Six In The Morning

Thousands of refugees pour into Austria as European crisis intensifies

  Around 13,000 people entered Austria on Saturday, according to the Red Cross, after being forced away from Croatia, Hungary and Slovenia

Agence France-Presse

Sunday 20 September 2015 06.31 BST

Thousands of refugees have streamed into Austria after being shunted through Croatia, Hungary and Slovenia as Europe’s divided nations stepped up efforts to push the migrants into neighbouring countries.

The continent’s biggest migratory flow since 1945 has opened a deep rift between western and eastern members of the European Union over how to distribute the refugees fairly, and raised questions over the fate of the Schengen agreement allowing borderless travel within the 28-nation bloc.

 Refugee crisis was caused by a careless West that allowed anarchy and fear to take root in the Middle East

The war in Syria and Iraq has gone on as long as the First World War

 PATRICK COCKBURN Sunday 20 September 2015

Little has been done to end the four-year civil war that is destroying Iraq and Syria and which has caused the biggest mass flight of people ever seen in the Middle East. More than half of the 23 million Syrian population have fled their homes, of which four million are refugees outside Syria. There is a growing exodus from Iraq, with three million people displaced, many of whom today see that the war is not ending and that they can never again hope to live safely in their own country.

The Iraq-Syrian war is the cause of the European Union’s refugee crisis and it is going to get worse. There is a bloody stalemate in Iraq, with the country divided by military front lines more heavily defended than the frontiers of the state. The Sunni Arabs are suffering particularly badly because they are being forced to leave the previously mixed provinces around Baghdad, where they are suspected of sympathising with Islamic State (Isis). They are unlikely to be able to return. Others flee provinces such as Anbar, Nineveh and Salahuddin to escape the fighting.

 South China Sea: Philippines may invite US back to Subic Bay

 September 20, 2015 – 12:59PM

Javier C. Hernandez

With China forcefully pressing its claim to a vast expanse of sea west of here, the Philippines are now debating whether to welcome the United States Navy back to the deepwater docks, airstrips and craggy shores of Subic Bay, which served as a haven for bruised battleships and weary soldiers during the Vietnam War.

It is also asking Washington for hundreds of millions of dollars in new funding to strengthen its own military, one of the weakest in Asia.

The change of heart is just one sign of the shifting strategic calculations in the region as President Xi Jinping of China has sought to reinforce Beijing’s claim to almost all of the South China Sea by turning reefs into islands and putting military facilities on them. Satellite photos taken last week appear to show China preparing to build a third airstrip on one of the new islands.

 Pope to hold a giant Mass in Cuba one day after veiled critique to leaders



  By Daniel Burke, CNN Religion Editor

Updated 0525 GMT (1225 HKT) September 20, 2015

Pope Francis will start the second day of his visit to Cuba by holding a Mass in Havana’s Revolution Square. Later Sunday he is to meet with government officials and follow that with meetings with local priests and seminarians.

When Francis landed in Cuba on Saturday, quickly calling on the communist nation to “open itself to the world,” while praising its recent restoration of diplomatic ties with the United States.

Francis was greeted by President Raul Castro at Jose Marti International airport in Havana, where the pontiff urged Cuba to grant its people the “freedom, the means and the space” to practice their faith, an implicit criticism of the many restrictions the country places on religion.

 Important but unfamiliar: A look at who’s coming to town with Chinese President Xi Jinping

  The Puget Sound stopover by President Xi Jinping also brings to town many significant figures in China’s government and business sectors.

 By Seattle Times staff

The Puget Sound stopover by President Xi Jinping also brings to town many significant figures in China’s government and business sectors.

Here’s a look at a few of the key Chinese visitors scheduled to be here:

Xi Jinping

President of China

He first visited the U.S. in 1985 as an agricultural official. In 2012, as heir apparent to China’s top leadership post, he returned to Iowa on a well-publicized visit. The son of a founding Chinese Communist Party leader who was purged during the Cultural Revolution, Xi spent seven years working in a remote village before studying engineering at Tsinghua University in Beijing and joining the Party himself. He came to power as an advocate of reform but has disappointed many in China and elsewhere with stricter controls on political speech and little change in the central role of big state-owned companies.

Why North Korea’s Latest Nuclear Threats Are Like Groundhog Day All Over Again

 

Charlotte Alfred

World Reporter, The Huffington Post

North Korean officials sent a defiant message to the world over their nuclear and missile programs this week, as the reclusive regime gears up to celebrate the ruling party’s 70th anniversary.

The head of Pyongyang’s space agency said on Monday it was preparing to send a new earth observation satellite into space on a long-range rocket. The U.S. has warned this would violate United Nations resolutions against Pyongyang conducting ballistic missile tests, because of the similarity of the technology involved. Meanwhile, analysts and South Korean officials are skeptical of the announcement, saying there is little sign that Pyongyang is readying a satellite launch.