Are We Charging The Brother? If Not, Why Not?

The BBC is taking out an onion for illegal immigrants again:

Obada and Ayser were among five people who drowned, a few metres from the shore, on the coast of northern France that night - the first to die while trying to cross to the UK in a small boat in 2024, a fortnight into the new year. To try to understand how a child could be put in this situation, the BBC reconstructed Obada's journey from Syria - using videos, messages and interviews with the brothers' relatives and others who accompanied them. Our aim was to explore the wrenching decisions involved at every stage.

Oh, that was your aim, was it? 

In his bedsit in west London, another of Obada's brothers, Nada, 25, kept glancing at his phone. It was 01:00 in London, 02:00 in France. A few hours earlier, Nada had called the whole group as they sat warming themselves around a fire at their makeshift camp under a canal bridge in Calais. They'd seemed confident about the journey ahead. Nada had made the same dangerous crossing two years earlier, ignoring his father, at home in Daraa, who had initially urged him to be patient, suggesting the war in Syria might soon end. Nada had chosen to travel to England because an uncle had already made the journey almost a decade earlier and been granted permission to remain. Both men had come illegally because, Nada said, there was no alternative.

And how did he repay this country? By encouraging more illegal immigration, of course. And now he has a foot in the door our own laws allow him to bring relatives legally. 

In October last year, Nada was granted refugee status and permission to remain in the UK for five years. He recently found a warehouse job near Wembley. He's now taking an English language course and hopes to bring his wife from Syria soon - something he is allowed to apply for as a refugee - and eventually to resume his law degree in England.

Which is the same aim his brother had:  

A neighbour from Daraa, who was with Obada the night he drowned, backed that up. "He would reach Britain and reunite with his brother and soon after would bring his mother and father. That was the whole point of them leaving, so his father could seek medical treatment abroad," said the man, who asked us not to reveal his name. In fact, the plan was flawed from the start. Given that he already had an adult brother in London, Obada would not have been in a position, as a minor, to arrange for his parents to follow him legally.

Well, thank goodness for that! As it happened  he never made it, but why has the brother's asylum not been revisited in light of his collusion? If he's broken no laws in encouraging the child and failing to alert the authorities, it's an utter travesty. 

The following evening, about 100 locals from Calais and a handful of migrants gathered in the town centre to hold a minute's silence for the five dead and to add Obada's and Ayser's names to a long scroll listing those who have died trying to cross the Channel in recent years.

"The biggest fault is the laws of Europe who make the life of the refugees impossible. Who give them not any rights. Who make their life here in Calais and all over the borders impossible. And we have to remember that. It is the fault of the European laws," a local French woman told the sombre crowd.

Sounds like France has its share of idiots too. Just like the UK. 

What's The French For 'Keeping Your Appointment In Samarra'..?

Mallet's victims on Friday included Emine Kara, the leader of the Kurdish women’s movement in France, who was refused asylum in the country earlier this year.

This infuriated Kurdish nationalists, who accused the French authorities of not doing enough to protect her.

Hey, if she'd gone back when her claim was refused, she wouldn't have been around to catch a bullet in Paris, would she? 

Beccuau referred to a burglary at his Paris home in 2016 which he believed was carried out by immigrants – a crime that helped radicalise him.

Something the police here might want to bear in mind... 

It was a year ago – on December 8 2021 – that the Frenchman went on the rampage in a refugee camp in Paris.

‘He used a sabre to slice two men, and damage six tents at a camp in the Bercy park in the 12th arrondissement of Paris,’ said the investigating source. ‘He was wounded when one of the refugees was disarming him. Two Sudanese refugees were badly wounded in the attack.’

The former train driver was put on remand in prison, while awaiting trial for attempted murder linked to racism, but he was bailed on December 12. Restrictions included having his French passport removed, and he was also banned from keeping any kind of weapon, while under ‘judicial supervision’.

Sounds like the judicial system over there is no better than ours... 

When Will A UK Politician Show The Same Backbone On Behalf Of The People Cull?

Denmark’s prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, has called a general election for 1 November after a member of her ruling coalition threatened to withdraw its support over her handling of the country’s controversial Covid mass mink cull.

Gosh! Mink are cute and make great coats. Do they rate higher than people, though? 

Frederiksen’s popularity has slipped after the government’s 2020 decision to cull Denmark’s entire captive mink population of 15 million for fear of a Covid-19 mutation moving from the animals to humans that could jeopardise future vaccines.

A parliament-appointed commission said in June that the government had lacked legal justification for the cull and made “grossly misleading” statements when it ordered Europe’s first compulsory shutdown of an entire farm sector.

Sounds familiar. Maybe we should all identify as mink, and maybe then our government could be brought to book for their actions during lockdown? 

Good!

Of course, in the crazy world of the 'Guardian', this is bad!

The government’s New Plan for Immigration aims to restrict family reunion rights for refugees who travelled through a safe third country before reaching the UK. This applies to the thousands who travelled to the UK in small boats.

Many of them have, in fact, travelled through multiple safe countries. Can the 'Guardian' find one that deserves to be here this time?

Reader, they cannot: 

One Syrian asylum seeker, who fled war, imprisonment and torture in his homeland before travelling through several countries and reaching the UK, said he was “horrified” by the government plans.

“We did not leave our country in search of happiness,” he told the Guardian. “I am talking here as the head of a family deserted. Rather, we went out to save our family from a war that does not know the young or the old and does not differentiate between the strong or the weak, in which no one can survive.”

“We walked in the most dangerous country, crossed the desert and crossed the English Channel in a rubber boat, knowing we may die in the sea. Has any official asked themselves what motivated us to risk ourselves … I was ready to die in order to save my family. What Priti Patel is thinking now is to eliminate our families by depriving us of family reunion.”

No, she's seeking to implement the will of the British people who have voted in a party that promised a crackdown on this sort of 'asylum shopping'.  

What Is Our Country Turning Into..?

The UK’s biggest business lobby group has called on the government to relax post-Brexit immigration rules...

Wait, why? 

...to help companies struggling with staff shortages to hire more workers from overseas.

Hire British ones instead! Oh, god, it's not the curry houses again, is it? 

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) said the government needed to immediately update its “shortage occupations list” to include several areas where employers are finding it difficult to recruit staff, including butchers, bricklayers and welders.

Oh! That's some strange collection of occupations there... 

Pressure is mounting on hauliers, hospitality venues and the food and drink industry in particular, with companies scrambling to hire staff as pandemic restrictions are relaxed and demand for goods and services returns.

Well, how many unemployed do we have? 1.6 million? I think we can find some there, can't we? 

A government spokesperson said: “Employers should invest in our domestic workforce instead of relying on labour from abroad.

The government carefully considered the migration advisory committee’s findings and recommendations on the shortage occupation list, but decided not to make wide-scale changes while we monitor the new skilled worker route and assess how the UK labour market develops and recovers post-pandemic.”

Quite right. Let's use the resources we have, rather than purchasing foreign ones. 

Chalk Up Another Win For Carrie..?

To animal welfare activists, it's 'torture in a tin'; to gourmets – or at least some of them – it's a delicious delicacy.

Now Britain is set to ban the import of foie gras in a post-Brexit move that should delight anti-cruelty campaigners.

And someone very close to the seat of power at No 10, no doubt. 

Sources said yesterday that Lord Goldsmith, the Animal Welfare Minister, is determined to implement the ban 'in the next few months'.

There's no more pressing concerns for his department to work on, then? 

Last month, he congratulated Fortnum & Mason after the Queen's grocer announced that it would no longer stock the delicacy, usually sold as a pâté or mousse made from the enlarged livers. At the time, Lord Goldsmith tweeted: 'Foie gras is unbearably barbaric. It's hard to imagine anyone could watch the process and still enjoy eating it.'

Don't they say the same about sausages? Oh, and laws? 

The Right Stuff..?

European space chiefs have launched their first recruitment drive for new astronauts in 11 years...

Excellent news!  

...with particular emphasis on encouraging women and people with disabilities to join missions to the Moon and, eventually, Mars.

Wait, what? Identity politics in space now...? 

The European Space Agency (ESA) said on Tuesday that it was looking to boost the diversity of its crews as it cavassed for up to 26 permanent and reserve astronauts.

Why? Space exploration is a tough enough job without having the added burden of someone who is potentially weaker than male crewmates, or needs expensive adaptations to perform to the same level.

I mean, what possible reason would you have, other than the PR opportunity? 

Adapting technology that enabled humans to be in space could open the opportunity for people with disabilities, Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti said.

“When it comes to space travel, we are all disabled,” Cristoforetti added.

But some will now be more disabled than others.