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☆ Germany's far-right AfD party is finding success on TikTok — as its popularity among young voters grows
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-29 | by ( Sophie Kiderlin | In | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

Cardboard stands with the AfD logo lie on the chairs in the Wiesenhalle before the start of the AfD Brandenburg state party conference. Traditionally, young voters are seen as more left-leaning, but the voting data suggests some divergences, with experts pointing to social media and what they describe as online echo chambers. A study published earlier this month showed that over half of those aged 14-29 in Germany use social media to stay updated about news and politics. But Berendsen told CNBC that it is one of the social media platforms where the tunnel-effect can be an issue. An AfD spokesperson confirmed to CNBC that its videos and texts posted on social media are tailored to young people.

Persons: Monika Skolimowska, Infratest Dimap, Eva Berendsen, Anne Frank, Baerbock, Maximilian Krah, TikTok, Berendsen Organizations: Getty, Russia, Anne, CNBC Locations: Hesse, Germany

☆ Formed in the Cold War, former members of Germany’s Red Army Faction are now fugitives
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-17 | by ( Sophie Tanno | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

CNN —German authorities have been tracking down the former members of the Red Army Faction (RAF), a now-defunct Cold War-era militant group, who have been on the run for nearly 30 years. The RAF, he said, emerged in what was then West Berlin, at the “crossroads” of the Cold War. The first, and most prominent period from 1970-1977, saw the group murder public officials and US soldiers and take many hostages. In April 1975, six RAF members seized the West German Embassy in Stockholm in a hostage standoff with the goal of forcing the release of imprisoned RAF members. The Red Army Faction claimed responsibility for the assassination, but the perpetrators were never brought to justice.

Persons: Baader, –, Jürgen Ponto, Siegfried Buback, Daniela Klette, Burkhard Garweg, Ernst, Volker Staub, Klette, Claudia Ivone, Garweg, Staub, pouncing, ”, Ivone, Wolfgang Kraushaar, Kraushaar, Axel, Andreas Baader, Ukrike Meinhof, Meinhof, ” Kraushaar, Helmut Schmidt, Franz Josef Strauss, Axel Springer, Springer, Alfred Herrhausen, Willy Brandt Organizations: CNN, Red Army Faction, RAF, East, Stasi, Dresdner Bank, Germany’s Public, Office, Police, ARD, ” Reuters, Bild, Red Brigades, Nihon, Springer, Criminal Police, West German Embassy, West, Meinhof Group, Reuters, Democratic, Deutsche Bank Locations: Berlin, West Germany, Kreuzberg, Bonn, Weiterstadt, German, Italy, Japan, West Berlin, Vietnam, Lower Saxony, Stockholm, Bavarian, Cologne, GDR, Democratic Republic

☆ Putin's invasion of Ukraine was his 'greatest intelligence fiasco,' spy expert says
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-20 | by ( Nathan Rennolds | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Russia's invasion of Ukraine was an "intelligence fiasco," an intelligence expert wrote in The Times. He said that Russia's FSB had failed to adequately prepare for the invasion of Ukraine. download the app Email address By clicking ‘Sign up’, you agree to receive marketing emails from Insider as well as other partner offers and accept our Terms of Service and Privacy PolicyRussian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine was his "greatest intelligence fiasco," an intelligence expert has claimed. It likely played a role in the FSB's failure to establish well-placed recruits to act as saboteurs and help Russian forces during the invasion, Walton wrote. "The time after the war, with all the expulsions, was a fateful time for the Russian intelligence system," a European intelligence official told the outlet.

Persons: Calder Walton, Vladimir Putin's, Walton, Putin, Celestino Arce, Der Spiegel, Der, Horst Jehmlich Organizations: The, Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government, Service, Sunday Times, Intelligence, Center for Strategic, International Studies, Guardian, Red Army Locations: Ukraine, The Times, Wall, Silicon, Russian, Ukraine's Kherson, Slovenia, Greece, Brazil, Norway, Netherlands, Dresden, East Germany, Soviet, West Germany

☆ Opinion: What Germany’s most famous trans woman could teach us about queer joy
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-13 | by ( Opinion Samuel Huneke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

Talking about queer persecution in the past gave activists a language with which to combat queer persecution in the present. But the relentless focus on queer persecution — while politically necessary — often has the unfortunate effect of shunting to the side an equally important history of queer joy. In my own research on sexuality in modern Germany, queer joy also appears in the unlikeliest of places. Reports from the Gestapo, the Nazis’ feared secret police, chronicled monthly fetes attended by hundreds of Berliners: queer women and trans men sporting elegant evening coats, queer men and trans women dressed to the nines in flowing gowns. Understanding how and why trans, queer, gay, bi and lesbian people were and are persecuted is vital to recognizing and combating oppression of all sorts today.

Persons: Samuel Huneke, Huneke, Samuel Huneke Hugh Ross, ’, Harvey Milk, revel, ”, John Boswell, George Chauncey, Germany —, Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, Sally Bowles, fetes Organizations: George Mason University, Democracy, State, CNN, Pride Month, Briggs Initiative, Initiative, Gay, Stasi, Gestapo, Twitter, Facebook Locations: Europe, States, Liberation, Cold, Germany, Nazi Germany, York, East Germany, Nazi

☆ Vladimir Putin was never the Soviet super spy he'd like us to believe. He was merely a KGB 'errand boy,' report says
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-04 | by ( Nathan Rennolds | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Russian President Vladimir Putin has been portrayed as an elite KGB intelligence officer in the 1980s. But a new report from Der Spiegel suggests he was never the super spy he was thought to be. Horst Jehmlich, a former Stasi officer who also worked in Dresden, told Der Spiegel that Putin was nothing more than an "errand boy." Putin worked for the KGB, the Soviet Union's intelligence service, for nearly two decades. Officially he retired from active KGB service with the rank of lieutenant colonel.

Persons: Vladimir Putin, Der Spiegel, —, Spiegel, Der, Putin, Horst Jehmlich, Oleg Kalugin Organizations: Service, Red Army, Dresden University, KGB, RFE Locations: Soviet, West Germany, Dresden, East Germany, Germany, Russia

☆ Putin's KGB past is key to grasping what he might do next in his failing Ukraine war, ex-spies say
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-24 | by ( John Haltiwanger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +13 min

Putin's time in the KGB helps explain his worldview and brutal approach to warfare, ex-spies say. As Western intelligence agencies vie to stay two steps ahead of the Russian leader and get inside his head, peering into Putin's KGB past may offer clues on what he's thinking. "Putin's KGB background tells us a lot about how he thinks and how he sees the war. He is a creation of the KGB, and the KGB was a terrorist organization," John Sipher, a former CIA officer who served in Russia, told Insider. The Ukraine war has seen Putin and his propagandists make a series of assertions — ranging from plausible to preposterous — to justify Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

☆ East Germany's last Communist premier dies aged 95
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-11 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

REUTERS/Tobias Schwarz/File PhotoBERLIN, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Hans Modrow, who as the last Communist prime minister of East Germany oversaw democratic reforms that opened the way to German reunification, has died at age 95, Germany's hard-left Die Linke party said on Saturday. With this, our party loses an important personality," the party, successor to the East German Communist Party, said in a statement. Modrow saw himself as a reformer who had wanted to change the communist party from the inside and make it more democratic. He also served in the East German parliament for more than three decades. Modrow became East Germany's de facto leader after Egon Krenz resigned as SED leader on Dec. 5, 1990, leaving Modrow holding the highest state post.

☆ A bizarre far-right coup plot uncovered in Germany hints at a much more sinister trend
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-21 | by ( Alexander Clarkson | World Politics Review | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +11 min

In early December, German police uncovered a plot by far-right conspirators to mount a coup. It is widely acknowledged that the electoral appeal of the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD, to about 10% of German voters is a matter of great concern. This image of political stability, though not unjustified, caused many observers to downplay the revelation in early December that German police had uncovered an organized plot by a network of far-right conspirators to mount a coup. German police and intelligence services had to take the threat this network represented seriously. This complacency gave the East German Stasi and other Soviet-bloc intelligence services opportunities to reach out to emerging radical networks willing to destabilize the Federal Republic at the time.

☆ Fact Check-Digitally altered image of former German chancellor Angela Merkel in handcuffs
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-05 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A digitally altered image purporting to show former German Chancellor Angela Merkel in handcuffs has been circulating online. The photograph shows Merkel wearing a green suit jacket walking behind an individual wearing all black, with her fingertips together. The original photograph is viewable via Reuters and Getty Images where the supposed handcuffs cannot be seen (here), (here). Other photos taken during the visit viewable via the platform Alamy similarly do not show any such handcuffs (here). After 16 years in office, Merkel was succeeded by Social Democrat Olaf Scholz in December 2021 (here).

☆ Putin's time in the KGB taught him 'how to lie' and to think like a terrorist, ex-spies say
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-05 | by ( John Haltiwanger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +13 min

Putin's time in the KGB helps explain his worldview and brutal approach to warfare, ex-spies say. A former KGB agent told Insider the biggest thing Putin learned from the Soviet spy agency was "how to lie." But ex-spies and Russia experts told Insider that Putin's time in the KGB — the Soviet Union's primary and much-feared security agency — played an instrumental role in shaping his mindset. "Putin's KGB background tells us a lot about how he thinks and how he sees the war. He is a creation of the KGB, and the KGB was a terrorist organization," John Sipher, a former CIA officer who served in Russia, told Insider.

☆ Drugmaker Merck: placed under formal investigation in France over Levothyrox
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-19 | by ( Nancy Lapid | ) www.reuters.com time to read: 1 min

PARIS, Oct 19 (Reuters) - Drugmaker Merck (MRCG.DE) said on Wednesday that it had been placed under formal investigation by a French court for possibly issuing misleading information regarding its thyroid drug product Levothyrox. Mario-Pierre Stasi, the lawyer for Merck, said the company would continue to co-operate with authorities on this matter and that full legal proceedings must be allowed to run their course. Merck added that the French court ruling did not concern in any way the new formula for the Levothyrox product. (This story has been refiled to remove incorrect stock ticker code)Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com RegisterReporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Myriam Rivet;Editing by Dominique VidalonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Per his defense, when conspiracy theorist Alex Jones called the Sandy Hook parents crisis actors, “he was looking at the world through dirty glasses.” Maybe so. But he has built a career selling “dirty glasses” to people like my mother, a self-described “truther” who spread misinformation before and after the Sandy Hook shooting. In this respect, my mother isn’t unique: Millions of Americans continue to spread Jones’ misinformation even as he is publicly debunked. Jones’ influence over my mother in the last months of 1999 is hard to overstate. During the trial in Texas, Jones’ attorney warned that “if you look at the world through dirty glasses, everything you see is dirty.“ Thirty years ago, Alex Jones sold my mother a pair of glasses, a lens into the world.

☆ DW: Mijloacele de spionaj ale serviciilor secrete ale Moscovei sunt similare cu cele folosite pe timpul Uniunii Sovietice
▼ + stars: | 2021-05-04 | by ( ) www.jurnal.md time to read: +3 min

Sursa foto: ReutersDW: Mijloacele de spionaj ale serviciilor secrete ale Moscovei sunt similare cu cele folosite pe timpul Uniunii SovieticeMijloacele de spionaj ale serviciilor secrete ale Moscovei sunt similare cu cele folosite pe timpul Uniunii Sovietice. Asasinările agenților dubli și ale dezertorilor din domeniul serviciilor secrete sunt și ele mijloace istorice folosite de Moscova. Cu toate acestea, operațiunile descoperite ale serviciilor secrete rusești au arătat că Moscova a devenit neglijentă. Rezultatul, însă, este o enormă pierdere de prestigiu politic, sancțiuni, și o rată foarte scăzută de succes a operațiunilor. Totuși, John Sawers, fost director al serviciului de informații externe britanic, MI6, estimează că sunt detectate doar 10% din operațiunile serviciilor secrete rusești.

Persons: Uniunii Sovietice ., Christopher Nehring, Alexei Navalnîi, Vladimir Nesterovici, Thomas Rid, John Sawers Organizations: Stasi, Ministerul, Interne, GRU, americană, IT, Deutsche, KGB, Armata SUA, Universitatea Johns Hopkins, NATO, MI6 Locations: Moscovei, Uniunii Sovietice, Rusia, Rusiei, Occident, Berlin, RDG, Bulgaria, Italia, Republica Cehă, german, URSS, Moscova, SUA, britanic

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