Belgian doctors are raising the alarm after encountering diseases they have never seen before in the country appearing in a migrant squat outside of Brussels.
Since last October, nearly 1,000 asylum seekers have lived in squalid conditions after illegally occupying a former Federal Ministry of Finance building in Schaerbeek, which is a suburb of Brussels. Residents in the area have complained about the squat for some time, saying the immigrants are constantly fighting with one another, raising concerns about public safety.
However, due to a lack of hygiene, professional cleaning, and unsanitary conditions, disease is also now running rampant in the building.
Doctors of the NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) were reportedly shocked to find diphtheria in patients who lived in the building. Thanks to vaccination, the disease was thought to have been eradicated from Europe years ago, but according to Belgian newspaper 7sur7, a number of homeless migrants have now brought it back to Belgium.
“Belgian doctors have never seen this disease in their lives,” David Vogel, MSF project manager, told La Libre. He also warns about cases of tuberculosis, “a disease that was present in Belgium in the last century when people heated with coal and did not ventilate.”
Other diseases are also present, including scabies and tuberculosis, with scabies spreading likely due to the lack of basic hygiene. The disease, which is an infestation of the skin with the human itch mite, is difficult to treat in such conditions. Even if the doctors treat the rash, the migrants are headed back to a building infested with the mites, which means outbreaks will likely continue, said MSF’s David Vogel.
A previous article detailed the extreme problems facing the residents near the building.
“We live in uncertainty every day. Every day, there are fights and police interventions, and fires are regularly lit in the squat,” said a local resident. “In addition, as residents, we suffer a lot from nighttime noise,” he adds.
In fact, some incidents at the migrant squat have made national headlines in Belgium, such as when a half-naked resident ranted and screamed while pacing outside on the seventh-story ledge of the building. A video of the incident can be seen on television 7sur7’s website.
“Sunday morning, the situation was such that a man wanted to throw himself out of the window of the seventh floor of the squat,” he said.
The paper describes how there have also been attacks on people, including migrants hurling pieces of glass and iron bars at residents. Despite reports to police, they have been unable to maintain public safety.
“Once again, the police had to intervene after the occupants of the squat threw pieces of glass, iron bars, and trash at passers-by. We feel helpless and totally forgotten and ignored by the authorities”.
Apparently it’s no longer just about tanks and fighter jets for Ukraine: According to Polish General Waldemar Skrzyptzak (67), the government in Kiev is said to have nuclear weapons once again. Other experts believe that even if they do not have such a weapon now, they’ll have one soon.
In an interview, one of Poland’s best-known military officers gave an analysis of where Europe might be headed in the war in Ukraine: General Waldemar Skrzyptzak said in an interview with radio station Wnet that President Zelensky’s government probably already has nuclear weapons.
This was not absurd, explained the general: “Ukraine has officially had no nuclear weapons since the early 1990s, when it agreed to hand them over to Russia under international agreements. Now the reality could be very different.”
The General concluded: “I do not rule out that Ukraine has nuclear weapons, because Ukrainians have nuclear power plants, scientists, laboratories and know-how. So you have everything to own such a weapon. In fact, as of today, no one will forbid Ukrainians from doing it.”
General’s statements a warning for Moscow?
However, the Polish media have also interviewed military experts who deny that Ukraine already has nuclear weapons. They believe that this is currently unlikely since the possession of nuclear weapons cannot be kept secret for long. However, it cannot be ruled out that Ukraine would be able to acquire such weapons in the near future.
On December 9, a Bangladeshi man staying at the youth hostel (formerly FJT) in Bruay-La-Buissière attacked a caretaker with a knife. He was sentenced to 30 months in prison, but did not say anything to explain what he had done.
It was a gaunt young man who sat in the dock, he had been in pre-trial detention for a month and a half. A 19-year-old man from Bangladesh, he seemed distracted during his trial and did not answer the judges, his lawyer or the interpreter. Yet the offences he is accused of are serious: stabbings, after which the question of intent to kill (and thus a verdict in the jury court) arose…
It was the morning of December 9. The resident, who was staying at the residence for young people in Bruay (formerly FJT) in the Rue d’Argentine, asked to speak to someone in charge, but the accused very quickly pulled out a 25-30 cm ceramic knife that he had hidden in his jumper and lunged at him. He stabbed him in the face and then in the upper part of the body. Dubout, the victim’s lawyer, explains: “Vital organs are at stake. My client saw himself die when he aimed for the heart!”
(…) The Bangladeshi man, who was arrested near the dormitory, allegedly made incoherent statements: “Allah akbar” and “I love mum”, and even spoke to her, even though she was dead….
La Voix du Nord / https://www.fdesouche.com/2023/02/08/bruay-la-buissiere-62-30-mois-de-prison-pour-nazim-uddin-mohamad-qui-avait-attaque-au-couteau-un-responsable-du-foyer-qui-lhebergeait-en-criant-allah-akbar/
0:00 your kids come home and out 0:02 as LGBT what do you do with 0:04 them 0:05 knows what to do with them 0:08 i’ll bury them alive if they come back with 0:12 lgbtq I bury them alive 0:14 my children alive 0:17 no exceptions 0:20 should dare to come and 0:24 to out themselves I send them to the village 0:30 and 0:38 they will be buried 0:41 show nothing right way when I 0:43 will talk left right to has no 0:46 no no no 0:48 what is the point of telling a child that this is 0:52 fire it means don’t burn yourself 0:54 it will still touch until it fall flat on his face
0:59 that’s why I’m sending this for half a 1:01 year in the village to see how real 1:04 life is 1:09 like my father did with me
In this file photo, incarcerated BNP chief Khaleda Zia, left, seen sharing a light moment with members of her alliance partner, then Jamaat-e-Islami chief, Matiur Rahman Nizami, right, and one of the top leaders back then, Delwar Hossain Sayeedi, centre, at a rally in Dhaka Courtesy. Image source – archive.dhakatribune.com
In January 2024, Bangladesh will be holding its next general election, where Islamist forces, including Jamaat-e-Islami are making frantic bids in returning to power with the help of Western governments, particularly the Biden administration.
While back in December 2021, the US Department of Treasury had imposed sanctions on a number of officers of Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), the elite force of Bangladesh Police that combats terrorism and militancy, recently during his Bangladesh visit, Donald Lu, Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs in the State Department said, Washington was considering imposing more sanctions on RAB in December 2022, but such actions were not taken as RAB has already shown significant progress in fighting terrorism and militancy and it has not shown signs of violating human rights.
But, according to recent media reports, US is considering imposing sanctions on dozens of individuals, including some Bangladesh nationals, using Global Magnitsky Act on allegations of corruption and money-laundering. Several high-ranking officials in Washington DC told me that process of imposing such sanctions have already started, where few days ago, the US has imposed sanctions on Paraguay’s former president Horacio Cartes and four of his companies, and accused Cartes of engaging in corruption before, during and after his term as president.
Paraguay’s current vice president Hugo Velázques was also sanctioned over his part in alleged corruption. US ambassador to Paraguay Marc Ostfield said on Twitter that the actions aim to protect “our financial system and support Paraguay in its fight against corruption”.
Separately, the US barred former president of Panama Ricardo Martinell from entering the country, “for his involvement in significant corruption”, according to a designation by the Department of State.
The US has accused Martinelli, who was in office from 2009 to 2014, of accepting bribes in exchange for improperly awarding government contracts during his presidency. “Such acts of public corruption diminish confidence in governance and reduce resources available for schools, hospitals, roads, and other government services”, said Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a statement.
In December 2021, Luis Enrique Martinelli Linares and Ricardo Alberto Martinelli Linares, who also featured in the Pandora Papers, pleaded guilty to laundering US$28 million in bribes paid by Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht to a Panamanian official during their father’s presidency. Although federal court documents didn’t identify the Panamanian official by name, only saying the person was a “close relative” of the Martinelli brothers, a press release from the US embassy in Panama identified Martinelli as the beneficiary of the bribes. A defense attorney for one of Martinelli’s sons told a federal judge in May that the brothers were “roped into this money laundering conspiracy … by their father … who was the recipient of the Odebrecht bribes”, according to a court transcript.
Those Washington officials indicated that “dozens” of Bangladesh nationals may fall under US sanctions “by this year” on allegations of corruption and money-laundering.
When asked, if leaders of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) would fall under US sanctions for corruption and money-laundering, Washington officials said, “it may not happen”.
Why? Because, BNP and its Islamist partner Jamaat-e-Islami are spending hugely on lobbyists and desperately pursuing with the US authorities and pushing forward names of a large number of Bangladesh nationals, mostly connected to ruling Awami League with the suggestions of bringing them under sanctions on charges of corruption and money-laundering.
This is certainly bad news, especially when Bangladesh is heading towards another general election in 2024. Shockingly, policymakers in Bangladesh seem to be either unaware or reluctant on this serious matter, while they even are not countering anti-Awami League negative propaganda that is continuing in the international media for months.
With such adverse situation, Bangladesh will choose its next government at elections that will take place in January next year. According to analysts, for the government led by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, the vote will be crucial given that it will be a reflection of the popular will regarding the various development programs as well as foreign policy measures that the Awami League has undertaken since its return to power in January 2009.
Meanwhile, BNP and Jamaat have been consistently telling Western policymakers that any election held under Awami League government won’t be free, fair and transparent. Awami League government, which until now is unwilling to accept BNP-Jamaat’s demand for holding the election under a “caretaker government” or “government of national consensus” also realizes too-well the imperative for an election that must be free, transparent and credible. Such a need arises from the perception among many that the elections of 2014 and 2018 suffered from drawbacks that the government has had a hard time trying to explain away.
Although former military dictator General Hussain Muhammed Ershad’s Jatiya Party continues to play the role of an opposition in the parliament, in practical sense, this party does not enjoy a public support or vote bank in comparison to that of BNP or even Jamaat-e-Islami. International community, including the US do not endorse Jatiya Party as a genuine opposition as it has in the past played the role of opposition while several key figure of this party, including its founder General Ershad were ministers in Awami League’s “coalition” government.
According to journalist and political commentator Syed Badrul Ahsan, “In recent weeks, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), founded by the country’s first military ruler General Ziaur Rahman, has come forth with a 27-point program it believes will lead to a process of a reform of the state. The BNP’s belief is that the state, indeed the institutions of the state, have either been undermined or politicized by the Hasina government in these past many years.
“The difficulty for Bangladesh’s people comes through the BNP’s inability or reluctance to explain its inclination or otherwise toward undertaking reforms within itself before it can go ahead with its election-related plans. And that precisely is where the dilemma for Bangladesh’s people comes in.
“The BNP in its years in power under General Ziaur Rahman, Justice Abdus Sattar and Khaleda Zia, promoted an ideology of ‘Bangladeshi nationalism’ which was at variance with the concept of Bengali nationalism espoused by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and his Awami League in the mid-1960s and leading up to the liberation of Bangladesh in December 1971. Up until the assassination in August 1975 of Sheikh Mujib, revered as Bangabandhu (friend of Bengal) and father of the nation by his people, Bengali nationalism served as the core of the nation’s constitution, underscored as it was by the principles of secularism, socialism and democracy.
“When, therefore, talk of free elections comes up in the country, public attention is quickly drawn to the failure of the opposition to come forth with any guarantees that the divisive policies it pursued in the years between 1975-1996 and again between 2001-2006 will be abandoned and that it will embrace the principles enunciated and brought into fruition through the emergence of the sovereign state of Bangladesh in 1971.
“In simple terms, Bangladesh is now caught between a rock and a hard place. With the elections approaching, the government is doing all it can to fend off western, essentially American pressure in national politics. Curiously enough, the degree of influence necessary to convince the electorate that the opposition is now ready to go for policy change and political reforms within itself has been conspicuous by its absence”.
He added stating, “Islamist militancy may have been curbed by the government in an appreciable way, but that is hardly any reassurance that religious militants are a spent force considering the series of militant hideouts the security forces have been unearthing in recent months.
“The danger will increase, perhaps exponentially, if the Bangladesh state is once again seized by forces, meaning the political parties which have failed to convince the nation that they have reformed themselves policy-wise, responsible for the slide which defined the dark period 1975-1996 once more make their way to power.
“Polarized politics is the truth in Bangladesh today. The larger truth is the failure of political parties and elements on the right-wing to identify with the ideology that shaped the idea of Bangladesh more than a half century ago.
Hence the worry assailing secularists in the country”.
Considering all the odds and challenges posed to the ruling Awami League centering the upcoming general elections in Bangladesh, one may ask – what will happen in 2024? Shall Islamists return to power thus transforming Bangladesh into another Afghanistan? The reply may still be difficult to find, but one plain truth is – Awami League government and the state-machinery are not realizing the consequences of BNP-Jamaat’s undeterred efforts, persuasion and frantic bids in misleading the Western policymakers with the well-produced propaganda stuff.
In the Farrukhabad district of Uttar Pradesh, a case of triple talaq and assault with a woman has come to the fore. The victim, Arshi Fatima, claims that her husband, Ali Ashraf Qadri, first gave her triple talaq and is now pressuring her to perform nikah halala with her father-in-law in the name of compromise. The wife claims that her husband is violent and is threatening to kill her.
Notably, the victim had filed a complaint regarding the matter to the Maudarwaja police in August 2022, but no action was taken against the accused. Disappointed with the police inaction, the victim lodged her complaint to DM Sanjay Kumar’s office on February 7, 2022.
As the Additional Magistrate Narendra Kumar was leaving the DM office, the victim Arshi Fatima stood in front of his vehicle. The security personnel then handed the magistrate the victim’s complaint letter. The magistrate returned to the office to hear the woman’s complaint after realizing the seriousness of the case. Following this, DM Sanjay Kumar met the woman and assured her to take action.
OpIndia has accessed a copy of the victim’s complaint letter. In her complaint, the victim stated, “I filed a report against the accused under crime number 373/2022, section 323 of the Muslim Women Act, and complained to police station Maudarwaja in August 2022. The police have not yet taken any legal action against the accused in the matter.”
Furthermore, the victim said in her complaint, “The investigator of Maudarwaja Police Station has dropped the names of the named accused Sayeedullah, Rihanna, Nida, Faizi, Shoaib, Mushir, Sarwar Hafiz, Master from the case.”
The victim also alleged that when she opposed triple talaq, “he thrashed me and threatened with a pistol that even my dead body would not be found if I dared to take legal action against him.”
“He had caused my father’s accident and now he’s pressuring me to perform halala with his father in order to accept me back as his wife,” the victim alleged adding that the accused can get her killed along with her family.
While speaking to OpIndia, victim Arshi Fatima said, “Despite being elder and like my father, my husband’s father was eager to perform halala with me. While she was listening to all of this, my mother-in-law was tacitly supporting this misbehaviour. Although everyone in my husband’s family is highly educated, their behaviour is nonetheless extremely horrendous. They have badly tortured me.”
The practice of Nikah Halala in Islam is a requirement if a divorced couple wants to remarry again. Once a man divorces his wife, he can’t marry her again directly. To be able to do so, the woman needs to marry a different man, consummate the marriage, and then divorce the second husband in order to marry the original husband. This has been used as a sexual exploitation tool by many people, who give instant divorce to their wives, then in order to remarry them they force them to have sex with friends or family members, including their fathers, in the name of halala.
Triple Talaq Law
It is notable that the central government has enacted the law against triple talaq in 2019 after the Supreme Court declared the regressive practice as unconstitutional in 2017. The law criminalizes the practice of triple talaq and prescribes punishment for up to 3 years. The woman is entitled to maintenance for her dependent children under the law.
Two climate activists who blocked traffic in the German city of Stuttgart earlier this year missed their court date because they flew to Bali and Indonesia, for a round trip of 23,000 kilometers producing 7.9 tons of CO2 emissions.
In September 2022, Yannick S. and his girlfriend Luisa S., both members of the Last Generation activist group, blocked commuter traffic in Stuttgart. The two were cited by police, but when their court date arrived, it was revealed that neither could attend because they were on the other side of the planet on vacation.
The two climate activists are now being held up as an example of the hypocrisy of many such activists who come from wealthy families that can afford the type of backpacking trip typical of this social class. At the same time, many of these same individuals have blockaded airports, arguing that airplanes are responsible for a significant amount of CO2 emissions and are only available to the “wealthy” percentage of the population.
Both individuals were summoned to the district court in Bd Cannstatt, where the 24-year-old and his 22-year-old girlfriend were supposed to be tried. When the judge asked the other defendants in the case where the couple was, they replied they were on vacation in Thailand, with plans to then travel on to Bali.
The case prompted a spokesman for Last Generation to say that they are permitted to take a vacation as “private individuals.”
“They booked the flight as private individuals, not as climate protectors. You have to keep that separate,” he said.
Yannick S. and his girlfriend Luisa S. are not the only two climate activists who have been called out for their double standards. World leaders, academics, and CEOs who arrived at the latest World Economic Forum in Davos on a fleet of private jets were harshly ridiculed for their relentless focus on climate change despite their own personal consumption habits.
In addition, Luisa Neubauer, the spokeswoman for “Fridays for Future,” has also been accused of hypocrisy for her travels to Indonesia, China, Hong Kong, Namibia, Canada, and Morocco when she was 26. The German climate activist has been nicknamed “long-distance Luisa” on social media.
The first forecasts for the new year in terms of uncontrolled immigration are catastrophic. Around 800 000 new “refugees” are expected by the German Ministry of the Interior for 2023. But that’s probably just a “slimmed down” official number. Last year, an unbelievable 1,4 million people immigrated to Germany.
The new forecast gave rise to incomprehension in the districts and municipalities concerned. Nobody knows how and where the expected newcomers will be accommodated.
The Brandenburg district administrators in northern Germany demanded that asylum seekers without a chance of recognition not even be distributed among the districts and municipalities. Conversely, this would mean the establishment of central deportation centers.
The district chiefs also have less and less patience for the “refugees” who have already been registered in other EU countries or have even gone through an asylum procedure there. These secondary migration movements would have to be stopped by the federal government, they argued.
Optionally, “people should be sent back quickly,” demanded Stephan Loge (SPD), District Administrator in the Dahme-Spreewald district. Only then can the remaining be “taken in” to be meaningfully integrated.
According to an INSA survey last Friday commissioned by the Bild newspaper, the majority of Germans think that Germany is taking in too many “refugees”. Thus, 51 percent of those surveyed said that Germany had taken in too many migrants, 33 percent found the number “reasonable”. And only 11 percent said that Germany should take in more people.
The hope for an easing of the situation is, however, illusory given the current state of affairs – no serious efforts are to be expected from the “traffic light” coalition government to ensure efficient border protection or to curb the flow of migrants.
Green senator protected Brockstedt station terrorist
A political earthquake is looming in Hamburg in connection with the “refugee” assassin Ibrahim A. The asylum seeker had already announced a terrorist attack while in custody, where he was being held for another stabbing. But Justice Senator Anna Gallina (Greens) chose not to tell MPs.
The deadly attack on the regional train at Brockstedt last month did not come as a surprise to prison authorities. Because a few months before his release from prison, the perpetrator had compared himself to the Islamist-motivated assassin from the Christmas market on Berlin’s Breitscheidplatz, Anis Amri. In 2016, Amri killed 13 people and injured 67. This raises the question of whether the Brockstedt massacre could have been anything other than an Islamist terrorist attack.
During her interrogations in the Hamburg Parliament and in the Judiciary Committee she did not mention a word of it. The statements by the 33-year-old were already known to her at the time, dpa reported. According to this, the terrorist said to prison employees in August: “There is not just one Anis Amri, there are several, I am one too.”
The prison staff had recorded the threat in a “perception sheet” in the prisoner’s personal file. Allegedly, Hamburg’s judiciary only became aware of this after the massacre in the regional train because Gallina had remained mum. Neither the Senate nor the domestic intelligence service forwarded this explosive information from the prison management, probably on orders from Gallina.
A change of heart in Bavaria
Criticism of unchecked mass immigration is also growing louder in Bavaria, which is a comparatively well-off state. The Bavarian district council has now issued a warning to the federal government and the EU: without a noticeable restriction on the influx of migrants and refugees, “integration at the municipal level will fail,” said President Thomas Karmasin (CDU) in a presidium meeting.
The association warned that municipal admission in Bavaria and throughout Germany has reached a limit. The war refugees from Ukraine and asylum seekers from other countries exceeded the numbers of the influx in 2015. The situation has become critical.
“Without a noticeable limitation of uncontrolled local access, integration at the municipal level will fail. The capacities for accommodating refugees, the resources for social care and the necessary places for children in day-care centers and schools are almost exhausted,” said President Karmasin. “The municipalities cannot solve this special situation created from outside without the European Union and the federal government.”
People who “from the outset have no prospect of staying” must be turned away at the EU’s external borders. “For this, the European Union must effectively secure its external borders,” demanded Karmasin, who is also the district administrator of Fürstenfeldbruck.
Bundeswehr halts target practice due to ‘refugees’
The Bundeswehr, out of consideration for “refugees”, has meanwhile halted target practice in Berlin. There, a planned exercise at Tegel Airport had to be relocated due to its proximity to the arrival center for “refugees”. The State Office for Refugee Affairs (LAF) asked the Bundeswehr to stop because the sounds of such target practice could evoke “traumatic memories and anxiety” in people fleeing the war, the agency claimed.
The exercise would have been three hours of shooting. The LAF had checked in advance whether the exercise would affect the 2 500 refugees in the arrival center.
“The practice shooting took place several times last year, so that the initial answer was that it had no effect,” said a spokesman for the authority. However, there is now a new situation. “We also housed people in temporary halls and no longer just in permanent buildings, where we cannot rule out the possibility of people being affected.” The Bundeswehr command was therefore asked to move the practice shooting to another location.
