Austria has begun tightening security at its churches and other sites of religious worship, fearing copycat attacks after an Islamist gunman killed four people in a rampage earlier this month in the capital Vienna.

The attacker may have also intended to target houses of worship, Interior Minister Karl Nehammer said on Thursday.

“It cannot be ruled out that the perpetrator also wanted to deliberately seek out victims in churches,” Nehammer told reporters, citing the investigation’s findings. “There will therefore be a reinforced protection of church facilities as of today.”

Currently, there is no concrete threat against places of worship, but the minister explained that security is being tightened against possible copycat attacks in the “sensitive phase” of the run-up to Christmas.

Nehammer said that more police will be present in front of churches, synagogues and other religious institutions. He also stressed the need for “social solidarity” to “fight terrorism together.”

According to the minister, the “rapid reaction” officers and mobile patrols of the Cobra taskforce with armored vehicles and heavy equipment will be used in case of terrorist threats, or events in which attacks cannot be ruled out.

The 60-member group examining the November 2 attack is investigating 21 people, and 10 suspects are remanded in custody over alleged links to the Vienna attack. The perpetrator, a 20-year-old man who was born and raised in Vienna, was shot dead by police after firing at passersby on the street and in bars.

Authorities in Austria have admitted “intolerable mistakes” were made in the handling of intelligence on the attacker. Police had been aware of a “persistent and increased risk” of Islamist terrorist attacks, according to a report published by the Interior Ministry in 2019. It warned of the “increased danger of Islamist-motivated attacks” in Europe by radicalized individual perpetrators or autonomously acting small groups.

https://www.rt.com/news/507914-austria-protection-churches-vienna/

Migrants should be provided with accommodations but in their home countries instead of in Europe, said Jordan Bardella, the vice-president and spokesman of the right-wing French National Rally, in an interviewon news channel CNews.

Bardella said if immigration is not halted, it represents a serious demographic threat to France and Europe.

“The borderless ideology of unlimited and unrestricted reception calls into question the demographic, economic and social balance of our countries,” Bardella said. “The EU’s Migration Pact is a new stage in this ‘rush for Europe'”.

The National Rally party has launched a campaign against the European Pact on Migration and Asylum, also known as the migration pact, with the party’s leader, Marine Le Pen slamming the plan during a news conference at the party’s headquarters in October.

“It is an organized plan of submersion of Europe and the nations which compose it,” said Le Pen. “It is a real pact with the devil which will lead to the suicide of Europe.”

According to Marine Le Pen, 60 to 70 million migrants could settle in Europe in a few years due to the EU’s migrant pact. 

France itself currently settles 400,000 immigrants a year, which has contributed to the country’s rapidly changing demographics, raising the potential that ethnic French will become a minority over the coming decades. 

Bardella said on CNews that compassion must be weighed with sensible strategies that ensure the safety and well-being of migrants in their own countries and allow the French to avoid becoming a minority, a policy that has been pursued by a number of nationalist parties and politicians in Europe, including Hungary.

“Of course the migrants should be offered a place to live, but at home,” Bardella said. “In a few days, [French Interior Minister] Gérald Darmanin has dropped to one knee by collectively letting go of the police and paying tribute to those who fought against France in Algeria.”

Bardella was referring to two recent incidents in France, one on Wednesday, in which police attacked a young Black man only identified as Michel, after he provoked them and tried to steal their weapons. Shortly after the attack, the General Inspectorate of National Police (IGPN) ordered an investigation into potential police abuse and falsifying evidence against the three police officers.

In the other case, which happened on Tuesday, police dismantled a migrant tent camp in downtown Paris, which sparked a debate in the French Parliament, eventually leading to a bill to ban videos identifying police officers with the “manifest intention of harming their physical or psychological integrity”.In both cases, Minister of Interior Gérald Darmanin bowed to public pressure and did not stand up to defend the actions of police, Bardella said.

rmx.news/article/article/unlimited-migration-is-threatening-the-demographic-future-of-europe-says-french-politician

The Mühlhausen district court sentenced a 24-year-old man to two and a half years in prison for attempted rape of a female pastor in Eichsfeld. The court found it proven that the man approached his victim in Leinefelde-Worbis in June and then pressed her to the floor to rape her. He also threatened the woman. Because she resisted and screamed, he let go of her. “No police, I know where you live,” he said before he ran away.In the courtroom, the victim identified the tolerated refugee from Iraq. DNA and traces of fibres also revealed him. The defendant said in court that he was ashamed – the woman could have been his mother.The 59-year-old had previously stated on the witness stand that she had been anxious since the assault and no longer went for walks alone. The accused was arrested shortly after the crime and has been in custody ever since. He lived in the immediate vicinity of the pastor’s flat in a shared accommodation.

mdr.de/thueringen/nord-thueringen/eichsfeld/urteil-prozess-versuchte-vergewaltigung-pastorin-100.html