Corruption is Everywhere > What is Harvard teaching our kids? Not moral values, that's for sure.

 

Top Harvard official accused of ethics breach

over $42M paid to his own law firm

By 

Social Links forIsabel Vincent

Published March 7, 2024

 Updated March 7, 2024, 9:09 a.m. ET

One of Harvard’s former top officials was named in two ethics complaints over the Ivy League college paying his law firm nearly $42 million while he served on the school’s governing board.

William Lee and Harvard University could face an investigation by the Massachusetts attorney general over whether the school was right to pay his firm, Wilmer Hale, between 2011 and 2022, when he was serving as one of the school’s most senior leaders.

The Post has learned that the Massachusetts Board of Bar Overseers and the state’s attorney general have been sent formal complaints accusing Lee of “possible conflict of interest by trustee/director with pecuniary interest in service provider to Harvard.”

And it took 13 years for someone to speak up about this. Surely, the other governors knew what was happening, or are Harvard graduates complete idiots?

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A law firm connected to William Lee, a former chair of the Harvard Corporation, billed the school nearly $42 million while Lee was on the school’s governing board.Wilmer Hale LLP

Both complaints have been obtained by The Post.

Lee’s most recent known work for Harvard included helping former president Claudine Gay prepare for her disastrous appearance before a Congressional committee probing antisemitism on campus in December when she said that whether calling for the death of Jews broke college rules depended on “context,” according to the Harvard Crimson.

The embattled Gay, the school’s first black president, resigned in January amid allegations of plagiarism, after less than six months in the top job.

Lee, who graduated from Harvard in 1972, served on the university’s board of directors from July 2010 to June 2022, and was senior fellow of the Harvard Corporation from 2014 to 2022.

During the time that he served on the Harvard Corporation board, Lee was also a partner at the powerhouse law firm. He was co-managing partner between 2004 and 2011.

Wilmer Hale served as Harvard’s outside counsel in the landmark affirmative action case “Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard,” which was filed in 2014.

Lee served as Harvard’s outside counsel during the trial court phase of the case, until the initial verdict in 2019.

The case was decided by the US Supreme Court in June 2023 in the plaintiff’s favor.

During the 2019 fiscal year alone, Wilmer Hale billed Harvard more than $11 million, according to the complaint to the AG.

As of June 2023, Harvard had paid out more than $27 million in legal fees related to the case, Bloomberg reported, in which the high court held that race-based affirmative action programs in college admissions violates the Fourteenth Amendment.

“Considering the vast resources entrusted to Harvard as a Massachusetts nonprofit corporation, do the circumstances with Bill Lee and Wilmer Hale raise questions about whether Harvard and its board have the necessary corporate governance procedures to avoid conflicts of interest, conflicts of duty or similar issues,” the complaint, which is anonymous, to the Massachusetts attorney general says.

The complaint alleges that “as a member/chairperson of the board, Bill Lee oversaw the Harvard officers and departments that normally manage relationships with outside law firms, such as the university’s general counsel.”

Lee stepped down from the Harvard board in May 2022 and in an interview with the Harvard Gazette, said the things he will miss most are “the personal relationships” with a host of the school’s leaders, including its general counsel.

Despite billing Wilmer Hale millions for legal work between 2011 and 2019, Harvard’s board of directors consistently answered “No” to a question on its annual disclosures to the state about whether a trustee had “a material financial interest” that was not reported as compensation, public documents show.

Harvard answered “No” to a question on an annual form required by the Attorney General in 2019 on whether a trustee or director had “a material financial interest” that was not reported as compensation despite paying William Lee’s firm $11 million that year.Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Office of the Attorney General

The Massachusetts Board of Bar Overseers told The Post Wednesday that they could neither confirm nor deny whether a complaint against an attorney had been received.

“It’s confidential,” the spokesperson said.

A spokesman for the Massachusetts AG said their office had received the complaint “but cannot comment on, confirm, or deny an investigation.”

Neither Lee nor Harvard returned requests for comment Wednesday.

European Politics > EU Court's Ruling rejected by Poland as 'Corruption'; Was it really a political protest or a far-left protest in Warsaw?

..

Justice minister rejects 'corrupt' EU court's ruling against

Poland's judicial reform

Polish Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro on Monday denounced the Court of Justice

of the European Union as 'corrupt' and rejected its ruling that a controversial

Polish judicial reform violated EU law

Issued on: 05/06/2023 - 15:52

Modified: 05/06/2023 - 17:38

Text by: FRANCE 24

The Luxembourg-based court's verdict "was not written by judges but politicians because it constitutes a clear violation of European treaties," Ziobro said, adding that "the European Union's top court is corrupt".

The European Union stepped up its rule-of-law fight with member state Poland on Monday when the bloc's highest court confirmed that Warsaw had refused to comply with EU rules on judicial independence for which it has already lost more than 500 million euros ($535 million) in fines.

The Court of Justice of the EU ruled that Poland's 2019 justice reform infringed EU law after the European Commission, the bloc's executive branch, said that the Polish Supreme Court lacked the necessary independence and impartiality.

“By today's judgment, the Court upholds the Commission's action,” a court statement said.

It was the latest in a streak of setbacks for the nationalist conservative ruling party in Poland, with many Poles furious at what they consider a dramatic erosion of democracy in the country. That sentiment boiled over into a massive anti-government protest in Warsaw on Sunday, probably the largest demonstration in Poland's post-communist era, with an election coming up in the autumn.

Opposition leader Donald Tusk, who had called for the march, estimated that 500,000 Poles turned out.

“Bad news for the government,” declared the conservative Do Rzeczy news portal about the EU court ruling. The state broadcaster, TVP, which acts as a propaganda arm of the ruling party, said that the EU court had overstepped its powers and “attack Poland again. The court exceeds its powers.”

The court decision was, however, welcomed by lawyers and other legal experts who hope it might restore independence to the judiciary.

The EU court argued that “the value of the rule of law is an integral part of the very identity of the European Union as a common legal order and is given concrete expression in principles containing legally binding obligations for the Member States.” It said Poland didn't meet these obligations.

Amid a plethora of condemnation and criticism, the court said that “the measures thus adopted by the Polish legislature are incompatible with the guarantees of access to an independent and impartial tribunal.”

Poland's minister for the European Union, Szymon Szynkowski vel Sęk, said that some parts of the ruling were no longer valid or had been abolished.

The court said that Polish law requires judges to divulge membership in an association or party and allows that information to be made public. The court ruling said that the provisions were “liable to expose judges to risks of undue stigmatization.”

The disagreement over the functioning of the Supreme Court is only one of several disputes that the conservative government in Warsaw has with the EU institutions. It claims the bloc is undermining Poland’s inalienable rights to make independent decisions.

The EU institutions have insisted that Poland, under the populist Law and Justice party, has been on a slippery slope away from the EU’s rule of law principles.

Thereby admitting the political bias of the EU.

The dispute centers on the independence of Polish Supreme Court judges when they review EU law.

Only last week, the United States and the EU’s top justice official criticized Polish plans for another law that could keep political opponents from holding public office without full legal recourse. The EU threatened to take measures if it became fully clear such a law would undermine democratic standards.

In the standoff centering on Monday's ruling by the Luxembourg court, Polish authorities already have had to pay about 550 million euros ($588 million) in fines since October 2021, when the system of 1 million euros in daily fines started. The daily fines were halved in April.

In the legal standoff between Brussels and Warsaw, EU authorities are also withholding the release of around 35 billion euros ($37 billion) in pandemic recovery funds.

After the collapse of the Soviet empire, Poland joined the EU along with other Central and Eastern European nations. Since they emerged from autocracy, they were long models for other emerging democracies. Critics now say that Poland and Hungary are slipping again toward one-party authoritarian rule.

Or, perhaps they just don't want to follow the EU down the Garden path. The EU is leading its countries in both godlessness and Islamization. In other words, away from anything resembling Christianity.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP and AP)

Hundreds of thousands join protest against Poland's

conservative Law and Justice Party

By Joe Fisher

Leader of main opposition party Civic Platform Donald Tusk and former Polish President and leader of the 

Independent Polish Trade Union Solidarity Lech Walesa take part in the '4th June March' in Warsaw, Poland, on Sunday. 

Photo by Pawel Supernak/EPA-EFE

June 4 (UPI) -- Opposition party leaders are heading one of Poland's largest protests in Warsaw on Sunday, marching against the conservative Law and Justice party.

People from across the country came out in force on the 34th anniversary of the trade union, Solidarity, defeating the Communist Party in 1989's election. With another election coming this fall, Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski tweeted that Sunday's demonstration may foreshadow the results at the polls.

Trzaskowski estimates that 500,000 people took part in the protest. No official number has been calculated.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk and former President Lech Walesa were among the prominent opposition leaders in attendance, the BBC reports. Walesa was the leader of Solidarity in the 1980s.

The Law and Justice Party has been in power since 2015. In that, critics contest that the party has weakened the country's democracy. It has targeted the rights of marginalized groups like the LGBTQ+ community and restricted reproductive rights, according to The Guardian.

For a country that is strongly Catholic, these are difficult issues. Can abortion access be called a reproductive right? Should it be called an anti-reproductive right? Surely, all women should have the right to not give birth, but that right should end once she is pregnant. There are many ways to avoid pregnancy; there is only one way to avoid birth once you are pregnant, and it is not God-approved!

The Civil Platform, led by Tusk, organized the protest, but other opposition parties were also involved. Protesters called for more trade union representation and rights for the transgender community.

Of the guesstimated 500,000 protesters, it appears not too many were actually celebrating Solidarity or there would be no need to call for more. 

Transgender rights are quickly fading across Europe as the UK and Scandinavia have realized that transitioning children is equivalent to child sexual abuse and worthy of very big lawsuits.

The protest also opposes a new law that would allow the government to ban people from serving in public office for 10 years. It also creates a commission to investigate Russian involvement with politics in Poland.

Last week, the European Commission released a statement on the law.

"The European Commission is very concerned by the adoption of a new law in Poland creating a special committee to investigate Russian influence on the internal security of Poland between 2007 and 2022," it said.

"This new law raises concerns that it could be used to affect the possibility of individuals to run for public office, without fair trial."

President Andrzej Duda has proposed making amendments to the law to respond to these criticisms.

Islam - Current Day - Toronto's Muslim Gangster; Links to Stories From My Other Blog - Some Hardly Believable

Four of the worst stories I've ever posted and they are all from Pakistan and recent:

Today's Global Pervs and Paedos List > 

Pakistan's Evils Astonish Even Me, and That's Not Easy to Do

It's not just Pakistan where Muslims kidnap Christian girls and Islamic police and courts back them up:

'Jihad of the Womb': Watchdog Details Systemic Abduction of Christian Girls in Egypt

Losing the War on Christianity in Egypt

Toronto murder victim dodged earlier assassin's bullet with cocaine bribe

Police wiretaps reveal bounty hunter was paid to fake victim's death in 2013

By Sam Pazzano · CBC - Posted: Sep 16, 2020 

Farogh Sadat was shot outside a bakery in Toronto's Corso Italia neighbourhood on June 23, 2020. Police wiretaps reveal there had been two previous attempts on his life. (Muslim Association of Hamilton)

In a plot twist worthy of a Hollywood crime thriller, the victim of a brazen execution in Toronto this summer escaped an earlier hit attempt by bribing a bounty hunter to fake the target's death.

The revelation came from a police wiretap of a phone conversation between the victim, Farogh Sadat, and another man on Jan. 15, 2015, which CBC learned about after recently obtaining a copy of a 2017 court decision about Sadat's bail conditions.

At the time of the wiretapped call, police were investigating the brutal kidnapping of a drug runner, allegedly by Sadat and others, in September 2014.

In the call, Sadat boasted that he bribed his would-be assassin with half a million dollars' worth of cocaine to stage Sadat's death in the Caribbean. Sadat said he then short-changed the bounty hunter by only giving him half of the promised amount.

Sadat, 37, was shot and killed in broad daylight on June 23, 2020, while he was sitting in his SUV with California licence plates at 1346 St. Clair Ave. W., in Toronto's Corso Italia neighbourhood.

It was the third known assassination attempt on his life.

Two previous murder attempts

In the 2017 judgment dismissing Sadat's bail application on the kidnapping allegations, Superior Court Justice Leonard Richetti noted that Sadat had bad blood with Mexican drug dealers in the Greater Toronto Area.

Police were called to the scene on St. Clair Avenue West near St. Clarens Avenue in June,

where they found Sadat in his car, having suffered fatal gunshot wounds. (Devin Keshavjee/CBC)

It started in 2013, when Sadat orchestrated a home invasion robbery. Sadat sent his henchmen to rob a suspected drug runner, H.G. (CBC is withholding his identity, as his life is likely at risk.) They grabbed $40,000 in cash and $20,000 worth of jewelry, and H.G. also gave them the keys and location of a stash house, where they stole several kilograms of low-quality cocaine.

That home invasion robbery was never reported to police.

A year later, on Sept. 6, 2014, Sadat and others allegedly kidnapped H.G., beat him and held him hostage for 12 hours, seeking information about another stash house. After that, the drug dealers put a bounty on Sadat's head, wrote Richetti.

On Sept. 23, 2014, shooters mistook Sadat's brother-in-law Ghorzang Zazai for Sadat, wounding Zazai and killing a friend, Gul Alakoozi, outside Sadat's parents' home in York region, north of Toronto. At the time, Sadat was living with his parents, who were his sureties for guns and drug possession charges in a Toronto hotel room in June 2014.

'We can't even fight these guys'

The wiretapped 2015 call was a conversation with Alakoozi's father. In it, Sadat told him he "knows" his son's killers, but York Regional Police say no one has been charged for the shooting and the investigation is ongoing. 

Sadat admitted on the call that he had sold up to 20 pounds of cocaine and "bought a couple of houses" with the profits of his criminal activity, but that he wasn't wealthy enough to mount a battle against the heavily armed drug lords.

"We can't even fight these guys, because I don't have the money like these guys," he said. Sadat also said he had a "toy" – meaning a handgun – because he didn't trust anyone at the time.

Sadat also disclosed his first assassination escape, in 2013. 

He said that a bounty hunter kidnapped him in the Dominican Republic, but that he bribed his would-be killer by offering him double the price of the hit — "10 bricks" (kilograms) of cocaine, worth $525,000.

The bounty hunter then staged Sadat's death by covering his "corpse" in fake blood as it lay in a Dominican ditch and photographing the "hit." But Sadat said he only gave him "half the bricks."

Sadat went into hiding on the West Coast and later tried to resolve the dispute with the drug barons.

'I hit a home run'

The drug dealers eventually discovered Sadat was still alive after he and others were busted and charged with possessing guns, drugs, a bulletproof vest and silencer after a maid spotted a man with a firearm inside a Toronto hotel room in June 2014.

Police found evidence on a laptop in the hotel room that Sadat and his partners had placed a tracking device on H.G.'s car, as well as details of a plot to pose as cops, abduct H.G. and force him to surrender the keys and location of a stash house.

Sadat's charges were stayed, however, after another man pleaded guilty. "I hit a home run," said Sadat on the wiretap.

Before H.G. was abducted in September 2014, a Peel Regional Police sergeant warned H.G. his life was in jeopardy and left her business card with him.

When the kidnappers took H.G. hostage that September, they discovered the officer's business card in his personal effects. Fearing H.G. might be under surveillance, the captors let him go after he agreed to give them some cash and the name of another potential kidnapping victim. He provided them $5,000 cash but not another name. Two days later, H.G. went to Peel Regional Police.

'Potential for further violence'

In a 2017 judgment dismissing Sadat's bail application on the kidnapping allegations, Justice Richetti wrote, "Any informed member of the public would be shocked that Mr. Sadat would be released into the public."

Sadat's vehicle at the scene in June.

Police continue to investigate Sadat's death.

(Paul Borkwood/CBC)

"Given the matters described by Sadat in the wiretaps involving shootings, bounty, faking deaths, retaliation and other criminal activity, the potential for further violence looms large," stated Richetti.

The judge quoted a "chilling" conversation between Sadat's wife and a co-accused's brother, in which Sadat's wife said, "If [the kidnapping victim] doesn't drop the charges, then they want to get rid of everyone involved permanently."

The kidnapping charges against Sadat were stayed in 2018 after Sadat's lawyer, Deepak Paradkar, undermined H.G.'s credibility during cross-examination at the preliminary hearing.

Toronto police continue to investigate Sadat's killing.

Outrage as Denmark Passes Law Making HANDSHAKE Mandatory for Naturalization

Denmark leading the Backlash against Islamization

© Reuters / RITZAU SCANPIX / Martin Sylvest

Danish lawmakers have approved a government-backed proposal to make citizenship applicants shake hands with the official conducting the naturalization ceremony. The bill has been criticized for discriminating against Muslims.

The new citizenship bill has been the subject of a heated debate since last summer. It requires those applying for Danish citizenship to commit to the country’s values and to show respect for its government by shaking hands with its representative.

Critics of the bill argue that it’s aimed at discouraging Muslims from seeking Danish citizenship, calling the proposal discriminatory and describing it as an unnecessary formality.

The proposal was backed by Denmark’s three-party minority government, with the driving force behind the legislation being the Conservative Party and anti-immigrant Danish People’s Party.

The changes to the naturalization ceremony, which come into effect on January 1, have been met with strong opposition from the local officials who conduct such proceedings. Some mayors have already said they will ignore the new guidelines. The mayor of the town of Kerteminde in central Denmark has gone so far as to imply that he would rather not show up at work than coerce an applicant to shake his hand.

“Shaking hands does not show if you are integrated or not. I think I will probably find an excuse and the deputy mayor will come to work that day,” Kasper Ejsing Olesen told the Guardian earlier.

The red tape associated with the festive ceremony will cost taxpayers an additional 2,400 kroner ($370) – double the current fee of 1,200 kroner ($183). However, the proponents of the new guidelines believe it’s a fair price to pay to become a Dane.

“When you consider that you are receiving the gift of Danish citizenship, I actually don’t think it’s that expensive. I think it is a tremendously large and valuable gift,” People’s Party spokesman Christian Langball told a local broadcaster in September, as cited by the Local.

Denmark’s Integration Minister Inger Stojberg, a member of the center-right Venstre party, brushed off the criticism, insisting that a handshake is “a completely natural part of the ceremony.”

Stojberg said that a spokesman for Hizb ut-Tahrir, an Islamic group that openly supports the establishment of a caliphate, told her that he would not have become a Danish citizen if the rules applied retroactively.

“I asked him if he would advise his followers in Hizb ut-Tahrir to pass on it, and he said he would. And that’s exactly what we want with the naturalization ceremony,” the minister said, as cited by TV2.

The point is if Danes or even half of Danes (women) are not considered worthy of shaking a Muslim hand, then why would Danes want them in their society? How can naturalizing a people who think they are better than you be a good thing? They will never be happy until they control you.

The latest measure is another step in the Danish government’s wide-ranging crackdown on migration. Earlier this month, Stojberg proposed sending rejected asylum seekers to a remote island, about two miles from the mainland. Some 100 failed asylum seekers and criminal migrants are going to be brought to the islet in the Baltic Sea on a ferry under the plan. 

In August, hundreds hit the streets to protest against a “burqa ban” – another “discriminatory” measure that came into effect that month.

Denmark has also been enforcing a controversial law allowing authorities to confiscate cash and valuables from refugees to fund their stay in Denmark since 2016. 

Islamic Face Veils Banned in Public Buildings by Dutch Parliament

Islamization Backlash - Partial Burqa Ban in Netherlands

© Toussaint Kluiters / Reuters

The Upper House of the Dutch parliament has passed a law banning Islamic face veils and other face-covering garments in public places such as schools, hospitals and government buildings.

But not mosques, I presume?

Lawmakers cited security reasons when they introduced the legislation which outlaws all face-covering garb in public buildings but not on the street. Motorcycle helmets and ski-masks are included in the ban and people who break the new law face a fine of up to €410 ($430).

The bill was approved by the Lower House in 2016, following the failure of efforts to impose a more general ban on burqas and other face-covering veils. The Dutch government’s main advising body in 2015 said the choice to wear an Islamic veil is protected by the constitutional right to freedom of religion, and that it saw no ground to limit that right.

Staunch anti-immigration politician Geert Wilders welcomed the passing of the new law on Twitter, tweeting a screengrab of an article about the issue along with the message: “Adopted!”  

Wilders has long campaigned for a ban on face veils, originally tabling a motion seeking to have them outlawed more than 10 years ago.

The Dutch government describes the new law as “religion-neutral” and it does not extend as far as more comprehensive bans in neighboring France and Belgium.

France introduced a ban on Muslim women wearing full-face veils in public in 2011. Belgium followed suit and introduced a similar ban later that year.

Both countries were taken to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) over their laws. The court upheld France’s burqa ban in 2014 and it also ruled in favor of Belgian authorities in 2017, saying that their law “doesn’t violate European human rights law.”

India to Strip Fugitive ‘Economic Offenders’ of Assets

Corruption is Everywhere - In India, they're fighting back

FILE PHOTO: Indian Empress superyacht © Darrin Zammit Lupi / Reuters

Indian lawmakers have approved the Finance Ministry’s proposal to punish offenders involved in economic crime and fraud of over $15mn, by stripping them of domestic assets, to deter them from fleeing abroad to escape prosecution.

On Saturday, the Union Cabinet, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, approved the Fugitive Economic Offenders Ordinance 2018, which allows the state to confiscate the property of offenders who flee the country. Counterfeiting currency, money laundering and fraud are some of the crimes listed in the bill, introduced in the lower house of Parliament on March 12.

“The Ordinance would lay down the measures to empower Indian authorities to attach and confiscate proceeds of crime associated with economic offenders and the properties of the economic offenders, and thereby deter economic offenders from evading the process of Indian law by remaining outside the jurisdiction of Indian courts,” the government said in a release.

Those violators who have arrest warrants issued against them but dodge prosecution, or who refuse to return to India to face charges for crimes that amount to more than 1 billion Indian Rupee ($15 million), could now be stripped of all of their assets back home pending a trial or conviction. The regulations, the government believes, will “re-establish the rule of law” by “forcing” a defendant to appear before court.

“This would also help the banks and other financial institutions to achieve higher recovery from financial defaults committed by such fugitive economic offenders, improving the financial health of such institutions,” the government added.

In order to declare an individual an economic offender, authorities have to start proceedings against the suspect in a special court, established under the 2002 Prevention of Money-laundering Act. The court then issues a notice and failure to comply with this within six weeks can lead to an arrest warrant. However, if the offender appears in person before the court, the notice would be terminated.

France Approves Restrictive Anti-Terrorism Law to Replace 2-Year State of Emergency

The New Normal - France

New laws equal 'State of Emergency light'. This is absolutely necessary and when it is determined that it doesn't really work, it will probably get worse. Even so, there will be many detractors who want the old freedoms and aren't wise enough to know that they cannot exist in a world where Islam is ascendant.

The French parliament has approved a new controversial anti-terrorism law, replacing the soon-to-expire two-year state of emergency. The new legislation has prompted fears it will severely limit civil liberties.

The French senate approved the new anti-terrorism law on its second reading on Wednesday. The new law, set to increase law enforcement powers in the fight against terrorism, was supported by 244 senators, with only 22 voting against it. The bill was overwhelmingly approved by the lower chamber of parliament earlier in October.

The state of emergency was imposed in France to combat terrorism in the wake of the deadly 2015 Paris terrorist attacks, and has been extended six times since. It is set to finally expire on November 1.

Its key points include allowing the authorities to search homes of those suspected of terrorist links, while holding them for up to four hours and seizing data, items and documents. It also allows the authorities to confine suspects to their town or city for up to a year and have them report to police every day. Any movement beyond that requires them to wear a tracking bracelet.

Top regional officials will be allowed to shut down places of worship for up to six months, if they deem preachers have incited attacks or glorified terrorism. This can be done without any hard proof obtained by police, but simply on the basis of "ideas and theories" shared by the preachers’ devotees.

Police are also granted the authority to stop and search people at vulnerable areas such as borders, train stations and airports.

Ahead of the parliamentary vote, French President Emmanuel Macron hosted 500 law enforcement officers including police, gendarmes, prefects, and other officials at the Elysees Palace. Macron defended the new law and mulled a new nationwide anti-radicalization plan.

“The first mission of the state is to protect our fellow citizens and ensure the security of the territory... We have to adapt our organization, our action,” he said.

video 5:13  © Gonzalo Fuentes / Reuters

The plan includes hiring 10,000 more police officers and gendarmes, as well as supplying them with technology suitable for the “smartphone era.” He also promised to implement stricter measures to more efficiently deport migrants with “no legal right” to stay in France.

“We don’t welcome people well, our procedures are too long, we don’t integrate people properly and neither do we send enough people back,” Macron told the law enforcement officers.

The new anti-terrorism law has repeatedly drawn concern over human rights issues. UN human rights experts urged France to comply with "its international human rights obligations," worrying the bill would "incorporate into ordinary law several restrictions on civil liberties currently in place under France’s state of emergency."

'Institutional racism against the Arab-Muslim community'

Even if granting the police sweeping powers helps foil some attacks, it may estrange minorities, in particular, Arab Muslims, making them more susceptible to terrorist propaganda, political analyst Dan Glazebrook told RT.

“If you are going to give police this power, they are going to discriminate communities that are already alienated, putting potentially more recruits into the hands of these death squads,” Glazebrook said, arguing that the French police have “a serious problem with institutional racism and brutality against the Arab-Muslim community” going back to the Paris massacre of 1961, when dozens of Algerians were killed in a police crackdown on the protest against the Algerian War on the River Seine.

The key to reducing the threat posed by international terrorism is to deal with the underlying causes of the Islamist violence and not with its consequences, Glazebrook said.

“If you don’t deal with the root causes, which is the brutal foreign policy on the one hand and the alienation of entire communities due to system institutional discrimination and racism… even the most vicious police state will not be able to stop there being some people who decide to lash out.”

“You can’t be a near-colonial war-mongering power like France and expect to be permanently immune to the blowback and to the consequences of that,” Glazebrook said, referring to France’s involvement in Libya and Syria.

The provision of the law enabling police to shut down suspected terrorist hotbeds without any proof may result in crackdowns on any dissent, thus eroding civil freedoms, former British intelligence officer Annie Machon told RT.

“What is radicalization? At the moment, of course, everyone in France is focused on the concept of Islamic radicalization, but what if that term spreads, what if there is mission creep, so someone who protests against the government is deemed to be radical and therefore be closed down?” she said, noting that French ecological activists used to be targeted by the state under similar pretexts.

Calling the concerns that human rights groups voiced about the law infringing on democracy “absolutely right,” Machon said that bulk data collection and mass surveillance envisioned in the law have proven to be ineffective means in combating terrorism.

She went on to note that while many of the terrorists that mounted attacks in Europe “have already been known to the authorities” it did not help security services to stop them.

“They are drowning in the tsunami of information rather than doing targeted specific investigations into people who might be particularly focused on committing terrorist atrocities… they are falling through the gaps of intelligence agencies.”

US Justice Dept Repeals Transgender Workers’ Protections

Reversing political correctness?

© David Bro / Global Look Press

US Attorney General Jeff Sessions has issued a memo reversing protections for transgender workers previously expanded under the Civil Rights Act. Under the revision, Sessions said discrimination only applies to men and women.

“Title VII’s prohibition on sex discrimination encompasses discrimination between men and women but does not encompass discrimination based on gender identity per se, including transgender status,” Attorney General Sessions wrote in the memo issued Wednesday. “This is a conclusion of law, not policy.”

Title VII makes it unlawful for employers to discriminate in the employment of an individual “because of such individual’s...sex,” and Sessions argued “Sex” is ordinarily defined to mean biologically male or female,” and cited legal precedent.

The memo reverses an Obama administration interpretation that expanded Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to protect transgender workers under “sex-based considerations.”

The revisions could now open up people to discrimination in the workplace due to their gender identity.

Under most state and federal laws, trans people are not explicitly protected from discrimination in the workplace, housing, public accommodation and schools. This means a person can be fired from a job, evicted from a home or kicked out of a business because an employer or landlord or business owner doesn’t approve of the person’s gender identity.

LGBT advocates argue that federal civil rights law should already shield trans people from discrimination, based on their broader interpretation of the legal protections provided by a ban on sex discrimination.

Civil rights advocates have argued the law that bans sex discrimination in the workplace includes transgender people because discrimination against someone based on their gender identity is fundamentally rooted in sex-based discrimination. The Obama administration embraced this view of the federal law, as did the Equal Opportunity Commission, which often takes up workplace discrimination complaints.

Under Trump, the Justice Department in July filed a friend-of-the-court brief arguing against an LGBTQ-inclusive interpretation of Title VII. The filing comes in the a discrimination case before the United States Court of Appeals in New York involving Donald Zarda, a skydiving instructor, who lost his job after telling a customer he was gay, and subsequently sued the company under Title VII.

‘Nobody is Safe’: French Parliament Backs Controversial Anti-Terrorism Law

The New Normal - en Francais

© Charles Platiau / Reuters

The French parliament has approved a new anti-terrorist bill, criticized by human rights activists as restrictive of civil liberties. Ahead of the vote, France’s interior minister Gerard Collomb said that “nobody is safe” in the country as “it is still in a state of war.”

The parliament's lower house, the National Assembly, passed the new legislation in the first reading.

The new bill, which seeks to increase law enforcement powers in the fight against terrorism, was supported by 415 lawmakers, with 127 voting against it.

It extends the powers of the Interior Ministry, which will be able to set up security zones without the approval of a judge.

Inside the zones, the movement of people and vehicles can be restricted and searches can be conducted. Police will also be given wider powers to raid private property with judicial approval.

Electronic surveillance tags might be imposed on those regarded as a threat to national security, while officials will also have more power to close down places of worship deemed by intelligence agencies as inciting violence or justifying terrorism.

The new bill is regarded by many as a conversion into common law of emergency measures, which have been in place in France since late 2015. The state of emergency, introduced following the Paris attacks in November that year, is set to be lifted on November 9.

In other words, these are not new measures, but simply the entrenchment of emergency measures into every-day law - the New Normal!

"The level of threat in France is extremely high," Collomb said earlier in the day, adding that the country remains "in a state of war."

"Those who thought... that we should loosen the capacity of our services to gather information, were mistaken because yes we are still in a state of war even if Daesh have experienced military defeats," Collomb said in an interview with France Inter radio.

France's new anti-terrorism bill expanding police powers has been criticized by human rights groups as restrictive of certain civil liberties. The minister argued "nobody is safe" in France, also referring to a recent incident in which a number of people were arrested in what appeared to be a failed bombing attempt in central Paris.

Police have revealed that over the weekend a resident of an apartment building in the affluent 16th arrondissement had alerted authorities to suspicious activity. What appeared to be a ready-to-detonate bomb was discovered, while a person who had been under government surveillance for radicalism was confirmed to be among the detained suspects.

“Planning to blow up a building in a chic district of Paris – is this not a sign that nobody is safe? This [shows] it can happen anywhere in France,” the interior minister said.

Collomb also criticized other countries lacking surveillance systems “like the one in France” and called for wider information exchange and cooperation within Europe to reinforce anti-terrorism measures.

“A number of countries do not have the systems and the level of surveillance that we know in France. We believe it is us who have made Europe a strong Europe on its borders, while a number of [other European] countries do not have that kind of organization,” the French minister claimed.

France has seen some of the deadliest terrorist attacks in Europe in the past years. Over 200 people have been killed since early 2015 by assailants having pledged allegiance to or been inspired by the Islamic State terrorist group. In a series of coordinated attacks in Paris on November 13, 2015 alone, 130 people were killed by IS terrorists. On Bastille Day in 2016, a truck was driven into crowds of people celebrating in Nice, killing 86 and injuring over 450.

16th Arrondissement, Paris

‘Enlightenment Values’: Austria Enacts Anti-Burqa & Compulsory Integration Law

A controversial integration law that will fine women for wearing face-concealing Islamic dress from October, and deprive of benefits migrants who fail to take language lessons has officially been enacted, after being rubber-stamped by the President.

“Those who are not prepared to accept Enlightenment values will have to leave our country and society,” reads the text of the law that drew thousands of protesters to the streets earlier this year, before it was passed by a centrist coalition last month.

I presume 'enlightenment' means to emerge from the dark ages!

Women who will wear Islamic veils – either the burqa or the niqab – in public places, will face a fine of €150 ($168).

More generally, newcomers who expect to stay in Austria, will need to enroll in a 12-month “integration course,” which includes German language lessons, if they are to receive their welfare benefits.

They will also be expressly forbidden from distributing incendiary radical materials, and are encouraged to volunteer before they can get their work permits, so that they are better prepared for life in the workplace.

More than 90,000 people have arrived in the Central European country since the start of the migrant crisis in 2015, most of them from Muslim-majority countries outside of Europe.

The law was opposed by the left-leaning Green Party, which said that it scapegoated refugees, and the nationalist Freedom Party, which called it a window-dressing for deeper integration issues and said it had been designed to stop its rise in the polls.

The centrist coalition promised that the legislation would offer a holistic approach. It has since collapsed, triggering an early election in October.

“Work is one of the most important factors for successful integration, which is why we are not only breaking down language barriers with this policy – we are also creating a continuous integration concept for the first time,” said Social Democratic politician Alois Stoger back in May.

France was the first EU state to introduce a similar ban in 2010, levying an identical €150 fine. It has since been copied in other countries, including Germany, which has also pushed through a prohibition of face coverings for state employees.