Western European News Digest

E. coli Epidemic Exposes Health-Care Take-Down

June 3 (EIRNS)—The outbreak two weeks ago of a new, highly aggressive E. coli epidemic in the northern German region of Hamburg and surroundings, and the difficulties encountered in attempting to get it under control, drive home the point made by the LaRouche movement: the takedown of crucial scientific and medical infrastructure, of crucial monitoring and precautionary facilities, is threatening to leave mankind defenseless against natural catastrophes like volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, and droughts, as well as against life-threatening diseases.

The collapse of medical services under cost-cutting and privatization policies has, even in Germany (which is not a Third World country, after all), created a situation in which the country's entire capacity for dialysis treatment is already fully utilized by the 500 most acute cases of the more than 2,000 enterohemorraghic E. coli (EHEC) infections, most of them in Hamburg. A few more cases like these, and triage will be imposed, most likely against the older patients first.

Reseachers are not even clear what caused the outbreak of this epidemic, which within two weeks has already killed 18 people.

Spanish 'Indignados' Movement Spreads to France

June 1 (EIRNS)—Ferment from the Indignados demonstrations organized by the Democracia Real Ya/May 15 movement (DRY/M15) in Spain, is spreading to France, where there have been daily demonstrations in Paris, Toulouse, Rennes, Lyon, and some 20 cities altogether, for the past 10 days. General assemblies are held every day with 100-200 mostly young people, and with larger crowds on Sundays.

The demonstrations are clearly organized by Spanish youth, either living or studying in France. The movement is calling on citizens all over Europe to rise up against the present financial order in their countries. The original Real Democracy Now leaflet being distributed, attacks the bailout policies through which the governments are trying to save the banks, by imposing crushing austerity. It ends by calling for a "Constituent Assembly" here, and refers to "government by the people and for the people," which is in the Preamble to France's 1958 Constitution.

While there is no programmatic perspective as such, it is not anarchist. The demonstrations have grown up outside of any formal political organization, and the movement is self-proclaimed to be "nonpartisan."

Swedish Daily Calls for Growth: Cites Indira Gandhi

May 30 (EIRNS)—The lead editorial of Sweden's leading daily Dagens Nyheter, May 29, blasts ecologism's "Exaggerated Doom," and, indirectly, German government advisor Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, KBE (who had a secret meeting to get a consensus for genocide among Nobel Laureates at the Royal Academy of Sciences just ten days earlier).

The editorial starts off: "Growth is not the main threat to mankind. To the contrary, growth is necessary to save the world from the greatest threat—poverty." The editorial quotes from Indira Gandhi's speech at the 1972 Stockholm UN Environment Conference, "Are not poverty and misery the greatest polluters?" and then continues, "Yes, say the authors of the book The Sustainability Mythos 39 years later and, encouragingly enough, there are more and more with them"—although avoiding any mention of the LaRouche Movement.

Berlusconi Suffers Serious Election Defeat

June 1 (EIRNS)—In the second round of local elections in Italy on May 30, Italy's scandal-ridden Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and his government coalition were handed a serious defeat, which will have repercussions at the national level. Especially in Naples and Milan, where Berlusconi personally had led the election campaign, his candidates lost with a large margin against the opposition. Thus, Berlusconi has ultimately joined the ranks of all government leaders in Europe who are being punished by voters for having betrayed the population in favor of the banksters.

Movisol chairwoman Liliana Gorini has issued a statement, "The Mass Strike in Italy," stating that Italian voters have punished Berlusconi because he has violated natural law, and has called on the next government to reject the EU and ECB dictates.

Queen Reinforces Troop Presence in Scotland

June 2 (EIRNS)—Has the British Queen's fears of losing her Scottish crown led her to order more troops to Scotland to crush any moves towards independence? As The Scotsman reports, "The U.K. government plans to double the size of the Army in Scotland to try to prevent military cuts being used by the SNP [Scottish National Party] to boost the case for independence." Three thousand of the 18,000 British troops to be withdrawn from Germany will be transferred to Scotland to double British army troop strength from 3,000 to 6,000. They will apparently have less air support, because the government will close down two air bases in Scotland as part of cutting the defense budget.

Former SAS commander Clive Fairweather is quoted saying that while the government wants to deploy the troops to prevent independence, the SNP could veto the move. The army in fact is not so sure that Scottish independence can be avoided, and therefore is "extremely reluctant to locate there on the basis that Scotland could become a foreign country."

Anti-Nuclear Referendum Approved in Italy

June 1 (EIRNS)—The Italian Supreme Court of Justice (Corte di Cassazione) has boosted the anti-nuclear faction by approving the referendum to be held on June 12. Italy already abandoned nuclear power years ago, after a referendum in 1986, but Prime Minister Berlusconi has proposed resumption of building nuclear plants by 2014. The referendum, if it gets enough support, could permanently (in effect) end nuclear energy in Italy. In order to avoid the referendum, the government issued a law suspending the potential nuclear program, but the court ruled that the referendum will be valid, the suspension notwithstanding.

The referendum has been promoted by Antonio Di Pietro's IDV (Italy of Values) party.

Indicative of the psychotic state of the population, a regional referendum in Sardinia on nuclear power two weeks ago saw over 90% of the population vote "No."