Daily Archives: 4. März 2015


04.03.2015 - 23:37 [ RT ]

NYC public schools to close for two Muslim holidays

New York City Public Schools will get two new days off in 2015, as Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the city will incorporate the Muslim holidays of Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha into its academic calendar. It will be the largest US school district to do so.

04.03.2015 - 23:08 [ PressTV ]

Israeli settlers storm al-Aqsa Mosque compound

Palestinian worshipers tried to push them out of the courtyard of the mosque after they approached al-Rahmeh Gates, but the worshipers failed as there was a large number of Israeli police protecting the settlers.

04.03.2015 - 23:05 [ Iran German Radio ]

Ägypten beschlagnahmt Vermögen der Hamas

Nach Einstufung der palästinensischen Widerstandsbewegung Hamas als Terrororganisation in Ägypten wird die ägptische Regierung die Hamas-Mitglieder in diesem Land festnehmen und deren Vermögen beschlagnahmen. Das kündigte Justizminister Mahfouz Saber laut der Webseite „Rai al Youm“ am Mittwoch an.

04.03.2015 - 22:57 [ German Foreign Policy ]

Kein Verzicht

Entsprechend erklärt es die Landsmannschaft in einer „Grundsatzerklärung“ vom vergangenen Wochenende zu ihrem Ziel, die Tschechische Republik solle die gesetzliche Basis der Umsiedlung der Deutschen nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg – die Beneš-Gesetze – nachträglich annullieren.

04.03.2015 - 18:31 [ Friedensblick ]

NSU: Medien verheimlichen Eklat im U-Ausschuss – “kein Vertrauen mehr in die Polizei”

Der NSU-Untersuchungsausschuss des Landtages von Baden Württemberg vernahm eine Reihe von Zeugen zum Mordfall Florian Heilig. Dabei gewann der Ausschuss offenbar Erkenntnisse, die grundsätzlich an der Polizei zweifeln lassen. Der Vorsitzende des Ausschusses, Wolfgang Drexler, sagte: “Es gibt kein Vertrauen mehr in die Polizei”. Deshalb werden vom Ausschuss gesicherte Beweise, Heiligs Laptop und Handy, nicht der Polizei zur Untersuchung ausgehändigt, sondern sollen an die Universität Stuttgart gehen. Nichts davon erfährt die Öffentlichkeit.

04.03.2015 - 18:23 [ Washington Post ]

Big Bang backlash: BICEP2 discovery of gravity waves questioned by cosmologists

(16.5.2014) It was the science story of the year: Astrophysicists held a news conference at Harvard on March 17 announcing that their South Pole telescope had found evidence of gravity waves from the dawn of time.

Cosmology doesn’t get any bigger than this. The discovery was hailed as confirmation of a mind-boggling addendum to the big-bang theory, something called “cosmic inflation” that describes the universe beginning not in a stately expansion but with a brief, exponentially rapid, inflationary spasm.

04.03.2015 - 18:19 [ Christian Science Monitor ]

Monster quasar shines 429 trillion times brighter than the sun

Astronomers have discovered the largest and most luminous black hole ever seen — an ancient monster with a mass about 12 billion times that of the sun — that dates back to when the universe was less than 1 billion years old.

It remains a mystery how black holes could have grown so huge in such a relatively brief time after the dawn of the universe, researchers say.

04.03.2015 - 18:10 [ Keep Talking Greece ]

IMF’s Director Batista: Greek bailout was “to save German & French banks” (video)

This was never said officially before! “They gave money to save German and French banks, not Greece,” Paolo Batista, one of the Executive Directors of International Monetary Fund told Greek private Alpha TV on Tuesday. Batista strongly criticized not only the euro zone and the European Central Bank but also the IMF and the Fund’s managing Director Christine Lagarde for defending Europe much too much..

04.03.2015 - 18:03 [ Techdirt ]

Data Retention Enthusiast Says Those Against The Idea Just Want Everything ‚Free Of Charge, Free Of Responsibility‘

Arguments over whether internet connection metadata should be retained for law enforcement purposes are raging around the world, but nowhere more heatedly than in Australia, where a new law bringing in data retention is currently being rammed through parliament. This has provoked widespread criticism of the move as unnecessary, intrusive and ill thought-out. Defenses have been thinner on the ground, which makes this column in the Australian newspaper The Age particularly interesting. The author, David Wroe, seems to think that the problem is a failure to explain what‘s really going on here:

04.03.2015 - 15:17 [ Post ]

Greece asks Russia to allow orange, strawberry, peach and kiwi imports

The request has been confirmed by the representative of the Federal Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance (Rosselkhoznadzor), Alexei Aleksiejenko, after meeting with the Greek Minister of Agricultural Development and Food, Panagiotis Sgouridis.(…)
The representative of the Russian Government said that a decision will be made as soon as the request is issued in writing, which should be done in the coming days.

04.03.2015 - 15:16 [ Netzpolitik ]

Live-Blog aus dem Rechtsausschuss – Gefangen im Leistungsschutzrecht-Labyrinth

Im Gegensatz zum NSA-Untersuchungsausschuss, in welchem es weder öffentliche Video-, Audio- oder Schriftprotokolle gibt, hat uns die Bundestagsverwaltung in diesem Fall versichert, dass ein Schriftprotokoll dieser Sitzung im Nachhinein auf den Seiten des Rechtsausschusses veröffentlicht wird. Wir werden in diesem Liveblog also nicht versuchen die Aussagen der Sachverständigen möglichst wortgetreu wiederzugeben, sondern eher die Kernpunkte der Debatte in Echtzeit zusammenzufassen und unseren persönlichen Eindruck wiederzugeben.

Für Interessierte gibt es hier die Stellungnahmen der Sachverständigen, welche diese im Vorfeld der Anhörung eingereicht haben. Feedback wird in den Kommentaren gerne entgegengenommen!

04.03.2015 - 15:11 [ Stefan Niggemeier ]

Christoph Keese erklärt, warum das Leistungsschutzrecht vielleicht auch Überschriften umfasst

Die Anhörung morgen ist vielleicht kein schlechter Zeitpunkt, um ein Gespräch zu veröffentlichen, das ich bereits im vergangenen November mit Christoph Keese, Executive Vice President bei Axel Springer und der wohl wichtigste Kämpfer für das Leistungsschutzrecht für Presseverlage, geführt habe. Er hatte am 9. November 2014 in einem langen Blogeintrag behauptet, das Gesetz sei nicht gescheitert, „ganz im Gegenteil“.

04.03.2015 - 15:07 [ VesselFinder ]

Sea Shepherd launches non-profit legal practice venture

Sea Shepherd Legal, a new international non-profit environmental law firm, has emerged on the scene and has aimed all of its resources and efforts towards the saving of the marine wildlife and habitats via enforcing, strengthening, and developing a number of protective laws, treaties, policies and practices on a worldwide basis.

04.03.2015 - 15:04 [ English Grammar 4 U ]

LingoPad – Mehrsprachiges Wörterbuch

LingoPad ist ein kostenloses (Freeware) mehrsprachiges Wörterbuch für Windows zum Übersetzen ohne Internetverbindung.

04.03.2015 - 15:01 [ Antiwar.com ]

A Covert Affair: Petraeus Caught in the Honeypot?

The FBI probe apparently started in late spring, when several people associated with Petraeus — not just the one woman, as (12.11.2012) has been reported elsewhere — received harassing emails. The emails were traced to 40-year-old Paula Broadwell, national security analyst, military intelligence veteran, and author of a biography of Petraeus. Authorities believed his email account may have been hacked, and this led to a remarkable irony: the CIA chief’s emails were monitored, without his knowledge, whereupon it was discovered Broadwell may have either had access to his account or tried to obtain access. In any case, in the course of their spying, FBI monitors discovered a large volume of emails to and from Broadwell.

04.03.2015 - 15:00 [ Buzzfeed ]

Anonymous May Have Hacked Petraeus Mistress

(10.11.2012) A Yahoo email account belonging to former CIA Director David Petraeus’ mistress may have been compromised by the group Anonymous.

The personal email account, which other sources confirmed belongs to the writer and veteran at the heart of this week’s Washington scandal, was revealed in the decentralized online group’s publication of millions of email accounts of customers of the commercial intelligence company STRATFOR.

04.03.2015 - 14:57 [ Daily Beast ]

Petraeus Mistress Got Black Books Full of Code Words, Spy Names, and Obama Briefings

On Oct. 26, 2012, Petraeus was interviewed by FBI agents in CIA headquarters while he was still director. Petraeus told them he had never provided any classified information to Broadwell or facilitated her provision of the information.

“These statements were false. Defendant David Howell Petraeus then and there knew that he previously shared the black books with his biographer.”

04.03.2015 - 14:37 [ Worldbulletin ]

Turkish lira slides to record low against dollar

The Turkish lira dropped to a historic low against the dollar Wednesday.
The Turkish lira fell to a new record low of 2.5492 against the dollar and has held close to that level into the afternoon.
So far this week, the value of the Turkish lira slipped by 1.7 percent against the dollar after dropping almost 2 percent in the previous week.

04.03.2015 - 14:27 [ BricsPost ]

China to raise defense budget by 10% in 2015

Notwithstanding slowing growth, China will raise its defense budget by around 10 per cent this year, a spokeswoman for the annual session of the country’s top legislature said Wednesday.
The actual figure will be released as part of the budget report on Thursday when the annual session of China’s Parliament opens, said National People’s Congress spokeswoman Fu Ying.
China’s defense budget rose by 12.2 per cent last year.

04.03.2015 - 14:18 [ Tlaxcala ]

The human cost of the Israel-Gaza conflict – in pictures

Photographer Heidi Levine, Sipa/Rex, documents Palestinians living with life-changing injuries in Gaza

04.03.2015 - 14:14 [ Rick Rozoff ]

Enhanced Partners: Ukraine To Participate In NATO Exercise

“Australia, Finland, Japan, Sweden and Ukraine will participate alongside Allies in the exercise. South Korea, New Zealand and Georgia chose to observe the exercise,” the NATO press office says.The exercise is designed to test the North Atlantic Council procedures at the strategic political-military level.(…)
The exercise will take place between 4 and 10 March 2015.

04.03.2015 - 14:08 [ Corporate Crime Reporter ]

Credit Suisse and One Collateral Consequence of a Guilty Plea

Last year, Credit Suisse AG plead guilty to charges that it aided and assisted U.S. taxpayers in filing false income tax returns and other documents with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
It turns out that the Department of Labor has a “bad actor” rule that automatically disqualifies institutions from claiming the status of qualified professional asset manager (QPAM) — those who advise pension funds and other investment funds.
But as turns out, automatic disqualification in this area is not automatic disqualification.

04.03.2015 - 14:06 [ Whisper Systems ]

Signal 2.0: Private messaging comes to the iPhone

Today we’re releasing Signal 2.0, with support for TextSecure private messaging.

It is now possible to send end-to-end encrypted group, text, picture, and video messages between Signal on iPhone and TextSecure on Android, all without SMS and MMS fees.

04.03.2015 - 14:03 [ Spiegel ]

Möglicher Gauck-Nachfolger Steinmeier: Plan S

So oder so – die Nachfolgedebatte in den Parteien und politischen Zirkeln Berlins hat längst begonnen. Ein Name wird dabei immer häufiger genannt: Frank-Walter Steinmeier, 59. Mancher Gesprächspartner macht sogar den Eindruck, als sei die Entscheidung für den Außenminister von der SPD bereits gefallen, falls Gauck in zwei Jahren abtritt.

04.03.2015 - 14:02 [ U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren / Washington Post ]

The Trans-Pacific Partnership clause everyone should oppose

The United States is in the final stages of negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a massive free-trade agreement with Mexico, Canada, Japan, Singapore and seven other countries. Who will benefit from the TPP? American workers? Consumers? Small businesses? Taxpayers? Or the biggest multinational corporations in the world?

04.03.2015 - 13:54 [ Reuters ]

Day after Netanyahu warning, U.S. and Iran make ‚some progress‘ on nuclear talks

„The bottom line here is that (there is) no deal to announce to anybody today, but very intense, hard work, some progress, but tough challenges yet to be resolved,“ the official said.

„We expect that we (and the Iranians) will regroup bilaterally, with the European Union present as well, on the 15th of March, location to be confirmed but most likely Geneva.“

04.03.2015 - 13:53 [ Wikipedia ]

United States Central Command

Das United States Central Command (CENTCOM; deutsch Zentralkommando der Vereinigten Staaten) ist eines von sechs Regionalkommandozentren (Unified Combatant Commands) der US-Streitkräfte. Es wird derzeit von General Lloyd J. Austin III. (USA) befehligt; stellvertretender Befehlshaber ist Vice Admiral Mark Fox (USN).

Das CENTCOM wurde 1983 gegründet und unter die operative Kontrolle des US-Verteidigungsministers gestellt.