Europe – Page 37 – praag.org

Total CEO sees no reason to pay for oil in dollar

Christophe de Margerie, Total’s chief executive said on Saturday the euro should have a bigger role in international trade.

The oil major’s CEO was responding to questions about calls by French policymakers to find ways at EU level to bolster the use of the euro in international business following a record U.S. fine for BNP.

“There is no reason to pay for oil in dollars,” he said. He said the fact that oil prices are quoted in dollars per barrel did not mean that payments actually had to be made in that currency.

French Finance Minister Michel Sapin said on Thursday that euro zone finance ministers would discuss ways of boosting use of the euro in international trade in their next monthly meeting on Monday.

“It would be a way to protect businesses when, outside of U.S. territory, they carry out transactions that are perfectly legal in the country they belong to,” he said.

Source: Reuters

German agent arrested for spying raise fears of serious US rift

A suspected double agent has been arrested in Germany accused of spying for the United States, raising fears of a serious rift between the two allies.

The arrested man, who is a German citizen, is a member of the country’s own BND intelligence service, and German media warned that if the case against him is proved, “it will be the biggest scandal involving a German-American double agent since the war”.

“The matter is serious, that is very clear,” a government spokesman told journalists. It is evident that the German authorities are taking the matter seriously. An emergency meeting of a parliamentary oversight committee was convened at short notice, and briefed by the head of the BND, Gerhard Schindler.

The German government has not denied reports by Der Spiegel and the Sueddeutsche Zeitung that the suspected spy was a double agent and worked for Germany’s foreign intelligence service, the BND.

The newspapers said the man allegedly passed the US information about a German parliamentary committee’s investigation into the NSA’s activities.

He claimed to have worked with US intelligence since 2012, they reported. A spokesman for the German government, Steffen Seibert, told reporters that the Chancellor and members of the parliamentary panel had been informed of the arrest.

It appears from details leaked to the German media that the man has been passing highly classified intelligence documents to the Americans for the last two years, in exchange for tens of thousands of euros.

It was he who first initiated contact, in an email to the US embassy offering classified information in return for cash, according to reports in both Spiegel magazine and Bild newspaper.

Since then he has handed over between 200 and 300 documents. He had access to the classified material because of his work for the BND, and would travel to Austria to hand it to an American intelligence contact by USB stick.

There were at least three such meetings in Austria, and another meeting was planned for next week, this time in the Czech capital Prague.

He was paid €25,000 for the documents, according to Bild, which reported that he received his instructions directly from the US embassy in Berlin. Germany summoned the US ambassador in Berlin on Friday.

A statement from the foreign ministry said John B. Emerson was called in “in connection with an investigation by the federal prosecutor” and “was asked to help in the swift clarification” of the case.

The latest allegations of spying by the US, Germany’s supposed ally, have provoked outrage across the country, where memories of espionage by the Stasi secret police are still fresh for some residents.

A member of the opposition on the NSA inquiry panel, said the case indicated that anyone who examined Snowden’s revelations in detail was subject to scrutiny by US intelligence agencies. “If the media reports are confirmed then there can’t just be a legal response, there also has to be a political response,” she said.

Thomas Opperman, secretary of the Social Democratic Party group, said: “If the espionage allegations are proved, it is an outrageous attack on our parliamentary freedom.

“There is no justification for any power or country to enlist intelligence agents to spy on parliament.”

Another opposition parliamentarian told Spiegel Online: “All co-operation between German security services and allied agencies need to be reviewed.

“Should the suspected intelligence service spying on the parliamentary investigative committee be proved, it will be a huge fiasco for the BND and the government.”

The US National Security Council declined to comment.

Austrian bank Erste suffers record loss

Austria’s largest bank by assets, and the third biggest bank in Eastern Europe after UniCredit and Raiffeisen, announced that its earlier forecast about the amount of bad loans on its books is wrong, and will have to rise by a massive 40%, leading to what will be a record $2.2 billion loss, and triggering writedowns.

Analysts, whose job it is to predict these things, were shocked:”This is a clearly bad surprise as it comes in addition to the already ‘badly surprising’ warning issued by the group at the beginning of this year,” Natixis Securities SAS analyst Steven Gould said in a note to clients. “These announcements hurt the management’s credibility going forward.”

What was the catalyst for the early recognition of the massive writedown? Bloomberg explains:

The provisions are caused by new rules due to be approved by Parliament in Hungary today, forcing banks to refund unfair loan fees, and by the Romanian central bank’s push for faster bad-debt reduction amid the European Central Bank’s bank health check, Erste said. Writedowns on goodwill and deferred tax assets, triggered by the loan-loss provisions, may reach as much as 1 billion euros.

“By taking these measures, we have done everything in our power to avoid one-off effects from 2015 onward,” Chief Executive Officer Andreas Treichl said in the statement. “We are convinced that these measures will also help us pass the asset-quality review and stress test comfortably.”

Hungary contributed to Erste’s loss with a new law forcing it to repay some loan costs to customers. New rules due to be approved by Parliament in Budapest today will require banks to refund certain expenses on as much as 6.5 trillion forint ($28 billion) of loans going back as far as 10 years, according to the draft bill.

Higher bad-debt provisions in Romania, the Black Sea country of 20 million where Erste bought Banca Comerciala Romana SA for 3.75 billion euros in 2005, were caused by the central bank’s pressure on banks to clean up their balance sheets as part of the ECB’s bank health check, Erste said.

EU joins campaign to boycott Israel

Amid growing Palestine-Israeli tensions, 12 more EU states have joined European heavyweights – such as the UK, Germany and France – in urging their nationals to refrain from doing business in Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

The group of those who issued warnings for their citizens on includes: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, Slovakia, and Slovenia.

The European nations stated that Israeli settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, Gaza and the Golan Heights are illegal and hamper a peaceful settlement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Involvement in business activities in the area carries both financial and reputational risks for investors, they warned.

The European states also pointed out that the EU “will not recognize any changes to the pre-1967 borders, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties”.

According to Irish Ministry of Foreign Affairs: “Financial transactions, investments, purchases, procurements as well as other economic activities (including in services like tourism) in Israeli settlements or benefiting Israeli settlements, entail legal and economic risks stemming from the fact that the Israeli settlements, according to international law, are built on occupied land and are not recognised as a legitimate part of Israel’s territory”.

“This may result in disputed titles to the land, water, mineral or other natural resources which might be the subject of purchase or investment,” the ministry said, adding that in case of disputes “it could be very difficult for Member States to ensure national protection of their interests”.

So far, 17 European countries have issued such advice to their citizens. Earlier this week, France, Italy, and Spain published their communiqués; Germany and the UK did so several months ago. Latvia is expected to join the group later this week, while Poland and Sweden are likely to do so in the near future, according to Haaretz.

At the same time, several other EU nations, including Cyprus, Lithuania, Estonia, Bulgaria, Romania, the Czech Republic and Hungary, have made it clear that they are not planning to warn on the matter, the Israeli paper wrote.

Israeli settlement policy has been among key stumbling blocks in the long-standing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. US Secretary of State John Kerry suggested that Israel’s approval to build over 700 new housing units in East Jerusalem – which the Palestinians want as the capital of their state – was among the reasons that led to the derailment of the April peace talks. The derailed negotiations were a result of Kerry’s eight-month effort to broker an Israeli-Palestinian peace accord.

The American diplomat said earlier that both sides had taken steps that were not helping the progress. But then, “when they were about to maybe get there, 700 settlement units were announced in Jerusalem, and poof, that was sort of the moment,” he said appearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Despite increasing international criticism over the settlements in the occupied territories, on June 5, Israel announced its plans to build 1,500 more homes in the area.

Source: RT

US supports ethnic cleansing in Ukraine

Poroshenko wants to rid Ukraine of ‘parasites’

On Wednesday, July 2nd, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko resumed unlimited war against the residents of southeastern Ukraine, whom he calls “terrorists” for their wanting not to be killed by his troops. European leaders (especially Merkel of Germany, Hollande of France, and Putin of Russia) urged him not to resume his bombing campaign against the southeast, but the U.S. (specifically President Obama) supports the bombings, and that’s enough for Poroshenko; so, he did it.

As the U.S. State Department said, “he has a right to defend his country.” Reuters reports that Poroshenko gave as his reason for the resumption, “to rid Ukraine of ‘parasites’.” Adolf Hitler had given the same reason for ethnically cleansing his country.

Here are graphic images of the Obama Administration’s sponsored ethnic cleansing.

After this ethnic cleansing, maybe Ukraine can have another nationwide election, which will produce the type of outcome that the U.S. Government likes. But on 25 May 2014, we held in Ukraine an election where people voted only in the pro-American portion of Ukraine, and only leaders who were acceptable to the U.S. White House were allowed onto the ballot.

America’s “news” media are not reporting on America’s ethnic-cleansing program in Ukraine. It’s happening in the dark, as far as the American public are concerned: they don’t know about it.

Washington’s people do not call this ethnic cleansing operation what it is; they instead call it Ukraine’s “Anti Terrorist Operation,” or “ATO” for short. The people we’re massacring are “Terrorists.” What they actually are is simply the residents in the parts of Ukraine that had voted overwhelmingly for Viktor Yanukovych on 7 February 2010 to become President, the final nationwide election in Ukraine.

The United States itself are actually terrorizing them.

And the Government that Obama put in place in Kiev, which is a government by Ukrainian oligarchs whom Obama’s agent Victoria Nuland selected and placed in control, is now advertising on the television stations that those oligarchs own, advertising that the people who live in Ukraine’s southeast are destroying the country and must therefore be destroyed by patriotic Ukrainians.

The government’s Defense Minister announces publicly that concentration camps are being established in order to deal with any who don’t flee. The message to those “Terrorists” is clear: flee, or else die. The government has even announced that the military volunteers who go to the southeast to do the killing are patriots, whose reward will be that they will receive the properties of everyone they kill.

A Google-search of “Ukraine” at a typical U.S. news site yields little — and nothing at all about this slaughter that our Government is financing and put into place there.

For example, at the left-wing Huffington Post, the search produces articles about supposed “aggression” by Russia for its accepting Crimea back into the Russian Federation after all public opinion polls and a public referendum in that region, which had been Russian until 1954, showed massive public support there for rejoining Russia.

A recent Gallup poll of Crimeans confirmed that they craved to rejoin Russia and are now delighted that they did. HuffPo has only news-wire reports about Ukraine, mainly AP and Reuters, screaming things like “Ukraine Vows To Punish Rebels Who Downed Plane.”

There’s nothing about the genocide.

For example, there’s no mention that this “plane” had been carrying 49 troops to murder civilians in the southeast where a genocide is taking place to clear the land and terrify the residents to flee into Russia. It’s a classic ethnic-cleansing campaign, and Obama put it into place. Americans don’t know.

One article is a March 3rd poll, which showed “Few Americans want the United States getting involved in policing the political turmoil in Ukraine.” The presumption there was that “we” shouldn’t fix “their” problems.” Who knew that “we,” our own President, is the mastermind behind that “turmoil,” and of this actual ethnic cleansing campaign?

This made-in-America horror story, which will only grow as the years roll by, just as is already happening in Iraq.

Remember Iraq? This one will be vastly worse.

Because, if the American public doesn’t start investigating this now, then the results for all of us will be far worse, especially because this one could end in a nuclear war.

Barack Obama’s Ukrainian gambit is the most evil and worst part of his entire Presidency, and you will be shocked to learn about it, and how evil it is.

Because the American press hasn’t told you about it. But it’s not too late for you to find out.

Source: globalresearch.ca

French luxury firm gets sued for racism at its London store

Top fashion house Louis Vuitton is being sued over racism claims after a boss at a flagship store allegedly told an African employee: “Black people are slaves who eat dirt off the floor.”

Sales associate Oliver Koffi claims he was in a stock room packing a pair of shoes for a customer when his manager began the shocking race rant in front of stunned staff.

He alleged that the manager called Barack Obama a “muppet” and said America would be better off with “Miss Piggy” as its president because “Muslim people… don’t eat pork”.

Mr Koffi says he was left humiliated by the “black slaves” slur while working at the label’s store in Central London.

Details of the allegations emerged in papers which will be presented to a Central London Employment Tribunal on July 18.

Mr Koffi is suing Louis Vuitton for racist discrimination and harassment.

He claims his manager’s tone of voice was “cold and serious” as he made the comments during a discussion on the origins of the English language with him and three other members of staff in December last year.

Mr Koffi said: “During this discussion, my manager quite randomly stated that ‘black people are slaves and eat dirt off the floor’.

“This comment was grossly offensive and extremely humiliating.

“His reference to slavery in this day and age with regards to black people is quite frankly revolting.”

Mr Koffi was a contract worker at the Louis Vuitton Townhouse at London’s iconic Selfridges department store at the time of the incident.

He says he recorded the offensive comments on tape after concerns over the manager’s alleged “racist conduct”.

He added: “He went on a rant about black people and other races and religions. He jumped from subject to subject, making comments about other races and religions. He made comments about Barack Obama.

“All of his comments were derogatory and a clear illustration of his prejudices towards other races and religions.

“His comments were offensive and degrading. I confronted him about his statement that ‘black people are slaves and eat dirt off the floor’.

“I told him that I was offended by his comment. He did not deny making the comment. He apologised and claimed it was a ‘joke’. It was not a joke at all.”

Mr Koffi says the manager, who left his job following a disciplinary proceeding, had previously questioned him about his nationality, asking, “where are you originally from?” and often referred to customers by their skin colour.

He alleges that the manager’s frequent remarks about Asian people and his comments about some Louis Vuitton products being “s***” because they were “made in China” created a “hostile and intimidating” working environment.

His solicitor Lawrence Davies, of Equal Justice solicitors, said: “The case will set the 21st century bar as to what employers have to do to prevent racism in the workplace.”

Louis Vuitton accepts that the racist comment was made but defends the claim on the basis the company had taken all reasonably practicable steps to prevent the racist comment.

High-end fashion has recently faced a barrage of racism claims, with models Naomi Campbell and Imam supporting worldwide diversity campaigns.

Yesterday a spokeswoman for Louis Vuitton said: “Louis Vuitton has a zero-tolerance policy to harassment of any kind.

“This reported sentiment is in total violation of the Louis Vuitton Ethical charter.

“This issue was investigated, and the manager in question no longer works within the company.” – The Daily Mirror

Irish schoolboys walk off soccer field due to ‘racist abuse’

Carrigaline United U15s made a brave decision in a crucial league match – and they’ve been punished for it in a manner that seems, at least on the face of it, unimaginably harsh.

One of the team had been subjected to what the Irish examiner described as “a tirade of verbal racist abuse” from one of the players on the opposing team during a Cork Schoolboys League match.

All of the players, and in particular the victim, were hugely disturbed by what had taken place as they came in at half-time – and with the referee taking no action, Carrigaline manager Mark McCarthy refused to allow his players back on the pitch.

Did the league support the stand against racism? they did not – and indeed McCarthy was called in front of the league’s disciplinary panel, at which the team was handed a €200 fine.

“I know things are said on the field of play, but you have to take a stand,” McCarthy told the paper.

“We are a multicultural society and our sports clubs and teams reflect that. We feel we are being punished for taking a stand. These are only kids who want to play a game and we think the league is hiding behind the rule book here.”

There is a caveat to add to the story at this point: the match was a crucial game which Carrigaline needed to win to avoid relegation. They were trailing 1-0 at half-time when they refused to re-start, so the logical inference from the league’s decision – albeit one not articulated in the Irish Examiner’s piece – is that Carrigaline’s complaint was dismissed out of hand and the club simply fined for refusing to play and demanding a re-match in a game that was going against them.

It was not the first time during the season that the Carrigaline player had been abused, an incident which came up before the league’s disciplinary committee – but McCarthy claims that his victim felt that his appearance before that committee following the first incident was not worthwhile:

“He felt it was a waste of his time,” McCarthy explained.

“He’s been subjected to this kind of thing twice. The second time, I had to make a stand.”

The Examiner’s report adds that “Eddie Doyle, the honorary secretary of the Cork Schoolboys League, declined to discuss the details of the disciplinary committee hearings. But he said the league does follow the FAI’s code of practice for dealing with racist incidents, which are on the increase.”

It is not the first time that a player has walked off to protest racist abuse: AC Milan’s Kevin-Prince Boateng picked up the ball and walked off the pitch after being abused during a friendly last year, forcing the abandonment of the game.

The Italian FA’s stance was very different: they branded it “unspeakable and intolerable” and saluted Boateng for his stand, while FIFA president Sepp Blatter subsequently backed the decision to walk off. – Eurosport

100 blacks storm EU fence, only 20 get in

Officials say around 100 migrants of sub-Saharan origin have stormed the barbed-wire border fence separating Spain’s North African enclave of Melilla from Morocco, with 20 managing to get across.

An Interior Ministry statement Tuesday said the storming occurred at 6 a.m. The migrants who avoided being repelled by police made their way to the city’s temporary migrant accommodation center. Police eventually repatriate the migrants or let them go.

There were no reports of injuries.

Also, Spain’s maritime rescue service said 10 migrants were intercepted trying to reach Spain by boat after crossing the Strait of Gibraltar.

Thousands of African immigrants living illegally in Morocco regularly try to enter Spain’s enclaves of Melilla and Ceuta in a bid to reach Europe in search of a better life.

Source: mailonline

US blackmailing French banks says Putin

Vladimir Putin said that Russia was aware of pressure that the United States puts on France over the deal to build the Mistral warships for Russia and views it as blackmail, RIA reports. “What is being done now with the French banks causes nothing but outrage in Europe and in our country as well,” Putin said at a meeting with Russian ambassadors and permanent envoys.

“We are aware of the pressure that our American partners exert on France with a purpose of not to deliver the Mistral warships to Russia. And we know even that the United States hinted that if the French do not deliver the Mistrals, then sanctions will gradually be lifted from the banks, or at least be reduced to minimum. If this is not blackmail, then what is it?” he added.

His comments came after leading French bank BNP Paribas pleaded guilty Monday to US criminal charges of violating sanctions on Iran and Sudan for eight years and was fined a record $8.9 billion.

France’s largest bank BNP Paribas has sufficient funding to back the fine and penalties it needs to pay under settlements with US authorities over sanctions busting, the French bank’s top executives said on Tuesday.

“Our liquidity situation, we always guided it as being ample,” said Chief Financial Officer Lars Machenil, “At Q1 we had an overall excess of stable funding of 100 billion in euros out of which 50 billion was in US dollars. Yesterday when I looked into the systems…, that figure was basically unchanged at the end of the (second) quarter. This should allow having relevant cash for the settlement.”

The Financial Officer added that there was “no hurry” to seek the additional tier 1 funding that is seen as a key measure of bank stability as a result of having to pay the fine, set at almost $9 under a settlement announced late on Monday in the US.

Machenil also said that the bank plans to offer cash dividends for this year at 1.5 euro per share, the same as it was in 2013.

France’s largest bank becomes the seventh bank to settle a violations case. “Like other banks, BNP hid the names of Sudanese and Iranian clients when sending transactions coursing through its New York operations and the broader American financial system,” media report.

France’s BNP to pay US $9 bln for violating American sanctions
BNP Paribas has neared a deal with US prosecutors that would see the French bank pay $8 billion to $9 billion and accept other punitive measures for violating American sanctions, The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday.

It also demonstrates that in the increasingly more fragile alliance against Russia, more of Obama’s foreign policy partners are turning their backs on the US.

The WSJ reports “a group of 400 Russian sailors are scheduled to arrive on June 22 in the French Atlantic port of Saint-Nazaire to undergo months of instruction before some of them pilot the first of two Mistral-class carriers back to Russia in the fall, said one of these people.”

As the WSJ explains, the training is a pivotal step that deepens France’s commitment to fulfilling the €1.2 billion ($1.6 billion) contract to supply Russia with the carriers, which are built to launch amphibious attacks with landing craft, helicopters and tanks.

Calling off the Mistral contract, a French official said, would be akin to “shooting yourself in the foot,” forcing Paris to take the costly step of reimbursing Moscow.

France has already completed the first ship and built half of the second Mistral, which is scheduled for delivery in 2015. The second ship is named The Sevastopol after the Crimean port that serves as a headquarters for Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

The Mistral is a potent weapon. The length of more than two football fields, the ship is designed to edge up to a shoreline and deploy more than a dozen tanks and attack helicopters as well as hundreds of troops.

The ship also plugs a crucial gap in Russia’s armed forces. Moscow boasts one of the world’s largest armies and a formidable air force. But Russia’s Black Sea fleet lacks an amphibious vessel like the Mistral, capable of launching a land invasion. That weakness deprived Moscow of a crucial knockout punch in 2008, when Russian troops invaded Georgia but never managed to dominate the former Soviet countries shoreline, forcing a stalemate.

“A ship like that would have allowed the Black Sea Fleet to accomplish its mission in 40 minutes,” Russian Navy Admiral Vladimir Vysotkiy said at the time.

Ukraine’s leverage evaporates

Vladimir Putin has scored a massive political victory in the heart of the Eurozone, after Austria openly defied NATO and sided with Russia.

Russia has an alternative pathway for its gas, one which bypasses Ukraine entirely and as the current South Stream framework is set up, crosses the Black Sea and enters Bulgaria before passing Serbia and Hungary on the way to the Central European energy hub located in Baumgarten, Austria.

The latest development comes only one short month after Putin concluded a game-changing deal with Beijing.

As Itar-Tass reports, citing Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller, “Russia’s gas giant Gazprom does not rule out gas transit via Ukraine may be stopped completely.”

“What happened once is a tendency, nothing happens incidentally. In 2009, gas supplies were stopped completely — so, we know precedents,” Miller told a briefing on Friday.

Clearly, this is bad news for Ukraine: Gazprom is no longer interested in participation in Ukraine’s gas transportation system (GTS).

“That train has departed”, the CEO said.

“It seems it departed yesterday,” Miller said. “It belongs to no one. The GTS has no owner,” he said. “The GTS of Ukraine does not belong to Naftogaz but to the Ukrainian government. Before discussing things with someone regarding modernization and cooperation, it should appear on the balance sheet of this or that economic entity.”

“Property and legal issues should be resolved first,” Miller said.

In fact, the civil war torn country may soon lose all leverage it had with both Europe and Russia as a transit hub for natural gas, which also means that it is quite likely that Ukraine is about to be abandoned by its western allies who will no longer have any practical use for it.

The Gazprom chief added that “a dozen Ukrainian laws need to be changed to be able to do something with the GTS.”

Confirming that Ukraine’s leverage at least with Russia is now effectively zero, Gazprom’s CEO also said that “As for the continuation of negotiations with Ukraine, today there is no subject for talks. First, they must repay their debts.”

“The gas price for Ukraine is fair – this price is fixed in the contract,” he stressed.

There have been no requests on the part of Ukraine’s national oil and gas company Naftogaz Ukrainy on a change of the transit deal with Russia, Alexei Miller said.

NATO will now turn its attention to the countries which the South Stream pipeline passes through.

Bulgaria, has just suffered its worst bank run in 17 years, and one which has paved the way to early elections.

This may provide the US with a government which will be more focused on their interests, instead of the current regime, whose allegiance to the Kremlin is said to take precedence.

The South Stream countries – starting with Bulgaria, and going through Serbia, Hungary, Slovenia, Italy and of course, Austria – will suffer scrutiny.

Finally, and perhaps most notably, is last week’s announcement by Gazprom CEO Miller that Gazprom is interested in discussing buying a stake in the Baumgarten gas hub.

“They do everything to disrupt this contract. There is nothing unusual here. This is an ordinary competitive struggle. In the course of this competition, political tools are also being used,” the Russian president said after holding talks with his Austrian counterpart, President Heinz Fischer, in Vienna.

Fischer defended the South Stream project, saying: “No one can explain to me – and I can’t explain to the Austrian people – why a pipeline that crosses EU and NATO countries can’t go 50 km into Austria.”

The mood turned jovial during Putin’s recent visit when the head of Austria’s chamber of commerce reminded Putin that part of Ukraine had belonged to Austria in 1914.

“What is that supposed to mean? What are you proposing?” Putin quipped, eliciting laughter from the business elite.

The one place which now matters most for Europe’s energy future is Austria.

Gazprom chief Alexei Miller said earlier he was in weekly if not daily contact with European Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger about winning approval for the South Stream project.

British MPs too white says David Cameron

‘MPs do not represent the people of Britain properly because they are too white’

David Cameron, the Prime Minister, said there is ‘much more to be done’ to encourage more people from ethnic minority backgrounds to enter Parliament.

The Prime Minister said there is “much more to be done” to encourage more people from ethnic minority backgrounds to enter Parliament.

Mr Cameron made the comments in a preface to a book, “Rainbow over Westminster”, which charts the increasing number of MPs who are black or from ethnic minority backgrounds.

In the preface, Mr Cameron said that the book “serves as a reminder – that there is much more to be done.

“Our Parliament is still nowhere near representative enough of the country we live in today.

“We should not presume that this will simply correct itself over time. History isn’t written for us: it is written by us.”

Mr Cameron said that he hoped the book – which is edited by the Labour MP Keith Vaz, who became the first British Indian to sit in the Commons for over 60 years when he was elected in 1987 – would help “to open up politics further”.

Since the first MP was elected 172 years ago, there have been 38 ethnic minority MPs in the Commons. Today 26 out of 650 MPs are from BME backgrounds.

In the 2010 election 16 men and women from black and ethnic minority backgrounds were elected – a quintupling on the three who were elected in 1987.

In an introduction, John Bercow, the Commons’ Speaker, said: “We need to ensure that we continue to benefit from the greater diversity of elected representatives.”

Mark Hammond, chief executive of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said: “Parliament should be drawing from the widest talent pool so that people from a range of backgrounds have the opportunity to take part in political life and help make fair and well-informed decisions.”

Mr Cameron’s remarks come after research published last month from the Policy Exchange thinktank, which said that non-white people will make up between 20 and 30 per cent of the population by 2050. The current share is around 14 per cent.

The think-tank, which has close links to the Conservative Party leadership, also highlighted the differing political leanings of different ethnic groups, advising politicians not to treat non-white voters as a uniform group.

The coming growth in Britain’s non-white population is largely explained by a higher birth-rate among ethnic minority Britons.

A quarter of all children under 10 in the UK are from ethnic minorities.

By contrast, 95 per cent of people aged over 60 are white.

The Conservative Party is doing more to reach out to black and ethnic minority groups, although it refuses to make such moves public.

In April, Michael Gove, the Education secretary and a Tory moderniser, issued the said the Tories should reclaim the term “multi-culturalism”.

He told an audience at the Asian Business Awards told the 500-strong black tie dinner at a hotel in central London earlier this month that Britain was a “stronger country” because of its history of immigration.

He said: “The answer to how we make our country strong in the future is that we welcome talent from whenever it comes and we celebrate the fact that we are stronger together as a United Kingdom, as a multi-cultural nation than we could ever be if we looked back to the past.”

Source: The Telegraph

Austrian Freedom Party tops the polls with 28%

Vienna – the conservative Freedom Party (Freiheitlichen Partei Österreichs – FPÖ) is now the strongest political party in Austria, according to the latest polls. If an election had to be held in the country today, 28 percent of Austrians would vote for the FPÖ, showing an increase from March this year. The Freedom Party is extending its lead over the leftist Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) that is currently showing 23 percent support.

The recent poll published by the magazine News prompted analysts to predict further gains ahead for the Freedom Party.

Christina Matzka of meinungsraum.at commented on the poll: “This is not a passing fad. The Freedom Party seems to be establishing itself in first place and rising without stopping. The cause is the unhappiness with government and government inaction. A quick agreement on tax reform gave them some buyoncy, for example. So they have not assuaged the dissatisfaction of the people.”

The Freedom Party has cemented itself around the 20 percent mark and 19 percent of the 800 people polled (margin of error +/- 3,5 percent) said they would vote for the party. The Greens are at 14 percent (plus 2), while the Neos are weakening, declining with four percentage points to 10 percent. The Stronach Team, currently at 2 percent, seems without any hope.

Also in a direct vote for the Chancellorship has the weakness of the top policitians become evident: the leader of the Freedom Party, Heinz-Christian Strache, has overtaken the current chancellor and chairman of the Social Democrats, Werner Faymann, with 15 percent against 14 percent. Only nine percent of voters support the vice-chancellor and leader of the Austrian People’s Party, Michael Spindelegger.

Kiev puppets want Putin killed

A Verkhovna Rada deputy who is also an ex-defense minister of Ukraine, said during a prime time talk-show that the country’s “patriots” would be justified “to kill” the very popular Russian President Vladimir Putin if he came to Kiev.

Anatoly Gritsenko made his shocking statement speaking on the popular national talk show ‘Shuster Live’.

“Putin won’t stop. He wants not only Ukraine, he wants the Baltic States and other countries,” claimed Gritsenko, who was a presidential candidate twice, in the 2010 and 2014 Ukrainian elections. Gritsenko did not elaborate on what had driven him to such a conclusion.

Calling the Russian president “a fascist,” Gritsenko went on to say that he cannot imagine Vladimir Putin coming to Ukraine to sign some kind of a deal.

“I believe there are patriots who would volunteer to kill him – and that would be the right thing to do,” Gritsenko remarked.

Source: RT