Day: October 12, 2013

More migrants die yesterday trying to get to Europe from North Africa

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment
Map is a little outdated, but still gives you an idea of where the migrants are coming from in Africa, and roughly how many.

There has been a second fatal boat sinking in the Mediterranean as “asylum seekers” attempt to escape the lawlessness and economic decay of North Africa (and Syria!).

Just 8 days ago, hundreds perished off Lampedusa, here.

Update October 13th:  Another boat sank on Friday carrying mostly Palestinians, here.

It is my observation that the number of boats carrying hundreds of migrants has increased dramatically since the highly touted Arab Spring got underway.  And, one wonders why European and American powers (who cheered-on the Arab Spring and helped overthrow Gaddafi in Libya) can’t get at the source of the problem (the crime!) in Africa.

Most news accounts of the quandary faced by European countries on the receiving-end of the migrant tide, directs the responsibility to find a solution on to European citizens to “welcome” the largely economic migrants instead of getting at the root problem in Africa and stopping the boats from launching there.

It almost makes me wonder if there aren’t ‘powers that be’ in the West who want the immigrant tide to continue.

I have never seen a single word in the press I follow on the Mediterranean boat people crisis that suggests attacking the problem in Africa, except of course that the West must help financially fix Africa.

Here is the latest news.  This boat carrying 250 sank in waters patrolled by Malta.  No nationalities of the deceased have been mentioned yet.

From the Irish Independent:

A boat packed with an estimated 250 refugees and migrants has capsized in the middle of the Mediterranean, just a week after a similar accident off the Italian island of Lampedusa left more than 300 people dead.

At least 200 people were reported to have been thrown into the sea after the boat tipped over yesterday and corpses were reportedly floating in the water.

According to Italian media reports, at least 12 people died in the incident and 50 are still missing, among them children, but up to 200 people have been rescued.

[….]

The capsizing happened around 60 miles south of Lampedusa, in waters where Malta has search and rescue responsibilities.

Malta immediately requested Italian assistance in going to the aid of the migrants.

[….]

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 32,000 have arrived in southern Italy and Malta this year alone, around two thirds of whom have filed requests for asylum.

In a dark mood?  Read the 40-year-old prescient fictional work ‘The Camp of the Saints’ by French author Jean Raspail.  Raspail got one thing wrong—the continent—his third world invaders were coming from the Indian sub-continent so their voyage was longer.

Are your kids playing the UN’s “Against all odds” game?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This morning on my twitter feed the UNHCR was promoting a kid’s game—“Against all odds”—which I had never heard of.  Turns out they have been working on building “empathy” in your children worldwide since 2005 with this game to be used in classrooms.  The goal is for Western children to accept “integration” (note they always shun the word assimilation!).

See how clever this is!  The character here looks strikingly like the internationally popular Japanese animation—Anime!

Here is some of what ‘wikipedia’ says about it (emphasis mine):

Against All Odds is an Adobe Flash video game developed by UNHCR designed to teach players about the plight of refugees. Originally released in Swedish in 2005, the game has been translated into several languages, the English edition of which was released in November 2007.

Initial funding for the project came from a grant of NOK 1 million from Statoil to UNHCR’s Baltic and Nordic regional office, with the aim of developing a project to reach young people and promote integration in the region.

UNHCR decided to proceed the project as a web-based game, a medium which could reach a large number of young people, require no distribution costs and minimal marketing costs. The game was aimed at 12 – 15 year olds, an age where people began to develop ideas regarding refugees and similar issues.

In Against All Odds, the player takes the role of a refugee, and plays through twelve stages – depicting his persecution and flight from his native country, through to eventual integration into a foreign country as an asylum seeker.

In awarding a prize in Austria, a jury said this, according to wikipedia:

The jury praised the game for building understanding, empathy and concern for the plight of refugees in the player

Swedish young teens have had eight years of this indoctrination—-do you think it worked there?  See here and here.

Britain plagued by immigrant welfare “tourists”

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

What can you expect when a country is larded over with one program after another to help the so-called downtrodden?  In the US, we too have increasingly developed and expanded programs for the destitute—I’m thinking specifically of food stamps and medicare/medicaid (Obamacare!)—where some sharp ‘entrepreneur’ has figured out, or will figure out, how to game the system.

Remember those NHS dancing nurses in the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics? Was it one colossal advertisement to the world—come on over for your free healthcare!

Here are two stories from the UK over the last week that tell us how ‘out of control’ things are there.  The second story reports on attempts by Parliament to rein-in “health tourism” by immigrants who are arriving illegally to get benefits from Britain’s great attraction—its National Health Service.

From the UK Telegraph (“Gang flew in benefit tourists!”):

An immigrant gang flew in scores of ‘benefit tourists’ to Britain, setting them up with houses and jobs, so they could steal hundreds of thousands of their tax credits.

A family of immigrants posed as interpreters to fly benefit tourists over to Britain so they could steal their tax credits, cheating HMRC out of £500,000.

The group flew in people from Eastern Europe and set them up in a house and low-paid job in exchange for their tax credits, which they pocketed.

Sisters Iveta and Magdalena Ferkova, 32 and 33, along with their aunt Alena Lackova, 39, and her husband Jan Lacko, 29, organised National Insurance numbers and housing to complete the scam over two years.

They managed to steal £500,000 in tax credits from HMRC, posing as interpreters for the workers they flew over when doing interviews in banks and at job centres.

All four were found guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud by making false representations.

Read it all.

And, here Parliament is considering a new law to restrict health tourism!

From Catholic Online:

LONDON, UK (Catholic Online) – If you are a foreigner visiting England, be prepared to show proof of citizenship before being given a NHS number, the item you need to receive free health services in the country.

A bill designed to cut down on health tourists and illegal immigration has been presented to Parliament as part of a package designed to crack down on people who are residing in the country illegally.

According to the bill, doctors will first have to check the immigration status of a patient who does not have a NHS number before they are authorized to provide treatment. Naturally, the proposal has doctors, among others upset. Doctors resent that they could be forced to participate in immigration enforcement.

Others say that healthcare should be provided no matter what. Defenders of the bill say that emergency care is still ensured.

England has become a destination for health tourists, foreigners who travel to the country to have procedures done for various reasons. These health tourists then receive the benefits of the national healthcare system but without having to pay any of the costs. To break down this practice, Parliament would pass a law that would ensure they must pay to access the system.

Pay attention America!