Nigerian film about Islamist insurgency aims at Oscar glory


By Angela Ukomadu and Abraham Achirga

© Reuters/HANDOUT Women are seen smiling in a wedding scene in "The Milkmaid", Nigeria's feature film submission for Oscar award in Taraba State, Nigeria

LAGOS/ABUJA (Reuters) - Ten years ago, Desmond Ovbiagele abandoned his career in investment banking to pursue his dream of making films. Now the Nigerian director's movie about the jihadist insurgency in his country has been put forward as an Oscars contender.


"The Milkmaid" tells the story of two sisters who are abducted from their village during a deadly attack by militants in northeast Nigeria. It has been submitted by Nigeria as its entry for international feature consideration at the Academy Awards.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will announce its nominations for the Academy Awards on March 15.

"Even having made it this far is a huge encouragement to filmmakers who don't necessarily want to tell the most commercial type of stories," Ovbiagele - who wrote and directed the film - told Reuters in an interview in Nigeria's commercial capital, Lagos.

The insurgency by militant group Boko Haram has killed more than 30,000 people and forced about 2 million to flee their homes since 2009. The group attained global notoriety in 2014 with the abduction of more than 270 schoolgirls in the northeastern town of Chibok.

"I felt it was important that we put some backstories and some personalities behind all these casualty statistics," said Ovbiagele.

The film has already won five Africa Movie Academy Awards, including Best Film. Although Nigeria is an English-speaking country, it is eligible for the Oscars best international film category because the characters address each other in the Hausa, Arabic and Fulfulde languages spoken locally.

Anthonieta Kalunta, lead actress in the movie, said she hoped those judging "The Milkmaid" would see the film as being told from "a very beautiful perspective", despite the subject matter.

For Ovbiagele, the film's success will draw attention to the plight of hidden victims.

"The victims of insurgency were not getting the attention that I felt they truly deserved," he said.

(Reporting by Angela Ukomadu in Lagos and Abraham Achirga in Abuja; Writing by Alexis Akwagyiram; Editing by Rosalba O'Brien)

PBS chief defends filmmaker Ken Burns, touts diversity

LOS ANGELES — The chief executive of PBS rejected a filmmaker’s argument that public TV's 40-year relationship with documentarian Ken Burns has come at the expense of diversity.

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President and CEO Paula Kerger was asked Tuesday about an essay by filmmaker Grace Lee, who contended that public TV's deep attachment to Burns, whose series include “The Civil War” and “Baseball,” slights viewers of colour.


“I feel very privileged to have the opportunity to work with Ken Burns, whose legacy is extraordinary and as we look forward, has a very rich pipeline of programs that he’s bringing to public television,” Kerger said in a virtual Q&A with the Television Critics Association.

“We create lots of opportunities for many filmmakers,” Kerger said. Burns “mentors a number of filmmakers who now have quite established careers ... and he has a deep commitment to mentoring diverse filmmakers.”

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She said she “respectfully disagrees” with Lee's arguments in a essay last fall for the Ford Foundation. Among them: that PBS decision-makers and funders have an interdependence with “one white, male filmmaker” who represents “one man’s lens on America,” as Lee put it.

Noting that she was a producer on PBS’ “Asian Americans" last year, Lee wrote that she takes seriously whether public TV reflects the diverse audience it was founded to serve because “I largely owe my documentary career to PBS.”

Kerger, who called Lee a “very talented filmmaker,” said PBS has worked with her on a number of projects “and I envision we’ll continue to work with her.”

Kerger said PBS is intent on fostering a culture of inclusion and ensuring that diverse voices are part of “every aspect of content creation." Among the upcoming projects she highlighted: a May film about the 1921 Tulsa race massacre, which decimated a Black business district in Oklahoma.

Burns is known for sweeping, award-winning examinations of chapters and issues in American history, including “The Vietnam War” and “The Central Park Five.” Through a spokesman, he declined comment on Lee’s comments.

In a separate panel with TV critics Tuesday about “Hemingway,” a documentary about writer Ernest Hemingway directed by Burns and Lynn Novick and airing on PBS in April, Burns was asked about choosing the subjects for his occasional film biographies.

A reporter noted they have featured prominent white people, including artists and political figures, but focused on Black athletes, among them pioneering greats Jackie Robinson, Jack Johnson and coming this fall, Muhammad Ali.

Burns said Louis Armstrong deserves his own lengthy documentary but was a central figure in “Jazz,” an example of biography as “one constituent building block” of broader historical films.

As for who gets singled out, “it has be done with your gut,” Burns said, then echoed a comment by Novick, his longtime colleague. “As Lynn said, they choose us."

"The stuff that’s coming up is incredibly diverse in every sense of the meaning of that word,” Burns said.

Lynn Elber, The Associated P

Terry Glavin: 

Myanmar’s 'democratic transition' 

came to a halt the day Suu Kyi was elected

© Provided by National Post In a file photo from Dec. 10, 2019, supporters of Aung San Suu Kyi rally in Yangon as Suu Kyi prepared to defend Myanmar at the International Court of Justice in The Hague against accusations of genocide against Rohingya Muslims.

It’s bad enough that Myanmar’s generals have reverted to type, engineered a coup, headed off the first meeting of the re-elected National League for Democracy government and locked up the former honorary Canadian citizen Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s de facto head of government since 2015.


It will only make matters worse if Joe Biden’s simultaneously-elected U.S government reverts to the type of approach to Myanmar championed by the White House the past time Biden’s Democratic Party ran the American show. That was when Barack Obama’s administration happily ignored warnings from human rights organizations, rushed to lift sanctions on the regime and threw its arms around the charming and glamorous Oxford-educated Suu Kyi.

Those warnings proved tragically prescient, straight away. Suu Kyi set about ingratiating herself with the worst elements in Myanmar’s ethnic Burmese majority by enthusiastically supporting a genocidal scorched-earth misery her military partners in government decided to inflict upon the Muslim Rohingya people in Myanmar’s western Rakhine state.

Within two years of Suu Kyi’s 2015 landslide win, more than 700,000 Rohingyas had been driven into squalid, makeshift refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh, joining close to 250,000 Rohingyas ethnically cleansed from Myanmar in earlier pogroms. Two years after that, in December 2019, the Nobel Peace Prize winner stood before the judges at the International Court of Justice in The Hague and denied that her government’s crimes against humanity in Rakhine had ever occurred.

Suu Kyi also denies the Rohingya people even exist. No matter how absurd the Myanmar military bloc’s claim about election-day fraud may be — that’s the coup pretext the armed forces’ commander-in-chief has resorted to — the military’s Union Solidarity and Development Party has a point in its claim that what occurred in November was not an election that was “free, fair, unbiased and free from unfair campaigning.”

Suu Kyi’s National League swept last November’s polls, taking 396 of the parliament’s 476 seats. But the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh didn’t get to vote, and neither did the Rohingya people remaining in Myanmar. That’s partly because of Myanmar’s racist citizenship laws. It’s also because of a spurious decision by an election commission dominated by Suu Kyi’s party that the Rohingyas in Rakhine, along with Myanmar’s ethnic Kachin, Karen, Mon, Chin and Shan minorities, lived in “conflict areas” too dangerous to allow polling.

© K.M. ASAD/AFP/Getty Images Rohingya refugees from Rakhine state in Myanmar walk near Ukhia, at the border between Bangladesh and Myanmar, as they flee violence, in a file photo from Sept. 4, 2017.

Several prominent minority candidates were barred from running in the election. Private news organizations were crippled by rules ostensibly enacted for pandemic-related public health purposes. The state-dominated media enforced election-commission rules that effectively censored opposition party campaign broadcasts. Election scripts were subject to approval or rejection by Suu Kyi’s Ministry of Information.

Journalists are routinely arrested in Myanmar. Internet access to more than 200 news sites was blocked last year. Reporters Without Borders ranks Myanmar 139th out of 180 on its Press Freedom Index.

There has been quite a bit of florid language making the rounds about the terrible blow the coup has dealt to Myanmar’s “democratic transition.” The High Representative of the European Union, along with the foreign ministers of the G7 — the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada, Italy and Japan — have asserted their commitment to what they call Myanmar’s democratic transition and to “unrestricted humanitarian access to support the most vulnerable,” which Suu Kyi’s government and the military have refused all along.

An easier case could be made for the proposition that Myanmar’s “democratic transition” came to an abrupt standstill the minute Suu Kyi was elected in 2015. Because her husband and children are British citizens, Suu Kyi was obliged to put a proxy in the president’s chair while she led the country in a post created for her — state counsellor. But she also had herself appointed minister for the president’s office, foreign affairs minister, education minister, and minister for electrical power and energy.

Surrounded by the incompetents and party hacks she’d appointed to senior positions, Suu Kyi’s government was a reluctant joint venture with the military, which the constitution allows to appoint the minister of defence, the minister of home affairs, and the minister of border affairs. One of every four seats in the national legislature is reserved for the military.

It was in the lead-up to Suu Kyi’s release from house arrest in 2011 — the daughter of a hero of the Burmese national liberation struggle, Suu Kyi had been confined to her home for nearly 15 years — that a genuine flowering of democratic modernization unfolded in Myanmar.

© AFP via Getty Images Rohingya refugees are seen on a Bangladeshi naval ship as they are relocated to Bhashan Char Island in the Bay of Bengal, in Chittagong, on Jan. 29, 2021.

Eager to break Myanmar’s cycle of debilitating violence, ethnic warfare and poverty, and desperate to convince the U.S. and its Western allies to lift sanctions on the half-century-old military regime, the armed forces had introduced a dizzying array of reforms. Restrictions on labour unions were lifted. Media censorship was dramatically scaled back. Hundreds of political prisoners, including Suu Kyi, were released.

The United States and its allies enjoyed crucial leverage back then, but the Obama administration, over the objections of senior State Department analysts and human rights groups, rushed ahead to rehabilitate Myanmar and end the country’s pariah status. In July 2012 — only weeks after a gruesome pogrom drove 120,000 Rohingyas into Bangladesh — the Obama White House lifted a tranche of sanctions on the regime. Later that year, after another orgy of anti-Rohingya violence, Obama paid a visit to Myanmar — the first American president to do so.

In the months before the calamitous 2016 election of Republican Donald Trump, Obama lifted almost all of what remained of the U.S economic sanctions on Myanmar. Other Western countries, Canada included, followed suit. Emboldened by their newfound impunity, Myanmar’s generals put Rakhine state to the torch, murdering thousands of Rohingyas. Suu Kyi was content to go along with the terror.

It wasn’t until October 2018 that the Senate and the House of Commons voted to revoke Suu Kyi’s honorary Canadian citizenship, awarded to her in 2007.

It’s hard to see what good it would do now to simply reinstate the earlier economic sanctions on Myanmar, a move the Biden administration says it’s considering. Suu Kyi has pulled Myanmar into Beijing’s comforting orbit. China’s supreme leader Xi Jinping visited Suu Kyi in Myanmar a year ago. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi was Suu Kyi’s first guest as Myanmar’s foreign minister, and Wang was back in Myanmar last month, pushing a massive infrastructure investment that would extend Beijing’s overland trade access to the Indian Ocean.

Thanks to China’s veto, the United Nations Security Council couldn’t even manage to say anything untoward about what has happened in Myanmar this week.

Myanmar’s generals say they’ll only hold total power for a year or so, and then perhaps Suu Kyi will be back. Unless something dramatic erupts in the political culture of Myanmar’s Burmese majority, that is how things will likely unfold, and in the meantime, it will be like Suu Kyi never left.

TRUMP TOO

President of Tanzania says it's free from Covid-19 and rejects vaccine

The world has found a common approach to dealing with Covid-19, but there are some outliers, like #Tanzania. Back In June, President John Magufuli declared his country to be free of the disease. In the months that have followed, he and other government officials have made fun of masks, openly questioned if testing works, and teased neighbouring countries which have imposed restrictions on movement. Magufuli is also denying Tanzanians a Covid-19 vaccine. - 

Also available on TRT World - Watch 'I Gotta story to tell' - weekly show focusing on colonialism, profiles of key historical figures as well as stories breaking down current affairs. 👉http://trt.world/ffbz

Pariah with benefits: US aiding Saudi defence despite chill

As a presidential candidate, Joe Biden laid out a tougher line on Saudi Arabia than any U.S. president in decades. He said he would make the kingdom “pay the price” for human rights abuses and “make them in fact the pariah that they are.”

© Provided by The Canadian Press

But if Biden is making Saudi Arabia a pariah now, it's a pariah with benefits.

While Biden announced Thursday he was making good on his campaign commitment to end U.S. support for a five-year Saudi-led bombing campaign in Yemen, his administration is making clear it won’t abandon U.S. military assistance for the kingdom and plans to help Saudi Arabia strengthen its own defences.

His approach reflects the complexity of the U.S.-Saudi relationship. While Biden is taking a tougher line than his predecessors, he and his foreign policy team recognize the U.S. can’t allow relations to unravel. They see the importance of maintaining aspects of a military, counterterrorism and security relationship seen as vital for security of both nations.

“The United States will co-operate with Saudi Arabia where our priorities align and will not shy away from defending U.S. interests and values where they do not,” the State Department said in an emailed response to questions from The Associated Press.

The aligned priorities have included a longstanding U.S. emphasis on playing a lead defending the kingdom and its oil from attacks that would jolt the world’s energy markets and economies. U.S. leaders also see Saudi Arabia as a regional counterweight to Iran.

Biden said Thursday that the Saudi-led offensive in Yemen has “created a humanitarian and strategic catastrophe.” He said he would stop arms sales related to the Yemen offensive, but gave no immediate details what that might mean. The administration already had said it was pausing the Trump administration's sale of precision-guided munitions to Saudi Arabia.

At the same time Thursday, Biden also reaffirmed that the United States was committed to co-operating in the kingdom's defence.

That will include helping protect Saudi Arabia's territory, critical infrastructure and shipping routes from the kingdom's opponents in neighbouring Yemen, the Houthis, the State Department said. The Biden administration has yet to spell out how it plans to boost defence of the kingdom. Saudi Arabia points to missile and drone strikes and other cross-border attacks launched by Houthis in Yemen.

Sen. Chris Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat and critic of U.S. involvement in the Saudi air campaign in Yemen, agreed that the U.S. may still have a security interest in helping guard the kingdom.

“Our focus should be providing basic defensive capabilities to help Riyadh defend itself from external threats, not fighting those threats for the Saudis," Murphy said.

But the U.S. should provide no “additional military support to Saudi Arabia unless we can clearly conclude that support...will not be used as irresponsibly as it has been in Yemen,” Murphy said. He called the kingdom an important partner nonetheless, and said he would work with the administration to reset relations with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations.

International criticism of Saudi Arabia has mounted since 2015, under King Salman and his son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Saudi Arabia that year led the United Arab Emirates and others in launching a war targeting Houthi rebels who had seized territory including the ancient city of Sanaa in Yemen, the Arabian peninsula’s poorest country. Saudi-led airstrikes since then have killed numerous Yemeni civilians, including schoolboys on a bus and fishermen in their fishing boats. The stalled war has failed to dislodge the Houthis and is deepening hunger and poverty. International rights advocates say Yemen's Houthis also have committed abuses, including repeated attacks on civilians.

The CIA and others also hold the crown prince responsible for the murder and dismemberment of a U.S.-based Saudi journalist, Jamal Khashoggi. The kingdom has imprisoned women who requested government permission to drive and other peaceful advocates. It detained numerous businesspeople and members of the sprawling royal family.

Saudi Arabia has been conciliatory as the Biden administration settles in. It said Thursday it welcomes international diplomacy in the Yemen conflict. Its leaders stress the shared history and co-operation on intelligence, education and other matters. On Thursday, in what was seen as the latest gesture to Biden, the kingdom conditionally released two dual Saudi-American citizens held in a crackdown on civil society and shortened the sentence of a third, the State Department said. The latter, Dr. Walid Fitaihi, had been convicted of “disobedience” to the government.

"I believe we will have a great relationship with them, because all the pillars upon which the relationship stands are still there," Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan told Saudi-funded Al Arabiya television about Biden officials.

It was the Obama administration — focused at the time on closing a nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia's rival, Iran — that greenlighted Saudi Arabia's military offensive in Yemen. American involvement with Saudi Arabia's command and control was supposed to minimize airstrikes on civilians, but often did not. Yemeni survivors displayed fragments showing it was American-made bombs that hit them. Some of those same Obama officials have since expressed regret, and are now in the Biden administration as it moves to end involvement with the offensive.

It's not yet clear how far Biden will go in fulfilling his campaign pledge to stop the multibillion U.S. arms trade with Saudi Arabia.

Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of the Democracy for the Arab World Now rights advocacy organization, said she was pleased at the administration's messaging so far involving Gulf countries and the Yemen war. The organization was founded by Khashoggi shortly before Saudis killed him

Whitson said she would watch to see if the U.S. maintained arms sales to the kingdom simply by rebranding offensive weapons as defensive, however.

Ultimately, stepped-up U.S. pledges to help Saudi Arabia build up its defences could give the kingdom the face-saving cover it needs to give up on its Yemen offensive, said Steven Cook, a Middle East researcher at the Council on Foreign Relations think-tank.

It could be “convincing the Saudis to declare victory and go home is really the only way,” Cook said. “Hold our nose and do it.”

Ellen Knickmeyer, The Associated Press

VICTORY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS

Women’s rights activist Hathloul freed from Saudi jail after almost 3 years

Loujain al Hathloul, who had campaigned to end a ban on women driving in the country, was arrested in 2018 and sentenced to six years in prison last December under a broad counterterrorism law.

In this file undated handout picture, Saudi activist 

Loujain al Hathloul poses for the camera. (Reuters)

Prominent women's rights activist Loujain al Hathloul was released from a Saudi prison after nearly three years behind bars, her family has said.

Hathloul, 31, was detained in May 2018 and sentenced in December to nearly six years in prison on charges that UN rights experts called "spurious" under broad counterterrorism laws.

The case has drawn international condemnation.

The court suspended two years and 10 months of her sentence, most of which had already been served.

She still faces a five-year travel ban ordered by the court.

"Loujain is at home !!!!!!" her sister Lina tweeted.

READ MORE: What it means for Saudi women to take the wheel amid growing tensions


Torture claims

Another sister, Alia, said Hathloul was at their parents' home in Saudi Arabia.

She posted a picture of Hathloul smiling in a garden, looking much thinner and with grey streaks in her hair.

Rights groups and her family say Hathloul, who had campaigned for women's right to drive and to end Saudi's male guardianship system, was subjected to abuse, including electric shocks, waterboarding, flogging and sexual assault.

Saudi authorities denied the accusations.

A Saudi appeals court dismissed the torture claims, citing a lack of evidence, her family said on Tuesday.

Amnesty International on Wednesday urged Riyadh to bring to justice "those responsible for her torture" and ensure Hathloul faces no further punitive measures like a travel ban.

Saudi officials have not commented on her conviction or sentencing.

There was no immediate comment on her release.

US President Joe Biden on Wednesday welcomed the release.

"It was the right thing to do," he said.

The White House has said President Biden, who is taking a firmer line with Saudi Arabia than predecessor Donald Trump, expects Riyadh to improve its human rights record, including releasing political prisoners.

READ MORE: 'Reforms' in Saudi Arabia exist only as a tool to appease Western allies


Harsh criticism over human rights

Hathloul, detained along with several other women's rights activists, was convicted on charges including seeking to change the Saudi political system and harming national unity.

Saudi Arabia's rights record came under global scrutiny after the 2018 murder of prominent Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents, which tarnished Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's image.

The prince denied ordering the killing.

Agnes Callamard, the independent UN rights investigator who led an international probe into Khashoggi's murder, welcomed Hathloul's release but said in a Twitter post that "the cruelty" of Saudi rulers that "violated her most basic right to physical and mental integrity" should not be forgotten.

READ MORE: Jamal Khashoggi: a murder case that continues to haunt Saudi Arabia





Many more victims

Diplomats have said the kingdom has appeared to be acting to address potential friction with the Biden administration.

Saudi authorities released two activists with US citizenship on bail this month pending trials on terrorism-related charges.

Last month, a Saudi appeals court nearly halved a six-year jail sentence for a US-Saudi physician and suspended the rest, meaning he did not have to return to jail.

Hathloul's family published her indictment after her case was transferred to a Specialised Criminal Court, established to try terrorism suspects but used in the past decade to prosecute perceived dissidents.

Authorities made few charges public.

The main ones against Hathloul included calling for an end to male guardianship and communicating with global rights groups, Saudi activists in the kingdom and abroad, and foreign diplomats and international media.

READ MORE: Saudi Arabia continues to target dissidents despite Khashoggi backlash

India restores 4G mobile internet in Kashmir after 550 days

SRINAGAR, India — India ended an 18-month-long ban on high speed internet services on mobile devices in disputed Kashmir, where opposition to New Delhi has deepened after it revoked the region's semi-autonomy.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

The order late Friday lifted the ban on 4G mobile data services However, the order issued by the region’s home secretary, Shaleen Kabra, asked police officials to “closely monitor the impact of lifting of restrictions.”

A blanket internet ban, the longest in a democracy which rights activists dubbed as “digital apartheid” and “collective punishment,” came into effect on August 2019 when India stripped Kashmir of its special status and statehood that gave its residents special rights in land ownership and jobs. The region was also divided into two federally governed territories.

The move accompanied a security clampdown and total communications blackout that left hundreds of thousands jobless, impaired the already feeble health care system and paused the school and college education of millions. Months later, India gradually eased some of the restrictions, including partial internet connectivity.

In January last year, authorities allowed the Indian-controlled territory’s more than 12 million people to access government-approved websites over slow-speed connections.

Two months later, authorities revoked a ban on social media and restored full internet connectivity but not high speed internet. In August, 4G services were allowed in two out of the region’s 20 districts.

Officials have said the internet ban was aimed at heading off anti-India protests and attacks by rebels who have fought for decades for the region’s independence or unification with Pakistan, which administers another portion of Kashmir. Both countries claim the landlocked territory in its entirety.

Officials have also argued that such security measures were necessary to better integrate the region with India, foster greater economic development and stop threats from “anti-national elements” and Pakistan.

Many Kashmiris, however, view the move as part of the beginning of settler colonialism aimed at engineering a demographic change in India’s only Muslim-majority region.

Digital rights activists have consistently denounced the internet restrictions and said they represented a new level of government control over information. They were also criticized by lawmakers in Europe and the U.S., who called on the government to end the curbs.

Omar Abdullah, the region's former top elected official who was jailed for several months in 2019, welcomed the internet restoration. "Better late than never,” he tweeted.

Others criticized such voices, saying the internet is among the basic rights.

“I actually see some going out of their way to thank govt functionaries for 4G restoration,” Anuradha Bhasin, executive editor of the Kashmir Times, said in a tweet. “They’re not offering us charity. We should be asking for compensation for our deprivation and losses.”

India often snaps mobile internet services in parts of the region as a tactic during counterinsurgency operations and anti-India protests.

According to the London-based digital privacy and research group Top10VPN, India ranked at the top in internet shutdowns in 2020.

The group in its January report said internet shutdowns in 2020 caused a loss of $4.01 billion globally and India was the most impacted while suffering a loss of $2.8 billion.

Most of India’s internet shutdowns have been enforced in Kashmir. But they also have used elsewhere by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Authorities have cut the internet at protest sites outside New Delhi, where tens of thousands of farmers for over two months have camped out against new agriculture laws. The move attracted global attention after pop star Rihanna on Tuesday tweeted a link of a CNN news report about India blocking internet services at the protest sites. It angered government ministers and Indian celebrities, who urged people to come together and denounce outsiders who try to break the country.

Aijaz Hussain, The Associated Press

Why Are Twitter Users Trying To “Expose” Greta Thunberg?

Since she first rose to prominence, 18-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg has faced (and expertly handled) opposition and harassment from many corners of the internet, including Twitter’s biggest cyberbully and least favorite U.S. president. But in a bizarre turn, figures in India are trying to “expose” Thunberg on Twitter, arguing that she that she and Rihanna (yes, Rihanna) are misrepresenting the ongoing farmer protests throughout the country and pushing a global conspiracy theory.

© Provided by Refinery29 HAMBURG, GERMANY – MARCH 01: Teenage Swedish activist Greta Thunberg demonstrates with high school students against global warming at a Fridays for Future demonstration on March 01, 2019 in Hamburg, Germany. Fridays for Future is an international movement of students who, instead of attending their classes, take part in demonstrations demanding for action against climate change. The series of demonstrations began when Thunberg staged such a protest outside the Swedish parliament building. (Photo by Adam Berry/Getty Images)

This week, Thunberg and Rihanna — along with a few other celebrities, including Mia Khalifa — tweeted out links to articles about the current protests in India, which have been ongoing since November. The protests, which are pushing back against recent laws that will strip farm workers of guaranteed wages, have been a point of contention within the country. In an effort to raise awareness, Thunberg shared a Google doc with information about how to help India’s farmers on social media. But she deleted that tweet after supporters of India’s ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party, began tweeting #GretaThunbergExposed and questioning the purpose of the document.

“@GretaThunberg has exposed the global conspiracy that she is a part of,” wrote the Republic Media Network, a right-wing news channel in India. “If you read the contents of the Google doc that she shared, it’s clear that there’s an orchestrated, scripted, and well-funded plan to target India, Indian companies, and Indian democracy.”

It should be noted that Republic TV has been accused of spreading false news and bias in favor of the Bharatiya Janata Party. And now, they are falsely implying that Thunberg is at the center of some kind of international plan to attack Indian democracy. Like previous conspiracy theories about Thunberg, this one is wrong.

The protests date back to a series of laws implemented last September. The main takeaway is that, under the new legislation, workers won’t be given guaranteed wages and will instead be allowed to sell their crops to anyone, at any price. The government insists that this will help India’s economy, but farmers argue that the laws will only lower the costs of their goods and leave agriculture workers across the country vulnerable to exploitation.

To fully grasp the magnitude of the problem, it’s important to recognize how many people are impacted by these changes. Not only does the industry make up almost 15% of India’s economy, but 58% of Indians cite agriculture as their family’s primary source of livelihood. The Indian government released a response to Thunberg’s call to action, writing that the protestors represent “a very small section of farmers in parts of India” who simply have “reservations” about the new laws.

“The temptation of sensationalist social media hashtags and comments, especially when resorted to by celebrities and others, is neither accurate nor responsible,” the external affairs ministry wrote on Wednesday.

However, Thunberg isn’t the one presenting inaccurate, irresponsible information. Hundreds of thousands of farmers have participated in the protests; many have camped out around Delhi for months. The government has escalated its attempts to stop the movement by obstructing protestors’ access to food and water and, more recently, shutting down internet access. There have also been concerns about freedom of the press since multiple journalists were detained for purportedly “inciting” the farmers at the border between Delhi and Haryana.

The internet shutdown has especially impacted people in India and drawn national attention to the protests. “I work tirelessly in the day, helping with the arrangements at the protest site,” 25-year-old Harneet Singh told The Guardian. “Normally, a video call in the evening with the family would relieve my stress but the internet shutdown is choking us.”

Critics believe that the aim of the shutdown was to slash communication between farmers from different protest sites, and communication between protestors and the rest of the world. “The government does not want the real facts to reach protesting farmers, nor their peaceful conduct to reach the world,” Darshan Pal said in a statement, according to CNN. Pal is a leader from Samyukta Kisan Morcha, a united front of over 40 farmers’ unions that banded together to protest the new legislation. He added that the government is afraid of different unions contacting each other and teaming up. “Typically, these village groups work together against each other, but this time they have all united for the collective fight.”

The protests came to a head on January 26, also known as India Republic Day. Farmers entered the capital of Delhi and clashed with the police, who reacted with tear gas and batons. The conflict left many protestors and members of law enforcement injured, and Delhi police called it an “anti-national act.”

The reality is, Thunberg hasn’t been exposed as anything other than a staunch activist, and her role in the protests isn’t dissimilar from the role she has played countless times before. She’s using her platform to raise awareness and attract attention to an important movement. And she probably isn’t going to let a hashtag stop her.

1 tweet from Rihanna on farmer protests gets India incensed

NEW DELHI — It took just one tweet from Rihanna to anger the Indian government and supporters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party. The pop star linked a news article in a tweet drawing attention to the massive farmer protests that have gripped India for more than two months.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Now, senior government ministers, Indian celebrities and even the foreign ministry are urging people to come together and denounce outsiders who try to break the country.

“It is unfortunate to see vested interest groups trying to enforce their agenda on these protests, and derail them,” India's foreign ministry said Wednesday in a rare statement criticizing “foreign individuals” posting on social media. It did not name Rihanna and others who followed suit.

Tens of thousands of farmers have been hunkering down at the Indian capital’s fringes to protest new agricultural laws they say will leave them poorer and at the mercy of corporations. The protests are posing a major challenge to Modi who has billed the laws as necessary to modernize Indian farming.

Their largely peaceful protests turned violent on Jan. 26, India’s Republic Day, when a section of the tens of thousands of farmers riding tractors veered from the protest route earlier decided with police and stormed the 17th century Red Fort in a dramatic escalation. Hundreds of police officers were injured and a protester died. Scores of farmers were also injured but officials have not given their numbers.

Farmer leaders condemned the violence but said they would not call off the protest.

Since then, authorities have heavily increased security at protest sites outside New Delhi’s border, adding iron spikes and steel barricades to stop demonstrating farmers from entering the capital. The government had also restricted access to mobile internet at protest sites up until Tuesday evening.

The latest controversy started Tuesday when Rihanna tweeted to her more than 101 million followers: “Why aren’t we talking about this?!” She linked to a CNN news report about India blocking internet services at the protest sites, a favoured tactic of the Modi government to thwart protests.

The Associated Press and multiple other international news agencies have been covering the farmer protests for months.

Soon after Rihanna's tweet, international condemnation from human rights groups and outrage from Indian supporters of Modi’s party followed. And the foreign ministry accused “foreign individuals” and celebrities of “sensationalism,” without names.

Teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg and the niece of U.S. Vice-President Kamala Harris, Meena Harris, were among those who tweeted their support, triggering a social media storm back in India.

Bollywood entertainers and sports stars, many of whom have long been silent on the farmer protests and often toe the government's line, tweeted in one voice.

They used hashtags #IndiaAgainstPropaganda and #IndiaTogether, echoing the government’s stand on the agriculture laws, and asked people outside India not to meddle with their country’s affairs.

“No one is talking about it because they are not farmers, they are terrorists who are trying to divide India,” actress Kangana Ranaut, a supporter of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, tweeted.

Rihanna’s and Thunberg's tweets also prompted responses from almost every senior leader of BJP, including Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and Home Minister Amit Shah, who said that “no propaganda can deter India’s unity.”

The main opposition Congress party leader Shashi Tharoor said the damage done to India’s global image by the government’s “undemocratic behaviour” could not be restored by making celebrities tweet.

Tharoor in a tweet said Indian government getting “Indian celebrities to react to Western ones is embarrassing."

Former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram took a swipe at the foreign ministry and called its statement “puerile reaction.”

“When will you realize that people concerned with issues of human rights and livelihoods do not recognize national boundaries?,” Chidambaram tweeted.

Negotiations between representatives of the government and farmers to end the protests have failed. The government has proposed suspending the laws for 18 months but is not meeting the farmers' demands for a full repeal.

Sheikh Saaliq, The Associated Press

 Why has YouTube censored viewers in India from accessing songs related to the farmers’ protests? #IndianFarmers

The farmers’ protests are the biggest political threat Modi has seen

K S DAKSHINA MURTHY

The protests are arguably the biggest challenge to the authority of the ruling BJP government to date, and they are going nowhere.

The borders between Delhi and that of two adjoining states, by all accounts, resemble a conflict zone with fencing, barricades, coils of barbed wire, iron spikes cemented to the ground and scores of security personnel manning them. All of it was erected by the government to keep away protesting farmers from the Indian capital.

For the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government under prime minister Narendra Modi, the protests are the latest, and arguably the biggest, challenge to its authority.

After initially appearing to be conciliatory and holding several rounds of talks with the agitating farmers, the government has stepped back and let the protests be – possibly hoping that the steam will run out and that the farmers will return to their homes.

But contrary to the government’s hopes, the protests have intensified. More farmers, in their thousands, have joined in and there is no way of knowing which way the agitation will turn.

Negotiations reach a stalemate

The protests have turned out to be extraordinary in several ways. Farmers – across all classes – are out on the streets in full force, along with their families including scores of women and children.

According to eyewitnesses, the anger is palpable and they are determined to fight to the finish. Hundreds of thousands of farming families take turns to be at the protest site and it is working with rare efficiency despite the biting cold.

Their demand is for the repeal of three farm laws passed by the Modi government in August last year. The laws open up India’s vast agricultural economy to the private sector enabling corporates to directly buy farm produce and allows private companies to stock essential commodities like wheat and rice without any limit. The third law allows private players to directly sign deals with farmers away from the gaze of government regulators.

The government terms these laws necessary as part of agricultural reforms which will enrich farmers and release the enormous potential of this sector.

But the protesters are not buying into the government’s view.

According to them, undermining government regulators and supervisors will expose farmers to the volatility of the market. The Minimum Support Price (MSP), which the government announces every season to ensure that farmers don’t run into losses, will effectively become redundant and they fear that private corporations will drive down prices.

To begin with, the farmers demanded that the MSP be turned into a law as a guarantee that corporations wouldn’t indulge in price undercutting. The government refused and the farmers hardened their stance asking for the cancellation of all three new laws.

Despite holding eleven rounds of talks with the farmers’ unions, the government has been unable to convince them to give up their protests. The discussions have boiled down to one basic demand: repeal the laws.

The Supreme Court of India, in response to a petition, intervened and named a committee of four individuals linked to the agricultural domain to try resolve the stalemate. But the farmers rejected the committee as, according to them, all four were individuals who had on earlier occasions supported the new farm laws.

The government offered to suspend the implementation of the three laws for 18 months to give time for a resolution. But the farmers rejected the offer on the grounds that there is no legal option to keep the laws in abeyance, and that they wouldn’t take the government on its word.

Protesters are in for the long haul

The protests are being spearheaded by two umbrella bodies of farmers that in turn make up nearly 300 farmers’ groups across the country. And these unions are ideologically diverse, ranging from ones led by left parties to centrist-liberal groups that have worked among peasants for decades.

Having carefully organised and planned the protests, the farmers committed one serious blunder on January 26, India’s Republic Day, when a planned tractor rally into Delhi went awry. A section of renegade farmers broke away from the pre-decided route and stormed Red Fort, a high-profile structure that over the years has come to symbolise India’s nationhood.

It is here that the prime minister traditionally hoists the national flag and addresses the nation on India’s independence day.

The farmers forced their way into the Red Fort and hoisted the flag of the Sikh community near the one where the national tricolour was fluttering. The government and many across the political spectrum frowned on the farmers’ actions. The Modi government attempted to use the farmers’ misstep and public condemnation by sending in security forces to evict the protesters from the border.

However, the farmers’ unions themselves criticised those who had stormed the Red Fort and claimed that it was an attempt by sections close to the ruling BJP that tried to sabotage the protests. Once the farmers realised their agitation was in danger they flocked back to the Delhi borders in their thousands, pre-empting the security forces from evicting them.

According to the latest reports, more farmers have now turned out at the protest sites compared to before January 26. And farm leaders have categorically stated they are in it for the long haul. Reports quoting Rakesh Tikait, one of the leaders, said they “will not go back home until the laws are taken back.”

For the Modi government, the situation is tricky as one wrong move can hurt its chances of returning to power in 2024. There is no immediate threat as the ruling BJP has a comfortable majority in the Lower House of Parliament. Of the 543 seats, it holds 303 – well above the halfway mark of 272.

But the challenge to the BJP is in the long-term, as public perception about the government will matter. Elections in at least four state assemblies are scheduled in a couple of months. They may prove an indicator on which way popular opinion is moving over the farmers’ issue.

Besides the farm laws themselves, questions have been raised over the urgency in the manner in which the farm laws were passed in parliament.

Despite the long-term implications of the three farm laws, which seek to overhaul India’s agriculture economy, the government rushed the laws through without adequate discussion.

Agriculture under the Indian Constitution is a state subject and, some experts say, the federal government may have exceeded its mandate by passing the three laws.

Though farmers in their thousands from the states of Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan have been in attendance for the protests, others from farming communities in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Kerala too have come out periodically in their own states in support.

The government would like its supporters to believe that the protests are restricted to one state – Punjab. But its pan-Indian character is there for anyone to see.

The situation, undoubtedly, is tense. Despite the veneer of a peaceful protest, the government knows it has to promptly handle the protests lest it blows up on its political fortunes.

Disclaimer: The viewpoints expressed by the authors do not necessarily reflect the opinions, viewpoints and editorial policies of TRT World.