Free Republic

What most Germans can agree upon is that the EU cannot stay as it is. But when it comes to how change should look, views differ sharply. The EU is about to celebrate its 60th birthday, but its age is showing. The British have opted to leave, while Euroskeptic parties are growing in popularity in major members, such as France and the Netherlands. In Germany too, the anti-Euro Alternative for Germany (AfD) are set to win their first seats in the Bundestag (German parliament) this September. And it seems that the German electorate are also restless for change. A YouGov...

While shamrocks and smiles typically define the Irish prime minister’s traditional St. Patrick’s Day visit to the White House, with President Donald Trump the celebration could turn more serious. Taoiseach Enda Kenny has signaled that he will use the meeting — scheduled for Thursday, one day before St. Patrick’s Day — to talk about Brexit and Trump’s immigration policies. Kenny, who labeled Trump’s language “dangerous” during the campaign, has said it is important to keep the standing date, which some critics have suggested he should cancel. Speaking to The Irish Times, Kenny said, “European leaders need to be over here...

After a marathon sitting lasting the whole week, the German parliament (Bundestag) agreed upon a law on Friday that will relax restrictions on video surveillance in shops, stadiums and stations. The law, drafted in response to a series of violent crimes in 2016, several attached to terror group ISIS, will make it easier for private companies to install CCTV. Specifically mentioned in the law as places where CCTV will become more prevalent are shopping centers, the area in front of football stadiums, and parking lots. […] The package of laws passed by the Bundestag also allows for police to use...

The head of Germany’s domestic security agency, the BfV, said on Wednesday that Germany has become a priority target for terror group ISIS over the past year. “Germany became significantly more prioritized as a target of ISIS over the course of 2016,” said BfV President Hans-Georg Maaßen, adding that the level of danger continues to be high. The country was shaken by several terror attacks in the name of ISIS last year, most notably the December 19th Berlin Christmas market attack in which 12 people were killed. …

Germany has fallen from its former top position from among 80 countries surveyed by U.S. News & World Report, achieving fourth place this year in a drop at least partly attributed to security concerns. “The nation was rocked by a range of events — from growing public anxiety over an influx of refugees to a string of deadly terror attacks,” the “Best Countries” report said. The news comes shortly after release of a report from the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) saying a growing number of individuals have left Germany to fight in Iraq and Syria...

A report has found that more than 900 extremists traveled to the Middle East from Germany. The revelation comes amid growing concern from German officials over domestic terrorism. Weekly news magazine Der Spiegel reported the increase in the number of homegrown jihadis in their latest issue, not long after Germany’s domestic intelligence service warned that Islamic extremism was spreading in the country. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) said that 910 suspected jihadis had left Germany to travel to Iraq and Syria, a noticeable increase from the roughly 800 extremists reported about a year ago, Spiegel...

As thousands of refugees walked to Germany in September 2015, Merkel’s government was ready to close the border, a report has found. The plan was stopped at the last minute only because no one wanted the responsibility. “Wir schaffen das,” or “We can do this” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said at the peak of the European refugee crisis in the fall of 2015. It’s a phrase the chancellor has held on to since those decisive months and repeated like a mantra. It’s a phrase that advocates have praised and critics have abhorred — but it’s also a phrase the chancellor...

Outgoing President Joachim Gauck criticized US President Donald Trump in an interview on Friday, saying the American leader is calling into question what the US and Europe have worked towards together. In an interview with Spiegel published on Friday, Gauck — who will be replaced by Frank-Walter Steinmeier this month — voiced his concerns about the Republican President. “It worries me a lot that the American President is putting some things into questions that generations of other Americans have achieved with Europeans,” said Gauck. The German President further condemned Trump’s fraught relationship with the media as he has referred to...

Sweden’s Integration Minister Ylva Johansson has done a U-turn after she told the BBC that the number of reports of sex crimes in Sweden was dropping. During a recent interview with the BBC, the minister said: “If there has been a rape towards her and a sexual harassment, we can see that the level is going down, and going down, and going down.” However, this isn’t the case. The latest stats actually show a 13 percent increase in reported sex crimes in Sweden in 2016, and a general increase over the last ten years. […] The Moderate Party’s labor policy...

Former CIA case officer Sabrina De Sousa thanked the Trump administration for intervening to save her from extradition to Italy and imprisonment in a statement on Friday. “I want to extend my deepest appreciation to the Trump administration for all their efforts on my behalf. Without their support I would be spending tonight in an Italian prison,” said De Sousa, in a statement quoted by Fox News. “The Obama administration and former CIA Director John Brennan abandoned De Sousa the last seven years, and in six weeks, the Trump team made her freedom possible,” Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) told Fox...

A report commissioned by Sweden’s Civil Contingencies Agency (MSB) to look into the influence of the Islamist organization the Muslim Brotherhood in the country has sparked debate, with a number of researchers disputing the methodology used and conclusions reached. The report suggests that the Muslim Brotherhood is secretly leading Islamists in building a parallel society in Sweden by infiltrating organizations and political parties in the country. It also claims that there is an “established structure of values among the country’s political elite which stipulate how as a citizen you should approach ‘minorities’”. But in a blog post signed by 22...

President Donald Trump will meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the White House later this month. A White House official says the meeting will take place on March 14. […] The White House official was not authorized to publicly confirm a visit that has not been formally announced and spoke on condition of anonymity. …

Polls show Germans generally wouldn’t vote Republican, and the vast majority don’t support US President Donald Trump. So for American immigrants in Germany who do, it can make for some difficult conversations. […] “If you go out socially and the topic turns political, you hear that Republicans don’t always feel comfortable. I tend to downplay it [being a Republican] for fear that someone won’t understand that there can be big differences in opinions [in the party],” explains Thomas Leiser, a Texan transplant in the Frankfurt area who leads the German Republicans Overseas branch. “Before the election, some people would make...

A Berlin mosque attended by the young Tunisian who attacked a Christmas market in December has shut its doors and been banned, as police on Tuesday launched a major raid against the capital’s Islamist scene. Berlin authorities have banned the Fussilet mosque, which Anis Amri used to attend. Meanwhile around 460 officers searched 24 locations across the capital city in the early hours of Tuesday morning in a raid linked to the mosque. Amri had visited the mosque regularly before he drove a truck into a Christmas market on December 19th, killing 12 people, in an attack later claimed by...

The domestic intelligence service has announced an uptick of hundreds in a matter of months. At least one cause of the worrying trend is the ease with which young people can become radicalized online, authorities said. Germany's domestic security and intelligance agency (the BfV) said on Wednesday that the radical Islamist scene in the country had grown considerably, from only about 100 people in 2013 to some 1,600 today. Indeed, according to BfV chief Hans-Georg Maassen, the number had jumped by several hundred in a matter of months."We receive between two and four credible tips on planned terrorist activity in Germany...

Criminology Professor Leif GW Persson appeared on a Swedish television programme and backed up claims by under-investigation police officer Peter Springare that migrants are vastly overrepresented in criminal cases. Professor Persson appeared alongside the policeman on an episode of “Weekly Crime” for the Swedish broadcaster SVT and they discussed the recent comments made by U.S. President Donald Trump about the high rate of crime among migrants in Sweden. Persson totally agreed with Springare who was recently slammed for expressing the fact that most of the criminal suspects he sees in his work are from other countries. “There is a strong...

A European nation becomes a rape capital -- due to its immigration policies. Sweden is the rape capital of the Western world. The general public is unaware of the epidemic of Swedish rapes because there has been an orchestrated effort by mainstream media and the Swedish government to deliberately mischaracterize offenders and downplay the number of incidents. The significant increase in rapes are the direct result of Sweden's open door refugee policy and denial of Muslim culture. Muslim immigrant rapists believe that all non-Muslim and uncovered women can be lawfully taken for sexual use; hence rape and sexual assaults are...

Today brought the US vice-president’s first official visit to Brussels and the first taste of the Trump Tea Party for presidents Juncker and Tusk. Mike Pence has all the charisma of a chair leg but with less capacity for love, compassion and charity. He styles himself as a devout Christian but his political career has been driven and defined by hate. He hates abortion. He hates man-made climate change. He hates gays, stem cell research and refugees. He hates reporters and refused to take any questions from the press. Even the foreign minister of Cuba, no democracy, managed to do...

So I have had a few discussions with idiot liberal acquaintances over the last few months since Donald trump won and then became our President. Many of them revolve around how horrible Trump is and how they feel like everything is going to hell. I just humor them as I tried to get a feel how they were before the election and they were either for the old dirtbag hag Hillary or some of the real fruitcakes were for Jill Stein. When they say that they want to move out of the United States I always recommend the following countries:...

French presidential frontrunner Emmanuel Macron has drawn a storm of criticism from his rivals after calling France’s colonization of Algeria a “crime against humanity”. In a TV interview in Algiers this week, the centrist said French actions in Algeria, which achieved independence in 1962 after eight years of war, were “genuinely barbaric, and constitute a part of our past that we have to confront by apologizing”. His visit also included a stop at the Martyrs’ Memorial in Algiers, saying he wanted to promote a “reconciliation of memories” between the two countries. The violent history between France and Algeria is still...