Norway to ban gas-powered cars

Norway Aims To Ban Sales Of Gas-Powered Vehicles By 2025

CHRIS WHITE

 10:56 PM 06/04/2016

 

 A Tesla Motors Model X electric sports-utility vehicles is seen on stage a presentation in Freemont, California September 29, 2015. REUTERS/Stephen Lam

Norway has decided to prohibit the selling of all gasoline-powered cars by 2025, according to Norwegian newspaper Dagens Næringsliv.

The ban, which has received support from political parties on the left and the right, is pegged to be the most aggressive anti-gasoline energy policies of its kind in the world – the irony, of course, is that Norway is one of the largest producers of fossil fuels in the entire world.

Norwegians produced and exported in 2013 more than 1.2 million barrels of oil, placing it 14^th overall on a list of exporting countries, just below Qatar and Mexico.

India and Denmark have discussed the possibility of banning gas-powered cars as well, but India’s policy would begin five years after Norway’s, in 2030, and the Dutch parliament is heavily divided on their version of the ban, which would also start in 2025.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2016/06/04/norway-aims-to-ban-sales-of-gas-powered-vehicles-by-2025/#ixzz4AjDKflYp

Can you blame Bulgaria’s migrant vigilante ?

Bulgaria’s vigilante migrant ‘hunter’

By Matthew Brunwasser Yambol, Bulgaria

• 2 hours ago
• From the section Magazine

Image copyrightHristo Rusev

A Bulgarian trader in spare parts for buses has become a national celebrity after starting to patrol the Turkish border “hunting” for migrants. Many Bulgarians applaud his vigilante initiative, though others are deeply troubled.

“Bulgaria needs people like me, dignified Bulgarians, willing to defend their homeland,” says Dinko Valev, sipping a fresh-squeezed orange juice in a flashy cafe in his hometown, Yambol, 50km (30 miles) from Bulgaria’s border with Turkey.

Valev, 29, is a beefy semi-professional wrestler with a shaved head and a brusque manner. His left pectoral is tattooed with a cross the size of a T-bone steak.

He became famous overnight last month when national television news carried a report labelling him a “superhero” and detailing a violent encounter with a group of Syrians near the border as he was out riding on his quad bike.

Image copyright Facebook / Dinko Valev

The presenter praised Valev for subduing the group of 12 Syrian men, three women and a child “with his bare hands”.

They can be seen on mobile phone footage filmed by one of Valev’s companions, lying on the ground waiting for police to arrive. Valev can be heard insulting the refugees and saying that they came from Syria “to kill us like dogs”.

“These are disgusting and bad people and they should stay where they are,” Valev tells me in the cafe. He estimates that 95% of Bulgarians support him, describing the migrants as dangerous “terrorists, jihadists and Taliban”.

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The Hungarian government is planning to re-open embassy in Estonia

HUNGARY TO RE-OPEN EMBASSY IN ESTONIA

2016-03-11 

embassies Estonia

The Hungarian government is planning to re-open the country’s recently closed embassy in Estonia, according to press reports.

According to the news website vs.hu, Hungary’s embassy in the country’s capital Tallinn was shut in 2014 because of the opening of new embassies in Mongolia and Ecuador meant that no resources were left to operate the representation in Estonia.

However, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has revised its decision and is now seeking to re-establish permanent diplomatic presence in the country. The first step in this direction is planned to be the deployment of a single diplomat to Tallinn, although sources speaking to the site said that it is “certain” that the embassy will be re-opened once Estonia assumes the presidency of the European Union in January 2018.

Hungary closed down its embassy in Estonia in 2014, citing financial reasons. In response, the Baltic nation shut down its representation in Hungary.

via mandiner.hu
photo: estonianexperience.com

Paris: The Jewish-Muslim butcher’s shop

Paris: the Jewish-Muslim butcher’s shop

The art of tolerant coexistence

As France deals with the aftermath of religiously motivated attacks, a small butcher’s shop in Paris employing both Muslims and Jews offers lessons on good interfaith relations. Elizabeth Bryant reports from Paris

“Yaya, come out!” Two Moroccan butchers laughingly coax their diminutive Algerian colleague who is hiding in a back room, wary of a reporter. Customers smile. Yaya is the jokester in the group.

It’s Friday morning. In about an hour, the Boucherie de l’Argonne will be closed. The Muslims working here will head to afternoon prayers. The Jews will prepare for Shabbat. A practical accommodation for staff sharing similar roots and cultural references.