Month: October 2019

Lisbon, 22 Oct 2019 (Lusa) – New traffic and information signs, particularly to indicate areas of residence and traffic of vehicles with reduced pollutant emissions, will enter into force in April 2020.

The new regulation creates traffic signals indicating zones of residence or coexistence of vehicles and pedestrians, as well as zones of reduced emissions, where only cleaner vehicles can circulate.

Signs of danger include approaching a passage for cycling, warning that the track may be crossed by Iberian lynx and amphibians.

Already in the new signs of obligation we highlight those that indicate a compulsory road for motorcycles and a road reserved for vehicles with high occupancy rate.

Warning signs are also provided on road pavements of speed limits in places where “special hazard situations may occur”, in addition to existing vertical signs, in particular indicating a ban on driving above 30 kms per hour.

As for road markings, their dimensions have been introduced with a view to “their uniformity”.

“In response to social developments, new information signs, new tourist, geographical, ecological and cultural indication symbols are introduced, as well as new tables with the graphic representation of the signals of drivers, traffic regulators and the graphic representation of light signals. ”, Stresses the regulatory decree.

In the most significant changes made since 1998, traffic signals, traffic signals and drivers are distinguished, “making it clear that traffic signals include temporary signs and comprise vertical signs, markings road signs and traffic lights “.

The revision of the traffic signalling regulation aims “to improve and update road signs in accordance with the Road Code” and are in line with the National Strategic Road Safety Plan – PENSE 2020.

Amendments to the traffic signalling regulations, indicate that as of April 1, 2020, no new signs may be placed that do not comply with the rules now approved.

According to the Decree Regulation, road signs which do not comply with the amendments remain valid until they are replaced by the new signs now published and must be replaced by 1 January 2030.

Tthe National Authority for Medicines and Health Activities (Infarmed) has suspended the license to two distributors for illegal export of a drug and for “serious irregularities” in drug distribution activity and has filed nine infringement proceedings.

In a note sent to the Lusa agency,  Infarmed also says it has 10 other cases with additional investigations underway.

One of the distributors who had his license suspended was identified to market a medicine to the intra-Community market when it had been banned for public health reasons. The other had several serious irregularities during the distribution activity.

Infarmed recalls that since August, when the new legislation came into force that only allows exports of medicines to Europe if the Portuguese market is stocked, to avoid ruptures in pharmacies, 173 inspections have been made to several entities.

Among the entities inspected were 56 laboratories, 25 wholesale distributors and 92 pharmacies, covering mainly 157 medicines.

The National Medicines Authority explains that, among the various irregularities, it identified non-supply or unfair supply by pharmaceutical industry laboratories in situations of stock and non-fulfillment of pharmacy orders even when stock was available. medicines concerned in the stores of wholesale distributors.

It was also detected “the communication of faults to the National Association of Pharmacies (ANF), electronically, despite the existence, in some cases, a significant number of packages in stock in pharmacies,” explains the note.

Infarmed underlines that it has been developing various inspection and market surveillance actions, already in accordance with the new legal framework, “in order to verify the availability of medicines and to verify the fulfillment of the supply and dispensation obligations by the circuit entities. of the medicine ”.

Cited in the statement, Infarmed president Rui Santos Ivo points out that the problem is complex and “affects all European countries”, and the Medicines Authority “is doing everything to combat this phenomenon”.

“Infarmed will continue to act incisively to preserve the Portuguese’s confidence in the drug circuit and its stakeholders,” says the official.

 

 

The Government wants to “stop the scourge of domestic violence” and proposes in the Government Program presented today “to develop an integrated signalling system for potential victims and aggressors”.

Government  proposes to promote the integrated action of the education system, the health system, the police, the judiciary and other agents and to focus on primary prevention, particularly in schools, universities and health services, in order to avoid dating violence and all forms of gender violence.

Thus, it promises “to expand the National Domestic Violence Victims Support Network to ensure full coverage of the national territory, while offering increasingly specialized responses to the various cases of domestic and gender violence.

In the program released on Saturday 26^th October, the Government outlines the creation of a ”single point of contact for victims of domestic violence, where it is possible to address all issues, with guarantees of privacy and ensuring the monitoring and protection of victims”. .

“Unifying the Domestic Violence Database by establishing an information processing system that is based on a global and integrated view on homicides and other forms of violence against women and domestic violence” is another intention.

The Government admits “to consider the possibility, in the current constitutional framework, and through the analysis of comparative experiences, to realize an integrated judicial approach regarding the decision of criminal, tutelary and promotion and protection cases concerning the commission of crimes against victims. particularly vulnerable, in accordance with the recommendations of the Council of Europe’s Expert Group on Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence ”.

In the document, the Government also devotes a chapter to combating all forms of discrimination and strengthening the fight against racism and xenophobia and will create “an observatory of racism and xenophobia, as well as“ institutionally empowering the fight against racial discrimination in treatment. of migration issues ”

“Combat the direct and indirect segregation of Afro-descendant children and Roma children within the education system”, “create incentives to support young people from the Roma community for the continuation of their education in the 3rd cycle and secondary education, observing equality of gender ”are other intentions.

The Government also intends to “develop, within the framework of the 1st Law program, specific initiatives to support the integration and access of Roma and Afro-descendant communities to housing, in order to counteract phenomena of ethnic-racial ghettoization and to eradicate“ camps ”. and non-classical housing zones that exist throughout the country. ”

It also wants to “counteract the effects of residential segregation by promoting integrated resettlement initiatives and the provision of public services, particularly education, of heterogeneous territorial scope”.

The firefighters from the Alenquer Corporation, accused by the Public Prosecution Service (MP) of causing forest fires in Lisbon district, between 2017 and 2018, have appeared the Court of Loures on Tuesday (29^th October).

The prosecution of the MP, stated that the defendants, 21 and 24 years old – one of whom remains in pre-trial detention – were serving at the Alenquer Volunteer Firefighters Corporation. One volunteered in 2014 and May 2017, became a professional firefighter, while the other was a volunteer firefighter for the last six years.

The prosecution describes that, for reasons not fully established, the two firefighters decided to set fires in the municipality of Alenquer “to increase the response action to the fires by the Alenquer Volunteer Firemen.”

In some of the fires, one of the defendants acted alone and in the others acted in co-authorship.

Arriving at the locations, “armed with ignition devices such as lighters and combustion accelerators such as gas or gasoline,” one of the men stood behind the wheel of the vehicle, while the other “started the fire”.

“The locations chosen for the outbreak of the fires were hard to reach places, usually dirt roads in poor places, with limited traffic of vehicles or people, with easy access to easily inflammable undergrowth, underbrush and reeds, rich in combustible material ”, explains the MP.

The prosecution describes that the defendants allegedly setting off wildfires on the afternoon of September 7, 2017, at dawn on June 16, 2018 and on June 17, 2018, and there was an attempted fire in late July 2017

The two young men are accused by the MP of co-authoring four forest fire offenses in the consummate form and one forest fire offense in the attempted form.

One of the defendants is also responsible for two forest fire crimes, in the consummate form, and one aggravated forest fire crime, in the consummate form.

The judgment is scheduled to be read at 12:15.

 

A former Irish priest, considered one of the greatest paedophiles in the Catholic Church for admitting rape and sexual abuse to more than 20 children in the 1970s and 1980s, has been detained in the Algarve.

The person widely reported in the media as 74-year-old Oliver O’Grady was being sought by the Irish authorities on suspicion of child pornography. Since late 2018, O “Grady lived in Loulé, in the Algarve hills, where he fled after a recurring crime. On Monday, he was located by inspectors from the Criminal Investigation Unit of the Judicial Police, who complied with the European Arrest Warrant.

O’Grady has a long history of sexual offenses against minors. In 1993, when he was a priest in California, USA, he was sentenced to 14 years in jail for crimes of sexual abuse. He served about half and was deported to Ireland. Then he moved to Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Despite his registration and not working in the Church, he worked as a volunteer in a parish of Rotterdam, where he organized children’s parties.

But the scale of O’Grady’s crimes was even greater and was not known until 2006, when the convicted paedophile admitted to having raped and abused more than 20 children in the documentary “Deliver us from evil”, which reported the crimes and the way the Church handled the case. It didn’t stop anyway. In 2010, he was again arrested. A computer was left on a plane and police found more than 280,000 images, six hours of videos and 500 pages of discussion about child pornography. He was sentenced to three years in jail.

In 2016, journalists found him living in Dublin, near a playground and schools. At the time, he said he avoided leaving when children were on the street and admitted, “Maybe I’m better off in a more secluded area.” The Irish authorities have kept an eye on him and believe he has relapsed.

Portugal’s Policia Judiciaria confirmed they arrested him on Monday.

They added: “The Irish national was wanted by the Irish authorities on suspicion of a crime of child pornography.

“He has been remanded in prison after a court appearance pending his handover to the Irish authorities.”

Lisbon, 26 Oct 2019 (Lusa) – The Government wants to make changes to the Aliens and Borders Service so that there is a “very clear” separation between the police and administrative functions of immigrant documentation, according to the executive program presented today.

“Without prejudice to a determined role in combating human trafficking networks or preventing terrorism, we must reconfigure the way public services deal with the phenomenon of immigration, adopting a more humanistic and less bureaucratic approach, in line with the objective, from regular and orderly attraction of labour to the performance of duties in different sectors of activity.

To this end, the Government will establish a very clear organic separation between the police functions and the administrative functions of permitting and documenting immigrants, ”reads the Government program.

Assuming that Portugal needs the “contribution of immigration” to its economic and demographic development, the program of the XXII Constitutional Government approved today by the Council of Ministers presents several measures to attract foreigners to the country and simplify procedures, aiming to create “formal migration channels, from the countries of origin and ensure that immigrants“ do not become undocumented or on the margins of the system ”.

In this sense, it wants to streamline and simplify the entry process, eliminate the employment quota system, anticipate a short-term temporary permit that allows immigrants to enter Portugal legally for the purpose of seeking employment, promote and modernize security conventions. Also to simplify and speed up the mechanisms of regularization of resident status, in addition to the implementation of regularization programs for foreign citizens, namely through proximity actions with the school community and deepening the SEF on the Move program.

The Government also announces that it wants to revise the residence permit for investment scheme, the so-called “gold visas”, which will “be directed preferentially to low density regions, investment in job creation and urban requalification and cultural heritage”. ”

Over the next four years, the executive intends to study “the implementation of a foreign citizen card equivalent to the citizen card, eliminating the duplication in the presentation of documents issued by public entities”.

According to the Government’s program, a mobile immigrant information and regularization service will be created in the Lisbon metropolitan area and in regions of the country with a high number of foreign workers and is intended to “simplify and shorten the procedures for renewal of residence permits. Portugal”.

In terms of immigration, the Government also wants to create a zone of mobility and freedom of residence between the countries of the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP) and launch programs to support the capture of qualified professionals and entrepreneurs in the technological areas. and of high added value, as well as promoting programs to support the attracting of foreign students and researchers by Portuguese higher education institutions, namely in the interior regions.

The XXII Constitutional Government Program approved today by the Council of Ministers has a structure similar to that of the PS electoral program, but different from the traditional thematic organization by ministries that characterized other executives’ programs.

Following approval by the Council of Ministers this afternoon, the Government’s program was sent electronically to the Assembly of the Republic and, as decided at a conference of leaders, will be discussed between Wednesday and Thursday in the Assembly of the Republic – calendar which deserved the disagreement of the PSD.

A third of the forest fires recorded this year and investigated were caused by extensive burnings and burning of cut and piled debris, reveals the latest report from the Institute for Nature Conservation and Forests (ICNF).

The interim rural fire report for the period from 1 January to 15 October indicates that, to date, the most frequent causes in 2019 are “arson – attributable” (29%) and “burning of forest surplus together with burning of cut and piled debris which amount to 33% of the causes found.

The ICNF also states that re-ignitions of fires represent 10% of all causes found, lower than the average of the previous 10 years.

According to the agency, up to 15 October, 80% of rural fires were investigated, allowing the investigation to assign a cause to 65% of the fires.

The report notes that between January 1 and October 15, 2019, there were 10,841 rural fires resulting in 41,622 hectares (ha) of burned area, including forrest (21,163 ha), bush (15,782 ha) and agricultural area. (4,677 ha).

Data show that the number of fires and burned area in Portugal has declined this year for the second year in a row, the first time since 2009.

“Comparing the figures for 2019 with the history of the previous 10 years, it is noted that there were 46% fewer rural fires and 70% less burned area than the annual average of the period. The year 2019 presents, by October 15, the second smallest number of fires and the second smallest burnt area”.

ICNF also points out that September was the month with the highest number of rural fires (2,344), accounting for 22% of the total number recorded this year.

July was the month with the largest burned area this year, with 14,034 hectares (34% of this year’s total burned area).

According to the ICNF, 85% of the fires that started a burned area of ​​less than one hectare by October 15, and so far there have been two fires with a burned area greater than or equal to 1,000 hectares.

The fire that occurred on July 20 in the municipality of Vila de Rei, in the district of Castelo Branco, was the largest in terms of burned area – 9,249 hectares, followed by the fire that occurred in the municipality of Águeda (Aveiro), with 1,633 hectares.

The ICNF points out that up to 15 October there were 62 “major fires”, namely those of a burned air of 100 hectares or more.

The ICNF also indicates that the largest number of fires occurred in the districts of Porto (1,843), Aveiro (924) and Braga (912), but most of them were small and do not exceed one hectare of burned area.

The Azores PSP Regional Command, through the Ponta Delgada Police Division Criminal Investigation Squad, on 9 October, arrested 2 suspects in the act of committing drug trafficking, having been seized 30 pounds of hashish.

Following investigations carried out by the Anticrime Brigade of the Ponta Delgada Criminal Investigation Police Station, which had been going on for some time and which has intensified over the past week, it was possible to detect and apprehend in Arrifes parish, 30 kgs of hashish, which were cut into small portions and would be sufficient for approximately 60,000 individual doses for consumption.

It was estimated that this would have a street value in the order of 100,000 euros.

Following the first judicial interrogation to which the detainees were subjected, pre-trial measures were applied to both defendants, and one of them will await the further terms of the pre-trial detention process.

Several police officers from the Ponta Delgada Police Division Criminal Investigation Squad were engaged in this operation with the close collaboration of the Cinotécnico Operational Group belonging to the High Force of the Special Police Unit in the Azores.

The Coastal Control Unit, through the Olhão Coastal Control Sub-Detachment, on Wednesday, October 16, seized 270 kilos of bivalves, estimated at 1280 euros, in Olhão and Quarteira.

As part of a surveillance and patrolling action aimed at preserving marine species and safeguarding fauna and flora on the island of Culatra, the military detected 224 kilos of shell captured in a prohibited area and was immediately seized.

Following the action, two men of 46 and 48 years were identified, and the respective case records were prepared, with a fine of up to 37,500 euros.

In the same morning, in the town of Quarteira, the military seized 17 kilos of shellfish, 13 kilos of mussel, 7 kilos of oyster, 5 kilos of Japanese clam and 4 kilos of cockles for being placed on the retail market for sale to bulk, without having passed a dispatch center.

Two men of 30 and 32 years old were identified and the respective infraction notice was issued, punishable with a fine up to 25000 euros. The bivalves, being alive, were returned to their natural habitat.

GNR warns that ingestion of contaminated bivalves can cause serious health problems as bivalve molluscs are filter-feeding organisms that have the ability to accumulate various toxic contaminants in their tissues.

GNR of Castelo Branco have announced that it has recovered a piece of sacred art, stolen 21 years ago, from the Ponsul riverbed, close to the Lentiscais Bridge.

In a statement, the GNR Castelo Branco Territorial Command explains that the recovery of the sacred art piece, missing 21 years ago, took place on Tuesday.

“With the reduction of flow in the river Ponsul, the military was alerted by a member of the public of the appearance of an ‘alminha’, near the Lentiscais bridge, which had been stolen from the parish of Louriçal do Campo

He also said that the Mountain Sub-Grouping of the GNR Emergency Protection and Relief Unit was deployed and collected the sacred piece of art weighing more than one hundred kilos , through a recovery action made from the bridge deck. .

“The piece was handed over to its rightful owner, the parish council of Louriçal do Campo (Castelo Branco), which will proceed with its restoration and replacement in its original location,” says GNR.

Portugal is the only country in the world that has its cultural heritage, usually located on the edge of rural roads and at crossroads, the alminhas, popular representations of the souls of Purgatory that beg for prayers and alms.

Often, they appear in small, patterned, independent niches or embedded in walls or in church corners, tile panels, or other independent structures.