North Korea threatens war over Christmas Tree
Atheist North Korea has threatened to shoot out the lights of a giant Christmas tree-shaped tower that South Korea plans to illuminate near the tense border.
The Communist North warned its southern enemy of ‘unexpected consequences’ if it went ahead to turn on the lights, saying Seoul would bear the ‘entire responsibilities’.
South Korea plans to illuminate about 100,000 lights on the 100ft-tall steel tower in the shape of a Christmas tree at the top of Aegibong Hill, located some two miles from the border with North Korea.
Officials in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, say that switching on the Christmas lights is an act of propaganda because they will be visible with the naked eye from the major northern border city of Kaesong.
It is thought that North Korea is concerned the lights will be regarded as a sign of the affluence of the South and will weaken the regime’s ideological control of its hungry people.
The North Korean website Uriminjokkiri has denounced the Christmas lights plan, saying it is aimed at provoking the North and stepping up anti-North Korea psychological warfare.
It is the second year in a row that the lights will be illuminated. The North threatened last year that it would fire artillery at the tower but nothing happened.
However this year the North has stepped up its warnings.
The Christmas tower used to be an annual event until 2003, after which it was suspended as part of a 2004 agreement not to spread propaganda near the demilitarised zone during a period of relative calm between the two nations.
But in the wake of the North’s sinking of a warship in 2010 and the shelling of a border island - attacks that killed 50 South Koreans - the South resumed the border tree lighting.
When the tower was illuminated last year South Korean troops were put on high alert at the demilitarised zone and fire trucks and ambulance were parked nearby.
The North’s official Rodong Sinnum newspaper denounced the South by declaring: ‘The psychological warfare activities of the puppet regime have entered full swing’.
Mr Tak Sejin, chairman of a church group which is organising the tree lighting said: ‘This is a ceremony for peace on the Korean peninsula and national unity.
‘It is being held with our desire for harmony among our fellow men and between North and South Korea.
‘We are doing this with the expectation that someday our people can become one.’ - dailymail
Escaping North Korea: Defiance and Hope in the World's Most Repressive Country
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Missing Time Scenario in Michigan
Michigan - unedited: Saturday November 5th, 2011 I left my Mothers house around 9:30 PM going back to my fathers home where I live for dinner. It takes about ten minutes to get to the top of the (address moved to fi box) cms 12/13/11 09:27 cst flg. overpass from my Moms. I was heading east on Boon rd and off to my left past the entrance ramp behind the Clam river on the ground was what I thought at first was a fire truck because of it’s size, and color of the lights. I slowed down to 25 put my truck in third by the time I made the bottom, and gazed into the woods at what it could be. I passed what I call “The Bridge to Nowhere" a newly installed bridge over the Clam river off Boon everyone who misses their exit turns around there. There is a thin tree line the rest is clearcut. The car behind me slowed down too at the top of the overpass with an open left lane too pass me. They saw it too. I pulled around in the car pool parking lot they continued on. I went back, and parked at the bridge to nowhere before the Us 131 North exit. It was blocked off by cement blockers and chain. It was right then I knew it wasn’t a vehicle unless it drove in through the back on dirt country roads. This thing was too big for that. I got out of the truck it was sleet and rain. All I had on was one coat, and a crappy pair of Converse. I went out anyway. I just kept thinking in my head. This isn’t how it’s supposed to happen. Like there is some way this should have happened... I walked as far as to the edge of the tree line I wanted cover. When I looked back I couldn’t see the road it was too dark and sleeting too hard. All I could see were the lights. These lights were not caused by blinking bulbs. I dont know what caused the lights, but they flickered like fire, or like magic. Red, yellow, white. Only on the edges the rest looked black metal it was dark it was a disk I couldn’t tell how thick or tall it was, but it was big as to compare it to the size of a fire truck or larger. I pulled my hood down after about a minute of watching the lights to see if I could hear anything other than the sleet hitting my hood. The lights made no noise, but I felt a low humming. Like inside my in my chest. I could hear the sticks on the ground around me cracking. Like something was moving around. By now my heart is beating out of my chest I should mention I have a heart condition so I did think I may die of awe or fright. I remember seeing three shadows in front of the light more cracking. Then the lights turned off. It was like it was gone. I could see nothing I turned and ran as fast as I could. I slipped right when I took off and hurt my wrist, and my pinky finger. I made it too the truck, and locked the doors. I stared into the woods with rain on my windshield for about five minutes before I drove home. I went inside to tell my dad what had happened, and to go back with me, but he was sleeping. His girlfriend was drunk on the couch him and her got into a fight. So I didn’t disturb him. I went back outside to call my girlfriend I told her I saw some lights, and I want to go back in the morning and check it out. I didn’t mention stopping just mentioned it, and she continued to ignore it and chew me out for not having a job instead. Two days later I’m telling my roommates about it in full detail, and they ask me what time did you call your girlfriend. So I looked in my phone it was 12:46 pm I called her moments after I got home. My sighting was three miles down the road from my bedroom. It didn’t take two hours to see this. I didn’t understand why my father was in bed at what I thought was early ten o clock ten thirty. I went back in the morning, and didn’t see any sign of cars or trucks back there. No burns or indents. I think it wasn’t touching the ground. I didnt think it would be like this. What I saw that night was beautiful, and terrifying. I still don’t understand. What don’t I remember. It took a lot to write this down. It kind of makes it feel concrete, but in the end it feels good just to say it. I don’t know where I wan’t this to go. I have no pictures I have no video only my word. What I saw happened. This is my own backyard for the most part. I’ve had sightings before, but not like this. This one was here on the ground. It seems to make a bigger impact. Each sighting seems to leave me with more questions than answers I wish I had a support group, or someone I could talk to about this. Everyone thinks your’e just crazy when you talk about this. Well I’m not crazy yet. I know what saw I’m just sharing now. Which is a lot harder than listening. - MUFON CMS
They Know Us Better Than We Know Ourselves: The History and Politics of Alien Abduction
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Alien contact and attempted abduction
Maine - 4/15/1994 - unedited: When I was a child I suffered from extreme night terrors. I thought there was something taking me in the night. I would awake to blinding light and then I'd wake a second time, as if I were having a dream inside a dream. These terrors kept on for most of my childhood. It wouldn't happen every night, but once or twice a month.
My family moved north when I was 8, after years of brutal nightmares the new environment seemed to calm my mind. This didn't last long though. More frequently I felt as I I were being taken by the white lights. I pleaded with my parents to believe me but they didn't. They had no answers either.
One of the nights I woke before the white lights. I was laying in my bunk bed, my brother on bottom and I m top. I was looking at the glow in the dak stars I had on my ceiling when, in an instant I was blinded by this white light. I felt fear come over me and I couldn't scream for help. I helplessly watched my door creek open. There it was. The night person I was dreamin about. It didn't look at me, it looked around for a second and walked toward the bunk beds. I remember trying to scream but I couldn't. I couldn't breathe or move. It walked up besides he bunk beds, inspecting my brother. I tried to scream and got nothing. It looked up at me with snap of its head. Almost like it was surprised I was looking at it. As if I startled it. It stretched it's hand out to my face as if to grab me. I fought my fear and managed to ball up a fist and try to hit it. I did, but barely. I tapped it, just barely touching it. It recoiled its hand and sidestepped away, out the door. In the morning I told my family. They laughed and said I have new friends. I kept this to myself until now. My family can back up my story. Only 3 people outside my family know this. I'll take a lie detector any day. - MUFON CMS
Alien Abduction: The War of the Worlds Has Already Begun
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Saudi woman executed for 'witchcraft and sorcery'
A Saudi woman has been executed for practising "witchcraft and sorcery", the country's interior ministry says.
A statement published by the state news agency said Amina bint Abdul Halim bin Salem Nasser was beheaded on Monday in the northern province of Jawf.
The ministry gave no further details of the charges which the woman faced.
The woman was the second person to be executed for witchcraft in Saudi Arabia this year. A Sudanese man was executed in September.
'Threat to Islam'
BBC regionalist analyst Sebastian Usher says the interior ministry stated that the verdict against Ms Nasser was upheld by Saudi Arabia's highest courts, but it did not give specific details of the charges.
The London-based newspaper, al-Hayat, quoted a member of the religious police as saying that she was in her 60s and had tricked people into giving her money, claiming that she could cure their illnesses.
Our correspondent said she was arrested in April 2009.
But the human rights group Amnesty International, which has campaigned for Saudis previously sentenced to death on sorcery charges, said it had never heard of her case until now, he adds.
A Sudanese man was executed in September on similar charges, despite calls led by Amnesty for his release.
In 2007, an Egyptian national was beheaded for allegedly casting spells to try to separate a married couple.
Last year, a Lebanese man facing the death penalty on charges of sorcery, relating to a fortune-telling television programme he presented, was freed after the Saudi Supreme Court decreed that his actions had not harmed anyone.
Amnesty says that Saudi Arabia does not actually define sorcery as a capital offence. However, some of its conservative clerics have urged the strongest possible punishments against fortune-tellers and faith healers as a threat to Islam. - BBC
Getting God's Ear: Women, Islam and Healing in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf
