Brazil: Indigenous Group Member Killed After Police Eviction

By Laura Benitez | The Argentina Independent | June 2, 2013

In last Thursday (30), an Indian was killed in Mato Grosso do Sul, during a repossession of a farm in Sidrolândia municipality which is about 60 kilometers from the capital Campo Grande.
Osiel abriel was shot dead, and according to Minister José Eduardo Cardozo, the Federal Police have opened investigation into the crime. The farm was occupied from the 15th of this month. It is in an area where there is conflict over land for more than a decade.

Indigenous groups have re-occupied farm land in Mato Grosso do Sul, South of Brazil, after being evicted on Thursday.

The groups are claiming ownership over part of the farm as they say it forms part of their ancestral lands.

The groups have occupied the land, which is owned by a local politician, Ricardo Bacha, for over two weeks. During the eviction process on Thursday, one of the group members, Osiel Abriel was shot and killed by police.

According to press reports, police officers have claimed that the group became violent during Thursday’s eviction process.

Brazil’s justice minister José Eduardo Cardozo, has called an investigation into the death of Abriel which will determine if an excessive and unnecessary use of force and firearms were used.

“We will very accurately determine what happened. If there were abuses, those responsible will be punished, “he said.

On Friday, 250 people from the group returned back to the farm to re-occupy the land.

Local media have said that although the situation continues to be “tense”, there has been no violence since the re-occupation on Friday.

Maoist attacks are a counter violence of resistance against the state: Arundhati Roy

 

First Post, May 28, 2013

(First Post) Editors note: This interview was originally run in April 2010 by CNN-IBN. Given the context of the recent attack in Chhattisgarh on a Congress convoy, (First Post) has republished the interview as it resurfaces some interesting points of view. 

In that interview, Arundhati Roy says that the Maoists have no choice but to indulge in ‘counter-violence’. Here is Roy’s interview with CNN-IBN Deputy Editor Sagarika Ghosh:

Arundhati Roy. AFP

Sagarika Ghose: You wrote your article ‘Walking with the comrades’ in The Outlook before Dantewada happened. In the aftermath of the Dantewada (incident of 2010), do you still stand by the tone of sympathy that you had with the Maoist cause in that essay?

Arundhati Roy: Well, this is a odd way to frame before and after Dantewada happened, because actually you know this cycle of violence has been building on and on. This is not the first time that a large number of security personnel have been killed by the Maoists. I have written about it and the other attacks that took place between the years 2005-07. The way I look at is, people make it sound that, ‘oh, on this side are people, who are celebrating the killing of CRPF jawans, and that side of the people who are asking for the Maoists to be wiped out.’ This is not the case. I think that you got to look at the every death as a terrible tragedy in a system, in a war that’s been pushed on the people and that unfortunately is becoming a war of the rich against the poor. In which rich put forward the poorest of the poor to fight the poor. CRPF are terrible victims but they are not just victims of the Maoists. They are victims of a system of structural violence that is taking place, that sort to be drowned in this empty condemnation industry that goes on. This is entirely meaningless because most of the time people who condemn them have really no sympathy for them. They are just using them as pawns.

UN, human rights groups examine India’s “democratic” claims and oppressive reality

UN to scrutinize Indian progress on rights

Groups say government must make significant improvements

Rita Joseph, ucanews.com, New Delhi, India
May 23, 2012

[Photo:  Homeless people share a makeshift shelter with their cattle]

Rights groups have said that India is to face “enormous human rights challenges” ahead of a UN review in Geneva tomorrow.

With the Human Rights Council set to conduct its second periodic review, Miloon Kothari, convener of the Working Group on Human Rights in India, said yesterday that the world’s second most populous country must improve on everything from poverty and housing to abuse against women and child trafficking.

“Given the enormous human rights challenges faced by India, the second Universal Periodic Review offers India an opportunity to admit its shortcomings and offer to work with the UN, civil society and independent institutions in India toward implementation of national and international human rights commitments,” Kothari, who is also a former UN special rapporteur on adequate housing in India, said at a Commonwealth Human Rights meeting in New Delhi.

More than 40 percent of children under five are under weight, he said, while India still has the highest number of malnourished people in the world at 21 percent of the population.

“While the average growth rate [in India] between 2007 and 2011 was 8.2 percent, poverty declined by only 0.8 percent,” said Kothari, adding that if India applied globally accepted standards of measurement the nationwide poverty rate would be close to 55 percent.

“Outside My Window” — poem by Jeff Hay

They Appear to be intelligent

engaging

even full of a type of life energy

and yet

there they are

with a table 

full of buttons and stickers

supporting 

advocating

voting for

a monster

On the surface

they seem to be

progressives

do they not know

have they ignored

or are they

just in denial

I’m sure

when Bush was President

they were adamantly opposed to war

to torture

to slaughtering 

blowing the guts out of

women and children

of treating “illegal” immigrants

like cockroaches

of fucking the poor

while enriching his rich buddies

of shredding the Constitution

of total disregard

for the safety of our 

food supply

of total disregard

for the climate catastrophe

that is unfolding

of being an

asshole

And yet they have  a table

outside my window

campaigning for a man

who has invaded more countries than Bush

given more money to the Banksters than Bush

deported and imprisoned more immigrants

than Bush

wiped his ass on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights

more than Bush

had more contempt for the poor

than Bush

And yet 

there they are

smiling and handing out

their buttons

and stickers

never reflecting

upon their hypocrisy

upon their 

favoring 

the policies

they hated 

when it was Bush

Then there are my 

right-wing friends

who call him a “socialist”

And if 

you’re talking about 

corporate welfare

and tax breaks for the rich

in other words

redistributing the wealth

to the already wealthy

than he is sort of a 

Robin Hood in reverse

Stealing from the poor

to give to the rich

a Socialist 

in reverse

My right-wing friends

wonder about his birth certificate

wondering about his

“muslim” name

never noticing

his glee

as he 

“changes the mindset that leads to war”

by blowing the brains

out of 

those “other” people

those “unpeople”

which he holds

in as much contempt

as Bush ever dreamed of

He said his campaign would be different

wouldn’t take huge corporate donations

he lied

He said he would filibuster

retroactive immunity for the telecoms

who helped the government

spy on us

He lied

He said in his victory speech

that global warming

would start cooling

that rising oceans

would start receding

now that he was in charge

he lied

He said he would not fill his

Administration

as Bush had

with lobbyists

he lied

He said he would close Guantanamo

instead he opened more Guantanamo’s than even Bush

He said he would make it easier 

for workers to join a union

he lied

When it came to 

who to help

he decided

that ten million people

losing their homes

while he gave trillions

of dollars

to the very people

who gave him more money

than any presidential candidate has ever received

from Wall Street

His choice was easy

I WILL FUCK THE POOR

Guess that’s 

“Socialism”

He “saved General Motors”

by giving billions to Management

while forcing pay cuts 

loss of health care

and pensions

on the workers

Guess that’s “Socialism”

He said

his administration

would be transparent and open

and democratic

he said

“whistleblowers should be protected”

he fucking lied

he has prosecuted more whistleblowers

than all other presidents in

the history of the United States combined

No President has hated democracy more than him

Oddly my right-wing friends

who loved all of this

when Bush did it

 think

he’s a Socialist”

and my “progressive” friends

who hated it when Bush did what he does

are the same

 in one way

they are tragically

ill informed

about

Barack Obama

 

Thirteen Ways the US Government Tracks Us

Tuesday, April 10, 20

by Bill Quigley

The national security state grew exponentially following 9/11, and now includes nearly 4,000 organizations across the country, employing technologies, old and new. Americans have been enlisted to track each other. “The Nationwide Suspicious Activity Reporting Initiative stores the profiles of tens of thousands of Americans and legal residents who are not accused of any crime but who are alleged to have acted suspiciously.”

“There are 3,984 federal, state and local organizations working on domestic counterterrorism.”

Privacy is eroding fast as technology offers government increasing ways to track and spy on citizens. The Washington Post reported there are 3,984 federal, state and local organizations working on domestic counterterrorism. Most collect information on people in the US. Here are thirteen examples of how some of the biggest government agencies and programs track people.

One. The National Security Agency (NSA) collects hundreds of millions of emails, texts and phone calls every day and has the ability to collect and sift through billions more. WIRED just reported NSA is building an immense new data center which will intercept, analyze and store even more electronic communications from satellites and cables across the nation and the world. Though NSA is not supposed to focus on US citizens, it does.

Two. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) National Security Branch Analysis Center (NSAC) has more than 1.5 billion government and private sector records about US citizens collected from commercial databases, government information, and criminal probes.

India: “Terrorism” Charges Crumble in Prosecution of Maoist leader Kobad Ghandy

Thanks to Delhi Police goof-up, Ghandy cleared of charges

by Jiby Kattakayam, The Hindu

Maoist leader Kobad Ghandy. File photo

But he will face trial for assuming fake identity and forging documents

New Delhi, March 28, 2012 — Communist Party of India (Maoist) leader Kobad Ghandy earned a reprieve on Wednesday when a Sessions court here discharged him of offences under the stiff Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), thanks to a defective prosecution sanction obtained by the Delhi Police. However, he will stand trial for impersonation, cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy charges under the Indian Penal Code for assuming a fake identity and forging documents. He faces a maximum of seven years’ imprisonment for these charges against life imprisonment under the UAPA charges from which he was discharged.

Additional Sessions Judge Pawan Kumar Jain said: “I am of the considered opinion that there is sufficient material on record to make out a prima facie case for the offence punishable under Sections 20 and 38 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act against accused Kobad Ghandy. But since the cognisance order dated February 19, 2010, qua the offences punishable under the UAPA was not in accordance with the mandatory provisions of Section 45(2) of the UAPA, I hereby discharge accused Kobad Ghandy for the offences punishable under Section 10/13/18/20/38 of the UAPA. Similarly, I also discharge accused Rajinder Kumar for the offences punishable under Section 10/13/18/19/20 UAPA. However, there is sufficient material on record to make out a prima facie case against both the accused for the offences punishable under Section 419/420/468/474/120B Indian Penal Code.”

Ghandy’s counsel Rebecca John had pointed out that the investigating officer had violated Section 45(2) of the UAPA by not submitting the evidence he gathered to an independent authority constituted by the Central or State government, which after vetting the documents was to recommend the sanctioning authority (the Lieutenant Governor) to grant sanction for prosecution. Realising the blunder committed, the prosecution, last week, belatedly submitted a fresh prosecution sanction as per the Act in the form of a supplementary charge sheet.

“There is nothing to show that the evidence collected by the investigating officer was independently reviewed by any authority appointed by the Central government or that after review of collected evidence, such authority had ever made any recommendation to the Central government … Needless to say, the main object of imposing condition of independent review is to prevent the misuse of the stringent provisions of the UAPA by the law-enforcing agencies … Since provisions were inserted by Parliament, thus the State cannot take the plea that State was not aware of the provisions …. By obtaining the fresh sanction, prosecution is trying to cure an incurably bad sanction order, which in the absence of any provisions of law is not permissible,” Mr. Jain said.

The court said it was clear that Ghandy was an “active member” of the CPI (Maoist) and it appeared that “his role was to persuade people and exhort them for Maoism.” The court also noted that he had prepared forged documents in the name of Dilip Patel in order to conceal his identity and avoid arrest.

Mr. Jain added: “There is sufficient material on record to hold prima facie that accused Ghandy was a vibrant member of CPI (Maoist). Since the CPI (Maoist) is a declared terrorist organisation, presumption will [be] that [the] CPI (Maoist) is involved in terrorist acts. Accordingly, I am of the view that prima facie a case is made out against the accused Kobad Ghandy for the offence punishable under Section 20 and 38 of the UAPA.”

The judge further said there was no evidence on record to show that Ghandy had committed any terrorist act and hence he could not be called a “terrorist.” This finding also helped co-accused Rajinder, who was discharged for offence under Section 19 of the UAPA for harbouring a terrorist.