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Moscow home-buying has boosted demand as Britain spooks wealthy Russians


RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 13:40 UTC
Moscow, Russia
© Maksim Blinov / Sputnik
The forced return of wealthy Russians from Europe as a result of explicit threats issued by UK authorities has boosted demand for premium property in Russia's real estate market.

The number of inquiries for luxury property in Moscow and the Moscow region surged by 21 percent in the first quarter of the current year, according to market research carried out by consulting and real estate company, Metrium Group. Nearly 66 percent of the inquiries reportedly came from the UK, 23 percent from Germany, and nine percent from the US.

According to Russia's Central Bank data, the volume of cash remittance for buying elite property from abroad hit an all-time high in the fourth quarter of 2017, when Russian immigrants transferred some 7.1 billion rubles ($122 million), representing 36-percent growth. The analysts say that the previous peak was fixed in the first quarter of 2014, when Russians brought back $102 million to buy real estate.

Comment: See also: Fallout: Blaming Russia for ex-spy poisoning could harm British business

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Jet1

US Air Force will deploy Ospreys to Tokyo base early despite Japanese requests to ground aircraft


RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 19:19 UTC
CV-22 Osprey aircraft
© United States Air Force
A CV-22 Osprey aircraft
The US military announced it will deploy five Air Force CV-22 Ospreys to a base in Tokyo, more than a year early. It follows a series of issues with the tilt-rotor aircraft, including a crash that killed three US marines.

The Ospreys are due to arrive at Yokota Air Base in the Japanese capital later this week. The arrival will mark the first time that Ospreys have been stationed at a Japanese military base outside of Okinawa, according to the Japan Times.

The five units are part of a deployment of 10 Ospreys that was initially scheduled to take place in the fiscal year which begins October 2019. However, the date for the five Ospreys was moved up in order to address "regional stability concerns in line with the recently released 2018 National Defense Strategy," the US military said in a statement cited by Stars and Stripes. It went on to state that the deployment "provides a platform that can rapidly react to natural disasters or crises."
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Dominoes

Proposal for visa applicants to surrender 5 years of social media history will have 'huge impact' on travel to US


RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 19:11 UTC
social media
© imago stock&people / Global Look Press
The proposal for visa applicants to surrender 5 years of their social-media history will have a "huge impact" on travel to the US and could be "very damaging" for those seeking to come to America, an immigration attorney told RT.

While diplomats and travelers facing medical emergencies are expected to be exempt from the new extreme vetting procedure proposed by the US State Department, all others, including both immigrants and tourists, would have to disclose their social-media history over the past five years, along with telephone numbers and email accounts used during the same period.

Attorney Rosanna Berardi, a first-generation Italian-American with several decades of legal experience, believes a lot of people would be denied entry should the proposal go through. "I'm guessing that if we take that one step further in this arena, they will be able to refuse people entry, as long as they can deem it as a threat to national security. That can be described in many different ways, being an opportunity here for a lot of people to be denied entry," she said.

Berardi explained that US border control already has all the authority needed to look through people's mobile phones and refuse entry if it deems necessary. "For example, if you cross the border between the US and Canada, the government can pretty much search whatever they want in the name of national security. So, they have a lot of freedom in terms of what they can look at and why they can keep you out of the country," the lawyer explained.
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V

Assange is working for the people, and now we need to help him

Slavoj Žižek
RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 18:56 UTC
assange
© Justin Tallis / AFP
Julian Assange has been silenced again, and the timing is most suspicious. With the Cambridge Analytica story dominating the news, it seems some powerful people have reasons to keep the brave WikiLeaks boss quiet right now.

Ecuador is a small country, and one can only imagine the brutal behind-the-scenes pressure exerted on it by Western powers to increase the isolation of Julian Assange from the public space. Now, his internet access has been cut off and many of his visitors are refused access, thus rendering a slow social death to a person who's spent almost six years confined to an apartment at the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

This happened before, for a short period around the time of the US elections, but back then it was a reaction to WikiLeaks publishing documents which could have affected the outcome of the Trump/Clinton race, while there is no such excuse now. Because, currently, Assange's "meddling" in international relations consists only of publishing on the web his opinions about the Catalonia crisis and the Skripal poisoning scandal. So why such brutal action now, and why did it cause so little uproar in the public opinion?
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Che Guevara

Puigdemont breaks his silence in prison interview - 'I am not a criminal, we won the elections twice'


RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 18:51 UTC
puigdemont
© Susana Vera / NASA
A banner, in support Carles Puigdemont, is seen next to a Catalan separatist "Estelada" flag
Former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont said he is "not a criminal" in the first interview since his arrest. The exiled leader reaffirmed the region's campaign for independence, saying it's based on democracy and non-violence.

In an interview with two German members of parliament, Puigdemont said: "We are not criminals. We won the elections twice." An audio recording of the interview was published on Monday by weltnetz.de.

Last week, Puigdemont was arrested in Germany on foot of a European warrant issued by Spanish authorities. Spain accuses the 55-year old of organizing a rebellion in the form of an unauthorized referendum. Puigdemont responded to the charges by saying: "The crime of rebellion demands the use of violence, and there is no violence so there is no rebellion."

The former president faces up to 30 years in prison for the October 2017 referendum, which has been declared illegal by Madrid. German authorities are still considering Spain's request to extradite him.
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Attention

Raqqa residents launch resistance against US-backed SDF occupation?


Sputnik
Mon, 02 Apr 2018 18:36 UTC
Raqqa
© Sputnik/ Hikmet Durgun
Raqqa, Syria
Local residents have been expressing their discontent with the policy conducted in Raqqa by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the US coalition-appointed authorities. They took their protest to the streets on March 27 and organized a resistance militia.

The press service of the Popular Resistance of Raqqa (PRoR) announced earlier today that it had fired several mortar shells at a US-occupied military base near the city, where he 93rd Brigade was deployed. PRoR also claimed that it will not tolerate "the occupation forces" on the Syrian territory, like the US and Turkey.

The Telegram channel Directorate 4, which monitors the situation in Syria and Iraq, posted an alleged video of the shelling on its YouTube channel. According to it, this was the first operation conducted by the group. The channel cites PRoR, who announced they will continue their fight until SDF and the US are expelled from Syria.

The first reports of PRoR appeared early in March, saying that they covertly recruit locals, who are opposed to the US appointed government's policies and the US-backed SDF. News about a full scale uprising in Raqqa appeared on March 30, allegedly due to the inability of the appointed government to deal with the humanitarian situation in the city and the forced mobilization. So far, no other information on the group's activity has been reported.


Comment: If the U.S. military plans for an extended stay in Syria, their occupation will be a difficult one - surrounded on all sides by people who want them gone - people with 7 years of non-stop experience at urban warfare. Their choice, but they'd probably be wise to follow Trump's wishes and get out alive while they still can.

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Eye 1

Supreme Court backs cop who shot Arizona woman in front yard


RT
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 11:02 UTC
US Supreme Court
© Joshua Roberts / Reuters
US Supreme Court in Washington, DC
The US Supreme Court has ruled in favor of an Arizona police officer who shot a woman four times in her driveway while she held a knife. The officer enjoys qualified immunity in the case, the justices said.

Officer Andrew Kisela shot Amy Hughes in 2010. Hughes was in her driveway and was approaching her roommate, Sharon Chadwick, while holding a kitchen knife. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in 2016 that Hughes could file a civil rights lawsuit seeking $150,000 in damages, but the Supreme Court threw out that case on Monday.

Hughes, who has a history of bipolar disorder, had accused Kisela of using excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and arrests.

The court ruled 7-2 in favor of Kisela, with liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg as the two dissenting voices. In her dissent, Sotomayor wrote that Kisela's actions were unreasonable and that he should not be shielded from liability.

Comment: See also:

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Take 2

Pizzagate, Seth Rich murder and the Clinton Foundation: The pro-Trump internet is ablaze with the Qanon conspiracy theory

Will Sommer
Medium
Fri, 12 Jan 2018 17:26 UTC
qanon
Update, 3/30: Roseanne's tweets have drawn new attention to QAnon! Read more at my updated post here.

Barack Obama will be shipped off to Guantanamo Bay any day now.

MS-13 murdered Seth Rich, probably at the DNC's behest.

Special counsel Robert Mueller isn't investigating the Donald Trump campaign - he's actually investigating the Clintons, and Trump's helping.

And Pizzagate is real, but don't worry - Trump finally has its perpetrators on the run.

Welcome to the exciting alternative universe of "The Storm," an increasingly popular mega-theory on the right that has already absorbed gobs of smaller conspiracy theories. In "The Storm," which also goes by the handle "QAnon," Trump fans can inhabit a world where their wildest Trump hopes can come true.
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Bulb

Sweeping new EU privacy law aims to give users greater control over what tech companies do with their data

Harper Neidig
The Hill
Sun, 01 Apr 2018 23:35 UTC
zuckerberg
© Getty
Facebook and other internet companies are racing to prepare for a sweeping new European Union (EU) privacy law that aims to give consumers greater control over the use of their data.

The law comes at a critical time for the industry, which is already facing tough questions over its data practices.

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which goes into effect across the EU on May 25, will drastically change what internet companies can do with customers' data.

Users will have greater control, including the ability to learn what information companies have on them. The GDPR will also codify what's known as "the right to be forgotten," meaning consumers will be able to order web services to delete their data or stop distributing it to third parties. The rules will also require companies to give users the ability to easily revoke consent for handing over personal information.
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Map

Land Day: Why is land so important to Palestinians?

Riham Darwish
Mondoweiss
Fri, 30 Mar 2018 16:42 UTC
Yasour
© PalestineRemembered.com
The land where the village of Yasour once stood.
It's Land Day in Palestine today (March 30th of every year). At least 12 people have been killed in Gaza amidst the peaceful "The Great March of Return". Although today's event is not expected to take any refugee home by tonight, because it's a symbolic event and nothing more, I think it's a great chance to explain why there's such a thing as Land Day. And why there are millions of people who continue to be called refugees 70 years after their grandparents were forced to leave their home villages in historic Palestine (besides the fact that most of them still live in impoverished refugee camps).


Comment: Exactly: a symbolic event. But in the imaginations of the literal-minded Israeli government, what the Palestinians really wanted to do was "swarm" into Israel, and destroy her precious security in the process. And of course, that justified murdering a dozen or two of them, and crippling or otherwise injuring another thousand or so.


The society of historic Palestine (before 1948) was largely a rural one. People lived and made a living off pieces of lands they inherited through many generations. It is actually hard, if not impossible, for most of us to know who the first great grandfather settling in their village was, or where they originally came from.

Farming the land was everything people knew. How much land a family owned determined their social class, because it meant they could make more money planting more trees. Culture varied by village, traditional songs featured the fruits people grew. Fashion wise, embroidery patterns and colors were inspired by the natural surroundings people were more familiar with, the colors of their fields and crops. People by the coast of the Mediterranean grew citrus, bananas, pomegranates, and melons, in other areas olives were the deal, in addition to almonds, grapes and figs.
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