On this date, December 13, 1945, 11 Nazi War Criminals were all hanged by Albert Pierrepoint in Hamelin Prison, Germany. I will post the information about from Elisabeth Volkenrath from Wikipedia and other links.
FEMALE NAZI GUARD: ELISABETH VOLKENRATH (SEPTEMBER 5, 1919 TO DECEMBER 13, 1945)
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THE WOMAN WITH THE DOGS: JUANA BORMANN (SEPTEMBER 10, 1893 TO DECEMBER 13, 1945)
On this date, December 13, 1945, 11 Nazi War Criminals were all hanged by Albert Pierrepoint in Hamelin Prison, Germany. I will post the information about Juana Bormann from Wikipedia and other links.
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SS-HAUPTSCHARFUHRER: FRANZ STOFEL (OCTOBER 5, 1915 TO DECEMBER 13, 1945)
On this date, December 13, 1945, 11 Nazi War Criminals were all hanged by Albert Pierrepoint in Hamelin Prison, Germany. I will post the information about Franz Stofel from Wikipedia and other links.
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WILHELM DORR (FEBRUARY 9, 1921 TO DECEMBER 13, 1945)
On this date, December 13, 1945, 11 Nazi War Criminals were all hanged by Albert Pierrepoint in Hamelin Prison, Germany. I will post the information about from Wilhelm Dörr from Wikipedia and other links.
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FRANZ HOSSLER (FEBRUARY 4, 1906 TO DECEMBER 13, 1945)
On this date, December 13, 1945, 11 Nazi War Criminals were all hanged by Albert Pierrepoint in Hamelin Prison, Germany. I will post the information about from Franz Hössler Wikipedia and other links.
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THE DACHAU TRIALS (VERDICT ON DECEMBER 13, 1945)
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GEORGE WASHINGTON ON DISCIPLINE [QUOTE ~ DECEMBER 14, 2014]
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George Washington on discipline |
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SEPPUKU
Every year on December 14, Sengakuji Temple holds a festival commemorating the 47-Ronin event (the most famous example of the samurai code of honor courage, and loyalty--bushido--as the country's "national legend"). I will post information about Seppuku from Wikipedia.
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Illustration from Sketches of Japanese Manners and Customs, by J. M. W. Silver, Illustrated by Native Drawings, Reproduced in Facsimile by Means of Chromolithography, London, 1867 |
Seppuku (切腹?, "stomach-cutting", "abdomen-cutting") is a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. Seppuku was originally reserved only for samurai. Part of the samurai bushido honour code, seppuku was either used voluntarily by samurai to die with honour rather than fall into the hands of their enemies (and likely suffer torture[citation needed]), or as a form of capital punishment for samurai who had committed serious offenses, or performed because they had brought shame to themselves. The ceremonial disembowelment, which is usually part of a more elaborate ritual and performed in front of spectators, consists of plunging a short blade, traditionally a tantō, into the abdomen and moving the blade from left to right in a slicing motion.
Vocabulary and etymology
Overview
Ritual
Female ritual suicide
History
Religious and social context
In literature and film
Terminology
Seppuku as capital punishment
European witness
Seppuku in modern Japan
While the voluntary seppuku described above is the best known form, in practice the most common form of seppuku was obligatory seppuku, used as a form of capital punishment for disgraced samurai, especially for those who committed a serious offense such as unprovoked murder, rape, robbery, corruption, or treason. The samurai were generally told of their offense in full and given a set time to commit seppuku, usually before sunset on a given day. On occasion, if the sentenced individuals were uncooperative or outright refused to end their own lives, it was not unheard of for them to be restrained and the seppuku carried out by an executioner, or for the actual execution to be carried out instead by decapitation while retaining only the trappings of seppuku; even the short sword laid out in front of the offender could be replaced with a fan. Unlike voluntary seppuku, seppuku carried out as capital punishment did not necessarily absolve, or pardon, the offender's family of the crime. Depending on the severity of the crime, half or all property of the condemned could be confiscated, and the family would be punished by being stripped of rank, sold into long-term servitude, or execution.
Seppuku was considered the most honorable capital punishment apportioned to Samurai. Zanshu (斬首) and Sarashikubi (晒し首）, decapitation followed by a display of the head, was considered harsher, and reserved for samurai that committed greater crimes. The harshest punishments, usually involving death by torturous methods like Kamayude (釜茹で), being boiled to death, were reserved for commoner criminals.
Notable cases
This list is in chronological order.
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THE CHUCK E. CHEESE SHOOTER: NATHAN DUNLAP (MURDERED 4 PEOPLE ON DECEMBER 14, 1993)
On this date, December 14, 1993, Nathan Dunlap shot dead 4 people at the Chuck E. Cheese’s restaurant in Aurora, Adams County, Colorado, USA. I will post information about this shooter from Murderpedia.
A.K.A.:"Chuck E. Cheese Killer"
Classification: Mass murderer
Characteristics: Revenge - Robbery
Number of victims: 4
Date of murder: December 14, 1993
Date of birth: 1974
Victims profile: Restaurant employees Colleen O'Connor, 17; Benjamin Grant, 17; Sylvia Crowell, 19; and night manager Marge Kohlberg, 50
Method of murder: Shooting
Location: Aurora, Adams County, Colorado, USA
Status: Sentenced to death on May 17, 1996
Nathan Dunlap was convicted and sentenced to death in 1996 for the murder of four employees at an Aurora Chuck E. Cheese's restaurant.
Fifty-year-old Margaret Kohlberg watched the clock. It was nearly 10 p.m. on a Tuesday night in December 1993, and her crew was antsy. A family birthday party had stayed late at the Aurora Chuck E. Cheese, and the parents were just now bundling up their two kids against the winter cold. Margaret headed back to the office to start tallying the night's receipts. She'd go home in a few minutes, after she got her teenage workers out the door.
Sylvia Crowell started cleaning the salad bar. The 19-year-old was balancing a full-time work schedule and classes at Metro State, but that day she'd gone shopping with her best friend, Carole Richins, before they'd clocked in for the night shift at the pizzeria. Carole had just left, shouting, "I love you!" over the restaurant's cacophony of arcade games and animated toys.
Nearby, Ben Grant, a high school junior, turned on the vacuum, and its whirring helped drown out the noise. He tossed the cord behind him, absentmindedly sucking up pizza crumbs and food left crushed into the carpet by the kids. Colleen O'Connor was helping close that night too, but she was distracted. The 17-year-old had called her mom during a break three hours before and found out her parents were giving her a car.
In the kitchen, Bobby Stephens scrubbed away. He hadn't been scheduled to work that day, but he needed the cash. Just 20, he had a seven-month-old baby boy at home. With the holidays coming up, he had stopped in to ask for extra hours, and they had put him to work. The small crew continued closing, the routine so familiar that they moved with the robotic motions of the mechanized creatures that danced, twirled, and sang around them.
Sylvia didn't even hear the intruder come up behind her. Silently, he raised the .25-caliber semiautomatic pistol to her left ear and squeezed.
Bang.
As she fell, he looked away. He couldn't stomach the sight of gore and blood. He moved quickly to where Ben was vacuuming.
Bang.
The bullet entered near Ben's eye, lodging in his brain as he fell to the ground.
Colleen saw him coming. He was a boy with a gun; he had too-big brown eyes above hollowed cheeks and a mouth that twisted in a half-smile. Kneeling in front of him, she begged for her life, raising her arms, her fists clenched, as he held a gun just 18 inches from her head.
"Don't shoot," she cried. "I won't tell."
"I have to," the shooter said as he pulled the trigger again.
Bang.
Inside the kitchen, Bobby heard the three sharp cracks, but he didn't stop working. He figured it was probably Sylvia or Colleen popping balloons. He didn't have time to think about it much before the kid with the gun barged into the kitchen. Tall but gaunt, like a boy who's not quite yet a man, the intruder was wearing a jacket, gloves with holes cut out at the knuckles, and a baseball cap perched backward on his head. Stunned, Bobby started to say hello. Half-smirking, the shooter raised his arm.
Bang.
The bullet entered Bobby's jaw and sent him sprawling to the floor. It felt like a burn, a cigarette scorching his skin, and then like a baseball bat slamming into his face. He watched as a pair of black high-top shoes headed toward the office. Margaret was still counting the evening receipts. She did what he asked and opened the safe. The last words she heard were "thank you."
Bang.
He shot her in the ear. Then he grabbed her bag, filled it with game tokens, key chains, cards, $1,591 and change.
Bang.
He shot her again, in the other ear, just to make sure.
Six .25-caliber shell casings dotted the floor. The shooting spree couldn't have lasted more than five minutes.
It would only take a few hours after the Chuck E. Cheese massacre for police to track down the shooter: 19-year-old Nathan Jerard Dunlap was at his girlfriend's apartment. The couple was having sex when his pager went off with a message from his mom, who was relaying a message from the cops. The investigators had heard he ate dinner at the restaurant that night and wanted to ask him a few questions. Dunlap agreed to meet. Before returning to his home, an apartment he shared with his mother, the teenager washed his hands with hydrogen peroxide and jumped in the shower, then stashed some of the money under the freezer. Back at his home, the police questioned him, swabbed his hands for gunshot residue, and took his clothes into evidence. About 12 hours after the murders the police returned to Dunlap's home and cuffed and arrested the teen.
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WINE, WOMEN AND WEAPONS: NORTH KOREA’S DR. EVIL – KIM JONG IL (FEBRUARY 16, 1941 TO DECEMBER 17, 2011)
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STRELKOV THE TERRIBLE: IGOR GIRKIN
I will post information about the Russian Nationalist Commander, Igor Girkin from Wikipedia and other news sources links.
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Igor Girkin |
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| Igor Girkin |
Nickname(s) | "Strelkov" |
Born | 17 December 1970 Moscow, Soviet Union |
Allegiance | Russia Transnistria Republika Srpska Donetsk People's Republic |
Service/branch | Federal Security Service |
Years of service | 1992 – March 2013 |
Rank | FSB Colonel |
Battles/wars | |
Other work | Donetsk People's Republic Defense Minister (16 May – 14 August 2014) |
Igor Vsevolodovich Girkin (Russian: Игорь Всеволодович Гиркин, Ukrainian: І́гор Все́володович Гі́ркін), also known as Igor Ivanovich Strelkov (Russian: Игорь Иванович Стрелков), born on 17 December 1970, is a Russian citizen from Moscow who played a key role in the War in Donbass as an organizer of Donetsk People's Republic insurgency. Strelkov, a Russian nationalist and veteran of several other conflicts, was charged by Ukraine authorities with terrorism and is currently sanctioned by the European Union for his leading role in the insurgency in eastern Ukraine. By his own admission, he served in the Russian FSB until March 2013. Ukrainian and EU authorities have identified him as a retired colonel of the GRU (Russia's external military intelligence organisation) who participated in the 2014 Crimea crisis.
According to different sources, he unreservedly demands that the "liberal clans" (liberal part of the Russian elite) be destroyed.
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Strelkov dressed as a White Guard of the Russian Civil War (specnaz.ru) |
Biography
Involvement in earlier conflicts
The Russian media has identified Igor Strelkov as an officer of the Russian military reserves who has expressed hardline views on eliminating perceived enemies of the Russian state and has fought on the federal side in Russian counter-separatist campaigns in Chechnya and on the pro-Moscow separatist side in the conflict in Moldova's breakaway region of Transnistria. According to various sources, Strelkov took part in the Bosnian War as a volunteer on Serb side, and in Chechnya under contract.[note 1] In 1999, he published his memoirs of the fighting in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2014, he was accused by Bosnian media (Klix) and a retired Bosnian Army officer of having been involved in Višegrad massacresin which thousands of civilians were killed in 1992.
The BBCreported Strelkov may have worked for Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) in a counter-terrorism unit, citing Russian military experts. According to Russian media, he has served as an FSB officer and his last role before retirement was reportedly with the FSB's Directorate for Combating International Terrorism.
In 2014 Anonymous International disclosed what it said were Strelkov's personal emails, revealing that he had served in the FSB for 18 years from 1996 to March 2013, including in Chechnya from 1999 to 2005, The Moscow Times reported. The newspaper also said Girkin was born in Moscow and that it contacted him by email and phone but that he would not confirm the claims. A local pro-Russia militia leader in Ukraine, Vyacheslav Ponomarev, a self-described old friend of Girkin's, said the information about Girkin was true. His pseudonym "Strelkov" ("Strelok") can be roughly translated as "Rifleman" or "Shooter". He has also been dubbed Igor Grozny ("Igor the Terrible").
Alexander Cherkasov, head of Russia's leading human rights group Memorial, is convinced that the "Igor Strelkov" of Ukraine is the same person as a Russian military officer called "Strelkov", who was identified as being directly responsible for at least six instances (on four separate occasions) of the forced disappearance and presumed murder of residents of Chechnya's mountain Vedensky Districtvillage of Khatuni and nearby settlements of Makhkety and Tevzeni in 2001–2002, when "Strelkov" was attached to the 45th Detached Reconnaissance Regiment special forces unit of the Russian Airborne Troops based near Khatuni. None of these crimes were solved by official investigations. Website of Chechnya's official human rights ombudsman in fact lists at least two residents of Khatuni who went missing in 2001 (Beslan Durtayev and Supyan Tashayev) as having been kidnapped from their homes and taken to the 45th DRR base by the officers known as "Colonel Proskuryn and Strelkov Igor"; another entry lists the missing person Beslan Taramov as abducted in 2001 in the village of Elistandzhi by the 45th DRR servicemen led by "Igor Strelko (nicknamed Strikal)". Cherkasov too lists Durtayev and Tashayev (but not Taramov) among the alleged victims of "Strelkov". Cherkasov and other observers suspected it was in fact the same "Strelkov" until May 2014, when Igor Strelkov / Girkin himself confirmed he has been present at Khatuni in 2001, where he fought against the "local population". According to Cherkasov, as a result of Strelkov's actions in Chechnya, two sisters of one of those "disappeared", Uvais Nagayev,[note 2] in effect turned to terrorism and died three years later: one of these sisters, Aminat Nagayeva, blew herself up in the 2004 Russian aircraft bombings over the Tula Oblast aboard a Tu-134"Volga-Aeroexpress" airliner, killing 43; the other sister, Rosa Nagayeva, participated in the Beslan hostage crisis that same year.
The emails leaked in May 2014 and allegedly authored by Strelkov contain his diaries from Bosnia and Chechnya he sent to his friends for review. One story describes an operation of capturing Chechen activists from a village of Mesker-Yurt. Asked by one of friends why he doesn't publish them, Strelkov explain that "people we captured and questioned almost slways disappeared without trace, without court, after we were done" and this is why these stories cannot be openly published.
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Bezler (left), Kozitsyn and Strelkov reportedly discussed the downing. Photos: Reuters, SCMP Pictures |
Involvement in the Ukrainian conflict
See also: Siege of Sloviansk and War in Donbass
On 12 April 2014, Girkin led a group of militants who seized the executive committee building, the police department, and the Security Service of Ukraine offices in Sloviansk. His militia was formed in Crimea and consisted of volunteers from Russia, Crimea, but also from other regions of Ukraine (Vinnitsa, Zhitomir, Kiev) and many people from Donetsk and the Lugansk region. Two thirds were Ukrainian citizens. The majority of men in the unit had combat experience. Many of those with Ukrainian citizenship have fought in the Russian Armed Forces in Chechnya and Central Asia. Others fought in Irak and Yugoslavia with the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
The SBU presented Strelkov's presence in Donbass as proof of Russia's involvement in the East Ukraine crisis and released intercepted telephone conversations between "Strelkov" and his supposed handlers in Moscow. Russia denied any interference in Ukraine by its troops outside Crimea. In July, Ukrainian authorities alleged Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoygu has coordinated all of Girkin's actions, supplying him and "other terrorist leaders" with "the most destructive weapons" since May and instructing him directly, with Russian President Vladimir Putin's approval.
On 15 April, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) opened a criminal proceeding against "Igor Strelkov". He was described as a Russian recruiter and leader of armed "saboteurs" and a chief organizer of the "terror" in Ukraine's Sloviansk Raion (including an ambush that killed one and wounded three SBU officers), who had previously coordinated Russian military takeovers of Ukrainian units in Crimea during the 2014 Crimea crisis in March, after having crossed the Russian-Ukrainian border in Simferopolon February 26. In Crimea, he was reported to be instrumental in negotiating the defection of the Ukrainian Navy commander Denis Berezovsky. The next day (April 16), he allegedly sought to recruit Ukrainian soldiers captured at the entrance to Kramatorsk.
Ukrainian government claims Strelkov was behind the 17 April kidnapping, torture and murder of a local Ukrainian politician Volodymyr Rybak and a 19-year-old college student Yury Popravko. Rybak's abduction by a group of men in Horlivka was recorded on camera. The SBU released portions of intercepted calls in which another Russian citizen, alleged GRU officer and Girkin's subordinate Igor Bezlerorders Rybak to be "neutralized", and a subsequent conversation in which "Strelkov" is heard instructing Ponomarev to dispose of Rybak's body, which is "lying here [in the basement of the separatist headquarters in Sloviansk] and beginning to smell." Rybak's corpse with a smashed head, multiple stab wounds and ripped stomach was found later in April in a river near Sloviansk; Popravko's body was also found nearby. Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov described Girkin as "a monster and a killer" and the incident helped to prompt the government's "anti-terrorist" military offensive against the pro-Russia separatists in Ukraine.
During the weekend of 26–27 April, the political leader of the separatist Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Girkin's long-time friend, Alexander Borodai, also a Russian national from Moscow, ceded control of all separatist fighters in the entire Donetsk region to him. On 26 April, "Strelkov" made his first public appearance when he gave a video interview to Komsomolskaya Pravda where he confirmed that his militia in Sloviansk came from Crimea. He said nothing about his own background, denied receiving weapons or ammunition from Russia, and announced that his militia would not release the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) observers that it had taken hostage unless pro-Russia activists were first freed by the Ukrainian government. On 28 April, the EU sanctioned "Igor Strelkov" as a GRU staff member believed to be a coordinator of armed actions and a security assistant to Crimea's Sergey Aksyonov. On 29 April, Girkin appointed a new police chief for Kramatorsk. On May 12, "I. Strelkov" declared himself "the Supreme Commander of the DPR" and all of its "military units, security, police, customs, border guards, prosecutors, and other paramilitary structures."
According to a report issued by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, "reportedly, on 26 May, by order of Igor Strelkov, Dmytro Slavov ('commander of a company of the people's militia') and Mykola Lukyanov ('commander of a platoon of the militia of Donetsk People's Republic') were 'executed' in Slovyansk, after they were 'sentenced' for 'looting, armed robbery, kidnapping and abandoning the battle field'. The order, which was circulated widely and posted in the streets in Slovyansk, referred to a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR of 22 June 1941 as the basis for the execution." The report also mentions Strelkov's efforts to recruit local women into his armed formations: "A particular call for women to join the armed groups was made on 17 May through a video released with Igor Girkin 'Strelkov', urging women of the Donetsk region to enlist in combat units." Sloviansk's separatist "people's mayor" and former boss of Girkin, Ponomarev, was himself detained on an order of "Strelkov" on 10 June for "engaging in activities incompatible with the goals and tasks of the civil administration".
On the night of 4–5 July, during a large-scale offensive by the Ukrainian military following the end of a 10-day ceasefire on 30 June, Girkin and his militants fled from Sloviansk, which was then captured by Ukrainian forces, thus ending the separatist occupation of the city which had started on 6 April. Shortly before this, a video was posted on YouTube in which Girkin desperately pleaded for military aid from Russia for "Novorossiya" ("New Russia", a separatist name for eastern Ukraine) and said Sloviansk "will fall earlier than the rest." Other rebel leaders denied Girkin's assessment that the insurgents were on the verge of collapse. One of them, the self-proclaimed "people's governor" of Donetsk Pavel Gubarev, compared Girkin to the 19th century Russian general Mikhail Kutuzov, claiming that both "Strelkov" and Kutuzov would "depart only before a decisive, victorious battle." However, his retreat was strongly criticized by the Russian nationalist Sergey Kurginyan and a rumor inside Russian ultranationalist circles alleged Russia's powerful "grey cardinal" figure Vladislav Surkov conspired with east Ukrainian oligarch Rinat Akhmetov to organize a campaign against "Strelkov" as well as against the Eurasianism ideologue Alexander Dugin. Kurginyan accused Strelkov of surrendering Sloviansk and not keeping his oath to die in Sloviansk. Kurginyan believes that surrendering Sloviansk is a war crime, and Strelkov should be responsible for that. Donetsk People's Republic security minister Alexander Khodakovsky, the SBU Alfadefector and commander of the rebel Vostok Battalion, also protested and threatened a mutiny.
In social networks Girkin claimed that "Junta forces" drive their newly mobilized Ukrainian soldiers into the ground with bulldozers, National Guard of Ukraine shoots at peaceful citizens and own "punishers" and the "punishers" with use of artillery and MRLs succeeded in destroying the local potato harvest.
On 10 July 2014, news outlet Mashable reported finding execution orders three days previously for Slavov and Lukyanov in Girkin's abandoned Sloviansk headquarters. The orders were signed "Strelkov" with the name Girkin Igor Vsevolodovich printed underneath. Also sentenced to death was Alexei Pichko, a civilian who was caught stealing two shirts and a pair of pants from an abandoned house of his neighbour; according to an unconfirmed story, his body "had been dumped on the front lines" after he was executed. On July 24, Ukrainian authorities exhumed several corpses from a mass grave site on the grounds of a children’s hospital near the Jewish cemetery in Slovyansk, which might contain as many as 20 bodies of those executed by order of "Strelkov". Among the identified victims were four Ukrainian Protestants who the police and locals said have been kidnapped on June 8 after attending a service at their church, falsely accused of helping the Ukrainian Army, robbed for their cars, and shot the following day.
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Multiple sources cited a post on the VKontakte social networking service that was made by an account under Girkin's name which acknowledged shooting down an aircraft at approximately the same time that the civilian arliner Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17) was reported to have crashed in eastern Ukraine in the same area near the Russian border on July 17, 2014. The post specifically referenced how warnings were issued for planes not to fly in their airspace and the downing of a Ukrainian military Antonov An-26 transport plane which the Ukraine Crisis Media Center suggested was a case of misidentification with the MH17. This post was deleted later in the day and the account behind it claimed that Igor Girkin has no official account on this social service. Most of the 298 victims in the plane's crash came from the Netherlands; the country's biggest newspaper De Telegraaf included Girkin's photo in the front page collage of pro-Russian rebel leaders under the one-word headline "Murderers" ("Moordenaars"). Russian opposition lawyer and politician Mark Feygin posted a purported order by Girkin where he instructs all his men and commanders who "have in their possession personal effects from this plane" to deliver the found items to his HQ so "the valuables (watches, earrings, pendants, and other jewelry and items from valuable metals)" would be transferred to "the Defense Fund of the DPR." Girkin was reported to the author of an alternative version of the incident, wherein "no living people were aboard the plane as it flew on autopilotfrom Amsterdam, where it had been pre-loaded with 'rotting corpses'." This conspiracy theory was then distributed and discussed in all of Russia state-controlled media outlets.
At his press-conference on July 28, 2014, Girkin denied his connection to the downed plane and announced that his militants were killing "black-skinned" mercenaries.
According to ITAR-TASS news agency on Wednesday, August 13, 2014, Igor Girkin was seriously wounded the previous day in fierce fighting in the pro-Russian rebel held territories of Eastern Ukraine, and was described to be in "grave" condition. DNS representative Sergei Kavtaradze refuted this news this shortly after, saying Strelkov is "alive and well".
On August 14 leadership of DNR announced that Strelkov was dismissed from his position of defense minister "on his own request" as he was assigned "some other tasks". On August 16 the Russian TV-Zvezda claimed that Strelkov was "on vacation" and was appointed a as military chief of combined forces of Lugansk and Donetsk (he previously was in command of Donetsk forces only) and after he returns he will be put to a task of creating an unified command over forces of Federal State of Novorossiya.
On August 22 a former insurgent Anton Raevsky ("Nemetz") said in an interview in Rostov-on-Don that Strelkov and his supporters are being cleansed from DNR by FSB because of this insufficient compliance with Kremlin's policy on the republic.
On August 28 Russian media published photos of Girkin walking with Alexander Dugin and Konstantin Malofeev in Valaam Monastery in northern Russia.
In November 2014 in an interview for "Moscow Speaking" radio said that "the existence of Lugansk and Donetsk People's Republics in their current form, with the low-profile but still bloody war, is definitely convenient for USA in the first place, and only for them, because they are the ulcer that divides Russia and Ukraine". Later in November in an interview for "Zavtra" newspaper Girkin stated that the war in Donbass was launched by his detachment despite both Ukrainian government and local combatants avoided an armed confrontation before. Also he recognized himself responsible for actual situation in Donetsk and other cities of the region.
Other activities
In late April 2014, Strelkov was identified by Ukrainian intelligence as Colonel Igor Girkin, registered as a resident of Moscow. Journalists visiting the apartment where he allegedly lived with his mother, sister, as well as his former wife and two sons, were told by neighbors that a "fancy black car" had that same morning picked up the woman living there. The neighbors also described him as "polite" and quiet, and knew him under two surnames, Girkin and Strelkov. Girkin is known as a fan of military-historical movement and has participated in several reenactments connected with various periods of Russian and international history, but especially the Russian Civil War where he would play a White movement officer. His personal idol and role model is said to be the White Guard general Mikhail Drozdovsky, killed in a battle with the Red Army in 1919. According to The New York Times, "his ideological rigidity precedes any connections he has to Russia’s security services, stretching back at least to his days at the Moscow State Institute for History and Archives. There, Mr. Strelkov obsessed over military history and joined a small but vocal group of students who advocated a return to monarchism."
Vice Newsclaimed that "during the 1990s, Girkin wrote for the right-wing Russian newspaper Zavtra, which is run by the anti-Semitic Russian nationalist Alexander Prokhanov" and where Borodai was an editor. Writing for Zavtra ("Tomorrow"), Girkin and Borodai, who too was reported to previously having fought with Girkin for Russia-backed Transnistria and Republika Srpska separatists in Moldova and Bosnia and Herzegovina, together covered the Russian war against separatists in Chechnya and Dagestan. He would also often write as "Colonel in the Reserves" on the Middle East subjects, such as the conflicts in Libya, Egypt and Syria, for Georgia's pro-Russian Abkhazianseparatist Russian language Abkhazian Network News Agency (ANNA).
Igor Strelkov claims that he worked as a security chief for the controversial Russian businessmen Konstantin Malofeev. The Prime Minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk Republic Alexander Borodai was also a close associate of the businessman.
According to Boris Nemtsov, Strelkov-Girkin is a complete marginal, freak person. His confederates recently tried to organize a rally in the support of "Novorossiya," and the rally gathered up to 350 people. Andrey Piontkovsky adduces the name of Girkin among the names of like-minded persons and says, "The authentic high-principled Hitlerites, true AryansDugin, Prokhanov, Prosvirin, Kholmogorov, Girkin, Prilepinare a marginalized minority in Russia." Piontkovsky adds, "Putin has stolen the ideology of the Russian Reich from the domestic Hitlerites, he has preventively burned them down, using their help to do so, hundreds of their most active supporters in the furnace of the Ukrainian Vendée."[93][94]In his interview to Radio Liberty, Piontkovsky says, maybe the meaning of the operation conducted by Putin is to reveal all these potential passionate leaders of social revolt, send them to Ukraine and burn them in the furnace of the Ukrainian Vendée. Moreover, this is namely what is prompted to him to do by collective Remchukov in his writings...
In his interview to Oleksandr Chalenko on 2 December 2014, Igor Girkin confirmed that he is colonel of FSB. He also acknowledged that among the so-called Novorossiya militants exists anarchy. Particularly militants of Igor Bezler act independently, the so-called "Russian Orthodox Army" has split in half, others forces represent a patched cover of various unrelated groups. Girkin was also critical about the ongoing attacks on the Donetsk International Airport calling them as pointless and harmful.
Critic
Former colleagues of Girkin, Borodai and Malofeyev stated that Girkin lost contact with reality, while commenting on his recent interviews, particularly Borodai called him psychiatrically inadequate in interview with Ksenia Sobchak.
Leader of political movement "Essence of Time" questioned Girkin for actions in giving up Slovyansk to the so-called banderovites.
Notes
1. The pro-Russian group Heroes of South-East (Герои Новороссии) published Strelkov's past military assignments, disclosed by himself on military reconstructions forum: June 1993 – July 1994 military unit (в/ч) 11281 МО ПВО; Feb–Dec 1995 contract service 22033 «Х» (166-я гв. МСБР); 24 March 1995 till 10 October 1995 67th ОГСАД; August 1996 – July 2000 military unit 31763. July 2000 – April 2005 military unit 78576. After 2005 military unit 36391. The latter was identified as international terrorism prevention unit of FSB (Управление по борьбе с международным терроризмом 2-й Службы ФСБ России).
2. Uvais Nagayev was a resident of Tevzani who was originally detained by the troops of the 45th DRR on 27 April 2001. After surviving a summary execution that killed Zaur Dagayev (Nagayev was wounded and pretended to be dead), Nagayev was again detained by a group of federal servicemen including Strelkov and then held for ransom before being transported to Khankalamilitary base and vanishing without a trace. According to an FSB-connected mediator, Nagayev had been tortured into confessing to unspecified crimes before he was executed and his body was destroyed with explosives.
INTERNET SOURCE: http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/europe/140722/8-things-you-should-know-about-igor-girkin-the-ukraine-separatist
Laura ColarussoJuly 22, 2014 10:44
8 things you should know about Igor Girkin, the Ukraine separatist leader
He's been called brutal and deranged, and he may have shot down a passenger jet. But did you know he also likes to play dress-up?
In the aftermath of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 tragedy, the world's attention turned again to eastern Ukraine, the crash site where pro-Moscow separatists are fighting government forces. Much of the scrutiny has fallen on the rebels' leader, Igor Girkin, especially since he reportedly braggedabout shooting down a Ukrainian aircraft at the same time and near the same place where MH17 went down. (The separatists also didn't help their cause when they blocked crash investigators from the site, took the aircraft's black boxes and looted the debris.)
So who exactly is this guy? Here are eight things you need to know about the man who's leading the separatists in Ukraine.
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The commander, pictured with his bodyguards in Donetsk last week, claimed blood serum and medication had been found at the site in eastern Ukraine [PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2697895/Now-rebel-commander-blamed-downing-MH17-says-bodies-aren-t-fresh-claims-corpses-dead-days.html] |
1. He's a conspiracy theorist.
On July 18, a pro-separatist website reportedthat Girkin had accused Ukrainian authorities of stashing already deceased bodies on the flight. "A significant number of the bodies weren't fresh," the site, Russkaya Vesna, quoted Girkin as saying. "Ukrainian authorities are capable of any baseness." He went on to say that he couldn't confirm the information, but that many of the victims smelled as though they'd been decomposing for a while.
2. He often goes by another name.
Girkin's nom de guerre is Igor Strelkov, which loosely translates to "rifleman" in Russian. Leaflets circulated around mid-May in the separatist stronghold of Donetsk referred to him as Colonel Igor Strelkov and noted that he was in charge of the rebel operations in eastern Ukraine. He may even go by a third name, Strelok, which is also a gun-related nickname.
3. He gets around.
The fighting in Ukraine isn't Girkin's first combat experience. He's a veteran of both the Russian and Soviet armies and has seen action in Serbia, Chechnya and Transnistria, a Russian-backed breakaway state in Moldova. He was also reportedly seen in Crimea during the time Russia annexed the territory. Stella Khorosheva, a spokeswoman for the separatists, says he "has rich military experience."
4. He enjoys historical re-enactments.
It's been widely reported that Girkin, who was born in 1970, is an avid military history buff to the point that he dresses up in costume for re-enactments. There are picturesof him on the Internet wearing medieval armor and uniforms from the World War I era. He also belongs to a club called Markovtsy, a group dedicated to re-enactments that was named after a Russian general killed by the Bolsheviks.
5. It's not clear what his ties to Russia are.
Ukranian intelligence authorities sayGirkin, who is from Moscow, is a top-level covert Russian operative. The United States has accused Russia of sending "a steady flow of support" to Girkin's operation. The Russian media, however, says that he served with the Russian Federal Security Service, the country's internal security and counterintelligence unit, but has long since retired. He and his supporters maintain that they have no ties to Russia, and that Putin's government hasn't given them a single gun or piece of military hardware.
6. He believes Russia should be doing more to help his cause.
To whatever extent Russia is involvedin stoking bloodshed in eastern Ukraine, Girkin believes the government should take a more hands on approach to the conflict. He wants Putin's army to invade and return eastern Ukraine, which the separatists refer to as "Novorossiya," to its rightful place as part of Russia.
7. He dislikes the West.
It may not come as a surprise to learn that Girkin has expressed strong anti-Western sentiments, deemingthose societies "decadent." Girkin reportedly has a deep interest in the history of his country and wants to instigate the re-establishment of the Russian empire as a counterbalance to the West.
8. He has been sanctioned by the European Union.
The EU has imposed sanctions on dozens of high-ranking Russian military officers and pro-Russian separatists as the crisis in Ukraine continues unabated. Girkin was added to that inauspicious list in April because European officials believe he is on the staff of Russia's GRU, or it's military intelligence agency, and is behind much of the fighting in eastern Ukraine. European leaders also cited him for advising Sergey Aksyonov, the de facto prime minister of Crimea.
More from GlobalPost: Here's all the evidence (so far) that pro-Russian separatists shot down MH17
OTHER LINKS:
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“BES” DEMON: IGOR BEZLER
I will post information about Russian Nationalist, Igor Bezler, nicknamed the Demon from Wikipedia and other links.
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Igor Bezler, nicknamed the Demon, in an image taken earlier this year. Photograph: Alexei Kravtsov |
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| Igor Bezler |
Nickname(s) | "Bes" (Demon) |
Born | 30 December 1965 Simferopol, Ukrainian SSR, Soviet Union |
Allegiance | Soviet Union Russia |
Service/branch | Donbass People's Militia |
Rank | Major General of the "Donetsk People's Republic" |
Battles/wars | Soviet war in Afghanistan Donbass War |
Awards | Order of the Red Star |
Igor Bezler(Russian: Игорь Николаевич Безлер; born 1965, Simferopol, Crimean Oblast, Ukrainian SSR) is one of the pro-Russian leaders whose group controlled the local police department in Horlivka. He thus participates in the 2014 pro-Russian conflict in Ukraine and is said to have also participated in the 2014 Crimean crisis.
BIOGRAPHY
Bezler's father, Nikolai Bezler, was ethnic German (original spelling of his surname in German - Besler), his mother was ethnic Ukrainian, but he considers himself Russian. It is also known that many of his relatives, Russian Germans of Crimea were oppressed in Soviet period and moved from Crimea to Kazakhstan.
In 1994-97 Bezler studied at the Dzerzhinsky Military Academy.
The Security Service of Ukraine claims that until 2002 he served in detachments of the Russian General Staff GRU retiring as a Lieutenant Colonel. In 2002 Bezler moved to Ukraine.
According to Ukrainian officials, in February 2014 he was contacted by agents of the Russian General Staff GRU. Complying with their instructions, Bezler supposedly moved to Crimea where he participated in number of violent events connected with taking over of military installations and government facilities. In April 2014, as a member of a diversion group, Bezler helped take over the SBU (Sluzhba Bezpeky Ukrayiny) headquarters in Donetsk Oblast and the MVS district department in Horlivka.
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Igor Bezler, in green fatigues and without his walrus moustache, is at a briefing of policemen in Gorlovka. Photograph: Alexei Kravtsov |
On April 14, 2014, a YouTube video showed a man claiming to be a lieutenant colonel of the Russian army addressing police officers at the pro-Russian-held Horlivka police station and naming a new police chief.
The man was subsequently identified as Bezler. Ukraine accused him and Igor Strelkovof orchestrating the killing of Horlivka deputy Volodymyr Ivanovych Rybak. Bezler denies his involvement.
On July 17, 2014, a phone call was made at 4:40 p.m. Kyiv time, 20 minutes after the crash of Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200 MH17, by Bezler who reports to a person identified by Ukraine’s SBU as Vasili Geranin, a colonel in the main intelligence department of the general headquarters of the armed forces of the Russian Federation, regarding the shooting down of a plane. Bezler has said that the talk had really taken place but that he had talked about a Ukrainian attack aircraft shot down by the militia a day before the Malaysian airliner crash.
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Bezler (left), Kozitsyn and Strelkov reportedly discussed the downing. Photos: Reuters, SCMP Pictures |
Shaun Walker, a reporter for The Guardian, claims that Bezler "is regarded as something of a loose cannon, even by other rebels, who speak about him in hushed tones." When Walker interviewed Bezler with the hope of asking him about the MH17 crash, Bezler reportedly bragged that he summarily executes some of the combatants he captures: "Those who are fighting with the Ukrainian army, we keep as prisoners. Those who are fighting with volunteer battalions, we question them and then shoot them on the spot. Why should we show any pity to them?... You should see what they have done to my people. They chop off their heads and shit in the helmets! They are fascists! So why should we stand on ceremony with them? Questioning, an execution, that’s it. I will hang those fuckers from lampposts!".
According to Walker, when Bezler saw the journalists recording this conversation, he ordered:
"Burn their notebooks! Seize their electronics! Search everything for compromising material and then destroy it! If you find anything, execute them as spies!... Don’t think for one minute I will hesitate to have you shot."
In November Bezler has disappeared from public sight in Donbass and speculations about his death was circulated by some Ukrainian media (including a version that he was assassinated by Russian special services). LNR representatives admitted "he left Donbass" but rejected the claims about his death as fake. A video appeared on YouTube by end of November in which Bezler appeared, explaining he's alive and stayin in Poltava Oblast (Ukraine).
On December 19, 2014, Bezler was placed on the Specially Designated Nationals List by the U.S Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). This placement prohibits U.S. persons from undertaking any business with him without first obtaining a license from OFAC.
INTERNET SOURCE:http://observers.france24.com/content/20140606-video-ukrainian-officers-being-executed-separatists-staged
Is this video of separatists executing two Ukrainian army officers staged?
By Team Observers on 06/06/2014 - 14:02
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Screen grab of video allegedly showing separatist leader ordering the execution of two captured Ukrainian officers. |
The authenticity of a video that alleges to show the execution of two Ukrainian officers in the restive east of the country is under heavy scrutiny. In the footage, a masked man shoots two men hooded and facing the wall after a separatist leader – identified as Igor Bezler – addresses the camera and gives the order to fire.
The video – which was posted online on Wednesday, June 4 – lasts one minute and 45 seconds. It was reportedly taken in Horlivka, in eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russian separatists are currently in control. The man addressing the camera threatens to shoot more prisoners unless his own men are released by the authorities in Kiev (scroll down for a full transcription of the video in English).
WARNING: THIS VIDEO CONTAINS GRAPHIC CONTENT.
Video posted to YoutubeJune 4.
Transcription:
The Junta captured my man three days ago. We were negotiating with them about exchanging this person for the Ukrainian army, SBU [Ukraine Security Service] and police officers [that we hold]. Three days, the Ukrainian junta refused to exchange the person it captured for the Ukrainian officers. I hold in captivity three colonels, one of them an SBU colonel, and three lieutenant-colonels. At the moments all agreements with the Ukrainian government have been broken. I waited for three days but I don't have time to wait any longer. So now we will shoot Mr. Budik and Mr. Vasyuschchenko. For Mr. Turchinov [Ukraine’s interim president], Parubiy [Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine] and others of their ilk - if my man is not released within one hour, I'll shoot another two. After another one and a half hour - another two. And so on, until 8 [Ukrainians] are shot. If the Ukrainian army and the state don't need these officers, I need them even less. Load! Aim! Fire!
At 1:25 in the video, the two prisoners – tied and facing the wall – fall to the floor after shots ring out. According to a weapons expert contacted by FRANCE 24, the ‘executioner’ appears to be holding what is likely to be an AK 74 weapon – an arm common in both the Ukrainian and Russian military, and among separatists. A magazine can also be seen attached to one of the weapons, and the sound of it being loaded can be heard before it is fired.
None of this proves that the executions are real, however. As our expert – among others - points out, the lack of a bright muzzle flash has lead many to suggest that the incident may have been staged [though it’s possible the camera wasn’t sensitive enough to pick up bright muzzle flashes]. Perhaps unusually, the faces of the two prisoners are never revealed: the cameraman keeps his distance, making it impossible to determine their true identity nor the extent of any injuries.
Internet users have also suggested that the manner in which the two men fall to the ground could prove that the execution was faked. According to Ann Kiernan - a ballistics expert contacted by FRANCE 24 - the noise indicates that the weapon was fired in automatic ‘burst’ mode, which is far less accurate than single fire mode. This means it’s unlikely the shooter would have hit his targets so precisely. Yet the two prisoners fall straight away, as if neatly shot in the head. She adds that both man fall far too quickly –almost at the same time as the burst of fire – and, unusually, lie still after the shooting.
What’s likely, however, is that the man featured in the video is separatist leader Igor Bezler. This shadowy figure – who the Ukrainian government claims worked in the past for the Russian military - has already featured heavily in news reports and articles on the unrest tearing eastern Ukraine apart. He reportedly goes by his nom de guerre ‘bes’– or ‘devil’ in English. He has also been linked to an attack that killed 16 Ukrainian soldiers in May.
The video below - posted in April - appears to show Bezler addressing separatists. Though he lacks a moustache, here Bezler bears a close physical resemblance to the man shown in the purported execution video. Other photos posted online reveal an even closer match between the two.
Video posted to Youtube showing Igor Bezler instructing separatists in eastern Ukraine.
In response to the video, acting Ukrainian President Oleksander Turchinov released a statement on Thursday. He accused Bezler of being a Russian-born “criminal” and vowed to capture and punish him. He added that Ukraine would never negotiate with “terrorists and murderers.” But Kiev has neither confirmed nor denied whether or not the two men named in the video are indeed dead.
The video could be footage of an earlier incident reported by Ukrainian media, in which Bezler carried out a staged execution of two officers in the basement of his headquarters on May 27. The two, named as Roman Babyuk and Dmitry Krikunov, were reportedly later released. Yet the names of the two men allegedly executed in the video – Budik and Vasyuschenko – do not correspond to those mentioned in earlier reports.
The question of the video’s authenticity is far from being settled. But real or not, the fact that gunmen have resorted to filming an apparent execution marks a turning point. Scenes that were familiar to the world from wars in Iraq and now in Syria are threatening to become part of a conflict raging on the fringes of Europe. The footage could succeed in terrifying a civilian population already caught up in the vortex of bloody infighting.
This article was written by FRANCE 24 journalist Andrew Hilliar (@andyhilliar).
OTHER LINKS:
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9 REASONS WHY 2014 WAS A GREAT YEAR FOR PRO-LIFE
As this year 2014 comes to an end, I will present this Pro-Life Article from Live Action, a Pro-Life Organization that I endorsed:
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Live Action in 2014 |
9 reasons why 2014 was a great year for pro-life
The pro-life movement experienced a milestone year, with huge national victories across the board. From a record number of pro-life legislators elected to Congress to wins protecting the freedom of conscience and pro-life legislation, 2014 was a benchmark year for pro-life. Not all pro-life victories of the past year were front-page news. Like Live Action investigations, some of the biggest pro-life victories happen “undercover.”
Here are nine ways you made a difference with Live Action in 2014!
9) Millions of people saw the ugly truth about abortion.
Live Action’s groundbreaking investigations into the abortion industry shaped the dialogue on abortion. In 2014, Live Action’s “What is Human?” video went viral, obtaining millions of views on Facebook. This exposé, released as part of Live Action’s Inhuman investigation, revealed the ugly truth about late-term abortion through taped, undercover conversations with the abortionists who perform them. “What is Human?” details the abortion industry’s refusal to recognize the humanity of pre-born children, as well as the willingness of abortionists to violently slaughter babies in egregious late-term abortion procedures.
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Millions of views on Facebook Live Action |
8) The pro-life movement is resonating with Millennials
Pro-life is becoming the social justice movement of this generation. Due to technological advances and the power of media, hearts and minds are changing about abortion. Did you know that most of Live Action’s Facebook audience is under the age of 25, with a sizable number between the ages of 13 and 17? This is Planned Parenthood’s target market. But Live Action is reaching these kids first, and ruining Big Abortion’s chances at hundreds of thousands of potential customers. Live Action’s worldwide media movement is mobilizing this generation as an active voice for life!
7) Planned Parenthood’s legacy of abuse was revealed.
In spring of 2014, Live Action released a report and video detailing six years of investigation into the lies, corruption, and scandal within Planned Parenthood, America’s largest abortion provider. Funded heavily by tax dollars, the abortion giant’s legacy is one of putting profit before the health and well-being of women and children. Live Action investigations unearthed numerous violations by Planned Parenthood, including rampant cover-up of sexual abuse, willingness to aid and abet sex-traffickers, readiness to perform infanticide and abortions based on gender and race, and peddling medical misinformation and manipulation.
Live Action sent a reportof findings from its six-year investigation into Planned Parenthood to each legislator on Capitol Hill, detailing the troubling abuses that are endemic in the Planned Parenthood corporation. From press conferences exposing abuses within the abortion industry to rallying alongside thousands at the March for Life in Washington, D.C., Live Action stood for life in 2014!
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The Advocate Magazine |
6) Pro-lifers across America spread the message in their communities.
The pro-life message is getting into the hands of young people across the United States! Live Action’s free pro-life student magazine, The Advocate, was distributed to 250,000 people in schools and communities across the nation. In fact, The Advocateincreased printing and distribution 235 percent in 2014! Founded by Live Action President Lila Rose, The Advocate shares the truth about abortion in a compelling and visually engaging publication.
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The Advocate Magazine by kids |
5) Media couldn’t ignore the reality of the abortion industry.
Live Action’s undercover investigations insisted that the media report on the abuses and scandals blanketing the abortion industry. From local news coverage to CNN, Fox News, and The Blaze, Live Action boldly shared the truth about abortion and the dignity of each human life. In 2014, Live Action made headlines with groundbreaking undercover investigations, bold op-eds, and debates and interviews on national television, radio stations, and publications. Thanks to your support, even the pro-abortion mainstream media has to cover what we’re doing. And the more they cover, the more America sees what an injustice abortion really is.
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Lila Rose versus Ilyse Hogue |
Lila Rose, president of Live Action, is one of the pro-life movement’s leading influencers. Rose founded Live Action at the age of 15 and has directed numerous groundbreaking investigations into the abortion industry. Rose is a regular guest on The O’Reilly Factor, Hannity, The Laura Ingraham Show, and many other national TV and radio programs. Her work has been featured on practically every major news outlet, from CBS to CNN, and from the Los Angeles Times to the Washington Post.
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Lila Rose |
4) Pro-lifers became the media.
While much of mainstream media fails to report the truth about abortion, Live Action’s news arm is boldly sharing the value and dignity of the human person. Live Action News is a leading pro-life publication, reaching hundreds of thousands of readers each week. In 2014, Live Action News reached a record number of readers with informative, hard-hitting pieces related to current events and the sanctity of human life.
3)Pro-lifers shared the beauty of life with their friends.
Good friends share things they like with the people they care about. This year, Live Action’s over 700,000 Facebook fans and over 25,000 Twitter fans engaged friends and family in discussion on the sanctity of life and the atrocity of abortion. Those hundreds of thousands of people are sharing Live Action’s content with others, multiplying the reach of the message into the millions!
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Save The Babies. End Abortion |
2)Parents learned about Planned Parenthood’s dangerous sex advice for kids.
Live Action’s SexEd investigation exposed Planned Parenthood’s dangerous sex advice for children. SexEd revealed Planned Parenthood staffers counseling minors as young as 15 on how to visit porn shops, obtain sex toys – illegal for minors under municipal laws – and experiment with BDSM (bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism). Investigations detailed Planned Parenthood staffers encouraging minors to engage in violent sexual role-play. Planned Parenthood’s promotion of truly frightening pseudo-sexual behavior popularized by the pornographic book series Fifty Shades of Grey is alarming for both parents and children.
1) Planned Parenthood was held accountable.
Live Action’s investigative journalism into the abortion industry sparked national attention. Following the release of Live Action’s SexEd investigation in 2014, Colorado attorney general John Suthers announced that attorneys would review a Live Action undercover video that details a Planned Parenthood clinician coaching an investigator, posing as a 15-year-old, in dangerous sexual activity. Suthers’s announcement came on the heels of a lawsuit filed against Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains for failure to report child sexual abuse. The probe into Planned Parenthood also came in the wake of troubling details highlighted by Live Action’s SexEd investigation.
YOU made it possible!
Your active participation bolstered major pro-life victories this year! From sharing our investigative videos and Live Action News articles to signing Live Action petitions and engaging others in the pro-life movement, your efforts made 2014 incredible. You distributed our pro-life magazine, and you shared the work of Live Action with others. Thank you for your continued investment in the work of Live Action, and for your efforts in upholding LIFE!
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THE EURASIAN ECONOMIC UNION (JANUARY 1, 2015)
The Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) came to force today on January 1, 2015. I will post some information about this Post-Soviet alliance from Wikipedia.
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Flag of the Eurasian Economic Union. |
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Emblem of the Eurasian Economic Union. |
Administrative centers |
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Official languages | 5 languages[show] | |
Eurasian | ||
Membership | Member states: Belarus Armenia (from 2 January 2015) Acceding state Kyrgyzstan | |
Leaders | ||
- | Chairman of the Eurasian Commission | Viktor Khristenko |
Establishment | ||
- | Original proposala | 1994 |
- | Establishment agreed | 18 November 2011 |
- | 10 October 2000 | |
- | 1 January 2010 | |
- | 1 January 2012 | |
- | Eurasian Union Treaty (signed) | 29 May 2014 |
- | Eurasian Union (established) | 1 January 2015 |
Area | ||
- | Total | 20,260,431 km2 7,822,596 sq mi |
Population | ||
- | 2014 estimate | 182,519,270 (including Crimea and Sevastopol) |
- | Density | 9.01/km2 23.3/sq mi |
GDP (PPP) | 2013 estimate | |
- | Total | US$4.064 trillions (5th) |
- | Per capita | US$22,267 |
Currency | ||
Time zone | (UTC+2 to +12) | |
Calling code | +374 (in Armenia) +375 (in Belarus) +996 (in Kyrgyzstan) +7 (in Kazakhstan and Russia) | |
Website Eurasian Economic Commission | ||
The Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) will be an economic union of states located primarily in northern Eurasia. A treaty aiming for the establishment of the EEU was signed on 29 May 2014 by the leaders of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia, and will come into force on 1 January 2015. Treaties aiming for Armenia's and Kyrgyzstan's accession to the Eurasian Economic Union were signed on 9 October 2014 and 23 December respectively. Armenia's accession treaty will come into force on 2 January 2015. Although Kyrgyzstan's accession treaty will not come into force until May 2015, provided it has been ratified, it will participate in the EEU from the day of its establishment as an acceding state.
The Eurasian Economic Union will create a single economic market of 183 million people and a gross domestic product of over 4 trillion U.S. dollars (PPP). The union will operate through supranational and intergovernmental institutions. The supranational institutions are the Eurasian Commission (the executive body), the Court of the EEU (the judicial body) and the Eurasian Development Bank. National governments are usually represented by the Eurasian Commission's Council.
In 1994, President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev, first suggested the idea of creating a regional trading bloc during a speech at Moscow State University. Numerous treaties were subsequently signed to establish the trading bloc gradually. Many politicians, philosophers and political scientists have since called for further integration towards a political, military and cultural union. However, modern-day Kazakhstan has insisted the union stay purely economic as it seeks to keep its independence and sovereignty intact.
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CAMP 14: KAECHON INTERNMENT CAMP
As it is the tenth anniversary of Shin Dong Hyuk’s escape from Camp 14, I will post information about the Concentration Camp, Kaechon Internment Camp, AKA Camp 14 from Wikipedia.
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The Kaechon political prison camp (개천제14호관리소), also known as Camp 14, is located in the center of the country, approximately 40 miles north of Pyongyang, in South Pyongan Province. Situated on the north bank of the Taedong River, the camp is directly across the river from the Pukchang political prison camp (Camp 18) and near Mount Purok. The Kaechon political prison camp is located 12 miles to the southeast of Kaechon reeducation labor camps (개천제1호교화소). The DPRK government maintains different systems of labor camps – the kwan-li-so, or political prison camps, and the kwo-hwa-so, or reeduction labor camps – among other types of detention facilities. Kaechon is approximately 60 square miles in area and is said to hold 15,000 prisoners, all serving life sentences. The camp appears to have been operating since at least the 1960s. Like all political prison camps in North Korea, Kaechon is designed to segregate from the general prison population those “enemies of the State” that have committed political crimes and to punish them for those crimes through unending hard labor. However, some Kaechon prisoners are victims of the regime’s “three generations of punishment,” in which two subsequent generations within the family of a “politically unreliable” person might be sent to the camps or born there, and might subsequently die in the camp without necessarily having committed a crime themselves. Kaechon is essentially one large total control zone from which there is no release. Economic activities that employ prisoners as slave labor have included mining, textiles, farming, and livestock raising. Induced starvation is common among prisoners, who are driven to catch and eat rodents, frogs, and snakes. |
Kaechon internment camp | |
Chosŏn'gŭl | 개천제14호관리소 |
Hancha | |
Revised Romanization | Gaecheon Je14ho Gwalliso |
McCune–Reischauer | Kaechŏn Che14ho Kwalliso |
Chosŏn'gŭl | 개천정치범수용소 |
Hancha | |
Revised Romanization | Gaecheon Jeongchibeom Suyongso |
McCune–Reischauer | Kaechŏn Chŏngch'ibŏm Suyongso |
Kaechon internment camp (Hangeul: 개천제14호관리소, also spelled Kae'chŏn or Gaecheon) is a forced labor camp in North Korea for political prisoners. The official name is Kwan-li-so (Penal-labor colony) No. 14. It is not to be confused with Kaechon concentration camp (Kyo-hwa-so No. 1), which is located 20 km (12 mi) to the northwest. This place is commonly known as Camp 14.
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Kaechon internment camp (Hangeul: 개천제14호관리소, also spelled Kae'chŏn or Gaecheon) is a slave labor camp in North Korea for political prisoners. The official name is Kwan-li-so (Penal-labor colony) No. 14. Shin Dong-hyuk gave testimony of human rights abuses inflicted on him or witnessed by him as prisoner in Camp 14. |
Location
The camp was established around 1959, in central North Korea near Kae'chŏn county, South Pyongan Province. It is situated along the middle reaches of Taedong river, which forms the southern boundary of the camp, and includes the mountains north of the river, including Purok-san. Bukchang, a concentration camp (Kwan-li-so No. 18) adjoins the southern banks of the Taedong River. The camp is about 155 km2 (60 sq mi) in area, with farms, mines and factories threaded through steep mountain valleys.
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Kaechon internment camp (Kwan-li-so No. 14) |
Description
Imprisonment at Kaechon internment camp is for life with no chance of release. Prisoners are forced to do hard labour and have to work until they die. So called "politically unreliable" people and their families are deported, without any trial, to the camp, where prisoners live completely isolated from the outside.
The camp is approximately 155 km2 (60 sq mi) in area. The camp includes overcrowded barracks that house males, females, and older children separately, and a headquarters with administration and guards housing. Altogether around 15,000 prisoners live in Kaechon internment camp.
According to Blaine Harden, Shin Dong-hyuk went to primary and secondary school inside the camp. The secondary school was "little more than slave quarters from which he was sent out as a rock picker, weed puller and dam labourer." This education did not include even basic information about North Korea since all outside information was cut off to inmates of the camp. The personality cult around Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jong-Il was also absent; for example there were no portraits of the Kim leaders on display. The camp was self-contained and self-sufficient. The camp was near a hydro-electric dam and mines in which the prisoners were forced to labour. In one of Shin's prison cells, where he was held during an interrogation, he said he had electricity and running water. Shin's mother lived in a house with multiple rooms in a "model village" within the camp, given to women who had children.
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Kaechon internment camp (Hangeul: 개천제14호관리소, also spelled Kae'chŏn or Gaecheon) is a slave labor camp in North Korea for political prisoners. The official name is Kwan-li-so (Penal-labor colony) No. 14. Shin Dong-hyuk gave testimony of human rights abuses inflicted on him or witnessed by him as prisoner in Camp 14. |
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Kaechon internment camp (Hangeul: 개천제14호관리소, also spelled Kae'chŏn or Gaecheon) is a slave labor camp in North Korea for political prisoners. The official name is Kwan-li-so (Penal-labor colony) No. 14. Shin Dong-hyuk gave testimony of human rights abuses inflicted on him or witnessed by him as prisoner in Camp 14. |
Purpose
The main purpose of the Kaechon internment camp is to keep politically unreliable persons classed "unredeemable" isolated from society, and exploit them with hard labour. The term "unredeemable" is applied to people who want to escape North Korea's deeply repressive government, or people who have spoken harshly about the government or other non-criminal elements. Actual criminals may also be sent to the camp. The labor at the camp is performed in mines and farms with primitive means.
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A still from the documentary film Camp 14 [PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.chroness.com/project/inside-the-worlds-worst-prison/] |
Human rights situation
Many prisoners of the camp were born there under North Korea's "three generations of punishment". This means anyone found guilty of committing a crime, which could be as simple as trying to escape North Korea, would be sent to the camp along with that person's entire family. The subsequent two generations of family members would be born in the camp and must also live their entire lives and die there. As reported by witnesses, the prisoners have to do very hard and dangerous work in mines and other workplaces from 5:30 in the morning until midnight. Even 11-year-old children have to work after school and may see their parents rarely. People are forced to work like slaves and are tortured in case of minor offences. The punishment for violating camp rules ranges from such punishments of having the tip of one's finger cut off, to being tortured for months, to death.
Food rations are very small, consisting of salted cabbage and corn, so that the prisoners are very skinny and weak. Many die of undernourishment, illness, work accidents, and the aftereffects of torture. Many prisoners resort to eating frogs, insects, rats, and snakes to try to survive. Eating rat flesh helps to prevent pellagra, a common disease in the camp which results from the absence of protein and niacin in the diet. In order to eat anything outside of the prison-sanctioned meal, including these animals, prisoners must first get permission from the guards.
Imprisoned witnesses
Shin Dong-hyuk
Shin Dong-hyuk (born in Kaechon in 1982 as Shin In Geun; escaped 2005) was born in the camp. His father was imprisoned because two of the father's brothers defected to South Korea during the Korean War. Shin gave testimony of human rights abuses inflicted on him and witnessed by him as prisoner in Kaechon camp:
- When he told the guards his mother and brother attempted to escape (in hopes of acquiring an extra ration of food). Shin was thrown into a small underground cell, where it is impossible to either stand or lie down, and was kept there and tortured for eight months at only 13 years of age.
- Later Shin was forced to watch the execution of his mother Chang Hye-kyong by hanging and his brother Shin Ha-kun by firing squad. Shin had reported his mother and brother's planned defection to the guards. He was tortured for eight months before he and his father were forced to witness the two would-be escapees' executions.
- When Shin worked in a garment factory at the gulag and accidentally dropped a sewing machine, the foreman hacked off his right middle finger just above the first knuckle, as punishment.
- Shin witnessed dozens of public executions each year.
- Shin saw a six-year-old girl in his school being beaten to death for hoarding 5 kernels of corn.
- When Shin was 12 years old, he was separated from his mother and was rarely allowed to see her. Instead of attending school, the children had to do all kinds of physical work including weeding, harvesting, and carrying dung.
- Between the ages of 13 and 16, Shin was forced to do dangerous construction work and saw many children killed at work; sometimes, four to five children were killed in a day. On one occasion, he saw eight people killed by an accident.
- Shin described how, at the age of 14, he was arrested, completely stripped, his legs cuffed and hands tied, and was suspended from the ceiling of his cell. His torturers then lit up a charcoal fire under his back and forced a hook into his skin so that he could not struggle. He still has a number of large scars from the burned flesh and from many other abuses.
- Shin's cousin was raped by prison guards and died later; when his cousin’s mother wailed, she disappeared and was never seen again.
- Shin saw how 12 fellow prisoners given toxic water for washing by the guards got seriously ill within a week; then they disappeared.
- When Shin escaped through the high-voltage electric fence surrounding the camp, his friend Park Yong-chul reached the fence first, and was fatally electrocuted. He escaped by climbing over his friend's body.
Kim Yong
Kim Yong (1995–1996 in Kaechon, then in Bukchang) was imprisoned when his relationship (which he covered up) to his father and brother, who both were executed as alleged US spies, was identified. He witnessed approximately 25 executions in his section of the camp within less than two years.
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SAINT BASIL THE GREAT ON PRO-LIFE (FEAST DAY ON JANUARY 2) [PRO LIFE QUOTE]
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Icon of St. Basil the Great from the St. Sophia Cathedral of Kiev. |
She who has deliberately destroyed a fetus has to pay the penalty of murder...here it is not only the child to be born that is vindicated, but also the woman herself who made an attempt against her own life, because usually the women die in such attempts. Furthermore, added to this is the destruction of the child, another murder... Moreover, those, too, who give drugs causing abortion are deliberate murderers themselves, as well as those receiving the poison which kills the fetus.[Letter 188:2, circa 370.]
AUTHOR:Basil of Caesarea, also called Saint Basil the Great, (329 or 330 – January 1, 379) (Greek: Ἅγιος Βασίλειος ὁ Μέγας) was the Greek bishop of Caesarea Mazaca in Cappadocia, Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey). He was an influential theologian who supported the Nicene Creed and opposed the heresies of the early Christian church, fighting against both Arianism and the followers of Apollinaris of Laodicea. His ability to balance his theological convictions with his political connections made Basil a powerful advocate for the Nicene position.
In addition to his work as a theologian, Basil was known for his care of the poor and underprivileged. Basil established guidelines for monastic life which focus on community life, liturgical prayer, and manual labour. Together with Pachomius he is remembered as a father of communal monasticism in Eastern Christianity. He is considered a saint by the traditions of both Eastern and Western Christianity.
Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus, and Gregory of Nyssa are collectively referred to as the Cappadocian Fathers. The Eastern Orthodox Church and Eastern Catholic Churches have given him, together with Gregory of Nazianzus and John Chrysostom, the title of Great Hierarch. His is recognised as a Doctor of the Church in both Eastern Orthodoxy and in the Roman Catholic Church. He is sometimes referred to by the epithet "Ουρανοφαντωρ", "revealer of heavenly mysteries".
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SPARKY VIGILANTE: JACK RUBY (MARCH 25, 1911 TO JANUARY 3, 1967)
On this date, January 3, 1967, the nightclub operator who shot and killedHarvey Lee Oswald, died of lung cancer in Dallas, Texas. Please go to this previous blog post to learn more about this hit man.
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Jack Ruby |
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Ruby about to shoot Oswald who is being escorted by Dallas police detectives Jim Leavelle and L. C. Graves. |
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HAPPY 59TH BIRTHDAY! MEL GIBSON! [PRO LIFE QUOTE]
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Mel Gibson |
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Save The Babies. End Abortion |
QUOTE:“This is Mel Gibson and I'm voting NO on Prop 71. - Research on adult and umbilical stem cells have led to cures in 300,000 cases. But that's not what Proposition 71 is about. This is Mel Gibson. I'm concerned that people aren't fully informed about Prop 71. We have a lot of questions to ask. Like why are we being misled into thinking prop 71 isn't about cloning, when it is. That's what it says, "somatic cell nuclear transfer". And that is a scientific term for cloning. If cloning human embryos for destruction is so promising, why aren't private companies paying the 6 billion dollars? Because in 23 years embryonic stem cell research has not produced a single human cure. All it has yielded is tumors, rejection, and mutations. See bad science doesn't attract venture capital. So why should the taxpayers be bled dry? This is Mel Gibson and I'm voting NO on Prop 71. Creating life simply to destroy it is wrong."
AUTHOR: Mel Gibson A.K.A Mel Colm-Cille Gerard Gibson, AO (born January 3, 1956) is an American actor, film director, producer and screenwriter. He was born in Peekskill, New York, moved with his parents to Sydney, Australia when he was 12 years old, and later studied acting at the Australian National Institute of Dramatic Art. After appearing in the Mad Max and Lethal Weapon series, Gibson went on to direct and star in the Academy Award-winning Braveheart. In 2004, he directed and produced The Passion of the Christ, a film portraying the last hours in the life of Jesus.
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THE UNCLE FESTER NAZI: DR. HANS LAMMERS (MAY 27, 1879 TO JANUARY 4, 1962)
On this date, January 4, 1962, Dr. Hans Lammers, the head of the Reich Chancellery passed away in Düsseldorf, Germany. I will post information about him from Wikipedia and other links.
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| Hans Lammers in SS uniform, circa 1938–1940. |
Chief of the Reich Chancellery | |
In office 30 January 1933 – 24 April 1945 | |
President | Adolf Hitler Führer |
Chancellor | Adolf Hitler |
Preceded by | Erwin Planck |
Succeeded by | none |
In office 1 December 1937 – 24 April 1945 | |
In office January 1943 – 24 April 1945 | |
Personal details | |
Born | 27 May 1879 Lublinitz, German Empire |
Died | 4 January 1962 (aged 82) Düsseldorf, West Germany |
Political party | Nazi (DNVP until 1932) |
Profession | Judge |
Military service | |
Allegiance | German Empire Nazi Germany |
Service/branch | Imperial German Army |
Battles/wars | World War I World War II |
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| Hans Lammers in 1937 |
Dr. jur. Hans Heinrich Lammers (27 May 1879 – 4 January 1962) was a German jurist and prominent Nazi politician. From 1933 until 1945 he served as head of the Reich Chancellery under Adolf Hitler.
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Reception when Quisling leader. Links Reichskommissar Terboven, Fri mid Minister Lammers, right Bormann, group leaders and group leaders Schaub Bormann. 02/13/1942. |
Biography
Born in Lublinitz (Lubliniec) in Upper Silesia, the son of a veterinarian, Lammers completed law school at the universities of Breslau(Wrocław) and Heidelberg, obtained his doctorate in 1904, and was appointed judge at the Amtsgericht of Beuthen(Bytom) in 1912. As a volunteer and officer of the German Armyhe received the Iron Cross, First and Second Class during World War I, then resumed his career as a lawyer and joined the national conservative German National People's Party (DNVP), reaching the position of an undersecretary at the Reich Ministry of the Interior by 1922.
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Hans Lammers in 1933 |
In 1932, Lammers joined the Nazi Party and achieved rapid promotion, appointed head of the police department, and in the course of the Nazi Machtergreifungin 1933 a State Secretaryand Chief of the Reich Chancellery. At the recommendation of Reich Minister Wilhelm Frick, he became the centre of communications and chief legal adviser for all government departments. From 1937, he was a member of Hitler's cabinet as a Reich Minister without portfolio, and from 30 November 1939 a member of the Council of Ministers for the Defence of the Reich. In this position he was able to review all pertinent documents regarding national security and domestic policy even before they were forwarded to Hitler personally. Historian Martin Kitchen explains that due to the centralization of power accorded the Reich Chancellory and with Lammers catching things before they made it to Hitler, Lammers became "one of the most important men in Nazi Germany." From the vantage point of most government officers, Lammers seemed to speak on behalf of Hitler, the ultimate authority within the Reich. Lammers was also one of the first officials to sign government correspondence with "Heil Hitler," which became a requisite greeting for civil servants and proliferated so much so that failure to use this greeting could bring one under Gestaposuspicion since it indicated an "overt sign of dissidence". Sometime in 1940, Lammers was also promoted to honorary SS General.
From January 1943, Lammers served as President of the cabinet when Hitler was absent from their meetings. Along with Martin Bormann, he increasingly controlled access to Hitler. In February 1943, following the Battle of Stalingrad, Bormann with Lammers attempted to create a three-men junta representing the Nazi Party (Bormann), the state (Lammers), and the army which would have been led by Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, chief of the OKW (armed forces high command). This Committee of Three would have exercised dictatorial powers over the home front. Joseph Goebbels, Albert Speer, Hermann GöringandHeinrich Himmler all saw this proposal as a power grab by Bormann and Lammers and a threat to their positions, and combined to block it. However, this scheme eventually collapsed due to the frequent infighting and mistrust the party, military, and the various ministries had amongst one another. Lammers eventually lost power and influence due to the increasing irrelevancies of his post due to the war and as a consequence of Martin Bormann's growing influence with Hitler.
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Hitler and Lammers |
In April 1945, Lammers was arrested by Hitler's forces during the final days of the Third Reich, in connection with the upheaval surrounding Hermann Göring. On 23 April, as the Soviets tightened the encirclement of Berlin, Göring consulted Karl Koller and Lammers. All agreed that Göring was not only Hitler's designated successor, but was to act as his deputy if Hitler ever became incapacitated. Acting on the matter, Göring sent a telegram from Berchtesgaden in Bavaria, arguing that since Hitler was cut off in Berlin, he, Göring, should assume leadership of Germany. Göring set a time limit, after which he would consider Hitler incapacitated. Hitler responded angrily, ordering SS troops to arrest Göring and to shoot Lammers. Lammers was rescued when he was captured by American forces, but in the meanwhile his wife, Elfriede (née Tepel), committed suicide near Obersalzberg (the site of Hitler's mountain retreat) in early May 1945, as did his younger daughter, Ilse Hoffmann (née Lammers), two days later.
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Lammers in 1947 facing trial for crimes against humanity |
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Lammers in 1947 facing trial for crimes against humanity |
Post-war
After the war in April 1946 Lammers was a witness at the Nuremberg tribunal. In April 1949 he was tried under Subsequent Nuremberg Trials in the Ministries Trial and sentenced to 20 years in prison. The sentence was later reduced to 10 years by U.S. High Commissioner John J. McCloy, and he was finally pardoned and released in 1952. He died on 4 January 1962 in Düsseldorf, and was buried in Berchtesgaden in the same plot as his wife and daughter.
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Hans Lammers on trial |
Awards and decorations
- Iron Cross of 1914, 1st and 2nd class
- Golden Party Badge of the NSDAP (31 January 1937)
- Civil Service Faithful Service Medal (6 July 1939)
- Sword of honour of the Reichsführer-SS
- SS Honour Ring
OTHER LINKS:
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POSTER BOY FOR HANGING: PAEDOPHILE SERIAL KILLER, WESTLEY ALLAN DODD (JULY 3, 1961 TO JANUARY 5, 1993)
On this date, January 5, 1993, Pedophile Serial Killer, Westley Allan Dodd was executed by hanging in the State of Washington. In my opinion, he should be the poster boy for capital punishment in the case of pedophile murders. Please go to this blog post to learn more.
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Westley Allan Dodd |
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