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Today's
Stories
August 7 /
8, 2004
Joshua Frank
The
Outsider: a Talk with Ralph Nader
Donald Macintyre
The
Battle of Najaf
August 6, 2004
Joshua Frank
David
Cobb's Soft Charade: the Greens and the Politics of Mendacity
Derek Seidman
An
Interview with Stan Goff
Mike Whitney
The
Arbitrary Imprisonment of Jose Padilla
William S. Lind
Corruption in the Marine Corps
David Price
In
the Shadow of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
August 5, 2004
Mike Ferner
The Kerry Show: When Peace is Off
Message
Bruce Anderson
Two
Rejections
Robert Fisk
The Tale of Saddam's Cameraman
Todd Chretien
Florida
Comes to California: the Democrats' Plot Against Nader
Peter Linebaugh
Doing Time for Political Crime:
Paul and Silas, Bound in Jail
August 4, 2004
Mickey Z.
Two
Traditions: WMD and Disinformation
Justin Huggler
The Hunt for Bin Laden
John Ross
Mexico's
Dirty War Never Ended: Inside Puente Grande Prison
August 3, 2004
Uri Avnery
The
Oligarchs
Ray McGovern
The 9/11 Commission Chimera
Jack McCarthy
Sexual Politics in Jeb's Florida
Eric Ruder
Meet Barak Obama: the Democrats' New Liberal Star
John L. Hess
Crying Wolf: Orange Alert!
Elaine Cassel
Civil Liberties Elections: 1800 v. 2004
Jules Rabin
The Man Who Didn't Walk By
Website of the Day
No Wall
Sex,
Drugs & the Blues!
Serpents in the Garden
CounterPunch's
Sizzling New Book on Culture and Sex is Now Available
Click here to purchase
August 2, 2004
Robert Jensen
Kerry's
Hypocrisy on the Vietnam War
Joshua Frank
Greens, Kerry and the Politics of Mendacity
Mike Whitney
The 9/11 Commission and Civil Liberties: "We Need an American
Police State"
Gary Leupp
Beyond
Good and Evil: Some Thoughts on Invasions
July 31 / Aug.
1, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Kerry:
He's the (Any) One
Merlin Chowkwanyun
Five Questions with Noam Chomsky: "The Savage Extreme of
a Narrow Policy Spectrum"
David Lindorff
The Shame of the DNC
John Chuckman
The
Disturbing Words of John Edwards
Brian Cloughley
All Slam and No Dunk; All Blame and No Responsibility
Christopher Brauchli
"Being Poor is a State of Mind": the Frowning Face
of Compassionate Conservatism
Fred Gardner
A World of Pain
Michael Donnelly
How Big Pharma Bilks the Elderly
David Nally
Genocide in Darfur?
Joshua Frank
Forest Battles Escalate in Oregon
Sam Bahour
Colin Powell and My Grandmother
Diane Farsetta
The IMF and the Indonesian Elections: The Invisible Hand in the
Voting Booth
Harold Gould
Was Iraq a Mutual Charade?
Van Bergen / Stephens
Election 9/11: Surreal Political Theater
Lee Sustar
A New Model for the Labor Movement?
Ron Jacobs
The Lost Art of Hitchhiking
M. Junaid Alam
An Interview with Palestinian-American Rapper, The Iron Sheik
Poets Basement
Albert, Ford, Krieger, St. Clair
Website of
the Weekend
Cross Cultural Poetics
July 30, 2004
Kolhatkar /
Ingalls
Shattering
Illusions: Kerry's Speech Tells Anti-War Activists They're Not
Wanted
Dave Lindorff
Murder
Not So Foul?
Bruce Jackson
Walt Whitman on the Sound of Wolf Blitzer's Voice
Fidel Castro
The
Pathology of George W. Bush
Maximilien Robespierre
Memo to Kerry and Bush: Why They Resist
Saul Landau
Bush
Charges Castro with Sex Tourism; JFK Rolls Over in His Grave
July 29, 2004
Cockburn /
St. Clair
Hail,
the Conquering War Criminal: What Kerry Really Did in Vietnam
Frank Bardacke
What
Michael Moore Left Out of F9/11
Tom Barry
Shallow and Formulaic: Kerry's Latin America Plan
Ron Jacobs
Kerry
and Lennon: Hawking the CounterCulture
Robert Fisk
The Unreported War
Lichtman /
Kellis-Borok
What Kerry Must Do to Win (But Probably Won't)
William S. Lind
The 9/11 Commission Report: Cashing in on Failure
CounterPunch
Wire
Doonesbury Onto John Kerry in 1971!
Website of
the Day
Jabbing JibJab: Copyright Madness
July 28, 2004
Robert Fisk
The
Occupation at 114 Degrees: Baghdad is Swamped in the Smell of
the Dead
Kevin Mink
Kerry's Misperception of Palestine
Ray McGovern
Israel and the Iraq War: How the 9/11 Report Soft-Pedals Root
Causes
United for
Peace & Justice
An
Open Letter to John Kerry: Winter Soldiers and Summer Patriots
Mike Ferner
Vets Demand End to Occupation: "Pull the Troops or Face
Impeachment Mvt."
Imraan Siddiqi
Turning Tricks with Ann Coulter
Alexander Cockburn
Candidate
Kerry
Website of
the Day
Iraq Vets Against the War
July 27, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Why
the Democrats Deserve Nader
Dave Lindorff
Back to the 19th Century: Globalization's Coming!
Mike Whitney
Control Room: Inside Al Jazeera
Ali, Anderson, Bello, et al.
If We Were Venezuelan, We'd Vote for Chavez
Stefan Wray
Texas Plan to Grab Los Alamos Takes Hold, as DOE Shuts Down Labs
Louis Proyect
Reflections on Nicaragua: First Came the Contra Butchers, Then
the Sweatshops
Rick Giombetti
Faith in Freedom: the Challenge of Thomas Szasz
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
The
9/11 Report and Its Weak-Kneed Consensus: Dogding Israel/Palestine;
Blinkered on Causes of Terrorism
July 26, 2004
Todd Chretien
Green
Resistance: a Reply to Normon Solomon & Medea Benjamin
Robert Fisk
Terror
by Video
Richard Forno
Security
Theater in Boston: Security Expert Harrassed by DHS for Exposing
Flaws at the Fleet Center
Mitchel Cohen
Report from a Boston Demo: Arresting the Curious
Richard Moreno
Rockers
for Justice: an Interview with Tom Morello and Serj Tankian
Alexander Cockburn
Boston
Awaits a Dead Party
July
24 / 25, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
The Democrats and Their Conventions:
Part One
Dennis
Hans
Those 16 Words Still Smell, Mr. Bush
Patrick
Cockburn
The Struggle for Iraq is Only Beginning
Josh
Frank
The War Path of Unity: Dems Reject
the Peace Movement
Justin
E.H. Smith
Christianity and the Left: the Latin
American Experience
Tariq
Ali
What's at Stake in Venezuela
Fred
Gardner
The Politics of Pot: Year of the
Antagonist
Mark
Scaramella
There's Dope and There's Dope
Ron
Jacobs
The Weather Underground's Prairie
Fire Statement...35 Years On
July
23, 2004
Lee
Sustar
Revolution in Nicaragua: 25 Years
On
Dave
Lindorff
Battle for NYC: Bush 1, Protesters
0
Saul
Landau
Zaniest President in US History: Bush
Beats Reagan
Mike
Whitney
The 9/11 Whitewash: Blaming No
One
Mickey
Z
Get On the Bus: 150 Years After Elizabeth
Jennings
Gary
Leupp
The 9/11 Commission and the Looming
War on Iran
July
22, 2004
M.
Junaid Alam
Ten Ways to Build a Better Democrat
Brian
McKinlay
Rusted On Down Under: Howard, Bush and Sharon
Jason
Leopold
Cheney Lobbied for Easing of Sanctions on Terrorist Regimes While
CEO of Halliburton
Chris
Floyd
Mob Rule: Ripping the Lid Off of America's Pious Myths
Uri
Avnery
Chirac v. Sharon
July
21, 2004
Paula
J. Caplan
The Emotional Casualities of War:
Psychologists Can't Heal All the Damage
Joshua
Frank
Nader Sleeping with the Enemy? Let's
be Fair
Ron
Jacobs
American Exceptionalism
Reza
Ghorashi
The Elections, Iran and al-Qaeda
Amy
Martin
Will Congress Rearm the Guatemalan Generals?
John
Ross
Bush May Lose, But His Wars Will Go
On and On
July
20, 2004
Stan
Cox
The Bush / Kerry War Ticket
Chris
Randolph
An Open Letter to Dr. Ehrenreich: It's Over, Barb!
Forrest
Hylton
The Ghosts of Gonismo: "Popular
Patricipation" and Bolivia's Gas Referendum
Mark
Scaramella
It's Official! Mendocino County is Crazier and Fatter Than the
Rest of California
Sam
Bahour
The World is Knocking on Israel's Door
George
Reiter
A Defense of David Cobb
John
Ross
Burying Iraq, Burying Bush
John
L. Hess
Girlie Stuff: Media Tolerance of Arnold & Co.
Website
of the Day
This Land is Your Land
July
19, 2004
Uri
Avnery
Marie and the Ghosts: the Hoax of
Paris
Col.
Dan Smith
What Has Been Accomplished?
Mike
Whitney
Allawi: Our Puppet with a Pistol
Karyn
Strickler
Just Marriage, Not Gay Marriage
Robert
Fisk
The Crisis of Information in Baghdad
David
Swanson
Media Blackout of US Labor Opposition
to Iraq War
Jennifer
van Bergen
The Death of the Great Writ of Liberty
July
17 / 18, 2004
Gary
Leupp
Apocalypse Now: Why the Book of Revelations
is Must Reading
Ghada
Karmi
Vanishing the Palestinians
Lenni
Brenner
When Cattle Unite, Lions Go Hungry: Notes for Ralph Nader
Ben
Tripp
Man on a Bridge: a Ghost Story
Brandy
Baker
What Would Elizabeth Cady Stanton Make of John Kerry?
M.
Shahid Alam
Israel Builds Another Wall
Sasan
Fayazmanesh
Nuclear Hypocrisy: Israel, Iran and the IAEA
Patrick
Bond
The George Bush of Africa
Fred
Gardner
Politics of Marijuana: Cannabiniod Therapuetics
William
Blum
Bush and Thucydides
Ben
Terrall
Carter and the Indonesia Elections: "I Don't See Anything
Wrong with a General Running the Country"
Tom
Barry
John Lehman on the War Path
David
Vest
Dylan Without the Music
Phyllis
Pollack
Return to Sin City: Keith Richards Does Gram Parsons
Ron
Jacobs
Smearing Muhammad Ali: Bob Feller Strikes Out
Joshua
Frank
Kerry to Edwards: "Let's Lose!"
David
Nally
A Call for Sudan: Our Georgraphical Blindspot
Toni
Solo
Bolivia's Gas Referendum
Landau,
Hassan, Prashad & Lindorff
Three Reviews of Moore's F911
Poets's
Basement
Ford, Smith and Albert
July
16, 2004
Dave
Zirin
Adonal Foyle: Master of the Lefty Lay-Up
Shervan
Sardar
Dershowitz, the ICJ and Jim Crow Laws
Ron
Jacobs
The Lil' Engine That Couldn't: Kucinich Surrenders on Anti-War
Plank
Robert
Fisk
Iraq, According to Edgar Allen Poe:
Coffin Bombs in Baghdad
Greg
Moses
The Forts of Iraq
Mickey
Z.
Ad Infinitum?: Presidential Campaigns in the Age of TV
Dan
Bacher
A Landmark Win for Salmon and the Tribes
Dave
Lindorff
The Mumia Case: Support from NAACP,
But a Movement in Shambles
Paul
McGeough
Did Allawi Shoot Inmates in Cold Blood?
Website
of the Day
10 Reasons to Fire Bush (and 9 Reasons Kerry Won't Be Any Better)
July
15, 2004
Heather
Williams
McMissing
the Point: Supersize Me Crashes on Its Message
Werther
Iraq: Follow the Money
Tom
Crumpacker
The Birds of Guantanamo
Brian
Cloughley
What Does the Bush Regime Object To?
Bill
Christison
Reorganize the CIA? Of Course,
But...
July
14, 2004
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Chronicle of a Nomination Foretold:
the Green Deceivers
Neve
Gordon
Of Socrates and the Apartheid Wall
Diane
Christian
The Priesthood of Death
Stefan
Wray
Who Benefits from Missing Data at Los Alamos Nuclear Lab?
Josh
Frank
The Nader / Dean Debate
Conn
Hallinan
Divide and Conquer as Imperial Rules
Elizabeth
Weill-Greenberg
Bring My Brother Home!: Class, War
and Education
Website
of the Day
Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear and the Selling of US Empire
July
13, 2004
Ray
McGovern
The CIA and Iraq: an Intelligence
Debacle...and Worse
Mark
Donham
The Sierra Club's Inexplicable Treatment of Cynthia McKinney
Ben
Tripp
Politus Interruptis: With Friends Like
These, Who Needs Electorates?
Mark
Gaffney
Slipping Towards Armageddon: Israel
in Iraq
Dave
Lindorff
Osama Wins! Election Postponed!
Chris
White
Double Think: the Bedrock of Marine
Indoctrination
July
10 / 12, 2004
Kathleen
Christison
The Problem with Neutrality Between
Palestinians and Israel
Janine
Pommy Vega
Trail of the Comet: a Gathering of the World's Poets Against
War
Sherry
Wolf
From Maverick to Party Attack Dog: Howard Dean Gay-Bashes Nader
Saul
Landau and Farrah Hassen
A Transfer of Power, Sort Of
Michael
Donnelly
How to Steal an Election: the Green Version, 2004
Stanton
/ Madsen
Iraq Survey Group: Rumsfeld's al-Qaeda?
Richard
Lichtman
The End of Innocence: Reflections on American Pathology
Gila
Svirsky
Thank You, Your Honors: a Legal Blow to the Wall
Kurt
Nimmo
Clinton's Life
Toni
Solo
Empire-Speak: What Roger Noriega Really Means
Ron
Jacobs
The Black Panthers and the Rest
Camelo
Ruiz Marrero
Gene Warfare in Oaxaca: Genetic Mutation of Mexican Maize
Omar
Barghouti
Wither the Empire: Rise of a Global Resistance
Poets'
Basement
Curtis and Albert
July
9, 2004
Dave
Zirin
Carlos Delgado on Deck: Blue Jays Slugger
Stands Up Against War
Justin
Delacour
Wishing Kerry Would Shut Up About
Latin America
Robert
Fisk
Iraq in Reverse: Martial Laws Fuel Insurgency
Boris
Kagarlitsky
Two Congresses and a Funeral
William
S. Lind
The October Surprises
Sibel
Edmonds
Our Broken System: John Ashcroft's War on Truth
Ron
Jacobs
Reading Tea Leaves: What Vietnam Tells Us About Iraq's Future
Gary
Leupp
The Lie That Will Not Die: Cheney and
the Iraq/al-Qaeda Link
July
8, 2004
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The Inexplicable John McCain
Toufic
Haddad
Protesting Israel's Apartheid Wall:
a Letter from the Hunger Strikers' Tent
Dave
Lindorff
Liberation as Martial Law
Joshua
Frank
The Fall: How Beltway Dems Sank Howard
Dean
Christopher
Brauchli
Bush & Cheney Play the Hitler Card
James
Petras
The Truth About Jimmy Carter
July
7, 2004
John
Chuckman
Kerry's BBQ: a Deafening Silence
of Meaning
Virginia
Tilley
A Line in the Sand: Azmi Bishara's
Hunger Strike
Susan
Martinez
A Letter to Bill Cosby
Mickey
Z
Elie Wiesel's Strange Parade
Michael
Donnelly
Our Own Private Wilderness: Trusting the Land in the Inland Empire
Sean
Donahue
Boston Social Forum: the Dems aren't the Only Show in Beantown
Diane
Christian
Sovereignty and Freedom in Iraq
July
6, 2004
Lisa
Viscidi
Fleeing Guatemala: Central Americans
Risk Lives to Reach El Norte
Marc
Norton
The Felonious Five Ride Again: the
Supreme Court and Enemy Combatants
James
Brooks
Chemical Warfare on the West Bank?
Ray
McGovern
Porter Goss as CIA Director?
William
Cook
Legacy of Deceit: If Dante Knew of Bush and the Neo-Cons...
July
5, 2004
Forrest
Hylton
US Imperialism in Latin America: Sept.
11, July 4 and Systematic Torture
Chris
White
A Former Marine Sgt. on the Meaning
of Independence Day
Joe
Bageant
Cranky Reflections on the 4th of July
Robert
Jensen
Stupid White Movie: What Michael Moore
Misses About the Empire
Kathy
Kelly
"Two Days an' a Wake-Up"
July
3 / 4, 2004
Elaine
Cassel
Bush's Police State and Independence
Day
Stan
Goff
ABC of Opportunism: "Progressive"
Latin American Leaders Support the Coup in Haiti
Snehal
Shingavi
"We Want Real Justice for Bhopal": Two Survivors Speak
Out
Bruce
Anderson
The Cheney-Leahy Metaphor and the Greens
Sharon
Smith
Twilight of the Greens: the Chokehold of "Anybody But Bush"
Josh
Frank
Ralph Nader's Revolt: an Interview with Greg Bates
Robert
Fisk
Pentagon Tried to Censor Saddam's Hearing
Joe
Bageant
Sons of a Laboring God: Leftnecks Unite!
Brian
Cloughley
Fortress Bush and the One Law Doctrine
Justin
Delacour
The Anti-Chavez Echo Chamber: Venezuela's Media Tycoons
William
S. Lind
Saudi Spillover
Linda
S. Heard
A Joke Called "Justice"
Greg
Moses
"It's Illegal, But It's Our Right": Korean Labor Won't
Back Down
Ron
Jacobs
"Ain't You Proud to be White on Independence Day?"
Toni
Solo
Weary of Indigenous Resistances? Just Pretend They're Not There
Dan
Nagengast
Chicken Manure as Cattle Food: Safe, But Do We Want to Eat It?
Stew
Albert
Brando, a Personal Recollection
Dave
Zirin
From the Black Panthers to Sacheen Littlefeather: a Eulogy for
Our Brando
Patrick
W. Gavin
The Progressive Case for Dodgeball
Steven
Rosenthal / Junaid Ahmad
The Problem is Bigger Than the Bushes: a Review of F911
Poets'
Basement
Kearney, Ford and Davies
Website
of the Day
Global Peace Solution
July
2, 2004
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Suicide Right on the Stage: the Demise
of the Green Party
Douglas
Valentine
Fahrenheit 911: Mocking the Moral Crisis of Capitalism
Gary
Leupp
"Just Because I Could": On Obscenities and Opportunities
Lee
Ballinger
Illegal People: Kerry Opposes Immigrant Rights
Robert
Fisk
Saddam in the Dock: Confused? Hardly
CounterPunch
Wire
"What Law Formed This Court?": a Transcript of Saddam's
Arraignment
Christopher
Brauchli
Bush's Drug Card Lottery: the Price Ain't Right
Saul
Landau
Buzz Words and Venezuela
July 1, 2004
Katherine
van Wormer
Bush's Damaged Mind: the Madness in
His Method
Joe
Bageant
Is Our President a Whackjob? Does It Matter?
William
James Martin
The Dogma of Richard Perle
Dave
Lindorff
Bush's Evacuation Moment
Robert
Fisk
Bread and Circus Trials in Iraq
Alan
Maass
Green Party in Reverse
Website
of the Day
Michael Moore and Israel: Blind or a Coward?
June
30, 2004
Kurt Nimmo
Nicholson
Baker's Checkpoint: a New Kind of Anger About Bush
Tariq
Ali
Getting Away with Murder in Iraq
Jennifer
Van Bergen
Bush and the Detainees
Douglas
Valentine
Apotheosis of the Psychopaths: Instead of Fahrenheit 9/11, Rescreen
The Quiet American
David
Price
Fahrenheit 9/11 Through the McCain-Feingold Looking Glass
Roger
Normand
America's Criminal Occupation of Iraq
Stan
Cox
Sanitized for Your Protection: Ashcroft's
War on Art
Henry
David Thoreau
On the Futility of Bush v. Kerry: All Voting is a Kind of Gaming
Ben
Tripp
Who Dast Call Him Liar: a Rebuttal to Nicholas Kristof
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
August
7 / 8, 2004
Which Way Now?
The
Saga of an Anguished Afghan
By
ASEEM SHRIVASTAVA
"After the migrant leaves
home, he never finds another place where the two life lines cross.
The vertical line exists no more; there is no longer any local
continuity between him and the dead, the dead now simply disappear;
and the gods have become inaccessible. The vertical line has
been twisted into the individual biographical circle which leads
nowhere but only encloses. As for the horizontal lines, because
there are no longer any fixed points as bearings, they are elided
into a plain of pure distance, across which everything is swept."
John Berger, And our Faces,
My Heart, Brief as Photos
I was biking back to my house
from the grocery store with a friend who is staying with me,
when I glimpsed a short, Nepalese-looking man cycling towards
us. We stopped and started talking. It turned out that he was
a refugee from Afghanistan, visiting a friend in the local area.
(For a few years I have been living and teaching at an international
junior college in the fjords of Western Norway.)
His name (changed here) was
Jamal and he belonged to the Hazara tribe from the highlands
of Central Afghanistan known as Hazarajat. The Hazaras are an
ethnic minority (4-5 million in number, now spread across many
refugee-absorbing countries), descended from Mongols (probably
remnants of Chingiz Khan's invading army) and settled in the
mountains to the north of Ghazni since the 13th century. Some
years ago, the Taliban destroyed the famous centuries-old Buddhist
statues in the region of Bamian (since orthodox Islam forbids
images), which is where Jamal is from. The Bandi-Amir lakes are
close by. Kabul, Bagram, and American presence, are not far.
The Hazaras are mostly Sh'ia
Muslims and have long been a persecuted minority, being a favored
target of the dominant Pushtoon tribes. Since the late 1980s
they have been trying to defend their regional autonomy (traditionally,
always crushed by the Pushtoon rulers in Kabul) under the banner
of Hizb-Wahadat (Party of Unity). As Jamal informed me, the Taliban,
being Sunni fanatics, were particularly harsh on them since gaining
control of Afghanistan after 1996.
When we met, Jamal had been
in Norway for several months. As we got talking he began to narrate
the spine-chilling story of how he got here.
A tormented
past
One would have guessed Jamal's
age at at least 30. It turned out he was about 20 (he did not
know exactly). The lines on his face were testimony to the life-experience
of a much older man. He had had education (in Dari, his own language,
and Persian) till grade 8. He had to suddenly leave schooling
and home 6 years ago under very trying conditions.
For one thing, there was a
serious family feud, involving his family with that of his uncle
(mother's brother) and the latter's son. Jamal's eldest brother
had avenged the killing of their sister (married to the uncle's
son and killed by him) by killing his own sister-in-law, who
was the uncle's daughter. Ultimately, the uncle and his son came
with Kalashnikovs one night and gunned down both of Jamal's elder
brothers, leaving behind little Jamal, his second sister, and
their parents. Soon after, the parents prevailed upon Jamal,
his sister, and her husband to leave the area.
An equally important impulse
for leaving home was the take-over of the region by the Taliban.
Initially, the Hazaras had managed to defend themselves against
a Taliban offensive in the Bamian region. The Hazaras' sense
of desperation is summed up in their proverb: Tang amad, dar
jang amad (He who is cornered must fight). But in September
1998, the Taliban attacked a second time, emboldened by their
capture of Mazhar-I-Sharif, armed this time with far superior
weaponry, helicopters and tanks. The Hazara resistance was crushed.
According to Jamal more than a thousand innocent people were
slaughtered. Many Hazara women were raped. He saw with his own
eyes the slaying of a six-month-old baby. Two of Jamal's cousins
died in battle with the Taliban.
In May, 1999, the Taliban committed
further massacres in the area, killing several hundred people
and consolidating their new-found hold on Hazarajat.
The Taliban considered the
Sh'ia Hazaras to be Kafirs (infidels) and told their own fighters
that the Qatl (killing) of a Sh'ia Kafir will ensure them a place
in Jannat (heaven). The Taliban's ultimatum to the Hazaras was
to leave their "Mazhab (religion), their country, or get
killed." The obvious results obtained.
In passing, Jamal noted the
American hypocrisy of first arming the Islamic fundamentalists
and the Taliban against the Russians and then pretending to destroy
them after 9/11, ignoring all along the humanitarian concerns
of the Hazaras, as also the other innocent tribes of Afghanistan,
victims, first of the Russians, then of the Taliban, and finally,
of US bombing and destruction.
The teenager's
flight into exile
Jamal's land-and-water journey,
without papers and passport, armed with little more than a limited
working knowledge of Persian, from Bamian in Afghanistan to the
fjords of Western Norway, a journey over six years and over a
dozen countries negotiating, in turn, the highlands of
Central Asia, the Baluchi desert, rugged, mountainous tracts
in Pakistan, Iran, Kurdistan and Turkey, before finding extraordinary
means of getting across to Greece and Italy over water, and traversing
Europe before reaching its Northern shores is the stuff
of epic human suffering. It shows just how imperiled, hearty
and brave a creature man is! Jamal came close to death on dozens
of occasions, running scared from army patrols and policemen
on some of them, barely surviving thirst and hunger on others.
Jamal claims that the bulk of the people who leave Afghanistan
in despair never make it to their final destinations and do not
survive to tell the tale.
Over the past century and more,
the West and its corrupt, violent accomplices in the Third World,
have perpetrated monstrous miseries on vulnerable millions across
the globe in the name of higher causes like 'peace', 'freedom',
'democracy', 'modernity' and 'progress'. For millions of beleaguered
migrants like Jamal, it is not the thrill of imperial adventure
chronicled by unjustly famous figures like Gertrude Bell
and Lawrence of Arabia that the human spirit lives. On
the contrary, its strength is stretched to unimaginable extremes
and it endures endless nights of hopelessness. The darkness stretches
longer than a Norwegian tunnel, and only the ones who suffer
know that, unlike the tunnel, it may never end. It is a tribute
to human courage and a testament to Jamal's tenacity that he
is able to smile through the violent cracks of his life.
Jamal's long trek began before
the winter of 1998-99 set in. Along with his sister and her husband,
he escaped from his qasba (small town) in Bamian by night, and
on foot. They had to avoid the eagle eyes of Taliban guards.
A Pathan then picked them up on the highway and brought them
in a sealed truck to Qandahar, from where they managed to get
a ride the next day on another truck to Quetta in South-West
Pakistan. They were saved from Taliban guards by truck-drivers
who concealed them at the back of their trucks under sandbags.
After two months of unsuccessfully
searching for work in Quetta, Jamal, his sister, and her husband
made arrangements with an agent to take them to Iran, which had
been accepting Afghan refugees for sometime. They had to let
go of the little sum of money they had left to pay the agent.
His education cut short in
grade 8 after he left Bamian, Jamal started his professional
life in Teheran. He began working under his brother-in-law who
himself hired his supervision services in construction to a local
contractor. Jamal began by lifting heavy loads, often carrying
sandbags as high as 5 or 6 storeys. On one occasion he fell from
the second floor of the building that his team was working on.
He fell and hurt himself miserably, putting himself out of work
for several months. Since he had no money to get medical assistance,
his knee has got dislocated permanently. It hurts even now and
he is not able to lift heavy loads for too long. For a person
who has few skills apart from his physical ones, it is a far
greater handicap than what one would otherwise imagine.
Soon after turning 16, Jamal
started working separately from his brother-in-law, having picked
up some metal-working skills and carpentry in his spare-time.
He would make doors and windows in people's houses. While earlier
he was earning about 50 Euros a month and giving all the money
to his sister, now he was making up to 150 Euros a month and
being able to save a good fraction of it.
Apart from the minimal fortune
of finding some work Jamal, like other Afghan refugees, was treated
badly in Iran. If he was caught by the police they would invariably
take all the money in his pockets as bribes, since he did not
have any papers. In case he did not have money on him, he would
often get a thrashing.
Beatings of Afghan refugees
are quite common in Iran. Jamal told a number of stories and
the accounts can also be cross-checked with similar reports on
treatment of Afghan refugees in Iran prepared by NGOs in Norway
as also groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
Authorities in Iran became
more stringent with Afghan refugees after 9/11. On one occasion,
two years ago, Jamal, along with some fellow-Afghans, was caught
by the police and taken in a sealed truck to Bazdashka (prison),
where they were asked to lie on the ground next to each other
and beaten with wooden batons by the guards. For one week, 300
refugees were imprisoned in a large hall. They were allowed to
leave the hall only once during the day to have water and visit
the toilet. They were robbed of all money and possessions and
provided with some burnt bread by way of food. There were daily
police atrocities. There was no recourse to justice for an Afghan
in the custody of Iranian police. From the prison they were taken
via Zaidan to Talisiyah near the Afghan border for deportation.
Finally, hungry, thirsty and broke, they arrived at Nimroz on
the Afghan border.
From Nimroz Jamal managed to
make a phone call to his sister in Teheran and received some
money after a few days, with which he could entertain the possibility
of re-entering Iran. Along with some of the other refugees he
was able to find a Persian-speaking Pathan agent who first took
them in a truck to Zabul and from there, in order to stay clear
of the Taliban guards, the agent took them on foot, by night,
to Zaidan on the border with Iran. A Baluchi agent then charged
them 200,000 Tomans (150 Euros) each to take them to Teheran
on a truck, the journey lasting three days. The agent's fee included
the bribes to be paid to the Iranian police, who, Jamal pointed
out, make money from Afghan refugees both ways: first when they
are deported, and then when they try to re-enter the country.
Upon returning to Teheran Jamal
worked for six more months, saved some money and, after advice
from his sister, made plans to make his exit from Iran since
the authorities were getting increasingly severe on refugees
after 9/11. For 450 Euros an agent promised him safe passage
to Turkey.
As Jamal left for Turkey, he
was for the first time completely separated from his family (he
has not seen his sister since). The overland journey from Teheran
to Istanbul took three weeks. Jamal just had a change of clothes,
some food and a bottle of water with him. The journey was through
heavily patrolled areas of Iran, Kurdistan and Turkey. It was
made with the help of a series of interlinked agents. There was
the man with the truck carrying sand. Jamal and his fellow escapees
were hidden under the sand. "How did you breathe?",
I asked him. "They had created tunnels in the sand for exactly
that purpose!" There were five people in the sands. When
they reached the next destination on the way to Istanbul, three
people were unconscious because of suffocation and had to be
revived with water. One of them could not be revived and was
left behind, likely dead.
There were several overnight
journeys on foot over the Kurdish mountains. Some of the migrants
died of cold, according to Jamal. In the villages and small towns
where they would halt for the night, they would often be asked
to stay with sheep and goats in their sheds, so that armies on
patrol would not catch them. On one occasion they stayed at the
house of an agent. There were as many as 80 fellow-migrants
including Pakistanis, Indians, Bangladeshis and Iraqis
staying there, each paying a sum of money to the host.
On several occasions Jamal
and his associates had close shaves with the army or the police,
in Iran as well as in Kurdistan and Turkey.
After a three-week odyssey
Jamal and his fellow-refugees arrived in Istanbul. Unlike the
others who had the money to pay agents to buy passage to Europe,
Jamal was broke and was lucky to find some work soon. He worked
for six months in a leather and rubber goods godown owned by
a Pakistani. The work involved cutting, sorting and arranging
the items. It enabled him to survive and also save a bit of money
to pay for the boat to Europe.
"Why did you want to leave
Istanbul?", I asked him. He replied that the authorities
there were very hostile to Afghan refugees and were unwilling
to give them legal status. There were a number of police atrocities
against them. Jamal himself got beaten up on a couple of occasions.
Moreover, most employers were not willing to hire people from
outside. The risks for Afghans were high. If you got caught without
papers you were deported to Iran and from there to Afghanistan.
Jamal thus had to work on the sly, going to work before dawn
and returning after dark, in order to escape the eyes of the
police. On one occasion when he was caught he was dispossessed
of all his money.
Finally, when he had set aside
enough savings, Jamal managed to arrange for an agent to take
him to Greece by boat. He was told that the crossing would take
5 hours. It took three days and three nights! He ran out of water
on the second day and stayed thirsty for the remainder of the
time. In a boat, no more than 20 metres in length, there were
as many as 40 people traveling, including 12 Afghans, several
Palestinians, Kurds, Iraqis and Iranians.
(During the mostly standing-room-only
crossing Jamal met an Egyptian man who showed anger at Afghans
because he thought they were the same as Al-Qaeda and were jeopardizing
prospects for Muslims across the world. Jamal responded by saying
that as an Egyptian he should know the difference between an
Arab and an Afghan, that in Afghanistan Al-Qaeda drew its recruits
predominantly from the majority Pushtoons and that there are
more Arabs than Afghans in the terrorist group, many of them
from Egypt! In general, Jamal feels that people all over the
world, thanks to American propaganda after 9/11, have wrongly
started thinking of all Afghans as Taliban, when, in fact, ironically,
most Afghans are the victims of the latter. Using a popular Hazara
expression, Jamal says that "the Taliban came and spoilt
their food." He would like very much for the world to recognize
the integrity of his people.)
Hungry, thirsty, tottering
at the edge of survival, Jamal was landed, after 72 hours on
water, in a Greek jungle-swamp. They were received by a local
agent who took four of them to his house at a time, strip-searched
them upon arrival with a knife held to their throats, and demanded
up-front cash before allowing them to stay for the night and
take them to their next destination.
After a couple of days, Jamal
and his new friend Asif, a 16-year-old fellow-Afghan, were put
with a consignment of watermelons in a container-truck headed
for Italy. Apparently, some off-duty policemen saw them being
loaded into the container. While the truck was driving to the
port it was stopped by the customs authorities for an examination.
As luck would have it, the police torches showed Asif concealed
under the watermelons, though Jamal escaped notice. Asif was
hauled out of the truck, after which Jamal merely recalls a loud
sound of screeching brakes and a crash. He was told later that
Asif had been killed in the accident. He said he was afraid for
his own life and was unable to know the real truth about Asif's
death. He will never know, he said.
Upon reaching the port at night,
Jamal was escorted out of the container by another agent and
shown the way into a waiting boat, where he joined dozens of
other potential immigrants en route to Italy. Once again, the
boat proved to be very heavy on a stormy sea and Jamal claims
that several people on the boat were thrown out on the water
to drown, or simply shot by the agents after being offloaded.
After a 30-hour ordeal, through
which Jamal went hungry, they arrived, again during the night,
at a deserted shore which, they were told, was Italy. There was
no agent to guide them from here. They were merely shown the
direction to the nearest village. So, with barely a few belongings
on their shoulders, Jamal and two others began their trek on
the European mainland. A policeman who encountered them on the
way turned out to be a rare piece of good fortune, managing to
explain to them in an alien tongue that they could spend the
night at the morgue in the village and then walk three kilometers
in the morning to the small town nearby which happened to have
the closest train-station.
They did as they were told.
Next morning they walked the three kilometers in the rain. Their
luck seemed to have run out when they were asked for documents
by two Italian policemen. Upon finding out that their captives
had no papers, the policemen took pity on their wet, frozen condition
and instead of taking them to jail, told them how to get to Rome.
Not having the requisite amount
of money they managed to get on to the train to Rome, but without
a ticket. Through sheer pluck they evaded the train-conductors
and made it to Rome. They had the address of a park where some
of their compatriots were apparently "staying." They
found them after a day's effort, and finally got some food to
eat.
Two weeks in Rome was Jamal's
baptism in Europe. He had various adventures but he managed to
evade the cops, thanks to a rapid acquisition of survival skills
perfected by his fellow-Afghans.
Jamal made contact with his
sister in Teheran again and got her to send him some money. Then,
he and two others made a plan to travel towards Norway, since
he had heard that they take the best care of Afghan refugees.
They bought a train ticket to Paris, so this time there was no
fear of being checked, though they did not have any other papers.
Paris was cold and wet and
they lay down, once again without blankets, in a park at night.
Next day they made contact with some Afghan refugees in the city
who put them in touch with a Persian-speaking Kurdish agent.
For a sum of 600 Euros (all of Jamal's savings, sent to him in
Rome by his sister), he agreed to take Jamal to Oslo and his
traveling companions to Copenhagen and Stockholm.
After spending a week in Paris,
they took trains and buses, and on one occasion found themselves
concealed at the back of a station-wagon! Jamal does not know
exactly which countries he was taken through. But his agent informed
him that he went through France, Luxemburg, Belgium, Germany,
Denmark before he reached Stockholm and was put on the bus to
Oslo.
He arrived alone in Oslo late
at night with 50 Norwegian Kroners (6 Euros) in his pocket. He
was met by a Kurdish man who immediately took him to the police
station to get him registered as a fresh seeker of refugee status.
They finger-printed him and took him to a refugee camp. He was
interviewed there and after 4 days, sent to a larger refugee
camp. He spent 40 days there and was well looked after, after
a very long time.
Right now, Jamal lives at another
camp (he asked me not to name it). He is given 2800 Kroners (325
Euros) a month by the Norwegian authorities for his upkeep while
he awaits the decision on the legalization of his status.
He casts a cynical eye on Afghanistan
after the "end" of the Taliban. He says that the Mullahs
still hold the reins of power, only this time (as before 1990)
they are with the Americans. He dreams of resuming and completing
the education which was rudely interrupted 6 years ago.
Jamal and
Afghanistan: Which way now?
No other country has been savaged
by the three most potent fundamentalisms of our time, namely
the Communist, the Islamic, and the capitalist. First, the declining
Soviets invaded and ravaged the country and ran it from 1979
to 1988. Then the most rabid Islamic fundamentalists, in the
shape of the Mujaheedin and the Taliban, armed by the CIA to
battle the Soviets, pillaged the land and its people. Hundreds
of thousands were killed. Osama Bin Laden was created by American
policies.
Finally, after the Soviet withdrawal
and the end of the Cold War, American interest in Afghanistan
and its warlords has centred around negotiations to build oil
and gas pipelines the new "Silk Route" through
Central Asia from the Caspian Sea region through Afghanistan
to Multan in Pakistan, from where already existing pipelines
would carry the oil and gas to waiting tankers in the Karachi
harbour. The powers involved in this 21st century version of
"The Great Game" for regional hegemony the US,
Russia, Iran, Pakistan, and to lesser extents, Britain, China
and even Argentina have been impatiently eyeing the $3-6
trillion oil and gas reserves of the Caspian Sea region.
Under pressure from the oil
companies, especially UNOCAL and AMOCO, the Clinton administration
consolidated its links with the Taliban. Many official exchanges
took place between US administrations and the Taliban, all the
way till negotiations over the oil and gas pipelines broke down
in 2001. In 1996, Clinton's Assistant Secretary of State for
South Asia, Robin Raphael even took a helicopter from Islamabad
to Qandahar to meet with the Taliban high command. It's worth
keeping in view the fact that till their falling out after 9/11,
the Taliban served as America's "pipeline police" in
Afghanistan. Their treatment of women or children never stood
in the way of official American dealings with them. On one occasion
the US even defended the Taliban at the UN.
After 9/11, the US, in a cowardly
show of misdirected retributive justice, began the high-altitude
bombing of an already savaged land. 17 of the 19 hijackers of
the 9/11 aircrafts came from Saudi Arabia. None came from Afghanistan.
But the Bush family's loyalty to Saudi royalty and to Prince
Bandar Sultan (known to the family as Bandar Bush) prevailed
and the Afghan victims of Al-Qaeda (the latter recruited largely
in Sunni-dominated regions like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan and
Pushtoon areas of Southern Afghanistan) were subjected to another
round of barbarism, this time in high-tech fashion by the Americans.
Informed observers believe
that America's "war on terror" is, at bottom, not only
a war for continued domination of the Middle East and its oil
(keeping it from the Europeans, the Japanese and the Chinese,
closest competitors in a globalized world), but even more for
Central Asian oil and gas. The area has vast gas reserves and,
as per latest estimates, could have up to 15% or more of the
planet's oil.
The Hazaras, Jamal among them,
only constitute a tiny fraction of the millions of innocent victims
around the globe of fossil-fuel-driven American foreign policies
for continued global hegemony, policies which should themselves
be fossilized if the planet is to survive into the next century.
As I was saying goodbye to
Jamal, I wondered aloud whether we would ever meet again. Giving
me a warm embrace, he said softly "kal ka kya pata, aaj
toh gale mil lein!" ("who knows about tomorrow, let's
embrace today!").
His fate now rests with the
immigration authorities in Oslo who have yet to legalize his
status, without which he does not even get the opportunity to
take the necessary Norwegian classes, get himself the education
he so badly desires and the medical attention he needs to attend
to the problem in his knee (doctors refusing to treat him in
Norway till he gets legalized). His fate also lies, more broadly,
with the Norwegian government which has recently been promoting
"Voluntary Return Programmes", trying to induce refugees
to return to their countries of origin.
Jamal himself remains extremely
grim about the possibility of returning home. He does not know
if his old parents are still alive. He is practically out of
touch with his sister. When asked about the return of peace to
Afghanistan after the American defeat of the Taliban, he responds
"Kaisa aman? Kaun sa aman?" ("What peace? Which
peace?"). He recalled that a Norwegian soldier had been
killed, and one wounded, less than two months ago in a grenade
attack near Kabul itself.
The Norwegian government should
take heed, and if the EU and the UN wish to stem the flow of
refugees from Afghanistan, they need to apply far greater pressure
on the US than they have done hitherto, to change the course
of its policies in the region. The problem has to be tackled
at its root.
The Americans have to take
responsibility not just for the destiny of Afghanistan as it
has unfolded since 9/11 (the US was willing to put 7 million
people, dependent on international food aid, at the risk of starvation
in winter when they began the bombing of Northern Afghanistan
in October, 2001), but for over two decades of problems resulting
from the proxy Cold War conflict that they engaged in with the
Soviets there since the Reagan years. For the first time in
the history of the Cold War, American-armed guerillas (Sunni
Islamic fundamentalists, the original ancestors of the ultimately
victorious Taliban and Al-Qaeda) were firing directly at Soviet
troops. The grand figure of Osama Bin Laden was created to prosecute
American interests in the region, and fight the Soviets with
a CIA-trained army of Sunni Islamic fundamentalist youth, recruited
from countries as far apart as Algeria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and
Pakistan. The US, with the pivotal assistance of radical Islamists,
was hugely successful in its goal of displacing the Russians.
Further, many observers regard the Soviet defeat and withdrawal
from Afghanistan as the key element in the final unravelling
of the Soviet empire. But the long-term legacy of American intervention
for the people of Afghanistan has been little short of catastrophic,
especially after the oil multinationals began to show an interest
in Caspian Sea oil and gas and of building the infamous pipeline.
The barbaric monstrosities of the Taliban notwithstanding, the
Americans wined and dined them all the way till August, 2001,
to negotiate a good deal for the oil companies interested in
Central Asia.
What now? Jamal recalls that
the American-appointed Hamid Karzai was a minister in the short-lived
Mujaheedin government in the early 1990s and was even a supporter
of the Taliban at the time. He is certainly very far from having
the interests of minorities like the Hazaras at heart. Jamal
says that no one in Afghanistan takes seriously the claim of
the Western media and governments that the Islamic fundamentalists
and the Taliban have been eliminated from the country. Karzai
is seen exactly for what he is, an American stooge who will ensure
safe passage for American oil interests. 'Karz' means loan in
Dari and Urdu, and the Hazaras believe that the Americans have
this time taken Karzai on loan from the Afghans, in order to
do their bidding in Afghanistan! The country outside of the small
circle of American light around Kabul is still run by warlords
who get their kicks from Kalashnikovs, either belonging to the
Taliban or the Northern Alliance or one of their supporting groups.
In many parts, thanks to complete lawlessness, women are no better
off than under the Taliban. Rapes are common. Kabul itself, Jamal
alleges, has become prohibitively expensive, affordable only
for American and UN officials and diplomats, whose presence has
spiked all prices and rents.
The Jamals, not the Karzais
and the Khalilzads (architect of Bush's policy in Afghanistan),
are not only the real survivors of a devastated Afghanistan,
but the true heroes of the modern world. For the Karzais and
the Khalilzads, having made their mealy-mouthed deals with the
Americans, life is simple and easy. Not for Jamal: "Whoever
believes that life is simple or easy has not lived", Jamal
says in fluent Urdu, reciting a couplet which now eludes my memory
and which offers consolation to a life almost resigned to exile.
Yet he harbors the soaring hopes of youth. His eyes light up
as he declares with zest: "Mustaqbil mein ek roshan
banana hai" (One has to make a light in the future).
Already fluent in several languages (his native Dari, Persian,
Urdu, spoken Hindi, some Turkish and now learning Norwegian and
English) Jamal still wishes more than anything else to complete
his education.
With wisdom missing nowadays
in men thrice his age, and hugely more educated than himself,
the saddened 20-year-old muses that "there is no hope for
my generation. I have never glimpsed happiness in my life, but
at least the next generation should see some, and we have a role
to play in that." I asked him how he wished to play his
part. "I do not want to become rich. If I can get an education,
I would like to be of some help to the poor children of Afghanistan,
because I know from my own life the conditions under which countless
tens of thousands of children are growing up in the country.
We need teachers, doctors and engineers, not Mullahs, weapons,
American-appointed leaders and what they and the Americans call
peace."
One of the most astute commentators
on Afghanistan and the modern world, the late Eqbal Ahmad from
Pakistan, used to describe the country as a "metaphor for
the world to come." The world had better take heed of his
words, given how prophetic he was in his prediction about the
rise of a once obscure Saudi Mullah called Osama Bin Laden, more
than a decade before 9/11 brought him immortal notoriety.
Aseem Shrivastava, a citizen of India, teaches philosophy
in Norway and can be reached at: mi97ashr@rcnuwc.uwc.org
Weekend
Edition Features for July 31 / August 1, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Kerry:
He's the (Any) One
Merlin Chowkwanyun
Five Questions with Noam Chomsky: "The Savage Extreme of
a Narrow Policy Spectrum"
David Lindorff
The Shame of the DNC
John Chuckman
The
Disturbing Words of John Edwards
Brian Cloughley
All Slam and No Dunk; All Blame and No Responsibility
Christopher Brauchli
"Being Poor is a State of Mind": the Frowning Face
of Compassionate Conservatism
Fred Gardner
A World of Pain
Michael Donnelly
How Big Pharma Bilks the Elderly
David Nally
Genocide in Darfur?
Joshua Frank
Forest Battles Escalate in Oregon
Sam Bahour
Colin Powell and My Grandmother
Diane Farsetta
The IMF and the Indonesian Elections: The Invisible Hand in the
Voting Booth
Harold Gould
Was Iraq a Mutual Charade?
Van Bergen / Stephens
Election 9/11: Surreal Political Theater
Lee Sustar
A New Model for the Labor Movement?
Ron Jacobs
The Lost Art of Hitchhiking
M. Junaid Alam
An Interview with Palestinian-American Rapper, The Iron Sheik
Poets Basement
Albert, Ford, Krieger, St. Clair
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