PGR explica tomada de decisão sobre Madeira e sublinha: "Mantém-se atual"

 

A Procuradoria-geral da República (PGR) emitiu esta sexta-feira uma nota explicativa sobre o caso de corrupção na Madeira, no seguimento de várias críticas após a libertação dos três arguidos, que estiveram quase três semanas em prisão preventiva.

 Assim, atendendo às dúvidas suscitadas no "espaço público" relativamente às investigações de crimes ligados a contratação pública na Região Autónoma da Madeira, a PGR esclarece que "a realização da operação do passado dia 24 de janeiro que conduziu à detenção de três arguidos, entre os quais o presidente da câmara do Funchal, foi ponderada pelas três magistradas que dirigem as investigações e pelo diretor do DCIAP".

E, de acordo com a PGR, "essa ponderação permitiu concluir que [...] os elementos probatórios até então recolhidos apontavam indiciariamente, de forma consistente e sustentada, para o cometimento de um conjunto de ilícitos, dos quais foi dada nota pública no próprio dia das diligências, e para a necessidade de aplicação de medidas de coação mais gravosas do que o termo de identidade e residência".

Assim sendo, ainda segundo a PGR, "o referido entendimento, subscrito também pelos inspetores da Unidade Nacional de Combate à Corrupção da Polícia Judiciária (PJ), que coadjuvam o Ministério Público (MP), mantém-se atual".

A PGR recorda no mesmo documento que "em momentos anteriores, cinco diferentes juízes de instrução proferiram no processo decisões sustentadas na convicção de existirem já então indícios de ilícitos criminais imputados".

"Não tendo sido esse o juízo conclusivo alcançado pelo magistrado judicial que conduziu os interrogatórios", a PGR confirma que o MP "interporá recurso do respetivo despacho".

MP alertou "múltiplas vezes" para "incomum demora"

Na mesma nota a PGR lamenta "o longo período de tempo decorrido desde as detenções até à prolação do citado despacho" e garante que "as magistradas do Ministério Público presentes nas diligências de interrogatório procuraram sensibilizar, por múltiplas vezes e pelos meios ao seu alcance, o magistrado judicial que as conduziu, para a incomum demora registada e para a necessidade de lhes imprimir maior celeridade, tendo inclusivamente dirigido, logo no dia 1 de fevereiro de 2024, exposição ao Conselho Superior da Magistratura, enquanto órgão de gestão e disciplina da magistratura judicial".

A PGR termina o comunicado revelando que vai manter "um acompanhamento próximo da evolução das investigações e prestará esclarecimentos sempre que, não existindo prejuízo para o seu desenvolvimento, o entender oportuno".

East Timor: Santa Cruz massacre

 

The Santa Cruz massacre (also known as the Dili massacre) was the murder of at least 250 East Timorese pro-independence demonstrators in the Santa Cruz cemetery in the capital, Dili, on 12 November 1991, during the Indonesian occupation of East Timor and is part of the East Timor genocide.
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During a brief confrontation between Indonesian troops and protesters, some protesters and a major, Geerhan Lantara were stabbed. Stahl claimed Lantara had attacked a group of protesters including a girl carrying the flag of East Timor, and FRETILIN activist Constâncio Pinto reported witness accounts of beatings from Indonesian soldiers and police. When the procession entered the cemetery some continued their protests before the cemetery wall. Around 200 more Indonesian soldiers arrived and advanced on the gathering, weapons drawn. In the graveyard, they opened fire on hundreds of unarmed civilians. At least 250 East Timorese were killed in the massacre. One of the dead was a New Zealander, Kamal Bamadhaj, a political science student and human rights activist based in Australia.
The massacre was witnessed by the two American journalists—Amy Goodman and Allan Nairn—and caught on videotape by Max Stahl, who was filming undercover for Yorkshire Television. As Stahl filmed the massacre, Goodman and Nairn tried to "serve as a shield for the Timorese" by standing between them and the Indonesian soldiers. The soldiers began beating Goodman, and when Nairn moved to protect her, they beat him with their weapons, fracturing his skull. The camera crew managed to smuggle the video footage to Australia.
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East Timor genocide and Major General Prabowo (Wikipedia)

 

The East Timor genocide refers to the "pacification campaigns" of state terrorism which were waged by the Indonesian New Order government during the Indonesian invasion and occupation of East Timor. The majority of sources consider the Indonesian killings in East Timor to constitute genocide, while other scholars disagree on certain aspects of the definition.
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Sharp condemnation of the military came not just from the international community, but from within parts of the Indonesian elite. The massacre ended the governments 1989 opening of the territory and a new period of repression began. Warouw was removed from his position and his more accommodating approach to Timorese resistance rebuked by his superiors. Suspected Fretilin sympathisers were arrested, human rights abuses rose, and the ban on foreign journalists was reimposed. Hatred intensified amongst Timorese of the Indonesian military presence. Major General Prabowo's, Kopassus Group 3 trained militias gangs dressed in black hoods to crush the remaining resistance.
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Mais de 40 anos depois, o que fazem os ex-FP-25 de Abril (O Observador)

  

Entre os antigos militantes das FP-25 há, hoje em dia, um professor, um empresário e um agricultor. E há candidatos partidários. Luís Gobern Lopes foi jornalista e concorreu às autárquicas de 2021 pelo Bloco de Esquerda. António Manuel Baptista Dias é professor e foi deputado municipal pelo PS. 

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UNRWA head says agency was in dark about Hamas center under Gaza HQ; Israel: ‘You knew'

 

Philippe Lazzarini says allegations should be probed, any other ‘suspicious’ activity reported to UN; COGAT says officials ignored information; Katz calls for agency chief’s ouster.

The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, Philippe Lazzarini, denied Saturday any knowledge of a Hamas data center found by Israeli troops underneath its Gaza headquarters, with the Israeli military and Foreign Minister Israel Katz immediately casting doubt on his claim.

In a tweet shortly after the findings were published by The Times of Israel and other media outlets, Lazzarini said his organization, UNRWA, “did not know what is under its headquarters in Gaza.”

He said that the reports “merit an independent inquiry that is currently not possible to undertake given Gaza is an active war zone.”

He also said Israel has “not informed UNRWA officially about the alleged tunnel.”

The subterranean data center, seen by The Times of Israel’s military correspondent on Thursday during an Israel Defense Forces media tour, included an electricity room, industrial battery power banks, and living quarters for alleged Hamas terrorists operating the computer servers.

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The Red Cross and the Holocaust

 

One of the sorry backstories of World War II is found in what the Red Cross did — or, more precisely, failed to do — during the Holocaust. 

The pointed question was asked aloud by one survivor in May 1945 — “Where, above all, was the International Red Cross Committee?” — and now it is answered with authority and in compelling detail in “Humanitarians at War: The Red Cross in the Shadow of the Holocaust” by Gerald Steinacher (Oxford University Press).

Steinacher is the Hymen Rosenberg Professor of Judaic Studies at the Lincoln campus of the University of Nebraska. One of his previous books, “Nazis on the Run: How Hitler’s Henchmen Fled Justice,” was honored with a National Jewish Book Award by the Jewish Book Council in 2011.

In his new book, Steinacher reminds us that the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), as the Swiss-based organization was formally titled, deferred to the German Red Cross throughout the 1930s, when Hitler’s concentration camp system was first put into operation. Already “deeply Nazified,” the German Red Cross assured the ICRC that “the living standard in the camps [was] higher than most of the inmates were generally used [to].” Steinacher writes: “The German Red Cross had for all practical purposes … turned into a National Socialist medical service unit supporting Hitler’s Wehrmacht.”

Even after the outbreak of World War II, the ICRC did little or nothing to assist the victims of Nazi terror. Steinacher describes how the ICRC managed to send a few food parcels to Germany in 1943, including 882 packages that reached Dutch and Norwegian inmates, and 31 packages that reached Jewish inmates. But when the ICRC proposed to send food parcels to Auschwitz, the German Red Cross “claimed that the Jews were employed exclusively in labour camps in the East and that food and medication there [were] reportedly abundant,” Steinacher writes. In a message tainted with bitter irony, a representative of the German Red Cross wrote to the ICRC that “shipments of supplies to these camps were in principle not necessary.”

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Portugal — 2024 general election (Source: POLITICO)

 

Portugal goes to the polls on March 10 to elect a new parliament. Here’s the latest polling data from POLITICO Poll of Polls. What is Poll of Polls and how does it work? 

New GPAHE Report Profiles Far-Right Hate and Extremist Groups in Portugal; Includes Chega!

 

The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism today released a report profiling 13 far-right extremist groups in Portugal.

Most groups profiled spread the racist and anti-immigrant “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory; others push anti-LGBTQ+ hate 

The report, Far-Right Hate and Extremist Groups, Portugal (also available in Portuguese), details 13 hate and extremist groups — including the rising far-right political party Chega! — that GPAHE identifies as embracing beliefs and activities that demean, harass, or inspire violence against people based on their identity traits.

The majority of the groups profiled are anti-immigrant, white nationalist, or both. The four anti-LGBTQ+ groups are also anti-immigrant, showing the trend seen elsewhere around the globe of far-right groups expanding the targets of their hate and extremism efforts, and exploiting the public scare over drag and Pride events happening across the West. The report also identifies groups that are neo-Nazi, antisemitic, anti-women, and anti-Roma as well as conspiracist, some of which started in response to the health measures during COVID. See list of groups by ideology.

“The anti-immigrant and white nationalist fervor among far-right groups in Portugal is very troubling,” said Global Project Against Hate and Extremism co-founder Wendy Via. “Especially when political parties and hardcore groups are spreading the same hate.”

The political parties named in the report, including Chega!, Alternativa Democrática Nacional and Ergue-Te/Partido Nacional Renovador, are profiled in addition to dangerous well-known hate and extremist groups with an international presence including the white supremacist Proud Boys, the neo-Nazi skinhead group Hammerskins, and Identitarian groups.

June 26, 2023

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