Category: Africa

Norway: Failed asylum seeker slaughters three innocent people on rural bus

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment
19-year-old Margaret Molland Sanden knifed to death by Sudanese man along with two other innocent men, one the bus driver, in rural Norway.

And, believe it or not, it’s not the first time an African migrant killed a Norwegian on the same bus line!

Writing at Limits to Growth, blogger Brenda Walker alerted us to the sickening news.

She begins her post:

The Refugee Industrial Complex wants us to believe that asylum seekers are poor little waifs who need the help of the too-rich West. But some of the demanding refugee crowd are dangerous characters, as was demonstrated recently in rural Norway, where a knife-wielding Sudanese man murdered three on a bus after he had been refused asylum.

We are directed to the news in The Local on November 4th:

The 31-year-old,  who was living at an asylum reception centre in Årdal,  was due to be deported to Spain on Tuesday, after having his application rejected in June.

“This person had applied for asylum, and come to Norway in April,” a spokesman for Norway’s immigration directorate said. “He was rejected in June, and was supposed to be returned to Spain under the so-called Dublin Regulation.”

The reference here to the Dublin Regulation refers to the EU policy put in place about ten years ago to try to reduce the number of asylum shoppers who land in one country and then ‘make their way’ to another country within the EU that is more to their liking.

The man is accused of killing the bus driver, Arve Haug Bagn (55) and Margaret Molland Sanden, a 19-year-old biotechnology student at the Oslo and Akerhus University College of Applied Sciences. The third victim,  a Swedish man in his 50s, has not been named.

[….]

The bus, the Valdres Express, travels the four-hour journey from the mountainous region of Valdres to Oslo , nd was hijacked between the towns of Årdal and Tyin in Sogn og Fjordane county.

The attack marks the second time the Valdres Express has been hijacked. In 2003, it was hijacked by a mentally disturbed 26-year-old Ethiopian man who stabbed the driver to death.

There is a follow-up story yesterday, also at The Local which brings up the subject of Anders Breivik in relation to the slow police response to the bus slaughter.  Readers will remember that Breivik’s main beef (which the anti-free speech Norwegians never let him vent, until they were forced to hear it in his murder trial) when he went on his slaughter spree of children of Norway’s Leftists, was that African and Middle Eastern immigration was killing Norway.

Police said the man suspected of hijacking a bus on Monday evening, killing all on board, was a 30-year-old asylum seeker from South Sudan whose application had been rejected and who was due to be deported.

[….]

Fire fighters and medical personnel were first to arrive on the scene,  ahead of police, and used a fire extinguisher to disable him.  [A fire extinguisher!—what else in the land of no guns!—imagine how things might have been different if that poor bus driver had a gun!—ed]

[….]

That fact has re-awakened criticism of the police which surfaced after the brutal massacre carried out by the right wing extremist Anders Behring Breivik on July 21, 2011.

[….]

Breivik killed 69 young Labour Party members on the island of Utøya on a 75-minute shooting rampage which was preceded by a bomb attack killing eight in central Oslo.

Then much to my shock, The Local has the audacity, the poor judgement!, to post a sidebar story also yesterday entitled ‘Ten Things Norwegians do that annoy Foreigners.’   Be sure to look at the trivial ten!

In fairness now, they should publish ‘Ten things foreigners do that annoy Norwegians.’

No 1:  Killing our beautiful girls on buses!

I won’t hold my breath!

Addendum:  If any one sees more news on this in which the religious affiliation of the murderer is identified, let us know (I won’t hold my breath on that either!).

Our lengthy Norway archive is here.

Israel: Maybe Netanyahu could teach Obama how to build a border fence!

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment
Israel’s southern fence (from The Guardian)

Israel is planning another major border fence project to thwart a possible “invasion” of Syrians from Jordan via the West Bank (and for other reasons).   According to Albawaba.com :

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he intends to build a separation barrier between the West Bank and Jordan after completing walls on the Egyptian and Syrian borders, according to a report by the Israeli newspaper Maariv on Sunday.

Netanyahu plans to construct the wall in order to send a message to Palestinians who oppose Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley, the report says.

The wall will also guarantee continued Israeli control of the border crossing, Netanyahu reportedly said.

He added that the thousands of Syrian refugees in Jordan pose a threat to Israeli security, the article continues. The wall would protect Israeli settlements from possible invasion.

A spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told Ma’an that new construction plans are a clear message from the Israeli government to the United States “declaring the failure of the peace talks.”

As we have reported many times on these pages, Israel was being invaded by Africans coming across its border with Egypt, but a sturdy fence has slowed that migration to near zero.

See our entire category on ‘Israel and refugees’ by clicking here.

Lutherans resettle 10,095 refugees in US in FY2013

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

What do you think the odds are that a paper like the Sacramento Bee would publish a press release from us verbatim as if its a news story?   Zip, zero, nada!    However, if what a refugee resettlement CONTRACTOR says (because they are good people) is published with nary a critical commentary.

LIRS CEO Hartke: In FY2014 we are focusing on bringing Tutsis to your towns!

Here is most of a press release from Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services (LIRS) published today in a paper near you!  LIRS is one of nine major federal contractors resettling refugees, but note (LOL!) they still call them “voluntary agencies.”

Headline is:  LIRS Helps U.S. Reach Refugee Admissions Target for First Time Since 1980  (emphasis is mine):

WASHINGTON, Oct. 31, 2013 — /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS) resettled over 10,000 refugees in fiscal year 2013, thereby contributing, as America’s second-largest resettlement agency, to the United States reaching its refugee admissions target for the first time since 1980.

“LIRS has resettled 10,095 refugees in 2013, including many refugee kids who arrived without a parent or guardian and in desperate need of protection and human care,” said Terry Abeles, LIRS Director for Refugee Resettlement. “This achievement comes as we approach our 75th anniversary in 2014, and marks an important new milestone in a history in which we’ve helped nearly 400,000 refugees rebuild their lives.”  

[Readers, up until 1980 they may have helped refugees out of Christian charity, today they receive millions of taxpayer dollars to bring immigrants to your towns and they hope to have even a larger clientele when (if!) Comprehensive Immigration Reform becomes law.—ed]

“LIRS is proud to have worked with our outstanding affiliates to play a key role in the nationwide effort that brought 69,930 refugees to safety and new lives in the United States in fiscal year 2013,” said Abeles. “That number is nearer to the authorized ceiling – 70,000 in 2013 – than in any year since 1980.”

“Reaching this threshold demonstrates this Administration’s efforts to create a refugee admissions program that meets the important security screening standards required by the American people and the growing humanitarian need,” added Abeles. “Research shows that refugees become successfully employed, tax-paying citizens and contribute in a relatively short period of time to the well-being of the United States.”

In fiscal year 2013, refugees were resettled in 186 communities in 49 states. For FY2014, President Barack Obama has authorized the admission of up to 70,000 refugees. Over 60 nationalities are expected to be admitted, with continued strong arrivals from Iraq, Burma, and Bhutan.

“Thousands of people overseas and across the United States make the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program possible each year,” added Abeles. “Their successes are a testament to the effective partnership between the public and private sectors, and express America’s commitment to being a country of refuge.”

LIRS welcomes refugees and migrants on behalf of The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, and the Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, thereby following God’s call to welcome and lifting up the importance of congregations in the work of welcome.

In the next paragraph they say they are lobbying for “comprehensive immigration reform.”

Check out LIRS’s digs at “Don’t break our rice bowls!”  (LIRS income $31 million and $30 million is from you, the taxpayer!)

Big news from LIRS website!

CEO Linda Hartke says this year they are going to put a focus on bringing Banyamulenge Tutsis from the Democratic Republic of Congo to your towns!

Another 400 plus migrants rescued trying to reach Europe; Fjordman gives us the larger picture

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Here is the news from Oman Daily Observer today.  Those identified in at least a half a dozen boats are Africans and Middle Easterners:

Rome — Italy and Malta were facing a new influx of migrant arrivals yesterday, as over 400 people were rescued from the Strait of Sicily and more boats carrying would-be refugees were spotted in the Mediterranean Sea.

[…..]

Last week European Union leaders pledged “determined action” to prevent more migrant deaths at sea, after two sinkings off Italy and Malta in early October left more than 400 dead.

Two days ago Fjordman (if you don’t follow him you should) has an essay posted at Gates of Vienna (if you don’t follow them you should) about the invasion of Europe entitled:  “The Camp of the Saints and the Golden Dawn.”    If you have not read “The Camp of the Saints” you should!  I continue to be amazed that author, Jean Raspail, saw this all coming 40 years ago!  Fjordman begins with this (emphasis is mine):

The Camp of the Saints is a dystopian novel written by the French author Jean Raspail. Although it was first published as long ago as 1973, the author is still alive today. Now 88 years old, his brain remains remarkably sharp for a man his age.

Raspail has published many books, but the one for which he will be chiefly remembered is ironically his most atypical one. Over forty years ago, The Camp of the Saints predicted a Third World mass invasion of Europe, causing the downfall of Western civilization. This process was compressed in time so that what might take fifty years in real life took fifty days in the book. Also, the main bulk of illegal immigrants in the novel came from India. Today, while immigration to Europe comes from every corner of the planet, much of it comes from the Islamic world and Africa.

Apart from that, the novel was remarkably prescient in describing the dysfunctional mindset of the modern Western world. We have become so wedded to unsustainable humanitarian ideals that we are mentally incapable of defending our own continued national existence. When faced with millions of people coming from the global South, we simply raise a white flag and say that they are welcome to colonize our countries.

Or at least, that’s what our leaders and mass media do. Some of the natives are finally and belatedly starting to get restless about their state-approved ethnic displacement. Is this European awakening coming too late, or does it happen at the very last moment? Only time will tell. Jean Raspail was pessimistic on behalf of his native France in a new interview with him made in 2013.

Read it all!

Now be sure to go to the recent interview the 88-year-old Raspail gave to French magazine Valeurs Actuelles, posted at ‘Islam versus Europe.’  He has much to say about what the Left and multiculturalism have done to France and Western Civilization generally.  Here (below) are just a couple of bits that hit home with me.

Regular readers know we write often about South Africa (the Rainbow Nation!)* as the prime example of a country set up with the idea that Socialism (with something for everyone who wants to come to the country) is somehow the model for the world, but is failing miserably!

Raspail:

All peoples are fascinating but when you mix them too much, it is much more animosity that develops than sympathy. Métissage is never peaceful. It is a dangerous utopia. Look at South Africa!

Raspail:

I don’t believe for an instant that the supporters of immigration are more charitable than me: there probably isn’t a single one of them who intends to welcome one of these unfortunates into his home… all of that’s just an emotional pretence, an irresponsible maelstrom that will engulf us.

There is so much more, read the whole interview.

* Our South Africa archive is here.

Portland, ME: Do African immigrant-entrepreneurs benefit Maine economy?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I don’t know how many times lately I’ve seen stories like this one (especially as the push is on for Congress to get the amnesty bill done), but frankly the premise that immigrants are growing businesses faster and with more success than Americans makes no sense to me.

26-year old Somali woman owns a grocery store in Portland. How many 26-year old Americans have the money to open such an enterprise? Photo Bangor Daily News

How does a Somali with a small grocery or African trinket shop in Portland stay afloat?  Is it done with extensive government supported help like micro-loans, or other special loans?  Is there a little money-transfer operation going on in the back room? I can definitely see how immigrant-owned and managed convenience stores survive by tapping into the lucrative fraud of the Food Stamp program.

But, has someone done a study to back-up this oft-repeated claim that immigrants run stores/restaurants better and with more economic success than Americans?

Here is the story that got me wondering about this again, from the Bangor Daily News (emphasis mine):

PORTLAND, Maine — As the rest of Maine’s business community struggled through the Great Recession and its recovery, one sector of the local economy remained relatively unscathed and could, with the proper support, provide the state with a much-needed economic boost, according to experts.

Maine’s immigrant-owned businesses — situated mostly in the retail and food-service sectors — were for the most part insulated from the effects of the recession because their communities serve as a dedicated customer base, one that continued to grow throughout the recession, according to Charles Colgan, a professor at the University of Southern Maine’s Muskie School of Public Service. Maine’s foreign-born population has grown by 16.5 percent in the last 11 years, according to the Migration Policy Institute.

“They may have played a larger role in the business sector over the last few years than you would think, given the size of the stores and businesses,” Colgan said.

Though hard data isn’t available, Colgan suspects that immigrant-owned businesses in southern Maine’s retail sector are faring better than the state’s retail sector as a whole. He estimates that perhaps half of the newly established small retail businesses in Portland over the last few years may be immigrant-owned.

Immigrant-owned businesses also hold untapped potential that, given the right tools and a concerted effort, could help the state bounce back from the recent economic slump, according to Claude Rwaganje, founder of Community Financial Literacy in Portland.

There is lots more, read it all.

Rwaganje’s Community Financial Literacy is a modest operation taking in about $110,000 annually (Form 990 here).  Rwaganje takes home about half of that in salary and benefits.  Funds come from these donors.

Apparently the Portland Chamber of Commerce is interested in doing a study, but I sure would like to know if anyone (without a political bias!) has done a study of this sort.  Please let me know if you know of such a study!

For new readers:  We have dozens and dozens of posts about Maine.  Just type ‘Maine’ into our search function. But, a 2009 post continues to be one of our most-read posts over the years—-Maine the welfare magnet.