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In Paris pub, British punters drown sorrows with Brexit beer

FILE PHOTO: Thibault, barman at the Cricketer English Pub, serves a Brexit draft beer in Paris
FILE PHOTO: Thibault, barman at the Cricketer English Pub, serves a Brexit draft beer in Paris, France, December 17, 2018. REUTERS/Charles Platiau/File Photo

March 11, 2019

PARIS (Reuters) – If Prime Minister Theresa May or any other Briton needs some Dutch courage to see them through the fraught final countdown to Britain’s departure from the European Union they need look no further than a Paris pub and its popular “Brexit” beer.

Brewed in Scotland, which voted largely in favor of remaining in Europe, the beer’s hoppy notes give it a deliberate bitterness, said Lomig Fronty, a French barman at The Cricketer pub.

The brewery “wanted to put across its feelings towards Brexit, hence the bitterness of the beer,” Fronty said in between pulling pints. “So that’s what I tell people who don’t want to take it for this reason, it’s actually an anti-Brexit move to buy this beer.”

May faces possible further humiliation in parliament over her Brexit divorce deal this week after failing to win any major concessions from the EU. British lawmakers will decide on Tuesday whether to approve the deal.

With less than three weeks until the March 29 deadline, possible outcomes include a delay, a last-minute deal, a no-deal Brexit, a snap election or another referendum.

The uncertainty is enough to give most drinkers at the British-themed pub near the Gare Saint Lazare a headache.

“Brexit is terrible,” said Rosie, a British-Australian patron of The Cricketer. “But at least the beer is good.”

(Reporting by Antony Paone and Johnny Cotton; editing by Richard Lough and Jason Neely)

Source: OANN

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Trump backs away from Special Olympics funding cut

After days of controversy and criticism, President Trump said he is backing off a budget request that would have cut funding for the Special Olympics.

Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday, “I’ve overridden my people for funding the Special Olympics.”

The president added: “I’ve been to the Special Olympics. I think it’s incredible.”

The Trump administration’s education budget proposal called for the elimination of $17.6 million for the Special Olympics, roughly 10 percent of the group’s overall revenue.

“We express our gratitude to President Trump for reauthorizing funding for Special Olympics school-based programming. He joins a long history of over 50 years of United States presidents and members of Congress on both sides of the aisle in their support of Special Olympics and the work we do in communities throughout the country,” the organization said in a statement after Trump’s announcement. “This is a nonpartisan issue and we are proud of our work to create inclusion in schools and among young people."

Trump officials previously called for the elimination of Special Olympics funding in their budget proposal for 2019, but Congress rejected the idea. Lawmakers from both parties said they would reject it again for 2020.

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Democrats pressed Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on the topic during a Senate budget hearing Thursday, just days after House Democrats grilled her on the proposal and sparked criticism online.

In a heated exchange with Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., DeVos said she “wasn’t personally involved” in pushing for the cut, but she defended it as her agency seeks to pare $7 billion from the 2020 budget.

The Special Olympics provides both training and competition for children and adults with disabilities, with partners around the globe.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Fugitive on the run for nearly 30 years is finally captured, police say

A fugitive who evaded the law for nearly 30 years has finally been caught by federal authorities in South Carolina, officials say.

Ted Lee Livingston, 49, was taken into custody by U.S Marshals on Wednesday in Horry County, outside of Myrtle Beach, after being wanted in Connecticut for an escape charge dating back to 1990, according to WBTW.

The station reports Livingston tried to hide from police by changing his birthday and ID information on his South Carolina drivers license. Details of how Livingston returned to the state -- and what he has been up to since 1990 -- weren't immediately available.

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Agents from the Connecticut Parole Fugitive Investigations Unit cooperated with local police to track Livingston down, WBTW reports.

Livingston currently is awaiting extradition back north.

Fox News' Michael Sinkewicz contributed to this report. 

Source: Fox News National

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Suspects arrested after AK-47 fired outside Tennessee bar: police

A suspect in Nashville, Tenn., fired off an AK-47 outside a bar early Wednesday before fleeing the scene, police said.

Officers were patrolling the area around 2:15 p.m. when they observed a fight outside a nightclub. Security guards broke up the fight and three people walked away from the scene.

A suspect then got into an unmarked car, pulled out an AK-47 and fired several shots before leaving, police said. No one was injured and the suspects fled the scene, WKRN reported.

SUSPECTED FLORIDA GUNMAN LEGALLY BOUGHT AK-47-STYLE RIFLE WEEKS BEFORE SCHOOL SHOOTING, REPORT SAYS

The officers called in for backup and followed the vehicle. When more officers arrived, they conducted a traffic stop, WSMV reported. The three gave themselves up and officers found an AK-47 inside the car with spent casings, police said.

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The three suspects were taken into custody and are expected to be charged with wanton endangerment, firing a gun in city limits, and aggravated assault, WKRN reported. An investigation is ongoing. No additional information was immediately available.

Source: Fox News National

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Deutsche Bank focused on solo destiny after Commerzbank deal demise

FILE PHOTO: The Deutsche Bank headquarters are pictured in Frankfurt
FILE PHOTO: The Deutsche Bank headquarters are pictured in Frankfurt, Germany, April 25, 2019. REUTERS/Ralph Orlowski/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Tom Sims

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Within hours of the collapse of merger talks with Commerzbank, Christian Sewing scrambled to convince investors and employees that Deutsche Bank can stand on its own two feet.

The Deutsche Bank chief executive told staff, many of whom opposed a merger because of significant job losses, that while he had not been “skeptical” about the Commerzbank talks, he was cautious about the chances of success from the start.

And another top Deutsche Bank executive said on Friday that it had been Commerzbank that initiated the talks, suggesting there was no desperation on their part for a deal.

Commerzbank denied that version of events, ending the apparent truce between the normally highly competitive cross-town Frankfurt rivals over the past six weeks.

German hopes of creating a national banking champion able to challenge global competitors were finally dashed on Thursday when Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank ended their talks due to the risks of doing a deal, restructuring costs and capital demands.

For Sewing, the failure to clinch a deal has left the 49-year-old chief executive of Germany’s largest bank, who took over just over a year ago, with his back to the wall.

Credit ratings agency Standard & Poor’s, which downgraded Deutsche Bank last year, said on Friday that Deutsche Bank “will remain under strain”, adding that it “seems to have acknowledged the need to adjust its strategy”.

Under Sewing, a new leadership has tried to revive Deutsche Bank’s fortunes, but it has faced money laundering allegations and failed stress tests, as well as ratings downgrades.

At the heart of the debate over its future is whether it should focus its business on Germany and draw a line under its costly global ambitions to take on Wall Street’s big guns.

“MARKET PLAY”

Without a deal, Deutsche Bank now finds itself back at the mercy of equity and debt markets, with UBS analysts warning that in a “stress scenario” it could again “be forced into a ‘debt-driven capital increase’ even with solid capital ratios”.

“Deutsche remains a levered market play vulnerable to external events,” the UBS analysts said in a note.

Sewing, along with many analysts, believes Deutsche Bank can go it alone in the short-term, but will be counting on a turnaround in market conditions to do so in the long-run given its dependence on volatile investment bank earnings.

“To reach our return objective, we also need to see a revenue recovery in our more market-sensitive business,” Sewing said on Friday after reporting results.

“These revenues are available to us in better market conditions given our leading positions in many of these businesses, but we need to capture them,” he added.

Revenue at Deutsche Bank’s bond trading division fell 19 percent in the first quarter, it said on Friday, underscoring weakness at its investment bank.

If those earnings do not improve, Berlin’s desire to keep its biggest bank out of foreign hands may start to wane.

“Germany’s globally active companies need competitive financial institutions that can support them around the world,” German finance minister Olaf Scholz said on Thursday.

(Writing by Alexander Smith; Editing by Keith Weir)

Source: OANN

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No. 1 Duke slips past Virginia Tech without Reddish

NCAA Basketball: NCAA Tournament-East Regional-Virginia Tech vs Duke
Mar 29, 2019; Washington, DC, USA; Duke Blue Devils forward Zion Williamson (1) shoots the ball during the first half against the Virginia Tech Hokies in the semifinals of the east regional of the 2019 NCAA Tournament at Capital One Arena. Mandatory Credit: Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports

March 30, 2019

Zion Williamson scored 23 points and Tre Jones hit five 3-point baskets on the way to 22 points as top-seeded Duke beat fourth-seeded Virginia Tech 75-73 Friday in a wild NCAA Tournament East Region semifinal at Washington.

Virginia Tech missed three shots in the final 10 seconds, including a pair of 3-point attempts.

RJ Barrett scored 15 of his 18 points in the second half and also finished with 11 assists as the Blue Devils returned to a regional final for the second year in a row.

Duke (32-5) next has a Sunday meeting with second-seeded Michigan State (31-6), an 80-63 winner against third-seeded LSU in the first regional semifinal Friday. The Blue Devils-Spartans victor will advance to the Final Four in Minneapolis.

Blue Devils freshman Cam Reddish didn’t play, apparently due to a sore knee, a team spokesman said.

Jones’ fifth 3-pointer made it 71-66 before Williamson added a dunk with three minutes to play — and suddenly Duke fans were drowning out the noise created by rowdy Virginia Tech supporters.

Justin Robinson, though, sank a pair of foul shots with 29.6 seconds left, pulling the Hokies within 75-73.

Jones missed the front end of a one-and-one and Virginia Tech’s Ahmed Hill grabbed the rebound. He then ariballed a 3-point attempt, but the Hokies rebounded and called timeout with 5.8 seconds to go. Ty Outlaw hit only backboard on a 3-point try but Virginia Tech got a rebound and one last chance.

On another inbounds pass with 1.1 seconds left, Hill’s running catch-and-shoot from the lane bounced off.

Kerry Blackshear Jr. posted 18 points for Virginia Tech (26-9). Hill poured in 13 of his 15 points in the first half, Robinson tallied 14, and Wabissa Bede had 10.

Duke started the second half strong with Barrett posting 13 points in less than eight minutes. By the time the Blue Devils finished a fastbreak with a Williamson dunk, it was 58-52, and the Hokies called timeout at the 10:23 mark.

Duke had its 60-52 lead trimmed to 64-61 with less than six minutes to go, but Williamson blocked a shot, leading to Jones’ jumper in transition.

Virginia Tech led 38-34 at halftime, making seven of its first 13 attempts from 3-point range. Duke shot 51.9 percent from the field in the opening half.

Jones, a freshman guard, made two 3-pointers in the opening 10 minutes. He had more than one trey in only two other games this season, both in November.

With Reddish sidelined, Alex O’Connell, a sophomore guard who didn’t play Sunday in the Blue Devils’ victory against Central Florida, made his seventh career start and scored four points.

Reddish has started all 35 games in which he has played.

–Field Level Media

Source: OANN

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NHL to purchase carbon offsets to counter playoff air travel

FILE PHOTO: NHL: Stanley Cup Playoffs-Tampa Bay Lightning at Columbus Blue Jackets
FILE PHOTO: Apr 14, 2019; Columbus, OH, USA; A view of the Stanley Cup Playoffs logo on a hat in the team store prior to game three of the first round of the 2019 Stanley Cup Playoffs between the the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Columbus Blue Jackets at Nationwide Arena. Mandatory Credit: Aaron Doster-USA TODAY Sports/File Photo

April 22, 2019

By Rory Carroll

(Reuters) – The National Hockey League said on Monday it would purchase carbon credits to offset airline emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases during the Stanley Cup playoffs.

For the first round of the playoffs, which has the highest number of teams traveling and is currently underway, the NHL will offset more than 465 metric tons of carbon emissions, equivalent to taking 99 cars off the road for one year.

The league will purchase the offsets from Portland, Oregon-based Bonneville Environmental Foundation, which operates offset projects that capture or cut greenhouse gases emitted from animal waste, landfills and fossil fuel use.

The announcement, which coincides with Earth Day, is part of the NHL’s efforts to address climate change.

Last season the NHL published its second Sustainability Report, which examined its commitment to ensure all levels of hockey — from the frozen ponds it was invented on to professional arenas — thrive for future generations.

The report estimated that in the coming decades the average length of the skating season may shrink by one third in eastern Canada and by 20 percent in western Canada.

In response the league has ramped up efforts at its arenas to cut carbon emissions, reduce waste and conserve water, among other initiatives.

(Reporting by Rory Carroll, editing by Pritha Sarkar)

Source: OANN

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Tiger woods celebrates after winning the 2019 Masters
FILE PHOTO: Golf – Masters – Augusta National Golf Club – Augusta, Georgia, U.S. – April 14, 2019 – Tiger Woods of the U.S. celebrates on the 18th hole after winning the 2019 Masters. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

April 26, 2019

Tiger Woods is sending a message that he thinks he still has enough left, emotionally and physically, to win three more major championships to tie Jack Nicklaus’ record 18 titles.

Speaking to GolfTV in his first sit-down interview since the Masters, Woods said he has taken some time off since his victory at Augusta National, which still doesn’t feel real.

“Honestly, it’s hard to believe,” Woods said. “I was texting one of my good friends last night … that I couldn’t believe that I won the tournament. That it really hasn’t sunk in. I haven’t started doing anything. I’ve just been laying there. And every now and again, I’ll look over there on the couch and there’s the jacket.”

That’s the fifth green jacket for the 43-year-old Woods, who hadn’t won a major tournament since the 2008 U.S. Open. Along the way, four back surgeries, a divorce and other personal issues derailed him.

He said he has been spending time with his children – daughter Sam, 11, and son Charlie, 10 – who weren’t born when their father was the most dominant golfer on the planet.

“They never knew golf to be a good thing in my life and only the only thing they remember is that it brought this incredible amount of pain to their dad and they don’t want to ever want to see their dad in pain,” Woods said. “And so to now have them see this side of it, the side that I’ve experienced for so many years of my life, but I had a battle to get back to this point, it feels good.”

He said he hopes – maybe expects — they’ll see this side again.

And no one will take Woods for granted at the PGA Championship at Bethpage Black Course on Long Island, N.Y., which starts May 16.

Woods said he’ll be ready for a course he already conquered once in a major: the 2002 U.S. Open.

“I’m doing all the visual stuff, but I haven’t put in the physical work yet. But it’s probably coming this weekend,” he said.

Before Woods encountered health and personal problems, it was expected that topping Nicklaus’ major mark was “when” and not “if.” Then the certainty went away, but Woods thought he still had a chance.

“I always thought it was possible, if I had everything go my way. It took him an entire career to get to 18, so now that I’ve had another extension to my career – one that I didn’t think I had a couple of years ago – if I do things correctly and everything falls my way, yeah, it’s a possibility. I’m never going to say it’s not.

“Now I just need to have a lot of things go my way, and who’s to say that it will or will not happen? That’s what the future holds, I don’t know. The only thing I can promise you is this: that I will be prepared.”

–Field Level Media

Source: OANN

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Maria Butina, the Russian woman who was accused of being a secret agent for the Russian government, was sentenced to 18 months in prison Friday by a federal judge in Washington after pleading guilty last year to a conspiracy charge.

Butina, who has already served nine months behind bars, will get credit for time served and can possibly get credit for good behavior, the judge said. She will be removed from the U.S. promptly on completion of her time, the judge added, and returned to Russia.

MARIA BUTINA, ACCUSED RUSSIAN SPY, PLEADS GUILTY TO CONSPIRACY

An emotional and apologetic Butina said in court Friday she is “truly sorry” and regrets not registering as a foreign agent.

“I feel ashamed and embarrassed,” she said, adding that her “reputation is ruined.”

Butina has been jailed since her arrest in July 2018. She entered the court Friday wearing a dark green prison jumpsuit and spoke in clear English, with a slight Russian accent.

“Please accept my apologies,” Butina said.

Butina’s lawyer, Robert Driscoll, said after the sentencing they had hoped for a “better outcome,” but expressed a desire for Butina to be released to her family by the fall.

Prosecutors had claimed Butina used her contacts with the National Rifle Association and the National Prayer Breakfast to develop relationships with U.S. politicians and gather information for Russia.

Prosecutors also have said that Butina’s boyfriend, conservative political operative Paul Erickson, identified in court papers as “U.S. Person 1,” helped her establish ties with the NRA.

WHO IS MARIA BUTINA, THE RUSSIAN WOMAN ACCUSED OF SPYING ON US?

In their filings, prosecutors claim federal agents found Butina had contact information for people suspected of being employed by Russia’s Federal Security Services, or FSB, the successor intelligence agency to the KGB. Inside her home, they found notes referring to a potential job offer from the FSB, according to the documents.

Investigators recovered several emails and Twitter direct message conversations in which Butina referred to the need to keep her work secret and, in one instance, said it should be “incognito.” Prosecutors said Butina had contact with Russian intelligence officials and that the FBI photographed her dining with a diplomat suspected of being a Russian intelligence agent.

Fox News’ Jason Donner, Bill Mears, Greg Norman and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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An official Sri Lankan police Twitter account was deleted after it misidentified an American human rights activist as a suspect in the country’s Easter Sunday terrorist attacks.

On Thursday, police posted the names and photos of six people that they said were at-large suspects in the bombings that killed more than 250 people.

However, one of the names on the list was Muslim U.S. activist Amara Majeed, who quickly tweeted that she had been falsely identified.

“I have this morning been FALSELY identified by the Sri Lankan government as one of the ISIS terrorists that committed the Easter attacks in Sri Lanka. What a thing to wake up to!” she wrote.

SRI LANKA AUTHORITIES SAY EASTER ATTACK LEADER KILLED IN ONE OF NINE HOTEL BOMBINGS

She wrote in a follow-up tweet that the claim was “obviously completely false” and asked social media users to “please stop implicating and associating me with these horrific attacks.”

“And next time, be more diligent about releasing such information that has the potential to deeply violate someone’s family and community,” she continued.

Later, she wrote an update saying police apologized for wrongly mistaking her as a suspect.

Police said in a statement: “However, although one of the released images was identified as one Abdul Cader Fathima Khadhiya in the information provided by the CID, the CID has now informed that a) the individual whose image was labeled as Abdul Cader Fathima Khadiya is not in fact Abdul Cader Fathima Khadiya b) the individual pictured is not wanted for questioning c) Abdul Cader Fathima is the correct name of the suspect wanted by the CID.”

On Friday, the account, @SriLankaPolice2 was deleted with no explanation. Police did not release more information regarding the mistake.

Majeed, who founded “The Hijab Project” when she was 16 years old, told the Baltimore Sun that it was hurtful to be linked to the attacks.

“Sri Lanka is my motherland,” the Brown University student said. “It’s very painful to be associated with [the bombings].”

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Mohamed Zahran, the suspected leader of the attacks which targeted six hotels and churches, killed himself in a suicide bombing at the Shangri-La hotel. Police also said they had arrested the second-in-command of the group, called National Towheed Jamaat. Catholic churches in Sri Lanka canceled all Sunday Masses until further notice over concerns that they remain a top target of Islamic State-linked extremists.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News World

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FILE PHOTO: Sri Lankan Special Task Force soldiers stand guard in front of a mosque as a Muslim man walks past him during the Friday prayers at a mosque, days after a string of suicide bomb attacks on Easter Sunday, in Colombo
FILE PHOTO: Sri Lankan Special Task Force soldiers stand guard in front of a mosque as a Muslim man walks past him during the Friday prayers at a mosque, five days after a string of suicide bomb attacks on Catholic churches and luxury hotels across the island on Easter Sunday, in Colombo, Sri Lanka April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Tom Lasseter and Shri Navaratnam

KATTANKUDY, Sri Lanka (Reuters) – Mohamed Hashim Mohamed Zahran was 12 years old when he began his studies at the Jamiathul Falah Arabic College. He was a nobody, with no claim to scholarship other than ambition.

Zahran and his four brothers and sisters squeezed into a two-room house with their parents in a small seaside town in eastern Sri Lanka; their father was a poor man who sold packets of food on the street and had a reputation for being a petty thief.

“His father didn’t do much,” recalled the school’s vice principal, S.M. Aliyar, laughing out loud.

The boy surprised the school with his sharp mind. For three years, Zahran practiced memorizing the Koran. Next came his studies in Islamic law. But the more he learned, the more Zahran argued that his teachers were too liberal in their reading of the holy book.

“He was against our teaching and the way we interpreted the Koran – he wanted his radical Islam,” said Aliyar. “So we kicked him out.”

Aliyar, now 73 with a long white beard, remembers the day Zahran left in 2005. “His father came and asked, ‘Where can he go?’.”

The school would hear again of Mohamed Zahran. And the world now knows his name. The Sri Lankan government has identified him as the ringleader of a group that carried out a series of Easter Sunday suicide bombings in the country on April 21.

The blasts killed more than 250 people in churches and luxury hotels, one of the deadliest-ever such attacks in South Asia. There were nine suicide bombers who blew apart men, women and children as they sat to pray or ate breakfast.

Most of the attackers were well-educated and from wealthy families, with some having been abroad to study, according to Sri Lankan officials.

That description does not, however, fit their alleged leader, a man said to be in his early 30s, who authorities say died in the slaughter. Zahran was different.

INTELLIGENCE FAILINGS

Sri Lanka’s national leadership has come under heavy criticism for failing to heed warnings from Indian intelligence services – at least three in April alone – that an attack was pending. But Zahran’s path from provincial troublemaker to alleged jihadist mastermind was marked by years of missed or ignored signals that the man with a thick beard and paunch was dangerous.

His increasingly militant brand of Islam was allowed to grow inside a marginalized minority community – barely 10 percent of the country’s roughly 20 million people are Muslim – against a backdrop of a dysfunctional developing nation.

The top official at the nation’s defense ministry resigned on Thursday, saying that some institutions under his charge had failed.

For much of his adult life, Zahran, 33, courted controversy inside the Muslim community itself.

In the internet age, that problem did not stay local. Zahran released online videos calling for jihad and threatening bloodshed.

After the blasts, Islamic State claimed credit and posted a video of Zahran, clutching an assault rifle, standing before the group’s black flag and pledging allegiance to its leader.

The precise relationship between Zahran and Islamic State is not yet known. An official with India’s security services, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that during a raid on a suspected Islamic State cell by the National Investigation Agency earlier this year officers found copies of Zahran’s videos. The operation was in the state of Tamil Nadu, just across a thin strait of ocean from Sri Lanka.

“LIKE A SPOILED CHILD”

Back in 2005, Zahran was looking to make his way in the world. His hometown of Kattankudy is some seven hours’ drive from Colombo on the other side of the island nation, past the countless palm trees, roadside Buddha statues, cashew hawkers and an occasional lumbering elephant in the bush. It is a town of about 40,000 people, a dot on the eastern coast with no clear future for an impoverished young man who’d just been expelled.

Zahran joined a mosque in 2006, the Dharul Athar, and gained a place on its management committee. But within three years they’d had a falling out.

“He wanted to speak more independently, without taking advice from elders,” said the mosque’s imam, or spiritual leader, M.T.M. Fawaz.

Also, the young man was more conservative, Fawaz said, objecting, for instance, to women wearing bangles or earrings.

“The rest of us come together as community leaders but Zahran wanted to speak for himself,” said Fawaz, a man with broad shoulders lounging with a group of friends in a back office of the mosque after evening prayers. “He was a black sheep who broke free.”

Mohamed Yusuf Mohamed Thaufeek, a friend who met Zahran at school and later became an adherent of his, said the problems revolved around Zahran’s habit of misquoting Islamic scriptures.

The mosque’s committee banned him from preaching for three months in 2009. Zahran stormed off.

“We treated him like a spoiled child, a very narrow-minded person who was always causing some trouble,” said the head of the committee, Mohamed Ismail Mohamed Naushad, a timber supplier who shook his head at the memory.

Now on his own, Zahran began to collect a group of followers who met in what Fawaz described as “a hut”.

At about that time, Zahran, then 23, married a young girl from a small town outside the capital of Colombo and brought his bride back to Kattankudy, according to his sister, Mathaniya.

“I didn’t have much of a connection with her – she was 14,” she said.

Despite being “a bit rough-edged”, Zahran was a skilled speaker and others his age were drawn to his speeches and Koranic lessons, said Thaufeek. He traveled the countryside at times, giving his version of religious instruction as he went.

Also, Zahran had found a popular target: the town’s Sufi population, who practice a form of Islam often described a mystical, but which to conservatives is heresy.

Tensions in the area went back some years. In 2004, there was a grenade attack on a Sufi mosque and in 2006 several homes of Sufis were set afire. Announcements boomed from surrounding mosques at the time calling for a Sufi spiritual leader to be killed, said Sahlan Khalil Rahman, secretary of a trust that oversees a group of Sufi mosques.

He blamed followers of the fundamentalist Wahhabi strain of Islam that some locals say became more popular after funding from Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Wahhabism, flowed to mosques in Kattankudy.

It was, Rahman said, an effort “to convert Sufis into Wahhabis through this terrorism”. Rahman handed over a photograph album showing charred homes, bullet holes sprayed across an office wall and a shrine’s casket upended.

ONLINE RADICAL

It was an ideal backdrop for Zahran’s bellicose delivery and apparent sense of religious destiny.

He began holding rallies, bellowing insults through loudspeakers that reverberated inside the Sufis’ house of worship as they tried to pray.

In 2012, Zahran started a mosque of his own. The Sufis were alarmed and, Rahman said, passed on complaints to both local law enforcement and eventually national government offices. No action was taken.

The then-officer in charge of Kattankudy police, Ariyabandhu Wedagedara, said in a telephone interview that he couldn’t arrest people simply because of theological differences.

     “The problem at the time was between followers of different Islamic sects – Zahran was not a major troublemaker, but he and followers of other sects, including the Sufis, were at loggerheads,” Wedagedara said.

Zahran found another megaphone: the internet. His Facebook page was taken down after the bombings, but Muslims in the area said his video clips had previously achieved notoriety.

His speeches went from denouncing Sufis to “kafirs”, or non-believers, in general. Zahran’s sister, Mathaniya, said in an interview that she thought “his ideas became more radical from listening to Islamic State views on the Internet”.

In one undated video, Zahran, in a white tunic and standing in front of an image of flames, boomed in a loud voice: “You will not have time to pick up the remains of blown-up bodies. We’ll keep sending those insulting Allah to hell.”

“HARD TO TAKE”

Zahran spoke in Tamil, making his words available to young Muslims clicking on their cellphones in Kattankudy and other towns like it during a period when, in both 2014 and 2018, reports and images spread of Sinhalese Buddhists rioting against Muslims in Sri Lanka.

In 2017, Zahran’s confrontations boiled over. At a rally near a Sufi community, his followers came wielding swords. At least one man was hacked and hospitalized. The police arrested several people connected to Zahran, including his father and one of his brothers. Zahran slipped away from public view.

That December, the mosque Zahran founded released a public notice disowning him. Thaufeek, his friend from school, is now the head. He counted the places that Zahran had been driven away from – his school, the Dharul Athar mosque and then, “we ourselves kicked him out, which would have been hard for him to take”.

The next year, a group of Buddha statues was vandalized in the town of Mawanella, about five hours drive from Kattankudy. There, in the lush mountains of Sri Lanka’s interior, Zahran had taken up temporary residence.

“He was preaching to kill people,” said A.G.M. Anees, who has served as an imam at a small mosque in the area for a decade. “This is not Islam, this is violence.”

Zahran went into hiding once more.

On the Thursday morning before the Easter Sunday bombings, Zahran’s sister-in-law knocked on the door of a neighbor who did seamstress work near Kattankudy. She handed over a parcel of fabric and asked for it to be sewn into a tunic by the end of the day.

“She said she was going on a family trip,” said the neighbor, M.H. Sithi Nazlya.

Zahran’s sister says that her parents turned off their cellphones on the Friday. On Sunday, when she visited their home, they were gone.

She does not know if Zahran arranged for them to be taken somewhere safe. Or why he would have carried out the bombing.

But now in Kattankudy, and in many other places, people are talking about Mohamed Hashim Mohamed Zahran.

(Reporting by Tom Lasseter and Shri Navaratnam; Additional reporting by Sanjeev Miglani, Shihar Aneez and Alasdair Pal; Editing by John Chalmers and Alex Richardson)

Source: OANN

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