Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Tuesday, 28 October 2014

The European Union Times


Posted: 28 Oct 2014 01:11 AM PDT
Canadian soldiers in Sangasar, Zari district in eastern Afghanistan, July 3, 2007.
In 1968 the government of Canada decided to openly admit Americans seeking to avoid being drafted into the US war on Vietnam. Before, would-be immigrants were technically required to prove that they had been discharged from US military service. This move made it easier for Americans to escape President Johnson’s war machine by heading north.
Although a founding member of NATO, Canada did not join the United States in its war against Vietnam. The Canadian government did not see a conflict 7,000 miles away as vital to Canada’s national interest so Canada pursued its own foreign policy course, independent of the United States.
How the world has changed. Canada’s wise caution about military adventurism even at the height of the Cold War has given way to a Canada of the 21st century literally joined at Washington’s hip and eager to participate in any bombing mission initiated by the D.C. interventionists.
Considering Canada’s peaceful past, the interventionist Canada that has emerged at the end of the Cold War is a genuine disappointment. Who would doubt that today’s Canada would, should a draft be re-instated in the US, send each and every American resister back home to face prison and worse?
As Glenn Greenwald pointed out this past week:
Canada has spent the last 13 years proclaiming itself a nation at war. It actively participated in the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and was an enthusiastic partner in some of the most extremist War on Terror abuses perpetrated by the US.
Canada has also enthusiastically joined President Obama’s latest war on Iraq and Syria, pledging to send fighter jets to participate in the bombing of ISIS (and likely many civilians in the process).
But Canada’s wars abroad came back home to Canada last week.
Though horrific, it should not be a complete surprise that Canada found itself hit by blowback last week, as two attacks on Canadian soil left two Canadian military members dead.
Greenwald again points out what few dare to say about the attacks:
Regardless of one’s views on the justifiability of Canada’s lengthy military actions, it’s not the slightest bit surprising or difficult to understand why people who identify with those on the other end of Canadian bombs and bullets would decide to attack the military responsible for that violence.
That is the danger of intervention in other people’s wars thousands of miles away. Those at the other end of foreign bombs, and their surviving family members or anyone who sympathizes with them, have great incentive to seek revenge. This feeling should not be that difficult to understand.
Seeking to understand the motivation of a criminal does not mean that the crime is justified, however. We can still condemn and be appalled by the attacks while realizing that we need to understand the causation and motivation. This is common sense in other criminal matters, but it seems to not apply to attacks such as we saw in Canada last week. Few dare to point out the obvious: Canada’s aggressive foreign policy is creating enemies abroad that are making the country more vulnerable to attack rather than safer.
Predictably, the Canadian government is using the attacks to restrict civil liberties and expand the surveillance state. Like the US PATRIOT Act, Canadian legislation that had been previously proposed to give the government more authority to spy on and aggressively interrogate its citizens has been given a shot in the arm by last week’s attacks.
Unfortunately Canada has unlearned the lesson of 1968: staying out of other people’s wars makes a country more safe; following the endless war policy of its southern neighbor opens Canada up to the ugly side of blowback.
Ron Paul is former Republican congressman and three-time presidential candidate.
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Posted: 28 Oct 2014 01:04 AM PDT

German authorities fear there could be as many as 7,000 Muslim extremists in the country by the end of the year. Disenfranchised youths are particularly vulnerable to being recruited, while there are around 450 German extremists in Syria and Iraq.
The extremists all follow the strict interpretation of Islam known as Salafism and believe that jihad is a legitimate tool in their fight against the West, which they believe is an enemy of Islam. Hans-Georg Maassen, who is the head of Germany’s BfV domestic intelligence agency, told rbb-Inforadi that there are currently around 6,300 Islamic extremists in Germany, but this figure could rise to as many as 7,000 by the end of the year, AP reports.
There has been a steep rise in the number of Germans attracted to fundamentalist Islam. Three years ago there were only in the region of 3,800 followers of Salafism in the country, which then rose to 4,500 in 2012.
Speaking in late August in Berlin, Maassen said young Muslims are attracted to Islamic State (IS) because of its brutality. The militant group has become infamous for beheading captives amongst other things. The German domestic intelligence chief also says the group formally known as ISIS, seems to be “more authentic” than Al-Qaeda.
“There is a link between the successes IS has had so far in Iraq and the activities here in Germany and the propaganda and canvassing activities aimed at young jihadists,” said Maassen, which was reported by Reuters. “The Islamic State is, so to speak, the ‘in’ thing – much more attractive than the Nusra Front, the al Qaeda spin-off in Syria.”
“What attracts people is the intense brutality, the radicalism and rigor. That suggests to them that it is a more authentic organization even than al Qaeda,” he said. “Al Qaeda fades besides the Islamic State when it comes to brutality,” the BfV chief added.
Massen also mentioned that many young people who feel disenfranchised from society are attracted to extremist Islamic groups, as it gives them a sense of belonging and purpose. They hope that by joining such organizations, they will go “from being underdogs to top dogs.”
It is estimated that around 450 Islamic fundamentalists from Germany have travelled to Syria and Iraq. According to German authorities the majority are German nationals, with about 30 percent coming from a number of nations, which include Turkey, Morocco and Bosnia.
AP quoted a security official as saying that around a quarter of them are converts to Islam.
The BfV estimates that there are currently around 43,000 Islamists in Germany overall, with 1,000 being of serious concern, while 130 are under round-the-clock surveillance.
A report by German security officials also found that the “most important factor for radicalization” was friends. They had more of an influence than recruiters or radical imams, while the internet was also another important source to gain extremist followers.
The document states that it normally takes around a year for the vast majority of people to become radicalized, which would allow sufficient time for them to be offered help. However, identifying someone who is going through the process of radicalization is not so easy, with visible changes in behavior only taking place once the person is becoming more extremist, the report added, according to Der Spiegel.
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Posted: 27 Oct 2014 03:58 PM PDT

A Liberal-Democratic party MP is suggesting jailing people for giving false testimony in court claiming that such measure would bring down the number of wrongful sentences in the country.
Presently Russian law punishes perjury only by fines of up to 80,000 rubles, or about $2000. A prison sentence of up to five years is possible if a witness lies within a hearing into a grave case, but prosecutors would still have a hard time proving that the false testimony was a deliberate lie and not an honest mistake.
The Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily that broke the story claims that this causes serious problems to courts as convictions can only be based on witness testimony.
The main sponsor of the bill, MP Roman Khudyakov of the Liberal Democratic Party caucus told the newspaper that both the defense and prosecution often used false testimonies in court processes and through this many honest people had their lives shattered. He added that in some cases people hired several false witnesses and completely innocent people received prison sentences in such ploys.
Khudyakov suggests that false witnesses receive real prison sentences of at least a year. He said that similar laws in foreign countries, like the USA, had proved that such measures could be effective.
Federal Judge Dmitry Novikov commented that the problem of perjury existed but added that often it was based on low professionalism of judges. However, the judge said that he had not seen a single case started against a lying witness in 15 years of work and called the LDPR initiative correct and even extremely mild. “If they started giving 10 years and demonstrate the seriousness of their intent in a couple of dozen cases people would quickly become more honest,” he said.
In addition, the judge criticized the way police investigators use to report their work. “As long as we have a box ticking system and investigators get punished for closing the cases, half of the court testimonies would be lies. There is no guarantee that it would be truthful,” the judge noted.
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Posted: 27 Oct 2014 03:45 PM PDT

British Prime Minister David Cameron has said that he will fight against the European Union’s demand for an extra contribution to the bloc’s budget.
While addressing the British parliament on Monday, the premier said the UK would not pay “anything like” the 2.1 billion euros the EU has requested.
“It is not just about the scale of the money being demanded. It is also the timetable,” Cameron said, adding, “The (European) commission admits it does not actually need this. So there is no pressing need for the money to be paid.”
The British prime minister went on to say that he would not permit the UK taxpayers’ money to be funneled into the EU.
“The European Union has to change. It has to regain trust and that starts by understanding and respecting the fact that these payments and adjustments are about the hard earned taxes of its citizens. This is just one of the many challenges in our long campaign to reform the European Union, but it is vital we stick to the task,” he added.
On Thursday, Brussels, the EU’s de facto capital, demanded that the UK pay the extra amount by December after a recalculation of the country’s national income found that Britain’s economy has enjoyed better-than-expected performance in comparison with other European countries since 1995.
Cameron has also warned that such behavior would certainly affect Britain’s decision on whether to remain in the EU.
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Posted: 27 Oct 2014 03:25 PM PDT

Purchasing train tickets with cash, exiting a train before or after other passengers, or appearing calm or nervous are all examples of behavior that Amtrak employees have been told to report as “suspicious activity.”
A document entitled Guidelines for Amtrak Customer Service Employees, which was obtained by the ACLU after an FOIA request, lists a number of different behaviors that are “indicative of criminal activity” and should immediately be reported to law enforcement personnel by Amtrak ticket agents.
Those behaviors include;
- Unusual nervousness of traveler
– Unusual calmness or straight ahead stare
– Looking around while making telephone call(s)
– Position among passengers disembarking (ahead of, or lagging behind passengers)
– Carrying little or no luggage
– Purchase of tickets in cash
– Purchase tickets immediately prior to boarding
Of course, such behaviors are so ludicrously broad that virtually anyone is likely to have engaged in at least one of the above activities at some point for a perfectly innocent reason. The demonization of using cash as a tool of criminals or terrorists is also a theme that has become more prevalent in recent years, primarily because authorities dislike the anonymity of hard currency.
“As we have seen with Suspicious Activity Reports and the TSA’s SPOT program, reporting based on broad categories of “suspicious” behavior is problematic because it almost always results in racial and religious profiling, as well as the targeting of perfectly innocent activity,”reports the ACLU. “Most importantly, building mountains of irrelevant data is ultimately an ineffective law enforcement tactic.”
The report also notes how Amtrak has not caught a single criminal or terrorist as a result of the snitch program, with one woman arrested instead for talking too loudly on their phone, in addition to a photographer who was arrested for taking pictures for the annual Amtrak “Picture our Train” competition.
The program has also greased the skids for police to engage in civil asset forfeiture, which allows law enforcement to confiscate money from travelers with no due process whatsoever.
In 2010, the Department of Homeland Security announced that it was partnering with Amtrak to expand its ‘See Something, Say Something’ program to rail transportation.
As we documented at the time, the promotional videos that accompanied the launch of the campaign characterized “suspicious activity” as a whole range of mundane behaviors, including opposing surveillance, using a video camera, talking to police officers, wearing hoodies, driving vans, writing on a piece of paper, and using a cell phone recording application.
The DHS received criticism back in 2010 after it partnered with Walmart to remind employees and shoppers to report suspicious activity. The federal agency also tasked hot dog sellers and other vendors with spotting potential terrorists at the 2012 Super Bowl.
Airport security-style measures have increasingly been implemented across other forms of transportation in recent years. Back in 2011, a video emerged of train passengers, including children, being subjected to TSA pat downs and bag searches after they had already disembarked at the Savannah train station.
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Posted: 27 Oct 2014 03:12 PM PDT

Australia has temporarily stopped processing visas for people from West African countries worst hit by Ebola in an effort to prevent the virus from entering the country.
Australia’s Immigration Ministry said in a report to the parliament on Monday that the new rules would apply to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea.
Immigration Minister Scott Morrison said non-permanent or temporary visas already granted to people from the three countries, who have not yet departed for Australia, would be canceled.
“These measures include temporarily suspending our immigration program, including our humanitarian program, from EVD (Ebola Virus Disease) affected countries,” he said, adding, “This means we are not processing any application from these affected countries.”
Permanent visa holders from West Africa will have to spend 21 days in quarantine before entering Australia.
The restriction comes after an 18-year-old girl, who arrived in Australia from Guinea earlier this month, tested negative for Ebola after showing symptoms.
According to the latest figures by the World Health Organization (WHO) on Saturday, the number of confirmed, probable, and suspected people hit by Ebola has risen to 10,141. The disease has already claimed 4,922 lives.
Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Liberia have taken the brunt of the spread of the disease, which is running amok in West Africa.
Ebola spreads through contact with bodily fluids such as blood, saliva, and sweat. It has killed around two-thirds of those it has infected over the last four decades, with two outbreaks registering fatality rates approaching 90 percent.
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Posted: 27 Oct 2014 02:57 PM PDT

New York City police have shot dead a Muslim man with a hatchet who attacked a group of policemen in broad daylight on a busy street in Queens. The man is reported to have had “Islamic extremist leanings.”
The man, identified as Zale Thompson, previously posted statements on YouTube and Facebook that “display a hyper-racial focus in both religious and historical contexts, and ultimately hint at his extremist leanings,” the SITE monitoring group said, as quoted by AFP.
Following the incident, one policeman is being treated for a serious head wound, the NYPD stated at a news conference, as cited by AP.
CCTV footage shows that the man, about 32 years old, intentionally attacked four patrol officers. While the officers were posing for a photo, the man tried to hit an officer with the hatchet, and the policeman blocked his blow. Then, the man hit another officer in the back of the head, who fell to the ground.
When the man attempted to make another blow, the two uninjured officers fired several rounds at the assailant, killing him. A 29-year-old female bystander was also shot in the back.
Prior to the attack, the man crouched on a street corner and pulled the tomahawk out of his backpack. The attack happened at around 2pm.
The 25-year-old officer who was injured in the head is currently in a critical condition.
Asked if the attack could be terrorism-related, NY Police Commissioner William Bratton stated that “this early on, we really cannot say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to that question.”
The statement comes just over a day after the attack on the Canadian Parliament Hill and the shooting at the National War Memorial in Ottawa. Three people were wounded in the shooting, and the gunman killed at the scene.
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Posted by Roberto Abraham Scaruffi at 19:48