Archive for the ‘Human rights’ Category

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

CIA destroyed 92 torture videos

March 3, 2009

By Jason Leopold | Consortiumnews.com, March 2, 2009

The CIA destroyed 92 videotapes – far more than previously known – to prevent disclosure of evidence revealing how the agency’s interrogators subjected “war on terror” detainees to waterboarding and other brutal methods, according to court documents filed by the Justice Department.

“The CIA can now identify the number of videotapes that were destroyed,” said a letter written by Acting U.S. Attorney Lev Dassin and filed in federal court in New York. “Ninety-two videotapes were destroyed.”

Previously, the CIA had disclosed that it had destroyed two videotapes and one audiotape of harsh interrogations of detainees. The tape destruction has been the subject of a year-long criminal investigation by John Durham, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia who was appointed special prosecutor last year by Attorney General Michael Mukasey.

In Monday’s filing, Dassin noted that a stay of a contempt motion filed by the ACLU seeking release of the tapes was allowed to expire on Feb. 28 without a request for a continuation – signaling that Durham’s investigation is now complete.

In January, Durham had indicated in a court filing that he expected to wrap up his probe by the end of February. The CIA has asked the court to give the agency until Friday to produce a list of all destroyed records, any memos relating to reconstruction of those records, and identification of witnesses who may have watched the videotapes before they were destroyed.

Dassin’s letter said some information sought by the ACLU may be classified or “protected from disclosure, such as the names of the CIA employees who viewed the videotapes.”

Dassin said the CIA “intends to produce all of the information requested to the court and to produce as much information as possible on the public record to the plaintiffs.”

Amrit Singh, a staff attorney with the ACLU, said the latest disclosure “provides further evidence for holding the CIA in contempt of court.”

“The large number of videotapes destroyed confirms that the agency engaged in a systemic attempt to hide evidence of its illegal interrogations and to evade the court’s order.” Singh said. “Our contempt motion has been pending in court for over a year now – it is time to hold the CIA accountable for its flagrant disregard for the rule of law.”

The videotaped interrogations, which were also withheld from the 9/11 Commission, were destroyed in November 2005 after The Washington Post published a story exposing the CIA’s use of so-called “black site” prisons overseas to interrogate terror suspects with techniques that were not legal on U.S. soil.

The Zubaydah Case

The Post’s story focused on alleged al-Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah and the harsh methods that the CIA used on him and other detainees. Abu Zubaydah was captured in Pakistan on March 28, 2002, and reportedly was whisked to a secret prison site in Thailand for interrogation.

Initially, Zubaydah was somewhat cooperative but later became tight-lipped when asked about alleged terrorist plots against the United States and the whereabouts of high-level al-Qaeda operatives.

In July 2002, a meeting was convened at the White House, where former White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, Justice Department attorney John Yoo, Vice President Dick Cheney, Cheney’s attorney David Addington, and unknown CIA officials discussed whether the CIA could interrogate Zubaydah more aggressively in order to get him to respond.

It was at this July 2002 meeting that Yoo, Gonzales and Addington gave the CIA the green light to use a wide variety of techniques, including waterboarding, on Zubaydah and other detainees at several secret prisons to “break” them and force them to cooperate with interrogators, according to an account published in Newsweek in late December 2003.

Less than a month after the meeting, on Aug. 1, 2002, Yoo drafted a memo to Gonzales that was signed by Jay Bybee, the assistant attorney general in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel. That memo declared that President Bush had the legal authority to allow CIA interrogators to employ harsh tactics to extract information from detainees.

Yoo’s memo – often called the “torture meme” – said Congress “may no more regulate the President’s ability to detain and interrogate enemy combatants than it may regulate his ability to direct troop movements on the battlefield.”

Michael Chertoff, then head of the Justice Department’s criminal division, reportedly advised the CIA General Counsel Scott Muller and his deputy, John Rizzo, that the Aug.  1, 2002, legal opinion protected CIA interrogators from prosecution if they used waterboarding or other harsh tactics.

In February 2005, during his Senate confirmation hearing to become Homeland Security secretary, Chertoff said he provided the CIA broad guidance in response to its questions about interrogation methods but never addressed the legality of specific techniques.

Bush Fixated

In the book The One Percent Doctrine, author Ron Suskind said Zubaydah was not the “high-value detainee” the CIA had claimed. Rather, Zubaydah was a minor player in the al-Qaeda organization, handling travel for associates and their families, Suskind wrote.

However, “Bush was fixated on how to get Zubaydah to tell us the truth,” Suskind wrote. Bush asked one CIA briefer, “Do some of these harsh methods really work?”

Zubaydah was strapped to a waterboard and, fearing imminent death, he spoke about a wide range of plots against a number of U.S. targets, such as shopping malls, the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty. Yet, Suskind wrote, the information Zubaydah provided under duress was not credible.

According to Suskind, Zubaydah’s captors soon discovered that their prisoner was mentally ill and knew nothing about terrorist operations or impending plots. That realization was “echoed at the top of CIA and was, of course, briefed to the President and Vice President,” Suskind wrote.

Still, in public statements, President Bush portrayed Zubaydah as “one of the top operatives plotting and planning death and destruction on the United States” and added: “So, the CIA used an alternative set of procedures” to get Zubaydah to talk.

The President did not want to “lose face” because he had stated his importance publicly, Suskind wrote.

Last year, Mukasey appointed U.S. Attorney Durham as special counsel to investigate whether the destruction of the CIA videotapes violated any laws, but did not give Durham the authority to probe whether the interrogation techniques themselves violated anti-torture laws.

In December 2008, Bush and Cheney both admitted in exit interviews that they authorized the waterboarding of Zubaydah and two other detainees.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers in January proposed expanding the scope of Durham’s investigation to include a broader review of the Bush administration’s interrogation policies.

Conyers said he urged Attorney General Eric Holder to “appoint a Special Counsel or expand the scope of the present investigation into CIA tape destruction to determine whether there were criminal violations committed pursuant to Bush administration policies that were undertaken under unreviewable war powers, including enhanced interrogation, extraordinary rendition, and warrantless domestic surveillance.”

The Senate Intelligence Committee, chaired by Democrat Dianne Feinstein, will soon conduct a secret investigation into the CIA’s interrogation program to determine whether the methods used against detainees worked, according to published reports.

Jason Leopold has launched his own Web site, The Public Record, at www.pubrecord.org.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Human rights, USA | Leave a Comment »

Peace in South Asia linked with Kashmir settlement: Shabbir Shah

March 3, 2009

Kashmir Media Watch, March 3, 2009

Srinagar, March 03 (KMS): In occupied Kashmir, the illegally detained senior leader of the All Parties Hurriyet Conference, Shabbir Ahmad Shah has said that peace will elude South Asia until the Kashmir dispute is resolved in accordance with Kashmiris’ aspirations.

Shabbir Ahmed Shah, in a statement issued from Srinagar Central Jail, said that the Kashmir dispute was the basic cause of tension between Pakistan and India. “The international community was evincing keen interest in Indo-Pak affairs after the neighbouring countries became nuclear powers as the Kashmir issue has become a potential threat to world peace,” he said.

The APHC leader strongly condemned the recent killing of two youth in Bomai by Indian troops and expressed solidarity with the families of deceased. He also articulated deep shock and outrage over the murder of Shabir Ahmad Sheikh of Maisuma and sympathised with his family.

Meanwhile, the APHC leaders, Zaffar Akbar Butt, Syed Salim Gilani and Abdul Rashid Untoo addressing public gatherings in Ganderbal, Budgam and Beerwah strongly condemned the human rights violations being perpetrated by Indian troops in occupied Kashmir. They also denounced the continued detention of a large number of pro-movement leaders and activists, demanding their immediate release. »

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in Human rights, India, Kashmir | Leave a Comment »

EGYPT: Solidarity With Gaza Brings Jail

March 3, 2009

By Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani | Inter Press Service

CAIRO, Mar 3 (IPS) – Magdi Hussein, secretary-general of Egypt’s suspended Socialist Labour Party, has been sentenced to two years in prison by a military tribunal. Hussein, along with two others, was charged with “infiltrating” into the Gaza Strip following Israel’s recent campaign against the coastal enclave.

Protests against his arrest continue to be ineffective.

“It was an illegitimate, vindictive sentence, for which there is no moral or legal excuse,” Gamal Fahmi, managing editor of opposition weekly Al-Arabi Al- Nassiri, and board member of the Egyptian Journalists Syndicate told IPS.

Hussein was arrested by Egyptian authorities Feb. 1 while returning to Egypt via the Rafah crossing, the sole transit point along Egypt’s 14-kilometre border with the Gaza Strip. Hussein was on his way back from a week-long visit to the territory, still reeling from Israel’s military campaign from Dec. 27 to Jan. 17.

“People are free to travel from one country to another,” Hussein told independent daily Al-Dustour shortly after his arrest. “When did it become a crime to visit our besieged Arab brethren?”

While in the Gaza Strip, governed by Palestinian resistance faction Hamas, Hussein witnessed the destruction wrought by Israel’s recent campaign, during which more than 1,300 Palestinians were killed, and infrastructure demolished. Hussein visited numerous bombed-out mosques and homes, as well as the badly damaged Palestinian parliament building, Gaza’s Islamic University and the Shifa Hospital, teeming with critically injured civilians.

While in Gaza, Hussein also spoke to the Hamas-run Al-Aqsa television channel and Sout al-Aqsa radio station. In live interviews, he criticised Egypt’s official stance vis-à-vis the conflict, particularly Egypt’s insistence on keeping the Rafah border crossing closed to both people and badly needed humanitarian aid.

Ever since Hamas wrested control of the strip in the summer of 2007, Egypt – like Israel – has kept its border with the territory sealed for the most part. Despite the increasingly desperate need for food, medicine and fuel supplies among Gaza’s roughly 1.5 million people, Egyptian authorities have continued to keep the border sealed both during and after the conflict.

Given the sensitive nature of the border area, which has come under frequent Israeli attack in recent weeks, Hussein’s expedition was not treated lightly by the authorities.

On Feb. 5, he was brought before a military tribunal in the canal city of Ismailiya on charges of “illicitly infiltrating across Egypt’s eastern border.” Independent daily Al-Bedeel reported the next day that Hussein’s lawyers had been banned from the courtroom and that his defence would be conducted by three state-appointed military attorneys.

In a second court session on Feb. 11, Hussein was slapped with a sentence of two years in prison in addition to a monetary fine. Outside the courtroom, security forces reportedly beat back dozens of Hussein’s supporters who had gathered to protest the harsh verdict.

One day earlier, two other activists – Ahmed Dumma and Ahmed Kemal Abdel-Aal – received one year in prison each on charges of “infiltrating” into the Gaza Strip.

On Feb. 12, the Journalists Syndicate organised a protest march in front of the syndicate’s Cairo headquarters to express its disapproval of the stiff sentencing.

“We strongly reject the trying of civilians before military courts,” Mohamed Abdel Qaddous, head of the syndicate’s freedoms committee, was quoted as saying by Al-Bedeel. “The committee will do whatever it can to secure Magdi’s release.”

According to Fahmi, the court’s accusations against the defendants have no basis in Egyptian law.

“There’s nothing in Egyptian law about ‘illicit infiltration’ over the borders,” he said. “Egyptians are frequently caught trying to immigrate to Europe illegally, and they are merely questioned and released – not sentenced to prison on charges of ‘infiltration’.”

Fahmi went on to say that, aside from a small protest march and a handful of angry statements, the Journalists Syndicate had done “nothing at all” to help Hussein, who was himself a syndicate board member from 1999 to 2003.

“Most of the syndicate’s board members are also members of the ruling National Democratic Party,” Fahmi said. “Their positions, therefore, generally reflect their affiliation to the regime rather than their loyalty to the syndicate or to their fellow journalists.”

The trial hardly represents Hussein’s first brush with the law. He was arrested twice in the past – in 1985 and 1991 – for organising protests against normalised relations with Israel and the first U.S.-led war against Iraq.

From 1987 to 1990, Hussein was an MP for Egypt’s Islamist-leaning Socialist Labour Party (SLP), established in 1978. In 1993, he became editor-in-chief of the party’s daily newspaper Al-Shaab. Four years later, Hussein was made party secretary-general.

In 2000, state authorities shut down Al-Shaab – after it ran a series of articles critical of high-level government officials – and officially suspended the SLP. Despite a number of subsequent administrative court rulings overturning the decision, the party has remained suspended, and Al-Shaab banned.

Even after the party’s suspension, however, Hussein continued to be a vocal critic of Egyptian state policy, especially as it pertained to the long-running Israel-Palestine dispute.

During Israel’s recent assault on the Gaza Strip, Hussein blasted the regime’s approach to the crisis, which he said favoured Israel at the expense of the Hamas-led Palestinian resistance. In the first days of the campaign, Hussein told IPS that there had been “indications” of Egyptian coordination with Israel in advance of the attack.

Hussein’s wife, Naglaa al-Qalioubi, told Al-Dustour that the harsh verdict represented “a settling of scores” between the government and her husband. “It also has to do with the fact that Magdi was planning to call for a peaceful march on Feb. 25 calling for (President Hosni) Mubarak to step down,” she was quoted as saying Feb. 12.

According to Fahmi, the stiff sentence constitutes a warning to other would- be Gaza sympathisers. “It was a message to others not to make any show of solidarity with the people of Gaza, the way Magdi did.”

The use of military tribunals is permitted under the terms of Egypt’s controversial 28-year-old emergency law. In 2007, a constitutional amendment gave the president the additional right to refer civilians to military courts if the case in question “has a bearing on Egypt’s national security.”

Last year, 40 members of the Egyptian Brotherhood opposition movement were brought before a military tribunal on charges of money laundering and promoting terrorism in a months-long trial that ended with stiff jail sentences for most of the defendants.

Tags:, , , , , , ,
Posted in Human rights, Palestine, Peace Movement | Leave a Comment »

Death Toll Continues to Rise in Sri Lanka

March 2, 2009

The Associated Press, March 1, 2009

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka – At least 10 Sri Lankan civilians were killed and dozens more wounded Sunday when artillery shells fell inside a government-designated “safe zone” in the heart of Tamil Tiger rebel territory, a health official said.

[Mumbai's Tamil community members hold placards during a protest rally in Mumbai, India, Sunday, March 1, 2009, demanding a cease-fire in Sri Lanka. (AP Photo/Rajanish Kakade)]Mumbai’s Tamil community members hold placards during a protest rally in Mumbai, India, Sunday, March 1, 2009, demanding a cease-fire in Sri Lanka. (AP Photo/Rajanish Kakade)

Government forces have driven the rebels from most of their strongholds in recent months and have boxed them into a tiny coastal territory in the northeast. A 7.5-mile (12-kilometer) -long “safe zone” serves as a haven for tens of thousands of civilians trapped inside rebel territory. Dr. Thurairaja Varatharajah said six people died at a makeshift hospital inside rebel territory, and he saw four more bodies scattered among the huts of displaced people.

He said 48 wounded civilians were also admitted to the hospital, which he runs out of a school. Many of the victims suffered burns from the exploding shells, Varatharajah said.

It was unclear who fired the shells. Varatharajah said they appeared to have come from an area where government forces are stationed.

The military and rebels did not comment. Government officials have repeatedly denied targeting civilians.

Humanitarian groups estimate that 200,000 people are trapped in the fighting zone and face the risk of being caught in the crossfire.

Top United Nations humanitarian officials urged the rebels Friday to allow civilians to flee the fighting, saying there are “credible reports” that some people trying to leave have been shot.

Tamil Tiger rebels have fought since 1983 to create an independent state for ethnic minority Tamils, who have suffered marginalization by successive governments controlled by ethnic majority Sinhalese.

More than 70,000 people have been killed in the violence.

© 2009 Associated Press

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in Commentary, Human rights | Leave a Comment »

Israel may face war crimes trials over Gaza

March 2, 2009

• International pressure grows over conflict

• Court looks at whether Palestinians can bring case

An injured Palestinian boy

A Palestinian man carries an injured boy into Shifa hospital in Gaza City during an Israeli attack on Gaza in January. Photograph: Khalil Hamra/AP

The international criminal court is considering whether the Palestinian Authority is “enough like a state” for it to bring a case alleging that Israeli troops committed war crimes in the recent assault on Gaza.

The deliberations would potentially open the way to putting Israeli military commanders in the dock at The Hague over the campaign, which claimed more than 1,300 lives, and set an important precedent for the court over what cases it can hear.

As part of the process the court’s head of jurisdictions, part of the office of the prosecutor, is examining every international agreement signed by the PA to decide whether it behaves – and is regarded by others – as operating like a state.

Following talks with the Arab League’s head, Amr Moussa, and senior PA officials, moves have accelerated inside the court to deliver a ruling on whether it may be able to insist on jurisdiction over alleged war crimes perpetrated in Gaza, with a decision from the prosecutor’s office expected within “months, not years”.

The issue arises because although the ICC potentially has “global jurisdiction” to investigate crimes which fall into its remit no matter where they were committed, Israel – despite having signed the Rome statute that founded the court and having expressed “deep sympathy” with the court’s goals – is not a party.

The ICC, which has 108 member states, has not so far recognised Palestine as a sovereign state or as a member.

The latest moves in The Hague come amid mounting international pressure on Israel and a growing recognition in Israeli government circles that it may eventually have to defend itself against war crimes allegations. The Guardian has also learned that a confidential inquiry by the International Committee of the Red Cross into the actions of Israel and Hamas during the recent conflict in Gaza is expected to accuse Israel of using “excessive force” – prohibited under the fourth Geneva convention.

The Red Cross has been collecting information for two parallel inquiries, one into the conduct of Israel and a second into Hamas, both of which will be presented in private to the parties involved.

In the case of Israel, the Red Cross is expected to highlight three areas of concern: the Israeli Defence Forces’ “use and choice of weapons in a complex and densely populated environment”; the issue of “proportionality”; and concerns over the IDF’s lack of distinction between combatants and non-combatants during Operation Cast Lead. Hamas is likely to be challenged over its use of civilian facilities as cover for its fighters; its summary executions and kneecappings of Palestinians during the campaign; and its indiscriminate firing of rockets into civilian areas.

Meanwhile, sources at the ICC say it is considering two potential tracks that would permit it to investigate what happened in Gaza. As well as determining whether the PA is recognised internationally as a sufficiently state-like entity, the head of jurisdictions in the office of the international criminal court’s prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, is looking at whether the court can consider war crimes allegations on the basis of the dual nationality of either victims or alleged perpetrators whose second passport is with a country party to the court.

The court’s deliberations follow more than 220 complaints about Israel’s actions in Gaza. “It does not matter necessarily whether the Palestinian National Authority is in charge of its own borders,” said a source at the court. “Right now the court is looking at everything from agreements it has signed on education to the constitution of its legal system.”

Yesterday, Ehud Olmert, Israel’s prime minister, warned Palestinian militants their continuing rocket attacks on Israel would not go unpunished. He said further strikes would “be answered with a painful, harsh, strong and uncompromising response from the security forces”. More than 100 rockets and mortars have exploded in Israel in the six weeks since it ended its air and ground assault on Gaza, to which the government has responded with airstrikes.

Olmert’s warning came as Israel’s attorney general notified the prime minister that he was considering indicting him on charges of allegedly taking cash-stuffed envelopes from a Jewish-American businessman. Five corruption cases are pending against Olmert, although he has denied all wrongdoing. His spokesman said yesterday the charges against the prime minister would “disappear in the end”.

Tags:, , , , , ,
Posted in Commentary, Human rights, Palestine, Uncategorized, War Criminals, Zionist Israel | Leave a Comment »

Political prisoners in Mexico

March 1, 2009
Lourdes Garcia Larque | Green Left, 28 February 2009

After seven-and-a-half years of unjust imprisonment, on February 16, the brothers Hector and Antonio Cerezo were released.

Together with their younger brother Alejandro Cerezo (released in 2005) and two other men, they were detained in August 2001, under the false accusations of being responsible for placing explosive artefacts in three branches of a bank and of being members of the People´s Revolutionary Armed Forces.

They were charged with “organised crime”, and “possession of weapons, ammunition and explosives”.

The Cerezo brothers were detained with no search or arrest warrant. During the detention they were tortured for 12 hours.

For over a year they were held in high security prisons without being charged. One of their lawyers, the human rights activist Digna Ochoa, was assassinated while representing them.

The detainees have suffered continuous harassment during their time in prison, including constant psychological torture, and long periods of isolation. In addition, their siblings outside jail and members of the human rights organisation Comite Cerezo have been constantly harassed and persecuted.

The case of the Cerezo brothers is not an isolated case of unjust imprisonment for political reasons. There are more than 500 political prisoners in Mexico today, the highest number since the “dirty war” of the ’60s and ’70s.

Since 2000, when the conservative National Action Party took office, a total of 900 people have been detained or persecuted for political reasons.

As was the case during the ’70s, the police and military have taken measures to stop and dissolve any political opposition. The dirty war of the ’60s and ’70s left us the inheritance of more than 500 disappeared, and several accounts of assassinations, torture and imprisonment.

Many of the prisoners in Mexico are indigenous people who were not even given an interpreter for their defence. Many are environmental activists who oppose transnational corporations stealing the natural wealth, or defend forests from being destroyed.

Many of them had been captured in frame-ups and massive police operations to stop social mobilisations, as was the case during the 2006 uprising in the state of Oaxaca.

In the Mexican jails there are several Zapatista supporters, students, and people defending their right to the land, human rights activists and sacked workers demanding the right to work.

There are prisoners of the insurgent groups the Popular Revolutionary Army and the Insurgent People’s Revolutionary Army.

Some famous cases include the Atenco leaders of the People´s Front in Defence of the Land, Ignacio del Valle and others, condemned to more than 67 years in prison — an exaggerated sentence that not even the most infamous professional and cruel kidnappers would face.

The military personnel and police officers who take part in the illegal detentions, physical aggression and sexual abuse of the victims, walk free on the streets and get promoted.

On the afternoon of February 16, Antonio Cerezo, now free, shouted to the crowd of activists waiting outside the jail: “Now we will keep fighting to release all the political prisoners in Mexico, and for all the disappeared from the past and the present”.

Tags:, , , , ,
Posted in Commentary, Human rights | Leave a Comment »

The High-Minded Illiteracy Of the Indian Elite

March 1, 2009

By Badri Raina | ZNet, Feb 29, 2009

“No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law”

(Article 21, Constitution of India)

I

The atavistic blood-lust of India’s corporate-media elite has again been to the fore.

Same “premier” English channel; same “top-billed” programme (viz., Face the Nation), same uninterruptibly high-pitched compere, shriekingly anguished about the State’s less-than-murderous response to terrorist crimes.

Question posed for the day: should the lone Pakistani terrorist, Ajmal Kasab, now in Indian custody and duly chargesheeted, be given a fair trial? To wit, does he deserve to be so given etc.,

Argument: since everyone saw the chap on video going about his terrorist business, do we not need only to find the most convenient lamp-post to hang him by?

Indeed, does it matter what the Constitution of the Republic of India stipulates in matters of life, liberty, or death? And, in any case, should not an elite mob have the privilege to consider the Constitution amended through high-minded soundbyte? A self-evidently patriotic procedure that would save the state much money, and peremptorily assuage the damaged prestige of the wounded clan of celebrities who, after all, speak for the whole nation—slumdog and all; at the least those slumdogs who have now become celebrities.

Interestingly, we have not heard such lawless bloodthirstiness expressed in relation to the accused in the Malegaon terrorist blast case. Recall that those accused are also in custody, and have equally made admissible confessions with regard to their guilt. Indeed, in the latest of those confessions, Dayanand Pandey has averred that the money for the Malegaon terrorist act came from the ISI of Pakistan (no less), and through the agency of two senior leaders of the RSS, under the patronage and protection of the top man himself, namely, Shri Mohan Bhagwat.

A senior advocate on the programme clearly had a hard time balancing his soundbyte on the question posed about Ajmal Kasab, since he happens to be defending the accused in the Malegaon case.

Much as he would have liked to concur with the compere, he must have known how indefensible his defence of Sadhvi Pragya Thakur— allegedly, one of the chief perpetrators of the Malegaon blast—would have instantly become had he been tempted by the force of his cultural sympathies to argue that the Constitutional provisions of due process and fair trial need not apply to Kasab. After all, what is sauce for the goose must be sauce for the gander as well—at least for a practicing lawyer!


II

The instructive inference from all this is the following: India’s fattened, free-market elite never tire of singing praises of India’s democratic system, and of cocking a snook at the poor relations next door in Pakistan and Bangladesh where democracy never seems to take root.

But to this day, some sixty years after the Republic came into existence via the adoption of the Constitution, the further thought that its founding stipulations with regard to freedom and equality are compellingly grounded in the rule of laws and in their impartial and non-partisan application has not sunk in.

Or the fact that even when the rights of people are circumscribed, that too must happen through the enactment of legislative procedures. Something that Indira Gandhi did during the infamous Internal Emergency of the seventies.

And remember what howls that raised among precisely the sorts of people compering the programme I have talked about!

So that when our no-nonsense elite laud the no-nonsense confinement of “vicious” people in Guantanamo, they do not stop to think why the now thankfully bygone Bush had to find a place for them outside the juridical limits of them United States of America.

Because had they been confined within the territory of the State, they would have automatically, as per American law, become eligible to all the procedures and privileges that American laws furnish to its own citizens.

And that circumstance would have disallowed both torture and kangaroo justice of the kind that our own madam compere seemed to think warranted in the case of Kasab.


III

Indeed, a further compliment is due to American democracy.

Study any American election post the dismantling of racist discrimination and segregation, and you will find that it is never a matter of debate whether laws should apply differently to different people. What those laws should be invariably is the crux of the contentions, in relation either to domestic or foreign concerns.

Alas, we are not there yet.

Thus, in law, white-skinned Americans or Britons or others who have gone over to the Al Qaeda are as much terrorists as those whose skin colour is different, or who espouse a different faith. Those that did the Oklahoma killings found few voices that claimed that they could not be terrorists because they were white and Christian-born. Certainly, no TV channel spoke for them.

India is a different matter altogether: do we not hear from honourable right-wing leaders who aspire to lead the governance of the Republic that Hindus cannot be terrorists, because, being Hindus they must ipso facto be regarded as “nationalists”?

The sort of reason, after all, why no mention of the Malegaon accused—all Hindus—came up at all in the programme I have alluded to.

Or why the killers of the Bombay pogrom of 1992-93 or of Gujarat, 2002 are sought to be viewed through glasses of another make.

Imagine that even after the Special Investigation Team (SIT) mandated by the Supreme Court of India to reinvestigate some of the more unconscionably gruesome episodes of the Gujarat pogrom has reported on affidavit how the state machinery upto its eyebrows was complicit in the pogrom, how a senior minister of Modi’s cabinet, one thought especially close to him, was on the scene of the carnage, distributing swords to the mob and firing from her own pistol, how two of the most upright police officers swore to being asked by Modi personally to lay off the Hindu leaders of the pogrom, none of India’s premier channels has squeaked even to ask for the concerned minister to resign, not to speak of Modi to be indicted! Do recall that during the Gujarat pogrom, among the rapes and hackings, a woman’s womb was cut up and the foetus flung from the point of a sword.

To this day, no one, least of all Modi, has expressed regret, not to speak of owning up responsibility. Even as the chief perpetrators continue to roam free, the state has sought at every step to subvert the procedures and reach of the law—all that testified to by the SIT.

If anything, don’t you know, the same Modi is the cynosure today of some of India’s leading industrialists, and of TV channels busily projecting him as the most desirable candidate to be India’s Prime Minister.

Let it be said that even under the Bush regime, this would never have happened in America.


IV

The Hindu-elite-Indian’s take on the regime of laws and jurisprudence is illustrated literally everyday, of course, in one circumstance or the other But here is another notable instance, also pertaining to Gujarat.

Some months ago, the POTA Review Committee examining the cases of some 135 Muslims who have been rotting in Gujarat’s jails for seven long years as persons allegedly culpable in the Godhra train-burning episode under provisions of that draconian Act (since repealed by the current Indian government), determined that the Act did not apply to these persons, since the train-burning event did not qualify as a “terrorist” Act in the first place! The Committee held that the violence ensued as a consequence of an altercation between the karsevaks (the goons who were returning home after demolishing the Babri mosque, and traveling ticketless as well), and the vendors on the railway station at Godhra.

A finding that has since been upheld first by the Gujarat High Court, and now by the Supreme Court.

Any Gujarat heads rolled for this perfidy? Not a one. Any TV channel ask for such a head or two to roll? Forget it. They are all Muslims, after all! And Modi is the engine of a projected Hindu Rashtra (Theocratic Hindu State), one that promises much to billionaire fat-cats out to make further killings in socially neutered conditions.

Futile to recount what screams go up among the channels here when some elite suspect is held by the police just overnight in confinement, provided of course he is not Muslim.

V

India thus, in truth, is a democracy-in-the-making. Thankfully, a vast enough civil society remains fully engaged in ensuring that in addition to voting every five years, this democracy learns to recognize and accept that unless Indian democracy is also to descend to the arbitrary cronyisms of those that it fatuously derides, it must learn to embrace without question the tenets of citizenship, of universal human rights, and the dispassionate and egalitarian principles of equality before the laws, regardless of caste, creed, gender, language, or class which the Constitution mandates.

All this while many well-to-do Indians who have milked Indian democracy to the hilt thus far seem hell-bent to make of it a handmaiden to hate-filled, sectarian agendas, in addition to the interests of the class they represent and speak for.

Consider that everyday some right-winger or other is heard to scream why Afzal Guru, sentenced to death in the Parliament attack case, is still alive; but never asks the same question about Murugan, sentenced to death for the Rajiv Gandhi murder several years prior to the Parliament attack!

Simple enough reason: the one raises the possibility of causing an electorally fruitful sectarian divide among the polity, the other does not. So much for justice. And so much also for the corporate channels who never mention Murugan, even as Afzal is pressed into the service of talk shows and such-like intended to favour the communalists.

That the NDA government, led by the Hindu right-wind BJP (1998-2004) never did anything to carry out the Afzal or the Murugan sentences is of course another matter that concerns the media but scantily.

The fact is that even some Rajas and Mughal Kings of old had a more non-partisan devotion to the dispensation of justice than many of those who fulminate on behalf of Indian democracy in our day. Who more memorable than Jehangir as a dispenser of impartial justice?

________________________________________________________________
badri.raina@gmail.com

Tags:, , , , , , ,
Posted in Human rights, India, Muslims, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

The new movement against Israel’s apartheid

February 28, 2009

Eric Ruder looks at the new movement taking shape in this country and around the world–for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel and its oppression of the Palestinian people.

Socialist Worker, February 27, 2009

Some 5,000 people turned out in Los Angeles to demonstrate against Israel's war (David Rapkin | SW)

THE RUTHLESS assault on the 1.5 million Palestinians of Gaza marked a decisive turning point in Israel’s six-decade war of conquest.

In the course of 22 days, Israeli air strikes, artillery shells and invasion forces killed 1,400 Palestinians, injured 5,000 and devastated Gaza’s civilian infrastructure. The onslaught also shattered the illusion that–after more than a decade of a “peace process” that was supposed to establish a Palestinian state–Israel has any intention of letting Palestinians realize their aspirations for self-determination.

The ferocity of Israel’s offensive, the enormous loss of civilian life (more than 90 percent of those killed and wounded were civilians) and the unanimous support for the carnage across the Israeli political spectrum shocked the world. Hundreds of millions of people watched in horror as the images of devastation and reports of civilians burned by white phosphorous bombs or buried in the rubble of their former homes filled evening news broadcasts.

But the assault on Gaza has also brought a change of another sort. It stirred a commitment among people around the world that the time has come to do something about the intolerable conditions facing Palestinians.

Labor unions, student groups and other organizations have responded to the renewed calls from Palestinians for a campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) to put pressure on Israel to end its apartheid policies toward the Palestinian population, both within the state of Israel itself and under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza.

What you can do

If you want to learn more about the growing struggle against Israeli apartheid, see the Global BDS Movement Web site and the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott Web site.

Union activists considering ways to bring up the issue in their own locals will find handy materials at the Canadian Union of Public Employees Ontario Web site.

Haidar Eid has written an article titled “Sharpeville 1960, Gaza 2009” that recounts his experiences during Israel’s war and adds his voice to call for an international movement to boycott, divest and sanction Israel, modeled on the anti-apartheid movement.

The One Democratic State Group has issued “A Call from Gaza” that asks activists and organizations to demand that their governments sever ties with Israel, and calls for Israel’s war criminals to be brought to justice.

In Britain, student groups at two dozen universities organized sit-ins and building occupations to demand that their educational institutions condemn Israel’s war crimes, cancel speaking events or honorary titles for Israeli officials, donate surplus supplies such as computers and books to Palestinian schools, and grant scholarships to students from Gaza.

In South Africa, dockworkers refused to unload a ship carrying Israeli goods. The action had a special symbolic significance, given the inspiring example of the South African struggle that overturned apartheid in 1994. As the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) stated in a February 4 press release:

Coming weeks after the massive Israeli massacre in Gaza, this distinguished expression by SATAWU [the union of South Africa’s dockworkers] of effective solidarity with the Palestinian people in general, and with Gaza in particular, sets a historic precedent that reminds us of the first such action during the apartheid era taken by Danish dock workers in 1963, when they decided not to offload ships carrying South African products, triggering a similar boycott in Sweden, England and elsewhere.”

Dockworkers in Greece threatened to block a ship carrying weapons to Israel during the Gaza offensive, and in late January, the Maritime Union of Australia endorsed the call for a BDS campaign, and pledged to boycott all Israeli vessels, as well as all vessels bearing goods arriving from or going to Israel.

In the U.S., a wave of student occupations is taking shape, starting with the University of Rochester and New York University, and others in the planning stages.

In Canada, the Ontario division of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), which represents some 200,000 government and other public-sector workers, passed a motion calling for an academic boycott of Israel and an end to any research or investments that could benefit the Israeli army. British and French academics have likewise issued statements calling for a boycott of Israel.

Thus, despite the trauma inflicted during the Gaza offensive, the emerging BDS movement has given a renewed sense of optimism to millions of Palestinians who have felt for years that the world shrugged as they faced daily threats to their existence. As the BNC continued:

If Gaza today has become the test of our universal morality and our common humanity, the fast-spreading BDS movement around the world has passed the test with flying colors. In fact, worldwide support for BDS against Israel in reaction to its war crimes…has shown that international civil society fully recognizes that Israel must be held accountable before international law and must pay a heavy price for its atrocities and ongoing willful destruction of Palestinian society.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

NEVERTHELESS, SOME people raise objections about whether a BDS campaign is justified or effective–or both. Does it make sense to describe Israel as an apartheid state, they ask–and in any case, will a BDS campaign have the desired effect?

While some who raise such considerations would defend Israel no matter how blatant its injustices, others have honest questions about such issues, which deserve careful answers, especially considering that so many people are just learning about the Palestinian struggle.

Though Israelis generally recoil at any comparison of Israel and South Africa, the shared pattern of racist discrimination and control is unmistakable.

“Apartheid was an extension of the colonial project to dispossess people of their land,” said South African cabinet minister Ronnie Kasrils during a visit to Jerusalem. “That is exactly what has happened in Israel and the Occupied Territories–the use of force and the law to take the land. That is what apartheid and Israel have in common.”

Kasrils should know what he is talking about. He is one of a handful of Jews who was active as guerilla fighters in the African National Congress during the anti-apartheid struggle.

Even a few prominent Israeli politicians draw the connection between Israeli and South African apartheid.

“The Intifada is the Palestinian people’s war of national liberation,” wrote former Israeli Attorney General Michael Ben-Yair in 2002 in Israel’s Ha’aretz newspaper, referring to the Palestinian uprising of that year. “We enthusiastically chose to become a colonialist society, ignoring international treaties, expropriating lands, transferring settlers from Israel to the Occupied Territories, engaging in theft and finding justification for all these activities…We established an apartheid regime.”

Indeed, Palestinians today endure the Israeli equivalent of the pass laws of South Africa’s white minority regime. In East Jerusalem and the West Bank, Palestinians must spend hours waiting to pass through checkpoints to travel distances that should take minutes–all while suffering humiliation and abuse at the hands of Israeli soldiers. Then there are the house demolitions, the strangulation of the economy and the constant threat of worse, in the form of targeted assassinations or violence from Jewish settlers.

“The similarities between the situation of East Jerusalemites and Black South Africans is very great in respect of their residency rights,” says John Dugard, a professor of international law who helped construct South Africa’s human rights law in the post-apartheid era, and now serves as the UN’s chief human rights monitor in the West Bank and Gaza. “East Jerusalem has territorial classification that has the same sort of consequences as race classification had in South Africa in respect of who you can marry, where you can live, where you can go to school or hospital.”

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

BUT EVEN if Israel can be accurately called an apartheid state, won’t a BDS campaign–and especially a cultural, academic and sports boycott–make impossible precisely the kind of exchange necessary to end Israeli apartheid?

As Haider Eid, a resident of Gaza, a professor of English literature, and a member of the steering committee of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, explains:

The same argument was used against the academic, cultural and sports boycott of South Africa.

In the 1970s and ’80s, Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan talked about ‘constructive engagement’ as a way to defend their diplomatic ties with South Africa. Some academics and athletes echoed these same arguments. But they forget that they are making an abnormal situation into a normal one. The international community had to make it clear to the white racists of South Africa that what they were doing was unacceptable.

I have no problem with the exchange of academic ideas. But I myself am an academic. I have been invited to five conferences over the last year, but I have not been allowed by the Israelis to leave Gaza. Why should there be such preoccupation about the freedom of exchange of ideas with Israeli institutions when Israel itself denies such exchange to Palestinians in all spheres of life?

Also, it’s important to point out that we are only talking here of boycotting institutions, not individual academics, and we are in favor of exchange with Israeli academics who object to Israel’s occupation, who support the right of return of the more than 6 million Palestinian refugees scattered throughout the region and so on. Israeli academic institutions, on the other hand, have unfortunately supported the occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, supported the dispossession of Palestinian refugees since 1948, and have not raised their voices against the latest massacre in Gaza.

An international campaign of the sort that was essential to the eventual victory of the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa is just as essential–if not more so–in the case of Israel because of the blanket support Israel receives from the U.S., the European Union and the United Nations Security Council.

The U.S., for example, gives billions of dollars annually–in the form of both military and economic aid–to Israel, and this support is crucial to Israel’s ability to continue its policy of territorial expansion and repression of Palestinians.

Likewise, the European Union in recent years has expanded, rather than reduced, its economic ties with Israel, a development that no doubt encouraged Israeli leaders to carry out the recent Gaza massacre without fear that such conduct might jeopardize their economic and political standing in the world.

The United Nations regularly reaffirms resolutions stipulating that Israeli settlements are illegal under international law and calling on Israel to accept the return of Palestinian refugees. But when it comes to enforcing its resolutions, the UN, which is beholden to world powers such as the U.S., won’t take any action to compel Israel to live up to its obligations under international law. As Eid explains:

We’ve lost faith in governments, in the United Nations, and the rest of the so-called international community. We’ve said our only hope is with civil society organizations, unions and solidarity movements–and this is what is happening right now.

We don’t want people just to react to the Gaza massacre for a couple of months, and then forget about it. We want this to continue. Israel is under fire now from civil society organizations. This is a historical moment, and we must seize it.

Tags:, , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Commentary, Human rights, Palestine, War Criminals, Zionist Israel | Leave a Comment »

SRI LANKA: U.N. Urged to Intervene to Protect Civilians

February 28, 2009

By Haider Rizvi | Inter Press Service

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 27 (IPS) – The fast deteriorating humanitarian situation in Sri Lanka – caused by the lingering armed conflict between the government and rebel forces – demands immediate action on the part of the U.N., a leading international human rights organisation said Friday.

The call for U.N. help comes as tens of thousands of civilians in Sri Lanka’s northern region have been caught up in a fresh round of fighting between Sinhalese majority-led armed forces and minority Tamil militants seeking freedom from the centre.

“The escalating humanitarian situation there needs an urgent Security Council response,” said Anna Neistat of the U.S.-based Human Rights Watch, which works closely with U.N. rights bodies.

During a recent two-week trip to the conflict zone in the north of Sri Lanka, Neistat observed that many civilians were forced to flee areas controlled by Tamil fighters, only to get trapped in military camps run by the government.

Her statement came just a few hours after the top U.N. humanitarian official, John Holmes, briefed the 15-member U.N. Security Council about how much pain and suffering the Sri Lankan civilians were enduring as a result of the armed conflict.

In his visit to the north, Holmes urged combatants on both sides to make greater efforts to stop the rising toll of civilian casualties and to protect the people trapped in areas held by rebel fighters.

According to U.N. reports, thousands of Sri Lankans are fleeing Vanni, where government forces are in the midst of a fierce armed offensive against the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

The U.N. emergency relief fund has targeted 10 million dollars to assist civilians who have fallen victim to the fresh round of fighting between the army and the LTTE militants.

“I am desperately concerned about this humanitarian situation,” said Holmes at the end of his three-day visit to Sri Lanka to assess the humanitarian situation.

According to the U.N., due to the conflict tens of thousands of people in the north have been deprived of food and medical assistance. During his visit, Holmes urged rebels to let civilians move freely and pressed the government to ensure a “peaceful, orderly and humane end” to the conflict.

Sri Lanka has been mired in ethnic violence between the Sinhalese-dominated national army and the LTTE rebels for more than three decades. The armed conflict has taken tens of thousands of lives, and is considered one of the deadliest in the world.

Last month, government forces captured a major stronghold of the Tamil rebels. President Mahinda Rajapakse called it an unparalleled victory and said he wanted the rebels to surrender.

A ceasefire between the government and the rebel forces in late 2002 raised hopes for a lasting settlement. But peace talks stalled and monitors reported open violations of the truce by the government and Tamil Tiger rebels.

The current round of fighting, which started last December, has trapped some 250,000 civilians in the conflict zone, with more than 30,000 already seeking shelter outside their native towns and villages.

Holmes said during his visit he found that most of the internally displaced persons (IDPs) were mentally and physically exhausted after weeks of sheltering in makeshift bunkers, but that their basic needs were met.

HRW and other human rights organisations say they want the U.N. Security Council to address the situation in Sri Lanka in accordance with international humanitarian law “without any delay.”

“People who flee abuses by the Tamil Tigers should not have to fear abuses by the government forces,” said Neistat. “But so long as international agencies are kept away from the screening process, they will have reason to be afraid.”

Considering the fact that a number of journalists have been killed in recent weeks and months, she may be right. The London-based rights watchdog Amnesty International claims that at least 10 media workers have been killed in Sri Lanka since 2006. Many of the killings have been linked by observers to the military and other law-enforcement agencies in Colombo.

In its annual press freedom index last year, the media watchdog Reporters Sans Frontieres (Reporters without Borders) ranked Sri Lanka 165 out of 173 countries.

Some reports from the region suggest that the Indian government is trying to put pressure on the Sri Lankan government to end its military operations in Tamil-dominated area, but whether it will be successful remains unclear.

Diplomatic observers who are knowledgeable about Sri Lanka’s internal conflict say that, at the moment, they do not expect that the U.N. Security Council is ready to send a peacekeeping force to that country.

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in Commentary, Human rights | Leave a Comment »

World Council of Churches: Statement on the Gaza war

February 27, 2009

World Council of Churches
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Bossey, Switzerland
17-20 February 2009
Document No. 12

“In the very place where Jesus Christ walked upon the earth, walls now separate families and the children of God – Christian, Muslim and Jew – are imprisoned in a deepening cycle of violence, humiliation and despair.”
Amman Call, WCC International Peace Conference,
June 2007, Jordan

1. The Gaza war during Christmas season took a terrible toll on lives and communities that were already fragile. Bombs, missiles and rockets striking densely populated areas spread an unconscionable sorrow from Gaza to much of the world. Approximately 1400 Palestinians are dead – mostly civilians, children and women – thousands more are wounded, countless thousands are traumatized, and there remains widespread destruction and damage to homes and institutions including church clinics and a hospital. Four civilians are dead in neighboring Israel and 11 soldiers were killed during the fighting and many other people injured.

2. The humanitarian situation in Gaza remains extremely alarming. More than one million people, 80 percent of the population, depend on food aid. Thousands of jobs have been lost. The educational and health systems have broken down due to the blockade that is still being imposed by the Israeli government. Palestinian church leaders, representatives from Action by Churches Together International and other humanitarian aid workers have been denied access to Gaza.

3. Still violence continues and the word peace is rarely spoken. With concerned people in many countries, we speak now to mourn the dead and to cry out with the wounded. The war and the political decisions behind it have deepened an intolerable spiral of despair, violence and deaths.

4. All the lives lost are sacred. Civilians were trapped in the war zone and had no way to escape. All of us who are part of the international community failed in our obligation to stop the killings. Governments failed to fulfill their legal obligations to prevent or remedy the Gaza war under the terms of international law and international humanitarian law. Such failure discredits international law and gives encouragement to those who rely on the use of force.

5. The Gaza war brought people onto the streets in cities around the world while those responsible for the enforcement of international law stood by doing little to nothing. Israel, like any other state, has the right of self defense, but is also bound by humanitarian principles of proportionality and distinction. The imperative to protect human lives is mandatory for all parties involved – including the international community. All have failed in this responsibility. Civilians have suffered on both sides. However, as the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Human Rights noted, “the scale of civilian harm resulting from Israeli unlawful conduct was far greater than that of Palestinian unlawful conduct.” Furthermore, given the evidence of possible war crimes, the international community has a “responsibility to protect” the population at grave risk in Gaza because the government responsible for them has failed to do so.

6. What happened in Gaza is not an isolated tragedy. It is to be seen in the context of the illegal occupation of Palestinian territory that began in 1967. In the case of Gaza the last three years have seen siege and collective punishment harden into a stringent 18-month blockade. Without an end to the occupation, the cycle of violence continues.

7. Israel’s future, its well-being and security depend on a just and genuine peace. The same is true for any prospective Palestinian state. Failure to achieve a just and peaceful resolution of the conflict will open the future to more violence and war. Indeed, while world attention was focused on Gaza, the expansion of settlements and violence against Palestinians continued in the rest of Occupied Palestinian Territory.

8. Gaza’s suffering should serve as a reminder to governments to carry out their third state responsibility. International law requires states not to knowingly aid or assist another state in internationally unlawful acts and not to recognize such acts as lawful. They bear indirect responsibility if they assist or recognize such acts, for example, the illegal use of force and violations of laws and rights that take place daily in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

9. Palestinians who take up arms are also accountable under the law for their use of force. We join the international condemnation of the violence perpetrated by members of Hamas and other groups against civilians in Israel and against their own people.

10. Palestinian unity is essential not only for ending the occupation but also for eventually building a viable Palestinian state. Members of the international community bear partial responsibility for policies that divided people and political structures in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. It is incumbent on the international community now to actively and responsibly support the reintegration of Palestinian political processes including elections and the reunification of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

11. We extend our solidarity to all Palestinians and Israelis who engage in the peaceful pursuit of national Palestinian independence and non-violent resistance to foreign occupation. Non-violent resistance is a right of people living under occupation. We encourage people of all nationalities, religions and good will to support the non-violent struggle for a comprehensive and just peace.

12. We recall the many WCC policy statements that bear on present challenges, including those addressing the siege of Gaza (2008), the Amman Call to churches (2007), the need to engage with all the elected representatives of the Palestinian people (2006), assessing Israel’s pullback from Gaza and ending economic ties to the occupation (2005), plus regular condemnation of all attacks against civilians and consistent church support for the implementation of UN resolutions as the basis for peace.

Accordingly, the executive committee of the World Council of Churches, meeting in Bossey, Switzerland, 16-20 February 2009;

A. Commends the many churches, related ministries, international church organizations, regional and national councils of churches, and civil society groups including Jewish and Muslim organizations that responded to the tragedy in Gaza with prayer, advocacy and aid.

B. Invites greater church engagement in joint efforts for peace, including broader participation in the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI), in the WCC-led World Week for Peace in Palestine Israel, 4-10 June 2009, and in other initiatives of the Palestine Israel Ecumenical Forum.

C. Calls member churches and related organizations, wherever applicable, to hold their own governments to account for third state responsibilities in the Israel-Palestine conflict under international law.

D. Recommends that member churches and related organizations in a position to do so practice morally responsible investment and purchasing in regard to corporations whose products or services support the occupation of Palestinian territory.

E. Calls for the United Nations to investigate alleged war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law by the parties to the Gaza conflict, including the use of weapons that have indiscriminate effects; and calls for the full implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1860 which requires inter alia that the government of Israel lift the siege of Gaza.

F. Urges the government of Switzerland as the repository of the Geneva Conventions to convene an international conference of the high contracting parties of the 4th Geneva Convention to investigate armed violations against civilian populations by the parties to the conflict.

G. Supports proposals that churches and governments which funded aid and infrastructure projects in Gaza hold the government of Israel accountable for the destruction it has caused during the war and demand compensation for the same.

H. Calls on the government of Israel to facilitate the on-going work of United Nations agencies in Occupied Palestinian Territory including access for the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights to the populations living under occupation; and also calls on the government of Israel to facilitate unimpeded access to Gaza for humanitarian aid workers, rehabilitation and reconstruction teams, pastoral delegations and clergy of religious congregations there.

I. Affirms Palestinian Christians in their endeavors to promote Palestinian unity, be of service to society, minister to their church members and join civil society in peaceful and non-violent measures to bring the occupation to an end.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Human rights, Palestine, Peace Movement, Uncategorized, Zionist Israel | Leave a Comment »

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »