REVEALED: Owner of steel giant Tata raked in £3billion profit last year as it axes 3,000 jobs in UK over ‘financial reasons’

Basit Mahmood 

Yesterday

The Government is giving Tata £500million of taxpayers’ money to help pay for the new electric arc furnace at the site

The owner of steel giant Tata raked in £3 billion of profits last year, it has been revealed by Unite the Union, after the company announced that it was axing around 3,000 jobs in the UK due to ‘financial reasons’.

Indian-owned Tata Steel UK last week confirmed plans to axe up to 3,000 British jobs. Most will go at its Port Talbot plant in South Wales with the closure of its two blast furnaces this year.

Most of the jobs are expected to go by September, with the majority in Port Talbot where the steelworks will be transitioned to a greener electric arc furnace, which will require a smaller workforce but will be environmentally friendly to operate.

The Government is giving Tata £500million of taxpayers’ money to help pay for the new electric arc furnace at the site.

Tata says that it was losing nearly £1.5million a day in the UK, however Unite the Union has slammed the company’s ‘pleas of poverty’ as a ‘sham’.

The union says that its research has revealed that Tata Steel Limited, the direct parent company of Tata Steel UK Limited made £3 billion in EBITDA and £900 million in net profits in 2022/23. Tata Steel Limited has reserves of £1.6 billion and has paid out dividends of £1.4 billion to shareholders between 2019 and 2023.

“In the last five years Tata Steel Limited’s revenue has grown by 47 per cent and it has generated a combined profit of £9.7 billion during that period. Tata Sons – parent company of Tata Steel Ltd is the massive Indian holding company of Tata Steel. Its company returns describe 2023 as its “best ever”, Unite said in a statement.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Tata’s pleas of poverty have been exposed as a sham. They are making money hand over fist and will only profit from bringing in more Indian and Dutch steel to the UK if we cut capacity.

“It is unbelievable that the government is going along with this. Rather than demanding that the needed investment comes with jobs guarantees and growth for UK steel – they are giving Tata half a billion of taxpayers’ money to slash its workforce and flood the UK with foreign steel.

“Port Talbot is far from the basket case that Tata has painted it as, there is an underlying healthy business, which could be transformed by serious investment to increase capacity, with the UK becoming the green capital of steel.”


Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward

‘Utterly catastrophic’: European Movement likens a UK departure from ECHR to ‘Brexit 2.0’

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead 

20 January, 2024 


The Winston Churchill-founded movement which campaigns to undo the damage of Brexit and see the UK return to its ‘rightful place in the heart of Europe,’ said the possible departure of the UK from the ECHR would be ‘utterly catastrophic.’

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Hard-right Tories have long wanted the UK to be out of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). As the fallout about the controversial Rwanda policy rumbles on, opposition towards the UK’s place in the ECHR has moved up a gear, in a bid to get flights to the Central African country off the ground.

The European Movement UK, which was founded by Winston Churchill in 1949 to promote European unity and has subsequently worked to build a closer relationship with Europe and now campaigns to ‘undo the damage of Brexit,’ has warned that a UK ECHR departure would be akin to Brexit 2.0. The UK’s largest pro-European movement is calling on Rishi Sunak to commit to protecting Britain’s membership of the court.

Sir Nick Harvey, the organisation’s CEO, said that while the UK government’s Rwanda policy is concerning in itself, the possible departure of the UK from the ECHR would be ‘utterly catastrophic.’

“In terms of the impact it would have on our human rights and justice system, the departure would be an event on a scale akin to Brexit 2.0.”

Harvey informed how the only countries in Europe that don’t belong to the ECHR are Russia and Belarus. He continued how since Britain became a member of the ECHR, the court has intervened 466 times to uphold human rights against the government.

“The ECHR ended the ban on gay people serving in the armed forces. The ECHR forced law change so that DNA records of innocent people are destroyed. The ECHR ensured that victims of domestic abuse gained exemption from the “bedroom tax”.

“The impact of our membership of the ECHR reaches beyond a singular immigration policy and must be protected at all costs.

The European Movement’s CEO said that Rishi Sunak must make an explicit commitment to protecting the UK’s membership.

“This is an issue far greater than infighting amongst a small and unrepresentative group of politicians.”


Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is a contributing editor to Left Foot Forward

Will the United States Again Look the Other Way When the World Court Rules?

As the ICJ reviews South Africa’s charges of Israel with genocide, it’s important to look at how the United States has responded to the court in the past.

Panorama of the International Court of Justice court room, principal judicial organ of the United Nations located at The Hague

BY STEPHEN ZUNES
JANUARY 20, 2024

Days before the start of 2024, South Africa initiated proceedings before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), charging that Israel was violating its obligations under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in its war on the civilian population of Gaza. The application requests a series of “provisional measures,” including a suspension of military operations in Gaza.

Genocide is one of those rare terms where the legal definition is broader than the popular understanding. It does not just include systematic mass extermination—such as the Holocaust, the Armenian Genocide, or the 1994 Rwandan genocide—but also military campaigns “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group.” Recent examples would include the Guatemalan junta’s campaign against Indigenous peoples in the highlands during the 1980s, Sudan’s war in Darfur, the attacks by Bosnian Serbs against Bosnian Muslims, Serbia’s war on Kosovo, Iraqi and Turkish campaigns against the Kurds, and the U.S. designation of “free fire zones” in rebel-held areas of Vietnam.

Israel’s indiscriminate military assault on crowded civilian areas in the Gaza Strip, the most destructive bombardment over a comparable time period in any war this century, would appear to meet such a definition.

Israel’s indiscriminate military assault on crowded civilian areas in the Gaza Strip, the most destructive bombardment over a comparable time period in any war this century, would appear to meet the definition of genocide.

Despite this, the Biden Administration and Congressional leaders have categorically denounced South Africa for submitting the application and the Court for considering it. Even in the face of overwhelming evidence presented by the South Africans, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby has insisted that the submission is “meritless, counterproductive, and completely without any basis in fact whatsoever.” By contrast, there have been no objections raised over the concurrent application by Gambia that accuses Myanmar of genocide for its war on the Rohingya, or disagreements with previous genocide cases before the ICJ.

While the Biden Administration has stridently objected to South Africa’s case, it has also acknowledged that it has not conducted any formal assessment as to whether Israel has violated the genocide treaty or other international humanitarian laws.

State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller, when pressed by reporters, responded by saying he would not discuss any internal deliberations. “I’m not aware of any kind of formal assessment being done by the United States government to analyze the compliance with international law by our partner Israel,” Kirby acknowledged. “We have not seen anything that would convince us that we need to take a different approach in terms of trying to help Israel defend itself.”

Matthew Duss of the Center for International Policy noted that “the Administration issued an assessment of Russian war crimes within a month of the Ukraine invasion. The United States has far more visibility into Israeli operations, so the claim that they’ve not been able to make such an assessment about Gaza after three months really strains credulity.”

A January 16 vote in the Senate to enact a provision in U.S. foreign assistance law that requires the State Department to examine the human rights practices of governments receiving U.S. aid, including Israel, was defeated by a 72-11 bipartisan majority.

The ICJ has its origins in the Permanent International Court, established in The Hague, Netherlands, in 1899. Since the founding of the United Nations in 1945, the ICJ—also known as the World Court—has functioned as the judicial arm of the U.N. system. Designed to better enable nations to settle their disputes nonviolently, the ICJ has been used by Washington on a number of occasions to advance U.S. foreign policy interests ranging from fishing disputes with Canada to the seizure of American hostages by Iran.

justflix, CC BY-SA 4.0
The International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands

The ICJ is a separate body from the International Criminal Court (ICC), also located in The Hague, which was established in 2002 to prosecute individuals for war crimes when national courts are unable or unwilling to do so. The United States has refused to ratify the ICC treaty; it has also pressured other nations to reject it, demanded special exemption from the ICC’s authority, and raised strong objections to an ongoing ICC investigation into Israeli war crimes. Secretary of State Antony Blinken claims that the ICC seeks “to target Israel unfairly,” even though the investigation also includes war crimes by Hamas and is one of more than a dozen ongoing conflicts which the ICC is also investigating.

Although the United States has expressed hostility towards the ICC, the Biden Administration is assisting in the gathering of evidence of Russian war crimes in Ukraine.

Despite the United States’ key role in the development of international humanitarian law, and despite the fact that the ICJ has more often than not ruled in favor of the United States and its allies, recent decades have seen increasing American hostility toward any legal constraints upon U.S. foreign policy.


The Reagan Administration withdrew the United States from compulsory jurisdiction of the World Court.

In 1986, for example, the ICJ—in a 14-1 vote with only the American judge dissenting—called for the United States to cease its attacks against Nicaragua, both directly and through its proxy army of Nicaraguan exiles known as the FDN (or “Contras”), who were notorious for their attacks against civilian targets. The court also ruled that the United States had to pay the Nicaraguan government more than $2 billion in compensation for the damage inflicted upon the country’s civilian infrastructure. The Reagan Administration refused to comply with either directive and withdrew the United States from compulsory jurisdiction of the World Court. No subsequent President has re-committed the United States to its authority.

Similarly, in 1996, the World Court voted that the United States and other nuclear powers were legally bound by provisions of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty—signed and ratified by the United States and all but a handful of the world’s nations—to take serious steps to eliminate their nuclear arsenals. The Clinton Administration refused to comply, and Congress continues to approve White House requests for funding the development and procurement of new nuclear weapons systems.

In an advisory opinion in 2004, also by a 14-1 vote with only the U.S. judge dissenting, the court ruled that while Israel, like any country, could construct a separation barrier along its internationally recognized border, it could not build it in a serpentine manner deep inside the occupied West Bank in order to incorporate illegal settlements into Israel. The decision was roundly condemned by both the Bush Administration and by Democratic presidential nominee and future Secretary of State John Kerry, who claimed that it was a “political” decision that denied Israel’s right to self-defense. The U.S. House of Representatives, by a 361-45 majority, passed a resolution deploring the decision.

The Israeli separation wall with Palestine.

What upset Bush, Kerry, and Congress is that the ICJ, in its advisory opinion, noted that all nations “are under an obligation not to recognize the illegal situation arising from the construction of the wall, and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining that situation.”

Part of the hostility to the 2004 opinion was the court’s insistence that every country that is party to the Fourth Geneva Convention must “ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in that Convention.”

It could be assumed that Washington might react in a similar hostile manner should the court rule favorably on South Africa’s claim of genocide.

Any such strict and uniform application of international law would interfere with U.S. policy objectives in the region, which rely heavily on the use of military force. This is why any attempt to enforce international humanitarian law must be met by slander, condemnation, and other attacks against the credibility of the international organizations daring to suggest that the United States and its allies are not somehow exempt from such legal obligations.


These attacks against the World Court by both Republicans and Democrats are not simply an endorsement of the dangerous and illegal policies of a rightwing ally. They are, in effect, a declaration of empire.

Attacks on the ICJ and ICC appear to be part of a broader effort to undermine and discredit the U.N. system. International law and intergovernmental organizations are seen by both Republicans and Democrats as interfering with the prerogatives of the U.S. government and its allies in strategically important areas like the Middle East. Given the overwhelming military dominance of the United States globally and allies such as Israel regionally, international legal institutions are among the few potential restraints on the unfettered exertion of American power.

As a result, the bipartisan attacks should not be seen simply as “pro-Israel” sentiment, particularly in light of the long-term detrimental impact on Israeli security if Israel continues its current policies. Instead, Washington’s unified hostility must be viewed as part of a broader effort to undermine international law in order to give the United States free rein in pursuing its policy objectives in the Middle East and beyond.

These attacks against the World Court by both Republicans and Democrats are not simply an endorsement of the dangerous and illegal policies of a rightwing ally. They are, in effect, a declaration of empire. If such policies go unchallenged, Palestinians will 

Stephen Zunes, a professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco, is currently serving as the Torgny Segerstedt Visiting Professor at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden.

READ MORE BY STEPHEN ZU

More than 300 Afghan refguees transferred to Canada from Pakistan

ByFidel Rahmati
January 20, 2024


The Canadian Immigration and Citizenship Department has announced that they have transferred 319 Afghan refugees from Pakistan to the city of Vancouver in Canada.

The department stated on Friday, January 19, on its social media platform X that these refugees have arrived in Vancouver on a charter flight.

According to the Canadian Immigration and Citizenship Department, these refugees will be settled in 26 different locations across Canada.

Based on the statistics from the department, Canada has relocated and resettled 45,820 Afghan refugees in the country from 2021 to the end of December 2023.

Previously, Canada had also announced the resettlement of 295 Afghan refugees from Pakistan to the city of Toronto in Canada.

Furthermore, the Canadian government had committed to resettling nearly 40,000 Afghan refugees by the end of the year 2023 in one of the world’s largest resettlement programs.

It should be noted that after the rise of the Taliban administration, over 120,000 Afghan citizens sought refuge in various countries in Europe, America, and some other countries.

Prior to this, Afghan migrants had arrived in Canada from countries like Pakistan, Tajikistan, the United Arab Emirates, and Albania through charter flights.

Worldwide protests against ongoing attacks on Hazaras and women’s rights in Afghanistan

ByFidel Rahmati
January 22, 2024


Afghanistan’s citizens around the world expressed their protest and solidarity through rallies and gatherings in response to the targeted attacks on the Hazara minority and the dire situation of women in Afghanistan.

On Sunday, January 21st, protesters in various cities of countries including Germany, Canada, the United States, and several others took to the streets in coordinated and simultaneous demonstrations against what they refer to as the ongoing “Hazaras genocide” In Afghanistan.

These protests, organized in nearly 40 different cities, were spearheaded by civil activists and women who aim to raise awareness about the plight of women in Afghanistan. They have highlighted that girls in Afghanistan are subjected to various forms of abuse.

Another objective of these global protests is to seek international recognition of the Hazara genocide.

A call for further protest gatherings was widely circulated on social media after the Taliban regime ordered the arrest of girls in western Kabul on charges of what they term as “dress code violations.”

Prominent slogans of these protests include “Stop the Hazara Genocide,” “End Ethnic Cleansing,” “Demand Recognition of Hazara Genocide,” and “Protect the Lives of Hazaras.”

Recently, targeted attacks have put the Hazara community in various parts of Afghanistan at risk, leading to widespread concerns about their safety and security in the country.

Since the Taliban regained control of the country in August 2021, they have enforced numerous decrees that have marginalized women in public life, limiting their access to education and employment opportunities.

Hazaras in Afghanistan being targeted deliberately: UNAMA

ByFidel Rahmati
January 22, 2024


The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) in its latest report on the human rights situation in Afghanistan, covering the months of October and December 2023, has documented several targeted attacks against Hazaras and stated that the perpetrators of some of these attacks remain unidentified.

This UNAMA report, titled “Human Rights Situation in Afghanistan,” has been compiled by the Human Rights section of the organization within the framework of its mandate from the United Nations Security Council.

According to this report, targeted attacks against Hazaras continue to persist in various parts of Afghanistan. In just the months of October and November 2023, at least 5 separate attacks against Hazaras were planned and carried out.

Three deadly attacks against Hazaras in Pul-e Khumri (during a gathering of worshippers) and Kabul (at a sports club and a bus station) on October 13, October 26, and November 7, 2023, resulted in the killing and injuring of at least 126 individuals (40 killed and 86 injured).

While ISIS claimed responsibility for all three of these deadly attacks, the UNAMA report mentions the mysterious targeting of Hazaras in Herat as the main factor in these attacks remaining unidentified and unknown.

The United Nations has just released a report on the human rights situation in Afghanistan, at a time when global protests continue in response to what is perceived as the genocide of Hazaras, with demonstrations taking place in nearly 40 cities across different countries around the world.

https://www.khaama.com
Fidai Rahmati is the editor and content writer for Khaama Press.

 You may follow him at Twitter @FidelRahmati

Two Journalists detained in Kabul raise concerns about press freedom

By Fidel Rahmati
January 20, 2024

The Afghanistan Journalists Center has reported the detention of two journalists in Kabul, stating that they were summoned and subsequently detained by the intelligence agency of the Taliban.

According to the center’s news release, on Thursday, Ahmed Jawad Rasouli and Abdulhaq Hamidi, the editor-in-chief and owner of the Gardesh-e-Etilaat News Agency, were summoned and detained by the intelligence office of the Taliban in Kabul.

The Afghanistan Journalists Center, citing sources close to these two journalists, has revealed that on Thursday, January 18th an anonymous caller contacted Abdulhaq, instructing him and Jawad Rasouli to report to the intelligence agency at 9 AM on Thursday. Upon arrival, they were immediately detained and subjected to interrogation.

Close associates of Abdulhaq Hamidi informed the Afghanistan Journalists Center that around 4 PM the previous day, intelligence personnel had come to his house, seized his mobile phone, and informed his wife that they had taken him into custody for their investigative purposes.

As of now, the Taliban administration and spokespersons for related agencies have not provided any information or statements regarding the detention of these journalists.

The sudden and unexplained detention of journalists in Kabul raises concerns about press freedom and the safety of media professionals in the country.

The international community and human rights organizations may closely monitor the situation and call for transparency and the release of detained journalists, emphasizing the importance of a free press in any society.

Since the return of the Taliban, media freedom and freedom of expression have been severely restricted, leading to the closure of numerous media outlets in the country. This crackdown on journalism has resulted in the loss of jobs for many journalists.

The Taliban’s imposition of these restrictions has had a detrimental impact on the media landscape, silencing voices and limiting the flow of information in Afghanistan.

https://www.khaama.com
Fidai Rahmati is the editor and content writer for Khaama Press.

 You may follow him at Twitter @FidelRahmati

Baloch activists intensify global appeal against human rights abuses in Balochistan

20-01-2024 |




In a bid to garner international support against ongoing human rights violations, Baloch activists, led by Mahrang Baloch, are urging global attention to the plight of their people. Their movement, now in its fourth phase, aims to raise awareness about enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and the suppression of peaceful protests in the resource-rich Pakistani province.

In a recent message, Baloch called upon people, particularly the youth of Pakistan and beyond, to join the campaign against the "Baloch Genocide." She emphasized the need to inform the world about the ongoing abuses and garner solidarity for the Baloch cause.

The activists are taking several initiatives to amplify their message. They plan to organize a conference for oppressed communities across borders and launch awareness campaigns in educational institutions. This comes as the movement against enforced disappearances continues for over 50 days, with sit-ins held in both Balochistan and the national capital, Islamabad.

Mahrang Baloch and fellow activist Sammi Deen Baloch recently met with United Nations officials to discuss the human rights situation in Balochistan. They presented details of enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and threats faced by peaceful protestors. The Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC), which organized the meeting, is urging the UN to send a fact-finding mission to the region for an independent investigation.

The BYC has also launched a social media campaign, #IStandWithBalochMarch, to garner global support and raise awareness about the plight of the Baloch people. The campaign aims to bring together voices in solidarity with the movement for justice and an end to the human rights violations in Balochistan.

(Inputs from ANI)

Human Rights Watch report blames IMF for additional hardships for low-income groups in Pakistan

PTI / Jan 20, 2024,

Pakistan faced one of the worst economic crises in its history, jeopardising millions of people's rights to health and food, Human Rights Watch said, underling that the cash-strapped country remained exceedingly vulnerable to climate change.It also said that the International Monetary Fund's policies have resulted in additional hardship for low-income groups.A non-profit with headquarters registered in New York, the Human Rights Watch investigates and reports on abuses happening in all corners of the world. The latest 740-page ‘World Report 2024' released on Friday has reviewed human rights practices in more than 100 countries.Read More


File photo

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan faced one of the worst economic crises in its history, jeopardising millions of people's rights to health and food, Human Rights Watch said, underling that the cash-strapped country remained exceedingly vulnerable to climate change.

It also said that the International Monetary Fund's policies have resulted in additional hardship for low-income groups.

A non-profit with headquarters registered in New York, the Human Rights Watch investigates and reports on abuses happening in all corners of the world. The latest 740-page ‘World Report 2024' released on Friday has reviewed human rights practices in more than 100 countries.
“With poverty, inflation, and unemployment soaring, Pakistan faced one of the worst economic crises in its history, jeopardizing millions of people's rights to health, food, and an adequate standard of living,” it said.

“The insistence of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on austerity and the removal of subsidies without adequate compensatory measures resulted in additional hardship for low-income groups,” it said.
“Pakistan remained exceedingly vulnerable to climate change and faced rates of warming considerably above the global average, making extreme climate events more frequent and intense,” it added.
Under ‘Freedom of Expression and Attacks on Civil Society Groups,' the HRW report said, “Government threats and attacks on the media created a climate of fear among journalists and civil society groups, with many resorting to self-censorship. Authorities pressured or threatened media outlets not to criticise government institutions or the judiciary.”

It quoted the example of journalist Imran Riaz Khan, who on May 11 last year, was arrested as he was attempting to take a flight to Oman. “Khan returned home on September 25 (but) he has not been presented in court at any time since his arrest,” the report pointed out.

The document also commented on Pakistan's sedition law, which it said, “is vague and overly broad and has often been used against political opponents and journalists” and described how while the courts have tried to declare it as unconstitutional, the government has thwarted the attempts with continued usage against critical voices.

In the section, ‘Freedom of Religion and Belief,' the report pointed out how Pakistan has not “amended or repealed blasphemy law provisions that have provided a pretext for violence against religious minorities and left them vulnerable to arbitrary arrest and prosecution.”

It gave examples of how members of the Ahmadiyya religious community continue to be a major target for prosecutions under blasphemy laws and specific anti-Ahmadi laws and that of a Christian settlement in Punjab province was attacked by several hundred people but made no mention of Hindu or Sikh minorities.

Pointing out that human rights defenders estimate that roughly 1,000 women are murdered in so-called “honour killings” every year in Pakistan, the report said, “The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) estimates that 18.9 million girls in Pakistan are married before the age of 18 and 4.6 million before 15.”

“Women from religious minority communities remain particularly vulnerable to forced marriage. The government did little to stop such early and forced marriages,” it added.

It also painted a dismal picture related to the rights of children, disabled persons, and in the field of sexual orientation and gender identity.

Pakistan faced worst economic crises in 2023: What report reveals

ANI |
Jan 20, 2024 


Pakistan remained exceedingly vulnerable to climate change and faced rates of warming considerably above the global average, as per the report.


Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said that Pakistan faced one of the worst economic crises in its history in 2023, with poverty, inflation and unemployment soaring, jeopardising millions of people's rights to health, food and an adequate standard of living, Dawn newspaper reported.

A dark street in a commercial area in Lahore, Pakistan.(Bloomberg)

In its 740-page 'World Report 2024', made available on Friday, the HRW reviewed human rights practices in more than 100 countries, and observed that the insistence of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on austerity and the removal of subsidies without adequate compensatory measures resulted in additional hardship for low-income groups in Pakistan.

Pakistan remained exceedingly vulnerable to climate change and faced rates of warming considerably above the global average, making extreme climate events more frequent and intense, according to the report.

The HRW said that Asia, unlike Europe, Africa and the Americas, lacks a meaningful human rights charter or regional institution to safeguard human rights standards.

Read more: Hamas on Palestinian state after Israel war: ‘Why is Joe Biden preaching’

The report says government threats and attacks on the media created a climate of fear among journalists and civil society groups, with many resorting to self-censorship. Authorities pressured or threatened media outlets not to criticise state institutions or the judiciary, as per Dawn.

NGOs reported intimidation, harassment, and surveillance of various groups by the government authorities. The government used its regulation of NGOs in Pakistan to impede the registration and functioning of international humanitarian and human rights groups.

According to the report, violence against women and girls, including rape, murder, acid attacks, domestic violence, denial of education, sexual harassment at work, and child and forced marriage, is a serious problem throughout Pakistan. Human rights defenders estimate that roughly 1,000 women are murdered in so-called "honour killings" every year.

In Pakistan's Punjab, 10,365 cases of violence against women were reported to the police in the first four months of 2023, according to a local NGO. The actual number of incidents is likely to be much higher given barriers to reporting, harmful social norms, and ineffective and harmful responses by the police. Pakistan's conviction rate for rape is less than three per cent.


Over six million primary school-age children and 13 million secondary school-age children in Pakistan were out of school, most of them girls. The HRW found that girls miss school for reasons including lack of schools, costs associated with studying, child marriage, harmful child labour, and gender discrimination.

 The elites’ absurd Davos crusade – ‘destroy freedom… to save humanity’

A very sharp and mocking commentary is published by ‘The New York Post’ following the results of the World Economic Forum in Davos-2024

NEWSROOM

JANUARY 20, 2024

photo: Unsplash

A very sharp and mocking commentary is published by ‘The New York Post’ following the results of the World Economic Forum in Davos-2024: Who would have guessed freedom of speech would become the biggest barrier to saving humanity?

Luckily, a fix is pending from the billionaires, political poohbahs and other weasels attending this week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

WEF has two big goals this year: “rebuild trust” and “crush dissent.”

OK, that last one is a paraphrase.

Instead, WEF is proclaiming the greatest peril humanity faces is “misinformation and disinformation.”

And how can we recognize “misinformation”?

Easy: It denies that Davos cronies should rule the world.

OK, that’s another paraphrase.

WEF’s latest Global Risks Report warns, “Some governments and platforms… may fail to act to effectively curb falsified information and harmful content, making the definition of ‘truth’ increasingly contentious across societies.”

In other words, governments must suppress “falsified” information to save truth.

WEF presumes governments are founts of truth — regardless of millennia of political deceit stretching back to the ancient Athens of Aristophanes’ satirical plays.

Or maybe it considers “truth” the same type of luxury nowadays as eating meat.

When the COVID pandemic erupted, WEF rushed to proclaim the need for a “great reset” to radically increase politicians’ power over every aspect of modern life.

Unfortunately, radically decreasing the non-elite’s living standards is the only way to save the planet, according to the fashionable experts.

British environmental activist Jojo Mehta performed one of Davos’ wackiest shows.

She hectored attendees to recognize that people making money from farming or fishing could be as guilty as people committing “mass murder and genocide.”

But if the elites succeed in stopping farmers from farming and fishermen from fishing, future Swiss shindigs may run short of caviar.

We are barely 2,000 days away from the halcyon time — the year 2030 — when WEF promised “You’ll own nothing and be happy.”

(Davos attendees are exempt, of course.)

Recent political reforms in many nations have furthered the first promise, ravaging private property rights and subverting individual independence.

But the world’s kingpins will need to tighten all the mental thumbscrews for propertyless serfs to “be happy.”

Public euphoria could be in especially short supply considering other policies championed in Davos.

“Individual carbon footprint trackers” are a popular panacea at Davos, and WEF has proposed the “setting of acceptable limits for personal emissions.”

How many burps will it take to get sent to Re-Education Camp?

Footprint trackers will be useless without imposing universal “digital identification,” another WEF pet project.

How can government “serve” people unless it can find and accost them at any moment, day or night?

WEF is also gung-ho on central-bank digital currencies.

The US dollar has lost 97% of its value since the Federal Reserve was created in 1913, but politicians deserve more arbitrary power over the currency, right?

The Davos crowd’s swagger is beyond parody.

“We will make sure that we bring together the right people,” WEF President Borge Brende promised, “to see how we can solve this very challenging world.”

But how can they have the right people when neither you nor I was invited?

Davos offers platitudes for democracy while championing ironfisted paternalist policies.

That’s why pervasive censorship is vital to carry out WEF-favored schemes to force common people to stop bothering the environment.

Government policies will be propelled by alarmist pronouncements that private citizens could debunk.

With WEF-sanctioned censorship, self-government could be replaced by “one person, one vote, one time.”

Whoever wins a national election will take control of the censorship regime and exploit it to insulate and perpetuate their power.

We already saw that here.

Censorship helped President Biden win the 2020 election, and his administration proceeded to carry out potentially “the most massive attack against free speech in United States history,” according to federal Judge Terry Doughty.

(The Supreme Court will settle that censorship controversy.)

But there is a specter haunting the Davos crowd.

WEF Chairman Klaus Schwab recently warned of “an anti-system which is called libertarianism, which means to tear down everything which creates some kind of influence of government into private lives.”

But it is not libertarians’ fault that Schwab’s standard for “some kind of influence of government” spurred cynics to claim WEF stands for World Enslavement Forum.

The most effective rebuttal at Davos of its sirens of subjugation came from the newly elected president of Argentina.

Javier Milei exhorted the friends of freedom around the globe: “Do not be intimidated either by the political class or the parasites who live off of the state. The state is the problem itself.”

Milei’s scoff at people “motivated by the wish to belong to a privileged caste” was perhaps the ultimate face slap for the self-proclaimed saviours in Switzerland.

OPINION

Palestine awakens the revolution

Bearing witness to Israel's genocide in Palestine has changed people forever. This is leading many to not only solidify their opposition to Zionism, but to reject the role of the West as a whole.

BY NYLAH BURTON 

MONDOWEISS

  JANUARY 20, 2024 

UPWARDS OF 400,000 PRO-PALESTINE PROTESTORS TAKE THE STREETS IN A NATIONAL MARCH IN WASHINGTON DC TO SHOW SUPPORT FOR PALESTINIANS AND CALL FOR A CEASEFIRE AND END THE GENOCIDE IN GAZA, JANUARY 13, 2024. (PHOTO: EMAN MOHAMMED)


When Patrice Lumumba was assassinated in 1961, Langston Hughes wrote, “They buried Lumumba/In an unmarked grave/But he needs no marker… My heart’s his grave/and it’s marked there.”

Since Israel began its slaughter in Gaza on October 7, I have felt my own heart become a grave for over 25,000 people in Palestine. I, along with the rest of the world, have borne witness to the world’s most documented genocide in history. I have watched, from my phone, the attempted annihilation of an entire nation.

These 100 days of genocide have replaced every cell in my body and made me into a different person. I am not the same as I was before witnessing these atrocities; my soul has shifted to revolve around this revolution. I’m not alone. The world has changed right along with me.

For many, this change has been driven by the work of Palestinian journalists who face death for exposing the truth.

“The heroic reporting, often captured and published by courageous Palestinian youth across Palestine, is offering us a clear lens through which to view the gruesome violence and racism inherent in the colonial settler project of Israel,” says Manal Farhan, a Chicago resident whose family was expelled from their home of Al-Malha in Palestine in 1948, during the First Nakba.

But this growing awareness and rage is not only being directed toward Israeli settler colonialism but the entire Western project as a whole.

Rawan Masri, a translator in Ramallah and co-founder of Decolonize Palestine, says she’s noticed this monumental global shift. “I think these 100 days have exposed Israel’s genocidal brutality to scores of people for the very first time and to those already in solidarity with us more than ever before. I think this is the beginning of the end not only for Israel but for Western colonial hegemony that so many of us accepted as a fact of life but are now seeing in a tangible way that it doesn’t have to be,” she says.

Palestinian freedom is my freedom

Iman Sultan, a Pakistani-American writer and journalist who has been involved in pro-Palestine activism, says that over 100 days of watching a genocide has “led to an awakening where we are more aware of our humanity by recognizing that of Palestinians,” something we’ve seen as people become more spiritual and reflective.

“I also think the regular cycles and spectacles of capitalist life — whether it’s the election, the cult around politicians, or celebrity — has effectively been rendered obsolete when the reality is that more than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 7,” Sultan continues. “And those in power have not just enacted, but justified their murders.”

This feeling of widespread rejection has extended into so many areas of our lives. BDS, the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement that aims to economically and politically pressure Israel to end the occupation, has received support like we’ve never seen before. After Starbucks sued the Starbucks Worker’s Union for supporting Palestine and videos came out of McDonald’s in Israel giving Israeli Occupation Forces soldiers free meals while they continued their campaign of slaughter, most pro-Palestinian Americans have refused to eat at the two fast food chains, indicating that their boycott is permanent and they will not be swayed by even a measly apology — which has not yet come. It may seem a small thing, but to get Americans — whose entire culture is about consumerism — to stop consuming two of the biggest pillars of this culture would have been unfathomable. But people can no longer keep going as they used to.

And BDS is not just limited to the list. People have been researching the companies they buy from, buying local and used, limiting their food waste, and intentionally supporting Palestinian-owned businesses and businesses that have risked their livelihood for Palestine, like HUDA Beauty. Masri says that in Palestine, she has also heard countless people announce they no longer want to watch Western movies or television.

“The common phrase I hear is they can’t stomach the hypocrisy,” Masri explains. “They can’t handle seeing what people think are problems compared to getting bombed and starved and seeing life being lived as normal when we’re denied that.”

As more people stand for Palestine and find themselves losing their jobs, threatened with violence, assaulted, and suspended just for wearing symbols of the resistance like the keffiyeh, let alone imprisoned for their activism, the stakes of this fight are becoming much more immediate for allies. “Many governments have largely ignored the recent outcry of their populace demanding an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza or have criminalized and punished the very act of speaking up in support of Palestinian human rights, [which] communicates clearly that these nations purporting to value and protect human dignity [are] a farce,” Farhan continues, adding that she herself is facing eviction from her landlord M. Fishman simply for flying a Palestinian flag outside her window. “People realize the implication of this; that they are not truly free — free to learn and speak as they wish, consume as they wish, gather as they wish, dress as they wish — until Palestine is free.”

Joining the world vs. the West

South Africa’s suit against Israel in the International Court of Justice, at The Hague, which is considered the highest court in the world, directly challenged this Western colonial hegemony. As Nesrine Malik wrote in the Guardian, the trial was not only condemning Israel for its bloody 75-year occupation and current genocide but challenging the West’s pernicious lie that it is the safeguard of morality, logic, and nuance, when in reality, they are responsible for some of the most barbaric and cruel acts of violence humanity has ever witnessed. “The ICJ case shows how Western logic is wearing thin and its persuasive power waning in a multipolar world,” Malik wrote.

It has been pointed out that most of the countries standing with Palestine are not part of the Western world. Namibia, where Germany committed the first genocide of the 20th century in 1904-1908, condemned Germany for its support of Israel. Ansar Allah in Yemen, commonly referred to as “the Houthis,” have been brave enough to disrupt shipping to Israel, and when their capital was bombed by the U.S. and U.K., in retaliation, they did not back down but extended the blockage to their attackers as well. Instead of despairing at the lack of powerful Western countries to join this call, I and my comrades see it as the revolution of the Global South. They cannot defeat us. Especially because we are not just geographically in the Global South, but we are in the West as well — the children of the enslaved and the displaced, the Indigenous and the refugee, and our refusal is so loud the world has heard us. We must make our screams unbearable.

A PROTEST SIGN READING “FROM PALESTINE TO SUDAN TO THE CONGO TO HAITI TO TIGRAY, NONE OF US ARE FREE UNTIL ALL OF US ARE FREE !!!” SHARED ON TWITTER/X BY THE ACCOUNT @AXMEDAMIINMAX

The genocide in Palestine has also led to increased awareness about other ongoing genocides. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, six million people have been killed due to Western interference and the cobalt mining industry — cobalt being the resource that powers our technology, including smartphones. And that genocide has been funded mainly by the United Arab Emirates and the U.S. In Sudan, a genocide funded by the United Arab Emirates has killed 9,000 people in six months, including the genocide of the Masalit in Darfur by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF)/Janjaweed and extrajudicial killings of non-Arabs throughout Sudan by Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF.)

“The positioning of the Palestinian cause called for global liberation. Naturally, people asked, ‘who else?’” says A., a non-Arab Sudanese woman and activist who wishes to remain anonymous for her safety and the safety of her family.

With so many people having fresh awareness of these other atrocities, it would be easy to paint a romantic narrative of global solidarity. But we’re not quite there yet, and dishonesty gets us no closer.

“People are interrogating their ideas of liberation and if it withstands the test of true allyship being extended,” A. says. ” In the case of Sudan, many found local activists who had already been creating content to educate, advocate, and support long before October 7th. In other causes like Tigray where there’s very few in the diaspora to share stories, we saw the disconnect between genuine allyship and just another slogan attached to another movement.”

There are those who have called for riots, for uprisings like we’ve never seen before, for acts of civil disobedience that make it impossible for our economies to function. Without this, we will have failed Palestinians, and we will have failed ourselves.

Sultan agrees that while we are living in unprecedented times, there’s still a long way to go. “I don’t think the cataclysm between the first and third world has quite been bridged. That still has yet to happen. But we can call this the beginning,” she says.

As African countries, the DRC and Sudan have struggled to gain the level of recognition and global solidarity that other nations have received in our movement. “Free Congo” or “Free Sudan” are tacked on during our protests, but turnout for protests focused on those countries is low. While Palestine remains the litmus test for morality, some seem unwilling to hold the testimony and truth of non-Arab Africans who are also being oppressed. This kind of willful ignorance is something we can no longer afford. For how many years was it acceptable to turn away from Palestine, to brush it off with “it’s complicated”? The era of complacency is over, and we must hold all our brothers and sisters in our hearts and keep them at the center of our fight. Perhaps it is easier said than done in a world where the oppression of Africans has always struggled to gain global recognition and solidarity, but it must be done. And we must go further. There are those who have called for riots, for uprisings like we’ve never seen before, for acts of civil disobedience that make it impossible for our economies to function. Without this, we will have failed Palestinians, and we will have failed ourselves.

The grief is deep, but freedom is attainable

This is our great test as humans, and if we fail it, we will cease to exist. This is not hyperbole or spiritual metaphor. It is a scientific fact that colonialism and capitalism are twin evils that are destroying humans’ ability to live on this Earth. During the genocide in Gaza alone, Israel’s military expelled the same amount of emissions as two of the world’s most climate-vulnerable nations in three months. The stripping of resources from the Congo and the same corporations and nations (like the U.S. and the U.K.) that fund Israel and wage war on Yemen are the world’s biggest polluters, killing our chance of human life on this Earth just for money. We must throw off the chains that have entrapped not only Palestine but the whole world.

We have a timer, and it is reaching its end, and so many of us feel this holy urgency. If we allow the most documented genocide in history to happen without consequence, without ending this occupation and freeing our brothers and sisters globally, then we will have lost everything. Masri says the outpouring of solidarity has made her feel that freedom is attainable, but she knows it will be hard-won and that Israel and other Western countries will commit horrific acts of violence we will never heal from in response to the death of empire.

“Yemen, Namibia, South Africa, and other countries give me hope, but there is still a long and bloody road ahead of us,” she says.

But I feel peace amidst my indescribable pain. Because somehow, I know that liberation is imminent. I know we will avenge the blood of everyone lost by bringing lasting peace. For the first time in my life, I can see it. Not on the horizon or in some distant future but here, now. I wish it not just for my children but for me. Freedom is here and we need only reach for it. It has never been so close.

My heart will never stop being a grave. I will never heal from what I have seen. I will cry forever. Still, I have never been so full of despair, and I have also never been so full of hope. For the first time, I have faith.