Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Tuesday 3 February 2015

The European Union Times



Posted: 02 Feb 2015 02:26 PM PST


Road deaths have continued to surge for a third consecutive quarter, new figures are anticipated to show, after a significant number of traffic patrols have been eliminated from Britain’s road system.
The Department for Transport on Thursday is expected to confirm an alarming trend among those killed or seriously injured (KSI) in automobile accidents. In the first six months of 2014, the percentage of KSIs had surged 4 per cent, to 24,580, while the latest quarterly results are expected to take that figure even higher, the Independent reported.
UK transport minister Robert Goodwill warned a parliamentary road safety conference last week to prepare for “bad news” ahead of Thursday’s announcement, telling attendees to expect a “rise” in road fatalities.
Road safety activists blame the surge in road deaths on austerity measures that have cut road police numbers by 12 percent across the country, with some regions losing up to 40 percent of their traffic police force, according to road safety watchdog Brake.
The steep cuts in police numbers follow a five-year decline in police budgets as the government adheres to austerity measures.
Jayne Willetts, Vice Chair of the Constables Central Committee, said officers are “absolutely frustrated” by the increase in road deaths, explaining that the numbers could be reduced if there were “more officers in marked cars acting as a deterrent,” she told The Independent.
Willetts suggested that the police may be relying too much on technology to solve particular road issues, like drink driving.
“We welcome hi-tech developments…but the increasing reliance on automated technology and cameras can’t compensate for the decline in traffic police, who are the most effective way of combating dangerous drivers, drink drivers and people using mobile phones while driving.”
Meanwhile, police departments from around the country have released independent figures that show a marked rise in road deaths in 2014, including in the Thames Valley region – up 36 percent, to 78; in Lincolnshire – up 14 percent, to 40; and in Northern Ireland – up 38 percent, to 79 deaths.
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Posted: 02 Feb 2015 02:16 PM PST
A handout picture released by Costa Rica’s presidency shows Cuban President Raul Castro delivering a speech during the inauguration of the III CELAC Summit 2015, 20 km northwest of San Jose, on January 28, 2015.
Cuban President Raul Castro has said that US interference in his country’s internal affairs would render rapprochement between the two countries “meaningless.”
Castro’s comments came a week after Assistant Secretary of State Roberta Jacobson, the highest-ranking US official to visit the island in over 35 years, met with dissidents following talks with Havana government officials.
“Everything appears to indicate that the aim is to foment an artificial political opposition via economic, political and communicational means,” said Castro while attending a summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) in Costa Rica on Wednesday.
“If these problems are not resolved, this diplomatic rapprochement between Cuba and the United States would be meaningless,” he added.
Embargo
Castro went on to urge US President Barack Obama to utilize his executive authority and ease a decades-long trade embargo against Cuba.
“The main problem has not been resolved: the economic, commercial and financial blockade, which causes huge human and economic damage and is a violation of international rights,” Castro said.
He added that Washington could expand measures similar to those announced for telecoms to other fields of the country’s economy.
Under Obama’s latest Cuban policies, US companies can be allowed to invest in the country’s telecommunications sector.
“The establishment of diplomatic relations is the beginning of a process toward the normalization of bilateral relations, but this won’t be possible as long as the blockade exists,” he said.
US Congress
Last week, Obama called on Congress to end the Cuban embargo, imposed in 1962, which has been a major source of tension between both countries.
Castro referred to Obama’s decision to debate the embargo’s removal in Congress as “significant”, adding he knew ending the ban “will be a long and hard road.”
In order to completely normalize relations with Cuba, Obama requires approval from the Republican-controlled Congress.
Historic talks
Last month, President Obama announced that Washington would start talks with Cuba to normalize diplomatic relations, marking the most significant shift in the American foreign policy towards the communist country in over 50 years.
On December 17, Obama and Castro announced they had reached an agreement to normalize ties after 18 months of secret negotiations.
In his State of the Union address on January 20, Obama said, “In Cuba, we are ending a policy that was long past its expiration date. When what you’re doing doesn’t work for 50 years, it’s time to try something new.”
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Posted: 02 Feb 2015 02:07 PM PST


White House sets up shadow amnesty program illegally.
The Obama administration has granted work permits to millions of unqualified illegals since 2009, according to data obtained by the Center for Immigration Studies.
The feds gave 1.7 million work permits to aliens whose legal status is unknown, 1.2 million to aliens with visas which did not authorize employment (tourists, students, etc.), and 982,000 to aliens who are known to have crossed the border illegally.
“This is a huge parallel immigrant work authorization system outside the limits set by Congress that inevitably impacts opportunities for U.S. workers, damages the integrity of the immigration system and encourages illegal immigration,” Jessica M. Vaughan of the CIS wrote.
Work permits are gateway documents to driver’s licenses and other benefits, Vaughan pointed out, which indicates the White House is operating a massive amnesty system outside of Congress.
And it isn’t the only time the Obama administration has enacted de facto amnesty.
Last year, Infowars discovered the Border Patrol was purchasing bus tickets and travel vouchers for illegal aliens to ship them deeper into the U.S. at taxpayer expense.
“Normally they have tickets or arraigned transportation to go somewhere in the interior [of the U.S.],” McAllen, Texas City Attorney Kevin Pagan said in an interview with Infowars.

Typically when illegals are detained by the Border Patrol, they are given a date to appear at an immigration court and then the Border Patrol arranges their transportation to other parts of the country.
But the court dates are set several years in advance and 90% of illegals never show up to court anyway.
“They know they are going to be processed and released and they are free to go wherever they want to go in the United States and the likelihood of them ever showing up for their court date is slim to none,” Stu Harris of the National Border Patrol Council Local 1929 told Infowars.

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Posted: 02 Feb 2015 01:52 PM PST
Dr. Melanie Mormile, the head researcher of a team of scientists from the Missouri University of Science and Technology who found a new species of bacterium which cleans up the environment and produces hydrogen.
Scientists have found a new species of bacterium which cleans up the environment and produces hydrogen, an element which may in the future reduce the world’s dependency on oil.
The bacterium Halanaerobium hydrogeninformans was discovered in Soap Lake Washington by a team of researchers from the Missouri University of Science and Technology.
It can “produce hydrogen under saline and alkaline conditions in amounts that rival genetically modified organisms,” said head researcher Dr. Melanie Mormile.
Mormile, a microbial ecology of extreme environments expert, found the Bacterium’s capability by accident when she was searching for bacteria that could aid in the task of cleaning up the environment, especially the extremophiles which live in Soap Lake.
An extremophile is a kind of microorganism which lives in extreme temperature, acidity, alkalinity or chemically concentrated environments.
She was focused on Halanaerobium hydrogeninformans because it has the metabolic capability to live under conditions which are usually prevalent in contaminated waste sites.
Mormile and her team discovered that the new species of bacterium is capable of producing hydrogen and 1, 3-propanediol in environments with high pH and salinity conditions.
“It would be great if we got liters and liters of production of hydrogen,” Mormile said. “However, we have not been able to scale up yet.”
Currently the infrastructure isn’t present for gasoline to be replaced by hydrogen as an energy source. But in the future it may become a solution to world’s problem of ever dwindling fossil-fuels.
The bacterium’s other product 1, 3-propenediol, an organic compound, can be used in industrial products such as coatings, laminates, adhesives and composites or even as a solvent or antifreeze.
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Posted: 02 Feb 2015 01:29 PM PST
Joshua Bonehill-Paine
Far-right nationalists are planning a demonstration in a London borough next month to protest the alleged “Jewification of Great Britain.” Anti-fascist groups have pledged to deny marchers “an inch of our streets.”
The march, organized by British National Party-linked activist Joshua Bonehill-Paine, is called “Liberate Stamford Hill.”
Bonehill-Paine is calling for a “fight back” against what he calls “Jewification and anti-white oppression” in the north London area.
Stamford Hill is home to one of the largest Orthodox Jewish communities in Europe. The march appears to be directly targeting the Shomrim, a Jewish community patrol group which supports the Metropolitan Police.
Bonehill-Paine further claims that “white people” in the area are subjected to abuse.
A Facebook post promoting the march condemns the Jewish patrol group for “enforcing their law” on the area.
“It’s utter disbelief that the Jews of Stamford Hill have set up their own police force which enforces their own Talmudic law on the streets of a White British city,” the post reads.
“In Stamford Hill, White people are openly spat at on the streets and viewed simply as ‘Goyim’, slave to the Jew. I refuse to ignore the on-going Jewification of my country whilst other ‘Patriotic’ organizations are busy attacking issues that don’t matter.”
“That’s why on the 22nd of March, 2015 in Hackney at Clapton Common, I will be demonstrating against the Jewification of Stamford hill (sic) in an effort to ‘Liberate’ the area and draw attention to the Jewish problem,” he adds.
Bonehill-Paine, 22, is a controversial figure who has described himself as a “rising star” in the far-right, yet was dubbed “moronic” by an expert in a court case in which he was found guilty of issuing anti-Muslim death threats against a pub landlord in 2013.
An ex-Conservative party member who previously tried to organize an anti-Islamist march in London after the murder of British soldier Lee Rigby, Bonehill-Paine publishes a blog called The Daily Bale (“Britons Against Left-Wing Extremism”) which ran a number of stories that later turned out to be hoaxes, the BBC reported.
He is due in court on Monday, where he is accused of writing a hoax story for his local newspaper, claiming that Tesco’s food was contaminated with Ebola, though this is not the first time he has been reprimanded for fabricating information.
In September 2014 he appeared in court accused of posting information online falsely claiming that individuals were paedophiles, homosexuals and held religious faiths.
In response to the call for an anti-Jewish march, anti-fascist groups have rallied, pledging to stop the event taking place.
The North London Anti-Fascists said they would work with members of the community in Stamford Hill to gain as much anti-fascist support as possible.
“This demonstration will not only be opposed, it will be stopped. We will do everything we possibly can to refuse National Action, or any other anti-Semitic, White Pride, nationalist or neo-Nazi groups who join this protest, even an inch of our streets,” a statement read.
“More information shall be released shortly about counter-demonstration plans and how we shall be working with Stamford Hill residents, community groups, and other antifascist groups to ensure that the intimidation and hate that this demonstration is designed to create is stopped.”
The Facebook event for the march currently lists 50 people as attending. Posts on the page refer to Jews as “the corruption behind mankind.”
The Metropolitan Police say they are still deciding whether to allow the demonstration to take place.
“We are aware of an application to hold a demonstration on March 22 in Stamford Hill. A decision as to whether the demonstration will be permitted has yet to be taken. We’re in consultation with the community about the possible impact it will have,” a spokesperson said.
Jewish Labour MP Luciana Berger protested against the march on Twitter, saying “this ‘rally’ has no place in Britain.”
News of the march comes only weeks after Home Secretary Theresa May said efforts must be doubled in the UK to combat anti-Semitism.
Her comments followed a warning from the UK’s former chief rabbi Lord Sacks, who claimed British Jews are frightened to go to Jewish shops in the wake of Muslim terror attacks in Paris, when a kosher supermarket was targeted by Islamist gunmen.
Lord Sacks told Sky News’ Murnaghan Show that anxiety within the Jewish community was at a “record high.”
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Posted: 01 Feb 2015 02:43 PM PST
Donetsk residents stand outside a house damaged by Ukrainian army’s shelling of the city’s Kuybyshevsky district.
Shelling of the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk is continuing practically non-stop with shells landing in civilian areas after mediators’ talks failed Saturday. Militia and Kiev forces are fighting for the strategically key area of Debaltsevo.
Officials of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) said at least three civilians have been killed by Ukrainian artillery fire targeting residential areas overnight.
“Overnight, the Ukrainian troops fired about 30 barrages at DPR cities. The night shelling injured 14 civilians” in two of the city’s neighborhoods, reported Eduard Basurin, deputy defense minister in the DPR.








Four more people have been killed on Sunday, the militia said, while the total number of injured over the past 24 hours is being counted at over 20. They blamed Ukrainian units holding two villages northwest of the city and several infiltration groups for the violence.
“They drive the streets in common freight mini-vans or garbage trucks and fire mortars they have inside at civilian and military targets, mostly to spread panic,” a militia official told RIA Novosti.
Ukrainian shells landed on two residential buildings, near a school, at the roof of a morgue near one of the city’s hospital and at garages, reports said.








The continued violence prompted local authorities to keep all schools closed until Wednesday.
Meanwhile clashes between Kiev loyalists and militia forces continued along the front line. Kiev reported losing 13 soldiers dead in the past 24 hours of hostilities. A further 20 soldiers were injured in the clashes, a military spokesman said. Their opponents offered no update on their casualties.
The Azov volunteer battalion reported a failed attempt to storm the city of Uglegorsk, a site of fierce fighting over the past few days. The militia forces claimed capturing it on Friday, but the Ukrainian military denied surrendering the strategically important location.
“The units of the Ukrainian Army and National Guard have fallen back from Uglegorsk. The city is de facto under enemy control,” the battalion said on its web page.
Uglegorsk is one of key points in the district of Debaltsevo, which is controlled by Kiev and protrudes deep into the militia-held territory. There are some 8,000 Ukrainian troops reportedly holding the region, who are at risk of being severed from their supply lines.
The OSCE called on Sunday for the continuation of attempts to negotiate a new ceasefire after talks on Saturday failed to produce any sort of agreement. Kiev and their opponents accused each other of derailing the talks.
The Ukrainian government said DNR and the self-proclaimed Lugansk People’s Republic, failed to send to Minsk officials with a high enough rank to sign a new agreement.
A house destroyed by Ukrainian army’s shelling in Kuybyshevsky district, Donetsk.
The previous one signed in Minsk in September 2014 was never fully implemented and collapsed completely in January, as the violations of the ceasefire by both parties escalated.
The militia said they are willing to negotiate, but wants Kiev to order a ceasefire first.
“We are prepared for dialogue and are willing to act within the framework of the Minsk agreement, but it should be a dialogue, not Kiev’s monologue,” Denis Pushilin, who represented the DNR at the Saturday meeting, told the media.
The rebels insisted that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko gave the order to his troops to stop all hostilities before any document could be signed. They also want to renegotiate the disengagement line that would separate territories controlled by Kiev and the self-proclaimed republics to correspond to their latest military advancement. Ukraine insists that the territories it lost over January, including the ruins of Donetsk International Airport, should be surrendered.
According to the UN’s estimate, the civil war in Eastern Ukraine has claimed at least 5,000 lives since April 2014, when residents in Donetsk and Lugansk regions of Ukraine took up arms against a coup-imposed government in Kiev, which responded with a military crackdown on the area.
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Posted: 01 Feb 2015 02:36 PM PST
China surpasses the US as the top destination for foreign direct investment.
China has surpassed the United States as the top destination for foreign direct investment (FDI), a position held by the US for 11 years, a United Nations organization says.
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) recently published a report showing China had attracted USD 127.6 billion in foreign investment in 2014 compared to USD 86 billion invested by foreign businesses in the US.
In addition, the report said China’s special administrative region Hong Kong also stood at the second spot ahead of the US after it attracted USD 111 billion in foreign investment.
When compared to the previous year, foreign investment in the US plummeted by 63 percent from USD 230.8 billion, while China saw a small increase from USD 123.9 billion.
James Zahn, director of Investment and Enterprise at UNCTAD, said contributing factors to the increase in foreign investment in China were structural changes in inflows to the country, “from manufacturing toward services, and from labor-intensive to tech-intensive.”
The UNCTAD data also showed that foreign investment in developing nations rose by four percent in 2014, whereas developed nations saw a decline of 14 percent, mostly due to the large fall in the US.
China world’s largest economy
The report comes nearly two months after the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said China has overtaken the US as the world’s largest economy. The US had held the top position since 1872 when it overtook Britain.
Last October, the IMF projected that China’s economy will be 20 percent larger than that of the US by 2019.
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Posted: 01 Feb 2015 02:24 PM PST
Prominent criminal barrister Alex Lewenberg allegedly told a victim of a sex offender he should not have co-operated with police.
Members of Australia’s Orthodox Jewish community who assist police investigating alleged child sexual abuse have been pressured to stay silent, secret tape recordings and emails obtained by Fairfax Media reveal.
The details of the pressure being exerted on victims have emerged as the Royal Commission into child sex abuse prepares to hold public hearings next week to examine the responses of Melbourne and Sydney’s yeshivah centres to alleged offences dating back to the 1980s.
In one secret, legally recorded 2011 telephone conversation, prominent Melbourne criminal lawyer Alex Lewenberg tells a victim of St Kilda Yeshivah centre sex offender David Cyprys he should not have co-operated with police.
“I am not exactly delighted that another Yid [Jew] would assist police against an accused no matter whatever he is accused of and that is the reason why I was very disappointed,” Mr Lewenberg, who was defending Cyprys at the time of the conversation, told the victim.
“Because there is a tradition, if not a religious requirement that you do not assist against Abraham and I was concerned about that … moserprinciple. Moseris well known.”
Mr Lewenberg was referring to the Jewish tradition of mesirah under which a Jew does not inform secular authorities about another Jew. Members of ultra-orthodox communities who assist police are often ostracised and given the derogatory label of “moser” or informer.
David Cyprys
Fairfax Media emailed Mr Lewenberg questions about the conversation with the victim on Tuesday. He replied that “the factual allegations as set out in your communications are not correct”.
Mr Lewenberg was telephoned by the victim in October 2011 after the victim had heard talk in the Jewish community about the barrister’s alleged displeasure at him assisting police with Cyprys’ prosecution.
On the recording, Mr Lewenberg initially said he should not be speaking to the victim as the matter was before court. But he then went on to express his thoughts on the victim’s assistance to police and his dislike of a Jew informing secular authorities on another Jew.
Victoria’s Legal Services Commissioner, Michael McGarvie, said while he could not comment on the specific conversation between Mr Lewenberg and the victim, there was a general principle that made it impermissible for a lawyer to tell a witness they could not inform police about a matter because of a religious or community rule.
Fairfax Media has also obtained a series of emails which show how three influential members of St Kilda’s Yeshivah community asserted that the victim’s assistance to police in the Cyprys case had “crossed red lines” and had the “potential to undermine the [Yeshivah] centre.”
They warned that if the victim continued “to stick his nose where it doesn’t belong”, a new article about the victim would be posted on an “anonymous blog”.
In comments posted online in 2013, the same victim was described by Yeshivah members as a “sick man” and a “coward” who should be “thrown out” of the community.
The victim’s employer was also contacted by prominent members of Melbourne’s Orthodox Jewish community and told about the assistance he had given to police.
Two men previously employed by the St Kilda Yeshivah school, security guard Cyprus and teacher David Kramer*, are serving custodial sentences after last year being found guilty of serious child sex offences dating back to the early 1990s.
In Kramer’s case, the school offered to pay for him to go to Israel after it received complaints about him from parents. He then went to the United States, where he raped a 12-year-old boy and served a lengthy jail sentence.
A third man, Aron Kestecher, was last year to face court on child sex abuse charges allegedly committed at St Kilda’s Yeshivah centre in the 2000s. But he took his own life before he went to trial.
Leading figures associated with the St Kilda Yeshivah are expected to face allegations in the royal commission hearings that they failed to report suspected abusers to police and sought to cover up crimes.
In Cyprys’ committal in 2012, Victorian magistrate Luisa Bazzani said it was “unfathomable” that the former principal of the Yeshivah College in St Kilda, Rabbi Abraham Glick, did not know of the sexual abuse that was occurring there during the 1980s.
In Sydney, a former prominent member of Bondi’s Yeshiva Centre, Daniel Hayman, last year pleaded guilty to indecent assault of a minor and received a 19-month suspended sentence. A bizarre legal oddity allowed him to escape conviction for the alleged assault of a 12-year-old girl.
The NSW Ombudsman is investigating senior leaders of the Sydney Yeshiva centre over whether they failed to comply with laws that required them to report Hayman’s abuse during the 1980s to the Ombudsman.
One of those senior leaders under scrutiny is Rabbi Boruch Lesches, a senior figure at the Bondi Yeshiva Centre in the 1980s, who was aware of complaints about Hayman but never reported him to authorities.
In an audio recording broadcast by Fairfax Media in 2013, Rabbi Lesches claimed some of Hayman’s alleged victims may have consented.
In the conversation between Rabbi Lesches and one of Hayman’s victims, the rabbi cautioned against involving the police, stating that do so would ensure “everybody gets dirty, everybody suffers”.
After Fairfax Media released the recordings of Rabbi Lesches, he released a statement apologising for his comments. But in that statement the New York-based rabbi also claimed he was “never informed of any allegations involving minors prior to this call.”
However, comments made by Rabbi Lesches during the taped conversation contradict his denial. He is recorded as saying how he warned Hayman during the 1980s to stay away from a boy who was 10 years his junior.
“Absolutely, that’s right, absolutely. I told him to stay away and I told him if this will not stop both of them will have to go away. Absolutely emes [truth], you got it right,” he is recorded as saying.
*Kramer was deported to the United States late last year. He was released from a Victorian jail after the time he had already served in custody was taken into account.
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Posted: 01 Feb 2015 02:07 PM PST


A Russian bomber reported intercepted flying over the English Channel last week is purported to have carried a nuclear weapon.
Sources within the Ministry of Defence have revealed that one of the two long-range bombers was carrying at least one air-dropped “seek and find” nuclear missile, designed to seek and destroy a Vanguard submarine, Sunday Express, reported Sunday.
It said RAF Typhoon fighter jets were scrambled on Wednesday after two long-range TU-95 “Bear” bombers were detected flying over the English Channel.
One senior RAF source reportedly said: “We downloaded conversations from the crew of one plane, who used a special word which meant the would-be attack was a training exercise.”
Both Prime Minister David Cameron and Defence Secretary Michael Fallon were alerted after cockpit conservations confirming the bomber’s nuclear payload were intercepted by a Norwegian military listening post, and shared with the MoD.
Now London-based journalist and former chief of Voice of Russia’s London Bureau Dmitry Linnik says: “This was no incursion. We are talking about the so-called zone of British interests, not British airspace. It was at least 25 miles out of British airspace.”
He said the UK was only following in the footsteps of the US and that “it is forming a hostile narrative to Russia, which has been going on for at least months now.”
The latest incident was described as “yet another in a series of deliberately provocative” measures by Russia.
Britain on Thursday summoned the Russian ambassador, criticizing the move.
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Posted: 01 Feb 2015 01:53 PM PST
Village of Bobodol, near Knin, in central Croatia.
Croatian government have gotten creditors on board a plan to erase the debts of some 60,000 poorest citizens. The “fresh start” scheme targets less than 1 percent of the entire debt, but is hoped to boost the economy in the long-term.
The unorthodox measure was voted for by the government on January 15 and comes into force on Monday. To be eligible to participate debtors must have no savings or property, have a debt no greater than about $5,100 and live on welfare or an income of no higher than $138 per month.
“We assess that this measure will be applicable to some 60,000 citizens,” Deputy Prime Minister Milanka Opacic said as he was introducing the bailout. “Thus they will be given a chance for a new start without a burden of debt.”
Some $31 million worth of bad debts are expected to be written off by creditors who have signed up to the government’s scheme. Those include several banks, telecommunication companies, major utilities, several major cities and municipalities as well as the government’s own tax agency. None will be refunded for their losses.
The program would return access to bank accounts to about 20 percent of the 317,000 Croatians, whose accounts were frozen in July last year due to debts. The entire population of the small Mediterranean nation is 4.4 million.
“This is the first time that any (Croatian) government is trying to solve this difficult problem and we are proud of it,” Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic told a cabinet session.
In addition to debt erasing Milanovic’s government is considering other measures to help its debt-stricken citizens amid the economic recession, which has been plaguing the country for six years in a row. Zagreb wants to follow the example of Bulgaria and fix a favorable exchange rate for mortgage loans taken in Swiss francs.
The Swiss currency was popular among lenders due to its long-running stability, and mortgage loans denominated in francs were popular in many Eastern European nations. But the economic turmoil in the Eurozone put pressure on the Swiss franc, which was pegged against the euro since 2011, when market volatility made investors rush to the Swiss safe-haven currency.


The pegging ended in mid-January, sending the franc’s value up 20 percent against other currencies. This led to franc-denominated debts costing much more for foreign borrowers.
Hungary was lucky to dodge the damage due to a program launched by the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban in 2011, which forced a conversion of franc-denominated mortgages into the Hungarian national currency at a fixed rate. Banks operating in the country took the hit, but now the Hungarian government is celebrating saving its citizens from a hard fall.
Poland and Romania are considering a similar move, while Croatia has amendments to its Credit Institutions Act already floating in the legislature.
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