Clashes
in Hong Kong between pro-democracy protesters and police have closed
government offices and parliament. Hundreds of Hong Kong pro-democracy
protesters clashed with police while trying to expand their protests
outside government ...
A
riot policeman prevents pro-democracy protesters from getting near
during clashes outside the government headquarters in Hong Kong,
December 1, 2014.
Clashes in Hong Kong between pro-democracy protesters and police have closed government offices and parliament.
Hundreds of Hong Kong pro-democracy protesters clashed with police
while trying to expand their protests outside government headquarters.
Demonstrators stormed past police lines early Monday in a bid to
occupy a major road in the Admiralty district. Hundreds of riot police
armed with pepper spray and batons pushed back, injuring several
protesters and arresting at least 18.
Police officials said they "had no other choice" than to use pepper spray and batons in their effort to de-escalate the clashes.
It was the latest in a series of skirmishes between police and
protesters in the past week. On Friday, authorities scuffled with
student protesters while clearing barricades from a main road in the
Mong Kok neighborhood. Several protesters were detained, including
student leaders Lester Shum and Joshua Wong.
The protests have persisted since late September, but have been
dwindling. Several recent public opinion polls suggest the protests are
beginning to lose public support.
The demonstrators have been calling for fully democratic elections in
2017. They took to the streets after China ruled in August that all
candidates for Hong Kong's chief executive must first be approved by a
committee that is stacked with pro-Beijing loyalists.
After reading the testimony in the above article, I sort of come to the same conclusion as the Grand Jury. Unless there were more police officers there, likely there was no chance that Mr. Brown wouldn't have at least been shot if not killed.
So, if on the surface you simply take the fact that an unarmed man who was black was shot you might have one reaction. But, if you take these exact circumstances the officer at a certain point was just trying to stay alive because Brown was not co-operating with the officer.
Should Officer Wilson have backed off and followed the pair of men until backup arrived. Very Likely.
However, this might not have been possible or useful either. One can never know about something like this.
Did Brown rob a convenience store and intimidate people there before being confronted by Officer Wilson?
Yes. There is footage of this. Was Brown high on some kind of drug? Possibly. This I don't think was brought up in this article.
As a matter of principle should any unarmed man be shot by police?
No. But, situations can create this type of scenario we have here especially if someone is harming another person be that an officer of the law or another innocent person.
However, I think the real problem here is that the laws of Missouri are getting black men killed by police whether they deserve to be or not.
So, a lot of thought needs to be put into how the people of Missouri are going to deal with all this.
If you haven't done this before because you live somewhere this isn't what you have to do every single winter the key to doing this well is to:
If you can afford it have an SUV or Pickup truck that is either All Wheel Drive or 4 wheel drive (either one). Then it really helps if you have one of the newer automatic transmissions where you can shift it into low in some way with the capacity to shif between all the gears through a button or lever somehow. Though stick shifts many people prefer for mileage and other reasons, actually it is usually safer to have an automatic transmission in the snow for many reasons as long as you have the capacity to easily shift it to from one gear to the other.
So, you are driving basically on a sheet of glass downhill with possibly other cars in a line. The first thing you want is that everyone else knows how to drive in these kinds of conditions. Otherwise you all might crash if any one makes a mistake on a steep enough slope.
So, unless you absolutely have to you don't want to be in this position unless you think it is sort of fun and something you just have to do or you have to drive to work or school.
The basic idea is that try to never use your brakes except in complete emergencies. So, whatever speed is safe to travel at be in the lowest gear possible so the engine is holding you back with all four wheels pulling back on the engine. Flick your eyes on the tachometer every so often too because in most cars you don't want to go above 4000 or 5000 rpm anytime you are doing this. So, be very careful shifting unless your life or someone else's life depends upon it and you are planning to sacrifice the car or the engine.
So, like I said try not to ever put on your brakes while driving down hill on a sheet of ice, especially if it isn't rocked. Or even if it is it is sort of like in many situations like today 3 inches of ice with rocks forced into it by people driving over it. It's still a sheet of ice that you can easily slide off of. So, remember what you are driving on when it is a sheet of white Ice or black ice. It's usually easy to tell in most situations if you look carefully at it especially in the daytime.
Also, remember never to drive on a sheet of ice downhill in the dark if you have any other choice because there are just too many things that could go wrong to be doing this unless people's lives are at stake and it is a completely emergency.
The problem with all ski lifts is they aren't perfect. Just like cars if the weather is too cold they freeze up in some ways, especially where you get off them. So, getting off the ski lift today the seat rose up because there was some ice where it shouldn't be which sort of left me in mid air over a 45 degree angle ice slope. Because I didn't expect this I landed on the ice pretty hard and bruised my right hip. Do I blame the lift operators or lift for this. Actually no because I actually understand basic mechanics when interconnected with weather too cold. For example, when this happened it likely was between 15 and 18 degrees Fahrenheit. If you are skiing lower than about 20 to 25 degrees Fahrenheit just expect problems with snow (ice) and with ski lifts (Ice) which is going to cause you to get injured.
Luckily, nothing was injured on me on the slopes and I have a bruise on my right hip bigger than my right hand with half of it weeping and the other half purple. However, if you are going to ski on ski lifts this is just part of the fun in the end.
One poor soul broke his leg today and I saw the rescue bag and sled he had ridden down on and in and the wheelchair they put him on to get him out of the cold nearby the fireplace until the ambulance arrived from far away. Looked like a compound fracture the way they had it set up.
After I got off the lift I watched three more groups of people fall right where I did too. Really cold weather and ski lifts don't work very well together below about 20 degrees Fahrenheit.
Also, the lift operators don't want the other 100 to 300 people or so riding the lifts up to turn into popsicles while every other group gets tossed into the air. So, hundreds of lives are at risk in various ways when lift is in operation below 20 degrees Fahrenheit and the winds are at least 20 to 30 miles per hour in gusts of blowing snow.
I was really glad I had my new ski gloves and my wool balaclava and my hood of my ski jacket today. At one point my little finger I was worried about how cold it got but then again that is par for the course on the first day of skiing for me this year.
Today was kind of borderline but still fun. There wasn't enough snow some places so hitting rocks and branches or fallen trees was pretty common if you were exactly in the right trough of snow going down. Also, I wasn't very familiar with this route so there were many surprises the first time down.
However, by the 2nd time down it was kind of fun once I had found the route I would be happy with and wouldn't kill myself on.
One of the routes led to an almost cliff with a 45 Degree slope. So, snowboarders often like this sort of thing if they are really good. However, the top 10 feet of the cliff like incline was barely covered boulders and rocks today. So, I was really glad I had chosen another route when I was below it and looked up at it. Because from above you don't see any of the half covered boulders. But, any day of skiing you can walk away from and still laugh about is a good day of skiing!
REUTERS/Jason Reed U.S. President Barack Obama checks to see if he
still needs the umbrella held by a U.S. Marine to protect him from the
rain during a joint news conference with then-Turkish Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Rose Garden of the White House in
Washington, May 16, 2013.
The US and Turkey are headed for a showdown over
Syria, as evidence mounts that Ankara is enabling groups that Washington
is actively bombing.
Discord between the two allies is now more public than ever following a new report by Dr. Jonathan Schanzer and Merve Tahiroglu of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
"Bordering on Terrorism: Turkey’s Syria Policy and the Rise of the Islamic State"
details Tu rkey's apparent willingness to allow extremists — including
militants from the Islamic State (aka IS, ISIS, or ISIL) — and their
enablers to thrive on the 565-mile border with Syria in an attempt to
secure the downfall of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad.
"The IS crisis has put Turkey and the US on a collision course," the
report says. "Turkey refuses to allow the coalition to launch military
strikes from its soil. Its military also merely looked on while IS
besieged the Kurdish town of Kobani, just across its border. Turkey
negotiated directly with IS in the summer of 2013 to release 49 Turks
held by the terrorist group. In return, Ankara reportedly secured the
release of 180 IS fighters, many of whom returned to the battlefield.
"Meanwhile, the border continues to serve as a transit point for the
illegal sale of oil, the transfer of weapons, and the flow of foreign
fighters. Inside Turkey, IS has also established cells for recruiting
militants and other logistical operations. All of this has raised
questions about Turkey’s value as an American ally, and its place in the
NATO alliance."
View gallery
.
REUTERS/Murad Sezer U.S. Vice President Joe Biden (L) meets with
Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan at Beylerbeyi Palace in Istanbul
November 22, 2014. Schanzer, a former counterterrorism
analyst for the US Treasury Department, told Business Insider that
Ankara was "like that guy at the casino who keeps doubling down on a bad
bet. Each time the policy has failed, Turkey appears to have decided to
go back and do it again, but with higher stakes."
Throughout the Syrian civil war, Turkey's southern border has served as a transit point for cheap oil, weapons, foreign fighters, and pillaged antiquities . As the conflict progressed, the fighters taking advantage of Ankara's lax border policies were more and more radical.
"What began with scattered opposition forces exploiting the border
became something that was really focused on the Muslim Brotherhood,
which then became something that was utilized by [Salafist rebel group]
Ahrar al Sham, which was then utilized by [al-Qaeda affiliate] The Nusra
Front, which is now utilized by ISIS," Schanzer told Business Insider.
He added that given various reports of jihadi financiers sitting in
hotels on the border between Syria and Turkey, "it is impossible that
[Turkey's intelligence agency] MIT is not aware" of what's going on.
The financiers "are doling out cash to those who come back with
videos of attacks, proof of what they've done against the Assad regime
or other enemies," said Schanzer, who previously detailed Turkey's terrorism finance problem to Business Insider. Those videos are then used as propaganda to raise more money for funding fighters.
America's Role
View gallery
.
REUTERS/Jason Reed
The report notes that policy of the administration of US President
Barack Obama regarding Syria may have indirectly instigated Turkey's
dangerous policy.
After supporting Turkey's cause of ousting Assad, Washington didn't follow up with significant support to the mo derate opposition while Assad dropped Scud missiles and barrel bombs on playgrounds and bakeries.
Obama then balked at enforcing his "red line" after Assad's forces killed an estimated 1,400 people in four hours by firing rockets filled with nerve gas on rebel-held territory near the capital.
"I was in Turkey during the Ghouta attacks, and [Turkish officials]
were incredulous," Schanzer said. "They believed that the United States
was squarely behind [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan, not only
just in terms of steering Syria into soft landing, but also that it
would back up its words with deeds and take action in light of an
ongoing slaughter.
"So I think in a sense once it became clear that the US was not going
to be holding to its word, there was a sense among the Turks that they
had to do this themselves."
View gallery
.
REUTERS/Yannis Behrakis Turkish soldiers watch fighting between Kurdish
fighters and Islamic State militants, from atop a hill overlooking the
Syrian town of Kobani, near the Mursitpinar border crossing on the
Turkish-Syrian border in Sanliurfa province November 5, 2014.
ISIS And Blowback
"Turkey does not have a conflict with ISIS, doesn't want a
conflict with ISIS, and ISIS is benefiting from [Turkey's] border
policies," Schanzer said. "Beyond that it gets a lot more fuzzy, but the
point is that the Turks are not being forthcoming about this
relationship."
He added that despite no evidence that Turkey was actively working
with ISIS, "it cannot be denied that Turkey is helping to facilitate
the activities of a terrorist organization that has killed Americans and
is destabilizing the region."
Furthermore, ISIS is gaining a following in the country. The report cites an email from Turkey-based BuzzFeed reporter Mike Giglio
that highlighted his concern about the "level of ISIS support among
the 1-million-plus Syrians living in Turkey. I don't see how they can
successfully weed out ISIS supporters from among these refugees."
View gallery
.
Reuters A look at the border between Turkey and Syria as of mid-September.
Schanzer said that as the suspected presence of ISIS inside
Turkey increased, and with it support inside Turkey for ISIS and other
extremist groups, it becomes that much more difficult for Turkey to do
anything.
"They've inadvertently created a mechanism that can yield blowback
for them that could be extremely painful," Schanzer said. "You have a
lot of people now that are invested in the business of extremism in
Turkey. If you start to challenge that, it raises significant questions
of whether" the militants, their benefactors, and other war profiteers
would tolerate the crackdown.
Impossible To Maintain
Tensions
between Ankara and Washington won't dissipate "so long as Turkey tries
to remain neutral with regard to ISIS while all of these things are
happening on its border," according to Schanzer.
Consequently, the report argues, Washington must find a way to work
with Turkey. Outgoing Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel described Turkey as
" absolutely indispensable
" to the ISIS fight. Turkey would need to shut down the border, wrap up
known nodes of Nusra and ISIS supporters, remove ISIS recruitment
cells, and dismantle ISIS logistical operations inside the country.
(Schanzer noted that the US or NATO could assist.)
View gallery
.
REUTERS/Ints Kalnins Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan listens during a news conference in Riga October 23, 2014.
"A lot of this is going to come down to the will of Ankara right now,"
Schanzer said, adding that a lack of cooperation could result in
Treasury Department sanctions against "individuals who are taking an
active role in these illicit pipelines" on the Turkish side of the
border.
"After that, I think we do begin to question whether security or
intelligence cooperation can continue when there isn't an honest give
and take with what's happened," Schanzer added.
The report concludes
that Ankara must understand that "while America's Syria policy may have
been feckless, its border policy has been reckless." And the
repercussions of doubling down even further would jeopardize relations
with a crucial ally.
"No one wants to scuttle this relationship. But I do think that as
more and more of this comes to light, it becomes ... essentially
impossible to maintain the status quo," Schanzer said. "If we've decided
that ISIS is an enemy worth defeating, it becomes impossible to
maintain the relationship as it is."
end quote from:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-collision-course-absolutely-indispensable-042855557.html
This has to be the most interesting thing I have read yet on this. First, the officer suspects Brown of stealing from a convenience store which he did some Cigarillos (small cigars) then it sort of gets out of hand between the two of them after that. Whether it is racial or whether both men are having the worst day of their lives it is hard to tell from what people said happened including the officer.
The strangest thing of all to me is that I had to read this on bbc.com from England to hear about all this.
The St Louis County prosecutor's office has released the full grand jury report after its decision not to charge Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson over the fatal shooting of Michael Brown.
The 12-person jury heard more than 70 hours of testimony from about 60 witnesses, many giving conflicting statements.
Here are extracts from various testimonies:
Police officer Darren Wilson
Mr Wilson said he had initially encountered Mr Brown and a
friend walking in a road and told them to move to the pavement, drawing
an expletive from Mr Brown.
Mr Wilson said he noticed Mr Brown had a handful of cigars.
"And that's when it clicked" for him, he said, that the men were
suspects in a theft at a convenience store reported minutes earlier.
Prosecutors released this photo of injuries sustained by Mr Wilson
He asked a dispatcher to send additional officers, then reversed his vehicle so that it was in front of Mr Brown and his friend.
As he tried to open the door, Mr Brown slammed it shut. Mr
Wilson said he pushed Mr Brown with the door and Mr Brown hit him in the
face.
He drew his gun and threatened to shoot if Mr Brown didn't
move back, fearing another punch to the face could "knock me out or
worse".
Mr Brown immediately grabbed Mr Wilson's gun and said: "You are
too much of a pussy to shoot me." The officer said he thought he was
going to be shot when Mr Brown dug the gun into his hip.
Mr Wilson said he managed to pull the trigger and the gun
"clicked" twice without firing, before a shot went through the police
car door.
Mr Wilson said Mr Brown stepped back and then looked at him with the "most intense, aggressive face".
"The only way I can describe it, it looks like a demon,
that's how angry he looked. He comes back towards me again with his
hands up."
Mr Wilson said he covered his face and fired the gun again,
firing two shots in the car before Mr Brown ran off and he followed him.
When Mr Brown stopped, Mr Wilson told him to get on the
ground. He said he fired a series of shots when Mr Brown kept coming
towards him and put his right hand under his shirt in the waistband of
his trousers.
He said he fired another round of shots as Mr Brown continued to gain on him, approaching as if he was going to tackle him. Read more of Darren Wilson's testimony (Warning: Explicit language)
Michael Brown's friend: Dorian Johnson
Mr Johnson said he was stunned when Mr Brown stole cigarillos
from the store and expected to be arrested while they were walking home.
Mr Wilson drove on after originally telling them to get on
the pavement, reversing his vehicle and coming back at the pair after
they ignored his demand.
Dorian Johnson said he thought the pair would be arrested
"After he pulled back, there was no more sidewalk talk, it was nothing, it was just anger."
He said Mr Wilson had opened his door suddenly, striking Mr
Brown, then closed the door and grabbed Mr Brown by the neck. He said
the two men engaged in a "tug of war", each holding on to the other's
shirt and arms.
As the two wrestled, Mr Johnson said he heard Mr Wilson say:
"I'll shoot." He said he never saw Mr Brown punch Mr Wilson and did not
think he grabbed the officer's gun.
Mr Johnson described being in shock as he realised the situation was getting out of control.
"At the time I couldn't open my mouth. I couldn't speak.. I
can see and hear the cuss words. I can see the frowns on their faces
getting more intense."
After the initial shots were fired, Mr Johnson said he and
Mr Brown ran off. After Mr Wilson shot again, he said Mr Brown stopped
running and turned to face the officer.
"At that time Big Mike's hands was up, but not so much in the
air because he had been struck... he said I don't have a gun but he's
still mad, he still has his angry face. I don't have a gun... And before
he can say the second sentence or before he can even get it out, that's
when several more shots came."
Mr Johnson was asked if Mr Brown ran at the officer prior to the fatal volley. He insisted he did not.
Unnamed witness 1
He was working in a nearby building and saw Mr Brown leaning
through the police car window and "some sort of confrontation was taking
place".
He said a shot rang out and Mr Brown fled as the officer chased him with his gun drawn.
The witness said Mr Brown stopped and turned but never raised
his hands. He said Mr Brown "ran towards the officer full charge". The
officer then fired several shots but Mr Brown kept rushing toward him.
Unnamed witness 2
She and her husband were visiting a nearby apartment complex when they saw the shooting.
She said after the first two shots were fired, Mr Brown began
running from Mr Wilson's vehicle but stopped, turned around and started
heading toward Mr Wilson, who shot at him.
When asked if it appeared Mr Brown was approaching Mr Wilson
in a threatening manner, she said: "No, he wasn't... I think he was
stunned."
end quote from:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-30189966
This is a cool picture of Timberline Lodge at around 6000 feet on the side of Mt. Hood in Oregon. The temperature outside is somewhere likely between about 5 and 15 degrees Fahrenheit right now. This photo was likely taken some year between February and April.
ISIS Launches Attack On Syria's Kobani From Turkey: Activists
| By
BASSEM MROUE
Posted:
Updated:
BEIRUT (AP) — The Islamic State group launched an attack
Saturday on the Syrian border town of Kobani from Turkey, a Kurdish
official and activists said, although Turkey denied that the fighters
had used its territory for the raid.
The assault began when a
suicide bomber driving an armored vehicle detonated his explosives on
the border crossing between Kobani and Turkey, said the Britain-based
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and Nawaf Khalil, a spokesman for
Syria's powerful Kurdish Democratic Union Party.
The Islamic State group "used to attack the town from three sides," Khalil said. "Today, they are attacking from four sides."
Turkey,
while previously backing the Syrian rebels fighting to topple President
Bashar Assad in that country's civil war, has been hesitant to aid them
in Kobani because it fears that could stoke Kurdish ambitions for an
independent state.
A Turkish government statement on Saturday
confirmed that one of the suicide attacks involved a bomb-loaded vehicle
that detonated on the Syrian side of the border. But it denied that the
vehicle had crossed into Kobani through Turkey, which would be a first
for the extremist fighters.
"Claims that the vehicle reached the
border gate by crossing through Turkish soil are a lie," read the
statement released from the government press office at the border town
of Suruc. "Contrary to certain claims, no Turkish official has made any
statement claiming that the bomb-loaded vehicle had crossed in from
Turkey."
"The security forces who are on alert in the border region have ... taken all necessary measures," the statement continued.
Associated
Press journalists saw thick black smoke rise over Kobani during the
attack. The sound of heavy gunfire echoed through the surrounding hills
as armored vehicles took up positions on the border. The Observatory
said heavy fighting also took place southwest of the town where the
Islamic State group brought in tanks to reinforce their fighters. Video from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights purporting to show ISIS militants firing from inside Turkish territory:
Mustafa
Bali, a Kobani-based activist, said by telephone that Islamic State
group fighters have taken positions in the grain silos on the Turkish
side of the border and from there are launching attacks toward the
border crossing point. He added that the U.S.-led coalition launched an
airstrike Saturday morning on the eastern side of the town.
"It is
now clear that Turkey is openly cooperating with Daesh," Bali said,
using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. Later in the day, he
said the situation was relatively calm on the border after a day of
heavy clashes.
The Islamic State group claimed three suicide
attacks in Kobani's border crossing point, the SITE Intelligence Group
reported. The group, quoting Twitter accounts linked to the militants,
said the suicide attacks were carried out by a Saudi and a Turkmen,
adding that one of them was driving a Humvee.
The Islamic State
group began its Kobani offensive in mid-September, capturing parts of
the town as well as dozens of nearby villages. The town later became the
focus of airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition against the militants.
Kurdish
fighters slowly have been advancing in Kobani since late October, when
dozens of well-armed Iraqi peshmerga fighters joined fellow Syrian Kurds
in the battles. The fighting has killed hundreds of fighters on both
sides over the past two months.
The Observatory said Saturday the latest fighting killed at least eight Kurdish fighters and 17 jihadis.
Syria's
Foreign Minister said in a television interview aired Friday night that
the U.S.-led coalition's weeks of airstrikes against militants in Syria
had not weakened the Islamic State group. Washington and the U.N.
Security Council "should force Turkey to tighten control" of its border
in order to help defeat militants, he added.
"Is Daesh today,
after two months of coalition airstrikes, weaker? All indications show
that it is not weaker," al-Moallem told Beirut-based Al-Mayadeen TV.
The
Islamic State group has declared a self-styled Islamic caliphate in
areas under its control in Iraq and Syria, governing it according to its
violent interpretation of Shariah law. The group has carried out mass
killings targeting government security forces, ethnic minorities and
others against it.
Associated Press writer Suzan Fraser contributed to this report from Ankara, Turkey. end quote from:
The
assault began when a suicide bomber driving an armored vehicle
detonated his explosives on the border crossing between Kobani and
Turkey, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and Nawaf Khalil, a spokesman for Syria's ...
Hosni Mubarak, the
86-year-old former president of Egypt, was brought back to a military
hospital after a court appearance on Saturday.Credit
Khaled Elfiqi/European Pressphoto Agency
CAIRO — An Egyptian court dropped all remaining criminal charges against former President Hosni Mubarak on Saturday in a sweeping repudiation of the Arab Spring uprising that forced him from power.
The
court dismissed murder charges against Mr. Mubarak in the killing of
protesters demanding an end to his 30-year rule — charges that once
inspired crowds to hang the president’s effigy from the lampposts of
Tahrir Square in Cairo and captivated the region. His reviled security
chief and a half-dozen top police officials were acquitted.
The
court also acquitted Mr. Mubarak, his two sons and a wealthy business
associate of corruption charges; the three others had come to personify
the rampant self-dealing of Mr. Mubarak’s era as much as the president
himself.
If
normal legal procedures are followed, Mr. Mubarak could soon go free
for the first time since his top generals removed him from power amid a
popular revolt in 2011, although it was not clear whether those rules
would be adhered to.
Photo
Opponents of former President Hosni Mubarak took in the news in Cairo of his legal victory on Saturday.Credit
Mohamed El-Shahed/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
About
1,000 demonstrators gathered around Tahrir Square at night to protest
the decision, but heavily armed security forces had closed off the
traffic circle. By 9 p.m., the police were firing tear gas and birdshot
to drive away the crowds, and by midnight state news media reported that
at least one person had been killed and more than 85 were arrested.
More
than five months after the inauguration of a military-backed strongman,
President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the authorities appeared to calculate
that the Egyptian public was so weary of unrest that it had lost a
desire for retribution against Mr. Mubarak, or at least that they now
had a firm enough grip to suppress any backlash.
“Today’s
verdict indicates a very deliberate decision by the regime to continue
on the path of rewriting the history that led to Mubarak’s ouster and
closing the file on the Jan. 25 revolution,” said Hossam Bahgat, a
journalist and human rights advocate who had cheered on that revolt and
is now studying in New York.
The
council of generals who took power from Mr. Mubarak had feared a public
backlash too much to ever allow the former president’s release, but Mr.
Sisi’s government felt no such compunction, Mr. Bahgat said. “They are
not afraid. They are perfectly capable of letting him walk free, and
they feel no pressure to hold him accountable.”
Mr.
Mubarak, 86, who has been held at a military hospital because of frail
health, appeared in court on a stretcher in sunglasses, a blue necktie
and sweater. He remained stone-faced as the chief judge, Mahmoud Kamel
al-Rashidi, read the verdict. Only at the end did he allow himself a
smile as his two sons, Alaa and Gamal, hugged and kissed him.
A
short time later, Mr. Mubarak was photographed waving to admirers from a
hospital balcony. In a telephone interview with a supportive,
pro-government talk show host, the former president scoffed at an
earlier guilty verdict against him. “I laughed when I heard the first
verdict,” he said. He suggested a conspiracy had been behind the 2011
uprising.
“They
turned on us,” he said, and when asked if he meant “the Americans,” he
replied that he could not explain over the phone. “I can’t tell you if
it’s the Americans or who.”
Judge
Rashidi, who led a panel of three judges, did not elaborate from the
bench on their reasoning, pointing instead to a 280-page summary of
their 1,340-page explanation of the case.
He
insisted that the ruling had “nothing to do with politics.” He
acknowledged the “feebleness” and corruption of Mr. Mubarak’s later
years in power, and he saluted the rallying cry of the 2011 revolution —
bread, freedom and social justice.
But
at other times he sounded sympathetic to the former president. “To rule
for or against him after he has become old will be left to history and
the Judge of Judges,” he said.
Judge
Rashidi did not explain from the bench why he had dismissed the murder
charges. Legal analysts said the judge had faulted the way Mr. Mubarak
had been added to an existing case. He acquitted Mr. Mubarak and his
friend the businessman Hussein Salem of corruption charges involving
allegations that they had conspired to sell Egyptian natural gas to
Israel at below-market prices. And he acquitted Mr. Mubarak and his sons
of charges that Mr. Salem gave them vacation homes on the Red Sea as
kickbacks in a land deal. (Mr. Salem fled to Spain in 2011 and was tried
in absentia.)
In
May, Mr. Mubarak was sentenced to three years in prison in a separate
corruption case involving lavish, government-funded improvements to his
and his sons’ private homes. But he has now spent more than three years
in custody on various charges, and under Egyptian law he has thus served
the requisite time and could be released.
Egypt’s public prosecutor said Saturday that he would appeal the new decision.
Sayid
Abdel Latif, whose son Mohamed was a demonstrator killed by police in
the uprising, said he had given up hope for justice. “Is there anyone
who would put himself on trial? Mubarak’s regime is still in place,” he
said.
“The January revolution is over; they ended it,” he said. “We thought Sisi would bring us our rights, but he is one of them.”
Photo
Supporters of Mr. Mubarak, who may be released from custody.Credit
Mohamed Kamal/European Pressphoto Agency
The
first sessions of Mr. Mubarak’s trial were often rowdy and loud, with a
courtroom full of human rights lawyers demanding retribution for the
demonstrators who had been killed and for decades of brutal autocracy.
But
the changed context was evident from the start. Judge Rashidi warned
that anyone who interrupted his reading of the decision would be
sentenced to a year in jail, and the spectators stayed obediently quiet.
And
the courtroom was packed with Mubarak supporters instead of human
rights lawyers. As soon as the judge finished, the room erupted in
jubilation.
Commentators
in the state-run and pro-government news media suggested that it was
time to move on from the 2011 revolution and its messy aftermath. “We
have to turn this page, and the long state of argument that has lasted
for years,” Dalia Ziada, director of the Liberal Democracy Institute and
a supporter of Mr. Sisi, said in an interview.
But
with Mr. Mubarak no longer on trial, she also suggested that it might
be time to explore a favorite theory of Mubarak supporters: that the
demonstrators had been shot not by the police, but by Islamists with the
Muslim Brotherhood. The Brotherhood dominated Egypt’s free elections,
but has been outlawed and suppressed under Mr. Sisi; the pro-government
news media has sometimes floated improbable scenarios in which the
Brotherhood both participated in the demonstrations and shot at the
demonstrators.
“Who
killed the protesters?” Ms. Ziada asked, suggesting that investigators
examine “all sides accused, even those that were maybe not present in
today’s case — for example, the Muslim Brotherhood.”
Legal experts said the ultimate outcome of the case had been increasingly clear, in part because of a flawed prosecution.
Prosecutors
originally appointed by Mr. Mubarak had rushed the charges to court in
the months after his ouster to appease the public’s wrath at their
former ruler. But the murder charges were difficult to prove because of
the many layers in the Egyptian military’s chain of command and the
broad latitude for self-defense given to the police. Lawyers for victims
often complained that security forces were withholding evidence or
refusing to cooperate.
The
corruption charges appeared to have been thrown together hastily,
without a thorough review of the many other allegations related to Mr.
Mubarak’s rule.
Mr.
Mubarak first faced the same charges in a trial that ended in 2012,
while the transitional council of military generals was still in power.
Evidently bowing to political pressure, that judge sentenced Mr. Mubarak
to life in prison for the killings of the protesters but simultaneously
acknowledged a lack of evidence. He acquitted everyone below Mr.
Mubarak in the chain of command within the security forces, and threw
out land-related corruption charges on technical grounds and ruled
against the gas charges.
An appeals court threw out the verdict and ordered the retrial that ended in Saturday’s decision.
“The
judges were basically collaborating with Mubarak from the first scene,”
said Khaled Ali, a human rights lawyer and former presidential
candidate. “It was not a trial, just a game they are playing with the
people, to relieve them and then enslave them again.”
The
political climate now is starkly different. Mr. Sisi, the former
general who last year led the military takeover that ousted Egypt’s
elected Islamist government, has consolidated power and surrounded
himself with former Mubarak advisers.
State-run
and pro-government news media now routinely denounce the pro-democracy
activists who led the 2011 uprising as a “fifth column” out to undermine
the state. Some of the most prominent activists are in prison, and the
Islamists who won free elections are now jailed as terrorists along with
thousands of their supporters.
Mohamed
Morsi, the deposed president and a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, is
now facing several trials in the same courtroom, some for charges that
could carry the death penalty.
As
the prison doors revolve, many of the most despised figures of the
Mubarak era, such as Ahmed Ezz, the ruling party power broker and
business tycoon, have already been released on charges brought against
them in the heat of the 2011 uprising.
