CINA

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While currently tens of thousands of Syrians are taking almost daily the streets to demand democracy and social justice(*), the North Korean "Dear Leader" Kim Jong-il (aka the "Sun of the 21st Century"...) used the anniversary of Syria's "Independence Day" to declare his (surprise, surprise!!) solidarity with the 'ruling' dictatorship (i.e. Assad's state terror against the protest movement)...

Last Saturday's KCNA published the following:

General Secretary Kim Jong Il Saturday sent a message of greetings to Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad on the occasion of the 65th anniversary of the independence of Syria.

The message reads as follows:

I extend warm congratulations to you and the friendly government and people of Syria on the occasion of the 65th anniversary of independence, the auspicious national holiday of your people.

After the independence the Syrian people registered a great success in the struggle to protect the sovereignty of the country and the nation and build modern Syria under the correct leadership of the Baath Arab Socialist Party.

Our people extend full support to you and the Syrian people in the just cause for the peace, stability, development and prosperity of the country and impartial and comprehensive settlement of the Mideast issue.

I, availing myself of this opportunity, express belief that the good friendly and cooperative relations between our two countries will grow stronger, sincerely wishing you good health and happiness and greater success in your responsible work for the country and people.

* Related news you'll check out here:
☞ Syrian security forces open fire on sit-in protest (AP, 4.19)
☞ Libya, Syria and Middle East unrest - live coverage (Guardian, 4.19)
☞ Syria Unrest (Al-Jazeera's special section, daily updated)


 

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Last Saturday the annual "4.20 Struggle Culture Festival to Support the Rights of the Disabled"(*) took place in downtown Seoul. Here some impressions:
 

* "April 20, the nationally designated day for the physically challenged", according to today's (bourgeois) Korea Herald

Related previous "reports":
☞ 4.20 장애인대회 (사진報告 #3, The Battle) (2005.4.21)
☞ 아름다운 장애인 문화제 (2004.4.19)

 

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Yesterday's Guardian(UK) reported the following about the current stage of the gov't controlled TERROR CAMPAIGN against the democratic mass movement:

Bahrain braced for new wave of repression

Arrests and troop movements signal another government crackdown on protests in the tiny Gulf state

Bahrain is braced for a fresh bout of violent repression as new arrests and the alleged death of a female student fuel the tensions in the tiny Gulf state.

Armoured vehicles and security forces were reported to be gathering in the streets of the capital, Manama, and in surrounding suburbs and villages.

Meanwhile, evidence has emerged that Saudi forces have been involved in violence against the opposition in the mainly Shia villages and suburbs around Manama. In a graphic eyewitness account of the repression given to the Observer, a Bahraini who has been caught up in the violence claimed that officers with Saudi accents, in plainclothes but armed with automatic weapons, had led attacks on members of the Shia opposition on several occasions over the past month.

When Saudi and UAE troops from the Gulf Peninsula Shield force entered the kingdom at the request of the government last month, it was said that they were there to guard strategic buildings and infrastructure.

Reports from the city said that a young woman – beaten up last month by government supporters at Bahrain University – had died. A family member confirmed her death but the circumstances remained unclear. Arrests of lawyers and doctors working for the opposition continued.

Protesters, who were brutally removed from their peaceful anti-government site at Manama's Pearl roundabout last month, claim that there has since been a systematic campaign of repression by Sunni Bahraini security forces, backed by forces from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Human Rights Watch says that four people have died in custody over the past month, out of 430 who were arrested. Opposition sources say that the true figure is 720 arrested with 210 missing.

Tensions were high after another day of mourning, for Karim Fakhrawi, a Shia businessman who died in police detention, allegedly after being tortured. The mourning also coincided with an important Shia festival, the commemoration of the death of Fatima al-Zahra, the wife of the Prophet Muhammad. This is traditionally marked by three days of religious observance, including marches, which are now banned under Bahrain's month-old state of emergency.

Meanwhile, Mohammed al-Tajer, a lawyer who represented detainees held during the protests, was reportedly arrested along with a doctor accused of treating injured demonstrators. Doctors and medical facilities have been singled out in the repression, with the main hospital in Manama, Salimanya, under military occupation for the past month.

The government says that it is acting to maintain security after what it describes as an "attempted revolution" by mainly Shia protesters last month. It says hospitals were being used as organisation centres for the protests.

The government appears to be backing down from a plan to outlaw the leading opposition parties, Al Wefaq and Islamic Action, after protests from America and Britain. But a suppression of media reporting continues. Last week a correspondent from the Financial Times was denied entry at the airport. No reason was given.

Frank Gardner, the BBC's security correspondent, was detained at the airport for three hours before being allowed into the country. Other journalists reported increasing difficulties in obtaining visas.

Bell Pottinger, a British public relations company that advised the Bahraini crown prince, Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa, and which was assisting with media visas, has had its government contracts suspended during the period of martial law.

Prince Salman is regarded as a moderate, but the failure of his offers of "dialogue" with the protesters has handed power to Sunni hardliners, led by the prime minister, Prince Khalifa, who has been in office since 1971.

The protests are seen as a threat to security across the whole Gulf region. There have been further protests in Iran in support of the mainly Shia Bahraini opposition, and Tehran recently warned Pakistan against sending any more "mercenaries" to join the crackdown.

Many Bahrain police officers are hired in Sunni countries such as Pakistan and Jordan (so we can call them mercenaries!!).

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/16/bahrain-arrests-repression

Related articles/reports:
☞ The Bahrain Revolt (Huffington Post, 4.15)
☞ EU in a bind over Bahrain (Asia Times, 4.15)
☞ Bahrain cracks down on protesting footballers (Al-Jazeera, 4.15)
☞ A chilling account of the brutal clampdown... (Guardian, 4.16)


 

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This video was funded by Anti-Slavery International and the International Trade Union Confederation

 

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1.) 쌍용차 故임무창조합원 49재, 교섭촉구 결의대회에 함께합시다
 

2.) 4.15 삼성자본 규탄 결의 대회 함께합시다.
 

주체: 과천철거민과 삼성일반노조
일시: 4월 15일 (쇠 날) 11시 30분-13시까지
장소: 삼성본관 정문 바로 옆(2호선 강남역 4번 출구)

For more info please check out: ☞ 4/15 삼성자본 규탄 결의 대회...!
 

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Today's Asia Times(HK) published the following remarkable analysis:

Libya: Ceasefire or bust 

The so-called Libya contact group - that euphemism defining the minute Western/Gulf emirates "coalition of the willing" - meets (today) in Doha, Qatar, ahead of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) ministerial meetings in Berlin, amid an atmosphere of downright farce.

Former Libyan foreign minister and current defector to Britain Moussa Koussa is a stalwart of the Qatar meeting, trying to convince the "rebels" of the Interim National Council (INC) that the only possible solution for the moment implies Colonel Muammar Gaddafi remaining in power.

That also happens to be exactly what mediator Turkey is saying. No wonder the "rebels" and their sponsors - the dashing Arab liberator Anglo-French couple President Nicolas Sarkozy and Prime Minister David Cameron - are fuming, and puzzled.

The head of the African Union (AU) mission to Libya, South African President Jacob Zuma - whose country is the only member of the BRICS group that supported United Nations Security Council resolution 1973 (Brazil, Russia, India and China abstained) - was convinced that Gaddafi had embraced the AU road map, which started with a ceasefire. But there has been no ceasefire so far. The wall of mistrust between Gaddafi and the rebels/NATO tandem has reached Himalayan proportions. NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen keeps stressing Gaddafi "does not keep his promises". Gaddafi is not fool enough to stop fighting while NATO may keep on bombing.

As for the United States, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton - who along with her Amazon warriors, envoy to the UN Susan Rice and National Security Council aide Samantha Power, forced this sorry adventure on a reluctant White House - now also stress a ceasefire (but always with inbuilt "regime change").

It's quite useful to compare the AU approach - developed by South Africa, Uganda, Mali, Mauritania and Congo-Brazzaville - with NATO's. Once there's a ceasefire respected by both sides, there's the establishment of humanitarian corridors; civilians, local and foreigners (especially African migrant workers) can be protected; and a national political dialogue may start, meeting "the legitimate aspirations of the Libyan people for democracy".

The INC is in no position to dictate its terms to Gaddafi. There's certainly a risk of a ceasefire reached after the current stalemate crystallizing a balkanization of Libya - east and west. But virtually no Libyans seem to want to embrace that possibility. The AU is simply being pragmatic. Libya - along with Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria and South Africa - finances 75% of the AU budget.

Gaddafi is friendly with the majority of the 53-member AU; Mauritania, Mali and Congo-Brazzaville, for instance, benefited from a lot of Libyan investment (in fact, no less than 31 African countries did).

On top of it the mediators are Africans - not neo-colonial Europeans. South Africa's Zuma would be the first to viscerally repudiate an Anglo-French-dominated Libya. There was ample suspicion about Zuma's motives when South Africa voted for UN resolution 1973. Anyway, the fact is now Zuma says what the top four BRICS plus Germany were saying before the vote; this Anglo-French-drafted resolution is open-ended. And it opens the door to the West just deposing any African leader they fancy, whenever they want it.

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has also been instrumental in this mediation. He considers Gaddafi a true nationalist - and as most of his African peers, not to mention in the Middle East and across the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in the developing world, they all favor nationalists compared to foreign puppets a la INC.

Community values

 
The AU mediation finally shatters the myth of the "international community" fighting the same old demonized "evil dictator" figure in Libya. Unless one considers the "international community" as comprised of seven members among the 28-member NATO (France, Britain, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Canada and the US), plus those two paragons of democracy in the Persian Gulf, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

"Regime change" (which is not part of the UN resolution) does have support; but only in Washington, London, Paris and Benghazi.

Now compare the realism of the AU position - similar to Turkey's - with the pathetic squabbling between the Anglo-French and NATO. London and Paris want NATO to go on a mad bombing spree - as if NATO bombs could be programmed to only decimate pro-Gaddafi Libyans.

Coming from two political midgets such as British Foreign Secretary William Hague and French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, that's no surprise. For its part, NATO's Brigadier-General Mark van Uhm tried to spin it in Brussels, warning - correctly - that Gaddafi's forces adapted to the air strikes by favoring "hit-and-run tactics by motorized columns of pickup trucks to wear out opposition forces psychologically rather than gain ground".

So NATO acknowledges it just can't shock and awe the enemy without provoking a genocide. And the grown ups in the picture are the Africans - who have come up with a plausible endgame. Only Paris, Rome and Doha have recognized the INC as the de facto Libyan government (can't resist the comparison with Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the UAE being the only ones to recognize the Taliban.)

It's telling that Washington at least has been more realistic. Now it's up to the Central Intelligence Agency-infested, opportunist-laden, marginally al-Qaeda-linked "rebels", and their Anglo-French sponsors, to wake up and smell the Arabica coffee.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MD14Ak01.html

Related news/reports:
☞ Contact group urges Libya action (Al-Jazeera, 4.13)
☞ The blame game is on in Libya (AToL, 4.13)
☞ Libya - live coverage (Guardian, 4.13)


 

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Syria: Mass Protests, Massacres and Resistance

Today's (London-based Arabic-language) newspaper Al-Hayat reported that the Syrian ruler Bashar Assad expressed his "regrets over the death of protestors during a Sunday anti-regime demonstration"...

But for the resisting masses the lession is clear:
 

Why? Because of the f*cking reality!! Despide Assad's repeated promises to "reform" the Syrian political system, his "security forces" yesterday - once again - went crazy...: ☞ Students rally in Syria's capital over deaths (source: Al-Jazeera), ☞ Student killed as Syria protest turns violent (source: Yedioth Ahronoth)

Related article:
☞ Syrian human rights watchdog: Death toll in protests reaches 200 (Haaretz, 4.12)

 

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Impressions from yesterday's Anti-Nuclear Rally in Suwon (S. Korea, Gyeonggi-do):
 

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Well, even the 'closest friend' of Seoul's ruling class (and its gov't) is zinging the current situation of the human rights in S. Korea (according to today's K. Times):

Discrimination against minorities persists in Korea

South Korea still discriminates against minorities and foreigners, the U.S. State Department said in its 2010 country report on human rights.

Citing a National Human Rights Commission report, the U.S. human rights report said there were six cases of alleged discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons last year.

“There are no specific laws punishing or providing compensation to victims of discrimination or violence against LGBT persons,” it said. “Societal discrimination against LGBT persons have persisted.”

In June the Constitutional Court heard arguments on the constitutionality of the military code of conduct prohibiting consensual homosexual relationships between military personnel.

At the year’s end the court had not issued a ruling, it said.

“Some observers claimed that persons with HIV/AIDS suffered from societal discrimination and a social stigma,” the report said.

The country has long prided itself on its racial homogeneity, but its growing ethnic minority population passed the 1.2 million mark midway through last year.

In cases of discrimination against ethnic minorities, it cited an incident where a man with a mental disability killed his foreign bride, which later led to a swift government crackdown on illegal matchmaking agencies.

It also said North Korean refugees, although supported by government-funded resettlement programs, “faced discrimination.”

Restrictions on Internet

It said that there were no reports that the government or its agents committed arbitrary or unlawful killings, but considered 35 suicides among military personnel as a problem.

It said that 13 of them were allegedly caused by hazing, mistreatment, or an inability to adjust to military life in the first six month of service.

Regarding freedom of speech and the press, the country received a favorable evaluation in the report.

“The law provides for freedom of speech and of the press, and the government generally respected these rights in practice,” the report said.

It added that an independent press, an effective judiciary, and a functioning democratic political system combined to ensure freedom of speech and of the press.

But it said, “there were some government restrictions on access to the Internet and reports that the government monitored e-mail and Internet chat rooms.”

The government blocked violent, sexually explicit, and gambling-oriented websites and required operators to rate their site as harmful or not to youth, based on telecommunications laws that ban Internet service providers from offering information to young age groups, the report said...

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2011/04/117_84929.html

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