PALESTINA/IZRAEL:
Günther Grass: Izrael kao prijetnja svjetskom miru
Njemački nobelovac Guenter Grass napao je u srijedu Izrael kao prijetnju svjetskom miru i kazao da toj državi ne smije biti dopušteno da napadne Iran... Grass (84), iskusni ljevičarski aktivist i kritičar zapadnih vojnih intervencija poput one u Iraku, također je osudio njemačku prodaju oružja Izraelu u pjesmi pod naslovom "Što se mora izreći" objavljenoj u srijedu u nekoliko novina u Njemačkoj te u New York Timesu i talijanskoj Republici.
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HRVATSKA:
Protiv privatizacije
Web stranice inicijative "Protiv privatizacije"
Protiv privatizacije je inicijativa čiji je cilj stvaranjem pritiska odozdo kroz različite direktne akcije pokušati spriječiti privatizacije koje je u 2012. najavila nova vlada. Privatizacija i deindustrijalizacija uz stvaranje nove kapitalističke elite (Tuđmanovih “200 obitelji”), kojoj je društvena imovina predana na lijepe oči, jedan je od glavnih uzroka većine današnjih hrvatskih ekonomskih problema. Mnoga uspješna poduzeća, poput Hrvatskog telekoma ili banaka, prodana su u bescjenje (često nakon namjernog sustavnog upropaštavanja) i putem njih se danas izvlače golemi profiti iz zemlje. Mnoga nekoć uspješna poduzeća, poput Plive, privatizirana su i svedena na sjenku svoje nekadašnje moći. Nova vlada je samo nastavila takvu štetnu politiku te ju dapače pokušava dotjerati do i u svijetu nezamislivih granica najavljujući postupnu i djelomičnu privatizaciju čak i škola, zatvora, staračkih domova, nacionalnih parkova, najavljujući davanje autocesta u koncesiju… Ukratko – potpuna rasprodaja i nastavak bezumne politike koja nas je u ovaj položaj i dovela. Među ostalim, najavljuje se i privatizacija Hrvatske poštanske banke (koja je lani ostvarila dobit od 87,7 milijuna kuna), Croatia osiguranja (lani dobit od 104,7 milijuna kuna) i kutinske Petrokemije (lani dobit od 107,8 milijuna kuna). Ako se gledaju interesi društva, riječ je o potpuno bezumnim potezima kojima će se nakratko zakrpati rupe u proračunu, ali će se dugoročno izgubiti profitabilna poduzeća koja svake godine vraćaju novce u proračun. Problem je u tome što ova vlada, kao ni prethodne, ne radi u interesu 99% ljudi u Hrvatskoj, nego u interesu 1% političko-gospodarske “elite” i stranih vjerovnika kojima treba vratiti dugove.
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Divovski promašaj
Država uporno nije željela prepustiti brodogradilišta na upravljanje osobama koje bi se nametnule stručnošću i osvjedočenim zalaganjem za javni interes, nego je tamo namještala stranačke pomazanike. Tako je postupala – i to svaka vlast kroz dva protekla desetljeća – i s drugim državnim i javnim poduzećima. U svima njima, osim Uljanika kao izuzetka, korupcija je nesmetano cvala do enormnih razmjera, a privatni kooperanti su iznosili sav mogući profit i državi ostavljali gubitke i dugove. Na dičnoj hrvatskoj brodogradnji, baš kao i na cestogradnji, recimo, obogatio se mnogi dotadašnji mali obrtnik. I sad, uvjeravaju nas, ništa logičnije se ne da smisliti doli prepuštanja brodogradnje takvim nekim brižnim privatnicima, jer je država, vele, više nego očito – najgori gazda. Na jednako logično pitanje, zašto se ne bi makar sad škverovi povjerili struci, odnosno samim njihovim radnicima, zagovornici privatizacije unisono odgovaraju kako država više nema prostora za novo zaduživanje i novi poslovni rizik. Za radnike ne, za privatnog kupca da. Ipak, premijer Zoran Milanović najavio je novu turu pregovora s Europskom unijom, koja inzistira na svršetku ove priče, kako bi se iznašlo neko rješenje za 3. maj te Brodotrogir. Da bismo shvatili s kojih pozicija će Milanović tom zgodom pohoditi Bruxelles, prisjetimo se njegovih prigovora otprije neki dan, povodom gašenja Kraljevice, a na račun posrnule brodogradnje. Škverovi su, govori on, ugrađivali previše uvoznih dijelova. Baš kao da su škverovi krivi za temeljito uništenje gotovo kompletnog ostatka hrvatske industrije i svega onog što se ugrađuje u brod, od metala, plastike, drva, gume i tekstila. Tako zatvaramo krug i dolazimo do temeljne zamjene teza u hrvatskoj ekonomskoj politici. Nema što više Milanović pregovarati s Europskom unijom, dok i on i ona poriču odgovornost elite za uništavanje proizvodnje i samim tim radničkih pozicija, u korist globaliziranog krupnog kapitala te financijaškog i trgovačkog biznisa. A privatizacija ama baš svega je njima cilj, nikakva posljedica niti gruba neminovnost.
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SIRIJA:
HRW: "We Live as in War" Crackdown on Protesters in the Governorate of Homs
Witnesses also reported security forces' use of heated metal rods to burn different parts of the body, use of electric shocks, use of stress positions for hours or even days at a time, and the use of improvised devices, such as car tires (locally known as the dulab), to force the bodies of detainees into positions that make it easier to beat them on sensitive parts of the body, like the soles of the feet and head. ... Syria remains off-limits to international journalists and human rights groups, and communications are often interrupted in affected areas. However, an expanding network of activists grouping themselves in local coordination committees and making extensive use of the Internet and social groups have compiled a list of 3,121 civilians dead, including 232children, as of November 2, 2011. On October 14, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay deplored the "devastatingly remorseless toll of human lives" in Syria and said the death toll had exceeded 3,000 people. ... "As we were burying the dead, I suddenly heard gunshots. Four pick-up vehicles with people in uniforms, helmets, and body armor drove up, shooting at the people with their automatic guns and guns mounted on the vehicles. We started running away. The mother and brother of one of the dead were killed next to his coffin. ..." ... "... Then two cars showed up suddenly and opened fire, targeting people even as they were ducking and lying on the ground. They were white Kia Cerato cars with tinted windows, like those used by Air Force intelligence. The guns were machine guns. ... In all, I saw four people killed, all by machine guns from those two cars. I don't know their names, but one was pregnant, one was about a year-and-a-half old, one was 30 years old, and one was 25 years old." ... According to the witness accounts, most of the violence was perpetrated by mukhabarat forces or shabeeha militias. In at least one case, in Tal Kalakh on May 14, a witness said that mukhabarat forces shot to death an army officer for refusing to open fire on protesters. ... a mukhabarat officer who defected told Human Rights Watch that a high-ranking mukhabarat officer ordered the soldiers to fire on the protesters holding a sit-in in the New Clock Tower Square in Homs on April 19, even though they knew that the protesters were unarmed. ...: "... At around 3:30 a.m., we got an order from Colonel Abdel Hamid Ibrahim from Air Force security to shoot at the protesters. We were shooting for more than half an hour. There were dozens and dozens of people killed and wounded. Thirty minutes later, earth diggers and fire trucks arrived. The diggers lifted the bodies and put them in a truck. I don't know where they took them. The wounded ended up at the military hospital in Homs. And then the fire trucks started cleaning the square." ... One local activist explained to Human Rights Watch that since June, army defections had increased and that many neighborhoods had about 15-20 defectors who would sometimes intervene when they heard gunfire. ...: "There was a huge protest. Thousands of protesters marching from three mosques eventually joined at a roundabout near Brazil Street. Security forces first fired teargas. Then they opened fire with blanks, before they started using live fire. About seven protesters were injured. At that point, several defectors showed up on motorcycles and killed 14 or 15 members of the security forces using Kalashnikovs and pump-action shotguns. By the time the security forces returned with reinforcements, the protesters had dispersed." ... "... When they returned him to the cell two hours later, he was half-dead. No matter where you touched his body, he screamed in pain. He had black-and-red marks from electric shocks on his hands, legs, and back. They pulled out nails on his hands. The interrogators also used an electric drill on him – he had holes from the drill on his hands, hips, knees, and feet. He was bleeding profusely. We asked the guard to give him medical assistance, but they refused. ..." ... "After the nurses stitched my wound without applying any anesthesia, the guards took me into a detention facility in the hospital, threw me on the ground, and started beating me. I told them I was injured and cried, asking them not to beat me, but they didn't stop. They put me on a bed, and when they removed my blindfold, I saw five other detainees, all with gunshot wounds, on the beds around me. Two hours later one of the guards came in, and beat me again. Then I saw him heating up a metal rod on a gas heater. I was terrified that he would use it on me, but instead he walked up to another man – he was naked, and his hands were cuffed. The guard put the red-hot metal rod to his testicles. The man screamed, saying he was innocent. The guard then beat him with the same rod, and then heated it up again, this time burning his feet." ... "A week after he was detained, his body was returned to his parents. I saw the body when it was brought in. It was covered in bruises and oval red and blue marks that seemed to be from electric shocks, mostly on his back. His ribs were broken – some of the ribs were sticking out of his body. His father said that he had been called into the central facility of the Military Intelligence in Homs and made to sign a statement saying that Ahmad had been killed by “extremists.” He said the security forces threatened to otherwise not only keep the body but also "go after his daughters." So he had no choice but to sign it." ... Residents of Homs interviewed by Human Rights Watch repeated allegations that mutilated bodies of people who had previously been detained were dumped in public gardens and other areas in the city. ... Human Rights Watch believes that the nature and scale of abuses committed by the Syrian security forces across the country, and in Homs Governorate, indicate that crimes including murder, torture, unlawful imprisonment, and enforced disappearances, amounting to crimes against humanity, have been committed. The similarities in the apparent unlawful killings, including evidence of security forces shooting at protesters without any warning in repeated instances, arbitrary detention, enforced disappearances, and torture, indicate the existence of a widespread or systematic attack against the civilian population, which has the backing of the state. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity can also be committed during times of peace, if they are part of a widespread or systematic attack against a civilian population. ... Because crimes against humanity are considered crimes of universal jurisdiction, all states are responsible for bringing to justice those responsible. International jurisprudence and standards establish that persons responsible for crimes against humanity, as well as other serious violations of human rights, should not be granted amnesty for those crimes. ... Human Rights Watch supports the call by the High Commission for Human Rights for a referral to the International Criminal Court (ICC). Human Rights Watch believes that in the current situation the ICC is the forum most capable of effectively investigating and prosecuting those bearing most responsibility for any crimes committed and offering accountability to the Syrian people. In the absence of the government of Syria ratifying the Rome statute, or referring the situation itself to the ICC, the Court requires a referral by the Security Council to be seized of the matter. However in the event of continued stalemate at the Security Council, Human Rights Watch recalls that crimes against humanity may also be subject to universal jurisdiction, and urges other countries to consider the exercise of universal jurisdiction for crimes committed in Syria.
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Human Rights Watch reporting on Syria
Stranica Human Rights Watch-a s izvještajima o kršenjima ljudskih prava i zločinima protiv čovječnosti počinjenim u Siriji.
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AI: HEALTH CRISIS: SYRIAN GOVERNMENT TARGETS THE WOUNDED AND HEALTH WORKERS
In Homs, one of Syria's major cities and governorates, government security forces have obstructed ambulances on their way to pick up wounded people and when ferrying the wounded to hospital, threatened Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) workers with violence or detention and interrogated wounded patients while they were still being conveyed in ambulances. ... The security forces have regularly entered state hospitals in search of people injured during the protests, who are liable to be arrested, detained incommunicado and subjected to torture or other ill-treatment. In consequence, unsurprisingly, many people are now reportedly avoiding state-run hospitals if they or their relatives have been wounded during the protests and unrest, and turning instead to private hospitals where they may obtain treatment without exposing themselves to likely arrest or to the makeshift field hospitals that have been set up by some local communities to treat people shot or otherwise wounded by the army and security forces. These private and field hospitals, however, face problems in obtaining adequate medical supplies, including blood for use in transfusions, which they can obtain only from the Central Blood Bank controlled by the Ministry of Defence. ... Many know that the security forces have raided hospitals in which they believed wounded unrest victims were being treated and are probably aware that a number of health professionals have been detained, and in some cases tortured, for seeking to protect patients in their care. ... "... Among them was a boy, aged around 15, injured in his foot. We, the doctors, were attending to more serious injuries as he waited on a bed… I remember hearing shrieks of pain, so I walked towards the voice and saw a male nurse hitting the boy hard on his injury and swearing at him as he poured surgical spirit on the injured foot in an act that clearly intended to cause the boy additional pain... ..." ... "I stood at the door of the emergency room while [“Ahmed”] was unconscious as he was being stitched. There were around seven or eight security men, some carrying rifles, and nurses wearing white robes crowded around him. He opened his eyes and said: ‘Where am I?’ They all suddenly jumped on him and started beating him and hitting him, including a nurse wearing a white robe and a security man with a stick. They shouted foul language at him and said: ‘You pig, you want freedom, eh?’..." ... "Ahmed" told him he had been beaten mercilessly, particularly on his stomach, by both security officials and male nurses at Tell Kalakh hospital. Then he was taken to the military hospital in Homs because his head wound started bleeding, only to be beaten and verbally abused again, though doctors did re-stitch his wound. He was moved to Military Security as a detainee, interrogated for several hours despite his injuries, and reportedly given electric shocks to his testicles, chest and neck. Next day, he was again interrogated from around 9am until the evening and was seen by other detainees to be in a very bad condition when returned to his cell. He said he had been forced into a stress position for a prolonged period and tortured with electric shocks. His fellow detainees asked a guard for anti-inflammatory pills and painkillers for him but were told there were none. ... "We were not treated like humans; it was like we were animals… for four days, I was cuffed to the bed by my feet and hands and it was hard to move… without food or water. Once I asked [the sergeant] for water, so he said: ‘Okay, I will give you water,’ and he peed on me… We were not allowed to use the toilet… we did it on the bed… sometimes as I closed my eyes to sleep, [the sergeant] would hit me with a baton made of wire cables… Nurses and doctors wearing white robes would come to the room, share a laughter with [the sergeant]… one told him that it was enough that we were beaten, he didn't have to pee on us… another came and watched us and then shouted that we deserved what we're going through because we were animals… Female nurses would come to the room at different times just to poke us with needles. I was poked by at least four nurses on around five different occasions to my face, feet and abdomen." ... For example, in two separate incidents at the Military Police facility, a wounded man and a wounded woman were tortured with a heated iron skewer placed on their genitals. ... Soldiers stabbed 21-year-old "Samer" twice in the buttocks with a bayonet during his arrest on 17 May 2011 in a town in the governorate of Homs. He was taken to Homs military hospital's morgue to identify bodies of men from his home town. "I was blindfolded and my hands were tied behind my back. The security man wrapped a mask over my mouth and took me to a very cold room. I wasn't told what it was. Then the security man ordered another man, who apparently worked at the hospital, to show corpse number one. He removed the blindfold and told me not to dare to raise my head. 'Don't look up, I will kill you. Just look where I direct you,' he told me. They opened a black nylon sack and I could see a corpse from the head to the chest. It was the corpse of X. I told him who it was. He wrote down the name on a piece of paper and tagged the corpse. His right eye was stitched, he was hit with bullets on the right shoulder and what appeared to be a stab to the chest. I remained composed but was crying deep inside me. Then he made me stand back and put the blindfold on my eyes again, and ordered the hospital worker to bring corpse number two. They showed me only the face and neck and I saw Y. It was as if they have burned his hair and beard, and his neck seemed to be broken because it was loose. Then I was told to stand back and he said: bring corpse number three. It was Z and his neck looked black and his teeth were black and his face was a bit disfigured, specifically his right eye and his chest as if they had stabbed him with a bayonet on the chest two or three times. There were maggots on the left side of his stomach. Again, he tagged the name I gave him on the corpse. Corpse number four was so disfigured that I couldn't recognize it. It was as if one side of his face had melted. I said: 'Sidi [sir], I don't know him.' So he started moving his face right and left but I just couldn't tell who he was. He showed me other corpses and I think the total was 10 corpses. I said I didn't know any of them. He got angry and said: 'So, you don't know them, eh? Okay, they will introduce themselves to you!' He opened the morgue door, blindfolded me again and pushed me inside and I fell face down on what I could feel was a body. I got up with difficulty as I was wounded in my backside, blindfolded and my hands tied. As I pulled myself up to stand up because I didn't want to lie down between the bodies, I tried to avoid stepping on any of the bodies. I finally stood up… I started praying silently so that God will make things easier for me. I then tried to put my mind off the fact that I'm confined in the morgue, and I started thinking about my family and friends, anything in the outside world that will make me forget where I was. After around one or two hours, I felt so cold deep in my bones and couldn't stop shivering… my bones were shivering, so I shouted to them: I beg you; I swear to God I now know them… I know them all. So they opened the door and dragged me. He ordered me to kneel down. I told him I was wounded but he forced me to kneel. He removed the blindfold and asked me to raise my head and then poured an entire bottle of surgical spirit over my head. I first thought it was water, but then realized it was medical alcohol from the smell and its burning effect. He wiped my eyes and then brought a small digital photo camera… he showed me photos of the same corpses that I saw earlier, and I repeated the names of the first three, and then recognized another two. The rest, I couldn't recognize… but didn't dare to say so, so I just came up with names of people I know from our town. I had to save myself. I was taken blindfolded but able to look from under it in a bus and they threw me on the bus floor and men there were stepping on me and hitting me. I told them I was wounded, they asked where? And when I pointed to the injury, they beat me hard on it. Then I started bleeding and someone ordered them to stay away from me. So they started spitting and swearing at me. We arrived at the Branch [probably Military Security], and were taken to the interrogators. They removed the blindfold and asked me to keep my eyes on the floor. Then one brought a camera and showed me the same corpses and every time I gave the name of a corpse, he would put an electric taser on me. It made my voice shiver. When I reached the last corpse, I couldn't remember the name I gave earlier, and came up with another name. So he put the electric taser on my left leg and kept it there for a while and then asked the guard to take me away." "Samer" was released in the first week of June after putting his thumb print to documents he says he was not permitted to read. ... However, when the ambulance had picked up the wounded person at about 10.35pm, it came under fire, apparently from the security forces as it took the alternative route from Haret al-Hameediye to Abu al-Hol Street. Three SARC volunteers were injured, including Mohamed Hakam Durraq al-Siba'i who died eight days later. ... on the night of 5-6 August at 12.30am, SARC was called to help an injured 14-year-old girl in Hayy al-Fakhoura in Homs. The ambulance was stopped at three security checkpoints on al-'Adawiyya, around a 2km-long street. ... the officer decided to keep the other five IDs to make sure that the ambulance returned to his checkpoint, warning the crew that if they did not return after five minutes, he would consider the ambulance stolen and it would be hit "with a propelled grenade". Fortunately, the girl was conscious and could walk, despite injuries to the pelvis, and the ambulance returned to the checkpoint within the five-minute deadline. ... The officer who initially had stopped them entered the ambulance holding his rifle – a clear breach of SARC rules – and questioned the girl. When she explained that she had been shot while in her grandfather's garden, the officer accused her of lying. ... With mistrust deepening about government-run hospitals, a growing number of wounded people and their families and friends have been opting to find treatment in less well equipped private hospitals or makeshift field hospitals. In response, the authorities have restricted the medical care that such facilities can offer. ... "He was bleeding heavily and shrieking from pain… we had no anaesthetics and no blood units, and all we could do was clean his wound, and provide him with painkillers and serum… What we needed were blood units, an anaesthetic, and a surgeon, and all are usually available at al-Bassel Hospital. But it was impossible to take Majed there because the army and security occupied the hospital and snipers positioned on its rooftop shot at anyone in their line of vision." ... Mohamed Majed al-Akkari died two days later. Video footage was taken of his body on the floor of a house. Two ice blocks had been put on top of him as it was too dangerous to take his body to the hospital morgue, which had been taken over by the army. He was eventually buried in the garden. ... "Communications and electricity were cut off, so we couldn't use essential medical equipment such as the XRay machine, which we desperately needed to locate the bullets lodged in the body… We had to perform clinical examinations without any diagnostic investigations." Private hospitals and health professionals working in them suspected of treating the wounded without informing the authorities and providing blood units from a source other than the Central Blood Bank have been targeted by government forces. The medical care of patients has also been compromised during security raids of hospitals after which wounded people have been taken away against medical advice. In at least one case, security forces stormed an operating theatre while a patient was undergoing surgery. ... he was in pain throughout and unable to stand after sustaining an abdominal wound and being tortured at the National Hospital in Banias. His interrogator allowed him to sit while being questioned, blindfolded and with his hands cuffed, but neither he nor the two other wounded detainees were examined by a doctor or treated for their injuries. Following this, "Mohamed" was moved to "Branch 235", a security installation in Damascus where he was subjected to further torture and abuse but received no medical care throughout the 17 days that he was held there. Boiling water was poured onto his neck, armpit and the soles of his feet and he and other detainees were whipped by guards. He told Amnesty International that he had feared to ask for access to a doctor. ... Medical staff have been among the thousands of people who have been arrested and tortured by the security forces since the current unrest began in March. Some have been detained for treating people injured during the unrest without reporting them to the authorities, others because of their participation in anti-government demonstrations or because they are suspected of providing information about human rights violations by Syrian security forces. ... "We were blindfolded with our hands tied behind our backs, and they swore at us and beat us badly. One of the doctors was wearing his white robe when he was arrested, and he was picked on a lot. They would say: 'So you're the one who treats the wounded, aren't you?' He attracted the attention of all the security personnel, and no one missed beating him. We were taken to the Military Security in Homs where we were welcomed with kicks and slaps to the face, and then placed in an overcrowded room… ... my colleagues, two doctors and the head of nursing, were beaten up badly… At the late stage of our detention, I was taken to an investigating judge and he told me that I had confessed to protesting and rioting. I said that I hadn't and that they forced me to sign a document that I had not read because I was blindfolded. I was released in late August on bail along with my colleagues and now face charges of protesting and damaging the image of the state… Since it would be improper to put us on trial for treating the wounded, they came up with such charges." ... He and the others were taken to the local sports stadium where there were hundreds of men, including some elderly men and a number of boys, who had been detained during the crackdown. They were blindfolded and had their wrists secured with plastic ties. ... "Soldiers and security would come in turn, and ask: 'Where is the doctor? Where is the doctor?' Then they would beat him very hard… They would taunt the nurse, ["Ihab"], saying: 'Look how beautiful he looks, wearing green!' Then I could hear a loud collision of the thick wooden baton against his body followed by "Ihab's" loud shrieking... As they hit him, they would say: 'You were at the hospital, weren't you? Treating the wounded, weren't you?'"
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