Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Tuesday 9 February 2016

The European Union Times


Posted: 09 Feb 2016 05:29 AM PST

North Korea’s controversial satellite is “tumbling in orbit,” CBS News reports, citing US officials. Meanwhile, South Korea confirmed that the satellite has been successfully launched into orbit, but could not verify if it is functioning.
Experts are yet to validate any signals from the newly launched satellite, but CBS News correspondent David Martin quoted US officials as saying that the satellite was “tumbling in orbit.”
The signal is hard to pinpoint by outside players, as the satellite’s frequency is unknown.
The latest reported sighting of the satellite was over the Super Bowl stadium on Sunday. It was spotted just an hour after the game finished in Santa Clara, California.
“It passed almost directly overhead Silicon Valley, which is where I am and where the stadium is,” space observer Martyn Williams told AP. “The pass happened at 8:26 p.m., after the game. I would put it down to nothing more than a coincidence, but an interesting one.”
The missile launch took place over the weekend, with North Korea announcing that it had succeeded in placing “newly developed earth observation satellite Kwangmyongsong-4” into orbit soon after. Pyongyang said the purpose of the satellite would be to monitor the weather and to map the location of natural resources and forests.
The satellite was launched aboard a “carrier rocket Kwangmyongsong” that blasted off from the Sohae Space Center in Cholsan County.
A metal object believed to be a part of the rocket’s fairing – the nose cone which houses the payload – was discovered southeast of South Korea’s Jeju Island by a navy ship, an official from the country’s Defense Ministry said.
Seoul confirmed on Tuesday that the satellite has been successfully launched into orbit, but could not immediately verify if it was working as planned.
While the launch has been criticized internationally, US National Security Adviser Susan Rice also called the launch “a serious threat” to American interests.
“North Korea’s missile and nuclear weapons programs represent serious threats to our interests – including the security of some of our closest allies – and undermine peace and security in the broader region,” Rice said.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Pyongyang is acting against the norms of international law.
“It is obvious that such actions aggravate the situation on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia as a whole,” said the ministry, adding that the course of action chosen by Pyongyang can only prompt strong protest.
It also warned against “any unilateral steps that could lead to further development of tensions in the region.”
China’s Defense Ministry also described the rocket launch as a “second violation” of UN resolutions by North Korea in just over a month. “The launch threatens the international system of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, leading to further deterioration of the situation on the Korean Peninsula,” the ministry said in a statement.
North Korea notified the International Maritime Organization (IMO) prior to the rocket launch that it was putting an earth observation satellite into orbit, saying the launch would happen in the period February 8-25.
The launch, however, triggered concerns as being a possible long-range missile test. Pyongyang is banned from using ballistic missile technology under UN Security Council resolutions. An emergency meeting of the UN Security Council was scheduled to discuss the event.
Sunday’s launch is the sixth long-range missile test by the North. Last month North Korea claimed to have successfully tested a thermonuclear bomb. While many experts doubt that the nuclear device was indeed an H-bomb, the move prompted the US and its regional allies, Japan and South Korea, to seek tougher UN sanctions against North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s regime.
In response, the American THAAD (Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense) system, which is to be deployed in South Korea will have the sole purpose of monitoring North Korea, Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook told a briefing on Monday.
“It’s going to be focused on the threat posed by North Korea,” Cook said. “This is an alliance decision that we’re making with South Korea and we’re doing this in response to what the North Koreans have done, and that’s how it should be viewed.”
According to the South Korean Defense Ministry, Pyongyang has not yet worked out the reentry technology crucial in bringing a launched missile back into the atmosphere, which eliminates the possibility of a successful long-range nuclear bomb launch.
Meanwhile, there are reports that North Korea is preparing for its fifth nuclear test, Yonhap agency cited the South’s intelligence services as saying.
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Posted: 09 Feb 2016 04:31 AM PST

The head of Norway’s Police Security Service (SSP) warns that the importation of large numbers of migrants who fail to assimilate into western society could spark civil unrest and a groundswell of right-wing extremism.
During a security and defense conference in Sweden, Benedicte Bjørnland said that the recent surge in asylum seekers from Muslim countries could have “unfortunate consequences,” including violent clashes.
“One can not take for granted that new population groups automatically adapt to the norms and regulations in Norwegian society,” said Bjørnland. “New populations are not homogeneous, and they can bring their ethnic or religious differences from their homeland.”
Bjørnland went on to warn that the mass influx of migrants is fueling “radicalization” and and “extremist environment” amongst anti-immigrant groups.
Meanwhile, Anders Thornberg, head of Swedish Security Service, also said that the country is on its second highest threat level as a result of the growing presence of Islamist groups.
Bjørnland’s comments are similar in nature to those made by Norwegian Army Chief Odin Johannessen, who recently remarked that Europe must be prepared to “fight” to defend its values against the threat posed by radical Islam.
It was also revealed last month that the chief of the Swedish army General Anders Brännström has ordered his troops to prepare for a war in Europe against skilled opponents “within a few years”.
Back in December, Swiss army chief André Blattmann warned that the risk of social unrest in Europe was intensifying and that citizens should arm themselves.
“The threat of terror is rising, hybrid wars are being fought around the globe; the economic outlook is gloomy and the resulting migration flows of displaced persons and refugees have assumed unforeseen dimensions,” said Blattmann.
Top security experts in Germany also told Chancellor Angela Merkel last October that the middle class was becoming “radicalized” as a result of her open borders migrant policy and that domestic disorder could ensue as a result.
Meanwhile, in France, security forces have been making preparations for mass civil unrest and radicalized immigrants taking over entire neighborhoods.
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Posted: 09 Feb 2016 04:25 AM PST
Refugees disembark from the passenger ferry Blue Star arriving from the island of Lesbos at the port of Piraeus on January 31, 2016 in Athens.
A newly leaked report has revealed that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had threatened EU leaders with a flood of refugees unless Ankara was offered better funding to deal with the ongoing crisis.
On Monday, the euro2day.gr financial news website published what it claimed to be minutes of a November meeting between Erdogan, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, and EU President Donald Tusk.
The report does not state the exact date of the meeting but, according to Reuters, it was probably held on November 16, 2015 in Antalya on the sidelines of a G20 summit.
During the meeting, the EU officials were attempting to gain Turkey’s support for stemming the flow of Syrian asylum seekers pouring towards Europe, most of whom arrive in Europe after crossing the sea between Turkey and Greek islands.
“We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses… So how will you deal with migrants if you don’t get a deal? Kill the refugees?” Erdogan was quoted as saying.
He also demanded some six billion euros over two years. When the amount was denied by Juncker, Erdogan said that his country did not need the money anyway.
In the end, Turkey settled for three billion euros, earmarked for improving asylum seekers’ living conditions, revival of the country’s accession talks, and acceleration of visa-free travel for Turkish nationals in exchange for curtailing the number of refugees entering Greece.
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Posted: 09 Feb 2016 04:02 AM PST

For the first time, the Islamic State (IS, former ISIS, ISIL) has targeted France’s right-wing National Front (FN) party and its supporters in a statement on the pages of its French-language propaganda magazine.
In the latest issue of Dar al Islam, the jihadists published a photo of an FN rally with the caption “prime targets.”
“The question is no longer whether France will be hit again by attacks like those of November… The only relevant question is the next target and the date,” the text read, as cited by Le Figaro.
A photo of an FN rally with the accompanying quote was tweeted by Romain Caillet, an Islamist expert and historian of global jihadist movements.
In response, the secretary general of the National Front challenged Prime Minister Manual Valls on Twitter, asking him if he was “satisfied,” referring to the PM’s harsh rhetoric condemning the right-wing party. Speaking on France Inter in December, Valls described FN as “racist and anti-Semitic,” while claiming that if they won power in regional polls, it could lead to “civil war” in France.
Caillet suggested on Twitter that the threat from militants might have been provoked by the slogan “A vote for FN is a vote for IS,” which was coined by the President of the Regional Council of Burgundy during regional elections at the end of last year. The mantra was picked up by socialist MPs, who suggested that FN was trying to divide France –the same goal it said is being pursued by IS.
Meanwhile, the party’s vice president, Florian Philippot, tweeted that in targeting the FN, the jihadists were attacking the whole country.
In an interview to RFI on Monday Louis Aliot , another FN vice president, said that he has asked the Interior Ministry to take the “threat seriously” and “do everything to prevent the worst.”
The head of the FN party, Marine Le Pen, has been gaining popularity in the wake of the deadly terror attacks in Paris in November of 2015 through anti-immigrant rhetoric and criticism of the EU’s handling of the current refugee crisis. Despite a solid lead in the first round of regional elections last year, the FN failed to win a single region in the second round of the regional elections in December.
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Posted: 09 Feb 2016 03:56 AM PST

Jeb Bush won’t hold President Obama responsible for the direction the country is heading under his watch.
“I will not blame Barack Obama for anything,” Jeb Bush said to a N.H. crowd Sunday. “I got sick and tired of hearing him blame my brother and I will never do it to him.”
In other words, the establishment candidate won’t throw the establishment president under the bus, even though a lot of what’s wrong with this country is thanks to Obama.
Remember it was President Obama who signed Obamacare into law, the wealth-transfer scheme that impoverishes Americans through excessive healthcare costs while enriching the private, off-shore mega banks who wrote the law.
“Today health care in the United States costs 500%, approximately, that of the same technology purchased elsewhere in the first world,” Karl Denninger of Market Ticket wrote. “There are places where the ‘offset’ is only 200% but virtually nowhere that it runs the other way.”
“It is literally possible in many parts of the U.S. to buy a plane ticket to Narita, Japan, have an MRI done and read there and then fly back home for less than you will be charged for the same exam in your town.”
And it was Obama who has been trying to enact gun control via executive action outside Congress and outside law.
For one thing, Americans critical of government could have their Second Amendment rights restricted if psychologists diagnose them with “Oppositional Defiant Disorder” or a similar diagnosis as a result of Obama’s new gun control executive action.
“[Adults with Oppositional Defiant Disorder] feel misunderstood and disliked, hemmed in and pushed around,” according to Russell Barkley, Ph.D.. “Some feel like mavericks or rebels.”
In other words, an Obama-supporting psychologist could potentially diagnose conservatives and libertarians with “Oppositional Defiant Disorder” due to their criticism of authority, particularly the federal government, and then report them to the FBI as too “mentally unfit” to purchase a gun.
But don’t worry, Bush won’t blame Obama for the loss of your Second Amendment rights and the loss of your savings due to Obamacare.
“Everybody knows I’m in the Establishment, because my brother was a president and my dad was a president,” Bush added.
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Posted: 08 Feb 2016 02:22 PM PST

Madeleine Albright’s warning that women who don’t vote for Hillary are going to hell should probably be taken seriously given that Albright once justified the deaths of half a million Iraqi children, and almost certainly has a special place reserved in hades for herself.
“There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other… [some] don’t understand the importance of why young women have to support Hillary Clinton,” Albright said during a Clinton campaign event on Saturday.
The remark was another reference to what seems to be the Clinton campaign’s primary platform – ‘vote for Hillary because she has a v@gin@’.
The irony of Clinton constantly touting her feminist credentials is particularly disgusting given her past role in hiring people to terrorize women who alleged they were raped by Bill Clinton.
However, if you believe in the concept of hell, Madeleine Albright is guaranteed to have a one way ticket.
During a 60 Minutes interview in 1996, Albright, then Ambassador to the United Nations, infamously suggested that 500,000 dead Iraqi children due to UN sanctions was a price worth paying.

“We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?” Lesley Stahl asked Albright.
“We think the price is worth it,” Albright responded.
After receiving intense criticism, Albright later tried to back away from the callous comment, but still took time to accuse Stahl of engaging in “Iraqi propaganda” simply for asking the question.
Given that Alright believes that geopolitical motives justify the mass slaughter of children, it’s no surprise that she seems very familiar with the concept of hell as she approaches the age of 80.
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Posted: 08 Feb 2016 02:07 PM PST


GOP frontrunner Donald Trump confronted a Republican debate audience that repeatedly booed him during an exchange with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
Trump shushed Jeb Bush during their exchange. His large gathering of supporters did not like that.
Trump then took on the GOP debate audience.
Business Insider reported:
The audience loudly booed Trump, driving the back-and-forth off the rails. Trump said audience members were all members of the Republican establishment.
“That’s all of his donors and special interests out there,” Trump said of the people booing him. “That’s what it is. And by the way, let me just tell you: We needed tickets. You can’t get them. You know who has the tickets? … Donors, special interests, the people that are putting up the money. That’s who it is.”
The booing continued. Trump said he was self-funding his campaign, so Republican donors weren’t a fan of his candidacy.
“The reason they’re not loving me is I don’t want their money.
Trump was right. The audience was stacked against the GOP frontrunner.
Trump’s close associate Roger Stone tweeted out that the Trump camp was only given 20 tickets by the GOP!
Roger Stone’s Tweet: “The HOUSE is stacked- Trump Camp given ONLY 20 tickets- RNC Donors PURCHASED TICKETS- Hostile Establishment House #Trump2016”

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Posted: 08 Feb 2016 01:38 PM PST

The British Army is to deploy 1,600 troops in Jordan to take part in war games as preparation for a potential ‘confrontation’ between Russia and NATO member countries in Eastern Europe, the Daily Telegraph has reported.
Army sources told the paper that the exercise, which will simulate an Iraq invasion for the first time in over a decade, is not a prelude to sending ground troops to fight Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS, ISIL), rather Exercise Shamal Storm could be seen as a practice routine to fight off any potential Russian invasion of Ukraine or Eastern Europe.
“This isn’t a counter-Isil exercise. If anything, this is much more about us being prepared to join the US in Ukraine than it is in Syria,” a source said as cited by the Daily Telegraph, adding, “This is not the sort of kind of force you expect to roll into Aleppo to take on a bunch of jihadists.”
The aim of the exercise is to show, despite defense cuts, that the British Army would still be able to deploy a 30,000-strong force, which would include troops and military hardware, to any potential global hotspot.
In January, around 80 military vehicles were sent from the UK, bound for the Jordanian port of Aqaba. More than 300 will be used in total. The exercise will be held in the southwestern desert area of the country, while troops from three UK divisions will be taking part.
The operation will look to simulate “theater entry tactics,” while also setting up a field hospital and dealing with chemical and biological weapons. It will be the biggest operation since 2001, when the British Army held a large-scale drill in 2001 called Saif Sereea in Oman.
A spokesman for the British Army told the Daily Telegraph: “The exercise will test key evolving concepts such as the air deployment of a very high readiness field hospital and the latest explosives ordnance disposal and search capabilities, all of which will enable us to be more agile in deterring threats to the UK and its interests.”
The Russian government has on numerous occasions accused the West of scaremongering. In July, President Vladimir Putin told the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera that a potential Russian attack on NATO would be “insane,” adding that the alliance’s defense budget is 10 times that of Moscow’s.
“I think that only an insane person and only in a dream can imagine that Russia would suddenly attack NATO. I think some countries are simply taking advantage of people’s fears with regard to Russia. They just want to play the role of front-line countries that should receive some supplementary military, economic, financial or some other aid,” Putin said.
Putin stated that hypothetically the US may be looking to maintain a hypothetical external threat in order to maintain its leadership of the NATO community.
On February 2, the Pentagon announced it wanted to quadruple its budget for Europe from $789 million to $3.4 billion in 2017, in order to deter “Russian aggression.”
The budget boost is expected to allow more US forces to be stationed in Europe and for them to take part in more training and exercise routines with local troops in Central and Eastern Europe.
“While we do not desire conflict of any kind with any of these nations – and let me be clear, though they pose some similar defense challenges they are very different nations and situations – we also cannot blind ourselves to the actions they appear to choose to pursue,” US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter said.
NATO has significantly increased its military presence along Russia’s borders, including in the Baltic States and Eastern Europe, since Russia’s reunification with Crimea in 2014 and the outbreak of conflict in eastern Ukraine. The alliance accuses Moscow of providing support to Ukrainian rebels, who rejected the armed coup in Kiev.
In late August and September 2015, NATO conducted the biggest airborne drills in Europe since the end of the Cold War. About 5,000 soldiers from 11 NATO member states participated in the “simultaneous multinational airborne operations.”
Russia’s national security chief Nikolay Patrushev accused Washington of trying to weaken Russia and did not exclude the US of wanting to break up the country.
“The US leadership has set an objective – to dominate the world. Therefore they don’t need a strong Russia. On the contrary, they want to weaken our country as much as possible,” the head of Russia’s Security Council said in January.
He also added that NATO’s expansion towards Russia’s borders poses a threat to Moscow’s national security.
“To understand NATO’s objectives, one needs to realize that NATO’s leadership strictly sticks to the US agenda. Washington skillfully uses the anti-Russian stance of its eastern members to neutralize ‘excessively independent’ members of the alliance (France, Germany and Italy).”
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Posted by Roberto Abraham Scaruffi at 20:27