’t see how the Darwiches can stand back after this. I mean, the head of the family has been killed — they have to act.”
Even arresting the killer would not solve the problem, he said. “It doesn’t matter if [police] get the offender, [the Darwiches] have to save face.”
The tension in the Auburn area was stretched a little tighter yesterday when a large fire gutted several business on South Parade, near the Auburn train station.
One of the shops is rented by Ali Al Maliky, who is related to the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki.
It is also feared that other criminals may be using the resumption of violence between the Razzaks and the Darwiches as an excuse to settle other scores.
That may be the reason behind the drive-by shooting at the house of a senior Bandido Motorcycle Club member, Mahmoud Dib, about 1am on Monday.
About a dozen bullets struck the low cement fence and the house’s facade, with several passing through the front wall and into the house.
Mr Dib, 27, is understood to be furious with the shooters for risking the lives of his wife and two children — including a four-year-old boy — who were asleep. Nobody was injured.
Notorious, the Kings Cross bikie club police suspect to be behind attacks on the Nomads’ Marrickville clubhouse and the Hells Angels’ Petersham clubhouse in recent months, is suspected of being behind the shooting.
“They think they’re untouchable,” one underworld source said of Notorious.
| — Hat tip: heroyalwhyness | [Return to headlines] |
Mauritania: Alliance Against Libyan Mediation Strengthens
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, MARCH 16 — The front against Libyan mediation in the crisis in Mauritania did not appreciate the statements made by Colonel Gaddafi who said “it is necessary to accept what has been done” in reference to the military coup of August 6 2008, which overthrew the first democratically elected president, Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, and has strengthened with the support of prominent politician Ahmed Ould Daddah siding against Libya. The head of the opposition under the Abdallahi regime, Daddah sided in favour of the coup to dissociate himself from the military council that came into power, regarding the presidential election on June 6, during which, in his opinion, no military candidates or the head of the council, General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz should run for office. “The statements of the Libyan mediator, which ask people to accept what has been done and the agenda of the council, following the final declaration in which he said that the mediation has concluded, lead us to declare that the mediation failed,” read a joint message signed by Daddah and by the National Front for the Defence of Democracy. “It is necessary to continue the fight to reject all unilateral solutions and all resignations to what has been done.” On Saturday night, Gaddafi, the current President of the African Union, which gave him the task of mediation, said that former President Abdallahi must “accept what has been done,” specifying that he discussed this with him in Sirte. “He told me that if they want to reinstate his power, fine, otherwise he will stay in his village,” said Gaddafi, who two days earlier said that the sanctions adopted by the African Union against the members of the council were now “closed” as a result of the elections that were announced for June 6. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Mozambique: Mozambique Mob, Angry Over Disease Rumors, Kills 4
MAPUTO, Mozambique (AP) — A mob angered by rumors that health workers were spreading cholera has killed four people in northern Mozambique. And 12 suspects in the violence were killed later in what a prison official said Tuesday was a fight in jail.
A police statement Tuesday said 29 people had been detained for questioning in Saturday’s violence in the Quinga area of Nampula province. The prison official, Floriano Sumane, was quoted on state radio Tuesday as saying he had received information from police that 12 of the suspects died early Tuesday during violence inside the cell they shared.
Sumane denied reports the deaths were caused by the police opening fire on prisoners trying to escape. The general director of prisons, Joao Zandamela, told state radio a team had been dispatched from the provincial capital to find out more about the deaths in detention.
The bizarre chain of events began early Saturday, when a mob killed a Mozambican Red Cross volunteer, two government health workers and a policeman.. Five other Red Cross workers were seriously injured. Authorities said rumors they were spreading the disease were false.
The Red Cross said 33 workers fled the area, of whom 16 were missing, presumably still hiding in the bush. Equipment was destroyed and a home belonging to a worker was set on fire, the Red Cross said.
The dead and injured were treating cholera victims and helping with prevention and education in the area, which has been hit by the waterborne disease.
In a statement, the Red Cross called on politicians, development groups, teachers and others to help prevent rumors by educating Mozambicans about how cholera is spread and how it can be prevented.
“We hereby express our deepest regret for what happened, and present our most sincere condolences to the bereaved families, as well as our solidarity to all the volunteers deployed in Quinga, particularly those who sustained injuries, hoping that they will recover soon,” the Red Cross statement added.
“These violent events do not encourage us to pursue our humanitarian work of alleviating human suffering and improving the living conditions of the most vulnerable communities.”
Cholera is spread by drinking contaminated water. It is easily treated, but can cause severe diarrhea and fatal dehydration.
Mozambique is one of the world’s poorest countries and is still struggling to rebuild its health and sanitation system after a long civil war. Cholera is fairly common, especially during the heavy rains of this time of year.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Sudan: President Orders Halt to Overseas Aid Distribution
Khartoum, 16 March (AKI) — Sudan’s president Omar al-Bashir ordered on Monday international organisations to stop distributing humanitarian aid in the country within a year, saying Sudanese aid groups will take over this job.
“We have ordered the ministry of humanitarian affairs to completely Sudanise the voluntary work in Sudan within one year, and after that no international organisations will distribute relief to Sudanese citizens, said al-Bashir during a rally of Sudanese armed forces.
“They (the international organisations) can just leave their food aid at the airport and Sudanese NGOs (non-governmental organisations) can distribute the relief.”
He made the remarks as the joint United Nations-African Union (AU) peacekeeping mission to Darfur (UNAMID) welcomed the safe release on over the weekend of four aid workers who had been abducted at gunpoint on 11 March allegedly in protest over al-Bashir’s indictment by the International Criminal Court at the Hague.
The aid workers — three international and one Sudanese national — from the non-governmental organisation Doctors Without Borders (MSF)’s Belgian arm arrived by government helicopter at Sudan’s El-Fasher Airport in North Darfur.
The aid workers had been taken at gunpoint from their office in the town of Saraf Omra in North Darfur on 11 March. One other Sudanese staff member abducted at the same time had been freed earlier.
One of those released, Mauro d’Ascanio, an Italian doctor, said he was fine and that he was looking forward to speaking with his family. The other staff have been identified as Laura Archer, a Canadian nurse Raphaël Meunier, a French coordinator and Sharif Mohamadin, a Sudanese guard.
“We are very happy. This is a very good thing — we were really concerned about this,” said AU-UN Joint Special Representative Rodolphe Adada.
Mohammed Osman Kibir, the Wali, or governor, of North Darfur state, said he personally intervened by negotiating with the abductors over the telephone four times. He flew with a government team to pick up the four aid workers.
While the identities of the abductors have not been made clear, they did inform Kibir that their actions were in response to the decision earlier this month by the ICC to issue an arrest warrant for al-Bashir last week for alleged crimes committed in the region.
Immediately after the ICC announced al-Bashir’s indictment of , the government ordered the expulsion of 13 aid groups which assist nearly 5 million people in Darfur, and the UN has continued to press the Sudanese authorities to reverse the expulsions.
Al-Bashir, the first sitting head of state to be indicted by the court, faces five counts of crimes against humanity, including responsibility for murder, rape and torture, and two counts of war crimes.
An estimated 300,000 people have died, either through direct combat or because of disease, malnutrition or reduced life expectancy, over the past five years in Darfur, where rebels have been fighting government forces and allied Arab militiamen, known as the Janjaweed, since 2003.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Chavez Offers Russia Use of Base
Venezuela’s President, Hugo Chavez, says he has offered Moscow the use of an airfield off its Caribbean coast for Russian strategic long-range bombers.
But Mr Chavez denied there would be discussions on building any permanent base on the island of La Orchila.
The comments came a day after a senior Russian air force general said it was considering Venezuela’s offer of a “whole island with an aerodrome”.
Moscow has played down the general’s remarks, saying they were hypothetical.
Russia has been strengthening its ties in recent months with several Latin American countries including Venezuela..
The two countries held joint naval exercises in Venezuelan waters in November.
Speaking on Sunday evening on his weekly TV and radio programme, Alo Presidente, Mr Chavez insisted reports that he had offered the Russian military a permanent base on La Orchila were not true.
“I simply told [Russian] President [Dmitry] Medvedev that any time Russia’s strategic aircraft need to land in Venezuela to meet their strategic aims, Venezuela will be at their service,” he said.
“We did just that not too long ago, when their strategic long-range bombers came. There is nothing new in that,” he added.
The Tu-160 is capable of carrying 12 cruise missiles that can be fitted with nuclear warheads, and has a range of 12,300km (7,642 miles) without refuelling.
On Saturday, Maj-Gen Anatoly Zhikharev, the Russian air force’s chief of staff for long-range aviation, said Mr Chavez had offered “a whole island with an aerodrome, which we can use as a temporary base for strategic bombers”.
“If a relevant political decision is made, this is possible,” he told the Interfax news agency in Moscow.
Gen Zhikharev said he had visited La Orchila to examine its military airfield. The runway was being extended, he said, making it the right length for takeoff by Russia’s long-range bombers when they are heavily loaded with fuel.
Foreign bases were forbidden under Venezuelan law, “but the temporary deployment of a contingent, for example for carrying out patrols, which is what we do, is possible,” he added.
After the report was published, a Kremlin spokesman said Gen Zhikharev had merely been “speaking about technical possibilities”.
| — Hat tip: islam o’phobe | [Return to headlines] |
Mexico: On the Trail of the Traffickers
Illegal drugs are causing havoc across the world. Over four articles, we look at attempts to curb supply and cut demand, beginning in Mexico
IN RECENT months Mexicans have become inured to carefully choreographed spectacles of horror. Just before Christmas the severed heads of eight soldiers were found dumped in plastic bags near a shopping centre in Chilpancingo, the capital of the southern state of Guerrero. Last month another three were found in an icebox near the border city of Ciudad Juárez. Farther along the border near Tijuana police detained Santiago Meza, nicknamed El Pozolero (“the soupmaker”) who confessed to having dissolved the bodies of more than 300 people in acid over the past nine years on the orders of a local drug baron. Mr Meza, revealing a proper sense of machismo, added primly that he refused to accept the bodies of women or children.
“Organised crime is out of control,” Felipe Calderón declared on taking office as Mexico’s president in December 2006. He launched 45,000 army troops against drug-trafficking gangs. Since then, some 10,000 people have died in drug-related violence, 6,268 of them last year. Troops and police have fought pitched battles against gangsters armed with rocket-launchers, grenades, machineguns and armour-piercing sniper rifles, such as the Barrett 50. But perhaps their most effective weapon is corruption: in November Noe Ramírez, the prosecutor in charge of the organised-crime unit of the federal attorney-general’s office, was charged with taking bribes of $450,000 a month to pass information to the Sinaloa drug mob. Six other officials from the unit face similar charges…
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
UK Action Over Turks and Caicos
Self-government in the Turks and Caicos Islands, a UK dependency, is set to be suspended after ministers were accused of incompetence and likely corruption.
The Foreign Office is threatening to suspend large parts of the Turks’ constitution and hand power over to the governor of the West Indies territory.
This follows a report which pointed to the “high probability of systemic corruption” in its administration.
Chief minister Michael Misick has faced allegations of corruption.
Mr Misick is alleged to have built up a multi-million dollar fortune since coming to power in 2003.
He has denied selling crown land for personal gain.
In a written statement to MPs, Foreign Office minister Gillian Merron said a draft order would be put to parliament in the near future seeking a suspension of parts of the islands’ constitution.
This follows an interim report by a Commission of Inquiry — led by a retired British judge — into allegations of corruption against members of the Turks’ Cabinet and Assembly.
It found “information in abundance pointing to a high probability of systematic corruption or serious dishonesty”.
It also concluded there were “clear signs of political amorality and immaturity and of a general administrative incompetence”.
The BBC’s diplomatic correspondent Paul Adams said if MPs approved the draft order, it would suspend the authority of the government and legislature, the House of Assembly, with powers being transferred to Governor Gordon Wetherell.
Mr Wetherell succeeded Richard Tauwhare last year.
Mr Tauwahre instigated the inquiry but was criticised by the Foreign Affairs Select Committee for not acting sooner to tackle what it said last year was “a climate of fear” on the islands.
In her statement, Ms Merron said ministers had “formed the view” that significant action was required.
“This would be an act of constitutional significance in order to restore the principles of good governance,” she said.
The West Indies dependency, which has a population of about 30,000, is a leading offshore financial centre.
Thousands of foreign companies are registered in the islands.
Once a dependency of Jamaica, the islands become a crown colony when Jamaica gained its independence in 1962.
Residents of the islands have British citizenship.
| — Hat tip: Fausta | [Return to headlines] |
Finland: Poll: Rural Residents and Blue-Collar Workers Most Negative Toward Immigration
Voters largely unaware of political parties’ views on immigration
Residents of rural areas appear to have the most negative views of a possible increase in the number of immigrants in Finland. According to a poll commissioned by Helsingin Sanomat and conducted by Suomen Gallup, opponents of immigration also outnumber supporters among those in blue collar professions. Men also tend to take a more negative view of immigration than women do. The most positive attitudes toward immigration are among students, those aged under 25, high-ranking white collar employees, and residents of the Helsinki area. “They are more open, and interact more with foreigners in general”, says Juhani Pehkonen of Suomen Gallup.
In September 2007 a poll showed that 55 per cent of Finns were in favour of increased immigration. Now the figure has dropped to 45 per cent. In the same period, the proportion of those opposed to taking more immigrants rose from 39 to 44 per cent. The proportion of those who are uncertain has also grown. Examined from the point of view of political party identification, the most eager to take in more immigrants are supporters of the Green League, the Left Alliance, and the National Coalition Party. Supporters of the True Finns were the most negative.
Juhani Pehkonen attributes the more negative attitudes to sharpened public debate concerning immigration policy and foreigners. The sharpened tones have been primarily to the benefit of the True Finns, who made considerable gains in last year’s municipal elections. Another significant factor is the present economic uncertainty. “We are now living a time that is ripe for an increase in reticence”, Pehkonen says.
The poll also surveyed views on work permit consideration. Under current practice, foreigners from outside the EU, the Nordic Countries, and Switzerland do not get work permits if Finnish labour is available for the posts that they seek. The poll shows that 44 per cent would like to drop the practice and put all foreigners on the same starting line along with Finnish job applicants. The present practice is favoured by 49 per cent. Changes from two years ago in this matter are not as sharp as in questions concerning the number of immigrants.
The survey also revealed that Finns do not have a very clear idea on the views taken by Finland’s various political parties on the immigration issue. For instance, half of respondents could not say which parties have taken a “right direction” with respect to immigration issues. Standing out were the True Finns, whom one third of respondents felt were “too anti-foreigner”. In January, Helsingin Sanomat ascertained the attitudes of political parties toward immigration policy. It came out at that time that in many party policy programmes, the issue had been touched upon only briefly. Some had not dealt with it at all. None of the parties that had been long in government were satisfied with the result of integration policies.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Hundreds More Illegal Immigrants Land on Lampedusa
Palermo, 16 March (AKI) — The recent wave of illegal immigrants heading for Italy by boat continued on Monday when coastguard intercepted a boat with 257 illegal immigrants on board ten miles south of the Italian island of Lampedusa.
Many of the illegal immigrants were transferred to Porto Empedocle on the southern Sicilian coast. Meanwhile in Maltese waters, an Italian navy vessel intercepted a boat with 76 illegal immigrants on board headed for Malta’s port of Valletta.
On Sunday, coastguard rescued over 250 illegal immigrants who were transferred to Lampedusa’s expulsion centre, bringing the total number of immigrants held there to 607.
A fire there last month started by inmates protesting at the conditions inside the centre destroyed half of the accommodation wing.
Originally designed as a temporary reception and identification centre for illegal immigrants, the Lampedusa centre is designed to hold a maximum of 800 people.
Members of the European Parliament, the United Nations refugee agency and other humanitarian organisations have criticised overcrowding on Lampedusa since the Italian government decided on a policy of expelling all illegal immigrants directly from the centre.
Most of the illegal immigrants currently being held in Porto Empedocle will be transferred to other expulsion centres in the Sicilian towns of Caltanissetta and Trapani.
Hundreds of illegal immigrants have been arriving on Lampedusa each week aboard people smuggling boats that set sail from the North African coast, especially during the warmer months between March and October.
The Italian government is currently seeking repatriation agreements with the various North African countries.
But the majority of illegal migrants (63 percent) enter Italy by land or plane, according to Italy’s interior ministry.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Malta Blocks Italian Navy Ship
(ANSAmed) — VALLETTA, MARCH 16 — The Maltese government has not authorised the Italian navy ship ‘Minerva’ to enter the port of Valletta to offload the 76 migrants (including 13 women) to whom it came to the rescue as they drifted in a rubber dinghy 40 miles south of Lampedusa in Maltese waters. The ship’s commander invoked the laws which guarantee docking at the nearest secure port for sea-rescue operations, whilst also considering the overcrowding of the identification and deportation centre (CIE) in Lampedusa. The Italian ambassador has begun to work on the issue. At this time the ship is just off the Maltese coast, waiting for the diplomatic impasse to be resolved. This evening the Maltese parliament is expected to discuss the immigration emergency, following the visit last Friday of the EU Commissioner for Justice and Civil Liberty, Jacques Barrot.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Migrant Boats Rescued South of Lampedusa
(ANSAmed) — PALERMO, MARCH 16 — The Italian navy and coastguard carried out 2 rescue operations of damaged rubber dinghies carrying migrants in the Sicilian channel yesterday evening. The Italian naval ship, Minerva, rescued an adrift rubber dinghy carrying 76 immigrants, including 13 women, two of whom are pregnant. The migrants’ boat, which was in Maltese waters, 40 miles south of the Pelagie islands, had been reported to the Italian authorities by a Tunisian motor trawler. All the immigrants were transferred onto the Minerva and taken to the port of Valletta. During the night, a boat carrying 237 non-EU citizens, amongst whom 15 women, was intercepted 10 miles south-east of Lampedusa. 79 were taken to Porto Empedocle in coastguard and financial guard patrol boats. A total of 250 immigrants in 4 boats disembarked on the Pelagie islands yesterday. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Nigerian Human Traffickers Go on Trial in the Netherlands
A high-profile trial against eleven suspects of human trafficking between Nigeria and Europe got off to a false start this week.
On May 4, 2006 a Nigerian woman who goes by the name of Jenny arrives at Schiphol airport on a KLM-flight from Lagos. She is travelling with a Nigerian man who had guided her through the check-in and customs in Nigeria. At Schiphol, the man asks Jenny to wait while he gets something to eat. When he doesn’t return, Jenny panics.
That’s how she was found by a policeman who belongs to a unit specialised in human trafficking. Jenny ends up at the IND, the Dutch immigration and naturalisation service, where she is introduced to Wilma Hompe, an immigration lawyer.
It doesn’t take Hompe long to figure out that Jenny is a victim of human trafficking. She fits the profile: lured to Europe with vague promises on a paid-for trip, papers in her purse she knows nothing about and caarying a fake passport. Hompe has a pretty good idea of what is in store for Jenny.
Transit country
Jenny says she is 16. The Netherlands doesn’t allow unaccompanied minors to be sent back immediately, not even to a “safe” country like Nigeria. The Dutch authorities are required to first make sure that there is adequate reception at the other end. Meanwhile, Jenny will be placed in an open shelter for unaccompanied minor asylum seekers. There a human trafficker will intercept her on her way to school or church.
“At the time, the Netherlands were being flooded with girls like Jenny,” Hompe says. “The police weren’t doing anything about it because the girls were not yet victims of human trafficking upon arrival; they were only potential victims. They had not yet been forced into prostitution. Although it was clear that the Netherlands were being used as a transit country, the police were concentrating on deportations. They had targets to meet.”
The next day a Nigeria calls Hompe’s office from a German phone number. He says he is Jenny’s cousin. How he found out that Hompe is acting as Jenny’s lawyer, he doesn’t want to say. Jenny says she doesn’t have a cousin in Europe. It is clear to Hompe that this is a human trafficker trying to locate Jenny.
Hompe puts in a call to a special police task force on human trafficking that was set up in 2005. A police investigation begins.
Public outrage
When the different police services start comparing notes, a pattern quickly emerges. Over the past few months, dozens of Nigerian women like Jenny have arrived at Schiphol airport. They all tell the same rehearsed story of how their parents were killed during fighting between Muslims and Christians in Nigeria. Many of them have false identity papers. Most have since disappeared from the shelters — destination unknown.
It is nothing new that Nigerian human traffickers have been using the Netherlands as their gateway to Europe. From 1996 to 1999, some four-hundred Nigerian girls have disappeared from the government shelters. Some were later found in Amsterdam’s red-light district or in sex clubs elsewhere in the Netherlands. In 1999, Dutch parliamentarian Boris Dittrich gave voice to the growing public outrage over this situation when he said that “Dutch asylum policy was facilitating the prostitution business.”
A few Nigerian human traffickers were arrested in the 90s but the business at large was unaffected. The gangs no longer put the women to work in the Netherlands but in neighbouring Belgium and later in southern Europe. When circumstances changed, they quickly adapted destinations, supply routes and methods. Nigerian women may have disappeared from the Dutch brothels, but Jenny’s arrival proved that Schiphol, with its direct flights to Nigeria, was still very much a hub for human trafficking in 2006.
In November 2006, the police start investigating a Nigerian called Solomon. His phone is tapped. His BMW 3-series is fitted with a transmitting device. Gradually, the police start getting a better idea of the organisation behind the human trafficking. A travel agency in Nigeria is in charge of getting papers for the girls, the customers are Italian brothels. The Netherlands is the transit country where a top operative takes possession of the girls and sends them on to their next destination. He has about twenty helpers, including several in Belgium and France.
The Dutch authorities are faced with a choice: either arrest the Dutch branch of the organisation, with the risk that someone else will take its place in no time, or go higher up the food chain. “We realised that if we wanted to uproot this organisation, we would have to go all the way: from the country of origin to the country of destination,” says Warner Ten Kate of the national public prosecutor’s office.
In March 2007, the Dutch police liaise with the Italian police who start their own investigation. Nigeria is a tougher nut to crack. There are no official police contacts, no extradition treaties, no direct experience with the ill-reputed Nigerian police. A local partner is found nevertheless in Naptip, a Nigerian organisation dedicated to the fight against human trafficking that reports directly to the president.
Jenny goes missing
Meanwhile, Nigerian women keep arriving in the Netherlands. Police count at least 89 potential victims in 2006 and 50 in 2007. And despite warnings about what awaits them, the women keep disappearing from the shelters. Jenny also has gone missing.
Through the phone taps, police discovered how the traffickers were putting pressure on the women. They reminded them that they had signed a contract back in Nigeria, and how higher powers had sealed that contract through rituals. Did they really think they could escape punishment? And what about their families back in Nigeria? One women panicked when she received a curse from a traditional Nigerian priest via a text message to her phone.
The Dutch authorities are faced with a dilemma. Given the opportunity, the police would have liked to plant chips under the women’s skin to track their whereabouts, or better yet, to lock them all up. But locking up asylum seekers — minors who have not committed a crime — is going too far for NIDOS, the Dutch institution entrusted with the guardianship of minor asylum seekers. The women themselves blame the police for endangering the lives of their families by keeping them from fulfilling their obligations to the traffickers. In the shelters, the women start breaking windows and attacking the staff.
At the same time, the police investigation is starting to pay off. Police witness a meeting between Solomon and a British suspect in Sheffield. The take pictures of Solomon meeting an Italian suspect in Amsterdam. They find out that Solomon gets a money transfer from Nigeria every time a women disappears from a shelter.
On October 24, 2007, police in the Netherlands, Belgium, Great Britain, Spain, France, Germany and the US raid the houses of eighteen suspects. The main suspect in Nigeria initially gets away but is later trapped with the help of Naptip. On January 15, 2008, the Italian police arrest 51 suspects.
Voodoo rituals
But the Dutch police now face another problem. Most of the suspects are in custody — seven from Nigeria, three from other African countries and one from Surinam — but none of the Nigerian women has filed a complaint. The women don’t trust the police. They fear deportation but also the religious rituals.
The authorities seek the help of a former victim of human trafficking, a Nigerian woman who now has resident status in the Netherlands and is employed as an interpreter for the government. She tells the women about her own experiences. The police also turn to a Nigerian preacher, Moses Alagbe. He tries to calm the women’s fear of spiritual vengeance. He tells them that God is mightier than any number of voodoo rituals. In the end, ten women agree to file a complaint.
Almost seventeen months after the arrests, the case finally went to trial this week. The public prosecutor’s office is calling it an historical trial and the result of groundbreaking police work.
“For the first time we have been able to tackle the entire chain from beginning to end,” says Ten Kate. He says the level of collaboration between the different European police forces is unique. “This rarely happens. Europe is a high-speed train when it comes to economics but it is a horse and cart when it comes to the justice system. And we have demonstrated that it is possible to work with the Nigerians in the fight against human trafficking. France, Norway, Italy, have already followed our lead.”
But there is no reason to assume that the investigation has dealt more than a temporary blow to the human traffickers. The airports of Geneva and Budapest are reporting suspiciously high numbers of Nigerian women arriving there. And most of the women who came through the Netherlands are still missing.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Inconsistent Rulings Frustrate Somali Asylum Seekers
The fate of Somalis seeking asylum in Sweden depends a great deal which court hears their case.
While the migration court in Gothenburg has allowed every Somali from the capital city of Mogadishu stay in Sweden, the migration courts in Stockholm and Malmö reject most asylum applications.
“It’s a threat against the rule of law,” said attorney Ove Behrens to the Dagens Nyheter (DN) newspaper.
“We can’t have it so that those who have their cases heard in Gothenburg get to stay, while at the same a whole gang here in Stockholm gets deported.”
He represents several Somalis who, according to court decisions, are to be deported from Sweden.
For the Somalis, it’s a question of life and death, said Behrens.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do. It’s impossible for me to return to Mogadishu. My family has fled to Kenya,” Mogadishu-native Yasin Ahmed told DN.
Following reports of the deteriorating situation in Mogadishu, the migration court in Gothenburg has reversed around a dozen decisions by the Swedish Migration Board (Migrationsverket) in the last three months and instead granted the Somali asylum seekers Swedish residence permits.
During the same period, the migration court in Stockholm has decided that about 50 out of 60 people should be expelled from Sweden. And of the few cases heard by the court in Malmö, most have resulted in deportation
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UK: More Than Three-Quarters of Britons Want to See Jobless Immigrants Forced to Leave UK
The Government has failed to ‘get control’ of the issue of immigration, ministers admitted today. Phill Woolas, the Immigration Minister, said he was not surprised by findings of a poll which showed that nearly eight out of ten people believe all unemployed foreign migrants should be asked to leave the UK. Mr Woolas said the the British people would never be comfortable with immigration until they believe ministers have a firm grip on the nation’s borders. Mr Woolas said: ‘The poll figures are not a surprise. They are a concern, and in significant part they are because the public don’t believe that the government has got control.’ ‘The central goal of my immigration policy is to provide the assurance to the public that we know who’s here and who’s not here.’
Insisting the Government’s border controls were working, Mr Woolas added today that hundreds of refugees risking their lives in Calais to get into Britain are “locked out, not queuing to get in”.
He told GMTV the UK’s borders were tougher than that between the United States and Mexico: “We are, on the whole, stopping people getting through,” he said. “We’re counting people in and counting people out.”
The minister claimed opposition to foreign workers was ‘based on the belief that the immigrant has no legitimate right to be here,’ adding: ‘We will only get a country that is comfortable with immigration when we can show the Government has it under control.’ Mr Woolas’s admission highlights the Labour Government’s defensiveness over immigration — following years of increasingly tough rhetoric and repeated efforts to tighten controls. More than half of those surveyed in the poll for the Financial Times opposed giving other EU citizens the right to live and work in Britain — one of the cornerstone principles of the European Union. It questioned thousands of people across the UK, Europe and the United States regarding immigration and the economy. Among the British public it highlights widespread ill-feeling towards foreign workers at a time when unemployment is nearing the two million mark. In the UK a huge majority — 78 per cent — believed immigrants should be asked to leave the country if they do not have a job, with only 14 per cent disagreeing and eight per cent undecided. A similar number held the same view in Italy along with sizeable majorities in Spain, Germany and the U.S. and around half of those questioned in France. Just over half of British adults opposed the right of all EU citizens to settle and work in Britain. A narrow majority of Germans agreed, while there was slightly more support for the right of free movement and access to Labour markets among French, Italians and Spaniards. An estimated one million foreign workers flocked to the UK after eight eastern European states joined the union in 2004. Most other member states exercised a treaty right to bar eastern Europeans from their own job markets, but Britain allowed a free-for-all and the huge numbers arriving massively exceeded the Government’s expectations. Shadow Immigration Minister Damian Green said: ‘What this poll represents is the combination of that policy failure with the obvious pressures on the job market because of the recession.’ Phil Woolas suffered a further setback yesterday when watchdogs rejected his criticism of the Office for National Statistics over its release of immigrant population figures last month. The ONS brought forward the published of the startling figures — showing that one in nine UK residents was born overseas — because of officials judged that the material was topical and important to the immigration debate. But Phil Woolas, who faced embarrassment over the figures, unleashed a ferocious attack on the independent statisticians accusing them of straying into ‘the most inflamed debate in British politics’ and claiming the release was ‘at best naive, or, at worst, sinister.’ Today the UK Statistics Authority gave its strong backing to the ONS, concluding that the publication was ‘consistent’ with the rules and the timing was ‘influenced by the level of public interest in the topic.’ The ONS’s press release was ‘factually accurate’ and ‘neutral and impartial’ in tone, the watchdog added, whereas failing to publish the figures could have led to a misinformed debate based on flawed figures — although it said the ONS should have made a formal announcement explaining why it was bringing the publication forward, and included more supporting information.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Why Are the Gurkhas Still Waiting?
But to see her once again standing outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London to plead the case for the Gurkhas is baffling. Was this issue not resolved last year when the Gurkhas won a famous legal victory against the Government that would allow them to remain in the country for which they had fought? Apparently not.
The Home Office was told in September by Mr Justice Blake that the immigration rules it applied to the Gurkhas, allowing only those discharged from the Army after 1997 to stay, were unlawful, ambiguous and irrational. Yet nothing has happened since. The Home Office says that it needs to consult widely across Whitehall; and it is surely the case that the wheels of bureaucracy grind exceeding slow. But as Miss Lumley pointed out, many of the Gurkhas affected are growing old. Many do not have the welfare opportunities that are available to asylum seekers because they are in a sort of legal limbo. There is a suspicion that the Government is dragging this matter out in order to reverse the judgment or to save money; yet the Gurkhas are not asking for money, just for the right to stay in the country that owes them a debt of honour.
They have returned to the High Court to force the Home Office to apply the new policy forthwith. There is no obvious reason why it should not do so. It cannot take more than a Ministerial order to change the immigration rules to enact the court’s judgment. Currently, there are more than 1,300 applicants seeking the right to settle in this country and not one case had been reviewed despite a Home Office promise to the court to do so by the end of last year.
The Government, to its credit, changed the rules several years ago to let post-1997 Gurkhas settle in the UK on their retirement. As a result, over 6,000 former Gurkhas and family members have been granted settlement in the UK since 2004. Subsequently, however, the Government has managed to make a total botch of this policy by failing to understand the injustice done to the Gurkhas who left the Brigade before it was relocated to the UK from Hong Kong after the handover the China in 1997. It has tarnished this country’s reputation for fair dealing. It is clear that most British people want the Gurkhas to be allowed to stay if they wish to settle and Ministers must end these delays.
As Gladstone said: Justice delayed is justice denied. The Government must get on with it.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
A Few U.S. States Buck Stem Cell Trend With Bans
WASHINGTON (Reuters) — Oklahoma politician Mike Reynolds believes the federal government has gone too far this time.
Days after President Barack Obama lifted limits on federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research this month, the state House passed a bill introduced by the Republican representative that would make much of such work illegal in his state.
“I absolutely believe that if the federal government messes things up, states have a right to straighten it out,” Reynolds said in a telephone interview.
“I believe the federal government has infringed on several states’ rights. The right to protect lives is one.”
Other states are taking similar action to curb stem cell research. Their moves are reverse images of legislation in Maryland, New Jersey, California, New York and other states that passed their own laws encouraging and even funding stem cell research despite the restrictions under former President George W. Bush.
Reynolds said his bill will need some rewording before it passes through the Oklahoma state senate. “My motivation is to protect unborn children,” he said.
The executive order from Obama, a Democrat, erased limits set by his Republican predecessor Bush on human embryonic stem cell research. The limits meant researchers could only use federal funds to work with a few batches, or lines, of the powerful cells that existed as of August 9, 2001.
Obama has left it up to the National Institutes of Health to control what scientists can do with federal money and opponents of embryonic stem cell research fear the NIH could open up the possibilities.
While most embryonic stem cell lines are now made from unused embryos from fertility clinics, there are some fears the NIH may allow or even encourage the use of cloning technology to make embryos as a source of cells.
OUTLAWING HUMAN CLONING
The trenches in this battle do not fall firmly along traditional abortion rights dividing lines. Some staunch opponents of abortion rights support human embryonic stem cell research, which supporters say could lead to insights that could provide treatments for diseases from diabetes to AIDS.
The Georgia state senate passed a bill last week outlawing the use of cloning technology to make a human embryo, and the bill specifically notes that stem cells from other sources, including stem-like cells called iPS cells, are not affected.
But the bill could put pressure on a traditional alliance of social conservatives and the business community.
A coalition ranging from academic institutions to business interests and patient advocacy groups opposes the Georgia bill, said Charles Craig, president of Georgia Bio, which promotes the state’s interest in the life sciences industry.
“Georgia should not do anything more restrictive than the federal government when it comes to scientific research,” Craig said. He fears the measure, if it becomes law, would send a “negative signal” to the rest of the world and could “brand the state as being anti-science.”
The Mississippi House passed a bill last week forbidding the University of Mississippi to use state funds for research that would destroy a human embryo.
A bill filed last week in the Texas legislature would ban the use of state funds for stem cell research.
Arizona already has a law on the books that says university researchers cannot use state funds to manipulate embryonic stem cells in pursuit of treatment or potential cures.
Another Arizona law prohibits Arizona scientists from experimenting with any type of human embryo or fetus. Similarly, Louisiana prohibits research on embryos made in vitro fertilization or IVF clinics.
| — Hat tip: Tuan Jim | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Bishops Start Pro-Life Campaign Against Abortion
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 16 — Spanish bishops have presented a very critical publicity campaign against the government’s plan to reform the abortion law. According to the ads, in Spain animal species in danger of extinction enjoy greater protection than unborn children. The campaign was presented today by Episcopal Conference Secretary and spokesman José Antonio Martinez Camino, on the Right to Life Day the Catholic Church will celebrateon March 25. For the day of pro-life demonstrations, the bishops, according to Martinez Camino, are promoting the campaign with posters displayed in 37 Spanish cities. The posters show a baby next to an Iberian lynx cub, with the slogan ‘The lynx is protected while the baby asks, And me? Protect my life!’. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Geert Wilders and Totalitarian Islam
By Andrew G. Bostom
During a thoughtful, revealing interview with the Boston Globe’s Jeff Jacoby (published March 8, 2009), Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders clearly unnerved the mainstream conservative journalist with this frank characterization of Islam:
I have nothing against the people. I don’t hate Muslims. But Islam is a totalitarian ideology. It rules every aspect of life — economics, family law, whatever. It has religious symbols, it has a God, it has a book — but it’s not a religion. It can be compared with totalitarian ideologies like Communism or fascism. There is no country where Islam is dominant where you have a real democracy, a real separation between church and state. Islam is totally contrary to our values.
Wilders remained steadfast, dismissing Jacoby’s invocation of the hollow, if oft repeated trope “radical Islam is the problem, and moderate Islam is the solution.” This tired mantra—reiterated constantly for the past decade without a scintilla of supportive evidence—is defied by hard polling data from 2006/2007, and their most recent follow-up reported February 25, 2009. Overwhelming Muslim majorities i.e., better than two-thirds (see the weighted average calculated here) of a well-conducted survey of the world’s most significant, and populous Arab and non-Arab Muslim countries, want these hideous, immoderate outcomes: “strict application” of Shari’a, Islamic Law, and a global Caliphate.
Specifically, the World Public Opinion.org/ University of Maryland poll (released February 25, 2009) indicated the following about our erstwhile Muslim ally nations of Egypt and Pakistan: 81% of the Muslims of “moderate” Egypt, the largest Arab Muslim nation, desire a “strict” application of Shari’a, Islamic Law; 76% of the Pakistan’s Muslims—one of the most important, and sizable non-Arab Muslim populations—want this outcome. Furthermore, 70% of Egyptian Muslims and 69% of Pakistani Muslims desire the re-creation of a “…single Islamic state or Caliphate.” Earlier, I detailed the totalitarian impact of these fulfilled Islamic desires —based upon their doctrinal and historical application, across space and time.
The tenaciously held pieties of Mr. Jacoby and his ilk notwithstanding, Wilders’ keen, if blunt conceptions articulate contemporary realities irrefragably, while re-stating seminal insights on Islam observed by great scholars whose works antedate the present day morbid affliction of cultural relativism…
| — Hat tip: Andy Bostom | [Return to headlines] |
How to Stop the Drug Wars
Prohibition has failed; legalisation is the least bad solution
Illustration by Noma BarA HUNDRED years ago a group of foreign diplomats gathered in Shanghai for the first-ever international effort to ban trade in a narcotic drug. On February 26th 1909 they agreed to set up the International Opium Commission—just a few decades after Britain had fought a war with China to assert its right to peddle the stuff. Many other bans of mood-altering drugs have followed. In 1998 the UN General Assembly committed member countries to achieving a “drug-free world” and to “eliminating or significantly reducing” the production of opium, cocaine and cannabis by 2008.
That is the kind of promise politicians love to make. It assuages the sense of moral panic that has been the handmaiden of prohibition for a century. It is intended to reassure the parents of teenagers across the world. Yet it is a hugely irresponsible promise, because it cannot be fulfilled.
Next week ministers from around the world gather in Vienna to set international drug policy for the next decade. Like first-world-war generals, many will claim that all that is needed is more of the same. In fact the war on drugs has been a disaster, creating failed states in the developing world even as addiction has flourished in the rich world. By any sensible measure, this 100-year struggle has been illiberal, murderous and pointless. That is why The Economist continues to believe that the least bad policy is to legalise drugs.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
What is Marxism?
Marxists claim that Marxism is a science. It is not. It is a sort of pagan religious cult. It is a theology. It is a form of superstition.
Marxists claim that Karl Marx understood capitalism and economics. He did not. They also claim that the entire validity of Marx’s set of theories on all subjects rests ultimately on how valid Marxist economic thought is. Marxist economic thought was completely wrong.
Marx claimed that all products contain value that is directly proportional to the amount of labor embodied within them. He was wrong. All the rest of Marxism is based entirely on this mistaken and falsifiable premise.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Bring Back Metternich
Klemens Lothar Wenzel, Prince Von Metternich, became Foreign Minister for the Austrian Empire in 1809. For most of the next forty years he was the diplomatic genius of the European political scene, dominating Continental affairs for the first half of the 19th century the way Otto Von Bismarck dominated the second half.
Metternich’s crowning achievement was the Congress of Vienna in 1815, which redrew the map of Europe after the departure of Napoleon and created a stable system that lasted for more than thirty years, until the revolutions of 1848.
The map of Europe was much more finely divided in those days, and Metternich had to juggle an incredible complexity of states, monarchs, dukes, princes, and territorial associations. By all contemporary accounts, he handled such tasks with tact, finesse, and a calm urbanity which managed to persuade acrimonious neighbors to reach accommodation with one another. The territorial adjustments were immense — the Kingdom of the Netherlands was created, various new pieces of territory were annexed to Austria, and many other pieces of the European jigsaw were put into place.
It brings to mind Al Stewart’s song “League of Notions”:
I’m sitting in the wreck of Europe
With a map of Europe
And the lines and the borders are gone
We’ve got to do this jigsaw puzzle
It’s an awful muddle
But somehow we’ve got to go on
The difference between 1815 and 1919 was due to ideology (or the lack thereof). Metternich’s unabashed goal was to balance the interests of various European powers while advancing those of Austria. But in 1919 at Versailles the Allies were purportedly acting out of the highest altruistic motives: national self-determination and democracy were the order of the day, and war would be abolished forever by the League of Nations.
We all know how that turned out.
I bring up Prince Von Metternich because of a discussion in the comments on Dymphna’s post about the UN. Everyone involved agreed that the UN is corrupt sinkhole and an abject failure. But Henrik Ræder Clausen also had this to say:
We need a new [alternative to the UN], strictly dedicated to democracy, civil liberties and the upholding of division of state and religion.
And islam o’phobe responded with this:
– – – – – – – – –
It would only go the same way as the League of Nations and the United Nations. Competitionless, bureaucratic entities of this kind naturally degrade into corruption.
John McCain’s proposed “League of Democracies” or some other alternative would be no different. I think it would be best to do away the United Nations and replace it with nothing.
As appealing as Henrik’s idea is, I have to agree with Mr. O’Phobe.
After all, the UN was “dedicated to democracy, civil liberties and the upholding of division of state and religion”. It still is, if you believe the text of its charter. The same was true of the League of Notions.
Why would a new organization — “The International Alliance of Democracies”, or whatever we choose to call it — be any different?
Why do we imagine that we could succeed where our forebears failed so abysmally?
An uncomfortable truth is at work here: enormous high-minded transnational institutions don’t work, because they can’t work. They are created in an attempt to wish away human nature.
And human nature is a stubborn thing.
Human beings in large groups do not act according to idealistic concerns. Their actions are governed by the brokering of interests among the collective participants. This happens regardless of the altruistic ideals that ostensibly guide the actions of the principal players.
Any institution that pretends otherwise — that asserts that it functions solely out of high-minded purposes — will inevitably devolve to a combination of corruption and totalitarianism, since it will not overtly be able to broker the interests of the powerful groups involved.
The underlying dynamics remain unchanged, but the process of their resolution must of necessity remain secret. Powerful groups will still run international affairs, but they will have to conceal what they do in order to make the pretense of disinterested altruism.
It is a recipe for disaster, as has been amply demonstrated.
We have avoided a cataclysmic war since 1945, and many people attribute this success to the United Nations. But how do we know that’s true? We have no control group to compare it with. The UN has in fact encouraged continuous low-level conflicts among secondary and tertiary powers by insisting on blockading the natural course whereby states act to preserve their interests.
Its actions concerning the Middle East may well usher in a cataclysm to make World War Two pale in comparison. Yet a balance-of-power approach might have long since resolved the crisis, and with much less bloodshed than we will eventually face.
The actions of the League of Nations guaranteed that the Great War would be resumed, and helped make it even worse than it would have been otherwise.
The United Nations has delayed the reckoning of thousands of conflicts, great and small. However, the horrendous financial collapse that we are about to enter will allow these conflicts to sort themselves out at last, and if we are lucky only a few million people will die as a result.
The Metternich-style balance of power system was a much better idea.
Unfortunately for the denizens of the 21st century, the modus operandi of Metternich (or Bismarck) is no longer feasible. For good or ill, we are stuck with high-mindedness as the publicly avowed motivating principle for international action, at least until the coming collapse forces a new order on us.
Part of the problem lies with the United States, which is unable to manage international affairs from a “competing interests” standpoint, because the propositional nature of our system commands us to view the world through our own rose-tinted idealistic glasses.
But that can’t be the entire explanation, because the architects of the Treaty of Versailles and the League of Nations included the major Western European nations, and the United States never even signed on for the League. The botch job from 1919 to 1939 was mainly due to the European powers, and the “end of war” was a popular European notion.
Western Europe was every bit as susceptible as the USA to the siren song of international idealism.
So what was different in Metternich’s time? Why could he do what became impossible a century later?
For much of the 20th century, historians wrote Metternich off as cynical and opportunistic — as indeed he was.
But that wasn’t the entirety of his character. He represented the interests of his country and his Emperor, and he believed, quite rightly, that a stable configuration of European powers — which managed the interests of all according to the best possible compromise — was in the interests of Austria.
Bismarck made similar calculations for the German Empire. Both leaders represented their emperors in such a way as to advance their nations’ interests, and in doing so they furthered the cause of peace.
Funny about that.
The two giants of 19th century Europe sat atop a system of hereditary monarchies which allowed enough representative government to maintain public support. Regardless of any cynicism and opportunistic behavior, it was generally accepted that God ordered the world so that kings and princes ruled, subjects obeyed, and nations prospered. Deviation from this natural order was dangerous — as the all-too-recent examples of Robespierre and Napoleon amply attested.
But their world is now gone. God is dead, as far as international statecraft is concerned. The ambitions of politicians are now unchecked by anything higher than themselves.
They maintain the pretence of international law. They support every high-minded ideal. Yet corruption flourishes, oppression rages unchecked, and violence is only countered when it serves the secret interests of the great powers.
The millions of corpses piled up in Rwanda, Darfur, and Cambodia are a mute testament to the effectiveness of the international world order.
“By their fruits ye shall know them.”
By its fruits, the United Nations is a dreadful bane upon the peoples of the world.
We would be better off without it, and we need no replacement.
Is Freedom Subjective?
On March 14th, Ehsan Jami, a politician in the Netherlands, was in Denmark to accept the Danish Free Press award. What follows below his is speech at that event.
Before you watch it, here’s some background on Mr. Jami. He is a former Muslim, a naturalized Dutch citizen, and the co-founder of the Central Committee for Ex-Muslims.
Ehsan Jami was born in Iran, to an upper-class family, in 1985. His father was a doctor and politically active, which forced the family out of the country. They landed in the Netherlands when Mr. Jami was nine years old.
It wasn’t until after 9/11 that he began to read the holy books of Islam. His father was nominally Muslim and his mother was a Christian. As he began to question the tenets of Islam, he says the greatest gift his family gave him was the freedom to ask questions and to choose. He found Islam unacceptable; at some point he identified himself as an atheist.
By 2007, having gone public with his denunciation of Islam, he was aggressive in his founding of the Committee for ex-Muslims.
In late 2008, Mr. Jami made the infamous film “An Interview with Mohammed”, which you can see here.
Predictably, he was beaten up, threatened with death, and lives in hiding. He quit school. Because of the large immigrant student population, Ehsan Jami is not safe, as Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Geert Wilders are not safe.
Here is his speech on March 14th, at the Danish Free Press Society’s award ceremony:
Mr. Jami says many things you’ve heard before; perhaps sentiments you have expressed yourself. However, I trust you are not in hiding, or living in the presence of bodyguards because of saying these things.
I won’t go through the whole thing, but there were several points he made that struck me, coming as they do from someone who was born and raised in Mashhad, Iran. Next to Mecca, this is the holiest city of the Shi’ite Muslims. His has been a long path to Copenhagen.
Most of what I say will be paraphrases; I’m not fast at dictation so I took some short-cuts, some of which I had trouble deciphering afterwards. But I think I did get the gist of what Mr. Jami wanted to get across to his audience and to us.
– – – – – – – – –
These are the things he said which most stood out for me. They may not be what you find most memorable, but I’d like to hear from people about that: what stood out for you?
Before beginning his speech, he dedicated his award to his mother, expressing his gratitude to her for allowing him to decide his own religious path. After the government put him under security, it was she who came to visit him. You can hear how isolated he felt.
Mr., Jami does not regret the path he has taken. Even if he had known what was to happen, he would still do it again. For him, freedom is an empty word; it exists for people. Thus, he must act.
He thinks the current system in the Netherlands is “dysfunctional”. Paraphrasing, he says:
“They have freedom of speech in Parliament but if a journalist asks you what you said, telling him is against the law. How insane is that?”
Hamas uses “freedom” all the time. Mullahs use it. Ahmadinejad talks about it. But groups like the Free Press Society are fighting for freedom.
Mr. Jami then asks: But is freedom objective? Is it subjective?
They say every terrorist is a freedom fighter after all [laughter]
I don’t believe that, of course.
Freedom has no color or age.
Freedom is what reminds us that we are all born free men.
We are free men to decide what the course of our life will be, not the government.
We are free to decide if we will marry, how many children we will have, what religion we will believe in.
Gay or straight, no shame, no hiding from what we are.
In other words, freedom of religion is a freedom of expression.
Freedom of religious expression is under attack in Europe. In Holland, 60% of Muslims say they want to use violence against those who leave Islam. That’s 60,000 Muslims who want to use violence against ex-Muslims…
…
I don’t want to play with words.
I refuse to say that my fight is against radical Islam…there is no radical Islam. There is only Islam. No radical Muslims, only Muslims
You can’t change a book, especially a holy book, but you can change people.
I know six hundred people in my country who changed. And people in the world are changing their minds about what liberty and religion mean. The numbers are growing.
…
We are the enemy. Look in the mirror. It is you, me, us. We are sleeping while they are making plans. In order to stabilize the world we should strike preemptively.
A lot of people criticize Bush. But he liberated people. We thank him. [applause] For thirty-five years before him we heard “negotiate”. They made bombs. Enough is enough. As Europe, as NATO, declare war on Iran and liberate the people.
Iran will nuke Israel.
…
One thing is as clear to me as the blue sky: we cannot depend on the government.
…
Freedom of expression means toleration of a great deal of nonsense and bad taste. I once said Mohammed could be compared to Osama bin Laden. They considered it a great compliment. Here, it was wrong to say.
They abuse our laws and turn them against us. They use terrorism and threats.
It is not negotiable. If they don’t assimilate, they can leave. If they won’t leave, we will kick them out.
Does any of that sound familiar? How would his words go down in your country? Would he be harassed, sneered at, jailed and silenced? What college in your country would invite him to speak?
He’s right: we need to look in the mirror to find the problem. And then what?
Quo vadis?
Hat tip: Steen.
Miles Full of Promises of Home…
In America, South Boston and Savannah have the best Paddy’s Day celebrations. Thus, I looked long and hard for a good video of South Boston on Saint Patrick’s Day – maybe some good background views of places like Gate of Heaven parish (if it’s still there), or maybe some ceili dancing, just to get your feet tapping.
Wouldn’t you know, all I could find on You Tube was drunks, brawls, and out of tune singing – or, more likely, brawling drunks singing off key. They also had thirty-second videos of long lines of policeman in the parades.
In other words, the only thing on offer was reality (at least reality after about 1:00 p.m.), so I gave up on Southie. She survives to remind us that God gave the Irish whiskey to keep them from taking over the world. ‘Tis a crying shame he didn’t give it to the Arabs…or that He didn’t teach the Irish what He did the Jews: eat first, then drink.
Instead of a parade, here is Enya. This is my favorite song from her first album. She captured so exquisitely childhood’s great fear and sorrow..
And, for all our readers, my mother’s favorite blessing:
May all your roads be downhill,
May the sun be always at your back,
May God hold you in the palm of His hand,
And may you be in Heaven three days before the devil knows you’re dead.
[post ends here]
Gates of Vienna News Feed 3/16/2009
The immediate crisis in Pakistan has been settled by the reappointment of the judge who had been suspended from his post during Musharraf’s tenure. An immediate popular uprising has thus been avoided, but the current government — which enjoys little legitimacy — has been weakened even further.
In other news, the EU is now threatening to boycott the Durban 2 conference because of the possibility that will turn into a festival of anti-Semitism. If the EU objects to it for those reasons, how bad must it be?
Thanks to Andy Bostom, C. Cantoni, CSP, Gaia, Holger Danske, Insubria, JD, TB, Vlad Tepes, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
– – – – – – – – –
AIG Ships Billions in Bailout Abroad
Billions of American taxpayer dollars used to bailout insurance giant AIG are flowing to some of the largest foreign banks in the world, according to new documents released by beleaguered company Sunday.
[…]
In all, AIG disclosed payments of $105.3 billion between September and December 2008. And some of the biggest recipients were European banks. Societe Generale, based in France, was the top foreign recipient at $11.9 billion, Deutsche Bank of Germany got $11.8 billion and Barclays, based in England, was paid $8.5 billion.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Britons Suffer 17% Plunge in Wealth
Households witness biggest drop in the value of their assets for 40 years after house price and stock market collapses
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Getty Trust Announces Steep Budget Cut
A loss of $1.5 billion in investments has forced the J. Paul Getty Trust arts institution to cut its operating budget by about 25 percent, officials said.
The Los Angeles Times quoted Getty President James Wood as saying the financial stability of the institution could “fall off a huge cliff” if it postponed the budget cuts while the U.S. economy continued to falter. The cuts in the coming fiscal year, which starts July 1, could mean some staff layoffs, fewer temporary exhibitions and a hold on the acquisition of additional works for several of the Getty museums’ collections.
[…]
New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art last week announced plans to lay off 10 percent of its workforce, partly because of an endowment loss of nearly 28 percent, the newspaper said.
| [Return to headlines] |
IMF Poised to Print Billions of Dollars in ‘Global Quantitative Easing’
[Comments from JD: Sounds like Zimbabwe’s economic plan.]
The International Monetary Fund is poised to embark on what analysts have described as “global quantitative easing” by printing billions of dollars worth of a global “super-currency” in an unprecedented new effort to address the economic crisis.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Push to Audit Federal Reserve Gains Steam
28 lawmakers join call to examine nation’s money controllers
A bill calling for the comptroller general of the United States to audit the private Federal Reserve is gaining momentum in Washington, D.C., as more and more representatives add their names to its bipartisan support.
As WND reported, U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, introduced last month H.R. 1207, the Federal Reserve Transparency Act of 2009, a bill requiring that an audit of both the Fed’s Board of Governors and the Federal Reserve Banks be completed and reported to Congress before the end of 2010.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Tourism: Crisis Worsens in Italy, Numbers Down by 10%
(ANSAmed) — ROME, MARCH 10 — “Tourism figures for February unfortunately show the signs of a worsening crisis, which weighs heavily on the companies in the sector”, said Bernabò Bocca, president of Federalberghi and Confturismo-Confcommercio commenting the results of the tourism survey the association carries out each month to monitor developments in the current economic situation. The survey on the month February was carried out from March 2 to 6, interviewing representatives of 1,226 accommodation facilities, distributed across Italy. The sample is representative for the classification in stars of the sector. After the 7% drop in numbers in January, in February a 10% drop is recorded despite the Carnival and other holidays. The number of hotel rooms “sold” in February fell by 11% (the same result as in January). The number of employees in accommodation facilities decreased by 6% in February (from -4,5% in January) with almost -5% for full-time workers (against -3% in January) and -9,5% for part-time workers (the same as in January). “We also see from ISTAT figures” added Bernabò Bocca “that hotel prices even came down in January with inflation at +1,6%, which adds to the loss of turnover of companies who are already suffering from a decline of the number of tourists. At this point companies and unions should start working together to develop the necessary instruments to stop the growing loss of jobs”.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey in Top 3 Countries to Lose Its Billionaires, Forbes
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 13 — Turkey is among the top three countries to lose the highest number of billionaires as the financial crisis shrinks total riches globally, Forbes magazine reported on Wednesday in its annual tally of the planet’s richest people. Bill Gates topped the list. The number of billionaires globally fell to 793 from 1,125 a year ago, plummeting to $2.4 trillion from $4.4 trillion Forbes said, adding that the number of billionaires in Turkey in 2008 declined to 13 from 35 the previous, the highest fall after Russia and India. Turkey experienced the highest decline in the number of billionaires in the Middle East region, president and the editor-in-chief of the magazine, Steve Forbes said. Depreciation of the Turkish lira against the U.S. dollar by some 30% was the main reason for this result, he added. The Turkish economy, which increasingly feels the impact of the global financial crisis, recorded only 0.5% growth in the third quarter of 2008, the lowest since Turkey emerged from a financial crisis in 2001. The growth rate is expected to decline in 2009, while an economic contraction is forecasted. Husnu Ozyegin, owner of FIBA Holding, became Turkey’s richest person with $2.9 billion, while Mehmet Emin Karamehmet, the owner of Cukurova Holding, which has a stake in Turkey’s leading GSM operator, Turkcell, ranked second with $2.8 billion. Ozyegin was placed 221st in the global list, while Karamehmet ranked in 224th place. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Barack Obama to Meet Sinn Fein Leaders
President Barack Obama is expected to ask Sinn Fein leader Martin McGuinness what lesson the Northern Ireland conflict holds for Middle East and Iraq.
The White House meeting is part of a series of events marking St Patrick’s Day and comes amid continued controversy over Sinn Fein’s reaction to the recent murder of two British soldiers and a police officer by extreme republican groups.
Martin McGuinness, first deputy minister, has been criticised for merely claiming that the deaths “betrayed the political desires” of the Irish people.
Gerry Adams, the president of Sinn Fein, has called the killings “wrong” but initially blamed army tactics for provoking the IRA splinter organizations that carried out the attacks.
Speaking yesterday in Washington, he interpreted the deaths in terms of the peace process. “Sinn Fein itself is as a much a target of the perpetrators as those that they killed,” Mr Adams said in a speech at the prestigious national press club. He called the attacks “a full frontal assault on the peace process”.
Over the weekend, Mr McGuiness signalled that he will take an upbeat message to the White House and will use the opportunity to reassure Mr Obama and his advisers that the devolved administration is firmly united in the wake of the murders.
“The fact is that we have a very successful peace process. We have a unified position in terms of our political parties,” Mr McGuiness said.
According to Northern Ireland officials, the White House wants Peter Robinson, the first minister, and Martin McGuinness, the deputy first minister, who has advised Iraqi politicians, to illuminate its approach to foreign policy challenges that look as intractable as Northern Ireland once did.
| [Return to headlines] |
Ex-Pa. Senator Convicted of 137 Corruption Counts
Vincent Fumo, once one of the most powerful figures in Pennsylvania politics, was convicted Monday of more than 130 counts of corruption for schemes that defrauded the state Senate and others of more than $3.5 million and allowed him to live a lavish lifestyle.
The 65-year-old former state senator was found guilty of all 137 counts against him, which also included obstruction of justice for destroying e-mail evidence. The jury deliberated about the Philadelphia Democrat’s fate for about six days after a five-month trial.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Frank Gaffney: Shariah’s Brotherhood
On Friday, President Obama reiterated for the umpteenth time his determination to develop a “new relationship” with the Muslim world. On this occasion, the audience were the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and the Philippines. Unfortunately, it increasingly appears that, in so doing, he will be embracing the agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood — an organization dedicated to promoting the theo-political-legal program authoritative Islam calls Shariah and that has the self-described mission of “destroying Western civilization from within.”
As part of Mr. Obama’s “Respect Islam” campaign, he will travel to Turkey in early April. While there, he will not only pay tribute to an Islamist government that has systematically wrested every institution from the secular tradition of Ataturk and put the country squarely on the path to Islamification. He will also participate in something called the “Alliance of Civilizations.”
The Alliance is a UN-sponsored affair that reflects — as, increasingly do most things the United Nations is involved in — the views of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). The OIC is made up of 57 Muslim-majority nations. Thanks to support from Saudi Arabia and its proxies, the Muslim Brotherhood has become a driving force within the Conference and their agendas largely coincide.
| — Hat tip: CSP | [Return to headlines] |
He’s Not ‘Doctor’ Obama
[Comments from JD: a laundry list of UK health care examples in article.]
Oh, good! After our new president saves the world economy and bails out every begging industry and state, he plans to revamp our medical care system — despite the fact, that for all its faults, it’s the best in the world on every level — doctors, nurses, hospitals and research.
My first night in London, two weeks ago, I flicked on the TV to see the British take on the events of the day, to see if the world had come to an end, and to see how their news format played out.
[…]
I read the local newspapers and saw it didn’t play out that way with Britain’s National Health Service, or NHS — the medical system American liberals want us to emulate.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Lose Your Property for Growing Food?
Big Brother legislation could mean prosecution, fines up to $1 million
House Resolution 875, or the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009, was introduced by Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., in February. DeLauro’s husband, Stanley Greenburg, works for Monsanto — the world’s leading producer of herbicides and genetically engineered seed.
DeLauro’s act has 39 co-sponsors and was referred to the House Agriculture Committee on Feb. 4. It calls for the creation of a Food Safety Administration to allow the government to regulate food production at all levels — and even mandates property seizure, fines of up to $1 million per offense and criminal prosecution for producers, manufacturers and distributors who fail to comply with regulations.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama is “Carter Redux”
We need to recall that, in terms of the votes cast in the 2008 election, President Obama did not win by a great majority. It was not a landslide. He had no real “mandate” to restructure the American government or its economy. He offered only vague promises of “change” and “hope”. Now, barely three months into his administration, as a recent Wall Street Journal article headlined, “Obama’s Poll Numbers Are Falling to Earth.”
The reasons are too obvious. He is a liar. He is a Socialist. He would bankrupt the economy and impose huge deficits unto the second or third generation. He is the political return of former President Jimmy Carter, a loony liberal desperate to embrace all the regimes that hate America and wish us dead.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Orchard Park Man Pleads Not Guilty in Wife’s Beheading
Muzzammil Hassan is charged with one count of second-degree murder for the Feb. 12 death of his wife, Aasiya, whose body was found beheaded at the offices of Bridges TV in the Buffalo suburb of Orchard Park.
Hassan, 44, founded the Muslim-American television channel in 2004 saying he hoped to balance negative portrayals of Muslims in the post 9-11 world.
According to Orchard Park police the couple was in the process of divorcing before Aasiya Hassan was stabbed multiple times and decapitated.
After the slaying the President of the National Organization for Women’s New York chapter condemned the death as an honor killing — a characterization local victim advocacy groups oppose.
Hours after Mr. Hassan appeared in court a Quranic Recitation was held for his wife at the Islamic Center in Amherst.
“In the Western sense you could call it a memorial service,” explained Khalid Qazi, President of the Muslim Public Affairs Council of Western New York.
“People will come in, both men and women, and they will read from the Koran and send blessings to Aasiya, the deceased,” Khalid said.
Khalid also told 2 On Your Side the local Muslim Community remains “horrified, and has no satisfaction as to why such a horrible event would take place and for what reason this horrible event could take place”.
Also attending the gathering was Susan Volk Sizemore, Executive Director of the Erie County Council on the Status of Women.
“When the unfortunate domestic violence death of Aasiya took place I was asked to get more involved. We have been working very closely with the (Islamic) community and its leaders to try and help them develop specific programs for their women on domestic violence issues and connect them with the different resources in Erie County,” Sizemore said.
Sizemore also told WGRZ-TV that, “Buffalo’s a little behind the times. In other large cities the Muslim community has very developed domestic violence programs.”
Meantime, Islamic leaders like Khalid wonder if some of the inroads made toward inter-cultural understanding post 9-11 were set back by Mrs. Hassan’s gruesome slaying.
“We feel lucky to be part of the Western New York community because it has always made us feel welcome and continues to do so. But an event like this puts you behind so much, especially when it is construed (as an honor killing) by the media and those who don’t know Islam and try to be the experts on such issues.”
An interfaith memorial service for Aasyia Hassan is scheduled for this coming Sunday at the Orchard Park Presbyterian Church, 4369 South Buffalo Street, Orchard Park.
The service which begins at 6pm is open to one and all.
| — Hat tip: Holger Danske | [Return to headlines] |
The Greens Hate Energy, America, and You!
I doubt that most Americans have a clue what the leading Green organizations like Friends of the Earth and the Sierra Club have as their agenda for 2009. They have already made it known their members, so I will share it with you.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Thousands of Tri-State Residents Gathered Sunday on Fountain Square in Downtown Cincinnati to Voice Their Opposition to Government Spending Bills Recently Signed by President Barack Obama.
The group called itself the Cincinnati Tea Party, modeled after the Boston Tea Party of 1773.
Many of the demonstrators carried signs with slogans that said “Honk if I’m paying your mortgage” or “Stop spending my allowance.” Some even wore tea bags on their hats to make their point.
Cincinnati police estimated the crowd at 4,000 people. Many who spoke with News 5 Sunday afternoon said they’re angry, including Congresswoman Jean Schmidt.
Protesters argued that the government shouldn’t be spending money it doesn’t have and they fear taxes and deflation will follow…
[More protests to come. See URL]
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Unity ‘09: Leftist Dem Groups Quietly Align
A broad coalition of left-leaning groups is quietly closing ranks into a new coalition, “Unity ‘09,” aimed at helping President Barack Obama push his agenda through Congress. Conceived at a New York meeting before the November election, two Democrats familiar with the planning said, Unity ‘09 will draw together money and grassroots organizations to pressure lawmakers in their home states to back White House legislation and other progressive causes. The online-based MoveOn.org is a central player in the nascent organization, but other groups involved in planning Unity ‘09 span a broad spectrum of interests, from the American Civil Liberties Union to the National Council of La Raza to Planned Parenthood, as well as labor unions and environmental groups.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Will Murdoch Publish Book by Anti-American, Anti-Semitic Terrorist?
Ironically, the book, Underground: My Life With SDS and the Weathermen, is by Mark Rudd, who is himself Jewish. But as former Congressional investigator Herbert Romerstein points out in his report, “What Was the Weather Underground?,” the American Jewish community was a particular target of the Weather Underground when Rudd was a top official of the terrorist organization and its predecessor, the SDS.
He notes that one communiqué from the Weather Underground group in California that called itself the New World Liberation Front threatened, “These Zionist ruling class pigs will not butcher poor people fighting for a just life without suffering drastic repercussions. The Jewish-American ruling class cannot protect themselves well enough for a sufficient amount of time. They should consider this carefully! We will show the Jewish-American ruling class how extremely vulnerable they are, here in the belly of the beast. Their lives will be in grave jeopardy if mad-dog Rabin imposes this massacre on the Palestinian people… We call on all comrades to move directly against all Jewish-American ruling class bloodsuckers if Rabin moves to massacre freedom fighters! These ruling class dogs are influential both here and in Israel and are extremely vulnerable!”
The Weather Underground was still writing in 1982, “Zionism is White Supremacy. Zionism is an integral part of white supremacist movement in the U.S. It is rooted in the defense of white privilege over colonized people.”
Romerstein, who investigated and exposed extremists in organizations like the Ku Klux Klan and Rudd’s SDS, notes evidence that “Some Weather Underground activists were born into Jewish families, but they were as anti-Semitic as their gentile born colleagues.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Montreal Brutality Riot Nets 221 Arrests
The Canadian city of Montreal’s 13th annual march against police brutality resulted in 221 arrests and 189 others being ticketed, police said Monday.
Initially, some 400 people gathered near a west-end subway station to start the march but officers quickly ruled it illegal as some of the protesters were carrying things that could be used as weapons, The Gazette newspaper said.
The situation deteriorated and running battles with riot police broke out. Tear gas canisters and rubber bullets were deployed as protesters smashed store windows and damaged police vehicles, the report said.
Monday morning, the force said at least $200,000 damage was done by the crowd.
Two officers also received minor injuries, Constable Laurent Gingras said.
Of those arrested, 32 of them were for criminal charges including assault, mischief, theft and possession of a weapon with dangerous intent.
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Ottawa Man Gets 10-Plus Years on Terror Charges
OTTAWA — The first Canadian charged under the new Criminal Code provisions of the Anti-terrorism Act was sentenced Thursday to an additional 10 1/2 years in prison for his role in helping a group of Islamic extremists plot to bomb London nightclubs and other targets in 2004.
In an Ottawa courtroom, Ontario Superior Court Justice Douglas Rutherford sentenced Mohammed Momin Khawaja, 29, to another decade and a half behind bars, spread over convictions on seven charges — on top of the five years he has already spent in jail awaiting trial and sentencing. Five of the convictions were charges of participating in, contributing, financing, and facilitating terror, while two other convictions pertained to Khawaja’s developing and possessing an explosive device — the so-called Hi-Fi Digimonster.
“He said he wanted to come home. I was hoping we could bring him home,” his mother Azra, who visited Khawaja behind bars earlier this week, told Canwest News Service on Thursday.
She and her husband, Mahboob, had hoped their son would be sentenced to time served for spending four years before conviction.
Khawaja told his parents he wanted them to pick up some honey, good meat, and the final episode of the Star Wars saga — just some of things he hasn’t had in jail, where he’s been a model inmate known for staying out of trouble. He spent his days working out to MuchMusic videos and praying on his mats. (There’s a painted arrow on the floor of his cell pointing to Mecca.)
“There’s a lot of new movies he hasn’t seen,” she said. “We still pray and hope he gets out,” said his mother, who hopes her son will appeal the conviction.
Khawaja’s lawyer, Lawrence Greenspon, said he was disappointed with the ruling, and will be considering both a conviction and a sentencing appeal over the coming days.
“It’s a long ways from what the Crown attorney was seeking, thankfully, but I still think the sentence is excessive,” he told reporters.
| — Hat tip: Vlad Tepes | [Return to headlines] |
Crime: Police From 16 Countries Tracking Pink Panther Gang
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, MARCH 11 — Investigators from Serbia, Italy, Montenegro, France, Spain and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are to take part in a two-day long meeting of 16 police forces organised by INTERPOL to coordinate the fight against the Pink Panthers, an international band of jewel thieves whose members are mainly from countries of the former Yugoslavia. This will be the third meeting of this kind since July 2007 and INTERPOL’s creation of an ad hoc group within the Monaco-based organisation. Monaco, France, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Japan, the Netherlands, Great Britain, and the UAE are among the countries worst hit by the 200-strong gang, which includes both men and women from Kosovo, Serbia, and Montenegro — many of whom fought in the Balkans conflict. It is thought that the group has amassed booty worth over 100 million euros through armed robberies, the most recent of which took place on September 4 when they cleaned out the jewellers at the Hotel Pagoda in Tenerife (Canary Islands), making off with over 600,000 euros of precious jewels. Two members of the gang were arrested in October in Monaco where they were doing reconnaissance for a fresh robbery. One of these two, Dusko Poznan, was wanted for his participation in robberies in Switzerland and Dubai. Milan Ljepoja, one of the central figures in the gang, was arrested in 2008 on the border between France and Switzerland. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Denmark: City’s Jews, Muslims Unite Against Racism
Islamic and Jewish organisations are working together to fight racism through a common campaign
Using the slogan ‘Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia — Not in Our City!’, the Jewish Community in Denmark and the United Council of Muslims (MFR) have created an unlikely alliance with the hope of learning more about each others’ concerns.
As part of the campaign to mark the United Nations’ International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination posters bearing the slogan will be put up across the city, and representatives of both organisations will meet with racism and religious experts to further dialogue between the groups.
But Finn Schwarz of the Jewish Community in Denmark emphasised that the campaign is not about Jewish-Muslim relations.
‘It’s a collaboration on racism and deals with anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. For the Muslims the campaign is aimed at Danish society, while Jews want to address both the general prejudices and pre-conceptions in society as well as Muslims’ anti-Semitism,’ he told The Copenhagen Post.
Despite the willingness to work together, the organisations behind the drive admit there are extreme parties on both sides that want to disrupt the alliance.
‘There will always be marginalised people who have another viewpoint on the matter,’ Zubair Butt Hussein, spokesman for MFR, said. ‘But it’s not a viewpoint we share’.
Hussein’s positive outlook is not shared by the Danish People’s Party’s Finn Rudaizky, however, a Jewish member of the City Council. He indicated he felt the collaboration represented a fantasy world and was detrimental to the Jewish community.
But Schwarz said that stance — much like that of the many emails he has received — misses the point of the campaign.
‘It’s actually the media that has focused on the Jewish-Muslim conflict, and a research seminar has just concluded that fact,’ he said. ‘But that’s not what this project is about.’
Schwarz admitted that the campaign itself will probably not directly make any difference in people’s attitudes about Muslims and Jews. But he felt it may lead to discussions and increase awareness, which will ultimately help the parties’ cause.
He added that other on-going projects involving Jewish Community in Denmark and MFR were of more importance.
‘We have several different school outreach projects, for example. The most important thing is for people to see Jews and Muslims for themselves and to show them that things aren’t necessarily what they thought they were.’
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Energy: Sicilian Environmental Energy Plan Approved
(ANSAmed) — PALERMO, FEBRUARY 27 — Sicily’s regional government has commented in a note on the approval of the island’s environmental energy plan (known as ‘Pears’), saying that from now on “each Sicilian should be able to produce his own energy”. The note continues to say that the plan is: “inspired by the internet model, in which each business, each local body, and each family will be able to present a request for funds for energy production on the island, beginning with renewable sources of energy. The capacity of old and new structures to become power plants with integrated solar and wind energy technology, the stockpiling of energy as hydrogen and its use as clean coal will be optimised. It will be possible to exchange locally produced energy through controlled networks of intelligent electronic systems.” The Sicilian region’s environmental energy plan, which will be presented on March 13 in Palermo by the island’s president, Raffaele Lombardo, and economist Jeremy Rifkin — who has been called the inspiration behind the project — “is in line with energy and climate directives from the European Parliament. Sicily will develop all four of the so-called pillars of the third industrial revolution in parallel: renewable energy, energy-positive buildings, hydrogen and ‘smart grids’ which allow the progressive de-carbonisation of Sicilian industry”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
EU Threatens to Boycott U.N. Anti-Racism Conference
BRUSSELS (Reuters) — The EU threatened on Monday to withdraw from a U.N. conference on racism next month unless its final declaration is changed, joining a number of countries concerned the meeting could become an anti-Semitic forum.
Israel and Canada have already withdrawn from the April 20-24 World Conference Against Racism in Geneva amid fears Arab nations will use it against Israel. The United States and Australia have said they are considering doing the same.
“The main voices were very skeptical about the direction of the papers prepared there,” Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg said after EU foreign ministers discussed the Geneva meeting on Monday.
“Probably we will send now from the EU a suggestion of ours and if the conference papers are in line with that, we will stay, otherwise there is a strong call to withdraw,” said Schwarzenberg, who chaired the talks.
“Some of the wording (in the conference’s draft documents) is considered to be anti-Semitic,” one EU diplomat said.
The bloc was also concerned about the mention of defamation against religion, he said. “The EU thinks this has nothing to do with human rights,” the diplomat told Reuters.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said he was concerned the conference “might be abused for one sided statements on the Middle East conflict.”
“I plead that we would cancel our participation unless there is in the next few days a change in the preparation,” he told reporters in Brussels.
The United States has also said it will not attend the conference unless the wording of the final declaration is altered radically. Israel is calling for a boycott of the event…
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Captive Afghan Freed From Kebab House
Rome, 10 March (AKI) — Police have freed a 30-year-old Afghan man allegedly being held hostage by two Turks in a kebab house in Rome’s central Trastevere district (photo). The man was dehydrated and weak, police said, quoted by media on Tuesday.
Four unnamed individuals who worked at the kebab house and a Romanian woman are currently being questioned by police over the Afghan’s suspected abduction in Germany and transfer to Italy.
Police said they also seized several knives and a suitcase stuffed with cash from the kebab house, as well as “other items of interest to the investigation.”
Local shopkeepers said the kebab house staff seemed respectable and said they had never noticed any suspicious comings and goings, cries or arguments.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: University, Students March Against Bologna Plan
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 12 — Several thousands of university students took part in demonstrations in a number of Spanish cities to protest against the Bologna Plan to homogenise higher education in the European Union. With the slogan: ‘For a non market-driven public university, real public debate’, students gathered together by their unions demonstrated in Barcelona and Madrid, where they assembled outside the Education ministry headquarters. The protest coincides with an information campaign by the government on the advantages of the European initiative, which aims to homogenise qualifications and university teaching throughout Europe by the 2010-2011 academic year. The general coordinator of the left-wing party Isquierda Unida, Cayo Lara, took part in the march in Madrid, to express his support for the protest; he has proposed an open referendum, with a public debate in Spain’s universities on the consequences of the Bologna Plan if it is implemented. Around 6,000 students took part in the march in Barcelona, according to sources from the Coordinating committee of the students’ union quoted by the Efe agency. The marchers reached the campus of the Pompeu Fabra University, where around two thousand students have occupied the building in order to hold a debate this weekend on the future of the university. The protests have received unexpected support from the teaching staff. Hundreds of professors, lecturers and researchers from 24 public universities, including philosopher and writer Fernando Savater, fully supports “the motives” for the anti-Bologna demonstration. “The Spanish public” said the website of the Complutense university in Madrid’s Faculty of Philosophy, “should know that far from being anti-establishment Neanderthals or misinformed teenagers, the anti-Bologna students are currently the only members of the university community with the clear-sightedness, the sense of responsibility, the courage and the generosity to unbendingly defend the very concept and conditions of existence of an authentic higher education system”. (ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Thousands of Girls Mutilated in Britain
The NHS is offering to reverse female circumcision amid concerns that there are 500 victims a year with no prosecutions
The NHS is to advertise free operations to reverse female circumcisions, with experts warning that each year more than 500 British girls have their genitals mutilated.
Despite having been outlawed in 1985, female circumcision is still practised in British African communities, in some cases on girls as young as 5. Police have been unable to bring a single prosecution even though they suspect that community elders are being flown from the Horn of Africa to carry out the procedures.
The advertisement will appear from next month on a Somali satellite TV station much viewed in Britain. It features Juliet Albert, a midwife who does the reverse operations, and promises, in English and Somali, confidentiality for victims of female genital mutilation.
The advertisement was expected to help to undermine demand for girls to be circumcised, and to popularise the reversal procedure, Ms Albert said. Thousands of such operations have been carried out at specialist clinics and hospitals around Britain and demand is growing slowly
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UK: Family of X Factor Contestant Who Died After His Cancer Was Missed Ready to Sue Doctors
The family of an X Factor contestant who died after doctors failed to detect a 4.4lb tumour in his chest are planning legal action against a doctor and a hospital trust after it emerged he could have been saved.
Christopher Chaffey, 19, who auditioned for the Leeds 2006 trials for The X-Factor, was told to ‘grow up and stop worrying’ by a doctor after he contacted his GP 12 times fearing for his life, an inquest heard.
Hull Coroner’s Court heard that doctors told Christopher he was suffering from anxiety rather than picking up the developing cancer.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Heart Attack Mother Died After Yobs Threw Fireworks at Head of Paramedic Trying to Save Her
A paramedic was trapped in his ambulance by youths throwing fireworks at him while the woman he was called out to save lay dying, it was revealed today.
Heart attack victim Winifred Jones, 57, was deprived of medical treatment for vital minutes after the gang set off fireworks and hurled them at the paramedic, forcing him to take cover in his vehicle.
He was forced to wait for back-up from police, but finally risked his own safety and made a dash for the house where the woman lay.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: IRA Targets Princes
SECURITY surrounding Princes William and Harry has been stepped up over fears that renegade IRA terrorists are preparing to carry out an assassination attempt.
Close protection officers guarding the two royals have been issued with machine guns and the number of bodyguards on each shift has been increased.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Senior Judge Condemns Use of the Word ‘Honour’ to Describe Abuse and Murder Within Muslim Families
In an Appeal Court test case he ruled that the welfare of children should not be put at risk because of the ‘honour’ idea held in some Muslim families.
The judge added: ‘Arson, domestic violence and potential revenge likely to result in abduction or death are criminal acts which will be treated as such.’
The case, involving three children of a Pakistani family who were removed by social workers and taken into care, is the first childcare case touching on honour issues to reach the level of the Appeal Court, which sets precedents to be followed in other courts.
The 41-year-old father of the children asked for the right to contact with them.
He also asked that the children, who have been put in the care of white non-Muslim foster parents, should be sent to live with a Muslim family.
The children were removed from the family following the death of another child and violent incidents connected to the role of a woman in their extended family.
Their 32-year-old mother is serving a five-year jail sentence for arson.
Violence in the family began when an uncle of the three children now in state care contracted a marriage to a woman from Pakistan, who was pregnant with her first child when she came to England in 2003. The child died at the age of 27 months after suffering multiple injuries.
The dead child was said in court to have shown injuries that may have been caused by sexual abuse.
The husband was convicted of murder. However, senior members of the family made it clear that they took his side.
A grandfather described the death of the child as an accident and the will of God, and made it clear that the husband should return to live at the family home on his release.
The mother of the dead child was said by Lord Justice Wall to have been kept ‘under virtual house arrest’ and to be unaware of the name of the city where she lived. In May 2005, with the help of police and social workers, she fled to a secret location with her second child. She is said to remain in fear of her life.
The family’s campaign against the fleeing mother extended to involve the three children now in care and living with a foster family.
The mother of the three children — a sister of the husband convicted of murder — reported in 2005 that her sister-in-law had returned to the family home in the company of a friend an+d dressed in a burka and had assaulted the children.
She alleged that her sister-in-law had cut her hands and neck with a knife, poured white spirit over the clothes of one of the children, and had set fire to clothing. The story was found to be untrue, and the three children were taken into care.
The foster parents of the three children — a girl of 11 and boys of nine and five — have since had to move several times because of fears for their safety.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Trainspotters to be Banned From Stations After 170 Years Because of ‘Security Risk’
Trainspotters could be banned from King’s Cross and other major stations for security reasons, it was claimed today.
Union leaders say National Express will bar spotters from stations on the East Coast main line because they are a nuisance and pose a “security risk”.
There are suggestions of other operators following suit.
The ban, which union leaders claim “betrays Britain’s 170-year long railway heritage”, covers King’s Cross and York, which is the spiritual home of the industry and next door to the National Rail Museum.
National Express is instigating the ban as it installs automatic ticket gates at main stations along the line, say union leaders, who accused the operator of “mindless vandalism”.
Gerry Doherty, general secretary of the TSSA, the industry’s second largest union, said one of his officials had been told by a manager that trainspotters posed a “security risk”.
Endangered: Trainspotters photograph a South West Trains Class 450 Desiro at Waterloo.
He said: “Do they really think that a 10-year-old boy with a pencil and notebook is in possession of a dangerous weapon? You do wonder sometimes what planet these people are on.”
Mr Doherty added: “The barbarians have finally taken over the industry. Only people with no sense of history would commit such an act of mindless vandalism. Young trainspotters have been with us since Victorian times. Now National Express is saying they should be banned as they are a nuisance.
“The company has told us that train spotters will be banned at all its main line stations which will be installed with gated barriers.”
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Serbia: Trial Production of Punto Begins in Zastava
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, MARCH 13 — In the Kragujevac automobile factory Zastava, the trial production of parts of the Punto car’s model has begun yesterday, the general manager of Zastava Automobiles Group, Zoran Radojevic, told BETA news agency. He said that the Autobody Plant had produced the first Punto body, bearing the number 7,000,001, adding that five bodies were made yesterday, and around ten will be produced by the end of day. Radojevic stated that the trial production is being monitored by the Fiat Torino director and ten experts, who are exploring the possibility of increasing the production capacity of the existing equipment, considering the great demand for Punto. “We are working on adapting the equipment, in order to harmonize the production quality with Fiat standards, and are considering the possibility of producing in the most economical way even more vehicles than originally envisaged,” he said. Radojevic added that around 100 Zastava employees are engaged in that task. He refused to say how big the increase in Punto production might be, but he reminded that the minimum envisaged production for 2009 is 15,000 vehicles. According to the Ministry of Economy, 17,880 applications for loans for the purchase of Puntos were submitted by March 11.(ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia: War Crimes Suspect Attacks UN Court
The Hague, 12 March (AKI) — Serbian nationalist leader Vojislav Seselj, accused of war crimes in Bosnia and Croatia, said on Thursday he had no chance of a fair trial before the United Nations war crimes tribunal. He also accused prosecutors of extending the trial indefinitely because they had no case against him.
Seselj, who surrendered to the tribunal voluntarily six years ago, told the court that all reasonable deadlines for a fair trial had passed long ago and accused prosecutors of “buying time” because they had no case against him.
“All reasonable deadlines passed a few years ago, therefore the trial can’t be fair,” Seselj said. “In the United States I would have been freed after one year and the indictment would have been rejected,” he added.
Seselj (photo) has been charged with the persecution and murder of Muslims and Croats, crimes allegedly committed by volunteers recruited by his Serbian Radical Party (SRS) during the 1991-1995 civil war which followed the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia.
Seselj has previously told the court it had no evidence against him and claimed he was being tried for verbal offences, based on his inflammatory nationalist speeches.
The trial was interrupted indefinitely last month at the request of the prosecution which claimed that the 11 witnesses had been threatened and feared for their safety.
The presiding judge Jean-Claude Antonetti said he opposed the interruption of the trial because there was a way to end it quickly, but he was outvoted by the other two judges, Frederick Harhoff and Flavia Lattanzi.
Seselj voluntarily surrendered to the tribunal on 24 February 2003. However, he has continued to run his party from his Hague jail cell.
Seselj’s trial began in 2006 but was almost immediately suspended after he went on hunger strike. The case eventually began in November 2007, after the court allowed him to defend himself.
Since it was created by the UN Security Council in 1993, the ICTY has indicted 161 individuals for crimes committed during 1991-1995 war that followed the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia. Close to 60 have already been sentenced to over one thousand years in jail.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia: Elderly Increase, Youth Decrease
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, MARCH 13 — Tunisia is growing older. The percentage of people above the age of 60 in the 1994 — 2008 period increased from 8.3 to 9.6%. Pensioners represent almost 10% of the active population. On the other hand, during the same period the percentage of people below the age of 14 dropped from 38.4 to 24%. As regards the active population, the percentage for the 15 to 59 age range is equal to 66.7% and the unemployment rate is below 14%. The female component in jobs is currently estimated at 27.4%. Figures were announced during the People’s Superior Council meeting in Tunis. (ANSAmed)
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia: Ramadan in Summer, This Year No Day Light Savings
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, MARCH 13 — Tunisia this year will not be adopting daylight savings time, announced Prime Minister Mohamed Ghannouchi, specifying that the decision is connected with the yearly recurrence of Ramadan, which this year will arrive in the Summer. Therefore, during the night which divides March 28 and 29, Tunisian clocks and watches will not be pushed forward an hour. Ghannouchi said that the publication for a decree regarding the matter is currently in course. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Tunisia: First Women Motorcyclists Club in Arab World
(ANSAmed) — TUNIS, MARCH 13 — It is called the ‘Association des Femmes Motardes’ (Association of Women Motorcyclists), the first ever in the Arab world. The association was founded in Tunis by Hamida Saklaoui, one of the few Arab woman motorcyclists, who also participates in races in which she has already won many prizes and medals. “Magharebia” reports that Saklaoui has said that the new association, besides the financial support of its members, can count on support from the Ministry for Youth and Sport and private sponsors. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
CAIR’s War on Truth
by Steve Emerson
The FBI severs its relationship with a group due to its ties to Hamas. Though it touts itself as “America’s largest Islamic civil liberties and advocacy group,” an FBI agent has testified that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is a Hamas front.
A ranking member of Congress asks the Bureau for more information. He viewed the response he got back as incomplete and he pointedly asks the FBI to try again, mentioning his role on a congressional committee responsible for FBI budgets.
CAIR — frozen out by the FBI since last summer — issued a statement Thursday, accusing the congressman, Virginia Republican Frank Wolf, of having “abused his power.” His hard line, the statement says, is an act out of vengeance because CAIR has disagreed with some of Wolf’s policies and statements.
Wolf is in his 15th term and has been re-elected easily. CAIR’s disagreements with him have done little to slow his work. But the statement still tries to deflect attention from bad news for CAIR about the FBI cut-off first reported in late January by the Investigative Project on Terrorism.
Evidence from the Hamas-support trial of five former officials at the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) show CAIR and two of its founders were part of a Muslim Brotherhood-created support network in America. CAIR founder and current executive director Nihad Awad is listed on a telephone list of “Palestine Committee” members, along with CAIR chairman emeritus Omar Ahmad and Hamas Deputy Political Director Mousa Abu Marzook.
Other records show Awad participated in a secret 1993 meeting of Hamas members and supporters called to discuss ways to “derail” the U.S.-brokered Oslo Accords, which then offered hope for a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
If CAIR wants to regain its access, the FBI has said “certain issues must be addressed to the satisfaction of the FBI.” In a letter to the FBI, Wolf sought details about those “certain issues” and asked what conditions might prompt the FBI to reverse its stance. The four-paragraph response from FBI spokesman John Miller did not address those questions, prompting a harsh rebuke.
The questions about CAIR are not plucked from thin air, but from exhibits in a terror-financing trial that ended with convictions on 108 counts. The FBI case agent called CAIR a front organization. But CAIR ignores all of this, with Awad choosing instead to attack the messenger…
| — Hat tip: Holger Danske | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Shalit, Hamas Thinks More Time Needed for Talks
(ANSAmed) — JERUSALEM, MARCH 16 — The differences with Israel on the exchange of Palestinian prisoners for soldier Ghilad Shalit, a prisoner of Hamas in Gaza, are still not resolved and more time is needed for negotiations, said Hamas spokesman in Gaza, Ayman Taha, today in an interview with a Saudi television network broadcast on Israeli public radio. Asked about the indirect talks with Israel in progress in Cairo with Egypt as mediator, Taha said that the biggest problem remains Israel’s refusal to release all prisoners on the list drawn up by Hamas. “We haven’t reached a turning point yet and more time is needed for negotiations” said Taha, ending hopes in Israel for a rapid and positive conclusion of negotiations. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Israel Recognition Not on Table of Arab Talks
Backed by millions in U.S. funds, Palestinian unity missing key element
The recognition of Israel is not on the table at talks aimed at creating a unity government between Hamas and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah organization, according to participants taking part in the discussions.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Israel: Kill for Peace: a Humane Policy?
Israel plays by rules, some encoded in its own laws or in international laws, others in long-established customs, which are part of the West’s collective consciousness. But Israel’s enemies don’t give a damn about our laws and customs.
Again and again we find that hard-won treaties or agreements mean nothing to our enemies. While Israel is word-oriented, its enemies are action-oriented. Israelis, like Americans, mirror-image and think that their enemies are like them, that they want peace, even though they have repeatedly said, “peace means the destruction of Israel.” Israelis live in a state of denial.
Even the terms used to describe the enemy—”terrorists” or “Islamic fundamentalists”—are misleading. Such terms hinder the political and military echelons from developing an appropriate strategy against the enemy. Former U.S. army intelligence officer Ralph Peters calls these terrorists “warriors.” He speaks of various types of warriors—because if we do not understand the enemy, we won’t win the war against them…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Arab Civil Society? it is Already in the Future (and Waiting for Politics)
In Egypt bloggers have created a Human Rights Observatory. In Turkey a group of intellectuals have launched a apology petition on the internet to the victims of the 1915 Armenian genocide, whcih goes against the national policies of their own country. In the Lebanon a group of 290 intellectuals signed an appeal for “peaceful civil resistance” to the war started by Hezbollah against Sunnis and Druzes. In the third millennium Muslim-Arab civil societies are moving at a speed that differs from that of the states, which act as spokespersons for a backward-looking vision of Islam resulting from post-colonial logic. Thanks to various forms of dissent, Muslim civil societies not only portray a different vision of Islam, but are also demolishing the political immobility of governments and causing profound transformations in their societies.
Those wishing to portray the Muslim-Arab world as a monolithic block in which there is no room for dissent must instead come to terms with a far more complex reality. The current series of attacks and threats against the western world, coming from “deviant elements of Islam” simply cloud the issue, making the problem even more difficult to understand. These attacks are often only superficially representative of Islam, instead nearly always have a specific political, strategic or territorial objective. Western public opinion seems unable to perceive the gap between the immobility and backwardness of government policies in some Muslim-Arab states and the extraordinary and dynamic characteristics of their respective civil societies. Often some of these countries embody a vision of Islam (or of the relationship between religion and political life) that is the result of an old and post-colonial logic that is obsolete in today’s world…
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Energy: Qatar; Offshore Delivery of LNG to Dubai by 2011
(ANSAmed) — DOHA, MARCH 12 — Plans to deliver liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Qatar to Dubai through a Royal Dutch Shell Plc offshore import terminal have been delayed for one year, it has been reported. Qatar’s oil minister said at a gas conference in Doha on Tuesday that delivery will start in 2011 as opposed to 2010, but gave no reason for the hold up, according to Bloomberg. Qatari Oil Minister Abdullah bin Hamad Attiyah added: “We may see an LNG tanker in Dubai soon, wéll be shipping gas there during the summer months.” Dubai already imports LNG from Qatar via the Dolphin Energy Ltd pipeline that passes through Abu Dhabi, but increased demand on the back of a growth in population has led the emirate to seek additional LNG supply options. An agreement signed by Shell earlier this year will see it transport LNG from Qatar to Dubai for 15 years. The company will build a floating terminal off Dubai to receive the fule and send it to the shore through pipelines, said John Mills, vice-president for Shell gas in the Middle East in November. However, some industry experts maintain that receiving fuel at a floating platform is not reliable as poor weather and sea conditions could hamper operations. “Floating LNG plants are not a fully proven concept,” said Poten & Partners Inc.’s gas consultants Ilmars Kerbers and Graham Hartnell, at the 7th Doha Natural Gas Conference and Exhibition. Dubai needs the fuel because power demand in the U.A.E. is expected to triple to 41,000 megawatts by 2020 as the country uses its oil revenue to develop infrastructure and industries. Qatar Petroleum, the state-run energy company, aims to generate QR560bn ($154bn) in revenue through 2012 as new projects begin producing fuel, Attiyah added. Qatar plans to complete all 14 LNG production units, or trains, by the end of next year and finish by 2012 a study on its North Field, the world’s largest gas reservoir, he said. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey and D-8 Secretariat Sign Headquarters Agreement
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, FEBRUARY 20 — Turkey and Developing 8 Countries (D-8) Secretariat signed “Headquarters Agreement” on Friday, as Anatolia agency reported. Selim Kuneralp, Undersecretary for Economic Affairs in the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Secretary General in D-8 Dipo Alam signed the agreement. Ambassadors of Egypt, Iran, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Nigeria, the members of D-8, also attended the meeting. Speaking at the ceremony, Kuneralp said political willingness, despite geographical distance between the D-8 countries, has arisen commercial and economic cooperation among those countries. With the agreement, the Secretariat of the Developing Eight would permanently settle in Istanbul. The agreement carries legal status about the mission and activities of the Secretariat. D-8 is a group of developing countries that have formed an economic development alliance in 1997, consisting of Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan and Turkey. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Independent Ballot Inspectors Needed, Experts
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 12 — An autonomous institution must be put in charge of the election process to ensure its independence from any potential government intervention, leading constitutional-law and election-law experts say, as daily ‘Referans’ reported. Erol Tuncer, the head of the Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation, or TESAV, said despite the praise showered on the new Address-Based Electronic Census System, certain gaps in the system allowed people to tamper with it. “The mistakes in the new system were directly reflected in the voter lists,” he said. Even though he has lived in the same house for the past 21 years, Tuncer’s own name suddenly disappeared from the voter registration lists put up at the local ‘muhtar’, or headman’s offices, he said. He added: “Many thousands face the same problem but only a few lodge a complaint.” Professor Ibrahim Kaboglu from the Marmara University Faculty of Law in Istanbul said every single article of the country’s election law had been changed since it was passed in 1961. “This shows how unstable elections are in Turkey,” he said. The sudden 6-million-person increase in the number of registered voters has harmed trust in democracy, said Professor Fuat Keyman of the Koc University Department of International Relations in Istanbul, adding: “While the elections show there is democracy in Turkey, they do not necessarily mean democracy is vibrant and healthy.” (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: One Million Driving Licences Withdrawn in 10 Years
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 12 — Road safety continues to be one of Turkey’s most serious problems, and as the newspaper Zaman reports today, it is almost impossible to reduce the number of road accidents, even when heavy fines are issued to drivers. The newspaper reveals how figures gathered by the General Directorate for publice safety show that police have stripped one million 32 thousand dangerous drivers of their licenses after they were considered to be driving in breach of the highway code. Some 907,335 driving licenses were withdrawn from individuals found driving in a state of drunkenness; 51,153 were withdrawn for speeding offences; 28,543 were withdrawn for various other offences. The same figures reveal that between 1999 and 2008, (in a country of just over 70 million inhabitants), road accidents led to the death of 5 million 943 thousand people, whilst one million 443 thousand people were injured on the roads. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Darwin Case, Scientific World Reacts to Censorship
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 12 — The administration of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK), which censored the cover-story of his own publication ‘Bilim ve Teknik’ (Science and Technique) regarding Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution, was asked to resign. A group of Turkish scientists convened in capital Ankara with representatives of nongovernmental organizations and they released a statement calling on TUBITAK’s executives to resign. As daily Cumhuriyet reports today, Prof. Semih Koray, who heads the scientific organization Bilim ve Utopya Kooperatifi (Science and Utopia Cooperative), joined the ranks of the magazine’s critics, saying that censorship of Darwin in the magazine was “one of the most disgraceful acts in the history of the Republic”. Parliament Speaker Koksal Toptan also directed criticism at TUBITAK for changing the March edition’s cover page. “You may like or dislike Darwin’s theory of evolution, and you may believe in it or not; this is a different thing. What has been done is wrong. The TUBITAK administration should have been more sensitive about the issue,” Toptan said. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Controversy After Darwin Censured on Science Magazine
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 11 — The Republican People’s Party in Turkey (CHP, the secular, left-wing opposition) has presented a motion in Parliament against the decision of the major scientific institution in Turkey to censure an article and cover of a magazine dedicated to Charles Darwin, the British naturalist known as the father of the theory of evolution, a theory that is incompatible with the teachings of the Koran, the sacred text of Islam, which proposes creationism instead. This was emphatically reported today by the secular press, pointing out that the case of Cigdem Atakuman, director of “Science and Technology” who was fired by the magazine’s publishing house for wanting to dedicate the cover-page and a 16 page story to Darwin in the most recent issue of the magazine. Atakuman — despite denials today by State Minister Mehmet Aydin — was fired by Professor Omar Cebeci, Turkish Vice-President of Scientific Research and Technology (Tubitak), who publishes the magazine. Atakuman had decided to dedicate the cover and a story to Darwin for the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth, for which UNESCO has dedicated the year 2009. According to CHP and various secular dailies ,the censuring practiced by Tubitak constitutes political meddling by the pro-Islamic Justice and Development Party (AKP, Premier Tayyip Erdogan’s party) in power since 2002, which according to critics, is trying to impose Islam upon Turkish society. After years of financial and administrative autonomy, last August, Tubitak’s regulations were changed giving President of the Republic Abdullah Gul (AKP) the power to nominatethe president, Nekey Yetis, whose candidacy was rejected by the ex-president (secular) Ahmet Necdet Sezer. For Hurriyet’, the controversial decision of the Tubitak represents “a flagrant example of flattery by the government”, while for secular party ‘Vatan’, it is “a scandalous censorship that will enter into the annals of the history of science”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Number of Turkish Workers Going Abroad Drops
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 13 — The number of Turkish workers who go to foreign countries to work dropped in 2009, Anatolia agency reports. The number of workers, who were sent abroad by Turkish Employment Organization (ISKUR), dropped 66.86% in January-February, 2009 when compared with the same period of 2008. A total of 13,930 workers were sent to foreign countries in January-February 2008, while this figure decreased to 4,616 in the same period of 2009. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Only Partial Changes to Constitution, Erdogan
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 13 — The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) government would make only partial constitutional amendments, not a complete change, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said today. “We will not change the constitution completely. We will make partial changes. We will make amendments on five or six issues like Political Party Law, Ombudsman Law and Election Law,” Erdogan was quoted by ANKA news agency as telling reporters. The Turkish prime minister had earlier said his government would resume talks with the opposition on drafting a new civilian constitution after the March 29 local elections. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Turkish Security Forces Seize 15.4 Tons of Heroin in 2008
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 10 — Turkish security forces seized 15 tons of heroin in 2008, a report said on Tuesday. The Counter-Smuggling and Organized Crimes Department of the Directorate General of Security released a report regarding its operations in 2008, and said that 15.4 tons of heroin was confiscated in operations, as Anatolia agency wrote. The report said that security forces impounded 39.1 tons of hashish, and 105 kilograms of cocaine in their operations in 2008. The report also said that security forces arrested more than 32,000 people in their 15,433 operations. The forces also seized 80 kilograms of morphine, 56 kilograms of opium, 8,753 liters of acidic anhydride, 681,247 synthetic pharmaceutical, 2.9 million captagon pills, 1.4 million ecstacy pills, and 163 kilograms of amphetamine. The report said that Turkey was affected by the ecstacy trafficking as a “target country”, and this illicit drug was brought to Turkey from the Netherlands and Belgium, two important ecstasy producers in the world. Also, the report indicated a rise in the number of foreigners arrested for illicit drug trafficking in 2008. The number of foreigners involved in drug trafficking was up 18.3% in 2008 over 2007. However, the number of Turkish citizens arrested abroad for drug trafficking was down 9%. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Burmese People Sacrificed on the Altar of Economic Interests, Says Indian Priest
Clergyman slams the “silence” of the international community, including India, and their tendency to dismiss human rights as an “internal affair” and do business with the dictatorship. In Myanmar today is Human Rights Day, but democracy “will be reached only on the long run.”
New Delhi (AsiaNews) — The silence of the international community with regards to the tragedy unfolding every day in Myanmar is “shameful”. Even India is interested only in “economic and commercial opportunities” and is doing nothing about “human rights”, dismissing the whole thing as “an internal matter” with the result that the military dictatorship is “enjoying all the privileges” whilst the population “continues to suffer”, this according to Father A Cyril, a Jesuit priest from Madurai, southern India, who was born in Myanmar and spent there the first ten years of his life.
The clergyman’s outcry coincides with Human Rights Day in the former Burma. For the occasion activists have launched a campaign to free Aung San Suu Kyi and the other 2,100 political prisoners held in the country’s prisons.
For Father Cyril the campaign is “good sign” and can be used to “reawaken the conscience of the international community”, but it “will not have any effect in Myanmar where the government will continue to play big brother. Anyone who puts his or her name to the signature campaign is in danger of arrest, torture and persecution.”
“In Myanmar the violation of human rights is total. The military junta does not provide a decent education and does not create job opportunities for people. There is no freedom; even religious freedom is heavily restricted. There is no freedom of movement and people are under surveillance, jailed if suspected of anti-government activities, and tortured in the most inhuman ways.”
“Real social and economic development” is an impossibility for the clergyman because the junta is not interested in “truly democratic reform.”
Father Cyril, who visited Myanmar after cyclone Nargis, spent four months in the country working in direct contact with displaced people.
The most extensive damages caused by the tropical cyclone that hit the southern part of the county on 2 May 2008 were in the area of the Irrawaddy Delta. Even now, ten months after the tragedy, the situation there remains critical.
Nargis killed about 140,000 people but affected about 2.4 million Burmese who are still waiting for assistance.
The Jesuit clergyman is upset that the military dictatorship has created “obstacles” to help and shown “unwillingness to accept foreign aid.”
“We tried to help people who lost everything in the cyclone. We tried to give them food, aid, a home, but the government prevented us. But people are still willing to fight to free themselves from an oppressive tyranny.”
The priest is concerned about the “future of the country and its liberation” because if there is democracy “the nation can grow.” Its soil is rich in mineral resources like gold and oil; its forests have precious wood; the land is fertile. But “capable and talented” people cannot express themselves because they have to “struggle to survive”, living “in terror” under the constant threat of “guns and rifles” with many killed.
“People are scared,” said Father Cyril, “but there are still some who are fighting for democracy and freedom. It is a journey that will take a long time and will be reached only on the long run. But Myanmar and its people have all it takes to emerge.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Pakistan Defuses Crisis, Agrees to Restore Judge
ISLAMABAD (Reuters) — Pakistan’s government agreed on Monday to reinstate Iftikhar Chaudhry as chief justice in a surprise bid to defuse a crisis and end agitation by lawyers and activists that had threatened to turn into violent confrontation.
Chaudhry’s reinstatement will cool tension but friction is likely to persist between President Asif Ali Zardari, seen as weakened by the controversy over the judge, and his emboldened rival, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.
“It’s the first time in the history of Pakistan that a movement launched by the middle class has proved successful,” said retired judge Tariq Mehmud, a leader of the lawyers.
Chaudhry became a cause celebre after being dismissed in late 2007 by then-President and army chief General Pervez Musharraf, apparently because Musharraf feared the judge would challenge his strategy for holding on to power.
Sharif had thrown his support behind the anti-government lawyers’ campaign, which was bringing added turmoil to nuclear-armed Pakistan, where the government has already been struggling to stem militancy and revive a flagging economy.
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani announced Chaudhry’s reinstatement in a televised address to the nation. Afterward, Sharif called off a “long march” protest making its way to the capital, Islamabad.
U.S. officials said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton telephoned both Zardari and Sharif on Saturday to warn that U.S. aid could be at risk unless they defused the crisis.
The officials said Clinton, who coordinated with British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, had exerted strong pressure for a deal.
The crisis gripping the Muslim nation had alarmed the United States and Britain, which fear a slide into chaos would help the Taliban and al Qaeda become stronger in Pakistan.
The United States welcomed Chaudhry’s reinstatement.
“This is a statesmanlike decision taken to defuse a serious confrontation, and the apparent removal of this long-standing national issue is a substantial step toward national reconciliation,” the U.S. embassy said.
The main stock index, which has been hurt by political worry, ended 5.4 percent higher. It had fallen 1.9 percent this year after a 58.3 percent slide last year.
Some analysts saw Chaudhry’s comeback further complicating the situation in Pakistan.
“Nobody knows what his allegiance is, in terms of Pakistan’s constitution,” said Brian Cloughley, a British defense analyst familiar with Pakistan.”
Zardari, elected by parliament six months ago, had feared Chaudhry could wage a vendetta against Musharraf, which could threaten Zardari’s own position.
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Talking to Taliban is Pointless and an Act of Surrender
First of all, the Taliban is a heterogeneous group of radical Muslims. Each group has got its own warlord, and rules a state within a state. But all of them want to impose the Shari’a law, a stone-age law, which is anti-women, against modernity, and anti-non-Muslims.
The Taliban finances its local “empires” and weapons through drugs, force Afghans to pay Zakat (a kind of taxes), and blackmail development projects through “protection money”.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Freedom to Criticize Religion is Being Sacrificed on the Altar of Religious Sensitivity
The Independent 28.02.2009 (UK)
According to British columnist Johann Hari, the freedom to criticize religion is being sacrificed on the altar of religious sensitivity. Case in point: The UN’s Rapporteur on Human Rights, a Pakistani, recently requested her job description be changed so she can condemn “abuses of free expression” including “defamation of religions and prophets”. Instead of condemning the people who wanted to murder Salman Rushdie,” writes Hari, “they will be condemning Salman Rushdie himself. “After Hari’s article was reprinted in the Indian Statesman, Muslims demonstrated in front of the newspaper’s Calcutta office and the editor and publisher were arrested on charges of “hurting the religious feelings” of Muslims. Among the statements deemed offensive was Hari’s comment, “I don’t respect the idea that we should follow a ‘Prophet’ who at the age of 53 had sex with a nine-year old girl, and ordered the murder of whole villages of Jews because they wouldn’t follow him.” Statesman editor Ravindra Kumar has issued an apology for publishing Hari’s article, but Hari himself is unrepentent. On 13 February, Hari wrote a follow-up column headed, “I Stand by What I Wrote.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Australia Slashes Immigration as Recession Looms
Australia will cut its intake of migrants for the first time in a decade, the government said today, amid concern that skilled foreign workers could stoke resentment by taking jobs at a time of rising unemployment.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Gunmen Seize 4 UN Workers in Somalia
By MOHAMED OLAD HASSAN
Gunmen seized four U.N. workers in southern Somalia on Monday, a U.N. spokeswoman said, the latest in a series of attacks on aid workers in the war-ravaged Horn of Africa nation.
[…]
A witness said a Somali translator was later released.
The witness said the three had only been in Wajid for one night and were on their way to the town’s airstrip when they were seized. The witness asked for anonymity for fear of retaliation by the kidnappers.
According to the U.N., a total of 35 aid workers were killed in Somalia in 2008 and 26 were abducted. Two aid workers have been killed this year already…
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Madagascar’s President Vows to Fight on -Spokesman
ANTANANARIVO, March 17 (Reuters) — Madagascar’s President Marc Ravalomanana will fight to the end and has discussed military support with both the United Nations and South African states, his spokesman said on Monday.
“The president plans to stay in Madagascar. He said this to the presidential guard, who told him he should be placed elsewhere, and he replied ‘I will die with you if I have to’. That’s his stand,” said Andry Ralijaona, spokesman for the president’s office.
“The president’s powers are now limited, obviously. This is becoming a military coup. He still has the power to call on external help and a network through which to call on the people,” Ralijaona told Reuters.
He outlined a series of options for Ravalomanana following the seizure on Monday of a presidential palace and the central bank by soldiers backing opposition leader Andry Rajoelina.
“The fourth option is we call for the support of the international community, from SADC (South African Development Community) and/or the U.N. This would be military and administrative support,” he said.
“This option has been discussed with both SADC and the UN.”
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Terrorists Among US
By Jamie Glazov
FrontPage Interview’s guest today is Ben R. Furman, the FBI’s Former Counterterrorism Chief. He writes a blog at blackhawkpress.com/blog, and he is the author of The Devil’s Darning Needle, a counterterrorism thriller.
FP: Ben R. Furman, welcome to Frontpage interview.
I would like to talk to you today about the infiltration of terrorists across U.S. northern and southern borders, and the groups here that support it via facilitating illegal alien immigration.
What is the state of this problem as we speak?
Furman: No one knows how many terrorists are currently in the United States, but that they are here is not debatable, and the tally goes up each day. It’s natural to be swept away by the frightening battle occurring along our southern border, and it’s easy to be overwhelmed by the flood of illegal aliens crossing over that are eluding capture, but there’s a similar problem on our northern border that can’t be overlooked and it is equally as serious.
Terrorist infiltration is a deadly ongoing problem that our counterterrorism and law enforcement agencies face, both externally and internally, and in many respects the internal obstacles are the most troubling. Rooting out terrorists is a difficult job under the best of circumstances, but it’s made more difficult by the “open border” crowd that labels the agencies or anyone trying to control illegal immigration as racists, xenophobes and bigots. And the current mantra of political correctness has darn near beaten common sense police work to death.
FP: Can you give us some examples.
Furman: Sure…
| — Hat tip: Holger Danske | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Stem Cells: Pannella, Sacconi ‘Socialist Like Putin’
(AGI) — Rome, 4 Mar. — “I don’t trust that socialist, I don’t like him”, referring to the steps taken against the clinic ‘La Quiete’ regarding the case ‘Eluana’ and today he even called him a “socialist like Putin who, and I don’t want to offend the Russians, intervenes with unethical measures without checking who has taking the initiative for the tender: it’s really strange that the most dull-witted and unreasonable points come from the socialist member of the government” said the leader of the Radical Party, Marco Pannella, criticising Welfare Minister Maurizio Sacconi for granting 8 million euros for research on stem cells but banning research on embryos. He made his remarks in a press conference in the presence of geneticist Giulio Cossu, director of the Institute for stem cell research of the San Raffaele hospital in Milan and Elena Cattaneo, director of a research centre on stem cells and embryos of the University of Milan who called the tender “discriminating”. Also present were MPs Donatella Portetti and Maria Antonietta Coscioni who said they will ask questions in parliament and member of the European Parliament Marco Cappato who announced “legal steps of single laboratories against the tender”.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
‘Praising Obsession’ Creates Generation of Egotistical Pupils
Teachers “obsessed with praising” are creating a generation of egotistical pupils, a child psychologist has warned.
School staff and parents feel they cannot criticise their children for fear of upsetting them, according to Dr Carol Craig, leaving them with an “all about me” mentality.
[…]
But Dr Craig, chief executive of the centre for confidence and wellbeing in Glasgow, said: “We are wrong in thinking we have to get the ‘I’ bigger. If we say to people the most important thing is how you feel about yourself, then if a child fails maths and feels bad, it is very tempting for them to blame it on others like teachers and parents.
“Parents no longer want to hear if their children have done anything wrong. This is the downside of the self-esteem agenda. The problem is that if you tell parents that its incredibly important that children feel good all the time, we will get people going out of the way to boost children’s self esteem all the time.”
She said an obsession with children’s self esteem was breeding narcissism.
[…]
The conference heard how a maths teacher in one school had corrected a pupil who had placed a zero in the wrong place. The pupil replied: “Thank you, but I prefer it my way.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Hurgronje on Reforming Islam
by Andrew Bostom
“…most Muslims are absolutely ignorant of the details of the doctrine of jihad. But so long as not one single Muslim teacher of consideration dreams of regarding these laws of the middle ages as abrogated, while a great proportion of the people exhibit the strongest inclination to restore the conditions which prevailed some centuries ago, so long does it remain impossible, however anxious we may be to do so, to omit the jihad from our calculations when forming a judgment on the relation of Islam to other religions.” (from C. Snouck Hurgronje’s “The Achehnese,” 1906, Vol. 2, p. 348)
Christaan Snouck Hurgronje was born Feb. 8, 1857, Oosterhout, Netherlands, and died June 26, 1936, in Leiden
A professor and Dutch colonial official, Snouck Hurgronje was also a pioneering and prolific Western scholar of Islam.
He visited Arabia (1884—85), including a stop at Mecca, while serving as a lecturer at the University of Leiden (1880—89). Hurgronje’s 2 vol. classic work “Mekka” (1888—89), describes the history of the city, and expounds upon Islam’s origins, and the traditions and rituals of the earliest Islamic communities. Translated into English as “Mekka in the Latter Part of the 19th Century” (1931), the second volume includes many details of daily life in an Islamic culture, and also discusses the Indonesian Muslim colony at Mecca.
From 1890 to 1906 Snouck Hurgronje was professor of Arabic at Batavia, Java. He also served as an advisor to the Dutch Colonial Government for Arabian Affairs, and in 1891 he was sent for a year to Sumatra to study the Acheh uprising—the subject of “De Atjèhers”, 2 vol. (1893—94; published in English translation in 1906 as “The Achehnese”), his ethnographic account of the people of northern Sumatra, a standard reference work.
Snouck Hurgronje remained a colonial adviser until 1933, but returned in 1906 to The Netherlands, where he was professor of Arabic and Islamic institutions at the University of Leiden until his death, in 1936. An explorer, scholar, politician, and jurist, Hurgronje wrote extensively on a range of Islamic topics, and also served as a visiting professor in Egypt (1911), and the United States (1914).
Although deeply respectful of Islamic religious life, as an authoritative scholar of Islamic doctrine and history, and Dutch colonial official, Hurgronje vigorously opposed Islamic jihadism.
Here are Hurgronje’s sobering views on the prospects for fundamental reforms of Islam itself from “The Achehnese,” (i.e., the English translation version published in 1906, Vol. 2 p. 340)…
| — Hat tip: Andy Bostom | [Return to headlines] |
Nobody Listens to the Real Climate Change Experts
The minds of world leaders are firmly shut to anything but the fantasies of the scaremongers, says Christopher Booker.
Considering how the fear of global warming is inspiring the world’s politicians to put forward the most costly and economically damaging package of measures ever imposed on mankind, it is obviously important that we can trust the basis on which all this is being proposed. Last week two international conferences addressed this issue and the contrast between them could not have been starker.
[…]
What a striking contrast this was to the second conference, which I attended with 700 others in New York, organised by the Heartland Institute under the title Global Warming: Was It Ever Really A Crisis?. In Britain this received no coverage at all, apart from a sneering mention by The Guardian, although it was addressed by dozens of expert scientists, not a few of world rank, who for professional standing put those in Copenhagen in the shade.
Led off with stirring speeches from the Czech President Vaclav Klaus, the acting head of the European Union, and Professor Richard Lindzen of MIT, perhaps the most distinguished climatologist in the world, the message of this gathering was that the scare over global warming has been deliberately stoked up for political reasons and has long since parted company with proper scientific evidence.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Study Could Realign Climate Change Theory
The bitter cold and record snowfalls from two wicked winters are causing people to ask if the global climate is truly changing.
The climate is known to be variable and, in recent years, more scientific thought and research has been focused on the global temperature and how humanity might be influencing it.
However, a new study by the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee could turn the climate change world upside down.
Scientists at the university used a math application known as synchronized chaos and applied it to climate data taken over the past 100 years.
[…]
Scientists said that the air and ocean systems of the earth are now showing signs of synchronizing with each other.
Eventually, the systems begin to couple and the synchronous state is destroyed, leading to a climate shift.
“In climate, when this happens, the climate state changes..
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The Clear and Cohesive Message of the International Conference on Climate Change
“There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.” — from the Oregon Petition, signed by over 31,000 scientists
United by that conviction, over 800 scientists, economists, and policy makers arrived in New York City last Sunday to attend the Heartland Institute’s 2nd Annual International Conference on Climate Change. They came to talk a wide range of subjects, from climatology to energy policy, from computer climate models to cap-and-trade, from greenhouse gas (GHG) effects to solar irradiation. But most of all they came to help spread the word that the answer to the question posed by this year’s theme — Global warming: Was it ever really a crisis? — is a resounding NO.
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More From the UN
Last night I posted a video of David Littman being squashed at the UN when he attempted to talk about anti-Semitism in the Muslim world.
But another spokesman for an NGO — David Cornut of the International Humanist and Ethical Union — manage to get the same message across without interruption:
Hat tip: Lars Hedegaard.
[Nothing follows]
The Wrath of a Patient Man
One of the advantages of maintaining the news feed is that I get to process a rapid-fire sequence of news stories. Every morning I wake up to fifty or sixty news tips that await me in our inbox — not to mention the ones in skype. As I flip quickly through the tips, copying and pasting them into the database form, I sometimes notice patterns in the news that I might otherwise miss.
These days the most dystopian reports come from the UK. Britain has recently moved to the head of the queue of nations most likely to descend into anarchy, revolution, civil war, or some combination of all three.
The three news stories highlighted below approach the British catastrophe from different angles, but they all converge at the same point. And not all of this is bad news — there is plenty of reason for optimism, if my interpretations are correct
First, from to the Telegraph, comes an ominous fiscal forecast for the UK. According to the haruspices of the Bank of England, the outlook is grim:
Britain is showing signs of sliding towards a 1930s-style depression, the Bank of England says today for the first time.
The country is displaying early symptoms of being trapped in a so-called “debt deflation trap” where families find themselves pushed further and further into the red every month, according to a Bank report published today.
The stark warning will cause serious concerns, since it was this combination of falling prices and soaring debt burdens that plagued the US in the 1930s.
– – – – – – – – –
[…]
Although inflation is currently in positive territory, it is expected to become negative in the coming months.
[…]
The Bank’s paper suggests that Britain is particularly at risk because there is a high proportion of families with significant levels of debt, and many of them are on fixed mortgage rate, which means they will not benefit from rate cuts.
Britons’ total personal debt — the amount owed on mortgages, loans and credit cards — is, at £1.46 trillion, more than the value of what the country produces in a year.
Total personal debt has risen by 165 per cent since 1997 and each household now owes an average of about £60,000.
The Conservatives claim this is the highest personal debt level in the world.
Yes, a deflation is on its way. But it is only a precursor to a bout of serious inflation, possibly even hyperinflation, as governments respond to the crisis in the only manner that is politically feasible.
Deflation — which is wonderful for those of us who still have jobs and own our homes outright with no plans to sell — causes a reduction of wealth, including the devaluation of real estate and other assets. This triggers a capitalization crisis in the banking system and increases the rate of bankruptcies. It’s a vicious circle: the money supply contracts as banks tighten their credit rules even farther, and as foreclosures and defaults mount, banks are left with assets they can’t sell that are appraised at much less than the nominal value they possessed when they were used as collateral for all the bad loans.
Since most Western countries have bailed out and/or nationalized the largest banks, the new bad debt is thus transferred to the State. The government becomes the creditor of last resort, and, unlike the banks or the general public, the government has a solution to its debt problems: it can print money.
Expect a massive inflation in the wake of the deflation, after a lag time of two to five years.
In the face of this looming economic crisis, what does Her Majesty’s Government preoccupy itself with? The important things: how much and what kind of rubbish the Crown’s subjects deposit in their wheelie-bins.
According to The Daily Mail:
Householders With ‘Wrong Sort of Rubbish’ to be ‘Re-Educated’ by the Bin Police
Householders who put ‘the wrong sort of rubbish’ in their bins are to face re-education visits from council officers at their homes.
They will be told how they are failing to recycle properly and will be encouraged to ‘do better’.
Bureaucrats are using microchips placed in bins to measure the volume of rubbish thrown away — and the contents may also be analysed in a search for plastic, glass or other items that should have been recycled instead.
Those who break strict rules will first be contacted in writing, but may be confronted by a council officer on their doorstep if they offend again.
This is not an inexpensive operation. The manufacture and distribution of the new wheelie-bins costs a pretty penny, and the subsequent monitoring and bureaucratic follow-up only adds to the cost.
The irony of all this is intensified by the fact that local councils have had to cut back on recycling operations because of budget problems. So ordinary citizens are being harassed and re-educated for not recycling rubbish that may not be recyclable in the first place.
Only in Britain.
Fiscal disaster. Petty harassment for trivial offenses. Polygamous Muslim immigrants sucking up dole money for multiple wives and uncountable children. Universal surveillance by Nanny.
Where do we go from here?
Well, my money’s on revolution. El Inglés and I have been reading the entrails ourselves, and all the signs indicate that the tipping point is near, if it has not indeed already been passed.
Remember the British soldiers who returned home to Luton only to learn from Muslim demonstrators that they were cowards and war criminals? This incident may have been the straw that broke the camel’s back. At long last, John Bull has roused himself to bellow, “That tears it!”
Here’s the story from The Daily Mail:
Fury as Islamic Extremist Who Abused British Troops is Given 24-Hour Police Protection
An Islamic extremist who abused British soldiers during a homecoming parade has sparked further outrage after he was given 24-hour police protection.
Yousaf Bashir was part of a gang that hurled abuse at 200 members of the Royal Anglian Regiment as they marched through Luton last Tuesday after a second tour of duty in Iraq.
The moves comes after the semi-detached home Bashir shares with his parents was attacked on Friday.
Two downstairs windows and the glass in the front door were smashed, and the rear windows of two cars parked in the driveway were shattered.
Two police officers have been stationed in a marked car outside the property since the attacks and a CCTV camera has also been installed.
[…]
Bashir and his friends shouted abuse and waved placards calling the soldiers ‘The Butchers of Basra’, ‘criminals, murderers, terrorists’ and ‘baby killers’.
Two lines of police had to be deployed after the crowd turned on the protesters.
In a show of solidarity for the soldiers, seven of Mr Bashir’s neighbours decorated their homes with Union Jack flags.
The outrage of Bedfordshire residents was inflamed by the lavish solicitousness that the police expended on those who insult and abuse British soldiers.
This from the same constabulary who advise citizens whose homes have been burgled to install better locks!
This from the overworked police force that can scarcely manage to send a patrol car round to houses where home invasions have taken place!
This from the people who charge pedestrians an exorbitant fine if they accidentally drop a scrap of paper on the pavement!
No wonder British blood is boiling.
There’s an old saying: Beware the wrath of a patient man.
Well, we’re about to witness that aphorism in action.
When the patient man is at last roused to his full level of righteous wrath — when the British public decides that it has finally had enough — the resulting spectacle will be a wonder to behold.
Then it will be time to pity Gordon Brown. I hope for his sake that the e-borders program processes his exit in a timely fashion.
Hat tip: Gaia.
The UK is a State of Oppression
Evidently this scheme has been flying under the radar for awhile. If you do a little googling, you can find references dating back to 2005. But now, with the plans more fully developed, news stories are appearing.
From the Telegraph:
The full extent of the impact of the government’s “e-borders” scheme emerged amid warnings that passengers face increased congestion as air, rail and ferry companies introduce some of the changes over the Easter holidays.
In a column in the Times online, Libby Purves opines that this is not going to sit well with the average Brit, which will cause “ministerial outrage”, since government is just doing this “for your own good”:
…ministerial outrage will be heard more and more as people come to realise exactly what is involved in the vast new “e-borders” system, currently being set up to track everybody’s international travel just because a tiny minority are up to no good. A huge new database near Manchester will hold your personal travel history and mine for up to ten years. A pilot is already running on “high-risk” routes; by the end of April 100 million will be tracked, by next year all rail, air and ferry travellers; by 2014, everyone.
And what will they know?
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Who you are, where you live, how you paid, your phone and e-mail, where you’re going, who’s with you, where you plan to stay and when you’ll be back. In most cases they want your intentions logged a full day in advance. We may be forced to be “EU citizens” in a hundred other ways, but there’ll be no more casual booze-cruises or spontaneous hops to the Normandy gîte or Frankfurt office; not without telling Nanny.
At the extremes, by 2014 pleasure boats, fishing vessels and private planes will be included. I recognise that yachtsmen are a minority, even counting big sail-training vessels with young crews. I can see that our problems with weather and last-minute changes of crew are hobbyist stuff. But all the same, it may interest you to know that the Royal Yachting Association and others have been trying without success to get government to say how it will work, and have little hope of modifying it.
This causes consternation, what with a £5,000 fine for not notifying your movements online 24 hours early and heaven knows what penalties for accidentally being blown on to an unplanned coast…
As she points out, this new oppression includes travel to the Republic of Ireland, too. No more booze cruising.
But here is her main concern:
Opposition voices have pointed out the complexity, the cost, the paucity of consultation, the extraordinary power given to the UK Border Agency by statutory instruments without parliamentary scrutiny. Given the cases of councils already using anti-terrorist powers to catch litterbugs and school admissions cheats, there is a real fear that e-borders will be used to trump up tax claims or detect petty infringements like taking your children abroad in the school term. And there is something profoundly dispiriting in the principle of us all being suspects: universal surveillance rather than targeted concentration on known criminals and murderous creeps with terrorist ambitions.
This is insane. The terrorists are already in Britain. Why lock the exit doors now, when they left the entry doors wide open for so long that the UK is a ticking bomb?
I think it’s an oxymoron called “government logic”.
The Telegraph has more of the nitty gritty details – and yeah, that’s definitely where the devil dwells, in the odious minutiae:
Anyone departing the UK by land, sea or air will have their trip recorded and stored on a database for a decade.
Passengers leaving every international sea port, station or airport will have to supply detailed personal information as well as their travel plans. So-called “booze cruisers” who cross the Channel for a couple of hours to stock up on wine, beer and cigarettes will be subject to the rules.
In addition, weekend sailors and sea fishermen will be caught by the system if they plan to travel to another country – or face the possibility of criminal prosecution.
The owners of light aircraft will also be brought under the system, known as e-borders, which will eventually track 250 million journeys annually.
Even swimmers attempting to cross the Channel and their support teams will be subject to the rules which will require the provision of travellers’ personal information such as passport and credit card details, home and email addresses and exact travel plans.
The full extent of the impact of the government’s “e-borders” scheme emerged amid warnings that passengers face increased congestion as air, rail and ferry companies introduce some of the changes over the Easter holidays.
The new checks are being introduced piecemeal by the UK Border Agency. By the end of the year 60 per cent of journeys made out of Britain will be affected with 95 per cent of people leaving the country being subject to the plans by the end 2010.
Boaters and private pilots get a break. They have till 2014 to comply with the new rules, which involve sending their information via the internet twenty-fours ahead of time. Failure to comply means a £5,000 fine.
In most cases the information will be expected to be provided 24 hours ahead of travel and will then be stored on a Government database for around ten years.
What a bucket of gold for the bureaucrats!
In case you’re wondering about the EU open borders policy, here’s the deal:
Exit controls for departure to other countries within the European Union were scrapped by the last Conservative Government. The rest were scrapped by Jack Straw, when he became Home Secretary, after Labour won the election in 1997.
However, passport inspections at ports have gradually been reintroduced as the Government looks to prevent anyone on a Government watchlist fleeing the country.
Gwyn Prosser, Labour MP for Dover and a member of the all-party Home Affairs Select Committee, said: “I think e-borders are absolutely necessary,” he said. “Governments of all complexions have always been criticised for not knowing who is in the country. This is a very sophisticated way of counting people in and out.”
The Telegraph compares e-borders to the US’ demand to have the same information from anyone wishing to visit here. They don’t say it makes sense to want to know who’s coming in but it’s merely a bureaucratic boondoggle to require exit information. I mean, the people are leaving for land’s sake. Why do you need their information and why do you need to store that data for a decade?
Here’s just one scenario: Joe Blow’s company has an emergency in Brussels and they want him to take the next flight. Tough luck. He has to wait 24 hours for e-Borders to register his trip and all the attendant information: where he’ll be staying, how long he’ll be there, etc.
Or perhaps you get word that your mother has been in an accident while traveling in France. The hospital warns you her condition is grave and urges you to get there immediately. “Not so fast”, says e-Borders. “Fill out this form. Give us your flight information, your hotel, your credit card number, your passport information, and how long you’ll be there. We’ll get back to you within twenty-four hours.”
Sure they will. And they’ll guard your private information, too, just as efficiently as they have other personnel data. This would be funny if it weren’t so idiotic, so detrimental to the economy, and so gob-stoppingly creepy:
Ferry firms and Eurostar – who, unlike airlines, do not gather such detailed passenger information – have also raised concerns about the impact on passengers and warned the plans may not even be legal under EU law.
The changes would mean that Eurostar, Eurotunnel and ferry companies will now have to demand passport details from passengers at the time of booking, along with the credit card information and email address which they would have taken at the time of the reservation.
“We are also concerned that the implementation of e-borders could prove expensive and time consuming. For passengers this could mean longer check-in times,” a Eurostar spokesman said.
“This will lead to unwelcome queues of vehicles at ferry ports and risks adding unnecessary complications to what always have been and ought to be a simple and straightforward journey,” said a spokesman for the Chamber of Shipping.
Ms. Purves draws out the implications:
All this began when Tony Blair was embarrassed by a question about how many failed asylum seekers were here, and when it became clear that UK immigration control is ludicrously ineffective in an enlarged, porous EU. The depressing thing is that there used to be a reasonable system for knowing who was here – exit checks on passports. These were largely abandoned in 2004 to save money.
Under e-borders, the idea is that the pendulum will swing back until they know everything about everyone. And having so much information, they will become even more confused and give your plans to some cowboy IT contractor, who will leave it on a train seat to be picked up by grateful burglars, blackmailers and gossips.
They’ll write in saying this is a caricature. It’s not. It’s an extrapolation, based on experience.
Welcome to Soviet Britain. Check your freedoms at the door, please. No smoking, no littering but be aware of the fines for not recycling, no taking pictures of policeman. Be careful what you say and do because we have cameras everywhere.
Do have a nice day, sir.
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