Christian Refugees Claim ISIS Militants Living Among Them in Germany

Christian refugees from Syria claim they saw a former Islamic State member living in Frankfurt, and that this is not an isolated case. Police investigated but refused to file charges because the alleged terrorist has done nothing criminal in Germany.

Apparently, there is no law in Germany against belonging to a terrorist organization.

On his last visit to the Saarland region of Germany, on the border with France, RT’s Peter Oliver met with a group of Assyrian Christians who had been held hostage by Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL).

They recalled that while being held in IS captivity, the only thing they prayed for was to be shot instead of being beheaded.

The same community, now living in the city of Saarlouis, say the horrors of that experience have followed them all the way to Germany, after they found out that a man they say had ties to Islamic State is living among them.

A refugee, who only agreed to speak to RT on condition of anonymity, said he is positive the man living in his town is the same member of IS he encountered in Syria.

“He stopped me many times at the checkpoint near our village; we were even able to find him on Facebook, I go to the web page and there's this guy again,” the refugee said.

When the man first saw the jihadist in Germany, his reaction was that of panic.

“I was very scared that this terrorist is in a democratic state like Germany just living here,” the refugee told RT, adding that he does not understand how those who kept whole families hostage now have Syrian refugee status in Germany.

The Assyrian community now feels very insecure as “this was not the first case” a former IS member had been recognized, the man said. He added that some people are even considering leaving Germany, but do not know where to run to.

Community leaders say that once they were convinced the ‘refugee’ was in fact a former jihadist, they went straight to the police.

“The police have taken this very seriously, but we worry that the law cannot back this up with a strong case. They have to wait until this person does something criminal here,” Charlie Kanoun, the chairman of the Assyrian Culture Association, told RT.

Astonishing! He gets one opportunity to murder people or create a massacre before German police can do anything. That must be so comforting to German citizens.

“But those people were killers in Syria and fly the ISIS flag here even. Such people should have no place in Germany,” Kanoun said.

No! No! Germany embraces all people in need! Their Nazi guilt complex prevents them from offending anyone except themselves.

Police confirmed that an investigation is underway, but no charges relating to terrorism or any other crime have been brought.

As the investigation continues, and with the influx of refugees showing no signs of slowing, the question is being asked as to who exactly is coming to Europe.

“This is a very difficult point for our community here. Those victims of kidnapping were brought here for safety and security, and then these terrorists are here,” Kanoun said, adding that the German authorities “are being very gentle with them,” reiterating that his compatriots might have to flee again.

“This is tragic that we will again be forced to be refugees, this time in a Christian state that cannot protect us,” Kanoun said.

Last February, Islamic State kidnapped around 250 Assyrian Christians and demanded ransoms of $100,000 per person. Some have since been released but many remain in captivity.

“ISIS came to our village, they devastated our fields, burnt our churches, tore apart our lives. They kidnapped us, murdered us. We have an unbearable feeling of loss,” a former hostage told RT.

He recalled that while in captivity, he overheard a conversation between his captors, saying that 
“the West will belong to us and we will conquer it through Islamization.”

One of the IS militants holding Assyrian Christians captive was a German who had converted to radical Islam, the former hostage said.

The German security services are currently preparing findings on more than 790 German Islamists who have traveled to Syria, the National Police Bureau of Saarland reported.

Germany has seen increasing tensions over the migrant issue. Recently scuffles broke out between police and a group of protesters who were attempting to disrupt a right-wing rally near Berlin.

The Alternative for Germany Party was demonstrating in the city of Potsdam in support of women's rights, following the mass sex attacks in Cologne on New Year's Eve.

They were confronted by a counter-protest claiming the assaults are being used to incite hatred towards migrants.

Liberals can be a confused, if not idiotic bunch. Rallying against a demonstration in support of women's rights to not be molested is nearly insane. Do they think we should embrace the Islamist way of treating women? Stupidity has no limits!

Part One of a Look at the Intriguing Murder of Alexander Litvinenko

President Putin 'probably' approved Litvinenko murder

From BBC UK

The murder of ex-Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 in the UK was "probably" approved by President Vladimir Putin, an inquiry has found.

Mr Putin is likely to have signed off the poisoning of Mr Litvinenko with polonium-210 in part due to personal "antagonism" between the pair, it said.

Home Secretary Theresa May said the murder was a "blatant and unacceptable" breach of international law.

But the Russian Foreign Ministry said the public inquiry was "politicised".

It said: "We regret that the purely criminal case was politicised and overshadowed the general atmosphere of bilateral relations."

Dmitry Peskov, Mr Putin's spokesman, said Moscow's official response to the report will happen through "diplomatic channels", the Russian news agency Interfax was quoted as saying.

Prime Minister David Cameron said the UK would have to go on having "some sort of relationship with them [Russia]" because of the Syria crisis, but it would be done with "clear eyes and a very cold heart".

David Cameron said the murder of Alexander Litvinenko had been shown to be "state-sponsored"

The long-awaited report into Mr Litvinenko's death found that two Russian men - Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitry Kovtun - deliberately poisoned the 43-year-old in London in 2006 by putting the radioactive substance polonium-210 into his drink at a hotel.

Sir Robert Owen, the public inquiry chairman, said he was "sure" Mr Litvinenko's murder had been carried out by the two men and that they were probably acting under the direction of Moscow's FSB intelligence service, and approved by the organisation's chief, Nikolai Patrushev, as well as the Russian president.

He said Mr Litvinenko's work for British intelligence agencies, his criticism of the FSB and Mr Putin, and his association with other Russian dissidents were possible motives for his killing.

'Send a message'

There was also "undoubtedly a personal dimension to the antagonism" between Mr Putin and Mr Litvinenko, he said.

The use of polonium-210 was "at the very least a strong indicator of state involvement" as it had to be made in a nuclear reactor, the report said.

The inquiry heard evidence that Mr Litvinenko may have been consigned to a slow death from radiation to "send a message".

Giving a statement to the House of Commons, Mrs May said Mr Cameron would raise the findings with President Putin at "the next available opportunity".

She said the UK would impose asset freezes on Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun and that international arrest warrants for the pair remained in place. They both deny killing Mr Litvinenko.

Both men are wanted in the UK for questioning, but Russia has refused to extradite them.

Speaking earlier outside the High Court, Mr Litvinenko's widow, Marina, said she was "very happy" that "the words my husband spoke on his deathbed when he accused Mr Putin have been proved by an English court".

She urged the UK government to expel all Russian intelligence operatives, impose economic sanctions on Moscow and impose a travel ban on Mr Putin.

The view from Moscow
By the BBC's Oleg Boldyrev

Andrei Lugovoi, left, and Dmitry Kovtun  Image copyrightAP

For years Moscow rejected allegations of high-level involvement in the murder of Alexander Litvinenko.

The fact President Putin himself is now associated with this assassination has not changed anything.

Taking their lead from Robert Owen's use of the words "high probability", the second tier of the Russian establishment, mainly Kremlin-loyalist MPs, are dismissing the entire report as a politically-based fabrication.

Russians on social media are making fun of its conclusions by using the hashtag "PutinProbablyApproved" in Russian - that is #ПутинВозможноОдобрил - to include all manner of crimes.

One Russian MP, Nikolai Kovalev, himself an ex-FSB boss, pointed out relations between Moscow and London would not be harmed by the report as there was no room for making them any worse.

How Russian media reported the Litvinenko inquiry

Responding to the report, Mr Lugovoi, who is now a politician in Russia, said the accusations against him were "absurd", the Russian news agency Interfax was quoted as saying.

"As we expected, there were no surprises," he said.

"The results of the investigation made public today yet again confirm London's anti-Russian position, its blinkeredness and the unwillingness of the English to establish the true reason of Litvinenko's death."

Mr Kovtun, now a businessman in Russia, said he would not comment on the report until he got more information about its contents, Interfax reported.

Andrei Lugovoi in hotel where Litvinenko was poisoned

'Harm relations'

London's Metropolitan Police said the investigation into the "cold and calculated murder" remained ongoing.

Alexander Yakovenko, the Russian ambassador in the UK, said Russia would not accept any decisions reached in secret and based on evidence not tested in open court.

The length of time taken to come to these conclusions led them to believe it was "a whitewash of British security services' incompetence", he said.

Mr Yakovenko said these events "can't help but harm our bilateral relations".

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said he did not have "any actions" to announce following the inquiry's findings. "But I certainly wouldn't rule out future steps," he said.


Analysis
By BBC security correspondent, Gordon Corera

Alexander Litvinenko, pictured at a news conference in Moscow in 1998,
when he was an officer of Russia's state security service FSB
Image copyrightReuters

The conclusions of this inquiry are stronger than many expected in pointing the finger at Vladimir Putin personally.

The evidence behind that seems to have come from secret intelligence heard in closed session.

Saying that Alexander Litvinenko was killed because he was an enemy of the Russian state will raise pressure on the British government to take real action - the steps taken nearly a decade ago were only limited in scope.

That may pose difficulties given the importance of Russia's role in the Middle East, but without tough action people may ask if the Russian government has been allowed to get away with what has been described as an act of nuclear terrorism on the streets of London.

Mr Litvinenko fled to the UK in 2000, claiming persecution. He was granted asylum and gained British citizenship several years later.

In the years before his death, he worked as a writer and journalist, becoming a strong critic of the Kremlin.

Russian President Vladimir Putin "probably" approved the killing, report says

It is believed he also worked as a consultant for MI6, specialising in Russian organised crime.

The inquiry heard from 62 witnesses in six months of hearings and was shown secret intelligence evidence about Mr Litvinenko and his links with British intelligence agencies.


The Litvinenko case

23 November 2006 - Mr Litvinenko dies three weeks after having tea with former agents Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitri Kovtun in London

22 May 2007 - Britain's director of public prosecutions decides Mr Lugovoi should be charged with his murder

5 July 2007 - Russia refuses to extradite Mr Lugovoi, saying its constitution does not allow it

May-July 2013 - The inquest into Mr Litvinenko's death is delayed as the coroner decides a public inquiry would be preferable - but ministers rule out the request

11 February 2014 - High Court rules the Home Office was wrong to rule out an inquiry before the outcome of an inquest

January 2015 - Public inquiry begins

Goldman Sachs' "Now You See It, Now You Don't", Recession

Despite being “too big to fail”, America’s “most important bank” Goldman Sachs may have done so this week, at least for a few minutes, when it possibly tipped off a new economic recession.

A graphic in the “Markets do not ‘Take it Easy’ to start the year” report posted online showed the US in a recession according to Goldman’s Current Activity Indicator.

“Although EM assets remain in the cross-hairs – and the outlook there remains tenuous in spots – growth concerns have impacted the market’s view of US and European growth as well, pushing our market-based measure of US growth risk to new post GFC lows,” the report read.

GFC = Global Financial Crash


Shortly after the financial watchdog website Zero Hedge tweeted their response, Goldman Sachs posted an altered graphic, moving the dark blue line from zero to closer to two.

CAI = Current Activity Indicator

So if Goldman Sachs changed the chart, there’s no recession, right?

Well, that’s where we get into a gray area.

Economist Paul Samuelson once said “the stock market has predicted nine out of the last five recessions”, according to the Washington Post, which asked “Is the stock market telling us we’re headed for a recession?” on Wednesday.

Andrew Levin, a Dartmouth professor and former adviser to Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, pointed out in this document posted Monday that the “jobs boom doesn't look like it will last” and “industrial production is falling as fast as it does when there's historically been a recession”, according to the Washington Post.

Art Cashin, Director of Floor Operations at UBS, told CNBC Tuesday: "If corporations start to pull back and say 'I don't want to advance anything; I don't want to hire anybody,' we could slide into a recession."

Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, who’s been spinning through the revolving door between Washington and Wall Street since the Clinton administration, wrote in the Financial Times earlier this month that “markets understood the gravity of the 2008 crisis well before the Federal Reserve” and cited a report by The Economist which found the International Monetary Fund (IMF) failed to recognize any of the 220 recessions in major countries in the April before the recession started.

Last week, portfolio strategist Michael Pento wrote in his CNBC commentary ominously titled “A recession worse than 2008 is coming”: “The unscrupulous individuals that dominate financial institutions and governments seldom predict a down-tick on Wall Street, so don't expect them to warn of the impending global recession and market mayhem. But a recession has occurred in the US about every five years, on average, since the end of WWII; and it has been seven years since the last one - we are overdue.”

Goldman Sachs has long been criticized, but rarely punished, for its role in the global financial crash, aka GFC.

As portrayed in the new Oscar-nominated film “The Big Short,” the $40 billion company sold investments they knew to be "crap" and "junk," and took out insurance policies against them.

“Investment banks such as Goldman Sachs were not simply market-makers, they were self-interested promoters of risky and complicated financial schemes that helped trigger the crisis”, Michigan Democrat Carl Levin from the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said.

Despite multiple revelations published by the Subcommittee, the Obama administration announced it was ending the investigation into Goldman Sachs for its manipulation of the sub-prime mortgage market in 2012.

Ironically, Republican presidential candidate and Texas Senator Ted Cruz loves nothing more than telling Republicans how Obama brought the country to its knees, failing to mention that his wife is a managing director for Goldman Sachs and regional head of the bank’s Houston office.

The government has been able to squeeze a few bob out of Goldman Sachs. Last week, it settled a joint lawsuit for $5 billion, specifically for Goldman Sachs’ role in selling mortgage-backed securities between 2005 and 2007.

It reached a $1.2 billion settlement with the Federal Housing Finance Agency in 2014 and in 2010, Goldman Sachs paid $550 million to the Securities Exchange Commission.

In all cases, the settlements allowed them to avoid prosecution or jail time.

Are Satellite Temperature Data Reliable?

Is there a scientific bias against that which does not support global warming?

Yesterday, I posted an article on global warming claiming 2015 to be 'by far' the warmest year on record. Computer models from NASA, NOAA, Japan Met Agency, and USC Berkeley all agreed that such was the case.

The article posed that the El Nino event currently happening may cause the temperature to rise by about 1/3rd of a degree; although, as I pointed out, this year's El Nino is very close to being on a par with the 1997-98 El Nino - the strongest ever. That El Nino resulted in a temperature spike of 2/3rds of a degree. 

The point is by using an average El Nino temperature spike rather than the more relevant 1997-98 event, the article appears to try to minimize the El Nino effect and, therefore, exaggerate the effects of anthropogenic CO2 production on global warming. As I also pointed out yesterday, this too is disingenuous since it has never been proven and, indeed, the best proof, or science, seems to indicate little or no anthropogenic effect on global warming.

Temperature data from satellite observations indicated that 2015 was, in fact, only the 3rd warmest year on record since those data have been tracked - 1979. This finding was handled by scientists informing us that satellite data are not reliable, that there is a larger margin of error. The video below indicates that the data actually verifies quite well with upper air observations. 

So the question is, are satellite data less reliable than the heavily messaged, unverified temperatures from the surface? Or, are scientists simply dismissing that which does not fit with their preconceived conclusions?

What do you think?

500 Families Returning Home as ISIS & Nusra Jihadists Withdraw from Damascus Suburbs

Well, this is a surprise

Al-Qadam district south of Damascus © RT Arabic / RT

Some 500 families are set to return to the devastated southern suburbs of Damascus, after ISIS and Al-Nusra fighters were allowed to withdraw from the area unharmed, as part of a “national reconciliation” deal with the Syrian government.

As part of the three stage withdrawal plan of the “reconciliation” more than 1,000 jihadists on Wednesday were provided with a safe passage to the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) stronghold of Raqqa in northern Syria. Al-Nusra fighters are making their way to Idlib, also in the north of the country, RR Arabic reports.

Al-Qadam district south of Damascus © RT Arabic / RT

Overall some 4,000 people, including the family members of extremist fighting units, were placed on the buses to head north. As part of the safety corridor agreement reached under the auspices of the United Nations and the the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) at the end of December, fighters had to surrender their arms.

Besides leaving the southern suburbs of Damascus, IS and Al-Nusra militants, mostly of foreign nationalities, have also moved out of the Palestinian Yarmouk refugee camp, which the fighters had been holding under their control since April 2015.

“Today is a happy and joyful day. Most armed ISIS units, that kept control of the Yarmouk camp and Al-Hajar Al-Aswad [city just 4 kilometers (2 miles) south of Damascus] have completed their withdrawal. This is about 4,000 people, including their families. This morning at dawn, they went away,” President of the Palestinian Reconciliation Committee, Sheikh Mohammed Omari, told RT Arabic.

At the same time around 1,300 fighters, Syrian nationals, have chosen to cut ties with the radicals, surrender and potentially join the national militia, according to Russian outlet LifeNews. In the Al-Qadam area alone, some 150 people had their legal status settled, according to Syrian state news agency SANA.

The clearing of the terrorist threat in the Damascus suburbs made it possible for the first batch of some 500 families to ready themselves to return to their homes in an area that looks nothing as it once did before the Syrian conflict erupted.

No kidding! Are they even going to want to return to that?

Al-Qadam district south of Damascus © RT Arabic / RT

Heavy fighting has left hardly anything but rubble and dusty empty streets. All of the buildings have been damaged or destroyed and barely any functioning infrastructure is left standing. But now, locals told RT Arabic, these ruins are a symbol of liberation, freedom from the tyrannical jihadi rule that reigned there ever since the suburbs were captured from the Free Syrian Army in 2014.

Heat Record: 2015 was Hottest Year by Huge Margin, Sort of

El Nino partly to blame, but human activity was the main driver, NASA and NOAA scientists say
The Associated Press 

Caution: there is a lot more hot air in this article than just the global temperature!

2015's global average temperature was the hottest ever by the widest margin on record, NASA and NOAA reported Wednesday.

Last year wasn't just the Earth's hottest year on record — it left a century of high temperature marks in the dust.

The National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration and NASA announced Wednesday that 2015 was by far the hottest year in 136 years of record keeping.

NOAA said 2015's average temperature was 
14.79 degrees Celsius (58.62 degrees Fahrenheit), passing 
2014 by a record margin of 0.16 C (0.29 F). 
That's 0.90 C (1.62 F) above the 20th-century average. NASA, which measures differently, said 2015 was 0.13 C (0.23 F) warmer than the record set in 2014.

A graphic shows what parts of the Earth were warmer and cooler than average in 2015. It was the warmest year since modern record-keeping began in 1880, according to a new analysis by NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. (Scientific Visualization Studio/Goddard Space Flight Center)

Because of the wide margin over 2014, NASA calculated that 2015 was a record with 94 per cent certainty, about double the certainty it had last year when announcing 2014 as a record.

Just want to point out that measuring the temperature of the earth's surface is an extremely complex process. That NASA and NOAA use different methods of calculating the global temperature and still come up with similar results should inspire a little confidence. 

The 94% certainty announced by NASA ought to also inspire some confidence although one wonders why the process requires a certainty rating in the first place. It would imply a certain amount of 'estimation' or perhaps, 'guesstimation' involved in the calculations. Such estimations could be influenced by the hope of a desired outcome.

4th record in 11 years

Although 2015 is now the hottest on record, it was the fourth time in 11 years that Earth broke annual marks for high temperature.

"It's getting to the point where breaking record is the norm," Texas Tech climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe said. "It's almost unusual when we're not breaking a record."

A boy cools off in a public fountain in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, October 16, 2015, when temperatures reached a record-breaking 42.8 degrees Celsius. The sharp temperature increase in 2015 was driven in part by El Nino, scientists say. (Pilar Olivares/Reuters)

Scientists blame a combination of El Nino and increasing man-made global warming.

Michael Mann of Pennsylvania State University said a strong El Nino, like this year's, can add about a third of a degree of warming to Earth's temperature.

This year's El Nino is currently the 2nd strongest on record (since 1950) and is very close to the strongest El Nino on record in 1997/98. That event caused a temperature rise of about 2/3rds of a degree above the norm, and above the 1997 temperature, not 1/3rd.

This year's increase of 0.16 or 0.13 degrees above the 2014 temperature is 1/6th to 1/8th of a degree. For such a strong El Nino, one might have expected more. 

Certainly, El Nino is not done yet and there is a bit of a lag in temperatures, so 2016 may well make up some of that short-fall; it will be interesting to watch. But as with all El Nino events, the temperature will drop the following year to normal levels leaving 2017 to be a cool year.

"Records will happen during El Nino years due to the extra warming boost they provide," Mann said in an email. "That boost of warmth however sits upon the ramp of global warming."

He's correct here, certainly, although the statement, "increasing man-made global warming", has yet to be proven. That ANY global  warming is anthropogenic has yet to be proven. Since only 3-4% of all CO2 that enters the atmosphere is caused by man's activities, any influence on the global temperature could only be very slight, if at all.

Prof Murry Salby has clearly shown that increased CO2 in the atmosphere is a consequence of increased temperature, not the other way about. That is, increased CO2 follows increased temperature because most CO2 comes out of the ground and its production increases with the temperature of the ground, and to a lesser degree, the moisture content.

And it's likely to happen this year, too. NASA scientists and others said there's a good chance that this year will pass 2015 as the hottest year on record, thanks to El Nino.

Road markings appear distorted during a heat wave, in New Delhi, India, 27 May 2015. At that time, more than 1,150 people were reported dead from the heat wave. (Harish Tyagi/EPA)

"2015 will be difficult to beat, but you say that almost every year and you get surprised," said Victor Gensini, a meteorology professor at the College of DuPage outside of Chicago.

Measurements from Japan and the University of California at Berkeley also show 2015 is the warmest on record. Satellite measurements, which scientists say don't measure where we live and have a larger margin of error, calculate that last year was only the third hottest since 1979.

Satellite measurements are used to calculate the temperature of the lower atmosphere and not just the surface of the earth. There are many issues affecting the accuracy of these calculations which is why it has a larger margin of error. Nevertheless, it is curious that satellite measurements found 2015 to be only the 3rd warmest year on record.

A heat wave took a heavy toll in Pakistan.

A man attempts to cool off in the worst heat wave to hit Karachi, Pakistan, in 35 years. There were more than 1,000 deaths as of June 25, with temperatures as high as 45 C since June 20. (Akhtar Soomro/Reuters)

Record-breaking heat hit Europe, too.

People cool off at Virgen de Regla beach in Chipiona, Spain, on Aug. 1, 2015 as locals and vacationers alike flock to the coast to beat a heat wave that has been bringing consistently high temperatures to parts of Europe this summer. (Marcelo del Pozo/Reuters)

‘Stop Asylum Nonsense!’ Anti-refugee Rally in Small Dutch Town Erupts in Violence

The term 'violence' may be a bit excessive here but it was certainly a good turn out for a small town

A mass anti-immigration rally in the Netherlands has erupted into violence after riot police moved in to disperse a 1,000-strong march against the opening of a refugee center in the town of Heesch. © Tom / YouTube

EU refugee & migrant influx
Protesters shot fireworks and threw flares at riot police who attempted to disperse a crowd of an estimated 1,000 people marching on the local town hall. The protesters took to the streets as officials held a meeting on Monday to discuss plans of accommodating some 500 refugees over the next 10 years.

Far right activists tried to storm the local government headquarters, forcing local officials to abandon their scheduled debate and evacuate the premises. The town “had given police extra powers” after a “demonstration ran out of control,” said a message from the mayor, Marieke Moorman, posted on the town's website.

Authorities did not immediately announce the number of those detained or possibly injured in clashes.

The demo began peacefully at around 6:00pm GMT. Protesters carried signs bearing slogans such as “stop the asylum nonsense!” the crowd marched to the town hall, where the building was eventually pelted with eggs.

Clashes erupted hours after notorious far-right politician Geert Wilders demanded that male Muslim migrants be locked up in asylum centers, justifying the move as a measure of protection for Dutch women after the New Year's Eve assaults in Cologne, Germany. Anti-migrant activists took the video message of the head of the Freedom Party (PVV) seriously, and moved quickly to organize an event via Facebook.

Police officers urged the crowd to disperse and called for riot-geared backup to take control of the situation and clear the square in front of the city hall by 7:30pm.

Protesters insist that 500 asylum seekers is a disproportionally high number for a town of some 12,500 people, urging authorities to scrap their plans for refugee resettlement.