Free Republic

Protests have continued this week in Cuba over one of the island’s worst ever economic and energy crises as food shortages and blackouts push the country toward the "verge of collapse." Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio took to X on Tuesday to say the disastrous situation was down to Cuba’s long-standing Marxist policies. "The reason Cuba is on the verge of collapse is because Marxism always leads to hunger, poverty and shortages," Rubio said The senator, an ardent critic of the Cuban regime, took to the social media platform to push back on accusations levied by the Cuban Deputy Foreign...

Severe penalties for countries that refuse to take them.. The EU has passed a migration pact dubbed “the suicide of Europe” which could lead to the continent being flooded with as many as 75 million new migrants. The European Parliament’s LIBE committee passed the act on Wednesday, which formalizes the distribution of migrants to member states and punishes those that refuse to take them. Because cultural enrichment and diversity is “our greatest strength,” countries that try to maintain their national identity without being subsumed by migrants will be hit with severe financial penalties. Marine Le Pen, the leader of National...

The wave of violence unleashed during harshly repressed anti-government protests has left some 220 people dead. What had been a vibrant tourism industry has been devastated, with ripple effects on the broader economy in a country that was already one of the poorest in the Americas. Business closings have left 200,000 people jobless, and unless the crisis ends soon, some 1.3 million of Nicaragua's 6.2 million people "risk falling into poverty," according to a study by the Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development (Funides).

The U.S. government has extensive contingency plans in place for an eventual death of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un that factor in expectations of a mass-scale humanitarian crisis inside the country, Fox News has learned. Sources discussed those plans amid conflicting reports about the reclusive North Korean leader's health. Those same sources urge caution about these reports, which have claimed he's facing serious health issues after a cardiovascular procedure. While his condition is unclear, a well-placed defense intelligence source told Fox News on Tuesday that the U.S. government has extensive plans in place for when Kim is gone, taking...

Over the weekend, President Donald Trump approved a new annual refugee cap of 18,000, the lowest since the U.S. program began in 1980. The reduction follows news that America took a pause last month and refused to admit any new refugees. On economic, public safety and national security grounds, this is a very good thing for the 325 million people already in our country. But you wouldn't know it from the grim headlines and hysterical condemnations by globalist zealots and media sympathizers. CNN International led the open borders funeral procession last week, with a report decrying, "No refugees will be...

The refugee and immigrant problem in Europe continues to worsen. Europeans opened their borders during the last few years to radical Islamists and others fleeing oppressive or impoverished conditions in Syria and other parts of the Middle East and North Africa. But instead of encouraging the new immigrants to assimilate, many of the European governments are bending over backwards to help them not assimilate. This is a losing proposition, since many of the refugees subscribe to radical Islam. It is incompatible with Western culture. Europeans are afraid to venture into certain areas, known as “no-go zones,” where the violent young men walk the...

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has “quietly” put an end to most work at the Office for Access to Justice (ATJ), one of the lesser initiatives of the Eric Holder era, according to a Thursday New York Times report.The tiny ATJ was founded in 2010 under then-Attorney General Eric Holder. Its last published organization chart, from 2015, shows only three appointees and their support staff. ATJ distributed grants and drafted “statements of interest” aimed at supporting the right to competent legal representation for the poor and indigent secured by the U.S. Constitution and the Supreme Court’s famous 1963 decision in...

The Afghan refugee, who is now on trial for the rape and murder of the medical student Maria Ladenburger in October 2016, is older than previously thought. Hussein Khavari entered Germany in November 2015 without identity papers. He told authorities that he was born in 1999 in Afghanistan and that his father was killed during the war. But it now appears that his father is still alive. According to German media his father said his son was born in 1984 and that he is 33-years-old. The Local Germany says about it: “Prosecutors were able to track down Hussein K.’s father...

The number of “Palestinian refugees” in Lebanon has decreased significantly over the past few years and many are leaving for other countries to try to improve their situation. In an interview with the Hamas newspaper Palestine on Thursday, Hamas’s representative in Lebanon Ali Baraka said that some 260,000 “Palestinian refugees” had left the refugee camps in Lebanon to various countries in recent years because of the difficult security and economic conditions. According to him, the figures he cited are based on a poll conducted by the Lebanese authorities and which indicates that there is a deliberate action to bring about...

Barnabas Aid finally obtained figures proving that the UN has only recommended tiny token numbers of Syrian Christians, Yazidis and other minorities for resettlement in the UK. The overwhelming majority of refugees recommended by the UN have been Sunni Muslims This gross neglect of peaceful Christians and other minorities has been long discussed, but without any steps being taken to remedy the injustice. Instead, the UK and other Western nations have turned their backs on the most needy groups, who are not only victims of war, but have been persecuted at the hands of jihadists. The former Archbishop of Canterbury,...

Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Thursday the Department of Justice has active "terrorism-related investigations" into "hundreds" of refugees. Sessions made the assertion during a national security speech in New York City, detailing President Donald Trump's agenda to keep out people like the alleged attacker who earlier this week killed eight in Manhattan. "The Department currently has ongoing terrorism-related investigations against hundreds of people who came here as refugees," Sessions said Thursday. "The FBI and our officers do heroic work, but it is simply not reasonable to keep asking them for more and more without putting policies in place that make...

The number of crimes against gays and lesbians in Germany has increased by almost a third in the past year. Is a lack of action by politicians, police and schools to blame? German parliament, the Bundestag, may have passed a bill to allow gay marriage in June, but that doesn’t mean that homosexuals are automatically accepted in all parts of German society. Information revealed Wednesday by the German Interior Ministry shows that the number of crimes committed against homosexuals and bisexuals has in fact risen significantly in 2017. In the first half of this year, from January 1 to July...

Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski has said his country is welcoming migrants from its poor and conflict-stricken European neighbours, but will resist the European Union’s efforts to impose a compulsory quota of migrants from North Africa and the Middle East. “Poland is open for migration. And last year, for instance, we issued 1,267,000 visas for Ukrainians. Half of these visas were work permits,” Waszczykowski told Russian media in a bruising interview reproduced by the Daily Express. “We are also open for migration not only from Ukraine but also from Belarus and other countries, [but] we do not want to participate...

More than half (54 per cent) of terror plots in Germany have involved asylum seekers and refugees since 2014 and the onset of the migrant crisis. The report, by the Heritage Foundation think tank, found that attacks across Europe by foreign trained militants increased dramatically in 2016, following the height of the migrant influx, with Germany becoming a much more popular target. “The increase in the threat to Germany is especially stark,” the report’s authors write. “There were no plots in Germany in 2014, and only two in 2015. In 2016, this increased eightfold. “There is a straightforward reason for...

FRESNO, Calif. — The police responded to a call about a loud party on East San Ramon Avenue, but it wasn’t just any party: A sheep was reportedly being slaughtered in a backyard. “Muslim refugees were unaware that slaughtering sheep is not allowed in the city,” the police wrote afterward in their report, which also stated that those involved “were advised to clean up the blood and mess” and warned that in the future “they could be cited.” The animal, actually a goat, was killed by a Syrian refugee who later skinned, roasted and shared it with his Syrian neighbors...

Matt Bracken has made a meme using a still taken from the video below. His topic is the carefully planned and executed “rescue” of migrants who cross the Mediterranean — usually just a few miles of it — in flimsy boats. He says: This is a massive effort by Soros and others like him. There was no market for these boats prior to the planned hijra invasion of Europe. They have no sporting or military use and were not built anywhere in the world prior to the migrant invasion. Boat plus engine cost at least $10,000, and probably double or...

VIENNA (AFP) – Austria will “very soon” impose border checks and deploy soldiers on its frontier with Italy if the influx of migrants across the Mediterranean does not slow, Vienna’s defence minister was quoted as saying Monday. “I expect that very soon border controls will be activated and that a assistance deployment (by the military) will be requested,” Hans Peter Doskozil told the online edition of the Krone daily. He was cited as saying that this move was “indispensible if the inflow into Italy does not ease”. The paper said that 750 soldiers were available and that four armoured vehicles...

Microsoft founder Bill Gates has warned that Africa’s population explosion will overwhelm Europe unless the continent makes it more difficult for migrants to reach its shores. In an interview with the German Welt am Sonntag newspaper, Gates said massive population growth in Africa will result in “enormous [migratory] pressure” on Europe unless countries increase overseas development aid payments. Praising Germany having achieved its commitment to devote 0.7 per cent of GDP to foreign aid as “phenomenal”, the 61-year-old called on “other European nations to follow its example”. But Gates also spoke of a dilemma caused by ‘the German attitude to...

Italy’s migrant welcome centers are in a state of “collapse” as huge waves of African migrants take advantage of the temperate climate to make the crossing from Libya to the Italian peninsula. On Tuesday, 8,500 African migrants are reaching Italian shores aboard 14 different ships, adding to the 5,000 who arrived on Monday. The massive arrivals have led local media as well as politicians to speak of an authentic immigrant “invasion” exceeding the country’s capacity of assimilation.

THREE quarters of Germany’s refugees will be long-term unemployed and claiming benefits for years, it was admitted today. Aydan Özoğuz, commissioner for immigration, refugees and integration, told the Financial Times that only a quarter to a third of the newcomers would enter the labour market over the next five years, and “for many others we will need up to 10”. The Institute for Employment Research (IAB) found only 45 per cent of Syrian refugees in Germany have a school-leaving certificate and 23 per cent a college degree. Statistics from the Federal Labour Agency show the employment rate among refugees stands...