Sri Lanka: one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter

They're known as the Tamil Tigers and since 1976 they've been fighting for their own homeland within the tiny island country Sri Lanka off of the coast of India.

The sepratist organization, the Liberation Tigers for Tamil Eelam, have waged a feirce campaign against the government for the creation of an independant state. The campaign has evolved into what is known as the Sri Lankan civil war and has been the cause of more than a

listed 80, 000 people's deaths.

The Tamil Tigers are also known for their dedication to the cause to the point of suicide. Within the subdivisions, there are the Air tigers (the air force) the Sea Tigers (the naval force) and the Balck Tigers. The Black Tigers are a commando unit trained with the purpose that one day they will meet their end as a suicide bombar. As well, all members of the guerilla militia are given cyanide capsuls which are to be broken and swallowed in case of capture.

The Tamil Tigers have been classified as a terrorist organization in 32 countries worldwide. The issue is definately political and the U. S. Department of State stated that "...it's reason for banning LTTE as a proscribed terrorist group is based on allegations that LTTE does not respect human rights and that it does not adhere to the standards of conduct expected of a resistance movement or what might be called "freedom fighters"." The Tamil Tigers are known as one of the most dangerous and deadly extremists in the world today.

The issue though, is that both "terrorist group" and government militia have been accused of rights abuses including political assassinations, abductions, and targeted attacks on civilians. In fact, there is alot of evidence to sugest that many of the Tamil Tiger became so because of attacks by the government on civilians around them.

Although there have been constant talks of ceasefires, recognizing the safety of the civilians within the state, such ceasefires have never been fully negotiated. In the past there have been three attempts at peacetalks, all of which failed. This past April, The Tamil Tigers attempted another ceasefire, declaring a "unilateral ceasefire Sunday, but the Sri Lankan government dismissed it as a joke, and said that only a stop troops from finishing the last battle in Asia's longest modern war."

Somalia pirates find livelihoods in their careers

Stories of horrific events on the Indian Ocean and other prominent world shipping lanes have sparked the world’s attention. The pirates from Somalia are armed with rocket propelled grenades and AK47s which are provided by the country of Yemen. They board ships of all types and rely on their ransom demands to the government naval service for a source of income. Ransom demands can vary from $ 1 Million to $3 Million and are almost always paid. 

The UN has responded with international naval presence being more prominent and powerful. But while most of the world’s attention is trained on the unrest on the seas, it seems that what needs to be first addressed are the issues ashore. With the struggle for peace that is enfolding, there is finally recognition of the instability and poverty that the nation of Somalia has been attempting to thrive under for a long while. It is for reason’s ashore that men risk their lives and freedom to pursue ships and endanger or instill fear into those onboard. 

Somalia has spent almost 20 years in a civil war and is one of the world’s poorest and most violent countries in the world. It seems that piracy is one of the only forms of stable support for most of Somalia’s civilians personal economy. Somalia suffers from frequent severe droughts and has few economic opportunities to offer to the civilians living there. 

In the face of such poverty and adversity, piracy has become one of the only possibilities as far as possible sources of income. Said Abdi Farah Juha, a citizen of the regional capital, in an interview with a BBC reporter, “Piracy in many ways is socially acceptable. They have become fashionable.” Juha expanded saying, “They have money; they have power and they are getting stronger by the day...”

In another interview by a BBC reporter with one of the pirates themselves, Mohamed Olad Hassan said that pirating is a “national service” because it stimulates the Somalia economy and everyone in Somalia is reaping the benefits. “...our work is seen by many in the coastal villages as legal and we are viewed as heros.”

In either case, most Somalian men have decided that the economic benefits of pirating are the only possibility in the face of a situation as dire as the ones they face each and everyday. 

The bronze shoe

This is actually not that recent of a story, but when I first read about it, i couldn't help but find it rather amusing. Forgive me for finding this story amusing, I know that it has deeper meaning than I'm not allowing it by partially making fun of it.

Anyways. the story follows a pair of shoes. The shoes just happened to be on the feet of a Iraqi journalist by the name of Muntazer al-Zaidi on December 14th, who was present during news conference of former president, George W. Bush on his final trip to Iraq. While the conference was in session, the shoes came off the feet of Muntazer and suddenly found themselves being propelled toward president Bush's head at an alarming rate. The shoes did not hit the desired target as president Bush ducked his head just in the nick of time. Forgive me all of you Bush- supporters, but all I can say is, "HA! serves you right Mr. Former President."

I respect the fact that Mr. Bush was simply making an effort to create a nation that would be safe and comfortable throughout his years in office, but i think he did a crappy job of international relations and promoting peace throughout the world. He called for a "war on terror" which is a amiable desire, but the way he carried through on his "war on terror" was an embarrassment that simply added fuel to the fire. In my opinion,  the shoe throwing instance was something of a inevitability. 

The journalist Muntazer is now facing up to 15 years in prison if he is found guilty of assaulting a foreign leader. His lawyer insists that Muntazer was expression his opinion, not trying to assault anyone. In his honor, people have created the pictured bronze shoe with the inscription, "Muntazer: fasting until the sword breaks its fast with blood; silent until our mouths speak the truth."  Unfortunately the bronze sculpter was dismantled on orders from a provincial governor in Iraq.  I suppose it would not be a wise choice to leave the monument of the bronze shoe up, but it would be a lovely monument.

Most of my information was from articles in either the Saskatoon Starphoenix or the Edmonton Journal.

Darfur

First of all, most of the information I am relaying from another blog I found that was tremendously informative. The video link especially was interesting. I encourage you to look it up at: http://www.sethandray.com/2008/07/23/understanding-darfur-how-did-it-all-start/

This is my interpretation of what they presented and of some other research I've done.

The conflict in Darfur involves three main issues.

The first issue is common to almost any large-scale conflict: Ethnicity.

The region of Sudan was actually simply thrown together after independance at the exodus of the English settlers. So the borders have very little significance in the concept of making a nation of unified and ethnically similar people.

The land is divided (generally) into three ethnic and religious groups. To the north is a group that considers themselves to be arabic muslims, to the south are the black Christians, and to the west in the Darfur region are black muslims. The ethnic hatred is basically as a result of a social hierarchy where the people who are considered "black" are looked down upon by those of the northern region who have paler skin and are thought to be more advanced. To people of western societies, such a distinction  of being "black" would not be visable for us to understand, but Sudanese people can easily classify each other as "black" or "not-black" based on accent or last name. There is a lot of hatred between the black people of the western Darfur region as well as the south and the arabic people of the north. The capital city is Khartoum and it is in the northern region, which makes the whole country under a predominantly arabic muslim governance. Khartoum was initially founded as a trading post for black slaves, so the racism conflicts have been ingrained in Sudan since independence.

Within the Darfur region, although it is predominantly made of ethnically black christians, there are arabic nomadic herding tribes which call themselves the janjaweed that would associate themselves with the politically powerful people of the north capital. 

This hierarchy and ideas of superiority give the basis of the conflict in the darfur region.

The second issue also follows the path of many other conflicts throughout international history: Oil. 

It seems as though where ever there is oil, conflict arises. In the history of Sudan, there has been much poverty and the promise of any form of cash flow would obviously have many people in conflict over who reaps the benefits. In the Sudanese war for oil, the oil is found in the southern region of Sudan. The port, however, is in the northern region, where the political powers are held. Both the oil and the oil port are needed to export the oil. So, although all the oil comes from the southern region, the northern region has access to the benefits of roads, hospitals, and other infrastructure. When the south confronted the political powers in the north, they, in basic terms made no effort to defend their hoarding of the money.  In fact the payments of the oil has had a lot to do with how the north has kept power. The south then launched a rebellion which is known as the 2nd Sudanese civil war for 22 years. The south eventually won, and the north was forced to sign a document that would allow a percentage of all profits to trickle down to the south region. In the west, the Darfur region was not a part of any of this and were left out entirely from the profits of the oil. They launched their own rebellion which is still being fought today. This conflict is fought by the Sudanese government in an absolutely atrocious manner. The object it would seem is to kill all even civilians within the darfur region simply to eliminate the group of rebels. The government would bomb entire villages and then send in the janjaweed later to kill off anyone left. More than 400,000 civilians have been killed in Darfur. The janjaweed rape the women who are left. Then they burn all of the houses and dig up the food store and pour diesel fuel on the food stores, and they through bodies into the wells so that there is absolutely nothing left for the darfur villages. The darfur civilians have been rounded up into camps for their protection, but these raids from the government and the janjaweed still offer the camps very little security. It is estimated that 2.5 -4 Million people have lost their homes.

The third issue is Desertification.

The concept revolves around the idea that the janjaweed (saudi) were born of a group of herding tribes and the black tribes were farmers. The issue of global warming is resulting in the expanding of the Sahara desert, which, obviously, makes it harder for farmers and herders to find land to live off of. There is almost water and the lifestyle of the peoples of the darfur region which was poverty-stricken in the first place is going even farther in terms of the lack of sustainability. There quite simply, is not enough water and good land for everyone to live off of. This has resulted in a conflict between the janjaweed and the black tribes. The janjaweed are, of course, backed by the Saudi Muslims political powers in the north. 

Since all three of these issues have little to no chance of reversal or mitigation the conflict in Darfur has very little hope of being resolved.  

You know what absolutely amazes me? the fact that there are humanitartian atrocities being committed in a small region of Sudan that are so dispictable and horrific, and in the past months there has not been a single article in the newspaper about it. Now- understandibly, Darfur is "old news" and people are looking to be informed on the newest "fads" of violence, but seriously- why is there no coverage of this? Also understandibly the newspapers can't be bogged down by the depressing stories from afar and still expect to sell, but, not even a small article in over a month? are newspapers now willing to sell out and not have a least a mention of the issues that are going on in the world. And are we so arrogant to believe that if we can't see it, it doesn't affect us? so comfortable in our own world? there has been no metion of this war at all. Does something seem wrong to the rest of the world, or is it just me?

Guantanamo Bay

Just learning about Gitmo has really opened the door to the whole conflict in the Palestinian/Israel/US war going on in Gaza. Especially through the opinions of one fellow blogger (see http://actseattle.wordpress.com for more details). It's amazing how society functions, what with how many different opinions of, well... just about everything, there are. How do we honestly know if we're making the right decision. Should we live with strict rules that govern us, or simply try to live in accordance to the greater good. But there too, we come to an opinion- what is the greater good, what should the rules be? 

Before digging into the background of Guantanamo Bay and the issues surrounding it, I simply assumed that it's closure would be a good thing. I'd heard that it's treatment of detainees there was somewhat... well, can we say torturous? The peace-keeper and humanitarianism in me cried out at hearing the of the great atrocities that seemed to be occurring there on a regular basis. I had little knowledge of the reasons for the atrocities. Why were these "convicted terrorists" being treated so harshly? More importantly, how did the US government get away with such treatment without the UN looking into it?

Aren't there such things as Geneva Conventions that guarentee the rights of prisoners of war? Why does it seem that these conventions are not being upheld by the UN? That is there job- is it not?

Firstly, of course, there is always the issue of censorship. As I was looking through some of the press releases of George Bush concerning Guantanamo Bay, it seemed that everywhere I searched I found him, in one way or another, avoiding taking about what was really going on at Gitmo. He used the phrase "for the sake of national security" in many of these interviews. Like, if he talked about what was going on at Gitmo at all, it would lead to a breach of security that would result in another terrorist attack. (now maybe I'm missing some vital information, but in my opinion, I think he's partially making up excuses.)

Secondly though, I found that there were many American's against shutting down Guantanamo Bay. In fact, by one report, it seems that the majority of Americans were against shutting it down.

"More Americans say the prison at Guantanamo Bay military base in Cuba should not be closed (45%) than say it should (35%), but 20% have no opinion on the matter." (taken from http://www.gallup.com/Home.aspx on February, 6th, 2009).

It would seem that they share the views that Islamic radicals are incapable of doing anything but killing "infidels". Said one such US citizen, "...Islamic radicals are driven by an unstoppable single minded gowl of following Allah for the conversion, submission, or death of infidels. They will use every means possible, every weapon possible, adn exploit every weakness to the accomplishment of this goal." US citizens seem to be so entirely convinced of such a thing that they feel that they have no option apart for keeping the Guantanamo prison open for their own security. They feel that the Guantanamo detention facility seperates them from dangerous prisons by bars, Marines, guns, walls, barbed wire, and 100 miles of ocean. 

Hmmm. This is one of those situations that is hard for me to form a conclusion about. I believe too much in humanity and goodness in human beings to believe that torture is the only possibility. Maybe those who would believe otherwise would call me naive. It's hard for me to understand killing being the only possibility for finding peace. I can't come to terms with this belief system. 

But i believe that if the US wishes to stand for freedom and equality, they cannot restrict those wishes of freedom and equality to themselves if they have any desire to have good relations with other nations. 

All in all, I think President Obama was wise in ordering the closure of  Guantanamo Bay. From what I've seen in his  presidency policies so far, i would say that he's working hard to create better relations with the world community, which i quite frankly appreciate.  The only issue now is that it seems that there are very few countries willing to offer asylum to these detainees. I hope that Canada is up for it's all-so-familiar role as peacekeeper.

I'm not saying treating "terrorists" (or prisoners of war in the "war on terror") better will make them want to kill others any less. Faith- based beliefs run deeper than that and I understand that. But surely we are above torture for the sake of torture. 

I would appreciate anyone's comments on this topic if they have a better understanding of it, or a different opinion.

overwhelmed by the world

First of all, I must say that it is insanely hard to simply start trying to understand world events if you've never payed any attention to them before. Considering I have NEVER been the type of girl to open up the news paper in hopes of understanding politics and the war on terrorism, it seems I have a TONNE of catching up. 

I suppose some of you reading this blog will be very unimpressed with my evidential lack of knowledge. You might role your eyes at my naivety. First of all, this blog is not for you; this blog is for the many of us out there that haven't made the effort to understand world events until a very short while ago and want a very basic rundown of what is going on, who is involved etc.,etc. Second of all,  May I defend myself in saying that, I am trying now. It will be an impossibly slow process I am sure, especially considering simply how much content there seems to be out there, what with news being a never- ending thing, but I want to be able to look back at these initial posts and recognize that I have learnt from them. 

As I'm looking through the many breaking news stories now and trying to make sense of them in my own mind, I realize how small I am and how amazingly big the world is. It's one of those humbling moments like the first time you look up at the stars and really realize how beautiful the idea of life on an infinitely tiny speck in the galaxy really is. Somehow trying to understand the world lifts the burden of selfishness off your back, as though after realizing that the world does not revolve around you, you stop trying to spin it. It's then that you're given the chance to truly observe. 

So, all I really have to say is, forgive me for my lack of knowledge. Give me time to understand who and why the Hamas are, the issues behind Guantanamo Bay, the religious significance of the Gaza strip, the beliefs of the Tamil Tigers, the psychology of a suicide bomber. 

This could be an interesting journey. 

The mission

This blog will be my attempt at learning a great deal more about the world of conflict that surrounds us and communicating my thoughts on the conflict. The idea is to focus on the concepts of relationships between nations, ethnic and religious groups as well as internal government/ civilian relations. 

I will try to get a global sense, in that, i do not expect to post many articles on the same area of conflict. 

I believe that our nation and more specifically, our generation, lives in ignorance of the conflict of the world around them. We are so attached to the comfort of the safety of Canada and North America that we are ignorant to the outcry of the world around us. I, myself, would easily profess very little knowledge of the conflict that surrounds and encompasses most of the world.

I now desire to break out of my comfortable zone of ignorance.

All too often it is ignorance itself that leads to conflict and conflict that leads to ignorance and therein lies the real problem of War and hatred. It is nothing more than a vicious circle that will not end.

I do not profess to believe in the possibility of a utopian society, at least on this side of heaven, but I do believe that it is in understand others and their goals that we find unity.

Assimilation should not be our goal- diversity of cultures is what makes the world a beautiful place, but it is in our knowledge that when it comes down to it, we are all humans and we all want to believe in the goodness of humanity that we will move toward achieving peace.

I was inspired by the work of Kevin Sites in his mission of traveling and documenting the world of conflict he saw around him in a personal way. I would encourage anyone with interest to look into his work at http://hotzone.yahoo.com/.