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Archive for September, 2011

Welcome to a New, Free Libya: Rebels Continue to Round Up, Rape and Imprison Blacks, Force Them to Chant ‘Allah Akbar’

09/19/2011 Leave a comment

NATO, is this the liberated Libya you fought to build up? …

BBC – “Hundreds of African migrant workers in Libya have been imprisoned by fighters allied to the new interim authorities, accused of being mercenaries for Col Muammar Gaddafi, and there are claims that homes have been looted, and women and girls beaten and raped, as the BBC’s Ian Pannell reports.

It was a visit the Nigerian family had been dreading.

They had been hiding in their tiny slum home in a Tripoli suburb since Col Gaddafi had been swept from power, fearing the knock at the door. Earlier this month 20 rebel fighters came, demanding to be let in, shouting ‘murtazaka’.

It is the word every black African in Libya knows too well. Murtazaka is Arabic for ‘mercenary’, the armed men allegedly employed by the former regime to carry out some of the worst excesses of the conflict.

The fighters forced their way into the Nigerian family’s home. They beat the couple living there. They stole their possessions and money, abducted the father of the house and turned on his 16-year-old daughter. She told us what happened:

‘A group of armed men came to our house. They started knocking, they came in saying ‘murtazaka’. They locked my mother inside a toilet. Six of them raped me. They took our belongings and money. My father tried to stop them but they hit him and carried him away.’

That was nearly three weeks ago and she has not seen or heard of her father since.” Read more.

Obama-backed rebels torture, lynch, even behead Libyan blacks – “There are persistent reports that U.S.-backed Libyan rebels are killing black Libyans in towns and villages near Tripoli, but the Obama administration and many members of the Congressional Black Caucus remain relatively mute about what human rights groups and eye-witnesses call war crimes and genocide, according to a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin. The rebels committing the slaughter also have the backing of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, without which they would not have ousted the government of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, who remains in hiding amid reports that he is preparing a counter-insurgency campaign against the loosely controlled rebels.” Read more.

Multiple Deaths Reported After 5.8 Earthquake Strikes Guatamala

09/19/2011 Leave a comment

Richter Magnitude 5.8 – GUATEMALA
Monday, September 19, 2011 at 12:34:00 PM
14.332°N, 90.142°W
Depth: 39.4 km (24.5 miles)

“Three people have been killed following a 5.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Guatemala on Monday, according to local firefighters. Ana Staackman, who lives in Guatemala City, Guatemala, said she felt a strong shaking in her office building during the quake. Staackman said she is used to the earthquakes since they happen every other week but this one lasted longer and felt stronger than usual.” Read more.

Categories: Earthquakes

Indonesia: Farmers Flee as World’s Deadliest Volcano Rumbles

09/19/2011 Leave a comment

By NASRULLAH ROA – “MOUNT TAMBORA, Indonesia — Bold farmers in Indonesia routinely ignore orders to evacuate the slopes of live volcanoes, but those living on Tambora took no chances when history’s deadliest mountain rumbled ominously this month.

Villagers like Hasanuddin Sanusi have heard since they were young how the mountain they call home once blew apart in the largest eruption ever recorded – an 1815 event widely forgotten outside their region – killing 90,000 people and blackening skies on the other side of the globe.

So, the 45-year-old farmer didn’t wait to hear what experts had to say when Mount Tambora started being rocked by a steady stream of quakes. He grabbed his wife and four young children, packed his belongings and raced down its quivering slopes.

‘It was like a horror story, growing up,’ said Hasanuddin, who joined hundreds of others in refusing to return to their mountainside villages for several days despite assurances they were safe.

‘A dragon sleeping inside the crater, that’s what we thought. If we made him angry – were disrespectful to nature, say – he’d wake up spitting flames, destroying all of mankind.’

…People here are jittery because of the mountain’s history – and they’re not used to feeling the earth move so violently beneath their feet. Aside from a few minor bursts in steam in the 1960s, the mountain has been quiet for much of the last 200 years.

Gede Suantika of the government’s Center for Volcanology said activity first picked up in April, with the volcanic quakes jumping from less than five a month to more than 200.

‘It also started spewing ash and smoke into the air, sometimes as high as 1,400 meters (4,600 feet),’ he said. ‘That’s something I’ve never seen it do before.'” Read more.

Categories: Natural Disasters

Pakistan: Flooding Affects Millions, Kills 347+, 31000 Villages Destroyed, Widespread Crop and Livestock Losses, 6000+ Stricken with Dengue Fever

09/19/2011 Leave a comment

“KARACHI, Pakistan, Sept. 19 (UPI) — Weeks of flooding in southern Pakistan killed at least 347 people and injured more than 600, the national disaster authority said Monday.

The region, with Sindh Province being the worst hit, has been devastated by massive flooding unleashed by torrential monsoon rains since early August.

Millions of people have been affected by the floods. CNN reported about 500,000 are sheltered in refugee camps.

Pakistani Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani canceled his trip to New York for the U.N. General Assembly session so he could supervise flood relief work, his spokesman said Friday.

In Sindh, water was standing anywhere from ankle-high to above the knees on empty lands where homes once stood, CNN reported.

United Nations agencies are distributing food and supplies to the affected areas.

The World Food Program estimates that 73 percent of the food crops and 36 percent of the livestock have been lost in the flooded areas.” Read more.

More than 6,000 struck with dengue fever in Pakistan – “Dengue fever has killed 25 people and affected more than 6,000 over the past two months in Lahore, Pakistan, a health department spokesman said Monday. In total, 6,400 cases of dengue fever have been documented, said Ikhlaq Ahmed, spokesman for the health department of Punjab province. Of those, 6,000 are in Lahore, a city of more than 6 million people known as Pakistan’s cultural capital. The 25 who died are all from Lahore, in eastern Pakistan. An average of 300 new cases of the virus-based disease, spread by mosquitoes, are being reported in the city daily.” Read more.

Australia: Freaked Out Driver Tail-Gated by UFO, Reported Sightings Double This Summer

09/19/2011 1 comment

By DAMIEN McCARTNEY – “A TERRITORY man was shaken after an encounter with a UFO south of Tennant Creek.

The man, who wished to be identified only as Aiden, was an hour south of Tennant Creek on his way to Melbourne when he noticed a bright light following him closely, the Katherine Times reported.

Aiden said he had left Tennant Creek at about 3.30am.

‘About an hour after I had set off I looked in my side mirror and noticed a light behind me,’ he said.

He thought nothing of it, believing it was another car – but the light got brighter.

‘I thought ‘geez, they must be driving fast’ as I was doing 120km/h,’ he said.

‘When I looked again after a few minutes the light was really bright but it was in the bloody sky.'” Read more.

UFO sightings spiked this summer – “According to an organization that tracks UFO reports, this summer has been an especially busy period for UFO sightings. The Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) noted that sightings increased over the past six weeks, with some states more than doubling their normal numbers. Are we on the cusp of an alien invasion? Or maybe people just have more time on their hands to spot — and report — strange things in the sky? ‘It’s pretty exciting,’ said Clifford Clift, the international director of MUFON. ‘When you average 500 a month [nationwide] and go to 1,013 in one month, that’s an interesting spike in sighting reports.'” Read more.

Turkey Wants to Revive Ottoman Empire

09/18/2011 2 comments

Revelation 13:3a, “And I saw one of his heads as if it had been mortally wounded, and his deadly wound was healed …”

By Sergei Balmasov – “A hundred years after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, Turkey is re-emerging on the international arena. Furthermore, it intends to regain the ground lost in the 19th-20th centuries, which is a direct threat to the interests of all the neighboring countries, including Russia.
 Consider the actions of the Turkish leadership during the past weeks that have caused serious concerns in Israel, Syria, Iraq, Iran and the EU.

Particularly noteworthy are the frictions of Ankara and Tel Aviv, which raise questions about preservation of the Alliance between the two. The Turkish leadership provides a strong support to the Palestinians, and threatened to appeal to the international authorities with a demand to monitor the Israeli nuclear program and promised to prevent the development of Israeli-rich gas fields in the Mediterranean.

Finally, a serious concern in Israel was caused by the fact that on September 7, Turkey announced its intention to sign an important military agreement with Egypt during a corresponding visit of the Turkish government. Of course, this is a historic day in the history of the entire Middle East. Given the sharp rise in anti-Israel sentiment in Turkey and in Egypt, as well as the ongoing processes of evolution of power in several North African countries, the concerns of Israelis about the activity of Ankara on the Egyptian direction are quite understandable.
” Read more.

Report: Erdogan plans to visit Iran – “Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said that he plans to pay a visit to Iran in the near future, according to Turkish media. Erdogan made the announcement in an interview with reporters in Tunisia on Thursday. Erdogan’s visit to Tehran will be important because Turkey has agreed to host an early warning radar as part of NATO’s missile defense system, which is ostensibly meant to counter an alleged ballistic missile threat from Iran. Tehran has expressed disapproval of the decision.” Read more.

Iran FM: Arab Spring heralds emergence of Islamic Middle East – “Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Salehi on Sunday told a conference in Tehran that the Arab Spring is heralding the emergence of an Islamic Middle East, PressTV reported. Speaking at a conference on ‘Islamic Awakening,’ the Iranian foreign minister attributed the developments in the Arab world to ‘the unhealthy and oppressive relations between certain governments and their nations’ in recent decades.” Read more.

Turkey Predicts Alliance With Egypt as Regional Anchors – “A newly assertive Turkey offered on Sunday a vision of a starkly realigned Middle East, where the country’s former allies in Syria and Israel fall into deeper isolation, and a burgeoning alliance with Egypt underpins a new order in a region roiled by revolt and revolution. The portrait was described by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu of Turkey in an hourlong interview before he was to leave for the United Nations, where a contentious debate was expected this week over a Palestinian bid for recognition as a state.” Read more.

Tricky New Superbug Making Inroads in Canada

09/18/2011 Leave a comment

TORONTO — A Montreal hospital has been battling for the last year to extinguish an outbreak with a worrisome and highly drug-resistant bacteria.

The outbreak at the Jewish General is the first in Canada caused by this strain of the bacteria, a bug that has sparked serious concern because of how easily it spreads and its ability to transfer resistance to other bacteria.

A report on the outbreak was presented in Chicago on Sunday to the Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, a major annual gathering of infectious diseases specialists.

Dr. Mark Miller, head of infection control at the Jewish General, said the outbreak has been brought under control, but a few patients with the bacteria are still being treated in the hospital.

The outbreak was caused by Klebsiella pneumoniae, which is normally found in the human intestine. In healthy people, these bacteria can live in the intestine without causing illness. In hospitals, however, they can cause a range of infections, including pneumonia, bloodstream infections and urinary tract infections.

Klebsiella pneumoniae traditionally have been treated with antibiotics called carbepenems. But in the last decade or so, a strain of the bacteria has developed that is resistant to this class of drugs. To make matters worse, the genetic component that gives Klebsiella pneumoniae this resistance has the capacity to transfer into other bacteria, making them resistant to these drugs as well.

The strain with this component is called KPC-producing Klebsiella pneumoniae, and it has even more tricks in its arsenal. The gene that makes it resistant to carbepenems is packaged in a cassette of genes that confer resistance to a number of other antibiotics.” Read more.

Categories: Pestilence

Au Revoir: Islam Set to Become Dominant Religion in France

09/18/2011 Leave a comment

By David Kerr – “New research suggests there are now more practising Muslims in France than practising Catholics.

While 64 percent of French people describe themselves as Roman Catholic, only 2.9 percent of the population actually practice the Catholic faith. That compares to 3.8 percent of the population who practice the Muslim faith. The research was carried out by the French Institute of Public Opinion on behalf of the Catholic newspaper La Croix.

More worrying for Islamic authorities in France is the finding that only 41 percent of the country’s 6 million Muslims actually describe themselves as ‘practising,’ although 75 percent are happy to label themselves ‘believers.’ Seventy-percent also claim to observe the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

Most French Muslims hail from the country’s former colonies in North and sub-Saharan Africa.

There is also further evidence that mosques are being erected at a much faster rate than Catholic churches. Mohammed Moussaoui, President of the Muslim Council of France, last month estimated that 150 new mosques are currently under construction across the country.

By contrast, the Catholic Church in France has built only 20 new churches during the past decade, and has formally closed more than 60 churches. Many of these are now destined to become mosques, according to La Croix.

Research in 2009 by the Amsterdam School for Social Science Research suggested that nearly 500 new mosques were built between 2001 and 2006, taking the present total to over 2,000. Many of these new buildings, however, were erected to re-accommodate local Islamic communities who had previously been using temporary accommodation – the so-called ‘Islam of the basements.’

One of France’s most prominent Muslim leaders, Dalil Boubakeur, who is the head of the Grand Mosque of Paris, recently called for the number of mosques in the country to be doubled again – to 4,000 – to meet growing demand.” Read more.

Palestinians Warn Obama Not to Stand in Way of Statehood, Will Still Demand ‘Uniting for Peace’ Resolution Enforcement

09/18/2011 Leave a comment

“The Palestinian Authority knows all the right buttons to push with Washington. The Palestinian leadership is fully aware of the value US President Barack Obama (like his predecessors) puts on overseeing an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement, and has regularly wielding that weakness like a diplomatic bludgeon against the White House.

On Saturday, the Palestinians were at it again, warning the Obama Administration that vetoing their UN Security Council bid for statehood would ‘destroy’ the two-state solution to the conflict.

‘Anyone who supports the two-state solution should back the Palestinian effort [at the UN],’ insisted chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat.

Senior PLO official Zakariya al-Agha followed up by reminding Obama that in September of 2010 he promised that a Palestinian state would be established in one year.

The warnings cames just hours after Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas confirmed in a speech in Ramallah that on Friday, September 23 he will address the UN General Assembly, after which he will submit to the Security Council an official application for UN membership for ‘Palestine.’

The Obama White House has repeatedly stated that it will veto the motion, with Obama himself going so far as to call the Palestinian stunt a ‘distraction.'” Read more.

Flashback: PA will demand enforcement of General Assembly ‘Uniting for Peace’ resolution even if US vetoes – “PLO official Saeb Erekat has said Palestinians would activate UN resolution 377 if faced with a US veto in September. The ‘Uniting for Peace’ resolution states that if the Security Council fails to act to maintain world peace and security, the General Assembly should consider the matter in an emergency session. The session can be called at the request of seven members of the Security Council or by a majority of UN member states. Following a widespread diplomatic campaign, some 112 countries have recognized Palestine as an independent state and more are expected to do so in coming weeks. Palestinians would need the support of 129 countries to implement Resolution 377 and secure a General Assembly vote on UN membership.” Read more.

At Least 74 Now Reported Killed After Powerful 6.9 Earthquake Strikes Northeastern India and Nepal

09/18/2011 2 comments

Richter Magnitude 6.9 – SIKKIM, INDIA
Sunday, September 18, 2011 at 06:10:48 PM
27.723°N, 88.064°E
Depth: 19.7 km (12.2 miles)

“Rescuers battled heavy rains and cleared dozens of landslides while making their way to Sikkim, the ground zero of Sunday evening’s 6.8 magnitude earthquake that has so far claimed 74 lives across three countries – India, Nepal and China (Tibet). According to late-night reports, at least 58 people were killed and hundreds injured in Sikkim, Bengal and Bihar, in addition to nine deaths in Nepal and seven in Tibet. The toll is likely to rise, say rescuers. In Sikkim, the toll had reached 41. The maximum casualties have been in Rangpo, Dikchu, Singtam and Chungthang in north Sikkim. Ten persons have died in Bengal and seven in Bihar.” Read more.

Categories: Earthquakes Tags: ,

NASA: Huge Defunct Satellite Falling Faster Than Expected, Will Plummet to Earth Around September 23rd

09/16/2011 Leave a comment

By Tariq Malik – “NASA space junk experts have refined the forecast for the anticipated death plunge of a giant satellite, with the U.S. space agency now predicting the 6 1/2-ton climate probe will plummet to Earth around Sept. 23, a day earlier than previously reported.

The defunct bus-size spacecraft is NASA’s Upper Atmospheric Research Satellite (UARS), which launched in 1991 and was shut down in 2005 after completing its mission. The satellite was expected to fall to Earth sometime this year, with experts initially pegging a weeks-long window between late September and early October, then narrowing it to the last week of this month.

That window, NASA now says, has been trimmed to just three days.

‘Re-entry is expected Sept. 23, plus or minus a day. The re-entry of UARS is advancing because of a sharp increase in solar activity since the beginning of this week,’ NASA officials wrote in a status update today (Sept. 16). The projection is a day earlier than a previous forecast released by NASA yesterday.

NASA spokeswoman Beth Dickey confirmed with SPACE.com earlier today that the reason UARS is expected to fall early in its re-entry window is because of the sharp uptick in solar activity. Solar effects from the sun can create an extra drag on satellites in space because they can heat the Earth’s atmosphere, causing it to expand, agency officials have said.” Read more.

France: Muslims May Be Arrested for Violating New Law Prohibiting Praying in Streets of Paris

09/16/2011 Leave a comment

By Henry Samuel – “Claude Guéant said that ban could later be extended to the rest of France, in particular to the Mediterranean cities of Nice and Marseilles, where ‘the problem persists’.

He promised the new legislation would be followed to the letter as it ‘hurts the sensitivities of many of our fellow citizens’.

‘My vigilance will be unflinching for the law to be applied. Praying in the street is not dignified for religious practice and violates the principles of secularism,’ the minister told Le Figaro newspaper.

‘All Muslim leaders are in agreement,’ he insisted.

In December when Marine Le Pen, then leader-in-waiting of the far-Right National Front, sparked outrage by likening the practice to the Nazi occupation of Paris in the Second World War ‘without the tanks or soldiers’. She said it was a ‘political act of fundamentalists’.

More than half of right-wing sympathisers in France agreed with Marine Le Pen, at least one poll suggested.

Nicolas Sarkozy’s party denounced the comments, but the President called for a debate on Islam and secularism and went on to say that multiculturalism had failed in France.

Following the debate, Mr Guéant promised a countrywide ban ‘within months’, saying the ‘street is for driving in, not praying’.

In April, a ban on wearing the full Islamic veil came into force. Holland today became the third European country to ban the burka, after Belgium, despite the fact fewer than 100 Dutch women are thought to wear the face-covering Islamic dress.

Yesterday, Mr Guéant said the prayer problem was limited to two roads in the Goutte d’Or district of Paris’s eastern 19th arrondissement, where ‘more than a thousand’ people blocked the street every Friday.

However, a stroll through several districts in Paris on a Friday suggests that Muslims spill into the streets outside many mosques.” Read more.

Flashback: In France, far right seizes on Muslim street prayers – “A call to prayer goes up from a loudspeaker perched on the hood of a car, and all at once hundreds of Muslim worshippers touch their foreheads to the ground, forming a sea of backs down the road. The scene is taking place not in downtown Cairo, but on a busy market street in northern Paris, a short walk from the Sacre Coeur basilica. To locals, it’s old news: some have been praying on the street, rain or shine, for decades. But for Marine Le Pen — tipped to take over from her father this weekend as leader of the far-right National Front party — it is proof that Muslims are taking over France and becoming an occupying force, according to remarks she made last month.” Read more.