Murder

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U.N. rights boss condemns Saudi Arabia’s beheading of 37 men

April 24, 2019

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet holds a news conference in Mexico City
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet holds a news conference at Centro Cultural Espana in downtown Mexico City, Mexico April 9, 2019 REUTERS/Carlos Jasso

April 24, 2019

By Stephanie Nebehay and Sylvia Westall

GENEVA/DUBAI (Reuters) – The U.N. human rights chief on Wednesday condemned the beheadings of 37 Saudi nationals across the kingdom this week, saying most were minority Shi’ite Muslims who may not have had fair trials and at least three were minors when sentenced.

Saudi Arabia, which said on Tuesday it had carried out the executions over terrorism crimes, has come under increasing global scrutiny over its human rights record since the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi last year at the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate and the detention of women’s rights activists.

“It is particularly abhorrent that at least three of those killed were minors at the time of their sentencing,” U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said in a statement issued in Geneva.

She said United Nations rapporteurs had expressed concern about a lack of due process and fair trial guarantees amid allegations that confessions were obtained through torture.

Amnesty International said late on Tuesday the majority of those executed in six cities belonged to the Shi’ite minority and were convicted after “sham trials”, included at least 14 people who had participated in anti-government protests in the kingdom’s oil-rich Eastern Province in 2011-2012.

It said in a statement that one of them, Abdulkareem al-Hawaj, was arrested when he was 16, making his execution a “flagrant violation of international law”.

London-based Amnesty said 11 of those executed had been convicted of spying for the kingdom’s arch-adversary, Shi’ite Muslim Iran, and sentenced to death in 2016.

The Shi’ite-majority Eastern Province became a focal point of unrest in early 2011 with demonstrations calling for an end to discrimination and for reforms in the Sunni Muslim monarchy. Saudi Arabia denies any discrimination against Shi’ites.

TERRORISM CHARGES

The Saudi government’s press office did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment on Bachelet’s remarks or the Amnesty report. Authorities have said the men were executed for “extremist terrorist ideologies”, forming “terrorist cells to corrupt and disrupt security” and inciting sectarian strife.

Bachelet called on Riyadh to review counter-terrorism laws and halt pending executions, including of three men on death row – Ali al-Nimr, Dawood al-Marhoon and Abdulla al-Zaher – whose cases she said had been taken up by the U.N. rights system.

Amnesty said the kingdom has stepped up the rate of executions in 2019, with at least 104 people put to death since the start of the year compared to 149 for the whole of 2018.

Tuesday’s mass execution was “another gruesome indication of how the death penalty is being used as a political tool to crush dissent from within” the country’s Shi’ite minority, said Lynn Maalouf, the group’s research director for the Middle East.

European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said the executions heightened doubts about respect for the right to a fair trial in Saudi Arabia and could fuel sectarian violence.

New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said at least 33 of the 37 men put to death were Shi’ites and it was the largest set of executions in the kingdom since January 2016.

It said one of the men convicted of protest-related offences, Mujtaba al-Sweikat, was arrested in 2012 as he was about to board a plane bound for the United States to attend university.

“Mass executions are not the mark of a ‘reformist’ government, but rather one marked by capricious, autocratic rule,” HRW’s Middle East director Michael Page said.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva and Francesco Guarascio in Brussels with additional reporting and writing by Sylvia Westall; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Source: OANN

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Democrats Outraged a Terrorist Can’t Vote

April 24, 2019

But if that is really true, why are they working so hard to sabotage their own chances of replacing him? Why are Democrats suddenly saying things that would guarantee Trump’s re-election as president?

In just the past few months, Democrats have said things that are so out of the mainstream that it is very hard to imagine voters will back them. On Monday night on CNN, Bernie Sanders, the frontrunner, endorsed allowing felons who are currently behind bars to vote.

“If somebody commits a serious crime — sexual assault, murder — they are going to be punished. They may be in jail for 10 years, 20 years, 50 years, their whole lives. That is what happens when you commit a serious crime,” he said. “But I think the right to vote is inherent to our democracy. Yes, even for terrible people.”

“Terrible people.” So how terrible is Sanders talking about? Cannibals? Convicted spies? How about terrorists who kill children? Oh, yes, said Bernie Sanders, they should get to vote, too. Unlike the First or Second amendments, that is in the Constitution.

Sen. Kamala Harris seemed to initially agree with that in an interview with CNN’s Don Lemon, saying, “I think we should have that conversation” about allowing prisoners to vote.

Okay, let’s have a conversation. Best to do it right now, actually, because whenever the left tells you they want a conversation about something, you can be certain that any dissent on that subject will be banned a year from now. In 2020, questioning whether imprisoned terrorists should vote could earn you a trip to the HR department and a lifetime ban from PayPal and Twitter.

So while we still can, consider the story of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Tsarnaev first came to the United States, you’ll remember, on a tourist visa with the rest of his family from Kyrgyzstan. All of them promptly claimed asylum here, and they were given it. Over time, the Tsarnaevs collected more than $100,000 in taxpayer-financed government benefits.

In 2012, Tsarnaev received U.S. citizenship. And less than a year later, he murdered three people and maimed hundreds with a pressure cooker bomb at the Boston Marathon. Now, he is on death row.

So Democrats hear that story, and they feel outraged. It’s not that immigrants repaid our generosity with a terror attack — that might bother you, but it doesn’t bother them. The injustice they are enraged by is that a convicted terrorist might not be allowed to help pick our next president. That is outrageous, in their view.

It’s just the kind of institutionalized bigotry that Kyrgyzstani refugees like the Tsarnaevs have faced historically in this country. Maybe they need reparations, too. They definitely need a voice.

So do the convicts of West Feliciana Parish, La.. Of the 15,000 people who live in that parish, fully one-third of them are inmates at the maximum-security Angola State Prison Farm. They are the single largest bloc of voters in the area.

According to Bernie Sanders, this is bad because they are being denied democracy. That is racist and once Bernie Sanders is president, they will be able to elect the city council and the sheriff, maybe the warden, too. That is the kind of “progress” we are talking about here.

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Even in Defeat, ISIS’ Ideology Inspires Mass Murder

April 24, 2019

Five years ago, ISIS reigned over 34,000 square miles in Iraq and Syria and collected billions of dollars in taxes and oil revenues as well as from looting banks. Today, its so-called caliphate is virtually gone. And yet on Sunday, Peter Bergen writes, the continued influence of ISIS’ ideology became gruesomely apparent: A terrorist attack, one of the most lethal since 9/11, killed at least 321 people at churches and luxury hotels in Sri Lanka.

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Irish, British leaders join mourners at funeral of murdered Northern Irish journalist

April 24, 2019

Funeral of journalist Lyra McKee in Belfast
A mourner wearing a Gryffindor scarf holds an order of service as she arrives for the funeral of murdered journalist Lyra McKee at St Anne’s Cathedral in Belfast, Northern Ireland April 24, 2019. Brian Lawless/Pool via REUTERS

April 24, 2019

By Amanda Ferguson

BELFAST (Reuters) – The leaders of Britain and Ireland joined hundreds of mourners on Wednesday at the funeral of journalist Lyra McKee whose killing by an Irish nationalist militant gunman has sparked outrage in the province.

The New IRA group, which opposes Northern Ireland’s 1998 peace accord, admitted one of its members shot 29-year-old McKee dead in Londonderry on Thursday when they opened fire on police officers during a riot McKee was watching.

The killing, which followed a large car bomb in Londonderry in January that police also blamed on the New IRA, has raised fears that small marginalized militant groups are exploiting a two-year political vacuum in the province and tensions caused by Britain’s decision to leave the European Union.

In a statement issued ahead of the funeral, McKee’s family described the writer and lesbian and gay rights activist as a smart, strong-minded woman who believed passionately in justice, inclusivity and truth, and would not wish ill on anyone.

“We would ask that Lyra’s life and her personal philosophy are used as an example to us all as we face this tragedy together. Lyra’s answer would have been simple, the only way to overcome hatred and intolerance is with love, understanding and kindness,” they said.

Northern Ireland’s political parties, which are broadly split between Irish nationalists aspiring to unite the British region with Ireland and unionists who want it to remain British, have called for calm in a rare joint statement condemning the murder.

The party leaders joined British Prime Minister Theresa May, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, Irish President Michael D. Higgins and the leader of Britain’s opposition Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, at the funeral in McKee’s native Belfast.

(Reporting by Amanda Ferguson, writing by Padraic Halpin; editing by Kate Holton)

Source: OANN

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Undeterred by Khashoggi murder, global executives return to Saudi Arabia

April 24, 2019

FILE PHOTO: Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman speaks during a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Hyderabad House in New Delhi
FILE PHOTO: Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman speaks during a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Hyderabad House in New Delhi, India, February 20, 2019. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi/File Photo

April 24, 2019

By Stephen Kalin and Saeed Azhar

RIYADH (Reuters) – Global finance chiefs who boycotted a Saudi investment summit last year following the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi returned to Riyadh this week as the Gulf kingdom gets business back on track.

Dozens of Western politicians and business executives pulled out of Saudi Arabia’s showcase summit in October amid global uproar over Khashoggi’s killing at the hands of Saudi agents inside the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate three weeks earlier.

A Saudi court has charged 11 suspects in a secretive trial and Western allies imposed sanctions on individuals. But Riyadh still faces criticism with some Western governments saying Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the murder. Saudi authorities have denied any connection to the country’s de facto ruler.

Big investors in Saudi Arabia appear to be focused on potential deals in the largest Arab economy and the world’s top oil exporter as it opens up under a transformation drive led by Prince Mohammed.

HSBC CEO John Flint and Blackrock CEO Larry Fink, who had stayed away from last year’s event, joined panels at the two-day financial forum that began on Wednesday, as did co-president of JPMorgan Chase & Co, Daniel Pinto.

“This is an economy that we have a lot of confidence in, I think the future is bright,” Flint told the gathering. “We are excited about the role that we can continue to play here.”

Fink told another panel: “The changes here in the kingdom in the last two years are pretty amazing.”

The CEO of the London Stock Exchange, who had pulled out of last year’s event, is also scheduled to speak at the financial conference. Also slated to attend is the chairman of Japan’s Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc, whose CEO decided to abstain from the October summit.

Riyadh has been trying for months to refocus attention on its reforms, sending a senior delegation to the World Economic Forum in Davos and unveiling an industrial plan to attract hundreds of billions of dollars in investments in January.

The summit is taking place days after Saudi security forces thwarted an attack on a state security building in central Riyadh province, which authorities blamed on Islamic State.

On Tuesday Saudi Arabia announced it had executed 37 people in connection with terrorism crimes, the majority of whom were Shi’ite Muslims. Amnesty International criticized the executions as a “gruesome indication of how the death penalty is being used as a political tool to crush dissent” in the kingdom.

Asked how Saudi Arabia was addressing national security issues, Finance Minister Mohammed al-Jadaan told the audience the Gulf region is “one of the safest worldwide”.

“These incidents will happen,” he said of the Riyadh province attack. “We are working with the world to make sure that we combat the financing of terrorism… and we work very closely with the West and the regional forces to make sure that we intercept and fight terrorism.”

MARKET CONFIDENCE

Earlier this month, state oil giant Saudi Aramco received more than $100 billion in orders for its first international bond issue, a record breaking vote of market confidence.

Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih told the forum that Aramco would be active in debt markets and that the $12 billion it raised in its debut bond issue was “only the beginning”.

The Saudi stock market has also seen an upsurge in foreign fund flows since the start of 2019 as the market enters global emerging market benchmarks. The index is up nearly 18 percent year-to-date, one of the best performing markets in the region.

The domestic financial sector is seeing a relative uptick in activity this year, fueled by an economic recovery from higher oil prices and government-led spending on big projects.

Jadaan told the forum that the ministry is launching a 12.5 billion riyal($3.33 billion)initiative to support private sector growth in the kingdom.

While some foreign investors are pushing ahead, other firms continue to keep Saudi Arabia at arm’s length, fearing a potential backlash at home over Khashoggi’s murder, the Yemen war and Riyadh’s detention of women’s rights activists.

Virgin Group last year suspended talks with the kingdom’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) over a planned $1 billion investment. Hollywood talent agency Endeavor and PIF “parted ways” after talks on the fund investing $400 million, a source familiar with the matter has said.

(Editing by William Maclean)

Source: OANN

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Yemen’s Houthis ignoring calls for political solution: Saudi minister

April 24, 2019

FILE PHOTO: View of cranes at the container terminal at the Red Sea port of Hodeidah
FILE PHOTO: A view of cranes at the container terminal at the Red Sea port of Hodeidah, Yemen January 5, 2019. REUTERS/Abduljabbar Zeyad/File Photo

April 24, 2019

DUBAI (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia’s deputy defense minister on Wednesday blamed Yemen’s Houthi movement for a stalled peace deal in the main port of Hodeidah, saying the Iran-aligned group was ignoring the kingdom’s call for a political solution to the four-year war.

Saudi Arabia is leading a Western-backed Sunni Muslim military coalition that intervened in Yemen in 2015 to restore the internationally recognized government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, which was ousted from power in the capital Sanaa by the Houthis in late 2014.

“They are ignoring our calls for a political solution to this crisis,” Prince Khalid bin Salman said at a security conference in Moscow, in his first comments on Yemen since becoming deputy defense minister in February.

The warring parties reached a deal at U.N.-sponsored talks in Sweden in December for a ceasefire and troop withdrawal from the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah, a lifeline for millions of people.

The Houthis say they are ready to implement the Hodeidah deal, but that the other side is obstructing it.

The truce has largely held but the redeployment of forces has stalled with each side blaming the other for impeding the pact, the first major breakthrough in peace efforts in over four years aimed at paving the way for political negotiations.

Prince Khalid, a son of King Salman and a full younger brother of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, accused regional rival Iran of trying “to seize the Yemeni state” by supporting the Houthis, who control Hodeidah and most urban centers in Yemen.

The Houthis deny being puppets of Iran and say their revolution is against corruption.

The conflict, which has killed tens of thousands of people and pushed the poorest Arabian Peninsula nation to the brink of famine, is largely seen in the region as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and its arch foe Shi’ite Muslim Iran.

The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), a database tracking violence in Yemen, last week said around 70,000 people have been reported killed since the start of 2016.

Western nations, some of which supply arms and intelligence to the alliance, have increased pressure on Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to end the conflict following the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi last October at the hands of Saudi agents at the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate.

(Writing by Lisa Barrington; Additional reporting by Tuqa Khalid; Editing by Alison Williams)

Source: OANN

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New Zealand, France plan bid to tackle online extremism

April 23, 2019

Man holds laptop computer as cyber code is projected on him in this illustration picture
A man holds a laptop computer as cyber code is projected on him in this illustration picture taken on May 13, 2017. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/Illustration

April 23, 2019

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – In the wake of the Christchurch attack, New Zealand said on Wednesday that it would work with France to bring together countries and tech companies in an effort to stop social media from being used to promote terrorism and violent extremism, .

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said in a statement that she will co-chair a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris on May 15 that will seek to have world leaders and CEOs of tech companies agree to a pledge, called the Christchurch Call, to eliminate terrorist and violent extremist content online.

A lone gunman killed 50 people at two mosques in Christchurch on March 15, while livestreaming the massacre on Facebook.

Brenton Tarrant, 28, a suspected white supremacist, has been charged with 50 counts of murder for the mass shooting.

“It’s critical that technology platforms like Facebook are not perverted as a tool for terrorism, and instead become part of a global solution to countering extremism,” Ardern said in the statement.

“This meeting presents an opportunity for an act of unity between governments and the tech companies,” she added.

The meeting will be held alongside the Tech for Humanity meeting of G7 digital ministers, of which France is the chair, and France’s separate Tech for Good summit, both on 15 May, the statement said.

Ardern will also meet with civil society leaders on May 14 to discuss the content of the call.

Facebook Inc, the world’s largest social network with 2.7 billion users, has faced criticism since the Christchurch attack that it failed to tackle extremism.

One of the main groups representing Muslims in France has said it was suing Facebook and YouTube, a unit of Alphabet’s Google, accusing them of inciting violence by allowing the streaming of the Christchurch massacre on their platforms.

Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg said last month that the company was looking to place restrictions on who can go live on its platform based on certain criteria.

“Social media platforms can connect people in many very positive ways, and we all want this to continue,” said Ardern.

“But for too long, it has also been possible to use these platforms to incite extremist violence, and even to distribute images of that violence, as happened in Christchurch. This is what needs to change,” she said.

(Reporting by Praveen Menon; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

Source: OANN

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Christchurch attack survivors offered New Zealand residency

April 23, 2019

FILE PHOTO: People comfort each other before the Friday prayers at Hagley Park outside Al-Noor mosque in Christchurch
FILE PHOTO: People comfort each other before the Friday prayers at Hagley Park outside Al-Noor mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand March 22, 2019. REUTERS/Edgar Su/File Photo

April 23, 2019

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – New Zealand will grant permanent residency to all survivors of the mass shooting at two Christchurch mosques in which 50 Muslim worshippers were killed, it said on Tuesday.

Australian Brenton Tarrant, 28, a suspected white supremacist, has been charged with 50 counts of murder for New Zealand’s worst peacetime mass shooting in which 50 other people at Friday prayers were wounded.

The government had said it was considering giving visas to survivors, but no decision was announced. Tuesday’s news was only released as a link on the immigration website, which some say was done to avoid any backlash by opponents of immigration.

Immigration New Zealand said a new visa category called the Christchurch Response (2019) visa had been created. People who were present at the mosques when they were attacked on March 15 can apply, as can immediate family members.

Applicants must have been living in New Zealand on the day of the attack, so the visa will not be available to tourists or short-term visitors. Applications can be made from Wednesday.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the attack was an act of terrorism and passed firearm laws banning semi-automatic weapons.

A Sri Lankan minister said on Tuesday that the Easter bombings at churches and hotels that killed 321 people appeared to be retaliation for the New Zealand mosque attacks.

The Islamic State group later claimed responsibility for the coordinated blasts.

(Reporting by Praveen Menon; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Source: OANN

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Prominent Sudan protester says revolution seeks removal of whole regime

April 23, 2019

Alaa Salah, a Sudanese protester whose video gone viral and make her an icon for the mass anti-government protests, makes victory sign as she is surrounded by protesters as she tours in front of the Defence Ministry in Khartoum
Alaa Salah, a Sudanese protester whose video gone viral and make her an icon for the mass anti-government protests, makes victory sign as she is surrounded by protesters as she tours in front of the Defence Ministry in Khartoum, Sudan, April 20, 2019. REUTERS/Umit Bektas

April 23, 2019

KHARTOUM (Reuters) – A Sudanese woman who has come to symbolize for many the protests that have forced out former president Omar al-Bashir said her country’s revolution was far from over and sought to remove what she called a regime of “murder and tyranny” in its entirety.

Alaa Salah rose to prominence after a video of her addressing protesters from a car roof at the beginning of April went viral. Women have played a prominent role in protests that began on Dec. 19, often forming a majority among demonstrators.

Sudan’s military ousted Bashir on April 11 and formed a transitional military council to run the country for up to two years before elections.

Bashir and some other former senior officials have been jailed, and the military council has announced a series of anti-corruption measures, but protesters are pushing for faster, deeper change.

“Our demands are related to the removal of a corrupt regime from its roots… It destroyed Sudan. Corruption has spread (everywhere). A regime of murder and tyranny,” Salah told Reuters in an interview.

“We are currently in the squares because Bashir is part of the regime, and our idea and goal is the fall of the regime as a whole,” she said.

“We want a better Sudan, a democratic state, one that judges all in accordance with the law, without favoritism.”

“Our revolution is continuing until our demands are met.”

Salah said that when she climbed on the car she was reciting a poem by Sudanese poet Azhari Mohamed Ali, entitled “The bullet doesn’t kill. What kills is the silence of people”.

“It is an inspirational poem,” said Salah. “Its words are a very accurate description of the Sudanese street.” 

Salah has become known as a “kendaka”, a name historically given to Nubian queens in ancient Sudan.

“The Nubian queen was brave, strong and wise,” said Salah, who said her nickname should apply to all female protesters.

“All of those struggling in the street and all the squares are kendakas.”

(Reporting by Bulent Usta and Omer Berberoglu; Writing by Aidan Lewis; Editing by Gareth Jones)

Source: OANN

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Watch: Jihad in America & the History of Islam

April 21, 2019

Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, and Keith Ellison, all identify themselves with Islam. And because they were sworn into congress using the Quran, which teaches lying as a virtue, they can legally lie to the American people so long as it benefits Islam.

Ever since Muhammad died fourteen-hundred years ago, so-called “radical” Muslims have dedicated their lives to an endless war against Christians and Jews. And moderate Muslims claim that the Quran is misunderstood, and that violent jihad is not true Islam.

But the difference between a religion that accidentally inspires mass murder, and one that deliberately inspires mass murder, is meaningless. When you see the true history of Islam, there is no rational excuse for any righteous person to defend it.

Source: InfoWars

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