A $2.7 billion plan to support nearly 15 million people this year is less than a third funded, resulting in huge shortfalls, which also impact local organizations at the forefront of the response.
“To stop a large-scale famine from taking hold, donors must urgently scale up their financial support while using diplomatic means to push for opening up of humanitarian access,” said Clementine Nkweta-Salami, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan.
“If not, we will see an even more catastrophic situation unfold,” she warned.
The appeal came a day after global food security experts declared that after 15 months of war, famine is prevalent in parts of North Darfur, particularly in the Zamzam camp for internally displaced persons (IDP), located near the state capital, El Fasher.
Ms. Nkewata-Salami said the findings reflect the gravity of the situation on the ground, noting that the people of Sudan have “suffered relentlessly” since war erupted between rival military forces.
“This is a man-made crisis, one which can be resolved if all parties and stakeholders uphold their responsibilities and commitments to the populations in desperate need,” she said.
“The humanitarian community in Sudan has been ringing the alarm about the unfolding hunger catastrophe and the risk of famine while the conflict has raged on, causing displacement, disrupting basic services, destroying livelihoods and severely restricting humanitarian access.”
Record hunger, immense needs
The experts said the famine conditions in Zamzam camp – home to some 500,000 people – are likely to persist through October while another 13 areas are at risk.
They highlighted that Sudan is facing the worst levels of food security in its history. More than half the population – 25.6 million people – are experiencing acute hunger. This includes more than 8.5 million who are facing emergency levels of hunger and more than 755,000 people suffering catastrophic conditions.
In response, humanitarians have been ramping up operations in recent months, but the needs are immense, Ms. Nkewata-Salami said.
“The humanitarian community is pushing ahead on multiple fronts, including urgently moving food, nutrition and health supplies and agricultural inputs to the highest risk areas, ramping up cash assistance to communities in need and scaling up presence where hunger is most acute,” she added.
Silence the guns
“But to do this, we need the guns to be silenced to enable humanitarians to reach the people in need,” she said. “We need an urgent injection of funding for the aid operation as well as safe and unimpeded humanitarian access, including across borders and battle lines.”
Separately, a senior official with the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, also called for donors to step up support to Sudan and for the war to end.
“The warning signs were there for months. Now we have the tragic confirmation that there is famine in Sudan’s North Darfur region,” said Mamadou Dian Balde, the UN agency’s regional refugee coordinator for the Sudan situation.
“With appalling human rights atrocities, the forced displacement of over 10 million people since the start of the war last year and the lack of the most basic services for a large percentage of the population, the world’s most pressing humanitarian catastrophe is growing and deepening every day, threatening to engulf the whole region.”
He added that as famine and hunger increase in Sudan, people fleeing to neighbouring countries “will arrive in more and more precarious conditions”.
“Urgent action is vital to avert even more death and suffering,” he said.
The alert from the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine follows significant destruction to power plants and the worsening energy crisis that has affected access to electricity, clean water and heating, while also pushing up prices for consumers.
The strikes on the national grid included one coordinated attack on 26 August which the Mission described in a new report as one of Russia’s largest since the onset of the full-scale invasion, involving “more than 100 missiles and 100 drones across numerous regions in Ukraine, primarily targeting energy and other infrastructure. Power cuts were implemented nationwide to stabilize the grid.”
There have been “nine waves of long-range and large-scale coordinated attacks”on Ukraine’s electric power system between 22 March and 31 August 2024, the report noted. These have either damaged or destroyed “numerous power generation, transmission, and distribution facilities” and caused harm to the civilian population and the country’s electricity supply, water distribution, sewage and sanitation systems, heating and hot water, public health, education and the economy.
The report further cites estimates that the latest attacks on energy infrastructure have “put over 10 per cent of the population – 3.7 million people – at risk of consuming contaminated drinking water. Risks increase for infants and young children, older persons, immune-compromised individuals and those with important comorbidities,” it noted.
Since March 2024, Russian attacks have hit facilities in 20 of the 24 regions under Ukrainian control, including the capital Kyiv, according to the Mission. These included 36 recorded strikes on power plants in nine regions and at least 101 confirmed attacks on electricity distribution and transmission facilities in 17 regions. “Many energy facilities were struck repeatedly, some until the point of total destruction,” it said, noting that it will “take years to fully repair and restore”.
Before the full-scale Russian invasion on February 24, 2022, Ukraine had 44.1 gigawatts of available electricity capacity, via its nuclear, thermal and hydroelectric plants, as well as renewable sources, the report noted, citing data from the National Bank of Ukraine. But by April 2023, Ukraine’s national grid had lost nearly half of its available production capacity from occupation and destruction. Additionally, 42 of its 95 high-voltage transformers were damaged, disrupting electricity distribution to homes.
Forced displacement fears
According to the UN refugee agency (UNHCR), more than 6.7 million Ukrainians have fled the country since the Russian invasion. Some 6.2 million are still in Europe and another 3.6 million remain internally displaced inside Ukraine. The UNHCR considers it “unlikely” that these numbers will decrease soon.
Border monitoring conducted by UNHCR and partners showed a slight increase in departures from Ukraine since April this year linked to a lack of access to electricity, water and heating. But “that rise then starkly increased” by June 2024to one in four respondents as energy outages became more frequent. By July, nearly half of those contacted at the Ukrainian border said they were leaving because of difficulty accessing electricity, water and heating.
“Most of those departing for energy-related reasons are intending to stay abroad temporarily, but for unknown periods,” UNHCR said.
Education: Millions of classroom hours lost
Beyond the expected exodus of people from Ukraine, the attacks have seriously impacted education, too. In July 2024, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimated that between 78 and 311 million hours of study have been lost each month from power outages.
After the initial waves of attacks in March 2024, the National Bank of Ukraine estimated that the national economy would shrink by 0.6 per cent. By June 2024, electricity prices rose by more than two-thirds. The country’s Government estimated that high electricity costs would add 1.2 per cent to consumer inflation and six per cent in additional costs for producers.
The UN Mission said that in view of the large number of regions affected by the coordinated attacks, “the high precision of the weapons involved, and the sheer scale of harm inflicted on civilians and interconnected civilian systems supplying the population with services essential to their health and survival…there are reasonable grounds to believe that multiple aspects of the military campaign to damage or destroy Ukraine’s civilian electricity and heat-producing and transmission infrastructure have violated foundational principles of international humanitarian law.”
Asteroid 2024 PT5, which is currently hurtling towards Earth, rather than burning up in the atmosphere, will likely remain in orbit and become a minimoon. However, it will be a fleeting visit and will probably only stay in the planet’s gravitational grip for two months.
The asteroid was discovered on August 7 and is about 10 meters in diameter.
Two astronomers from the Complutense University of Madrid, Carlos de la Fuente Marcos and Raúl de la Fuente Marcos, studied the motion of the object and concluded that it will be caught in Earth’s orbit for a short period between September 29 and November 25. It will then fall back into the Sun’s orbit and continue its journey through the Solar System.
In other words, for a total of 56.6 days, Earth will have two moons (more precisely, one true moon and one minimoon).
The study notes that 2024 PT5 is “unlikely to be artificial,” meaning it’s probably not just a piece of space junk that could be mistaken for a minimoon. Researchers suggest it could be the Arjuna asteroid, a near-Earth object with an orbit similar to that of our planet. It is named after an ancient prince of the Kuru kingdom, located in present-day India, and a central character in the Hindu epic Mahabharata.
Unfortunately, you will hardly be able to see the minimoon. According to NASA’s JPL Small Body Database, 2024 PT5 has an absolute magnitude of 27.6, which is very faint and will not be visible in most amateur telescopes.
So-called minimoons have graced Earth with their family before – for example, asteroid 2022 NX1 in 1981. It quickly left our planet’s reach before returning as a minimoon in 2022. It is predicted that in 2051 it will again will return.
2024 PT5 is also expected to make several visits. The asteroid will return to Earth’s orbit in January 2025 before quickly leaving and returning again in 2055.
Illustrative Photo by Pixabay: https://www.pexels.com/photo/full-moon-during-night-time-53153/
On September 16 and 17, the residence of the Coptic Patriarch in the monastery “St. Bishoy’, Wadi el-Natrun (i.e. the Nitrian Valley), hosted a meeting of representatives of the Orthodox Churches of the world with the pre-Chalcedonian or ancient Eastern Orthodox Churches. This comes after a gap of about thirty-four years since the last meeting in 1990, under the late Coptic Patriarch Shenouda the Third. The purpose of the current meeting was to prepare the renewal of the dialogue between the two families of churches. During the meeting, the participants also discussed a number of religious and social issues in the field of church care and ministry under the motto “Christ’s love compels us” (2 Cor. 5:14).
Each church was represented by two members who were from Constantinople, Greece, Bulgaria, Russia, Romania, Cyprus, Jerusalem, Syria, Lebanon, Armenia, Poland, Egypt, Eritrea and Albania.
The meeting was opened with a welcome from Coptic Patriarch Theodore II and a message from Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, which was read by his representative, Metropolitan Emmanuel of Chalcedon.
The participants agreed to continue meetings and mutual visits in the next period in order to support the ministry of the Orthodox Churches and to address the social challenges affecting the Christian family in all its forms. The co-chairs will visit the churches in the various countries and will inform them of the results of the theological dialogue at this time.
The resumption of the Orthodox-pre-Chalcedonian theological dialogue comes after the interruption of the dialogue between the Copts and the Roman Catholics, which was announced by the Coptic Church with its decision of March 2024. As a reason, the Copts highlighted the admission of a form of blessing of same-sex couples by the Roman Catholic Church.
This theme also found a place in the joint communique after the end of the meeting, in which the representatives of the Orthodox Church and the Pre-Chalcedonian Churches stated: “Our church families perceive the indissoluble and loving union between a man and a woman in holy marriage as a “great mystery” (Eph. . 5:32), reflecting the relationship between Christ and the Church, in contrast to some modern approaches to marriage. From this union arises the family, which is seen as the only basis for the birth and upbringing of children according to the divine plan. That is why our churches consider the family as a “small church” and provide it with appropriate pastoral care and support.
Our churches categorically reject the justification of same-sex relations within the framework of so-called “absolute human freedom” that causes harm to humanity. Our churches, by affirming their full faith in human rights and freedom, also affirm that the freedom of the created is not absolute to the extent of transgressing and violating the Creator’s commandments.
The communique also noted the common celebration of Passover next year: “As 2025 marks the seventeen hundredth anniversary of the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea, and Christians around the world will celebrate Passover on the same date, the representatives of both families expressed their desire that all Christians around the world celebrate Easter following the canonical tradition of Nicaea and the Orthodox Paschalia”.
The Ministry of Justice of Finland approved last week a law that prohibits the sale of real estate to citizens who endanger the independence of Finland.
The document signed by the Minister of the Supreme Court has already been published.
The document says that the main purpose is to protect the national identity of Finland. For the preparation of the legal proposal for the prohibition of foreigners to carry out transactions with Finnish real estate, it was officially announced at the end of August.
The restrictions will apply to the purchase in Finland not only of residential properties (apartments, houses), but also of agricultural lands, as well as land and office properties.
Exceptions will apply to Russian citizens living in Finland with a permanent residence visa. The ban will not lock in those with dual citizenship.
At the same time, it is known that the authorities in Latvia are considering the possibility of forbidding the freezing of real estate similar to that in Finland. This is the latest message from the news portal Delphi.
Illustrative Photo by Paul Theodor Oja: https://www.pexels.com/photo/view-of-colorful-houses-in-the-city-of-porvoo-finland-3493651/
The majestic building stands menacingly on the edge of the cliffs, its frescoes faded and distorted. The facade shows the deep traces of time and when the spires are enveloped by clouds, the monastery looks like an apparition.
Sumela rises 1200 meters above sea level and is located in Altendere Park. Although it is only about 50 kilometers from the Black Sea city of Trabzon, the monastery is not overly popular.
How the “Holy Virgin Sumela” appeared is the subject of legends and outright myths.
One of them states that an icon of the Holy Virgin Mary, painted by the Apostle Luke himself, was lowered into the cave by two angels.
Somewhere in the 4th century, two monks read the omen and decided to found a monastery right in front of this same cave, and gradually a whole complex sprung up there.
In the heart of the monastery is the so-called Rock Church, which is as if dug into the rocks. Over time, chapels, cells, common rooms, an aqueduct and others were built around it.
All this has experienced a dizzying change of eras – from the collapse of the Roman Empire, through the Byzantine Empire and the Ottoman rule, to Turkey‘s struggles for independence.
Some of the frescoes are badly damaged – in one place Saint John has no hand, in another Jesus is faceless, in a third there are vandalized inscriptions on the frescoes.
Again, myths say that because of some mystical power, the Ottomans spared “Sumela” and left the monastery intact during their invasion.
The latter, however, is more likely due to the location of the monastery complex, which made the invaders not hang it. It is a fact that in the 18th century the monks were calm enough for the monastery to paint a huge part of its walls with the frescoes that are still visible today.
The crisis for “Sumela” came in the 1920s, when after the First World War the monks left the monastery in panic.
Massive migrations due to the military conflict did not pass the region and the priests fled to Greece, but not before burying a large part of the valuables in secret places around the monastery.
After that, “Sumela” was attacked by vandals, deceived by the rumors of what untold riches the monastery hides. Valuables were never found, but a significant part of the unique frescoes were damaged, the altars were broken, and the cells of the priests were insulted.
In 1970, however, the Turkish Ministry of Culture turned its attention to Sumela and began the first restoration program. In the 1980s, symbolically, on the Great Mother of God, the monastery officially began to receive pilgrims and tourists again.
The restoration works are still ongoing because the frescoes are many and complex. The only images that are completely spared are those of the Virgin Mary, because she is considered a holy figure in Islam as well.
The monastery can be reached from Trabzon by private transport or by one of the organized buses. Entrance is 20 euros, and “Sumela” is open for visits and prayers all year round.
Amulets were consecrated on September 16 in the main temple of the Russian Armed Forces. They are called “Seals of Purity”, contain Psalm 90 and will be sent to the Russian military in Ukraine, the manufacturers boasted.
The “Seals of Purity” were made by the famous artist Dmitry Sever, “in the style of church calligraphy”, in four versions – “normal” and camouflage.
Fans of computer games immediately recognized in military amulets a replica of the red sheets with wax seals that are attached to the armor of the “Angels of Death” – space marines from the popular game Warhammer 40k.
In-game Seals of Purity are described as: “The perfect accessory for fans of the Warhammer 40K universe. These are metal or wax seals used to attach strips of parchment to the armor of a war machine or infantryman. These seals show the piety and purity of the faith of their bearer. Seals of Purity are perhaps the most common award in the Imperium and are found in all armies loyal to the Throne. Every day thousands of people, at the discretion of the missionaries and the blessed cardinals, receive this high honor”.
The makers of the amulets claim to have been inspired by the computer game and its ‘Seals of Purity’ as they believe that ‘Russian soldiers in the Special Military Operation Zone are the world’s brightest warriors who fight the forces of chaos’. They also produced titanium icons “Spas Neraktoverten” (the image of the Savior not made by hands or the so-called tablecloth), which were also sent to the front.
The Orthodox Church in principle forbids the creation of amulets, regardless of what texts are written on them, and defines their creation and use as paganism.
The stones and cracks in the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem were cleaned of the thousands of notes with prayers and wishes left by the faithful, called “Messages to God”. The procedure is performed twice a year under the supervision of the chief rabbi. Now the occasion is the Jewish New Year, and so a place will be made for the new notes, which will be left in the holiest place for the Jews.
Shmuel Rabinovitch, who is the chief rabbi of the Western Wall and Israel’s holy sites, emphasized that this year’s notes “were soaked in tears.”
The messages collected after the cleaning will be buried with a special ritual on the Mount of Olives near the city, as tradition dictates. Offering a prayer through a note that is placed between the stones of the Wailing Wall dates back centuries. Visitors from all over the world take advantage of the opportunity to have their requests heard.
The Western Wall, or the Western Wall as it is also known, is one of the symbols of Judaism and one of the most visited sights in Israel. It is a legacy of the Second Temple in Jerusalem, which it reminds of. The temple was destroyed in the 1st century, but the Wailing Wall maintains its sanctity among the faithful.
The name “Wailing Wall”, and descriptions such as “wailing place”, appeared regularly in English literature during the 19th century. The name Mur des Lamentations was used in French and Klagemauer in German. This description stemmed from the Jewish practice of coming to the site to mourn and bemoan the destruction of the Temple and the loss of national freedom it symbolized.
Muslims have associated the name Al-Buraq with the wall at least since the 1860s.
Source: “Reuters”
Photo: Engraving of the Western Wall., 1850 by Rabbi Joseph Schwarz.
“People in Gaza are facing yet another peril: Hepatitis A is spreading including among children,” Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency that assists Palestine refugees, UNRWA, wrote on social media.
Since the start of the war last October, UNRWA shelters and clinics have reported 40,000 cases of the disease, he said, compared to only 85 in the same period before conflict erupted, representing “a frightening increase”.
Hepatitis A is an inflammation of the liver caused by a virus of the same name that is transmitted through ingestion of contaminated food and water, or through direct contact with an infectious person.
The accumulation of waste is posing a health hazard in Gaza.
“The waste management system in Gaza has collapsed. Piles of trash are accumulating in the scorching summer heat. Sewage discharges on the streets while people queue for hours just to go to the toilets,” said Mr. Lazzarini. When combined, they “make a dangerous recipe for diseases to spread”.
Humanitarians are also preparing for the worst-case scenario of a polio outbreak following the recent discovery of the disease in sewage samples.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said earlier this week that although efforts are ongoing to acquire vaccines, it is not enough just to get them across the border.
WHO called for a ceasefire and at the very least, clear roads and safe access to allow partners to reach every person in Gaza with the necessary vaccinations.
Access impediments
Meanwhile, humanitarians continue to face impediments to aid delivery, including continued hostilities, unexploded ordnance, damaged and impassable roads, attacks on aid convoys, a lack of public order and safety, and not enough border crossings.
The Israeli authorities also continue to impose restrictions on the entry of certain humanitarian supplies into the enclave.
“These factors continue to significantly hinder the entry of aid into Gaza and the delivery of aid and basic services to hundreds of thousands of people across the Strip,” the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said.
In July, Israel facilitated just 67 out of 157 aid missions planned to northern Gaza. The others “were either denied, impeded or canceled due to security, logistical or operational reasons,” OCHA added.
‘Tragic and devastating milestone’
This week marked “a tragic and devastating milestone’ for UNRWA as the number of staff killed since the war began rose to 202, Mr. Lazzarini said in a statement on Monday.
This is the largest number of UN personnel killed in a single conflict since the Organization was established in 1945.
He said these fallen colleagues were teachers, doctors, nurses, social workers, engineers, support staff, logisticians, and technology and communications workers.
Most “were killed with their families at home or in a place they thought would be safe”, while several lost their lives in the line of duty, providing humanitarian assistance to people in need.
“I echo the call from the Secretary General: the UN will spare no effort to demand accountability for the deaths of our staff,” he said.
“Over the coming weeks, we will find several occasions to mark this somber memory of our fallen colleagues.”
The starting point was a personal revenge by an academic who got a suspended sentence of four months in prison for harassment
On 28 November 2023, just after 6 a.m., a SWAT team of around 175 policemen wearing black masks, helmets, and bullet proof vests, simultaneously descended on eight separate houses and apartments in and around Paris but also in Nice. They were brandishing semi-automatic rifles, shouting, making very loud noises, crashing doors and putting everything upside down.
For comparison, in late August 2024, the French anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office engaged about 200 police officers to hunt a suspect who had tried to set a synagogue ablaze in the southern French city of la Grande-Motte and caused an explosion wounding a police officer and destroying several cars nearby.
The November 2023 raids were not an operation against a terrorist or armed group or a drug cartel. It was a raid targeting eight private places mainly used by peaceful Romanian yoga practitioners.
Most of them had chosen to combine the pleasant with the useful in France: to practice yoga and meditation in villas or apartments kindly and freely put at their disposal by their owners or tenants who were mainly yoga practitioners of Romanian origin and at the same time to enjoy picturesque natural or other environments.
The first objective of the operation was to arrest people involved in “trafficking in human beings”, “forcible confinement” and “abuse of vulnerability” in organized gang. The second objective was to save victims of these illegal activities but there were no such victims.
About 50 of them happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time and had nothing to do with the search warrant justifying the operation. At any rate, they were victims of the police intervention as they were kept in custody in inhuman and humiliating conditions for two days and two nights, or more in some cases, for interrogations. Human Rights Without Frontiers interviewed about 20 victims of the police raids and abuses, in particular in Villiers-sur-Marne, Buthiers and Vitry-sur-Seine. None of them and others was interviewed by the French media.
The Romanian yoga practitioners were not treated with the same respect and humanity as Pavel Durov, the big boss of the famous social media Telegram, when he was arrested at the end of August 2024, getting off his private jet in Paris. After four days of police custody and interrogation, he was released on bail despite 12 serious charges – child pornography, complicity in all sorts of arms and drug trafficking for willfully failing to regulate Telegram according to the French law. The authorities put him under judicial control at the risk of letting him escape as the Lebanese businessman Carlos Ghosn managed to do by concealing himself inside a large box shipped as freight on a private jet while he was under house arrest in Japan awaiting trial in 2019. Double standards. “Depending on whether you are powerful or miserable, the court judgments will make you white or black…,” wrote the famous French writer La Fontaine in one of his numerous fables.
The testimonies collected by Human Rights Without Frontiers about the inhuman and humilitating conditions of the custody of the Romanian yoga practitioners detained and interrogated by the French police after the November 2023 raids were confirmed by a Canadian researcher: Susan J. Palmer, an Affiliate Professor in the Religions and Cultures Department at Concordia University in Montreal who is also directing the Children on Sectarian Religions and State Control project at McGill University. She published her own findings after interviewing in Romania the yoga practitioners who had been arrested and kept in custody in France: The Police Raids Against MISA in France: Conflicting Narratives – MISA Students Tell Their Stories – The Yogis’ Complaints About The Police – The MIVILUDES Behind The Raids.
The question raised by this paper is “What is the origin of such a disproportionate police operation targeting yoga practitioners?”
At the origin, a university researcher sentenced for harassment against a female colleague
According to the French media, the story of the widescale police raids targeting yoga practitioners started with a University of Angers medical researcher called Hugues Gascan.
His peer-reviewed publications in scholarly journal shows that he is an esteemed scientist, said Massimo Introvigne in Bitter Winter. Some of his earlier articles were co-authored with a female colleague, P.J., and others.
At one stage, a dissent emerged between Gascan and P.J. about alternative therapies for cancer and perhaps other matters as well. Gascan accused P.J. of being influenced by her participation in a “cult” led by a Canadian teacher of tantric yoga.
The conflict in the laboratory became so acute that the University of Angers in 2012 decided to close the research center where both Gascan and P.J. had worked. Gascan now presents himself as a victim of a “cultic infiltration” into his laboratory but court records tell a different story.
His female colleague P.J. filed criminal charges against him for “moral harassment” and had him sentenced in first instance, and on appeal, and finally by the Court of Cassation on May 14, 2013, which confirmed the suspended sentence of four months in prison. The term “harassment” was used 11 times in the final judgment.
According to the court decisions, he also harassed other employees of his laboratory. Several people in the university testified that they had personally been subjected to a similar pattern of denigration of their work, and to various forms of bullying which led to their isolation from the group and their removal from the department.
The judges noted as well that a forensic psychological examination of P.J. had confirmed she was in a good mental health, and that even the governmental anti-cult agency MIVILUDES, reported that no cultic deviances had been identified” in her behavior.
This experience seems to have developed a deep hatred of Tantric yoga groups in Gascan.
Gascan and MIVILUDES behind the massive police raids
After this failure, Gascan declared war on cults. In 2022 he created a small confidential anti-cult group of two persons called GéPS (Groupe d’étude du phénomène sectaire/ Study Group of the Cult Phenomenon). This ‘group’ was almost unknown until November 2023, has no website and no public report of activities but surfing on the anti-cult wave in France easily attracts the attention of the media in a positive way. It was a way for Gascan to bury in the sands of oblivion his judicial troubles and his suspended sentence of four months in prison, and to restore his personal public image.
He boasted in some French media, as Le Point and Nice-Matin, that for 10 years he had investigated the activities in France of the Romanian Tantric yoga group MISA founded by Gregorian Bivolaru who had been accused of using it for sexual abuse. Moreover, he claimed that he had provided testimonies and his research documents to the governmental anti-cult agency MIVILUDES (Interministerial Mission of Vigilance and Combat against Cultic Drifts) but they never emerged in any trial. His thunderous declarations earned him the pinnacle of certain media outlets in search of sensationalism as “The man who brought down MISA.”
According to him, the then president of MIVILUDES, Hanène Romdhane, transferred his reports to Claire Lebas of the Cellule d’assistance et d’intervention en matière de dérives sectaires/ Assistance and intervention unit with regard to cultic deviances (Caimades) and from there to Major Franck Dannerolle, head of the Office central pour la répression des violences aux personnes/ Head office for the repression of violence against persons (OCRVP). The result was the police raids of 28 November 2023 on eight separate houses and apartments in and around Paris but also in Nice, Gascan said.
While readers of French media are led to believe that this operation was the result of a Sherlock-Holmes-like work by GéPS, the sensational stories and accusations that he shared with some journalists had been known for years by the French authorities. At this stage, the accusations of trafficking in human beings and sexual abuse of foreign women have never been confirmed by any court decision in Europe.
Moreover, two scholars have investigated the testimonies of so-called victims of sexual abuse and have highlighted their unreliability: the Italian scholar Massimo Introvigne in his book Sacred Eroticism: Tantra and Eros in the Movement for Spiritual Integration into the Absolute (MISA) (Milan and Udine: Mimesis International, 2022) and the late Swedish scholar Liselotte Frisk in her research the case of Finnish women claiming to have been victims
Surprisingly for the 175 policemen wearing bullet-proof vests and armed with semi-automatic rifles, none of the women reportedly ‘liberated’ and interrogated by the police confirmed Gascan’s story but numerous women were victims of abusive police custody in humiliating and traumatizing conditions during which there were serious breaches of the law as Human Rights Without Frontiers brought to light throughout interviews of about 20 female yoga practitioners.
Whether Gascan’s fake story about the alleged trafficking and detention of several foreign women for sexual abuse in France really influenced the MIVILUDES and the French judicial authorities in the decision that was taken to launch such a huge operation finding no victim will only be verifiable if access to key administrative documents of the MIVILUDES is granted to researchers.
