As Kurdish President Announces Resignation, Supporters Storm Parliament With Knives And Guns

Iraqi Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani announced his resignation Sunday after the biggest gamble of his 12 years as president of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) not only failed, but utterly backfired as territorial reversals reduced KRG power to its weakest position in decades. Though his push for an independence referendum had overwhelming support among Iraq"s Kurds, and with even the encouragement of some external allies, the decisive military response by the Iraqi national government resulted in rapid forced handover of Kurdish-held oil rich areas and a return to pre-2014 borders, prior to the blitz by ISIS which aided Kurdish political expansion. Barzani will step down effective November 1. 

And now the future of the KRG is itself under threat as reports of inter-Kurdish fighting emerged Sunday night. Multiple international reports characterized Barzani"s speech as "bitter" and it further appears that violence erupted during or after his televised speech before parliament. During the speech Barzani proclaimed that, "three million votes for Kurdistan independence created history and cannot be erased" while also denouncing rivals who abandoned the fight for Kirkuk as committing "high treason."

His supporters, angry at what is essentially a forced resignation after rival Kurdish factions failed to oppose Iraqi national forces as they advanced in Kirkuk and other areas earlier this month, reportedly stormed parliament brandishing knives sticks, and guns. There are also unverified reports emerging that opposition party members were attacked during the chaos, as well as arson attacks on opposition offices in various parts of Erbil. 

According to a statement described as an "urgent message" to the international community from the Speaker of Kurdistan Parliament, Yousif Mohammed Sadiq, we could be witnessing the start of a broader breakdown in security in Erbil: "We are gravely concerned about the attack on Kurdistan Parliament Building today by a number of rioters with utter disregard for all human values and at the encouragement of a political party without any attempt by the security forces to prevent them." 

Barzani supporters storm Iraqi Kurdish parliament as he announces his resignation. There were reports of wounded among Erbil opposition politicians and some media staff on Sunday. 

 

As Barzani steps down, chaos in Kurdistan parliament as a KDP mob attack opposition media by sticks, knife, may attack opposition MPs too. pic.twitter.com/Umt2f4wbwB

— Abdulla Hawez (@abdullahawez) October 29, 2017

A Gorran MP was attacked by unknown individuals for criticizing Barzani during a presser he held at the Parliament moments ago. pic.twitter.com/NAtpyTvNqq

— Rawaz Tahir (@TahirRawaz) October 29, 2017

More people armed with AK47 just arrived shouting “our president is Barzani “ #Kurdistan #Iraq pic.twitter.com/2MHMRJW6rF

— Fazel Hawramy (@FazelHawramy) October 29, 2017

Barzani supporters blame the recent disastrous KRG territorial losses on the Kurdish opposition party PUK, whose fighters generally allowed the previous advance of Iraqi forces after Baghdad ordered the pacification of Kirkuk city. The PUK has admitted that it reached agreement with the Iraqi military even as fighters representing Barzani"s Kuristan Democratic Party (KDP) continued to battle. For this reason the KDP Peshmerga accused PUK factions which refused to fight of “plotting” against the Kurds and committing “a great and historic treason.”

For the Kurds, the non-existent to lukewarm support for the referendum among international powers was the latest (and perhaps greatest) in a long list of historic betrayals. According to Kamal Alam, a Middle East analyst for the Royal United Services Institute the Kurds "overstretched and one cannot help but feel sorry for them" as they were effective fighters against ISIS after the Iraqi army all but disappeared from some parts of the country. 

Alam told BBC World Service radio in an interview late last week, "But they were warned not to do this referendum by both Baghdad and Turkey and they were hoping to capitalize on the disagreements between Ankara and Baghdad, but it seems the referendum brought both the two capitals together to work against Kurdish dominance." And he added "they thought that a hundred year wrong which had been done to them would be corrected and they were perhaps given some assurances in some Western capitals that this time we won"t let you down - you saw loads of Western officials say it and write about it... they have been let down again and now they"ll have to just stay with what they have."

As the Iraqi Kurdish independence project has now resulted in failure, it will be interesting to see how this impacts developments in Syrian Kurdish areas across the Iraqi and Turkish borders - no doubt the example of Iraq has now provided further incentive for the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF, whose core component is the Kurdish YPG) to go to the negotiating table with Syria and Russia, in the hope of retaining some kind of autonomous or federalized union with Damascus, as opposed to all-out war, which would result in being squeezed by Turkey from the north and Damascus from the south.

“The Entire White Race Is Violent”: BBC Proudly Airs Transgenders Attack On All White People

In yet another obvious example of a mainstream news outlet pushing racial divide throughout the world, the BBC recently gave a platform to openly anti-white transgender model Munroe Bergdorf who asserted that the entire white race is violent during a disgusting tirade against white people as a whole.

Amazingly, Bergdorf initially gained notoriety after another anti-white rant that forced the company L’Oreal to end its working relationship with her. Despite this fact, Bergdorf, and the BBC by extension, decided to once again stoke the racial divide in an interview that has many people furious at the national broadcaster for airing it in the first place.

Appearing on BBC This Week, Bergdorf doubled down on her attacks, claiming that the United Kingdom was a “deeply racist society” that had “built its success on the enslavement of non-white people.”

“The uncomfortable truth is that the white race is the most violent and oppressive force of nature on earth” @MunroeBergdorf in #bbctw film pic.twitter.com/TePO0S1RhX

— BBC This Week (@bbcthisweek) October 12, 2017

Bergdorf then went on to claim that white people do not learn racism, rather they are born with it automatically.

“If white people want to see an improvement for people of color, they need to understand that racism is not learned, it is inherited and either consciously or unconsciously passed down through privilege,” she claims in what amounts to declaring that in order to fight racism, all white people must first declare themselves racist regardless of their actual reality and life experiences.

She then gets to the crux of her argument which is seemingly that white people as a whole are the devil that must be stopped.

“The uncomfortable truth is that the white race is the most violent and oppressive force of nature on earth,” she continued before concluding with her worry that it is “too late” to do anything about it.

Comments such as those by Bergdorf are not only openly racist, they can also actually help real racists by providing source material for white supremacist organizations to claim that the left is pushing “white genocide.”

One has to wonder, why would the BBC allow this to be aired when the only thing it could possibly do is further stoke racial animosity amid an already tense situation?

Divide and conquer anyone?

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Author: Alex Thomas
Views: Read by 213 people
Date: October 13th, 2017
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"It's Really Hard In China" - Sex Doll Rental Business Withdraws From Market After Just A Week

As we warned over the weekend, when we first learned of Beijing"s new sex doll rental business, China"s sharing economy may have just jumped the shark.

Now, just 4 days later, after its business model elicited a flood of complaints and criticism, Chinese company Ta Qu – or “Touch” in English – has announced that it will close its week-old sex-doll rental business, inspiring budget-focused silicon slammers in the world’s second-largest economy to issue a collective groan.

Touch began offering five different sex doll types for daily or longer-term rent last Thursday in Beijing. But according to the BBC,“it quickly drew complaints and criticism.”

The company said in a statement on Weibo that it "sincerely apologized for the negative impact" of its business model.

But the company added that sex is "not vulgar" and said it would keep working towards more people enjoying it. The company said it had generated “a lot of interest and requests” during its short-lived run.

Unfortunately for entrepreneurs hoping to enter China’s thriving sex-toy industry, the company noted that succeeding in that industry “is really hard in China.”

"We prepared ten dolls for the trial operation," a company spokesperson said via email, adding that they received very positive feedback from users.

"But it"s really hard in China," the firm wrote, saying there had been a lot of controversy with the police over the issue.

The company had offered the sex dolls for a daily fee of 298 yuan (about $50), according to Chinese media. It also sells an array of sex toys and dolls, according to the BBC.

Here"s what that would"ve bought you:

In its Weibo statement, the firm said its original intention had been to make expensive silicone dolls more affordable but conceded that the service triggered a heated public debate. The company also said it would pay out compensation to users worth double the amount they had paid as a deposit for reserving a doll.

The statement added that Touch would in future pay more attention to its "social duty", and would actively promote a "healthier and more harmonious sex lifestyle".

The Chinese app was launched in 2015 as a platform for discussing issues about sex and sexuality before “pivoting” into sales.

As we reported earlier in the week, the company planned to offer five models to choose from: "Greek bikini model," "US Wonder Woman," "Korean housewife," "Russian teenager" and "Hong Kong car race cheerleader." Users can customize the dolls to their liking by picking out hair and eye color, as well as their outfits.

For those asking the obvious question, the company states that it also has hygiene on its mind, as explained by their official policy.

"The dolls" lower parts are changed for every customer," reads the app. "Please remove the lower parts before returning. After the lower parts are cleaned, the doll can be used repeatedly."

The company hoped to capitalize on China’s notorious gender imbalance favoring men, as well as the country’s thriving online gaming culture, which breeds hordes of lonely young men.

Reporter who exposed BBC pedophilia cover-up suddenly dies at 52

Courageous investigative journalist and ex-BBC News correspondent Liz MacKean, 52, who exposed infamous pedophile Jimmy Saville – and ultimately resigned in 2013 over the BBC’s decision to refuse to air her investigation into Saville – has died after suffering a stroke.

Only in 2016 did her investigative work exposing Saville’s rampant molestation of children see the light of day on the BBC, featured as Abused: The Untold Story.

While it was an open secret within the UK corridors of power, it was not yet public knowledge that Saville was a serial child molester, thus MacKean’s investigative work on Saville’s abuse of children would have blown the doors off the UK’s power elite’s dirty secret.

Sadly, the power players in British media worked diligently to cover up the obscene sexually predatory behavior of Saville by not airing MacKean’s expose until after his death. The public only became fully aware of Saville’s rampant pedophilia a year later, after a Panorama documentary on ITV.

Current BBC director of news, James Harding, paid tribute to MacKean saying she had earned a reputation as a “remarkably tenacious and resourceful reporter”.

“In Northern Ireland, she won the trust of all sides and produced some of the most insightful and hard-hitting reporting of the conflict,” he said.

“It was as an investigative reporter that she really shone, shining a light on issues from the dumping of toxic waste off the African coast to Jimmy Savile, the story for which she is probably best known.”

Rather than tempering the growing public awareness of Saville’s crimes against children, the BBC’s decision to attempt to cover-up his crimes by shelving the story only served to make headlines around the world – with the investigation ultimately being recognized by the London Press Club with a scoop of the year award.

According to a report in UK’s Mirror:

In a Panorma special about its handling of the Jimmy Savile scandal in 2012 MacKean explained how former Newsnight editor Peter Rippon was initially excited.
But she adds: “It was an abrupt change in tone from one day ‘excellent, let’s prepare to get this thing on air’ to ‘hold on’.”

MacKean says she was left with the clear impression that Mr Rippon was feeling under pressure.

She wrote to a friend documenting a conversation she had with her boss on November 30 – a month after Savile’s death: “PR [Peter Rippon] says if the bosses aren’t happy [he] can’t go to the wall on this one.”

She tells the programme: “I was very unhappy the story didn’t run because I felt we’d spoken to people who collectively deserved to be heard and they weren’t heard… I felt very much that I’d let them down.”

Interestingly, Mark Thompson, the current CEO of the New York Times, which has often taken to attempting to normalize pedophilia, was Director-General of the BCC at the time, which is considered the most powerful position in the U.K. television industry. Thompson was implicated in attempting to cover-up the open secret of Saville’s rampant molestation of children – a charge which he denies.

A report from the Telegraph succinctly noted the investigative work MacLean undertook to expose Saville’s crimes against children, and the BBC’s attempt to cover-up his crimes:

The Newsnight reporter must have worked so hard to get Karin Ward to talk openly on camera. Karin was one of several girls from Duncroft Approved School who were groomed by Jimmy Savile, with the promise of trips to Top of the Pops. Karin, now 54, had not spoken about her ordeal for 40 years. When MacKean and producer Meirion Jones tracked her down last November, she was suffering from cancer. How the poor woman must have recoiled from the prospect of a gruelling interview in which she would have to reveal shameful acts she had long suppressed. Somehow, MacKean convinced her.

A tenacious and compassionate reporter, MacKean will have done all she could to reassure her fragile witness. Jimmy “Ow’s‑About-That-Then?” Savile was dead and buried. Ward could trust the BBC flagship news programme to bring the truth about his disgusting behaviour into the open. Here, at long last, was her chance to be heard and believed.

As an interviewer myself, I can imagine the relief, even satisfaction, MacKean felt as the camera rolled, and Karin – the girl she once was still visible in that gaunt, sweet face – told of jaunts in Savile’s Rolls, and the sordid fare for those rides. There was one, yet more monstrous memory: 14-year-old Karin was in Savile’s dressing room at the BBC, which was “full of people”, when she saw a second notorious pop pervert having sex with another Duncroft girl.

Shocking hardly begins to cover it. MacKean must have returned to the office feeling confident she had her story. This was not only a scoop, it was a chance to smash the halo of St Jimmy of Television Centre.

So imagine how MacKean felt when she read an email from her Newsnight boss, Peter Rippon: “I think the key is whether we can establish the CPS did drop the case for the reasons the women say. That makes it a better story – our sources so far are just the women and a second-hand briefing.”

Just the women? That is how a senior news executive chose to describe Karin Ward and the other victims who had overcome fear and self-loathing to speak to the BBC. Four decades before, their protests had gone unheard because they were “only girls” from an approved school. Now they were “just the women”. Just the women who, as vulnerable teenagers, had been molested by a peroxide pied piper using the BBC as both cover story and brothel.

Revealing the breadth of the cover up, in a leaked email, MacKean alleged that Newsnight’s editor had implied the witnesses were not really victims:

“He resorts to saying, Well, it was 40 years so, the girls were teenagers, not too young… they weren’t the worst kind of sexual offences, etc.”

Essentially, the BBC turned a blind eye as young girls were seduced by the lure of fame and fortune and groomed into participating in orgies in Saville’s dressing room – yet a senior BBC News executive thinks Saville’s offenses weren’t the “worst kind of sexual offenses, etc.”.

As the Telegraph reported:

After Savile died, a year ago on Monday, a commemorative page was put up on the BBC website. As requested, viewers shared their memories of “Ow’s-About-That-Then” Jimmy – only, instead of a light-entertainment legend, they recalled a dark, devious pervert. The Savile tribute page was hastily removed. Shouldn’t that have been the first sign that celebrations needed to be put on hold?

On Tuesday morning on Radio 4, a spokesman for the Association of People Abused in Childhood said something that cut through the week’s lies and obfuscation to pierce your heart: “Children seldom speak out, and when they do they are rarely believed.”

Liz MacKean did believe. Acting in the very best tradition of BBC journalism, she did her research and found out that Jim had fixed it to escape prosecution. She put together a powerful story that vindicated Savile’s victims and damned their doubters. The fact that the story was not broadcast, as Karin Ward was promised, is a scar on the face of the world’s most trusted broadcaster.

Make no mistake that the power-elite cover for their own, and only through the efforts of diligent investigative journalism are the lies of these power players ever exposed. Sadly, the powers that be continue to sweep the scourge of organized pedophilia under the rug as the UK inquiry, which implicated hundreds of politicians and celebrities, fell apart after the public began to understand the scope and breadth of the UK’s organized pedophilia rings.

Liz MacKean was a true hero for choosing to go up against a system that routinely attempts to hide the crimes of the rich and famous, while marginalizing the child victims into obscurity. Rather than allowing her work to be summarily dismissed as part of a larger cover-up, MacKean took a principled stand and resigned from the organization she had worked for her entire professional life. The world could certainly learn something from the MacKean’s righteous actions.

Via The Free Thought Project

Reporter Who Exposed BBC Pedophilia Cover-Up Suddenly Dies at 52

Courageous investigative journalist and ex-BBC News correspondent Liz MacKean, 52, who exposed infamous pedophile Jimmy Saville – and ultimately resigned in 2013 over the BBC’s decision to refuse to air her investigation into Saville – has died after suffering a stroke.

Only in 2016 did her investigative work exposing Saville’s rampant molestation of children see the light of day on the BBC, featured as Abused: The Untold Story.

While it was an open secret within the UK corridors of power, it was not yet public knowledge that Saville was a serial child molester, thus MacKean’s investigative work on Saville’s abuse of children would have blown the doors off the UK’s power elite’s dirty secret.

Sadly, the power players in British media worked diligently to cover up the obscene sexually predatory behavior of Saville by not airing MacKean’s expose until after his death. The public only became fully aware of Saville’s rampant pedophilia a year later, after a Panorama documentary on ITV.

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Current BBC director of news, James Harding, paid tribute to MacKean saying she had earned a reputation as a “remarkably tenacious and resourceful reporter”.

“In Northern Ireland, she won the trust of all sides and produced some of the most insightful and hard-hitting reporting of the conflict,” he said.

“It was as an investigative reporter that she really shone, shining a light on issues from the dumping of toxic waste off the African coast to Jimmy Savile, the story for which she is probably best known.”

Rather than tempering the growing public awareness of Saville’s crimes against children, the BBC’s decision to attempt to cover-up his crimes by shelving the story only served to make headlines around the world – with the investigation ultimately being recognized by the London Press Club with a scoop of the year award.

According to a report in UK’s Mirror:

In a Panorma special about its handling of the Jimmy Savile scandal in 2012 MacKean explained how former Newsnight editor Peter Rippon was initially excited.
But she adds: “It was an abrupt change in tone from one day ‘excellent, let’s prepare to get this thing on air’ to ‘hold on’.”

MacKean says she was left with the clear impression that Mr Rippon was feeling under pressure.

She wrote to a friend documenting a conversation she had with her boss on November 30 – a month after Savile’s death: “PR [Peter Rippon] says if the bosses aren’t happy [he] can’t go to the wall on this one.”

She tells the programme: “I was very unhappy the story didn’t run because I felt we’d spoken to people who collectively deserved to be heard and they weren’t heard… I felt very much that I’d let them down.”

Interestingly, Mark Thompson, the current CEO of the New York Times, which has often taken to attempting to normalize pedophilia, was Director-General of the BCC at the time, which is considered the most powerful position in the U.K. television industry. Thompson was implicated in attempting to cover-up the open secret of Saville’s rampant molestation of children – a charge which he denies.

READ MORE:  International War & Peace Journalist Found Hanged in Airport Bathroom -- Friends Allege Murder

A report from the Telegraph succinctly noted the investigative work MacLean undertook to expose Saville’s crimes against children, and the BBC’s attempt to cover-up his crimes:

The Newsnight reporter must have worked so hard to get Karin Ward to talk openly on camera. Karin was one of several girls from Duncroft Approved School who were groomed by Jimmy Savile, with the promise of trips to Top of the Pops. Karin, now 54, had not spoken about her ordeal for 40 years. When MacKean and producer Meirion Jones tracked her down last November, she was suffering from cancer. How the poor woman must have recoiled from the prospect of a gruelling interview in which she would have to reveal shameful acts she had long suppressed. Somehow, MacKean convinced her.

A tenacious and compassionate reporter, MacKean will have done all she could to reassure her fragile witness. Jimmy “Ow’s‑About-That-Then?” Savile was dead and buried. Ward could trust the BBC flagship news programme to bring the truth about his disgusting behaviour into the open. Here, at long last, was her chance to be heard and believed.

As an interviewer myself, I can imagine the relief, even satisfaction, MacKean felt as the camera rolled, and Karin – the girl she once was still visible in that gaunt, sweet face – told of jaunts in Savile’s Rolls, and the sordid fare for those rides. There was one, yet more monstrous memory: 14-year-old Karin was in Savile’s dressing room at the BBC, which was “full of people”, when she saw a second notorious pop pervert having sex with another Duncroft girl.

Shocking hardly begins to cover it. MacKean must have returned to the office feeling confident she had her story. This was not only a scoop, it was a chance to smash the halo of St Jimmy of Television Centre.

So imagine how MacKean felt when she read an email from her Newsnight boss, Peter Rippon: “I think the key is whether we can establish the CPS did drop the case for the reasons the women say. That makes it a better story – our sources so far are just the women and a second-hand briefing.”

Just the women? That is how a senior news executive chose to describe Karin Ward and the other victims who had overcome fear and self-loathing to speak to the BBC. Four decades before, their protests had gone unheard because they were “only girls” from an approved school. Now they were “just the women”. Just the women who, as vulnerable teenagers, had been molested by a peroxide pied piper using the BBC as both cover story and brothel.

Revealing the breadth of the cover up, in a leaked email, MacKean alleged that Newsnight’s editor had implied the witnesses were not really victims:

READ MORE:  Assange Exposes the Truth About Corporate Media: "You Are Reading Weaponized Text’

“He resorts to saying, Well, it was 40 years so, the girls were teenagers, not too young… they weren’t the worst kind of sexual offences, etc.”

Essentially, the BBC turned a blind eye as young girls were seduced by the lure of fame and fortune and groomed into participating in orgies in Saville’s dressing room – yet a senior BBC News executive thinks Saville’s offenses weren’t the “worst kind of sexual offenses, etc.”.

As the Telegraph reported:

After Savile died, a year ago on Monday, a commemorative page was put up on the BBC website. As requested, viewers shared their memories of “Ow’s-About-That-Then” Jimmy – only, instead of a light-entertainment legend, they recalled a dark, devious pervert. The Savile tribute page was hastily removed. Shouldn’t that have been the first sign that celebrations needed to be put on hold?

On Tuesday morning on Radio 4, a spokesman for the Association of People Abused in Childhood said something that cut through the week’s lies and obfuscation to pierce your heart: “Children seldom speak out, and when they do they are rarely believed.”

Liz MacKean did believe. Acting in the very best tradition of BBC journalism, she did her research and found out that Jim had fixed it to escape prosecution. She put together a powerful story that vindicated Savile’s victims and damned their doubters. The fact that the story was not broadcast, as Karin Ward was promised, is a scar on the face of the world’s most trusted broadcaster.

Make no mistake that the power-elite cover for their own, and only through the efforts of diligent investigative journalism are the lies of these power players ever exposed. Sadly, the powers that be continue to sweep the scourge of organized pedophilia under the rug as the UK inquiry, which implicated hundreds of politicians and celebrities, fell apart after the public began to understand the scope and breadth of the UK’s organized pedophilia rings.

READ MORE:  Death Rattle of Mainstream Media: Multiple Corporate Outlets Now Labeling Each Other "Fake News"

Liz MacKean was a true hero for choosing to go up against a system that routinely attempts to hide the crimes of the rich and famous, while marginalizing the child victims into obscurity. Rather than allowing her work to be summarily dismissed as part of a larger cover-up, MacKean took a principled stand and resigned from the organization she had worked for her entire professional life. The world could certainly learn something from the MacKean’s righteous actions.

US Urges All Nationals In North Korea To "Depart Immediately", Bans Tourists From Visiting

Dennis Rodman will be disappointed to learn that the US is set to ban all citizens from traveling to North Korea, according to two agencies that operate tours there. Koryo Tours and Young Pioneer Tours said the ban would be announced on 27 July to come into effect 30 days later, the BBC reported. "After the 30-day grace period any US national that travels to North Korea will have their passport invalidated by their government." The ban comes one month after US student Otto Warmbier died following his imprisonment by the Kim regime.

China-based Young Pioneer Tours, which had taken Warmbier to North Korea, and Koryo Tours said the ban will come into force on July 27 - the anniversary of the end of the Korean War - with a 30-day grace period. Koryo Tours added that the Swedish embassy in Pyongyang, which handles consular affairs for the United States in the North, informed it of the ban, but did not say how long it would last. The U.S. embassy in the South Korean capital, Seoul, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Rowan Beard said that the 30-day grace period would "give leeway for any [Americans] currently in the country as tourists or on humanitarian work". Simon Cockerill, of Koryo Tours, said: "It remains to be seen what the exact text is, but the indication is it"s just a straight up ban on Americans going." Mr Cockerill told the BBC the agency would still conduct tours and take Americans until the ban came into effect.

Additionally, Rowan Beard of Young Pioneer Tours, told the BBC the embassy was urging all US nationals to depart immediately. He said the embassy was trying to check on the number of US tourists left in the country.

For now there has been no official confirmation from the US: the state department continues to have an alert dated 9 May strongly warning US citizens not to travel to North Korea.

As the BBC adds, there has been movement towards a ban for a while in the US, which increased with the Warmbier death.

In May, two congressmen introduced the North Korea Travel Control bill to cut off the foreign currency the country earns from American tourists. The House foreign affairs subcommittee is scheduled to take up the draft legislation on 27 July but it would still have to go to the Senate. So there could be an executive order. Last month, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said: "We have been evaluating whether we should put some type of travel visa restriction to North Korea. We have not come to a final conclusion, but we are considering it." Apart from the treatment of Americans in North Korea, tension has been increasing over Pyongyang"s nuclear programme.

Some are suggesting the US is using the date the ban is set to be announced - 27 July - to cloud North Korea"s Victory Day on the same day. It was not clear if the urge to clear out US citizens from North Korea is a precursor to more "aggressive" (or kinetic) action by the US government.

UK Police Confirm Manchester Suicide Bomber Was Salman Abedi, Son Of Libyan Refugees

Confirming what CBS reported earlier today, UK police and Whitehall officials said that the suspected bomber who killed at least 22 people is 22-year-old Salman Abedi (or Salman Ramadan Abedi) from a family of Libyan origin. Abedi had not been identified by the coroner so no further details would be given, Greater Manchester Police said.

Born in Manchester in 1994, the second youngest of four children his parents were Libyan refugees who came to the UK to escape the Gaddafi regime. His parents were both born in Libya but appear to have emigrated to London before moving to the Fallowfield area of south Manchester where they have lived for at least ten years according to the Telegraph.

They had three sons in total and a daughter, who is now 18-years-old. Abedi grew up in the Whalley Range area, just yards from the local girl"s high school, which hit the headlines in 2015 when twins and grade A pupils, Zahra and Salma Halane, who were both aspiring medical students, left their homes and moved to Isil controlled Syria.

There were unconfirmed reports in Manchester that the whole family apart from the two elder sons recently returned to Libya.

Abedi was named by Greater Manchester Chief Constable Ian Hopkins on Tuesday.

Manchester Police Chief Hopkins said: “Our priority, along with the police counter terrorism network and our security partners, is to continue to establish whether he was acting alone or working as part of a wider network.”

Authorities say they are trying to determine if suspect Salman Abedi was "acting alone or working as part of a wider network." pic.twitter.com/NhcrpxeyOZ

— CBS News (@CBSNews) May 23, 2017

According to the FT, police launched raids across the south of Manchester on Tuesday as authorities tried to establish whether the suicide bomber who killed at least 22 people, including children, in the terrorist attack on a concert arena was working alone.  The hunt has initially focused on three adjoining neighbourhoods in the city’s southern districts. Greater Manchester Police said they had raided two addresses in Whalley Range and Fallowfield, where they also carried out a controlled explosion. Forensic investigators could be seen at one of the addresses searching for clues.

Armed officers also arrested a 23-year-old man in connection with the attack, swooping on the suspect outside a Morrison’s supermarket in nearby Chorlton. It is unclear whether the arrest was related to either of the raids.

All three areas are ethnically diverse and popular places to live for students. Manchester is the biggest university city in the UK outside of London.

Earlier on Tuesday, Isis claimed responsibility for the attack, although the jihadi group has in the past taken credit for terror incidents that were later found to be unconnected. Dan Coats, the US director of national intelligence, said Isis’s role had yet to be confirmed, adding: “They claim responsibility for virtually every attack.”

UK Police said the attacker died in the explosion, which left 59 people in hospital with injuries. The device, which detonated just after 10.30pm on Monday, appeared to have been packed with metal objects to maximise its lethality. Witnesses at the scene described finding nuts and bolts on the floor near the blast.

Another priority noted by the police will be to establish whether any further linked attacks or copycat incidents are planned. It is likely that the bomber"s communications will form a significant part of the inquiry, while investigators will also be checking if he was known to authorities in any way.

One area of focus will be examining the remnants of the device used in the attack as officers work to establish whether the perpetrator built it himself or had help. As well as seeking to identify any potential accomplices in Britain, authorities will also be looking into the possibility of any link to international groups. In the first hours after an attack on this scale investigators were sifting through a number of theories as they work to settle on the most likely lines of inquiry.

Commentators also pointed out that the Manchester attack took place on the fourth anniversary of the killing of Fusilier Lee Rigby in Woolwich, south-east London. Chris Phillips, the former head of the National Counter Terrorism Security Office, told BBC Radio Four"s Today programme: "That may be significant as well."

CNN Covers Up Genocidal Crimes of U.S.-Backed Syrian Rebels

(MPN) Damascus — This week, Syria saw one of its most deadly attacks against civilians fleeing al-Qaeda-held areas in Al-Fu’ah and Kafrayah through a government-rebel civilian swap. Rebels targeted and killed 126 people, including dozens of women and children, after a blast hit a convoy of evacuee buses Saturday.

The evacuees, all of whom were Muslim Shiites, were scheduled to be bussed from the al-Nusra-Front-dominated Idlib Province as part of an evacuation deal between the rebels and the government of President Bashar al-Assad.

Strangely, the fact that the victims targeted in the blast were all Muslim Shiites was either outright ignored by the media or construed as proof that they were “pro-Assad,” a term that much of the mainstream media uses as a pejorative.

The rebels in Idlib, where the bombing took place, have been proven to be aligned entirely with the al-Nusra Front – otherwise known as al-Qaeda’s Syrian branch. This group and their associates have a specific interest in carrying out attacks against Muslim Shiites, whom they consider to be heretics along with Syria’s Christian minority and the Druze.

This genocidal ideology, which has manifested itself repeatedly through the actions of terrorist groups and rebels active in the Syrian opposition, owes to the extreme Wahhabi leanings of these groups, which seek to unite Syria under their particular brand of extreme political ideology. Said differently, many of these extremist rebels seek to create a politically-motivated theocracy that parallels that of the Saudi Arabian government. This would only include Wahhabis and extremist Sunnis who share their ideology – supplanting Syria’s secular government, which has allowed a multiplicity of faiths to flourish without fear of state persecution.

Despite their supposed commitment to “democracy” and self-determination in Syria, the media outlets that support the regime-change narrative promoted by foreign governments have conveniently omitted these facts from their coverage. For instance, Al Jazeera, funded by the Daesh (ISIS) and rebel-supporting Qatari government, refused to even mention the fact that the victims were Muslim Shiites, as well as omitting the fact that the attack occurred in al-Qaeda territory – even going so far as to imply that the attack was perpetrated by the Syrian government.

Al Jazeera was by no means alone in twisting the facts. The BBC, funded by the pro-Syrian opposition British government, also insinuated that Assad’s forces were to blame for the attack, even claiming that the attack “would not be in the rebels’ interest” despite the fact that extremist Syrian rebels have been calling for the massacre of all Muslim Shiites in Syria for years and that even the U.S. government has admitted that anti-Assad groups, particularly Daesh, are committing acts of genocide against those of different faiths.

In addition, most mainstream media coverage – from CNN to the Huffington Post – has concluded that there was “no evidence” that rebels were involved in the attack or that no one could be blamed as “no group had claimed responsibility.”

CNN went on to dehumanize the Syrian victims fleeing al-Qaeda as Assad supporters just because they were Muslim Shiites, and described the attack as a “hiccup.”

Rebel suicide attack kills over 100 civilians in Syria.
CNN reports “dozens of supporters of Assad” killed in a “hiccup”. pic.twitter.com/hUhFsCXlW9

— Lina Arabi 🇰🇵 (@LinaArabii) April 16, 2017

One BBC correspondent completely dismissed al-Qaeda and described the bus attack as a false flag attack perpetrated by Assad’s government.

BBC correspondent blames yesterday’s slaughter of Shia on Assad false flag, says Al Qaeda wouldn’t do such a thing https://t.co/S75ZLrwyzG

— Mark Ames (@MarkAmesExiled) April 16, 2017

These news outlets failed to mention that al-Nusra Front rebels have been caught before burning civilian evacuation buses while also casting doubt on the accounts of Syrian government sources that blamed a suicide car bomber for the most recent attack. However, these same outlets had no problem condemning Assad for the early April chemical gas attack that occurred in the same province, despite the fact that Assad’s government never claimed responsibility and that evidence has emerged calling the details of the attack into question.

Also dubious is the mainstream media’s continual reliance on only two sources of information from inside Syria – the White Helmets and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). As MintPress News has reported in the past, the White Helmets are a mercenary-founded and Western government-funded group that collaborates with the al-Nusra Front on a regular basis and has even facilitated street executions of civilians despite their “humanitarian” image.

SOHR, in contrast, consists of just one man: the vehemently anti-Assad Rami Abdul-Rahman, who lives in the United Kingdom. Abdul-Rahman’s “sources” in Syria, from which he receives his information regarding the war, are anonymous and never recorded – thus making them completely unverifiable.

Since the Syrian conflict began over six years ago, most media coverage of the war – particularly that of news organizations from Western and pro-regime change nations – has been noticeably slanted in favor of rebel groups funded and armed by proxy nations with the interest of ousting the Assad government.

Through selective reporting, the omission of key facts and reliance on dubious sources of information, including Western NGOs and rebel groups operating alongside the Al-Nusra Front, these media outlets have sought to twist the facts and whitewash crimes committed by the rebels while ignoring their agenda of ethnically cleansing Syria of anyone who refuses to follow their extremist Wahhabi political ideology. In the process, the media has colored the Syrian crises through a false narrative of Sunni survival against a power-hungry Alawite Syrian government and expanding Shiite Iran – a narrative that was manufactured by the rebels and their proxy nations to justify their insurgency.

Through this sectarian lens, rebels are using a “divide and conquer agenda” supported by the proxy nations that are arming them to target Muslim Shiites, Muslim Sunnis, Arab Christians, Druze, Zoroastrians and other minorities in their fight to destabilize Syria, spread sectarianism and drive the nation into a civil war in order to weaken and eventually oust the Assad government.

The media has worked to flip the narrative to glorify the rebels and frame any atrocities committed by them as having been perpetrated by the Syrian government. The BBC, Al Jazeera and CNN are the most prominent examples.

Such disparities have been commonplace over the past several years. The last month alone has been particularly telling of the mainstream media’s refusal to value the lives of innocent civilians equally, instead only choosing to cover the deaths of civilians in Syria when it supports the long-standing regime change agenda targeting Assad.

Arguably the most dramatic geopolitical event of the year took place earlier this month, when U.S. President Donald Trump chose to bomb Syrian government forces, an act of alleged retaliation for a still-unconfirmed chemical gas attack in al-Qaeda-held Idlib. The attack killed an estimated 58 civilians, including nearly a dozen children. The gas attack received non-stop media coverage, largely because it served as a convenient pretext to further vilify Assad and justify U.S.-led unilateral military action within Syria.

However, higher civilian death counts that resulted from U.S.-led coalition airstrikes went largely uncovered and failed to generate the same level of outrage among these same media outlets, even though they took place just weeks prior.

Considering this, it is no small wonder that viewership and popularity of the mainstream media have reached a historic low, given their propensity to overlook journalistic standards and even manipulating tragedies to sell a particular narrative – whether true or false – to their audiences.

By Whitney Webb / Republished with permission / MintPress News / Report a typo