From Volume 38, Issue 3 of EIR Online, Published Jan. 21, 2011

Western European News Digest

Zapatero Told He Should Listen to LaRouche's Jan. 22 Webcast

Jan. 15 (EIRNS)— In the course of a 20-minute radio interview with EIR's Dennis Small, which was broadcast last night on Spain's Radio Intereconomia, host Daniel Estulin picked up on Small's promotion of Lyndon LaRouche's upcoming webcast as the real U.S. State of the Union address, as opposed to Obama's Nazi policies. Estulin said that he would write Spanish President Zapatero an e-mail urging him to listen to that webcast, to learn what his government should do in the current global breakdown crisis.

BüSo's New Book Hand-Delivered to Merkel

Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—German Chancellor Angela Merkel addressed her Christian Democratic Union party's New Year's reception in Mainz yesterday, where a team from the Civil Rights Solidarity Movement (BüSo), the LaRouche movement in Germany, was distributing literature.

Encountering her outside the event, an EIR representative greeted her and gave her a copy of the BüSo's new book, telling her to go for a Glass-Steagall law ("two-tier banking system") and to protect Germany from the "English disease." The book is titled Das Geheimnis der Wirtschaft: Losung der globalen Systemkrise: Trennbankensystem und produktive Kreditschopfung (The Secret of Economics: Solving the Global Systemic Crisis: A Two-Tier Banking System and Productive Credit Creation).

EIR Challenges Trichet on ECB Bankruptcy

Jan. 13 (EIRNS)—Answering a question from EIR's correspondent at today's European Central Bank press conference in Frankfurt, ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet said that the idea that the ECB could default is "absurd." EIR's Claudio Celani had mentioned increasing concerns that the ECB, through its Assets Purchase Program, is becoming a European "bad bank"—a toxic waste dump—and that the sudden decision to increase the ECB capital shows the risk of default.

Trichet denied that the capital increase was a sudden decision, and gave a long, sophistical explanation of how it had been an option since 2008. Trichet refused to answer whether, should the EU governments refuse to expand the EU bank bailout fund, the threat of insolvency would become real, as a result of the ECB being left alone with the burden of bailing out banks.

The following day, several British, German, and Italian media reported the exchange.

ECB Discusses Glass-Steagall Universe

Jan. 13 (EIRNS)— In a clear response to EIR's Glass-Steagall campaign, the European Central Bank has posted a paper discussing whether the elimination of Glass-Steagall led to increased defaults in securities. The article concludes that this has been the case, but that the repeal of Glass-Steagall is not being questioned. The problem can be fixed with "more supervision," they claim.

The ECB posting includes a disclaimer: "This working paper should not be reported as representing the views of the European Central Bank (ECB). The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the ECB."

Expert Predicts Anarchist Terror Wave

Jan. 11 (EIRNS)—A senior European security source told EIR that the anarchist-inspired terrorism now taking place in Greece and Italy, will spread throughout Europe and will eventually eclipse so-called al-Qaeda terrorism. These will be more unpredictable and more dangerous than the Red Brigades, the Baader Meinhof, and the terror groups that were active in the last three decades of the last century. The new anarchist groups consider all political currents as potential enemies and appropriate targets, including high-level politicians; therefore, they are easily manipulated by "interested groups," the source noted.

The source is very familiar with the name Alfredo Bonanno, the 74-year-old "insurrectionary anarchist" and "theoretician" who was arrested in 2009 for a bank robbery in Greece. He said Bonanno has contacts in Greece, Italy, France, and Switzerland, where he has the support of Andrea Stauffacher and her Secours Rouge organization.

Memorial for T-4 Euthanasia Victims Inaugurated

Jan. 11 (EIRNS)— With speeches and a wreath-laying ceremony, the cornerstone for a new memorial that will commemorate the victims of the Nazis' Tiergarten-4 mass euthanasia program was laid Jan. 10 in the city of Brandenburg/Havel. The "tool room" at the former prison there, which was turned into a gas chamber, the first of its kind in the T-4 context, served as the testing site in January 1940 for the euthanasia program, which eventually killed 9,000 at this site alone, and up to a quarter-million more at numerous other extinction sites, often masked as "psychiatric clinics," between January 1940 and May 1945.

Dr. Astrid Ley, the director of the memorial project, noted that the first test-run of gassing victims 71 years ago, was attended by top Nazi "health" officials such as Dr. Klaus Brandt and Dr. Leonardo Conti, who personally oversaw the murder of the first "test persons" there, of whom not even their names are documented.

Irish Scandal Could Lead to Early Elections

Jan. 10 (EIRNS)— A scandal hitting Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen might very well bring his hated government down and open the way for new elections. With a revolt among his back benchers, and his own party's parliamentarians seeking early retirement rather than face humiliation at the next elections, Cowen is now accused of having ties to former Anglo Irish Bank chief Sean FitzPatrick.

These ties were revealed in the Irish Times, Jan. 9, which ran excerpts from a forthcoming book, The FitzPatrick Tapes, in which FitzPatrick speaks of social encounters, including dinners and golf games, between the two men as recently as July 2008.

Anglo Irish Bank received huge government bailouts, starting in 2008, then came under state ownership in June 2009.

Greek Unemployment Increases 39%

Jan. 14, (EIRNS)—The destruction of the Greek economy by the European Union's austerity demands is dramatically exposed by a 39% increase in unemployment; hardest hit are youth aged 15-24, with an unemployment rate of nearly 35% in October 2010, up from over 27% in October 2009. In the 25-34 age bracket, unemployment shot above 18% from 12.6% in that time period, and for the 35-44 age group to 11.5% from 8.0%.

Tractor Sales Fall in France, Britain

Jan. 14—In France, in 2010, the number of new tractors sold fell by over 21% from the year earlier. Xavier Beulin, the new head of the farmers union FNSEA, reports that every year, France is losing 70,000 hectares of valuable farm land.

In Britain, annual tractor sales for 2010 ended up 11% lower than for 2009, according to the Agriculture Engineers Association.

Portuguese Government Crisis Looms

Jan. 11 (EIRNS)—Rumors that Portugal is being pressured by the European Union to negotiate a bailout like those that were forced on Greece and Ireland, are precipitating a government crisis. While Portuguese Prime Minister José Socrates continues to deny that this country is being pressured into a bailout, the opposition Social Democratic Party is demanding his immediate resignation if the rumors are true.

Tony Blair: Nazi NICE One of My Most Important Successes

Jan. 11 (EIRNS)—President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia reported in a speech on Colombian health reforms on Sept. 21, 2010, that he had asked former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, when Blair visited him as President-elect last June, "what were the most important things that he had done in his ten years in power. And he told me that the creation of something called NICE [National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence], which is an institute which controls, which oversees, the prices of medications and some of the health system, was among the important things which he had done."

NICE, of course, is the notorious Nazi rationing system Blair put in place, a system which is President Barack Obama's direct model for his deathcare system.

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