About two weeks ago John Vidal of the Guardian newspaper wrote that conflicts will increase as government backed companies in the scramble for resources push into territories contested by indigenous people.  About a week before his article, something extraordinary had happened.

Peru sent in heavily armed police to clear away some 2000 Aguarana and Wampi Indians protesting against the government’s right wing president, Alain Garcia, who sold 70%of their communal rain forests to oil and gas corporations.

These  include the Anglo-French Perenco, Argentina’s PlusPetrol, Canada’s Petrolifera, Spain’s Repsol, Brazil’s Petrobras and many others.

Dozens were killed according to Amnesty International. But something else happened.  Their protests, their sacrifice to save the rain forests, have for the moment, repealed President Garcia’s sale who is under pressure from the US to open up these forests as part of a destructive Free Trade deal.

The Peruvian Congress has since repealed the laws that would have allowed the corporations to drill by a margin of 82 to 12.

A leader among the Indians, Davi Yanomami said:

The earth has no price. It cannot be bought, or sold or exchanged. It is very important that white people, black people and indigenous peoples fight together to save the life of the forest and the earth. If we don’t fight together, what will our future be?

Throughout the war with Iraq  under the Bush administration, the question of torture seemed to provoke the basest of sensibilities. 

On the one hand were the Jack Bauer types who believe in the ticking bomb scenario, on the other, are the Geneva Conventions, the War Crimes Act, and let’s face it - what’s left of humanity. 

But the question of torture and accountability is not uniquely American.  Bush had approved of 14 “techniques” to extricate information from  alleged terrorists and, most disturbing, innocent people. 

I won’t go through list of techniques, we know them or of them and have been employed since the Middle Ages.  Instead, it should be noted that Europe’s complacency in allowing the US to torture, allowing the CIA to fly more than 1000 “extraordinary renditions” flights through and even land in the EU, is an understudy that also deserves the full extent of exposure and transparency.

US journalist Maura Stephens once described how one man, on his way to work on a morning in December, was approached by three men in US military uniforms.  They asked him his name, he acknowledged, at which point he was hooded and thrown into the back of a truck. 

He spent the next five months at Abu Ghraib where he was jailed, naked, and endured beatings and humiliation.  Sodomized by a gun barrel and electrocuted.  You know this man.  You have seen his photo standing on a box, hooded, with wires attached.  His name is Hajji Ali.

Tomorrow, June 26th, is the International Day in the Support of Victims.  At that moment on Link TV, the premiere of the Culture Project’s “Blueprint for Accountability,” will show General Ricardo Sanchez, the former top coalition commander in Iraq, call for a Truth Commission. 

It is a first and flies in the face of President Obama’s unfortunate reversal of his campaign promise to hold accountable those guilty of this madness.

Retired in 2006, the former General is also known for his strong views against the Bush administration and the war in Iraq.

 Check it out at youtube:

The freedom of expression and press has long been a contentious issue in Georgia where journalists, both Georgian and foreign, are facing intimidation, threats, and beatings.  Reporters without Borders ranks Georgia 120 on the press freedom index scale, worse than Sierra Leone and only one up from Algeria.

And Saakashvili’s government is fully aware of it.  In a surprise move,  Georgian Parliament Speaker David Bakradze earlier this month publicly apologized for the police beatings of Georgian journalists staging a protest outside  Georgia’s State Chancellery.

George Orwell once said that the spoken and written word can be used “as an instrument which we shape for our own purpose.” The Saakashvili government is fully aware of this as well. According to Tamuna Kakulia, a media analyst with Internews Georgia, Georgian television coverage of the war with Russia was tightly controlled and criticism muted.

Immediately following the war,  the iron grip  on the press  remains tightly clenched. Georgia’s former Ambassador to Russia, Erosi Kitsmarishvili, writes in openDemocracy that overt government manipulation has set back press freedom for years.

On March 17, the former spokesperson for the minister of defence, Nana Intskirveli, was appointed as head of news at the privately owned TV station Imedi. The glaring conflict of interest has turned heads, especially at Reporters without Borders, who have condemned the appointment as “an incomprehensible strategic error.”

Imedi was the main opposition news channel. November two years ago, masked riot police with machine guns ransacked the studio as the cameras rolled.  The screen then went black but the voice of the newscaster was still audible as he described the attack live according to the New York Times. Now that voice belongs to Saakashvili.

The freedom of opinion, expression, and information without interference is an absolute right. Article 19 (pdf) of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights makes that abundantly clear.

But it will be up to Georgia’s vibrant and diverse civil society along with those brave individuals courageous enough to face down a government that is eroding the most basic freedoms - like assembly - that people enjoy in any healthy democracy.

Since April 9, the beatings and intimidation of demonstrators in Tbilisi has eroded that freedom.  Even Georgia’s staunchest ally, the United States, has documented the erosion of human rights.  The 2009 Human Rights report available on the US Embassy to Georgia website, says that police brutality and politically motivated detentions , among others, were reported.

An American journalist and human rights activist Jeffrey Silverman who has lived in Georgia for the past 18 years was jumped and grabbed from the street by government thugs in Tbilisi.  Two months later, in an email I received today, he says the latest bruises have yet to heal.  You can read one of his harrowing experiences here.

As I wrote in my previous post, only two days ago, Norwegian journalist Ragner Skre was attacked by five thugs in ski masks at his apartment in Tbilisi.  He escaped with minor bruises but his bag with his notes, a dictaphone, and a wallet was taken.

In his own words, which I will leave you with - Ragner describes the incident:

“At around 22:00 on Friday 19. June 2009 there was a knock on the door, and when I opened it, I saw four or five men with black masks. The one in front pointed a gun at my face. I grabbed the gun and we fought over it while the other attackers forced their way in through the door and pushed me through the corridor and into the kitchen. I got control over the pistol for a short time, maybe ten seconds. They forced me to the floor facing down, and the pistol landed on the floor beside me. Then I noticed that one of them was pointing at me with another pistol. I shouted “help, help”, as there is a ventilation shaft through which our neighbours might hear me, and one of them understands English. Then one of them placed his hand over my nose and mouth so I couldn’t breathe. He was wearing black gloves, as several of the others. He banged my face into the floor with the hand covering my face. One of them brought out a broad adhesive tape, apparantly to gag me with it, but didn’t apply the tape. Then, about five minutes after they had entered the apartment, they left it, slowly, waving their guns around towards me. Afterwards I discovered that they had taken my mobile phone and my bag, which contained a digital camera, a dictaphone, my wallet with a little cash and two Visa cards. I don’t think they searched the apartment, and it bore no signs of it. A glaring green money bag (the kind tourists wear around theyr neck underneath their clothes) lay on the table three meters from the entrance, in plain view. They had not taken it.

Six months ago someone took my camera on the road in the same area. I want to clarify that I do not think there is enough evidence at the current moment to say whether the attack 19. June was thieves who were after my camera or an attack against me because of my work as a journalist. But my first reaction was that it was the latter. If so, I think it is too early to speculate in what the reason could be, since I have not been involved in any investigations which could explain such a violent attack.”

I received a disturbing email from a human rights activist contact inside Georgia.  He forwarded the following email from freelance Norwegian journalist Ragnar Skre:

I was attacked - two hours after I sent this. Masked men with guns. How can I contact you? I called your mobile, talked to probably your son, now there is no answer.

Georgian President Saakashvili is feeling the heat.  When I was there just before the war broke I spoke to numerous civil society organisations (Open Society) and individuals from Human Rights Georgia who warned of media crackdown and human rights violations.

A recent article in Der Spiegal has uncovered (yet to be) published documents by the European Commission that places the blame for the war with Russia squarely on this man’s shoulders.  The Commission report has found no evidence to support the President’s claims that a column of Russian tanks advanced into Georgia on the evening of August 7.

Brewing anger among the hundreds of thousands peaceful protesters in central Tehran has the Iranian government on edge.  Behind the scenes, arrests of prominent individuals backing the opposition are underway.  Yesterday, according to the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, the Secretary-General of Nehzat e Azadi (Freedom Movement) Ebrahim Yzdi was arrested while in intensive care.

The elections were stolen.  Robert Fisk at the Independent today says a secret letter written on June 13 that claims Mousavi had a slight lead, not enough for an all-out victory, but enough for a second round of votes. Fisk is careful to note that there is no hard evidence that the document is genuine.  But it will undoubtebly fuel the demonstration.

The letter:

Interior Ministry’s letter to the Supreme Leader

Salaam Aleikum.

Regarding your concerns for the 10th presidential elections and due to your orders for Mr Ahmedinejad to be elected President, in this sensitive time, all matters have been organised in such a way that the results of the election will be in line with the revolution and the Islamic system. The following result will be declared to the people and all planning should be put in force to prevent any possible action from the opposition, and all party leaders and election candidates are under intense surveillance. Therefore, for your information only, I am telling you the actual results as follows:

Mirhossein Mousavi: 19,075,623

Mehdi Karroubi: 13,387,104

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: 5,698,417

Mohsen Rezai: 38,716

(signed on behalf of the minister)

Iranians are hungry for democracy, for a change.  What is happening today is not incidental. The demonstrations resonate with a protest for reform that has caught the elite off guard.

For years a civil society movement has been fomenting. Moreover,  individuals within the inner state circle want change writes Nazenin Ansari - Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani (a former president), Mir-Hossein Moussavi (a former prime minister), and Mehdi Karroubi (a former speaker of the majlis) figure among those.

Women and the youth (70% of whom are under 30)  have been appealing and fighting for more rights.  Early February, the 2003 Nobel Prize winner and human rights activist Shirin Ebadi arrived at Tehran’s airport.  Ten thousand cheering people were there to greet her. Ebadi’s demands for human rights and democracy have inspired many and today, the voices of countless thousands is shaking the authoritarian underbelly of Iran’s government.

A rise in homophobia appears to be spreading throughout the world.  Some twenty years ago the World Health Organization removed homosexuality from the list of mental disorders.

But since then, the crimes perpetuated against homosexuals has continued.  While the UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights reaffirmed that all individuals have equal rights no matter what their sexual orientation, disturbing trends even within organizations slated to protect the rights continue.

Last year, a Committee member on the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) said that sexual orientation and gender discrimination would not be recognized in the Committee’s text nor work.

Numerous international organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch asked for clarification and sent a letter (pdf) in protest.

In Gambia, the president passed an ultimatum onto homosexuals to leave the country within 24 hours or face summary executions.

Homophobia in whatever shape or manifestation is a hate crime.  But in the US, homophobia cannot be persecuted in 20 states. The US federal hate crime legislation extends to race, religion, or national origin, but not to sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or disability according the Human Rights First.

If you live in the US and are a citizen - you can change this.  The US Senate will soon vote on a hates crime act. This legislation should include homophobia.  Write to your senator today.

The ambiguity of the term human rights has taken on interpretations that do not often coincide with the rule of law. But it is precisely this conflict of interests that sets human rights apart from the conventional understanding of the rule of law.  The strength of human rights lies in the rhetorical ambiguity  of its definition. We speak of human rights in ubiquitous terms no matter where we live.

In other words, a political dissident in an authoritarian society may demand the freedom to exercise her activities but not without breaching an established law.  The dissent has based her convictions on a moral imperative, a  higher international law or body that undermines the country’s legal position.

Human rights are a subcategory of law with a set of conditions that extend beyond borders.   These conditions are in themselves not entirely clear.  For instance,  ”the right to life” commonly referred to in human rights is unable to define if life starts immediately upon conception or thereafter.  This ambiguity and open interpretation allows for a wide array of debate because it is based on morality.

But therein lays another problem.  Nation-states have borders and wish to define the terms of human rights in ways that do not infringe upon conventional laws and rules.  Morality has little basis in conventional law. At some extremes, the lack of morality flies in the face of common sense.  Rich US bankers getting huge paychecks after having caused the global financial crisis comes to mind.  Or UK asylum seekers forced to live off 1$ a day is another.

Check out the story of rejected UK asylum seekers forced to live in horrendous conditions here: Britain\’s shadow people

All too often reports coming out of Africa paint a bleak picture of war, disease, and famine.  While no one can deny the sad state of affairs in certain areas of the continent, there are numerous success stories of prosperity and hope. 

According to the recently published 2009 Annual Africa Report, Africa’s overall trend has been an increase in democracy and development.  Unfortunately, it is estimated that some $150 billion is lost to corruption each year.

In the meantime, certain European countries like France and Italy have reneged on their 2005  G8 committements to stem poverty and reduce crippling debt.  Their timing and their decision could not be worse. 

France’s and Italy’s dismal performance is further compounded by unfair IMF conditions.

Last April the IMF increased its resources to $1 trillion in face of the financial and economic crisis.  But its checkered past at managing and imposing free market structural adjustment programs onto low-income countries does little to inspire confidence. 

According to the European Network on Debt and Development, the current IMF conditions prevent governments from spending funds to improve public welfare.

“IMF policies create and sustain poverty. IMF/World Bank policies are diametrically opposed as the former stymied the realisation of the latter”. - Ministry of Education official in Sierra Leone.

This is not the time turn our backs on Africa.  The IMF should reconsider its conditions as should France and Italy; especially given the global economic meltdown.

Press freedoms and diversity of the press have long been contentious issues in Italy ever since the current Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi secured almost 90% of the entire private Italian media market.  Berlusconi, who has been rapt in scandals and corruption charges since his first stint as prime minister in 1994, seems immune as he continues to flaunt his enormous wealth while offering disparaging remarks about journalists who dare criticize him.

He owns one of Italy’s largest press and book publication companies (Mondadori) as well as three commercial television channels under the umbrella of Mediaset.   His daughter is president of Mondadori and his son is vice-president of Mediaset.

And as prime minister, he has considerable influence over RAI, Italy’s state-owned TV broadcaster and once even fired two its  journalists in 2002.  His flagrant disregard for press freedoms and open contempt has many on edge.

It is little wonder that  Freedom House currently ranks Italy as having one of the lowest press freedoms in Western Europe.  But while debate on eroding press freedoms in Italy is nothing new, it has taken on a renewed ampler inside Italy and in the rest of Europe.

Last month 48 editors-in-chief and leading journalists from 19 countries adopted and signed the “European Charter on Freedom of the Press” in Hamburg.  The charter’s primary objective is to unify Europe’s journalism and serves as a tool to invoke its principles in case of violations.   So far, only one Italian journalist from Corriere della Sera has dared sign the charter.

Mondadori recently refused to publish a book by  Portuguese Nobel laureate Jose Saramago  because of the following sentence:

“In the land of the Mafia and the Camorra, how important is the proven fact that the prime minister is a delinquent?”

But perhaps most astonishingly is the recent flurry of activity from an openDemocracy article that has put forth a series of questions to the prime minister.  Journalists in Italy as well as Italians  and one the country’s few newspapers not owned by Belusconi - La Repubblica, appear to be rallying for more civic engagement and a restoration of democracy.  Some of the comments offer lengthy analyses while others are pleading for help.

Check it out here.