Posted by: Frozen Al ||
11/01/2012 12:49 ||
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#1
I read this the other day. Many young people in Europe like Spain are going to Norway. I recall one fellow arrived in Norway and got a job the next. 2% unemployment rate also.
Greece's debt-load is rising much faster than expected as the country spirals into a sixth year of depression, ratcheting up the pressure on Germany and Europe's creditor states to accept debt-forgiveness for the first time.
Finance minister Yannis Stournaras said public debt will reach 189pc of GDP, far higher than estimates of 179pc published just weeks ago.
The new estimates exceed the worst-case scenario sketched by the International Monetary Fund and demolish any hope that Greece can claw its way back to solvency. "Unless EU leaders come up with a sustainable solution and cut the debt burden, everything is going to fall apart in Greece," said Simon Derrick from BNY Mellon.
The Greek economy is still caught in a vicious circle. It will contract by further 4.5pc next year, while the budget deficit will remain stuck at 5.2pc, according to forecasts in the 2013 budget.
The EU-IMF Troika is expected to give Greece an extra two years until 2016 to meet budget targets but the issue has already been overtaken by events.
The IMF now fears that the debt will still be 150pc of GDP in 2020. It has already stated that it cannot take part in any further aid packages unless the debt in on track to fall below 120pc.
The German, Dutch, Finnish and Austrian governments have for now dug in their heels on "haircuts" for official creditors, an explosive political issue in their own parliaments.
All losses so far from Greece's default been concentrated on private investors. They have taken write-downs of 75pc, or nearer 85pc on current market prices. The scale of the debacle in Greece means that any future write-downs must come from taxpayers and the EU bail-out fund (EFSF).
#2
"The German, Dutch, Finnish and Austrian governments have for now dug in their heels on "haircuts" for official creditors, an explosive political issue in their own parliaments. All losses so far from Greece's default been concentrated on private investors. They have taken write-downs of 75pc, or nearer 85pc on current market prices."
This contempt for the little guy is just one reason why the EU deserved the Barack Obama(TM) Nobel Peace Prize.
[Dawn] Spanish police said on Wednesday they had smashed a human trafficking ring in Barcelona, arresting 18 people suspected of smuggling around 1,000 Paks every year into the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... Officers have "dismantled a criminal organization dedicated to the trafficking of undocumented Democrats of Pak nationality," local police said in a statement.
The victims had paid between 600 and 15,000 euros ($800 and $20,000) each to be smuggled into Barcelona and other European cities, local police said in a statement, adding that the network had operated for at least seven years.
[An Nahar] French police Tuesday unveiled a damning report that showed up several loopholes in the investigation of al-Qaeda-inspired gunman Mohamed Merah before his shooting spree in Toulouse ...lies on the banks of the River Garonne, half-way between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. The Toulouse metropolitan area is the fourth-largest in La Belle France... The 17-page report by the police disciplinary unit IGPN said "several objective failures had come to light," including a "delayed coordinated reaction," as Interior Minister Manuel Valls vowed to "rapidly put into place the necessary adjustments."
Various units of the French police and intelligence bodies were working in a compartmentalized manner, the report said, slamming the French intelligence agency DCRI, which reports directly to the interior ministry, for "identifying the change in Merah's profile very late."
Merah, a self-described al-Qaeda sympathizer, shot a rabbi, three Jewish schoolchildren and three French paratroopers in attacks in and around the southern city of Toulouse in March before being rubbed out in a police siege.
The report said Merah, who has had at least 15 previous criminal convictions, attacked a neighbor in June 2010 who confronted him for showing her son a video depicting decapitation.
The lack of coordination resulted in the DCRI being unaware of this development, which could have led to increased surveillance on Merah, who turned into an Islamist hardliner in prison in February 2008, it said.
Merah's transformation to a radical only became apparent to the agency two years later.
And Merah's departure to Pakistain in August last year also went unnoticed because he transited through Oman, which is not part of the 31 destinations where outbound travel is monitored by French intelligence.
It called for tighter surveillance and better coordination between the various security agencies, including fiscal policing. Merah had a rented apartment in Toulouse despite having no declared income.
Separate reports from the DCRI show that Merah was under intense surveillance throughout 2011 but that agents decided to reduce monitoring.
They show that Merah, who had been under surveillance since 2006, was identified as a "privileged target" at the beginning of last year after returning from a trip to Afghanistan, where he was cooled for a few years Don't shoot, coppers! I'm comin' out! in November 2010.
Surveillance from March to July indicated he was in regular contact with "the radical Islamist movement in Toulouse", was showing "paranoid behavior" and was receiving funds from myrmidons.
Merah traveled to Pakistain between August and October last year and met with DCRI agents upon his return.
President Francois Hollande ...the Socialist president of La Belle France, and a fine job he's doing of it... has vowed to beef up its anti-terrorism laws following the killings.
Plans presented to cabinet earlier this month would allow authorities to prosecute suspects for terrorism-related crimes committed outside the country, allowing La Belle France to target cut-throats who attend foreign training camps.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Greece's debt-load is rising much faster than expected as the country spirals into a sixth year of depression, ratcheting up the pressure on Germany and Europe's creditor states to accept debt-forgiveness for the first time.
