Times of India
WASHINGTON: Nearly 30,000 foreign recruits have now poured into Syria, many to join the Islamic State, a doubling
of volunteers in just the past 12 months and stark evidence that an
international effort to tighten borders, share intelligence and enforce
antiterrorism laws is not diminishing the ranks of new militant
fighters. Among those who have entered or tried to enter the conflict in Iraq or
Syria are more than 250 Americans, up from about 100 a year ago,
according to intelligence and law enforcement officials."
Friday, 2 October 2015
Money Flows With Refugees, and Life Jackets Fill the Shops
NYT
IZMIR, Turkey — For months, Ahmed Abdul-Hamid, a Palestinian
from the Syrian city of Aleppo, tried and failed to cross the sea to
start a new life in Europe. The Turkish police detained him. Smugglers
tricked him. Once, his boat stalled and he had to swim back to shore,
leaving him stranded and broke. But
his fortunes changed this summer when a Turkish smuggler hired him to
recruit passengers from among the refugees and migrants flooding into
this port city. Soon, his phone was ringing nonstop with people trying
to get to Europe, and the cash was pouring in for him — as much as
$4,000 per day."
German nurse faces eviction from council block where she brought up her children to make way for asylum seekers
Daily Mail
A German
woman is set to be evicted from the home where she raised her children
on order for the local council to turn her block of flats into a refugee
shelter. Bettina
Halbey received a letter earlier this month, telling her that she has
to move out of her home-of-16-years in Nieheim, west Germany. The
51-year-old nurse has been told that she has until May next year to
vacate her flat, as Germany struggles to find housing for the thousands
of refugees and migrants arriving in the country every week."
#Germany govt plans to provide #Syria refugees 3-year residence permits to offload asylum procedures
handelsblatt.com (German)
Vereinfachung ihrer Asylverfahren rechnen. Die zuständigen Behörden widersprachen einem Medienbericht, wonach Syrer ohne Asylverfahren Aufenthalt bekommen sollten." (use google translate !)
Vereinfachung ihrer Asylverfahren rechnen. Die zuständigen Behörden widersprachen einem Medienbericht, wonach Syrer ohne Asylverfahren Aufenthalt bekommen sollten." (use google translate !)
Dozens of ethnic brawls in Germany’s “refugee” centres
Andrew Bolt,Herald Sun (Australia)
In a September 29 interview with the newspaper Passauer Neue Presse, the head of the German police union (Deutschen Polizeigewerkschaft, DPolG), Rainer Wendt, warned that “brutal criminal structures” have taken over the refugee shelters and that police are overwhelmed and unable to guarantee safety and security. He called for Christians and Muslims to be separated before someone gets killed:
In the past two months alone, dozens of violent brawls and riots between different groups of migrants have erupted in Germany’s refugee shelters." (follow the link and read the rest)
In a September 29 interview with the newspaper Passauer Neue Presse, the head of the German police union (Deutschen Polizeigewerkschaft, DPolG), Rainer Wendt, warned that “brutal criminal structures” have taken over the refugee shelters and that police are overwhelmed and unable to guarantee safety and security. He called for Christians and Muslims to be separated before someone gets killed:
“We have been witnessing this violence for weeks and months. Groups based on ethnicity, religion or clan structures go after each other with knives and homemade weapons… Sunnis are fighting Shiites, there are Salafists from competing groups. They are trying to impose their rules in the shelters. Christians are being massively oppressed and the Sharia is being enforced....Wendt gave the interview days after 300 Albanian migrants clashed with 70 Pakistani migrants at a refugee shelter in Calden, a town in the state of Hesse, on September 27. More than a dozen people, including three police officers, were injured… More than 60 migrants, including ten children, were injured after Pakistanis and Syrians clashed at the same shelter on September 13. ...
In the past two months alone, dozens of violent brawls and riots between different groups of migrants have erupted in Germany’s refugee shelters." (follow the link and read the rest)
UN reveals it expects 1.4 million migrants to have crossed the Mediterranean to Europe during 2015-16 - nearly DOUBLE its original estimate
Daily Mail
The UN says
as many as 1.4million migrants may cross the border into Europe this
year and next - nearly double its original estimates .
The
UNHR - the UN's refugee agency - launched a funding appeal on September
8, based on estimates 400,000 migrants would come to Europe in 2015 and
450,000 next year.
But
within days, that estimation was revised, and a new document seen today
reveals that the number could be more than double the original estimate
of 850,000 which it has planned for."
Britain Deeply Divided Over Refugee Influx
SkyNews
Exclusive survey results by Sky News have found that 47% of British people favour taking in fewer refugees. When the same question was asked using the term "asylum seeker", that figure was 57%.
Meanwhile, 61% think Britain's resources can't take the strain of more refugees."
Exclusive survey results by Sky News have found that 47% of British people favour taking in fewer refugees. When the same question was asked using the term "asylum seeker", that figure was 57%.
Meanwhile, 61% think Britain's resources can't take the strain of more refugees."
Saturday, 26 September 2015
Only by showing his distaste for the EU can the David Cameron convince us to stay
Telegraph
The balance of hope and fear, however, has changed. The great moral advantage for the pro-Europeans 40 years ago was that they represented hope, whereas the No campaign drew on fear. It felt like the 21st century versus 1940. The future defeated the past.
Now that we live in the 21st century, the shocks of the euro and mass migration and the marked decline of European world competitiveness, have ensured that the EU does not feel like the future any more. The argument for British membership is now almost wholly a status quo one – that getting out is too risky. No sane British pro-European publicly campaigns for much more Europe (although that is what many of them privately want): that side has lost its visionary power.
If it gets it right, the “Leave” campaign can annex both hope and fear – hope that we could be freer to govern ourselves and freer actors in the wider world where the global future is actually being decided; fear that if we stay in we shall be more regulated, more dragged into the deeper Euro-project and more vulnerable to uncontrollable immigration.
Add the fact that voters are much less respectful and more insurgent than they were in 1975, and a Crosby-ish calculation of the outcome becomes much narrower now than then. Recent polls tend to bear this out. The pull of aspiration among the undecided is away from the EU, while that of security is still for remaining. A typical formulation of such a voter might be “I want my country back, but not if it means I lose my job”.
The balance of hope and fear, however, has changed. The great moral advantage for the pro-Europeans 40 years ago was that they represented hope, whereas the No campaign drew on fear. It felt like the 21st century versus 1940. The future defeated the past.
Now that we live in the 21st century, the shocks of the euro and mass migration and the marked decline of European world competitiveness, have ensured that the EU does not feel like the future any more. The argument for British membership is now almost wholly a status quo one – that getting out is too risky. No sane British pro-European publicly campaigns for much more Europe (although that is what many of them privately want): that side has lost its visionary power.
If it gets it right, the “Leave” campaign can annex both hope and fear – hope that we could be freer to govern ourselves and freer actors in the wider world where the global future is actually being decided; fear that if we stay in we shall be more regulated, more dragged into the deeper Euro-project and more vulnerable to uncontrollable immigration.
Add the fact that voters are much less respectful and more insurgent than they were in 1975, and a Crosby-ish calculation of the outcome becomes much narrower now than then. Recent polls tend to bear this out. The pull of aspiration among the undecided is away from the EU, while that of security is still for remaining. A typical formulation of such a voter might be “I want my country back, but not if it means I lose my job”.
Friday, 25 September 2015
How Volkswagen was caught
Andrew Bolt, Herald Sun (Australia)
......to do the first ever evaluation of the tailpipe emissions of diesel cars in America made by European manufacturers.
They tested three cars: a BMW X5, Volkswagen Jetta and Volkswagen Passat, while travelling over 2400kms on each car to get their results.
After driving from Los Angeles to Seattle and back they noticed something odd about their Passat. Going by Volkswagen’s claims, it should easily have let out the least amount of pollution between those three cars — it had a more modern catalytic reduction system which is meant to convert toxic fumes into safer ones — but that wasn’t the case. The nitrogen oxide that came out of the Passat was in fact 20 times more than the baseline levels permitted by the California Air Resources Board.
The team was puzzled. There was no way it could be wrong. They triple-checked the accuracy of their equipment after the Volkswagen Jetta they tested showed readings 30 times more than the claimed pollution rating.
The BMW, though, gave off the exact results they expected.
At the time, the team had no idea why the cars were emitting so much pollution… “...We didn’t point and say, ‘Volkswagen has a defeat device’,” Thiruvengadam told Autoblog. ......"
......to do the first ever evaluation of the tailpipe emissions of diesel cars in America made by European manufacturers.
They tested three cars: a BMW X5, Volkswagen Jetta and Volkswagen Passat, while travelling over 2400kms on each car to get their results.
After driving from Los Angeles to Seattle and back they noticed something odd about their Passat. Going by Volkswagen’s claims, it should easily have let out the least amount of pollution between those three cars — it had a more modern catalytic reduction system which is meant to convert toxic fumes into safer ones — but that wasn’t the case. The nitrogen oxide that came out of the Passat was in fact 20 times more than the baseline levels permitted by the California Air Resources Board.
The team was puzzled. There was no way it could be wrong. They triple-checked the accuracy of their equipment after the Volkswagen Jetta they tested showed readings 30 times more than the claimed pollution rating.
The BMW, though, gave off the exact results they expected.
At the time, the team had no idea why the cars were emitting so much pollution… “...We didn’t point and say, ‘Volkswagen has a defeat device’,” Thiruvengadam told Autoblog. ......"
Thursday, 24 September 2015
Toxic facts about dash for diesel
Daily Mail
Tony Blair
introduced the ‘dash for diesel’ in the late 1990s to meet climate
change targets. Under the 1997 Kyoto Protocol wealthy countries had to
slash emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main greenhouse gas, by 8
per cent over 15 years.
Like
other leaders, Blair was swayed by the motor industry’s argument that
switching from petrol to diesel would lead to huge drops in greenhouse
gas emissions.It’s
true that diesels emit less CO2 – mostly they are more efficient and go
further on one litre of fuel. However, in the 1990s the industry argued
the average diesel emitted 13 to 17 per cent less CO2, a figure that
turned out to be hugely optimistic. How was the UK persuaded to switch to dirty diesel?
The
2001 Budget overhauled vehicle excise duty and introduced a new banding
system, still in place today. The more CO2 cars emitted, the more
owners had to pay. The system favoured diesel cars which, according to
the manufacturer’s test results, tended to have lower CO2 emissions.
Labour also brought in tax breaks for diesel company cars to encourage
businesses to switch."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)