Month: April 2019

The wife of white nationalist leader Richard Spencer has accused him of physically, verbally and emotionally abusing her throughout their eight-year marriage.

In a court filing for the couple’s divorce proceedings in Montana, Nina Koupriianova said Spencer once left her with bruises after dragging her of bed and down stairs in 2011. She also said he "attacked" and bruised her again in 2014, when she was four months pregnant with their first child.

Spencer told The Associated Press on Tuesday that he is "not an abusive person" and said his wife was "never in a dangerous situation."

Spencer popularized the term "alt-right" to describe a fringe movement mixing white nationalism, anti-Semitism and other far-right extremist views.

BuzzFeed News first reported the allegations Koupriianova made in a June court filing. 

A knife-wielding assailant injured 14 children at a kindergarten in the western Chinese city of Chongqing on Friday, police reported.

The attacker, a 39-year-old woman, was taken in custody and no motive for the assault was given.

Police said the attack at the Xinshiji Kindergarten in the city’s outskirts took place at 9.30 am as the children were returning to classes.

It said all were receiving treatment in a hospital. 

No other information about the attacker was given, other than her surname, Liu. Footage posted on social media showed injured children walking to ambulances from the school gate, with some being placed on gurneys.

China has suffered a number of such incidents in recent years, blamed largely on the mentally ill or people bearing grudges.

In June, a man used a kitchen knife to attack three boys and a mother near a school in Shanghai, killing two of the children. Police said the assailant was unemployed and carried out the attack "to take revenge on society."

Chinese law restricts the sale and possession of firearms, and mass attacks are generally carried out with knives or homemade explosives.

Almost 20 children were killed in school attacks in 2010, prompting a response from top government officials and leading many schools to add gates and security guards.

Warsaw’s mayor has banned a march celebrating the 100th anniversary of Polish independence amid mounting fears it will be dominated by neo-fascists and the far-Right.

The march has become a major feature of Polish independence day, which falls on November 11, but has been marred by violence in the past and become increasingly associated with ultra-Right extremists.

Last year it made headlines around the world after it was led by groups carrying banners emblazoned with far-Right symbols and slogans.

Despite the reputational damage done to Poland, the march’s defenders argued that the majority of people who took part in it were not neo-fascists.

Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, Warsaw’s mayor, on Wednesday defended the ban by alluding to the Polish capital’s destruction by Nazi Germany, saying: “Warsaw has suffered enough at the hands of aggressive nationalism”.

But with organisers of the march already saying they will appeal the ban, and hinting they will march regardless, the Polish capital could well face a volatile showdown between marchers and the police on Sunday.

The centennial of the Polish independence was expected to attract an even larger crowd than usual by acting as a lure to neo-fascist groups both in Poland and abroad.

Poland’s conservative government has also sought to distance itself from the march. In a magazine interview published before the ban was announced Matuesz Morawiecki, the prime minister, said no government representatives would attend, saying: "We know what happened last year."

He added that the government did not want to take part in a march where "provocateurs" may be present.

Critics of the government often accuse it of encouraging far-Right politics through nationalistic policies and by demonising migrants.

Adding more reasons for the ban Ms Gronkiewicz-Waltz said that she also had concerns over security owing to industrial action being taken by the police.

Poland’s police force has been involved in protracted dispute with the government over pay and working conditions, and the mayor expressed fears that this could undermine its ability to cope with the march.end

The US Secret Service dealt with at least one credible assassination threat against Donald Trump on his visit to the Philippines last year.

Agents tracked a man who was heading in the direction of the president’s hotel after posting on Twitter "Gonna be in Manila the same time as Trump… I’ll take one for the team."

They also swarmed a park in Manila after identifying a known Isis operative who was meeting with an associate there.

Both threats were revealed in a National Geographic documentary United States Secret Service: On the Front Line, which went behind the scenes with agents.

The agents picked up the threatening tweet which was accompanied by a picture of Lee Harvey Oswald.

On the suspect’s Instagram account they found a picture of a book called The Definitive History of the Assassin.

Twenty minutes before the president, whose Secret Service codename is "Mogul," arrived in Manila for a summit in November, agents were also trying to locate the exact whereabouts of an Isis operative known to be in the city.

Special Agent Chad Ragan was seen in the documentary shouting into a phone: "What is going on proactively to track this guy down? I need an update. Now."

The operative was tracked to Luneta Park, a mile from the president’s hotel, which was then inundated by Philippines police officers, and the suspects were arrested.

Special Agent Ragan told the Daily Beast: "With technology, that was one of the things that was a blessing for us, because we were able to know that he was moving close to us, where he was, and track him. That was a huge piece of stopping the threat."

The Democrats have taken control of the House of Representatives in the midterm elections, delivering a bitter blow for Donald Trump after a campaign that became a referendum on his leadership.

The Republican Party went into Tuesday’s elections in control of the chamber with a 43-seat majority. However, Democrats rode a wave of dissatisfaction with the US President to gain the 23 seats needed to win control of the House. 

The lower chamber of the US Congress, the House is made up of 435 seats.  The number of seats each US state receives depends on its population size. California, the most populous state, has 53 representatives while seven states – Alaska, Delaware, Montana, North Dakota, South…

A man threw a Molotov cocktail into a crowded McDonald’s restaurant before taking a woman hostage in the German city of Cologne’s main railway station in what police said may have been a failed terror attack.

A 14-year-old girl suffered burns to her legs when the man claiming to be a member of Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Isil) attacked the restaurant. Police said the could not rule out terrorism.

He then took a second woman hostage in a pharmacy inside the station complex while onlookers fled. Witnesses described him as shouting that he was acting for Isil.

Police special forces stormed the station and freed the hostage, who suffered moderate injuries according to emergency services.

The suspect was shot in the stomach by police marksmen and was said to be in critical condition last night (MON).

The residence document of a 55-year-old Syrian who has been living in Cologne since 2016 was recovered from the scene, but police said it was not clear if it belonged to the suspect. The owner of the residence card has a criminal record for theft.

The incident began at around 12.45pm local time (11.45pm BST) when the suspect threw a Molotov cocktail into the station’s McDonald’s outlet. A 14-year-old girl was injured but managed to escape.

“It was indescribable, terrible to look at,” a witness who saw the teenager’s injuries told the local Express newspaper. The girl was rushed to hospital and was said to be in stable condition last night (MON).

Armed with a handgun, the suspect then took another woman hostage in the station pharmacy. Loudspeaker announcements ordered the public to leave the station by the nearest exit and police sealed the complex off.

A two-hour stand-off followed as nervous passengers waited on the nearby steps of Cologne cathedral, many of them clutching their luggage. All trains to and from the station, one of the busiest in Germany, were cancelled.

The suspect made various “political demands”, including the release of a Tunisian woman from prison, according to police. He also demanded safe passage out of the station.

He was known to police for offences including theft and fraud, Cologne’s deputy police chief Miriam Brauns said.

"We also do not rule out a terrorist attack," Ms Brauns said.

Police were unable to determine if the handgun he was carrying was genuine from a distance, and the decision was made to storm the station, a spokesman said. A police marksman shot the suspect in the stomach to disable him.

Inquiries were still ongoing last night, and it is not yet clear if the handgun the suspect used was genuine, police said.

Police made the decision to storm the station when the suspect threatened to set light to the hostage. He had taped gas cartridges to her body and poured fuel over her. Police were unable to determine if the handgun he was carrying was genuine, so a police marksman shot the suspect in the stomach to disable him.