The 4 Freedoms Library
2024-03-28T14:51:52Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/66096223?profile=RESIZE_48X48&width=48&height=48&crop=1%3A1
http://4freedoms.com/group/terrorism/forum/topic/listForContributor?user=3g0oedh53p9am&feed=yes&xn_auth=no
Antifa (redirecting placeholder)
tag:4freedoms.com,2023-03-10:3766518:Topic:277509
2023-03-10T19:55:36.859Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<p>The Antifa forum was originally created in the US room, so please go there for Antifa info. This forum is a placeholder. </p>
<p><a href="http://4freedoms.com/group/us/forum/topics/antifa">http://4freedoms.com/group/us/forum/topics/antifa</a></p>
<p>The Antifa forum was originally created in the US room, so please go there for Antifa info. This forum is a placeholder. </p>
<p><a href="http://4freedoms.com/group/us/forum/topics/antifa">http://4freedoms.com/group/us/forum/topics/antifa</a></p>
Attack on Salman Rushdie in New York
tag:4freedoms.com,2022-08-13:3766518:Topic:275813
2022-08-13T00:05:44.273Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<h1 class="ssrcss-15xko80-StyledHeading e1fj1fc10" id="main-heading">Salman Rushdie: Author in surgery after being stabbed on stage</h1>
<p class="ssrcss-ugte5s-Contributor e5xb54n2"><span><strong>By Sam Cabral </strong>BBC News, Washington…</span></p>
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<h1 id="main-heading" class="ssrcss-15xko80-StyledHeading e1fj1fc10">Salman Rushdie: Author in surgery after being stabbed on stage</h1>
<p class="ssrcss-ugte5s-Contributor e5xb54n2"><span><strong>By Sam Cabral </strong>BBC News, Washington</span></p>
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<div class="ssrcss-ab5fd8-StyledFigureContainer e34k3c21"><span class="ssrcss-11kpz0x-Placeholder e16icw910"><source type="image/webp"></source><img alt="Image shows Salman Rushdie" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/23EF/production/_126299190_gettyimages-1210237824.jpg" width="976" height="549" class="ssrcss-evoj7m-Image ee0ct7c0"/></span><span class="ssrcss-tvuve5-StyledFigureCopyright e34k3c20"><span class="visually-hidden ssrcss-1f39n02-VisuallyHidden e1y6uwnp0">IMAGE SOURCE,</span>GETTY IMAGES</span></div>
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Witnesses say Salman Rushdie was stabbed multiple times<br />
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00"><b class="ssrcss-hmf8ql-BoldText e5tfeyi3">Author Salman Rushdie, who suffered years of Islamist death threats after writing The Satanic Verses, has been stabbed on stage in New York state.</b></p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">The Booker Prize winner, 75, was speaking at an event at the Chautauqua Institution at the time.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">New York State Police said a man ran up onto the stage and attacked Mr Rushdie, who is now undergoing surgery at a local trauma centre.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Police detained a suspect named as Hadi Matar, 24, from Fairview, New Jersey.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">No motive or charges have yet been confirmed by police.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Mr Rushdie was stabbed at least once in the neck, and at least once in the abdomen. He was taken to a hospital in Erie, Pennsylvania, by helicopter.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">The interviewer who was also on stage, Henry Reese, suffered a minor head injury and was taken to a local hospital. Mr Reese is the co-founder of a non-profit that provides sanctuary to writers exiled under threat of persecution.</p>
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<li><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-62523259" class="ssrcss-k17ofw-InlineLink e1no5rhv0">Salman Rushdie: The writer who emerged from hiding</a></li>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Police told a press conference that staff and audience members had rushed the attacker and took him to the ground, and he was then arrested.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">A video posted online shows the moment people dashed onto the stage immediately after the incident, and police said a doctor in the audience gave Mr Rushdie first aid.</p>
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<span class="visually-hidden ssrcss-1f39n02-VisuallyHidden e1y6uwnp0">Media caption,</span><br />
<div class="ssrcss-y7krbn-Stack e1y4nx260"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Watch: From the scene where Salman Rushdie was attacked on stage</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Indian-born novelist Mr Rushdie catapulted to fame with Midnight's Children in 1981, which went on to sell over one million copies in the UK alone.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">But his fourth book, in 1988 - The Satanic Verses - forced him into hiding for nine years.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">The surrealist, post-modern novel sparked outrage among some Muslims, who considered its content to be blasphemous, and was banned in some countries.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">A year after the book's release, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini called for Mr Rushdie's execution. He offered a $3m (£2.5m) reward in a fatwa - a legal decree issued by an Islamic religious leader.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">The bounty over Mr Rushdie's head remains active, and although Iran's government has distanced itself from Khomeini's decree, a quasi-official Iranian religious foundation added a further $500,000 to the reward in 2012.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">The British-American citizen - who was born to non-practising Muslims and is an atheist himself - has become a vocal advocate for freedom of expression, defending his work on several occasions.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-ab5fd8-StyledFigureContainer e34k3c21"><span class="ssrcss-13t93ir-Placeholder e16icw910"><span><source type="image/webp"></source><img alt="Analysis by Aleem Maqbool, BBC religion editor" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/11E6/production/_125328540_aleemmaqbool_v2_tr-nc.png" width="1536" height="306.11957796014065" class="ssrcss-evoj7m-Image ee0ct7c0"/></span></span></div>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Salman Rushdie has faced death threats for more than 30 years since the publication of The Satanic Verses. Mr Rushdie said the main thrust of his novel was to examine the immigrant experience, but some Muslims were offended by portrayals of the Prophet Muhammed and the questioning of the nature of the revelation of the Quran as the word of God.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">The Satanic Verses was banned first in the author's country of birth, India, and then several other countries before Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini issued his infamous fatwa.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">The fatwa called for the killing of anyone involved in the publication of the book and offered rewards to those who took part in the murders. That fatwa has never formally been rescinded.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Surprised by the widespread nature of the protests, Salman Rushdie apologised to Muslims but went into hiding for much of the next 10 years.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Though the writer had escaped physical harm until now, others associated with the book had not, with its Norwegian publisher having been shot and seriously wounded in the early 90s, and its Japanese translator stabbed to death.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-ab5fd8-StyledFigureContainer e34k3c21"><span class="ssrcss-1wnw6kc-Placeholder e16icw910"><span><source type="image/webp"></source><img alt="Presentational grey line" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/464/cpsprodpb/10301/production/_98950366_presentational_grey_line464-nc.jpg" width="464" height="2" class="ssrcss-evoj7m-Image ee0ct7c0"/></span></span></div>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">When Mr Rushdie was knighted in 2007 by the Queen, it sparked protests in Iran and Pakistan, where one cabinet minister said the honour "justifies suicide attacks".</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Several literary events attended by Mr Rushdie have been subject to threats and boycotts - but he continues to write. His next novel, Victory City, is due to be published in February 2023.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-ab5fd8-StyledFigureContainer e34k3c21"><span class="ssrcss-185m0jc-Placeholder e16icw910"><span><source type="image/webp"></source><img alt="Salman Rushdie's life in numbers" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/3EEE/production/_126301161_rushdie-idt.png" width="1024" height="820.8" class="ssrcss-evoj7m-Image ee0ct7c0"/></span></span></div>
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<div class="ssrcss-ab5fd8-StyledFigureContainer e34k3c21"><span class="ssrcss-1rix78v-Placeholder e16icw910"><span><source type="image/webp"></source><img alt="1px transparent line" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/cpsprodpb/4BEB/production/_112953491__108802839_624_transparent-nc.png" width="624" height="1" class="ssrcss-evoj7m-Image ee0ct7c0"/></span></span></div>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">His appearance at the Chautauqua Institution event, in western New York, was the first in a summertime lecture series hosted by the non-profit organisation.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson tweeted: "Appalled that Sir Salman Rushdie has been stabbed while exercising a right we should never cease to defend."</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">Writer and graphic novel creator Neil Gaiman said he was "shocked and distressed" by the attack on his friend and fellow writer.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">"He's a good man and a brilliant one and I hope he's okay," Gaiman wrote on Twitter.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">In a statement, Mr Rushdie's publishers at Penguin Random House said: "We condemn this violent public assault, and our thoughts are with Salman and his family at this distressing time."</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">New York Governor Kathy Hochul vowed to "assist however needed in the investigation" into the stabbing.</p>
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<div class="ssrcss-uf6wea-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0"><div class="ssrcss-7uxr49-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1"><p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00">"Here's an individual who has spent decades speaking truth to power. Someone who's been out there, unafraid, despite the threats that have followed him his entire adult life," she said.</p>
<p class="ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph eq5iqo00"><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-62524922">https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-62524922</a></p>
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The murder of MP David Ames
tag:4freedoms.com,2021-10-19:3766518:Topic:274118
2021-10-19T01:31:09.543Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<h1>The Future Is Showing Up</h1>
<p><b>by Mark Steyn <i>Steyn on Britain </i>October 18, 2021</b></p>
<div><p><a href="https://ci6.googleusercontent.com/proxy/BdHsiQbtlq_Vvc9Cih2lBqZsIvaR2ib1479denOXiQIMjpqO8fOEriK71fRh7UfJtL0EH6S2d318PHr_GAQGgbNq=s0-d-e1-ft#https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/4842.jpg" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="https://ci6.googleusercontent.com/proxy/BdHsiQbtlq_Vvc9Cih2lBqZsIvaR2ib1479denOXiQIMjpqO8fOEriK71fRh7UfJtL0EH6S2d318PHr_GAQGgbNq=s0-d-e1-ft#https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/4842.jpg?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="370"></img></a></p>
<p style="text-align: right;">Post-English England</p>
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<div><p>On<span> …</span></p>
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<h1>The Future Is Showing Up</h1>
<p><b>by Mark Steyn <i>Steyn on Britain </i>October 18, 2021</b></p>
<div><p><a href="https://ci6.googleusercontent.com/proxy/BdHsiQbtlq_Vvc9Cih2lBqZsIvaR2ib1479denOXiQIMjpqO8fOEriK71fRh7UfJtL0EH6S2d318PHr_GAQGgbNq=s0-d-e1-ft#https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/4842.jpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://ci6.googleusercontent.com/proxy/BdHsiQbtlq_Vvc9Cih2lBqZsIvaR2ib1479denOXiQIMjpqO8fOEriK71fRh7UfJtL0EH6S2d318PHr_GAQGgbNq=s0-d-e1-ft#https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/4842.jpg?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="370" class="align-right"/></a></p>
<p style="text-align: right;">Post-English England</p>
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<div><p>On<span> </span><b><a href="https://www.steynonline.com/11780/tragic-event-of-no-broader-application" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the weekend edition of<span> </span><i>The Mark Steyn Show</i></a></b><span> </span>we discussed the jihad's first murder of a sitting member of the British Parliament and the first Islamic murder in an English church. The slaughter of David Amess has already faded into the usual woozy passive blur of candlelight vigils, but, before his death is completely memory-holed, I would like to note one particular distinction of Sir David:</p>
<p>He had five children.</p>
<p>This made him an unusual man for one of his generation (born 1952) and a remarkably enthusiastic father among today's Englishmen. As Fleet Street reported the day before Sir David's horrific stabbing, the fertility rate in England and Wales has fallen to<span> </span><a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/wales-england-office-for-national-statistics-romania-pakistan-b960547.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the lowest on record</a><span> </span>- 1.58 "children per woman", as it is still quaintly formulated, so maybe all those pregnant men will stampede into the maternity wards and save the day. You need 2.1 children per women to maintain a stable population, so when it's 1.58 you're heading for an England and Wales with fewer English and Welsh.</p>
<p>This is the same trend line seen in the United States, where fertility has also<span> </span><a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-57003722" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fallen to record lows</a><span> </span>- and in a year when both countries have been locked down with nothing to do but procreate, watch Netflix, or Instagram selfies of themselves watching Netflix. Evidently, procreation comes a very distant third. As<span> </span><i>The Times</i><span> </span>(of London) reports:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>The trends towards later motherhood and having a smaller family may also have been accelerated by financial uncertainty caused by the Covid pandemic, according to the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS).</i></p>
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<p>Could be. Or it could be that increasing numbers of western populations are simply checking out of the kid business entirely. It's almost as if, for all the joys of the multiculti utopia, they have no faith in the future, or at any rate zero interest in it.</p>
<p>Fifteen years ago I wrote<span> </span><a href="https://www.steynstore.com/product49.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a bestselling book about demography</a>, which is actually pretty tricky to do. And so to increase its chances of going gangbusters at the mall I tried to come up with pithy lines such as:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>The future belongs to those who show up.</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p>If you have a country with great infrastructure, handsome buildings and extravagant emporia, it would be unreasonable to expect it just to empty out - any more than a stately home is going to lie abandoned for long just because the last in the line has expired on his drug stash. So, at the Channel ports as at the Rio Grande, the future is showing up. Thus, while the overall fertility rate in England and Wales is going down, the fertility rate of non-UK mothers is<span> </span><a href="https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2021/10/17/british-fertility-rate-falls-to-lowest-in-history/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">going up</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>While fertility rates have continually fallen, the actual population of Britain has continued to increase, with mass migration accounting for 'about 90 per cent of population growth between 2017 and 2019.'</i></p>
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<p>For anyone with even a residual memory of Britain from the day before yesterday - or even anyone who's watched a British movie from, say, the 1950s - the specifics are impressive. From the<span> </span><a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/livebirths/bulletins/parentscountryofbirthenglandandwales/2020#live-births-to-non-uk-born-mothers-by-geography" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Office of National Statistics</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p><b>Percentage of live births to non-UK-born mothers, 2020</b></p>
<p>Newcastle 31.8 per cent;</p>
<p>Birmingham 43.6 per cent;</p>
<p>Coventry 46.3 per cent;</p>
<p>Manchester 51.3 per cent;</p>
<p>Oxford 51.6 per cent;</p>
<p>Leicester 56.4 per cent;</p>
<p>Cambridge 58.2 per cent;</p>
<p>Slough [next door to Windsor Castle] 64.8 per cent;</p>
<p>Barking and Dagenham 68.2 per cent;</p>
<p>Kensington and Chelsea 69.9 per cent;</p>
<p>Ealing [as in those very English 1950s "Ealing comedies"] 70.9 per cent;</p>
<p>Westminster [as in "the Westminster system"] 72.8 per cent;</p>
<p>Newham 73.8 per cent;</p>
<p>Harrow [where Winston Churchill went to school] 74.8 per cent;</p>
<p>Brent 75.8 per cent.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Where are all these "non-UK" mothers born? Don't worry, they're not all Somali. The Number One country of origin is Pakistan - legacy of empire and all that, so a lot of vibrant diverse first-cousin marriage in West Yorkshire.</p>
<p>The Number Two country of origin is Romania. Not all Romanian mothers come here<span> </span><a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/uk-pimp-s-paradise-sex-traffickers-warning-diana-johnson-a4572932.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">voluntarily</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>Around three quarters of women trafficked to the UK come from Romania and the majority are sold into the sex trade.</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p>On the other hand, Bangladesh is down to Number Five and Somalia down to Number Seven.</p>
<p>Non-UK mothers accounted for 29.3 per cent of all births in England and Wales - which means the fertility rate of ethnic Anglo-Celts is not 1.58 but something closer to 1.3 births per woman, which is what demographers call lowest-low fertility from which no society known to human history has ever recovered.</p>
<p>The rate of immigration into Britain, Canada and America is beyond the powers of "assimilation", even if our societies were minded to assimilate, rather than denigrating the host culture by introducing (under a government of pseudo-conservative wankers) such novel concepts as<span> </span><a href="http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2021/10/17/the-children-are-our-future-66/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the racism of mathematics</a>. But, even without such over-egging of the pudding, on UK and other western rates of immigration, the "host community" does not assimilate the incomers, but vice-versa, as is happening in all the English cities listed above.</p>
<p>In Mitteleuropa, governments are energetically pro-family and opposed to mass unskilled immigration, noting crudely that the easiest way not to have a lot of Muslim terrorist stabbings is not to have a lot of Muslims. Even in France, Eric Zemmour, who may well be in<span> </span><a href="https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/eric-zemmour-is-france-s-margaret-thatcher" target="_blank" rel="noopener">next year's presidential run-off against Macron</a>, speaks of a "<a href="https://galliawatch.blogspot.com/2008/11/demographic-tsunami.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">demographic tsunami</a>" - and God bless him for doing so, because it is not seemly for great nations to exit the stage of history without at least acknowledging the truth.</p>
<p>In the ever more stupid and trivial politics of the English-speaking world, that kind of talk remains strictly buried in what Tony Blair calls "<a href="https://www.steynonline.com/11674/subterranean-tone-sick-blues" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the subterranean conversation</a>" - save for a dwindling number of "<a href="https://archive.macleans.ca/article/2008/4/21/amis-descends-into-steyn-hugging" target="_blank" rel="noopener">sayers of the unsayable</a>". Even the obsession with "wokeness" and "cancel culture" misses the central point: the educated white upper-middle-class leading the charge against statues and history and all the rest have (consciously or otherwise) grasped that it's over and, like canny aristocrats in revolutionary France or Tariq Aziz in Saddam's Iraq, are simply negotiating a place for themselves in the new order.</p>
<p>At the start of the Great War, Rupert Brooke wrote:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>If I should die, think only this of me:<br/> That there's some corner of a foreign field<br/> That is for ever England. There shall be<br/> In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;<br/> A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,<br/> Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam;<br/> A body of England's, breathing English air,<br/> Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p>But not when the foreign field is England itself.</p>
<p><b><a href="https://www.steynonline.com/11790/the-future-is-showing-up" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://www.steynonline.com/11790/the-future-is-showing-up</a></b></p>
</div>
The poisoning of Robert Spencer
tag:4freedoms.com,2019-12-20:3766518:Topic:205857
2019-12-20T01:02:34.014Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<div id="print_content"><h1>The Poisoning of Robert Spencer</h1>
<p class="sans-serif"><b>by Mark Steyn<br></br><i>The War on Free Speech</i><br></br>May 18, 2017</b></p>
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<div id="print_content_3"><div class="media"><div class="photo"><p><a href="https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/2012.jpg" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/2012.jpg?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="370"></img></a></p>
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<div class="article_body"><p>For years now I've said that anti-free-speech leftists and the men who slaughtered the staff…</p>
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<div id="print_content"><h1>The Poisoning of Robert Spencer</h1>
<p class="sans-serif"><b>by Mark Steyn<br/><i>The War on Free Speech</i><br/>May 18, 2017</b></p>
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<div id="print_content_3"><div class="media"><div class="photo"><p><a href="https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/2012.jpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://www.steynonline.com/pics/large/2012.jpg?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="370" class="align-right"/></a></p>
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<div class="article_body"><p>For years now I've said that anti-free-speech leftists and the men who slaughtered the staff of<span> </span><i>Charlie Hebdo</i>, shot up Lars Vilks' event in Copenhagen, etc, are merely different points on the same continuum: They're both in the shut-up business: both groups find it quicker and easier and more satisfying to silence you than to debate you.</p>
<p>There were those who found the comparison offensive - to whom I would on good-humored days grant that the two points on the same continuum were nevertheless some distance apart.</p>
<p>Well, they got considerably closer in Reykjavik last week.</p>
<p>Robert Spencer, the author of several bestselling books on Islam, a brave crusader against the dopier multiculti illusions and the proprietor of the indispensable<span> </span><a href="https://www.jihadwatch.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jihad Watch</a>, gave a speech at the Grand Hotel, went to unwind at dinner afterwards, and was poisoned by a social-justice warrior. Here's Robert's<span> </span><a href="https://pjmedia.com/homeland-security/2017/05/17/robert-spencer-poisoned-after-giving-anti-jihad-speech-in-iceland/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">account of what happened</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>After the event, my security chief, the organizers of the event, Ms. Williams, and I went to a local restaurant to celebrate its success. But I was quickly recognized: a young Icelander called me by name, shook my hand, and said he was a big fan. Shortly after that, another citizen of that famously courteous land likewise called me by my name, shook my hand, and said "f*** you."</i></p>
<p><i>We left.</i></p>
<p><i>Back in my hotel room, I began to feel numbness in my face, hands, and feet. I began trembling and vomiting. My heart was racing dangerously. I spent the night in a Reykjavik hospital.</i></p>
<p><i>A hospital test confirmed that I had been poisoned -- Ritalin mixed with MDMA (Ecstasy). One of the local Icelanders who had approached me (likely the one who said he was a big fan, as he came much closer to me than the "f*** you" guy) had dropped drugs into my drink. I was ill for several days afterward.</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p>That's quite a sophisticated operation - a two-man team, the first a fake fan, the second a post-kiss-of-death gloater.</p>
<p>Before the banking crash of '08, Iceland was flush, and celebs like Elton John were flown in for gala bashes. But it's all quietened down a bit since then, so the Spencer event was a big deal. He drew an audience of 500 - which in a town of 125,000 and a nation of 300,000 is pretty impressive. There was lots of coverage of his visit - none of which actually quoted him or excerpted his speech or interviewed those who were interested in hearing what he had to say. Instead the media preferred to cover the few dozen protestors of his trip. In all the column inches devoted to Robert Spencer, no journalist thought to seek a comment from Robert Spencer. There are two sides to every story - except this guy's story: he doesn't deserve a side.</p>
<p>This kind of dehumanization sends a message - and the man who poisoned Robert got it loud and clear:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>Those who paint the targets, and those who shoot at them, think they're doing something great. Not only does the Left fill those whom it brainwashes with hate, but it does so while portraying its enemies as the hatemongers, such that violent Leftists such as the young man who drugged me feel righteous as they victimize and brutalize for the crime of disagreement.</i></p>
<p><i>I have no doubt whatsoever that whoever poisoned me in Iceland went away feeling happy over what he had done. If he told anyone what he did, I'm sure he was hailed as a hero. I'm also aware that many who read this will crow and exult in knowing that someone who hates my opposition to jihad terror and Sharia oppression made me seriously ill. This is how degenerate and evil the Left has become.</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p>I don't know how I'd stand up to a cocktail of Ritalin and Ecstasy. I do know there's at least one person in my modest entourage it would kill. And I have no doubt that had the fellow in the restaurant switched on the radio the following morning and heard that Robert Spencer had died in hospital overnight he would have celebrated.</p>
<p>Like the guns at Singapore, the social-justice mob's fingers are pointing in the wrong direction: They accuse their opponents endlessly of "otherization"; yet they are the ones who so deny the humanity of "the other" that it seems cool and heroic to attempt to kill a chap who gave a speech you object to - even though you never heard the speech, and, even if you had, are incapable of articulating what exactly in it you take issue with.</p>
<p>Douglas Murray and I noted after the tenth anniversary of the Mohammed cartoons how strangely controversial the post-event dinner has become. In Copenhagen, the restaurant panicked at the sight of the PET - the Danish security-service agents - and canceled our booking. As Douglas wrote:</p>
<blockquote><p><i>Ten years ago, you could publish depictions of Mohammed in a Danish newspaper. Ten years later, it is hard for anyone who has been connected with such an act to find a restaurant in Copenhagen that will serve them dinner.</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p>For those in Robert Spencer's line of work, these events are undeniably stressful. There are security precautions, of course, but you never know, from the Vilks event in Copenhagen to Robert's in Garland, Texas, whether some jihadist will succeed in breaking through. There's a sense of relief when you exit the stage and it's all gone off without incident. You're looking forward to a drink and a bite to eat in convivial company. And you're on your post-performance high, so you're generally bonhomous when people approach professing to be fans and seeking a selfie or an autograph. And there's three or four and they're all around you, and you put your drink down on the table - as Douglas and I did again and again in the bar we wound up in late that night. And the fans move on, and you pick up your glass without a thought...</p>
<p>Robert Spencer will never do that again.</p>
<p>The social-justice crowd are moving toward the same point as the<span> </span><i>Charlie Hebdo</i><span> </span>killers, and for the same reason: They're too stupid to argue. For the Islamic imperialists, debate is a largely alien concept. For the left, it's simply too much effort. As I said<span> </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdEGJb5W5ks" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a><span> </span>many years ago, the great appeal of multiculturalism is that it absolves you from having to know anything about other cultures: If they're all equally valid, what's the point? Slap on the CO-EXIST bumper sticker and off you tootle. No need to worry whether the "C" might have a bit of a problem with some of the other letters, and that indeed, if not for the "C", you wouldn't need a bumper-sticker admonition to CO-EXIST in the first place. But, after two generations of social engineering, of the substitution of attitudes for education, it would require too much effort to equip yourself to argue against the difficult questions a man such as Robert Spencer raises. It's literally easier to kill him.</p>
<p>Not yet in the blood-lusting exultant scimitar-raising style of the decapitators of French priests. But just through whatever you've got in your stash that might ensure he'll be flying out of Reykjavik by the handles. So for the moment there is still a continuum. But it's narrowing, and will narrow still.</p>
<p>Get well soon, Robert.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.steynonline.com/7820/the-poisoning-of-robert-spencer" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://www.steynonline.com/7820/the-poisoning-of-robert-spencer</a></p>
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'How We Trained Al-Qaeda' - The Bosnian War Taught Islamic Terrorists to Operate Abroad
tag:4freedoms.com,2019-04-29:3766518:Topic:203119
2019-04-29T14:13:14.580Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<p>Brendan O’Neill says the Bosnian war taught Islamic terrorists to operate abroad<br></br>– The Spectator, 13. September 2003</p>
<p>Fulor all the millions of words written about al-Qa’eda since the 9/11. attacks two years ago, one phenomenon is consistently overlooked — the role of the Bosnian war in transforming the mujahedin of the 1980s into the roving Islamic terrorists of today.</p>
<p>Many writers and reporters have traced al-Qaeda and other terror groups’ origins back to the Afghan war of…</p>
<p>Brendan O’Neill says the Bosnian war taught Islamic terrorists to operate abroad<br/>– The Spectator, 13. September 2003</p>
<p>Fulor all the millions of words written about al-Qa’eda since the 9/11. attacks two years ago, one phenomenon is consistently overlooked — the role of the Bosnian war in transforming the mujahedin of the 1980s into the roving Islamic terrorists of today.</p>
<p>Many writers and reporters have traced al-Qaeda and other terror groups’ origins back to the Afghan war of 1979-1992, that last gasp of the Cold War when US-backed mujahedin forces fought against the invading Soviet army. It is well documented that America played a major role in creating and sustaining the mujahedin, which included Osama bin Laden’s Office of Services set up to recruit volunteers from overseas. Between 1985 and 1992. US officials estimate that 12.500 foreign fighters were trained in bomb-making, sabotage and guerrilla warfare tactics in Afghan camps that the CIA helped to set up.</p>
<div class="media-p"><div class="media file-default"><img height="1033" width="631" class="media-element file-default img-responsive" src="http://russia-insider.com/sites/insider/files/styles/1200xauto/public/screenshot_2019-04-28_at_12.14.50_pm.png?itok=Ke12vC90" alt=""/></div>
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<p>Yet America’s role in backing the mujahedin a second time in the early and mid1990s is seldom mentioned — largely because very few people know about it, and those who do find it prudent to pretend that it never happened. Following the Russian withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 and the collapse of their puppet regime in 1992, the Afghan mujahedin became less important to the United States; many Arabs, in the words of the journalist James Buchan, were left stranded in Afghanistan with a taste for fighting but no cause’. It was not long before some were provided with a new cause. From 1992 to 1995. the Pentagon assisted with the movement of thousands of mujahedin and other Islamic elements from Central Asia into Europe, to fight alongside Bosnian Muslims against the Serbs.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="ads within1"><div class="ads desktop"><div class="adsbyvli"><div id="vi_3551050_2"></div>
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<p>The Bosnia venture appears to have been very important to the rise of mujahedin forces, to the emergence of today’s cross-border Islamic terrorists who think nothing of moving from state to state in the search of outlets for their jihadist mission. In moving to Bosnia. Islamic fighters were transported from the ghettos of Afghanistan and the Middle East into Europe; from an outdated battleground of the Cold War to the major world conflict of the day; from being yesterday’s men to fighting alongside the West’s favoured side in the clash of the Balkans.</p>
<p></p>
<p><img alt="albright-clinton-izet" src="https://mightynose.files.wordpress.com/2018/04/albright-clinton-izet.jpeg?w=700"/></p>
<p>If Western intervention in Afghanistan created the mujahedin, Western intervention in Bosnia appears to have globalised it. As part of the Dutch government’s inquiry into the Srebrenica massacre of July 1995, Professor Cees Wiebes of Amsterdam University compiled a report entitled ‘Intelligence and the War in Bosnia’, published in April 2001 In it he details the secret alliance between the Pentagon and radical Islamic groups from the Middle East, and their efforts to assist Bosnia’s Muslims. By 1993, there was a vast amount of weapons smuggling through Croatia to the Muslims, organised by ‘clandestine agencies’ of the USA, Turkey and Iran, in association with a range of Islamic groups that included Afghan mujahedin and the pro-Iranian Hezbollah. Arms bought by Iran and Turkey with the financial backing of Saudi Arabia were airlifted from the Middle East to Bosnia — airlifts with which, Wiebes points out, the USA was ‘very closely involved’.</p>
<p>The Pentagon’s secret alliance with Islamic elements allowed mujahedin fighters to be ‘flown in’, though they were initially reserved as shock troops for particularly hazardous operations against Serb forces. According to a report in the Los Angeles Times in October 2001, from 1992 as many as 4,000 volunteers from the Middle East, North Africa and Europe, ‘known as the mujahedin’, arrived in Bosnia to fight with the Muslims. Richard Holbrooke, America’s former chief Balkans peace negotiator, has said that the Bosnian Muslims ‘wouldn’t have survived’ without the help of the mujahedin, though he later admitted that the arrival of the mujahedin was a ‘pact with the devil’ from which Bosnia is still recovering.</p>
<p><img alt="klinton grob džihad" src="https://mightynose.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/klinton-grob-dc5beihad.jpg?w=700"/></p>
<p></p>
<p>By the end of the 1990s, State Department officials were increasingly worried about the consequences of this pact. Under the terms of the 1995 Dayton peace accord, the foreign mujahedin units were required to disband and leave the Balkans. Yet in 2000, the State Department raised concerns about the ‘hundreds of foreign Islamic extremists’ who became Bosnian citizens after fighting against the Serbs, and who pose a potential terror threat to Europe and the United States. US officials claimed that one of bin Laden’s top lieutenants had sent operatives to Bosnia and that during the 1990s Bosnia had served as a ‘staging area and safe haven’ for al-Qa’eda and others. The Clinton administration had discovered that it is one thing to permit the movement of Islamic groups across territories; it is quite another to rein them back in again.<br/><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx-REROXvtg" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx-REROXvtg</a></p>
<p></p>
<p>Indeed, for all the Clinton officials’ concern about Islamic extremists in the Balkans, they continued to allow the growth and movement of mujahedin forces in Europe through the 1990s. In the late 1990s, in the run-up to Clinton’s and Blair’s Kosovo war of 1999, the USA backed the Kosovo Liberation Army against Serbia. According to a report in the Jerusalem Post in 1998, KLA members, like the Bosnian Muslims before them, had been ‘provided with financial and military support from Islamic countries’, and had been ‘bolstered by hundreds of Iranian fighters or mujahedin . . . [some of whom] were trained in Osama bin Laden’s terrorist camps in Afghanistan’. It seems that, for all its hand-wringing, the USA just couldn’t break the pact with the devil.</p>
<p><img alt="ali Hamad" height="317" src="https://mightynose.files.wordpress.com/2018/04/ali-hamad.jpg?w=423&h=317" width="423"/></p>
<p>Why is this aspect of the mujahedin’s development so often overlooked? Some sensible stuff has been written about al Qaeda and its connections in recent months, but the Bosnia connection has been left largely unexplored. In Jason Burke’s excellent Al-Qa’eda: Casting a Shadow of Ten-or, Bosnia is mentioned only in passing. Kimberley McCloud and Adam Dolnik of the Monterey Institute of International Studies have written some incisive commentary calling for rational thinking when assessing al-Qa’eda’s origins and threat — but again, investigation of the Bosnia link is notable by its absence.</p>
<p>It would appear that when it comes to Bosnia, many in the West have a moral blind spot. For some commentators, particularly liberal ones, Western intervention in Bosnia was a Good Thing — except that, apparently, there was too little of it, offered too late in the conflict. Many journalists and writers demanded intervention in Bosnia and Western support for the Muslims. In many ways, this was their war, where they played an active role in encouraging further intervention to enforce ‘peace’ among the former Yugoslavia’s warring factions, Consequently, they often overlook the downside to this intervention and its divisive impact on the Balkans. Western intervention in Bosnia, it would appear, has become an unquestionably positive thing, something that is beyond interrogation and debate.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Yet a cool analysis of today’s disparate Islamic terror groups, created in Afghanistan and emboldened by the Bosnian experience, would do much to shed some light on precisely the dangers of such intervention.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Brendan O’Neill is assistant editor of spiked-online.</p>
<p><a href="https://russia-insider.com/en/how-we-trained-al-qaeda-bosnian-war-taught-islamic-terrorists-operate-abroad/ri26890">https://russia-insider.com/en/how-we-trained-al-qaeda-bosnian-war-taught-islamic-terrorists-operate-abroad/ri26890</a></p>
Kuffarphobia via Violence and Intimidation by Leftist Quislings
tag:4freedoms.com,2018-07-19:3766518:Topic:197339
2018-07-19T13:45:40.511Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<p>This forum is for open threats of violence, and actual violence and intimidation of conservative speakers, by Leftist and Progressive accomplices of Islamic fascism. It is particularly for the brazen calls for death and violence towards conservative speakers, which are accepted by the media without admonishment, and which also do not garner the interest of the police and state prosecutors.</p>
<p>Once again, this category has been active for many years, but I only just realised it needs to…</p>
<p>This forum is for open threats of violence, and actual violence and intimidation of conservative speakers, by Leftist and Progressive accomplices of Islamic fascism. It is particularly for the brazen calls for death and violence towards conservative speakers, which are accepted by the media without admonishment, and which also do not garner the interest of the police and state prosecutors.</p>
<p>Once again, this category has been active for many years, but I only just realised it needs to be separately identified.</p>
Terror against Pop Concerts - collected articles
tag:4freedoms.com,2018-03-05:3766518:Topic:194603
2018-03-05T11:52:12.048Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<p>When the Ariana Grande concert was attacked, did any of us ever think that would become a formal 4F category? Yet here we are.</p>
<p><span>Teen jailed for life after police thwart terrorist attack on Justin Bieber concert:<br/></span> <a href="https://www.rt.com/uk/420443-wales-teen-terror-bieber/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://www.rt.com/uk/420443-wales-teen-terror-bieber/</a></p>
<p>When the Ariana Grande concert was attacked, did any of us ever think that would become a formal 4F category? Yet here we are.</p>
<p><span>Teen jailed for life after police thwart terrorist attack on Justin Bieber concert:<br/></span> <a href="https://www.rt.com/uk/420443-wales-teen-terror-bieber/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://www.rt.com/uk/420443-wales-teen-terror-bieber/</a></p>
Global Terrorism Index
tag:4freedoms.com,2016-09-23:3766518:Topic:183315
2016-09-23T20:10:57.096Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<div class="row"><div class="col-xs-11"><h1><span class="font-size-5"><strong>2015 Global Terrorism Index</strong></span></h1>
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<div class="row top-margin what-is-gpi"><div class="col-xs-11"><div class="pull-left col-xs-7"><p class="summary">Terrorism continues to rise, with over 32,000 people killed in terrorist attacks in 2014, the highest number recorded. Despite being highly concentrated in five countries, terrorism is spreading, with more countries recording attacks and…</p>
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<div class="row"><div class="col-xs-11"><h1><span class="font-size-5"><strong>2015 Global Terrorism Index</strong></span></h1>
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<div class="row top-margin what-is-gpi"><div class="col-xs-11"><div class="pull-left col-xs-7"><p class="summary">Terrorism continues to rise, with over 32,000 people killed in terrorist attacks in 2014, the highest number recorded. Despite being highly concentrated in five countries, terrorism is spreading, with more countries recording attacks and deaths.</p>
<p>Now in its third year, the Global Terrorism Index provides a detailed analysis of the changing trends in terrorism across 162 countries, over the last 15 years. It investigates the patterns of terrorism by geographic activity, methods of attack, organisations involved and the national economic and political context.</p>
<div><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/2015%20Global%20Terrorism%20Index%20Report_1.pdf" target="_blank">Download the report</a><br/> <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#/page/indexes/terrorism-index">Explore the interactive data map</a> to see the global impact of terrorism since 2002</div>
<p><img alt="" src="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/GTI15_Results_300dpi.jpg"/></p>
<p><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Global%20Terrorism%20Index%20Map_Ranks.pdf" target="_blank">Download results map</a> (pdf) </p>
<h3><span>KEY FACTS</span></h3>
<ul>
<li>Deaths from terrorism increased 80% last year to the highest level ever, with 32,685 people killed, compared to 18,111 in 2013.</li>
<li>Boko Haram and ISIL were jointly responsible for 51% of all claimed global fatalities in 2014.</li>
<li>78% of all deaths and 57% of all attacks occurred in just five countries: <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/AFG/OVER" target="_blank">Afghanistan</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/IRQ/OVER" target="_blank">Iraq</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/NGA/OVER" target="_blank">Nigeria</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/PAK/OVER" target="_blank">Pakistan</a> and <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/SYR/OVER" target="_blank">Syria</a>.</li>
<li>Iraq continues to be the country most impacted by terrorism with 9,929 terrorist fatalities the highest ever recorded in a single country.</li>
<li><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/NGA/OVER" target="_blank">Nigeria</a> experienced the largest increase in terrorist activity with 7,512 deaths in 2014, an increase of over 300% since 2013.</li>
<li>The global economic cost of terrorism reached an all-time peak at US$52.9 billion.</li>
<li>Since 2000 there have been over 61,000 terrorist attacks, killing more than 140,000 people.</li>
<li>Thirteen times as many people are killed globally by homicides than die in terrorist attacks.</li>
</ul>
<h3><br/> <span>TERRORISM CONTINUES TO RISE</span></h3>
<p>There has been a dramatic rise in terrorism over the last 15 years. There are nine times more people killed in terrorist attacks today than there were in 2000. In 2014, 32,685 lives were lost to terrorism, the highest number recorded, and an 80% increase from 2013. <img alt="" src="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Terrorist%20Incidents%20Map%202014_web_0.png"/></p>
<p><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Global%20Terrorism%20Index%20Incidents%20Map_detailed.pdf" target="_blank">Download detailed incidents map</a> (pdf)</p>
<p>Just two terrorist groups, ISIL and Boko Haram, are now jointly responsible for 51% of all deaths from claimed terrorist attacks world-wide. Both groups predominately target private citizens. </p>
<p><img alt="" src="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Boko%20Haram%20and%20ISIL%20in%20numbers_web.png"/><br/> <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Boko%20Haram%20and%20ISIL%20in%20numbers_branded.png" target="_blank">Download image</a> (png)</p>
<h3><span>TERRORISM IS SPREADING</span></h3>
<p>Terrorism spread significantly in the past year, with attacks and fatalities in more countries than ever. While many countries experience no terrorist activity, the number of countries to experience at least one or more deaths from terrorist activity has increased from 59 in 2013 to 67 in 2014. This includes OECD countries such as <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/AUT/OVER" target="_blank">Austria</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/AUS/OVER" target="_blank">Australia</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/BEL/OVER" target="_blank">Belgium</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/CAN/OVER" target="_blank">Canada</a> and <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/FRA/OVER" target="_blank">France</a>.<br/> Despite this, just five countries - <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/AFG/OVER" target="_blank">Afghanistan</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/IRQ/OVER" target="_blank">Iraq</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/NGA/OVER" target="_blank">Nigeria</a>, <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/PAK/OVER" target="_blank">Pakistan</a> and <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#page/indexes/terrorism-index/2014/SYR/OVER" target="_blank">Syria</a>– account for 78% of all deaths in 2014. Importantly, over 60% of the countries ranked by the Index experienced no deaths from terrorism, and 13 times as many people are killed globally by homicides than die in terrorist attacks.</p>
<p><img alt="" src="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Deaths%20from%20Terrorism%202000-2014_web.png"/><br/> <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Deaths%20from%20Terrorism%202000-2014_branded.png" target="_blank">Download image</a> (png)</p>
<h3><span>THE UNDERLYING DRIVERS OF TERRORISM</span></h3>
<p>The two factors most closely associated with terrorism are the levels of political violence and conflict. Ninety-two per cent of all terrorist attacks between 1989 and 2014 occurred in countries where political violence by the government was widespread, while 88% of all terrorist attacks between 1989 and 2014 occurred in countries that were experiencing or involved in violent conflicts.</p>
<p>However, drivers of terrorism differ: in OECD countries, socio-economic factors such as lack of opportunity and low social cohesion correlate significantly, while in non-OECD countries, internal conflicts, political terror, and corruption are strongly correlated.</p>
<blockquote><p>“Since we can see a number of clearly identifiable socio-political factors that foster terrorism, it is important to implement policies that aim to address these associated causes. This includes reducing state-sponsored violence, diffusing group grievances, and improving respect for human rights and religious freedoms, while considering cultural nuances,” said Steve Killelea, Institute for Economics and Peace Founder and Executive Chairman.</p>
</blockquote>
<h3><span>TERRORISM IN THE WEST: LONE WOLF ATTACKS</span></h3>
<p>The majority of deaths from terrorism do not occur in the West. Excluding the September 11 attack, only 0.5% of deaths from terrorism have occurred in the West since 2000. Including September 11, the percentage reaches 2.6.</p>
<p>Of the attacks that do occur, lone wolf attackers are the main perpetrators, causing 70% of all deaths in the West over the past 10 years. It is important to note that political extremism, not Islamic fundamentalism is the main driver of terrorism in Western countries.</p>
<h3><span>FOREIGN FIGHTERS</span></h3>
<p>The rise of ISIL has brought with it several challenging dynamics for counterterrorism. The flow of foreign fighters into Iraq and Syria since 2011 is the largest influx in modern times. Current estimates now range from 25,000 to 30,000 fighters, from roughly 100 countries. Half of the foreign fighters travelling to Iraq and Syria are from neighbouring MENA countries and a quarter from Europe and Turkey. The flow of foreign fighters does not appear to be diminishing with over 7,000 arriving in the first six months of 2015.</p>
<p><img alt="" src="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Foreign%20Fighters%20in%20Iraq%20and%20Syria_web_0.png"/></p>
<div><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Foreign%20Fighters%20in%20Iraq%20and%20Syria_branded.png" target="_blank">Download image</a> (png)<br/> <em>For the full statistics on Foreign Fighters see the <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/2015%20Global%20Terrorism%20Index%20Report_0.pdf" target="_blank">Global Terrorism Index</a> page 45. For an analysis on why individuals become foreign fighters for violent extremists groups see page 73.</em></div>
<h3><span>THE ROOT CAUSES OF FORCED MIGRATION</span></h3>
<p>Terrorist activity is a significant driver of forced migration. Ten of the 11 countries most affected by terrorism also have the highest rates of refugees and internal displacement. This highlights the strong connection between the current refugee crisis, terrorism and conflict.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/2015%20Global%20Terrorism%20Index%20Report_1.pdf" target="_blank">Download the Global Terrorism Index report</a><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/2015%20Global%20Terrorism%20Index%20Report_1.pdf"> </a><br/> <a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#/page/indexes/terrorism-index">Explore the interactive data map</a>: see the full list of country ranks, compare two or more countries, or use the timeline to see changes in terrorism impact since 2002.</p>
<h3><span>METHODOLOGY</span></h3>
<p>Developed by the Institute for Economics and Peace, and based on the Global Terrorism Database aggregated by START, a Department of Homeland Security Center of Excellence led by the University of Maryland, the Global Terrorism Index provides a comprehensive summary of the impact of terrorism in 162 countries, (99% of the world’s population). The indicators include the number of terrorist incidents, fatalities, injuries and property damage.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#/page/our-gti-findings">http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#/page/our-gti-findings</a></p>
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The Attempted Assassination of Pope John Paul II
tag:4freedoms.com,2016-04-15:3766518:Topic:177622
2016-04-15T02:32:25.887Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<h1>Gunman who tried to assassinate John Paul II is expelled from Italy two days after laying flowers at his grave and saying he wanted to meet Pope Francis</h1>
<ul class="mol-bullets-with-font">
<li><font><strong>Mehmet Ali Agca laid white roses on the tomb of Pope John Paul II</strong></font></li>
<li><font><strong>Comes 31 years to the day the Pope visited him in prison and forgave him </strong></font></li>
<li><font><strong>He fired shots at point-blank range at the Pope in St Peter's…</strong></font></li>
</ul>
<h1>Gunman who tried to assassinate John Paul II is expelled from Italy two days after laying flowers at his grave and saying he wanted to meet Pope Francis</h1>
<ul class="mol-bullets-with-font">
<li><font><strong>Mehmet Ali Agca laid white roses on the tomb of Pope John Paul II</strong></font></li>
<li><font><strong>Comes 31 years to the day the Pope visited him in prison and forgave him </strong></font></li>
<li><font><strong>He fired shots at point-blank range at the Pope in St Peter's Square in 1981 </strong></font></li>
<li><font><strong>Vatican officials have denied his request for a meeting with Pope Francis</strong></font></li>
</ul>
<p class="author-section byline-plain">By <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/search.html?s=&authornamef=Thomas+Burrows+for+MailOnline" class="author" rel="nofollow">THOMAS BURROWS FOR MAILONLINE</a></p>
<div><p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>An assassin who tried to kill Pope John Paul II has been expelled from Italy two days after he laid white roses on the tomb of the late pontiff and requested a meeting with Pope Francis.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>Mehmet Ali Agca was bundled aboard an airplane at Rome's Fiumicino airport by security last night to be sent home to his native Turkey after an Italian judge approved the expulsion.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>On Saturday Agca had made a surprise visit to the Vatican to place flowers on the tomb of John Paul II 31 years to the day that the Pope visited the assassin in prison and forgave him for the attempt on his life.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font><span class="mol-style-bold">Scroll down for video </span></font></p>
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<p class="imageCaption">Sent packing: Mehmet Ali Agca, an assassin who tried to kill Pope John Paul II, is escorted by security to a waiting airplane in Rome three days after his request to meet Pope Francis was denied</p>
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<p class="imageCaption">Mehmet Ali Agca is bundled aboard an airplane at Rome's Fiumicino airport by security last night to be sent home to his native Turkey</p>
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<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>Agca left John Paul critically injured when he fired several shots at close range in St Peter's Square on May 13, 1981.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>The 56-year-old spent 19 years in prison for the failed assassination attempt. His motive remains a mystery.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>His arrival prompted questions as to how he was able to land in Austria and cross the border into Italy as he is banned from visiting either country until 2016. </font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>It is the second time Vatican officials have denied Agca's request for a face-to-face meeting with His Holiness. </font></p>
<div class="artSplitter mol-img-group"><div class="mol-img"><div class="image-wrap fff-pic"><img id="i-f8d457936ef7e3fd" src="http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/12/27/244951DD00000578-2888550-image-a-1_1419707490744.jpg" height="422" width="634" alt="Turkish assassin Mehmet Ali Agca, 56, put roses on the tomb of Pope John Paul II, who he tried to kill in 1981" class="blkBorder img-share" name="i-f8d457936ef7e3fd"/><div class="share-pictures-overlay" id="share-pictures-3"></div>
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<p class="imageCaption">Turkish assassin Mehmet Ali Agca, 56, put roses on the tomb of Pope John Paul II, who he tried to kill in 1981</p>
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<p class="imageCaption">Agca, 56, spent 19 years in prison for the failed assassination attempt, which he carried out when he was 23</p>
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<p class="imageCaption">The assassin left John Paul critically injured when he fired several shots at close range in St Peter's Square</p>
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<div class="art-ins mol-factbox floatRHS news"><h3 class="wocc"><b>A SECOND OF SILENCE... FOLLOWED BY CRIES OF HORROR</b></h3>
<div class="ins cleared xolcc bdrcc"><p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>On May 13 1981 John Paul II was on his way to his regular weekly public audience - being driven in his white - and then unarmoured popemobile, through a crowd of 20,000 worshippers.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>The Polish pontiff had been elected less than three years earlier.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>At 5.17pm, shots rang out and John Paul II slumped back in his seat after being struck by four bullets - two of which hit him in the stomach.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>After a second of silence, people in the square began to scream: 'Hanno sparato il Papa! Hanno sparato il Papa!' (They've shot the Pope).</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>A minute or so later, police grabbed a man running from the scene - Mehmet Ali Agca.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>Following a five-hour operation, John Paul II went on to make a full recovery.</font></p>
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<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>'He has put flowers on the tomb of John Paul II. I think that is enough,' Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi told La Repubblica newspaper.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>Agca, once a member of a Turkish far right group known as the Grey Wolves, carried out the attack on John Paul after escaping from a Turkish prison where he was serving a life sentence for killing journalist Abdi Ipekci in 1979. </font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>During the assassination attempt, John Paul was left seriously injured, with one bullet passing through his abdomen and another narrowly missing his heart.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>During his 19 years imprisoned in Italy, Ali Agca converted to Christianity, and the Pope helped to pressure Italian authorities for his eventual release and deportation to Turkey in 2000. </font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>He then served an additional ten years in prison for the murder of Ipekci and other crimes. He was released from jail in 2010. </font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>When police seized Agca, they found a letter in his pocket which read: 'I have killed the Pope so that the world may know of the thousands of victims of imperialism.' </font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>A number of theories have been put forward about who was behind the assassination attempt. </font></p>
<div class="artSplitter mol-img-group"><div class="mol-img"><div class="image-wrap fff-pic"><img id="i-8bec822058eae17f" src="http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/12/27/2449923200000578-2888550-image-a-6_1419708208499.jpg" height="471" width="634" alt="After a second of silence, people began to scream: 'Hanno sparato il Papa!' ('They've shot the Pope!')" class="blkBorder img-share" name="i-8bec822058eae17f"/><div class="share-pictures-overlay" id="share-pictures-6"></div>
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<p class="imageCaption">After a second of silence, people began to scream: 'Hanno sparato il Papa!' ('They've shot the Pope!')</p>
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<p class="imageCaption">It comes 31 years to the day the Pope visited the assassin in prison and forgave him for the attempt on his life</p>
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<div class="artSplitter mol-img-group"><div class="mol-img"><div class="image-wrap fff-pic"><img id="i-8c7289fb8190a52b" src="http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/12/27/2449923600000578-2888550-image-a-9_1419708268420.jpg" height="469" width="634" alt="Following a five-hour operation, John Paul II went on to make a full recovery and forgave his would-be murderer" class="blkBorder img-share" name="i-8c7289fb8190a52b"/></div>
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<p class="imageCaption">Following a five-hour operation, John Paul II went on to make a full recovery and forgave his would-be murderer</p>
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<div class="artSplitter mol-img-group"><p class="imageCaption">Agca was released from prison in Turkey in 2000 after serving the best part of three decades behind bars</p>
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<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>An official inquiry blamed Soviet-sponsored assassins - who wanted the Pope dead because of his support for the democracy movement Solidarity.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>But in 2011 Polish communist leader General Wojciech Jaruzelski, who died this year aged 90, claimed Islamic fanatics sponsored the would-be assassination.</font></p>
<p class="mol-para-with-font"><font>'Radical Islam detested the pope and saw in him a leader of crusades,' he told Poland's 'Jezus' Catholic magazine. </font></p>
</div>
<p><span><br/> Read more: <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2891035/Assassin-tried-kill-Pope-John-Paul-II-expelled-Italy-three-days-laying-flowers-grave-saying-wanted-meet-Pope-Francis.html#ixzz45rHyIs7S">http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2891035/Assassin-tried-kill-Pope-John-Paul-II-expelled-Italy-three-days-laying-flowers-grave-saying-wanted-meet-Pope-Francis.html#ixzz45rHyIs7S</a> <br/></span></p>
Turkey: sponsor of terrorism
tag:4freedoms.com,2016-04-02:3766518:Topic:177139
2016-04-02T10:39:36.376Z
Joe
http://4freedoms.com/profile/38DD
<h1 class="article__heading">Turkey is key supplier of weapons, military hardware to ISIS - Russian envoy to UN</h1>
<div class="article__date">Published time: 1 Apr, 2016 14:25Edited time: 2 Apr, 2016 08:26</div>
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<h1 class="article__heading">Turkey is key supplier of weapons, military hardware to ISIS - Russian envoy to UN</h1>
<div class="article__date">Published time: 1 Apr, 2016 14:25Edited time: 2 Apr, 2016 08:26</div>
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<div class="article__summary summary">Moscow has submitted data on Turkey’s illegal arms and military hardware supply to Islamic State in Syria to the UN Security Council. Supplies are supervised by the Turkish intelligence service, Russian UN envoy Vitaly Churkin said as cited by Russian media.</div>
<div class="article__text text"><p><em>"The main supplier of weapons and military equipment to ISIL fighters is Turkey, which is doing so through non-governmental organizations. Work in this area is overseen by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey,"</em> Churkin wrote.</p>
<p>According to the envoy, transportation <em>"mainly involves vehicles, including as part of humanitarian aid convoys."</em></p>
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<p>The letter mentioned several NGOs – funded from Turkish and foreign sources – which sent different cargo, including military equipment, to Syria last year.</p>
<p><em>“The Besar foundation [President — D. Sanli] is most actively engaged in pursuing these objectives and, in 2015, formed around 50 convoys to the Turkmen areas of Bayirbucak and Kiziltepe [260km north of Damascus],”</em> Churkin stressed, adding that the Iyilikder Foundation and the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms were also involved.</p>
<p>The deliveries are performed through various checkpoints on the Turkish-Syrian border as well as waterways, particularly the Euphrates River, the letter said.</p>
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<div class="fb-video"><div class="fb-xfbml-parse-ignore"><blockquote cite="https://www.facebook.com/RTvids/videos/1179306565412928/"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/RTvids/videos/1179306565412928/">RT films trove of jihadist docs providing a stunning insight i...</a><p>ISIS, oil & Turkey: Stunning insight into illegal links#EXCLUSIVE via RT Documentary</p>
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<p>The weaponry received by the terrorists in recent months included TOW anti-tank missile systems, RPG-7 grenade launchers, M-60 recoilless rifles, and hand grenades, as well as various ammunition and communications tools, it added.</p>
<p><strong><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/337484-syria-militants-turkey-reinforcement/">READ MORE: Over 50 militants cross Turkish border to join Al-Nusra in Syria – MoD</a></strong></p>
<p>According to the Russian envoy, terrorist groups operating in Syria received explosive materials worth $1.9 million from Turkey last year.</p>
<p><em>"Total supplies to terrorists through Turkey were as follows in 2015: 2,500 tons of ammonium nitrate [worth approximately US$788,700]; 456 tons of potassium nitrate [$468,700]; 75 tons of aluminum powder [$496,500]; sodium nitrate [$19,400]; glycerin [$102,500]; and nitric acid [$34,000],"</em> Churkin wrote.</p>
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<p>Calls have intensified for an international investigation into Turkey’s links with Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) militants, following RT’s reports implicating Ankara in IS’s illegal oil trade and the smuggling of looted antiquities.</p>
<p>In a recent interview with Sputnik, Syrian President Bashar Assad labelled the militants fighting in his country as <em>“the army of Recep Tayyip Erdogan,”</em> accusing his Turkish counterpart of directly supporting the terrorists.</p>
<p><strong><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/337877-assad-turkish-troops-syria/">READ MORE: Assad says ‘Erdogan's army of terrorists’ fighting in Syria</a></strong></p>
<p>In late 2015, the Russian military released a batch of evidence, including satellite images, of columns of oil tanker trucks moving into Turkey from the areas controlled by Islamic State in Syria.</p>
<p>Since the start of the Syrian conflict in 2011, Turkey has been the main transit route for foreign recruits joining Islamic State, Al-Nusra Front and other terror groups in its neighbor state, with reports suggesting the militants were allowed to cross the border unimpeded.</p>
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