‘Absolute No Go’: German Police Officers Injured in Clashes with Bicycle-Throwing Asylum Seekers

FILE PHOTO: Police officers walk on the premises of the Stephansposching refugee shelter, Germany,

October 24, 2018. ©  Global Look Press / Armin Weigel

Five police officers have been injured in violent clashes with asylum seekers, who have staged a riot in a shelter in the state of Bavaria, Germany. German crime statistics also show that migrant violence is becoming a new trend.

Police were deployed to a large refugee shelter located in the small Bavarian community of Stephansposching on Friday evening following reports of asylum seekers going on a rampage. When the officers arrived at the scene, they were confronted by a group of some 30 aggressive refugees and migrants, Bavarian Radio reports, citing police.

The officers were harassed and even spit at in the face from the very start. The situation then dramatically escalated when they attempted to detain the alleged ringleader. In response, the group assaulted the officers and started beating them. Some asylum seekers even threw bicycles at them.

The rioters then attempted to prevent the police from leaving, with one man jumping at a police car’s side window while others built barricades and blocked the shelter gates with stones and cable-reels to stop them from escaping the scene. The officers, apparently, had to leave their car there as, according to Bavarian Radio, they only managed to flee the scene by getting over a construction fence.

It was only after large reinforcements arrived that the police finally managed to restore order in the facility. Five police officers, who were initially caught in the riot, sustained various injuries, including cuts as well as eye and rib injuries. Four of them were admitted to hospital.

Police initially detained 15 people but only six of them were arrested. Those arrested face charges of a serious breach of the peace and property damage, as well as resistance to law enforcement and assault. The suspected ringleader initially managed to flee the shelter as the officers were assaulted by other rioters and the police had to use a helicopter to track him down. He eventually surrendered to police several hours later.

A regional police union chief condemned the incident in Stephansposching by calling it absolutely unacceptable, and decrying the lack of respect the asylum seekers demonstrated to the police. “This is an absolute no go,” he told Bavarian Radio, adding that it is “troubling that police officers were injured in the refugee shelter again.”

Again?

It is not the first time Germany’s refugee shelters hit the news following violent clashes between police and asylum seekers. In early May, police officers and a rescue service crew were pelted with stones and bottles as they sought to retrieve the body of a woman who was found dead on the premises of another shelter in the Bavarian town of Regensburg.

A group of some 40 asylum seekers gathered in front of the shelter and sought to prevent German law enforcement from entering the building. The officers were again harassed and attacked by the refugees and migrants, who later retreated to the shelter and barricaded themselves inside, while pelting the police with stones and bottles which they threw from the windows.

In the end, 20 patrol cars and 50 officers were needed to stop the riot. No one was injured in the incident, though. According to the Bild daily, there were also “no indications” that the dead woman in the shelter had fallen victim of a crime.

So, what was the point of the rioting?

Migrant violence against Germans on the rise – police

A recent German police report published in April paints an even grimmer picture as it indicates that the number of violent crimes perpetrated by migrants and refugees against Germans has been on the increase in recent years.

Of course it has. How could it not be so? It will continue to get worse. Mother Merkel has picked a good time to abandon the ship she so effectively scuttled in 2015.

One in ten victims of violent offenses in Germany in 2018 had been assaulted by migrants, the German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) said. The statistics on “violent crimes” included murders and contract hits, sexual assaults as well as particularly brutal physical abuse and robberies. Out of about one million victims of such crimes in Germany last year, 102,000 were assaulted by migrants. The number of such crimes committed by immigrants and asylum seekers against Germans increased by seven percent in comparison to 2017, the police said.

In particular, 230 Germans have been victims of attempted murders and contract hits, in which at least one non-German citizen was identified as a suspect – twice as many as in 2017. More than 100 people were killed.

More than 3,200 Germans were sexually assaulted by immigrants and asylum seekers in 2018, police added. The total number of violent crimes committed by foreigners against Germans has risen by 19 percent in comparison to 2017.

At the same time, only 8,455 asylum seekers and refugees were victims of violent crimes – mostly infliction of bodily harm – perpetrated by Germans. That amounts to 18 percent of all violence-related cases, in which foreigners seeking protection in Germany were registered as victims. In most cases, refugees and asylum seekers were attacked by other non-Germans, according to police.

‘They are Undesirable & They Must Feel It’: Denmark to Ship Unwanted Refugees to Remote Island

Denmark's Backlash against Islamization continues

Lindholm Island © Google Maps

Denmark will send rejected asylum seekers to live on a remote island. Located in the freezing Baltic Sea, the island is currently home to animal research laboratories and crematoria.

"If you are unwanted in Danish society, you should not be a nuisance to ordinary Danes,” immigration minister Inger Støjberg wrote in a Facebook post on Friday. “They are undesirable in Denmark and they must feel it!”

Rejected asylum seekers are more than a nuisance, they are a significant danger to ordinary Danes. Rejected asylum seekers have been responsible for several acts of violence and/or terrorism in Europe. If they can't be immediately deported, then they must be segregated from the rest of society.

The island, Lindholm, sits in an inlet of the Baltic Sea, about two miles from the nearest shore. Around 100 rejected asylum seekers and criminal immigrants will be sent to live there, and will be required to check in daily with authorities there, or face jail. Ferry service to the island is infrequent, and one of the boats serving the island is reportedly named the ‘Virus’, a reference to the contagious animal disease research center currently occupying the island.

The plan was agreed upon by Denmark’s ruling centrist Venstre party, and the more right-wing Danish People’s Party, as part of annual budget negotiations.

While Venstre may have been looking for votes to secure its budget plan, the People’s Party is looking to take the hardest line on immigration.

“We’re going to minimize the number of ferry departures as much as at all possible,” party spokesman Martin Henriksen told TV2. “We’re going to make it as cumbersome and expensive as possible.”

Experiencing the same influx of refugees and migrants as its Scandinavian neighbors since 2015, Denmark’s government has adopted harsh measures to push unwanted arrivals out. Rejected asylum seekers or migrants with criminal records are held in emergency accommodation, where they live on a pittance, or are deported if possible.

“It’s not easy to ask families to go home, if they’ve actually settled,” Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said last month. “But it is the morally right thing. We should not make refugees immigrants.”

Støjberg has been a key author of her government’s anti-immigration policies. In March, she marked the passing of her 50th anti-immigration measure by celebrating with a cake decorated with fruit, the Danish flag, and the number ‘50.’

Among Støjberg’s 50 regulations is one requiring newly arrived asylum-seekers to hand over their valuables and jewelry to help pay for their stay in Denmark, and a separate law imposing identity checks along the border with Germany.

“We’re doing everything in our power to make sure that it is not attractive to come to Denmark,” Støjberg told Der Spiegel in 2016.

It's amazing that they would do this, but far more amazing that they would admit to it. I'm surprised the rest of the EU, and especially the far-left Nordic countries are not screaming and yelling and running around with their hair on fire.

The government has also targeted settled immigrants, who it says often live in “parallel societies.” In July, as part of a series of measures aimed at eradicating immigrant ghettos, the government announced tougher criminal penalties, lower benefits, and mandatory integration classes for those living in ghettos.

A controversial ‘burqa ban’ was introduced earlier this summer, and legislation that would force legal immigrants to shake hands with officials at their naturalization ceremony is currently making its way through Parliament. Some Muslims had refused to shake hands with officials of the opposite sex, prompting a backlash from conservative politicians.

Asylum applications in Denmark have dropped by 84 percent between 2015 and 2018. The country is home to some 500,000 non-western immigrants, mostly hailing from Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, and Somalia.

Lindholm Is., Denmark

Rejected Asylum-Seeker ‘Slit Throat’ of Elderly German Man Who Gave Him Job & Shelter at His Home

The scene of crime. © dpa / Axel Heimken via Global Look Press

An Afghan migrant has been arrested in Germany for allegedly slitting the throat of an elderly man whose home he worked in. The man’s daughter, a charity worker, had suggested he hire the asylum seeker.

Arriving in Germany with no job, the 20-year-old Afghan was given a helping hand by the victims’ daughter, a refugee aid worker. Last August he was hired to work as the 85-year-old man’s carer, and he was hired again over the weekend to carry out some gardening and cleaning work around the house.

The asylum seeker repaid his hosts’ kindness in blood. In the early hours of Saturday morning, the Afghan allegedly took a knife to the victim’s throat, killing him as he slept, before stealing the man’s car and fleeing the scene, public prosecutors announced on Sunday.

The victim was identified as Dietrich P., while the suspect’s name is being withheld, as is standard practice in Germany. Dietrich P. lived in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, where German tabloid Bild reports he had been active in the agricultural wing of the socialist GDR party that ruled East Germany during the Cold War.

“Everyone here knew Dietrich,” a neighbor told Bild. “He was always friendly and helpful. It's unbelievable that this could happen to us.”

Dietrich’s daughter met the young man at a refugee center in Zwickau district in the state of Saxony, where she was volunteering and where the Afghan was living at the time.

According to the prosecutors, the murder was witnessed by a Bosnian man, who was working as a live-in carer to the aging Dietrich. The Bosnian carer saw the murder on a baby monitor he had installed to check on Dietrich, and at first thought that the Afghan was leaning over Dietrich to straighten his blankets.

Only later did he realize the grizzly reality, and called the police.

The suspect apparently stole a car and tried to flee, but crashed the vehicle and continued on foot. He was intercepted by a police patrol and taken to hospital, but was soon identified as a wanted person and detained. A judge ordered him to be placed into pre-trial custody.

The state police said the suspect has no criminal record in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and that they were checking with law enforcement in other parts of Germany for more information about him. It is known that the man’s claim for asylum was rejected and that his permission to stay is to expire at the end of January 2019.

The police said the Afghan man had not stolen anything from Dietrich’s house and that he has not spoken about the murder.

Interior Minister for Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Lorenz Caffier warned against using the crime for political speculation. After a spate of Afghan crimes in Germany, Caffier’s call echoes that of UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi in September.

Sending Afghans home, Grandi said, is a “complex issue,” despite a series of much-publicized attacks by Afghan nationals, like a stabbing in Chemnitz, a rape in a Berlin elementary school this September, and the rape and drowning of a teenage girl in Freiburg in 2016.

Nevertheless, it seems German authorities are more concerned about the welfare of Afghans who have been deemed unfit for asylum in Germany, than they are for innocent Germans. If a person is refused asylum, he should be sent back immediately. Whatever the obstacles to that, they are not worth the rape and murder of innocent people.

Mecklenburg-Vorpommern

On Other Side of Border, Mexico Detaining Thousands of Migrant Children

By Patrick Timmons

Mexican immigration officials in Tamaulipas state give instructions to a group of Central American

immigrants intercepted as they crossed the country on Feb. 3. Photo by José Martínez/EPA-EFE

MEXICO CITY,  UPI  -- As the United States grapples with the separation of immigrant families, the same thing is happening across the border in Mexico.

When families with children are caught inside Mexico without papers, they are often detained in prison-like conditions and adolescents are often split from their parents.

Mexican law prohibits detaining migrant children, but it happens anyway because state-run children's shelters lack the capacity to handle the tens of thousands of children, mostly from Central American countries. Instead, Mexican immigration authorities detain children and their families and then deport them together after 60 days if there is no political asylum petition.

Official statistics show Mexico detained 16,191 migrant children from January to July 2018. Of those 8,662 were between the ages of 12 and 17; 7,529 were under age 12. Those under 12 are housed with their families; adolescents are detained separately.

Most of those apprehended under age 12 were traveling with at least one adult family member, but 432 were traveling without family.

Migrant advocates in Mexico have renewed their calls for the Mexican government to improve how it treats the migrant families and children it detains after the outcry this summer over the Trump administration's policy of separating families at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Not a crime in Mexico

Unlike in the United States, Mexico does not criminalize the unauthorized entry of migrants, Madeleine Penman, Amnesty International's Mexico researcher, told UPI. When immigration agents discover migrants without papers they take them into custody, placing them in migrant detention centers until they are deported.

It's a policy known as "assisted return," Penman said, noting that Mexico only uses the term deportation for migrants who have violated their visa conditions.

"In 2016, more than 40,000 children were detained in immigration detention. In 2017, child detentions decreased to about 18,000, with the decline mostly because of reduced migration through Mexico. But this year, child detentions have picked up again and 16,000 children have already been through migrant detention centers," Penman said, citing official statistics from Mexico's National Migration Institute.

Most of the migrant children detained by Mexico this year come from the Central American countries of El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. For those under 12, almost 3,500 came from Honduras and almost 3,000 came from Guatemala, with most of these accompanied by family members.

"We've seen a number of cases of babies in detention for weeks on end, and there are mothers breastfeeding in detention centers," Penman said.

Conditions in migrant detention

"The problem is that officials -- out of negligence, out of will, or lack of capacity -- are not able to enforce the law in Mexico prohibiting child detention," said Ximena Suárez Enríquez, the Washington Office on Latin America's assistant director for Mexico, a human rights lobbyist in Washington, D.C.

Mexican immigration authorities can only detain irregular migrants. Political asylum seekers are not detained and are instead released into the community until their application is processed and approved.

Mexico's Human Rights Ombudsman has a dedicated office for migrant rights, headed by Edgar Corzo. The ombudsman has called for Mexican authorities to comply with the law prohibiting detention of migrant children.

The ombudsman issued a recommendation for implementing effective migrant child protection in May in a case of an adolescent Honduran girl arrested in Guanajuato and held in Mexico City's Iztapapala migrant detention facility, where she was raped. She filed a complaint against the facility. But Mexico's immigration authorities deported her to Honduras before an investigation could occur.

Lack of legal protection

Many of the state-run community shelters are similar to the migrant detention facilities, afflicted by negligence, abuse and lack of legal protection.

"Mexican federal and state laws are meant to protect all children," said Alberto Xicotencatl Carrasco, director of the Casa del Migrante in Saltillo, a migrant shelter run by the Catholic Church. "But what happens with migrant children and their families is that federal and state authorities pass the buck off between each other, leaving children in legal limbo and so children do not receive appropriate protection."

"There are many unaccompanied children and the federal immigration authorities send them to state-run children's shelters. But these shelters aren't equipped to provide these children with legal representation and so the child just remains in the shelter. Should they be given political asylum or repatriated? The state-run shelter cannot handle those questions. We have seen cases where unaccompanied migrant children are in state-run shelters for more than a year because they don't have legal representation and they don't have legal status in Mexico," Carrasco said.

The detention facilities and state-run community shelters in Tapachula, Chiapas, illustrate the problems. It's the first Mexican city many migrants encounter traveling north from Guatemala en route to the United States.

Tapachula's migrant detention center is Mexico's largest, and a hub for Mexico's detention of Central Americans crossing from Guatemala. Other large migrant detention facilities are in Veracruz and Mexico City.

In 2015 and 2016, a Citizen's Council with unprecedented access to Mexico's migrant detention centers calculated that 2,000 Central American children arrived in Tapachula each month.

Tapachula's state-run children's shelter has capacity for 64 children.

The children's shelters' minuscule capacity means that Tapachula's migrant detention facility is the only facility Mexican authorities can use to house children detained by immigration authorities.

Hope for change

Migrant advocates are hopeful for change with Mexico's new president taking office on Dec. 1. Corzo recently called on president-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador to end the practice of detaining migrant children.

López Obrador campaigned on a message of wanting Mexico to welcome migrants. His nominee for Interior Minister, Olga Sanchez, also said she wants "a more humane, more empathetic policy" toward migrants. The Interior Ministry runs Mexico's immigration enforcement system.

Sanchez said last week Mexico would not be a policeman for migrants for the United States.

Until, and unless the USA gets involved in improving the lives of people in Central America, this migration will continue. America is of the habit of taking from 3rd world countries and is reaping the consequences of that most unChristian attitude. It's time to start giving back or become part of Latin America with its uncontrollable crime, violence and corruption.

Controversial Germany-Spain Deal on Migrants Comes into Force

Germany takes advantage of left-leaning government in Madrid

African migrants react after crossing the border from Morocco to Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta, Spain

August 7, 2017. / Reuters

As a Berlin-Madrid deal to send back migrants coming though Spain comes into force, critics call it a "symbolic" gesture aimed to calm the political storm in Germany but that will not solve the migrant crisis.

Germany reached a deal on Wednesday for Spain to take back previously registered migrants who show up at the German border. The move is seen as the first step towards implementing a deal which Merkel earlier reached within the ruling coalition to defuse the political dispute in Germany over migration.

Under the Wednesday agreement, migrants picked up at the German border who previously registered in Spain will be returned there within 48 hours, German Interior Ministry spokeswoman Eleonore Petermann said.

While Berlin portrays the deal as a breakthrough in the current gridlock over migrants, some Spanish port cities are concerned there are not enough resources to cope with the new arrivals. On Thursday, the mayor of the Andalusian city, Algeciras, one of the largest ports in Europe, criticized the recent arrival of an NGO rescue ship carrying 87 migrants.

José Ignacio Landaluce told local media that as mayor, he has "to ensure citizens' interests" and that he doesn't want a "social imbalance."

"The Spanish have big hearts, yes, but on this issue we have to use our heads, because there is not enough money," he said.  

Spain overtook Italy to become the largest European gateway for asylum seekers traveling across the Mediterranean, according to recent data from the International Organization for Migration. Over 24,000 have arrived on Spanish shores so far this year – three times more than in 2017.

The vulnerability of the Spanish borders was seen in a recent incident in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, a hub for African migrants trying to reach Europe. In late July, hundreds of asylum seekers attempted to cross into Spain from Morocco, and most of them succeeded. 

Symbolic agreement?

Rafael Ripoll, the president of the right-wing Spanish party Respeto, says that Spain is blindly following orders from Germany. "The only purpose of this symbolic agreement is to help Merkel save face before her own government, which is in trouble right now. And of course, Spain is going to obediently take whatever Merkel throws at us," he told RT.

Ripoll believes that Europe – particularly Spain – can't take in more migrants. "Every week, we see problems plaguing Spanish cities, all because there is no way to control the inflow of migrants, and because there is no way to give jobs to the newcomers."

Meanwhile, "thousands of skilled young Spanish people" are leaving the country every month because the state fails to provide them with opportunities, Ripoll said. "We've made the biggest mistake a nation can make: we have forsaken our own children to take in others."

Merkel's coalition nearly fell apart in June over a rift caused by the migrant crisis. German Interior Minister and Bavaria's Christian Social Union (CSU) leader Horst Seehofer threatened to resign if the influx of asylum seekers to Germany wasn't curbed. A compromise was eventually reached after it was agreed that Germany will prevent migrants registered elsewhere from entering the country and will return them to the point of their departure. However, the political damage had already been done – recent polls show a record decline in the ratings of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's ruling coalition.

Europe is currently experiencing the biggest refugee crisis since WWII. The number of asylum applications reached 650,000 in 2017. 

Europe Struggling to Deal with Migrants, Jihadists, Terrorists and Other Muslims

New interior minister vows end to ‘refugee camp’ Italy

© Giovanni ISOLINO / AFP

Italy’s newly sworn-in minister of the interior and one of the leaders of the Euroskeptic coalition, Matteo Salvini, has assured Italians that he’s ready to fight illegal immigration and fulfill his election promises.

Only days after the long-awaited government was formed, the leader of the League party travelled to Sicily, where he confirmed that he intends to initiate a massive crackdown on migrants, declaring that “the free ride is over.”

“As the minister of interior, I will collaborate with the European and African states to do everything I can to avoid more deaths [in the Mediterranean], avoid that thousands of desperate people deceive themselves that, here in Sicily, there are houses and jobs for everyone,” Salvini said during his visit to one of the migrant “hot spots” in Sicily.

According to a poll conducted by Quorum in 2017, 68 percent of Italian voters have a negative view of immigration.

Many people applauded when Salvini said that “Italy and Sicily cannot be Europe's refugee camp” anymore, and that Italy needed to create deportation centers.

Not everyone is in favor of Salvini’s tough migration policies, however. There were those who heard dangerous notes in his speeches in Sicily, with protesters shouting “Salvini, go home!”“Shame on you!” and bluntly calling him “racist.”

Salvini’s anti-immigrant initiative has also been dismissed as unrealistic by critics like journalist Oscar Giannino, who on his radio program ‘La Versione di Oscar’ raised doubts about whether the new interior minister had properly evaluated all the difficulties involved in repatriating over 500,000 people.

However, during his visit to Sicily, Salvini emphasized that his was not a “hard line against migrants,” but simply “a line of commonsense.” With “€5 billion spent to keep migrants in hotels,” it would be better to reallocate this money and send them back home to their countries of origin and invest in their future, he said. This was especially so because not all of them were asylum seekers, as they declared themselves to be, he said.

“They are not asylum seekers, because someone arriving from Tunisia isn’t escaping any war,” the minister said.

Widely criticized by the European community for his anti-migrant rhetoric, the League’s leader insisted that he wanted to safeguard the interests of common Italians.

“They either help us to safeguard our boundaries, save lives, and ensure the security of our country or we will have to take a different path,” the minister said, responding to the criticism.

In light of the forthcoming meeting of EU interior ministers in Luxembourg to discuss the EU’s “Dublin” rule, Salvini emphasized that the problem of immigration could not be solely an Italian problem anymore. The Dublin rule, under which migrants have to file for asylum in the first EU state in which they arrive, had serious repercussions for Italy, which remains the favorite spot for migrants crossing the Mediterranean Sea in smugglers' boats. It was forced to receive over 700,000 refugees since 2013.

Most refugees, who had initially intended to move to countries in northern Europe, never made it there because of stricter border controls in France, Austria and Switzerland.

Europe’s largest prison housing radicalized inmates

‘starting to explode’

© Christian Hartmann / Reuters

A major French prison, which houses more than a hundred radicalized inmates, is overcrowded, understaffed and “starting to explode,” a correctional officers’ union warns. It says the guards suffer attacks and commit suicide.

Europe’s largest prison Fleury-Merogis is in dire condition, the representative of the CGT Penitentiaries Union told RT. “Every day in France, there are prison supervisors who are attacked violently; every day we have security problems because all the proposals are not yet in place,” Ambroise Koubi said. He added that the authorities offered to send in extra 1,100 supervisors, but so far it didn’t happen.

“Fleury-Merogis is starting to explode already. Because we are tired of this. You are the first TV channel I’m telling this to, but yesterday we had a suicide,” Koubi said, adding that the prison had 10 other suicide cases since January, with supervisors among the victims.

The prison, situated north of Paris, (Google Maps, below, shows it in the south of Paris) housed several well-known jihadists. Among them was Salah Abdeslam, who organized the Paris shootings in November 2015, Amedy Coulibaly, who attacked a kosher store in January 2015, and the Charlie Hebdo attacker Cherif Kouachi. The jail currently has over 120 radicalized inmates, says the penitentiaries union official.

Koubi told RT that the existing staff isn’t enough to maintain an overcrowded jail. “On one floor, the supervisor can have between 100-130 detainees to manage,” he said. “Just imagine how hard it is to manage all these prisoners.”

The prison guards staged several protests in the past, decrying the lack of attention towards poor working conditions inside and the radicalization of inmates. In January, they managed to block the entrance to the prison for a few hours and clashed with riot police.

Overall, there are more than 500 terrorists currently behind bars in France’s prisons, with 1,200 more inmates considered to be radicalized, according to the French Justice Minister. The government is set to release 40 convicted terrorists within two years.

The country’s public anti-terrorism prosecutor voiced concern over the plans. “There is a major risk of seeing people who are not at all repentant at the end of their sentence come out of prison, who could even be more radical given their stay in prison,” Francois Molins told French BFM TV channel last week.

No kidding! The solution is not a very good one, but I haven't heard any better. The solution is to declare radicalized Muslims insane, for they surely are, and then lock them up until they renounce Mohammed and the Quran. If they are unable to do that then they should remain in a secure facility or be deported.

Jihadis and far-right extremists to be targeted in UK's renewed counter-terrorism strategy

The new measures will give security services greater powers to intervene in terror plots

© Luke MacGregor/Reuters

The Home Office has announced an overhauled counter-terrorism strategy that includes the closer monitoring of British jihadists and a new approach to targeting the growing threat of far-right extremism.

Home Secretary Sajid Javid has announced the new measures as part of efforts to revamp the security service’s Contest strategy, which will utilize a multi-agency approach in order to tackle terrorist threats that are becoming “increasingly diverse.”

Javid has previously described his family's heritage as Muslim but clarified that he himself does not practise any religion.[6][66] He received religious hate mail in the form of a "Punish a Muslim day" parcel; as of March 2018, he was the fifth British MP to receive such abuse.[67]

Normally, when I quote Wikipedia, as I did immediately above, I remove footnote references. I didn't this time because it struck me as hilarious.

I was horrified when his name was announced as the new Home Secretary, but having read about him, I have to say I am very impressed; and I like what he's doing here.

As part of the renewed strategy, technology companies will have greater responsibility in tackling cases of extremism online, while Javid has called for greater cooperation with businesses when they spot worrying buying-patterns, or suspicious behavior while hiring a vehicle, purchasing chemicals, or components that could be combined to make explosives.

An additional 1,000 security services staff will also be recruited to collect and analyze data as well as keep suspects under better surveillance, and powers will be granted with the intention to disrupt terrorist plots and jail suspects before an attack could take place.

MI5 and counter terrorism police are currently running more than 500 live operations involving roughly 3,000 'subjects of interest'.

At the Contest relaunch, Javid said that there had been a “step change” in the threat from terrorism. He also drew a comparison between Islamist extremists and far-right terrorists.

The Home Secretary said the UK will still identify “the biggest threat is from Islamist terrorism,” including Al-Qaeda and “Daesh,” the Arabic term used for Islamic State, he will also identify far-right extremism as a growing cause for concern.

“...Extreme right-wing terrorism is also an increasing threat," Javid said on Monday. "Both exploit grievances, distort the truth, and undermine the values that hold us together."

Of course, right-wing extremism grows because the government does so little in controlling Muslim immigration and in curbing Muslim men's violent behaviour toward young, White, British girls. Many are being prosecuted now, but there is still a profound reluctance in many areas to clamp down on Pakistani child sex exploiters.

"Our greatest strength lies not only in what we do but who we are and the values and freedoms we hold dear," Javid added."That is why everyone has a part to play in confronting terrorism. I want to say to all those who stand up against all forms of extremism that this government stands with you. I stand with you. But there is more for us all to do."

The announcement comes the day after the first anniversary of the London Bridge and Borough Market terrorist attacks where eight people were murdered by jihadists.

Javid also reaffirmed his support for the government’s much criticized Prevent program, which aims to avoid radicalization and extremism. This will see MI5 warn teachers and police about terrorism suspects in future.

Labour Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott, however, has called for Prevent to be reviewed, claiming it can be counterproductive, according to the Guardian.

Earlier this year, it was reported that anti-fracking and animal rights activists were being included in Prevent training, with Merseyside Police likening them to jihadists and neo-Nazis.

Since March last year, security services and police claim to have thwarted 12 jihadist and four far-right terror plots.

Switzerland to inspect Facebook and Twitter profiles

of asylum seekers

File photo © Kai Pfaffenbach / Reuters

Asylum seekers in Switzerland could soon have their social media profiles reviewed as part of their application processes, according to local media reports.

The newspaper ‘NZZ am Sonntag’ reported that Swiss authorities will inspect data from an applicant’s Facebook and Twitter accounts to investigate claims of asylum. A spokesperson for the State Secretariat for Migration told the newspaper that the information published on these sites can cultivate a better understanding of a person’s circumstances.

"From the information that asylum seekers publish on social networks, it may be possible to draw conclusions that may be of importance for the asylum procedure such as references to family relationships," the spokesperson said in a statement cited by SwissInfo.

Quite frankly, I'm astonished to see this report. Astonished that is isn't already being done everywhere in Europe and America. 

A working group has now been established to set down rules around how and under what conditions information on social media can be accessed.

Advocates for the strategy cite the case of a Nigerian man who applied for asylum in Switzerland in 2016 amid claims that he had been persecuted in his own country. After finding pictures the man’s wife had posted online, investigators learned that he had not come from Nigeria but from Spain, where he had been living under a different name. A deportation order was appealed by the man’s lawyers on the grounds that the man’s privacy had been violated. The appeal was rejected by a federal court.

According to the non-profit group Swiss Refugee Council, Switzerland received more than 18,000 applications for asylum last year, including a record number from people living in other European countries. The majority of applications from outside Europe were from people from Eritrea, Syria and Afghanistan.

Austrian Gov't Calls for ‘Restrictive Asylum Policy’ Amid Growing Crime Rate by Foreigners

The New Normal - Austria

Austria's Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (L) and Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache in Seggau, Austria, on January 5, 2018. © Heinz-Peter Bader / Reuters

The number of crimes committed by “foreigners” in Austria increased to 40 percent of the total in 2016, a new government report says. Interior Minister Herbert Kickl says a “strict asylum policy” is needed to tackle the issue.

In 2016, some 500,000 offenses were registered in Austria, with 40 percent of them being committed by “foreigners,” a new security report presented by the Interior Ministry says. According to Kickl, the number of foreign offenders increased by 13 percent.

Unfortunately, this article does not articulate what exactly is meant by the term 'foreigner', but Wikipedia identifies 10% of the Austrian population as 'foreigners', as of 2006. Half of them are from the former Yugoslavia and Turkey. It is probably safe to assume that at least 11% of the current population is 'foreign'.

This means that about 11% of the population is responsible for 40% of crime. Also, it means that 89% of the population is responsible for 60% of crime. So, out of a pop of 8.75m, less approximately 1 million foreigners, that leaves 7.75m non-foreigners to commit 300,000 crimes. That is a crime rate of less than 0.04%.

The other side of the coin reveals approximately 1 million people responsible for 200,000 crimes which results in a crime rate of 0.2% - 5 times the rate of non-foreigners.

The Austrian vice chancellor and head of the right-wing populist Freedom Party (FPO), Heinz-Christian Strache, also told journalists following the government meeting that asylum seekers accounted for almost 46 percent of foreign offenders. He described the figure as “significant” and called for a stricter refugee policy.

Here, also is a staggering statistic. At most, there are 150,000 asylum seekers in the country, and probably considerably less than that. So, that makes up 15% of the foreign population, or less, but account for almost half of the offenses committed by foreigners. So the issue is getting much worse and will continue to unless significant measures are taken.

“This shows that those who come to us to allegedly seek protection are also those from whom we then have to protect the Austrian people,” Strache said, as cited by the Kronen Zeitung daily. Kickl and Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, the head of the conservative People’s Party (OVP), have both called for a “tough” and “restrictive” asylum policy.

Ahead of the government meeting, Kickl told the Austrian ORF broadcaster that “a restrictive asylum policy is absolutely necessary” in the view of the latest security data. He went on to say that it should be particularly aimed at “preventing large masses of people from coming into [our] country in an uncontrollable manner.”

Kickl particularly called for accelerated asylum proceedings and deportation of failed asylum seekers. Other measures proposed by the minister include allowing the authorities to access refugees’ smartphones as well as introducing mandatory age checks for asylum seekers.

Following the government meeting on Wednesday, Kurz and Strache also said that they would stick to their election promises and enhance security in Austria. The new government was sworn in last month, swaying sharply to the right of the political spectrum with the inclusion of the FPO in the coalition.

In October’s parliamentary election, the FPO, known for its hardline anti-immigrant stance, came in third with 26 percent of the vote. Strache’s party clinched a deal to form a coalition with the OVP led by Kurz, who also took a more hardline stance on immigration.

Anti-immigrant sentiment appeared to grow in Austria after it was overwhelmed by a wave of asylum seekers fleeing war and persecution during the refugee crisis. Since 2015, the country has taken in some 150,000 asylum seekers, which accounts for over 1 percent of its population, one of the largest shares per capita alongside Sweden.

Austria's serious swing to the right of the political spectrum should be a warning call to Sweden, Holland and other left-leaning governments in Europe who hide statistics like these from their people in order to protect the growing criminal element invading Europe. Of course most migrants are not criminals, but governments need to do a much, much better job at removing those who are from the incoming migration. The alternative is to watch their country lurch sharply to the right.

Strache has previously offered controversial proposals concerning asylum policy. He recently suggested housing asylum seekers in barracks, adding that a curfew could be imposed to keep them there. Later, he clarified that the government so far had no such plans and that his idea was currently off the table.

220+ Flights To Repatriate Rejected Asylum Seekers from Germany Canceled

Protest against deporting migrants who were denied asylum at Duesseldorf Airport.

© Wolfgang Rattay / Reuters

Looks like 7 people to me. Why Reuters thought this was newsworthy is beyond me?

German pilots refused to fly flights to deport rejected asylum seekers in 2017, leading to the cancellation of more than 220 flights over “security” concerns.

A freedom of information request revealed that some 222 flights scheduled to repatriate rejected asylum seekers back to their countries of origin were forced to be canceled over the course of 2017. 

Deutsche Welle reports that 140 of the canceled flights were to take off from Frankfurt Airport, which is the largest in the country. Dusseldorf Airport, where activist groups regularly hold demonstrations against deportations, saw 40 flights canceled.

According to Lufthansa, however, its staff view deportees as regular passengers, and any flight cancellations are made “on a case by case basis” and only due to “security reasons.”

“The decision not to carry a passenger is ultimately made by the pilot on a case by case basis. If he or she had the impression that flight safety could be affected, he must refuse to transport the passenger,” spokesman Michael Lamberty was quoted by the Westdeutsche Allgeimeine Zeitung as saying. “Should security personnel at the airports have some sort of information in advance which indicates that a situation could escalate during a deportation, they can decide ahead of time not to let the passengers board.”

An anti-deportation protester is denied entry into Duesseldorf Airport. © Wolfgang Rattay / Reuters

Despite a recent increase in deportations, Germany remains by far the most popular destination in the European Union for refugees and migrants. In 2017, it processed more asylum applications than all other EU countries combined.

I keep associating the word 'insane' with 'asylum' here. It somehow seems appropriate.

The most recent statistics from the immigration office reveal Germany has accepted nearly 170,000 asylum seekers this year. It has also rejected approximately 210,000, however nearly half of those decisions have been appealed and about 25 percent of them have been overturned.

In order to reduce the number of appeals and speed up the deportations the German Interior Ministry has started offering rejected asylum seekers up to €3,000 (US$3,550) to return to their countries of origin.

The new program, dubbed ‘Your country. Your future. Now!’ promises generous payouts to those who decide to return voluntarily. Families are eligible for up to €3,000 and individuals for up to €1,000.

‘Christian Duty to Fight Satan’s Soros Plan to Bring Migrants into Europe’ – Hungarian MP

FILE PHOTO: Migrants wait in the transit zone where their asylum claims are processed in Tompa, Hungary, June 14, 2017. © Laszlo Balogh / Reuters

A Hungarian MP slammed billionaire George Soros and supporters for attempting to dilute the spirit of Europe with “the forced settlement of tens of millions of migrants.” He claimed there is a Christian duty to fight what he called “Satan’s Soros” plan.

The lawmaker in question, Andras Aradszki, who represents the Christian Democratic People’s Party (KDNP), claimed that “Soros and his comrades want to destroy the independence and values of nation states,” as cited by the Budapest Beacon.

According to Aradszki this is happening “for the purpose of watering down the Christian spirit of Europe with the forced settlement of tens of millions of migrants.”

“But the fight against Satan is a Christian duty. Yes, I speak of an attack by Satan, who is also the angel of denial, because they are denying what they are preparing to do — even when it is completely obvious. They frantically try to prove that there is no [refugee] quota, there is no compulsory settlement, and the Soros Plan does not exist,” Aradszki noted.

“The national consultation is an outstanding opportunity for us to make our opinions known about Satan’s Soros Plan,” he concluded. On Sunday, the Chief Security Advisor to the Prime Minister, Gyorgy Bakondi, warned of the implications of the “Soros Plan.”

“This may have serious consequences for the sovereignty of member states, for the nations themselves, and also with regard to the security of European citizens,” he pointed out.

The Soros Plan

Soros stated in 2015 that the “EU has to accept at least a million asylum-seekers annually for the foreseeable future. And, to do that, it must share the burden fairly.”

“Adequate financing is critical,” the billionaire wrote. “The EU should provide £10,000 (€15,000) per asylum-seeker for each of the first two years to help cover housing, health care, and education costs – and to make accepting refugees more appealing to member states.”

So, €15,000 per person; 1 million people; 2 years; that works out to €15bn the first year and €30bn each subsequent year. A high price to pay for cultural suicide.

Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who has repeatedly blamed Hungarian-born Soros of fueling the refugee crisis in Europe, said that “Brussels has come under George Soros’s influence.”

“We have revealed the existence of the Soros plan, and the drafter himself admitted that it exists. We have placed it in the focus of politics,” the prime minister said in an interview to public radio on Friday.

In July, Orban accused Soros of using the EU in order to create a "new, mixed, Muslimized Europe,” according to AP. The prime minister said that Soros is now more powerful in Brussels than in Washington or Tel Aviv and he argued that European institutions should fight to limit his influence.

It's odd, Soros, who is extremely anti-communist and still very much anti-Russian, would appear to be trying to destroy Christianity by replacing it with Islam. But, no matter what you think of Christianity, it is vastly better than Islam. The irony is that communism is godless, Christianity is Christ, the Son of God, and Islam is about a false prophet, but it is Islam that Soros is promoting.

He noted that reforming Europe can only begin by stopping illegal migration into the EU and that Hungary’s border defenses will help with that effort.

Late last month Orban called on Hungarians to participate in the government’s public survey on the “Soros plan,” noting that it will help the country shield itself from migration. The survey dubbed “national consultation” will ask Hungarians for their view on whether or not Hungary should become an immigrant country.

“We want a Hungarian Hungary and a European Europe,” Orban said on the first day of parliament’s autumn session.

Last week Goran Buldioski, director of Soros’ Open Society Initiatives in Europe, told AP that Soros and his foundations support “more coherent and humane policies for helping to resettle migrants fleeing oppression and violence in their homelands” but that “there is no such thing as a global conspiracy against Hungary.”

Unless something is missing from this report, no-one said there was a global conspiracy against Hungary, but against Europe.

Hungary is engaged in a bitter row with the EU over the refugee relocation quotas, together with Poland and Slovakia. The issue dates back to the EU decision made in 2015 to rehouse some 160,000 refugees from Greece and Italy over a period of two years, only around 27,700 of whom have been settled so far.

Hungary claimed in September that its fences on the borders with Croatia and Serbia had helped to cut the inflow of migrants by 99.7 percent since 2015. The small inland nation now has one quarter of the length of its borders protected by a fence. The Hungarian border fence has been repeatedly criticized by other European countries, as well as by EU politicians, but Budapest has resisted pressure to remove it.

Only 3% of 2.2mn Migrants Who Entered Europe Since 2015 Sent Home – Pew Research

FILE PHOTO © Wolfgang Rattay / Reuters

More than half of the immigrants who arrived in the EU, Norway and Switzerland in 2015 and 2016 still have no legal asylum status, and only 3 percent of the 2.2 million newcomers were returned to their homeland.

Meanwhile, those rejected for asylum are likely to “disappear” rather than allow themselves to be deported, the paper indicates.

The most systematic study of the biggest migration wave in Europe since World War II has been conducted by the Pew Research Center on the basis of official Eurostat data, and shows that the continent still has not dealt with the migrant crisis.

 Although the peak of media attention came in 2015, when 1.3 million asylum applications were filed, almost as many – 1.2 million – came in 2016, many from migrants who arrived the previous year, before moving to a different destination inside Europe in the hope of better chances of citizenship and a better livelihood. Germany was the most popular application country, taking 45 percent of all the asylum seekers on the continent.

Forty percent of all applicants have been approved, with the highest rate of acceptance among those who said they were fleeing from Syria, 80 percent of whom have no legal residence in Europe. On the other hand, only 2 percent of the 80,000 Albanians, whose homeland is not suffering from any recognized humanitarian crisis, have been designated as refugees.

But this does not mean they were forced to go home: 89 percent of all Albanian immigrants are still inside the EU, waiting for their initial application and appeal to go through, and only 9 percent have given up and decided to travel back across the border. Similarly, 77 percent of Kosovars, Afghans and Iranians are still being processed, with many banned from working officially and resident in temporary state-provided accommodation.

In total, 52 percent of all immigrants are still in the application phase.

Thus, only 8 percent of newcomers have been definitively told that they cannot stay in Europe. The location of majority of those – some 5 percent of the total migrant influx, or more than 100,000 people – is listed as “unknown,” suggesting that they may have settled somewhere illegally, left Europe, or changed identity in another bid for residency within the EU.

Though varying backgrounds of the migrants makes direct comparisons difficult, the most welcoming European countries are the Netherlands (52 percent of applicants approved), Germany (50 percent) and Sweden (48 percent). The least likely to grant asylum is Hungary, which has given green light to just 1 percent of all asylum claims.

Thousands of Afghan Refugees in Germany Claim to be Former Taliban Fighters – Der Spiegel

© Reuters

The German authorities are now verifying statements of thousands of Afghan refugees, who came to Germany and claimed to be former Taliban militants, the German Der Spiegel weekly reports, adding that criminal investigations have been launched in 70 cases.

Since 2015, several thousands of refugees who came from Afghanistan admitted during interviews with representatives of the German Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) that they either had contacts with some radical Islamist groups in Afghanistan or directly fought for the extremists, Der Spiegel reports, citing data provided by the BAMF to the German security services.

The weekly also says that the German Federal Prosecutor’s Office has already opened criminal cases against 70 Afghan refugees after verifying their statements. Six asylum seekers have been already arrested, the media reports, adding that legal action against some of the suspects will be initiated next week.

However, it is still unclear if all refugees who declared themselves Taliban fighters indeed fought for the extremists or had links to any radical group. According to Der Spiegel, the German authorities suspect that some asylum seekers may be seeking to boost their prospects of receiving asylum in Germany in this way, as affiliation with the Taliban is punishable with the death penalty in Afghanistan.

In November 2016, it was reported that the German authorities planned to send home some 12,000 Afghans as they considered the security situation in Afghanistan safe enough. Under such circumstances, the refugees might try to indicate that it is not safe for them to be sent back because they would face imminent death at the hands of the authorities.

However, German security services expect a surge in anti-terrorist investigations against alleged Taliban fighters in addition to the inquiries, which were already launched against the members of Islamic State terrorist group in Germany.

The German Federal Prosecutor’s Office warns that it is already “pushed to the limit” by the sheer number of anti-terrorist investigations it has to pursue. In 2016, the agency opened 200 criminal cases against suspected Islamic terrorists, Germany’s Die Welt daily reports.

In early March, the head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency (BfV), Hans-Georg Maassen, said that Islamists could carry out terrorist attacks at any time, warning that “the potential of violence-oriented Islamists in Germany is growing steadily and will continue to increase.”

He also said that his agency has as many as 1,600 people on its radar.

In the meantime, one Taliban leader tried to claim asylum in Germany using fake ID papers. Abdul Rauf Mohammed, the former health minister under the Taliban between 1996 and 2001, arrived at Germany's Frankfurt airport from the Saudi Arabian capital, Riyadh, presented a fake passport and applied for asylum for himself and his family members.

However, the German authorities promptly uncovered his true identity and rejected his asylum request, sending him back to Saudi Arabia.

US-led forces, including Germany, invaded Afghanistan to oust the Taliban from power more than 15 years ago, following the attacks of September 11, 2001. However, the extremist group, which advocates strict Islamist rule, is still active and continues to attack Afghan military and carry out terrorist attacks.

On Friday, more than 100 Afghan soldiers were killed and injured in a Taliban attack on a military base in northern Afghanistan, according to the Afghan Defense Ministry.