RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/nigerian-gunmen-kidnap-primary-school-children-in-latest-mass-abduction-11615820244?mod=world_major_2_pos1

Gunmen kidnapped three teachers from a primary school in northwestern Nigeria on Monday, government officials said, as parents of students kidnapped in another school four days earlier staged a protest demanding the government bring their children home safely.

Samuel Aruwan, the security commissioner for Kaduna state, initially said that authorities had received reports that both pupils and teachers had been abducted on Monday morning in the Birnin Gwari area, but later issued a statement to say the missing children had escaped. A local vigilante group who was hunting for the kidnappers said it would take until Tuesday morning to say definitively that none of the students had been abducted.

The victims’ families said the gunmen arrived Monday morning, shortly after school gates had opened, and attacked the school. Primary schools in Nigeria usually admit children between 6 and 9 years old.

“They came to the village looking like normal people and one of them drew a gun from his caftan and started firing before moving to the school,” said Abduljalal Usman, the elder brother of one of the abducted teachers.

It was the fifth mass school abduction since December in Nigeria’s northwest, where a surge in armed militancy has led to worsening security and kidnapping for ransom become a lucrative industry.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17113/lukashenko-crushes-belarus

Lukashenko, who has ruled Belarus since he came into power in 1994, has cracked down violently on the still-ongoing protests in which police have detained more than 33,000 people.

Belarus “is not a member of the Council of Europe – it still has the death penalty which is an automatic bar to its membership. This means that it is not subject to… requirements… to bring its prison system in line with the norms outlined in the European Prison Rules…. All prisoners are vulnerable to their treatment in custody being manipulated at the behest of investigators to exact confessions and witness statements from them. The lack of transparency of the Belarus prison service is almost absolute.” — Judith Pallot, Director of the GULAGECHOES project at the University of Helsinki, Open Democracy, November 20, 2020.

The US has “designated” several individuals and entities in Belarus for their role in undermining democracy and human rights abuses. The EU has also imposed several rounds of sanctions against high-level officials…. It is up for debate, however, whether sanctions have any effect on the leadership of Belarus, especially because Belarus largely relies on Russia, not the West…. “The individuals on the list don’t care about being on it. On the contrary, they consider it a medal of honor.” — Artyom Shraibman, a political analyst based in Minsk, politico.eu, September 19, 2020.

“I will not suddenly give up the presidency. I have nothing other than Belarus. I cling to it and I hold on to it”. — Alexander Lukashenko, president of Belarus, France 24, February 11, 2021.

It has been six months since protests began in Belarus against the authoritarian regime of President Alexander Lukashenko and the unfree elections that took place there on August 9, 2020. Lukashenko, who has ruled Belarus since he came into power in 1994, has cracked down violently on the still ongoing protests, in which police have detained more than 33,000 people.

On November 5, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) issued a report, OSCE Rapporteur’s Report under the Moscow Mechanism on Alleged Human Rights Violations related to the Presidential Elections of 9 August 2020, which concluded that the presidential elections “fell short of fulfilling the basic international requirements for genuine elections. Accordingly, the allegations that the presidential elections were not transparent, free or fair were found confirmed.”

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/03/uk-foreign-secretary-claims-britain-dismantling-robert-spencer/

The Islamic State (ISIS) is newly emboldened by the departure of Donald Trump from the Oval Office and the return to power of the forces of appeasement, denial, weakness and surrender. The National reported Thursday that “children are being exposed to ISIS terrorism online during lockdown, raising fears of brainwashing,” according to British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab. Raab talked tough in response, but all he really offered was more of the same: lip-service to counterjihad efforts from a government that lacks the will to confront this foe, and would rather pretend that its real problem is “right-wing extremists.”

Dominic Raab (pictured above) told Parliament that “security services were fighting hard to combat the threat,” but he also recounted “the terrorists’ rising global influence, with armed groups in Africa and Asia adopting its violent methods.” The “biggest worry,” however, “was the ‘perfect storm’ of young people stuck indoors during lockdown, and going online to relieve their boredom where they were subjected to extremist indoctrination.” Accordingly, Raab said, “we can see a worrying rise in the proportion of children and teenagers that are now being arrested for terrorism offences.”

Yeah, that’s it, Raab, boredom leads to jihad. Give these boys a basketball and a job at Tesco and all will be well, right?

ISIS, he continued, is “still able to carry out lethal attacks,” and contrary to all the propaganda about “white supremacists,” it is still Britain’s “most significant terrorist threat.” Raab asserted that ISIS “more and more reliant on its perverse propaganda and warped narrative to try and maintain its relevance and cement support for its terrorist attacks. Daesh [the political elites’ favored euphemism for the Islamic State] maintains a steady drumbeat of violent communications, which they distribute with encrypted messaging applications.”