The FCID sought Attorney General’s (AG) advice on future legal action to be taken against five suspects including Hambantota district MP Namal Rajapaksa for their involvement in money laundering amounting to Rs.15 million.
When the case filed under money laundering charges came up before Colombo Additional Magistrate Chandana Kalansuriya, the FCID said that the preliminary investigations regarding the incident have been concluded and sought AG’s advice in this regard.
Accordingly, further magisterial inquiry into the incident was fixed for April 26.
Four suspects Namal Rajapaksa, Sudarsha Bandara Ganewatta, Nithya Senani and Sujani Bogollagama were present before Court.
They are currently out on bail.
Meanwhile, the Court was informed that Indika Prabhath Karunajeewa who had evaded court since the inception is living in Australia.
The Court had issued warrants through the Interpol for the arrest of Indika Prabhath Karunajeewa.
The FCID commenced investigation into a complaint that MP Namal Rajapaksa had purchased Hello Corp. Pvt. Ltd for Rs.100 million using ill-gotten funds of Gowers Corporation and NR Consultation Pvt Ltd, allegedly owned by Namal Rajapaksa.
The FCID informed Court that investigations revealed that MP Rajpaksa had been allegedly involved in money laundering to the amount of Rs. 15 million at NR Consultation Pvt Ltd and another Rs.30 million in Gowers Corporation Pvt Ltd, in 2012.
The Attorney General filed indictments in the Colombo High Court against Namal Rajapaksa and five others who are alleged to have money laundered to the amount of Rs.30 million at NR Consultation.
Police alleged that money laundering transactions had been taken place through a company named Boston Capital, allegedly owned by Rohan Iriyagolla and he has revealed everything on this regard.
Samarasinghe alleged that MP Namal Rajapaksa had bought shares of a company named Hello Corp and set up a company called Gowers Corporate Services (Pvt) Limited while being a MP, from the Rs.125 million he earned through illegal means.
AFP/GETTYImage captionNaomi Coleman was deported from Sri Lanka
15 November 2017
A woman who was deported from Sri Lanka for having a tattoo of the Buddha on her arm has won compensation.
Naomi Coleman, from Coventry, was detained for four days in April 2014.
Granting her compensation of 800,000 Sri Lankan rupees - about £4,000 - the country's Supreme Court said her treatment was "scandalous and horrifying" and ruled her rights had been violated.
Ms Coleman told the BBC Sinhala Service she was "overwhelmed" by the ruling.
Officers involved in her arrest were also ordered to pay her compensation.
Ms Coleman, a mental health nurse, took legal action against the Sri Lankan authorities after her return to the UK.
The court ruled there was "no legal basis" for her arrest and said she had been subject to "degrading treatment" by some officers and a prison guard.
In particular, one guard had "made several lewd, obscene and disparaging remarks of a sexually-explicit nature" towards Ms Coleman, while some police officers had forced her to give them money.
'Really frightened'
Her lawyer JC Weliamuna told the BBC her deportation had been "contrary to the law governing immigration and emigration".
Ms Coleman, who was arrested at Bandaranaike International Airport in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo, said previously the detention had left her "really frightened".
She told the BBC on Wednesday she was "shocked" and "emotional" on hearing the news.
"Finally the court has actually seen it that I didn't do anything wrong," Ms Coleman said.
Asked whether she would go back to Sri Lanka, she replied: "I'm not sure, I don't know. Probably not.
"I'm very happy. I just wouldn't want it to happen to anybody else."
After an order was made to have her deported, Ms Coleman spent a night in prison in Negombo and two nights in a detention centre while security checks were carried out.
She said she told police she practised Buddhism and had attended meditation retreats and workshops in Thailand, India, Cambodia and Nepal.
Sri Lankan authorities take strict action against perceived insults to Buddhism, which is the religion of most of the island's Sinhalese population.
(Lanka-e-News -15.Nov.2017, 9.50AM) While the leader of the SLFP Maithripala Sirisena, the president of the country is making loud announcements and pronouncements protruding his tongue out as far as possible that he is against rogues and it is the UNP which is protecting them , this was belied day before yesterday by the episode at Weligama – it clearly proved it is rather the Maithri group which is comprised of confirmed rogues.
As there are clear indications that the Maithri group will tumble down to the fourth position(even below the JVP) at the forthcoming local body elections , the group is desperately holding secret discussions in dark corridors to jointly contest with the rogues of most notorious Rajapakses , despite the group stating they would be contesting alone under the SLFP symbol of hand .
No matter what, the cat was out of the bag at Weligama: Former minister Hemal Gunasekera the Weligama organizer of Maithri group revealed, the SLFP and the Rajapakse rogues have come to an understanding to contest the forthcoming elections jointly as an independent group under a new symbol after casting aside the SLFP symbol of hand , and the flower bud symbol of the Rajapakse crooks. In any event they cannot arrive at that agreement on their own without the consent of Maithri.
The Maithri group of infernal beings that knows it has fallen into the fire fears that it would even fall below the level of the JVP based on its sure impending defeats , has realized it has no choice except this joint self destructive avenue.
Following these desperate and dastardly attempts the whole country has come to know who are the rogues , and who are seeking the rogues like buddies of the same feather trying to get together to rob the country together.
Prior to this Vijith Vijithamuni Soysa who poses as the ‘ mouth piece’ of Maithri without any sense of shame explained how to join with the den of rogues.
He explained thus : Without contesting jointly with the Rajapakses , following the local body elections , when the local administration is being established , they shall firstly discuss with the ‘flower bud’ symbol Rajapakse group . If only that fails , they shall be holding discussions with the UNP in that direction , Soysa openly disclosed at a recent media briefing.
In other words the SLFP group of Maithri which has already confirmed it has no sense of shame or scruples , has demonstrated , it also has no qualms about joining hands with the Rajapakse rogues.
It is crystal clear from all these despicable announcements and villainous moves of these rascals that while claiming and proclaiming they are with the consensual government , they are engaging in the worst treacheries and betrayals to the detriment of the entire country . These are scoundrels who know not what is good governance let alone what is good and bad. By the ban imposed on Lanka e news on the orders of the president it is now proved beyond any trace of doubt who are those diametrically opposed to good governance.
In the circumstances , the present government cannot now say to the world it is still adhering to good governance with clothes on if it has any sense of shame. Neither can it say that after stripping nude because nudity to them is not dishonorable .
It is a most crucial question who drove the consensual government into this impasse ?
It is none other than the Machiavellian mendacious president Pallewatte Gamaralalage Maithripala Yapa Sirisena who should hold himself responsible for this dire situation , for he is the one who made countless solemn pledges and promises to the people to seize power , and then most unscrupulously dishonored them within 48 hours of becoming president.
--------------------------- by (2017-11-15 04:26:47)
When I was collecting field data on Chronic Kidney Disease of Unknown Aetiology (CKDu) in Medawachchiya in 2013, I wondered why healthcare providers believed that the Veddas (pronounced as Vädda) were less affected by the deadly disease. I knew that urinary tract infections had been reported among Vedda people in Hennanigala and Dambana in Mahaweli areas through Premakumara de Silva and Asitha G. Punchihewa’s study on a Socio-Anthropological Research Project on the Vedda Community in Sri Lanka, but there were no reports of the Veddas in Medawachchiya and Wilachchiya in Anuradhapura District suffering from urinary tract infections or CKDu. Some believe that the Veddas, particularly those in Anuradhapura district, are immune to CKDu. As Wiveca Stegeborn has carried out extensive anthropological research since 1977 and has lived among the Veddas as a participant observer, speaking both their language and Sinhalese (Wiveca prefers Singhalese, which is phonetically correct), I contacted her through LinkedIn to get her views on CKDu and the Veddas.Although she had sporadically visited the Anuradhapura Veddas, she acknowledged that she never conducted fieldwork among them. Her focus was on Veddas in Dambana, Hennanigala, Pollebedda and Ratugala areas in Ampara and Badulla districts in the east. The facts that she has produced are relevant for the Veddas who live east of the Central Mountain massif.
I exchanged several emails with Wiveca, and she has willingly responded to my queries amidst editing conference presentations, articles and a contribution to an encyclopedia. I present in this article some of her reflections on the Vedda people and CKDu among them in the form of direct quotations form emails. The early part of this article although not directly related to CKDu, but I present them as they provide valuable information on the Veddas, their names etc. I asked her whether she had come across any CKDu patients among the Veddas that she had been working with. Her first reaction to my question was that the reality of CKDu among Veddas is not publicly known, meaning that the Veddas who suffer from the disease are not in the national statistics.
Wiveca Stegeborn is a Cultural Anthropologist from Sweden with an MA in Anthropology from Washington State University. She completed her PhD coursework at Syracuse University, New York and taught Cultural Anthropology and conducted research at Michigan State University in the USA. At the time we were exchanging emails, she was finalising her dissertation work on Wanniyala-Aetto or Veddas (pronounced Wanniyala-Ätto; Wiveca prefers ‘Wanniyala-Aetto’ to ‘Vedda’.In this article both terms are used interchangeably) to defend her contribution at the University of Tromsø, Norway. Wiveca has worked with Veddas for many years and her extensive publications on the Veddas’ traditional subsistence economy and society include contributions to the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Hunters and Gatherers and the Berg Encyclopedia. She is currently compiling an article for Brill’s Encyclopaedia about the Wanniyala-Aetto’s religion.She is a human rights defender who has organised human rights work among the Vedda people since 1977.
To begin with, Wiveca explained to me the meaning of Wanniyala-Aetto. Wanni, a Sinhalese word, refers to a small jungle, particularly in the dry zone districts in Sri Lanka. Ätto or Aetto is both an animate noun and a way of addressing a person respectfully. Due to the derogatory nature of the term, the Wanniyala-Aetto do not like to call themselves Veddas. The Wanniyala-Aetto have been living in Sri Lanka long before the country was populated by the Sinhalese (believed to have migrated from Bengal) and Tamil people. As Gananath Obeyesekere, Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Princeton University puts it, Vedda people then lived in virtually every part of the island. After the Sinhalese had occupied many parts of Sri Lanka, the Wanniyala-Aetto were confined to the Vedi rata or Maha Vedi rata, the area that extends from the Hunnasgiriya hills and lowlands to the east coast. The fact that they live between the Tamil-speaking people on one side and the Sinhalese on the other has given rise to the notion of a buffer zone. While they are distinct from present-day Tamils and Sinhalese, they speak the majority language in the areas where they reside. Vedda villages in Anuradhapura District comprise about sixty communities, practising agriculture, just like their Sinhalese neighbours. The Vedda population in Anuradhapura, Wilachchiya, Muthur and Panama was assessed by Premakumara and Punchihewa at approximately 7350 – 7500 in 2012.
Wiveca told me that ‘Wanniyala-Aetto parents sometimes name their sons Wanniya. The suffix “–a” denotes masculine gender. The Wanniya or Uru Warige Wanniya, I referred to in my text is the son of late Uru Warige Tissahamy and Uru Warige Heenmenika.Tissahamy was a well-known spokesperson for the Wanniyala-Aetto in their area and even more so, his son Wanniya.’Wiveca explains, ‘we formed a great team of Wanniyala-Aetto comprising about 2,000 persons of all ages and settlements and collected ethnographic information and knowledge on Human Rights. We concentrated for many years on their, and other indigenous people’s struggle to survive. After Tissahamy’s death, my work continued with Wanniya, and now he is bringing up his son, Punchi Banda, who has shown interest in taking over the yoke.’
‘Wanniya is married to Morane Warige Heenmenika. She changed her warige name to the same as Wanniya when the government registered them for identity cards. Traditionally the warige name goes from the mother to her children, but the government has changed this [practice], causing insecurity for the offspring in case the father dies.’ Wiveca’s observation is interesting as the Muslims in the east coast name their children after their mother’s kudi (a system of exogamous matrilineal clan membership shared by both men and women and transmitted through women, usually mother). Kudi among the east coast Muslims, like Warige for the Veddas, refers to the clan of the mother. This common practice between the two ethnic groups on the east coast illustrates a culturally valid coincidence, more than an assimilation.
I asked Wiveca whether she had collected any health-related data on the Wanniyala-Aetto, and she said she had conducted various health surveys. ‘I also worked with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in order to eliminate leprosy and Tuberculosis. I have many binders for health records. Since I am medically trained to some extent, I also had a small health clinic where I took care of minor ailment. My most important task was to teach where they could find natural ingredients in the forest to stay healthy. That way they did not need to buy pink, blue and yellow pills from the pharmacy’. Interestingly, she said ‘many [Veddas] used them [pills] as [beads in] necklaces and bangles instead because I told them the places they could find iron, C-vitamin, minerals, etc. I worked with the village herbalist/shaman. Also, my “mother” Morane Warige (M.W.) Sudumenica taught me a lot’.
When I asked her whether there were health problems other than CKDu among the Veddas, she said, ‘Yes, with time diabetes started to spread. It came with junk food, and with Cokes, Seven-Ups and Fantas. They also received welfare coupons for sugar and white flour among other things. The tea was no longer taken with honey or hackuru [Kithul jaggery], it was with refined sugar.This is a common ailment among all indigenous people introduced to a “western” excessive food culture. Because people were uprooted from their natural environment to become confined inside compact villages with people of other places, maybe with latent diseases unknown to the Wanniyala-Aetto, epidemics spread easily, among that tuberculosis [is prominent]. Last, but indeed not the least, we have the introduction of alcohol, not only arrack, beer and casippo [illegal brews] but also whiskey and rum. The Wanniyala-Aetto were taken to perform on stage for the government and tourists on the west coast. In those occasions they were invited, with the best of intentions, to have drinks with the tourists who wanted to share a drink with them.Also, it became an exchange of goods and services for the national park guards; they gave a bottle of alcohol for a blind eye on specific dates, a shot deer, honey or other delicacies from the jungle.’
Justin Trudeau was the first leader attending this week’s ASEAN summit who has publicly said he brought the issue with the Filipino leader. Duterte is highly sensitive to such criticism.
The prime minister says the president of the Philippines was receptive to concerns he raised about human rights. Rodrigo Duterte’s violent crackdown on drug dealers and drug users by his government's forces has left thousands dead. (The Canadian Press)
By ANDY BLATCHFORD-Tues., Nov. 14, 2017
MANILA—Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said he was angered and insulted on Tuesday by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s comments about the Philippine government’s war on drugs, which has earned widespread condemnation for leaving thousands of suspects dead.
Speaking to reporters in Manila after a summit of Southeast Asian countries, Trudeau said he told Duterte about the need for the rule of law in the Philippines, and also made a friendly offer of support to help the Philippines move forward.
Trudeau said Duterte — whose violent crackdown on drug dealers and drug users by his government’s forces have left thousands dead — was receptive to the comments during what the Canadian prime minister called a very cordial and positive exchange.
Duterte, however, seemed to remember it differently.
“I said, ‘I will not explain. It is a personal and official insult,’” he told a news conference later Tuesday of his discussion with Trudeau. “‘It angers me when you are a foreigner, you do not know what exactly is happening in this country. You don’t even investigate.’”
Duterte is highly sensitive to such criticism, and in the past called then U.S. President Barack Obama a “son of a bitch” after the State Department publicly expressed concern over the Philippine anti-drug campaign.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, left, say he spoke with Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte on human rights in Manila on Monday. (ADRIAN WYLD / THE CANADIAN PRESS)
President Donald Trump, who also attended this week’s ASEAN summit, did not publicly take Duterte to task for the drug crackdown. Instead, Trump said he and Duterte “had a great relationship,” and avoided questions about whether he raised human rights concerns in a meeting with the Philippine leader.
The White House later said they discussed Daesh, also known as ISIS and ISIL, illegal drugs and trade during the 40-minute meeting. Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said human rights came up “briefly” in the context of the Philippines’ fight against illegal drugs. She did not say if Trump was critical of Duterte’s program.
Harry Roque, Duterte’s spokesman, said there was no mention of human rights or extralegal killings during the meeting with Trump, but there was a lengthy discussion of the Philippines’ war on drugs, with Duterte doing most of the explaining.
The two sides later issued a statement saying they “underscored that human rights and the dignity of human life are essential, and agreed to continue mainstreaming the human rights agenda in their national programs.”
The foreign affairs minister says she shares “serious concerns” over human rights abuses in the Philippines. In Manila on Sunday, Chrystia Freeland said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is focused on attending ASEAN, an East Asian summit. (The Canadian Press)
The prime minister’s brief meeting with Duterte took place before Trudeau delivered a speech to members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in a bid for Canada to eventually join its exclusive, influential circles that focus on security in the Asia-Pacific.
For several years, Canada has been working to forge closer ties with ASEAN, including its East Asia Summit security grouping that includes leaders of the U.S., China and Russia.
The Canadian government asked the Philippines for an invitation to ASEAN and a working luncheon before this year’s East Asia Summit. It’s unclear how long it will take Canada to obtain a more-permanent status within ASEAN.
Francisco Fernandez of the Philippine embassy in Ottawa says Canada sought the invitation and Manila didn’t hesitate to grant it, partly because of trade and investment ties and partly due to the 837,000 people of Filipino descent who live in Canada.
It’s unclear how long it will take Canada to obtain a more-permanent status within ASEAN.
Trudeau, the first Canadian prime minister to participate in the summit, also highlighted Canada’s efforts to help the Rohingya Muslims in Burma, including its decision to appoint former Liberal MP Bob Rae as a special envoy to the region.
Trudeau also said Canada stands alongside Asia in demanding that North Korea abandon its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.
“Countries around the world know that when you engage with Canada you will hear about human-rights concerns and we are the first to mention that we are not perfect, either.”
Trudeau said Indigenous peoples in Canada have suffered “neglect, marginalization and mistreatment” for centuries.
Jesse Rubin - 14 November 2017
Somewhere in Ramallah, footsteps echo against the concrete of an empty warehouse basement. Raed Andoni guides a handcuffed and hooded man into a cavernous, gray room, his hand on the man’s shoulder.
“Here?” Andoni asks the hooded man, whose sight is blocked and hearing muffled.
“Yes,” the man replies, and Andoni lifts off the hood to reveal Mohammed Khattab, family man and former political prisoner.
Khattab, or Abu Atta, is a warm and fatherly figure, calm despite deeply repressed trauma from his time in prison, as the film reveals.
He exhales, looks at Andoni and the two men share a smile – not between jailer and jailed, but between comrades – in contradiction to the tension built to this point in the film.
So opens Ghost Hunting, director Raed Andoni’s latest genre-blurring feature which abandons standard portrayals of interrogation and imprisonment for an understated glimpse into the chaos that occupies and sometimes consumes prisoners’ minds.
The loose narrative depicts Abu Atta’s real encounters with the cruelty of Israel’s penitentiary system. But when the director cuts, the camera keeps rolling.
Moving between fiction and documentary, Ghost Hunting leaves room for its subjects to simultaneously express their deepest emotions from within the safety of fiction and also display their enduring trauma. Merging the two genres together translates the prisoners’ anxieties to the viewer; visually, it portrays an inability to distinguish a nightmare from being awake.
A very Palestinian experience
While familiar to the incarcerated everywhere, the film specifically speaks to the experience of the more than 800,000 Palestinians who have passed through Israeli detention, jail and prison.
First released at the Berlin International Film Festival or Berlinale in February this year, where it won first prize for best documentary, Ghost Hunting made its way to Washington, DC in October, where it showed at a sold-out opening night at the seventh annual DC Palestinian Film and Arts Festival.
After the screening, Randa Wahbe, a former international advocacy officer at Addameer, a Palestinian human rights group, spoke about solidarity with Palestinians prisoners tried by Israeli military courts, where the conviction rate is more than 99 percent.
Palestinian prisoners are frequently tortured, psychologically and physically, held in interrogation for up to 75 days and often denied access to a lawyer for the majority of that time, said Wahbe. The film reveals the “depth of what happens [behind the statistics] and how long it stays with the prisoner.”
The effect on Palestinian society has been devastating, she added.
“This is exactly why incarceration is used as a tool of colonization and as a tool of occupation,”
Wahbe told The Electronic Intifada. “It is an effective tool at trying to break down social structures.” Ghost Hunting shows the minute pressures exerted by the system of incarceration which, she said, succeeds when it breaks the spirit of prisoners.
“The solidarity and the community that’s built,” as well as the individual resistance of the mind, is “a way to remember why they’re in prison, that they’re fighting for their nation and that is really what is at the center of it,” according to Wahbe.
Searching for Ghosts
Andoni assembled a cast entirely of former prisoners by placing a small ad in a Ramallah newspaper, he explains in the film. The ad sought former prisoners with some experience in architecture, general contracting or acting.
The viewer sees the casting process in one of the first scenes; Andoni sits on one side of a flimsy white desk interrogating ex-prisoners on their experiences the way an Israeli agent might press a current prisoner about their political affiliations.
The camera never leaves the gray room; it bears witness as former political prisoners, among them Mohammed Khattab, Atef al-Akhras, Adnan al-Hatab, Abdallah Moubarak, Ramzi Maqdisi and Andoni himself, rebuild from collective memory the infamous interrogation center in Jerusalem’s Russian Compound.
Their political affiliations are deliberately left out. With between 15 to 20 percent of the Palestinian population “at least jailed once,” said Andoni, “the reasons are not important.”
Andoni was born in Ramallah in 1967, the same year Israel occupied the West Bank. In 1985, he was arrested by Israeli soldiers and taken from his Beit Sahour home near Bethlehem to the Russian Compound.
Charged with belonging to a faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization, a young Andoni was interrogated, tortured and imprisoned for a year – an experience that he said will never leave him.
Making Ghost Hunting was therefore not a question of “how” or “why” but “when,” Andoni said.
“This issue has been living with me since I was arrested at the age of 18, so the story is part of my unconscious behavior – like something living inside of me,” he told The Electronic Intifada. “As a filmmaker, as an artist, I think it’s about time to express these deep emotions that I experienced.”
Freedom of the mind
Not without a sense of humor, Andoni recalls the feeling of physical imprisonment, noting that for one year the only freedom he found was in his imagination.
“My first lesson in cinema was in that interrogation center,” he joked. “I thank the Israelis for teaching me cinema.”
Andoni says the idea for the film came as part of an effort to confront his trauma.
“I asked myself what could happen if I brought a group of ex-prisoners [together] and asked them to rebuild the interrogation center,” he said.
“But the moment the film started and I started to meet the characters, my script [became] useless.”
The former prisoners – including Maqdisi, the only professional actor in the group, who himself spent a year in prison – bring their own insight to Ghost Hunting.
Much of the film shows the process of drawing, planning and physically reconstructing the interrogation center under the quiet direction of Abu Atta.
When Adnan al-Hatab finishes reconstructing one of the cells, he calls over Abu Atta to examine the shade of gray of the cell’s interior.
Abu Atta approves the color and squeezes into a cell with barely enough room for a man to stand and turn around in. In what seems to be a playful gesture, he hunches down and smiles at the camera. But this is the kind of cell, the viewer is reminded, where Abu Atta spent 19 days of interrogation and torture.
Ghost Hunting has many such scenes, where the brutality of imprisonment is the underlying context but not the story.
Prisoners yesterday, comrades today
Raed AndoniSearching for this specific balance would have been impossible, Andoni said, if he was not an ex-prisoner himself. Forging relationships with his subjects was easier because he was not an outsider, both in regards to prison but also based on his own participation as a character in the film.
“[The cast] don’t feel that I’m a stranger, that they have to explain to me what prison is,” he told The Electronic Intifada. “We are already in front of that; that is behind us.”
Acquainted with the varied perceptions of prisoners within larger Palestinian society, Andoni said from the beginning he never approached the cast as victims “who need a kind of therapy … I would not do such a film.”
“We are all survivors who went through an extraordinary experience,” he told The Electronic Intifada. “This film was done with the pride of sharing … not with victimizing.”
In fact, the victim narrative so often applied to Palestinians undermines the collective struggle for liberation, the director argued.
“I think to free Palestine first we have to free our souls and believe in ourselves; if internally we are free, freeing the land is a matter of time,” he said.
“[If] we start to see ourselves as the victims, begging for support and help and money and funds, I think this is a kind of occupation of the soul.”
Weaponizing “tolerance”
The only scene that is entirely fictionalized in the film is one in which Anbar Ghannan, playing an Israeli interrogator, makes sexual advances on Ramzi Maqdisi, playing Ghannan, who was an actual victim of sexual assault by an Israeli guard.
Where one might expect this to be a commentary on how Israel markets itself as the only safe place for LGBTQ individuals in the region while simultaneously weaponizing the notion in the form of sexual assault – the scene has implications far deeper than criticism of this hypocrisy.
As the tension builds, a defiant Maqdisi finally breaks the nerve of the interrogator when he asks: “How does your fiancée stand you?”
At this, he is beaten and pushed against the wall, fiction becomes reality, as the participants later explain, and the real Ghannan must be restrained in order to keep from hurting the real Maqdisi.
In a subsequent scene, a more relaxed Ghannan explains that the dramatization became, for a moment, too real when “[Ramzi] provoked me by talking about my fiancée.”
Someone off-screen points out that the insult was directed at him, not his fiancée.
“I’ll get married before the film is screened,” Ghannan quips and the characters in the film laugh.
The harrowing scene was not, Andoni said, meant as a commentary on Israeli brutality but a celebration of Palestinian resistance. He called it the psychology of survivors.
“Palestinian society in general is a society of survivors because that’s what we do. We make a lot of jokes.”
The film, Andoni added, is intended to shine a spotlight on the “Palestinian soul.”
Palestinians, he said, “are fighters. They are survivors and they are humans. They are nice and kind and simple and sophisticated.”
“This is how we are.”
Jesse Rubin is a freelance journalist from New York. Twitter: @JesseJDRubin.
Smoke billows above a building affected by explosion after a suicide bomb blast in Kabul, Afghanistan, November 16, 2017, in this still image from a social media video. Mahboob Atiqi via REUTERS
NOVEMBER 16, 2017
KABUL (Reuters) - A suicide bomb attack in the Afghan capital on Thursday near a gathering of supporters of an influential regional leader killed at least nine people and wounded many, the interior ministry said.
It was not clear if the politician, Atta Mohammad Noor, governor of the northern province of Balkh and a leader of the mainly ethnic Tajik Jamiat-i-Islami party, was at the meeting at the time of the attack.
Islamic State claimed responsibility, according to Amaq, its official news agency. The Taliban denied involvement.
“We are proud to be martyred because of our country and our rights. This gathering was for the sake of our country to raise our voice,” said witness Jan Mohammad.
The explosion was the latest in a wave of violence that has killed and wounded thousands of civilians in Afghanistan this year.
Political tensions are up as politicians have begun jockeying for position ahead of presidential elections expected in 2019.
People in the street stand outside a building affected by explosion after a suicide bomb blast in Kabul, Afghanistan, November 16, 2017, in this still image from a social media video. Mahboob Atiqi via REUTERS
A spokesman for the interior ministry said the bomber approached the hotel hosting the gathering in the Khair Khana district of Kabul, on foot. The dead included seven policemen and two civilians.
Media showed photographs, apparently from witnesses, which appeared to show about a dozen bodies. Reuters was unable to verify the photos.
People escape through the back of a building after a suicide bomb blast in Kabul, Afghanistan, November 16, 2017, in this still image from a social media video. Mahboob Atiqi via REUTERS
The northern-based Jamiat-i-Islami was for years the main opponent of the Taliban, who draw their support largely from the southern-based ethnic Pashtun community.
In June, a suicide bomber attacked a meeting of Jamiat-i-Islami leaders, including Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah.
Abdullah, who is backed by Noor, and other ethnic minority leaders, formed a coalition government with President Ashraf Ghani after a disputed 2014 presidential election.
Ghani on Wednesday sacked the chairman of the Independent Election Commission, raising doubts over whether parliamentary and council ballots scheduled for next year will take place as planned.
Only three countries: USA, Saudi Arabia, and Israel are not happy about Iran’s nuclear program. But the rest of the world agreed that nuclear is important for Iran’s energy production and it is no harm to any country.
by Dr. Mohamed Shareef Asees-
INTRODUCTION
( November 14, 2017, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The aim of this article is to explore the Iran’s nuclear program and its consequences throughout the world. Iran one of the nuclear power countries in the Middle East, which has brought very grave concern to the US. From the US point of view, possessing nuclear is a threat to the global peace. But from Iran’s point of view, having peaceful nuclear technology is important for its own energy production and other development activities. Iran’s nuclear program was launched in the 1950s with the help of the United States as part of the “Atoms for Peaceprogram”. The participation of the United States and Western European Governments in Iran’s nuclear program continued until the 1979 Iranian Revolution that toppled the reign of the last Shah of Iran. Following the 1979 Iranian Revolution, most of the international nuclear cooperation with Iran was cut off. In 1981, Iranian diplomats and officials concluded that the country’s nuclear development should continue. Negotiations took place with France and with Argentina in the early 1980s, and agreements were reached.
In the 1990s, Russia formed a joint research organization with Iran, providing Iran with Russian nuclear experts and technical information. In early 2000s, the revelation of Iran’s nuclear program raised concerns that it might be intended for non-peaceful uses. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) launched an investigation in 2003 and concluded that Iran’s nuclear program was not a threat to any country and it purely used it for its own energy productions. According to Iran’s Supreme Leader’s fatwa (Religious explanation), the use of nuclear weapons and all other types of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) is haram or prohibited in Islam. Furthermore creating and keeping these weapons are sins, useless, costly, harmful and dangerous, posing a serious threat to the entire humanity. In fact, it was referred by the former US president Barak Obama on several occasions, including in his speech in September 2013 at the United Nations Office.
Iran’s first nuclear power plant, the “Bushehr” was completed with major assistance from the Russian government and officially opened on 12th September 2011. The Russian engineering contractor predicted that the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant would reach full capacity by the end of 2020. Iran has also announced that it is working on a new 360 MegawattDarkhovin Nuclear Power Plant, and that it will seek more medium-sized nuclear power plants and uranium mines in the future. It shows that Iran is very transparent with regards to its nuclear program with other countries. In January 2016, all nuclear related sanctions got lifted in Iran due to the agreement with five veto power countries together with Germany (P5+1). However the rhetoric between the USA and Iran continues over the nuclear agreement. The above examples show that the nuclear program was initially promoted by the US in 1952. However, due to the Iranian revolution and the fall of Shah, US became disappointed with Iran and began to accuse for its nuclear program with Russia and other European countries. Further, Iran was labeled as one of the greatest threats to the world peace and the US continues to tarnish Iran’s image in the international arena.
GLOBAL PEACE
Global peace is an idea of a world without violence, where nations try to beat peace with each other. World peace could mean equal human rights, technology, and free education for everyone. A report in May 2017 on the Global Peace Index, found that if the world had been 25% more peaceful in the previous year, the global economy would have had an additional amount of $2 trillion. This amount would have covered 2% of the GDP per year required to avoid the worst effects of global warming. According to the UN report there are 194 member countries in the UNO; out of these over 100 countries have conflicts either domestically or internationally. Most of these conflicts have been identified in the Middle East and Africa. There are 13 countries in the Middle East, where most of them have conflicts. Out of all Iran is the only country which does not promote any direct or indirect violence in this region. Iran is well-known for being a neutral and peaceful country during war times. It is reported that during the First World War (1914-1919) and the Second World War (1939-1945) Iran kept a neutral position and decided not to support any countries. Further during the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988) Iran did not carry-out any offensive attack against Iraq rather it defended for eight years. The above examples show that there is no single evidence to show that Iran is a threat to the global peace. It is reported that Iran did not promote any form of direct or violence in the past three hundred years. Having nuclear is very important and constructive to Iran rather destructive.
IRAN’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM FROM THE US POINT OF VIEW
It has been 38 years since the Iranian revolution took place, since then the US has been accusing its nuclear experiments and imposing economic sanctions from time to time just to weaken its economy and minimize its nuclear technology. However, Iran manages to continue its nuclear program and economic developments despite with so many challenges. The last economic sanction which was imposed on Iran in 2006 was very heavy and affected Iran’s economy. In 2015 Iran was succeeded and signed an agreement with P5+1 known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). According to JCPOA-UN Resolution 2231, Iran agreed to reduce its nuclear program, in return P5+1 country decided to check every three months by IAEA. According to the IAEA last three reports and UN general Secretary Speech, it show that Iran has committed to this agreement and has been following it. However, the newly elected US President Donald Trump (January, 2017) is not happy with this agreement and Iran’s commitment to that.
The US president has been a frequent critic of the Iran nuclear pact. Mr. Trump recently called it “one of the worst deals I’ve ever seen”, stating that Iran had “violated so many different elements”. It shows that US does not want to allow Iran to work on the nuclear program further and he wants to keep it fully under their control. From the US point of view Iran cannot have the nuclear technology, but other permanent members and other supporters of US can have it. The Trump’s nuclear theory is that, those who support US can survive and enjoy the nuclear freedom while those who oppose, will be perished by the US.
IRAN’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM FROM EU’S POINT OF VIEW
The European Union was very critical over Iran’s nuclear deal until 2015. However, after the nuclear agreement which was signed in Vienna, the European Union began to do some trade activities with Iran. The current move of US towards Iran has disturbed some EU member countries while High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini, UK, Germany, France, Italy and many other EU countries have supported JCPOA and Iran.
IRAN’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM FROM OTHER COUNTRIES’ POINT OF VIEW
Only three countries: USA, Saudi Arabia and Israel are not happy about Iran’s nuclear program. But the rest of the world agreed that nuclear is important for Iran’s energy production and it is not harm to any country. Officials in several countries have voiced support for Iran over its nuclear program. These include Iraq, Algeria and Indonesia, etc. Turkey has expressed support for Iran’s right to a nuclear program for peaceful energy production and along with Egypt has urged for a peaceful solution to the standoff. From Russia’s point of view there is no objective evidence that Iran is seeking for nuclear weapons. According to a 2008 global poll of Arab public opinion, the Arab public does not appear to see Iran as a major threat and does not support international pressure to force Iran to curtail the program. The above examples show that most of the countries are with Iran for its nuclear program except the above mentioned three countries.
6. IRAN’S JUSTIFICATIONS AND ACCUSATIONS
From Iran’s point of view nuclear technology is very important for its own energy production and other activities. Meanwhile, it has been continuously arguing that it never ever had challenged the world peace at any occasions in the past. Further it argues that US is not fair with Iran although it had supported to develop the nuclear program long ago (1951). If US want to destroy the nuclear program and promote peace it should reduce all nuclear related weapons belonging to every country in the world. There should be a common rule for all countries where every country is equal in front of International law. The unipolar system and double-standard policy of US shows that US is seeking more power (world hegemony) to be one man rule in the world.
CONCLUSION
Although Iran’s peaceful nuclear technology is never ever threatened the world peace, Every time US accuse its nuclear program and impose economic sanctions just to weaken this country and perish its nuclear program. The US have created more conflicts in the world compared to other countries: Conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain and they created terrorist groups such as Al-Qaida and ISIS according to the Donald Trump Speech during his campaign. The crisis in the region including in those countries are rooted in occupation, illegal military intervention and hegemonic designs of the United States
ISTANBUL, Turkey – A stroll through a bustling underpass in the centre of Istanbul offers the chance to buy a range of everyday goods: cheap watches, kettles, $2 emergency umbrellas to ward off autumn showers. And replica AK-47 assault rifles.
While the rifles, and dozens of handguns displayed nearby, are imitations, they nevertheless stand out from the surrounding Karakoy stalls. And their prominent placement is perhaps a window into a deeply entrenched gun culture in Turkey that now kills more than 1,500 people a year.
This year alone at least 1,575 deaths have been reported in Turkey as a consequence of more than 20,000 incidents involving guns. And according to the latest report, there are an estimated 25 million privately owned firearms in Turkey in 2017, an increase of five million in a year.
It works out to one in every three households having a firearm of some sort. Out of these, 85 percent are said to be unregistered and unlicensed weapons.
In its annual report, the Turkish NGO the Umut Foundation said 2,225 incidents involving firearms were reported in the media from 1 January to 22 September and that they had resulted in 1,575 deaths.
Firearms incidents accounted for 79.76 percent of violent crimes reported during this period.
Discounting organised crime incidents, the deaths and injuries often result from arguments over unpaid debts, business disagreements, issues concerning “honour”, and sometimes even cases of road rage.
However, Istanbul in particular - and Turkey in general - remains one of the safest places for visitors and travellers with very few instances of armed robbery targeting individuals.
Ministry contests data
The Turkish interior ministry on 8 November contested the numbers provided in the Umut report, saying figures were not based on any scientific or statistical data and therefore needed verification.
The foundation did not respond to Middle East Eye’s request for a response to the ministry’s statement.
The ministry also contradicted the NGO report and said gun-related crimes were fewer than last year when 26,818 incidents involving firearms occurred.
It said there were 23,498 gun-related incidents, including threats to use weapons, in the first 10 months of this year. The statement said 10,790 firearms were seized during these incidents and 12.9 percent of those were registered firearms while 87.1 percent (9,390 firearms) were unregistered.
The Umut Foundation cites the main causes of the problem as ease of access to firearms and the lack of any deterrent punishment for offenders using unregistered weapons.
It said courts often commuted prison terms for such offences to cash penalties, and paltry sums at that.
The interior ministry in its statement said that cash penalties for possessing unregistered firearms had been increased. It also said 55 illegal vendors selling firearms online and via social media sites had been tracked and shut.
It also stated Turkey did not have an acute gun problem. Legal private gun ownership in Turkey was about three percent of the population whereas it was eight percent in Norway, 6.5 percent in Sweden and 4.5 percent in Spain. It didn’t provide any numbers on unregistered illegal gun ownership.
A shop selling electric razors, hairdryers, hunting knives and guns (Suraj Sharma/MEE)
Brisk sales
Ahmet, an employee at a gun store in Istanbul that also conducts online sales, told MEE that business was brisk.
“Sales are good. We sell air guns, shotguns and other rifles. The air guns don’t require permits because they use pellets and are harmless. Customers need to show the proper paperwork to buy the other guns,” he said.
But he said permits were easy to obtain.
A health report from a state hospital, a court document showing they have no previous criminal convictions and the registering of the weapon with the police along with the annual permit fee are the main requirements to obtain a firearm permit.
The annual firearm permit fee is about 10,000 lira (about $2,600) and is sometimes the reason why buyers resort to buying illegal firearms.
Hasan, who works at one of the gun shops in Karakoy, told MEE they only sold guns that didn’t require permits.
“We only sell air guns and guns with their barrels blocked. They don’t require permits and are also cheaper. My customers are mostly men looking to use it for celebratory gunfire during weddings and other ceremonies,” he said.
I will not hesitate to use my gun if someone threatens my family’s safety or honour
- Mehmet, gun owner
Ahmet said the majority of their customers were men between 18 and 40.
“We rarely have women customers. The men always say they are buying the weapons for safety and protection whether they are air guns or proper guns,” said Ahmet.
A customer tries out an M16 variant in a gun shop in Urfa (screengrab)
Mehmet, an alias, lives near the outskirts of the capital Ankara and is in his 50s. He owns a firearm and told MEE it was to protect his family.
“I will not hesitate to use my gun if someone threatens my family’s safety or honour. Should I sit around waiting for the police while my family is threatened? What would you do?” he said.
He refused to divulge whether he had a legal permit to carry a firearm, and said it was perfectly legal since he had “bought it from a former military guy”. He also said he had no problems finding live cartridges for his firearm.
Mehmet said he sometimes went out of the city with his children to fire a few rounds and relieve stress.
Despite saying he only owned a gun to protect his family, Mehmet said he always carried his weapon tucked into the waistband of his trousers at the back “just in case”.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, left, say he spoke with Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte on human rights in Manila on Monday.
A shop selling electric razors, hairdryers, hunting knives and guns (Suraj Sharma/MEE)
A customer tries out an M16 variant in a gun shop in Urfa (screengrab)