SRI LANKAN TAMILS: A DISCONCERTING SITUATION FOR INDIA

June 19, 2011 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy

B.RAMAN

My attention has been drawn to a disturbing documentary titled “Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields” produced by Mr.Jon Snow of the Channel4 TV channel of the UK.

2.The documentary highlights the results of a forensic investigation into the bloody culmination phase of the counter-insurgency operations of the Sri Lankan Security Forces against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in April-May,2009. It alleges that the culmination phase, which physically wiped out the leadership of the LTTE for which no right-thinking person opposed to terrorism need  shed tears, was also marked by executions, shelling of civilians and other atrocities carried out by the Security Forces. The documentary is available at http://bit.ly/mDpkez .

3. In the culmination phase, the Sri Lankan Security Forces did face a cruel dilemma because  the ruthless leadership of the LTTE headed by Prabakaran was making a last-ditch effort to save itself from capture or killing by taking shelter in the midst of civilian refugees. It was not an opportunistic tactic in the face of the mounting pressure from the Security Forces. It was a consciously-planned tactic of Prabakaran to force the international community to intervene by creating a situation in which hundreds of civilians were used as  cannon fodder in a futile attempt to save the LTTE leadership from extinction.

4.After the operation ended with the elimination of the LTTE leadership and the collapse of the LTTE as a terrorist organisation, there was a spate of allegations from well-reputed international human rights organisations, humanitarian workers, representatives of Western Governments and UN officials —many of whom often levelled the allegations independently of each other and not in a concerted campaign— that the Sri Lankan Security Forces could not escape their share of the blame for the large-scale violations of the human rights of the Sri Lankan  Tamil civilians living in the operational area under the control of the LTTE.

5.Two kinds of violations were alleged. Firstly, that the leaders of the LTTE, including Prabakaran, wanted to surrender but were not given an opportunity to do so, but instead were physically eliminated. Secondly, that the Security Forces consciously used disproportionate force with light, medium and heavy weapons knowing fully well that such use could kill many civilians. Protecting the civilians caught  was not on the agenda of either the LTTE or the Security Forces.

6. These allegations have been accompanied by demands for an independent international enquiry under the auspices of the UN to determine the truth and for action against the officers of the Security Forces and others found responsible for the violations — in a manner satisfactory to the international community. It has been alleged that some of the atrocities amounted to crimes against humanity and war crimes.

7. The Sri Lankan Government headed by President Mahinda Rajapaksa has strongly and consistently denied these allegations. While it admits the possibility that there might have been some violations to determine which it has been holding its own enquiry, it has indignantly refuted the allegations that the violations were of such a serious nature as to call for international intervention and action.

8. Unfortunately, human rights violations are rarely avoided in counter-insurgency situations however much the Security Forces try to do so. Terrorist and insurgent organisations train themselves well in creating situations where human rights violations do occur in order to seek the intervention of the international community.

9. What distinguishes a civilised and responsible Government sensitive to the rights of its civilians from a Government which is totally insensitive to the human rights dimensions of counter-insurgency operations is that the former takes cognisance of the allegations instead of summarily rejecting them, enquires into them and takes the follow-up action warranted by the results of the enquiry.

10. That is what the Sri Lankan Government has promised to do. Should it be trusted to do justice to the Sri Lankan Tamils or should it be distrusted and pressured to let the enquiry and follow-up action be handled by an international mechanism set up under the auspices of the UN?

11. While there were obviously serious violations, evidence available till now do not bear out the stand of those who accuse the Rajapaksa Government of violations amounting to crimes against humanity or war crimes.

12. In our anxiety and sympathy for the legitimate rights of the Sri Lankan Tamils, we should not exaggerate or over-state our arguments in support of or against an international enquiry. The Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora which has been active in demanding an international enquiry has stepped up its pressure on Governments and non-Governmental personalities, including reputed journalists of India and other countries, to take cognisance of the forensic evidence collected by the documentary and  support the demand for an international enquiry.

13. The Government of India should pay serious attention to the alleged evidence produced by the documentary and have it examined by our legal and humanitarian experts in order to see whether the documentary needs to be taken up officially and at the bilateral level with the Government of Sri Lanka and, if so, in what manner and for what objective.

14. The objective should be to ensure that justice is done to the relatives of the victims and that the honour of the victims is respected even if it be posthumously. It should not be to use the documentary as a stick to beat the SL Government with.

15. The Rajapaksa Government will facilitate a more meaningful Indian role in calming the feelings of indignation and concern of the Sri Lankan Tamils if it handles the documentary with the seriousness it deserves. Inaction is not an option for the Government of India. But action should be within acceptable limits of our bilateral relations with Sri Lanka and should not be overdone.(20-6-11)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )

Copyright © 2011 B. Raman – South Asia Analysis Group (SAAG).

This article may not be republished, broadcast, framed, or redistributed without the permission of the original author or copyright holder.


Filed Under: Asia, Commentary, Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Media, Politics, Terrorism Tagged With: , ,

OP-ED: Solid Present, Bright Future for Latin America’s Film Industry

April 12, 2011 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IPS

By Roberto Perez

AMSTERDAM, Apr 12, 2011 (IPS) – Since the 1980s, despite chronic social crisis, Latin America has seen significant advances in economic and industrial development, which have given a boost to the region’s film industry.

But the industry is still in the process of getting established, thanks to the improvement of legislation and the greater funds made available for filmmaking projects selected by national film institutes.

Film production in Latin America is still mainly made possible by the support of national governments.

The region’s economic opening, which began in the 1990s, aggravated the problems of distribution and exhibition faced by Latin American films.

These difficulties are cited to justify government action to protect national filmmaking industries, which suffer from a serious lack of competitiveness against Hollywood fare, with the exception of a handful of box office hits.

Experts say the issue is also related to the scarcity of cinemas in the region and the high price of tickets, which are unaffordable for the vast majority of the population.

But the countries of Latin America are working to boost distribution of and access to nationally-made films.

This effort is represented by the Specialised Group of Cinematographic Authorities (RECAM) of the Mercosur trade bloc, which is the founder of OMA (Mercosur Audiovisual Observatory), whose aim is the unification of the data systems of the bloc’s members – Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay – in order to bolster the development and integration of the national film industries.

The available data confirms that most films do not reach a minimum level of distribution within the national territory, let alone in other countries of the continent.

In Brazil, a country of 191 million people with just one cinema for every 47,000 people, experts are aware that expanding the distribution of local films would require a broadening of the market and the opening of more movie theatres.

According to Gustavo Dahl, the head of Brazil’s national film agency ANCINE, "It is clear that unequal distribution of wealth limits the number of showings, and the audience."

A notable exception was the 2007 film "Tropa de élite" and its 2010 sequel, directed by José Padilha, which explored the inner workings of the Rio de Janeiro Special Police Operations Battalion (BOPE), whose methods have frequently drawn fire from human rights groups.

The first part won the Golden Bear at the 2008 Berlin International Film Festival and the second became the most watched movie in the history of Brazilian filmmaking. Only Hollywood blockbusters have enjoyed similar levels of success in Brazil.

"Tropa de élite" 1 and 2 were a milestone for Brazil’s movie industry because distribution was 100 percent independent, by the film’s production company, Zazen Produções, founded by Padilha and his fellow filmmaker Marcos Prado.

And in Argentina, only one locally-made production was among the 20 most popular films in 2009: "El secreto de sus ojos" (The Secret in Their Eyes) by director Juan José Campanella, which was not only the most watched film of the year, but also won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2010.

However, it was not the only national film to draw wide audiences in Argentina. In 2008, "El nido vacio" (Empty Nest) by Daniel Bruman was among the most widely-watched films, and in 2007 "La Señal" (The Signal) was described as a masterpiece by popular actor Ricardo Darín. But these were exceptions. Hollywood films still have a virtual monopoly on the market, as they do in many other parts of the world.

Quality films often receive good reviews from critics, but fail to get adequate distribution. One example is "La sangre brota" (Blood Appears), directed by young Argentine filmmaker Pablo Fendrik and released in 2008.

One challenge in terms of distribution and exhibition is how to schedule a relatively large number of films in a declining number of cinemas in South America.

And once a national production does manage to get distributed, how will it compete against films from the U.S.?

Publicity is clearly key to achieving the necessary audience. Because most of the government incentives go towards production, only a small proportion is left to cover the costs of promotion. Many nationally produced films, without star power to draw in audiences, find it difficult to promote themselves.

One solution could be expanding the number of theatres, so that local films could be more widely shown. But there is also the question of how to reach the considerable number of people in Latin America who have never been to the movies.

Because of the competition from U.S.-made movies, government subsidies are justified by the need to protect national productions, which often have social, cultural and artistic content not normally found in mass-produced Hollywood films.

In using federal funds to produce local films with their own cultural character, most of which never reach the attention of the general audience, the people and governments of Latin America expect the investment to benefit society as a whole.

In this sense, Latin American films are more similar to productions coming out of Europe, where governments, or national film agencies, are also the main stimulus for the production and protection of local film industries in the face of competition from Hollywood.

Despite the challenges faced by the region’s growing film industry, there is no doubt that it is benefiting from the current favourable economic conditions, and it is likely to have a promising future.

Since the turn of the century, authorities in the region have proclaimed the cultural value of national filmmaking industries, which were severely undermined by previous governments.

In the last 10 years there has been strong support for national film industries, as reflected by the quality and quantity of films produced, such as "The Motorcycle Diaries" (a 2004 international co-production), "Y tu mamá también" (And Your Mother Too), a 2001 Mexican film, and "Cidade de Deus" (City of God), a 2002 Brazilian hit, which express the level of maturity achieved by Latin America’s film industry.

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2011.

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: Culture, Latin America, Opinion Tagged With:

Films Shrink Global Problems Down to a More Human Scale

April 11, 2011 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IPS

By Elizabeth Whitman

UNITED NATIONS, Apr 11, 2011 (IPS) – "It’s bad to be rich at the height of fame with your morals a dirty shame," says Valter pointedly as he bumps along in the back of a pickup towards Jardim Gramacho, the largest landfill in the world, located in Brazil.

Captured on screen in the film "Waste Land", Valter is one of 3,000 pickers, or catadores, who work at Jardim Gramacho pulling 200 tonnes of recyclable material per day from the garbage deposited there.

Documentaries "The Sound of Mumbai: A Musical", "The Boy Mir: Ten Years in Afghanistan", and Academy Award-nominated "Waste Land" were screened on Friday and Saturday as part of the third annual "Envision: Addressing Global Issues Through Documentaries", a joint programme of the U.N. Department of Public Information and the Independent Filmmaker Project.

This year’s theme was eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, one of eight U.N. Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to be achieved by 2015.

Evocative and richly detailed, the films highlighted certain qualities in each individual they portrayed, be they dignity, intelligence, humour, or determination. The timeless wisdom of Valter and the youthful hope and exuberance of Ashish, star of "Sound of Mumbai", brought their stories to life, converting them from mere faces on a screen to people with touching depth of character yet living a world away.

In addition to the films, the programme featured panels of experts discussing topics from the use of documentary filmmaking to food security to the role of women in combating hunger and poverty. Today, 925 million people globally remain undernourished, or one out of seven. Seventy percent of the hungry are women and girls.

Panelists underscored the need for films to craft compelling stories so that audience members stop seeing someone as an "other" and instead as a fellow human being.

Crafting the individual’s story

With films, one panelist, Lina Srivastava, told IPS, "You can tell stories that are… a little more human as opposed to that sort of top down perspective that we always get of us helping the other. You realise there is no other."

Srivastava is on the board of directors of Global Grassroots, a nonprofit that facilitates conscious change in communities to help women. She is also former executive director of with Kids with Cameras, a nonprofit established to raise awareness about the children from the documentary Born Into Brothels.

One way to evoke the human aspect in stories, Srivastava said in a panel about the role of women in combating poverty, is to tell tales of the individual. She spoke to the power of films and media in this task, because "what we really need is access to information and the ability to tell… stories."

Additionally, stories need to be compelling, in both the people and the places they portray.

Filmmakers also have another responsibility – to be respectful to the people they film. "The more you craft stories that are respectful, the more people are going to be used to those images as opposed to negative images," Srivastava told IPS, and the more people will understand why they need to help.

"Sounds of Mumbai", the story of kids from the slums of Mumbai selected to perform songs from "The Sound of Music", intersperses scenes of hardscrabble life in Mumbai – tiny homes, tents by the side of the road, chickens roaming freely, thin men squatting on corners – with rehearsals and interviews with the children.

Not only did the adults involved in the "Sound of Music" production believe that being part of the production would show the children a different but achievable reality, but Ashish’s own family also recognised the potential for change – even if it’s a long shot. "Ashish can get us out," his older brother says in the film.

Bridging the gap between rhetoric and action

Arguably one of the greatest challenges of the MDGs is transforming stated goals into concrete results. "Waste Land" showed precisely that transformation as it chronicled the project of Vik Muniz, a Brazilin-born artist, and several catadores from Jardim Gramacho to create portraits from recyclable materials. Muniz then photographed the portraits, and gave the proceeds from their sales back to the pickers and the community.

"Another power of stories is that you can actually spur direct action," said Srivastava. For example, "The Devil Came on Horseback", a documentary about genocide in Darfur, led people to divest from companies operating in Sudan.

"Filmmakers can leverage the power of the way they tell stories to lead people to action or to lead people to a change in their perceptions," she told IPS.

Divestment, however, is only one method of action. Rebeca Grynspan, an under-secretary-general at U.N. Development Programme and panelist on Saturday, acknowledged that implementation and execution of plans are major difficulties in the fight against poverty.

"The whole issue is: how do we make it happen?" she said. "The truth is that we need… the grassroots organisations themselves getting involved in the transformations themselves." She suggested that civil society must lead the change it wishes to see.

She and other panelists emphasised that the best way to fight poverty is to invest in women and girls, who remain a hidden and underutilised yet crucial resource.

An enduring dignity

"I am not self-conscious; I have confidence… I can do everything," went Ashish’s mantra.

Despite living in abject poverty with limited opportunity to escape it, Ashish’s spunk, determination, and imagination shone during moments of beauty, including a highly existential, albeit one-sided, conversation that Ashish held with a parrot about life inside a cage.

In "Waste Land", the women at Jardim Gramacho remain determined to survive with dignity. "It’s not a future," one of the women, Isis, conceded. Yet they agreed that picking through trash was far better than a life of prostitution.

The film also continued to capture the wisdom and inner strength of Valter. "Ninety-nine is not 100," he stated simply in the film, explaining what he would say to people when they asked if recycling just one can made a difference. Indeed, a single can makes all the difference in the world.

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2011.

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: Culture, Latin America, Report Tagged With: ,

‘God Bless Montevideo’ Inspires Serbs

March 22, 2011 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IPS

By Vesna Peric Zimonjic

BELGRADE, Mar 22, 2011 (IPS) – Only months ago, most of the Serbs would probably not know that Montevideo is the capital of Uruguay, as there is hardly anything that connects the two nations.

But now, for more than half a million of them, it is a well known spot on the world map after they saw the Serbian movie under the unusual title: ‘Montevideo, God Bless You’.

In a country of 7.5 million people, where the introduction of new technologies and economic hardships have reduced the number of cinemas to only 70, the movie led to the re-opening of dusty cinema theatres and screenings organised in sports halls for more than 1,600 viewers at a time in provincial towns of Nis or Kragujevac. The number of people who saw it made it the most successful and popular movie ever in Serbia.

"This is not just an ordinary movie", prominent Belgrade movie director and critic Dinko Tucakovic told IPS. "It has become a phenomenon, as it filled a vast void in Serbia".

‘Montevideo, God Bless You’ is a well tailored story about the efforts and success of young Serb enthusiasts who rallied around a seemingly impossible goal — to practice the recently introduced game of football to perfection and make a team for the first world football cup held in 1930 in Montevideo.

They made the dream come true in Montevideo, the city "at the end of the globe", as the players put it, and came in third. It was one of the greatest football successes of what used to be Yugoslavia. The team was made up solely of Serb players.

Based on the book by prominent sports journalist Vladimir Stankovic, it is a historical, well-costumed film with a nostalgic view of the Serbian capital of Belgrade in the 1930s. The audience sees the cobblestone streets of Cubura neighbourhood that disappeared in the course of decades and witnesses the magic of rising electricity use and birth of the radio. Ford T model cars circle the capital and cabaret nightclubs flourish downtown.

The heroes of the movie are well-bred, pleasant young men from ordinary yet decent families, highly aspirant, head-strong ambitious. In the course of the movie, however, it is companionship, faith, honour and respect, together with patriotism, that determine the role of the main characters.

"This is a movie that reminds us of values back in the past decades," psychology professor Zarko Trebjesanin explained to IPS, commenting on the fact that the audience has largely been comprised of young people. "It is particularly impressive to the young, as there is no violence, war atrocities of the past or materialism that prevails in modern lives," he added.

The whole generation of young Serbs grew up in wars, poverty and isolation of the 1990s after the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia, when the traditional values system collapsed. The painful transition into the market economy in the past decade did not bring the expected economic improvement and prosperity, which led to disappointments and resignation among many.

"The movie tells the story of young and ambitious Serbia, that wants change, prosperity and affirmation," prominent writer Ljubomir Simovic told IPS. "It reminds us of the level of civilisation we were forced to forget and could achieve no more…It also tells a valuable story of efforts to reach out from a small and tight community into something modern and avant-garde. That is why it is liked so much."

For young people like Mladen Josipovic (23) and his friends who saw the film in Belgrade, it was "an opportunity so see what life was like back in the 1930s". "We know nothing about it, and there are few people who could tell us how life looked at the time," he added.

Mirjana Jakovljevic (55) said she wanted to see "something without violence or war subject that surrounded us for so many years." "There are so many things we should think about and not only the wars, poverty and crime," she added.

For movie and TV producers, this seems to have become a central focus over the last few years. While the director and producers of "Montevideo, God Bless You" are currently in Uruguay trying to arrange the shooting of an imminent sequel that would deal with the historic football championship of 1930, politeness and old-style finesse are taking over the TV screens.

The series "Taste of Rain in the Balkans", which tells the story of five sisters from a Sephardic Jewish family from Sarajevo between the two world wars, who move across former Yugoslavia, has been a major hit on TV in Serbia, with the prospect of entering Croatian, Bosnian, Montenegrin and other ex-Yugoslav markets.

All rights reserved, IPS – Inter Press Service, 2011.

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: Culture, Europe, Report Tagged With:

‘Fair Game’ and Foul Players

November 20, 2010 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IDN

By Ernest Corea

IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
 
WASHINGTON DC (IDN) – "Fair Game," the film, delivers the George W. Bush Administration to viewers as fair game for condemnation and scorn. The film was released for public viewing around the same time that the Bush memoir "Decision Points" (Deception Points said a cynic) reached bookstores. The juxtaposition has engrossed political junkies, giving them much to think about and talk or write about.

(Pause for an aside. Bush was never known as a literary president, and his entry into the field of authorship has caused shock among his critics and awe among his followers. Late night comedians have made a feast of his role as writer-in-chief.

One of them insisted that the Bush memoir is a very useful publication. "It is so thick that you can keep it on the ground and stand on it to reach for a better book on a high shelf." Actually, as such memoirs go, a 497-page book — including acknowledgements and index — is about average. Not talking substance here.)

To consider the political aspects of "Fair Game" is not to write the film off as just another polemic. It is based on two politically-oriented books, Fair Game by former CIA employee Valerie Plame and The Politics of Truth by Joe Wilson, her husband, a former U.S. diplomat. They were both directly and deeply affected by events dramatically encapsulated in the film.

The film deals with themes and plots — yes, indeed, plots — that are quintessentially political. As Washington Post reporters Walter Leahy and Richard Leiby who covered the politics of that period have written: "watching ‘Fair Game’ is like unsealing a time capsule……" Yet, it is first and foremost a film.

Director Doug Liman and his scriptwriters have taken the skeins of partisan politics, espionage, warmongering, as well as the emotional tensions of a marriage under strain, and woven them into a rich cinematic tapestry. "Fair Game" is some 105 minutes of enjoyment, and it should surprise nobody when Liman, the scriptwriters, Naomi Watts (Plame) and Sean Penn (Wilson) are nominated for Oscars.

It is a captivating film, but it also provides insights beyond the film world that cannot be ignored or forgotten.

IN THE BEGINNING

We are dealing here with a saga that has many beginnings. Perhaps a suitable point to jump in would be the post-9/11 reference to the Bush Administration and Iraq by Richard N. Haas, currently president of the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations. Haas wrote in "War of Necessity, War of Choice" that "the first instinct of the president (Bush) was to push the bureaucracy to find a connection between Saddam and the (9/11) attacks.

"Paul Wolfowitz, then deputy secretary of defense, argued at the Camp David meeting convened on September 14 that the attack was too grand for al-Qaida to have accomplished on its own and that the US should go after Iraq."

Thus, long before Plame and Wilson became, overtly, part of the narrative, the Bush administration considered Saddam Hussein the villain that needed taking down. Confirmation comes from Bush who writes:

"Befor 9/11, Saddam was a problem America might have been able to manage. Through the lens of the post-9/11 world, my view changed. I had just witnessed the damage inflicted by nineteen fanatics armed with box cutters. I could only imagine the destruction possible if an enemy dictator passed his WMD to terrorists . . .

"The lesson of 9/11 was that if we waited for a danger to materialize, we would have waited for too long. I reached a decision. We would confront the threat from Iraq, one way or another."

NOT AUTHENTIC

In the context of that decision, it was not surprising that when rumors surfaced in political and intelligence circles that Iraqi representatives had attempted to buy uranium ore known as yellowcake from Niger, the White House wanted corroboration.

In February 2002, Plame was asked by CIA colleagues whether her husband, who had experience in Africa, would undertake a mission to check out the yellowcake story in Niger itself. He agreed.

On returning from Niger, he confirmed what at least two others (civilian and military) from the U.S. Government had reported. There was no evidence of any such purchase, although there were indications that Iraqis had expressed an interest in increasing their commercial relations with Niger.

No matter. On January 23, 2003, Bush said in his State of the Union address: "The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

That claim was debunked on March 7, 2003, when Mohamed El Baradei, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported to the UN Security Council (UNSC) as follows: "The IAEA has made progress in its investigation into reports that Iraq sought to buy uranium from Niger in recent years. The investigation was centred on documents provided by a number of States that pointed to an agreement between Niger and Iraq for the sale of uranium between 1999 and 2001 . . .

"Based on thorough analysis, the IAEA has concluded, with the concurrence of outside experts, that these documents — which formed the basis for the reports of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger — are in fact not authentic. We have therefore concluded that these specific allegations are unfounded."

Bush refers to the Butler Report (from a five-member committee appointed by Prime Minister Tony Blair, chaired by Lord Butler of Brockwell) as having concluded that the yellowcake allegation was well-founded. In the UK, the report’s findings were described as a "whitewash" and as a "lifeline" thrown to Blair.

WAR BEGINS

Those assertions covered only the speculation about Iraq’s alleged purchase of yellowcake from Niger. There was, however, even more compelling testimony, from Hans Blix, the highly respected head of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC). He is a distinguished academic from Sweden who served as Sweden’s foreign minister before heading the IAEA and then UNMOVIC.

On Feb. 14, 2003, Blix formally addressed the UNSC and through it the world. UN officials like to hedge their bets and their reports are sometimes equivocal. Neither El Baradei nor Blix was cast in that mold. Blix, like El Baradei, was direct, unequivocal, and left no room for misinterpretation.

He said: "How much, if any, is left of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and related proscribed items and programs? So far, UNMOVIC has not found any such weapons, only a small number of empty chemical munitions, which should have been declared and destroyed."

With that, two serving officials of the U.S. Government, a former U.S. ambassador, and the head of an international agency had said that there was no proof of Iraq having entered into an agreement to buy yellowcake from Niger, and the head of another international agency had declared that meticulous inspections had found no WMD in Iraq.

On March 19, 2003, nevertheless, Bush launched the invasion of Iraq.

In the White House Situation Room, with service chiefs as witnesses via video conference, he said to Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld: "Mr. Secretary, for the peace of the world and the benefit and freedom of the Iraqi people, I hereby give the order to execute Operation Iraqi Freedom. May God bless the troops."

Later that day, he wrote an intensely personal letter to his father President George H. W. Bush in which he said, in part: "In spite of the fact that I had decided a few months ago to use force, if need be, to liberate Iraq and rid the country of WMD, the decision was an emotional one."

FALSE PRETENSES

Wilson was clearly offended by the Bush Administration’s rejection of his findings in Niger, although they were confirmed by other sources. He had served as a career foreign service officer for 23 years, had served as an ambassador, and had built a reputation for himself as a reliable consultant. He obviously decided that he could not lie down and shame dead when his credibility was assailed.

On July 6, 2003, the New York Times published an article by Wilson under the headline: What I Didn’t Find in Africa. Wilson’s tone was one of indignation. His central argument challenged the rationale on which war was launched. He wrote:

"If my information was deemed inaccurate, I understand (though I would be very interested to know why). If, however, the information was ignored because it did not fit certain preconceptions about Iraq, then a legitimate argument can be made made that we went to war under false pretenses."

That’s when the debris hit the fan.

HITTING BACK

Just eight days after Wilson’s article appeared in the New York Times, the late Robert Novak, a senior Washington and Chicago journalist who fervently espoused conservative causes and revelled at being known among friends and foes alike as the Prince of Darkness, "outed" Plame. He wrote:

"Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me Wilson’s wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report. The CIA says its counter-proliferation officials selected Wilson and asked his wife to contact him. ‘I will not answer any question about my wife,’ Wilson told me."

With that, Plame’s career, well established through years of painstaking effort, was up in smoke. Wilson’s adversaries had decided that the best way to get at him was by hitting at his wife. A White Houise official is said to have commented that Plame, as Wilson’s wife, was "fair game." Hence, the title of her book and, now, the title of Liman’s film.

Plame’s outing did more than damage her. It placed several lives in jeopardy. As she said in spyspeak when interviewed by CNN about the consequences of her "outing", her "network of assets was compromised." This does not mean simply that her carefully nurtured agents were no longer of service to the U.S. It could also mean that several of them could have been rounded up by their governments and "terminated with extreme prejudice."

In personal terms, as well, the "outing" and subsequent events imperilled the Wilson-Plame marriage, stretching taut emotions almost to breaking point. After much soul searching they decided to hit back, narrating their version of events.

NO PARDON

The Justice Department named a skilled special prosecutor to investigate Plame’s "outing" and related matters. (Under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, leaking the name of an undercover agent is a federal offence.) The investigation lasted two years and the result of his labours was one conviction against Scooter Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff.

Libby was found guilty on four of the five counts against him: two counts of perjury, one count of obstruction of justice in a grand jury investigation, and one of the two counts of making false statements to federal investigators. The sentence was a fine and 30 months in jail.

In the face of requests that he be pardoned, Bush decided on a compromise which he described as follows:

"I respect the jury’s verdict. But I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr. Libby is excessive. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Mr. Libby’s sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison."

The requests for a full pardon continued in the waning days of the Bush presidency, until he delivered his final "no" to Cheney.

Cheney, writes Bush, stared at him with an intensity he had not previously encountered, and said: "I can’t believe that you’re going to leave a soldier on the battlefield."

Other soldiers were less fortunate. Over 4000 U.S. troops died in the Iraq war and over 30, 000 were injured. Estimates of Iraqi civilians who died have not been confirmed by but estimates are staggeringly high. All of them were "fair game"? (IDN-InDepthNews/18.11.2010)

The writer has served as Sri Lanka’s ambassador to Canada, Cuba, Mexico, and the USA. He was Chairman of the Commonwealth Select Committee on the media and development, Editor of the Ceylon ‘Daily News’ and the Ceylon ‘Observer’, and was for a time Features Editor and Foreign Affairs columnist of the Singapore ‘Straits Times’. He is on the IDN editorial board and President of the Media Task Force of Global Cooperation Council.

Copyright © 2010 IDN-InDepthNews | Analysis That Matters

This article should not be republished, or redistributed without the permission of the original author or copyright holder.


Filed Under: Commentary, Politics, United States Tagged With:

CUBA: The Environment Plays the Lead in Low-Budget Cinema

October 18, 2010 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IPS

By Patricia Grogg*

HAVANA, Oct 18, 2010 (IPS) – Scientists and experts took on the challenge of sharing their environmental concerns with filmmakers at the Third Thematic Showcase of the Humberto Solás Low-Budget Film Festival in the Cuban capital.

"It’s important to realise that low-budget cinema, which is resource-poor but rich in ideas and enthusiasm, is a major ally in the defence of the environment and the search for solutions to environmental problems," Teresita Tellería, vice president of ProNaturaleza, a Cuban environmental organisation, told IPS.

The first thematic showcase was held in 2008 as an extension of the Humberto Solás International Low-Budget Film Festival, which since 2003 has encouraged the use of digital technology to make films of excellent artistic quality on a shoestring.

The conferences and debates taking place at these events are considered interactive spaces for reflection on the problems of contemporary filmmaking and the search for solutions. On this occasion, the debates focused on the issues of environment and gender.

The event, which concluded Saturday Oct. 16, brought together people from different disciplines, highlighting the importance of working together and "creating mutual synergies," since problems affecting the environment are daily becoming more complex, Tellería said.

The thematic showcase was held in the Historic Centre of Old Havana, the first time this venue has been used for this purpose. It opened Wednesday Oct. 13 with the première of the documentary "Niños del presente" (roughly, Children of Today), a video entirely made and directed by a group of children in Gibara, in Holguín province, some 800 km east of the capital.

The making of the video was supported by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to send a message of hope and solidarity to children in nearby Haiti, where a magnitude 7 earthquake claimed at least 220,000 lives in January and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

"We want to tell them they are not alone; that we, too, went through some very bad times because of climate change," Ernesto Reyes, who plays one of the leading parts in the video, told IPS.

The children filmed their stories about hurricane Ike, which lashed the city of Gibara in Holguín in 2008. "We were the directors, editors and camera operators," said Ana María Leyva.

According to Sergio Benvenuto, head of the Low-Budget Film Festival held annually in Gibara, working with children and teenagers creates an opportunity to change the rules that usually apply in education and culture and, at the same time, foments interest in low-cost digital filmmaking.

"It is they who teach us lessons," Benvenuto told IPS. "The film was not prompted in any way. The children decided on an environmental theme that they felt strongly about, and that reflected their own tragedy and their sensitivity toward other children living through an even worse catastrophe."

One of the showcased films that attracted special attention was "Flash Forward", made in Budapest in 2005 by Cuban director Arturo Infante.

The short documentary presents a futuristic vision of Havana in 2026, portraying it as an overpopulated megacity with a subway system, where temperatures plunge, snow falls, and rundown neighbourhoods have been converted into thriving shopping centres.

"DeMoler" (the title is a word play on the Spanish terms for "demolish" and "grind") by Alejandro Ramírez portrays the feelings of sugarcane workers when a sugar mill is dismantled because of the decline and restructuring of the once powerful sugar industry.

"Revolución azul" (Blue Revolution) by Diego Fabián Archondo, a Mexican filmmaking student in Cuba, about the introduction of the North African sharptooth catfish (Clarias gariepinus) into Cuba, was another work addressing environmental issues and social concerns.

The morning session on Friday Oct. 15, on "Water and the Environment", stirred up heated debate as pollution damage to seas, rivers and sources of drinking water was discussed, as well as the need not only to expand the role of the media in environmental education, but also to create opportunities for citizen participation.

"Simply denouncing what we continue to do wrong can be useful," said photographer Jorge Larramendi, who urged the environmental authorities to issue the required permits to filmmakers wanting to create works that reflect environmental problems and the errors committed in the past.

"Art cannot change a country, but it can change attitudes," said actress Luisa María Jiménez, who called for broader debate on the environmental impact of human activities, and protested censorship on the debate in the arts and the media.

Like the previous thematic showcases, the event included debates on gender issues, the roles of women, sexual diversity, independent and alternative contemporary film, and a special session on gender perspective in the early films of internationally acclaimed Cuban director Humberto Solás (1941-2008).

The showcase "is a great challenge for those who have kept his ideas going, along with everything Humberto bequeathed to Cuban culture," Deputy Minister of Culture Julio Ballester told IPS, saying he had just "dropped in" to attend one of the debates on gender violence and feminism in Cuba.

He said "this is a complicated time for Cuba, in financial terms," and stressed the need to "seek alternatives, in order to continue doing the things that matter."

"We must ensure that the efforts made in these difficult times achieve the same high standards Humberto Solás reached with his films. In other words, our resources must be used to make things of lasting value, that leave us worthwhile teachings," Ballester said.

* Dalia Acosta in Havana contributed to this article.

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: Culture, Latin America, Report Tagged With: ,

CULTURE-CHINA: Now Showing – Independent Films

August 27, 2010 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IPS

By Mitch Moxley

BEIJING, Aug 27, 2010 (IPS) – While Hollywood blockbusters and state-funded historical epics continue to dominate China’s box office, a vibrant independent film scene is quietly growing.

Lacking distribution channels that lead to wide audiences, these films, which tend to focus on aspects of day-to-day life in China, are finding a home at the few independent cinemas that exist here and at film festivals dedicated to independent and documentary filmmaking at home and abroad.

"Although these kinds of films aren’t allowed to be screened at most theatres, independent film is developing well in China," Cui Weiping, a film professor at the Beijing Film Academy, told IPS. "You can find people talking about them at university lectures, in art salons, etcetera. Independent film is an influential part of China’s film industry."

China’s box office take is expected to hit 1.5 billion U.S. dollars this year, according to the state-run Xinhua News Agency. Hollywood films, 20 of which are allowed to play in China per year, continue to be the biggest money makers. ‘Avatar’, James Cameron’s 3-D epic, pulled in 204 million dollars in China in 2010.

China’s home-grown, big-budget film industry is also growing. ‘Aftershock’, which focuses on the 1976 Tangshan earthquake, recently became the highest-grossing Chinese film in history after it earned 79 million dollars in ticket sales as of early August, overtaking ‘The Founding of a Republic’, a 2009 film that depicts Mao Zedong’s rise to power and pulled in 62 million dollars.

Film Bureau Director Tong Gang told Xinhua that China had made 288 movies in the first half of 2010 and is projected to complete 500 this year, which will make China the third largest film producer in the world, after India and the United States. Only a small number of Chinese films make it to theatres, and many of these are produced by the state-run China Film Group and often play on a swelling national pride to attract wide audiences.

The growing number of big-budget films playing in China’s multiplexes is not necessarily a bad thing for independent cinema in the country, said Wu Jing, programming and marketing manager at Broadway Cinematheque, an independent cinema in Beijing. As the audience for big-budget films grows, an interest in independent films will emerge accordingly, Wu told IPS.

"Cinema is growing very fast in China," she said. "As the audience grows, they become eager to find other things to see."

Broadway Cinematheque was founded 14 years ago in Hong Kong by Bill Kong, producer of films including ‘Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon’ and ‘Hero’. The Beijing branch, which opened in December 2009, hosts a number of film festivals – including, recently, a tribute to Charlie Chaplin – and helps shine the spotlight on local talent. The cinema also hosts lectures and runs a library, bookstore and café.

More than half of the films screened at Broadway are made by Chinese directors. Even though these films all meet Wu’s definition of independent movies – they do not appear in commercial theatres – they are still subject to the country’s censors, as are all films played in China.

China currently has film festivals dedicated to independent and documentary films in Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, Guangzhou and Chongqing, and some of China’s independent films are finding a small audience abroad. dGenerate films, a U.S. based distributor, carries 25 titles available for online streaming at five dollars per film, and for purchase, at varying prices.

Independent cinema in China emerged in the 1980s, when underground films were made outside of state funding. Some were screened at international film festivals. In the 1990s, national control of distribution was opened up, allowing filmmakers to cooperate with private businesses to see their films distributed.

Notable films representative of this period, according to Beijing Film Academy’s Cui, include Wu Wenguang’s 1990 documentary ‘Bumming in Beijing’, considered one of China’s first independent documentaries, and Zhang Yuan’s 1993 film ‘Beijing Bastards’, one of China’s first independently produced films.

Broadway Cinematheque’s Wu said that for independent film to truly thrive today and reach a wider audience, China’s censor system will need to be overhauled – something unlikely to happen anytime soon. She also worries about the aspirations of younger directors, whose goals are to make big- budget films destined for commercial theatres.

The weakened international film market, meanwhile, gives little incentive for Chinese directors to make controversial films that skirt the censors in order to appeal to an international audience, Wu said.

For some filmmakers, however, China is the land of opportunity.

Qiao Li, 24, was born in Jinan, Shandong province, raised in Melbourne, Australia, and in 2006 moved to Beijing, where he co-wrote and co-directed a feature film called ‘Ring Roads’ and has maintained a constant stream of work since then. He says the low cost of entry and the freedom he has as an independent director working outside the mainstream Chinese film industry have given him opportunities that do not exist in Australia.

"The reason I decided to work in China were the many, many opportunities available to a filmmaker here," Qiao told IPS. "China to me seemed like a land of potential and where there didn’t seem to be many rules and for me, that was all I needed to know to make my mind up to be based here. The overall industry here is thriving and it’s free enough to let me do my thing and still be able to pay the rent, and that’s something I would have had a hard time doing back home."

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: Asia, Culture, Report Tagged With: ,

”Women in Focus” at Gender-Conscious Film Festival

May 12, 2010 by

Global Geopolitics & Political Economy / IPS

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, May 12  (IPS)  – The First International Women and Film Festival for Gender Equity drew enthusiastic audiences this month in the Argentine capital, where movies from nearly 40 countries were screened.

In comments to IPS, the organisers said they felt they had achieved their goals of increasing the visibility of women’s problems, raising awareness among viewers about the debate on the inequality of the sexes, and promoting inter-gender dialogue.

”The results were more than positive,” said the artistic director of the festival, Cynthia Judkowski. ”We had a great deal of active participation from male and female members of the audiences, at the screenings and at the debates, which were so well-attended that some people were unable to get in.”

The festival, titled ”Mujeres en foco” (Women in Focus), was held May 5-10 at six venues in Buenos Aires that served as movie theatres or debating halls. There was also a retrospective, and a seminar on screenwriting, directing and producing.

The idea was to call on filmmakers to submit films that address women’s issues related to health, migration, cultural practices, violence, inequality, political participation, sexual diversity and family life.

”Over 200 films were entered, and we selected 68, five of which competed in the feature-length category and six in the short film category,” Judkowski said.

The films selected came from Algeria, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Costa Rica, Cuba, Denmark, Ecuador, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Nicaragua, Peru, Poland, South Africa, Sweden, the United States, Uruguay and Venezuela, among other countries.

Films by women directors included ”Claroscuro” by Ana Faerrón of Costa Rica, about a women’s music group, ”Fim do silêncio” (The End of Silence) by Thereza Jessouroun of Brazil, about unsafe abortion, and ”Mémoire à la dérive” (Memory Adrift) by Pauline Voisard of Canada.

Films by male directors who tackled subjects from a gender perspective were also screened, such as ”Lilja 4-Ever” by Lukas Moodysson of Sweden, and ”Antiguos sueños de mujeres kichwas” (Quechua Women’s Former Dreams) by Santiago Carcelén Cornejo of Ecuador.

Entrance to the film shows was free, and there were no charges for registering films for the competition, each section of which was judged by a panel comprising two women and a man.

A retrospective of the work of Spanish filmmaker Helena Taberna, the director of ”Yoyes” and ”La buena nueva” (The Good News), was also shown. Taberna herself gave a seminar on screenwriting, producing and directing.

Debates were held on subjects like the place of women in the media, and ”machista” violence. A meeting was also held for filmmakers wanting to explore how to promote gender parity and human rights.

”The aim was to create an opportunity for meeting, exchanging ideas and promoting movies by men and women directors that deal with gender issues and human rights,” Judkowski said.

In the medium term, the idea is to stimulate the making of films embodying commitment to a gender perspective and human rights.

Usually, festivals stressing women’s point of view include a broad variety of subjects, but show films made exclusively by women directors.

The Buenos Aires festival was organised on the reverse principle: the subjects of the films were limited to key issues about gender perspectives, while the sex of the directors was immaterial.

The organisers, a group of independent professional women filmmakers, were supported by a number of local and international institutions. They plan to hold the festival on an annual basis in Buenos Aires, as well as taking it abroad.

”We are convinced that the practice of art is transformational and revolutionary insofar as it modifies space and time, creating new situationsà that challenge social relations of domination,” the festival announcement said.

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: Culture, Gender, Latin America, Report Tagged With: ,

Training Young Mapuche Filmmakers in Chile

May 6, 2010 by

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS

Daniela Estrada

SANTIAGO, May 6  (IPS)  – ”I want to film the few untouched natural resources we have left and show the injustices that have been committed against our communities,” Claura Anchio, who took part in an innovative free filmmaking course for young Mapuche Indians in Chile, told IPS.

Anchio was referring to a number of garbage dumps and water treatment plants installed near Mapuche lands in the southern Chilean region of Araucanía.

Because of these developments, Mapuche communities have accused the Chilean state of ”environmental racism” before the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD).

The 27-year-old Anchio is one of 20 young Mapuche selected to attend the first course ever organised to teach filmmaking to members of Chile’s largest native group, in order to draw attention to their experiences and problems.

Taiñ Azkintun (”Our View” in the Mapuche language) is the name of this initiative organised by the non-governmental Citizen’s Observatory and the Mapuche newspaper Azkintuwe. The course is financed by the Canadian embassy and sponsored by La Frontera University and the Catholic University of Temuco, both based in Araucanía.

”The idea is to give them basic but essential tools so that they can inform and communicate from their communities, whether in the sphere of reporting wrongs, communicating culture or maintaining and recovering language,” Mapuche journalist Pedro Cayuqueo, the editor of Azkintuwe and one of the project’s coordinators, told IPS.

According to 2006 statistics, there are nearly one million Mapuche, the largest of the nine legally recognised indigenous groups in this South American country of 17 million people, where about seven percent of the population are indigenous people.

In the late 19th century, Mapuche lands covering the regions of Bío-Bío, Araucanía, Los Ríos and Los Lagos, over 500 kilometres south of the Chilean capital, were wrested from them by force by the state, which also attempted to annihilate their culture.

A century later, in the early 1990s, Mapuche communities and organisations began to lay claim to their ancestral territories through a strategy of occupying private lands they regarded as their own, which were often in the hands of lumber companies, and protesting logging and mining initiatives and garbage dumps with serious environmental impacts installed near their communities, while demanding respect for their political, social and cultural rights.

With respect to the landfills, the Mapuche complain that they are in breach of the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) Convention 169, which stipulates that indigenous peoples must be consulted in advance on any measure involving their traditional territory — something the government had failed to do, on this as well as on other occasions.

As part of their struggle, many documentary films reflecting their complaints and demands have been made by indigenous and non-indigenous people, in addition to the creation of blogs and web sites.

The 20 young Mapuche Indians taking the course are from Araucanía and Los Ríos. The course will consist of four intensive theoretical and practical sessions, to be held May 8, 15 and 29 and Jun. 5.

Cayuqueo said this is the first of a planned series of courses, and highlighted the keen interest shown by the young people, more than 50 of whom applied for the course.

The idea is for some of the students to visit Canada, to learn from the experience of young Canadian indigenous people who are also working in communication.

”Rather than communicators or ‘reporters’, we want to educate communication ‘promoters’, young people who will use the new formats like internet and its social networks,” Cayuqueo said.

During the course they will learn to use film and video equipment and computer programmes for editing, and to write documentary screenplays.

In their fieldwork, they will try to document Mapuche ways of communicating, such as ”nütram” (conversations), and record for posterity the ”epew” (stories) told by elders to make a moral point.

”The communities involved in the conflict (over land and rights) have very few tools to convey a proper picture of the reality of their situation,” said Cayuqueo, who added that ”we’re not trying to promote a kind of communication based on ethnic fanaticism; on the contrary, it’s about how to potentiate our own values and identity by appropriating the best of what modern technology has to offer.

”Those of us who work in communication in the area of indigenous rights in Chile feel that there really is freedom of expression and freedom of opinion. But when those freedoms are always exercised by only one side, another right is being violated — the right to plurality of information,” he maintained.

In his view, ”only one voice is broadcast in Chile, one opinion across all the media. That’s why we think that this course, which we call ‘Our View’, will not only benefit the Mapuche but society as a whole.”

Erwin Quizulef, a 32-year-old resident of Panguipulli, a lakeside town in the southern Chilean region of Valdivia, told IPS he was motivated to apply for the course ”by the irregularities committed by companies that have recently arrived in the area, which damage the environment of many Mapuche communities living there.

”These things are not brought to public attention in the media. At a meeting of our community we talked about the fact that there is no one who can get the story out there, follow it up, and record what happens, both good and bad,” he concluded.

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: Culture, Education, Featured, Latin America Tagged With: ,

BURMA: Despite Loss at Oscars, Film A Testament to Courage

March 11, 2010 by

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS

By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Mar 11, 2010 (IPS) – It may have not won an Oscar, but its having been a final contender for the prestigious statue at the U.S. Academy Awards on Mar. 7 has taken ‘Burma VJ’ to heights never achieved by previous films depicting the oppression and courage in military-ruled Burma.

‘Burma VJ’ was beaten by ‘The Cove’, a film about the brutal hunting of dolphins in a Japanese fishing town, for Best Documentary Feature of 2009 at the U.S. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awards held at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles, and watched by millions of television viewers across the world.

Yet Sunday’s disappointment for ‘Burma VJ’ comes on the back of the remarkable story behind a documentary that was released in May 2009 in a single theatre in the United States to little applause and few earnings.

It then blazed its way through the international film festival circuit, winning 40 awards by the night of the Oscars, including for a prize for documentary film editing at the Sundance Film Festival and the Vaclav Havel prize at the Czech Republic’s One World Festival.

"This film made the world aware of the brutality inside Burma," Aung Zaw, editor of ‘The Irrawaddy’, a magazine on Burma produced by exiled journalists, says of the pulsating, edgy work of cinematography that captures the violent crackdown of anti-government protests led by unarmed Buddhist monks three years ago.

It is a film "about courage," he told IPS, of not just the thousands of saffron- robed monks who rose up against the oppressive South-east Asian junta in September 2007 but also "the courage of the citizen journalists who were on the streets, filming this uprising to show the world about military oppression."

The documentary by Danish filmmaker Anders Ostergaard tells the story through the voice of Joshua, one of the many video journalists (or VJs, as appearing in the film’s title) who have been working clandestinely for the Oslo-based broadcaster Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB) in the country.

Joshua’s soft-voiced narrative draws the viewers into the brazen acts of defiance, as does the raw, in-your-face footage in ‘Burma VJ’. The unfolding scenes show chanting monks march through the city of Rangoon, the former capital, cheered on by hundreds of people, some marching behind them, some clapping from the sides of the streets, and many more encouraging them from balconies and windows of buildings.

The palpable anger toward the military dictatorship is understandable. The September 2007 show of public outrage came nearly 20 years after a pro- democracy uprising in August 1988 in Burma, also known as Myanmar, where over 3,000 protesters were killed in a brutal military crackdown.

A repeat was inevitable, and the tension mounts as the cameras pan to capture troops appearing on the streets. Then the final assault begins; no monks are spared.

Yet ‘Burma VJ’ also achieves its dramatic tension through another creative means of filmmaking. Based in Thailand after fleeing the crackdown at home, Joshua is constantly online with his DVB team on the ground, talking to them via mobile phones or chatting through the Internet, to discuss and direct coverage tactics.

Such moments, intended to get the best images for DVB’s audiences in the country and the world, reveal the bravery of the ‘undercover’ or citizen journalists who dared to expose themselves by holding out their small, hand- held cameras in pursuit of documenting the truth.

"Never underestimate the power of the handycam," says one of the DVB’s video journalists, who goes by the name of Aung Htun. "It is the little eye of the oppressed people."

"Our job was to capture this historic event," he continues of his dangerous assignment during the ‘Saffron Revolution’, the footage of which was used in ‘Burma VJ’. "I never thought about risks, danger, as I worked."

"Taking pictures in public has only been done by the military intelligence and the authorities. What we did raised suspicion, but we had to do it and win the trust of the public and the monks," the slightly built 30-year-old, now in Bangkok, told IPS. "We knew something was happening in the mood of the people and some monks before September. And we knew we had to record it."

While the footage of Aung Htun and four other DVB VJs were used in the film, the nearly 60 VJs in the country were making waves elsewhere during the 2008 protests. Their images broke through the cloak of secrecy imposed on the country by the junta.

Little wonder why a ranking police officer does not mince his words in the final scenes of ‘Burma VJ’. "DVB are the worst," rages a visibly angry Maj Gen Khin Yi, Rangoon’s police chief, who then goes on to accuse the non-profit media outlet of being "the ones who broadcast most of the false news about us."

Until the insight into Burma provided by ‘Burma VJ’, the only documentaries that had offered a window to the country’s suffering had been a British Broadcasting Corp production after the 1988 crackdown called ‘Inside Burma Land of Fear’, done by Australian journalist John Pilger, and the more recent ‘Orphans of the Storm’ about the children who survived the powerful Cyclone Nargis in 2008.

"There is no doubt that ‘Burma VJ’ has had the most impact of any documentary made on Burma," says David Scott Mathieson, Burma researcher for Human Rights Watch, the New York-based global rights lobby. "It captured the bravery and the ingenuity of the Burmese journalists working under trying conditions to get their story out."

"The September 2007 protests were a defining moment of the undercover journalists, who have been working for years building up their networks," he told IPS. "They continue to do so knowing the risks, a jail term from two to 20 years."

DVB, in fact, has paid such a price. At least two of its known undercover reporters are languishing in Burmese jails, where at least 13 journalists and bloggers are imprisoned. Among them is 25-year-old Hla Hla Win, who was given a 20-year prison sentence at the end of 2009.

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: Culture, Report Tagged With: ,
«Older Posts