Spain Assaults the Catalan Government

Spanish militarized police assaulted Catalan government offices and arrested 15 officials on Wednesday in order to stop the October 1st banned referendum. The Catalan president said that this action meant the suspension of Catalonia’s government and the implementation of a state of emergency across the country.

Tens of thousands of protesters crowded outside the Catalan government offices in downtown Barcelona’s tourist district, waving Catalan flags and chanting “Occupying forces out” and “Where is Europe?”.

“The Spanish state has by all rights intervened in Catalonia’s government and has established emergency rule,” said President Carles Puigdemont. “We condemn and reject the anti-democratic and totalitarian actions of the Spanish state,” he said, calling on the Catalans to vote in the referendum to preserve democracy.

Spanish militarized police detained Catalonia’s junior economy minister Josep Maria Jove and 14 high-ranking local officials. The raid targeted numerous regional government departments.

Police confirmed that they were carrying out raids to dismantle the organization of the October 1^st referendum.

Despite Spanish police provocations to cause riots, mass protests across Catalonia remained peaceful. Protesters bore banners reading “Democracy” and “Vote to be free”.

The FC Barcelona soccer club said in a statement: “FC Barcelona, in remaining faithful to its historic commitment to the defense of the nation, to democracy, to freedom of speech, and to self-determination, condemns any act that may impede the free exercise of these rights.”

Police efforts to stop the referendum have intensified in recent days as the Catalan government reaffirms its commitment to hold the referendum by any means. A few days ago, President Puigdemont said that he and his administration members were willing to go to prison if necessary. He added that he is not afraid of defending people’s rights.

Over the last few weeks, the Spanish police have raided printer’s shops, newspaper offices private post-delivery companies looking for the necessary material to hold the referendum, instruction manuals for manning voting stations and ballot boxes.

 

Yahoo Has Allowed The NSA To Spy On All It Is Emails Users.

Last Tuesday Reuters published that“Yahoo secretly scanned customer emails for U.S. intelligence”

Last year, the NSA and the FBI requested Yahoo give them access to all incoming emails. As a result of this request, Yahoo built a service software for the NSA in order to scan and have real-time access to all email accounts. However, Yahoo has declined to comment on this issue further, Instead, they responded via email:

Good Morning-

We are reaching out on behalf of Yahoo regarding yesterday’s Reuters article. Yahoo said in a statement:

“The article is misleading. We narrowly interpret every government request for user data to minimize disclosure. The mail scanning described in the article does not exist on our systems.”
Best,
The Joele Frank Team

After these revelations, we contacted Google and Microsoft to know if other companies have done the same.

Google responded:

“We’ve never received such a request, but if we did, our response would be simple: ‘No way.'”

Microsoft responded:

“We have never engaged in the secret scanning of email traffic like what has been reported today about Yahoo.”

Neither Google nor Microsoft has specified how they have collaborated with US intelligence. Under laws including the 2008 amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, intelligence agencies can ask US phone and internet companies to provide customer data to aid foreign intelligence-gathering efforts for a variety of reasons, including prevention of terrorist attacks.

In recent years, Edward Snowden has disclosed that the NSA has collaborated with companies like Apple, Yahoo, Amazon, and Microsoft to do mass surveillance. However, it has been the first time that such collaborations imply the creation of new software to do mass surveillance over all users in real time.
It is time for all Yahoo users to delete their accounts in order to have privacy, since Yahoo has violated their human rights. However, it is acceptable to allow such agencies to surveil specific users in cases of terrorism and crimes.

People think that these things cannot happen in real life, but the reality sometimes takes over fiction.

In conclusion, if you are a yahoo user, please delete your account for dignity, and do not use Yahoo products anymore. “Action, Reaction”