A miracle for the family!

Thursday, 7 January 2016

   When Arjuna Ranatunga, former cricketer, now the Minister of Ports and Shipping, nominated his own brother Dhammika Ranatunga to head the Ports Authority, the large and economically vital statutory authority coming under the Minister, among the more social conscious there was only consternation. They were gripped by a sense of betrayal, made sharper when committed by a person who by his political stand at the general elections only held just before, stood against nepotism and other such acts of favouritism.

A Miracle for the Family! by Thavam Ratna

Maithri betrays wholesale the masses that installed him in power ! Takes ruthless extreme racists into his embrace !!

(Lanka-e-News- 06.Jan.2016, 11.30AM) It is only just a year has passed  since president Maithripala Sirisena became the president . Yet , sad to note  , within this short period the president has become the center of yet another unsavory traitorous  incident which alienates the Sinhala , Tamil and Muslim communities that installed him as the president. That is ,the appointment of an extremist most shameless bootlicking stooge under the former Rajapakse regime -the Divaina newspaper editor Gamini Sumanasekera as president’s media advisor with effect from  1 st January 2016.

In addition ,Malinda Seneviratne  another racist and ‘English’ stooge  of the brutal and crooked Rajapakses , was also appointed as the president’s media advisor.

Needless to say, these are the scoundrels and rascals -  Gamini Sumanasekera and Malinda Seneviratne who were responsible during the era of the crooked , barbaric and brutal Rajapakses to isolate nad insulate  the country from the civilized ‘world,’ owing  to their extreme self seeking  racist ideologies.

It is therefore very unfortunate that the president in spite of all these deadly results staring in his face , is still  unable to understand that the masses threw out the  Rajapakses lock , stock and barrel because the masses  were opposed to the destructive  extremist stance of these scoundrels and rascals . Indeed the president’s incapacity to realize this is casting a cursed spell on  the masses , and none else.

By the  appointment of  the then deputy editor of Divaina as the presidential advisor now , the president has acted that rashly and recklessly, that conflicts  can arise among those close and dear to him.

The most atrocious andv pernicious  part of  this move is : the president’s present forgetfulness  of the past incident in which , Daham Sirisena, the son of president Maithripala and his friends were involved ,when  they molested  the fiancee of the son of deputy IGP Waidyalankara who were  in a hotel in the eastern province .It  was Gamini Sumanasekera who was then instrumental in giving glaring  Island wide  publicity to this ugly episode through the Divaina newspaper at the instigation  of the ex president Mahinda Rajapakse to the detriment of the incumbent president Maithripala Sirisena and his family.

It is a matter for deep regret  that Maithripala’s amnesia is such that he has even  forgotten, during that period  while he  was a minister , it was he who convened a media briefing and bitterly  blamed and castigated the Divaina newspapers and its editorial board led by individuals like Sumanasekera.

When the citizens force team met with the president yesterday to lodge their protest against the appointment of Rajapakse regime racists like Gamini Sumanasekera, Malinda Seneviratne, A.B. Lalith De Silva and Chamudina Samarawickrema, the president has said , he is being attacked through the websites , and in order to save his skin, he had appointed these Rajapakse racists cum stooges.

Maithripala Sirisena today forgetting the stark and unassailable truth  that Mahinda Rajapakse had to meet  his Waterloo because of these scoundrels and rascals who acted  on Mahinda’s  behalf , while  it was only some websites , one  TV channel and the face book that stood by Maithripala  steadfastly,   is most deplorable and detestable . This forgetfulness deliberate or otherwise only goes to demonstrate his ruthless atrocity, unalloyed hypocrisy  and political duplicity  . ( His backstabbing  the only TV channel which stood by him , and granting 8 new TV channels to Kili Maharaja is another villainous vicious action  of his , and another sordid story)

The pro good governance masses who were responsible to install Maithripala as the president point out , the president instead of himself rectifying his faults , seeking refuge under pro Rajapakse villains and venomous serpents, to find solutions  is to court disaster . By the time he realizes,it might be only after he has been reduced to ashes long  after falling   from the frying pan into the fire , the concerned pro good governance masses revealed  with concern.

It is learnt that  Maithripala is being fed with these ‘dead ropes’ by lethal self seeking serpents  like Shiral Lakthileke and deadly Karunaratne Paranavitharne . It will be to the president’s own good if he realizes sooner than later all those who swallowed those  dead ropes met their Waterloo earlier than scheduled.

The masses for good governance are of the view that Maithripala is embracing  these racists not for anything but to impede the new constitution that is under way.  Undoubtedly , through these extreme ruthless racists , it is the plan and plot to sabotage the devolution of powers within a unitary state , and  the abolition of executive presidency . Anybody who remembers what political machinations and manipulations Maithripala resorted to  when the 19 th amendment was being presented , will surely understand where Maithripala is headed now in relation to the proposed new constitution – to root it out  even before it is  a sapling. 

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by     (2016-01-06 06:32:40)

Vimukthi J’s Late Disclosures Tarnishes TISL’s Integrity Award Further

January 5, 2016 

A member of this year’s transparency International Sri Lanka chapters’ “integrity Award’ panelist has failed to disclose apparent conflict of interest, Colombo Telegraph can reveal today.

Good governance watchdog Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL) has given this year’s ‘Integrity Award’ to the Chairman of the ‘Ravaya’ newspaper, Victor Ivan, a known fraudster by way of marking the International Anti-Corruption Day.

Vimukthi Jayasundara | Photo via Vimukthi’s Twitter

A member of the selection panel, Vimukthi Jayasundara, a Sri Lankan film director, screenwriter and visual artist, has worked in Ravaya as a contributor, copy editor and received a monthly remuneration for his services in the late 90s. Jayasundara came from the remote down South, looking for opportunities and subsequently edited an arts page in Ravaya along with Manubandu Vidyapathi and Ruwan Jayanath.

After a private viewing of Vimukthi Jayasundara’s film “Sulanga enu pinisa” Ivan wrote a positive and lengthy review. This was one of Ivan’s first film reviews.

When contacted by Colombo Telegraph and asked why he did not declare his conflict of interest, Jayasundara said that he was not legally obliged to declare his early involvement with Ravaya. “I was not a permanent employee’ he said. However, he added “Now I feel I should have declared. Now I realize it is a moral issue.”

Jayasundara also contributed to the Ravaya fund.

“There is no record that Jayasundara declared his conflict of interest.” A source close to the chairman of the panel told Colombo Telegraph

According to the guidelines of Transparency International, disclosure of conflict of interest “applies, except as otherwise stated, to every person associated with Transparency International (TI), its Secretariat or any of its National Chapters as a board member, officer, resource person or staff member. The “interests of any person associated with TI” include the interests of any person with whom they have a close personal relationship, including their spouse, life partner, children, parents, siblings or other close family members.”

Further to that the person who handles the integrity awards, Ananda Jayasekara served as Ivan’s clark. A source close to the chairman of the panel told Colombo Telegraph, “there are serious doubts whether all nominations for the award were properly handled, whether some were hidden or manipulated”.

The current editor of Ravaya, KW Janaranjana is also a director of Transparency International.

                                  Read More

15 soldiers nabbed for illegal tree felling in Wilpattu

January 6, 2016

A group of 15 army soldiers, attached to the Mannar army camp, have been arrested for illegally cutting down trees within the Wilpattu forest reserve.   

The suspects were arrested while transporting the timber along with a truck belonging to the Sri Lanka Army following an operation carried out by Wildlife officers and Silawathura Police on Tuesday (5).

They were released on bail after being produced at the Mannar Magistrate’s Court and ordered to appear before the court on January 27, police spokesman ASP Ruwan Gunasekara said.

He stated that steps have been taken to notify the Sri Lanka Army regarding the incident.    

Police searching for 1000 men involved in rape mob

2016-01-06

Police are investigating reports of a group of 1,000 men carrying out a mass sexual assault on dozens of women in the middle of a German city on New Year's Eve.

German police has received numerous complaints from women who said they were groped and attacked in Cologne city centre. One woman has claimed she was raped.

Wolfgang Albers, the Cologne police chief, says witnesses described the assaults as coming from a group of up to 1,000 men whose appearance indicated they were of "Arab or North African origin."

He said the incidents were "a completely new dimension of crime".

An MP in Angela Merkel's party has claimed the events are proof Germany needs to tighten its borders.

But the police also said many of the men had been known to them for some time and were not newly-arrived refugees, according to The Local.

The crowd, believed to be men between 15 and 35 who were possibly intoxicated, reportedly flooded the city's famous square and began to throw firecrackers and shoot fireworks.

As the festivities took place outside the famous Cologne cathedral, some of the men allegedly began sexually assaulting women and pick pocketing others, according to Reuters.

Local media reported that at least 80 people fell victim to the assaults, 35 of whom were sexually assaulted.

One of the victims, named only as Katja L, told Der Express her buttocks and breasts were grabbed.

"I was groped everywhere. It was a nightmare. Although we shouted and beat them, the guys did not stop. I was desperate and think I was touched around 100 times in the 200 meters," she said.

"Fortunately I wore a jacket and trousers. A skirt would probably have been torn away from me."

Some 60 criminal complaints have so far been filed, including the allegation of rape.

MP Steffan Bilger from Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union has claimed the events in Cologne were proof Germany needed to reduce its intake of refugees.

"It can't go on like this," he tweeted. "Urgently needed: reduction of influx, secure borders, intensifying of deportations and meaningful justice."

But others urged Germans not to jump to conclusions, with one user tweeting ""it makes me sad that the refugees who really need protection will bear the brunt of the hatred because of Cologne.

"We need to be able to tell the difference."

Police sent 143 local officers and 70 federal officers into the area in a large-scale operation to clear the area.
But due to the dark and sheer scale of people, Mr Albers said that this operation was not effective.

(The Independent)

We would remove the Maththala paddy storage – Cabinet Minister

 Jan 06, 2016

Fisheries minister Mahinda Amaraweera said by March this year he would take action to remove the paddy storage located in the Maththala airport and change it to an operational airport.

The minister said this when he joined a community program held in Ranna in Hambanthota.

Area residents were protesting against the current government which started to store paddy in the Maththala airport from last September.
Chamal Rajapaksa.

Minister Mahinda Amaraweera said that MP Chamal Rajapaksa too has joined to take forward the Hambantota district development committee.

The media reported that the current government has decided to give Chamal Rajapaksa the chairman post for the Hambantota district development committee.

“I am happy to note that MP Chamal Rajapaksa has joined with us to strengthen the Sri Lanka Freedom Party and to take forward the government’s development plans. Myself and Chamal would work together to strengthen the SLFP. We don’t need to give power to any other. We don’t need to break this government. We need to form a government on our own. Our aim is to create an SLFP government in 2020” the minister said

The minister categorically said that the country would not divide under this government.

Reported North Korean nuclear test signals snub of China, fraying ties

 

North Korea said it had successfully conducted a test of a miniaturized hydrogen nuclear device on the morning of Jan. 6, in an announcement broadcast on state-run television. (Reuters)

By Simon Denyer- January 6

 

BEIJING — North Korea may have explained Wednesday’s announced hydrogen bomb test as a response to U.S. “hostility,” but experts say it may more accurately reflect deteriorating relations with China.

 

The question now is how Beijing will respond: not by abandoning its troublesome ally, experts agree, but perhaps by supporting further sanctions against it. Whether that would have any effect is in doubt.

 

“In a way, this is a protest against Beijing,” said Bo Zhiyue, director of the New Zealand Contemporary China Research Center at Victoria University of Wellington. “They are saying: ‘We can do whatever we want. This shows our independence, and we don’t need your approval.’ ”

 

Scientists and officials say the test almost certainly did not involve a hydrogen bomb. But the fourth test of any kind of nuclear device by the isolated country would signal its continuing defiance of the outside world — including China, which has long expressed displeasure with Pyongyang’s nuclear program.

 

[White House: No evidence to support North Korean ‘hydrogen bomb’ claim]

These countries have tested nuclear weapons

Since 1945, eight nations have detonated such weapons.

On Wednesday, China’s Foreign Affairs Ministry said North Korea had “ignored” objections from the international community to its staging of such tests. “China firmly opposes this,” the ministry said in a statement. “We urge North Korea to fulfill its promise of denuclearization and stop any actions that would worsen the situation.”

 

Spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at a regularly scheduled news conference that Beijing had not been warned before the test and would summon Pyongyang’s ambassador in Beijing to lodge a protest.

 

But experts say Beijing’s influence over Pyongyang has diminished since Kim Jong Un took over as North Korea’s leader at the end of 2011 and Xi Jinping became president of China in 2013. The two men have not met since assuming power, with Xi even snubbing his counterpart by visiting South Korea first in 2014.

 

In October, there was talk of a thaw when Xi sent an envoy to attend a military parade in Pyongyang with a signed letter carrying the Chinese president’s “best wishes” to Kim. But relations swiftly turned frigid again in December, after Kim declared that his country had developed a hydrogen bomb. Within 48 hours, a glamorous North Korean girl group, the Moranbong Band, packed up and left Beijing just before a scheduled debut concert there. That was less than a month ago.

 

“The Moranbong Band incident basically revealed North Korea’s intentions, and you could see that communication between China and North Korea is quite bad,” said Xuan Dongri, director of Northeast Asia Studies at Yanbian University in northeastern China. “China and North Korea’s understanding of each other is deteriorating further.”

 

Bo, of Victoria University of Wellington, said a key problem in the relationship has been the centralization of power in Beijing under Xi.

 

Instead of the multi-faceted policy toward North Korea that prevailed under Xi’s predecessor, Hu Jintao, with some senior leaders advocating engagement and others taking a harder line, Xi is now calling all the shots, Bo said.

Eight countries. 2,055 nuclear tests. 71 years.

[Xi tells grumbling party cadres: ‘Don’t talk back’]

 

Since Xi has not met Kim and has his hands full with domestic and foreign-policy challenges, there is little meaningful dialogue taking place and very little internal debate on how best to influence Pyongyang, Bo added.

 

“You need to have a connection if you want to convince or persuade the other side,” he said. “If you don’t have a connection, where is the leverage?”

 

Bo said Xi was “caught in a dilemma,” reluctant to hew closer to the U.S. approach of isolating and punishing North Korea but left “powerless” to prevent North Korea’s nuclear program.

 

Analysts are not predicting a complete breakdown in Sino-North Korean ties. Nor do they foresee North Korea abandoning the nuclear program that has become a key pillar of its regime’s declared legitimacy, at least not soon. But some suggest that this test poses a particular challenge for China.

 

“Beijing will face increased pressure both domestically and internationally to punish and rein in Kim Jong Un and to ultimately force Pyongyang to give up its nuclear weapons,” said Yanmei Xie, senior China analyst with the International Crisis Group in Beijing. “But there is likely to be a repeat of the worn playbook of denunciation, tightening of sanctions and calling for resurrection of the six-party talks.”

 

North Korea pulled out of those negotiations with South Korea, the United States, China, Russia and Japan over its nuclear program in 2009. On Wednesday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman, Hua, said the talks were the “only practical and effective way to solve the North Korea problem.”

 

China is North Korea's largest trading partner and supplies most of its neighbor's oil and gas, as well as about half of its foreign aid. But it has been unwilling to pull the plug for fear of toppling the Kim regime.

 

Paul Haenle of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center in Beijing agreed that despite Pyongyang’s singling out of the United States, “the real attention is focused on China” and its response. China is likely to move cautiously, he said, but he did not rule out a tougher line from Beijing.

 

“North Korea’s defiance is not only an untenable burden on China’s image as a credible and strong leader on this issue, but will also lead to an enhanced U.S. security posture in the region and increased cooperation between the U.S. and its Asia-Pacific allies — not something Beijing wants,” he said.

 

“I don't think we can overlook the fact that Xi is a new and fundamentally different kind of Chinese leader,” Haenle added, citing Xi’s his historic decision to meet with Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou in November as an example. “While analysts have plenty of evidence to justify their assessments that China won't change course, I think we need to be open to the possibility that China could respond differently this time.”

 

Shi Yinhong, a professor of international relations at Renmin University of China, said that the test left China no choice but to back further U.N. sanctions against North Korea. But the Crisis Group’s Xie cautioned that nothing would be done that might upset Beijing’s bottom line.

 

“For Beijing, a nuclear-armed North Korea is uncomfortable and disturbing, but a regime collapse in Pyongyang, leading to mass chaos next door and potentially a united Korean Peninsula with Washington extending its influence northward to China's doorstep is downright frightening,” Xie said.

 

Gu Jinglu and Liu Liu contributed to this report.

Saudi Arabia’s Last-Ditch Effort to Stop America’s Pivot to Iran

Did Riyadh execute Nimr to show the West that Tehran is still a loose cannon?

BY DAN DE LUCE-JANUARY 5, 2016

Saudi Arabia’s escalating diplomatic war with Iran is part of a new attempt to derail what Riyadh sees as a clear American shift towards Tehran. Unfortunately for the kingdom, it probably won’t work.

That’s because the Obama administration has effectively decided that upholding the nuclear accord with Iran is more important to U.S. interests — and to the president’s historical legacy —  than safeguarding a decades-old alliance with Saudi Arabia. From holding off on imposing new sanctions after Iran violated U.N. resolutions recently to all but turning a blind eye to Tehran’s military role in Iraq, the Obama administration has alarmed Riyadh and other Persian Gulf powers that fear being left on the sidelines.

The kingdom may have reason to worry. The United States sharply criticized Riyadh over the execution last week of a prominent Shiite cleric, Nimr al-Nimr, voicing concern it could fuel sectarian tensions in the region. But when a mob torched the Saudi Embassy in Tehran in outrage over the cleric’s death, Washington and other Western governments offered a more muted response, calling on the Iranian authorities to ensure the security of diplomatic missions.

That’s a sharp contrast from how the White House reacted in 2011 when the British Embassy in Tehran was overrun after Western governments tightened sanctions on Iran. President Barack Obama himself publicly accused the Iranian government of permitting the attack.

“For rioters essentially to be able to overrun the embassy and set it on fire is an indication that the Iranian government is not taking its international obligations seriously,” Obama said at the time.

In another sign of what the Saudis see as evidence of a conciliatory approach to Iran, Washington has yet to impose sanctions against Tehran even after the regime conducted two ballistic missile tests since the nuclear deal was agreed in July. The U.S. administration said it would impose sanctions on Iran over the missile launches — which violated U.N. resolutions — but has since pulled back from taking action. The delay has drawn criticism fromlawmakers and critics of the deal.

The missile tests have coincided with a pivotal moment when Iran is required to carry out key measures under the nuclear deal to dismantle elements of its program, including shipping out stockpiles of enriched uranium, decommissioning centrifuges and dismantling a heavy-water reactor.

The administration’s reticence on the missile tests have reinforced Saudi Arabia’s fears that Obama has begun a gradual strategic turn toward Tehran and is abandoning its traditional Arab allies.

“The larger issue is by talking to Iran, the U.S. confirmed the fact that it no longer views the Arab world as singularly important,” said Vali Nasr, a former U.S. diplomat and dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

Since tensions spiked over the weekend between Riyadh and Tehran, the United States has appealed for calm and urged both sides to take steps to defuse the crisis — without publicly siding with either country in the dispute.

Since Sunday, Secretary of State John Kerry has spoken to Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif at least twice and also talked to Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir and Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, State Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters Tuesday.

The United States had no intention of acting as a mediator in the conflict, Kirby said, and White House spokesman Josh Earnest said there was “plenty of blame to go around.”

In years past, it would have been unthinkable for the U.S. government to take an even-handed approach in the case of an argument between the Saudis and their Iranian rivals. The rapport that developed between Kerry and other American diplomats and their Iranian counterparts during the course of the nuclear negotiations has dismayed Riyadh.

The Saudis are not able to accept “a world in which an American secretary of state can talk to his Iranian counterpart on his BlackBerry,” Nasr told Foreign Policy.

Angered over Obama’s reluctance to intervene in Syria, his withdrawal of support for former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak after popular protests in 2011, and his readiness to turn a new page in Washington’s relations with Iran, Saudi Arabia has come to believe that the United States can no longer be counted on as a rock solid ally ready to come to the aid of its Arab friends, Nasr and other analysts said.

Increasingly, the Saudis are striking out on their own, staging a major military intervention last year in neighboring Yemen against Shiite Houthi rebels supported by Iran. The campaign has failed to achieve a quick victory and threatens to turn into a quagmire for Riyadh, with U.S. officials privately urging the Saudis to cut their losses and negotiate a peace deal.

For its part, Washington has been disappointed with Saudi Arabia’s lackluster efforts fighting the Islamic State, as Riyadh has devoted most of its energy in recent months to the faltering campaign in Yemen. U.S. officials, and their counterparts in Europe and the Middle East, worry about the future stability of the Saudi monarchy given a growing succession crisis and other domestic problems. And Western governments were particularly disturbed by the execution of Nimr, as well as its provocative timing — which came after months of painstaking diplomacy to persuade Iran and other powers on both sides of the Syrian war to enter into a peace process.

But Brett McGurk, the U.S. pointman for the anti-ISIS effort, told reporters Tuesday he expects both governments to overcome their differences and work toward a diplomatic solution to the crisis in Syria, citing encouraging signs from Riyadh.

“Even the Saudis recognize you have to have some sort of a political process to de-escalate the overall conflict,” he said. “What I’ve heard is they’ve said that, you know, nothing here should really stop the process that was launched in Vienna.”

The next round of peace talks between the Syrian government and the opposition is slated for Jan. 25, but many diplomats doubt the prospects for success without the presence of Iran or Saudi Arabia at the table.

Iran voiced incandescent rage over the execution of Nimr but will likely calibrate its reaction to Saudi Arabia’s actions, according to analysts and former officials who said Tehran is anxious to avoid jeopardizing the planned lifting of economic sanctions promised under the nuclear deal. Iran’s economy has suffered under the weight of the sanctions coupled with falling oil prices, and Tehran stands to gain access to roughly $100 billion in impounded funds. The easing of sanctions also could allow Iran to increase its oil exports from 1 million barrels a day currently to a pre-sanctions level of up to 2.5 million barrels a day.

“We should not underestimate how much they are committed to the deal to secure sanctions relief,” said Matthew McInnis, a former U.S. intelligence official who tracked Iran and is now a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.  

After the nuclear deal was clinched last year, the Obama administration tried to repair its frayed tieswith the Saudis, with little success. The White House chose not to publicly warn Riyadh against executing Nimr, and instead conveyed its concerns in private.

But Washington may soon face a day of reckoning with the Saudis, as the two countries interests diverge, according to Nasr.

“At some point, Saudi actions are going to force us to say this particular action undermines our interests and we can’t support you,” he said.

The perception that the United States has pulled back from a once dominant role in the Middle East has prompted Arab governments to entertain overtures from Russia, which has waded into the Syrian conflict to prop up the regime in Damascus.

While the Saudis and Iran engaged in a war of words this week, Russia offered to serve as an intermediary. Moscow’s foreign ministry said Monday that Russia was ready to help both sides pursue “a path of dialogue.”

FP’s John Hudson contributed to this article.

Photo credit: Olivier Douliery-Pool/Getty Images.

Invitation to a Beheading: Saudi Arabia’s Enablers

Saudis have little to worry about from the UN. Or from the US or the EU or Dave. Until the revolution.

by Robert Fisk

( January 6, 2016, London, Sri Lanka Guardian) When Saudi Arabia was elected to the UN Human Rights Council in 2013 – with Dave Cameron’s help – we all regarded it as farce. Now, only hours after the Sunni Muslim Saudis chopped off the heads of 47 of their enemies – including a prominent Shia Muslim cleric – the Saudi appointment is grotesque. Of course, the world of human rights is appalled – and Shia Iran is talking of the “divine punishment” that will destroy the House of Saud. Crowds attack the Saudi embassy in Tehran. So what’s new?

“Divine” and secular punishment have been variously sought against Middle East leaders for centuries, most recently against Bashar al-Assad of Syria who, according to the French Foreign Minister, did not “deserve to live on this planet”.

The Saudis were long ago telling the Americans to “cut off the head of the serpent” – Iran’s head, needless to say – but they have obviously settled for the head of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, at least for now. But all the shouting and screaming doesn’t stop the oil flowing from Saudi wells – nor the kingdom’s friends from using the usual weasel language to excuse their outrages.

The executions are an “internal matter”, a “retrograde step” perhaps, and certainly the executions were “events that don’t help” peace in the Middle East. All of this classic verbiage, I should add, from Crispin Blunt, the Tory chair of the Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee, came within hours of the mass head-chopping.

He also told Channel 4 that “we’ve got to judge when it’s right to engage” with the Saudis on such “matters”. You bet we have. “Never” would be my guess. After all, you can’t fly your flags at half mast when the last King of Saudi Arabia dies a natural death, and then get all antsy when the Saudis start slashing at the necks of their enemies.

There is, however, one little step that those who protest and roar and rage over the latest Saudi butchery might contemplate, if they can calm down enough to concentrate on the small print. For the resolution which established the United Nations Human Rights Council – upon which the Saudis are proud to sit – says that “members elected to the Council shall uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights”.

Even more to the point, the UN General Assembly, which elects those members who occupy the Council’s 47 seats, is empowered – with a two-thirds majority – to suspend the rights and privileges of any Council member which has persistently committed gross and systematic violations of human rights while a member of the Council.

But here’s the snag. Quite apart from the fawning Western leaders who would object to such a slur being uttered against Saudi Arabia – Dave, obviously, along with his counterparts in France, Germany, Italy, indeed the whole EU and the US (of course) and any recipient of Saudi largesse – we’d have to witness the absurd vote of Iran against Saudi Arabia. Iran, you see, has hanged an estimated 570 prisoners – 10 of them women – in the first half of 2015 alone. That’s about two lynchings a day – of “criminals” and “enemies of God” – and far outdoes the poor old Saudis who were, scarcely two years ago, advertising for more official executioners. In March, six Sunnis were put to death in Iran in a mass hanging.

In other words, he who casts the first stone – this would be literal if the Taliban were still in power in Afghanistan (though they may yet return) – had better look at his own track record. And quite apart from the US (28 executions in 2015, not counting drone attacks, “targeted killings” and other extrajudicial murders), we have to remember that on the UN Council we can find such vigorous defenders of human rights as China and Russia.

So the Saudis have little to worry about from the UN. Or from the US or the EU or Dave. Until the revolution.

Robert Fisk writes for the Independent, where this column originally appeared.

US college professor faces dismissal over 'same God' support for Muslims


Evangelical Christian college says it has begun proceedings to terminate contract of professor who donned hijab in solidarity with Muslims 
Larycia Hawkins called for women to wear the hijab as a show of "solidarity with our Muslim sisters" (Facebook) 

Simon Hooper-Wednesday 6 January 2016

An evangelical Christian university in the US has begun proceedings that could lead to the dismissal of a professor who wrote on social media that Christians and Muslims worshipped the same god and wore a hijab in solidarity with Muslims.

US College Professor Faces Dismissal Over 'Same God' Support for Muslims by Thavam Ratna

Donald Trump threatens to cancel '£700m investment in Scotland'

Billionaire’s firm warns of repercussions as MPs prepare to debate calls to ban him from entering the UK

Donald Trump at the Trump golf course in Aberdeenshire. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod for the Guardian

Ben Quinn-Wednesday 6 January 2016

Donald Trump has reacted to the announcement that MPs will debate banning him from entering the UK over his incendiary pledge to ban Muslims from the US by threatening to pull the plug on what his company claims are plans to invest more than £700m in Scotland.

MPs are due to address calls for the travel sanctions in the House of Commons on 18 January after more than half a million people signed a petition triggering the debate.

The US Republican presidential candidate, who became the focus of the petitionafter his call for Muslims to be banned from entering the US, reacted on Wednesday by saying his organisation had plans to invest more than £200m in the development of his resort in South Ayrshire and invest £500m in a golf course in Aberdeen.

“Any action to restrict travel would force the Trump Organisation to immediately end these and all future investments we are currently contemplating in the United Kingdom,” his company said in a statement.

“Westminster would create a dangerous precedent and send a terrible message to the world that the United Kingdom opposes free speech and has no interest in attracting inward investment.”

It added that many millions of US citizens who it said “wholeheartedly support Mr Trump” would also be alienated.

“Many people now agree with Mr Trump that there is a serious problem that must be resolved. This can only be achieved if we are willing discuss these tough issues openly and honestly.” 

More than 570,000 people signed the petition demanding the billionaire businessman be barred. Politicians will also discuss a separate petition opposing such a ban, even though it only gained about 40,000 signatures – well below the 100,000 threshold for triggering a debate.

Trump, who is seeking the Republican presidential nomination in the US, faced an international backlash last month after urging a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on”.

The UK government signalled last month that it would not refuse Trump entry.

The debate in Westminster Hall will be led by the Labour MP Paul Flynn, a member of the House of Commons petitions committee. He said on Wednesdaythat he would suggest inviting Trump “to view London/Newport/Cardiff areas of proud racial harmony”.

Justifying his calls for a ban on Muslims entering the US, Trump had claimed there were “places in London and other places that are so radicalised that police are afraid for their own lives”.

No drop in asylum seekers reaching Germany, Berlin says

Migrants queue to enter a tent that serves as a waiting room at the the Berlin Office of Health and Social Affairs (LAGESO), in Berlin, Germany, January 5, 2016.REUTERS/HANNIBAL HANSCHKE

 BY GABRIELA BACZYNSKA-Wed Jan 6, 2016

Germany has seen no drop in the number of people arriving and seeking asylum despite EU efforts to confront a migration crisis, the deputy interior minister said on Wednesday, blaming a lack of controls at Europe's borders.

More than a million people fleeing the Middle East and Africa arrived in Europe in 2015. Denmark began 2016 by imposing checks on its border this week, prompting the EU to call Germany, Denmark and Sweden to a meeting in Brussels.

Germany has been one of the most seriously affected EU member states. Sources in Berlin said on Wednesday the country registered some 1.09 million asylum seekers last year.

"We had an average influx of 3,200 refugees per day arriving in Germany, and the numbers are not declining in the last days," Ole Schroeder, the deputy German minister, told a briefing in Brussels. "Our problem at the moment in Europe is that we do not have a functioning border control system, especially at the Greece-Turkey border," Schroeder said.

The European Union is counting on Turkey to help reduce the number of migrants entering the bloc following a deal between Brussels and Ankara late last year for Turkey to absorb more people fleeing Syria's civil war.

Schroeder was speaking after meeting with EU migration chief Dimitris Avramopoulos and with Danish and Swedish officials to discuss temporary border controls after Denmark implemented spot checks on its border, raising new concerns about the durability of the EU's passport-free Schengen area.

Germany, Denmark and Sweden all said that they wanted to safeguard the Schengen zone but that effective controls on Europe's external borders, as well as other agreed measures, were necessary.

The European Commission, which has sought to help forge an EU migration policy since the death of hundreds of migrants in the Mediterranean last April, underscored the limited progress so far.

Of the 160,000 migrants that EU governments have agreed to relocate from Italy and Greece to other parts of the Union, only 272 people have been moved so far, it said on Wednesday.

PREFERENCE FOR GERMANY

Three migrant screening centres, known as hotspots, are operational in Italy and Greece now, below the target of 11, although Italy is due to add two more early this year, the Commission said.

Pascal Brice, a director with Ofpra, the agency in charge of granting asylum in France, said this explained the slow start to some extent, but that refugees' own destination preferences were also a factor.

"The French system is ready but the migrants' appetite for it remains weak," he told Reuters in an interview. Germany is attractive for its positive stance towards refugees as well as the strength of its economy, he said.

"You have to remember the relocation mechanism is offered to migrants on a voluntary basis," he said.

"For now, most of the migrants choose Germany and also Britain to some extent, which explains the situation we face in Calais," the French port city where thousands of migrants have been camped out in the hope of reaching Britain.

Brice said he was nevertheless confident France would be able to take in the 32,000 refugees it has promised to accept under the mechanism on top of those it grants asylum to annually. In 2015, France gave asylum to 25,000 citizens, up 60 percent year on year.

(Reporting by Gabriela Bacynska in Brussels and Matthias Blamont and Chine Labbe in Paris; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

CNN Analyst: White Militiamen Aren’t a Threat Like Black Protesters Because ‘They’re Not Looting Anything’

By David Edwards-January 3, 2016

"This is a very rural area. It is out in the middle of nowhere. What are they actually doing? They’re not destroying property, they’re not looting anything.”

A CNN law enforcement analyst Art Roderick said over the weekend that armed protesters who took over a federal building in Oregon were not being treated harshly like Black Lives Matter protesters and Muslims would be because they were “not looting anything.”

On Saturday, an armed group of militiamen and members of Cliven Bundy’s family seized the Malheur Wildlife Refuge headquarters to protest sentences against two ranchers who were convicted of setting wildfires.

Roderick told CNN host Brian Stelter on Sunday that law enforcement should not react with force to end the militia’s occupation of the federal building. 

“The last thing we need is some type of large confrontation because that’s when stuff goes bad,” Roderick explained. “And I think in this particular instance, if we just wait them out, see what they’ve got to say, then eventually, they’re all going to go home.”

Stelter pointed out that many activists had complained if the militia members were “Black Lives Matter protesters or if these were peaceful Muslim Americans [then] they would be treated very differently by law enforcement.”

“This is a very rural area,” Roderick replied. “It is out in the middle of nowhere. What are they actually doing? They’re not destroying property, they’re not looting anything.”

“I mean, there’s a whole separate situation going on as to exactly why they’re there and that will be worked out through the legal process,” he continued. “But I think now that they’ve taken over this location out at the fish and wildlife, this brings in the federal side. And I know the federal government has learned over the years how to deal with these types of incidences.”

Watch the video below from CNN’s Reliable Sources, broadcast Jan. 3, 2015.