Last week saw the London launch of a new book by Frances Harrison called Still Counting the Dead. Harrison is a former BBC foreign correspondent. The work is about the civil war in Sri Lanka and the killing of tens of thousands of Tamils in the slaughter. Here’s video of the event:
Showing all posts tagged human rights
US peace group Code Pink in Pakistan protesting drone strikes
An Australian friend of mine was on this remarkable march and he’ll be writing something about it soon. It’s vital to raise awareness of the fact that US drone attacks are often indiscriminate and kill countless civilians. American peace group Code Pink, with whom I was in Cairo a few years ago for the Gaza…
This is what we’re leaving in Afghanistan; likely chaos
International Crisis Group doesn’t mince words in its latest report: Plagued by factionalism and corruption, Afghanistan is far from ready to assume responsibility for security when U.S. and NATO forces withdraw in 2014. That makes the political challenge of organising a credible presidential election and transfer of power from President Karzai to a successor that…
Speech in support of Wikileaks and against 11 years of war in Afghanistan
This month is the 11th anniversary of the Afghan war, a disastrous conflict that has achieved nothing more than destruction for Afghans and foreigners. Yesterday Sydney’s Stop the War Coalition held a rally to mark this anniversary as well as supporting Wikileaks and Julian Assange in their struggle to tell the truth about Afghanistan, via…
Recovery in Haiti doesn’t mean selling the joint to the highest bidder
During my recent visit to Haiti, working on a book and documentary about disaster capitalism, it was very clear that the US government, many NGOs and multinationals all wanted a piece of the country. And it’s working out badly. There’s a new book about how outside forces, especially Washington, continually attempt to control Haiti by…
When the corporate media is oh-so-keen to be bought
Here’s a disturbing report from Glenn Greenwald in the Guardian about CNN and its apparent willingness to broadcast sponsored news from less than savoury regimes. Is this what the crisis in journalism is leading to? Bought “news” on a supposedly independent channel?
That is what global “help” looks like in Afghanistan
America and China talk about assisting the war-torn country but the reality is so very different. The result? A supposed need to bring in private companies to fix the mess:
Calling it apartheid because that’s what it is
Mustafa Barghouti in Al-Ahram Weekly: What we need to do in Palestine is to develop a better knowledge and understanding of the system of slavery that Israel created, and that some of us do not see, whether out of ignorance, out of fear, or out of a sense of impotence in the face of this…
What I discovered as a Middle East correspondent
Independent journalist Donald MacIntyre has written a reflection on his eight years reporting Israel/Palestine: As the world concentrates on the Israeli Prime Minister’s new “red line” for an Iran strike, Jewish settlement in the West Bank accelerates apace. Settler leader Dani Dayan offered, in a recent New York Times article, a panglossian picture of the…