"UK’s May tells critics to drop dream of a ‘perfect’ Brexit" by Jill Lawless Associated Press October 03, 2018
BIRMINGHAM, England — British Prime Minister Theresa May battled to unite her Conservative Party on Wednesday, telling critics to abandon their dreams of a ‘‘perfect’’ Brexit and ‘‘come together’’ as divorce negotiations with the European Union enter their tough final phase.
May took on her detractors in a punchy address to the party’s annual conference, a day after a rival, former foreign secretary Boris Johnson, challenged her authority with a crowd-pleasing speech of his own.
May’s speech was a direct riposte to Johnson, who told a rapturous audience on Tuesday that May’s proposal for close post-Brexit economic ties with the EU was an ‘‘outrage’’ that would leave Britain unable to strike new trade deals around the world.
May defended her Brexit blueprint, which aims to keep Britain aligned with many EU rules in return for remaining in the bloc’s single market for goods.
May’s speech was a triumph compared to last year’s disastrous event, when she was plagued by a cough, interrupted by a prankster, and had parts of the stage backdrop fall down as she was speaking.
This time, May even poked fun at her robotic public image — cemented when her awkward dance moves on a trip to Africa went viral — by busting a move as she took the stage to ABBA’s ‘‘Dancing Queen.’’
I saw here coming out on stage doing her jig, and honestly, she looked foolish.
She painted an optimistic picture of post-Brexit Britain, saying ‘‘our future is full of promise.’’
The web version kept the music going:
A week ago, the opposition Labour Party met in Liverpool, at an event brimming with energy and confidence. The Conservatives, in contrast, were full of doubt. Many delegates lamented the fact that Brexit has drowned out the party’s message on housing, taxation, health care, and other big issues.
While pro-Brexit delegates railed against May’s compromises and the iniquities of Brussels, pro-EU Tories claimed Brexit had tainted the party with an inward-looking image that turns off voters, especially the young. May’s speech was welcomed by many in a party worn down by Brexit bickering.
‘‘It was not just about Brexit — she gave a vision for the country for the future,’’ said Rishi Fernando from London. ‘‘This has definitely increased my respect for her,’’ but May’s future remains uncertain. Many Conservatives expect her to face a leadership challenge soon after Brexit day — or even before.
Pro-Brexit legislator James Duddridge on Wednesday called the Brexit negotiations ‘‘an absolute disaster’’ and said he had added his name to a list of Conservative lawmakers demanding a confidence vote in the prime minister.
A vote will be triggered if 48 legislators ask for one.....
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And when she got there the cupboard was bare:
"UK prime minister seeks to stem Cabinet exodus over Brexit" by Jill Lawless Associated Press July 10, 2018
LONDON — British Prime Minister Theresa May has spent the past few days fighting for her political life as first Brexit Secretary David Davis and then Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson quit. On Tuesday, two more lawmakers followed them out the door.
Johnson sent an incendiary resignation letter on Monday accusing May of killing ‘‘the Brexit dream’’ and flying ‘‘white flags’’ of surrender in negotiations with the EU.
May, who has tried to keep calm and carry on, replaced Johnson with a loyalist Jeremy Hunt, a former health secretary, and gave Davis’ job to Dominic Raab in a bid to shore up her authority.
She held a meeting of her new Cabinet on Tuesday before attending a Western Balkans summit in London with other European leaders.
Many pro-Brexit lawmakers are furious at a plan they say will stop Britain from forging an independent economic course, but senior pro-Brexit Cabinet ministers said they supported May and would not resign. Asked if he was planning to quit, environment Secretary Michael Gove said ‘‘absolutely not.’’ Conservative lawmaker Michael Fallon, an ally of May, dismissed Johnson. Fallon warned Conservative rebels that a challenge to May’s leadership is ‘‘the last thing we need.’’
Two years after Britain voted 52 percent to 48 percent to leave the EU, May is trying to find a middle way between two differing views — within her party and the country — of the UK’s relationship with Europe.
Pro-Europeans want to retain close economic ties with the bloc and its market of 500 million people, while some Brexit supporters want a clean break to make it possible to strike new trade deals around the world.
The British government is due to publish a detailed version of its plans on Thursday.....
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Related:
"The EU is now more popular than ever before. A new, extensive survey by the European Union’s public opinions office, published on Wednesday, found that 67 percent or over two-thirds of EU citizens believe membership in the bloc benefits them. It is the highest score measured since the EU was formed under its current name in 1993. Back in 2010, only about half of all citizens agreed that the EU had benefited them. The bloc’s popularity also suffered further during the refugee influx in 2015 and 2016. Years of responding to political catastrophes — from Brexit to Greece’s debt crisis — have taught EU officials a certain sense of humility. In recent weeks, however, the European Union appears to have regained a self-confidence in line with its new public support, even though the bolder remarks coming out of Brussels may not be aligned with its actual power in the world. The EU survey may not foreshadow a sudden Brexit reversal — other studies still show that many Brits want to leave regardless of whether membership has benefited them economically — but it does indicate that the rather chaotic Brexit preparations seem to have deterred others....."
They took a survey and found that they are more popular than ever as the entire continent veers right against them. The self-delusion and reassurance is astounding.
As with everything, the economy will be the key:
"With austerity measures slashing maintenance budgets and leaving streets gashed with potholes, local city planning councils are considering a broader sell-off of Britain’s public space in the form of surveillance post kiosks....."
The total $urveillance $tate will be posing as glorified billboards, and six months before Brexit becomes official, many in UK fear the worst.
Time to start digging:
"The beginnings of the study can be traced back to the 1920s, when archeologists first excavated pits at Stonehenge. They identified 58 Neolithic individuals, but the archeologists reburied bone fragments in a single hole, creating a jumble....."
And then drive on:
"Rolls-Royce joined the list of household names to fire a warning shot about the cost of Brexit, turning up the heat on British Prime Minister Theresa May to deliver a road map to a future economic relationship with the European Union. The aerospace giant said on Thursday that it’s moving the design approval for large jet engines to Germany to ensure it can continue operating whatever the Brexit outcome. While it said the action is “precautionary and reversible” and won’t involve jobs moving, the move shows how UK businesses and their allies are losing patience. Get it wrong, the message from manufacturers is, and Britain will hemorrhage jobs and investment....."
People are “starting to plan for the worst-case scenario.”
"Amid ire, UK’s Labour Party alters anti-Semitism definition" Associated Press September 04, 2018
LONDON — Britain’s main opposition Labour Party on Tuesday adopted an internationally recognized definition of anti-Semitism, an about-face aimed at defusing a crisis that has alarmed UK Jews and divided party ranks.
After a meeting lasting several hours, Labour’s National Executive Committee backed a definition approved by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.
Earlier this year, the party adopted a more limited definition, omitting some of the alliance’s language around criticism of Israel. The alliance’s definition, for example, says it is anti-Semitic to compare contemporary Israeli policies to the policies of the Nazis. The original Labour definition left that out, but it has now been included.
It may be "anti-Semitic" -- then again, it may not -- but it doesn't change the fact that the behavior is similar.
Labour’s reluctance to adopt the entire definition renewed claims that the left-of-center party has become hostile to Jews under leader Jeremy Corbyn, a longtime supporter of the Palestinians.
You can be one without the other, but being that last one gets you tarred as the other. It's enough to truly earn your vote.
Corbyn has insisted that anti-Semitism has no place in the Labour Party, but some members accuse him of failing to stamp out anti-Jewish prejudice. Last week, veteran lawmaker Frank Field quit Labour’s grouping in Parliament, saying the party had become a ‘‘force for anti-Semitism.’’
Corbyn has been accused of failing to expel party members who express anti-Semitic views and has received personal criticism for past statements, including a 2010 speech in which he compared Israel’s blockade of Gaza to Nazi Germany’s sieges of Leningrad and Stalingrad during World War II.
Actually, they are worse. they have gone on longer and Gaza has about 2 years of habitable life left.
Critics have also condemned him for attending a 2014 wreath-laying to Palestinians whom Israel has linked to the murder of 11 Israelis at the 1972 Munich Olympics.
Corbyn supporters accuse political opponents and right-wing media outlets of misrepresenting the leader’s views. Some also say accepting the alliance definition could quash legitimate criticism of Israel.
The European Jewish Council ‘‘cautiously’’ welcomed Labour’s change of policy but said it was ‘‘deeply regrettable’’ it had taken so long.
Emotions ran high outside Tuesday’s meeting, where rival groups of demonstrators shouted chants for and against Corbyn. Anti-Corbyn protesters held signs altering the party’s slogan ‘‘For the many, not the few’’ to ‘‘Labour: For the many, not the Jew.’’ The opposing group insisted that ‘‘Anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism.’’
That's right, and it is a very important distinction.
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Time to get out of town:
"A leading campaigner for Britain’s exit from the European Union was accused of hypocrisy Thursday after applying for permanent residency in France. Former UK Treasury chief Nigel Lawson told English-language French newspaper The Connexion that he is applying for a permanent ‘‘carte de sejour,’’ or residency card. The 86-year-old former politician, father of celebrity cook Nigella Lawson, lives in southwest France. The pro-EU group Best for Britain said Thursday that Lawson ‘‘looks like a hypocrite’’ for living in ‘‘his luxury home in France’’ as Brexit causes economic uncertainty in Britain....."
"Seeking to strenghten economic ties as Brexit looms, UK leader visits Kenya" by Tom Odula Associated Press August 30, 2018
NAIROBI — British Prime Minister Theresa May on Thursday became the first UK leader to visit Kenya in 30 years, bringing security and development funding to East Africa’s commercial hub and neighboring Somalia as Britain seeks to boost economic ties ahead of a bumpy exit from the European Union in March.
May met with President Uhuru Kenyatta on the last stop of her three-country Africa tour, which also included South Africa and Nigeria, the continent’s top economies. The prime minister was travelling with a large business delegation, as Britain wants to push its trade with Africa beyond the $40.2 billion registered last year.
I know they dropped the charges, but he was once an indicted war criminal.
I know Obama also met with him, but you know.
‘‘I want to ensure that the UK’s relationship with Kenya and with Africa is more and more about private investment, about doing business and making the most of commercial opportunities together,’’ she told reporters after meeting with Kenyatta. Britain is Kenya’s largest foreign investor.
The coloniali$ts never really go away, do they?
No British leader had visited Kenya since Margaret Thatcher, and this is the first visit by a British prime minister to Africa in five years.
Kenyatta for a moment appeared to struggle to remember the name of former British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, calling him ‘‘Boris . . . Boris Johnson, the bicycle guy. The bicycle guy, yeah, that one.’’ Johnson has been an outspoken advocate of cycling in London.
Kenya, a former British colony, is a key ally in East Africa on trade and security. The British military has run a training camp for Kenyan troops for years.
May visited the British troops in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, who help to train peacekeepers with a multinational African Union mission in Somalia to handle the threat of explosives used by the Al Qaeda-linked al-Shabab extremist group, the deadliest Islamic extremist group in sub-Saharan Africa.
Britain’s government said May’s visit brought 7 million pounds in new funding for the AU peacekeeping mission, as well as 60 million pounds to help Somalis recover from drought. Another 25 million pounds will go toward helping the fragile Horn of Africa nation’s government, which is struggling to assert control beyond the capital, Mogadishu, and certain other urban centers.
Look, I don't want the Africans to suffer but this comes at the same time that her government pushes social austerity and budget cuts at home! All to fight a self-created enemy!
Al-Shabab is a constant threat in Kenya after the extremist group vowed retribution for that country sending troops to Somalia. Dozens of Kenyan police have been killed in bombings in recent months.
Aka Al-CIA-Bob.
‘‘We have democracy in common and we need to defend it together. And as for our common enemies such as terrorism we need to fight them together,’’ Kenyatta said.
May noted Kenyatta’s call for a transition from the AU peacekeepers to stronger Somali security forces and said Britain wants the same, adding that the UK is leading efforts to ensure the AU mission receives the funding it needs.
Concerns about the readiness of Somali troops to take over the country’s security, however, remain high. The United Nations Security Council recently voted to delay the reduction of troops in the AU force from October to February and the target date to hand over security to Somali forces to December 2021.
May also pointed out Kenya’s new push to combat widespread corruption, and the United Kingdom signed a new deal with the country to return stolen money hidden in British banks. The returned money will be used exclusively for development projects.
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Next stop, Libya:
"UK apologizes for role in Libyans’ kidnapping and torture" by Jill Lawless Associated Press May 10, 2018
LONDON — Britain acknowledged Thursday that its intelligence agents played a role in the kidnapping and torture of an opponent of the late Libyan leader Moammar Khadafy and the man’s wife — a rare admission of wrongdoing by British spies.
Attorney General Jeremy Wright told lawmakers that Prime Minister Theresa May had apologized ‘‘unreservedly’’ to Abdel Hakim Belhaj and his wife, Fatima Boudchar, saying that Britain’s actions ‘‘contributed to your detention, rendition, and suffering.’’
Belhaj, a former leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group that had opposed Khadafy, and Boudchar were kidnapped by the CIA in Thailand in 2004 and sent to Libya. Boudchar, who was pregnant at the time, says she was tortured and released before giving birth to a son. Belhaj spent six years in custody and says he was tortured repeatedly.
Belhaj and Boudchar say a tip-off from British intelligence helped the CIA abduct them. They have spent years pursuing British officials through UK courts seeking compensation and an apology.
Wright told lawmakers that the pair had now withdrawn their claims against the British government, former foreign secretary Jack Straw, and Mark Allen, a former senior officer in the MI6 intelligence agency.
In an opinion piece in The New York Times, Boudchar said she was chained to a wall and tortured by the CIA when she was pregnant while being detained at a secret site in Thailand. She said she wanted to know what Gina Haspel, President Trump’s nominee to head the CIA, knew about her mistreatment.
Haspel, a 33-year CIA veteran, is believed to have run a CIA ‘‘black site’’ in Thailand in the early 2000s.
Haven't heard a word about or from her since confirmation. Kavanaugh could only be so lucky.
Btw, where is the women's movement when it comes to criminal cretins like Haspel, anyway?
Do they stay silent because she could whisk them away to a black site and supervise interrogation like she did in Thailand?
The renditions happened at the height of the US-led ‘‘war on terror,’’ and at a time when Britain was trying to improve relations with Khadafy, a former international pariah who had recently renounced weapons of mass destruction.
Has that ebbed, because we seem to be more active in more countries than ever before, with more interventions planned.
In 2004, then-British Prime Minister Tony Blair met Khadafy in Libya, beginning a thaw in relations dubbed the ‘‘deal in the desert.’’
Yeah, that turned out to be a big, Saddam-Hussein like mistake for him.
I hope that Korean learned the lesson.
After Khadafy was overthrown and killed in 2011, documents were discovered that disclosed the cozy working ties between Khadafy’s spies and Western intelligence officials.
Then why did they regime change him?
The Bank of Africa idea, wasn't it?
They wanted the oil?
They included a faxed letter from MI6 congratulating Khadafy’s intelligence chief Moussa Koussa on the ‘‘safe arrival’’ of Belhaj, saying that it was ‘‘the least we could do for you and for Libya to demonstrate the remarkable relationship we have built over recent years.’’
Wright told lawmakers that in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Britain and its international partners ‘‘were suddenly adapting to a completely new type and scale of threat.’’
He said British agencies ‘‘were in some respects not prepared for the extreme demands suddenly placed on them’’ and were too slow to understand ‘‘the unacceptable practices of some of our international partners.’’
‘‘The government has enacted reforms to ensure that the problems of the past will not be repeated,’’ Wright said.....
Do you feel safe now?
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I'm surprised they hung out that dirty laundry.
Related:
Britain Abetted U.S. Torture of Terrorism Suspects
Looks like the U.S. owes some apologies, too.
Also see:
Lithuania and Romania Complicit in CIA Prisons
The cases shed light on the murky and once-hidden world of renditions, and it looks like the conviction will have to be overturned:
"Accused Benghazi ringleader convicted of terrorism charges in 2012 attacks that killed US" by Spencer S. Hsu Washington Post November 28, 2017
WASHINGTON — A Libyan militant accused of being a ringleader of the 2012 Benghazi attacks on US facilities was convicted on terrorism charges Tuesday in the assaults that killed US ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, but the jury found him not guilty of the most serious of the charges, including murder.
The case was seen as a test of detention and interrogation policies developed under the Obama administration to capture terror suspects overseas for criminal trial, with the result likely to factor into assessments of the suitability of civilian courts for terrorism prosecutions.
The jury in Washington, D.C., deliberated for five days after a seven-week trial before convicting Ahmed Abu Khattala, 46, in the attack the night of Sept. 11 at a US diplomatic mission that killed Stevens and State Department employee Sean Smith in a fire, and in a second attack that took place before dawn on Sept. 12 on a nearby CIA annex, where CIA contractors Tyrone S. Woods and Glen Doherty were killed by mortar strikes.
The jury acquitted Abu Khattala of all but four of the 18 charges against him.
At trial, his defense team said Abu Khattala was drawn to the fiery scene in his hometown as a bystander. They questioned the credibility of three Libyan witnesses who testified they saw or heard Abu Khattala take steps to plan, execute, or claim responsibility for the attacks.
Prosecutors presented what they called ‘‘indisputable’’ records linking the times of calls on Abu Khattala’s cellphone and surveillance video from the diplomatic mission attack that they said showed he was at least a key plotter.
Abu Khattala was a leader in an extremist brigade that was part of a militia that sought to establish strict Islamist rule in post-revolutionary Libya. US intelligence assessments have reported that several groups were involved in the attacks, including Abu Khattala’s brigade and the militia.
Stevens and Smith died of smoke inhalation after militants overran the diplomatic compound and set fire to the diplomatic villa. Woods and Doherty were killed on a rooftop at the CIA annex in a predawn mortar strike.
He was captured in June 2014 by US commandos and interrogated and transported for 13 days aboard a Navy warship to the United States.
It was Obama's way of getting around international law as he floated around the Mediterranean.
Onboard, he was questioned by two teams, the first working in a classified operation to extract intelligence and the second a separate FBI team that collected evidence for his trial under the legal safeguards provided defendants in civilian court.
Yeah, right, the U.S. government was worried about his legal rights.
He was charged with aiding or abetting the killing of the four Americans and wounding two other Americans, providing or conspiring to provide material support and resources to terrorists that resulted in death, destruction of government buildings and property, and a firearms violation.
Abu Khattala has been the only person brought to court in attacks that saw the compound overrun. However, on Oct. 29, during his trial, US authorities snatched a second suspect from Misrata, Libya, for prosecution in Washington. The suspect, Mustafa Al-Imam, has pleaded not guilty.
Abu Khattala’s trial moved the Benghazi inquiry from the partisan political realm, where Republican claims of a Democratic coverup continued throughout the 2016 presidential contest, into a courthouse where the jury of 12 District of Columbia residents sorted through six binders of exhibits and hours of video evidence.
That's because the initial story was bullish**.
The Trump administration recently showed a willingness to continue bringing terrorism cases in civilian courts, including additional Benghazi suspects. President Trump on Oct. 30 personally announced that ‘‘on my orders,’’ US forces captured the second Benghazi suspect, Al-Imam, to ‘‘face justice in the United States.’’
Although several Republicans in Congress and conservative analysts called for a military tribunal for Abu Khattala, there were no such calls in Al-Imam’s case.
Before the trial began Oct. 2, Abu Khattala’s defense moved to toss out his statements in military and FBI custody, arguing the 13-day detention without a lawyer present violated his legal rights and that the circumstances were so coercive they negated his signed waivers to a right to an attorney and against self-incrimination.
I suppose that is a polite way of saying he was tortured.
The government won a critical ruling from US District Judge Christopher ‘‘Casey’’ Cooper denying the motion, and upholding the government’s flexibility in handling overseas terrorism suspects.
I doubt Kavanaugh would vote to overrule that.
The web version brought more screams:
The trial featured dramatic testimony from surviving State Department and CIA operators, some of them taking the stand under fake names and disguised in wigs and mustaches to protect their identities.
That is not being confronted by your accuser.
Prosecutors also relied heavily on surveillance video taken by overhead drones and diplomatic compound cameras, and cellphone records the government obtained from Libyan authorities that listed call times and numbers but not the call contents.
Key testimony came from three, paid Libyan informants, all testifying under pseudonyms.
The kind of guys who can't be trusted.
They included an undercover Libyan businessman who received $7 million for aiding the United States by approaching Abu Khattala as a financial supporter after the attacks, collecting incriminating statements from him, and luring him to his capture.
Looks like entrapment.
The witness, testifying as Ali Majrisi, said he was present in 2013 when in conversation Abu Khattala, urged to conduct more spectacular attacks like those of Al Qaeda in Iraq, allegedly said of the 2012 attacks, ‘‘I intended then to kill everybody [all the Americans] there, even those who were at the [Benghazi] airport.’’
Majrisi, who at one point told his secret American military handlers he was willing to kill Abu Khattala himself, rejected a $1 million payment as ‘‘insultingly low’’ before eventually receiving $7 million for his help in the investigation.
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Our man on the ground:
"Group: Libyan groups loyal to army may have killed dozens" Associated Press November 30, 2017
CAIRO — Armed groups loyal to Libya’s self-styled national army may have killed dozens of civilian men in a town 30 miles east of Benghazi, Human Rights Watch said Wednesday.
In a detailed report, the US-based watchdog said the bodies of 36 men were found on Oct. 26, near the town of al-Abyar. The rights group reported that relatives of six victims say the men had been arrested earlier in 2017 in Benghazi or other areas controlled by forces led by Field Marshal Khalifa Hifter, who commands the self-styled Libyan National Army.
The relatives said all six victims were civilians seized from their homes, in the presence of their families without an arrest warrant, it said. Hifter is loyal to the interim government. Another, United Nations-backed government is based in Tripoli. Phone calls and a message left with a spokesman for Hifter were not immediately returned.
This incident, the group said, comes after a series of unlawful killings in Benghazi that prompted the International Criminal Court prosecutor to issue an arrest warrant against a special forces commander loyal to Hifter on Aug. 15.
On Nov. 9, ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda demanded the arrest and transfer of suspects already named in ICC warrants, including the son of former Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi. In the demand, she also implicated other officials as possibly being behind the Abyar killings, including the former head of Libya’s Internal Security Agency.
Hifter ordered the military prosecutor of the eastern region to investigate the case, but his office has yet to announce any investigation results, the group said. ‘‘The LNA will be condoning apparent war crimes if their pledge to investigate the gruesome discovery in al-Abyar proves to be another empty promise,’’ Eric Goldstein of Human Rights Watch said.
That's nothing new for the U.S.
Libya descended into chaos following a popular 2011 uprising that toppled and killed Gadhafi. A multitude of militias hold actual power on the ground.....
That's a polite way of saying regime change failed.
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Libya is now under a state of emergency as the elections approach.
Related:
"Scotland’s criminal appeals body said Thursday that it will review the case of a Libyan man convicted of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, as his family tries posthumously to clear his name....."
That will be my last word on Lockerbie because the plane is taxiing down the runway.
"Resignation of once-towering Salmond leaves Scotland reeling" AP August 31, 2018
LONDON — Scotland’s governing Scottish National Party was reeling Thursday after the resignation of Alex Salmond, the former leader who built the separatist party into a major political force and took the country to the brink of independence from the United Kingdom.
He was no Gandhi (they forgot his birthday).
Salmond quit the party he led for two decades late Wednesday amid an investigation into sexual harassment allegations. Salmond denies the harassment claims from two staff members, saying,‘‘I absolutely reject any suggestion of criminality.’’
He said that he was quitting to prevent divisions in the party from worsening, but that he is also suing Scotland’s SNP government over the way it has handled the complaints process against him.
Kavanaugh can sue, too, although he would be better off just forgetting it.
On Wednesday, Salmond launched a crowdfunding campaign for his legal action. By Thursday morning he had exceeded his $65,000 target.
Details were made public last week about the allegations, which relate to alleged behavior in 2013, when Salmond led the government. Police confirmed Friday that they had received the complaints.
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He later claimed he had a drinking problem.
So what do you have to say, mum?
"MI6 wants moms" by Kitty Donaldson Bloomberg News May 24, 2018
Think of a British spy and the name’s Bond. James Bond, but MI6 instead wants mothers for their emotional intelligence, not a martini-swilling, gun-toting womanizer in a tux.
The UK’s overseas secret intelligence service is on a recruitment drive aimed at women with kids and black and minority ethnic candidates. Why? Because the changing nature of the security threat calls for a more diverse workforce with different skills.
“We want, oxymoronically, people who never thought of joining MI6 — to join MI6,” the agency’s Chief Alex Younger said at the launch of a new TV and online advertising campaign. “We want different points of view when making the crunchy decisions.”
The advertisement plays on the public’s imagination of what a spy should look like. Footage shows menacing sharks circling their prey before the camera pan out to reveal a mom at an aquarium able to anticipate danger. It concludes: “Secretly, we’re just like you.”
MI6 officers based in Vauxhall, south London, say the agency offers flexible work patterns to suit parents, as it seeks to recruit 800 more staff by 2021. According to the latest figures available, as of March 2016 the agency employed 2,594 people. Of those, 39 percent were women in junior positions, with 24 percent of female staff in senior jobs. Just 8 percent of MI6’s workforce were black and minority ethnic workers — all in junior roles.
Applicants need to have strong presentation skills, be over 21 and hold a degree. At an annual starting salary of around 36,000 pounds ($48,000) for an intelligence officer, Younger admits the agency isn’t the best for pay.
“Our staff are not motivated by money,” he said, adding that new hires need “to want to make a difference.”
MI6 saw applications rise following the poisoning of a former Russian double agent in Salisbury, southern England in March. Security threats to the UK include from Islamist-inspired terrorism, white supremacists and dissident Irish republicans and cyber threats from hostile foreign states such as Russia.
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So who will be watching the kids?
"London couple convicted of murdering nanny, burning her body" by Jill Lawless Associated Press May 24, 2018
LONDON — A London couple delusionally obsessed with a former boy-band star were found guilty Thursday of murdering their French nanny and burning her body on a bonfire in their backyard.
A jury at the Central Criminal Court convicted 35-year-old Sabrina Kouider and 40-year-old Ouissem Medouni after six days of deliberation.
The couple, who had a turbulent on-off relationship, denied killing Sophie Lionnet, though they admitted disposing of the body. Each defendant blamed the other for the death of the 21-year-old Frenchwoman.
Prosecutors say the pair killed Lionnet after becoming obsessed with the belief she was in league with Kouider’s ex-boyfriend Mark Walton, a founding member of Irish boy band Boyzone.
Kouider was said to be fixated on Walton and believed Lionnet was having an affair with him and helping him carry out a sex-abuse plot — though in fact the two had never met. Kouider and Medouni, a banker, repeatedly interrogated Lionnet in an attempt to make her confess.
Must have learned it in Libya.
Prosecutors said the couple starved the nanny, beat her with an electrical cable, and tortured her by dunking her head under water. After killing her in a bathtub in September, they threw her body on a bonfire in their yard in an affluent area of southwest London near the home of the Wimbledon tennis tournament.
When neighbors called firefighters because of the pungent-smelling smoke, Medouni claimed the charred remains belonged to a sheep.
Walton, a music producer who lives in Los Angeles, said his two-year relationship with Kouider was ‘‘the most turbulent relationship I had ever been in.’’
He described in court how she would sometimes ‘‘flip, get very angry, very loud and just not care where we were. She would just go crazy over something trivial.’’
He continued to pay Kouidar’s rent for a time after they split up in 2013. After he stopped, she began a campaign of harassment, reporting him to police more than 30 times for allegedly sexually abusing a cat, using black magic, and hiring a helicopter to spy on her. Frustrated that police were not taking her seriously, she accused Walton on Facebook of being a pedophile.
Do you have to believe the woman over there?
Prosecutor Richard Horwell told jurors that the couple’s ‘‘unhealthy, myopic, all-consuming, and groundless’’ obsession with Walton had deprived them of reason.
Kouider collapsed in tears as the jury foreman delivered the verdicts, while Medouni hung his head. The pair will be sentenced June 26.
The victim’s father, Patrick Lionnet, said in court that his daughter was a ‘‘kind, quiet, and reserved’’ young woman who loved children and animals.
Her mother, Catherine Devallone, wept in court and called her daughter’s killers ‘‘monsters.’’
‘‘These monsters repeatedly beat Sophie,’’ she said in a statement. ‘‘They starved, tortured, and broke her. They took away her dignity and finally her life.
‘‘Our Sophie will soon be laid to rest. No god will ever forgive you both for what you have done to our daughter.’’
Aisling Hosein of the Crown Prosecution Service said ‘‘only Kouider and Medouni know exactly how they killed Sophie but the prosecution was able to prove that she died as a result of purposeful and sustained violence, and not by accident.’’
Detective Inspector Domenica Catino, who led the investigation, called it an ‘‘extremely harrowing and tragic case.’’
‘‘I believe that we are Sophie’s voice telling of the torment, abuse and torture she suffered, and today she has finally been heard,’’ Catino said.
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Related: London couple who killed French nanny get 30-year sentences
Also see:
Nanny who killed kids, pleaded insanity convicted of murder
Nanny who killed 2 children gets life in prison without parole
She said she was “very sorry for everything that happened,” and added that her “life is in the hands of God.”
She said it was because she was underpaid, and I wouldn't keep a light burning for her.
Related:
"Britain’s home secretary says up to 80,000 people pose an online sexual threat to children and warned that Internet companies could face new laws and regulations forcing them to ramp up efforts to protect children. Sajid Javid said Monday that Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Twitter, and others should fight child abuse with the same intensity used to remove political extremists’ material from the Internet. He said the threat has evolved more quickly than the industry’s response, citing a ‘‘horrifying’’ rise in pedophile activity online. ‘‘I am not just asking for change. I am demanding it,’’ he said."
Yeah, the nanny state will look after them:
"Britons sent abroad as children sue government over abuse" Associated Press August 30, 2018
LONDON — Britons who were sent overseas as poor or orphaned children under state-approved programs in the decades after World War II are suing the British government over the abuse and neglect they suffered, their lawyer said Wednesday.
In March a child-abuse inquiry ordered the government to compensate 2,000 survivors of programs that sent children to countries including Australia, Canada, and Southern Rhodesia — now Zimbabwe.
The survivors are the last wave of some 150,000 children sent to Britain’s then-colonies starting in the 17th century. The programs were intended to ease pressure on British social services, provide the children with a fresh start, and supply the empire with a sturdy supply of white workers, but many children ended up in institutions where they were physically and sexually abused, or were sent to work as farm laborers.
The British government took over primary responsibility for the policy after World War II and did not end it until 1970.
Lawyer Alan Collins, who represents more than 100 survivors, said the government had not yet taken any action to offer redress. He has filed papers at London’s High Court, seeking to force the government to provide compensation.
Collins said the surviving child migrants, scattered around the globe, were elderly and their numbers ‘‘are sadly reducing.’’
He said setting up a compensation plan is ‘‘not rocket science.’’
‘‘If the government had the will, it would have done so by now,’’ Collins said.
‘‘I’m hoping that common decency and humanity will kick into play and the UK government will do right by these people.’’
Then-prime minister Gordon Brown apologized in 2010 for the ‘‘shameful’’ child migrant program.
The Department of Health said it accepted the policy had been wrong, and was ‘‘committed to providing a timely response to the inquiry’s recommendations.’’
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They are making apologies all over the place:
"UK apologizes to deported, detained residents from Caribbean" Associated Press August 22, 2018
LONDON — The British government apologized Tuesday to 18 long-term UK residents from the Caribbean who were deported or detained because they could not produce documents to prove their right to live in the country.
Your papers, pleez!
Home Secretary Sajid Javid said their treatment was completely unacceptable and issued a personal apology. He said those affected would get support and compensation.
The government reviewed almost 12,000 immigration cases after it was reported that some people from the Caribbean who had lived in Britain for decades had been denied housing, jobs, or medical treatment because they could not prove their status.
The Home Office said Tuesday that the most serious cases include 11 people who were wrongly removed from the country, and another seven who were detained but not deported.
Javid said these 18 people are the ‘‘most likely to have suffered detriment.’’ The government found 146 other cases of Caribbean immigrants who were detained or deported, but ‘‘the degree of detriment suffered varied considerably,’’ he said.
Those affected are known as the ‘‘Windrush generation’’ after the ship Empire Windrush, which in 1948 brought hundreds of Caribbean immigrants to a Britain seeking nurses, railway workers, and others to help it rebuild after World War II.
They and other Commonwealth immigrants who came to Britain before 1973 had an automatic right to settle in the UK, but some have fallen foul of rules requiring employers and doctors to verify people’s immigration status.
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Also see: She spent 10 hours in the water after falling off a cruise ship
She survived, and ‘‘it is a real miracle that she is alive.’’
"UK: 450,000 women missed out on breast cancer test" AP May 03, 2018
LONDON — Britain’s health minister apologized Wednesday for what he called a ‘‘serious failure’’ that resulted in hundreds of thousands of women in England not being invited to a screening test for breast cancer.
Jeremy Hunt said Wednesday in Parliament that the mistake appeared to be the result of a ‘‘computer algorithm failure’’ dating back to 2009.
‘‘The fact is that for many years, oversight of our screening program has not been good enough,’’ Hunt said. He said about 450,000 women between ages 68 and 71 weren’t given a chance to have a mammogram. Of those women, Hunt said, experts estimated up to 270 might have died prematurely.
‘‘Many families will be deeply disturbed by these revelations,’’ he acknowledged, adding that the glitch meant some breast cancers were only diagnosed at a later stage, when the disease might have been harder to treat. The risk of breast cancer increases with age.
Hunt apologized ‘‘wholeheartedly and unreservedly’’ for the suffering caused and promised there would be an independent review of the national breast screening program.
Breast cancer screening is offered to all women aged 50 to 70 in England every three years; they are sent invitation letters to make an appointment for the test.
Hunt said that any women who missed their mammogram will be contacted by the end of May.
‘‘It’s very concerning to learn that so many women have not received an invitation to screening over a prolonged period of time,’’ said Emma Greenwood, Cancer Research UK’s director of policy and public affairs, in a statement.
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Do your implants leak over there?
"UK foreign secretary calls Chinese wife Japanese on Beijing visit" New York Times July 31, 2018
HONG KONG — Jeremy Hunt, the new British foreign secretary, made a diplomatic gaffe Monday, calling his Chinese-born wife Japanese during a discussion with his counterpart in Beijing.
China and Japan have been longtime military rivals: During the 1930s and 1940s, Japan invaded and seized much of China.
Hunt committed the flub during a meeting with China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi.
“My wife is Japanese — my wife is Chinese,” he said. “That’s a terrible mistake to make.”
How Rudd!
“My wife is Chinese, and my children are half-Chinese, and so we have Chinese grandparents who live in Xi’an and strong family connections in China,” he added.
His wife, former Lucia Guo, hails from that ancient city in central China.
Motioning to the foreign minister after he misspoke, Hunt said that he and Wang “spoke in Japanese at the state banquet,” in explaining the mistake.
Hunt was in Beijing to try to strengthen trade with China as Britain struggles to figure how to carry out its decision to leave the European Union.
Who handles the household finances?
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She filed for divorce when they got home:
"UK Supreme Court rejects woman’s appeal in divorce case" Associated Press July 26, 2018
LONDON — The UK Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that a woman must remain married to her husband of 40 years after he opposed her request for a divorce, saying its hands were tied by the country’s divorce laws.
The justices upheld a lower court ruling that Tini Owens, 68, failed to prove ‘‘unreasonable behavior’’ by her husband, 80-year-old Hugh Owens, who she claimed was moody, argumentative, and disparaging. English law requires a spouse to prove unreasonable behavior, adultery, desertion, or a separation of five years unless both parties agree to divorce.
In issuing their ruling, the justices made their unease plain, noting that society’s expectations for reasonable behavior have changed since divorce laws were last updated in 1969 and marriage is now seen as a partnership of equals. The court then opened the door for lawmakers to rewrite the rules.....
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You want to go get something to eat?
Time to look for a job:
UK government picks sole man in shortlist for top bank job
"Royal Bank of Scotland said Thursday it has agreed to pay $4.9 billion to settle US claims that it misled investors who bought securities backed by risky mortgages in the run up to the 2008 financial crisis. The tentative settlement with the US Department of Justice marks a watershed moment for RBS, which was bailed out by British taxpayers after a series of acquisitions briefly made it the largest bank in the world before it collapsed a decade ago. The British government insisted that the US claims had to be resolved before it could sell its 72 percent stake in RBS. RBS is just the latest bank to settle Justice Department allegations that they misled investors about mortgage-backed securities, helping trigger the financial crisis. JPMorgan in November agreed to pay $13 billion, the largest settlement in US history. RBS’s British rival, Barclays agreed to a $2 billion agreement in March."
Anybody go to jail?
"Royal Bank of Scotland fined $4.9B for housing bubble role" Globe Staff and wire services August 14, 2018
The Royal Bank of Scotland will pay the largest fine arising out of the mortgage crisis to settle allegations it misled investors about risky home loans made during the housing bubble that ultimately led to the 2008 financial collapse.
The $4.9 billion settlement was reached with the US Attorney’s office in Boston and was the largest penalty on a single company that the US Department of Justice has imposed on banks and lenders for financial crisis-era misconduct.
“This resolution . . . holds RBS accountable for defrauding the people and institutions that form the backbone of our investing community,” Andrew Lelling, the US attorney in Boston, said in a statement.
It's a kickback after they were allowed to get away with such behavior and keep the riches they made.
In 2008, RBS was the third largest underwriter of residential mortgages, which it then packaged and sold on to investors as securities, but government prosecutors said the bank routinely failed to inform investors of the risky nature of some of the mortgages backing their securities, including that some borrowers could not repay their loans and the underlying assessments of the properties were inflated.
The bank also provided inaccurate data that made the loans seem less risky, the government said.
You mean they lied?
Internal Royal Bank of Scotland documents released by prosecutors show bank officials knew the loans were risky and the underwriting process faulty, but pushed sales of the securities nonetheless.
For example, court records quote Royal Bank’s chief credit officer in the United States as characterizing its mortgage-backed securities as “total [expletive] garbage” loans with “fraud [that] was so rampant . . . [and] all random,” so “the loans are all disguised to, you know, look okay kind of . . . in a data file.”
Looks like proof of intent to me.
In a statement, Ross McEwan, the chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland who took over the bank in late 2013, said, “This settlement dates back to the period between 2005 and 2007. There is no place for the sort of unacceptable behaviour alleged by the DoJ at the bank we are building today.”
RBS and other banks sold tens of billions of dollars in mortgages to investors, who experienced massive losses when borrowers failed to repay and housing prices collapsed nationwide. The banks also suffered enormous losses with prominent institutions such as Bear Stearns failing outright; Royal Bank of Scotland required a $70 billion bailout from the British government.
The DOJ has since issued billions of dollars in fines to settle similar allegations against Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and other big banks in the years following the crisis.
Yeah, everything is all right now.
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While in the office:
"UK police investigate new allegation against Weinstein" New York Times September 18, 2018
LONDON — Police in Britain are investigating a new allegation of sexual assault against Harvey Weinstein, the 11th case in the country against the American movie producer, who was disgraced when dozens of women came forward last year to accuse him of sexual misconduct.
The Metropolitan Police said in an e-mail Tuesday that it had received an allegation of sexual assault by a man against a woman in the early 1990s, in a case connected to what the police call “Operation Kaguyak.”
The statement did not identify the accused person as Weinstein, following the usual procedure of withholding personal details until a person is charged, but news reports have widely linked the operation to the allegations in Britain against Weinstein. A representative for Weinstein declined to comment on the matter.
Federal prosecutors in the United States are examining his ties with a private Israeli intelligence firm after Weinstein was accused of spying on some of the women who had accused him of sexual misconduct. A New York Times investigation found last year that the web of accusations against Weinstein spanned the globe.
You mean the Black Cube?
Btw, the NYT sat on Weinstein's transgression for 14 years and only outed him because the New Yorker forced their hand.
In the 1980s and ’90s, as Weinstein built the success of the production company Miramax, which had offices in London, several female employees reported unwanted sexual advances.....
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He claims their eyes smiled at him:
"Ireland seeks reparations for mass baby burials" by Sylvia Hui Associated Press August 28, 2018
LONDON — Church-run homes in Ireland housed orphans, unmarried pregnant women, and their babies for most of the 20th century.
The institutions have been subject to intense public scrutiny since a local historian in 2014 tracked down death certificates for nearly 800 children who died at the former Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, County Galway — but could only find a burial record for one child.
Investigators later found a mass grave containing remains of babies and young children in an underground sewage structure on the grounds of the home, which was run by an order of Catholic nuns and closed in 1961. DNA analysis of some remains last year showed the dead ranged from 35 weeks to 3 years old and most were buried in the 1950s.
‘‘It is my strong conviction that given the role of the church in this shameful chapter of recent Irish history it must play a practical role in addressing the hurt and damage,’’ wrote Minister for Children and Youth Affairs Katherine Zappone. ‘‘I believe that the church should contribute substantially to the cost of whatever option is decided by the government. . . . Nothing less will demonstrate remorse.’’
In a separate development Monday, archbishop of Washington ‘‘categorically denied’’ ever being told that Pope Benedict XVI had sanctioned his predecessor for sexual misconduct, undercutting a key element of the bombshell allegation that the current pope covered up clergy abuse.
Cardinal Donald Wuerl issued a statement after the Vatican’s former ambassador to the United States accused the pope of effectively freeing ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick from the sanctions in 2013 despite knowing of McCarrick’s sexual predations against seminarians.
Wuerl would have presumably known about the sanctions since McCarrick lived in his archdiocese.
The claims of the former Vatican ambassador, Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, have thrown Francis’ papacy into crisis. His main allegation rests on what sanctions, if any, Benedict imposed and what, if anything, Francis did to alter them.
Hundreds of protesters marched through the Irish town of Tuam on Sunday, reciting the names of the 796 babies and young children who died while residents of the home. They placed hundreds of pairs of infant shoes around a tiny white coffin at the burial site.
Responding to a question about the Tuam home Sunday, Francis said he accepted Zappone’s lament as ‘‘constructive collaboration’’ and that he would read a memo she prepared for him on the government’s investigation.
Francis met Saturday with some adult adoptees who were forcibly taken from their unwed biological mothers at birth. They urged him to denounce the practice, demand an apology from the religious sisters responsible, and assure the mothers they could search now for their lost children without fear of sin.
During a prayer Sunday in Knock, the country’s main shrine dedicated to Christ’s mother located not far from Tuam, the pope denounced how Irish children were ‘‘robbed of their innocence and taken from their mothers’’ during Ireland’s years of forced adoptions.
‘‘There was little compassion shown to children and their mothers in this home,’’ Zappone wrote. ‘‘We cannot change what happened to them. For the little ones whose remains are in a sewage system, we owe them dignity in death. For their mothers, siblings, and families, we need to give them some peace.’’
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That's why you shouldn't have sex on the first date.
"Irish government apologizes to 126 people illegally adopted. There may be thousands like them, activists say" by Allyson Chiu Washington Post May 31, 2018
Theresa Hiney Tinggal was born to an unwed mother and then given up in a shadowy adoption. Her adoption was just one such case. Like Tinggal, many more people in the same situation have had the truth kept from them for decades.
Now, after years of adoption activists calling for action, the Irish government has finally apologized and is now attempting to shed light on one of the country’s biggest open secrets.
The revelations and the apology hark back to a period, not that long ago, when Ireland was still in the thrall of a Catholic church that had no tolerance and little compassion for unmarried mothers and their ‘‘out-of-wedlock’’ infants. Exposés in recent years have shed new light on decades of mistreatment of ‘‘fallen women,’’ who were sent to bleak homes run by various church orders.
Now, in an effort to address the falsified birth documents, the country’s Minister of Children and Youth Affairs Katherine Zappone announced that an independent review of a broad sample of adoption records would be done to see if ‘‘clear evidence of incorrect registrations’’ could be established.
While activists have praised the government’s action, they warn that the actual number of illegal adoptions may be in the thousands.....
What government?
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That's the kind of thing that makes you want to jump off a cliff, and the Vatican says the kids are crazy:
"Vatican removes reference to ‘psychiatric help’ for gay kids" AP August 29, 2018
VATICAN CITY — The Vatican has scrubbed from the official transcript of Pope Francis’ in-flight press conference a comment that young gay children might seek psychiatric help.
Francis was asked Sunday what he would tell a father whose child comes out as gay. Francis said that he would counsel prayer, dialogue, and space, but that it depended on the child’s age when this ‘‘turmoil’’ had manifested itself.
He said: ‘‘Because it means something if it shows when you are still a child, when there are a lot of things to be done, either with psychiatric help, or to see how things are. While it is something else when it shows 20 years later.’’
The transcript on the Vatican website removed the ‘‘either with psychiatric help’’ phrase.
The Vatican frequently cleans up Francis’ off-the-cuff remarks.
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Here is the last place you kids want to find yourself:
"No policy in place to protect children within Vatican City" Associated Press July 01, 2018
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis has taken measures to address a spiraling sex abuse scandal in Chile, but he hasn’t moved on a problem closer to home: Vatican City itself does not have policies to protect children from pedophile priests or require suspected abuse to be reported to police.
Seven years after the Vatican ordered all bishops conferences around the world to develop written guidelines to prevent abuse, tend to victims, punish offenders, and keep pedophiles out of the priesthood, the headquarters of the Catholic Church has no such policy.
It's called hypocrisy, and that makes the Vatican a sanctuary for them..
The gap in Francis’ oft-pledged ‘‘zero tolerance’’ for abuse is surprising, given that the Holy See told the United Nations five years ago that it was developing a ‘‘safe environment program’’ for children inside the 44-acre Vatican City.
Asked about the promised child protection guidelines, the secretary general of the Vatican City State administration, Monsignor Fernando Vergez, said he couldn’t respond ‘‘since the study and verification of the project are still underway.’’
Thousands of children pass through the Vatican walls every day, touring the Vatican Museums, attending papal audiences and Masses, and visiting St. Peter’s Square and basilica.
The absence of clear-cut policy became evident late last year following revelations that a teenage seminarian in the Vatican’s youth seminary had, in 2012, accused one of the older boys of sexually molesting his roommate.
No one ever interviewed the alleged victim,
The student who lodged the complaint, Kamil Jarzembowski, was promptly kicked out of the seminary while the accused seminarian was ordained a priest last year.
The Associated Press has learned that the victim has since filed a formal complaint with the Vatican’s criminal tribunal and Italian church authorities launched a canonical investigation into the newly ordained priest.
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If that doesn't work, file a lawsuit:
"Lawsuit alleges abuse at Catholic monastery in ’70s" by J.D. Capelouto Globe Correspondent July 18, 2018
A 55-year-old Worcester County man sued a Roman Catholic monastery in Harvard Tuesday, alleging that a monk sexually assaulted him as a child and that other abbey staff negligently withheld crucial information from him years later.
The lawsuit, filed in Worcester County Superior Court, lists St. Benedict Abbey as a defendant, its abbot, Francis Xavier Connelly, and the Swiss-American Benedictine Congregation.
The plaintiff, who was not identified, told reporters Wednesday that he was abused the 1970s by Joseph Martin, a brother of the Benedictine Order who died in 2015. Martin admitted to the abuse in 2013. The man said the alleged abuse occurred for four to six months when he was between the ages of 10 and 14. He and a friend often stayed at the abbey on weekends, he said.
“It was a fun place to be as a little kid,” he said. “At the time, I didn’t know that I had this man sort of preying on me, and I can’t actually explain why he chose me and why he did what he did.”
According to the lawsuit, Martin repeatedly abused and raped the youth. Martin would come into the room where the boy slept and take him to his own room, the suit states.
Years later, the plaintiff began to vividly remember what happened to him; he spoke to others about the alleged abuse and it sparked a police investigation in 2013, the lawsuit says.
According to the police report, a detective spoke to the accused monk, who admitted to touching the boy without his consent. At the time, Martin was living in a rehabilitation and nursing center in Worcester and had been diagnosed with dementia, Harvard police Detective Daniele Fortunato wrote in the report.....
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He blamed excessive drinking for the transgressions.
As we come upon the Irish border, they are saying ‘The British are coming’ — (is that what happened on this day in history?).
NEXT DAY UPDATES:
"Pret A Manger said a second customer died after an allergic reaction to food sold at the popular British sandwich chain. The revelation of the death in December comes as Pret is under scrutiny after a 15-year-old girl who was allergic to sesame seeds died in 2016 after eating a sandwich. After testing confirmed the presence of a dairy protein in the vegan yogurt, it alerted British regulators....."
Scottish leader supports calls for new Brexit referendum
Also see:
British union calls for ‘digital’ picket line against Uber
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