Category Archives: Fail!

france 24 – Thousands of Syrians fleeing Aleppo mass at Turkish border – France 24

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Thursday up to 70,000 people were heading to his country, with 10,000 already waiting at the border.His country hosts about 2.5 million Syrian refugees.On Friday morning, the main border crossing in northern Aleppo was closed and quiet on the Turkish side near the town of Kilis, with no sign of arriving refugees.But footage released Thursday by activists showed hundreds of people, including many children, heading towards the Turkish frontier, some carrying their belongings in plastic bags on their backs.“We were driven from our homes because of Russia, Iran, Bashar and (Lebanese Shiite militia) Hezbollah,” a child said in the video. “We ask (Turkish President Recep Tayyip) Erdogan to let us into his territory.”

Source: france 24 – Thousands of Syrians fleeing Aleppo mass at Turkish border – France 24

Avian Flu Diary: UK: Aircraft Disinsection Ordered For Zika

On Monday, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the issue of microcephaly – which may be linked to Zika – a public health emergency of international concern. As a precautionary measure, the government is asking airlines to ensure that disinsection (spraying with insecticide) takes place on all flights to the UK from countries with confirmed transmission of Zika. Disinsection involves spraying a simple insecticide inside the aircraft to reduce the risk of passengers being bitten by any mosquitoes that could have entered the aircraft. It already occurs on the majority of flights from the region as a precaution against malaria. The move is consistent with advice from WHO Europe. The type of mosquito that transmits the virus is extremely unlikely to survive and breed here given the lower temperatures in the UK.

Source: Avian Flu Diary: UK: Aircraft Disinsection Ordered For Zika

TPP: Lessons from New Zealand | Inter Press Service

Asia-Pacific, Featured, Food & Agriculture, Globalisation, Headlines, Trade & InvestmentTPP: Lessons from New ZealandBy Jomo Kwame SundaramReprint |      | Print | Send by email |En españolJomo Kwame Sundaram was an Assistant Secretary-General responsible for analysis of economic development in the United Nations system during 2005-2015, and received the 2007 Wassily Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought.KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Feb 2 2016 (IPS) – A new paper* on the implications of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement for New Zealand examines key economic issues likely to be impacted by this trade agreement. It is remarkable how little TPP brings to the table. NZ’s gross domestic product will grow by 47 per cent by 2030 without the TPP, or by 47.9 per cent with the TPP. Even that small benefit is an exaggeration, as the modelling makes dubious assumptions, and the real benefits will be even smaller. If the full costs are included, net economic benefits to the NZ economy are doubtful. The gains from tariff reductions are less than a quarter of the projected benefits according to official NZ government modelling. Although most of the projected benefits result from reducing non-tariff barriers (NTBs), the projections rely on inadequate and dubious information that does not even identify the NTBs that would be reduced by the TPP!Jomo Kwame Sundaram. Credit: FAOAgricultureThe main beneficiaries in NZ will be agricultural exporters, but modest tariff reductions of 1.3 per cent on average by 2030 are small compared to ongoing commodity price and exchange rate volatility. Extensive trade barriers to agricultural exports in the Japanese, Canadian and US food markets remain, and will be locked in under TPP. TPP has also failed to tackle agricultural subsidies that are a major trade distortion. Significant tariff barriers remain in some sectors in Japan, Canada and the US likely to be ‘locked in’ under the TPP that are almost impossible to remove in the future. TPP’s Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures limits on labelling may also restrict opportunities for food exporters to build high quality, differentiated niche market positions.TPP has also been used to undermine negotiations in the World Trade Organization, the only forum for removing such trade distorting subsidies.ISDSTPP’s investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) provisions and restrictions on state-owned enterprises will deter future NZ governments from regulations and policies in the public interest, for fear of litigation by corporate interests. The threat, if not actual repercussions, are good enough to ‘discipline’ governments by causing ‘regulatory chill’. TPP is very much a charter for incumbent businesses, especially US transnational corporations. Thus, it inadvertently holds back the economic transformation the world needs. The agreement’s TPP’s benefits are likely to be asymmetric as it is more favourable to big US business practices and will deepen the disadvantages of small size and remoteness. Potential ISDS compensation payments or settlements could far outweigh the limited economic benefits of TPP. Even when cases are successfully defended, the legal costs will be very high.Value-additionTPP can both help and hinder ambitions to add value to raw materials and commodities, and to progress up value chains. However, it is likely to reinforce NZ’s position as a commodity producer and thus hinder progress up the value chain where greater economic prosperity lies. More analysis based on the actual agreement is required to ascertain the conditions for and likelihood of such progress. TPP will limit government’s ability to innovate and address national challenges and is likely to worsen rapidly escalating problems such as environmental degradation and climate change.Furthermore, TPP is projected to reduce employment and increase income inequality in NZ. In its analysis, the government has not considered the likely costs, which are probably going to be very significant, and may well outweigh economic benefits.TPP thus falls well short of being “a trade agreement for the 21st century”, as its cheerleaders claim. A more comprehensive, balanced and objective cost-benefit analysis on the basis of the October 2015 deal should be completed before ratifying the TPP.

Source: TPP: Lessons from New Zealand | Inter Press Service

‘I Want a Safe Place’: Refugee Women from Syria Uprooted and Unprotected in Lebanon | Amnesty International USA

Shortfalls in international assistance and discriminatory policies imposed by the Lebanese authorities are creating conditions that facilitate the exploitation and abuse of women refugees in Lebanon, said Amnesty International in a new report published ahead of the Syria Donors Conference in London on February 4.The report, ‘I Want a Safe Place’: Refugee Women from Syria Uprooted and Unprotected in Lebanon, highlights how the Lebanese government’s refusal to renew residency permits for refugees and a shortage of international funding, leaves refugee women in a precarious position, and puts them at risk of exploitation by people in positions of power including landlords, employers and even the police.

Source: ‘I Want a Safe Place’: Refugee Women from Syria Uprooted and Unprotected in Lebanon | Amnesty International USA

www.german-foreign-policy.com refugees

Within the EU, the mounting pressure to ward off refugees, is intensifying the debate about a possible dismantling of the Schengen system. It is yet unclear, whether Berlin can reach its objective of stopping refugees at the external borders of Greece to be immediately deported to Turkey. Alternately, attempts are being made to turn Macedonia into a buffer state against refugees, while threatening Greece’s exclusion from the Schengen system. The establishment of a “Mini-Schengen” is being considered as an emergency solution. Even while officially continuing to reject such a “Mini-Schengen,” the German government is already involved in its planning, which the Netherlands is officially directing. Any option beyond effectively sealing off Greece’s external borders, i.e. abandoning part of the Schengen-system, would be a first retreat – with unforeseeable consequences. According to observers, this could seriously weaken the EU.

Source: www.german-foreign-policy.com

Masked gang threatens attacks against asylum seekers in Stockholm – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Dozens of masked, black-clad men believed to belong to neo-Nazi gangs rampaged through the streets of Stockholm on Friday night handing out leaflets threatening to attack migrant street youths “to make a statement”, with police saying two arrests have been made.The incident highlights the growing tensions over immigration in Sweden, a country of 10 million which received 163,000 asylum seekers last year, and comes days after a 22-year-old female worker was stabbed to death in a centre for unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors in south-western Sweden.As many as 100 people with their faces covered descended on the Sergels Torg pedestrian square, a popular meeting point for young people, including migrant youths.Police had beefed up their presence in the city centre, deploying anti-riot and helicopter units after learning that extremists were planning “aggression on unaccompanied migrant minors”.By midday police had not received any complaints of assault but one 46-year-old man was arrested after striking a plainclothes officer, police spokesman Towe Hagg said.The leaflets handed out on Friday night, which were confirmed by police as being the same as those posted on Swedish social media, said:”When Swedish streets are no longer safe for ordinary Swedes it is our DUTY to fix the problem … Today, therefore, 200 Swedish men gathered to make a statement against the North African ‘street children’ who are ranging around the capital’s central station.”The police have amply shown that it lacks the means to rein them in and we now see no alternative than for us to mete out the punishment they deserve.”Swedish Interior Minister Anders Ygeman condemned the “racist groups which threaten and spread hate in the public space”, adding: “One must respond strongly.”

Source: Masked gang threatens attacks against asylum seekers in Stockholm – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

“The Settlers”: New Film Reveals History & Consequences of Israeli Settlements on Palestinian Land | Democracy Now!

As Israel faces international condemnation over its plan to build 153 new settlement homes in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the watchdog group Peace Now reports Israel’s defense minister has approved the construction of the new Jewish-only homes last week. The plan sparked swift criticism from U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who called the settlements “an affront to the Palestinian people and to the international community.” In response, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Ban Ki-moon’s criticism gives “a tailwind to terrorism” and that the “U.N. lost its neutrality and moral force a long time ago.”

Source: “The Settlers”: New Film Reveals History & Consequences of Israeli Settlements on Palestinian Land | Democracy Now!

Sweden investigating Israeli death threats against its foreign minister | The Electronic Intifada

In the article, translated for Mondoweiss by Jonathan Ofir, Zameret lists Bernadotte’s supposed transgressions in the eyes of the Zionist movement and then turns his fire on Wallström: “The Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström, with her characteristic covert anti-Semitism, with her arrogance, ignorance, and her interest-bound speculation regarding her future Muslim voters – she too seeks to fight the foundations of the State of Israel. I am convinced and certain that her intentions will smoulder, just as all of the undignified count’s [Bernadotte] intentions did.”Zameret has denied that his article was an implicit endorsement of violence against Wallström, but Swedish officials will be concerned because of high profile assassinations of the country’s political leaders in recent decades.In 2003, Wallström’s predecessor Anna Lindh was murdered while out shopping in Stockholm. Her killer, Swedish citizen Mijailo Mijailović, is serving a life sentence.In February 1986, the country’s Prime Minister Olof Palme was shot dead while walking home with his wife from a cinema in the Swedish capital.His murder has never been solved, but among the many theories pursued by investigators over the years is that it was linked to South Africa’s apartheid regime, of which Palme was an outspoken international critic at the time.IncitementZameret’s article came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had turned his anger on Wallström.

Source: Sweden investigating Israeli death threats against its foreign minister | The Electronic Intifada

Danes in ‘historic’ flight from Social Democrats over asylum – The Local

 Social Democrats leader Mette Frederiksen. Photo Thomas Lekfeldt/Scanpix

 

Danes in ‘historic’ flight from Social Democrats over asylum

A new poll shows a “historic” drop in voter support for the Social Democrats, with eight of ten voters who jumped ship saying they left the party over its hard-line position on asylum and immigration.

A Megafon poll showed that the Social Democrats plummeted seven percentage points, going from 26.3 percent support in November to just 19.3 percent this week.  The drop was so significant that Megafon conducted an extra poll just to make sure the numbers hadn’t lied.  “The poll shows an historic large drop in support for the Social Democrats. The drop is so big that we have to go all the way back to 1998 to see anything similar,” Megafon CEO Asger Nielsen told TV2.  Measured by parliamentary seats, the poll would mean that the Social Democrats would go from their current 47 down to 34.  The reason for the drop in support was clear. Voters rejected the party’s hard lurch to the right on immigration and asylum policies.  “We asked everyone who left the Social Democrats in the poll to explain why and when I looked at all of the explanations, for 80 percent of them the refugee situation was the clear reason,” Nielsen told Politiken.  Earlier this week, the Social Democrats were the only ‘red bloc’ party to vote in favour of Denmark’s controversial asylum package, which among other things allows for the confiscation of cash and valuables from refugees and will make some refugees wait three years before they can even apply to bring their families to Denmark.

Source: Danes in ‘historic’ flight from Social Democrats over asylum – The Local

Welcome To America — Now Spy On Your Friends

One of the agents told Osman they had a deal for him. A “good deal,” Osman recalled: The FBI could help him with his green card application and even help some of his family immigrate to the United States.But something changed, he said, when she called and said, “I want to ask you where Osama Bin Laden is.”“That was when I got shocked,” he recalled. “I was really scared, and I was not feeling comfortable. She was giving me so much pressure. I think she was trying to scare me.” But he did not dare tell anyone in his community, lest someone think he was cooperating.Immigration records indicate that right around that time, and again in March and May of 2010, the Joint Terrorism Task Force — a partnership of law enforcement agencies led by the FBI — requested information about Osman’s immigration files from USCIS.In March 2011, Osman was informed that his claim to be a member of Somalia’s persecuted Tuni clan “may have” been false. He tried to fight the charge, but lost. First his refugee status was revoked. Then, six years after filing an application for a green card, Osman finally got an answer: No.An immigration lawyer did eventually get him in front of a judge, who ruled that the government had acted improperly. Osman’s refugee status was reinstated, and he even got a green card.But when, encouraged by those developments, he applied to become a full citizen, he ran into the very same kinds of delays. FBI agents don’t show up at his door anymore, but he worries that he might still find himself searching for a country to call home. “I believe I’m already an American,” Osman said one recent night, sitting in a hotel lobby.“I mean, I am an American!” he exclaimed, with his hands in the air. “This is my home. They might believe something else, but of course I am.”

Source: Welcome To America — Now Spy On Your Friends