Category Archives: Government Oppression

Plans for a controversial sculpture at a Welsh castle have been put on hold after more than 9,000 people signed a petition opposing it .

Opponents claimed that the Iron Ring sculpture at Flint Castle celebrates the subjugation and oppression of the Welsh people.

Welsh Government cabinet member Ken Skates announced that they will "pause and review" the plans.

The U-turn comes days after Mr Skates described the sculpture as the "perfect way" of marking the significance of Flint Castle .

Ken Skates, Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Infrastructure, said on Wednesday: We have listened and recognise the strength of feeling around the proposed art installation at Flint Castle and feel it is only right that we now take a pause and review the plans for the sculpture.

Working closely with local partners we will continue to work on proposals for developments at Flint, including reviewing new visitor facilities.

Announcing it, the Welsh Government said it symbolises a giant rusted crown.

But the Iron Ring is the term for the fearsome castles built by Edward I in an enormous military and building effort to assert dominance over the uprising Welsh.

They include Harlech, Conwy, Beaumaris and Caernarfon. Flint was one of the first castles to be built in Wales by Edward I - construction began in 1277.

Edward led an army into Wales in 1277, and in 1284 the Statute of Wales was issued, in which Edward stated that Wales and its people were wholly and entirely transferred to our proper dominion.

Plans for the sculpture - which will cost 395,000 - were unveiled on Friday. According to the Welsh Government, it could be seven metres high and 30 metres wide.

Plaid Cymru has welcomed the rethink.

Plaid Cymru AM Llyr Gruffydd said: This crass design for a sculpture to symbolise Wales oppression was inappropriate and insulting to the people of Wales.

"It showed a serious lack of judgement by the Welsh Government, which failed to consult with local people about this 400,000 sculpture.

"The Labour government has rightly been shamed into rethinking its design, however it has failed to acknowledge how disrespectful this plan was. The Cabinet Secretary for the Economy should apologise for its bad judgement.

He should heed the words of Plaid Cymru MPs who wrote to him stating that nations with a robust grasp of their history erect monuments to their peoples liberty, not conquest.

I hope to see the Welsh Government announce a new design soon for an installation at Flint Castle that both recognises and respects our past. I am sure the people of Flint and the whole of Wales would be happy to support that.

Read the original here:

Plans for Iron Ring sculpture dubbed a 'monument to oppression' put on hold - WalesOnline

Labor leader Bill Shorten will be under increasing pressure to recognise Palestine after the party's NSW conference appears set to make an "historic" push to do so, despite some MPs complaining about "extraordinary interventions" and lobbying against the motion by the Israeli government.

On Friday afternoon shortly before NSW Labor Right figures met to negotiate on the wording of a proposal that would "urge" a future federal Labor government to recognise a Palestinian state, state MPs who were delegates at this weekend's NSW party conference received an email.

"Time and again throughout its history Israel has extended a hand of peace only to have it rejected by the Palestinians," the three-page document from the Public Affairs Section of the Israeli Embassy labelled as a fact sheet and obtained by Fairfax Media, reads. "The international community must speak up against the culture of oppression, genocidal rhetoric, terror and incitement that is prevalent among the Palestinians."

Former Premier Bob Carr told Fairfax Media there had been a "furious" lobbying campaign against the motion, which will "urge" a future federal Labor government to recognise Palestine and be voted on by 800 party conference delegates on Sunday.

"How did they know which MPs were delegates [only up to one-third of caucus go to conference]?" one NSW MP told Fairfax Media on condition of anonymity, saying the list was not publicly available.

An email and phone call to the Israeli Embassy in Canberra was not returned.

Former foreign minister Bob Carr said: "It's an honour to be asked by the party to move anhistoric motion that supports recognition of Palestine and to do so in the face of a furious lobbying campaign."

The final motion does include an affirmation of a two-state solution and supports Israel's right to exist, something pro-Israel Labor MPs said was an insertion that followed a compromise between Labor factions.

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Pro-Palestinian NSW MPs claim they were subject to other lobbying last week from official and back channels, such as suggestions of alternative motions including that Australia only acknowledge Palestine when that country's institutions improve.

Mr Carr caused a fissure in the Gillard government by advocating abstaining on a motion before the UN on upgrading Palestine's official observer status, when the then-PM advocated voting against the proposal.

Mr Carr later wrote in his memoirs that the former prime minister was overly influenced by the Israel lobby and constituents in Melbourne.

Backers say the motion is an historic break for Labor, whose support for Israel dates back to its the 1940s and backing from party legend and former UN General Assembly President, Doc Evatt.

But that support, particularly in the NSW Right, has been weakening recently, particularly as the party relies more heavily on voters descended from middle-eastern countries in Sydney's west for its supporter base.

Earlier this month frontbencher Tanya Plibersek said foreign affairs was a matter for the party's national conference and would not be influenced by state branches.

But state conferences can influence policy debate significantly, party insiders say. Queensland Labor's conference this weekend also reportedly backed recognition.

At Labor's last national conference leader Bill Shorten's Victorian Right faction opposed any change to policy on Palestinian recognition.

Continued here:

NSW ALP set to back Palestine despite 'furious' lobbying by Israeli government - The Sydney Morning Herald

Frontier Myanmar

Myanmar still using 'same tactics' of oppression as junta: Yanghee Lee Frontier Myanmar YANGON Myanmar is still using the same "tactics" to silence its people as the former junta, the UN's rights envoy said Friday, urging the government to allow the UN to probe allegations of ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims. More than 70,000 ... and more »

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Myanmar still using 'same tactics' of oppression as junta: Yanghee Lee - Frontier Myanmar

An advocate must be free to stimulate his audience with spontaneous and emotional appeals for unity and action in a common cause. When such appeals do not incite lawless action, they must be regarded as protected speech. (NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co., 1982)

In contradiction to such sentiments, Sen. Maggie Hassan is co-sponsoring a Senate bill Israel Anti-Boycott Act (S.720/H.R.1697) that would make it a felony for Americans to support an international boycott against Israel.

Its a bill designed to strip Americans of constitutionally protected rights, a bill that targets supporters of the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement that works to end international support for Israels oppression of Palestinians and pressure Israel to comply with international law.

Boycotts to achieve political goals, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has written, are a form of expression that the Supreme Court has ruled are protected by the First Amendments protections of freedom of speech, assembly and petition.

BDS is designed to give Palestinians and their supporters a nonviolent platform from which to resist occupation and illegal settlement activity, activity which the international community believes is a flagrant violation of international law without legal validity, activities condemned by innumerable U.N. resolutions from No. 242 to No. 2334 and the Fourth Geneva Convention.

In 2014, Nobel Peace laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu said: I have witnessed the systemic humiliation of Palestinian men, women and children by members of the Israeli security forces. Their humiliation is familiar to all black South Africans who were corralled and harassed and insulted and assaulted by the security forces of the apartheid government.

BDS is designed to empower Palestinians to resist that humiliation.

In response to (S.720/H.R.1697) the ACLU has written: The bill would amend those laws to bar U.S. persons from supporting boycotts against Israel, including its settlements in the Palestinian Occupied Territories, conducted by international governmental organizations, such as the United Nations and the European Union. It would also broaden the law to include penalties for simply requesting information about such boycotts. Violations would be subject to a maximum civil penalty of $250,000 and a maximum criminal penalty of $1 million and 20 years in prison. We take no position for or against the effort to boycott Israel or any foreign country, for that matter. However, we do assert that the government cannot, consistent with the First Amendment, punish U.S. persons based solely on their expressed political beliefs.

This bill would impose civil and criminal punishment on individuals solely because of their political beliefs about Israel and its policies.

I support BDS because its a nonviolent response that I recognize initiated by Palestinian civil society to the illegal occupation of Palestinian territory, to the oppression of Palestinians, to the continued incarceration of hundreds of Palestinians held under administrative detention without either indictment or trial.

BDS does not delegitimize Israel; it delegitimizes illegal occupation and oppression.

In April, BDS co-founder Omar Barghouti said, Twelve years ago, we were called romantic dreamers or worse. Today, our fast-growing movement is recognized as being so strong as to be fought by the full force of Israels regime of occupation, settler-colonialism and apartheid, and by its partners in crime.

Partners like members of the United State Congress whove aligned themselves with oligarchs and power brokers, partners who not only oppose BDS but who oppose making political and economic distinctions between Israel and occupied Palestinian territory.

I support BDS because I recognized, and supported, the boycott in South Africa that helped to strike down apartheid. I supported the Montgomery bus boycott and the Delano grape strike because I believe in justice.

Because I recognize that were called upon to resist oppression and occupation.

I recognize, too, that even when boycotts dont change anything, as in the anti-Nazi boycott of 1933 that did nothing to stop the harassment of German Jews, that its morally necessary to act.

As Rabbi Stephen S. Wise of the American Jewish Congress said at the time, We must speak out, and If that is unavailing, at least we shall have spoken.

BDS is working.

In 2016, the EU, along with Sweden, Ireland and the Netherlands, affirmed the right to support BDS as protected by freedom of speech and freedom of association.

Last month the Spanish parliament unanimously passed a motion affirming the right to advocate for BDS as protected by freedom of speech and freedom of association.

BDS is working.

BDS supporters know its working because of the scale of resources its opponents are devoting to delegitimize and criminalize the nonviolent movement including getting members of Congress to emasculate the First Amendment.

I know BDS is controversial. Some of my dearest friends dont support it at all; others want BDS to apply only to the occupied territories.

I get that, and support their choice.

However, those friends and I do agree that the Israel Anti-Boycott Act is unjust and is a blatant attempt to dissuade American supporters of Palestinian freedom and justice from engaging in protected political speech and action.

Resisting violence is easy. Use greater violence and destroy, imprison and emasculate the enemy. If they resist, hit them harder.

Resisting nonviolence is harder you cant bomb non-violent resisters into submission.

So, to counter BDSs nonviolent philosophy, Israels calling upon America to violently defile existential imperatives and collude in squelching First Amendment rights.

Pay attention: (S.720/H.R.1697) aligns America with governments that choose to deal with dissent and protest by limiting freedoms and speech governments like Poland, Russia, Turkey, Israel and Egypt.

Were not like them. Were better than that.

Pay attention: If speech can be criminalized in order to oppress Palestinians then it could as easily be used against any other group that displease the government or oligarchs in the future.

Pay attention: Last week Vice President Mike Pence said, America stands shoulder-to-shoulder with Israel, as together we confront those enemies who threaten our people, our freedom and our very way of life.

What he, and Hassan, fail to recognize is that those who threaten our people, our freedom, and our very way of life is us that were in danger of becoming our enemy.

Let us speak out: If that is unavailing, at least we shall have spoken.

(Robert Azzi is a photographer and writer who lives in Exeter. He can be reached at theother.azzi@gmail.com and his columns are archived at theotherazzi.wordpress.com.)

Continued here:

Robert Azzi: Congress assails First Amendment, BDS, Palestinians, justice - Concord Monitor

THE approval of the Congress on Saturday, July 22, to extend martial law in Mindanao until December this year has drawn mixed reactions from different sectors.

Labor leader Wildon Barros said the decision of Congress to extend the military rule is an anticipated move as he believes that the more it is extended, the more human rights violation is committed by the government.

Barros added this will only alienate the Moro people, particularly the Maranaos who have fled their homes in Marawi City, if the destruction of their homes and properties continue.

The martial law extension, he said, will not dismantle the Maute Group but it will create more armed factions who will take up arms against the government.

It was rigged from the start, said Cristina Palabay, secretary-general of the human rights group Karapatan, referring to the approval of the extended martial rule, and had only one intended outcome to rubberstamp the Congresss imprimatur on the legality of the declarations extension.

Palabay said Dutertes martial law can never be different from the version of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

The factual bases of both declarations (Dutertes and Marcoss) have been proven as outright lies, if not products of the militarys creative imagination, she said.

A government that uses military hubris to allegedly quell terrorism or armed revolutionary rebellion is one that is most afraid of the people, driven to terrorism or rebellion by years of oppression, exploitation, poverty, and mendicancy to foreign interests. Securing the public is the least of their interest, Palabay said.

Vic Escober, 53, a fisherman, said: Lets give Duterte the chance to end the Marawi crisis and neutralize the Maute group and restore peace and order there once and for all. The extension of martial law is the only way to do that.

Belinda Yucatan, 48, farmer said its better to leave it to the government to deal with the Marawi crisis.

My only hope is that human rights will be upheld and violence will not spill over to other parts in Mindanao due to martial law extension, Yucatan said.

Read more from the original source:

Martial law extension in Mindanao draws mixed reactions | SunStar - Sun.Star

Mizzima News

Myanmar still using 'same tactics' of oppression as junta: UN envoy Mizzima News Myanmar is still using the same "tactics" to silence its people as the former junta, the UN's rights envoy said Friday, urging the government to allow the UN to probe allegations of ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims. More than 70,000 Rohingya have ... and more »

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Myanmar still using 'same tactics' of oppression as junta: UN envoy - Mizzima News

The legacy of colonialism in Africa has largely affected the idea and nature of the post-colonial State. It is in the wake of decolonisation (with all its attendant meanings) that discourses of Negritude, Pan-Africanism, Afropolitanism, Marxist Socialism, Neo-colonialism, among others, took root. In the efforts to re-imagine and reinvent an Africa which did not privilege European ideals at its centre, new ideologies and policies were crafted and promulgated.

Guest Column: PATSON DZAMARA

Patson Dzamara

Colonialism in all its forms and with all its multi-dimensional ills was to be done away with and replaced with Afrocentricism. However, the experience soon turned sour; military coups, failed economies and failed social experiments like Ujamaa led to criticisms of the failed States.

Chief among the explanations of failed States was the legacy of colonialism. It was argued that developing countries were in a perpetual neocolonial exploitative core-periphery relationship with the metropoles of the developed world, hence their underdevelopment.

Notwithstanding the exploitative and extractive relations, African political philosophers began to engage with a different legacy of colonialism. Scholars like Mbembe in his seminal work, On the Postcolony argues that post-colonial state heavily borrowed from the colonial state especially in the way that violence has come to undergird rule.

What is statehood?

A State has eight attributes: territory, population, sovereignty (indivisible and autonomous), power (and accumulation of power through legitimacy, custom and/or fear), law, nation/nationalism (image of civil society as natural), State as international actor, and State as an idea (can be hero or villain).

However, the colonial State lacked the attributes of sovereignty, sense of nation and was not an actor on the international scene, but was rather an appendage of the metropolis. Some African countries although considered States, have to some extent failed to make a nation out of the different ethnic groups within their borders. Many have also existed as client States to outside interests; this pseudo-sovereignty also hampering their development into true nationhood and bringing a host of issues with it.

Zimbabwe

Onto the stage of this historical debate, enter Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe, like other former settler colonies, occupies a unique position in that the country was administered by both direct and indirect rule. The sheer power of the relatively small number of settlers and their economic interests made for exploitation and control which was in general a notch above peasant or labour exporting economies, and it can be argued, something close to an economy based on slave labour.

That coupled with the cold war context of the liberation struggle meant that on the eve of independence, the Rhodesian government, like South Africa was heavily-armed and merciless towards its enemies.

The present history of Zimbabwe is best situated in the nature of the colonial State, the transition from the colonial to the post colonial State and how the post-colonial State chose to continue the institutions and practices which buttressed the colonial State. It is safe to conclude that what transpired on April 18, 1980 was merely a transition in terms of colour rather than systems or modus operandi.

Oppressive similarities between the two dispensations

The colonial State did not permit the politico-economic space or social foundation for civil society politics; this derives from a colonial regimes exclusive ideologies and practices they employed to secure and maintain control. The cutthroat nature of administration employed by and during the colonial State ensured that anything deemed a threat to their oppressive agenda was ruthlessly annihilated.

Accountability was not a part of the colonial States modus operandi. They superimposed their whims and fancies on everything and everyone. Borrowing from the colonial state, the President Robert Mugabe government has stifled free speech and dissenting voices at every turn.

Under the Zanu PF government, a weak civil society is generally preferred and once civil society seeks to make the government accountable, it is labelled an enemy of the State. It is only those organisations whose mandate is apolitical or those who sing praises to the ruling party that are welcome.

The clamping down on civil society was not so apparent when the economy was on firm ground, not many people worried about political liberties. Marxs analysis turned out to be true (not Lenins), the economy is the superstructure once livelihoods were disrupted, it became difficult to hide an oppressive political agenda. The existence of a strong civil society is anathema to the ideals of Zanu PF.

This explains why some organisations under the civic society banner have been infiltrated by Zanu PF elements.

White rule in Southern Rhodesia was characterised by violence. Charles Van Onselen succinctly captures the violent nature of white rule in Chibaro. The colony was founded on violence. Africans were beaten up in their places of work, small tort infractions were often punished with the sjambok and claims like breaches of contract were made criminal.

Violence and the threat thereof was the life blood of the colonial state it was the only way in which a small minority could control the majority.

Though ubiquitous, the State needed to maintain a faade of legitimacy, therefore, violent acts were often softened by the threat of force rather than use of it, something which became increasingly useful as the possible repercussions for violence escalated with the rise of black nationalism.

Fast forward to the post-colony: the Zanu PF government has a monopoly on violence. Election violence, human rights violations and everyday abuses in everyday situations characterise the lives of many ordinary Zimbabweans.

Morbid and atrocious acts such as Gukurandi and Murambatsvina are an apt accentuation of the Zanu PF governments violent nature.

Those who never tasted violence, live in fear of it. The present leaders who lived through colonialism understand the potency of violence and the threats thereof as a means of rule and control. They have borrowed the same colonial tactics of intimidation to rule.

Oppressive institutions were not disbanded after independence in some ways, they were actually buttressed. At the end of the Federation in 1963, Rhodesia inherited its heavy artillery, state-of-the-art aircrafts and military airbases. These were used to perpetrate mass terror.

It was not only the military that could mete out violence; the police were equally empowered to deal ruthlessly with African subjects. The anti-riot squadron were actually created for that specific purpose.

After independence, freedom fighters (mainly the Shona ones) were absorbed into the national army and like the Rhodesians before them who answered to Smith, they too answered only to Mugabe. The army which is meant to protect citizens is usually let loose to punish dissenters which in the past have included opposition party supporters and even college students.

The budget for defence is the least affected by economic austerity even though Zimbabwe faces no outside threats. It is not a coincidence. The huge army exists largely for the suppression of any internal dissent and thus to keep the Mugabe regime in power.

Not only does the Zanu PF government rely on the uniformed forces to silence the masses and to mete out violence, it also relies on a well regimented and basterdised social system. Almost all the chiefs and village heads are an appandage of Zanu PF. They campaign and work for Zanu PF. If any of their subjects choose not to conform, they find themselves on the receiving end of violence and alienation.

In order for any form of oppression to thrive, it must be institutionalised. The people were oppressed under colonialism through the use of uniformed forces and pseudo social systems; the people are still oppressed in the post colony by means of the uniformed forces and pseudo social systems.

The law is yet another instrument that was used for political and economic control by the colonial State. The post-colonial state also similarly relies on the law for political and economic control. Acts like the Land Apportionment Act, Masters and Servants Act, Pass Laws etc were used to disenfranchise and control Africans.

The colonial State crafted draconian laws earmarked at furthering their oppressive agenda. The law was meant to bring about the idea of statehood semblance and yet it was merely a medium of oppression.

In the same despicable manner, the law has been used as an instrument of furthering Zanu PFs agenda. From lobbying for a One Party State in the 1980s to Land Reform and the various Acts that proscribe freedom of speech and movement, such as Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) and Public Order and Security Act (Posa). In fact, many of these acts are recycled versions of earlier Rhodesian laws earmarked at oppressing the masses.

Despite socialist leanings inherited from the liberation struggle, the Zimbabwean government did not challenge the ownership of critical and strategic resources by foreigners and whites at and after Independence until their own power was threatened. Until 2000, Zanu PF sought an accommodation with white capital and in the process, became a rentier state of sorts thus continuing the legacy of white ownership of resources despite empty political promises of nationalisation.

While the government pursuing a hard-line anti-Western and populist rhetoric in public they remained beholden to, and profited from foreign industrial interests.

After 2000, white capital was replaced by a coterie of nouveaux-riches connected to or actually in Zanu PF, who then took up land and equipment which they never intended to farm, but pillage. For the ordinary Zimbabweans, the benefits of independence in terms of ownership of resources is yet to be realised as Zanu PF bigwigs continue to plunder the country.

White capitalism was by nature extractive and most of the proceeds were repatriated to foreign countries. In spite of that, at the very minimum, jobs, however, menial were created and infrastructures set up to support that extraction. In the era of Zanu PF landlords, those slim benefits have collapsed, formal jobs belong to a bygone era and despite the immature and bogus celebrations of indigenisation, the country is more than ever dependent on foreigners to the point of many reduced to surviving on handouts from aid organisations.

The gross domestic product continues to shrink and corruption is ubiquitous. The post-colonial State has by far outdone the colonial State in terms oppression, maladministration, malevolence, and pretty much every vice they share.

While ethnicity was not created by white rule like in other places, it was further entrenched by white practice and colonial conceptualisations. The Ndebele were identified as war-like, while the Shona were said to be docile. Even the delimitation of provinces was along tribal lines: Manicaland, Mashonaland, Matabeleland.

National identity cards cemented and classified ones ethnicity which in some places had been fluid. The division of peoples into different tribes was instrumental to divide and rule. The Mugabe government made no efforts to foster nation building in terms of identity, an otherwise doable process. Rather, they rode on the foundations of white tribal misclassifications and radically divided the country by slaughtering Ndebele-speakers, largely ordinary citizens, under the pretext of combating dissidents in the early 80s.

A Zimbabwe unified along national lines rather than divided by tribe was a threat to Zanu PF hegemony: the person of the late Vice-President Joshua Nkomo being the centre of such a threat. Nkomo was a better man than Mugabe, had been a freedom fighter longer than Mugabe and commanded the respect of more people within and out of the Zimbabwean borders. Ethnicity became the trump card by which the younger, lesser known teacher could elbow out the veteran Father Zimbabwe.

The Mugabe government has deliberately done little presently to channel development funds and projects to Matabeleland, further disenfranchising citizens economically along ethnic lines. All that is deliberate and meant to protect their control of power.

The colonial State created distinct classes out of whites and blacks. One of the aspirations of the Africans pre-independence was to become part of the citizenry and cast off the yoke of subjecthood. This was done in name only. We have become citizens with no attendant rights, just like we were in the colonial era.

In fact, classism has replaced racism and Zanu PF elites are the only real citizens like white Rhodesians were. As such, subjecthood in the post-colonial State still exists, although it wears a different face.

Under the Zanu PF-led government, anyone who is not connected to the oligarch is treated as a second class citizen. The privileges and rights of those who are connected to the oligarch and those who are not are not on the par.

We still live in a country which prioritises propaganda above truth. Propaganda was a weapon of choice of the Smith regime during the liberation struggle and of other white governments before Smith. Freedom fighters were turned into communist terrorists and claims of independence were rubbished. Mugabe has used similar tactics.

Threats, opponents and nonconformists, like Nkomo, became the subject of propaganda which was disseminated by institutions like ZBC, just as Mugabes predecessors had targeted enemies using national institutions. In the 2000s a Ministry of Information, that is, a propaganda ministry was created for the very purpose of dispensing lies, like the colonial state before it.

Anyone who dares to take a stand against the failure of the government to administer its duties automatically becomes a target for character assassination and propaganda. They are portrayed as cousins of the devil and traitors of the diluted nationalist project.

Mugabe the black Smith

I, therefore, argue that the Mugabe regime did not seek to disband the instruments of oppression when it came into power. It fully understood the risk of losing power in a truly democratic setting and so avoided truly democratic institutions and systems.

Joshua Nkomo, a nationalist par excellence was considered a threat at independence. With time, other opposing voices joined the choir of the disgruntled, Tekere with ZUM and later Morgan Tsvangirai at the helm of the MDC.

As such, the institutions and systems of oppression were needed in order to deal with any threat to Zanu PF hegemony. It may seem at first glance that it was unintended that colonial institutions and systems were left intact, for simple convenience, but, in fact, it was calculated machination and scheming that led to the retaining of the practices and institutions of oppression.

Ours is a case of inherited oppression under an indigenised faade. And just as Zimbabweans had to liberate themselves from the colonial regime, today we must liberate ourselves from its successor, the black Smith, Robert Mugabe.

The black Smith, Robert Mugabe and his minions, must fall.

Patson Dzamara is a leadership coach, author, human rights activist and political analyst based in Zimbabwe.

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From white to black Rhodesia: A case of inherited oppression - NewsDay

BENGALURU: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi said on Friday that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) were rewriting history to silence the voice of Indians, and in specific, that of the oppressed classes.

At the inauguration of the three-day global seminar on 'Reclaiming Social Justice, Revisiting Ambedkar' hosted by the Karnataka government to mark the 126th birth anniversary of B R Ambedkar, Rahul recalled Adolf Hitler: "There is a new global epidemic wherein leaders are trying to strangle reality, inspired by Hitler's way of thinking. Modi wants to create a perfect history of India and thereby silence the oppression against sections of people who have suffered due to age-old practices and discrimination."

From plastic surgery to nuclear weapons, which Modi had invoked as being ancient Indian practices of mythological gods, Rahul said the present dispensation is trying to gloss over the realities of the nation. "There have been good and bad sides to India, and we need to accept it and change it. The Modi government is trying to wipe out history and create a perfect India, thereby strangling the reality of Vemulas and Akhlaqs," he added.

He said the BJP and RSS want to destroy Ambedkar's Constitution with such silencing of voices and not care about the people it protects.

Earlier, chief minister Siddaramaiah said the idea of India as a plural society is at the crossroads. "Values that our civilization and culture held in high esteem are facing a critical test in view of the onslaught of divisive and exclusivist ideas," he said.

Siddaramaiah said the recent spate of communal and caste-based attacks has shown that people cannot afford to rest. Endorsing Rahul's views, the CM said: "Today, we are told that being a good Indian means we have to ignore the inequality and exploitation in our midst; that we need to adhere to rigid norms regarding food, clothing, language and free speech; that we have to privilege the majoritarian view of India. I reject such a view as it is totally opposed to the letter and spirit of our Constitution."

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Modi, RSS rewriting history to muffle the oppressed: Rahul Gandhi - Times of India

In March, government banned veils and growing of long beards traditional Muslim customs

Jingwang app is expected to automatically detect terrorist and illegal material stored on the phone. PHOTO: AFP

Chinese officials have sent out a notice instructing Muslim citizens to install a surveillance app on their phones, and are conducting spot checks in the region to ensure that residents have it, Mashable reported.

According to Radio Free Asia reports, the notice was issued over a week ago after China ramped up surveillance measures in Xinjiang, home to much of the minority population. WeChat sent the notice, written in Uyghur and Chinese, to residents in Urumqi, Xinjiangs capital.

Android users were asked to scan the QR code to install the Jingwang app that would, as Chinese officials claimed, automatically detect terrorist and illegal religious videos, images, e-books and electronic documents stored on the phone. If illegal content was detected, users would be ordered to delete it, said the notice. Users who deleted, or did not install the app, would be detained for up to 10 days, according to social media users.

The Jingwang app reportedly scans for the MD5 digital signatures of media files on the phone and matches them to a stored database of offending files classified by the government as illegal terrorist-related media. It also keeps a copy of Weibo and WeChat records, as well as a record of IMEI numbers, SIM card data and Wifi login data. The records are then sent to a server.

The move is the latest in digital surveillance in Urumqi. In March, government workers were asked to sign an agreement have terrorist-related media content, while the police sprung a surprise spot check on a group of nursing students.

Chinese police are so powerful, particularly in Xinjiang, [that] anyone being stopped is unlikely to be able to refuse the polices requests, said Maya Wang, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch.

The authorities have a lot of explaining to do about this software, including what it does, she added. While the authorities have the responsibility to protect public safety, including by fighting terrorism, such mass collection of data from ordinary people is a form of mass surveillance, and an intrusion to privacy.

Xinjiang has a population of eight million Uyghurs, a Turkic ethnic group. Its people have complained of longstanding oppression under the countrys Communist government.

In March, the government banned veils and the growing of long beards traditional Muslim customs. Last year, Xinjiang residents who used foreign messaging apps such as Whatsapp found they had their phone services cut.

This story originally appeared on Mashable.

Originally posted here:

China forces Muslim minority to install 'surveillance app' on their phones - The Express Tribune

In reference to Mark Weisbrot's July 21 viewpoint "Venezuela needs negotiation, not American intervention," I am troubled by the half-truths and disregard of events included in the piece.

The opposition in Venezuela has been mostly very pacific, as opposed to the actions of the government; violent repression, jailing of opposition leaders, and disregard of national and international law all with the only purpose of staying in power to implant obsolete ideas under a dictatorship.

During 2015 and 2016 a dialogue was established by some ex-presidents (chosen by the government), and at the end with the participation of the Vatican. The result was some agreements with which the government did not comply. Its response was more jailing of dissidents and persecution and oppression of the opposition. The government has refused to accept the elected national assembly by disregarding its laws, with the protection of a Supreme Court elected with disregard of the Venezuelan constitution and at the service of the president.

The present situation is best described by the words of President Maduro: "What we will not gain with votes we will gain with weapons." The armed forces (with the help of the Cubans) is the only support of the government. The people are overwhelmingly opposed to it, as demonstrated by the recent civic voting act.

The only possible dialogue is the negotiation of the exit of the present government, which the government has refused to accept.

As demonstrated, the government is disregarding the Venezuelan people; if it kills one or 100, if it jails thousands and tries them under military courts, the opposition is powerless to stem it.

The only alternative is international community pressures with strong measures against the government and its corrupt elite by the U.S., the European Union and Latin American countries.

Carlo Ermoli, Plantation

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International community pressure only way to aid Venezuela | Letters - Sun Sentinel