Free Republic

An Italian coastguard ship carrying more than 900 migrants was allowed to dock in Sicily Wednesday, after Italy controversially turned away a separate foreign vessel with rescued migrants on board. ... The migrants aboard the Aquarius, run by French NGO SOS Mediterranee, were stuck on the overloaded ship as Italy and Malta bickered over who should take them.

Berlin — A brutal murder case has gripped Germany: On June 6 the body of a 14-year-old girl, Susanna Maria Feldmann, was found in Wiesbaden. She had been raped and strangled. Two days later her alleged assailant, Ali Bashar, a 20-year-old asylum seeker from Iraq, was apprehended in Iraqi Kurdistan, where he had fled. He reportedly confessed to the murder. The case is just the latest in a string of murders and assaults by asylum seekers against women in Germany. In October 2016, Maria Ladenburger, a 19-year-old university student, was raped and killed by an Afghan asylum seeker. In December...

When every last Trudeau eyebrow has been scraped off the floor of the Manoir Richelieu, it's worth remembering that the divisions in the G7 are not quite as straightforward as the media would have us believe. For one thing, it's not G6 vs Trump; there's another disrupter in town: Just met the new Prime Minister of Italy, @GiuseppeConteIT, a really great guy. He will be honored in Washington, at the @WhiteHouse, shortly. Signor Conte heads what would once have been regarded as a pantomime-horse coalition of two rear ends: the left-wing Five Star Movement (M5S) and the right-wing Northern League...

German police have arrested a Tunisian man after discovering "toxic substances" at his flat in Cologne, officials said Wednesday, with prosecutors not ruling out a possible terror motive. The man and his wife, whose nationality was not released, were detained late Tuesday night after officers raided their flat and came across "unknown substances" that are now being analysed by specialists, Cologne police said in a statement.

In Germany, the case of a young Muslim refugee charged with the rape and murder of a teenage girl has captured media attention and rocked Germany’s Jewish community: The victim, 14-year-old Susanna Feldman, was Jewish. Missing since May 22, the girl’s body was found June 6 buried in a shallow grave near her hometown of Mainz. The case has rattled Germany, which is beset with worries about crime emanating from the large Muslim refugee population — many of whom are young, single men, frustrated and aimless. Before it appeared that anti-Semitism likely played no role in this crime, the...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday struck back at US President Donald Trump’s repeated complaints over the US trade deficit. Merkel pointed out the United States actually runs a significant account surplus with Europe if one factors services into the equation. She went on to say that the current accounting systems for global trade needed to be updated to also take services into account. “Trade surpluses are calculated in a relatively old-fashioned way nowadays,” she told an audience of businessmen at the Christian Democratic Union’s Economic Council Conference in Berlin. “If services are included in the trade balance, then the...

“Keep calm and carry on.” In the wake of a disastrous G7 summit where US president Donald Trump all but broke off the Western alliance, the EU should stay cool and prepare to take over global leadership. That is the message on Monday (11 June) by a former member of the EU leaders club, Helle Thorning-Schmidt. “The US is leaving a vacuum. And who should step in? For me, it is completely obvious, it is Europe’s time to step in,” the former Danish prime minister said at an event in Brussels. “That’s where our new next opportunity is,” she said,...

QUEBEC CITY (AP) — President Donald Trump took more swipes at Canada and its prime minister over trade issues as he settled in for a summit with North Korea in Singapore, contending that “Fair Trade is now to be called Fool Trade if it is not Reciprocal.” Trump roiled the Group of Seven meeting in Canada by first agreeing to a group statement on trade only to withdraw from it while complaining that he had been blindsided by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s criticism of Trump’s tariff threats at a summit-ending news conference. As he flew from Canada to Singapore...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday warned Syrian President Bashar Assad was “no longer immune” from retaliation, while declaring the Iran nuclear deal is over after Washington ditched the accord. “He is no longer immune, his regime is no longer immune. If he fires at us, as we’ve just demonstrated, we will destroy his forces." “Syria has to understand that Israel will not tolerate the Iranian military entrenchment in Syria against Israel,” Netanyahu added. “The consequences are not merely to the Iranian forces there but to the Assad regime as well,” he said, adding: “I think it’s something that he...

BERLIN (Reuters) - Iraq has extradited a 20-year-old Iraqi suspected of raping and killing a 14-year-old girl in Germany last month, German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said on Saturday.“I’m glad that the alleged perpetrator wanted by German authorities is back in Germany,” Seehofer said in a statement, adding that the investigation of the case could now be accelerated. “For the girl’s family, that is only a small consolation, and my thoughts are with them during these difficult hours,” Seehofer said. “But for the state and our society, it is important that crimes are cleared up and suspects are brought to...

This afternoon, Donald Trump made an announcement regarding the future of the Iran nuclear deal. Ahead of a self-imposed May 12th deadline, the President announced that he will not be waiving the sanctions. This decision places the United States in violation of the deal. But while it may not kill the JCPOA completely – European states and Iran could decide whether to keep some version of the deal going without the United States – it will start a period of profound uncertainty about the future of U.S-Iranian relations. In some ways, this uncertainty is the most concerning thing about the...

Over 2,000 people attended a neo-Nazi music festival in the German city of Themar on over the weekend. German police reported that during the event, which was attended by local neo-Nazis, 55 criminal offenses were recorded. 33 of the offenses involved the use or display of symbols prohibited by the German constitution, including a swastika, the use of Nazi salutes, and more. One of the concert participants also struck a press photographer who documented the event. Attendees began arriving on Friday for the festival, which took place on Saturday and Sunday. The annual festival is the largest neo-Nazi event in...

President Trump’s top envoy in Germany has found himself in the middle of a diplomatic firestorm less than a month after being sworn in. In an interview from his office in Berlin with the right-leaning Breitbart News, Richard Grenell made an acknowledgement unusual for a diplomat: he wanted to “empower other conservatives throughout Europe.”“I absolutely want to empower other conservatives throughout Europe, other leaders. I think there is a groundswell of conservative policies that are taking hold because of the failed policies of the left,” Grenell said, adding that it was “an exciting time” to be serving as ambassador. The...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has largely abandoned support for the European Union’s migrant quota system, instead, pushing for what she has termed “flexible solidarity” and a “Marshall Plan” for Africa to prevent illegal migration. Merkel made her remarks on Wednesday at a meeting of the European People’s Party, a European Union parliamentary group of which Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CSU) is a member, Le Point reports. “If we fail to provide a common answer to questions of illegal migration, the foundations of the European Union will be called into question. Action is really needed here,” she said. Merkel appeared to...

President Trump rebuked Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Saturday, saying that the U.S. will not endorse a joint communique signed with the other Group of Seven (G-7) members at this weekend's summit and seemingly threatening to impose further tariffs on the country. “Based on Justin’s false statements at his news conference, and the fact that Canada is charging massive Tariffs to our U.S. farmers, workers and companies, I have instructed our U.S. Reps not to endorse the Communique as we look at Tariffs on automobiles flooding the U.S. Market!” Trump tweeted. Based on Justin’s false statements at his news...

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Leaders of the Group of Seven rich nations headed for a summit in Canada on Thursday more divided than at any time in the group’s 42-year history, as U.S. President Donald Trump’s “America First” policies risk causing a global trade war and deep diplomatic schisms. In a bid to rebuild America’s industry, Trump has imposed hefty tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, including those from key G7 allies like Canada, Japan and the European Union. He has threatened to use national security laws to do the same for foreign car imports and has walked back on environmental...

The 583 delegates of Die Linke (The Left) voted on Saturday in Leipzig in favor of the party executive’s motion which included its refugee policy. The party has a formal commitment for all who are looking for protection in Germany not to be turned away. The executive motion was based on a trio of proposals: bringing an end to conflict, including an end to arms exports; a social program for everyone in Germany to solve housing and employment difficulties; and finally, safe and legal escape routes as well as open borders for people seeking protection. The divisions within the party...

Germany was voted onto the United Nations Security Council for the sixth time on Friday, after it secured a two-thirds majority in the General Assembly. The place was effectively guaranteed going into the vote: Germany and Belgium ran unopposed for the two spots in the Western European and Others category. Israel was initially also in the running, but withdrew its bid last month. Germany received 184 votes from the 190 cast ballots. […] In a tweet, the German Foreign Office in Berlin said: “We are looking forward to this huge task and responsibility. Many thanks to all those who placed...

An Iraqi man suspected in the rape and murder of a teenage Jewish girl in Germany admitted to strangling the girl, and is expected to be extradited back to Germany to be tried for the murder. Last week, authorities in the German city of Wiesbaden, north of Mainz, found the remains of 14-year-old Susanna Maria Feldman near train tracks not far from a district housing a refugee shelter. Feldman had last been seen by her mother on the evening of May 22nd, and was reported missing the following morning. Police said the body showed signs of violence, suggesting that the...

France called on Friday for more ambition from Germany in reforming the eurozone, saying Europe faced a “now or never” moment with rising external threats from the United States and China. French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, speaking in German to a business conference in Berlin, offered the first official response from Paris to European reform proposals sketched out by Chancellor Angela Merkel in a weekend newspaper interview. He welcomed her support for the idea of a eurozone investment budget, one of French President Emmanuel Macron’s key demands, but said France and Germany had “a way to go” to reach...