Society's ChildS


Candle

Russian teen suffers horrible death after being doused with kerosene and set on fire

Fire
A 15-year-old boy has died at a Moscow hospital after receiving burns to 98 percent of his body. The story of how he caught fire is absolutely stunning in its gore and senselessness.

Terrible screams and banging sounds woke up the residents of an apartment block in the north-west of the capital late on January 24. Those who decided to check out what was going on witnessed a truly bizarre sight: a human figure, engulfed in flames, hitting the walls and doors in vain attempts to put the fire out.

The burning boy then rushed outside where one of the neighbors and a yard-keeper began tossing snow at him, the witnesses said. Someone called an ambulance and when the medics arrived the victim was still conscious, but couldn't answer what had happened to him.

The teen was taken to one of Moscow's best emergency care hospitals, the Sklifosovsky Institute, where the doctors fought for his's life for three days. But the injuries were too severe and he died on Monday.

Ambulance

Wife of former National Front leader Jean-Marie Le Pen violently assaulted in Paris street robbery

Jean-Marie Le Pen, wife Jany
© AFP/Getty ImagesJean-Marie Le Pen's wife Jany (together) was violently attacked and robbed by a moped thug at a market in Paris over the weekend.
Jean-Marie Le Pen's wife was violently attacked and robbed by a moped thug at a market in Paris over the weekend. Jany, 86, was punched to the ground and battered with a motorcycle helmet by the man in the La Celle-Saint-Cloud suburb at around 1pm on Saturday.

The thief made off with her handbag on the back of a scooter after his getaway driver waited nearby. The thugs managed to withdraw £2,000 from Mrs Le Pen's credit cards before she could block them.

Mrs. Le Pen was hospitalised with bruising to her left elbow and neck pain after the attack.

Her husband, Jean-Marie, founder of France's far-right National Front party, praised his wife's 'courage and determination' in fighting off the mugger.

Magnify

Sergei Skripal's niece to demand Yulia Skripal, a Russian citizen, be declared missing

Yulia Skripal
© facebook.com/julia.skripalYulia Skripal at her 'press conference'
Viktoria Skripal, the niece of former GRU officer Sergei Skripal, will demand that Russian law enforcement agencies declare his daughter Yulia Skripal, who is a Russian citizen, a missing person, the newspaper Izvestia reported on Tuesday.

"In February it will have been a year since I last heard Yulia's voice. At the moment no one knows where she is and in what situation she is now. I am now going to collect all necessary documents in order to go to Russian law enforcement agencies next month in regard to Yulia's disappearance. I will take steps to have her declared a missing person and also to get our structures to start investigating her disappearance. Yulia is a citizen of the Russian Federation, and it is unacceptable that even Russian diplomats didn't have access to her," Viktoria Skripal told the newspaper.

According to Izvestia, Viktoria Skripal also thinks that London is using Yulia as a hostage in order to advance its own interests.

The "poisoning" of Sergei Skripal and his daughter was required in order to put a further strain on relations with Russia, she said. Therefore, Viktoria said, it is not ruled out that the West, including the United Kingdom itself, could have staged the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia using a military-grade nerve agent in order to impose further anti-Russian sanctions and destabilize the international situation, according to the newspaper.

In early March 2018, a former Russian military intelligence officer, Sergei Skripal, and his daughter Yulia were found in critical condition in the British city of Salisbury. British Prime Minister Theresa May told parliament that the Skripals had been poisoned with the nerve agent novichok (A-234) developed in Russia. Moscow has dismissed the accusations, saying that Russia finished disposing of its chemical weapons in 2017 under the supervision of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

Hardhat

12 minutes to understand the Yellow Vest movement in France

yellow vests
© Reuters / Jean-Paul Pelissier
A 12-minute video to help you understand what's presently going on in France - who the Yellow Vests are, what they are fighting for, and whether they really are violent...

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Eye 1

Members of alleged sex cult NXIVM appear in New York federal court

Clare Bronfman
© Brendan McDermid/ReutersClare Bronfman, an heiress of the Seagram's liquor empire, arrives at the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse, for her trial regarding sex trafficking and racketeering related to the Nxivm cult in the Brooklyn borough of New York, Jan. 9, 2019.
A federal judge in Brooklyn told members of the alleged sex cult NXIVM that 75 percent of the funds in an irrevocable trust had been depleted.

Judge Nicholas Garaufis had directed the defendants to appear in court "to address issues it has identified" with the irrevocable trust established by Seagram's heiress Clare Bronfman. The trust was being tapped to pay for defense lawyers.

Prosecutors raised questions about the trust and whether Bronfman, who is charged with racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to commit identity theft, established it in order to exert control over her fellow members of NXIVM.

The judge reviewed who contributed to the fund, how much money it has and whether there are conflicts in a trust established by one defendant that's meant to aid all six. It is not clear what happens if the money runs out.

Comment: See also: Second Seagram's heiress sued for ensnaring women in 'fraudulent scheme' as part of NXIVM cult


Marijuana

New Russian bill may legalize importation of cannabis for medical study

Cannabis
© Sputnik / Vitaly Ankov
The Russian Health Ministry has drafted a bill authorizing the importation of cannabis for the purpose of studying the drug's "addiction-causing capacities."

New amendments to the legislation propose importing 1.1kg of marijuana, 300g of hashish, and 50g of hash oil. The legislation would also increase the importation quota of tetrahydrocannabinol - the chemical responsible for most of marijuana's psychological effects - from 10g to 50g per annum.

The document emphasizes that imported cannabis could be only used for scientific purposes, and that its use for medicinal purposes would remain prohibited in Russia.

However, the Health Ministry noted that the medical use of marijuana is "on the table" for the WHO and other international bodies.

Star of David

UN Middle East envoy condemns 'shocking' murder of Palestinian man by Israeli settlers

palestinian mourners
© Annelies Keuleers/Al JazeeraRelatives of Naasan mourn during his funeral at al-Mugheir village
The UN's Middle East envoy has termed the killing of a Palestinian man by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank "shocking and unacceptable".

Nikolay Mladenov on Sunday called on Israel to "put an end to settler violence and bring those responsible to justice".

Hamdi Naasan, 38, succumbed to his wounds on Saturday near the village of al-Mugheir after Israeli settlers from the nearby illegal settlement of Adei Ad fired shots.

According to the Palestinian health ministry, Naasan was shot with a live bullet in the back. At least 30 other Palestinians were injured, of whom six were shot with live ammunition, according to Maan news agency.

Attention

Racist tirade: Man arrested after calling for Muslim schoolgirls to be sterilized

School girls
© TwitterThe man filmed students leaving a school.
A man in his 60s has been arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated abuse after video emerged online of a horrific, racist tirade calling for young Muslim schoolgirls to be sterilized, citing inspiration from the Nazis.

The unnamed man was taken into custody by Tower Hamlets police in London on Monday after footage of a vile verbal assault was published online. In the video, a man can be seen describing schoolgirls, dressed in headscarves, "c**ts" and calling for people to "burn their ovaries out" so they can't "breed like f***ing rats."

Propaganda

Flashback US media distorts Venezuela's food crisis by blaming Socialism

Supermarket shoppers in Caracas
© ReutersSupermarket shoppers in Caracas.
The facts are clear — Venezuela does have a food crisis, but mainstream U.S. media always blames the socialist government.

Disgruntled customers, empty store shelves, long supermarket lines. These are the images that mainstream U.S. media typically feature in their coverage of Venezuela's ongoing food crisis.

These images are usually accompanied by sarcastic headlines like Forbes' "Venezuela Discovers the Perfect Weight Loss Diet" and the Cato Institute's "Hunger Is in Retreat, But Not in Socialist Venezuela."

U.S. media outlets publish stories blaming Venezuela's food crisis on the socialist government almost daily. Today isn't any different.

A new study released by researchers from three Venezuelan universities reported that nearly 75 percent of the population lost an average of 19 pounds in 2016 for lack of food. The report, titled, "2016 Living Conditions Survey," added that about 32.5 percent of Venezuelans eat only once or twice a day, compared to 11.3 percent last year.

Moreover, 93.3 percent told the researchers that their income was not enough to cover their food needs.

Comment:


Heart - Black

Far-right Polish group leads anti-Semitic protest at Auschwitz during commemoration ceremony

Polish far-right activists Auschwitz
Polish far-right activists enter the former German Nazi death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau
Far-right Polish nationalists organised an anti-Semitic protest during a HolocaustMemorial Day ceremony at Auschwitz.

The small group of hardline activists held their demonstration inside the former concentration camp at the same time as the official Holocaust commemorations on Sunday.

The 50 protestors from the Polish Independence Movement were led by Piotr Rybak, who was once jailed for burning an effigy of a Jew.

Mr Rybak told reporters they were there to oppose the official - and historically accurate - narrative that millions of Jews were murdered by the Nazis with the active collaboration of some Poles.

Comment: The Times of Israel reports that Polish prosecutors have since opened a probe into the protest:
Piotr Rybak, a far-right activist with a past conviction for burning an effigy of a Jew in 2015, could be seen in TV footage saying, "We must tell Jewish invaders... that we are masters of this country."

Mariusz Slomka, a deputy district prosecutor in Oswiecim, said Monday that prosecutors are investigating. In Poland, it is a crime to incite hatred based on religion or race.