Predictably, Brandenburg Interior Minister Jörg Schönbohm has been attempting to put in doubt that there was a racist component to the assault in Potsdam two weeks ago that has left the 37-year-old Ethiopian-born engineer, Ermyas M, in a coma. (For background, see "A Grim Record (Racist Violence in Brandenburg)".) This despite the massive prima facie evidence constituted by the voice mail recording on which the presumed assailants can be heard repeatedly calling Ermyas M. a "nigger", as well as a "shitty nigger". (For Schönbohm's "cautious" approach, see here, for instance, in English; and note that the Deutsche Presse Agentur [DPA] report linked fails altogether to mention the voice-mail recording.)

Philippe de Villiers, President of the French political party Movement for France (MPF) and candidate for the French Presidency in 2007, is coming out with a new book this week titled The Mosques of Roissy [Les Mosquées de Roissy]. In it, Mr. de Villiers, citing the French domestic intelligence service, the renseignements généraux (RG), and police reports, warns about the presence of Islamic radicals – including, most notably, adherents of the rigorist Salafi current of Islam – among the employees of French airports.

In yesterday's edition [dated 26 April], Le Monde quickly responded with an article supposed to demonstrate that Mr. de Villiers has exaggerated the danger. The article is titled "Few Muslim Radicals Employed in the Airports, according to the RG" [link in French]. Here some reassuring excerpts:

In its edition of 12 April, the Berlin weekly Jungle World reports about a soccer match in Hamburg earlier this month between FC St Pauli and the Chemnitz FC.

During the match Chemnitz supporters chanted racist and anti-Semitic slogans such as "Galatasary, we hate Turkey" or "We're building a subway from St. Pauli to Auschwitz"…. The head of security for FC St. Pauli spoke of "60 to 70 right-wing radicals". He says he was himself called a "Jewish pig" by fans in the Chemnitz rooting section.

On Sunday, a German citizen of Ethiopian origins was attacked and gravely injured in Potsdam in the German Land of Brandenburg. He is presently in critical condition in an artifically-induced coma. On a recording that the victim left on his wife's voicemail just before the attack, one of the presumed assailants can be heard yelling "Hey, Nigger!".

In its Wednesday edition (19 April; link in German), the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung provides a grim retrospective of some of the most infamous acts of racist and xenophobic violence in Brandenburg over the last decade and a half: in effect, since German Reunification.

The US government's refusal to issue a visa to the self-styled Muslim "scholar", Tariq Ramadan, continues to provoke howls of outrage from equally self-styled defenders of civil liberties – like, of course, the ACLU. (On Ramadan and his visa difficulties, see here on Trans-Int.) This even though controlling the entry of foreigners to the national territory obviously constitutes one of the defining prerogatives of a sovereign state and – other than in the fevered imaginations of ACLU "experts" – equally obviously does not affect the rights and liberties of citizens. What, however, would these same persons and organizations say if the government denied America's own citizens the liberty to travel abroad?

German authorities, notably, do this.

The extent to which the apparent victory of Romano Prodi's "Union" coalition in the Italian elections depended upon the support of Communist and "post"-Communist forces could easily be overlooked.

The following from a report published Monday (10 April) on the website of the German newsweekly Focus.

A ninth victim has been shot to death in a mysterious series of murders. The victim was the owner of an Internet café in Kassel. The 21-year-old Turk was killed last Thursday by two shots to the head. According to the police and the district attorney's office, the analysis of the bullets shows that his violent death belongs to the same series as eight other cases. The same gun was used in all the cases. Investigators are puzzling over what other possible connections there could be.

Last week, French President Jacques Chirac announced that he had signed into law the so-called Law on Equality of Opportunity passed by the French National Assembly; at the same time, he instructed the government to "take all necessary measures" to assure that the dispositions of the law concerning the contested "First Employment Contract" are not applied as written. (For the text of Chirac's speech [in French], see here.)

On June 6, 2004, the 60th anniversary of D-Day, French President Jacques Chirac stood before hundreds of American veterans of the Allied invasion of Normandy at the American Cemetery at Colleville-Sur-Mer, where their fallen comrades are buried. "To the entire American nation," he said, "...to all those men and women who paid the heavy price of those heroic days, I want to address the message of France: a message of friendship and brotherhood, of recognition and gratitude."

Two weeks ago, however, when the French public television channel France3 broadcast the documentary "The Dark Side of the Liberators" [La Face cachée des libérateurs], the message was a decidedly different one. For more, see my new article on TCSDaily: "D-Day for Revisionists".