...Or Does It Explode?

Akbar Mohammadi, R.I.P.

Largely forgotten by the outside world, Iranian student leader Akbar Mohammadi has at last achieved the attention that was long overdue. His death from a hunger strike has generated dozens of international news stories, including the following piece featured even on
ABC News:

TEHRAN, Iran Jul 31, 2006 (AP)— A jailed former student leader died in prison after a nine-day hunger strike, a human rights activist said Monday. Akbar Mohammadi, who died late Sunday, was arrested after taking part in anti-government protests at Tehran University in July 1999 the country's biggest domestic crisis since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

He was sentenced to death but the sentence was later reduced to 15 years in prison.

He was released on medical leave last year to seek treatment for a spinal-cord injury suffered after his arrest, said Kohyar Goodarzi, a member of the Student Committee of Human Rights Reporters of Iran.

Two months ago, toward the end of the yearlong leave, Mohammadi "was arrested without any explanation," Goodarzi said, and placed in Tehran's notorious Evin prison.

Mohammadi went on a hunger strike to protest a lack of proper medical care, Goodarzi said.

"He suffered a heart attack as a result of his strike," Goodarzi said.

Senior prison official Sohrab Soleimani said Mohammadi had been receiving appropriate medical care.

"He was drinking water and tea and was under doctors' supervision," the semiofficial Islamic Students News Agency quoted Soleimani as saying.

Some 25 Iranian political activists and prisoners issued a statement criticizing the government for its treatment of Mohammadi.

"Those who returned him to the prison should now be held responsible," for the consequences of his rearrest, it said.

More background here:

A student in social sciences, Mohammadi was arrested during the peaceful protests of 1999 that are considered to have fueled one of Iran's biggest domestic crises since the Islamic revolution two decades earlier.
 
The student protests were primarily aimed at restrictions on freedom of the press.
 
Clashes between protesters and members of the Iranian security forces -- reinforced by the pro-government vigilante student group Ansar-e Hezbollah -- claimed at least one life. Hundreds of protesters were arrested, and many received court sentences.
 
In September 1999, Tehran's Revolutionary Court sentenced Mohammadi to death after a trial that rights group say was unfair. Although Iran's Supreme Court upheld the sentence in 2000, it was eventually commuted to 15 years in jail -- reportedly following the intervention of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
 
Two other leaders of the 1999 student protests, Ahmad Batebi and Ali Shafei, were sentenced to death along with Mohammadi. Their sentences were commuted to 10 years and 2 1/2 years in jail, respectively.
 
Rights group say Mohammadi was tortured during his detention, and that it seriously damaged his health. He was reportedly suffering from kidney ailments and hearing problems.

Gulf Migrant Workers as Mercenaries: Sins of Commission and Omission

The Catholic Enclycopedia explains the doctrinal concepts of doing bad and failing to do good, otherwise known as sins of commission and sins of omission:

Actual sin is committed by a free personal act of the individual will. It is divided into sins of commission and omission. A sin of commission is a positive act contrary to some prohibitory precept; a sin of omission is a failure to do what is commanded.

Chan'ad Bahraini gets at both these themes in a remarkable post on the hundreds of thousands of expatriates living in Bahrain - individuals who despite lacking citizenship (or in the case of security forces, receiving hasty naturalization) in many ways define civil rights abuse in the Gulf state. Chan'ad provocative claim is that all expats in Bahrain are in one form or another mercenaries.

First the security forces:

I can’t think of any way to describe the naturalised employees of the defence and interior ministries other than as mercenaries. These people have been hired from far away lands to protect the interests of the ruling regime by threatening or administering violence on vast sections of the population. They have been hired and naturalized specifically because they hold no family or cultural ties with other Bahrainis, making them entirely loyal to their paymasters. Although they work in organizations with titles such as “Public Security”, they are little more than private organizations serving certain individuals within the Al Khalifa ruling family. (This confusion between public and private is all too common in Bahrain). If they are not mercenaries, then I don’t know what is.

Chan'ad offers historical background on the rise of foreign defense forces in the 1970s, in large part linked to Shi'a unrest and the oil boom. He then pivot 180 degrees from these willing participants in the regime's abuses to consider the silent majority, Bahrain's expat working force:

Even though we aren’t beating and torturing people on orders from the government, we do unwittingly play a key role in supporting the regime’s political strategies and the suppression of sections of the local population...

Expats in Bahrain are repeatedly reminded, over and over, that this is not our country so we have no right to say anything about it. It’s implicitly and explicitly drilled into us that we have no stake in Bahrain. We hear it from the government, from our home embassies, from employers, from regular Bahraini civilians, and if we came here as children then we also hear it from our parents and school teachers: constantly reminding us that as non-Bahraini citizens we have no right to make any moral statements about what might be happening around us. Discussing the politics and social issues of our “home countries” is generally allowed and encouraged, but getting involved in local affairs is not tolerated...

s civilian expats we have unfortunately become passive mercenaries. For example, in the 1990s, when the government was waging a secret war against its people, most of us shut our eyes to what was actually happening to our neighbours, believing rumours and false propaganda. The remaining few who were aware of what was taking place refused to take any type of action, big or small, against the outright injustices. Rather, they continued to sell their labour as though everything was normal. Through our silence we supported these injustices, and solidified our position as outsiders and mercenaries.

Every time we renew our residency permits to stay in Bahrain, we also sell away our inherent rights and responsibilities as moral agents towards this country. It is about time that we expats reclaim that moral agency, regardless of how much anyone might tell us not to. Of course, risking your job or safety is not a trivial matter, so what I am advocating is certainly easier said than done. But let’s start by at least saying something, if it’s not possible to actually do something. Learn about what is happening around us and become aware of the wider social and political implications of our actions or inactions in Bahrain. No more being passive mercenaries.

By challenging this sin of omission in his blog post, Chan'ad has already put his rhetoric into action.

Q80 Dictator

Yesterday we gave a shout out to the new Baha'is in Egypt blog, so today let's take a look at Q80 Dictator, the blog of a frustrated Canadian in Kuwait:

Before I came to Kuwait I used to be the very quiet type who minds his own business. However, after my arrival it all changed. I had been witnessing and reading about so many human rights violations against those who can’t and/or aren’t allowed to defend themselves, the impunity enjoyed by the offenders because of the corruption and a system turning against the victims rather than protecting them. Eventually, I could no longer contain my outrage and decided to take a stand. I do not consider myself as a human rights freak but I do care a great deal about the issue. I believe every human being, men and women, deserve to be treated as equal. I despise those who abuse their power to force others into servitude. I admire anyone who has the courage to stand up for the weakest simply because it’s the right thing to no matter what the risks are.

Mr. Rivard, we admire your passion. As you note:

Kuwait, a culture of face, is more concerned about its reputation than anything else. As a result, issues such as corruption, terrorism and human rights violations are often denied or simply ignored. In most cases, the victims are punished. Despite the fact most people are too afraid to denounce them, some Kuwaiti and expat writers are exposing the violations committed against helpless victims... some times at the risk of being accused of destroying Kuwait’s reputation or even being arrested.

It's been nearly two months since your last update, though. Keep the information coming.

"Baha'i Faith in Egypt" Blog Debuts

Thanks to a crosslink, we just discovered the compelling new blog Baha'i Faith in Egypt, an informative portal for following the tribulations of Egypt's small Baha'i community. Among many remarkable stories on the site is this account of Egyptian student Sarah Maher:

Students in the Egyptian educational system are required to attend religion classes and be examined on the subject, just as in any other component of their curriculum. Only Muslim and Christian classes are offered. If a student does not belong to either religion, then he or she will be required to attend an examination on the subject of "Morals".

This courageous student named, Sarah Maher, attending a high school in the city of al-Minya in Upper Egypt, had to register for the final examinations required for obtaining the high school diploma. These examinations are organized and administered on a national level by the Ministry of Education. Sarah had registered for this important examination as a Baha'i, and thus her certificate of admission was printed with "Baha'i" as the candidate's religion. This allowed her to be examined on the subject of "Morals" rather than on one of the two allowed religion subjects.

An issue brought to light by the newspaper was that the Ministry of Education had acknowledged Sarah's religion and had in fact recognized the Baha'i Faith as an independent religion "more than once." Consequently, the newspaper questioned the Minister of Education, Dr. Yousry al-Gamal, to divulge whether or not other students in city centers such as 'Mahala el-Kobra' and 'Shobein el-Koum' were taking "Morals" examinations instead of "Religion" examinations?

One would question: why should a young innocent student be exposed to such a controversy? Is it not enough for her to endure the stresses of such an important transition in her educational career? If she were not a Baha'i, this would have never been an issue. But this is just another clear example of what Baha'is have to endure in an intolerant system, regardless of their age or status. Extremism appears to surpass reason and reality!

Shams Shines in Saudi: Power of the Press

Try saying the title of this post ten times fast. Think that's hard? Try publishing a newspaper in Saudi Arabia, including criticizing Wahhabis and re-printing the notorious Danish cartoons. That's apparently all been done by Shams, the new tabloid on the block in Wahhabi-land. "Sunshine is the best disinfectant," goes the old mantra, and such is the role of this bright new sun in Saudi:

The fact that he still has a newspaper to edit is proof enough to Khalaf Alharbi that the ceiling of freedom in ultraconservative Saudi Arabia is rising.

His mischievous tabloid Shams, Arabic for Sun, has endured suspension, the arrest of one of its journalists and the carping of Islamist hard-liners who say it embodies the Westernized future they fear Saudi Arabia will face if liberals get their way.

But with a daily print-run of nearly 70,000, and recent permission to print inside the oil-producing kingdom instead of in neighboring Bahrain, Alharbi says the paper for young people aims to set a new standard after its first turbulent six months.

"Boldness is one of the basic tools of a journalist. You have to try to enter all the sensitive areas and you have to try to go over the line," he said in an interview.

"Fear of the free press is based on an illusion. Countries that have a free press have discovered that there's no problem, that the press can be responsible, because in the end the press is patriotic and loves its country."

Shams, which is owned by a grandson of Crown Prince Sultan, has certainly put its money where its mouth is.

Trying to break the mold of Saudi Arabia's sometimes drab print media, it avoided hiring experienced journalists.

"We preferred to have a team without previous journalistic experience. The rules of work on the other papers are a bit traditional, and we wanted to be different," Alharbi said.

Saudi Arabia is one of the world's most conservative societies, an absolute monarchy which governs through a strict interpretation of sharia, Islamic law. When King Abdullah came to power last year, he promised progress on a range of political, social and economic reforms.

The appearance of Saudi Arabia's first tabloid last December has been seen as another sign of slow, but inevitable, change.

The paper has published sensational features about forced marriage for young girls, premarital relationships, unemployment among women, an official ban on school sports for girls and arbitrary detention by police.

THE PROPHET CARTOONS

And it managed to survive its most daring act of all -- publishing some of the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad that provoked a global outcry among Muslims earlier this year.

The paper was shut down after running the caricatures, but the Ministry of Information, seen as a progressive force in Saudi Arabia under Minister Iyad Madani, allowed it to return a few weeks later, under its new editor Alharbi, a short-story author who had previously written in Gulf newspapers.

"We had the right permissions (to publish the cartoons) but it was a crisis and people were very excitable, so it would have been wiser not to have got into it," Alharbi said.

The paper said at the time it had clerical approval to publish the cartoons so that the Saudi public could judge for itself how much of an insult they were to Islam.

Two months later, one of the paper's journalists was arrested over an Internet article criticizing the puritanical school of Islam followed by Saudi clerics, known as Wahhabism. The journalist was later released.

So far, Saudi Arabia's religious police have not challenged Shams directly, despite its criticism of the organization.

"We're not against them but we believe that their role needs some order and clarification. People have the right to know their rights," said Alharbi, who describes himself as a liberal.

"On Internet sites we're accused of being troublemakers, of being outside the boundaries of custom and tradition, of moving toward the way of the West or Westernization." 

Alharbi sees a domestic market for tabloids, a success in other Arab countries, because of Saudi Arabia's huge young population -- 60 percent of 17 million Saudis are thought to be under 21.

The traditional crop of broadsheets, packed with text-heavy articles and semi-official communiques about those in power, leave many cold. Major dailies claim print-runs of more than 200,000 copies, but the true figure could be half that.

"The biggest press market in the Middle East is Saudi Arabia," said Alharbi, referring to an expected Saudi gross domestic product in 2006 of at least $350 billion.

"It will take us a few years to grow but there's no limit. The market is big."

The Internet, where Saudis express opinions that the country's conservative culture and closed political system cannot tolerate in public, presents one of the biggest challenges for Saudi Arabia's print media.

"The press is like your daily bread, you can't do without it. But the Internet has raised the bar of freedom, so papers have to try to push for more freedom too," Alharbi said.

"The Saudi press has progressed a lot but not enough yet for the modern world."

Indeed.

New Documentary on Morocco's Female "Imams"

In May, an official Moroccan government academy for training imams graduated the first group of 50 female students - the first Middle Eastern women in the modern era to be trained as Muslim religious leaders. There is one caveat for the imamat: they cannot lead juma (Friday) prayers. But it's an intriguing breakthrough nonetheless, and documentary filmmakers for PBS have now "unvieled" a film about the pioneering band of sisters: Class of 2006.

Check out the video clip that's available online (and seemingly impossible to link to directly). It shows Morocco's strange mix: it is by order of King M6 that the women are able to achieve this breakthrough.  (Dig the opening shot of the king's portrait being hung up on the wall.) So the king's divinely sanctioned role as "guardian of the faith" the drives the civil rights breakthrough, rather than a freedom obtained by civil society organizing. And the closing shot in the roughly two-minute clip features a newly-minted imam(a) praising M6 as the greatest leader in the world.

It's hard to know how excited to be about these kinds of civil rights breakthroughs. But despite the uncertainty, let's chalk it up as a step forward.

80,000 Sri Lankans Stranded in Lebanon

The US media has been vividly chronicling the evacuation of American citizens from Lebanon. But far outstripping the Western nationals in Lebanon are Sri Lankans, according to a BBC report. In fact, 80,000 Sri Lankans - mostly domestic workers - are trapped in Lebanon (plus an additional 30,000 Filipino migrant workers).

During the Cedar Revolution protests there were photos going around that showed a few Lebanese women attending the rallies with their Sri Lankan maids, who dutifully held protest signs on behalf of their employers. Indeed, the substantial South Asian population providing menial labor to thousands of households in Lebanon has been a sort of invisible group, a sad fact compounded amidst the ongoing bombing.

Padma, 22, described her terror to the BBC News website. "We tried to go away, but the employers won't let us. We have been so very scared," she said.

"They won't give us our passports. They want me to continue working here and they won't pay me the rest of my salary if I go now. I have been working for one-and-a-half years but I have only got three months' pay."

...Fellow domestic helper Menika, 21, said that her employers were withholding her passport because they didn't want her to make her own way to Beirut, fearing for her safety.

...Sri Lanka's ambassador to Lebanon, Amanul Farooq, said: "Unfortunately, this story is not uncommon. Many employers are very good and have brought their charges to safety. But some refuse to give people their passports and pay their salaries. We have had domestic helpers run away and come to us leaving all their documentation behind. Others are in a terrible plight because their employers have left them at home and escaped."

The Sri Lankan embassy has already evacuated 300 nationals and is processing about 1,000 more. But Mr Farooq says it is proving very difficult to get access to the tens of thousands across the country. There are estimated to be 80,000 Sri Lankan nationals in Lebanon, the vast majority of these employed as domestic helpers typically earning $100 a month.

...Hemalatha, 30, a domestic helper left at the refuge by her employers had only bitterness. "I have been dumped here. My husband is blind and I have to support my children. There is no work for me back home," she said.

Orwellian Doublespeak in Yemen

Dig this photo of Yemen's "long-serving" president, who now presents himself as a champion of freedom of expression. Who knew?!

Video of the Week: LBC Hizbollah Satire Video Surfances

"We will liberate the garden of Abu Hasan in Detroit..."

Way back last month (it seems ages ago), Hezbollah supporters took to the streets of Beirut in angry protest... over a TV comedy sketch. The protestors were furious that an actor had impersonated Hassan Nasrallah in a skit mocking, in part, Hezbollah's missile cache. The show's producer and director, Sharbil Khalil, had to backpeddle and apologized for the episode on TV. But anyone should be fair game for humor, and the right to mock should never be denied. Anyway, the inevitable has happened: a video of the offending clip has surfaced on YouTube. Click below to watch the mildly funny though oddly prescient clip.

Photo of the Week: Interview with a UAE Minister

This photograph hardly needs a caption. But it captures an interesting culture clash, and the UAE Minister being interviewed certainly finds himself caught between two worlds.