#his country's prime minister asked for his extradition

[fuckyeahchinesefashion]

OP: Check out. The fully-sexual charged cinematic movement design.

Cnetizens: How did the director come up with the idea to have him kneel on a playing card, adding so much aesthetic energy, is that some kind of genius?

[matan4il]

Hello! What kind of power does the recent ICC statement hold, and what kind of precedent will the arrest of Netanyahu and other several high ranking members of the Israeli government set? I'm genuinely frightened, as I can't imagine that the consequences will be anything but utterly disastrous

Hi Nonnie!

Honestly, I've read and heard so much about this topic, I will do my best to convey what I've been exposed to and processed, but keep in mind that I am not a legal expert.

First, I just wanna point out that for the time being, the ICC's chief prosecutor Karim Khan has only asked for arrest warrants against Hamas' leaders and Israeli ones. They've not been granted yet.

Second, a short explanation on the difference between the UN's two international courts.

The ICJ (International Court of Justice) is where states can be "judged" and "be sentenced," with some judicial outcomes having more real life consequences than others. This is upheld through conventions these states are signed on to (apparently, this is somewhat problematic, because it means the judges are not necessarily using established laws, rather they go by loose and open to interpretation statements that exist in the conventions), while the ICC (International Criminal Court) can only be used to prosecute individuals, not states, for their own crimes that they personally committed or oversaw.

The ICC's record in actually bringing major human rights violators to justice is... rather poor. It's not very good at getting these leaders extradited, so the court can put them on trial (because it's really easy to not travel at all to avoid extradition, especially for a wealthy tyrant who got rich from their war crimes, or to only travel to countries the criminal has reason to believe won't extradite him... shall we talk again about South Africa not extraditing Omar al-Bashir when he was on its soil, despite being responsible for countless murders in his country of Sudan?) and then, even on the rare occasion when they do get a leader extradited and put on trial... more than one ended up being exonerated by the court. Most people prosecuted there are NOT brought to justice.

In the case of Israel, it is NOT a party to the Rome Statute, which established the ICC. It initially wanted to join, but then had reason to believe the ICC might end up being used to wage political warfare instead of justice. I think seeing this proves Israel was right. BTW, the US ended up not being a party for the same reason. The ICC can only investigate and prosecute for 1 of 4 possible crimes (genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and crimes against peace. This means if you want to prosecute someone at the ICC, you HAVE to accuse them of one of these crimes, giving people motivation to make false accusations if need be), and only if that person's own country is "unwilling" or "unable" to do so.

That means Israel has several reasons to point out that the ICC's chief prosecutor is abusing his power: Israel not being a party to the Rome Statute means he has no jurisdiction over us (which means Israelis prosecuted will not even "get to" appear in court and plead their case, because as subjects of Israeli law, they can't recognize the court), it has not yet been established beyond doubt that any of the aforementioned crimes has actually been committed (how do you prosecute someone for a murder that might not have been a murder?) and lastly, Israel as a democratic country has an independent judicial system, which is both willing and able to investigate and put on trial its leaders (this is demonstrated by the fact that several of our past leaders have been put on trial, some even found guilty and imprisoned, and that our current prime minister, one of the two Israeli men the ICC is targeting, was and still is on trial in Israel, and is under threat of imprisonment).

On top of that, there's of course a few more signs that point to the prosecutor's behavior not being "kosher." For one thing, there's the fact that by requesting arrest warrants against Hamas' Sinwar and Israel's Bibi and Gallant, Khan created a moral equivalence between Hamas, the antisemitic, genocidal terrorist organization, which we KNOW carried out on Oct 7 (as well as before and since) war crimes, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity, and the elected leaders of a democratic state, waging a defensive war started by said genocidal terrorist organization. There's also the fact that Khan was supposed to come to Israel for the stated purpose of collecting evidence, but he canceled the trip, and made this move instead. What is he basing his request on, if he hasn't completed the measures that he himself thought were necessary to have a proper idea of what's happening here? This is also a precedent, because this is the first time ever when a democratic state's leaders are prosecuted by the ICC, something that as an idea shouldn't happen at all, since democratic countries have judicial systems willing and able to prosecute their leaders.

Now as an idea, if the ICC prosecutes individual Israeli leaders, not states, that shouldn't have an influence on Israel as a country. In reality, it does.

Because the prosecutor's move creates this false moral equivalence between Hamas' leaders, men responsible for insane death tolls for both Israelis and Palestinians for decades through their violent, extremist, genocidal antisemitic ideology and corresponding actions, and Israel's leaders, who are waging a defensive war, in which Israel is providing the enemy controlled territory with water, electricity, humanitarian aid, does its best to differentiate between civilians and terrorists, and even has a legal team to make sure all orders and struck military targets comply with International Humanitarian Law. This moral equivalence plays into every anti-Israel lie and dehumanizing propaganda, and enables the antisemitic wave we've been seeing around the world, so this is def gonna affect Israel for the worse, not to mention Jewish communities everywhere.

But it will also have consequences for Israel as it's painted as more and more of a pariah. "Why did you overstep your own jurisdiction and prosecute a democratic country's leaders?" will get twisted around to "this is proof that Israel is not a democracy and is committing war crimes!" which will make many wanna stay away from us, even though they'd be wrong. If Israel does become more and more shunned on the international stage, not because of actual crimes, but due to public perception, then this can hurt its financial, commercial, scientific and cultural ties. Basically, anything that requires international collaboration can be hurt, and the people who will pay the price will be the regular people in Israel. Ironically, this might also come back to bite the regular Palestinians in the ass. The Palestinians have never done anything (not under Hamas and not under the Palestinian Authority) to develop their own financial system, independent from Israel, so when Israelis will suffer financially, so will the Palestinians. The regular ones, the Hamas leaders and terrorists will continue to enjoy the donated money and stolen humanitarian and financial aid.

Lastly, the ICJ in its case against Israel (submitted by the same South Africa which has failed to extradite al-Bashir, and which enables its own political party guilty of genocidal chants) might be able to now quote Khan's request as "support" that Israel is committing a genocide. Just notice the possible loop between these two courts. The ICJ will take years to decide on this case, but in the meantime, can decide on provisional measures, which will punish Israel as if it has already been found guilty. The ICC, as an idea, is supposed to rely on the ICJ's findings and not prosecute anyone on a crime that hasn't yet been determined to have happened. But by requesting these warrants anyway, the ICJ can rely on the ICC to justify even further provisional measures against Israel.

This is a mockery of justice, a political weaponization of courts against a democratic state whose greatest crime is being misjudged based on the same ignorance and hatred that in the past have led to the type of genocide (against Jews) that these courts are meant to help prevent.

(for the record, several states have condemned the prosecutor for its moral equivalence of Israel and Hamas, but they also seem to understand that this blatant violation of some core principles regarding how the ICC is supposed to operate means that one day, that court can be used against others, too)

Footnote: Khan has never prosecuted anyone for crimes committed in other human-created disaster areas, including Bangladesh, Myanmar, the Philippines, Afghanistan and Venezuela, despite investigations there, and to the best of my knowledge has never ordered investigations into other areas where HUNDREDS of thousands have been murdered, such as Yemen and Syria, or regime leaders whose states sponsor global terrorism, like Iran.

Yeah, one day people are going to look back on this and try to figure out how the ICC and ICJ went so terribly wrong.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[zvaigzdelasas]

[CBC is Canadian State Funded Media]

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Wednesday senior bureaucrats are reviewing the Deschenes Commission report — a 1980s-era independent inquiry that looked at alleged Nazi war criminals in Canada — with an eye to making more of it public. Governor General Mary Simon also said today Rideau Hall is sorry for honouring Peter Savaryn — a former chancellor of the University of Alberta who served in the same Nazi unit as Yaroslav Hunka — with the Order of Canada [in 1987].[...]

The vice-regal office is also examining the Golden and Diamond Jubilee medals previously awarded to Savaryn, who also served as president of the Ukrainian World Congress, a group that represents the Ukrainian diaspora.[...] The first [part of the report], which included recommendations to make it easier to extradite war criminals, was released publicly. The second was marked secret and the names of alleged Nazis in Canada were never released. Jewish groups, including B'nai Brith and the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre (FSWC), have said the second part should be unredacted and disclosed publicly so that Canadians can learn more about the country's shameful history of admitting an untold number of Nazi collaborators after the Second World War.[...]

"There are top public servants looking very carefully into the issue, including digging into the archives," Trudeau told reporters. "We're going to make recommendations."

Reports suggest as many as 2,000 Ukrainian members of Hitler's Waffen-SS were admitted to Canada after the war — after some British prodding. The commission said the number is likely lower than that.[...]

Quebec Liberal MP Anthony Housefather said it's a delicate issue because the government doesn't want to "bring pain to a lot of Eastern European communities." Hunka, for example, has framed his war service as a fight for Ukrainian independence. The unit he fought for, the 1st Galician division, is also memorialized by Ukrainian expatriate groups at different sites across the country.[...]

The Deschenes report has also concluded that allegations of war crimes committed by this division have "never been substantiated."

That finding conflicts with what the post-war, Allies-led Nuremberg trials concluded about SS units like that one.[...]

"We have to recognize we have a horrible past with Nazi war criminals. We opened our country to people after the war in a way that made it easier to come if you were a Nazi than if you were a Jew," Housefather said.[...]

Conservative MP Melissa Lantsman, the party's deputy leader, said Canadians need to know more about the country's "dark history" of "letting Nazis through the door to live here in peace and security." Lantsman represents the Toronto-area riding of Thornhill, a riding with one of the country's largest Jewish communities. In an interview with CBC News, Lantsman said the party supports revisiting the Deschenes report and its findings in some way.[...]

Asked if it might be too painful for some communities to revisit alleged Second World War-era crimes, Lantsman said "history is painful but that doesn't mean we don't need to reckon with it."[...]

Quebec Conservative MP Gérard Deltell, Poilievre's environment critic, said Wednesday he's not open to revisiting the issue right now.[...]

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said he supports releasing the commission's report.

4 Oct 23

[beardedmrbean]

BANGKOK (AP) — A plane with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange departed Bangkok after refueling Tuesday and he is on the way to Saipan to enter a plea deal with the U.S. government that will free him and resolve the legal case over the publication of a trove of classified documents.

The chartered flight from London that Assange’s wife, Stella, confirmed was carrying her husband left Don Mueang International Airport, according to the Flightradar24 plane tracking app. The official WikiLeaks account on X said Assange was heading toward Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth in the Pacific, where he’s scheduled to appear in court on Wednesday.

He’s expected to plead guilty to an Espionage Act charge of conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified national defense information, according to the U.S. Justice Department in a letter filed in court.

Assange is expected to return to his home country of Australia after his plea and sentencing. The hearing is taking place in Saipan because of Assange’s opposition to traveling to the continental U.S. and the court’s proximity to Australia, prosecutors said.

British judicial officials confirmed that Assange left the U.K. on Monday evening after being granted bail at a secret hearing last week.

“Thirteen-and-a-half years and two extradition requests after he was first arrested, Julian Assange left the U.K. yesterday, following a bail hearing last Thursday, held in private at his request,” said Stephen Parkinson, the chief prosecutor for England and Wales.

The plea deal brings an abrupt conclusion to a criminal case of international intrigue and to the U.S. government’s yearslong pursuit of a publisher whose hugely popular secret-sharing website made him a cause célèbre among many press freedom advocates who said he acted as a journalist to expose U.S. military wrongdoing. U.S. prosecutors, in contrast, have repeatedly asserted that his actions broke the law and put the country’s national security at risk.

Stella Assange told the BBC from Australia that it had been “touch and go” over the past 72 hours whether the deal would go ahead but she felt “elated” at the news. A lawyer who married the WikiLeaks founder in prison in 2022, she said details of the agreement would be made public once the judge had signed off on it.

“He will be a free man once it is signed off by a judge,” she said, adding that she still didn’t think it was real.

She posted on the social media platform X that Assange will owe $520,000 to the Australian government for the charter flight, and asked for donations to help pay for it.

Kristinn Hrafnsson, editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks, said the deal for Assange came about after the growing involvement of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

“This is the result of a long, long process which has been going on for some time. It has been a tough battle, but the focus now is on Julian being reunited with his family,” Hrafnsson told the PA news agency.

In a statement posted on the social media platform X, WikiLeaks said Assange boarded a plane after leaving the high-security London prison where he has spent the last five years. WikiLeaks applauded the announcement of the deal, saying it was grateful for “all who stood by us, fought for us, and remained utterly committed in the fight for his freedom.”

Albanese told Parliament that an Australian envoy had flown with Assange from London.

“Regardless of the views that people have about Mr. Assange’s activities, the case has dragged on for too long,” Albanese said. “There’s nothing to be gained by his continued incarceration and we want him brought home to Australia.”

The deal ensures that Assange will admit guilt while also sparing him additional prison time. He is expected to be sentenced to the five years he has already spent in the British prison while fighting extradition to the U.S. to face charges, a process that has played out in a series of hearings in London.

Last month, he won the right to appeal an extradition order after his lawyers argued that the U.S. government provided “blatantly inadequate” assurances that he would have the same free speech protections as an American citizen if extradited from Britain.

Assange has been heralded by many around the world as a hero who brought to light military wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Among the files published by WikiLeaks was a video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack by American forces in Baghdad that killed 11 people, including two Reuters journalists.

But his reputation was also tarnished by the rape allegations, which he has denied.

The Justice Department’s indictment unsealed in 2019 accused Assange of encouraging and helping U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning steal diplomatic cables and military files that WikiLeaks published in 2010. Prosecutors had accused Assange of damaging national security by publishing documents that harmed the U.S. and its allies and aided its adversaries.

The case was lambasted by press advocates and Assange supporters. Federal prosecutors defended it as targeting conduct that went way beyond that of a journalist gathering information, amounting to an attempt to solicit, steal and indiscriminately publish classified government documents.

The plea agreement comes months after President Joe Biden said he was considering a request from Australia to drop the U.S. push to prosecute Assange. The White House was not involved in the decision to resolve Assange’s case, according to a White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Assange made headlines again in 2016 after his website published Democratic emails that prosecutors say were stolen by Russian intelligence operatives. He was never charged in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, but the inquiry laid bare in stark detail the role that the hacking operation played in interfering in that year’s election on behalf of then-Republican candidate Donald Trump.

During the Obama administration, Justice Department officials mulled charges for Assange but were unsure a case would hold up in court and were concerned it could be hard to justify prosecuting him for acts similar to those of a conventional journalist.

The posture changed in the Trump administration, however, with former Attorney General Jeff Sessions in 2017 calling Assange’s arrest a priority.

Assange’s family and supporters have said his physical and mental health have suffered during more than a decade of legal battles.

Assange took refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2012 and was granted political asylum after courts in England ruled he should be extradited to Sweden as part of a rape investigation in the Scandinavian country. He was arrested by British police after Ecuador’s government withdrew his asylum status in 2019 and then jailed for skipping bail when he first took shelter inside the

Although Sweden eventually dropped its sex crimes investigation because so much time had elapsed, Assange had remained in London’s high-security Belmarsh Prison during the extradition battle with the U.S.

[mariacallous]

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg announced on Monday night that after months of obstruction, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has finally agreed to support Sweden’s NATO membership bid – a move hailed by other members of the Western military alliance.

“I stand ready to work with President Erdogan and Turkey on enhancing defence and deterrence in the Euro-Atlantic area. I look forward to welcoming [Swedish] Prime Minister [Ulf] Kristersson and Sweden as our 32nd NATO ally,” the White House said in a statement.

“At 32, we’re all safer together,” German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock wrote on Twitter, while British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak also said that Sweden joining would “make us all safer”.

Stoltenberg said that Erdogan’s decision to support Sweden’s membership was an historic step which makes all NATO allies stronger

“President Erdogan has agreed to forward Sweden’s accession protocol to the [Turkish] Grand National Assembly as soon as possible and ensure ratification,” Stoltenberg said.

Turkey had blocked Sweden’s membership bid over its claims that Stockholm has been hosting and supporting Kurdish groups that Turkey designates as terrorist organisations.

Sweden changed legislation and promised action to accommodate Turkey’s demands but Erdogan refused to drop his objections, seeking further concessions, until his apparent about-turn on Monday.

However, no timeline has been announced for the Turkish parliament’s ratification of Sweden’s NATO membership protocol.

The agreed conditions for President Erdogan lifting his veto are also unknown.

Erdogan was previously asking the US to sell him new F-16 jet fighters and the Turkish leader this week unexpectedly asked Brussels to revive Ankara’s EU membership process, which has been practically dead for more than a decade.

“First, let’s clear Turkey’s way in the EU, then let’s clear the way for Sweden, just as we paved the way for Finland,” Erdogan told a news conference on Monday before he travelled to Vilnius for this week’s NATO summit.

The NATO Summit is opening on Tuesday with the alliance’s leaders expected to adopt new defence plans amidst the war in Ukraine.

The US and other members pushed Turkey to ratify Sweden’s membership before the summit but Ankara insisted that Sweden must take concrete steps, including the extradition of political fugitives by Stockholm.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine prompted Sweden and Scandinavian neighbour Finland to apply to join the Western alliance.

Finland joined NATO in April. All NATO members except for Turkey and Hungary – which has been acting in cooperation with Turkey – have since ratified Sweden’s NATO membership in their parliaments.

Countries can join NATO only if all its members unanimously agree, which effectively gave Turkey veto powers over Sweden’s bid to join.

A Council of Europe report said on June 23 that Turkey’s government was using its blockade of Sweden’s NATO membership bid to exert its power over its critics living abroad.

[head-post]

Western vehicles, Ukrainian manpower: mass footage of forced mobilisation

NATO Secretary Jens Stoltenberg said during his farewell speech that achieving peace in Ukraine depended on the number of weapons delivered to Kyiv. However, the Ukrainian authorities face a shortage of manpower, which local Territorial Recruitment Centres (TRCs) are trying to address in any possible way.

Stoltenberg stressed that peace talks should be held with Russia’s participation and expressed confidence that Ukraine would become a NATO member.

The third lesson is that military strength is a prerequisite for dialogue. I know this from my time as Prime Minister of Norway. We have to speak to our neighbours. However difficult it might be. But dialogue only works when it is backed by strong defences. This is clearly demonstrated in Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Kyiv points to the need to replenish the ranks of its Armed Forces (AFU). In an attempt to mobilise Ukrainians who left the country, the authorities faced citizens’ reluctance to return to fight on the front lines.

Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof asked the head of government during a debate in parliament to examine the possibility of expelling alleged Ukrainian evaders back to Ukraine. He urged to be “extremely cautious” in applying coercive measures. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the Netherlands was home to almost 19,000 Ukrainians of conscription age as of November 2023.

With European countries predominantly refusing to extradite Ukrainian citizens, citing human rights, Kyiv is forced to resort to more drastic measures to replenish almost daily battle losses on the frontline, especially against the backdrop of the incursion into Russia’s Kursk region which started last month.

Coercive measures

Territorial Recruitment Centres enlist Ukrainian citizens fleeing conscription within the country. However, in the absence of proper measures to control the activities of such organisations, they often exceed their official powers.

Ukrainians shared footage of TRC work in Lutsk, Volyn region, and Chernivtsi, Chernivtsi region, in social media. The operator who filmed the actions of the employees stated:

Democracy. A free country.

A shooting conflict between TRC and local residents took place in Transcarpathia, also known as Zakarpattia region. Local groups reported a confrontation involving warning shots.

In the city of Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk region, employees of the mobilisation centre threatened a woman who filmed their vehicle on her phone. However, according to Ukrainian laws, citizens have the right to record on video representatives of the authorities, whether they are police officers or TRC officials. The men threatened to “break” the woman and almost knocked her over with their vehicle.

These stinky f**gots were catching the boys just now. What am I supposed to delete [TRC employees demand to delete the video]? I’ll delete nothing, I’m not even filming your face! Are you sick?

Again in Lutsk, TRC staff came to a single father, handcuffed him and forced him to come to the mobilisation centre. The female operator asked him to follow them and not to resist.

– Sasha, go. Make them happy. Don’t let them do such things to you. Please, go sit [in the car]. I can’t stand it. Sasha, it’s gonna be okay. They’ll let you go. – What okay? The videos will disappear. This is Ukraine!

Another Ukrainian shared footage of TRC work in Dnipro city in social media. The employees dragged the man into the vehicle right along the asphalt.

In Rivne, Rivne region, men in uniform tried to force a man into a vehicle without military licence plates. The man resisted, then passers-by stood up for him, and the officers were forced to let him go.

Ukrainian media recognise lawlessness

Ukrainian media outlets started condemning the actions of TRC officers. The AVERS TV channel broadcast a story about a 22-year-old Ukrainian student who was detained by police and military recruitment centre officers on the street. The men surrounded him, began to verbally humiliate him and applied physical violence.

A video appeared in open sources, where a young man is ‘broken’ by three TRC officers and a policeman. At first glance, a commonplace situation. A person liable for military duty evades conscription and resists. However, in fact the guy is not subject to military mobilisation, as he is too young. And you can’t look at the police officer’s actions without indignation.

According to the testimony, the policeman also “put his knee on my throat, which made it difficult for me to breathe and I could not scream.” However, the police said that the guy “categorically” refused to provide documents, tried to escape and was aggressive.

In an interview with Ukrainska Pravda (Ukrainian Truth), member of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence, and Intelligence, Serhiy Rakhmanin, said that the ceiling of the draft age should be lowered from 60 to 50. He also stated that there would be no demobilisation until the authorities abolished martial law.

Rakhmanin reported a significant increase in the number of those mobilised, but noted that their quality was “not sufficient for the needs of the AFU.” He cited the mobilisation of the elderly and reduced training as the reasons.

If you saw the number of those recruited, you would cry.

Journalist Anton Gura told about a woman from the city of Kitsman, Chernivtsi region, who reported that the head of the local TRC Oleksandr Tovsty threatened to send her husband without 3 fingers on his hand to the army “out of principle” and hit her in the chest when she was 20 weeks pregnant.

And why doesn’t a single journalist who comes from Chernivtsi write about this? Why do these unfortunate people turn to me?

Nevertheless, TRC noted that the woman’s statements “did not correspond to reality” and the head of the department did not communicate with her.

Ukrainians are also facing an active border guard force that is catching men trying to leave the country amid the war. Border guards have drones, machine guns and chain dogs in their armoury. The deputy head of the border guard unit spoke out about the evaders:

I don’t understand them, they are cowards to me.

Complaints of AFU soldiers

Meanwhile, AFU soldiers complain that the mobilised men are causing problems at the front. A militant of the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade with the call sign “Pitbull” accused TRC employees of recruiting men aged 40-50. He also noted that the new recruits lacked motivation to fight.

As far as I know, more than half [of the military officers] have not participated in combat [operations]. They don’t even know what it is. All they want to do is (…) report to their superiors.

DW also shared an interview with an instructor of the 59th Motorised Brigade.

The level of motivation is very low. Most of the mobilised people who come to us are those who have been caught somewhere on their way to a “boozer” [bar] or so. Some were taken off a trolleybus, some were caught in an alley elsewhere. What motivation can they have if they didn’t come here on their own? We try to raise [motivation], but it’s very hard. Sometimes they leave their positions.

Ukrainian media reported about the mobilisation of an 18-year-old boy with cerebral palsy, MP Oleksiy Goncharenko said.

I appealed to the heads of the TRC a few weeks ago, I asked, I explained that the law will be adopted soon, that it is not necessary to mobilise these unfit, because soon they will have to be released. And what? An 18-year-old sick guy is about to be sent to the airborne assault troops.

Tougher methods of forced mobilisation not only undermine the spirit of Ukrainians outraged by the actions of TRC officers and authorities, but also undermine Ukrainian soldiers fighting on several fronts. Newly arrived troops in poor health and lacking motivation raise the risk of failure of any AFU offensive or defensive operation.

Some military experts attribute the stalemate in Kursk region to the low preparedness of Ukrainian soldiers, not only to the shortage of manpower and ammunition.

Read more HERE

[atlanticcanada]

How an ex-Mountie accused of conspiracy became China's 'hired gun' in a campaign Canada once tacitly supported

As an RCMP officer, William Majcher, 60, used fake identities to infiltrate organized crime groups to investigate money laundering. He even went undercover to help the FBI to build a case against a Colombian drug cartel, knowing that if he was outed, a bounty would be put on his head.

After leaving the national police force in 2007, Majcher moved to Hong Kong, where he helped create a firm called Evaluate Monitor Investigate Deter Recover (EMIDR) in 2016. The company’s raison d’etre was to help China and its corporations recover assets it alleged were stolen, Majcher said in previous interviews.

In an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Company in 2019, Majcher admitted to being an “economic mercenary.”

“As long as the claim is valid and we’re doing everything lawful and properly - I’m a hired gun to help either large corporations or governments get back what's rightfully theirs,” Majcher told ABC.

OPERATION FOX HUNT

Three security experts told CTV National News it’s likely Majcher was part of China’s notorious Operation Fox Hunt, an anti-corruption campaign under the regime of President Xi Jinping.

CTV News asked RCMP Insp. David Beaudoin, head of the Montreal Integrated National Security Enforcement Team that is leading the investigation if Majcher was involved in Fox Hunt. Beaudoin declined to provide more details in order “to respect the work of the courts.”

CTV News has reached out to Majcher's lawyer, and this article will be updated when a response is received.

Created in 2014, Fox Hunt and its later iteration, Sky Net, targeted Chinese nationals living abroad. Under the program, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) would recruit police officers, private investigators and lawyers in foreign countries to help track down fugitives suspected of financial crimes and bring them back to China to face prosecution.

The CCP’s latest statistics from October 2022 show that more than 12,000 Chinese Nationals have been “involuntarily returned” to China under Operation Fox Hunt and Sky Net. According to Safeguard Defenders, a Spanish non-government organization, alleged fugitives were repatriated using extradition as well as covert methods such as threats and kidnapping. Safeguard says targets can also be lured to another country with an extradition treaty with China and arrested there.

And not all of those forced to return home are suspected criminals. Human rights groups say fighting corruption was also a guise used by the CCP to find and silence its critics. 

When asked for comment, the Chinese embassy told CTV News in an email, "China always adheres to the principle of non-interference in other countries' internal affairs and strictly abides by international law."

A RARE CHARGE

The RCMP, Majcher’s former employer, has charged him under the rarely used Security of Information Act with preparatory acts for the benefit of a foreign entity and conspiracy.  Majcher is accused of foreign interference-related activities for using his knowledge and extensive network of contacts to allegedly help the Chinese government “identify and intimidate” an individual in Canada.

Scott McGregor, a former military intelligence officer who has researched Operation Fox Hunt, says the charges likely stem from Majcher’s work tracking down alleged criminals for the Chinese government.

“It's likely the information that was gleaned was used by the Chinese to ascertain where these people are. What measures were used to get them back or get back their assets, we’ll find out from court.”

But McGregor points out that prosecuting Majcher under these charges will be complicated because Canada once tacitly supported China’s international efforts to fight corruption.

“It’s a grey zone because there are international laws where this is allowed,” said McGregor. 

SHARING STOLEN ASSETS

In September 2016, nearly a year after he became prime minister, Justin Trudeau welcomed former premier Li Keqiang to Canada.

During that visit, Keqiang, China’s second-in-command, sealed a historic agreement to work together to recover and share in the return of stolen assets. According to Chinese state media, Canada was the first country to enter into such a treaty with China since it launched its anti-corruption campaign in 2014.

 The CCP estimated that as many as 25 per cent of its most wanted financial fugitives had fled to Canada. Under the agreement, Canada and China would co-operate in investigations and split the proceeds of crime once they were recovered. But where the individual faced prosecution would have to be negotiated, because Canada doesn’t have an extradition treaty with China. 

During Keqiang’s visit, where removing trade barriers was also discussed, Trudeau expressed in a speech his excitement about developing “a real partnership that will benefit all our people for generations to come.”

But five years later, the government began striking a different tone. In February 2021,Public Safety Canada issued a warning about Operation Fox Hunt stating that China’s anti-corruption efforts weren’t just used to bring criminals to justice, but its tactics could also be used to “silence dissent, pressure political opponents and instill a general fear of state power on Canadian soil.”

Later that year in the autumn of 2021, the RCMP would begin investigating Majcher. 

MORE CANADIANS TARGETED

Police have not released the name of the victim that Majcher is alleged to have targeted, but other Canadian cases related to Operation Fox Hunt have been made public.

Safeguard Defenders claimed in a March 2022 report that Zhang Yan from Canada was warned by Chinese police to return because they had placed his father under arrest. The human rights organization also revealed the presence of a global network of illegal Chinese police stations, including at least five in Canada.

Earlier this year, CTV National News reported on the case of Edward Gong, a Chinese-Canadian entrepreneur and former Toronto mayoral candidate who is suing the Ontario Securities Commission. Gong alleges the OSC endangered his life by co-operating with Chinese police in a fraud investigation.

EROSION OF TRUST

Katherine Leung, a policy advisor for advocacy group Hong Kong Watch, says the arrest of Majcher could also erode the diaspora’s trust in law enforcement.

“They’re told to go to the police when things like this happen,” says Leung. “Knowing that  there's someone who could be in the RCMP today and be on China's side tomorrow tells us that  there needs to be a better way for these diaspora groups to report foreign interference and intimidation.”

Leung wants to see a dedicated phone line to report foreign interference, staffed with workers who can communicate in Cantonese and Mandarin. 

Leung says Majcher’s case also illustrates the need to create a foreign agent registry. If the registry existed, Majcher would be legally required to identify himself as someone who worked for the Chinese government instead of allegedly operating in the shadows.

In the meantime, Leung is watching the case to see who else could be implicated. The Mounties say they’re looking into more than 100 cases of foreign interference. Majcher is currently in custody will appear in court again on Tuesday.  The RCMP say more arrests and or charges connected to the former Mountie are possible.

from CTV News - Atlantic https://ift.tt/TOlnDKf

[thessalian]

Thess vs Unfair Hashtags

Welcome to another edition of Translating British News, where someone who wasn’t born here but has to fucking live here gives a brief precis of various news items that might have leaked over into US media but mostly might be some very oblique Twitter hashtags. Today: Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. Hashtags include (and please bear with me; it hurts to type this) #ungratefulcow and #sendherback.

So, back in 2016, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe (born in Tehran) wanted to see her mother, so her mother could see her daughter, then two. This necessitated a trip to Iran, on her Iranian passport. So Zaghari-Ratcliffe went to Iran visited her mother ... and then was arrested as a political prisoner for no apparent reason just before she boarded the flight home.

She was released last week, after about six years in an Iranian jail. And a lot of this is Johnson’s direct fault. No, he wasn’t in power back then. But his lack of attention to detail and saying whatever he thinks sounds good at the time literally hurt Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s case. Because while she really was there just visiting her mother, and just about everyone backed her up on this, Johnson (who was Foreign Secretary back then) went on one of his spiels and said that she was “simply teaching people journalism”. Now, consider Iran and its Supreme Leader and consider how they’d feel about training journalists. He got his wires crossed and made Zaghari-Ratcliffe out to be a liar and a political dissident, and it was used as evidence against her. Johnson never corrected, retracted, or even apologised for this.

Not that the situation wasn’t complicated anyway, given as how Iran doesn’t recognise dual-citizenship the way the UK does and once she was arrested on Iranian soil, her UK citizenship meant squat to the people of Iran. There were trial releases and new charges against her that seemed to come up out of nowhere and honestly, I think they just liked having a bargaining chip. They did try requesting a prisoner swap with an Iranian prisoner in Australia awaiting extradition to the US, but nobody was having that.

Six years in an Iranian jail, and you want to know why she was released? Fixing a Conservative government fuck-up from 1971. See, if you hear someone talk about £400m? That’s an arms trade thing. It’s not talked about much, but the UK is surprisingly into arms trading for such a dinky-ass country (hell, every time I go to the Excel Centre for MCM Comic Con, there’s generally someone protesting the fact that arms deals go on there an awful lot). So in 1971, the then-Shah of Iran paid a lot of money for a variety of weapons. When the Shah’s regime fell, the Brits didn’t finish delivery. The new regime asked for a refund, and a legal battle ensued. That legal battle has been going on for decades. And funnily enough, when the UK finally agreed to pay some of that back? Suddenly Iran was willing to release Zaghari-Ratcliffe.

She came back to the UK on 16th March, the same day as the payment was agreed. And yesterday, after a bit of decompression time, she gave a statement to the press. Now, her husband was all gratitude. Six years without his wife, all his endless campaigning, the hunger strike, everything - he finally had her back and that was great.

Nazanin was not so generous, however. Six years. Five Foreign Secretaries. One of whom - the one who sunk a nail in the coffin of her defense - is currently the fucking Prime Minister. She should, she said, have been released years ago. She lost a huge chunk of her daughter’s childhood and she’s never getting that back. She’s been through absolute hell, her life has been like something out of Kafka for six years, the UK government has not been particularly helpful, and she’s justifiably pissed.

Which is why those awful hashtags. It honestly feels like the government finally arranged for Zaghari-Ratcliffes’ release just as a way to get some brownie points for “being nice to foreign people” in the wake of their horrible track record on immigration and asylum-seekers, and a lot of them feel betrayed by a woman who, while grateful that her ordeal is finally over, isn’t going to gush all over the Prime Minister whose unresearched, unretracted lie about her reason for being in Iran compounded this mess in the first place. And of course, consider Brexit and its knock-on effect of letting people get really loud about their racism and xenophobia. So when a woman of colour is anything less than simperingly, fawningly grateful that the government that fucked up her life has unfucked it only by unfucking a bigger Tory fuck-up from fifty years ago ... she’s called an “ungrateful cow” (and that’s honestly the nicest C-word used) and the cry goes out to “send her back”. Apparently if she can’t be grateful that someone got around to her plight, she doesn’t deserve the freedom and should be thrown right back in an Iranian jail. So people are blaming her and saying, “Everyone advised against travel to Iran, and you went anyway!” Which is funny from what appears to be the same section of the population who visited elderly relatives at the height of the pandemic and / or bitched about “My child needs to see their grandparents! This is too hard!”

Of course, those same people are doubting that Iranian jail was really hard for her, simply because she presented herself so well and so eloquently, and didn’t talk about her ordeal much. I mean, first of all, she’s in journalism - up until her detainment, worked as a project manager for Thomas Reuters’ London branch. Hell, her journalism background is why Johnson’s statement at the start of all this fucked her over so badly in the first place. So of course she’s going to present herself well. And granted she was released with a tracking anklet and her movements heavily monitored the last couple of years because of the pandemic, so there was probably at least some time to recover from straight-up detention. Also consider that she spent a lot of time in and out of courtrooms, let out on staged release only to be dragged back into court again on new charges and re-jailed. No, she wasn’t physically traumatised that anyone saw, but you try living through Kafka’s “The Trial” and see how you’re doing inside. She should not be obliged to be performative about her trauma to somehow ‘prove’ to the British people how hard her life has been the last six years ... but some of the British people feel entitled to her pain as well as to her gratitude.

Currently, there’s going to be an inquiry into why we waited fifty years to pay the debt to Iran that resolved this. I don’t imagine anything will come of it, but in the meantime I can’t check Twitter without seeing #ungratefulcow and #sendherback. Honestly, checking the tags is worse because you find a whole bunch of people trying to spin this as an anti-Labour thing. They call the debt that was repaid “Labour’s debt”; ten seconds on Google and I found out that Edward Heath, a Tory, was PM in ‘71, and while there were a few Labour governments between then and now (Wilson succeeded by Callaghan 1974-1979, Blair / Brown 1997-2010), that debt still started with the Tories. And Wilson’s government only had a clear majority once. You try doing anything with a hung Parliament.

So that’s another bit of headline and Twitter hashtag demystified. This is my last day off before Easter week, so I’m going to try to enjoy it ... largely by staying away from the news.

[Edit: Oh gods, I’m going to have to do another one of these, since the other hashtag currently trending is #Labourlosingwomen, which is apparently to do with a bunch of TERFs screaming that Labour supporting a trans woman winning in a women’s sporting competition is “anti-women” and there’s that huge fucking transphobic streak in this country oh gods why do I have to live here?!? Oh, right - money.]

[newstfionline]

Friday, February 26, 2021

Canada says genocide (Foreign Policy) The Canadian Parliament overwhelmingly voted in favor of declaring the atrocities in Xinjiang genocide. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau abstained from voting on the motion, which passed 266-0. China has responded with the usual vitriol. The decision follows former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s declaration of genocide, despite a split memo from the State Department. Some U.S. lawyers argue that the atrocities are crimes against humanity but not genocide. The Canada-China relationship is already fraught. Two years ago, China detained two Canadian citizens, Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, on spying charges after Canada detained the CFO of Huawei, Meng Wanzhou, following a U.S. extradition request. The Canadian government has described China’s actions as “hostage diplomacy.” The new genocide bill includes a provision calling for the 2022 Winter Olympics to be moved from Beijing if the atrocities continue—a significant move given Canada’s influence in winter sports.

School voucher push taps frustration over distance learning (AP) With her children struggling in many classes last spring, Kelli Rivera became so frustrated with how her suburban Atlanta district was handling the coronavirus pandemic that she withdrew them to home-school them. They’re back in public school and mostly attending class in person. For now. Rivera is thinking of enrolling her younger son in private school next year, and she hopes the state of Georgia might help her pay for it with an expansion of school choice programs. “We’ve been just a public school family forever, without any intention or desire to leave,” Rivera said. “But when the pandemic hit and we moved into virtual schooling, it really wasn’t working for us.” School choice advocates and lawmakers in many states are counting on the frustrations of parents like Rivera to bolster efforts to pass or expand laws allowing families to use public money to pay for private school or to help teach their own children at home. Some sort of school choice program already gets public money in 29 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. “If you talk to any parent of a school-aged child, what you’ll find, literally across the board, is they’re just mad, frustrated, that traditional public school districts failed to deliver education to their children,” said American Federation for Children President John Schilling, who lobbies for school choice programs. “What the pandemic has laid bare is just how inflexible the K-12 system is.”

Cold wreaks havoc on aging waterworks (AP) The sunshine is back and the ice has melted. But more than a week after a deep freeze across the South, many communities are still grappling with getting clean water to their citizens. For years, experts have warned of the need to upgrade aging and often-neglected waterworks. Now, after icy weather cracked the region’s water mains, froze equipment and left millions without service, it’s clear just how much work needs to be done. Families stood for hours in lines to get drinking water. They boiled it to make it safe to drink or brush their teeth. They scooped up snow and melted it in their bathtubs. Hospitals collected buckets of water to flush toilets. “You don’t realize how much you use water until you don’t have it,” said Brian Crawford, chief administrative officer for the Willis-Knighton Health System in the northwestern Louisiana city of Shreveport, where water pressure at one hospital only started returning to normal Wednesday. Tanker trucks had supplied it with water since last week. The still-unfolding problems have exposed extensive vulnerabilities. Many water systems have decades-old pipes, now fragile and susceptible to breaking. A 2018 survey by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimated $473 billion was needed over 20 years to maintain and improve water infrastructure. In a 2020 report, the American Society of Civil Engineers said a water main breaks every two minutes on average in the U.S., and described “chronic, long-term and insufficient investment.”

Shopping online eases isolation for older adults (AP) In November, Paula Mont did something new: The 86-year-old, who hasn’t left her New Jersey senior living community in nearly a year, went shopping—online. Mont used an iPad, equipped with a stylus to help her shaky hands, to buy a toy grand piano for her great-granddaughter. She picked it out from more than a dozen versions of the instrument on Amazon. “It is like a wow feeling. I found it!” Mont said. The pandemic has motivated many who have been isolated at home or unable to leave their senior communities to learn something they may have resisted until now: how to buy groceries and more online. Instacart president Nilam Ganenthiran predicted that online groceries will be a “new normal” for older people even when the pandemic ends. Still, there are many barriers, from struggling to use new technology to high prices to access.

Venezuela kicks out head of EU delegation after new sanctions (Reuters) Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza said on Wednesday that the head of the European Union’s delegation in Caracas had 72 hours to leave the South American country and declared her persona non grata after the bloc imposed new sanctions on Venezuelan officials this week. In announcing the action against Portuguese national Isabel Brilhante, Arreaza described the sanctions against 19 Venezuelan officials as “truly unacceptable.” The sanctions were a response to legislative elections won by President Nicolas Maduro’s allies that Venezuela’s opposition and many Western democracies deemed fraudulent. Two EU diplomats said the move was unwelcome but will not change the bloc’s policy, end sanctions, or derail efforts to mediate a way toward new “free and fair” presidential elections in the country.

Ecuador raises death toll from prison riots to 79, says situation controlled (Reuters) Ecuador on Wednesday raised the death toll from riots in four jails to 79, and said authorities had regained control following one of the bloodiest outbreaks of prison violence in its history. Police and troops were stationed at detention centers in the cities of Guayaquil, Cuenca and Latacunga, where gangs on Tuesday fought one another with handmade weapons in what authorities said was a coordinated outbreak of violence. Prison authority SNAI said all those killed the rioting were prisoners. President Lenin Moreno declared Ecuador’s prison system in a state of emergency in 2019 after a wave of incidents that killed 24.

Britain’s GCHQ cyber spies embrace the AI revolution (Reuters) Britain’s cyber spies at the GCHQ eavesdropping agency say they have fully embraced artificial intelligence (AI) to uncover patterns in vast amounts of global data. AI, which traces its history back to British mathematician Alan Turing’s work in the 1930s, allows modern computers to learn to sift through data to see the shadows of spies and criminals that a human brain might miss. GCHQ, where Turing cracked Germany’s naval Enigma code during World War Two, said advances in computing and the doubling of global data every two years meant it would now fully embrace AI to unmask spies and identify cyber attacks. The world’s biggest spy agencies in the United States, China, Russia and Europe are in a race to embrace the might of the technological revolution to bolster their defensive and offensive capabilities in the cyber realm.

Amnesty strips Alexei Navalny of ‘prisoner of conscience’ status (BBC) Amnesty International has stripped the Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny of his “prisoner of conscience” status after it says it was “bombarded” with complaints highlighting xenophobic comments that he has made in the past and not renounced. A spokesman for the human rights organisation in Moscow told the BBC that he believed the wave of requests to “de-list” Navalny was part of an “orchestrated campaign” to discredit Vladimir Putin’s most vocal critic and “impede” Amnesty’s calls for his release from custody. But on review, Amnesty International concluded that comments made by Navalny some 15 years ago, including a video which appears to compare immigrants to cockroaches, amounted to “hate speech” which was incompatible with the label “prisoner of conscience”. “We had too many requests; we couldn’t ignore them,” spokesman Alexander Artemev told the BBC, explaining that the team initially discounted Navalny’s previous statements—which he has not repeated—as “not relevant” in the light of his current, political persecution.

India and Pakistan announce cease-fire for first time in nearly 20 years (Washington Post) India and Pakistan announced Thursday that their militaries would cease firing across their shared border, the first such step since 2003 and a potentially significant move toward lessening tensions between the two rivals. Military officials in the two countries released a joint statement saying they had agreed to a cease-fire that went into effect at midnight, including along the unofficial frontier in the disputed region of Kashmir. Indian and Pakistani soldiers regularly exchange mortar and small-arms fire in the region, a situation that analysts have described as a war by other means. The low-grade conflict is deadly, with dozens of villagers and military personnel killed each year. Relations between the two neighbors have been frosty since 2019, when India conducted an airstrike in Pakistan after a terrorist attack killed 40 Indian soldiers in Kashmir. The two countries then engaged in their first aerial dogfight in nearly 50 years. Cross-border firing in Kashmir—which can involve everything from small arms to artillery—has also intensified. There were more than 5,000 such incidents in 2020, according to Indian data, the highest such figure since 2002.

Hong Kong’s Lesson to Schoolchildren: Love China, No Questions Asked (NYT) The orders seemed innocuous, even obvious: Primary school students in Hong Kong should read picture books about Chinese traditions and learn about famous sites such as the Forbidden City in Beijing or the Great Wall. But the goal was only partially to nurture an interest in the past. The central aim of the new curriculum guidelines, unveiled by the Hong Kong government this month, was much more ambitious: to use those historical stories to instill in the city’s youngest residents a deep-rooted affinity for mainland China—and, with it, an unwavering loyalty to its leaders and their strong-arm tactics. Students, the guidelines said, should develop “a sense of belonging to the country, an affection for the Chinese people, a sense of national identity, as well as an awareness of and a sense of responsibility for safeguarding national security.” The Hong Kong government is using history as a potentially powerful tool to inculcate obedience and patriotism. In some cases, the government has moved to literally rewrite history. It is backing the creation of a 66-volume set of “Hong Kong Chronicles,” which is projected to cost $100 million and promises a “comprehensive, systematic and objective” record of the city’s last 7,000 years. In official yearbooks that summarize the government’s achievements, references to past cooperation with Western countries—which had been reprinted without change for decades—have disappeared. In mainland China, major events, including the government’s 1989 massacre of Tiananmen Square protesters, have been largely erased from public memory by censorship and official directives that insist on “patriotic education.” Critics fear that model is being imported to Hong Kong.

Pro-military marchers in Myanmar attack anti-coup protesters (AP) Members of a group supporting Myanmar’s military junta attacked and injured people protesting Thursday against the army’s Feb. 1 seizure of power that ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. At least several people were injured in the attacks in Myanmar’s largest city. The chaos complicates an already intractable standoff between the military and a protest movement that has been staging large-scale demonstrations daily to have Suu Kyi’s government restored to power. Photos and videos on social media showed the attacks and injured people in downtown Yangon as police stood by without intervening. The attackers fired slingshots and carried iron rods, knives and other sharp implements.

US-Saudi relations (Times of London) President Biden will warn Saudi Arabia’s aging King Salman of his intent to reset US relations with the kingdom as he prepares to unveil a possibly explosive report on the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Mr. Biden will speak to the king soon and does not expect his son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, 35, the kingdom’s day-to-day ruler, to be on the call, the White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said yesterday. The normally routine matter of protocol represented by Biden’s first phone call to the kingdom as president has taken on significance in the light of his pledge, outlined in his election campaign and by aides since he took office, to upend US policy towards the Middle East. A CIA report due to be declassified and published this week on Khashoggi’s murder is expected to suggest that it was ordered by the crown prince.

[telfordcarly]

Bringing Nawaz Sharif back to test govt

ISLAMABAD/LAHORE: The government and the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) have become active to bring former prime minister and PML-N Rahber Muhammad Nawaz Sharif back from the UK after his increasing contacts and consultations with the opposition parties.

Nawaz Sharif’s politicking has thrown a serious challenge to the government and official proceedings to bring him back will be initiated next week.

It has been learnt that the National Accountability Bureau will approach an accountability court to declare Nawaz a proclaimed offender in the Toshakhana case.

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday, August 20 disposed of a petition filed by Nawaz against declaring him absconder in the Toshakhana case.

A division bench – comprising Chief Justice Athar Minallah and Justice Aamer Farooq – took up the petition.

The court dismissed the petition seeking withdrawal of non-bailable arrest warrant for Nawaz in the case when his counsel Barrister Jahangir Khan Jadoon sought permission to withdraw it.

An accountability court on Tuesday, August 18 passed orders for seizure of vehicles of former president Asif Ali Zardari and Nawaz Sharif in Toshakhana case.

The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had requested the court to seize the vehicles of PPP co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari and PML-N Rahber Muhammad Nawaz Sharif.

The court froze Zardari’s ownership of three vehicles, including two BMWs and one Lexus car. The ownership of one Mercedes owned by Nawaz Sharif was also seized.

The NABhas also decided to inform the IHC that Nawaz was an absconder. The bureau will file an appeal with the court for implementation of Nawaz Sharif’s sentence in Al Azizia reference.

Meantime, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) will hear former prime minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif’s appeal against his sentence in Al-Azizia Steel Mills reference on September 1.

A divisional bench – comprising Justice Aamir Farooq and Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani – will hear the appeal.

The court has also fixed for hearing the NAB’s appeals against extension in Nawaz Sharif‘s sentence and acquittal in the flagship reference.

It merits a mention here that the Accountability Court Judge Muhammad Arshad Malik had given verdicts in Al-Azizia Steel Mills and Flagship References. Arshad Malik was sacked following a video scandal.

Addressing a press conference in Lahore on Saturday, Prime Minister’s Advisor on Accountability and Interior Barrister Shahzad Akbar said the government was determined to bring Nawaz back as a convicted criminal very soon, along with his children and former finance minister Ishaq Dar.

“The government has decided to make fresh contacts with the UK government to extradite the convicted criminal who had been allowed a limited 8-week conditional bail only for medical treatment. But the criminal has never fulfilled any condition and has been roaming freely on London streets defying the law and judiciary,” he said.

Shahzad dispelled the impression that the PTI government was politically victimizing the PML-N chief and stressed that it was not a vendetta, but the government wanted to uphold the writ of law.

He reiterated that PM Imran Khan would never give “NRO or even its N” to the opposition leaders. He said the PTI government would write letters to the British government and Interpol for the extradition of Sharif family members. He told a questioner that the judiciary and the Punjab government had rejected the extension requests in Nawaz Sharif’s conditional bail and thus his status was now a convicted absconder.

He said Nawaz Sharif was permitted the bail only to get medical treatment from abroad, on conditions to return to the country within the stipulated time. Secondly, he was bound to submit his periodical medical reports and updates to the court as well as the Punjab government. But Nawaz never submitted any report, to either the court or the Punjab government, he added.

Shahzad explained that Nawaz was granted conditional bail by the Islamabad High Court on October 29, 2019 for eight weeks for medical treatment in the Al-Azizia case. The Punjab government was to proceed the case under Code of Criminal Procedure and conduct a proper hearing after his return. Later, Shahbaz Sharif filed an undertaking in the Lahore High Court on November 16, assuring that Nawaz would return after the required medical procedures. But after the eight-week bail had expired on December 23, Nawaz appealed to the Punjab government for an extension in his bail, he said.

Shahzad said since the bail was granted on medical grounds, the Punjab government constituted another medical board, which demanded fresh reports of Nawaz’s treatment in London. But the board was not satisfied with the reports as Nawaz had not been given even a single injection over there, he said, adding that the medical board had thus recommended against extending Nawaz’s bail. Later, three hearings took place this year on February 19, 20, and 21, where Nawaz’s lawyer, doctor, and party members submitted documents describing Nawaz's health problems. The Punjab Home Department rejected extension in his bail on February 27, and demanded that Nawaz should return to Pakistan immediately and surrender before authorities.

Later, Nawaz’s lawyer filed an application in the Islamabad High Court, claiming that he had not received the government’s decision, which the PML-N had actually received, claimed Shahzad and added that he had brought this order to satisfy media and if someone could send it to Nawaz. He said the order has also been sent to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs with the direction to send it to the British government. Shahzad said recently, on August 18, the IHC declared Nawaz an “absconder" as his bail has expired. The federal government wants to proceed in the case with the help of the NAB. He lamented that this dual standard of accountability could not be continued in Pakistan as common people hardly get any relief or parole, but people like Nawaz Sharif who has been disqualified for life by the Supreme Court and found guilty in two cases, is enjoying his life in London.

Shahzad said Nawaz Sharif was convicted for seven years in the Al-Azizia Steel Mills case, and would not be able to enter practical politics for the next seven centuries. Nawaz was disqualified for life, said Shahzad. He told a questioner that Pakistan has an agreement with Britain for the "exchange of criminals and the law is applicable to all criminals.

To another query, he said, Nawaz's political activism is confined to the Oxford Street, while his daughter Maryam's politics is restricted to Twitter. About Ishaq Dar, he said he has also been declared an absconder by an accountability court in 2017 and the government would not allow him to stay further in London, and bring him back along with Nawaz's children.

About Shahbaz Sharif, Shahzad said the PML-N president "is free nowadays and should appear before the NAB". He added that the relevant institutions have stepped up efforts to prosecute Jahangir Tareen and Suleman Shahbaz. "If these people resist against being a part of the probe, we will issue red warrants against them,” he added.

Talking about “NRO plus”, a reference to the opposition’s proposed amendments to the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO-1999), he said Imran Khan won't even give the "N" of "NRO plus" to the opposition. He said Pakistan is in danger of moving from the Financial Action Task Force's "grey list" to "black list", and added that if it happened, “we would become like Iraq and Iran, and wouldn't even be able to import medicines”. He said after receiving a list of recommendations from the FATF, a civil servant has been appointed as director-general FATF. In charge institutions such as Counterterrorism Department, State Bank, Federal Investigation Agency, National Accountability Bureau, ministries, and provincial governments are also involved to address the FATF issue.

He said: "All watchdogs are made non-functional and an institutional capture took place that was noted by the international forum.” He said the PTI views money-laundering as a serious offence while the opposition did not consider this crime "serious". He said: "The biggest bottleneck is money-laundering as the opposition is asking us to not bring the crime under serious offences.”

Meanwhile, the Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) leaders Saturday warned the government against using the NAB as a political weapon against the opposition parties.

Addressing separate news conferences in the federal and provincial capitals, PML-N Secretary Information Marriyum Aurangzeb and central leader Ahsan Iqbal said Nawaz Sharif had gone abroad after fulfilling all the legal requirements and he would come back when doctors would declare him fully fit.

Marriyum said the PTI government was desperately trying to shift focus away from their deplorable two-year performance. She said the government had launched a new onslaught against the PML-N Quaid Nawaz Sharif because Imran Khan's political existence had no roots and he could not survive without using Nawaz Sharif's name.

She said the selected prime minister could not even lay a brick as the development work while Nawaz Sharif completed various projects worth billions of rupees.

Slamming the statements regarding making those responsible for sending Nawaz abroad an example, she said the government should start the process by arresting, investigating and prosecuting Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid, board of government doctors and the Punjab government, who had clearly stated that Nawaz's treatment was not possible in Pakistan and he had to be moved abroad to save his life. Nawaz went abroad through legal processes, she said adding that Imran should set an example by bringing back the money-launderers and public sugar money looters, who he conveniently helped flee the country on a chartered plane. She demanded arrest of Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar and Jahangir Tareen, who were responsible for flour and sugar crisis in the country.

The former information minister said the new wave of hoopla against Nawaz was because the Imran-led mafia government knew it had destroyed every sector in the country from its economy, industry, to businesses, and jeopardised national defence and security.

She said Imran's corruption and corrupt decisions had plummeted national growth from 5.8 to minus 0.4, sugar price has reached Rs110/kg from Rs52, flour from Rs32 to Rs78, medicines have become unaffordable because of PTI's 500 per cent price-hike, petrol had hit the roof with unprecedented price-hike and inflation had skyrocketed from 3 to 13 per cent.

Marriyum said Imran inaugurated Nawaz Sharif's initiated projects and then alleged corruption in the same projects. “Why hasn't he shut down any of these projects if they were marred by corruption,” she questioned.

She said the NAB-Niazi alliance was not just called out and criticised by the opposition but the Supreme Court of Pakistan too. She said the international rights bodies slammed it as an instrument of political engineering and persecution of opposition. She stressed that the PML-N would stand strong against any law that hampered the national growth and progress. She said those who embezzled Rs13,000 billion in loans, Rs120 billion in Peshawar BRT, trillions in sugar, wheat, flour and petrol corruption, were now busy laundering that money.

Marriyum pointed out that it was the joint opposition that included the money laundering clause in the FATF related legislation. She told the government mouthpieces like Shahzad Akbar to read the letter written by Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi lauding and appreciating the opposition's role in FATF related legislation before doing a presser filled with lies.

The PML-N secretary information warned the PTI government against politicising matters related to national security such as FATF, as it would have devastating long-term consequences. Stop telling PML-N what it should do regarding the FATF legislation because it had more knowledge and experience of such matters than the PTI, she said.

She once again challenged Imran to file a case in the court and name those who demand an NRO. She lambasted that the selected PM had neither the power nor the mandate to give anyone any NRO other than his mafia friends who loot the country.

"Imran Khan has intentionally taken every action to destroy every sector and institutions of the country with a well-planned agenda motivated by the money of those 23 illegal and undeclared accounts for which he refused to answer," she said.

Answering a question regarding the all parties conference (APC), she said the Rahber Committee is busy formulating the agenda of the conference because the upcoming sitting would not end with just a declaration but start a movement to send the government packing.

Separately, PML-N leader Ahsan Iqbal said Prime Minister Imran Khan and his advisors should resign if they think they were deceived on the issue of Nawaz Sharif’s health.

Addressing a press conference at 180-H Model Town Lahore on Saturday, he said Nawaz Sharif was sent abroad after complete examination by senior doctors including Chief Executive of Shaukat Khanum Hospital Dr Faisal. Why he was made health advisor if he had deceived prime minister, he asked. Dr Faisal had said the condition of Nawaz Sharif was not good and he should be sent abroad for treatment. Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid had also confirmed that the condition of Nawaz Sharif was critical.

He said Nawaz Sharif would come back when doctors would give him certificate of good health.

Ahsan Iqbal said actually Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government has been doing politics on Nawaz Sharif health issue, like it did on the health of the late Mrs Kulsoom Nawaz.

He said actually the government had failed to fulfil the promises they had made with people. They had actually wasted 200 pages by publishing a performance report.

He said why the circular debt had increased despite increasing the rates of electricity and gas. He said after two years, the economic situation had deteriorated from bad to worse.

He claimed that the PTI Members of National Assembly (MNAs) had started saying that their government had broken all records of corruption. Jahangir Tareen was sent abroad in the darkness of night. Who made money by increasing fuel prices, he questioned.

Meanwhile, addressing a news conference at the Railways Headquarters, Lahore, Railways Minister Sheikh Rasheed said that the case of PML-N President Shahbaz Sharif and his son Hamza Shahbaz was very serious and they were in troubled waters.

To another question, Sh Rashid said former finance minister Ishaq Dar and Suleman Shahbaz could not be brought back. However, he added, Nawaz Sharif should come back and face cases against him in the courts. The railway minister said the PM was regretting why Nawaz was allowed to go abroad.

[justinssportscorner]

Jen Kirby at Vox: 

The Portland Trail Blazers still have to win four games to reach the NBA Finals. So do the Toronto Raptors.

But if that happens — and that’s a big if, as the Trail Blazers are already down a game to the reigning NBA champs the Golden State Warriors — the NBA playoffs could suddenly have some geopolitical implications.

That’s because Enes Kanter, the center for the Portland team, is currently the target of an Interpol “red notice” — basically, an arrest warrant — put out by the Turkish government.

Kanter is an outspoken and longtime critic of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğanand his increasingly authoritarian policies. Kanter’s Turkish passport was revoked in 2017, and though he’s a reportedly a US green card holder, if he travels to Canada to compete, he could open himself up to arrest.

Again, the Trail Blazers are still a long way from reaching the NBA finals (as are the Raptors). But the potential matchup has already prompted Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) to write to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to ask him and Canadian officials to “facilitate Mr. Kanter’s safe passage to and from Canada” if Portland and Toronto meet in the finals.

“I also urge your government to state publicly that it will not comply with any Interpol red notice meant to interfere with Kanter’s livelihood and to intimidate him and his family back in Turkey,” Wyden wrote.

A spokesperson for Canada’s minister for immigration told the Associated Press that it couldn’t comment on specific cases because of privacy reasons, but that “we are committed to ensuring that every case is assessed fairly, on its merits and in accordance with Canada’s laws.’’

But Kanter’s saga began long before the prospect of a playoff matchup at the end of the month — and his status as an NBA player has elevated his protest against Erdoğan’s anti-democratic crackdown, even as he finds himself a victim of it.

Who is Enes Kanter, and why is he battling with Turkey?

Enes Kanter, 26, is a Turkish basketball player (though he was born in Switzerland) who’s played professionally in the United States since 2011. He joined the Portland Trail Blazers in February 2019.

Kanter is a Muslim — he’s been very open about fasting during Ramadan during the NBA playoffs — and a devoted supporter of Fethullah Gülen, a Turkish cleric who preaches a moderate form of Sunni Islam. Education is a huge part of Gülen’s movement, and he and his adherents have helped establish schools in Turkey and abroad that preach his teachings.

Gülen has lived in Pennsylvania since 1999. But Erdoğan has accused him of orchestrating the failed July 2016 coup against him and his government. After the coup, Erdoğan demanded that the US extradite Gülen to Turkey to stand trial, despite little evidence that Gülen and his followers instigated the coup attempt.

Even so, Erdoğan purged thousands of suspected followers of Gülen from the armed forces, civil service, and the judiciary in the wake of the coup — and then continued to try to stamp out pretty much any form of dissent within the country.

In the nearly three years since the coup attempt, Erdoğan has awarded himself additional powers, which has effectively turned Turkey into an autocracy. He continues to quash any challenges to his authority; in March, an opposition candidate was elected Istanbul’s mayor, in an embarrassing blow to Erdoğan, whose ally lost the race. But in May, Turkey’s electoral commission voided the election and declared a new contest to be held in June.

Given all this, it’s not that surprising that Kanter’s ties to Gülen, and his criticism of Erdoğan’s power grab in recent years, have turned him into a target for Erdoğan.

Kanter vocally criticized Erdoğan after a terror attack in Ankara in 2016 and has continued to publicly blast the leader for his crackdown, calling him a dictator and the “Hitler of our Century.”

In May 2017, Kanter said he was detained in Romania after authorities told him his passport was invalid. He said that Turkey rescinded his passport because of his “political views.” He was eventually released and was able to get to London and then New York, reportedly with the help of the State Department.

n December 2017, the Turkish state-run news agency said prosecutors sought a four-year sentence for Kanter for insulting Erdoğan over Twitter in 2016. Kanter was also reportedly indicted in 2018 for making “hurtful and humiliating” comments about the head of the Turkish basketball league, who happens to be an ally of Erdoğan’s and has, incidentally, said some hurtful things about Kanter.

Kanter’s family also became a target for the Turkish leader, including his father, mother, and sister, who are still in Turkey. Kanter told the New York Times in January that he stopped communicating with them directly after his family home was raided in 2016.

But in the summer of 2018, the Turkish government indicted Kanter’s father on charges of being a member of a terrorist group. In an op-ed Kanter wrote for Time in September 2018, he said his outspokenness had directly endangered his father and the rest of his family. 

[...]

In Turkey, Kanter’s activism is effectively nonexistent. Erdoğan tightly controls the media, which repeatedly accuses Kanter of terrorist ties. It also censors his on-court performance. Earlier this month, the NBA cut ties with a Turkish company that ran the league’s Turkish Twitter account after it completely omitted any mention of Kanter’s performance (15 points, nine rebounds) in a playoff game against Denver in a recap tweet.

And Turkey’s S Sport station, which airs NBA games in Turkey, hasn’t broadcast any games since his indictment, according to Reuters. That’s one thing if it’s a Knicks game, but that’s now including Kanter’s Trail Blazers playoffs games against the Warriors. And if the Trail Blazers make it to the NBA finals, Turkish TV just won’t air those games either.

[greysgeeks]

Petition rescind blairs knighthood thousands signatures

(Be sure you confirm your signature after submitting the form, check your Inbox. If knighting Tony Blair makes you angry, please consider adding your name to the petition: Petition to Rescind Tony Blair’s Knighthood Gets Hundreds of Thousands of Signatures By BY STEPHEN CASTLE from NYT World Share Get link Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Other Apps Labels: NYT. While the West has barely bothered to count up the numbers of innocent civilians killed due to war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, the toll is at least several times higher than that suffered by all sides of the Yugoslav civil wars of the 90s combined. Petition to Rescind Tony Blair’s Knighthood Gets Hundreds of Thousands of Signatures Obtenir le lien Facebook Twitter Pinterest E-mail Autres applications janvNearly 15 years after he left office, the prime minister’s support for the Iraq war has not been forgiven by many in Britain. LONDON (NYTIMES) - By tradition, former British prime. Tony Blair: Petition to rescind knighthood reaches one million signatures. Petition to rescind Tony Blairs knighthood gets hundreds of thousands of signatures. More than 400,000 signatures were left under a petition urging the UK prime minister to ask the queen to rescind the order in less than a day after it was launched. Tony Blair: Petition to rescind knighthood reaches one million signatures. The former UK prime minister should be held accountable for war crimes instead, it says. Hundreds of thousands of people have signed an online petition calling for the removal of knighthood from Tony Blair. War Criminals receive knighthoods while those that exposed their crimes #JulianAssange languish in maximum security jail facing extradition and a 175 year sentence #FreeAssangeNOW Petition to strip Tony Blair of knighthood racks up 400,000 signatures. Laura Kuenssberg Translator December 31, 2021 Rise Sir Tony!īREAKING: Tony Blair has been given a knighthood for killing a million innocent people in Iraq and Afghanistan petition to rescind Tony Blairs knighthood received 1,106,497 signatures. Petition EN: We, European citizens of all origins and of all political persuasions, wish to express our total opposition to the nomination of Tony Blair to the Presidency of the European Council.To sign the petition, please go to the bottom of this page. One million Iraqis dead, three million dispossessed, a trail of blood to 7/7. is a worldwide petition website, based in California, US, operated by the San. The contempt in which Britain's elite holds the public has never been more eloquently expressed than in the decision to award Tony Blair the highest order of knighthood. The story has been picked up by ITV, Guardian, Daily Mail, Express, Metro and The Independent. While most of the media have focused on his military misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, Serbs remember the war crime which triggered all the others – the 1999 bombing of Yugoslavia which killed thousands of civilians and left the economy in ruins. The decision prompted a massive public backlash with an online petition demanding the honour be rescinded exceeding 500,000 signatures. He is to receive the country’s highest honour, a knighthood, and will subsequently be known as Sir Tony Blair. The New Year Honours List includes former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

[mariacallous]

The Constitutional Court of Montenegro on Friday agreed to suspend the extradition of South Korean cryptocurrency mogul Do Kwon, who is wanted by South Korea and the US.

The Supreme Court had decided in September that the extradition of Do Kwon would be made by the Minister of Justice. But the Constitutional Court suspended that ruling until it decides on Do Kwon’s appeal against his extradition.

“The request for the suspension of the judgment of the Supreme Court… until the final decision of the Constitutional Court is adopted,” the Constitutional Court said.

The Ministry of Justice announced on Friday that the Constitutional Court only informed it today that Do Kwon’s lawyers had filed a constitutional complaint. The ministry stated that, due to the great interest in this case, timely communication between branches of government and institutions is important for making valid decisions.

“That’s why we ask the Constitutional Court to act in this case as soon as possible and inform us about it without delay in the future,” the Ministry of Justice said.

Kwon and crypto company Terraform’s former chief financial officer, Han Chang-joon, were arrested in March last year at Podgorica airport, trying to board a private jet to Dubai with false Costa Rican travel documents. They have since been convicted of forgery by a Montenegrin court.

Kwon is wanted in South Korea on financial charges, as well as in the US where, hours after his arrest in Montenegro, federal prosecutors in New York charged him with fraud over his management of Terraform.

The company was behind the digital currencies Luna and TerraUSD, whose collapse in 2022 wiped out billions of dollars in value, caused a market meltdown and cost their investors everything.

Kwon’s case had an impact on political life in Montenegro. Days before last year’s parliamentary elections, media reported that he had written to then Prime Minister Dritan Abazovic, the then justice minister and the Special State Prosecution, claiming he was financing Europe Now, the centrist movement whose leader, Milojko Spajic, became prime minister after the election.

Abazovic confirmed receiving a letter and urged prosecutors to investigate. Europe Now dismissed the reports, claiming it was a political smear campaign. Prosecutors questioned Kwon and the investigation is ongoing. Spajic called the claims a “brutal abuse of state institutions” ahead of the election.

After several different judgments by the High Court in Podgorica, which decided variously that Kwon should be extradited to the United States, then to South Korea, or that the decision should be made by the Minister of Justice, the Supreme Court on September 19 ruled that the minister should decide which country he should be extradited to. This decision is now on hold pending Do Kwon’s appeal.

Besides the South Korean, Montenegro faces another high-profile crypto-related case over Polish national Roman Zimian, who is wanted by Poland and South Korea on suspicion of multimillion-dollar crypto fraud. He was arrested in Montenegro in August.

Asked about international fugitives choosing Montenegro as a haven, Minister of Justice Bojan Bozovic told BIRN in an interview earlier this week: “It is a concern… why those people are coming here… we do not want to send the message that we are a comfortable place for anyone who wants to deceive anyone, anywhere on this planet.”

[head-post]

Nuland Revealed Details of Russia-Ukraine 2022 Talks Collapse, Johnson’s Role Confirmed

In a recent interview, former spokesperson for the US Department of State, Victoria Nuland, spoke out about negotiations between Russia and Ukraine in 2022, shedding light on the details of the military conflict.

Nuland said that during the talks, Kyiv and its allies discussed whether a deal with Russia would be favourable. The main condition at the time, she said, was a limit on the specific types of weapons systems Ukraine could have after the deal.

She also confirmed that the story of former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Ukrainian MP David Arakhamia was true. Ukrainian authorities asked for advice regarding the direction of the negotiation process and how the war would develop.

In 2022, Moscow offered Kyiv to end hostilities on condition that Ukraine would not join NATO. However, the country refused neutrality partly due to the advice of former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. According to Arakhamia, Johnson allegedly advised Ukraine to abandon the negotiation process.

In my opinion, they [Russia] really believed to the last that they could push us to take neutrality. This was the main point for them: they were ready to end the war if we would accept neutrality like Finland once did. And give a pledge that we would not join NATO. (…) Moreover, when we came back from Istanbul, Boris Johnson came to Kyiv and said that we would not sign anything with them [Russia] at all. And [said] ‘let’s just go to war’.

Johnson travelled to Kyiv in April 2022 and met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He promised Kyiv military assistance in the form of 120 armoured vehicles and anti-ship systems, as well as additional loan guarantees worth $500m. The former prime minister also visited the country several times after his resignation.

Consequences of failed talks

As a result of the failure in 2022 to produce the desired outcome, the conflict continues into its third year. Ukraine has already lost large territories, including four regions that Russia incorporated into the Constitution. Moreover, Ukrainian media continue to report the threat of losing defensive positions in the Donetsk region.

Ukrainian economist Oleksiy Kushch said that Ukraine’s population could shrink to ten million people due to migration and a decline in women’s fertility. He specified that only 187,000 children were born in Ukraine in 2023, while 230,000 children were born a year earlier.

Literally in three iterations of three generations in 75 years, Ukraine’s population could shrink to 10 million people. (…) War is a national tragedy. And a demographic crisis is a national catastrophe.

Kushch also noted that the pandemic and border closures worked against Ukraine, as people did not return during a period of relative calm.

Forcibly returning them will not work, because Europe is open and free. As long as there is a war, no one will forcibly return refugees. This is a fundamental principle of humanitarian law: if you ask for asylum from war, Europe gives it. They can extradite only in individual criminal cases, there will be no mass extradition.

The National Bank of Ukraine reported that since the beginning of 2024, 400,000 citizens had already left the country despite the reduction of benefits in European states. Germany, Poland, and the Czech Republic received the most Ukrainian refugees. According to the bank, about 6.7 million Ukrainians have left the country since the outbreak of the war.

Meanwhile, Russian troops continue their offensive in Donbas (common name for the Donetsk and Luhansk regions). The Ukrainian army is suffering heavy casualties in an attempt to halt the advance, according to The Economist.

Soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) are reportedly unable to counterattack due to a lack of manpower. This forces the soldiers to retreat from their positions.

Moreover, the Polish Dziennik Gazeta Prawna reported that the Ukrainian Legion had not found volunteers from among EU residents.  During a July visit to Warsaw, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced the creation of the legion, which was supposed to gather volunteers from among Ukrainians permanently residing in Poland and other European countries. However, two months later, Kyiv has not launched official recruitment yet.

THE ARTICLE IS THE AUTHOR’S SPECULATION AND DOES NOT CLAIM TO BE TRUE. ALL INFORMATION IS TAKEN FROM OPEN SOURCES. THE AUTHOR DOES NOT IMPOSE ANY SUBJECTIVE CONCLUSIONS.

Bill Galston for Head-Post.com

[eagle-eyez]

John McAfee, the outlandish security software pioneer who tried to live life as a hedonistic outsider while running from a host of legal troubles, was found dead in his jail cell near Barcelona on Wednesday.

His death came just hours after a Spanish court announced that it had approved his extradition to the United States to face tax charges punishable by decades in prison, authorities said.

McAfee, who was among other things a cryptocurrency promoter, tax opponent, US presidential candidate and fugitive, who publicly embraced drugs, guns and sex, had a history of legal woes spanning from Tennessee to Central America to the Caribbean. In 2012, he was sought for questioning in connection with the murder of his neighbor in Belize, but was never charged with a crime.

McAfee’s body was discovered at the Brians 2 penitentiary in northeastern Spain. Security personnel tried to revive him, but the jail’s medical team finally certified his death, a statement from the regional Catalan government said.

“A judicial delegation has arrived to investigate the causes of death,” the statement read. “Everything points to death by suicide.”

McAfee’s death was confirmed after Spain’s National Court ruled in favor of extraditing McAfee, 75, who had argued in a hearing earlier this month that the charges against him by prosecutors in Tennessee were politically motivated and that he would spend the rest of his life in prison if returned to the US.

The court’s ruling was made public on Wednesday and was open for appeal, with any final extradition order also needing to get approval from the Spanish Cabinet.

McAfee was arrested last October at Barcelona’s international airport and had been in jail since then awaiting the outcome of extradition proceedings. The arrest followed charges the same month in Tennessee for evading taxes after failing to report income from promoting cryptocurrencies while he did consulting work, made speaking engagements and sold the rights to his life story for a documentary. The criminal charges carried a prison sentence of up to 30 years.

Nishay Sanan, the Chicago-based attorney defending him on those cases, said by phone that McAfee “will always be remembered as a fighter.”

“He tried to love this country but the US government made his existence impossible,” Sanan said. “They tried to erase him, but they failed.”

Born in England’s Gloucestershire in 1945 as John David McAfee, he moved to Virginia as a child and grew up troubled, with a father who “beat him mercilessly” and killed himself with McAfee’s shotgun when the boy was 15, said Steve Morgan, who spent time with McAfee in Alabama in 2016 to talk about his life for a biography he’d been contracted to write. Morgan is also the founder of market research firm Cybersecurity Ventures.

“He told me his father never showed him an ounce of affection,” Morgan said, adding that recounting his father’s death was the only time during their long meeting that McAfee cried.

While McAfee’s tech legacy may have been overshadowed in recent years by his tumultuous life, Morgan said he sees his most lasting impact as a software and security pioneer.

“I think that’s how ultimately he really most like to be remembered. I think a lot of people will remember him as a very troubled soul. Some people will remember him as a criminal. It depends on your age and your exposure to him,” Morgan said.

McAfee founded his eponymous company in 1987. At the time, Morgan said, he was operating a BBS, a bulletin board system that served as a precursor to the World Wide Web and working with his brother-in-law. When the first major computer virus, called “Brain,” hit in 1986, “John instantly dialed up a programmer he knew and said, there’s a big opportunity. We need to do something. You know, we want to write some code to combat this virus,” Morgan said. He called the program VirusScan and the company McAfee Associates.

“He was a true pioneer, not just as a security technologist but as one of the first companies to distribute software over the internet,” Morgan said.

California chipmaker Intel, which bought McAfee’s company in 2011 for $7.68 billion, for a time sought to dissociate the brand from its controversial founder by folding it into its larger cybersecurity division. But the rebranding was short-lived, and Intel in 2016 spun out the cybersecurity unit into a new company called McAfee.

In the software industry, McAfee’s claim to fame was that he offered the first all-in-one virus scanner, said Vesselin Bontchev, a Bulgarian computer scientist and an early antivirus researcher. Prior to that, said Bontchev, researchers would only scan for one virus at a time. But there were only about a dozen computer viruses back then.

“Technologically, as a scanner, it wasn’t anything outstanding. It was just the general idea that was good. Not the implementation,” said Bontchev, a senior researcher at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.

Bontchev said McAfee was “a peculiar guy,” even back then. He said he wrote McAfee asking for a part-time job about the time the Soviet Union was breaking up so he could work on a post-doctoral dissertation in the US.

In response, McAfee told Bontchev in a letter that the Bulgarian was believed to be a Soviet agent so “they cannot work with me,” he said. “This is a really bizarre way to say no to somebody who is asking for a job.”

The two later met in the US at the annual Virus Bulletin conference, said Bontchev. “I don’t think he was a typical American. He was just weird.”

McAfee twice made long-shot runs for the US presidency and was a participant in Libertarian Party presidential debates in 2016. He dabbled in yoga, ultralight aircraft and the production of herbal medications.

In 2012 he was wanted for questioning in connection with the death of Gregory Viant Faull, who was shot to death in early November 2012 on the island in Belize where both men lived.

McAfee told AP at the time that he was being persecuted by the Belizean government. Belizean police denied that, saying they were simply investigating a crime about which McAfee may have had information. Then-Prime Minister Dean Barrow expressed doubts about McAfee’s mental state, saying, “I don’t want to be unkind to the gentleman, but I believe he is extremely paranoid, even bonkers.”

A Florida court ordered McAfee in 2019 to pay $25 million to Faull’s estate in a wrongful death claim. He refused to pay it, writing in a statement posted on Twitter that he has “not responded to a single one of my 37 lawsuits for the past 11 years.” He claimed to have no assets, writing that the order was a “mute point” — an apparent misspelling of “moot.”

In July of that year he was released from detention in the Dominican Republic after he and five others were suspected of traveling on a yacht carrying high-caliber weapons, ammunition and military-style gear.

Wired Magazine reporter Joshua Davis spent six months investigating McAfee’s tumultuous life in 2012, when he was living in Belize and being sought for questioning in connection with his neighbor’s murder. He described watching as McAfee took out a pistol to illustrate a point.

”‘Let’s do this one more time,’ he says, and puts it to his head,” Davies wrote. “Another round of Russian roulette. Just as before, he pulls the trigger repeatedly, the cylinder rotates, the hammer comes down, and nothing happens. ‘It is a real gun. It has a real bullet in one chamber,’ he says. And yet, he points out, my assumptions have somehow proven faulty. I’m missing something.”

source https://www.firstpost.com/tech/news-analysis/john-mcafee-security-software-pioneer-found-dead-in-jail-cell-after-court-approves-his-extradition-to-the-us-9748081.html

[newstfionline]

Headlines

Rescuers in Bahamas face a ruined landscape (AP) Rescue crews in the Bahamas fanned out across a blasted landscape of smashed and flooded homes Wednesday, trying to reach drenched and stunned victims of Hurricane Dorian and take the full measure of the disaster. The official death toll stood at seven but was certain to rise. The storm parked over the Bahamas and pounded it for over a day and a half with winds up to 185 mph (295 kph) and torrential rains, swamping neighborhoods in muddy brown floodwaters and destroying or severely damaging thousands of homes.

Pentagon approves diversion of military construction funds for Trump’s wall (Washington Post) Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper has agreed to take $3.6 billion that was designated for 127 military construction projects to pay for 175 miles of border wall.

US watchdog: Separated migrant children suffered trauma (AP) Migrant children who were separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border last year suffered post-traumatic stress and other serious mental health problems, according to a government watchdog report Wednesday. The chaotic reunification process only added to their ordeal.

Guatemala Declares State of Siege After Suspected Drug Dealers Kill Soldiers (Reuters) Guatemala’s government on Wednesday declared a state of siege in five northeastern provinces in an effort to regain control after three soldiers were killed by suspected drug traffickers, authorities said.

Former First Lady of Honduras Sentenced to 58 Years in Jail (Reuters) The former first lady of Honduras Rosa Elena Bonilla, wife of ex-president Porfirio Lobo, was sentenced on Wednesday to 58 years in jail on charges of fraud and undue appropriation of funds, a spokesman for the nation’s highest court said.

Argentine markets hold steady as anti-government protesters take to the streets (Reuters) Argentine markets held steady on Wednesday, even as thousands of protesters took to the streets to demonstrate against the government of President Mauricio Macri and a darkening economic outlook in the recession-hit South American country.

UK Government Gives Up Trying to Stop Brexit Delay Bill in Parliament (Reuters) British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government abandoned attempts in the upper house of parliament to block a law aimed at stopping the country from leaving the European Union without a deal.

Brexit breathes life back into Scottish independence push (AP) When Scotland voted in 2014 against independence, that seemed to settle the issue. But less than two years later came the Brexit referendum, and while the U.K. voted to leave the European Union, Scots distinguished themselves as the biggest dissenters. Not only did Scotland vote overwhelmingly to stay in the EU, it was the only one of the U.K.’s four parts where not a single constituency delivered a “Yes” vote to leave. Simply put: Scotland is being dragged largely unwillingly toward what many of its people fear will be economic suffering on Oct. 31. In the aftermath of Brexit, Scotland could again become a headache for whoever is in power in London.

In Battle for France’s Soul, Maurice the Rooster Scores Victory (Reuters) A French court ruled on Thursday that a rooster called Maurice could continue his dawn crowing despite complaints from neighbors, in a case the French media has cast as a battle between the old rural way of life and modern values creeping in from the city.

Russians consider life after Putin (Foreign Policy) The Moscow city council elections set for Sunday have become an unlikely political lightning rod in Russia, drawing thousands of people to the streets in protest after the election commission banned some opposition candidates from running. While the opposition seems unlikely to be able to send a political message this weekend, the protests show a growing discontent with President Vladimir Putin’s government as his term limit approaches in 2024.

Turkey: Erdogan Rejects Constraints on Nuclear Capabilities (AP) Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says it is unacceptable for states with nuclear arms to tell Turkey that it cannot have missiles with nuclear warheads.

Taliban Car Bomb Rocks Afghan Capital Near US Embassy Area (AP) A car bomb rocked the Afghan capital on Thursday and smoke rose from a Kabul neighborhood housing the U.S. Embassy, the NATO Resolute Support mission and other diplomatic missions. At least three people were killed and another 30 wounded, a hospital director said.

Hong Kong leader withdraws China extradition bill that fueled protests (Washington Post) “The government will formally withdraw the bill in order to fully allay public concerns.” So said Hong Kong’s chief executive, Carrie Lam as she announced plans to “fully withdraw the controversial extradition bill that sparked three months of increasingly fierce protests.” But the scope of the demonstrations have expanded beyond just that issue. So the 14 weeks of protests might just keep on keeping on.

At Least 34 Injured, One Critically, as Truck and Train Collide in Japan (Reuters) At least 34 people were injured, one critically, on Thursday when an express train and truck collided in Japan’s second-largest city of Yokohama, setting the truck on fire and derailing nearly half the train.

‘Any Suggestion?’ Duterte Asks After Xi Reaffirms Sea Claims (AP) The Philippine president has acknowledged he’s short of solutions to press China to adhere to Manila’s arbitration victory in their South China Sea disputes after he said Chinese President Xi Jinping told him flatly: “We will not budge.”

Saudi troop levels in Yemen (Foreign Policy) Saudi Arabia has increased the number of troops on the ground in southern Yemen as the conflict continues between separatists and pro-government forces--technically allies in the Saudi-led coalition. The separatists, supported by the United Arab Emirates, took control of the port of Aden early last month.

Xenophobia in South Africa (Foreign Policy) More than 80 people have been arrested in South Africa amid anti-immigrant rioting in Johannesburg and Pretoria. The riots have targeted foreign businesses and have heightened tensions between South Africa and Nigeria in particular. Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has sent a special envoy to meet with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa to address Nigerians’ safety in the country. It is the latest wave of xenophobia in South Africa, where immigrants from other African countries have long been the targets of brutal violence.