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Nigerian-Canadian Citizen Illegally Detained By Border Patrol For 8 Months

Friday, 15 June 2018 22:00 Written by

According to the Guardian (UK), a Nigerian, Olajide Ogunye, who has Canadian citizenship, was detained for 8 months by Canadian border agents despite showing them his papers. 

 
 
A Canadian man is suing the country’s government after he was arrested by border agents and detained for eight months – despite producing evidence of his citizenship.
 
Olajide Ogunye, 47, is seeking $10m in compensation from the Canadian government after he spent months incarcerated in what his lawyer has described as a “profoundly disturbing” case of mistaken identity.
 
Ogunye was approached by border agents and detained outside his Toronto home in June 2016, even though he produced citizenship papers and a government-issued health card.
 
The agents disputed the validity of the documents and brought him to a detention facility near Toronto Pearson airport, where they fingerprinted him and alleged his prints matched those of a fraudulent refugee claimant who was deported to Nigeria in the 1990s.
 
“It is shocking,” said Adam Hummel, Ogunye’s lawyer. “Even people who are having their citizenship revoked … are not detained like this.”
 
The results of the fingerprint analysis – which Hummel says were never shown to his client – were contradicted by numerous sworn affidavits by friends and neighbours who had known Ogunye for years.
 
Ogunye, who immigrated to Canada from Nigeria with his family and became a citizen in 1996, was moved between Maplehurst correctional facility and Central East correctional centre.
 
Near-constant security lockdowns – a problem plaguing prisons and jails throughout the country – prevented him from making contact with family members. Traumatized by his detention, he was placed on suicide watch.
 
“One time, for the whole month, I was crying nonstop. I was crying continuously,” he told the CBC. “The nurse had to give me depression pills to make me calm down.”
 
Ogunye was released in February 2017. Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) alleged fraud and impersonation by Ogunye as justification for his detention.
 
CBSA said in a statement that it had received Ogunye’s claim and was reviewing the matter, but that it would be “inappropriate” to comment further.
 
Targeted arrests, like the one that ensnared Ogunye, are common for clearing a backlog of immigration violations, said a number of lawyers working in immigration and refugee law.
 
But the arrest of a Canadian citizen by border guards was nearly unheard of, said Max Chaudhary, a Toronto-based immigration lawyer. “That’s simply not what [border] officers do. Their mandate is not with Canadian citizens.”
 
Chaudhary speculated that if border officials believed Ogunye was a foreign national or permanent resident violating immigration laws, it could explain the duration of the detention – and the slow pace in which investigation unfolded.
 
“It seems quite incredible there could be a case of mistaken identity that could not have been cleared up in a faster amount of time, having this person deprived of his liberty for eight months,” he said.
 
Ogunye’s case was indicative of a broken system, said Lorne Waldman, a professor of immigration law at Osgoode Hall. Despite years of lobbying for oversight of the agency’s conduct – and assurances from the public safety minister, Ralph Gooddale, that such mechanisms would be put in place – Wadlman said no progress has been made
 
“Because there’s no oversight, there’s nobody who reviews the conduct of CBSA officers and this matter was allowed to drag on for months and months. It’s extremely unacceptable.”
 
Hummel and his client charge that the government breached Ogunye’s constitutional rights; he filed the case in Ontario superior court on 30 May.
 
“The very fact that this happened, someone who was approached and showed he was a Canadian citizen, means that it could happen to anyone if this is how [border agents] are operating,” he said.

Trump aide Manafort sent to jail

Friday, 15 June 2018 21:20 Written by

onald Trump’s former campaign chief, Paul Manafort was sent to jail Friday pending trial on a series of federal charges.

Manafort, who is facing money laundering and tax evasion charges among others, was the first former Trump campaign aide to be jailed in the sprawling probe led by special counsel Robert Mueller since May 2017.

The revocation of Manafort’s bail was a fresh sign of the looming collision course between Mueller and Trump, with the White House increasingly worried that the president could face obstruction of justice charges and an impeachment effort in Congress.

Manafort, 69, had been under house arrest while awaiting trial in both the US capital and Virginia. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges against him, which also include obstruction of justice.

Trump condemned the treatment of Manafort, a veteran Washington political consultant, as he sought to paint Mueller’s team as well as the Federal Bureau of Investigation — which Mueller once ran — as deeply biased and illegitimate.

“Wow, what a tough sentence for Paul Manafort, who has represented Ronald Reagan, Bob Dole and many other top political people and campaigns,” Trump wrote on Twitter.

“Didn’t know Manafort was the head of the Mob,” he said. “Very unfair!”

Earlier, Trump lashed out at the entire investigation, labelling it a “ridiculous witch hunt” after a Justice Department watchdog report revealed that several FBI investigators had sent anti-Trump text messages during the 2016 campaign.

“There was no collusion, there was no obstruction, and if you read the report… what you’ll really see is bias against me,” Trump said.

Manafort, who is facing trial later this year on money laundering charges involving his work for Ukraine that predated the 2016 presidential election, saw his bail revoked by Judge Amy Berman Jackson over claims he was trying to influence witnesses in his case.

He is one of 20 people and three companies already indicted by Mueller, who is investigating whether members of the campaign colluded with Russia during and after the election.

Mueller’s team has been seeking to interview Trump as well, and questions they have submitted to the White House indicate that they are also investigating whether Trump has illegally interfered with the probe.

On Friday, Trump sought to make use of the Justice Department inspector general’s report on the 2016 investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server during her time as secretary of state to erode confidence in Mueller’s operation.

While the IG report made almost no mention of Mueller or any alleged wrongdoing by Trump, the president claimed it “exonerates” him, while his lawyer Rudy Giuliani said Mueller and his team themselves should be investigated.

“The report yesterday may be more important than anything. It totally exonerates me,” Trump told journalists in front of the White House.

The report faulted the FBI and its former director James Comey, whom Trump fired in May 2017, over the handling of the Clinton email probe.

It said Comey, who cleared Clinton of allegations of mishandling classified materials, was insubordinate and guilty of bad judgment.

It also showed several agents involved in both that investigation and the subsequent Russia meddling probe repeatedly expressing anti-Trump bias in private text messages.

“That is probably the tip of the iceberg,” Trump said. “There was total bias, I mean total bias.”

He referred to Comey and other senior FBI officials as “the scum at the top” of the bureau and as “total thieves.”

*AFP

Ford Nation rises again: What Doug Ford means for Ontario

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 21:57 Written by

Up until a few months ago, discussions of Doug Ford becoming premier of Ontario were relegated to amusing hypothetical conversations. However, the hypothetical “what if” has become reality.

The man many view as a Canadian Donald Trump has seized on a unique political opportunity to dethrone the province’s Liberal party and reassert Progressive Conservative control over the most populous province in Canada with a majority government.

For some, the prospects of Ford’s tenure as premier are concerning if not downright frightening. There is an understandable fear that Ford’s brand of right-wing politics will bring sweeping reforms to social programs while undoing many of the progressive policies enacted under Kathleen Wynne’s Liberal government.

While it’s impossible to predict precisely how his premiership will unfold, we can look to his rhetoric during the election campaign as well as his late brother Rob Ford’s tenure as mayor of Toronto for an indication of what might loom ahead.

Populism in the 2017 Ontario election

Doug Ford’s campaign platform was based on a number of well-worn conservative policy positions. From scrapping the carbon tax to reducing corporate tax rates and promising to balance Ontario’s budget within two years, Ford’s campaign, at least in terms of substance, relies on many of the same ideas and policy positions as other Canadian right-wing politicians.

What marks his campaign as unique, at least in Canada, is that these positions are couched within the language of populism. Ford has offered his candidacy and his ideas as a way to expel Liberal elites from power, remove the influence of “radical special interests” and, most importantly, to create a government that works on behalf of the people.

Ford casts his ballot in Toronto on June 7, 2018. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette

The populist framing of Ford’s campaign offers a reimagination of politics as a fight between hard-working, tax-paying citizens against out-of-touch “elites” beholden to special interests.

While there is no crystal ball to predict how successful Ford will be in following through with the specific promises outlined in his campaign platform, Ontario residents can expect that the populist discourse used to defeat the Liberals and NDP during the campaign will continue, and may even intensify in the future, as Ford pursues his legislative agenda.

With Ford at the helm, we should anticipate a major shift in political discourse over the next four years. Like Donald Trump to the south, Ford represents a different way of doing politics, one where political civility, technocratic knowledge and compromise are replaced by brashness, common-sense solutions and decisive unilateral action.

Ford’s successful positioning of himself as a voice of the people, and the harbinger of common sense, will force his opponents to adapt their strategies to appeal to Ontarians.

If this campaign demonstrated anything, it’s that using Donald Trump as a bogey man to scare voters away from Conservative politicians has only limited sway over the hearts and minds of voters.

For opponents at the centre and on the left of the political spectrum looking to draw support away from Ford, they’ll need to develop strategies to undermine his populist credentials while offering their own policies that appeal to those affected by a sense of disaffection and political alienation.

Rob Ford Redux?

While much has been written about the similarities between Ford and Donald Trump, Doug Ford most closely resembles the populist stylings of his late brother Rob. Doug and Rob Ford share a remarkably similar neoliberal world view centred on halting the proverbial “gravy train” by drastically reducing government spending vis-à-vis the privatization of government services.

The late Rob Ford, then the mayor of Toronto, addresses media at City Hall in November 2013 as Doug Ford, then a city councillor, looks on. Ford, engulfed in scandal, offered an emotional apology for his ‘mistakes,’ among them crack-smoking. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young

Above all else, Rob and Doug Ford’s politics are shaped by staunch anti-elitism and anti-cosmopolitanism. Under brother Rob, this mixture of populism, neoliberalism and anti-elitism manifested itself in proposals to close homeless shelters, to end HIV/AIDS prevention programs and to cut funding for arenas, playgrounds, pools and day-care centres.

Doug Ford’s campaign for premier evokes the same underlying logic used by his brother as mayor. In order to strengthen his appeal to middle-class taxpayers, Ford has promised not to cut public sector jobs or reduce services. The successful alignment between Ford and the middle class represents a broadening of Ford Nation.

On the outside looking in are those who fall under the banner of special interests: The LGBTQ community, public sector unions and low-income communities.

So if we want to get an indication of where Ontario might be headed with Doug Ford as premier, we ought to examine his brother’s tenure as mayor and the groups alienated by Ford Nation.

While concern about Doug Ford may be widespread, it will likely be the most marginalized among Ontario citizens who are the most adversely effected by his premiership.

 

 

Author:   Ph.D Candidate, University of Guelph

Credit link:  https://theconversation.com/ford-nation-rises-again-what-doug-ford-means-for-ontario-97985<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/97985/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-advanced" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />

The troubling signs leading up to Anthony Bourdain’s suicide

Monday, 11 June 2018 05:27 Written by

It wasn’t like Anthony Bourdain to skip a good meal.

When the star of “Parts Unknown” didn’t come down from his hotel room for a rustic French dinner Thursday night, it was the first sign something was very wrong.

“We thought it was strange,” waiter Maxime Voinson told The New York Times Saturday, recalling Bourdain’s no-show the night before his suicide.

“Mr. Ripert thought it was strange,” he added, referring to Eric Ripert, the renowned French chef who would find close friend Bourdain upstairs the next morning, hanged in his hotel bathroom.

Ripert, Bourdain and the crew of the CNN show had traveled early last week to the med­ieval village of Kayserberg in northeastern France to film an episode on Alsatian food.

They were staying at Le Chambard, a five-star hotel in a cozy, converted 18th-century mansion.

Pretty much every night, Bourdain and Ripert, the executive chef at Manhattan’s famed Le Bernadin, would dine together at the hotel’s quaint bistro, the Winstub, known for its foie gras and charcuterie.

“Mr. Bourdain knew the chef, Monsieur Nasti,” the waiter told the Times, referring to chef Oliver Nasti.

“He knew the kitchen,” the waiter recalled. “Maybe he went out and ate somewhere else, we said. But we didn’t think much of it.”

Bourdain and Ripert had also eaten breakfast together each morning, again at the Winstub’s big, distressed-wood tables.

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The Le Chambard hotel in Kaysersberg, FranceAP

“Fresh bread, Viennese pastries, kouglof, panacota verrines, dried fruits,” the hotel lists as breakfast offerings. “Dried fruits, cold cuts, local cheese, fruit salad, butter, honey and a jar of Christine Ferber jam.”

But again, on Friday morning, Bourdain didn’t join him at the table.

“His friend was waiting at breakfast,” the waiter told the Times.

“And waiting and waiting.”

Also waiting, just down the road, was Bourdain’s camera crew.

Master butcher Christine Speisser told People magazine Saturday that the crew had set up to film at an outdoor market in nearby Strasbourg.

Speisser was to show Bourdain around the market, starting at 10 a.m.

“For me, it was something exceptional,” she told People.

“It was an honor to receive chef Bourdain.

“People knew he was coming to the market, and everything was in place, ready to film,” she said.

‘He is the last person in the world I’d imagine to do something like that’

But back at the hotel, Bourdain wasn’t picking up his cellphone. It was 9:30 a.m.

Ripert got up from his table at the Winstub, where he had been set to choose among the breads, pastries and local cheeses with his good friend.

French authorities say a receptionist ­unlocked Bourdain’s hotel-room door.

Inside, the 61-year-old TV host had used the belt of his hotel bathrobe to hang himself in his bathroom.

Ripert found him “unresponsive,” CNN reported.

There were no other signs of violence to Bourdain’s body, local prosecutor Christian de Rocquigny said Saturday.

“There is no element that makes us suspect that someone came into the room at any moment,” the prosecutor added.

De Rocquigny also noted that the suicide appeared to have been an “impulsive act.”

Blood was drawn from the body, and results of screenings for drugs or other toxins will follow in coming days.

“This is solely to give the family more information about the motivations and the cause of death,” de Rocquigny said of the screenings.

“We have no indication that he was consuming alcohol the days before his death or changed his behavior.”

“A visionary,” Nasti, the Chambard chef, would say Saturday of his lost guest and friend, offering his condolences to Bourdain’s family “and all those around the world who he caused to dream.”
Over at the outdoor market, Speisser continued to wait.

Then a production assistant rushed to the scene, announcing, “There’s a big problem.”

“It was like they were all struck by lightning,” Speisser told People magazine Saturday.

“They all just sat on the ground.”

An hour would pass.

“They didn’t say what was happening. They probably didn’t know everything,” Speisser’s friend Christelle Schenck, who had been there to help with the filming, told People.

Finally, “apparently, they need to cancel, we were told,” Schenck said.

“They said we’ll call you back.”

Modal TriggerAnthony Bourdain at "Parts Unknown Last Bite" in Las Vegas in 2013.
Anthony Bourdain at “Parts Unknown Last Bite” in Las Vegas in 2013.WireImage

The crew packed up and left the market.

Reached by The Post Saturday, Bourdain’s mother, Gladys, 83, a longtime Times editor, could barely speak.

“It’s really too difficult,” she said.

“He was an incredible guy. I really can’t talk about him . . . He was brilliant and sharp and funny,” she said.

“He is the last person in the world I’d imagine to do something like that.”

Still, by many accounts, including Ripert’s, Bourdain had not been himself.

There was exhaustion — and darkness.

Gladys Bourdain recalled Ripert telling her that “Tony had been in a dark mood these past couple of days,” Ripert told Bourdain’s mother on Friday according to the Times.

Anthony Bourdain had reportedly kept a brutal work schedule filming “Parts Unknown” in the months before his death and was “absolutely exhausted,” a source told People.

“​His travel schedule was grueling, and he often seemed quite beat-up from it, as anyone would be,” said the source, described by the magazine as having worked closely with Bourdain in the past year.

“He’d put everything into the shoots and then go back to his room to ­isolate.”

Tributes to Bourdain continued to pour in from around the world Saturday.

He had been a devoted student of jiujitsu. Champion Lucas ­Lepri, who trained Bourdain at his home in the Hamptons, recalled how his student surprised him one day with a home-cooked meal inspired by Lepri’s native Brazil.

“I was really moved because he cooked me a feijoada, which is a very special dish from Brazil, made with black beans and pork,” Lepri recalled.

“You have to be really devoted to cook a good feijoada, because you need to simmer the beans all day.

“Tony’s feijoada was incredible. He knew everything about Brazil and Brazilian food, and had traveled all over the country. He told me that the greatest Brazilian chefs came from Minas Gerais, my home state. He really moved me. I’ll never forget him.”

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Jason Merder (left) and Anthony BourdainJason Merder

Jason Merder, Bourdain’s road manager from 2009 to 2013, remembered it wasn’t all fine dining with the celebrity chef.

“One of the funniest things was Tony’s craving for Popeye’s chicken,” he recalled.

“Every time we flew through Atlanta and had an hour between flights, I would get a look from him. And I was like, ‘Alright, man, we’re going to Popeye’s.’

“It happened every single day, and it didn’t matter what time of day it was.”

Marilyn Hagerty was an octogenarian columnist for the Grand Forks Herald when her 2012 rave review for a new Olive Garden in her small South Dakota town went viral.

As trolls pounced, it was Bourdain who “came to my rescue,” she recalled.

He flew her to New York City, where they had coffee.

“He said he came to realize that what I do is a reflection of how people eat,” she said.

And he surprised her, too.

“I found him to be not a wild, reckless character of a person, as I had expected,” Hagerty told Time magazine. “He was nothing but kind and a gentleman.”

Additional reporting by Georgett Roberts, Kirsten ­Fleming, Lauren Steussy, Dana Schuster and Wire Services

FAMILY SHADES MUM IN OBITUARY FOR ABANDONING KIDS TO LIVE WITH BROTHER-IN-LAW

Wednesday, 06 June 2018 09:15 Written by

A family shaded the heck out of their 80-year-old relative in a newspaper obituary because she left her husband and kids to go live with her brother in law.

Kathleen Dehmlow passed away last Thursday in Springfield, Minnesota. In an obituary published in a local newspaper, her family let it b known that she would not be missed at all. They went on to spill details about her life in the paper.

The obituary states that Kathleen married Dennis Dehmlow in 1957, and the couple had two children, Gina and Jay. Five years later she apparently "became pregnant by her husband’s brother Lyle Dehmlow and moved to California."

The obituary continues;
She abandoned her children, Gina and Jay, who were then raised by her parents in Clements, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Schunk.

She passed away on May 31, 2018 in Springfield and will now face judgement.

She will not be missed by Gina and Jay, and they understand that this world is a better place without her."

The obituary has already been shared over 20,000 times on Twitter. Some social media users have slammed the family for the disrespectful tribute, while others are in support of the family for being truthful.

Culled from; https://www.torimill.com/2018/06/family-shades-mum-in-obituary-for-abandoning-husband-and-kids-to-live-with-brother-in-law.html
Source: Nairaland News

US Government Arrests Two Nigerian Pharmacists Arrested Over $9.6Million Illegal Drugs Distribution

Sunday, 03 June 2018 19:08 Written by

An indictment was unsealed today charging three pharmacists, one doctor and two other individuals with conspiracy to illegally distribute prescription drugs, U.S. Attorney Matthew Schneider announced today.

Charged in the indictment are: Nigerian pharmacists Enitan Sodiya-Ogundipe, 42, and Abiodun Fabode, 56, Pharmacist Amir Rafi, 49, Dr. Vasan Deshikachar, 50, Niesheia Tibu, 44, and Andrei Tibu, 30.

The indictment alleges that from January 2015 through March 2018, these pharmacists and doctor conspired with the other defendants to issue and dispense a large number of prescription opioids for supposed patients, who did not have a legitimate medical need for the drugs.

Deshikachar primarily prescribed oxycodone and oxymorphone, two of the most addictive opioids that have high street value. The Tibus would take the supposed patients to Precare Pharmacy, Global Health Pharmacy and Friendz Pharmacy, where Sodiya-Ogundipe, Rafi and Fabode would dispense the drugs.

The Tibus then obtained the drugs and sold them on the street. According to the indictment, the pharmacies dispensed more than 344,737 dosage units of Schedule II opioid prescriptions during the course of the conspiracy. These controlled substances had a conservative street value in excess of $9,600,000.

“In this case, three pharmacists and one doctor allegedly conspired to distribute nearly $10 million worth of opioids into the community, potentially spreading addiction and causing untold damage to Michigan families.

Diversion of prescription pills to the street market is a direct cause of the current opioid epidemic facing our country,” U.S. Attorney Schneider said.

Nigerian Yahoo Boy Sentenced To Prison In U.S After Pleading Guilty Of BEC Fraud

Thursday, 31 May 2018 04:12 Written by
A US-based Nigerian fraudster popularly known as Evertipsysmiley, has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and have been sentenced to federal prison. 
 
 
A 34-year-old Nigerian man who illegally resided in Houston has been ordered to prison for his involvement in numerous Business Email Compromise (BEC) schemes. Samson Olugbenga Oyekunle pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud Oct, 6, 2017.
 
Today, U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon ordered Oyekunle to serve 63 months in federal prison. He initially came to the United States on a student visa, but not a U.S. citizen, he is expected to face deportation proceedings following his sentence.
 
At the hearing, a victim spoke before the court as to how this case has devastatingly affected him and his law practice. Judge Harmon further ordered Oyekunle to pay restitution to the victims he defrauded. 
 
BEC fraud is a sophisticated fraud targeting businesses that regularly perform wire transfer payments. The fraud is carried out by compromising legitimate business e-mail accounts through social engineering or computer intrusion techniques to conduct unauthorized transfers of funds. The front end fraud of these BEC schemes originates from international locations.
 
The fraudsters will use the method most commonly associated with their victim's normal business practices and make victims believe the emails are coming from a legitimate source.   
 
 
Others, such as Oyekunle, working within the conspiracy open bank accounts with counterfeit passports that are being funded with fraudulent BEC wire transfers. These domestic bank accounts are a crucial component of the fraud scheme being a success. 
 
From on or about Jan. 1, 2016, through February 2, 2017, Samson Oyekunle was involved in numerous BEC schemes. Co-conspirators, working outside the United States, caused funds obtained through a variety of BEC schemes to be wire transferred into the various bank accounts Oyekunle fraudulently opened.     
 
Oyekunle would open bank these bank accounts in or around the Houston area with counterfeit passports in order to facilitate fraud payments into these accounts. Oyekunle opened numerous bank accounts at several financial institutions including Chase Bank, Bank of America, Capital One Bank, First National Bank of Texas, and Wells Fargo Bank. 
 
A total of 30 fraudulent wire transfers totaling $823,765 were taken from victims across the United States under false pretenses and were deposited into these accounts.
 
Oyekunle has been and will remain in custody pending transfer to a U.S. Bureau of Prisons facility to be determined in the near future.
 
The U.S. Postal Inspection Service conducted the investigation along with Department of State – Diplomatic Security Service. Assistant U.S. Attorney Suzanne Elmilady is prosecuting the case.
 

The shocking history of enslavement of 1.5 million white Europeans in North Africa in the 16th century

Wednesday, 30 May 2018 23:34 Written by

Late last year, the BBC reported that historians had launched a campaign to create awareness about the Barbary pirates of North Africa. These pirates, also called the Barbary corsairs, captured hundreds of thousands of people from Britain’s coastal communities from the 16th to 19th century and sold them into slavery in North Africa, where many spent the rest of their lives.

The Barbary slave trade, which occurred at the same time as the Trans-Atlantic slave trade where black Africans were shipped off from Africa to the Americas, has been an especially contentious topic, drawing furious debate on the issues of slavery, racism, and religion.

The Barbary Coast

Also called the ‘White Slavery’, the trade occurred on the Berber Coast of North Africa that encompasses present-day Morocco, Tunisia, Libya and Algeria, which were then independent states under the jurisdiction of the Ottoman Empire. The people in the region were mainly African Arabs.

While some contend that Barbary pirates were African, others, like historian Adrian Tinniswood, maintains that though some of the pirates were Barbary natives, many were European renegades who brought naval expertise to the piracy business. Some notable ones were Henry Mainwaring, Captain Jack Ward, Sinan Reis, and Dragut as well as the Barbarossa brothers, Mulai Ahmed er Raisuli, and Salih Reis, traders of Turkish descent who held the piracy and slavery business in high esteem.

Moroccan Slave Market. Anonymous woodcut (17th C.)

The Barbary pirates were known to have demanded tributes or ransoms from American and Swedish vessels in the Mediterranean Sea or attack European and American ships, especially in Baltimore, Ireland, and Devon and Cornwall, England. Their captives ranged from fishermen, sailors to coastal villagers and were mostly Christian and from impoverished families. But historians are careful to note that, “slaves in Barbary could be black, brown or white, Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Jewish or Muslim”.

Historian Daniel Barker explains,

The context of the Barbary slave trade was a centuries-old Christian-Muslim feud in which both sides’ behavior toward each other was pretty ghastly.  Muslims conquered, tortured, massacred and enslaved Christians; Christians conquered, tortured, massacred, and enslaved Muslims.  To the degree there was any difference, it favored the Muslims; the Muslims usually allowed Jews and Christians to keep their religion as second-class citizens, while Christians generally required Muslims to convert or die.  A considerable number of Barbary corsairs were actually renegade Englishmen, Greeks, or Italians who had converted to Islam; no such acceptance awaited Muslims who converted to Christianity, as the conversos of Spain discovered.

While some historians report that Barbary pirates took between 7000 and 9000 British men into slavery, others like Robert C. Davis, a professor of history at Ohio State University, in his book “Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters: White Slavery in the Mediterranean, the Barbary Coast and Italy, 1500-1800″, put the number at 1 and 1.25 million Europeans from 1500-1800, give or take 50 years.

Photo caption from Technoracism: British captain witnessing the miseries of Christian slaves in Algiers, 1815. Original caption: “Captain Croker horror sricken at Algiers, on witnessing the Miseries of the Christian Slaves chain’d & in Irons driven home after labour by Infidels with large Whips.”

Additional information about the source:

“The cruelties of the Algerine pirates, shewing the present dreadful state of the English slaves, and other Europeans, at Algiers and Tunis; with the horrid barbarities inflicted on Christian mariners shipwrecked on the northwestern coast of Africa and carried into perpetual slavery. Authenticated by Mr. Jackson of Morocco, Mr. MacGill, merchant and by Capt. Walter Croker of His Majesty’s Sloop Wizard, who in last July (1815) saw some of the frightful horrors of Algerine Slavery; to rouse general attention to which, this Economical Publication is issued. With an engraving. London: printed for W.Hone, 55 Fleet-Street. 1816”.

Ancientorigins.net describes the lives of the slaves as follows:

The slaves captured by the Barbary pirates faced a grim future. Many died on the ships during the long voyage back to North Africa due to disease or lack of food and water. Those who survived were taken to slave markets where they would stand for hours while buyers inspected them before they were sold at auction.

After purchase, slaves would be put to work in various ways. Men were usually assigned to hard manual labour, such as working in quarries or heavy construction, while women were used for housework or in sexual servitude.  At night the slaves were put into prisons called ‘bagnios’ that were often hot and overcrowded. However, by far the worst fate for a Barbary slave was being assigned to man the oars of galleys. Rowers were shackled where they sat, and never allowed to leave. Sleeping, eating, defecation and urination took place at the seat. Overseers would crack the whip over the bare backs of any slaves considered not to be working hard enough.

The Barbary slave trade, which was also the scene of the Barbary Wars, only ended when Thomas Jefferson declared war on the Berber pirates after refusing to pay tributes, leading to the United States’ first foreign land military operation in that region.

On the fact that many people do not know about the Barbary slave trade, some argue that it is because of a larger liberal agenda. Edward Browning, a retired government manager shared,

Because it would complicate the thinking of liberals who set the agenda for European guilt. In the first half of the 1600s, pirates from the Barbary Coast of North Africa, authorised by their governments to attack Christian shipping ranged all around Britain’s shores. They grabbed ships and sailors and sold the sailors into slavery. Admiralty records show that during this time they plundered British shipping pretty much at will, taking at least 466 vessels between 1609 and 1616, and 27 more from near Plymouth in 1625.

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