COP15: Some basic info

Dear activist colleagues,

before you come to Copenhagen to protest during the climate summit December 7th-18th, you should know a few things about the rules that apply to you. The police have put together a pamphlet in Danish, English, German, French and Spanish with some of the main points. You can download the pamphlet here and pass it around to others.

However, you should also be aware of a few things that aren’t mentioned in the pamphlet.

A so-called Lout Package has been designed to reduce public disturbances in connection with major events, and to keep COP15 calm. It allows for a 40-day remand of activists who prevent police carrying out their duties. This could, for example, be when activists chain themselves to each other to prevent their removal. It also provides for a six-hour increase in administrative preventive detentions to 12 hours. (source: Politiken.dk)

Administrative preventive detention means you basically don’t need to have done anything wrong and you can still be detained.

I’ve been to a fair share of protests in Denmark, but never ones with a violent outcome. Therefore I have no better advice for you than the above… And I’m sorry to say this, but I don’t blindly trust the police either especially since I saw videos of them brutally beating young protesters at a sit-down in support of refugees (for example this one).

A big march is planned to take place on December 12th. It will go from the square in front of the Parliament (Christiansborg Slotsplads) at 13.00 to the summit venue at the Bella Center. A lot of climate activists are expected, but also other citizens who will join as a way of protesting against the “Lout Package”. A protest for the right to protest, as some have put it. This might be the safest protest because of its size (hopefully) and nature, but then again – no one really knows how the “Lout Package” will be applied. So be careful.

“Denied” – Iraqis from Church Asylum

Last May I wrote about a group of Iraqi refugees who had taken refuge in a church in Copenhagen because they were at risk of being forcefully deported. They moved from Our Lady Church to the Brorson Church, where they remained until the police raided it in night of August 13th. The raid was quite violent and peaceful activists were beaten with batons or had tear gas sprayed directly into their faces.

The following day thousands of people protested in Copenhagen and other cities in Denmark – sadly with no effect. Several of the Iraqis have since been forcefully deported.

During the Iraqis’ stay in the church, a professional film crew with director Aage Rais Nordentoft followed them to document their situation. They all worked for free so that the film could be shared for free. There are English subtitles. You can see the entire documentary on Vimeo or here in two parts:

For more info go to http://kirkeasyl.dk/english/.

The story of human rights

Go to http://www.youtube.com/user/unitedforhumanrights for videos about each of the universal human rights.

IWR: Journalism for humanity

A new activist-minded magazine has seen the light of day: Independent World Report (IWR), a bimonthly newsmagazine about issues that don’t get their fair share of (or any) attention in mainstream media. Its credo is journalism for humanity, its reporters are from all over the world. Editor Tasneem Khalil is a Bangladeshi journalist now in exile in Sweden, a survivor of torture for working as an editor for the Dhaka-based Daily Star newspaper, as a news representative for CNN in Bangladesh, and as a consultant researcher for Human Rights Watch. Tasneem found me through my blog and asked me to write for IWR.

My contribution to the first issue is a piece on asylum children in Denmark in which I compare my experiences from the mid-nineties to the situation today. Things are quite different today, and in many ways much, much harder on children than when I used to live in an asylum center, as you already may have read about on my blog.

In the first issue of IWR you can also read an essay on religion’s role in the oppression on women, investigative reporting on forced child labour in the Uzbek cotton industry, an interview with former British diplomat who blew the whistle on torture, Craig Murray, and much more.

I am working on a piece for the next issue, this time about the ICTY. If you have any suggestions, feel free to leave me a comment in the next few days And make sure you browse through the excellent pieces in the first issue of IWR on independentworldreport.com.

14 years since the Srebrenica Holocaust

14 years ago Ratko Mladić and his heavily armed soldiers began their holocaust against unarmed civilians in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica, proclaimed by the UN as a “safe haven”. In his own words, Mladić did it in the name of the Serb people. They brutally murdered more than 10.000 Bosnians, among them babies too young to even have been named yet. Their remains were buried in mass graves. The Dutch UN soldiers watched all of it, and even helped separate men from women and children (most of the murdered Bosnians were men, but neither women nor children were spared – countless women were raped, for instance). In the years to come, the remains were dug up and scattered in order to hide the evidence – something not even Hitler had thought of. To this day there are people in the world who admire and idolize Mladić and all those who committed the holocaust with him. Mladić is still at large.

The survivors have seen no justice yet. Cases have been brought to international courts, without any useful outcome. A couple of years ago the Dutch government awarded medals to the soldiers who had been in Srebrenica during the genocide. Is having part in a holocaust really something to be proud of?