Month: February 2023

Greta Thunberg is apparently no longer fighting for renewable energy. The planned wind farms in Norway is the latest quixotic battle in which the “Fridays for Future” initiator is engaged.

The Swede, together with other climate protectors, blocked access to the Norwegian Ministry of Energy in Oslo. They are protesting against the construction of wind turbines in the west of the country, reported the AFP news agency.

The reason for their resistance is the indigenous peoples who live in the area. “We cannot use the so-called climate change as a cover for colonialism,” said Thunberg, according to TV2, outside the ministry’s doors. “A climate transition that violates human rights is not a climate transition worthy of the name.”

Thunberg wants to protect the rights of the Sami people

The Sami people still live in northern Fennoscandia. Around 100 000 people belong to this group. They fear that the wind farm project will curtail their rights. They traditionally raise reindeer in the Fosen area. The court had confirmed the conflict of interest and declared the construction of 151 turbines invalid.

The Norwegian authorities have ordered further reports. “We understand that this case is a heavy burden for the Sami reindeer herders in Fosen,” Minister Terje Aasland said on Monday. However, the court has not yet made a decision about what to do with the wind turbines.

Incomprehension

Credit Suisse said they were perplexed by the court’s decision: “In 2013, following a long and thorough process, Fosen Vind was granted a license by the Norwegian authorities. As part of the licensing process, all affected parties were consulted and the relationship to reindeer husbandry was particularly emphasized.

“Today, the Supreme Court in Norway ruled that the decision to grant a license and permit to two of Fosen Vind’s six wind farms, Storheia and Roan, was invalid. Fosen Vind and Energy Infrastructure Partners are analyzing the ruling, its implications on the investment, and awaiting the Ministry’s processing of this verdict,” said Dr Anne Sexton, from the Energy Infrastructure Partners, Credit Suisse (CSEIP).

Stadtwerke München is a shareholder

“If our fundamental rights are not respected, then I don’t know which country to trust,” emphasized the musician Ella Marie Haetta Isaksen. She herself belongs to the Sami people.

The Roan and Storheia wind farms are part of one of the largest onshore wind energy projects in Europe. The German company Stadtwerke München is also a shareholder.

https://freewestmedia.com/2023/02/28/greta-storms-wind-turbines-in-norway/

The nation that is responsible for the murder of Six Million Jews in Europe during World War II, also known as the Holocaust, is now knowingly funding the murderers of Israeli Jews, through the “good offices” of the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority (PA). Germany’s funds are being used by the PA to make payments to families of terrorists with Jewish blood on their hands, and terrorists currently in Israeli prisons. The Palestinian practice is better known as “pay to slay.”

Israel’s ambassador to Germany Ron Proshaur sharply criticized the German government for the transfer of funds to the PA. In an interview with the German left-wing daily Tatz, a mouthpiece for the Green party whose leader is Annalena Baerbock, Germany’s foreign minister, Proshaur charged that the current German government representatives are ignoring the PA use of the funds Berlin is providing to promote terrorism.

It is not the first time such willful ignorance is being used by the German government. In 2016, the German government led by Angela Merkel (Christian Democratic party) admitted that the PA is making payments to terrorists’ families with aid funds from Germany. It was not, however, an admission that came out willingly, but was forced out by repeated questions from Bundestag Member Volker Beck. The German foreign ministry in Berlin (run by the Social Democrat party) acknowledged that German funds went to “martyrs,” and Palestinian terrorists’ prisoners in Israeli jails. The funds were distributed by the PA from its annual budget. According to the Times of Israel, Germany annually provides the PA with about $179 million.

Back in 2016, Volker Beck pointed out that the government in Berlin knows how the system that supports terrorists’ and their families works. Beck added, “But that they closed their eyes in front of this problem is not understandable.”

The Berlin Spectator, September 21, 2020, headline read “Germany continues to support Palestinian NGO’s linked to terrorism.” The article continued saying that, “While the US brokered a peace between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, Germany chose the opposite path, in at least one way: Berlin is still funding NGO’s that are affiliated with the terror organization Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).”

According to NGO Monitor, in 2018 and 2019, the German group Medico International implemented the project, “Defense of Palestinian land rights in the Jordan valley,” with the Palestinian PFLP-linked Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC). According to the UAWC, this project was funded by the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) as funders of its projects in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.

UAWC has been identified by Fatah as an official Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) affiliate and by the USAID as the agricultural arm of the PFLP. In 2019, two senior UAWC operatives responsible for the NGO’s finances, were arrested, and are currently on trial for membership in the PFLP terror cell responsible for the bombing that murdered Rina Shnerb, a 17-year old Jewish Israeli girl.

Since the beginning of the 1980’s, Germany has pledged over billion euros to bilateral projects in Palestine as part of its development cooperation efforts. This is in addition to Germany’s contributions to EU, UN, and World Bank development programs as well as its pledges for projects with UNRWA.

Ambassador Proshaur, while connecting German funds with Palestinian terror suggested that, “Every representative from Germany who travels to Israel, has no choice but to visit ‘Uncle Abbas’ in Ramallah. Instead of listening for hours to his fairy tales about the ‘poisoning of the wells’ and the ‘theft of organs’ by the Jews, the visitors should confront him with his gifts of money to terrorist families, since these funds come from the German and European aid budgets.” Proshaur added, “It’s hard to believe but these funds flow to the ‘pay to kill’ camp, meaning the more Jews you kill, the more money you get.”

Proshaur had also something to say about his counterpart in Israel, Germany’s ambassador Steffen Seibert, who during Israeli Operation Breaking Dawn in Gaza, against the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) last year, twitted, “Another lethal, disproportionate attack against a besieged population.” For a representative of the German government to infer that Israel’s defensive operation against a murderous terrorist group was “lethal and disproportionate” is downright shameful. Apparently, he would rather shed “crocodile tears” over the Israeli-Jewish victims than support preventing such attacks on Israelis.

Seibert’s first official meeting in Israel was with Physicians for Human Rights in Israel, an essentially anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian NGO masquerading as a human rights organization allegedly concerned with medical aid for all people. This NGO receives significant funding from the German government.

More recently, during the IDF anti-terror operation in which nine Palestinian terrorists were killed, Seibert tweeted that he was concerned by the high number of Palestinian casualties, and demanded that Israel protect its security in a “proportional manner and in accordance with the law.” What seemed to escape Seibert’s mind is the fact that if Israel did not act in the manner it did, innocent Israelis in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv would be murdered by these terrorists.

The world saw how the Germans acted against the Munich Olympic terrorists in 1972. It was a terrible fiasco that cost the lives of 11 Israeli Olympic athletes. Germany’s soft treatment and bribery of terrorists has spawned the likes of the 9/11 Arab terrorists who found safe and a hospitable ground in Germany.

While Germany professes to be Israel’s close friend, its voting pattern at the UN does not reflect such friendship. In December 2019, Germany voted against Israel on the critical issues that deemed that Jerusalem’s Western Wall, the holiest Jewish site as “Palestinian territory.” Germany voted for a UN resolution titled “The right of the Palestinian people to self-determination,” which was sponsored by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea), Egypt, Nicaragua, Zimbabwe, and “the state of Palestine.” The former German ambassador to the UN, Christoph Heusgen, had frequently used his bully pulpit at the UN to join the ongoing orgy of diplomatic targeting of the Jewish state for opprobrium.

More recently, Germany’s chancellor Olaf Scholz faced criticism for not responding to PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ antisemitic outburst. Abbas, speaking at a joint press conference with Scholz, accused Israel of “committing 50 Holocausts” against the Palestinian people. Only after being criticized did Scholz expressed “outrage” at Abbas for “inciting hatred.”

For a nation that committed the greatest crime in history against the Jewish people and humanity itself, Germany seeking to assuage its guilt by pandering to the Palestinians with its generous charity toward the PA that extends to funding Palestinian murder of Jews, is immoral and unacceptable.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/germanys-dollars-for-palestinian-terror/

More and more EU politicians are getting dragged into the Qatargate bribery investigation, said Dominik Tarczyński, an MEP from Poland’s ruling conservatives, while speaking with public Polish Radio 3.

“As many as a hundred MEPs could be involved,” said Tarczyński. 

The corruption scandal, which shocked Europe and made headlines across the world, has seen a number of MEPs and former EU officials land in handcuffs after Belgian police raided offices and residences, where they reportedly found €1.5 million in bribe money stuffed in papers bags and suitcases.

According to Tarczyński, Poland’s Internal Security Agency, the ABW, played a key role at the beginning of the investigation and handed over information to Belgian investigators. He also revealed that new information on the scandal has been procured as a result of revelations regarding the arrest warrant issued against MEP Eva Kaili, the former vice-president of the European Parliament.

The Polish MEP said that new names are appearing all the time and that two more MEPs have now been arrested, according to a report from Radio Szczecin. Moreover, there is now “information that Kaili received more than €10 million in total, whereas back in December, it had been reported that this figure was between half a million and 1.5 million (euros),” said Tarczyński.

The information regarding the bribes was reportedly obtained from law enforcement surveillance of Kaili’s phone calls. 

Tarczyński argued that there is now a need to review the whole legislative process in the European Parliament and that all those involved in this scandal must be named. After that, there must be an investigation into who instigated the bribery plot, as many trails lead not only to Qatar and Morocco but to Russia as well.

“The scandal will run and run, with more names emerging and new leads too,” said Tarczyński. Given that those who were allegedly bribed by Qatar helped influence a number of key votes related to Qatar, such as on the issue of allowing Qataris visa-free travel to Europe, the Polish MEP said he thinks there will now be moves to review and overturn some past resolutions of the European Parliament. There is concern that the Qatargate bribery case was only the tip of the iceberg and that many past votes and resolutions in Europe were influenced by foreign money and outright bribery.

The present corruption scandal emerged in December 2022, which involved accusations that countries such as Qatar and Morocco had bribed MEPs to ensure political and economic decisions taken by the European Parliament went their way. A former MEP, Pier Antonio Panzeri, a key figure emerging in the scandal, has admitted that he handed over €120,000 to Belgian MEP Marco Tarabelli. Panzeri is now cooperating with the investigators in return for a reduced sentence for his role in the crimes. 

The scandal has hit the socialist grouping the hardest. Eva Kaili a Greek socialist MEP who was a vice-president of the European Parliament, has lost her post and been charged with corruption. 

https://rmx.news/poland/100-meps-may-be-involved-in-qatargate-corruption-scandal-engulfing-eu-parliament-says-polish-mep/

In Great Britain, a particularly depressing facet of the crisis is now showing its first contours – and thus anticipating what is likely to happen in other European countries in the near future: because of the exploding energy prices, agriculture is being strangled and fresh produce has to be rationed.

High energy prices in the UK have meant that many farmers have made limited use of greenhouses to plant winter crops. According to a BBC report, this is leading to the first supermarkets to ration various types of vegetables. Field crops such as tomatoes, peppers, lamb’s lettuce, cauliflower or cucumbers are sometimes only sold in limited quantities.

Meanwhile, wholesalers are looking for new suppliers from other countries – but this means that the harvests have to travel much longer distances to Europe, which is not in the interest of the environment.

So far, farmers are not among those who benefit particularly from public support. This is now beginning to have an impact on consumers. Inexpensive food that is available all year round will soon be a thing of the past in Europe.

Rabat markets ‘well supplied with basic products’

British consumers are told that the impact that high electricity prices are having on produce grown in greenhouses in the UK, is due to “climate change”. The UK government has therefore blamed “bad weather” in Morocco.

The situation is quite different however: From the beginning of 2023 to February 22, 64 034 places of production, storage and wholesale and retail sales were inspected, said Moroccan government spokesman, Mustapha Baitas.

During these interventions, 3 325 offences were recorded in terms of pricing and quality, Baitas said in a press briefing after the meeting of the Government Council, in response to a question on the results of control operations and the situation of seized products.

The joint commissions seized and destroyed 400 tons of products “not conforming to the standards in force”, while all usable products were sold at public auction, he added.

The minister had stressed earlier that the markets “are well supplied with basic products”.

UK to introduce GM foods

In the UK, the Lea Valley Growers Association (LVGA) produces around 75 percent of the country’s crops. They now say that half of the greenhouses are empty and production is expected to go down by up to 60 percent.

The Bank of England director, Andrew Bailey, apologized in June last year for sounding “apocalyptic” about rising food prices.

Such dire warnings have led to support for the introduction of a Bill that paves the way for genetically modified (GM) crops, with new food laws expected to pass through the UK’s Parliament.

Not a UK problem only

“Many greenhouse producers are abandoning their businesses due to the inability to cover their current heating and labor costs. So far, the state has taken absolutely no measures to support the greenhouse production sector. As we all know, it is one of the most expensive industries in the agricultural sector and is directly related to gas and electricity prices,” according to the Bulgarian Association of Greenhouse Farmers.

The profitability of Dutch companies have also been impacted, because energy represents 20 to 30 percent of their costs, Reuters reported.

A study conducted by ABN Amro predicted that rising energy prices would cost Dutch companies around 22 billion euros this year as gas and electricity prices jumped almost 5 times their 2019 levels.

Among the most impacted sectors: greenhouse production whose annual turnover reaches around 8 billion euros but where energy represents 20 to 30 percent of the costs. Already 40 percent of the members of the Glastuinbouw Nederland group are operating at a loss, due to excessive energy costs.

https://freewestmedia.com/2023/02/28/uk-greenhouses-shut-down-due-to-high-energy-costs/

As he was about to pick up his children from a kindergarten in Vienna’s Leopoldstadt district, the police’s investigators caught him. They arrested a Syrian (40) who was wanted on a European arrest warrant for rape.

The arrest warrant for the refugee (40) from Syria had been requested by the Italian judicial authorities and issued by Europol. The Syrian is wanted on suspicion of rape.

Investigators of the Provincial Criminal Police Office located the Syrian in Vienna, and police officers of the Brigittenau police station apprehended him on Monday. He was about to pick up his children from a kindergarten in Leopoldstadt.

In the course of the identification and subsequent arrest, the Syrian went berserk, shouted loudly and was uncooperative. He was taken to a prison.

https://exxpress.at/zielfahnder-fassten-syrischen-vergewaltiger-vor-wiener-kindergarten/

The trial of an Afghan man began today at the Görlitz Regional Court. He is accused of stabbing his blind neighbour. The prosecution accuses the defendant of attempted manslaughter. Attempted murder for malice aforethought could also be a possibility, said presiding judge Theo Dahm after reviewing the investigation file.

At the beginning of the trial, the accused confessed to the crime. He had felt made fun of by his neighbour. The 70-year-old man from Bautzen had arranged a job for him in an assembly company in Bischofswerda, 40 working hours a week. This was allegedly the condition for the 23-year-old to get a residence permit in Germany, i.e. not to be deported. The accused had debts, among others with his landlord and the health insurance company. His new boss had therefore paid a large part of his wages to creditors and paid him only 50 euros a week, the neighbour described. The accused also had debts with him. They added up to 4,000 euros. The man from Bautzen gave him pocket money, financed a course and driving school. “I wanted to help him get on his feet in Germany. I felt sorry for him.” He wanted the borrowed money back, considered it a loan.

He could not explain the crime. The accused had visited him from time to time, including on September 12 of last year. The man from Bautzen opened the door without suspicion, heard him walking through the hallway while he was sitting on the couch in the living room. Suddenly he said: “I have to kill you now”. Then the blind man felt a blow and another. There were four knife wounds in total, as doctors later found out. One went through the lungs to the heart. The pensioner was in intensive care for a week. The man from Bautzen could only be saved by rapid medical treatment. He dialled the emergency number with his last ounce of strength, while the accused ran to the police and turned himself in.

He had not been in control of his senses, the Afghan with the childlike face defended himself. He had wanted to punish his neighbour, to hurt him, but not to kill him. However, he could no longer recall the details of the crime. The Afghan came to Germany at the end of 2015. In Bautzen, he first worked at McDonalds. He moved into an apartment building on Löhrstraße. The two became acquainted with each other. The accused called the relationship with his neighbour fine. He had been nice and had helped him. In the weeks and months before the crime, the accused allegedly heard voices. The accused had taken drugs in the past. A few hours before the crime, he allegedly wanted to take his own life with a mobile phone cable.

The trial will be continued.

https://www.radiolausitz.de/beitrag/blinden-niedergestochen-prozess-in-goerlitz-763249/

The public prosecutor’s office in Chemnitz has charged a Libyan. He is suspected of raping and robbing a 73-year-old woman in Chemnitz.

As the authorities announced on Friday, the 37-year-old allegedly entered the woman’s flat via the balcony shortly before midnight on November 28. Among other things, he threatened her with a pair of scissors, assaulted her and injured her.

Afterwards, the man forced his victim to give him money, jewellery, cheque cards and other objects and fled, the indictment says. When he tried to break into a vehicle a little later, he was caught by a police patrol. After a short chase, the Libyan was arrested and has been in custody since then.

It is not yet known when he will be tried. If convicted, the suspect faces a prison sentence of several years.

https://www.radiolausitz.de/beitrag/chemnitz-anklage-gegen-libyer-wegen-vergewaltigung-762900/

The Supreme Court Monday dismissed a petition seeking directions to the Central government to constitute a ‘Renaming Commission’ to find out and restore the original names of ancient historical, cultural and religious places which were changed by foreign invaders.

The PIL was filed in the Supreme Court by lawyer Ashwini Upadhyay on February 12, 2023, days after the Mughal Garden in New Delhi was renamed Amrit Udyan.

Read detailed report :

'You Want To Keep The Country On Boil? Don't Belittle Hinduism's Greatness' : #SupremeDismisses Ashwini Upadhyay's Plea To Rename Cities#SupremeCourtOfIndia https://t.co/WHWiShpgwI

— Live Law (@LiveLawIndia) February 27, 2023

While dismissing the plea, the apex court bench of Justices KM Joseph and BV Nagarathna questioned the motive of the PIL filed by lawyer Ashwini Upadhyay, saying it will bring alive those issues, “which would keep the country on the boil”.

The bench made the remark when petitioner Ashwini Upadhyay asked the court why history should start only after Ghazni-Ghori. What is Aurangazeb’s relationship with India?” he asked.

“We have roads after Lodhi, Ghazni, Ghori….there is no single road named after Pandavas, though Indraprastha was constructed by Yudhishtir. Faridabad was named after the person who looted,” Upadhyay remarked.

Upadhyay urged that Constitutional protections should not be given to foreign invaders, adding that renaming of such structures is necessary because Hindus have become a minority in many historical places.

Sensing that the bench was not inclined to entertain the matter, Upadhyay sought permission to withdraw the petition with the liberty to file a representation before the Ministry of Home Affairs. However, the bench said that it will not allow such a course to be adopted.

However, the bench said that it will not allow such a course to be adopted.

The bench here, while talking about Hinduism said that Hinduism has a great tradition and it should not be belittled.

“Hinduism is the greatest religion in terms of metaphysics. The heights that Hinduism has in the Upanishads, Vedas, and Bhagavad Gita is unequal in any system. We should be proud of that. Please don’t belittle it. We have to understand our own greatness. Our greatness should lead us to be magnanimous. I am a Christian. But I am equally fond of Hinduism. I am trying to study it. You read the works of Dr S Radhakrishan on Hindu philosophy,” Justice Joseph said.

If you come to Kerala, it was the Hindu rajas who donated lands for churches, they gave money. That is the history of India. Please understand that,” he added.

Further speaking on Hinduism, Justice Nagarathn stated, “Hinduism is a way of life. There is no bigotry in Hinduism.”

To this, Upadhyay replied that Hindus have been “wiped off from many historical places due to this kind of nature”. He said that Hindus are in a minority in many states and districts.

The bench, however, rejected the plea while describing it as against secular principles of the Constitution.

Disheartened by the SC’s decision, lawyer Ashwini Upadhyay tweeted in Hindi that the “issue of Renaming Commission is not over today but started today. The case will now go to the people’s court and India will definitely win. India will now hit the road and will struggle till the last trace of the barbaric tyrants is eradicated.”

PIL filed in SC seeking the formation of a Renaming Commission to identify ancient, historical, and religious places named after foreign invaders

Notably, in the Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed in Supreme Court, lawyer Ashwini Upadhyay, had asked the Supreme Court to issue an appropriate directive to the Home Ministry to form a “Renaming Commission” to determine the original names of “ancient historical cultural religious places” in order to protect the sovereignty and secure the “Right to Dignity, Right to Religion, and Right to Culture” guaranteed by Articles 21, 25, and 29 of the Indian Constitution.

According to the PIL, while the Mughal Garden in Rashtrapati Bhawan was recently renamed Amrit Udyan, the government has not renamed a large number of roads named after invaders. It states several examples like Babur Road, Humayun Road, Akbar Road, Jahangir Road, Shahjahan Road, Bahadur Shah Road, Sher Shah Road, Aurangzeb Road, Tughlak Road, Safdarjung Road, Najaf Khan Road, Jauhar Road, Lodhi Road, Chelmsford Road and Hailey Road etc.

The petition pointed out that houses of Cabinet Ministers, Parliamentarians and the Hon’ble Judges are located on these roads.

Citing names of the prominent persons of the Mahabharat era, the PIL states that “injury to the citizens is extremely large” as Pandavas who converted a deserted land of Khandavprastha into Indraprastha do not have a single road, municipal ward, Assembly Constituency named after Lord Krishna, Balram, the five Pandavas, Draupadi, Kunti, and Abhimanyu. But many such places have been named after barbaric foreign invaders.

The PIL contended that this infringes the rights to dignity, religion, and culture protected by Articles 21, 25, and 29 of the Indian Constitution in addition to being against Indian sovereignty.

https://www.opindia.com/2023/02/sc-dismisses-plea-seeking-renaming-of-historical-places-named-after-islamic-invaders/

By Andrea Widburg

When it comes to the Ukraine-Russia war, Ukraine gets its strongest support from Europe, which has a long history of fearing Russians, and America, which has a penchant for the underdog and, possibly, has politicians with Ukrainian money lining their pockets. However, barring the New Zealand and Australian anglosphere, most of the southern hemisphere supports Russia. That is, it’s not just China that aligns with Putin; it’s almost everywhere in that part of the world.

One of the reasons that Russia’s economy is surviving despite Western sanctions is because other parts of the world are happy to do business with Russia. They’re not being forced. It turns out that those parts of the world that are not in the American/Anglo/European axis like and respect Russia. I learned thanks to a fascinating article by Krishen Mehta, “a member of the Board of the American Committee for U.S.-Russia Accord (ACURA), and a Senior Global Justice Fellow at Yale University,” who has written an essay explaining five reasons for this support.

Mehta reviewed a meta-analysis of multiple surveys about different countries’ views of the conflict. He summed it up this way:

These are:

• For the 6.3 billion people who live outside of the West, 66 percent feel positively towards Russia and 70 percent feel positively towards China, and,
• Among the 66 percent who feel positively about Russia the breakdown is 75 percent in South Asia, 68 percent in Francophone Africa, and 62 percent in Southeast Asia.
• Public opinion of Russia remains positive in Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, India, Pakistan, and Vietnam.

Those are, as Mehta says, “robust” numbers when it comes to supporting Russia. He offers five reasons that could explain these attitudes. I’ve quoted Mehta’s topline arguments, and then added my own commentary. I urge you to read the original essay, though.

First, says, Mehta, “The Global South does not believe that the West understands or empathizes with their problems.”

While the West obsessea with gender, lockdowns, and climate change, the southern hemisphere lives in the real world, one of poverty (exacerbated by the craze for ESG investing), famine, and high energy prices due to war and climate change madness. A friend of mine routinely travels to Cambodia, and she says that the West’s lockdown, which ended tourism and broke the supply chain of Southeast Asian goods to America, left friends of hers so destitute she’s surprised they survived. Meanwhile, Russia, China, and India sent vaccinations to the Southern hemisphere (although much good they did).

Second, says Mehta, “History Matters: Who stood where during colonialism and after independence?”

Put another way, countries that were once European colonies still bear that resentment while feeling that it was the Soviet bloc that helped them fight back against Western colonialism. The fact that the Soviet bloc (a) helped them to destroy the free world and (b) intended to put them under the communist boot is irrelevant. What matters is that the Soviet bloc—that is, the Russians—was the agent of change.

Third, writes Mehta, “The war in Ukraine is seen by the Global South as mainly about the future of Europe rather than the future of the entire world.”

The southern hemisphere is correct. This is strictly a European war. Putin may want to fulfill the Soviet destiny of dominance across all Europe and England, but there’s no indication that his territorial ambitions extend to any part of the southern hemisphere. And again, for people who are facing daily starvation, the Ukraine-Russia war is a first-world, European problem that really doesn’t matter to them. They’d like the war to end simply to help lower prices (food, fuel, debt service, etc.) that are eating away at their scarce resources.

Fourth, “The world economy is no longer American dominated or Western led and the Global South does have other options.”

I have nothing to add to that. It’s self-evident and self-explanatory, although Mehta offers lots of data to support it.

And fifth, Mehta writes, “The ‘rule based international order’ is lacking in credibility and is in decline.” In a nutshell, it’s the hypocrisy that sees the West, especially America, changing the rules for itself as it goes along. As Mehta says,

For decades now, for many in the Global South, the West is seen to have had its way with the world without regard to anyone else’s views. Several countries were invaded at will, mostly without Security Council authorization. These include the former Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria. Under what “rules” were those countries attacked or devastated, and were those wars provoked or unprovoked?

The West’s fondness for sanctions isn’t appreciated either, again considering the poverty and famine that dog the southern hemisphere.

Back in 1985, when there was a famine in Ethiopia, a lot of rockers got together to sing “We Are The World.” It wasn’t true then, and it’s less true now. We are not the world, and our concerns do not match those in the southern hemisphere, while our quarrels hurt them badly.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/02/while_the_us_and_europe_back_ukraine_most_of_the_southern_hemisphere_supports_russia.html

Iranian state media reported that school girls in Qom city in South Tehran were ‘deliberately’ poisoned in order to restrain education for them. Younes Panahi, the deputy health minister of the country on Sunday also confirmed the news of the poisoning and said that it had been a deliberate attempt with the aim of shutting down education for girls. He, however, said that no arrest has been made in the case.

It is pertinent to note here that earlier, Youssef Nouri, the Minister of Education had called the reports about the poisoning of schoolgirls “rumours”, claiming that the students taken to the hospital had “underlying diseases”.

According to reports, the first such incident was reported in Qom, a deeply conservative and religious city, in November last year. Then the incident of about 18 girls getting ill together in a school in Qom city came to light. They were then taken to the hospital. All the girls reportedly felt difficulty in breathing along with vomiting, abdominal pain and a sharp sensation in their hands and feet.

Subsequently, girls from neighbouring cities also fell sick. Since then, hundreds of cases of respiratory poisoning have been reported among schoolgirls.

On Sunday, Majid Monemi, the deputy governor of Lorestan, said 50 female students of a high school in Borujerd, western Iran, were poisoned again.

“It has been revealed that the chemical compounds used to poison students are not war chemicals, and the poisoned students do not need aggressive treatment, and a large percentage of the chemical agents used are treatable,” he told a press conference.

“After the poisoning of several students in Qom schools, it was found that some people wanted all schools, especially girls’ schools, to be closed,” local media agencies cited IRNA state news agency, which in turn quoted Panahi as saying.

Homayoun Sameh Najafabadi, a member of the health committee of the parliament, also confirmed in an interview with the Didbaniran website that the poisoning of female students in schools of Qom and Borujerd is intentional.

Reports in local media say this could be the work of Islamist fanatics who want to prevent girls from attending school.

According to IRNA, on February 14, parents of the ill students gathered outside the city’s governorate to “demand an explanation” from the authorities.

The next day, government spokesman Ali Bahadori Jahromi stated the intelligence and education ministries were investigating the cause of poisoning.

Prosecutor General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri launched a judicial investigation into the event last week.

Anti-hijab protests raged across Iran

Significantly, the poisoning began in late November, amidst unprecedented protests against Iran’s regime for the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody. She was arrested by the ‘Morality Police’ in Tehran for “improper hijab”, which means she had not fully covered her hair. She was arrested by the police and then beaten in the police van while being taken to a detention centre, dubbed as a ‘re-education class’ for not conforming to the country’s mandatory hijab rules.

Soon after, Iran saw a wave of protests following her killing, with many women taking to the streets to take a stand. In support of the victims, a number of women, including schoolgirls, burnt their hijabs, and women everywhere chopped their hair in protest. Protests broke out in hundreds of places around the nation after her death.

The Police used brutal force to contain the protests, which died down after several weeks after the govt used excessive force to control it, where several protesters, including minors, were killed, and thousands were arrested.

https://www.opindia.com/2023/02/iranian-schoolgirls-poisoned-to-refrain-from-pursuing-education-report/