Category: zerohedge

Amazon has just scored a major victory in Europe’s second-highest court that mirrors Apple’s recent tax victory in Europe.

The American tech giant on Wednesday saw a $300 million tax bill assessed by the Eropean Commission’s antitrust regulator back in 2017 overturned Wednesday in a ruling by the EU’s General Court, the second-highest court in the land. The money was supposed to be paid to Luxembourg (in Apple’s case, the money was owed to Ireland, where Apple’s European headquarters were located).

In the decision, the court argued that EU regulators had failed to prove that Amazon had received an illegal advantage from certain decisions made by the Luxembourg government. Amazon said it welcomed the court’s decision, “which is in line with our long-standing position that we followed all applicable laws and that Amazon received no special treatment.”

Like the Apple decision before it, the ruling is a blow to Europe’s anti-trust chief Margrethe Vestager, the Continent’s most visible regulatory crusader. Vestager has led the Continent’s efforts to attack US tech giants on anti-trust and tax grounds as the dominance of American tech firms in Europe’s economy has long been a source of economic embarrassment for the Europeans.

The General Court’s decision came as a surprise, and analysts are now looking ahead to appeals of three cases filed by Vestager against Google, which is appealing three separate cases brought by Vestager.

According to WSJ, both the Amazon and Apple tax cases are based on an aspect of EU law aimed at creating “a level playing field” by forbidding governments from providing tax incentives that could be construed as state benefits or subsidies. Governments across the bloc have used tax incentives to attract American tech firms, which are seen as a valuable boon for economic development (and a reliable return on investment).

While European courts overturning her fines is expected, Vestager is now seeing her thunder stolen by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who is pushing a minimum global corporate tax framework at the OECD which could completely revolutionize how ‘Big Tech’ is taxed.

In another case decided Wednesday, the European General Court ruled that the EU was right to issue a €120 million tax bill to French energy giant Engie in Luxembourg.

So far, Vestager’s record has been somewhat mixed: European courts have sided against her in overturning fines levied against major foreign firms including Apple, Starbucks and now Amazon, but has upheld the fine against Fiat and Engie. However, she can still appeal the ruling to the EU’s highest court, the European Court of Justice.

By Charles Kennedy of OilPrice.com

Sensors have detected increased levels of neutrons in an inaccessible chamber at the Chernobyl site, signaling that nuclear fission reactions are taking place in the entombed reactor hall, Science reports.

The signs that fission reactions are occurring come 35 years nearly to the date when the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in what is now Ukraine exploded on April 26, 1986. It was the worst-ever nuclear disaster in the world to date.

The nuclear fission reactions are taking place in a room that is sealed with concrete and contains a large part of the uranium fuel of the former reactor.

Ukrainian scientists are now trying to assess whether the detected nuclear fission reactions will die out or create a larger problem that will require some type of extraordinary intervention.

“It’s like the embers in a barbecue pit,” Neil Hyatt, a nuclear materials chemist at the University of Sheffield, told Science.

Maxim Saveliev of the Institute for Safety Problems of Nuclear Power Plants (ISPNPP) in Kyiv, Ukraine, says that the scientists cannot rule out the possibility of an accident.

“We’re talking about very low rates of fission, so it’s not like a fizzing nuclear reactor,” Hyatt told New Scientist.

“And our estimation of fissile material in that room means that we can be fairly confident that you’re not going to get such rapid release of nuclear energy that you have an explosion. But we don’t know for sure,” the nuclear materials chemist noted.

According to Hyatt, the higher level of neutrons is a “cause for concern but not alarm.”

However, if sensors continue to detect rising production of neutrons, the site may need an extraordinary intervention, Hyatt said. One approach could be to drill into the entombed chamber and spray it with a substance such as gadolinium nitrate, which would stop the fission reactions.

On one hand, UBS seems hell bent on keep its new Gen Z employees who have recently been promoted to associate positions. After all, it was just hours ago that we wrote about how the bank was showering these newly promoted employees with $40,000 bonuses. 

Yet on the other hand, UBS apparently isn’t as determined to hang on to certain other employees. The bank has reportedly re-started its “Reduction in Force” job cut plan this week, according to Bloomberg. 

Inside Paradeplatz, citing unidentified people familiar with the matter, said that the bank has “started giving notice to employees” of the layoffs. The bank reportedly pointed to “planned savings” for its reasoning, without identifying further details about the planned layoffs. The bank also didn’t comment to Bloomberg, when asked. 

The action stands at stark odds with the bank’s recent push to retain its global banking analysts when they are promoted. Recall, we wrote this week that the bank was going to pay a one time $40,000 bonus to its global banking analysts when they are promoted – double what some of the bank’s competitors are offering. 

The bank is planning on paying the bonus to analysts who are promoted to associates, on top of regular salary increases. It marks a bonus that is about 30% of the base pay of a newly promoted associate, we wrote.

Recall, last month, junior bankers at Goldman Sachs spoke out about long hours worked during the SPAC boom. Their public outcry catalyzed a trend of other banks and employers rushing to kiss the ass of their respective employees to avoid turnover, and (likely more important) a PR crisis.

We have also noted at length the ongoing labor shortage that has developed as a result of the government paying the unemployed more to stay home than they would make in the labor force. Trillions in Biden stimulus has incentivized workers to not seek gainful employment, but rather to sit back and collect the next stimmy check for doing absolutely nothing in what is becoming the world’s greatest “under the radar” experiment in Universal Basic Income.

Even more amazing: a stunning 91% of small businesses surveyed by the NFIB said they had few or no qualified applicants for job openings in the past three months, tied for the third highest since that question was added to the NFIB survey in 1993.

We can’t help but wonder what will be going through the head of UBS employees being laid off while the bank apparently shifts its priorities to Gen Z investment banking analysts, who will be rewarded with the new bonuses. 

Recall, UBS took a “restructuring charge of $300 million in the second quarter” related to the implementation of new corporate initiatives, that included the layoff plans.

The company employs about 73,000 staff across 50 countries. 

Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

Michel Barnier has called for a 3-5 year suspension of immigration into EU countries, warning that the bloc’s external borders have become a “sieve” for criminals and terrorists.

“I think we have to take the time for three or five years to suspend immigration,” Barnier told French media.

The EU’s former Brexit negotiator cited links between between immigration and “terrorist networks that infiltrate migrational flows” as part of his reasoning for calling for the shutdown, while also highlighting the issue of human trafficking networks.

The comments are particularly noteworthy because Barnier is known as a centrist – even a globalist in some ways – yet he is spouting rhetoric normally espoused by right-wing politicians.

When asked whether the comments contradicted his “moderate” reputation, Barnier responded, “The problems of immigration are not moderate. I know, as the politician that I am, to see the problems how they are and how French people experience them and to find solutions.”

However, Barnier made a point of asserting that the controls wouldn’t apply to “refugees,” despite the fact that there have been numerous terror attacks carried out in France and other European countries by refugees.

Barnier’s warning arrives while France is simultaneously gripped by the controversy of a letter penned by active duty military personnel warning President Macron that the country is heading towards civil war, partly as a result of mass uncontrolled immigration.

“A civil war is brewing in France and you know it perfectly well,” the military members warn, adding that the French government must take swift action to ensure “the survival of our country.”

France is home to millions of immigrants, many of them illegal aliens, who have refused to integrate into society and live in decrepit unruly ghettos on the edge of major cities where law and order is virtually non-existent and into which authorities fear to venture.

Such no go zones have also served to protect violent criminals and terrorists because police are often violently attacked by Islamist mobs when they try to make arrests.

Barnier is expected to challenge President Macron in next year’s elections, where he will also face stiff competition from populist Marine Le Pen.

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The best way to decrease the risk of Alzheimer’s disease could be a Mediterranean diet that is rich in fish, vegetables, and olive oil, according to a new study. 

The research, titled “Mediterranean Diet, Alzheimer Disease Biomarkers and Brain Atrophy in Old Age,” was published in the online issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology, and found a Mediterranean rich diet may “protect” the brain from protein build-up and shrinkage that can lead to the debilitating neurological disease. 

The study examines abnormal proteins called amyloid and tau. The amyloid-beta precursor protein plays a vital role in neural growth and repair. However, later in life, a corrupted version can destroy nerve cells, leading to memory loss, while tau is a protein that forms into a tangle. Both are found in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s disease but may also be found in the brains of older adults with healthy brain function.

While there is no single definition of the Mediterranean diet, it is typically high in fish, vegetables, fruits, whole grains, beans, nuts and seeds, and olive oil. The diet has a low intake of saturated fatty acids, dairy products, and red meat.

“Our study suggests that eating a diet that’s high in unsaturated fats, fish, fruits and vegetables, and low in dairy and red meat may actually protect your brain from the protein build-up that can lead to memory loss and dementia,” said study author Tommaso Ballarini, Ph.D., of the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) in Bonn, Germany. “These results add to the body of evidence that shows what you eat may influence your memory skills later on.” 

Ballarini and his team observed 512 people in the study. Of those, 169 were cognitively healthy, while 343 were at higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease. Respondents were asked a series of questions about how closely they followed the Mediterranean diet. 

Researchers then studied how closely each respondent followed the Mediterranean diet and the relationship to both their brain volume, tau and amyloid biomarkers, and cognitive skills. They adjusted for factors like age, education, and sex, finding those who followed the Mediterranean diet had better brain function than those who didn’t. 

When looking at amyloid and tau in respondent’s spinal fluid, those who did not follow the Mediterranean diet had higher levels of amyloid and tau than those who did. 

Researchers found people who did not follow the diet scored worse in memory tests than those who did. 

“More research is needed to show the mechanism by which a Mediterranean diet protects the brain from protein build-up and loss of brain function, but findings suggest that people may reduce their risk for developing Alzheimer’s by incorporating more elements of the Mediterranean diet into their daily diets,” Ballarini said. 

For the tens of millions of Americans who chowed down on western foods with high intakes of dairy and red meat during the pandemic – perhaps one should rethink their dieting habits if they want to be cognitively there when they grow old. 

Authored by Paul Antonopoulos via GlobalResearch.ca,

800 paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division of the U.S. Army departed from Fort Bragg in North Carolina last Friday morning for a Swift Response exercise. They were dropped into Estonia in a “joint forcible entry” operation in the early hours of Saturday. The airborne exercise is designed to test the fast response capabilities of the U.S. to defend Estonia in case of a hypothetical war with Russia. It is also part of larger NATO exercises that includes the participation of 30,000 troops doing drills with battlegroups led by the UK in Estonia, Canada in Latvia, Germany in Lithuania and the U.S. in Poland.

In effect, NATO has mobilized tens of thousands of troops right onto Russia’s border. Moscow has repeatedly expressed concern about a NATO building up in Europe and Russian Presidential spokesperson Dmitry Peskov stated that Russia does not threaten anyone but will not ignore actions that could endanger its interests.

On the Estonian television program Välisilm, Colonel Paul Clayton of the Royal British Armed Forces, unashamedly expressed, in the context of NATO’s military exercises, the types of pressure that NATO is attempting to impose against Russia. He admitted that the Alliance is helping Ukraine train its troops and praised the Estonian government for its readiness to devote more than 2% of its GDP to defense. He also recommended more frequent co-operation with Latvia and Lithuania. In his opinion, this is all the more crucial because NATO’s “Northern Division” is being built in Riga, which consists of military units from the Baltic States under the command of Denmark.

The NATO contingent deployed in the Baltic States is under the pretext of “countering Russian aggression.” Moscow emphasizes, under the pretext of concern for the security of the Baltic States, that NATO has in fact provocatively brought its military bases closer to Russia’s borders. The Kremlin has also repeatedly stated that it has no plans to attack, but NATO continues to grow its potential and Russia has been forced to provide an asymmetric response to its military plans.

It is for this reason at the end of April, by presidential decree, the U.S., UK, Ukraine, Lithuania, Poland, Latvia, Czechia, Estonia, Australia and Georgia were put on a list of countries that are “unfriendly” to Russia. Although Germany and France frequently criticize Russia, Moscow recognizes that they are to some extent independent in their decision making and are not as beholden to Washington’s interests like the listed countries are.

Effectively, what Moscow does by establishing such a list is identity countries that enact policies completely aligned with Washington. Unsurprisingly, all the European Union countries to make the list are former Warsaw Pact members, and this points to two observations.

• Firstly, Russia is announcing that it does not view the European Union as a single monolith and recognises that it is a fractured organisation with many divisions. One such division is between the majority of the EU who are mostly disinterested in pursuing aggressive anti-Russia policies, and Poland, Czechia and the Baltic States, who as former Warsaw Pact members have the expressed desire to be active participants in Washington’s containment efforts against Russia.

• Secondly, Russia is once again demonstrating its flexibility by identifying the likes of Paris and Berlin as having issues with Moscow, but not at the behest of Washington and instead for their own interests. In this way, Moscow believes that it can negotiate with Western Europe, something it has failed to do with Washington and its vassal states in Eastern Europe.

By creating a list of unfriendly states (which nearly perfectly corresponds to the states involved in large scale NATO military drills on Russia’s borders), Moscow has broken Washington’s ultimatum of “us” or “them.”

By not including France and Germany on the list, Russia is recognizing that the two leading countries of the European Union have agency that can shape and influence the destiny of Europe independently from Washington.

Although the U.S., UK and its vassals are attempting to intimidate Russia through its enormous military exercises, the show of strength does not reflect the reality that will unfold in a hypothetical war as there are huge divisions within the European Union and NATO. The overwhelming majority of member states are unwilling to go to war with Russia despite enthusiasm from Poland and the Baltics, rendering the joint NATO exercises as not an accurate reflection of a real war scenario.

The French government and much of the public has reacted with outrage after another open letter issued by military personnel has warned that France is headed for “civil war” if it doesn’t handle its Muslim extremism problem.

The controversy was further stoked when Marine Le Pen – commonly dubbed by mainstream media as France’s outspoken “leader of the far-right” – once again showed support for the letter by agreeing on the “danger of a civil war” in an apparent rallying of her base around the message ahead of next April’s election where they’ll seek to take on President Emmanuel Macron. Clearly a significant bulk of officer and enlisted military members agree with her stark assessment.

Bloomberg noted that “While Le Pen has consistently spoken out about tightening migration and the need to be tougher on Islamism, her recent comments are perhaps the most controversial to date.”

The Macron government condemned the second letter issued Sunday as “crude” – which unlike the first letter written by 20 retired generals and which included signatories by some 1,000 currently serving soldiers – had anonymous authorship: 

The letter, posted on the website of the rightwing Valeurs Actuelles magazine late Sunday, echoes the one published by the same publication last month but appears to have been written by an unknown number of younger troops still in active service.

Far-right leader Marine Le Pen said France was in danger of a civil war as it prepared to tackle President Emmanuel Macron in next April’s election.

At least 200,000 people had signed the letter by the time Le Pen commented on it. In particular Le Pen while at a campaign event on Monday had promoted the new letter as a “clear” assessment of the country’s inability to combat the growing tide of Islamism. 

“There is always the danger of civil war,” she had said, which her opponents were quick to dimiss, and are calling out the statements as far-fetched and outrageous.

Among more controversial highlights of the letter include the line: “If a civil war breaks out, the military will maintain order on its soil because it will be asked to do so,” it said while addressing Macron, according to Bloomberg. It said the active duty signatories have long been “fighting Islamism, to which you are making concessions on our soil.”

Read a translation of the full letter below…

Active duty French soldiers wrote a second letter warning their leaders about civil war in France. You can find my translation and analysis here. https://t.co/5Qhg4Q7clt

— Alister Riviere (@RiviereAlister) May 10, 2021

“If nothing is undertaken, laxity will continue to spread inexorably in society, causing, in the end, an explosion and the intervention of our comrades in action in a perilous mission of protecting our civilisational values and safeguarding our compatriots in the national territory,” the letter said.

“There is no more time for procrastination, otherwise tomorrow the civil war will put an end to this growing chaos, and the dead, for which you will bear responsibility, will number in the thousands.”

It also calls out French leaders’ “hatred” of the country’s own history (a reference to the ongoing debate over French colonialism) while at the same time making accommodating statements on Islamic extremism.

And all of this comes after the shocking street beheading of 47-year old teacher Samuel Paty, who Muslim students and parents had accused of showing derogatory cartoons of Islam’s founder Muhammad to his students. France and other European countries have since been rocked by similar Islamist shootings and attacks, including against Jewish neighborhoods.

Authored by Alexander Zhang via The Epoch Times,

The UK government plans to introduce requirements for voters to show photographic ID when casting ballots, in order to ensure the integrity of elections.

The Electoral Integrity Bill, which requires voters to show identification before being issued with a ballot paper in a polling station, is part of the Conservative government’s legislative agenda set out in the Queen’s Speech on Tuesday.

“We think showing identification to vote is a reasonable approach to combat the inexcusable potential for voter fraud,” Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s official spokesman said.

“Everyone wants to maintain the integrity of our democracy and this would bring us in line with not only Northern Ireland but countries such as Canada, many European countries including France, the Netherlands, Sweden—all require a form of identification to vote,” the spokesman said.

The main opposition Labour party accused the government of trying to make it harder for people to vote.

Shadow Justice Secretary David Lammy said on Twitter that the government is prioritising “voter suppression” and “disenfranchising millions through Voter ID.”

Lisa Nandy, Labour’s shadow foreign secretary, told Sky News that the government should defend the UK’s democracy by taking action against Russian interference.

Asked if Labour would support plans to require voter IDs, she said: “We have got to defend our democracy robustly but I just think it’s really bizarre coming from this government that they have made it so much more difficult for people in this country to vote over recent years, but they have taken absolutely no action to defend our democracy from attacks overseas.”

The Electoral Integrity Bill has also come under attack from U.S. civil rights groups.

According to The Guardian, The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), and Common Cause said the requirement for voter ID “amount to Republican-style voter suppression and are likely to erode faith in the democratic process.”

Voters casting their vote in polling stations in Great Britain currently do not need to present any form of identification before receiving a ballot paper, but identification has been a requirement in Northern Ireland, also part of the UK, for nearly 40 years.

Voter ID requirements were introduced in Northern Ireland after the 1983 General Elections following concerns about the extent of voter fraud in the British province. Since 2003 photographic ID has been required.

According to a briefing paper for the House of Commons, “There has been no evidence that the ID requirements in Northern Ireland have affected turnout.”

Since 2014 the Electoral Commission has recommended that photo ID should be required in the rest of the UK.

The Commission recommends that any system of voter ID introduced in Great Britain should mirror that in Northern Ireland, where voters without access to approved photo ID can apply for a free photographic electoral ID card from their local council.

Authored by Roger Simon via The Epoch Times,

The other day, I wrote that “woke” was the new conformism.

It is, of course, but I undersold it. It’s much more than that and more dangerous.

As Tal Bachman notes at Steynonline, it’s now our state religion, a state religion in a country that – constitutionally and for good reason – isn’t supposed to have one.

But “Wokism” is yet more than that, too. It’s a mass psychosis similar to many that have arisen throughout history when the masses followed leaders who, in their zeal or self-interest, took them to disastrous ends.

A good example was when the Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola – in a 1497 version of “cancel culture” – swept up everything secular in Florence from some of the most extraordinary paintings and sculpture of all time to the works of Boccaccio and burned them in the so-called Bonfire of the Vanities.

Being Jewish, I am also reminded of the bizarre tale of Sabbatai Zevi, the 17th-century Sephardic rabbi who proclaimed himself the long-awaited true messiah of the Jews, garnered thousands of followers, and then ended up leaving them completely in the lurch when he converted to Islam. (Interestingly, Bachman writes that “wokism” resembles Islam structurally.)

Closer to our time, the great Italian director Federico Fellini, in his film “La Dolce Vita” (1960), shows us what seems like hundreds of people rushing about, tears streaming, trampling each other, believing reports that the Madonna has been sighted. As the scene progresses, the crowd grows, with more and more people convinced of the sighting.

Of course, what Fellini documents is more or less harmless—not so “woke.” This psychosis has a political dimension and the capability of changing a society, which it has already done.

Face Excommunication

“Woke” gains adherents much in the manner of “est”—the cult-like Erhard Seminars Training—that I attended in the 1970s at the behest of a movie producer interested in making a film about it. (It never happened.)

If you’re too in, you’re out.

For est, several hundred people sat in a large conference room listening to the “training” for hours under instructions not to get up, even to go to the bathroom, until they raised their hands signaling they “got it” (i.e., effectively joined the cult). Nature’s calling being what it is, most eventually did.

Although operationally similar, “woke” is exponentially more perilous than the now-defunct est training. Our position in society, our livelihoods, and our children’s educations and futures are being held over our heads, not our mere use of a restroom.

An iron-fisted, ideologically extreme minority has our country under its thumb—play along or face ex-communication. This is stronger than anything in our history and almost identical to what we see and have seen in totalitarian countries.

It’s a psychosis approaching mass hallucination.

In Franco’s Spain, they shouted, “Viva la muerte!” (“Long live death!”) Here we are asked to proclaim just as loudly “Black Lives Matter,” to display signs saying as much on our lawns, although we never thought otherwise and always thought (naively, we are told) that all lives mattered.

All key aspects, most parts of them anyway, of our society “get it” as they did in est (i.e., now believe in ”woke”) or, yet more ominously, cynically say they do—the media, the corporations (“Better woke than broke!”), the government bureaucracy, the Democratic Party, the Department of Justice, the FBI, the military (yikes!), entertainment, the university system, the K–12 system, the medical community, the scientific community (incredibly), the religious community (sadly), and on and on.

All, to one extent or another, believe in “woke” except—the people.

Most of the people anyway.

Most of what used to be called the common men (or women) in the street roll their eyes at “woke”—including even some silent, but browbeaten, Democrats—and do their best to move on, although many realize that “woke” and its sister “social justice” are in essence euphemisms for an ideology far more totalitarian than any ever in control of this country, communism.

Rebellion Brewing

How long can this gaping dichotomy continue?

How long before they stop rolling their eyes?

A rebellion against “woke” is brewing, particularly in red states, some of which are banning or have already banned critical race theory in their schools, among other pushbacks. (Kudos to Rep. Mark Green, Republican of Tennessee and Iraq War veteran, for introducing legislation to block critical race theory training at U.S. military academies.)

But will that be enough against a federal government that lives and breathes this evil ideology and that is essentially governed by a homegrown politburo—the thought that Biden acts by himself is ludicrous—determined to impose it?

As this imposition increases, the “contradictions,” as the Marxists would say, are heightened.

What the extremist ideology of “woke” actually provokes is talk of—and not just talk—secession and even civil war.

Few of us have heard anything like that in our lifetimes. But now it’s real. We have been driven apart as never before. We have been awakened indeed.

Anything can happen and some of us, who would never have considered anything like secession and civil war, suddenly do—highly disturbing to us as those thoughts may be.

So why do we even tolerate “woke”?

Bachman gives us a quotation from Austrian philosopher Karl Popper that is remarkably apposite for our times:

“Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.”

From Antifa to BLM (whose leader apparently identifies with the mass murderer Chairman Mao) to the willfully blind talking heads of left-wing cable TV, no one is as intolerant as the ”woke” folks. They break all domestic records in that regard.

Time to stop tolerating them.

China is angrily boycotting and urging the banning of a planned United Nations event because it will highlight human rights and China’s treatment of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang.

The event will be held virtually on Wednesday, and is sponsored by the United States, Germany, and Britain. China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying issued a hugely provocative statement Monday, saying “This is total blasphemy against the United Nations.”

“The US has banded up with several countries, abused the United Nations’ resources and platform, and smeared and attacked China to serve it’s own interests,” she said at a daily briefing Monday. She urged UN member nations to not attend the virtual event which she further said is an insult to the institution.

China’s UN mission issued a simultaneous rejection of the planned UN meeting, “We trust the member states will see through this political scheme… and choose to reject it,” it said. “The US and other co-sponsors are obsessed with fabricating lies and plotting to use Xinjiang-related issues to contain China and create mess in China.”

Beijing has long sought to combat an avalanche of Western media stories highlighting the network of labor and communist-run ‘reeducation’ centers for China’s minority Muslim population. Chinese officials have defended what they tend to call “vocational centers” which are “necessary” to combat Islamic extremism.

It should be remembered that China has for years boasted of its outsized monetary contributions to the United Nations, particularly with regard to its peacekeeping mission, and also being a major contributor of troops.

Currently, China is the second-largest funder of the UN’s peacekeeping mission at 15% of the total budge, behind the United States (at 27%).

Like with its influential role within the World Health Organization (WHO), Beijing probably expects more quid pro quo type acknowledgement when it comes to the issues the UN highlights.