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In latest inflammatory remarks, Farrakhan warns Israel to stay away from 'black youth'

In his latest inflammatory remarks about Israel, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan warned the Israeli government to stay away from ‘black youth’ and threatened the country in a provocative video posted on Instagram Wednesday.

“There’s a saying today that Israel sees the black youth as a problem for them,” Farrakhan told his followers. “Israel! A government after black youth.”

“Well let me tell you something Israel, you’re making a very big mistake. And your hastening, you’re doomed,” Farrakhan said while his followers applauded.

“You leave my black brothers and sisters alone because you fear what they are going to become if they listen to Farrakhan,” the controversial leader warned Israel.

Farrakhan, known for his anti-Semitic remarks, appears to have made the comments Feb. 17 during a “Savior’s Day” speech in Chicago. “Savior’s Day” is a Nation of Islam holiday.

During the same speech Farrakhan defended Minnesota congresswoman Omar Ilan and her tweets that were condemned as being anti-Semitic, advising her not to apologize.

“So you’re not lying, so if you’re not lying stop laying down,” Farrakhan shouted.

Farrakhan also said “the wicked Jews want to use me to break up the women’s movement” while addressing the #MeToo movement at the same conference according to reports.

Source: Fox News National

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Notre Dame fire shows the power of monuments to the French

Monuments are the emotional backbone of France. That accounts for the despair over a blaze that killed no one, yet seared the collective soul. It is the power Notre Dame had — still has, despite the charred scars on its Gothic walls.

It is not only the unique beauty of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the palaces of Versailles or Mont Saint-Michel proudly facing the sea that make monuments the epitome of France — it is also the sense of nationhood they represent.

"It is the epicenter of our lives," French President Emmanuel Macron said of the 12th-Century Cathedral.

"It is what we are," added historian Camille Pascal on CNews.

When one such monument goes up in flames, the country weeps — literally in the case of another historian on national radio, even before the full extent of the damage became clear.

Across the nation, the pain was equally felt, especially because just about every region has a similar treasure to cherish.

In the eastern city of Strasbourg, which has an equally stunning cathedral made of red stone reminiscent of the glow the fire reflected on the towers of Notre Dame in Monday's twilight, solidarity was immediate.

"All our heart is with Paris and Notre Dame," the city said in a statement. Several European Union leaders were in town, gathering to address their legislature and discuss treaties, laws and regulations.

"The burning of the Notre Dame Cathedral has again made us aware that we are bound by something more important and more profound than treaties," said EU Council President Donald Tusk early Tuesday.

For all, it was clear the monument transcended its religious meaning and instead was a symbol of European civilization.

For President Macron too, such is the aura of national monuments that his whole agenda was turned upside down in minutes. After months of violent protests by the yellow vest movement, on Monday evening he was finally to make a solemn televised statement from the Elysee on how to fix the nation's social fabric.

No sooner had news of the fire spread than Macron canceled all plans for the TV address and he was heading over to the burning cathedral a few miles up the Seine river that slices Paris in two. The nation fully understood.

Instead of addressing social inequality he was announcing an immediate national fundraising campaign to restore the building.

"I tell you solemnly tonight: This cathedral, we will rebuild it, all together," Macron said in front of the smoldering church. "Without a doubt it is a part of our French destiny."

Since the church has become such a symbol of European culture, Tusk said the whole EU should help.

"I call on all 28 member states to take part in this task. I know that France could do it alone, but at stake here is something more than just material help," he said.

France has had to come to the aid of its monuments before. With many churches and monuments ravaged by the 1789 revolution, Eugene Viollet-le-Duc inspired a restoration drive during the 19th century that left monuments from Notre Dame to Mont St. Michel and the walled medieval city of Carcassonne the envy of the world.

And at the same time, beyond providing national pride, he helped France become of the top tourist nations in the world, which now adds some 200 billion euros annually to the nation's GDP.

The draw of the French monuments was already there when U.S. chronicler Mark Twain visited Notre Dame a century and a half ago.

Mischievously, he wrote in "The Innocents Abroad": "We recognized the brown old Gothic pile in a moment; it was like the pictures."

He continued: "We loitered through the grand aisles for an hour or two, staring up at the rich stained-glass windows embellished with blue and yellow and crimson saints and martyrs, and trying to admire the numberless great pictures in the chapels," he said of some of the attractions.

That picture had endured through the decades since. It changed indelibly on Monday.

Source: Fox News World

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Beto O’Rourke, no longer the shiny new candidate, says he’s still ‘in a good place’

Beto O’Rourke isn’t the shiny new thing anymore in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Indeed, the media spotlight and the momentum appear to have shifted in recent weeks to South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, whose candidacy has surged over the past month.

O'ROURKE CONFRONTED AT TOWN HALL

But O'Rourke, a former three-term congressman from El Paso, Texas, says he's not fretting.

“I feel great,” he told Fox News on Thursday. “I feel like we’re in a good place.”

He added: “I think more than any other candidate, we’ve been showing up answering questions. I think we’ve answered nearly 600 questions so far in a little bit more than a month. Have visited more communities. That’s what I want to do. That’s democracy.”

O’Rourke spoke with Fox News during stops in Derry and Concord, N.H., making his second trip since launching his campaign to the state with the first primary in the race for the White House.

THE LATEST 2020 REPORTS FROM FOX NEWS

O’Rourke was soaring in the polls and was posting eye-popping fundraising figures as he basked in generous media attention and large crowds on the campaign trail in the weeks after he declared his candidacy in last month.

But even if the sheen has diminished to some degree, O’Rourke remains a draw on the campaign trail. Derry’s Grind Rail Trail Cafe was packed with voters eager to get a look at the former congressman, who nearly upset Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas last year. And a crowd of a couple of hundred watched him at Gibson’s Bookstore in Concord, a key stop for Democratic White House hopefuls.

“We show up for everyone. We take no one for granted,” he told the audience.

In an interview after the event, O’Rourke pointed to the calendar, emphasizing that “we’re still roughly 10 months out from the first votes being cast. And that’s a lot of time, a lot of miles, a lot of hours, a lot of town halls, a lot of questions, and I’m up for it and I’m looking forward to it.”

He discounted early polling, saying, “I just am not concerned about, nor am I following, the polls. You may know that throughout the Senate campaign we never hired a pollster or participated in a focus group.”

O’Rourke raised more than $9 million in the 18 days from the launch of his campaign through March 31, which was the end of the first quarter of fundraising. Asked if he can keep up that pace in the second quarter, he noted that “there are more people who have given to us (in last year’s Senate campaign) that can give for the first time in this race, or who can give additional amounts. I think that speaks to our ability for capacity and pace.”

He said he'll tap his nascent campaign war chest to increase staff in New Hampshire and other early-voting states, and “use that money doing what we’re doing here, ensuring that we have an ability to show up everywhere, in every part of every state that we go to.”

BIDEN JOINS STRIKING UNION MEMBERS AS 2020 SPECULATION MOUNTS

O’Rourke’s trip to the Granite State came days before a likely presidential announcement by onetime Vice President Joe Biden.

O’Rourke said Biden “would be a great addition to an already outstanding field of Democratic contenders. He certainly brings something to the conversation, to the debates.”

Ahead of O'Rourke's arrival in New Hampshire, the Republican National Committee painted him as one more too-liberal Democrat supporting fringe proposals.

"Beto’s socialist schemes would kill jobs, hike taxes and reverse our country’s roaring economic success," RNC spokesperson Mandi Merritt told Fox News.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Defrocked priest accused of abusing teenage boys fatally shot in Nevada, police say

A defrocked Roman Catholic priest who was among nearly 200 New Jersey priests facing accusations of sexual abuse was shot and killed in a Las Vegas suburb, officials said Tuesday.

John Capparelli, 70, was found dead Saturday inside the kitchen of his Henderson home with a gunshot wound to his neck, said Nicole Charlton, the Clark County Coroner’s Office medical examiner. Capparelli had moved into the $319,000 home in August 2016, according to property records.

TOP FRENCH CARDINAL SENTENCED IN 'HISTORIC' CASE FOR NOT REPORTING CHILD ABUSE BY PRIEST

Police believe Capparelli died amid “suspicious circumstances,” but authorities haven’t divulged details as to whether there’s a suspect in his death or if the killing had anything to do with the abuse allegations.

“Preliminary investigation indicates the victim died of suspicious circumstances, and the incident is being investigated as a homicide,” police said in a statement, according to NJ.com. “A suspect has not been identified at this time and police are following up on developed leads.”

Capparelli, who was included last month on a list of 180 priests facing abuse allegations as named by five New Jersey dioceses, was a math tutor for high school and college students.

Joann D’Angelo, a neighbor, told the Associated Press that Capparelli lived alone.

“He was a very quiet man,” she said. “He minded his own business.”

Capparelli was among the priests accused of groping and brutalizing teen boys in the 1970s and 1980s and was defrocked in 1992, according to an NJ.com report last month. He later worked as a public school math teacher in the Newark, N.J., School District but agreed to have his teaching licenses revoked in 2011 when the allegations first emerged.

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Capparelli was also accused of running a website featuring young men wrestling in revealing bathing suits.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News National

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Multiple fatalities at New Zealand mosque shooting: police 

New Zealand police said one person was in custody in connection with a mass shooting that claimed multiple lives at two mosques in the city of Christchurch Friday.

The name of the person detained by authorities was not released. Officers responded to a shooting at the Masjid Al Noor Friday afternoon where witnesses said several people had been killed and injured.

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Details on the shooting were not released and no official number of casualties were given. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Friday's events were "one of New Zealand's darkest days."

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Source: Fox News World

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Warm February helps UK retail sales keep up strength in 2019

People shopping on Oxford Street in central London
People shopping on Oxford Street in central London, Britain, December 20, 2018. REUTERS/Henry Nicholls

March 21, 2019

LONDON, (Reuters) – British retail sales unexpectedly kept up a robust pace of expansion last month, after unusually warm weather boosted sales, reinforcing the sector’s role as a bright spot for the economy ahead of Brexit.

Annual retail sales growth slowed only a fraction to 4.0 percent in February after sales volumes grew at their fastest in more than two years in January, the Office for National Statistics said on Thursday.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast a slowdown in sales growth to 3.3 percent.

Consumer spending has been a source of strength for the British economy at a time when businesses say that Brexit uncertainty is forcing them to postpone investment and a slower global economy is hurting export demand.

On Wednesday Prime Minister Theresa May asked for a three-month delay to Brexit on Wednesday to buy time to get her twice-rejected departure deal though parliament, but the request faced immediate resistance from the European Commission.

Sales volumes in February alone rose by 0.4 percent versus a poll forecast of a decline, after jumping by 0.9 percent in January, while annual sales growth for the three months to February was its strongest in over two years at 3.7 percent.

Falling inflation, a steady rise in wages and the lowest unemployment since 1975 have all boosted household incomes over the past year, though after inflation wages are still below their peak before the financial crisis.

Last year overall British economic growth slowed to its weakest since 2012 and the Bank of England – which is predicted to keep rates on hold later on Thursday – forecasts the weakest growth for a decade this year.

The ONS said that unusually warm weather in February had boosted spending at garden centres and on sporting equipment, sales fell at supermarkets and in clothing stores due to an end of January’s seasonal promotions.

Earlier on Thursday, major British clothing chain Next reported a small fall in annual profit on Thursday, hurt by lower store sales, and forecast another decline for 2019-2020.

Figures from the British Retail Consortium at the start of the month had suggested that annual sales growth at bigger high-street stores slowed in February, with the trade association blaming Brexit.

Separate figures from the ONS on Thursday showed the government broadly on track to meet updated borrowing goals for the 2018/19 financial year, as the strong labor market boosted income tax revenue.

Public borrowing for February, the eleventh month of the tax year, fell to 0.2 billion pounds from 1.2 billion pounds a year earlier, below economists’ average forecast of 0.6 billion pounds in a Reuters poll.

With just one month remaining of the current financial year, government borrowing totals 23.1 billion pounds, down 44 percent from the same point in the 2017/18 tax year, though these figures are likely to be revised further.

Last week Britain’s official budget forecasters cut their 2018/19 borrowing forecast to 22.8 billion pounds or 1.1 percent of GDP from 25.5 billion pounds.

Finance minister Philip Hammond said at the time that if Brexit went smoothly there would be more money for public services in a major multi-year spending review due late this year.

(Reporting by David Milliken and Andy Bruce)

Source: OANN

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Nxivm member admits to enslaving woman in a locked room for 2 years

A Nxivm cult member who secretly pleaded guilty last week to charges of racketeering conspiracy admitted to keeping her own personal slave locked in a room for two years, newly unsealed court documents reveal.

“I knowingly and intentionally harbored Jane Doe 4, a woman whose identity is known to me, in a room in the home in the Northern District of New York,” said Lauren Salzman to Brooklyn federal court Judge Nicholas Garaufis last week.

Salzman told the judge she held the woman hostage between March 2010 and April 2012 “and threatened to deport Jane Doe 4 back to Mexico if she did not complete labor requested by myself and others,” court transcripts said.

The 42-year-old defendant also admitted during the proceeding to being a member of Nxivm’s secret inner organization, DOS, which prosecutors have accused of starving and branding women.

At least one DOS member was also coerced into having sex with cult leader Keith Raniere, according to the government.

DOS was pitched as a women’s empowerment group but was actually grooming its members to have sex with Raniere, the feds claim.

“Smallville” actress Allison Mack and Seagram’s heiress Clare Bronfman have also been charged for their roles in Nxivm.

“I’m very sorry for my poor decision-making and decisions that result in the harm to others and not the just victims in this case but to hundreds of members of our community and their friends and families as well,” Salzman said during the hearing.

"I’m very sorry for my poor decision-making and decisions that result in the harm to others and not the just victims in this case but to hundreds of members of our community and their friends and families as well."

— Lauren Salzman, Nxivm cult member who secretly pleaded guilty last week

Salzman’s guilty plea last Monday did not appear on any public calendar, and portions of the transcript are redacted — leading to speculation she may cooperate against her fellow cult members at trial.

Salzman faces up 20 years behind bars on charges of racketeering conspiracy, but prosecutors could recommend she face less time under a cooperation agreement.

Salzman’s mother, Nancy Salzman, is the only other Nxian to plead guilty. Nancy Salzman’s lawyers adamantly denied last month that she was cooperating against her co-defendants in any way.

Prosecutors have also said that Mack and the group’s accountant, Kathy Russell, are engaged in plea negotiations. Mack last week lost a bid to push back the trial date, currently set for April 29, as her lawyers continue to attempt to negotiate on her behalf.

The apparent growing wave of guilty pleas come after prosecutors filed a new indictment claiming Raniere sexually abused underage girls and produced child porn.

Lauren Salzman’s lawyer did not immediately return a request for comment.*

Source: Fox News National

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FILE PHOTO: Naqvi Founder and Group Chief Executive of Abraaj Group attends the annual meeting of the WEF in Davos
FILE PHOTO: Arif Naqvi, Founder and Group Chief Executive of Abraaj Group attends the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, January 17, 2017. REUTERS/Ruben Sprich/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Tom Arnold

LONDON (Reuters) – A London court case to extradite Arif Naqvi, founder of collapsed private equity firm Abraaj Group, to the United States on fraud charges was adjourned until May 24, a court official said on Friday.

Naqvi was remanded in custody until that date, the official said. A former managing partner of Dubai-based Abraaj, Sev Vettivetpillai, was released on conditional bail to appear again at Westminster Magistrates Court on June 12, the official said.

Under the U.S. charges, both men are accused of defrauding U.S. investors by inflating positions held by Abraaj in order to attract greater funds from them, causing them financial loss, the official said.

Vettivetpillai could not be reached for a comment.

Naqvi, in a statement released through a PR firm, has pleaded innocent.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission alleges that Naqvi and his firm raised money for the Abraaj Growth Markets Health Fund, collecting more than $100 million over three years from U.S.-based charitable organizations and other U.S. investors.

Naqvi and Vettivetpillai were arrested in Britain earlier this month. Another executive, Mustafa Abdel-Wadood was arrested at a New York hotel, Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrea Griswold said at a hearing in Manhattan federal court on April 11.

Abdel-Wadood appeared at the Manhattan hearing and pleaded not guilty to securities fraud, wire fraud and conspiracy charges.

(Editing by Jane Merriman)

Source: OANN

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Former Vice President Joe Biden announces his 2020 candidacy
Former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden announces his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination in this still image taken from a video released April 25, 2019. BIDEN CAMPAIGN HANDOUT via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS – THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES

April 26, 2019

By James Oliphant

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, in his first interview as a Democratic presidential candidate, said on Friday that he does not believe he treated law professor Anita Hill badly during the 1991 confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Biden had joined the burgeoning 2020 Democratic field a day earlier.

Biden’s conduct during those hearings, when he was chairman of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, became a renewed subject of controversy after the New York Times reported that Biden had called Hill earlier this month in the run-up to his presidential bid and that Hill was dissatisfied with Biden’s expression of regret.

Appearing on ABC’s “The View,” Biden largely defended his actions as a senator almost 30 years ago, saying he believed Hill’s allegations of sexual harassment levied at Thomas and tried to derail his confirmation.

Activists have long been unhappy that Hill was questioned in graphic detail by the all-white, all-male committee chaired by Biden.

“I’m sorry she was treated the way she was treated,” Biden said, but later, he asserted, “I don’t think I treated her badly. … How do you stop people from asking inflammatory questions?”

“There were a lot of mistakes made across the board and for those I apologize,” he said.

Biden praised Hill as “remarkable” and said she is “one of the reasons we have the #MeToo movement.”

Asked why he had not reached out to Hill earlier, Biden said he had previously publicly stated he had regrets about her treatment and that he “didn’t want to quote invade her space.”

That seemed to be a reference to another controversy that looms over Biden’s presidential run: allegations by several women that he made them uncomfortable by touching them at political events.

Biden also addressed that criticism, saying he was now more “cognizant” about a woman’s “private space.” But he maintained that he had been “trying to bring solace.”

He suggested he was still trying to sort out the guidelines for his conduct going forward.

“I should be able to read better,” he said. “I have to be more careful.”

Pressed by the show’s panel for an apology to his accusers, Biden would not entirely capitulate.

“So, I invaded your space,” he replied. “I mean, I’m sorry this happened. But I’m not sorry in a sense that I think I did anything that was intentionally designed to do anything wrong or be inappropriate.”

Biden, 76, served as former President Barack Obama’s vice president for two terms. He is competing with 19 others for the Democratic presidential nomination and the chance to likely face President Donald Trump next year in the general election.

His first public event as a presidential candidate is scheduled for Monday in Pittsburgh.

(Reporting by James Oliphant; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Source: OANN

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FILE PHOTO: The logo of Tesla is seen in Taipei
FILE PHOTO: The logo of Tesla is seen in Taipei, Taiwan August 11, 2017. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Noel Randewich

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Tesla Inc’s stock slumped over 4% on Friday to its lowest price in two years, rounding out a rough week that included worse-than-expected quarterly results and a pitch by Chief Executive Elon Musk on autonomous cars that failed to win over investors.

With investors betting Tesla will soon raise capital, the stock has fallen 13% for the week to its lowest level since January 2017, before the launch of the Model 3 sedan aimed at making the electric car maker profitable.

One positive development for Tesla: a U.S. District Court judge on Friday granted a request by Musk and the Securities and Exchange Commission for a second extension to resolve a dispute over Musk’s use of Twitter.

On Wednesday, Tesla posted a worse-than-expected loss of $702 million for the March quarter. Musk said Tesla would return to profit in the third quarter and that there was “some merit” to raising capital.

Musk is still battling to convince investors that demand for the Model 3, the company’s first car aimed at the mass consumer market, is “insanely” high, and that it can be delivered efficiently to customers around the world.

Tesla ended its first quarter with $2.2 billion, down from $3.7 billion in the prior quarter, and the company is planning expansions including a Shanghai factory, an upcoming Model Y SUV, and other projects.

(GRAPHIC: Tesla’s cash – https://tmsnrt.rs/2DyJjX6)

On Monday, Musk hosted a self-driving event, where he predicted Tesla would have over a million autonomous vehicles by next year. Some analysts perceived the presentation as a way to deflect attention from questions about demand, margin pressure, increasing competition and even Musk’s ongoing battle with U.S. regulators.

Tesla’s stock has now fallen 29 percent in 2019 and the company’s market capitalization has declined to $41 billion from $63 billion in mid-December.

(GRAPHIC: Tesla’s declining market cap – https://tmsnrt.rs/2Dwd62r)

Analysts now expect Tesla’s revenue to expand 19% in 2019, compared with 83% growth in 2018 and 68% growth in 2017, according to Refinitiv.

Following Tesla’s quarterly report, 12 analysts recommend selling the stock, while 11 recommend buying and eight are neutral. The median analyst price target is $275, up 16% from the stock’s current price of $236. Berenberg analyst Alexander Haissl has the most optimistic price target, at $500, while Cowen and Company’s Jeffrey Osborne has the lowest, at $160, according to Refinitiv.

(Reporting by Noel Randewich; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Source: OANN

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Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee said Friday that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein’s rare public criticism of the Obama administration was a “soft” way of accusing the previous administration of covering up Russia’s attempts at hacking the 2016 presidential election.

While speaking Thursday in New York at the Public Servants Dinner of the Armenian Bar Association, Rosenstein said that the Obama administration “chose not to publicize the full story about Russian computer hackers and social media trolls and how they relate to Russia’s broader strategy to undermine America.”

During an appearance on “America’s Newsroom” Friday morning, Huckabee called the comments an “unusually candid moment for Rosenstein.”

“I thought it was a soft way of him saying there was a cover-up,” Huckabee said. “They knew the Russians were attempting to influence the election and attempting to hack the election but they didn’t fully disclose that to the American people and certainly didn’t disclose it to the Trump campaign.

SWALWELL NOT CERTAIN TRUMP ISN’T A ‘RUSSIAN ASSET’

“Instead they tried to set a trap for them. It failed. The Trump team did not take the bait. And that’s the one conclusion that we can certainly come away with from the $35 million worth of investigation,” Huckabee continued.

Next week, Attorney General William Barr will testify before Congress and is expected to answer questions about Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of President Trump, which found that there was not adequate evidence to conclude that President Trump and his administration colluded with Russia, though the president could not be exonerated in terms of the possibility that he obstructed justice.

Barr will testify to the Senate Judiciary Committee next Wednesday and to the House Judiciary Committee the following day.

TRUMP ASSESSES 2020 DEMS; TAKES SWIPES AT BIDEN, SANDERS; DISMISSES HARRIS, O’ROURKE; SAYS HE’S ROOTING FOR BUTTIGIEG 

“It is going to be a theater, an absolute show,” Huckabee said of the hearings. “Just like the Kavanaugh hearings were and like everything else is in Congress. We ought to close the curtain on them and can’t come back until after the election. They aren’t doing their job anyway. We aren’t paying them because they’re doing a wonderful service to the country and spare us the hypocrisy of thinking they’re interested in getting to the bottom of the facts,” he continued.

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Ultimately, Huckabee argued, if Americans “took their partisan hats off,” they would see that President Trump was exonerated by the investigation.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Sri Lanka's former defense secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa greets his supporters after his return from the United States, in Katunayake
Sri Lanka’s former defense secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa greets his supporters after his return from the United States, in Katunayake, Sri Lanka April 12, 2019. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte

April 26, 2019

By Sanjeev Miglani and Shihar Aneez

COLOMBO (Reuters) – Sri Lanka’s former wartime defense chief, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, said on Friday he would run for president in elections this year and would stop the spread of Islamist extremism by rebuilding the intelligence service and surveilling citizens.

Gotabaya, as he is popularly known, is the younger brother of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa and the two led the country to a crushing defeat of separatist Tamil rebels a decade ago after a 26-year civil war.

More than 250 people were killed in bomb attacks on hotels and churches on Easter Sunday that the government has blamed on Islamist militants and that Islamic State has claimed responsibility for.

Gotabaya said the attacks could have been prevented if the island’s current government had not dismantled the intelligence network and extensive surveillance capabilities that he built up during the war and later on.

“Because the government was not prepared, that’s why you see a panic situation,” he said in an interview with Reuters.

Gotabaya said he would be a candidate “100 percent”, firming up months of speculation that he plans to run in the elections, which are due by December.

He was critical of the government’s response to the bombings. Since the attacks, the government has struggled to provide clear information about how they were staged, who was behind them and how serious the threat is from Islamic State to the country.

“Various people are blaming various people, not giving exactly the details as to what happened, even people expect the names, what organization did this, and how they came up to this level, that explanation was not given,” he said.

On Friday, President Maithripala Sirisena said the government led by premier Ranil Wickremesinghe should take responsibility for the attacks and that prior information warning of attacks was not shared with him.

Wickremesinghe said earlier he was not advised about warnings that came from India’s spy service either, presenting a picture of a government still in disarray since the two leaders fell out last October.

Gotabaya is facing lawsuits in the United States, where he is a dual citizen, over his role in the war and afterwards.

The South Africa-based International Truth and Justice Project, in partnership with U.S. law firm Hausfeld, filed a civil case in California this month against Gotabaya on behalf of a Tamil torture survivor.

In a separate case, Ahimsa Wickrematunga, the daughter of murdered investigative editor Lasantha Wickrematunga, filed a complaint for damages in the same U.S. District Court in California for allegedly instigating and authorizing the extrajudicial killing of her father.

Gotabaya said the cases were baseless and only a “little distraction” as he prepared for the election campaign. He said he had asked U.S. authorities to renounce his citizenship and that process was nearly done, clearing the way for his candidature.

‘DISMANTLE THE NETWORKS’

He said that if he won, his immediate focus would to be tackle the threat from radical Islam and to rebuild the security set-up.

“It’s a serious problem, you have to go deep into the groups, dismantle the networks,” he said, adding he would give the military a mandate to collect intelligence from the ground and to mount surveillance of groups turning to extremism.

Gotabaya said that a military intelligence cell he had set up in 2011 of 5,000 people, some of them with Arabic language skills and that was tracking the bent towards extremist ideology some of the Islamist groups were taking in eastern Sri Lanka was disbanded by the current government.

“They did not give priority to national security, there was a mix-up. They were talking about ethnic reconciliation, then they were talking about human rights issues, they were talking about individual freedoms,” he said.

President Sirisena’s government sought to forge reconciliation with minority Tamils and close the wounds of the war and launched investigations into allegations of rights abuse and torture against military officers.

Officials said many of these secret intelligence cells were disbanded because they faced allegations of abuse, including torture and extra judicial killings.

Muslims make up nearly 10 percent of Sri Lanka’s population of 22 million, which is predominantly Buddhist.

(Reporting by Sanjeev Miglani; Editing by Frances Kerry)

Source: OANN

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