About 30 protesters from the Bulgarian nationalist party VMRO have rallied during a conference of the Jehovah's Witnesses in Sofia, which was guarded by three times as many policemen.
The tight security measures appear to have been taken after after tensions ran high between VMRO and the Jehovah's Witnesses in the recent months, including hand-to-hand clashes in Burgas at one point.
Saturday's protest of the nationalists against Jehovah's Witnesses, who held their conference in the Studentski Grad quarter, where the dormitories of Sofia universities are located, ended without clashes.
According to Angel Dzhambazki, Deputy Chair of VMRO, as cited by news.bg, the participants in the conference are about 200-300 people brought to Sofia by buses, and including primarily "foreign preachers who don't speak Bulgarian and are trying to attract to their sect primarily young and unstable people."
He believes that the Jehovah's Witnesses are blackmailing the Bulgarian government, and said that when the organization was registered in Bulgaria, it signed an agreement with the authorities that it will not try to persuade people not to donate blood or organs.
"However, the Jehovah's Witnesses are continuing to preach these ideas at every religious gathering they make. After you have predicted the end of the world five times, and it didn't happen, there must be something wrong with the clock ticking in your head. Such craziness blossoms in a time of crisis when people are faithless, outraged, and poor," Dzhambazki said, while slamming the representatives of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church for driving around in jeeps and wearing expensive watches and massive gold jewelry.
The VMRO protesters said they are rallying against the Jehovah's Witnesses not because the organization is different from Eastern Orthodox Christianity but because they deem their "religious propaganda" dangerous for society by denouncing all national and religious holidays and the respect for national symbols and family values.
Dzhambazki vowed that VMRO will continue to rally until the Jehovah's Witnesses stop preaching their "mad theses". He stressed that the organization has not been registered in a number of EU countries as well as in Turkey, and that there is a reason for that.
Novinite
Sunday, 3 July 2011
Report Warns of Neo-Nazis Disguised as Boy Next Door
The latest annual report on extremism in Germany suggests that neo-Nazis have swapped the skinhead look for a boy-next-door image, making it harder to identify right-wing extremists. Although overall extremist crime is down, the tendency towards violence is increasing -- within both the far left and right.
Germany's far-right is undergoing a transformation that is making it less conspicuous but more dangerous, Germany's Interior Ministry and Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), warn in a new annual report being released on Friday.
The report by the Interior Ministry and BfV, Germany's domestic intelligence agency, found that, in 2010, there were 15,905 politically motivated crimes associated with the far right. The figure represents a 15.2 percent drop compared with the 2009 figure of 18,750 crimes. The number of violent crimes in the same period fell from 891 to 762, a 14.5 percent reduction.
However, the report also found that there was an increasing tendency toward the use of violence. "On the whole," the report concluded, "it is possible to see a rise in the potential for violence as well as in the willingness to employ violence to attain one's political goals." This is particularly the case, the report found, among members of the so-called "autonomous nationalists" of the far right, while the more noticeable skinhead subculture is becoming "increasingly less interesting for right-wing extremist youths."
The fact that the autonomous nationalist -- sometimes also known as the "anarchist nationalists" -- do not wear clothes and other articles publicizing their beliefs makes it considerably more difficult to identify them. Indeed, the report finds that the classic skinhead style -- such as having shaved heads and combat boots -- has become outmoded. "Members of the (far-right) scene instead prefer to wear articles of clothing or brands that orient themselves more toward general trends in youth fashion and that use corresponding lettering or symbols to signal their membership in the scene in a less visible way," the report states.
The report also finds that the number of neo-Nazis has "significantly risen," from 5,000 to 5,600. The BfV puts the total number of far-right extremists at 25,000 out of a total population of around 82 million.
The report also concludes that far-right extremist violence continues to be concentrated in the five eastern states that were part of the former East Germany. While there has been a decrease in the number of far-right crimes in Germany as a whole, the number of far-right crimes in these eastern states has risen; of the 762 total crimes, 304 -- or 40 percent -- were in these five states. When measured as a ratio of crimes to inhabitants, the state of Saxony-Anhalt topped the list of most far-right crimes (67, or 2.8 per 100,000 citizens). It was followed by Brandenburg (66/2.6), Saxony (98/2.3), Thuringia (44, 1.9) and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (29/1.7).
Less but More Violent Left-Wing Violence
When it comes to left-wing extremist violence, though, the report does not find a similar east-west divide. It also notes that there was a year-on-year decrease in the total number of left-wing crimes, from 4,734 to 3,747, or 20.8 percent. Although it cites a corresponding reduction in left-wing violent crimes -- from 1,115 to 944, or 15.3 percent -- the report also finds an increased willingness to use violence on this end of the political extreme, as well.
Spiegel
Germany's far-right is undergoing a transformation that is making it less conspicuous but more dangerous, Germany's Interior Ministry and Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), warn in a new annual report being released on Friday.
The report by the Interior Ministry and BfV, Germany's domestic intelligence agency, found that, in 2010, there were 15,905 politically motivated crimes associated with the far right. The figure represents a 15.2 percent drop compared with the 2009 figure of 18,750 crimes. The number of violent crimes in the same period fell from 891 to 762, a 14.5 percent reduction.
However, the report also found that there was an increasing tendency toward the use of violence. "On the whole," the report concluded, "it is possible to see a rise in the potential for violence as well as in the willingness to employ violence to attain one's political goals." This is particularly the case, the report found, among members of the so-called "autonomous nationalists" of the far right, while the more noticeable skinhead subculture is becoming "increasingly less interesting for right-wing extremist youths."
The fact that the autonomous nationalist -- sometimes also known as the "anarchist nationalists" -- do not wear clothes and other articles publicizing their beliefs makes it considerably more difficult to identify them. Indeed, the report finds that the classic skinhead style -- such as having shaved heads and combat boots -- has become outmoded. "Members of the (far-right) scene instead prefer to wear articles of clothing or brands that orient themselves more toward general trends in youth fashion and that use corresponding lettering or symbols to signal their membership in the scene in a less visible way," the report states.
The report also finds that the number of neo-Nazis has "significantly risen," from 5,000 to 5,600. The BfV puts the total number of far-right extremists at 25,000 out of a total population of around 82 million.
The report also concludes that far-right extremist violence continues to be concentrated in the five eastern states that were part of the former East Germany. While there has been a decrease in the number of far-right crimes in Germany as a whole, the number of far-right crimes in these eastern states has risen; of the 762 total crimes, 304 -- or 40 percent -- were in these five states. When measured as a ratio of crimes to inhabitants, the state of Saxony-Anhalt topped the list of most far-right crimes (67, or 2.8 per 100,000 citizens). It was followed by Brandenburg (66/2.6), Saxony (98/2.3), Thuringia (44, 1.9) and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (29/1.7).
Less but More Violent Left-Wing Violence
When it comes to left-wing extremist violence, though, the report does not find a similar east-west divide. It also notes that there was a year-on-year decrease in the total number of left-wing crimes, from 4,734 to 3,747, or 20.8 percent. Although it cites a corresponding reduction in left-wing violent crimes -- from 1,115 to 944, or 15.3 percent -- the report also finds an increased willingness to use violence on this end of the political extreme, as well.
Spiegel
ROMANIAN PLAN TO WALL OFF ROMA STIRS PROTESTS
Local authorities in Baia Mare, in northwest Romania, have stirred protests by deciding to erect a concrete wall around a block where a large number of Roma/Gypsy people is living, in order to "stop so many crimes from happening" in the area. The almost two-metre wall, stretching 100 metres and costed at around 7,300 euro, will have only one-access way, "so that everything related to the route can be conrolled", Baia Mare's mayor, Catalin Chereches, has said. Chereches stressed that the wall’s purpose is to “make order and discipline people in an turbulent area and also to protect children who should became victims of car accident”.
He added that a police station will be set up near the wall, where police and local Roma can work together “to keep public order under control”, according to media reports. Roma rights advocates oppose the planned measure, describing it as discriminatory and abusive. “This initiative of the authorities in Baia Mare is profoundly discriminatory and leads to Roma ghettoisation and humiliation by subjecting them to degrading treatment”, Romani Criss, a Roma organization, said in a press release. “If implemented, these measures would violate Romanian law, as well as the international human rights standards to which Romania is a party,” it added. Such actions are not isolated, however. Civic organization have documented other cases where local authorities in Romania have violated Roma people's right to decent housing through forced evictions and deliberate residential segregation.
The Roma community in Romania is struggling with discrimination, poor literacy rates and massive unemployment. Its official number is around 550,000, although it is widely believed that there are actually at least twice as many Roma in the country.
Many people of Roma origin do not declare their ethnicity due to the widespread prejudice that they face.
Balkan Insight
He added that a police station will be set up near the wall, where police and local Roma can work together “to keep public order under control”, according to media reports. Roma rights advocates oppose the planned measure, describing it as discriminatory and abusive. “This initiative of the authorities in Baia Mare is profoundly discriminatory and leads to Roma ghettoisation and humiliation by subjecting them to degrading treatment”, Romani Criss, a Roma organization, said in a press release. “If implemented, these measures would violate Romanian law, as well as the international human rights standards to which Romania is a party,” it added. Such actions are not isolated, however. Civic organization have documented other cases where local authorities in Romania have violated Roma people's right to decent housing through forced evictions and deliberate residential segregation.
The Roma community in Romania is struggling with discrimination, poor literacy rates and massive unemployment. Its official number is around 550,000, although it is widely believed that there are actually at least twice as many Roma in the country.
Many people of Roma origin do not declare their ethnicity due to the widespread prejudice that they face.
Balkan Insight
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