Monday, October 27, 2008
Which way the wind blows?, by Richard Martineau
Journal de Montréal
At each election, it's the same thing: we always wondered why so many people do not even bother to vote.
Well, my answer to that question.
A two-pronged response: Pierre Auger and Michel André Reidl.
RATHER THAN RED DEAD
Imagine: you vote for two candidates adéquistes because you want to kick ass party in power, and what happens?
The two candidates that you have elected their badge ADQ throw in the trash and join the ranks of party you want to dislodge!
Hello slap in the face ...
Pierre Michel Auger and André Reidl did not even have the decency to declare itself independent members, no. They immediately jumped into the liner of the Prime Minister not to sink the boat with their former leader.
And do not come tell me that because our two zozos suddenly converted to liberal credo. These guys are completely not care program PLQ (as it does not care from the ADQ). All they want is a job.
The ruling party would have been obedience Communist qu'Auger and Reidl had sung gloriously The Internationale, the torso draped in a flag bearing the effigy of Lenin.
As Jacques Dutronc sang: "I am for Communism / I am for socialism / And capitalism / Because I am opportunistic / There are those who contest / Who claim and protesting / I do that a single gesture / I return my jacket / Always on the right side / I trust the voters / And I want to do my butter ... "
AT GENIES OF NONOS <7b>
As for Jean Charest, he demonstrated an even cynicism.
One day, the ADQ is a party of two of pique populous ignorant and uneducated. The next day, the two defectors from the party of Mario Dumont are welcomed with pride and enthusiasm.
Why? Because Jean Charest is that they are candidates value?
No. Because it made two more members of its board. Auger and Reidl have the IQ of a refrigerator light that the Prime Minister vanterait great intelligence.
All these people will not care voters and democracy. All that interests them is to push the puck in the net of the opponent.
SAILING
All sociologists and economists say Quebec is in trouble up to his neck.
The solutions we are out of the hole. All specialists know. But no politician will not apply.
Why? For that. For the same reason Reidl and Auger have switched parties, and Jean Charest has welcomed with open arms.
Because politicians think only one single thing: staying in power. Getting re-elected.
They will not care in Quebec, they will not care in Canada, they will not care of ideology, welfare workers, health of democracy or program of their party.
They are neither right nor left, green or red or blue.
They are in the wind, that's all.
And they adjust their sails under his leadership.
Labels: Action Démocratique du Québec, Elections, Parti Libéral du Québec, Québec, Richard Martineau
Save the topless bars!, by Richard Martineau
There's a wind of Puritanism breath on the country.
After Stephen Harper which is a sign of the cross when he hears the word "seal" and the status of women who skate hair legs when Madonna closed the leg a bit too high, it is now the turn of the mayor of Granby want to close the last topless bar of the municipality to protect "the family-oriented downtown."
Montreal going to imitate Granby? Not according to the spokeswoman for the Mayor Tremblay.
"Montreal has a strong economic, cultural and international," said Ms. Sauriol to the Journal.
A JEWEL OF OUR HERITAGE
What topless bars have to do with the economy, tourism and culture, you ask yourself?
Well, everything.
First, topless bars are part of Quebec.
What we found in each municipality of La Belle Province? A case pop, a chemist Jean-Coutu, a church and a bar dancers. With factories in corrugated iron and trailers to potato chips, these monuments are the four pillars of the architectural heritage of Quebec.
From Red Light of Val-d'Or to Triple Sexe of Jonquière through Sherbrooke The Tigress and The Body Shop Saint-Antoine, bars dancers are Quebecois villages that are covered bridges in southern U.S. .
TRAPPES TO TOURISTS
You really think that tourists come to Montreal to see the Olympic Stadium, Place Ville-Marie and Notre Dame?
No: they come to Montreal to go have a drink at Parée and at Wanda's.
Ruins, buildings and churches, tourists have mass home. That their fate by the ears.
But beautiful girls running around on a pole She's Got The Look for Roxette, that they do not.
Instead of closing the topless bars, the mayors of Quebec should subsidize.
No, it's true: what would the hockey players if Parée did not exist? Where they meet their blond?
THE MECQUE
Why do racing fans like they come to Montreal, do you? For the beauty of the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve?
No. They like to come here because Montreal has more bars dancers per square kilometer than any other North American city.
It is not Gérald Tremblay, Raymond Bachand and Michael Fortier should be sent to the bedside of Bernie Ecclestone to save the F-1. It is the owners of clubs of the metropolis dancers! The owner of Solid Gold, manager of Super Sex!
They not find words to mollify Bernie. The words, but the images.
And then, everyone knows that Montreal is one of the world capitals of dance. Marie Chouinard, Ginette Laurin, Edouard Lock and Louise Lecavalier are recognized by all over the world.
Ditto for the young and nice Sandra in the second part of his show ...
In short, not sure that the mayor of Granby has made the right decision in closing the last club dancers in the city.
After all, if he does not like the idea that people pay to see furry creatures, why do farm he not the zoo?
Labels: Religion and fanaticism, Richard Martineau, Secularism, Sex
Friday, October 24, 2008
International Criminal Court’s Trial of Thomas Lubanga, by Marie-Êve Marineau
What is the current status of the Lubanga case?
In its decision of September 3, 2008, Trial Chamber I rejected the prosecution’s application to lift the stay of proceedings in the trial of Thomas Lubanga, which the trial chamber imposed on June 13, 2008. In that earlier decision, the trial chamber unanimously decided to “stay” the proceedings against Lubanga—therefore suspending the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) first-ever trial— because the prosecution was unable to release more than 200 documents containing potentially “exculpatory” information that it gathered during its investigation. The court defines “exculpatory” material as documentation that shows or tends to show the innocence of the accused, that mitigates the guilt of the accused, or information which may affect the credibility of the prosecution evidence. According to the judges, “the right to a fair trial—which is without doubt a fundamental right—includes an entitlement to disclosure of exculpatory material.”
The information at issue was collected under article 54(3)(e) of the Rome Statute. Under this provision, the prosecution can agree to receive documents or information on a confidential basis “solely for the purpose of generating new evidence.” This confidential information is supposed to be a “springboard” for the prosecution to collect new evidence in its investigations that can be used at trial. If the prosecution wants to use any of this information at trial—or to fulfill its obligation to disclose exculpatory material collected under this provision to the defense—it must get permission from the source. The sources at issue had previously refused to consent to the disclosure of the potentially exculpatory information in the prosecutor’s possession.
Does that mean Lubanga will be released?
This ruling does not mean that Lubanga will be released. On June 23, the prosecution filed an appeal of the trial chamber’s June 13 decision challenging the court’s decision to “stay” the proceedings, among other issues. Any decision relating to Lubanga’s release is tied to the appeals chamber decision. That decision is still pending.
Then why did the trial chamber issue a decision?
While any decision regarding Lubanga’s release depends on the outcome of the decision of the appeals chamber, in the meantime, the prosecution has been working to disclose the more than 200 documents containing exculpatory information in a manner that would address the trial chamber’s concerns and would “restart” the Lubanga trial. The trial chamber retained the power to “lift” the stay that it had imposed at any time, provided certain conditions were met. The trial chamber decided that the prosecutor’s proposals did not meet its conditions to restart the trial.
Why did the trial chamber reject the prosecutor’s proposals?
The trial chamber felt that there were still too many restrictions on the potentially exculpatory documents to ensure that Lubanga would receive a fair trial. The more than 200 documents at issue were provided to the Office of the Prosecutor by the United Nations (UN) and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and could not be disclosed without the information providers’ consent.
Of the roughly 200 documents, 152 were from the UN. Of these, the UN was imposing restrictions—in terms of the trial chamber’s review of the documents and their disclosure to the defense—on 99 of them. Of the remaining more than 50 documents from NGOs, disclosure is currently being contemplated with respect to only 3 documents. It was uncertain how many of the remaining NGO documents would be disclosed and in what form.
Why cannot the information providers simply turn over the information?
As mentioned earlier, the information at issue was collected under article 54(3)(e) of the Rome Statute, which means that if the material is to be used in any way at trial—even if it is exculpatory—the prosecution must get permission from the source. Requiring consent from the information providers helps to ensure, for example, that these sources are not unknowingly or unwillingly exposed to safety risks because of their cooperation with the ICC. This is particularly relevant for sources that operate in countries where the ICC is carrying out investigations.
In its decision, the trial chamber stated that “responsibility for the continuing problems […] does not rest with the information providers, who have sought to discharge their respective mandates. As the Trial Chamber has previously observed, the United Nations and the NGOs entered into the relevant agreements in good faith, and thereafter have sought to assist the court to the extent that is consistent with their individual responsibilities.”
Labels: Human Rights Watch, Marie-Êve Marineau
Kyrgyzstan: Protect Lesbians and Transgender Men From Abuse, by Iba Bouramine
Based on detailed interviews, the 49-page report, “These Everyday Humiliations: Violence Against Lesbians, Bisexual Women, and Transgender Men in Kyrgyzstan,” tells of beatings, forced marriages, and physical and psychological abuse faced by lesbian and bisexual women and transgender men. The government refuses to protect them or to confront the atmosphere of prejudice in which the attacks take place.
“No one should have to confront brutality or danger because of who they are or whom they love,” said Boris Dittrich, advocacy director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program at Human Rights Watch. “It is time for the government to protect these communities instead of denying they exist.”
The report notes that the OSCE, which conducts programs in Kyrgyzstan, works to combat hate crimes and identity-based violence throughout Europe. However, the United States and the Holy See have blocked including sexual orientation in its mandate.
Several people interviewed for the report said they had been raped to punish them for not conforming to gender norms, or to “cure” them of their difference. One lesbian told how, when she was 15, her girlfriend’s brothers raped her brutally, saying: “This is your punishment for being this way and hanging around our sister.”
Another woman told Human Rights Watch that an acquaintance locked her in a room and allowed several men to rape her. The men promised the acquaintance “that they would help her to ‘cure’ me” of being a lesbian, she said.
Pervasive social prejudice in the Central Asian country leaves the victims with little hope of government protection, the report says. The police themselves sometimes abuse lesbian and bisexual women and transgender men. Police have also raided and harassed organizations that defend the basic rights of these groups.
In all of Kyrgyzstan, only one shelter for survivors of domestic violence – run by a nongovernmental organization – offers specific services for lesbians or transgender people.
A sweeping law passed in 2003 should protect all victims of domestic violence. However, the report found that much more needs to be done to carry out the law, including training criminal justice officials to investigate domestic violence and educating the general public about the law’s provisions.
The government has ignored the need to address issues of sexual orientation or gender identity. In some cases, officials have actually endorsed hatred and violence. In 2005, a Ministry of Interior official said of lesbians and gay men at a human rights roundtable: “I would also beat them. Let’s say I walk in a park with my son. And there are two guys walking holding each other’s hands. I would beat them up too.”
While Kyrgyzstan has made efforts to respond to violence against women overall, some groups are still ignored or excluded. Human Rights Watch called on Kyrgyz authorities to improve direct services for lesbians and transgender men; to train state officials in issues of sexual orientation and gender identity; to educate the public about domestic violence and sexual-rights issues, and to create measures for legal identity change to respect and recognize each person’s self-defined gender identity.
Human Rights Watch also urged the OSCE to address human rights issues, including discrimination and violence against lesbians and transgender men, in its trainings for police and other programs in Kyrgyzstan.
“Programs to stop violence will not work unless they reach everyone who is vulnerable,” Dittrich said. “Europe should not join Kyrgyzstan’s government in turning a blind eye.”
Labels: Human Rights Watch, Iba Bouramine, Kyrgyzstan
EU: Stand Firm Against Diplomatic Assurances, by Noémie Cournoyer
The 36-page report, titled “Not the Way Forward: The UK’s Dangerous Reliance on Diplomatic Assurances,” calls on the EU to uphold its own guidelines on torture and to refuse to legitimate unreliable promises against torture made by abusive governments.
“The reason there’s a global ban on sending people back to places where they might be tortured is precisely because abusive governments can’t be trusted,” said Julia Hall, senior counterterrorism counsel at Human Rights Watch. “Terrorism suspects at risk of torture in their home countries should have fair trials in the EU.”
The report details the British government’s advocacy in various EU-related forums in favor of broader acceptance of diplomatic assurances, which British officials claim are “an effective way forward” for European countries. The UK is currently leading an effort, through the G6 (group of interior ministers from France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, and the UK), for broader EU endorsement of its “deportation with assurances” policy. At meetings in Venice and Sopot in 2007, the G6 issued concluding statements urging the further exploration of possibilities for employing diplomatic assurances and seeking consensus on their use in the EU.
The UK also advocated for consideration of national security expulsions in reliance on diplomatic assurances prior to a Justice and Home Affairs Council meeting in November 2007. The working group setting the agenda for that meeting declined to put the issue on the agenda, signaling an unease among some member states that the use of such assurances could be enshrined as a matter of EU policy.
In February 2008, the European Commission’s Directorate General for External Relations issued an opinion expressing strong concern that the use of such assurances undermines the global ban on torture and efforts to eradicate such abuse.
“So far, the EU has remained firm and rebuffed the UK’s efforts to weaken the ban on torture,” said Hall.
In addition to documenting the UK’s efforts to advocate at the EU for broad acceptance of diplomatic assurances, the Human Rights Watch report reviews recent European Court of Human Rights jurisprudence in cases involving diplomatic assurances. These cases include Saadi v. Italy, in which the UK intervened in an ill-fated attempt to water down the ban on returns to risk of ill-treatment. The report also explains how other countries –including EU members Denmark, Italy, and Spain, as well as Switzerland, Russia, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan – are exploring or already using diplomatic assurances for deportations and extraditions, further weakening the global ban on transfers to risk of torture.
“The British government is setting a bad example at a time when measures designed to prevent torture are under assault,” said Hall. “It is disturbing that other EU countries with long histories of promoting and protecting human rights are following the UK’s lead. All EU member states should be holding perpetrators of torture accountable, not partnering with them.”
The new report highlights two appeals before the upper house of the UK Parliament, the House of Lords, in October 2008. In RB and U v. Secretary of State for the Home Department, to be heard on October 22 and 23, 2008, the potential deportees are two Algerians, and the assurances from the Algerian authorities were negotiated for each individual. On October 28 and 29, the Lords will hear Secretary of State for the Home Department v. OO (Othman) involving Omar Othman (a.k.a. Abu Qatada), a radical Muslim cleric accused of ties to al Qaeda. The UK is seeking to deport Othman in reliance on assurances from the Jordanian authorities in a broad “memorandum of understanding” between the UK and Jordan.
The British government concedes that, but for the assurances, the men would be at risk of torture; it is thus the effectiveness of the assurances that lies at the heart of the appeals. In hearing these appeals, Britain’s highest court will for the first time grapple with the government’s “deportation with assurances” policy, an important component of its counterterrorism strategy. Human Rights Watch and Justice, the London-based affiliate of the International Commission of Jurists, submitted an amicus brief for consideration in both appeals.
Labels: Europe, Human Rights Watch, Noémie Cournoyer, United Kingdom
Five Activists Win Human Rights Watch Awards, by Anne Humphreys
The five winners of Human Rights Watch’s 2008 Human Rights Defender Awards are:
Bo Kyi, a co-founder of Burma’s Assistance Association of Political Prisoners;
Mathilde Muhindo, who works to stop the use of rape as a weapon of war in Democratic Republic of Congo;
Abd al-Rahman al-Lahim, a human rights lawyer in Saudi Arabia;
Sunila Abeysekera, founder of the Sri Lankan human rights group INFORM; and,
Umida Niazova, an Uzbek journalist who covered the turmoil in Andijan.
“Despite the dangers and difficulties they face every day, these five activists continue to expose abuses and seek justice for victims of human rights violations in their own countries,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “It’s an honor to stand with such brave and determined people, and we hope that this award will help them to keep working as effectively and safely as possible.”
Human Rights Watch staff work closely with the human rights defenders as part of our human rights investigations in more than 80 countries around the world. These defenders will be honored at the 2008 Human Rights Watch Annual Dinners in Chicago, Geneva, Hamburg, London, Los Angeles, Munich, New York, Paris, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Toronto, and Zurich.
As a college student, Bo Kyi participated in Burma’s “8.8.88 Uprising,” a popular revolt against military rule that reached a turning point on August 8, 1988. On that day, after months of unrest, millions of people took to the streets calling for an end to military rule. The military government’s violent response to the uprising resulted in the deaths of an estimated 3,000 people during the seven months of protests.
“The outside world largely ignored events inside Burma, but for me there was no escape,” said Bo Kyi. “As a student in Rangoon, I participated in many demonstrations and witnessed the brutal suppression by the riot police that killed and wounded so many.”
Bo Kyi ultimately spent seven years and three months in prison for his political activism. He suffered repeated interrogations, beatings, shackling, and torture in prison, amid squalid living conditions. In prison, Bo Kyi learned to speak and write in English, hiding his educational materials each time a warden passed his cell.
Upon his release from prison, Bo Kyi fled to the Burma-Thailand border, where he helped to found the Assistance Association of Political Prisoners in Mae Sot, Thailand. Some 1,920 political activists remain imprisoned in Burma, where they endure abysmal treatment. The number detained increased dramatically after the August and September 2007 crackdown when security forces brutally suppressed peaceful demonstrations of activists, monks and ordinary people.
Assistance Association of Political Prisoners works on behalf of current and former political prisoners and their families. It provides them with financial support and medical care, monitors prison conditions, and advocates internationally for the prisoners’ release.
Over the last 20 years, Bo Kyi has demonstrated unfaltering courage, sharing his story and those of other political prisoners and exposing the Burmese military government’s abuses. Human Rights Watch honors Bo Kyi for his heroic efforts to speak out against Burmese repression and to advocate on behalf of those who have dared to criticize the military government.
Mathilde Muhindo, Democratic Republic of Congo
“Women and children are paying dearly for the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo,” said Mathilde Muhindo. “Sexual violence in eastern provinces should be seen in its proper contexts – a war within a war. A war against women.”
Muhindo, once a member of Congo’s parliament, works to support rape victims in South Kivu, in eastern Congo, which has been ravaged by armed conflict for over 10 years, up to today. She draws attention to the widespread and systematic use of sexual violence by government troops and armed groups – including sexual slavery, gang rape and mutilation – and to the disastrous consequences for the victims.
As director of the Olame Centre, a nongovernmental women’s rights organization, Muhindo provides urgently needed psychological and practical assistance to victims of abuse and empowers women to fight against pervasive discrimination and sexual violence. To address the crisis – tens of thousands of women and girls have been raped – she also founded a parliamentary committee to investigate rape as a weapon of war.
In partnership with Human Rights Watch and other groups, Muhindo has pressed the European Union, the United States, and others to address ongoing atrocities in eastern Congo. She led a coalition of local women’s organizations that advocated successfully for a comprehensive law on sexual violence. Muhindo has faced death threats for her work, but refuses to be silenced. Human Rights Watch honors Muhindo for her unfaltering dedication to the safety, health, and rights of eastern Congo’s most vulnerable, and often forgotten, women.
Abd al-Rahman al-Lahim, Saudi Arabia
Abd al-Rahman al-Lahim’s commitment to justice is manifest as he fights on behalf of those in Saudi Arabia who have been persecuted arbitrarily under dubious interpretations of Sharia (Islamic law). His constant quest for justice and thorough knowledge of Islamic teachings are valuable catalysts for change within oppressive Saudi Arabian laws.
As the leading human rights lawyer in Saudi Arabia, al-Lahim defends the rights of women, educators, and human rights activists who have been unjustly convicted under the Saudi religious establishment’s narrow interpretations of Islamic law. He has been arrested several times, imprisoned and banned from traveling outside the kingdom for his unfaltering defense of the rights of Saudi activists, but he continues to engage fearlessly in the fight for justice.
Al-Lahim is a classically trained Sharia scholar. It is his understanding of Islamic religious teachings that makes him such a formidable force for human rights reform. Al-Lahim provides free legal services to those in desperate need and is writing a comprehensive guide to human rights in Saudi Arabia. Where the Saudi justice system failed him and his clients, Human Rights Watch has helped raise al-Lahim’s cases with Saudi decision-makers, and with success: King Abdullah has pardoned six human rights victims defended by al-Lahim. Human Rights Watch honors al-Lahim for protecting the human rights of people in Saudi Arabia and for his dedication to progressive judicial reform.
Sunila Abeysekera, Sri Lanka
Sunila Abeysekera, one of the best-known activists in Sri Lanka, has advised Human Rights Watch on human rights work in the country for more than a decade and a half. She has tirelessly fought against abuses by both sides in Sri Lanka’s long civil war.
“When I started working on human rights two decades ago, it was not easy,” Abeysekera said. “One is regarded as a troublemaker, sometimes as a traitor. Questioning the role of the government and of the different political actors in destroying democratic structures and creating a militaristic environment led to attacks from all sides.”
As executive director of INFORM, a nongovernmental human rights monitoring organization, Abeysekera fights to expose serious abuses and bring institutional change. For over two decades, Abeysekera has struggled against the entrenched culture of impunity to hold perpetrators accountable for enforced disappearances, killings of civilians of all ethnicities, violence against women, and the protection of those displaced by the armed conflict.
With a rare ability to act as researcher, advocate, and spokesperson both within Sri Lanka and abroad, Abeysekera is internationally recognized as one of Sri Lanka’s preeminent human rights activists. In a war driven by ethnic tensions, she refuses to take sides, denouncing abuses by both the government and armed separatist Tamil Tigers. Her neutrality and fierce commitment have won Abeysekera the respect of Sinhalese and Tamils alike. She has faced death threats for her work in an environment that has become increasingly difficult for human rights defenders, but remains steadfast in her work. Human Rights Watch honors Abeysekera for bridging the gaps between ethnic groups and upholding the human rights of all Sri Lankan citizens.
A long-time activist and contributor to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and other news agencies, Umida Niazova stood trial before a court in Uzbekistan in April 2007 for “distributing material causing public disorder,” among other criminal charges. Despite the threat of a lengthy prison term, Niazova continued her criticism of the government and its repressive laws. “This is the idea of a democracy,” Niazova told the court. “If we want to build civil society, criticism of the authorities must be allowed.”
Niazova embodies the struggle of Uzbek human rights defenders who, in spite of government repression, continue to speak out against the government’s abuses. In the three years since government forces killed hundreds of unarmed protesters in the eastern city of Andijan, Uzbekistan’s rulers have continued to engage in widespread harassment, interrogations, house arrests, and arbitrary detention of civil society actors. Niazova, an independent journalist from Tashkent and a former translator for Human Rights Watch, was arrested in January 2007 and convicted in May 2007 on politically motivated charges. At her appeal, she was forced to denounce the work of Human Rights Watch and publicly admit guilt. She was eventually granted amnesty, but it was understood that she would not take up her human rights or journalistic activities within Uzbekistan again.
As a token gesture, in response to criticism from the European Union and the United States, the Uzbek government has recently released a few human rights defenders from prison. These releases are welcome. But, as Niazova’s experiences demonstrate, Uzbek society is far from free. The government continues to deny accountability for its role in the May 2005 Andijan killings, and it silences those who question the official version of the massacre. Human Rights Watch honors Niazova, who, at great personal sacrifice and risk, has advocated on behalf of her fellow citizens and compelled the international community to scrutinize the Uzbek government’s deplorable human rights record.
Labels: Anne Humphreys, Human Rights Watch
Thursday, October 23, 2008
UN Urged to Ban Executions of Juvenile Offenders, by Renata Daninsky
The vast majority of states enforce the absolute prohibition on the death penalty for individuals who committed crimes as children, in compliance with international law. But the overall number of such executions has been rising. Five countries – Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Pakistan and Yemen – have carried out 32 of these executions since January 2005, and have well over 100 other juvenile offenders on death row.
“Groups from all over the world are saying that these executions are an outrage,” said Clarisa Bencomo, researcher on children’s rights for the Middle East and North Africa at Human Rights Watch. “The General Assembly should demand that countries stop these killings immediately and pass reforms so that no one is ever again executed for a crime committed as a child.”
Iran has been at the forefront of the recent rise in executions of juvenile offenders. Between 2000 and 2004, five states are known to have executed 18 juvenile offenders, with the nine executions in the United States and five in Iran accounting for the majority. The United States ended the juvenile death penalty in March 2005, but since January 2005, Iran has been responsible for 26 of the 32 executions of juvenile offenders worldwide. NGOs in all five countries that currently execute juvenile offenders are among those seeking General Assembly action, and the Iranian Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi endorsed their statement.
On October 15, 2008, the UN General Assembly will begin its annual debate on the rights of the child. Past General Assembly resolutions have included a broad call for states to comply with their international treaty obligations to end the juvenile death penalty, but with language so general that even states that execute juvenile offenders supported the measures.
The NGO petition is co-sponsored by the Child Rights Information Network and Human Rights Watch. The petition urges UN member states to recognize the urgency of the current situation by calling for an immediate moratorium on all executions of juvenile offenders and commutation of existing death sentences to custodial or other sentences in conformity with international juvenile justice standards. States that prohibit the death penalty for juvenile offenders should ensure that essential safeguards are in place so that children are not mistakenly sentenced to death. These safeguards should include legal assistance, universal birth registration and training for judges and prosecutors in juvenile justice.
The petition also calls on the General Assembly to request a report from the UN secretary-general on all states’ compliance with the absolute ban on the juvenile death penalty, including information on the number of juvenile offenders currently on death row and the number executed during the last five years. Such a study would be an important tool in identifying good practices that states can use in implementing the absolute prohibition on these executions and to set benchmarks for moving toward full compliance.
“The General Assembly should adopt strong, detailed recommendations on the steps states should take to implement the prohibition on the juvenile death penalty, and then follow up to monitor states’ actions,” Bencomo said. “It is unconscionable that, in some countries, children are facing execution because they lacked birth certificates or didn’t have lawyers during investigation and trial.”
The text of the petition and a list of the 305 groups that have signed it are available in Arabic, English, Farsi, French, Japanese, and Spanish.
Labels: Children, Human Rights Watch, Renata Daninsky, UN
The New Age propaganda in schools, by Patrick Andries
The new course on ethics and religious culture was introduced in September 2008 in primary and secondary schools in Quebec. This course is the thought of the Bouchard-Taylor report which, according to the doctoral student in sociology Mathieu Bock-side, "suggests that transforms society into ideological re-education camp where the identity will be deconstructed for the individual to déprendre the national culture of Quebec history. " It aims to create a new human race, gender "pluralist" without past or roots or national identity, a "New Man and postoccidental postnational." Analyzing the course, Bock-side concludes that "behind certain phrases such as education for tolerance and awareness of the difference" is a real self-hate that teach young people become alien to its own culture. "
For Carl Bergeron, writing about the riots in Montreal North, after repeating to the "Other" it is inherently superior, that our history is filled with horror and that the West is despicable, it Eventually we believe that one's crap, and it must eliminate us. It creates an empty field where privileged, as in Britain and the Netherlands, plunges Islamist propaganda. It goes up to celebrate groups whose allegiance is dedicated to foreign interests, in the name of "diversity".
Richard Martineau on the new course on ethics and religious culture (ECR), which he speaks in his column of Oct. 18: Draw me a flag
We reproduce the article by Patrick Andries issued on 14 September 2008 in Le Quebec Libre. Patrick Andries est parent éducateur à la maison et père de quatre enfants. Patrick Andries is parent educator at home and father of four children. Cet article est reproduit avec la permission de l’éditeur. This article is reprinted with permission of the publisher.
Courses ethics and religious culture: the New Age propaganda in schools
The first textbooks for the new course mandatory ethics and religious culture (ERC) approved by the Ministry of Education (MELS) have been published. If it is legitimate to study at the school several religious traditions, probably towards the end of the secondary, it is indeed naive to believe that intellectual knowledge of those traditions ensure harmonious relations between communities as the MELS seems to want us to believe. Just think about the fratricidal struggles between communities who know well their respective doctrines (the schisms exist!) And the recent unrest in Montreal North who had no religious dimension.
How the study of all these religious traditions is addressed in September approved textbooks published by Modulo and ERPI debatable appear for at least five reasons: prematurity, confusion, unrepresentative, bias and superficiality. From six years, children are imposed on the study of several religions while they barely understand them, if they have one. It would be better to first learn spiritual or philosophical language before to become a linguist. It seems wiser than the children are first trained in their religious or philosophical tradition, before studying others. But this course seems to want to avoid this: we need a clean slate, young and malleable educators.
The handbook for students 8 years published by Modulo admits that the course could disrupt. Thus the young hero of this manual admit that their ideas are upset "after hearing conflicting stories of creation. Who to believe? The response of "wise" that closes the manual is a distressing mièvrerie and imprecision. It is legitimate to ask whether this confusion is not the purpose of early denounced above. Remember the words of one of the fathers of an auditor ECR and scientific manuals Modulo, Fernand Ouellet, who said "We must also learn to shake the" sufficiency of identity "and quoting these words as explanation:" He [s Is] therefore less "build an identity that, conversely, to undermine an identity too massive and introduce divergence and dissonance, it is not to prepare for coexistence and tolerance "[1].
The religious tradition of nearly 90% of Quebecers is poorly represented. Thus, in the textbooks of the first cycle of Modulo, only 52.3% of religious content pages can be viewed as speaking of Christianity while 20% of pages are subject to Aboriginal spirituality whose followers, according the 2001 census, representing less than 0.1% of the population of Quebec! It also deplores the lack of systematic Greek or Coptic Orthodox in authorized textbooks while Hinduism, Sikhism, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and spirituality, each of equal weight or strongly below orthodoxy in Quebec's population, are well described!
The bias is not absent from textbooks studied. Take the case, among others, the manual Modulo 2nd primary. While "religious stories" devoted to other religions, whether the dream of Queen Maya or the revelation to Muhammad, are still in the indicative or the imperative ( "God revealed to Muhammad the divine message") The resurrection of Jesus is described in the conditional: "They have not met alive! Elsewhere [ERPI] in high school, the role of women in spirituality is treated with lyricism: "The woman represents the Earth Mother and personifies fertility. It ensures the growth and socialization of children. All women's activities will make them guardians of life. "No flight for Christians. ERPI focuses on non-ordination of women among Catholics, about which we do not say a word when it comes to women in Islam, but where it says that their lot has improved with the arrival of Muhammad ! What the fate of Christian and Jewish women in Arabia and the Middle East has it improved with the arrival of Islam? The manual does mention.
"The handbook for students 8 years published by Modulo admits that the course could disrupt. Thus the young hero of this manual admit that their "ideas are upset" after hearing conflicting stories of creation. Who to believe? "
The manuals are well documented and the limited texts made available is spent for a good part of ethics. Learning in Primary religions is very rudimentary. Students will have only a vague idea of what these different religions. He will not know anything about the differences between the current Protestants, or even what might separate the orthodoxy of Catholicism. Add to this the desire to demonstrate that religions are similar (they all have stories of creation, rites of marriage, encourage sharing, etc.). Modulo The manual for the 2nd primary asks young people to highlight similarities, not differences in "stories of the Annunciation of Queen Maya and the revelation to Muhammad [Muhammad heard in French]." But what is interesting is what distinguishes religions and sometimes hides under the same name. To quote Rémi Brague, define Napoleon, saying "it has two legs and a head, so it is like me," not put anything.
Note, for the religious party, the nagging feeling of reading documents as New Age by placing on an equal footing of different religions, recovery of spirituality, ecology, Earth - Mother and the pursuit of happiness here as the ultimate goal - not salvation as is the case for Christians.
Often absent from this course: parents. The figure of the wise is rather interpreted by Mr. Paulo whose likeness with Paulo Coelho, author of successful novels syncretistic, is striking. Teachers are relegated to the role of facilitator who must ensure that young people do not follow the rules of dialogue at their findings on religion or morality. Children seem to construct an ethic of living by themselves without having been educated in a tradition entity.
The manuals are replete with items proposed for discussion of children. The content of these discussions will depend largely on the teacher. Consider this question: "Do an inventory of all family models you know. What comments do you? "It easily conceives that the discussion could begin, with some teachers, homosexual couples, about where religions and families have very different positions and trenches. That will there for the child in such a discussion? For students who think that single-parent families are less desirable than families with a mom and dad, an appropriate manual criticizes this behavior by the caricaturing negatively. This page ends with the following question: "What we need to form a family? Talk to your friends. "The child will live social pressure if his family values do not go in the direction of the program or group.
The transmission of tradition and training of the child to a moral demanding tailored to their age, do not seem to be the subject of these manuals. Rather, it seeks to accustom earlier than a set of traditions presented as equivalent without undue depth in the doctrines or differences, so it seems he chooses what he likes this buffet religious superficial. What advantages to this spiritual atomization of Quebecers? What this respect he wishes of Quebec parents for their children?
Labels: Human mistake, Religion and fanaticism, Secularism
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
God does not go to school, by Richard Martineau
The debate on the famous course on ethics and religious culture confronts both sides.
Those who find the brilliant idea of opening young people to religious diversity, with the cultural and historical.
And those who want children can be exempted from this course to follow a religious education.
I propose a third way.
Why would not we not simply religious schools?
EYES CLOSED
"In my book at me," looks like Stan, the school is the temple of knowledge, science and knowledge.
What religion do just that?
Want to teach your children that the world was created in six days, that Jesus was born by a virgin and that God spoke to Moses through a bush that burns without consuming?
It's your right to do so, but do it at home, outside school hours.
The primary mission of the school is to encourage children to think. However, as would the American polemicist Bill Maher, religion is the art of not thinking.
Religion do not mind criticism she has taught to believe word, to hold true for what can not be proved and to adhere to a system of values blindly, without doubt or never called into question.
Quite the opposite of what should advocate school!
APPLIES TO ALL
As for the "neutral" advocated by the new course on ethics and religious culture (studying cultures in Historical and cultural), it suffers from excessive politeness.
Under this approach politically correct, all religions are equivalent and no dogma, even the most ridiculous or most discriminatory, deserves to be judged or questioned.
This is the triumph of relativism. There is no moral absolute or universal values, but morals and values that all are equal.
As the Greek philosopher Protagoras, each person believes what is true for him, and anyone else that he can not criticize their beliefs or values.
In short, do not say Excision is a gender mutilation that should be condemned, "but" Female circumcision is a cultural practice millennium must be understood. "
PUT WHITE GLOVES
We would he head to set an equal fascism, communism and democracy? Of course not.
So why should we put our trial on hold when it comes to religion?
Why should we put white gloves and be careful not to make any critical point of view?
That is fine, preach tolerance and openness, but it is not true that all opinions and all beliefs are equal.
The school is not to say: "You have your reasons for believing as you do and I think of myself as I think. Everyone has the right to think what he thinks and nobody has the right to dictate to others what to think and do ... "
The school is to teach children to make judgments.
Should push tolerance to tolerate intolerance?
Studying fundamentalism in the cultural, it's like studying the concentration camps under the architectural angle.
It is absurd and stupid.
Labels: Religion and fanaticism, Richard Martineau, Secularism
PARENTS It is up to us to choose for our children! PAS AU GOUVERNEMENT NOT FOR THE GOVERNMENT
Draw me a flag, by Richard Martineau
Journal de Montréal
18/10/2008 06h57
Discussion in the car the other day with one of my daughters. "So you like it, the course of ethics and religious culture?"
-Oh yes, I love it. The teacher is super dynamic ...
-And what are you doing in this course?
-This week, we will redesign the flag of Quebec. The professor said he was more representative of the new reality because there is a cross over. We must create one that would better reflect the Quebec of today ... "
ERASE THE PAST
I am a man open. I think that immigration is an asset. I hope my children will be more informed about other religions and other cultures than I was at their age.
But when I hear things like that (ie we should redesign the Quebec flag on the pretext that it contains, oh sacrilege, a cross), I want to scream.
Yes, we must open ourselves to others. But why this opening should absolutely go through an erasing itself?
We can not and RECEIVE at the same time? We must at all costs j'enlève the family photos that decorate the walls of my room when I get people in my house?
AND THE OTHER?
The Algerian flag and the flag of Turkey contain a crescent representing the path that must travel a Muslim during his life to get to paradise.
The Palestinian flag has a red triangle symbolizes the Hashemite house of Muhammad.
The flag of Israel has a Star of David. The flag of Saudi Arabia is green (color of Islam). The flag of Iraq is flanked by the slogan "Allah Akbar" (God is great). The flag of Afghanistan contains the drawing of a mosque, etc..
Demand there for these people to redesign their flag because he no longer represents the "new reality"?
ENJOY THE DIVERSITY!
Yes, Quebec has changed. Yes, there are people of all religions.
Still, Quebec is still very strong and majority Catholic. When we think in Quebec, is believed to Catholicism, not Islam or Buddhism, hell!
If I say "Italy", you see what you? Couscous or pasta? Priests or imams?
And if I say "Saudi Arabia", what images do you have in mind? Images of churches and cathedrals, or pictures of mosques?
That's not the idea behind the concept of cultural diversity: protect the existence of various cultures throughout the world?
If there is to protect Zulu culture and the pygmies, why could we not also protect Quebec culture?
Unless you tell me it does not exist. It is a big catch-all without identity and it's not worth being preserved ...
THE SHAME OF ITSELF
That's what annoys me gnangnan in multiculturalism: the idea that only other crops worth protected.
That we must stop being so others can feel exist.
The theory that past and future are contradictory, we can embrace both at the same time.
You can not have both branches and roots.
Can not find it absurd you?
Labels: Hostile races, Human mistake, Religion and fanaticism, Richard Martineau
We don't care, by Richard Martineau
Journal de Montréal
16/10/2008 05h38
The motto of Belle Province may be "I remember," Quebeckers are less vindictive beings in the world.
Just look at the results of federal elections for realizing it.
MR JOE LOUIS
Take Maxime Bernier.
For weeks, journalists and commentators have repeated how the former foreign minister lacked trial.
Not only has he attended a woman who had links with organized crime, but he even left confidential documents at home!
In addition, when Mr. Bernier has visited the Quebec soldiers in Afghanistan, he insisted that the military are being photographed eating Joe Louis in order to please an entrepreneur in his region.
Imagine: using young people who risk their lives every day to make the pub!
But what did the voters of County Beauce to this fact?
They said "We don't care," and they reelected Maxime Bernier.
THE INVISIBLE WOMEN
Take Josee Verner.
The Minister of Canadian Heritage, Status of Women and the Francophonie accumulated gaffes during the campaign. All journalists and commentators have stressed its incompetence, its inability to clearly explain the decisions of its government and its tendency to take the powder Escampette when we wanted to question the cuts in the cultural sector.
Proof that Ms. Verner is beside its pumps: it did not favor his own party Tuesday! Instead of voting in the constituency it represents, as the Electoral Act permits, she went to vote in the constituency where she lives - and where the Conservative Party had no candidate ...
But what did the voters of Louis-Saint-Laurent to this fact?
They said "We don't care,'' and they reelected Josee Verner.
NOT SO GREEN
Thomas Mulcair now.
According to a survey of shock Devoir, the former Minister of Environment Liberal prevented Hydro-Quebec to give a grant of two million dollars to an environmental group that fights against climate change because Jean Charest ( "the boss "As he called him in his e-mails) was too PQ these activists to his liking.
Not bad for a politician who brags about being green, right?
In addition, during the campaign, the NDP walked alongside a candidate who campaigned in an organization advocating sharia.
But what did the voters of Outremont to this fact?
They said "We don't care," and they re-elected Thomas Mulcair.
CRYING IN THE DESERT
In recent days, much has been written about the growing gap between artists and the public.
But it seems that artists are not only talking in a vacuum. Journalists, political analysts and columnists also cry in the wilderness.
Day after day after day during this campaign, you disclosed the incompetence and inconsistencies of this or that politician.
And you, what do you do?
You shrugged and you re-elected.
Labels: Elections, Richard Martineau
All this for that, by Richard Martineau
Journal de Montréal
15/10/2008 05h39
All this for that. All these signs, all these millions, all promises, all these insults, all these debates, all these steps, all these stories, all these tests? For that.
To return quietly to square one.
CHANGE OF SCENERY
However, this detour has not been completely unnecessary. It comes home, but the scenery has changed. Some furniture had been moved during our absence.
The Conservatives, for example, even if they are less minority that the last time, emerging from this election fairly amochés. They believed wrest a majority, they are in the same uncomfortable position in January 2006.
We could even say that their position is even more precarious.
Not only the Conservative Party failed to convince Canadians to give him the flexibility he wanted, but this campaign has allowed political opponents of Stephen Harper to organize and be heard.
Now they are on a war footing, they do not lay down their arms, on the contrary they will continue fighting until the head of their enemy rolling in the sawdust.
Harper believed themselves from the elections stronger. A gust of wind, and his government might take the edge.
IT SHOULD KNOW
For liberals, this defeat has the air of victory.
They now have every reason to get rid of their evil leader loved, who was propelled to the throne by accident. Stéphane Dion has repeated many who wants to hear it will not, is not he who will decide. You do not want much to get rid of, if your girlfriend made his luggage, casts its alliance in the trash and moved with her new boyfriend, you have no choice.
You must draw the obvious conclusion. As sings the great Charles Aznavour: "You should know / Leave the table / When love is served Without clinging, air pitiful / Going without making noise?
Stéphane Dion Will it at all costs keep all his dignity and, despite what it costs, go without return?
This is seen in the coming days.
TOUR OF THE BLOCK
If there is one who has slept well last night, is Gilles Duceppe. It announced the funeral of his party, and now Quebecers voted en bloc for the Bloc.
Instead of descending on the ice and participate in the match being played between conservatives and liberals, we have chosen, once again, remain in the stands and throwing slaps on the ice.
If, on the provincial scene, it was preparing to vote massively for the PQ, that decision would make sense.
But no: Bloc vote on the federal and Jean Charest in Quebec City. Try to understand something.
It sends to Ottawa separatists and federalists in Quebec!
No wonder our immigrants are all mixed and not know what language to speak more!
NOT SERIOUS
In my riding, the Green Party candidate called F. Pilon, Mr clothesline.
It was written like that on the ballot. After that, we said that we must take the Greens seriously.
Labels: Elections, Richard Martineau
The ghost of Lee Atwater, by Richard Martineau
Journal de Montréal
14/10/2008 05h58
I do not know about you, but I'm glad that cursed in this campaign is over. It may have been short, I found endless.
As rightly says Marco Fortier yesterday: "It is time that this campaign comes to an end. The leaders have uttered so many big words for 37 days they have nothing more to say if it continues."
I am sure that Lee Atwater turned in his grave and heard our leaders start insults.
ROCKY THE SQUIRREL
Remember Lee Atwater? It was one of the greatest political strategists of his generation.
Specialist negative publicity, Atwater (we called him the Darth Vader of the Republican Party) was ready to do anything to save their foals.
It will stop at nothing - no mud bath, no baseness, no fight. He circulated false rumors about his opponents, investigating their personal lives, and so on.
In 1988, when Michael Dukakis was threatening to win the presidential elections, Atwater has produced a 30-second video which completely demolished the campaign of Democratic candidate.
Known as Rocky the squirrel, this pub murders showed Dukakis in the process of piloting a tank of the U.S. military. Affubled a helmet ridiculous move that would net the famous Gilles Duceppe for a Stetson, and awkwardly trying to play cowboy, Dukakis (a frail intellectual who was also macho that Stéphane Dion) had looked like a twit finished.
Result: George Bush Sr. moved to the White House and the poor Dukakis has become a footnote ...
SAVE ME MY
In 1990, at a breakfast fundraiser, Lee Atwater delivered a speech to a packed house. As he recounted how he had just rolled in flour Dukakis, the pitbull of the Republican Party has had convulsions and crashed on stage.
Transported to hospital, he learned he was suffering from brain cancer in the terminal phase.
Remorsed, seeking a form of redemption, Atwater has spent the last months of his life to apologize to his former victims and denounce the immoral of the American political scene.
He died on 29 March 1991, a month after writing in Life magazine:
"My illness helped me see that I missed it fails to U.S. policy in general: a little heart, a little compassion. A tumor is dangerous now gnaw the soul of my country ... "
A GOOD EXAMPLE
Leading a country is not just pass laws and put the economy on track. It is also - and above all - inspire citizens.
However, during this campaign, no politician not inspired me.
The heads have lost so much time to tell us why we should vote against their opponents that they forgot to tell us why we should vote for them.
They spent their time to shout names. To quote Marco Fortier, the candidates have launched more than mud that children of 12 years in a camp. "
That's the example you want to show Canadians? That's nice.
After that, we wonder why young people do not respect authority figures ...
Labels: Elections, Richard Martineau, United States
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