In memory of Oury Jalloh who died six years ago

Break the silence
Stop racist police brutality !

• January 7th, 2011 demonstration in Dessau
- 2pm start of the demonstration, main station
• January 8th, 2011 demonstration in Magdeburg
- 1pm start of the demonstration, main station
• January 12th, 2011 beginning of the trial
- Mahnwache! Picket and food for everybody from 9am on, court Magdeburg, Halberstädter Str. 8

On January 7th, 2005 Oury Jalloh burnt with his hands and feet tied in a police cell in Dessau. The trial against the accused police man ended with acquit in December 2008. On demand of the Initiative in remembrance of Oury Jalloh the incidental action contradicted against the verdict at the federal court (Bundesgerichtshof, BGH) - rightly. On the exact date of the death the BGH confirmed what the Initiative Oury Jalloh and other organisations criticized since a long time:

The trial against the police men in duty was a farce because: Cover-up of the murder of Oury Jalloh, wheeling and dealing of police men, lies and wrong testemonies of witnesses and accused - all without consequences. The BGH decided therefore logically that the trial against one of the accused police men has to start again because the family of the victim has the right to get a legal procedure.

The fear seems to be certified that the supposed revision was only meant to be the attempt to lower the pressure; because now the trial was abducted and postponed just like the first one. This shows once again that the legal system in Germany is not interested in revealing the truth. The accusation against Schubert is "injury which caused death" and still not murder - what we believe.

The essential questions for clearing up were not answered:
• Who came into the cell directly before the fire burst out and why is it not documented?
• How could a lighter appear although Oury Jalloh was searched before?
• How could a completly tied person burn a hardly inflammable and undamaged mattress?
• Which kind of liquid was on the floor just before the fire started?
• How broke Oury Jallohs nose, an injury which was not detected in the first autopsy?
• Where is the video tape of the crime scene and how could it disappear?
• How could the second pair of handcuffs which was meant to be evidence be thrown away?

That's how the impression evoke that the first trial only served to exonerate the involved police men.

Oury Jalloh - it was murder! All attempts to postpone the trial again and again show the institutional and structural racism in Germany. Never surrender! Never forget!

Participate in the actions!

Lets make the refugee lager to be HISTORY of the past in Germany

The German Lager Mentality is an act of forceful execution and violation of human dignity

„Lets make the refugee lager to be HISTORY of the past in Germany“

The Lager control mentality of the German Asylum system has a long and dubious history with far reaching Consequences of isolation, stigmatization, persecution, exploitation, enslavement and domination of those people classified as either not directly useful or those that are outrightly unwanted.

Lager and control mentality

From the general point of view to the specific, the strategy is to isolate, stigmatise and then persecute the victims. From the various notorious Lagers under the National Socialists through the Lagers for Guest workers, the Lager and control mentality has been a consistent and perverse feature of the German system in dealing with those that are either considered not directly useful or those that are out rightly unwanted. It should be recalled that in the erstwhile DDR, many contract/guest workers were similarly kept in Lagers and even couples amongst them were separated to ensure they did not raise families. The story is told of some women guest workers who were sent home because they were pregnant and refused to abort the pregnancy. The rule was that you were either here to work as demanded by the state or sent out of here to ensure that not even family issues obstructs that requirement. You are either useful for our economy or you’re out. Through all these phases, the Lager and control mentality was sustained. And was it not this control mentality that was evident in the Nazi requirement of foreigners to obtain permission to have children? Interestingly disturbing to note how deep and ingrained the control mentality is in Germany-so little attitudinal changes in the many years that have gone by.

But why is it so?

Good question. It may not have been necessary beyond academic inquiry to re-visit this question now, if many of us are not currently re-living the hash realities and the bitter consequences of this mentality and its attendant system. When the darkest and bloodiest history of this country was forcefully prevailed upon in the mid-forties, the so-called Allied were determined to set up a system different from what they just defeated. But the new system was set up perfectly to accommodate and rehabilitate majority of the dramatis personae in the very regime they just defeated, blurring over all these with the Nuremberg Trials. So, the rehabilitation and continious presence of highly placed people under the National Socialists in basically all fields of endeavour also meant that there was enough room to accommodate some of the policies of the Nazi past in Germany. As the old culprits settled more comfortably into the new political system with their cohorts, the easier it became for them to re-lapse nearer into their old frame of mind. We should remember here that we are talking of the Lager and control mentality. And nowhere in the Western world is this more demonstrated than in Germany.

History records the restriction of movement placed on Jews and other foreigners in 1938 and the consequent fine for violation of such restriction. While world outrage and condemnation have since been rightly heaped on this and the more horrible crimes of the era, since 1982, this obnoxious restriction has been replicated on all asylum seekers in Germany in the form of the so-called Residenzpflicht. That for a refugee to leave his/her immediate District he/she needs a written permission from the Foreigner’s Office - or else a fine or possible jail term awaits him/her, upon police control as a startling reminder of that 1938 restriction. Now, what does it cost Germany (culturally or economically) if refugees or asylum seekers can move freely within the country like normal human beings? NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING!!! But it is the German Lager and control mentality that is at play here. Just to clarify this with one more example. Many studies by independent investigators have shown that it is much cheaper if refugees are accommodated in private housing. And even different governmental sources have acknowledged this. But the authorities baulked at this cost effective measure and rather continue to take pride in maintaining the humiliating Lager system; that defies human dignity and denies refugees privacy. The same is true of food coupons-the “Gutscheine”. It costs the government more than the value of the Gutscheine that is actually paid out. And with all the unwanted attention, humiliation and the problems associated with Gutscheine, one wonders why the authorities insist on using Gutscheine and not cash, which is cheaper, easier andmore dignified. It has to do with the Lager and control mentality-encrusted old habits!!

-We demand for the abolition of lagers.
-We demand deportation stop.
-Abolish the apartheid Residenzpflicht in Germany.

No compromise with a racist state – Join us to fight for a better world - Our struggle is your struggle

___________________________________________________________

• The declaration of The VOICE Refugee Conference 2010 in Jena: Reinforced resistance against institutionalised racism http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1909
• The VOICE Refugee Forum Network: On Colonial Injustice and the Continuity of Barbarity in Germany
• http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1279
  jw presse zu The VOICE Refugee Conference in Jena
  http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1901

Make Donation to support the Refugee Community in the lagers/camps in Germany! - Break the Isolation! Close all lagers! http://thevoiceforum.org/node/1851

OAS Diplomat's Words Rattle Haiti’s Occupation Regime

Written by Roger Annis

Tuesday, 28 December 2010 23:14

As the one-year anniversary of Haiti’s earthquake approaches, a brutally frank account of the plight of its people has been delivered by a highly placed diplomat. Ricardo Seitenfus, the representative to Haiti of the Organization of American States, delivered a hard-hitting assessment of the foreign role in that country in an interview published in the December 20 edition of the Swiss daily Le Temps. i The interview also appeared in the right-wing, Haitian daily, Le Nouvelliste. For his words, he was immediately recalled from his posting. Seitenfus is Brazilian and a graduate of the Institute of Advanced International Studies in Geneva. The truths he pronounced in the now-famous interview are not unique; they have been voiced by many Haitians and their allies abroad. But to hear them uttered by someone of his standing is a sign of the unraveling of a miserably-failed foreign military and political occupation force in Haiti. The Failings in Haiti Seitenfus questions the legitimacy and utility of the UN Security Council occupation force known as MINUSTAH. It numbers 13,000 military and police (an increase of 50 per cent since the earthquake) along with several thousand political officers. “Haiti is not an international threat,” he says. “We are not experiencing a civil war.” He is asked, is it a counter-productive presence? The answer is, yes. The diplomat traces the 200-year history of foreign subjugation of Haiti. He draws a line of continuity to the present. “The world has never known how to treat Haiti, so it has ignored it.” He says the country has lived a “low intensity war” since 1986, the year of the overthrow of the Duvalier tyranny. “We want to turn Haiti into a capitalist country, an export platform for the U.S. market, it’s absurd. Haiti must return to what it is, that is to say, a predominantly agricultural country still fundamentally imbued with customary law.” Noting that nearly half of Haiti’s people—4 million—live abroad, Seitenfus says he does not pine for a return to a quaint rural past as a solution to Haiti’s present crisis. But he believes that the foreign intervention runs contrary to the country’s interests and needs. “The problem is socio-economic. When the level of unemployment is 80%, it is unacceptable to deploy a stabilization mission. There is nothing to stabilize and everything to build.” When the interview turns to questions of aid and earthquake relief, Seitenfus drops a bomb in declaring, “If there is proof of the failure of international aid, it is Haiti.” Charity and aid to Haiti have enfeebled the Haitian state. “Emergency aid is effective. But when it becomes structural, when it replaces the state in all its duties, collective responsibilities in society end up abandoned.” His words for the world of charities and ngo’s are harsh. Haiti, he says, has become a “Mecca” for them, a “laboratory,” a “go-to” destination, and worse—a stage in their professional development. The existence of many ngo’s, he says, is dependent on Haiti’s failings. “Haiti is ground zero of humanity’s tragedy and the failings of its international solidarity.” A disastrous election The dismissed ambassador does not comment on the electoral exercise that was staged in Haiti on November 28. It’s not difficult to imagine that, like many others in the world, he was aghast at what took place. By any measure, the vote was a violation of the democratic will of the Haitian people: * It was financed by foreign powers, to the tune of at least $30 million. * The country’s most representative political party, the Fanmi Lavalas of exiled, former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was ruled off the ballot. * The list of registered voters that was used by the country’s electoral commission predated the January 12 earthquake and therefore contained the names of the more than 250,000 people no longer alive. * It was difficult, if not impossible, for voters to register and cast their ballots. In the last genuinely democratic election in Haiti, the year 2000, there were some 12,000 polling stations. This time, there were less than a thousand. * Widespread violations and irregularities at polling stations on election day were observed and reported. But none of this has slowed the international powers in Haiti from pressing ahead to a second-round presidential vote in what many Haitians term not an election but a “selection.” Haitians will end up with a foregone result—a “president” whose extreme-right political leanings will be at odds with the political sentiments of the vast majority of the people but perfectly suited to the interests of the foreign powers that installed him (Martelly) or her (Manigat). The cholera tragedy Perhaps the most tragic of the calamities that have befallen Haiti is the introduction of cholera into the country by the very occupation force criticized so heavily by Ricardo Seitenfus. The disease has taken a heavy toll with more than 2,000 killed and tens of thousands fallen ill. Its economic consequences, especially on Haiti’s vital agriculture, will be costly and long lasting. ii After weeks of denying any responsibility for introducing cholera, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced on December 15 that the organization would conduct an inquiry into its possible role. French epidemiologist Renaud Piarroux says "no other hypothesis" could explain his findings that cases of the diarrheal disease first appeared near a Nepalese-staffed MINUSTAH base in central Haiti. iii The inquiry will need to look not only at where and how cholera was introduced, but also what measures, if any, were taken by the UN to prevent its occurence. For as New Scientist writer Debora MacKenzie wrote in the December 7 issue of the prestigious weekly magazine: UN peacekeepers around the world are largely supplied by poor countries, and of the top 15 contributors, which supply 71 per cent of UN troops, 12 harbor cholera. If Haiti's cholera did indeed come from Nepal, it was a foreseeable accident. More caution is called for. iv MacKenzie’s column slammed the UN for stalling an inquiry and the World Health Organization for stating that finding the source of the disease was “not important.” Another startling element to the cholera saga was brought to light by Joia Mukherjee, Executive Director of Partners In Health, in an article written shortly after the outbreak. She reminded the world that among the victims of the aid embargo against the government of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide instituted by the U.S., Europe and Canada following the 2000 election were water treatment facilities in the very region where cholera first appeared. v A challenge to Latin America His views reflect the concerns of growing numbers of people in Latin American and the Caribbean over Haiti’s treatment. These concerns were underscored when CARICOM decided to lend legitimacy to the November 28 election by sending a delegation of monitors and then endorse the outcome as regrettable but legitimate. This writer and co-author Kevin Edmonds published an article on November 15 that argued, "The decision by CARICOM to participate in this deeply flawed election constitutes a significant reversal of the position it took in February 2004 when Haiti’s elected president and government were overthrown by a paramilitary revolt with key backing from the U.S., Canada, France and the UN Security Council. At that time, CARICOM condemned the overthrow." vi Ricardo Seitenfus says that as a Latin American, Haiti’s treatment shames him. It’s an “offense to our conscience.” Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic Policy Research warns in a recent article that the continued participation of Latin American countries in the MINUSTAH military mission is increasingly untenable as the mission’s predatory role becomes more and more evident. Referring to the attempted coup d’etat against the elected government in Venezuela in 2002, he asks rhetorically whether any Latin American government would have dared to participate in an occupation mission had the coup succeeded. Weisbrot explains the stakes for Latin America and the Caribbean in Haiti thus: "People who do not understand US foreign policy think that control over Haiti does not matter to Washington, because it is so poor and has no strategic minerals or resources. But that is not how Washington operates… Left governments will be removed or prevented from taking power where it is possible to do so." vii “Enough of playing with Haiti” In his damning interview, Ricardo Seitenfus describes a vision for Haiti that would see true international solidarity come into play. “Enough of playing with Haiti!” he declares. While paying tribute to the outpouring of solidarity and compassion following the earthquake, he says that charity cannot be the driving force of international relations. What is needed, he argues, is autonomy and sovereignty of peoples, fair and equitable commerce, and respect by human beings towards each other. In Haiti, “We must build roads, hydroelectric dams, assist in building government structures, including a judiciary system.” “The UN says it is not mandated to do that,” he laments. “It’s mandate in Haiti is to maintain the peace of the graveyard.” His prophetic words may no longer grace the offices of the OAS in Haiti. But they have given voice to countless Haitians still living in the miserable conditions of the camps of internally displaced or still waiting for the promised “reconstruction.” They will not wait forever. They will continue to assert their rights. The longer the elites of Haiti and the world fail to offer a vision for the future of the country, the more certain become social explosions through which the people reassert their dignity and their rightful claim to social justice. Roger Annis is a coordinator of the Canada Haiti Action Network. He resides in Vancouver and can be reached at rogerannis@hotmail.com This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . Photo by Tory Field. Notes: i. Haiti is Proof of the Failings of International Aid (in French), interview with Ricardo Seitenfus, Le Temps, December 20, 2010. ii. Impact du cholera sur l’agriculture haïtienne (in French), by William Michel, November 26, 2010. iii. Haiti cholera outbreak 'came from UN camp', by Deborah Pasmantier, Agence France Presse, November 29, 2010. iv. Haiti: Epidemics of Denial Must End, by Debora MacKenzie, New Scientist, December 7, 2010. v. Cholera in Haiti: Another Disease of Poverty in a Traumatized Land, by Joia Mukherjee, October 22, 2010. vi. With Friends Like These…CARICOM and the Flawed Election in Haiti, by Roger Annis and Kevin Edmonds, November 15, 2010. vii. Wikileaks Cables Show Why Washington Won't Allow Democracy in Haiti, by Mark Weisbrot, The Guardian, December 17, 2010.

Georgia Prison Inmates Stage Peaceful Strike

By Bruce A. Dixon

Created 12/09/2010 - 13:41

Submitted by Bruce A. Dixon on Thu, 12/09/2010 - 13:41

• prisons and jails [1]
• racially selective mass incarceration [2]

By BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon

In an action which is unprecedented on several levels, black, brown and white inmates of Georgia's notorious state prison system are standing together for a historic one day peaceful strike today, during which they are remaining in their cells, refusing work and other assignments and activities. This is a groundbreaking event not only because inmates are standing up for themselves and their own human rughts, but because prisoners are setting an example by reaching across racial boundaries which, in prisons, have historically been used to pit oppressed communities against each other. PRESS RELEASE BELOW THE FOLD

The action is taking place today in at least half a dozen of Georgia's more than one hundred state prisons, correctional facilities, work camps, county prisons and other correctional facilities. We have unconfirmed reports that authorities at Macon State prison have aggressively responded to the strike by sending tactical squads in to rough up and menace inmates.

Outside calls from concerned citizens and news media will tend to stay the hand of prison authorities who may tend to react with reckless and brutal aggression. So calls to the warden's office of the following Georgia State Prisons expressing concern for the welfare of the prisoners during this and the next few days are welcome.

Macon State Prison is 978-472-3900.	Hays State Prison is at (706) 857-0400
Telfair State prison is 229-868-7721	Baldwin State Prison is at (478) 445- 5218
Valdosta State Prison is 229-333-7900	Smith State Prison is at (912) 654-5000
The Georgia Department of Corrections is at http://www.dcor.state.ga.us [3] and their phone number is 478-992-5246

This is all the news we have for now, more coming.

One in every thirteen adults in the state of Georgia is in prison, on parole or probation or some form of court or correctional supervision.

*********************************

Press Release

BIGGEST PRISONER STRIKE IN U.S. HISTORY

Thousands of Georgia Prisoners to Stage Peaceful Protest

December 8, 2010…Atlanta, Georgia

Contacts: Elaine Brown, 404-542-1211, sistaelaine@gmail.com [4];Valerie Porter, 229-931-5348, lashan123@att.net [5]; Faye Sanders, 478-550-7046, reshelias@yahoo.com [6]

Tomorrow morning, December 9, 2010, thousands of Georgia prisoners will refuse to work, stop all other activities and remain in their cells in a peaceful, one-day protest for their human rights. The December 9 Strike is projected to be the biggest prisoner protest in the history of the United States.

These thousands of men, from Baldwin, Hancock, Hays, Macon, Smith and Telfair State Prisons, among others, state they are striking to press the Georgia Department of Corrections (“DOC”) to stop treating them like animals and slaves and institute programs that address their basic human rights. They have set forth the following demands:

· A LIVING WAGE FOR WORK: In violation of the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution prohibiting slavery and involuntary servitude, the DOC demands prisoners work for free.

· EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES: For the great majority of prisoners, the DOC denies all opportunities for education beyond the GED, despite the benefit to both prisoners and society.

· DECENT HEALTH CARE: In violation of the 8^th Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishments, the DOC denies adequate medical care to prisoners, charges excessive fees for the most minimal care and is responsible for extraordinary pain and suffering.

· AN END TO CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENTS: In further violation of the 8^th Amendment, the DOC is responsible for cruel prisoner punishments for minor infractions of rules.

· DECENT LIVING CONDITIONS: Georgia prisoners are confined in over-crowded, substandard conditions, with little heat in winter and oppressive heat in summer.

· NUTRITIONAL MEALS: Vegetables and fruit are in short supply in DOC facilities while starches and fatty foods are plentiful.

· VOCATIONAL AND SELF-IMPROVEMENT OPPORTUNITIES: The DOC has stripped its facilities of all opportunities for skills training, self-improvement and proper exercise.

· ACCESS TO FAMILIES: The DOC has disconnected thousands of prisoners from their families by imposing excessive telephone charges and innumerable barriers to visitation.

· JUST PAROLE DECISIONS: The Parole Board capriciously and regularly denies parole to the majority of prisoners despite evidence of eligibility.

Prisoner leaders issued the following call: "No more slavery. Injustice in one place is injustice to all. Inform your family to support our cause. Lock down for liberty!"

__________________________________________________________________

by BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon

The peaceful strike begun by inmates of several Georgia state prisons continued for a second day on Friday, according to family members of some of the participants. Copyrighted news stories [4] by AP, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and local TV stations in Macon and Atlanta quote state corrections who say several institutions were placed on lockdown beginning Thursday in anticipation of the inmate protest, on the initiative of wardens of those prisons.

GA Prisoner Strike Continues a Second Day, Corporate Media Mostly Ignores Them, Corrections Officials Decline Comment

by BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon

Offices of the wardens at Hay's, Macon State, Telfair, and Augusta state all referred our inquiries to the Department of Corrections public affairs officer, who so far has declined to return our repeated calls.

The prisoner strike in Georgia is unique, sources among inmates and their families say, because it includes not just black prisoners, but Latinos and whites too, a departure from the usual sharp racial divisions that exist behind prison walls. Inmate families and other sources claim that when thousands of prisoners remained in their cells Thursday, authorities responded with violence and intimidation. Tactical officers rampaged through Telfair State Prison destroying inmate personal effects and severely beating at least six prisoners. Inmates in Macon State Prison say authorities cut the prisoners' hot water, and at Telfair the administration shut off heat Thursday when daytime temperatures were in the 30s. Prisoners responded by screening their cells with blankets, keeping prison authorities from performing an accurate count, a crucial aspect of prison operations.

As of Friday, inmates at several prisons say they are committed to continuing the strike. “We are going to ride it,” the inmate press release quotes one, “till the wheels fall off. We want our human rights.”

The peaceful inmate strike is being led from within the prison. Some of those thought to be its leaders have been placed under close confinement.

The nine specific demands made by Georgia's striking prisoners in two press releases pointedly reflect many of the systemic failures of the U.S. regime of mass incarceration, and the utter disconnection of U.S. prisons from any notions of protecting or serving the public interest. Prisoners are demanding, in their own words, decent living conditions, adequate medical care and nutrition, educational and self-improvement opportunities, just parole decisions, just parole decisions, an end to cruel and unusual punishments, and better access to their families.

It's a fact that Georgia prisons skimp on medical care and nutrition behind the walls, and that in Georgia's prisons recreational facilities are non-existent, and there are no educational programs available beyond GED, with the exception of a single program that trains inmates to be Baptist ministers. Inmates know that upon their release they will have no more education than they did when they went in, and will be legally excluded from Pell Grants and most kinds of educational assistance, they and their families potentially locked into a disadvantaged economic status for life.

Despite the single biggest predictor of successful reintegration into society being sustained contact with family and community, Georgia's prison

authorities make visits and family contact needlessly difficult and expensive. Georgia no longer allows families to send funds via US postal money orders to inmates. It requires families to send money through J-Pay [5], a private company that rakes off nearly ten percent of all transfers. Telephone conversations between Georgia prisoners and their families are also a profit centers for another prison contractor, Global Tel-Link [6] which extracts about $55 a month for a weekly 15 minute phone call from cash-strapped families. It's hard to imagine why the state cannot operate reliable payment and phone systems for inmates and their families with public employees at lower cost, except that this would put contractors, who probably make hefty contributions to local politicians out of business.

Besides being big business, prisons are public policy [7]. The U.S. has less than five percent of the world's population, but accounts for almost a quarter of its prisoners. African Americans are one eighth this nation's population, but make up almost half the locked down. The nation's prison population increased more than 450% in a generation beginning about 1981. It wasn't about crime rates, because those went up, and then back down. It wasn't about rates of drug use, since African Americans have the same rates of drug use as whites and Latinos. Since the 1980s, the nation has undertaken a well-documented policy of mass incarceration, focused primarily though not exclusively on African Americans. The good news is that public policies are ultimately the responsibility of the public to alter, to change or do do away with. America's policy of mass incarceration is overdue for real and sustained public scrutiny. A movement has to be built [8] on both sides of the walls that will demand an end to the prison industry and to the American policy of mass incarceration. That movement will have to be outside the Republican and Democratic parties. Both are responsible for building this system, and both rely on it to sustain their careers. The best Democrats could do on the 100 to 1 crack to powder cocaine disparity this year, with a black president in the White House and thumping majorities in the House and Senate was to reduce it to 18 to 1, and then only by lengthening the sentences for powder cocaine. On this issue, Democrats and Republicans are part of the problem, not the solution.

As this article goes to print Saturday morning, it's not known whether the strike will continue a third day. With prison officials not talking, and corporate media ignoring prisoners not just this week but every day, outlets like Black Agenda Report [9] and the web site upon which you're reading this are among the chief means inmates and their families have of communicating with the public. The prisoners are asking the public to continue to call the Georgia Department of Corrections, and the individual prisons listed below to express concern for the welfare of the prisoners.

Prison is about corruption, power and isolation. You can help break the isolation by calling the wardens' offices at the following prisons. Prisons, naturally , are open Saturdays and Sundays too.

Macon State Prison is 478-472-3900.	Hays State Prison is at (706) 857-0400
Telfair State prison is 229-868-7721	Baldwin State Prison is at (478) 445- 5218
Valdosta State Prison is 229-333-7900	Smith State Prison is at (912) 654-5000
The Georgia Department of Corrections is at http://www.dcor.state.ga.us [10] and their phone number is 478-992-5246

http://www.blackagendareport.com/

Bruce Dixon is managing editor at Black Agenda Report, and based in Marietta GA. Dixon is a member of the state committee of the GA Green party.

Dozens wounded following police raids on Easter Island

At least 25 people have reportedly been injured after police evicted indigenous inhabitants from buildings on Rapa Nui, widely known as Easter Island.

Rapa Nui woman wounded by a rubber bullet

Since August this year, Rapa Nui people have occupied a number of buildings on land they claim is legally theirs.

A pro-Rapa Nui website claims that police used tear gas and shot rubber bullets at close range during the protests on Friday.

According to the BBC, officials have claimed 17 police officers and eight civilians were injured during the protests. Local witnesses have put the figure at 19 civilian injuries and deny any police were hurt.

Santi Hitorangi, a documentary filmmaker who was present at the raids, said, ‘What happened… is their way of trying to stop any attempt of the Rapa Nui people to reassert their right to the land. All we are asking for is title to the land. It’s a rightful claim. We are not asking the government for anything else.’

The Rapa Nui are indigenous Polynesians who live on Easter Island, famous for its large carved stone heads known as ‘moai’. The island was incorporated into Chile’s territory in 1888 despite being located more than 3000 km from the South American coast.

An increase in tourism and settlement on the small island has put mounting pressure on native inhabitants who reject the privatisation of their ancestral lands.

Parliamentary president to the island, Leviante Araki, told a Chilean radio station, ‘We are willing to die, we won’t accept them coming to handle our property. No, we will never leave.’

Meanwhile, Chile’s Interior Minister expressed hope that an agreement can be reached, but confirmed they will continue to evict illegal occupants. ‘In our country, nobody can live outside the law,’ he said.

Fuente de fotografías: El ciudadano, Azkintuwe, Prensa Pueblo Rapa Nui.

Posts relacionados:

• Isla de Pascua: Represión brutal de carabineros en Rapa Nui
• Isla de Pascua: Represión brutal de carabineros en Rapa Nui
• Pueblos Originarios: Rapa Nui, de la alegría al horror
• Isla de Pascua: carabineros disparan y queman bandera Rapanui
• Paseando por rapa nui (isla de pascua)

Massacre of Native Americans in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil

On behalf of Our Tribe:

We cannot sit still and be quiet anymore in a situation that urges action.

Infants chased away from their birthright and forced to subsist on filth as nourishment?

These photos were taken by a photographer who cannot be identified because his life is at risk. This is a genocide that is happening in Brazil, in a state ruled by President Lula’s political party (PT)*. We must not close our eyes and turn our back to those people who are suffering all kinds of discrimination and violence. Children die of malnutrition and adults commit suicide by drinking themselves to dead. (Where does the booze supply come from?) The infant mortality is high and the murder rates as well. The mass media refuses to publish this because it is the “land of Gilmar Mendes“** (according to the photographer’s own words), a mafia that is not afraid to kill anyone who dares to question or even try to help these poor people. The goal is to transform the little Native American land there is into soybean and livestock area, and this is already happening!

Here you see a photo of an Indigenous person killed by repeated strikes in the face, young Indians who commit suicide victims of depression and alcoholism and children dead from malnutrition. The villages are burned down to force the Kaiowa-Guarani people off their land … Look at the drawings of children, all images shown people being murdered because that is the reality of these little children forgotten by Brazil and all the irresponsible world media who laude Lula as the champion of the poor!

Please forward this, we want it to reach the hands of someone who can help!!

According to the photographer who sent us these pictures the only chance for these slaughtered Indigenous people is the interference of some strong and foreign institution working in the field of human rights.

“Foreign” because the MAFIA that is behind the ongoing genocide is infiltrated in all the branches of official organs and authorities and there are very few who have the courage to speak out or do something since the mobsters threaten and kill without hesitation.

Contact me:
Natalia Forcat
NaT / Illustration Studio and Visual Solutions

NOTICE: This e-mail contains terrible images WHICH MUST BE SEEN!

A coincidence(?): I was with a friend a few days ago and we talked about the ongoing genocide committed against the Kaiowa-Guarani People.

She told me that back in the 80s, early 90s, while she worked on cases of “suicide“, an forensic expert – very famous today – was studying 20 of these suicides and had come to the conclusion, that most of them were incredible “accomplishments” just to avoid a more blunt word. Since most of these “suicides” were committed by young people who hanged themselves from a height less than their own and still managed to break the neck…

The photo of an Indigenous boy hanged below does not invalidate such insinuations. Or did the branch give way over time, until they find his body?

Isn’t it (in many cases) rather opportunistic and ruthless talk on suicides in the region in order to cover the ongoing genocide?

Luis Carlos de Alencar

*Blairo “Motor saw” Maggi (his nickname is a reminder of his stand towards the rainforest and the Native Peoples living in and depending on it) is a soya-billionaire and former governor of Mato Grosso who started out politically in the PPS (a “communist” party opposed to President Lula) but soon changed to PR (a fascist party) in order to support(!) President Lula. (Everything is possible in Brazilian politricks.)
He is the single most responsible person for Marina Silva to step down as (very successful) Secretary of the Environment, since President Lula favored Motor Saw Maggi rather than his secretary and party founding comrade Marina (who is now running for president as the Green Party’s candidate).
He is not governor anymore but doubtlessly still one of the most influential people in Brazil.
See more at http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blairo_Maggi

**53rd President of Brazil’s Supreme Court
Widely criticized by famous Brazilian law professors like Dalmo de Abreu Dallari (who is one of Brazil’s leading intellectuals and lectures on Peace Education, Human Rights and Democray and Tolerance at UNESCO, among other institutions) who wrote in an article in Brazil’s leading daily newspaper Folha de S.Paulo that with Mendes’ approval by the Senate (he was chosen by then president Fernando Henrique Cardoso) Brazil will be running serious risks as a state of law, including the fight against corruption and the constitutional normality.
Gilmar Mendes also had to encounter many regional prosecutors who were working for his impeachment. And he even made it into the BBC headlines. See more at http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilmar_Mendes

DENUNCIA! Massacre de Indios em Matogrosso! Não feche os olhos!

olá,

AVISO: esse email imagens terríveis QUE PRECISAM SER VISTAS!!!!

Toddlers draw out the horrors which have aged them beyond reason

coincidência: estava com uma amiga há alguns dias e comentavamos sobre o genocídio dos kaiowá.
ela me disse, que lá pelos anos 80, início dos 90, trabalhou com os casos de “suicídio”.
um perito – muito famoso até hoje – estudou 20 e tantos episódios naquela ocasião e declarou-lhe, o que também é a sua opinião (a de minha amiga), ser uma proeza incrível (na falta de melhor palavra) a maioria desses “suicídios” serem cometidos por jovens, ou quase jovens, que se enforcaram de uma altura menor do que a sua própria.
e ainda conseguem quebrar o pescoço.
a foto do garoto indígena enforcado abaixo não desmente tais insinuações.
ou será que o galho cedeu com o tempo, até acharem seu corpo?
será que, em algumas situações, não há um oportunismo cruel com o discurso dos suicídios dos kaiowá para encobrir diversos casos de extermínio naquela região?
abraços e solidariedade

Luis Carlos de Alencar

Is this right?

DENUNCIA! Massacre de Indios Guarani Kaiowá em Mato Grosso! Não feche os olhos!

Estas fotos foram tiradas por um fotógrafo que não pode se identificar pois corre risco de morte. Se trata de um genocidio que está acontecendo no Brasil, não devemos fechar os olhos para esta gente que está sofrendo todo tipo de discriminação e violencia. As crianças morrem de desnutrição e os adultos, por não vislumbrar saídas acabam se entregando à bebida ou se suicidam. A mortandade infantil é altíssima e os assassinatos também. Os medios de comunicação se negam a divulgar isto porque lá é “terra de Gilmar Mendes” (segundo as próprias palavras do fotógrafo que plasmou estas atrocidades) , uma mafia que não tem medo de assassinar quem for questionar ou até tentar ajudar esta pobre gente. O objetivo é transformar as reservas em plantação de soja e criação de gado e isso já está acontecendo!!!
Tem uma foto de um índio morto a pauladas no rosto, indios jovens que se suicidam vítimas da depressão e o alcoolismo e crianças mortas de desnutrição. As aldeias são incendiadas para forçar os índios abandonar a terra…Vejam os desenhos das crianças, em todas as imagens aparece gente sendo assassinada pois essa é a realidade destes pequenos filhos esquecidos do Brasil!

Por favor, repasse, queremos que isto chegue às mãos de alguma pessoa que possa ajudar!!!!

Segundo o fotógrafo que nos encaminhou estas fotos a única possibilidade para estos índios é a interferencia de alguma instituição de peso ESTRANGEIRA de direitos humanos pois a MAFIA que está exterminando estos índios está infiltrada em várias instancias do poder e são poucos os que tem coragem de fazer alguma coisa pois estes mafiosos ameaçam e matam mesmo!

How children interpret the evil they're forced to endure

Contato comigo:
Natalia Forcat

NaT / Estúdio de Ilustração e Soluções Visuais

Free Peltier now

American Indian Movement (AIM) activist Leonard Peltier

Dozens of the supporters of American Indian activist Leonard Peltier have gathered in Rapid City in the US Midwest to call for a review of his case and his release from prison.


Rapid City, IOWA -- The group gathered in the South Dakota city on Friday to pray for Peltier's release, saying that he is innocent and was framed by the FBI because of his political activities.

James Swan, the head of the Black Hills chapter of the United Urban Warrior Society -- a nonprofit group that helps American Indians fight racial discrimination and injustice -- who took part in the gathering, described Peltier as a political prisoner whose case needs to be reviewed by an independent body.

"What we want people to realize is that this is an injustice," AP quoted Swan as saying.

Peltier, 66, was convicted and sentenced to two life sentences in 1977 on charges that he killed two FBI agents.

Peltier asserts that he is innocent and that the FBI framed him for political reasons, especially his activities as a member of the American Indian Movement. He has lodged numerous appeals against the conviction but all of them have been unsuccessful.

He has been denied parole and will not be eligible for it again until 2024, when he turns 79.

According to Peltier's relatives, he suffers a number of health problems such as diabetes, arthritis, and the loss of vision in one eye following a minor stroke.

Many activists say Leonard Peltier is the most important political prisoner in the United States.

In the review of the human rights record of the United States at the UN Human Rights Council Universal Periodic Review (UPR) conference in Geneva, one group called for a new trial for Leonard Peltier.

The U.S. Human Rights Network (USHRN) filed a 423-page submission to the Geneva meeting -- actually, 23 separate position papers bound together with a 15-page “overarching report,” or executive summary, Fox News reported

The UN Human Rights Council reviewed the human rights situation in the United States in Geneva on Friday at its Universal Periodic Review conference, which opened on November 1 and runs until November 12

One of the papers, entitled “Political Repression-Political Prisoners,” about cases in the 1970s, indicts the FBI, accusing its Operation COINTELPRO of “maiming, murdering, false prosecutions and frame-ups, destruction and mayhem throughout the country,”

It cites the FBI for targeting the Puerto Rican Independence Front, the Black Panther Party, the Weather Underground, the American Indian Movement, the Black Liberation Army, as well as “peace activists and everyone in between,” and says that “many of today's political prisoners” in the U.S. were jailed indefinitely as a result. That repression has increased since 9/11, the paper argues.

The political repression paper demands an “immediate criminal investigation into the conspiracy,” and also new trials for two now-aged activists jailed on murder charges, Mumia Abu Jamal and Leonard Peltier.