[Onthebarricades] miscellaneous articles part 2

[Andy]

[NOTE:  I was pleasantly surprised to read the report on what seems to be a 
big U-turn from Sarkozy.  Maybe he's given up his plan to ruin France? 
We'll have to see...]

*  CALL FOR ACTION:  Support freedom of speech in Afghanistan
*  INDIA:  Survey reveals huge majority think the masses distrust the police
*  RUSSIA:  Negotiations to bring Doomsday cult out of caves
*  IRAQ:  Millenarian cults
*  INDIA:  Naxalites raid police
*  FRANCE:  State plans investment, community support for deprived areas
*  CHIAPAS:  Zapatistas "stronger", despite paramilitary backlash
*  CHIAPAS:  Revolution of the snails
*  PAPUA NEW GUINEA:  Six killed in ethnic clashes, 1000 homeless
*  PAPUA NEW GUINEA:  Land where spirits still rule
*  PAPUA NEW GUINEA:  Protests pit landowners against Australian 
conservationists
*  UK/US:  Banksy graffiti fetches hundreds of thousands - despite his 
objections
*  PAKISTAN/INDIGENOUS:  Behind the uprising in SWAT
*  BALOCHISTAN/IRAN:  Indigenous insurrection against Iranian state

Publicly Archived at Global Resistance: 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/globalresistance


Urgent ELP Bulletin (1st Feb 2007)

Dear friends

As everyone who knows ELP's history will be aware, ELP has a strong belief 
in the freedom of speech. We would therefore like to raise peoples awareness 
to an arrest in Afghanistan where a young journalist risks loosing his life 
for merely promoting womens rights!

Please read the below e-mail and do everything you can to support Parwiz 
Kambakhsh (many thanks to the 'Revolutionary Association of Women in 
Afghanistan' for this e-mail).......


Declare Your Strong Support for Immediate Release of Young Afghan Journalist 
Parwiz Kambakhsh

Galileos are still being interrogated in the disastrous courts of 
ignoranceYoung Galileos are crying Oh You! Darkness lovers: We will not be 
frightened of burns and fires We are the everlasting flames of history
Sirus Tabristani, an Iranian Poet
The criminals who are in power in Afghanistan have imprisoned Parwiz 
Kambakhsh, a young journalist, since October 2007 in Balkh province - 
Northern Afghanistan. He is threatened to be hanged by the dark-minded and 
ignorant judges in the medieval courts of Afghanistan. The accusations are 
so ridiculous and injudicious that they make any freedom-loving person want 
to stand and say enough is enough. Mr. Kambakhsh is accused of 
printing/distributing an article from the Internet, which points out 
controversial verses of the Quran regarding women’s rights. The book 
“Religion in the History of Civilization” (by Will Durant) taken from his 
living room has been kept as an evidence against him in the court!

In a country where for the last six years there are many claims regarding 
“democracy”, “human rights”, and “freedom of press”, the religious fascists 
have their grip on justice and try every possible way to mute anyone who 
criticizes or comments about the Northern Alliance criminals.
Imprisonment of Parwiz Kambakhsh is not only for his enlightening articles 
in a local newspaper, Jahan-e-Now (The New World), but also because of his 
brother Yaqub Ibrahimi, who is a well-known, brave and realistic reporter 
and exposed many criminal faces from Jehadi mafia in Northern Afghanistan to 
the world public.

The Jehadi criminals, who could not silence Ibrahimi, now try to pursue a 
traitorous agenda by unlawfully imprisoning his brother in order to hush 
him.

The Religious Scholars Council of Balkh province who have never condemned 
the criminal acts of the fundamentalist warlords in the north, now 
disgracefully issued a verdict for the execution of Parwiz Kambakhsh.

Above everything, the shocking detention of Mr. Kambakhsh is a great 
disgrace for Mr. Karzai and his Western patrons who decorated the notorious 
criminals in pants and ties and brought them in power under the guise of 
“democrats”. Now Mr. Karzai says he is not as powerful to control them.
Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) kindly asks all 
freedom-loving individuals and organizations who believe in human rights and 
democracy to stand up against the unjust imprisonment of Parwiz Kambakhsh, 
and ask for his immediate release. Only your strong support for justice and 
freedom can stop the mediaeval acts of the Afghan government and its allies, 
which are in the style of the brutal Iranian regime.
Please email your protest letters to:
Presidential Office:president at afghanistangov.org
United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan 
(UNAMA)spokesman-unama at un.org
The Supreme Court of Afghanistanaquddus at supremecourt.gov.af
You may also send protest letters to Afghan embassy in your country.

http://www.schnews.org.uk/archive/news608.htm

Proving SchNEWS reaches all corners of the globe, we this week received an 
email from a punter in the punjab (well somewhere in india anyway). Apart 
from singing our praises (of course), he alerted us to the fact that we’re 
not the only ones with trust issues when it comes to cops, demonstrated by a 
recent online poll by the Times of India – largest circulation of any 
English broadsheet in the world (over 2.5 million and rising – in your face 
Murdoch, your tired rag gets less than 700,000. Plus T of I is still family 
owned, resisting selling out any of the corporate media tycoons since 
getting independence from the Brits in 1950). They asked for opinions on the 
statement, “Police in India spells fear and trouble in the common man’s 
 mind”- to which the answer was pretty unequivocal: Agree – 96%, Disagree – 
3%, Not sure – 1%. Impressive figures, even for our anarcho-anti-capitalist 
“Resist the facist pigs” bi-monthly meeting...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7320086.stm

Hope for end to Russia cave siege

Cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov was brought in to negotiate
Fresh talks are under way to persuade 28 doomsday cult members in Russia to 
end a five-month cave siege after seven sect women came to the surface.
The women were allowed to leave with cult leader Pyotr Kuznetsov after he 
was brought to the scene to negotiate.
The True Russian Orthodox Church members barricaded themselves into the cave 
in the Penza region, about 650km (400 miles) south-east of Moscow.
They are waiting for doomsday, which they believe will occur in May.
The members entered the cave in October and have refused to come out.
They threatened to detonate gas canisters if attempts were made to remove 
them and this week reportedly shot at police to drive them off.
However, there are reports of a split in the cult after a number of cave-ins 
due to prolonged rainfall. There are fears the cave could collapse 
completely.
'Prophet'
Mr Kuznetsov, who is undergoing court-ordered psychiatric treatment, was 
brought to the scene and after negotiations was allowed to take the seven 
women to his home in a nearby village to await the May doomsday date there.

The vice governor of the Penza region, Oleg Melnichenko, said the women were 
in good health and did not need medical help.
"The women who have come out will continue their isolation until May, when 
supposedly the end of the world will happen. That was their condition, which 
we promised to respect," Mr Melnichenko said.
The governor's office said it hoped the remaining members would come out 
soon, possibly as early as Saturday.
Four children are among those still in the cave.
Mr Kuznetsov, who calls himself Father Pyotr, declared himself a prophet a 
number of years ago and has attracted followers in Russia and Belarus.
He is thought to have ordered his followers into the cave but did not join 
them.

http://www.jamestown.org/terrorism/news/article.php?articleid=2373990

The Ansar al-Mahdi and the Continuing Threat of the Doomsday Cults
in Iraq
By Fadhil Ali
[From: Terrorism Monitor (The Jamestown Foundation, USA)
Volume 6, Issue 4 (February 22, 2008)]

On January 18, a day before the annual Shiite festival of Ashura,
most of the concerns in Iraq revolved around possible attacks by
Sunni extremists against the Shiites. What happened was unexpectedly
different—the attacks came from the little-known Shiite cult of
Ansar al-Mahdi (Helpers of the Expected One). Gunmen of the cult—
believing that a Shiite Messiah was coming to help them—launched
simultaneous attacks against Iraqi forces in the cities of Basra and
Nasiriya in Shiite-dominated southern Iraq. The attacks came a month
after British forces handed over security responsibilities in Basra
to Iraqi security forces. During the clashes in Basra and nearby
Nasiriya, 97 members of Ansar al-Mahdi were killed and about 500
arrested. Among these were doctors, engineers and other respected
professionals (al-Hayat, January 30).

The media mistakenly referred to the group as the Soldiers of
Heaven, another small Shiite cult with similar beliefs. By the end
of the second day of fighting, Iraqi forces succeeded in restoring
order in the two cities, but the mystery of Ansar al-Mahdi was not
completely solved—especially with the disappearance of the leader of
the group, Ahmad al-Hassan, better known as Shaykh al-Yamani. It is
possible, as some suggest, that al-Yamani commands the allegiance of
as many as 5,000 followers.

Development of the Post-Invasion Doomsday Cults in Iraq

The apocalyptic radicalism of the Ansar al-Mahdi derives from a
militant interpretation of the "Twelver School" of Shiite theology.
Twelver Shiites await the return of a Mahdi (Expected One) in the
form of the twelfth Shiite Imam, Muhammad ibn Hassan ibn Ali, born
in 868 A.D. It is believed that the Imam is still alive, but has
been hidden by God from mankind—a process known as "occultation"—
until the appointed time of his return. The Imam will help the Nabi
Isa (Prophet Jesus) to defeat al-Masih al-Dajjal (the false Messiah—
an Anti-Christ figure) and establish social justice on earth prior
to the Day of Judgment. Mahdism is not unique to Shiite Islam,
though many orthodox Sunnis frown on the concept as being
unsupported by Quranic tradition. The most notable Sunni "Mahdi" was
Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi—who lived from 1844 to 1885 and led a
successful revolt against Turco-Egyptian rule in the Sudan during
the 1880s.

During the January 2007 Ashura festival, a millenarian cult known as
the Jund al-Samaa (Soldiers of Heaven, or SoH) engaged in severe
clashes with Iraqi government forces in southern Iraq's Shiite holy
city of Najaf. The SoH were led by Dhia Abdul Zahra al-Gar'awi, or
the Judge of Heaven as he is known among his followers. According to
the Iraqi government, hundreds of gunmen of the SoH were about to
implement a plan to assassinate the top Shiite clerics. The SoH
believed that killing those clerics who are followed by the majority
of Iraq's Shiite population would pave the way for the return of al-
Imam al-Mahdi (the Shiite Messiah). The Iraqi government announced
that it had uncovered the plot. Coalition-backed Iraqi forces
surrounded the SoH in a rural area and attacked them—263 of the SoH
members, including al-Gar'awi, were killed and a further 500
arrested.

Al-Mahdi Army

The radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and his followers in the
Jaysh al-Mahdi militia might not believe in an imminent return for
the Mahdi, but their ideology still gives the impression that his
return is close. Whenever al-Sadr or other leading members of the
movement are asked about the possibility of disbanding the militia,
they reply that only the Imam al-Mahdi (the returned savior of
mankind) could do this and no one else, including militia founder
Moqtada al-Sadr.

The Sadrists deny any connection with Ansar al-Mahdi. Some media
reports mentioned that Sadr's men were fighting with the Iraqi army
against Ansar al-Mahdi, but an anti-Sadrist web forum suggests that
Ansar al-Mahdi is merely a group of al-Mahdi Army. There are reports
that former members of the Baathist Fedayeen Saddam militia have
joined the Ansar al-Mahdi and al-Mahdi Army in an effort to regain
their old power and influence (Shababeek, January 19).

Al-Yamani and the Ansar al-Mahdi

Ahmad al-Hassan al-Yamani—whose real name is Ahmad Ismail Gat'a—was
born near Basra to a well-known and well-respected Shiite family.
One of his brothers had a doctorate in nuclear technology and worked
as an assistant to General Hossam Ameen, the spokesman of Saddam's
nuclear program. Another brother of al-Yamani was a colonel in the
former Iraqi Army. The strong family ties to the regime could not
help al-Yamani when he was sent to jail in the 1990s for unknown
reasons. After the 2003 Coalition invasion, al-Yamani—who already
had a college degree in civil engineering—enrolled as a scholar in
the Shiite religious institutes of Najaf and became a cleric. In
2004 he participated in the Najaf battle between Coalition forces
and Moqtada al-Sadr's al-Mahdi Army. Eventually al-Yamani led his
followers to his home town of Basra and the adjacent Nasiriya and
Emara areas where they established their own mosques and offices.
The mission expanded quickly in the poor Shiite far south of Iraq
(al-Malaf, February 2007).

In 2006, the Ansar al-Mahdi started to increase their propaganda
efforts in Basra and Baghdad with slogans like "Every solution has
failed but the solution of al-Mahdi" or "Democracy is the people's
rule but al-Mahdi is Allah's rule." On August 28, 2007, the first
issue of the group's newspaper (al-Sirat al-Mostakeem) was published
to express the policy and ideology of the cult. Intellectual
adherents of al-Yamani were placed in charge of editing the paper.

Al-Sirat al-Mostakeem was mostly devoted to the cult's propaganda,
but the editorials had a clear anti-American position. In the
October 13, 2007 issue, there was an article about "jihad by words
and swords" based on Jihad is the Gate of Heaven, a book written by
al-Yamani. In the January 25 issue, there was a statement by al-
Yamani—allegedly answering a Christian woman—declaring that America
would fall by Imam al-Mahdi's hands. The United States is
customarily referred as al-Masih al-Dajjal (the "Grand Imposter"
or "False Messiah," a personality comparable to the Anti-Christ). In
the same issue, al-Yamani writes that the Americans—whom he cursed—
supported the enemies of Islam, like the apostate rulers of the Gulf
countries. He claims that Osama bin Laden was raised up by U.S.
support and says elsewhere in the same issue that the campaign
against the followers of Moqtada al-Sadr is intended to clear the
ground for U.S. occupation.

In a video released on YouTube, al-Yamani stresses his role as a
representative and deputy of Imam al-Mahdi while challenging other
Shiite clerics to a debate. Al-Yamani has made this challenge many
times, but while the traditional senior Shiite clerics have not
responded, some junior members of the Shiite movement have offered
to take up al-Yamani's challenge. The top Shiite spiritual leader in
Iraq, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, has urged the government to address
those who spread defective views on religion. The Sadrists blame the
Iraqi government for the emergence of "spoiling movements" like that
of al-Yamani, claiming that while the national army was busy
tackling al-Sadr's al-Mahdi army, more dangerous extremist groups
were proliferating in southern Iraq.

An Iranian Role?

The Iraqi government first accused neighboring countries of
sponsoring the extremist millenarian Shiite groups. Later on,
government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh stated that there was no
evidence that the cult was supported by any party from outside Iraq
(al-Sharqia, January 28). In an interview with al-Hurra TV, an
arrested senior member of Ansar al-Mahdi admitted that there were
foreign individuals but no states involved in the financial support
of the cult. Unnamed political and security sources took a different
view by telling the Iraqi press that "the interrogations with Ansar
al-Yamani showed that they are agents of Iranian intelligence and
some of them were trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. The
weapons and ammunition of the cult's fighters were Iranian made" (al-
Malaf, February 6).

Conclusion

Although the Iraqi forces succeeded in putting down the Ansar al-
Mahdi rebellion in two days, the danger is still present. Cult
leader Ahmad al-Hassan al-Yamani managed to escape and might return
to launch other attacks against the Iraqi government or the
Coalition. The possibility of attacks outside Iraq cannot be ruled
out. Militant cults like Ansar al-Mahdi and the SoH have an
international agenda as they believe that al-Imam al-Mahdi is coming
back to liberate the entire world and defeat the unbelievers. It was
a worrying sign that one of the SoH had a British passport.

The clashes at Basra and Nasiriya occurred a month after the
security handover between the British and the Iraqis in the south
and a month before the end of the six-month suspension of al-Mahdi
Army activities. The Iranians have expressed many times that they
are willing to be involved in the security arrangements in Iraq and
fill what they describe as a security vacuum that will exist after
the Coalition withdrawal. A connection between Ansar al-Mahdi and
Iranian intelligence could explain the clashes—even partially—as an
unusual means for Iran to send a message about potential instability
in Shiite Iraq.

The followers of al-Sadr ascribed the violence in southern Iraq to
the government's crackdown on their militia. By accepting al-
Yamani's call for a debate, the Sadrists are apparently trying to
gain the political benefits of negotiating on behalf of the Iraqi
government or being a mediator. They are likely thinking of bringing
the cult back to its wider Shiite environment and more specifically
to al-Mahdi Army.

It is important that the Iraqi government not underestimate the
threat of such cults; the Shiite-led government must avoid being
affected by its historical relationship with Iran if Iranian forces
are indeed behind these cults. Dealing with radical Shiite groups is
complicated by the delicate internal balance between the different
Shiite parties that form the government. Whether al-Yamani is
captured or remains on the loose, the danger of the doomsday cults
could linger for years, even after the backbone of the movement has
been destroyed.

http://www.hindu.com/2008/02/17/stories/2008021750190100.htm

ORISSA
15 killed in naxalite raids on Orissa police depots
Prafulla Das

Large quantities of arms and ammunition looted

NAYAGARH (ORISSA): Hundreds of armed Maoists simultaneously raided several 
police establishments in Nayagarh district late on Friday night, killed 15 
persons, including 13 policemen, and looted large quantities of arms and 
ammunition.

A village guard and one civilian were the others killed. Ten persons, 
including nine policemen, were injured.

The operation started at 10.30 pm and ended at 12.30 am. Police swung into 
action on Saturday and encircled the Kupari forests where the Maoists had 
taken shelter.

Till last reports came in, two extremists were gunned down in the combing 
operation undertaken by 800 security personnel belonging to the Orissa 
police, Andhra Pradesh police, and Central para-military forces. Two Maoists 
were also arrested.

Two Air Force bomber helicopters were pressed into service to locate the 
Maoists. If needed the authorities would bomb the naxalites, highly placed 
sources said.

According to Nayagarh Superintendent of Police Rajesh Kumar, the naxalites 
first blocked all the four entry points to Nayagarh town and then all at 
once attacked the arms depot at the local police training school, district 
armoury and the local police station catching the security personnel off 
guard.

The Maoists, numbering around 600, came in several vehicles. There were 
three trucks, one jeep, and several motorcycles. Around 100 women were part 
of the attackers.

While a majority of the extremists opened fire at the arms depots and police 
stations, many stood guard at prominent locations of the town after blocking 
the road with boulders and their vehicles. The roads to Mr. Kumar’s 
residence were also blocked.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jan/23/france.international

Sarkozy unveils €1bn plan to stop repeat of 2005 riots
· Minister promises to create 45,000 new jobs
· Investment to focus on notorious 'banlieues'
Angelique Chrisafis in Paris
The Guardian,
Wednesday January 23 2008
Article history
About this article
Close
This article appeared in the Guardian on Wednesday January 23 2008 on p23 of 
the International section. It was last updated at 09:27 on January 23 2008.

Firemen run past a car set ablaze during riots last November in 
Villiers-le-Bel, outside Paris. Photograph: Martin Bureau/AFP/Getty Images
Nicolas Sarkozy's government yesterday unveiled its first moves to tackle 
problems on France's run-down high-rise estates, which remain plagued by 
poverty, unemployment and race discrimination two years after major riots in 
2005.
Yesterday at Vaulx-en-Velin, the site of France's first suburban riots in 
1979, the junior minister for urban affairs, Fadela Amara - an outspoken 
leftwing campaigner handed responsibility for the plan - promised to create 
45,000 new jobs in areas where up to half of young men who are black or of 
north African origin are out of work.
Amara, who grew up on a rough estate with her illiterate Algerian parents 
and still insists on living in a council flat, said the aim was to cut youth 
unemployment by 40% in three years, providing tutors for struggling children 
and work placements for school-leavers.
The government will invest €1bn (£750m) on education, employment schemes and 
transport focusing on 100 out of more than 300 areas that erupted in 
violence in 2005.
Amara said she wanted to create a banlieue elite and restore hope to French 
citizens in these ghettoes who were treated as outcasts because of their 
colour, immigrant origins or address. She described "discrimination, 
exclusion, misery, a France that is very poor" and tense.
But bickering between ministers, and the president's desire to take control 
of the plans himself meant yesterday's promises of jobs and investment were 
thin on detail. Sarkozy has promised a full explanation of his strategy for 
the riot-hit suburbs at a media event at a tower block next month.
The French president is a hate figure to many of the 5 million who live on 
France's decaying suburban estates after he called wayward youths "scum" and 
endorsed riot police squads when he was interior minister. He was unable to 
do walkabouts during his election campaign last year because of fear for his 
own safety.
But before his election he promised an ambitious "Marshall Plan" for the 
banlieues that would end the poor living conditions, discrimination and 
poverty in neighbourhoods where the rate of unemployment for under-25s 
hovers around 35%. The urgent need for action was driven home by riots last 
November in Villiers-le-Bel, north of Paris, where rioters shot at police.
On Monday night, Sarkozy staged a surprise visit to a fragile estate west of 
Paris, his first such trip since his election. He told youths: "We won't let 
anyone down, on one condition: that those who have been given advice and 
training make the effort to get up in the morning."
This month, the government announced it would restore a form of community 
policing - a practice Sarkozy had scrapped as interior minister, favouring 
the sporadic use of riot police and officers bussed in from outside. The 
president also vowed to compensate people whose cars are torched on estates. 
At least 46,800 cars were burned in France in 2007, compared with 44,000 the 
year before.
Sarkozy, stung by his recent poor poll ratings, is hoping that his own 
highly-anticipated detailed banlieue plan next month will boost his 
standing.
But on the ground, some remained sceptical. "If this is just another thin 
sprinkling [of measures] it won't work," warned the Socialist mayor of 
Villiers-le-Bel.

http://www.ww4report.com/node/4957

Chiapas: Zapatistas "stronger" —despite paramilitary backlash
Submitted by Bill Weinberg on Sun, 01/20/2008 - 00:37.
Refuting widespread media portrayal of the "erosion" (desgaste) of the rebel 
Zapatista movement, Jorge Santiago, director of the local group Economic and 
Social Development of the Indigenous Mexicans (DESMI), which has been 
working with Maya communities in the Highlands of Chiapas for 35 years, told 
Blanche Petrich of the Mexican daily La Jornada that 14 years after the 
armed uprising, "we are stronger, because we are linked" with social 
struggles across Mexico. "Our word has to do with the words of others. The 
people are beginning to have confidence in themselves as builders of 
relations, with the local base." He especially credits the Zapatistas' 
maintenance of the moral high ground—"The decision not to instigate 
confrontations with the local enemies, in spite of harassment and the 
onslaught on their territory." (La Jornada, Jan. 6)
Paramilitary harassment of the Zapatista communities continues unabated. At 
Bolon Ajaw settlement, near Agua Azul nature reserve, gunmen with shotguns 
and rifles opened fire on community members working in the corn fields on 
Jan. 2. Although there were no casualties, community members say this was 
but the most recent in a series of such attacks. They say gunmen routinely 
set up illegal roadblocks, threatening community members and impeding access 
to their farmlands. They blame the attacks on the Organization for the 
Defense of Indigenous and Campesino Rights (OPDDIC), which they charge is a 
paramilitary group loyal to the political machine of the Institutional 
Revolutionary Party (PRI). (CGT Chiapas, Jan. 5)
The attacks have continued despite a public ceremony Dec. 19 in which the 
pro-PRI leaders of the community Ejido Agua Azul supposedly "defected" from 
the OPDDIC and handed their arms over to Chiapas state authorities. La 
Jornada reporter Hermann Bellinghausen called the ceremony a media "show" 
organized by the state government. He also notes that attacks have continued 
despite the establishment of new Mexican army camps near Agua Azul in a 
supposed crackdown on arms and drug plantations. (La Jornada, Dec. 22)
Since then, the leaders of Ejido Agua Azul have publicly called for the 
eviction of the local Zapatista communities, accusing them of causing 
ecological damage and threatening the nature reserve. (Noticias Palenque, 
Jan. 12) Local Zapatista leaders, in turn, charged the Ejido Agua Azul 
leaders of seeking to clear the lands to make way for tourism development. A 
statement from the Zapatista community Nuevo Progeso Agua Azul said: "We are 
natives here. Like our parents. Our grandparents were resident farmworkers 
[peones acasillados] of the landlord [patrón]. And for more than 13 years we 
have been in resistance." (La Jornada, Jan. 16)
Two local campesinos, Fidelino Ruiz Hernández, 73, and Alfredo Hernández 
Pérez, 48, could face 25 years in prison in an imminent judicial ruling for 
the killing of two OPDDIC members in 2002. Accused by local authorities of 
being "Zapatistas," the two have been held at the prison in Ocosingo for 
almost five years. The Zapatistas deny any attacks on the OPDDIC. (La 
Jornada, Jan. 15)
At an international memorial held in the Highland city of San Cristobal de 
Las Casas for the late anthropologist and Zapatista supporter Andrés Aubry, 
writers John Berger and Naomi Klein, Belgian priest Francois Houtart and 
dozens of other academics and activists issued a statement on the growing 
paramilitarism in Chiapas, saying "a new Acteal must not be permitted in 
Mexican territory." (La Jornada, Dec. 18)
La Jornada's Hermann Bellinghausen, who has reported aggressively on the 
paramilitary activity, reports that in recent weeks his house in San 
Cristobal has been under constant surveillance by unknown men with cameras 
in matching sports jerseys, and that vehicles have followed him as he leaves 
his home. (La Jornada, Jan. 11)
In an ominous sign that elements of the violent PRI machine are being 
incorporated into the Chiapas state government now under a coalition led by 
the center-left Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), Gov. Juan Sabines 
has appointed prominent rancher Jorge Constantino Kánter as his 
sub-secretary for commerce in the Agriculture Secretariat. Kánter is a 
bitter opponent of the Zapatistas, and was widely known in the '90s as 
leader of the "White Guards," a paramilitary force established by the 
state's cattle lords. (La Jornada, Dec. 16)
The struggle over turf in Chiapas even extends to San Cristobal, where 
Zapatista-loyal inhabitants of the poor neighborhood (colonia popular) 5 de 
Marzo have announced that they will re-install water services, which were 
cut off to their families by municipal authorities. (CGT Chiapas, Jan. 14)
Escalating social struggles in Chiapas also extend beyond the contest 
between the Zapatistas and their opponents. On Jan. 7, members of the 
Coalition of Independent Organizations of the Lacandon Selva (COCISEL), an 
alliance of 30 community groups from the lowland rainforest, peacefully 
occupied the offices of various state and federal agencies in the state 
capital, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, to demand better government services for the 
impoverished region. (La Jornada, Jan. 8)

http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/tomdispatch/2008/01/revolution-of-the-snails.html

Revolution of the Snails

Commentary: Encounters with the Zapatistas: Real change takes time.
By Rebecca Solnit
January 15, 2008

I grew up listening to vinyl records, dense spirals of information that we 
played at 33-1/3 revolutions per minute. The original use of the word 
revolution was in this sense—of something coming round or turning round, the 
revolution of the heavenly bodies, for example. It's interesting to think 
that just as the word radical comes from the Latin word for "roots" and 
meant going to the root of a problem, so revolution originally means to 
rotate, to return, or to cycle, something those who live according to the 
agricultural cycles of the year know well.
Only in 1450, says my old Oxford Etymological Dictionary, does it come to 
mean "an instance of a great change in affairs or in some particular thing." 
1450: 42 years before Columbus sailed on his first voyage to the not-so-new 
world, not long after Gutenberg invented moveable type in Europe, where time 
itself was coming to seem less cyclical and more linear—as in the second 
definition of this new sense of revolution in my dictionary, "a complete 
overthrow of the established government in any country or state by those who 
were previously subject to it."
We live in revolutionary times, but the revolution we are living through is 
a slow turning around from one set of beliefs and practices toward another, 
a turn so slow that most people fail to observe our society revolving—or 
rebelling. The true revolutionary needs to be as patient as a snail.
The revolution is not some sudden change that has yet to come, but the very 
transformative and questioning atmosphere in which all of us have lived for 
the past half century, since perhaps the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955, or 
the publication of Rachel Carson's attack on the 
corporate-industrial-chemical complex, Silent Spring, in 1962; certainly, 
since the amazing events of 1989, when the peoples of Eastern Europe 
nonviolently liberated themselves from their Soviet-totalitarian 
governments; the people of South Africa undermined the white apartheid 
regime of that country and cleared the way for Nelson Mandela to get out of 
jail; or, since 1992, when the Native peoples of the Americas upended the 
celebration of the 500th anniversary of Columbus's arrival in this 
hemisphere with a radical rewriting of history and an assertion that they 
are still here; or even 1994, when this radical rewriting wrote a new 
chapter in southern Mexico called Zapatismo.
Five years ago, the Zapatista revolution took as one of its principal 
symbols the snail and its spiral shell. Their revolution spirals outward and 
backward, away from some of the colossal mistakes of capitalism's savage 
alienation, industrialism's regimentation, and toward old ways and small 
things; it also spirals inward via new words and new thoughts. The 
astonishing force of the Zapatistas has come from their being deeply rooted 
in the ancient past—"we teach our children our language to keep alive our 
grandmothers" said one Zapatista woman—and prophetic of the half-born other 
world in which, as they say, many worlds are possible. They travel both ways 
on their spiral.

Revolutionary Landscapes
At the end of 2007, I arrived on their territory for a remarkable meeting 
between the Zapatista women and the world, the third of their encuentros 
since the 1994 launch of their revolution. Somehow, among the miracles of 
Zapatista words and ideas I read at a distance, I lost sight of what a 
revolution might look like, must look like, on the ground—until late last 
year when I arrived on that pale, dusty ground after a long ride in a van on 
winding, deeply rutted dirt roads through the forested highlands and 
agricultural clearings of Chiapas, Mexico. The five hours of travel from the 
big town of San Cristobal de las Casas through that intricate landscape took 
us past countless small cornfields on slopes, wooden houses, thatched 
pigsties and henhouses, gaunt horses, a town or two, more forest, and then 
more forest, even a waterfall.
Everything was green except the dry cornstalks, a lush green in which 
December flowers grew. There were tree-sized versions of what looked like 
the common, roadside, yellow black-eyed susans of the American west and a 
palm-sized, lavender-pink flower on equally tall, airily branching stalks 
whose breathtaking beauty seemed to come from equal parts vitality, 
vulnerability, and bravura—a little like the women I listened to for the 
next few days.
The van stopped at the junction that led to the center of the community of 
La Garrucha. There, we checked in with men with bandannas covering the lower 
halves of their faces, who sent us on to a field of tents further uphill. 
The big sign behind them read, "You are in Territory of Zapatistas in 
Rebellion. Here the People Govern and the Government Obeys." Next to it, 
another sign addressed the political prisoners from last year's remarkable 
uprising in Oaxaca in which, for four months, the inhabitants held the city 
and airwaves and kept the government out. It concluded, "You are not alone. 
You are with us. EZLN."

As many of you may know, EZLN stands for Ejército Zapatista de Liberación 
Nacional (Zapatista Army for National Liberation), a name akin to those from 
many earlier Latin American uprisings. The Zapatistas—mostly Mayan 
indigenous rebels from remote, rural communities of Chiapas, Mexico's 
southernmost and poorest state—had made careful preparations for a decade 
before their January 1, 1994 uprising.
They began like conventional rebels, arming themselves and seizing six 
towns. They chose that first day of January because it was the date that the 
North American Free Trade Agreement went into effect, which meant utter 
devastation for small farmers in Mexico; but they had also been inspired by 
the 500th anniversary, 14 months before, of Columbus's arrival in the 
Americas and the way native groups had reframed that half-millenium as one 
of endurance and injustice for the indigenous peoples of this hemisphere.
Their rebellion was also meant to take the world at least a step beyond the 
false dichotomy between capitalism and the official state socialism of the 
Soviet Union which had collapsed in 1991. It was to be the first realization 
of what needed to come next: a rebellion, above all, against capitalism and 
neoliberalism. Fourteen years later, it is a qualified success: many 
landless campesino families in Zapatista-controlled Chiapas now have land; 
many who were subjugated now govern themselves; many who were crushed now 
have a sense of agency and power. Five areas in Chiapas have existed outside 
the reach of the Mexican government, under their own radically different 
rules, since that revolution.
Beyond that, the Zapatistas have given the world a model—and, perhaps even 
more important, a language—with which to re-imagine revolution, community, 
hope, and possibility. Even if, in the near future, they were to be 
definitively defeated on their own territory, their dreams, powerful as they 
have been, are not likely to die. And there are clouds on the horizon: the 
government of President Felipe Calderón may turn what has, for the last 14 
years, been a low-intensity conflict in Chiapas into a full-fledged war of 
extermination. A war on dreams, on hope, on rights, and on the old goals of 
the hero of the Mexican Revolution a century before, Emiliano Zapata: tierra 
y libertad, land and liberty.
The Zapatistas emerged from the jungle in 1994, armed with words as well as 
guns. Their initial proclamation, the First Declaration of the Lacandon 
Jungle, rang with familiar, outmoded-sounding revolutionary rhetoric, but 
shortly after the uprising took the world by storm, the Zapatistas' tone 
shifted. They have been largely nonviolent ever since, except in 
self-defense, though they are ringed by the Mexican army and local 
paramilitaries (and maintain their own disciplined army, a long line of 
whose masked troops patrolled La Garrucha at night, armed with sticks). What 
shifted most was their language, which metamorphosed into something 
unprecedented—a revolutionary poetry full of brilliant analysis as well as 
of metaphor, imagery, and humor, the fruit of extraordinary imaginations.
Some of their current stickers and t-shirts—the Zapatistas generate more 
cool paraphernalia than any rock band—speak of "el fuego y la palabra," the 
fire and the word. Many of those words came from the inspired pen of their 
military commander, the nonindigenous Subcomandante Marcos, but that pen 
reflected the language of a people whose memory is long and environment is 
rich—if not in money and ease, then in animals, images, traditions, and 
ideas.
Take, for example, the word caracol, which literally means snail or spiral 
shell. In August 2003, the Zapatistas renamed their five autonomous 
communities caracoles. The snail then became an important image. I noticed 
everywhere embroideries, t-shirts, and murals showing that land snail with 
the spiraling shell. Often the snail wore a black ski mask. The term caracol 
has the vivid vitality, the groundedness, that often escapes metaphors as 
they become part of our disembodied language.
When they reorganized as caracoles, the Zapatistas reached back to Mayan 
myth to explain what the symbol meant to them. Or Subcomandante Marcos did, 
attributing the story as he does with many stories to "Old Antonio," who may 
be a fiction, a composite, or a real source of the indigenous lore of the 
region:
"The wise ones of olden times say that the hearts of men and women are in 
the shape of a caracol, and that those who have good in their hearts and 
thoughts walk from one place to the other, awakening gods and men for them 
to check that the world remains right. They say that they say that they said 
that the caracol represents entering into the heart, that this is what the 
very first ones called knowledge. They say that they say that they said that 
the caracol also represents exiting from the heart to walk the world…. The 
caracoles will be like doors to enter into the communities and for the 
communities to come out; like windows to see us inside and also for us to 
see outside; like loudspeakers in order to send far and wide our word and 
also to hear the words from the one who is far away."
The caracoles are clusters of villages, but described as spirals they reach 
out to encompass the whole world and begin from within the heart. And so I 
arrived in the center of one caracol, a little further up the road from 
those defiant signs, in the broad, unpaved plaza around which the public 
buildings of the village of La Garrucha are clustered, including a 
substantial two-story, half-built clinic. Walking across that clearing were 
Zapatista women in embroidered blouses or broad collars and aprons stitched 
of rows of ribbon that looked like inverted rainbows—and those ever-present 
ski masks in which all Zapatistas have appeared publicly since their first 
moment out of the jungles in 1994. (Or almost all, a few wear bandannas 
instead.)
That first glimpse was breathtaking. Seeing and hearing those women for the 
three days that followed, living briefly on rebel territory, watching people 
brave enough to defy an army and the world's reigning ideology, imaginative 
enough to invent (or reclaim) a viable alternative was one of the great 
passages of my life. The Zapatistas had been to me a beautiful idea, an 
inspiration, a new language, a new kind of revolution. When they spoke at 
this Third Encounter of the Zapatista Peoples with the People of the World, 
they became a specific group of people grappling with practical problems. I 
thought of Martin Luther King Jr. when he said he had been to the 
mountaintop. I have been to the forest.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7227787.stm

Six killed in PNG ethnic strife
At least six people have been killed and several seriously injured in ethnic 
violence in Papua New Guinea.
Clashes between Western Highland Jiga tribesmen and Engan settlers broke out 
after a Jiga man was killed in the town of Mount Hagen on Sunday.
Police have set up road blocks and hundreds of residents have sought shelter 
in a police gymnasium.
Local media say the gym is running out of food and water, and the town's 
schools and businesses remain closed.
Appeals for calm
Fighting erupted after a brawl in Mt Hagan, the country's third-largest 
city, in which a Jiga man working as a hotel security guard was killed.
Relatives and tribesmen of the man arrived in the area carrying guns and 
knives and began attacking Engans.
Homes and properties in Mt Hagen have been burned or damaged in revenge 
attacks, which local police say they could not prevent.
Security personnel are being drafted in from other towns and community 
leaders have appealed for calm amid concerns that the conflict could spread.
A senior Western Highlands police official, Kaiglo Ambane, told Australia's 
ABC News: "Things are slowly getting back to order, it will take some time 
to recover."

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23163058-5005961,00.html

1000 homeless in PNG ethnic clashes
Article from: AAP
Font size: Decrease Increase
Email article: Email
Print article: Print
By Ilya Gridneff in Port Moresby
February 05, 2008 11:50am
ABOUT 1000 people remain homeless following ethnic violence in Papua New 
Guinea's Western Highlands Province that left six dead.
PNG Police Commander Gari Baki has ordered 35 Port Moresby officers to fly 
to Mt Hagen, in PNG's central west, to help restore law and order after a 
weekend hotel brawl triggered fierce retaliation attacks in the city's 
settlements.

Six men died and several more suffered serious injuries, while an estimated 
thousand people are homeless after homes and businesses were torched or 
destroyed by Jiga tribesman.

Family and friends from the Jiga tribe rushed to Mt Hagen seeking revenge 
against settlement dwellers they blamed for killing a relative - a hotel 
security guard.

In the ensuing violence an Engan man who lived in the settlement was killed 
in a drive-by shooting, while four more died in violence between groups 
wielding bush knives and guns.

Many of the homeless have been moved to a police gym and businesses and 
schools are slowly reopening.

Meanwhile highlands men have been told to stay at home to avoid the rick of 
reprisal attacks.

Western Highlands Acting Provincial Commander Chief Inspector Kaiglo Ambane 
said about 1000 people were staying in police barracks because they have no 
home or feel threatened.

"There is a lot of speculation and talk and these rumours don't help the 
situation,'' he said.

"Things are slowly getting back to order, it will take some time to 
recover,'' he said.

Police will investigate reported allegations of rape, he said.

Senior government officials condemned the violence and some community 
leaders called on the government to declare a state of emergency, PNG's Post 
Courier newspaper reported.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/7/story.cfm?c_id=7&objectid=10489389

Papua New Guinea: Land where spirits still rule (+photos)
It is believed black magic cannot cross water, so homes in Hanuabada 
Village, Port Moresby, were built over the sea.
Drive along the brand new freeway from downtown Port Moresby to the sea and 
you may notice a huge chunk of stone about the size of a car standing beside 
the highway.
"See that?" says Steven, who is showing me round the capital of Papua New 
Guinea. "That's a spirit stone."
Eh? Looks just like a big lump of brown rock to me.
"When they cut the road through here," he continues, "they found this stone 
was too hard to break up so they put it on a truck, took it down to the 
harbour and dropped it in the sea. But the next morning it was back here 
again. That happened three times. They dropped the stone in the harbour but 
overnight it returned, so finally they left it here."
Steven, who is telling me this, is a well-educated man, speaking not only 
his clan language and pidgin but also English and Japanese. He moved to the 
capital from his home in the Highlands to find work as a guide for PNG 
Explorers International. But clearly, as far as he is concerned, spirit 
stones, black magic and such are a normal part of life.
Seeing my sceptical look, Tom, our driver, nods his head. "This sort of 
thing happens a lot," he says. "There are many powerful spirits living in 
the hills and stones and it is not a good idea to disturb them."
Unfortunately, he adds, Government officials from other parts of the 
country, who do not know where the local spirits dwell, often try to push 
through works in the wrong places.
"Near my village here in Port Moresby they tried to bulldoze a mountain 
where a very strong spirit dwells. The spirit was angry and froze the 
bulldozer so it could not move. The bulldozer is still there today."
And was the mountain left alone after that? "Oh, yes, the mountain has not 
been touched. Now they know about the spirit."
Tom is another well-educated man who, when he is not driving tourists, does 
the accounts for the travel company. But he, too, accepts such spirits as 
just a matter of fact.
As we drive around Port Moresby the two of them compete to swap the scariest 
spirit story. For my money, Steven won with his tale of "the spirit who 
kills", a spirit who invades the bodies of men and forces them to kill 
people.
Does this spirit, I wonder, strike very often. "Oh no," he says, "only 
sometimes." And then the two of them discuss various murders attributed to 
the spirit.
Later, when we stop at the village of Koki, one of several around Port 
Moresby where the houses are built on stilts over the sea, Steven whispers 
to me that they are really refuges from black magic.
"Tom would not tell you this, because he is a Motu [the people who built the 
villages], but I can tell you because I am from the Highlands."
For generations, he explains, the Motu who live on the coast have feuded 
with the Koiatu people from the surrounding hills, who are famed for their 
knowledge of black magic.
"Black magic cannot cross water so the Motu built their houses on the sea so 
they would be safe from their Koiatu enemies."
Indeed, even though Port Moresby is a modern-looking city, signs of magic 
are all around.
Even the National Parliament, designed by New Zealander Cecil Hogan, is 
based on a spirit house from the Sepik River area.
Above the entrance doorway is a magnificent mosaic depicting different 
aspects of PNG life - the modern world is represented by a helicopter and a 
longhaired pilot - including the figure of a witchdoctor.
And inside is a superb totem pole, carved from five huge logs, with spirit 
figures representing the main regions of the country.
Taking pride of place in the foyer is an amazing collection of the country's 
insects, which includes the world's largest moth, largest butterfly and what 
may be the largest stick insect.
However, Steven is more interested in the fine fat cicadas, which he assures 
me are "good to eat, very sweet".
There are some even bigger cockroaches in the display and I can't help 
wondering if they are also good to eat. "Not for me," says Steven, "but some 
do. Many people like these too," he adds, indicating the giant stag beetles, 
"but I don't like them."
The nearby National Museum also has plenty of reminders of the national 
fascination with magic. The focal point is an extraordinary collection of 
spirit figures, some merely weird, but many with great artistic power.
The other highlight, for me, is the display of that other great driving 
force of the human race, money, which in PNG used to be made from shells, 
pig or dog teeth, cowries, nuts, cassowary bone and even pig tails, all much 
more interesting than our circles of metal and pieces of paper.
Of course in PNG it's not just black magic that people seek protection from 
these days but the more modern menace of the bad characters who are rather 
quaintly called "rascals".
That's seen most clearly on the hill above Port Moresby's central business 
area, where the well-to-do live, their houses and apartments surrounded by 
high walls topped with vicious broken class and ferocious entanglements of 
razor wire.
One property we pass has such extensive fortifications, including a solid 
metal gate protected by an armed guard in a tower, that I ask if it is the 
prison. "Oh, no," says Steven, "that is just a rich man's house."
Crime in Port Moresby is not as bad as a few years ago, Tom adds, but there 
are still problems with people moving in from outside in search of work - at 
this point he grins at Steven, who is one of those outsiders - and living in 
squatter settlements on the outskirts.
Those unable to get a job often turn to trading to make money, buying 
vegetables or betel nuts from the surrounding villages and peddling them in 
town, or purchasing packets of cigarettes and on-selling them as singles. 
But others resort to crime.
The central business area, with its cluster of contemporary buildings, is 
full of people from the squatter settlements, most of the women sitting 
behind small piles of produce, most of the men standing around aimlessly.
Despite their presence the atmosphere wasn't hostile and I felt quite 
comfortable wandering round.
Having heard horror stories about the threat of the rascals in PNG, and Port 
Moresby in particular, I asked several locals about safety.
The general response was summed up by Steven: "Tourists are okay if they 
have a guide and ask advice about where to go. Mostly it is okay but there 
are places you should not go, especially at night."
Hideo Kamioka, who owns PNG Explorers International, says he can recall only 
one instance of a tourist travelling with his company getting into trouble.
"This man wanted to go for a walk at night and I told him, `No, this is not 
a safe area.' But he went for a walk anyway. Well, he is not a child, I 
cannot put him on a lead. And he met a man with a knife and had to give him 
20 kina [about $10]."
As muggings go that sounds fairly mild, but it's obvious the authorities 
don't want the fledgling tourist industry ruined by a nasty incident and 
there are security precautions everywhere. Hotels and lodges have 
barbed-wire fences, barred windows and entrances manned by security guards.
And I couldn't help noticing as I strolled through Port Moresby's delightful 
Botanical Gardens - the highlight is the orchid house displaying many of the 
3000 species of orchid found in PNG - that a security guard shadowed me the 
whole way round.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601081&sid=aN77kThgUgWk&refer=australia

Australia Seeks to Protect World War II Kokoda Trail (Update1)
By Michael Heath and Shani Raja
Feb. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Australia wants an accord with Papua New Guinea to 
safeguard the Kokoda Trail, the World War II battle site, after local 
villagers blocked part of the track to support the building of a gold and 
copper mine.
``Australia has the very strong view that the Kokoda Trail needs to be 
protected,'' Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said yesterday, adding he will 
make this point to his Papua New Guinean counterpart, Sam Abal, when they 
meet in Canberra next week. ``The Kokoda Trail for Australia and Australians 
is iconic.''
Frontier Resources Ltd. plans to dig up part of the track between Kokoda 
village and Owers Corner about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the capital, 
Port Moresby, to mine a $6.7 billion gold and copper deposit. Local 
landowners have been offered a 5 percent stake in the mine and are calling 
on Papua New Guinea's government to allow its development to proceed.
The Kokoda Trail has become a central event for Australians in war, as was 
the Gallipoli battles in Turkey in World War I, in which more than 25,000 
Australians were killed or wounded.
Troops were rushed there in July 1942 to intercept Japanese forces marching 
across Papua New Guinea to Port Moresby. The Australians turned back the 
Japanese advance in fighting that included hand-to-hand combat in the 
mountainous terrain, preventing the capture of Port Moresby and a possible 
invasion of Australia 160 kilometers to the south.
Mining Study
Peter McNeil, managing director of Australia-based Frontier Resources, 
defended the project, which may bring as much as $115 million to local 
landowners.
``The track is 96 kilometers long, a mining study shows the area of impact 
from the Kokoda deposit will consume about 600 meters of the track,'' McNeil 
said today by telephone from Port Moresby. ``You can move the track around 
it.''
About 5,000 Australian tourists visit the track each year to pay homage to 
the 600 soldiers, known as Diggers, who died there.
``We very strongly believe that Australia and Papua New Guinea can work 
cooperatively to protect the iconic value of the Kokoda Trail,'' Smith said 
in Perth, Western Australia, according to a transcript. ``We also very 
strongly believe that, to Papua New Guinea, the Kokoda Trail provides great 
potential and capacity for tourism.''
In July 1942, the 39th Australian Militia Battalion was sent to fight the 
Japanese and hold the only working airstrip at the village of Kokoda.
Inferior Numbers
The soldiers, sick from dysentery, malaria and malnourishment, were pushed 
back by superior numbers of Japanese. They managed to reverse the retreat as 
they moved back toward their own supply lines and the Japanese lines became 
overextended.
Troops were supported by Papuan carriers, guides and soldiers, who also 
helped the sick and wounded Australians. They became known as ``Fuzzy Wuzzy 
Angels,'' from a soldier's verse that included the line, ``May the mothers 
of Australia when they offer up a prayer, mention these impromptu angels 
with their fuzzy wuzzy hair.''
Papua New Guinea's government is waiting for a briefing on the mine, 
expected in the next few days, before making a decision, the office of Prime 
Minister Michael Somare said.
The government will put the interests of Papua New Guinea's people first, 
Berta Somare, the prime minister's spokeswoman, said by telephone from Port 
Moresby today.
``We're sensitive to the feelings of Australians who want to use the track, 
but we have to put the needs of the people and the economy first,'' she 
said.
Papua New Guinea shares the island of New Guinea with Indonesia. Highlands 
villagers in the nation of 6 million people didn't come into contact with 
Europeans until the 1930s.

http://www.boston.com/ae/theater_arts/articles/2008/03/08/former_graffiti_artist_makes_his_mark/

Former graffiti artist makes his mark
Banksy has risen from hip outsider to gallery star
The spray paint stencil titled "Riot Green" is among the works of British 
artist Banksy on exhibit in London's Andipa Gallery. (ALASTAIR 
GRANT/ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Associated Press / March 9, 2008
LONDON - At a white-walled gallery in one of London's priciest quarters, a 
small army of stenciled rats and smiley faced storm troopers is awaiting an 
invasion.
more stories like this
U.S. trader bonuses hit harder than in London: poll
Britain targets Muslim women to fight extremists
Gold opens higher in London
Recycling and wild cats keep London busy
`Sin taxes' hit Britons

The chic Andipa Gallery is expecting a stampede of art buyers to its latest 
exhibition of works by Banksy, the pseudonymous "guerrilla artist" whose 
satirical images have gone from street-corner graffiti to coveted artworks 
that sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Gallery owner Acoris Andipa says Banksy's rise from hip outsider to 
art-world star has been rapid, as he discovered when he held a preview in 
the exclusive Swiss resort of Gstaad.
"Last year, we were having to explain who Banksy was and why his canvases 
were 30,000 or 40,000 pounds ($60,000 to $80,000)," Andipa said. "This year, 
every single person - including clients who'd come in their Lear jets - 
walked in and said, 'Wow, Banksy - and it's only 150,000 pounds ($300,000).' 
"
Such prices are no longer exceptional. Last year, a Banksy went for almost 
$600,000 at a London auction. Earlier this month, "Keep It Spotless" - a 
Banksy stencil over a polka-dot painting by British artist Damien Hirst - 
sold for $1.8 million in New York.
The 60 works in the Andipa show range from $15,000 for limited-edition 
prints to $900,000 for a painting of sharks circling supermarket trolleys 
full of bright orange fish.
Banksy's opinion of all this can only be guessed. Andipa does not know or 
represent him. The works in the show - on wood, canvas, fragments of wall, 
and pieces of metal - were bought from collectors around the world.
Banksy's website says the artist does not endorse gallery shows of his work 
and disapproves of auction houses selling his street art because "it's 
undemocratic, it glorifies greed, and I never see any of the money."
His publicist, Jo Brooks, said the artist had no connection with the Andipa 
show.
"It's absolutely nothing to do with him, and there is no comment," she said.
It's a classic Banksy contradiction that he is famously publicity shy, but 
also employs a publicist. He's an expert at blending an outsider image with 
commercial savvy. He almost never gives interviews, avoids being 
photographed, and has not even confirmed his real name.
Most agree his name is Robert - or possibly Robin - Banks, he is in his 
early 30s, and he comes from Bristol in southwest England, where he began 
his graffiti career in the 1980s and 1990s.
Using spray paint and cardboard stencils to tag walls, bridges, and street 
signs, Banksy evolved a cheekily subversive style. His most famous images 
include two police officers kissing, armed riot police with yellow smiley 
faces, and a chimpanzee with a sign bearing the words, "Laugh now, but one 
day I'll be in charge."
In various corners of London, he stenciled rats holding placards saying, 
"You Lose" and "Get out while you can."
Several of the rats are in the new show, as are Vladimir Lenin on roller 
skates, a masked rioter preparing to hurl a bouquet of flowers, a military 
helicopter topped with a jaunty pink bow, and a group of well-heeled lawn 
bowlers tossing bombs.
Andipa said that Banksy has a knack for "boiling satirical points down to a 
simple, single image."
"Everybody gets it. It's so accessible," he said.
That accessibility does not impress everyone. Art critic Matthew Collings 
wrote recently in The Times newspaper that Banksy's ideas "only have the 
value of a joke."
Owning his work "would make you modern and clever - or stupid. It's a fine 
line."
Banksy's reputation has been boosted by a series of attention-grabbing art 
pranks.
In 2005, he hung an image of a spear-toting ancient human pushing a shopping 
cart in the British Museum. The next year he smuggled a life-size figure of 
a Guantanamo Bay detainee into Disneyland.
For a 2006 exhibition in Los Angeles, he spray painted an elephant red and 
gold and placed it in a living room with matching wallpaper. People lined up 
around the block outside the warehouse where the show was held. Brad Pitt 
and Angelina Jolie were among those who bought work.
As his fame and reputation grow, it's becoming increasingly hard to see 
Banksy's work in its original setting - the streets. At first, the main 
threat was local authorities removing it. In recent years, building owners 
have sold entire walls, or covered up Banksy stencils to preserve them.
Lately someone has been painting over Banksy works in London, leaving the 
stenciled words "all the best" beside them. Some say the vandal is a rival 
street artist. Others say it is Banksy himself. We may never know.

http://icga.blogspot.com/2007/11/akond-of-swat.html

Saturday, November 24, 2007
The Akond of Swat

Who or why, or which, or what, is Maulana Fazlullah of Swat? Recent
headlines from Pakistan have been grim - pitched battles with many
reports of casualties and mass migration of civilians from the
conflict region. Yet, the foreign media hasn't really focused on
Maulana Fazlullah - perhaps thinking that the story
of "Talibanization" covers this particular mullah just as well as it
does any other (Baitullah Mehsud, in Waziristan, is slowly getting
some attention, though). At a cursory glance, it all does blend in.
The overall deterioration in the NWFP (North Western Frontier
Province) and the FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas) areas
in recent years - specifically in Waziristan, the Malakand Agency
regions, Dir, Bajaur, Swat and areas around Peshawar - is often
called "Talibanization" and is often pegged to the aftermath of the
Afghanistan war of 2001. There is, though, a longer history that
offers some additional venues of thought. At the very least, it
tells us to pay attention to the local even as we highlight
transnational movements like the Taliban.

Shah Ismail (1789-1831) and Sayyid Ahmed Barelvi (1786-1831),
specifically, are pivotal figures in the memory and history of
Swat.1 In the late 1820s, they waged a religious war against Ranjit
Singh's forces for the control of Peshawar. They succeeded briefly,
declared themselves an emirate where the creed of Muhammad held
sway, and were swept away in 1831 - killed in battle. Shah Ismail
and Sayyid Ahmed, though defeated, emerged as an integral part of
the narrative of anti-imperialism. But not simply for their militant
struggle for the establishment of an Islamic polity, they came to
represent a profound connection to the revivalist thought of
nineteenth century Muslims in India. Shah Ismail was the grandson of
Shah Waliullah - the progenitor of the deobandis, who have continued
to enjoy a wide following in NWFP. I know that it is more
fashionable nowadays to connect Shah Waliullah to Abdul Wahhab and
build an argument about some unitary "fundamentalist" strain of
Islamic thought - but, it is a wrong notion. There are crucial
difference, not only in history but in the theological arguments
underlining deobandi and wahabbi ideologies of revivalist Islam. The
deobandi, in particular, combined the idea of a polity based on
Islamic Shar'ia and free from foreign influences with a more
quixotic attempts to "migrate" or "settle" a Caliphate in
Afghanistan. (The migration of thousands of Muslims to Afghanistan
in 1920 needs recent historical attention.)

The mountainous regions between Kabul and Peshawar and across
Baluchistan and Gilgit remained an odd absence in the centralizing
ideology of Pakistan. Partly it was due to the linguistic and ethnic
communities that stretched beyond the nation-state. Partly it was a
function of the lack of political legitimacy for any federal
government in the region. The Pakistani State, created with unequal
halves of East and West Pakistan, proved unequal to the task of
imagining itself. In 1971, Bangladesh emerged out of the political
chaos and opportunism and military destruction wrought by West
Pakistani armies. In 1972, Pakistan embarked on a new path to re-
affirm itself. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, the father of Benazir Bhutto,
was the chief architect of a program of Islamization to glue
together the rest of Pakistan. He looked towards the Pan-Islamic
movement to position Pakistan as an international entity that wasn't
simply a footnote in the red hot Cold War. Bhutto's Islamization
efforts continued under Zia ul Haq, who overthrew Bhutto in 1977.
Except, that under Zia ul Haq, they became the Sunnification efforts
to counter his (and Saudi) fears of a Shi'a revolution sweeping out
of Iran and across the Muslim world. The frontier, as always, of
these efforts was the NWFP. It is around this moment that the Soviet-
Afghan war overshadows all local narratives but I would like to put
in a call to study the movement of Pashtun men out of NWFP
territories and into the urban centers of Karachi and Lahore - and
further to Riyadh and Doha - for economic reasons. We are sorely
lacking scholarship that can trace these movements back to the
origins where petro-dollars (from doing labor in the Gulf States)
transformed these small communities. (It is one sad casualty of our
current myopia that we are interested only in the monolithic account
of Soviet-Afghan war and the "Talibanization" and continue to
stress "top-down" factors in our analysis.)

In November 1994, the year old government of Benazir Bhutto faced a
crisis in NWFP. Some of the Pashtun tribal chiefs, led by a Maulana
Sufi Muhammad proclaimed that Shari'a needed to be enforced in NWFP.
His movement, the Tehrik Nifaz-i Shariat Muhammadi (Movement for the
Establishment of the Path of Muhammad), enjoyed wide-spread support.
He was shutting down airports and businesses and making life hard
for the PPP. So, she cut a deal. It may be shocking to remember that
this same Benazir Bhutto who is now proclaiming herself as the Sole
Secular Leader was none too shy about cutting deals where it suited
her. The Musharraf regime also turned to TNSM and Maulana Sufi
Muhammad to try and operate in the Swat region. But, the Bajaur
strike and the Lal Masjid crisis ended their partnership. Maulana
Sufi Muhammad is under arrest but Musharraf is actively trying to
broker another deal.

The reason is Maulana Fazlullah and his declaration of open
hostility against the Pakistan military. Fazlullah is the son-in-law
of Maulana Sufi Muhammad and has organized his own army called
Shaheen Commandos. He is operating in and around Matta and openly
calling themselves the Taliban. He is young - 30 or 32 - and comes
from Imam Dheri area in Swat. Around a year or so ago, as the Imam
of the seminary in Imam Dheri, he established an FM radio channel in
the area to deliver sermons and became a local celebrity.2 After the
Lal Masjid crisis, he declared jihad on the state of Pakistan. His
Shaheen Commandos now control Matta. And the fight is slowly
reaching the capital.

This is certainly a complex and deeply troubling development for the
state of Pakistan. The rise of local militias and the oppressive
reaction by the military was certainly a contributing factor in the
secession of East Pakistan. And a similar pattern is clear in
Baluchistan. Just two days ago, Mir Balach Khan Marri was killed -
something that is sure to have wide repercussions for thatseparatist
movement.

So to wrap it up: separatist religious movement in Swat, separatist
nationalist movement in Baluchistan and a separate Musharraf from
his dictatorship movement in the rest of the country. Things can
only get better, no?

———
1) See, for example, http://ghazwah-
urdu.sitesled.com/Articals/Jihad/Qafla/11.htm [↩]

2) FM radio channels have proliferated in the past 3 years as the
key means of transmission of ideas and information. They are very
cheap to set up, mobile and can usually transmit up to 80 miles. No
militant is without one. [↩]

http://jamestown.org/terrorism/news/article.php?articleid=2373892
Insurrection in Iranian Balochistan
By Chris Zambelis
[From: Terrorism Monitor (The Jamestown Foundation, USA)
Volume 6, Issue 1 (January 11, 2008)]

Issues of dissent and rebellion amongst Iran's elaborate patchwork
of ethnic and sectarian minority communities are receiving
increasing international scrutiny. Many advocacy organizations
representing Iranian minorities accuse Tehran of operating a policy
of cultural subjugation aimed at erasing identities distinct from
Iran's dominant Persian culture and Shiite brand of Islam. In some
cases, these grievances have led to unrest and bloodshed. The latest
round of violence between ethnic Baloch nationalists led by
Jondallah ("Soldiers of God") and Iranian security forces in the
province of Sistan-Balochistan is indicative of this wider trend in
Iranian society. The shadowy Jondallah group emerged sometime in
2003 to advocate on behalf of Baloch rights. It has been known to
operate under other monikers as well, including the People's
Resistance Movement of Iran (PMRI).

Tehran has implicated Jondallah in a series of high-profile
terrorist and guerrilla attacks against the security forces and
symbols of the regime in Iranian Balochistan. Bold operations—such
as the June 2005 abduction of Iranian military and intelligence
personnel along the Iranian-Pakistani border and the February 2007
car bomb attack against a bus transporting members of the elite
Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) just outside of the
provincial capital of Zahedan that left 11 dead and scores injured—
have become a Jondallah signature (see Terrorism Focus, February 27,
2007).

Iranian government sources reported a series of clashes in recent
weeks between Jondallah rebels and the IRGC and provincial police
forces in Iranian Balochistan. On December 13, Iranian security
units reported killing 12 men belonging to Jondallah and arresting
others affiliated with the group in the city of Iranshahr. Security
officials also reported the discovery of a weapons cache that
included automatic rifles, ammunition, detonators and explosives
material, as well as communications equipment and what were
described as "important internal documents." They also claimed that
the detainees confessed to being part of a cell planning a series of
bombings across the province in an effort to foment ethnic and
sectarian unrest (Islamic Republic News Agency, December 13, 2007).

Subsequent reports alleged that Jondallah leaders and four men
directly implicated in previous terrorist attacks were among those
killed and detained by Iranian security forces (Voice of the Islamic
Republic TV, December 19, 2007). In a December 14 interview,
Jondallah's young leader Abdulmalak Rigi disputed the official
casualty count, and claimed that only one member of his group was
killed in the battle. Rigi, who is reported to be in his mid-
twenties, also claimed that Iranian forces killed civilians during
the skirmishes—including women and children—and that his forces
killed 26 IRGC officers. He vowed to "take revenge for the women and
children who were killed" (Voice of the Islamic Republic TV,
December 19, 2007).

In another sign of escalating tensions, Iran hanged two Baloch men
convicted of armed robbery and drug smuggling on December 31, in a
Zahedan prison and amputated the right hand and left foot of five
others convicted on armed robbery and kidnapping charges a few days
later (Iranian Students' News Agency, January 6; balochpeople.org,
January 7). Baloch activists accuse Tehran of systematically
harassing dissidents in the province by accusing them of false
criminal charges in an effort to intimidate opposition elements. In
a January 3 incident, Baloch sources reported that Iranian security
forces opened fire against a vehicle delivering drinking water to a
wedding ceremony on a busy street in Zahedan. Witnesses videotaped
the alleged incident and the ensuing chaos and posted it online [1].

Nationalism and Rebellion in West Balochistan

The Baloch national question has been a source of simmering tensions
for decades. Iran's approximately one to four million-strong Baloch
community inhabits the southeastern province of Sistan-Balochistan
[2]. This desolate and underdeveloped region is one of Iran's
poorest provinces. Unlike most Iranians, the Baloch are
predominantly Sunni Muslims. Violent crackdowns and repression by
security services in the economically backward province have
engendered deep-seated animosity toward the Shiite Islamist regime
among the fiercely independent and proud Baloch people.

Iranian Baloch identify with their kin in neighboring Pakistan's
southwestern province of Balochistan—home to the region's largest
Baloch population at approximately four to eight million—and the
smaller Baloch community in southern Afghanistan. The Pakistani
Baloch are engaged in their own long-running struggle for greater
rights and independence through a violent insurgency against
Islamabad. The sum of these circumstances imbues the Baloch national
consciousness with a sense of historic persecution at the hands of
imperial powers that left the Baloch nation divided and without a
state of its own. Baloch nationalists see the unification of their
people in an independent "Greater Balochistan" as a historical
right. The plight of Iranian Balochistan, referred to as "West
Balochistan" by Baloch nationalists, is a pillar of the wider Baloch
nationalist cause [3].

Despite a lack of evidence, Tehran accuses Jondallah of serving as
an affiliate of both al-Qaeda and the Taliban, claims the group
emphatically denies (see Terrorism Monitor, June 29, 2006).
Jondallah does, however, rely on religious discourse to highlight
its grievances against the Shiite Islamist regime. This most likely
represents an effort to highlight the Iranian Baloch position as an
oppressed ethnic and sectarian minority within the Shiite Islamist
clerical regime. Nevertheless, there are no indications that the
group has ties to radical Sunni Islamists. Iran also links Jondallah
to other Iranian opposition groups—including the radical People's
Mujahideen of Iran (PMOI), more commonly referred to as the
Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), and the affiliated National Council of
Resistance of Iran (NCRI)—in an effort to tarnish its reputation.
Tehran also accuses Jondallah of harboring secessionist aspirations.
Abdulmalak Rigi has stated on numerous occasions that his group's
goal is not secession, but the achievement of equal rights for his
people in a reformed Iran. Essentially, Jondallah frames its
campaign as a war of self-defense. At the same time, Rigi has gone
so far as to declare himself an Iranian and Iran as his motherland
(roozonline.com, May 10, 2006). This is a position held by other
Iranian Baloch dissident groups advocating on behalf of greater
Baloch rights. Organizations such as the Balochistan United Front
and the Balochistan National Movement coordinate closely with other
ethnic and sectarian-minded opposition groups agitating for greater
rights and representation in Iran, including the Congress of
Nationalities for a Federal Iran [4].

Iranian authorities often describe the group as Pakistani-based in
an apparent effort to implicate outside forces in the insurgency,
especially the United States. Iran also occasionally accuses
Pakistan of turning a blind eye to Jondallah activities, despite a
strong record of Iranian and Pakistani cooperation in suppressing
Baloch nationalism on both sides of the border. Iran also suggests
Jondallah is a creation of the CIA, an allegation strongly denied by
Rigi himself. Iran believes that the United States and other hostile
forces are providing moral, material and financial support to ethnic
and sectarian-based secessionist movements—including insurgent and
terrorist organizations—to undermine the Islamic Republic. Tehran is
convinced that any potential U.S. attack against Iran stemming from
tensions over its nuclear program or alleged support for insurgents
in Iraq and Afghanistan will include a campaign to destabilize the
Islamic Republic from within. Groups such as Jondallah would figure
prominently in such a strategy (see Terrorism Monitor, August 2,
2007).

There is no concrete evidence that Jondallah maintains a formal
operational base in Pakistan. The difficult terrain that
characterizes the Iranian-Pakistani border region is, however, a
major crossroads for drug and arms smuggling between locally-based
gangs. The porous border also facilitates links between Baloch
families and tribes on both sides of the border. In a testament to
the extent of Iranian and Pakistani Baloch links, a controversial
proposal by Islamabad to construct a wall along the border inspired
vocal protests from Pakistani Baloch leaders who labeled the
initiative the "anti-Baloch wall" (The News International [Karachi],
May 28, 2007). Given this background, it is likely that Jondallah
maintains contacts over the border in Pakistan, possibly with Baloch
insurgent groups operating there, such as the Baloch Liberation Army
(BLA). There is no evidence, however, of formal operational links
between the two groups, as both appear committed to furthering their
respective causes separately within the Iranian and Pakistani
contexts.

The recent assassination of two-time Pakistani Prime Minister and
opposition leader Benazir Bhutto raises questions about the
trajectory of the Baloch insurgency in Pakistan and—by extension—
Iran. As a center of Baloch nationalism, events in Pakistani
Balochistan have a profound impact on the Baloch cause in Iran. In
an effort to win support in Pakistani Balochistan for her campaign
to oust incumbent President Pervez Musharraf, Bhutto promised that
her Pakistan People's Party (PPP) would implement a general amnesty
for Baloch prisoners and rebels and immediately enter into
negotiations with local leaders to help settle the conflict. She
also criticized Islamabad's heavy-handed approach in dealing with
the Baloch insurgency, accusing Musharraf of exacerbating regional
tensions (Dawn [Karachi], December 21, 2007); her assassination was
strongly condemned by Baloch activists. Ironically, tensions between
Pakistani Baloch and the state during her father Zulfiqar Ali
Bhutto's tenure as prime minister in the mid-1970s were high. The
senior Bhutto used brutal tactics—as well as direct material and
military support from the Shah of Iran that included helicopter
gunships and armored vehicles—to quell the armed Baloch uprising
[5]. The history of Iranian-Pakistani cooperation in jointly
repressing Baloch nationalism—a trend both countries see as a
potential threat to their respective territorial integrity and
stability—suggests that Iranian accusations of Islamabad's support
for Jondallah in Iran are unfounded.

Bhutto's assassination is not likely have a major impact on the
situation in Iranian Balochistan, at least not directly. Despite
expressions of solidarity and what is most likely limited contact,
ethnic Baloch rebels in Iran and Pakistan will continue to devote
their efforts to pursuing local agendas, essentially focusing on
furthering the Baloch cause in Iran and Pakistan, respectively.
Although Bhutto's amnesty proposal may have set an interesting
precedent for relations between Tehran and Iranian Balochistan had
she lived to implement it, it is unlikely that Islamabad will pursue
a similar course of action in the foreseeable future.

Conclusion

The simmering tensions and violence in Iranian Balochistan will
continue to characterize Tehran's interface with its Baloch
minority. The social, political and economic grievances of the
Iranian Baloch will remain a source of resentment toward the
clerical regime until Tehran commits to integrating minorities into
the fabric of society. Despite Iranian claims, there is no
conclusive evidence that the United States is providing material
support to Jondallah. It is likely, however, that the group
calculates its activities and operations to correspond with periods
of tension between the United States and Iran. This enables
Jondallah to maximize the effect of its campaign. At the same time,
Iran does have cause for concern, as the United States could
consider the possibility of supporting active insurgencies as a
means to pressure Iran during any potential conflict.

Notes

1. See "Iranian Security Forces Shooting at Furious Baloch
Demonstration," Balochistan News, January 1, 2008. For footage of
the alleged incident, see the official website of the Baloch
People's Party (BPP), a Baloch nationalist organization based in
Sweden: .

2. Demographic figures related to ethnic and sectarian minority
representation in Iran tend to be heavily politicized, hence the
wide ranging estimates.

3. The Baloch national cause is bolstered by a sophisticated network
of activists in the diaspora and online advocating for their kin in
Iran and Pakistan. For more details, see ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; and .

4. The Congress of Nationalities for a Federal Iran includes
Kurdish, Azeri, Ahvazi (Arab), Turkmen, Baloch and other
organizations advocating the federalization of Iran along ethnic and
regional lines. For more details, see .

5. Stephen Philip Cohen, The Idea of Pakistan (Washington, D.C.:
Brookings Institution, 2004), pp. 219-221.