the real world
exposing how greed, corruption, injustice, and imperialism impacts the world
and exposes the leaders who benefit
dec 6, 2019
*Boris Johnson referred to police watchdog over alleged relationship with American businesswoman The prime minister of Great Britain may be facing an investigation as impeachment grips America.
Man becomes great exactly in the degree in which he works for the welfare of his fellow-men
Mahatma Gandhi
articles
*BREXIT AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S. QUITS OVER ‘HALF-TRUTHS’
NO MORE LIES(ARTICLE BELOW)
*MASSIVE LEAK OF DATA REVEALS NEW MONEY-HIDING SECRETS OF SUPERRICH — AND THIS IS ‘ONLY THE BEGINNING’(ARTICLE BELOW)
*LEAKED DOCUMENT REVEALS US DRUG FIRMS ARE PUSHING TRUMP TO TARGET THE NHS AFTER BREXIT(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Dozens of Jewish graves vandalized at cemetery near Strasbourg
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Nepal’s mass animal slaughter begins despite outcry
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Government shutdown in Samoa amid ‘cruel’ measles outbreak
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Raid of startup ‘Pro-Nazi’ party in Italy reveals weapons, fascist propaganda and ‘Miss Hitler’ beauty pageant winner(ARTICLE BELOW)
*‘Secret agenda today is exposed’: Corbyn says leaked docs show Tory plan to privatize NHS with Trump’s help(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Muslim countries' silence on China’s repression of Uighurs
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Bolsonaro's son faces probe over 'ghost employees'
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Netanyahu indicted for bribery, fraud and breach of trust
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Sweden drops Julian Assange rape investigation
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*'Show no mercy': leaked documents reveal details of China's Xinjiang detentions
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Catastrophic Wildfires Threaten Sydney, Australia, as Government Backs Coal
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Why is inequality booming in Chile? Blame the Chicago Boys
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Boris Johnson's Conservative party has received cash from 9 Russian donors named in a suppressed intelligence report(ARTICLE BELOW)
*LEAK FROM NEO-NAZI SITE COULD IDENTIFY HUNDREDS OF EXTREMISTS WORLDWIDE
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Sweden bomb attacks reach unprecedented level as gangs feud
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Indian capital Delhi gasps under choking smog
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*German city declares "Nazi emergency"
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Super-rich prepare to leave UK 'within minutes' if Labour wins election
(ARTICLE BELOW)
funnies(at the end)
*World Highlights*
12/6/19
*Australia fires Five blazes merge north of Sydney with worse to come
*UK general election Leaked Brexit paper negates PM's Northern Ireland claims – Corbyn
*France Country faces second day of travel chaos as strikes continue
Transport stoppages to run into weekend amid protests against planned pension changes
Brexit Ambassador to the U.S. Quits Over ‘Half-Truths’
NO MORE LIES
Nico Hines - London Editor
Published Dec. 06, 2019 11:32AM ET
DAILY BEAST CHEAT SHEET
One of the senior diplomats at the British Embassy in Washington, D.C. has quit in protest at the “half-truths” and distortions she said she was expected to peddle as a representative of Boris Johnson’s Conservative government. Alexandra Hall Hall, who has worked in the foreign service for 33 years including a stint as ambassador to the Republic of Georgia, announced her resignation in a searing letter, which was obtained by CNN. “I would prefer to do something more rewarding with my time than peddle half-truths on behalf of a government I do not trust,” she wrote. As U.K. Brexit counselor, she was responsible for explaining Britain’s approach to Brexit on Capitol Hill. “I have been increasingly dismayed by the way in which our political leaders have tried to deliver Brexit,” she wrote. “[Including] the use of misleading or disingenuous arguments.”
Massive leak of data reveals new money-hiding secrets of superrich — and this is ‘only the beginning’
December 5, 2019
By Common Dreams - raw story
A massive trove of documents, data, and recorded phone calls showing how British company Formations House works to hide money for the superrich is being reported on by journalists all over the world, with the first stories dropping at midnight on Wednesday.
The reporting is being done under the name “29 Leaks,” a reference to Formations House’s original address at 29 Harley Street in London. The data was leaked to the group Distributed Denial of Secrets over the summer.
“It takes a concerted effort from a large number of people to make substantive headway on an investigation like this, in which a large amount of data needs to be quickly processed and examined,” Claire Peters, executive director of the Pursuance Project, told Unicorn Riot on Tuesday.
Peters and Pursuance Project outreach director Annalise Burkhart led a team of reporters from around the world uncovering and detailing the information stored in the huge, roughly 100 GB-sized trove of data.
“Formations House was the perfect example of a ‘one-stop shop’ for creating legal entities that serve as fronts for fraudulent operations and money laundering,” said Burkhart. “In only a matter of days, a client could purchase offshore companies bundled into packages touting minimal compliance requirements, tax-free operations, and anonymity for directors and shareholders.”
“It’s hard to overstate how notorious and suspicious the firm is,” Boing Boing wrote of Formations House when the leak’s existence became public in July.
According to Unicorn Riot, reporting from the data will have an international scope:
Formations House has been the subject of international scrutiny for years, and the #29Leaks documents have been under investigation for some time. It is expected that news stories in Central America, Africa and Europe will examine information drawn from this set of leaks. The use of Formations House-managed companies to move money around between offshore and private banking centers like Luxembourg and other parts of the world is among the main themes of this dataset. Other documents expected to be covered in detail show how the African nation of The Gambia is commonly used to create banks and insurance companies on paper for wealthy people in other continents, which Formations House and related parties package and facilitate.
On Tuesday The Times of London showed, via undercover reporting, how Formations House sets up shell companies for its clients.
McClatchy reported on how Formations House helped Iran’s national oil company avoid sanctions. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project detailed schemes across Eastern Europe. The Economic Times, meanwhile, dug into the comapny’s Pakistani-British management.
More reporting will come, said the Pursuance Project’s Peters.
“There’s much more work to be done with this data,” said Peters, “we’re only at the beginning.”
The reporting is being done under the name “29 Leaks,” a reference to Formations House’s original address at 29 Harley Street in London. The data was leaked to the group Distributed Denial of Secrets over the summer.
“It takes a concerted effort from a large number of people to make substantive headway on an investigation like this, in which a large amount of data needs to be quickly processed and examined,” Claire Peters, executive director of the Pursuance Project, told Unicorn Riot on Tuesday.
Peters and Pursuance Project outreach director Annalise Burkhart led a team of reporters from around the world uncovering and detailing the information stored in the huge, roughly 100 GB-sized trove of data.
“Formations House was the perfect example of a ‘one-stop shop’ for creating legal entities that serve as fronts for fraudulent operations and money laundering,” said Burkhart. “In only a matter of days, a client could purchase offshore companies bundled into packages touting minimal compliance requirements, tax-free operations, and anonymity for directors and shareholders.”
“It’s hard to overstate how notorious and suspicious the firm is,” Boing Boing wrote of Formations House when the leak’s existence became public in July.
According to Unicorn Riot, reporting from the data will have an international scope:
Formations House has been the subject of international scrutiny for years, and the #29Leaks documents have been under investigation for some time. It is expected that news stories in Central America, Africa and Europe will examine information drawn from this set of leaks. The use of Formations House-managed companies to move money around between offshore and private banking centers like Luxembourg and other parts of the world is among the main themes of this dataset. Other documents expected to be covered in detail show how the African nation of The Gambia is commonly used to create banks and insurance companies on paper for wealthy people in other continents, which Formations House and related parties package and facilitate.
On Tuesday The Times of London showed, via undercover reporting, how Formations House sets up shell companies for its clients.
McClatchy reported on how Formations House helped Iran’s national oil company avoid sanctions. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project detailed schemes across Eastern Europe. The Economic Times, meanwhile, dug into the comapny’s Pakistani-British management.
More reporting will come, said the Pursuance Project’s Peters.
“There’s much more work to be done with this data,” said Peters, “we’re only at the beginning.”
the blood suckers are circling!!!
Leaked document reveals US drug firms are pushing Trump to target the NHS after Brexit
Thomas Colson business insider
12/4/19
- American drugs firms believe the British market will be easier to crack after Brexit, according to a leaked document.
- US companies want the Trump administration to open up the UK market, despite warnings it would lead to much higher costs for the NHS.
- The document, leaked to the Mirror newspaper, reads: "Concerns about potential impacts on Britain's National Health Service are being aired. It should prove easier to overcome these challenges with the UK as an individual negotiating partner."
- Experts have warned that the NHS would be landed with a much bigger bill for medication and denied the chance to use cheaper alternatives if it agreed to Washington's demands.
US health firms believe the NHS will be easier to crack after Brexit, according to a leaked document which reveals pressure on the Trump administration to open up Britain's free healthcare system as part of a trade deal with the UK.
The document, written by the Chamber of Commerce and Coalition of Services Industries, indicates that US negotiators believe that contracts to supply the NHS with drugs will be easier to secure once it has left the EU, and is a smaller negotiating partner.
The document, which was leaked to the Mirror newspaper, states that: "Concerns about potential impacts on Britain's National Health Service are being aired. It should prove easier to overcome these challenges with the UK as an individual negotiating partner."
The document also confirms that the US will demand the right for pharmaceutical companies to bid for health services in the UK.
"The United States will seek rules that prohibit, across all services sectors, discrimination against foreign services suppliers and restrictions on the number of services suppliers in the market," the document states.
The prospect of a free trade agreement with the US has often been trumpeted as one of the main attractions of leaving the EU.
But the US makes tough trade demands, especially under the "America First" policy of Donald Trump's administration. It has already made it clear that it will demand much greater access to all UK markets, including drugs and food markets.
Experts have warned that hospitals and patients would have to pay billions more for drugs if the UK did agree to a trade deal with Donald Trump.
A report in November by the NHS Confederation, which represents most hospitals, warned that the NHS would be landed with a much bigger bill for medication and denied the chance to use cheaper alternatives if it agreed to Washington's demands.
"Regarding pricing, the USA objectives [in the trade deal talks] seek to 'provide full market access [in the UK] for US products'[…] Under the [VPAS] scheme, NHS expenditure on branded medicines is capped, ensuring predictability of expenditure for the NHS on the entire branded medicines bill.
"One can imagine that such a scheme would not meet the USA's objectives, which if achieved would result in higher prices for medicines and pass on costs to both patients and the NHS," the report said.
Trump denies the NHS is on the table(a lie of course)
Trump insisted on Wednesday that he would not be interested in access to the NHS if it was presented "on a silver platter."
However, during a previous visit to the UK in June, Trump suggested that the NHS would be "on the table" as part of trade talks before he attempted to backtrack.
Johnson's Conservative party have repeatedly insisted that the NHS will not be part of trade talks with the US.
But Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn believes the potential privatisation of the NHS is one of Labour's strongest cards in the election campaign.
"If that's the case, why have these talks gone on for two years?" Corbyn told the BBC on Tuesday.
Responding to the leaked trade document, Labour's shadow health secretary John Ashworth said: "Today's revelations are yet more evidence that US big pharma companies are lining up to cash-in on a toxic Johnson-Trump deal.
"These mega-corporations want us to pay more for medicine and the proposed US-UK deal could draw £500 million a week from our NHS."
Dozens of Jewish graves vandalized at cemetery near Strasbourg
December 3, 2019
By Agence France-Presse
More than 100 graves were found covered with swastikas and anti-Semitic graffiti at a Jewish cemetery near Strasbourg in eastern France on Tuesday, officials said, just hours after similar vandalism in a nearby village.
“It’s a shock,” Maurice Dahan, president of the Jewish consistory for the Bas-Rhin region, told AFP, adding that most of the graves were daubed with swastikas.
The government’s regional authority said it was investigating the damage to 107 graves at the cemetery in Westhoffen, around 25 kilometers (15 miles) west of Strasbourg.
And about 20 kilometers away it said that anti-Jewish inscriptions were also found in the village of Schaffhouse-sur-Zorn.
The Alsace region has suffered a rash of racist vandalism over the past year, most notably the desecration of 96 tombs at a cemetery in Quatzenheim in February, which drew nationwide outrage over a spate of anti-Semitic attacks.
President Emmanuel Macron, during a visit to inspect the damage, vowed to crack down on hate speech, including by an increased focus on educating against racism in schools.
The rising number of anti-Jewish offenses reported to police — up 74 percent in 2018 from the previous year — have caused alarm in the country that is home to both the biggest Jewish and the biggest Muslim communities in Europe.
“It’s a shock,” Maurice Dahan, president of the Jewish consistory for the Bas-Rhin region, told AFP, adding that most of the graves were daubed with swastikas.
The government’s regional authority said it was investigating the damage to 107 graves at the cemetery in Westhoffen, around 25 kilometers (15 miles) west of Strasbourg.
And about 20 kilometers away it said that anti-Jewish inscriptions were also found in the village of Schaffhouse-sur-Zorn.
The Alsace region has suffered a rash of racist vandalism over the past year, most notably the desecration of 96 tombs at a cemetery in Quatzenheim in February, which drew nationwide outrage over a spate of anti-Semitic attacks.
President Emmanuel Macron, during a visit to inspect the damage, vowed to crack down on hate speech, including by an increased focus on educating against racism in schools.
The rising number of anti-Jewish offenses reported to police — up 74 percent in 2018 from the previous year — have caused alarm in the country that is home to both the biggest Jewish and the biggest Muslim communities in Europe.
barbarism in the name of religion!!!
Nepal’s mass animal slaughter begins despite outcry
December 3, 2019
By Agence France-Presse - raw story
The stench of raw meat hung in the air and pools of blood dotted the muddy ground on Tuesday as what is thought to be the world’s biggest animal sacrifice swung into action in a remote area of Nepal.
Efforts from activists and officials were expected to cut the death toll from the 200,000 butchered at the last Gadhimai Festival five years ago, but thousands of creatures were still set to be killed over the two days.
The event in honour of a Hindu goddess kicked off in the early hours amid tight security, with the ceremonial slaughter of a goat, rat, chicken, pig and a pigeon. A local shaman then offered blood from five points of his body.
Some 200 butchers with sharpened swords and knives then walked into a walled arena bigger than a football field that held several thousand buffalo as excited pilgrims climbed trees and walls to catch a glimpse.
“We had tried not to support it but people have faith in the tradition and have come here with their offerings,” Birendra Prasad Yadav from the festival organising committee told AFP.
Thousands of goats were also bound for sacrifice — mostly by having their throats slit — as well as pigs and even some rats. The pilgrims could either take the remains to cook or leave them for organisers to bury.
Thousands of worshippers from Nepal and neighbouring India have spent days sleeping out in the open and offering prayers ahead of the event in Bariyarpur village, close to the Indian border.
“I believe in the goddess. My mother had asked her for the good health of my son,” one of them, Rajesh Kumar Das, 30, told AFP, holding a goat in his hand.
Some 2,000 police personnel were patrolling the village and the field where sacrifices were taking place to control crowds gathered to watch.
According to legend, the first sacrifices in Bariyarpur were conducted several centuries ago when goddess Gadhimai appeared to a prisoner in a dream and told him to offer blood and establish her temple.
When he awoke, his shackles had fallen open and he was able to leave the prison and build the temple, where he sacrificed animals to give thanks, so the legend goes.
– ‘Less bloodshed’ –
Indian border authorities and volunteers have in recent days seized scores of animals being brought across the frontier by unlicensed traders and pilgrims.
While this has failed to stop the flow, officials and animal rights groups say such efforts combined with awareness campaigns have helped decrease the bloodshed.
“The temple committee seems to be shaken by the campaigns as well as the government. The number of animals sacrificed are gradually decreasing,” said Amruta Ubale of Animal Equality India.
Local officials have also been running programmes to raise public awareness against the sacrifices and asked devotees to offer money instead of animals, district official Phanindra Mani Pokharel said.
Many were hopeful the centuries-old tradition would end after the temple authorities announced a ban in 2015 and Nepal’s supreme court directed the government to discourage the bloodshed a year later.
But animal rights activists say both government agencies as well as temple committees have failed to implement these rulings.
“It is now time for the Nepal government to step up and introduce a ban in law on animal sacrifice so that this is the last time we witness such horrors at Gadhimai,” said Tanuja Basnet, director of Nepal’s Humane Society International.
Among the bleating goats in the temple area were some devotees who opted not to kill any animals but to free pigeons, like 20-year-old Rabindra Kumar Yadav who came to thank the goddess for his health.
“We didn’t sacrifice an animal, we worshipped the goddess with a pair of pigeons instead,” he said, before the lucky birds flapped away to safety.
Efforts from activists and officials were expected to cut the death toll from the 200,000 butchered at the last Gadhimai Festival five years ago, but thousands of creatures were still set to be killed over the two days.
The event in honour of a Hindu goddess kicked off in the early hours amid tight security, with the ceremonial slaughter of a goat, rat, chicken, pig and a pigeon. A local shaman then offered blood from five points of his body.
Some 200 butchers with sharpened swords and knives then walked into a walled arena bigger than a football field that held several thousand buffalo as excited pilgrims climbed trees and walls to catch a glimpse.
“We had tried not to support it but people have faith in the tradition and have come here with their offerings,” Birendra Prasad Yadav from the festival organising committee told AFP.
Thousands of goats were also bound for sacrifice — mostly by having their throats slit — as well as pigs and even some rats. The pilgrims could either take the remains to cook or leave them for organisers to bury.
Thousands of worshippers from Nepal and neighbouring India have spent days sleeping out in the open and offering prayers ahead of the event in Bariyarpur village, close to the Indian border.
“I believe in the goddess. My mother had asked her for the good health of my son,” one of them, Rajesh Kumar Das, 30, told AFP, holding a goat in his hand.
Some 2,000 police personnel were patrolling the village and the field where sacrifices were taking place to control crowds gathered to watch.
According to legend, the first sacrifices in Bariyarpur were conducted several centuries ago when goddess Gadhimai appeared to a prisoner in a dream and told him to offer blood and establish her temple.
When he awoke, his shackles had fallen open and he was able to leave the prison and build the temple, where he sacrificed animals to give thanks, so the legend goes.
– ‘Less bloodshed’ –
Indian border authorities and volunteers have in recent days seized scores of animals being brought across the frontier by unlicensed traders and pilgrims.
While this has failed to stop the flow, officials and animal rights groups say such efforts combined with awareness campaigns have helped decrease the bloodshed.
“The temple committee seems to be shaken by the campaigns as well as the government. The number of animals sacrificed are gradually decreasing,” said Amruta Ubale of Animal Equality India.
Local officials have also been running programmes to raise public awareness against the sacrifices and asked devotees to offer money instead of animals, district official Phanindra Mani Pokharel said.
Many were hopeful the centuries-old tradition would end after the temple authorities announced a ban in 2015 and Nepal’s supreme court directed the government to discourage the bloodshed a year later.
But animal rights activists say both government agencies as well as temple committees have failed to implement these rulings.
“It is now time for the Nepal government to step up and introduce a ban in law on animal sacrifice so that this is the last time we witness such horrors at Gadhimai,” said Tanuja Basnet, director of Nepal’s Humane Society International.
Among the bleating goats in the temple area were some devotees who opted not to kill any animals but to free pigeons, like 20-year-old Rabindra Kumar Yadav who came to thank the goddess for his health.
“We didn’t sacrifice an animal, we worshipped the goddess with a pair of pigeons instead,” he said, before the lucky birds flapped away to safety.
Government shutdown in Samoa amid ‘cruel’ measles outbreak
December 2, 2019
By Agence France-Presse - raw story
Samoa ordered a government shutdown to help combat a devastating measles outbreak Monday, as five more children succumbed to the virus, lifting the death toll in the tiny Pacific nation to 53.
The government said almost 200 new measles cases had been recorded since Sunday, with the rate of infection showing no sign of slowing despite a compulsory mass vaccination programme.
The scheme has so far focussed on children but Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi said it was time to immunise everyone in the 200,000 population aged under 60.
To achieve the goal, he said government services and departments would close on Thursday and Friday this week in order to allow all public servants to assist with the mass vaccination campaign throughout the country.
He said only electricity and water utility workers would be exempt and called on the nation to stand together to contain the outbreak.
“In this time of crisis, and the cruel reality of the measles epidemic, let us reflect on how we can avoid recurrence in the future,” Malielegaoi said in a national address.
Since the crisis began in mid-October, there have been 3,728 measles cases, accounting for almost two percent of the population.
Infants are the most vulnerable and form the bulk of infections, with 48 of the fatalities aged four or less.
A state of emergency was declared in mid-November, with schools closed and children banned from public gatherings, such as church services, to minimise the risk of contagion.
The outbreak has been exacerbated by Samoa’s low immunisation rates, which the World Health Organisation blames on overseas-based anti-vaccine campaigners.
Malielegaoi was unequivocal in his message, telling his people “vaccination is the only cure… no traditional healers or kangen (alkaline) water preparations can cure measles”.
“Let us work together to encourage and convince those that do not believe that vaccinations are the only answer to the epidemic,” he said.
“Let us not be distracted by the promise of alternative cures.”
Officials say the anti-vaccination message has resonated in Samoa because of a case last year when two babies died after receiving measles immunisation shots.
It resulted in the temporary suspension of the country’s immunisation programme and dented parents’ trust in the vaccine, even though it later turned out the deaths were caused when other medicines were incorrectly administered.
The government said almost 200 new measles cases had been recorded since Sunday, with the rate of infection showing no sign of slowing despite a compulsory mass vaccination programme.
The scheme has so far focussed on children but Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi said it was time to immunise everyone in the 200,000 population aged under 60.
To achieve the goal, he said government services and departments would close on Thursday and Friday this week in order to allow all public servants to assist with the mass vaccination campaign throughout the country.
He said only electricity and water utility workers would be exempt and called on the nation to stand together to contain the outbreak.
“In this time of crisis, and the cruel reality of the measles epidemic, let us reflect on how we can avoid recurrence in the future,” Malielegaoi said in a national address.
Since the crisis began in mid-October, there have been 3,728 measles cases, accounting for almost two percent of the population.
Infants are the most vulnerable and form the bulk of infections, with 48 of the fatalities aged four or less.
A state of emergency was declared in mid-November, with schools closed and children banned from public gatherings, such as church services, to minimise the risk of contagion.
The outbreak has been exacerbated by Samoa’s low immunisation rates, which the World Health Organisation blames on overseas-based anti-vaccine campaigners.
Malielegaoi was unequivocal in his message, telling his people “vaccination is the only cure… no traditional healers or kangen (alkaline) water preparations can cure measles”.
“Let us work together to encourage and convince those that do not believe that vaccinations are the only answer to the epidemic,” he said.
“Let us not be distracted by the promise of alternative cures.”
Officials say the anti-vaccination message has resonated in Samoa because of a case last year when two babies died after receiving measles immunisation shots.
It resulted in the temporary suspension of the country’s immunisation programme and dented parents’ trust in the vaccine, even though it later turned out the deaths were caused when other medicines were incorrectly administered.
Raid of startup ‘Pro-Nazi’ party in Italy reveals weapons, fascist propaganda and ‘Miss Hitler’ beauty pageant winner
November 29, 2019
By David Badash, The New Civil Rights Movement - raw story
Police in Italy raided the homes of 19 people who allegedly were working to create a despicable “openly pro-Nazi, xenophobic and anti-Semitic” party in Italy. Search warrants from the two-year investigation into “extreme right-wing local militants” led to the uncovering of “firearms and propaganda celebrating Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and fascist dictator Benito Mussolini,” CNN reports.
Also revealed: one of the members is a 36-year old woman who won an online “Miss Hitler” beauty pageant.
“The tattoo of a shoulder-to-shoulder Nazi eagle above a swastika spanning the back of Francesca Rizzi leaves little to the imagination about her political ideology,” The Daily Beast explains.
There are multiple reports of a “Miss Hitler” beauty pageant that was to be held on the Russian social media site VK, going back as far as 2014.
Members of the group are described by local police as a “vast and jagged galaxy of subjects” who shared the same “ideological fanatism” and were not arrested but are “under investigation.” They used social media to attract followers and even set up a closed chat group called “Militia.”
Also revealed: one of the members is a 36-year old woman who won an online “Miss Hitler” beauty pageant.
“The tattoo of a shoulder-to-shoulder Nazi eagle above a swastika spanning the back of Francesca Rizzi leaves little to the imagination about her political ideology,” The Daily Beast explains.
There are multiple reports of a “Miss Hitler” beauty pageant that was to be held on the Russian social media site VK, going back as far as 2014.
Members of the group are described by local police as a “vast and jagged galaxy of subjects” who shared the same “ideological fanatism” and were not arrested but are “under investigation.” They used social media to attract followers and even set up a closed chat group called “Militia.”
‘Secret agenda today is exposed’: Corbyn says leaked docs show Tory plan to privatize NHS with Trump’s help
November 27, 2019
By Jake Johnson, Common Dreams - raw story
U.K. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn on Wednesday unveiled over 450 pages of leaked documents that he said expose British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s effort to open up the National Health Service to corporate exploitation in trade negotiations with U.S. President Donald Trump.
During a press conference, Corbyn said the Trump administration’s negotiators are “demanding” that the NHS be put “on the table” in talks over a possible post-Brexit trade pact between the U.S. and U.K.
“We will never let Donald Trump get his hands on our NHS. Because our NHS is not for sale.”
—Jeremy Corbyn, U.K. Labour Leader
“That could lead to runaway privatization of our health service,” said Corbyn. “Mega-corporations see Johnson’s alliance with Trump as a chance to make billions from the illness and sickness of people in this country. And if the Conservatives have their way and this deal goes forward, the changes I’ve revealed will be almost irreversible.”
The documents Corbyn presented Wednesday were unredacted government records from six rounds of U.S.-U.K. trade talks spanning from July 2017 to July 2019.
Corbyn said the official documents discredit Johnson’s insistence that the NHS is not on the table in the trade negotiations with the Trump White House.
“These uncensored documents leave Boris Johnson’s denials in absolute tatters,” Corbyn said. “Voters need to ask themselves some very serious questions. Is the NHS safe in Boris Johnson’s hands? We’ve now got evidence that under Boris Johnson, the NHS is on the table and will be up for sale. They tried to cover it up. Their secret agenda today is exposed.”
Corbyn’s press conference came just weeks after the U.K.’s Channel 4—citing anonymous sources with knowledge of the ongoing trade negotiations--reported that the “U.S. government and its powerful pharmaceutical industry want the NHS to pay more for their medicines which are much more expensive across the Atlantic.”
“They want to remove the U.K.’s ability to block American drugs not deemed ‘value for money’ and restrict our powers to allow cheaper alternatives to be prescribed to patients which save the NHS hundreds of millions of pounds a year,” Channel 4 reported.
Nick Dearden, director of U.K.-based advocacy group Global Justice Now, said in a statement that the documents obtained by the Labour Party “clearly show the British negotiators being bullied by Trump’s administration, and Boris Johnson dancing to the tune of U.S. big business.”
“The U.S. is demanding damaging changes to the British economy which threaten our public services like the NHS, our food standards and farmer livelihoods, our access to new cancer medicines, and our ability to tackle climate change,” said Dearden. “U.S. officials are damning about parliamentary scrutiny over safety standards and are even trying to dictate what positions Britain can take in international fora.”
Johnson has repeatedly denied that the NHS is on the chopping block. “Our NHS will never be for sale,” the British prime minister tweeted earlier this month.
“This did not age well,” Corbyn said of Johnson’s tweet following the press conference Wednesday.
“So for the want of any doubt, let me give this reassurance,” Corbyn said Wednesday. “Labour will never ever treat our NHS as a bargaining chip in trade talks with anybody. We will never let Donald Trump get his hands on our NHS. Because our NHS is not for sale.”
During a press conference, Corbyn said the Trump administration’s negotiators are “demanding” that the NHS be put “on the table” in talks over a possible post-Brexit trade pact between the U.S. and U.K.
“We will never let Donald Trump get his hands on our NHS. Because our NHS is not for sale.”
—Jeremy Corbyn, U.K. Labour Leader
“That could lead to runaway privatization of our health service,” said Corbyn. “Mega-corporations see Johnson’s alliance with Trump as a chance to make billions from the illness and sickness of people in this country. And if the Conservatives have their way and this deal goes forward, the changes I’ve revealed will be almost irreversible.”
The documents Corbyn presented Wednesday were unredacted government records from six rounds of U.S.-U.K. trade talks spanning from July 2017 to July 2019.
Corbyn said the official documents discredit Johnson’s insistence that the NHS is not on the table in the trade negotiations with the Trump White House.
“These uncensored documents leave Boris Johnson’s denials in absolute tatters,” Corbyn said. “Voters need to ask themselves some very serious questions. Is the NHS safe in Boris Johnson’s hands? We’ve now got evidence that under Boris Johnson, the NHS is on the table and will be up for sale. They tried to cover it up. Their secret agenda today is exposed.”
Corbyn’s press conference came just weeks after the U.K.’s Channel 4—citing anonymous sources with knowledge of the ongoing trade negotiations--reported that the “U.S. government and its powerful pharmaceutical industry want the NHS to pay more for their medicines which are much more expensive across the Atlantic.”
“They want to remove the U.K.’s ability to block American drugs not deemed ‘value for money’ and restrict our powers to allow cheaper alternatives to be prescribed to patients which save the NHS hundreds of millions of pounds a year,” Channel 4 reported.
Nick Dearden, director of U.K.-based advocacy group Global Justice Now, said in a statement that the documents obtained by the Labour Party “clearly show the British negotiators being bullied by Trump’s administration, and Boris Johnson dancing to the tune of U.S. big business.”
“The U.S. is demanding damaging changes to the British economy which threaten our public services like the NHS, our food standards and farmer livelihoods, our access to new cancer medicines, and our ability to tackle climate change,” said Dearden. “U.S. officials are damning about parliamentary scrutiny over safety standards and are even trying to dictate what positions Britain can take in international fora.”
Johnson has repeatedly denied that the NHS is on the chopping block. “Our NHS will never be for sale,” the British prime minister tweeted earlier this month.
“This did not age well,” Corbyn said of Johnson’s tweet following the press conference Wednesday.
“So for the want of any doubt, let me give this reassurance,” Corbyn said Wednesday. “Labour will never ever treat our NHS as a bargaining chip in trade talks with anybody. We will never let Donald Trump get his hands on our NHS. Because our NHS is not for sale.”
Muslim countries' silence on China’s repression of Uighurs
Sarah LEDUC - france 24
27/11/2019
In response to the extraordinary revelations about China’s programme of “re-education” camps for Uighur Muslims over recent weeks, member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation have stayed silent.
“Sorry, but I do not wish you a good Ramadan,” wrote the head of the Uighur Institute of Europe in Paris, in a cri de coeur railing against Muslim countries’ indifference to the plight of Uighurs in China’s far-western Xinjiang region, published by French weekly L’Obs in May.
In November, Dilnur Reyhan furthered this message in an open letter to Emmanuel Macron ahead of the French president’s trip to Beijing, co-written by the essayist and MEP Raphaël Glucksmann published in the left-wing French paper Libération. “Great crimes feed on silence,” she asserted: “The Uighurs have fallen into a kind of black hole – a legal black hole in China.”
A form of “black hole politics” is operating in the world, the open letter continued: the Uighurs are “barely mentioned in our countries’ exchanges with Chinese leaders”.
‘Remarkable achievements in human rights’
After the publication of troves of official documents leaked to The New York Times and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, outlining a systematic policy of mass internment in Xinjiang, Muslim countries have shied away from supporting the Uighurs.
There is a dividing line at the UN between defenders and critics of the Chinese state’s actions in Xinjiang. At the end of October, 23 countries including France, the UK and the US denounced the repression of the Uighurs at the UN Committee on Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Affairs. Nevertheless, Beijing won the support of 54 countries, who praised the Communist Party’s management of Xinjiang.
A similar thing happened in July: 22 states called on China to put a stop to arbitrary detention in the province. Then 37 countries rushed to Beijing’s defence, praising its “remarkable achievements in the field of human rights”. Amongst them were 14 members of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) – including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan, the UAE, Qatar and Algeria.
In 2017, the OIC responded very differently to the Myanmar military’s crackdown on the country’s Rohingyas. Many Muslim countries – including Saudi Arabia, Iran and Turkey – rallied to the defence of the Muslim minority group in Myanmar. Indeed, the OIC took an active role in condemning the treatment of the Rohingyas at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
‘A great cause of shame for humanity’
By contrast, the last OIC statement on the Uighurs dates back to a simple communiqué in 2015, in which the 57-member group of Muslim countries said it was “concerned” about whether they would be able to celebrate Ramadan.
“There is less solidarity than there is for the Palestinian or Rohingya causes,” noted Sophie Richardson, director for China at Human Rights Watch. “China has managed to win these countries’ support because they need Chinese investment.”
Saudi Arabia demonstrated this in February, expressing its “respect” for Chinese leader Xi Jinping before signing major commercial contracts. Egypt, which wants Beijing to finance its infrastructure, went so far as to allow Chinese police to come and interrogate Uighur exiles on its soil in 2017. Even Pakistan – which has spoken out for the Rohingyas with particular alacrity – has been silent on the Uighurs while the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative proceeds in the country.
For a long while, Turkey was the exception to this silence on China’s actions in Xinjiang. Most notably, Ankara decried the detention of Uighurs in “concentration camps” as a “great cause of shame for humanity”. But since then, Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government has enacted a U-turn: focused on trade talks with Beijing, the Turkish president refrained from signing the 22 states’ letter condemning the repression in Xinjiang.
“There is a lot of sympathy for the Uighurs in Turkey, but the reality is that Erdogan needs China as an ally for economic reasons and to counteract the West’s diplomatic pressure on issues like Syria,” said Rémi Castets, a political scientist specialising in China at the Bordeaux-Montaigne University. It’s a matter of “realpolitik”, he continued.
‘Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism’
At the same time, the Chinese state has worked hard to give the Uighurs a bad press. In 2014, Beijing launched its “Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism”, justifying its tight grip on Xinjiang by presenting it as a necessary measure in the fight against Islamist extremism.
It seems that many Muslim countries are receptive to this way of framing the issue: at the UN committee meeting in July, the letter signed by OIC members praised Beijing’s “counter-terrorism and deradicalisation measures” in Xinjiang. “Now safety and security has returned to Xinjiang and the fundamental human rights of people of all ethnic groups there are safeguarded,” it continued.
The arrest of Uighurs in Taliban networks during the war in Afghanistan, their incarceration at Guantanamo, and the apparent presence of Uighur contingents in al Qaeda-affiliated groups in Syria have all fueled this discourse presenting China’s actions as a crackdown on terrorism.
But human rights campaigners dismiss this as a pretext for the Chinese Communist Party’s campaign to subjugate the Uighurs. “Using terrorism to justify oppression is a classic technique of authoritarian regimes,” said Bénédicte Jeannerod, director of Human Rights Watch France. “The presence of Uighurs in extremist groups does not justify the arbitrary and systematic oppression of more than one million Uighurs, classed as suspects simply because of their ethnicity and religion.”
“Sorry, but I do not wish you a good Ramadan,” wrote the head of the Uighur Institute of Europe in Paris, in a cri de coeur railing against Muslim countries’ indifference to the plight of Uighurs in China’s far-western Xinjiang region, published by French weekly L’Obs in May.
In November, Dilnur Reyhan furthered this message in an open letter to Emmanuel Macron ahead of the French president’s trip to Beijing, co-written by the essayist and MEP Raphaël Glucksmann published in the left-wing French paper Libération. “Great crimes feed on silence,” she asserted: “The Uighurs have fallen into a kind of black hole – a legal black hole in China.”
A form of “black hole politics” is operating in the world, the open letter continued: the Uighurs are “barely mentioned in our countries’ exchanges with Chinese leaders”.
‘Remarkable achievements in human rights’
After the publication of troves of official documents leaked to The New York Times and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, outlining a systematic policy of mass internment in Xinjiang, Muslim countries have shied away from supporting the Uighurs.
There is a dividing line at the UN between defenders and critics of the Chinese state’s actions in Xinjiang. At the end of October, 23 countries including France, the UK and the US denounced the repression of the Uighurs at the UN Committee on Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Affairs. Nevertheless, Beijing won the support of 54 countries, who praised the Communist Party’s management of Xinjiang.
A similar thing happened in July: 22 states called on China to put a stop to arbitrary detention in the province. Then 37 countries rushed to Beijing’s defence, praising its “remarkable achievements in the field of human rights”. Amongst them were 14 members of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) – including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan, the UAE, Qatar and Algeria.
In 2017, the OIC responded very differently to the Myanmar military’s crackdown on the country’s Rohingyas. Many Muslim countries – including Saudi Arabia, Iran and Turkey – rallied to the defence of the Muslim minority group in Myanmar. Indeed, the OIC took an active role in condemning the treatment of the Rohingyas at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
‘A great cause of shame for humanity’
By contrast, the last OIC statement on the Uighurs dates back to a simple communiqué in 2015, in which the 57-member group of Muslim countries said it was “concerned” about whether they would be able to celebrate Ramadan.
“There is less solidarity than there is for the Palestinian or Rohingya causes,” noted Sophie Richardson, director for China at Human Rights Watch. “China has managed to win these countries’ support because they need Chinese investment.”
Saudi Arabia demonstrated this in February, expressing its “respect” for Chinese leader Xi Jinping before signing major commercial contracts. Egypt, which wants Beijing to finance its infrastructure, went so far as to allow Chinese police to come and interrogate Uighur exiles on its soil in 2017. Even Pakistan – which has spoken out for the Rohingyas with particular alacrity – has been silent on the Uighurs while the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative proceeds in the country.
For a long while, Turkey was the exception to this silence on China’s actions in Xinjiang. Most notably, Ankara decried the detention of Uighurs in “concentration camps” as a “great cause of shame for humanity”. But since then, Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government has enacted a U-turn: focused on trade talks with Beijing, the Turkish president refrained from signing the 22 states’ letter condemning the repression in Xinjiang.
“There is a lot of sympathy for the Uighurs in Turkey, but the reality is that Erdogan needs China as an ally for economic reasons and to counteract the West’s diplomatic pressure on issues like Syria,” said Rémi Castets, a political scientist specialising in China at the Bordeaux-Montaigne University. It’s a matter of “realpolitik”, he continued.
‘Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism’
At the same time, the Chinese state has worked hard to give the Uighurs a bad press. In 2014, Beijing launched its “Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism”, justifying its tight grip on Xinjiang by presenting it as a necessary measure in the fight against Islamist extremism.
It seems that many Muslim countries are receptive to this way of framing the issue: at the UN committee meeting in July, the letter signed by OIC members praised Beijing’s “counter-terrorism and deradicalisation measures” in Xinjiang. “Now safety and security has returned to Xinjiang and the fundamental human rights of people of all ethnic groups there are safeguarded,” it continued.
The arrest of Uighurs in Taliban networks during the war in Afghanistan, their incarceration at Guantanamo, and the apparent presence of Uighur contingents in al Qaeda-affiliated groups in Syria have all fueled this discourse presenting China’s actions as a crackdown on terrorism.
But human rights campaigners dismiss this as a pretext for the Chinese Communist Party’s campaign to subjugate the Uighurs. “Using terrorism to justify oppression is a classic technique of authoritarian regimes,” said Bénédicte Jeannerod, director of Human Rights Watch France. “The presence of Uighurs in extremist groups does not justify the arbitrary and systematic oppression of more than one million Uighurs, classed as suspects simply because of their ethnicity and religion.”
Bolsonaro's son faces probe over 'ghost employees'
france24
Issued on: 24/11/2019
Rio de Janeiro (AFP)
Brazilian prosecutors have started a new investigation into the eldest son of President Jair Bolsonaro over suspicion he embezzled public money by hiring "ghost employees," officials said.
The Rio de Janeiro Prosecutors' Office said in a statement Saturday they were investigating Flavio Bolsonaro -- a 38-year-old senator -- in relation to "the employment of ghost employees" from his cabinet.
The events in question date to the period he was regional deputy of the State of Rio.
Flavio's father, the far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, took office on a promise of eradicating corruption but has been repeatedly hit by scandals involving his son.
At the beginning of the year another investigation initially focused on Flavio's former bodyguard and driver, a policeman named Fabricio Queiroz.
Brazil's government anti-financial crimes agency COAF detected 1.2 million reais in transactions made in 2016 through Queiroz's accounts (equivalent to $344,500 according to average exchange rates that year), far exceeding his salary.
One transaction was a deposit to an account belonging to President Bolsonaro's wife Michelle. The president said it was repayment of an undeclared loan he had made to Queiroz.
Later, it was revealed that COAF also found 48 deposits to Flavio Bolsonaro's account in June and July 2017 -- some made within minutes of each other -- that totalled 96,000 reais.
Both Queiroz and Flavio Bolsonaro denied wrongdoing in media interviews.
The prosecutor's office opened an investigation into the case, but it was suspended in July after the Supreme Court decided judicial authorization was needed to obtain this type of financial data.
The decision could soon be reversed, however, after the court last week began a fresh debate in plenary session, the result of which could exempt prosecutors from requiring such authorization.
Brazilian prosecutors have started a new investigation into the eldest son of President Jair Bolsonaro over suspicion he embezzled public money by hiring "ghost employees," officials said.
The Rio de Janeiro Prosecutors' Office said in a statement Saturday they were investigating Flavio Bolsonaro -- a 38-year-old senator -- in relation to "the employment of ghost employees" from his cabinet.
The events in question date to the period he was regional deputy of the State of Rio.
Flavio's father, the far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, took office on a promise of eradicating corruption but has been repeatedly hit by scandals involving his son.
At the beginning of the year another investigation initially focused on Flavio's former bodyguard and driver, a policeman named Fabricio Queiroz.
Brazil's government anti-financial crimes agency COAF detected 1.2 million reais in transactions made in 2016 through Queiroz's accounts (equivalent to $344,500 according to average exchange rates that year), far exceeding his salary.
One transaction was a deposit to an account belonging to President Bolsonaro's wife Michelle. The president said it was repayment of an undeclared loan he had made to Queiroz.
Later, it was revealed that COAF also found 48 deposits to Flavio Bolsonaro's account in June and July 2017 -- some made within minutes of each other -- that totalled 96,000 reais.
Both Queiroz and Flavio Bolsonaro denied wrongdoing in media interviews.
The prosecutor's office opened an investigation into the case, but it was suspended in July after the Supreme Court decided judicial authorization was needed to obtain this type of financial data.
The decision could soon be reversed, however, after the court last week began a fresh debate in plenary session, the result of which could exempt prosecutors from requiring such authorization.
Netanyahu indicted for bribery, fraud and breach of trust
Barak Ravid of Israel's Channel 13 news
11/21/19
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will face indictments in all three corruption cases against him — for bribery, fraud, and breach of trust, according to Israeli officials.
Why it matters: This is the first time in Israeli history that a sitting prime minister will face charges for bribery. Israeli's attorney general sent the indictments to Netanyahu's lawyers and to the speaker of the Knesset in order to begin the process of stripping him of his parliamentary immunity, the Justice Ministry said in a statement.
The big picture: The looming indictments have plunged Israel into a political deadlock following an inconclusive election two months ago.
The backdrop: The most painful charge for Netanyahu stems from "Case 4000," which concerns he and his wife's relationship with Israel's leading telecommunications tycoon.
Why it matters: This is the first time in Israeli history that a sitting prime minister will face charges for bribery. Israeli's attorney general sent the indictments to Netanyahu's lawyers and to the speaker of the Knesset in order to begin the process of stripping him of his parliamentary immunity, the Justice Ministry said in a statement.
The big picture: The looming indictments have plunged Israel into a political deadlock following an inconclusive election two months ago.
- Netanyahu and Benny Gantz both failed to form coalitions, and a proposed national unity government has been blocked because Gantz refuses to serve under a prime minister facing corruption charges
- Netanyahu, meanwhile, has refused to step aside as prime minister because the indictments threaten his political survival.
The backdrop: The most painful charge for Netanyahu stems from "Case 4000," which concerns he and his wife's relationship with Israel's leading telecommunications tycoon.
- According to a police statement, Netanyahu, who at the time was also the telecom minister, allegedly gave Shaul Elovitz regulatory benefits worth hundreds of millions of dollars. In return, Netanyahu and his wife were allegedly allowed to demand positive coverage from one of Israel's major news websites, owned by Elovitz.
- Flashback: Police recommended charges in two other bribery cases in February. One involves Netanyahu allegedly taking "gifts" worth $200,000 from businessmen in return for promoting their interests (Case 1000). The other is an alleged bribe deal between Netanyahu and Arnon Mozes, the publisher of Israel's largest newspaper (Case 2000).
Sweden drops Julian Assange rape investigation
Prosecutor says country will not proceed with investigation into WikiLeaks founder
Ben Quinn
the guardian
Tue 19 Nov 2019 08.15 EST
Swedish authorities have discontinued an investigation into a rape allegation against the WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, after a review of the evidence.
The deputy chief prosecutor, Eva-Marie Persson, said the complainant’s evidence was deemed credible and reliable, but that after nearly a decade, witnesses’ memories had faded.
“After conducting a comprehensive assessment of what has emerged during the course of the preliminary investigation I then make the assessment that the evidence is not strong enough to form the basis for filing an indictment,” Persson said. An appeal against the decision could be made to the office of Sweden’s attorney general, she added.
Assange, who is battling extradition to the US, which accuses him of publishing secret documents related to his WikiLeaks work, has been facing potential charges in Sweden since 2010. The 48-year-old has denied all allegations against him.
Swedish prosecutors dropped their preliminary investigation into the rape allegation in 2017, because they were unable to proceed while Assange remained in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. He had been living there since 2012 after seeking refuge to avoid arrest after Sweden asked Britain to extradite Assange for questioning.
However, the investigation was reopened in May this year after Assange was removed from the embassy when the Latin American government abruptly withdrew his asylum. He was immediately arrested and is serving a 50-week sentence in Belmarsh prison in south-east London for breaching bail conditions.
Persson said in May that the circumstances allowed for an extradition to Sweden from Britain, and that an interview should be conducted with Assange.
Persson said the investigators had collected additional documentary evidence since reopening the inquiry and that further interviews had been conducted with five witnesses who had already spoken to officials.
Two people who had not been interviewed had also been spoken to, while one interview took place in Denmark following a request for international judicial assistance involving that country.
However, after additional investigations over the summer and autumn it was clear that the oral testimony given in support of the woman had weakened, Persson said on Tuesday. This was primarily because a long time had passed and memories had faded for natural reasons, she added.
Tuesday’s decision follows a ruling in June by a Swedish court that Assange, who denies the accusation, should not be detained.
Tuesday’s decision was welcomed by WikiLeaks, which called for a focus on the threat of extradition to the US.
Kristinn Hrafnsson, the WikiLeaks editor-in-chief, said: “Sweden has dropped its preliminary investigation into Mr Assange for the third time, after reopening it without any new evidence or information.
“Let us now focus on the threat Mr Assange has been warning about for years: the belligerent prosecution of the United States and the threat it poses to the first amendment.”
A statement issued by the Swedish prosecuting authorities said: “The preliminary investigation concerning allegations against Julian Assange was resumed on 13 May 2019 after Assange left the Ecuadorian embassy in London.
“The investigation relates to a suspected rape committed in August 2010. A number of investigative measures have been conducted since May, largely in the form of witness interviews.
“The preliminary investigation has now been discontinued, the motive for which is that the evidence has weakened considerably due to the long period of time that has elapsed since the events in question.”
A spokesman for Assange’s legal team said: “From the outset of Sweden’s preliminary investigation, Julian Assange’s expressed concern has been that waiting in the wings was a United States extradition request that would be unstoppable from Sweden – and result in his spending the rest of his life in a US prison.
“Now that the US does seek Mr Assange’s extradition to stand trial on unprecedented charges for journalistic work, it continues to be a matter of extreme regret that this reality has never been properly acknowledged and that the process in Sweden – with which Mr Assange has always expressed his willingness to engage and indeed did so – became so exceptionally politicised itself.”
The deputy chief prosecutor, Eva-Marie Persson, said the complainant’s evidence was deemed credible and reliable, but that after nearly a decade, witnesses’ memories had faded.
“After conducting a comprehensive assessment of what has emerged during the course of the preliminary investigation I then make the assessment that the evidence is not strong enough to form the basis for filing an indictment,” Persson said. An appeal against the decision could be made to the office of Sweden’s attorney general, she added.
Assange, who is battling extradition to the US, which accuses him of publishing secret documents related to his WikiLeaks work, has been facing potential charges in Sweden since 2010. The 48-year-old has denied all allegations against him.
Swedish prosecutors dropped their preliminary investigation into the rape allegation in 2017, because they were unable to proceed while Assange remained in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. He had been living there since 2012 after seeking refuge to avoid arrest after Sweden asked Britain to extradite Assange for questioning.
However, the investigation was reopened in May this year after Assange was removed from the embassy when the Latin American government abruptly withdrew his asylum. He was immediately arrested and is serving a 50-week sentence in Belmarsh prison in south-east London for breaching bail conditions.
Persson said in May that the circumstances allowed for an extradition to Sweden from Britain, and that an interview should be conducted with Assange.
Persson said the investigators had collected additional documentary evidence since reopening the inquiry and that further interviews had been conducted with five witnesses who had already spoken to officials.
Two people who had not been interviewed had also been spoken to, while one interview took place in Denmark following a request for international judicial assistance involving that country.
However, after additional investigations over the summer and autumn it was clear that the oral testimony given in support of the woman had weakened, Persson said on Tuesday. This was primarily because a long time had passed and memories had faded for natural reasons, she added.
Tuesday’s decision follows a ruling in June by a Swedish court that Assange, who denies the accusation, should not be detained.
Tuesday’s decision was welcomed by WikiLeaks, which called for a focus on the threat of extradition to the US.
Kristinn Hrafnsson, the WikiLeaks editor-in-chief, said: “Sweden has dropped its preliminary investigation into Mr Assange for the third time, after reopening it without any new evidence or information.
“Let us now focus on the threat Mr Assange has been warning about for years: the belligerent prosecution of the United States and the threat it poses to the first amendment.”
A statement issued by the Swedish prosecuting authorities said: “The preliminary investigation concerning allegations against Julian Assange was resumed on 13 May 2019 after Assange left the Ecuadorian embassy in London.
“The investigation relates to a suspected rape committed in August 2010. A number of investigative measures have been conducted since May, largely in the form of witness interviews.
“The preliminary investigation has now been discontinued, the motive for which is that the evidence has weakened considerably due to the long period of time that has elapsed since the events in question.”
A spokesman for Assange’s legal team said: “From the outset of Sweden’s preliminary investigation, Julian Assange’s expressed concern has been that waiting in the wings was a United States extradition request that would be unstoppable from Sweden – and result in his spending the rest of his life in a US prison.
“Now that the US does seek Mr Assange’s extradition to stand trial on unprecedented charges for journalistic work, it continues to be a matter of extreme regret that this reality has never been properly acknowledged and that the process in Sweden – with which Mr Assange has always expressed his willingness to engage and indeed did so – became so exceptionally politicised itself.”
China
'Show no mercy': leaked documents reveal details of China's Xinjiang detentions
More than 400 pages leaked to New York Times by Chinese political insider document brutal crackdown on Muslim minority
Lily Kuo
the guardian
Sun 17 Nov 2019 07.54 EST
More than 1 million people are thought to be interned in ‘re-education’ camps in the Chinese province of Xinjiang. Photograph: Thomas Peter/Reuters
Hundreds of pages of leaked internal government documents reveal how China’s mass detention of Uighurs and other minorities in Xinjiang came from directives by Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, to “show absolutely no mercy” in the “struggle against terrorism, infiltration and separatism”.
More than 400 pages of documents obtained by the New York Times show the government was aware its campaign of mass internment would tear families apart and could provoke backlash if it became widely known.
Beijing has repeatedly refuted criticisms of its crackdown in the predominately Muslim region, which has seen more than 1 million Uighurs, Kazakhs and other minorities sent to camps where they are often subjected to political indoctrination. China has organised tours of the camps, which it describes as voluntary “vocational training centres” intended to provide “students” with job skills.
The documents, leaked by a member of the Chinese political establishment who hoped to prevent Xi and other leaders the ruling Chinese communist party from escaping responsibility, contradict those claims. That person requested anonymity, according to the New York Times.
According to the report, Xi first called for the crackdown in a series of private speeches given to officials during and after a visit to Xinjiang in 2014, weeks after Uighur militants had attacked a train station, stabbing and killing 31 people.
“We must be as harsh as them,” Xi said, adding, “and show absolutely no mercy.” In the speeches, Xi did not explicitly order the creation of a large network of camps, but called for the party to use the “organs of dictatorship” to deal with extremism.
Other documents showed that officials looked at the UK as a cautionary tale of a government placing “human rights above security.” Instead, Xi encouraged officials to follow aspects of the US “war on terror” following the September 11 attacks.
Among the most telling of the documents is a script for local officials in Turpan in southern Xinjiang to use when the children of parents being “punished” and sent to a camp returned home for school holidays. Many of Xinjiang’s top students attend university outside of the region, in universities in other Chinese provinces.
Officials were instructed to meet students as soon as they returned home and explain that their loved ones had been exposed to religious extremism and were receiving “concentrated education” to eradicate them of “violent terrorist thoughts.”
If asked why the relatives could not return home if they are only receiving training, officials were to employ the language of disease to justify the prolonged detention and isolation. “Freedom is only possible when this ‘virus’ in their thinking is eradicated and they are in good health,” the script said.
The documents also highlight the extent of resistance from local officials. In 2017, more than 12,000 investigations into party members for violations related to the “fight against separatism.”
According to internal documents, one Han Chinese official was jailed for trying to slow down the detentions and protect Uighur officials.
Another, named Wang Yongzhi in charge of Yarkand county, was made an example of after he defied orders and quietly released more than 7,000 detainees. “He refused,” an internal document said, “to round up everyone who should be rounded up.”
Beijing has not issued a response to the documents. While the New York Times is blocked in mainland China, the report appears to have been circulated. On the microblog Weibo, often heavily censored, some users posted in English: “He refused”.
One Weibo user wrote: “Time records everything. Those who need attention the most are often the ones who are not able to ask for it. The tide of history is surging. The truth will come out one day. That’s what I believe.”
More than 400 pages of documents obtained by the New York Times show the government was aware its campaign of mass internment would tear families apart and could provoke backlash if it became widely known.
Beijing has repeatedly refuted criticisms of its crackdown in the predominately Muslim region, which has seen more than 1 million Uighurs, Kazakhs and other minorities sent to camps where they are often subjected to political indoctrination. China has organised tours of the camps, which it describes as voluntary “vocational training centres” intended to provide “students” with job skills.
The documents, leaked by a member of the Chinese political establishment who hoped to prevent Xi and other leaders the ruling Chinese communist party from escaping responsibility, contradict those claims. That person requested anonymity, according to the New York Times.
According to the report, Xi first called for the crackdown in a series of private speeches given to officials during and after a visit to Xinjiang in 2014, weeks after Uighur militants had attacked a train station, stabbing and killing 31 people.
“We must be as harsh as them,” Xi said, adding, “and show absolutely no mercy.” In the speeches, Xi did not explicitly order the creation of a large network of camps, but called for the party to use the “organs of dictatorship” to deal with extremism.
Other documents showed that officials looked at the UK as a cautionary tale of a government placing “human rights above security.” Instead, Xi encouraged officials to follow aspects of the US “war on terror” following the September 11 attacks.
Among the most telling of the documents is a script for local officials in Turpan in southern Xinjiang to use when the children of parents being “punished” and sent to a camp returned home for school holidays. Many of Xinjiang’s top students attend university outside of the region, in universities in other Chinese provinces.
Officials were instructed to meet students as soon as they returned home and explain that their loved ones had been exposed to religious extremism and were receiving “concentrated education” to eradicate them of “violent terrorist thoughts.”
If asked why the relatives could not return home if they are only receiving training, officials were to employ the language of disease to justify the prolonged detention and isolation. “Freedom is only possible when this ‘virus’ in their thinking is eradicated and they are in good health,” the script said.
The documents also highlight the extent of resistance from local officials. In 2017, more than 12,000 investigations into party members for violations related to the “fight against separatism.”
According to internal documents, one Han Chinese official was jailed for trying to slow down the detentions and protect Uighur officials.
Another, named Wang Yongzhi in charge of Yarkand county, was made an example of after he defied orders and quietly released more than 7,000 detainees. “He refused,” an internal document said, “to round up everyone who should be rounded up.”
Beijing has not issued a response to the documents. While the New York Times is blocked in mainland China, the report appears to have been circulated. On the microblog Weibo, often heavily censored, some users posted in English: “He refused”.
One Weibo user wrote: “Time records everything. Those who need attention the most are often the ones who are not able to ask for it. The tide of history is surging. The truth will come out one day. That’s what I believe.”
Catastrophic Wildfires Threaten Sydney, Australia, as Government Backs Coal
BY Juan Cole, Informed Comment - truthout
PUBLISHED November 12, 2019
A state of emergency has been declared and authorities are closing 500 schools today. Already 140 homes have been lost, and their proprietors are not impressed with the Australian denialist prime minister’s offer of thoughts and prayers. Scott Morrison ranted about urban leftists and the fact that there have always been bushfires in Australia. Yes, but they haven’t been this intense or frequent.
That the country’s wildfire risk has been vastly exacerbated by human beings driving cars and heating their buildings with coal and natural gas is not in question. Global temperature has increased by 1.8 degrees F. in the past century, which has contributed to greater dryness in Australia. In 2011-2016 bushfire frequency increased 40%. Graham Readfearn at the Guardian points out that controversy has erupted in Australia because the government there is the worst in the G20 on climate policies.
A new report on the G20 and climate finds that Australia’s emissions are increasing and there is no plan to rein them in. The Australian government is even more committed to Big Coal than Trump is, and is full of whiny climate change denialists. Readfearn says that the report finds that Australia is a “deforestation hot spot.”
Australia’s carbon emissions per person are among the largest in the world, between 22 and 25 tons a year. An automobile weighs two tons.
While Australia’s population of about 25 million is small and therefore its proportional contribution to global heating is also small, the country is especially vulnerable to the effects of burning fossil fuels. Drought, wildfires and sea level rise powerfully threaten its population. As a simple matter of ethics and accountability, then, Australians have a responsibility to step up.
Although their government is horrible, Australians as a people have been enthusiastic for solar energy. Last Wednesday for a brief moment renewables supplied some 50% of the electricity to the Australian grid. Graham Readfearn at the Guardian explains that most of the solar was rooftop, i.e. the government hasn’t invested or given incentives for investment in industrial-scale solar. The bad news is that the other 50% came mostly from coal, the most carbon-intensive pollutant among the fossil fuels. And ordinarily coal forms an even greater proportion of the energy making electricity.
That the country’s wildfire risk has been vastly exacerbated by human beings driving cars and heating their buildings with coal and natural gas is not in question. Global temperature has increased by 1.8 degrees F. in the past century, which has contributed to greater dryness in Australia. In 2011-2016 bushfire frequency increased 40%. Graham Readfearn at the Guardian points out that controversy has erupted in Australia because the government there is the worst in the G20 on climate policies.
A new report on the G20 and climate finds that Australia’s emissions are increasing and there is no plan to rein them in. The Australian government is even more committed to Big Coal than Trump is, and is full of whiny climate change denialists. Readfearn says that the report finds that Australia is a “deforestation hot spot.”
Australia’s carbon emissions per person are among the largest in the world, between 22 and 25 tons a year. An automobile weighs two tons.
While Australia’s population of about 25 million is small and therefore its proportional contribution to global heating is also small, the country is especially vulnerable to the effects of burning fossil fuels. Drought, wildfires and sea level rise powerfully threaten its population. As a simple matter of ethics and accountability, then, Australians have a responsibility to step up.
Although their government is horrible, Australians as a people have been enthusiastic for solar energy. Last Wednesday for a brief moment renewables supplied some 50% of the electricity to the Australian grid. Graham Readfearn at the Guardian explains that most of the solar was rooftop, i.e. the government hasn’t invested or given incentives for investment in industrial-scale solar. The bad news is that the other 50% came mostly from coal, the most carbon-intensive pollutant among the fossil fuels. And ordinarily coal forms an even greater proportion of the energy making electricity.
Why is inequality booming in Chile? Blame the Chicago Boys
Milton Friedman thought his disciples had created an economic ‘miracle’ in Chile’. But their policies soon backfired
RICHARD DAVIES
the guardian
Wed 13 Nov 2019 05.29 EST
We thought that inequality would, in the end, disappear” says Rolf Lüders, recalling his time at the helm of the Chilean economy. Now in his 80s Mr Lüders is one of a group known as the ‘Chicago Boys’ who are held responsible for the extreme inequality seen in Chile and who tend to be vilified during protests and riots, including those of the past two weeks. I went to Santiago to spend time talking to people at both ends of the income spectrum, and the Chicago Boys themselves. Chile was once a pin-up economy, lauded as the model other emerging economies should copy—what went wrong?
The Chicago Boys were exchange students who travelled to the US to study economics, the idea being that they would return home to teach, driving up standards and encouraging their peers to abandon socialism-inspired ideas. Their impact would be far greater than anyone imagined. After General Augustine Pinochet seized power in 1973 the dictator quickly promoted the Chicago-trained economists to ministerial positions. A thick book of market-orientated policies they had put together, known as El Ladrillo (‘the brick’) became a blueprint setting out how the Chilean economy must be run.
El Ladrillo diagnosed the bloated state as Chile’s biggest problem-the public sector was duly slashed. Between 1973 and 1980 the number of state-controlled companies fell from 300 to 24 and there were big cuts to budgets for infrastructure, housing, education and social security. The early results were disastrous--Chile’s newly liberalised financial sector was crippled by a crash in 1982—but with time the country began to bloom, growing 7 per cent a year on average between 1985 and 1997. There was low inflation and Chile’s investment and export rates became the best in South America. Milton Friedman, who had taught Mr Lüders and his compatriots in Chicago, called it ‘the miracle of Chile’.
Inequality began to rise sharply too—but two pillars of the economists’ plan made this a secondary concern. The first was the belief that poverty, which was more important than inequality, could be eradicated by growth. Here Chilean data and the accounts I heard in Santiago chime and show the Chicago Boys were, in a way, right. Fully 17 per cent of the population were recorded as indigent in 1987 (meaning they could not afford food) and by 2000 this had fallen to 6 per cent. At the ‘Los Blanco’ market in San Bernardo—a low-end market in a poor district—I met people in their 50s who recalled being cold and hungry in their youth and regarded Chile’s economic expansion as a reason for their improved lot.
The second pillar, and the reason Mr Lüders believed inequality would go away, were educational reforms. El Ladrillo contains a section on ‘equality of opportunity’ which explains how liberalisation will help: privatisation would mean more universities, and a new system of loans help those from poorer families gain degrees. With latent talent spread evenly across the country education would be an equalising force, and would make Chile prosper. On paper their plan—poverty-eradicating growth backed up by an educational safety net—seemed complete and coherent. The accounts of those struggling in modern Santiago lay bare the gaps in these ideas.
“We get no assistance” explains Melissa Niera, showing me the self-built camp she and her husband Emmanuel call home in one of Santiago’s southern suburbs, “we are considered middle class, not poor”. The people I met all had jobs—as gardeners, care assistants, labourers and in cell phone shops—with joint incomes that put their families just above the poverty line. Yet their makeshift homes are built on a reclaimed dump and made of thin chipboard, the communal bathroom—shared between a dozen or so families—is four sheets of corrugated iron and has no roof.
Santiago-style inequality creates hidden poverty that official statistics do not pick up. It is caused in part by high prices: living hand-to-mouth families like Melissa’s buy goods from small local stores on informal credit, adding up to 20% to the cost of basic goods. Another driver is a refusal to supply: Santiago’s pharmacy chains see no reason to operate in the poorer parts of the city. In Recoleta, one such district, I met Daniel Jadue, a communist local politician forced to set up a state-run “people’s pharmacy” as a result.
Far from soothing inequality, a twisted market for education has come to cement it. Privatisation did boost numbers: in the 1970s there were eight universities in Chile, all government funded, now there are over 150, two-thirds of which are for-profit outfits run by private firms. The Chilean government commits just 0.5 per cent of GDP to higher education, the lowest in the OECD, yet Santiago seems like a city of learning: there are universities everywhere—one main roads, up side streets, and between car showrooms.
Competition is supposed to drive prices down and quality up. In Chile things have gone the other way. The average university course cost 41 per cent of the average income, the highest in the OECD. Anything costly, including pastoral care, is cut as university-companies seek profits: the country’s 50 per cent university dropout rate is another dubious statistic in which it is a world leader. Melissa and Emmanuel both regretted their time at university which had done nothing for their job prospects yet shouldered them with debt that will take years repay.
Mutated competition also blights high schools. With the sector effectively privatised exam scores have become a kind of equity value; the result is aggressive selection to weed out poor performers, rather than help them. It is a city in which performance can be bought and the stratification that has resulted is staggering: as you travel south, away from the leafy Las Condes district where Melissa and her neighbours work and towards the one where they live, educational results and incomes fall in perfect unison. One parent described the scramble that results as an ‘educational war’.
This does hidden damage to fabric of a city. Unwritten divisions of income that everyone in Santiago understands delineate places and activities. The Plaza Italia, scene of recent riots, is a dividing line the wealthy avoid stepping south of. There are high-class parks and low-class parks—the informal conversion of public spaces into gardens where access is based on income. It is perhaps the ultimate privatisation—that of a city’s social infrastructure—and the only one the Chicago Boys did not intend.
RELATED: Chileans Face State Repression as They Continue Revolt Against Neoliberalism
by Rodrigo Acuña, Truthout
The Chicago Boys were exchange students who travelled to the US to study economics, the idea being that they would return home to teach, driving up standards and encouraging their peers to abandon socialism-inspired ideas. Their impact would be far greater than anyone imagined. After General Augustine Pinochet seized power in 1973 the dictator quickly promoted the Chicago-trained economists to ministerial positions. A thick book of market-orientated policies they had put together, known as El Ladrillo (‘the brick’) became a blueprint setting out how the Chilean economy must be run.
El Ladrillo diagnosed the bloated state as Chile’s biggest problem-the public sector was duly slashed. Between 1973 and 1980 the number of state-controlled companies fell from 300 to 24 and there were big cuts to budgets for infrastructure, housing, education and social security. The early results were disastrous--Chile’s newly liberalised financial sector was crippled by a crash in 1982—but with time the country began to bloom, growing 7 per cent a year on average between 1985 and 1997. There was low inflation and Chile’s investment and export rates became the best in South America. Milton Friedman, who had taught Mr Lüders and his compatriots in Chicago, called it ‘the miracle of Chile’.
Inequality began to rise sharply too—but two pillars of the economists’ plan made this a secondary concern. The first was the belief that poverty, which was more important than inequality, could be eradicated by growth. Here Chilean data and the accounts I heard in Santiago chime and show the Chicago Boys were, in a way, right. Fully 17 per cent of the population were recorded as indigent in 1987 (meaning they could not afford food) and by 2000 this had fallen to 6 per cent. At the ‘Los Blanco’ market in San Bernardo—a low-end market in a poor district—I met people in their 50s who recalled being cold and hungry in their youth and regarded Chile’s economic expansion as a reason for their improved lot.
The second pillar, and the reason Mr Lüders believed inequality would go away, were educational reforms. El Ladrillo contains a section on ‘equality of opportunity’ which explains how liberalisation will help: privatisation would mean more universities, and a new system of loans help those from poorer families gain degrees. With latent talent spread evenly across the country education would be an equalising force, and would make Chile prosper. On paper their plan—poverty-eradicating growth backed up by an educational safety net—seemed complete and coherent. The accounts of those struggling in modern Santiago lay bare the gaps in these ideas.
“We get no assistance” explains Melissa Niera, showing me the self-built camp she and her husband Emmanuel call home in one of Santiago’s southern suburbs, “we are considered middle class, not poor”. The people I met all had jobs—as gardeners, care assistants, labourers and in cell phone shops—with joint incomes that put their families just above the poverty line. Yet their makeshift homes are built on a reclaimed dump and made of thin chipboard, the communal bathroom—shared between a dozen or so families—is four sheets of corrugated iron and has no roof.
Santiago-style inequality creates hidden poverty that official statistics do not pick up. It is caused in part by high prices: living hand-to-mouth families like Melissa’s buy goods from small local stores on informal credit, adding up to 20% to the cost of basic goods. Another driver is a refusal to supply: Santiago’s pharmacy chains see no reason to operate in the poorer parts of the city. In Recoleta, one such district, I met Daniel Jadue, a communist local politician forced to set up a state-run “people’s pharmacy” as a result.
Far from soothing inequality, a twisted market for education has come to cement it. Privatisation did boost numbers: in the 1970s there were eight universities in Chile, all government funded, now there are over 150, two-thirds of which are for-profit outfits run by private firms. The Chilean government commits just 0.5 per cent of GDP to higher education, the lowest in the OECD, yet Santiago seems like a city of learning: there are universities everywhere—one main roads, up side streets, and between car showrooms.
Competition is supposed to drive prices down and quality up. In Chile things have gone the other way. The average university course cost 41 per cent of the average income, the highest in the OECD. Anything costly, including pastoral care, is cut as university-companies seek profits: the country’s 50 per cent university dropout rate is another dubious statistic in which it is a world leader. Melissa and Emmanuel both regretted their time at university which had done nothing for their job prospects yet shouldered them with debt that will take years repay.
Mutated competition also blights high schools. With the sector effectively privatised exam scores have become a kind of equity value; the result is aggressive selection to weed out poor performers, rather than help them. It is a city in which performance can be bought and the stratification that has resulted is staggering: as you travel south, away from the leafy Las Condes district where Melissa and her neighbours work and towards the one where they live, educational results and incomes fall in perfect unison. One parent described the scramble that results as an ‘educational war’.
This does hidden damage to fabric of a city. Unwritten divisions of income that everyone in Santiago understands delineate places and activities. The Plaza Italia, scene of recent riots, is a dividing line the wealthy avoid stepping south of. There are high-class parks and low-class parks—the informal conversion of public spaces into gardens where access is based on income. It is perhaps the ultimate privatisation—that of a city’s social infrastructure—and the only one the Chicago Boys did not intend.
RELATED: Chileans Face State Repression as They Continue Revolt Against Neoliberalism
by Rodrigo Acuña, Truthout
a party of traitors!!!
Boris Johnson's Conservative party has received cash from 9 Russian donors named in a suppressed intelligence report
Adam Bienkov - business insider
11/10/19
Boris Johnson and Evgeny Lebedev Getty
Boris Johnson's Conservative Party has received a surge in cash from nine Russian donors, who have been named in a suppressed investigation into Russia's attempts to undermine democracy in the UK.
The report by Parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee identifies close links between major donors to the Conservative party and the Russian government, the Sunday Times reports.
The report was due for publication this week but was blocked by Johnson, due to reported fears that the information would damage his chances of winning the upcoming UK general election.
Among those donors named in the suppressed report are Alexander Temerko, who worked for the Russian defence ministry and has previously boasted that the prime minister is his "friend".
Temerko donated more than £1.2m to the Conservatives over the past seven years.
Other Russian donors to the Conservative party include Lubov Chernukhin, who is married to Vladimir Chernukhin, a former ally of Putin.
Chernukhin previously paid £160,000 for a tennis match with Johnson and former prime minister David Cameron and has donated more than £450,000 in the past year.
The inquiry also heard concerns about the former Russian spy Alexander Lebedev, who owns the Evening Standard and Independent newspapers.
Lebedev's son Evgeny is a close friend of the prime minister and has repeatedly hosted him for parties at his castle in Perugia Italy, while Johnson was mayor of London and Foreign Secretary
Concerns were raised about Johnson's decision to attend the events, in which guests have reported that "nothing is off the menu from the moment you are greeted to the moment you leave."
Fears have previously been raised that Johnson's private life may make him a "security risk" due to the possibility he could be blackmailed.
"There's the danger that people leak what they have over him or blackmail him with it," a Cabinet minister in Theresa May's government told the Sunday Times earlier this year.
"Billionaires fund the Conservative Party, so this sordid cover up shouldn't be surprising.
The opposition Labour party accused Johnson of seeking to cover up the story.
"The Tories blocked this report and oppose tax transparency so their billionaire backers can continue to rip us off unchallenged," Labour's election co-ordinator Andrew Gwynne said.
"Labour is on the side of the many, not the few, so we'll get dirty money out of politics, introduce an oligarch levy and take on the vested interests selling out our people and public services."
Sources who have seen the report told the Times they believe the report has been suppressed because it highlights extensive connections between Conservative donors and Russia's Federal Security Bureau."What makes it interesting is just how close some of these people are to the FSB are or have been," one source told the paper.
An investigation by Open Democracy this week found that the Conservative Party received at least £498,850, or about $642,000, from Russian business executives and their associates between November 2018 and last month.
This was a significant increase from the previous year when such donations amounted to less than £350,000.
The increase came despite increased pressure on the party to cut its ties to Russian oligarchs since the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Salisbury last year.
The news also comes with Johnson's chief strategist, Dominic Cummings, under the spotlight after the Sunday Times reported claims from a whistleblower about "serious concerns" about the time he spent in Russia in the 1990s.
Cummings has reportedly had his access to intelligence restricted by UK authorities, despite his senior position.
Labour MP Ben Bradshaw told the Sydney Morning Herald this week that this "unprecedented arrangement" was a concern for Britain's security relations with other countries.
"If I we're one of the UK's Five Eyes allies I would be extremely concerned about this unprecedented arrangement," Bradshaw said.
"Boris Johnson's chief of staff, whose account of his time in Russia is apparently full of gaps and inaccuracies, is granted inexplicably the highest level of security clearance yet is not given full access to secret intelligence."
- Boris Johnson's Conservative party has received donations from nine Russian donors, with suspected links to the Kremlin, according to an official report which has been suppressed by the prime minister.
- Johnson chose to block publication of the report amid reported fears it could cost him the upcoming general election.
- Leaked details from the report tie Johnson's party to London-based Russian oligarchs, some of whom have known ties to the Russian security services.
- There has been a surge in donations from prominent Russians to the Conservative party over the past year.
Boris Johnson's Conservative Party has received a surge in cash from nine Russian donors, who have been named in a suppressed investigation into Russia's attempts to undermine democracy in the UK.
The report by Parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee identifies close links between major donors to the Conservative party and the Russian government, the Sunday Times reports.
The report was due for publication this week but was blocked by Johnson, due to reported fears that the information would damage his chances of winning the upcoming UK general election.
Among those donors named in the suppressed report are Alexander Temerko, who worked for the Russian defence ministry and has previously boasted that the prime minister is his "friend".
Temerko donated more than £1.2m to the Conservatives over the past seven years.
Other Russian donors to the Conservative party include Lubov Chernukhin, who is married to Vladimir Chernukhin, a former ally of Putin.
Chernukhin previously paid £160,000 for a tennis match with Johnson and former prime minister David Cameron and has donated more than £450,000 in the past year.
The inquiry also heard concerns about the former Russian spy Alexander Lebedev, who owns the Evening Standard and Independent newspapers.
Lebedev's son Evgeny is a close friend of the prime minister and has repeatedly hosted him for parties at his castle in Perugia Italy, while Johnson was mayor of London and Foreign Secretary
Concerns were raised about Johnson's decision to attend the events, in which guests have reported that "nothing is off the menu from the moment you are greeted to the moment you leave."
Fears have previously been raised that Johnson's private life may make him a "security risk" due to the possibility he could be blackmailed.
"There's the danger that people leak what they have over him or blackmail him with it," a Cabinet minister in Theresa May's government told the Sunday Times earlier this year.
"Billionaires fund the Conservative Party, so this sordid cover up shouldn't be surprising.
The opposition Labour party accused Johnson of seeking to cover up the story.
"The Tories blocked this report and oppose tax transparency so their billionaire backers can continue to rip us off unchallenged," Labour's election co-ordinator Andrew Gwynne said.
"Labour is on the side of the many, not the few, so we'll get dirty money out of politics, introduce an oligarch levy and take on the vested interests selling out our people and public services."
Sources who have seen the report told the Times they believe the report has been suppressed because it highlights extensive connections between Conservative donors and Russia's Federal Security Bureau."What makes it interesting is just how close some of these people are to the FSB are or have been," one source told the paper.
An investigation by Open Democracy this week found that the Conservative Party received at least £498,850, or about $642,000, from Russian business executives and their associates between November 2018 and last month.
This was a significant increase from the previous year when such donations amounted to less than £350,000.
The increase came despite increased pressure on the party to cut its ties to Russian oligarchs since the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Salisbury last year.
The news also comes with Johnson's chief strategist, Dominic Cummings, under the spotlight after the Sunday Times reported claims from a whistleblower about "serious concerns" about the time he spent in Russia in the 1990s.
Cummings has reportedly had his access to intelligence restricted by UK authorities, despite his senior position.
Labour MP Ben Bradshaw told the Sydney Morning Herald this week that this "unprecedented arrangement" was a concern for Britain's security relations with other countries.
"If I we're one of the UK's Five Eyes allies I would be extremely concerned about this unprecedented arrangement," Bradshaw said.
"Boris Johnson's chief of staff, whose account of his time in Russia is apparently full of gaps and inaccuracies, is granted inexplicably the highest level of security clearance yet is not given full access to secret intelligence."
Leak from neo-Nazi site could identify hundreds of extremists worldwide
Researchers claim users identified from online leak of contents of now defunct Iron March, linked to acts of extremist terrorism
Jason Wilson
the guardian
Thu 7 Nov 2019 09.40 EST
An apparent online leak of materials from influential neo-Nazi website Iron March, which has linked to several murders and acts of extremist terrorism, has the potential to identify hundreds of extremists around the world.
The material, posted anonymously to an online archiving site on Wednesday, US time, by a user identified only as “antifa-data”. It apparently comprises the contents of the now defunct Iron March website’s underlying database and makes it possible to match usernames with email addresses, IP addresses, forum posts, and direct messages.
Material uncovered in the leak so far suggests some users on the platform registered with existing personal email addresses, including addresses associated with several US universities. Posts and direct messages suggest that some members were on active military service at the time they posted, according to the open source journalism website, Bellingcat.
By Wednesday evening on social media, researchers were claiming to have identified several individual users by means of the leak, including a one-time congressional candidate.
Iron March was founded in 2011 by a Russian nationalist named Alexander “Slavros” Mukhitdinov, and abruptly closed without explanation in November 2017.
Members and groups associated with the website were involved in a range of deadly violence after the site’s founding as influential users became more voluble in their support of uncompromising extremism, genocide and insurrectionary terrorism.
In May 2017, Iron March user and Atomwaffen Division (AWD) member, Devon Arthurs, murdered two roommates – and AWD comrades – in Tampa, Florida. Police found neo-Nazi literature in the house, along with explosives, radioactive materials, and a framed photo of Oklahoma City bomber, Timothy McVeigh.
AWD has been tied to at least three other murders, a terror plot, and the assault of a protester in Charlottesville.
Another group with links to Iron March is Vanguard America, the group that supporter James Alex Fields marched with at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville before he murdered Heather Heyer on 12 August 2017 by driving his car into the protesters.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Iron March was “affiliated with or offered support to at least nine fascist groups in nine different countries”, including Serbia, Greece, Australia and Ukraine. The chats, too, appear to feature users from a range of different countries.
The website was also central to the development of “accelerationist” neo-Nazi ideology – which seeks to destabilize and replace liberal democracy by exacerbating its tensions with violence – and aesthetic of so-called Siege culture, which takes in skull masks and violent and racist memes.
In both respects, it has been influenced by the work of American neo-Nazi James Mason, who joined the white power movement in his teens, in the 1960s.
Mason’s 1980s newsletters for the National Socialist Liberation Front were eventually compiled into a volume entitled Siege, which Iron March adopted as its central text. Among other things, Mason praised murderer Charles Manson and Adolf Hitler and advocated the use of terrorist violence by decentralized neonazi cells.
Iron March users came increasingly to advocate Mason’s ideas, which have become a touchstone in their subculture. Those ideas are now part of the DNA of neo-Nazi groups like AWD and The Base. Mason still lives in Denver, and has appeared in a recent AWD video.
The material, posted anonymously to an online archiving site on Wednesday, US time, by a user identified only as “antifa-data”. It apparently comprises the contents of the now defunct Iron March website’s underlying database and makes it possible to match usernames with email addresses, IP addresses, forum posts, and direct messages.
Material uncovered in the leak so far suggests some users on the platform registered with existing personal email addresses, including addresses associated with several US universities. Posts and direct messages suggest that some members were on active military service at the time they posted, according to the open source journalism website, Bellingcat.
By Wednesday evening on social media, researchers were claiming to have identified several individual users by means of the leak, including a one-time congressional candidate.
Iron March was founded in 2011 by a Russian nationalist named Alexander “Slavros” Mukhitdinov, and abruptly closed without explanation in November 2017.
Members and groups associated with the website were involved in a range of deadly violence after the site’s founding as influential users became more voluble in their support of uncompromising extremism, genocide and insurrectionary terrorism.
In May 2017, Iron March user and Atomwaffen Division (AWD) member, Devon Arthurs, murdered two roommates – and AWD comrades – in Tampa, Florida. Police found neo-Nazi literature in the house, along with explosives, radioactive materials, and a framed photo of Oklahoma City bomber, Timothy McVeigh.
AWD has been tied to at least three other murders, a terror plot, and the assault of a protester in Charlottesville.
Another group with links to Iron March is Vanguard America, the group that supporter James Alex Fields marched with at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville before he murdered Heather Heyer on 12 August 2017 by driving his car into the protesters.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Iron March was “affiliated with or offered support to at least nine fascist groups in nine different countries”, including Serbia, Greece, Australia and Ukraine. The chats, too, appear to feature users from a range of different countries.
The website was also central to the development of “accelerationist” neo-Nazi ideology – which seeks to destabilize and replace liberal democracy by exacerbating its tensions with violence – and aesthetic of so-called Siege culture, which takes in skull masks and violent and racist memes.
In both respects, it has been influenced by the work of American neo-Nazi James Mason, who joined the white power movement in his teens, in the 1960s.
Mason’s 1980s newsletters for the National Socialist Liberation Front were eventually compiled into a volume entitled Siege, which Iron March adopted as its central text. Among other things, Mason praised murderer Charles Manson and Adolf Hitler and advocated the use of terrorist violence by decentralized neonazi cells.
Iron March users came increasingly to advocate Mason’s ideas, which have become a touchstone in their subculture. Those ideas are now part of the DNA of neo-Nazi groups like AWD and The Base. Mason still lives in Denver, and has appeared in a recent AWD video.
Sweden bomb attacks reach unprecedented level as gangs feud
Police say lack of fatalities ‘incredibly lucky’ after 30 bomb squad call-outs in two months
Jon Henley
the guardian
Mon 4 Nov 2019 08.01 EST
Police cordon off an area outside Varby Gard metro station south of Stockholm after an explosion. Photograph: Henrik Montgomery/EPA
Sweden’s national bomb squad has been called out to 30 blasts in the past two months and 100 so far this year, more than twice the number in the same period in 2018, as concern grows about rising levels of violence by criminal gangs.
Police arrested three people over the weekend following an explosion in an apartment block in the southern city of Malmö early on Friday that blew out the building’s main door, shattered windows and substantially damaged the entrance level.
The blast was the first of three in the space of 24 hours, local media reported, with others destroying cars and damaging property in Växjö, 127 miles (204km) north-east of Malmö, and Landvetter outside Gothenburg on the country’s west coast.
“There are 10 million people in Sweden and I have not found the equivalent of this level of explosions in any industrialised country,” Ylva Ehrlin, an analyst with the bomb squad, told the public broadcaster SVT.
The number of recent explosions was “unacceptably high” and “obviously undesirable”, she told the news agency TT. “It’s very serious, a social problem. We not only must find the explosives and tools, but uncover the cause.”
Most of the blasts have occurred in big cities, authorities said. Almost a third have taken place in Malmö, scene of a string of increasingly violent gun and bomb attacks that rightwing politicians have linked to the large flows of immigrants who arrived in in Sweden during the 2015 migration crisis.
Nineteen bombs have also exploded in the capital, Stockholm, so far this year, and another 13 in Gothenburg, compared with 39 nationwide in 2018. The squad have also defused 76 suspected bombs that were spotted before they could be detonated.
Ehrin said that although no one had died in the explosions so far, the risk of fatalities must be considered very high. “We’ve been incredibly lucky. You just don’t usually have that kind of luck,” she said.
The bombs, which mostly target empty buildings, offices and cars, are usually small and experts believe they are intended to intimidate rival gangs. Police have said, however, that some could have been deadly. One device in Linköping earlier this year contained about 40 times the usual explosive charge, seriously damaging two residential buildings and injuring 25 people.
The bomb-makers themselves “usually do not know how dangerous, how sensitive these substances are” and are risking their lives, Ehrin said, noting that an 18-year-old man who was seriously injured when a bomb exploded in Malmö last December was later charged with trying to detonate it.
But the greater danger was to innocent bystanders, such as the female student who suffered severe facial injuries in September when a device inside a shop exploded as she was walking past on her way home from a night in Lund. “With a gun, you control it until you press the trigger,” Ehren said.
“Also, you usually aim at the intended target, but you do not have the same control over an explosive charge, especially if you are a criminal without much education or experience in the field. You have no control over the target or the effect.”
Experts have said the growing use of mainly plastic explosives is part of a wider increase in reckless violence among Sweden’s gangs. Fatal shootings ascribed by police to criminal networks have surged from an annual average of about four 20 years ago to more than 40 in 2018, official figures show.
The government has announced a 34-point plan to combat the violence, including measures making it easier for police to search homes and read encrypted phone messages. Denmark, however, is alarmed enough to have reintroduced border controls following two blasts in Copenhagen linked to Swedish gangs.
Despite the gang attacks, Sweden’s murder rate has fallen since the 1990s and remains among the world’s lowest, with killings linked to domestic violence, hate crime and “spontaneous fights” all significantly down.
Police arrested three people over the weekend following an explosion in an apartment block in the southern city of Malmö early on Friday that blew out the building’s main door, shattered windows and substantially damaged the entrance level.
The blast was the first of three in the space of 24 hours, local media reported, with others destroying cars and damaging property in Växjö, 127 miles (204km) north-east of Malmö, and Landvetter outside Gothenburg on the country’s west coast.
“There are 10 million people in Sweden and I have not found the equivalent of this level of explosions in any industrialised country,” Ylva Ehrlin, an analyst with the bomb squad, told the public broadcaster SVT.
The number of recent explosions was “unacceptably high” and “obviously undesirable”, she told the news agency TT. “It’s very serious, a social problem. We not only must find the explosives and tools, but uncover the cause.”
Most of the blasts have occurred in big cities, authorities said. Almost a third have taken place in Malmö, scene of a string of increasingly violent gun and bomb attacks that rightwing politicians have linked to the large flows of immigrants who arrived in in Sweden during the 2015 migration crisis.
Nineteen bombs have also exploded in the capital, Stockholm, so far this year, and another 13 in Gothenburg, compared with 39 nationwide in 2018. The squad have also defused 76 suspected bombs that were spotted before they could be detonated.
Ehrin said that although no one had died in the explosions so far, the risk of fatalities must be considered very high. “We’ve been incredibly lucky. You just don’t usually have that kind of luck,” she said.
The bombs, which mostly target empty buildings, offices and cars, are usually small and experts believe they are intended to intimidate rival gangs. Police have said, however, that some could have been deadly. One device in Linköping earlier this year contained about 40 times the usual explosive charge, seriously damaging two residential buildings and injuring 25 people.
The bomb-makers themselves “usually do not know how dangerous, how sensitive these substances are” and are risking their lives, Ehrin said, noting that an 18-year-old man who was seriously injured when a bomb exploded in Malmö last December was later charged with trying to detonate it.
But the greater danger was to innocent bystanders, such as the female student who suffered severe facial injuries in September when a device inside a shop exploded as she was walking past on her way home from a night in Lund. “With a gun, you control it until you press the trigger,” Ehren said.
“Also, you usually aim at the intended target, but you do not have the same control over an explosive charge, especially if you are a criminal without much education or experience in the field. You have no control over the target or the effect.”
Experts have said the growing use of mainly plastic explosives is part of a wider increase in reckless violence among Sweden’s gangs. Fatal shootings ascribed by police to criminal networks have surged from an annual average of about four 20 years ago to more than 40 in 2018, official figures show.
The government has announced a 34-point plan to combat the violence, including measures making it easier for police to search homes and read encrypted phone messages. Denmark, however, is alarmed enough to have reintroduced border controls following two blasts in Copenhagen linked to Swedish gangs.
Despite the gang attacks, Sweden’s murder rate has fallen since the 1990s and remains among the world’s lowest, with killings linked to domestic violence, hate crime and “spontaneous fights” all significantly down.
Indian capital Delhi gasps under choking smog
November 3, 2019
By Agence France-Presse - raw story
India’s capital New Delhi was enveloped in heavy, toxic smog Sunday — the worst levels in recent years — with flights diverted or delayed as politicians blamed each other for failing to tackle the crisis.
Every winter, the megacity of 20 million people is blanketed by a poisonous smog of car fumes, industrial emissions and smoke from stubble burning at farms in neighbouring states.
Concentrations of particles measuring less than 2.5 microns hit the highest level of this season, exacerbated by light rains late Saturday, India’s state-run System of Air Quality Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR) said.
The reading for pollutants in the atmosphere hit 810 micrograms per cubic metre Sunday morning, in the “hazardous” zone according to the US embassy in Delhi, which independently monitors pollution levels.
The recommended World Health Organisation safe daily maximum is 25.
“Pollution has reached unbearable levels,” Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted Sunday.
Locals complained of sore eyes and throats, with some residents wearing masks to protect themselves.
Visibility was so poor major carriers Air India and Vistara said Sunday flights were being delayed or diverted to and from Delhi’s airports.
Some cricket players and coaches have also been training in masks ahead of the Twenty20 international between Bangladesh and India later Sunday.
The shocking conditions sparked a blame game between state and federal politicians over who was responsible for the conditions, which authorities said Friday had reached “emergency” levels.
In a tweet last week, Kejriwal called on the state governments of neighbouring Punjab and Haryana to take action.
“Delhi has turned into a gas chamber due to smoke from crop burning in neighbouring states,” he tweeted.
Federal Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar accused Kejriwal of politicising the issue and presenting the two states “in a bad light and as villains”.
Schools in Delhi have already been ordered closed until Tuesday, and construction halted From Monday there will be an odd/even car licence plate scheme to cut traffic.
Last year, a UN report found 14 of the world’s 15 most polluted cities were in India, with one US study saying it kills a million people prematurely every year.
Every winter, the megacity of 20 million people is blanketed by a poisonous smog of car fumes, industrial emissions and smoke from stubble burning at farms in neighbouring states.
Concentrations of particles measuring less than 2.5 microns hit the highest level of this season, exacerbated by light rains late Saturday, India’s state-run System of Air Quality Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR) said.
The reading for pollutants in the atmosphere hit 810 micrograms per cubic metre Sunday morning, in the “hazardous” zone according to the US embassy in Delhi, which independently monitors pollution levels.
The recommended World Health Organisation safe daily maximum is 25.
“Pollution has reached unbearable levels,” Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted Sunday.
Locals complained of sore eyes and throats, with some residents wearing masks to protect themselves.
Visibility was so poor major carriers Air India and Vistara said Sunday flights were being delayed or diverted to and from Delhi’s airports.
Some cricket players and coaches have also been training in masks ahead of the Twenty20 international between Bangladesh and India later Sunday.
The shocking conditions sparked a blame game between state and federal politicians over who was responsible for the conditions, which authorities said Friday had reached “emergency” levels.
In a tweet last week, Kejriwal called on the state governments of neighbouring Punjab and Haryana to take action.
“Delhi has turned into a gas chamber due to smoke from crop burning in neighbouring states,” he tweeted.
Federal Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar accused Kejriwal of politicising the issue and presenting the two states “in a bad light and as villains”.
Schools in Delhi have already been ordered closed until Tuesday, and construction halted From Monday there will be an odd/even car licence plate scheme to cut traffic.
Last year, a UN report found 14 of the world’s 15 most polluted cities were in India, with one US study saying it kills a million people prematurely every year.
German city declares "Nazi emergency"
NOVEMBER 2, 2019 / 8:39 PM
CBS NEWS
A city in eastern Germany has declared a "Nazi emergency" to tackle the rise of the far-right. Dresden is the capital of Saxony, which is considered a stronghold of the far-right movement.
"'Nazinotstand' means - similar to the climate emergency - that we have a serious problem. The open democratic society is threatened," local councilor Max Aschenbach, who tabled the motion, told BBC News.
Dresden's city council approved a resolution Wednesday night to 39 votes to 29 to pass the motion that declared "anti-democratic, anti-pluralist, misanthropic and right-wing-extremist attitudes and actions, including violence in Dresden, are occurring with increasing frequency."
The motion was opposed by Germany's governing Christian Democrats (CDU), who said it was "primarily an intended provocation."
"'State of emergency' means the collapse or a serious threat to public order," Jan Donhauser, chairman of the CDU City Council Group, told BBC News. "That is not given rudimentarily. Furthermore, the focus on 'right-wing extremism' does not do justice to what we need. We are the guardians of the liberal-democratic basic order and no violence, no matter from which extremist side it comes, is compatible with it."
Aschenbach, who is a member of the left-leaning satirical political party Die Partei, said the city was not obliged to take any action following the adoption of his resolution, but that "theoretically, existing measures should be given a higher priority and future decisions should follow this."
The anti-Islam and xenophobic movement PEGIDA, which stands for German for Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the West, began in Dresden in 2014, according to Deutsche Walle. The group regularly holds rallies in the city.
According to Deutsche Walle, Saxony is a stronghold for the far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD), which came in second in state elections in September.
"'Nazinotstand' means - similar to the climate emergency - that we have a serious problem. The open democratic society is threatened," local councilor Max Aschenbach, who tabled the motion, told BBC News.
Dresden's city council approved a resolution Wednesday night to 39 votes to 29 to pass the motion that declared "anti-democratic, anti-pluralist, misanthropic and right-wing-extremist attitudes and actions, including violence in Dresden, are occurring with increasing frequency."
The motion was opposed by Germany's governing Christian Democrats (CDU), who said it was "primarily an intended provocation."
"'State of emergency' means the collapse or a serious threat to public order," Jan Donhauser, chairman of the CDU City Council Group, told BBC News. "That is not given rudimentarily. Furthermore, the focus on 'right-wing extremism' does not do justice to what we need. We are the guardians of the liberal-democratic basic order and no violence, no matter from which extremist side it comes, is compatible with it."
Aschenbach, who is a member of the left-leaning satirical political party Die Partei, said the city was not obliged to take any action following the adoption of his resolution, but that "theoretically, existing measures should be given a higher priority and future decisions should follow this."
The anti-Islam and xenophobic movement PEGIDA, which stands for German for Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the West, began in Dresden in 2014, according to Deutsche Walle. The group regularly holds rallies in the city.
According to Deutsche Walle, Saxony is a stronghold for the far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD), which came in second in state elections in September.
no PATRIOTISM from the greedy!!!
Super-rich prepare to leave UK 'within minutes' if Labour wins election
Wealthy see potential taxes imposed by Jeremy Corbyn as bigger threat than Brexit
Rupert Neate Wealth correspondent
the guardian
Sat 2 Nov 2019 04.00 EDT
The super-rich are preparing to immediately leave the UK if Jeremy Corbyn becomes prime minister, fearing they will lose billions of pounds if the Labour leader does “go after” the wealthy elite with new taxes, possible capital controls and a clampdown on private schools.
Lawyers and accountants for the UK’s richest families said they had been deluged with calls from millionaire and billionaire clients asking for help and advice on moving countries, shifting their fortunes offshore and making early gifts to their children to avoid the Labour leader’s threat to tax all inheritances above £125,000.
The advisers said a Corbyn-led government was viewed as a far greater threat to the wealth and quality of life of the richest 1% than a hard Brexit.
Geoffrey Todd, a partner at the law firm Boodle Hatfield, said many of his clients had already put plans in place to transfer their wealth out of the country within minutes if Corbyn is elected.
“Lots of high-net worth individuals are worried about having to pay much higher taxes on their wealth and have already prepared for the possibility of a Corbyn government,” he said. “Transfers of wealth are already arranged – in many cases, all that is missing is a signature on the contract.
“There will be plenty of people on the phone to their lawyers in the early hours of 13 December if Labour wins. Movements of capital to new owners and different locations are already prepared, and they are just awaiting final approval.”
Dominic Samuelson, the chief executive of Campden Wealth, which advises more than 3,500 rich families, said: “From the ultra-high net worth perspective, a Labour government under Corbyn is a much greater threat to them and their businesses and their wealth than Brexit.”
On Thursday, Corbyn singled out five members of “the elite” that a Labour government would go after in order to rebalance the country.
He claimed Mike Ashley, the billionaire owner of Sports Direct and Newcastle United, was a “bad boss” who exploited his workers through zero-hours contracts. Ashley hit back, telling the Financial Times: “Corbyn’s not only a liar but clueless.”
The Labour leader also named the “greedy banker” Crispin Odey, the hedge fund manager who made £220m betting against the pound in the run-up to the EU referendum. Odey responded by telling the Daily Telegraph: “Luckily they [Labour] can’t even run a campaign, let alone the country.”
The others singled out by Corbyn were: Jim Ratcliffe, the chemicals billionaire who has left the UK for tax-free Monaco; the Sun and Sunday Times owner, Rupert Murdoch; and the Duke of Westminster, who has a large central London property empire.
The shadow Treasury minister Clive Lewis went further than the Labour leader, telling the BBC’s Newsnight programme: “Billionaires shouldn’t exist. It’s a travesty that there are people on this planet living on less than a dollar a day.
“There are people, when I walk into parliament, who are sleeping rough on the streets of this country – the sixth-wealthiest in this world.” He also described private schools as “engines of inequality”.
Josie Hills, a senior tax manager at Pinsent Masons, said not being able to educate their children at Eton, Harrow or Winchester was a key worry for many of the law firm’s rich clients, who were considering moving to Switzerland and other low-tax countries with well-regarded private schools.
“I would say 80% of our clients have thought about the implications of a Corbyn government,” she said. “They tend to say they sincerely hope it won’t happen but they want to be ready if it does. If that means uprooting themselves and their families then so be it.”
John Caudwell, the billionaire founder of Phones4u, has already vowed to leave the country if Corbyn becomes prime minister. Caudwell, who has an estimated £1.6bn fortune, said a Corbyn-led government would be “a complete fiasco” and he would “just go and live in the south of France or Monaco”.
Corbyn has not set out precisely how he would target the rich, but Labour’s 2017 manifesto pledged to impose a 45p tax rate on those earning more than £80,000 and a 50% rate above £123,000. At present, the highest income tax rate is 45% for those earning more than £150,000.
Labour would also significantly increase capital gains tax and replace inheritance tax with a “lifetime gifts” levy, with a tax-free allowance of £125,000 – less than half the current £325,000. There are also plans to increase the corporation tax rate to 26%, up from the current rate of 19%.
Corbyn’s plans for workers’ rights, with ideas floated including a four-day working week and giving employees 10% of the shares of big firms, are also of concern to the wealthy.
Peter Hargreaves, who has an estimated fortune of £3bn and co-founded the stockbroker Hargreaves Lansdown, warned Corbyn’s plans would be an “own goal and leave the country much worse off”.
He added: “It has been proven time and time again: there is only so much you can tax a nation before the tax take starts to go down because people will leave. My family will not be leaving, I love this country and I have always been enormously patriotic.
“But certainly the very, very wealthy people will consider leaving if you make it intolerable. People are petrified of him [Corbyn], and what he might do.”
Hargreaves said the stockbroker employed about 1,700 people and had “created a vast amount of wealth for this country”.
He added: “If you create a tax regime that is not going to welcome and support people like me who create wealth then you are going to rapidly reduce the health of your economy.”
Hargreaves said he paid about £40m in tax last year, and “if 50 of us [the biggest taxpayers] got on a plane and left, that would put a big hole in the chancellor’s budget”.
Lawyers and accountants for the UK’s richest families said they had been deluged with calls from millionaire and billionaire clients asking for help and advice on moving countries, shifting their fortunes offshore and making early gifts to their children to avoid the Labour leader’s threat to tax all inheritances above £125,000.
The advisers said a Corbyn-led government was viewed as a far greater threat to the wealth and quality of life of the richest 1% than a hard Brexit.
Geoffrey Todd, a partner at the law firm Boodle Hatfield, said many of his clients had already put plans in place to transfer their wealth out of the country within minutes if Corbyn is elected.
“Lots of high-net worth individuals are worried about having to pay much higher taxes on their wealth and have already prepared for the possibility of a Corbyn government,” he said. “Transfers of wealth are already arranged – in many cases, all that is missing is a signature on the contract.
“There will be plenty of people on the phone to their lawyers in the early hours of 13 December if Labour wins. Movements of capital to new owners and different locations are already prepared, and they are just awaiting final approval.”
Dominic Samuelson, the chief executive of Campden Wealth, which advises more than 3,500 rich families, said: “From the ultra-high net worth perspective, a Labour government under Corbyn is a much greater threat to them and their businesses and their wealth than Brexit.”
On Thursday, Corbyn singled out five members of “the elite” that a Labour government would go after in order to rebalance the country.
He claimed Mike Ashley, the billionaire owner of Sports Direct and Newcastle United, was a “bad boss” who exploited his workers through zero-hours contracts. Ashley hit back, telling the Financial Times: “Corbyn’s not only a liar but clueless.”
The Labour leader also named the “greedy banker” Crispin Odey, the hedge fund manager who made £220m betting against the pound in the run-up to the EU referendum. Odey responded by telling the Daily Telegraph: “Luckily they [Labour] can’t even run a campaign, let alone the country.”
The others singled out by Corbyn were: Jim Ratcliffe, the chemicals billionaire who has left the UK for tax-free Monaco; the Sun and Sunday Times owner, Rupert Murdoch; and the Duke of Westminster, who has a large central London property empire.
The shadow Treasury minister Clive Lewis went further than the Labour leader, telling the BBC’s Newsnight programme: “Billionaires shouldn’t exist. It’s a travesty that there are people on this planet living on less than a dollar a day.
“There are people, when I walk into parliament, who are sleeping rough on the streets of this country – the sixth-wealthiest in this world.” He also described private schools as “engines of inequality”.
Josie Hills, a senior tax manager at Pinsent Masons, said not being able to educate their children at Eton, Harrow or Winchester was a key worry for many of the law firm’s rich clients, who were considering moving to Switzerland and other low-tax countries with well-regarded private schools.
“I would say 80% of our clients have thought about the implications of a Corbyn government,” she said. “They tend to say they sincerely hope it won’t happen but they want to be ready if it does. If that means uprooting themselves and their families then so be it.”
John Caudwell, the billionaire founder of Phones4u, has already vowed to leave the country if Corbyn becomes prime minister. Caudwell, who has an estimated £1.6bn fortune, said a Corbyn-led government would be “a complete fiasco” and he would “just go and live in the south of France or Monaco”.
Corbyn has not set out precisely how he would target the rich, but Labour’s 2017 manifesto pledged to impose a 45p tax rate on those earning more than £80,000 and a 50% rate above £123,000. At present, the highest income tax rate is 45% for those earning more than £150,000.
Labour would also significantly increase capital gains tax and replace inheritance tax with a “lifetime gifts” levy, with a tax-free allowance of £125,000 – less than half the current £325,000. There are also plans to increase the corporation tax rate to 26%, up from the current rate of 19%.
Corbyn’s plans for workers’ rights, with ideas floated including a four-day working week and giving employees 10% of the shares of big firms, are also of concern to the wealthy.
Peter Hargreaves, who has an estimated fortune of £3bn and co-founded the stockbroker Hargreaves Lansdown, warned Corbyn’s plans would be an “own goal and leave the country much worse off”.
He added: “It has been proven time and time again: there is only so much you can tax a nation before the tax take starts to go down because people will leave. My family will not be leaving, I love this country and I have always been enormously patriotic.
“But certainly the very, very wealthy people will consider leaving if you make it intolerable. People are petrified of him [Corbyn], and what he might do.”
Hargreaves said the stockbroker employed about 1,700 people and had “created a vast amount of wealth for this country”.
He added: “If you create a tax regime that is not going to welcome and support people like me who create wealth then you are going to rapidly reduce the health of your economy.”
Hargreaves said he paid about £40m in tax last year, and “if 50 of us [the biggest taxpayers] got on a plane and left, that would put a big hole in the chancellor’s budget”.
funnies
ESPECIALLY THE U.S.!!!
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