Europe

Start-Ups Fill Void Left by Spain’s 26% Unemployment Rate

"Figures from the INE statistics office show that 53 percent of Spanish companies have no employees, as many can’t afford to hire full-time workers. That portion reached 55 percent last year. The total number of businesses declined for a fifth year in 2012, falling to the lowest level since 2005, the INE said in a statement this month. The proportion of those people losing their jobs who decide to start a business has risen to 15 percent, more than three times the historical rate, said Carmen Sebrango, Randstad’s outplacement director in Spain." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingStart-Ups Fill Void Left by Spain’s 26% Unemployment Rate

Human rights court blocks extradition of U.K.-based terror suspect to U.S.

"Extraditing a UK-based terror suspect to an American 'supermax' high security prison would constitute 'inhuman or degrading treatment', the European court of human rights (ECHR) has ruled. The Strasbourg court barred the removal of Haroon Aswat, whose nationality is unknown, from Broadmoor psychiatric hospital to the US on account of his severe mental illness. Aswat, who suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, has been indicted in the US as a co-conspirator in a plan to establish a jihad training camp in Oregon. He was arrested in 2005 in Britain following a request from US authorities for extradition. His lawyers have resisted his removal since then in a series of appeals." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingHuman rights court blocks extradition of U.K.-based terror suspect to U.S.

UK Parliament votes against war for the first time since American Revolution end

"Prime Minister David Cameron's plans to join a potential military strike on Syria were thwarted on Thursday night when Britain's parliament narrowly voted against a government motion to authorize such action in principle. In a humiliating defeat for the British leader likely to damage Cameron's hopes of being re-elected in 2015 and set back traditionally strong U.S.-UK relations, parliament defied Cameron by 285 to 272 votes. Commentators said it was the first time a British prime minister had lost a vote on war since 1782, when parliament effectively conceded American independence by voting against further fighting to crush the colony's rebellion." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingUK Parliament votes against war for the first time since American Revolution end

Hollande Undeterred By UK: “France Will Participate. It Is Ready” For Syria

"After France refused to join the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, but was quickly aided by the US in the military intervention against Islamist militants in Mali earlier this year, Hollande is vehement of the need to 'punish' Damascus, 'France will participate. It is ready.' Sounds like a resounding 'we're in,' right? It seems Hollande is dead set on lower French unemployment... by making every jobless person a soldier in Syria (packing at least one backup white flag of surrender). But, don't get too excited since, with lukewarm public support, Hollande has said he will summon the French parliament to vote on the debate... on September 4th." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingHollande Undeterred By UK: “France Will Participate. It Is Ready” For Syria

The Syria vote: Britain’s new mood

""There is no evidence that British public opinion has turned isolationist. There is plenty of evidence that it is fed up with the debilitating post 9/11 years of national sacrifice, with the humiliating excesses of US national security policy (not least its abuses of human rights and surveillance), with the unequal burden-sharing among allies and, above all, with the failures of policy. Iraq casts a very long, very dark shadow. As a result, right from the start of its spiralling civil war, Syria has felt like a sacrifice too far. When the latest call to arms came, though it came from a respected American president and was provoked by clearly intolerable war crimes, the answer was a clear one. Enough." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingThe Syria vote: Britain’s new mood

Codename ‘Apalachee’: How America Spies on Europe and the UN

"The classified documents, which SPIEGEL has seen, demonstrate how systematically the Americans target other countries and institutions like the EU, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna and the UN. They show how the NSA infiltrated the Europeans' internal computer network between New York and Washington, used US embassies abroad to intercept communications and eavesdropped on video conferences of UN diplomats. The surveillance is intensive and well-organized -- and it has little or nothing to do with counter-terrorism. In an internal presentation, the NSA sums up its vision, which is both global and frighteningly ambitious: 'information superiority'." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingCodename ‘Apalachee’: How America Spies on Europe and the UN

An Important History Lesson: Hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic

"Why did the German government not act to halt the inflation? It was a shaky, fragile government…More than inflation, the Germans feared unemployment. In 1919 the Communists had tried to take over, and severe unemployment might give the Communists another chance. The great German industrial combines — Krupp, Thysen, Farben, Stinnes — condoned the inflation and survived it well. A cheaper mark, they reasoned, would make German goods cheap and easy to export, and they needed the export earnings to buy raw materials abroad. Inflation kept everyone working. So the printing presses ran, and once they began to run, they were hard to stop." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingAn Important History Lesson: Hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic

The Italian government really screwed this poor woman

"They’ve jacked tax rates to the moon. And governments have forced banks to become unofficial tax collectors… limiting the amount of money that can be withdrawn and scrutinizing international wire transfers. Then the government went and, practically overnight, made her agricultural operations unprofitable. The home is another story altogether. The villa was awarded a special status as a sort of national monument years ago. This meant that she was able to make upgrades, improvements, and maintenance investments on a tax-free basis. The government revoked this status, retroactively. And they’ve now presented her with a big tax bill that she was never expecting before." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingThe Italian government really screwed this poor woman

‘Robin Hood’ band of ‘left-wing activists’ nabs school supplies from shop

"A Robin Hood-style band of Spanish left-wing activists openly stole cart-loads of school supplies from a supermarket on Friday, promising to distribute them to needy children. More than 200 members of the Sindicato Andaluz de Trabajadores (Andalusian Union of Workers) emerged from a Carrefour supermarket in the southern city of Seville pushing about 10 shopping carts brimming with exercise books, pens, felt-tips and dictionaries. They loaded the back-to-school supplies into vans and left. School materials 'expropriated' this time would be given to needy families in the next few days, the union said in a statement, describing it as a 'symbolic act for equal opportunity'." Continue reading →

Continue Reading‘Robin Hood’ band of ‘left-wing activists’ nabs school supplies from shop

Turkey becomes partner of China, Russia-led Shanghai Cooperation Organisation

[April 2013] "China, Russia and four Central Asian nations - Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan - formed the SCO in 2001 as a regional security bloc to fight threats posed by radical Islam and drug trafficking from neighboring Afghanistan. Ankara began talks on joining the EU in 2005 but has only completed one of the 35 policy areas, or 'chapters', every candidate must conclude to be allowed entry due to disagreements largely over the divided island of Cyprus. While China vies with Russia and the West for access to Central Asia's vast natural resources, some analysts view the SCO as a potential counter-balance to NATO." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingTurkey becomes partner of China, Russia-led Shanghai Cooperation Organisation