Free Republic

While a global row rages over the controversial background of historical figures immortalized as statues, on Saturday a divisive new monument to Soviet leader Lenin will be unveiled in Germany. More than 30 years after the post-World War II communist experiment on German soil ended, the tiny Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany (MLPD) will install Lenin's likeness in the western city of Gelsenkirchen. The MLPD says it is the first such statue ever to be erected on the territory of the former West Germany, decades after the eastern German Democratic Republic communist state and its deadly Berlin Wall and Stasi secret...

A shocking report out of Germany says that government agencies intentionally placed homeless children with a widespread and influential pedophile ring for decades. Starting in the 1970s psychology professor Helmut Kentler conducted his “experiment.” Homeless children in West Berlin were intentionally placed with pedophile men. These men would make especially loving foster parents, Kentler argued.A study conducted by the University of Hildesheim has found that authorities in Berlin condoned this practice for almost 30 years. The pedophile foster fathers even received a regular care allowance.Helmut Kentler (1928-2008) was in a leading position at Berlin’s center for educational research. He was...

Poland finds itself in a bind. For the past two years, Warsaw has lobbied Washington for an increase in American troop presence on its territory. It now appears likely that it will get at least some of what it wants, but that could be at the expense of America’s presence in Germany. Should that happen, Warsaw would find itself at odds with its economically powerful neighbor, a circumstance that — given the tragic history of German-Polish relations — the Polish government wishes to avoid. Not surprisingly, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki made clear, “It is not [Poland’s] intention to achieve...

European governments are working with the United States on plans to overhaul the World Health Organization, a top health official for a European country said, signalling that Europe shares some of the concerns that led Washington to say it would quit. The European health official, who spoke on condition of anonymity while discussing initiatives that are not public, said Britain, France, Germany and Italy were discussing WHO reforms with the United States at the technical level. The aim, the official said, was to ensure WHO’s independence, an apparent reference to allegations that the body was too close to China during...

Merkel outlined her objectives Thursday for Germany’s forthcoming 6-month presidency of the EU, saying a more Global role and Enhanced International Governance are a way forward. This is not the first time Merkel has touted an E.U. global role...Her simple solution remains: more E.U. in more places more often. The presidency of the Council of the European Union passes among member states on a rotating basis and lasts for a six-month period, with Germany taking the role from July 1 until the end of the year.

A pair of top Democrats has introduced a bill aimed at blocking President Trump’s plan to withdraw thousands of U.S. troops from Germany. The bill, introduced by Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking member Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and House Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) in their respective chambers, would prohibit funding to implement a withdrawal in Europe unless several conditions are met. “The current U.S. troop presence in Germany is in the U.S. national security interest. Full stop,” Menendez said in a statement. “The administration has made no effort to explain how our country is stronger because of this...

Arab clan gangs have threatened to kill police officers who attempt to enforce the law in the troubled area of Marxloh in the city of Duisburg, claiming only sharia applies to them. The Marxloh area has become a hub for Arab clan gangs in recent years. Last month, police faced down a mob of around 200 residents when attempting to arrest a local teen. After using tear gas and calling for reinforcements, it took 36 police to finally detain the youth who had hidden in a residential building. Just days after the incident, police received threatening emails, allegedly from Marxloh...

Starting in the 1970s psychology professor Helmut Kentler conducted his "experiment." Homeless children in West Berlin were intentionally placed with pedophile men. These men would make especially loving foster parents, Kentler argued. A study conducted by the University of Hildesheim has found that authorities in Berlin condoned this practice for almost 30 years. The pedophile foster fathers even received a regular care allowance. Helmut Kentler (1928-2008) was in a leading position at Berlin's center for educational research. He was convinced that sexual contact between adults and children was harmless. Berlin's child welfare offices and the governing Senate turned a blind...

The saying goes that in Berlin’s nightclubs, you can be or do whatever you want, as long as you don’t put anyone in danger. In a pandemic, that’s a problem. Paris has the Louvre, London its royal palaces and Berlin its nightclubs. Rooting back to the years after the fall of the Wall, when wild, improvised parties took place in abandoned industrial buildings, legendary techno club Tresor, rival Berghain and the city’s myriad other dance spots form a wild party scene that caters to all tastes—in music, drugs or sex. Clubs are among the biggest draws for the 13 million...

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg warned Saturday that China’s increasing influence had created a “fundamental shift in the global balance of power” that should not be overlooked. In an interview with Germany’s Welt am Sonntag newspaper, that was released in advance, the Norwegian official said that Beijing had the second-largest defense budget in the world after the United States, and was investing heavily in nuclear weapons and long-range missiles that could reach Europe. “One thing is clear: China is coming ever closer to Europe’s doorstep,” he said. “NATO allies must face this challenge together.” […] Stoltenberg stressed that no member country...

In Berlin, organizers expected 1,500 people to show up. Instead, an estimated 15,000 protested in Alexanderplatz, Berlin’s city center, with signs that read “Germany is not innocent” and “Black Lives Matter,” German media outlet DW reported. Demonstrators held a moment of silence that lasted eight minutes and 46 seconds, the amount of time the former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on George Floyd’s neck. But the protests extended far beyond Berlin, with rallies organized in nine other cities across the country. Munich saw a crowd of at least 20,000 people and 14,000 people rallied in Hamburg. Even German football...

Conservative British politician and Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage has left his talk show at LBC radio after he made comments comparing the Black Lives Matter supporters to the Taliban. Farage faced a storm of backlash after tweeting about protesters demonstrating against police brutality and racial discrimination. Protests in the United States over the death of George Floyd, a black man who died while police custody, have spread around the world, including England. “A new form of the Taliban was born in the UK today,” Farage tweeted Sunday. “Unless we get moral leadership quickly our cities won't be worth living...

Police arrived at the home of an Oxford-educated museum curator last night after she tweeted a guide on how to use domestic chemicals to destroy bronze statues in the wake of recent Black Lives Matters protests. Madeline Odent, the privately schooled curator of Royston Museum in Hertfordshire, sent an inflammatory series of tweets last night to her 5,164 followers, which was then shared thousands of times. In the posts, the American-born banker's wife revealed how to dissolve bronze statues, saying that the damage would be 'irreversible' and 'practically impossible to stop'. She then hinted that her next target was Winston...

A dark and shuttered United Nations building in New York will not play host to world leaders for a week of speeches come September, as the globalist body contemplates being silent for the first time in 75 years. A bitterly disappointed president of the U.N. General Assembly confirmed Monday the annual gathering of leaders and bureaucrats been cancelled because of the march of the global Chinese pandemic.

President Trump’s reported decision to pull 9,500 troops from Germany is “completely unacceptable,” said Berlin’s coordinator for transatlantic ties, according to Reuters. Peter Beyer told the Rheinische Post that the White House did not inform Germany in advance before reports of the decision began to emerge, the report said. The Wall Street Journal, citing U.S. government officials, reported on Friday that Trump ordered the Pentagon to reduce the 34,500 service members in the country. A U.S. senior official told the paper that internal discussions have been continuing since September and the move is not in retaliation to German Chancellor Angela...

The Wall Street Journal reported on June 5 that President Trump directed the Pentagon to permanently reduce the U.S. military presence in Germany by 9,500 troops. This corresponds to an approximately 27.5-percent troop reduction  and would cap the U.S. military presence in Germany at 25,000. This move is coming just days after German Chancellor Angela Merkel rebuffed an invitation from President Trump to attend a G7 leaders summit in Washington later this month. Politco writes: Trumps' withdrawal plan appeared to be less a form of direct retribution for Merkel's G7 decision but rather a follow-through on previous threats to reduce the U.S. military presence in...

Germany under intense pressure to scuttle the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to bring natural gas from Russia underwater to Germany. That's the assessment of Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova. The United States behind that pressure. On Friday a White House official told the media that nine thousand US troops were going to be withdrawn from Germany..... A Russian disc jockey arrested in Berlin at the request of the United States...... A Florida judge who has refused to release grand jury records related to the late Jeffrey Epstein has close ties to politicians involved in the investigation of Epstein 15...

The Black Lives Matter movement (BLM) casts itself as a spontaneous uprising born of inner city frustration, but is, in fact, the latest and most dangerous face of a web of well-funded communist/socialist organizations that have been agitating against America for decades. The Black Lives Matter movement claims that only whites can be racists. And while justifying violence to achieve “social justice,” the movement’s goal is to overthrow our society to replace it with a Marxist one. Many members of the black community would be shocked to learn that the intellectual godfathers of this movement are mostly white Communists, “queers”...

A positive sign for the US economy today with the unemployment rate dropping to 13.3 percent last month, an improvement from April's 14.7... The Mayor of Washngton DC, Democrat Muriel Bowser, renaming the plaza near the White House "Black Lives Matter Plaza" with the name "Black Lives Matter" spelled out in large yellow letters on the street there. Her move not looked upon positively by the "Black Lives Matter" organization which said her move was: "a performative distraction from real policy changes" and "a way to appease white liberals while ignoring our demands"...... Questions being asked about the federal law...

Trump orders Pentagon to remove thousands of troops from Germany: report BY J. EDWARD MORENO - 06/05/20 03:36 PM EDT 2 Trump orders Pentagon to remove thousands of troops from Germany: report © Getty Images President Trump has directed the Department of Defense to send 9,500 troops home from Germany, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, which would bring the total stationed there down to 25,000. A defense official told the Journal the plan, which was ordered by national security advisor Robert O'Brien, has been underway since September and is not related to rising tensions between Trump and German...