This is an international story that has yet to receive the attention it deserves.

Deutsche Welle 8.27.2019

A Chechen from Georgia was shot dead in Berlin — allegedly by a man from Russia. If it was an act of revenge, two wars may have played a role.

Was it a straightforward case of murder, or was the killing of a Chechen asylum-seeker in Berlin politically motivated?

The federal prosecutor’s office has yet to get involved in the investigation, but on Monday, a spokesperson told news agency DPA that they were “monitoring for developments.” The highest criminal prosecution authority said it would intervene if there were indications that a “foreign power” was involved in the crime.

The media has also speculated about the possible involvement of the Russian secret service.

Hitmen and revenge?

The attack last Friday in Berlin had echoes of a film plot about former Chechen fighters, hitmen and revenge. Shortly before noon, a man walking through a park in Berlin’s Moabit district was killed when a cyclist fired two targeted shots.

The 40-year-old victim was an asylum-seeker of Chechen descent from Georgia. In some Russian and Georgian circles, he is known by the name of Selimkhan K. (pictured above); he is also known by a second identity, Tornike K.

The suspect was quickly apprehended owing to witness accounts. So far, little is known about him. He is being held in custody and has made no comment on the allegations.

Berlin police officers secure evidence at the park in Moabit

According to the Berlin public prosecutor’s office, he is 49 years old and a Russian passport holder. On Monday, the Russian Embassy in Berlin said it was “in contact” with the German authorities.

Not far from the crime scene, police retrieved a bicycle presumed to have been used by the fleeing attacker, along with a wig and the alleged murder weapon, a 9 mm Glock 26 pistol, from the Spree River.

Who was Selimkhan K.?

A profile of the victim, which can be put together from various sources, provides indications of possible motives for the incident.

Selimkhan K. has lived in Germany since 2016. He comes from the Georgian Pankisi valley — which is on the border with Chechnya, a republic of Russia, in the North Caucasus.

This remote mountain region was the scene of the Second Chechen War, which began in 1999 and lasted for about a decade. Chechen separatist fighters and Islamist militants hid there from Russian troops.

Selimkhan K. is said to have fought against Russia as a separatist.

This undated photo shows warlords in the Second Chechen War: Shamil Bassaev (m.) and Abu Al Valid (2nd from right)

In a 2017 letter that has been made available to DW, Ekkehard Maaß, head of the German-Caucasian Society in Berlin, wrote to the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF): “During the Second Chechen War, he fought first under Shamil Bassaev, then under the Arab leader Abu Valid.”

The infamous Chechen warlords Bassaev and Valid, the latter born in Saudi Arabia, were killed by Russian units.

In the letter to BAMF, Maaß also mentions the Russian-Georgian war, when Selimkhan K. is said to have set up a group of “200 volunteers to defend Georgia in South Ossetia” in August 2008. But the group was not deployed.

On top of this, many media outlets are reporting that Selimkhan K. worked together with the Georgian Interior Ministry. It is said that he acted as a “mediator” during a hostage situation in 2012.

Not a one-off case?

Maaß describes Selimkhan K. as his “friend,” who had been “neither an Islamist threat nor a terrorist.” Some media reports said the German authorities had initially classified him as a dangerous Islamist but later retracted this classification.

In a letter to the BAMF, Maaß had requested protection for Selimkhan K. because he was receiving “threatening” SMS and WhatsApp messages in Germany. He also said he had been a victim of attacks in the past, most recently in Tbilisi in 2015.

Revenge for an incident during the Second Chechen War? Chechen fighters in 1996 (File photo)

If Selimkhan K. is confirmed to have been executed, this would set a precedent for Germany — but it would also mark a continuation of Chechens being targeted across the globe. 

In 2009, Chechen refugee Umar Israilov — also a former fighter in the Chechen war — was shot dead on a street in Vienna. Three Chechens living in Austria were convicted of the crime.

Several prominent Chechen militants have been killed in Turkey and the Gulf region. Ekkehard Maaß told DW he considers the murder of Selimkhan K. to be part of a pattern of similar cases.

https://www.dw.com/en/mystery-surrounds-slaying-of-chechen-asylum-seeker-in-berlin/a-50177849

Election Day is only 10 weeks away and the hardball politics of San Francisco are now taking center stage. Progressive candidate Chesa Boudin has a good chance to win. His opponents will trash and defame him until the votes are counted.

DA Candidates shown above. Leif Dautch, Nancy Tung, Chesa Boudin and Suzy Loftus

48 Hills 8.26.2019

I always argue that big campaign money functions less as a bribe (although in some cases, there’s some of that) but as an indication of which candidate certain individuals and interests think will be most likely to help them. In the last mayor’s race, we quickly learned that the tech and real-estate moguls thought London Breed would be best for them. In the current D5 race, it’s pretty clear that the real-estate money is hoping Vallie Brown will defeat Dean Preston.

Six months after his untimely death on February 22nd, San Francisco officialdom continues to be on the Hotseat. A just released report, put together by medical professionals hired by late Public Defender Jeff Adachi’s family, determined the 59 year old died of natural causes.

In its finding the San Francisco Medical Examiner maintained that Adachi’s death was the result of recreational drug use. Coming on top of the scandalous release of a Police Report shortly after Adachi died, the debunking of the official medical report is further evidence that even in death Jeff Adachi’s foes would not let him rest in peace.

Adachi’s associates in the Public Defender’s office, where he presided for 18 years, are justifiably outraged at the report released by the Medical Examiner.

Excerpted from San Francisco Chronicle 8.22.2019

Jeff Adachi’s family hopes new reports that conclude his death was natural — rather than drug induced, as the city medical examiner found in March — will help with “restoring his reputation,” according to the family’s lawyer.

The new reports, outlined Wednesday by the public defender’s office, concluded that Adachi died from a heart attack due to heart disease and that his death was “natural.” While the reports acknowledge that alcohol and cocaine were found in his system, a press release from the office argues it would be difficult to conclude those substances caused his death because the small amounts were “a generally unreliable sample.”

In Wednesday’s release, the Public Defender’s Office also suggested a potential conflict of interest involving the medical examiner’s director of operations, Christopher Wirowek. Shortly before Adachi died, he accused Wirowek of lying about the office’s accreditation and called for his termination after he failed to correct what he called “false statements.”

Wirowek did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

The medical examiner’s office declined to comment further Thursday, and referred to its earlier statement: “The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner routinely conducts autopsies to investigate deaths. Forensic pathologists sign off on the cause and manner of death, and their reports speak for themselves.”

The family’s attorney hired three medical experts — including San Francisco’s former chief toxicologist who filed a lawsuit against the city over an employment dispute in 2017 — to review a March report by the medical examiner’s office, which determined that a mixture of cocaine and alcohol caused the public defender’s already-damaged heart to fail.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/Adachi-family-hopes-new-report-will-help-with-14372224.php

During our trips to Berlin in 2017 and 2018 we stayed in a Hotel directly across the Street from where this “Execution Style” Murder took place.  There’s a children’s playground and a walking path. The Park is a frequent destination for mothers, children and seniors. The Kleiner Tiergarten is in the middle of Berlin and nearby the Central Train Station.  It is a very tranquil place. At one end of the Park is the Courthouse where Hitler testified as a witness in a 1931 trial, two years before his ascension to power in Germany in 1933.

Deutsche Welle 8.25.2019

A 40-year-old Georgian man was shot to death in a Berlin park by a man on a bicycle. Police have arrested a Russian national over the killing, but authorities are still trying to determine the motive behind the attack.

Police in Berlin ramped up investigations on Sunday into the death of a 40-year-old man from Georgia who was shot in broad daylight at a park in the German capital.

The deadly shooting occurred around noon on Friday at the Kleiner Tiergarten park in the Berlin neighborhood of Moabit.

An eyewitness told the Berliner Morgenpost newspaper that the attack looked like an “execution-style” killing.

A suspect approached the victim from behind, shooting him twice in the head before fleeing on his bicycle, the witness said.

Police divers later recovered a handgun and the bicycle from the nearby Spree River, according to news agency dpa.

Shortly after the incident, police arrested a 49-year-old suspect from Russia in connection with the attack. Berlin prosecutors said that an arrest warrant was issued against the man on charges of “insidious murder” and that he is in pretrial detention.

Questions about victim’s background

Authorities have not released many details about the backgrounds of either the victim or the suspect in the case and have not commented on a possible motive for the attack.

German media reported that the victim was a veteran of the Second Chechen War, which took place from 1999– 2009, who later joined an anti-terrorist unit in Georgia.

According to information from public broadcaster WDR, German security agencies had listed the 40-year-old victim as a potential militant Islamist, but he was later removed from the list last year after authorities determined he did not pose an acute threat.

The man was reportedly an asylum-seeker who was slated for deportation but had appealed the decision, saying there had been multiple attempts on his life — most recently in Georgia in May 2015.

https://www.dw.com/en/berlin-police-probe-execution-style-killing-in-park/a-50157955

Every Picture Tells a Story. Ongoing Series

8.24.2019

Haight Street – San Francisco

Photo by Lee Heidhues

Forget all the Trump nonsense. It’s a waste of time. He will be out of the picture soon enough. This American  media creation is just an Idiot’s messenger boy.  It’s good for the talking heads and bloviators.  The Amazon conflagration is the genuine crisis and will be with us long after this Orange headed clown is gone.

Nature is taking its revenge on the Planet as destructive, clueless leaders continue to defy the laws of nature. These reckless, selfish mindless politicians will reap the whirlwind for themselves and the rest of us, too.

Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 8.23.2019

The Brazilian president has been coming under increasing pressure as European leaders criticize his environmental policies. Wildfires continue to rage in the Amazon rain forest.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro on Friday promised to send in troops to fight wildfires in the country’s Amazon rainforest, blaming dry weather for this year’s spike in outbreaks.

Bolsonaro said his government was very aware of the situation and will fight “environmental crime” the same way it combats other types of crime, amid accusations that he had turned a blind eye to illegal deforestation by farmers and land grabbers in the region.

The military will “act strongly” to control the blazes, the president promised, as he signed the decree that states the armed forces will collaborate with public security and environmental protection agencies.

“The protection of the forest is our duty,” he said. “We are aware of that and will act to combat deforestation and criminal activities that put people at risk in the Amazon.”

Fires are a regular occurrence during the yearly dry season but environmentalists blamed this year’s jump on farmers increasingly clearing land for pasture.

World leaders react

Bolsonaro’s reaction came as international criticism mounted  over his failure to protect the Amazon, nicknamed “the lungs of the planet.” The 64-year-old had previously described rainforest protections as an obstacle to Brazil’s economic development.

https://www.dw.com/en/brazil-jair-bolsonaro-sends-in-army-to-tackle-amazon-fires/a-50147151

The  August 2018 incident in Chemnitz, Germany which resulted in the murder of a German citizen and caused days of riots, upheaval and worldwide attention has come to a closure of sorts.

Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 8.22.2019

The man accused of the killing that led to a week of far-right violence last year in Chemnitz, Germany was found guilty of manslaughter at a court in Dresden on Thursday, and sentenced to nine and a half years in prison.

Alaa S., a 23-year-old Syrian asylum-seeker, had always maintained his innocence, while state prosecutors had demanded an 10-year prison sentence for “joint manslaughter and serious physical injury.” The prosecution case was largely based on the testimony of an employee at a nearby kebab shop.

In an interview with public broadcaster ZDF a few days before the verdict, Alaa S. swore that he did not touch either the victim or the knife that killed him. His lawyers pointed out there was no DNA evidence linking him to either, though in their final statement on Thursday, prosecutors said his guilt had been proved.

The main suspect, 22-year-old Iraqi Farhad A. who had previously been accused of stabbings, has not been found and is believed to have fled the country. A third suspect, another young Iraqi, was released last September for lack of evidence.

For the people of Chemnitz, the verdict is unlikely to bring closure to what escalated into a series of ugly events last year, and attracted major media coverage to the city.

‘Moralizing’ riles people

Despite the city’s best cultural efforts at fostering tolerance, many Chemnitzers resist what they see as attempts to impose an ideology. “If it becomes too demonstrative, then it becomes divisive,” said Franz Knoppe, project director for the Chemnitz cultural and educational organization ASA-FF, the “Network for Global Learning.”

“The ‘Wir Sind Mehr’ demos are an act of self-assurance: ‘Maybe we are more,’ but it doesn’t open the people who maybe didn’t want to march with the Nazis, but also didn’t like the fact that Daniel H. was killed.”

On the day after Daniel H.’s killing, a city street festival that had been running the whole weekend turned sour, and some people were filmed chasing migrants, while the police appeared unable to control the situation. When the festival was abruptly shut down, it gave way to a week of far-right protests, attended by thousands of neo-Nazis from across the country, often in violent confrontation with Antifa counterprotests, and desperate attempts by the local government to find dialogue with citizens.

These were followed by a major rock concert in Chemnitz, and huge demonstrations in Berlin and other German cities under the hashtag #WirSindMehr (“We are more”), meant to highlight Germany’s open and inclusive culture.

But beneath these efforts at political engagement in Chemnitz, the politics in the city can’t be hidden. The results of the city council election in May this year returned the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) 18% of the vote, a close second to the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU). That doesn’t sound that much, except that the far-right group Pro Chemnitz, which includes some neo-Nazis, and which organized last year’s far-right demo in the wake of Daniel H.’s death, took another 8% and now has five of the 60 seats in the city council.

https://www.dw.com/en/chemnitz-syrian-asylum-seeker-convicted-of-killing-that-sparked-far-right-riots/a-50120472

This is the kind of recognition which should be coming from the American government since it is largely responsible for the turmoil and carnage visited upon this Region during the past nearly 30 years.

Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 8.21.2019

Germany’s defense minister has met with female victims from the Yazidi minority group in northern Iraq. It is the German minister’s third and final day of her inaugural tour of the Middle East.

German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer concluded her three-day tour of the Middle East on Wednesday, full of admiration for the women and girls from the Yazidi minority group in northern Iraq who were enslaved and abused by “Islamic State” militants.

“These women have witnessed unspeakable things,” Kramp-Karrenbauer said.

The recently installed defense minister was wary of history repeating itself as she said: “They need more targeted help so that they are not victims of this terrorism a second time.”

The fight against IS has not finished, the German politician admitted.

“This was a very emotional moment for me this morning, and that alone is a good reason to say: We should continue acting here in this region,” she said.

Kramp-Karrenbauer expressed her gratitude to the Iraqi Kurdish fighters for their help in fighting the militants.

“We have a joint goal. This goal is to defeat the Islamic State terrorism in the long term,” she said.

The defense minister, also known by her initials, AKK, concluded that Germany would not forget the sacrifices made by Iraqi Kurds. “You have lost lives and fought this fight, not only for the security of your own region, but for the security of Europe and Germany as well,” she said.

The 56-year-old visited Jordan, in addition to Iraq, as part of her first trip to the region and said the mission was to help her gain a better understanding of the anti-terrorist mission the German troops are involved in on the ground there.

https://www.dw.com/en/german-defense-minister-meets-islamic-state-victims-in-iraq/a-50117977

The alleged assailant in two incidents has become political fodder in San Francisco. The Judge, following an outcry from law enforcement and a portion of the population, has decided to put the suspect behind bars.  The Judge may be correct procedurally speaking. But there is also a belief that she bowed to the pressure in making her ruling.  

It is distressing that a candidate for District Attorney in the November 2019 election has jumped into the fray for what can charitably be described as political purposes.

San Francisco Examiner 8.20.2019

The San Francisco Superior Court judge who came under fire for releasing a man charged  in a widely publicized attack near the Embarcadero has had a change of heart.

Judge Christine Van Aken decided Tuesday that Austin James Vincent would beheld in custody pending trial after prosecutors filed new charges against him.

Vincent, a 25-year-old homeless man, is said to have been suffering a mental health crisis when he allegedly grabbed a woman outside her Embarcadero condo building Aug. 11.

News that Van Aken, the judge, had initially released Vincent, upset the rank-and-file police union. The San Francisco Police Officers Association issued a statement calling for her demotion to Traffic Court.

“Van Aken should not be allowed to preside over any criminal cases,” said Tony Montoya, president of SFPOA . “She may have been a reasonably competent civil attorney, but she’s a catastrophe of a criminal judge.”

Unlike Van Aken, the District Attorney’s Office has largely not been blamed for the release. Yet court transcripts obtained by KPIX may raise eyebrows.

The transcripts show that Chang, the prosecutor, did not articulate the evidence included in the police report or video of the Embarcadero assault to Van Aken when she decided to release Vincent last Tuesday.

Van Aken did, however, have a copy of the police report, and Chang told her that Vincent had a criminal history from New York including a petty theft and a misdemeanor conviction for menacing with a weapon.

“You can present the evidence in a way that’s more persuasive,” said Nancy Tung, a prosecutor who is running for district attorney.

Van Aken did, however, have a copy of the police report, and Chang told her that Vincent had a criminal history from New York including a petty theft and a misdemeanor conviction for menacing with a weapon.

“I’m not discounting the fact that defendant might be — might have been at a point of crisis, but there is enough evidence to show that he’s a public safety risk,” Chang said at the initial hearing, according to the transcripts.

Tung was at the most recent hearing to see whether Van Aken would decide torelease Vincent again.

“She should have detained him in the first place,” Tung said. “This was heropportunity to right that wrong and she made the right decision this time.”

But after a widely shared video of the attack surfaced and outrage mounted overher decision, she ordered Vincent to be placed on GPS monitoring Friday.

Van Aken said his concerns about public safety grew when police obtained a warrant for Vincent’s arrest Friday night in connection with a February assault in the South of Market.

Vincent surrendered to authorities Monday morning at the Hall of Justice.

On Tuesday, Van Aken said she was too concerned about public safety to release Vincent again after learning that the new allegations involved criminal threats and a knife.

“I take this very seriously,” Van Aken said.

Vincent shook his head in court as the judge decided to hold him in custody.

His attorney, Saleem Belbahri, had argued that Vincent should be let out because he was a “model client” in the treatment program Van Aken initially released him into.

“He’s been open to getting treatment,” Belbahri told the judge.

Belbahri told reporters outside the courtroom that he was disappointed in the decision.

“He was getting the help that he needed,” Belbahri said. “He was having the root causes of his issues being addressed and now he’s in jail where he’s not going to get help with those issues”

District Attorney Assistant Edward Chang had argued for Vincent’s detention.

https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/judge-decides-to-hold-embarcadero-attack-suspect-in-jail/

Right here in Deep Blue California.  This is disturbing. Ignoring the reality of a strong and growing Nazi sentiment in America is a recipe for Disaster.

The Guardian 8.19.2019

High school students in southern California appeared to give the Nazi salute in disturbing video footage taken at a sports team awards ceremony.

Among outraged reaction on social media, the musician and activist Bill Madden blamed the president, writing on Twitter: “This is America. Trump has made the Third Reich family friendly.”

A video purportedly shows around 10 members of the boys’ water polo team at Pacifica high school in Garden Grove giving the salute while facing a figure at a lectern who is saluting and singing.

According to the Daily Beast, which published the video, the incident occurred before an awards ceremony late last year. The website reported that the song is an obscure Nazi marching song from the second world war.

The video was reportedly shared on Instagram by a student, who allegedly also posted lyrics to the song in his bio on the social network which he later removed.

It is the second incident involving Nazi depictions and high school students in the region to come to national attention this year. In March, pupils from nearby Orange county appeared to do the Nazi salute while surrounding cups arranged in the shape of a swastika.

The Garden Grove Unified School district, which oversees Pacifica high school, said both organizations “strongly condemn” the video, which it said was “recorded last year of some students who engaged in offensive Nazi-related gestures”.

A district spokesperson told the Guardian that the incident took place before an “after school hours, off-campus” student athletics banquet and shared with “a small group of students” on Snapchat.

“It was not brought to the attention of the administration of Pacifica high school until March of 2019, four months following the banquet, at which time school administrators took immediate action and addressed the situation with all students and families involved,” she added.

The district declined to comment on whether any disciplinary measures were taken, citing the Federal Educational Rights and Privacy Act. But the spokesperson said following the incident, the school has “reached out to community organisations to provide support that will continue to ensure an anti-bias learning environment and address issues of hate, bias, and exclusion with all staff and students”.

She added: “Pacifica high school, along with our other district schools, will be working with students, staff, and parents to continue to address these issues in the fall in collaboration with agencies dedicated to anti-bias education.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/19/nazi-salute-high-school-students-video-california