Balkans blow-back in Britain. (Insider Report).It sounds like the plot of a bad made-for-television movie: Acting on a tip from tabloid reporters who had infiltrated an art theft ring, Scotland Yard foils a plot to kidnap a pop star and extort To compel or coerce, as in a confession or information, by any means serving to overcome the other's power of resistance, thus making the confession or admission involuntary. To gain by wrongful methods; to obtain in an unlawful manner, as in to compel payments by means of threats of a five million pound ransom from her soccer star husband. This is the improbable scenario that played out in England over the weekend of November 2nd-3rd. In a November 3rd raid, Scotland Yard nabbed nine people accused of conspiring to kidnap Victoria Beckham, formerly known as "Posh Spice" of the British pop group the Spice Girls. According to the police, the suspects planned to invade Beckham's home, sedate her with a chemical spray, and hold her for ransom at a location in Brixton, South London. The would-be kidnappers also planned to abduct abduct /ab·duct/ (ab-dukt´) to draw away from the median plane, or (the digits) from the axial line of a limb.abdu´cent ab·duct v. , if possible, the famous couple's two young sons -- three-year-old Brooklyn and newborn Romeo. Apart from the celebrity angle, what makes this thwarted kidnapping noteworthy is that it underscores the growing strength of Balkans crime syndicates in Britain. Several of the suspects in the Beckham conspiracy are from Romania, and at least one is Albanian. Tony Blair's socialist Labour government eagerly supported the 1999 NATO NATO: see North Atlantic Treaty Organization. NATO in full North Atlantic Treaty Organization International military alliance created to defend western Europe against a possible Soviet invasion. bombing of Yugoslavia There were two aerial bombings of Yugoslavia in history.
"The British Helsinki Human Rights Group The British Helsinki Human Rights Group is an Oxford-based non-governmental organization which monitors human rights in the 57 member states of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). predicted that UK support for Kosovan refugees would also open it up to offshoots of [KLA-linked] criminal gangs and, within two years, that prediction had shown itself to be true," commented The Herald of London on November 4th. "By 2001, the Albanian mafia had seized the Soho vice trade....The sheer scale of the alleged plan to kidnap Victoria Beckham for a ransom of 5m [pounds] suggests it may be further proof of the strength of such gangs in Britain....Although the alleged plot to kidnap Victoria Beckham would be the first time British-based Albanian gangs had been known to become involved in abductions, they are a very popular means of raising a supplementary income among the mafia and political groups in Kosovo." |
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