5: 

Hiding The Homeless

A growing number of American cities are ticketing or arresting homeless people for essentially being homeless. The new laws ban behavior commonly associated with homelessness like reclining in public, sharing food or sitting on a sidewalk.

Supporters argue these measures are necessary to push homeless people into the shelter system and maintain public safety. Critics say the laws violate the rights of homeless people and ignore the more complicated drivers of homelessness like mental illness.

We found homeless people camping in the woods to escape police harassment, a homelessness consultant opposed to feeding homeless people and a city that uses solitary confinement to force homeless people into shelters. 

VICE News began its investigation in Boise, ID, where a group of homeless people have filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of these laws. Their case could change the way homeless people are treated across the country.

Vice News

 

4: 

THIS FAKE BOMB DETECTOR IS BLAMED FOR HUNDREDS OF DEATHS. IT’S STILL IN USE.

THE ADE 651 IS A SMALL, HANDHELD WAND with a plastic grip and a swiveling antenna, designed by a British company named ATSC for the ostensible purpose of finding hidden explosives. I saw one of these devices firsthand last year while driving up to a security checkpoint at Jinnah International airport in Karachi, Pakistan. As our vehicle approached, a security officer walked past us, waving the wand alongside our doors. In theory, had there been a bomb located inside, the device’s antenna would have moved, alerting officials to the danger nearby.

Happily, there wasn’t any bomb. 

However, even if there were, the fact is that the ADE 651 wouldn’t actually have found it. In fact, although it remains in use at sensitive security areas throughout the world, the ADE 651 is a complete fraud. A 2010 BBC Newsnight investigation into the device determined that it was based on pseudoscience and amounted to nothing more than a divining rod. Investigators from BBC also found that the ADE-651’s manufacturer sold it with the full knowledge that it was useless at detecting explosives. 

The device is once again back in the news as it was reportedly used for security screening at hotels in the Egyptian resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh. A Russian airliner that took off from that city’s airport was recently destroyed in a likely bombing attack by the militant Islamic State group. Speaking to The Independent about the hotel screening, the U.K. Foreign Office stated it would “continue to raise concerns” over the use of the ADE 651.

The sordid story of how the ADE 651 came into use involves the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. 

The Intercept

3: 

Anti-immigration, anti-liberal: meet Sweden’s far-right future

Sweden’s liberal identity is under attack. As increasing numbers of refugees enter the country, anti-immigrant violence is rising. And the Sweden Democrats, a radical nationalist group, is now the third largest party in the country. Phoebe Greenwood meets the young Swedes who believe multiculturalism is a threat – and the migrants afraid of what this means for them

The Guardian

2: 

2 Men Barred from U.S. Flight for Speaking Arabic

Islamophobic incidents have continued in the United States following the attacks in Paris. On Thursday, two men were temporarily barred from boarding a Southwest flight from Chicago to Philadelphia after a passenger heard them speaking Arabic. In Texas, meanwhile, armed protesters rallied outside the Islamic Center of Irving, decrying the “Islamization of America.”

Democracy Now!

1: 

Siberia’s melting permafrost fuels climate change

Over the past year, a number of giant, mysterious holes have emerged in Siberia, some as deep as 200 metres.

Scientists say the craters may be emerging because the frozen ground, or “permafrost”, that covers much of Siberia has been thawing due to climate change, allowing methane gases trapped underground to build up and explode.

Permafrost is ground that is permanently frozen, where the ground temperature has remained below zero degrees Celsius for at least two years. It covers about a quarter of the northern hemisphere’s land surface.

When permafrost thaws, microbes digest the plant and animal remains that were locked in the permafrost and release greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide and methane into the atmosphere.

The phenomenon is a self-feeding cycle, explained Sarah Chadburn, from the University of Exeter.

“Permafrost soils contain vast amounts of carbon, nearly twice as much as is currently in the atmosphere. As the permafrost thaws in a warming climate, the soil decomposes and releases carbon to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide and methane. These are greenhouse gases, and they warm the Earth even more. This leads to more permafrost thawing, more carbon release, and so the cycle continues,” Chadburn said.

At the recent Arctic Circle Assembly in Reykjavik, Iceland, Max Holmes from the US-based Woods Hole Research Center (WHRC) said in a presentation that the Siberian sinkholes “are an additional indication that vast changes are under way in the Arctic”.

Aljazeera