COLOMBIA: Voices of Women Peace Activists Silenced

October 20, 2010 By

Global Geopolitics Viewpoints / IPS

By Helda Martínez – IPS/TerraViva

BOGOTÁ, Oct 20, 2010 (IPS) – "When we women speak out, without showing fear, we pay a high price: living with that fear," says one peace activist in Colombia. "The threats will not stop us from working for peace and social justice," says another.

Their voices echo those of the many Colombian women — peasant farmers, indigenous and black women, and mothers of victims of forced disappearance — who have mobilised for peace and to fight impunity in a country that has suffered a half-century of armed conflict between leftist guerrillas, government forces and the far-right paramilitary groups that joined the fray in the 1980s.

The best-known among them is Senator Piedad Córdoba of the Liberal Party, an Afro-Colombian feminist who was a mediator in the talks that led to the release of 14 captives held by the leftwing Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), in 2008, 2009 and 2010.

In her push for a negotiated solution to end the civil war, Córdoba works in association with non-governmental organisations like the Casa de la Mujer women’s centre and the Colombian Men and Women for Peace collective, which she founded. The collective maintains an ongoing dialogue by means of public letters with the FARC and with the second largest guerrilla group, the National Liberation Army (ELN).

"There’s no turning back from peace" and "our mission is to defeat the war" are Córdoba’s mantras. But she has paid a high price for her involvement in the peace effort: she was banned from serving in public posts for 18 years by a Sept. 27 ruling by inspector general Alejandro Ordóñez, based on charges that she collaborated with the guerrillas. However, the ruling can be appealed.

The Ruta Pacífica de las Mujeres (Women’s Peace Route) was created in 1996, describing itself as "anti-militarist and a builder of an ethic of non-violence." Its members, who range from feminist thinkers to rural workers in some 300 groups from nine regions, take part in convoys that travel through conflict zones with their message to those involved in the armed conflict.

"It is up to us to build peace," Olga Amparo Sánchez, director of Casa de la Mujer, told TerraViva. In the second half of 2009, at least 11 of the organisation’s leaders were victims of threats, harassment and physical mistreatment. Another organisation in May reported threats against 90 more women activists.

"I often receive aggressive phone calls in my position as an activist," María Arizabaleta, a member of the Ruta in the southwestern province of Valle del Cauca, told TerraViva. "In Valle we are 300,000 women strong," added Arizabaleta, who has been an activist for 60 of her 76 years.

"When we women speak out, without showing fear, we pay a high price: living with that fear," stated Pilar Tobón, a community negotiator with the Peace and Coexistence Programme of the Medellín city government, capital of the northwestern province of Antioquia.

Women activists fall victim to the paramilitaries, the guerrillas, and the armed forces.

Women and children "account for the vast majority of those adversely affected by armed conflict," states Resolution 1325 of the United Nations Security Council. The tenth anniversary of the resolution is Oct. 31.

In this South American country of 45 million people, 75 percent of those internally displaced by the civil war are women and children, according to the National Assembly for Peace. Colombia is second in the world for its proportion of internally displaced persons, who number more than four million.

From July 2002 to December 2007, the conflict claimed the lives of 1,314 women, and another 179 were forcibly disappeared. Of every 103 victims of sexual abuse in the context of the conflict, 100 are women and girls, the report states.

The U.N. Security Council "resolution is important in formal terms, because it underscores the role of women in working for peace and calls upon the armed groups to respect the rights of women," said María Eugenia Ramírez, of Mesa Mujer y Conflicto Armado (Women and Armed Conflict in Colombia).

What is missing, she told TerraViva, "is a commitment by the Colombian government to implement concrete measures, because it seems to have forgotten that it also forms part of the conflict, with its military forces."

In terms of "humanitarian law, the insurgent groups are just as responsible as the government," Ramírez added.

Esmeralda Ruiz, gender and human rights adviser at the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA), said "what is urgently needed is a political commitment by the government to women’s organisations, as well as mechanisms and strategies that make their contributions to peace processes more visible. That is what the (U.N. Security Council) resolution is all about."

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2010.

This article may not be republished, broadcast, framed, or redistributed without the written permission of IPS – Inter Press Service. Republication of this material without permission from IPS, the copyright holder, constitutes a violation of United States and international copyright laws and may result in legal action.

Filed Under: Human Rights, Latin America, Report

OBAMA:DANGERS OF INDO-PAK RE-HYPHENATION

November 5, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites
Wednesday, November 05, 2008

Copyright © B. Raman – South Asia Analysis Group
www.southasiaanalysis.org

B.RAMAN

The Presidential campaign is over. The transition drill has begun. Senator Barrack Obama will take over as the President only on January 20 next, but his immense work as the President-elect would have already begun from the moment he left the dais after making the victory speech to his followers and supporters.

2.The Americans call it the period of transition. It is during this period that the President-elect chooses his team of Cabinet members and senior officials, decides on his policy priorities and works out his goals during the first 100 days of his administration and thereafter. Those, who would constitute the hard core of his transition team, would start co-ordinating with the outgoing Bush administration.

3. Senior officials of the US Secret Service, which protects the President and the Vice-President, would have already called on him and set in place the arrangements for his security. Other officials of the Bush Administration would be calling on him and his close advisers to keep them briefed on the actions of the outgoing administration.
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Filed Under: Asia, Geopolitics, Politics, Report, Security

POLITICS-US: Yes, He Could Obama Handily Takes White House

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Nov 4 (IPS) – In a historic victory, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama has been elected the 44th president of the United States.

Obama, the first African American to be elected to the nation’s highest office, was declared the winner by all of the country’s major media networks as the polling on the West Coast of the U.S. closed Tuesday night, even as millions of votes remained to be counted throughout the country.

”A new dawn of American leadership is at hand,” Obama told a cheering crowd of about 125,000 people gathered in Chicago’s Grant Park, after the formal concession of rival John McCain.

”You understand the enormity of the challenges we face — two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century,” he said. ”The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America — I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you — we as a people will get there.”
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Filed Under: Elections, Featured, Politics, United States

RIGHTS-COLOMBIA: Army Chief Steps Down

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

Constanza Vieira

BOGOTA, Nov 4 (IPS) – General Mario Montoya stepped down as Colombia’s army chief, putting an end to his career Tuesday. The general is under investigation by the attorney general’s office, although he has not yet been charged.

”I have been in the service of my country for 39 years and today I can say that the journey has come to an end,” Montoya said in a brief statement to reporters.

The annual announcement of armed forces officers who are retiring is due Wednesday, and local analysts believe Montoya wanted to quit before he was forced into retirement, to preserve his image.

Montoya was widely regarded as a hero for the successful Jul. 2 operation in which the army managed to rescue former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, three U.S. military contractors and 11 members of the police and military who were held hostage for years by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas.
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Filed Under: Conflict, Human Rights, Justice, Latin America, Politics, Report

LEBANON: Another Rupture Sealed, For Now

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

By Mona Alami

BEIRUT, Nov 3 (IPS) – Over the past few months, Tripoli, a large harbour city sitting on Lebanon’s northern shores, known for its mazy souks, century-old mansions and oriental sweets, has made front page headlines, falling prey to a series of deadly security threats. Following the recent political reconciliation between warring politicians, however, the army made headway towards establishing stability by infiltrating a terrorist cell accused of orchestrating attacks against the Lebanese army.

In the presence of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, leaders of Tripoli’s various factions last month agreed a reconciliation agreement at the residence of Sheikh Malek Chaar, Mufti of Tripoli and North Lebanon. The document’s ratification put an end to four months of spiralling violence between the Alawite minority living in the Baal Mohsen area, also known as Jabal Mohsen, and Sunni communities from the adjacent impoverished neighbourhood of Bab el-Tebbaneh. The Alawites are a Shia sect.

The agreement was signed by Sunni and Future movement leader Saad Hariri, son of slain premier Rafik Hariri who was killed in a bomb blast in 2005 that is largely attributed to Syria. It was endorsed by pro-Syrian Alawite leader Rifaat Al-Assad and his son, Ali Eid. Siniora declared while signing the document that “Tripoli should be a demilitarised city, free of gunmen and any military presence.”

He went on to underline that the army and security forces have been ordered to enforce law and order. Hariri also attempted to reassure the public by pledging that the state will meet the needs of victims of the violence.

An army source interviewed by IPS, who chose to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the issue, admitted that “power struggles among the different factions in the north have temporarily ebbed since the reconciliation.” But he said that while money flowing into Tripoli will help relieve pressure in the shanty towns sprawling around the city, the issue of weapons, which abound in the northern capital, remains unresolved. The source said the Alawites are still in possession of large stockpiles of weapons received from Syria, while weapons are also found in many Sunni households.

The fractured Lebanese government has yet to address the issue of weapons, and restoring the peace in Tripoli has proved a complex exercise in cooperation. The Lebanese pro-Western and Arab parliamentary majority — comprised of the Future movement, the Druze Progressive Socialist party as well as the Christian Phalangists and Lebanese Forces — has been engaged in intense rivalry since the death of Rafik Hariri with the pro-Iranian and Syrian minority dominated by the Shia Hezbollah and Amal parties, which are allied to the Christian Free Patriotic movement.

In spite of both blocks forming a unity government in July, and Tripoli’s allegiance to the majority leadership, the dissention between the two factions, though condemned officially by all sides, has translated into intermittent eruptions of violence in the northern city. The area was shaken by two terrorist attacks that targeted the army on Aug. 13 and Sep. 29, resulting in 21 deaths.

“There was a definite breakdown of power in the North, with every small faction taking over a neighbourhood and imposing its own law, with individual feuds being exploited by various political factions and taking on a sectarian dimension,” said the army source.

However, political factions seem to have finally reached a consensus. “The resulting collaboration between the various intelligence services has allowed the crackdown on a terrorist cell accused of the bombings, which, according to information provided to me, was operating independently,” said Future movement MP Moustapha Allouch.

Islamist factions close to the minority added, however, that fear of possible Syrian intervention in the north under the banner of support to the Alawite community, or a possible quelling of the Salafist movements (a radical faction of Islam) as well as pressure from foreign countries allowed for the crackdown. Syria, Lebanon’s immediate neighbour to the north, ruled by an Alawite minority, has historically suppressed Islamic movements, and Tripoli is known to be home to various fundamentalist factions.

On Oct. 13, members of the terrorist group allegedly involved in the recent bombings targeting the army in northern Lebanon were arrested, according to a statement released by the Lebanese army.

“Tensions have been diffused to a certain extent since the intervention of the High Relief Commission (HCR), which is handling the compensation of victims of violence in Tripoli and has beefed up its staff working on the relief effort from four to ten committees. However, the lengthy process has frustrated some citizens,” said Allouch.

The MP pointed out that the fragile reconciliation process could still be jeopardised by the activity of foreign intelligence services — namely, Syria. But for now, the decrease in the number of men in fatigues roaming the streets is a refreshing sight.

Filed Under: Middle East, Report

ECONOMY-BRAZIL: Crisis Delays Threat of ‘Venezuelan Disease’

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

By Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO, Nov 4 (IPS) – The global financial crisis has corrected the extreme overvaluation of Brazil’s local currency, caused by the policies of its Central Bank, thus temporarily chasing away fears of “Dutch disease”, which in the developing world could well be called “Venezuelan disease”.

The change of name for this particular “economic ailment” in the countries of the developing South is based on the work of the late Celso Furtado (1920-2004), who in 1957 identified the phenomenon of “underdevelopment with abundant foreign exchange” in Venezuela, a unique case in Latin America at a time when the region’s main complaint was the lack of capital for industrial development.

The study by the economist who was the top authority on Brazilian political economy, carried out for the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), was just now published by the International Celso Furtado Centre for Development Policies, as part of the first volume of a series based on his personal archives, that includes another essay on Venezuela, written in 1974, and commentaries from other experts.

Furtado’s analysis of the “peculiarities” of the Venezuelan economy identified problems that would only be labeled “Dutch disease” two decades later, said Carlos Aguiar de Medeiros, a professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, who commented on the two studies by the late economist.
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Filed Under: Economy, Latin America, Report

POLITICS-US – Racism Won’t Keep Arab Americans From Polls

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

Habib Battah

NEW YORK, Nov 3 (IPS) – Arab Americans are expected to vote in large numbers Tuesday, despite concerns over voter intimidation and weak outreach from the presidential candidates, representatives of major community organisations say.
The Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) has set up a voter protection unit staffed by lawyers to help dispel rumours that may have prevented some from going to the polls in the past.

“As always, there will be voter intimidation,” predicted Abed Ayoub, one of five attorneys attached to the unit. Enthusiasm for the election is higher than it was in 2004, he contended, pointing to a recent ADC-sponsored event in Michigan that saw at least 500 Arab Americans register in just two days.

At the same time, the ADC has received hundreds of calls over recent months from Arab Americans who mistakenly believed they may have been ineligible to vote.

“One rumour was that if you are in foreclosure, you can’t vote,” Ayoub said. Another is the misconception that those who couldn’t read or write in English — often a problem for elderly Arab Americans — would not be allowed to use translators.

But the greatest fear is of an incident like the one at the 1999 municipal election in Hamtramck, Michigan, where dozens of dark-skinned Arab Americans were asked to take a citizenship oath before voting. The move caused many to avoid the polls for fear of embarrassment.

Even in more recent elections, a number of complaints were made to ADC, though never made public, the lawyer said. “This year we want to attack the problem before it happens,” Ayoub said.

Votes of the estimated 3.5 million Arab Americans could be pivotal, especially in swing states. And though a September poll by the Arab American Institute showed that Sen. Barack Obama was far more popular — with a 54 percent to 33 percent lead over Sen. John McCain — it also found that 20 percent of Arab Americans are not enrolled in any political party. And Arab organisations say both presidential campaigns have largely failed to recognise Arab Americans as an important voting bloc.

“Neither party has done a lot of outreach to the community,” said Lelia Al-Qatami, ADC’s communications and cultural affairs director. “Ethnic outreach is very common, but we haven’t seen any with regards to the Arab community.”

The Obama campaign briefly had a liaison to the Arab American community, she acknowledged. But the liaison, Mazen Asbahi, resigned 10 days after his appointment in early August, after the Wall Street Journal ran a story alleging that he may have had ties to a fundamentalist imam. The Arab American Institute called the Journal’s claim “vague and specious.” But the incident was just one of many that upset Arab Americans.

Many Arab Americans also felt let down by the Obama campaign this summer when two Muslim women wearing headscarves were barred from appearing seated behind the senator in a television shot at Detroit rally. And there’s been disappointment over McCain’s recent response to supporters who called Obama “an Arab”. By defending Obama as “a decent family man”, McCain drew fire from Arab American Institute director James Zogby, who issued a statement noting that Arab Americans were “also decent men and women”.

“We would have liked to have better contact from both sides [of the presidential race],” said Christina Zola, AAI communications director. “The racism on behalf of staff or supporters should have been dealt with better.”

A feeling of alienation from the two campaigns was also voiced by the Arab American Political Action Committee, which decided not to endorse either presidential candidate. And neither campaign requested an endorsement, the AAPAC said.

“Those candidates who are not willing to make the effort to request our support and pursue it respectfully are not worthy of our vote, regardless of who they are,” the AAPAC said in its Oct. 11 statement.

Both Obama and McCain have also been criticised by Ralph Nader, an Arab American of Lebanese descent and the Green Party presidential candidate. Nader challenged both McCain and Obama to visit a Muslim place of worship before Election Day, “like they [visited] churches and synagogues,” according to a statement on Nader’s campaign website.

Still, hundreds of Arab Americans are campaigning for Obama or McCain, the ADC said, while the AAI has recruited several hundred volunteers to help register Arab voters, as part of the Yalla Vote Campaign. (Yalla means “come on/let’s go” in Arabic.)

“We need to be involved in this election,” said Mohammad Al Filali, outreach director for the Islamic Center of Passaic County, New Jersey, home to one of the greatest concentrations of Arab Americans. “We cannot allow our voices to be muzzled.”

At least 100 Arab Americans registered to vote in the space of a few hours during an event to celebrate the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in early October, Al Filali said. He said the community was energised by the election, despite the perception that the word Arab has “all of a sudden become a curse” in campaign rhetoric.

Samir Issa, a software engineer who took part in the event, said he was still supporting Obama, the abrupt departure of the candidate’s Arab American liaison notwithstanding. “I lost some trust in him [Obama], but not all, because the other choice is even worse,” said Issa, 36. “He’s just trying to win, whatever the cost.”

Community involvement is another problem. The campaigns “pay closer attention to people with money,” Al Filali said. “We are new to the game of politics. We have to make ourselves known.”

Filed Under: Politics, Report, United Nations, United States

POLITICS-US: Vote-Flipping Reported on E-Voting Machines

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

By Matthew Cardinale

CHARLESTON, West Virginia, Nov 3 (IPS) – Several U.S. citizens reported watching their votes flip on electronic voting machines in different states during the early voting period, highlighting the continued vulnerability of “e-voting” systems, which about 50 million U.S. citizens will use on Tuesday, despite problems since as early as 2004.

Most of the voters with complaints so far have said they saw their votes flipped from the Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama, to Republican Sen. John McCain, although at least three voters in Tennessee reported the reverse.

Vote-flipping has been reported so far in at least four states — Colorado, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia — out of the 31 states where early voting has taken place.

However, the reports of vote-flipping are just of the tip of the iceberg, according to Emily Levy of Velvet Revolution, a voter rights group.
[Read more...]

Filed Under: Elections, News, Politics, United States

THAILAND: Anti-Coup Movement Strikes Back

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

By Marwaan Macan-Markar

Supporters at an anti-coup rally cheer as Thaksin ‘speaks’ from exile.

Credit:Marwaan Macan-Markar/IPS

BANGKOK, Nov 4 (IPS) – For the past five months Ataporn Kampa has endured insults hurled at him by an anti-government protest movement, that is supported by affluent, urban-based Thais who openly profess right-wing, conservative views and want the military to take over the country.

To this protest movement, the likes of Ataporn, who come from the impoverished agricultural belt of north-east Thailand, are a bane to the country’s politics. They have been sneered at as uneducated, stupid and lacking in intelligence required of voters in a democracy.

Such brazen contempt for the country’s rural poor by this right-wing movement, which calls itself the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), has also prompted calls for the rolling back of the voters’ power in the country. The PAD wants the military to turf out the ruling six-party coalition that was elected at last December’s poll.
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Filed Under: Asia, Politics, Report

POLITICS-US: Can Naturalised Citizens Tip the Balance?

November 4, 2008 By

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Tuesday, November 04, 2008

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2008.

By Nuzhat Naoreen

The Korean-American civic group YKASEC says it has registered more than 26,000 people to vote since 2004.

NEW YORK, Nov 3 (IPS) – Juan Carlos Jimenez had already lived legally in the United States for nearly 40 years when he became a citizen in October, at 44. He joined hundreds of other immigrants at a New York courthouse to take his oath.

“It’s the only reason I became a citizen — to vote in this election,” said Jimenez, who was born in Colombia.

The Iraq war and the foundering economy made him want to vote for the first time.

“There’s just too much at stake now,” he said.

Issues like the war, the economy, and failed immigration reform are expected to drive many first-time immigrant voters like Jimenez to the polls this year, in greater numbers than before.
[Read more...]

Filed Under: Analysis, Elections, Politics, United States
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