Sunday, December 27, 2015

Islamic invasion of Europe update (December 27, 2015)



Austrian police say European capitals have been warned of possible attack
VIENNA (Reuters) - Vienna police said on Saturday a "friendly" intelligence service had warned European capitals of the possibility of a shooting or bomb attack before New Year, prompting police across the continent to increase security measures.

"Several possible names of potential attackers were mentioned, which were checked, and the investigation based on (these checks) has so far yielded no concrete results," Vienna police said in a statement, some six weeks after 130 people were killed in Islamist bombing and shooting attacks in Paris.

"In the days before Christmas a warning was sent out by a friendly (intelligence) service to numerous European capitals, saying that it could come to an attack involving explosives or a shooting between Christmas and the New Year in crowded spaces."

The police asked Austrians for their understanding of the need for more security controls.

Extra steps include surveillance in crowded spaces, "especially at events and traffic hubs" as well as intensive identity checks and higher alertness for objects which could carry explosives such as bags or "bicycle frames", it said.

Vienna police were not immediately available for further comment.

A spokesman for the German Interior Ministry said it did not comment on particular situations for operational reasons.

"Germany is still in the crosshairs of Jihadist terrorism," he said, adding the country had reviewed and adapted its security measures, where necessary, following the Paris attacks.




Bosnia - European ISIS stronghold no one’s talking about
The number one European supplier of ISIS fighters is not France, the U.K. or Germany … it’s Bosnia.

John Schindler, a former counter intelligence officer for the National Security Agency, describes on his 20 Committee blog how Bosnia-Herzegovina, a small Balkan country in Eastern Europe, has supplied more fighters to ISIS per capita than any other European country.


According to Schindler, “the country [Bosnia-Herzegovina], as I recently explained about Canada, is considered something of a ‘safehouse’ for radicals, a permissive environment for their clandestine activities, and terrorism committed there is considered off-message by both ISIS and Al-Qa’ida.”

“Western intelligence places the number of Bosniaks (i.e. Bosnian Muslims) who have gone abroad to fight with ISIS around 300,” Schindler, currently a national security contributor at Observer.com, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. Though 300 may not seem like much, it should be noted that the entire country’s population numbers around 3.8 million, of which approximately 1.82 million are Muslim.

Bosnia-Herzegovina is located just to east of Italy across the Adriatic sea. The population of the Balkan country is highly diverse and includes a 48 percent plurality of Bosniak Muslims, 32 percent Serbs and around 15 percent Croats. The Ottoman Empire brought Islam to the region centuries ago and held the area until it was annexed by the Austro-Hungarian empire. The country existed as part of Yugoslavia throughout most of the 20th century until it proclaimed independence in 1992 after the fall of the Soviet Union.

Following shortly, the Bosnian war erupted with the Muslim Bosniaks and Croats pitted against the Bosnian Serbs. The Bosnian Serbs were supported by Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic and would eventually conduct ethnic cleansing of the Bosniaks and Croats.

When asked why Bosnia has become a hotbed of ISIS support, Schindler says: “Salafi radicals built a strong infrastructure in Bosnia beginning in the early 1990’s, thanks to both Saudi and Iranian money and assistance, and now there is a robust, self-sustaining radical infrastructure in the country.” Salafism is a radical fundamentalist Sunni Muslim movement that has influenced several jihadists. Given the violent history of ethnic tension in the region, it comes as no surprise that Bosnia would be a ripe target for ISIS recruitment.

“[ISIS support] is aided by Bosnia’s incredibly serious socio-economic problems — youth unemployment exceeds 50% and the cumbersome political system, put in place by the West 20 years ago, is impervious to reform,” explains Schindler.

Scindler’s point on Bosnia comes as the country today engaged in what has been called ‘Operation CUT’, a series of raids against suspected ISIS supporters, particularly around the town of Sarajevo.

More...

Germany recruits 8,500 teachers for child refugees
Berlin (AFP) - Germany has recruited 8,500 people to teach child refugees German, as the country expects the number of new arrivals to soar past the million mark in 2015, Die Welt daily reported Sunday.

With some 196,000 children fleeing war and poverty entering the German school system this year, 8,264 "special classes" have been created to help the new arrivals catch up with their peers, Die Welt said, citing a survey carried out in 16 German federal states.

"Some 8,500 additional teachers have been recruited nationwide," the daily said.

According to Germany's education authority, 325,000 school-age children reached the EU country in 2015, amid Europe's worst migration crisis since World War II.

Germany expects over a million asylum seekers this year, which is five times more than in 2014 and has put a strain on its ability to provide services to all the newcomers.

"Schools and education administrations have never been confronted with such a challenge," Brunhild Kurth, who heads the education authority, told Die Welt.

"We must accept that this exceptional situation will become the norm for a long time to come."












Posted by Watcher at 12/27/2015 05:12:00 PM | | E-mail this article

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