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 must use it while we can.
“We invite individuals from around the world to come together and unite on board our Lady Ships to have an incredible holiday, fueled by the diversity of our Sailors and crew, in addition to the amazing cultures we sail to,” Chris Stubbs, senior director of sailor experience, and the leader of LGBTQ+ advocacy for Virgin Voyages, added in the statement. “VirginVoyages welcomes everyone to come as they are and to be their best selves – with diverse hopes, experiences and backgrounds.”
https://www.travelandleisure.com/trip-ideas/lgbt-travel/richard-branson-worldpride-virgin-voyages-lgbtq-cruise
Bumper ultimate guide:
https://youtu.be/-7scgfx7-A0
Cruising. Coronavirus has no chance.
Watch Syrian Army Repel Militant Attack in Idlib
https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/202002221078376346-watch-syrian-army-repel-militant-attack-in-idlib/
Syrian military reinforcements convoy heads towards Idlib
Syrian army’s convoy was seen heading towards the northwestern city of Idlib. Footage shows vehicles and tanks on the road in Idlib province, where the Syrian army has been fighting against opposition Ankara-backed militant groups and rapidly regaining control of areas.
allahu ackbar!!!
Finland to Accept Up to 175 Migrants From Mediterranean Camps – Interior Ministry (sputniknews, Feb 22, 2020)
https://sputniknews.com/europe/202002221078378977-finland-to-accept-up-to-175-migrants-from-mediterranean-camps—interior-ministry/
“Finland will take in up to 175 vulnerable migrants living in refugee camps in the southern EU frontier states, the Interior Ministry announced in a statement Saturday.
“Up to 175 asylum seekers can be brought in from Greece, Cyprus, Malta and Italy, depending on the seriousness of the humanitarian situation,” the statement read.
Finland will prioritize those eligible for international protection. They are primarily children and families with only one parent, coming from “fragile states,” such as Syria and Afghanistan.
Interior Minister Maria Ohisalo was quoted as saying that Finland, itself a frontier EU member state, needed to participate in finding a lasting solution for the EU refugee situation.
The UN International Migration Organization estimates that 7,168 migrants came ashore in Europe during the first five weeks of 2020, an uptick of 3 percent from the year before. Greece received almost a half of them.”
Jihadists could be released in just DAYS as Lords block Boris’ new terror plans (express, Feb 22, 2020)
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1245818/terror-news-boris-johnson-prison-conservative-party-streatham-knife-attack-met-police
“LORDS could delay the Government’s emergency terror laws next week which may risk dozens of terrorists being freed from prison early.
Currently, some convicted terrorists can be automatically released at the halfway point of their sentence – even if they still remain a threat to the public. But the Government’s new emergency legislation would end automatic early release.
The automatic early release ban would be for current terror prisoners, and Parole Boards would only allow them to be released early at the two-thirds stage of their sentence.
However, now a report by a committee of peers has called for the new emergency legislation to be halted allowing offenders to continue to be permitted for early release.
According to The Sun the House of Lords Constitution committee called for the new terror laws to be shelved until later in the year so they have more time to analyse them.
The report does suggest that Parole Boards should have the power to block early release.
But Government insiders are unhappy with the report and have said that they need the new legislation to be approved to make sure that six terror prisoners are not released back onto the streets by the end of next month…”
First Europeans die from coronavirus in Italy (telegraph, Feb 22, 2020)
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/coronavirus-news-uk-china-south-korea-singapore/
FREE SPEECH UNION IS ONLINE
includes video – 10 minutes 8 seconds
Free speech is the bedrock on which all our other freedoms rest, yet it is currently in greater peril than at any time since the Second World War. The Free Speech Union is a non-partisan, mass-membership organisation that stands up for the speech rights of its members. If you think there’s a risk you’ll be penalised for exercising your legal right to free speech, whether it’s in the workplace or the public square, you need the protection of the Free Speech Union. How might we protect you?
? If you find yourself being targeted by a digital outrage mob on social media for having exercised your legal right to free speech, we will mobilise an army of supporters.
? If a petition is launched calling for you to be fired, when you’ve done nothing other than exercise your legal right to free speech, we’ll organise a counter-petition.
? If you’re no-platformed by a university—a feminist professor who challenges trans orthodoxy, for instance—we’ll encourage you to go to law and organise a crowdfunding campaign to pay your costs.
? If newspaper columnists and broadcasting pundits start attacking you for dissenting from orthodox views and opinions, we could get our allies in the media to come to your defence.
? If you’re punished by your employer because you’ve exercised your lawful right to free speech, we’ll do our best to provide you with legal assistance.
https://freespeechunion.org
UK: Convicted Acid Killer Launches Jihadist Terror Attack on Prison Staff (breitbart, Feb 22, 2020)
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/02/22/uk-convicted-acid-killer-launches-jihadist-terror-attack-prison-staff/
“A man convicted of killing a grieving mother with “industrial strength” acid has launched a terror attack on prison staff after becoming radicalised behind bars, according to reports.
Xeneral Imiuru, also known as Xeneral Webster, is said to have feigned a suicide attempt in order to lure guards to his cell in HMP Winchester.
When they approached his seemingly lifeless body, he leapt to his feet and launched what The Times describes as a “copycat jihadist attack” with an improvised blade, although fortunately they were able to restrain him without injury.
It is the second known attack of this sort in a British prison in 2020, with terrorist “emir” Brusthom Ziamani and another prisoner having stabbed and slashed a number of prison staff with makeshift weapons while wearing fake bomb belts and screaming “Allahu Akbar!”
Unlike Imiuru, Ziamani was already a hardened jihadist when he went to prison, for a plot to behead a British soldier in emulation of the radical Islamic terrorists who assassinated Lee Rigby in the street.
According to fellow inmates, the so-called emir “once tried to organise a coup against the prison system” and “would also hold sharia courts in his prison cell”, ordering punishment beatings for violations of Islamic law.
Ziamani’s prison, which was exposed as a hotbed of Muslim gangs and forced conversions in 2011, was also home to Usman Khan, another already convicted terrorist who went on the commit a terrorist attack — although Khan killed members of the public after being released on licence early, rather than attacking prison staff.
“It’s not clear yet what the motive is but the features of this attack in what ought to be the most secure environment in any prison suggest audacity and careful pre-meditation at the least” said Ian Acheson, a former prison governor who conducted the 2016 review of extremism in prisons, in comments to The Times on the most recent attack.
“The attack could well have been inspired by recent violent extremism inside and outside the prison walls,” he added.
“It’s extremely important that the police investigation is speedy and transparent and that a terrorist motive is thoroughly investigated.””
80% of People in Arts Fear ‘Controversial Opinions’ Risk Professional Ostracism (breitbart, Feb 22, 2020)
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/02/22/80-people-arts-feel-those-controversial-opinions-risk-professional-ostracism/
“More than eight in ten people working in culture and the arts feel those with “controversial opinions” risk professional ostracism.
The Freedom of Expression survey commissioned by ArtsProfessional magazine found in its research of 500 professionals that more than 80 per cent thought that “workers in the arts and cultural sector who share controversial opinions risk being professionally ostracised”.
This has resulted in arts sector workers self-censoring around colleagues or bosses if their views are considered “politically incorrect” or express support for Brexit, even thought a majority of the voting public backed it.
Non-liberal-progressive views on sex, religion, and sexuality were also considered forbidden.
Responses were anonymous. One said in the survey: “Our arts, culture, and indeed education sectors are supposed to be fearlessly free-thinking and open to a wide range of challenging views. However, they are now dominated by a monolithic politically correct class (mostly of privileged white middle-class people, by the way), who impose their intolerant views across those sectors.
“This is driving people who disagree away, risks increasing support for the very things this culturally dominant class professes to stand against, and is slowly destroying our society and culture from the inside.”
The findings were published after last month’s high-profile attempt to “cancel” British actor Laurence Fox, who challenged progressive orthodoxy on the BBC’s Question Time programme.
Dubbed the “anti-woke crusader” by Breitbart London’s James Delingpole on the journalist’s Delingpod show, Mr Fox further committed the cardinal sins in the entertainment industry of speaking favourably about Brexit and coming out as pro-Trump.
“Cancel Culture” is also prevalent in academia, where figures on both the left and right are being de-platformed for failing to have sufficiently woke views.
Oxford Brookes University cancelled a speech in November by feminist artist Rachel Ara because she was deemed “transphobic”.
The Open University in Milton Keynes cancelled a conference on prison reform after threats from transsexual activists over the proposed policy of separating biologically male prisoners claiming to be female from women.
Cambridge University cancelled a pro-Brexit lecture in November because it was deemed to not be “mainstream” and could make people feel “uncomfortable”.
Cambridge had also rescinded several months earlier the visiting fellowship of Canadian clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson after complaints from the students’ union.
Recent surveys also found that Brexiteer students feel unable to express their opinions in a classroom setting, whilst another found that conservative students likewise feel the same need to self-censor.
Even private citizens expressing opinions on important cultural issues are not immune to the creeping infringement on free speech, the cornerstone of Western democracy.
Last week saw former police officer Harry Miller win a High Court case against Humberside Police over his right to tell jokes about transgenderism.
The series of events began when a police officer called Mr Miller to “check his thinking” after his tweets were reported and classified as a ‘non-crime hate incident’.
Reports revealed that nearly 120,000 “non-crime hate incidents” had been recorded by 34 police teams across England and Wales between 2014 to 2019, with more than 3,300 recorded in a databae by Police Scotland in the same timeframe — with the “non-crimes” in question including “offensive” jokes.”
China’s COVID-19 death toll now over 2,300
142 new COVID-19 cases confirmed in S. Korea, bringing total to 346
87 new COVID-19 cases confirmed in S. Korea, bringing total to 433
Swedish Report: Stockholm Violent Gang Leaders Have Migration Background (breibart, Feb 22, 2020)
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/02/22/swedish-paper-admits-violent-gang-leaders-come-from-migrant-backgrounds/
“A Swedish news outlet has revealed that 17 of 32 gang leaders committing violence in Stockholm were born overseas, with the other 15 born in Sweden but from migration backgrounds.
The 32 men are believed to be leaders of various criminal gangs in the Swedish capital and have been the focus of Stockholm police as part of Operation Rimfrost, a nationwide police operation to tackle the growing violence among gangs in Sweden, according to an Expressen analysis quoted in a Nyheter Idag report.
Of the 15 gang members who were born in Sweden, just one is said to have a Swedish-born parent, while the rest reportedly have parents who migrated to Sweden.
“I’m not naive. There are other crimes where the deportation and migration issues are more relevant, but when it comes to the leadership layers of the worst criminal gangs in Stockholm, it is obviously a failed integration,” Expressen journalist Fredrik Sjöshult wrote.
The report echoes a prior report in the city of Malmo in September of last year that revealed the majority of the shooting suspects in the multicultural southern Swedish city were also from migration backgrounds.
A total of 20 cases were reviewed by Swedish newspaper Sydsvenskan, which found that 14 of the 20 individuals were born to parents who had migrated to Sweden from Africa, the Middle East, or elsewhere.
While some have pointed to a lack of integration, ghettoisation of no-go suburbs, and other immigration factors to explain the rise in gang violence, Prime Minister Stefan Löfven has rejected such claims.
In November, the Swedish leader stated: “The segregation is because there is too low employment and too high unemployment in these areas. But that would have been the same regardless of who had lived there. If you put people born in Sweden under the same conditions, you get the same result.””
Coronavirus: How WHO Corruption Helped It Spread
UN: 100,000 civilians casualties in Afghanistan in 10 years
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/100000-civilians-casualties-afghanistan-10-years-69139753
“A United Nations report says Afghanistan passed a grim milestone with more than 100,000 civilians killed or hurt in the last 10 years since the international body began documenting casualties in a war that has raged for 18 years.
The report released Saturday by the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan comes as a seven-day “reduction of violence” agreement between the U.S. and Taliban takes effect, paving the way for a Feb. 29 signing of a peace deal Washington hopes will end its longest war, bring home U.S. troops and start warring Afghans negotiating the future of their country.
“Almost no civilian in Afghanistan has escaped being personally affected in some way by the ongoing violence,” said Tadamichi Yamamoto, the secretary-general’s special representative for Afghanistan. “It is absolutely imperative for all parties to seize the moment to stop the fighting, as peace is long overdue; civilian lives must be protected and efforts for peace are underway.”
Last year there was a slight decrease in the numbers of civilians hurt or killed, which the report says was a result of reduced casualties inflicted by the Islamic State affiliate. The group was drastically degraded by U.S. and Afghan security forces as well as the Taliban, who have also bitterly battled the Islamic State.
According to the U.N. report, 3,493 civilians were killed last year and 6,989 were injured. While fewer civilians were hurt or killed by Islamic State fighters, more civilians became casualties at the hands of the Taliban and Afghan security forces and their American allies.
The report said there was a 21% increase in civilian casualties by the Taliban and an 18% rise in casualties blamed on Afghan security forces and their U.S. allies who dropped more bombs last year than in any year since 2013.
“All parties to the conflict must comply with the key principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution to prevent civilian casualties,” said Michelle Bachelet, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights. “Belligerents must take the necessary measures to prevent women, men, boys and girls from being killed by bombs, shells, rockets and improvised mines; to do otherwise is unacceptable.”
The seven-day “reduction in violence” began at midnight Friday. If it holds it will be followed by the signing of a long sought peace deal between the United States and the Taliban in the Middle Eastern state of Qatar where the Taliban maintain a political office.
U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, who has spent the past 18 months negotiating the deal with the Taliban after his appointment in September 2018 by the White House, will sign the deal on the behalf of Washington. President Donald Trump has repeatedly said he wants American troops brought home from Afghanistan. He says they have become a police enforcement force, which is not what they are there to do.
The peace deal will also include Taliban guarantees that Afghanistan will not be used as a staging arena for attacks against the U.S. or its allies.
The most difficult phase is expected to be the intra-Afghan negotiations as Kabul still struggles to come up with a unified position opposite the Taliban. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani was declared the winner of a presidential race held five months earlier, followed by his political rivals refuting the results and calling the polling fraught with fraud.
The negotiations among Afghans, which will also hammer out an eventual permanent cease-fire, are to begin around March 10. Both Germany and Norway have offered to host the negotiations but until now a venue has not been chosen.”
Pakistan says 5 militants killed in shootout; 2 arrested (abcnews, Feb 22, 2020)
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/pakistan-militants-killed-shootout-arrested-69141216
“Pakistani security forces said Saturday that five suspected militants were killed in an overnight raid in the country’s northwest, and that two other militants were arrested in a separate operation.
Senior counter-terrorism officer Tahir Khan said the shootout took place at a compound in the working-class suburb of Mathra near Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. He said the militants belonged to a banned group and that security forces found suicide vests, sub-machine guns and other weapons at the scene.
Two militant commanders from the Sajna group of the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban, were captured in a second Friday-night raid, according to counter-terrorism officer Mohammad Ajmal. The operation took place in Tank district, which serves as a gateway to the mountainous South Waziristan district, a former militant stronghold.
Pakistan has carried out a number of operations in the country’s rugged northwest in recent years. The government has repeatedly claimed the areas were cleared of insurgents, but violence there has continued.
Militant groups in northwest Pakistan are often interlinked with those across the border in Afghanistan. That makes the Pakistani government’s progress at reining in terror critical, particularly as the U.S. is setting the stage for signing a peace deal with the Afghan Taliban next week.
Terror attacks in Pakistan dropped by more than 85% over the last decade, from nearly 2,000 attacks in 2009 to fewer than 250 in 2019, according to Pakistani think tanks.”
Local gov’ts announce tight measures to curb COVID-19
Officials prepare for coronavirus pandemic; Statements conflict about turning point in outbreak
Grooming gang review kept secret as Home Office claims releasing findings ‘not in public interest’ (independent, Feb 21, 2020)
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/grooming-gang-rotherham-review-home-office-findings-a9344896.html
“The government is refusing to release official research on the characteristics of grooming gangs, claiming it is not in the “public interest”.
Survivors accused ministers of making “empty promises”, while a man who prosecuted abusers in Rochdale called for the Home Office to “show some courage and publish” its findings.
It comes after The Independent revealed that almost 19,000 suspected child sexual exploitation victims were identified by local authorities in just one year, sparking renewed calls for prevention efforts.
Sajid Javid promised the review as home secretary in July 2018, pledging that there would be “no no-go areas of inquiry”.
“I will not let cultural or political sensitivities get in the way of understanding the problem and doing something about it,” he said at the time.
“We know that in these recent high profile cases, where people convicted have been disproportionately from a Pakistani background.
“I’ve instructed my officials to explore the particular contexts and characteristics of these types of gangs.”
But the government has made no further announcements on the review following Mr Javid’s move to the Treasury last year. It has, however, said it will soon publish a national strategy that will set out a “whole system response to all forms of child sexual abuse”.
In December, The Independent was told that the work had been completed but would only be used for internal policy-making and would not be publicly released.
In response to a freedom of information (FOI) request asking for the research carried out and any reports drawn up as a result, the Home Office confirmed it held the information but would not release it.
In a letter to The Independent, officials said they had applied a “public interest test” but the information was exempt from the act because it concerned the development of government policy.
“One of the main purposes of the exemption is to protect the ‘safe space’ necessary for ministers and officials to consider policy options in private without risk of premature disclosure,” it added.
“Disclosure would risk pre-empting decisions still to be made by ministers. In addition, the information could be misleading if made public and used out of context.”
The Home Office’s FOI unit said the documents also included “operationally sensitive” information from police and could prejudice ongoing investigations.
The letter added: “We recognise that this topic in general and any insight and learning are matters of strong public interest, although it does not necessarily follow that it is in the public interest to disclose any specific information relating to it.”
Sammy Woodhouse, a Rotherham victim who helped expose the scandal, told The Independent she believed the research was going to be made public.
“I always got the impression they were going to do a full report and get something official,” she said.
“A lot of people were backing it, it’s ridiculous they’re not releasing it.
“We keep hearing ‘we’re going to do this and that’, and when it actually comes to it there’s nothing. It’s empty promises all the time.”
Another woman, who was also sexually abused by a grooming gang in Rotherham and wanted to remain anonymous, said she was “disappointed and frustrated” by the decision not to release the report.
“The government’s repeated failure to acknowledge the role of racism and religious bigotry in grooming gang crime has led to inadequate investigation, protection and prosecution,” she said.
“Prevention of future grooming gang crime can only come through counter-narrative sex and relationships education.”
The woman is campaigning for changes to hate crime guidance and the creation of a parliamentary committee to examine gender-based violence linked to faith and belief.
A former chief prosecutor who initiated charges against a grooming gang in Rochdale warned that far-right groups were using a “vacuum” of reliable information to spread their beliefs and gain support.
Nazir Afzal said he had been calling for formal research on potential links between ethnicity and street-based abuse since 2012.
“The misinformation and anecdote are exploited by white supremacists and others with an agenda,” he added.
“The sooner we have evidence, the sooner we can truly confront it. The Home Office should show some courage and publish.”
Mr Javid’s original pledge was in response to a letter from a cross-party group of politicians who called for the Home Office to undertake research into common patterns of behaviour and drivers of grooming gangs.
Sarah Champion, the Labour MP for Rotherham, was among the signatories and voiced hope at the time that the review would prevent abuse and protect children.
The Home Office has said it will soon publish a national strategy that will set out a “whole system response to all forms of child sexual abuse”.
A spokesperson for the government department said: “Child sexual abuse is a sickening crime and predators who abuse children will face the full force of the law.
“We’re pursuing work on a number of fronts to understand the characteristics of group-based offending and the contexts in which it occurs. This includes ongoing work commissioned by the previous home secretary and will inform future government policies on child sexual abuse.
“New sentencing laws will also ensure the most serious violent and sexual offenders spend time in prison that matches the severity of their crimes, protecting victims and giving the public confidence in the criminal justice system.””
Police spray pepper spray into man’s face after he allegedly violates lockdown rules | #Coronavirus
Police in China restrained a man who did not wear a facial mask while walking on the street
The China they DON’T want you to SEE!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbHxeOQA1Mc&feature=em-uploademail
State Department Will Unmask Chinese Operatives Working As Journalists in the US
Will 4 Mysterious ‘Spygate’ Figures Be Emerging Soon?
China’s president warns coronavirus outbreak is far from over
China’s president has warned that the coronavirus outbreak will likely get worse before it gets better.
While speaking to some of his top officials on Friday, President Xi Jinping said the peak of the outbreak has not yet been reached. Xi’s remarks came as other Chinese officials assured governments around the world the outbreak will soon be over.
https://www.oann.com/chinas-president-warns-coronavirus-outbreak-is-far-from-over/
THE 5G TROJAN HORSE
includes video – 96 minutes
This 96 minute documentary will expose the truth behind the global “Race to 5G”, the health, privacy, and local power concerns, and the corruption between the Big Wireless industry and the U.S. government. The cold hard truth is that we have willingly accepted this technology. Yes, we have been lied to by people we believed we could trust, but at the end of the day, the power lies in our hands. We decide if we still choose to surround ourselves with devices that threaten our privacy and health. We must take responsibility for our actions and remember to be skeptical of promises of convenience and utopia. As the saying goes, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Derrick Broze
https://www.globalresearch.ca/5g-trojan-horse-documentary/5704266
IS FINLAND ABOUT TO MAKE CHRISTIANITY ILLEGAL? CHRISTIAN LAWMAKER FACING FINES AND PRISON
includes video – 4 minutes 20 seconds
Päivi Räsänen is under two investigations for allegedly defaming or insulting homosexuals. The first after she shared a Bible verse on Twitter last year aimed at Finland’s Lutheran church for promoting the homosexual lifestyle…Romans first chapter and verses 24 to 27 and posted the picture of the passages from the Bible.” The passage condemns homosexuality. Finland’s Prosecutor General has now opened a second investigation concerning a pamphlet that Päivi wrote 15 years ago about Biblical Christian marriage, called “Man and woman, He created them.” Dale Hurd
https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2020/february/historically-christian-finland-threatens-to-fine-imprison-believers-who-speak-out-on-matters-of-faith
New Russian interference theme: They’re helping Bernie, and he’s known for a month
By J.E. Dyer February 22, 2020
Just in time for the Nevada caucuses, the Washington Post reported on Friday that U.S. officials recently briefed Bernie Sanders about some help he’s been receiving. The Russians, according to those officials, are “attempting to help his presidential campaign as part of an effort to interfere with the Democratic contest.”
That’s just how diabolical the Russians are. Whichever candidates the media and the “establishment” most want to bring down, those are the candidates the Russians unerringly throw their conniving, underhanded support behind.
WaPo goes on: “President Trump and lawmakers on Capitol Hill also have been informed about the Russian assistance to the Vermont senator.”
That said, “It is not clear what form that Russian assistance has taken,” says WaPo. It never is. “U.S. prosecutors found a Russian effort in 2016 to use social media to boost Sanders’s campaign against Hillary Clinton, part of a broader effort to hurt Clinton, sow dissension in the American electorate and ultimately help elect Donald Trump.”
https://libertyunyielding.com/2020/02/22/new-russian-interference-theme-theyre-helping-bernie-and-hes-known-for-a-month/
The Pentagon lost track of $715 million in weapons and gear funneled to anti-ISIS allies in Syria
The U.S. government failed to effectively account for nearly $715.8 million in weapons and equipment allocated to Syrian partners as part of the multinational counter-ISIS fight, according to a new report from the Defense Department inspector general.
The audit, publicly released on Tuesday, revealed that officials with Special Operations Joint Task Force–Operation Inherent Resolve “did not maintain comprehensive lists of all equipment purchased and received” to equip Syrian allies in the anti-ISIS fight (known as CTEF-S equipment) in fiscal years 2017 and 2018 due to a lack of a central repository for accountability documentation.
In addition, officials with the 1st Theater Sustainment Command “did not properly store or secure” the relevant equipment in accordance with Pentagon guidelines so far that, in at least one case, 1st TSC personnel “stored weapons outside in metal shipping containers, exposing the equipment to harsh environmental elements, such as heat and humidity.”
The core focus of the report is the resulting equipment redundancies that arise from poor accounting. “Without accurate accountability records, such as inventory records and hand receipts, SOJTF-OIR personnel could order equipment that SOJTF-OIR already has in stock, risking unnecessary spending of CTEF-S funds and further overcrowding the BPC Kuwait warehouse resulting in equipment being stored outside.”
Poorly maintaining gear or ordering duplicates is one thing; maintaining custody of sensitive equipment, especially weapons, is another. Indeed, the DoD audit found that the lax standards for gear accountability left “thousands” of weapons and other gear “vulnerable to loss or theft.”
While Military Times rightfully notes that the audit doesn’t indicate that any of these weapons ended up in enemy hands, the audit suggests that the lack of clear accounting makes it impossible to determine what gear, if any, may have ended up where it doesn’t belong.
“Without conducting consistent inventories and ensuring proper security for CTEF-S equipment, 1st TSC could not determine whether items were lost or stolen which could delay the initiation of an investigation,” according to the report.
This is generally not great, but also deeply unsurprising. Indeed, a damning report from Amnesty International published in May 2017 suggested that the U.S. has already failed to track more than $1 billion in arms transfers to Iraqi and Kuwaiti security forces as part of OIR, a lack of accountability that didn’t stop the U.S. from requesting that $715.8 million in weapons and gear to equip Syrian forces
As Task & Purpose has previously reported, this lack of gear accountability among both U.S. forces and other foreign countries has only fueled the capabilities of non-state actors like ISIS. In August 2017, Iraqi security forces turned up an FGM-148 Javelin anti-tank missile and launcher while expelling militants from city of Tal Afar; the following month, an ISIS propaganda video showed a jihadi sniper rocking a U.S.-made 7.62mm Mk 14 Enhanced Battle Rifle.
This has been a problem since the beginning of the Global War on Terror. Indeed, a 2016 investigation into 14 years of Pentagon weapons contracts by non-profit Action on Armed Violence revealed that of the nearly 1.5 million firearms that DoD provided to Afghan and Iraqi security forces, officials only had records for around 700,000 weapons.
Those weapons can turn up when you least expect them — and in the worst possible way. Consider the deaths of two members of the 7th Special Forces Group in an insider attack in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar Province earlier this month. According to the New York Times, the Afghan soldier who killed them didn’t use a Soviet-era Kalashnikov, but an M249 Squad Automatic Weapon supplied by the United States.
According to the Pentagon audit, SOJTF-OIR and 1st TSC personnel agreed with the problems detailed by the DoD OIG and immediately initiated “corrective actions” to address the lack of accountability among U.S. military gear. But according to the report, this may be too little too late — and without a proper system, the U.S. has no way of knowing which gear is ending up in the wrong hands.
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/syria-weapons-isis-pentagon-inspector-general-report
Australia: Thousands march in Melbourne climate protest
Thousands of people took the streets of Melbourne city centre to protest the government’s inaction towards climate change, on Saturday.
Footage shows protesters marching with signs reading “100% renewable, 100% doable” and “Another world is possible.”
“It’s your own government that continues to put profits over the environment, profits over the planet and profit over human need,” said Nowie, a climate activist, as she was addressing the crowd of demonstrators.
“This is the time for everybody to be courageous and step up and to stop protecting their own job in the face of an existential crisis for all of us,” said one protester. “We need to stop the logging, stop the fossil fuelling and it’s time for everyone to join in so that’s what I’m trying to encourage,” she continued.
Australia experienced one of its hottest winters amid heatwaves, as temperatures hit 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit). The hot and dry weather conditions have led to severe and repeated bushfires.
Protest against right-wing groups in Hanau in the wake of shooting
Key member of yellow vest movement removed from Paris Agricultural Show
One of the leading figures of the yellow vests movement, Eric Drouet, is kicked out from the Paris International Agriculture Show without having managed to approach Emmanuel Macron.
PARIS – WEEK 67
TOULOUSE
LiLLE
LiLLE
LONDON UK – Mosque attack victim Raafat Maglad: I forgive knifeman
DAILY MAIL – From police fortress to anarchy HQ: Britain’s most secure station once house terrorists and killers – now it’s occupied by fanatics bent on smashing the state
Paddington Green police station was once Scotland Yard’s answer to Alcatraz
It is now occupied by coalition of anti-capitalist and environmental extremists
The squatters belong to groups singled out in a police anti-terrorism document
Built to a fittingly Brutalist design half a century ago as a stronghold detaining IRA terrorists, and later holding the most dangerous jihadists, Paddington Green police station was once Scotland Yard’s answer to Alcatraz.
Prisoners described being shut away for interrogation in its 16 subterranean cells, with their two-inch thick doors and sound-proofed walls, as a Kafkaesque hell that could unhinge the most resilient mind. No one ever escaped.
Since it is topped by a 15-storey accommodation block, this formidable concrete bunker also served as a billet for the Met’s fearsome Territorial Support Group, and housed officers drafted into Central London to marshal protest marches and demonstrations, as well as other potentially troublesome events.
PIC – the inside of the former police station with it’s new residents. Yes, you read that correctly. A bunch of hardline agitators have commandeered what was once Britain’s most secure police station, and are not only ‘occupying’ this former bastion of law and order, but using it as a base from which to wage war on the very society it was built to protect
Next Friday, dozens of men and women will again pour down its ramps and take to the streets. But this time, they will not be constables tasked with maintaining law and order. Astonishingly, they will be a mob of masked anarchists on a mission to ‘strike at the heart of the capital’.
Rallying to a slogan of ‘F*** the Banks, F*** the City’, this menacing rabble — a coalition of anti-capitalist and environmental extremists who regard Extinction Rebellion as too limited in aim and insufficiently radical — will do whatever it takes to cause mayhem in the financial district around the Bank of England.
Yes, you read that correctly. A bunch of hardline agitators have commandeered what was once Britain’s most secure police station, and are not only ‘occupying’ this former bastion of law and order, but using it as a base from which to wage war on the very society it was built to protect.
The squatters belong to groups singled out for attention in a police anti-terrorism document recently uncovered by the Guardian newspaper. They include Anarchist Federation, the Industrial Workers of the World and Reclaim Power. It is surely the ultimate irony. More ironic even than the Mail’s revelation last year that a former Manchester police station was being used as a cannabis farm.
It is claimed that some 50 anarchists are now squatting in Paddington Green station and the tower-block that rises 175ft above it.
Since gaining access on February 8, they have triumphantly renamed it the Green Tower, hung a green flag from its mast, smeared it with slogans and attached propagandist leaflets to its railings.
They have also daubed the initials ACAB — an acronym for ‘All Coppers Are B******s’ — in huge letters on its grimy windows, overlooking the thronging Edgware Road.
Unlike the more pacifist Extinction Rebellion they say they ‘respect a diversity of tactics’ which they will adapt according to the situation.
They pledge to use squatters’ rights to turn the police station into their permanent base, and the Paddington Green squatters are urging people to join them.
During the past decade an estimated 600 police stations have closed down in England and Wales, and the Paddington Green mob are calling for others to be similarly taken over.
This week, before their disruptive demo in Threadneedle Street, they will also hold various other events there. These are set to include everything from ‘self-defence workshops’ to seminars bearing titles such as ‘weaving ecology, democracy and gender liberation into a revolutionary political paradigm’.
Given such mumbo-jumbo, many might be tempted to surmise that the lunatics, rather than the anarchists, have in fact taken over the asylum.
Yet whatever we might think of this rabble, who call themselves the Green Anti-Capitalist Front (GAF) and derive from an amalgam of anarchist factions, one has to admit they have pulled off quite a coup — humiliating the Met and the entire police service.
In a week when the force in Cambrideshire faced heavy criticism for standing by without taking action as Extinction Rebellion dug trenches in a beautiful lawn at Trinity College, it is another body-blow for the police’s reputation.
In many ways, the capture of Paddington Green is part of a bigger story — one that has become depressingly familiar in lawless Britain. It is a story of police stations, not only in London but all across the country, being closed down and sold off to save costs and raise revenue.
And for the communities they served, the consequences have been devastating.
All too often, the victims of crime must journey many miles if they wish to see an officer in person rather than speaking to an answer-phone or logging the offence online. People have lost the symbolically reassuring presence of a blue lamp shining from a building manned 24 hours a day.
But back to Paddington Green, whose former detainees include Patrick Magee, the IRA bomber who murdered five people at a hotel during the 1984 Tory Conference in Brighton, and Finsbury Park mosque hate preacher Abu Hamza. It also housed several Guantanamo Bay prisoners for debriefing after they were released from the U.S. top security prison in Cuba.
Having withstood the full might of major terror groups — the IRA once targeted it with a bomb, and one of the fanatics who murdered Fusilier Lee Rigby led a protest march on the building — how could it fall to a few dozen unarmed quasi-Lefties?
Totemic and strategically important though it had previously been, the station went on to be decommissioned less than two years ago, in July 2018, since when it has stood empty.
Indeed, though more than half of London’s 73 stations have been shut since 2017, under a plan to sell them off and raise £165 million for the Met, only one has found a buyer, according to a Freedom of Information request from the Hackney Gazette. Two other leases were allowed to expire.
The remainder have been largely abandoned or used for storage — a colossal waste of buildings situated in prime locations.
But the anarchists have found that Paddington Green was being used by the police for firearms training.
For when they gained entry, they were shocked to find it littered with spent cartridges, grenade pins and a lifelike ‘terrorist’ shooting target. Doors had been smashed down and bullet-holes riddled the windows — a discovery they announced with relish.
The Met says its ‘important’ weapons training sessions will have to be ‘rescheduled’ owing to the squatters’ presence, adding that the bullet casings would not have been from live rounds.
It was clearly far easier to break into this former fortress than ever it was to break out.
According to the Met, the interlopers simply used a ladder to scale the roof under cover of darkness and, with a ‘concentrated effort’, forced their way in.
As the power supply remains obligingly switched on, apparently for safety reasons, they have lighting and heating, and the plumbing and even the lifts work. Who is footing the bill for these creature comforts? The taxpayer, naturally.
On Wednesday, I went to the station to try to speak to its shadowy new occupants, whose presence — after almost two weeks — remains largely unknown to shopkeepers and passers-by.
It was an eerie experience. They had covered one window with the cardboard ‘terrorist’ (complete with shades and pistol) and when I banged on the door, a pair of human eyes peered at me through bullet-holes.
‘What do you want?’ came a gruff voice. When I explained, he said he would ‘feed my request to the rest of the group’. Several minutes later he was back. ‘It’s a No,’ he barked. ‘Now I’m going to stop talking.’
Then there was silence. But, the anarchists wasted no time in posting my interest on their website. ‘What do we say to Daily Mail journalists? We tell them to get f****d,’ they wrote, saying they would never speak to this newspaper, nor other so-called ‘hate rags’.
This week, though, they deigned to receive a reporter from the Left-leaning news and entertainment website Joe. The anarchist’s spokesman — an articulate, bitter man with a North-Eastern accent, a black face-mask and hooded Parka coat — led him on a tour.
Though we can read the GAF’S self-righteous ramblings on their website, the resulting video tells us much about them and their ludicrous aims.
Taking Paddington Green was hugely significant, the spokesman said self-importantly, as the camera followed him through ghostly corridors strewn with the detritus of police-work — keys, papers and the discarded munitions.
‘This is a massive building and we see no point keeping it to ourselves. The police relentlessly side with the State against people trying to get by . . . we’re turning their tools against them and making it a space for the people again.’
An awkward moment came when he was challenged over why the group wore ‘intimidating’ masks. Yes, they were ‘scary’, he laughed, but they were necessary. Artlessly he added: ‘It’s a kind of cool aesthetic.’
The triumphal tour ended with the spokesman and several comrades gazing down on the city they aim to attack, from the dizzying heights of the tower-block roof. Did he have a message for the police whose bastion they had captured?
‘Come and get it mother******s!’ he whooped, making the sort of double-handed, ‘bring-it-on’ gesture that boxers use to taunt opponents at the weigh-in.
He was reproached by a savvier female member. ‘No! What do we always have to say to the cops? ‘No comment’,’ she prompts.
But yesterday on the group’s website and Twitter feed, the gloating continued unchecked.
‘Let’s take a minute to reflect on all those poor coppers who dreamed of using violence to protect the interests of climate destroyers, only to see one of their most iconic centres of repression turned into a green community centre,’ read one post.
Then there was a somewhat disturbing video in which an activist whose voice has been distorted appears to approach two officers and ask them whether they are going to Paddington Green station. ‘Well you can’t — ’cause it’s ours now!’ he sniggers.
One follower hailed the anarchists as ‘absolute legends’. We can only imagine what the officers who served at Paddington Green must make of all this.
But who should shoulder the blame? Labour will say the mass closure of police stations is a consequence of Tory cuts; and there is no denying that in London, where there is now just one 24-hour staffed station per borough, the shutdown began when Boris Johnson was mayor.
However, Shaun Bailey, the Conservative mayoral candidate in the election this May, justifies this with the claim that the capital’s crime-rate was then falling.
He points the finger at Johnson’s successor, Sadiq Khan, who — when in opposition — warned that the closures could mean that victims would be forced to report crimes at desig- nated contact points, such as McDonald’s restaurants.
This week, Mr Bailey pledged as mayor to re-open London’s 38 shut-down stations, arguing that ‘police station visibility is a central plank of making Londoners feel safe in their community again’.
The former youth worker, who grew up in West London’s tough Ladbroke Grove area, said the closure and anarchist occupation of London’s most secure police station was ’embarrassing’ and ‘ridiculous’, and emblematic of Mr Khan’s loss of control of the streets at a time of rising violent crime.
When the anarchists spring from their unlikely lair next Friday, he added, thousands of hard-working Londoners would suffer.
Mr Khan, for his part, recently told the London Assembly that the sell-off had been ‘paused’, as the Met examines where to accommodate the 1,400 extra officers it expects to recruit under Johnson’s promise to boost Britain’s police ranks by 20,000.
A spokesman for the Mayor told me this week: ‘A review of the Met’s entire estate is under way and some sites previously approved for disposal have been put on hold while the potential impact of an increase in officers is taken into account.’
For many Londoners this will come as some relief. But there will be no reprieve for Paddington Green, whose ‘size, condition, location and value’ meant it would not be retained, City Hall said.
As to the famous building’s future use, the spokesman said it was being discussed with the ‘owner of the adjoining site’ — presumably meaning a huge block of mainly high-end flats being developed by Berkeley Homes.
However, as a security guard working there remarked this week, unless they are speedily ejected, the squatters’ presence could jeopardise the sale, which would doubtless delight them.
Meanwhile, as London braces itself for another day of chaos this Friday, we might wonder how many more empty police stations, in the capital and beyond, could ironically fall into the hands of an enemy whose very purpose is to sabotage law and order.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8031205/From-police-fortress-anarchy-HQ.html
IRAN: COVID-19
Heshmat is doing a good job, he’s getting video clips with info. Expect loads of trouble. Among important people: Two (I think) mayors, two elected MPs, people in a Central Industrial Dormitory, and now a student in school.
Government wants to set up quarantine areas in small cities but residents are rebelling. The virus is spreading everywhere for lack of initial proper management.
https://twitter.com/HeshmatAlavi/status/1231318618601918467
SCOTLAND: No joke Hundreds of Scots who tell ‘offensive jokes’ on social media are being secretly logged on police database.
HUNDREDS of Scots are being secretly placed on a police database – for telling offensive jokes online.
Police Scotland has logged more than 3,300 “hate incidents”, such as sharing offensive jokes on social media, even though they involve no criminality.
But comedians and campaigners say it’s over-policing the public and a danger to freedom of speech.
Officers currently go by official guidelines which state jokes appearing to be motivated by hostility towards race, religion or a person being transgender are filed “irrespective of whether there is any evidence to identify the hate element”.
And any information logged could appear on disclosure checks and handed to employers if police deem it relevant to a job they are applying for.
More here: https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/scottish-news/5298498/police-scotland-offensive-jokes-database/
Syrian bomb kills 16th Turkish soldier this month in Idlib (reuters, Feb 22, 2020)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-syria-security-turkey/syrian-bomb-kills-16th-turkish-soldier-this-month-in-idlib-idUSKCN20G0ME
“A Turkish soldier was killed in Syria’s Idlib region in a bomb attack by Russian-backed government forces, the defence ministry said on Saturday, Turkey’s 16th military death during a month in which talks between Ankara and Moscow have stalled.
The rising Turkish military death toll, including two on Thursday, could complicate a possible deal to halt a spike in fighting in Syria’s northwest. Since early December nearly a million Syrians, mostly women and children, have been displaced in the winter cold there.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said he will meet Russian, German and French counterparts on March 5 to discuss Idlib, where Syrian government forces are pushing to retake the last large rebel-held region after nine years of war in the country…”
the gatewsay pundit – UPDATE: Murdered Whistleblower Philip Haney Spoke Out Against Muslim Brotherhood’s Infiltration of US Government in October – Spoke Out Against CAIR (VIDEO)
DHS whistleblower Philip Haney was found dead on Friday.
The whistleblower against the Obama administration was shot dead near his vehicle in California.
Haney told Sean Hannity in 2016 that he was ordered during the Obama administration to scrub the record of Muslims in the US with terrorist ties.
The story of his death has still not hit the mainstream media.
The Gateway Pundit was notified of his death last night.
more :
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/02/update-murdered-whistleblower-philip-haney-spoke-out-against-muslim-brotherhoods-infiltration-of-us-government-in-october-spoke-out-against-cair-video/
Breaking: Official Statement: Philip Haney Death Appears to Be by Self-Inflicted Gunshot
DHS whistleblower Philip Haney died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot, according to a statement issued Saturday afternoon by the Office the Sheriff-Coroner for Amador County, California that cautions the investigation is “active and ongoing”. No final determination has been made.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/02/breaking-official-statement-philip-haney-death-appears-to-be-by-self-inflicted-gunshot/
NEW JERSEY – Paterson ordinance will let mosques broadcast Muslim call to prayer
A proposed ordinance before the City Council will allow mosques in Paterson to broadcast the Adhan or the Muslim call to prayer.
Under the ordinance, mosques will be allowed to use loudspeakers to announce the call to prayer during a 16-hour span. The ordinance states: “The city shall permit ‘Adhan’, call to prayer’, ‘church bells’ and other reasonable means of announcing religious meetings to be amplified between the hours of 6:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. for duration not to exceed five minutes.”
Councilman Shahin Khalique proposed the ordinance on Tuesday night as an amendment to the existing noise control ordinance.
Council members spent three minutes discussing the measure.
Paterson has approximately 30,000 Muslims. It has a dozen mosques scattered throughout the city. Presently, mosques make the call to prayer five times a day; however, the sound is not amplified outside the buildings.
Late last year, Khalique, who is up for reelection in May, promised local leaders he planned to introduce the measure modeled on an ordinance in effect in Hamtramck, Mich. At the time, Khalique said he had been in discussions with other members of the City Council to get the measure passed.
Khalique has styled himself as a pious and devout Muslim amongst his mostly Bengali-American supporters. He suffered a blow to his image earlier in the month when it was revealed he had been arrested for intoxicated driving by New Jersey State Police in 2010.
Council members will consider the measure for preliminary approval next Tuesday
http://patersontimes.com/2020/02/19/paterson-ordinance-will-let-mosques-broadcast-muslim-call-to-prayer/
The UK Government is Too Scared to Release the Grooming Gang Report
Bloomberg-founded gun control group spending $8 million in Texas to elect Pro Gun Control candidates
The rise of Russia’s biohackers: Implanting technology under the skin and monitoring ‘biochemical markers’ to prolong life is on the rise in Moscow
Biohackers in Russia are embracing technology to help improve their life and increase their life expectancy as part of a growing movement.
The trend of putting implants into the body is growing steadily around the world, and Russians are using microchips and monitoring technology to improve their life.
Biohacking is a global movement whose followers seek to ‘upgrade’ their bodies with experimental technology and DIY health fixes that began in Silicon Valley.
For some wealthy Russians the technology is being adapted to allow them to live longer.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-8015881/The-rise-Russias-biohackers.html
“On Marxism in America, the Communist China Threat, Unconventional Warfare & Hong Kong—Joshua Philipp”
American Thought Leaders – The Epoch Times – August 2, 2019
Coronavirus Spreads in Italy – 40 Confirmed Cases – 50,000 People under Quarantine in Lombardy Region — “Index Person” Shows NO SIGN of Illness
Jim Hoft by Jim Hoft February 22, 2020 123 Comm
Coronavirus Spreads in Italy – 40 Confirmed Cases – 50,000 People under Quarantine in Lombardy Region — “Index Person” Shows NO SIGN of Illness
Jim Hoft by Jim Hoft February 22, 2020 123 Comments
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In the last 48 hours the number of cases of coronavirus in the Lombardy region in Italy has grown from six to over 40 victims of the virus.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/02/coronavirus-spreads-in-italy-40-confirmed-cases-50000-people-under-quarantine-in-lombardy-region-index-person-shows-no-sign-of-illness/?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=the-gateway-pundit&utm_campaign=dailypm&utm_content=weekend
Joint Niger-Barkhane operation ‘neutralizes’ 120 terrorists, defense ministry says
https://thedefensepost.com/2020/02/22/niger-france-operation-terrorists-tillaberi-120-neutralized/
“A joint operation conducted by Niger’s armed forces and troops deployed to the France-led Operation Barkhane “neutralized” 120 “terrorists” and seized bomb-making equipment and vehicles in western Niger, the defense ministry said on Friday, February 22, AFP reported.
As of February 20, “120 terrorists” had been “neutralized, including 23 in the Inatès-Tongo Tongo-Tilloa triangle” in the expansive Tillaberi region near the border with Mali and Burkina Faso, a statement read on public radio said, adding there had been no losses “on the friends’ side” during the operation.
“Ten motorcycles and various equipment used for the production of improvised explosive devices and for observation” were seized and destroyed.
Niger’s defence minister Issoufou Katambé praised the “cooperation with the strategic partner in the fight against terrorism” alongside the Armed Forces of Niger (FAN), the statement said, adding that the joint operation “is in line with the recommendations of the Pau Summit of January 13.”
The French Armed Forces Ministry has not yet released a statement regarding the operation.
At the Pau summit, France and the G5 Sahel states – Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Chad and Mauritania – injected new urgency into the counter-terrorism fight in the vast sub-Saharan region, announcing a new Sahel Coalition that will increase coordination between French and local forces. Troops from Operation Barkhane and the regional G5 Sahel Joint Force (FCG5S) operating under joint command will focus on the Mali-Burkina Faso-Niger tri-border zone, targeting Islamic State as a priority.
Barkhane is already building command coordination with Sahel Coalition partner forces, setting up dedicated coordination mechanisms in Niger’s capital Niamey and Chad’s capital N’Djamena, where Barkhane is headquartered.
“Exchanges of officers between the two forces have been carried out and joint planning is already advanced,” the FCG5S commander, Niger’s Brigadier General Oumarou Namata said this week.
“Officers from the Burkinabé, Malian and Nigerien general staffs have also been associated to harmonise actions with the national forces involved,” Namata said.
Increasing violence in western Niger
One of the world’s poorest countries, Niger lies in the heart of the fragile Sahel region.
Niger faces insurgency on two fronts: the southeastern Diffa region near Lake Chad is increasingly frequently hit by Nigeria-based Islamic State West Africa Province insurgents, while militants based in Mali, including ISIS and al-Qaeda-affiliated fighters, are active in the west of the country near the borders with Mali and Burkina Faso.
Authorities in the western Tillaberi region have ramped up security restrictions, closing markets and banning motorbike traffic after militant attacks in December and January killed 174 Nigerien soldiers.
A state of emergency has been in place in the region for the past two years.
In January, an Islamic State attack on Chinagodrar camp in the east of the Tillaberi region left at least 89 dead, the biggest single loss in the country’s modern history.
That attack occurred around 180 km east of Inates, where 71 Niger soldiers were killed in a December attack also claimed by Islamic State that saw dozens of insurgents storm a military camp near the border with Mali. It was then the deadliest attack on Niger’s military since Islamist extremist violence began to spill over from neighboring Mali in 2015.
Last May, 28 Niger soldiers were killed in Balley Béri, near Tongo Tongo in an ambush later claimed by ISIS.
A month later, the joint Operation Aconit was conducted by Barkhane, Mali and Niger troops and targeted ISIS-affiliated fighters on both sides of the border. In Niger, 18 “terrorists” were “neutralized” and five others captured in the Tongo Tongo area.
Islamist insurgents in the Sahel
The complex insurgency in the Sahel began in Mali in 2012, when a Tuareg separatist uprising was exploited by al-Qaeda-linked extremists who took key cities in the desert north. Former colonial power France began its Operation Serval military intervention the following year, driving the jihadists from the towns.
But the militant groups morphed into more nimble formations operating in rural areas, and the insurgency gradually spread to central and southern regions of Mali and then into Burkina Faso and Niger.
More than 4,000 people were reported killed in militant attacks in the three countries last year, according to the U.N., and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has warned that the spiraling violence in the Sahel has spread to coastal states of West Africa.
Many armed groups including Islamic State are active in the Sahel region, but the majority of attacks are attributed to JNIM, which formed in March 2017 from a merger of several smaller groups. JNIM’s leadership has pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri.
Since May 2019, ISIS has attributed insurgent activities in the Sahel area to ISWAP, its West Africa Province affiliate that split from Boko Haram in 2016, rather than to Islamic State in the Greater Sahara. ISWAP’s main area of operations is the Lake Chad area of Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon.
Macron has said the Sahel Coalition would prioritize the fight against ISIS in the Mali-Burkina Faso-Niger tri-border area because it is the most dangerous.
Growing French presence in the Sahel
The French military presence in the Sahel began in 2013 with Operation Serval in Mali, and evolved in August 2014 into Operation Barkhane, which has a mandate for counter-terrorism operations across the region. The Barkhane force focuses activity in insurgent-hit Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, working alongside local troops and other international operations, including the FCG5S and MINUSMA, the U.N. stabilization mission in Mali.
Earlier this month, Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly said that the number of French troops deployed to the Sahel would increase from 4,500 to 5,100.
Mali has launched Operation Maliko, a new counter-terrorism operation that will take into account cross-border, regional and international cooperation.
France has also been trying to build support for the new special operations Task Force Takuba that will train, advise, assist and accompany local forces in their fight against Islamic State and al-Qaeda affiliates in the region. Takuba will declare initial military capability in the summer and will be fully operational by the autumn.
France hopes that Takuba will comprise around 500 special forces personnel, according to Le Monde. The new French deployment will include around 50 special forces personnel who will form the nucleus of Takuba, Le Monde reported.
So far, Estonia, the Czech Republic, and Sweden have announced plans to contribute to Takuba, and discussions with Finland and Norway are reportedly ongoing, but Germany and the U.S. have declined.
Belgium is to contribute three staff officers to Takuba according to the Belga news agency, but the current caretaker government’s Foreign Minister Philippe Goffin told AFP on February 13 that committing troops to such an operation would require a government with a full mandate, plus the approval of parliament.
Barkhane already has an international dimension, with European partners contributing troops and equipment. Estonia is to almost double the size of its force protection contingent this year, Denmark has deployed two Merlin helicopters, and three Chinook helicopters from the United Kingdom currently support the operation.”
Iraqi Kurds Rally against ‘Corruption’ of Ruling Elite
https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/2144506/iraqi-kurds-rally-against-corruption-ruling-elite
“Thousands of Iraqi Kurds Saturday rallied against poor public services and “corruption” among the ruling elite in their autonomous region, an AFP correspondent said.
The rallies led by the New Generation movement, an opposition party, came amid ongoing protests since October in Baghdad and Iraq’s south demanding an overhaul of the federal government.
“Fix the unemployment problem,” read one banner.
“Public services quickly,” read another.
The autonomous Kurdish region, which initially saw an economic boom when the rest of the country descended into violence after the 2003 US invasion, is considered to be more secure and prosperous than Iraq as a whole.
But an economic crisis worsened by conflict with the ISIS group and tumbling global oil prices has given rise to periodic protests in more recent years, especially in the northeastern city of Sulaimaniyah.
On Saturday, thousands took to the streets of the city to decry tough living conditions in a region which has been autonomous since 1991.
The New Generation movement was founded in 2018 to channel public anger at the region’s elite.
Iraqi Kurdistan has been split for decades between the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP)– led by the Barzani family — and its rival, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), headed by the Talabani clan.
New Generation leader Shaswar Abdulwahid, said the ruling elite have “failed to (properly) administer the region” for 29 years.
“By way of demonstrations, we will bring hope back to the youths and the entire Kurdish community,” in Iraq, he said in a speech during the rally.
He said Saturday’s protests were only a “first step.”
Since 2014, Iraqi Kurdistan has borrowed more than $4 billion (3.7 million euros) to stay afloat, experts say.
According to the UN, 36 percent of households across Iraqi Kurdistan — home to around six million people — eke out a living on less than $400 per month.
Iraq is ranked 16th from bottom in Transparency International’s 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index.”
Terrorists Kill Two Border Guards in SE Iran
https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2020/02/22/2208795/terrorists-kill-two-border-guards-in-se-iran
“Two Iranian border guards were martyred in a clash with members of a terrorist group in the country’s southeastern province of Sistan and Balouchestan, the police said on Saturday…”
Iran Disinfecting Public Places amid Coronavirus Outbreak
https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2020/02/22/2208796/iran-disinfecting-public-places-amid-coronavirus-outbreak
“An Iranian health official said all public places and means of public transportation are being disinfected on a daily basis amid the deadly coronavirus outbreak that has killed at least five people in Iran so far…”
Iranian, Dutch Top Diplomats Discuss Closer Ties
https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2020/02/22/2208709/iranian-dutch-top-diplomats-discuss-closer-ties
“Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and his Dutch counterpart, Stef Blok, held talks on a host of topics, including ways to boost bilateral relations between the two countries…”
Aramco to win unconditional EU clearance for $69 bln SABIC deal
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200222-aramco-to-win-unconditional-eu-clearance-for-69-bln-sabic-deal/
“The world’s largest oil producer, Saudi Aramco, is set to gain unconditional EU antitrust approval for its $69 billion buy of a 70% stake in petrochemicals group Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC), people familiar with the matter said to Reuters on Friday.
Aramco announced the deal to acquire the controlling stake from sovereign investor Public Investment Fund (PIF) in March last year, a move key to its diversification into refining and petrochemicals.
Riyadh-headquartered SABIC, the world’s fourth largest petrochemicals group, has operations in over 50 countries.
The European Commission, which is scheduled to decide on the case by February 27, declined to comment.
Competition watchdogs in India and a number of other countries have already given the green light without demanding concessions.
Aramco’s downstream expansion strategy tracks rivals such as Exxon Mobil, BP, Total and Shell, which have over the years transformed themselves from merely oil companies to energy companies with extensive upstream and downstream operations.”
European Union condemns Haftar, yet does not stop arming him
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200222-european-union-condemns-haftar-yet-does-not-stop-arming-him/
Turkey prevents 4 Russian military aircrafts from crossing into Syria
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200222-turkey-prevents-4-russian-military-aircrafts-from-crossing-into-syria/
“Russian daily newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported that Turkey has prevented four Russian military aircrafts, including two bombers, from crossing its airspace to Syria.
Field sources knowledgeable about the Russian Hmeimim Air Base, revealed on Thursday that the Russian forces brought in military reinforcements from the storage facilities of the Russian army to the airbase, in an indication that battles may intensify in north-western Syria.
The sources revealed to Al-Quds Al-Arabi the arrival of heavy shipments of modern Russian tanks and missile launchers, heavy artillery and anti-armour missiles, in addition to shipments of bombs and missiles used by Russian strategic bombers and fighters, as well as the bombs used by Sukhoi aircraft of various categories.
Russian reinforcements also included tanks, troop carriers and mechanisms used to lift dirt berms and build fortifications, as well as defensive barriers.
The measures undertaken by the Russian forces came as tension escalates and rifts deepens between Ankara and Moscow over the developments in Idlib and the countryside of Aleppo, northern Syria, especially following the failure of technical and political negotiations between Russian officials and their Turkish counterparts.”