UK Parliamentary Recognition of Kurdish Genocide in Iraq: What This Means for Minority Groups Today

On the 25^th Anniversary of the Halabja poison gas attack against Iraqi Kurds, Awaz Raoof, a UK lawyer currently assisting MRG’s legal cases team, reports back from the UK’s House of Commons.

Iraqi Kurds in Iraqi Kurdistan. Credit: james_gordon_losangeles

On 28 February 2013, the UK’s House of Commons formally recognised the genocide against Iraqi Kurds, coinciding with the 25^th Anniversary of the ‘Anfal Campaign’ – a programme designed by the Ba’athi regime to systematically exterminate Kurds from Iraq. The House agreed to encourage governments, the EU and the UN, to formally recognise the genocide, believing that this would enable the Kurdish people to achieve justice, and demonstrate the UK’s support for human rights, made all the more important in light of the slaughter in Syria, and the possible use of chemical weapons there.

The Kurds

The Kurdish ethnic minority number between 30 and 40 million people, and are believed to descend from Indo-European tribes which migrated to the Zagros Mountains around 4000 years ago. Today, Kurds are split across Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria, with populations also living in Azerbaijan and Armenia. There are over five million Kurds in Iraq, constituting 20 percent of Iraq’s population

Kurds have a history of persecution and forced assimilation, including by the British during the 1920s. The Ba’athi regime’s campaign of ‘Arabisation’ and extermination of Kurds is often recalled with reference to the Anfal Campaign, which involved their forced displacement, aerial bombardment, chemical attacks, internment camps, torture, extra-judicial killings, and mass graves. The bombing of the city of Halabja on 16 March 1988 with mustard gas and suspected nerve agents resulted in the horrific death of 5,000 people, and injuries to an estimated 10,000 more. Around 180,000 people were killed between 1987 and 1988, although the true scale of the killing between the 1960s and 1990s is unknown. Widows, broken families, thousands of destroyed villages, and physical and psychological scars and illnesses, continue to tell the tale of the horrendous acts committed.

Was this genocide?

The UK Government defended its recent failure to formally recognise the Kurdish genocide in Iraq on the basis of it being “a complex legal question.” And indeed it is. Under Article 2 of the 1948 Genocide Convention, genocide includes the killing of, or causing serious bodily or mental harm to, members of a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, that group. As expected, the law is riddled with technicalities in meeting the various requirements, particularly with regards to proving specific intent (see for example Akayesu (ICTR-96-4) and Krstić (IT-98-33)).

However, the case for political recognition of the Kurdish genocide in Iraq is strong. In 2005, a Dutch District Court characterised the attacks against the Kurds in the 1980s as genocide, followed by a similar decision by the Supreme Iraqi Criminal Tribunal in 2007, and the Iraqi Supreme Court in 2010. Similar conclusions were also reached by non-governmental organisations investigating the matter, supported by evidence obtained from official records of the Ba’athi regime itself. It is therefore no surprise that, in 2012, the Swedish and Norwegian parliaments recognised the acts as genocide.

Why recognition is controversial

The recognition of genocide is inherently political. The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, which recognised the genocides of Srebrenica and Rwanda, respectively, were products of the UN Security Council, a body which continues to be dominated by the power struggles of its permanent members. The International Criminal Court, which aims to end this issue of ‘selective justice’, has jurisdiction over genocide only if committed on the territory, or by a national, of a consenting state or state party to the Rome Statute, or if referred to it by the Security Council. (Note that the Court does not have jurisdiction over events prior to 1 July 2002.)

Further, genocide – often described as the most heinous crime – is a label which conveys particular moral abhorrence and condemnation, and necessitates questions of blame and responsibility – a particularly delicate area in the field of international politics. This is why instances of alleged genocide continue to fall under the diplomatic radar.

So, it is not what the label reveals, but rather what it allegedly hides that is the concern. The recognition of the Kurdish genocide does not highlight the similar persecution of Yezidi, Assyrian and Turkmen minorities, or the slaughter of Arab Shi’a groups in Iraq. The characterisation of the situation in Darfur as genocide has similarly been criticised for depoliticising and simplifying the complex power struggle into one of “Arabs” against “Africans”, demonising the former in the process, and constructing a vision of the desired political makeup of (what was then) Sudan (M.Mamdani (2007)). The limitation of genocide to national, ethnic, racial or religious groups also eclipses other forms of discrimination. The use of sexual violence as an instrument of war was recognised with respect to the Rwandan genocide, but not the Jewish Holocaust, it being only later in the 20^th century when States were politically prepared to frame gender discrimination as a legal problem (see Catharine MacKinnon, Genocide’s Sexuality, in Political Exclusion and Domination, (2005)).

Iraqi Kurdish refugees in Damascus, Syria. Credit: james_gordon_losangeles

What recognition means for minorities today

Various crucial psychological, diplomatic and legal consequences flow from the recognition of genocide. First, it begins a healing process for the families and communities affected, which is particularly important if the fate of missing persons remain unknown. Under the Genocide Convention, States have an obligation to punish perpetrators of the crime, thus helping to provide the victims with a sense of justice.

Second, Parliamentary debates can shed light on a State’s failure to prevent the genocide, or even on its dealings with the perpetrators. Several MPs during the UK Parliamentary debate highlighted the UK Government’s arms trade with Iraq during the 1980s, despite the calls from certain MPs to suspend these links. Admissions of this kind can further assist victims with dealing with their loss.

Third, State obligations include the prevention of genocide. The Kurdish people continue to suffer discrimination, including serious violations of basic culture and language rights in Turkey, and torture and even death in Iran and Syria, simply because of their ethnicity, often under the guise of anti-terrorism measures. Recognition therefore places a spotlight on such human rights violations, acting as a word of warning to the current perpetrators, and prompting international action to secure the rights of the victims.

Finally, as bearers of human rights under international law, we individuals are direct stakeholders in the international community. We can strive to prevent the recognition of an act of genocide being exploited by States as an opportunistic tool in international politics. As the UK Parliamentary debate demonstrated, by recognising and remembering acts of genocide, not only do we honour the dead, but we give a voice to the most marginalised and silenced communities. And that includes all minority groups affected by genocide, whether or not the act of recognition directly applies to them.

Through this very article, the debate regarding recognition has been a means of highlighting such forgotten groups. Recognition provides an educational role for society, to learn from past experiences, to explore root causes, and to act early to stop history from repeating itself. It allows us to focus on other mass human rights violations in the world today, whatever label is used to describe them, and to strive to ensure that human rights are guaranteed by states for all individuals, in a global society of respect, acceptance and peace.

This is what the UK Parliament’s recognition of the Kurdish genocide in Iraq means for minority groups today.

Part 1: How to Skin a Porcupine

Daniel Openshaw, MRG’s Publications Intern, reports back from the Expert Seminar on Indigenous Peoples’ Languages and Cultures. In the first of two blogs he discusses the importance of cultural rights and their inseparability from rights to self determination and land.

I have no idea how to skin a porcupine, but then I do not speak Innu-aimun, the language of Canada’s indigenous Innu. Innu-aimun has specific terms describing how to kill and prepare porcupine, for which there is no equivalent in other languages. Those who don’t speak Innu-aimun will be able to guess, they might hack away at the rodent, trying to avoid being pricked by one of its sharp spines until it resembles a steak, over time even cultivating methods resembling those that Innu have been using for centuries. However, there will be no efficient way of explaining these processes to others if Innu-aimun ceases to exist. This cultural wealth and ancestral knowledge will be lost…at best assigned to the history books with the useful words assimilated (‘borrowed’) into more dominant languages, at worst, forgotten.

This example highlights a recurring theme that emerged at the Expert Seminar on Indigenous Peoples’ Languages and Cultures, organised by Dr Alexandra Xanthaki from Brunel Law School in collaboration with the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, which I attended in March. Majority cultures have a longstanding history of dismissing and assimilating indigenous cultures and languages that are often differ radically from the mainstream.

A panel of expert speakers and OCHCR representatives gather during the Expert Seminar on Indigenous Peoples’ Languages and Cultures

Academics and indigenous representatives from around the globe attended in order to aid the development of a study by the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples at the behest of the UN Human Rights Council under resolution 18/8 of September last year. The aim of the study is to investigate the role of languages and culture in the promotion of the rights and identity of indigenous peoples.

The seminar emphasized the importance of preserving and promoting cultural rights and also important issues standing in the way of this. Professor Elsa Stamatopoulou, former Chief of the UN Permanent Forum on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, summed up the conundrum: human rights are seen as the weak part of international law and within these rights cultural rights are seen as the weakest, as illustrated by the make-up of the ICESCR which covers Economic rights (E) and Social rights (S) from articles 1 through to 14 and then tags on Cultural rights (C) as a vague afterthought in article 15. Things are improving with the introduction of UNDRIP, which although legally non-binding has achieved almost universal recognition and indicates a step forward to recognizing what Professor Stamatopoulou referred to as ‘the essentiality of cultural rights’, not simply as a luxury secondary to a person’s right to food and water.

Maasai child in front of traditional hut. Credit: Kibuyu

‘If you don’t have a traditional culture or speak a traditional language then you are a slave’ – a Swahili proverb that emphasizes that the right to maintain one’s culture is fundamental to one’s right to self-determination. Lucy Mulenkei, head of the Indigenous Information Network, further illustrated this through the displacement of Maasai in Kenya.

When they are displaced, for whatever reason, it is almost certainly a non-indigenous person who has decided they must be displaced and they might be moved to areas where traditional materials are unavailable to build traditional huts in traditional ways. Perhaps without malice but definitely with indifference, decision-makers have not taken into account the cultural rights of indigenous peoples and in doing so have denied the Maasai part of their identity.

Cautious optimism did prevail at the seminar, especially because of recent developments in the recognition of cultural rights, often in conjunction with land claims. Dr Jeremie Gilbert of Middlesex University highlighted the Inter-American Court of Human Rights’ (IACHR) 2001 landmark ruling in favour of the Mayagna community of Awas Tingni, Nicaragua. Logging permits had been granted on indigenous land by the state without obtaining the free prior and informed consent of local communities. The IACHR recognized Awas Tingni land as property of the Mayagna peoples on the basis of traditional use and occupancy, equal to the social integrity of the community.

Traditional Maasai huts. Credit: J. Czliao

Dr Kristin Hauser of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law also highlighted how the Supreme Court of British Columbia had allowed traditional culture to be heard on a equal footing to anthropological and scientific evidence in the case of a land dispute involving the Tsilhqot’in first nations peoples of Canada. Given the evidence, the judge stated that 50% of disputed land should have been awarded to the indigenous community but as this was an ‘all or nothing’ claim, no land could actually be awarded. Nevertheless, the recognition has been heralded as a victory.

Furthermore, MRG has been involved in the case of the Endorois in Kenya, semi-nomadic pastoralists who were evicted from their ancestral land in the 1970s to make way for a national park. Here the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) took the rights to religion, culture and access to natural resources, together to be equal to the right to cultural integrity and used this to award the Endorois land rights and posthumous compensation; a positive step but one that two years on is yet to be implemented.

These cases illustrate the inseparable nature of cultural rights and land rights, further emphasizing the essentiality of cultural rights. This will be explored in MRG’s ‘State of the World’s Minorities and Indigenous Peoples’ to be launched on June 28^th, which this year focuses on natural resources and extractive industries.

However, what is striking is the lack of acknowledgment of linguistic rights in the ACHPR definition of cultural integrity. This is a cause for concern as Dr Mark Harris of Adelaide University pointed out; Aboriginal land claims in Australia are often imbedded in language, a discussion that will be continued in my next blog…

Privatization of court interpreting hinders access to justice for non-English speakers in the UK

The UK Ministry of Justice’s decision to adopt a privatized contract for court interpreters has severe implications regarding access to justice for minorities from non-English speaking backgrounds. Shahendra Suliman, MRG’s Conflict Prevention Programme intern, reports.

A contract between the Ministry of Justice and a translation company to provide interpreters for all courts in England and Wales has angered interpreters and frustrated judges.

Whilst previously each individual court hired freelance interpreters from a national register of qualified interpreters, under the new scheme interpreters are provided by a single company, Applied Language Solutions (ALS). The contract, which has promised to cut the annual translation bill by a third, came into effect on 1^st February and has already provoked countrywide protests and boycotts.

Not only does this new deal undermine interpreters by cutting their pay and removing travel expenses for the first hour, but it appears to have had widespread implications for the justice system, particularly for people who do not speak English as their first language.

An interpreters' demo outside the Ministry of Justice. Credit: Andy Taylor

Previous interpreters needed a Diploma in Public Service Interpreting and at least 400 hours of proven public service interpreting experience in the UK to obtain full status on the national register, as well as providing an enhanced Criminal Records Bureau disclosure check. ALS interpreters are assessed using the company’s own method which makes it difficult to determine whether they are fully qualified, for the decision rests at ALS’s discretion. Nonetheless, anecdotes backed up by statistical evidence – 60% of the 2,300 interpreters on the National Register of Public Service Interpreters have refused to work for ALS – suggest that there is a real shortage of qualified interpreters willing to work for the company.

In several cases, interpreters have failed to show up at all, resulting in people being kept in custody longer than necessary. Recently a mother of three young children was kept in jail for three days for a minor theft (such a first time offence rarely results in this) because the interpreter failed to show up. No-shows have left all parties inconvenienced and put victims through unnecessary stress and trauma. An interpreter failed to show up in the case of a vulnerable Pakistani woman who had been violently and sexually assaulted, leaving the presiding judge to brand this ‘a disgrace.’

It should go without saying that competent interpreters are crucial for a fair trial – a right which applies to both English and non-English speaking persons alike. Despite this, court clerks have had to resort to using web translations which can produce highly inaccurate results – one had to rely on Google translate to tell a defendant the details of his next hearing.  In cases where interpreters have showed up, there have been several incidents suggesting that they are not qualified for the task. One interpreter failed to understand the solicitor when he said they had to go down to the cells and didn’t understand what an oath was. A solicitor who deals with a large number of Polish cases has expressed concern that many of the new interpreters ‘don’t understand legal jargon.’

Yet perhaps a failure to interpret is better than a poor interpretation – incidents of incorrect interpretations include telling a suspect that being charged meant that they had to pay the court money, and telling a suspect charged with perverting the course of justice that they were accused of being a pervert.

Needless to say, the potential miscarriages of justice due to poor interpreting should be a huge cause for concern. In Immigration and Asylum tribunals, personal testimonies are vital in deciding whether or not a person is granted asylum or entry/leave to remain in the UK. The slightest misinterpretation could result in vulnerable people being denied entry or deported. Not only this, but the rising number of adjourned trials and the cost of keeping people in custody due to no-shows suggest that the new system may end up costing much more than the old one.

Most recently a trial collapsed at a London court after a Romanian defendant said the claimant had “beaten” them but the interpreter said “bitten.” It was only when the prosecution cross-examined the defendant the next day, asking for evidence of the biting that the defendant corrected them. The estimated cost of the resulting re-trial is £25,000. The mistake only came to light at the end of a four-day trial and the defendant – who is 13 years old – will be forced to go through the experience and give evidence once more.

An interpreters' demo outside the Ministry of Justice. Credit: Andy Taylor

Organizations such as the Association of Police and Court Interpreters, Professional Interpreters Alliance and the Institute of Translation and Interpreting have hit back, teaming up with Britain and Ireland’s biggest trade union Unite to launch a campaign to reverse the privatisation of court interpreting. Protests have taken place in Manchester, Birmingham and London, with interpreters decrying poor pay and condemning the contract as a monopoly.

The Ministry of Justice has authorized courts to bypass the new system for urgent cases for the time being, however until it abandons the new scheme in its entirety non-English speaking minorities are likely to continue to experience poor/false interpretations, extra nights in custody, adjourned trials and potential miscarriages of justice.

London play highlights Chagossians’ plight

MRG interns John Lubbock and Sofia Nazalya found A Few Man Fridays at the Hammersmith Riverside Studios in London to be more than just a theatrical performance. The three-hour-long play represented a formidable campaign for the rights of the Chagossians, whose story is still not widely known.

Adrian Jackson’s play serves in part to address this lack of awareness of the people of Diego Garcia, a small island in the Chagos Archipelago, in the British Indian Ocean Territory, and epic struggle following expulsion from the island to make way for a US military base. The continued refusal of the UK to allow the Chagossians to return has seen the case taken to the High Court in London all the way to the European Court of Human Rights.

The play follows Prosper, a Chagossian searching for the identity of his mother and encountering the history of his people who he has become separated from. His attempt to put together the pieces of the past and find his mother provides a sympathetic personal prism through which to understand the Chagossians’ quest to return to their motherland.

Even at three hours, the play never became monotonous or dull, and actively encouraged the audience to take action to bring attention to the cause. The following is an exchange of thoughts between us on the event.

JL: The first thing that came to my mind was the African proverb which Marwan Bishara had previously used to describe the Arab Spring; ‘when elephants fight, the grass gets crushed, and when elephants make love, the grass still gets crushed’. Diego Garcia is a great example of two states conspiring together for mutual benefit while completely ignoring the fundamental rights of a group of people who they probably considered too small to do anything about it. In the end however, I felt that it was quite a hopeful story, because it shows that even though they are a tiny group of people, they can do something about it, and even though it’s taken 40 years, they might win and be allowed to return.

Chagos islanders demonstrate after law lords verdict

SN: Still it’s rather astounding to know that it’s been 40 years and their story is still quite unknown. I read a review of the play last week that started off highlighting this – most people, including the reviewer, had no idea who the Chagossians are, or much less where the Chagos Islands are.

JL: I imagine that probably more people have heard of Diego Garcia as a result of its use in extraordinary rendition flights and possible torture by the US military. The lack of awareness on colonial history is something I have been thinking about since I left school; at some point I realised I had studied all this history, but the story I was given was ‘in 1066 England began when we were invaded by French Vikings, then we had a couple of civil wars, invented democracy and then nothing happened for a few hundred years until the First World War began’. It’s a transparently colonial narrative of history with all the unflattering parts edited out. I think we should be made to learn about colonial history in school. I know you studied it in Singapore.

SN: Yeah, I’m not saying education in Singapore was informative at all on human rights issues, but there definitely was that consciousness of colonial history, not only of Singapore but the region. I thought ultimately the play did a great job of raising how serious the problem is, how it’s connected to people living in the UK and just how things that seem far removed from us really aren’t at all. Ultimately it’s a real eye opener, and I know it definitely moved a lot of people in the audience, and the post play Q&A discussion with the panellists answered a lot of questions to do with the legal proceedings and where the case is at currently.

JL: I was shocked by a few things raised by the play and the discussion. In the play, I was shocked by the fact that when the US effectively bought Diego Garcia, they asked for it to be ‘wiped clean’ and ‘sanitised’. They could have re-employed the people on the island and allowed them to continue their way of life to some extent, as they had been previously employed by the coconut processing company there before. And as mentioned in the Q&A discussion, even though the UK government acknowledges that they abused the rights of Chagossians, they are still trying to fight them in the courts to keep them from returning.

SN: I think the denial of their right of return can be blamed on lack of political will. Even though the UN Declaration on Indigenous Peoples is a relatively new progression, I think the fact that it exists shows how far we’ve come in terms of awareness of the need to respect and promote the rights of minorities and indigenous peoples. The fact that the expulsion happened 40 years ago shows the readiness at that point in time to exploit a situation where a group had weak legal protection and little recourse to justice.

JL: Definitely. That’s shown by the fact that the UK denied them the same rights enjoyed by citizens of other territories which were colonial possessions: the right for second and third generations to attain British citizenship even though they won that right in 2002.

SN: Yes, and the argument now seems to concentrate on things that really just seem to miss the whole point – for instance how marine conservation and the presence of the US air base are used as justifications to deny Chagossians the right of return. The situation is certainly complicated, but in the end it doesn’t approach it from a human rights viewpoint: that ultimately, the base that exists (which was the cause of their expulsion and violation of rights) is not a reason to fail to address the Chagossian cause. And the justification of protecting marine biodiversity is a mere greenwashing of the situation.

JL: David Snoxall, the Coordinator of the Chagos Islands All-Party Parliamentary Group, said that if the European Court decides the case is admissible, it is likely that the UK will have to let them return. The fact that they aren’t asking to go back to Diego Garcia but some outlying islands 140 miles away means they can’t possibly be a security concern, so you do wonder what could possibly be the reason for the UK continuing to obstruct the right of return. The UK could save itself a lot of trouble and money by facilitating their return, and also try to right a historic wrong which it created in the first place.

SN: Yes, and MRG has supported the Chagossians’ cause including submitting a shadow report with respect to the Sixth Periodic Report of the UK to the UN Human Rights Committee.

JL: That they were never consulted about their eviction is significant to note. They weren’t told they were going to be deported until shortly before it happened, they were intimidated in order to make them leave, tricked into leaving the island and not allowed to return. Even in the feasibility studies about the right of return in 2002 they were never asked what they wanted. That lack of dialogue shows there is still a serious problem with how the UK treats minorities.

SN: Definitely. I also felt that the use of different media techniques in the play was highly effective. The oral and video recordings of Chagossians, some of whom have recently passed away, the occasionally surreal scenes, the double narrative of the protagonist Prosper and his struggle, and the dramatisation of the past – they all culminated in a moving and cohesive artistic portrayal of reality.

JL: Yeah, I think the play served to give them a voice, to try to make them visible rather than just mute colonial servants like Man Friday who Robinson Crusoe has to teach to speak.

SN: Yeah I liked the part in the beginning when one of the actors talks about their language, and how Chagossian Creole isn’t a Pidgin or a colonial language but a language of freedom, a language that was born out of years of survival and struggle.

JL: The play does a great job of illuminating their culture and affecting sympathy for such a unique group of people, who have suffered such an injustice. It’s impossible not to sympathise with so basic a desire as wanting to return home.

While some may express ‘doubt that justice can now ever be done ‘ for the Chagossians, we think that change is partially up to us. You can be part of this change by signing this petition for the US Government to redress wrongs against Chagossians. Twenty-five thousand signatures are needed by 4 April 2012.

A visit to embattled Dale Farm

Marcin Derkacz, MRG Legal Cases intern, paid a visit to Dale Farm in Essex, UK, to show support and see for himself how Irish Traveller residents were bearing up under the threat of imminent eviction from their homes

 

It seems to be a never-ending story. A real, fascinating, gripping rollercoaster of a ride. However, for its main actors – the residents of Dale Farm – this story is a nightmare. Living under constant threat of being cut off from their water and electricity supplies, watching bailiffs getting their heavy machinery ready in preparation for an eviction, being harassed by the local Council and last but not least, living in the media spotlight, has been the everyday life of these residents who, in spite of all adversities, decided to stay at Dale Farm – a place they have called home for many years. 

I had a chance to visit Dale Farm a few weeks ago – just before lawyers for the Travellers obtained a High Court injunction preventing bailiffs moving in while the courts were asked to rule on several areas of contention. The Traveller site reminded me of a village under siege in a war zone: a helicopter hanging over the site, massive, reinforced gates at the entrance, an army of bailiffs stationed just next to the farm, TV crews waiting for sensational developments. A sense of apprehension and anxiety could be felt in the air.

After being held at the gate for over an hour by a bunch of kids, I was permitted to enter the site. The camp looked deserted at first; however I was told that many of the residents had moved their best caravans to Stockwood Park, a large public park on the outskirts of the nearby town of Basildon.

All the people I spoke to declared they would fight for Dale Farm, however, their morale was obviously shaken. “We are people stripped of our basic rights; we are deprived of land which we legally occupy. We want to stay but we don’t know what tomorrow will bring” a red-haired woman in a green raincoat told me. “But God is with us – he sent rain to put off the bailiffs from taking any action”. Indeed, it was in fact raining, although I suspect the bailiffs were probably put off by unresolved legal issues rather than the rain.

The residents of the former scrap-yard were preparing for the worst. There were at least three barricades blocking the main roads to the site, erected by activists who had come to Dale Farm a few days before in order to support the Travellers and try to prevent the eviction. Their role should not be overlooked or underestimated – they spent their own time and money in order to support Dale Farm and give its residents hope for a better tomorrow.

Children face upheavals in schooling and access to health services if evicted. Credit: Marcin Derkacz

Despite the evictions and uncertainty, Dale Farm looked surprisingly well-organized. I met a few women sweeping their porches and pottering around their caravans. “We want to live like human beings and the world should see that we are not animals” said one, “We eat, we sleep and we have fun here. It is our place to live so we take care of it,” she continued.

It was hard to disagree. A small investment in Dale Farm could make this place even better and certainly the alleged £18 million which the Council plan to spend on the forced eviction seems to me to be preposterous and absurd. If the worst came to the worst and the Travellers have to leave, this money could be better used to fund developments that would allow the residents at risk to move voluntarily and peacefully to culturally adequate new locations. This solution is dictated by logic and simple good will; however it seems that both are the Achilles’ heel of Basildon Council and its leader Tony Ball.

I left the site in a gloomy mood. Irrespective of the final result there will be no winners at Dale Farm. Traveller life has already been disrupted and it is never going to be the same. Despite the economic crisis, millions of pounds are going to be wasted and the Council is going to lose its credibility and be stigmatised as a heartless violator of human rights. It seems that something went wrong at the initial stage of the negotiation process and every further decision worsens the situation. Unreasonable stubbornness, lack of good will and an inability to reach a compromise have been the main culprits of the conflict. And everyone is a victim here.

All dressed up in India

MRG’s Gender Programme Coordinator, Kathryn Ramsay, is in Madhya Pradesh at a training with inspiring Dalit women leaders from north India

 

I’m standing in a hotel room surrounded by nine laughing Dalit women who are wrapping a sari around me. I feel like I’m a doll being dressed up! As they tuck and pin the 5 meters of material around me, I wonder how long it takes sari-wearing women to get dressed every morning. Apparently not as long as it’s taking them to dress me – maybe because they’re taking photos of every step of the process!

I’m in India (in Pachmarhi, a small hill station in Madhya Pradesh) for a four-day training programme for Dalit women leaders. The last time I came to India, I met most of the 24 women from 8 different Indian States at a regional conference held by MRG’s partner Navsarjan, where we discussed their training needs and planned a programme to equip them with leadership skills and opportunities to put those skills into practice to benefit other Dalit women. Navsarjan has begun that programme and is running a series of training events for the group over the next 10 months.

They are an inspiring group of women. Many have experienced domestic violence; one is taking a case of attempted murder against her husband. All have been put under pressure to stop their work as activists, either by the dominant castes in the community or by their own families. But all of them are determined to continue their work, and, through the trainings, improve their skills to become more effective in helping other Dalit women.

Today was the last day of the training. Over four days we have focused on human rights and gender equality, the Indian Constitution, Penal Code and the Prevention of Atrocities Act (an act which specifically outlaws caste based discrimination and violence and provides increased punishment for crimes committed because of caste). Most of the women are already supporting others in taking up cases of violence against Dalit women and they were totally absorbed in the topics. One of them commented, ‘We’ve had other trainings, why didn’t anyone tell us this information before?’

The intricacies of how to register a criminal case with the police and the investigation process which should then be followed (but is frequently not) were presented by one of Navsarjan’s most experienced lawyers. The material was explained using a case invented by the participants – a fight between four of them in the hotel dining room resulting in a death, with plates, sandals, handbags and a water bottle as the weapons used! I don’t think any class of university law students either studied so hard or laughed so much while learning the same material.

Finally the sari is pleated, tucked and pinned to their satisfaction. One gives me her necklace to wear, another sticks a bindi on my forehead and I’m ready to be taken downstairs and showed off to the others!

After many more photos, several participants want me to go dancing in the tiny hotel disco which is pumping out Indian pop music at a decibel level I think would probably be illegal in a London nightclub. We all had a great time dancing there on the night we arrived (something they would never do at home) but this time I have to say no since I think if I try to dance in a sari, I may break my ankle, or at least fall in a very ungraceful heap in the middle of the dance floor!

Tomorrow there are a few hours free for visiting the area around Pachmarhi (a first visit for all of us) and then everyone leaves for long train rides back to their home states. I feel privileged to have shared this time with these women. I’m humbled by the challenges they face and determined to raise the money we need for the rest of the programme. I’ll also be taking away some of the ideas gained from the women’s experience which might transfer to some of the other communities MRG works with. I now have a few days off and I’m heading back down to the sweltering heat of the plains (around 43 degrees Centigrade) to a national park in the hope of seeing one of India’s rarest animals, the tiger.

Part 2 – “We have become squatters in our own home.”

In the second part of his 2-part blog, Carl Soderbergh reflects on a land rights issue which is confronting Maasai in Loliondo District of northern Tanzania. See Part 1 here.

While the Maasai whom Lucy and I met in Loliondo are not directly affected by what is happening to those living in the Ngorogoro Conservation Area, they follow it with concern. More particularly, they have their own land problems.

This was most vividly described to us by Sandet Reiya, elder of Mondorosi sub-village. Mondorosi lies to one side of a valley, the sides of which are dotted with several other smaller sub-villages. In the middle of the valley is a large stretch of mixed savannah and forest. The seasonal Pololet river flows through the valley. When Lucy and I arrived in Mondorosi, there were easily 150 men and women waiting to talk to us about their problems. We sat around an acacia tree and gazed out over the valley unfurled below us. In the far distance, I could see the silhouettes of giraffes loping across open ground.

Sandet Reiya

Sandet looked out over the valley. He waved his staff across the expanse and said bitterly, “It is very simple. A person is welcomed into a house and is entertained by the owner. Instead of just visiting, the person occupies all of the place and the owner becomes a refugee… We have become squatters in our own home.”

The placement of the sub-villages follows Maasai traditional good husbandry practices – their communities are built away from the open areas in order to reserve the best land for their cattle.

This practice was drastically curtailed in 2006 following the purchase of over 12,000 acres across the middle of the valley by Tanzania Conservation Limited (TCL), a company linked to the American tour operator Thomson Safaris. TCL bought the land from the state-owned Tanzanian Breweries Ltd. (TBL). TBL’s title dated from the 1980’s but had been disputed by the local communities, who complain of improprieties at the time of the sale. In particular, there are questions concerning whether the Maasai who signed the sale agreement with TBL really had the authority to do so. The communities lost their claim in court and were sadly too impoverished to keep travelling to Arusha in order to follow up the case, missing their opportunity to appeal. At any rate, TBL only cultivated 700 acres and did not establish possession over the rest of the land, so the Maasai of the area continued to graze their livestock on the stretches of savannah above Pololet river.

While questions remain regarding TBL’s title, a further issue is whether the open stretch of land in the middle of the valley was TBL’s to sell and TCL’s to buy. It may largely be open ground, but it was not unoccupied. The fact that there are wild animals there to look at is not an accident. It is very much due to the Maasai communal approach to land as well as their traditional respect towards wildlife. In short, the valley was not Terra nullius.

View over Maasai bomas and towards the disputed land

When Thomson moved in, they sought to create a wildlife sanctuary on the property. Villagers state that Thomson security guards used force to evict Maasai caught grazing on the land. Bomas, the thorn-bush cattle pens typical of Maasai settlements, were reportedly burnt down, and men and boys caught herding livestock on the property are alleged to have been beaten and taken to the police.

One clear sign of the violence was the fact that when we drove between communities on the access roads that run along the edges of property, the boys herding goats or cattle would run and hide when they saw us coming. Everywhere else, the young goat-herders would stand alongside the track, waving and laughing as we drove by.

While Thomson dispute the accounts, Lucy and I met two victims, as well as many others who described helping those who had been beaten. One of the victims is David, a man in his twenties whom we met in Mondorosi.[1] He described being caught near Pololet river in 2007. Six Thomson security guards ordered him to get into their vehicle. When David refused, the security guards kicked him and beat him with sticks. David was pushed to the ground; one man sat on his chest and held him by his throat. The beating lasted an hour, David said. He rolled up his trouser legs and showed us the scars. David was taken to the police station in Loliondo, where he was held for 24 hours. He did not receive food, water or any medical help. He was released after the community raised 100,000 Tanzanian shillings.

The involvement of the police appears to form a pattern and explains why the victims have not dared to bring charges against their assailants. Another Maasai was shot in the jaw in 2008, when he and nine others demonstrated on the property; police arrived and started shooting when the group refused to disperse.

At each of the meetings, Lucy and I asked the women who were present how they viewed the situation. I was struck by the response we got from the women of Sukenya sub-village, who otherwise praised Thomson for the income-generating scheme it had introduced – namely a market for handicrafts to which it brings its visitors. These women are presumably benefitting from Thomson’s presence. And yet they also emphasized that access to land is a gender issue, since it affects their families. It is their children who are being beaten, they said.

PWC Women’s Choir

On our final day, Lucy and I were invited to the PWC women’s choir graduation ceremony. The songs were beautiful, and some of the women began crying while they were singing. One of the songs was about the land issue. With tears streaming down her face, the chairwoman of the choir stepped forward and pointed towards the children sitting off to one side. She said that their children are being beaten and some are getting lost in the bush as they run away.

Maanda Ngoitiko

Lucy and I met with Thomson representatives on the last day of our visit to Tanzania. They expressed an interest in a mediated solution. We welcomed this, given the strong emotions the situation arouses. Indeed, Maanda Ngoitiko, Coordinator of PWC, put it simply. She said,  “Since Thomson came, I have had no peace of mind.” At the same time, the Thomson representatives vigorously denied all accusations of violence, saying  variously that it had only occurred during the days of TBL, that it had been exaggerated because of the political ambitions of local NGOs, and that it was due to inter-clan rivalries – something that we as foreigners could not comprehend during such a short visit.

In my mind, though, none of Thomson’s arguments explains why those little boys ran away and hid in the brush, leaving their goats and cattle untended, whenever they saw us coming in our 4-wheel drive vehicle. And when we parted company, I wondered what Thomson’s customers would make of the fact that their very presence strikes terror in the heart of young boys.

• See also: Condé Nast Traveler‘s recent article “Last days of the Masai?“

Notes

1. David’s name has been changed to protect his identity.

Debating freedom of expression, religion and secularism

Joe Gonzales, MRG’s Media Intern in London, reports back from a recent MRG council seminar debating the increasing discord between freedom of religion, freedom of expression, and the notion of a secular state.

The 32^nd floor of the Broadgate Tower in the City of London, the site of MRG’s recent Council Seminar on MRG Policy Issues, offers a sweeping panorama of London’s impressive skyline.  From it, one can see all the way from Canary Wharf’s sky-scraping banks in the east, past Victorian icon Tower Bridge and Sir Norman Foster’s famous “gherkin” building, and westwards towards the colossal London Eye ferris wheel and beyond.

Closer to the building’s base, indeed only a few minutes’ walk away, is the East End’s Brick Lane. The heart of London’s mostly-Muslim Bengali population, Brick Lane and the surrounding Bethnal Green area represent a commendable example of successful coexistence between secular European tradition and the growing presence of Muslim cultural values.  A walk through the area reveals fashionable nightclubs around the corner from a mosque, and Londoners and tourists from all backgrounds convening on a row of restaurants to negotiate the best prices for a Halal-certified curry meal.

Thus, the area acted as an appropriate setting for the MRG Council Seminar, entitled “Freedom of Expression, Freedom of Religion, and the Separation of Religion and State.”  While a successful balance between these principles seems to have been found around the corner in Brick Lane, it is obvious that elsewhere the intersection of these concepts is often met with public controversy and uproar. A variety of issues seem capable of instigating such upheaval:  the Swiss ban on minarets, the French ban on face-covering veils, the Danish cartoons portraying the prophet Mohamed, etc. The sensitive nature of religious belief, and the diversity of circumstances it affects, clearly has made it difficult for policy makers worldwide to reach a consensus on the appropriate method for handling such conflicts of interest.

The MRG Council, a group consisting of accomplished individuals from a wide range of professional and national backgrounds, was presented with the task of analysing and discussing a number of topics in order to identify the positions which would be most logical and appropriate for MRG to take on such nuanced issues.

Two topics of debate were specifically put forward.  One considered the possible limitation of freedom of expression in order to protect against hate and discriminatory speech.  The other debate examined the relationship between the freedom of religion and the secular notion of separating religion from state. These specific enquiries, however, acted less like limitations as to what could be discussed and more as the centrelines on which to base a wider avenue of debate that included the very nature of the rights to free expression and religion.

The discussion concerning the relationship of religion and state created a noticeably tense atmosphere and unsurprisingly quickly focused on the French Senate’s September approval of a ban on full-face veils in public.  Azar Majedi, an Iranian activist and chairperson of the Organization for Women’s Liberation, passionately defended the French ban, making a variety of points that induced widespread, head-nodding acknowledgement from other participants (an impressive feat given the near-unanimous anti-ban position that the majority of the room seemed to take).

Drawing upon her personal memories of growing up in Iran, Majedi claimed that Islamic traditions that require women to cover themselves are both the symbols and the tools with which women are marginalised. She feels that the burka and the niqab are misogynistic and disadvantage women to such an extent that they represent “gender apartheid.”   She quickly admonishes claims that veils and burkas are simply misunderstood symbols of Iranian culture by wondering aloud, “Just because I’m born in Iran, my culture is misogynist?  No. Cultural relativism is racism.”

Representatives from MRG presented the issue’s other side, stating that the veil ban denies personal autonomy, particularly in cases in which an individual has genuinely chosen to cover their face of their own volition.  Secularism, it was claimed, requires the government to be free from religion, not society as a whole.   If this is true, then if it is possible to manifest one’s religion without harming society, it should be done.

Majedi responded that permitting the veil’s use is not in the interest of the common good.  She interestingly compared the veil ban to the more commonplace ban on smoking in public places.  This is not done because the government has decided that individuals are unable to make decisions concerning the negative effects that smoking may have on their own health, but instead because second-hand smoke poses a serious health risk to others.  According to Majedi, the existence of essentially “identity-less” individuals within a community is not only degrading to those individuals, but also negatively affects public wellbeing, trust and security.

The other debate, concerning the notion of protecting against hate speech, saw most participants cite the controversy surrounding a series of Danish cartoons. The 2006 publication of a series of cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed in Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten sparked waves of protest from the worldwide Muslim community. MRG’s representatives quickly identified one of the key tasks at hand as acknowledging that neither of these human rights automatically takes precedence over the other.

Guest speakers Sejal Parmar and Jonathon Heawood, representing the NGOs Article XIX and English PEN respectively, predictably took a more hardnosed defence of freedom to expression, claiming it to be a necessary component of any human rights-based society. Many participants noted the seemingly baseless distinction often made between offending others on religious grounds and doing so on a political or personal basis. Such a distinction is unfounded, it was argued, and as such individuals should be able to criticise religion to the same degree as they can criticise political beliefs, art and everything else in society.

Majedi, also a fervent defender of unlimited freedom of expression, stated that it would be foolish to believe that the outcry caused by the Danish cartoons was caused simply by their offensive nature, hinting that such protests were more organised than they appeared.  Referencing the widespread burning of Danish flags that occurred after the cartoons’ publication, she humorously remarked on the strange fortune it was that so many average Middle Eastern families happened to have Danish flags at hand ready to burn en masse.

MRG purposefully added a non-European perspective to both debates, indirectly mentioning the significant effects that the elasticity of language has on human rights concerns.  The European secular state often identifies secularism as the absence of religion.  Secularism as defined in India’s constitution, however, is defined as a tolerance of all religions.  When viewed through the lens of the latter definition, the French veil ban seems to be in fact anti-secular, as it abandons religious tolerance.  Similarly, in the debate concerning freedom of expression, it was noted that often such discussions focus on a free press more than other sorts of expression.  As such, monitoring mechanisms often neglect other forms of expression more prevalent in the developing world, such as printed pamphlets and village meetings. Monitoring mechanisms, it was argued, also often ignore the less visible barriers to free expression caused by one-sided societal power structures that intimidate certain groups from criticising others.  The effects such structures can have on the freedom of expression of minorities are self-evident.

By the end of the seminar, MRG’s position on both issues still remained to be determined by further discussion among members of the Council and MRG’s staff.  It is amusing to note both the near religious fervour often displayed by those praising and defending secularism, as well as the fact that criticising unlimited freedom of expression is only possible if the freedom of expression is present.

A ray of hope for minorities in Kenya referendum vote

Mohamed Matovu, MRG’s Africa Regional Information Officer, examines the Kenyan vote for change and looks at how it will change the lives of the country’s marginalised communities.

By massively endorsing the proposed constitution with a 67% Yes vote in the recently concluded referendum, Kenyans emphatically put an end, at least on paper, to historical and ethnic injustices that have long divided their country.

“The result of the referendum”, says Kenyan constitutional law Professor Yash Ghai, “puts beyond doubt the wishes of Kenyans to bring about fundamental social and political changes – a new birth, no less.”

Despite the win, the proposed constitution raised some sticky issues reflected in the 33% of Kenyans that voted against it. Many of the ‘No’ camp came from Rift Valley Province, the location of most of the country’s land disputes and ethnic tensions. One source of controversy was the retention of Kadhi’s (Islamic family) courts, despite the fact that there have been provisions for them in the constitution since independence.

The referendum marks the beginning of a wider reform agenda agreed to by the Grand Coalition Partners – comprising major political parties that participated in the flawed 2007 presidential elections – meant to strengthen Kenya’s democracy, the rule of law and avert a repeat of the post-election violence that left scores dead, thousands displaced and property worth millions destroyed.

The far-reaching reform agenda, mediated by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, focuses on four main areas:  stopping violence and restoring fundamental rights and freedoms; addressing the humanitarian crisis and promoting national healing and reconciliation; resolving the political crisis through power-sharing; and resolving long-standing issues as a means of bringing about national reconciliation.

What is in it for marginalised communities?

Several political commentators have endorsed the new Kenya constitution’s bill of rights as “the most progressive in Africa”, stating that it is even a notch better than South Africa’s. Others have called it “easily the most ambitious in Africa”, especially in relation to how it dramatically reduces the power of the president, expands parliamentary oversight over the executive, and provides for dual citizenship.

Members of the Endorois indigenous community, Mochongoi, Rift Valley

However, the most important gain in the new constitution for minorities and indigenous peoples, who have endured all manner of exclusion, including widespread landlessness, is the recognition of their existence.

According to Nyang’ori Ohenjo, the chairman of the Minority Rights Consortium, a loose coalition of minority and indigenous groups in Kenya, the new constitution “is a huge building step which opens a lot of opportunities to have the rights of marginalised communities secured.”

For instance article 56 ensures affirmative action for minorities and marginalised groups, allowing for their participation and representation in governance and “special opportunities in educational and economic fields.” Article 63 recognises community land ownership, while article 100 directs parliament “to enact legislation to promote the representation in parliament of, among other groups, ethnic and other minorities and marginalised communities.”

“Such provisions,” argues human rights lawyer Korir Sing’oei, “are very progressive and explicit in recognising and addressing the specific concerns for minorities as far as recovering expropriated tribal or community land by big names, big money, and state functionaries is concerned.”

For Africa moreover, the new constitution is some form of continent-wide redemption because it represents an all-important victory:  a group of (civilian) reformists managing this kind of reform through a civil political process.

Unraveling the policies of the Khmer Rouge: targeted or mass killings?

Jared Ferrie, MRG’s Regional Information Officer in Phnom Penh, examines the implications for minorities of the first verdict of the Cambodian war crimes tribunal.

When the Cambodian war crimes tribunal delivered its first verdict recently, reactions varied from relief to anger. Relief because three decades after the fall of one of the bloodiest regimes of the 20^th century, Cambodians have now been provided some small measure of justice; anger because many felt the judges let a war criminal off with a relatively light sentence.

A torture chamber at the S-21 prison

Kaing Guek Eav, better known by his revolutionary name, “Duch”, was given 35 years for running a prison where as many as 17,000 people were tortured before being killed. But the court reduced his sentence by 16 years, taking into account a period of illegal detention at a Cambodian military prison, as well as time served while awaiting his trial.

This means Duch could walk free after serving a further 11 years.

The S-21 prison, now a museum.

The prison, a former high school called Tuel Sleng that became known as S-21, was where the Khmer Rouge sent many of its perceived enemies. There, they were tortured into confessing that they were spies working for the Soviet Union, the United States or Vietnam. Among the victims were members of minority communities whom prosecution lawyers say the regime targeted in particular.

The regime’s attacks against minority communities were raised during the Duch trial. But the issue is likely to take on much greater importance in the next case, when four former members of the regime’s ruling clique stand trial on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. As of December, each leader is charged with genocide, stemming from the regime’s history of targeting minority communities.

A memorial at the “Killing Fields” outside of Phnom Penh

While the regime carried out mass executions of Cambodians in general – as many as 2 million people died of execution, starvation or disease during their four-year rule – prosecutors succeeded in arguing that the Khmer Rouge targeted minority Cham Muslim and Vietnamese populations in particular.

Members of the Cham community interviewed immediately after the genocide charges were announced said they supported the judges’ decision. Tolosh Kor Seum, 42, and Mok Sika, 69, plan to testify on behalf of victims. Both said they agreed that Khmer Rouge leaders should be charged with genocide.

Tolosh said he decided to testify because he wanted to make sure an historical record exists for the next generation. ‘I want them to know how many Muslim people have been killed by the regime.’

Members of the Cham Muslim minority line up to attend the trial of “Duch”

The Khmer Rouge took a radical interpretation of communism that conflicted with Cham religious beliefs and traditions, which the regime attempted to eradicate. The result was disastrous for the Cham, members of which were the only group to rise up against the regime in armed rebellion. In response, the Khmer Rouge carried out massacres, including one that wiped out an entire Cham community on the island of Koh Phal.

In his book, The Pol Pot Regime: race, power and genocide under the Khmer Rouge, historian Ben Kiernan accuses regime leaders of using rhetoric about ridding Cambodia of those not part of the majority Khmer ethnic group.

According to research conducted by another scholar, Gregory Stanton, Cham Muslims experienced a mortality rate of more than 50 percent, while the rate affecting the general population was about 21 percent.

In March 1999, a United Nations panel of experts concluded that the regime’s targeting of minority Cham and Vietnamese communities constituted genocide, which the UN defines as ‘acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.’

Some scholars, however, disagree that charges of genocide should play a part in the upcoming trial. In a telephone interview from Melbourne, where he teaches at Monash University, historian David Chandler said it would be hard to prove in court that the regime targeted minorities specifically. He said the new charges could create a ‘smokescreen’ used by the defence to stall the proceedings.

Journalists watch the judgment of "Duch"

All four remaining defendants are elderly and have health problems. There are concerns that they may not live to see their trial through.

Philip Short, who wrote a definitive biography on the Khmer Rouge’s leader, Pol Pot, also disagreed with the genocide charges. ‘Vietnamese were indeed targeted and killed – and not only Vietnamese, but Khmers who had any contact with Vietnam and were suspected (almost always wrongly) of being traitors,’ he said in an email. ‘But they were killed for political reasons, not simply because they were of the Vietnamese race.’

Buddhist monks attend the judgment of "Duch"

He said Cham were slaughtered because of their refusal to adhere to Khmer Rouge orders, and in response to their armed rebellion. In their attacks against the Cham and Vietnamese minorities, Short characterized the regime as being motivated primarily by politics rather than genocidal intent.

The policies of the Khmer Rouge toward minority communities is sure to be one of the most hotly debated issues in the next trial, which is expected to start sometime in 2011.