From www.iabolish.com:
We need your help today to ensure that essential anti-slavery legislation will be signed into law. Representative Chris Smith of New Jersey, a longtime supporter of American Anti-Slavery Group (AASG), is ready to reintroduce House Resolution 5911, the Eradication of Slavery in Sudan Act.
Click here to learn more about this bill and to contact your representative today.
The bill is struggling against opposition by the U.S. State Department, which argues that they can do the job without a commission. However, tens of thousands of Southern Sudanese slaves remain in bondage in Northern Sudan. Representative Smith needs co-sponsors in order to re-introduce his bill.
Please ask for your legislator's support.
The Resolution would:
1. Create an independent commission of experts;
2. Investigate the fate of slaves in Sudan; and
3. Make recommendations on U.S. policy to eliminate slavery in Sudan.
This legislation is crucial to the elimination of slavery in Sudan, which has victimized tens of thousands of people. But without significant co-sponsorship, it will not even come to a vote.
Let your representative know this is important to you, and then make sure you tell your friends to do the same.
Please also join AASG on Tuesday, July 3, from 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm EST as we call Congress to urge them to support this piece of legislation.
Click here for a list of legislators that we are targeting and a sample script of what to say.
We must tell Congress that we can no longer tolerate the complicity of the U.S. government on this deliberate abuse of human rights.
In Freedom,
the iAbolish team
© American Anti-Slavery Group. All rights reserved.
Friday, June 29, 2007
Fear in Afghanistan
NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson, clad in a burka, stands with farmers in an opium poppy field outside Lashkargah, in Afghanistan's Helmand province.
A Correspondent Finds Afghans' Optimism Waning
by Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson
Morning Edition, June 28, 2007 · More than five years after the fall of the Taliban, little optimism remains about the future of Afghanistan, and more and more people are looking to get out of the country, says Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson, who covers the country for NPR.
"There is still a little hope," Nelson, who is wrapping up a U.S. visit, tells Steve Inskeep.
"You ask an average Afghan, [and] they will tell you everything is dire, the economy stinks, there are no jobs, the government is collapsing, the corruption is rampant, the Taliban menace is growing.
"And you will ask them, 'Well, do you think the Taliban are going to take back over?' Most of them will say, 'No.' They haven't gotten quite that far yet. But I think that's only a matter of time."
Civilian casualties, largely in NATO airstrikes against Taliban fighters, are contributing to the pessimism.
"The anger toward NATO is very much there," she says. "People really feel that they are not there to help them anymore and that they in fact are killing people."
Life in Afghanistan these days is a tale of two cities — the somewhat Westernized Kabul, and a violent Taliban stronghold called Lashkargah, in southern Afghanistan.
"In Kabul, you'll see women or girls walking down the street with just a veil on and jeans," Nelson says. "It's very relaxed and it has a little bit of a Western feel to it. You definitely see that Afghanistan has come a long way from the Taliban days."
Nelson says Kabul feels safe enough to walk around in — especially in daylight.
But the situation is much different in Lashkargah, the capital of Helmand province.
"You don't see any women on the streets without burkas. [There is] a lot of paranoia. The bazaar is very rarely filled. People are so scared, they don't trust their neighbors. They don't trust anybody.
"They're basically racing to work — if they even still go to work — and race home at night. A lot of life is spent in the family compound. Nobody ever goes out.
"There's fear because it's very difficult to tell who's Taliban and who's not .... A lot of times they'll use motorcycles that have sirens very similar to what the police will use. As a result, you just don't know who's in town, you don't know who's an informant because the Taliban do pay money to be able to find people to kidnap. A lot of times, bodies will be left outside the city .... As a result, you just don't have really any life."
listen to full story
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Supreme Court: Schools can't use race to assign students
Bob Egelko, San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer
Thursday, June 28, 2007
(06-28) 10:17 PDT WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Supreme Court dealt a severe blow to school integration efforts today, ruling that the Constitution forbids assigning students to particular schools because of their race, even when the goal is campus diversity.
The 5-4 ruling, on the last day of the 2006-07 term, came 53 years after the court unanimously outlawed racial segregation in public schools and declared that segregated schools are inherently unequal. Today's decision invoked some of the same concepts of racial equality to strike down race-conscious enrollment systems in Seattle and Louisville, Ky., similar to programs in hundreds of school districts nationwide.
"The state must seek alternatives to the classification and differential treatment of individuals by race, at least absent some extraordinary showing not present here,'' said Justice Anthony Kennedy, who cast the decisive fifth vote against the Seattle and Louisville districts.
The court's most conservative members, led by Chief Justice John Roberts, would have gone further and banned all school district efforts at racial balancing, saying they violated the principle of a "color-blind'' Constitution. Kennedy disagreed, saying racial diversity in public schools is a legitimate goal, but that it generally must be pursued by such measures as designing attendance zones or locating new schools to minimize racial isolation rather than assigning individual students on the basis of their race.
If those measures are inadequate, he said, a school may be able to justify an enrollment system that takes a student's race into account. Kennedy did not define those circumstances but said the Seattle and Louisville districts failed to meet his test.
Dissenting justices said the ruling endangered the principles of racial equality established in the landmark 1954 ruling, Brown vs. Board of Education.
"The last half-century has witnessed great strides toward racial equality, but we have not yet realized the promise of Brown,'' said Justice Stephen Breyer. "To invalidate the plans under review is to threaten the promise of Brown. The (Roberts) position, I fear, would break that promise. This is a decision that the court and the nation will come to regret.''
The ruling comes four years after the court allowed public universities to consider applicants' race as one of several factors to promote a diverse student body. The 5-4 majority in that case included Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who retired last year and was replaced by Justice Samuel Alito, an appointee of President Bush who joined Roberts' opinion today. The court majority said today it was not questioning the 2003 ruling.
The decision affects numerous school districts that have adopted race-conscious enrollment systems to offset the effects of housing patterns and parental choice that have resulted in heavily white and minority schools even after the abolition of state-sponsored segregation.
According to a report by the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University, whites made up 58 percent of the nation's public school enrollment in 2003, but the average white student attended a school that was nearly 80 percent white. African Americans accounted for 17 percent of all students, but the average black student attended a school that was 53 percent black. Latinos made up 19 percent of enrollment but attended schools that were typically 55 percent Latino.
The impact of today's ruling on California is less clear, because state voters may have already outlawed race-based enrollment systems more than a decade ago.
Proposition 209, passed in 1996, prohibited race and sex preferences in public education, employment and contracting. The state Supreme Court has declared that the initiative bans all government classifications that treat the races differently, but has never ruled on its application to public schools.
San Francisco's new school superintendent, Carlos Garcia, said earlier this month he would like to resume the use of race as a factor in enrollment, a position shared by a majority of the school board. Students' race was considered in school assignments under a court order in effect from 1983 until 2001, when racial considerations were prohibited in a settlement of a suit by Chinese-American parents. Since then, single-race enrollment at some schools has risen above 80 percent.
Any attempt to reinstate race-based enrollment would face a legal challenge under Prop. 209 as well as the U.S. constitutional standard that the court announced today.
The ruling was a victory for groups of white parents who sued the Seattle and Louisville districts, saying their children were turned away from their preferred schools because of their race.
read on...
Thursday, June 28, 2007
(06-28) 10:17 PDT WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Supreme Court dealt a severe blow to school integration efforts today, ruling that the Constitution forbids assigning students to particular schools because of their race, even when the goal is campus diversity.
The 5-4 ruling, on the last day of the 2006-07 term, came 53 years after the court unanimously outlawed racial segregation in public schools and declared that segregated schools are inherently unequal. Today's decision invoked some of the same concepts of racial equality to strike down race-conscious enrollment systems in Seattle and Louisville, Ky., similar to programs in hundreds of school districts nationwide.
"The state must seek alternatives to the classification and differential treatment of individuals by race, at least absent some extraordinary showing not present here,'' said Justice Anthony Kennedy, who cast the decisive fifth vote against the Seattle and Louisville districts.
The court's most conservative members, led by Chief Justice John Roberts, would have gone further and banned all school district efforts at racial balancing, saying they violated the principle of a "color-blind'' Constitution. Kennedy disagreed, saying racial diversity in public schools is a legitimate goal, but that it generally must be pursued by such measures as designing attendance zones or locating new schools to minimize racial isolation rather than assigning individual students on the basis of their race.
If those measures are inadequate, he said, a school may be able to justify an enrollment system that takes a student's race into account. Kennedy did not define those circumstances but said the Seattle and Louisville districts failed to meet his test.
Dissenting justices said the ruling endangered the principles of racial equality established in the landmark 1954 ruling, Brown vs. Board of Education.
"The last half-century has witnessed great strides toward racial equality, but we have not yet realized the promise of Brown,'' said Justice Stephen Breyer. "To invalidate the plans under review is to threaten the promise of Brown. The (Roberts) position, I fear, would break that promise. This is a decision that the court and the nation will come to regret.''
The ruling comes four years after the court allowed public universities to consider applicants' race as one of several factors to promote a diverse student body. The 5-4 majority in that case included Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who retired last year and was replaced by Justice Samuel Alito, an appointee of President Bush who joined Roberts' opinion today. The court majority said today it was not questioning the 2003 ruling.
The decision affects numerous school districts that have adopted race-conscious enrollment systems to offset the effects of housing patterns and parental choice that have resulted in heavily white and minority schools even after the abolition of state-sponsored segregation.
According to a report by the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University, whites made up 58 percent of the nation's public school enrollment in 2003, but the average white student attended a school that was nearly 80 percent white. African Americans accounted for 17 percent of all students, but the average black student attended a school that was 53 percent black. Latinos made up 19 percent of enrollment but attended schools that were typically 55 percent Latino.
The impact of today's ruling on California is less clear, because state voters may have already outlawed race-based enrollment systems more than a decade ago.
Proposition 209, passed in 1996, prohibited race and sex preferences in public education, employment and contracting. The state Supreme Court has declared that the initiative bans all government classifications that treat the races differently, but has never ruled on its application to public schools.
San Francisco's new school superintendent, Carlos Garcia, said earlier this month he would like to resume the use of race as a factor in enrollment, a position shared by a majority of the school board. Students' race was considered in school assignments under a court order in effect from 1983 until 2001, when racial considerations were prohibited in a settlement of a suit by Chinese-American parents. Since then, single-race enrollment at some schools has risen above 80 percent.
Any attempt to reinstate race-based enrollment would face a legal challenge under Prop. 209 as well as the U.S. constitutional standard that the court announced today.
The ruling was a victory for groups of white parents who sued the Seattle and Louisville districts, saying their children were turned away from their preferred schools because of their race.
read on...
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Ocean's 13 Cast Helps Darfur
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: June 27, 2007
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- ''Ocean's Thirteen'' stars have donated $5.5 million to humanitarian efforts in Sudan's Darfur region, according to actor George Clooney.
Clooney told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Rome that he was joined by Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle and producer Jerry Weintraub in raising $9.3 million for Darfur, most of which was contributed at a dinner during the film's premiere last month at the Cannes Film Festival.
Clooney said more than half the money has already been donated to various charities dealing with Darfur. He said his group wants to keep emptying and replenishing the coffers of the humanitarian organization they co-founded, called Not On Our Watch, to focus global attention on the plight of the 2.5 million civilians in Darfur who have fled their homes.
''There are only a few things we can do -- protect them where we can, and provide food, water, health care and counseling,'' he said. ''We're just trying to get them to live long enough to get to the next step.''
More than 200,000 people have died in the Darfur region of western Sudan since 2003, when local rebels took up arms against the Sudanese government, accusing it of decades of neglect. Sudan's government is accused of unleashing in response a militia of Arab nomads known as the janjaweed -- a charge it denies.
Clooney announced the latest donation from Not On Our Watch -- $1 million to the U.N. World Food Program -- which will be used to help the U.N. agency deliver food and other necessities by helicopter to inaccessible villages in Darfur.
The latest donation raised to $5.5 million the amount that Not On Our Watch has given to humanitarian and relief organizations in Darfur in less than three weeks.
Not On Our Watch's first donation of $2.75 million went to the International Rescue Committee. It has also donated $750,000 to the British-based relief agency Oxfam and $1 million to the Westport, Conn.-based charity Save The Children.
Clooney said everyone on the board is committed to keep raising awareness and money.
''I have every intention of doing it in other places,'' he said, and the upcoming film festivals in Venice, Italy, and Deauville, France, ''sound like good spots'' for fundraising events.
------
On the Net:
Not On Our Watch:
http://notonourwatchproject.org/
Published: June 27, 2007
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- ''Ocean's Thirteen'' stars have donated $5.5 million to humanitarian efforts in Sudan's Darfur region, according to actor George Clooney.
Clooney told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Rome that he was joined by Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle and producer Jerry Weintraub in raising $9.3 million for Darfur, most of which was contributed at a dinner during the film's premiere last month at the Cannes Film Festival.
Clooney said more than half the money has already been donated to various charities dealing with Darfur. He said his group wants to keep emptying and replenishing the coffers of the humanitarian organization they co-founded, called Not On Our Watch, to focus global attention on the plight of the 2.5 million civilians in Darfur who have fled their homes.
''There are only a few things we can do -- protect them where we can, and provide food, water, health care and counseling,'' he said. ''We're just trying to get them to live long enough to get to the next step.''
More than 200,000 people have died in the Darfur region of western Sudan since 2003, when local rebels took up arms against the Sudanese government, accusing it of decades of neglect. Sudan's government is accused of unleashing in response a militia of Arab nomads known as the janjaweed -- a charge it denies.
Clooney announced the latest donation from Not On Our Watch -- $1 million to the U.N. World Food Program -- which will be used to help the U.N. agency deliver food and other necessities by helicopter to inaccessible villages in Darfur.
The latest donation raised to $5.5 million the amount that Not On Our Watch has given to humanitarian and relief organizations in Darfur in less than three weeks.
Not On Our Watch's first donation of $2.75 million went to the International Rescue Committee. It has also donated $750,000 to the British-based relief agency Oxfam and $1 million to the Westport, Conn.-based charity Save The Children.
Clooney said everyone on the board is committed to keep raising awareness and money.
''I have every intention of doing it in other places,'' he said, and the upcoming film festivals in Venice, Italy, and Deauville, France, ''sound like good spots'' for fundraising events.
------
On the Net:
Not On Our Watch:
http://notonourwatchproject.org/
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Paying Developing Countries Not to Burn Forests
Indonesian students look at the wooden wall which was cut down by a Greenpeace activist during a protest against deforestation in Jakarta. AFP/Getty Images
from www.npr.org
by Christopher Joyce
Morning Edition, June 26, 2007 · Many industrialized nations are trying to use less coal, oil and natural gas to lower carbon dioxide levels, which is warming the atmosphere and changing the Earth's climate. But one-fifth of all greenhouse gases comes from forests that are cut down and burned to make way for crops or pasture.
Now there is a movement to get countries with big forests to slow the rate of cutting by paying them.
When a forest is burned to make room for a soybean field or a cattle pasture, for instance, the carbon in those trees goes up into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide — the leading greenhouse gas. As a result, burning forests creates a huge pulse of the gas.
The international treaty that limits greenhouse gases, the Kyoto Protocol, doesn't do anything directly about deforestation. It is aimed at factories and power plants in industrialized countries.
Thus, the new idea was born; it was first floated by developing countries: Why not pay them to slow down their deforestation. In the process, after the carbon that is kept earthbound as a result is tallied, it can be sold as a carbon credit to anyone who wants to offset their own carbon dioxide emissions.
Supporters of the "avoided deforestation" idea also say that in the effort to slow climate change, it could help remake developing countries from spectators into first-string players.
"Every year in tropical countries we lose about an area of forest about the size of New York state," said Peter Frumhoff, of the advocacy group the Union of Concerned Scientists. "The sum total of those clearings is that it contributes about 20 percent of the heat trapping gases into the atmosphere that cause global warming."
One group that has emerged to represent the developing countries is the Coalition for Rainforest Nations. Led by Kevin Conrad, a young business school graduate born and raised in Papua, New Guinea, the coalition tries to offer incentives for its members to keep their plush forest lands.
"What was driving deforestation was a global market for cows or a global market for coffee," Conrad said. "Nobody could compete head to head with the money a country was making elsewhere, so carbon was the first time we had a chance, a global market that could compete head to head with these other markets."
Monday, June 25, 2007
Redoubling Efforts? The International Community and Darfur
Meeting on Darfur ends with few signs of progress
By Craig S. Smith
International Herald Tribune
Published: June 25, 2007
PARIS: They came, they met, they agreed that more must be done, but a Paris meeting aimed at solving the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan ended with little visible progress Monday.
"We really must redouble our efforts, and I think that that was the spirit of today's conference," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said at a brief news conference following the day of closed-door meetings. "The point here was to take stock of where we are and to make sure that we are doing everything we can."
Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner of France said the delegations from 18 countries, including Sudan's major donors, the Group of 8 industrialized countries and China had reaffirmed their support for a joint African Union and United Nations peacekeeping force according to a deal hammered out with Khartoum earlier this month.
"There is a little light at the end of the darkness," Kouchner said.
But there was no announcement of who would contribute soldiers to the force, nor was there any signal that China had softened its resistance to levy sanctions on Sudan, a measure that would require Chinese acquiescence for it to win UN Security Council approval. China is a staunch Khartoum ally and major buyer of Sudanese oil.
France did say it would contribute about €10 million, or $13.5 million, to help fund the peacekeeping force. The country has spent just €2.5 million on aid to Darfur so far this year and only €3.9 million for all of 2006, according to UN figures. The European Union also promised to spend an extra €31 million for humanitarian relief in the coming months.
Since early 2003, an Arab militia known as the janjaweed have been raping and killing non-Arabs in Darfur, ostensibly as part of the Sudanese government's effort to suppress a rebellion there.
The United States labeled the violence genocide in 2004, but the international community has done little to stop it.
The African Union and the United Nations hope to get all factions to sit down for peace talks in August. China's special envoy, Liu Guijin, said Monday that the Sudanese government was ready to participate in such talks.
But delegates said that with more than a dozen armed groups operating in the region, negotiating peace will be difficult.
By Craig S. Smith
International Herald Tribune
Published: June 25, 2007
PARIS: They came, they met, they agreed that more must be done, but a Paris meeting aimed at solving the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan ended with little visible progress Monday.
"We really must redouble our efforts, and I think that that was the spirit of today's conference," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said at a brief news conference following the day of closed-door meetings. "The point here was to take stock of where we are and to make sure that we are doing everything we can."
Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner of France said the delegations from 18 countries, including Sudan's major donors, the Group of 8 industrialized countries and China had reaffirmed their support for a joint African Union and United Nations peacekeeping force according to a deal hammered out with Khartoum earlier this month.
"There is a little light at the end of the darkness," Kouchner said.
But there was no announcement of who would contribute soldiers to the force, nor was there any signal that China had softened its resistance to levy sanctions on Sudan, a measure that would require Chinese acquiescence for it to win UN Security Council approval. China is a staunch Khartoum ally and major buyer of Sudanese oil.
France did say it would contribute about €10 million, or $13.5 million, to help fund the peacekeeping force. The country has spent just €2.5 million on aid to Darfur so far this year and only €3.9 million for all of 2006, according to UN figures. The European Union also promised to spend an extra €31 million for humanitarian relief in the coming months.
Since early 2003, an Arab militia known as the janjaweed have been raping and killing non-Arabs in Darfur, ostensibly as part of the Sudanese government's effort to suppress a rebellion there.
The United States labeled the violence genocide in 2004, but the international community has done little to stop it.
The African Union and the United Nations hope to get all factions to sit down for peace talks in August. China's special envoy, Liu Guijin, said Monday that the Sudanese government was ready to participate in such talks.
But delegates said that with more than a dozen armed groups operating in the region, negotiating peace will be difficult.
Friday, June 22, 2007
2007 AnneMerie Donoghue Human Rights Fellows Named
Fifteen students have received AnneMerie Donoghue Fellowships for projects this summer. The Fellowship, sponsored by CMC's Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights, provides financial support for internships or research projects that deal with human rights. Students much submit a detailed project description and budget proposal to be considered for this prestigious award. This summer, Donoghue Fellows will be spread across the globe. Their projects take them to China, California, Spain, Tanzania, South Africa, Washington, D.C., and Russia. Below is the list of internships and research projects of these students.
Internships:
Jennifer Ambrose, '09: U.S. Department of State, Bureau of African Affairs, Washington, DC
Kyle Block, '10: Orphanage in Yanji, China
Natasha Bogopolskaya, '08: Doctors to Children, St. Petersburg, Russia
Jim Castellanos, '08: Veteran’s Writing Group, Berkeley, CA
Elizabeth Pavlovich, '08: Touch Foundation, Mwanza, Tanzania
Max Wilson, '09: Enough: The Project to Abolish Genocide and Mass Atrocities, Washington, D.C.
Vanessa Carter, '08: Student Movement for Real Change, Limpopo, South Africa
Raymond Hall, '09: U.S. Embassy, military attaché office, Spain
Ilana Kegel, '08: Weill Medical College of Bugando University College of Health Sciences, Mwanza, Tanzania
Alexandra Aznar, '08: Guatemala Human Rights Commission; Washington, DC
Andrew Bogrand, '09: Special Olympics Office, San Gabriel, CA
Kevyn Klein, '08: Holocaust Centre, Cape Town, South Africa
Research projects:
Amy Berg, '08: Philosophical approaches to global poverty
Becky Grossman, '08: Ethnic minorities in the former GDR during the Communist era
Marisa Shea, '08: The effects of Turkey’s 2002 Civil Code on the welfare of women
Internships:
Jennifer Ambrose, '09: U.S. Department of State, Bureau of African Affairs, Washington, DC
Kyle Block, '10: Orphanage in Yanji, China
Natasha Bogopolskaya, '08: Doctors to Children, St. Petersburg, Russia
Jim Castellanos, '08: Veteran’s Writing Group, Berkeley, CA
Elizabeth Pavlovich, '08: Touch Foundation, Mwanza, Tanzania
Max Wilson, '09: Enough: The Project to Abolish Genocide and Mass Atrocities, Washington, D.C.
Vanessa Carter, '08: Student Movement for Real Change, Limpopo, South Africa
Raymond Hall, '09: U.S. Embassy, military attaché office, Spain
Ilana Kegel, '08: Weill Medical College of Bugando University College of Health Sciences, Mwanza, Tanzania
Alexandra Aznar, '08: Guatemala Human Rights Commission; Washington, DC
Andrew Bogrand, '09: Special Olympics Office, San Gabriel, CA
Kevyn Klein, '08: Holocaust Centre, Cape Town, South Africa
Research projects:
Amy Berg, '08: Philosophical approaches to global poverty
Becky Grossman, '08: Ethnic minorities in the former GDR during the Communist era
Marisa Shea, '08: The effects of Turkey’s 2002 Civil Code on the welfare of women
Hypernova: Illegal Indie-Rock from Iran
Iran's Hypernova is an underground band by necessity: Western-style music is banned by the country's Islamic regime.
by Shereen Meraji
Day to Day, June 19, 2007 · In Iran, people are not allowed to listen to Western music, let alone make it.
But more than half of Iran's population is under 25 years old. So it's not surprising that young Iranians download music off the Internet, watch satellite TV and make music in a thriving underground scene.
Hypernova is an indie-rock band from Tehran influenced by groups such as The Strokes, the Arctic Monkeys and Queens of the Stone Age. Their new CD is called Who Says You Can't Rock in Iran?; they recorded it illegally in their home country.
Lead singer Raam says, "There's an element of danger involved in what we do. But the laws are so chaotic back home that they're hardly enforced. Ninety-nine out of 100 times you can get away with anything."
The Iranian indie-rock band struggled for seven long years in Tehran. They played shows in dank basements and at kids' birthday parties. One day, Raam decided to try for the big time: the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas.
Raam recalls: "I got this e-mail: 'Congratulations! You've been accepted to showcase the festival.' I thought it was spam mail or something."
The trip was not easy. "We had to go to Dubai, because there's no U.S. consulate in Iran," Raam says. After traveling from Tehran to Dubai, the band was denied visas. Heartbroken, they waited and applied again — this time, with a faxed letter from Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY).
Hypernova eventually got the visas, but the band missed the South by Southwest music festival. Despite the setback, Hypernova continues to tour. Raam says Hypernova's members are living their dream in the United States. Soon they will be back in Tehran, rocking in the shadows.
from www.npr.org
by Shereen Meraji
Day to Day, June 19, 2007 · In Iran, people are not allowed to listen to Western music, let alone make it.
But more than half of Iran's population is under 25 years old. So it's not surprising that young Iranians download music off the Internet, watch satellite TV and make music in a thriving underground scene.
Hypernova is an indie-rock band from Tehran influenced by groups such as The Strokes, the Arctic Monkeys and Queens of the Stone Age. Their new CD is called Who Says You Can't Rock in Iran?; they recorded it illegally in their home country.
Lead singer Raam says, "There's an element of danger involved in what we do. But the laws are so chaotic back home that they're hardly enforced. Ninety-nine out of 100 times you can get away with anything."
The Iranian indie-rock band struggled for seven long years in Tehran. They played shows in dank basements and at kids' birthday parties. One day, Raam decided to try for the big time: the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas.
Raam recalls: "I got this e-mail: 'Congratulations! You've been accepted to showcase the festival.' I thought it was spam mail or something."
The trip was not easy. "We had to go to Dubai, because there's no U.S. consulate in Iran," Raam says. After traveling from Tehran to Dubai, the band was denied visas. Heartbroken, they waited and applied again — this time, with a faxed letter from Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY).
Hypernova eventually got the visas, but the band missed the South by Southwest music festival. Despite the setback, Hypernova continues to tour. Raam says Hypernova's members are living their dream in the United States. Soon they will be back in Tehran, rocking in the shadows.
from www.npr.org
Sierra Leone: Landmark Convictions for Use of Child Soldiers
(New York, June 20, 2007) – The war crimes court for Sierra Leone has handed down the first convictions by a UN-backed tribunal for the crime of recruiting and using child soldiers. Human Rights Watch said that these convictions are a ground-breaking step toward ending impunity for commanders who exploit hundreds of thousands of children as soldiers in conflicts worldwide.
" This use of child soldiers is a particularly horrific crime. These children should have been learning how to read, not how to shoot an AK-47. "
Jo Becker, children’s rights advocate for Human Rights Watch
In Freetown today, the Special Court for Sierra Leone handed down verdicts against three accused men from the rebel Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), one of three warring factions during Sierra Leone’s 11-year brutal armed conflict, which ended in 2002. The judges found the three accused – Alex Tamba Brima, Brima Bazzy Kamara and Santigie Borbor Kanu – guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, including the recruitment and use of child soldiers.
“This use of child soldiers is a particularly horrific crime. These children should have been learning how to read, not how to shoot an AK-47,” said Jo Becker, children’s rights advocate for Human Rights Watch. “We hope that the Special Court’s decision will protect children in other parts of the world from suffering what so many Sierra Leonean children were forced to endure.”
Thousands of children were recruited and used by all sides during Sierra Leone’s conflict, including the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), the AFRC, and the pro-government Civil Defense Forces (CDF). Children were often forcibly recruited, given drugs and used to commit atrocities. Thousands of girls were also recruited as soldiers and often subjected to sexual exploitation.
The Special Court for Sierra Leone was established in 2002 to prosecute those “who bear the greatest responsibility” for war crimes, crimes against humanity and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, along with several domestic offenses, committed since 1996. All nine defendants being prosecuted by the Special Court have been charged with the recruitment and use of child soldiers. The trial phase is complete for cases involving individuals associated with the CDF and AFRC. For accused associated with the RUF, the defense began presentation of its case this May. The Special Court began the trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor on June 4 in The Hague.
“Commanders in many conflicts deliberately prey upon children as recruits,” said Becker. “Now that child recruiters are being brought to justice, their impunity is no longer so certain.”
The Special Court’s Appeals Chamber also issued a significant ruling in 2004 that the prohibition on the recruitment or use of children under the age of 15 had crystallized as customary international law prior to 1996, and that individuals bore criminal responsibility for such acts.
The first individual being tried by the International Criminal Court (ICC), the former militia leader Thomas Lubanga from the Democratic Republic of Congo, has also been charged with the crimes of enlisting and conscripting children as soldiers and using them to participate actively in hostilities. In March 2006, Lubanga was transferred to the ICC in The Hague.
from: www.hrw.org
" This use of child soldiers is a particularly horrific crime. These children should have been learning how to read, not how to shoot an AK-47. "
Jo Becker, children’s rights advocate for Human Rights Watch
In Freetown today, the Special Court for Sierra Leone handed down verdicts against three accused men from the rebel Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), one of three warring factions during Sierra Leone’s 11-year brutal armed conflict, which ended in 2002. The judges found the three accused – Alex Tamba Brima, Brima Bazzy Kamara and Santigie Borbor Kanu – guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, including the recruitment and use of child soldiers.
“This use of child soldiers is a particularly horrific crime. These children should have been learning how to read, not how to shoot an AK-47,” said Jo Becker, children’s rights advocate for Human Rights Watch. “We hope that the Special Court’s decision will protect children in other parts of the world from suffering what so many Sierra Leonean children were forced to endure.”
Thousands of children were recruited and used by all sides during Sierra Leone’s conflict, including the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), the AFRC, and the pro-government Civil Defense Forces (CDF). Children were often forcibly recruited, given drugs and used to commit atrocities. Thousands of girls were also recruited as soldiers and often subjected to sexual exploitation.
The Special Court for Sierra Leone was established in 2002 to prosecute those “who bear the greatest responsibility” for war crimes, crimes against humanity and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, along with several domestic offenses, committed since 1996. All nine defendants being prosecuted by the Special Court have been charged with the recruitment and use of child soldiers. The trial phase is complete for cases involving individuals associated with the CDF and AFRC. For accused associated with the RUF, the defense began presentation of its case this May. The Special Court began the trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor on June 4 in The Hague.
“Commanders in many conflicts deliberately prey upon children as recruits,” said Becker. “Now that child recruiters are being brought to justice, their impunity is no longer so certain.”
The Special Court’s Appeals Chamber also issued a significant ruling in 2004 that the prohibition on the recruitment or use of children under the age of 15 had crystallized as customary international law prior to 1996, and that individuals bore criminal responsibility for such acts.
The first individual being tried by the International Criminal Court (ICC), the former militia leader Thomas Lubanga from the Democratic Republic of Congo, has also been charged with the crimes of enlisting and conscripting children as soldiers and using them to participate actively in hostilities. In March 2006, Lubanga was transferred to the ICC in The Hague.
from: www.hrw.org
Muslims' Veils Test Limits of Britain's Tolerance
A "mark of separation" or freedom of dress?
By JANE PERLEZ
Published: June 22, 2007
New York Times
LONDON, June 16 — Increasingly, Muslim women in Britain take their children to school and run errands covered head to toe in flowing black gowns that allow only a slit for their eyes. On a Sunday afternoon in Hyde Park, groups of black-clad Muslim women relaxed on the green baize lawn among the in-line skaters and badminton players.
When she is walking she is often stopped, Ms. Mayata said. “People ask, ‘Why do you wear that?’ A lot of people assume I’m oppressed, that I don’t speak English. I don’t care. I’ve got a brain.” More Photos »
Their appearance, like little else, has unnerved other Britons, testing the limits of tolerance here and fueling the debate over the role of Muslims in British life.
Many veiled women say they are targets of abuse. Meanwhile, there are growing efforts to place legal curbs on the full-face Muslim veil, known as the niqab.
There have been numerous examples in the past year. A lawyer dressed in a niqab was told by an immigration judge that she could not represent a client because, he said, he could not hear her. A teacher wearing a niqab was dismissed from her school. A student who was barred from wearing a niqab took her case to the courts, and lost. In reaction, the British educational authorities are proposing a ban on the niqab in schools altogether.
A leading Labor Party politician, Jack Straw, scolded women last year for coming to see him in his district office in the niqab. Prime Minister Tony Blair has called the niqab a “mark of separation.”
David Sexton, a columnist for The Evening Standard, wrote recently that the niqab was an affront and that Britain had been “too deferential.”
“It says that all men are such brutes that if exposed to any more normally clothed women, they cannot be trusted to behave — and that all women who dress any more scantily like that are indecent,” Mr. Sexton wrote. “It’s abusive, a walking rejection of all our freedoms.”
Although the number of women wearing the niqab has increased in the past several years, only a tiny percentage of women among Britain’s two million Muslims cover themselves completely. It is impossible to say how many exactly.
Some who wear the niqab, particularly younger women who have taken it up recently, concede that it is a frontal expression of Islamic identity, which they have embraced since Sept. 11, 2001, as a form of rebellion against the policies of the Blair government in Iraq, and at home.
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