Islamist Trafficking
BOKO HARAM HAVE THREATENED TO ‘SELL’ 230 SCHOOLGIRLS
The Islamist group’s leader claims that’s what God told him to do
(via)
Videos by VICE
Nigerian Islamist militant group Boko Haram has said in a video message that it will “sell” the hundreds of schoolgirls it abducted three weeks ago.
About 230 girls are still believed to be missing after being taken from their boarding school in Chinok, northern Nigeria, and the video is the first time that Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has said the group is responsible for their disappearance.
Boko Haram – which translates to “Western education is sinful” – have attacked numerous educational institutions in the past in their bid to stop what it deems as Westernisation, instead trying to establish an Islamic state ruled by sharia law.
In the video, Shekau says the girls should have never been in school in the first place, adding: “God instructed me to sell them, they are his properties and I will carry out his instructions.”
The Nigerian government has been criticised for failing to locate the girls.
Postal Problems
UKIP CANCELLED ITS FREEPOST ADDRESS
Because people kept sending them packages of blood and faeces
(Photo via)
(via)
Ukip has shut down its Freepost address after opponents mailed the party a series of packages containing stuff they presumably didn’t want to receive.
Freepost, in case you’re not up on the intricacies of Royal Mail’s services, allows a person to send mail without a stamp because the recipient pays the postage fee.
After a Twitter campaign, people began sending heavy items to the Ukip Freepost address, hoping to rack up a huge postal bill for the party, before others started mailing packages containing blood and faeces.
The Ukip Bexley Twitter account confirmed that the address had been closed down by posting a photo of a Royal Mail note, captioned: “What kind of person sends faeces or blood to a political party? Are people OK?”
UK Property Market
AN EARL IS TRYING TO SELL HIS MOUNTAIN TO PAY A HUGE TAX BILL
One of the Lake District’s highest peaks could be yours for a cool £1.75 million
Blencathra mountain (Photo via)
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Hugh Lowther, the Earl of Lonsdale, has been forced to put a mountain up for sale to pay off a large tax bill.
Blencathra, one of the Lake District’s highest peaks, has been put on the market for £1.75 million, and it’s apparently worth all that; John Robson, the man charged with its sale, has said, “This is the first time we have handled the sale of a mountain – and what a mountain it is.”
The Earl is selling the 2,676 acre plot – and the right to use the title “Lord of the Manor of Threlkeld” that it affords – to help him pay the reported £9 million in tax he owes from his father’s inheritance.
Robson said that the ideal buyer would be someone “who obviously has a certain amount of disposable income”, and who would “want to own something in the Lake District that is easily recognisable”.
Illegal Art
AN ARTIST WAS FOUND GUILTY OF EXHIBITIONISM
After dancing around in Paris with a cockerel tied to his penis
(Photo via)
(via)
A South African man has been found guilty of exhibitionism after dancing under the Eiffel Tower with a cockerel tied to his penis.
Performance artist Thomas Cohen, 51, danced for around 10 minutes with the rooster attached to his manhood before police intervened.
“I think the victim is art,” he said, apparently without irony. “I’m not saying I’m going to, but my desire is to complete what was incorrectly halted by the authorities.”
The 51-year-old told the court that the performance had “nothing to do with sexuality”, and that nobody – including a group of nuns – had complained.
The chicken is now reportedly living “a totally happy life in Normandy”.
