News of the World

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ASIA

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Yakuza-san had a nuclear bomb...

DOJ: Japanese Yakuza Leader Trafficked Nuclear Materials, Weapons-Grade Plutonium

A leader within Japan’s Yakuza crime syndicate is accused of trafficking nuclear materials, including uranium and weapons-grade plutonium, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced Wednesday.

Takeshi Ebisawa, 60, was allegedly caught conspiring with a network of associates to traffic nuclear materials from Burma to other countries, according to the agency. Ebisawa allegedly sent photos depicting samples of nuclear materials in Thailand to an undercover U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

“With the assistance of Thai authorities, the Nuclear Samples were seized and subsequently transferred to the custody of U.S. law enforcement authorities,” according to the agency. “A U.S. nuclear forensic laboratory examined the Nuclear Samples and determined that both samples contain detectable quantities of uranium, thorium, and plutonium.”

Ebisawa believed the materials were going to be used in the development of a nuclear weapons program in Iran after an undercover agent posed as an Iranian general, according to the allegations contained in the indictment, which was unsealed on Wednesday in Manhattan federal court.

“It is impossible to overstate the seriousness of the conduct alleged in today’s Indictment. As alleged, Takeshi Ebisawa brazenly trafficked material containing uranium and weapons-grade plutonium from Burma to other countries,” U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement.

MIDDLE EAST

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3 Articles

Terror Victims Sue Associated Press over Alleged Link to October 7 Attack

Victims of the Hamas terror attack in Israel on October 7 announced Thursday that they have filed a federal lawsuit against the Associated Press (AP) for allegedly paying members of Hamas who also functioned as “stringer” photographers for the company.

The AP was forced to cut ties with one freelance photographer, Hassan Eslaiah, who was seen holding a grenade near the Gaza border during the attack, and who had earlier posed for a photograph with Gaza-based Hamas terrorist leader Yahya Sinwar.

Later, an AP freelancer was reported by the HonestReporting watchdog organization to have broadcast a live video, along with a Reuters freelance photographer, allegedly encouraging Gazans to participate in the October 7 attack while it was still ongoing.
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Separately, a New York Times photographer who had been accused of accompanying Hamas terrorists on October 7 won a prestigious George Polk Award for his coverage of the war.

As Breitbart News reported last year, the Times denied any wrongdoing.

U.S., UK Resume Air Strikes Against Yemen’s Huthis

Combined U.S. and British forces carried out a fresh wave of strikes Saturday against 18 Huthi targets in Yemen, hitting back after weeks of attacks on Red Sea shipping by the Iran-backed rebels.

Targets were hit across eight locations in Yemen” including weapons storage facilities, attack drones, air defense systems, radars and a helicopter, a joint statement said seen by AFP said.

It was co-signed by Australia, Bahrain, Denmark, Canada, the Netherlands and New Zealand, who gave unspecified “support” to the new round of strikes, the second this month and fourth since the rebels began their attacks on ships in the region, the AFP report details.

“The Huthis’ now more than 45 attacks on commercial and naval vessels since mid-November constitute a threat to the global economy, as well as regional security and stability, and demand an international response,” the statement said.

Huthi-run Al-Masirah television reported “a series of raids on the capital Sanaa,” while AFP correspondents in the rebel-controlled city in western Yemen said they heard several loud bangs.

Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin said in a separate statement the air attacks were necessary to keep one of the world’s busiest waterways free for commercial navigation...

USA

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An Airport Hosting Illegal Immigrants

Rep. Keith Self Battles FAA over Housing Unvetted Illegal Immigrants at Airports

Rep. Keith Self (R-TX) is leading the charge fighting the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) new practice of housing thousands of “potential terrorists” at airports across the country.

The FAA has allowed the housing of unvetted illegal immigrants at airports, including Boston Logan, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta, and Chicago O’Hare after the overflow of shelters across the nation, fueled by President Joe Biden’s policies, which have ushered in almost 7.3 million migrants since he took office.

The extraordinary move has drawn the ire of congressional Republicans.

“America’s worst terror attack started at an airport – so it is unconscionable that the FAA is allowing unvetted illegal immigrants, and potential terrorists, to be housed in U.S. airports,” Self said. “Democrats’ lawless open border policies have turned American cities, schools, and now airports into processing centers for illegal immigrants. These troubling practices cannot continue.”

On Thursday, Self led 36 of his colleagues in a letter to FAA administrator Michael Whitaker demanding answers regarding its dangerous practice which they point out is a distraction from the FAA’s mission and places the safety of those who travel by air in jeopardy.

That letter demands answers on the authority the FAA is exercising to use transportation hubs for migrant housing, steps the FAA is taking to ensure the safety of the facilities and their operation, and an accounting of where migrants are being housed.

FAA’s new and dangerous practice was highlighted during a February 15 House Transportation and Infrastructure hearing. In the hearing, Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) questioned Whitaker about how the FAA could seemingly violate existing regulations requiring approval of the FAA for airports to engage in non-aeronautical uses.

“The determination was that it did not interfere with aeronautical uses,” Whitaker replied.

Yet Whitaker appeared to have spent little time studying – or even familiarizing himself – with the issue before allowing the dangerous policy.
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Self, in addition to leading the letter, introduced the Airport Immigration Enforcement Act to address the problem.

Unlike most legislation, which can often run for dozens or hundreds of pages, this two-page bill simply would prohibit the FAA administrator from authorizing the housing of illegal immigrants within an airport and prohibit the use of federal funds to house illegal immigrants on airport property.

CBS News Boston footage, which captured “dozens of families” of migrants sleeping on the floor of Boston’s Logan International Airport, helped amplify the issue for Congress.

Those families, which included toddlers and babies, have been arriving at least since August.

Brazil Should Fix Biden's Mess in Venezuela

Blinken Hopes Brazil’s Lula Helps Clean Up Biden Mess in Venezuela

The United States is reportedly hoping that Brazil’s radical leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva uses his “influence” to convince Venezuela’s socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro to commit to a “free and fair” election following his meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday.

The “free and fair” presidential election agreement — which the Maduro regime and Venezuelan opposition signed in 2023 and Blinken has repeatedly promoted over the years — has, so far, resulted in a major blunder for the Biden Administration.

Venezuela’s political situation was one of the subjects reportedly discussed in Blinken’s meeting with Lula, held on the sidelines of the G20 meeting of foreign ministers in Brazil, taking place from February 22-23.

“Secretary Blinken underscored our position that Nicolas Maduro must return to implementation of the Barbados electoral roadmap agreement to ensure competitive presidential elections in 2024,” State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Wednesday.

Blinken also allegedly “commended” Lula “for Brazil’s role in de-escalating tensions between Guyana and Venezuela over the Essequibo region.”
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María Corina Machado, the frontrunner candidate against Maduro in the hypothetical “free and fair” election, is currently banned from running for public office through 2030. In early February, socialist thugs attacked one of her campaign events, injuring several of her supporters and forcing her to flee from the premises.

Machado was elected in late October to run against Maduro after securing roughly 93 percent of the votes in an opposition primary election. Maduro then had the nation’s socialist-controlled courts invalidate the election, claiming that the event was “fraudulent” and part of an alleged coup against the ruling socialist regime.

Despite myriad actions that Maduro and his regime committed following the October sanctions relief deal — and the lack of any indication of an imminent change of course from Maduro — the White House stated it would wait until April to commit to the terms of the agreement before reinstating the oil and gas sanctions that Biden lifted.

Following Thursday’s G20 meeting of foreign ministers, Blinken is scheduled to travel to Argentina to meet with President Javier Milei, where Venezuela will reportedly be discussed.

Harvard & Plagiarism

Harvard Plagiarism Scandal Deepens with Allegations Against Diversity Administrator

Plagiarism allegations against Harvard Extension School DEI administrator Shirley Greene involving more than 40 passages of her 2008 dissertation have been filed with the Ivy League institution, according to a report by City Journal.
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Moreover, Harvard University Chief Diversity Officer Sherri Ann Charleston was also accused of plagiarism in a new complaint, which alleges that Charleston claimed credit for her husband’s work.
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As for the latest allegations against Greene, who is a Title IX coordinator affiliated with the Office for Gender Equity, she has worked to advance the concept of so-called “Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging.”

The full complaint, obtained by City Journal, raises serious questions about Greene’s scholarship and academic integrity.

In one instance, Greene appears to take words, phrases, passages, and almost entire paragraphs verbatim directly from academic Janelle Lee Woo’s 2004 dissertation, “Chinese American Female Identity,” without including appropriate attribution or quotation.
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While the duplicated sections of Woo’s work are italicized, proper citation was not included.

Greene also reportedly lifts most of an entire table on “Racial/Ethnic Identity Development Models” without acknowledging the source.

Another example in the complaint compares Greene’s dissertation with a passage from “Developing Leadership Skills for Diversity” by Anthony Antonio.
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While Greene cited the source, she failed to include quotation marks. Notably, the entire paragraph is copied verbatim, with only the word “ethnic” being added to it.

The complaint reportedly calls out more than three dozen other examples of Greene allegedly taking language from other scholars. The allegations range from small violations to what appears to be the blatant stealing of others’ work.

The article includes actual extracts from both the original articles or dissertations and Greene's "own" works.

The Epstein Drama

Ron DeSantis Vows to Sign Bill Permitting Release of Epstein Documents

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis this week vowed to sign a bill passed by the Florida legislature which would permit the release of documents related to the Florida case of the late disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

The Florida Senate passed Senate Bill 234, which allows for the release of testimony and evidence from the grand jury investigation in 2006.

The bill reads in part:

An act relating to disclosure of grand jury testimony; amending s. 905.27, F.S.; revising the list of persons prohibited from disclosing the testimony of a witness examined before, or the evidence received by, a grand jury; creating an exception for a request by the media or an interested person to the prohibited publishing, broadcasting, disclosing, divulging, or communicating of any testimony of a witness examined before the grand jury, or the content, gist, or import thereof; providing criminal penalties; providing construction; making technical changes; reenacting s. 905.17(1) and (2), F.S., relating to who may be present during a session of a grand jury, to incorporate the amendment made to s. 905.27, F.S., in references thereto; 16 providing an effective date.

The House version of the bill passed earlier this month, and DeSantis announced this week that he will, indeed, sign it.

“All files related to Jeffrey Epstein’s criminal activity should be made public,” DeSantis said.

“While the federal government continues to stonewall accountability, I’m glad the Legislature has taken action to release the grand jury material from the Florida state case,” he continued.

“I will sign the bill into law,” DeSantis added.

Fani Willis Loves to Hide Important Details

Nathan Wade Led Fani Willis 2020 Transition into Office

The revelation of Wade’s previously unreported position as the former personnel decision-maker for the District Attorney’s Office raises ethical and conflict of interest concerns. It also raises questions about whether Wade and Willis have been forthright about the timeline of their affair.

“Wade is a prosecutor on the Trump case and he selected the office employees,” a source told Breitbart News.

Wade led a transition team of ten to twelve people who interviewed and evaluated current employees to remain in Willis’ newly won office just weeks after she won the election in November, said the sources, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of retribution due to their direct knowledge of the environment inside the District Attorney’s Office, which they characterized as “corrupt.”

Wade, a second source told Breitbart News, was in charge of determining who of the 250 office employees would remain with Willis. Sources described one-on-one interviews behind closed doors with Willis and Wade, who was “too invested to be just a friend” of Willis to hold such a powerful position.

Wade and Willis claim their relationship started in 2022 after Willis launched the probe into former President Donald Trump. But sources say Wade and Willis “obviously” had an ongoing romantic relationship at the time Willis won the election. “There was just something so weird going on,” one source said.

“Willis said everyone in the office was essentially all terminated, and that essentially we had to reapply for our jobs and must submit an application and schedule a time to appear for an interview,” a source said. “We had to reapply and came back in so they could interview everyone — from lawyers to paralegals to assistants to investigators.”

“And in that room, in my interview, there were a lot of people other than Fani Willis. And that was her transition team. I definitely know that Nathan Wade was in that room because he was taking the lead role,” the source stated. “And I was a little confused because I had never seen him before.”

Russia Evaded Sanctions

State Department: Prior Sanctions Worked, But Russia Found Ways to Evade Them ‘Over the Last Six Months’

[PBS NewsHour] Co-host Geoff Bennett asked, “President Biden today announced more than 500 sanctions on Russia. This is the largest tranche since the conflict started. Is this a tacit admission that the previous sanctions haven’t worked, what with Russia’s military-industrial complex up and running and seemingly drawing on limitless supplies and support from its authoritarian allies?”

[Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria] Nuland responded, “Well, let me start with your premise, Geoff, that previous sanctions haven’t worked. Russia has become a pariah state around the world, thrown out of the international banking system, and now, so desperate for weapons that it has to go to countries like Iran and North Korea to get them. But those Russians are wily, and they have, over the last six months, found ways to evade sanctions, but we have also got smarter about how to hurt them, and that’s why this package is so massive. It looks at punishing sanctions evaders. It looks at closing down further Russia’s access to credit and finance. It also punishes for the death of the leading opposition figure, Navalny, at the hands of Putin and his prison guards, and it sanctions those involved in the abduction of Ukrainian children into Russia. So, it is a massive package, and partly, it’s because we’ve got to staunch this evasion and because we have far more targets now, as we understand better how to staunch the Russian industrial complex.”

Bennett then asked, “Why should it, though, take an event like the death of Alexei Navalny to prompt these types of sanctions? Couldn’t some of this have happened two years ago, at least to stop the flow of technology into Russia’s military-industrial complex that goes into building the kinds of missiles that kill Ukrainians?”

Nuland answered, “Geoff, we did sanction technology from around the world as — two years ago, just before and after the invasion. What has happened is that Russia has found ways to evade those sanctions, going to third markets or buying, for example, a billion washing machines, and then taking out the computer chips that we’ve denied them in other ways. So, this is a tightening of those sanctions as Russia adjusts, and we’re confident that they’re going to have a very profound impact. But the other thing that’s happening, and this is quite worrying, is that Russia has been willing to intensify its economic and security relationship with China, in fact, becoming increasingly dependent on China. And that is how it is fueling its war machine. It’s also been willing to put the vast majority of its own economic stimulus into the war effort, so it is starving Russia and Russians of investment in education, in their own future, all in service of Putin’s imperial ambitions. So, what we’re having to do is adjust as well.”

EUROPE

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Upcoming Elections in Belarus

Belarus Opposition Calls for Boycott of ‘Farce’ Parliamentary Elections

Polls opened Sunday in Belarus’ tightly controlled parliamentary and local elections that are set to cement the steely rule of the country’s authoritarian leader, despite calls for a boycott from the opposition, which dismissed the balloting as a “senseless farce.”

President Alexander Lukashenko, who has ruled Belarus with an iron hand for nearly three decades and on Sunday announced that he will run for the presidency again next year, accuses the West of trying to use the vote to undermine his government and “destabilize” the nation of 9.5 million people.

Most candidates belong to the four officially registered parties: Belaya Rus, the Communist Party, the Liberal Democratic Party and the Party of Labor and Justice. Those parties all support Lukashenko’s policies. About a dozen other parties were denied registration last year.

Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who is in exile in neighboring Lithuania after challenging Lukashenko in the 2020 presidential election, urged voters to boycott the elections.

“There are no people on the ballot who would offer real changes because the regime only has allowed puppets convenient for it to take part,” Tsikhanouskaya said in a video statement. “We are calling to boycott this senseless farce, to ignore this election without choice.”

Sunday’s balloting is the first election in Belarus since the contentious 2020 vote that handed Lukashenko his sixth term in office and triggered an unprecedented wave of mass demonstrations.

More on Navalny

Russia Hands Over Body of Dissident Alexei Navalny to Family

The body of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has been handed over to his mother, a top aide to Navalny said Saturday on his social media account.

Ivan Zhdanov, the director of Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation, made the announcement on his Telegram account and thanked “everyone” who had called on Russian authorities to return Navalny’s body to his mother.

Earlier Saturday, Yulia Navalnaya, Navalny’s widow, accused President Vladimir Putin of mocking Christianity by trying to force his mother to agree to a secret funeral after his death in an Arctic penal colony.

“Thank you very much. Thanks to everyone who wrote and recorded video messages. You all did what you needed to do. Thank you. Alexei Navalny’s body has been given to his mother,” Zhdanov wrote.

Navalny, 47, Russia’s most well-known opposition politician, unexpectedly died on Feb. 16 in an Arctic penal colony and his family have been fighting for more than a week to have his body returned to them. Prominent Russians released videos calling on authorities to release the body and Western nations have hit Russia with more sanctions as punishment for Navalny’s death as well as for the second anniversary of its invasion of Ukraine.

Navalny’s mother, Lyudmila Navalnaya, is still in Salekhard, Navalny’s press secretary Kira Yarmysh said on X, formerly Twitter. Lyudmila Navalnaya has been in the Arctic region for more than a week, demanding that Russian authorities return the body of her son to her.

“The funeral is still pending,” Yarmysh tweeted, questioning whether authorities will allow it to go ahead “as the family wants and as Alexei deserves.”

Zelensky Doesn't Know How Many Ukrainians Have Died

Zelensky Claims Just 31,000 Ukrainian Soldiers Have Died During Past Two Years of War With Russia

President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday claimed that 31,000 Ukrainian soldiers have died in the war with Russia since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of the country two years ago.

In a departure from Kyiv’s tight-lipped stance on revealing casualty figures, President Zelensky for the first time has given a tally of how many soldiers have been killed by the Russians since the 2022 invasion.

Speaking at the “Ukraine. Year 2024” forum in Kyiv on Sunday, the president said per the AP: “31,000 Ukrainian military personnel have been killed in this war. Not 300,000, not 150,000, not whatever Putin and his deceitful circle have been lying about. But nevertheless, each of these losses is a great sacrifice for us.”

Zelensky said that he would not reveal how many of his soldiers have been wounded or have gone missing over the past two years. He also said that his government does not have a full accounting of how many civilians have been killed by the Russians, but suggested it is in the “tens of thousands”.

“We don’t know how many of our civilians they killed. We don’t,” he said, noting that a firm figure on civilian deaths will likely not be determined until the war is over.

According to the latest report from the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, there have been at least 30,457 civilian casualties since the conflict broke out into full war in February of 2022. This estimate was comprised of 10,582 killed and 19,875 injured.

Contrary to Zelensky’s claims on Sunday, a report from the New York Times in August found that some 70,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed in action, with a further 100,000 to 120,000 suffering injuries.

Problems in UK

Pro-Palestinian Protesters Shut Down London’s Tower Bridge as Mid-East Conflict Takes Centre Stage in British Politics

London’s Tower Bridge was shut down on Saturday evening by a group of pro-Palestinian protesters demanding a ceasefire in Gaza as the conflict in the Middle East takes centre stage in British politics.

Dozens of anti-Israel activists waving Palestinian flags and setting off flares shut down the famed Tower Bridge in London on Saturday, the Daily Mail reported. The activists carried a banner reading “Save Gaza, Ceasefire Now” while others carried placards accusing Israel of “genocide” and “murder” for its attempts to root out Islamist Hamas terrorists in the wake of the barbaric October 7th terror attacks that saw around 1,200 people murdered in Israel and hundreds more taken captive.

A City of London police statement said at the time: “Tower Bridge is currently closed due to protest activity. Officers are in attendance at the scene.” The bridge in Central London was eventually without any arrests.

The protest came in the wake of a controversial vote in the House of Commons this week tabled by the leftist separatist Scottish National Party (SNP) calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

The vote on Wednesday evening descended into chaos as House Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle broke with convention to allow for the Labour Party to add amendments to the motion,  effectively saving Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer from embarrassment over the likely defection of many of his own members joining the demand from another party for a ceasefire.

Extraordinarily, Sir Lindsay said that his decision was prompted by concerns that parliamentarians may face violent reprisals from “terrorists” if they were not given an opportunity to express their opinions in separate amendments.

Hundreds of anti-Israel activists gathered outside of the Commons during the vote, while some even projected the genocidal Palestinian battle cry: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” onto Parliament’s Big Ben clock tower.

British Transport Police Scraps Fitness Test over ‘Indirect Discrimination’ Against Female Officers

British Transport Police have scrapped mandatory fitness tests after they were determined to promote “indirect discrimination” against females and because they were more likely to fail than their male counterparts.

The police force, which patrols railway stations in Britain, has been accused of sacrificing standards in favour of political correctness after it scrapped its annual Job Related Fitness Test (JRFT). Dubbed the ‘bleep test’, officers for the past decade were required to run back and forth on a 15-metre track for three and a half minutes.

However, according to a report from the Mail on Sunday, British Transport Police stopped requiring officers to do the test in 2022 because it was deemed as discriminatory to women officers, with 8 per cent of female officers failing the test as of June 2022 compared to just 1.9 per cent of male officers.

The test was also argued to be unfair to older officers, with 86 per cent of failures coming from officers older than 35 and 32 per cent coming from those over the age of 50.

The policy change means that at least 50 officers were reinstated to active duty after being relegated to office work or other light duties for failing the test. Now, only specialists such as armed police and K-9 handlers, as well as new recruits, will be subjected to a physical fitness test.

Commenting on the sliding standards, a serving officer in the force told the paper: “Members of the public call the police expecting officers capable of doing the job of protecting them.

“It’s embarrassing to see colleagues who can barely do up their stab vest, and knowing they might not even be able to manage a two-minute jog is not just concerning but dangerous.”

France

Eiffel Tower Reopens to the Public as Union Strike Ends

Eiffel Tower that had been closed for five days by a strike will reopen Sunday after the monument’s management announced a deal had been struck with unions.

The stoppage since Monday at one of the world’s best-known tourist sites was the second within two months in protest at what unions say was insufficient investment.

The tower’s operator SETE said it had reached agreement with the unions on Saturday “under which the parties will regularly monitor the company’s business model, investment in works and revenue through a body that will meet every six months”.

With an aim to balance its books by 2025, both sides also agreed to see an investment of some 380 million euros up to 2031 toward works and maintenance of the tower, the statement said.

SETE extended apologies to visitors caught in the strike action, which resulted in the loss of some 100,000 admissions.

The Eiffel Tower booked a shortfall of around 120 million euros ($130 million) during the Covid pandemic in 2020 and 2021.

SETE has since received a recapitalisation of 60 million euros, which unions say is insufficient given that major maintenance work is needed, including a fresh paint job.

Macron Berated by French Farmers: ‘You Gave Ukraine Colossal Sums, But Gave Us Crumbs!’

French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday was surrounded by groups of farmers who chastised the neo-liberal leader for his green agenda and for prioritising Ukraine over his own people.

At the 60th Agricultural Show held in the Porte de Versailles exhibition centre in Paris on Saturday, agricultural unions and organisations clashed with security and breached the gates in order to air the grievances of farmers to Emmanuel Macron directly. After initially showing hesitancy, the French president acquiesced and held an impromptu debate with several farmers.

“You gave Ukraine colossal sums, but you gave us crumbs,” one farmer said to Macron according to broadcaster BFMTV.

According to the German-based think tank the Kiel Institute, Macron’s government has committed approximately $2 billion in French taxpayer money to Ukraine since 2022. However, the French taxpayer has paid substantially more through the European Union’s funding of the war, which is set to total over $150 billion after Brussels recently approved an additional $54 billion to Kyiv.

Farmers in France, and indeed throughout Europe, have been financially impacted by the war in Ukraine in more ways than having their tax dollars sent to Kyiv. Last year, the European Union decided to allow Ukrainian agricultural imports to flow into the bloc without any tariffs. The move has severely hurt the ability of local European farmers to compete, given that the lower regulatory burden and the lower cost of labour in the former Soviet state means that food can be produced at a much cheaper rate.

On Wednesday the EU announced that it would extend duty-free access to its market for Ukraine for at least another year as a measure to help its economy stay afloat amid the war with Russia. Although Brussels said that it would put some safeguards in place to protect domestic agriculture, farmers’ groups said that the move would ultimately see further protests from farmers across the continent as it did not go far enough.

Ukraine was not the only issue raised by the farmers to Macron on Saturday. Multiple farmers spoke of the problems they are facing due to transitioning their operations to organic farming at the urging of the government in Paris and the EU.

Radical Islamist Imam Deported From France in Just 12 Hours… Vows to Return

France used a new immigration law to deport a radical Imam in just 12 hours, but the target insisted that he is the victim of a misunderstanding and vowed to return.

French interior minister Gérald Darmanin hailed the nation’s new immigration law passed last year for making it easier for the government to deport undesirable foreigners after it was used on Thursday against a radical preacher. Tunisian-origin Imam Mahjoub Mahjoubi went from detention to being put on a plane in just 12 hours.

Darmanin said: “Instructions were given to issue a ministerial expulsion order against this radical ‘imam’ who made unacceptable remarks and he was the subject of a home visit and an arrest.

“Without the immigration law, this would not have been possible. Firmness is the rule.”

Per the expulsion order seen by the conservative newspaper Le Figaro, Imam Mahjoubi was accused of advocating for a panoply of extremist causes. The state accused him of promoting terrorism, and advocating a “literal, retrograde, intolerant and violent conception of Islam”. The Imam is also alleged to have discriminated against women and fermented tensions with the Jewish community.

Offences against the symbols of the state are a reasonably serious offence in France, as they are in several European nations where post-war work to prevent the resurgence of fascism treats deviance from democratic norms severely. In this category, Imam Mahjoubi is said to have called the French flag “satanic” that has “no value to Allah”. The comments came to light after a video of one of the Imam’s sermons went viral on French social media earlier this week.

Imam Mahjoubi, on the other hand, insists these accusations boil down to a misunderstanding — claiming that he was actually talking about football in his sermon and suffered a “slip of the tongue”, he claims — and that in any case, he has rights that should be respected. The government’s order under the new law is “arbitrary” and he said he was being made an example of by the Interior Minister to promote the new law.

The Imam’s lawyer said the expulsion would be contested in court.