Peace and Justice Post

Maan News Agency, Aug. 17, 2011

CAIRO (AFP) — Egypt’s military, which faces growing condemnation for cracking down on critics, on Wednesday sentenced two men to six months in prison each for chanting anti-military slogans, a prosecution official said.

One of the men, 18-year-old activist Hassan Said, was arrested in a central Cairo square on August 2, a day after soldiers and police violently dispersed a weeks-long sit in by activists demanding a civilian government.

The second man was named as 23-year-old Karim Sayid but no further details about when he was arrested were available.

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Stephen Lendman, MWC News, Aug. 17, 2011

It begs the question why Israelis put up with lawless governance harming them as well as Palestinians. When will weeks of social injustice outrage arouse them to embrace universal equity?

Why haven’t Martin Luther King’s words hit home that, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” In Israel and Occupied Palestine, Arabs and Jews both are harmed. Injustice to anyone denies it to all.

Since the 1980s, destructive neoliberalism plagued Israel like the West. A race to the bottom followed, producing social injustice, inequality, and growing human need. Israelis finally reacted, demanding change, at the same time showing a hint of solidarity with Arab citizens, far more gravely impacted than themselves.

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A Joint Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission, REDRESS Trust UK, and Human Rights Alert, Manipur, India

A draconian legislation like the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 and the concept of democracy do not go together. While democracy nurture values of justice, equality and fraternity, laws like the AFSPA are synonymous with injustice, discrimination and hatred. A report that analyses the legislation’s complete incompatibility with India’s domestic and international human rights obligations is released today in India, Hong Kong and London. Human Rights Alert, a human rights organisation working in Manipur, India; REDRESS Trust, a human rights group based in London, UK; and the AHRC, a regional human rights body based in Hong Kong have jointly authored the report.

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By Eileen Fleming,  opednews.com, Aug. 18, 2011

I was eyewitness to that day when priests and nuns, atheists, anarchists and a clown were among the 23 arrested by the State and 13 by the Federal Government for nonviolently resisting Nuclear Weapons at the Y-12 Complex in Tennessee.

Federal charges were for trespassing-and I was tempted to join those who crossed under the wire fence as MEDIA when I saw the “photographer’ who had been very busy the preceding few hours snapping photos of our crowd of over 200 nuclear resisters who had come together two days prior for a weekend long celebration of 30 years of The Nuke Resister and Nukewatch.

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 Thomas C. Mountain, Foreign Policy Journal, August 17, 2011

Just exactly what influence Omar “The Secret Minister” Suleiman retains over the military junta that rules Egypt is a question of utmost importance for those who live on the banks of the Nile River. With a résumé including 20 years as head of Egyptian Intelligence, he is not someone anyone of those who helped bring about the downfall of Mubarak can afford to ignore.

He was the CIA’s go-to man when it came to doing the Agency’s dirty work in the Middle East, as well as being the liaison with Israel, and was reported to be in contact with Mossad on an almost daily basis.

Suleiman is infamous for enforcing the blockade of Gaza, saying he wanted the Palestinians there to “be hungry but not starving” in punishment for supporting Hamas; hungry as in a 40% level of malnutrition-related disability rates amongst Gaza’s children.

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Politicians take great umbrage when poor people violate property laws (as in the British riots) but the same leaders readily absolve themselves of guilt over much more serious crimes (like aggressive war in Iraq that killed hundreds of thousands). Such was the hypocrisy of British parliamentarian Jack Straw, writes Robin Beste.

By Robin Beste, Consortium News, August 15, 2011

Jack Straw, former foreign secretary in Tony Blair’s government, was quick to his feet, following British Prime Minister David Cameron’s speech on the UK riots in Parliament on Aug. 11.

“We need more prisons,” Straw told Cameron and the House of Commons.

He may get his wish, looking at some of the sentences that have already been handed down in the hundreds of cases rushed through emergency courts — no doubt at the government’s bidding, to show that instant retribution will take precedence over justice.

A mother of two, who was asleep at home during the riots, has been given a five-month jail sentence for accepting running shorts stolen by someone else. A 23-year-old student got six months for stealing a £3.50 case of water from a supermarket. A 43-year-old man is in jail pending sentence for stealing items worth £1 from a newsagent.

But, if Jack Straw is right and we need more prisons, he should be one of the first inmates, alongside Tony Blair, who he served so loyally throughout the 13 years of New Labour government.

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By William Pfaff, Tribune Media Services, Aug. 16, 2011

PARIS — Following the Second World War, people who had been involved with the American, British and other Allies’ “Jedburgh” teams supporting the European Resistance just before the Normandy landings, and the work of the British Special Operations Executive and the American Office of Strategic Services in Asia, were among those planning for the eventuality of a Soviet invasion of Western Europe.

We know now that this invasion never was a serious risk, either while Stalin was alive or after his death in 1953, but it was a threat that preoccupied governments in the West. Before the creation of NATO, a rudimentary “stay-behind” network of Europeans was developed to provide the nucleus for resistance following such an invasion. This was the work of the U.S. State Department-controlled Office of Policy Coordination, predecessor to the CIA, and British Intelligence’s MI9 department, which had run underground networks during the war. The U.S. part of the project was later assigned to the Defense Department. The operation was called “Gladio” (a Roman short sword) and remained secret until 1990. (In Italy and certain other countries, it had been corrupted by acquiring a right-wing conspiratorial political character.)

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By Gareth Porter, uruknet.info, Aug. 17, 2011

ISLAMABAD, Aug 16, 2011 (IPS) – Pakistani civilian and military leaders are insisting on an effective veto over which targets U.S. drone strikes hit, according to well-informed Pakistani military sources here. The sources, who met with IPS on condition that they not be identified, said that such veto power over the conduct of the drone war is a central element in a new Pakistani demand for a formal government-to-government agreement on the terms under which the United States and Pakistan will cooperate against insurgents in Pakistan. The basic government-to-government agreement now being demanded would be followed, the sources said, by more detailed agreements between U.S. and Pakistani military leaders and intelligence agencies. Continues >>

Socialist Worker, August 17, 2011

An artists’ portrayal of the Pueblo Revolt

IN AUGUST of 1680, the indigenous Pueblo nations of the Southwest accomplished something almost unique in the history of the European conquest of North America: they expelled their colonizers completely from their land and returned to self-rule.

In 1540, Francisco Vásquez de Coronado led the northward expansion of New Spain into what is now the American Southwest, followed by Don Juan de Oñate, who established the first Spanish colony in the region in 1598. With the colony came both Spanish soldiers to subjugate the indigenous populations to the Crown and Franciscan friars to convert them to Catholicism.

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AHRC, August 16, 2011

Urgent Appeal Case: AHRC-UAC-142-2011

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INDONESIA: Authorities cover up a journalist murder case

ISSUES: Freedom of expression; police negligence; impunity; prosecution system
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Dear friends,

Three police officers accused of the murder of journalist Ridwan Salamun have been acquitted. Ridwan Salamun was covering the communal clashes in Tual, Southeast Maluku in August last year as a camera man for SUN TV. The police officers witnessed the assault against Mr. Salamun but did nothing to prevent it, effectively consenting to the violence. In the subsequent examination, the prosecution refused to recognize Mr. Salamun’s capacity as a journalist during the clash. The case is currently in cassation at the Supreme Court. It follows a series of killings of journalists in Indonesia that have not been resolved by the authorities. (photo: Ridwan Salamun, source: SUN TV)

CASE NARRATIVE:

According to information the AHRC received from KontraS the Commission for the Disappeared and Victims of Violence, on 21 August 2010, at around 07.30 am, Ridwan Salamun, a cameraman of SUN TV was covering the clash between the inhabitants of neighbouring villages, Mangon and Banda Eli in Tual, Southeast Maluku. A group of villagers did not welcome his attempt to cover the event and struck him on the neck, back and thighs with machetes. Police who were watching the incident stood by and did nothing to halt the attack or assist the victim. Mr. Salamun was severely wounded and lay on the road side for approximately two hours before being evacuated by the community leader, Jhon Tamher to Kare hospital. Mr. Salamun died one hour later from his injuries.

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