Contributor’s Links post for January 12, 2019

Daily Links Post graphic

Each day at just after midnight Eastern, a post like this one is created for contributors and readers of this site to upload news links and video links on the issues that concern this site. Most notably, Islam and its effects on Classical Civilization, and various forms of leftism from Soviet era communism, to postmodernism and all the flavours of galloping statism and totalitarianism such as Nazism and Fascism which are increasingly snuffing out the classical liberalism which created our near, miraculous civilization the West has been building since the time of Socrates.

This document was written around the time this site was created, for those who wish to understand what this site is about. And while our understanding of the world and events has grown since then, the basic ideas remain sound and true to the purpose.

So please post all links, thoughts and ideas that you feel will benefit the readers of this site to the comments under this post each day. And thank you all for your contributions.

This is the new Samizdat. We muse use it while we can.

About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

114 Replies to “Contributor’s Links post for January 12, 2019”

  1. Germany: Libyan serial offender among others also worked as a fake doctor in a hospital+++
    Nurse unmasks Libyan “specialist”. According to the newspaper HNA, a 38-year-old Libyan has pretended to be a doctor at the Asklepios Clinic in Melsungen. He had applied to the clinic despite a criminal record for fraud with forged documents and was promptly hired. It was not until he was on duty that the false physician was noticed for dangerous incompetence.The “specialist” from the desert country had applied to the clinic in the spring with forged documents for a temporary position for standby duty. The fact that the documents were forged was not noticeable, says the medical director of Asklepios Melsungen, Dr. Gunther Claus, to the HNA.As Dr. Claus further reports, the 38-year-old has proven medical experience on a trial day. During standby duty, he took in patients, made initial diagnoses and then ordered x-rays and blood tests, for example.Only days later, during the initiation of a blood transfusion, a nurse noticed the obvious incompetence of the man. She immediately reported this suspicion and thus presumably prevented further misfortune. A blood transfusion follows strict standardized rules, Dr. Claus explains to the newspaper. If a new tin can is needed, the nurse puts the tube into the bag and calls the doctor. The physician vents the system and first tests the blood group to compare it with that of the patient. The Libyan did not follow this procedure.Thereupon the application documents were again examined in detail and after this research a complaint was made. The investigations revealed that the 38-year-old had already been convicted in May of commercial document forgery in eleven cases and commercial fraud. The verdict: three years and ten months! He had appealed against this. At the end of October, the Kassel Regional Court reduced the sentence to two years and five months. The HNA’s report also states: “In May, a pre-trial detention was found, but suspended against conditions. The defendant used the freedom to immediately apply to the Asklepios Clinic in Melsung.After his brazen appearance as a false physician, the Libyan is now finally behind bars. According to the public prosecutor’s office in Kassel, he will be tried again – that would be his third trial. This case, which ended well at least for the patients, also shows how little authority the rule of law enjoys in certain circles. The fact that the prison sentence had not been carried out made the crime possible in the first place.
    Read more:
    https://searchlight-germany.blogspot.com/2019/01/germany-libyan-serial-offender-among.html

  2. China accuses Canada of ‘white supremacy’ over the detention of Huawei CFO

    • China and Canada are feuding over the arrest and detention of Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Chinese tech giant Huawei, in Canada in early December.
    • Beijing detained two Canadians on vague national-security charges shortly after, in what is widely seen as retaliation. Canada has been calling for their release.
    • China’s ambassador to Canada wrote in a Wednesday op-ed that Meng’s arrest was “groundless.”
    • She said that Canada’s demands show “Western egotism and white supremacy.”

    NR: Don’t these Maotown gangsters realize that Justine Trudeau’s Multicultural bona fides immunize him from all accusations of racism?

    Admittedly—what with him having to prink around on the world stage in those embarrassingly laughable get-ups—his dieversity credentials come at a marked expense to human dignity (see “costly signalling”).

    Then again, it’s not as if Justine has a lot of “harmful masculinity” to dispense with in the first place.

      • It does take skill to play the race card, their clumsiness shows they aren’t used to thinking of themselves as victims.

    • Being whiter than Chinese melamine baby formula, I have no problem feeling superior to little brown Chinese commie bastards.

      • Being whiter than Chinese melamine baby formula, I have no problem feeling superior to little brown Chinese commie bastards.

        Much like the thirty stone bloke wearing a t-shirt printed with, “I overcame anorexia!”, it’s patently clear that congratulations are in order for the way you’ve won your battle of recovery from White guilt and male privilege.

        On the off chance you may not have already seen this short little 150 second gem, it’s posted just for you and your thoroughly rotten, waycist ‘tude, BL@CKBIRD: (Totally NSFW)

        PS: The time machine part is sheer genius, as is his finale:

  3. Time for Trudope to go to China and wear a Mr Foo manchurian outfit and make a total fool of himself once again

  4. But seriously.

    Capital gains on investment is a serious tax, particularly in Dear Leader’s Dystopia. Socialism is expensive.

    Holders of gold and silver beware. Because of the inversed relationship between USD and precious metals (pm), a sudden drop in the USD will almost inevitably cause a pm spike. Redemptions at higher levels will have the tax man on the lookout for those wishing to redeem their pms for fiat–or taking their winnings so to speak. You may be asked, for instance, to produce a receipt proving the value of your pms when you originally purchased them so that the government can assess the difference and tax the capital gains. What will they do if you cannot produce an original receipt? Will they unilaterally designate a low original value to maximize their tax? Will they confiscate as found money? Will they take your word for it?

    I see trouble. This will create a substantial black market, incriminating many unfairly.

    My point is that there is no true “capital gains” under this scenario. The value of the pm never changed, and never does change. It is a constant. Only the fiat rises and falls relative to the pm. To be fair, he redeemer should be paid extra in the form of a tax credit, by government, for being forced to accept payment in a devalued fiat. If this argument fails the compromise should be that the redeemer is left alone.

    I know, good luck with this. Fat chance. But unless the tax man is fair he will propogate a massive underground economy.

    After all, who is responsible for our pickle if not the central bankers?

    https://gnseconomics.com/en_US/2019/01/11/the-scenarios-of-the-collapse/

    • This will create a substantial black market, incriminating many unfairly.

      Not just “will create” but, intentionally creates a new criminal class out of previously law-abiding citizens. Come to think of it, what a splendid pretense for sundry unnamed government agencies to fleece property owners confiscate material wealth from those who have worked hardest to gain most of it. This cannibalism-by-proxy devours your life’s work, saving your physical body for last-phase involuntary organ donation.

      Just as with the late Soviet Union, Nanny States, Centrally Planned Economies, Deep States, and Big Government all glory in their onionskin layers of Byzantine legal intricacies. They engender enough superfluous litigation to make Jarndyce and Jarndyce look like settling a parking ticket.

      So many laws have been put in place—please see American tax code for reference—that, just like in the USSR: It’s not a matter of guilt or innocence, it’s merely whether or not they’ve gotten around to arresting you yet. Soon, anyone not kowtowing to The Narrative™ will, in 20:20 hindsight, find themselves making a mantra of Solzhenitsyn’s lament.*

      Unlike just a bare few decades ago, today, someone’s guilt is more or less a forgone conclusion. The progressive Left’s fervent PoMo oath to uphold the sanctity of human liberty ended up being just another taillight guarantee.**

      Freedom peeled out of their potholed gravel car park years ago and any eye witnesses to that event are being silenced—if not by sheer mortality—through various combinations of intimidation, murder, extortion, duress, coercion, graft, and hostage-taking, or all of them together.

      * “And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?… The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If…if…We didn’t love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation…. We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.

      — Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn

      ** Not to be confused with it’s Dixie kissing cousin, the Tennessee Guarantee™. To wit:

      • You buy something at our store.

      • We let you drive all the way home and find out it doesn’t work.

      • You get to come all the way back and call us a sonovabitch.

      • We get to tell you to take your business elsewhere and never come back again.

      • Two points, Creating a new group of criminals is what the governments wants, this way they have something to pressure the new criminals with if the governments decides they know something they want to know.

        2) The quote from Solzhenitsyn shows why the authoritarian governments disarm the people, armed people think for themselves and have the means to resist when they are oppressed. Disarmed people are slaves waiting for the chains to be slapped on.

    • Article Excerpt:

      I have mentioned the very visible decline of the US and its associated Empire in many of my articles already, so I won’t repeat it here other than to say that the “ability to exert influence and impose its will” is probably the best criteria to measure the magnitude of the fall of the US since Trump came to power (the process was already started by Dubya and Obama, but it sure accelerated with The Donald). But I do want to use a metaphor to revisit the concept of catastrophe. – UNZ

      It accelerated with The Donald?

      “The Path to Armageddon with Jeff Nyquist and Benjamin Baruch (must see video in the description)”
      Remnant Call Radio – Published on November 15, 2018

  5. Socialism is expensive.

    When hasn’t it been? A rhetorical question I’m sure, but maybe not-so-much-so for those who were trapped in Warsaw and Kiev or perished in The Great Leap Forward.

    Time has stilled the voices of nearly all who survived these calculated atrocities. Still, nothing changes how multitudes of lives were needlessly cut short by Socialism’s perpetually hissing scythe.

    Right now, Caracans think it’s just another leaky gas main they’re hearing. Soon enough, that hissing sound will get even louder as Venezuelans begin to sell their bodies. Not for money, but for food—something that a wheelbarrow of paper currency cannot buy. Too soon, their bodies will become food, just as in every aforementioned Socialist paradise.

    Like with a ruptured gas line, even the smallest spark could ignite a firestorm. A conflagration devouring every child not already cast into the furnace. Immolating every lamb not yet incinerated on the altar of utopianism.

    Whetted by innocent cries cast up to the starless night, in deepest darkness, Death’s blade gleams brightest.

    • Soon enough, that hissing sound will get even louder as Venezuelans begin to sell their bodies. Not for money, but for food—something that a wheelbarrow of paper currency cannot buy.

      This is already happening, the people living near the borders are already crossing over and sell their bodies for food for themselves and their families. I haven’t heard of cannibalism but I am sure that is coming.

  6. “LIVE: Yellow vests call for unauthorised protest in Bourges (MUTED)”
    Ruptly – January 12, 2019 – Started streaming 35 minutes ago

    The Yellow Vest movement has called for a protest in Bourges on Saturday, January 12, as part of ‘Act IX’ marking the ninth week in a row since the first protests began.

    According to the prefecture of Cher, no request was made for the protest, and authorities have decided to ban any gathering in the city center. More than 13,000 people were interested in attending the event on social media.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrmNUHKAxUU

    “LIVE: IX Yellow vest protest against Macron’s policies ‘Paris is ours’”
    Ruptly – January 12, 2019 – Started streaming 22 minutes ago

    Yellow Vest protesters are demonstrating for the ninth week in a row in Paris on Saturday, January 12.

    Last Saturday, around 50,000 protesters demonstrated on the streets of various French cities. In Paris, French government spokesperson Benjamin Griveaux was evacuated from his offices as protesters seized an abandoned forklift and rammed it into the building’s front entrance. In other demonstrations, protests were met with tear gas as rioters burned cars and set barricades on fire.

    The French government has now suspended prices hikes, risen wages for low-income earners and cut taxes for pensioners, but protests continue nevertheless.

  7. “My name is Norma Tyson Padgett Upshaw and I’m the victim of that night.

    And I’ll tell you now that it’s on my mind, it’s been on my mind for about 70 years.

    I was 17-years-old and this never left my mind…

    I’ll tell you this: If you had a gun held to your head and told that you if you screamed and didn’t do what they said that they’d blow your brains out, so what would you do?

    And if you had a daughter and a mother and a wife and a sister or a niece, would you give ’em pardon? No, I don’t think you would. I really don’t.

    And every time it comes up, I just quiver on the inside. And I have lived it for 60 years.

    When my boys was little, I kept my mouth shut ’cause…I was afraid something would happen to ’em. They might find out where they were and kill ’em or do somethin’ to ’em. Now my grandkids is up, and they go to school, and I worry about them. And my great-grandkids are coming up.

    Y’all just don’t know what kind of horror I’ve been through for all these many years.

    (Her voice trembles.)

    I never told my kids…they knew it but they never did know what kind of horror I’ve been through. And I love each and every one of them.

    And I don’t want them pardoned, no, I do not. And you wouldn’t either.

    I know she (Beverly Robinson, Samuel Shepherd’s cousin) called me a liar.

    But I’m not no liar.

    If I had to go to court today I could tell you the same story that I told then and I could [take] you on the route. Some of the places is not there no more but I could [take] you and I could show you and I walked all night long.

    I don’t know how many miles it was but I walked all night. And I knew I was closer to another town. But they went that way and I’d seen headlights and I’d run to the woods. I don’t know how long I stayed in there. I didn’t have no watch. I didn’t have nothing.

    And right now, my nerves is so bad and I’m quiverin’ on the inside and I can’t help it.

    I’m beggin’ y’all not to give them pardon because they done it.

    Your minds might be made up. I don’t know.

    If you do [pardon them], y’all going to be just like them…

    And that’s all I got to say, ’cause I know I’m telling the truth.

    I went to court twice.…

    I can tell you right now — not the exact words — but could tell you today almost quote to what I said then. And if any of you got any questions, ask me, I’ll answer them the best I know how.”

    Like I say…if something happens to any of my kids I hope it ponders y’all’s mind [because] I begged you not to do it and it’s liable to.

    Like I said, if there’s any question ya’ll want to ask me, I’ll try to answer it if I can.”
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6583585/Florida-Governor-Ron-DeSantis-posthumously-pardons-four-black-men-1949-rape-case.html#comments

    The voice of a woman.

    Now, I hold that for strangers who are proven to have raped, the jury should have the range, of life imprisonment to death, to decide. The savage to be isolated or be put down for the safety of their future victims. This is their duty to deliberate, whilest this woman had to live with the horror all her life. Some women become so disturbed they forever hold themselves as worthless or invent a new superiority in her sexuality. Submisive or dominant revolving around her hatred of men, becoming a Feminist.

    So rape in America then, is no less a crime than rape is today. The victim may frame it within a Politically Correct Narrative that it was her privilege at fault, or Sharia Law states she provoked it by revealing her hair, so that their rapist walks free, but the scars are the same. Religious, Political or Sub-Dom, controlled into lower-status by dhimmi, cuck or anal males who can then, and only then, get a rise.

    Putting it simply, k-selection animals never appreciate these r-selection animals. Ks can only be changed by submission, conversion or elimination. Islam, Communism or by flooding the country with low-cognitive capacity r-selectors, so they are then mimicked by the Useful Idiots disconnected from souls by their State-run Education System.

    In this criminal case, the victim was told to shut up and her rape-record rewritten. Herstory.

    Sexuality is not a badge of identity for k-selectors. To be a k-selected means the father is present; r means it is not. The fetus is a child or it is not. Survival by selecting only the r-genes for future-breeds of proletariat that have nothing in common with the ancestors of their host nations.

    Communism pays for this Socialist pig-trough. Free condoms, free abortions and free nurseries, no responsibility, promoting r-genes and the political murder, imprisonment and atrophy of k-genes. Tommy Robinsons fighting for their families will cease. Betas will be shared out amongst the females.

    “A study made by the U.S. Department of Justice of prison releases in 1992, involving about 80 percent of the prison population, found that the average sentence for convicted rapists was 9.8 years, while the actual time served was 5.4 years.” – wiki

    The Woman and the Liberal Republican.

    K and r.

    Agents from China and Russia, await their funding of America’s descent.

    • “In unstable or unpredictable environments, r-selection predominates due to the ability to reproduce quickly. ”

      “Organisms whose life history is subject to r-selection are often referred to as r-strategists or r-selected”
      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/R/K_selection_theory

      With this built-in genetically it is a force to manipulate and control.

      Those who cannot be made into beasts of burden are deposed and disposed.

      • With this built-in genetically it is a force to manipulate and control.

        And people wonder why I squawk about interventional editing of human genes. Go figure…

        PC, your r/K speculation certainly lends credence to the old Cassandra-like complaints about people, “breeding like rabbits…” [insert curmudgeonly grumbling >here<]

        Far worse, the many politicians who treat "1984" like an owner's manual are also just tickety-boo with inner cities becoming the equivalent of human puppy mills. Mining that same vein of surplus human capital, Stalin was known to have quipped:

        "Quantity has a quality all its own.

        The entire Communist theory of humans-as-interchangeable-parts is automatically biased towards r-type reproduction. Western Leftists have spent many decades implementing this biological-level Social Policy via ghettoized Mendicant Voter Plantations, commonly known as “housing projects” or, more recently, banlieues.

        As hoary urban fermentation vats of ignorance, illegitimacy, and criminality—human warehouses like Sunnydale, Cabrini-Green, Bed-Stuy, and Pruitt-Igoe incubated colony after septic metropolitan colony of multigenerational poverty in the form of congenitally programmed Democrat voters. The Left’s longstanding soft racism of lowered expectations never seems to cross anybody’s mind.

        Each and every one of these welfare dependents will vote Democrat until hell freezes over. All of them secure in the knowledge that free ice skates will be handed out as they head towards the balloting station.

        • This r-reproductive-strategy, of dhimmis and betas, who will evolve eyes on the sides of their heads to elude the cameras in the streets, to sneak a bit of sex behind each other and dart furtively away.

          The r-person, this revert; as opposed to the k-person, this kufar who sees from the inside.

        • For the American Nation they oncevwere: once were rape was vile.

          For Liberals, if they survive, it is like Homosexuals receiving AIDS, or four muslims not telling on each other: rape is a rite of passage, and the more ethnically diverse the better.

  8. “Democrat Rashida Tlaib Recites ‘Muslim Victory Call – War Cry of Allah’ in Radical Speech at CAIR Reception (VIDEO)” by Cristina Laila – January 11, 2019
    https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/01/democrat-rashida-tlaib-recites-muslim-victory-call-war-cry-of-allah-in-radical-speech-at-cair-reception-video/

    “Full Video: CAIR Congressional Reception with Reps. Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar and André Carson” CAIRtv – Published on January 11, 2019

  9. When Chinese hackers declared war on the rest of us
    Many thought the internet would bring democracy to China. Instead it empowered rampant government oppression, and now the censors are turning their attention to the rest of the world.

    by James Griffiths January

    ate one Wednesday in March 2015, an alarm sounded in the offices of GitHub, a San Francisco–based software firm. The company’s offices exemplified the kind of Scandinavia-meets-soullessness style that has spread out from Silicon Valley to take over modern workplaces: exposed wood, open spaces, and lots of natural light. Most employees were preparing to leave, if they hadn’t already. Outside, the sun had started to set and it was balmy and clear.

    Alarms weren’t uncommon at GitHub. The company claims to maintain the largest repository of computer code in the world. It had some 14 million users at the time, and prides itself on maintaining its service and staying online. GitHub’s core product is a set of editing tools that allow large numbers of programmers to collaborate on software and keep track of changes as bugs are fixed. In October 2018, Microsoft would buy it for $7.5 billion.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/s/612638/when-chinese-hackers-declared-war-on-the-rest-of-us/

  10. Race row in South Africa as health officials advertise for 100 new doctors – but white people are told not to apply

    A race row has broken out in South Africa after health officials advertised for 100 new doctors, but did not allow white medics to apply for specialist roles.

    The health department in the KwaZulu-Natal province expanded its registrar programme for 2019 from 314 to 414, but aimed to fill the new posts with only black candidates.

    Health bosses said the move was implemented to redress the country’s historical racial imbalance of Apartheid that saw most high-ranking positions filed by white doctors.

    Campaigners and human rights activists have branded the recruitment policy ‘discriminatory, unconstitutional and racist’.

    Leaked documents show the department wanted to train a total of 366 black doctors and had already recruited 32 Indian, 12 white and four mixed race registrars, but need a further 100 black medics to meet employment equity targets.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6581753/Race-row-South-Africa-health-officials-advertise-100-new-doctors-not-white-medics.html

  11. Long Island teen stabbed by 3 of Nancy Pelosi’s ‘patriotic young undocumented immigrants’
    By Howard Portnoy January 12, 2019

    Back in November, shortly after the Democrats had gained control of the House in the midterms, Nancy Pelosi and fellow Democratic representative John Sarbanes published an op-ed in the Washington Post promising:

    We will confront discrimination with the Equality Act, pass the Dream Act to protect the patriotic young undocumented immigrants who came here as children, and take the first step toward comprehensive immigration reform. [Emphasis added]

    Since the new Congress opened for business on Jan. 3, however, the Democrats have been like kids in a poisonous candy store, gobbling down one toxic treat after another in a quest to seek vengeance on Donald Trump. Several have reintroduced articles of impeachment, while another has proposed replacing the Anti-Terrorism Subcommittee with a Trump-Investigating Subcommittee.

    While Pelosi et al. have lost sight of their pledge to protect “patriotic young undocumented immigrants who came here as children,” said children have been busy. Three of them, all members of MS-13 who entered the country illegally as unaccompanied minors, attacked and stabbed a student who attended the same high school in broad daylight.

    https://libertyunyielding.com/2019/01/12/long-island-teen-stabbed-by-3-of-nancy-pelosis-patriots/

    Richard: Senator Graham was right when he said that all the Dems are interested in is power, power to push around other people. They don’t care about the lives or health of the people and the don’t care about the US except as a path to domination of other people.

  12. Turkey Gathers Military Vehicles Near Syrian Border – Reports (sputniknews, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201901121071422950-turkey-syrian-border/

    “Turkey continues to concentrate military vehicles near the Syrian border, Anadolu news agency reported on Saturday.

    According to the Anadolu news agency, a new group of armored vehicles and other military vehicles have arrived in the province of Hatay bordering Syria.

    On Friday, Turkish Defence Minister Hulusi Akar reiterated that the country was preparing for this military operation, claiming that it would be launched “at the right time.”…”

  13. US Navy Sends Warship Toward Syria Amid Expected US Withdrawal – Reports (sputniknews, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201901121071421898-us-syria-withdrawal-warship-deployment/

    “Earlier, a US official indicated that the country had begun pulling military hardware out of Syria, but that troops were not being withdrawn “at this stage”.

    The US has sent the USS Kearsarge, an amphibious assault ship currently deployed in the Mediterranean, toward Syria, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed defence officials.

    The massive, Wasp-class vessel, capable of carrying over 1,800 troops and/or dozens of armoured vehicles in its 13,600 square-foot well deck, was sent toward Syria along with other US Navy vessels to support the expected withdrawal, according to the newspaper.

    The naval group will be complemented by hundreds of US Marines, along with armed helicopters, to protect troops while they leave the country, according to the WSJ’s sources.

    “Nothing has changed. We don’t take orders from Bolton,” one of the officials said, in apparent reference to earlier reports that Trump’s National Security Adviser John Bolton has been discussing possible plans to keep a presence in Syria ‘to counter Iran’ in spite of the president’s orders.

    Earlier, a US official speaking to the news agency AFP said that the Pentagon had begun withdrawing ‘non-essential equipment’ from the war-torn country, but that military personnel remain deployed…”

  14. Germany: Juncker awarded Freedom Press Award

    President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker was awarded Freedom Press Award by Weimer Media Group in Tegernsee on Friday.

    Speaking at the Ludwig Erhard Summit, Juncker said “without media freedom, without press freedom, there will be no democracy. They belong together.”

    The 64-year-old EU President has maintained the unity of Europe in the spirit of solidarity and humanism in times of rising populism, refugee crisis and Brexit, according to the jury.

    • Germany: Juncker awarded Freedom Press Award

      Which category of activity should this article be filed under?

      Back Patting or Circle Jerking? (There is a difference!)

  15. Flüchtlinge aus Stuttgart werden Lokführer

    Das steckt hinter dem Modellprojekt

    Die Schienenverkehrsunternehmen suchen händeringend nach Personal. Nun startet Verkehrsminister Winfried Hermann ein ungewöhnliches Modellprojekt – wir verraten die Details.

    Stuttgart – In einem Modellprojekt, in dem Flüchtlinge innerhalb von 15 Monaten zu Lokführern ausgebildet werden, will Landesverkehrsminister Winfried Hermann zwei Fliegen mit einer Klappe schlagen. Zum einen soll der Personalengpass bei den Schienenverkehrsunternehmen bekämpft werden, der immer öfter zu Zugausfällen führt. Und – andererseits – „tun wir etwas Gutes für die Menschen und die Gesellschaft, indem wir helfen, Flüchtlinge zu integrieren“, so der Grünen-Politiker. Dies entspreche auch dem Koalitionsvertrag seiner Partei mit der CDU.

    Die Ausgangslage
    Die Personalgewinnung gilt als eine der größten Herausforderungen im ÖPNV – bei Bus- und bei Schienenverkehrsunternehmen. Dabei spielen die im Vergleich zur Industrie oft geringere Entlohnung und die Arbeitszeiten ein Rolle, aber auch der Umstand, dass in der Region quasi Vollbeschäftigung herrscht.

    Schon die Bahn-Tochter DB Regio tut sich schwer, genügend Lokführer bereitzustellen. In den vergangenen Monaten fielen daher immer wieder Regionalzüge aus. Wegen vieler Krankmeldungen beim fahrenden Personal stellte die S-Bahn Stuttgart Anfang Oktober an einigen Tagen zwei Nebenbahnen ein. „Wir als Ministerium sind zwar nicht zuständig für Personalfragen“, sagt Hermann, „aber wir handeln aus Verantwortung für einen funktionierenden Nahverkehr.“

    Die Stuttgarter Besonderheit
    Der Vorstoß des Landes ist auch dem Umstand geschuldet, dass Mitte 2019 ein gewaltiger Umbruch im Regionalzugverkehr bevorsteht. Neue Anbieter übernehmen die bisher von der DB Regio im Auftrag des Landes gefahrenen Linien von und nach Stuttgart. Das Tochterunternehmen der niederländischen Abellio-Gruppe wird für den Verkehr von und nach Pforzheim, Heilbronn und Tübingen zuständig, der Ableger der britischen Go-Ahead-Gruppe fährt die Züge von und nach Crailsheim, Ulm, Aalen, Karlsruhe und Würzburg. Zwar beteuern die Unternehmen, dass sie genügend Lokführer haben, doch die Personalgewinnung gilt als schwierig.

    Das Modell
    Gemeinsam mit der Arbeitsagentur, großen Schienenverkehrsunternehmen im Land, den Gewerkschaften und mit anderen Ministerien abgestimmt startet Minister Hermann nun ein Projekt. Dabei sollen anerkannte Asylbewerber und Flüchtlinge mit einem geklärten Aufenthaltsstatus in den Betrieben zu Lokführern ausgebildet werden. Dazu werden sie von den Unternehmen als Helfer für ein Bruttogehalt von etwa 2100 Euro an- und für die Ausbildung freigestellt.

    Die Arbeitsagentur übernimmt den Teil, der über der normalen Ausbildungsvergütung des Verkehrsunternehmens von rund 700 Euro liegt, und finanziert die Weiterbildungskosten. Das Bundesamt für Migration kommt für die allgemeine Sprachförderung auf, der spezielle „Eisenbahnsprech“ muss in den Unternehmen vermittelt werden. Das Land koordiniert das Projekt und finanziert neun Coaches, die die Lokführer in spe in allen Fragen unterstützen.

    Geplant sind zunächst drei Gruppen mit je 15 Aspiranten: in Stuttgart, Mannheim/Karlsruhe und in Hechingen/Zollernalb. Beteiligt an dem Projekt sind die DB Regio, Abellio, Go Ahead, die landeseigene SWEG, die Albtalverkehrsgesellschaft der Stadt Karlsruhe, die in Konstanz ansässige Tochter der Schweizerischen Bundesbahnen, die Trandev, deren Tochter WEG die Täles-, Strohgäu-, Schönbuch- und Wieslauftalbahn betreibt. Hinzu kommen die Personaldienstleister MEV und Netinera.

    Die Expertenmeinung
    „Das ist ein rundes Paket“, sagt Christian Rauch, der Chef der Regionaldirektion Baden-Württemberg der Agentur für Arbeit. Er sieht vor allem zwei Vorteile: Die Flüchtlinge bekämen sofort ein Gehalt und würden qualifiziert; und durch die Coaches steige die Erfolgswahrscheinlichkeit.

    Bei der „normalen“ Zusatzausbildung zu Lokführern, beispielsweise von Arbeitslosen, sprängen viele Bewerber wieder ab, zudem „haben wir dieses Potenzial weitgehend ausgeschöpft“, sagt der Experte. Dagegen gebe es rund 44 000 Arbeit suchende Flüchtlinge im Land. Sollte das Projekt zur Qualifizierung von Flüchtlingen zu Lokführern erfolgreich sein, will es Rauch auch auf andere Branchen ausweiten.

    https://www.stuttgarter-zeitung.de/inhalt.personalengpass-in-der-region-stuttgart-15-fluechtlinge-sollen-in-stuttgart-lokfuehrer-werden.5968c909-2730-49aa-a7d1-a76f20e56ce3.html

  16. Police are armed with metal detectors in latest bid to crackdown on knife epidemic sweeping streets of Britain (dailymail, jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6584217/Police-armed-metal-detectors-latest-bid-crackdown-knife-crime.html

    “Police will arm themselves with metal detectors in a bid to tackle a sharp rise in knife crime in the West Midlands.

    It’s the first time officers have been issued with ‘wands’ as part of plans to use stop and search powers to take deadly weapons off the street.

    West Midlands Police will be handed eighty knife wands following a recent Home Office report that showed the region has the highest level of knife crime outside London.

    And half of all response cars will also carry the devices to make it more difficult for criminals to conceal weapons….”

  17. Violent crime on rail network up 75 per cent as train operators urged to act against ticketless travellers (telegraph, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/01/12/violent-crime-rail-network-75-per-cent-train-operators-urged/

    “Violent crime on the rail network has soared by 75 per cent over the past five years with experts claiming a lack of ticket barriers at stations is helping to fuel lawlessness on trains.

    Last year there were more than 10,000 assaults reported to British Transport Police (BTP), one for every mile of railway across the UK.

    Serious assaults, in which victims were injured, have increased by almost 30 per cent since 2012-13, peaking at 2,400 last year.

    But assaults without injury – which include incidents such as pushing, grabbing and even spitting – have rocketed by a staggering 95 per cent over the same period, with more than 6,700 offences reported over the previous 12 months…”

  18. Priest: Blame ‘White Tribe’ For Anti-Mass Migration Attitudes (breitbart, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/01/12/priest-blame-white-tribe-for-anti-mass-migration-attitudes/

    “A priest-professor of the Jesuit-run Gregorian University in Rome blasted populism as a “perversion” in a hard-hitting interview published Saturday.

    Father Rocco D’ambrosio, who holds the Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland chair in Catholic Social Teaching at the Gregorian University, said that “populism is an ancient malady” and must be forcefully resisted, in an interview with Claire Giangravè of Crux, an online Catholic news outlet.

    “The populist uses the people, he makes a generic reference to ‘the people’ but in the end wants to bring forward his politics, his vision,” he said.

    Father D’ambrosio spoke this week at a conference at his university titled ‘Power and Populisms’ in opposition to Italy’s populist government and especially interior minister Matteo Salvini, who has made curbing illegal immigration the cornerstone of his mandate.

    Today’s populist leaders, or “new Caesars,” according to D’Ambrosio, “are immature, corrupt, with monolithic institutions at their back and are weary of measures of control.”

    And while populists generally “don’t tolerate genuine and authentic power relations,” he claimed, “they are eager to self-replicate and expand their model in every direction.”

    The priest is especially critical of U.S. Catholics who have embraced political populism and support a conservative agenda…”

  19. Priest: Blame ‘White Tribe’ For Anti-Mass Migration Attitudes (breitbart, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/01/12/priest-blame-white-tribe-for-anti-mass-migration-attitudes/

    “Italian priest Alex Zanotelli has blamed the current popular support for anti-mass migration policies on the “white tribe”, claiming that white people feel “threatened” by mass migration and demographic replacement.

    Father Zanotelli, who has had a long background in social activism, blamed “whites” from European countries, including Italy, rejecting the migrant transport vessels Sea Eye and Sea Watch from docking in their ports earlier this month, Il Giornale reports.

    “It’s absurd, we talk about closed ports but there is not even a ministerial decree, nothing written, it’s all tweeted,” he complained, added: “It’s a problem with the white tribe, which feels threatened everywhere. For 500 years the white tribe conquered the world: we gave birth to slavery, to colonialism.”

    “Now we begin to perceive that we are a minority, these peoples are advancing and we find them even at home. It is valid for Australia, for the United States, for Europe, Canada. How generous we were with the Africans when they were at home!” he said.

    Father Zanotelli also went on to allege a “new racism”, saying: “There is so much wickedness expressed by people like [Matteo] Salvini, [Viktor] Orban, that is scary. The construction of walls, the total rejection of the other, in many respects, is new.”

    Several left-wing mayors have come out against Deputy Prime Minister Salvini’s anti-mass migration policies, with some promising not to enforce the migration and security decree recently passed by the Italian parliament despite a majority of Italians supporting it.

    Zanotelli put his support behind the mayors, saying: “I am among those who believe that civil disobedience needs to be dusted off right now. The mayors are representatives of the state, of civil society, so they must be careful. But the refusal to obey, as a reaction of the community they represent, becomes fundamental at this time.”

    The priest is just the latest member of the clergy to attack Salvini, with Italian priest Enrico d’Ambrosio labelling his supporters “insignificant Christians” and Father Paolo Farinella accusing his supporters of “killing God” last month.”

  20. Poll: Fewer than One in Five Italians Want Ports Reopened to Migrants (breitbart, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/01/12/poll-fewer-than-one-in-five-italians-want-ports-reopened-to-migrants/

    “Fewer than one in five Italians (19 percent) would like the government to reopen the country’s closed ports to migrants, according to a poll released Friday.

    Only 12 percent of those surveyed say that it is the responsibility of individual states in whose territorial waters the migrant ships have arrived to resolve the situation. The survey commissioned by the Italian daily Corriere della Sera revealed that 60 percent said that in these cases it is the responsibility of the European Union (EU), while 13 percent said the duty lies with the NGO vessels that took the migrants aboard in the first place.

    The issue of migration has returned to the political foreground in Italy with the ongoing saga of the two vessels operated by the NGOs Sea Watch and Sea Eye. The story has highlighted tensions in relations with the EU and other international organizations such as the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

    A significant majority of Italians (64 percent) are favourable to the Minister of the Interior Matteo Salvini’s decision to close the country’s ports. Of these, 80 percent want the government to stand by its absolute ban on new migrant landings even in the case of the vessels Sea Watch and Sea Eye, while the other 20 percent think an exception should be made for these 49 migrants.

    The closure of ports is the prevailing option among all social segments regardless of gender, age, educational qualifications, employment status, or religious faith, including Catholics who regularly attend mass, the poll found.

    In its analysis of the survey, Corriere della Sera said Italians continue to fear the uncontrolled mass immigration experienced in recent years and also resent what seemed to many a betrayal by the EU in failing to come to their assistance…”

  21. Syrian army shells areas held by insurgents in northwest (abcnews, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/syrian-army-shells-areas-held-insurgents-northwest-60331731

    “Artillery shelling by government forces pounded parts of the northwestern Idlib province on Saturday, thwarting an infiltration attempt by militants as tension rises in the region following victories by al-Qaida-linked militants against Turkey-backed opposition fighters, Syria’s state news agency reported.

    The violence came as officials in neighboring Turkey said efforts are being exerted to maintain stability in Idlib.

    SANA said the shelling focused on the areas of Zarzour near the border with Turkey and Tamanaa near Maaret al-Numan that was taken this week by al-Qaida-linked militants from Turkey-backed opposition fighters. It reported casualties among the militants…”

  22. Egypt says its security forces killed 6 militants (abcnews, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/egypt-security-forces-killed-militants-60330146

    “Egypt’s interior Ministry says security forces have killed six Islamic militants in a raid on their desert hideout south of the capital Cairo.

    It said the militants killed in the early Saturday raid were hiding in an area between the southern provinces of Sohag and Assiut. The militants were killed in a firefight initiated by the militants, it added.

    Egypt has been battling Islamic militants for years. An all-out military campaign to quash their insurgency in the north of the Sinai Peninsula began nearly a year ago with the government throwing into battle tens of thousands of troops, jet-fighters, tanks and helicopter gunships.

    The campaign brought to a halt high-profile attacks blamed on the militants, like one last year in which they killed more than 300 worshippers in a Sinai mosque.”

  23. 10-Year-Old Boy ‘Drag Kid’ Photographed With Naked Adult Drag Queen

    On Monday, 10-year-old Canadian boy Nemis Quinn Mélançon-Golden was featured in a troubling Huck Magazine piece highlighting the life of a so-called “child drag queen.”

    Young Nemis, whose drag name is “Queen Lactacia,” was shot by photographer Jonathan Frederick Turton for the spread. In one of the shots that did not make the magazine, Nemis, in full drag makeup and a black dress, is posing for a photo with the Season 7 winner of “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” Violet Chachki. In the shocking photo, Violet is wearing nothing but a pair of heels and a small piece of fabric covering his genitals, as seen in the screenshot below:

    https://www.dailywire.com/news/42081/10-year-old-boy-dressed-drag-pictured-naked-amanda-prestigiacomo?utm_source=cnemail&utm_medium=email&utm_content=011219-news&utm_campaign=position1

  24. Another Honduran Migrant Caravan Has Formed, Headed Straight to U.S.

    Here we go again…

    So, it would appear that once a month now America will be dealing with a “migrant caravan” situation.

    Why?

    Could it be because there’s unrest at the border and people know that if they get into the country now there’s a good chance they’ll be able to stay?

    https://flagandcross.com/breaking-another-honduran-migrant-caravan-has-formed-headed-straight-to-u-s/

    • Another Caravan Forming in Honduras – Headed Northbound to US ‘Next Week’

      Another Caravan Forming in Honduras – Headed Northbound to US ‘Next Week’
      Cristina Laila by Cristina Laila January 11, 2019 288 Comments

      619Share 201Tweet Email

      Another caravan is forming in Honduras and is planning to head northbound to the United States next week.

      The Mexican government is reportedly preparing for the caravan’s arrival, according to the Washington Post.

      “We have information that a new caravan is forming to enter our country in mid-January,” said Olga Sánchez Cordero, the interior minister. “We are already taking the necessary steps to ensure the caravan enters in a safe and orderly way.”

      “With this caravan, the goal is to give them a chance to work and have a better life, be it in Mexico or the United States,” added a taxi driver in the Honduran capital.

      https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/01/another-caravan-forming-in-honduras-headed-northbound-to-us-next-week/?omhide=true

  25. Armed Good Guys: Targeted by Juggers

    January 5, 2019 by David Dolbee 6 Comments

    News stories of civilian self-defense seldom receive adequate media coverage. After all, armed good guys stopping violent felons does not make headlines like the lives of innocents being taken. Bias and agendas play their part, but the media does not cover an event that did not happen, such as a case where a good guy stopped a violent event before it resulted in the loss of innocent life. However, these are exactly the type of stories we need to highlight to educate non gun owners before they head to the voting booth.

    https://blog.k-var.com/self-defense/armed-good-guys-3/

  26. euronews – Saudi refugee welcomed to Canada by its foreign minister

    Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun, who flew into Toronto from Thailand, said she had feared for her life after fleeing from her family.

    • CBC – Saudi teen on the run from her family lands in Toronto

      ( 9 min )

      Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun, the Saudi teen who was granted asylum in Canada after fleeing an arranged marriage and what she says was an abusive family, has arrived in Toronto.

      • I’m truly delighted she made it. This is one hell of a brave girl.
        Let’s hope they don’t try to kill her here, in Canada.
        I’m waiting for Asia Bibi’s escape from the savages in her homeland.

    • DAILY MAIL – Safe at last: Smiling Saudi girl, 18, arrives in Toronto after Canada offered her asylum when she fled her family and locked herself in a Bangkok hotel room after they threatened to kill her for rejecting Islam

      Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun, 18, fled her family fearing they would kill her
      She was greeted at Toronto’s Pearson airport after flying in from Seoul today
      Ms al-Qunun was greeted with flowers by Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland
      She smiled and waved as she walked into the airport with a ‘CANADA’ hoodie on

      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6584661/Saudi-teenage-girl-18-touches-Toronto-wearing-CANADA-hoodie-fleeing-family.html

    • CBC – Are there political risks for Canada in granting Saudi teen asylum?

      Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister met Saudi teen Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun with open arms in Toronto on Saturday.

      Some are questioning the political motives behind the government’s decision to grant her asylum.

  27. ‘Is it a crime to pray for Palestinians?’: Imam filmed calling on Allah to ‘burn Zionists’

    The president of the League of Imams in Belgium has found himself in hot water – after a video emerged of him, calling on Allah to “burn the Zionists.”

  28. ‘Terrorist’ attack in Gasseliki in northern Burkina Faso kills 12 (thedefensepost, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://thedefensepost.com/2019/01/12/burkina-faso-12-dead-terrorist-attack-gasseliki-soum/

    “Twelve people were killed and two injured in a terrorist attack in Gasseliki in northern Burkina Faso, the security ministry said on Friday.

    “Around 30 armed individuals perpetrated a terrorist attack in the village of Gasseliki,” around 30 km (19 miles) south of Arbinda, in Soum province in the northern Sahel Region on Thursday, January 10, the ministry said in a Facebook post.

    The attack, carried out in the middle of the day, “left twelve dead and two wounded,” the ministry said.

    Six shops and a granary were set on fire, and five motorcycles and “several oxen” were seized by the assailants who “quickly melted into the wild,” it added.

    Also on Friday, Burkina Faso’s parliament approved a six-month state of emergency in several provinces impacted by militant Islamist violence, Reuters reported…”

  29. Leader Urges Iranian Students’ Efforts to Eliminate Any Reliance on Aliens (tasnimnews, jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2019/01/12/1921067/leader-urges-iranian-students-efforts-to-eliminate-any-reliance-on-aliens

    “TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei called on Iranian students to make efforts to boost the country’s self-sufficiency in various areas and eliminate any reliance on “aliens”.

    “We all know that you are among the best (sources of) hope for the future of the country,” Ayatollah Khamenei said in a message to the 53rd annual meeting of the Union of Islamic Students Associations in Europe, which opened in Germany’s Hamburg on Saturday.

    “What everyone should know is that, with the blessing of God, a large number of yesterday’s students are now involved in great works in the country….,” the message read.

    “Our students today, anywhere in the world, will have the opportunity to join these faithful and devoted groups and fully eliminate the country’s need for (help from) aliens,” the Leader added.

    In relevant remarks in October, Ayatollah Khamenei called on Iranian elites to push for the country’s scientific progress, saying advancements in science will help the Islamic Republic counter hostile threats.

    In an address to a gathering of young Iranian elites and scientific talents in Tehran on October 17, Ayatollah Khamenei highlighted the need for scientific progress in the country, saying employment of the potential of elites will boost the country’s power and minimize its vulnerabilities.

    “If we make scientific progress, the threats from our civilizational, political, and economic enemies will not be permanent and will diminish,” the Leader added.

    Hailing Iran’s 2-percent share in the global scientific production, Ayatollah Khamenei said Iranian universities have greatly contributed to the country’s advances in aerospace, biological sciences, dam construction, nuclear industry, stem cell research, biotechnology, and recombinant drugs.”

  30. Finland Court Sentences Iraqi Ex-soldier for War Crimes (aawsat, Jan 12, 2018)
    https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/1542996/finland-court-sentences-iraqi-ex-soldier-war-crimes

    “A Helsinki court has sentenced a former Iraqi soldier for war crimes after he was filmed cutting off the head of a dead ISIS militant.

    Ahmed Jabbar Hasan, 41, a corporal in the Iraqi army between 2003 and 2015, was handed an 18-month suspended sentence for desecrating and violating the dignity of a dead body, which constitute war crimes under international law.

    During an operation against ISIS near the town of Karma in March 2015, Hasan was filmed decapitating the body of a militant and then brandishing the man’s head.

    The video was uploaded to Hasan’s Facebook page, along with a second clip of him posing in front of burning bodies.

    Hasan admitted to the acts but denied they constituted a war crime, Agence France Presse reported.

    The court did not release details of when, or for what reason, Hasan came from Iraq to Finland.

    The Helsinki District Court quoted Hasan as saying that the ISIS militant “had been a terrorist and was himself accused of far more serious crimes” and that he, on the other hand, “had not caused anyone suffering, pain or injury.”

    Hasan carried out his actions knowing that four of his close army colleagues had been captured and executed by ISIS, court documents said.

    In 2016 two Iraqi migrants to Finland also received suspended sentences after they were pictured on social media cutting off the heads of dead fighters.”

  31. Our duty is get rid of evil people: Asheikh (saudigazette, Jan 12, 2019)
    http://saudigazette.com.sa/article/553698/SAUDI-ARABIA/Our-duty-is-get-rid-of-evil-people-Asheikh

    “The Minister of Islamic Affairs Dr. Abdullateef Al Asheikh warned against the Arab Spring revolutions, describing them as “poisonous and destructive” for Muslims and Arab, due to the destruction of countries, peoples and properties.

    Speaking at the final gathering for Cooperative Offices’ religious callers on Friday here, Al Asheikh stressed that giving a free reign to those who cause sedition and evil and toy with peoples’ emotions leads to displacement, killings and destruction of nations.

    The minister emphasized the necessity for unity and cohesion, “until we are able to rid the country of the evil people, those believing in heresies and falsehoods and Muslim Brothers and Kharijites (Khawarij or renegades) and those following their footsteps.”

    He also said: “All these are caused by people who propagate sedition and politicize religion for worldly gains and attempting to grab power.”

    “The Kingdom is facing an unjust attack by the enemies of Islam. What has increased the agony, harm, sorrow and regret is that there are Muslims who are spreading sedition, creating discord and inciting people against their rulers and leaders,” Al Asheikh added.

    He called on the ministry’s personnel to seek perfection in their work and call people to Islam away from any deviant thought or extremism.

    Al Asheikh demanded renouncing deviant thought, bad trends and abominable partisanship.”

  32. Saudi man is accused of sexual assault in Canada, but his location remains mystery (mee, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/saudi-man-accused-sexual-assault-canada-his-location-remains-mystery-1580750889

    “Mohammed Zuraibi Alzoabi, 28, a Saudi citizen who studied at a university in Nova Scotia, Canada, and faces multiple criminal charges failed to show for a court date and authorities don’t know where he is, according to the local Chronicle Herald newspaper.

    Alzoabi was to face charges of sexual assault, assault, forcible confinement, uttering threats, criminal harassment, dangerous driving and assault with a weapon (a vehicle) in separate trials related to two incidents that occurred in Sydney between 2016 and 2017.

    His $37,500 bail, posted in cash, which was forfeited at a hearing on Monday was provided by the Saudi embassy, and Canada’s Cape Breton police confirmed to the Chronicle Herald on that they have the passport he was forced to turn over.

    “It should be impossible (for him to leave the country or enter another without a passport) unless Saudi Arabia furnished him with a Saudi travel document,” Halifax-based immigration attorney Lee Cohen told the newspaper. “They have done this before.”

    This comes at a time when Saudi Arabia is already under international pressure over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by a team of Saudi agents, amid its unpopular war in Yemen and as teenage asylum-seeker Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun was granted asylum in Canada after fleeing Saudi Arabia last week, saying she feared her family would kill her.

    The Saudi Arabian Embassy did not respond to a Chronicle Herald request for comment on Alzoabi.

    And Alzoabi refuses to say where he is. “Probably not,” he told the Chronicle Herald when asked via a Facetime call whether he was in Canada. “… I can’t tell you that.”

    Alzoabi said he won’t come back to Cape Breton, an island of about 132,000 population off the east coast of Nova Scotia, to face the charges because he thinks they are “unfair.”

    The Chronicle Herald said it could not publish details about the actual incidents, as the charges are still technically headed for trial…”

  33. ‘Terrible and unbelievable’: Exiled Saudi journalist laments kingdom’s abuses (mee, Jan 12, 2019)
    https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/terrible-and-unbelievable-exiled-saudi-journalist-laments-kingdoms-abuses-2082374477

    “For a moment, late last year, it appeared as if Saudi Arabia might be on the verge of a sea change.

    Jamal Khashoggi’s murder had drawn the world’s attention to the human rights abuses and crackdown on dissent in the kingdom, with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s international stock plummeting as a result.

    Yet today those same people responsible for Khashoggi’s assassination are still wielding power, according to another outspoken Saudi commentator, Reem Sulaiman.

    Sulaiman, like her slain compatriot before her, has been forced into exile after her words caught the eye of top royal aide Saud al-Qahtani.

    A close confidant of the crown prince, Qahtani has been implicated in Khashoggi’s murder by the Saudi prosecutor. He has been sanctioned by several Saudi allies, including the United States.

    Speaking exclusively to Middle East Eye from the Netherlands, where she is seeking asylum, Sulaiman says Qahtani’s influence is undiminished, however.

    “The main initiator of the wave of abuses exercised against activists and opponents inside the kingdom is still in power,” Sulaiman tells MEE.

    “I am referring to Saud al-Qahtani, the former adviser to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, because he controls Twitter and is responsible for directing editors all over the country.”

    Qahtani, who with Mohammed bin Salman’s blessing waged an information war against any Saudi voice that diverged from the royal court’s preferred line, has vanished from the public eye since the Khashoggi scandal broke in October.

    Unlike women’s rights activists and other Saudis whose views have been deemed dangerous by Riyadh’s rulers, however, Qahtani apparently walks free.

    According to the Washington Post, the crown prince regularly seeks advice from him still.

    Life in the Saudi royal court, it appears, is almost unchanged…”