World May Soon Face Lost Decade of Low Economic Growth
Chief Economist Indermit Gill noted several challenges to global economic growth, but the Washington, DC-based financial institution is often seen as a tool of Western interests.
The end of 2024 is likely to conclude the slowest half-decade of economic growth in 30 years, according to new analysis from the World Bank.
The report, entitled “Global Economic Prospects,” was released online by the Western financial institution Tuesday. A number of continued economic headwinds were identified by World Bank Group Senior Vice President Indermit Gill, including “tight monetary policies, restrictive credit conditions, and anemic global trade and investment.”
The report also spotlighted the recent conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine – coercive Western sanctions on Russia have increased energy prices worldwide.
“Global cooperation is critical to address the issues of high debt, climate change, trade fragmentation, and food insecurity and conflict,” read an overview on the World Bank’s website. “Across emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs), limited fiscal space highlights the need to improve spending efficiency. Decisive policy action is also needed to encourage a sustained acceleration in investment.”
World economic growth is expected to slow for the third year in a row according to the report, down to 2.4% from 2.3% in 2023. This comes after a steep decline amidst the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, which was followed by a partial recovery in 2021.
But the damage wrought by the global pandemic remains, according to the analysis. About a quarter of people in developing countries and 40% of people in low-income countries will remain poorer in 2024 than they were before the emergence of COVID-19.
The World Bank predicted developing economies would face the greatest challenges. Latin America and the Caribbean would perform slightly better than average, with the most significant growth to come from the Middle East and Africa. North America, Europe, Central Asia, and the Asia-Pacific would see the greatest declines in growth according to the financial institution.
“Near-term growth will remain weak, leaving many developing countries – especially the poorest – stuck in a trap: with paralyzing levels of debt and tenuous access to food for nearly one out of every three people,” said Gill, who studied at the University of Chicago, a school famous for its advocacy of neoliberal economic policy around the globe.
The World Bank has often been criticized for exactly that kind of free market evangelism. Observers suggest the institution’s advocacy of austerity and privatization actually prioritizes economic opportunity for transnational capital over genuine foreign development.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank’s sister institution, is often accused of predatory behavior in saddling developing countries with large amounts of debt, necessitating further privatization.
Gill suggests he’s very much a champion of neoliberal economics in his forward to the World Bank’s report, which praises “consolidation of government finances” and “a better investment climate for private enterprise.”
Every president of the World Bank since its creation in the 1940s has been an American citizen while its managing director has always been European (usually French or German). Critics say the institution’s leadership symbolizes its Western neocolonial role.
A few years back, the World Bank was forced to recognize strong poverty reduction and economic growth in Bolivia, where socialist President Evo Morales succeeded by defying the kind of policy generally imposed by the IMF and World Bank. Bolivia has been recognized for presiding over the lowest inflation in the region and some of the lowest in the world with strongly interventionary government policy.
Over the last decades, socialist China has played the largest role in global poverty reduction, pulling some 800 million people out of poverty.
The NWO’s 2024 Black Swan Tell
Hostage Crisis at Ecuador’s TV Station Ends
The hostage crisis at a TV station in Ecuador’s largest city, Guayaquil, has ended with all assailants detained and captives rescued, national police chief Cesar Augusto Zapata Correa announced on Tuesday evening.
Masked gunmen invaded the headquarters of TC Television earlier that day, interrupting a live broadcast and taking journalists and other employees captive. The assault took place amid the national emergency declared by President Daniel Noboa in response to prison riots and attacks by gang members that swept the country on Tuesday.
Heavily armed security forces quickly arrived at the scene and entered the TV station building, detaining 13 assailants and recovering “weapons, explosives and other evidence,” Zapata Correa said. He added that all hostages were freed. He did not report any casualties.
El operativo policial en @tctelevision dejó 13 aprehendidos, armas, explosivos y otros indicios.
— GraD. César Augusto Zapata Correa (@CmdtPoliciaEc) January 9, 2024
Se liberaron a los rehenes y se puso a buen recaudo a los trabajadores.
Los causantes serán puestos ante la justicia para que sean sancionados por los actos terroristas. pic.twitter.com/9KEXWvDfzZ
“The perpetrators will be brought to justice in order to be punished for their terrorist acts,” the police chief wrote on X (formerly Twitter), vowing that law enforcement “will not allow violent actions to threaten order and peace.”
A video posted to social media shows police escorting detainees out of the building.
???#BREAKING: Footage of police escorting arrested cartel members out of the Ecuadorian Television studio. https://t.co/4LHe4d9s3O pic.twitter.com/7to25mVIus
— Censored Men (@CensoredMen) January 9, 2024
The freed employees were filmed hugging their loved ones and praying outside the TV headquarters.
??? Video of some of the freed hostages meeting their loved ones ♥️ pic.twitter.com/vJZDrU16be
— Censored Men (@CensoredMen) January 9, 2024
At least eight people were killed and two were injured in Guayaquil on Tuesday, Mayor Aquiles Alvarez said at a press conference. President Noboa earlier authorized the military to neutralize criminal gangs he described as “terrorist organizations and belligerent non-state actors.”
BREAKING: UN Planning New Pandemic To Establish Planetary Dictatorship
Illegal Aliens Tried Buying Guns 48,000 Times In 25 Years
Over the past 25 years, illegal aliens have attempted to purchase firearms at gun shops just under 48,000 times – only to be denied, according to a group that monitors border security policy.
The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) reported on Jan. 2 that the FBI has nearly 14 million records of firearms applications that failed a national background check due to “unique prohibiting events.” Of those, 47,930 denials were issued to illegal aliens according to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) between Nov. 1998 and Nov. 2023.
“While the 13.9 million unique prohibiting events cataloged in the FBI database represent events—not individual illegal aliens—the data point to large numbers of migrants in the market for firearms. Whatever the total may be, one is one too many,” according to FAIR, which added that “the dangers posed by largely unvetted illegal aliens possessing firearms has been vastly exacerbated over the past three years, as the Biden administration has presided over record numbers of new illegal aliens entering our country.”
“At the same time, federal policies and the proliferation of sanctuary jurisdictions that prohibit the sharing of critical law enforcement information will inevitably result in more Americans falling prey to criminal aliens.”:
Meanwhile, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported the seizure of 547,610 illegal weapons in 2023 alone, including ammunition, gun parts, scopes, silencers and body armor, the Epoch Times reports. In 2022, there were 1,147,497 weapons seizures.
“We’ve got plenty of laws; criminals are criminals,” Arizona gun shop owner Charlie Bollenbaugh told the outlet. “They’re going to find ways around them.”
Mr. Bollenbaugh added that there’s “no real way of telling” who is a U.S. citizen the moment they walk through the door to purchase a gun.
But there is a legal process to weed out the ineligible buyers, he said.
In Arizona, as in other states, the gun buyer must first show a valid state driver’s license or government-issued photo ID along with proof of age and residency and have no felony convictions.
Federal law requires that each buyer fill out and sign a Form 4473 national background check under penalty of perjury. The form is submitted by the gun store electronically through the NICBS, and the results are known within minutes. -Epoch Times
“If they are legally allowed to purchase a firearm, and they’ve come here correctly, the government tells me to go ahead and proceed,” Bollenbaugh told the Times. “They can’t buy a firearm without going through a valid background check and presenting a government-issued ID.”
More via the Epoch Times;
In 2019, the Democrat-controlled U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that mandated federal background checks for all legal firearms sales and transfers.
Included in the bill was a Republican-sponsored amendment that would have required gun dealers to report to federal immigration when an illegal alien attempted to purchase a firearm.
The provision failed passage in the Senate in a heavily partisan vote.
“In rejecting this amendment, the Democrats have shown their true colors,” said U.S. Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.), sponsor of the amendment, in a written statement after the vote.
“It is clear they are not interested in preventing gun violence or stopping the illegal purchase of firearms, but rather they are only interested in limiting the rights of law-abiding citizens to advance their political agenda.”
In southern border states such as Texas, crime involving illegal aliens is a serious problem.
The DHS reported more than 422,000 criminal aliens were booked into Texas jails between June 1, 2011, and Dec. 31, 2023, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety (TDPS).
Nearly 300,000 were classified as illegal aliens by DHS.
The TDPS added that illegal aliens committed more than 509,000 criminal offenses, including homicide, burglary, drug offenses, theft, sex crimes, and kidnapping.
In the first few days of 2024, there were 3,104 noncitizen arrests by CBP, 48 involving weapons violations. In 2023, there were 15,267 arrests, with 307 for weapons offenses, according to CBP data.
Mr. Bollenbaugh said illegal gun purchases by criminals happen “all the time” despite serious efforts by law enforcement to track every firearm transaction and serial number in the United States.
He said it is illegal for a U.S. citizen to purchase a firearm for a person who is not authorized to own a gun, which includes illegal aliens.
A gun purchase by proxy is known as “straw purchase,” he said.
“The definition of a straw purchase is you are knowingly filling out the 4473 and background check because you know the person that wants the gun can’t obtain it legally,” Mr. Bollenbaugh said.
At MPP Guns in Phoenix, gun manager Henry Escobar said the rules are clear when purchasing a firearm.
“Our policy here is if you come in with more than one person—two or three people—we’re going to ask everybody for ID,” he said. “Even if they come in with an ID from another state, we’re going to turn them down.”
He said that many people enter the store simply to inquire about purchasing a gun.
“We ask if they’re a citizen, from out of state, or a permanent resident,” Mr. Escobar told The Epoch Times.
While federal background checks work for the most part, he said: “If they come in and lie saying they’re a U.S. citizen, and they fill out the form”—hopefully, “there’s a way for [the ATF] to catch that,” he said.
The NWO’s 2024 Black Swan Tell
US Defense Chief’s Hospitalization Scandal Reveals Biden Team’s ‘Total Incompetence’
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s failure to inform his own deputy and even President Joe Biden that he had been hospitalized and could not perform his duties for an extended period of time revealed the systematic incompetence of the entire Biden administration, former US defense officials told Sputnik.
Austin underwent an initial medical procedure on December 22 and then suffered severe pain on January 1 after which he was admitted to intensive care at Walter Reed military hospital in Maryland.
Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks assumed some of Austin’s duties on January 2, but she had no idea what had happened to him at that time. Hicks was only informed of his hospitalization on January 4.
The White House was also kept in the dark for four days about Austin’s condition. Air Force General C. Q. Brown, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was told on January 2 that Austin was hospitalized. But, for some reason, he failed to inform the White House, leaving the Defense Department leaderless while war raged in both Ukraine and between Israel and the Palestinians in Gaza.
Incompetence on All Levels
Retired CIA analyst Philip Giraldi, founder and chair of the Council for the National Interest, said the chaos, disorganization and incompetence extended well beyond Biden and Austin personally but throughout their entire administration.”The lack of competency … as far as I am concerned, extends throughout the entire Biden administration inner circle. We are in for a rough 2024!” Giraldi said.
Retired Pentagon analyst Chuck Spinney further noted that Deputy Defense Secretary Hicks had no scientific or engineering background, or the kind of military management that the Defense Department always needed.
“Hicks … has a PhD in political science, but no history of real scientific and engineering training and no experience in managing the subtle, technologically intensive, bureaucratically complex infighting strategies of the Pentagon’s bureaucracy – with its many hidden as well as obvious nodes of independent interests and informal power sharing relations,” Spinney said.
Because Hicks lacked so much necessary experience and expertise, putting her in charge, even if only temporarily, could have generated even more chaos and confusion in the US military establishment, Spinney said.
“Now ask yourself the question: Which would you prefer: Keeping an ineffectual Secretary of Defense’s incapacitating illness secret or putting a more incompetent Deputy Secretary of Defense with an ambitious penchant for pushing hair-brained techno visions in charge of a Pentagon that is already clearly out of control?” Spinney asked.
Biden might be better advised to leave the ailing Austin in titular charge of the US armed forces from his hospital bed rather than hand over leadership and control, even if only temporarily, to Hicks, Spinney said.
“Perhaps, like the White House, the lesser of two evils is to let the Pentagon run on autopilot instead of invoking the line of temporary succession,” Spinney added.
Former Assistant Defense Secretary for International Security Affairs Chas Freeman, who served in that post during the Clinton administration, agreed that the scandal revealed the incompetence of Austin and his inner circle. Asked whether this was an instance of their lack of capability to perform competently and responsibly, he asnwered, “You got it.”
Scandal During Time of Great Danger & Instability
Retired US Army Lt. Col. Earl Rasmussen, an international consultant and former vice president of the Eurasia Foundation, observed that the scandal had broken and embarrassed Biden and Austin at a time of great danger and instability in global affairs.
“[It is an] interesting and awkward situation. Especially in light of the complex global environment that we are heavily involved in,” Rasmussen said.
Many questions still remained to be answered, Rasmussen said.
“What was the procedure? What caused an emergency situation and subsequent admission to the hospital? Who was informed and at what level? What actions were in place to ensure Secretary Austin’s duties were being performed?” Rasmussen asked.
Typically, one would think that Hicks would have been informed prior to any type of procedure or absence, Rasmussen noted.
“In an emergency situation, such as what subsequently occurred, one would assume that either the Secretary or the Deputy Secretary would have at a minimum notified the President’s Chief of Staff and potentially other principles. … We still are left wondering about the transparency within this administration,” he said.
Both Austin and Hicks bore responsibility for the ignorance, lack of communication and chaos caused by the Defense Secretary’s unacknowledged extended absence, Rasmussen said.
“Is Secretary Austin responsible for the apparent lapse? Ultimately, yes. However, depending on the urgency of the situation, one could understand why he may have not been able to react accordingly. In that case, the Deputy Secretary had that responsibility and, one would assume, was in constant contact with the Secretary, health care providers at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center as well as the White House,” Rasmussen also said.
There needed to be a major review of processes and actions taken to resolve any gaps, Rasmussen added.
On Monday, the US Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Jack Reed acknowledged in an official statement that the incident was a serious one and he called for transparency and accountability in the Defense Department.
The NWO’s 2024 Black Swan Tell
Thieves Steal Car With Baby Inside From Posh Neighborhood in Nation’s Capital
A 4-month-old baby was dropped off outside a random home in Washington D.C. after thieves stole the car in which she was sitting over the weekend, authorities say.
The harrowing incident unfolded just after 6 p.m. on Friday evening in Georgetown, an upscale neighborhood in the nation’s capital.
The D.C. Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) received a 911 call from a woman saying her Jeep SUV had been stolen after she left it idling with her child inside.
*URGENT* MPD is searching for a stolen auto with a female 4-month-old inside. The vehicle is a white Jeep SUV with a missing gas cap door. The baby was wearing a pink snow suit. The vehicle was taken from the 3000 block of M Street, NW, at approximately 6:03 PM.
— DC Police Department (@DCPoliceDept) January 5, 2024
MPD reportedly made immediate preparations to launch a full-scale search that included air support.
However, approximately an hour later, an MPD officer was flagged down on Pennsylvania Avenue by a person reporting that a baby in a car seat had been found on a porch outside a nearby home.
The 4-month old was located safely.
— DC Police Department (@DCPoliceDept) January 6, 2024
The child was not injured and was reunited with her family, an MPD spokesman explained at a press conference.
The vehicle remained missing as of Saturday, according to the latest available updates.
MPD recorded 126 motor vehicle thefts through the first eight days of 2024, down slightly from 139 during the same period last year.
In 2023, 6,829 motor vehicle thefts were recorded in the nation’s capital, an increase of 82% from 2022.
InfoWars has been documenting the surge of crime across the United States, including carjackings, ‘street takeovers,’ smash-and-grab loot mobs, home invasions, and physical attacks on innocent victims.
The NWO’s 2024 Black Swan Tell
NYC Secret Tunnel Synagogue Linked To Child Sexual Abuse For 30 Years
The New York City Jewish Chabad secret tunnel temple has been linked to child sexual abuse for at least 30 years, which it refused to report to proper authorities. The Jewish Chabad movement, which dug […]
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