Turkey Blackmails Europe on Visa-Free Travel

• The European Union now finds itself in a classic catch-22 situation. Large numbers of Muslim migrants will flow to Europe regardless of whether or not the EU approves the visa waiver for Turkey.
• "If visa requirements are lifted completely, each of these persons could buy a cheap plane ticket to any German airport, utter the word 'asylum,' and trigger a years-long judicial process with a good chance of ending in a residency permit." — German analyst Andrew Hammel.
• In their haste to stanch the rush of migrants, European officials effectively allowed Turkey to conflate the two very separate issues of a) uncontrolled migration into Europe and b) an end to visa restrictions for Turkish nationals.
• "Why should a peaceful, stable, prosperous country like Germany import from some remote corner of some faraway land a violent ethnic conflict which has nothing whatsoever to do with Germany and which 98% Germans do not understand or care about?" — German analyst Andrew Hammel.
• "Democracy, freedom and the rule of law.... For us, these words have absolutely no value any longer." — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Turkey has threatened to renege on a landmark deal to curb illegal migration to the European Union if the bloc fails to grant visa-free travel to Europe for Turkey's 78 million citizens by the end of June.
If Ankara follows through on its threat, it would reopen the floodgates and allow potentially millions of migrants from Africa, Asia and the Middle East to flow from Turkey into the European Union.


Under the terms of the EU-Turkey deal, which entered into effect on March 20, Turkey agreed to take back migrants and refugees who illegally cross the Aegean Sea from Turkey to Greece. In exchange, the European Union agreed to resettle up to 72,000 Syrian refugees living in Turkey, and pledged up to 6 billion euros ($6.8 billion) in aid to Turkey during the next four years.
European officials also promised to restart Turkey's stalled EU membership talks by the end of July 2016, and to fast-track visa-free access for Turkish nationals to the Schengen (open-bordered) passport-free zone by June 30.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (left) has boasted that he is proud of blackmailing EU leaders, including European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker (right), into granting Turkish citizens visa-free access to the EU and paying Turkey billions of euros.

To qualify for the visa waiver, Turkey has until April 30 to meet 72 conditions. These include: bringing the security features of Turkish passports up to EU standards; sharing information on forged and fraudulent documents used to travel to the EU and granting work permits to non-Syrian migrants in Turkey.
The European Commission, the administrative arm of the European Union, said it would issue a report on May 4 on whether Turkey adequately has met all of the conditions to qualify for visa liberalization.
During a hearing at the European Parliament on April 21, Marta Cygan, a director in the Commission's migration and home affairs unit, revealed that to date Ankara has satisfied only 35 of the 72 conditions. This implies that Turkey is unlikely to meet the other 37 conditions by the April 30 deadline, a window of fewer than ten days.
According to Turkish officials, however, Turkey is fulfilling all of its obligations under the EU deal and the onus rests on the European Union to approve visa liberalization — or else.
Addressing the Council of Europe in Strasbourg on April 19, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said that Turkey has now reduced the flow of migrants to Greece to an average of 60 a day, compared to several thousand a day at the height of the migrant crisis in late 2015. Davutoglu went on to say that this proves that Turkey has fulfilled its end of the deal and that Ankara will no longer honor the EU-Turkey deal if the bloc fails to deliver visa-free travel by June 30.
European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has insisted that Turkey must meet all 72 conditions for visa-free travel and that the EU will not water down its criteria. But European officials — under intense pressure to keep the migrant deal with Turkey alive — will be tempted to cede to Turkish demands.
EU Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos on April 20 conceded that for the EU it is not a question of the number of conditions, but rather "how quickly the process is going on." He added: "I believe that at the end, if we continue working like this, most of the benchmarks will be met."
European officials alone are to blame for allowing themselves to be blackmailed in this way. In their haste to stanch the rush of migrants to Europe, they effectively allowed Turkey to conflate the two very separate issues of a) uncontrolled migration into Europe and b) an end to visa restrictions for Turkish nationals.
The original criteria for the visa waiver were established in December 2013 — more than two years before the EU-Turkey deal — by means of the so-called Visa Liberalization Dialogue and the accompanying Readmission Agreement. In it, Turkey agrees to take back third-country nationals who, after having transiting through Turkey, have entered the EU illegally.
By declaring that the visa waiver conditions are no longer binding because the flow of migrants to Greece has been reduced, Turkish officials, negotiating like merchants in Istanbul's Grand Bazaar, are running circles around the hapless European officials.
Or, as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently proclaimed: "The European Union needs Turkey more than Turkey needs the European Union."
The European Union now finds itself in a classic Catch-22 situation. Large numbers of Muslim migrants will flow to Europe regardless of whether or not the EU approves the visa waiver.
Critics of visa liberalization fear that millions of Turkish nationals may end up migrating to Europe. Indeed, many analysts believe that President Erdogan views the visa waiver as an opportunity to "export" Turkey's "Kurdish Problem" to Germany.
Bavarian Finance Minister Markus Söder, for example, worries that due to Erdogan's persecution of Kurds in Turkey, millions may take advantage of the visa waver to flee to Germany. "We are importing an internal Turkish conflict," he warned, adding: "In the end, fewer migrants may arrive by boat, but more will arrive by airplane."
In an insightful essay, German analyst Andrew Hammel writes:

"Let's do the math. There are currently 16 million Turkish citizens of Kurdish descent in Turkey. There is a long history of discrimination by Turkish governments against this ethnic minority, including torture, forced displacement, and other repressive measures. The current conservative-nationalist Turkish government is fighting an open war against various Kurdish rebel groups, both inside and outside Turkey.
"This means that under German law as it is currently being applied by the ruling coalition in the real world (not German law on the books), there are probably something like 5-8 million Turkish Kurds who might have a plausible claim for asylum or subsidiary protection. That's just a guess, the real number could be higher, but probably not much lower.
"If visa requirements are lifted completely, each of these persons could buy a cheap plane ticket to any German airport, utter the word 'asylum,' and trigger a years-long judicial process with a good chance of ending in a residency permit."

Hammel continues:

"There are already 800,000 Kurds living in Germany. As migration researchers know, existing kin networks in a destination country massively increase the likelihood and scope of migration.... As Turkish Kurds are likely to arrive speaking no German and with limited job skills, just like current migrants, where is the extra 60-70 billion euros/year [10 billion euros/year for every one million migrants] going to come from to provide them all with housing, food, welfare, medical care, education and German courses?"

And finally, "the most important, most fundamental, most urgent question of all":

"Why should a peaceful, stable, prosperous country like Germany import from some remote corner of some faraway land a violent ethnic conflict which has nothing whatsoever to do with Germany and which 98% Germans do not understand or care about?"

Turkish-Kurdish violence is now commonplace in Germany, which is home to around three million people of Turkish origin — roughly one in four of whom are Kurds. German intelligence officials estimate that about 14,000 of these Kurds are active supporters of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), a militant group that has been fighting for Kurdish independence since 1974.
On April 10, hundreds of Kurds and Turks clashed in Munich and dozens fought in Cologne. Also on April 10, four people were injured when Kurds and Turks fought in Frankfurt. On March 27, nearly 40 people were arrested after Kurds attacked a demonstration of around 600 Turkish protesters in the Bavarian town of Aschaffenburg.
On September 11, 2015, dozens of Kurds and Turks clashed in Bielefeld. On September 10, more than a thousand Kurds and Turks fought in Berlin. Also on September 10, several hundred Kurds and Turks fought in Frankfurt.
On September 3, more than 100 Kurds and Turks clashed in Remscheid. On August 17, Kurds attacked a Turkish mosque in Berlin-Kreuzberg. In October 2014, hundreds of Kurds and Turks clashed at the main train station in Munich.
In an essay for the Financial Times titled "The EU Sells Its Soul to Strike a Deal with Turkey," columnist Wolfgang Münchau wrote:

"The deal with Turkey is as sordid as anything I have ever seen in modern European politics. On the day that EU leaders signed the deal, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish president, gave the game away: 'Democracy, freedom and the rule of law.... For us, these words have absolutely no value any longer.' At that point the European Council should have ended the conversation with Ahmet Davutoglu, the Turkish prime minister, and sent him home. But instead, they made a deal with him — money and a lot more in return for help with the refugee crisis."

"Brexit" - What Else Is Wrong with the European Union?

• Ever since the inception of the European Economic Community, British politicians across the entire political spectrum have been perceptive enough to realize that Britain will lose its sovereignty and turn into a vassal of the France-Germany axis.
• This month, in March, an official audit reported that EU auditors refuse to sign off more than £100 billion ($144 billion) of EU spending. The Brussels accounts have not been given the all-clear for 19 years in a row.

There is a joke going around the internet it how the European Union works (or doesn't):

Pythagoras's theorem - 24 words.
Lord's Prayer - 66 words.
Archimedes's Principle - 67 words.
10 Commandments - 179 words.
Gettysburg address - 286 words.
U.S. Declaration of Independence - 1,300 words.
U.S. Constitution with all 27 Amendments - 7,818 words.
EU regulations on the sale of cabbage - 26,911 words.

Why are EU Regulations so long? Maybe because they have to be translated into the 18 official languages? Interpreters also have to be found who can work into and from those languages at the European Parliament. The translation budget is massive. One of the official languages currently is Irish. It can confidently be said that there is no one in the Republic of Ireland who does not speak English; many Irish do not even speak or understand Irish, and certainly none of Ireland's politicians will be fluent only in Irish. But all of the "acquis," the body of regulations that are already part of the EU body of laws, also have to be translated into the languages of candidates for EU membership, such as Turkey, thus adding more languages to the tally each time a new regulation is passed. If Catalonia breaks away from Spain and remains a member of the EU, Catalan will need to be added, even though Catalan politicians all speak perfect Spanish.

Corruption and Waste

This month, in March, an official audit reported that EU auditors refuse to sign off more than £100 billion ($144 billion) of EU spending. The Brussels accounts have not been given the all-clear for 19 years in a row. Moreover, the EU is apparently less than incompetent at managing the funds it has.
This is happening at a time when the EU is demanding that the UK pay it £1.7 billion ($2.45 billion). It was reported on September 17, 2015 in the Daily Mail newspaper that Britain had reluctantly paid this sum, which prime minister David Cameron himself, a fan of staying in Europe, has described as "appalling."
Also reported on September 17 in the Daily Telegraph, was that, according to the annual report of the European Court of Auditors, £5.5 billion ($7.9 billion) of the EU budget last year was misspent because of controls on spending that were deemed by experts to be only "partially effective."[1]
The audit, published on March 17, 2016, found that £109 billion ($157 billion) out of a total of £117 billion spent by the EU in 2013 alone was "affected by material error" -- that is, disappeared into various people's pockets.
Thanks to the European Union, the Value Added Tax (VAT), the tax which in the UK replaced purchase tax in 1973, is now applied to services as well as goods. Such a tax discriminates against service-based economies, such as those of the developed countries, because such economies are taxed so they cannot compete with services provided outside the EU. Each member country's tax regime is micro-managed by the European Union. The former purchase tax was specifically designed for taxing luxury goods, but the VAT is now imposed even on essentials needed by the poorest members of society. Furthermore, the VAT discriminates against women because the EU requires the member states to tax products used by only one gender, such as tampons.

The "Traveling Circus"

Few people outside European parliamentary circles are aware that there is an EU "traveling circus." Once a month, the European Parliament moves from Brussels in Belgium to Strasbourg in France. Even though Members of European Parliament (MEPs) voted to scrap this move, the French government, which initiated this madness in the first place, has the power to block any such decision and is apparently determined to do so. That is another fact which goes unmentioned by those determined to keep the UK in the EU. When this author challenged an MEP, Mary Honeyball, on the subject, she claimed that it was "being dealt with," but the French government is fiercely opposed to keeping the parliament exclusively in Brussels and it has the power to block any such reform. The cost of the "travelling circus" alone is conservatively estimated at £130 million ($187 million) a year.

Free Movement of Labour

The free movement of labour between EU member states was always going to be a non-starter. Has anyone noticed the hordes of British plumbers and electricians emigrating to Bulgaria and Romania? The movement of skilled and unskilled labour from the poorest countries of the EU to the wealthier ones -- those that offer generous benefits to the unemployed and even subsidise low wages -- has always been a fact of life, one seriously underestimated by successive British governments. The British suffer most because, of all the countries of the EU, the UK offers the most generous benefits. The so-called "freedom of movement," which has proved to be just a one-way street, is only one of the reasons why Britain needs to regain control of its own destiny and stop being subservient to laws being made by unelected, overpaid, un-unelectable bureaucrats in Brussels.

But Will There Be a Brexit?

Unfortunately, most voters in the British referendum glean their information from the sound bites of politicians on television. This circumstance leaves the public open to manipulation, uninformed, and ignorant of the facts. One fact, however, that cannot be ignored is that ever since Britain joined the European Economic Community in 1973, British politicians across the entire political spectrum from left (Tony Benn) to right (Enoch Powell) were perceptive enough to realize that Britain would lose the power to make its own laws and turn into a vassal of the France-Germany axis.

Leaving the European Union will give the UK back its sovereignty and leave it free to make alliances not only with its former European partners, but with other Commonwealth countries, to say nothing of the United States, and Central and South America.

Josephine Bacon is a journalist, author, and translator based in London. She is an active member of the British Labour Party and the Cooperative Party.

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Sweden: Muslim Government Minister Sacked After Making Nazi Allegations

• "This is not about freedom of speech, this is about insulting people's faith. I cannot see anything that has to do with freedom of speech here." — Mehmet Kaplan, on the Mohammed cartoon controversy, 2005.
• Mehmet Kaplan told Turkish media that the reason young Muslims join ISIS is "the rampaging Islamophobia in Europe." As a solution to the problem, he suggested that the Swedish government support mosques financially, ostensibly to counteract ISIS's recruitment.

In 2014, three Muslims became ministers in the Swedish government. Clearly the most fervent and committed believer was Mehmet Kaplan, 44, who took on the role of Minister for Housing and Urban Development.
Kaplan came to Sweden from Turkey, at the age of one. Despite many claims that he is in fact an Islamist, until now Kaplan has been untouchable. That is, until it emerged that he said that Israel treats the Palestinians the same way the Nazis treated the Jews in Germany. At a hastily summoned press conference on April 18, Prime Minister Stefan Löfven announced that he had accepted Kaplan's resignation.

Mehmet Kaplan was a minister in Sweden's government until last week, when he was forced to resign after revelations that he compared Israel's treatment of Palestinians to that of the German Nazis' treatment of Jews. (Image source: Wikimedia Commons/Jan Ainali)

Kaplan, a member of the Green Party, has a history of being affiliated with various Muslim organizations connected to the Muslim Brotherhood. In 2005, he denounced the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, for publishing cartoons depicting the Muslim prophet Mohammed. In an interview with the Christian magazine Dagen, he said, "This is not about freedom of speech, this is about insulting people's faith. I cannot see anything that has to do with freedom of speech here. This is an insupportable provocation."
In 2010, Kaplan was aboard one of the ships of the flotilla sailing to the Gaza Strip, with the aim of breaking Israel's naval blockade. He, along with several others, was arrested after the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) boarded the vessel. Once safe and sound back in Sweden, he complained that the IDF "acted like pirates."
In 2011, he invited the well-known Islamist and anti-Semite, Yvonne Ridley, to the Swedish parliament for a seminar. Ridley, a supporter of Hamas, has called Israel "that disgusting little watchdog of America that is festering in the Middle East."
Since becoming a minister in the Swedish government, Mehmet Kaplan has continued to stir up controversy. He has made several hair-raising remarks, such as, in the summer of 2014, when he compared Swedish Muslims who go to Syria to fight for the Islamic State, to Swedish volunteers fighting for Finland in the 1939 Winter War, when Finland was attacked by the Soviet Union three months into the Second World War. Under the slogan "Finland's cause is ours," 8,260 Swedes traveled to Finland to aid their neighbors. To compare this courageous and highly moral effort to that of murderous jihadis, willingly joining the killing machine known as ISIS, rightly upset many Swedes. When the Finnish media criticized the Swedish minister, Kaplan retreated, saying that it "was not a good comparison," and that he was "against young Swedes joining the war in Syria."
In the fall of 2014, it was time for the next controversial statement. Kaplan told the Turkish media that the reason young Muslims join ISIS is "the rampaging Islamophobia in Europe." As a solution to the problem, he suggested that the Swedish government support mosques financially, ostensibly to counteract ISIS's recruitment.
This thought evidently made Social Democrat Party member Nalin Pekgul (a Kurdish Muslim) furious. In an opinion piece for the business paper Dagens Industri, she wrote that the only reason more people did not openly criticize Kaplan was their fear of being labeled "Islamophobes":

"Appointing Mehmet Kaplan government minister is surprising and appalling. ... I am convinced that Mehmet Kaplan said exactly what he meant and that he regards the jihadis as freedom fighters. ... Mehmet Kaplan says that he believes in the equal value of all human beings and equality between the sexes, but very few secular Muslims believe that he is not in fact an Islamist. With Mehmet Kaplan in the government, [Green Party leaders] Gustav Fridolin and Åsa Romson have sent a clear signal to the Muslims of Sweden -- that the Islamists now have the support of the Swedish establishment."

Social anthropologist Aje Carlbom supported Pekgul's conclusion that Kaplan is an Islamist. In an opinion piece for the magazine Dagens Samhälle, Carlbom wrote:

"When it comes to identity politicians in general, this might seem like political mudslinging. One should be aware, however, that Kaplan has his ideological background in the Islamist movement that, for the past 20 years, has been hard at work trying to gain influence in various political arenas."

Last week, another scandal exploded around Kaplan. It all started with the Turkish National Association of Sweden holding a meeting in central Stockholm, where Association Vice President Barbaros Leylani made a speech in which he agitated against Armenians and shouted to the audience: "The Turk awakens! The Armenian dogs should take care. Death to the Armenian dogs!"
Leylani was forced to resign from his organization, but soon pictures surfaced, taken at a Ramadan dinner in July 2015, where Mehmet Kaplan could be seen dining with Barbaros Leylani. To make matters worse, members of the Islamist organization Milli Görüs were visibly present, as were members of the Turkish ultra-nationalist, right-wing extremist organization, the Grey Wolves.
Kaplan said that he had no knowledge of their presence, and that it is his job as a politician to meet with representatives of "Turkish civil society in Sweden." Prime Minister Stefan Löfven called Kaplan's presence at the dinner "deeply regrettable":

"As a government minister, one has a responsibility to act in such a way as never to raise any doubts about what organizations or values one represents. That is why it is deeply regrettable that Mehmet Kaplan ended up in this company, and he realizes now that he needs to be more meticulous."

On Sunday, April 17, the final straw appeared. The daily Svenska Dagbladet published pictures taken by the Somali Star, a local Swedish-Somali TV station. In the segment, which aired in 2009, Mehmet Kaplan comparedIsrael's treatment of Palestinians to that of the German Nazis' treatment of Jews:

"There are certain similarities, which many Jews have actually testified to. The persecution in the 1930s -- the persecution under Nazi Germany -- against the people thought to be the most deviant, people were treated in such a way that they constantly had to explain why they had chosen a certain way of life."

This turned out to be a bit rich, even for Sweden's notoriously Israel-critical Foreign Minister Margot Wallström. Come Monday morning, Wallström made a statement: "I think this is an appalling statement, and I strongly denounce this." Wallström did not want to speculate about the consequences at that point, and explained that it was up to Prime Minister Stefan Löfven to decide Kaplan's fate.

      China’s Communist Billionaires: Darlings of Harvard, Wall Street, CFR             

       East Coast-West Coast, from Harvard to Hollywood, China Inc. is setting down a big footprint, with indispensable assistance from some of the biggest names on Wall Street: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Carlyle Group, Kissinger Associates, CitiBank, JPMorgan Chase.
Wang Jianlin, “China’s richest billionaire” and chairman of the huge Wanda Group conglomerate is the current leading darling among China’s Communist Party elite being toasted by America’s and Europe’s globalist elites. As The New American recently reported (China Cash and Movie Moguls — The Disturbing New Hollywood-Beijing Axis), Wang Jianlin is leading Beijing’s multi-billion dollar “Chollywood” effort aimed at merging the China-U.S. film industries to create the dominant global entertainment-propaganda machine. That project is well on its way, with Wang’s $2.5 billion purchase in 2012 of AMC Theaters (making Wanda the world’s largest cinema operator), his $8.2 billion investment in a mammoth film studio/entertainment complex in Qingdao, and Wanda Group’s $3.5 billion buyout of Legendary Entertainment (producer of blockbusters Jurassic World, 300, the Batman/Dark Knight trilogy, Pacific Rim, Godzilla, and Man of Steel).
Harvard’s Faustian Bargain
From low-brow entertainment to high-brow academia, Wang is covering all the bases. In a September 6, 2015 press release, the Wanda Group proudly displayed a photograph (shown above) of Chairman Wang shaking hands with Harvard University President Catharine Drew Gilpin Faust. The photo marked the occasion of Wang’s induction as vice chairman of the university’s Global Advisory Council.
“Wang Jianlin, Chairman of Wanda Group, was invited to serve as the Vice Chair of Harvard University’s Global Advisory Council by Catharine Drew Gilpin Faust, the President of Harvard University,” the Wanda press release stated. “The Global Advisory Council is Harvard’s most authoritative advisory body,” it continued, “designed to offer advice and suggestions on the university’s global strategy. The council is comprised of leading individuals from various sectors and chaired by Co-Founder and Managing Director of the Carlyle Group, David Rubenstein. Harvard University is one of the most prestigious universities in the world and it is a great honor for Wang Jianlin to serve as Vice Chair of its Global Advisory Council.”
Typical of Chinese corporate PR pieces, Wang’s promoters at Wanda went heavy on the name dropping and puffery:

Wanda has also been active in top business and political circles. Wang Jianlin met with US President Barack Obama at the SelectUSA Investment Summit back in March and has also met with numerous heads of state such as UK Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Francois Hollande and Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbot among others. Furthermore, Mr. Wang has delivered keynote speeches at various world-renowned universities such as Harvard in the past. Harvard Business School has incorporated Wanda’s high-profile acquisitions of AMC Cinemas and Infront Sports & Media into its case studies.

Did Wang simply buy his way into the prestigious Harvard appointment? For many observers, that is an obvious affirmative. The following month, in October 2015, Harvard’s own media relations department announced the launch of a new Harvard Global Institute financed by Wang. “Harvard has long been an international institution, but a new University-wide effort hopes to create a globalization strategy as intentional as it is inherent,” said the Harvard press release. “Called the Harvard Global Institute (HGI), the effort was established at the recommendation of the International Strategy Working Group and the Faculty Advisory Committee on Global Institutes.”
“The launch of HGI was made possible through support from Wang Jianlin, chairman of the Beijing-based Wanda Group,” said the Harvard announcement. “Wang views this gift as a mutually beneficial collaboration between China and one of the world’s leading teaching and research institutions.”
Wang, whom Forbes magazine named “Asia’s Businessman of the Year in 2013,”  is well connected in both the communist and capitalist worlds. “So confident are Beijing’s communist dictators of the willful blindness and ideological affinity of the Hollywood movie industry and the American press that they can hide their schemes in plain sight,” we noted in a previous posting on Wang.
“This can be seen, for instance, in Wang Jianlin’s official curriculum vitae for the World Economic Forum, the annual gathering of the super-rich and their tagalongs among the global glitterati, intelligentsia, and commentariat.” We pointed out that the WEF states Wang has served as "Deputy to the 17th National Congress, CPC [Communist Party of China]. Member, Standing Committee, CPPCC National Committee. Vice-Chairman, All China Federation of Industry and Commerce.” Nowhere do the words “Communist” or “Communist Party”, as such, appear in the WEF bio, but that is precisely what “CPC” and “CPPCC” refer to, of course.
The same can be said for many of the other Chinese “businessmen” who are regular attendees among the jet-set billionaires at the WEF confabs in Davos, Switzerland. Jack Ma, who vies with Wang for the title of China’s richest tycoon, plays it more coy than most; he is not openly a CPC member, but his loyalty and ties are apparent. Ma, the founder of e-commerce giant Alibaba (China’s version of Amazon and EBay — but many times bigger than both combined), for instance, reportedly told the South China Morning Post, in a 2013 interview, that the decision by Communist authorities to mow down protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989 was the “correct” thing to do. That outrageous remark caused a temporary flare-up of indignation outside of China, but undoubtedly worked to his favor with Party leaders. A report by the Epoch Times last year entitled, “Richest in China are Connected with the Communist Party,” cites evidence that Ma and other top Chinese “capitalists” are actually servitors of the Communist Party, which should not be news to anyone but the most obdurate and willfully blind.
Nevertheless, Jack “Mow ‘em down” Ma is the darling of the globalist set. At the latest WEF gathering, Ma’s private dinner party featured A-List names of “the great and the good” from all spheres of power and influence. A Shanghai website featuring photos of the exclusive event reported: “Perhaps the belle of the ball was British Prime Minister David Cameron, who showed up in a blue-collared shirt with no tie, he was greeted by such international celebrities as Bono, Leonardo DiCaprio and Kevin Spacey,one of Alibaba's biggest  fans.”
“Though the party was not just attended by celebrities alone,” the report continues, “there were also some people with real power as well, including: Cisco CEO John Chambers, Coca-Cola CEO Muhtar Kent, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, UPS CEO David P. Abney, former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and new Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau….” A few months earlier, at the 2015 APEC summit in Manila, Ma enjoyed an even greater triumph, sharing center stage with President Barack Obama (photos here) in a duo performance that catapulted him to the top levels of the global business firmament.
CFR Game Plan
The stepped-up pace of China’s acquisitions of companies, real estate, and influence in the United States (see articles linked below) is being facilitated by Wall Street’s globalist titans. As we reported in 2013, the planned acceleration of convergence of the U.S.-Chinese economies was forecast (and set in motion by) “Policy Innovation Memorandum No. 13,” published by the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in 2012, under the title “Fostering Greater Chinese Investment in the United States.” The study was written by David M. Marchick, managing director of the Carlyle Group, the huge investment firm ($194 billion in assets under management) that has been one of the key bulls on both U.S. investement in China, and vice versa.
“Given the slow pace of the economic recovery, the United States would benefit hugely from additional FDI [Foreign Direct Investment],” Marchick claimed. “Critics argue that Chinese investment could compromise U.S. security interests and lead to job offshoring,” he continued. “While Chinese acquisition of certain U.S. companies in the defense or technology sectors would create national security concerns, the preponderance of potential Chinese investments in the United States would raise no such issues.”
Following up on the Marchick/Carlyle/CFR memo, Edward Alden (CFR) authored a blog on the CFR’s “Renewing America” web page entitled “Attracting Chinese Investment: Here’s Where to Start.” According to Alden: "The United States needs to start by making it clear that this country actively wants and will encourage Chinese investment, and by working with China to eliminate misperceptions and clear away unnecessary obstacles where they exist. Both countries need to move beyond the bad feelings that were generated in 2005 when the Chinese oil company CNOOC faced a political firestorm over its effort to purchase Unocal."
Alden and Marchick outlined the political strategy behind the plan for successful convergence and integration of the two economies: make American workers dependent upon paychecks from Chinese employers. Alden advised that Chinese companies (and their Wall Street advisers) should replicate the Japanese experience, writing:

The experience with Japan is instructive. Trade relations with Japan soured badly in the 1980s when exports surged even as Japan’s market remained largely closed to U.S. products. While Japan has never done much to open itself to imports, trade relations with the United States improved after Japan began investing heavily in this country, building cars and other products and creating good-paying jobs. As a result, members of Congress with large Japanese investments in their districts began defending those companies when trade disputes would arise.

The same needs to happen with China. David Marchick’s paper offers a blueprint for where to begin.

The recent announcements of the Chicago Stock Exchange being purchased by Chongqing Casin Enterprise Group (CCEG) of China, the $5.4 billion buyout of General Electric’s appliance business by Qingdao Haier Co., Ltd., and the recent Beijing-Hollywood mergers and acqusitions are but a few of the many indicators that CFR elites have put the Marchick convergence scheme on the fast track.

UN Persecution of Whistleblowers Shocks U.S. Congress


WASHINGTON, D.C. — The United Nations' persecution of whistle-blowers who expose wrongdoing at the international outfit and its agencies is a major threat, said shocked U.S. lawmakers and former UN officials during a congressional hearing this week investigating the issue. But despite the seriousness of the offenses, this is hardly the first time the UN has been exposed engaging in severe retaliation against those who blow the whistle on UN crimes. The implications of the case are enormous: If left unaddressed, UN officials who know of wrongdoing and criminality will be unlikely to report it, knowing that their lives will be destroyed and nothing will change anyway. But lawmakers did pledge to act.
The whistle-blower scandal probed this week by Congress — one of many similar scandals at the UN — surrounds the UN's World Intellectual Property Organization, or WIPO, and its director-general, Francis Gurry. According to current and former employees of the agency, which runs the international intellectual-property regime, the UN agency boss sent sensitive U.S. technology to the dictatorships ruling Iran and North Korea, in defiance of U.S. law and international sanctions. The reason, whistle-blowers said, was to secure the votes of those regimes in Gurry's reelection contest. When WIPO officials found out, though, they realized something was wrong, and attempted to take action. In response, Gurry retaliated against them in what observers described as an “outrageous” and potentially criminal abuse of power.


Among those testifying was Miranda Brown (shown), who served as strategic advisor to WIPO boss Gurry. In her testimony, she described retaliation at the hands of the UN agency chief, as well as “an ongoing pattern of abuse of authority and impunity.” When Brown found out about the scheme to transfer American technology to North Korea, at first she thought it was a joke, she told the committee. When she realized it was not, she tried to stop it, and advised Gurry that it was likely a violation of U.S. law and UN Security Council sanctions. The UN agency chief, who also came under fire for threatening a journalist with prosecution for doing his job in recent years, seemed “non-committal.”  
“Despite the fact that WIPO had no whistle-blower policy in place at the time I blew the whistle on the North Korea and Iran shipments, I felt confident that the U.S. Government would use its considerable influence to fully protect me,” said Brown, one of at least three whistle-blowers at WIPO involved in the explosive scandals. “I felt I had a responsibility, as a UN staff member, to blow the whistle and report a UN agency that was supplying high-end American IT equipment to North Korea, in violation of U.S. domestic sanctions and without consulting the UN Security Council Sanctions Committees.”
In response to blowing the whistle, the retaliation was “severe,” Brown told lawmakers. Among other actions, Gurry accused her of “disloyalty” and of “leaking documents” to the U.S. government and the media. Then, in an apparent test of loyalty, he ordered her to help on a secret plot to establish WIPO offices in Beijing and Moscow without approval from agency member states. Gurry told other staffers to avoid Brown or face “consequences,” and finally told her that her contract would not be renewed. Finally, she was forced to resign under duress, she told the congressional committee. 
“Mr. Gurry’s leadership of WIPO is characterized by secrecy and also an extraordinary vindictiveness towards whistle-blowers,” Brown told U.S. lawmakers, adding that the agency chief appears to see the outfit he leads and its resources as his “personal fiefdom.” He also “consistently undermined the internal accountability mechanisms,” she added, citing examples, including one senior official targeted by Gurry who went on to commit suicide. Brown said the suicide should be investigated. Gurry fired and destroyed virtually everyone who tried to stop his lawlessness and abuses, it seems.
And when people dare to continue exposing him, Gurry has the power to destroy them anyway, because it takes three years for whistle-blower cases to be resolved, during which time the whistle-blower would be unemployed and ruined. Brown also said that the retaliation can reach across the UN system, not just at the agency involved, making the prospect of whistle-blowing by those who know of wrongdoing both terrifying and unlikely. “Once the retaliation starts, it's difficult,” she said.
Perhaps most outrageous of all was Gurry's abuse of Swiss police to illegally seek out his critics. Beginning in 2007, several letters about Gurry were circulated alleging corruption and sexual harassment. In response, Gurry apparently ordered security officials to enter the offices of his suspected critics and steal personal effects for DNA testing. The behavior has now been investigated by the UN's investigative agency, but the report on it has not been released, sparking widespread criticism and suspicion.
The implications are massive. Because of the secrecy, “the only way we will ever learn of misconduct within these international organizations is from whistle-blowers,” Brown continued, adding that would-be whistle-blowers from across the UN system are watching this case closely to see what happens. “In the event we don't achieve something, you may be looking at the last UN whistle blowers to come forward.”
Others testifying at the hearing included attorney James Pooley, a fellow whistle-blower and former deputy director of Innovation and Technology at WIPO. He outlined similar concerns, and other, separate ones. He also provided further details, including Gurry's hiring of a U.S. lobbying firm for $200,000 to help him quash U.S. investigations. Pooley also described the retaliation he suffered for blowing the whistle on all of the behavior.
Geneva-based international lawyer Ed Flaherty, an American who represents international organizations' staff members and whistle-blowers, told The New American that the testimony shows the UN whistle-blower protection system is “completely broken.” Calling WIPO leadership “rogue” and “arrogant,” he said that they felt secure in the fact that they receive near absolute immunity — even for criminal wrongdoing. “It seems we have gone back to the monarchy model when it comes to the governance of international organizations,” he said, adding that what was happening at WIPO was “absolutely” a systemic UN problem. And it is a big problem.
Also speaking at the hearing was attorney Matthew Parish with the Gentium Law Group, which is representing WIPO staffers. “If the evidence you've heard today is correct, it appears Gurry has committed very serious criminal offenses in both Switzerland and the United States,” said Parish, adding that, because of diplomatic immunity, the UN agency chief could not be held accountable.
He also pointed out that individual whistle-blowers in the WIPO Staff Council, which he represents, were prohibited from testifying or exposing wrongdoing by their boss, Gurry. “I am advised that WIPO threatens staff who seek to expose wrongdoing in public fora and that its leadership has prohibited staff from testifying before Congress in the past,” Parish said. “My understanding is that WIPO tells its staff that they are forbidden from whistle-blowing to the media, due to their confidentiality obligations to their employer. But the organization’s own whistle-blowing procedure involves cover-ups and charades.”
All of the lawmakers at the hearing sounded shocked and appalled at what they were hearing. “I'm very concerned about Mr. Gurry's ability to continue retaliating against you both,” said Representative Ileana Ros-Lethinen (R-Fla.), commending the whistle-blowers for their bravery. “I am shocked that Gurry remains in office.”
Representative Chris Smith (R-N.J.), who chaired the hearing, also sounded incredulous, vowing to do “a great deal of follow up” to ensure the future of whistle-blowing at UN. The UN is “not a sustainable organization” if this sort of behavior continues, he added, calling Gurry “a bureaucrat who, with impunity, is abusing his authority.” Whistle-blowers are some of the most noble people in an organization, he continued. “They are the canary in the coal mine,” he added.
In response to questions by The New American after the hearing ended, Smith praised another UN whistle-blower, Anders Kompass, who recently suffered extreme retaliation for exposing “peacekeeping” troops on a UN mission in Africa raping children. When asked about the “Turin e-mails” exposing top UN officials plotting to silence and destroy Kompass, Smith again expressed major concerns.
While Kompass and the WIPO whistle-blowers are the most recent whistle-blower scandals to surface, they are hardly unique. As The New American reported last year, the UN's war on whistle-blowers is massive, systemic, and extreme. According to the non-profit Government Accountability Project (GAP), which works to protect whistle-blowers around the world, between 2007 and 2010, the UN failed to protect more than 98 percent of whistle-blowers from retaliation. Countless more have declined to come forward. 
Going back even further, the story of UN whistle-blower Povl Bang-Jensen would shock people to the core. The senior Danish diplomat, who worked in the UN Secretariat and served on an international committee examining Soviet terror and tyranny in Hungary, tried to expose sabotage of the committee by powerful forces. The entire machinery of the UN set out to crush him in sham “hearings” and “tribunals,” even attempting to paint him as mentally ill. Eventually, after warning multiple people that he was being targeted and that he would never commit suicide under any circumstances, Bang-Jensen “committed suicide.” Virtually every credible analyst realized the “suicide” happened under extremely suspicious circumstances. 
Lawmakers vowed to take action about the persecution of those who expose the UN. In a follow-up article, The New American will highlight some of the measures proposed to deal with the ongoing war on whistle-blowers and to end the UN's impunity.

Egypt's "Security Threat": Churches

• Whenever Christians attempt to repair, renovate, or build a church -- all of which contradict Islamic law -- the same chain of events follows. Local Muslims riot and rampage, and local (Muslim) officials conclude that the only way to prevent "angry youths" from acts of violence is to ban the church, which is then declared a "threat" to security.
• Repeatedly, Christian leaders accuse local officials of inciting Muslim violence against churches. Muslim leaders then point to this violence to deny the church a permit on the grounds that it has attracted violence.

On February 1, Tharwat Bukhit, a Coptic Christian member of Egypt's parliament, announced "there are approximately 50 churches in Egypt closed for reasons of security."
When the "Arab Spring" broke out in 2011, Egypt's Christians compiled a list of 43 churches that had been shut down by local authorities over the years. This list was given to the prime minister of Egypt at the time, Dr. Essam Sharaf, who said that the churches would be opened as soon as possible. Yet since then, according to Bukhit, "Today, the number of closed churches has grown to almost 50."
Why are Christian churches being "closed for reasons of security"? Whenever Christians attempt to repair, renovate, or build a church -- all of which contradict Islamic law [1] -- the same chain of events follows. Local Muslims riot and rampage, and local (Muslim) officials conclude that the only way to prevent "angry youths" from acts of violence is to ban the church, which is then declared a "threat" to security.
Such events have occurred repeatedly throughout Egypt. For instance, Abdel Fattah Sisi, Egypt's president, agreed to build a memorial church in the village of Al-Our, which was home to 13 of the 21 Christians beheaded in February 2015 by the Islamic State in Libya. The families of the victims still live there. After Islamic prayers on Friday, April 3, 2015, Muslim mobs from Al-Our village violently protested Sisi's decision. They yelled that they would never allow a church to be built. They chanted, "Egypt is Islamic!" and then attacked a Coptic church with Molotov cocktails and stones. Cars were set on fire, including one belonging to the family of a Christian beheaded by the Islamic State. Several people were seriously hurt.
In Sohag City, a similar chain of events took place. After waiting 44 years, the Christians of Nag Shenouda were issued the necessary permits to build a church. According to a 2015 report, local Muslims rioted and burned down the temporary worship tent. When a Christian tried to hold a religious service in his home, a Muslim mob attacked it. Denied a place to worship, the Christians of Nag Shenouda celebrated Easter 2015 in the street.

Shenouda celebrated Easter 2015 in the street. The Christians of Nag Shenouda, Egypt celebrated Easter 2015 in the street after local Muslims rioted and burned down their temporary worship tent, and attacked their religious service at a home. In a separate incident, also after waiting years, the Christians of Gala' village finally received formal approval to begin restoring their dilapidated church (see pictures here). Soon after, on April 4, 2015, Muslims rioted, hurling stones at Christian homes, businesses and persons. Christian-owned wheat farms were destroyed and their potato crops uprooted. The usual Islamic slogans were shouted: "Islamic! Islamic!" and "There is no God but Allah!" In July 2015, Muslims suspended prayer in a church in the village of Arab Asnabt. They called for the church to be demolished as part of an effort "to prevent Coptic Christians from practicing their religious rites." Repeatedly, Christian leaders accuse local officials of inciting Muslim violence against churches. Muslim leaders then point to this violence to deny the church a permit on the grounds that it has attracted violence. More recently, a church under construction in the village of Swada was attacked by a mob of at least 400 Muslims, possibly incited by local officials. After the attack, the church was closed by the same officials who had previously granted the necessary permits required for its construction. The 3,000 Coptic Christians in Swada, who make up approximately 35% of the population, do not have even one Coptic Orthodox Church to serve them. This year, on February 1, the same day as Coptic Christian MP Tharwat Bukhit said nearly 50 churches had been shut down, the priest of St. Rewis Church described how, on the first day Christians met to worship in a fellow Christian's home that he had transformed into a church, "Muslims prevented them so that the church was closed on the very day it was opened." On February 2, Father Lucas Helmi, an official of the Franciscan Order in Egypt, explained how "the closure of St. George's Church in the village of Hijazah in Qous [shuttered 25 years earlier] goes back to tensions between Coptic and Muslim families in the village, especially the Muslim neighbors around the old church, which is still unfinished because they refused to allow it to be rebuilt after it was demolished." During a 25-minute interview on Arabic satellite TV, Bishop Agathon revealed [2] how, after an official council meeting with government leaders on the possibility of building a church, one of the authorities contacted the Islamic sheikhs of the village. The official asked the sheikhs if they stood "with the Coptic church or with the State?" The sheikhs apparently told the Muslim households to each send one family member to protest the building of the church. Security officials could then point to the "rioting mob" and, as usual, on grounds of security, ban the church. Raymond

Germany: Migrant Crime Skyrockets

• The actual number of crimes in Germany committed by migrants in 2015 may exceed 400,000.
• The report does not include crime data from North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state in Germany and also the state with the largest number of migrants. North Rhine-Westphalia's biggest city is Cologne, where, on New Year's Eve, hundreds of German women were sexually assaulted by migrants.
• "For years the policy has been to leave the [German] population in the dark about the actual crime situation... The citizens are being played for fools. Rather than tell the truth, they [government officials] are evading responsibility and passing blame onto the citizens and the police." — André Schulz, director, Association of Criminal Police, Germany.
• 10% of the migrants from the chaos in Iraq and Syria have reached Europe so far: "Eight to ten million migrants are still on the way." — Gerd Müller, Development Minister.

Migrants committed 208,344 crimes in 2015, according to a confidential police report that was leaked to the German newspaper, Bild. This figure represents an 80% increase over 2014 and works out to around 570 crimes committed by migrants every day, or 23 crimes each hour, between January and December 2015.
The actual number of migrant crimes is far higher, however, because the report, produced by the Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt, BKA), includes only crimes that have been solved (aufgeklärten Straftaten). According to Statista, the German statistics agency, on average only around half of all crimes committed in Germany in any given year are solved (Aufklärungsquote). This implies that the actual number of crimes committed by migrants in 2015 may exceed 400,000.
Moreover, the report -- "Crime in the Context of Immigration" (Kriminalität im Kontext von Zuwanderung) -- includes data from only 13 of Germany's 16 federal states.
The report does not include crime data from North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state in Germany and also the state with the largest number of migrants. North Rhine-Westphalia's biggest city is Cologne, where, on New Year's Eve, hundreds of German women were sexually assaulted by migrants. It is not yet clear why those crimes were not included in the report.
The report also lacks crime data from Hamburg, the second-largest city in Germany, and Bremen, the second most populous city in Northern Germany.
Further, many crimes are simply not reported or are deliberately overlooked: political leaders across Germany have ordered police to turn a blind eye to crimes perpetrated by migrants, apparently to avoid fueling anti-immigration sentiments.
According to the report, most of the crimes were committed by migrants from: Syria (24%), Albania (17%), Kosovo (14%), Serbia (11%), Afghanistan (11%), Iraq (9%), Eritrea (4%), Macedonia (4%), Pakistan (4%) and Nigeria (2%).
Most of the migrant crimes involved theft (Diebstahl): 85,035 incidents in 2015, nearly twice as many as in 2014 (44,793). Those were followed by property and forgery crimes (Vermögens- und Fälschungsdelikte): 52,167 incidents in 2015.
In addition, in 2015, migrants were involved in 36,010 reported cases of assault, battery and robbery (Rohheitsdelikte: Körperverletzung, Raub, räuberische Erpressung), roughly twice as many as in 2014 (18,678). There were also, in 2015, 28,712 reported incidents of fare evasion on public transportation (Beförderungserschleichung).




There were 1,688 reported sexual assaults against women and children, including 458 rapes or acts of sexual coercion (Vergewaltigungen oder sexuelle Nötigungshandlungen).
According to the report, migrants were accused of 240 attempted murders (Totschlagsversuch), in 2015, compared to 127 in 2014. In two-thirds of the cases, the perpetrators and victims were of the same nationality. There were 28 actual murders: migrants killed 27 other migrants, as well as one German.
Finally, the report said that 266 individuals were suspected of being jihadists posing as migrants; 80 of these were determined not to be jihadists; 186 cases are still being investigated. The infiltration of jihadists into the country, according to the report, is "a growing trend."
The report leaves far more questions than answers. It remains unclear, for example, how German police define the term "migrant" (Zuwanderer) when compiling crime statistics. Does this term refer only to those migrants who arrived in Germany in 2015, or to anyone with a migrant background?
If the report refers only to recently arrived migrants -- Germany received just over one million migrants from Africa, Asia and the Middle East in 2015 -- this would imply that at least 20% of the migrants who arrived in Germany in 2015 are criminals. But if the number of crimes committed by migrants is actually twice as high as the report states, then at least 40% of newly arrived migrants are criminals. Yet the report asserts: "The vast majority of asylum seekers are not involved in criminal activity."
Also, for reasons that are not given, the report fails to include offenses committed by North Africans, long known to be responsible for an increase in crimes in cities and towns across Germany.

Police in Bremen, Germany are shown detaining four young North African criminals who have been terrorizing local shopkeepers. (Image source: ARD video screenshot)

In Hamburg, police say they are helpless to confront a spike in crimes committed by young North African migrants. Hamburg is now home to more than 1,000 so-called unaccompanied minor migrants (minderjährige unbegleitete Flüchtlinge, MUFL), most of whom live on the streets and apparently engage in all manner of criminal acts.
A confidential report, leaked to Die Welt, reveals that Hamburg police have effectively capitulated to the migrant youths, who outnumber and overwhelm them. The document states:

"Even the smallest issue can quickly lead to aggressive offensive and defensive behavior. The youths come together in groups to stand up for each other and also to fight each other...
"When dealing with others, the youths are often irreverent and show a lack of respect for local values ​​and norms. The youths congregate mainly in the downtown area, where they can be seen almost every day. During the daytime, they hang out mostly in the St. George district, but in the evenings they carry out their activities in the Binnenalster, Flora- and Sternschanzenpark and St. Pauli [all across central Hamburg]. They usually appear in groups; up to 30 youths have been observed on weekend nights in St. Pauli. The behavior of these highly delinquent youths towards police officers can be characterized as aggressive, disrespectful and condescending. They are signaling that they are indifferent to police measures...
"The youths quickly become conspicuous, mainly in the domains of pickpocketing or street robbery. They also break into homes and vehicles, but the crimes are often reported as trespassing or vandalism because the youths are just looking for a place to sleep. Shoplifting for obtaining food is commonplace. When they are arrested, they resist and assault [the police officers]. The youths have no respect for state institutions."

The paper reports that German authorities are reluctant to deport the youths back to their countries of origin because they are minors. As a result, as more unaccompanied minors arrive in Hamburg each day, the crime problem not only persists, but continues to grow.
Meanwhile, in a bid to save the city's tourism industry, Hamburg police have launched a crackdown on purse-snatchers. More than 20,000 purses -- roughly 55 a day -- are stolen in the city each year. According to Norman Großmann, the director of the federal police inspector's office in Hamburg, 90% of the purses are stolen by males between the ages of 20 and 30 who come from North Africa or the Balkans.
In Stuttgart, police are fighting a losing battle against migrant gangs from North Africa who are dedicated to the fine art of pickpocketing.
In Dresden, migrants from Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia have effectively taken control over the iconic Wiener Platz, a large public square in front of the central train station. There they sell drugs and pickpocket passersby, usually with impunity. Police raids on the square have become a game of "whack-a-mole," with a never-ending number of migrants replacing those who have been arrested.
German authorities have repeatedly been accused of underreporting the true scale of the crime problem in the country. For example, up to 90% of the sex crimes committed in Germany in 2014 do not appear in the official statistics, according to the head of the Association of Criminal Police (Bund Deutscher Kriminalbeamter, BDK), André Schulz. He said:

"For years the policy has been to leave the [German] population in the dark about the actual crime situation... The citizens are being played for fools. Rather than tell the truth, they [government officials] are evading responsibility and passing blame onto the citizens and the police."

In an apparent effort to defuse escalating political tensions, Germany's Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge, BAMF) on February 16 said it was expecting only 500,000 new migrants to arrive in the country in 2016. In December 2015, however, BAMF director Frank-Jürgen Weise told Bild that "this figure [500,000] is only being used for 'resource planning' because at this time we cannot say how many people will come in 2016."
On January 1, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimated that 1.3 million asylum seekers would enter the European Union annually during 2016 and 2017.
In a January 9 interview with Bild, Development Minister Gerd Müller warned that the biggest refugee movements to Europe are still to come. He said that only 10% of the migrants from the chaos in Iraq and Syria have reached Europe so far: "Eight to ten million migrants are still on the way."
Adding to the uncertainty: On February 18, senior security officials from Austria, Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia and Slovenia — all countries along the so-called Balkan Route, which hundreds of thousands of migrants are using to enter the European Union — agreed to coordinate the joint transport of migrants from the Macedonia-Greece border all the way to Austria, from where they will be sent to Germany.

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