López narrates how her 19-year-old daughter, Jahaira Guadalupe Vaena López, was abducted in Tlacolula, Oaxaca. She describes her efforts to get the authorities to investigate the crime, how she was warned not to press the matter, how informants told her that her daughter was murdered in a turf battle between fractured drug gangs. Just days before leaving for the United States with the Caravan for Peace, she faced one of the assassins who had been apprehended and listened as he described in detail how her daughter was raped and beheaded.

Margarita has joined some 50 grieving family members to accompany caravan leader Javier Sicilia on a trip across the United States. Sicilia, a poet who lost his son to drug war violence in March of 2011, catalyzed a movement of victims and Mexican citizens fed up with the bloodshed that has claimed more than 60,000 lives and left tens of thousands more disappeared since former President Felipe Calderon launched the drug war five years ago.

Mexico’s Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity decided to organize the U.S. caravan after taking two caravans from Mexico City–one north to Ciudad Juarez on the U.S. border, and one south to the border with Guatemala. Both drew out victims of the drug war and registered their cases to provide support for family members seeking justice and solace.

The decision to take their pain across the border came after discussion with the San Francisco-based group Global Exchange. Soon a coalition came together that included Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, the Latin American Working Group, the RFK Center, the Washington Office on Latin America, our CIP Americas Program, the Drug Policy Alliance, and the National Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean Communities, among the key players. The coalition later expanded to include the NAACP, and local organizations in each of the cities along the route.

A binational meeting in June defined five demands of the U.S. caravan: to open public debate on humane alternatives to drug prohibition, to ban the import of assault weapons and crack down on illegal gun smuggling over the border, to combat money-laundering with full investigation and strict enforcement, to suspend all aid to the Mexican armed forces and end the war on drugs abroad, and to halt the militarization of the border and criminalization of migrants.

I joined the caravan on the final east coast leg of its 6,000-mile trip. I had heard most of the stories before in Mexico, having accompanied the northern caravan and numerous marches and meetings.

I was curious to see the impact on people in the United States. As the women in the room told their stories, each one struck like a cold blade in the heart. Although women are a minority of the war’s deaths, attacks on women usually include brutal sexual violence, and women make up the majority of those actively seeking justice and an end to the war.

Along the route, caravan members like these women have become confident and eloquent spokespersons to end the drug war. They speak from the heart and appeal to the heart. Their empowerment as leaders is one of the most important achievements of the caravan. Another is the sympathy and outrage their testimonies evoke.

And it’s not a one-way street. Caravan members also listened to the stories of U.S. citizens. Like Kimberly Armstrong in Baltimore, whose 16-year-old son was shot and killed by a 14-year-old in endemic drug violence. Or Carole Eady, who struggled her way out of the stigma and life disruption of imprisonment for a drug offense in New York City.

The threads begin to come together. In her brilliant book The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander notes that in Washington, D.C., the caravan’s last stop, it’s estimated that three out of four black men can expect to serve time in prison. She calls this mass incarceration of black people a new racial caste, the latest Jim Crow system of social control, where young black men and women are jailed, stigmatized, and in many cases disenfranchised for life by discriminatory drug laws.

Based on the shared sorrow of losing loved ones to jail, violence, death, or disappearance, Mexicans and Americas found they fight the same unjust system of social control of the poor and people of color. The drug war generates profits for the defense industry and siphons public funds into perpetuating itself. It rips apart families and communities, north and south of the border. The bogus attempt to eliminate rather than regulate something in great demand creates a multibillion-dollar black market run by groups that become more violent as they are selectively attacked. It pits security forces against the public, providing them with the tools to violate human rights and life with impunity. It erodes democracy and the rule of law it purports to uphold.

Whether it’s through imposing a military/police state in Mexico or shunting youth into the margins of society, the drug war machine runs on the human lives it destroys.

A binational peace movement?

The caravan’s call to end the drug war resonated in city after city. But has the caravan forged a binational movement for peace?

Not yet. As the Mexican caravaners go back home, their U.S. hosts return to daily life. Many will simply guard the memory of Mexico’s pain and begin to read the news a little differently.

But others will act. The Peace Caravan has already achieved something remarkable. It brought together groups in U.S. cities that scarcely knew each other before. Some community organizers in the scores of cities from San Diego to the nation’s capital plan to continue the dialogue with the Mexican movement and among themselves.

In New York City, the Latino and African-American communities plan a meeting to discuss the impact of mass arrests and detention. In Baltimore, the movement to block construction of yet another multimillion-dollar prison in one of the nation’s most economically devastated cities is making common cause with movements for drug policy reform, racial justice, and youth rights.

In Texas, faith-based organizations advocating stricter enforcement of gun laws are intensifying their campaign against gun show sales and arms smuggling after seeing close up the human cost of the flow of guns to Mexico. In Arizona, human rights organizations working against the militarization of the border and the death and detention of migrants came face-to-face with activists protesting Mexico’s militarized drug war in a cross-border reflection. In Washington, members of Congress received caravan lobbyists whose power to convince came not from money or influence, but from human empathy and reason.

The way many U.S. citizens understand the drug war has changed through meeting the Mexicans who bear the brunt of it. While U.S. politicians and media portray it as a necessary fight against the threat that organized crime supposedly poses to national security in both countries, the victims spoke of the violence that resulted from the war on drugs itself. Audiences and congressional representatives were surprised to learn that many of the victims on the caravan accused not gangs but the U.S.-funded Mexican police and military for the murder or disappearance of their loved ones.

Organizers now face the question of how the moral victory can lead to a political one. On the drug policy front, U.S. society seems to be moving toward a tipping point despite push-back from law enforcement and private prison interests that make big money off incarceration, as well as from politicians who convert insecurity into “law and order” votes. A recent poll shows Colorado could legalize marijuana in the November elections after a similar measure narrowly lost in California. The award-winning film The House I Live In presents a stunning indictment of the domestic drug war through the words of its enforcers, its participants, and its victims.

But the federal government continues to be on the wrong side of the trend. Some hope that President Obama, if he is reelected, could make bolder moves toward reorienting a policy that imprisons so many mostly African-American youths and costs the nation $51 billion a year, according to the DPA. I’m inclined to agree with a LEAP editorial that warns the reform movement to watch the actions, not the rhetoric, of the Obama administration. It will take a stronger push from constituents to get the administration to take on the interests that benefit from sustaining America’s longest war.

Moral victories plant seeds that are often slow to bear fruit. Evaluating the experience on the last morning in a church hall, exhausted caravan members saw a mix of catharsis and consciousness-raising that gave them strength. Lopez noted that the “the tragedy I’m living through can be useful to a lot of people.” Melchor Flores, whose son was arrested in January of 2009 in Monterrey and never seen again, stated that the caravan had “touched consciences”.

He added, “Wherever my son is, he should be satisfied because he knew I wouldn’t let him down.”

Teresa Carmona, a tiny, white-haired woman whose son Joaquin was murdered in Mexico City, has become a powerful voice before the public and the media. She believes the caravan met its goal.

“We brought the faces of our beloved children, parents, and relatives all the way here, and so we legitimated this pain and this reality.”

In the nation that first invented the drug war and exported it to their country with deadly results, the Mexican bereaved have left a mark in the hearts of thousands of men and women. Sometimes it takes tragedy to make change. The cumulative histories recounted in the peace caravan represent a tragedy of mammoth proportions.

That should be more than enough to act on.

AUTHOR: Laura Carlsen
URL: www.cipamericas.org and http://americasmexico.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: lecarlsen [at] gmail.com

Making their way to the streets for the first general convention of the party’s National People’s Volunteer the Mohan Baidhya led fraction of the Communist Party of Nepal – Maoist announced the party military wing to be formed soon here at Basantapur Kathmandu on Wednesday. The announcement was made by Chairman Mohan Baidhya during the inauguration of the general convention of the party’s people’s volunteer bureau.

During the program the Netra Bikram Chand sectary of the fraction party said, “We are not here to be ignored, we will fight for our rights where we will not let the sacrifice of 16000 Nepalese go in vain. The current government and its leaders have forgotten their values. We declare a new war against that ideology which is corrupt and lack to understand people’s voices and sentiments.”

AUTHOR: Shreedeep Rayamajhi
URL: http://www.rayznews.com
E-MAIL: weaker41 [at] gmail.com

How else to explain bringing a lawsuit against the Russian fashion designer Artem Lebedev for writing “god” in lowercase letters? Actually, Lebedev wrote “F*ck god,” but in justifying their lawsuit, Orthodox activists say that they were offended by the disrespect the lowercase type denotes.

Or the fact that a group of Orthodox activists have prevented the performance of Jesus Christ Superstar in Rostov by charging that the musical offends their religious sentiments. That’s right Jesus Christ Superstar. Funny, the musical has been running in Russia for 20 years, and now suddenly its offensive. The bees are buzzing indeed.

At the moment there is no law to hold Lebedev or the Rostov Philharmonic responsible for offending the faithful. But that might soon change. The Russian Duma is planning on turning the Russian codex back before 1917 by passing what essentially is a blasphemy law. The proposed law, which has support across party lines, will make “publicly insulting the religious beliefs and feelings of citizens” punishable up to a 300,000 ruble fine, 200 hours of community service, or a max of three years in prison, and “the desecration of objects and articles of religious worship and places of religious rites and ceremonies” liable to a fine between 100,000 to 500,000 rubles, 400 hours of service, and up to five years in the slammer.

Now, Michael Bohm’s idea that Russia is becoming Iran and must choose between becoming “anti-Western and theocratic or liberal-­democratic” is quite presumptuous, not to mention downright silly. But that’s the kind of hyperbole that his editorializing is known for. Nevertheless, the upsurge in concern about the sanctity of Russian Orthodoxy does suggest that something is amiss. And that something, I would argue, is that the Russian state has yet to offer its citizenry an ideology to bind the nation. The outlandish maneuvers on the part of Orthodox activists and the politicians that seek to capitalize on them are expressions of this ideological lack. The militant turn to Orthodoxy, however, is hardly a cure. In fact, such gestures in a society that is lukewarm about religion in general are likely to perpetuate the symptoms.

AUTHOR: Sean Guillory
URL: http://seansrussiablog.org and http://newbooksinrussianstudies.com
E-MAIL: sguillory1 [at] niu.edu

No wonder, she is being applauded by the Gujarat riot victims for scripting the story of their great fight back. However, judge, Jyotsana Yagnik is not the only character in this amazing story.

On 28 February 2002, ninety-seven persons were killed in Naroda Patiya, in the outskirts of Ahmadabad. This was one the biggest massacre of Muslims during post Godhara riots in Gujarat. It followed the protest call given by the BJP government after train fire tragedy in which 97 Hindu lost their lives near Godhra railway station.

The mysterious fire was blamed on the Muslims and in a retaliatory move; a well organized progrom was launched in different places of Gujarat. In this innocent Muslims were attacked, Muslim women were raped, houses burnt and this mayhem continued for weeks. The law enforcing agencies remained mute spectators to such blood and gore obviously following the instructions from ‘above’. According to one estimate more than 2,500 Muslims lost their lives in the post Godhara riots.

Call it conscience, courage, honesty, humanity or sense of duty, many social activists, lawyers, journalists and actors came out in open to seek justice for the Gujarat riot victims. They were joined by some upright officers who worked in the police and administration making it an incredible story of fight for justice.

In a hostile atmosphere when section of bureaucracy, society and officials spew hate against the Muslims, social activists braved threats on their lives to side with the victims, lawyers’ came forward to file cases for them, journalists risked their lives to do sting operation to nail the culprits, serving officers risked their career to disobey the orders and some openly spoke about the perpetrators of the crime.

This is something unimaginable in the annals of independent Indian history as all those on the forefront of this great fight are non –Muslims. Their valiant efforts deserve a salute. But for them, like many other cases of communal violence in India, this one too could have become a case of justice denied.

Social activists Teesta Setalvad has became a symbol of this amazing story. She braced all odds and painstakingly collected evidences to fight the court battle seeking justice for the riot victims. Her efforts literally set up a fight between David and the Goliath. The strong judgment in the Naroda Patiya case could not have been possible, without her and others determination to take the cudgels against the might of the state and the society in large.

In this amazing story, Harsh Mander, a Sikh, is another hero. He left the coveted job of an IAS officer, in wake of Gujarat riots. This courageous officer openly criticized his colleagues of not doing what was expected from them during the communal pogrom. It is not an easy job to take such a moralistic stand for a serving officer. Since then Mander is relentlessly fighting for relief and rehabilitation of the riot victims.

Mukul Sinha, of Jan Sangharsh Manch activists is another character of this story. He painstakingly collected vital evidences, scanning thousands of pages of documents and producing them in the court as records, so that the culprits could be brought to justice. He did this with great courage ignoring even the threats to his life.

Actor Nandita Das, also a social activist, at various forums openly spoke about Gujtat’s officers’ laxity; their complicity and the role of politicians’ in perpetrating the riots for days together. Her movie “Firaaq” graphically depicts the pain and agony of the victims of the post Godhra riots.

Thelka journalist Ashish Khetan, whose sting operation ‘kalank’ established the role of Babu Bajrangi and others in the post Godhara riots is exceptional piece of journalism. The extra-judicial confessions recorded by Khetan on camera proved to be corroborating evidence against the Bajrang Dal-VHP leaders who had given a go-ahead to the anti Muslim program.

Criticizing the perpetrators of riots from outside is a easy, but to speak for the victims being the part of the ‘system’ requires extra ordinary courage. The intelligence chief, RB Sreekumar is one such person who got disgusted with the state apparatus that drove him to fight for the justice of riot victims.

The figure of deaths in Gujarat could have been much higher except for some prompt action by some men in uniform. IPS officer Rahul Sharma who showed exemplary courage ordering firing on the mob of rioters on way to burn a Madarsa in Bhavnagar that housed 300 children. Sharma later came up with revelation of politicians’- rioter’s nexus and for this Gujarat government acted against him and issued a charge-sheet.

There are other officers who also didn’t budge despite pressure and ensure that violence was controlled in their areas. V K Gupta, Manoj Shashidhar, Narasimha Komar, Vivek Srivastava, M D Antani, Upendra Singh, Keshav Kumar and other are to name a few.

IPS officer, Sanjeev Bhatt is the shining star of this amazing story who listened to the call of his conscious. He risked his career naming Chief Minister Narendra Modi for complicity in Gujarat riots. It really requires an extraordinary courage to speak up so boldly and Bhatt has become a symbol of this courage. FIRs were filed against him and he was arrested for challenging the most powerful person in the state.

The names mentioned here are just some cues to give an indication about the nature of this fight. There are many unsung hero who deserve equal praise. Their combined efforts have resulted in Supreme Court monitoring the cases, constituting the SIT, rapping government, and taking other important steps.

The other riot cases in Gujarat have on the judgment stage, prominent being Gulbarga housing society case. It is expected that just like Naroda Patiya case, the judgment in other cases may too indict some high and mighty people of Gujarat.

Even though the SIT has absolved the Chief Minister Narender Modi, of role in Gujarat riots, the forthcoming judgment may spill some beans. Modi remains evasive, even though being called ‘merchant of death’ in popular discourse. It’s likely that some crucial evidence may filter in such cases that may become the clinching evidence to nail the ‘big fish.’

Indian secular traditions many a times has withstood such storm and each time it has emerged stronger. The fight for justice of Gujarat victim is the story of India’s glorious secular tradition. It is the acts of such heroic deeds that have instilled the faith of the Muslim community in the Indian democracy. All those who are part in this great fight back deserve a heartfelt gratitude from every Muslim of this country.

AUTHOR: Mujtaba Syed
URL: http://mujtabas-musings.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: syedalimujtaba [at] yahoo.com

First was the mass exodus of the Bengali speaking Muslims population from their shanty homes residing in the lower Assam valley? It followed the armed raid by the murderous Bodo tribe. There was much of blood letting and mayhem in this tragedy that triggered one of the largest displacements of population in the independent Indian history.

Unfortunately, Assam is too far from New Delhi, the seat of power and also far from the so called national media that’s more comfortable in reporting Anna Hazare and Ramdev. Even though five lakh people left there home and over 100 perished, the tragedy did not moved the national media to report it like a national crisis.

The second important development was the angry and violent protest by Muslim youth in Mumbai and the subsequent violent protest. It sparked off the question, why Muslims in Mumbai should protest for the happenings in Assam; after all they are too far away and have no connection except common religion.

The argument may sound fair enough, but living in Chennai, and witnessing protest in support of Tamils in Sri Lanka, who are citizens of another country, the Mumbai protest definitely make sense to me.

The protest was to tell the government and the media to do something to address the issue and not let it to recur again. This has to be seen into the context of 1983 Nellie riots in Assam, when more than 3000 people died and not an FIR was lodged against such program.

However, the act of Mumbai protestors to become violent is something really condemnable. It would be prudent that those indulging in acts of vandalism must be given exemplary punishment. However, Mumbai protest also exposes the laxity of the police force that did not anticipated the situation and had not made enough preparations to handle the possible fall out if the peaceful crowed becomes unruly.

Continuing with the negative news, the story of rumor mongering mills then came in. The so called national media that could not cover the Assam story properly started giving live commentary of the fleeing northeast people from various metropolitan cities. The citizenship issue of Assam became secondary, primary was to unearth the rumor mongering factories in the country.

It was discovered that the rumors were spread through the internet using social media and the mobile phones, the modern day tools of communication. This triggered a debate how to control them from having damaging influence on the society, while others arguing that such mediums should not be controlled.

The government took the decision to put restrictions on these two sets of communication and set a precedent for future as well. Do we like to remain under such control and restricts in a democratic country is something that requires a national debate.

Oblivious of all these facts, a youth organization, in New Delhi took a bold step to cool the social temperature that was rising due the problems related to recent developments in Assam.

It assembled a large number of it volunteers at India Gate in solidarity of the people of Assam in particular and northeast in general. Youth gathered there shouted slogans of peace and non violence and harmony. They joined hands and formed human chain near Amar Jawan Joti to show the solidarity for the northeast people.

The youth shouted slogans ‘we are one.’ Many placards were displayed condemning the violence and riots in Assam. One placard read; ‘Na Bodo Na Muslamaan, Sabse Pehle Hai Insaan’ (no Bodo, no Muslim, we all are first human beings). Many present at India Gate also joined the human chain to convey the message for restoring unity and harmony.

“This human chain is a way to show our unity and solidarity, we also want to say that these violence and riots cannot disintegrate our society and we through our unity will rise every time together,” said Shekhar Jain, of Mission Bhartiyam that organized the peace initiative.

“We are really hurt by the recent ongoing violence and thus we feel that it is us (youths) who have responsibility to come forward and to show that we are against all violence and riots,” he added.

Ansaar Ahmed from National Confederation of Human Rights Organizations (NCHRO) who joined the human chain said; “This is the time of national emergency, our society is in danger and people must know that they are human first, not the Bodos, Hindus or Muslims.”

“We were hurt by this violence in Assam and its aftereffects. Though some organizations and individuals went there and helped in relief works, we also have responsibility towards our fellow citizens. It will be a good gesture if we all can come together to tell that we are one,” said Ms Pathak, a Mission Bhartiyam activist.

“We, as citizens of this country and as human beings, condemn riots and violence in all forms. We also condemn the shock, the pain, the terror that the people had to face. We empathies with the people of northeast and show our solidarity and extend our support to them” she added.

Such developments are powerful narratives of contemporary India. It lives up the adage, that what is true of this country, the opposite of it is also true. Among the stories of hatred and violent protest this little tale, was hardly reported anywhere in the media.

As this story sends positive messages- a message of peace and harmony- a message of being human first- a message that we all are Indians and we share our joys and sorrows together, it at least deserves a glance.

AUTHOR: Mujtaba Syed
URL: http://mujtabas-musings.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: syedalimujtaba [at] yahoo.com

Still, there’s been a burst of Orthodox militancy of late. Here’s a list of recent events: A call for Orthodox believers to form patrol squads to tag along with police to combat “enemies of the faith” (Thankfully, the police declined). The outspoken Father Vsevolod Chaplin blesses the measure, saying that “It’s a step in right direction.” A group of Orthodox activists descends on G-Spot, a museum of erotic art in Moscow, with bricks in hand and threaten its curator, Alexander Donskoi. A similar group of Orthodox, accompanied by a NTV camera crew, no less, burst into Teatr.doc to disrupt a so-called “Eyewitness theater” where a panel of witnesses to the Pussy Riot trial were giving their impressions.

Then there are reports that Alexandr Sidyakin, the United Russia deputy who came up with the law upping the fines on protests, is working on a blasphemy law based on the German and Austrian codices. He later denied that any such law is in the works.

For their part, the so-called “enemies of faith” have not remained silent. On 17 August, the bare-chested activists of FEMEN cut down a cross in central Kiev to protest Pussy Riot’s two year prison sentence. Then ten days later, a previously unknown group, Narodnaya Volia, or People’s Will, the namesake of the 19th century Russian terrorist group, took a chainsaw to three crosses in village of Smelovsky in Chelyabinsk Province and another in the district of Varavino-Faktoriya in Arkhangelsk. According to Narodnaya Volia’s statement:

“The cutting down of the Russia Orthodox Church crosses in the village of Smelovsky, Verkhneuralsky District of the Chelyabinsk Region and in the city district Varavino-Faktoriya in Arkhangelsk is part of our operation against the Russian Orthodox Church called Krestopoval and was carried out by the military wing of our Movement, the flight combat units Neizvestnyye [the Unknown]. . . Russian Orthodox Church signs are a response to the statement on the creation of Orthodox militia, the Russian Orthodox Church’s reprisal of the Russian girls from Pussy Riot, and the insult by Archpriest Dimitrii Smirnov of the prominent Russian revolutionary movement leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. . . We demand the immediate release of the Pussy Riot members. Attacks against the Russian Orthodox Church will continue until our demands are fully met.”

Then there is this week’s Russian tabloid sensation: two women were found murdered in Kazan with “Free Pussy Riot” written on the wall in their blood.  RuNet was immediately ablaze with all kinds of conspiracy theories (Why didn’t initial reports mention the blood tinged “Free Pussy Riot”? The cops must have planted it . . . ) and cries of provocation from Pussy Riot supporters, and their denunciation by Pussy Riot foes (Archpriest Smirnov: “The blood of the murdered women of Kazan is on the conscious of Pussy Riot’s supporters”). The cops immediately dismissed any real connection to Pussy Riot and passed it off as the work of a crazy person.

The police were right: the killer turned himself in and revealed that his Charley Mansonesque scrawl was meant to throw off the cops.

Sill, the discourse on Pussy Riot gained new intensity.

And now Vedomosti reports that there are plans to create the All-Russian Association of Orthodox Youth. Interesting timing. Actually, the idea seems that have been in the works as Putin was asked about it at this year’s Seliger summer bash. He supported the idea as long as it didn’t become “a new quasi-Orthodox Komsomol.” Wouldn’t that be ironic if it did?

The Pussy Riot Affair only gave the idea of a Orthodox youth organization more purpose. According to Vadim Kvyatkovskii, the meeting’s coordinator, Pussy Riot showed that missionary efforts among youth require intensification. Surveys have shown that youth tend to support Pussy Riot more and often have negative views of the Orthodox Church. That said, Pussy Riot bogey-women have the potential to draw religiously inclined youth into defending the faith. During the trial, the church affiliated group Georgievtsy increased its membership from 400 to 600. Even United Russia’s youth wing, Molodaya gvardiia is looking to get into the act. It’s leader, Maksim Rudnev, said that there is room to work with Kvyatkovskii’s new Orthodox youth organization.

But perhaps its too soon to lump Kvyatkovskii’s group in with the Orthodox fanatics. Pussy Riot may spark new earnest, but not militant urgency. One sign of this is that Kvyatkovskii has ruled out the idea of his new youth group joining the Orthodox patrols. When asked about his position on the matter in an interview on Slon.ru, he responded:

Militias are a form of united citizens, but no more. In general, I don’t know of a single such voluntary patrol really existing. I know that where were several PR efforts, but I am not confident that this most effective way to unite youth. For example, we have young guys actively participating in helping Krymsk. This experience showed them that such volunteer groups now have much more demand. We aren’t very close with the tendencies toward some conservatism. On the contrary, we talk about the openness of the church and our activities, and we are prepared to make steps towards any interested people. Therefore we are not close or interested in the idea of a street patrol as some kind of watchdog.

It seems that in the search for new militants, Russian Orthodoxy’s street fighting men will have to look elsewhere.

Picture: Ridus

AUTHOR: Sean Guillory
URL: http://seansrussiablog.org and http://newbooksinrussianstudies.com
E-MAIL: sguillory1 [at] niu.edu

The Assam riots had begun as a clash between the natives and the settlers in the lower Assam valley. It went on to become a clash between natives and illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Ultimately it got blown out of proportion and took a communal turn between the tribal and the Muslims.

As long as the battle between natives and the settlers or illegal immigrants was going on, we relaxed and gulped the pulp feed on 24×7 news channels at our TV sets. However, when the problem started sending heat waves across India, forcing the northeastern people to flee back to their native places, we started blaming the social media. The euphoria of Arab spring withered away, as we suddenly started feeling the heat of social media and its repercussions near us.

In this cacophony we left the main issue and the focus shifted to those spreading the canard. We started demanding the rumor mongers to justice. Without acting the devils advocate, and condemning the rumor mills in strongest term, the entire Assam citizenship debate needs to be put in perspective to understand the problem and think about its solutions.

In 1970, when 90, 000 Bangladeshi refugees were sheltered in India, purged by the Pakistani army, this became the prime reason for going to war with Pakistan. Humanitarian reasons were cited as ground for the liberation of Bangladesh. The country rejoiced at the heroic victory over Pakistan and Indira Gandhi was hailed as the liberator, a messiah of the Bengali speaking Muslims.

However, this created another problem that of illegal migrants to India from Bangladesh. These were actually economic migrants who moved on looking for living space and livelihood. They melted with the earlier settlers and slowly their numbers started swelling.

It led to the agitation by All Assam Students Union. The agitation was contained by the signing of the Assam accord and the formation of the political party AGP. After coming to power, the AGP left the problem in the lurch, and from time to time, it exploded like a time bomb.

The origin of the problem of illegal settlers in Assam owes to the creation of Bangladesh but there was no mechanism put in place to solve this problem. It would be naïve to expect Bangladesh to take back the illegal settlers. Blaming them would also no solve the solution.

It was 90,000 Bengali refugees that warranted action from the Indian state, now, when five lakh refugees are sheltering in Assam camps, in one of India’s biggest internal exodus, no one is talking about solving this niggling problem. How long will this problem go on and how many more times Assam will burn again, no one really knows.

What appears that like many other problems facing the northeast, India is not serious about solving this problem as well? Instead of giving a serious thought to address such issues, India seems to be running away from them?

The problem of Nagaland is a classic case. Even six decades India still has not been able to address this issue. Fifteen years of deadly silence the peace talks between Nagaland negotiators and government’s interlocutors has yielded no tangible results.

Same is the case of Manipur where the tactical divide and rule game has put a lid on the twin issue; the liberation movement and the Naga population living in the Manipur areas demanding greater Nagaligm.

As long as guns remain silent at whatever price, every thing seems to be fine but the question is how long can we hold on issues like this?

The problem of Bodoland too falls in the same category. Bodo’s were demanding an independent state of Bodoland since March 2, 1987. The armed struggle which they waged for the fulfillment of their demand made the government to yield to the creation of autonomous Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) in 2003.

However, it gave birth to another problem that is the current issue of debate, the native verses settlers. The Bodos are only 29 per cent of the population but were given the powers for development and other matters in the BTC. This was disliked by the 69 percent non-Bodo people. This includes Bengali speaking Muslims who are settled in those areas from a long time. The non-Bodo people feel deprived and are opposed the formation of the BTC.

The Bodos, on the other hand, want to increase their number in their area to become a majority and justify the creation of BTC. They have taken up the issue of native verses settlers and through violent methods want to cleanse the Bengali speaking Muslims whom they dub as illegal settlers from Bangladesh. The creation of the BTC thus has created enormous tension in that area. It instead of solving the problem has complicated it much further.

The recent conflict in Assam has a much wider connotation for the entire country. At its bottom lay the complex problem of “Assam’s citizenship” issue. A permanent solution based on economic consideration can only ease the tension on the ground. This has to be done in an amicable manner so that no party feels aggrieved. If we do not like such acts of violence to reoccur we have to look for long term peace and stability in Assam.

AUTHOR: Mujtaba Syed
URL: http://mujtabas-musings.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: syedalimujtaba [at] yahoo.com

But the historical semblances didn’t stop with references to bygone eras or now defunct imperial codes. Some of the more interesting ones were those that placed Pussy Riot within a broader historical tradition of Russian minstrelsy, where hooliganism, art, and protest collided into a staple of Russian medieval culture.

Indeed, there were two references to Russian medieval minstrels, or skomorokhi, in the trial. When one of the prosecutors asked Stalnisalv Samutsevich, the father of Pussy Rioter Yekaterina, if he believed “it was acceptable to say ‘Holy shit’ in a church”, he compared his daughter’s act to that of the skomorokhi of the sixteenth century. Likewise, in her statement to the court, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova said that Pussy Riot were in the tradition of the skomorokhi. “We are jesters, skomorokhi, maybe even, holy fools. We didn’t mean any harm.”

Skomorokhi were minstrel entertainers in Kievan and Muscovite Russia that performed for public and Tsar alike. They were wildly popular as they performed songs and folktales or acts of trained bears to the delight of onlookers. Despite their entertainment value, like Pussy Riot, they combined entertainment and mockery with unruliness. Unlike the balaclava-clad feminists, however, the lawlessness of the skomorokhi mostly involved theft and pillage. One famous story told of a band of minstrels distracting the peasants of Likovo with their performance, while their comrades were busy rounding up the villagers’ sheep. Other incidents told of skomorokhiransacking barns, raiding animal pens, and making off with whatever they could grab. According to Russell Zguta, a historian of the minstrels, “The performing minstrels would frequently allude in song and proverb to the mischief their unseen comrades were engaged in, but no one was wiser until it was too late.”

As Ivan’s unleashing of the skomorokhi on the Archbishop suggests, the minstrels had few friends in the Orthodox Church. Church officials viewed the skomorokhi as disseminators of paganism, purveyors of “shameful performances” on street corners and marketplaces, and disruptors of church rituals. Weddings garnered many priests’ ire as the minstrels’ performance often overshadowed the religious sanctity of the nuptials. Sometimes confrontations between priests and skomorokhi descended in fisticuffs.  In his biography, Ivan Neronov, a leader of the Orthodox Zealots of Piety, told of an incident in the mid-1640s where he attacked a group of minstrels, seized their instruments and smashed them. Angered, the skomorokhi severely beat clergyman in return.  But the zealot was undaunted. As Zhuta reports:

Henceforth [Neronov] and some of his students patrolled the streets of the town during the major festival periods such as Koliada in order to discourage the skomorokhi from performing. But, says the author, students “received not a few wounds at the hands of the skomorokhi, those servants of the devil, and they bore these bodily wounds with joy as they returned to their homes, bloodied but alive.”

Avvakum too had confrontations with skomorokhi. When a band of minstrels with dancing bears arrived to his village of Lopatishch in 1648, he quickly set to drive them away. “I, a sinner, being zealous in the service of Christ,” he wrote, “drove them out and destroyed their masks and drums, one against many in the open field, and I took two great bears from them—one I killed but he later revived, the other I set free in the open field.”

Neronov’s patrols and Avvakum’s clash with the minstrels provide a whole new historical context for the recent call by Ivan Otrakovsky, head of Orthodox Christian movement Holy Rus, for Orthodox activists to form patrol squads to protect worshipers from the “enemies of faith.” “The time has come to remind all apostates and theomachists that it is our land and we forbid blasphemous, offensive actions and statements against the Orthodox religion and our people,” Otrakovsky wrote in his appeal to the faithful. A modern day Zealot of Piety, I’d say.

Though skomorokhi enjoyed the patronage of Tsars Ivan IV, Fedor I, and Mikhail Romanov, the latter’s son, Alexei, took stringent action against minstrelsy. Urged by his confessor and leader of the Zealots of Piety, Stefan Vonifatev, and pushed to reestablish public order in the wake mob violence in Moscow and revolts in Ustiug, Solvychegodsk, Yaroslavl, Tomsk, Novgorod and Pskov, Alexei issued “On the Righting of Morals and the Abolition of Superstition” in December 1648 against the skomorokhi. Aleksei was alarmed by the “drunkenness and devilish amusements” of the skomorokhi, which turned the people away the Orthodox faith and God and to the worship of the minstrels. The 1648 edict unleashed a wave of repression against minstrels, including the confiscation and destruction of their instruments, and penalties such as knouting and exile for performing skomorokhi entertainments, as well as prohibitions on a whole host of pagan rites, festivity, games, and practices. Even priests questioned confessors about their connection to the skomorokhi.  They asked penitents: “Did you seek out the games of the skomorokhi? Did you seek out Satanic games, look upon these, or yourself take part in them?” If they answered yes, the penitent was required to recite, “I have sinned, I delighted in hearing the sound of gusli and the organon, of horns, and all manner of skomoroshestvo, of Satanic sayings, and for this I also paid them [that is, the minstrels].”

The skomorokhi hobbled along after 1648, but thanks to Alexei’s crackdown, they never regained their popularity, notoriety, or cultural significance. While the practices of the skomorokhi certainly continued in different forms, according to Zhuta, historical references to them died out after 1768.

But as the Pussy Riot affair shows, the memory of the skomorokhi lives on in Tolokonnikova’s “We are jesters, skomorokhi, maybe even, holy fools.” And perhaps thanks to her, Maria Alyokhina, and Yekaterina Samutsevitch’s “punk prayer” they will live again, in all their former anarchic glory.

All references come from:

Russell Zguta, Russian Minstrels: A History of the Skomorokhi, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1978.

AUTHOR: Sean Guillory
URL: http://seansrussiablog.org and http://newbooksinrussianstudies.com
E-MAIL: sguillory1 [at] niu.edu

A protest-rally was organized at Mumbai’s Azad Maidan by the much marginalized minority Muslims to highlight the heart-wrenching atrocities against their fellow-brethren in the State of Assam and in Myanmar. It is understandable even though from the political perspective, the Indian Foreign Ministry has clarified that the Government has no say in the Myanmar genocide.

Moreover the fact of the matter remains that the killings in the regions need to be addressed as ethnic-violence rather than restricting it to just communal disharmony.

However the violence in the aftermath in Mumbai was totally against the principles of Islamic values and contrary to the spirit of Ramazan that is being observed by Muslims across the world.

Having said that, the unjustified post-rally carnage that subsequently made it a lost cause of drawing attention to the inhuman butchery in the North-East parts of India and in Myanmar was ironically, far much lesser in comparison to what Muslims as well as non-Muslims have suffered in those places recently.

An interesting fact is, more than the under-prepared Mumbai Police, it was the protest-rally organizers who were caught on the wrong foot with the sheer numbers of participants at the rally.

Taking into consideration the monsoon season and the ongoing month of Ramazan, hardly 1200-1500 participants were anticipated to come. Surprisingly, within a few hours, a sea of some fifty-thousand enthused people got gathered according to media reports.

Had the organizers over-publicized the protest-rally unintentionally? Or, was the mammoth turn-out a result of a new simmering Muslim generation categorically sidelined from the Indian mainstream? Both factors hold water in this case.

Signature campaigns, SMS circulations, and systematic pamphlet distributions all giving statistical information on Muslim massacres were doing the rounds extensively. Along with that, the Urdu media rightfully pointing out the national and international media’s indifference to effectively report the slaughters, all snow-balled into an explosion of frustration of the Muslim youth.

Not that the riot is justified in all senses, but it certainly wasn’t an overnight reaction.

With investigations already underway by the Crime Branch, an important factor reported in the media that certainly needs to be addressed is the criminal instigation by a community leader from Uttar Pradesh, Molvi Abdul Qadir Alvi whose highly emotive and fiery speech at the venue aroused unwanted sentiments. Unfortunately, by the time one of the other speakers sharing the dais cut-short the mindless rhetoric, the damage had already been done. What followed is now history.

If proved right, apart from pursuing for stringent criminal proceeding against him, Muslim authorities and institutes, as to set an example, should recant all honors and credentials bestowed upon the Molvi and debar him from delivering community discourses and leading prayer congregations.
Ostensibly, the political angle also cannot be ruled out in the Mumbai riots.

Assam being a Congress-ruled State burned for days due to the deliberate lackluster government response in handling the fiasco. The Congress-led Union government in New Delhi also dragged its feet in deploying the Army which was stationed just 150 km from Kokrajhar and Chirang the worst-hit districts by the violence.

The ipso-facto is, an over-whelming anti-Congress atmosphere prevailed over the Mumbai protest-rally.

With the General elections approaching, no political entity at the helm of affairs or in the Opposition can afford such mass retribution. It wouldn’t have taken much to take advantage and disrupt the seemingly peaceful protest-meet in progress by sending a group of skull-cap wearing miscreants- of whichever religion- to ignite a riot. If so, the accusations against the organizers and participants in the protest-gathering will be thick and fast from the ‘investigations’ to create enough public distraction from the communal polity apathy of the political masters.

In the process, the culprits- hired goons, responsible speakers at the venue, liable political and community leaders- all should be booked as it would serve part of the justice sought by the Muslim community.

Nevertheless, there is ample space for hypothesis on the untoward event till the true facts are revealed.

The nagging question however remains. Can Indian Muslims afford such protest-rallies putting the community’s reputation at stake? Can it possibly resort to more effective and innovative ways to bring to light the plight of their fellow brethren and get due justice for them?

As experienced in the past, it shall be an arduous task to get justice in all likelihood.

It has been a long journey as India celebrates its 65th Independence Day.

AUTHOR: Qureish Raghib
E-MAIL: Qhraghib [at] gmail.com

The caravan description reads:

“Led by the poet, Javier Sicilia, the caravan will meet with members of US society through dialogue and peaceful action, carrying proposals to shut off the flow of illegal arms to Mexico, supporting humane and health-oriented alternatives to the prohibition of drugs and demanding effective, non-violent security policies. It will also seek a humane immigration policy.“

The CIP Americas Program–along with some 100 partner organizations of migrants, churches, unions, students, NGOs and community members in the cities along the route–is helping to organize caravan events and give voice to the victims of the drug war. We will be accompanying the caravan on part of its long journey through the country and providing daily blogs, articles and interviews as events unfold.

A handful of U.S. companies that produce weapons and defense and intelligence equipment are raking in taxpayer dollars in government contracts for the drug war, while in Mexico more than 70,000 people have died since the war was launched in December 2006.

Today the face of the U.S. government in Mexico is the face of war. This face is reflected in the vast expansion of joint security operations and direct intervention in Mexico´s counter-narcotics planning and operations. Instead of schools and hospitals, our tax dollars support military helicopters and espionage systems.

The relationship between the two nations has degenerated into a seemingly endless war on drugs, The war is commanded from the north, where enforcing prohibition is considered more important than human lives, and fought in the south, where the long arm of enforcement has left 70,000 dead in the past six years.

Despite tragically negative results, the U.S. government has dismissed calls from citizens in both countries to end the war on drugs and the misguided Merida Initiative that supports it. Instead, we continue on a path that throws U.S. youth behind the bars of lucrative private prisons and feeds defense companies by perpetuating violent conflict in Mexico.

Family members of the thousands murdered, disappeared, attacked and displaced in Mexico’s drug war and their supporters will present a very different, human, face of binational relations. They will meet with families in the United States that have suffered senseless incarceration and violence as a result of criminalizing drugs, rather than supporting communities and individuals to manage the health and social threats posed by consumption and addiction.

Find out what organizations are planning in your community. You are needed to help out with organization of events and logistics for the peace caravan. Please plan to attend the events. Learn first-hand the human costs of the drug war and find out how to make change from your own community on up to the national and international levels.

Here is the caravan schedule. For more information on events in your community, see the caravan website. To volunteer for upcoming caravan events, please write us at: info@cipamericas.org

SCHEDULE:

San Diego, CA – Aug 12 SUN
Los Angeles, CA – Aug 13- Aug 14 MON/TUES
Phoenix, AZ – Aug 15 WED
Tucson, AZ – Aug 16 THURS
Las Cruces, NM – Aug 17 FRI
Albuquerque/Santa Fe, NM – Aug 18 SAT
Santa Fe, NM – Aug 19 SUN
El Paso, TX – Aug 21 TUES
Laredo, TX- Aug 22, WED
Harlingen/Brownsville, TX – Aug 23 THURS
McAllen/San Antonio, TX – Aug 24 FRI
Austin, TX – Aug 25 SAT
Houston, TX – Aug 26 SUN
New Orleans, LA – Aug 27 MON
Montgomery, AL – Aug 29 WED
Atlanta, GA – Aug 30 – 31 THURS/FRI
(Travel Night to Chicago, IL & Rest Day – Sept 2 SUN)
Chicago, IL – Sep 3-4 MON/TUES
Cleveland, OH -Sept 5 WED
New York, NY – Sept 6-7 THURS/FRI
Baltimore, MD – Sept 8-9 SAT/ SUN
Washington, D.C. – Sept 10-12 MON-WED – FINAL CITY

For More Information:

• Caravan for Peace with Justice and Dignity web site: http://www.caravanforpeace.org/caravan
• Global Exchange,  Co-Organizer of the Peace Caravan http://www.globalexchange.org/mexico/caravan
• Invitation to join the Peace Caravan here.
• Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity’s website (Spanish)
• Sign up to volunteer with the caravan by using this registration form.

Some English-language press on the Caravan so far:

Democracy Now! “Javier Sicilia Brings Peace Caravan to the U.S.to Condemn Deadly Drug War” Aug. 16.  http://www.democracynow.org/2012/8/16/mexican_poet_activist_javier_sicilia_brings.  Also see: “Mexican Poet Javier Sicilia Condemns U.S. Role in We¡idening Drug Violence” May 11. http://www.democracynow.org/2012/5/11/stop_the_drug_war_mexican_poet

“Cross-country tour to point out the failure of the war on drugs”, Steve Lopez, Los Angeles Times, Aug. 12, 2012.  http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-0812-lopez-moms-20120812,0,6855876.column?page=1

“Mothers share their anguish at losses to Mexico’s violence”, Steve Lopez, Los Angeles Times, Aug. 15, 2012. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-0815-lopez-mexicomoms-20120814,0,218429.column

The Nation: Can the Caravan of Peace End the War on Drugs?

Los Angeles Times: Mexican activist, poet brings Caravan for Peace to U.S.

AFP: Drug war ‘peace caravan’ woos Hollywood

KPFA 94.1-FM in Berkeley: Victims of US/Mexico Drug War Lead Caravan for Peace

Contacts for Organizing:

1) Kirsten Moller: San Diego, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Jackson, Atlanta, Charlotte
kirsten@globalexchange.org, 415 255 7295

2) Louise Levayer: Tucson, El Paso, Brownsville/Harlingen/McAllen, San Antonio, Austin, Houston
louise.levayer@gmail.com, (415) 575 5531

3) Chelsea Brown: Albuquerque, Santa Fe, New York City, Baltimore
Chelsea.avril.brown@gmail.com, (415) 575 5531

4) Liz Sanchez: Cleveland, Phoenix, Montgomery, Chicago
lizsanchez0916@gmail.com, (415) 575 553

AUTHOR: Laura Carlsen
URL: www.cipamericas.org and http://americasmexico.blogspot.com
E-MAIL: lecarlsen [at] gmail.com