The United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) has defended its decision to hold its General Assembly in Zimbabwe.
Speaking to the media at Victoria Falls, UNWTO Secretary-General Taleb Rifai says the agency wanted to bring hope to Zimbabweans.
“We as the secretariat feel that it was correct and it was the right decision to come here and if you need the reason go walk in the streets of Livingstone and Victoria Fall. Ask the children, the men and women how do they feel about it and how much it has impacted their lives.It is exactly what we are here to do, we are not here to deliberate on grand issues, we can do that anywhere else in the world but the excitement, optimism and the hope, that this meeting has created in this place makes everything worthwhile,” says Rifai.
On Sunday President Robert Mugabe officially opened the 20th UNWTO General Assembly in the resort town of Victoria Falls.
Delegates from 150 countries will attend the seven-day event which Zimbabwe and Zambia are co-hosting.
A retired British Army officer who ran a game reserve where the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were guests has been killed in a botched robbery at his home in Kenya.
Lieutenant Colonel David Parkinson, 58, and his wife Sonja were attacked after a gang of five robbers, armed with machetes and a gun, broke into their house in the Lolldaiga Hills, a wildlife farm, in the early hours of Sunday.
During the confrontation, Lt Col Parkinson’s hand was cut off and he was fatally wounded, police said.
Local police chief Marius Tum said the intruders entered the couple’s bedroom by breaking a glass door using a large stone.
They ordered the couple to hand over money and guns.
“One of the gang members was armed with a pistol, another with a machete while the rest had crude weapons. While one of them was terrorising Mr Parkinson the others tied his wife’s hands with ropes,” Mr Tum said.
However, Mrs Parkinson who had sustained a cut on her back managed to untie herself and escaped to a strong room where she hid herself until the robbers fled.
On returning to the main house she found the body of her husband on the floor, police said.
Mr Tum said a post-mortem examination would be carried out to determine the cause of Lt Col Parkinson’s death.
On Sunday afternoon, a suspect from a nearby village was arrested after police mounted a major manhunt using sniffer dogs.
Lt Col Parkinson, who had a distinguished career in the Army for 30 years, worked as the manager of the Lolldaiga ranch in Laikipia East district since 2008.
Before that he was a director of Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya where Prince William spent his gap year helping with various conservation projects before taking up his place at St Andrews University.
The Foreign Office confirmed the death of Lt Col Parkinson.
“We are aware of his death and we stand ready to provide consular assistance to his family at this sad time,” a spokesman said. – Sky News
As videos of an alleged chemical attack in Syria were shown to the world, some experts cast doubt on their authenticity.
Stephen Johnson is an expert in weapons and chemical explosives at Cranfield Forensic Institute. He said there were inconsistency among the patients’ symptoms.
“There are, within some of the videos, examples which seem a little hyper-real, and almost as if they’ve been set up. Which is not to say that they are fake but it does cause some concern. Some of the people with foaming, the foam seems to be too white, too pure, and not consistent with the sort of internal injury you might expect to see, which you’d expect to be bloodier or yellower,” Johnson said.
Johnson said that although much of the video showed injuries consistent with trauma to the nervous system, it was too early to conclude that it was from chemical weapons.
“At this stage everyone wants a ‘yes-no’ answer to chemical attack. But it is too early to draw a conclusion just from these videos,” he added.
Syrian anti-government activists claim regime forces targeted eastern suburbs of Damascus with a toxic gas.
France and Britain have called for UN inspectors, who are already in the country, to be allowed immediate access to the site. – euronews.com
Syndicated columnist Pat Buchanan made a statement Friday guaranteed to make liberal media members’ heads spin.
During a discussion about Affirmative Action on PBS’s McLaughlin Group, Buchanan said, “Whites are the only group that you can discriminate against legally in America now”
JOHN MCLAUGHLIN, HOST: Are you saying college admissions should be based on diversity?
ELEANOR CLIFT, NEWSWEEK/DAILY BEAST: Yeah, I mean, I think lots of factors go into diversity. I think race can be one of them, and I think the Supreme Court so far agrees with that.
MCLAUGHLIN: 67 percent opposed it, 28, you’re in the minority. Only 28 percent are in favor of it.
PAT BUCHANAN: It should be based on excellence, John.
CLIFT: As long as the Supreme Court agrees with me, I’m fine.
BUCHANAN: It should be like the NFL: whoever’s the best player plays, and whoever does best academically should be advanced. What is wrong with that?
MICHELLE BERNARD: Here’s a question I have. One of the things I always say because I think you can measure diversity in a lot of ways, but I think there’s an argument to be said that the greatest Affirmative Action program that there is in the country is being born white. There is a natural assumption when you are applying to institutions of higher education that you are excellent or you are more superb than others.
BUCHANAN: With due respect, whites are the only group that you can discriminate against legally in America now. – newsbusters.com
The U.S. National Security Agency has bugged the United Nations’ New York headquarters, Germany’s Der Spiegel weekly said on Sunday in a report on U.S. spying that could further strain relations between Washington and its allies.
Citing secret U.S. documents obtained by fugitive former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, Der Spiegel said the files showed how the United States systematically spied on other states and institutions.
Der Spiegel said the European Union and the U.N.’s Vienna-based nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), were among those targeted by U.S. intelligence agents.
In the summer of 2012, NSA experts succeeded in getting into the U.N. video conferencing system and cracking its coding system, according one of the documents cited by Der Spiegel.
“The data traffic gives us internal video teleconferences of the United Nations (yay!),” Der Spiegel quoted one document as saying, adding that within three weeks the number of decoded communications rose to 458 from 12.
Internal files also show the NSA spied on the EU legation in New York after it moved to new rooms in autumn 2012. Among the documents copied by Snowden from NSA computers are plans of the EU mission, its IT infrastructure and servers.
According to the documents, the NSA runs a bugging program in more than 80 embassies and consulates worldwide called “Special Collection Service”. “The surveillance is intensive and well organized and has little or nothing to do with warding off terrorists,” wrote Der Spiegel.
OPEN LETTER
Snowden’s leaks have embarrassed the United States by exposing the global extent of its surveillance programs. Washington has said its spies operate within the law and that the leaks have damaged national security.
A week ago Britain, a staunch U.S. ally in the intelligence field, detained the partner of a Brazil-based journalist working for London’s Guardian newspaper who has led coverage of Snowden’s leaks. British police said documents seized from David Miranda were “highly sensitive” and could put lives at risk if disclosed.
The Guardian last week destroyed computer equipment containing Snowden files after it was threatened with possible legal action by senior British government advisers.
In an open letter to British Prime Minister David Cameron published on Sunday, editors of leading Nordic newspapers said Miranda’s detention and moves against the Guardian were “undermining the position of the free press throughout the world”.
“(We are) deeply concerned that a stout defender of democracy and free debate such as the United Kingdom uses anti-terror legislation in order to legalize what amounts to harassment of both the paper and individuals associated with it,” said the letter from Sweden’s Dagens Nyheter, Finland’s Helsingin Sanomat, Denmark’s Politiken and Norway’s Aftenposten.
Earlier this month, U.S. President Barack Obama announced plans to limit U.S. government surveillance programs, saying the United States could and should be more transparent.
The issue has also become a hot topic in Germany before an election next month. Some reports have suggested that German intelligence agents have cooperated with U.S. spies.
There could be a voter backlash if it emerges that Chancellor Angela Merkel, tipped to win a third term, knew more about such cooperation than she has so far acknowledged. – Reuters
Malaysia and Washington are looking to expand its defence collaboration in various areas including regional and international security, trading, military technologies and exchanging information, said Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein.
The two countries also reaffirmed their commitment to continue conducting training for humanitarian efforts, disaster relief and peacekeeping, and counter trans-national threats, piracy as well as terrorism, he said after meeting US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel here yesterday.
“The relationship between the two countries is strong, but with the visit, we believe that it has added value.
“With the strategic and unfolding landscape, it is important for us to have friends that appreciate our concern, with the ability to cooperate and share with us at many levels,” he told a joint press conference at the “US–South East Asia Ties” programme organised by the Malaysian Institute of Defence and Security (Midas), here yesterday.
Hagel said the United States would also conduct more than 75 activities this year with the armed forces, including military exchanges and visits, designed to boost capabilities and help the armed forces become more professional and flexible.
“Malaysia has always been a good friend and has played an impressive role in contributing towards regional and global security,” he said. – thestar.com
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe on Sunday threatened “tit-for-tat” actions against Western countries that have imposed sanctions on his rule, suggesting US and British firms could be targeted.
“They should not continue to harass us,” said the 89-year-old veteran leader whose re-election last month drew Western doubts over the credibility of the polls.
“We have British and American companies here and we are treating them well. There will come a time when we will lose our patience.”
The United States and European Union imposed sanctions including travel bans and asset freezes on Mugabe and members of his inner circle and several companies following 2002 elections which western observers said were rigged.
“They have companies here and we have not imposed controls or sanctions against them but time will come when we will say tit-for-tat. You hit me, I hit you. You impose this on me, I impose this on you,” Mugabe said.
“Our attitude is not going to continue as it was in the past — passive. We have had enough and enough is enough.”
Mugabe won an extension to his 33-year rule in general elections on 31 July, which were slammed as “a farce” by his rival Morgan Tsvangirai and prompted serious concerns from Western nations.
Local observers said the elections were fraught with irregularities but observers from the African Union and the regional Southern African Development Community (SADC) bloc were less critical.
Mugabe was sworn in last week after the constitutional court declared the elections “free, fair and credible”.
He has vowed to forge ahead with his controversial equity drive to force foreign companies to cede majority shares to local investors.
So far mining companies including Zimplats, a subsidiary of the South African-based Impala Platinum, and Anglo American Corporation’s Unki mines have been forced to sell their majority stake to locals.
Companies in the retail sector are set to follow.
The EU earlier this year retained an asset freeze and travel ban on Mugabe but eased most of its decade-old restrictions on Zimbabwe.
The majority of those on the US sanctions list still remain, including a travel ban and asset freeze on individuals and entities with links to Mugabe.
Mugabe was addressing mourners at the burial of Mike Karakadzai, a retired air commodore and hero of the 1970s liberation war, who died aged 56 on Tuesday.
In his first public speech since Thursday’s swearing-in, he targeted Tsvangirai, his former partner in a shaky powersharing government, as “an ignoramus” and “a lone stray locust”.
This was in reaction to Tsvangirai’s attempt to seek a court’s help to overturn the polls and his calls to rid the security forces of officers allied to Mugabe and his Zanu-PF party.
“I hope our people will never repeat the same mistake and choose an ignoramus when you have bright children who went to university. I wonder what you admire in him,” he said.
On security reforms that were meant to precede the polls, he also hit out at Tsvangirai.
“What sector reform can you a lone stray locust implement? When has the frog aspired to be the crocodile?” he said.
“You are better off with an ignorant person who is conscious of his ignorance. It becomes a problem when you assume your ignorance is wisdom and lead people into trouble.”
The vote ended the pair’s regionally brokered compromise government forced by chaotic 2008 polls.
This time round the electoral commission declared Mugabe the winner with 61 percent of the vote, against 34 percent for Tsvangirai. – AFP
Flag-waving Mugabe supporters on 13 August 2013 in Harare (AFP file photo)
by Reagan Mashavave
Veteran Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe hit out at “vile” Western critics as he was sworn in for another five-year term Thursday in a stadium packed with jubilant supporters.
Festooned in a sash, garland and medals, the 89-year-old dismissed accusations the July 31 election that returned him to power was rigged and vowed to rejuvenate the foreign-dominated banking and mining sectors.
Mugabe’s 33-year rule since Zimbabwe’s independence has been marked a drive to transfer foreign-owned and white-owned assets, including farms, to blacks.
“I promise you better conditions,” he told the 60,000 capacity crowd of supporters at a stadium in Harare.
“The mining sector will be the centrepiece of our economic recovery and growth. It should generate growth spurts across sector, reignite that economic miracle which must now happen.”
Mugabe’s inner circle has faced decades of international sanctions over rights abuses, and the veteran leader said he expected the punitive measures to continue.
“Most likely we shall remain under these sanctions for much longer.”
“We continue to look East,” Mugabe said lampooning, Western countries which have called into question the legitimacy of his election victory.
“We dismiss them as the vile ones whose moral turpitude we must mourn,” he said venting against Britain, Australia, Canada and the United States.
Former colonial power Britain called Thursday for an “independent investigation” into the conduct of the election, which Mugabe officially won by a landslide.
Unlike previous low-key investitures, Thursday’s event — replete with banners, flags and chants — carried strong echoes of Mugabe’s inauguration as prime minister of a newly independent Zimbabwe in 1980.
A no-show by many leaders from neighbouring countries — including President Jacob Zuma of regional power-broker South Africa — did little to dampen enthusiasm.
Neither did a boycott by opposition leader and former prime minister Morgan Tsvangirai, who insists the July 31 vote was stolen.
Mugabe was greeted in the stadium by thunderous cheers and whistling. On board a military truck he inspected assembled military personnel.
Gates to the Chinese-built stadium, the venue of Mugabe’s inauguration as president in 1987, opened shortly after dawn.
The day was declared a public holiday, helping boost attendance.
“Mr Mugabe, you are one of a kind,” sang a group of supporters slamming the sides of the minibus taking them to the stadium, while others waved fists as drivers honked their horns.
“It is a great day for Zimbabwe and the world will come to a standstill today,” said Alfred Tome, the Harare provincial administrator and spokesman for the organisers.
A concert will include artists from South Africa, Zambia and Jamaica –whose iconic singer Bob Marley played at Zimbabwe’s independence event.
Banners around the oval stadium carried messages praising African leaders and denouncing Western governments accused of meddling in Zimbabwe’s political affairs.
“Which African ever observed elections in Europe, America?” read one banner. “Africa has spoken, respect it’s voice,” said another.
The inauguration had been delayed after Tsvangirai challenged the poll results — which he denounced as “massive fraud” — in a petition to the Constitutional Court that was later withdrawn.
Among a series of complaints, Tsvangirai queried the suspiciously high number of voters who were turned away from polling stations in urban areas, which are considered opposition strongholds.
He also charged that his party’s supporters in rural areas were intimidated by Mugabe party backers into feigning illiteracy and voting in the presence of police and election officers.
The Constitutional Court confirmed Mugabe as president and declared the elections “free, fair and credible”, saying the results “reflected the free will of the people of Zimbabwe”.
‘Farewell event for Mugabe’
Eldred Masunungure, a political scientist from the University of Zimbabwe, said the event was at once Mugabe’s victory lap and his “last supper”.
“This inauguration is being projected as the crowning of a victory of a struggle for the past 13 years against big Western powers,” he said.
There is however also an “unintended meaning”, he said. “It can be read as a farewell event for Mugabe. It reminds one of Jesus’s Last Supper.”
The electoral commission declared Mugabe winner with 61 percent of the vote, against 34 percent for former prime minister Tsvangirai.
The vote ended a shaky power-sharing government formed by Mugabe and Tsvangirai four years ago to avoid a tip into all-out conflict following a bloody presidential run-off election in 2008.
Local observers judged the elections flawed and Western powers have raised serious doubts over the vote.
But regional groupings the Southern African Development Community and the African Union were less critical. – AFP
Police say a young woman photojournalist has been gang raped while her male colleague was tied up and beaten in India’s business hub of Mumbai. The case was reminiscent of the December gang rape of a young university student in the Indian capital.
Police said the woman was on assignment to take pictures of an abandoned textile factory in south Mumbai late Thursday when five men confronted her, and offered to help her get permission to shoot inside the building. Police Commissioner Satyapal Singh told reporters that the men tied her colleague’s hands with a belt while she was gang raped. The woman, reported to be in her early 20s, is in stable condition in hospital.
The assault comes amid heightened concerns about sexual violence in India. – AP
Egypt’s toppled dictator Hosni Mubarak was transferred from prison to house arrest at a military hospital on Thursday, in a move overshadowed by a blistering crackdown against his Islamist successors.
The former strongman, forced to quit in early 2011, was flown by medical helicopter to a military hospital, where he will remain under house arrest as he stands trial on corruption and murder charges.
His ouster in 2011 was a pivotal moment in regional democratic upheavals that in Egypt led to an Islamist government, which lasted a year before a popularly backed military coup last month.
In other circumstances, the 85-year-old’s removal from prison might have caused shockwaves.
But with Egypt mired in a deadly conflict between the military-installed government and Islamists, Mubarak’s transfer took place amid little fanfare or protest.
He was ordered released after his lawyer argued Mubarak’s stay in prison had exceeded the maximum pre-verdict detention, and Mubarak made financial amends for one of his charges.
He still faces trial for corruption and his role in the deaths of protesters during the uprising that toppled him, with his next hearing on Sunday.
Prime Minister Hazem al-Beblawi, empowered with the authority to order arrests under the current state of emergency, ordered Mubarak to be placed under house arrest after release from jail.
Mubarak chose to be held at the military hospital, the official MENA news agency reported.
The decision to grant Mubarak pre-trial release added a volatile new element to the political turmoil that has gripped Egypt since the army ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi on July 3 following massive protests against him.
More than 1,000 people have been killed in the past week in violence following the forcible break-up of two pro-Morsi camps in the capital.
Authorities have arrested dozens of members of Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood, including its supreme guide Mohamed Badie — the first time the group’s chief has been arrested since 1981.
Morsi himself is being held at a secret location and faces charges related to his 2011 escape from prison and inciting the death and torture of protesters.
The juxtaposition between the fates of the two ousted presidents, Mubarak and Morsi, is notable, analyst Hisham Kassem said.
Mubarak “committed numerous crimes… against the country, but managed to hide the evidence, particularly as all the state’s institutions were working for him at the time he was overthrown”.
“The opposite is true for Morsi, who was thrown in prison while all the state’s apparatus were against him.”
Arrests of Brotherhood leaders continued, with authorities detaining Ahmed Aref, a spokesman for the group, in Cairo.
Despite the pressure, a Brotherhood-led coalition has defiantly called for mass rallies on Friday, in a test of its support following the crackdown.
Egypt has experienced unprecedented political bloodletting since August 14, when security forces stormed two pro-Morsi protest camps in the capital.
The crackdown and resulting violence across the country killed nearly 600 people in a single day, the bloodiest in Egypt’s recent history.
Islamists have been accused of torching and attacking dozens of Christian churches, schools, businesses and homes — mostly in the rural south –accusing Egypt’s sizable Coptic minority of backing Morsi’s ouster.
On Thursday, Human Rights Watch condemned the government for failing to protect churches, but also the Brotherhood for failing to halt incitement against Christians.
Violence has also targeted police and soldiers, including two who were killed in a drive-by shooting near the Suez Canal town of Ismailia on Thursday.
The unrest has prompted international criticism, and EU foreign ministers agreed at an emergency meeting Wednesday to suspend the sale of arms and security equipment to Cairo in response to the mounting violence.
They issued a statement calling recent security operations “disproportionate”, while also condemning “acts of terrorism” in the Sinai and the church attacks.
But they expressed concern over the economic situation and said “assistance in the socio-economic sector and to civil society will continue”.
The United States has also criticised the violence, as well as Badie’s arrest, and announced the cancellation of joint military exercises.
But it has stopped short of halting its $1.3 billion annual defence aid package to Egypt, and denied reports it was withholding aid.
Washington on Thursday also sidestepped questions about Mubarak’s release, saying it was a matter for Cairo to decide, but called for Morsi to be freed.
“With respect to the Mubarak trial and decisions made, this is an internal Egyptian legal matter,” said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.
“Our position on Mr. Morsi remains the same. We believe there should be a process for his release,” Psaki said.
Reporters had for days asked the State Department to comment on the seemingly paradoxical situation of the two leaders.
Oil-rich Saudi Arabia, which backs the army-installed interim government, has said it would step in with other Arab nations to fill any funding gap if Washington halts aid.
Meanwhile, a Hamas official said Egypt was set to reopen the Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip daily from Saturday after closing it in the wake of last week’s bloodshed. – AFP
In a testament to the depravity of black thug culture, an Australian collegiate baseball player attending school in America was killed by three teenagers looking for fun, police reported. Christopher Lane, who was out for a jog in the town of Duncan, Oklahoma where his girlfriend and her family live, was targeted at random after he passed a home where the boys were staying. ”They saw Christopher go by, and one of them said: ‘There’s our target,’” said Police Chief Danny Ford. ”The boy who has talked to us said, ‘We were bored and didn’t have anything to do, so we decided to kill somebody.’”
James Edwards, 15, Chancey Luna, 16, and Michael Jones, 17, have all been charged as adults in Lane’s death. Edwards and Luna, both black Americans, have been charged with first degree murder, and will be tried as adults per Oklahoma law. Jones, who is white, was charged with using a vehicle in the discharge of a weapon and with accessory to first-degree murder after the fact. He will also be tried in adult court, but is still considered a youthful offender. If convicted, Edwards and Luna face life in prison without parole. Jones, who wept in court as he tried to talk about the crime before being cut off by the judge, faces anywhere from two years to life in prison. Edwards and Luna are being held without bond. Jones’s bond is set at $1 million.
Police noted that Lane was jogging through an affluent section of Duncan around 3 p.m. local time when a car carrying the three teenagers pulled up behind him. In court, prosecutor Jason Hicks alleged that Luna was in the back seat, Edwards was in the passenger seat and Jones was driving the vehicle. Luna allegedly shot Lane in the back with a .22 caliber revolver that has yet to be recovered. ”We were bored,” Luna reportedly admitted to authorities.
Hicks, who called the boys “thugs,” noted that Edwards found the slaying amusing. “I believe this man is a threat to the community and should not be let out,” Hicks said during the bail hearing. “He thinks it’s all a joke.” Edwards, who has had earlier run-ins with the law, had also been in court on Friday, apparently after the crime had been committed, to sign papers related to his juvenile probation.
James Johnson, who called police to tell them the trio was hiding in the carpark of the Immanuel Baptist Church about 5pm on Friday, described them in all-too-familiar terms. He called them “troublemakers” and “bullies” with no parental supervision, and said that Edwards had threatened to kill his own son using Facebook. ”They threatened to kill my son because they are in a gang, the Crips, and were trying to get my son in it and I wouldn’t let him do it.,” Johnson explained. “I told him he couldn’t run with those boys. He’s a little terrified.” Police Chief Ford believes that the teens’ wanted “to make a name for themselves” on the streets.
Indeed, a dark picture emerges as one peruses the social media sites teens like these invariably use to brag about themselves and their exploits. Before it was removed, Chauncy Luna’s Facebook page revealed he goes by the alias Baby Drake. It showed photos of him posing with friends, including Edwards, and flashing gang signs. Two pictures on James “Lilbuggy” Edwards’ Facebook page are also quite revealing. One shows a handgun, and several others show staggeringly large sums of cash. Both may be explained by another photo containing hashtags suggesting he was a member of the Crips. There is also a photo of him posing with a shotgun. ”Bitch we up them poles,” Edwards says in the clip, “F— ‘em.” (A dismantled shotgun with the serial numbers ground off was found in the car, but it is not currently known if it is the same weapon).
Tweets on Edwards’ Twitter account suggest he is racist. On April 29, he tweeted “90% of white ppl are nasty. #HATE THEM.” On July 15, shortly after George Zimmerman was acquitted, Edwards tweeted “Ayeee I knocced out 5 woods since Zimmerman court!:) lol shit ima keep sleepin shit! #ayeeee.” “Woods” is a term used to denigrate white people. Yet Chief Ford, who has yet to see Edwards’ social media, told the Daily Caller a hate crime charge is not likely. “I’m not discounting the stuff that’s on there, but they do that for shock and effect,” he contended.
The real shock and effect evidenced by this case so far is the deafening silence of the racial grievance industry along with their media and celebrity enablers who apparently see no way to exploit this tragedy. Jesse Jackson is the lone exception, if one considers a single tweet much of an effort. “Praying for the family of Chris Lane,” Jackson said Wednesday on Twitter. “This senseless violence is frowned upon and the justice system must prevail.” Not a word, however from people like Al Sharpton, Attorney General Eric Holder, or President Obama, all of whom were willing to weigh in on the Trayvon Martin case on numerous occasions.
Former Congressman Allen West directly addressed the reticence of what he characterized as the “race industry crew.” On Twitter, he castigated Obama. “‘We were bored & decided to kill somebody.’ 3 black teens shoot white jogger.Who will POTUS identify w/this time?” West tweeted Tuesday afternoon. West’s Facebook posting was equally caustic. “[S]hall we hear anything from the race industry crew, Hollywood elites, or maybe Oprah Winfrey? The issue is not about proliferation of guns in America. This is about a failing black community and the fact that its young men are desensitized to violence because a gangsta culture promotes it,” West wrote.
The apologists for the status quo invariably point to America’s long and tattered track record of racism, going all the way back to the days of slavery, to explain the cultural dysfunction behind such heinous crimes. Yet as black conservatives such as Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams have pointed out on numerous occasions, black Americans were making steady progress in times that were far more racist (and poorer) than today. Yet today, in a time of vastly more racial equality and wealth redistribution, black men between the ages of 14 and 24 commit homicides at a rate 10 times that of young white and Hispanic males combined, according to a study by Northeastern University.
The key factors observers like Sowell and Williams frequently point to are the destruction of the nuclear family and the widespread glorification of social dysfunction. Though they affect all racial groups to varying degrees (after all, one conspirator in the Lane killing was white) no one can dispute their devastating effects on the black community. Rather than address this, many politicians, businessmen and entertainers hypocritically glamorize, enrich themselves and further their careers by promoting this culture of destruction. Thus, as Barack Obama wonders aloud how America “can bolster and reinforce our African-American boys,” he pals around with rapper Jay-Z, who has become a multi-millionaire rapping about guns, dope, misogyny and gratuitous violence. Amazon.com is selling a line of Trayvon Martin hoodies, while Ebony magazine has published several covers with celebrities dressed in the same thug-symbolizing attire. A director at the Smithsonian Institute expressed an interest in displaying Martin’s hoodie there, before the idea was ultimately rejected.
Yet when violence occurs, “civil rights” leaders like Jesse Jackson call it “senseless” and carefully avoid drawing attention to the real problem. The same goes for all the celebrities who have lined up to turn Trayvon Martin into a cause célèbre, but are currently nowhere to be found or heard on the Lane case. And despite wall-to-wall media coverage of this atrocity, principal deputy White House press secretary Josh Earnest professed ignorance about the case, before claiming he “wouldn’t want to get ahead of the legal process here.” When Fox News chief White House correspondent Ed Henry noted President Obama was more than willing to get ahead of the legal process with regard to Trayvon Martin, Earnest offered up a generic response about the president’s “concerns” regarding the “impact of violence and whether there is more we can do to try to protect our children.”
We can’t protect our children from a thug culture when those who know better can’t be bothered to acknowledge its existence because it doesn’t accrue to their political advantage. And while the social dysfunction proliferates, blessed by the liberal and cultural elite, the racial divide widens. That is the real reason why the usual suspects have nothing to say about the killing of Christopher Lane. They know they, too, are part of the problem. – frontpagemag.com
One of the teens charged with first-degree murder in the shooting death of Australian baseball player Christopher Lane in Duncan, Okla. in the US, previously posted anti-white statements on his Twitter feed.
James Edwards, 15, Chancey Luna, 16, and Michael Jones, 17, have all been charged as adults in Lane’s death. Lane, a 22 year-old student from Melbourne, was out for a jog last Friday evening when the three teens began following him in a car and shot him “just for the fun of it,” according to Duncan officials.
Edwards and Luna are charged with first-degree murder while Jones is accused of using a vehicle in the discharge of a weapon and as an accessory to first-degree murder after the fact. Edwards and Luna are held without bond; Jones’ bond has been set at $1 million.
Edwards’ social media activities are still on stark display and show the teen glorifying hip-hop, violence and sex. Pictures on Facebook also show Edwards and Luna wearing gang colors and flashing gang signs.
A couple of Tweets also suggest that Edwards wasn’t fond of white people.
On April 29, he tweeted, “90% of white ppl are nasty. #HATE THEM.” – Daily Caller
The United Nation Security Council (UNSC) has echoed sentiments by the UN Secretary General of strong concern for the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria.
Opposition groups have accused the Syrian government of firing rockets with poisonous gas on residential areas early Wednesday morning, with reports claiming hundreds if not over one thousand victims. The allegations are uncorroborated but vehemently denied by the Syrian army.
The Council was briefed by the deputy Secretary General on the situation in Syria in an emergency session late Wednesday.
“There is a strong concern among council members about the allegations. There is also a general sense that there must be clarity on what happened and that the situation has to be followed carefully. All council members agreed that any use of chemical weapons by any side under any circumstances is a violation of international law,” says Council President Argentina’s Ambassador Maria Perceval at an emergency session in New York.
A UN team is on the ground to investigate earlier claims of chemical weapons usage and is now pushing to examine the site of Wednesday’s attack.
Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson called the latest attack an escalation. “We see the need to investigate this as soon as possible. This represents, no matter what the conclusions are, a serious escalation with grave humanitarian consequences and human consequences. We hope that we will be able to conduct the investigation. Dr Sellström and his team are in place in Damascus,” says Eliasson.
Syria would have to agree to any change in the team’s mandate to include additional sites. Modalities for the inspection of three earlier sites took months to iron out with the team only arriving in Damascus just this weekend.
“It is a very dramatic situation and the security situation right now does not allow such access and that is why this should also be seen in the broader perspective. We need cessation of hostilities in this particular area and in general,” he added.
The mandate of the investigators is a limited one they are merely to establish whether chemical weapons were used in Syria and not who used them.
That, the Secretary General said earlier this week, would be for member states to decide, perhaps the Security Council which has two options, to break the stalemate on Syria and agree on a course of action or engage in more of the same. But first an investigation must still take place to clarify what are to date merely accusations and denials. – SABC
Hundreds of people, who have marched on Parliament in Cape Town to protest against the ousting of Egyptian President, Mohamed Morsi, have dispersed after handing over a memorandum to a member of the Committee for International Relations.
The protesters marched to parliament in Cape Town today condemning what they called “illegitimate military rulers who are trying to silence the voices of peaceful protesters in Egypt”.
Some Capetonians who were present at a demonstration organised by the Muslim Judicial Council support the council’s view that Morsi’s ousting undermines democracy.
Secretary General of the MJC, Abdul-Khaliq Ebrahim Allie has described the events taking place in Egypt as “unacceptable.”
“We are speaking as fellow South Africans who have enjoyed democracy, South Africans that have seen apartheid. What we see and witness in Egypt today is unacceptable. And as fellow South Africans, we are saying to the Egyptians that we stand with the masses who have elected the first democratically elected government. This we regard as a military coup.”
Some said the MJC did not speak on behalf of Egyptians.
“I’m an Egyptian citizen living in South Africa. I really love and appreciate the freedom in this country. They have changed the Constitution in Egypt. They want us to go backwards again. They don’t want us to be a prosperous country. Besides the fact that I’m an Egyptian, this violates everything to do with Human Rights, and we are here to show our support for the Muslim brothers and sisters who are being killed in Egypt for the mere fact that they stood up against oppression and injustice.”
Meanwhile, an Egyptian court has ordered the release of former President Hosni Mubarak. Security sources say he will leave prison later in the day as there are no longer any legal grounds for his detention.
85-year old Mubarak was being retried on charges of ordering the killing of protesters during the 2011 uprising that led to his downfall. Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison last year for failing to prevent the killing of demonstrators.
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The United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) has defended its decision to hold its General Assembly in Zimbabwe.
