OLD CONTENT contd.
www.dailysabah.com/americas/2019/07/09/peruvian-writer-mario-vargas-llosa-nominates-capt-carola-rackete-for-nobel-for-migrant-rescuesNobel laureate Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa on Monday called for the Nobel Peace Prize to be awarded to German ship captain Carola Rackete, who was arrested in June for docking a migrant rescue ship without authorization in the Italian port of Lampedusa.
Vargas Llosa made his nomination in an article published in the Argentine daily La Nacion (The Nation) entitled "The captain Rackete, my candidate for the Nobel."
On June 12, Rackete, who works for the German rescue organization Sea-Watch, picked up 53 migrants in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Libya. Rackete rejected an offer to dock the "Sea-Watch 3" in Tripoli, which is considered an unsafe port due to the ongoing conflict in the city.
The 31-year-old captain headed the Dutch-flagged ship – which was carrying children, pregnant women and sick migrants – toward the nearest port of Lampedusa. But, on June 14, Italy closed its ports to rescue ships. Italian Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Matteo Salvini refused to authorize docking, except for 10 migrants in critical need of medical care, until other European countries agreed to take the rest of the migrants.
A desperate Rackete and her crew made inquiries with Malta, France and Germany. They tried petitioning the European Court of Human Rights, which rejected the appeal on grounds that Sea-Watch 3 should have taken the migrants to the nearest country of Tunisia instead.
Two weeks later on June 28, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg and Portugal agreed to take in the other 43 migrants.
On June 29, still awaiting authorization, Rackete decided to dock the ship, stating that the migrants aboard were exhausted.
Rackete was arrested after docking the ship and placed under house arrest until July 2, when she was released after a court ruled she had broken no laws and acted to protect the safety of her passengers.
She faces a second hearing on Tuesday on charges of aiding and abetting illegal entry by the migrants and illegal entry into territorial waters.
"When laws, such as those invoked by Matteo Salvini, are irrational and inhuman, it is a moral duty to disobey them, as Carola Rackete did," Vargas Llosa wrote, underscoring that the alternative of letting the migrants die of exhaustion at sea was morally untenable.
"The young German has violated a stupid and cruel law," Vargas Llosa said, adding that Italy's League party and its leader Salvini represent "not respect for legality, but a prejudiced and racist caricature of the Rule of Law."
"And it is precisely he and his followers (too numerous, indeed, and not only in Italy, but in almost all of Europe) who embody the savagery and barbarism of which they accuse immigrants," he continued.
"Thanks to the courage and decency of Carola Rackete, at least these 40 unfortunates will be saved, since there are already five European countries that have offered to receive them," Vargas Llosa added.
Vargas Llosa called for Rackete's trial in Italy to be closely followed, calling on the public to "demand that the judges save the honor and good traditions of Italy trampled today by Salvini and the League."
"I am sure that I will not be the only one asking for that young captain (to receive) the Nobel Peace Prize when the time comes," Vargas Llosa concluded.
I support this. However, gestures like these do not lessen the need to assassinate Salvini ASAP.
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Better than nothing, but will not stop the raids:
www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/hotel-chains-vow-to-block-ice-from-using-rooms-as-backup-detention-centers-during-raids---
Captain Rackete speaks:
www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/07/16/migrant-ngo-captain-demands-europe-500000-migrants/Migrant transport NGO Captain Carola Rackete has demanded that Europe take in all asylum seekers from Libya, a number believed to be over half a million people.
The Seas Watch captain told German media that she wanted to see Europe take in all of the migrants currently in Libya, according to German tabloid Bild, saying: “We hear of half a million people in the hands of smugglers or in Libyan refugee camps we need to get out.”
Rackete, who is currently under investigation in connection with aiding illegal migration in Italy, was arrested late last month and then released after forcing her vessel, the Sea Watch-3, into Italian territorial waters without permission and ramming a patrol boat in the process.
“As far as the accident goes, nobody was in mortal danger, that was a minor technical collision. But even politicians should not judge that, but experts alone. In general, all the excitement could have been prevented if Italy had supported us,” Rackete said.
She went on to say that Europe should also take in so-called “climate refugees” arguing that “asylum has no limit!” and went on to say: “The collapse of the climate system causes climate refugees, which we naturally have to absorb. In some African countries, caused by industrialised countries in Europe, the food base is being destroyed.”
According to Rackete, European states like Germany have a “historical responsibility” to Africa because of their colonial past. “There is a historical responsibility to accept refugees who can no longer live in their countries due to the balance of power or the climate situation,” she said.
I agree with all the above. There are going to be more climate refugees in future, whom we need to start preparing to take in now. However:
Rackete launched a lawsuit for slander against the League party leader earlier this month and has demanded Salvini have his social media platforms on Facebook and Twitter taken away.
Rackete briefly commented on the lawsuit in her interview with Bild saying: “I think you can not put up with everything. He has spread falsehoods and I want him to erase these untruths on Twitter and Facebook. And also that a judge tells him: ‘You can never say that again!'”
Salvini needs to have his life taken away, not his Facebook and Twitter. Salvini is not someone who will let a judge tell him what he can say, or do. He will keep pushing refugees back out to drown until he dies. Therefore his death must be hastened.
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www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7275255/ICE-agents-forced-retreat-activists-link-arms-prevent-man-son-taken.htmlA group of neighbors and activists in Tennessee formed a human chain Monday after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents tried to detain a man who was with his 12-year-old son.
Cellphone video captured the controversial moment that friends and activists joined hands to allow the father and son to escape into their Forest Ridge home in Nashville, Tennessee's Hermitage neighborhood.
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'They were saying, "if you don’t come out, we’re going to arrest you, we’re going to arrest your 12-year-old son," local attorney Daniel Ayoadeyoon told WFTF. 'That’s just not legal, it’s not the right law.'
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'They don't bother nobody and this is illegal,' one bystander said during the encounter.
'I've been knowing these people for 14 years,' added another neighbor, Felishadae Young. 'It's sad to see these children being ripped away from their parents.'
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'I could see if these people were bad criminals, but they’re not, they’re just trying to provide for their kids,' neighbor Stacey Farley told reporters after the incident. 'They work every day, they come home, the kids jump on their trampoline, it’s just a community.'
Sanctuary cities are banned in Tennessee under a state law that went into effect on January 1, according to Think Progress, but Nashville police chief Steve Anderson has resisted calls for his department to help round up immigrants, saying doing so would make them fear cooperating with police in the city that has the state's largest foreign-born population.
Good work, but ICE will be back. If you do not want ICE back, you need to use firearms. You seem to have a sympathetic police chief, so if every person in the neighbourhood put one bullet each into the ICE agents, is the police going to arrest the entire neighbourhood?
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New subreddit:
www.reddit.com/r/WhereAreTheChildren/---
www.technologyreview.com/f/614146/whole-foods-amazon-palantir-ice-rekognition-technology-backlash/A group of anonymous Whole Foods employees is calling out Amazon (which bought the supermarket chain in 2017) for working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). An open letter, posted via the group’s Twitter account, criticizes Amazon for providing cloud computing services to Palantir, a data analytics company that works for ICE, which has been cracking down on undocumented immigrants. The group, called Whole Worker, also asks Amazon to stop selling its facial-recognition technology, Rekognition, to law enforcement and demands that it stop business with “any other company involved in the continued oppression of marginalized groups.”
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Elsewhere in the company, employees have been protesting Amazon’s relationship with ICE for over a year, though momentum has grown recently because of anti-ICE protests. Last month, employees of Amazon Web Services circulated a letter that also demanded the company stop working with ICE.
Whole Foods > Amazon
news.yahoo.com/migrant-ship-150-board-arrives-123108197.html
A migrant rescue ship with nearly 150 people on board has docked near an Italian island after a judge in Rome overruled the interior minister Matteo Salvini’s ban on the boat entering the country’s waters.
The Open Arms was stranded in the Mediterranean Sea for nearly two weeks after Mr Salvini said the ship should not be allowed to dock.
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The court ruled that the ban violated international laws and called for “immediate assistance to the to the rescued people most in need”.
Following the ruling, Mr Salvini issued a fresh decree banning the ship from docking at the island of Lampedusa to disembark the passengers.
But the Italian defence minister Elisabetta Trenta, a member of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement, refused to countersign it and said she was “listening to my conscience”.
But when are we going to start seriously punishing those states which violate international law? Because if there is no punishment for violation, there is no pragmatic incentive for following international law. Trenta may have a conscience, but Salvini clearly does not. The very reason law exists is because many people lack conscience and need to be threatened with death in order to be persuaded to not initiate violence.
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Nitpick time: Does it make sense to criticize pretentious and arrogant politicians in the UN for declaring certain "international laws" to be legit in all nations, including ones that do not consent to said laws ~~~ and then to cite the violation of one of those laws as a reason for action against a nation that has done so, even if the law being violated is perfectly moral?
It's better to just say "to Hell with these guys for doing evil ****" rather than "to Hell with these guys for violating a law".
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"politicians in the UN declaring certain "international laws" to be legit in all nations, including ones that do not consent to said laws"
Politicians in the UN speak to UN member states. UN membership is not compulsory. You would think that states disagreeing with UN legal standards would voluntarily leave the UN. In reality, however, they shamelessly want the privileges of UN membership but not the burdens. What I am criticizing is the fact that they are allowed to get away with this by the UN, which instead merely issues impotent "warnings" over and over again that carry no practical consequences with them:
www.euractiv.com/section/justice-home-affairs/news/un-warns-italy-over-tough-law-on-migrant-rescue-boats/"It's better to just say "to Hell with these guys for doing evil ****""
Sure, but that's for us to say. UN politicians speak within their capacity as UN politicians.
Everyone has to contribute in their own capacity:
www.worldreligionnews.com/religion-news/elca-americas-first-sanctuary-church-body---
Judges are not going be able to help us much longer:
www.nytimes.com/2019/08/10/us/immigration-judges-union-justice-department.htmlThe Justice Department has moved to decertify the union of immigration judges, a maneuver that could muffle an organization whose members have sometimes been openly critical of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement agenda.
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“This is a misguided effort to minimize our impact,” said Judge Amiena Khan, vice president of the judges’ union, which has publicly criticized the use of a quota system in immigration court and other attempts to speed up proceedings.
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“We serve as a check and balance on management prerogatives and that’s why they are doing this to us,” said Judge Khan.
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Both Judge Khan and the union president, Judge Ashley Tabaddor, have spoken out repeatedly against what they say is an attempt to turn immigration judges from neutral arbiters of the law to law enforcement agents enacting the White House’s policies. They have called for immigration judges to be independent of the Justice Department.
Last year, the union criticized the department’s quota system, which required immigration judges to complete 700 cases per year, as well as a move to bar judges from an administrative tool they had previously used to reduce their caseloads. The union says the focus on efficiency impedes judges’ ability to work through complicated cases and could affect the due process rights of immigrants in court.
A day will come when due process will no longer exist at all, at which point firearms will be the only alternative to capitulation.
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Judges with conscience act while they still can (see previous post):
news.yahoo.com/judge-hurries-u-naturalization-pregnant-193453132.html
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A judge in California had to speed up the naturalization of a pregnant immigrant on Thursday when the woman, anxious to become a U.S. citizen because of President Donald Trump's immigration policies, started experiencing contractions.
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She refused to leave until she was sworn in as a U.S. citizen, said U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney, who performed an impromptu naturalization ceremony before the official event began for immigrants from 114 different countries.
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"I sped up this process because of the fact of the current president, because the immigration laws are under attack," said Tatev, a former California high school history teacher, adding she was fearful her green card, which makes her a legal permanent U.S. resident, would be taken from her.
Trump said on Wednesday his administration was seriously looking at ending the right of citizenship for U.S.-born children of non-citizens and people who immigrated to the United States illegally.
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"I don't want my kid to face these issues growing up in this country and having this be his home and not legally being part of this country," said Tatev, who stays home to care for her 2-year-old daughter.
Tatev said in a phone interview that she arrived in the United States from Armenia when she was 14 and it took her 17 years to first get a green card and then citizenship.
"If he (Trump) doesn't like what's happening, why don't we pass better policies that make it a little easier for people to go through this process instead of having to sneak into this country and go through so many horrible experiences?" she said.
Because Trump is a Westerner. Putting us through horrible experiences gives him a feeling of importance. This is called Western civilization. As a history teacher, surely you know something about this?
And I predicted long ago that our enemies would be going after the Fourteenth Amendment.
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Good news!
thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/458325-illinois-enacts-law-barring-landlords-from-evicting-tenants-over
Illinois enacts law barring landlords from evicting tenants over immigration status
© Getty Images
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) signed a bill into law Wednesday that prohibits landlords in the state from evicting residents due to their immigration status, the second state in the nation to do so.
The law, which passed with bipartisan support through the state legislature after a broader version was vetoed by former Gov. Bruce Rauner (R), also prohibits landlords from using their clients' immigration status in any way to intimidate them, including barring landlords from threatening tenants with calls to immigration officials.
Those found guilty of doing so can be fined up to $2,000 for each violation, according to the governor's website. The bill takes effect immediately.
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news.yahoo.com/italian-doctor-fights-shed-light-mediterraneans-migrant-dead-035822027.html
Paris (AFP) - For Cristina Cattaneo, the thousands of migrants who have died trying to reach Europe's shores in recent years deserve the same as any other disaster victims: a concerted effort to find out who they were and let their families know the painful truth about their fate.
"The dead need to be identified -- not for the dead, they are lost, but for the living. People need to bury and identify and grieve their dead," Cattaneo, an Italian forensic pathologist, told AFP in an interview.
Since 2013, the laboratory she heads at the University of Milan has been waging a lonely fight to piece together a life from the photos or love letters, school reports and bits of clothing carried by migrants, who have drowned trying to cross the Mediterranean to Europe.
Many younger victims from Eritrea and Sub-Saharan Africa, in particular, she said, also tuck away small pouches of soil from their homelands -- just like the leaves and flowers that Cattaneo herself stashed away on summer trips back to Italy after moving to Canada as a child.
"I was putting them in my pocket to remind me of the place I loved," she said.
"If people could see what these adolescents had in their pockets, they would understand that they are actually us."
Fine, so why are we letting rightists drown us by the thousands and not ensuring rightists die in greater numbers? These are not "disaster victims", these are victims of artificial barriers knowingly and purposefully set up by rightists to be lethal on a mass scale to those who happened to be born on the wrong side through no fault of their own. We should be talking about what rightists deserve. The unjustly dead need not to be buried, identified or grieved, but before all else to be avenged.