Latest news with #ThirdReich
Malaysiakini
a day ago
- Politics
- Malaysiakini
PM seeks shield fit for a king
Good morning. Here's our news and views that matter for today. Key Highlights PM seeks shield fit for a king Third Reich, Your Honour Shake-up at the top PM seeks shield fit for a king Anwar Ibrahim's unprecedented push for immunity from civil lawsuits has ignited a fierce debate over its constitutional legitimacy. Leading legal experts have voiced doubts about whether the Federal Constitution actually shields sitting prime ministers from such legal challenges. Several prominent lawyers tell Malaysiakini that, by and large, this kind of immunity does not extend to government officials. 'I think first and foremost, the concept that the prime minister of Malaysia has some form of legal immunity against civil suits or even criminal suits is something that the courts in Malaysia have not decided yet. 'In fact, the Federal Constitution only says that the Yang di-Pertuan Agong and state rulers have a certain degree of immunity. The Constitution does not bestow immunity to any other person, including the prime minister,' said Lim Wei Jiet. 'So I am not sure on which basis the prime minister's lawyers are framing these questions of law to the Federal Court, relying on Articles 39, 40, and 43, because those articles don't talk about immunity. They talk about the powers of the executives and the cabinet in general,' he added. HIGHLIGHTS Third Reich, Your Honour Lawyer Shafee Abdullah draws a dramatic parallel between the ongoing royal addendum hearing for ex-premier Najib Abdul Razak and the dark days of Nazi-era rule, taking aim at the presiding judge over what he claims is a serious misstep. 'A judicial decision means you hear both parties. Since when do we do a Nazi-Germany kind of hearing? You must hear both parties,' he exclaimed. This was related to the contempt of court proceedings launched by Najib's legal team against former attorney-general Ahmad Terrirudin Salleh, over his actions in 2024, where he declined to reveal in court the existence of a royal addendum ordering Najib to serve the remainder of his six-year jail term under house arrest. Shafee's complaint is that the judge made a decision administratively without hearing both sides, which he argues is improper and unfair. HIGHLIGHTS Shake-up at the top Following the resignations of PKR ministers Rafizi Ramli and Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad, attention is squarely on Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim - what will his next move be in the upcoming cabinet reshuffle? Anwar stated that no discussions regarding a cabinet reshuffle have taken place and affirmed that such changes would not take place anytime soon. Khairy Jamaluddin, who is rumoured to make a comeback, has since downplayed the speculation, saying he is preoccupied with other matters. A reshuffle could additionally take place in Selangor, regardless of whether Menteri Besar Amirudin Shari moves to a federal post. The PKR election results are being cited to justify potential changes. HIGHLIGHTS Views that matter In case you missed it HIGHLIGHTS
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Chicago mayor calls DOGE 'an act of war,' compares second Trump term to Third Reich
Chicago Democratic Mayor Brandon Johnson laid into the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and President Donald Trump's economic policies during his weekly press availability, drawing parallels between the Third Reich in Germany and Trump's second term in the White House. Johnson said the Windy City is the most "pro-worker" city in the U.S., but faces "hostility" from Washington. "The fact that the President of the United States of America is cutting off food supply and medicine to working people and families across this country — that is an act of war," Johnson fumed. "And we're going to need leaders who are prepared and willing to stand up for working people, because this battle has reached our front doors all across America where people are struggling and suffering. And in order to alleviate that pain and discomfort, it's going to require bold leadership. We can't tippy toe." Proposed Chicago Police Resource Cuts Could Land City In Court, Top Officials Warn Addressing a reporter who asked how to work with the Trump administration for the benefit of the city from such an adversarial position, Johnson cited Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker's State of the State address in February, which referenced how it "took the Nazi's one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a Constitutional Republic." Read On The Fox News App "Governor Pritzker… offered up a warning," Johnson said. "You have a president that is cutting off medicine and food, a president that is working to erase culture. I mean, you can't make this up. He's doing it in plain sight." Pritzker had compared the rise of former German Chancellor Adolf Hitler to Trump's popularity, in that the eventual national-socialist dictator was seen as the answer to "inflation and [the public] looking for someone to blame." Chicago Democrat Goes Off On City's Handling Of Migrant Crisis In his remarks, Johnson noted how people have wondered how Germany could have descended into Nazism and anti-Semitism so quickly and dreadfully, saying that Trump is "carry[ing] out the playbook that was done against an entire people-group." "He's doing it right here in this country, against working people, erasing Black folks from museums and the history and the culture. So, when you ask how we balance that, you have to fight it and resist it with everything that's in you," he said. "The President of the United States of America is capturing the hopes and aspirations of working people and holding us hostage as he works to implement and annihilate democracy," Johnson said, returning to comment on lawsuits the city has joined to halt DOGE-type efforts. Chicago is party to a lawsuit filed by several municipalities, including Baltimore; Santa Clara, California; and the county that encompasses Houston, which seeks to stop DOGE's slashing of the federal bureaucracy. "Congress created these federal agencies. It funded them. But the president is trying to fire all these people and gut these agencies that Congress created," Chicago Deputy Corporation Counsel Steve Kane told the city's ABC affiliate, calling the situation unconstitutional. DOGE-driven cuts affecting the Windy City have included the Energy Department's 2025 Small Business Expo, originally pinned for June. The cut came as part of billions in spending reductions for cabinet agencies, and other closures of clean-energy-centric operations have affected the city, according to reports. Earlier in May, Chicago hired Ernst & Young, an international consulting firm, to find ways to bridge its own budget gaps, according to Bloomberg. The Trump administration has threatened to withhold funding from sanctuary cities, a definition within which Chicago falls. While city-specific data was not immediately available for DOGE-related cuts, the Trump administration saw the Department of Health & Human Services cut its regional office in Illinois, which served 28,000 low-income families. Efforts to consolidate federal real estate and office space affected America's third-largest city as well. The Federal Transit Administration, Securities and Exchange Commission, Labor Relations Authority and Civil Corps of Engineers all saw their offices there shut down. A federally-owned art collection in Chicago also sees some of its staffing on the chopping block, according to Axios. Fox News' Remy Numa and Patrick McGovern contributed to this article source: Chicago mayor calls DOGE 'an act of war,' compares second Trump term to Third Reich
LeMonde
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- LeMonde
In Paris, a Nazi locomotive is hidden in the middle of artists' studios
Seventy-six metric tons and 22 meters long, a massive Nazi steam locomotive is hidden in the heart of Paris. The engine, the same model as those that pulled trains carrying deportees to death camps, has been locked away behind a small door since 1994, just a few hundred meters from the François-Mitterrand Library, in the middle of Les Frigos, artists' studios in the 13 th arrondissement of Paris. Much more than just a railway engine, it is both a piece of history and a work of art: a testament to the industrialization of death by the Third Reich and the creation of a painter, Jean-Michel Frouin, to whom we were led by a very devoted train enthusiast. Known as BB27000 on the social network X, Wilfried Demaret is the most influential railway worker in France, with some 100,000 followers who want to know everything about trains in general and the SNCF (France's national railway company) in particular. Drawing from his many anecdotes, he published a book, Plus belle la ligne! ("Line's Looking Good!"). He is a train driver for the SNCF, but not just any trains. He drives those that break down, need repairs, or must be transferred across France by unusual routes. He knows every locomotive, can instantly identify the equipment and where it was built, and has encyclopedic knowledge of the railways. But the Ty2 locomotive took him a long time to track down.
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Nazi criminals allegedly paid $200M in bribes to Perón government
ASUNCIÓN, Paraguay, May 23 (UPI) -- Recently declassified files suggest that Nazi criminals may have paid $200 million in gold bribes to Argentine authorities to secure refuge in the country after World War II. The files indicate German submarines transported the gold to Argentina's southern coast, where it was delivered to Eva Duarte, wife of then-President Juan Domingo Perón. The money was reportedly later handled by German bankers Richard von Frente, Ricardo Stauch and Rodolf Freude. The released material includes 1,850 documents compiled into seven files dating from 1950 to 1980. The records confirm that Third Reich fugitives arrived in Argentina beginning in 1945 with the protection of Perón, and that their arrival was not isolated but part of a larger effort. Nazi ideology had gained notable support in Argentina as early as the 1930s. On April 10, 1938, nearly 10,000 people attended a rally organized by the German embassy at Luna Park stadium in Buenos Aires. Perón was reportedly an admirer of fascist aspects of Nazi Germany. "The German government encouraged that sympathy by promising major trade concessions after the war. Argentina was full of Nazi spies. Argentine officers and diplomats held important posts in Axis Europe," said Christopher Minster, a Latin American history and literature expert, in an interview with ThoughtCo. Among the most prominent Nazis who found refuge in Argentina were Josef Mengele, known as the "Angel of Death," Adolf Eichmann, one of the main architects of the Holocaust and leader of the so-called "Final Solution," and Josef Schwammberger, who commanded the Krakow concentration camp from 1942 to 1944. Mengele evaded capture for years, living under a false identity in Argentina and Paraguay. He drowned off a Brazilian beach in 1979 and was buried under the name Wolfgang Gerhard. Eichmann was captured by Mossad in a covert operation and brought to Israel, where he was tried and executed by hanging on June 1, 1962. He had entered Argentina under the alias Ricardo Klement. Schwammberger was arrested in 1987 and extradited to Germany, where he was sentenced to life in prison.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
The brutal men who built Hitler's war machine
The title and sub-title of Charles Dick's well-researched and scholarly book, Unknown Enemy: The Hidden Nazi Force that Built the Third Reich, do him, and it, no favours. Yes, Dick has studied, in depth, the Nazi machine – Organisation Todt (OT), named after its founder Fritz Todt – and which Hitler charged with overseeing the infrastructure of the new Germany. But OT was not an unknown enemy, and it certainly isn't after much scholarship on it. Dick himself published a book on it three years ago, though for an academic market, of which this appears to be in effect a 'popular' version, and it is 15 years since Blaine Taylor's Hitler's Engineers: Fritz Todt and Albert Speer – Master Builders of the Third Reich. As well as books, there are numerous articles in learned journals. But then this is a book for the mass market, which is not credited with too much intelligence; early on, we're told that the Red Army answered to 'Soviet dictator Josef Stalin'. (We are, at least, spared the formula 'Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler'.) Todt was a highly qualified engineer who had fought in the Great War and joined the Nazi party early on. Hitler had great regard for him, not because he was a sycophant – he was far less of one than many who greased up to the Führer – but because he was exceptionally good at his job. He took a realistic view of what his organisation could do, and never overpromised about the speed at which it would do it. Hitler's first great dream in transforming Germany was to improve the roads, so OT built the autobahns. Hitler also regarded them as essential to get his troops to all corners of Europe swiftly, in order to discharge his acts of conquest. When the Second World War came, OT had new priorities: the Atlantic Wall, submarine pens, mines for raw materials, bunkers for command posts and, after the devastating RAF raid on Peenemünde in summer 1943, huge underground factories in which to develop the V-2 and also to build Messerschmitts. This is where Dick lifts up the stone: much of what OT achieved, or tried to achieve, required slave labour. As such, OT played its part in the Final Solution and other war crimes. This book is a depressing reminder that most of the leaders of the organisation, and the chief brutes who worked under them, got away with it. Todt himself did not live to have judgement passed on him: he was killed in a plane crash just after meeting Hitler at his eastern command post in 1942. There have been conspiracy theories ever since that the plane was sabotaged on Hitler's orders. Todt, who had a remarkable grasp of realism in a movement characterised by blind fanaticism, had been to tell his Führer that the war against the Soviet Union was unwinnable, and the Germans should offer peace terms before the conflict broke the Reich's economy. Dick discounts the theory and is right to do so, given the absence of evidence. He points out that if Hitler wanted to be rid of Todt, he had plenty of other means by which to do so. Todt was succeeded by Hitler's blue-eyed boy, Albert Speer. Speer later served 20 years in Spandau for war crimes but managed to charm some of the judges at Nuremberg into believing he should not be hanged. However, his responsibility for OT, the orders he repeatedly gave for the urgent completion of infrastructure projects, whatever the cost, and the bestial conditions in the labour camps for which he was responsible suggest a rope round his neck was the very least he deserved. He compounded his offence by continuing to lie about what he knew – or didn't know – in the 15 years between his release in 1966 and his death in 1981. Dick highlights some of the discrepancies in the stories he told at various times, and his apparent unawareness that a sustained act of genocide was happening. Dick presents the story often from the point of view of the enslaved: Jews for whom getting on an OT work detail was a possible escape from the gas chambers, Russian prisoners of war, Poles and others from the overrun territories of the East. There were also German criminals, hauled out of jail and put to work on lethal projects such as the railway in north Norway that could help ship iron ore to the Reich. Those from western Europe whom the Nazis considered racially superior – French, Dutch, Danes – had better treatment, but the management and overseer class were almost entirely German, and contained the usual quota of sadists and psychopaths. Dick does highlight the odd more humane SS officer, but they were rare birds. What he also makes clear was that OT leaders did not merely work their charges to death, they beat them to death, shot them and sometimes even buried them alive if it suited them. They deserve their place in infamy, but the question of how so many of them got away with their hideous crimes shows just how ineffective the restoration of order in post-Nazi Germany really was. Unknown Enemy: The Hidden Nazi Force that Built the Third Reich is published by Bloomsbury at £25. To order your copy for £19.99, call 0330 173 5030 or visit Telegraph Books Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
